Man, I can hardly hear myself think over this rain!

Before I go talking about the announcement of the Canon 400D replacement (which is the replacement of my current 350D), I want to talk about something amazing that happened to me at Pep Boys today. Get your popcorn ready folks, but this time, the outcome won't suck like when TO says it. So, it's raining, but I'm really late on my oil change. My last one was on October 1st, and not only has three months gone by, but so has 4,500+ miles. I usually do my oil changes about three months or 3,000 miles, whatever comes first – three months used to always come first cos I never did much driving, but now that I commute down to Santa Monica almost everyday, the miles have gone up. Anyway, I needed to do my oil change – and my folks' too, by the way. I had enough oil in the house, but not enough filters, only one when I obviously needed at least two, one for each car. So what do I do? Head over to Pep Boys. I have only one thing on my mind – oil filters. PL14459 is the serial number. As soon as I enter Pep Boys (the one on Reseda between Saticoy and Sherman Way, right near that Mobil/Chevron where PTA shot one of the final scenes in Magnolia), the first thing I see is this annoying employee. I ignored him. The second thing I see is this tall blonde guy, a famous guy, way off on the other side of the store. I at once recognize him, but I think to myself, there's no way he'd be here! Pep Boys, on a rainy day? So what do I do? Not go over to the filters, that's for sure. I head over to the paint polish isle to my left which gives me a better look of the back of his head. I nose around there for a little bit, toppling bottles over because I'm so nervous. After I get a better look of the guy, who I now think even more is who I think it is, from that isle, I decide to head on over to the oil filters – but I take the long route, you know, just to make sure this guy is who I think it is. I pass by, and sure enough, it is! So I get over to the oil filter area, and without hesitation pick up the PL14459 filters. I wanted three, but I settled with two because that's all the store had. Ah well. I stand there for a sec, and now I have a side-view of the blonde guy with long hair. I think to myself, no one's going to believe me when I tell them (especially Imadul, he always tells me to "take a pic"), so I better whip out my phone and shoot him. So I do. But I'm soo far away! The shot comes out horrible! Click here to see it.

So I'm thinking to myself, there's no way anyone will believe me. But before I can take a better one, he heads over to the cashier. After I realize this, I pick up my filters and head off to the cashier too! What else! I want to get as close to this famous person as I want! So I'm standing right next to the guy, and there's no question it's who I think it is. He's freaking tall, has to be almost seven feet tall, but he doesn't look as good as he's supposed to look – probably cos he's at Pep Boys, I think to myself. He has four wiper blades on the counter and is paying the cashier. I get a look at his wallet. It's huge! A bunch of credit cards! He signs for what he buys and I try to get a look at his signature, it's kind of circular, but masculine at the same time – this guy is built. It turns out, his black 2001 Chevy truck that's sitting right outside needs some new wiper blades and the guy gave him the wrong ones when he was here before, so that's why there are four, two he's buying, two he's returning. The lady calls another employee over to return the blades, and while he goes to do that, the famous guy moves to the side to let me pay for my filters. He was very nice, the famous guy was. Before I continue, let me preface with how star-struck I can get. I get very, very star-struck, even with this guy. I get all nervous and shaky. It's really strange because it never happens any other time. So, I give the lady the two filters, and a twenty dollar bill, and she rings me up. As she's doing that, I gather up all the courage I can and to talk to the famous guy. I turn a little to my right, and as soon as I do, I notice how close he is to me. He has to be about two feet away from me and almost a foot taller than me. So I'm looking straight up like he's a skyscraper. I could feel the force field around him pushing me away, like the opposite of gravity. That's how built this guy was. So even if I didn't have enough courage, I had no choice but to ask, I asked the famous guy...

click here to read what I asked the famous guy....

Man, I've been gone for quite some time, haven't I? Frankly, it's been because I've been too scared to show up. The Orphanage really got to me guys. It really is one freaky movie.

