Wings Of Steel, Hearts Of Fire

the week is getting even shittier, would you believe? nearly flipped out last night when i was studying and Jo mentioned her desire to go to Wild Wild Wet. got to be wound quite tight for that to happen... at home now which is unusually early for me. i went to the library after class and just fell asleep for one and a half hours with my immuno notes in my lap. kinda echoes back to the discussion i had with Tien during dinner yesterday about why i suck at school. guess i really do have issues with performing under pressure at bulk adsorption of information. i dont believe in adsorption as a learning method. cos yeah, its adsorption. it just all falls out after the test. but thats the way they want to work in this country. looks like i have to suck it up and work as best as possible under the circumstances.

had the quietest RP session ever. hardly talking in the cluster at all. freaky... sure it was still somewhat more animated than other lab sessions, but i think the strain of school is already showing. even Dr Thean looked really wiped during the lesson, and started off with a minor blowup over Nijam's phone firing off. Shafiq suspects bipolar personality...

tomorrow's a holiday which i shall proceed to spend with my texts. so for tonight i shall soothe my sadness with DotA. so much for stopping during term. got to go hammer some people now.

You Make Me Want To Fall In Love - F.I.R.

Grinder

missed out on doing a monday update because i was too wiped! the 5 day week looks pretty killer, and the friday holiday and consequent rescheduling of classes to the remaining days is not helping at all...

still not quite into the clinic. thankfully all the old stuff is signed, even the scraping and tapping. viva la big-ass round bur! have a very ambitious plan of 4 sessions to get all the work done. in actual fact, 5 or so looks more realistic. see if i can get those 5 restos done in a day as planned, the rest of the schedule shouldnt be too mad.

Operation Phantom 2 is in progress. date set for Wednesday the 5th... and i really dont care too much whos going. if its just Shafiq and me, or a whole buncha random people, i still wanna watch the movie. whether the reviews are fantastic or ambivalous i'll still watch it. musicals herald back to my Band days in ACS(I) and ACJC, when i could still play decently. i really miss those days...

Endo looks a bit killer. wonder why the schedule is so rushed this time round... best suspect is probably our dear 5 day week again. and for the life of me why cant certain individuals figure out that Dr Chng has a soft voice and gets drowned if they engage in idle chatter in SM1B?

Your Eyes Open - Keane

The Birthday Of A King

2 days blogging in one entry again! looks like my holidays are slowly melting into oblivion even as i type. the mood surely mirrors that in Diana's 25th Dec blog entry...

to those who asked... the musical went okay from my personal opinion. the film bit turned out much stronger cos of good camera angles and some Jin Ma Jiang-level work from Mum and Dad. the live bit was, however let down slightly due to some rather loose tone work from the choir. haiz... really need to start earlier. 2 months is a recipe for disaster.

got to watch Kung Fu Hustle on Christmas Day. and by empirical testing i can now state with confidence that first row seats in Cine are okay, you wont get a neckache. this show is a must-see. sure, its not cerebral, but thats the beauty of it. the comedy is actually not very in-your-face, a departure from the usual Stephen Chow style. good fight choreo, interesting characterisation, and an okay plot.

had a pretty good outing today with Amanda, Samm and Changshuo. havent talked to Samm for ages, always good to catch up and see how people are doing. had mucho fun window-shopping, and i somehow ended up giving advice about orthodontics. no rest for the dental...

started work on my christmas present, a Macross Super Valkyrie model kit, fully articulated even. got to say that im none too impressed with the plastic work. some of the joint lines are screwy. and they decided to make this one a 15th Anniversary Metallic Coat Special Edition. its fugly as helll, being a metallic silver and green colour. and when you cut the sprues the plain plastic color shows at the incisions. dont get me started on what it looks like when you file the joints even... she's got a lot of work ahead, and im planning to paint it up like Skull One with some proper acrylics to cover the gay metallics.

back to school tomorrow, havent packed yet. hope i dont forget anything, esp PJ's christmas presents...

