The Magnificat

The Magnificat is a beautiful prayer and we can learn so much from it. However, I’ll just keep this brief because I figure if I really do go in depth, it might take quite a while and I don’t have the patience so I’ll just try to keep this simple yet meaningful.

“My Soul glorifies the Lord,
My Spirit rejoices in God my Saviour”

Thus begins Mary’s lovely song of praise that is witnessed by her kinswoman Elizabeth with both the unborn Jesus and the unborn John the Baptist in these women’s wombs. Notice, Elizabeth praises Mary and Mary in her immense humility turns the praises to God. That I guess is what happens when we pray the Hail Mary and echo some of Elizabeth’s words, she immediately glorifies the Lord.

Why does her soul and spirit glorify the Lord?

“For He has looked on His servant in Her lowliness,
Henceforth all ages will call me blessed.”

God has looked at His lowly handmaid, a young virgin girl of only 14 and has chosen her to be the mother of His Son. Mary knows that it is the Lord that makes her worthy of our praise and admiration and actually prophesizes that all generations will call her “blessed”. Thus, it could be said that those who do not praise Mary and give her due respect are actually not following the Word of God.

Mary actually here shows us that God in his immense love and wisdom can and will use anyone of us no matter how unworthy we feel we might be. It recalls the story of St Juan Diego and Our Lady of Guadalupe. St Juan Diego was a simple man with no education or anything and Our Lady appeared to him and commissioned him to have a church built in her honour in Mexico. He said that he was not the right person for the job as he did not know how to talk to those in power but Our Lady gave him the strength and courage through his humility and his simple humble act together with the ultimate humility of Our Lady, together helped convert almost the entire population of Mexico in less than a single generation.

“The Almighty works marvels for me,
Holy is His name,
His mercy is from Age to Age,
On those who fear Him,”

Our Lady then talks about the amazing things that God has done for her and she actually tells us why or maybe how it is that she had won God’s favour. She says that He shows His mercy on all those who “fear” Him. What does this fear of God mean?

Most of us would rightly see fear as a bad thing and it is if it keeps us from being all that we could be. However, this fear that is being spoken of here and in many other places in the Bible is actually a fear of being apart from the presence of God. I think that could be more accurate than when people think that it is a fear of God’s wrath. Yes, that is important but for the loss of God is an even scarier thing. We should all have this fear of the loss of God within us and thus hope never to do anything that might cause that to happen. So the fear of God, this Holy Fear, would actually help keep us from sin. And when we have this Holy Fear, God’s mercy will be upon us and He will work marvels for us.

“He puts forth His arm in strength,
And scatters the proud-hearted,
He casts the mighty from their thrones,
And raises the lowly,
He fills the starving with good things,
Sends the rich away empty,”

This is quite simple and complex. I remember somebody, probably Bro. Mike, calling it an ecclesiastical revolution of something. That’s just a fancy way of saying that God will change everything and that what we expect to happen might not always happen. God changes everything and if you’re leading a comfortable life at the expense of others then we need to know that God might change that at any time. Same for the opposite.

“He protects Israel is servant,
Remembering his mercy,
The mercy promised to our fathers,
To Abraham and his sons forever.

I read something recently about how if Abraham is the father of faith, then Mary, is the mother of faith and the similarities between the two are astounding. Both we told about miracle births that involved them, Abraham about how Sarah, his wife who was super-old was going to conceive and Mary about how she would experience an immaculate conception. Also, how both their journeys of faith ended on a mountain. Abraham leads Isaac up to a mountain to sacrifice him for God and God stops it before anything and a ram is sacrificed instead. Mary follows Jesus up to Golgotha and witnesses how God has His own Son sacrificed for all mankind. So God remembers the mercy of Abraham by sacrificing His own dear Son not just for Abraham but for all of us, forever.

As I’m still trying out this blogging thing, I’m not sure about how to end and so I’ll just stop here and say something brief and simple.

Thank you God for your gift of Mary and Thank you for everything you have done for all of us. Thank you for your mercy and all your marvels.

