cadbury madness

oh dear cadbury,
why must you begrudge them so?
allies they mayn't be
do they seem better as your foe?

"Chocolate makers Magic Chef, Alpha Confectionary and the Hunter Valley Chocolate Company were all threatened with legal action for using purple in their packaging."

oh cadbury bully,
why do you get swayed by power?
little 'uns get threats
but nestle doesn't need to cower?

"It allowed Nestle to use purple in Violet Crumble, Wonka, Quality Street and Polly Waffle bars." full story @ news.com.au

oh your purpleness,
when will you end this daft crusade?
i've purpled this post
now should i start seeking legal aid?

a different kind of splish splashing

the sun is out with nary a cloud to cast any shadows of relief. the waters are turquoise, crystal clear with sparkles reflecting millions of tiny twinkles. the sea breeze playfully dances with the blanket of warmth draped over the shoulders. refreshingly icy coolness laps at the ankle, whirlpools of sand tickling between the toes.

the horizon looks so tantalizing near as you wade out into the immense expanse of freedom and new adventures. pumped to tackle the world, you suddenly lose that grainy footing. no more ticklies. you see shadows zooming past out of the corner of your eye. icy water rushes up your nose and you splutter and chortle. splish splash goes the arms, flailing haphazardly as you slowly lose sight of the horizon. everything begins to go pink and blurry, you start forgetting where you are...disorientated

do you ever get days like these? i hope you never do.

see-saw

good news, bad news. back to good, another round of bad. a vicious cycle but really, without the bad, how can you call something good? even if you managed to find a way to, i doubt the goodness would be appreciated as much without previous helpings of badness.

bad news would be that it's been a week and i still haven't managed to ditch those yellow boogers. admittedly, i'm not as miserable as booyahman but it's still not much fun to have a constantly dripping nose. aloe vera kleenex has prevented further peeling and taken away the pain after every nose wipe but nothing more. good news is that my appetite hasn't waned even once... i still gobble up chocolates faster than cookie monster does with his cookies, i still hanker after certain foods including dumplings. was reminded they existed during the tzuching camp so i went looking for round white dumpling skins but had to make do with square yellow wonton ones. hmph.

sad news would be the possible lack of wedding bells for an old friend. silly as it sounds, i nearly sobbed tears of indignation as she recounted and vented. felt really helpless, unable to even give her a simple hug. happy news would be the engagement of another old friend. a birthday she will never forget, no doubt =)

depressing news would be my 8am start at the OTs tomorrow. blue scrubs to match a blue mood at the return to classes. delightful news would be realization of a week cut short with the weekend looming close... wheee!

worrying news would be the backlog of work to plod through. news of relief is that i won't torture you all with this drawn-out exercise and should go offline.

OOoo ooh, for those of you who use google calendar... my own aemii's, bdaes & holidays and schmacademics calendars are up for linking. would love to be able to sync schedules with all you busybodies scattered across the various continents! (pssst lu, this means better and/or more frequent planning of rendevous! should drag liz along for the next one...)

the calm before a storm

seems like there have been a lot of bones to pick recently. busy busy.
certain posts have irked me for the sheer fact that they paint an untrue picture.
certain comments have irked me for the sheer miscommunication apparent.
funny how they both lead down the same road.
not funny how tension has been discretely bubbling for some time now.

i almost blew my top for all to see. in fact, i did blow my top behind the sanctuary of my screen. i almost opened my vintage pandora's box. that'd be a chilling sight to behold, let me warn you. a few things did leak as i cracked the box's seal but a few people quickly wrenched the box away, caught the bad vibes and returned them to their locked resting place.

deep breaths. deep breaths.
listen to the wise one...

