JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

Ordinarily we ignore the pronouncements of people who get hit on the head a lot in the line of work, no matter how ignorant, vile and barbaric they are. But this person is running for office, this person we have looked upon as our champion. We will not stand for this. You don’t fuck with my friends, asshole.

So delete his picture, his name, any indication of his existence from your blogs, your Facebook Twitter Instagram, all your social media. You don’t have to say anything other than “I have deleted Pacquiao from this post.” The deletion IS the statement. Talking about him will only increase his chances of getting elected. Let’s forget his existence.

We will not have this blight upon our community of human beings. Erase him. You have that power.

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To all our straight guy friends: Don’t just stand on the sidelines chuckling as if this were some melodrama that involves only the LGBTIQ and the girls they are friends with. This is not about sex or gender, this is about being human. Don’t just be guys, be mensches. Just do it (Thank you, Nike).

Yikes, I look demented.

Ninety-five people attended last night’s almost-instant Free Workshop at the WSI Corporate Center. I had a blast, and I especially enjoyed listening to the participants’ story ideas and pointing out the approaches and directions they can take.

Many thanks to our friend Juan for letting us use the WSI conference hall, Victor Yang and the techs at WSI for setting up the facilities including the video conference and audio recording perfectly, and our original workshop elves Roni, Angus, Deo, Momelia and Bubbles for manning the registration desk.

You and your group of up to 20 (even 30) people can book your own workshop on any of these subjects:

The Essay
The Short Story
The Personal Essay (Memoirs)
The Novel
Writing for Beginners
Movie Reviews
Travel Essays
Interviews and Personality Profiles
Feature Articles
Poetry
Writing Refresher Course
Starting A Book Club

Each workshop is tailored to your requirements, and can take from one to four two-hour sessions.

Workshops can be held at your office or a venue of your choice. If you do not have a venue in mind, we can book a conference room in Makati for you.

For inquiries, or to book a workshop for your group, email saffron.safin@gmail.com.

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About the teacher

Jessica Zafra is a columnist at the Philippine Star, BusinessWorld, and InterAksyon. She has written two collections of short stories and a dozen Twisted collections of essays on film, literature, travel, rock music, popular culture and politics. Her work has appeared in the New Yorker, Newsweek, the Hong Kong Standard, and The National. She was editor-in-chief of Flip: The Official Guide to World Domination, and the annual literary journal Manila Envelope.

Outside of publishing, Jessica has hosted talk shows on the FM stations NU-107 and K-Lite, and the TV show Points of View. She is an executive producer on the film Norte by Lav Diaz and screenwriter of Esoterika: Manila by Elwood Perez. Her new TV show will premiere this year. Visit her website, www.JessicaRulestheUniverse.com.

Maeve Dermody and Aidan Turner in Agatha Christie’s And then there were none

Before long they start dying one by one, and no one suggests that they all stay in one room to watch each other. However, at some point they search the rooms, giving Aidan Turner an excuse to take off his clothes. I am not making this up. So he’s leaning against the door, smouldering so hard I feared the wallpaper would combust, clad only in a towel so you can count his abs and slice your retina on his hip cleft. He goes on wearing just the towel long after the search is over, and all I can say is, Five stars for the Beeb! I have not read the Agatha Christie source material, and I strongly doubt that she wrote the towel scene, but who cares. Cover your granny’s eyes, this may kill her.

Read our TV column, The Binge.

Keanu Reeves narrates. . .from the future.

By the end you will understand quantum mechanics.

Caltech’s Institute for Quantum Information and Matter collaborated with Trouper Productions to create the short in celebration of its Quantum Summit, an event where experts discuss the future of various quantum technologies. So the short film serves as advertising and entertainment—but it’s also an introduction to the basics of quantum mechanics, which you learn as Paul Rudd does.

“Seven hundred years ago,” future-Reeves intones at the beginning of the video, “Paul Rudd changed the course of history by showing the world that anyone could grapple with the concepts of quantum mechanics.” Rudd achieves this goal through the clever game of quantum chess, where the pieces must obey both the rules of chess and the laws of quantum mechanics. To understand what’s going on in this game, you have to master two quantum principles: superposition and entanglement.

Read on.

Wait, weren’t you supposed to do your first workshop for the year at Ayala Museum on Thursday?

It’s been cancelled.

I got an email at 8am saying, “Due to low turnout of participants, we have to cancel the workshop for Movie Reviews.”

Oh, really? The day after my second announcement appeared in the Philippine Star? With four days to go, when historically participants wait until the very last minute to register and pay the fee? The first workshop of the year, without which the series straggles along like a headless corpse?

“We will push further with the rest of the workshops,” the email went on to say, whatever that means.

What for? Just cancel the entire series for the year.

Then I had a brainwave: I’m going to do workshops and organize them myself. And since I’m free on Thursday anyway, I’m going to give a FREE WORKSHOP, how about that? Yes, the first taste is free. I think I’ll call my workshop You Do Not Cancel My Motherfucking Workshop. Naah, I’ll call it THE CRAFT AND PRACTICE OF WRITING. For anyone who has ever contemplated the writing life.