I saw it on Saturday night with Jo at ArcLight Hollywood. I wasn't expecting a lot of people in the theatre – it's completely Spanish, not very well-known, and has been out for a month – but damn was I wrong. The theatre wasn't exactly packed, but it was still a lot of people. The more the merrier for scary movies, I always say! If you don't know, the movie was banking on Guillermo del Toro's name as the producer; he did movies like The Devil's Backbone, Pan's Labyrinth, and the Hellboy movies. I guess you can kind of think of him as the Tim Burton of horror movies – but I'll stop there, because I don't entirely agree with that statement... but then why would I bring it up...? Who knows, haha.

The movie, again, is extremely eerie. It takes place almost entirely in a really old house that used to be an orphanage, an orphanage in which the main character Laura, played by Belén Rueda, used to live. After finding a permanent home as a child, and a husband as an adult, she decides to move back into the house with her family and start the orphanage up again. But that's about when things start to go nuts. Her son Simón, played by Roger Príncep, who suffers from a horrible disease, starts to make friends... imaginary friends. His parents, or his father rather, think that it's nothing to worry about and that Simón will grow out of it on his own. It turns out that the friends Simón makes aren't the imaginary people his parents thought they were. They are in fact not real people, but they were at one point. That's right, he's talking to ghosts! Fantasmas! AHHH! They are the spirits of the children that Laura used to live with as a child in the orphanage... eerie, eh? But wait, then it really starts to get heavy. Simón later goes missing after Laura yells at him, and his parents are convinced that the spirits kidnapped their son. And that's what the movie is all about, the parents searching for Simón in the orphanage, and never giving up until he shows up. Great stuff. Really great stuff.

Now, I came back home Saturday night, and I couldn't go to sleep until a little after three in the morning because I had to go to the bathroom at around midnight. I could've easily went to the bathroom at midnight... but I was too scared to. haha. So what did I do? I went to Netflix.com and watched Season 2 and part of Season 3 of The Office until I forgot about the movie (by the way, I've finished every episode of The Office now, and am extremely obsessed, and I owe it all to Netflix's "watch now" feature that I wrote about last night. Over 20 hours worth of episodes). I finally ended up going to the bathroom at around three, but slid the tub/shower door shut as soon as I entered – you'll understand why when you watch the film, haha. I'm somewhat over the movie, but I still see the kid in the mask creeping around my house every so often... I don't think he likes me much. But anyway, watch the movie if you get a chance, even you scaredy cats out there. Even though it doesn't have a lick of English in the film at all, you hardly notice because you're so into the movie. Sure I forgot to read some of the subtitles when I was covering my face or jumping behind the seats in fear, but you sure don't notice the language difference. And to be quite honest, I was jumping like a freaking jack rabbit, ask Jo. I was having the freaking time of my life – such a freaking fun movie! Oh, and I'm using the English versions of the movie titles because I'm writing in English, not because I hate the Spanish people – you guys make great movies!

click here to read what I didn't tell you earlier in the week....

So the game last night was a doozy, like I said it was going to be - though I didn't use the word "doozy" because everything is a doozy to me and I have yet to come up with a new word. We won the game after an overtime thriller in which Kobe scored a total of 48 points in 44 shots - so he pretty much made up Bynum's points due to his absence: 20 for Bynum, 28 for himself. If that stat alone doesn't show you how much we missed Andy last night, let me also add that half way through the first quarter, his starting backup, Mr. Kwame "I'm super clutch" Brown, had already racked up three fouls. Even with the last foul (that they called a blocking foul) being overturned a few minutes later, giving him only two fouls in the first quarter, Bynum would never have done the same, especially against the Sonics. Bynum would have also been dunking alley oop after alley oop and would definitely not have backed up to give Szczerbiak some room for a three. No, Drew would never have done that.

