Everything will fall into place

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

The promos are so near that I am surprised that I am able to find the time to relax. Of course my day is still padded with lots of cramming, but being able to spend time with my friends to relax between crazy economics notes reading really makes it that much bearable.

I know this is not the first time I am saying it, but I think I finally nailed economics. The last time I had this feeling, it ended with me feeling extremely disappointed that I was still unable to answer the questions properly. Please let this be it, I really could use a deans list to restore my confidence in the subject.

The worse thing about mugging like crazy is that you expect to see the results. In fact, you do not just expect to see it, you look forward to reaping the joy that comes from seeds of your effort watered with your very blood and sweat. I am feeling really optimistic about the promos now, I just know that I must not screw up. I am really sick of being faced with disappointments, all this must not sum up to nothing.

Also, I lost an argument with Kenneth today. It turns out that the animorphs can morph into other humans. How insane is that? They allow you to turn into another human? This is the exact reason why I do not read fiction.

xw 7:56 AM

Monday, September 28, 2009

After a hard day of mugging what ever little bit I might have missed, I decided it was time to find a nice game to clam my shaken nerves. Being a fair person, I played many genres of game just to be sure I am not missing anything while exploring the world of gaming for once in a long time.

Little King's Story

First up, it was a role playing game. Not just any lousy mass multiplayer online role playing game like Maplestory, but a game with a real story line. Little King's Story proved to be really entertaining, but the action gets pretty repetitive after awhile, just like any other role playing game. At least the boss battles here are challenging, such that it is nearly impossible to complete the bosses in one try. One has to carefully pick the citizens with the correct jobs to win the boss with minimal difficulty (Which proves to be rather hard still). It was pretty fun throwing my citizens around, but sadly, the boss i was fighting needed some knowledge of geography which I am lacking. In a fit of angst, I switched the Wii off.

Relax rating: 7/10

Minesweeper

Next, it was everyone's favorite game, minesweeper. This is a harmless puzzle game that is in everyone's computer. Everyone uses Microsoft Windows right? Clicking minute boxes on the screen has never been so fun and addictive. Not at all relaxing though. Whenever I click on a mine, I imagine some Sai Kang Warrior far away blowing up into pieces because he was rushing to break the high score. Ouch.

Relax rating: 3/10

DotA

Defense of the Ancients! This aeon of strife game is so popular that every guy must have played it once or twice in their life. Those who have not probably played it nearly a thousand times. Sadly, a new similar game is coming to take over DotA with a closed beta. Also, the pubs seem to be getting lousier at a faster rate than me. Maybe it is about time I desert DotA for LoL. DotA always ends in you complaining how low the standard of the opponent's team is, or how low the standards of your team mates are.

Relax rating: 0/10

Winterbells

Winterbells is an online flash game in which you control a white bunny. Initially, you might think that the music is really soothing, but as you get higher and higher up, you notice the winterbells are shrinking until they finally become so small you wonder how your bunny can still jump on them. It was then I started to wonder what happens to the bunny when it falls down from such a ridiculous height. In a moment of worry, I broke my concentration and the bunny dropped. Oh look, it looks fine. How could I forget that it is a magical bunny.

Relax rating: 9/10

xw 8:21 AM

Why did I ever though that the Chinese teacher would have patience of steel. As usual, I was feeling really hungry after Physics tutorial, so I went off to get a quick bite. Well, since I would be so near the photocopy shop by then, I might as well take the time to photocopy a revision paper for my classmates. You would think that the teacher will not miss me and Leonard.

How wrong I was. I suddenly received a text message from one of my classmates that the teacher has decided to issue me a white slip. I know of people who skip Chinese classes every other day, and I get white-slipped for being late for class for the third time. Come on, it is not as if we do not turn up. We are just helping her channel some of her period to do something a little more useful than us stoning there trying to figure out what she is saying. Slightly annoyed at the situation, I just skipped the whole damn lesson.

Well, I have been thinking about why I got white-slipped while other people do not, and I finally came up with a theory. I figured that the teacher has categorize her students into 4 distinct categories. The first one would be the good students who turn up for class on time every lesson, except for Tuesdays where they are still late, but earlier than most of the class. In other words, the first category consists of most of the girls and a couple of guys. The second one group of students are those who never skip lessons, but goes there only to sleep/ talk amongst themselves/ play PSP with it hidden stealthily in his bag. Under this falls a lot of the guys. The third group is bordering on hopeless. This happens to be the group I am from. We still turn up for classes, but we are late once in awhile. We do not bring our notes, and have only a few textbooks between all of us. On top of that, we use her lesson to do our work from other subjects. The very last category would be those who only turns up half the time, and when they do, they would stretch their non-interested bodies across the tables, close their eyes of apathy and take a quick one hour nap.

In hope of transferring people from the second group into the first group, she tries to engage her class by asking them questions so often that sometimes I wonder if she knows anything. And in hope of transferring people from the third group into the second group, she issues white slips to deter us from falling into the dark side. This is the only explanation.

xw 1:17 AM

Saturday, September 26, 2009

I managed to finish the math revision paper with two minutes to spare. Considering that I ate lunch somewhere during the 3 hours, I guess I will have more than enough time to complete the real paper and check for mistakes. Paper was surprisingly easy, all my marks were lost on carelessness, though the inequality question did throw me off a little. No matter how strictly I mark, I cannot get below an A. Woohoo! That is one subject out of the way.

xw 11:38 PM

I am almost done with my revisions. Tomorrow, I will be taking the past year's math paper, just to ensure myself that I am able to ace the test when it finally comes. 3 hours is a really long time, I am starting to wonder if the paper will be really long, or if they just want to make sure we do not run out of time half way. A minute and forty-eight seconds per mark, this must seriously be the easiest paper that we will have to sit for. Oh well, I shall know tomorrow how long 3 hours really is.

