Steve & Eydie

*photo from kids.eb.com

Someone played a cruel joke on me and told me that Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme had filed for divorce--I was a bit shocked and very sad!  My notion of true love was dissipated when one of the pillars cracked and fell apart.  I got hooked with their music in the mid-seventies when Gwammy's older brother and my uncle Jay introduced them to me, Steve had "Poinciana" while Eydie had "Blame It On the Bossanova," among others.  Luckily it turns out that the rumor is not true, and that one of the most enduring showbiz couples is still very much together!  The  two have been very successful with their respective solo singing careers, and the husband and wife team gained even more international success doing concert tours together.  I guess the ugly rumor started a few years ago when Eydie announced that, due to health reasons, she was retiring from active concert duty, leaving Steve to tour by himself.  While the song "The Best Thing That Ever Happened To Me" is usually attributed to Gladys Knight and the Pips, I will always think of Steve's version as the gold standard.  If you will note, at the very last line, he sings the song especially for his wife, and he says "Eydie, you are the best thing that's every happened to me!"  It's truly one of the sweetest tributes in recording history.

Claudette Colbert

Photo via Google

I was surfing the web and I came across some movie discussion sites that talked about glamour actresses during the black-and-white film period.  I remembered my favorite, Claudette Colbert, a French-born actress who made films in New York in the 1920s up to the 1940s.  I was introduced to her work by my uncle, Tito Jay (Gwammy's older brother), and she was one of my boyhood fantasies--to my mind, absolutely stunning!  I think the photo on the left was digitally colored, and you can clearly see the haunting expression of her eyes... Two thumbs up for this fine and wonderful lady! C'est Magnifique!

Andy Williams

* courtesy of Wikipedia

I just read that Andy Williams passed away last month at the ripe old age of 84, from bladder cancer.  To me and to his multitude of fans worldwide, he will forever be known as "Mr. Smooth," and his numerous hits, among them, Moon River, Days of Wine and Roses, Love is a Many Splendored Thing, Theme from the Godfather (Speak Softly Love), Theme from Love Story (Where Do I Begin), and the happy Christmas song It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year, will forever be etched in my memory.  We used to have this on LP vinyl and cassette, and we played the songs so many times at the main house, with Kong & Gwammy always listening intently.  Songs full of life, love and romance!  Thank you, Mr. Williams, for all the lovely songs that you so wonderfully sang--we enjoyed every bit.

Gene Roddenberry

Space... the final frontier.  These are the voyages of the Starship Enterpise, its continuing mission... to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before. (Star Trek, August 1966)

Michaela and I had the opportunity to discuss about economic progress, ecological sustainability and population growth over the Eid Al Fitr weekend.  Her thinking is that while current human population is already at 6 billion, we could peak at 12 billion, but population would slowly stabilize in time at around 8 billion.  I was of the opinion that Malthusian predictions could be adjusted and that the Earth could comfortably house more humans, even at 20 billion, if allocation and distribution methods were more efficient.  Furthermore, my thinking is that the exponential growth of technology demonstrates that the human intellect is growing and someday, give or take a couple of hundred years, we will be able to pierce Einstein's light barrier.  That has been clearly shown with the discoveries of black holes (gravity becomes a more propelling force than light) and has been heavily theorized with postulates on tachyons.  While these are science fiction today, you have to consider that manned space flight was seemingly impossible in the early twentieth century, and that today we have a roving camera stationed in Mars.

Gene Roddenberry was a humanist and a futurist.  He began his career as a US Air Force pilot World War II, and thereafter became a sergeant with the Los Angeles police department.  He envisioned the television series Star Trek, and his philosophy about the possibilities of the human potential leads me to believe that there is hope for the human race.

Human nature.  We squabble, we fight.  We love, we nurture.  We oppress, we conquer.  We suffer, we adapt.  We go forth and we multiply.  We live, and we love.  We become true to ourselves.

Jessica Gomes

Apparently Maxim readers have piled up the votes for Jessica Gomes as the best looking bikini lady.  This 26 year old swimsuit model from Perth has a Singaporean-Chinese mother and a Portuguese father, which probably accounts for her beautiful Eurasian looks!  Absolutely stunning, I agree!

