The Obligatory Pre-New Year Post.

Mostly because I feel that, as a writer, there is something at the end - and at the start of things - that has to be written about. I don’t know how it fits to logic, or reality, or anything else for that matter. I pretty much filed it as personal delirium - compulsiveness, if you may. That madness in all of us.

In truth, however, I have nothing to write about (gya-har-har-har).

Nope, I have not drawn my New Year’s resolution yet. It seemed like a pointless thing to do. That’s right; I’m one of those people who’d have the gall to draw a list and call it a Resolution, proclaiming to the world that by rule of death and living it shall and will be fulfilled… and then turning that list into a paper airplane to see if it flies well down the third storey. Oh dear goodness.

This year had been a wonderful year. Every year had been. I am a fortunate man (it feels odd, and maybe a little too ambitious, to put myself in that ‘man’ stature), and I have friends that make me feel like I’m loved. I am happy. And I hope somewhere I’ve made people happy too.

And I know that I’ve made people sad or angry; you always know if you did, intentional or not, and for that I apologise. Sorry doesn’t wipe the scar, but if it does something at all, then I can only say it, and ask that I’m forgiven somewhere.

I’ve not done a lot this year. Some I had promised, most I had not. I’ve done so little that looking back, it was a wasted year. The few that I did, well, were nothing. Maybe it wasn’t. But you’ll have to tell me. I don’t see anything myself.

But yeah, all in all, it was a good year.

And for that glorious ‘09, here’s to wishing that it will remain - at the least - like it was; and here’s to wishing that it will become something else entirely.

Something more beautiful, of course.

Happy New Year!





P.S: And to my good mates, namely Bryan, Kelvin, Pauline and Vic (and everyone else, even if you‘re not mentioned, but remembered in heart) ; in the good nature of 2009 being the year of the Ox, it’s gonna be full of Bull-crap.

Here’s to you, with hopes that you don’t take bull-crap from anyone, and that yes, bull-crap is very much welcomed if flung here in good jest XD.

Once again;

Happy end of 2008!

No Christmas Lights Tonight.

Somehow the power-box managed to short circuit itself, or at least the rain had helped in more ways than one, so that trying to turn on the lights to the garden Christmas tree (it’s not pine, not anything else, but it’s tall and it looks like any Christmas tree) will result in the main fuse tripping.

Not that it matters, since we don’t quite celebrate Christmas, but it’s nice to help brighten the festivities with a tree of blinking lights to decorate one small side of the road.

For a little bit of speciality the family decided on KFC for dinner, and guai ling-gao for dessert (bitter as hell, but a sign of good quality), and instead of a humble fire and some popcorn we sat and watched TV and cussed at the ever unchanging grievances of Hong Kong soap dramas (at least, dad and I did).

This evening we found the first grapes of the house.


We’ll we watching if more will follow, but from how my mother accidentally killed the other vine with her random trimming, the future looks bleak.

*****

Here’s a note for you, if you even plan to have a house with a garden that gives you a lot of space to plant and grow trees or flowers;

Avoid. Planting. Bougainvilleas.

They can look very nice, especially when good balances of rain and sun come around with the weather, and they can bloom into a menagerie of colours, and when the flowers shed onto the ground it can look like it came out of a Victorian painting (at certain perspectives, also depending on your tastes). But when it comes to upkeep, you either make it a point to trim it consistently, or prepare to hack at it one fine evening, ala Prince Phillip to rescue the Sleeping Beauty.

Damage report; several splinters, a couple of cuts, a thorn through the pirated Crocs and into my feet and twigs and brambles and leaves in the hair on both days of battle.

Also, I neglect to mention; as it is pretty much common for people to plant it by the fences, an untended bougainvillea can cause mega damage to it, as it grows outwards and if you have those wire-type fences, it can push it outwards and pretty much open up holes where it shouldn’t.

We don’t have wire-fences now, but I remembered that year where gardening led to discovering that the fence was fucked up by a rogue bougainvillea, which led to the father engineering his dream fence, which led to the most miserable month of self-construction, and golly, it had hurt so much.

Do yourself a favour, and skip on bougainvilleas. Pretty yes, but the thorns and the nature of it, it’s like something Maleficent herself would throw up for good measure.

***********

I don’t know why I keep finding stuff like this:



Oh, and this is some neat animation:



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Ooh nuts, it’s pretty much belated since I uploaded it so late, but

Merry Christmas everyone.

And here’s wishing that you’re with the people you love and that you’re out giving love.

And if you don’t celebrate Christmas but just the holiday, I hope you had a great day.

Cheers!

That’s funny.

It’s already two years now. Two years since the last.

And these two years had been incident-free. In that sense.

There was one thing. But it’s different. Very.

There’s no asking why; the answer’s pretty much straightforward.

Laid like red apples, on white canvases.

I simply didn’t talk.

And unsurprisingly;

It’s what that makes it matter.

******

On a couple of side-notes (now yellow and Stick-It):

I’m back to a semester break and when put into perspective (by a late-night, accidental glance at a MSN private message), it’s the last semester break I’ll be having, for this course, at least. I doubt I’ll ever be in another course again so this is just as much as finale as the curtains drawn over the bowing actors.

Make the best out of it? Perhaps, haha…

It also opens up several new things to consider, but I’m not talking about that tonight. It wouldn’t quite fit. A better night would call for it, if it comes.

Ah, and there’s the matter of the new Prince of Persia game.

I like it. I don’t love it like I did with Sands of Time, but as far as this rebooting-of-the-series goes, it went on a beautiful, vastly joyous direction.

So, I heard there’s a sequel. Thank you.

Next stop, possibly, properly play Fallout 3.

And then there’s RE: Chain of Memories. And Persona 4.

For some reason, Christmas 2008 has been generous with games.

Yes, yes, I know; I have a final year project to complete and I’m way overdue. But golly, Christmas is soon. And there’s something about spirits and festivities and the universal agreement that a somewhat deprived gamer would get his games, no?

No?

What Christmas are you celebrating?

Sometimes I piss myself off. I’d piss myself with a bad case of urine infection and watch it stink, then feel the burn. Then go Fuck Shit Mama, it Hurts like Nails down the Pipelines. Hear it ring and clang? Clatter clatter clatter clatter.

The aftermath of it; I put it behind, among the shelves and old cabinets, and when something like this resurfaces I get to look back and say, well, been there, so might as well be careful. Maybe I’d forget it. I know myself to do it sometimes. At any rate, it was a stinking bad piss-off. Like bed-wetting incidents, I should just go hang it out to dry. Then spray some FeBreeze.

It’ll smell like pine, but beneath it all, you know it’s stained.

*****

Skipping Stones.

I miss doing those, really. Whenever I do it I happen to be with my brother, and we’d just start picking pebbles to fling them and compete to see whose stone can skip the most. He’d win, mostly. Sometimes I luck out. Importantly, however, was the sensation of seeing the stone skip across, leaving ripples at its wake, which mould into one another and become intricate, shimmering webs.

Ripples settle back into steadiness. Placidity, and unbroken calmness.

Then we’d toss another few more stones, and watch them skip.

************

Excuse what I just wrote above. I’ve been struck with a case of emo-ness lately and it had started to turn into a mess of boils and pus, so I better put it down in a more arranged manner. So it wouldn’t mutate. That might turn ugly.

Now, as I always do, and now it’s almost tradition, really, and a by-product of years and years of increasing laziness; I summarise 10 days worth of events in bullets and points, which saves time for both you and I, and goodness know we don’t have much of those lately:

1) Broadcast Journalism took several days to properly edit, and I’ve just taken a look at the marks the other and I thought it wasn’t anywhere bad, just nowhere great. No better results, truly.

2) My NaNoWriMo novel, somehow, managed to complete itself, at 50, 539 words. They gave me a few digital badges and a certificate that I can print and laminate and hung on the wall, but I think I’ll just keep it in the computer.

3) I fell sick. This sickness came with fever which made me hot and cold sometimes, to the point I had started wondering if it had to do with certain objects and the relative distance between myself and it; I lost voice for 3 days and mostly I couldn’t do anything but try and sleep.

4) I fucked up for Online JR assignment. That’s the easiest and least painful to way to put it.

5) After everything was finished, I went ahead and spent the afternoon completing Dead Space. I sat through the credits feeling rather shaky, and when they allowed me to return to the game with the equipment I had plus the new Stormtrooper looking suit I went ahead and spent some quality time stomping with brand new white boots.

6) I have managed to hitched an addiction towards Left 4 Dead, which is turning out to be one of the best zombie shooters out there, and one of the best co-op games I’ve had the pleasure to play.

7) I’m facing trouble for my Final Year Project, because I’ve not been able to submit anything final and I’ve not even drafted the questionnaires yet. Future looks bleak.


I’m so glad it’s over -- even if it didn’t go particularly well -- that I’ve been spending the past few days loafing and goofing and fooling around.

