angels for sale!

[~ling] made some very pretty angels outta swarovski crystals and is selling them at SGD$8 each on her yahoo auctions site.

i couldn't resist gushing about them =)

there's angel pendants and pendants for cell phones...
or just very pretty petite suncatchers to hang by windows or in your car ~

here's my ad (sorry girlie, i had to snitch your images!) on her behalf! you can contact her directly too at geechan [at] hotmail dot com.

no, i don't get commission!

clicky clicky for an old classmate from jr high ~

on a totally unrelated note.. if i had an iPod, i'd definitely want an iGuy *wistful sigh*

huo bao ~

huo2 bao3, chinese for "living treasure" is the only way to describe my grandpa. scarily enough, i can see where i get some of my quirky stubborness. *sigh* (why is it that i get to inherit all the bad genes of the family... the stubby fingers with matching nails, the rolls of tummyfat (hey em! we can compare rolls hehe), the predisposition to autoimmune diseases. oh and breast cancer. *zip*)

anyway..
your pride, that horrible habit of ciggie smoking, your stubborness, your gullibility, that "kia simi kia. gui kia wa!"* attitude... grandpa grandpa grandpa.. where do you want me to start! *literally translates to "scared what scared? ghosts scared of me!"

as much as i'd like to blame the incompetent doctor (that's doctor #2 i'd like to personally meet when i go home at the end of the year so i can decide if they warrant a verbal thrashing)... as much as i'd like to do so, my dear grandpa was to blame for some of it too..

mom called for the weekly dose of taiwan gossip ~ this week, she started with "guess what your grandpa did?" *groans* i don't know. the last time she started the conversation with that question, it was to tell me that he almost got seduced by a nubile pretty young thang who was around my age. *shudders* he had no clue.. he thought she was just being friendly. GOODNESS!
being an octogenarian doesn't give one the liberty or the license to be blur ...

this time, our living treasure had melena. for six days. *whistles* and he didn't tell anyone because he thought it must've been something red he ate at first before attributing it to tar. *piaks forehead* it bugged him enough to arrange for a doctor's appointment on the 6th day. thank goodness for that. no thank goodness for my grandpa's set ways of thinking that the older the doctor, the better the doctor. doctors back home get a registration number ~ the smaller the number, the older the doctor. grandpa genius went to pick the doctor with the smallest number in the hospital directory. aiyaiyai! incompetent he is. not so much my grandpa, but the doctor he picked. what kind of doctor asks their patient to go back home after arriving for their afternoon appt to retrieve a stool sample they did in the morning? one would think it seemed logical to get the patient to produce a new sample then and there. the good doctor obviously has not been initiated into the exciting world of rectal examinations where he could've gotten a fresh stool sample. (dr c's voice floats into my head...it's very important lubricate. now just stick your finger in there.. that's right. feel around, like how you would skirt the inside of a jar.. feel anything abnormal?) tisn't your normal way of getting a sample ~ an endoscopy would've been a better call but did that happen? of course not! my dear old grandpa got sent home with some painkillers and intructions to present to emergency if he got into strife in the middle of the night.

by this time, i was ready to sue the doctor for negligence. thank his lucky stars i wasn't there *death stares* my mom sent my grandpa off to another hospital's emergency dept where they did all the tests, crossmatched and gave him blood and found the cause of the GI bleed during the course of his 2-day stay in the hospital. white patch, dead tissue, intestines, source of bleed, benign is what my mom told me. i can't figure it out from that info but at least my grandpa's got enough blood in him to let him climb those 4 flights of stairs back home again. enough energy for him to be puffing on his ciggies 2 days home from the hospital despite explicit instructions not to smoke. arghh. the young doctor wasn't pleased and neither is this granddaughter.. i had half a mind to call him up and admonish him but didn't end up doing so. he's gone through enough crap (pun fully intended) this past week to enjoy some peace and quiet methinks.