Michelle Saram

I was just looking for old CDs to play, when I chanced upon the disks of Meteor Garden, which was the local craze sometime 10 years ago (Vicky had purchased the whole set of disks of both Season I and Season II).  My thoughts immediately turned to the Singaporean actress Michelle Saram, a lovely lass of Chinese and Indian descent, who played Ye Sha, the second love interest of the protagonist Dao Ming Su (played by Jerry Yan) who loses his memory in the second season.  She was an absolute beauty, and I was immediately captivated by her charms.  I guess everyone rooted for the character of Shan Cai (played by Barbie Hsu), being the first love interest of Dao Ming Su, but I was a true Michelle Saram fan!  Cheers for this wonderfully elegant young lady!

Donna Summer

Whispering Waves


       By the shore of the sea searching for his memory
       Sifting sand through my hand weighing what he means to me
       In the early morning haze seagulls seem to cry my pain
       And the ocean feels it too sighs his name on whispering waves

       Wrote his name next to mine big and deep there in the sand
       Till the earth tends to flow and our names will be drowned
       All the birds sing harmonies to the top line of the breeze
       While the ocean breathes his name on whispering waves

       There's a bistro where we would dine each evening
       Candle light and California wine
       Love is holding hands across the table
       I still go past each night
       Look for his car outside

       At the foot of this cliff we spent days weaving our dreams
       Making plans building homes raising kids and coloring scenes
       Then one morning he was gone and our story reached an end
       But his words still linger on on whispering waves

       By the shore of the sea searching for his memory
       Sifting sand through my hand weighing what he means to me
       All the birds sing harmonies to the top line of the breeze
       While the ocean breathes his name on whispering waves

Donna Summer, 63, passed away from lung cancer yesterday.  The Ultimate Disco Queen gave me the ultimate bar, club & discotheque memories of Manila's night life in the seventies--Q, Stargazer, Cellar, Jungle Bar, El Camarote, 1571, On, and Where Else?  And yet for me, the most haunting memories are brought forth not by the boom-boom beats of her greatest hits, but by her most intimate ballad.

Your music lives on in my heart.  Farewell.

Kelly Rutherford

Monique just loves watching reruns of Gossip Girl, and having seen a lot of episodes, I must say that I am quite fascinated with actress Kelly Rutherford, who plays Lily Van der Woodsen, the mother to the character of Blake Lively, on the TV show.  I understand that she is also a bag designer, and is an active philanthropist.   Always looking elegant, acting serene and standing statuesque, I give this lady two thumbs up!

Vegeta's Tribute to Whitney

The news is all over, Whitney Houston was found dead at her room in the Beverly Hills Hilton Hotel.  Anita pointed out this tribute to Whitney by Vegetta, husband of Bulma and arch-rival of Son Goku, courtesy of You Tube.  Take a good look!

Sports Illustrated

While I don't actually purchase copies of Sports Illustrated, it is quite a fun thing to wait up for the next beautiful athlete that will pose for the swimsuit edition of the magazine.  I understand that this time, the lady-in-the-spotlight is Alex Morgan of the US Women's soccer team--she is absolutely gorgeous!  I picked up the picture on the left from Yahoo! Sports and this is quite unique because that's not a swimsuit she's wearing--it's actually body paint!  That could've fooled me; it looks just like fabric!  Fantastic, if you ask me--both the body paint imaging and the beautiful lady featured!

Bruce Lee

I was watching the National Geographic channel last night and since they were running a documentary about the life of Bruce Lee, my eyes were glued to the screen till midnight!  You guessed it right, memories of kung fu action pics galore!  For the younger ones, he's the HK-American martial artist that made (almost) 5 movies in the early seventies--The Big Boss, The Fist of Fury, The Way of the Dragon, Enter the Dragon and The Game of Death (which was unfinished at the time of his untimely death in 1973).  I was a fan, no, make that an avid fan, as most of my other friends were too!  I remember patiently waiting in line to buy tickets at Universal Theater along Rizal Avenue to watch his movies--which were all SRO!  We simply couldn't believe the news of his death--he was Mr. Indestructible!  As I look back, his distinctive brand of action, plus his inimitable cocky facial artistry was the stuff all of us dreamed of!  He lives on in our hearts!

