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It must be the hot afternoons these days, but i am very lethargic (headache!) then especially if i have to walk in the sun. Not just that, but it seems that mosquitoes are very abundant these days.
If I, who usually don’t get any bites at all, ended up with almost ten bites (i think) — there musta been a hell lot of mosquitoes in one seating.
Lucky for me, the bites go away very quickly — it is almost as if before i get the next bite, the first bite goes away (yes there were that many mosquitoes)
As long as i don’t get malaria/dengue and die during the chinese paper.
Not everytime mindgaming people will succeed, failure sometimes occurs. Not everything will go our way. (Bugger, now i actually have to do SOME work)
In such an instance, I’ll whine for a while and realise the triviality of it all. While it is not exactly an Ideal situation, After all, everything is within the short term. Anything can be thrown away before long. It is pointless to get affected by something temporal (i lost my zen for a short while!)
And I have effectively pacified by myself with my Loot — though not having enough com space is quite a problem and i need to buy a new external harddrive (or COM soon!)
In the meantime, I need to at least think about Museums and Singapore History and recall what I have seen in the History Gallery, bearing in mind that I was one of those who took the longest to finish. Not too hard though, compared to writing a poem, that which i have neither the calibre nor interest to do.
Recall what I used to say about bate mode — tho there is a less large difference for those whose crazy bate mode has eaten into their soul and personality already (like a certain someone). Or those who have their personality (of slothness) to shape their bate mode.
Then there are those whose bate mode increases Intelligence Points or rather unseals latent intelligence when speaking! The chinese phrase for this would be tianyuanzibie — the difference between sky and earth.
Apart from bate mode, there are the variants like Chamber Mode where the dude who usually has sweaty palms has his hands dry up and a serious face on his usual joke expression. Or stage director mode where the usual bum exudes rare serious aura .
Point is: based on stimuli, we are able to subconsciously express different characters of ourselves while locking away the Character when not needed. (I make this sound damn anime with latent powers, finishing moves and Inner Monster >< ) And here we have — some mode, which i dont know how to label. Note that the act of touching lousy cookbooks got me glared at.
“That is a lousy cookbook!” (woah, judgmental. I don’t know, but i can’t tell what a good cookbook is)
“Garlic dumplings? That totally discredits the book!” (Actually, I thought garlic dumplings sounded nice ><)
” A book titled a good day for soup can’t possibly be good!” (Sounded nice to me…. ><)
And the best –
“Betty Crocker? That’s the Britney Spears of cooking!” (Admittedly i thought i saw this name in NTUC the day before)
Of course, I am not concerned about cooking at all — however I read this book about the WAY OF THE NINJA. And in the book, soya bean has been named as “warrior food” or “magic food” by the ninjas. If there is any explanation for any physical thing i, who does not exercise at all, pull off (like some monster jump) it has to be the soya bean, the WARRIOR FOOD!
This holidays maybe instead of running, I’ll learn the Way of the Ninja! (Or probably some Qigong that doesnt require me to get out of bed at all) It might be more useful too!
Coming from someone who might be rather forgetful, I wish to create Fake Memories or be able to forge them. It’s one thing to be able to fabricate your own memories, it will be another to mess with someone elses mind (findmuck them!) and fabricate their memories, making them recall a Fictitious Event!
According to this article I read, there is this woman who after memory recovery therapy accused her father, a clergyman, to have raped her several times when seven and even having to abort a fetus by herself with a clothe hanger. Oh sick. The thing is, medical examinations showed that she was still a virgin at 21 and she never did get pregnant. I am curious as to how memory recovery hypnosis works… And also, how her false memories came to be formed — her story seems to be believable, clothes hanger is a common home-abortion horror story and raped by father is another common horror story. (Oh my, this is my definition of “common” horror story.)