Besides math, I shall be doing a physics and chemistry paper too. But of course, I will not time myself for those, because I know that I will not complete in time and will only scare myself when I realized how slow I am. We all need a fair dose of self-delusion, or we would live in a world where almost nothing that we need to be true is true.

I wonder if I will be contented with my promos marks after studying so hard, but I guess only time will tell. Or the Magic 8-ball. "Not another word" is says, I wonder if that is a positive reply.

xw 8:08 AM

Friday, September 25, 2009

The whole Project Work thing is finally over for now. The written report has been handed in, we are free from hell until promos are over, after which it shall resume. Oral presentation is like a little spin off of Project Work, made just for all the fans who cannot get enough of it. I have no idea what sort of presentation would be expected of us then. Are they looking for something conventional or creative? Will they focus on the content or the mode of presentation? Who cares, all this shall be pondered upon only when I have finished enjoying my break from Project Work, which happens to be packed with exam papers.

Every once in awhile, something hits you and you do not even know where it came from or what it is. Ignorance is bliss, but the truth is necessary. With so many questions and no answers, I cannot help but wonder how I could have been so oblivious.

xw 7:04 PM

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Tonight, I will pray my hardest that at the strike of midnight, it would still be 24th September 2009 again. I am not asking for one more day to do make my Project Work report perfect, I just want to relive today, and change all the horrible mistakes I made.

My prayers will probably just go unheard, and I would have to live with this ugly day in my memory. Some of my believes; hasty actions, courage to face judgement, got tested. They proved to be really good guidelines to follow once again, but I failed by not following them. On any other ordinary day, I would have enjoyed today so much that my prayer for 24th September 2009 to come again would be so that I can enjoy my day once more. Why did I not listen to myself?

On a separate note, the instructions for the submission of written report is really clear. Not only do they have instructions for teachers and students, they also have instructions for CD ROMs. Way to go!

xw 7:14 AM

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

The final version of the Project Work written report is finally done. I opened the CD ROM provided to me by the school and had a look at the contents. Ah, good memories of our first written report draft. It looks like crap to me now. Who would have though that we would decide to do each chapter individually and dump them into one document before declaring it was a report. The link between the chapters were so bad that it was almost as if no one read through the whole report, every single chapter. It was a pretty good start though. At least we had something to work with from then on.

Oh, looks like they saved another document inside the CD ROM. The "Originality Report". This magical report tells us how much of our written report has been taken from the net, or from another student report that has been through "turn it in" too. With an overall similarity index with our sources of 8%, I guess they cannot say that we plagiarised. It appears that we have a 1% similarity index with Wikipedia. How wonderful. On top of that, we have a 1% similarity index with many other student reports from the past too. Maybe they took information from Wikipedia too, hmmm...

My mouse hover above the "Save as" button, as I considered if I should just save the final version of our written report into the CD ROM now. They made the disc a read-only disc, which meant that once we saved our report, there is no way we can remove or edit it. It had to be our real final version. I phased out for a minute, and imagined Gabriel coming up to me tomorrow, waving the printed report in front of my face before proceeding to point out a couple of grammar mistakes, a handful of spelling mistakes, some formatting error that occurred while converting the document from Microsoft Word 2007 to Microsoft Word 2003 and signing off with one huge conceptual error that somehow managed to sneak all the way from the start to the end. Horrors. Luckily, we have one more day. I should just save the document tomorrow.

xw 8:51 AM

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

I once said that a slow decision is a bad decision. Today, I proved that this statement could not be nearer to the truth.

Kenneth and I passed the MRT gantry of Hougang Station. Sometimes the gantry would not let you pass if it feels unhappy, but luckily for us, today was not the day. We saw a poor woman wearing heels in the distance, struggling to free herself from a hidden ninja trap. I have never worn heels in my life, but I would expect the worse thing that can happen to you while wearing them is to get them stuck in a little hole. Is that worse than breaking your heels? That is something that I would never find out. But whatever the case, she had them stuck. Being the kind soul that I am, I suggested to Kenneth that we should go and offer her some help. As a result, we stood there looking at her and planning our approach. Carefully. We did not want to appear like untactful people since we were wearing our school uniform.

So there we were, standing there looking at her in her plight. We pondered carefully, silently thinking through every word that would come out of our mouths, as the other commuters just walked past the whole thing. It was as if the two of us were locked in time and space, along with her.

In all this time, my mind was formulating the perfect approach. "Madam, may we offer you some assistance?" Wait no, that would make us look like sales assistants. Perhaps we can just cut the crap and go straight to the obvious solution. "You know, you should try taking your heels off first." Hmmm, that is about as rude as it can get. No, rapport is the key. I have to make her feel like we are not there to make fun of her, since she is in a vulnerable position. "Yo missy, you know, that happened to me once..." Bleah. I really do not think she would have bought that. Maybe I have to let her know that we recognise that she is in a bad position. "Hey, looks like you are stuck." Nah, she will take offence to that.

Finally, I looked at Kenneth. I have no idea if he was going through the same thought process as me, but we both agreed that we should just walk pass her as if we did not see a thing. After staring at her for about half a minute. We should have just ignored her from the start, it would have reflected so much better on us than standing there to observe her situation as if she was some exhibit. Oh well, what is done is done. We were genuinely trying to summon enough sense and courage to help, one step further than what the other commuters could offer.

