For the love of UP….I have done something I haven’t done in a decade… which is dancing in front of a large group of people….and in shorts, too.  I saw the videos taken by students and I look like a gleeful ball bouncing on stage.  No, the videos are not online….. yet.

When I came out to introduce our dance number, my entrance was reminiscent of a diva tearing apart the curtains.  I saw so many students with their camera phones and digital cameras ready for shooting.  I wanted to puke.  But the show must go on.  And it did.  Quite loudly, in fact.  Hahahaha.  I just love the U.P. crowd…..peerless in so many ways…especially at screaming with a mixture of joy and malice at their professors who subjected themselves into this act of humiliation.

For the love of U.P., I was at a queue in a convenience store in Makati.  When the cash register opened, I saw this and asked the cashier for an exchange:

Wooohoooo……the UP Centennial overprint!  Yes!  I couldn’t find a centennial shirt to fit me.  I don’t really like buying planners.  I don’t like jackets unless the temperature is below 19 degrees centigrade.  So, this peso bill is gold to me.  Sure, it has a crease but I don’t care.  I’ll just insert it inside my yellowed-with-age diploma.  Or store it inside the special plastic casing of my most precious collection of X-Men issues.

The cashier commented on how fast my eyes are for spotting it as she counted her stack of 100 peso bills.  All those years of riding the taxis in Manila with an eagle eye (checking if the taxi meter is tampered and such) must have paid off.

But I am glad I got this.  This commemorative bill is being sold in UP for at least 200….the wort price was 1000 pesos!  Are you nuts?  So, I am sure the cashier understood why I practically dove into her peso bill stacks.

These are two evidences of the lengths of humiliation I will go through for the love of U.P.

Fab alert, dears! A friend of mine sent this link and I almost died in gayness heaven. It’s a movie entitled The Thank You Girls.

For the beauty pageant freak, to be called a Thank You Girl, it’s a sprinkling label otherwise known as “Loser.” Our dismal performance at the Miss Universe have relegated our “beauties” into mere smiling creatures that guide Donald Trump to his table. Here’s what the filmmakers have to say:

“The ‘Thank You’ Girls” is a Visayan film with a gay lingo twist.

Tired of losing in all the beauty competitions in Davao City, five dysfunctional gay beauty pageant veterans decide to travel north to Cagayan de Oro City, in the island of Mindanao.

Their mission: to conquer the grandest competition of beauty, personality
and brains in the whole province.

They believe that being city dwellers, gays in the province will never
stand a chance against them.

When I saw the trailer. I thought gays in a road trip into the great “unknown.” Reminds me of the classic Priscilla Queen of the Desert. There’s even a shot atop the jeepney which aped the iconic scene with Guy Pierce fabulously lipsynching operatic trills as a silver trail billowed in the desert wind. Homage? Perhaps. But it is not exactly a copy because of the concept of beauty pageants. Drag shows are a spectacle of measured campiness, yes, but beauty pageants, especially Gay beauty pageants, are an exercise of suspension of good taste. I love the question and answer part because it should showcase the gravitas of wit and humor several gay people wear like a badge.

PLUS, this movie is in Cebuano! Nahala lampornas ang mga bayot, dai! Maginigat igat ning mga gi-atay! Maputlan ta! Enjoy and scream……

Why, God, why? Why must they address it as “Bora?” and not Boracay? What possessed people to drop the last syllable? How hard can it be to add “Cay” at the end? You don’t call it Singa. It’s Singapore. You don’t call it Bei. It’s Beijing. This is why God allowed the creation of the concept of proper nouns so one may address people, places and objects properly. People say it’s like a nickname. We have nicknames for our islands and places now? What shall I call Manila? “Philippine armpit?”

More than America’s Next Top Model. More than Amazing Race. Definitely more than American Idol. Project Runway is my absolute favorite reality TV show. Why? Because in one show, you have bitcheries and creativity. Modeling is not creative all you have to do is look like you have scoliosis and pout and voila you’re Avant Garde! Fashion Design is creative. Period. In terms of stress and insanity like the ones I occasionally see in Amazing Race? Well, I see that in the designers’ workshop under the desperation from th deadline. Stress + Shears = Must See TV.

I just finished watching the first episode of Project Runway Season 5. I didn’t see any fabulous creatures like last season’s Chris March. I have a feeling that it is the ladies who will dominate this time. Just a hunch.