AIDS Memorial Display

Last week, I had the privilege to be a volunteer in the AIDS Memorial Quilt display at Rockland Community College. This display was the largest display of the AIDS Memorial Quilt in the Northeast in the past eleven years. The display was held for three days (Thurs - Sat) and it sure felt surreal seeing the effort that someone put on in creating the quilt for someone they loved. I was there during setup which was amazing as we had to line up 240 blocks that contained 1,920 panels. This only represented 4% of the entire collection which is currently at 44,000. If the whole memorial quilt is laid down, it would take 10 football fields. Coincidentally, the first time the quilts were displayed in 1987, they had 1,920 panels.

Each panel is consist of eight 3x6 quilts. The display had 4,500 names which is just a 4% of more than 91,000 names in the entire display. So after lining up the panels, we had to unfold them and refold them in a lotus flower folded design. It was interesting to be the first one to see the display before the public and some of the quilts were truly amazing. Some told the story of their struggle while some just contained the names of those who have died due to this disease. There was one quilt that truly touch me (image on the right), it was a quilt made by a friend who made it because the other half of the person who died was so sick and wasn't able to do it by himself. You almost feel for the person who was making the quilt for losing two friends.

I had a chance to walk through the whole quilt and saw some familiar names such as Liberace, Rock Hudson, Ricky Wilson, Arthur Ashe and Freddy Mercury. Most of the quilts for the stars were probably made my their fans. I also notice that the dates were mostly in the 80s and 90s but not much in 00s. The reasoning was the current medication is making people who are infected with HIV / AIDS live much longer.

Names of the people who passed were read throughout the exhibit. I had the chance to be a reader one night and read through a couple of pages of name. Did notice one page containing names of kids who have scumbag to this disease. There was name of a baby who was only 6 month. I had to stop for a second after reading the baby's name just to get my throat cleared before continuing on.

As to with opening, so it must have a closing. I was one of the closer, first, all the closers lined up around the quilts. At a signal, we all walk towards a panel and folded it from top to bottom. Signally the closing of the quilts. Then there was a dedication of new panels before the exhibit was official close.

Hopefully it wont take another 11 years for the exhibit to come back.

More info about the aids quilt here

Tweets are Searchable

Google has reached an agreement with Twitter that will allow its search engine to scour Twitter and show related items in their search results. That means, you can get real-time updates on things such as star sightings, weather conditions or event tweets from tweeters. Will Yahoo Search and Bing follow?

Read more about it here

So what will happen now? You get real-time answers to questions that you have. Sorta like having your friends at your side.

Book Wars

Last Week, Walmart.com started the online Book Wars by slashing the prices of 10 highly anticipated hardback titles to $10. Amazon.com, the largest online bookseller, followed suit slashing prices on the same 10 titles to $10. Walmart slashed the price to $9 and Amazon followed suit.

Then 10 books are:

1. Going Rogue: An American Life by Sarah Palin
2. Ford County by John Grisham
3. Under the Dome by Stephen King
4. I, Alex Cross by James Patterson
5. Breathless by Dean Koontz
6. Pirate Latitudes by Michael Crichton
7. Kindred in Death by J.D. Robb
8. Ice by Linda Howard
9. The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver
10. First Lord's Fury by Jim Butcher

The last time I checked, Walmart has slashed their prices further - going down to $8.98 and $8.99 with free shipping. While Amazon stuck with $9.00 price. Now, Target has joined the war offering $8.99 to six (6) of the books listed above (1, 2, 4, 6, 8 and 9) plus shipping. Walmart has a pre-order price  guarantee on the books meaning if the prices goes lower, then you will received the lowest price. Will Barnes & Noble and Borders follow suit?

What's the benefit of the price wars to consumer? Well, if you haven't realized, you are saving tons of money of possibly the hottest books that will be coming out this November. The hardcover, Under the Dome by Stephen King has a regular price of $35. That means, you save $26.02 or at least 74%. That's the biggest savings among the 10 pre-selling books.

Of course a lot of book publishers are worried that this would hurt long-term sales since lowering of the price can sometimes devalue the books. This also affects the usual booksellers since most consumers will be running to Walmart, Amazon and Target to snatch these books at the lowest price especially when the economy is still not unstable and consumers are watching their pockets more carefully.

But I'm pretty sure this price war won't last since the three online retailers still need to make up for the losses that this price war would produce. So before this ends, you should start going to Walmart.com, Amazon.com or Target.com and snatch these books while the prices are still at the lowest.

Hey, I already pre-purchase five (5) of them...

Movie Review: Zombieland

Zombieland is a fictitious story where a virus was spread in the United States turning every human into zombies. It stars Jesse Eisenberg as a college kid, Columbus,  who didn’t get infected because of his phobia with everything. As he tries to get back to his hometown to see if his parents are still alive, he meets three other survivors, Tallahassee (played by Woody Harrelson) a gun-toting thrill seeker who hates zombies and sisters Wichita and Little Rock (played by Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin).  Together, they journeyed across United States trying to enjoy what’s remaining of the country while trying to fend off zombies who are after them.

The premise of this movie – humans turn into flesh eating zombies – is too familiar (i.e. 28 Days later, Resident Evil). But the movie has a twist – it’s a comedy rather than the usual thriller – sci-fi – gory genre.  The actors played their roles pretty well.  You will surely laugh even though on the scenes where the characters would slaughter the zombies. And would make you wonder if what they did was possible (i.e. Woody Harrelson character inside a carnival booth warding off at least 50 or so zombies and killing all). But I should say that the movie got my attention alright and had just enough laughs to make you want to stay on your sit and watch the entire movie.

Ever send an email to the wrong person?

So you are typing a long email and then start adding the e-mail address of the person. But since you are used to quick typing, you don't realize you have type in the wrong address and sent it to the wrong person. What now??

If you are using Gmail, then there is a new feature in the Google Labs called "Got the wrong Bob?"

When enable, it will help you from sending out an e-mail message to the wrong person - well almost - Gmail will try to identify if you accidentally added someone else's e-mail address that wasn't meant to be.  Read more about the new feature here

Disasters = Signs??

What's going on with this world? 

A tropical depression in the Philippines dumped so much water that it flooded the capital and the surrounding towns making it the worst flooding in four decades. Not to mention that it inundated a freshwater lake that they predicted that the surrounding towns around the lake will be submerged for at least two months. 

Samoa was hit by a magnitude 8 earthquake - the worst in 90 years - that resulted into 10 - 25 feet tsunamis that has resulted into 200 deaths. 

The next day, Indonesia got rattled by a 7.6 magnitude earthquake toppling buildings causing massive destruction and killing at least 1000 people as rescue workers continued digging through the rubble in the hopes of finding survivors. 

Cambodia and Vietnam also felt the wrath of the tropical storm that struck the Philippines. 

Just this morning, I heard of the mudslides in Sicily.

And to end the week, the Philippines is bracing for a super typhoon - just four days after getting inundated with rain.

Geez, natural disaster after natural disaster  - it's like non-stop anymore. Every time I turned on the news, that's all you hear. Disaster here.. disaster there.. disaster everywhere!!!
I guess Mother Earth is now fighting back after years and years of taking abuse from us - humans. And don't think that the US is safe - unusual weather patterns in the east coast, wildfires in the west coast. We sure have underestimated nature and now we are feeling her wrath. 

I guess the only good thing that's coming out of this is the free marketing blitz for the movie 2012...


Click here for an exclusive scene from 2012.