Saturday, noon time. All I want to do is to laze away the heat of the afternoon and sip a iced drink periodically — one that fills up magically by itself and does not make me fat. I've got to do the milk run tomorrow — what possessed me to sign up for a run that starts at 3:30pm in the afternoon? Coupled with the fact that I am far from fit, it is going to be a horrible experience. So tempted to pull a no-show but that seems cowardly.
The heat makes us snap at each other. We irritate each other like flies buzzing about the head. If only we could lie in large recliners with our books of choice and sip iced drinks, occasionally holding hands, surely we would be more conciliatory then. But all of this nonsense writing is only to procrastinate walking out into the humidity, to procrastinate even on getting up and fixing me a drink.
A drink will be make this world a better place, for now, for me anyway.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
Digression at the peak of the day
Friday, June 29, 2007
Aardvarks and Aardwolves
Source: National Geographic
aardvark |ˈärdˌvärk|
ORIGIN late 18th cent.: from South African Dutch, from aarde ‘earth’ + vark ‘pig.’
aardwolf |ˈärdˌwoŏlf|
ORIGIN mid 19th cent.: from South African Dutch, from aarde ‘earth’ + wolf ‘wolf.’
In retrospect, the dictionary plug-in on my Mac that is accessible via Quicksilver is actually pretty good. It occasionally gives even more info than my Concise Oxford English Dictionary.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
All flights into Dallas suspended
It's crazy. My sister is stuck in LA because they have canceled all flights into Dallas for the next three days because of tornadoes. She has been flying for 30 hours; she lost her luggage; she has no extra set of clean clothes; and it is mayhem in the LA airport. Every queue takes an hour and a half. She waited for hours to be on standby for the 1am flight and then hours more for the 6am flight, only to be told that she could not fit on either. I feel so sorry for her. I just found out that she has just checked into a hotel. Do pray for her and the bad weather Dallas is experiencing if you get a chance.
[She's back home safe after a 48 hours journey, thank God.]
Weight
When I walked out of Kinokuniya yesterday evening, I was grinning like a squirrel on drugs. I had just bought more books at one go than I have ever had in my entire life. My head was light; my pocket was light; the only thing that kept me firmly on the ground were the two heavy bags of books.
Concise Oxford English Dictionary $66.10
How to Travel with a Salmon (Rushdie) $27.69
Clash of Civilization (Huntington) $26.25
Weight (Winterson) $17.33
Sexing the Cherry (Winterson) $22.10
Spoken Here (Abley) $25.73
The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald) $17.33
Elements of Style (Skunk & White) $13.60
Oxford Mini School Dictionary $13.95 [Three copies]
The Sandman Papers $34.41
Season of Mists (Gaiman) $27.08
Total (after 20% discount=$63.89) $255.58
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Monday, June 25, 2007
Probably PMS
This is a self-centered site. I have another site where I affirm the people I love, but this is my site to gripe.
Went to look at two three-room HDB flats recently and both of them left me with a sinking feeling. It is beginning to dawn on me that I don't like small, cramped, old flats but I cannot afford anything else. I am stuck-up about toilets too. One look at the toilet and I've made up my mind.
So I wanted some wine to cheer myself up. I had a chilled bottle of white wine in the fridge that I wanted to sip in my nice homely room, but I could not get the cork out, even with a corkscrew. As I am typing this, that chilled bottle of wine is warming up on my bookshelf.
I think I will spend all of my money on feel-good things that fill the belly instead. At least then I would feel like I can afford whatever I wanted. Sour cream and onion chips or coca-cola? Both please, with nachos on the size, super upsize! Sigh I have issues.
Sunday, June 24, 2007
The most belated birthday party ever
I had a birthday party yesterday — two months and ten days after the fact — can anyone here beat that? :)
I had a cake from choc.a.bloc (endorsed by Jamie Oliver's chocoholic siblings), party hats, party squealer things (which were very noisy and festive), a piggy bank present (for me to save up for my new place — imagine two hundred thousand dollars in coins stuffed into a tiny pig, not going to happen), a wonderful framed photo present of a silly looking cow, but best of all, I had four human friends and two doggie ones determined to throw me a surprise party no matter how belated it was.
