Transformation is instantaneous - one moment my head's stuffed with cotton and I'm drifting rather than walking - and next moment I'm sharp as a tack, ready to take on yet another stupid group assignment.
You know why group assignments are stupid? I'll tell you why. Firstly there's this get-to-know-each-other stage, which unfortunately is also decide-the-topic stage. Here's when you don't want to appear too pushy yet have to get your point across. If you're lucky you might be interested in the same area and come to the topic easily. If you're not, you might argue for two hours (politely) and come to a consensus of working on homosexuality in the area of films, which is nobody's area of interest thus it is fair to everybody. No prizes for guessing which end of the spectrum I was.
OK, past the topic deciding stage. Here's when you do the real work. To put people into two broad categories, there are the morons, and there are the non-morons, for lack of a better word. And within the category of morons are the super morons and the regular morons. Regular morons, bless their little hearts, at least have the courtesy to realize that they're not that bright, and after a few raps on the knuckles will eventually come to terms that they should be seen and not heard. Super morons however, fight back. They will go on incessantly to force their moronic world views down everybody's throats, and may in some instances win through sheer perseverance.
You do not want to be in a group with a Super Moron. Write that down. If a huge calamity hits the earth and you're left with only one person to group with, and that person turns out to be a Super Moron - insist on doing an individual project. Even if that means the extinction of mankind (since you'd end up having to repopulate the whole earth as well - but we don't want little Super Morons running around do we?). But there is one problem. We don't know who these Super Morons are. In an ideal world, Super Morons would have "SM" tattooed on their foreheads so that they can be identified and quarantined accordingly. It's really too bad we live in the real world.
So after endless homicidal thoughts triggered by a certain Super Moron that I had the good fortune to be in a group with - I have come to the conclusion that there's only one thing worse than having a Super Moron in your assignment group. What is that, you may ask. Elementary, my dear Watson. Having two of them. Now that's the ultimate killer. My utmost sympathy and respect to one of my friends who is in that situation. You know who you are. *Hugs*
And then there are the blood suckers. People who leech off the work of others, just because they can. The unethical bastards. People who fabricate data and plagiarize. The empty vessels. People who make helluva noise and end up being.... sigh. Being Super Morons. Here we go again.
Anyway - where was I? Yes. Group assignments. Energy suckers. Logistic nightmares. They exist for a sole reason - convenience for lecturers who want to grade as few papers as they can. We're postgraduate students, for godsakes. We shouldn't have to deal with this undergraduate shit, at least the best of us, to work on topics irrelevant to ourselves, to educate the Super Morons, to support the blood suckers, to admonish the unethical bastards - just so that the lecturers can grade fewer papers. It's just unfair. Best part is - our grades are affected, not only because of the poor quality of the group work, but also because we spend so much time dealing with group work shit that we have less time and energy to study.
I've gone off tangent again. The original plot was just to marvel at the remarkable effects of God's great creation - coffee, and to commence work on the last stages of the homosexuality thing. I should go now.
*Update* What happened to my blog header?? o_O No time to figure that out. Bloody hell!
*Update 30 secs later* Blog header's back. Weird stuff.
So incredibly sick of my life.
I'll go out on Monday. I'll work on Saturday, I'll work on Sunday, but I promise on Monday I will take a day off, go shopping, walk around, have fun.
That was what I promised to myself. Saturday was spent largely correcting a groupmate's work (I shouldn't even be calling him groupmate. I should call him the Assignment Wrecker From Hell.). Sunday still spent correcting his work. Back and forth for tens of times till I told him to just give me the fucking raw data, I'll do it myself.
Today's Monday. I couldn't finish my work yesterday so I came again to the office. I wanted to lie in this morning, but I thought, I won't, because I will go to the office, finish the assignment, then go out with my officemate Kristy. So I reached the office at 9:30am. No aircond. Couldn't breathe. Need to finish the assignment. Need to get out. Work. Work then you can get out.
I didn't go have lunch. The nearest canteen takes a 20minute walk because all the nearer ones are closed, because it's a public holiday. Kristy went. I stayed. I had cereal. Need to finish the assignment. Never mind, just have the cereal, you can have a big meal in the evening. Aircond came back at 1pm. It was good. I persevered.