*sigh* if you'll let me, i'll trade my life for yours grandpa...

self-control

argh! i told you i told you i told you! >.<

of course i couldn't just click click the pages and be happy. of course i couldn't merely bookmark the pages. of course i had to share them so here's a flood of links to satisfy my own quirky self for the time being. in the words of mr vee... "everything you also want. no hope liao." >.<

i wanted a visual tracker like HitMaps but they're not offering new accounts anymore. so i googled.. and googled.. and came across Visitorville ~ if only it was free...

and advancing to something a tad more geeky (although i prefer the term nerdette), here's a keyboard that allows you to place the keys exactly where you want them to be.

proceed to nerdette, maximum setting, and you'll stumble across these giant microbes with me. i had quite a few of them to start out with but over the years, i've been a naughty li'l girl and given away such bugs like the flu, the common cold, the stomachache that i've previously mentioned.. and even such maladies like mono, the kissing disease! i've still got my ulcer tho... *snuggle*

and for rainy days... grab your luminescent raincoat ~ it's got electroluminescent patches that light up in response to raindrops falling on the coat itself. *gasp* i wish they showed a demo with the drops falling on the coat... all they've got is a pic of the coat itself with sketches. cool sketches, but just sketches nonetheless. the inventor of this contraption's got plenty more up his/her sleeve with a funky webby timeline design to boot. (i'm confuzzled yet again. elise is a feminine name, yet the pic of "elise co" looks decidedly male.. am i missing something here?)

::edit::
more electronic garb ~ are you ready for a wearable hug? ooooo, it's enticing ~ i'd choose this over the raincoat any day!

and as an aside... have any of you cried while eating? or have you ever wondered what it'd look like? i stumbled on this site thru the rbj forums and sat there for the the first few moments alternating between "wth?!" and "bwahahahaa" and o.0

and speaking of eating... have any of you tried eating out of a toilet bowl? *grin* yes.. that's my hometown. *beams for kaohsiung* might pay the place a visit when i go back this x'mas if it's still open ~ remind me to bring my camera!

*crawls back to the books*

ooo! i almost forgot! guess what, guess what?? i finally finished my critical review of clinical practice guidelines paper!! *throws the confetti*

wheeeeee ~ now i can hit the books proper *beams*

well... after i oogle at this photoshopped car. please tell me it isn't =(

as far as i know from the image name, it's a porche cayenne. a squished up version, not a mini like it says because the mini-cayenne is a golf cart. literally. it says gt 600 on the side but that is a gemballa gt600... so what is this i see then?

thank you dkxeon for sending over the pic >.<

bad state

haven't been in the best of mindsets lately ~ i'm finding myself disturbing. lotsa death, violence and general negativity. i blame pms and star wars episode 3. i woke up this morning feeling awful. had another nightmare, but not as bad the one i had a week or 2 ago where i woke up to my own yelling. o.0

these exams are gonna be a leap of faith in a way. i know that i know the stuff. it's in there in that head of mine somewhere. *knock knock* i also know i'm careless. always have been. (confession: i was the one who got the 14 wrong questions when mrs levine was nice enough to check our answers halfway through a math test in um.. 4th grade. everyone gasped in utter shock and we all looked around wondering who the person might've been. yes, i know i get away with playing innocent a lot.) i know that if i relax a bit, my thoughts won't get jumbled up* and i'll be fine during the exams themselves, yet i can't relax. it's bloody hard to do so when you know what the consequences of not getting through are. but to not relax would prolly mean i won't get thru. *sigh* what a vicious cycle. i need the confidence. bah.. mebbe i should learn how to hone charisma, according to the bbc article mr vee sent over for perusal. really tho.. i say leave charisma alone. if everyone perfects it, then what's the point of having charisma? the world might be much more charming a place...but more likely than not, the already-charming people will get more charming and the uber uncharismatics will remain so. yes, i'm cynical and jaded ~ i also happened to notice the position my bag had been dumped in, along with the little jap chook attached. that's meeeeeee right now...how apt.

prolly won't be updates for a while.. til exams end on the 29th next month. that being said, i'm positive that something will crop up between now and then to irk me so much that i'll hafta gripe about it, or that something so absolutely beautifully happy will warrant me to share the smiles. i always seem to defy myself. we shall see =)

* by jumbled up, i mean doing things like crossing off options A and D on the question paper and spending 5 minutes debating whether the answer could be B or C... to color in the bubble saying A on the computer-graded MCQ answer sheet. or to want to write down "in the basal ganglia of the brain" on my notes and end up writing "in the bagang..." because my thoughts are moving faster than my hand. arghhh... like i said. i've gone mad ~

i eat my words..

lol. i just said i wouldn't be whinging. hmm... *tilts halo*

fowarded email from course coordinator to fellow colleague in the same boat as me:

You only have to pass the course(s) you are enrolled in, so you only
have to satisfy assessment requirements for the course you are enrolled
in. So,if mandatory ethics sessions are in Professonal Practice [MEDI3015] and you
are not enrolled in that course you do not have to satisfy the attendance requirement.

