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read between the lines
blog housekeeping tut, tut. looks like i have a lot of cleaning up and updating to do on my blog. i don't know what's with me these past few months. it's not that i have nothing to write, nor that i don't still churn out yarns of paragraphs; it's just, after i write the whole thing i find it too private or not meaningful or too whiny to post it here. so yeah, i have a lot of filtering to do before i put everything up and stop living in a temporary shell.sigh. speaking of which, over dinner my mom brought up the talk again about our projek terbengkalai (botched project) for renovating the house. of course she felt stressed out talking about it to my dad, which in turn made me feel a little stressed as well. it's been coming close to 4 years since a corrupt contractor, a "friend" of my father's, took up the job to renovate our house (it's in my blog entries around this time four years ago). long story short, he cheated us by using cheap materials, borrowing construction tools, engaging in shoddy workmanship and cutting corners (claiming this and that cannot be done any other way except in the most crude and basic way). he overshot our budget, his workers smoked and pissed in our now nonexistent garden, so my dad fired the contractor, the house has been left half-done and things remain the same to this day. thank god for protecting us from break-ins, considering one of our neighbours recently successfully got broken into (allegedly by the same unsuccessful previous attempter). over time, i learnt to forgive and forget (or more like deliberately not think of it), but whenever my mom chances upon the topic (today she suddenly remembered who "borrowed" our metal cutter when my dad wondered aloud where it was), you can feel the frustration and regret in her voice and not being able to complete this project and get this whole house done up for goodness' sake. there is one circumstance of inconvenience that reoccurs in my mind and frustrates me whenever i have to face it, though. i have been living in a makeshift bedroom for nearly four years, and so has my brother. he has no privacy cos his room is actually an open area, while for me, i haven't had a proper bed nor a likeable place to curl up and read a book in comfort...in four years. which sucks, because i end up wasting my time like today doing nothing at home outside my room as i am very particular about how my 'hiding place' should be like (besides, how do i hide in an open area?). upon reflection, i guess she feels the pinch more because she is past career-making age and can no longer hope to save up such money since whatever pension the government pays us here is pittance, whereas for me, in the back of my mind i have a rough dream of somehow accumulating enough money to pay for construction fees and fulfilling this unfinished business. i digress, but i think i'll leave this up, since after mulling over it, i realise i have to start somewhere. hopefully i will update soon, and i bear good news, which is what this blog needs i suppose, after hiding in the shadows of decay, depression and emotional death for...most of this year. gosh i can't believe we've three months left to the end of 2008 already, and i haven't even updated (in concrete posts) since the year began. [post-entry note: i did update my blog after all...by publishing all the drafts i'd saved. figured it would be better to leave the raw emotions out than to rewrite everything now.]
coming soon: joy it's about time this blog had some joy injected in it. and the time is coming...soon. once my joy ride stops tomorrow.wooohooo! contented i feel extremely contented right now, i don't know why. perhaps it's because i had a very long weekend (evaded that thing called work on friday thanks to my sickness), or that (for a few months) saturdays have always been my favourite slots for watching the telly, or simply because i had a relaxing day today, taking out my (proudly) self-purchased hp touchscreen pc and using up most of the free game sessions that came along with it.so maybe it is a good thing after all, falling sick. okay so i felt bad having to miss a wedding, and okay so i feel guilty having to miss church tomorrow (i wouldn't if there wasn't any peer pressure, because i think god understands), and of course i felt uneasy taking a day off work and not being able to squeeze in eight more hours of much-needed finishing up the project, but today i just put it all behind me and gave myself the break i needed, for once. and it feels like it's paying off now. of all the 100 free trial games i played, diner dash and fate were the closest to what i would find engaging; i'll have to leave out insaniquarium and nitro drive 'cos my brother used up their free sessions. it felt pretty good to hold, touch and doodle around (with the stylus) on the very first laptop (or tablet pc, to be politically correct) i bought with my own money -- it's that independent consumer thing; nothing beats using something you like that you were financially able to afford. side note: it also helped that i got it at a good deal, with an optical mouse, headset, upgrade to 4GB RAM and laptop bag (all hp products) thrown in, thanks to the second-last day of s'pore's recent pc fair -- probably the first and last time i will be going, no thanks to the crowd, the two-hour wait for the taxi back to jb due to terrible traffic congestion and this commanding biatch (see post script) i met while doing my rounds as i checked out what each booth had to offer. kind of like my baskin robbins ice-creams, the hmv on-sale CDs and the my chocolate indulgence cakes. the wrong impression would be that i splurge and i get these things often, but that isn't the case. it's just, lately comfort food has been...a source of comfort to me. an affordable comfort that i am able to get on my own, anytime i want, to ease me into something close to bliss. thank god for good genes providing high metabolism and (a blessing in disguise) daily exercise in the form of speedwalking through the customs crowd every day. back to after the tablet pc. (oh and i slept well, i woke up late but not extremely late.) grey's anatomy was supposed to come on, but instead they had this mooncake festival concert in this alien language called mandarin, so it gave me more time to match egyptian runes in some pyramid bejewelled-style game. cashmere mafia was up next, which, though no match for its tv slot predecessor, private practice, was better than nothing. then came beverly hills 90210 (not the new one, the very first season). at first when they announced they were showing the rerun i was rolling my eyes like the rest of the family, but watching it again is different this time around, 'cos i was a kid when that show first took off. the only thing i remembered as a kid was that jason priestley was hot and it was this show about students. ahahaha. well my memory did serve me well, but of course this time i am able to understand the dialogue and i now see why they compared my favourite O.C. to this show -- the similarities are obvious. (note: i can understand why the final season of the O.C. tanked...the storyline became just too illogical for suspension of disbelief to continue to take place.) yawn. i'm tired so instead of tying up this loose end i am going to stop abruptly and retire contentedly -- basically soak in this passing moment before i wake up and go back to the grind. p.s. "commanding biatch" -- she is the icon of why i hate the average girl. she recommended a laptop but someone else was perusing it, so while waiting i wanted to ask related questions but she cut me off and said in a really rude tone of voice, "let me explain the specifications to you first" like some madame hitler. and after rattling off whatever was on the brochure (as if i am blind or like a child in dictation class), i asked if the laptop in question could support games. "yes, but research shows that playing for hours on the laptop can spoil your eyesight." like, what kind of promoter are you to talk bad about your product and who are you to wrongly prejudge that i am an avid gamer? |
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