The place for yakking, yakking, yakking. The place for talking, chatting, commenting, whining, cursing, gloating.
The online version of the old-fashioned diary - the web blog.

Shifted blog to http://supra-being.blogspot.com

In a bind now, all because I had this absurd idea of conserving points during CORS bidding. As a result placed only 500 points for USE2301, thinking I should be able to get it (since the highest bid at that point in time was only 10???)

Well. Stupid. Now I've been outbidded and all vacancies have been snapped up. Which means even if I'm willing to dump everything I have now to bid I won't be able to get it this semester. Which leaves the only alternative to be Making of a Nation. Not that there aren't other modules, but they all have to clash with something else I want to do. Like Negotiating Moral Issues would be interesting, but it clashes with Management of Intellectual Property. Like if I take CS3253 (which I will) then I can't take CS1231 since the exams are back to back, with only one night's interval in between.

So WHY did I spend 3 years waiting for the Econs module if the end result is the same?? If I do Making of Nation I won't do USE2301 anymore since I only need one SS module.

I can literally watch all plans poof up in smoke.

I usually detest public holidays. One, because I dread going out for fear of meeting the crowds, or that all the shops are closed. Two, because there's nothing to do at home. Three, because I know I have to finish my work since it's a short break, but resent the fact that most people are taking the chance to hang out. So invariably, public holidays are spent holeing myself up in my own room sleeping, surfing the net, and generally squandering time away.

It's really bad, but over the course of the holidays, I've developed this warped sleeping pattern. Namely, sleeping at 3am, then waking up at 12-1pm the next day. And still feeling damn lethargic after so many hours of sleep. And for this period of time, it's a sleepy routine which additionally includes reading the newspapers fervently, and watching CNN. Because of the tsunami disaster. Somehow, I'm just attracted to natural disaster stories. I remember this has been a habit I started acquring dunno how many years ago. Kobe Earthquake, SQ air crash, Twin Towers collapse, Taiwan earthquake... I used to chase the news about these events a long time ago, and I'm doing the same for the latest tsunami disaster as well. I tend to consciously pick out the bits that detail how survivors, well, survived. You never know what information you can learn from these tidbits here and there, which might come in handy when travelling. Muahahaha... I'm just a travel freak... who believes that she'll meet an early demise one day while travelling...

Because this IS the first entry of the New Year, I shall NOT make any new year resolutions. No point, since I will never keep them. We'll see how this year goes. Horoscopes tell me that it's a turbulent year for the Taurus this year, with plenty of upheavals. Well, whatever. I can only say, I trust the Temple's lots much better than mass-produced horoscopes, since the former is, minimally, individually 'personalized and customized', as opposed to the latter, which is 'one size fits all'.

Been doing nothing these days other than going out shopping, smirking at the high prices, then becoming convinced that Singapore is a lousy place to live in when one goes to work since so much stuff is unaffordable. Made several 'star buys' from sales here and there, so feeling rather poor now again. (*Hint: please do not propose going to extremely high-end places for lunch/dinner/tea unless you're treating me..). Frankly speaking, there is nothing much to really wish for in the new year... all those wishes I have are merely old wishes, whose possibility for ulfillment commenced long before the start of this new year.

And... I'm really a pig lolz. The Mogu pillow, which was a Christmas present, is now beckoning me to the bed, and I'm so tempted to go sleep again. Oh no....

Haven't updated for these few days. Been much too tired. Fell asleep the minute I touched the bed for the past 2 days.

Wednesday. Went JB by bus with Trax. The original aim was to hang around City Square, catch some movie and shop at FOS. Then eat as much as possible.

Unfortunately, going there took a lot more bother than expected (including smelling bus fumes on the Causeway). We left Kranji MRT on 170 at 8:15am in the morning, and had successfully crossed the Causeway by 9:00am. Hanged around the shops beside City Square, eventually picking a particular coffeeshop to have wonton noodles for breakfast. So, by the time we tried to enter City Square, it was already 9:45am. But guess what? The entire shopping center was locked and closed. Apparrently City Square only opens at 10am. So we got a cab to Holiday Plaza instead.

Unfortunately, the same scenario greeted us at Holiday Plaza, so we had a second breakfast at Macdonald's instead (which was the only other thing open besides Guardian Farmasi). The shops slowly opened between the 10-11am period. Was trying to look for a cheap pair of ballet pumps, to no avail (I'm still very sore at having missed the Shoebox sale! Their shoes look really nice! )However, made the unexpected discovery that VOV cosmetics are like 50% cheaper in JB than than in Singapore. Didn't buy much in the end, only one box of eyeshadow, an eye pencil and a packet of biscuits. Was so tempted by all the cheap packages offered by the numerous hair salons, but resisted.

