Clinched in G6, I will not mind.

LA clinched the West ticket to the finals in game 5. San Antonio's defense of the title ended in LA. A factor: where Manu goes, the Spurs goes.

In the East, some bad news for the Pistons. Rip is a doubtful starter or will he be available come game 6?

Another case.....

It is everybody’s right to complain of unfair developments but not this way:

The NBA acted quickly to Rasheed Wallace's postgame criticism of Game 5's officating crew, hitting him with a $25,000 fine, it was announced early Thursday evening by league offices.

The league said Wallace was fined "for his use of profanity and criticism of the officiating following last night's game" at Boston, which the Celtics won 106-102 to take a 3-2 lead in the Eastern Conference finals.

Here's what Wallace was reported to have said: "All that (expletive) calls they had out there, with Mike (Callahan) and Kenny (Mauer) - you've all seen that (expletive). A lot of them phantom calls, cats are flopping and falling all over the floor and they're calling that (expletive). That (expletive) ain't basketball out there. It's all (expletive) entertainment. You all should know that (expletive). It's all that (expletive) entertainment."

With such irresponsible statements like that, I would not mind at all for Boston to clinch the East ticket to the Finals.

 

A couple of G7 in the East and West will be just fine.

Five and four games each into the East and West conference finals and I have yet to actually watch any of the past games live. I just content myself to reading game results in the net given the chance or the papers.

Yesterday, the defending champs Spurs lost a game at home and got deep 1-3 in the west. But i still they will rise to the occasion and steal game 5, give the home crowd pride at game 6. Champs are capable of that. G7?

Today, Detroit trailed and lost in a close end game. Boston is up 3-2 in the East. Good news is game 6 will be in Detroit.  G7?

Then G7. Whoever win this one in the East and the West deserve it.

But my forecast for the 2008 Champ? The team from the West.

Got it on the third!

Left to my own devices, I finally completed my first set of Sudoku (at today’s issue of the PDInquirer), difficulty level 3 stars in 15 minutes.  This after failing in my two tries in difficulty level 5 stars last Sunday.

I’ve been seeing this Sudoku puzzle in the newspaper but I never bother to try until last Saturday when I was in a public transport AUVan and was seated alongside a woman who was trying to solve one from a bookful of Sudoku puzzle.

As the trip went along, I thought to myself that at a point in time maybe I can be of help to her in solving the puzzle. But to my surprise, she was too competent with the puzzle and there is really no need for me to help. And as I watched, I learned of her strategy in solving the puzzle.

I thought I have something to help her with but it turns out that I have something to learn from her.

She did not finish the puzzle though it is about to be completed. I understand that this is her way of getting sleepy for the duration of the trip. Feeling sleepy, she gently closed the book, look my way with a little smile in her face then bow her head in her arms and sleep.

I, too slept to trip out with the thought that I need to get competent with this puzzle called Sudoku. Surely it will be worth the time than twisting, solving the recurring fad called Rubiks cube.

U2 of the 80's: The Stories Behind The Songs

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Music
Genre:	Alternative Rock
Artist:	U2

1. "I Will Follow" (1980) This peppy tune, released on the Boy album, is still as fresh today as when it debuted nearly three decades ago. The song is charged with Edge's gritty guitar riffs and a pounding drum beat by Larry Mullen, Jr., still played with the intensity of an 18 year old. According to Bono, the lyrics are about the unconditional love between mother (or God) and child. Whatever the child does, whatever his or her faults, a mother (or God) still loves her child.

2. "Out of Control" (1980) Another toe-tapper from Boy, "Out of Control" has the distinction of being the first song the guys heard played on the radio. Bono wrote the lyrics in the wee hours of the morning following his eighteenth birthday. "It was one dull morning/I woke the world with bawling/I was so sad/They were so glad . . ." The song is about being born -- or rather objecting to it -- and feeling that you have no control over your life.

