Huggies or Drypers

In a few days, I will attend my first Baby's First Month celebration. The closest thing we have to a Western Baby Shower, the guests usually bring something useful for the Mum/Baby and leave with Dyed Red Eggs and Sponge Cake. I'm not sure of the relevance of the guest's gifts but, hey they're usually tasty enough. Maybe I'll find out this Sunday. Anyway a colleague for M/s L has just gone and had little Baby E, and I mentioned it to my Dad when we were out today. He said buying diapers was usually a good idea, and when I texted the New Mum, she said Huggies or Drypers. So a-hunting I will go over the next few days for Huggies or Drypers.

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Today was a strange day. I woke up with the full intention of just staying home and ordering Pizza in, and ended up all over in places I never thought of. It first started when I woke up and realised my Dad was still home. He asked me to go to Johor Bahru with him, and looking at the sky (cause it seemed nice and clear today), said OK. So off we went to JB, and had fish porridge for lunch. Then we went grocery shopping, and he ran some errands. We managed to cross the border back to Singapore by 4:00pm, and straight away headed downtown to run more errands.

First stop was Change Alley, where I finally went to change money for my upcoming Japan trip with Joaquin. Then we headed to Marina Square to collect some home entertainment system for my Grandmama that she got with some credit card promotion. It was when my Dad was topping up his ERP card for the car that he got a call from my Grandmama that derailed the rest of our plans. She was in Plaza Singapura, and in a lot of pain. She wanted my Dad to come over and help her. She also mentioned she couldn't walk.

So off we went, first to a Church Friend's house to borrow his wheelchair. Recently he had gotten into an accident. While rounding a bend in his spiffy 500cc motorbike (I think), he had lost his balance and fell off the motorbike. The motorbike then fell on top of him, and broke his leg. Anyway, he had a wheelchair handy, so my Dad drove to his place to borrow it.

Then we headed to Plaza Singapura to pick up Mama and Matthew, who had gone there to watch a movie and have lunch. They were sitting in the food court.

Then we drove to Tan Tock Sing Hospital's Accident and Emergency department, which was quite a mess. We waited about 30 minutes for her the see the triage nurse. Then Mama got directed to the X-Ray department and we couldn't follow her any longer, so I took Matthew back to Mama's in a cab, then headed home myself.

I feel quite headachy now. Need to plan for tomorrow's relief teaching class at 1pm. 

Dilbert and Haze

I sort of feel a bit like this now from work. Am feeling really tired and would LOVE to just stop teaching and be able to clear all those compositions that have been weighing on my mind. Unfortunately that's not about to happen any time soon. Instead the haze has gone and reduced my productivity by at least 30% by making me feel giddy and mentally displaced from whatever is in front of me. I took an MC today, hoping that I could rest and get well for the rest of the week, unfortunately the damn thing's gone and peaked at 290+ which means my resting today could well nigh be in vain.

I'm currently reading Vanity Fair now by William Makepeace Thackeray. I can't remember when I started it, Saturday or Sunday evening perhaps, and am now quite besotted. Only thing I must say about it that's bad is that it is slow paced (considering I just finished a PD James novel - Death in Holy Orders) and it is INCREDIBLY heavy and thick, making reading it in a comfortable position pretty unattainable.

I currently taste smoke and ash at the back of my throat. Seriously. 

Dustbin

Yesterday I went out with my Dad to pick up Ryan and go to Toyogo to buy plastic drawers. There, I found a nice small dustbin for $1.80. We bought the dustbin. For the past week or so, I've been dustbin-less in the office because the Cleaning Aunty took the bin away, because some asshats have been throwing food leftovers into the bin. It's like nevermind that we're university educated professionals, we're still not mature enough to have our own damn bin because people aren't civic-minded enough. Anyway stupid shit tossed into the bin aside, I realised the Cleaning Aunty couldn't take the bin away if it was a proper plastic thing, rather than a makeshift bin made of a cardboard box. So yeah I bought a bin. I'll bring it after the next makeshift bin gets tossed away, since I managed to make one just last Friday, complete with a sign telling people to NOT TOSS FOOD WASTE into it. 

