I think that I will swear off alcohol for the next month. I'll need that much time to recover from the damage wrought by this weekend of hedonism!

There's still the offer of a Flaming Lamborghini from an overseas friend though. Oh dear.

It's my birthday today!

But, in typical me style... or not, as the case may be, I've been having celebrations the entire weekend. I figured, why not?

So, on Friday night, I celebrated with my colleagues, who decided to try getting me drunk with one of my weaker drinks - champagne. After downing two glasses, I was close to being gone, but fortunately, after taking some time out, I wasn't drunk by the time I got back home. While I don't ordinarily like to hang loose with my colleagues that much (I try to separate business from pleasure), that night was an exception. I had to make an impassioned plea to try and get one of my colleagues, who I'm rather close to (and I'm probably his closest female colleague, I think) and who is rather popular and happening and also has something on, to come down and just wish me a happy birthday. He turned up and stayed until close to midnight, so that was really cool too. It's been a while since my batch hung out after work. The manager of the bar even treated me to a bottle of champagne as well, which was not good since I was definitely not getting any more sober!

Have I said anything about the bar yet? This place is chic, elegant, classy and gorgeous. Located on the top floor of the world's tallest hotel, the view of my decidedly boring country at night is still an amazing sight to behold. It's definitely a place to bring your significant other to because the ambience is really fantastic. And thanks to the aforementioned colleague of mine, he got us a table in the exclusive members' section so we didn't have to mingle with the riff-raff. Okay, just kidding. It's just good that we had a place to sit and drink in such a nice place.

I was dressed up all pretty and feminine too - in a black Morgan top with frilly lace lining the collar and the sleeves, and a tailored cream silk circular skirt which flounced when I moved, so I really felt very elegant that night.

Yesterday night was good too! I went to see the amazingly talented Swingle Singers. I would love to be able to sing like them... and sometimes I think I can, but I'm just too shy to be able to do that in front of everyone! I bumped into two ex-classmates there too, and it's just so amazing how small this world really is.

I ended off my night seeing the Trance Republic DJs do their thang. I had to sprint from the concert hall all the way to the club in order to catch my friend make his debut, and it's funny how all these other people were seeing this funkily dressed individual in really nice suede Camper boots just streak down the office area 'cos I was just running like hell. I managed to catch the last twenty minutes of his set, which he ended off with Beautiful Things. As the next DJ was going to be on from 11.30 pm to 1 am, just before he went on, I said, "Could I make a special request? Could you just make sure that at midnight, your set is going to be damn good? I'll be turning 23 in half an hour." So thank you very much for obliging. :)

The only bad thing, if it can be considered bad, is that people tend to ply you with drinks on your birthday. I had already drunk a Sex on the Beach cocktail (always something I find a little difficult to order, because I tend to go, "Could I have Sex on the Beach please?") before midnight came along, and then, all of a sudden, people start wishing me happy birthday two minutes before my watch says it's my birthday. Turns out my watch was slow, so okay, fine. And then... tequila shots just start coming at me. Three of them within the span of half an hour, and I could definitely feel the effects.

Strangely enough, after having sat down for 30 minutes, I was told by my friend that I didn't seem drunk anymore (I mean, like yeah, when I first sat down, I was covering my head with my hands) and that I'm quite a good drinker, considering how much I took. Now, this is coming from a guy who seems to be able to take close to 20 shots easily and not get drunk. So, like, wow.

In any case, I didn't get any higher or any more drunk that night, despite taking half a jug of vodka red bull and one more Sex on the Beach (this time in shooter form). It's a little weird, but I've noticed if the first three drinks don't get me drunk, I won't get drunk for the rest of the night. It's a good thing I was dancing though, because whenever I stopped moving, I started feeling more unsteady.

Enough about alcohol. The night ended, I went off home and got into bed at about 4 am. It's been a great birthday so far, so it's really cool. When you compare this with my birthday last year (spent mostly at home) and the year before (nursing a slightly bruised heart), you can see the drastic change. It's good to see that my plan to ensure that I celebrate my 23rd birthday in style has paid off!

Have been in a rather bipolar mood today. Was very high most of the working day (not just due to the clubbing on Mon night/Tues morning but also because of the strong Lavazza coffee I drank) but towards the end of the day, I had a mini-meltdown over an assignment which is due this Friday but which no one has given me any feedback on. It's my first assignment and no one's been telling me what I'm doing right, what I'm doing wrong and I'm just so freakin' worried that I almost broke down and cried. It's only because I was in the office that the tears didn't flow. But they did when I came back home.

It's a vicious cycle. Sometimes I get rather depressed and stressed by work. I don't know whether I'm doing well, or if I'm doing badly. I'm very very worried about the latter. Then, I think that I'm old enough and have been through enough to know better than to freak out over work, over not being able to handle assignments and stuff like that. But thinking like that only makes it worse... like you start to think "What's wrong with me? Why can't I handle all this? I'm close to being 23 for goodness's sake, and I'm freaking out over this?!"

Yes, I'm scared. Work scares me. It stresses me out tremendously.

Thank goodness that today, I finally stopped being such a private individual, and confessed this to one of my good friends.

Originally written November 26 2003 - 9.41 am.

Can you believe it? I'm still high! I'm still in that incredible state of bliss, still finding grins breaking out ever so often. I went to bed at 6.30 am on Tuesday and woke up at 9.45 am that same morning in order to visit a friend for Hari Raya and even though I was completely exhausted by the time noon came around, it seemed that I was still all smiley. Even today, even now, I'm still happy, undaunted by the prospect of having to submit an assignment by the end of this week, or that after that I only have two weeks to complete my next one, which is more complicated than the one I've been spending a month on.