[mr v] says:
bad karma does you no good

gan'en.

homecoming

that mysterious blue slip arrived in the mailbox, the one that announced the arrival of a registered package waiting to be picked up in the mailroom. picked it up, i did! the heart did a marathon of *lubdubs* as i sped home to open it up. mr snuffles was gonna suffocate in there!!

working the penknife with the skill and agility of macgyver, i raced to free mr snuffles from his cardboard prison. a very sorry sight greeted me... mr. snuffles! what have they done to you?! seeing him bound and gagged by a magenta ribbon in a recyclable plastic bag, i couldn't decide whether to laugh or cry. a sweet gesture by the doll hospital to send him home all tied up with ribbon, i must say. very cute =)



the doll hospital must not have been that bad, snufflewuggles... don't give me that look! it was for your own good, getting that hernia of yours repaired! and look at you! you've put on weight in there. your butt's no longer saggy and you look 10 years younger =)

he's been home for a day or two now and he still doesn't believe that he's been fixed. still grumpy at the fact that he was sent away for 2 weeks, grumpy that it was all disguised under the veil of a vacation. at the moment, he's still getting used to his firmer butt. actually, i am too. it packs a wallop of a punch when he inadvertently sits on me now. hmph.

mr snuffles, hurry and wear in your new butt! you've got a few newfound friends that wish you a speedy recover and want to play with you! one day, someday... he'll hopefully get to meet sad sam and have that fight with yoshi bear =)


.

how dare you

my eyes grew wide and ears perked up when came across a certain post of potatohead's whilst trawling my bloglines stash. you've got to be kidding!? i thought... so rather than rant and rave first before gathering my facts later, i turned to trusty ol' google (which in fact, isn't as trusty as you'd think. as the lovely mr. v pointed out, just try googling "tiananmen" in global google images and google china images)

so anyway, i tried all sorts of combinations and forms of "united nations" with "mandarin" and "traditional" and even "abolish" on both google and the UN webby to no avail. i kept getting sporadic, random pages. mostly irrelevant. a forum discussing this petition was trudged up from the midst of all the cyberjunk but i steered myself away. forums are awful places to be at, efficient timesinks to draw one into heated type-fests as opinions clashing in the virtual world create ripples into the real world.

from what i can gather, there was a miscommunication and a dash of sensationalization. the u.n. is receiving the benefit of the doubt, just to be clear. conspiracy theories abound in my little head you see. a random xangan i googled somewhat clarified what seemed more and more to be another urban legend, this whole abolition of traditional chinese business. she posted an article regarding the issue including "Local media reported yesterday that most of the supporters were overseas Chinese instead of local Taiwanese and attempted to dig into the issue." well now. overseas chinese eh? well no shit. of course we make up the majority when you leave out the mega millions of chinese in mainland china. what is there about that statement making it deserving of being bolded? enlighten me. while you're at it, enlighten me as to why the rest of the statements in bold are the way they are...

dear u.n. people...

i had originally wanted to rant and rave, asking how dare you abolish a flourishing language that has been in everyday use in at least 3 different countries for at least the past half a century. i was going to ask how you can call yourself a representative of our world and still hold your head above the shameful irony. apologies for jumping to conclusions, for i did a bit of snooping around.

ok. i get it. so you want to abolish all forms of traditional mandarin from all your publications and such. assuming that there's no other hidden agenda, go ahead u.n. go ahead. just don't impose your own set of rules on the rest of the world, for that would be ridiculous. as ridiculous as the rest of the world insisting that we will only accept one version of english. howdja lik it if engwish as wee noe it will henz4th b typed lik dis? hw'd u lk it if we suddnly had 2 uze a shrtr, mor smplified v. of chnze??

do you understand where i'm coming from? do you see what a harebrained scheme this abolition of traditional chinese is, should it be what the people on the internet claim? is that not what you were planning? you were already publishing everything mandarin using the simplified version, so why choose to make an official announcement about it and set a target date? that's akin to me clanging the pots and pans to announce that i'm going to officially start using my green towel in 5 minutes henceforth even though everyone else in the cabin has seen me with the only towel, a green one no less, i packed for the past 3 days.

whatever it is you had wanted to achieve from this announcement, i don't know but good for you. that being said, it's not going to stop the rest of us who value the cultural and historical value of traditional mandarin from continuing to use it, to teach it, to pass it on.