Circa 3pm I was still working. Hate the assignment. There are no findings. Why am I writing a paper that has no findings, that has no contribution to the academic world? Why am I writing this dead end paper when I should be working on something more meaningful? Why am I still. fucking. in. the. office.
4pm I told Kristy that we should leave at 5pm. She said OK let's work harder to make it.
4:59 I sent the paper to my groupmates. I slumped, lifeless, soulless, on the desk. Kristy said, sorry, Jun-E. I don't think I can go. I slumped, lifeless, soulless, on the desk, and started to cry. Noiselessly.
5:37pm. Tears are still flowing down my cheeks. I weighed my options. I checked the cinemas, there are no shows on that I want to watch. I thought of going for a big dinner. But I don't want to eat alone. I thought of the journey to Boon Lay MRT, the journey to godknowswhere, the journey back. The masses of people. The queues. The stupid complexes. The bland food.
I thought of going back to the hostel. I thought of staying and working on another project. But my brain is entirely numb. I can't work anymore. I can't go anywhere. I can't do anything. I can't function anymore.
So this is how I spent my long weekend. I hate Singapore. I hate my life.
That was what I promised to myself. Saturday was spent largely correcting a groupmate's work (I shouldn't even be calling him groupmate. I should call him the Assignment Wrecker From Hell.). Sunday still spent correcting his work. Back and forth for tens of times till I told him to just give me the fucking raw data, I'll do it myself.
Today's Monday. I couldn't finish my work yesterday so I came again to the office. I wanted to lie in this morning, but I thought, I won't, because I will go to the office, finish the assignment, then go out with my officemate Kristy. So I reached the office at 9:30am. No aircond. Couldn't breathe. Need to finish the assignment. Need to get out. Work. Work then you can get out.
I didn't go have lunch. The nearest canteen takes a 20minute walk because all the nearer ones are closed, because it's a public holiday. Kristy went. I stayed. I had cereal. Need to finish the assignment. Never mind, just have the cereal, you can have a big meal in the evening. Aircond came back at 1pm. It was good. I persevered.
Circa 3pm I was still working. Hate the assignment. There are no findings. Why am I writing a paper that has no findings, that has no contribution to the academic world? Why am I writing this dead end paper when I should be working on something more meaningful? Why am I still. fucking. in. the. office.
4pm I told Kristy that we should leave at 5pm. She said OK let's work harder to make it.
4:59 I sent the paper to my groupmates. I slumped, lifeless, soulless, on the desk. Kristy said, sorry, Jun-E. I don't think I can go. I slumped, lifeless, soulless, on the desk, and started to cry. Noiselessly.
5:37pm. Tears are still flowing down my cheeks. I weighed my options. I checked the cinemas, there are no shows on that I want to watch. I thought of going for a big dinner. But I don't want to eat alone. I thought of the journey to Boon Lay MRT, the journey to godknowswhere, the journey back. The masses of people. The queues. The stupid complexes. The bland food.
I thought of going back to the hostel. I thought of staying and working on another project. But my brain is entirely numb. I can't work anymore. I can't go anywhere. I can't do anything. I can't function anymore.
So this is how I spent my long weekend. I hate Singapore. I hate my life.
Meet the Peckers Beckers
Audi has been known to poke fun at its competitors. The most infamous jab came in 2004 when Audi made fun of the Lexus LS’s self parking technology. The ridicule of Lexus continues in their new web site experience for the new A4 campaign, but Lexus isn’t the only one to take a hit or two. Mercedes and BMW owners are called out for their stereotypes too.
Meet the Beckers is an episodic experience that has more to do with the “what group do you fit into?” marketing communication approach. The luxury market is ripe with tons of stereotypes about the owners of particular brands: snobby, elitist, arrogant, and just plain assholes who think because they have a nice car they own the road, and two parking spaces (sorry Audi, your owners do it too.) With plenty to make fun of, Audi decided to do some comedy webisodes that highlight these stereotypes and, of course, show the sane, cool driver drives an Audi.