Information overload has findmucked us and making salad in our brains. It is disturbing that our dreams, or what we view on television may very well be remembered as part of our memory. In the manga series Monster, Johan’s memory of being raised to be a Killer were never his own, but instead what his twin sister who went through the training recounted to him. This is an intellectual psycho series which actually has a plotline, instead of the rah rah fighting kind which is can be read while Plucking Leg Hair. (Not that i really do, for the record, just that it sounds funny!)
In the Boston Legal’s last episode of season 2 “Trial of the Century”, Denny Crane previously won a case by asking the witness “are you very sure that this is the man whom you saw leave the building” when it turns out that man was not the accused and was nowhere near the building. A cunning plan that ended up having the victim’s son to eventually look for vengeance by threatening to blow up the law firm. For this episode, what was most impressive was perhaps how video clips of William Shatner in his youth in another lawyer show were shown to show Denny Crane when younger.
In any case, to fabricate our own memories would bring us one step to living in our own universe or rather utopia. Perhap to create fictitious happy memories and induce amnesia about all that is unhappy (its an extension of forgetting the traumatic)
I have a feeling that in recounting certain storylines from what i’ve seen a year or two ago, I made many factual inaccuracies in remembering ><
Anyway, main point is: I want to fabricate people’s memories! (Actually, I already have done so before) The joy of reading a psychology book.
The irony, by the way, is in how i forgot what inspired me to write this. Hrmm..
Instead of (or rather as a result of) doing bio practicals, I decided to clear out my room. This is using poison to fight poison — to get away frm work, I do some other work as a form of soft p rn drug and substitute.
Its contents were shocking: papers and textbooks from 2005, a lot of useless math workings, random certificates of competitions i have taken part in and thirteen bate books which i cannot bear to throw away. This is despite the fact that they are illegible and I will probably never read them. Not to mention the stacks and stacks of news magazines like newsweek and the economist. The best thing is probably that it freed up space for books — i no longer have to stack books in front of books on the shelf, but my shelf is still packed and now nicely split into Useless Literature, Chinese books and Content Heavy books including psychology, philosophy, politics, economics and history. Somehow I am having a nice new bookshelf which covers the wall as a Wish now.
Perhaps I could make some money out of this by reselling the old textbooks and news-magazines. As long as I got a dollar for each of them…
Evidently, this was a cathartic experience (somehow) and would be something I would reserve for only when I am in a terrible mood.
So I went back to school to look for it but to no avail. Oh whatever. Nothing can be done. And I don’t view them as replacable at any rate either. As Funny Guy said “Life goes on” and that I have incorporated in my life philosophy and nature for a long while already — to not care and perceive most things as trivial.
Such is the malicious nature of the universe, where I realised things a bit too late. A bit.
On another note, one wonders if there is a difference between a treasure that has gone missing and a treasure that is buried, hidden and forgotten about as valuable as it might be.
Likewise, consider if there is a difference between a person leaving you, never to be seen again and never to talk to you again and the death of a person. Both may very well be same in the impact they create.
In history class, the students were made to write a history about themselves and then have someone else do an account based on the chronology we write. I’m not sure how rigged this is but david got to do mine. His reaction was to scrunch up my chronology and present a supposedly biased and harsh account, evaluating my life to be “the eternally recurring cycle of mundane”, “a tale of an ordinary person achieving extraordinary things”, “- who had never been great in is life, achieved greatness and a life to be envied”
Unusually and surprisingly, quite a nice sounding and well written account even if we were to consider thinly veiled insults. Do note that the historian who evaluated not only has a bias, but also has a slant as he places a large value on winning — I on the other hand, do not view it to be that ‘great’ or enviable even…The account clearly speaks more about the writer /historian than the subject/history.
At any rate, this written piece of work trumps the school testimonial I got from last year — which is not only untrue (about my diligence and compassion for the underprivilege and attentiveness), but also the same for the entire class!
But I digress. The main subject is on the bias of the historian who wrote my life and THE ROOT OF IT ALL:
“why are you so biased?”