3. "Gloria" (1981) No, it's not a cover of fellow Irishman Van Morrison's 1960s hit. This one comes from U2's sophomore album, October, which was heavy-laden with references to religion and spirituality. Bono has said he had a difficult time writing the lyrics, so he turned it into a psalm, complete with verses in Latin. The music is quite edgy considering the subject matter, which is what makes it classic U2.

4. "Tomorrow" (1981) Most U2 lyrics are pretty heavy. But with "Tomorrow," from October, Bono was truly speaking from the heart. When he was 14, his mother suffered a brain hemorrhage at her father's funeral and died a few days later. Bono would later state that the melancholy lyrics to "Tomorrow" were a description of her funeral.

5. "Sunday Bloody Sunday" (1983) From the War album, "Sunday Bloody Sunday" is a powerhouse in the U2 canon, performed on every major tour since its debut. It's a classic U2 protest song about the troubles in Northern Ireland. Larry's militaristic drumming and Edge's abrasive guitar drive the song, while Bono's powerful lyrics cry out "How long, how long must we sing this song?"

The song, which reached number seven on Billboard's Mainstream Rock chart in the 1980s, has now become a global plea to end the violence that threatens the world today.

6. "New Year's Day" (1983) This song, inspired by the solidarity movement in Poland, reached number two on Billboard's Mainstream Rock chart. It was also the first U2 video to get major airplay on MTV, giving the band the exposure that would get them named "Band of the Eighties" by Rolling Stone magazine just two years later. During live shows, Edge takes control on this song, playing guitar and keyboard simultaneously in parts and also singing backup vocals.

7. "40" (1983) Also from War, Bono based the lyrics of this bass-driven song on Psalm 40. Although the song was only released in Germany, it is a fan favorite that has frequently been used to close shows. When a show ends with "40," guitarist Edge and bassist Adam Clayton switch instruments, and the band members leave the stage one by one -- first Bono, Adam, then Edge, leaving Larry alone onstage to perform a brief (but kickin') drum solo, as fans chant the chorus.

8. "Pride (In the Name of Love)" (1984) Released on The Unforgettable Fire album, this song about Jesus ("one man betrayed with a kiss") and Martin Luther King, Jr., reached number two on Billboard's Mainstream Rock chart. Bono gave his all recording "Pride," shouting the lyrics from the depths of his soul.

But don't rely on Bono for a history lesson; the lyric referring to Dr. King ("Early morning, April four/Shot rings out in the Memphis sky . . .") is
incorrect -- King was actually killed around 6:00 p.m. Bono has since realized his mistake and now sings "Early evening, April four" in live shows.

9. "Bad" (1984) From The Unforgettable Fire album, "Bad" was never released as a single, but it's a fan favorite that sometimes closes shows. As always, the lyrics are subject to much debate, but according to Bono, the song is about drug addiction, specifically heroin, which ran rampant in Dublin in the early 1980s and had taken hold of one of his friends.

Ever the perfectionist, Bono feels the song could've been better if he'd "finished" it. Most fans think it's a masterpiece as it stands.

10. "With or Without You" (1987) This perpetual crowd-pleaser, released on the Grammy Award-winning album The Joshua Tree, was U2's first number-one song in America. Some feel the song is about Jesus ("see the thorn twist in your side"); others think it's about romantic love and longing for someone you can't be with.

The song is rife with symbolism, in both the lyrics and the music. Adam's bass is the pulse. Larry's drumming is the heartbeat. Edge's guitar chords represent the agony of a heart breaking. And Bono's voice and haunting lyrics are the personification of love and longing and the agony of unrequited love.

When his voice cries out, you know he's not just reciting the words but truly feeling the pain of loving someone he can't be with . . . and you feel that pain with him.

11. "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" (1987) No dual meaning here -- U2's second song to top U.S. charts, "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For," is a gospel song about searching for and understanding one's spiritual beliefs. U2 even took a gospel choir with them to sing backup vocals during The Joshua Tree tour.

Bono often says he's not satisfied with some of his recorded lyrics, so he tends to "rewrite" them during live performances. For example, the original lyric: "You broke the bonds/And you loosed the chains/Carried the cross of my shame/Oh my shame . . ." is now sung: "You broke the bonds/And you loosed the chains/Carried the cross/Took my shame/You took the blame . . ." The change is ever so slight, but it makes the song much deeper and more meaningful.

