twisted binge

as a wide-eyed thirteen year old schoolgirl, i was already an aficionado of all kinds of reading crap. woman today, a newsprint magazine almost the size of a daily tabloid, was my weekly ritual. from amongst the folios of the said mag and just before the cover interview page, comes the womenagerie column of jz. based on my cache of cutouts, the erstwhile voice of my generation began her stint in the mag when i was fourteen, percolating in deft strokes all kinds of compelling stuff -- the informative and funny side of politics, the skewered aspects of the entertainment industry, portraits of herself and all the other categories compiled in the book adaptation first printed on 1995. fast forward to twenty years later, jz is still the indefatigable writer and observer and my escape from alcatraz ( a dominion of scrub wearing professionals who haven't read her, haven't heard of her and wouldn't even try reading her). thanks to the tenacity of the lovely ivy, who clearly has the talent in communicating with national bookstore salespeople, i was able to lay my hands on jz's eighth twisted book, the 14th jz book in my repository. unlike the previous versions of the earlier twisted titles, which were chronicled in the broadsheet today, the eighth edition has a diffrent format. if i can gather succinctly, most of the stuff in the eighth twisted were transcribed from her primordial blogger turf. not that i don't prefer the internet variant but a book compilation still triumphs over a blog page. in this age of blogs and blogs, jz could actually update her current blogs almost twice a day. when it comes to writing, the bespectacled lady in black clearly doesn't dawdle.

in the subject of tennis, i don't linger in jz's path. in the last decade i've tracked down her tennis writing, she has rooted for the success of marcelo rios and goran ivanisevic when they were still active, and marat safin and roger federer at present time. between andre agassi and pete sampras, she prefers the former. in her words during wimbledon 2001, "I don't like pete sampras. I find him lacking in personality, which of course has nothing to do with his ability, his incredible focus or with the game itself, and I know this, so don't write irate letters telling me I don't know !@#$ about tennis, thank you. Sampras doesn't need you to tell me that he's probabbly the best tennis player ever --- the number 13 sums it up very neatly. My not liking him is no hair off his back."

i may have missed sampras london return at the royal albert hall in december, but so unlike jz, i'm a sampras fan. as i venture deeper into life and living in my raving 30's, i've accepted the hard facts -- the youngest US open winner is no longer the greatest tennis player in history. that title belongs to federer, by virtue of reaching the french open final three times and loads more clay court titles. thanks to the tenacity of one rafael nadal, the swiss master is being brought down to earth. perhaps i could write about federer the way jz wrote about sampras. but i will leave it to the likes of nadal, djokovic, andy murray and any more up and coming tennis prodigies to annihilate his assault to overtake sampras. so as a divergent entity from all other glory-hunters within my blue-wearing circle, i cheer for nadal for the sampras perspective.

aside from the essays, the eighth twisted also comprised the usual movie reviews, introspection of sundance and european sojourns, topics embracing various interests that are as thought-provoking as they are captivating and three short stories of which the starlet suicides is clearly my runaway favorite. blithely, a lot more jz books would be forthcoming in the vast horizon and her audience wouldn't mind anew matching wits with the perplexed salesclerk.