The Annunciation

The Youth In the Spirit Seminar has just come to a close and I was just looking at some stuff in the Bible and realising that what we did at the camp actually can be understood by looking at the mystery of the Annunciation.

Reflecting on this mystery is important for me because I remember telling a lot of people to be like Mary and to say “Yes” so that Jesus can come alive within them. It occurs to me now that in doing something like that, we, the ministers, are actually playing the role of the Archangel Gabriel. We are bringing the news that God wants to live inside all our participants.

It is interesting that the words said by the angel are similar to the words we sometimes use while undertaking the work of ministering. We tend to echo the angel’s words, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.” Now, as for the next bit of that line (Luke 1:35), the angel says, “therefore, the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God.” Do we say this? Does this apply?

(OK, I’m no expert so all I can give is my opinion. Hopefully it helps but if it is in anyway wrong, please do feel free to correct me. I really don’t want to tie a millstone around my neck for leading sheep astray.)

When we pray for the Holy Spirit to fall upon somebody, we should pray for a child to be born within that person. No. I do not mean literally. I mean that the Holy Spirit, when He first comes into contact with a person, would create a new person, a new Child of God. I guess that’s why I feel that the theme for this year, “All Things New” was a truly inspired theme. Anyway, we should thus pray for an awakening, within the person we pray over, of a new Child of God who will be holy, so holy that he/she will be called a Child of God. I guess that is what many people come to the camp seeking to achieve. Thus we need to be their angels and serve them in the same way the Archangel serves the Mother of God.

So if the ministers play the role of the Archangel Gabriel, it follows that the participants, those who have received the gift of the Holy Spirit should play the role of Mary. Mary is given a mission by the angel and she carries out this mission even though it is rather difficult especially in her new state. She brings Jesus to her relative and there is no outward show of Him but rather, He is concealed within her. Do we who have received the Holy Spirit do such a thing?

Let’s examine this a little further. Do we carry Jesus around like Mary does, in such a way as to give joy to others even though they might not be able to outwardly see Him? I tend to not be a huge fan of extreme evangelists who keep preaching of fire and brimstone and how everybody must accept Jesus as Lord or they’ll go to hell or something. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that it’s a sin or anything; I’m just saying that I just don’t think it’s effective. I think we should just follow Mary’s example and start with our own circle of friends and family and that we should carry Jesus to them such that it will give the joy that only He can give.

Let’s just embark on that mission then, all of us who have received new life after our YISS. Let us serve those around us with a spirit of Love and Joy such that those around us can see and even feel the Joy of Jesus within us. Let us start small, with our family and close friends and just spread His Love.

Right, I know I said I was going to reflect on the Annunciation but then went on to talk about the visitation and I apologise but I felt that putting them together might be a little clearer. I have a strange feeling my next post will continue on from here and look at the Magnificat, Mary’s beautiful song of praise to God.

Revival

Aloha,

I've decided to revive my moribund blog and change it up a bit...

First, I will actually post stuff regularly...

Second, I will not post pictures of my holiday/exchange in Hawaii anymore... (You can just get those pictures by adding me on facebook). I might put other pictures up though.

Third, I will be using my blog as something to help me wih my quiet time and reflections.

In other words, this blog will be a *gasp* religious blog. I know last time it had some religious elements but now it will have a lot more. I think, knowing who I am and what I enjoy doing, this will also have reviews on movies, books and comic books probably. It might have some poetry I might write, if I actually start writing poetry again. It might have some advertising of events that might happen like upcoming plays that I think would be awesome or movies that I really want to watch and stuff.

Yup, that's it... The DNR has been removed from my blog and now like people who've had a near death experience, this blog is going to do things different. It will really start living now...

Mahalo for reading...

For Lou...

I know I haven't posted anything since Halloween and there's a good reason for that. I'm lazy...

But today I need to post something because, well, just because...

Today my friend Lou took her life. It is a sad day. At times like these I always ask myself why. And guess what... I don't know why. Stuff just happens that we might never understand. It is unfair but well... nothing, it's just unfair.

