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.

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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.

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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…

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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!