Please note, however, that this applies ONLY to the mandatory attendance
requirement. It does NOT mean that there cannot be Ethics questions in
Medi3016 written assessment.

rriighht...
i say:

that so doesn't make sense... no ethics lectures scheduled under MEDI3016 timetable, let alone mandatory ones. yet we need to go for ethics lectures AND it can be examinable. did i mention it wasn't in the MEDI3016 timetable? while we're at it, why don't we attend the anatomy labs with the first years? it's not in our timetable, but hey.. mebbe we'll get examined on it..

and while we're at it, why don't we attend physics 101. and japanese for beginners... because you know, it's not in our timetable but we might get examined on it. who knows when it'll come in handy.. you know, when you need to figure out the rate of blood flow or if you ran into a japanese patient who doesn't understand english..

*sigh*

freebies!

i spent days scouring the net for a web host. i knew i was with an awesome web host when i first signed up. i just didn't know how awesome until today when i got this in the mail. they signed it by hand! awwwwww! *melts at the personal touch*

(edit: all gone! gmail invites still available)
sooo... i don't know why i got the thank you card from flexihostings, but now i've got 2 (edit: one poofed already!) 1 free one-year hosting plans to give away. if anyone wants one, drop me an email or leave your contact info/email as a comment. first come, first serve basis! i've got the 2 postcards waiting to be sent out via snail mail ~

while on the subject of giveaways... i've got 50 gmail invites sitting there gathering dust, so for those of you who still want a gmail account, let me know too. i forgot about them heh. 2 free gigs of mailbox sitting waiting!

***

i had so much to write about. just never got around to it. seems like i've recently been whinging and whining a lot. again. the things i wanted to gripe about fell into that category too and well, i'm sick of my own attitude and wanted to break the cycle. sure, it would've been nice to get things off my chest but instead, i took a step back. i looked at the stuff that was bugging me and suddenly, it seemed really trivial. it's a nice feeling ~ i somehow feel lighter. =)

not sure how good that is for me right now tho. less stressed, not because i'm more confident about exams but because i'm caring less. yes, i would like to graduate from med school but it's not the end of the world if things don't go according to plan. 10 years from now, will i be one of those people juggling kids and on-call duties at the hospital or will i be a stay-at-home mom? will i be in a powersuit, pulling all nighters trying to start up my own business or will i be scribbling away with my tablet to produce graphic illustrations? will i still be in australia or will i have moved yet again.. or will i even be physically here? i don't mean to be morbid but really, nothing is certain. is there a point in worrying about one exam in the grand scheme of things? i may sound like i'm losing my focus but i'd prefer to think of it as letting go. after all, who knows what tomorrow will bring. old friends rediscovered. old friends falling out. friends getting married. friends becoming a mommy. if one had the ability to be omnipotent, if time was available to view in frames a la macromedia flash, what would one see in every corner of the world from people to animals if one picked a random second to watch?

i'll leave you to reflect on the tragedy of this boy and his thoughts. it's a heart-wrenching read... i was gonna ramble on about my own reaction after reading it but not today. i got about a paragraph or two typed out before realizing how morbid it was starting to sound. might save it for another day when the sun's shining a tad too brightly.

rAndom

i stumbled upon their page and immediately fell in love with their projects. right up my avenue of quirky fun. arggghh i want all that stuff they've invented *sulks*

i'll leave you with a list of links. they do a much better job of explaining their projects that i do.
watch paper <-- where can i get my hands on one of these.. need. on. wall. now
hidden horoscopes <-- interactive fun! *gushes hearts*
pixel roller <-- i half get it. not sure how the pixels of light transfer onto surfaces tho...
instant label <-- great idea, old news. unless this was their brainchild..