Part of me is still shrieking in disbelief at my behaviour at 4 am that night at Centro, that I salsa'd with a guy I had just met. I'm still working on imposing some distance; after all, we're both dancers. I acknowledge that in salsa, they do dance that intimately, more intimately than we do in swing, but still, dancing is just that, dancing, and shouldn't be misconstrued to mean something more than it is. But. I had a lot of fun. He has a great body and he is rather cute. Ultimately, whatever else happens, or doesn't happen, it shouldn't take anything away from the fact that for that period of time, I let my hair down completely, jumping around madly, screaming, dancing, and that if it didn't hurt me that time, it should be possible for me not to feel so self-conscious about it and to be able to do so another time.

Originally written on November 25 6.11 am.

Oh. My. Gosh.

Judge Jules' set was incredibly hardcore. He played a banging set, dropping Pulser's My Religion and Motorcycle's As The Rush Comes, among other hard trance and hard house tunes. It's been a while since I could sing to a trance song (i.e. ATRC) so that was really cool. He played Lil Louis's French Kiss as well... and at the part where the woman reaches her climax, I let out a scream of sheer enjoyment. Yes. I was rather high.

That I was in such a state was clearly evident when the next DJ, Godwin P, came on. He changed the mood of the set tremendously, dropping techno tracks, and generally, I just wanted Jules to come back on. I would have left too, if not for the fact that this guy had started dancing with us - and I ended up dancing with him. He could shake his booty so I asked him if he knew salsa. Apparently, he did, and he begun salsa'ing with me. Man, did he have a fine body and incredibly smooth skin. Trust me, my hands were a little naughty that night. Well, okay, more than a little. But he encouraged it, so what the hell. Who am I to argue?

I have to admit that my brain was yelling at me during this point. "What the F**K are you doing?" kept going through my head. I mean, yes, I only met that guy like on Saturday... but he can move so well...

He told me - twice - that he'd had a little too much to drink... but by then, so had I, so I didn't care. He told me that he's been told he dances like a girl... but dude, honestly... not like any girl I've seen, or danced with! And I have seen many.

Best part is: he told our mutual friend that I'm a good dancer - and his friend agreed! That really is one of the best compliments anyone can give me. I mean, I'm so mad about dancing and that I'm so convinced that I'm not born to be a dancer!

Too bad he prefers ladies who are 'different' (i.e. not local) and who are older than he is. I definitely wouldn't mind.

If Coldplay's Clocks was the icing on the cake, the dancing was like a cup of the world's best cappuccino. Smooth, intense, delicious and very nice to hold between the hands. Hmm-mm!

Originally written on November 24 3.23 pm.

I feel incredibly happy today. Despite getting more work and finding out that the assignments I'm on are more complicated than originally thought, I am ecstatic.

The mood I am in is not due to the coffee I imbibed earlier, nor entirely attributable to the fact that tomorrow's a public holiday. I'm amazingly excited about my birthday this wekeend and while working at my desk and listening to Coldplay's amazing A Rush of Blood to the Head, a great big smile kept breaking out on my face. I'm almost amazed that the entire office didn't brighten up from the sheer radiance of my grin. Yes, I was that happy.

I'm really looking forward to treating my friends and myself to a fabulous night out this weekend. In fact, the celebrations have already begun! I splurged on a gorgeous set of lingerie - a bra, panty and slip set decorated with roses - made by After Eden. I may not have anyone to wear it for, but by gosh, it looked good on the window display.

The state of rapture that I am in is indescribable. It's comparable to the feeling of pure joy I felt when I returned to work after my Germany and London trip, or when Phil and I were together. It's an awesome feeling; and somehow, listening to the strains of Coldplay's Clocks just intensified that feeling. It certainly was the icing on a truly fine cake.

Almost forgot. Yesterday, I saw Havana Night, a musical about the dances and music of Cuba. It wasn't a bad show at all. The dances were lively and spectacular (though I was a little annoyed that the rumba didn't look like any rumba's I've seen) and the music was nice and loud. There was salsa, merengue, mambo, samba, rumba, cha cha and flamenco, and it just made me more determined to learn at least one of them... I'd been wanting to learn the samba ever since I'd seen it danced to the Gipsy King's Soy, an irresistably upbeat tune that you cannot help but smile and dance to, and as some of my friends know, I want a rumba for my wedding dance (as well as a wedding lindy hop, but we'll cross that bridge once we come to it).

Latin music was just one of the many genres which I'd been listening to that day. I'd been listening to electronica (especially In a State!), swing and as it turns out, I would end my night by listening to a local band that does great rock covers.

A complete non sequitor here. I met a former prom king of my high school whose sister happened to be the prom queen in my year, and he told me, once we'd been introduced, that I looked like his sister. I never know how people mean these things (trust me, it's not a good thing to hear if you happen to think that guy's good looking and that you wouldn't mind dating him), but I'll take it as a compliment. Hee hee :)

Oh yes! I went bowling today! I was practising for my company's bowling competition on Wednesday, as my department decided to enter a team. Unfortunately for me, each team must have a female, and guess who the lucky one was? *Sigh* Anyway, my friend, this really nice guy who's become a good friend over the last three months, went bowling with me today and he gave me some tips. Stuff like, swing the ball higher, bowl straight, bend down lower and release the ball closer to the ground, don't spin the ball, etc. It's hard to conceptualise all these things when you're doing the actual bowling, but somehow, on some frames, I seemed to be getting the hang of it. My eventual scores for the three games we played? 58, 42 and 63. I'm happy. I broke 60 for the first time ever... although of course, I have only bowled four times before in my life!

