Singing hallelujah with a fear in your heart

Music: My Heart is an Apple ; The Arcade Fire
"Alice died in the night"

Hot piece of the day:

David Duchovny, aka Hank Moody on the set of Californication, my favourite TV series since the last 10 weeks. If you ignore all the porn scenes, it's really a very tragic show about a middle aged guy trying to get his life (his ex-girlfriend, daughter, and his career) back on track, but he's proud and stubborn and hard-headed, yet so vulnerable at the same time. oh it's great. Best script in a while.

I've been victim of really bad writer's block, I've been reduced to prying off random keys from my laptop keyboard to 'check' if there's any dirt/debris/food trapped under them, and then pushing them back in. I've been having trouble sleeping, waking up many times at night result of bad dreams, and then having grumpy days in school, where i can be in class or walking to class and suddenly have these overwhelming bouts of unhappiness. I can't wait for the next 3 weeks to be over. I've been feeling over-anxious and down lately and i haven't the slightest clue why everything's affecting me so badly. Argh. Least i could have would be some support.

I'll admit, I'm full of shit.
that's how i know i love you,
that's how i know i trust you.
You're not sure, if there's a right or wrong,
but it feels like there is,
when i treat you like this.
I go outside..

Texas, i won't come home.
not even if you call,
can't hear you at all.
I can't explain why it's a sin,
state i'm living in,
i just feel so tired.

My mouth is full, your heart is an apple.
Your mouth is full, my heart is an apple.

We watched the pole dance of the stars

Music + Hot Piece of the day : Interpol

"she found a lonely sound, she keeps on waiting for time out there"
Antics- arguably still my favourite Interpol album, even though i agree that Turn on the Bright Lights may be more genius. Remember to check out Our Love to Admire, especially 'No I in Threesome', 'The Scale', and 'Heinrich Maneuver'.

I'm staring at the grand total of 200 words i've written for my Romanticism essay (only 2,800 more words to go) and panicking harder by the second. I've learnt my lesson though, next time i have to choose a topic and commit to it beforehand (because we have to hand in essay outlines), i shall use a more sound method to choose, as opposed to pointing to a random number on the page and shrugging off bad choice as the call of fate. Die suffer die.

Yeah but nobody searches
Nobody cares somehow
When the loving that you've wasted
Comes raining from a hapless cloud
And I might stop and look upon your face
Disappear in the sweet, sweet gaze
See the living that surrounds me
Dissipate in a violet place
Can't you see what you've done to my heart
And soul?
This is a wasteland now

We spies
We slow hands
Put the weights around yourself
We spies
Oh yeah we slow hands
You put the weights all around yourself now

Late night tales (Nightmares on wax)

Hot Piece of the Day:

"Love is kinda crazy with a spooky little boy like you"
The Dusty Rose- a rose (obviously.) grown by avid Dusty Springfield (jazz musician with arguably the most sexy voice in the history of jazz music- her cover of The Look of Love will make the world make love ) fan, John Harding, in her honour. Her voice is sex on notes. I've been in love with her song Spooky, which i heard on Lush over the weekend- instant chillout. Jazz always brings back memories of singing Orange Coloured Sky at home when i was a little girl in a pink dress, Unforgettable on karaoke with my dad, Sade, daydreaming about a smokey blues lounge with Ella/Billie/Anita etc etc. Ah jazz.

Watch it here (you won't regret it i promise!)

That night i had a horrible nightmare. I remember this now because sometime in the course of the night, i must've woken up in a sweat and scribbled these words down on my Political Science notes (hence the tardy discovery- Pol. Sc. makes me quake in my imaginary boots and therefore receive very little notice under my radar.), 'dream about language'. I don't know if it's the indoctrination of post-structuralism via my 20th century module, or pure coincidence, or some Freudian manifestation, but i dreamt that i couldn't write any more- i distinctly remember showing Steph and Ashton (or my dream Steph and Ashton) an 'essay' that i did that was covered with incoherent babblings that were supposed to be something else. I just couldn't write a thing- nothing i wrote came out as it was supposed to. Scary.

On the subject of dreams, i dreamt that Nick and i wanted to reach the sky because it was above our heads (and yes you can make loads out of this analogy. this time i swear i have lit to blame- John Keats you will be the death of me). so we set out (it was a dream la okay i can't remember how we actually went about 'setting out'. not that we packed our bags and gunned our laser boots or anything) to reach the clouds, etc etc. Long story short, when our feet were firmly planted against the sky (which means our heads were pointing at the earth), we looked 'up' and realised that everything that used to be below was now above our heads, ie, the new sky/ destination/ 'Holy Grail'/ goal/ unattainable.

