Spa day

© Joselito Briones

When every wash day is a spa day, courtesy of Charles.

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Riding on a feeling

© Joselito Briones

In the summer of 1974, the preschool kids in my neighborhood learned riding a bicycle together.  There were 5 or 6 of us.  My brother Uwel took it upon himself to teach us.  The school, the designated training spot about ten houses from our house, adjacent to open rice fields, was still closed for the summer season.

I was late to learn about what was going on. Everybody was  already in the school grounds when I got there.  Jojo and Toto had their turns. Then everybody else.  I was jealous.  By the time my turn came, it was getting dark. We did one quick round of me riding poorly then we went home. 

We never got to finish the training.

  

A few days on, I discovered that as long as I could keep my self vertical on the bike with my feet on standby by my sides, still barely on the ground’s sloping  driveway I can just let go and let the bike roll by itself.  Doing it several times, i saw t could just rest my feet on the pedal, then the pedal was just a matter of going through the motions.

The next day, full of confidence, I proudly mounted the bike in the middle of the street. Perfect balance.

Only it won’t go. Tried and tried but, no.

Out of nowhere, Uwel yelled, “RELEASE THE BREAK!“ 

I did, and lo and behold. 

(Soundtrack: Hallelujah!)

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Mystery flowers

© Charles George

We couldn’t figure out what these are.  From our local bodega/deli. Any idea?

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The cutest ever on halloween

When you were two.

Who’d have thought?

At fifty-two and you three years more, I’ll be watching you as you sleep, tired from chasing away my boogeyman.

 

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Beef Pie

© Joselito Briones

Homemade by my lovely husband.

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setting uprIght knocked down school chairs

High school competitive Quiz open season. 1982 or thereabouts.  Anybody with the guts for it could enter.  Having the guts didn’t cost anything, so off to the quizzes I went.

I didn’t do particularly well that year, a fifth place in science and third place in English (I think).

My brother Uwel, three years my senior, and his friends were there cheering for me through the windows and grates of the school library where it was held. The talk was that I can finally put upright the chairs he knocked down while we were  in high school.  I was sure he was proud of me.

I remember the buzz and tension after every question. I’m usually indifferent about things like this, but that time they managed to get me excited. Excited enough to look forward to the following year.

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thanks eric cyntch and carina for the photo.

Tiny boots as vase

© Joselito Briones

Another round of chemo drugs today.

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Thanks for the sinigang na baboy

© Joselito Briones

Filipino comfort food, made at home in Brooklyn.  Thanks!

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Freshly baked banana chocolate bread

© Joselito Briones

© Joselito Briones

Thanks husband, they’re delicious!

Banana-chocolate bread and chocolate chip cookies from Maggie George‘s recipe.

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Wall decoration

© Joselito Briones
Wall objects.  The oil painting was by Charles’ grandfather. Ceramics mostly from Astier dela Villatte. 

Charles eventually relented and agreed to not keep the hanging lantern where it was in this picture.  I sit on that side of the couch because of the wheelchair and I always felt like the lantern was gonna fall on my head.

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2 years ago

© Joselito Briones

2 years ago, when I could still walk, project construction site close to jfk.  I was so looking forward to doing the whole thing. I loved how peaceful it was there.

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tiny hand blown glass vase

© Joselito Briones

Tiny blown glass vase in the shape of a head from la soufflérie. 

Out apartment constantly has flowers since lockdown.

 

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Iittle luxuries

© Joselito Briones

These enormous bath towels from Paris, pure washed linen, pure luxury.

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Den Den

© Louie  Briones

We have a tradition in the Philippines that’s a cross between a  debutante’s ball and a religious procession.

This is Den Den, a grandchild one of my brothers.  

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A day at the hospital

© Joselito Briones

Long hair courtesy of COVID-19 lockdown..