“BECAUSE HE’S TRYING TO STEAL MY GIRLFRIEND!”
*Points to beulah who then starts to hit me*
“You’re hitting the wrong person!!”
“He’s too far away!!”
What implications can we draw from my teammate making such a statement. Ah, I’ve been pairing the two of them even since secondary school.
I think this means I will pick to go for History Class instead of “Philosophy of Economics” which it clashes with on Day Two.
P.S: bearing in mind that there is a purpose behind every “historical record”, something to think about: what would have been my purpose for writing this post? Truth be told? I’m not sure either.
Arguably this was the best English Literature lesson I’ve had. Rephrase: this is the first good english literature lesson I’ve had for the year.
The main subject was on Archetypes — how it is part of human nature regardless of culture to gravitate to certain images and attach certain values to them, such as the hero archetype.
Or: the woman archetype — where they are either Mothers or “Others” , Mo or Ho.
I was told that it did not reflect well on me based on the observations I made:
1. that in the subconscious mind of American Women, they were seeking an adulterous lifestyle and hence found escapist appeal in Desperate Housewives. Much like how children are seeking superheroes and teenagers are drawn by romance movies/soap operas. (Jung!)
2. the unicorn does not necessarily typify the values we thought it used to be. It is up to the viewer to decide what he wishes to label it with: it could be said to be majestic or virtuous, but i preferred to pick on the horn and said that it was violent and vicious — much like how the World War 2 occupants pierced babies with bayonets. This led to the interpretation that the Unicorn is a Phallic Symbol. (Freud!)
In which case, it is disturbing that many girls like unicorns (at least in USA). I wonder what it means….
It is interesting to note that beulah does not know what Phallic means, nor does she know what voyeuristic means. In response, I told her that Phallic is derived from the word “Fallacy”. Oh well, maybe she might mis-use the word without knowing the meaning like voyeuristic, something like:
“It would be phallic of the proposition to want to legalise prostitution!”
Hrm, the Fallus phallacy.
Much like it was put in the Picture of Dorian Gray, I was told today at lesson that when a lot of effort and time is committed to make a piece of art, there is usually fragments of the creator’s soul in the artwork and when we view the artpiece, we take in bits of his soul as well. After all the eyes are the window to the soul.
What would be disturbing would be the viewing of pr0n (as raised as an example) and how tainting it would be to the soul…
It was at this juncture of conversation that I realised that my zenstones (which were painstakingly made and I value very much) may well have been thrown away when the classroom was cleared out yesterday.
I will try to search for it tomorrow but it is extremely unlikely that it is still around. I can only pray and hope, that somehow it dropped out on the floor or somehow the rubbish has not been all cleared, as unlikely as it might be.
I am quite speechless, while to a certain extent affected by this loss. One major indicator is how I halted work when i was supposed to be rushing policy papers by midnight.
Perhaps all that is left. Am rather doubtful/ accepting of the reality already. I need a drink.
Contradictions in morning assembly quasi-sermon speeches usually targetted at making students feel bad or guilty and want to become good moral citizens.
We are told to “live for today and not tomorrow” to not plan for holidays during term 3 before exams (that which we are very guilty of, seeing that our monday party was right after last paper)
But doesn’t the speaker realise that the very reason we are at school is for tomorrow. Most people are in school so that they can have a job which pulls in the money in future. Yes, perhaps there are the few who learn for the sake of learning — that is true interest and is rare and must be applauded. Also there are people who just like to score high for the sake of cockbig stroking their ego just for the sake of it — that is pointless and I see no meaning in scoring high for the sake of competitive pride.
In fact to truly live for today would be to do what we enjoy and not to constantly worry about tomorrow, to constantly toil and labour for a future and an end that has no end.
If we keep looking to the long term alone and neglect the short term, we may never even enjoy what is in the long term. This is like procrastination — which people criticise often, and here they are, procrastinating their own enjoyment. Where is the sense in that?