I've been to three different dance classes on three consecutive days now, today being my third day.

On Friday, I attended a Club Dance class, the first in a series of four classes. This course promised to teach us the proper techniques of club dancing. When pressed to explain, all the receptionist could tell me was "all the dances that you see done in clubs." Brilliant, I thought. Should be interesting enough. At the very most, it'll just all be hip hop.

I was wrong. Instead we were taught that there apparently is a right way to dancing to electronic music. My teacher called it disco music, but as he's over forty years old, I'll attempt to translate it into modern lingo. I'm fairly certain he meant Eurodance and disco house. At the very least, those are the kind of songs he played.

I came out of that dance class a little traumatised, a little upset at learning that I'd been techno-dancing the wrong way for the last two years. Then, I decided, heck it. So he's taught me the right way to move my knees - so as not to injure them - but he sure as heck doesn't have the hands down. And even if he considers my hand movements to be wrong dance-wise, I don't care. It's raver culture, man.

Yesterday, I went to a Lindy Hop workshop, teaching us spinning technique, which is good, because I tend to have trouble with my spins, either completing them quickly, or more recently, not getting dizzy at the end of the spin. That class was relatively less intense than Friday's class, and the music played was completely different... in fact, the music they played was completely different from all of the swing music I usually dance to.

And today, it was my weekly MTV Dance class at my gym. We'd been doing Janet Jackson's All For You for three weeks now, and I can tell you that it is without a doubt one of the most complicated MTV dances I've learnt. It's exactly like what she does in the music video. And if you've heard the song, you'd know for sure that the song has a very quick tempo. Today's class was the conclusion, and we learnt some rather difficult moves today. So, at the end of the class, when it was time for us to put everything together, and I found myself able to do it all (though with mistakes here and there of course), I felt exhilarated. It's been a long time since I'd gotten that feeling from any of the dance classes I've attended, and it felt really good to be getting my groove back.

In A State, one of the singles off Unkle's second and latest album, Never Never Land, sounds nice enough in the original version. The piano intro, though uncommon for a dance track, is not bad at all. The female vocals imbue the song with a general feeling of melancholiness. It's a sad, beautiful tune.

What Sasha has done to it, however, is amazing. It's like a whole different tune. The piano intro has been slowed down and faded up (in the original, the piano fades down), synth overtones have been added, as well as a guitar riff (reminiscent of the guitar riffs in another fantastic tune, Andain's Beautiful Things) giving it a more atmospheric feel. On the whole, it's been made into an exceedingly dark and sexy tune.

It's Sasha's first remix in a long time (his last was in 1998!), and man, was it worth the wait. He may have disappointed me at the two sets he played in Singapore, but I have to admit, as a producer, he is one of the best and most talented ones out there.

Friday Five - Nov 21, 2003

1. List five things you'd like to accomplish by the end of the year.
Be a happy smiley person again, as I was last summer.
Lose two kgs.... actually, no. To just have a better looking bottom. I hate my thighs and butt.
Be a productive, capable individual at work.
To be recognised by others as the above.
To maintain a clean-ish room for a period longer than two days.

2. List five people you've lost contact with that you'd like to hear from again.
My Chilean American flatmate in final year.
My Nigerian flatmate in first year.
A coursemate of mine who I got to know better only in my final year.
A good friend in my class back in secondary school.
That's all I can think of right now. For the first two, I didn't really speak to them all that much, but they were really cool and interesting people. I wish I had gotten their contact details!

3. List five things you'd like to learn how to do.
Ice-skate.
Drive.
Present (as in PowerPoint, speaking, etc.).
Salsa.
Think before I speak.

4. List five things you'd do if you won the lottery (no limit).
Hire my friend as my personal masseuse.
Take up dance classes seven days a week.
Travel all over the world in comfort - no more rickety night trains!
Purchase overseas properties - an apartment in London overlooking Tower Bridge, a villa in Barcelona, apartments in Venice, New York and California - so that I can stay there when I'm in the area.
Pay my parents back for sending me to university... and give them more money to ensure that they'll be comfortable for the rest of their lives.

5. List five things you do that help you relax.
Watch TV, especially 24, Alias, CSI and Friends.
Listen to music. The genre differs depending on my mood.
Read magazines. My favourites are Shape, Self and The Economist.
Dance.
Chat with friends.

Oh goody. A book that'll enable me to overcome my so-called lack of marriageability.

This week has been a busy one, hence the delayed response to an article in published in the local newspaper which invoked my ire. For the later half of last week, I had been seeing captions such as "RGS girls are intellectual snobs" and "Why I wouldn't send my daughter to RGS" advertised in the Straits Times. I was all set for the article on Sunday, November 16, to see what they had to say about my former school. This is what came out.

Laments of a girl from RGS by Chua Mui Hoong

Among other things, these are the bits of the article that I found the most interesting:

"IF I EVER had a daughter, I wouldn't put her in Raffles Girls' School. Don't get me wrong. RGS gave me a very good education academically.

It taught me there were no limits to what I could achieve, if I only tried hard and had the talent. I made lifelong friends, including a bunch of us who still meet to makan, celebrate birthdays and share sorrows.