Kinda sweet, if you think about it.
Real vs. virtual knowing
Made a new friend three months ago. She's an amiable, unassuming and a gentle person, and I enjoy working closely with her. Early on, through a few remarks she made about my finisher's t-shirt, I guessed that she was closely affiliated with the sgrunner's group, and with TLR in particular.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
The Art of Reading Poetry by Harold Bloom
Adagios of islands, O my Prodigal,I don't think I could ever look at the word adagio again without turning red.
Complete the dark confessions her veins spell.
~ Hart Crane, Voyages II
There are two methods of approaching poetry. One breaks it down to meter, metaphor, symbol and every literary device in between. The other method is Bloom's, so inspired that it is hard to fully understand.
He speaks of recognition and allusions, and of poetic voice, a nebulous but unmistakable tone in every poem. He believes in the superiority of the sense of inevitability — unavoidable phrasing as opposed to the invariable. For example, Edgar Allan Poe's "In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore" is invariable; Walt Whitman's "If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles" in what Bloom calls "unavoidable phrasing", the best kind.
And he speaks of strangeness. Consciousness is to poetry what marble is to sculpture, and the best poems generate a felt change in consciousness.
How cheem. Read More!
Blink by Malcolm Gladwell
This book shows that our instincts are sometimes better than our analysis. Gladwell gives evidence that it is sometimes impossible for us to explain adequately the reasons why we come to a particular decision. We are a mystery even to ourselves.
An interesting read, but his prose is not as tight as Bryson's, nor as lyrical as Sharman Apt Russell's.
I miss my Macbook
One of the reasons why I almost got an Acer was that I could get my baby back within 24 hours, as opposed me calling up the service centre on Day 6, the guy getting my service no ID and then saying: "I'll give you a call after lunch," and me with alarm bells going off furiously in my head — you mean you haven't taken a look at it yet?!? The lady at the counter said five days!
And the call comes at 5pm informing that he could not replicate the random shutdown that I was experiencing — erm, that's why I said it was "random" — and he made me feel as if I was an over-reacting woman for just the briefest second, before saying, "But we'll change the board anyway and it'll be ready by the end of the week."
It means that the Mac folks' turn-around time is 11 days, compared to Acer's 1 day. And you know what the funniest thing is? I had actually read enough online about my Macbook's problem that I could have told them the diagnosis and what they ought to do with it, or at least what they have been doing for people with problems like mine, right at the counter. But because you guys are supposed to be the experts and I am only an internet rumour monger, I kept quiet.
I really hope it isn't a problem with the battery instead.
Monday, June 18, 2007
To market! To market! To buy a fat pig!
I went marketing today. Overseas, you go "grocery shopping"; here, you go "marketing". Do Europeans make a verb out of this noun as well? Just curious.
Anyway, I went marketing. I not only stopped by the local NTUC to pick up some bee hoon and chye sim, I even ventured into the wet market, which is precisely what it sounds like, a market that is very very wet. I found the Yong Tau Foo stall with the help of my mother's directions (facing the Chinese temple—was actually only an altar. Run by an older lady and a younger lady—erm, okay), and bought nine pieces for $1.40 after mangling a bit of the raw fish in the green peppers with my tongs.
I feel so accomplished.
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
America in the 1920s: the wealthy throw lavish parties, America is divided into the East and the West, where Middle East refers to the America continent rather than to the Arab equivalent that we have become used to since the 1990s. Even the lack of air-conditioning adds to the oppressive atmosphere in the pen-ultimate scene before they "drove on toward death through the cooling twilight," the excellent sentence that Fitzgerald uses to prime us for the climax.
I love the phrases he uses. They are so good that it catches me by surprise and I have to re-read the sentence.
When I looked once more for Gatsby he had vanished and I was alone in the unquiet darkness. (21)
Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known. (59)
Her wan, scornful mouth smiled, and so I drew her up again closer, this time to my face. (80)
He put his hands in his coat pocket and turned back eagerly to his scrutiny of the house, as though my presence marred the sacredness of the vigil. So I walked away and left him standing there in the moonlight — watching over nothing. (145)
It was after we started with Gatsby toward the house that the gardener saw Wilson's body a little way off in the grass, and the holocaust was complete. (162)
Brilliant stuff, if you catch what I mean, old sport. Read More!
