Tying things up.

This is a weird sort of defiance that even I don't understand.

It's kind of like this - You gimme exams, make me study, stop me from going online for two whole weeks?
You made my two weeks miserable as heck?
Now that exams are over, I'mma go online and I'm gonna SPEND HOURS online. Even if I have nothing to do on the net, I'm at the computer just to be online. I'll show you!

And I don't even know who 'You' is.


So anyway.

For the first time since I started SAM, I actually really studied. And I mean really really studied.

You know, the lock-yourself-in-your-room-become-a-two-week-hermit kind of study.

Other than a steamboat dinner with friends, it was a 'no' to anyone who suggested anything other than learning about photons and electrons and cells in my body.

Back in high school, I used to be a Two-Week Hermit all the time.

Even if I almost never do my homework, don't even have the exercise books we're supposed to have, got the teacher so exasperated she made me stand one period, daydream during classes and was completely blur about things (hence the two-week pre-exam intense cramming), I'd at least put in effort during exams.

This year, however, had been a slack-all-you-want year for me.

I'd go to class blur, don't understand what little notes I copy during class, return from college and go back the next day without having my bag opened once, and go in for exams still being blur.

Ahhhh, my highschool self would've been disappointed.

So anyway, I slaved my ass off for the trials, so if I still fail/borderline pass, then you know, it's meant to be.



All the above, is a very circuitous way of getting to the main point of the post.

And yeah, "circuitous" is not a word I knew all along (it means 'very round-about', by the way). I am, unfortunately, in the middle of memorising as many SAT words as I can. Saaaaaaaaaad huh?

So like I said, I was surfing the net just for the sake of surfing the net, showing defiance to the "you" who made me take exams, and was reading a stranger's blog, and she was studying for the SAT.

How do you study for the SAT??

She was panicking because she couldn't finish preparing, which made me very VERY nervous because the test is next week and I have done zilch preparations, save for ONE test practice!


How how how?

Trials just ended today, and now I have to go and prepare for another test taking place nest week.

Then two weeks after the SAT, I have the TOEFL to sit for.

Two weeks after that, I'll be sitting for the SAT Subject Tests.

Two DAYS after that, the Dreaded Finals.

The be-all-and-end-all of SAM.

The screw-this-up-and-you-just-threw-away-RM20k-of education.

The one that determines your future, and your past (y'know, whether your past 11 months have been a complete waste of time).

So yeah.

Five different exams (including this trial exam), all within the space of 1.5 months.


As such, I have written a note to myself, telling Present-Chooi that she will NOT let Future-Chooi down.
She will make full use of every single day of the next one month.
She will study like she has never before.
She will redeem all the C's and D's she has so far gotten for SAM.
She will not get the TER of 60 that her ex-physics teacher had predicted of her class (which is virtually useless, what self-respecting university would accept you then?).


(My ex-physics teacher has very uninspiring expectations of us. Prior to the first common test, he told me I was going to fail the paper, which I did NOT grrrrrr. Then when I got a very average result during common test 3, he told me to ask my parents for a car, which got me thinking, "Had I really been that bad?")


So okay, I will try harder to get better grades.

My motivation?

The knowledge that after this one month of gruelling studying, I'd be free for the next 9 months.

Nine months!

Assuming things go the way I hope, of course.

So.

Wish me a lot of luck, hope that nothing interesting and potentially distracting will take place for the next one month, and pray my determination and self-discipline will not crumble by the day.

That is all!

When you wish Things were just THINGS

- Instead of being made up of atoms and molecules.

Life would be so much simpler then.


* * * * *

You know that U2 song that tells us not to worry about things?

"What you don't have you don't need it now,
what you don't know you can feel it somehow."


Then why when I look at Chemistry questions, and I feel I have the right answer, it turns out wrong half the time?

I hate Chemistry.


Thou givest me the nastiest headache ever.




5 more days to go!

Must-have qualities. Maybe.

Oh, now I get what Lu meant when she went, "You've been tagged." I thought she just meant she's tagging on my tagboard.

Anyway, I've never done a meme, so here it goes!

RULES:
1. The tag victim has to come up with 8 different points about his/her perfect lover.
2. Have to mention the gender of his/her perfect lover.
3. Tag eight other victims to join this game and leave a comment on their blog.
4. If you are tagged the second time, there is NO need to do this again.
5. Lastly, and most importantly, HAVE FUN DOING IT.


Broad-minded
This is a must. Especially in religion.