Quite tired because I stayed late to work in the office, and I still have more to prepare for lessons tomorrow. Urgh. 

I have a supermassive craving for Thosai now ):

156

Took the 156 back home today as usual, except this time I got one of those old early 2000s type rickety-shuddery buses rather than the new sleek stable ones. The interior was pretty dark as some of the ceiling lightbulbs has blown, and the windows were frosted beyond belief with thick droplets on condensation. In short you couldn't really read on the bus (as I am wont to do every time with BBC on my phone) or look thoughtfully out the window. Plus I started to develop a headache from being shaken about. I tried closing my eyes initially, but somehow felt even worse. Instead as the bus trundled  down its route, I started looking around.

As a prominent stop, a male Indian boy and a Chinese girl got on the bus and sat right in front of me. I mention the race because I have a soft spot for mixed race couples, and I was somehow eager to see something different on the bus. Maybe she'd lean on his shoulder or something. Anyway she soon got off, telling him to 'let her know how things go'. I was about to turn back to attempting to read the news of my phone when I noticed he was holding his phone up so high, that I could read his texts. My eyes were also drawn to the fact that he was typing 'Fuckkkkkkkkkk' into my phone.

Shamefully, I ended up eyes-dropping on him. There was simply nothing else to do on the bus to keep me stimulated or entertained, and I longed to be off and reach home. The best thing seemed to be keeping mentally occupied, so I wouldn't notice how damn slow the bus was moving. I surmised that he was probably texting a sister, as their exchange centered mainly around him being horrendously late for something, and the word that cropped up in almost every reply back to her was 'Fuckkkkkkkkkk' with multiple 'k's. Poor lad. I assume it's his Dad he's worried about, considering his age.

He got off a few stops before me, so I assume whatever he was fearing on the bus has either come true around now, or has already passed. This sort of reminds me a little about Das Leben Der Anderen, but is obviously more selfish and anti-social. Oops.

I had a long and tiring day at work. 

Populaire

Just got back from watching Populaire with Shu and Tiff. The movie was at 7pm, and around 11am I got notice from The Office that they wanted me to teach a class at 5pm. Oh boy did I pray to wriggle out of it! In the end I managed to get a 3pm class, and snuck out early from work, feeling utterly rotten. I figured I had lesson prep left, and I could do that at home anyway. Just like I plan to do in about 30 minutes time. I ran into Tiff at the train station at around 6:45pm, and we rushed to buy Burger King to eat in the cinema. Shu went to collect tickets, and we made it into the theatres a few minutes late... only to be inundated by more trailers HAHAHA. I guess they figured 7pm was a tight timing for the working crowd.

Populaire was lovely. Much nicer than The Great Gatsby. Certainly more intelligent and charming. I loved Deborah Francois in the movie. Everything, from her clothes to her cute ponytail, was amazing. Ahh, to be French, beautiful and quirky. The male lead however, Romain Duris, reminded me of Sarkozy for some odd reason. That kind of killed any sex appeal he was supposed to have, for me. Also realised this was the first movie I watched with Shu and Tiff since coming back to Singapore. Woo.

It's currently Week 36 since I started working. Sometimes I feel like I know what I'm doing, other times I feel like I'm utterly hopeless and a shit at my job. I wonder if this on-and-off self-doubt/double-thinking is normal, or healthy?

Spiders and Kennedys

Recently a spider has taken up residence in my bathroom. It seems to be fairly nocturnal, because I only see it at night. Then again that could say more about my waking hours than the spider's actual habits, but I never see it in the afternoon. When I first saw it, it gave me an unpleasant surprise because it was awfully large - about 5 cm in diameter - bloody huge for a house spider. BRRRRR. That time I managed to scare it off by tossing some extra water I had in a cup in its direction. After that I kept seeing it around. About after a week I got used to seeing it hanging about on the ground. It would stay completely still if I was around, which suited me fine. I have no desire to squish things as long as they do not come towards me.

