did the photoshoot for some of the bmod newbies today. too bad it was hot and humid out.. there were even a couple raindrops. but it was fun.. photoshoots are always fun, but all the crap i have to do after; resizing, uploading, emailing, touching up, re-emailing, updating the website.. quite tedious.. but in the end it's still fun.


the four newbies that got their pictures taken today..
and if anyone remembers Alvin from barkada a few years ago..
that's his little sister on the left.

went to red robin again to take advantage of my mom's free birthday burger. i tried their raspberry limeade.. it was alright; just tasted like sprite with raspberry syrup.. and for the same price as their famous strawberry lemonade; i'd rather have the strawberry lemonade.. i did see, though, that they have a new drink: the blueberry pomegranate limeade.. made with pomegranate syrup and real blueberries.. sounds like i might like it.. that's for next time..

last night after practice, me vince kj gigz arvin leah mark jasmine and jean ate at the new guppy [tea] house in hacienda heights right off the 60fwy. as far as food and the quality, its the same as the other guppys' (awesome!!), but this just makes it soooo much better because now we dont have to drive all the way to cerritos to get our guppy's fix!! much excite!

and here's another cat story. so.. around 5am (give or take 15 minutes) EVERY DAY, kobe starts scratching at our bedroom doors, never mine though; because my door is always open so he can freely walk in and out at night. but for my mom and sister, he just continuously scratches at their doors. while the majority of his reasoning is that he's hungry, it just seems interesting to me that he does it at around the same time every day. but sometimes, he's just weird and it seems like he's just checking that whoever is in the room is ok. for example, he'd scratch at my sister's door for 15 to 30 minutes.. when my sister finally cant take it and gets out of bed, she opens the door and just looks at him sitting there, and he looks up as if to say, "hello..". she closes the door and goes back to sleep, and kobe wont bother her anymore for the rest of the morning.

i've found myself going back into country music mode and listening to rascal flatts and ms. underwood a lot recently.. dont hate!

last weekend's rooted movement 2 year anniversary party at highlands in hollywood was all kinds of awesome.. and the aftermath was all kinds of not.

bmod's beach outing on saturday was fun as well; even though kj and i made a death defying walk with a bunch of beach stuff. our grill and ice chest failed.. so bad that our neighboring beach-goers decided to sell us their grill!

my sister's and mom's birthdays were on the 4th and the 6th; while not hugely celebrated, they were still celebrated nonetheless. but i do miss those days when your birthday was THE thing to look forward to.. that, and Christmas..

we've been feeding kobe less because he's starting to gain a lot of weight. and yesterday, when me arvin vince and bert went to fry's on our nerd trip, i bought some batteries for my red laser (not the green one, that would kill my cat), so that kobe has something to chase around. threw the batteries in; and then his fun started.. but it only lasted about 3 minutes before he got bored of the laser.. whomp!

did quite some movie downloading/watching... highly recommended: wanted, hot rod. recommended: hancock. avoid at all costs: poseidon, premonition, the happening. yet to watch: the wackness.

the world is currently all blah right now; but im doing my part to attempt to maintain balance. because the only thing worse than blah is a chaotic blah.

strongest quake to hit the LA area in over a decade..

my experience: just laying there, awake. then i felt the initial jolt. took me less than two seconds to realize it was an earthquake. im on a steel loft bed, so it was dumbing down the violent shaking and smoothing it out for me haha. a few seconds later, my mom comes running into my doorway screaming my name in franticness. then she started saying some prayer. when it transitioned from violent shaking to that slow rumbling that makes you feel like you're on a boat or drunk or something, i reassured her to calm down and that it was almost over. but she said she could still feel shaking, which i found out later it was a longer quake than i realized because my bed had absorbed a lot of the small shakes towards the end.

went on our normal day shortly after while watching the news coverage on the event. the entire time my i noticed my cat wasn't popping his head around while we ate.. hmm.. went looking for him, poor thing, totally forgot about his well-being because of the quake and picking up random things that fell. found him cowering in the corner behind a couch.. got him out and he was on permanent alert mode. ears perked. eyes dilated. constantly looking around. found his way behind our tv and hid there for about an hour.. had to pull him out myself and take him to my room where he found yet another small covering to hide in the shelves.. it wasn't until about 7pm where he was finally able to walk around the house by himself, with extreme caution of course, but at least he was able to wander.. poor guy hah..


