be my friend.

so what happens when you run out of patience?

i got left behind. of course, there's a story explaining how, who and why, but, hello, i'm the king of stories. i can say for sure that that wasn't the truth, but it's entirely possible it was a lie. and i'm going with that right now, because i think adrian hates me. or, at least, has been scared off by me.

thanks, too, jacky. and jinghui.

housekeeping is in the room right now. apparently she's very keen on cleaning all the rooms on the floor she's assigned, 'cause when i headed out to ask her for an extra roll of toilet paper, she asked me if she could tidy up my room [i had the Do Not Disturb sign on the door]. i haven't figured out if it's just incredible work ethic or trying to case the room or my stuff, but i'm here, and my gut says it's the work ethic.

there is nothing to see in shanghai. i want to go ride the maglev train, but it seems kind of silly seeing as it only goes between the city and the airport, and shirlyn won't let me take the train to the airport on monday.

i'll hit the bund tomorrow if things get desperate. then the maglev train. should forget about M. too expensive, reservations needed, eating alone is just No.

se7en

what i really, really want to do right now is to head to the top floor of the hostel, sit on the staircase, and just mope until i feel better.

but too many people would notice, wouldn't they.

conference

"i have radiohead, christian music, and someone watching kitty-cat stuff.

i am so confused right now."

disaster struck--many times

and it all happened in Singapore, not here.

i'm in fact quite content to stay here, and not go back.

i'm not blogging as much as i thought i would be, but i think that's just because i have far less to complain about. and there's not point complaining about human beings, taking into account that that's what they are. human beings.

that's all. this made no sense whatsoever.

cold weather is your best friend

no, really, it is. i like it so much here i actually think about never going back.

this trip just proves to me that singaporeans are just sick, sad, wrong human beings.

i am the king of the world!

i have internet access! the wonders of a simple ethernet cable.

did you know that there exist people who can't grasp the concept of a wired network or wired internet access?

three minutes

i'm in someone else's session on the Free Internet access terminals at the transit mall at terminal one, so this is all i'm going to say:

see you in one month.

and now, the coffee from the bean and the tea from the leaf beckons.

i should be asleep, or otherwise doing something more constructive than what i am doing now

as above.

four line breaks

four line breaks or two with a horizontal line spanning half the page?

i can't decide between the two, and because of that my life is suddenly drawn to a complete halt. which looks better? the original formatting in the document i'm copying from had horizontal lines in it, but it's getting tiring to manually code in the horizontal lines. which wins, anal-retentiveness or natural laziness?

it's now 12:02 PM. anal-retentiveness won.

my mom is sending me to the airport tomorrow. i don't want anyone to send me there. i want to go by myself. i need a clean break.

deadline

"oh my god since when did you grow breasts?"

"my period coming."

so is this why i have sisters?

take a chance on me

“Yes, Rodney, that was my point. The world is a romance novel, and you are the main character.”

what will be, will be

this doesn't feel right. it's the last weekend before i leave for China. i should be, in the words of Betty, rocking out.

instead, here i am listening to Sympathique on my old Dell and catching up on email, livejournal, blogger and RSS. not by choice, but by default because of the lack of motivation to do anything the fuck else.

great. i just remembered to check the Detour shirt i wanted to buy online. and it's no longer for sale.

i feel sad.

i've made a huge mistake

i really, really, really do not want to go to china now.

MIDI'ed up, and into the groove

I never liked George Michael much
Although they say he was the talented one
Andrew Ridgley drew the map
That rescued me, took me to paradise

I was brought up to the sound of the synthesiser
I learned to dance to the beat of electronic drums
I came alive to the smouldering fire in your eyes
I love you now and I will 'til the day that I die

I had a tooth pulled as a child
I put it underneath my pillow
And when I looked the very next morning
There was a ten pound note

I took it to the nearest record shop
I put it down upon the counter
I gotta tell you what I know to be true
I bought my first record because of you

I was brought up to the sound of the synthesiser
I learned to dance to the beat of electronic drums
I came alive to the smouldering fire in your eyes
I love you now and I will 'til the day that I die

I love everything
I love to be around money
A daughter of negative equity
A child of Black Wednesday (Blue Monday, Black Wednesday)

This is Sarah Nixey talking
MIDI'ed up and into the groove
I've got to tell you
What I know to be true

