plan b

So it's the beginning of the weekend and all, and i'd been meaning to finally try and recap my recent trip back to the motherland over here (not as much for others to read as for me to be able to have something concrete for me to actually recall what happened there in the distant future...)

Alas, circumstances have made it such that it is way past the time when my brain is normally capable of such deep recollective and reflective thought, so the aforementioned post will have to wait till another day for it to reach fruition. Instead i'll stick to random thoughts over the past couple of weeks.

The recently concluded summer break has in certain ways been anything but, owing to the amount of stuff that i had on my plate from both moving house and then settling in (which is, as always, a work in continual, and i fear eternal progress); as well as from cf stuff (which has thankfully been more enjoyable, but still time-consuming and tiring). Still, however, i'm glad it was, when all is said and done, a fulfilling one, not only due to the timely and sorely-needed quick escapes from S'pore to our friendly ASEAN neighbors; but i guess due to the stuff that contributed to busyness as well...

When i was recalling the year past and how i missed things that happened then, one thing that i forgot to mention was how last year's national day was my favorite one in a long time. Um, unfortunately, it was precisely because i was out of the country that it was my favorite one. Yeah (and i hope the people up there in charge of the national pottery don't take offense if they ever should read this) i'm sorry but i'm just not a fan of huge outward displays of patriotism. My personal take is that resources could be far better spent elsewhere, and particularly not spent on things like the commissioning of atas nat'l day songs that seem to be less your love for the country than a lesson in world geography cum a rubbing it in to the average S'porean who probably counts the occasional weekend trip up to Genting or even JB as a real treat that some of us (um and i readily admit i'm one of them) just have been blessed to have it much better or the choreographing equally atas mass display programs that seemed more a showcase either of unwilling or, worse yet, alarmingly enthu parade participants with drag queen outfitting and makeup (more befitting perhaps of The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert than of a country's birthday celebration - and yes, freaky red fish-man, i'm talking about you here...) than the retelling of the S'porean past.

It's not that i don't like this country (though once again i'll readily admit that many people love it more than i do), but rather exactly because i do that i shudder to see how it celebrates its birthday each tacky year after another. Well, if there's anything i am happy about from this year's festivities, is that the engineers played a key role in its execution, and that the guy in charge, the current CEO, is a real nice guy whom i respect from the time i was still serving. And if there's anything that i'm even happier about, it's that he was not tasked to do this five years ago, for if so i might be the one frustratingly burning weekends and then some for an event i don't really care much for...

And so now school has started... As i've probably mentioned somewhere before, i'm really thankful that my workload this year isn't that bad after all, owing to one times favorable exchange last year which cleared me of 37.5% of a typical honors year workload. That's freed up much deeply-treasured time for lots of other things.

It hasn't been all roses though. My classes (especially the honors ones), while hardly as bad as i thought they would be, are still nevertheless a challenge (for one of my classes, i nearly freaked out when i entered the room early and lo and behold the lecturer was talking to one grad student in Mandarin - i immediately put my bag down and went outside to check the room number, and it was correct - but it turns out that he was only talking to the student in Mandarin cos i guess more efficient communication could then be carried out - the proceeding lecture, save for the occasional, incomprehensible cheng yu here and there, was thankfully in English). The future of any possible thesis looks as grim as ever since yours truly is too indecisive thus far to narrow down a topic in any way (although the deadline is still weeks away, i know i'll procrastinate heaps) And the other day, i got so tired after four days of continuous activity, late nights and early mornings, that i think my energy level just fluctuated downwards drastically, so for the first time in my living memory i skipped cg to just go home and rest. I guess it's still early days yet though, so there's the unavoidable slow adjustments that have to be made...

partial recall

On this note of my less-than-effective guard dog, here goes a mundane recap of the past week plus or so since exams ended...

Think that everyone had a good time over at night cycling last week. I must say that i was a little intimidated at first as to how to get everyone organized and ready, but things really worked out well in the end by God's grace. Weather was great, fellowship was great, route was reasonable, food was ... erm relatively missing but still ok lah... Overall hope that the tradition will continue cos think it's more than worth it to do so...

Over the weekend i also finally got my hands on it - a little on the expensive side maybe, but worth it especially in the long run methinks... Maybe she's a bit too fat for my liking, ah but i'll get used to it...

Mon was games day - and once again we had great weather. Think i was so un-used to such perpetual sunniness that i had a bit of a headache for the rest of the day - dehydration maybe... But anyways, had a great time playing ultimate and captain's ball - a good way to destress after exams that's for sure.