I'm not going to turn into some Kwame hater – like practically the rest of the world – but what I will do is say that I'd rather have Ronny take over the starting position for Andy than Kwame take it over for him. He was quite fantastic the first time out, Ronny was. In fact, the whole second unit did great their first time out last night. It's so refreshing to see them play like that; at times this season, it feels like the only way a game can start to gain some rhythm is with them on the floor, making the starters look like the reserves from the start – but that shouldn't be the case of course, both squads should be amazing. They really are doing very well though. And everyone has to step up. From here on out, everyone needs to. We're now officially tied in first place with the Suns in the West, and we definitely won't be able to maintain that position if we play like we did last night (and by the way, Phoenix is in town to play the Clippers tonight). Imadul brought it up, but I will too: if we win by only a point or two against bad teams, how will we do against good teams? To maintain our No 1 spot, we'll definitely have to do well this next month while Bynum is out, where 11 of our next 15 games are on the road, including 9 straight games outside of Los Angeles. It starts in Detroit, against a team that let Chris Webber go this year. Well guess what, the Lakers might sign him to help us out during the absence of Bynum - after all, we only have 14 guys after trading Mo and Cook for Ariza. Maybe he'll finally get a ring with us!

click here to read about the new Netflix addition....

Before I go on to the horrible, horrible, horrible (did I say horrible?) news from last night, I want to give my congratulations to the Patriots for beating the Jaguars. I've hated you guys since - forever, and have been rooting against you guys for just as long; I really thought that Jags would take you down. Well, you guys did it again, 17 - 0! So congratulations. Congrats to the Packers as well to killing off the Seahawks (who would've thought!), but did anyone see the game? All I got on my TV was snow. haha, get it?! Those games were Saturday, Sunday was full of upsets - first the Chargers took it to the Colts, I am so bummed and surprised! Then the Giants beat up the Cowboys, I was happy about that. Both were real great games. So now we wait for this Sunday to see who's going to the Super Bowl. Because the Colts lost to the Chargers, a team that played its second-string players in the second half of the game, doesn't that mean the Patriots are going to have an easy Sunday? Who knows - don't put anything passed the Chargers now I guess. The Packers are playing at home this Sunday - against the Giants. Let's root for another snow day! Too bad for Romo, I feel sooo bad for him, I bet you're going through hell. 0 - 2 in the Playoffs, and both were your fault! The Giants are looking great too, I'm glad they didn't get into the Playoffs and die like the Redskins. It's going to be a fun weekend!

But enough football. The Lakers just went on a six game winning streak - something the team hasn't done for four years, and they ended up going to the Finals that year - does that mean they will do the same this year? Sure did look like it until the third quarter last night. If you don't know what happened last year, the Lakers looked great during the first half of the season. But as soon as the second half rolled around, players were dropping left and right and ended up only two games over .500 - the worst for Phil Jackson ever. We're 25 - 11 so far, only a half game out of first - and we were healthy just before last night. Sure we were missing Rad, Sasha, and Mihm, though we didn't have Mihm last year either; but we have better players this year compared to last. Much better. Besides the obvious addition of Fisher, Ariza and Farmar have been great - Javaris too. But the best by far has to be our baby, Bynum. Bynum has been off the chains lately - dropping career highs in nearly every game, both points and rebounds; dropping big guys with his blocks, dropping great lobs into the hoop from Kobe, Fisher, or anyone else who wants to try, even dropping a couple F-bombs on TV the other night. Bynum has been dropping a lot of stuff, all good, but one of the things we didn't want him to drop was to the floor last night. It was horrible.

click here to continue reading about Bynum's injury and watch a few game clips....

Although this writers' strike is definitely affecting a lot of people, from the actual writers to their bosses, I for one am having a lot of fun. Sure, I might be gaining some enjoyment from the losses of others, but that's not why I'm having fun; I'm having fun watching how great the shows without writers actually are on their own. In the instance of late night shows, if you're a fan you've come to love your favorite host (mine being Conan) over the years - in a way, the writers from past shows have somewhat created a wall between our hosts and us, we never had the ability to fully hang out with just them. Well with the strike, we are forced to hang out with just them (except for Letterman and Ferguson of course, and Letterman's sucking even with writers). And because we are forced to be with just them, we have so much more fun. I was talking with Ima about it a few days ago, this writers' strike is like when we were back in school during those days where we knew nothing would happen in class. You know the ones, it's either raining uncontrollably so you know you'll sit around in the gym during PE or it's the end of the year so the teachers let you goof around during class - or it's the middle of the year and your English teacher, for whatever reason, starts the class an hour late everyday. You look forward to those days, you yearn for those days. When you do nothing, with the people you'd enjoy even if you had to do something. You enjoy them even more, you cherish those moments. And that's what the strike is like. Like that, only on TV.

