Do you hear it whizzing by?

i must've said this a million times, yet i'm gonna say it again.

'It's freaky how fast time flies!'

I'm well into week8 of uni now. that means half the semester's gone. which means that the finals are ever that much closer. which means that i only have OMG 5 MORE FREAKING WEEKS TO COMPLETE ALL MY ASSIGNMENTS!!! which points to the fact that i've still got 4 more major reports to write up and two more field excursions yet to be attended. to which i'm currently asking myself..'IS THERE ENOUGH TIME??'..

i don't want to be the white rabbit again..

but really..my life here revolves around the likes of this:

1. YES it's the WEEKEND!
2. fuck...where did my Weekend go?
3. YES it's the WEEKEND!
4. Repeat infinity times.

The speed at which time is leaving me behind also reminds me that i'll be turning 20 in a good matter of 4 weeks. 20! in 4 weeks! how did that happen? although i'm jubilant over the fact that i have just one more year to go before hitting the legal age, i'm secretly frightened.

there's a part of me that doesn't want to grow up and wants to remain a kid forever. that part of me feels that i am not ready to shoulder such responsibility like mortgages and bills and the most dreaded of all..Work. that part of me wants to be able to run around barefoot without attracting condescending and disapproving stares from those who have been in the adult community for a longer period than i have. that part of me wants to remain young and carefree, and not have to conform to the expectations that is required of a young-adult. that part of me wants to remain a teenager for life because, let's face it, it is prefectly normal and ok for a teen to sleep late and wake even later because of our hormonal imbalances etc etc but it is absolutely FROWNED UPON when an adult does that. because we should be more responsible. ergh.

[some might say that they're adults and they SLEEP LATE and WAKE UP LATE too...but i bet your mom would've made a helluva noise about it, eh, when she calls you at 12.00noon on a Saturday/Sunday and you don't pick up the phone...*snorts*...adults]

la..bottomline is: i don't want to grow up. i want to find my own Never-never-land.

*shakeshead* scary shit.

Backfire.

Sometimes, i think i'm just too darned smug and too cock-sure about myself and my work for my own good. it happens all the time when i lapse into what i call 'my comfort zone' where my brain tells me to 'stop working so hard because the current standard of your work is enough to propel you forwards'..

scenarios such as the aforementioned have occurred throughout my years of education, and it shows no signs of stopping...what more, it seemed to have increased in leaps and bounds since the past year. it's the whole aussie attitude towards education. they don't really care about grades, so indirectly it affects me as well.

i care less about my grades than i really ought to, but i care more about my grades than they do about their grades... therefore, by applying Occam's Razor (i.e. the law of parsimony to phylogenists), i am a slacker who's too darned smug for her own good.

the reason for this sudden change of heart is the marks that i received for a certain report. according to my normal standards of grading marks, whereby a pass is sufficient, i should be well satisfied and maybe even ecstatic over it. however, what i felt was just a mild case of disappointment. my smug little mind told me to expect something GREAT...but what was handed back to me was only something GOOD. hence the lack in euphoria.

sigh...i guess it wasn't a great idea to slack off together with the Aussies after all. i should now learn that i should not bank upon my superior *cough* pre-university education provided by the malaysian education system and also the 11-month hiatus in Taylor's...it's just not enough.

Ok...so maybe it is enough. but i don't think it's enough for me anymore.

i'm out for the kill, dammit! i'm a changed woman from tonight!

NerdsFC!!

The world is embracing the very epitome of 'Nerd' now.

Don't believe me?

Well, what do you get when you gather 14 self-professed nerds hailing from every knook and cranny of Nerd-dom, equip them with sharp blue shorts and jerseys, hire a bitter ex-athelete who used to represent Australia in football to be coach and place a ball in front of them?

you get NERDS FC!!

yep..NerdsFC is correct. among the group is a man who single-handedly built an empire with its own topographical map, own never-heard-before-in-this-world language and own never-seen-before-in-this-world alphabets and writing script (although it looks and sounds suspiciously like Elfish from LOTR). and then there is another who is a war enthusiast; he has more books than i do concerning the art of war...from Sun Tzu's Art of War to a biographies of Winston Churchill to Nazi-praising propaganda. plus, he owns authentic WW1 and WW2 army uniforms.

in l337 (y0u kn0w 7h4t 17'll b3 th3 0ff1c14l 5cr1p7 0n3 d4y)

N3RDs R0xx0rz!!