So, how does one find Meet the Beckers? Automotive blogs started promoting it first and I have yet to see any media put behind the site. The Audi USA site does not list the site anywhere off its home page or on the A4 vehicle pages or the A4 launch site. It is also non-existent from the current campaign Truth in Engineering I’m guessing a site that is more about exaggeration doesn’t really fit with “truth”, so Audi has let “Meet the Beckers” live on its own, separate from the current A4 and brand campaigns.
Having a site that is outside of the current brand and vehicle campaign, that even Audi acknowledges doesn’t fit in its current communications (evidenced by the difficulty of finding the Meet the Beckers), is something I don’t recommend since it is so disconnected from everything else they are putting out there about their product. So, Meet the Beckers just doesn’t fit with what Audi is doing.
The site does have the expected YouTube Channel. Views are decent, considering there is no media supporting the content. Unfortunately, nothing is really unique about the content or experience with the channel and you wonder why Audi didn’t just avoid the channel cost and post the videos up on the YouTube site without the burden of a channel to manage.
Regarding the site, there are a couple key things missing. Most prominent is a link to the Audi A4 for information about the product the site is promoting. Also, there is no way to share the video content through Facebook or MySpace. The site is expected to get views through viral communications yet Audi only provides links to “digg it”, “del.icio.us”, and “send to a friend.” The send to a friend execution simply opens one’s email software and places the following language in the body of the message:
Every Thanksgiving the Becker family plays football. And every Thanksgiving, things get worse.
Visit the link below to watch the game unfold.
Meet the Beckers. You're invited.
www.meetthebeckers.com
Does the content relate to the target and is the content funny? I felt the content was right on as I personally enjoyed and felt other consumers in this space would find the jabs funny and offensive in a fun way. Well, after doing a non-scientific poll on a well-known BMW enthusiast site, the verdict is in: 80% of the audience I polled enjoyed the first episode and left comments in support of the site; even though, the site really digs in hard against the BMW arrogant, asshole stereotype. Will everyone get it? No. But the enthusiast consumer does and it looks like that was Audi's aim.
All in all, the site does have some merits but the merits are outside of Audi’s current Truth in Engineering campaign and, therefore, will die a slow viral death since it doesn’t really fit within Audi’s major marketing efforts. I’m guessing Meet the Beckers came up in some brainstorming around what do with the new A4 campaign and someone felt it still was worthwhile to pursue even though the direction went elsewhere.
UPDATE 11/04/2008: Audi released episodes 2 & 3 and well let's just say they fell flat. The humor just wasn't as fun the second and third time around. Unfortunately, only the first video was worth watching and overall the concept became more about the ridiculousness of the characters (even the Audi guy became annoying in his normal-ness.) I did also learn that Audi did run some media to the site when episode 2 went live, they had some banners on ESPN.com. Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to catch the messaging.
Hahahahahahhaha.
There comes a point when stupidity ceases to annoy, becoming comical instead.
Hahahahahahhahahahaha.
Hahahahahahhahahahaha.
The bad news is.
I am bound for yet another night in the office trying to write on a topic that I have only a barest inkling about. I mean I am by no means an expert on homosexual movies. I've watched two or three, yes, but to go in depth into the political undertones, shooting from a male perspective, Japanese pink film genre... I am totally clueless. How can you write about something that you don't know about? That's right. You goreng.