Yes, the profound words of kids and their graffiti. Perhaps we should stop to think– just why are we so working hard, what is our purpose, what are we trying to achieve in the long run and most importantly, what are neglecting today?
I shall end with a bible verse to show that I’m not just some anti-institution pariah:
Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life Matthew 6:26-27
My index finger on my right hand got pretty much mangled up and painfully torn with a number of small (but deep) cuts at the tip.
If anything: the plaster (which i was forced to wear, not to be ungrateful for the kind thought) caused more annoyance than the injury itself. It got in the way of my finger functions — taking out my contact lense for one or even using a spoon properly. I also think that it hindered my rate of hyper-recovery somewhat. Above all, it was difficult to take off and left sticky remnants. No surprise that it has not been my habit to use a plaster — although my alternative would have been to leave the wound exposed and open to infection further injury etc.
I am somewhat thankful that most of my toilet functions are Left-Hand reliant >< typing might however be quite hindered — whatever, i can bear with it. After all, I hyper-recover.
My sister for some strange reason says she’s had worse… I can’t help but to wonder how they were inflicted. But I think I have some idea =\
I know full well by now that just because two people look the same (especially from behind) and have numerous traits of similarity, I should not point it out.
As for accidental slip-ups, Oh Doom. Even my pills might not be able to save me
I have decided that even though I have not finished using my tube of toothpaste, I am going to buy a new tube. This is because I am lazy to waste effort and time squeezing out toothpaste. If it requires more than 3 secons to squeeze out, I’m throwing the guy away.
Evidently, campaigning for us to care about the environment, to reduce reuse and recycle does not work.
As my life philosophy goes: spend first, pay later (Payment includes health and not just monetary)
And currently I am living off debt money. Deficit spending!
Channel 8 is often referred by me as a set of drama that is recurringly the same. I have stopped watching Tv since holand V btw and i generalise that everything following holland v follows its formula. I mean after a hundred over episodes, it must have extensively covered and exhausted everything Channel 8 is capable of.
One of them is how a guy has to marry a girl because he gets her pregnant. The plot differs sometime — he might love or hate her or like someone else.
A suggestion to channel8:
How about the guy gets TWO girls pregnant and somehow needs to marry either one of them (not possibly both in this country) In my opinion, he is either a lucky bastard, or he is seriously seriously screwed.
Very very excite.
Two things to note when going to work
1. Always make yourself indispensable
2. Always make yourself look like you might leave
This would be a recurring theme here: Any form of monopoly creates inefficiency and complacency and is a bad thing, be it a monopoly of a market or someone’s time, job, affection even (this will be further expounded upon eventually). All of these are bad, a monopoly would make a person treasure something less because of diminished incentives.
These two are however easier said than done. But that is like most principles.
The easiest is to be content though. The thought of politics does irk me quite a bit despite my sneaky capabilities. Amazing that such things can happen in places where we least expect it, with threats to leave etc and fighting to get positions. If only everyone could turn down a deputy post even if it meant $100 a month less (and a lot less admin work, which makes it worth it!)
I’m yet to think up the ideal job which pulls in the money yet maintains the work-life balance. (Life is defined by me as……)
I find today’s talk in church quite interesting. No doubt it did not inform me more about God or give me greater spiritual insights. But the speaker used to be able to conjure spirits and have demonic powers. How often do we see that!
Anyway, it occurs to me that in Hong Kong movies, there is a God of War (Guan Gong) statue in the police station..
And then there is one with the triads as well.
I can’t help but to wonder who’s side Guan Gong is on.
A bit like how the guy in the kingdom asks “whose side is Allah on?” between the saudi police and the terrorists.
At a stairwell (smoker’s corner) talk today, I was told that in the instances where caucasians do like asians, two things can be said.
