Juan of Words

El Paso, Dallas & Houston: Enter to Win Tickets to the Screenings of “Warrior” and “Contagion”

Warrior

I’ll get straight to the point on this one.  If you’re in El Paso, Dallas or Houston and would like to attend the film screenings of two new movies – which to me look pretty good, by the way – next week on Wednesday or Thursday evenings, keep reading and make sure to follow the instructions on how to enter this particular giveaway from yours truly, in partnership with Checa LA movie.

There is no cost involved to participate, of course, unless you are like me and have to have the biggest bucket of popcorn and a jumbo sized coke to watch a movie agusto in the theater.  In that case, you’re on your own with the snacks.  Sorri for you!

But seriously now, the two movies that are screening in these three Texas cities are ‘Contagion’ and ‘Warrior’, which are set to hit the box office for the masses in a couple of days, but you, desde luego, would be the first ones in your cities to watch them before all of your friends and everyone else (just thought I’d throw that in, in case that is a factor for you).  So here are the dates and times for each city:

EL PASO
Warrior                 Wednesday, September 7, 2011 – 7:30 p.m.
Contagion           Thursday, September 8, 2011 – 7:30 p.m.

DALLAS
Warrior                 Thursday, September 7, 2011 – 7:30 p.m.
*sorry no Contagion screening here

HOUSTON
Contagion           Wednesday, September 7, 2011 – 7:30 p.m.
Warrior                 Thursday, September 8, 2011 – 7:30 p.m.

The goal is to give away the tickets to you in pairs, so if you’re interested in attending, here is what you need to do.  You must enter by Sunday, Sep. 4, 2011, for a chance to win tickets.  I will let you know if you received tickets to the movie by Tuesday, Sep. 6th at the latest.  Sin más borlote, this is what you need to leave in the comments section of this blog post in order to enter the giveaway:

YOUR NAME
YOUR CITY
YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS (or a link to your Facebook or Twitter profile so that I can notify you that you have won)
HOW MANY TICKETS YOU WOULD LIKE
WHICH MOVIE, DATE & TIME YOU’RE INTERESTED IN

If you’re not in Texas, and would like a chance to win movie tickets to the screenings of these two films, check out my friend Teresa’s blog at: www.checalamovie.net for more screening dates and times.

Mucha suerte and maybe nos vemos en las movies!

CONTAGION OFFICIAL MOVIE TRAILER

WARRIOR OFFICIAL MOVIE TRAILER

We Might Not Have Won, But We Certainly Didn’t Lose. Gracias!

Houston, you made a big difference!

Pues como quien dice, you win some, you lose some… y esta vez, me toco perder, but not entirely.  In a lot of ways we all won.  Not only did we get the opportunity to showcase Houston as one of only eight cities participating in this nationwide competition, but we were able to pull together as a community (both online and offline) to raise awareness about the importance of supporting our schools.  When I was asked to put together a community event to as part of this challenge, I knew immediately that Denver Harbor would be the focus of our efforts.

This often overlooked, very historical, and bien Latino community has managed to steal my heart in the couple of years that I’ve called it home, and it was very rewarding to be able to give something back to precisely my neighborhood.

To everyone that voted for me, asked others to vote for me (maybe even harassed a couple of people, lol), donated items, attended our event, volunteered, or did anything else, no matter how big or small, to support my efforts in the Ford F-150 EcoBoost Challenge, thank you so very much por todo. I am indebted to you.  Anjelica and all of her family were wonderful, and I honestly don’t know how we would have pulled off this event without their support.  A very special thank you for that… it really meant a lot to me.  And then of course, so much gratitude to the Ford Motor Company, my new buddy Jackie, all of the marketing folks in Austin and Dallas, and the great people at the Harris County Department of Education for allowing us to sponsor local school Pugh Head Start, as well as hold our event there.  ¡Muchísimas gracias!

And now, without further ado, here are the pictures from our Ford-Denver Harbor Community Yard Sale & Back to School Benefit:

Tweety and Winnie the Pooh stole the show... for good reason. They were dancing tribal, LOL!

The shoppers were ready to shop, for a good cause, with more reason.

Our Official DJ, Element Entertainment really kept the house rocking. They're great, just FYI!

Y'all know Anjelica! On the right is my sister Irma, and on the left my sis-in-law Rosa.

The arts & crafts section of the event were a huge hit with all the kids... hasta uno que otro grandote!

As were the face paintings by this local artist who was kind enough to volunteer her time and creativity.

Once again, gracias a todos por el apoyo and all of the hard work!!

Let’s Win Some Free Gas!!

Un doble honor it is for me to have been asked to represent the city of Houston and the Great State of Texas, as well as the Latino community – I’m the only Latino blogger in this competition – this month, in the Ford Motor Company’s F-150 EcoBoost Challenge! In a nutshell, Ford will be delivering a brand new F-150 EcoBoost to me and seven others across the United States on Sunday, August 21, 2011, so that we can participate in a nationwide challenge that will measure how each one of us bloggers maximize our miles per gallon on the trucks from the 22nd until the 26th.

