A major development on the job hunt front: I've just started work on the resume, albeit with some forceful cajoling from Hanief. Suck it. Anyway, a while ago he sent me two books on how to make a resume and how to do a job interview. Both books came with software aids. However, the resume book came out in 1996, so I was wondering whether the floppy disk would be compatible with XP. After figuring out how to work it, I began filling in my details - and wondering how to pad out my details so it'll seem like I've actually done quite a lot in my life. Now all I've got to do is figure out how to transfer the format to Word, and then on to the long, arduous process of finding a job that doesn't sound like mind-numbing torture and/or something I'm capable at...which I'm finding is rather short on supply.
In TV land: today's episode of
Oprah (guilty pleasure, hur hur. Plus I don't check in religiously, so cut me some slack) was about a book called
He's Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Guide To Understanding Men. It's supposed to be a self-help guide for women who're confused about mixed signals they receive from guys. On the show, a bunch of women with man problems posed questions to the author, and no matter the situation, it all boiled down to the fact that their guys just weren't that interested in them, otherwise they'd be trying harder to impress and commit, e.g. "He's just not that into you if he's not asking you out, because if he likes you, trust me, he will ask you out." In my case, perhaps you could add, "Maybe he does like you, but he doesn't see the point of trying if you don't meet him halfway." I wonder if the answers in the book also apply to women - if they were interested in you, they wouldn't disappear into thin air if you seemed to be into them. Ah, that explains it...
The mainlight of my Wednesday TV viewing is The Amazing Race. If you're reading this, are in South East Asia and have
AXN, please watch if you haven't done so already. Very entertaining, the best reality show out there if an Emmy award is any indication. They'll be showing the earlier episodes of the season on Sunday the 16th and 23rd, so check it out. I won't give any details of this week's episode, but I will highlight another aspect that makes this series special due to the fact that it airs almost simultaneously as in the States: I can put more emotional investment in it because I don't know what's going to happen - plus there's an added benefit to the show not being as popular as, say,
Survivor,
The Apprentice or
American Idol, because the results aren't plastered everywhere when I'm online, so I can avoid spoilers. Ergo, I get that sense of heartache whenever contestants I'm rooting for get eliminated. Which is what happened this week. Sad.
Back in the real world, me and Halief went to the Sahid Hotel to pick up Dad from this gathering of folk from his old high school almamater. We had to wait for a speech to be over, so we went around mucking about. The place was pretty deserted at that hour, the lifts were barely touched - in fact, we got on one and didn't press anything, just to see what would happen. And maybe get a sense of what getting trapped feels like. Not too bad, but then again we always had the option of pressing the button and instantly regaining our liberty.
First thing I saw on TV this morning was one of those local crime news shows. Of main interest was the ongoing case of the Hilton New Year shooting. If you haven't heard by now, a waiter working in the Fluid Club was shot and killed during the early hours of Saturday while the club was still in the midst of its New Year's celebrations. The alleged shooter - though witnesses and evidence are making it increasingly positive - is Adiguna Sutowo. Who? Yeah, I had no idea before this incident either. Turns out he's the son of the decased former director of Pertamina, Ibnu Sutowo, and younger brother of Pontjo, who more or less owns the Hilton (and no, that doesn't mean they're related to Paris and Nicky).
As the story goes, Adiguna was at the club with a lady friend, who gave her credit card to the waiter to pay for his tab (why he wasn't paying his own friggin' tab, I have no idea). The waiter came back to tell the woman that her card had been rejected and asked if she had any other cards for payment. Now, normal people would wonder what the problem was and go sort it out, maybe get a little bit incensed, maybe take it up with the manager. But in the world of the rich, pompous and loaded (in more ways than one), the skank started screaming words to the effect of, "How dare you! Don't you know that his here is the majority shareholder?!" and Monsieur Sutowo took out a revolver and shot the poor guy in the head. In the middle of a busy crowd. It was probably the booze doing the thinking, but it still boggles the mind to imagine that one would be so conceited enough to think they could get away with shooting someone in public. He didn't even have the good sense to have a bodyguard or other lackey do the dirty work.
The waiter, a 28 year old named Rudy, was in his final year of law school at Bung Karno University. He was only filling in at Fluid because his regular workplace was under renovation. And then his girlfriend, whom he was going to marry in a few months' time, only found out about the incident after she arrived at the club a few hours later to wish him a happy New Year. Tragic.
Anyway, the case is undergoing investigation. Police have yet to find the gun, but they did find bullets hidden in the toilet of the hotel room where Adiguna was staying. Sixteen witnesses have been questioned, fifteen of which confirm that Adiguna was the shooter, and the exception is his wife (no surprise there). The president himself has had his say on matters, mentioning that justice must be upheld. Here's hoping justice does prevail, Adiguna gets sent away for a very long time, and doesn't get any perks or special treatment in prison, save for being the inmates' favourite bitch.