Went back to City Square pretty quickly as we were super bored. Thereby commenced another round of aimless walking around, including a trip to FOS. But bought only one top in the end, because they were either all out of size, or all faulty. And this top wasn't even an Abercrombie top!! Came back to Singapore after that (no mood to watch any movie liaoz) and proceed to FOS in Marina Square! Yeah! Bought a pretty nice, plain Abercrombie top finally! Dinner was at Fish & Co, and seriously, by the time were were done, my legs were so damn tired and my shoulders aching that I was only too happy to go home. Flopped onto the bed, and immediately started snoozing. Well, almost.

Stuff from the 'JB' trip.

Yesterday, was, unfortunately even worse. Other than going for piano lesson early in the morning, then discovered that Mrs See had made a mistake and arranged 2 students to come at the same time and thus rescheduling my lesson in the end. Went shopping with Mum at the Mango sale and squeezed through 5 outlets, and in the process made myself bankrupt. Ended the day with a trip to U2 to buy pants and got another 2 tops... on mum's account since she wanted the pants.

Spoils from the Mango sale.

And as for today, went to Kimage to dye and cut my hair.

So I'm having an extremely boring Xmas eve. And tomorrow is xmas.... but also the day results are released. Arghh!!!! Enough said.

A friend wanted a photo of me and Trax together. That prompted a search for photos of us together.

Hmm.

In the time we've known each other, the Europe trips in total, between the two of us, produced a total of 6,348 photos. And out of these photos, there something like 6 photos of us together.

That's pathetic. A rate of 0.1%.

Fast forward. Back to Singapore.

Ys's convocation, took 1 picture together. Cable car date, 3.

So now, our total number of couple portraits = 10.

Hahaha.

The irony is I have lots of pictures of him alone, and him of me alone. But we never ever take pictures together, it seems.

It was supposed to be a happy day. But it handed horribly.

All because idiotic me tripped and fell and found myself kissing the granite floors. Now my lower lip is swollen to twice its usual size. And I have no idea how much bigger it will go. Of course this wasn't the only physical damage. Money wise, I've scratched one of the buttons on my phone and the right lens of my new glasses. Great.

So am in a black mood. Dunno whether to let down some people a not for tomorrow. Dunno whether to just walk away from it all. Super frustrated at how everything turned out.

So now I don't have to worry about the wisdom tooth problem anymore. Since that pain is now insignificant, with a lip as swollen as this, I can forget about eating normally.

Some things happened which once again made me bitterly disappointed. Why is happiness so elusive, life so complicated? In the pursuit for happiness, is it not ironic that I feel happy so rarely, and frustrated, disappointed, bitter and just dejected most of the time?

In this current state of mind I don't feel like doing anything. Salon concert tomorrow? Huh. Jamming tomorrow or Wednesday? Yeah right. Don't feel like going piano lesson on Thursday. The Coronation dinner is extra also. Torn between living life the way it should be like when there is no tomorrow, or just freezing everything in place.

Just feel an endless bucket of sadness welling up in me again. Probably I'm an extremely naive person since usually my disappointment and anger translates itself into the purest form of sadness. Sometimes I think crying is a form of emotional cleansing.

It is often said that people grow more mature and callous with age. Somehow I feel the opposite is happening to me. It sounds whiny, irritating, stupid, immature to say that I'm very tired of all things in life. But it is true. I wish I could be more desensitized.

And so once again I'm stressed up by responsibilities again. Again. And again. Always the same old thing. Why must I always have some responsibility on me? Why can't I be irresponsible? Because it's not in my character to do so? What is character but some self-made, glorified image to project to the rest of the world?

Have I evolved into such a nastily complicated creature that must worry about such intricacies? Ultimately I'm just another stupid 21-year-old who knows jack shit about this world.

I used to read this girl's blog. She used to be an active member on flowerpod, which was how I got the blog address. I don't know her personally but she came across as an interesting character, which was why I enjoyed reading her blog.

Until some months back. Her blog got closed. At least, whenever I accessed it, I get this "Forbidden / You don't have permission to access / on this server. " message. As her most recent entries had indicated that she seemed to be in a state of perpetual confusion about her life, I thought that maybe she had regained a new direction in life and now wanted to try new stuff, which included erasing her old blog.

Until, that is, I was reading a blog by one of her good friends and learnt what happened to her. Quite horrifying, and very shocking. This blog entry from her friend here describes it best, in the words of what she heard from the girl in question:

I read your blog. Thanks! After I cut my hair short, I realised I look so ugly, so I coloured it. Yesterday he told me to dye it black to look decent. He spends every waking hour with me so i can't meet my friends. Last night, I wanted to sleep at 11 cause i was really down with a fever. He forbidded me to, saying that i'm just pretending and will run out after putting down. Made me force myself to stay awake till 3am just so that it's deem safe to him to sleep. I had to call him as soon as i wake up and he questioned why i din sms him before i sleep. I can only sms you now cuz i told him i want to shower, but i have time limit too. i must call him after 15 mins den go find him. i'm going crazy girl. i want to cut myself.

