I like books.

(*Shocking I know right?*)

Whenever there's a mall-wide sale, I do check it out but if I'm not on the market for anything prioritizingly important, I make a mad dash for the bookstores and see what they have on sale.

The thing is that I'm finally building my library with my chosen book collections and, save for one (regretably) , every book I've ever bought this year were all at 20% off! Sweet! Thank you National Bookstore, Powerbooks and Fully Booked (SM Mall of Asia) and Powerbooks (Robinson's Ermita)

This is because I've recently developed the tendency to stockpile on books I know I've yet to read in the edition that I need them to build a consistent collection. Come on, it's not everyday that the books I need are at 20% off and some of the editions aren't exactly that commonplace. So I buy them if I find them (in bulk!) even if I don't have the time to read them yet. So, my to-read pile just keeps on growing.


To read:
Temple of the Winds (Terry Goodkind, Sword of Truth 4 - Gollancz Ed.)
Soul of the Fire (Terry Goodkind, Sword of Truth 5 - Gollancz Ed.)
Faith of the Fallen (Terry Goodkind, Sword of Truth 6 - Gollancz Ed.)
The Devil and Miss Prym (Paulo Coelho - Harper Ed.*)
The Pilgrimage (Paulo Coelho - Harper Ed.*)
Eleven Minutes (Paulo Coelho - Harper Ed.*)
The Witch of Portabello (Paulo Coelho - Harper Ed.*)
A Feast for Crows (George RR Martin, A Song of Ice and Fire 4 - Bantam Spectra Ed.)
*The small paperback editions.

Currently reading:
Blood of the Fold (Terry Goodkind, Sword of Truth 3 - Gollancz Ed.)
Veronika Decides to Die (Paulo Coelho - Harper Ed.*)

Yes, I know many have been dying for me to post this.
I think it's time I share this with everyone.
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Yes, folks. I've had my first time.

Yup. I got myself my own computer for the first time (and a notebook at that).
Meet my baby: the DEEP BLUE H1 UMPC


Last Sunday, I tried out WiFi for the first time. But this is the first entry I've posted using WiFi on the H1. Thank you Araneta Center.


It still feels weird.
I own that? Seriously?

Special thanks to Ron who first showed me that the unit existed.
And to Alec without whom I wouldn't have gotten a great deal.

Got more stories to tell - how I got it, the day it had no OS, things like that.

Aug. 6, 2007
12:20pm

This morning, I was watching what I presume is an old episode of the Ellen Degeneres Show on Star World. Her guest was Katherine Heigl (Grey's Anatomy, Roswell) who was talking about how she used to have a crush on Grey's co-star Patrick Dempsey and now she's working with him. I guess everyone has such stories.

My recent one happened a week ago.

It all started in 2000 when I got hooked on "The Avengers" (the comic books, not the '60's British TV show turned '90's American movie).Anyway, I was turned into a major fan and started collecting anything related to the comics. At some point, my brother brought home a copy of MTV Ink magazine. Lo and behold! There was an article there about "The Avengers" and their DC counterpart, the JLA, and what-was-at-the-time the upcoming Avengers/JLA crossover.  God bless Kurt Busiek and George Perez! The article and its accompanying artwork was done by someone by the name of Oliver Pulumbarit. I cut out that article and up until now, it's inserted in my Avengers folder at home.

Every now and then, I flip open that folder and marvel (pardon the pun) at Oliver's artwork. I actually spend time naming the Avengers he had drawn in there. I still do it until now.

Last March, I decided to form a Friendster group about... what else? The Avengers. I invited everyone on Friendster who listed "The Avengers" among their favorite books and called the group "Avengers Mansion Philippines".

*Can you honestly say you don't see where I'm going with this?*

I discovered Oliver on Friendster because of the invites. Thankfully, he accepted and joined the group. I sent him a message about how I kept the clipping and he responded with a link to his blog where an updated, higher resolution version of the same image was posted. I was in fanboy heaven! Having taken out the JLA using Photoshop, Oliver's Avengers now sits as a wallpaper on my desktop PC and my Palm E2!

*On a similar note, I've had a letter I sent to Marvel printed on Kurt Busiek's farewell issue and I've had one of my X-men comics signed by current New Avengers artist Leinil Yu!*

Having visited his blog, I found out that Oliver was actually at New Worlds: Transformed - the event me and my friends at the New Worlds Alliance organized. I responded to his blog and told him had I known, I could've met him. Small world! He was there to support his friend Benedict who I knew from Alec - both are part of Cybertron Phils.  Ben was cosplaying as Bumblebee (for the nth time). Oliver responded by saying he's sure we'll meet one of these days. That was three weeks ago.

Talk about surreal. Two weeks later, I was at a Fandom Inc. meeting at Fandom Cafe - the dream me and my friends at the NWA built. Ben dropped by to pick up a few prizes for winning 3rd place in the Cosplay competition and he brings along who else? Oliver! The heart of the geek boy in me started racing double-time! I mean, here I was shaking hands and talking to the person whose article and artwork I cut up years ago! I felt exactly the same way in that minute or so when I was having Leinil sign my book. I didn't know where to begin shooting my mouth off with geeky references to this and that!

Nevertheless I tried to play it cool.

*Sighs*

It's a small world after all!