It’s been a busy couple of weeks for me. From San Jose for a wedding a couple weekends ago to Las Vegas this past weekend for my cousin’s 21st birthday, I’ve traveled hundreds of miles. I’ll probably post more about the weekend events later, but in short: San Jose, thumbs down; Las Vegas, thumbs up!

One of the most frustrating things about traveling is not knowing the area. With GPS navigators and internet-enabled cellphones, it’s hard to imagine how life was before these were common. Thomas Guides, anyone? Well, for me it’s not too hard to imagine. I am without either of these two nifty gadgets, but after our trip to San Jose my desire to acquire both has been reinforced. I will be getting these some day soon!

Since our hotel charged an arm and a leg for internet, I tried getting creative when it came to trying to find directions. I thought about using Google’s 411 service (call 1-800-GOOG-411 or 1-800-466-4411) or texting Google (text to GOOGL, or 46645) but the best that could do for me is get an address and/or connect me to a phone number. Only NOW do I find out about Dial DIR-ECT-IONS.

Need directions to an address? Select “Address” and say your start and destination points. You can give an address (e.g. 150 Broadway) or an intersection (e.g. Broadway and 53rd). The service is available in nine major metro areas, and more cities are coming soon!

This is so cool! I wish I knew about this sooner. We could have really used this. Lucky for us, concierge services are free and we were able to find our way around.

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I love Gwen’s Harajuku Lovers line and have always wanted a watch but thought they were a bit on the expensive side. Lucky for me, their watches are on sale at Amazon until tomorrow!

For a limited time, Save 50% on Harajuku Lovers watches direct from Amazon.com. Join the Harajuku-chic world of Gwen Stefani with these wickedly cute and fatalistically attractive Harajuku Lovers Watches.
Expires Sep 13, 2007

I had the hardest time narrowing down my choices, but ended up walking away with two watches. As much as I wanted it, I had to walk away from this one:

The best part is they qualified for free super saver shipping!

A new game for the Nintendo DS comes out today called “Jam Sessions“. I just heard about it and it seems to be pretty cool. Basically, you make music but strumming at the bottom touch screen and change chords using the D-pad. You can even record your sessions! I guess its more of a toy than a game. It kind of reminds me of those tiny electric keyboards with the rubber buttons that you’d get from the dollar store when you were a kid… just so much cooler

Here’s a clip of Taking Back Sunday playing Jam Sessions:

We’ve been working on a new trick for our puppy NY. We’ve attempted to record her doing her new trick: “tongue”, haha. We tried to teach her to stick her tongue out because B loves it so much when she does it (she gets anything she wants when she does this… ANYTHING). It’s not very consistent so we’re not even sure she really knows what she’s doing, but we’ve been seeing the tongue more often now so it seems to be working somewhat, hehe. She even does it sometimes when she’s in trouble to try to soften the blow

Here’s the best video I have of her trick. It takes a while to see it since at this point she was already tired of doing it and just wanted her treat

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B took me to an Incubus concert this past Friday at the Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in Irvine (uber huge venue… blah). The Bravery and one other band opened for them (unfortunately I didn’t see this band so their name didn’t stick).

It’s been a long time since I’ve seen my all-time favorite band, and I’m so excited I got to see them again. I stopped going after the last concert I attended because I noticed that the audience was becoming a lot more girl-teeny-bopper. I didn’t really like that. Don’t get me wrong, I’m just as crazy about frontman Brandon Boyd as the next girl (he’s my ultimate #1 favorite male celebrity), but appreciate the music not just the boys!

This past Friday, however, couldn’t have been more different. Instead of tween girls, I was surrounded by more Mom-fans, and by that I mean an older more mature looking audience. It was the strangest thing. The lady next to us came to the concert with her daughter and was the wildest one around us. How wild? She screamed,”Show us your tits, Brandon!!!” at the top of her lungs in the middle of the set. Although he’s known for going topless mid-set and didn’t completely take his top off until the encore, such a comment was a bit uncalled for… Who am I kidding, I was thinking the same thing! LOL, j/k… maybe not in such a graphic or vulgar way, but it did come off as odd to me that the shirt had not come off yet, haha.

Anyway, they played an awesome set. I loved their cover of Prince’s “Let’s Go Crazy”, and it was a treat to hear a newer single (released only in Japan at the moment) “Punch Drunk“. This was also the first time I got to see them perform with their new bassist Ben Kenney. I can’t wait to see them again.

Yesterday, I attended the 16th Annual Festival of Philippine Arts & Culture aka FPAC. Considering my involvement in the Fil-Am community in high school and college, although not intense, I’m surprised I had never heard of this festival until this year especially since it’s been advertised to be the ‘biggest Filipino festival in the nation’. My friend had mentioned that he was going to be there to work his friend’s booth, Pnoy Apparel, and had asked if I was attending. I decided to go and I’m glad I went. It was nice to see a lot of familiar faces there (from LA and SD). Some of the acts/performances that I was interested in seeing and got to see were Touchblue, Rex Navarette, Abalos Pros, and Philippine All-Stars. While waiting for Rex Navarette, we saw a rap performance by Bambu. It was a fun experience and I would probably go again, but there’s a chance that this year might be their last year. I hope this rumor is false!

How is everyone? I hope you all enjoyed the holiday weekend. Mine was chill for the most part. I celebrated becoming 27 in a low-key way. I wasn’t up for much more since I was still sick :

Anyway something fun… I was browsing a music site when I saw an advertisement to make you and your friends into Gwen Stefani Harajuku-style girls. Gwen Stefani is involved in an advertising campaign for HP so they’re making this fun project available. It kind of reminds me of Simpsonizing yourself. There are some other cute little printouts available, so check it out!

Anyway, here is the Harajuku me as well as the Simpson me