Z is for zest. Zest has the potential to be contagious, but only if the zesty person is really energetic to the extent that he keeps colliding into the people around him. By the conservation of energy, everyone around him will feel energetic too. Sadly, this is an emotion that comes with something new and fresh. On top of that, only people who are not apathetic to everything around them can ever hope of experiencing zest.

xw 7:58 AM

Monday, September 21, 2009

Everyone should be able to count the number of days to the promotional exams using their fingers now. That is not a good sign. Why does time but us through horrors like this? I wish that these 10 days would fly past, so that I can finally stop the mugging madness and have other things on my agenda. Right now. my agenda looks like this:

1) Go through Chemistry term one topics

2) Do some Physics practice

3) Do alot of Math practice

4) Understand Economics to the best of my abilities

5) Read through the Project Work written report again for the billionth time

But at the same time, I want these precious moments that I have with my notes. There is a need to make every second count when time is so short. When I am studying, I look forward to meeting the goals I set myself quickly, so that I can spend some time doing what I want to do. However, when I start having fun, my guilt will creep up being me and start breathing down my neck. Life should not be like this. I have long forgotten what I used to enjoy doing.

Junior College life was never short, but you lose so much time to mugging that it appears like you did not do much else in that two years. I really miss the early part of this year, where we could have fun by organizing BBQs and enjoying a few days at Ubin. Hopefully the upcoming learning journey would remind me what fun it is to just relax as a class.

Y is for yellowness. When someone feels yellow, he might experience a longing for purple. A trigger for yellowness includes red with green when lit along with white, but this emotion can also come unexpectedly as something that is primarily subtractive. This feeling might quickly fade into blue while you search for your purple, but you must keep in mind that indigo is what you want. Just make sure you do not end it by feeling really brown.

xw 6:29 AM

Sunday, September 20, 2009

I finally saw the upper limit of mugging. Who would have known that studying like the exams are tommorow would actually not work as well as I thought. I could actually see my productivity dropping slowly, as I completed the questions slower and slower, before I finally reached the last questions on buffers and could not even identify a salt from a base. At the end of it all, I could not think stright and was laughing uncontrollabily at nothing. I was tempted to start doing my Summation assignment, but I know that the moment I see a question that I could not do, I would just break down and cry in agony. Oh well, I completed the whole chapter on ionic equilibrium in one day. Sort of.

I am suddenly getting worried for my Project Work though. Not because there is alot that still needs to be done, but because there seems to be nothing that needs to be done. While all the other groups are so busy that all their members are working on something, I cannot even find something for myself to do. Why is this so? I am going to have to read through the report again. Maybe the addition of a few diagrams would make me feel better.

Stock up on barrles of midnight oil, as we all gear up for a week and a half more of mugging. I know it is all going to be over soon anyway, after which we can lead normal lives again.

X is a disgusting little letter. It represents the unknown in many fields of science and mathematics, but is almost useless at the start of words.

xw 7:10 AM

Saturday, September 19, 2009

The days are getting shorter and shorter. Who says time cannot fly when you are not having fun.

However, lets try not to think about the Promotional Examinations for a minute. You know what else is coming soon? The Mid-Autumn Festival! Though I do not know exactly when it is, or whether it has passed already, what I do know is that I have mooncakes spawning at home. Who doesn't love to eat calories so condensed that you could eat just two and go the rest of the day without eating anything else? It is arguabily the most sinful food on the face of this planet. If we celebrated the festival all year round, the Asians would have a higher obesity rate than the Americans. It is a good thing that I have the discipline to be contented with just smelling the snow-skinned mooncakes that are calling out my name everytime I open the refrigerator door.

If I were not so busy, I would actually consider finding out the day of the full moon and leave the house then. Following which, I can just find somewhere nice and quiet to just sit and stare at the moon. The tranquillity of it all would probably make me melt.

W is for worry. Everyone would have felt this emotion before. It makes one feel very restless, as one foresees that something bad might be going to happen. However, sometimes we are just too imaginative, which results in us worrying about something that has actually no chance of happening. For all other situations, feeling worried is actually a good thing, as it makes us prepare for the worst, or even make us spring into action and do some pre-emptive work. It is still undeniable that being worried is mentally and emotionally taxing. Sometimes, we just have to learn how to relax.

xw 4:10 AM

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Finally, I have trimmed every single excess word. Hours ago, we had about 650 more words than we should. Now, the written report actually has less than 3000 words. It felt like we have spent the last couple of months building a perfect sandcastle, only to find out that we used too much sand and have to use a toothpick to poke a certain number of grains of sand out. One by one.

For those who are going to take Project Work later on in their lives, I would like to warn you that you should do consistent word counts from version to version. Never have the mindset that you want all the content in first before starting to remove the excess word. You will end up so far from the word limit that you have to climb mountains to meet the limit again. But just in case you still end up in my state, here is a quick guide on how to cut words.

The '"The"s - If you have a proper noun that you used alot in your written report, do remember to go and check if there is a "The" in front as part of its name. There is a chance there is no "The", in which case drop all of them. Do not think that it would be a good idea to uncapitalise them, just because removing them does not feel right.

Adjectives - If it is not needed, remove it. As long as it does not serve to substantiate your point, drop them. Every word counts.

Reducdant useless white elephants - If you find a phrase like "will be in the future", save yourself 3 words by omitting "in the future". Keep your eyes peeled for these minor redundancy. They hide really well.

The first few chapters - Chances are that your group got really excited and did a really nice (and lengthy) job for the first few chapters. If you try to cut from the last few chapters instead of the thick fleashy frontline chapters, you will end up with a marker that is wondering why the front was so promising, but led to nothing in the end.

Repetition - If you decide to give each of your members a chapter to do, since your group happens to have five members too, points will definitly be repeated across chapters. Get everyone to read though the whole thing once (or get one person to read through it five times) and remove all of these word comsumers. They not only waste words, they bore the readers too.