(or something like that..did i get the leet parts right?)

either way..go check them out at www.nerdsfc.com.au and if you can, download the series from Limewire or whatever you guys are using to rob the system.

you won't regret it! it's like watching Russell Peters minus the sexual annotations!!

for the aussies..if you didn't know, they air on SBS every Friday at 7.30pm.

Another reunion come and gone..

Someone once said to me,

"It feels so good to see a familiar face when you're in a foreign place."

And it's true...it really is.

Ms Teo Hong Yin decided to grace Sydney with her presence for 3 whole days and of course, what else better to commemorate the joyous event than plenty of good food, good drinks, and great pictures?

Of course, shopping gets better when the items are branded, selling at factory-outlet prices AND marked down by discounts as well..it drives otherwise normally sane girls crazy...they launch into a buying spree...and wrap the productive day by camwhoring.

Birkenhead Point is the place to be.







Sorry lar...shopping is very stressful, you knoee...and you know what i think about stress and cameras, right?

Dinner with the boys the next day at Encasa, a swanky spanish place which delivers great food, excellent ambience and surprisingly, all at a fairly reasonable price. The night started with Ms Teo being a little grouchy, but after the first sip of Sangria, she bloomed back into the normal chirpy-noisy-opinionated one...can you say Bloody Alcoholic? Later...more drinking, pooling and socialising...and by socialising, i mean bitching about everyone who wasn't seated at the table with us..

best summed up by Waiking:

"Hong Yin, if you are really having problems with the bottle, it's safe to come out and admit it. Nobody will think any less of you just because you're battling your fiery desires for R-OH."


The S3-ians who know where the 'life' is...and it's certainly not near the south of the great Oz. heh..never-ending rivalry.



The boys got whipped for all four games..three of it by default..bwahaha.. we girls rock.



A little inside-joke..heh..

Forgive some of the pictures...i personally dislike flash, it tends to bring out every little detail..

Plus...the quantity of alcohol imbibed throughout Ms Teo's stay in Sydney shall remain private and away from the scrutiny of the public eye (Hi, mom.)...ignorance is bliss..Amen.

Finally...we hit The Rocks Sunday Market...did i ever tell you how beautiful that place really is? Really really is? No uninhibited purchasing sprees this time around...just for a fact that the price tag on some of the items sport heavyweight numbers..





And then, she left for Canberra...bringing with her, 12 egg tarts. Canberra people are really deprived in some aspects. if you count the number of egg tarts in the picture, there's actually 18, but 6 were for me..hehe..how nice.



See you soon, Hongzz!! *sniffs*..i'm already missing you, ok???

All I want is one more chance,

To be young and proud and free.

Do Did Done

Just a quick note to say that i've completed the dastardly report..it's only 8 pages and i'm not proud of it...as far as i can see, it's all just a repeated ramble of minimum, maximum and mean values sprinkled with notations of SEM values and error bars on every paragraph based on 6 damned species of marine organisms.

frankly, it's rubbish, from my point of perspective.

HOWEVER!

(yes..in the great adversities of life, there is ALWAYS a HOWEVER..or a BUT, if you're a lazier person and would rather type 3 alphabets rather than 7..)

everyone seems to think that their report is rubbish as well...and the great thing is that everyone's been asking me how to do it..well..not everyone..but quite a substantial few. so i'm currently satisfied to think that although mine is rubbish, it's of a greater class of rubbish compared to theirs...so that would mean that, based on the Almighty Bell-shaped Curve of the Normal Probability Distribution, i stand a higher chance of getting a great mark, based on my own hypothesis that great rubbish would inadvertantly turn into relatively great marks.

i know pride comes before fall...heck, i'm already a master at that adage...but i'm just too stuffed with this...i've completed it and now, it lies in the hands of fate (or Dr. Ross Coleman, actually) to either deal me yet another sweet card or to give me a final blow to my self-esteem as an aspiring marine biologist.

and with that said...i now proceed to fly off to the Old Geology Building Rm 105 to hand in these sheets of pestilence and brain-numbing figures...to wash my hands clean of it and know that i only have one final report to hand in..