Okay you know what? I didn't explain it properly- it was deeper than i just made it out to be.

BTW, i skipped school again today. Ever had one of those mornings where you open your eyes and feel overwhelmed by the thought of the day? Well i copped out big time today. I'm sorry- I'm tired and angry and tired of being angry and angry at being tired.

Consolation prizes

Music: Why I Can't Stand One Night Stands ; Catatonia

"And Saturday's fuss is just small-town lust"

We don't need the sunshine/

Hello people. After another weekend i looked at my calendar and panicked, because

1) i have 2 weekends to get my shit together and compose 4 essays (approx 6-15 pages EACH),

2) 3 presentations (including one soci show and tell that i'm totally clueless about. Im thinking of bring Jack to demonstrate modern day conjuring magic?)

3) wk 12 is going to be a disaster
4) my exams are actually about a month away
5) and i haven't even bought all my books/ read them.

Well then, welcome to the Panic City, have a seat, grab a laptop and please furiously start writing essay of your major/minor/why-the-fug-did-i-even-choose-this-module-was-i-unconscious?-probably/"choice". The good news is that we're going to be out of this school fog in a bit- 1 month (plus some) more and i'm not touching a book until January comes.

Hot Piece of the Day:

Smashing Pumpkins' very rare CD single, Disarm 2.
Containing song of the moment for me, a cover of Thin Lizzy's Dancing in the Moonlight. Gorgeous.


When i passed you in the doorway,
you took me with a glance.
Should've taken that last bus home,
But i asked you for a dance.
Now we go steady to the pictures,
i always get chocolate stains on my pants.
My father says, 'he's going crazy'
He says im livin' in a trance.

Dancing in the moonight,
Its caught me in its spotlight.
It's alright, it's alright, the moonlight-
On this long hot summer night.

Theatre in time

Hot Piece of the Day:
"so the madman has struck!"

Still shot from Tom Stoppard's play: The Real Inspector Hound (1968). One of the most fabulous reads of late for me (thank you 20th century Brit Lit), Stoppard (genius screen-writer as well) writes a murder-mystery-thriller parlour whodunnit that parodies similiar plays of the genre like Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap, thought processes that go into the making of such plays, and even the pompous theatre critics, exposing the farce and at times, ridiculousness that go into theatre. Hilarious and interesting- coming from a person who has only read and loved Shakespeare, The Crucible, and Wilde in her life. So go pick it up! It's short and terribly interesting, I swear. One will go through slight amusement, laughter, confusion, very confused surprised, more confusion, and an ending worthy of a second read.

Quick excerpt (for those who care):

Birdboot: where's Higgs?
Moon: I'm standing in.
Moon and Birdboot: Where's Higgs?
Moon: Every time.
Birdboot: What?
Moon: It is as if we only existed one at a time, combining to achieve continuity. I keep space warm for Higgs. My presence defines his absence, his absence confirms my presence, his presence precludes mine... When Higgs and i walk down this aisle together to claim our common seat, the oceans will fall into the sky and the trees with hang with fishes.
Birdboot: [He has not been paying attention, looking around vaguely, now catches up] Where's Higgs?

So reads my weekends nowadays. Catch up on my texts for the week's lecture (a whopping average of 3 books per weekend! sigh) + be dutifully impressed/mention text on blog, have quick prata suppers, plan chill movie marathons, and look forward to December. At least NUS has taught me the beauty, skill and Godsend of speedreading. Makes everything so much easier, really.

Extraordinary machine

Music: O' Sailor; Fiona Apple
"just because i play so far from my vest"


Good morning. I skipped school today for the 3rd time this week, and i must say- it's really addictive. Really changes your perspective, because once you skip you really can't stop. Anyway yesterday Steph and i (matching outfits not intended i swear) went for our usual- 2 hour Japanese dinners, shopping, magazine buying, etc etc. Except i made her search the whole of town for some godforsaken out-of-print book that i was craving, to no avail. All we got was slight embarrassment from the "no no your turn to go ask!". Never mind.

20th Century lecture yesterday was nothing but .. really really depressing. Anyone who wants a lesson on how human suffering has no reason, but for the fact that there just is, a philosophical play on existentialism, minimalism and all other 'isms', pick up Samuel Beckett's absurdist play Endgame. Yes, same guy who gave the world Waiting for Godot, basically about people waiting for God and wasting time and God never comes anyway (in a VERY SMALL NUTSHELL).

