when you wish

you never knew

—————————————-

i did a grand total of NOTHING tonight. after coming back from guitar at 730, i ate dinner. then i slacked until 9, when i went to play tennis with my dad and uncle hock ching. coincidentally, a guy and girl were playing in the other court, and i think the girl stays in my block. too bad i didnt ask her, or i would have someone to play tennis with. and so after tennis, i bathed, switched on my comp, and did more than my fair share of stoning. and now i shall go and sleep, because even though tomorrow is a holiday for year 5s, we still have to go to school for stupid bio prac.

——————————————

would you rather have a friend or a teacher. i think id rather have a teacher, if i had to choose between the 2. of course i know instances where they both exist in the same person. somehow it doesnt seem to apply to chinese teachers. why cant i go back. id rather spend my lessons doing work and getting my 7 points than being in a class with a bunch of people who wont listen to the teacher just cos he’s funny. just cos he’s their friend.

——————————————

so now. im confused. archery or tennis. archery is an interesting sport, and i can set it up in school as a cca and get CAS. but tennis will keep me fitter and is easier to organise. although i certainly cant play it in school. killer question.

——————————————

i think the whole thing about the cosmic calendar and squeezing everything into one year is kinda dumb. so what if we are totally insignificant to the world. does that mean we should just lie around waiting to die. after all we cant change anything. thats just dumb. our lives hold infinite significance, even if just to us. but because we are who we are, we should matter to ourselves, and therefore it is immaterial even if we are worth only the smallest fraction of a nanosecond in a cosmic year. so live.

——————————————

when you try your best but you dont succeed

immaterial

unimportant

————————————————-

today was uneventful. other than the fact that we had PE, and i now know that i really need to get fitter. like a lot fitter. if im planning to get gold for napfa. i wonder how i managed to do it last year.

we actually made chinese new year decorations, although our class looks the exact opposite of impressive, in my opinion. oh well, you dont have to win EVERYTHING. especially cultural competitions.

———————————————–

my stupid e key is pissing me off. if it keeps this up, i might end up going to replace the comp. although i have transferred quite a bit of stuff over already, its not worth replacing a key every 3 sentences. another thing. my screen randomly flashes black, and my cursor decides to jump around. notwithstanding my horrible internet connection which only works half of the time.

another thing i hate. cable tv connections which fail when im trying to watch a show. no signal indeed.

———————————————–

to avoid subjecting any of you to my unintelligible nonsense, i shall refrain from saying anything.

———————————————

the difference a word makes.

childish maturity

experienced naivety

——————————————————–

for the first time ever, i can actually install a game while using other problems. usually my msn would have hung by now. especially since im now running the game and blogging. so for the first time since i bought it 2 years ago, ill have battle for middle earth 2 (collector’s edition) on my own computer. instead of my brother’s all i need now is a decent mouse.

———————————————————

i had quite a bit of stuff to blog about. but now after install the game i cant remember a single one of them. i should go play instead. (: OH btw. my skype is now online.

———————————————————

your body is a wonderland

contemplation

distillation

—————————————————————————-

everything looks so different now, with my new computer. HP Pavillion dv6715TX. now, for specs. at least the specs that i think will be useful for me:

2.2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo

4 GB RAM (supposedly. for some reason the computer information says 3 GB)

250 GB Hard Drive (I’ve a feeling only 222 GB is usable)

Altec Lansing Speakers

Fingerprint reader

15.4 Widescreen

Webcam and microphone

Bluetooth

Vista Home Premium (with media centre! woohoo)

Remote Control

—————————————————————–

the only problem now is that the e key keeps on coming out of the keyboard. ive got to find someway to fix that. fast. other than that, i think its quite awesome. despite the fact that its not a mac and the 4gb of ram doesnt give me as much speed as i thought it would. its still cool. time to get used to Vista. and the cool new design of this laptop.

—————————————————————-

this has been a rather awesome weekend.

friday: half day of school ending at 11am. although its only 2 hours off the usual, its still good. we gave jason and his 2 girlfriends a lift to his house. tsk jason. such a flirt. that makes you too, you who were with him. (: so anyways, had piano after that, then i went laptop shopping! i went that thinking of getting the dell inspiron cos its so nice and colourful. but then it didnt seem to look as cool as the hp. so it was between hp and mac. but the mac salesman pissed me off, and the macbook pro looks so gigantic and scary. besides, if i bought a mac, i might probably end up buying vista to put in it, which would be a waste of money. plus i probably wont have much of a chance to use iMovie and garage band anytime soon. so i settled for the hp. with the free upgrade to 4GB ram. after my parents paid for it, we went back for dinner. then i went to church for worship practice, while they picked up the comp from the shop. pure joy.

today: more fun. guitar meeting at 9, and i must say we accomplished quite a bit in the 2 hours. at least we got the planning going for march camp. then joshua lim came over to my place and we jammed for a while. well mostly i watched him being pro. with his pro line 6 pod x3 live. owning pedals ftw. so after that i finished my homework within the next 2 hours. although it did help that all the chinese answers were at the back of the book, and there was only tok and chinese work. as i said. awesome weekend.