THE BIG MAMA!

coming all too soon on 18th May 2006.

p.s. i ramble when i'm hungry..and right now..the spicy chilli tuna sandwich tucked inside my bag is beginning to look really good.

Anymore suggestions, anyone?

I would have loved to publish it to the whole World Wide Web that I loved Kelvin and that I will now grant any ONE of his wishes..anything!! anything that he asks for!! thankyouThankYouTHANKYOU!!

sadly...it won't come true. thanks for the suggestion of running it in safemode and doing the whole virus scan, my friend. however it yielded no positive results, although it did get me mightily excited and crossing my fingers...what resulted was a long drawn-out 'AAOOOooWWwWWwwhhh!!! DARNIT' when i realised that nothing's been changed.

no virus was detected but i just KNOW that something is infecting it...i KNOW. and my norton anti-virus is disabled (still) and i can't get it to run..so that must mean something.

i hope those virus-creators rot in hell (luckily for me, i'm Catholic, so we BELIEVE in hell)..yea, rot in hell sonsoffemaledogs.

and, how befitting...

the comp is struckdown by a virus..(it's a virus i'm telling ya!)..now the owner is infected as well. woke up today with a SORE throat, groggy-heavy-head, stuffed up nose. and right now, i feel like shit...headache and TakingBackSunday just does NOT mix.

oh cruel world...*whinewhinewhine*...

. . .

Today i had a talk with the nephew..

Josh: Auntie Melanie, do you have a boyfriend?
Me: Hmm..? Err..why do you ask? Do you have a girlfriend?
Josh: Nooo...err..i mean, yeaaaa..
Me: *laughs*..REALLY? What's her name?
Josh: Alice. She's from my class..
Me: Oh..nice name..how does she look like..?
Josh: She's got blonde hair..and her eyes are blue..
Me: Oh WOW! she sounds pretty (heh..GREAT TASTE runs in the family..) ..
Josh: Yea..she is..but we're not together anymore...
Me: *openseyesbigbig* Whyy..?
Josh: We had a talk and I asked her if she wanted to stay together or break up..
Josh: And she said, Break Up.

OOokkaayy..we're talking about a 5.5-year-old kid here who still needs to be fed (sometimes) during mealtimes, and needs someone to be in the shower with him while he does his thang.. so what's he doing talking about girlfriends and breakups?

boy..do they mature fast.

yet..it was really interesting talking to him and i really liked it. it made me smile when he answered me matter-of-factly about everything of his now-ex-girlfriend..staring me dead in the eye. it made me think back about the time when i was in kindergarten as well..and i had this mini crush on this boy in my class..heh..i ended up kicking him down the slide. young love..how sweet.

but still...the simplicity of such feelings is all the more magnified through the eyes of a child. in his world, there's no complexity, no confusion, no hesitation, no complication. it's all just straightforward 'I'm in love with you, will you be my girlfriend/boyfriend?'...and if it doesn't work out, they talk to their aunties about it and move on..without a single regret clouding them.

it's all just a matter of fact. you don't like me? fine. i'm moving on.

heh...now, why can't we learn from the little ones, eh?

life would be much less of a hassle then.

Day 3

I'm starting to think that maybe...just maybe...not being able to access into MSN isn't so bad after all. I now have more time to do my own stuff...like assignments, or clipping my fingernails (which i'll do tomorrow since i've lost all hope in ever resurfacing into the arena of MSN), or baking cute little cupcakes.