*goreng goreng tengah goreng*
This section of the paper (I'm only writing one section of it, it's a group project) reminds me of eggless maggi curry. It's just... soulless. I mean yeah it fills your stomach but one part of you know that something's not quite right. Incomplete. Like a gourmet chef (who specializes in instant noodles), I hesitate to cook something which does not have a soul. Which is why I am stuck in this stupid situation of procrastinating through my blog, yet again, at 10:30pm when I should be slaving over the paper to get it over with. It's just four pages. How hard could it be? *deep deep breath*
Anyway. I'm a little jittery. I sent my supervisor a paper which I'm interested to submit for a conference... and he just told me to pop by his office tomorrow morning, without letting on whether it's a positive or negative response. I think around here people like giving bad news face to face. It softens the blow and you don't get the other person scarred for life with a badly written email rejection. But Greenpeace did wonders for my resilience in handling rejections. No? OK, moving on to the next door. After 30 doors, someone's bound to cave in. Good ol' Greenpeace. Fingers crossed till they're knotted beyond human capacity though, for the conference paper. *whispers: it's held in Chicago next May*
At this point you're probably expecting the good news after the bad news (which was just me being dramatic about being stuck in office). Hehe. I just bought my tickets to Kota Kinabalu, flying from Singapore 22nd Nov, flying back KL 27th Nov. Booking tickets online still gives me that rush =D And during my times of procrastination I have taken to looking at pictures of the wonderful beaches Sabah has to offer... and I really can't wait. Nex has been kind enough to suggest and arrange an itinerary for me, so I don't have to invest too much time to plan =D Mucho mucho terima kasih!!
So my finals are on 12th, 14th and 21st... 22nd I'll be off to KK! Burning a hole in my pocket, but I bet it'll all be worth it, my first trip to East Malaysia!
I've decided to go back to the hostel. The paper will write itself, as it always does, at the 11th hour.
*goreng goreng tengah goreng*
This section of the paper (I'm only writing one section of it, it's a group project) reminds me of eggless maggi curry. It's just... soulless. I mean yeah it fills your stomach but one part of you know that something's not quite right. Incomplete. Like a gourmet chef (who specializes in instant noodles), I hesitate to cook something which does not have a soul. Which is why I am stuck in this stupid situation of procrastinating through my blog, yet again, at 10:30pm when I should be slaving over the paper to get it over with. It's just four pages. How hard could it be? *deep deep breath*
Anyway. I'm a little jittery. I sent my supervisor a paper which I'm interested to submit for a conference... and he just told me to pop by his office tomorrow morning, without letting on whether it's a positive or negative response. I think around here people like giving bad news face to face. It softens the blow and you don't get the other person scarred for life with a badly written email rejection. But Greenpeace did wonders for my resilience in handling rejections. No? OK, moving on to the next door. After 30 doors, someone's bound to cave in. Good ol' Greenpeace. Fingers crossed till they're knotted beyond human capacity though, for the conference paper. *whispers: it's held in Chicago next May*
At this point you're probably expecting the good news after the bad news (which was just me being dramatic about being stuck in office). Hehe. I just bought my tickets to Kota Kinabalu, flying from Singapore 22nd Nov, flying back KL 27th Nov. Booking tickets online still gives me that rush =D And during my times of procrastination I have taken to looking at pictures of the wonderful beaches Sabah has to offer... and I really can't wait. Nex has been kind enough to suggest and arrange an itinerary for me, so I don't have to invest too much time to plan =D Mucho mucho terima kasih!!
So my finals are on 12th, 14th and 21st... 22nd I'll be off to KK! Burning a hole in my pocket, but I bet it'll all be worth it, my first trip to East Malaysia!
I've decided to go back to the hostel. The paper will write itself, as it always does, at the 11th hour.
Choppy.
Aisehman has stopped blogging. I am dispirited. Whyyyy. Why do you have to leave us. Sob. Sigh.
I am tremendously tired. Still trudging on. Finals coming soon. Term papers due soon. Macam mana. Do loh. Read loh. Maybe coffee will increase my spirits artificially. But I'm not in a coffee mood now.
Imeem is wonderful. Listening to soundtrack of Amelie through it now. Good stuff.
Isn't it sad when you realize that your life boils down to a packet of maggi curry for lunch in the office on a Sunday. Or when you walk home at 1:30am getting scared of moving shadows at an empty corridor.
Why is the lady next door laughing hysterically. Why. Why is it not raining yet. Why.
If life were a movie I'd be in a montage now. I wonder what movie I'm in. Some low budget art film or a huge production with loads of scenes and explosions and damsels in distress. Yesterday someone told me that she was afraid of Westerners because they hug and kiss people as a culture. I said if you're not comfortable with it, just say so. She said she didn't want to make them angry. I said they wouldn't be angry if you just told them nicely. She ignored my input and said she felt taken advantage of when they do it. There you go, a self-made airhead in distress. The oh-so-victimized. The someone-come-save-me-I'm-so-dainty-and-helpless. She doesn't want to be saved. She just wants her helplessness to be reinforced. The bastards! How dare they take advantage of a sweet young thing like you. You know I really feel for you. I wonder why noone has taken advantage of me. Maybe 'coz I'm not as sweet and young and I'm not a thing. Moron.