"Minister of Education Tu Cheng-sheng also said that due to the language's historical and cultural significance, the MOE is firm in its stance that traditional Chinese characters will continue to be taught in local educational institutions regardless of the U.N.'s decision." says the article. atta boy!

just wanted to let you know...

...that my presentation didn't go as smoothly as i'd have liked it to but it's over and done with.

kleenex anti-viral was a new discovery. their "kills 99% of cold & flu viruses* in the tissue" with "*virucidal against influenza A&B (causes of the flue), rhinoviruses type 1A and 2 (leading cause of the common cold) and respiratory syncytial virus (rsv - leading cause of lower respiratory infection in children.)" small print was impressive. that's not what brings me back tho. it's the pretty kleenex tissue itself with itty bitty pretty blue mizutama happily dancing across like waves of pollen that keeps me blowing my nose, sneeze after sneeze =)

i'm also still on my adrenaline rush from all my newfound friends from this past weekend. like i said, it was like going home... on a frowny note, i'm missin all the goofy times we had, short as they might've been. i'm also now sporting a croaky sore throat and dribbling neon boogers that could be distant cousins to melted kryptonite. *sniffles*

on a happy note, i've just received a notice to pick up a registered parcel from the mail room. i'm hoping it contains mr snuffles ~ it's been 2 weeks and i miss him =( mr snuffles, come home soon. mr booger and his yellow friend are dying to meet you!

this little light of mine...

candles have always fascinated me. so much so that i've been accused of being a pyromaniac during the first tutorial of my degree on "the fishing trip" - 'twas a problem-based learning exercise that teleported the entire group onto a rickety fishing boat that got blown out to sea, only to end up on a deserted island with limited supplies. i think there was alcohol and there were books in the inventory that i had wanted to burn to keep everyone warm.

sometimes, i'll light candles for the heck of it and other times, it'll be out of necessity. a few times, i've been scared outta my mind as i get jolted awake by the awful screeching of the fire alarms in the middle of the night. thank goodness that's a rarity, thank goodness the culprit wasn't me =P despite the repeated scares, i still don't learn and am now looking foward to the dark and gloomy winter nights when i'll be able to initiate candlemania. you know how a werewolf'll only transform under a full moon? the same could be said of me... transforming into a pyromaniac only under the blanket of darkness =)

anyway, i digress. didn't mean to raise a few eyebrows with all this talk of candles and burning things. all i wanted to do was to jot down something that caught my attention, for my own sake. 'twasnt the first time i've heard it said, but it resurfaced again during one of the video clips at the camp. with my memory as bad as it is, i don't quite remember the exact phrasing but it was to do with how one should strive to be like a candle. "huhh??" you ask? nooo don't give me that look! i aint off my rockers... yet.

what it's trying to convey is that the candle is self-sacrificing. burning, diligently carrying out what it was made to do, consuming itself for the greater good to give light, to guide, to lead the way for everyone else. it's also about how a wee little candle can make huge ripples of difference and how it's something to mull over. something to keep in mind. and with that, i'll leave you with my snappy happy collection of various flames of the non-romantic kind =) credits to mish for the tzuching candle art heart snap!


lotsa gratitude, little light... 感恩. gan'en

the debrief

i had expected to come home dead beat after this camp of mine over the easter weekend. with a statement like that, you know that i'm gonna tell you i'm not dead beat. *nodnod* em, you hit the nail on the head miss conference geek! i miss conferences.. i miss being involved. i miss being proactive. i miss being needed. maybe it's some unaddressed want to be accepted, to feel useful or maybe i just need that ego boost now and then to keep me afloat. whatever the case may be, i've gotten a double dose of conferences and mass gatherings of the intellectual and goofy kind recently and that's not good. i think i'm addicted =(

no words can describe the weekend... pictures and music, maybe. not quite tho. it's one of those things you have to be there for. the timetable lies as a string of words and numbers, meaningless to those who didn't hear the enlightening and sometimes whimsical speakers in person. the food was to die for and yes, it was all vegetarian. fried mantou, sushi and chinese veggie burgers represent only a minute proportion of the gastronomical delights. chinese veggie burgers i say, because for some insane reason, they taste like something outta those little brekkie shops in taiwan. nothing like the horrible veggie burger roll thingies they serve up at burger king or mickey dees!