I got my stuff from Amazon today and one of the books that I got is Richard Bach's "Messiah's Handbook: Reminders for the Advanced Soul". Several years ago, my friend Maxine recommended a book called "Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah". It was not a Christian book but there were many wise sayings in there that can be applied to life. It was a book that changed my life and I hope I still have it somewhere at home.

Anyway, I picked up the new book and followed the instructions. Think of a question, close your eyes, flip through the pages of the book, stop at one of the pages, then choose, left page or right... I know it's funny but that's what the book really says. And this is the page I came to:

"You're the master of what you've lived,
artisan at what you're living,
amateur at what's next to live."

What does it all mean? Nothing. At the beginning of Messiah's Handbook, there's a disclaimer that's found at the end Illusions too. It says that when the person who "gave" this book to the "author" got killed by an angry mob, he asked himself why such a good man had to die such a senseless death. He flipped through the book and came to a page that said, "Everything is this book may be wrong." And that's it isn't it.

We can never have all the answers, but keep asking the questions anyway. There is no book that can tell you all you want to know or need to know, keep reading anyway. And I can't write anything smart to complete this paragraph but that's just like life. Seldom is there going to be a punchline to end it all. Who cares. Just sit back, enjoy the show and when the end comes... It just ends.

Lou, we'll miss you...

Halloween

Here a picture of some of the Krazy Kalo people. That's me in the scary mask. And next to me are Jess "the pirate", Mary "the hot little mermaid", Cassius "the classic basketball guy", Ben "the rubber duckie', John "the Karate Kid", Jess "the lady bug", Hassan "the Indian Maharaja" and Kim "the Bumble Bee"...



That's Cheerleader Kristie, Scary Don and Batgirl Lou from Japan...



My housemates Dan and Dick as "undercover Narcotics officers who are corrupt and do whatever they confiscate"...



That's Aaron, "Tom Cruise from Dirty Money", Dan, Hannah "a leopard from down-under", Binh "the Japanese Schoolgirl from Vietnam" and Jenn "Helllloooo Nurse"...



That's me and the kind soul Justin who gave me the burger when I was tailgating last Saturday. He's Zorro, and I don't know who the other guy is. That's what the rest of the pictures are like. I really have no idea who these people are...



Oompa Loompas!!!



Makes you wanna go to heaven don't it? Angels like that make me wanna trade in my horns...



Captain Caveman!!!



Native Hawaiian Soccer Player... Yep, Sweeper...



japanese Bunnies...



Father Time...



Even those in wheelchairs are getting involved in Halloween! This dude is a Nascar Racer! Coolness!!!



With Zeus and Aphrodite...




Two pictures that sort of give you an Idea of how crazy crowded it gets in Waikiki during Halloween... It really was super fun... And I'm bringing back my mask so guys, it's time for some more fun in Central 6...

preparations for halloween

I went for a little fall party last sunday and we played lots of fun games and had lots of good food too. Here are some pictures.



That's me and the pumpkin I helped to carve with my group. My groupmates were Hsinying from Taiwan and Marcus from Washington who is a member of YWAM as well...



Some of the Pumpkins that were carved...



That's Marcus with two guys from Kathmandu Nepal...




A picture of some of the girls at the party. Sumi from Malaysia, Laura from Minnesota (YWAM), Hiromi from Japan, Hsinying, and Ayaka from Japan...



Here's Agustinho from Timor Lieste, Laura and June from Yunnan China carving their pumpkin.

Yup, prep for halloween was fun but halloween it self was way nuts... pictures coming soon...

My first football game

I went for my first football game on Saturday and it was a lot of fun. The thing I will take back the most from that experience will be the experience of tailgating. I know many drivers out there will tell you that following too closely behind someone is very dangerous but I'm not talking about that kind of tailgating. Tailgating is what happens before football games. Familes or friends will go down early for the games and set up a barbi and kegs or coolers full of beer. Some will come bringing tents and radios or even tvs all to enjoy the game at the stadium. Yes, not in the stadium but at the stadium. They never enter the stadium to watch the game but remain outside in the carpark roasting hotdogs or making burgers or something. And that something is known as getting very happily drunk...