Paraphrasing - Sure you can get a few words off at a time by searching high and low for unneeded words one by one. But if you paraphrase a point, there is a chance that you can phrase it in a nice word saving way. Words like "came up with the action plan" can be replaced with "formulated an action plan", saving a grand total of two words at once!

If you hear me scream in agony during the General Paper promotional papers, it probably means that I overshot the word limit for the summary by 650 words and got reminded of the horrors of Project Work. But before that happens, I shall take this experience and hide it in a corner of my mind.

V is for vengefulness. When you have been wronged or hurt by someone, sometimes you might feel vengeful and want to make him or her feel your pain. You probably only started off being really angry at that person, but somewhere along the road, this anger translated into vengefulness while you are thinking about the unfairness of it all. You probably will not notice this change in emotion as they are both very similar, but I am sure the person you are going to exert your vengence on is going to.

xw 8:46 AM

Way to go Nintendo! After all these years, they are still able to squeeze money out of the giant cash cow called Pokemon. Heart Gold (Kudos to the people responsible for this name) and Soul Silver are coming out soon. I am not too sure when, but I heard it is going to be some time next year. I also heard, from a ninja-in-training, two weeks ago that it was to be release last week, but that is besides the point. Nintendo should stop targeting the poor Pokemon fans and create something for the good of mankind. Something that allow you to go through life as if you were playing a game. Have you wondered how much better life would be if it was as easy as a handheld Role Playing Game?

One of the best things about it would be that we would be able to carry around an insane amount of items in our bag/pocket/pouch. Never having to tire from lugging about a tonne worth of inventory everywhere we go, I would bring my bike to school everyday, along with the whole year's worth of notes and a huge boulder, just because I am able to.

A 'save' function would also come in really handy. All my tests would be aced, because I can just save an hour before the test, have a peep at all the questions first, then restart from my saved point and mug out all the things that are coming up. In fact, calculations can even be done before hand. Most importantly, I would be able to experience death without actually dying. I am sure we have all wondered at one point of our non-virtual life what comes after death. Now we can find out for sure. Just remeber to save before jumping down, or you might revert to the last time you saved and lose some of your progress in life.

Speaking of progress, if life was an RPG, we would also never have to deprove. RPGs are usually made such that you can only go up, so we never have to worry about going through what Charlie Gordan went through. I would not have to restudy what I learnt for Chemical Bonding just a few months ago, and we could have spent the time ealier this year learning something new (or playing DotA) instead of recapping what we already learnt and conveniently forgot.

Conversations would be so easily initiated too. Instead of looking at her wondering what to say before finally deciding not to speak, I would be one button press away from starting a conversation. Hmm, I wonder if it would be as difficult to get myself to press that button as it is already. Come to think of it, this might not change a thing.

U is for uneasiness. Right next in line after discomfort, uneasiness is the direct opposite of comfort. When subjected to a new experience, it is natural to feel like one is in a foreign (lost half mark in a comprehansion spelling this word wrongly) land. This can be described as feeling uneasy. Another way to feel uneasy is when you are on the verge of losing something or someone that matters. That way, it can be said that to feel uneasy is to feel unsafe and unsecure about something. Be brave and venture forth into the uncharted lands, it might bring you unimaginable rewards. Or regret.

xw 2:23 AM

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Many times, I find myselves lying on my bed in the middle of the night, unable to sleep. Sometimes, it might be because I am anticipating something exciting that is about to happen the following day, or maybe something is weighing me down, like the taught of a deadline looming over my head. Perhaps it could be due to my inability to dispel my head from thoughts of a math question, or it could even be because I am having a sleepover. (Though I would be prabably on the floor in this case.) Never in my life have I been kept awake by my power fan until yesterday night.

This is no ordinary fan. It is a power fan. One reason why I call it the power fan is because it is really more powerful than your normal household fan. Another reason would be because it has the words "power fan" printed on it. It has been serving me for a really long time now, sitting alone on my desk, overlooking the mess that my room is in, as it waits silently to be employed. However, for some reason, it has decided that it should make a loud clanking noise about once every 10 seconds from the time it is switched on. Being the only thing in my room that is capable of keeping me from melting form the sheer humidity, I was torn between sleeping in a stuffy room and sleeping in a noisy room. I knew that I should have submitted to the aircon ages ago.

Maybe it would have stopped emoing by tonight.

T is for tiredness. While this is a physical condition when used to refer to one's physical state, tiredness is also an emotion in the context of one's mental state. When feeling tired of something, one might see no point in trying to continue a deed or keeping that thing. Feeling tired is closely related to feeling defeated, but the main different is that the person feeling tired has not given up entirely yet. All that is needed is some time to recover from the fatigue and all will be well.

xw 8:00 AM

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

I knew my English was not that bad. During the last Project Wrok consultation, I was wrongly accused of creating my own words. Me? The captain of Scrabble Club? (I know it is not even a student's interest group yet, but it will be next year) Oh yeah, for those who do not know yet, I am in the midst of hatching an evil ploy to overthrow the current Scrabble Club captain from his post. Feel free to approach me with suggestions that do not include challenging him to a Scrabble game where the winner gets to be captain.

Anyway, I had the words 'sellable' and 'demolishment' challenged. In place of sellable, my Project Work tutor offered me saleable and for demolishment; demolition. Fine, I must admit that I should have used demolition instead of demolishment, but in my defence, sometimes common words just choose to hide in an obscure corner of my brain. I hate it when that happens during General Paper Essays though. But it turns out that the words I used do exist as less commonly seen synonyms. I feel a great sense of satisfation from being right as I replace the words with the recommended ones anyway.

