Halloween 2008

We had our office Halloween Event today--just like last year, we were urged to come in costume, with the Best Costume getting some prizes at the end of the day. However, unlike last year, we had very little time to plan & prepare, since the past few weeks have been kinda busy and hectic--too many tasks, too many changes, etc.--you get the idea.

New this year was the Decor Contest, where each department was given a budget to decorate their work areas with a Halloween-related theme. Joyce, our Dept. Head, suggested a House of Horrors, while I wanted a simple batcave with hundreds of paper bats suspended from the ceiling. Eventually, these two suggestions were merged, and we ended up with the Batcave of Horrors.

We only had a couple of days to decorate our area, so I had to do some advanced work by making some bat cutouts at home on Wednesday night to bring to work the next day. With most of our materials ready by Thursday, we got to work.

Rachel, Jazz, Wenda, Dick, Albert & Edgar took care of enveloping our work area entrance with huge black fabric, covering up our windows with newspapers, as well as cutting out humongous fringe-like hangings that were attached to the ceiling. Joyce & I made more bat cutouts using the ones I already made the previous night as templates, while the others took care of hanging them from the ceiling and sticking them on walls.

As Thursday evening approached, we had our batcave, complete with mini-coffins and tombstones, and our area became a lot darker. It also became somewhat stinkier, as the garbage bags used for the black fringe hangings reeked of recycled plastic. My hands were sore from cutting out bats; we must've done about 200 or more, but it felt like I cut out about a thousand, LOL


On Friday morning, I already anticipated that I'd be late for work, so I managed to dress up in costume so I wouldn't have to change at work anymore. For this year, I dressed up as Ash Ketchum, the lead character of the Pokemon anime. Ash has had about 3 wardrobe changes in the anime, and I chose his newest getup that can be seen in the current Pokemon episodes in Japan and the USA. Of course, the costume would be pointless without an ubercute plush Pikachu and some other necessary props that I borrowed or made with some help--so thanks to Yelane, Cecille, Andy, Marga, and especially to Mang Pons the tailor who all helped me out with the costume.

Like I said, we had little time to plan for this year's event, so our team didn't really have a common theme--most weren't even in costume. But the other teams did manage to come up with some impressive concepts, particularly the Designers, who got their idea from The Joker gang of The Dark Knight movie; everyone's face was mostly painted clown-style, with lots of variations.

Sometime around 9:00am, we went out for breakfast at McDonald's, and it was unusual because of the way we were dressed--with me was Joyce, who was in a kimono & skirt ensemble that J dubbed a "skank geisha" (LOL), but it actually reminded me of a Yuna/Lulu hybrid in Final Fantasy X, complete with cool shoes that looked exactly like a staple of those Square Enix RPGs.

Derrick was also with us, and he was wearing a really great outfit that initally reminded me of Albus Dumbledore--it was a long, flowing priest-like robe costume with some fancy buttons. He told me it was from a character of some game called Trinity, but it also looked like he was one of the Professors at Hogwarts.

Soon we were joined by the Joker gang and some other costumed officemates as well, and we were all seated at some tables we that we linked together. It was kinda funny to see the reactions of some of the McDonald's customers as they saw our costumes.

Lunchtime was also different, as we went to SM Megamall, which was also holding some kind of trick-or-treat event, so there were lots and lots of costumed kids walking around and going from shop to shop. We managed to find some tables outside ChowKing, and while the others ordered some food inside or at KFC, I bought some Baked Linguini & a Vanilla Caramel blended coffee from nearby Gloria Jean's.

It was nearly 2:00pm when we returned to the office, and it's a good thing we only had some light tasks for today. Despite my recent caffeine intake, I felt suddenly sleepy, mainly because our area was too dark and the Halloween sound effects that we've been playing nonstop throughout the day was starting to have a sleep-inducing effect, so I finally shut it off.