But now, as an adult considering schooling options for youngsters, I realise there's a lot more to life than getting good grades. There's also a lot more to life than being achievement-oriented."

"I benefited from going to school there. But I'm just not sure I would want my (hypothetical) daughters to turn out the way I did.

In addition to the RGS traits of confidence and competence, I would want them to be kind and gentle, patient with others, and to develop their emotional and artistic selves fully."

"Maybe it's a gross stereotype, but I've always thought MGS girls were gentler and more feminine than RGS ones. Rafflesian girls are assertive and stroppy. We scare some men. We're probably less marriageable."

Now, I'm from RGS, and I loved my time there. I spent four years there, making wonderful, long-lasting friendships, and was surrounded by incredibly intelligent and articulate people. The teachers there were dedicated and enthusiastic. I had a fantastic time in the chess school team, an activity that took up a lot of time. I have to stress, though, that my report card was anything but spectacular. All in all, I think that my school did and still does a good job of turning out confident, assertive, intelligent, capable young women.

First things first. Ms. Chua, I do not believe for a second that being in RGS made me a meaner, less gentle person than I naturally was. Nor did it stunt my emotional development. Perhaps it did make me more impatient; after all, I'm used to dealing with intelligent people, and stupidity is not something that I can tolerate. But the inculcation of such qualities in a person is not, and should not be, the responsibility of a secondary school. In fact, by the time one reaches secondary school, more often than not, one's character would have been moulded already, by the teachings of one's parents, as well as one's experiences in one's primary school. So, if you want your (hypothetical) daughters to turn out kind and patient, this should be your job, your responsibility. It shouldn't be something to be blamed on a secondary school, and certainly not RGS. If you turn out to be a bad parent, don't try and shirk the blame by taking aim at a popular target.

Secondly, might I highlight that if the (questionable) fact that we Rafflesians scare off some men makes us less "marriageable" (whatever the hell that means), then I'm all for it. If a man is scared off by our assertiveness, confidence and independence, then that man certainly isn't worthy of our time or attention. If your objective in sending your daughters to a different school is to ensure that they turn out to be more "marriageable", then I have absolutely nothing to say to you. So be it. Good for you.

Declaring that you're from RGS and therefore should be excused from the flying brickbats that you just knew would be coming your way once the article was published was a futile act. Your arguments are illogical and your writing is poor. Nothing in this world can shield you from that.

A common adage goes, "You never really get over your first love."

I guess it must be true. I have been over my first boyfriend for a few years now, but upon learning that he seems to have gotten a girlfriend, I find that I'm feeling a little sad. It's a similar feeling to what Bridget Jones feels in Bridget Jones's Diary where she finds out that her ever-reliable ex-boyfriend is getting married and she's at a loss because she always thought that he would be there for her, single and available, kind of like her last resort should anything happen.

Not that I view my first love as someone who I'd run to if I ever need, say, a shag or a snog, or even a hug, just that whenever a non-platonic relationship ends, and turns into a "just friends" relationship, nothing much really changes until one of the pair gets attached. Then, suddenly, there are restrictions to what you can do, what you can say, which memories you can allude to, what personality traits and character defects you can bring up during a normal conversation. And it's the sudden imposing of limits that saddens me.

Went out for dinner with my mentor and all of her mentees today. We ate at The Canteen by Les Amis, which is a really nice, somewhat affordable restaurant with delicious food. Despite the seeming lack of main courses - just one page of the menu - every one of the six dishes we ordered tasted fantastic! The desserts were freshly made and just as good as the main courses.

All in all, it was a rather different girls' night out. For one thing, my mentor has a lot of experience, having worked for my company for 30 years. She's more than twice my age, and loves roller-blading, skiing, wakeboarding and generally all these rather energetic activities which I don't feel that I can do. Another thing is that despite all the fun and laughter that was going around the table, there was this thought in the back of my mind - that I was having dinner with my colleagues, so watch what you say, watch what you do.

Sometimes I feel that I'm all together too paranoid, but perhaps, in a company like mine (which seems so very political at times), that it's better to err on the side of caution.

It would be nice to be able to show them the friendly, sparkling, vivavious person that I am capable of being though.

Went to see John Digweed on Friday night. Was actually considering giving it a miss because I didn't have anyone to go with and my knees were hurting, but I couldn't resist the fact that the legendary Diggers was going to be playing a four hour set with no change in the entrance cover of S$23 whatsoever.

I got to the club just after 11 pm, when Diggers was scheduled to come on. I went to the main dancefloor and saw that it was rather empty. At about 1130 pm, two of my colleagues SMS'd me to let me know that they'd decided to come after all, and were at the entrance to Phuture. I went off to collect them, brought them back to the main dancefloor and discovered much to my surprise that it was now completely full up. We weren't bothered though. We went off to get ourselves some drinks and then proceeded to go off to the ladies' platform. The music was okay then, but I figured that with four hours, Digweed had ample time to warm up, and that this was going to be one hell of a set. He started off with some deep house (I think - it was house with a little more drums than usual and was what I'd consider to be sensual and sexy) for the first hour, and we just took it easy, chilling by the sidelines indulging in some leisurely dancing (i.e. slower than my usual standard).

