Friday, July 02, 2004

Employment Updates

Before I start, here's a plug for those looking into RPG Design.

Anyway, I'm still unemployed, and I heard from my "spies" that Client Logic will probably call me mid-July so my work got postponed. Which gives me lots of free time this month.

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Thursday, July 01, 2004

Spiderman

No, I haven't watched the movie, and I don't play to do so anytime soon, because I don't have money (figuratively speaking).

Anyway, here's a fun fact. In Japan, there was a live-action series of Spiderman during 1978. It featured Spiderman fighting against evil foes, who would then turn into giant versions of themselves once defeated. Of course Spiderman pioneered the sentai formula of power rangers boarding their super robots to combat the same foe again. In this case, Spiderman had a giant robot, Leopardon (and there was even an old toy released).

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Wednesday, June 30, 2004

Couldn't Resist

Murphy's Laws of War.

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Toycon Pics

Well, here's a link to some toycon pics. I think the photographer is the guy in the B'T X costume (white armor, green knuckles).

Here's some notable pics: Uruk-Hai, Elektra, Witch-King, Orc, Tepei Takamiya, girl in a Ragnarok costume, Chii, orc, Witch King vs Sauron.

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Free Comic Book Day

I just want to remind people that July 3, 2004, will be Free Comic Book Day. For those living here in the Philippines, I know Comic Quest and CCHQ will be participating.

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Tuesday, June 29, 2004

Goodbye!

Generally, there are two things that don't last more than a year with me. One of them is shoes, because I do tend to get around a lot, and they eventually get worn out.

The other object is my bag, for various reasons, whether it's a broken zipper, or it collapses under the strain of the weight it's carrying (but strangely enough, I don't collapse under the weight I'm carrying). Last Sunday, my old bag was officially out of commission.

Anyway, it'll be interesting to see if people will still recognize me at first glance since I'm now without my trademark backpack. I'll probably get a haircut as well and I'll be a complete stranger to them. =)

Rain, Rain, and Power Failures

It seems that the two go hand in hand and today was no exception. Of course it's annoying when your computer's turned on when the power failures, and when electricity returns, you find out that some of your files have been corrupted, and the cache on your web browser has been reset.

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Monday, June 28, 2004

Links

USDA Classifies Frozen Fries as "Fresh Vegetables". I won't even comment on that (it's nothing compared to the formaline issue we had with our own vegetables here in the Philippines several years back... and then there was the pandesal [literally bread of salt, is the staple bread here in the country] dilemma as well).

20 Questions with Ellen Datlow.

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The Beauty of the Internet

I don't think I've plugged this before but there's this JAVA program called VASSAL which lets you play board/war games over the Internet (and even has PBEM [Play by Email] options). All you need to do is to download VASSAL and the appropriate module to play your favorite game.

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Sunday, June 27, 2004

Exhausted

Suffice to say, yesterday has been a busy day. I attended the toy con at Mega Mall, but had to leave before the cosplay competition because we usually eat at our grandmother's house (strange how we always refer to it as "grandmother's house" even though grandfather has always been living there as well, plus not to mention that the former is now deceased; and this isn't the only scenario for me since some of my friends usually refer to "lola" or grandmother's house as well if they do have regular visits) for dinner on Sunday nights. Of course it lasts until 7:30 pm, to my chagrin, so by then, most of the toy con would have been over. Then had to go to Gamer's Shop to meet some friends.

Toy Con Travails

Well, the good news is that they actually used an actual Mega Trade Hall rather than the Conference Room two years past, so the place is bigger (which is as good thing considering how crowded the place can get). Of course bigger venue also means a bigger entrance fee. They were now charging P50.00, but I guess that price is cheap compared to what the other anime/manga/comic/cosplay conventions are charging.

Bigger venue also means the possibility of a cosplay and there were some very interesting and original costumes (the latter because many Filipinos, not to fault them for it because it does become a budget constraint, tend to recycle the same costume over several events, even across several years... so seeing the same person wearing the same costume for the nth time can get disappointing at times). What caught the attention of most people at first was the girl who dressed up as Chii from Chobits. She was a very nubile Chii in a state early in the series where she was scantily dressed and merely had wrappings to cover her. I was also impressed at how she made the cloth at her back stand out like a butterfly ribbon (I presume she used chicken wire?). Of course when I found out her reputed age, I felt like Dean when he mentioned in an entry several weeks old of how he saw a girl he found beautiful, and was shocked at her age.

Later in the afternoon, I saw someone dressed up in a Doctor Octopus costume (movie and not the comic). What impressed me was how he managed to suspend his four iron tentacles (it was done with those transparent plastic wires). Other than the tentacles, the rest of his getup wasn't as impressive (because honestly, the movie Doctor Octupus anyway didn't look so unusual/spectacular, with the exception of his aforementioned appendages). He would have gotten bonus points in my book if his tentacles did manage to move.

Of course just before the cosplay competition was about to start, what I presumed would be the winners entered the waiting area. The Witch-King, an orc (complete with tusks and all), and the Uruk-Hai chieftain (with a very believable skeleton propped up behind him) entered. The material they used was well-painted and really looked like battle armor. I was impressed at the details, such as the skeleton hanging from the Uruk-Hai.

Unfortunately, I didn't get to see the cosplay competition so I didn't get to see who won. But I was betting the ones I mentioned above would somehow get into the finals. It seems that I was only wrong about the guy in the Dr. Octopus costume. A friend, Robert, won second place (I'm assuming this is the Robert in the Sauron costume and not the one in the Aragorn outfit), Chii for third, and the Uruk-Hai who won first place.

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