And not being able to check my mail? it's all good. saves me 10 minutes of my time each day deleting forwarded mail...yes, my mailbox is a forwarded-mail graveyard. it is where they come to die...but the best part of it is that they don't know it..teehee..what more, it would mean that i needn't stress myself over the multitudes of unimail being sent through the marine faculty asking for tips on how to score a D for the reports. truth be told, i don't really like teaching people; not because i'm kiasu, i'm just too lazy to explain in detail to them...unless they call..and boy, do they call..i'd rather avoid it all if i could.

still, i'm all for this whole mess to fix itself...i'm open to all suggestions..ALL. EVERYTHING. and if your suggestion works...well...you'll be rewarded. i promise you. anything. anything that your heart desires. except a Ferrari. or a Porsche. or any automated vehicle for that matter. but i could do a bicycle, i guess. which isn't automated, but is a vehicle nontheless. or one of those scooters where you have to push yourself manually...yeaa..i could do that.

anything.

oh dear, do i sound desperate?

noo..i'm not desperate.

i can live without msn...it's quite a nice change, actually. you guys should try it too.

oh yea...in case you needed to send me a message or anything, i can still access into Friendster (I KNOW..! IT'S SO DARN FREAKY/STUPID RIGHT??) so pop whatever you want that way. i'd like to believe that there are some of my 'friends' out there pulling their hair out from the roots in frustration just because they couldn't say hi to me for a day.

eheh..

humour me, please.

i have been rendered virtually contact-less, ok?

seclusion isn't very fun after all.

Damned technology

Great news, everyone. My internet has crashed on me again. This is the second day that i am denied access into any website that needs my authentication..my unimail, my yahoo-mail, my msn..

Now, i know i have a Trojan lurking somewhere in my pc...i just didn't have the time to exterminate it, or whatever you tech-nerds call it. i didn't have time. so i guess it must've morphed into something and diddled with my connections. A second thing is, my Norton Anti-Virus Auto-Protect has been disabled and i cannot get it running again...so currently, i'm using the internet UNPROTECTED. it's worse than having unprotected sex, ok?

it's TABOO.

and i blame it on the damned Trojan...just cos i don't know what else to blame.

So, i can't log on to anything, nor can i start a live-update of my anti-virus application, AND i'm always smacked in the face with a big fat



Tech-nerds...i'm sorry i ever made fun of your hair style, y0ur qu1rky w2y 0f wr171ng 1n l337, the way you laugh at jokes 5 seconds too late...i need your help NOW!! i see the error in my ways! FORGIVE ME!

SSSsssiiiiiggggghhhhh......

So, if i don't reply your emails, don't get mad at me and think that i'm too stuck-up. It's just that the powers-that-be won't allow me to.

Looking at the bright(er) side...at least i can still blog. i guess God still Loves Me.

How I spent my Easter.

This is my smaller little man. He's grown so big and talkative that i can hardly recognize him anymore..(heh, just trying to make conversation)..OF COURSE I CAN RECOGNISE HIM!


My name is Benjamin Chai.
My favourite Auntie Melanie thinks i look like Kenny Sia.
And I shake my booty to the tune of Queen's We Will Rock You.

Easter Morning-Egg Hunt.

Have you ever thought that kids nowadays are just so darned lucky? they seriously get everything...and i mean, EVERYTHING.

see, when i was a kid, i didn't have an auntie who would buy me hundreds of chocolate easter eggs (and, no joke, i think there was at LEAST a hundred), then wake up on Easter morning to run over to the neighbour's garden to hide them, then bring me over to go hunt for them. all this complete with two pretty straw baskets and a whole crew of adults smiling down on you as you 'find' an egg..(it's not THAT hard..May Chiew made it pretty obvious..if it were me, i'd make him WORK for it..bwahaha..)





The Sydney Royal Easter Show.

The lights, the noise, the people, the games, the shows, the food, the animals...

It's all a money-making scam.