One day however while on the loo, I started counting its legs and somehow counted 6. This led to some minor soul/brain searching as I tried to figure out how I had confused it for a spider, followed by dammit-I'm-sure-it-was-a-spider. The next time I went to the bathroom and saw the spider, I counted its legs again and this time got 7. So it was a 1-leg-less spider. I wondered how it lots its leg.

When I finished showering today, I spotted it hanging off the wall near the shower curtains. Never actually saw it anywhere but on the floor before, so that kind of gave me a little shock. Still it's strange how people get used to things. I guess it has partly to do with the fact that I think spiders are far more acceptable than other sorts of insects, and how all this one does is stay still or scamper away from me. I doubt I'd ever have this sort of odd relationship with URGH a cockroach.

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Tuesday as usual is a day spent preparing for Wednesday. I worked till a little bit past 7:45pm and then headed off home. My side of the office was empty when I left. After coming back and talking to Joaquin, then eating dinner and showering (where I saw the spider hanging on the wall), I finally sat down and started planning my lesson for tomorrow.

This time it's a short piece on Caroline Kennedy, and I started digging around for more general knowledge to feed my students with, especially on JFK's death and how dramatic Lyndon B. Johnson's swearing in ceremony was (99 minutes after JFK's death, on Air Force One!). I finally watched the Walter Cronkite clip of him announcing JFK's death, and as I listened I just left incredibly sad. I can't imagine what it must have felt like to live in America at the time and feel so scared and uncertain after a political leader's sudden death.

Feeling quite easily emotional nowadays, urgh. I hope my students don't get on my nerves tomorrow :x

Pomfets

Yesterday I had lunch with my Guo Mah and parents at a Teochew restaurant in Bendeemer. As my father pointed out, the place was filled with families bringing grandparents out for lunch, and we were no exception. My Mum ordered a pomfret fish for lunch, and when it came out it was huge and tasty. I mentioned that this particular pomfret was cooked exactly the way I remember it to be when I was growing up, steamed with ginger, tomatoes and some sour plum thing, and how we no longer ate it at home. My Mum said it was because my Dad didn't buy it anymore because it's now far more expensive than when I was growing up. Then something sort of clicked in my mind even though I knew about the upsurge in price before: I was eating soon-to-be-extinct fish. I started to feel real guilty.

The fish was still nice, but it had somehow lost some of his flavour after that conversation, and I didn't really want to eat it anymore. The though of eating something to extinction made me feel kind of disgusted, like we humans were so satisfied to stuff our faces that we'd kill of an entire species. URGH. Now this is a strange thought for me mainly 'cause I never bothered about those sharks fin boycotts before. In fact, I throughly enjoy sharks fin soup. Now after this whole strange pomfret thing, I'm wondering what my reaction would be next time I'm faced with a bowl of sharks fin soup.

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I watched The Great Gatsby with Gail tonight. My feelings towards the movie can be summed up as: WTF. The soundtrack was grotesquely jarring, the script and directing IN YOUR FACE (really, ending every one of Jay Gatsby's line with 'old sport'?/zooming in on that damn green beacon at every chance?), the party scenes like a club in 2013 and immensely distracting multiple cut scenes in the beginning of the movie. Plus I wanted to throughly slap Carey Mulligan because she portrayed how irritating Daisy Buchanan was, so well. There were times I just burst out laughing, especially when the rapping soundtrack started in the beginning. For all the hype, I felt this movie to be disappointing. Boo.

Rules of Civility

Just polished off Rules of Civility by Amor Towles. I started reading it on a Monday afternoon (was it at the hairdressers?) and am now done with it on the wee hours of Wednesday morning. Towles' prose is beautifully understated - the whole show not tell thing done to perfection. His style reminds me almost of Kazuo Ishiguro in a way. I really liked how although majority of the story is done from a first person perspective, we are never actually told what the narrator is thinking, but instead simply how she reacts and responds.