Now, there’re the exams to worry about…

***************************

Ah, yes, and because I needed to gloat about it one way or another, even if it wasn’t anything great or amazing:

Also, I found out something about a script frenzy thing, which, like Nanowrimo, will have you writing a 100 page script in 30 days. It starts in April, I think, and it sounds all fun.

Do check out the MPH-Alliance Bank National Short Story Prize 2009, if it’s your kind of thing.

Well, for tonight, oyasumi!

Deadness of the Brain; Petrifaction, Calcification; The Frozen Leaf.

Snow. I’d like some snow now.

I’d like to feel cold beneath layers of clothing and working on a computer that will inevitably freeze up, and I will proclaim that work and assignments and the entirety of it useless, pointless, and go sledding at the nearby hill. And then I’ll chuck snowballs at random people. And then I’d return home, cold and wet, and I’d drink hot chocolate and make myself a fire and go to sleep.

I’d like some rain, at least. To make the night a cold one.

Funny thing is, it rained today. Once in the afternoon and all the way till 4, where it stopped for a bit and then continued until 8+, after I bought dinner. It had rained and it was hot, and stuffy, and even under the drizzle it felt like going through a line of hot water shower. Somewhere I started wondering if my car’s air-conditioner stopped working; it had seemed compelled to give me more of warm circulated air.

I had thought I was having a fever. I was not, of course. I figure I was only being delirious.

This heat is getting on my nerves.

Tell the truth
Sing the story
Write the words
Wish the glory.

NaNoWriMo on imminent failure; I’ve clocked 37K but I haven’t been properly updating for days now. The story had pretty much walked out of my hands and dived down somewhere among the muck and convulsing concoction of horrendousness that some stories turned into. In another word, it’s starting to mutate into something I don’t ever remember making up. It pretty much woke up and started strangling me. Now feel like I should rouse the villagers, arm them with photon cannons, and take them on a hunt to kill the creature I created. But I might not. It’s my creation after all.

Somewhere along the lines I started thinking about making it a wife. As in, writing a sequel. Holy nuts. Maybe they’d start having kids.

At the rate of work and assignments, I probably have to spend the best of 3 days writing 13000 words. I won’t finish the novel, but I intend to finish the race. And one fine afternoon I’ll start thinking of rewriting it down. Maybe. Possibly.

The room,
And burning coal.

The smoke, smog
Steam
Dryness and wetness and all round constriction

Deadness of the Brain
Petrifaction of the Mind
Is the Calcification of Thought.

The Falling Leaf
Frozen in the Air.

And because I’m too tired to NaNoWriMo tonight;

1) Things are still as it is.

2) I bought an external HDD the moment my cheque came and now I’m back to being broke.

3) Broadcasting Journalism is fun, but dear goodness, inexperience with the camera can cause you trouble

4)




I’ve missed fulfilling NaNoWriMo quota for two days now, so I figure I have to make up for it over the weekend, provided my father didn’t rob my days off like he always does.

On the side note, EA’s Dead Space is probably one of the best survivor horror action game to come out since RE4, and if you’re talking about being immersive and downright scary, Dead Space is topping charts for a long way to go.

I should probably be back to updating regularly, if I ever did, once the month’s over and I can safely put myself away from Nanowrimo.

For tonight, Goodnight.

This one is with some explaining to do.

I’ve been occupied with a few things. It hadn’t robbed me of my life and turned me into a recluse, but all the same it strayed me away from this blog, and I had to walk a full circle and past the bridge and across the paddock to get here.

Right now, I’ve been kept busy by;

A) Final Year Project

B) Assignments

C) Nanowrimo.


Of all which takes up my free time unless I made ensure the time is occupied by something else, such as slacking in secret, or asking friends to join me for lunch/dinner one Sunday.

I predict that I wouldn’t be updating for sometime, considering the slowly but surely growing stack of work, both given and taken.



These were what happened over the past few days;

Firstly, of which I am still rather dazed yet somewhat proud of, is the fact that I’m still actually participating in Nanowrimo after 10 days and has been making steady progress. My current word count is 20,014. It is the worst novel ever written. I kid you not.

I’ve been writing without actually thinking, which is an interesting thing to do. I’ve pretty much screwed structure and limning and grammar and vocabulary and had spent the last 10 days dumping whatever word or dialogue or parts of the story that I felt relevant into the word processor -- the result is a mish-mash of scenes that don’t make sense holding together a paper thin plot with the stupidest dialogue made by characters who never turned out into what I wanted.

But it is all fun. Great fun, in fact. Only very tiring. I only write nearing midnight and so far I’ve been damned sleepy everyday.

Only 30000 more words to go. My God, I feel that I really want to make it.


Secondly, I’ve been left home alone - literally - for the first time in the 21 years of my life. The father went outstation for work and the mother went on vacation. The brother is in the UK. I was suddenly given unprecedented freedom to do whatever I want whenever I want, over the course of 3 days. What I did was have the guys over to Kajang for lunch and dinner and as much fun as we could handle.

It was not without its problems, though. I had to spend 4 hours of Saturday cleaning up the house and ensuring nothing really died. So far I have only one casualty; the shark-like fish in the deep tank. I flushed it down the drain. So far, so good.


And that’s pretty much it without me having to go into details, and details I would rather try and place into the Nanowrimo novel. I have a 2000 word minimal quota daily.

They say writing is a voyage into the unknown; the majestic beauty and enchantment of it, the shadows and blight and deprivation. Well, Nano is a 50000 mile marathon into it, and I’d tell you, it’s quickly getting very exhausting.

Very, very quickly.

Something a little more like a proper update.

I’m feeling distraught. Try as I might, my work doesn’t seem to get itself done. I’ve gone to great lengths; even tried putting it in a bucket of water and chanting that Tanuki charm, hoping to see it grow into completion, but nothing’s changed. And I’m feeling frustrated. And it’s so hot today I’m already making it an excuse for not properly doing work.

I think, right now, what I really need is a hilltop somewhere in New Zealand, one that hugs the coast, where it’s cool with ocean breeze and warm with gentle sun, and a computer that functions with Internet despite being miles away from the nearest power source. I’ll finish off my work and even write you a novel. Or a short story anthology. Whichever you prefer.

So. Period: it’s too hot, my work won’t finish itself, and I prefer to fill the remaining time with dreams of the impossible. Ah.

Ah, yes, speaking of novels, this is what I got from the MPH Warehouse Sales that happened last week;

And the books, from bottom to top:

Hannibal Rising by Thomas Harris - RM10 and hardcover.

Abarat by Clive Barker - RM10 with glossy pages and Van Gogh like illustrations occupying several of the pages.

The Chronicles of Narnia (C.S Lewis), in a whole tome, and only RM15.

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak - introduced and found by Pauline, and only costing RM5 because it is water-damaged, but still very readable.

The Old Kingdom Trilogy by Garth Nix (Sabriel, Lirael, Abhorsen) - RM19 each. I think it’s slightly cheaper than getting the complete box-set.

The Sandman: Book of Dreams, Edited by Neil Gaiman and Ed Kramer - an anthology of Sandman stories by several authors. RM20.

The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents by Terry Pratchett - I’ve always wanted it, never knew it was written by Pratchett, and now that I have it I can proudly say I only got it for RM20.

A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon - This is a compulsory must-have, because I really enjoyed Curious Incident. RM20.

And, last but not least, Sun Tzu’s Art of War, bought for the father and brother. RM20.

The total tally of money spent: RM177.

Which means that I’m so broke now I’ll be eating Roti Canai for weeks to come.

*****

On another novel related topic, I think it’s proper to point out that Nanowrimo starts on Saturday.

And being a participant, it’s only natural that I ask people to join, because it’s fun and if you’re dedicated enough, it’s also frustratingly blissful.

Sign up at: www.nanowrimo.org

And you can find out all about it there, if you don’t know anything about it.

********

Ok. After a whole entire year of doing nothing but growing roots into this chair here, I’ve finally (oh dear Heavens, finally) managed to play a game of badminton.

It was fun. I ended up pulling both my calf muscles and one at my left foot (which was a curious sensation; it didn’t quite hurt but my toes kept bending backwards and it impeded walking, so I had to waddle to the car and stretch for a bit). This means I need a couple more sessions, preferably enough to last me my entire lifetime, even during my wheelchair days (count: 20 more years).

And my play-mates are still a bunch of wackos.

And Michelle’s tennis swings still scare the intestines outta me.

Oh, and Mekz is surprisingly fine at badminton. I say surprising, because somewhere some time I heard (whether from herself, or from other people) that she won’t play sports for nuts. Mich managed to get her to come along, and she’s a fine player.

Well, hopefully, another game this Thursday will materialise.

**************

The Longest Sunday.

It ends with fireworks.

I hear it outside. I hear the jubilee, and beyond that I hear the celebrations, imagined the joy and cheer and merrymaking, those that fill itself with night and stars and the great big bottles of beer.

It is 12.

It is The Celebration of Light.