This Love - Maroon 5

How Much Of This Can He Take?

its past midnight in Geng's place. and im a little bit booored! think this party this year was a bit quieter. just beat the stuffing out of Nijam in straight sets in a wierd wrestling game that Kenny brought. all girl high-res wrestling action, the naughty boy! sure made pwning Nijam a little more interesting...

looks like Operation Phantom was a flop. to tell you the truth... i think i kinda didnt follow it up due to the expectation of mucho kite being flow. what with late comers and people falling sick... whats happening to our people?

had the object lesson today that tactile investigation in a game of Polar Bear is muchly over-rated. quite amazing how much noise the class girls can make in a simple RPG setting. and in my class, dead men still tell tales!

Streamers In The Wind

today was a slow day... windsurfing din materialise due to Lego being overseas. like... damn! and i hate the concept of having to haul my board without a buddy. of course coulda called Cheryl out but then heck lah.

instead had to meet up with Nijam to do the verdammte fluoride project. i swear... who the heck does holiday homework at the age of 22? we do! sadness indeed. planning to compile the data tomorrow morning... which means i have to haul my fat ass out of bed and do work. think im a really hard-to-motivate person. if i think something is stupid i'll have trouble working with it.

still in the process of ramming the script for Christmas into my head. i think its actually easier working with Shakespeare. they have a rhyme scheme, and the internal rhythm of the verse makes it stick. damn... next musical shall be worded in iambic pentameter. yeah, right...

Inuyasha gets better and better! we now see the re-entry of Kagome into the scene, and Naraku shows a bit of power. and the closing credits are not being played to the second closing theme, Fukai Mori by Do As Infinity! w00tz!

for all the guys watching The Amazing Race, i'll state for the record that Jonathan of Jon and Victoria fame is a jerk. he needs professional, institutionalised care. and the missus should get a freaking medal for not slapping him and quitting. like that taxi driver did. hes da man!

Neverland - Love Psychedelico

Cheap Deals, Big Steals

had the most amazing lunch today due to an accident at the fast food counter. considering that KFC 2-piece meals were going for disgustingly cheap, i thought i'd get 2 for myself. and i thought my brother was thinking the same thing. and here's why the meal was amazing... i was wrong. he only wanted one. and i hence managed to eat 5 pieces of KFC for lunch. had to skip dinner tho. urrk..

watched Kaena in Cine. its some animated artsy filmy thing whereby the biggest sell point was that Kirsten Dunst of the adorable rotated laterals voiced over the lead character. it was ok lah... nothing to scream about. plot a bit jumpy even for Jon and his leaps of logic. and still uncomfortable from surfeit of fried chicken.

song of the day:

__________________________________

Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

Have yourself a merry little christmas

Let your heart be light

From now on all troubles will be out of site

.

Have yourself a merry little christmas

Make the yuletide gay

From now on all troubles will be miles away

.

Here we are as in olden days

Happy golden of yours

Faithful friends who are dear to us

Gather near to us once more

.

Through the years we all will be together

If the fates allow

Hang a shining star upon the highest bow

And have yourself a merry little christmas now

.

Hang a shining star upon the highest bow

And have yourself a merry little christmas now

__________________________________

who's coming for my church musical thingy? response over the class mailing list has been not so forthcoming, so sms me if you need details on how to go!

By Breaking Free, Will I Be Broken Hearted?

listening to some very nice Do As Infinity as i try and recall 2 days worth of events. was totally wiped after getting home after a bloody long ride from Tanah Merah MRT Station last night so i couldnt blog due to my brain feeling like it was full of cotton wool.

soccer yesterday morning was another reminder of encroaching age and flagging fitness. dammit, 10 minutes and i get tired? that blows! did however run into an old school friend from JC. Esmundo is now doing aeronautical in the US. lucky cow. now on holiday back home eating local food with abandon and playing mucho tennis. was great catching up with him, was talking a lot of materials science to him too. the consequence of too much DM i guess. but its true that our dental stuff broadens our base a lot more than what the MBBS guys are getting. after that went to look for the rest who were playing on without me, and found them on a very muddy pitch playing against people with proper boots! failing skill rolls and falling into mud while trying to change direction or brake is not kewl.