kobe scared to come out from
behind the tv after the quake

anyways, with this 5.4 quake; there is a 5% chance that within 24hrs, it is a prelude to a bigger quake.. but after around noon tomorrow, the chance goes down to 1%.. so let's hope that doesn't happen.. earthquakes are fun when there's not damage, so anything stronger than today's will be too much to handle..

and man.. within ten minutes of starting this entry, i heard some news.. felt like i was slapped in the face, kicked in the groin, stabbed in the back, and had my heart torn out.. some people can just throw something good away so easily..

oh man i have not updated in over 10 days! i dont know.. these past couple weeks i just haven't had the inkling to jot down my thoughts.. and even now i feel like i'm forcing myself to..

been feeling a bit distant and absent from everything and nothing at the same time; makes no sense at all but it's the best i could do.. theres always a million reasons not to do something, but when you find that one reason TO do it, it's supposed to make it all worth while. but i feel like im forcingly continuously searching for that one reason.

anyways, this is pretty semi-random; it's one thing to dislike someone, but it's another thing to not have respect for someone. you can be disliked and respected. but when you're BOTH disliked and not respected.. and you're still trying to talk as if you're in a legit position assuming you have that respect when all you've done was to lose respect.. it just makes me laugh.. and others are laughing too..

new set planning for bMod will be put in motion soon, so pretty excited to see what comes of it!

anyways, i've decided to put my entire music library out there for the masses (for streaming only, not downloading.. that's illegal.. haha). but it's only for my regular livejournal readers right now; so you have to log in: username is just your first name, and password is.. password. if it doesn't let you log in, leave a comment, and i'll add you in. this will help me in the future when i'm reviewing a new album that hasn't been released yet so you guys can listen to it as well. so yeah, to listen to my library, CLICK HERE!!

i had a very restless sleep last night; i remember i wasn't fully awake, but awake enough to know i felt sore and sick, and my stomach was killing me, and i vaguely remember tossing and turning a lot. woke up late with a groggy sickhead. blahh.. sick again; during hot weather.. it isn't right i tell you!!

went to jackie's to take care of some stuff, then headed over to rooted movement.. bunches of people came and chilled. i was craving taco bell's new value menu. convinced some others to go once we closed shop. i got there and ordered the cheesy double beef burrito, and the queso crunch wrap.. with an empanada and fruitista. as i pulled out my card and was about to swipe, the girl asked me, "you know our policy right?" oh great.. "no, what is it?" she told me that i would be charged a $1.25 fee.. and IN ADDITION to that, i would have to make a "required" $10 withdrawal from my account... What. The. Fudz. i kept my cool and didn't want to start a whole "THIS IS ILLEGAL!" scene, so i just asked KJ to spot my dinner.

i did my part as a consumer and reported that Taco Bell location.

for those who are unaware, charging a fee to use your card, or requiring a minimum purchase amount to use your card is illegal and against merchants' contracts with the credit card companies. when restaurants have those signs up saying there is a minimum to charge your card, i just want to tear it down and start something with the manager.

some useful information to report your favorite restaurants (be sure to have the restaurant name and address ready):

VISA
call: 1-800-VISA-911 (intl. 1-410-581-9994), or call the number on the back of your card.
mailing addy: Visa USA Inc., PO Box 194607, San Francisco, CA 94119-4607
online: card issuer's website may let you report an online dispute

according to visa merchant rules:

“Visa merchants are not permitted to establish minimum transaction amounts, even on sale items. They also are not permitted to charge you a fee when you want to use your Visa card.”

MasterCard
Make a report online!
or call: 1-800-MASTERCARD (intl. 1-636-722-7111), or call the number on the back of your card.

according to mastercard merchant rules:

“A merchant must not require, or post signs indicating that it requires, a minimum or maximum transaction ammount to accept a valid MasterCard card.”

