Rambles

Reflection 141: On Annoying Commenters on Blogs

Sun, 03 Jan 2010 17:36:59 GMT

I like taxidiary.blogspot.com

Not the best writing, or the best or most informed opinions of the world, but it's good stuff. Nice, funky anecdotes and slices of life, nothing too serious. And the premise is quite amusing.

Of course, such a blog with such a novel premise draws a lot of attention. A lot of people read it, and a lot of them become commenters.

As with all commenters, some are absolute turds, like this guy called rajapisang. He's annoying, very rude, and (warning: understatement) doesn't sound too bright.

I just found the best response to him. Now I'm waiting for him to say something stupid again, so I can use it.

I'm terribly bored aren't I?

Reflection 140: On Something That Was Meant For Twitter But Was Too Long (Like This Title)

Thu, 31 Dec 2009 04:34:53 GMT

Newsweek calls Arts & Letters Daily “the go-to site for the world’s procrastinating intellectuals.”

I'm not sure if I count as an intellectual, but I certainly procrastinate!!!

Reflection 135: On Malaysia

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 16:54:59 GMT

Am headed off to Malaysia from 18 to 22. Will be contactable by phone, but it is expensive (especially for calls, SMS is ok). Will have Internet unless the neighbour turns it off.

Happy holidays! All the best with apps! And dinner was awesome today :) Thanks guys for coming :)

Reflection 133: On Laziness

Sun, 13 Dec 2009 09:11:37 GMT

I've been terribly lazy these past few days, and hence the US apps lie on my computer mostly undone...

I need to be more hardworking!!! ARGH!

Reflection 132: Stephen Fry Wins!

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 14:53:57 GMT

Stephen Fry is brilliant!

Reflection 131: Senior Citizen

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 14:07:07 GMT

I spent today playing mahjong, while wheezing, coughing and drinking tea.

I'm practically 80 now...

Reflection 129: Passport

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 06:08:08 GMT

It takes 9 hours to renew a Malaysian passport

Great...

Reflection 127: Medication

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 14:01:11 GMT

I can't handle this: I'm taking syrup medication for cough. Wth... I cannot do this. This is too much...

Reflection 126: Shopping

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 06:09:07 GMT

My shopping skills are retarded. So stupid!!!

I could have gotten the stupid bow tie cheap, but I didn't know where to find it. Instead of calling up friends to ask, I bought some overpriced thing at Taka! And it's not even self-tie! WTH! Damn dumb...

zzz I am going to get my refund etc...

Reflection 125: Frivolous FTW!

Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:59:09 GMT

What I have:

Suit (jacket and pants)
White long sleeve spread collar shirt (standard, so nothing fancy like removable cuffs etc.)
Black socks
Black leather shoes

What I need:

Black Bow tie
Handkerchief/Pocket square

What I want:

White long sleeve wing collar shirt
Bowler hat
White, red and pink roses/carnations

What I dream about:

Ferragamo shoes
Silk Black Bow Tie
Silk White Bow Tie

And on a random note, I love Aldo ads! I don't know why! I just love them! I think I shall swing by and have a looksee.

Reflection 121: ><

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 11:57:04 GMT

There comes a time in a man's life, when he has to get utterly decimated by something.

That time for me was today

Reflection 120: Code Monkey...

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 12:37:03 GMT

When I fail my A levels, I'm going to vocational school to become a code monkey!

Reflection 119: Taking a Break from LIFE

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 13:16:03 GMT

That's quite literally (ha!) how I feel right now. Life has come to a complete standstill, pushed roughly aside to make away for the behemoth that is the A levels.

The gravity of the situation is nigh unfathomable. And frankly quite annoying.

Because of this, I am currently unable to, among other things:

Apply myself in deep intellectual pursuits like blogging about epistemology and political philosophy
Apply myself in nerdy pursuits like designing/writing unnecessarily grandiose computer infrastructure
Apply myself in frivolous pursuits like reading Leviathan, Nozick, picking up a new manga (or 2), and watching Gureto Ticha Onizuka (among other excellently (read: frivolously) produced Japanese drama serials).

Argh! As! I hate you so!

After all this, I am intent on getting dead, piss drunk. I don't intend to come home for 2 days because of that.

21 more days!

Reflection 118: Bonne Chance

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 12:49:47 GMT

Bonne chance tout le monde! Il y a 22 jours!

Reflection 117: On a Comic

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:53:54 GMT

Of all the random, pointless things I read, this is perhaps my favourite comic of all:

www.xkcd.com

Warning: A lot of the humour is nerd humour, like really nerd humour. My kind of humour, haha.

Reflection 116: On Music Part II

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 12:35:23 GMT

Many thanks to jumbiez for introducing me to this!!!

Reflection 115: Argh!

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 10:47:01 GMT

Argh! TSA!

Ok, the MCQ wasn't too bad, even though I am unsure about half the paper.

But argh! My essay! I never imagined myself writing something so bad! But for some reason in that half hour, everything went wrong. I was incoherent, I had contrived examples, and ARGH!

As the days go by, so do my dreams of Oxford; it's all flying away.

Ah well, the other options aren't so bad...