the ex's birthday party was, believe it or not, a drag. almost all 21sts are lah. lets face it, cramming 40 guests together from diverse backgrounds and trying to entertain them for the night is a bitch. i should know, i had 70ish! haiz... but aniwei, it was also a big reminder about how things change, how people change. dont know if its me still having hangups, but i suspect that i had met her for the first time with her in this phase in life and me in this phase, i might not have fallen for her. she's lost a lot of her old innocent charm, grown pseudo-sophisticated without the accompanying depth. she had 4 shoe boxes of photos for the guests to peruse (which saved me and her council from death by boredom) and it just showed all the changes. her as a 6-year-old missing her anteriors, when the braces went on (wtf the ortho yanked her upper 3s? got to check that!), her totally retro glasses in primary school, her MGS uniform, council camp, her hair as it grew out to tail length in J1, her in Council No 1s, her in Seniors Night gear, her uni friends. her with bf number 2... it was kinda like a big grin and bear it session. and now, she's so unfamiliar to me, my present to her was a bottle of scent. and even that was hazarding her tastes, i dont know what she listens to or wears now. or even if her sizes have changed. and since i figured i wouldnt be able to talk to her much i just wrote her some stuff on a Zo-Card. thankfully had my ass hauled out of there by Lincoln and his little A-class Merc. damn the kid is a maniac at the wheel... suffice to say after the first road junction i saw fit to remind him about the A-class and its stability issues on moose tests. die in Tanah Merah = not cool.

also had the opportunity to listen to Vocaluptuous in Heeren while killing time to go down to Tanah Merah. some of their members look gayer than a lamb in spring, but they sound damn good! people should listen to this kinda thing more. its good harmony without being deep and inaccessible. and it can disillusion people who think their singing is fantastic when it isnt.

Quando - Vocaluptuous

But If I Turn Away From What I've Started

watched Ocean's 12 yesterday! and woulda blogged about it too if i wasnt feeling rather sluglike. never got to watch Ocean's 11 in either of its incarnations, so i have no basis for comparison, but in the context of a stand-alone movie its good stuff! it really does look somewhat like all the actors clowning around for the camera, but in a nice way that allows you to see the character interaction. and yeah... Julia Roberts got the short end of the glamour stick in this show. Catherine Zeta-Jones = hot stuff.

this outing was the classic definition of a sausage party. no girls came out simply cos Soh figured that the probability of them coming would be so low, he didnt bother to ask them in any detail. and so... in the heady testosterone-laden air we had a wonderful guy outing. of course it was a bit dental-centric but good lah. the pre-movie sit-down was pretty funny too cos Mao was around and we did our usual babe-spotting thing. Lido is prime ground on any movie opening day! and after that we proceeded to Haagend-Dazs to have icecream with Stan's amazing coupon. busted Weisong with Kaili, sore throat my ass! and got presents for mum and Jo after that.

SF was pretty good. Uncle Jason discoursed on the work of God in the Salvation process. without going into details, it was clarifying.

DotA sesion after Inuyasha was a teensy bit lonely... only game i completed without leavers PinkDolphin happened to be around. and it was quite funny cos while in the ready room waiting for 10 players a discussion started about Ocean's 12. have settled on a good build for Banehallow. happiness!

When All The Tears Have Dried - Dick Lee

Where The Wild Things Are

another excellent windsurfing session! good winds, and i managed to get back without being towed. the jibes and tacking are still a bit shite though. looks like next week will be the last session for a while though. sad...

seems like i keep running into bazillions of juniors in orchard and wherever, and theyre all going for my ex's birthday thingy. should be like some great big reunion! these things arent always the best time to catch up with the birthday girl though, cos she will doubtless be busy. considering writing a long letter to talk about life.

ran into Taby and her sister Joanne in the Heeren. the resemblence is uncanny, she looks like a younger version of her sister. same jaw line, incisal relations, forehead, cheekbones, and they even sound the same. she just has slightly chubbier cheeks. but cute too!

cref yesterday's blog, i think it might really be dead. frequent readers hang in there, im sure i'll be posting a confirmation some time in the next month or so.

