Ah a lot has happened over the past week.

Firstly, my family decided to put Sandy down. My mum and dad brought him to the vet and he passed away quite peacefully. Both my parents were quite sad. I don't know if the other two dogs noticed his absence... they seemed pretty indifferent actually :/

And last Saturday my Ama had a big bash at a restaurant for her 98th birthday. Damn she's old! As the ancient matriarch of the family she has tons of grandchildren and great-grandchildren and when they all come forward to greet her and kiss her she loves the attention . All was good..or so we thought. The day after my mum noticed she was running a fever and wasn't moving so well so we brought her to A & E. Turns out she had a few ongoing infections. I'd say there was too much hot blood in those frail veins. But anyways she's fine now.

Ah and just this week was my branch cohesion. It was pretty fun and interesting. Definitely more than your average outing. We're something like the organizers of this years tiger trail so thats prettty sick. It owns to be the bitch of the division -_-.

Anyway I've been checking out lots of movies over the last 2 weeks. I watched

1) Kung Fu Panda - One of the better animated movies I've seen. Not on the level of Pixar or Shrek 1 and 2 but still very entertaining.

2) Ironman (again) - Love the slick coolness of the show though I maintain that the villain is a little weak.

3) Gran Torino - I really enjoyed this one. Clint Eastwood's chemistry with the Vietnamese boy is really good and the former's portrayal of a jaded, unhappy war vet who unexpectedly gets drawn to the path of redemption is top-notch. The supporting cast could have put in better performances but Clint Eastwood is enough for me. Clearly the ending took some reference from Unforgiven.

4) Cinema Paradiso - I liked this movie a lot. The story of a boy's relationship with his mentor and their collective love of film. A lot of movies are idealized and are not a reflection of life but still these ideals are beautiful.

5) Crimson Tide - I have never actually watched this movie in its entirety but boy it's one of the best action thrillers I've ever seen. Gene Hackman and Denzel Washington play off each other so well and this is the most suspense I've ever felt in a movie. The ending is slightly predictable but Damn the movie is still good.

6) Donnie Brasco - Some of the mafia jargon here really left me bewildered but I really liked it because it shows the less glamorous, gung-ho side of the mafia. It's nice to see Al Pacino not shout and rant.

7) Apocalypse Now: Redux - This was pretty good until the French plantation scene. At that point it became awfully teduous and plain fucked-up boring. My mum and I fell asleep when they actually reached the Colonel's self-made "civilization". We tried to see ending again the next day, we fell asleep again lol. Well up to the plantation part it really showed the damage and craziness of war. Robert Duvall owns as the surfer commander.

Well I watched Watchmen with wally last night and it was an absolute visual feast. A lot of credit has to go to Zack Snyder for staying faithful to the book. The ending was slightly different and at first I was commenting to wally that it was a little hollywood the way things were so well wrapped up. But on second thoughts, it still captured the essence of the novel in quite a smart way. The ending in the novel also might not have come out so well on the silver screen. It might have been a little ridiculous.

I don't think it was as enjoyable as TDK or LOTR but it certainly was an unbelievable experience. It was a damn absorbing visual orgasm that makes you think freaking hard. The price of peace, the concept of god, the superhero, nuclear war, the nature of life... so many things. At the same time however, I think that those that have not read the graphic novel are going to be overwhelmed and mildly confused by it all. It's not a conventional superhero hero movie and neither is it easy to follow. It's heavily plot-driven and filled with flashbacks and dialogues saturated with detail which the viewer is expected to piece together himself.

Acting wise, Jackie Earle Haley(Rorschach) really stole the show with his twisted, angry (at times sad) performance. The character is already damn cool with his no holds barred, no-compromise attitude but Haley did all that and then made him more sympathetic and less "black and white" than he's made out to be in the novel. Billy Crudup (Dr. Manhattan) did well to portray that genuine detachedness while still coming across as fascinating. The Comedian was pretty badass, Ozymandias was ok and Silk Spectre was by far the worst.

Ah in other news my oldest dog Sandy is quite close to dying. He's about 13 or 14 years old now and quite clearly, he's going to go soon. He can hardly stand up nowadays and when he gets up he can't even walk without flopping down after a few steps. My mum suspects he had a stroke. He can't even get up to take a shit and ends up in his own urine and faeces. It's kinda tragic and painful to see him like that so my parents have been considering putting him down. Personally for me I've never been that close to Sandy. When he was first bought I was only about 7 years old so I never really forged a significant bond with him at the start. It's harder when you try after a few years. He and my dad definitely shared a much tighter bond. I'm a lot closer to Pete and Eddie so if either of those two die, I'll be devastated. But Sandy... I'll probably just be sad.

I just watched this Korean gangster movie called A Bittersweet Life. It was really good.

I've also watched Stepbrothers, Journey to the Centre of the Earth, Mongol and Shoot Em Up this week. Stepbrothers was pretty funny, JTTCOTE actually exceeded my expectations, Mongol was very interesting and cool. Shoot Em Up is exactly what the title says. It kicks royal ass.

Feels great to be on off.