American Express
Make a report online!
or call: 1-800-528-4800 (intl. 1-336-393-1111)
mailing addy: American Express, PO Box 297812, Ft. Lauderdale, FL 33329-7812

amex is a little different with their policy, because according to their rules:

“American Express’s regulations do not explicitly prohibit minimum charges, but its policy is to discourage any merchant practices that create a “barrier to acceptance.” Amex does prohibit “discrimination” against the Amex card, however, so if a merchant has no minimum or maximum charge or require ID for Visa and MasterCard, the merchant may not discriminate against Amex by imposing a minimum or maximum charge or requiring ID.”

it seems as though a website has emerged addressing this issue and provides a way to report merchants requiring minimums regardless of the card being used: citizens against minimum purchase

i say, if you're going to put that logo on your window, be ready to pay for it! dont make the customers do it for you! so yes. save that info and those links to your favorites, and let's bring these bastards down!!

sources: visa merchant rules and mastercard merchant rules

random: i'm heating up my caramel apple empanada with my laptop.. for those who have ever had my laptop in their lap, they know that it is quite capable! haha

( and here's a random survey )

nerdpost.

i have dropped using pidgin. it has served me well for the past 2 years after i dropped aim because of bloat-ness. and for software, 2 years is like an eternity. for those familiar with the crazy popular mac im client, adium; pidgin was advertised to be the same.. but a windows version, both running off the libpurple engine, except the windows counterpart running off the gtk interface. and for me, pidgin was just never up to par to its advertised big brother adium.

i then stumbled upon digsby purely by accident browsing through the twitter website. this little guy has everything in one package. it has pretty much everything i wanted in adium, but with the simplicity of pidgin. plus email and social networking integration, meaning it gives me updates on any facebook, myspace, and twitter activity without having to open a browser. and what's better, is that it seamlessly works with adium's conversation skins. i know, skins just slow programs down, but if a skin can look great without using many resources, im all for it. my only wish for further development is support for flickr. that would be quite awesome.

some screens:


<-- convo1 . convo2 -->

screenshot
* * *
watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall today. very good movie. i would recommend it. i've only heard good things about it so my expectations were high, and i was still impressed. which can only mean good.

and yesterday, had a bit of a confuzzled moment. when i signed onto twitter via the web, i got a big red box saying "hey, is your phone okay?" saying they tried to send me updates to no avail. i thought not too much of it and re-enabled phone updates. later on in the day, i had decided to sign onto aim on my phone. send the message. but then the aim on my computer didn't say another account signed on.. and my phone never received a confirmation. so i texted chad, and asked him online if he received it. nothing. sent an email to my phone from my outlook. and i didn't get anything. it took all that for me to realize that my phone wasn't receiving or sending texts for that entire day! what was i to do? im heavily dependent on those things.

signed onto the at&t website to check out our plan. and i noticed that the 1500 texts a month that me and my sister should get weren't there anymore. informed my dad. he called at&t and they apologized for making the mistake of accidentally removing our text services. but then gave us a better deal than what we were paying for and gave all four of the phones under our plan unlimited texts for the same price. and my texts started working instantly.. although any and all texts i would have received during the day were lost forever in cell phone land.

bye!

had an awesome time in san francisco this weekend for the fourth of july slash charmane's birthday bash. attendees: me eric chloe cesar andrew shelly rk charmane jamie maureen. with specials guest visits by linden, jamiie?, and leanne. i had no idea i'd be doing that much walking though! click the individual pictures to enlarge, or CLICK HERE for the entire album.


day 1: crossing the bay bridge as we near our hotel in the heart of SF. beautiful fog yes?
eric, chloe, and i left my house around 8:30pm on thursday.. the ride up was actually not bad at all.. haterade-fueled talks on the way up, haha.. we got to our hotel, the grand hyatt, in the middle of the city by 3am. we literally just got into the room, and slept till the morning.



day 2: the guys in front of the golden gate bridge
the next morning, we had all purchased the wonderful open-top double-decker bus tour of the city. it's only $28 to have full hop-on hop-off access to the tourbus at any sightseeing spot for two consecutive days! pretty much the cheapest taxi ever! took a tour of san francisco. hop'd off at the golden gate bridge sightseeing spot and took pics there. got back on, and eric and i suffered the bridge's wrath. it's COLD up top of the bus going over the bridge. i had to cover my eyes the entire time because the wind was sure to blow my contacts right out. we made another stop at those ancient column looking things.. where sean connery met his daughter in The Rock. hit up Ghirardelli Square and had lunch at Lori's Diner. got back on the tourbus for more sightseeing. got back to the hotel and got our drank on as we set out for fisherman's wharf to make our reservation at the Neptune's restaurant on the pier. really good dinner. and it was time for the 4th of july fireworks over the bay. we all got out and 'watched.' i forgot san francisco is fog hell.. and we literally just watched the sky change colors for 10 minutes and heard explosions.. haha. and that marked the end of day 2.