But anyway. I'm watching movies of other people. Real life drama, of turbulent and forbidden passion, of meeting the man of your dreams on an island vacation, of he-likes-me-he-likes-me-not. Eh why all love stories huh. I'm a bystander, like I always am. The all-seeing oracle, the agony aunt, the shoulder people like to cry on. I mean I can't help it. People just flock to my shoulder like bees to honey.
I guess when there's nothing much in your life, seeing what's happening to other people is the next best thing.
Yeah. When will this montage end so that I can be in some real action.
Hmm. This post was initially just going to be whining about Aisehman leaving. Why you don't want us anymore. Why.
I am tremendously tired. Still trudging on. Finals coming soon. Term papers due soon. Macam mana. Do loh. Read loh. Maybe coffee will increase my spirits artificially. But I'm not in a coffee mood now.
Imeem is wonderful. Listening to soundtrack of Amelie through it now. Good stuff.
Isn't it sad when you realize that your life boils down to a packet of maggi curry for lunch in the office on a Sunday. Or when you walk home at 1:30am getting scared of moving shadows at an empty corridor.
Why is the lady next door laughing hysterically. Why. Why is it not raining yet. Why.
If life were a movie I'd be in a montage now. I wonder what movie I'm in. Some low budget art film or a huge production with loads of scenes and explosions and damsels in distress. Yesterday someone told me that she was afraid of Westerners because they hug and kiss people as a culture. I said if you're not comfortable with it, just say so. She said she didn't want to make them angry. I said they wouldn't be angry if you just told them nicely. She ignored my input and said she felt taken advantage of when they do it. There you go, a self-made airhead in distress. The oh-so-victimized. The someone-come-save-me-I'm-so-dainty-and-helpless. She doesn't want to be saved. She just wants her helplessness to be reinforced. The bastards! How dare they take advantage of a sweet young thing like you. You know I really feel for you. I wonder why noone has taken advantage of me. Maybe 'coz I'm not as sweet and young and I'm not a thing. Moron.
But anyway. I'm watching movies of other people. Real life drama, of turbulent and forbidden passion, of meeting the man of your dreams on an island vacation, of he-likes-me-he-likes-me-not. Eh why all love stories huh. I'm a bystander, like I always am. The all-seeing oracle, the agony aunt, the shoulder people like to cry on. I mean I can't help it. People just flock to my shoulder like bees to honey.
I guess when there's nothing much in your life, seeing what's happening to other people is the next best thing.
Yeah. When will this montage end so that I can be in some real action.
Hmm. This post was initially just going to be whining about Aisehman leaving. Why you don't want us anymore. Why.
Non-Automotive Video Content from Lexus L/Studio
What makes auto manufacturers think they make great film studios? I think all of this goes back to BMW Films and their well-received series from several years ago. Unfortunately, Lexus has decided to throw their hat in with L/Studio, a new web experience that features several unique webisodes and documentaries that is “an eclectic collection of unique perspectives meant to inspire you… and to help you innovate in your own way.”
Now when I think about innovation I don’t think smarmy, poorly written comedy webisodes staring Lisa Kudrow (of Phoebe from Friends fame.) Nor do I think about brief documentaries about high-heeled shoes, so it isn’t clear what inspires innovation from the
content on L/Studio. There is one video called “The Long Run” that covers the conditioning of an ultra marathon runner but this is really more about motivation than it is about innovation. If inspiring innovation was really their cue, the documentaries provided by Acura on the Acura Advance campaign are probably more inline with Lexus’ goal. At least with the Acura site, one gets a glimpse into the lives of truly innovative people who are impacting our world and not just some trite attempt at comedy. 