1. The girl will be asian and the guy caucasian instead of the other way round — for some reason..
2. The girl will (with all due respect) be ugly
Ugly, in the sense of as defined by us locals (I generalise) or perhaps she might be very very beautiful just in the eyes of what people from the other side of the globe consider to be beautiful.I’m assuming that the main deciding factor is physical appearance since I’d assert that most people are shallow and physical appearance still plays a large role.
And my wonderful relevant analogy:
Ugly girls winning is like some IB students not getting into NUS but able get to go to oxford, cambridge and other UK universities. Partly because they consider 6 as a B, when 6 is actually an A. A conversion in score cannot be done so simply. I’d make the assumption here that caucasian guys are superior (or at least perceived to be so than lazy chinese men who are either bums or overly concerned with work). This assumption is debatable. I also assume more reasonably that our national university is more far behind than oxbridge.
On a related note, the Singaporean nature of a certain Institution is starting to annoy me. Their competitiveness in wanting to set up a R- Diploma (which went to the ground) and now i heard that they want to go into IB as well. As if owning at A levels was not already enough. Surely there must be more that blatant competitiveness. Don’t people have anything better to do?
Of late, I keep running into people when out of the house — this is rather unprecedented.
It is however most scary to see your teacher somewhere in town with random guy queuing for soybean. Quite a wonder that these are times where I can -ninja- past stealthily without being seen.
There happens to be a-certain-person in the class next door whom I keep running into at city hall but has walked right past her thrice without her noticing (i think/hope). Perhaps I become harder to recognise when out of school uniform.
What is more scary is if another of your teacher comes into a restaurant and sees you there in your school uniform after school.
Strange that both of them are from the same department.
“Here’s your lunch”
(after walking off for quite a while)
“……………….”
“Eh, where’s our cutlery huh?”
“Do you want me to make you milo?”
(Pours hot water into plastic disposable cup)
“Eh david, she made you the milo with LOVE, take it.” (looks at murky cup with two layers of colour)
Looks like your idea to make her a maid to serve tea was doomed to fail.
As if all the melamine and other toxic substances/practises I make isn’t enough. I think there are too many health scares lately.
Most importantly, congrats to my juniors for winning the competition and taking the top two rankings together with best speaker of the finals. It’s been a long while. Not to mention, my school has proudly been the first to have won both the under 14 competitions. Unexpected, but you guys earned it. (Of course, I have no role to play or credit to claim in their win since i’ve been MIA, I wouldn’t even if i were present actually)
I see this as a preamble or prelude to what is to happen.
Unexpectedly I have been promoted despite having not done anything for the whole year. This is in line with my day of fruity euphoria — once again undeserved.
I view this as a sneaky and devious strategy to ensure I do stuff, much like how making the class bully the monitor would make him behave. The analogy however might not work (corruption!) and the same applies. I still need to stone around/spend time with hos after school. Somehow I will get by.
Somehow I have the feeling that i -might- get demoted soon because of my idleness. Not that it matters.
That which comes easily can go easily as well. Although it feels worse to think you have something when you don’t, or think you have something and losing it, than to have never had it from the start.
Besides I’m not one who has been concerned with ranks and I have little regard for artificial priding and ego-masturbation (unlike someone =P) unless there are tangible benefits that go with them. This is at most a nice trophy on paper.
Thank God for everything, for blessing me and allowing me to reap so much more than I sow.
A lot more than I sow or expect.
People sometimes pride themselves in “eating the fruits of their labour”
Better yet if we still get to eat the fruits without having to sweat and labour, for it is the curse of Adam to.
I refer you to hiddenv where i talked about the effort-results curve.
Really, I do not deserve this time and am in no way capable enough to — it’s all God. I pray that you continue to help me and yet not allow me to become complacent and arrogant. Never let me fall under the curse (Deuteronomy) of sowing seeds which do not bear fruit.
