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Irony-on T-shirts, originally uploaded by 160507.

Brilliant cartoon, makes coffee spurt out of nose.

Kermit the Cat, originally uploaded by 160507.

Things I knew about James Blunt before yesterday:
1. If you hear his hit song 200 times in a row, you fly into a murderous rage.
2. He briefly dated the model Petra Nemcova who appears on the billboards of a local clothing brand.
3. He served in the British army and was in the UN peacekeeping force in Kosovo.

Things I learned about Blunt from Kermit, one of his first fans in Manila.
1. His accent was considered too posh by British record labels.
2. The original spelling of his name is “Blount”.
3. One of his ancestors was a mistress of Henry VIII and his family has been the keepers of some lighthouse for 14 generations.
4. He was voted second most annoying pop star in Britain, after Paul McCartney.
5. Carrie Fisher was his landlady in Los Angeles.

Must ask Kermit if James is related to Anthony, who was the Keeper of the Queen’s Pictures and head of the Courthauldt Institute until he was unmasked as a Russian spy.

Things I learned after Kermit compelled us to watch James Blunt at Araneta Coliseum in the most vicious way possible (He bought us patron tickets, making it impossible to resist).
1. Blunt’s voice recalls the Bee Gees, which is not a bad thing.
2. He puts on a good, solid show that one can enjoy even if she knows exactly one Blunt song (the one that triggers murderous rage).
3. He seems very down-to-earth, does not whore himself out to the audience, or make cute patter. The concert was actually about the music.
4. The venue was half-full, but nearly everyone in it knew all of Blunt’s songs and sang them back to him.
5. All this talk of Kosovo makes me think I should’ve been a war correspondent. True, I don’t like discomfort and I demand a private bathroom, but I’m calm in a crisis plus I’ve read a lot of epics.

Cape Bojeador, originally uploaded by 160507.

My article on Ilocos Norte appears in the May issue of Travel+Leisure (Southeast Asia). The best time to go is December. I went in October, it was boiling.

I’m getting this site organized and posting links to articles I’ve written for foreign publications. See Podcasts + Journalism, above. So far I’ve found links to some Hong Kong Standard pieces, but not all of them. There’s quite a lot of stuff published in Newsweek (Centennial, the fall of Erap, female golfers, “porn”, Pinoy youth, etc), the defunct Asiaweek (yayas and world domination, etc), and the catalogue of the Far East Film festival in Udine, Italy, which I haven’t found online, not that I’ve looked very hard and I have some deadlines looming.

If you find my articles in the abovementioned publications online (the pieces not yet included in the Podcasts + Journalism listing; I’m adding them as they come in), please post the links here and I’ll give you a book for your trouble. One book per link. I’ll be in touch on Saturday.

Koosi in the kitchen, originally uploaded by 160507.

Happy Birthday to my eldest cat Koosi, who adopted me in 1999. I found her sitting in a patch of sunlight on the sidewalk in front of the Today office while cars and buses roared by. My sister named her after the imaginary friend in Dexter’s Laboratory. Koosi is the most antisocial cat in the house, preferring to hang out on the tops of bookshelves and cabinets. When she deigns to come down she announces her presence by biting my toes. Her favorite pastime these days is people-watching from the living room window. She thinks she is invisible.

Winding Stair bookshop, originally uploaded by 160507.

Twisted 8 is now available at The Winding Stair bookshop in Dublin, Ireland. Retail price: 10 euros. The Winding Stair is on Dublin’s northern Quays, close to the Ha’penny Bridge, just 5 minutes’ walk from O’Connell Street. Ige Ramos, who designed and co-published our book, also lugged the copies to Dublin and delivered them yesterday. We love the Irish. Especially Daniel Day-Lewis. And James Joyce. W. B. Yeats. The makers of Guinness. And the people who made Once, and Colin Farrell. . .

Twisted 8 will soon be available in other bookshops in Ireland and Europe. For inquiries, email zeusbooks.twisted8@gmail.com.

REMINDER: If your comment appears in Dibs! the book you asked for is yours. You can pick it up during office hours at Anvil Publishing, 8007B Pioneer St Mandaluyong near Shaw Boulevard. Look for Ms Jo Pantorillo.