day 3: longest walking day EVER. in front of coit tower after conquering the crazy hike.
get up and eat. get ready for a day out in the city. take the tourbus to the painted sisters; the 6-house sextuplets. we walk uphill to haight street. which is NOT walking distance. we shop for a little bit at haight and have lunch there. the next nearest sightseeing spot/tourbus pickup is at the de Young museum. so we make our way there. which is NOT walking distance. we are quite tired and everyone passes out on the tourbus, not interested in the sights at all, ahhaha.


christopher columbus looking out to sea. patriotic much?
we get dropped off at ghirardelli square and we hit up a bar there. patron shots all over the place. irish carbombs. 151. cactus coolers. yes. we were refueling for our next big walk; which was going to be quite harder than the ones we just did. we trekked up the hills of SF to lombard street, the "crookedest street" in sf. with 8 turns within a block's distance. beautiful view of the street from the bottom. and from lombard street, you can see the coit tower in the very far horizon. being so late in the day, the tourbus was already over. so walking was our only choice. and that is surely NOT walking distance. we trekked even more. downhill for a little bit.. but uphill for most. legs, knees, and shins were dying. we got to coit and rested a bit at the entrance. then got in and took some more pictures with the tower and the christopher columbus statue. from coit, you can see our hotel, which was our next destination. and it seemed about as far as our previous walk.. downhill for a bit then a tiny incline as we near our hotel. we get back to our room. and surprisingly we're not dead! cicero was supposed to be at this trip; but considering his knee injury.. i think he made the right decision to not go.. these walks would damage it to no return..

we give linden a call and he meets us at our hotel. kuya and ading reunited! it was good seeing him. i tend to only see him about once ever 1.5 years.. we all get our drank on and head out to osha thai food. i was expecting a "hole in the wall" like everyone described, but it was VERY good food. i would say better than mixbowl/coconut bay. and while small, it's not a hole in the wall at all.. we then hit up element lounge and club out for a little bit. strongest tokyo teas ever. drank more than i should have. me rk and linden stayed when everyone left, then we jetted and got jack in the box on the way back to the hotel. we eat.. then linden has to leave to pack for his vegas trip the next day.



day 4: return home.. not many interesting pictures from our last day.. except for this pointless pic of a field..
after a quick breakfast, we head out to go shopping around our hotel. H&M, urban outfitters, forever 21 mens, etc. we hit up the food emporium at the westfield mall, turns out to be the best mall food ive ever had. we head back to the hotel, where me eric and chloe must part with everyone and head back since we weren't flying with them. but it turns out we got home before they even boarded their delayed flight. hah!

and thus ends a fun trip up north. i wasn't expecting it to be like this.. i wasn't overly excited since i've been there so many times; but since we took the major tourist approach, it was quite awesome. i had a great time.. and now my wallet is sad.. again, CLICK HERE for the entire album.

so my computer gave me a huge scare today.

i was looking for a screensaver that would display pictures on my flickr account. i found a couple: slickr and flickr screensaver. slickr actually worked quite well.. but the image output wasn't as random as i'd like.. it kept taking pictures from the same set rather than going throughout my entire photostream. the other one, flickr screensaver, simply wasn't up to par.

i then turned to looking for screensavers that could display RSS feeds.. because flickr allows you to subscribe to certain sets or an entire photostream through feeds. both of the one's i found didn't work at all.

but upon uninstalling the rss screensavers, one of them made all my previously installed screensavers disappear. so i decided to restart my computer. but then my system wouldn't even boot up. a required file for a system restart had been corrupted or deleted. and starting in safe mode wouldn't even go through. so i here i am, stuck with a laptop that wont start, at all. i was already thinking of removing the hard drive and putting it in a 2.5hdd enclosure to retreive all my important files.. then reformatting and losing everything that isn't backed up.

WHOMP.
i noticed that every time i attempted to restart, it would say to try to repair the system files with the original windows vista disk. so i searched my room high and low for that thing. found it and threw it in. booted from disc and started the repair process.. and almost a full hour later.. it said it was ready to restart. and that it did. happiness. but my computer was in the state it was a few days ago, haha. all good though.