So I have only good things to say about late night - except for Letterman and Leno, both of them are writing and only one is allowed to (Leno's going to be punished!). But it's only going to get better - during this Thursday's late night shows, NBC and ABC are going to join forces (the two broadcast networks without writers) and Kimmel and Leno will be guests on each other's shows. How awesome is that. We've seen late night hosts go on other shots, like Conan going on Leno, but never from other networks! That's going to be awesome. Conan is out of the loop, but his stuff is getting funnier and funnier every day - last night, he did a German laser show from his desk, as some fellow named Rudy, that cost him $62. It was hilarious. Both Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert came back to the air last night, and Colbert pronounced both the Ts in his name - he's lost without his writers. Both were a bore - Jon was with the writers, then started to bash him, like he does every other topic, and then a Cornell professor came on (who Marc told me he met by the way) to talk about the effects of the strike. It was pretty useless. The other late night shows are doing well though - let's hope it doesn't get too old soon though.

click here to find out why the graphic has nothing yet to do with the post....

Read that title in a Borat accent.

Imadul kept referring to this movie as the sequel to Edward Scissorhands - because Tim Burton directs Depp, who cuts hair. He wasn't serious of course, as it was very far from it. I've never read or seen the play itself; the only thing I knew about the story before watching this film was Ben Affleck and Liv Tyler re-enacting the play for Ben's daughter in Jersey Girl, haha. Other than that, the name Sweeney Todd meant nothing to me. And being a big Tim Burton fan, as well as a big Johnny Depp fan, this was a movie I definitely had to see - and boy was it great.

Musicals have always been somewhat difficult for me to comprehend, why are they so likeable? Even I enjoy a fun musical from time to time. Going into the film, I knew it'd be a musical, but I didn't think the whole thing would be singing - but I'm glad it was because I tended not to notice it. In the second song of the film, during a flashback sequence, I totally forgot there was singing and took it simply as narration - the whole film is done quite well. And Johnny Depp's voice! It was bad at first, because there was a younger boy singing who had a much better voice before he started, but his voice became somewhat adored, it was his character. Everyone's singing was quite good, no one was horrible - except for Wormtail's, I mean Timothy Spall (I didn't know his name, had to look it up). He looked like a rat; I guess he's become typecasted for me even though he's done a lot of non-Harry Potter films. Speaking of Harry Potter, three Potter actors were in this film. There was Spall, Rickman, and Helena - Rickman who is obviously the most notable as Snape. Helena plays Bellatrix in the fifth film - and will in the sixth and seventh films as well when those come out of course. I guess the Harry Potter franchise just tries its best to grab all the notable Brit actors that it can. But the Potter feeling of the film disappears afterwards, except for when Radcliffe shows up at the end flying his broom through the Tower Bridge.

Anyway, for those who do not know anything about the film Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, it's about a man named Benjamin Barker, Depp, who has a wife and daughter, who is thrown out of London and into Australia from false charges by Judge Turpin, Rickman. A judge that creates such false charges because he lusts for Barker's beautiful wife Lucy, and daughter Johanna. The film starts fifteen years after Barker is sent to Australia, he escapes with the help of a sailor, Anthony Hope. Barker returns to London, to find his wife and daughter, but instead takes a new name, Sweeney Todd. Todd returns to his home, above a meat-pie shop on Fleet Street, owned by Mrs. Lovett, Helena, who claims she sells the worst pies in London, and decides to create a song about it... which I have to say I enjoyed a little too much. She tells him that his wife Lucy poisoned herself years ago and that their daughter Johanna was taken in by Judge Turpin - unwillingly of course. Todd therefore vows that he will seek revenge on those that have ruined his life. And how does he do that? Well, go watch the movie; it's pretty damn gruesome, but lovely at the same time.

click here to continue reading about Sweeney Todd....