a lot of things at the camp reminded me of home. the little things. warm welcomes. instant acceptance without preconceived judgements about a person per se. the quiet sneaking of little vitamin c tablets next to our bowls during meals. mass braiding sessions in the morning for those who couldn't braid their own pigtails - i felt like i had a football team of little sisters! lotsa smiles. lotsa encouragement. lotsa positive thinking. lotsa "it's ok"s. at the expense of sounding like a hippie transported from the flower power free love era, i've gotta say that there was hella lotta love in one place this weekend... the kind you feel when you've come back from a long tiring day to be greeted by the mother's cooking wafting through the air, where you walk into your bathroom and there are fresh soft fluffy towels, still slightly warm from the dryer, next to a new shower cap in your favorite color.

some of you may know about my fear of mass congregations of asians in general... maybe it's a banana complex, white on the inside, yellow on the outside but i attribute it more to the fact that i've had the worst luck when it comes to meeting fellow asians. i s'pose i come across as an ingrate, one who doesn't appreciate one's own race but don't get me wrong... i only have problems with asians as a collective entity. i know i'm generalizing, i know i'm stereotyping. indulge me... they travel in hordes. they talk real loud, second to the americans around here. here we go, fist in my mouth again.. oops. anyway, back to the asians. they bring with them the worst set of personal ethics and habits and leave the place worse off than a pigsty. sometimes they leave a coat of oil so thick that the next dorm occupant is surprised by the white kitchen tiles beneath the brown muck. you know, as a nice welcome gift for the next person. see what i mean about personal ethics? charming. maddenly so.


this was one of the few times that i liked being around asians. i liked finding similarities (and many did i find! my msn list is now half a foot longer and my memory lane now stretches a few miles further) with fellow taiwanese campers. i wanted to find more similarities, to find my little niche of belonging. this has nothing to do with the poor kenny bashing, really =) S reflected in a wave of amazement... "you know, this is the first time i've been in the company of so many taiwanese people!" and then she grinned as she saw the lightbulbs go off above the heads of each of us girlies in the bunk and produced similar grins too.

4 days and one firmer tummy later, thanks to the laughs.. i'm finally back in newie from my little chooq's maiden drive down the F3 to sydney in one piece. am dreading the next 4 days of this week, for that means class. looking very forward to anzac day next tuesday for all the wrong reasons but hey, holidays are scarce. you take what you can =)

as comfy as i'll ever be

some things were never meant to be said. like this

emotional rollercoasters aside, i'm ready for the weekend =) will be attending a camp of sorts in sydney for the next couple of days.. i try to ignore that the organization's got a religous slant. i guess growing up with a "weird" religion has made it hard to want any religious association at all. the other kids would give me blank stares or a "whatever!" look and religion has been quietly shoved under the carpet as discretely as possible in public. i've come as far as being comfy with telling people i lean towards buddhism in one way or another, depending on how they ask. sometimes, i get the "so you're christian right?" and other times, people assume that i'm an aethiest. my answers range from outright "no, buddhist" to "well actually.. sorta, but no." i get embarrassed, squirming away when people associate it with wads of incense, gaudy scary looking figures and noisy chanting ceremonies. that is so not what buddhism is about.

will's little quote on his bloggie nicely encompasses some of the fundamental ideas about buddhism.. it's more about letting go, about attaining happiness. the concept that nothing is permanent, that life is an illusion. something along those lines. unable to kick the habit of being nit-picky, i usually have a teeth-gnashingly devilish time picking out inconsistencies with buddhist principles mostly with my dad. that's as close to a proper conversation as i get with him.. and yes, i'm working on improving that. very. very. slowly. so.