And it is my pleasure in wishing everyone a Happy Deepavali; if you’re celebrating it, then my best regards and wishes, and if you’re just enjoying that extra bit of holiday then I say go out and have fun and fall in love, or keep loving, because you have time and parking is free.

I’m wool-gathering. Forgive me. The night is of such, and I’m trying to tell something that wouldn’t come immediately. Or, at least, I feel that going into it immediately wouldn’t come off as right or proper. Then again, you’d do better someplace else.

It’s a long post, as far as I see it now. And I haven’t actually started.

Where do I start?



I kept thinking… ruminating, more like, in a reminiscing sort of way, of what my brother would’ve said today. I’ve sat down and waited for him to sit beside me, where we would’ve been silent of a bit. And then he would’ve turned and said to me; “This is just how it is. One rock in that rivulet; one chink in the chain, and the whole process changes. And everything, norms or monotony or whatnot, becomes chaos.”

And he would’ve said it sagely, though he wouldn’t sound like one any day. He would’ve said it like he had forgotten he’s told me the same thing for more than 5 times now.

But 5 times or not, he would’ve been right. This is how it is. This is the reality of the world; how easily it crumbles, and how easily to look at the broken, unfixable path and say, but there’s where I’m going. Nope. The road always changes. It’s all about keeping to that right direction, and knowing where that exit is.

I’ve made it sound dramatic. It isn’t. It’s no biggie, I guess, and that perhaps would tell you to go away; you won’t find anything here. This is just rambling. Thoughts that I feel that I need to put down for no significant reason, aside from personal satisfaction.



It started with rice vermicelli in soup.

That was breakfast. Sunday’s breakfast. We haven’t had something else for a long time now, and that was fine by us. It was good, within that expectation that won’t likely break. And it was with its pleasantries. It was quiet.

And then we cleaned the store.

Here’s the thing about spring cleaning with the father. He gets grumpy and starts blaming everything else for the pile of junk we somehow ended up keeping. He’d accuse people for putting things away and forgetting it when its needed, and then he’d blame useless junk on other people. He’d forget that most of the junk was kept there by himself, or by his orders, and now that it’s piled up he’d clear off every fingers of accusations pointed towards him and frame it on everyone else. And then he’d say how much other people talk back to him. He believes in national democracy. He practices tyranny at home.

And after getting the store down we cleaned Gary’s aquarium, and all in total it robbed me four hours of my life.

I had bathed in cold water and was preparing to get started on a freelancing script when the phone rang, and said that the grandmother had somehow sprained her waist, which rendered her immobilised, and that she was in so much pain she couldn’t be carried to a car and now awaited an ambulance.

We got there and waited for the ambulance, and when it came the parents went on it and I trailed it on the Accent with 6th Aunt as company. It was the 6th time I ended up in Kajang Hospital, and I take that as something of a bad thing.

I am one of those people that dislike hospitals.

It’s not so much of the smell of sickness, or the medicine, or that looming shadow of death that hung low like a hairy mop in cheap thriller parks. For me, it is that feeling of unreality. It’s like walking into a place that was rightfully and blissfully hidden behind the stone walls, because the old people say that it is horrible and terrifying, and that we shouldn’t gaze upon it because it is otherworldly. I walk into it and find it a completely paradoxical world; I’d see nurses joking and laughing while pushing decrepit patience around on wheelchairs that squeak something in B minor. I’d see children running around and a man holding his urine sample to his chest, and then see the doctors with scrubs looking like theirs the hands of God. Then I’d meet doctors that are saintly in speech and care, and nurses that are too sombre for the life of them, and then that hurt women and burnt men and myself in the mirror, too utterly fine, too utterly fortunate.

I don’t like that feeling.

They made us wait for an hour, maybe two. And when we couldn’t wait anymore we walked into the emergency ward, disregarding that No Entry sign, to find my grandmother somewhat uncared for. All she had was just an injection. And then she was left there until people felt compelled enough to take her for an x-ray.

My grandmother is fine; she had a sprain, but the doctor warned that she, being older now, is starting to have weaker bones.

My grandmother is the greatest grandmother there is. I’ll tell everyone that, and I won’t be exaggerating. That, coupled with the fact that I cannot respect my grandfather beyond the point of obliged piety, makes her my single-most loved (living) grandparent.

We talked to the doctor, who said that my grandmother was free to go, but when we tried to help her up she hurt so much that the doctor suggested that we admit her for one night. We did that, and then regretted it, because the wards are… well, horrible. Perhaps I’m just being a jerk about it, but truly. It’s a horrible place. It’s a place that deserves better, could be better, but it is there, like limbo, like the stuff we can say we detest but truly cannot do without.

My first impression was a World War 2 infirmary. I’m being overtly histrionic. But impressions are impressions.

Here’s the part where it got ironic. We don’t want our grandmother (mother, in my mom and aunt’s case) there. And my grandmother actually got better; she could walk and it didn’t hurt as much. So we say, we want her out. It sounded like a kid wanting to a go at that Ride of Terror, and then realising that it’s all too scary, after the tickets are bought and the seatbelts fastened. We know we annoy, but that’s the thing to do, because it had to be done. Turned out that to discharge a patient from the wards we first require a doctor’s diagnosis, and then the green light. The doctor wanted a night for further observations. We said, no thanks. She said she would need us to sign a letter. And then she said her senior doctor wouldn’t allow that until the senior him/herself took a look first.

So we had to wait.

I’ll tell you that we waited until 11 at night and there the senior never showed up, and by then my grandmother was feeling so guilty for having bothered us this much that she insisted she stay for the night. That was when I got home, took a bath, and sat here, listening to fireworks.



I’m thinking now… imagining it, that my brother would be calling me gay for sitting here and writing into the night. He’d be calling me gay for quoting him somewhat, and I’ll call him a big asshole. Then he’d hit me and ask me to repeat that (and I would, and get hit again; some things never change). But I’ll see him wear that tired face into the bathroom, and then we’d probably end up talking into the night.

We’d talk about grandma and grandpa, about hospitals and doctors, about death and life and dreams. And then, when it’s late, we’d say goodnight and go to sleep.


I talk to a computer screen now. I told it about the longest Sunday.

For a moment there, I thought I was having one of those bad days.

It lasted for half an hour. I sort of just sat outside of my house to ruminate things through, wondering what a stock broker must’ve felt when facing plummeting figures, and then wondering if it’s sort of the same as the bed of nails I was sitting on.

I don’t call it misfortune, because most times it happened because I made it so, in an indirect sort of way. The full circle that came back to bite the ass; the Ouroboros serpent, branded on the skin. I’d still blame it on bad luck, but at the end of it, the reason why that bit of misfortune snowballed into a catastrophic avalanche, was because I was being lazy or an utter dunderhead.

I was, however, luckier than I thought. Someone up there must’ve decided my fate deserves the worst another day, and turned the electricity back on. And then there was light. And the fan. Oh thank mercy. Never mind that I still had to climb the gate to my own house. At least I submitted my FYP proposal.

You’d wonder if there was some sort of lesson learned here, but I think if you’re actually wondering, you didn’t know better. Oh boy, didn’t you know any better at all…

*******

Malfeasance

\mal-FEE-zuhn(t)s\, noun:

Is:

Wrongdoing, misconduct, or misbehaviour, especially by a public official.

Used as in;

It is part of that vicious circle that if a politician’s malfeasance, practised whether on men or women or the people in general, would return to haunt him till the graves.

(Dictionary.com)

Just so you know.

Emptiness itself is not a wrong; leaving it empty is.

********

There’s probably nothing else that I can really talk about aside from the rain and driving and the hectic atmosphere that comes with the semester, of which is both constricting and exasperating at the same time. And even if I do want to talk about it, it’ll probably sound the same like it had been, and will ever be; that, I figure, is how persistent monotony is.

So classes have started, and on the first day alone we’ve been kindly but very sternly reminded that the semester will be so jam-packed with things to do that any form of leisure should be heralded as grateful grace and gifts. And after having kindly be told so, I spent the week finishing freelancing work and then forgetting everything else, and when I started reminding myself I ended up sitting blankly and finishing nothing.

Somewhere a little voice had started saying, not good; definitely not good. Pretty soon the same voice will yell Game Over Man, Game Over! when deadlines peaked and I find myself amidst the inhabitants of hell, commenting on the rather baking weather.

Right. It’s high time I get started on things.

Say what? Battle for Middle Earth at 10.30? I’m in.

*************

Here’s Aunt 6 (or 6th Aunt) with little Forest. I apologise for the poor quality; apparently that’s the best my phone can produce.



Forest is Aunt 5’s (or 5th Aunt’s) new puppy, which dad was given by a friend and he in turn (and thankfully understanding that 2 dogs at home now is already the breaking point of responsibilities, not to mention the rabbits and the fishes and Gary) gave it to Aunt 5, since they needed a dog to care for the house.