The moment you step into the Homebush Showground, you lose yourself completely. You spend 5 bucks in a 1/20 chance game in hopes of winning a gigantic Homer Simpson soft-toy which you eventually lose in. Then, you sit in the NAB Arena under the hot-blistering-unforgiving Australian sun, wearing your long-sleeved black jumper, red Toyota cap that you borrowed from your cousin-in-law, sunnies that you stole from your 5.5-year-old nephew for an hour just to watch some lady from America shoot herself out of a cannon. It ends in 5 seconds and you get 4th-degree burns. Later, you wrestle with the huge throng of crowds at the Showbag dome to buy yourself a crummy showbag worth 12 bucks which contains, together with other items, a roll of celophane tape, a tin of cat food and a few sachets of Green Tea&Apple Twinnings Tea. In the end, you trek to the dairy farmers' showtent to smell cow fart.


But heck, the bag itself was worth the 12 dollars. pretty, no?

At the end of 6-odd hours, you emerge from the showground scarred, traumatized, all-the-more-wiser and physically drained.







You vow never to do it again...but of course, who believes that?

Regret and Pride goes hand-in-hand.

Do you know Pride? It’s that little teeny thing that we all have ingrained into our psyche. It becomes our best friend over time, but once in awhile, when you’re not looking; it nips you around in the ass and kicks you down the drain. It overwhelms you and all you can think of is Pride; everything else fades into oblivion.

In a moment spurred on by irrationality and a cocktail of lost inhibitions, I blurted out what I shouldn’t have. Something about an apology triggered a landslide of emotions that should’ve been kept dammed inside. How tiny and insignificant and trivial…yet I lost it. I lost it because for once, I didn’t want to hear you apologize anymore. There wasn’t any need to because you didn’t do anything wrong yet you felt compelled to. I lost it because I didn’t know what you were apologizing for. I lost it because what I wanted to hear was not ‘Sorry’. Sometimes, sorry doesn’t work.

And of course, I wrote everything that came into mind. Every damned thing. Every damned thing that made it’s way first into my mind. Every damned thought that was clamouring to be heard. But it was all under the influence. To a certain degree, it shouldn’t have meant anything…but reviewing it now, I think a bit of it does, although I can’t remember what I’ve wrote. All I remember is pissedannoyedirritated or something to that degree.

I woke up the next morning feeling lousy, and totally regretting what I did. As the wave of irrationality passed, reason took over. And I knew I fucked up. See, it’s not just you. I wanted to take back everything I’d said, pretend nothing had happened, wished the mail had gotten lost, hoped that you didn’t read it. I knew what I did was about the stupidest thing ever, it was the first time my heart took over and it led to this mess.

I wanted to tell you sorry, sorry for sounding harsh, sorry for being such a pain. But I couldn’t. Although eventually, I would.

See? There’s pride. And your reply to my bout of insanity dented my pride. And I would’ve readily admitted my mistake if I had not felt that my pride had taken a bashing. Even if you say that I’ve misunderstood you or whatever, I still stand fast that my pride is dented.

My pride says I cannot take back my words. And so it still stands that way…indefinitely. But please know that I’m not angry at you. Not truly angry. Not pissed. I don’t hate you. I can’t hate you, see?

That’s the crux of the whole mess.

GIG!!

Easter is here...together with copious amounts of chocolates and the long-awaited holidays.

To kick off the festive season, there was the The Beautiful Girls gig at Manning Bar. why didn't anyone tell me that live music is so SO much better than listening to it out of your mediaplayer or yp-f1 (i don't have an iPod, unless someone is to be so kind..)??

two words: THEY ROCKED.


Eunice, fellow marine-biologist.


Forgive the grainy picture...no flash and no stabiliser..


Live rendition of Lamar (The Ocean)...it was the best thing ever...evereverever...it transported me back to a time and place where assignments and deadlines were far from thought.

which is funny..because they're more of a groovy sorta band than a rock band..

later we jimmied over to the 3wisemonkeys..couldn't find Sam et al, was running up and around the top level of the bar..got accosted by so many drunk men..disgusting..i ran away. found them eventually and we hopped on over to..

somewhere.

the next morning...Good Friday didn't seem so good after all..slept at 4 woke up at 9..kneeled through the whole 13 Stations of the Cross. did some repenting and soul-searching. ended up trying to be a photographic genius.

failed miserably.


Inner sanctum of the cathedral of St Mary...peacecalmsolitude was what i needed then.