* * *
quick recap of recent events:

friday, june 27th - jean andrew and i went out to watch Wanted at the harkin theatre in chino hills. very good movie i thought. from the first scene alone, one should not expect the movie to be realistic. and i took it as just that. the direction reminded me a lot of how fight club was done. story is quite good. with a twist.

saturday, june 28th - anthony diana and i took a trip down to san diego to visit rk and help him move. but it turns out we wouldn't have time since anthony had planned to leave that same night. so i just met rk's new dog, met rk's new car (beautiful! 5series bmw), chilled, drank, hookah'd, and swam in the awesome resort-style pool and jacuzzis. dentists. haha.

monday, june 30th - mark and i are excited for the ading's return visit to pomona. we plan a lunch. but we end up just meeting at jackie and mels and getting scared of ghosts. hit up the bmod practice/workshop, then arvin joins as we get food and slurpees. and chill a bit more with a Lost and HIMYM and Teen Girl Squad marathon.

* * *
this is a random picture of us at the ne-yo concert a few months ago, jamie is having a moment with ne-yo, and i'm reppin an RM tee. w00t. i'm laughing because i had just attempted to block a bunch of crazed ne-yo fans from crushing our girls up front. hah.


ne-yo concert


so anyways... who wants to lend me a ps3 and mgs4? yay thanks!

i rarely ever remember my dreams.. i only remember dreams probably once every three months.. it's gotten to the point that i dont even think i have dreams.. but i remember bits and details from last night's!

dream sequence start. bMod was on a summer retreat in san diego, but we had a competition on the saturday of that retreat. but i was in total retreat mode. having fun and drinking. our house was awesome. the only things i remember was that everything was hi-tech and electronic; all automated.. the pool started on the second floor and the whole thing waterfalled to the first floor pool. so everyone was having fun with that, running up to the second floor pool and sliding down the huge embankment to the bottom level. and then we had to get ready to tech for our competition. our tech time was about 6 hours before the competition started. and during tech, i noticed some of our members were already wearing their costume. and i remembered that i left mine at home in pomona. whomp. so i was freaking out and was thinking of taking someone's car without asking and doing a 2 hour drive home, grabbing my costume, and coming back. and somewhere along getting ready to leave and using the cool bathroom with the futuristic sink, soap dispenser, and hand-dryer, i realized i was dreaming and woke up.. dream sequence end.

anyways, yesterday, me bert vince and carissa ate at guppy tea house, where i got to meet mishka, vince and carissa's new dog. tiny black puppy chow mix thing. he tends to get tired and sleep on random things.. like my menu:


mishka, asleep on my menu

two workshops right after each other are quite tiring..

and i do NOT approve of powerade zero (the zero-calorie powerade). it tastes like nutrasweet (sweet&low, splenda, equal).. and it made my mouth all dry and cottony while i danced.. regular powerade (strawberry lemonade flavor pwns!) and gatorade frost glacier freeze all the way!!

and i could eat in & out everyday.. and i would if it wasn't going to kill me..

yesterday, my dad visited and had dinner with us. it was the first time i've seen him since the beginning of april. my mom conjured up a very nice selection of food: coconut shrimp, ribeye steak, some other dish that i didn't eat because it was green, and finished it off with tino oporto wine from mexico (woot ensenada crew!). dinner was great. no hostility, no parents screaming at each other and crying.. all good. while i'm not expecting my parents to be on the best of terms, or even on good terms, anytime soon, it's nice to have a good, non-distracting, dinner with everyone once in a while. and as long as my dad makes more of an attempt to come around more often, things should be relatively ok.. so for those who want to come up to me and say "your dad's an ass. f*ck him," i hear broken glass tastes great! you should try it!

what an eventful week.

for some odd reason, i always look at auditions weeks as a week where i get to chill and relax since i'm not dancing as much.. but i always forget how much stress and hectic-ness i put myself through every single time auditions come around. but it's always nice seeing interested people wanting to join the family and the skill levels that come with it. we've taken in four new members as well as two new scholarship/trainee members. interested to see how things turn out on the stage with them; because they fit just fine with the team already evident from our first meeting/mixer/social. pictures here.

yesterday, bert carissa vince and i accompanied wes, bert's kuya aka dj konnex, to roscoe's chicken and waffles. i haven't had it in forever and it was nice to have a 1/4 chix (all dark meat) with 2 waffles and a side of fries. when we all parted ways, we met back up at the shop and the five of us (add arvin) took a very random trip to the San Manuel casino. arvin carissa and i dont gamble much so we were having a nice time sitting at an empty poker table talking about... stuff.. and bumming the free sodas. headed home shortly after bert and vince came up in hold'em. got home at the crack of dawn.