And Forest is quite the puppy. In fact, he looks and reminds me exactly of the puppy Lanna, in the same way that they look like bear cubs, and that they bumble around with their fur puffed up looking like pouncing fur-balls.

I realised today that I didn’t really have any pictures of a puppy Lanna. There’re probably one or two adult Lanna pictures, and some puppy Marley pics, and probably even Latte (which is now living with an aunty friend, apparently rather happy), but no puppy Lanna pics. I figure it was because I hadn’t had a digital cam back then to go snap happy, but all the same I wondered why I hadn’t taken one with the old Olympus, to keep in the album.

The bulk of the pictures are in the old computer… I have to retrieve it someday.

I woke up as though someone had just kissed me on the lips.

There was this feeling… this untruth of it; this lie that was bitter-sweet and profound. I opened my eyes knowing that I have been cheated. I wondered if I dreamt. And if I did, what I had dreamt about.

I brushed my teeth and rinsed with Listerine, but the taste lingered.

******

It’s a strange morning. I’ll warrant that.

For one, I was up earlier than anyone else in the house, something that doesn’t happen in most weekends. I slouched to the bathroom past an empty dining table; no TV, no morning Chinese classics from the mother, no disgruntled talk and chatter. No barks from the dogs, either. That’s really strange. It left the house in this ringing, hollowed atmosphere. Like an empty cathedral; there’s even a sort of sacredness to it. A serenity that I’m wary to trespass. So I found myself closing the doors rather softly, and consciously avoid banging something and cause a ruckus.

There were flowers by the gate, on top of the post-box.

I learned later that it was delivered over by flower vendor at the morning markets; he does it over the 1st and 15th days of the months in the Chinese calendar. The flowers are for prayers, and my dad ordered in for Tuesday. I didn’t quite know that, of course, and the sight of it on the post-box was something. Sentimental. Sad. (I may need to note that it was morning and I was sleepy).

I drove on empty streets. So empty that I didn’t see the next moving car until I turned into Taman Zamrud, and that’s about 5 minutes worth on the main road, plus traffic lights. The restaurant, though, was packed, but I got the breakfast taken away soon enough.

And it was as though things just bloomed up like a cascade of fireworks; I was the 15th car in line at the next traffic light; the newspaper stand was almost crowded; I noticed that there were probably more cars than it should heading down my neighbourhood (turned out that there was a celebration somewhere, and the guests gets invited early in the morning for whatever reason); I drove past joggers and a cyclist and a family walking down to the bus stop; my parents were awake and they were already making gentle bicker over the garden stuff.

I don’t know why, or how it did it, but it left me feeling rather lively throughout the morning.

**************

I wanted to sleep the whole afternoon away.

It was made for that. It rained, and despite a script I must tend to I felt relatively carefree and relaxed. I fell asleep for an hour, woke up thinking I slept for three (misread the clock) and bustled to try and get work done. Then I gave up and played Call of Duty in separate bursts.

Classes start tomorrow. I noted disdain from myself and several others in regards of Mr Money-moron returning as our tutor. He’s rather bad, really. Passionate, slightly, but his teachings are in shambles.

I might not be the only one saying this, but truly; this semester break feels really short.

Ah well, time for things to get back on track.

Goodnight people.

Stale. Repugnant. Decadence at the state of rotting splendour, dour and grim and black. The state of it; in its entirety, is useless. There is only turning back, but turning back is going back into the pig-pen, reliving the same stoic wallow; the same muck and fence and food. Going forward is the running out into the sunlight-basked fields into the unknown; crevasses and cliffs or diseased blight, hidden by promised valleys and daisy-strewn hills that rule the eyes and brimming with White Light Majesty.

It’s simple; it is simply hatred. It is reluctance and bitter sighs of regret which, for all its worth, the mark of despise and catatonic abhorrence stemming from basic like-or-dislike factors. There is no reason; this, itself, is the explanation. Plainly said, I hate it. I dislike it. I give it loathe and I give it curses and I bid it to hell.

I write it to reap its benefits but I write it as though I am typing it, churning it, gobbling the same repeated points and information, chewed and regurgitated into a less comprehensive form; but chewed at least, because they want it chewed. They want it masticated and spat out looking like moulds of brown lumps discoverable at failed cafeterias. I give what they want, and that’s the one important point. The whole other unrelated one is how I find it detestable and how I take it upon to myself to do it.

Uninspiring is the word. Shallow, hollow, decayed and the likes come secondary. After sales service, they say; get it from us and get something else. Two birds with a stone, two cockroaches with a single slipper; hit one get another twice the benefit double the fun. Up yours, I say. Go fuck something else.

Boring. Boring boring boring boring. Dull. Like watching flower grow. Like watching metal rust. No, wait, like penning the next Magnum Opus of Magnificent Bore, starring the silent symphony, attended by the ghost of crowds going for Transformers 2. What joy. What prospects. Gay-yippee-yay.

Imperative. Important. Prominent. Culmination. Amalgamation. Benefits. Repeated to the point of conundrum, humdrum, ho-hum. Like train announcements. Ever heard it go? Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6. Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6. Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6. Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6. Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6. Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6.
Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6.
Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6.
Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6.
Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6.
Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6.
Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6.
Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6.
Train to Seremban Arriving at Platform Number 6.

You missed it.

No. It’s a death trap. I refuse that cheese. I’d renounce cheese just so I won’t be tempted back into it. You go in there and the trapdoor shuts, and they put you under the sun. Everything dehydrates. Everything leaves. You die dried like salted fish. Of course, you’re not just quite dead dead. You just lose it all.

This is the last one.

I will not go through it again.

*******************

For the record, Adaptation., written by the ever bizarre Charlie Kaufman, is one of weirdest movies I've watched. It's either a win big or lose big type of movie; it's either you love its peculiarity or you hate it and go wtf.

For the other record, I really liked it very much.

I have seen moments like this. I start of with a casual sentence; the reason this post took so long to write is because… and then I drag the mouse over them, press Delete, and then start over, with the same sentence, over and over and over…

And then I’d settle on something else. Something that felt like a start. And then I’d wonder why I ever needed to be so picky.

And then, for a momentary wonderment, I’d feel envious for people who can start their sentences off effortlessly.

****************

The reason this post took so long to write is because it so happens to be the 200th post. I thought it was a big deal -- initially. I told myself that big plans had to be made; we simply can’t be done away with a simple offering, darling, we need a hall and decorations, Renaissance , and yes, darling, never without a band. Never! Give or take a few days later, I was settling towards merely a simple celebratory thing, starting off saying Yay! Des Dos-ciento! and then be contented.

Yesterday, I thought, to hell with it. To hell with all of it. And I guess I stuck by it.

Truth is, I reckon, probably has a lot to do with me wondering what to actually write about. I’d sit down, get some work done, feel the urge to write and draw out Microsoft Works Word, and then spend the remainder of the night writing and deleting. And I thought it’d be useless, might as well leave it be and do something else. A few minutes later the urge comes back, winking and eye-batting, and I’d sit down writing and deleting and then surrender, feeling impotent (powerless. Not… you know. Right)

Days went by. I see my writing furling up into smoke and ashes.

I’m still being hypocritical. I mean, I spend a lot of time telling people that stubbornness is the way to go; don’t give a damn what you write, just write and if people don’t like it, you make a note and smile, saying thank you. The gung-ho way is the way to go. Then, when I sit down to write, I give myself excuses.

It feels rather stupid to have a philosophy you can’t abide to yourself.

But if there’s something that I tell myself to abide, even by severe incapacitation, is to never neglecting the art of writing. I still believe that it’s an art you need to keep in touch with; neglecting it means you lose it, little by little. I already felt mine rusted, crumbling in parts. Whatever that’s ever intact. It’s not a good feeling. It feels like losing part of the bones that hold the flesh.

Lose too much, and something breaks. Sometimes, bones that break, never heal.

You gotta try doing it half-drunk, for once.

I’m feeling rather light headed now; put me at the edge of something and I’d tip over, laughing and saying Oops. It’s thanks to the alcohol I was forced to drink earlier, at Mekz’s place, at small-esque party meant for someone that couldn’t make it (Bryan, who had the misfortune of catching food poisoning on his birthday. I’ve toasted for his health, twice).

Well, it was either I take the booze (Smirnoff or Mich’s Special Brew) or drink something nasty Mekz blended into juice. I’ll try to name the ingredients; bell peppers, cili padi, wasabi, bitter gourd, coriander, strawberry syrup and a whole bunch of other things; it tasted rather similarly to Coca’s steamboat chilli sauce, only that the taste lingers in your mouth and throat, and after the first time, I realised that if I drink it again I’d puke.

So I chose booze. Mostly. I drank them when I lose in the games we played. It’s not enough to get me drunk, but I’m feeling woozy and tipsy and since, as they say, among scholars even, that legendary writers of old like Shakespeare himself, wrote under the influence of alcohol/drugs, so I thought I’d give it a try, and see what comes out.

I’ll leave you to decide if it’s any different, for better or worse.

