Mon Santos Video48 - Quezon City

Over the years I have collected a dozen of video rental membership cards from different places and until now I still have a few of them.

Last Saturday, I brought my family to Video48 to claim my prize, an FPJ t-shirt for winning an online trivia contest by Mon Santos, owner of Video48. And I bought another one for my brother and several FPJ movies. This shop has withstood the passing of time and still holds a pleasant environment for people who buy and rented movies with a cheerful staff and a great customer service. I never got to meet Mon but just seeing his shop, you can instantly sense his personality, a true aficionado of the art of motion pictures.

Aside from tons of movie files, he also has a great toy collection in his shop most notably Star Wars and Lord of the Rings. We learned from his staff that his collection is extended up to the third floor. Of course, I did not pay much attention on the rest of things there except for FPJ movies and be back for sure…

Thanks for the shirt, Mon! Congrats for the two-decade celebration of your shop and for the many years of movie hunting as well.

John Elway - So Good For So Long

My appreciation for American Football started in 1987 when I was in 4th Grade. My elder brother, Jason, who was in high school then, would only go home during weekends and loved to watch sports shows while he's having a good massage from our dad.

Being an 11 year old boy, I would rather watch cartoons more than anything else which we, my siblings would fight for the television tuner. My brother, being an athletic teenager, always brought home MVP medals from different sports he joined in school. He then became my idol that whatever shows his watching, I see to it that I understand whatever it was, how to score, the name of the plays and the players. One great thing I admire from him is that he loves all sports events. And often times, during championships, he cheered for the underdogs except for local pro-basketball (PBA), where he and the whole family is a die-hard Jaworski fan who wore jersey 7 for Ginebra San Miguel.

One Sunday morning my brother requested to watch the football game and I got intrigued by way the game is being played unlike from any sports I've seen so I also watched the games even when he's not around. What caught my attention during his visits was the NFL Denver Broncos Quarterback, John Elway who also wore jersey number 7. Being a new fan of NFL, I didn't realized that this guy will be my idol too but not until my senior year in college when he won his first Super Bowl. And repeated the feat the following year and ended his career on top with two rings and an MVP award.

In 2005, I bought this McFarlane’s 12 inches figure of Elway. For me, he’s one of the greatest QB I’ve seen because I've seen him in his "The Drive" season when I was a kid and seen him at the end of his career a decade later.

And I can never be happier when I saw and bought an SI 2004 Hall of Fame edition from a small local bookshop entitled: “A Tribute to John Elway, So Good for So Long” where the cover photo is very similar to my McFarlane collectible.