Taylor Swift

Such a graceful and charming young lady with wonderful talent--Taylor Swift!  The American singer-composer is a worldwide sensation, and at the age of 22, has remained the simple country girl despite all the glitzy trappings that stardom has brought her.  On the last leg of her Speak Now Tour (around 80 playing dates, all sold-out), she invited her best friend Selena Gomez to sing onstage at the Madison Square Garden, the first time ever that the two stars share a stage.  The BFF (Best Friends Forever) sang a duet on Selena's hit song "Who Says.

On the same concert show, the country star called out and introduced the legend himself--James Taylor--who sang his famous hit song "Fire and Rain" on a duet with Swift, and who played the guitar to accompany Swift on her hit song "Fifteen."  It may seem obvious, but for the record, Taylor Swift was named after James Taylor!

You're So Vain

You walked into the party like you were walking onto a yacht
Your hat strategically dipped below one eye
Your scarf it was apricot
You had one eye in the mirror as you watched yourself gavotte
And all the girls dreamed that they'd be your partner
They'd be your partner, and....

You're so vain, you probably think this song is about you
You're so vain, I'll bet you think this song is about you
Don't you? Don't you?

You had me several years ago when I was still quite naive
Well you said that we made such a pretty pair
and that you would never leave

But you gave away the things you loved and one of them was me
I had some dreams they were clouds in my coffee, clouds in my coffee and....

You're so vain, you probably think this song is about you.....
You're so vain, I'll bet you think this song is about you
Don't you? Don't you?

Well I hear you went up to Saratoga and your horse naturally won
Then you flew your Lear jet up to Nova Scotia to see the total eclipse of the sun
Well, you're where you should be all of the time
And when you're not you're with
Some underworld spy or the wife of a close friend
Wife of a close friend, and....

Carly Simon's No. 1 hit in 1973 has always been the subject of intense debate.  She had just married James Taylor at that time--so which of her previous lovers did she refer to?  Kris Kristofferson?  Warren Beatty?  Mick Jagger?  Cat Stevens?  I had for several years believed it was James Taylor because James did fly to Nova Scotia.  This was my cousin Fernando's theory, which I have believed from 1974 till a few years ago when I was corrected by a friend who believed it was Warren Beatty.  She has publicly given 3 clues--the name has the letters "A,"  "E" and "R," which would eliminate Kris Kristofferson & Cat Stevens, and just leave Warren Beatty and Mick Jagger (who sang background vocals on the song).  What do you think?

Park Ye Jin

Monique and Vicky have been watching the Korean telenovela "My Princess," and while the leading lady is quite beautiful, I find the contrabida kinda cute and attractive, much to the chagrin of everyone else in the family. The actress playing the contrabida part is Park Ye Jin, and she plays a strong-willed museum director in the TV series. I especially like storyline--while her character is strong-willed and decisive, she also realizes that she's stress-out thus forcing her to reach out to her boyfriend. Just like Mentos, hard and crunchy on the outside but soft and sweet on the inside!

Real-Life Princess

I found this heartwarming tale on today's news flash--

When Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge, arrived at Calgary, Alberta, a 6 year-old gir named Diamond Marshall broke protocal and rushed into her royal idol's warm embrace.  Diamond (her bald head is due to chemotherapy) suffers from a rare form of cancer, as her mother did before her, and had wished to meet a real-life princess.  Her other idol is Princess Aurora, of Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty.

Ashley Tishdale

I just watched Aliens in the Attic on Cable TV, and realized that Ashely Tishdale appeared as a teen in this movie.  It's strange that I found this lady more exciting to watch in High School Musical than Vanessa Hudgens, who was the star of that show.  I felt that she had funk & pizazz, and her portrayal of the contrabida was interesting and enjoyable.  I understand that this actress is actually a veteran acting hand, having played Cosette in the Korean stage production of Les Miserables when she was a child.  I googled her bio and learned that she posed nude last month for the magazing Allure.  Now that's what I call an alluring photo!