S is for surprise. Surprise is an emotion that can either be pleasent or nasty, but either way, it is so short lived that you probably do not remember how it feels. Surpirse will quickly translate into another emotion, depending on whether it is a positive or negative surprise. That way, it is really hard to describe what a surprised person would feel, but it is basically a state of shock from an unexpected event.

xw 6:02 AM

Monday, September 14, 2009

Declining the chance to play at SCBA today, I walked myself to the bus stop after dinner. Hmm, the magical oracle board says that the next bus service number 55 is coming in 4 minutes. The other bus service which I can take, 156, is coming in 19 minutes. 4 minutes, looks like I have the time to check out my Chemistry notes and see if I can get any new insights that I should have gotten weeks ago.

The thing about Chemistry is that I must take it. Well, I did not really choose to take Chemistry directly, but some other choices I made demanded that I take the subject. Now, I am topics behind, trying to keep up lecture after lecture,tutorial after tutorial. I really planted a seed of self-destruction the moment I decided not to pay attention for Chemical Energetics. Now, as I sturggle to just get the topics that will be tested in a couple of weeks stright, I foresee me being lost in a few months time too. Magical oracle board says 55: 4 minutes, 156: 17 minutes.

Today, I returned Jinyu her physics mock test MCQ question, happily pointing out 4 of the questions she got wrong. Guess what, turns out that I was wrong for 3 out of the 4 questions. Physics is supposed to be the subject that I am ready for. How ready am I, spending more than 30 minutes on 15 MCQ questions and still getting them wrong. The last test was no fluke, my understanding of Physics is flawed. During physics lesson today, I could not recall anything from oscillations either. This is going back on my checklist. Magical oracle board says 55: 4 minutes, 156: 12 minutes.

Speaking of subjects that I am supposed to be good at, I did some questions on inequalities in the libary. I took down questions that are simple as they can possibily be in no less than an awfully long time. On top of that, I had some questions which ended with an answer I know cannot be right. I frantically searched for the mistake hiding behind the wall of workings, ignoring the chuckles and taunts from the irrational numbers at the foot of the wall. I tried to test the hypothesis of me being able to keep my only A, but I could not remember the format. Maybe I would have better luck calculating the probability that I will pass Math Promos. Nope, I forgot my "Probabilities" too. Magical oracle board says 55: 4 minutes, 156: 10 minutes.

I was smacked in the face this afternoon by my Economics mock test. Hey look, I got 8. It is a nice single digit number. Maybe it is a good Chinese omen. I really thought that I might be doing something right this time, but apparently not. That made me start doing my holiday essay assignment on market failure and government intervention. Maybe I will actually understand the topic better if I do what my tutor tells me too. Magical ordacle board says 55: 3 minutes, 156: 7 minutes.

I cannot help but to think what I am working so hard for. No matter how hard I try, I see myself failing multidisciplinarily (Perfect Spelling! 8 syllabus bonus +3000 points!). I just have to tell myself that everything will be okay, just like I do to my Project Work members when they ask. Depressingly, I know that behind these exams are Project Work and Chinese. I have faith in Project Work, but I know it is still going to be alot of work. I have not touched Chinese for so long that I am not surprised if they changed some of the characters into more modern, new fangled ones. Not that I would notice anyway. Magical oracle board tries to say something. It gets ignored.

55 came to a halt in front of my face, and beckoned me back from my hellish thoughts about impending academic doom. I stuffed my unread notes back into my bag. A world class public transportation system have boards that tells you the timings for all the different bus services. Singapore's public transportation system have boards that lies about them. Magical oracle board says 55: 3 minutes, 156: 4 minutes.

R is for regret. Sadly, time only flows forward. We cannot change our past actions, nor can we accurately depict future consequences of our current actions. This leads us to do things that we might want to change, to correct. This longing for another chance is regret. Actions are commitments. Once we do them, there is no turning back, so just live with all the commitments that you have made. Triggers for regret includes stupidity and rashness. Unfortunately, there is nothing you can do about other than get over it.

xw 6:35 AM

Sunday, September 13, 2009

The holidays are finally over. Now I get to go back to school and waste my time there instead of wasting my time at home. Yesterday, I was so unproductive that my guilty conscience would not let me sleep. I was unable to grasp Summation, which was pretty sad since mathematics is supposed to be my strongest subject. So, I spent 1AM to 4AM reading my lecture notes and attempting the tutorial. At least now I have the Mathematical Induction steps burned into my brain. If you look really carefully at my head tommorow, you can see the scars where the smoke was coming out from while I was busy mugging.

I am looking forward to going back to school, as learning will finally take place. However, I look like a mess currently. I wonder if I will get white slipped for looking like a zombie. My hair is... long. And flying all over the place. My eyebags are so obvious from last night's guilty mugging session. Look what the Promotional Examinations does to your appearance.

Today, I celebrated the end of a non-productive holidays with the most unproductive day of all. With my Project Work still untouched from the last consultation and my Economics essay that I mentioned a few posts back undone, I decided to spend the whole day playing Litte King's Story. It is a weird game where you control this King. He is so paper that I actually accidentally died to creeps, or whatever they are called. Then I realized that the trick is to throw your minions at the creeps, because the minions actually have slightly more than 3HP. The graphics for this game really reminds me of Maplestory somehow, but I hope that is just my imagination.

Q is for noobs.

xw 7:12 AM

Thursday, September 10, 2009

The internet is a great place to meet new people and make new friends or even spouses. Even your old friends might turn into a totally different person online. Brace youself for Hex's guide to the MSN people. The twenty catagories are arranged nicely in alphabetical order so that those who have a clear idea of which one they belong to can scroll stright to it. Which species are you?

The Acadamaniac - These species of MSN people will spring on you with difficult questions about subjects that you might not even take. Of course it is all in the name of knowledge and we all love them for their undying curiousity about the world.