Sunday, June 17, 2007
When love dries out
Falling in love is a preposterous idea. What do you love, the way he tilts his head when he looks at you? The elusive dimple at the corner of his smile? The way he flatters you? That tenor in his voice that echoes in your head long after you hang up the telephone? Can you understand another person, distill his very being into words and write a three page essay double-spaced with the title in bold 14-pt Times New Roman font, "This is whom I love"?
When love dries out, what happens to the person in your head that you loved?
What happens the next time you bump into him and he smiles at you, and that elusive dimple winks at you, a distant tremble of something that you've long forgotten?
Is it you who has changed, or he?
Friday, June 15, 2007
Do you like your women fat?
Apparently, according to this test, I like fat people better than thin people. The results prove it:
Your data suggest a strong automatic preference for Fat People compared to Thin People.A strong automatic preference! Apparently only 1% of all respondents think like me (see table below). I feel so..... weird.
Read More!
Monday, June 11, 2007
Exaggerating, Exacerbating & Escalating the Exasperating Tongue-Twister
After a few rounds of yellowlorryyellowlorry (x10) today, we upped the ante.
Exaggerating and expediting the extra exciting excavation will exacerbate and escalate the exemplary exhibition to an exasperating expedition.
Your turn. :)
[Hahahahaha! Eric just made my day with his rendition here. I'm jealous. He says it two times faster than me. But can he say it from memory? ;) ]
Sunday, June 10, 2007
I, in my soapbox
I don't know why I even try to keep my regular life separate from this blog when every so often this place degenerates into a soapbox.
The detail I have let slip into my posts is appalling. If you have been reading carefully, you would know my gender, my race, my age, possibly even where I live, where I work, what I read, where I run. Two years ago I would have been paranoid about being ferreted out by people who know me in real life. But now, I have grown complacent. I rest on my anonymous laurels.
I could find me if I really wanted to. I'm only grateful that most of my friends aren't me.
Anyway, going with the soapbox quality of this blog, let me share with you the enlightened conversation I had with my Indian friend about eleven minutes ago.
Me: "Swatch is short for Swiss Watch"Friend: "What?"Me: "Swatch is swart for Swish Watch"Friend: "What?"Me: *slower* "I said, Swash is short for Swish Watch!"Friend: "Haha! Say `Yellow Lorry' fast"Me: "Yellow Lorry Yellow Lorry Yellow Lorry.*faster* yellowlorryyellowlorry *even faster* yellowlorryairlololiairlololi"Friend: "I bet you can say it because you are too English-fied. Chinese have problems saying that."Me: "Huh?"Friend: "That's true. Indians can't say `Windshield Wiper'. We say `Vinshield Viper'. Example, There's a snake on my vinshield."Me: "Heh. You say `Yellow Lorry Yellow Lorry' fast."Friend: "No."
You see, there was absolutely no point in me posting that exchange.
Friday, June 08, 2007
Buying a HDB flat as a single person
Buying a HDB flat in Singapore is a bloody social commentary. What does being 30 years old, single, and Chinese have anything to do with buying a flat? Every single bloody thing, if you're living in Singapore.
You can't buy a flat on your own if you are single and not yet 35 years old. 35 freaking years old! Am I supposed to hang around in my parents' flat, or burn my money in rent for another 5 years if I'm not yet married? With all due respect PM Lee, I want to buy and I want to buy now. I know you would like me to get married and propagate, but whether or not I can buy my own place now isn't going to affect that one single bit.
I am Singaporean. I am bred to be pragmatic. I don't like the idea of putting my hard-earned money into rent and helping some stranger pay his mortgage when I could be paying my own. And I hate it that I am not eligible for the $40,000 living-close-to-parents subsidy. Aren't I expected to take care of my parents too? I can only take care of them when I am married, is it? $40,000 takes me at least 7 years to save up. It ain't a piddle-squat sum, and you're not going to give it to me 'cos I'm not married.