I didn't do too well at school
They said I couldn't concentrate
The day you flew off into the sunset
Was the day my education was saved

Then years later on Kensington High Street
I saw you drive a white convertible Golf GTI
Carefully edging out into the traffic
Just like a real live human being

I was brought up to the sound of the synthesiser
I learned to dance to the beat of electronic drums
I came alive to the smouldering fire in your eyes
I love you now and I will 'til the day that I die

Daddy lost everything
Our beautiful house, his beautiful sports car
His beautiful wife, I held his hand and told him
Everything would be all right

This is Sarah Nixey talking
MIDI'ed up and into the groove
I've got to tell you
What I know to be true

I was brought up to the sound of the synthesiser
I learned to dance to the beat of electronic drums
I came alive to the smouldering fire in your eyes
I love you now and I will 'til the day that I die

I was brought up to the sound of the synthesiser
I learned to dance to the beat of electronic drums
I came alive to the smouldering fire in your eyes
I love you now and I will 'til the day that I die

look here

Look Here.

I DID NOT FUCKING WANT TO BE THE GROUP LEADER. I DID NOT NOMINATE MYSELF.

i also did not appreciate practically HALF THE FUCKING CLASS nominating me for group leader when only three people in the class are in the same group as me.

that is all.

x-type

My first uncle, his wife, and his eldest daughter have just arrived. They smell like their Jaguar, which after all this time still has that nauseating new-car smell that is actually hazardous to your health, and does nothing for me beyond giving me a migraine and nausea.

As usual, they’ve brought a half a chicken and a quarter of a pig along with them for lunch. A lunch for five people, three of which eat half that of a normal human being’s intake. I will never understand it.

The weakness is still there. The mind is unwilling, and the flesh is weak, too many things, too little desire to see anything through.

You, will be, the death, of me.

And our time is running out.

let you down

something's wrong. i go to bed at ten at night and wake at five in the evening. sleep for seven hours and have to take a three-hour nap not five hours later. and i still feel like constant shit, like moving off my bed or off my seat will stir up such shit and drain me so much, it's not worth the effort.

the China trip hasn't bored me yet, surprisingly, but it has despaired, discouraged, disheartened and i have lost the excitement of it. take, for instance, my toiletries. my mom got me what appears to be a liter of Dove body soap, and another liter of Head & Shoulders shampoo. the two bottles combined are three times the volume and twice the weight of my PowerBook. then, my aunt, after bitching and moaning about my mother's common sense, gets me a smaller double pack of Head & Shoulders shampoo and conditioner. then, my first aunt gets me a smaller bottle of Head & Shoulders shampoo. every one is making this huge fuss.

i don't think i'm going to be out of this funk any time soon, and i think this is going to be problem.

under the skin

"Give me the pen," Rodney said.

"What for?"

"I want to write liar across your stupid forehead," Rodney said.

08-19-05_1946.jpg

right. a caption for this photo is being demanded out of me, so, um. i was looking through my old photos and thought this one looked interesting? 

09-21-05_1250.jpg

09-21-05_1250.jpg
Originally uploaded by aklw.

The bus stop i'm shooting this from is named "Opp Tan Tock Seng Hosp". The one in the picture, i assume is named "Tan Tock Seng Hosp". The building you see in the picture? Is not named Tan Tock Seng Hosp. I had to trek for five minutes from the ward wing of Tan Tock Seng to get here. The nerve they have, when naming bus stops.

the shape of things to come

if this, truly, is the shape of things to come, then this might be the last season of The O.C. i watch. yes, shocking, isn't it. second episode of the season, and already so ridiculous.

i feel like i need to watch at least three episodes of something good to make up for it. but it is three AM, and i need to ration the good stuff. i don't have many episodes of Stargate Atlantis left unwatched, and the first season is nowhere near ready.

and, so i leave you with a quote from the episode:

GIRL: (after hearing SUMMER's suggestion to raffle off a hybrid instead of a gas-guzzling SUV) "Air quality, is so important?"

OTHER GIRL: "I know. We breathe it."

Why do the aliens speak English?

Q: Why do the aliens speak English?
A: Practical reasons that come with television production. The time constraints of an hour-long episode mean that it would become a major hindrance to the story each week if the team had to spend the first 10 minutes of each episode learning to communicate with a new species.

how much do i love Stargate Atlantis?