a few hours later, today, i woke up and vince and i met up at bert's to take a very random trip down to san diego for some guamanian/chamorro food. got to the islander grill and had my first guam experience with cihcken kelanguin and red rice. considering how anti i am with anything other than american and italian food, i thoroughly enjoyed the dish. and the lady who took our order looks like she could be jun quemado's sister.

headed out to 5 & a dime afterwards, met some of the staff and even mr. 5 & a dime himself, jay dread. seems like a fun slash chill crowd. a lot of them were saying how hot it was.. when it was just a mere 85 degrees at the most there.. haha. i loved it. but alas, it was a short trip since bert had to get back by 6pm, so we had to head out. played gigz' password game on the way back and had to make it work with just three people. kept us awake for a good hour. random and pointless pictures of the car ride here.

i was welcome'd home by a smack in the face of hot weather and humidity. i was tired considering i barely had any sleep last night; so i decided to take a nap.. but since my bed is a loft bed, heat likes to rise up to where i sleep; so i ended up passing out and taking a nap on my hot but not as hot floor. jhetto status. new team's first practice tomorrow woot.

hm, so i've noticed; when people have that "everyone, even my friends, are just out to get me" attitude.. it's usually not everyone out there with the problems.. it's just that person. some people are just a-holes.. and they dont know that because no one tells them.. and it's not because people are scared, it's because people dont care enough about that person to say anything.

on the way to vegas, i have no idea why, but "can't hardly wait" was brought up.. so when i returned home after the awesome weekend, i decided to look through my dvd collection and pull it out.. watched it. and man, i still love this movie. and the soundtrack is awesome even though i cant find that cd anymore.. will have to download.

i'm sick. and the weather is hot.. does anyone else find it strange to have a cold during hot weather? it's so uncomfortable..

and i need a haircut.

everyone's writing emotastic letters to unknown recipients regarding the nba finals results.. so here's mine!

so the lakers lost.. not surprised.. i only watched two games out of the finals but from those two; what was up with their defense? pretty much left the celtics out there in the open. while at the same time, they could barely even penetrate boston's.. i'm not a basketball fan but i'm surrounded by enough hardcore laker fans to know what they've gone through this season, and while things just kept getting better for them; gasol, kobe mvp, finals.. given more time, they could have developed into something a lot better and things could have turned out great; but come finals, i just dont think they were ready for it. it was simply boston's year.. and they brought it. hard.

-from a non-basketball fan since forever

vegas trips never cease to be awesome. new crowd for me too, majority 21+ bmod: me jean froi kj gigz hannah chris jackie mel chele kc and rommel who met us up there.

highlights:

• firefly
• fat tuesdays
• club
• rio buffet
• palace pool
• more fat tuesdays
• psycho moment
• club
• the cal. cheap games. gigz gambles and drinks!
• main street buffet
• laker game
• bellagio water show
• 'password' game on the ride back leaving vegas at 1am!

good trip.

but seriously.. boo to hot weather!

n.e.r.d. - seeing sounds
you knew it was coming. my review for n.e.r.d.'s "seeing sounds"!

( read my "Seeing Sounds" review )

all-in-all, i'd choose this album by light years above Fly or Die. but i highly doubt it will ever surpass the classic that is In Search Of.... that album is a gem.

pharrell up close. click for more pics.

jamie and i attended N.E.R.D.'s mini-concert today at the Jimmy Kimmel Live show. and ehh.. they were just........ AWESOME and everything i could ever ask for at a concert.

anyways, we headed to the virgin megastore first to buy a couple copies of Seeing Sounds to get wristbands to meet N.E.R.D. after the concert. and then we headed for the super long wait outside Jimmy Kimmel's Pontiac Garage stage. about an hour into the wait, we could see the band start setting up and teching, and not too long after, the guys of N.E.R.D., pharrell, chad, and shae, show up and start teching. i heard them do parts of Spaz and Antimatter which are currently my top two tracks, so i already knew i was in for a good show.