Actually… If you were to think about it, am undeserving even in the aspect of God, quite sure there are the more religious who pray everyday, do quiet time everyday and go to church every week. I should least be grateful.
(wa lau eh, I don’t want to go for English class tho!)
(Hmm.. maybe it is a bit ironic that I’m throwing in a random image from atheist country)
A certain not-very-smart girl said “being intelligent is a chore”. I don’t happen to like chores or at least, its quite clear that -she- doesn’t like chores as seen from behaviour.
One of these chores happened to be getting selected to go for a talk about economics.
Some of the trends he identified such as how it is profitable to go into developing a water system for China since “Northern China has horrible water” or going into tourism since China is opening up and supplying tourists for the world seem valid. Most valid is perhaps to become a divorce lawyer — which is the most likely advice I’d take as compared to an engineer or travel agent.
What is more bizarre is his suggestions for us to become farmers. I hope he meant it metaphorically as in to invest in commodities but he seemed to have used it in a literal fashion. This seems to contradict Unit 2.1 of our Blue Book in the Long Run and Short Run problems of agriculture due to fluctuation and supply increasing far faster than the income-inelastic demand of a necessity.
Singaporeans (in particular the aunties) seem to regard this western ‘expert’ as a demi-god, much like Cai Shen, who wil know everything about the economy and the business cycles. He is not a crystal ball.
But if anything, a major flaw in the speaker’s argument is that it is impossible to identify a field so profitable and attractive and easily go into it. If it were to be so good, many others will flock to it as well, diminishing the profits one could make.
Or perhaps he did make more valid points and give a more extensive explanation when i drifted off to sleep without knowing. The feeling of falling asleep without knowing you even fell asleep is damn good. I was under the impression that I have not fallen asleep — but I can’t seem to recall what he said for the past ten minutes. Ten good minutes.
The things you get to talk about when you are a millionaire investment banker and with nothing to do or lose.
To my surprise (actually not much of it), after having not been to church for three months plus, the place has changed quite a bit. Especially with new people/mentors (whom I think are probably quite good) and have never seen me before.
The strange thing is: quite a number of these mentors/uncles think of me to be healthy, fit and to have exercised regularly i.e. visit the gym. This clearly is not true -_- and muchly bewilders. Perhaps I have gotten fitter, yes, despite no exercise at all minus one isolated example of a 4km run.
(Oh btw, your mashed potatoes may be damn awesome, but that does not mean you can use my lap as a cushion)
Think of a character trait which you loathe, one which you would never like to see or have done to you — perhaps it may be the seven vices, or being hurtful. (In my opinion it is worse to be hurtful than to be self indulgent)
The scary thing is: the very behaviour and act that we fear the most, may be very well what we become. Perhaps its because that in our subconscious, we know that we may soon fall prey to that Vice-we-hate and hence have an inclination to hate it.
Or perhaps, we all just fail sometimes. The more we try, the more likely we are to fail. That is my immense faith in the human fallibility.
As for myself, I’d wonder what is it exactly I wouldn’t want to manifest..
Some thick talk about life in the middle of the night huh?
To be able to endure urges and separate one self from the world — that might be what it means to be zen.
There I was walking back by the river,
resisting the sun,
the urge to sleep, the urge to eat, the urge to drink .
To some extent, even resisting the urge to scratch itches.
After all, i hadn’t slept at all since 5am the day before — lasting more than 24hours awake. What’s new though — done it before for a paper even.
perhaps it was more than just a beer after the soco, since the Bailey’s ice cream was so mother awesome. And the four of us should talk into the next morning sometime soon again (despite myself not remembering much of what we discussed then)
My view point of resistance? Why bother. Embrace it and not resist.
Though, self deprivation can somewhat lead to a better feeling and true appreciation because of the Contrast Effect. We cannot appreciate what we have until there comes a time where we do not have them. Never had better sleep for a month or so.
To be Zen, would mean to be one with one’s individuality.
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