Tune in to Lisa Macuja’s weekly radio show Art 2 Art: Usapang sining at kultura para sa lahat, Sundays at 3.30pm on DZRH. The show marks its first anniversary this month; I’m the featured guest this afternoon. We talk about books. The show was taped at the radio station a couple of weeks ago. I met the comedian Palito in the hallway. He’s a volunteer on their Operation Tulong program. I asked if I could take his picture, and he said okay, then he said we should all be in the photo. Remind me to post the photo later, I’m sleepy. I drank too much wine at dinner, and heard many versions of Relight My Fire by Take That (pre-breakup, and post-Robbie Williams). We also watched a recent concert by A-Ha, even if we only remembered two of their songs plus the theme from the Bond movie (Aaaaaah, the living daylights). The handsome vocalist whose name we can’t remember looks fabulous and hasn’t aged since the mid-80s. Let’s go to Norway.

Bloody Twisted Valentine Cake, originally uploaded by 160507.

This is My Bloody Twisted Valentine Cake, the latest creation of the Dessert Diva. It was awarded to the winner of our story contest, sylviaplathsghost. It’s Strawberries and Chocolate Cream—layers of chocolate meringue sandwiched in chocolate cream and strawberries under a blanket of chocolate roses. If the leaders of our nation ever tell us to eat cake, we hope they mean this.

Twisted 8, originally uploaded by 160507. TWISTED 8 by Jessica Zafra. Now available (P250) at Cibo and Cafe Bola branches, National Bookstores, Powerbooks. We deliver orders of 10 copies or more; email zeusbooks.twisted8@gmail.com.

Every so often on this blog I give away books as prizes for contests, as cheap bribes, or to make space on my shelves. The winners are notified by email to claim their prizes at the offices of Anvil Publishing in Mandaluyong (fairly accessible, near Robinson’s Pioneer). Jo at Anvil has informed me that many of the books have not been claimed. Please claim your prizes by the end of this week, or I’ll have to think up another contest and give them away again. If you live outside of Metro Manila, have someone pick them up.

Now sold at Cibo.JPG, originally uploaded by 160507.

We can’t stock the bookstore shelves fast enough, so TWISTED 8 IS NOW ALSO AVAILABLE AT CIBO AND CAFE BOLA. Have your TWISTED 8 straight up, or with a tiramisu and espresso, or a spinach gorgonzola dip and mint iced tea, or a chicharon pizza, or anything on the menu, as long as you get it. Cibo is open at Greenbelt 5, Glorietta 4, Shangri-La Plaza, Alabang Town Center, Promenade Greenhills, ABS-CBN in QC, Power Plant Rockwell, Gateway Cubao, and Trinoma QC. Cafe Bola is at Greenbelt 3 and Araneta Coliseum, Cubao. Andiamo!

If you missed the reading and book-signing at Ateneo last week, you could get your organization or your class to invite me back. Just email zeusbooks.twisted8@gmail.com.

Is your romantic history a strange mash-up of Fatal Attraction (Meet, boink, stalk, kill rabbit, rethink big hair), Letter From An Unknown Woman (They meet, he seduces her, they meet again years later, he seduces her again. . .having forgotten than he had already seduced her), and Kill Bill (He kills her, she kills everyone)? Or maybe The Exorcist (The 360-degree head spin, projectile hurling, speaking in deep voices and all the symptoms of demon possession) and The Crying Game (She’s a dude)? Or is it in a more literary vein, like Wuthering Heights (Obsess, obsess, obsess, die) or The End Of The Affair (Obsess, obsess, die, obsess, obsess)?

Then it’s not a total catastrophe. You could write a novel, or make a movie, or join My Bloody Twisted Valentine contest and win a heart-stopping cake created by the Dessert Diva! (Picture to follow as the cake is still being invented.)

Beginning today until February 12, tell us your true Horrible/ Heinous/ Heart-rending/ Hilarious (or Horrible, Heinous, Heart-rending And Hilarious) love story in the Comments section of this entry. The Jury composed of various characters who have appeared in this blog will choose One Winner of My Bloody Twisted Valentine Cake, to be delivered within the Metro Manila area on February 13. If you live abroad, we can deliver it to your ex/crush/anyone you nominate within the Metro Manila area.

Happy endings are allowed. Pseudonyms are recommended to protect the not so innocent. No minimum or maximum word count, let it bleed.

Cats with books, originally uploaded by 160507.

I (not Koosi my ginger cat, who hates humans) am doing a TWISTED 8 reading and book-signing tomorrow, 30 January, 4 to 6pm at the Fajardo Room, De La Costa Building, Ateneo de Manila in QC. If you’re on campus and you’re not doing anything, pop over, buy a book, have it signed, and see my co-publisher Ige Ramos’s live montage of climactic moments in Nora Aunor movies.

If you’d like to schedule a TWISTED 8 event at your school, email us at zeusbooks.twisted8@gmail.com.