09-13-05_0116

09-13-05_0116
Originally uploaded by aklw.

this one confirm you all ne'er eat before.

09-12-05_1534.jpg

09-12-05_1534.jpg
Originally uploaded by aklw.

Apparently, royston's ones are bigger.

the bluest light

god, i should go and fracking sleep now. only two hours of air-conditioning left.

the intense desire to throw everything at a wall or through a window

yes, it's back, again. sadly what i had in hand was what i was going to give to nelsie for her birthday. but i guess that doesn't fucking matter now, does it?

09-11-05_1912.jpg

09-11-05_1912.jpg
Originally uploaded by aklw.

...
won't break me down,
won't brick me up,
won't fence me in.

free ruler

Note: Free Ruler is only available for Mac OS X. It may work on Mac OS 9, but this has not been tested. It most definitely will not work on your stupid Windows PC.

messages - nelsie tay

i can't post the same thing twice in a row, so this will have to do.

what the hell, is going on?

Where are we?
What the hell
Is going on?

The dust has only just begun to fall
Crop circles in the carpet
Sinking, feeling

Spin me round again
And rub my eyes
This can't be happening

When busy streets
Amess with people would stop to hold
Their heads heavy

Hide and seek
Trains and sewing machines
All those years
They were here first

Oily marks appear on walls
Where pleasure moments hung before
The takeover
The sweeping insensitivity of this still life

Hide and seek
Trains and sewing machines (Oh, you won't catch me around here)
Blood and tears
They were here first

Umm, what'd you say, ohh
That you only meant well?
Well, 'course you did

Umm, what'd you say, umm,
That it's all for the best
Of course it is

Umm, what'd you say, hmm
That it's just what we need
You decided this

Umm, what'd you say, hmm
What did she say?

Ransom notes keep falling out your mouth
Mid-sweet talk
Newspaper word cut-outs

Speak no feeling, no I don't believe you
You don't care a bit
You don't care a bit

(Hide and seek)
Ransom notes keep falling out your mouth
Mid-sweet talk
Newspaper word cut-outs

(Hide and seek)
Speak no feeling, I don't believe you
You don't care a bit
You don't care a bit

You don't care a bit
Oh no, you don't care a bit
Oh no, you don't care a bit
Oh no, you don't care a bit

You don't care a bit

You don't care a bit

oh, god.

oh, god.

that is all. two words. call me what you will, but i don't think anything encapsulates my current stew of feelings as well as those two words.

and that was dawn

and that was dawn tan, reporting live from the VSC studios of TP DES. and, dawn, i checked. it's "Chine".

aaron is happy cause he is going to Chinos.

haha...aaron.90 bloody buck for IDN conference.
going? i think hmm.

je ne veux pas tout

there are only three green lights on my adium contact list right now. one is always green no matter what he is doing, so no point saying anything. another is going off to work soon, and the last one i'm not exactly close to.

so what's a lonesome person to do at five thirty in the morning?

i don't know. why am i awake, anyway? i missed the briefing yesterday because i spent too much time worrying about missing the briefing and hence couldn't sleep.

i ended up waking very, very late. so late it's not even funny. so here i am. there's another briefing today, and i tried to go to sleep earlier.

no dice.

so here i am, not sleeping. the only way to guarantee i will be awake when i have to be.

i've listened to, all night long, Sympathique, tracks from Our Little Corner Of The World: Music From Gilmore Girls, The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, and The Powerpuff Girls: Heroes And Villans.

yes, happy music, for the most part. i think i'm trying to hard to be happy, and it's even harder because i'm so very not happy. i tend to do certain things when i'm severely depressed--beyond my normal chronic depression, that is--and lately i think i've covered all the major points. alternating between eating a whole lot and eating nothing at all, not even trying not to be completely irritable all the time, not speaking at all, saying only nasty things, not doing anything that will count for working towards the things i want to work for, giving up on everything, appearing to wake up on the wrong side of my mattress when there isn't any other side to wake up on, wanting to throw all my things all over the place, et cetera, et cetera.

what am i going to do? what do you do when you hate everything and everyone and love everything and everyone and need everything and everyone, all at the same time? do you go to China? will it help?

what do you do? what do i do?

huh must watch lost ah? dowan already

TELEVISION: "... and win tickets to STOMP! ..."