Now, today was a fun day. I drove down to Sunway Pyramid, and we ice skated until we grew tired and hungry. Pauline, the first timer, was improvingly very quickly. I was getting worse, but at least I didn’t fall as much. Haha. After that we had chicken and takoyaki for lunch, and after that dessert in BerryYogurt or YogurtBerry or whatever you call it.

Then the dinner, in which we played Guessture and Black Jack, the penalty being booze or the nasty stuff.

Gah, the aftertaste of it… thankfully, I’m not as red as I was afraid I’d be; the parents didn’t notice anything when I got home. If they had, I’d say I had wine as a toast and pray that I pass any drunken tests (which I may, considering that I can still write).

If anything else, I’m feeling rather sleepy right now. But I have this urge to stay up late, and then sneak into the kitchen and cook myself some Maggi.

Maybe I’ll do it.

Maybe I will.

Filled with fish-bonding, and thoughts of oddities.

It’s strange, and -- when I gave it some thought -- hypocritical, even.

The father was away on outstation, and on the night before he left, shortly after I made him iced coffee, he looked into my eyes and said;

“Take care of the fishes while I’m away. And water the plants, or they’ll go chao tarr.”

I nodded, taking note that he placed the fishes’ importance over the plants, for my mental hierarchical chart of Things to Do and Bloody Hell Done Right.

“Feed them every 2 days, and clean out the turtles’ and the big pot.” I nodded, adding side- notes and making a huge circle over “Turtles, and Big Pot”. Then I spent the next couple of second trying to look like I’ll get it done, truth to honest, honest to good; because the father seemed to be rather ponderous and, in another perspective, especially mine, terrifying. I retreated to the room, and stamped a red URGENT sign over the mental chart.

Dad probably spent both flights composing and rehearsing the things to say to me should I fail. I don’t assume it; I feel it like the strands at the back of my neck, prickling over some invisible apparition (Tingling! Tingling!).

I think I did a good job, as far as my other jobs are concerned.

The thing is, it’s rather leisurely if I did all the feeding and cleaning and water-refilling without the father perpetually looking over the shoulder, barking tips and orders and insults (a rather common, and already stale, occurrence); in fact, getting it done over music and a peculiar affinity to scare the fishes silly, makes it rather nice.

I named the alligator gar Gary.

The goldfish in the fountain pot, I named him Fugly.

The turtles are now named Leo and Raph.

Feeding Gary is like watching National Geographic. You can even add your Steve Irwin voice-overs.

Look at her, what a beauty! And here she comes, eyeing the small little fishes, and WHACK! Look at the size of that mouth. And the teeth; see how she grabs and BANG! Fishies’ a goner.

Don’t get me wrong, though. Given the chance, I’d rid of the fishes and the turtles in a flash. Pour them down the drain or see them swim in a pot over a nice fire. Maybe I’ll keep Gary, but just so I can see him feed over the smaller fishes. But still, I see the appeal; if I’ll ever live to become old and lonely, routinely feeding fishes and occasionally cleaning them out (over music) can be very relaxing.

(I doubt my dad will appear and nag me behind the ear, and say how I never remember the positions of the aquarium decors).

********

Like the fantasies I told, I always thought you’d be a dreamer.

You’d dream and believe and persevere, when the world turned desolate, left you alone, tell you lies and truths and stories about ‘reality’.

Thinking back, weren’t you one? A dreamer. A sailor on a solitary yacht, with a sail as large as imagination, heading into that horizon believing in treasures and sea monsters. Adventure and friendship. Love.

But I guess the world caught up. I guess there’s no good running, really. It always catches you.

I wonder what really happened.

I wonder what you made happened.

But I guess, in truth, I just wanted to know what you’re feeling. Pain? Anguish? Hurt?

Loneliness?

What happened was, I stopped assuming. I’d wonder, but never assume. I’d imagine if it was true; I guess that’s what you call empathy. But I’d stop, because that’s not knowing. That’s just standing and watching at a distant, seeing things as a dot. What moves or didn’t, I wouldn’t know.

I don’t think I’ll ask.

I don’t think I’ll dare.

The most I’ll do is wish you luck. Pray that you’ll be fine. Which you will be, surely, knowing you to that extent.

Maybe I’ll hope you’ll become a dreamer. If you were ever one, perhaps you’ll be.

Maybe I’ll say hi one day.

Right-o.

I’m having trouble starting this post. Somehow it felt that the course of this exam took away whatever little writing prowess that I own, and spread it around a Pacman maze waiting for me to avoid ghosts and try to gobble it up (pardon the odd analogy, but of everything going around my head now, it felt closest to that).

I don’t think I can call it writer’s block. Felt more like wading through scrambled eggs looking for egg shells than trying to climb an impenetrable wall, if it makes sense to you.

Well then, now to the usual update of events;

The exams are over, and while I’m nor particularly free or feeling as light as cotton candy puffs (final year project, beckoning, beckoning), still meant that between the guilt and work I have more time to game. And I have Assassin’s Creed, Devil May Cry 4, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and a second Kingdom Hearts 2 play-through to keep me occupied, not accounting possible new games.

It’s probably high time I start reading the bunch of novels I got during the Book Fair thing; I’ve only finished four, and perhaps I should hold buying The Graveyard Book (Gaiman) until I finish Galilee (Barker).

Speaking of books, my Kinokuniya RM10 coupon only have 10 days left of validity. I’m thinking of getting Elizabeth Bear, just for the heck of it, or perhaps Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. Any suggestions? (Airman by Eoin Colfer also looks mighty tempting, if not the for crazy 50 bucks price tag).

(A Tom Holt might be nice, for a change.)

(And lets not forget the great Terry Pratchett).

(Gah damn so many damn choices).

*****

Yeah, well, it’s the start of sem break.

The first thing I got around to do was to convince my dad I didn’t need a vacation and it wouldn’t help to bring me down to Laos for a 5 day trip; on the contrary, it’s best that he leaves me alone so that I can camp in my room gaming and writing and movie watching until I go blind. It’ll also be nice if I get to go out once in a while, for a movie or for lunch with the gang.

I’m well aware that this sem break wouldn’t rightly be a break; there’s the FYP to worry about, and because I’m starting to drive down to uni now I think I should try freelancing, wherever I can find them.

(And I’m rightly the type that wouldn’t want to be introduced in by a friend, because I believe that if I get accepted or hired or whatever you call it, it should be based on the quality of my work, of which they should judge and decide).

(That’s probably my ego speaking. Gee, he’s been dormant for quite some time.)

What’s left now is the initiative to start, and knowing me, the initiative is probably as faulty and useless as a 1940 ‘Thunder-luck’ truck left to rust in a field.

And maybe I should start picking up basketball or badminton again; it felt like it was a century ago since I played something.

****

Ah, part of the bunch of things I looked up to distract myself while cramming for the exams;



CalArts looks like a really nice institution...



(Just to see how many people get amused by it. Oh, do check it out on Newgrounds, for better quality).

And lastly



Because it looks like a Gorillaz MTV.

Oddly, insomniac.

Which isn’t to do with the exams, or so I assured myself (the possibility of it is, well, impossible), and certainly didn’t have to do with a whole bunch of unwanted thoughts that haunt in the middle of the night.

I just couldn’t sleep, no matter how tired.

But if there’s something good out of it, I’d say is that, somehow, it gave me dreams that are both vivid and strangely intriguing. Dreams which I wake up from, waiting to disperse and make sense, and then quietly “Huh,” at. And then I’d find myself awake sometime before the initial alarm, more sober and conscious than I’d liked.

The one I remembered most, not without its reasons, was the one two days ago. The dream had shifted from something that had to with beds and lamplights to a full-fledge murder scene. There was a dead body, and a lot of blood, and when I moved closer I realised that it was Wendy (from class) lying face down in her own puddle of crimson plasma.

I think I went, oh shit. Then someone spoke to me.

“Don’t pity her. Don’t pity at all.”

I’m not. “What happened?”

“Got whacked. Pissed off the wrong people. Clean and jerk. Professional.” He lit a cigarette.

“Who did she piss off?”

He didn’t answer. Instead, he tipped me a wink.

And then he went away.

The CSI team moved in; Kelvin was among them, and he went Haha grimly while taking the blood sample. I realised it was not my scene, and walked away. Someone passed me a towel and sat me by the ambulance, like I was a fire victim. A hot cup of chocolate was put into my hands. I didn’t remember if I had tasted it.

It was like the ending of a Die Hard movie; throngs of ambulances, police patrol cars, the red-and-blue lights dancing and intercepting each other. A medic checked my eye, asked me for my name, and then walked away sniffing. She was quite pretty. I don’t know if I’ve seen her before.

That was when the dream shifted into something else, this time to do with watching a movie. Casablanca was on. (This, here, was when I woke up).

I had thought of telling someone about it, or write it down as a story (it struck me as one that’s fun to write), but the day drove it off my mind.