The Cliffhanger - This guy can never think of anything to say. He wants to upkeep the conversation, but just lack the social skills required. The result, you get to see "Soandso is typeing a message..." there for half a minute. Then it dissappears. Oh here it comes again! Wait no, still nothing. Oh well, maybe next time you will get further than 5 sentences.

The Daoist Master - With their status set as Available, these people are really good at ending conversations. In fact, they are so good that they end it before it starts. Some of them try to revive it 30 minutes later, but you would have forgotten what you originally wanted to say by then.

The Dead - Huh? Why is this guy never online? Never. Have he blocked you back then when you were telling him about your first time cutting your toenail with a rusty pair of scissors?

The DotA Kaki - Suddenly, you will be whipped off into a mass convo filled with these people and be talking about which room to join and trying to settle who can host without having everyone lag. About half an hour after this conversation start, a DotA game will be born. Then the pubs leave and you rinse and repeat.

The Emoticon Trainer - Pleasing to talk to, the Emoticon Trainer makes sure that every few lines are embedded with an emoticon. A good trainer recognises that MSN does not allow space for much tone, except for ocassional capitalization of words. Thus, the trainer would use the emoticons to help express the meaning of every line as precisly as possible. A bad trainer would have his Level 100 emoticons running wild, leaving a trail of destruction.

The Fair-weathered - What a bright and sunny day! Suddenly, someone who never talks to you initiates a conversation. Ahha, it is about a Project Work survey, or perhaps some dude that wants to open Hexic. (The best MSN game EVER!) Oh well, you can now choose to be helpful, or be a Daoist Master.

The Geek - Spamz eu with chatspeak and drps vwls frm wrds, or sometimes r3p1@c3s 13tt3r5 wi+h numb3r5 0r symb01s to make life as hard as possible for you. Makes lots of references to random internet forum fads too, like something along the lines of over 9000? I have no idea. These are the only species of MSN people that MUST be blocked without delay.

The GIANT Emoticon - While scrolling through your contacts, your attention is diverted to this ENORMOUS emoticon. It could come in a form of a heart, or a confused smiley, but the point is that it is HUGE. It is so LARGE that you feel like just creating a group for them and putting them in, so that they will never make your other friends look less significant again.

The Linker - "LOLOLOLOL check this out -----> www.randomlink.com" These people are great when you are bored. It also expands your knowledge of random things.

The Monosyllabic Monster - With a wide range of vocabulary and acronyms like "ya", "lol", "k", "nah", "huh" and "I don't really feel like talking to you", the Monosyllabic Monster will make you feel like you are talking to a wall. Seeing no effort to continue the conversation what so ever, you should just stop trying before they finish you off with their ultimate move. "ttyl busy now" *change status to busy* Ouch. At least you know they care more about you then the Daoist Masters and are probably really busy.

The Ninja - Huh? I do not remember adding this guy. Time to stalk him on facebook and try to trace when I came to know about his existance.

The Ninja with No Name - Okay. Not only did he sneak into your MSN contact list stealthily, he also has an email address like "pinkpajamasguy123@hotmail.com". On top of that, his nickname does not resemble a name either. Looks like you will never find out who he is, while he chuckles at you from behind his screen.

The Possessed - Suddenly, someone of the opposite gender (or same gender) professes his or her undying love for you over MSN. Hopefully you are not really interested in him or her (especially for those with the same gender) as it is likely to leave you feeling foolish. Maybe the spirits guilty of this possession might try to make you guess who they are after you caught them, but you can choose to just ignore them at this point.

The Random - Often caught initiating the conversation with "lol" or "hahaha", this guy just wants to comment on your personal message, nickname, or display picture. After a few minutes, you might notice that he really only wanted to comment, and has no intention at all to converse. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

The Sibling - For the sake of having one more contact, you might have decided to add your own sibling. Of course there is never a need to talk on MSN because he or she is one room away from you, but who knows? Maybe there will be a need to use it when you suddenly get stuck in your room and lose your voice at the same time.

The Soulless - Oh dear. It is another emotional personal message on the back of a name. It paints an ugly picture of the horrors of life and how unfufilling it is to live it. The bad experience that this person has went through have destoried the soul, leaving an empty shell. Which brave soul (Ya, you cannot have another soulless person) would volunteer to talk to him about it?

The Stealth Assassin - Out of the darkness, someone who is appearing offline talks to you. Ah, it feels great to be the only one to know that the person is on stealth. You cannot open a MSN game with a Stealth Assassin though...

The Virused - Closely related to the linker, the virus person will offer you links, in hope that you will click and become of them. This guy might have seen naked pictures of you online, or found a great way to lose weight, or even have some accai berry pills to sell you. But do not be tricked! It is a trap I kid you not.

The 24/7 - Huh? Why is this guy always online? Always. Does he ever sleep or go to school?

P is for panic. When your life might be in danger, your body's natural reaction is to throw you into a state of panic. Triggers for this emotions includes accidentally killing your friend's hamster, waking up in the afternoon on the day of Promotional Exams, and being stalked by a whole group of gangster gang. When feeling panic, one might try to calm down and think clearly. However, I do not think that this is a good solution. When feeling panic, you should just wave your arms in the air and run about. That way at least people will know that you think you are in trouble.

xw 8:02 PM

As expected, our Written Report owned the consultation. We have like 3 smiley faces scattered around our whole report, and they make me feel happy because my few days of hardwork has not gone unnoticed. Ya, I know that my groupmates might have been working hard too, but I can only speak for myself right? A few more minor changes and our Project Work journey shall be done. Wait, there is still Oral Presentation! Oh well, I guess whoever said that Project Work never ends was a wise person.

I have been smacked with the sudden realization that I have not done any of my homework for the holidays. Ouch. It shall be done by midnight tomorrow, afterwhich I will be able to enjoy the last remant of this pathetic excuse for a holiday by catching up on my Chemistry. If I could get my way, holidays will be longer. And I will get stright 'As' without studying. And lots of money. While I am at it, I might was well throw in the girl of my dreams. Ah, my imaginery life is good.