SAMARIA KHOO: "eh i want!"

--FIVE SECONDS LATER--

SAMARIA: "huh must watch Lost ah? dowan already."

but it's impossible

i want to wake my PowerBook and check my email. but i can't for the next two hours at least.

i want to go to the flea market at zouk that's opening in two hours. but i can't unless i be thick-skinned and ask rosemarie to cover me for a few hours and take care of my grandfather by herself.

i want. but all i have is sitting here with my phone, texting.

mad world

i am mad at the world. fuck off and try again next business day.

the spinning pinwheel-rainbow-beachball of death

i don't see why the fuck i should get the fucking spinning pinwheel-rainbow-beachball of death just because i've pressed the spacebar to scroll down one page on the webpage i'm reading.

i really do no see any reason why.

09-02-05_2201.jpg

09-02-05_2201.jpg
Originally uploaded by aklw.

She's crazy.

Je veux

Everyone's snoring. I can't sleep.

Today's the last day of term. I feel... sad. And I have a weird sense of foreboding.

If i don't pull myself together soon... I don't know. I might never? But one surely cannot live like this.

Je veux seulement oubiler,
Et puis je sieste.

tickets to the Opera

Opera is throwing a 10-year birthday party and is handing out free registration codes to anyone who signs up at their site today [the US today, I don’t know what time that’s until].

http://my.opera.com/community/party/

That’s the link. Go try it out, Opera is a decent alternative browser, and said to be the fastest on the market.

Kill yourself, or get over it.

If you're ever contemplating killing yourself and need someone to talk you out of it, do not, under any circumstances, call kenneth foo.

That is all.

time is on my side

Cerys Matthews [of the now-defunct band Catatonia] covered The Rolling Stones' "Time Is On My Side" for a Mercedes-Benz ad in 2002. i want that song, that ad, a sixty-second mp3 ripped straight from the commercial, SOMETHING.

"chocolate charlie and the factory"

my brother just said the above.

it's not cute. he's fifteen.

08-24-05_2129

08-24-05_2129
Originally uploaded by aklw.

smile like you mean it.

comment spam (actual)

sorry kids. i had to switch word verification on for commenting. just far too much spam. i hope this doesn't discourage anyone from commenting, though, 'cause that would just mean that the spam won.

i've found cupcakes

White Cupcakes

Makes 3 dozen


4 1/2 cups sifted cake flour (not self-rising)

2 tablespoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups milk

1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons (2 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

2 1/4 cups sugar

7 large egg whites

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Line cupcake or muffin tins with papers; set aside. Into a medium bowl, sift together cake flour, baking powder, and salt. Combine milk and vanilla in a glass measuring cup.

2. Place butter in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, and beat until pale and creamy. With mixer on medium speed, gradually add sugar in a steady stream; continue beating until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low.

3. Add flour mixture to butter mixture in three batches, alternating with the milk mixture and starting and ending with the flour. Do not overbeat.

4. In a clean bowl of electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat egg whites on medium-high speed until stiff peaks form. Fold one-third of the whites into flour mixture to lighten. Fold in remaining egg whites in two batches, being careful not to deflate the whites.

5. Pour batter into prepared tins, filling cups to about 1/2 inch from the tops. Bake until a cake tester inserted near the centers comes out clean and the tops spring back when pressed lightly in the center, 18 to 20 minutes. Remove from oven; let cool completely before icing or storing.

From Martha Stewart Living. That Martha sure knows how to live. Now all I need are the above ingredients, a cupcake tin, my treasured Braun mixer back, and an oven. I might need a whisk, too. I don’t think I’ve spotted one here before.

cupcake

I am craving me a cupcake. One with rich icing on it. Strangely I don’t want a chocolate cupcake, I want a buttercream or vanilla or even a lemon cupcake, but IT MUST HAVE ICING.

Yeah, I’m a few bricks short of a wall at a moment. Back next week.