The second hour, Digweed progressed into somewhat more electro-house (heavy on the synths), which was a bit more hardcore than the first hour, and what my friends enjoyed. I was happy because based on my experience with Digweed's style at Bedrock's 5th birthday, I figured that he'd change genre from hour to hour, and that each hour would only get better. So far, he hadn't proved me wrong. We still didn't dance too much though; the floor was packed and so many people just kept walking by us that it was difficult to dance. So off we went to use our second coupon to get more drinks. Unfortunately, it took us close to half an hour (inclusive of queueing time) before we managed to get our drinks. By that time, Digweed had changed style again, upping the tempo somewhat. So I hastily finished my Vodka Ribena and dragged my friend off to the platform so that we could get some space to dance. That was the first time I'd been on the podium at Zouk this year. Last year, I'd been on it twice, and each time, I had a fantastic night, and this time proved to be no different, in spite of the fact that it was still packed and a little difficult to move. Still, it was a lot better than being on the dance floor.

I don't recall that much about the tracks he was playing as I didn't recognise many of them. He wasn't playing very much vocal music, which I tend to prefer, but I didn't object. However, when he did play vocals, the response he got was really good with the whole crowd cheering and responding. For once, it seemed more like an educated crowd was at Zouk, rather than the usual clueless bunch of poseurs. The biggest tune of the night had to be the one that he closed off the 1 am to 2 am hour with, and it happened to be one of the few tunes I recognised that night. It was one of the tracks that Digweed played towards the end of Bedrock's 5th birthday, but I wasn't able to find out what song it was although I'll recognise it if I hear it again. I really really like it. He also dropped Sasha's remix of Unkle's "In A State" (which you can listen to here), which I also enjoyed tremendously.

Digweed's DJing style was excellent too and I felt he used build-ups and breakdowns very effectively. In spite of the length of his set, the quality was consistent throughout and he managed to keep the crowd's energy level high. It's not often that you see the entire crowd dancing away for three hours straight without anyone leaving.

By the time he ended, it was 3.00 am. The crowd was chanting Digweed's name, going "We want more! We want more!" and he duly obliged, kicking off his encore with a tune similar to the kind he was playing in the first hour, before building up into something more hardcore and dropping an electro-house tune. The weird thing about the tune was that I heard hints of "Heaven Sent" in that. I'm guessing he sampled it and used it here, but he really had me for a moment that. I was really hoping he'd play that tune, even if it is old! He ended. The time was 3.13 am. Again the crowd begged for more. And then he dropped something very unusual - a house remix of Kylie's latest single, Slow. It's the first time I've found myself dancing to hip hop house, and I must say that it was a very enjoyable experience to be able to give my knees a rest (electronic music dancing takes a heavy toll on my knees) and just bust off some hip hop moves. The remix wasn't at all bad, especially when after about five minutes of the song (hip hop with a twinge of electronic remixing), the electronica kicked in and we all went back to our usual raver style of dancing.

At about 3.25, his second encore ended, and I was about to get off the platform since I didn't think that Zouk was going to allow Digweed to play further. However, much to my delight, I was proven wrong, and the lights dimmed once again to present the third and final encore. He played something which I thought was retro house... retro meaning that the melodies that I could hear somehow seemed more seventies than anything else. In fact, I realised that for all three encores (other than the Kylie), there was a strong overtone of retro house throughout most of the tunes he chose to drop. But then again, I'm not an expert, so I could have been wrong.

All in all, I enjoyed his set quite a bit. It's the longest I've heard him play - just over four and a half hours - and I'm happy to say that it was definitely a consistenly high quality set throughout. There wasn't any moment when I found myself just wanting to yell, "Get on with it!" (which has happened at Sasha's sets) and to put it simply... it was brilliant. I loved that he drifted from genre to genre effortlessly, and just upped a notch with each hour.

I've decided to hate life.

Much better. Ahh...

Why? Just because... Some days I take a look at my life, at myself, and wonder what became of those wonderous dreams I had not so many years ago. I ask myself why I've become so much meaner ever since I've started working... and then I realise that I've gone from being a shy, sweet girl who tended to let people walk all over her... to a mean, cynical b***h who still lets people walk all over her.

Recall all those personality tests (albeit not scientifically tested nor empirically proven) that state I'm a wonderful person, full of charm and charisma, capable of attracting anyone I so choose. Moreover, I'm supposed to be the perfect girlfriend - sweet, sexy, nice, caring, able to hang out and be one of the boys. Really? If that's so, then why do I always feel as though I'm trying too hard to make people like me?

And what about my much-vaunted linguistic ability? I feel as though I've writing pure crap, just plain drivel. I find myself unable to find more elegant synonyms for what I'm trying to express. When it comes to speaking, I lapse into hated Singlish and slang, and just refer to things as... "thingy".

Forgive me. It's been one of those days. My knee hurts, my back hurts and I was fairly nauseous this morning.

And it's November. I tend to have a hard time liking November.

Work's been piling up lately, which explains how I missed this little gem of a news piece about my beloved home.

Policeman gets two years for oral sex (Yahoo! News)

A 27-year-old local policeman received a two year prison sentence for receiving oral sex from a 16-year-old girl. Now, this girl was above the age of consent and had consented to perform the act on the policeman. However, oral sex is against the law in my country.

A brief explanation if you will. According to section 377 of my country's penal code, unnatural sex is against the law. Offenders can be prosecuted with the maximum penalty being life imprisonment. This section was taken from the British penal code, which was established back in antiquated times.

After the above incident, a fair amount of people wrote in to the papers, outraged that such a ridiculous law could still exist in the 21st Century. Several expressed their surprise that oral sex was regarded on the same level as rape and murder, given that the penalties were just as severe. As one man put it, "if unnatural sex (inclusive of oral and anal) is indeed as dangerous as murder, why is it that there has been no effort put into educating the general public about their so-called dangers?"