Here are some pictures of my 1st game...



This is the Aloha stadium which is a sad stadium. it is sad because Hawaii has no NFL team. That is also why UH games are so huge here because it is the only thing that hawaiian can do together in terms of sport. It is also sad because it is painted rust brown. Really it's paint but everybody just thinks it's a rickety old stadium.



here's a picture of some very kind people who gave me a burger which was very tasty indeed. They gave it to me for nothing and the reason, that's the spirit of tailgating. to give and not to count the cost. they just give willingly. It's all about sharing the love that is the Aloha spirit!



here's a picture of my friend George playing beer pong which is a game in which you try to bounce a ping pong ball into a cup of beer. Just look at the concentration on his face...



here's a picture of the stadium from the inside. hawaii smashed Idaho 68-10. What can i say, these warriors rock. And yes Idaho that's right, U da HO...



Hawaii is in black and Idaho is in white...



these are two pictures from the halftime show which was hugely entertaining. The marching band got into costume and stuff because one, it's halloween and two, because it was the homecoming game. There were also these little girls who were dancing with their dad's which i though was super adorable. The dad's wore t-shirts saying Dads and they danced too and did cartwheels and stuff to boot. Hugely funny...



And yes, the obligatory picture of the uber-cure cheerleader... Uber, uber cute...

the other movie

I know I left you guys in a dirch with my last post and kept you in suspence for the last movie but I'd like you guys to know that this was for good reason. I felt that this movie needed a whole post all to itself. Heck, honestly, it needs way more than that but I can't afford to do that. Besides, it's pretty tough to talk about it at length without killing it for everybody.


The movie I want to talk about it called Rang De Basanti and it is pretty much the best film I've seen all year and just to continue my use of the hyperbole, pretty much the best film I've seen in a long time. It is a Hindi movie which if translated in Singaporeanish is a Hindustani movie. It is the 2nd highest grossing movie in Indian cinema in this past decade. It broke many box office records in India. And it did all this without Shah Rukh Khan, Aishwarya Rai and Amitabh Bachan. (If I spelt any of the aforementioned names wrongly you have my sincerest apologies. Make that a thousand apologies.)

Yes, I am a losy Indian boy who has never until this movie sat through an entire movie from India. (Gandhi does not count. It was made by Sir Richard Attenborough) The only time I managed to watch a large chunk of a movie from India is that Christmas at Auntie Michelle's where all the slackers were just watching some Shah Rukh Khan movie. I still needed help from Amrit to tell me what I had missed. Anyway, that was a pretty memorable Christmas. I don't think anything says Christmas like Indian cinema and curry. And by the way, I am serious about the curry part. If I do happen to stay in Hawaii for Christmas it will be the first Christmas for me ever with no curry. (I miss my mummy's tulang curry)

Back to the movie. Rang De Basanti means The Colour of Sacrifice and the only big name it has in the cast was Amir Khan. It was directed by Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra and I shook his hand after the movie. Seriously. The first big time movie director I've ever had the pleasure of shaking hands with. Gosh I wish I took a picture of that. Besides that the cast was made up of smaller actors one of whom reminds me of one of the slackers, Mr Siddarth Khapur and another reminds me of my cousin Ashley. Ashley's a guy by the way. I'm not too sure about whether his name has an "e" but the rest of his siblings have the "e" so i'm guessing it does.

The movie, like any respectable Bollywood movie, had an intermission. As to why I would bring this up, the reason is simple. The said intermission was so well placed as to split the movie into 2 parts. The first part of the movie was merely an ordinary picture of college life with drunken nights and merry making. There were the obligatory love stories and the story of the father who wants the son to further his education. The furthering of education bit is such a stalwart of Indian cinema it's incredible. There was also a line which appears in many college films. The "In college I am somebody but once I leave and go into the real world, I am nobody" schpiel. The quintessential line for many college students who realise that college, in no way, reflects the world out there. This group of students is also known as everybody, ... hopefully.