in other news.. omg i can't believe there's 3 weeks til exams. *tries to scream but nothing comes out*

please excuse me while i have a breakdown :(

road rage

think of the Count from sesame street.
we will count to three today, cheeeldrrrren.

one idiot.. muahahaha!
black beemer. doesn't know how to drive. two lane street. beemer on left lane, oversized trailer on right lane. trailer sees upcoming traffic light with 2 cars at a standstill, waiting to turn right. trailer signals to change lanes 50m from the stationary cars. our good samaritan beemer brakes. to a stop. IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FRICKING ROAD to let the trailer in. i slam on my brakes and stop about a meter behind the offending black butt of that beemer. my bag flies from the front seat. i grab. im left with a bleeding pinky from the zipper. [insert appropriate string of curses that will last for the rest of the 10 min drive back home]

two idiots... muahahaha!
now you'd think that nothing else could happen in the span of that 10 min drive. ok, so not really with how this is being retold... so idiot number two takes the form of a pearl sea green toyota previa aka tarago in australia. he sees me coming from a block away because he actually had the vantage point to do so. yet, he decides to creep into the traffic as i'm about 20m from his intersection, me going straight. ok. so i see that coming, i was already braking when i saw him inch. so i travel behind him for another 50m. cross the intersection. ok.. he flips on his blinkers to turn right. thank you for the ample warning! i braked happily. that soon turned into another string of unmentionables when the sea green whale crawled to a complete stop before turning. once again, IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FRIGGING ROAD not 20m from the traffic light. mind you, there was no oncoming traffic so i wasn't expecting the complete stop. of course, i had to slam the brakes. this time, i had a car behind me. we were buzzing along at 60kph. to slam on the brakes at that speed and close proximity... lets say that the dude behind me wasn't happy either. and then i got even maddder because im like "great, now the dude behind me will think that i'm the idiot" ... and you know i hate being forced into situations beyond my control. i hate being the scrapegoat.

threeee idiots... muahahahaa!
nah. there wasn't a third.. wait a sec. yes there was. about 500m later, idiot #3 materialized in the form of a shiny metallic blue astra. it didn't seem to know how to drive with no lane markings. it hovered in between 2 lanes before deciding to stay on the left shoulder. it should've turned left. that's when it prolly realized and said no! i wanna go straight! so it hovers in between the lanes again. i'm giving it death stares by this point. it decides on the left lane again. (it'll never learn) only to find that a bus has stopped at a designated bus stop ahead. it stays in the left lane. until about 10m before it would've stopped behind the bus. THEN the shiny blue monster decides to float over to my lane. brakes. slam. insert line of unmentionables again, 20m from the dorm.

one, two, three! muahhahaa!

not happy.

mood swings

thank you dear faculty, for the great example of responsibility you have shown us. thank you for showing respect for our property, just as you've tried to instill the sense of respect for patients and feelings in us for the past 4 years i've been under your wing. thank you for implementing changes in the middle of a course so that certain subjects only exist for one year and never again. thank you. you'll be sure that i'll proudly proclaim you're my alma mater when i graduate.

i need to vent..

i guess this ultimately boils down to ego but i can also distill it into respect, or lack of.

what happened: we had a health records and info privacy act 2002. faculty put up announcement in march, didn't pay much heed because they never told us there was a last page to sign and return. thank you A for pointing that out, so i went and printed a copy to sign and hand in.

passed A's signed copy to mel, forgot to bring mine so i trudged back the next morning to hand it in. i've got the last accessed date on the document showing March 21, 2005. it would've been dated March 21, and handed in 2 days after. they had about 2 or 3 announcements..

URGENT REMINDER

A large number of students in all years of the program have not signed and returned the Health Records & Information Privacy Act 2002 Student Undertaking. All current students are required by law to read a brief summary of the legislation and to sign an undertaking that they will comply with it. The Faculty will over the next week check which students have and have not returned the undertaking. Students who as at 5.00 pm on 16 May 2005 are identified as having not returned the signed undertaking will be contacted via email and instructed to cease all clinical work.

i happily ignore. until yesterday. i got that friggin email. so i emailed back telling them i handed it in sometime in march. my reply goes as such...