Thursday, 18 February, 1830 at the office of BBDO-Guerrero, Frabelle Building (the one with Wildflour on the ground floor), Rada Street (up the street from Union Church), Legazpi Village, Makati.

You need to register by posting a comment here, or sending an email to saffron.safin@gmail.com. Quick, quick, quick, I need to know how many people will turn up.

The more I think about it, the more I like this idea. Why do people piss me off? Don’t they know I live for conflict? Oh right, I’ve been quiet and polite for a long time. Screw that. I’m taking the swords out of the lockbox. See you on Thursday. Tell your friends. Tell everybody. Tweet and repost this.

Update: Here’s our low turnout count as of 1100 of Thursday the 18th.

Registered on Comments section: brewhuh23, Momelia, balqis, santi01 + 1, cookie, Jules, unlimitedgrubgrabs (If you are a spammer, your ass is dead), leiastrud, themark, Leoj, paulaxgianna + 1, tsitai + 1, Ronigurl, kittyb73, gerezimdelapena, Angus, egfallorina, jichuacuco.

Overseas, will attend via video link: spooky, primavera579, alpha12, toyomansi, Cacs, Miray, traceea. To avoid bandwidth issues we are no longer accepting participants via Skype. The address will be emailed to you.

Registered by email: Christian, Carla, Glaiza, Florence + 1, Pb + 1, Murshamir, Erlyn, Dylan, Kate, Fidel, Shala, Jove, Niccolo, Mikhaela, Judith, Irish, Nelson, Kate, Leonora, Johanna, Joanne, Wenz, Dolarica, Marvin, Ancel, Jessica, Joyce, Roch, Rizza, Glaiza Mae, Lucille, Fatima, Roxanne, Albert, Tim, Jeffrey + 1, L.A., Gielizza, John Paul, Anna, Aldrin, David, Grace Anne, Antoniette, Martika, Joe, Anna, Dan, Nissa, Jenica, Rizza, Polly, Chuckie, Marisol, John Michael, Hanniel, Monique, Patricia, Mikaela, Nora, Melissa, Pia, Cherry, Barbie, Bianca, Jhantzen, Angelico, Phia + 1, Jayne, Roselle, Maika, Amy, Janina, Patricia, Kalel, Zoe, Pia, Jannah, Mary Grace, Katherine, Camille, Lynn, Rosette, Chuck, Denison, Hans, Jerome, Agel, Bong, Paula, Michaelo, Christine, Patricia, Janus, Jamaica, Mafe, Jannica, Elai, Lei, Dinnah, Kate, Sharmaine, Mikee, Kim, Emman, Aldrine, Mari, Chenie, Romina, Jules, Christine Ingrid, Lyka, Chrixy, Rosette, Ronalyn, Zonel, Franco, Joy, Tami, Sandino, Aytch, Judy.

15 from BBDO Guerrero
2 from Campaigns & Grey

We are no longer accepting participants, so stop grovelling. We expect that not everyone who registered will show up. If you registered, you had better make sure you appear or you will be barred from any future workshops. You think I’m kidding? This is serious shit.

The venue is

7th floor, WSI (Wordtext Systems) Corporate Center
1005 Metropolitan Avenue (beside Ecoville, near the Makati Fire Station)
Makati 1205

This is a map to WSI.

Ask me again where the venue is and YOU’RE OUT OF HERE.

Do not ask me when the next free workshop is. WHAT ARE YOU, CHEAP?

Participants, “Be there by 630” means “BE THERE BEFORE 630.” Of course there’s traffic. DEAL WITH IT.

Do not be late. THE GATES CLOSE AT 630.

And if you have to ask if you can take selfies with me, YOU HAVE NEVER READ MY WORK, GET OUT.

If any of this causes you distress, forget about writing altogether because YOU DO NOT HAVE THE SPINE TO BE A WRITER.

NO ONE was more excited about the return of The X-Files than I was. In the 1990s, that show was my life in an alternate universe. I never met a limb-stretching serial killer who killed people and stole their livers, then hibernated for 30 years in a nest of newspapers, but Tooms was an improvement on some people I knew. (At least Tooms admitted he was a monster.) I did meet some of my favorite people because of The X-Files — they would send me unsigned letters sealed with an X in aluminum foil. On my radio show we would spend an hour discussing the latest episodes, particularly the progress of the Fox Mulder-Dana Scully relationship, whether David Duchovny broke out of deadpan, and whether he could be legally compelled to wear the tiny red Speedo more often. (Obviously we had no advertisers.) Hell, I read Gravity’s Rainbow because it was the subject of Duchovny’s doctoral dissertation.

In case you are very young or were in a cult during the ’90s, The X-Files was about FBI Special Agent Fox Mulder, whose obsession with extraterrestrials and paranormal phenomena began with what he believes to be the abduction of his younger sister by aliens when he was 12. The FBI puts him in charge of the X-Files, the department which looks into weird, unexplained occurrences, then assigns Special Agent Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) as his partner. Scully, a skeptic, a pragmatist, and a medical doctor, debunks Mulder’s theories at first, but as the series progresses she becomes a reluctant believer. It helped the series that its two stars had mad chemistry — I, for one, am still waiting for them to announce that they’ve been together all this time.

Read our TV column The Binge.