A small excerpt from Engame:

Clov: Why this farce, day after day?
Hamm: Routine. One never knows [Pause] Last night i saw inside my breast. There was a big sore.
Clov: Pah! You saw your heart.
Hamm: No, it was living. [Pause. Anguished] Clov!
Clov: Yes.
Hamm: What's happening?
Clov: Something is taking its course. [Pause]
Hamm: Clov!
Clov: [Impatiently] What is it?
Hamm: We're not beginning to... to... mean something?
Clov: Mean something! You and I, mean something! [Brief laugh] Ah that's a good one!

-

Nell: What is it my pet? [Pause] Time for love?
Nagg: Were you asleep?
Nell: Oh no!
Nagg: Kiss me.
Nell: We can't.
Nagg: Try. [Their heads strain towards each other, fail to meet, fall apart again.]
Nell: Why this farce, day after day? [Pause]
Nagg: I've lost me tooth.
Nell: When?
Nagg: I had it yesterday.
Nell: [Elergaic] Ah yesterday! [They turn painfully towards each other.]
Nagg: Can you see me?
Nell: Hardly. And you?
Nagg: What?
Nell: Can you see me?
Nagg: Hardly.

-

Hot piece of the day:


Soft-shell crab handroll. Yummy.

oh you silly stupid pastime of mine,
you were always good for a rhyme.
and from the first to the last time,
the signs said stop.
but we went on wholehearted,
it ended bad but we loved what we started.

[ Fiona Apple - Parting Gift ]

Our endless numbered days

Text: Lady Chatterley's Lover ; DH. Lawrence

"How she hated words, always coming between her and life: they did the ravishing, if anything did: ready-made words and phrases, sucking all the life-sap out of living things."



Yes okay fine, i've been reading Lady Chatterley's Lover. Yet, amid all the erotica there seems to be a search, if not frail existence, of tenderness that kind of moves me. Why can't Heathcliffs and hot stable boys (yeah, stable boy, gamekeeper, lady, princess- same difference) exist in real life? Dr. Ang said something about the paradox of modern age: people of the renaissance actually sought to create ruins in their own backyard because while they loved the convenience of modernisation, there was always this nagging feeling that the contemporary age held nothing but a colourless kind of reason. Basically, the search for history is a search for character and a kind of romance, mainly because (I feel) the past is so unattainable (whereas the future and present is what is to come and what is already here) that we try to recapture that loss, and that entails more loss.

Hot piece of the day:

Walpole's Strawberry Hill library, a gothic mansion in the 18th century done in the style of 12th and 15th century gothicism.

For all students out there, I'm sure you can relate to me when i talk about the inferior essay syndrome. It happens when you're halfway through an essay/ staring at two words and a blinking cursor/ writing a hasty conclusion, and you realise the essay itself, along with your uncertain superfluous inadequate and utterly off-the-mark moronic words, are all mocking you and going, ah. you are so out of your league!

I hate political science.

Quote of the day-

Nick: what's that book? Ladybird Chatterbox?

Ping: oh so that's not the part yet? i thought the chickens were 'chickens'.

Lost highway

Music: Jeff Buckley
"I'm not sure but sometimes we're so blind"

Hot piece of the day:

The original Chanel Vintage 2.55 in washed lambskin, mustard. Seriously, just drool and die. This is one of those bags you love and hate- you love it for the structure, the material, the versatility, its sheer beauty and classic-ness, and you proclaim it is the 'bag to end all bags' and that you will love it forever no matter what. YET, the fact that it comes in so many materials (satin, patent, distressed, quilted leather, denim) and colours (mustard, pink, black, white, beige, navy) makes you just want to scream in frustration, hit every Chanel from here to the end of the world, and grab all the 2.55s you can see, risking life and limb.

My dad recently promised me this bag (and watch of my choice, even though i don't wear watches. who wouldn't wear a Frank Muller) if i make it to honour's year in NUS. As sweet as he was being, i doubt the promise of a bag- even if it is of orgasmic proportions-, will magically transport and propell me toward genius inclination.