Another wrote that if the police should be going after the distributors of flavoured condoms since such products were obviously sold for the promotion of oral sex. And that magazine houses should be shut down for having articles on different sexual positions, including those which would fall under the category of unnatural sex.

Such a ridiculous law, to be bandied about as and when people need to be made an example of. It's 2003. Get with the freakin' programme.

When you're lonely, watching Sleepless in Seattle is not a good idea.

Instead, just do as I do. When the tears begin to flow a little too freely, turn on the VCR and go somewhere else.

I am terribly envious of my friend, of her amazing ability to express herself so well both in written and oral fashion, her intelligence, the fantastic people she's met, and of course, the fact that she's been together with an incredibly nice and caring Catholic boy for two years now.

'Nuff said.

By the way, I'm still angry at him.

You might not understand why yet. It's because I gave him so much of myself, and I really really do want him to be worthy of what I gave, what I did. It cost me a lot despite how much I loved him. And if he is indeed the cheating, lying cad that he seems to be, then... it'll be very difficult to live with what I did. Even more difficult than I find it now.

I had to play netball on Saturday morning for our inter-floor games.

Before I tell you what happened, let me give you a summary as to my history with the game and how I ended up playing.

I have not played netball before, although I have played basketball occasionally while in high school (which by the way, was at least five years ago). In order to foster corporate bonding, my CEO decided that there should be inter-floor games so that we all could get to know the new divisions that've been merged with our side, as well as those working on the other floors. It was decided that there would be two games - netball (ladies only) and football (men only).

For netball, there are seven players from each side being on the court at all times (with unlimited substitutions for this friendly). Now, on my floor, there're like nine ladies, six of who don't want to play. So, unfortunately, we had to recruit players from other floors (after obtaining approval from our opponents). We ended up with a squad of ten with a blessing of an extra player turning up today, bringing us to a grand total of 11. Our opponents had 19 players with an average height of 1.7 m while ours was around 1.65 m.

Obviously, you can see that the odds were stacked against us.

The final score: we won 23 to eight.

I'm still not quite sure what happened. We never expected to be in a position where we would be leading, much less thrashing our opponents.

But what a great game! It's really inspired me to get my fitness back up to par, and maybe, just maybe, I'll start playing basketball again.

FYI, I played the Goal Attack position and managed to score one goal. Our captain, the goal shooter, scored like 18. Still, I helped. Our guys won the football game too, so we're overall champions!

I watched Matrix Revolutions yesterday night, and unfortunately, the reviews were right. I expected to be disappointed (such is the nature of sequels) but still... This movie bit.

WARNING! SPOILER ALERT!

There didn't seem to be much of a point to many scenes, or worse, some of the characters. In the beginning of Revolutions, there was this whole brouha about the Trainman, this being who exists in the land between the human world and the machine world, where Neo is after his encounter with the sentinels at the end of Reloaded. The Trainman works for the Merovingian, so there's this part where the Oracle warns Trinity and Morpheus that there'll be a lot of trouble since the Merovingian find Neo before they manage to. And yet... it's so darn easy for them to rescue Neo. All it took was for them to manage to get into a situation where they could kill the Merovingian and he caved in to their demands. What happens after that? Trinity is taken to Neo in that dreamland place, and... there's no treachery on the part of the Merovingian. Simply unbelievable if you ask me.

And that is the only scene where the Merovingian and Persephone appear in. They were so good in Reloaded and they appear for like all of five minutes in the sequel. In that case, the Wachowski brothers shouldn't even have bothered bringing them in!

Sathi? The oh-so-cute never-stops-smiling Indian girl? Pointless. Useless. Annoying. 'Nuff said.

The dialogue really suffered too. While I did slam Reloaded for being too pretentious with all the philosophical talk about free will, control and destiny, it still was far more interesting than all the crap they delivered in Revolutions. For instance, during a dialogue with a programme, Neo lets on that he's surprised that a programme can love, and the programme replies, "Love? Love is but a word. What is love? It is a connection." And then five minutes later, regarding another topic which I've already managed to forget, he says the same thing. Others may not feel the same way I do, but I generally feel whenever a movie attempts to be philosophical, it usually fails.

Anoter example of general cheesiness was the scene where Trinity lay dying after being impaled by several metal cables after managing to get Neo into the heart of the machine city. It's supposed to be a sad scene, but I ended up laughing through part of it. For someone who's dying, she's a lot more composed - and a lot less in pain - than in any other part of the show. And she lives for an awfully long time after being impaled, managing to deliver a rather long speech about how grateful she is to Neo for showing her so much, and that she believes in him and that the last time she died, she felt regretful that she wouldn't be able to tell Neo how much she loved him but that he brought her back and gave her a second chance yada yada yada. What I want to know is, if she felt that way, then why didn't she tell him sooner? Why only tell him just as she's going to die, given that one never knows how much time they're going to have left to deliver a little speech right after being impaled in three different places? She conveniently manages to die right after he kisses her for the last time.