And that's apparently not the only 'abuse' she's suffering at the hands of her 'loved one':
-She intends to quit ntu to be a teacher and not continue studying to be an accountant... to please him.
-She quit dancing, which was her main passion in life.
-She erradicated most contact with the friends which she got to know in flowerpod, because he disapproves.
-She no longer wears anything sleeveless, backless, or deemed 'too revealing' because of that
-She no longer can access her MSN, friendster, blog accounts... because he stole her passwords and changed them, and refused to tell her what the new passwords are.
...and the list goes on.

And her new boyfriend, whom she broke off with her previous boyfriend, whom she apparrently loved very much to be with, is not some adolescent, but a 28-year old guy. I find this particular guy's actions downright disturbing not only for his over-obsessive behavior, but also for his motives in doing the things he is doing to his girlfriend. Ultimately, what did he ever see in the girl to fall for her? Did he like her character, her personality, or they shared common interests? If so, why is he trying to change her, to mould her into somebody else so as to fit with his expected ideals of what his giflriend should be? Of course the girl cannot be absolved of the blame; she clearly must have her own psychological and emotional imbalances since she is willing to hang onto this guy for dear life. But what this guy does is disturbing enough, definitely. He sounds like one of those husbands in The Stepford Wives, who is trying to meld his girlfriend into a mould.

No wonder they say love is blind. Or is this a case of really being blinded by love, or more the fear of losing what one is accustomed to? I feel quite sad for this girl in question, and I seriously, seriously, cannot believe how she could allow herself to be so controlled by this guy in question. What good can come out of a relationship like this? Well, I could envisage myself in that girl's shoes breaking down one day, murdering the guy, and after that getting myself confined into a mental hospital for insanity.

I finished Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code the other day. Interesting book. Is the current society's state of patriachy one of our founders having destroyed all matriachical elements once upon a time? Well, if people such as the guy above exist, obviously yes. But why doesn't she rise up and kick the guy away? So what if he threatens to die? Die, go die, rid the world of one extra piece of shit. Sorry for the 'extra violence', but real-life stories like these really make my blood boil.

Haiz... how time flies... it's our first year anniversary liaoz... I feel myself growing OLD.....

Been in the 'holidays mood' this past couple of days... Heez... bought my new Sony Ericsson K700i on Sunday, was playing with it for the whole of Monday in addition to trading in my old Nokia in exchange for a new Sony Ericsson K500 (for dear ole daddy), went shopping on Mummy on Tuesday (hahaha... who paid for a lot of stuff for me!!!), culminating with today going out the whole day again because it's our first anniversary.

In short, slacking, slacking, slacking. (Opps... this is not good... must work harder.... kekez)

My nasty flu is gone, so is the sore throat, but the irritating cough remains.... I need to get rid of all that disgusting phelgm quick.

Shopping list for the past few days:
1. SE K700i (the phone giving you all the pictures from now on though the camera sucks!!)
2. Hush Puppy mules (a bargain at Tampinese Mall when I went to buy the phone... $29 only!! So comfy!!)
3. New pair of glasses (Mum had a bargain at the neighborhood optician for $88 for her pair... turned out NOT to be a bargain for me since the promotion didn't cover high index lens... nevertheless got a new pair since my old pair is HORRIBLE with all that peeling paint...)
4. 6 pairs of contact lens (About time, I must say.)
5. Red tube dress (Bought with the free CK tang vouchers we had)
6. Laneige Combination Skin Xmas set (mother sponsered! Hurray!)

7. Bobbi Brown Brown Lip palette (bought with free Robinson vouchers!! Heez.. my family is now crazy over using credit cards to pay bills since we can then exchange the points earned for vouchers!!)

(And no that colored 'thing' my laptop is sitting on is NOT an ironing board but my study desk if you're wondering)

8. Chomel jewel clip (Been lemming for these a pretty long time, I must say..)

Total damage to wallet = $10 + $29 + $28.20. Not too bad seeing that I didn't pay for most of the stuff.

Anyway, for our anniversary, we did really typical stuff. Went out for lunch, then went to catch a movie (Polar Express!!), then went for dinner. In between, went to walk around town. So I just hit Orchard two days in a row. Shall sleep in tomorrow... not going anywhere. MUST MUST MUST practise Hanon and Oscar Beringer and MUST MUST MUST review research papers. Opps. MUST NOT get distracted with downloading new games, ringtones, wallpapers, themes for my new phone.

I digress again. OK. Hit Sakae Sushi today, and because I didn't have sashimi for ages, everything tasted damn good. Suffice to say, mainly hit only on the sashimi... (yum yum!!) Oh apparrently they now have ice-cream coated in glutinous rice skin... too bad Trax ate both (compliments of the sashimi set lunch) because I didn't dare to aggravate my cough further, when I had already maximally aggravated it by eating cold salmon, drinking cold water etc.