so yeah, this camp thing... i guess it's kinda like world vision. they're a christian organization but they're known for their work rather than their religious foundation... at least in my mind. i don't immediately associate christianity with them. pictures of kids and the "sponsor a child" project spring into mind first. that's how it's like with tzu-chi. that's what this camp will be about.. "to promote environmental protection and community volunteering activities" according to the final camp details they sent out. personally, i'm hoping to network and meet new people outside the little med clique, to also see what other people have been doing to help out the community, to let me get out of my little padded cell here in newie for just a weekend. i was tentative about signing up but decided to throw caution to the winds. after all, had i not gone.. i would've spent my 4-day easter break vegging out at home and killing my eyes with excessive screen staring time and still wouldn't have gotten any work done anyway. so what the heck. sydney, here i come =) cya on monday and lotsa wishes for a safe and happy long weekend. ooo.. and watch out for the cops! i noe i'll be keeping a close eye on the speedometer tomorrow =)

humble bumbles

i climbed so high up on my little soapbox that i lost my balance and tumbled off today. serves me right, that was a much needed tug at my invisible leash in a way.

remember that mr lack of social skills i whinged about just yesterday? managed to meet up to thrash out our presentation with the single thought of getting the job done and leaving as soon as possible. there's nothing i can specifically pinpoint that makes me uncomfy around him but that's the cumulative general aura he exudes... it's almost like a hmm... george on desperate housewives maybe? squeaky clean, slightly awkward with a very wide tight grin where you're not quite sure if he's just conducting jaw exercises or smiling. his eyes don't smile you see... they just stare at you, deadpan. unchanging. boring into you like a game of staring gone wrong. the type of guy that you fear will eventually snap and turn into the next serial rapist, still carrying that tight forced grin.

despite the squirminess, kudos to him for coming up with exactly what the prof wanted. an interesting presentation was called for and my idea bank was dry as a drought. how does one make a student-directed seminar on menstruation interesting, let alone interactive? *faints* i had trudged up a silent version of disney's the story of menstruation cojointly produced with kotex for women back in the late 1940s thinking that might provide some form of entertainment. i immediately snapped up his suggestion of conducting the seminar through the eyes of a maturing egg, if eggs had eyes. it kinda reminded me of that "journey through a cell" assignment we had to write for biology in 7th grade. one of the best classes i've taken, conducted by one of the best teachers i've ever had.. a certain ms kathryn davis who went off to bulgaria the year after =(

mr lack of social skills remains clueless about my whingefest involving him, but i still feel compelled to apologize for strutting around on my pedestal. sadly, i forgot that not confirming to the norm in one aspect didn't equate to being a complete kook, that this wasn't adequate justification for ostracization both physically and mentally. although i was humbled, old habits have a tendency to resurface. i could've given him a ride home yet i made the conscious effort to suppress my blabbermouth from asking if he wanted one after the meeting today. the thought of spending 10 minutes in an enclosed space, in my enclosed space of a car made me queasy. this, i think i can justify.. i can't deal with creepiness. that intense piercing gaze projected by those huge black holes where eyes are supposed to be. would you want to be locked up in a moving bubble with eyes like that? a heartfelt sorry. i really am, for being unable to overcome my personal judgements and i'm sorry for being so quick to judge in the first place. thank you for bursting my ego balloon, thank you for bringing me back down to earth.

today, it's all about me

when does the desire for personal space cross the line to become antisocial behavoir?

as much as i blush with joy at the notion that there are people out there, some who are complete strangers, who would take the time to come back and read my ramblings... the attention is a double-edged sword. i'm flattered, i really am. flattered that there are people who are interested for one reason or another, flattered that the random bored stranger decided to linger for a moment longer or that a long lost friend takes the time to blog-hop despite a hectic busy schedule.. just to check up, you know =)

what stinks is the lack of freedom. i hate being caged up.. i'm sure many of us delight in having some form of freedom. identities try to be hidden as i dredge up rants and sometimes embarrasing snippets of the daily drudgeries but sometimes, it just gets a bit tiring. i've always seen my blog as my venting space, my haven for keeping me sane in this crazy world. a place where i can scribble down my thoughts and not care what others think, to be unafraid of being judged. things have pretty much stayed this way since the inception of this blog with the exception of odd blips scattered here and there.