Run - Snow Patrol

Theres Gotta Be More To Life Than This

windsurfing tomorrow! now i can re-burn the bits that have been happily peeling away. looks like i'll have been averaging something like 1 session a week... but i'll surely forget it all once term starts. no sentosa time this holiday... but at least i'll have had some fun in the sun.

went to orchard road and got a new pair of glasses due to mum's insistent complaints. after 30min of aches in the right eye, the world is so much clearer! i think im so dazzled by the clarity that i lose my ability to pick up babes in my peripheral vision... damn! also got the christmas party gift and the birthday present for my ex. hope she likes it... hard to tell if her tastes have changed, just going by instincts. also ran into Farhana, one of my council juniors (the nice type). reminds me of days of yore...

yesterday i woke up and realised that something inside me had died. i searched my insides and couldnt find the usual warm pulse that it brought me... i went through the day trying to evoke it and it wouldnt respond. i think maybe it really might be gone, since its Day 2 and there are no stirrings. but ther is no way to test until i meet up with the source of what i have lost... if that does not revive it, i am a liberated man. empty, but happy.

Everything's Changing - Keane

How Do They Rise Up, Rise Up High?

life's been taking a few twists and turns lately. still somewhat in windwalk mode... Jo gave me a little talk yesterday while at the icecream place at Serene. yeah... i cant hide forever but i guess im having trouble admitting that im a pig-headed person who has a tendency to pick fights based on his mis-guided sense of chivalry.

Debra the Violin Girl gave me lots of amazing happy-happy J-Rock CDs! currently burning them all to my hard drive! muahahahahahahahaha!

read Night Watch by Terry Pratchett, once for the feel and another time for filling in all the bits where i read fast cos it was exciting! this one makes the highly recommended list. one of my achievable wants in life is to collect all of Terry Pratchett's books. cos they're worth it.

Cheap Delights

went to watch National Treasure with Jo! this one gets mucho kudos for pseudo-intellectual fun. okay plot, fast pacing, lots of action! and Nicholas Cage's character keeps using one of my signature lines...

NYDC binge before the movie, stuffed myself with spaghetti and meatballs. as most people would know, the NYDC incarnation has mega-balls, which are great for a filling meal! and as per tradition, helped Jo with the mushroom pizza. am still stuffed even as i typed, enough to inhibit any post-movie Gelare.

Picked up a copy of Night Watch. havent read Terry Pratchett for like ages, and ive always liked his style and sense of offbeat humour. still need to snaffle a copy of all of Dan Brown's stuff. its so controversial, i kinda wanna read it just to form my own opinions.

life's weird sometimes. lets say you have a friend who calls you at 9.45 in the morning on a holiday to ask your advice, and youre willing to go out of your way to haul ass out of bed and help as best as you can. and when you ask said friend if the friend wants to go out and do stuff cos youre gathering fungus at home, and the reply is say 3 hours late, is it natural to feel used?

Hao Xin Fen Shou - Candy Lo feat. Wang Lee-Hom

Don't Speak

finally, a day worthy of my holidays! fun from morning to night!

had a windsurfing session, created ad-hoc last night by Lego... hauled ass out of bed at 6.45am, got on the mrt and was rather miffed to discover that Lego couldn get his ass out of bed as my mrt was passing Queenstown. snarfed breakfast and halued ass to the Seasports Centre, and had to wait another 30min for Kokyang. as sessions go, it wasnt too bad. din go out too far cos the wind was wimpy even for a 5.0m2 sail. got to turn and tack and jibe and all that jazz just out of the breakwater. and when the wind got shitty, i'd just lie on the board and stone. not too much time spent falling in due to gusts of wind yanking the mast out of my wimpish hands.