Finis. Truly.

As promised.

As vain/arrogant/whatever as it may sound, i never really expected so many people to read my blog...although i DO know the possibility of my readership being a grand total of 20 and somehow they just like to refresh my page ever so often in a day, hence the hits that are being generated.

Before this, when i first started, i knew..or rather, i thought that it'd be safe to blog about anything..just because i'd only given out the address to a selected few. but somehow, the selected few gradually grew..and now..i feel as though there's this invisible censorship that comes with the whole package.

notably, my mom reads this, sometimes..also my cousins, an auntie..maybe more..i don't know..they like surprising me like that...so expletives should be kept to the barest minimum. and also...lovey-dovey stories...cannot simply supply my mom the information for free..must make her grovel a bit for it.

and then, of course, there's many many other factors to consider..like how much is too much? or, heck-do-i-really-wanna-write-it-down-and-let-him-read-it? ok..this was just a general statement, but sometimes, i wish i hadn't told you about the blog. haha..too late. i wish i could be bolder, more devil-may-care, but ultimately i shrink away...embarassment plays a big role...also the thought of satisfaction not on my part but maybe yours...cannot. my heads says CANNOT and by now you should be rather familiar with that aspect which governs my actions.

so what do i do when i need to release emotions, yet can't be stuffed to write it in a diary, cos at the end of the day, i want an audience to witness these feelings...but an audience that i do not know, and vice versa, personally... i'd rather they knew me just through my words.

enter the secret BLOG! hehehe..by now, you should know that i only mean to antogonize you.

maybe one day i might have the courage to post up what i want when i want without a single care about what response it might generate. cos maybe by that time, i'd be so desensitized that i wouldn't care anymore. I don't care so I shall post. but right now, i still care so i post carefully.

heh.

ok...wtf...ranting. tired. sleepy. GOING TO THE BEAUTIFUL GIRLS GIG TMRW AND THEN HOPPING IN TO 3 WISE MONKEYS BAR WITH MARS2007 PEEPS!

wouldn't anonymity be so fun?

oh yes..i figured, to celebrate the sort-of end of assignments till Saturday.


Obligatory poser pic

And since there's all these SALES signs flashing around the city...i figured, heck, i'm generous..so see one get one free..


Complimentary poser pic

I realise now how much i love the lights from the bathroom...EXCELLENT LIGHTING without the need for flash...and i've rediscovered the therapeutic values of camwhoring...

Just a thought:

What would you have wanted me to say,

when you put me in a spot like that?

Finally...

Partial Freedom.

"Freedom" because i've handed in all my pre-easter reports, wiped my hands clean of them, and just hoping for the best...heck, i'm content with a D, who gives a shit about A's anyway?? you're in uni man...aim low. be realistic. Ds ALL THE WAY!

"Partial" because as sweet as freedom is, the universe always conspires to screw it up. Now i've got 2 reports to hand in: one on Monday right after the easter hols and another on May 8, which is the Big-Mama...the decider on whether i make my living in the future as a Marine Biologist or if i spend the rest of my life sipping 1st-grade Hot Chocolate (i don't drink coffee), catching up with friends, visiting the manicure parlour and shopping with my platinum MasterCard (tell me it exists, SAY IT!), occasionally throwing in a couple of charity events or two. hey, if i can't swim with the dolphins i may as well use what little knowledge i've acquired in the first half of semester 1 of my 2nd year and catch me a BIG FISH, right?

RIGHT!

So, for the meantime, i shall continue with what i normally do best, idly surfing blogs and websites, churning out post after post after post of irrelevant opinions and ideas, check my Friendster site a kazillion times a day and indulge in inane MSN-chats with friends who undoubtedly have better things to do...but i shall thwart them. we will talk about the weather, the alcohol, the current situation of the Market at large and who's being a bitch to who..

Mwehehehe..

Ahh...sweet smell of Nothingness.

Prepare yourself for another post circa-around Midnight.

The 6 Top Destinations You Must Visit At Least Once In A Lifetime.