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Help me, Doggie, I think I’m falling

© Joselito Briones 
Over the last 15 months, I’ve been in and out of hospitals, I’ve seen and/or been treated by numerous doctors, neurologists, oncologists, onconeurologists, neurosurgeons, radiologists, had undergone craneotomy twice, and just about anything else they can throw at me.
I’m tired.

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I’m waiting for you

Love this show. Seen all of it several times.

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Ano sabi mo?

© Joselito Briones

What did you say dear?  My eldest sister, Norie, would ask earnestly whenever I started belting/shouting a song. It took me a while before I caught on that she was making fun of me, inferring that she couldn’t tell if I was singing or just talking to myself really, really loud.  I must have been 10 or 11.

There was a flurry of activity that day.  I was hanging around Norie’s room because she was moving.  Nobody said where to. I assumed to Manila, where else?  Another sister was taking over her room. I don’t know if it was my age, I always assumed everything’s fine. 

After a while, I remember receiving a card from Norie.  The card said,  “Missing you!”.  It had two penguins hugging. It had a very specific smell that I have since associated with things sent from the U.S..

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Afternoon sun

© Joselito Briones

This is what the afternoon sun looks like in our tiny living room.  There’s a young tamarind tree, passion fruit vines and other greens all planted and taken care of by Charles.

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On my father’s shoulders

© Joselito Briones

In the Philippines we start celebrating Christmas in September, as soon as we get a respite from summer heat.

It usually ends early January.

One Christmas season, I must have been 5 or 6, my father took me to work - a bus depot that he managed.  In the waiting room, right next to the glittery Christmas tree was a poster of “Jaws”, that summer’s ubiquitous image. 

There was a buzz in the air., “Mrs. is here.”, everyone whispered.  “Mrs.” was always just “Mrs.”.  She was the boss, owner of the company.  My father must have been busy attending to work.  When eventually he caught wind of her presence, he grabbed and lifted me to his shoulders and we ran and looked for Mrs.  The idea was to see if she was giving Christmas presents.  She was gone by the time we got to her office.

Whenever I’m reminded of that day though, I realize it wasn’t the missed “papasko” that I think about.  It was that my father never  picked me up  before then, at least not that I remember. I remember that it was nice being on his shoulders. I remember it was awkward because even at that young age I was tall and spindly.

I remember feeling special.

 

We went back to his office and he sat me on his desk He told me to keep my hands open and onto them he dumped all the coins from his pockets.

Happy days.

 

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i can use my right hand again...

© Joselito Brionesor so i dreamt.  

I woke up middle of the night without the usual heaviness on my right arm. i slowly moved my fingers. They’re here alright, although i couldn’t tell where my right hand was.  moving some more confirmed that my right hand was resting flat on my belly.  my right hand was moving freely again.

fearing the disappointment of finding out that this was just a dream, i forced myself awake, once in a while moving my hand to make sure that i can still do it.  after a couple of hours i fell asleep again.  I woke up again and found my right hand very stiff again.

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glorious morning

this is the morning glory vine that charles planted at t  window by my side of the bed. it’s already got two flowers since he planted it a month ago.  pretty eh?

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you...

left something in the toilet, darling husband.

 

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bukó revelation

There was one time when one of my sisters, Ate Julie, when I was about 10 or 11 and she in college, was obsessed with the movie "Fame", Irene Cara, and her song "Out Here on My Own".  I was still in elementary school then and have not heard of the movie until she told me about it.  She had a radio with her and she turned the station dial relentlessly until she found a station that played the song. What was memorable about it was that before then, I never saw her passionate and excited about anything at all.  She's always kept to herself.   I never saw her reveal so much of herself after that, either.

Satisfied on finding and hearing the song at that moment, she let me in on a something even more precious to her:  she said much as she loved the song,  there was another in the same movie that she loved even more.  I remember her trying afterwards to play down how much she loved it, which only made it obvious that she did.   She had a girly crush and she told me about it!

Today, as everyone in the family has their heart and mind with her, I looked up the song and found the video, above, which appears to have been filmed a couple of blocks from where I first lived in New York.