i refuse to password certain personal entries, i refuse to make entries only accessible to certain people. i refuse to be shackled by fears of misconceptions and assumptions, of relinquishing the freedom that comes with laying claim to one's own blog. i'd like to think of myself as a wysiwyg person - what you see is what you get, for all the non-geeks out there. so don't think too much about entries i write. stop asking me if a certain entry is referring to you. you will know without a shadow of a doubt if i'm talking about you. i'll make sure of that, even if your name wasn't mentioned. if you need to ask, chances are that it wasn't about you.

i'm here for my friends, i'm here if you need me but please leave me the hell alone if you don't. i'm not some guardian angel sent to keep track of everything happening in everyone's life - gawd knows i need help keeping mine from derailing.

yes, G.. that phone call sparked off this post and i'm sorry you caught me in a pissy mood. this blog is my outlet, a blank slate ready to accept anything and everything i write with the "publish post" button... one that doesn't judge, one that doesn't care. i'm sure you have a sanctuary like that somewhere and i'm sorry i'm not in the picture.

maybe i've already crossed the line to the land of the selfish bitches. i guess i could always blame pms but the truth is, i'm fed up with a lot of this being taken for granted thing and i'll be perfectly happy being the proverbial bitch at this point. just because one listens doesn't mean one listens for a lifetime. just because one cares doesn't mean one is willing to die for the cause.

i'm tired. it's the 2nd day of this bloody obs/gyn rotation. i'm trying really hard not to let this whole repeating thing get to me but it's tiring holding a brave front, greeting tutors who've taught you just 5 months ago and trying to ignore their curious stares as to why you're back again before literally seeing the lightbulb of realization flash past their eyes. i'm stuck with someone who lacks social skills so badly he would put a drunk pebble to shame. he's presenting the student seminar with me next week. his reputation precedes him so much that every consultant he's come into a 5mile radius of has run for cover at the first sign of his approach. worse than those silent farts, i tell you. i have last week's laundry piled on top of my bed in a heap. the comforter's piled on top of that and when night comes, i clamber onto that mountain of cloth and drift off to sleep. my sink is overflowing with dishes. the trash resides in a temporary shopping bag for i haven't gotten to putting a garbage bag in the trash can yet. i need to do a second load of laundry but the dryers have yet to be fixed since they broke down over a month ago. i need to pack for a weekend trip down to sydney. the wacom's being a pain in the butt... the pen's too sensitive. i can't find my 3rd year notes, yet i've already promised someone i'll pass them my past year papers. i hate breaking promises. that seminar with mr lacking social skills is next thursday, no seminar plan let alone powerpoint in existence yet. i've been living off microwave dinners and takeouts since coming back from perth. i don't like any of this at all, that's not me... but apparently it now is.

i'm truly sorry for being curt and antisocial, but can you please try to understand that i need my own space, my own time. that i need to sort out my own head and my own life before i can even start to tackle someone else's. =(

i needed to vent, apologies if i scared any of you.. my bark's worse than my bite (or was it the other way around o.0)

88 turns of the hands on the clock

a lot can happen in 88 turns of those big hands on the clock... just think 24. the tv show, not the magic number.

after a harrowing last 48 turns of the big clock hand comprising of a total of 3 turns of intermittent sleep, i arrived home safe and sound thanks to network all travel albeit sporting a very fashionable half-closed eye look highlighted by puffy dark eyebag accents and a slight limp. removal of newly-discovered horrible walking colorado clogs revealed various lines and patches colored in glorious shades of wine red and purple on one side, stbborn annoying disgusting calli callousi callouses on the other. the painful patch at my hip was a bonus, just so it matched my feet. a sprinkling of red speckles beautiful enough to shame a robin's egg greeted me. there must be some unaccounted factor triggering my jean-burn only after the 3rd day of wearing commenced but im in no mood or state to conduct a scientific experiment to determine the aforementioned factor.

head swirling like a whirlpool,
tidal waves of travel thoughts and visions
sweep across the turquoise ocean calm
yet return will be one of my missions

to the place of course, not the current state
consisting of pink elephants and polka dots
few drugs does this humble home keep
but of sleep deprivation, i sure have lots