Sometime past 3:30pm, we were all gathered in the office central area, and they announced the winners of the Best Costume. The People's Choice was Louie, who was really the best Joker among the rest--he looked as creepy as Heath Ledger in the movie. Derrick & Joyce deservedly won for Best Male & Female Costume respectively, and we're looking forward to another breakfast blowout from those two next week, hehe.

Best Group Theme winner was obvious enough--it was the Joker gang. As for the Best Decor, we had to wait until this Monday for the winner to be announced, as the Night Shift was also included, and they still had work tonight.

The party started after the announcements, but I couldn't stay anymore, as I had to rush out and join my nieces and relatives at the annual Acropolis Trick-or-treat event. After that, we had dinner at my cousin Hywel's place, where we stayed until late evening. Lots of food--pasta, pizza, and perhaps the best new cake I ever tasted this year--English Sticky Toffee Pudding made by Olive Isidro-Cruz, which my sister Ella bought just for tonight. It tasted heavenly, especially the caramel topping.

Despite all the stress of the past few weeks, Halloween 2008 was a blast, and it was a good end to a nerve-wracking month.

Music | The Ting Tings - Shut Up And Let Me Go

While I rarely have any interest in pop music nowadays, I take a peek at MTV sometimes while channel surfing. One of the music videos I've seen recently was this gem titled Shut Up and Let Me Go by the British duo The Ting Tings--yeah, their name sounds so Filipino, which is actually a term for a local broom-like sweeper thingy.

The video is nothing short of superb; it's just mostly band members Katie White and Jules De Martino sitting, standing, or fighting while the camera zooms in on their hand gestures as it transitions to another scene; the effect is somewhat mesmerizing, and is probably one of the coolest videos to come out this year.



The song isn't that bad either--it's got a catchy riff which reminds me of Need You Tonight by INXS or Another One Bites The Dust by Queen. First time I saw the video, it sounded so familiar, and no wonder--it was featured in an iPod commercial just last April, similar to what happened to Feist's 1234. Hmmm...the people who do the iPod commercials really have great taste in music, heh.

Design | Animal Planet Logo

Was surprised to see the new logo of Animal Planet recently. It's so different from their old one that I had to do a double take to make sure that it was really their logo.


Compared to the old Animal Planet logo where an elephant and the earth appears on top , the new logo makes use of bold typography, where the "Animal" portion has been stylized with the letters in different weights. Of particular significance is the letter M, which is lying on its side, creating a unique, distinctive look that resembles a kind of animal.

The same color scheme with greens in different shades has been retained, and the result is a logo that's easily identifiable, which makes for excellent brand recall.

I didn't like the logo at first, since the change was so jarring, but it kinda grows on you, and it remains a good example of using plain typography as a stark, corporate image.

aaaarrghh

Ever have one of those days where everything just seems wrong? It happened to me today at the office, and it's something that I rarely experience. Things have been tense at work for my co-workers lately due to internal problems, with people leaving and others feeling pretty bummed about all of it.

While I thought that I wasn't directly affected by all that's been happening, it turns out that I was wrong; friends of friends were involved, and when your friends are down, you can't help but feel down as well.

This feeling of gloom seemed to hang around me as the week started, and today it was like a storm cloud hanging over my head. I was assigned some work that I wasn't particularly pleased on doing, since I wasn't familiar with it, and wtf, it was supposed to be due TODAY, when typical tasks like that take at least a couple of days to finish.

The task involved a design template with custom colors, which was bad enough to begin with, because custom colors are never easy to duplicate, plus they also had gradients, which can take a long time to do. Why does it take me a long time to do? Gee, I dunno--maybe it's because I hate doing them?

Aside from the custom colors, the template also required an additional image button that wasn't really provided in the original, which meant I had to hunt for a different image to use, then recolor it to match the style of the other buttons, a process that takes more time.

The worse thing about all of this? I couldn't even preview my work--this type of template I was working on was different in the sense that the pages can't be viewed unless you upload them on the server; something involving databases, which I know next to nothing about, and don't even want to know about.