When I first started reading it I thought it was simply a story about a girl who had to stand in the sidelines while her best friend wheeled in the man she loved, but the story is so much more than that, and brings up little nuggets of things to think about. It is is more about a year in the life of a girl in her prime, and the varied things that happen. I think this will definitely be one of the highlight reads of the year.

"And at the same time, I know that right choices by definition are the means by which life crystallises loss."

Rose Petals

I made my montly sojurn into town today to cut my hair, and do some shopping. I had been putting off cutting my hair for about a month because I still felt annoyed at getting charged a Chinese New Year surcharge the last time, nevermind that I cut it in early Jan. Today I finally caved after realised my hair was getting messier and messier especially when I got flustered at work, much to the amusement of my students.

After getting my hair cut, I went to get some books. I bought Ian McEwan's Atonement cause this particular edition caught my eye:

I also got Su Tong's Raise the Red Lantern and Charlotte Street by Danny Wallace. The latter I bought mainly cause it made me think of THAT Charlotte Street right in the middle of Bloomsbury. I suspect it's the same one the book is referencing. I went to Charlotte Street often last time mainly cause of Oxfam, and always walked off with a ton of cheap books for under £10. Man I miss those days. 

Walking by Guess on the way to Kinokuniya just now, I noticed that they use mannequins that are quite different from other shops. The main difference is that the mannequins used by Guess have massive breasts. I'm talking about D/DD size cups here, which is quite disturbing when you notice it. I know Guess aims for the whole 'I'm a sex bomb' market, but does it have to do it in such an obviously tacky way? Their mannequins scream 'bad boob job'. Urgh.

At Ngee Ann City I also stumbled upon the new Laduree branch, and bought some macaroons. The first thing I did when I got home to was indulge in a Rose Petal one. It was light and fluffy, and creamy in the middle. So very tasty mmmm.

A Wednesday

To be very honest, I thought about posting many times over. Each time I dismissed the though because I felt (and still feel) tired. It was another long, exhausting Wednesday. As usual I made mistakes, because I felt rushed and stressed. And as usual despite all my misgivings, I survived it. I'm blogging however because I realised I have to write something out lest later when I lay my head on the pillow, it churn around over and over, and making me unable to sleep. Gah.

Today out of my 3 classes, I had to scold 2. First time was because apparently the kiddos ran to the male bathroom and decided to lock each other out. Sigh. That still wasn't so bad because I know! They're kids! They do silly shit like that. Hell, even people my age still do that. Just not in the middle of a lesson and in full view of other authority figures. So that was scolding number 1, which was draining.   Still class ended on a high note as I showed them some videos like the Red Panda getting scared, and some PSY & MC Hammer videos that were related to a passage we gave out.

The next was my second class, of tweens. The problem with that class is that every time I scold them, it lasts for perhaps that lesson alone and then they clean forget everything. In essence they drive me nuts with their lack of respect or willingness to shut up and learn. It is very discouraging on my end, week after week, to come in and bear the brunt of their attitude problems. The best bit is that I know they don't mean it maliciously, it's just that they are naturally very playful kids who hate doing work - all stuffed together in one hellish classroom setting.

Unfortunately it's hard not to be upset by them as well, because it is very dispiriting to have to deal with the same problem all the time with no headway. This scolding really drained me, because in a sense I also felt it personally. Last night till past 1:30am I was still doing syllabus planning, and I had planned something extra on the Rama Plaza collapse for their level. I was excited at the prospect of teaching them about the global supply chain, how everything from their $10 H&M t-shirts to worker's rights was linked. I wanted them to think critically about the situation, to open their eyes. To an extent it did work, because when I conducted this portion of the lesson it was after the big scolding. I saw that they were interested. However it was too late for me, and I was dragging myself through it. They had killed my motivation to want to work hard for them.