The other strange thing is, although it's going to be out of fashion (if it isn't already), I've just discovered a new-found, child-like passion for the Toyo toy.. .the figure that sits on your table and keeps on nodding its head (supposed to de-stress you?) and that's found in most toy departmental stores and giftshops. The 'nod-nod head', as I call it... Geez... want that for Christmas.... if only to test out the claim whether it will make me less or actually more stressed just looking at it... (*Hint Hint Trax you must get me present horz...)

Spent the majority of the day looking for a unique handphone pouch, but refusing to buy any of those I saw because I think they're too freaking expensive. In the end landed up in Spotlight looking for cloth after Trax volunteered to sew me one (Wah! I really have to see what kind of 'sewing skills' you have lorz...)

Photo of Trax carting the entire roll of cloth (damn heavy btw) to the counter for cutting. And yes this is the full sized, unedited version of an indoor picture by the K700i. Sucks right? Nvm. Photos by the same phone are substantially better outdoors.

As I said I watched Polar Express today. Pretty nice rendering of the North Pole scenary in general (OK I'm biased lorz... but all that ice, snow, fir trees and grey sky REALLY brings back memories of the REAL North Pole I remember!! Sigh... the kids on the Polar Express saw the Northern Lights!!! I STILL HAVEN'T SEEN THE NORTHERN LIGHTS!!!) Want to go back to the North Pole again and just immerse myself in the silence, bleakness and desolation of sky, snow and ice in that midst of darkness. Serenely and hauntingly beautiful.

That said, the story was horrible. Had no idea why most of the scenes existed in the story, other than to solely provide some excuse for the animators to work on what they wanted. But the track... OK... the real North Pole does not have a train running through it... the most northerly stop any train can make is in Rovaniemi, aka the town of Santa Claus, which is technically just outside the Arctic Circle. Even within the Arctic Circle, it is amazingly civilized. There are roads, electricity, hot water, brick houses, cars, vehicles and just about everything else that one finds in normal suburbs. The only difference is the scenary, which, admittedly, is full of frozen ice on the ground, snow and fir trees. That part is exactly the same as in the Polar Express. However, the Polar Express merely depicts the romanticized notion of the North Pole being desolate. In actual fact, I think Man has colonized every part of the North Pole... OK... I mean the parts which are made up of land... excluding the glaciers and the Arctic Ocean at the really Northern spot of this planet. However, the North Pole is also relatively flat land... there are some hills, but no mountains, no deep or sharp valleys (unlike what is seen in the animation)... that part where the train went out of control and swirled around in the ice amidst the surroundings of an icy mountain range? OK... that part doesn't exist in North Pole which really is a lot of low-lying, flat land.... on the other hand, that particular scene reminded me more of the stuff I saw on my trip from Oslo to Bergen.. but that was most definitely, not in the North Pole.

OK I digressed again. Dinner today was at the Mushroom Pot, this restaurant at Orchard Point which serves mostly dishes made out of some kind of mushroom. Got to know of this place from reading forums (heez... that's how I keep up to date with stuff happening in town.... anyway I know nuts about restaurants and Trax is worse than me...) Anyway, tried four dishes today... we didn't have the guts to try their steamboat or hot pot yet... generally the food was unique and nice... Hmm... will probably go back for repeated visits on another day...

From left: Mushroom fries, cheese and fish roe with mushroom, mushroom with beef rolls and wild mushroom soup.

Went down to the Esplanade Park at Trax's insistence on nuahing... Boy it's quite a terrible place. When one walks along the path along the river, one gets harassed to take river taxi rides. The benches are mostly filled with smoking gatherings of friends.... the railings lined with NOT smooching couples but aunties putting their legs horizontally along the edges talking at the top of their voices... Admittedly there is some river breeze, but the place is certainly not silent... haha... to top it off they have the "Ah Pek's Ice Cream Stall" which is manned by an auntie!

Guess this is what makes this place Singaporean.

Moved back home. And got sick. Sore throat, itchy throat, sniffing and snivelling, blocked nose, coughing. Yuck.

Dreaming of getting wireless internet connection in my air-conditioned room. Well dear daddy took apart the home wireless network... kudos spent the whole of today to get it working with my IBM laptop... at a damn high cost. Still can't solve some problems. Arghh.

For some strange reason everyone has an aversion to asking me out. Very bored to stay at home with nothing to do but fix wireless network. No kick or incentive to go online since nothing much I wanna do there. Am sick. Feeling weak. Only wanna sleep and sleep and sleep.

Thinking of changing my handphone to a K700i, since Nokia's current phones all suck or are retailing at sky-high prices.

And I must be the only person (kid) alive who introduced sammyboyforum to my mum, who was all-so-interested in knowing about the.. *ahem* *censored censored*. In any case, not a place to advertise to the uninitiated for fear of corrupting young feeble minds.

First of all, let me start off this blog entry with a disclaimer notice. This entry has been written for self-gratification purposes and is not really intended for audience consumption. Hence the author bears no responsibility for the reader drowning in this entry thereafter.

