Best Of '09... Part 2

Best Viral Videos of 2009:

JK Wedding Entrance Dance

In second place:

Kanye Interrupts Taylor Swift at the VMA's

(worth mentioning: Baby Dancing to Single Ladies, and Susan Boyle's Britain's Got Talent Audition)

Best Weirdly Awesome/Awesomely Weird TV Character:

Sheldon Cooper, The Big Bang Theory

In second place:

Sue Sylvester, Glee

Best Dessert Place of The Year:

Classic Confections (Nono's Chocolate Oblivion cake)

In second place:

Tie: Cafe Breton (Adam and Eve crepe), Wicked Kitchen (Gluttony)

Best Fish Dish I Tasted For The First time This Year:

Cookbook Kitchen's Parmesan Crusted White Fish

In second place:

Fely J's Tilapia with Sweet Plum Sauce

Best Sandwich for Lunch In the Office:

Subway's Italian B.M.T. in Parmesan Oregano Bread with Honey Mustard and Sweet Onion dressing

In second place:

Delifrance's Frech Dip Roast Beef

Most "I don't get it..." Music Trend of 2009:

Justin Bibier being popular (I mean come on, his voice is exactly a quarter of an octave lower than Alvin and the Chipmunks')

In second place:

K-Pop girl bands.

Most Annoying Showbiz Issues of 2009:

Hayden Kho sex tapes. (Seriously, a senate hearing? So you just couldn't find anywhere else to waste our tax money on, Bong Revilla?)

In second place:

Manny Pacquiao's alleged extra-marital affair with Krista Ranillo. (At least he didn't try to beat Tiger Woods' list of hoes.)

Best Starbucks Pastry That I Eat With My Cafe Mocha:

Banoffee Pie

In second place:

Cinnamon Swirl

2009 Pinoy Hero:

Muelmar Magallanes

In second place:

Efren Peñaflorida

Da da da, da da, Da da da.

Great song, awesome voices.

Randomly stalking people while singing? Sounds like a great idea while walking around the streets of Paris.

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And here's another good one. Great old school song sung by a great old school voice.

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Been watching the 15th season of the Amazing Race on Studio 23. They broadcast it via satellite, so it starts on time, and with no commercial breaks. Best way to watch TAR! Only six teams left, and I like all of them. It's been a pretty good season so far, they've been to Japan, Vietnam, Cambodia and Dubai. The last Dubai episode was AWESOME.

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I had another bout with the flu 2 weeks ago which lasted for more than a week. Never went to the doctor though so I have no idea what kind of flu I had. What's annoying is this is the 2nd time I've gotten the flu this year, after paying for flu vaccine earlier. Before the vaccine, I've gotten the flu maybe once or twice in my life.

Thanks, flu vaccine. You were worthless.

Girls Strumming Guitar Strings and Guys Pounding Piano Keys.

Or great YouTube finds.

I've been scouring YouTube for some good cover versions of songs that I like, and I've stumbled upon some really, really, really good ones.

Such as...



The Beatles' Across The Universe, covered by Kiersten Holine. Awesome, clear beautiful voice.


Here's some solid vocals. Fucking good piano-playinng too. Precious Things by Tori Amos, covered by Matthew Luke Sandoval


Cover of Paolo Nutini's Autumn by a cute French girl named Lou Salomez. I love this song, and I love her accent.


Shelley Green covering Rachael Yamagata's Worn Me Down. Beautiful quirky vocals.


Probably the best of the bunch. Adam Monroe doing 3 Libras by A Perfect Circle. He's got some great originals too. And he has a piano-based cover of Pardon Me by Incubus that's pretty amazing.



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Now playing: Badly Drawn Boy - One Plus One Is One
via FoxyTunes

Comings and Goings

Roland Garros Update:

Of the top 32 men entered in the tournament, 13 are already gone. The highest seeds who lost after three rounds are #6 Da-veed Nalbandian of Argentina, who lost to 21 year-old French wildcard Jeremy Chardy after winning the first two sets (Chardy won 3-6, 4-6, 6-2, 6-1, 6-2) and #7 James Blake, went down to 19 year-old Latvian Ernests Gulbis in four sets.

On the women's side, 12 of the 32 seeds are gone as of this writing. Must be a bad time to be the sixth seed, as #6 Anna Chakvetadze also lost in the 2nd round to Estonian Kaia Kanepi in straight sets. The big surprise of the tournament (well, so far...) is former champ and 5th seed Serena Williams going out in the third round after losing to Slovenian Katarina Srebotnik, again, in straight sets.

Turning out to be an interesting tournament, this RG is.

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Ok, now that we've gotten that out of the way, let me just give out my yearly moment of remembrance of Jeff Buckley's passing.

...

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And welcome the newest addition to the family. My 1-day old niece! She's my brother's first baby:

She's adorable.

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Now playing: Jeff Buckley - Last Goodbye
via FoxyTunes

Oh Well.

Ok. World #1 Justine Henin just announced that she's retiring from tennis, immediately.

"This is the end of a child's dream. This is a definitive decision. Those who know me know it is serious. I thought long about this. I started thinking about it late last year. I was at the end of the road. I leave with my head held high."

I usually pick my favorite female tennis players using a very shallow criteria (from Mary Pierce and Dominique Van Roost to Daniela Hantuchova and Maria Kirilenko) rather than on the number of tournaments they've won. But I became a fan of Justine because of how beautiful her game was, most especially her one-handed backhand. If I had Federer's forehand and Justine's backhand, I'd die happy. I remember how great it was when she won her first French Open title back in 2003 because as she said, it was at that tournament as a ten year-old girl when she told her mother while watching the Graf-Seles final that she'll win it someday too. Her mom died of cancer two years later. She won the French Open eight years after that.

Justine retires from the sport as the #1 ranked player. She will not be defending her French Open crown this year, after having won it for the past three years.




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Now playing: Iron and Wine - Such Great Heights
via FoxyTunes

Fix Me Now

OK.

This is just great.



According to the description:

This is from a documentary shown on Channel 4 in the UK called 'Young@Heart'; the name of the New England octogenarian chorus line. The performer here is Fred Knittle, who suffers from congestive heart failure. This song was intended to be a duet between Fred and another chorus member, Bob Salvini. Sadly, Bob died of a heart attack and it was left to Fred to carry the song on his own. If I'm correct, the people you see crying at 01:13 are Bob's family. The lady you occasionally see mouthing the lyrics in the audience is Fred's wife.

There were some very touching scenes where we see Fred rehearsing alone soon after Bob's death. It was an incredible film.

They also do songs by Sonic Youth and The Ramones on their concerts. I heard there's gonna be a movie released about the group too.




video uploaded by http://www.youtube.com/user/akf2000

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Now playing: Tori Amos - Precious Things
via FoxyTunes