after finally letting us in, everyone finds their spot on the standing room only area. jamie and i find our spot only about 10 feet away from the end of the stage. woot. since it was a live taping, we had to stand there and watch the entire jimmy kimmel show while he interviewed sean william scott and emmanuelle chriqui (girl from 'on the line' w/ lance bass). but once N.E.R.D. came out on stage it was pure craziness. they opened up with Everyone Nose, which is probably the only one that will air on tv. that got the crowd hyped up and the guy next to us started moshing.. which got annoying after like 1 second. security came and told that group to stop. So it was perfect after then. after their opening song, they continue with Spaz, then Antimatter.. which both hit sooo much harder live. i'm glad i heard the album first or else i'd be spoiled by the live performances.. then they throwback to their first album with Brain, and then to their second album with She Wants to Move. the entire time their energy was CRAZY. pharrell and shae were all over the stage, and i was surprised to see shae getting a lot more mic time than the previous two albums. chad of course is more on the production side and just sung background vocals and played synths. free concert of five songs.. and by those none other than N.E.R.D., it was more than worth it.

after the concert ended, jamie and i were heading back to virgin megastore.. and on the way all the groupies were screaming and running across the street.. adding them to the line that had already formed IN the store for the cd signing.. yeah, we were not about to wait in that line. so we headed home, stopping by tgiFriday's on the way. awesome times.

things i'm looking forward to in the near future: bMod banquet and vegas the day after then auditions the day after then the new team mixer the day after auditions.. beezee much??

what a week for music. at least for me.. harry gregson-williams' score for Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots leaked. and of course, just with all the other metal gear solid series after the first one, it is a collab effort with some other composers (but on different tracks/cues). AND N.E.R.D.'s new album Seeing Sounds just leaked today! just give me some time to dwell into the sounds and let the melodies set into my head.. and i'll be sure to post my thoughts up later.

[edit1]: holy crap, nerd's "anti-matter" is siccccccccckkkk

may was a hell of a lot better than april ever was or wanted to be. no broken phone.. no car accident.. no ipod breaking in the car accident.. no hookah breaking..

started off with our ensenada cruise. shortly followed by a nice mother's day. then our ne-yo concert. pacn. maureen's bbq/pool party. rk's sisters' graduation party. and ending it with ultimate brawl and a chill week off. rockband and hookah nights like no other. felt like i've gotten closer to some people while at the same time pushing those away who obviously dont value friendship.

but of course, the supreme being out there wouldn't want me to be completely happy, so it has to leave me with some lingering bad thoughts to forever stay in my mind.. like my dad.. can we say: not making a single attempt at all to see me after the car accident? it may not have been the most serious accident.. but i dunno, i still feel like its a pretty significant event.. and while i've pretty much trained myself to hide all emotion.. that kinda hurts.. like a lot.. bleh..

also, if you're ever bored in the mission viejo area, dont hesitate to stop by 26605 Baronet, Mission Viejo, CA 92692 and toss a brick through a window. but be forewarned that a woman might approach you and ruin your family.

but yes. may was still a better month.. maybe even a good one..

after our last day of hell week on thursday, some of us really took advantage of our mini-break before saturdays practice and sundays performance. rockband and hookah at kj's that night till the wee hours. and we all woke up too late to get a movie viewing of indiana jones planned, so we ended up just getting a bunch of people together at kj's again for more rockband, drinks, and hookah. partied it up. jean came with apples to apples and a drunken card game ensued. i went upstairs to check something online real quick, and when i came back downstairs in a matter of five minutes, i was surprised to see froi had come by and had already passed out. another morning at kj's, but i went home at around 9am. i was missing my own bed..

ultimate brawl came and went. experience was awesome. i am amazed at how hospitable and generous 909 was considering how cheap and affordable the competition fee was per team. a big thanks to them and a big congrats to GRV for taking home 1st place! totally deserved. sad that ub was bmod's last performance of the year, and i wont be seeing some of my favorite people as much after it. but we ended the year the strongest and closest bmod has ever ended.

gigz and i went to rooted yesterday to chill with vince and bert, as we, of course, hookah'd.. also did some nerd status stuff as i brought my hard drive to give vince some games for his ds. mel and marco visit for a bit then we all head out to sevillas without vince, who had a court hearing the next morning. met up with adam, static, and wobz. liked the music selection a lot. but we were only there when dj e-rok was spinning, so i cant say how the rest of the night was. it started to get pretty rowdy at the end of his shift (hyphy much?), so we decided to leave. i just have to throw in there, that it smelled like the ne-yo concert at the club. dont know what that means? use your imagination. but a good and fun night that didn't require me much alcohol.

we need to plan something this week because i know im going to already start feeling team withdrawals soon..