The ending just plain sucked. It was boring, bland and on the whole, too straightforward. This one was just a bad attempt at tying up all the loose ends. No new questions were raised, unlike the previous two movies, and no new standards were set. The colossal fight scene between Neo and Smith was boring, and over-the-top. How many tidal waves and mushroom clouds does one need to see? And the scene where Smith was frustrated with Neo's refusal to just lie down and die... Hugo Weaving seemed to be overacting, with his lips just protruding so far from his face in an attempt to sneer and appear frustrated at the same time. I couldn't quite figure out whether it was because being a programme, Smith is unable to feel emotion and was jealous of Neo for his ability to feel, or whether he was just frustrated and trying to be overly bombastic as he usually is. Like the previous movie, Revolutions suffered from too many focus on special effects and not enough on the storyline and character development.

One last point. When Bane (Smith in the human world) is taunting Neo, it sure does take Neo a hell of a long time in figuring out who Bane really is. Given thaT Bane calls him "Mr. Anderson" at least four times from the beginning of the scene, Neo sure is slow on the uptake.

I seem to have lost my mind.

Have you seen it anywhere?

Split Widens Over Gay Bishop (Newsday.com)

"'This isn't primarily about sex,' said the Rev. Canon Kendall Harmon of South Carolina, one of the leading American voices opposed to gay ordination. 'It's about the authority and interpretation of Scripture, about who gets to make decisions and how they make them.'

Many acknowledge it's also about changing religious demographics - in Harmon's view, 'about whether Christianity at the beginning of the 21st century is going to be shaped by wealthy, mainly white, shrinking Western churches - or by the simple, faithful, growing churches of the Global South.'"

Personally, I have nothing against homosexuality and homosexuals. But they should not be made leaders of the church. Especially when this particular leader comes equipped with a partner. If priests - at least in Catholicism - are required to remain pure and chaste, even during training, I do not see why gay (some would say deviant) priests should be allowed to follow different guidelines.

You want to know why I'm still angry, still mad, still full of fury and rage?

It's simple. It's so incredibly simple that I'm amazed you couldn't see it. It strikes at the very heart of me. It's what makes me me.

I don't like feeling as though I'm just another notch on your bedpost. I want you to be a good, trustworthy guy with whom I have this amazing connection and who honestly thought of me as someone special, who is almost good enough for me to not regret everything I've done... and not what seems to be the real you: a slimeball, who if I had stuck to my guns and just said no, would have moved on to the next girl who you could get drunk.

How can you constantly tell me that I'm special, and that you miss me dearly... and then turn around and just shag someone else... while in a relationship with yet another girl?

Yes, you did tell me that you had a "medium-term girlfriend" but that for me, you'd always be available. Why did I choose only to hear the latter? If I had realised - for one second - that you considered her your girlfriend at that point in time, I would just have called it quits after dinner. Do you not understand what being a boyfriend entails?

And so, it comes down to this. Was what we had just some cheap affair? Was I just someone convenient to have around so that you didn't need to go hunting or go without every night? Did I ever truly mean anything to you?

Having a laugh in Ethiopia (BBC News)

"An Ethiopian man has broken his own unofficial world record for laughing non-stop.

Seeming to defy what was humanly possible, the noise just went on and on - a mixture of loud guffaws, cackles and a sprinkling of giggles.

In all, Belachew managed to laugh for two hours non-stop - exceeding his previous record by 20 minutes.

'Let us communicate by smiling,' he said."

Nice to know there's still some laughter left in this world.

Hilarious quotes from work

Male colleague (in response to my asking him if he had forgotten his employee pass): I'm well-equipped.
Me: (laugh)
Male colleague: I'm always prepared. I've got everything.
Me: Mmmm hmmm.
Male colleague: Man, that just sounds dodgier and dodgier.

Scene: My female colleague and I had opened a large pack of Nacho Cheese Doritos and had demolished half of it. Another male colleague happened along and joined us.
Me: Let's offer this to the rest so that they can help us finish it.
Male colleague 2: No! I'll finish it!
And he did.

I don't get it. Or rather, I don't get you.

You pulled. You pulled her. Why did you lie to me? Are you just a pathological liar? Why did you do to her the same things you did to me? In more ways than one! You've been seeing your present girlfriend for two months. I last saw you a month ago. You said you were single then. That you weren't into anything serious. If she was your girlfriend then, I sure as hell would have considered it serious!

Why the hell am I mad, I hear you ask. What's between us was over a long time ago. And that may be true. But I thought we had a close friendship. And close friends don't lie to each other. And damn it, what you did... just shows me the kind of person you are. And that is damning. It cheapens what we had... and is making me reconsider whether I really do want to continue this so-called friendship after all.

But you do SMS me when there's no reason for you to do so. And the words that you use... are touching. And technically, when we first started seeing each other, you weren't seriously going out with your girlfriend then. I don't know what to feel, what to think. From what I've seen of one side of you, I should be cursing my misfortune with men, wondering why it is that my judgement of people is so bloody bad. The other side of you... makes me thank God for having met you, for the fact that we had such a wonderful time together.

What should I go with? The reality? Or the memories?

Unfortunately, this kind of fits me right now.


You represent... anger.
Mad at the world, eh? You have a tendency to...
freak out easily. Overly emotional about
everything, you're most prone to bouts of
cruelty and moodiness. Other people may be
afraid of the fact that you explode so easily,
but at least you're honest... even if you're
honest about not liking anything.

What feeling do you represent?
brought to you by Quizilla

Male octopus is a sucker for big girls who kill him after sex. (Sydney Morning Herald)

"The male blanket octopus faces a significant gender imbalance - he is just two centimetres long, while the female of the species can measure up to two metres.

And as if being 100 times smaller than his mate wasn't bad enough, he dies right after having sex with her."