I am not bloody earning enough to afford a private place. Two of my single friends have bought a $900,000 and a somethin'-million dollar condominium. Sorry manz, that's just waay out of my reach with my $2000-odd monthly income and GST going up to 5% and two parents to take care of, with my SINGLE income to boot. SINGLE. Did I say that loud enough for you? Is it such a crime to be single?
I count my pennies. I don't drive. I don't smoke, drink, club, go for spas, eat at expensive restaurants, go on month-long exotic holidays even though I would really like to do so. I have lived within my means for the last 6 years but even so, I find it impossible to afford my own place.
And I am angry.
Thursday, June 07, 2007
HOT!
HOT!
It is so hot that my bro-in-law has called it quits and returned to
sunny Dallas. So there are four people in my HDB flat now.
Still one loo though. Still sufficient for three showers per day per
person. :)
(Sorry about being so melodramatic/ cryptic in the previous post.)
Read More!Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Waiting
Sometimes I feel like I am balancing on a tight-rope and one false move is all it takes for the people I care about to get upset with me. I suppose it will blow over; it usually does; but I hate this waiting, this dark night, when I don't know whether you still like me.
I will wake up tomorrow, brush my teeth, have my coffee, head to work. Nobody will be able to tell that I've been waiting all night.
How to password protect your files on a Mac
I have a secret. I keep a document of my online identities and passwords. It is a pretty vulnerable document to have hanging around in my hard drive, but I just can't trust my brain to do the work. So I type them into my document in cryptic short-hand, but once in a while I worry that it is not cryptic enough.
3. Choose the folder you want to encrypt.
How to burn a multi-session CD in Mac OS X
Burning CDs on a Mac will be the death of me. If you want to create a single-session CD (i.e. you cannot add any more to the CD once you've burned it once), it is quite easy. Just create a new burn folder in Finder (File>New Burn Folder), then drag all the files you want into that folder and click "Burn" whenever you are ready.
- Open Disk Utility (Applications>Utilities>Disk Utility)
- Create a new disk image from folder (File>New>"Disk Image from Folder.") Select a folder that contains all the items that you want in your CD (you may have to create it first). Click "Image".
- Type a name for the image and click Save.
- When the disk image is complete, select it in the Disk Utility list and click "Burn" in the toolbar.
- Insert a blank CD
or DVD. - Select the "Leave disc appendable" checkbox. If you don't see this option, click the triangle in the top-right corner.
- Click Burn.
[*Alamak! Cannot burn multi-session DVDs on a Mac. What the??? Read Ted Landau's comments here. Have a mentioned that burning CDs on a Mac will be the death of me?]
Monday, June 04, 2007
Saturday, June 02, 2007
The End of the Affair by Graham Greene
Lust and faith are strange bedfellows, but surprisingly, this novel by Graham Greene works remarkably well.
This book resonates with me, so much so that it makes me want to take a pen and write my story down. I'll start my story: "I'm an ordinary person. An ordinary face: eyes, ears nose and mouth, the way they teach a child kindergarten to sing. Ordinary fears, desires and loves." And the story will continue about the deep desire for "ordinary corrupt human love", over God and godly things, but how God took me and wouldn't let me go. But a person can't write a book anonymously so my unwritten book may only exist in Lucien's library.
I think I may prefer Catholic authors over Protestant ones. I wrote about this idea before way back in 2004 when I was reading Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. Catholics find the body sacred so they write sensually and reverently about physical things. Protestants tend to distance themselves from the physical — the body and blood of Christ is an idea, a concept of redemption — and the body becomes a temptation. But we believe that we will have resurrected bodies on that last day.
The first half reads almost like a slutty novel. It isn't anywhere near explicit and it won't make you break out in cold sweat or anything, but there is no hiding what it alludes to. And for that reason, it is a page-turner, and possibly my favourite Greene novel so far. Can't help it, sometimes I have to submit to my baser tastes. ;)
I wonder what the movie is like. Does it capture the internal monologue of the characters that Greene does so well?
Friday, June 01, 2007
Five people in a HDB flat
Three rooms, one stuffy kitchen
Five people, two surnames
One big ang mo, four kichee chinese
Sharing one loo one family
How to charge your US iPod in Asia
Plug it into a laptop.
(More boringness to come: how to charge a Treo and a HP digital camera, once I figure it out! Keep your seat belts on!)