ended on time and went to meet Shafiq. movie session was planned for 4pm. apparently PJ wanted to watch The Incredibles, and Shafiq was bored shitless, and out of all the usual suspects canvassed, he only got me. Mao had to paint the windows, and other assorted people were too busy and too lazy. and as we were queueing in line to buy tickets at 3.30 for the 4.00 show, we discovered to our horror that PJ was still at home packing for a sleepover. needless to say, the proverbial kites of ours had been flown way high, so we turned the day into a mega window-shopping cum bitchin' session. Pringle had it right, bitching is very therapeutic. topics covered in the discussion of the brotherhood included behaviour of girls, the state of our class brotherhood, why kites fly so high, and a really weird guy with tattoos and straggly greyish hair done up in a bun, who was showing baby photos to a well-dressed woman in the Coffee Club in Kino at Taka. Shafiq said he looked like a baby smuggler... intercepted PJ with Siew Ping at Taka, and after a few jibes at my un-glam gear (yeah, after windsurfing mah) and PJ's choice of bracket colours, we let her go to eat, drink and be merry, in that order. dinner at BK Lane Crawford with more bitching, and then went home to watch anime.

Inuyasha was amazing! even more plot development as we see how the death of Kikyo and enchantment of Inuyasha are intertwined... and the relationships of the characters are developed as well. damn this anime rocks!

Hope DotA session will be Beyond Godlike! hey now, you're an Allstar, get yer game on, go, play...

My Will - Dream

*fits the emotional content of this episode so well*

Waiting In The Wings

think my holidays are turning boring. didnt bother blogging monday because i basically spent the whole day trying to clean my room. this trend seems to be continuing for today, since christmas item practice precludes my going to JB with the rest of the class. damn.

the book i've been reading lately has been making me analyse my own weaknesses and flaws. its not self-help, the great premise of Christianity is that we are all humanly beyond help. wicked, deceitful, hopeless. the stock term is Total Depravity. though we try to do good, its hopeless cos we're just congenitally sinful. and life as a Christian, once possessing the renewed nature and being placed on the path to heaven, is a walk to perfection in God's standard through his cleansing, and doing his will.

jon's major flaws:

1) im an incredibly lazy guy. damned if im having a heck of a time cleaning up the stacks of notes in my room now. old occlusion stuff, microbe notes, dust bunnies...

2) wrath. friends and frequent blog patrons should no doubt have a little insight to jon's nasty temper.

hope that as i go through my life with God these get ironed out, and not just cos of all the trouble it gets me into (cref sunday's entry)...

quite an amazing DotA session last night. had 2 okay sessions as AM, then got sick of the AM training and randomed. got the Slayer! w00tz! i can conclude, after that game, that my heavy-caster play is much stronger than my melee play. 8-1 kill-death ratio! amazing escapes! humiliating tower kill! unexpected slaying! yeah! shall never live down the embarassment of missing a Laguna Blade kill... tagged a creep instead. and the victim noticed. damn.

____________________

Dirty Stunner Trick Of The Day:

Reversal Of Fortune!

scenario: Slayer being chased by NS. its night, NS is at half-health. Slayer is at 1/3 health after letting rip with a Laguna and Dragon Slave. Slayer runs for tower. NS gets cocky and hammers away at Slayer, making use of faster run speed and attack speed. at 1/4 health, just into tower range, Slayer lets rip with a Light Strike! NS stunned in range of tower, Slayer runs for fountain laughing. tower pwns NS.

____________________

recapping a conversation with Wanyi during the biking session after windsurfing, about the ways of man and woman. seems like our accepted practice of a man chasing a woman is the open-tender style. a man tenders his proposition, be it for life-long companionship (will you marry me) or a night of fun (hey you doing anything tonight, heard the new movie is good) or whatever, and it is the woman's perogative to accept or reject. in a sense, she said she pities us for having to face rejection in our path to happiness. and in a sense that's true. rejection isnt a pleasant thing. but it makes the journey memorable. we would be much weaker, poorer people if all we tasted of in life was success. failures, accidents, misfortunes, unrequited crushes, loss, these all shape, mould and teach us in different ways. they teach us to know when to persevere, and the warning signs that perseverance should give way to inevitability. but it doesnt take away the pain of every rejection...