Once upon a time, after I had gotten myself a UROP project with Prof Tan, I remember myself asking him: What are we expected to do in UROP specifically? Prof Tan proceeded to give me a brief summary of a particular 7-step research process; he told me UROP students need only reach about level 3 or 4 of this process, honours students about levels 4-5, and PHD candidates are supposed to be able to achieve all 7 steps involved.

I hadn't much inclination of what he was talking about then. I 'grew up' with the conviction that a good UROP project doesn't have any difference with the level of difficulty required of a HYP project. Even Juliana reinforced my view. I didn't really care about the PHD process.

CS4250 gave me a good idea of what research entails and what a researcher is supposed to do. I had almost grown sianz of reading all about constructs, variables, hypotheses... essentially all stuff at the measurement level. After the initial euphoria of having gained the ability to understand a large proportion of the research papers I had read, I thought I was 'almost there', in time for the exam tomorrow. Actually I thought that my level of preparedness was already quite OK. I judged that by the ability to understand all those research papers. I began to speculate that the difference between the level 4000 and level 6000 course in IS methodology laid mainly in that the level 6000 course would focus a lot more on qualitative research, as well as data analysis, probably with inclusion of statistical techniques as well.

Well, I'm getting closer to seeing research, or at least, comprehending the idea of what research is all about all over again. The catalyst? A particular paper that blew me completely off course all over again (reminds me of the first time I tried to read a research paper). Having emerged from it, I think I have gained a much better understanding of Levels 6-7 of that research process Prof Tan was talking about. In two words: "Theory creation".

At the level I am currently at, a horrendously 'cheem' concept, not lest because this particular paper wasn't even telling me how theories are constructed (which I haven't read anything about yet!!!), but because this paper was detailing how to critically evaluate theories - in short, what determines a good as opposed to a bad theory. The author explains this process via different levels of consideration - consideration of the constructs and propositions (YUPE... I discovered that propositions AND hypotheses are different), consideration of the variables and measurement (This area is where 4250 touches mostly on...), consideration of the boundaries of a theory, scope and parsimony etc. The strange thing is, I now have a much better idea of what convergent and discriminant validity is all about, or in the author's words:

In determining convergent validity the theorist must confirm that "evidence from different sources gathered in different ways all indicate the same or similar meaning of the construct". In determining discrminant validity, the theorist must confirm that "one can empirically differentiate the construct from other constructs that may be similar, and that one can point out what is unrelated to the construct."

I have also, grapsed some understanding of what is an antecedent and a consequence and generally grew over-confused with a full stuffing of foreign-looking terms. I can't be sure I understand this particular article yet, so if I have the time I will definitely re-read it.

The said article, I feel, is one of those illuminating illusionaries that has just shown me "the way", the path to knowledge. It's like discovering America, experiencing the joy and exhiliration of suddenly uncovering something completely foreign, completely new, but which is ever so interesting. It's like gaining a higher level of insight over the course of 2 hours (because I had to digest, re-read and rethink every sentence I read!!!)

This should be what the pursuit of knowledge is all about - discovery and unearthing more and more 'gems'. It should not be the monotonous, senseless, boring exercises that I'm starting to think most HYP projects are. Is it because the quality of students in NUS are too low, such that they cannot be 'shown' this way by their supervisors and thus be encouraged to embark on the journey of self-discovery, because the students cannot be bothered with research and are doing it just for the sake of getting that "Honours" title in their graduation certificate, or because the research culture in Singapore is completely 'standardized', and gaining knowledge is never a means of self-gratification and self-fulfillment but the means to an end in publishing one more paper?

What is so wrong with education in Singapore? Because people are learning for the sake of getting a certificate. Because people do not revel in the process of learning and accumulating knowledge. How often, if ever, do you see people getting excited at having learnt something new? More often than not, this excitement is only manifested when the results appear at the end of term and the said student scored an "A+". Yet, how much is an "A+" worth when it is but a memory exercise that involves coughing up all that the student has learnt in the course of attending the lectures and tutorials? That "A+", I feel, merely denotes that the student is hardworking. Nothing can be commented about the said ability of the student in question, or his joy for learning, if even such a concept exists in the first place.

Today was the day of my first paper.. the dreaded Financial Accounting. Despite all the things that could have gone wrong, this paper seemed to proceed quite smoothly... managed to answer most of the questions... quite confidant of some of those answers... found the paper easier than expected... in short, the week of mugging paid of as I managed to clarify a great number of concepts.

