SAN DIMAS — Munching on some potato salad at Coffee Bazar….damn good stuff….a shame the wifi keeps flaking out like blonde.
We had a bunch of people in my parent’s cute little house on last Saturday for aparty/feast for my brother. My aunts came up to my room to check out the wedding dress….thank you Jen for taking those beautiful pictures. My auntie spied an old picture of my brother and me, in a tiny silver frame. We were in some restaurant booth and I held my Cabbage Patch doll in the middle.
She laughed, “Do you remember how I used to make you cry over that doll?” she asked me. “I kept telling you it was such an ugly doll and you kept bringing it everywhere.”
I suppose I’ve graduated from ugly dolls to alcholic bears. A few weeks ago, Jen speculated the bears picked up something from their travels.
“You don’t know where their butts have been,” she told me. “They sit everywhere.”
“They’re inoculated,” I retored on the phone.
Maybe I should toss the bears into the washing machine some day.
And if you didn’t catch that earlier - I bought a wedding dress. Well, my mom bought it, but you know what I mean. I thought I found some winners back in Dec - and on our April visit to the bridal salon - I discovered those dresses were all wrong for me. They looked pretty - but when I tried it on - they didn’t do anything for my figure. Then I tried on one style that was too damn big for me….the consultants took some clips to pin back the extra material. When I faced the mirror, I realized - this is probably the dress.
At the end - I tried on that style, in a different color - but the right size. When I turned back in front of the mirror, I smiled. I looked like royalty. A princess. The dress. I felt relieved that I didn’t have to settle for something that I only had a lukewarm reaction to. I never had fairy-tale dreams of getting married. I couldn’t imagine myself walking down the aisle….but in this dress…yeah…all those dream could come true. I liked how I looked in it. My mom kept bugging Jen to keep taking pictures. My ninang held what was left of my cold coffee from across the street.
Four more months…and then we tie the knot. I think I’m more nervous about pulling of the wedding than the marriage. It helps that we’ve been dating for almost 5 years…and living together…and seeing the world together. But the wedding thing - shit - I want people to have a good time and I don’t want to disappoint my family.
Thank heavens I have had my fill of dating. It’s a cruel world out there and I know it’s damn exhausting being nice to folks I don’t know. Maybe that’s why I felt exhausted after the Vegas conference - being fake just wipes me out. I still hate it when strangers try to get to know me better. Unless I’m in reporter mode…the male species doesn’t hold much interest for me. The other day, I took my dad’s Camry into the Toyota parts store. He asked me to buy some touch-up paint to cover up the blue markers left by some idiot. So, I couldn’t figure out the exact shade of silver to buy - so I asked one of the dudes working at the counter to give me a second opinion.
“So are you a school teacher?” he asked. I told him no and that this was my dad’s car. I suppose with my eyeglasses and my red tanktop from the Dido concert, I could pass for a school teacher. Or not.
“Where did you get these blue ink marks? Is your dad’s a school teacher?” I told him no, again. Am I giving off school teacher vibes? I told him the marks probably came when the car was parked outside our home.
“But you live in the fine city of Glendora, yes?” Once again, no. He figured out the car color, gave up trying to needle information out of me and headed back inside.
Honestly, pathetic and a bit creepy. It reminded me of when palm readers or tarot card readers tried to personalize my fortune telling session by fishing for personal info. I don’t give them anything….and stuck with yes or no responses. Hell, they’re suppose to be able to read my mind and I shouldn’t have to fill in the blanks for them.
Another tangent….
After the party on Saturday - my honey and I headed down to the Edwards theater in Brea for Kung Fu Hustle.
[from rottentomatoes.com]
First off - we hated Kill Bill. Senseless blood, violence and lacking soul, integrity and honor. The sloppy storyline and forced Samurai-esque acting left a bitter taste in my mouth. I enjoy action films, from Hong Kong Action flicks (A Better Tomorrow, Hard Boiled) to classic Samurai hits (Seven Samurai)…..and Tarention managed to bastardize the action genre with his weak attempt to cover up his violent jerk-off fantasies. I suppose the film could have been salvaged with a sense of humor.
Back to Stephen Chow’s film - in which he pulls a Charlie Chaplin by writing the screenplay, sitting in the director’s chair and starring in his Chinese language film with English subtitles. In the beginning, I was worried he followed in Kill Bill’s footsteps….thankfully I was proven wrong. Kung Fu Hustle pays a homage to several action films including the Matrix. It easily slips into the Kung Fu genre with it’s cast of cartoon-like characters - each with his or her fighting specialty. Chow’s playful use of CG and special fx ups the ante on the fight scenes. The characters’ martial arts expertise are balanced nicely with dry wit and soul. The film entertained me to the very end and I couldn’t help rooting for Chow’s hero - a cowardly thief jonesing to cozy up with the bad-ass Axe gang, but with a heart of gold….almost a requirement for these martial arts films. Yeah, it’s a fantasy world were the codes and ruthleness of the American West collide with the Hollywood version of Al Capone and Prohbition. But it’s a child’s fantasy and the kung fu masters battle for your hearts and sympathy.
I’ve been calling up the contacts I made at the Vegas conference. They say they want to check out my tapes and asked if I could mail them out. Then they ask - “So where are you working now?”
I feel damn foolish when I have to say, “I’m in the middle of my job search now.” Then I explain that I graduated from Medill’s masters program last month. It would be nice to have a job - a career. The best I can do is to continue calling up folks and sending out resumes and tapes. I’ll find something.
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