Besides content not really fitting the objectives set by Lexus, whom is this supposed to appeal to? Since this is a luxury brand, it must be trying to appeal to luxury buyers and content like the baby boomer Ray Manzarek from The Doors segments or the high-heel documentary certainly reach an older more established consumer. The high-heel documentary that is currently being run as an online media spot on YouTube with the message of “The Height of Obsession” and a pair of black stiletto heels appeals to any woman I suppose, considering I have yet to meet a woman who isn’t into shoes, but once consumers get to L/Studio do they ever go back? Repeat visits is something Lexus is expecting since there is a whole registration process one can do where you can add friends from L/Studio’s current user community, recommend videos, or mark some as favorites. This part of the site is the most baffling. Am I really going to have any social network here? Most likely not. I found only one user of the site who made a recommendation of a video after looking at about 20 random profiles using the “Find a user” tool. A social community online is usually an expression of your offline world, you “friend” people you know and with some minor exceptions you reach beyond your real world social networks. The lack of any real networking on L/Studio is really not surprising since the ‘invite a friend’ capability is hard to find on the site and inviting friends to sites is something people rarely do. And if L/Studio is all about attracting a 30-40 something luxury consumers, inviting friends and engaging in a social network on an automotive funded video site with limited content is even more highly unlikely.
So, what should Lexus have done with all of this content? They at least should’ve made the video content more viral by allowing viewers to post the videos within social networking sites instead of assuming people would become part of a L/Studio community and invite all their friends. The video content should’ve also been posted on YouTube to get the content into a place where video is most expected to be on the web. So, extending content into more likely environments instead of driving consumers to a campaign site with an unknown, vague brand like L/Studio seems futile.
I also think the mission of L/Studio to “inspire innovation” is really lost by the content that was developed for the site. The content is just all over the place and really there is no common thread or anything that really inspires one. Most of it is contrived, sitcom-like content that looked like a way to keep writers busy during the 2007-08 writers strike and the documentaries really are not that captivating, and I’m a huge fan of documentary film. So content alignment to the goals of the site really needs to be addressed. Is it entertainment? Is it motivation? Is it for musicians? What is it? It isn’t clear and unfortunately leads to a site with no defined audience, which like most sites with undefined audiences will live a brief life since it will fail to gain a vibrant audience.
<Visit Lexus L Studio>
I came to office to work today.
But ended up doing nothing but playing with the idea of going to Sabah after my finals. Just to chill, nothing strenuous like climbing a mountain. I'm just gonna bum around. Nex, or anybody else, any suggestions on what to do there? I'm looking at 5 days, maybe some beaches, some walks in the jungle, some poking my nose around. I read that the weekend market is good. Is it? Any cultural thing to do? Like art exhibitions or performances would be nice.
Need. a. break.
Need. a. break.
The Fine Art of Delayed Gratification
At 4pm EST on September 18, Ferrari debuted its full communication on the new Ferrari California. Of course, this online event is probably more for auto enthusiast geeks like myself than the average Ferrari buyer who is too busy trying to find employment now that Lehman Brothers is bankrupt. Good timing Ferrari! Just in time for the global financial crisis, good thing golden parachutes are the norm these days.
Timing aside, Ferrari has been doing one of the more interesting delayed vehicle reveals. It all began several months ago when they launched their Ferrari California web site complete with a countdown clock and, the interesting part, “Hear”. “Hear” simulated the sense of sound by allowing the user to click on various sound environment features thereby letting the ferocious sound of the exhaust note be enjoyed even if you can’t afford one.
Their next debut came with the “See” content. Finally, the official images, some downloadable wallpaper, and a screensaver were made available for PC and Mac. By this point the car’s full look inside and out was clearly communicated unlike some of the annoying delayed reviews from Citroen GT, Ford Mustang, and Porsche Panamera. The final installment that arrived for the Paris Auto Show reveal is “Feel” and what a rich experience it is. There are 11 videos all done to showcase the car: the premier, backstage, interviews, after party, the typical road cruise full of beauty shots, and what everyone was waiting for the President’s speech… okay just kidding about the last one, but hey someone took the time to film his talk so post it to the web site.