The second part of the movie is undescribable. Well, I lie. In actuality I could describe it but I just don't want to. This is because i really want everybody to go out and watch this movie. It is well worth whatever you need to pay to watch a Hindustani movie. The difficult part might be in finding the cinema that still shows it. If all else fails, just wait a while because from what I've heard, Rang De Basanti is the official entry from India for the Academy Awards. Thus, it might have a second showing closer to the awards. Or just get the DVD. Don't ask me where from but I'm guessing Mustafa Centre.

This movie will blow you away. It is a brilliant cinematic experience and an all round great movie. I am pretty good at predicting Oscar winning movies after watching movies just once. I am proud to say that I predicted Gladiator would win the Oscar on the opening night. I also predicted that Battlefield Earth would win the Razzies which it made a clean sweep of. One more reason to show that Scientology fries your brain. (The Razzies are the anti-Oscars) Anyway, I'm predicting that Rang De Basanti will take the Best Foreign Film Oscar. And when that happens it will mean that I am 2 degrees of Separation from the Oscar considering I shook the Director's hand.

Anyway, apart from awards and box office success, the film was also big in another way. It changed Indian society. It made students awake from their slumber and take to the streets like proper students to protest the injustices of the nation they lived in. This by the way is why we at NUS hardly have any time to do much. We are overworked so that we can't do anything crazy on the streets. The powers that be probably decided that the best thing to do was to give us so much work that the phrase idle time does not appear in our vocabulary. I think they should just make beer cheaper for students and thus achieve the same objectives. Of course maybe it just makes us smarter and I am just propogating insane conspiracy theories because conspiracy theories are cool. By the way, to any Government people reading this, I have a tendency to jest so do not take this seriously. Except the part about watching the movie. Go do that.

Yeah, since the movie came out there have been many protests in India, non-violent protests, trying to fight the machine of injustice that is so rampant in that country. Many people know that India has the potential to explode into a truly great nation and yet everybody also knows that the capacity for Indians to self-destruct is also boundless. (Ok, this might not be an appropriate time to make jokes about the bindi - the little red dot on the foreheads of many Indians) Anyway, many students who lead these candlelit procession quote the movie and claim that it was the movie that inspired them to try and change the world they live in.

On a more serious note, the movie inspired me. It showed me that my generation should be called the "Sleeping Beauty Generation". Forget the Gen-X ers or the Gen-Y - (I still think that Gen-Y is a retarded Euphemism). This generation I claim to belong to is full of potential but we all just need something to rouse us from our sleep. We are an enormous powder-keg just looking for something to ignite us to cause us to explode to our full potential. We have the power to change the world but we just need to know what we want to change it into. Once the initial point of inspiration is begotten then, I believe, this generation will show what it can really do. It will be an exciting time, just you wait and see. I see potential all around me hungering for something to convert them, from potential to Kinetic or Light or Heat or blooming Nuclear Energy. As the song goes, "It only takes a spark..."

Here is a sonnet I wrote about the movie. It is the first proper sonnet I've ever written. Proper as in it scans and it rhymes. I don't think my previous attempts were in iambic pentameter. hahaha, another thing this movie has inspired...

The peachiness of youth skips idly by
These are the carefree days of college life
With days of bloodshot eyes and Spidey's wife
And nights of Lucy and the Diamond Sky
'Tis wasted on the young they prophesy
And none will argue with truth so rife
Our life is rounded by a little trife
These Halcyon days we'll live until we die

But every now and then there comes along
Events that make a man out of the mice
Against the system shall we rise up strong
Our foes consume our youthful sacrifice
In truth it's us who are the fortunate
Our legacy will live indefinite

great movies

I've just spent too much money on films this week. But what am I supposed to do. It's the Hawaii International Film Festival. Sure the movies shown here cost more than normal commercially released films but that's usually because they're much better and three out of the four movies I've watched were.

