July 30, 2008
the foreign mother tongue
I played tennis with jensen today – and it turned out to be an utter farce. it’s experiences like this which make you seriously concerned about global warming. and this, too, at 150 million kilometres away from the sun. can’t wait for the day we manage to colonize and inhabit mercury.
anyway during the torturous ordeal I (to my detriment) realized my inability to write 残废. uneasiness ensued and hence when I reached home I began to prepare for the chinese placement test (funny how in america they screen foreign admissions so stringently, selecting the best of the very best, only to assume that everyone’s first (and only!) language is somehow english – and hence everything else satisfies the foreign language criteria). again, not a very satisfactory experience as I discovered what 5 years of inactivity can do to your mastery of language. these are (some) of the products of that session:
invasion of the scrawlies
I’m probably overreacting and overpreparing, but heck. I’m balancing it out by reading the great gatsby anyway.
July 27, 2008
the washout
just as you thought it couldn’t – and wouldn’t – get worse, it does.
well I wasn’t present, and the venue was certainly different – but how big a difference can it make? this is absolutely inexplicable (unless you believe that money makes the world go round). and some random deluded soul says something along the lines of “told you the earlier one held a while ago had rubbish results. this one’s so much more accurate and I was proven correct. this has more people from various places and hence it’s more fair.”
firstly – fuck you. so the previous one disagreed with your opinion and the current one doesn’t, and hence that completely justifies the first one being wrong and it’s vindication for you immediately.
and secondly – go take a proper course in statistics.
oh how the mighty have fallen.
July 26, 2008
Protected: Seriously Incapacited Beyond all Function ’08
Permalink Enter your password to view comments.
May 28, 2008
daze
you know your life is probably rather screwed up when:
1) you’re awake at 1am in the morning and
2) someone asks you out for ice cream then and
3) you agree cos you’re hungry anyway and not too sleepy and
4) you walk out on the street and realize that you haven’t been to the end of it for YEARS and
5) when you reach macdonalds you decide that you’re actually quite hungry so you order a burger instead and
6) you eat till macdonalds closes at 2am and
7) the staff switches off the lights and makes a snide remark that seems to insinuate that you’re on a gay date and
9) you leave with the intention of eating icecream cos macdonalds closed too early for that and
10) you decide to settle for the 7-11 nearby instead of heading to esso and
11) you spend 5 minutes deciding on which flavour to get cos most of the cones are very much deformed and
12) you both get cornettos which cost a smacking $2.60 each and
13) you head towards the car with your cones, remarking on the incredulity of the whole scenario and
14) finish the icecream cones in the car before heading home and
15) all this while the car had virtually no brake pad linings cos they had worn off long ago and hadn’t been replaced yet and
16) you come home and still have the time to do this
all at 2.37am.
(8 is skipped cos it yields a smiley 8) which I don’t know how to disable)
October 30, 2007
bravo.
there is nothing quite like it. each sound, so sharply defined and immaculately crafted; each phrase, so elegantly constructed and projected with such stunning resonance. loud, but never blaring, not hitting out at you but always enveloping, drawing you closer.
and when the final crescendo came, an upward flurry of notes eventually led to a cascading flash of brilliance and thereafter the final, breathaking flourish.
“do you want to give a standing ovation?”, came the question.
many others were. we didn’t in the end, but there was understandbly no need to. it would’ve been a great way to show appreciation and admiration, but unlike fond memories of such a stunning experience, it would remain only in the concert hall.