Met up with Trax after the exam to go grocery shopping!! Yeah, nothing makes me happier than going shopping haha! Turned out to be a bit more complicated than expected... the number of people overflowing from mpsh, the exam venue, was so terrible that we couldn't get onto bus 96 at the YIH bus stop, at the Central Library bus stop or at the architecture bus stop. In the end, we went to Foong Seng for dinner instead and had roti prata (the two of us only shared 3 pratas... so now I'm feeling hungry and cooking myself a midnight supper of porridge) before going down to Clementi's NTUC to buy food... ok... the grocery shopping was damn extravagrant... spent so much that Trax had to sponser in the end coz I didn't have money to pay.... $50++ on food.... haaa... today was one of those rare days when both of us were utterly relaxed after our respective papers... anyway grocery shopping reminds me of the old days when we used to do the same thing in Sweden... him pushing the trolley, me telling him what to buy, him telling me what cannot buy because I want to buy a lot of 'extra' and unnecessary stuff etc etc etc.... Even the overspending part was so familiar... we were reminiscing about having blown 1000 kronas not too long ago at Co-op Konsum when we bought so much we nearly couldn't carry it back!!!

For some strange reason, the good mood persisted even after I got back... subsequently I went to do my laundry, mopped the floor and washed my Burberry bag (which is getting black from persistent daily usage)... thereafter flopped onto bed and proceeded to devour the latest issue of Her World..... I must say this December issue is booorrrriiinngg... far to much devotion to clothes... high-end fashion, specifically the haute couture brands which normal folks like myself obviously cannot afford.... even then all the stuff they featured were mostly for parties and unsuitable for most other daily occasions... furthermore the fashion looked so mature and 'oldish'... sorry... even with the hefty price tags, I can only say they look bad, though they are glamorous. And the magazine was severely overbloated... 700++ pages!! Thicker than my textbook lehz! Page after page of advertisements, most of them I'm definitely not interested in (eg. Aussino bedsheets, countless slimming salon offers come to mind) Nothing much memorable for skincare, though there were a substantial number of ads on the Xmas makeup sets on promotion. Yawnz.

In any case, I'm looking for a moisturiser aka night cream because I'm about to finish my current one. I want to change brands because my current (Kose Sekkisei) one, though pretty good with whitening, contains way too much alcohol and I'm definitely not going to use it in the long run. Want something that is alcohol free, moisturizing, not oily or greasy (which also means probably not very rich??), preferably whitening, and nothing above $200 (Sorry no SKII). Any recommendations?

After spending yesterday in dismay because Slyvester got into the Singapore Idol finals instead of Olinda, I'm now praying that Taufik will win eventually. I can't imagine Slyvester as the Singapore Idol... omg... having him represent Singapore on World Idol will be disastrous!!! Philosophically speaking, the sad state of affairs in Singapore Idol whereby popularity is prized more highly than talent is unfortunately true of most affairs in life.

Fortunately, amazingly, despite not having practised my piano for months, there was substantial improvement in the Mozart Adagio that I'm playing. I have no idea why. After the past few weeks of extremely 'jialat' piano lessons where I got dissed for everything, suddenly I got the mood of the piece today. Don't know why. So today's piano lesson wasn't half as bad as those for the past few weeks.

It could be the music I was listening to on the bus to class. Joi Tsai's "Ri Chu" album, which is a really good album. Initially picked it up only because Peggy Hsu (Yupe... I still like her 2 years later...) had a few compositions in this album. But surprisingly, the album is really good. It's extremely difficult to find albums nowadays whereby the songs can all be blended and melded together into a single flavour. This is one of the rare gems.

I spent yesterday, or was it the day before? reading through 2 Chinese romance novels in one sitting. Too sick of Accounting already which always seems neverending. I'm behind schedule by 3 days. Never mind. Monday's the paper. Good riddance.

The moral of the story, however, isn't about Accounting. It's about romance novels. I realized why my life is so boooorrrriinnnggg because not only is nothing happening in real-life, but I've lost the ability to imagine as well. Namely, I've stopped reading fiction, not by choice, but because there's always a pile of non-fiction stuff that I feel obliged to read and which I forever cannot finish. And when the stress builds up and there isn't an outlet to destress, the end result is I become a bitch with pms symptoms.

So to upkeep my spirits, I should continue reading, or at least 'experience' something 'virtually'. Because nothing ever runs smoothly in real-life; the problem is however nothing ever runs too 'un-smoothly' either. It's just a general sense of dissatisfaction, being a general buildup of small little things that combine together to form one hell of an irritation.

I used to believe in the concept of 'perfect', 'neverending', 'true' love. Unfortunately those were the days, and I find I subscribe to that notion less and less nowadays. I mean, if you break down the concept of 'love' into its absolute basics, what is left? And it is precisely because 'love' is such a vague term that there is such an abundance of love songs around, describing this 'complicated' emotion. The term itself is even more confusing because of its combination of a myriad of adjectives to form one potent mixture of potentially explosive emotions. Rightfully so, as no single soul truly understands this imprecise term, hence 'love' has become one of those things which gives rise to gossip, which gives rise to relationship problems. In summary, 'love' becomes an excellent excuse to assign blame to when something goes wrong since it is such a generic category. But thereby is the problem since no one knows what the problem is exactly.