—————————————————————–

acoustic guitars are hard to play. now ive got a blister on my thumb. and my left hand nails are utterly destroyed

——————————————————————

———————————————————-

i cant wait

normalcy

adequacy

——————————————————————————————-

so the o level results were released today. my score: 4. and thats with 2 subjects. i wonder what i would have gotten if i had taken o levels instead of going through-train. if i would have been disappointed or pleasantly surprised. if i would be rejoicing now or being depressed. but then again, thats just alternative history for another day.

MEP: A1 (with merit)

Higher Chinese: B3

—————————————————————————————-

congratulations to everyone who got back their o level results today. as elisa said. “i did good enough. thats all that matters eh?”. so if you exceeded your expectations, good for you. if you met your expectations, thats just awesome. and if you fell short of what you wanted, at least now you know how hard you have to work.

—————————————————————————————-

so. a half day tomorrow eh. for all the hard work of our express friends, we earned a 2 hours discount off school. wonderful aint it.

—————————————————————————————–

i just dont know why ive been feeling so lethargic these past 2 days. when i come home, im so sleepy i dont feel like doing any work. so i just finish the stuff due the next day and go sleep. i sure hope this isnt a prelude to the rest of the year. because in that case, i would just die. especially since i still have to organise guitar, set up archery, prepare for wsc, prepare for fps, and finish my work and projects. gosh.

——————————————————————————————

if anyone asked me or zhang why we were doing wsc if we wont be available for the international finals, the answer would be to gain experience and put it on our CVs. but why? we spend our entire childhood and youth in institutes of formal education, preparing for the future. gathering knowledge, building an impressive track record, and having no time to just enjoy and live. and for what. to have a better life ahead, where we wont have to work so hard. which i believe is an outright lie. we do all this, get good results, so that we can get a good job. and a good job would mean one with better pay, which entails greater responsibilities. and so we would have to work even harder. for example. i want to do well so that i can go to law school. so that i can grow up to be a lawyer. so i can stay up past midnight working on cases. so that ill bring my work home with me. so that i can just work and work and work. wheres the “better” in that life. unless we make an effort NOT to spend all our time working. but hows that possible, when weve been brought up to think that our life IS what we are working on at that moment. for now, my life is that of a student. of going to school, staying back late everyday, and coming back to rush through my homework. when i grow up, itll be the same, except ill be responsible to my boss and not my teacher. it wont be little numbers on papers that matter but my chance at earning money. i wont have friends to call up and ask for the answers to questions. ill be grown-up, mature, and just more busy than ever.

so what exactly are we working for. eternal glory in the history books? the short fraction of our lives that we will spend as retired grandparents? or are we just working so we can get better, harder work.

—————————————————————————————–

im not making any sense to myself. so itll be a wonder if i make sense to any of you. time to go do my bio homework. as usually, ill probably end up finishing the schoolwork due tomorrow. which happens to not include theory.

—————————————————————————————–

just another wish

lack

of mood

——————————————————————————————–

i wonder why i feel so drained. to the extent that i just want to go and sleep. maybe it was the long drawn out school day. maybe it was the 2hr40min of energy sapping HL math lesson. or it could be the extra long guitar cca session. maybe the chemistry assignment. its surprising how much of a drain new topics can be.

now i know a fraction of what the soldiers in wilfred owen’s dulce et decorum est felt like. zombie-like.

——————————————————————————————

tomorrow. the o lvl results are out. to all you people waiting and hoping. all the best, and i do hope you get the marks that you want. as for me. mep and higher chinese. i hope i did well.

——————————————————————————————

please give us a holiday. i have theory homework to do.

——————————————————————————————

oh school

why doth thou torture me so

amazing race

TK AND RACHEL ROCK

missing

something

——————————————————————————————–

this is amazing. i have no homework today. and yet, im not using this opportunity to do things like long-term projects and theory homework. why is that. instead im using it to slack, blog, watch House and Monk, and slack some more. wheee.

——————————————————————————————-

i <3 wordpress. the only thing i feel its lacking is that thing that they have on lj, which shows you posts from your friends. or maybe it does have that and i just dont know about it. either way, its a small matter.

——————————————————————————————-

I SO WANT A LG VIEWTY.

——————————————————————————————-

if youre looking for something to read, theres the post right below this waiting for your perusal. so there, this post will have nothing more in it.

——————————————————————————————-

the importance of friendship

saving it all up

for what?

——————————————————————————————–

blog about something interesting eh? but what if there really isnt anything interesting to talk about.