The competition

What’s at stake you ask?  FREE Nitrogen Enriched Gasoline, not only for me, but for all of you in the city of Houston at two select Shell locations, on September 2, 2011 (Labor Day Weekend), if we can pull off being the # 1 City in this competition.

I won’t bore you with the details of how exactly Ford will select one of us bloggers as the overall winner, but it does involve a community event which I’ll be putting together over the course of the next week, and, most importantly, your VOTES!!!  Yes, part of the measurement will be your votes.  So please vote for me and vote often (if that’s allowed).  As far as the miles per gallon, I think I’ve got that covered (soy mexicano after all, we’re used to stretching things out to get the most out of them), but if you have tips I’m all ears!

Here's the ride I'll be using for the challenge. Sweet, huh?

Stay tuned and I’ll let you know how else you can help secure that free gas for Houston.  In the meantime, VOTE!!

Our First Official Meet Up

¿Qué les puedo decir? Tonight was everything I expected and much, much, more!  To all of you who made it out for the First Official Juan of Words Meet Up, that’s sounds kind of silly in writing, but it’s late y no puedo pensar en algo más ahorita, so perdon… thank you very much!

We met up at the “Green Lantern” Advance Screening in Houston, and really had a great time hanging out, albeit kind of briefly, before and after the movie.  It was in 3D, something we were all very pleasantly surprised with since we hadn’t been made aware of this until the last minute, and all in all it was a pretty good movie.  I could go on and on, pero mejor aquí están las fotos.

Alyssa, Isidoro, JJ, Jacob y yo

With my buddy & compadre, Paco

Michelle, pues yo otra vez, y Sarah

Rosemary, me, and Paco. Too bad the pic is fuzzy...

Con Rocio.

And of course, with my wife Anjelica

Official Rules: Green Lantern Advance Screening Houston

So here are the Official Rules.  As I said before, me encantaría llevarlos a todos conmigo, pero desafortunadamente there are only a certain number of passes.  So to make it fair for everyone, here’s what you need to do to win:

1. Make sure you’re available on Wednesday, June 15, 2011 at 7:30 p.m. to attend the advance screening (this is really important since not everyone who wants to go will win tickets)

2. Leave a comment on this post with your name as it appears on Twitter or Facebook, and/or, if you want to, with your email address, so that I can get in contact with you.

3. The DEADLINE for entry will be Monday, June 13, 2011 at 6:00 p.m.

4. I will collect all the names posted on THIS BLOG ENTRY (not the previous one) and use Random.org to pick the winners, for lack of a better word, randomly.

5. Then I will contact you directly to let you know you won by Tuesday, June 14^th at 10:00 a.m.

I’ll be at the advance screening of the movie also, and would love to greet everyone personally… maybe take a couple of pictures for a later blog.  Of course, only if you’re okay with that.  So, there you go, those are the Official Rules.

Our Movie Night is going to be fun!

¡Suerte!

© 2011 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Green Lantern Advance Screening Houston

© 2011 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved.

You remember those knock off ‘G.I. Joe’ figurines you could get at the grocery store for a quarter?  As a kid, those were my heroes.  My brothers and I would spend hours throwing those little green men around with their little plastic parachutes to see how fast they could fly into our make-believe battles and combats.  We’d hold them by the tip of their parachutes, lift our arms up as high as we could, and simultaneously drop them to see whose would make it down to the ground first.  Whosever did got dibs on choosing one of our toy cars first, for their transportation.

We were pretty simple boys.

Edgar, on the other hand, looked at the package of knock-off military figurines I bought him and asked what is that? Even after I explained it to him, how much fun my brothers and I had with them, he seemed a little confused.  Still, he took the toys and played with them, for all of one day, before he was no longer amused.  He’s much more of a comic book hero kid, he says.

He really is.

We can’t walk into any store without him finding the nearest comic-book-action-figure toy and pleading with us to buy it for him, his bedroom is plastered with posters of them all over the wall, he likes playing with them in the bathtub (he’d kill me if he knew I shared that with you… so shhhh), he can’t watch a commercial for any new comic book hero movie without saying I want to watch that, and when we pick up a happy meal for him, he doesn’t care about the food inside, all he wants to know is what super hero it comes with.  In the middle of his movie he’ll come running out of his room all excited to tell us what’s going on: it was awesome… this guy was trying to catch (insert action hero name here) and then he just turned around and knocked him across the room! We smile and say okay, Edgar… finish watching the rest of your movie.

He’s not the only one, which is why I was so excited to get the chance to offer passes to the Houston advance screening of the “Green Lantern” next week!  It will be the first local screening of the movie based on the DC Comic’s fearless intergalactic guardian, which opens nationwide next Friday.

I know a lot of you are fans and are looking forward to the movie, so give me an idea of how you think would be the best way to give away these tickets.  Por mi, yo los invitaría a todos, pero I don’t think they’d have enough room for all us at the AMC Studio 30… LOL!  I’ll do another post very, very soon (like probably later tonight) to let you know how we’ll be selecting the ticket winners, but I do want your input to make this as fair as possible, so please leave your comments below!

It’s going to be fun!