After arts fg (which i've been missing for quite some time already), it was agm time. Glad that things went far more smoothly than last year's did. I definitely don't recall laughing so much at an agm of any sort before (and many thanks to people like Ade Fam, Debs and Evan for that - and guess what? Their initials spell ADE - incidentally the chief unintentional inducer of amusement - think she must have set some sort of a record for non-exco member whose name appears most often in the agm report...)

One thing i've noticed is that since i've come back, every time after i get a hair cut i see people i hadn't seen since before i left, and people still remark on how my hair has grown so long and therefore i was hard to recognize - at agm was no exception...

There also was pecop, which was a great experience i thought. All the fun that XK and i had preparing for our nonsense songs aside, the whole concept in itself was a refreshing one, and it did work well, by God's grace. Um and i thought i'd be far more verbose over here but somehow nothing comes to mind so i shall leave it at that...

Went to cycle and think some things through the other day - decided to take a route i haven't taken in maybe nine months - up ecp and the airport-hugging road to Changi Village and back. That road in particular, come to think of it, has remained remarkably free of roadkill in the ten or so times i've gone past it (save for a solitary snail at last year's night cycling), and i was just thinking that when what else should i chance upon but a squashed monitor lizard. And in fact, before i had reached Changi Beach Park, i encountered one more squashed monitor lizard and two squashed snakes. - enough to make at least one handbag methinks... Then i was lamenting to myself that i was glad that i didn't see any live snakes, so what should i encounter mere minutes later but a snake slithering away from me as i cycled past. The anti-cherry on the cake was when i was back at ecp and noticed a parrot chick that must have fallen from its nest onto the bike path just in time to swerve to the side to avoid squashing it. I then continued another twenty minutes or so before turning back and thinking of putting it to one side, when who should appear but a less keenly-eyed cyclist who must have run the chick over, since i heard a loud squeak and him breaking suddenly =( I honestly felt guilty for the next ten minutes or so, but odf course i didn't want to go back and see what actually happened to the parrot so i cycled away...

Well, the past few days i ended up at a place i originally had no intention of being at, but at the end of the day i guess i'm glad i did go in the first place, even if i haven't arrived at any decision even now. We'll see how things go lah...

What's up with Federer?

dilemma

Just over ninety hours before my essay is due and here i am still deciding between two of the given topics.

I thought i had, after a week or so of lazy consideration, decided to do the question which features the most familiar subject matter, so that things would be more straightforward.

But now i am suddenly torn between this question and another one which is very much more unconventional and therefore more risky to attempt cos if i did it wrongly i'd fall flat on my face.

Why am i even considering this second question then? Because i think that at least half of the cohort will be doing the first question, as the subject matter is as, if not more familiar, to them as it is to me. Taking that into consideration it will certainly be harder to score well for this question, unless i produce an exceptional essay, which i think at this stage is far beyond me.

One thing though, is that due to my late start, practically all the resources that may have proved useful for me have already been borrowed out. That being said, however, the nature of the second question is such that not much sources are needed, and furthermore i do have some existing sources with me left over from the last essay...

So after purposefully blogging out my thought processes here i have come to a decision, i shall take a risk and attempt the second question. We'll see how lah...

to go or not to go?

Ok i do realise that there are many more important things that i could be doing at this moment (such as actually start on my due-on-thursday essay) but i decided to take a look at the sep website instead...

Now, i suppose the answer to the titular question is a bit of a no-brainer (YES), especially in considering that the cash factor is not an issue, due to certain provisions that have come by God's grace (i shall not elaborate here due to my irrational fear of these provisions somehow evaporating into thin air - with blogs nowsaday one can never be too careful)...

But still, anyone who knows me knows that i am not one for hassle (i.e. i am lazy - i refer you to my now three-year-old struggle to just head down to register for basic theory), and the whole sep process is just one such bothersome thingy...

Furthermore, there are so many sub-decisions to make in the course of the whole thing, and decision ranking doesn't rank very high on my comfortability meter either (i.e. i am indecisive - i refer you to how i choose where to eat when at a shopping centre - go to the mall directory, close my eyes, and randomly point my finger in the direction of the f&b section of the directory, eating at wherever my finger lands)...

And after reading Sida's mid-sem progress report, the slacker in me is having second thoughts...

That being said, i have already been making grand plans in my head as to how i could use sep to my advantage to siam some modules back here that i really dun want to do (with special reference to my cs2 modules *bleah*)...

Also, finally a chance to go overseas for an extended period of time and just recharge in a whole new environment, away from all that is *insert random negative word of your choice (once again, you never know which dubious character could be reading this)* back here.

Once again, for me the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.

(btw the above also applies to my ongoing struggle with my dear essay that just refuses to get started in my head...)