Luckily my last class was much better. They're a jovial, bright bunch. Initially I had to scold them quite a bit because they loved running to the bathroom, stampeding like animals and disturbing the nearby classes. I managed to wean them off that bad habit after about a month, and today's lesson went swimmingly. I even managed to get a usually mischievous student to cooperate by bribing him with a red triceratops sticker (that he could be bribed by a sticker surprised me and his classmates) that he had somehow fallen in love with. To be fair it was a cute sticker. I even showed them silly videos like the Slow Loris being tickled and they LOVED it.

Ahh teaching. I supposed all in all, you need to take the good with the bad. On the other hand however, why does the bad have to be so bloody bad? 

Nerds

It oddly just hit me how nerdy my office is, while looking through the lesson plan for tomorrow. The Synthesis and Transformation questions were all inspired by characters from Archie comics, while a Grammar Question has a 'Mr. Lannister' in it. It makes me smile a silly smile. 

Test Anxiety

Most recently my students had to read a passage titled Test Anxiety and answer some questions. Some of the funnier suggestions included giving students motivational pencils to encourage them to do better. Regardless, as I was teaching it, I was going "HEH HEH HEH" in my mind as I was thinking about how I didn't have exams/tests anymore. Then I remembered, I did. And the smile slid from my face, and fell to the floor with audible PLOP.

Yesterday was my Basic Theory Test for driving. Although the passing rate is quite high, I was as usual disproportionately panicked about it. It didn't help that my Dad kept making snide remarks, saying that if I didn't pass the Test it meant I didn't have a brain/was dumber than XXX (insert stereotypical dumb person here). He was, and as is always, very very encouraging. So anyway I went to Bukit Batok Driving Centre feeling stressed out and did the test. When the invigilator (in a traffic police uniform funnily enough) said the passing grade was 90% and up (that is, 45 out of 50 correct), I almost wanted to slide from my seat and hide under the table.

Daft panicking aside, I passed, and boy did I feel relieved. I got 47/50. Instead ironically, the one I almost failed was the eye sight test afterwards. Apparently my eyesight has deteriorated, which means I might need to get a pair of glasses just for driving. This is the part where I laugh incredulously at life and my fate, because 4 years ago I went for a $3,000 surgery to get rid of my glasses. PFFFT.

Today I went out for dinner with Steph, Ianthe and JH. The last time I had seen them was probably in Oct, if not near Dec last year :/ Quite scary how time flies... and how bloody complacent I am. I am the sort that is content to be at home most of the time, because I have some mental block against any perceived strain and/or being stuck in a crowd. On the other hand that's quite silly because when I do drag my lazy ass out of my usual Work/Home combination, I do enjoy spending time hanging out with my friends. But because I am so lazy, the thought of actively seeking people and arranging a meeting flitters about my mind for about half a second before I think "NAH I'll be tired."I am an old grumpy shut-in way before my time. 

Books and Heaven

Went for a massage today at one of those TCM-like places. It was painful, yet soothing. I couldn't help but thing, in my strange lull zone then, that a good massage was probably the closest thing one could experience to heaven on earth. I had a whole wonderful thesis all set out in my head that I was going to record down, but as with most things, I forgot about them after a while. In essence it was something along the lines that when you get a good massage, all your physical pains are taken away, and you're lulled into a comforting floating place. Heaven on earth indeed. For the few rare times today too, I tipped. The masseuse looked pleasantly surprised.

Finished reading David Lodge's Changing Places last night. It was an enjoyable a read, and infinitely a much better one that Michael Frayn's Skios. It was much more witty, observational, and relied more on our inherent neuroses to propel the storyline forward than the idea that everyone is inanely stupid. I refer of couse, to the lack of IQ or a brain displayed by any of Michael Frayn's characters. It's almost as if he tried to be PG Wodehouse, but aimed far, far lower. Pfft.