There is such a thing as being too religious (pushy about their religion, disrespecting other faiths, etc), which does not fit with me. Agnostic-type discussions would be interesting, don't you think?

Also, has to be fairly acceptive of people. You know, no racist comments, not homophobic, that kind of thing.


Clean
By this I mean not drinking / smoking / doing drugs. I cannot imagine living with someone who is intoxicated half the time.

And if someone goes and gets himself involved with that kind of thing, you know he probably isn't very intelligent.


Optimistic
Very, very important.

I've had a few clashes with my mom because she is pretty much a jaded 53-year-old who is cynical about things, people, and the world at large. I think she thinks the world is ugly, and people cannot really be trusted.

I think it's the cynical people that make the world that way.

I believe in good things to come. I believe in serendipity. I believe in The Apocalypse That Changes The World. I believe in the world during Genesis.

You have to. Otherwise life would be like dry toast.
("Ian Miller's family is like a piece of dry toast. Ian has a toast family!")


Chews with mouth closed
I'm sorry. It annoys me to no end when someone chews like he's worried no one knows he's chewing.

Also, you can tell a lot about someone by the way the handle bones when they eat. People either
1. put them aside on their plate, or
2. dump them on the table then scoop them onto the plate when they're finished, or
3. dump them on the table, and leave it there

Number 3 is a big no-no.

Eating habits is obviously very important to me.


Doesn't mind a bit of mess
If someone can put up with my mess, then that's a very big plus. If someone clears my stuff without first asking me, they're struck off the list right away.

And just to make things clear, I'm not dirty. My room is a mess (organized mess - there's a difference), but there are no dirty plates lying around, no candy wrappers, no mold growing on stuff.


Likes females
Pretty self-explanatory.

You've heard of people finding a decade after their marriage that their spouses are in fact attracted to the opposite sex.

Of course, who is it that likes females (i.e. what gender they are of themselves), is a different matter altogether!

* * * * *

Um, that is only six points, but I cannot think of anything else.

If you must know, the points above are in order - from being the Most Important at the top, to being the Somewhat Important.

Who do I tag?

I dunno, everybody seems to have done it already (a year ago somemore), so I tag whoever has nothing else to write in their blogs. Or who want to match-make themselves with blog-readers-cum-prospective-life-partners.

I broke the "8 points" rule, might as well break the "tag 8 people" rule.

I hope Mr. Yap doesn't see this.

It's not a very appropriate blog topic for your lecturer to see.


I am a bit too idealistic with the whole "soul mate" thing.

I mean, I actually really do believe in love at first sight. And having THAT ONE PERSON somewhere on earth.
(Which of course, doesn't makes sense, because if there already is a soul-mate, my list is then rendered useless.)

I also naively believe in first-real-love-that-lasts-for-eternity.

Which is why Gajendran asked me last year, "You think life is a fairy-tale?"

Actually, yes. Kind of.

Only just a little less perfect, and a lot more homework to complete.

Greeks and Tenors

Journal entry #000:

I hate diaries.

I hate Ian's long hair - it is so unbecoming. Maybe he should've worn the dress and veil during the wedding.

I hate the wedding. My own daughter, doing it to spite me.

(Did you know, the word "wedding" comes from the Greek word "jdfixwrycvn", which means "Gus-does-NOT-write-in-diaries".)

I am not a sissy man. I don't lament in diaries about regrets and talk about lessons-I-have-learned-about-different-cultures.

I am a manly man.

I never flinch in the face of adversity - I just use Windex.

And I DON'T write in diaries.













* * * * *

Never liked writing essays on How I've Learned To Accept Cultures.

We did it with June May in the Joy Luck Club, we wrote about how she finally embraced her Chinese roots.

Now Gus has learned to accept non-Greeks, and really, Cultural Lessons is the most boring topic to write about.

* * * * *

Speaking of media people, fictional or otherwise - I finally realize the gravity of the death of Luciano Pavarotti.

Since I was in primary school, my father would listen to The Three Tenors, and his favourite had probably been Pavarotti, seeing that he always goes, "Roti, Roti!" around the house.

His rendition of Nessun Dorma is the only one of such piece to go into my iPod's Top 25 Most Played.


We were looking at the article in The Star that reported his death, and I was stupid enough to go, "Eh look, his eyebrows are thicker than his eyes!"

Which is, obviously, NOT the kind of thing you say about a man who could sing opera and died from battling cancer.

R.I.P.