12. "Where the Streets Have No Name" (1987) Although "Streets" didn't crack the top ten in the States, it's a fan favorite that was frequently used to open shows on The Joshua Tree tour. The lyrics were inspired by a trip Bono and his wife took to Ethiopia in the mid-1980s, during which they volunteered at a refugee camp orphanage. With Edge's distinctive scratchy chords, Larry's enthusiastic drumming, and Adam's deep bass holding it all together, even the band admits it's much better live.

13. "Desire" (1988) With "Desire," released as the first single from the album Rattle and Hum, Bono parodies and criticizes evangelical preachers, politicians, and the greed ingrained in the landscape of 1980s America. But the lyrics can have a more carnal interpretation as well.

Either way, the song was a hit, reaching number one on both Billboard's Mainstream Rock and Modern Rock charts. The song also won a Grammy for Best Rock Performance, and it was U2's first song to reach the top of the charts in the U.K.

14. "Angel of Harlem" (1988) With "Angel of Harlem," U2 racked up another number one on Billboard's Mainstream Rock chart. Recorded in Sun Studios in Memphis, Elvis's legendary music engineer Cowboy Jack Clement pitched in on this one, and it was all captured on film in the "rockumentary" Rattle and Hum.

The song chronicles the band's arrival in America for their first tour in 1980 ("It was a cold and wet December day/When we touched the ground at JFK . . ."). It is also a tribute to Billie Holiday, the "Angel of Harlem."

15. "All I Want Is You" (1989) Bono has said that "All I Want Is You," from Rattle and Hum, is dedicated to his wife, Ali. The poetic and symbolic lyrics describe his desire for true, unconditional love, and the promises his lover makes show the depth of her feelings. The song closed the Rattle and Hum movie, and much to the surprise of fans (because it seldom closes a live show), it was the last song played on the Vertigo tour, when it closed the show in Honolulu in December 2006.

a cuisine, delicacy.......not.

Foie Gras

Foie gras, which literally means "fatty liver," is what actor Roger Moore calls a "delicacy of despair." When Moore discovered how geese were tortured to create the hors d'oeuvre, he was so appalled that he teamed up with PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) and APRL (Animal Protection and Rescue League) to educate the public.

In order to create foie gras, ducks and geese are painfully force-fed up to four pounds of food a day by cramming it down their throats through metal pipes until, according to Moore, "they develop a disease that causes their livers to enlarge up to ten times their normal size!"

Investigations into foie gras farms have revealed such horrible, unabashed cruelty to animals that the dish has been banned in many countries and many parts of the United States.

 

Ortolan

In the same cruel fashion as foie gras, this tiny bird has little to sing about, as historically it was horribly tortured before being eaten as a gastronomic treat by the aristocracy of France.

Its fate was often to be captured, have its eyes poked out, and be put in a small cage, then force-fed until it grew to four times its normal size. Next the poor bird would be drowned in brandy, roasted, and eaten whole.

Now considered a protected species in France, the ortolan is also in decline in several other European countries. Nevertheless, hunters still kill about 50,000 birds per year even though it is illegal to sell them.

Defining Silence

.......no pm, ym, e-mail from you. me just hoping all is well.

 

 

 

Our Time In Eden

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Music
Genre:	Alternative Rock
Artist:	10,000 Maniacs

Our Time In Eden': the title is an imagined memory as well as the statement of a Utopian ideal. In the vision of Natalie Merchant, the singer and primary songwriter of 10,000 Maniacs, the high-minded belief that somehow life – and our individual lives within it – is perfectible battles a deeper, Catholic assumption that we are fallen beings and no amount of effort on our part can re-create paradise, or possibly even a livable world, now. That struggle between fervent hope and a kind of wide-eyed despair propels the thirteen songs on this gripping new album, infusing it with a provocative, unnerving power.