Please fax another copy as I have not received the first - may have
gone astray in the mail.

here's the venting bit:
initial reaction ~ ok, i'll go prin... hey wait a sec!! how come i'm now "identified" as one of those who can't follow directions and blacklisted by the faculty because they made a mistake?!

(this is when indignation started building up.)

i go absolutely angry mad if i'm placed in a situation i didn't intend to be at. mebbe it's the control freak talking in me, mebbe it's the ego. it's not like the faculty doesn't know who i am already, after the whole 3rd/4th year incident. now i get to join another group ~ the group that doesn't know how to follow directions and get clinical rights revoked. thanks for telling me after the fact!!

and as a last gripe ~ what's with the may 16th deadline when the Act was dated 2002? as if a few more days would hurt. it's friggin 2005 already, for those who haven't noticed.

off i go in the rain to hand it in. *evil death stare*

2nd dose of happiness..

happiness is ~

rediscovering an old childhood best friend

understanding what i'm reading

making friends smile

friends making you smile


sleeping in

having rain splash around you whilst you're in the comfort of your little car with the heater on

snuggling up in thick fluffy sweaters

discovering rainbows as you reach the top of a hill


finishing the whole block of chocolate by yourself

catching up with old friends

knowing that there are better times ahead

lighting up a whole room of candles, just for the heck of it


tranquility.

*contented sigh*

yesteryear

something i came across in the new england journal of med: msl ~ now why didn't i think of that?!
(no, don't answer that please)

reading the article made me ponder a bit about how foreign medical lingo can be to the uninitiated. as nuls tried to comfort all of us some years back when we were all pulling our hair out and literally sprawling on abs' living room having panic attacks... we've actually come a long way since first year, let alone high school graduation. the lightbulb within glowed. and then it fizzled out as reality crept back with the imminent stormy raincloud called Exams. horrible things that come every bi-annually nowadays, thanks to my faculty screwing up our cirriculum. we've had a new course outline for the same course (if lucky) every frigging year for the past 4 years, yet they support their changes with wanting to maintain the high standards our faculty was known for. yeah... that was true maybe back in the 1970s.

it's a tad disconcerting when i take a step back and look at myself through the eyes of a stranger. to read what i rattled off for my long case presentation ~ whoa! tis a bunch of gibberish if i took off my "medicine" hat. moments like that make me feel like i've somehow learnt something ~ and then moments like the past few days make me ponder if i would be better off getting a job that only asked for high school qualifications and hope that i marry someone who would be able to support the two of us for the rest of our lives.

a friend in pretty much the same boat as me wrote a dreary entry and i might've interpreted it the wrong way, clouded by my own whinges but i really am grasping at straws at the moment. what i'd give to have my focus back. that feeling of ...interest. what happened to being excited by homework!? come back, Feeling, come back! >.<

i remember one teacher of mine at buckley ~ ms kathryn davis. she moved to bulgaria after 7th grade but she was one huge inspiration to me. she made biology fun! we had projects like the edible cell, the human body t-shirt, the "journey through a cell" essay... i wish i had pictures. my edible cell was made outta jello, i remember going over to carla's place further down woodland hills to make our anatomically correct t-shirt with plastic tubing as the GI tract sewn on. i remember trying to fill it with water dyed with blue food coloring and having the thing leak. i remember my essay ~ we were shrunk to the size of a sugar molecule and was the only scientist in the world with the chance to explore the contents of a human cell. we would be injected into the bloodstream of a subject and have 12 hours to explore before being picked up by the needle again. that was our assignment. i made friends with a cute girly sugar molecule called SM with a pink ribbon and she was my chauffer for the whole time. we even cried when parting time came! *nostalgia.. ahhhhh!*

i guess we can't have "fun" assignments like that forever. i guess we all have to eventually grow up and learn to crunch numbers, analyze journal articles and leave institutions dressed in ridiculous black gowns and hats with a flowery stamped piece of paper. and all that for what? to slog away like most of my friends back in singapore now, at the beck and call of superiors and patients alike. to be the scum of the scum in the heirarchial ladder after managing to climb to what one thought was the top upon completion of med school. wow. i'm so looking foward tot that! rrriiighht. expectations, i've learnt through the years, aren't worth it anymore for they cause more heartaches, dash more hopes and bruise more ego than ever anticipated. although i might be immensely bored when i get there, joining peter pan in nevernever land has never been more appealing. i'm tired of the real world :(

let it rest!

i had lots to write
but it's lost its bite
after tapping away
in great disarray

this blogging thing
aint just some fling
it lets me grumble...