O is for optimism. There are those who might argue that optimism is a characteristic, more than a mood. Either you are optimistic, or you are not. However, I feel that this is complete rubbish. How can there be a person on earth so foolish that he or she feels optimistic all the time? Optimism is more like a mood. Someone with the 'optimistic characteristic' is merely optimistic most of the time. When one feels optimistic about something, one would feel like the outcome of the event would be a positive one. One trigger for this optimistic feeling could be lots of effort put into making something work, like when you spend lots of time on your Economics essay and you really think that you can scrape a pass and top the class this time. Another trigger could be plain stupidity, where you just think that something will happen and you invest all your hopes in it. Hopefully the emotion you experience after optimism is not dissapointment.

xw 7:41 AM

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Service does not get any better than that which is offered in a certain branch of fastfood restaurant, which shall not be named. For convinence sake, we shall just call it the Compass Point Burger King branch. As we entered the restaurant, we noticed that half the talbes were taken. The other half had trays on them, with left over onion rings and burger wrappers. It was a sight to behold. It is almost like a whole gang of collaborative fast food eaters had gone in and left at the same time, such that they could not clear the mess in time.

After that, we approached the counter. Apparently they did not only have a lack of staff to clean the place, they did not have manpower to have more than one counter open. Me and Kenneth approached a counter. It said next counter please, with a nice big yellow arrow pointing to the counter on the left. So we went to the counter on the left and what do you know. It is a next counter please sign with a big yellow arrow pointing to the right. It does not get any better than that.

On top of all these, the only counter that was opened had to be manned by a soft spoken woman. Really soft. She could probably be singing at the top of the voice in an exam hall and the invigilators would not even hear her. At least she could hear us. If she was deaf too, I would not be too surprised at this juncture, but it would have been a little more troublesome.

Finally, to complete our Compass Point Burger King experience, we had two free Cokes. It was an honest mistake on my part. When she asked me if I took the drinks already, I forgot that Kenneth already took it back to our seat. So told her that we did not recieve any yet and, her memory being as bad as mine, got us some free drinks. We happily took the drinks as compensation for epic service.

N is for nostalgia. It is the feeling of missing a past expeirence, or just the past in general. When one is nostalgic, many might mistaken one for being emotional, but what do those little kids know? The past is already gone, and all that we have left would be fragments of memories. If we were not allowed to use those fragments of memories, it would really be a waste. There are not much actions that might come from one feeling nostalgic, but we must still keep in mind that it is not healthy to dwell on the past for too long. Move on and live in the present.

xw 3:33 AM

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

After the last unproductive meeting, I felt really guilty. Really really guilty. It called for a special hardcore Project Work rush. Luckily, when all the information is infront of you, it becomes really easy to link them. Well, the written report still is not done yet. The contents page is totally out of sync and the word count got busted so badly it looks unsavable. I brace myself for the consultation this Thursday, 3:30PM. Don't be late guys.

Today was Earth Day, whether I liked it or not. I woke up all drenched in my own sweat. Who the heck turned the Power Fan off. I quickly rushed off to take a shower, only to find out that the water heater was not working. I heard drilling sounds and it all became clear. It was the day where the random people came to do some re-wiring work. This means that I get no electricity till 5PM. What a great day to go out!

Sneaking into M18 movies is not as easy as one might think. Unless of course, you did not get a strict ticket seller who insisted on seeing one Identification Card for every ticket purchased. Oh well, Time Traveller's Wife was not that bad. I was under this impression that it would be a chick flick, but it appeared to be an intruging time paradox. No really, if you were a time traveller, how would you know how old you are? Will your perception of time not be totally different from everyone else's? Too bad my company thought that the movie was not good. I think it is worth watching.

M is for misery. Misery is a combination of two negative emotions; overwhelmness and sadness. This nasty combination not only makes you feel sad, it also makes you feel defeated bacuse you are under the impression that there is nothing you can do about it. When feeling miserable, I guess your best chance is to surround yourself with your closest friends, and hope their optimism can shine through and get you out of the bad patch.

xw 9:20 AM

Sunday, September 6, 2009

I have really defeated myself this time. It is pretty sad to be defeated, but to be defeated by one self is just plain stupid. Whatever possessed me to start playing DotA in the middle of my Project Work meeting, I would never find out. At least they were sitting behind me reading through the Written Report before I went to play DotA. Sure they were obviously not nearly as serious as I was, but to start playing? That just gives them the excuse to run off and play with the Wii. We have finished 3 sections of the appendix, and I have a written report in front of me with colourful writings on it waiting to be corrected on the softcopy. Oh wait, they are not corrections, they are just all the mistakes being pointed out. Just mistakes. Where are the solutions? I only have myself to blame.

There are only two people whom you can tell you when you are doing something wrong. The first one is someone who does not cares about you and laughs at you for it. The second is close enough to you to be able to tell you for your own good. Anyone else in between will not mention it least he or she offends you. Now that I have been greeted with two wake up calls, there is no reason for me to go down the same road is there? If only I was a little more receptive to reason. Just a little more.

L is for love. It is a strong feeling of fondness for something or someone. When used towards an object, love can be used to describe an obession. For example, if you keep going to Pizza Hut to eat pizzas, someone might say that you love pizzas. In reality, it is just a nice way of saying that you are obsessed with them. When used towards someone of the opposite gender, love is just an illusion. It is a feeling that is so strong it makes you think that it will last forever, and it is so pleasent that you want it to last forever. Blinding and binding, who would not want to fall in love?

xw 1:36 AM

Saturday, September 5, 2009

The one week school holidays are finally here. I cannot wait for all the Project Work meetings that I have in stored for me. In fact, I have one tommorow! Maybe we would be able to actually meet our agenda today and we do not have to meet again on Monday.