——————————————————————————————-

lets see. i went cycling today. 8km, after which my mum got pissed cos i didnt bring my phone and came back late for dinner. oh well. at least i got some exercise. soccer in church didnt count, cos the room we were playing in was too small to get any of us sweaty. besides, we hardly played for half an hour. anyway, today i found out that the winter holidays in australia are like in june. thats like only 4 months after summer ends. still, they only get 2 weeks off, unlike us singaporeans with our month holiday. and i also found out about this interesting system which mark yeo and i think they should apply here in singapore. over there, when the temperature forecast hits 40 degrees, they dont have school the next day. if only we had that here, except with a max of 30 degrees. that would be too awesome for words.

——————————————————————————————-

so today during lunch, the dads were talking about investments. supposedly theres this guy, who had lots of investments that were appreciating, but he didnt cash in on them. so now when the economy is somewhat unstable, his houses got taken by the bank. well, except the one he is living in of course. if i were him, i would have cashed in on half my investments when they were at a high price. in which case, if they went higher, i still have more to sell, and if they drop and die, ill have half the assets as liquid assets. instead of paper values, which in the end fluctuate and arent worth much.

another thing, i think that if you were to have a bunch of people with a whole lot of money at hand, you would be able to avert stock market crashes. cos see, the stock market only crashes when the investors start pulling out and trying to sell off all their stocks. when they lose faith in the market’s sustainability, it proceeds to shrivel up and die. HOWEVER. if this bunch of people were able to buy enough shares in certain strategically chosen companies, enough to raise the values, confidence levels would rise again. and people would start selling and buying at higher prices. but thats only if you could raise the share prices enough to make investors believe that the market is picking up again. otherwise, you’d just be wasting all your money.

——————————————————————————————

today i read a clive cussler book. polar shift. its about, well, the poles shifting as a result of some madman messing around with electromagnetic fields. but there was this subplot where one of the characters fell into this cavern in siberia, and found an ancient city. with a whole bunch of dwarf mammoths living inside of it. wouldnt that be just awesome? finding animals that you thought were extinct, living in some hidden city somewhere. i remember i used to wonder what it would be like to find mammoths or dinosaurs in alaska. how awesome it would feel to chance upon these long dead creatures, alive and kicking in a mountain range somewhere. and why would it be so awesome? i think its cos of the mysticism that comes along with the unknown. it brings a sort of fairy-tale, dreamlike, almost utopian feeling to the scenario. in fact, finding anything that defies conventional knowledge would be equally fascinating.

——————————————————————————————

henry said this the other day. you should never send revolutionary leaders to prison. they usually end up writing books and spreading their ideas even more. i mean, look at lenin and hitler.

i totally agree. although that should apply to anyone who is capable of thought. i mean, when you leave someone alone to think out and sound out his ideas, chances are he will come up with something totally mind-boggling. everyone can think, can come up with crazy ideas. its just that few of us are crazy or capable enough to believe in our ideas, put our ideas into action, and convince other people of our ideas. and the few that do? thats where you get your world leaders.

——————————————————————————————

facebook is getting annoying. “[insert name here] has just sent you a message”. “You’ve been Superpoked!”. “[insert name here] has added you as a friend on facebook”. when will they realise that people like me dont like anything that involves commitment or regular checking.

——————————————————————————————

incoherent incompetence

it feels so good just to argue a point.

smiling

is good for the soul

——————————————————————————————–

the happiness of 2008 is beginning to wear off. my solution to it? smile more. i realised that people treat you better when you treat yourself better. if you keep being insecure, afraid, they just leave you to wallow in your own self-doubt. its only when you carry yourself with confidence that you get noticed. so amongst the many things i have to do this year, which include mugging, exercising and setting up archery, ill have to learn to smile more and be more confident.

——————————————————————————————

classes are so much more interesting when you participate. like for example, today during english i thought of an idea while the teacher was talking. but i wasnt sure if it was valid so i didnt say anything. only to hear someone say it 5 minutes later and get a vote of approval from the teacher. and so i decided to attempt to voice my opinions during tok and english. it surprises me how much satisfaction one can gain from arguing with people.

—————————————————————————————–

suc·cess     [suhk-ses]

–noun

1.	the favorable or prosperous termination of attempts or endeavors.

2.	the attainment of wealth, position, honors, or the like.

so. what is success? i think that whenever anyone talks about success, they are talking about society’s definition of success. a social construct. even if they say that you dont need society’s approval to be successful, and that all you need is to be happy, even that is imposing a definition on people. however, as henry said, its inevitable. when you live in a society, you are usually supposed to adhere to the general consensus on things, which just happens to include the definition of success. so what id say is, theres nothing wrong with going by society’s definition of success. it can still be a good enough personal success for you. despite that, i doubt theres a permanent road to success. to each his own, and everyone will find their own way to success and happiness, whichever comes first. although i think that someone who finds happiness before he reaches success is truly awesome.

——————————————————————————————

so 2 people are gone from our class. funny how things always come and go in pairs.

——————————————————————————————

look back and see

and fear