On Saturday I taught one of my classes Blake's A Poison Tree. While teaching it I felt myself grow really impassioned, because it is such a wonderfully constructed and accessible poem. However as always, my students were rather expressionless, which slightly killed it for me. I only hope that some of my enthusiasm rubbed off on them. Then after that I rushed for lunch with a colleague, R, that I often go for lunch of Saturdays with. Coming back about 1 minute late, I dashed into the class that I was assisting with, and tried to suavely wave at the little students. Ended up fooling around slightly with them, nagging them to copy things off the board, and sharpening multiple pencils. By the time my regular class rolled around at 4pm, I felt quite exhausted. Still of course, I survived till 6pm and gladly packed up my things to go home.

Tomorrow I plan to stay at work till late, since Wednesday is a public holiday. I am infinitely more productive when I am in the office. Perhaps it's the stuffy atmosphere, the desk that is the right height and being surrounded by stacks of marking all over (some mine, others my colleagues'), but whatever it is it works. Fingers crossed that it's throughly productive, cause Lord knows I need to clear a lot of things.

On Wednesday I plan to bring my Mum to a nice lunch at a French place for a Mother's Day treat. Looking forward to it, for tasty food if nothing else :) 

Memories and Illness

One of the things about teaching young teens is that when I look at them, I cannot help but recall what I was like at their age. Being giggly around boys. Not giving a toss about my studies. Racing home just so I could play computer games. All those not-very-nice memories about how I spent my awkward days. For some students I cannot help but shake my head, and call them my neanderthals, my animals, but there are also others I cannot help but respect because they just seem so calm and collected, far more than I could seemingly hope to be even though I am twice their age. It is a strange mix, that makes me reflect upon my not-too-distant terrible teenage years.

Yesterday I felt quite ill during my last class. Right before stepping in, I started to get a headache. Midway, almost 1 hour into the lesson I realised I was started to get breathing problems. As a result, I kept coughing whooping coughs and my airways struggled to clear. I wanted badly to sit down, and just rest my body. Except I was teaching, and I needed to teach lest my kids get the whole damn comprehension wrong. So I stood, propped against the cupboards and trying to gather my energies. When I had given them enough help, I finally left to puff on my inhaler and sat down, more than 30 minutes after I had first felt sick. I wondered what my students would do if I collapsed at that point in time (indeed I felt I was only at 30% function). That thought brought me back to an old memory, of when I was 15 years old.

That year I was Secondary 3, and suffering greatly in Chemistry class. We had a teacher that was very old school, and terrifying in an old school way, especially since we had only experienced more enlightened ways of teaching. What I mean simply was that she acted like a mean old bitch, and wouldn't hesitate to tear you one if you made her mad. Except lots of things made her mad. Not knowing the answers to questions, titrating experiments wrongly, even saying 'sorry' too many times made her angry. Boy were we all scared shitless by her and her ability to shred your confidence to bits. There was not a single girl she didn't pick on, and she did it almost methodically. Later we rationalised it was probably to make us realise we weren't as great as we thought we were - because underneath all those hurtful comments we knew somehow that she meant well. Anyway for those of you in the know, it was Ms. G K Goh.

One lesson late in 2005, she started to feel very ill. We knew she had been poorly for a while, and her condition only seemed to be getting worse. She was teaching us halfway when she suddenly stopped at sat down at the desk. She looked pale and said she felt like vomiting. I can't remember if that was the day she also took off her wig, but I do remember her saying she felt weak and needed to rest. Then she lay her head down on the table, and us students just looked at each other, stunned and scared. Although we cared for her in a human way, somehow we never thought of her as being human. That she too felt weak, could get sick and suffer physically. That she would feel so bad that she actually needed to stop the lesson and show her frailty in front of us. She died the following year after fighting for cancer for many years. Right after National Day celebrations in school, we went as a class to her wake. After she died there was much random tears and morose thoughts among all, plus the occasional odd morbid poetry popping from some classmates. I don't remember her death helping much with my already present depression then either.