The last day of school was especially fun, not only because I can constantly remind myself that after this day was over, I had a week of 'rest' ahead of me. I also enjoyed a great bonding session with my bridge mates! Not only did I learn so much more about my friends, the session also included many learning points about bridge. Go exclusive RKCB!

Instead of ending the session with the usual dinner followed by going to SCBA for pairs, we had an expensive meal (with free bread) and a massive sleepover at my house. Just to test the upper limit of my apartment's hosting capacity, I had 9 guests. I came to a conclusion that my house is not suitable for such large-scaled events. At least playing Mariokart was really fun. Somehow, this racing game about Italian plumbers and princesses could entertain some of us until 4am. By then, I was finding it impossibily hard to stay on the road for more than a couple of seconds. So being the sensible person that I am, I played for 1 more hour before trying to sleep. Finding sleeping space was surprisingly easy, considering I was the second last to attempt to do so. Morning came soon after I close my eyes. It felt like 5 minutes and probably was. What happened after that was a blur to me.

K is for Kennethkohiness. Someone who is feeling very Kennethkohy might behave like Kenneth Koh. Surprise! One that is in the mood for some reason and logic could be said to be Kennethkohy. In that way, there is a faction of word studiers that say that Kennethkohiness is a mental state rather than an emotion. Another faction of word studiers say that this word does not even exist. In interest of reason and logic, one feeling Kennethkohy might appear to be highly critical of both people and situations, as one would tend to over-analyse things when under this emotion. Thus, he would often appear either very loving or Ruthless.

xw 7:00 AM

Thursday, September 3, 2009

I was planning to post something yesterday, but somehow I forgot all about it. Once again, it has been proven that me and planning does not go together. Of course, being a good Civics Tutor, Mr. Lim tried to made us write down our revision schdule this civics period. I took a look at the timetable he handed out to us and penned down some datelines that I am not going to meet. Not on purpose anyway. If I happened to meet them, good for me. Everything will fall into place.

Today was a magical day. Kenneth reminded me "No, YOU are getting on the bus. Not me." I felt the fabric of time and space rip as the bus came to a halt infront of me. I entered the bus, and the bus uncle grinned at me. I tapped my card and made my way back of the bus, and I suddenly noticed. This bus does not have air-con! NO AIR-CON! And it is not even ecoday. The gentle night breeze carassed my skin, and I thought about how much more unpleasant my journey would be if it was a crowded bus filled with sweaty commuters. For some reason, the bus was eeriely empty. Then two ah bengs entered and began talking loudly. I was honestly not eavesdropping. It was really funny hearing them talk about their problems, and constantly reminding each other that they did not care about them. It is like they were trying to ask for advice with their problems while trying to convince the other that they were not affected by them. Oh well, I guess that is their way of communication. After a few stops, the ah bengs alighted, and peace was restored. As I enjoyed the rhythmic bumps of the bus as it rode as smoothly across the road as it possibly could, I could not help but think back on the days where my bicycle tire was flat. As I stepped out of the bus, I felt the fabric of time and space restore itself. Oh my tian! Suddenly it is 8:45 PM! Oh wait, considering that I entered the bus at about 8:30 PM, I guess it is just about right. Or is it...

J is for jealousy. Often confused with envy, this emotion is actually considerable closer to love. One ugly thing about love is that it makes us want to possess the thing or person that we cherish so dearly. Therefore, it is only natural that we feel uncomfortable when it looks like we might lose them. Brought down to its most primative form, jealousy is the feeling that we get when someone else tries to come close to the thing or person that we love. More often it would be a person than a thing, as it is, for obvious reasons, easier to possess things. However, jealousy may result in behaviour that make you appear insecure or cause unneeded emotional damage to various parties. This might ultimately lead to strained relationships. Understanding that it is perfectly normal to feel jealous and being able to talk about it is a good way to get around negative actions that might arise from it.

xw 7:31 AM

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

I shrudder in anticipation as tommorow draws closer, minute by minute. Tommorow will be the day where what I have believe in all this while shall be tested. The Economics Mock Test! Will my knowledge for the subject be enough to allow me to pass this time? Only time will tell. Oh right, my Magic-8 Ball can tell too. "The part is yours" it says. How enigmatic.

As I scroll through all the pictures on my computer, I am reminded of the things I love. Well, some of it does remind me of that, there are some random ones which somehow managed to find their way in my file. The pictures have startigically been placed in four folders.

Looking at the card towers, I still cannot believe how much time I spent on them. They would just crash down with the slightest mistake, or when someone decides to on the fan. Ahha! Hexic pictures! I now have conclusive proof that I have way too much time to waste. At least I know for a fact that no one will ever beat my highscore, ever. Of course there are the pictures which I draw on MSN. They are artistically drawn to prove a point, each pixle placed to perfection. Some critics might say that they suck, but I think that if they had better imagination, they should actually be able to make out what I am trying to draw.

The rest of the pictures are dumped in this folder called "Random". Stupid blogger "Add Image Button" not working. My heart swells with disappointment as I conclude my post prematurely.

I is for Indifference. It is the lack of feeling towards something. Indifference can easily be demonstrated through contrasting it with other feelings. For example, if someone you love so dearly ignores you on MSN, you feel sad (hopefully not grief). If your Project Work member ignores you, you would feel angry. If it was your close friend, you would probably feel uneasy. But if it was Jack that was ignoring you, you will feel indifferent. You just cannot bring yourself to care. Basically, if you are indifferent towards something, you will not dwell on it for any more than a second.

xw 8:10 AM