The first movie I watched in this movie festival was 4:30 by Royston Tan. I know, watching a Singapore Movie in Hawaii? But in all honesty, it was free and I am Singaporean and so I went to watch it because of that mainly and also because I thought that Royston would be there and he was supposed to but didn't show in the end. That was good because if he did I'd be trying to market myself more than anything else. You know like, "Hey, if you need an handsome leading man to sweep the girls off their feet, here's my card. Or, if you need a really good actor for a really difficult role and you can't find the right guy, you could call me too."

Since he didn't show, I also did not have to pretend to enjoy his movie too much. I'm not saying that it wasn't a good movie. It was alright but I'm happy I didn't pay US$9 to watch it because if I did, I would have probably hated it. Also, I wrote in the introduction that 3 of the movies I caught were great and well, this one just wasn't one of them.

Somehow there is a new wave in Singapore theatre that seems like the next big film from home will be a silent movie. I mean "Be With Me" by Eric Khoo had very little words said but it more than made up for it by having a few great stories and very creative ways of telling the stories. 4:30 goes one better with a script probably consisting of about 300 words. I'm not kidding. In one scene, a teacher asks the protagonist to read an essay and that was 150 words long. That was half the script right there.

The visuals were pretty well done though. I'm a word-phile and I like words so that might be one reason I am judging this movie badly. The shots were well done and the emotional range of the actors was extraordinary. However, my major gripe with the movie is the fact that it comes off as a touch pretentious. It seems to think of itself as an arthouse movie and so it just spends a lot of time on still scenes where nothing happens. Yes, this does add to the artistic element of the film but in my opinion, it was way overdone. The pacing of the movie suffered greatly because of this. In all honesty, some people just walked out of the cinema after a while. My overall judgement of it was that it was a good effort but it really did become tedious very quickly.

The next movie I watched was called "Paper Dolls" and was a documentary about crossdressing Filipino caregivers in Israel. I watched it with my friend Yael from Kalo. She's a Filipino-Israeli hapa and so the movie caught her imagination. It really struck a chord with her because she could actually relate to the characters in the movie. It was great fun to watch and was warm and engaging all the way through. We get to see another view of life in Israel. It was not all violence and Arab-hating but just like any other country with it's own problems.

It focuses on a few caregivers who do really serve their employers really well. One of them gets so close to 'her' employers that 'she' says that 'she' is not a mere employer but more of a loyal daughter taking care of him. At night however, these caregivers don wigs and costumes and form a troupe of performers who call themselves the Paper Dolls. Their bad lip-synching reminds one of Ashley Simpson but the spirit and joy they attain from performing reminds one of Lisa Simpson. Their body shape unfortunately and dance mistakes are very like Homer Simpson crossdressed as Jessica and through it all, they had the spunk and rebeliousness of our dear Bart Simpson.

It was a great study of prejudices and how it is difficult to get rid of them especially in a place where tradition and decorum is so engrained like Israel. It speaks about judging people for what they look like on the outside and not for who they are on the inside. The thing I enjoyed most about the film was probably the film stock which was a documentary film stock which gives the whole thing a certain graininess that spoke so much about the harshness of life for these immigrants, strangers in a strange land.

After that movie, Yael and myself snuck into another movie called "Eve and the Fire-horse" and that was pretty sweet too. It was a movie about two young second generation Chinese girls in Canada. I think it was shot in Vancouver. It was such a sweet movie and the two young girls was fantastic actresses. It was a captivating movie about how children react to religion and how they understand such complex matters.

The scene of the movie is a shot where we see Jesus dance a waltz with Buddha. The director said after the movie that she was afraid that it would anger a lot of people but she said that all the comments about that scene bar one were positive. My gripe with that scene was the fact that Jesus had a belly. He was the fattest Jesus ever. Maybe it was intentional as maybe that's what the little girl might have thought since the family had placed the crucifix together with statues of Buddha and all the offerings. The little girls asks if Jesus and Buddha are friends and very wisely says that they should be since they say the same things pretty much. Reminded me of a little fact I heard once before that there was a period of time that Buddha was actually a Catholic Saint. Cool huh?