· ¤ · ¤ · ¤ · ¤ · ¤ ·

98 turns of the hands on the clock
10 hours of blissful sleep later
11am on a beautiful saturday morning

one blog post to finish from last night...
and no mr. snuffles to hug! *wails* he's been successfully admitted at the doll's hospital but they could only fix his hernia. looks like i'll be needing to scout around for teddy bear specialists to fix his grubby ears and nose. trekked up a neverending hill with gerbs to send snufflelumps to the hospital (and subsequently gave up less than 500m from it, succumbing to a taxi ride) only to be told there wasn't a thing to be done about his grubbiness. it was a teddy bear equivalent of being handed a sentence of skin cancer and my heart sank through the floor...as if it wanted to keep poe's telltale heart company under those wooden floorboards. even if he was ripped apart at the seams and thoroughly washed would his grubby nose and ears remain that icky patchy mess =( poor little snuffles took along a lotta of hugs and ji-in's well wishes as he was weighed and measured for height at hospital admissions. brave little 'un he was =) a photolog of his little adventure is at flickr.

perth itself was very tranquil. much bigger than newie, much more relaxed than sydney, much cozier than brisbane and much smaller than melbourne. i kinda liked it actually!

the conference itself was really interesting. plenty of tips and tricks of the trade, plenty of networking. possibly snagging another research project... maybe.

the meetups went as planned =D big shouts to laziicat, j, wx and family and my cousin for taking the time for a chat or two over scrumptious food! i saw a different snippet of perthian life with each, so thank you and thank you again =)

i had a few pathetic moments happen during the various gaps of free time, but they were fun on hindsight. the type of fun you half groan half giggle at, telling yourself you can't believe you're doing this. the type of thing that happens after a full day's conference program with a 2 hour wait for dinner plans with the rest of the jhh crew that went, only to be smsed saying that nobody could be found and one was heading towards hypoglycemialand, so sort yourself out or try to get in touch with them yourself. my tummy wasn't happy and i made a beeline for the room service menu. what a life... mr snuffles, a pizza to myself + hot piping garlic naan and the teevee. snuggling under fluffy hotel comforters propped by 4 pillows and the aircon turned down low... mmmmhmm! pathetically comfy.

my solo tour was great ~ one tends to realize what a small world this is on trips it seems. there must be some unwritten, unproven theorem where the number of miles away from home is inversely proportional to the proximity by association of a total stranger met enroute. ran into a nurse from the jhh i've never seen before. also gallavanted around freemantle with a fellow 'merican from georgia. there were of course the obligatory retirees on the same tour, having a free and easy vacation with perpetual smiles of sunshine beaming in all directions.

a few more pix to fix up ~ i'll leave you with a scene from my last nite there =)

stowaways

take the genes of an incessant worrier and add them to those of a meticulous planner. ditch a few other genes in the process and sprinkle a dash from the unlabelled flask nearby. finish the concoction by brushing the stray genes left on the countertop and you get me.

vacations are supposed to be easy breezy. you're supposed to have fun picking out places to visit and maybe throw in a squabble or two if one has siblings. they're not supposed to be a carefully planned miliatary operation like how mine's sorta turning out. i'm off to perth tomorrow for the PSANZ conference, the one to do with the research project i helped work on last year. (of all the things it could've been called, my first research publication/poster was merrily titled "Australasians talk about sex more than the rest of the world!" by doc wright. no, it's not what you think...) i'll prolly be meeting a few friends and my cousin before i return back to newie if everyone's schedules allow for it =)


will also be planning to send mr snuffles to the doll hospital in sydney. there's supposed to be one in every state and it took me forever to find it, let alone decide.. i wanted to fix him up. he's got a hernia ...his pellet bag must've bust open and now you can feel little knobbly pellets jiggling in his feet. on the other hand, fixing him up would mean surrendering him to unknown bearmakers and horrors of horrors should he come back with new and replaced parts. i'm a stickler for originals you see... but well, '06 has so far been a year for new beginnings and so i'm thinking "why not?" crossed fingers for mr snuffles.. i'm not expecting a speedy discharge from the hospital so he'll be missed for the next few weeks at home. poor little bugger has no idea he's going to the doctor's... all he knows is that he'll be on his first flight ever as a stowaway to perth.