All this bitching & moaning seems really juvenile, but what disturbed me was that I totally felt infuriated by this task, which just gave me a foul mood for the rest of the day--I didn't even want to talk with anyone, and it took a lot of willpower trying to reply nicely when being talked to.

Adding to my crankiness was something that I overheard from another co-worker, that we'd probably have to move again--our office department had already previously moved from our former workplaces to our current area, and I'm not really looking forward to move again, just because some new people "need the space". It's not fair, we were there first, so why do we have to move? Damnit.

Good thing I always have my PSP with me, and I vented out all my anger and frustration into Star Wars: The Force Unleashed during coffee breaks at Starbucks and lunch at Pancake House--Die, Stormtroopers, Die! If only it were that easy...

TV | Fringe

We're roughly one month into the 2008 Fall television season in the USA, where new TV shows either try to make their mark and get a loyal following, or sink into the depths of TV limbo, never to be seen again. Fringe is definitely in the former category, as it seems poised to take over where The X-Files left off. I was already looking forward to watching this when I heard that it was created by J.J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, three people who were also collectively responsible for Lost, Alias, Cloverfield.

The intro of the two-hour pilot alone was a doozy, which properly sets the tone for the entire series. All over the world, strange cases are occurring, as if someone has been conducting experiments and using the entire planet as one big laboratory. These cases, designated as "The Pattern", usually involve aspects of fringe science, that branch of science that deviates from the mainstream, often including concepts like telepathy, dark matter, reanimation, and others.

The cast of Fringe

When FBI Special Agent Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) becomes personally embroiled in one bizarre case, she tracks down the man responsible for pioneering research that appears to have been the origin of these Pattern-related cases--the brilliant scientist Dr. Walter Bishop (John Noble), who's also batshit crazy, having been confined in a mental asylum for the last 17 years.

To help her convince Dr. Bishop to assist her in investigating the Pattern cases, Olivia enlists the aid of Bishop's son Peter (Joshua Jackson), a genius with an I.Q. of 190, but who's also somewhat of a con man, often getting himself into shady deals with people of questionable repute.

Complicating matters for the trio is the huge technology conglomerate named Massive Dynamic, which appears to be connected to the Pattern cases. And that's not all--Massive Dynamic's founder, the mysterious William Bell, also happens to be Dr. Bishop's former lab partner before the good doctor was institutionalized.

After watching 4 episodes of Fringe, I was already hooked. The cast give exceptional performances, notably Noble, who alternates between fatherly figure and loony mad scientist. He played Denethor in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, so he channels Denethor every now and then, which suits his part just fine.

Jackson, who was best known for playing the smartass Pacey Witter in Dawson's Creek, is in fine form here as well, delivering enough snarkiness as Peter Bishop to balance off Walter's eccentricities. Australian actress Anna Torv as Agent Olivia Dunham resembles a younger Cate Blanchett, and it's great to see another strong female lead character, just like the leads in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Just like Lost, which delights and confounds viewers with anagrams of names and places, Fringe is filled with easter eggs--clues that hint about future storylines are hidden in plain sight in each episode, plus strange icons that flash at the end of each episode. And then there's The Observer, a mysterious bald man in black with no eyebrows that appears in every episode, who observes events related to the Pattern.

The strange glyphs seen in every Fringe episode--what can they possibly mean?

And while most TV shows just scroll captions or display zooming text to inform the viewer of location changes, the huge, 3D floating letters that Fringe uses for captions are so unique that they have to be seen to be believed; it's just pure awesomeness, and certainly one of my favorite parts of the show.

With only four episodes aired so far, only time will tell if Fringe manages to sustain its momentum for the entire season and be a worthy successor to The X-Files. It was initially ordered for 13 episodes, but as of October 1, 2008, a full season of 22 episodes was ordered by the Fox Network. Which can only mean that the fun's just beginning...