No, wait, might not be back next week. Don’t count on that.

rare ram

i want two hundred twenty-five dollars to upgrade the Dell. ninety-five to get a 512 MB stick of [very rare and amazingly cheap right now and probably not for long] RDRAM, and the rest for a 7200rpm, 120GB, 8MB buffer hard disk drive. and i could even donate the smaller drive it'd be replacing to kenneth for his broken eMac. save him two bundles by not only giving him a free hard drive but also convincing him to install it DIY instead of going to a shop.

sadly my mom's not very understanding with regard to why technology is needed and why upgrading is necessary at all [for us it's years between computer upgrades, and that's only after bitching about the slow PC for at least a year prior, to the point where i've given up hope of ever getting funding to upgrade the Dell to make it more decent to run].

if only i had the ninety-five dollars. the hard disk drive upgrade isn't as crucial as the need to have more than 256MB of RAM.

o/cd

this is going to be a stay at home weekend, i guess. i don't know why this upsets me now, when i used to be perfectly content staying at home on weekends, doing nothing. right now though it's driving me freaking nuts. it doesn't make sense--not everyone goes out every weekend, right?

sympatico

I've only just realized this, but i'm slowly sliding backwards.

Once again, my mind is thinking of a million questions and problems a minute but comes up with no answers or solutions. Doesn't shut down or switch off or even slow down unless severely distracted, affecting all faculties and function, including sleep. Always angry, pissed off, upset, worrying or bitching about something.

I don't want to have to think so much. I don't want to have to think, period. I don't want to work. I don't want to lunch. I want only to forget. And then I sleep.

08-21-05_1516.jpg

08-21-05_1516.jpg
Originally uploaded by aklw.

Royston's music? Must be some bad shit, man.

andalucia

For some reason, I have suddenly and recently become very afraid of being by myself.

Also, apologies for the stunningly accurate capitalization. I’m trying out the Blogger For Word plug-in.

Surprisingly, amos was the only one that questioned if my motives for wanting to transfer into VSC were right. If I felt pressured to transfer and join VSC because all my friends in design school were either all there [check] or close to the people in VSC [check].

While I can say it’s not the main, pressing reason, I can’t pretend it's not or deny the fact that it’s an issue. They're great people, and there is just no one in PID. But what about when [if!] I transfer to VSC? What if, after my friends graduate, I’m back to the desolate feeling I have when I was in my first PID semester? Will loving the work at VSC more than the work at PID keep me moving?

I think I’m making a huge mistake. And I think the fact that everyone’s leaving for the China trip very soon, with me by myself here, is a huge, ginormous, pink-elephant-in-the-room indication of my future to come. It’s so weird that I have such abandonment issues when I should feel used to being abandoned by now. I actually have become open to going to China and actually experiencing the country and the people, first-handing, with relatively minimal bitching, if it meant I didn’t have to be by myself here, and could have one of those vital coming-of-age experiences with a group of good friends, overseas, experiencing a new country and a new culture.

That’s just not going to happen.

“Subject to approval”. My third cousin, daughter of my first uncle, just said that in the conversation they’re having next to me. I feel like that’s what I am now. Subject to approval.

also

i hate the china trip. i don't want to hear about it. really.

command Q, command Z

yes, i waited too long. but that's me, isn't it.

how

i breezed in and attempted to breeze right into hon's office and get it done. the faster you do it, the less pain there is, right?

no. he wasn't in his office. and rumor has it he's gone home. i'll call every quarter hour until six pm.

i'm spinning around

i'm experiencing that weird sensation again.

the one where i'm perfectly still but feel like i'm spinning like a bloody top.

perry

i just came back from my cut at Toni & Guy Academy. it's neater but not much shorter. and having sat there for three hours while the student hairdresser tried to figure out my hair, i wasn't really motivated to ask him to get it even shorter after he asked me once and cut off another half-inch. i'll probably end up going back in less than a month.

and so that this isn't one of those one-paragraph posts, here is another sentence thrown into the mix just for the heck of it.

profusion

and i know, i can feel bad
when i get in a bad mood
and the world can look so sad ...
...

the day after

so, last night i went to my primary school's 88th anniversary alumni dinner. and today kailyn came online from NUS. i said:

kill yourself, or get over it. says: (1:19:07 PM)
hi

and, promptly, she said:

kai's favourite bags says: (1:19:27 PM)
hey i have diarrhoea do you

tomorrow's monday.

... and i don't feel like talking about it any more.

08-14-05_1629

08-14-05_1629
Originally uploaded by aklw.

total bitch lip balm.

for those who demand the very best.

weirdest dreams.

i'm having the weirdest dreams again.

boreders

borders is open until midnight at the weekend. wonder how i never noticed that.