First impressions of the album will not reveal those depths. As always, the Maniacs – guitarist Rob Buck, keyboardist Dennis Drew, bassist Steve Gustafson and drummer Jerome Augustyniak – style instantly appealing musical surfaces. Buck's playful fascination with the shimmering sounds that can be coaxed from a variety of stringed instruments – lap and pedal steel guitar, electric sitar, banjo, mandocello – lend enticing strangeness to the band's otherwise straightforward smart-pop arrangements. Merchant herself plays a good deal of piano on the album, and her simple, searching melodies evoke mystery and yearning.

Strings add luster to three tracks; bassoons turn up on another. The JB Horns strut their funky stuff on two songs – as a concept (Natalie Merchant as the hardest-working woman in showbiz?), the collaboration may sound contrived, but they pull it off with ease. And with alternative all-star Paul Fox handling production – replacing Peter Asher, who did In My Tribe (1987) and Blind Man's Zoo (1989) – the Maniacs are far less restrained, though no less disciplined.

Merchant's voice, of course, provides continual sensual pleasure. She is one of the rare singer-lyricists – Van Morrison and Michael Stipe also come to mind – who, while obsessed by what they have to say and by words themselves, exult in the sheer physical delight of making vocal sounds. Given the choice – though she would prefer not to have to make the choice – Merchant will always opt for pleasure over verbal meaning in rendering a vocal line, and rightly so. This makes her songs difficult to understand in literal terms but easy to respond to emotionally.

The emotions called forth, however, are not always to be trusted. Coupled with the appealing textural feel of the band's music, Merchant's instinct for joy provides a jarring complement to the frequent darkness of her themes and her occasionally chilly moral earnestness. In other words, the sonic allure of the Maniacs' music and Merchant's voice is a seduction into songs that are charged, complex and troubling.

As it typically does in Merchant's lyrics, biblical imagery runs throughout Our Time in Eden. That can give her songs the feel of parables, as do the questions that come up again and again, making the album both instructional and a kind of driven spiritual quest. "If You Intend," a challenge to live that might be addressed to a person suffering with AIDS, defends life's inherent worth and asks, "How can you be so near and not see?" In "Eden," Merchant confesses, "We're not honest, not the people that we dream," and then wonders, "Is there still time?" The JB Horns kick in fine R&B style on "Few and Far Between," but Merchant agonizes: "I'm a body frozen/I'm a will that's paralyzed/When will you ever set aside your pain and misery?"

Most dramatically, the gorgeous balled "Circle Dream" takes an ancient symbol of perfection and transforms it into a horrifying emblem of entrapment. In a floating, childlike voice, over a delicate piano and keyboards accompaniment, Merchant sings: "I dreamed of a circle.... And in that circle was a maze, a terrible spiral to be lost in/Blind in my fear, I was escaping just by feel/But at every turn my way was sealed." In stunning contrast, the exuberant "These Are Days" summons up an almost mystical sense of ecstatic connection to a world that is wild and open: "When May is rushing over you with desire/Take part in the miracles you see in every hour/You'll know it's true that you are blessed and lucky/It's true that you are touched by something that will grow and bloom in you."

Such moments may be as close as we come to getting back to the garden, Merchant suggests on Our Time in Eden; paradise may indeed be forever lost. But in our minds and hearts, our time in Eden is as real as our days on Earth; it exists within us to inspire us to hope for better days ahead – and to be better ourselves. (RS 640)



ANTHONY DECURTIS

http://www.rollingstone.com/reviews/album/307664/review/5941177/ourtimeineden

You are suppose to be ready.

"We want you to know what we have known, and put this into test, compare the doctrines of the Lord Jesus Christ that you will hear in this indoctrination sessions to the doctrines of great world religions."

Check out this invitation.

Ang Dating Daan Worldwide Mass Indoctrination

Start:	May 12, '08 7:00p
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Location:	all Ang Dating Daan Locales and Coordination Centers

May 12 Monday at 7 o'clock in the evening at all Ang Dating Daan Locales and Coordination Centers. Come and hear the True Doctrine of Christ from the Most Sensible Preacher of our dispensation, Bro Eli Soriano.

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