Now why am I writing this? Hm... good question. I had intended to start off penning down some thoughts on how I hate being disappointed, especially in the light of previous anticipation. I guess I'm not tolerant enough, far too self-centered, and just pissed off at this general state of affairs. It's one of those problems which is precisely not a problem because it's just too minute to be considered one. It's a thorn in the flesh, a very small one, one which you know exists, but whose precise position you cannot locate, and hence cannot pluck it out. And it continues to fester in you, increasing your irritation.

I once used to think that as long as two people are in love, they should always stay together. I didn't believe in partings because I thought they were stupid, and simply meant that the couple concerned had weak characters such that they could not overcome the opposition around them. I've never really understaood why people don't do the things they really want to do and change their actions just because of others' opinions of them.

Is it then a blessing that I'm slowly understanding why partings even exist in the first place? That 'love' is nothing more than an abused, convenient means to rationalize the grounds for staying together? That 'love' is just one of the prerequisites to staying together, but the ultimate success in staying together depends on a whole bunch of other factors such as tolerance?

The conclusion then, is that, love is worthless. It's a term reminiscent of the lost times, of past nostalgia, and which conjures up wonderful imaginings of what could have been. But what could have been obviously never came to be. Hence the regrets, the nostalgia, because given the option to reverse time, things might have been different. But would they really have been different? I doubt it. People make choices due to the circumstances they are in, and due to their own characters. Even if time is reversed, the situation would still be the same, the characters would still be the same. So ultimately the decision would have been similar. It is therefore no use whining about what would have been, because it would never have been because of who you are.

Sometimes I just get so tired of this state of affairs. Or maybe it's because I can't afford to be distracted. Regardless. Behold the mad rantings of a fortunate soul who doesn't know how fortunate she is. I'm toying with a dangerous idea. If I feel crazy enough and suddenly obtain the courage to do so, I might just implement it.

Well, first of all, sold off my Ayumi Hamasaki CD today (when I say sold off, means Accounts Receivable translate into Cash... kekez... simply got the money).

Secondly, was walking, walking, walking, when I became the recipient of a flyer. The flyer said there was a handbag fair at factory direct prices at XXX. So out of curiosity, popped in to take a look.

Wah! Jelly bags going at $5 each! And they were the huge ones, with lock! $5! OK... been bitching about the lack of a big tote that can fit my textbooks and the jelly bag can fit one nicely. Anyway, $5 only. Bought one naturally.

They also had a lot of pop art bags. So ended up spluring on another bowling bag. An extremely colorful one, with pictures of girls on it. Don't really know how to describe the bag nor do I have any photos. My camera's still with my parents, who, at this point, are on their way to KL, I think.

Bankruptcy.

As arranged, collected my new Jaden Floral mini from the seller who also stays in PGP coincidentally. Here's a picture:

Whoo... the skirt fits me perfectly! Really very nice colors and smooth satin touch! *Excited*

& because I got paid for the Hollister Ballet mini which I sold off, now am thinking of bidding for one of the following:

...The Shelly Mini... Hmm... yellow looks nicer right??...

...The Connor Tiered... Have been thinking of getting this for a really long time...

...Or the Emily Floral?? I have the pink one but it's a little loose for me so I'll probably sell it off to get the XS one...

Arghh.... I want all 3!!! I need a santa claus!!

Enough of shopping lemmings.

Moral of the story? I'm becoming a full-blown shopaholic :(:(:( And holidays haven't even started yet. The good news is, there aren't that many Abercrombie minis that I like = I won't buy that many minis; the bad news is I don't see myself stopping before buying those that I like.

And it's time for a round of Singapore Idol in the meantime.... So this is the end of this pathetic entry.

I'm officially broke this month from excessive online shopping, but I had thought that The Sims 2 would be one of those "must-buy" games... in fact I had every intention to get the real thing (well.. if you know me you should also know that Maxis stuff are the only games that I buy un-pirated.. that is if I even bother to buy a game in the first place). But then again, I suppose I will save my money. The Sims 2 is still on my wishlist, but just that I will probably not buy the real thing anymore. At least not after the saga about EA's maltreatment of its employees broke out. （Read here).

Being quite a workaholic sometimes, I've to admit that my goal in life is most definitely not to BE a workaholic. Granted, a workaholic nature IS needed to get me, at this stage, what I want and so is a necessity, BUT I absolutely have no intention of letting this become a life-long trend. I mean, why work so hard until I have no time to enjoy the money I earn? No travelling? No shopping? Shooz. I don't need to be the richest billionaire on earth. I just need to make enough for a yuppie's lifestyle.

That said, it is disturbing to know that the industry I plan to join (or at least the industry I am purportedly studying to join -- it remains to be seen whether I will even join this industry in the end) is renowned for slavery. I can fully imagine those long, neverending working hours that await me should I really join the commercial IT industry -- that is fine on weekdays, but I absolutely don't believe in working on weekends. Call me lazy, but, I strongly believe in the concept of efficiency. Which means, when working, NO breaks, NO gossiping with the colleague in the next cubicle, and PRODUCE results, for god's sake. And so, hence, to finish work early so that I can have my free time. Absolutely hate working with morons who screw up everything, who are so goddamn inefficient (yupe.. they spend all their "working" time doing anything but work) ... and so for all of the above reasons I remain an ignorant, conceited, snobbish arrogant asshole, and will probably be hated by everyone and denounced and backstabbed. Meaning, will never see promotions or pay raises, but will be shown, as early as possible, to the door.