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our lovely fish tank

© Joselito Briones
I love how with the new Canon 5D Mark IV, pulling focus is just a matter of of pointing at different elements of the view on the touchscreen LCD monitor.

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christmas splurge

© Joselito Briones

room fragrance from cire trudon - we love the "ernesto" scent but even if we didn't like any of their scents, we would've bought one anyway just for the bottle-atomizer.

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thanksgiving potluck at work

© Joselito Briones
lovely people, good food.


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mochi from daigaharakinseiken?

© Joselito Briones
our neighbors arisa and the kids are back from their japan trip and they brought us this present - best mochi ever!  it comes with an ampoule of molasses to drip on the mochi - how nice is that?  i googled the image and it looks like it comes from a store called "daigaharakinseiken", but as i can't read the characters i can't tell for sure.

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dave warns bett - a scene from "house of trixxx"

© Joselito Briones
so this scene takes place before the other one.

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first completed scene of "house of trixxx"

© Joselito Briones
This took several rehearsals, 3 hours of filming, 10 takes (different angles) and days of editing - resulting in less than 3mins of the movie. I haven't even started on putting in the audio that was recorded separately (crappy audio on this video is from camera).  Bett/Zirconia is played by Aja and Dave by Edwin de Leon.

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gorl wants food

© Joselito Briones
random photo time.  this one was taken in a safari park in indonesia earlier this year.


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edwin joins the cast of house of trixxx

© Joselito Briones
actor edwin de leon joins the cast as of "house of trixxx" as dave, bett/zirconia's younger brother.  am so glad of his enthusiasm in tackling the role.

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preparing for a shoot

we're finally doing a couple of scenes, and i don't wanna mess up so i did this very rough story board. i thought a dp/camera guy was gonna join us and i was looking forward to concentrating with directing, but... so i'm gonna end up doing those too.  i went to aja's and momo's to check the room we're shooting in, and try to dress it up a bit.  hope things go well.

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a meta-mystery game of a neo-noir movie making kind

© Joselito Briones

i've turned the g+ page of +House of Trixxx into a meta-mystery game.  because, why not?

big fan of sherlock?  fond of nancy drew-ing?  you think we're now over-saturated with mysteries and crime-dramas and you can predict every cliché and every ending of every whodunnit?

let's take it a step further.  predict the outcome of this story without seeing the actual movie.  why be Sherlock when you can be Doyle?  Why be Ms. Marple when you can be Ms. Christie?  ever written or thought of writing a crime-drama? predict how this story is structured and what's gonna happen.  every post is a clue.   no worries, even if the movie doesn't get made, the screenplay is already registered with the WGA, so the storyline you're solving for will be based on that.

post your predictions on the link above.  correct predictions wins a portion of the script as additional clue.  if you can piece together the whole plot, you'll win a copy of the entire screenplay.

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1st day of rehearsal for house of trixxx

© Joselito Briones
This is one of the scenes that we did on the 1st day of rehearsal.  Momo was kind enough to stand in for the role of Dave (the character has since been renamed Paolo and hasn't been cast), Bett's cop brother.  In this scene, Paolo confronts Bett for withholding information about an on-going murder investigation.

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main drag characters complete as ms. ivy ferriya joins the house of trixxx project

© Joselito Briones

welp, there it is.  now that ms ivy ferriya has joined the project, all the major drag queen roles are cast.  now on to the other characters.

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rimowa - now that's what i call service

my rimowa suitcase          © Joselito Briones

i've had this rimowa suitcase for 5 years now and it's been with me everywhere.  it's supposed to be a carry-on, but there's been a couple of times when i had to check it in.  the last time it happened, i noticed a missing screw-on foot (stand).  i brought it to rimowa's new york shop , and they repaired it for me even tho i bought this one in hong kong.  they even checked the locks and found that they are a bit shaky, so they repaired that too.  at no cost! (and look at that, they even decorated it with a ribbon)

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severed doll head shimmery purse

© Joselito Briones

the sort of thing one will find on sale at the local flea market in my neighborhood. severed doll head shimmery purse (note the tiny wreath detail below the head), matching cape/shawl knit with angora trim, pink camisole, salmon-colored sailor-collar top with lace trimmings.