Charlie And The Chocolate Factory was interesting. i don't like it because it strayed far too far from Roald Dahl's book, but it would have been fantastic if it hadn't. it was visually perfect and aurally amazing. shame about the script.

i am buying three CDs later. i shouldn't, but i am.

fucking fuckity fuck-fuck

Apple just emailed me about the new iBook. and i have just come to realization that Royston's new iBook is actually faster than my PowerBook.

sous la pluie

why does it rain now, when i can't enjoy it?

where the fuck is my fucking coffee?

i left eleven packets of Aik Cheong Ice Coffee in the shared locker. i clearly labeled them as mine, and to ask before taking any. i wasn't asked if any could be taken. none are left.

where the fucking fuck is my fucking coffee that i had to buy from fucking melaka?

A perfect slurpee

You may have woken up late, on the wrong side of the bed, gotten to the hospital and had to discuss unpleasant things, but life can't be that bad if you can still get a perfect cherry slurpee, can it?

mac at mac's

finally, a mac-based post.

i'm at McDonald's Takashimaya now. ordering royston's iBook and iPod. and he can't think of what to laser-engrave on his iPod.

sigh.

boys

second Windows post in a row.

i'm at alvin chow's house now. and i have a huge problem.

no, i'm not going to say what it is. but anyway, today i dropped my iPod, and my RAZR, the former of which has two dents on the back and the latter of which has a blunted edge. all because i was carrying xuan's adidas jersey and i got called twice at the same time by pat and dax.

and the lot of them are inebriated. post-Lancer-joyride, post-Ploop!, post-SlapJack, post-mahjong, post-whiskey, post-port, post-broken beer mug.

ruiwen is so wasted he's spent the night giggling and coming on to us whilst swinging a tennis racquet around.

what am i doing? and i'm supposed to be going out later today? didn't i promise myself to stop going to these things?

my resolve? it's slipping

i just booted a windows machine just to upload my phone's pictures. if it wasn't for that silly bug in my motorola's software that times out bluetooth browsing of its pictures folder once the number of items in it goes over certain unknown number...

oh well. i have my A&F photos. i'm happy. i wonder if crap shots taken by a hack using a RAZR that are 640 x 480 pixels can form part of a portfolio.

lazy-hazy-crazy days

i've managed to clear up my desktop to the point that there're now three spots for new icons to appear.

shooting Polaroids with the classic, old-style camera was fun. well, not so much fun, but surreal, lazy-hazy-crazy, soothing, that kind of thing. sitting in the middle of a soccer field, in my Levi's, Kenneth Coles, Topman blazer and Heineken Rugby World Cup jersey, surfing the internet on my PowerBook and listening to Ron Sexsmith, Leona Naess, Imogen Heap and the like. dawn obsessing and shooting and jinghui blowing bubbles all over the field and sitting on Terence's chair in front of a goal post, reading a book. and, then, me on the same chair in the same place, reading my PowerBook. it felt so Abercrombie & Fitch-y. Casual Luxury. exactly what i'd want to do if were ever to do a fashion shoot. in any case, it was, at worst, like we were shooting Shooting Stars and i was Taufik-in-a-blazer. okay, ew.

i also got Minute Maid Lemonade on my PowerBook and RAZR today, the latter of which i'd just finished paying off. now i'm waiting to see how long i can hold out with the waiting game before i put the battery back in and fire it up, fingers crossed and eyes wanting to shut but staying open.

just one of those lazy-hazy-crazy days. i decided to block out the bits of the day that weren't entirely complementary to the lazy-hazy surreal feel.

Sociology 101

jinghui: "i am very dying."

do i quit?

dare i?

it makes no sense to keep on going nowhere.

it makes no sense to keep on.

25th August.

divorce

it would be so much easier if they weren't married to begin with.

"Je ne veux pas travailler
Je ne veux pas déjeuner
Je veux seulement l'oublier
Et puis je fume

Je ne suis pas fière de ça
Vie qui veut me tuer
C'est magnifique
Être sympathique
Mais je ne le connais jamais"

i am not this disorganized

my friend Raymond, who moved back to the states some years ago, is back in Singapore on vacation. i was supposed to meet up with him, and over two three-in-the-morning IM sessions we hashed out some vague details. and now i don't know when and where to meet him. and the Meritus Mandarin Hotel is surely sick of someone calling up to ask for the same non-existant guest.