Anyway. Today woke up at 12.30pm and realised that i had already missed Soci tutorial and half of film tutorial, so i turned up my air-con, brought some chocolate to bed, and came online. No point going for Romanticism tutorial, film lecture and film screening now right? Actually, there is a point, but i missed it somewhere along the way.

wise men say,
it looks like rain today.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=7Yhs6-nNDLE

Picaresque

Music: The Decemberists

"here's a hand to lay on your open palm today"

AAAAANNNNDDD.. it's Sunday. Already? The school weeks zoom past so quickly it's not even funny- come tomorrow it'll be, what, Week 9, ie, the start of Deadline City. Last night tried to read Vathek in the midst of all the madness, and that was, needless to say, a failed enterprise. I ended up eating half a tray of those jello-creamcheese-biscuit squares and then going out for coffee.

aboxoflove:

There are angels in your angles,

there's a low moon caught in your tangles.

There's a ticking at the still,

there's a purr of a pigeon to break the still of day.

As we go on drowning,

down we go

Away.

And darling, we go a-drowning,

down we go away,

Away..

[ The Decemberists - Of Angels and Angles ]

hands away

Music: Not Even Jail; Interpol

"If things come alive"

Good morning Singapore. I've moved my blog because diaryland was, well, not user-friendly enough for my computer-moron skills (or lack thereof). Sorry if i sound distracted- i'm currently marvelling at how easy it was for me to post pictures without having to use a hosting website. Anyway the new pre-class hangout is now Portsdown's Colbar, a perfect place to have Monday-blues brunch, a seriously coconutty curry lunch, sentimental iced horlicks, or to tuck into a hearty breakfast.

okaaaaaay. still trying to get used to blogspot now, but i think we can safely pronounce my picture posting so far quite successful. Anyway, it seems that time wants to creep up on us students stealthily, yet present itself as a desperate stretch for the lovers. I find myself approaching week 9 of school (unfathomable!), with the finals (along with plenty of final paper deadlines) a mere 5 weeks (or so) away. disgusting. judging by the sad state of affairs, the future looks bleak:

1) EN3227: English Romanticism- incomplete midterm essays(40%). pending presentation(20%) on Wuthering Heights (not yet read). currently launching into Gothic Lit (texts also unread). pending deadline(week 12) for the final paper (40%). status: not yet in existence.

2) EN3224: 20th Century British Lit- disgraceful midterm essays (15%). pending deadline (9nov) for final paper (25%), status: not yet read topics. currently launching into Samuel Beckett (plays unread). final exam (50%)- here's to crossing fingers and hoping it's open book.

3) EN2241: Film Studies- one half-baked Casablanca midterm paper (10%, thankfully). pending deadline(5nov) on final paper (20%). pending presentation on Breakfast at Tiffany's. status: not yet watched film. final exam (50%)- here's to crossing fingers and hoping it's just a simple essay response paper on cinematography.

4) PS1101: Political Science- (i actually had to think about what other modules i was doing). pending deadline (19oct) for midterm paper (30%- holy mother of god). status: not yet read question. one practically silent presentation on nationalism (20%). final exam (50%)- here's to crossing fingers and hoping school burns down.

5) SCsomething: Soci of Popular Culture- one pending deadline (29oct) for midterm paper/ midterm MCQ (wk12)(30%). one pending show-and-tell(wk11).

Now that i have said all those things, i feel an undeniable sense of panic. maybe i should do some reading this weekend. like, Vathek, Frankenstein, Beckett and (whatismyothermodule) my pol. science readings. oh and i should buy the soci reading package. yes.

In the meantime, happy birthday grandma-

we went to pan-pacific's haitien lo for a cantonese dinner.

Quotes of the day:

stacey: what are those green vegetables?

me: they are not vegetables, they're leprechan fingers.

stacey: what the hell! no they're not

me: you just have no sense of imagination.

-

stacey: what is that!

me: fried gluten in vegetables

gwen: yucks.

maril: (with look of rapture) IT'S VERY NICE!

-

maril: (one dish later) ohwow the superior soy sauce is superior indeed!

-

grandma: your dress looks very casual.

me: oh should i change?

grandma: no la! for girls, the face is the most important. dress is secondary. the face must look pretty! go and glue some eyelashes on

-

me: (at start of dinner) OMG IM SO EXCITED! we changed the menu to get ee-foo noodles yes!

me: (middle of dinner) omg i can't wait for the ee-foo noodles yes!

me: (before the last dish) im going to the toilet- if the noodles come then just call me and i'll rush back

me: (at the arrival of the noodles) omg here goes....

uncle simon: eh why don't you kids just take all the noodles.. we're too full.

us: ... the noodles suck.

Hot Piece of the Day:

Grandma's old film camera. which died in the middle of dinner.