Another item in the crime news was more down-to-earth: a would-be purse snatcher getting the bejeezus beaten (and kicked. And whipped) out of him by a mob. Though these beatings apre pretty commonplace (at least based on what you read and see in the news), I don't think I've ever seen one in person. The after-effects, at most, even on TV. So this was the first time I saw it happening, albeit halfway through: by the time the cameras caught up with the action, the tattooed, bloody perpetrator was already down to his skivvies and was trying to keep them on while trying to escape into traffic from the mob's fists, feet and swinging belts. You should've seen the guy with the belt go at it like he was riding Seabiscuit. People were getting their shots in even after the police arrived to take the thief away. Anarchic vigilantism is rarely pretty...in fact, it never is. But if it makes would-be thugs think twice before taking up a life of crime...well, I'm not condoning it, but I do hope someday things will reach a point where people don't have to take things into their own hands...and feet.
Still on a negative vibe (hey, I'm on a roll), you know those Friendster bulletin board chain posts, where someone starts a topic and people paste their replies under the original post? There's one floating around my network in which the original author laments the fact that the New Year's party at the Indonesian Embassy in Berlin was cancelled in light of the recent disasters. Needless to say, this drew the ire of several people. Out of curiosity, I thought I'd track down the insensitive cow - not an easy task, given I had to sift through several degrees of friend networks, and even then I couldn't find the culprit. Then I tried doing a gallery search, and after several rounds of fine-tuning, I think I finally found the guilty party: a 19 year old Indonesian girl currently residing in Berlin. I don't know why I spent all that time and energy to track her down; I was thinking of pasting her Friendster and e-mail addresses in the bulletin board so that others could send heaps of abuse messages to her inbox, but I think I had an attack of conscience. She's just a kid, after all. A dumb and shallow one, granted, but a kid, nonetheless. A lesson still needs to be taught, but I don't think I'm the one to do it. Let's just hope someone close to her reads the board and sorts her out properly.
On to more positive stuff: today was the first extended drive I took after sending the car to the garage to sort out a problem with the steering wheel which kept veering to the left. It turns out that the front tyres were uneven (as a result of the tyre change when I had a flat several months ago), causing the steering to go off-balance. I asked for the tyres to be rotated, and then it was discovered that the rear tyres had been misplaced. Apparently, those arrow-like engravings on the side of tyres aren't just for decoration. D'oh. Anyway, I think those rear tyres have been in place and unchanged for about two years, so it seems I've been driving them wrong during that period. Double d'oh. After the tyres were switched around, I don't know if it was psychological or something else, but the car handled much more smoothly. I can once again take my hands off the wheel without having to worry that I'll plough into various objects on my left. This comes in handy when doing other stuff, like, say, peeling price tags off newly-purchased CDs.
Speaking of which, I just bought two - Jimmy Eat World's
Futures and Live's
Awake: The Best Of. Both are: 1) the deluxe versions, of which I'm always a sucker for, and 2) the last copies on the shelves, which is why I felt the urge to buy both at once and avoid the classic scenario of them not being available the next time I go to the shop.
In the case of the former, I'd been meaning to get the album for a while now, especially as I'd earmarked it for review in the next issue of
djakarta!. I'd held off buying because I was hoping to get the deluxe. I wasn't going to buy the tape because I was expecting a freebie to arrive at the office, but it hadn't the last time I went. As deadline approached, I supposed I was going to have to listen to it on Halief's iMac, but I held off on that too, because I prefer the whole package when enjoying my music - which includes the actual packaging itself, as in lyrics, liner notes and other info tidbits they can cram on your average CD sleeve. Anyway, the deluxe edition has a bonus CD containing demo versions of all the songs on the album, plus the band's liner notes on how the demos eventually evolved into the final versions. I think I'll put off listening to the demo disc until I'm familiar with the album, so I can appreciate the creative process better. A little snag, though: the local version of the album comes with a bonus track, and I'm wondering if it's worth the purchase of the tape. Hopefully the freebie will arrive soon, so I won't have to make that decision.
And in the case of the latter, I'm a lapsed Live fan. Like most people who was ever a fan, I got into them on their second album,
Throwing Copper, which was one of the soundtracks for my last year at junior high. I even sang 'Selling The Drama' and 'I Alone' at this end of school year thing - my first gig ever. Not that there have been many, but I digress. Anyway, even though it was the first time I'd ever performed, I thought it was a good idea to be all rock star-like and whack the mic stand on the stage floor - much to the chagrin of the equipment rental people. Hey, I was in the zone, man.
Anyway, I liked the follow-up to
Throwing Copper,
Secret Samadhi, even though it apparently killed off their popularity. I myself dropped off on the next album,
The Distance To Here. Just couldn't find any songs I deemed likeable at all. Got the next one,
V, out of habit, but didn't pay much attention to it, either. Got their sixth,
Birds Of Pray, for free, but I still haven't heard it. Heck, my initial copy of
Awake was also a freebie tape - but it was enough to get the nostalgia kicking in. And so I got the CD, which strangely enough has a different tracklisting than the tape, and most probably with the local CD too. The bonus disc is a DVD of all their videos, which also includes songs not on the CD, plus an interview with lead singer Ed Kowalczyk, where he talks about the band's evolution, their albums and their videos. In between, there's lots of "serious artist/hippie" talk, and the revelation that they recorded
Secret Samadhi in Jamaica and got "very friendly" with the gardener, which is why it came out so weird that even Ed doesn't understand a lot of the stuff he wrote on it. Ah, pot: kills your brain cells
and your record sales. Just say no, kids.