ARGHH stop showing me all these articles about jh! i get mad everytime i see one. yes, mebbe i dont have the highest eq in the room. now i can't finish my poem showcasing my *emo* day.
this latest mangling of words article is on TODAYonline, as linked by mrbrown.

*cracks knuckles*

gripe 1: that's one hella one-sided article there. jh's story didn't fully get told. from how the snippets of quotes were strewn across the article attached to "well-known" names, a sense of gross editing and madlibs comes to mind.

gripe 2: no, you're biased! you say. well if it wasn't so biased, mrbrown wouldn't have made the effort to blog about it eh? i leave it up to you to decide..

gripe 3: i guess everyone derives a different lesson from the same incident.

"The rather unusual action against Mr Chen not only underlined the extent to which online journals have blossomed as a medium of expression, but also served as a wake-up call for those who think they can hide behind the anonymity of the World Wide Web."

funny that! jh's blog was linked to his site. it had his resume on it. mebbe i know a different definition of anonymity than the writer...

gripe 4: dearie me.

"I have named and put up pictures of people (for criticism), but that's because I know they won't sue me," she said. "Naming or taking on an organisation would probably be foolhardy." the article quoted wendy of xiaxue fame

for her sake, i hope that comment's been thrown into a blender and reconstructed. is the article insinuating that it's ok to carelessly blog so long as one knows a lawsuit isn't in one's future? is it further trying to educate its audience that it's a no-no to specify organizations, but it's ok to slam friends and enemies.. so long as they're not from a "formal" organization?

gripe 5:

"To be precise: It would be foolhardy if you couldn't back up any of your claims."

the article subsequently concludes. sorry dear, you're not writing an aesop's fable here. and hellooooooo... the blogosphere caught onto the concept of responsible blogging well before the publication of this article. get with the program!

journalism already died. i sent my condolences already last week. the least one could do is respect the dead and let it rest in peace.

*throws hissy fit* (no, no pictures of said hissy fit. i scare enough people already, it seems)

the skyping game

given the choice of sitting down and typing out a critique of a very dry set of clinical guidelines and being online to blogstroll and squander time.. guess which one i chose? *tilts halo*

came across skype again and yes, i'll never learn. actually... i have. no more filling in of personal info! decided to give it one more try after a freak called me up on my landline last year. a very egotistical one i might say.. he claimed he was a 1337 hax0r who knew everything about me. said he found my info online and can get into my computer. he said he had his ways.. so i take it with a pinch of salt.. never mind the fact that i was out of my mind to carry on the convo with him in the first place. curiosity got the better of me. it killed the cat, i know. thank goodness im a chicken. *chirp* so i egg him on.. where did you find all this info about me? i pressed.. ohhh, i have my sources. y'know, msn and skype and stuff. i can hack into their databases. sure buddy.

this was the turning point. incredulous fear turned into incredulous scorn. he told me that all i had to do was say "hello [insert his name, i've forgotten]" and he can sense me and draw up a visual picture of me. rrrightie-o. i refused to say hi, he went on to describe what he saw of me. i had no idea i had very pretty green eyes and blonde hair. hmm. after his little psychic showing-off session, i basically told him to leave me alone and don't call back. it didn't help his case that he insisted he was my #1 fan. in his exact words. creeeeep!!!

whaddya know? he calls back a few days later. by this time, campus security has been alerted. his next few calls went unanswered, straight to the answering machine and then they thankfully stopped. that was enough to trigger mass hysteria on my part. would explain why all my personal info's been taken down from instant msging clients etc.

anyway, i've basically redownloaded skype. trying to build up address book again so i'd appreciate any of you with an account to msg over your user names ^^

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

***

that was the auto-add by haloscan..
sorry guys ~ changed the commenting system and prolly lost all the previous comments :(

madness

i would not have been able to do what you have done, my friend. you've shown a lot more maturity than those who've accused and defamed you. methinks they lack mirrors in their own homes and offices to realize that ~ or they just need a new prescription for their glasses. to hold up the white flag for reasons greater than your own... *hugs* r e s p e c t ..nothing short of that!

had i been in your shoes... my teeth would've been worn to the gums from the gnashings, my eyes would've rolled to timbuktu from the image of "integrity and excellence" portrayed by various people involved.. well anyway, this pic i found strikes a certain harmony with my sentiments ~

moms and dads

moms


mommy ~ you can unpack tomorrow, it's not going anywhere ^^

god-moms and auntie-moms ~ i want to thank you for the pampering day in and day out. today's your day to be pampered instead... hope you had a good mothers' day!