Apparently, last night after inflicting eye-watering injuries to..my eyes..i cracked and went bonkers. being the voyeur of procrastination that i am, i promptly downloaded Google-Earth (spurred on by an unbeknownst to Karen, who, the night prior to last night, had sent me an image of a Google-Earth-ed image of Penant Hills Station) and started Google-Earth-ing everything and anything that i could think of.

First off, we have this.



Being the ultra-patriotic-satay-loving-Kajangian that i am, of course i have to Google home first, right? (the satay thing, is not true. but because the whole world believes that Kajang People Love Satay..well..whatever makes you happy)

and then, i got excited.




aAaahhhHhh...good old cloud cover prevented total imaging of the topography of Langkawi..but no matter. the most important bits i.e. Pantai Cenang was not covered. So, now, i'm happy.

And then, i thought, why stop there? Heck, you have the power of controlling a freaking satellite, not just reading and listening about it in MARS2005, by Jove, do SOMETHING! (around this time, maybe due to fatigue of the brain, i assumed God-like powers)..

Thus




And



And



I tried Googling SriHartamas but it didn't appear...here's the irony...Kajang appears on Google Earth but SriHartamas does NOT! hah...haha...HAHAHAHA...*wipestearsofmirthaway*...now i'm truly happy.

It was then that this little red button akin to the one on Ultraman (you know, the one that starts beeping each time he's about to die when his ass gets mightily royally kicked by some space monster in a cheap rubber suit) started buzzing off...and i knew i only had time enough for one more Google-Earth-moment before i undergo complete functional breakdown.

Hence, as a token to You, You and You...here's a lovely picture of the place where we'll be going at the end of the year for our decadent-hedonistic-alcohol-fuelled-holiday...looks lovely, right?




I know i know...you guys can thank me later.

I see the light...!!

If you didn't notice, i have been quite low-profile on the internet during the past week...no long-winded MSN sessions with Hong Yin, no soul-searching heart-wrenching post on my blog every other day, no posting up pictures (i think i kinda OD-ed a few posts prior to this), no nothing.

The reason being, i had my attention diverted towards the reports that i'm bent on finishing and getting that elusive HD for..i'll be damned if i don't.

and thus, voila, tonight i shall be able to cross yet another title off the list...hehe..*joy*..all that's left is the report on the distribution of phytoplankton, which i'm going to attempt to complete over the weekend..and by complete, i mean, fully Harvard-referenced, with all figures and tables LABELLED, page numbers highlighted at the top together with my name and SID number, and of course, a pretty cover page to go with it.

sigh..all this nerding does not become me...i was not born to slog it out in the boxing ring armed with a piece of paper and pen against the ominous Assignment Dude. i'm more the lounging-around-the-pool-side-with-a-martini-in-hand-reading-Tolstoy-or-Bronte-under-the-Mediterranean-sun kinda person.

to prove how unsuitable i am for all this nerding shit, my nose bled this evening. what was a mild headache in the morning slowly progressed to a pounding one accompanied with a mild feeling of light-headedness when evening arrived, then a slight tingling of the nose, followed by a sudden GUSH of blood. ok..maybe not gush...but it bled pretty badly..which freaked the shit outta me, cos i very very rarely encounter nose-bleeds...

bad...bad..all this nerding shit.

how those self-proclaimed nerds aka Hong Yin and Yihaur pull it off, i swear i don't know.

i need a drink.

I found a fatal flaw,

in the logic of love.

"Have you seen my book on diurnal tides in estuaries?" asked the White Rabbit.

As crazy as it may seem...i suddenly find myself sympathising deeply with the White Rabbit from Alice in Wonderland. For just this one week...i realised how dreadful it can be to be running aroung with a watch in your hand going.."I'M LATE I'M LATE!"..

because right now, the only thought replaying itself in my mind is..

"NO TIME NO TIME!!"

which is essentially the same thing, if you look past the spelling.