Two football matches on TV at about the same time, featuring two teams who'd just come off respective losses. First there was Indonesia, away to Malaysia on the second leg of the Tiger Cup semi-final. They'd lost the first leg 2-1 in front of about 80,000 fans at Senayan, so they had to turn things around and repay the favour. After making things worse with some really ugly play and falling behind 1-0, Indonesia came back with four goals in the second half to set up a date with Singapore in the two-legged final. The first game will be on the 8th at Senayan...might be a hoot to catch. Hope things won't get too unruly, especially if Singapore do the business.
The second match was Liverpool away to Norwich. Fourth game in two weeks for all teams in the Premiership, so you can imagine they were running on fumes. After the 1-0 loss to Chelsea two days ago, Liverpool had to work extra hard, especially considering their away form which has been woeful for most of the season, but has been picking up in recent weeks. Fortunately they got the much-needed win, and the next game will be on the 15th against Manchester United. Televised, of course. Looks like another date at Sportsman with the foosball table.
Elsewhere, I've just seen the trailer for
Sin City, and all I can say is OH. MY. GOD. Words can't express how cool it looks. It's co-directed by Robert Rodriguez (
Desperado,
Spy Kids) and
Sin City creator Frank Miller, who you might've caught from his cameo as the corpse with the pencil in his forehead in
Daredevil (he also did a couple of definitive runs on the book, plus
Batman: The Dark Knight Returns and
Batman: Year One). Apparently Rodriguez was a huge fan of
Sin City and wanted to do a straight translation as is. This meant giving up membership in the Director's Guild so he could get Miller to co-direct, and making the movie look exactly like the comic: black and white, with occasional hints of primary colour. Plus he got a shitload of big-name actors: Bruce Willis, Jessica Alba, Benicio Del Toro, Josh Hartnett, Mickey Rourke, Elijah Wood, Clive Owen, Brittany Murphy, Michael Clarke Duncan...the list, as they say, goes on. And he also got Quentin Bloody Tarantino to direct a scene. For a dollar. He probably could have got QT for free, but paying him a buck makes it cooler. Anyway, this is by far the coolest trailer I've seen in a long time, and it's made me drool even more than
Batman Begins. If you're need of drooling...well, check
this out.
The first day of the new year was marked with a big match between Liverpool and Chelsea. Watching football is mroe fun with company, so I went down to Sportsmans Bar in Blok M along with Yoga and Anita, Deeka, Rija and assorted guys on the Big Reds mailing list. Unfortunately, a good first half for the Reds didn't last, and eventually Liverpool started 2005 with a 1-0 loss (damn you, Joe Cole! Again!). At least the bar had a foosball table, so we could make like Joey and Chandler in
Friends.
Speaking of which, Star World's been playing all the old episodes every weekday. I'm something of a lapsed
Friends aficionado, who's been out of the loop during the last few seasons, and there was a time when I thought that the old episodes, the ones that originally got me hooked - upon re-viewing - were not as funny as I remembered. But after watching them again recently...I'm laughing, and it's not entirely out of nostalgia, you know?
Anyway, I think this was the second time I recall having an opportunity to play foosball. The first time was about two years ago on an out-of-town trip to a villa that happened to have one. That one was free, unlike the table at Sportsmans - luckily it's just Rp 2,000 per coin, which gets you 11 balls. On both foosball playing occasions, I was pretty good, winning most of the time. The downside, though, is that I seem to have tendonitis in my left wrist. At least, that's what I think it is. So I guess that puts a damper on any plans to get a foosball table for home usage and furthering my Joey/Chandler emulation.
Then today, the second day of 2005, Halief and I saw
Bad Santa, which eventually made its way to our local cineplex. As with our experience watching
Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story at the same place, you could count the number of people in attendance on your fingers. For some reason, this number included a married couple who brought along their kids. And these kids were just about past the toddler stage. Normally I wouldn't take much notice, were it not for the fact that these parents seemingly thought that a near-empty theatre gave them license to allow their kids to run up and down the aisles. And I also have to wonder, what the hell were those people doing, bringing their kids to that movie? Either they were boneheaded enough to think it would be a wholesome Christmas film, or they figured that all the swearing, boozing and sex would go over the heads of their non-English speaking children. It's people like this that make me wonder why they bother putting ratings on films.
Later on, it was time to catch
The Tonight Show With Jay Leno. Cue this post's Cosmic Pop Culture Coincidence: one of the guests was Lauren Graham of
Gilmore Girls fame - who was also in
Bad Santa. There was another Lauren in the movie: Lauren Tom, whom you might recognise from her guest stint on
Friends as Julie, Ross' first girlfriend who causes Rachel heartbreak when she realises she has feelings for the greasy-haired mug. I wouldn't have noticed if it weren't for all those old episodes I've been seeing lately. The pop culture planets align once again...