***
materials:
pink flower patterned vellum paper
plastic sheet
stock photo from floriade '04
printer
photo paper
pen knife
glue gun
ribbons
fabric roses
deca-dry dry transfer lettering (where do they sell these in oz?!)

time: 30 mins




***

dads

the bombing in burma. some sources report 11 people dying, others report 3. whatever the number, it's still a tragedy that further highlights the evil side of human nature. my mom was telling me they usually do their shopping ever saturday around 3pm at City Mart. the bomb went off there around that time. my dad was in burma up until friday when he flew back to taiwan to help with the moving. (parents shifted to their new place today. they're bz unpacking everything now... what a way to spend mothers' day!) shiv ~ this is more like an "i almost died!" moment dear.

didn't really think much about it when my mom told me. she was saying that yangon was the only safe haven in burma all this time because it was the capital and nobody dared mess with the government over there. now, this last sanctuary is pretty much gone with the recent bombings. not one but four of 'em. apparently, they were planted by rebels who were pro-democracy. now, what sounds wrong with that statement... but yah, anyway ~ thought more about it after A called. got me thinking about "what if"s. what if they hadn't decide to move this weekend? what if my dad got caught by the blast? what if my dad got injured? what if he didn't make it? being a tad melodramatic here, but it's still too close to home for comfort.

i know it's mothers' day but my mom gets paid her tribute pretty much all the time, be it happy memories or fits of anger *adjusts halo* hehe. my dad's the quiet one in the shadows. growing up, i was daddy's little girl. he's my human-mobile when i stepped on his feet and let him do the walking, literally. he's the mediator when my mom and i quarreled. he's my staunch supporter in everything i attempt, even if i don't succeed. he's so many things lumped into one to make him "Daddy" to me. sometimes i can't handle the oodles of well-wishes and lash out though. every single time, i feel awful because i know he means well. for that, im sorry daddy ~ we may not have the girly talks like i do with mommy, we may not get to talk a lot because you're away, but i hope that you know that i love you as much as i do mommy. i miss the times when i could crawl into your lap when you guys were watching tv. i'm glad we got some much-needed father-daughter bonding time earlier this year. *hugs* amituofo daddy ~

Marimo with box

Marimo with box
Originally uploaded by æ.

*gush*

*squeals bimbo-style* isn't that the cutest thing!?! *adds to wishlist*

gawd.. 3 posts in a day, albeit at all hours. i really need to get back to the books.

can you say airhead?

how embarrasing... it still is, after finally getting some sleep...
experienced one of the most air-headed moments in my life last night (as far as i can remember. i think these sorta things get subconsciously filtered from one's memory). my excuse was that it was like 3am in the morning. the mother in me sat there nagging for me to go to sleep. i put her on mute.

if it's not a record somewhere, this was definitely a personal record. mr tofu msged, i thought he was mr f without checking email add that appears when i hover my mouse over the user name. spent 40 mins talking before mr tofu finally had enough and confronted me with:

........... u have no idea who i am do u haaaa
dont worry maybe your just overstressed
sleep a little and u will be more coherrent tomorrow

oh dear. that's when the warning bells in my head screeched mayday.
i'm sooooooo sorry mr tofu!

*crawls back under carpet*

mishmash

warning ~ rants and rambles up ahead!
i'm delirious from a really satisfying night of good food, laughter and great company.
my jaws hurt from laughing, my tummy aches from the guffaws.
my head hurts from the neuro overstimulation. tis been a while since i've been to a gathering of any sorts, really.. said i wouldn't attend any social functions for this whole semester. i kinda cheated..

i wish this was a regular thing, this thing called a social life. i just can't wait til the semester's over. a lot's actually hanging on how exams go. if i don't pass my 3rd year subject, i get presented to a board to convince them that they should let me continue. if they aren't convinced, i flunk out of med school. would mean i get my visa cancelled. which would mean i have 28 days to leave australia. it's something i try not to think about but well.. to say it's hard would be an understatement. i wonder what they would say if i passed my 4th year subject, but not the 3rd..