Cheerios

Reflection 114: On Stories

Sun, 25 Oct 2009 03:43:13 GMT

Everyone has a story to tell; stories about their lives, who they were, who they are, who they want to be. Stories tell you a lot about people, even when they're not explicit. Down to the little quirk in a person's behaviour can be explained by something. And once you have gathered enough stories, people become predictable. Not in a bad way of course, but humans were never evolved/designed to be unpredictable creatures. We are irrational, but not unpredictable.

What's your story?

Reflection 113: L'espirit

Sat, 24 Oct 2009 14:23:53 GMT

L'espirit vagabonde quelquefois. C'est étrange.

Reflection 112: On Music

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 13:39:37 GMT

Of all the music I listen to, these I like best:

Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp minor "Quasi una fantasia", Op. 27, No. 2, 1st Movement Adagio sostenuto (aka Moonlight sonata)
Played by Wilhelm Kempff

Chopin: Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor, Op. 11, 2nd Movement Romance - Larghetto
Played by Li Yundi

Reflection 111: On Smiles and Frowns

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 12:03:43 GMT

"It takes seventeen muscles to smile and forty-three muscles to frown"

I used to like this quote, until I gave it a bit more thought. It's absolutely ridiculous. So what if smiling is muscle-wise easier than frowning? Doesn't mean it's always easier to smile. Some days you feel like smiling, some days you feel like frowning. There are even times when it's easier to frown or cry than it is to smile, and to the biologists who like to utilise their sense of humour by constructing such patently untrue quotes, these activities are far more exhausting than smiles. There are REAL quotes that make sense, like "The grass is always greener on the other side" or "Look for the silver lining"; these make some sense a lot of the time. But the only times you can apply this ridiculous muscle/smile/frown thing, i.e. when people feel like frowning, it. Just. Doesn't. Help.

No one cares if it takes seventeen muscles to smile and forty-three muscles to frown.

Edit: This was inspired by seeing the quote on the train. Really annoyed me to no end, being the intolerable ass that I usually am.

Reflection 110: On Long Nails

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 12:42:55 GMT

I like keeping long nails. I especially like how they look when they're clean, well-shaped, and unadorned. Long nails look best as I type, especially SMS-ing. Because the nails obstruct my typing, I have to re-angle my fingers, and I get to hold my phone and SMS in my idealised effeminate manner. Long nails under a faded, faint sunlight are wispy and surreal. They have this soft glow and glisten.

I like long nails.

Reflection 109: On the Coming Months

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 07:30:17 GMT

It suddenly dawned on me how daunting the coming months are going to be. It's not just all the studying and sitting for one of the most important examinations I will sit for in my 18 years of life. It's also the prospect of being forced to grow up, being shoved out of an organised school system, where for once anything and everything you do you are legally responsible for. It is also the end of my 9 years of education here, because I am almost certainly going to have to leave Singapore for university abroad, and leaving behind not only the friends but the uniquely quirky environment I have grown up in, not as a total stranger, but not a local either.

I'm not sure how I will cope the next few months, both academically and emotionally. I've never had an emotional breakdown from stress over studying before, but then again the stress I am likely to face seems to far exceed whatever I have experienced, especially since I can no longer employ my old tactic of shrugging things off on the basis of there is a "next time". Not that I'm terribly concerned, distressed or anxious about the entire thing; things will come and go, and I suppose I will find a way. But that in no way reduces the scale of the daunt that I face.

All the best for As :) May your dreams come true

Reflection 108: On the Prelims

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 12:12:44 GMT

Ah, the prelims. These wonderfully boring and annoying exams. Vaguely reminiscent of the A levels, yet not quite there yet. And to think we studied like no tomorrow for these; we'll have to do it again. Sigh... The thought of spending the 18th year of your life doing this is so depressing. That so many no longer understand the significance of turning 18 could perhaps be a tragedy wrought unto us by the As...

But enough with the melodrama, which I had a lot of fun typing. The prelims have been pretty decent to me, I must admit. Objectively speaking I should have nothing to complain about. For the amount of hard work I put in, to get the grades I got is pretty spectacular to me, especially since I seriously wasn't expecting much from myself for these prelims. So it's all round good stuff, not as bad as I thought it would be.

Strangely though, I was left with a sour feeling this week, sort of like drinking lemon juice sometimes; oddly unpleasant, even though I quite like lemon juice. I can't find the source of this lemony feeling though, which is rather odd. I don't suppose it's a deep-seated feeling of disappointment that I did not do better for Econs, but I really shouldn't be complaining as on both a relative and absolute standard I did pretty alright - not anything worth or deserved of complaining about. And I far exceeded my expectations...

Alas, I shall not care, for my grades are my grades, which are 1) pretty good and 2) in any case very inconsequential to my life.

All the best for As!

Reflection 105: In 6 Hours

Sun, 27 Sep 2009 17:59:57 GMT

In 6 hours I will sit for the single most difficult exam paper in my entire life. It is 2 am in the morning, I am unable to fall asleep, random trade concepts are floating in my head, most of which I doubt are relevant to tomorrow. Otherwise, irrational insecurities creep into my mind about my prelim grades, every ounce of sleep I get is a dream about tomorrow being a disaster, or my results being a holocaust. I am wholly unprepared for the stress and the difficulty. Love Me, Hate Me, Kill Me Now!

ARGHLE!!!