07-28-05_1512

07-28-05_1512
Originally uploaded by aklw.

i washed cherry tomatoes in the vsc studio sink yesterday. they were the dirtiest and smelliest tomatoes i have ever washed.

my PowerBook's Combo Drive failed. i have to go to Apple today. and i really, really, don't feel like doing so. should i put my iPod in as well?

if you are wearing pink shoes then you definitely need to be slapped

i have lost all productivity. i don't even feel like explaining the quote i used in this title. or, indeed, typing any more at all. pity. i had a good, expository rant building up.

good-bye.

"stealth"

please. it was anything but. a bull of a movie, stumbling through a china shop. yes, it might make blockbuster status, but it's a brainless movie. watch the fireworks and leave with a weird sense of emptiness.

sympathique

i took a trip to Borders today after having dinner with my mother, and managed to complete half my Borders goals--i found "Sympathique" by Pink Martini. it was remarkably easy to find, and they even had "Hang On Little Tomato", but i felt it was time to go slow with the spending.

so i finally have their translation for the lyrics to Sympathique. not that that was what i bought the entire album for, but, damn, is that my ultimate song or what? it is my fucking theme song.

dawn's worrying me. if you read her blog, you'd know why. i'd link you, but i haven't been able to get myself to so much as move my old blog entirely here, let alone create my intended network of links. and i digress. new paragraph.

dawn. you don't have to take what a lecturer says so hard. or even, seriously. they say that those who cannot do teach, and that is true for most of the teachers and lecturers i've met in my life. so there you go. remember the graphic artist/designer from the states that came here for a talk on illustration and said she loved your drawings? hello?

end of verbal diarrhea. i have no idea why i'm so chatty at the moment. probably because my phone's out of commission. because i didn't pay the phone bill and they cut my line off when i was in melaka. because i gave most of my money to my siblings. because they have none, and no one was going to give them any.

because.

07-22-05_1500

07-22-05_1500
Originally uploaded by aklw.

i would like to say more, but there is no time. i have yet to even unpack.

i'm back from melaka. it was enjoyable (more so than other times i've been there, anyway) and i'm glad i went.

however i still don't know what i want to do about... well, everything, actually.

anyway. that's my mother. now i might not always be thinking so, and she might not be all the time, but that is one amazing woman. i mean, why else would i agree to go somewhere where i have been beaten down by the unrelenting blaze of sun that covers the entire place many times before? it was her birthday, and she wanted to spend time with her estranged kids.

i'll tell all soon--and by this, i mean i probably will never get around to it. but who knows?

at the very least, i'll upload all the photos i took.

it's sick

we're supposed to be on our way in fifteen minutes. but time still can be found for my father to come over and pick a fight. and when that was done, he picked another one so that the caretaker would have been done feeding my grandfather, and couldn't reasonably refuse if he were to ask her to loan him money.

shit. there's more to say, but it's time to go.

road trip

today's lecture is: I Am Right And Every One Else Is Wrong, Especially My Eldest Brother's Third Daughter.

i swear, if she wasn't in a wheelchair, people would seriously do things to her.

we're headed on a road trip as of one PM today. to malacca, for my mother's birthday. back on monday. will bring cell phone, don't know if will be cut off, but will take pictures.

pretenses

it's all about pretenses.

when both bathrooms are taken up when you wake up with one and one half hours to get to school, one by your grandfather and one by your disabled aunt, you pretend you don't mind.

when your grandfather has to be taken to the polyclinic to have a worrying weeks-old wound checked out, but you can't go because they want you to go to class, even though you're going to be late and don't want to go anyway because this week they're covering the depressing state of the job market (or lack thereof) for people with the diploma you're supposed to be pursuing, you pretend you don't care.

when you find your two-hundred-dollar sneakers shoved into what appears to be a recycling/trash bag for the fifth time this month, you just take them out and put them on without saying anything, on the pretense that you're in a hurry.

when you take money out to be put into your bank account to pay the power bill and find out that it's more or less all the extra money you had, you take your receipt and bankbook, turn around and sprint towards the bus, pretending to know that it's the one you need to get on to.

when joan catches up to you while crossing the overhead bridge after getting off the bus, you acknowledge her, surprised out of the thoughts you were deep in as you were walking, as she apologizes for being in a hurry and walks away at a speed slower than you usually move at, you want to laugh at the ironic reversal in walking speeds, to see if it'll help pretend that you don't really care that much about anything.

but, you don't laugh.

new music.

portishead! how could i have not heard of them before? especially since i HAVE heard them before?

for fuck's sake!

go to sleep, aaron!