And today, halfway through Newspaper Management, I imagined it as a stage musical. Starring the class. The poster of the play is titled The Blob(:Not The Horror Movie, Please).

Somehow, that amused me.

Bitter and Butter

I wonder if those two go together. Somehow, somewhere, there’s probably a Marjory and Mabel’s Bitter Butter, stacked at the supermarket refrigerator, beside the cheese and the dairy, and sales research would register that a lot of the buyers consists of little girls named Betty.

(I’m not the sanest tonight; I think lack of sleep and tiredness is accounting for some rather severe loss of rational thought and coherence. It’s probably best that you ignore this post, and go someplace more conducive, like Newgrounds, or East of the Web.)

Are there really bitter butters?

Butters, so far, are just butter to me. The only difference between them is the price that go with them, and with it probably quality in taste of which I can never truly discern (they taste the same, smell differently when put on a pan, and maybe a little different in saltiness). That, and the fact that I don’t see them any different from margarine, makes it even more evident. Nope, I just don’t taste butter. But I like them, and whatever they make with them.

So if there are really bitter butters out there, I’d like to try one. Just for the heck of it.

*****

There is a bitterness that linger in my mouth when I walk into the papers, and when I walk out the bitterness turned tart and seeped into my central nervous system, so that I lumber around and slur like goo.

Ah well, tis brought upon to myself. Talk about splashing yourself with Nippon paint while aware of the consequences, but you do it anyway because it seemed pretty artsy.

Two more papers to go; one of them I’m still unaware of what and how it will be tested, the other hopefully an easy hurdle if I take the days before it to study extensively.

Two more papers. Then I taste the beckoning freedom, and shelf it away for the sake of the FYP.

*****

My father surprised me the other day by bringing back a piece of art.

It comes in the form of a badly framed, rather flimsy looking painting depicted two half-naked women (with perfect Goddess of Venus bosoms), both of them who reminded me of Lindsay Lohan, amidst a sci-fi fantasy backdrop. The painting is very grey, rather sombre, but rather beautiful. In a mystifying way; Elegantly gloomy.

I followed a logo at the bottom corner of the painting and found that it was illustrated by Luis Royo. My father told me that his boss bought it sometime ago, in an art exhibition, for RM3000. The office was being moved, and the boss decided that the painting has to go. So the father took it home.

The next day, the father and I sat down and tried to frame the painting better (it was disdainfully held between a cardboard piece and a plastic layer, with cello-tape to hold it together) when we discovered that it’s not quite a painting, but a poster.

I wonder if it was really worth 3000 smackaroos, and if the father’s boss hadn’t got himself conned stupid.

At first we hung it at the wall facing the dining table. When I got home today, however, the painting is on the floor, leaned against the wall, and in its place was the Fortune Deity picture we had hung at the top of the front door. On top of the front door now is a wood ornament, supposedly a carving of the Qilin (or Kylin, or Kirin).

If the painting (poster) have nowhere to go, I think I might just ask if I can hang it in my room.

Ah-la-la-la

I’m feeling tired right now, and I don’t know if it’s caused by dinner or an innate self-defence mechanism that triggers when I’m supposed to study (it makes me stay away from the notes, go to happy places, do happy things, like sleep or Call of Duty or to visit old manga shelf). But it’s Creative Strategy for Advertising tomorrow, which doesn’t require me to study, only make things up as creatively as I can (oh yay ain‘t I good at it? Ain‘t I?), so I guess I’m entitled to rest a bit and allow the happy place to kick in.


Today was action packed. The exam was easy and I didn’t know how to do it, and on the way home I made three illegal U-turns and got caught in a traffic jam, in which I saw someone picking his nose. And when I got home it was late, the dad had managed most of the chores, and I actually took time and listened to the news.


News that told me that the UMNO Supreme Council had suspended Bukit Bendera division chief Datuk Ahmad Ismail for 3 years, due to his racist remarks. Good for him, but he’s not being racist; he’s just being a nationalist. What’s wrong with you people?


(Three years is also very short. Something more viable would be a lifetime ban).


I’m not very political.


It’s a staple of my father to lament my lack of insight and knowledge of the political realm, something he considers of utmost importance if I actually intend to stick to a journalistic career path.


I didn’t tell him that journalism is more than politics, nor the fact that my journalistic views does not dictate me to follow our nation’s political development with as much mileage as I can handle; journalism, for me, is getting stories and telling it as it is; truth. But yes, obviously, such responsibility shouldn’t be given to those who knew not the truth, and know little of everything else. So yes, I should, probably, get more involved in politics. But no, quite honestly, I don’t really see myself heading that way.


I don’t see myself heading anywhere, anyways. I’ve blindfolded myself, turned around three times and walk wherever my legs lead me, and if I fall into a pothole, well, I don’t think I’ll still learn anything.


But then again, walking blindly is very lonely. Fearful.


It’s also very painful.

********

Ah, this is worth noting.

Step 4 for the There She Is!! Flash animation series by SamBakZa is up. Head over here to see it: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/456643


You probably don’t know it, but There She Is! By SamBakZa is probably one of the best flash animations around. Somewhat conventional-cute, but the animation is great, and the story effectively told plainly through music, animation and emotion. Great stuff. Check out the entire series if you can. You can find all of it at http://www.newgrounds.com/

Well then. Goodnight everyone.

So, it continues like this…

The bro is now safely in the UK, possibly shivering his arse off, bless his soul. We’ve video-called him three times now and he looks dandy on the webcam, albeit, well, cold. Mom’s quickly lost her anxiety, I’m not swamped with unnecessary housework (not yet, perhaps) and my exams started off with a hail of blizzard and possibly a touch of imminent disappointment (there you go, it’s what you get if you didn’t study enough).

Life’s good. However I see it, it should probably stay as good. I’m optimistic enough.

Well, that aside, there’ll be no more stories to tell. I won’t bother going with the same-old, same-old; that’s because everything’s quite about same-old, same-old, surprisingly. Aside from the brother gone, everything seems unchanged. Probably the tricks in the bag ran out, or, as I see it, probably life just reached that pinnacle, in which I’ll walk up to and find a brick wall, a sign saying; “end of the road. Nothing else ahead.”

Fine with me, I guess.

*****

Ah, this will be the first blogpost I’ve written on this PC (hard-damn the keyboard takes getting used to). So, well, YAY!, I suppose.

A post. The sort that goes very long.


And it’s because I have a lot of things to write about, so I guess a little forewarning will be extremely helpful.


It’s also because this will be the last time I’ll be writing (typing) on this laptop; I predict that this will be the last of my using it, and whatever else that’s down the road, will come as it comes.


I guess this is the best adieu I can give it, doing what I do best, on this faithful compatriot.


Let’s hope he does well to serve his new master.


*****

I’ve noted with great disdain that my writing has taken a dip down the cesspool, so bear with me for quite a bit; as far as my consistency goes, this is the plummet in the pulsing chart that goes all the way down and down, and whatever chance to see it climb up again into the sunlight will depend on how much improvement my brain will take during what I hope to be a revitalising plan, come the next few weeks.


Well, there’s a lot to tell. To brag and to bawl, so to speak. Let’s get started, shall we?

*****

My brother is leaving for the U.K. The big United Kingdom.


He’s there to further his studies and will be back a year later, with the complete and full acknowledgement into the world of law and the practising of it (dear God doom is upon us). I’ll miss him, I guess. I really might. After I celebrate, of course. I’ve planned a quiet, personal champagne-popping event at 4 in the morning, and later in the morning I’ll go ignite the leftover fireworks.


The house will be quieter now.


He flies tomorrow night. Thursday morning, to be exact. Taking with him his luggage and this laptop here, which I tendered up for him to take over rather than get a new one. I’ve gotten Bod (Black of Death, the new PC) to fill the role of house computer, so it’s fine. And this baby here comes with a webcam and full wireless online access, so it’s everything he’ll ever need over there, food and clothing aside.


The anvil took longer to drop, but drop it did, probably way later compared to everyone else. Him leaving will be a huge change. It’ll be his longest time away from home, and I daresay mom is already at the tipping point of her anxiety; she fusses endlessly, and for the next few weeks I expect to see her walking around with a shade of worry under her eyes. She’ll be proud, but she’ll be very worried. I wonder if my brother knows that.


With him gone I’ll be around to take the full fodder of whatever the house throws at me. It means that everything, and I mean everything, is under my full care. The dogs, the rabbits, the fishes, the car, dad… I’m up against it frontally, no armours, no covers, just guts and glory and tubs of lards. Ooo-rah!


Hmm well. The moss adepts to the cold, so they say.


I wonder if my father is anxious? I wonder if he worries, let his thoughts wander in the middle of the night, traversing the small cracks of possibilities and concerns.


He’s very cool about it.


*******

My brother leaving has been a huge cause for celebrations.