Isn't nature wonderful?

The research paper for the abovementioned subject can be found here.

More movie viewing today.

Re-watched Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back or at least most of it just now. Whenever the original Star Wars episodes come on, I just have to watch them. I'm a Jedi wannabe. Episode V is my absolute favourite, and ever other Star Wars fan agrees that it's the best of the entire series. But my favourite part of the whole movie is the scene when Luke's ship finally sinks into the swamp, and Luke is told by Master Yoda to get it out. And this is where my favourite Star Wars line ever is uttered:

LUKE: All right, I'll give it a try.
YODA: No! Try not. Do. Or do not. There is no try.

(Luke fails the first time, and discourages, he gives up.)

LUKE: (discouraged) You want the impossible.

(After that, Master Yoda raises Luke's ship out of the swamp.)

LUKE: I don't...I don't believe it.
YODA: That is why you fail.

I like the sentiment behind the lines. Even though the Force is clearly a mystical and mythical thing, I guess what George Lucas is trying to impart to us is that no matter how difficult a task seems, as long as we believe hard enough, we'll be able to achieve anything we set our minds to. Most importantly, we need to clear our minds of doubt; instead of trying to do something, we need to tell ourselves that no matter what, we're going to do it.

The other movie I watched today was How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. It was a painful movie to watch, to say the least, although the emotional parts of the movie did get to me somewhat. The movie was quite boring and dragged on until Benjamin (Matthew McConaughey) brough Andie (Kate Hudson) home to see his family... and even then, that wasn't enough to save the show. The things that Andie did in an attempt to drive Benjamin away were, I suppose, plausible, but even then, I just kept thinking that they were rather extreme. And the showdown at the party... completely unbelievable even if Andie was slightly or more than slightly drunk. The ten days dragged on for far too long. This show lost me within the first 30 minutes.

Only saving grace: Andie's dress for the party was gorgeous and the Isodora necklace was beautiful. I'm not one for precious stones and jewellery but that was one heck of a necklace.

Probably the only other interesting thing that happened today was the priest's homily during Mass today (today being All Souls' Day). His speech was quite funny, with little anecdotes such as the fact that Catholicism has Heaven, Purgatory (the place where souls go to when they're not bound for either Heaven or Hell and they spend time there atoning for their sins (with the aid of prayers made on their behalf by people still on the mortal coil) until they're allowed to go to Heaven) and Hell, whereas other branches of Christianity and other religions only have Heaven and Hell, so if we were to convert, we had better "watch out!" He qualified the former part of this statement by reassuring us that people did indeed make it to Heaven (since one of the sins that disqualified us from automatic entry would be stuff like not paying attention during Mass, something which I am definitely always guilty of), and not to assume that people either made it to Purgatory or Hell only. Give God some face, he said. Ha ha!

Almost forgot! Kind of managed to celebrate Halloween this year! I didn't dress up as I didn't have the time to hunt down a costume, although more importantly, no one else wanted to dress up. However, we did end up at a club where lots of people were dressed up. I saw someone dressed up as The Bride in Kill Bill, a character from Star Wars, vampires, monsters, etc. It was great fun dancing among these people to incredibly pumping techno. Not really my kind of music but not abhorrent either.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (which, incidentally, has been banned in my country ever since its release) is so bad it's wonderful.

Tim Curry is fantastically camp as Dr. Frank-n-Furter and Richard O'Brien is... well, he's the man! Not only did he play Riff-Raff (with deliciously smouldering eyes, I might add), but he also wrote the script!

I want to meet them. Hell, I want to marry them and have their children! Nevermind that this show was released in 1975!

As for Peter Hinwood (the actor who played Rocky, the man Dr. Frank-n-Furter created to fulfil his every sexual whim)... good body, but pity about the face.

On a more serious note, the whole movie experience was great. We were watching the show outdoors, in a park with no shelter, and the weather was great. The audience participation (a completely new concept to me, and something which I wasn't sure to expect in this particular screening since I had prior knowledge of the movie's cult status) added a whole new dimension to the viewing experience. It was incredibly fun yelling "SLUT!" and "ASSHOLE!" at Janet and Brad respectively and joining in with the throwing of cards and all that. The organisers didn't encourage us to follow the whole audience participation script however, as I suspect they considered the script rather... vulgar and offensive for the local audience. And quite frankly, despite having spent three years of my life in London and therefore being almost immune to these things, I have to agree.

The music played during the interval between the two movies screening (Scary Movie was the other, but I didn't want to see it as once was more than enough) was pretty cool too, with Solarstone's Seven Cities and Underworld's Two Months Off among the tracks played. It was kind of strange as initially I thought we were in the wrong part of the park since the music was obviously so clubby. And the audience... the audience was splendid too, especially those who bothered to dress up as members of the RHPS! Although most, if not all, of them were Caucasian, still, it was still an interesting sight to behold big burly men dressed up in slinky PVC corsets and made up with heavy black eyeliner.

SPOILER:
Scene - when Dr. Frank-n-Furter enters Janet's room disguised as Brad and is about to have sex with her when she discovers who he is.
Janet: Oh, I hope so, my darling. Oh...Ah...ahh OHHH! Oh it's you!
Frank: I'm afraid so, Janet, but isn't it nice...
Janet: Oh, you beast, you monster...Oh what have you done with Brad?
Frank: Oh, well... nothing. Why, do you think I should?

Hilarious. And the sexual innuendo in the entire show... fantastic. Especially since it was made in 1975!