07-19-05_2030

07-19-05_2030
Originally uploaded by aklw.

he was sitting like that. he wasn't posing. except for the limbs covering up his face, that is.

one half hour

royston left with my cashcard to go photocopy something about, it seems, one half hour ago.

he's not back yet.

baybeats '05

07-17-05_2307
Originally uploaded by aklw.

why are they the last mention?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aklw/sets/603312/

poses.

if you know of something that's better than walking through the open spaces of a thirty-hectare campus in the rain, with Rufus Wainwright playing audibly from one of the buildings where your PowerBook is wired up in the middle of the night, please let me know now.

Traffic

I'm supposed to be back before dinner is over. Traffic information reports slow traffic up to Kallang. And that's where i live.

as an added bonus...

because i am feeling generous at the moment, and also because i am an organizational freak, here's the set of photos from the July Angels BBQ.

also known, of course, as the barbecue-that-almost-wasn't that was for kenneth, jiawei & joyce.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aklw/sets/580300/

the making of "the design portrait", day one

here's the link to the Flickr set:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aklw/sets/580272/

the set will eventually include photos from the entire paint job, though.

digitzing woes (and some mural-related issues)

apparently a possible cause of my TT's non-responsive digitizer is the "screen protector" that i've been using since i got this unit from palmOne [a.k.a. the company formerly known as Palm, that will be known as Palm again come July 14th 2005] after i sent in my replacement for replacement. yes, that means that the TT i have is my third one.

what was i talking about? yeah, the digitizer. apparently constant pressure on the screen will cause the digitizer to malfunction. since the screen protector i'm using is simply the ultra-thick vinyl sheet that came with the unit, and i regularly experience this issue, i assume that it's the cause.

now all i have to do is wait for the digitizer to reset itself like it used to, or for the battery to run flat, thereby reseting everything on the Palm.

oh, and today we painted the base coat of the ramp mural. which, actually, should be the stair mural, since the mural is on the walls that encompass the stairs, and not the ramp. oh well. even if i was a complete extra and appeared to be nothing more than a glorified odd-job laborer/runner/gopher/PA/operations manager/QC/floor manager/etc, at least i wasn't all NAP.

i was going to upload some photos of the paint site, but i realized that i wouldn't be able to post all related photos elegantly in one blog post. i guess i'll need to link to flickr.

07-12-05_1952

07-12-05_1952
Originally uploaded by aklw.

NO. that one is TRACKPAD. call yourself a library some more.

(taken at the Adult Lending Floor of Toa Payoh Community Library)

perhaps

perhaps it was a little ignorant/uncaring/apathetic/nonchalant/whatever of me to blatantly bitch about MTV and Laguna Beach when there's all that going on in London (i hear the Apple Store there closed for the day!), but quite frankly, people, let's get real. it may be shocking, but it's by no means surprising. if new york got the hosting, they would have been the ones. not that they had a shot, but yeah.

lesson to be learnt? don't carry uncle sam's balls so much, yeah? i betcha paris probably wouldn't have gotten hit if they'd been the ones that clinched the hosting.

laguna beach? the fuck?

what is this Laguna Beach nonsense? who wants to watch "The Real Orange County", complete with attention-deprived rich bitches pretending to be pretending, when there's an actual drama with a better-looking cast , better music, and better almost-everything-else to watch?

why does MTV feel like it needs to ruin everything with its cool?

give me my newport/hermosa beach anytime.

eric, emily, and james. cameron.

i feel nauseous. watching TV on your chest isn't so hot an idea.

it looks like i won't be there for the meeting with moses re: the ramp mural later today. oh well. best not to force your way into places you don't fit into, anyway.

a million ways

it feels like my body's decided to give up a long time ago, but my mind hasn't yet.

what good is it, though, if the mind is willing but the flesh is weak?

mini-crit is supposed to be when again? i don't think i can do this.

general rule of thumb

it is not normal to want to just break down and cry more than once a day.