*topic switch* yes, i've got flight of ideas. i've also got poor concentration, short term memory loss and is anti-social. the beginnings of a schizophreniform disorder, depression or both methinks.

anyway, an email i received from my friend coupled with the newsflashes reported in the past few days set off a whole host of feelings that can most accurately described as.. well, think of someone who looks constipated. indignation, frustration, "get on with it" are all creating a horrible cacophony of feelings that's piling up because i don't quite know how to express it all coherently.

one thing that's glaring is the atrocious journalism. even an unseasoned journalistic greenhorn like me could pick out the biased nature, incorrect facts, random sprinklings of english words much akin to the phrases accompanying embarrasing counterfeit mickey mouse t-shirts the rellies used to send over. funny. i thought They made people take compulsory linguistics modules. oh wait. that was only for teachers. must be that other professions don't need this kind of enlightenment, especially aspiring journalists.

*light bulb flashes on top of head* *blink* *blink*

here's a thumbnail of my condolence card. don't take it out on the poor professionals who caused the death. it might not have lived like an animal, but it sure died like an angel, immortalized by those snippets of literary masterpieces called articles, published in an asian shrine somewhere in south east asia. i made this card especially for you ~ i hope you'll pick yourself out of the rut soon.

two dozen

two dozen years old ~ it was a quirky day. it's come and gone and i don't feel any different. just musing about bdaes in general i guess.. what's there to celebrate about when really, it's one step closer to deathdae. depressingly morbid, i know... i'm not one for the fuss although i do appreciate the thought. how one is supposed to let me know one remembers my birthday without telling me and making me blush is something even i don't know the answer to..

thank you for the tugs at my heartstrings:
had a very sweet diabetes-inducing gathering with chocolaty sugary goodness ~ i'm touched that people actually took time out to sit around and chat on my account! midnight greets from the girlies upstairs. late nite greets from sy ~ touched by the effort to send a greet despite being tired and overworked. ran into an old friend at bara foyer after a dry spell of a year or more. heard from buzzy, even though she was offline when i got the msg. got a call from b ~ i miss the talking. nightly phone calls comparing math answers in 6th grade sound dorkish now, but they remain one of the pearls threaded to the string of beads making up life as i know it. got a freakin' huge box 2 feet high ~ very unexpected, very taken aback. the sender called, we talked. it brought some closure but i still don't know how to react to the present and whatever it signifies. parents called.. more to remind me to send mothers' day cards to my god-mothers than anything lol. i think it's my mom's subtle way of hinting not to forget to get her something. lectures were finally interesting and useful. ricebowlers' greets made me melt to mush. to be newly acquainted and feel so accepted.. awww!


speaking of ricebowlers, here's a late announcement of a new grass-roots magazine called halfway mag... click click to see the spanking new magazine!




and in invisible ink...
the contents of the friggin' 2ft box really.. i don't know what to do with them. it's very cute and i appreciate the thought but i'm also very much creeped out at the whole situation.

happiness is...

mama frangipani. daddy frangipani. amy frangipani.

never would've thought this to happen. i just got hit by a sudden wave of homesickness...
happy early mothers' day mommy!

pulling a marge

when you run your fingers through your hair, end up without your ring and then proceed to spend at least half a minute trying to find the ring somewhere in your crowning glory... it might be a subtle reminder that a haircut is due.

i didn't believe it at first so i sat there and tousled my hair. no ring anywhere. so i stood up and tousled. nothing dropped on the floor. so i then i started getting worried and i squatted on the floor, flopped my hair over my head and stared at my toes as i flicked strand after strand of hair to find my ring... i felt it a couple of times but couldn't find it. finally fished it out a while later.

for those of you who complain that you have too little hair, that your hair's too fine, that you're going bald... well, here's a perfect moment to gloat and feel good about not having a thick mane.