Strange what I think about now, when I look at my students. 

Worn

I feel very worn down from the seemingly endless and always expanding piles of marking. I feel overwhelmed, and sightly hopeless. Just got to keep plodding on I suppose, but damn 'cause I haven't felt this way in months. This has been the 30th week since I've started working, and I'm 7 months into this job.

16 April 2013

Had a hectic day today, starting out by a gym session that wore me out. Before leaving the house however, I checked the news and first read about the Boston bombings. I spoke briefly about it with my trainer, and he referred to the bombers as 'idiots'. Ahaha. The TVs in the gym featured the News showing the bombings too, but by the time I was done exercising, I had forgotten all about the bombings. Then I rushed to have lunch, get my daily Teh Ping, and to mark Mock Exam papers for my P5 classes tomorrow.

I ran down to the cab stand around 4:25pm, to realise that there was a mega long queue for the taxi and frantically booked a cab. When when the cab came about 5 minutes later, we headed off for Rochester Mall. Upon arrival around 4:50pm, I practically ran up the stairs and burst into class, barking at the little kiddies to make them afraid of me. Needless to say, it did not work. Class went on as (presumably normal), and midway I got really bloated and had a bad headache.

Finally at 7:05pm, I let them run off. Then I quickly packed my things and my parents picked me up around 7:10pm. Got home, and had dinner till about 7:25pm. Finally from then till 8pm, I managed to vegetate like an idiot (with a headache), watching Hotel Impossible with my Dad. He seemed very enthusiastic about telling me that Daytona Beach in Miami was on a Barrier Island. During commercial break he channel surfed, and we ended watching a bit of Fox Sports covering the Boston Marathon bombings. They were interviewing the runner who was closest to the first bomb, and showed how the bomb blew him off his feet. Hmm.

At 8pm, I went upstairs and spoke briefly to Joaquin while trying to finish my marking and grade recording for my P5s. I realised (sort-of) in horror that I might have helped my students too much with their comprehensions, because they were scoring abnormally high, which inflated all their grades. When I was finally done, I ended up playing Tropico for two and a half hours, and then went to shower. I felt pretty exhilarated  and ready to face The Shit of Wednesday. Freshly showered, I went to read the news again (as is my habit) and got reminded of the Boston bombings. Now, I feel kind of sober again.

This sort of reminds me a bit of the 2008 Mumbai Bombings for some reason. I remember feeling quite melancholy the night of prom when I first heard about the bombings and hostage situation. Strange how such world events can influence one's mood even though you might not be directly involved or know anyone who is. I wonder, is that normal? 

Greene

Reading Graham Greene's The End of the Affair now and it's proving a captivating read. Stumbled upon a line however, that I love, and for posterity's sake must make a note of it lest I forget: "the telephone presented nothing but the silent open mouth of somebody found dead."

Book Two, Chapter Five, is just so exquisitely written.

Free Mondays

This was the first Monday I spent alone in a while. Usually I spent at least a portion of it with my Dad, but today I had it in my mind to go shopping, and I certainly couldn't go with my Dad to do that. Still, for some reason, the idea of going alone and making decisions about what to do made me feel anxious -  and I hadn't the foggiest idea why.

My first stop was Namnam, where I finally tried their Pho. I had previously tried the Banh Mi from there when I went with Ianthe to attend the Esperenza Spalding concert, and thought it was a poor cousin to it's London-based counterparts. The Pho there was tasty, and the spring rolls were great too. I was happy at having chosen to eat there, plus their set lunch menu prices were quite reasonable.

After that I ended up going in and out of stories looking at superficial things. Then I headed to Kinokuniya to get some books. I bought 4 books in total, 2 of them graphic novels. One of the graphic novels was written by a Singaporean, called The Girl Under The Bed. The other was Yoshihiro Tatsumi's Abandon the Old in Tokyo. I had previously read The Midnight Fisherman and thought it was great (Joaquin has it now), so I decided to try another one of his books. Books wise, I bought Michael Frayn's Skies and Ruth Ozeki's A Tale for the Time Being.