In the eye of the beholder

As I was walking past a mirror today, I did what I always do; glance at my reflection, squint at my nose and start pinching and pulling at it in vain to (hah) make it ‘sharper’. Basically, what I was trying to do was to conform to the idea of what society deemed as ‘Beauty’, and that is, to have a nose although not as Nicole-Kidman-ish, but at least one that has a reasonably well-defined structure. And evidently, it’s something that I lack around the nasal department.

And it got me thinking, how the idea of beauty plays such a big role in our daily life. If you’re beautiful, doors naturally open wider and more frequently for you.

There will be others who disagree with me. Beautiful people might say that I discriminate against them and that they’re more often than not, not taken seriously. To those of you, I say, Bullshit. I know for a fact that beautiful people KNOW they’re beautiful and LOVE being beautiful. Then there are those who say that beauty is skin-deep. Even more bullshit. No one believes in that anymore. If beauty is only skin-deep, why do we have cosmetics companies popping up like mushrooms after a rainy day? If beauty is only skin-deep, why are we making sure that the head-honchos of MNG, Zara, and Burberry etc are able to buy their BMWs and go on holidays to the Pacific Islands? If beauty is only skin-deep, why is Jenny Craig still in business?

In truth, EVERYONE wants to be beautiful. What separates each of us from the other is our degree of vanity. You might be someone who’s always coiffured and immaculately dressed and accessorized, taking each day armed with a bottle of heavy-duty mascara and a pair of fake eyelashes from MAC (does MAC sell fake eyelashes?). Or you may be someone who’s contented to dab on moisturizer everyday and draw on a little bit of eyeliner before stepping out of the house. Either way, you’re still guilty of wanting to be beautiful.

And then I thought, Shit, being beautiful actually pays off…and that’s just it. I’m not beautiful. I’m average-looking. Shit, actually, I’m not even average-looking; I’m about 2.7cm below the average-looking line.

Die.

To make myself feel better, I started making up excuses about why being 2.7cm below the average-looking line wasn’t that bad after all.

There might be a grain of truth in what the beautiful people have to say. Those who are aesthetically pleasing may sometimes not be treated seriously. Think of the terms that we have coined these days: Bimbo, Airhead, Barbie Doll (sadly they’re all derogatory female terms). Pretty people have it hard…sometimes. I know that I would hate being brushed off when I present my ideas or opinions…or being spoken condescendingly to whenever I put my two cents worth into the conversation.

Then there is always the problem of unwanted attention when you’re beautiful. Attention is good, when it’s in small quantities. Heck, even if it comes in moderate quantities, like getting the attention of everyone in the room when you walk in is FAN-fcuk-TASTICALLY amazing. But not when you walk down the streets and you get old men in stained white singlets slurping black coffee from chipped teacups leering at you from the safety of a kopitiam. Or when you pass by a whole bunch of mat-rempits wolf-whistling at you and thinking that they (and you) are the best creations on Jalan Telawi.

And then there’s a question of love. To be loved when you know you’re not good-looking is the best feeling in the world. To know that the person you’re sharing your emotions, problems and happiness with loves you for who you are and not because you’re pleasing to look is absolutely satisfying. I think this is pretty much self-explanatory. If I looked like Angelina Jolie (which I still repeat in my prayers every night before I go to bed), I’d be a paranoid wreck…not because I’m afraid Brad Pitt will leave me for another woman (cos I know I’d be THE most fabulous, so there’s really no one he can leave me for) but because I’d be wondering whether he likes me for being the ambassador of a lot of charitable organizations, for being witty, for being me or because I look stunning in that little black dress and will complement him wonderfully in paparazzi pictures.

Get my drift?

So girls, if you’re born beautiful, congratulations. Heaven must’ve smiled upon you. If you’re like me, born 2.7cm below the average-looking line, or heck, if you’ve got better luck than me and you’re born average-looking…cheer up. There’s no need to smile at your beautiful friends by day and hex them with curses by night…just accept it, add more eyeliner and know that being average-looking (or in my case, 2.7cm below average-looking line) isn’t so bad after all.


(i'm blogging tonight because i'm sick of assignments...yes...like a car that's run out of petrol due to the recent price-hike because my owner refuses to pay that extra ringgit...i cannot tahan anymore)