So far, we’ve had three BBQ parties, two to his name and one to our aunt who takes it as another chance to celebrate with him. Everyone went up to him, bid him bon voyage, shook his hand and patted his back, questioned his plans to bring home a ‘blue-eyed blonde’ (on my grandfather’s loud prompting), handed him gifts and ang pows and advices, asked him the questions he answered to millions of times. It’s not surprising; he’s the eldest grandson on both side of the family, and he’s the first to ‘soak in the sea’s salt-water’, as the Chinese say. He’s the first to step across the pedestal, up onto that threshold that leads far far away.


There’re times people had asked me if I felt unfair that my brother is given the chance to study overseas. They asked if I’m jealous. I told them there’s no forsaken way I’d travel halfway across the world to study, not unless the study involves art and is free and takes the course of a three-week European tour. I told them the only thing I’ll be jealous about is that he gets to see Trafalgar Square before me, and he won’t take a single goddamn picture of it.


And it’s true. I don’t want to go away unless I go away to write, or backpack into the unknown with a notebook and a camera. I’ll go for an adventure. I’ll stay here if I want to study.


*******


I gave my brother a Moleskine


It’s not that I’ve given in to its marketing gimmick that went on to say that it’s used, a long time ago, by the likes of Picasso and Hemingway and Matisse. I got it because I see giving it equals the same as giving someone a silver-embossed Parker pen; it’s the symbol of growth and the ascension into the mature world. Sounds gay, inevitably, but it’s the best thing I can get for him, since pens were no longer an option (my 5th aunt beat me to it).


And the notebook’s really nice. Gives you a vibe of class and inspiration; boy, I’ll get myself one if I can help it.


Unfortunately, I won’t. But I’ll get those imitators that go for half the price.


*******


Well, I’d be lying if I said that life didn’t just revolve around my brother and the hullabaloo of flying over, but there’re snippets that still went on, quietly, at the sidelines, poking over imploringly.


The exams are near, and it’s sort of near enough to feel it burning the hairs on my arms. I’m grossly unprepared. I have time; I always have time, bearing the mark of a true procrastinator (class S = Sloth, 2nd Honours). Just not enough, I suppose, now that it’s immensely close and I haven’t done anything.


What sucks is that I promised -- swore, that I’ll ace it, months and months back, in a fit of burning inspiration. I see that inspiration taking the next plane to Cuba.


Holy crapshot doesn’t regret and anxiety burn? Ss-ah!


I realised, in a lurch of panic, that the work I’ve sent to my ex-boss might not actually have been sent, and that the true copy of it is accidentally deleted while I was transferring my documents over to the PC. I feel that I’ll be getting an SMS or an E-mail a few weeks later asking what the heck happened and if I’ve just abandoned some unfinished work. I’ll be waiting for it.


My brother had picked up Artemis Fowl and the Time Paradox at Borders last week. I read it up in a day, barely leaving the room. It’s a pleasant book, nothing short of Eoin Colfer’s ingenuity, but nothing more as well. That’s the unfortunate bit about it; after what I feel was the excellent Lost Colony, Time Paradox fell short and disappointing in scope. It still makes for an enjoyable Artemis Fowl romp, though.


We won’t see another Arty Fowl for 3 years or so, so I guess there’s nothing else to wait for but Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book, coming in 4 weeks time.


I was surprised when I heard of it, but I found out that Elizabeth Bear’s excellent short-story, Tideline, actually won the Hugo Awards for Best Short Story.


You can read the story here: http://www.elizabethbear.com/tideline.html


I found her novel in Kinokuniya the other day, which is a rarity. Her books aren’t very popular here, and if it wasn’t placed (rather oddly) together with Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, I wouldn’t have noticed it. The novel is going for 25 bucks; I’ve got a Kino coupon for 10. That makes 15 bucks for it.


Excellent.


*********

I guess this concludes it. I expect tomorrow evening to be the last time I shut this laptop down, pack it into the bag and give it the usual dust down the top cover.


Thursday night I’ll be typing on Bod, on a keyboard which I’ll have to get used to.


I’ll be bidding farewell to the brother.


Here’s where I put up my wishes and prayers for him, and mine would go: Don’t shag the ang mohs.


I guess I really will miss him.


And to you, reader, if you’ve actually endured to this point of the post:


Goodnight.

This morning, I woke up freezing.

I had a weird dream. I don’t remember the details, but it was vivid enough to make me sleep on my hands, so I had to spend a couple of minutes flexing it to make it feel at least relatively like hands, and not tofu stuck on bones.


It was cold the way that it bites, and latches, temporarily, until you rub it off or take a few minutes under the blanket. It must’ve rained prior, else it wouldn’t be so cold.


I think I like these sort of mornings. I wake up and I feel obliged to return to my cosy bed and sleep through it; somehow it felt like the only plausible thing to do. And if I couldn’t, the cold will nag me awake and I’d feel more awake than usual, Goosebumps all around and the stubborn tingle down the spine.


The cold stayed the whole day, and by evening it ten-folded and turned into rain, one that stayed into the night and would probably remain a drizzle till morning.


I said today that I’d it like to rain. I regret it now.


It probably shouldn’t have rained. But it would, and it did, because it’s that time of the year. It’s that season, and it’s that rain that comes after a long bout of dry days fraught with the hottest sun. I guess I could say that it’s inevitable. But I reserve the right to say that it shouldn’t, and I say that yes, it probably shouldn’t have rained. It should be done with after the morning chill and yesterday’s torrent and as the right equivalent balance this evening should be dry and warm with a touch of wind. And in that way, I’m being childish.


But that’s the way of the world; when it folds on you, the only way to fight back is to demand that what happened shouldn’t have happened. It’s a lost fight, but as fights can sometimes do, it may make you feel better. I guess it’s a consolation, somewhat, that sometimes after a fight you sit down and you cry, you bawl perhaps and shout, but at the end you tell yourself you lost, and it’s ok, really. It’s ok. You didn’t make it lose. You simply got bested.


It probably never worked like this. It probably worked differently and harder than this, maybe. I wouldn’t know. I’ll find out eventually, and that’s the sort of bridge you cross when you come to it.


I can only imagine, and what I’m imagining now, is that it worked that way, only that it’s real, and really, really painful.


*************


I don’t know what I’m writing. I was hoping that it’d reflect of what I felt after receiving some rather sad news, but the way I see it, it’s a hazy mirror behind a fog.


I’ll keep it at that, and I’ll keep it here, so perhaps one day I’d come about and get reminded of it. And then maybe it’ll make more sense than it does now.


And for now, I’ll go to sleep.

Two round things, and lines.

I’m still amazed, roughly 48 hours later, of what Wall-E did and still could do.

It’s an amazing movie. It’s the perfect amalgamation of the simplest and best of storytelling, of presenting visuals and music and sound and emotions, and at the of it even manages to throw a few rather serious matters into our faces (a world we can destroy so easily is one, overtly obese and hover-chair reliant humans are another).

But what got me the most is how utterly astounding it is to stoke the heart, evoke comfort and love and sadness, with just two coloured lights for eyes, a heart-wrenching “No..No..”, and a small gesture of hand.

That, I think, is the biggest achievement in animation history.

Bravo, Pixar, and Thank You.

******

I hope I’m not hyping it up too much.

But I feel that Wall-E had tapped on both the epitome and the deepest root in animation; if you can remember what Disney used to be able to do, then you’ll understand what I mean. For that reason itself, I can say that Wall-E is one of the greatest animated movies ever made.

(I’m not going to go into the other parts of the movie, namely the visuals and the music and the utter cuteness of most everything, because if you read just about any other movie review about it, professional or not, they’ve practically touched on it enough to wrinkle it and make it shrivel.)

It’s just a movie, and I think to some it’s probably nothing special, but how I see it, we’ve all forgotten how easy it was to be touched and transported by a simple movie of simple proportions.

Right, that’s about it. I’ve talked enough about Wall-E and if I start talking again I’ll be writing a thesis on it.

I find it peculiar. Curious, and somewhat precarious, but in a sense that I cannot place.


I don’t know why I think about it, anyhow.


I wonder, sometimes. I harbour a sense of unwonted romanticism and let myself be harkened back, unnecessarily, to that time where I made what I feel was the wrong choices, thronged with the what ifs and whys and come what mays that sat there smoking cigarettes and glare at you distinctly, harpies of the bygone memories.


I always think it’s stupid, but I always do it. I guess you can say that I can’t help it, and in that sense I’m hypocritical; I always believe that we can pull away from the mud and the muck, and go ahead. But still, there’re stains that never go.


So I guess it’s all that pondering that made me stand where I stand now, feeling weird and stupid about it, watching revelations after revelations tumble-weed down and away and thinking, man, isn’t this really odd? Ever asked yourself if things had happened differently and why the painting never materialised?


And then, I thought, the painting had always been romantic. Optimistic. Happy ending happy beginnings, you know? Not reality. No surprises. Surprised me, still.


I know it doesn’t make sense. Nothing ever will, not even to me. You’ll do better ignoring it. I do, too.