as odd as it may seem, i finally understand how patients feel when they keep putting off appointments. they're scared. they don't noe what to expect. they want to be fixed, they want to get well but that desire's been outweighed and overshadowed by doubt, distrust and anxiety. i just went thru that with mr snuffles although my case, it ain't exactly a life or death situation. nevertheless, i can now tell them "i know" and really mean it. not that i didn't mean it before... i just thought i knew, you know?

and just for random's sake... if someone had a flight to catch at 3am saturday night, just when everyone was supposed to turn their clocks back an hour, would the person need to check in an hour earlier at 2am or at 4am?

ponderings aside, i need to pack my bags for tomorrow =) if you don't know me by nowwwww... you will never ever eve- *cuts the singing* as i was saying, if you know what i'm like, you should be expecting a flurry of pictures from the next few days up at my flickr and a trip recap at the end of the week =)

april fools is no excuse!

with the amount of whinging and incredulous indignation pouring out from each chilipadi pore of mine today, i wish it was some cruel concoction of an april fools' joke gone too far. be warned, beware. a rant of aemii proportions is about to happen. familiar with richter scales? this one would come close to the Big One all californians have come to dread.

where do i start? where, in this mess of inane inefficiency do i start? shall we discuss the state of the dryers in the laundry room? yes, the lonely three who have diligently served bara for the past 5 years. it's been a month since the first dryer broke down and reported for maintenance. it's been 2 weeks since the 2nd dryer broke down. excuse me for being naive - i believed the management would've had enough time to at least fix the first one. maybe they would've had enough sense to fix the 2nd one in one session, but that might've been hoping for too much. apparently, even the first hope was a tad too far fetched. one dollar poorer, one hour later... my clothes were as damp and heavy leaving the dryer as they were entering it.

and then there's my bathroom light. as romantic as it sounds to shower in candlelight, it's highly irritating to light up 10 tealights and grab my candeloos with a secret fear of burning down the whole building with one careless toppled candle onto my shaggy bathroom rug. and no, the rug stays. *makes angry face* maintenance form was put in friday afternoon. picked up by friday night. light still dead as minced meat by saturday night. on-call caretaker was NOT on call. campus security had to come, two of them... to change a lightbulb, my lightbulb. does this not remind you of those "how many people does it take to change a light bulb" jokes? trust me when i assure you that at the end of this fiasco, the answer will be more than 4. their master key didn't fit the newly changed lock to the storeroom, the deputy warden had to be called. key was nowhere to be found, they will try to find it first thing tomorrow morning and get someone to change my lightbulb. i'll believe it when i see artificial light flooding my bathroom.

shall i continue? what about anj's temperamental toilet bowl... the one with a mind of it's own, letting out sighs shaming those of moaning myrtle's every ten minutes or so? her maintenance slip was put in 2 months ago. or what about those stomping elephants from last year who have morphed into bouncing rhinos upstairs? is a year's worth of complaints and phone calls not enough? do i need to book myself into the nearest mental institution with a padded room to stay away from vibrating ceilings and furniture? will i then only escape from becoming chicken little??

do not be fooled by the eggshell exterior of enchanting studio apartments with the latest state of the art comforts. entering medicine turned me caustically cynical, entering bara turned me cantankerously churlish.

*sigh* i haven't whinged about this place for a while. now and then, a whinge-fest bubbles to the surface of apparent calm. that's the trouble with suppressing things. you always end up with at least a wedgie, hurting yourself the most in the process. some people say.. take a deep breath, let it go. just let it go. pishposh! i'd like you to tell me that with a straight face the next time you find yourself roused from sleep at 2am in the morning by burnt toast because the idiots were smart enough to install smoke detectors next to the stove.