Anyway, the movie was full of wit and had many moments which left many members of the audience laughing out their popcorn. There were also many parts of the movie that just tugged at your heartstrings so had that you thought the cord might break. It made me think of home and how we manage a touch on syncretism in our beliefs because of our cultural understandings. It would probably not do very well in the US though it really took off in San Francisco (what a shocker! hahaha) but it might do well in Singapore although I doubt it will ever get to our shores. It was just really low budget so I really do hope it does well.

As for the last movie I want to talk about I think I shall save it for the next post because this one might just be a little too long. By the way, the last movie is also probably the best movie I've seen all year. It was also the first Hindi movie I've ever watched in a cinema. Probably one of the first Hindi movies I've seen all the way through too. I'll share more with you soon.

stolen from somewhere else, i'm sorry

I came across this really funny list of rules for every woman so as to help them live with men. Some of them I agree with, some of them I don't but almost all of them are true and funny... Yes, it is completely copied but sometimes other people say it better. and it's good that they do all the difficult work for you so that you can just sit back, relax and enjoy. I'm putting this on my blog because I know I'll forget the website I found this at and so it's easier if I just put it in a website i visit everyday.
Somebody should make t-shirts with these. I'd buy them...

Women, learn to work the toilet seat. You're a big girl. If it's up, put it down. We need it up, you need it down. You don't hear us complaining about you leaving it down.

Birthdays, Valentines, and Anniversaries are not considered by us to be opportunities to see if we can find the perfect present . . . . again!

Sometimes we are not thinking about you. Live with it.

Sunday = sports. It's like the full moon or the changing of the tides. Let it be.

Don't cut your hair. Ever. Long hair is always more attractive than short hair. One of the big reasons guys fear getting married is that married women always cut their hair, and by then you're stuck with her.

Ask for what you want. Subtle hints do not work! Strong hints do not work! Obvious hints do not work! Just say it!

We don't remember dates. . . .Period!!

Most guys own three pairs of shoes - tops. What makes you think we'd be any good at choosing which pair, out of thirty, would look good with your dress?

Yes and No are perfectly acceptable answers to almost every question.

Come to us with a problem only if you want help solving it. That's what we do. Sympathy is what your girlfriends are for.

A headache that lasts for 17 months is a problem. See a doctor.

Anything we said 6 months ago is inadmissible in an argument. In fact, all comments become null and void after 7 days.

If you won't dress like the Victoria's Secret girls, don't expect us to act like soap opera guys.

If you think you're fat, you probably are. Don't ask us. We've been tricked before!!

If something we said can be interpreted two ways, and one of the ways makes you sad or angry, we meant the other one.

Let us ogle. We are going to look anyway; it's genetic.

You can either ask us to do something or tell us how you want it done. Not both. If you already know best how to do it, just do it yourself.

Whenever possible, please say whatever you have to say during commercials.

Christopher Columbus did not need directions, and neither do we.

The relationship is never going to be like it was the first two months we were going out. Get over it. And quit whining to your girlfriends.

ALL men see in only 16 colors, like Windows default settings. Peach, for example, is a fruit, not a color. Pumpkin is also a fruit. We have no idea what mauve is.

If it itches, it will be scratched. We do that.

We are not mind readers and we never will be. Our lack of mind-reading ability is not proof of how little we care about you.

If we ask what is wrong and you say "nothing," we will act like nothing's wrong. We know you are lying, but it is just not worth the hassle.

If you ask a question you don't want an answer to, expect an answer you don't want to hear.

Don't ask us what we're thinking about unless you are prepared to discuss such topics as navel lint, the shotgun formation, or monster trucks.

Foreign films are best left to foreigners. (Unless it's Bruce Lee or some war flick where it doesn't really matter what they're saying anyway.)

BEER is as exciting for us as handbags are for you.

Thank you for reading this; Yes, I know, I have to sleep on the couch tonight, but did you know, it's like camping.