But still…


I find it peculiar.


I find it fascinating.

********************

CSA. Is. Done.

*Confetti!*


I had worried over it. I had dreaded it like I’ve dreaded it like I’ve dreaded dad after I accidentally broke his favourite teapot. Now it’s done, perhaps not very well or very satisfying, but it’s done and done and to hell with it, good riddance, sayonara sucker and bye bye babalu, it’s been a pleasure, yes sir-ree.


Now, to Media Ethics, Media Planning, BEC, Newspaper Management x2...


You don’t get a more hectic end-of-semester assignments rush.


I’ve been slaving ahead with the Creative Strategy Advertising assignments to the point I had to disregard everything else. We were largely behind schedule, rather messed up, confused and mostly up to our necks with other assignments.


Somehow we pulled through, I guess, as best as we could. At least it was considered so-so and not bad in general.


I can breathe easier, at least.


Nothing new lately; I vaguely remember classes anymore because I either spend my time spaced out trying to figure out better ad executions (not much different of an act as compared to daydreaming; largely imaginative) or trying to doodle myself into sense (which is like doodling normally, only that I do it in a notebook instead of the table).


I play a lot of cards lately, too. Somehow I managed to.


Roughly two weeks or so before the exams arrive. Dear god, I still don’t know half of what that’s taught in class.

**************

I called it a dynamic storyboard; I recalled unused Ratatouille storyboards that the developers bundled into the DVD release, which is sort of a pseudo-animation thing with actual music and voice acting, and in a desperate bid in trying to make a better presentation for CSA, churned this thing out;




It’s largely experimental; I spent an entire evening figuring it out while doing the chores. It’s simple, really. And it took 8 hours, mostly because I had to draw the slides with the mouse.


(I kick myself every time when I think about it; this is unnecessary work brought upon to myself by myself.)


No more. Not for last-ditch assignment situations, at least.

Teru no Uta




From Studio Ghibli's Tales From Earthsea (Gedo Senki), Goro Miyazaki's directorial debut and arguably weakest Ghibli movie produced.

The song is performed by Aoi Teshima, who voiced Therru (Teru) in the movie. You can check out the scene here, too.

Cheers

“No, no, I beg to differ, quite honestly; I don’t believe that cheesecakes are it. Black Forest… now, that’s the sweet stuff,” she said.

“Someone told me that it was the cheesecakes,” I said.

She shook her head histrionically, her tomboyish hair tossed around like a weird variation of a shampoo commercial.

“Cheesecakes are cheesy. You need… exquisiteness. You need… subtle, sublime charm. Passion. Mystery.” She smacked her lips.

“It’s just a cake,” I said.

She winked. “A cake to go somewhere. Think about it.”

And then she was a fisherman tossing the day’s catch into a wicker basket, yelling “4 KILOS!”. And after that, she was gone.

* * * * * *

My dream didn’t go exactly like that. It’s roughly like that, and I can only say roughly, because it’s a dream (my dreams are the type that are built like film reel badly edited and horribly cut; it jumps and stutters and most of the time the sound is out of sync), but I did remember that I was talked to about Black Forest cakes.


(I am also pretty sure the fisherman yelled 4 KILOS, but it might’ve been mandarin sounding like that. It might’ve even be German.)


This harkened back to a long, long time ago to that dream where a girl told me about cheesecakes. I think I might’ve written it down somewhere, but I forgot. It was the weirdest dream I ever had (this also accounting the other scenes the dream jumped into, one of them about ghosts and a frying wok), and I sort of forgot what the cheesecake was all about. I don’t know if anyone can remind me.


It’s funny when I dream about cakes. I don’t like cakes.


I do, however, to a certain degree, enjoy Black Forest cakes.


**********


Now, yesterday was a peculiar day.


You see, I woke up at 9.45 or so, and the first thing that struck me was that I was late for class. The second thing was the fact that both my father and my brother had left for work and outing respectively, and I was literally stuck home with no transportation and no company. I third thing was the several trucks rumbling into the front of my house, most of them with ladders and men, one of them a large wooden cylinder with huge wires twirled into it.


I went outside and asked the nearest uncle what’s up. He said that there’ll be a power-line wire upgrade for the street and that power will be out until 4 in the evening. He said that there was a notification prior. I walked back into the house, looked at the fridge and found the notification.


I said, oh shit.

I walked down to the shoplots and bought breakfast and lunch, and by the time I returned home the power had already been cut.


When the power’s out, my house is as dark as hell.


The power didn’t come back until it was 5. By that time, I was already mossy and the cobwebs had settled and the termites had eaten through.


This was what I did during the 6 hour power outage;


1) Play solitaire (with actual cards, of course) at the front door, where there’s a little light.

2) Do as much work as I could until the laptop battery ran out (1 hour and a half, with music on).

3) Go talk to the dogs. Lanna talked back. Marley slept.

4) Took the rabbit Happy out, petted him for a few seconds, and placed him back.

5) Found a gecko in the garden.

6) Read a book in the porch, but the mosquitoes annoyed me out of it.

7) Practised the Coin Matrix trick with 10 cents coins. Practised the coin drops absent-mindedly for a bit.

8) Raked leaves in the garden.

9) Shot at some birds with the BB pistol (intentionally missed; just to scare them off from stealing Marley’s leftovers).

10) Lay on the floor and thought of sleep.

11) Ate lunch at the porch, beside Marley.

12) Grabbed a bunch of manga from the store, settled down at the porch and read with the music playing from the phone. Made 3 books when the father came back.

13) Read the newspaper.

14) Retreated to the room to lie down and hope to sleep.


The first thing I did when the power came back was to turn on the PC and play Assassin’s Creed until it was time to feed the dogs.

Surprisingly, it wasn't quite a long day.

You have to do it, one way or another.

Ah, to be honest, this post took several tries to finally get up. Mostly it’s because I never actually got around to finish it, and whenever I did I forgot to post it up (it happens, because I type it down on MS Words and forgot to save it). And when I’m finally adamant on completing it, like tonight (and I’m sure I will), I realise that I have nothing much to tell.

The week was busy and hectic, and the aftermath was a tense, constricting air of anticipation; how it works into anticipation, I guess I wouldn’t able to describe. But there was, certainly, a bated breath of worry and wonderment, of which that seem to sprout out, raven like, to latch on a tree and watch wordlessly.

It’s like we’re all waiting for something bad to happen, or something to give reason and stand and shout and lob mash potatoes at one another. Like we’re waiting for something to blame.

(This is, of course, the stupid things I thought I felt and mostly best to do away as nonsense).

And the workload never ended. What ended, however, was the urgency of it. And I’m certainly not feeling it, aside from the way it settles down the gut like guilt (for all in the world it is), but heck; I’m supposed to be swamped and buried, but I’m here and I’m blogging and I have two tabs featuring Naruto and Slam Dunk.

Tomorrow! I swear, tomorrow I’ll get it done… tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow row row row rowrowyourboatgentlydownthestream…

******

I was food-poisoned on Tuesday.

Or rather, my epicurean self did. He insisted that his unrelenting thirst for epicure demands that I purchase that roadside nasi lemak I’ve eyed for a week, to be consumed for dinner. He said if I didn’t, I would forever feel the wrath of not having passion for good food (dear heavens no!), for he controls that side of my longings, so I gave in and bought it. I ate it for dinner.

And after I washed it down with water, I felt this feeling that went sorta felt like, oh shit. And the epicurean self, he was looking away shiftily and starting whistling.

And then I was feeling all rumbly-tumbly, as Pooh may have put it after some bad honey.

And then it was like the Brazilian Fire-breathing Troupe was performing for the Queen of England in my gut.

So I went to bed early and thought I’d sleep it out…

Then I woke up at 4 and barely left the toilet.

So I took Wednesday off from classes (impeccable timing, really; I had quite a lot of work and it needed to be tended to immediately). I gained a lot of reading time, and at one point I thought, wouldn’t it be great if the toilet had a drink stand and some sun so that I can read and drink lemonade? (this point, I knew I was seriously f-ed up).

But it wasn’t that bad. Least I didn’t go until I had to crawl around with shivering knees and the loss of all hope of living. In fact, come dinner, I was strangely full of appetite, but the parents forced porridge on me and told me to lay of the spice and fry-ies for a few days.

I thankfully still got the work done, and it’s thanks to me group mates who stayed around and helped.

As of now, I’ve given the epicurean self a good lecturing, and he promised no more roadside nasi lemak aside from the ones I trusted. I said, good enough. No more new roadside ones.

He grinned at me, and said, so, what’s for lunch?

I asked dad, and he said, rojak stall down in Sg. Chua.

Ah, noodles vegetables egg tofu bean-sprout cucur udang aaaaand sotong.

I’ve noted as I go, the way I would not know,
But hey, Why not stop?
The daisies are blooming.
Perfect day, perfect place
For picnicking down the mountains.

(Lalalalalala…)