Sad to say, all these have only made me gain a greater phobia of working in the so called, IT "commercial" world. No doubt, a cut-throat business world. Thankfully if I stay in there long enough I will probably be in the management ranks since that is where my course of study lies in, BUT then again, I don't want to become that sort of slave driver either. Slave driver, yes, in the sense that I expect employees to produce the work and meet the deadline, but I don't care whether you work 5 hours to do it, or 20 hours to do it. Too bad if you're inefficient; then it is only fair that you work more hours to compensate for it.

Haa... this is a seriously depressing topic. If I had my way I probably wouldn't be in the commercial line anyway so all this is besides the point. I'm still convinced that there is absolutely NO way to make me stay in a job that underpays me but expects me to help them reap huge profits without giving me any share. Seriously, if I was that talented, I wouldn't work for anybody but myself. Pure Y-Generation, selfish mentality, but that's me.

Have been thinking it over for some time already, and I'm more and more convinced that my own IT web programming skills are, unfortunately, severely lacking. And hence, I've more or less made the decision that I will take CS3266, the module that requires that individual project where you create an e-commerce website all by yourself, eventually. I say eventually, because I highly doubt I will take it next semester, since that would probably have horrendous results and I can't afford the devotion that it necessitates not when I should be doing UROP and probably CS1231 (Yupe.. I still haven't taken it yet... please don't ask me why and how is it that I have managed to take ST2334 however which by the way is still one of the modules I hate the most all-time and I offer my condolences to anyone who has to take it) The other reason is that being the perfectionist I am, I absolutely cannot allow myself to churn out the incomplete result which we did for CS3214. That said, since CS3266 is an individual project, I should legitimately be able to have all the time in my world (as long as I plan it properly) to work on it, to a standard that I find acceptable. And yes, I already have an idea of what a good e-commerce website should have. Not just a shopping cart and credit card verification, but more than that.

E-commerce is also interesting since I have recently developed such a huge appetite for online shopping. I could always learn something from Abercrombie's website in how to develop a successful one. Haa... I even roughly know what product I would like to sell. Fashion! Clothes! And I have a huge 'study base' from which to learn from since I sort of have such a huge interest in this area currently (Muahahah... more excuses to shop!!) Anyway, for the upcoming holidays as well as next semester, I could seriously spend a lot more time learning the three web programming languages ASP, JSP and PHP since I have such vague recollections of each language.

I think CS3214 was the start. Dealing with open-source software opened my eyes to a lot of things, and also sort of convinced me that web programming really isn't that difficult, just tedious. I'm very tired of not knowing how to program well enough, or at least, as well enough as the 'good' people around me, a belief which I gained, I dunno whether from the impression others have of me, or that I have convinced myself to believe in. Well, my web skills have been stagnant for so many years ever since those initial startup times when I dived straight into web design to attempt to learn everything in that area....those were the days when I was a bit 'crazy' and that was where my passion to join the IT line actually came from. Looking back, nobody ever taught me any of that knowledge which I picked up on my own. Which makes me convinced that what I need to do is regain that fervent passion to do such crazy things again. Only this time, apply it to TomCat, play with open-source software ten times more, and learn from the best practices in the industry. Heck, as long as SunApp isn't the prerequisite in the project, I doubt I can sink that badly.

I know I'm ranting. But I'm just tired. I know what I'm good at, and what others think I'm good at. That's good by all means, but those skills like essay-writing really don't require too much further development, and there, frankly, isn't too much more that I can learn and improve on. I mean, since I'm getting my 'A's for my essays already, it is just silly to focus more time to hone a skill, which, I believe I have the technical prerequisites for. All that can help me in that area is maturity and foresight, to see beyond the intricate details, and be able to focus on an ever more abstract, higher level of overview. Whereas in terms of technical skills, I clearly have a lot more to learn.

The web was why I got into IT, because of interest. I don't see any reason why I will switch to systems programming instead, which, frankly, bores me because there are no cute graphics. Every once in a while, when I smell disaster coming because I lose focus in what I'm doing, it's time to take stock and redefine one's priorities. Because what differentiates the best from the average, I truly believe, is that you must know what you are doing, and why you are doing it. Doing it blindly is the worst way of doing things.

How right those personality tests in secondary school were. INTF. Oh and the comments in my previous entry about shutting down my blog? Juz kidding, or maybe not. I don't want to become another one of those mundane 'Life Bloggers'. Henceforth I will consciously switch to blogging less about my life's boringness.

Entries from 16/11/04 and before here
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