Alright, let's get through all these Happy New Year crap messages and out of the way so we can get down to business. But while we're on the topic, I don't know whether I should feel that I got more Happy New Year wishes than Happy Birthday wishes... maybe I should be happy that so many people rejoice the potential of the new year, haha. And speaking about 2008, is it just me or does that collection of numbers seem way too futuristic right now? I can't be the only one that thinks that we're jumping too quickly from a pointy-7 to a rounded-8, plus the rounded-0s; it's all happening way too fast. The number 2008 looks so sleek and streamlined, almost metallic-looking. It should be hovering over the streets without the need of fossil fuels - it's way too futuristic right now. Perhaps we should've done with another year until we were ready. I don't know what could've taken place after 2007, but 2008 seems too much, no?

Anyway, it's 2008. So stop writing 2007 on your papers (I saw some girl do that today, I wanted to punch her in the face - just joking). I won't go down the line listing all the cool things that will happen in 2008, because frankly, I am too lazy to go Wikipedia the year. The only thing that I will list though is that today is the date that all the late night shows will come back on the air. It's been two months since the WGA went on strike, and nothing has been resolved since. We have been in a phase of re-runs, unless of course shows were written before the strike began (and even then, some unions didn't want to cross each other's picket lines), but I frankly have hardly noticed. The only places in which I have noticed the strike's effects are the late night shows - Letterman to Leno, Conan to Kimmel. The guys who have entertained me when I stayed up into the late hours of the night, or the guys for whom I stayed up into the late hours of the night. After two months, they're coming back. But some shows have an advantage....

Only the guys on CBS are allowed to have writers. Why? I don't know, Letterman cracked a deal with the WGA. Only he and Ferguson are allowed to have union writers writing jokes for their shows. The other four guys (Carson though has been back for a month already) will have to run the show without writers, which means they can't write anything themselves. Now think about that for a second, not the fact that the CBS guys will have the upper hand tonight; think about how a show, a late night show, will run without a script. No cue-cards, no monologue, no sketches - complete improv. How completely hilarious will that be? Very. And I say Conan's will be the best. Conan has always done a lot of zany improvs during his show anyway, so I'm sure tonight will not be that much different. And how about the other guys? Leno isn't funny even with writers, so his will be a bore, and I don't think Kimmel will do very well without writers, even though we all love him and his show. So does this mean CBS' late night shows will finally become more popular than the other networks'? I don't think so, Letterman wasn't too great to begin with. We'll all change to NBC and ABC to watch how crazy the other shows are without writers. I for one am going to stay up, maybe even past Carson - it probably isn't the best idea because I'm recovering from a cold and I have class in the morning, but who cares. It's all in the name of television!

That's all I want to write about today - a new year but nothing really new to talk about. Except, I'll probably cut down on the NFL talk, the Saints lost and so they're out, now it's time to come back next season stronger. How about you work on defense this time around, eh? I'll just talk about the Playoffs a bit. Lakers are still strong even though they lost to the Celtics, and Lamar's gone for the next game. This site had low hits in December, as expected, but it was higher than I expected it to be: fourth of the year with 327, just behind March which had 328 individual hits. Page hits though ranked number three after the big Disneyland months with 1367 page views, so I'm happy about that. Nothing really changed with this site for the new year - I wanted to change the image behind "modenadude.com", but the one I wanted to change it with didn't look right, so no changes will be made. Except... hey, would you look at that... ho hum diggity - comments are activated! Boom! Comment all you want people! Don't worry, I don't like this format either, but I guess it'll do for now - it's from HaloScan. It counts the number of comments (which I did for Ima), it pops up in a new window, it lets you add a website, you can add images, and you can even do smilies! Everyone loves smilies! So that's it. I hope you guys all had a safe New Year and are feeling better. Oh and Happy Birthday to Paz Vega - 32? No way. I won't hear it - you'll never get old! Take care everyone. see u.