Sorry for the infrequent posts; this is the reason why:

I can’t even guess the number — about 120 bluebooks and over 150 papers (not including those e-mailed to me). Which is why I haven’t thanked Barb for the poetry workshop, or written about Izzy’s first-ever big-screen movie (or her second-ever concert), over the weekend.

The last week or so: coffee, Swans, coffee, Ulrich Schnauss, coffee, Merzbow, coffee, the Chameleons UK, coffee, the Cure, coffee, Rilo Kiley, coffee, Echo and the Bunnymen, coffee, NON, coffee, the Delgados, coffee…

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My formative music years were probably a little different, on account of having grown up in the Philippines; radio was different, for one, and releases were very selective. You couldn’t buy any R.E.M. album earlier than Fables of the Reconstruction, for instance; there were, in effect, huge gaps in bands’ discographies. There was very little old-school hiphop as well; for instance, the first time I heard Grandmaster Flash was in the ’90s.

But as a child I grew up listening to my parents’ music, most of which I consider excellent today; my mom claims I used to dance to “Taxman,” and to this day Revolver is still one of my favorite albums ever. Simon and Garfunkel, Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole also rounded out that period (thankfully Richard Clayderman and Ray Conniff didn’t affect my consciousness that much).

My very first record purchase was the “My Sharona” vinyl single, so that dates me. (Actually, it might have been on cassette, mixed with Patrick Hernandez’s “Born to Be Alive.”) I still remember quite vividly the day my mom gave me and my brother money to buy an actual cassette tape for the very first time. (My purchase was Synchronicity; my brother bought Huey Lewis and The News’s Sports. Ha!)

So, my formative years: U2′s The Unforgettable Fire, the Police’s Reggatta de Blanc, Talking Heads’ Remain in Light (I was the only Heads fan in my entire high school) — and, obviously a little late, Pink Floyd’s Meddle — were all high school purchases, and they’ve happily passed the test of time. (Synchronicity is overplayed — I can’t be the only one who changes the station when “Every Breath You Take” comes on the radio — but I happened to listen to it with a pair of great in-ear headphones earlier this year and it sounded like a totally different album.)*

By college I went through an unfortunate lapse into lite-jazz; it still sounds terrible now, and I can’t imagine ever returning to that crap. But I also went hog-wild buying albums, some of which are still stellar (Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me, Substance, In My Tribe) and some not (Seven and the Ragged Tiger, Make It Big — though I will always have affection for many ’80s hits).

The nineties (and grad school) finally set me on the path I’m on now, where my music purchases were mostly associated with record labels / distributors: Impulse, Tzadik, World Serpent, and especially early to mid-90s Matador.

*Having written this, I now realize why Bono, Sting and Michael Stipe (and Robert Smith to a certain extent) are all in a special circle of hell — because in my mid-teens they were all part of bands that meant the world to me. And now they just suck.

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(I was going to parody an LJ entry, but couldn’t find the energy.)

Haven’t posted in a while: redeye to Philly to see Happy and Clarissa, then a long drive down to Virginia in a Ford Expedition which we did not want to rent, but was a free upgrade (we told the Enterprise people that it felt morally wrong), then the iPod battery ran out halfway, forcing us to do a quick recharge at some random rest stop. Stayed with Clarissa’s aunt Diana and the two kids in Centreville, Spongebob with the kids (“You can’t fool me! I listen to public radio!”), then to yet another one of Clarissa’s aunts for Thanksgiving and a fantastic time. Huge spread, huge house, and I was too sober to join in on the Magic Sing videoke. Amazed the next day at the tons of people who came out for outlet shopping.

Then, back to work: wrap-up lectures for the final week, a pitcher apiece with Darren at the Edinburgh, the great Kiwi (and Irene from 8th Wonder) in my lit class, a big meat dinner at L&L with Kiwi and students (Joedobo was his usual scintillating self).

And, finally, 80s karaoke: Romeo and I drove down to Gilroy to see our high school classmate (my ESP partner) Eloise and her partner in crime Sean, rattling around alone in a massive house in front of a golf course in a gated community. I don’t think I’d ever actually been in one in the U.S. (though they’re everywhere in the Philippines). Saw old classmates Dave and Myra and their respective families. The Magic Sing reappeared (I guess you can count on Filipino gatherings to have one) and this time I couldn’t resist. As evidence, there’s a photograph of me on Ofoto clutching (I think) the mic in one hand and yet another Heineken (number 5 of 7, if I remember correctly) in the other. Met the coolest couple, Lan and Juan, who I swear are the biggest new wavers ever; very quickly our conversation turned to the Chameleons UK and Cure B-sides. Later we successfully wrested the mic from the, um, “old” group who was busy singing “My Way” and “Bikining Itim,” and did a group rendition of “We Are The World” (I did Bruce, Michael and Daryl Hall; Lan did a scarily good Cyndi). And I did “My Sharona” (though Juan may have been singing too; I can’t remember) and got a 100. Yes.

Glad I wasn’t too hungover to see Joannie and Luna and Ging the next day in Oakland for some dimsum mania — too bad Izzy was feeling under the weather (we’re talking bittorrents of vomit into her bib at the restaurant), but later Joannie read Stellaluna to her and she started feeling better.

Last night, at the Edinburgh again: can’t remember if Karen and Darren and I placed fourth on the pub quiz; nothing like 5 pitchers between 3 people to cloud your memory. “I had a dream / I had an awesome dream” — that I remember.

Today: just finished reading a book on Filipino Americans which, let’s just say, won’t look like my next book.

Tomorrow: 100 exams to grade, big potluck in class, and poetry workshop with Barb.

Weekend: The Polar Express with Izzy, and the Dan Zanes concert with Jeff, Kumi and Maia!

Next week: about 140 papers to grade. Whee!

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A little while back, Rodel Rodis posted the full contents of his Philippine News column as comments to my previous entry (you can see Rodis’s column at that link), and I wasn’t sure how to respond — primarily because its contents were pretty much the opposite of what our source (whom the SFSU Pinoy faculty tried to protect) told us directly.

Rodis’s column made us, well, look like fools, and I think I would have appreciated it if he gave my colleagues a little benefit of the doubt; surely Rodis himself has been placed on “non-existent” government blacklists both before and after his immigration to the U.S.!

But now our previously unnamed source has stepped forward demanding a retraction from him; to make a long story short, Emil Guillermo’s latest
article has excerpts from Lorraine Mallare’s long letter, rebutting Rodis’s points.

It’s the “Secret Service list” part that’s quite scary; since Vice Consul Antony Mandap has already pooh-poohed the suggestion that a list came from “a Philippine Secret Service” because “there’s no such entity” (and therefore the list could not exist), we can perhaps assume that:

a) Of course there’s some sort of a Philippine Secret Service, and Vice Consul Mandap may simply be playing with semantics here; or

b) that the non-existent Philippine Secret Service may have compiled the list with help from their American counterparts, which may mean

c) that this now non-existent list may have came from the U.S. Secret Service itself (who after all were protecting a visiting head of state), and was handed directly to the Philippine Consulate.

We academics like to joke that the government must have files on us somewhere, but it’s frightening when my colleagues are smacked directly with it.

(I’ll be flying to the Philippines in a few weeks; wish me luck.)

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