Paying for the books at the cashier's in the Fiction section, I chanced upon a most surprising poster. It listed the Booker Prize Shortlist nominees for this year, but under Tan Twan Eng's book was a little stuck on sign that said 'Winner'. I was distressed at this for two reasons. One is that I couldn't believe I had missed such literary news, and the other than was I wasn't quite a fan of his. But then again I wasn't quite a fan of anyone else on the list (Narcopolis by Jeet Thayil which I read about a week ago, I didn't quite enjoy), so I'm not sure why I cared.

Ruminating on the poster later on, in Toast Box, I decided to stop my marking and google the 2013 Booker Prize Winner. Predictably (to you other book lovers out there), the Booker Prize for this year had not been released. It was far too early. I started to get rather annoyed. Then, I did something I never did before: I called the Kinokuniya hotline and complained. My heart thudded in my chest as I went on a short inane rant about how they should not have misrepresented Tan Twan Eng's book. I think I even said Tash Aw a few times instead by accident. I became That Weirdo Who Obsesses About Inconsequential Things. After the call, I felt strangely exhilarated. Then I went back to marking and wondering how I could ever drill proper grammar into my students' heads. 

Demon Eye Wednesdays

My left eye is demonic red.

Wednesdays leave me utterly stricken, despairing, and shattered.

I feel like projectile vomiting at the HR department that has made my schedule (and life!) such a living hell.

In my 9 non-stop hours of work today, I could only visit the bathroom once, because that's how miserable my Wednesdays are.

I will get kidney stones.

I loathe Wednesdays.

23

When I was about 18, one of my favourite music albums of all time was Blonde Redhead's 23. Looking back, I still can't explain why I loved that album so much. The subsequent album, Penny Sparkle, I listened to once and then forgot about - so it wasn't quite the band that I loved, but just that one album. Listening to that album, I'd inevitably think about being 23, and sort of softly chuckle to myself because I couldn't IMAGINE being 23. Years ago when I was about 14, and still madly in love with my first love (who is ironically getting married this year!), I thought 23 was a great age to get married - something that added to my chucking too years later at 18. So anyway here I find myself, 23.

The day before I turned 23, I watched Side Effects with my Dad. We had Pepper Lunch for lunch.

On 26 March itself, I went to the gym as per normal. I met Jean for lunch at Professor Brawn Cafe, where the Poached Salmon dish was excellent. After getting to the office, Jean snuck off and suddenly reappeared next to me with a slice of cake from Bakerzin, and a few colleagues came over and sang a wee birthday song. I was touched :) Then I spent the rest of the day marking, went to teach a class, and hung around the office till about 8pm cause I had papers to clear. One colleague gave me a small kinder bueno egg, which was cute, when she found out it was birthday.

Before leaving for home, I bought 5 slices of cake. Then I went back, had dinner, had cake, and watched a few episodes of Law and Order SVU.

Wednesday was shit teaching day again. What made the day great however, was that right after I finished teaching at 9:30pm, I checked my phone and saw a text from my Dad. The text simply said that one of my friends from the UK had sent a cake over for my birthday. Incredulous, I called home immediately, and spoke to my mum who confirmed my Dad's text. I went home, practically floating on a cloud. When I saw the cake, I burst out laughing. It was a fine, well made thing, but the inscription was "one pound fish, very nice, very nice". Still I felt so touched I almost teared up.

Saturday after work I met up with Shu and Tiff for dinner at Itacho. I was mad hungry so I ordered a lot , and realised they were treating my only when it came for the time to pay :/ I felt kinda bad, so we walked over to Holland Village and I treated them to dessert from The Daily Scoop.

Was a nice birthday, all in all.