Out Of My Head, Out Of My Mind - Fastball

These Are The People That I Came To Save

dont you hate it when a day is so blah that theres nothing worth blogging? saturday was such a day...

sunday, on the other hand, was a totally different matter. haiz... getting into controversy at orchestra. me and my big mouth need to work out a peace treaty. a certain uptight individual was complaining that the violin girls werent following his lead when he was conducting while songleading. thought this wasnt a fair go so i saw fit to defend them by pointing out that said song-leader's conducting was lagging behind his singing, thus making it actually impossible to follow his lead in any coherent matter. and yes, it's been bugging me for months. just dont think its right that the violins eat flame when it isnt entirely their fault. and then after church i had to windwalk out cos the leadership, as expected, wanted to have a word with me. just love my l33t n1nj4 sk1llz! muahahahahaha! they'll never take me alive!

and dear Debra The Violin Girl brought me an empty jewel case in exchange for my generously-proffered CD collection. but she's so funny about it... like when we heard that she voted for both Taufik and Sylvester. yes, i kid you not. one for his singing, one for his image. and it was so funny seeing her redden when Jo pointed out that that was effectively spending money on null votes. remember kids... Nulls are only cool in DotA.

why do people keep repeating the same mistakes? is it their fault for being unobservant to disasters? or are we at fault when we dont tell them? what if we tell them but they take no heed to our advice because after weighing up our word against their instincts they make the wrong decisions? is the blame discharged from us? do we have to push harder? or should we become docile and peaceable and watch things go all pear-shaped because the leadership is pig-headed and slow of wit? should we leave or should we stay? is it a trial laid upon us to strengthen and teach us, or an indicator that we are in the wrong place?

tried setting up a pool session with the Brotherhood but response seems to be crap. dunno if i should try again, ask more guys, more girls, heck it...

Fill My Heart With Song And Let Me Sing Forevermore...

looks like this blog entry is gonna be a short one. only thing of note today was Dental Idol!

woke up late today, 1.13pm to be exact. panicked cos i was supposed to be in school at 2, so ended up rushing out of the house and getting fruit from Kopitiam for lunch. and as usual i shouldn have rushed so much, cos everyone was late. esp since i forgot to wear a belt and it was my S&K jeans. had to offload my pockets into my bag.

singing was of variable quality. some sucked, including me. it basically came down to a showdown between Wanyi and Tammy, but Tammy was on form and out-powered Wanyi. and yeah, Wanyi should sing more. a voice like that shouldnt be hidden. theres nothing embarassing about it, its only embarassing when you suck like me.

ad-libbing session after the competition proper, looks like i should have taken Fly Me To The Moon rather than Eternal Flame. goddam eternal lyric loop... haiz. not funny when u end up reiterating the stanza like 5 times over cos the karaoke doesnt realise its getting boring...

still in pain from yesterday's sunburn. hope it subsides soon, its damn irritating!

Kai Shi Dong Le - Lin Wanyi

A Bicycle Built For One

an amazing day! windsurfing, cycling, talking nonsense... how much better can it get? gotta lovw the holidays!

as per normal, the guys cant be trusted to turn up on time... we ended up like almost an hour late at the seasports centre. total of YH, me, Diana, Wanyi, Stan, Kok Yang and Mr Mohamad. the wind was a bit perverse today... strong enough to blow us out but just the right direction to stop us noobish surfers from coming back. so there i am stranded in the water, with Wanyi sitting pretty 600m away. took me like, what, 10min to drag the damn board all the way in the classic chin-grip sidestroke to get to her. spent the next hour talking while waiting for the boat. just before we got rescued we also found out that we were in the middle of a national sailing competition, and only when they came rushing in. nearly got headcapped by some boorish chap who was leaning over the side to brace himself against the sail. heng i ducked in time, i would never live down the shame of getting headcapped by some guy's ass at high speed.

cycling session after the windsurfing. it was actually like a real big conversation on wheels. we talked about the effect of the rumour mill in class, the eligibility of various guys, crazed sylvester fans, everything! and im not gonna say anymore, thats all the details yer getting... its always good to know how people think about certain issues. especially in the light of the microcosm that is our class.

dental idol karaoke session tomorrow. im seriously not prepared. see how that goes...

Love Psychedelico is t3h R0x0rz! nothing like a new CD to boost the morale...

All Over Love -Love Psychedelico