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happy international drag day

drag queen ivy ferriya               © Joselito Briones

i did not know there's such a thing as international drag day.  well, turns out there is, and it's today!  photo above is of super talented ivy ferriya

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jemma and momoshade also joined the "house of trixxx" project

Jemma and MomoShade    © Joselito Briones

two more lovely queens agreed to take part in the "house of trixxx" project.  jemma will take on the femme-fatale character and momoshade will be taking on ms. trixxx of the title.

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aja is on board

fierce drag queen "aja" joins the cast

well, the project has gained momentum. super talented drag queen aja has agreed to be part of the "house of trixxx" project. more updates soon!

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hearts' desire

© Joselito Briones

before they're monks, they're humans, they're kids.

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a short scene from "house of trixxx"

© Joselito Briones
so... yesterday i did this photoshoot, supposedly with drag queen extraordinaire aja, but when i got to the location there were 3 other drag queens there and they were all so nice to join the shoot - ivy ferriya, momo shade, and jemma (she's wearing the "die" cap).  currently, i always take the opportunity to ask people to do a scene from my project, and they did it.  video above is the second take - the first one was all reading from my iphone.  considering they did it in a snap of a finger. they were so much fun. they also shared some major T (contestants who made it in the show) on season 8 of rupaul's drag race.

pardon the quality, i wasn't prepared to do video.  one of those days when i wished i brought a tripod.

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p.s. for some reason sharing the link to this picks up random images from this page as thumbnail photo, so i'll just put here below the cover photo for this project, so maybe that can be picked up as thumbnail.

© Joselito Briones

how is pinterest even legal?

 

a commercial company copying and putting images up in their website, without permission, that is for exclusive use of people with +pinterest account. am i missing something?  i was under the impression that their reasoning was that it's no different than google images, where images are shown in search result, and that theirs is just a way of people organizing it.  but, hey, anyone can use google image search, but with pinterest, you have to have an account and logged in to be able to use it.  no, that's definitely not the same. i cry douchebaggery!

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reading for "house of trixxx"

© Joselito Briones
i told you about the "house of trixxx" screenplay that i wrote a while back, right?  well i've decided to film some scenes from it.  i placed an ad on craigslist for actors and this is matt benson reading a short scene. he's reading for the part of shane - a drag queen noob from a religious family. in this scene he's being interrogated by the police, being a key witness to a murder. hopefully i can post a better scene video when we record it with proper setting and with the dialogue memorized.  this was our first meeting, at brooklyn's anchored inn, over fries.

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kids walking through rice fields to get to school

© Joselito Briones

taken in my hometown in the philippines when i went for a walk one morning.  the best part is when i discovered upon inspecting the photo closely that one of the boys was holding a bird to bring to school - just the sort of thing kids did when i was growing up.

© Joselito Briones

anyway, the photo seemed popular when i used it as my page cover in fb, so i thought i'd post it here.


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4th of july fireworks

© Joselito Briones 4th of july fireworks in new york as scene from our building's rooftop.

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table reading for "sharp shooters" sitcom script

© Joselito Briones so i wrote a screenplay for a tv pilot that i submitted to a studio - no it wasn't picked up, but i thought i'll develop it anyway.  it's a silly sitcom with stock photographers as main characters.

photo above shows me, charles, and my neighbors tim, sim, shuno and another neighbor (who prefer to be unidentified) doing a table reading at tradesman in brooklyn.

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my mother the player

found one of my stock photos on a wall poster for cotton:on in jakarta

..with some others also from stocksy. norie and irma happily posed in front of it for scale.  the poster is for fashion company cotton:on.

-XXX