Overlooking the President’s speech, the films are interesting and really build a lot of passion for the car along with bringing everyone up into the debut beyond just filming the typical stage introduction of the car on the media day. The videos are really for brand passionate visitors, which I’m sure there are a lot of when introducing a historic nameplate like a California GT.
What I find most compelling about the Ferrari California website is the way they did a staggered delay to reveal. They also accompanied the reveal with a lot of photos sent out to auto enthusiast sites, prior to the auto show reveal, to generate some early buzz for the car. Vehicle shots were not isolated to showing one photo of a headlight or a shift knob; instead, Ferrari realizes the car is beautiful in its entirety and that showing a couple professional shots of the car would generate more passion for the car than just feeding the public a small corner of the car’s exterior or interior and to keep building suspense by progressively releasing more and more professional shots.
Teasing with minute photos of each part of the car is excruciating. If you want to tease, please do it the Ferrari way and not the Citroen way.
Friday is Blood Donation Day
And today's Friday. Hence I am going to donate blood today. Haha crap title and crap first paragraph.
Let's start over. I'm feeling restless today - the good kind though. Like my mind's racing 100kms per hour and my body's just sitting in front of the computer, letting my mind be, knowing full well that it will come back when it's exhausted from all the racing. But in the meanwhile the mind's just darting in circles, dabbling a bit here and there, jumping from topic to topic in leaps and bounds.
OK there's this thing about learning a new language. Some time within the week I decided that I will take up an European language. I don't know where it came from but it came and it stuck and then I figured that I would do something about it. So I googled it and found out, to my utmost joy, that NTU actually has a language school that teaches some languages. I could choose from French, German or Spanish. So then I shot an email to the German coordinator, just for the heck of it, to ask if I could participate as a postgrad student. Turns out that NTU DISCRIMINATES POSTGRADUATE STUDENTS ACTIVELY. Yes you can quote me on that, in all its capitalized glory. We have no buses after 9pm though our classes end at 9:30 (so we have to walk), postgrad students are excepted from exchange programmes, we have to pay to use sports facilities while staff and undergrads don't, the list goes on.
So anyway. I have to get private lessons or join a group class. Private classes cost about $70 per hour, which is something I obviously can't afford - and group classes are held extremely far away so the commuting will be a killer (like 3 hours to and fro). I don't know. After taking into account Val's suggestions (and he doesn't have one ounce of national pride in him) maybe I'll take French instead and commute every Saturday afternoon. Kristy thinks I am nuts. Maybe I am but I am a cheerful and happy nut.
*break for a while to check through some group work*
I don't like it when people change my stuff. Fine if you're some editor who's good at what you do. But - oi - "confidential" is not equal to "confident" ok. And a series of other idiotic mistakes that I don't want to reproduce here. Thanks for doing something completely counterproductive, wasting more than 30 minutes of my time, weeding the questionnaire of spelling, grammatical and logical errors, basically restoring the whole thing to its original form except that yours is in Excel and mine is in Word, and yours has pretty little boxes that people put ticks in and mine didn't. Appearance does not surpass substance. Fuck you. RAGERAGERAGE.
I hate group work. Did I ever mention that I hate group work? I hate it with all my guts and intestines and - well, my entire digestive system. Anyway I sent him an email which was quite blunt and curt, i.e. "I hope you shrivel up and die" or something to that effect. Actually nothing to that effect lah. I'm too nice =_= . But blunt and curt nonetheless.
*back from the Blood Donation Drive*
So. After lunch I realized that I didn't bring my passport and hence would not be able to donate my blood. But since today's Friday and Friday's Blood Donation Day I decided to go back to the hostel to get my passport. Hence began my arduous journey of waiting for the bus for 20 minutes, getting my passport, waiting for the bus for 20 minutes again, getting on the bus, getting lost in the labyrinth of North Spine, finally finding the Blood Donation Drive place, realizing that the process would take "one hour plus plus plus", walking back to my office, getting some reading material, going back to the station again, and finally registering myself.
Then I waited. Then I queued. Then I waited. Then I queued again. Finally I got to the last station where the nurse would mark your vein. The nurse tried my left arm. Then my right. Then she took off the blood pressure thingy and told me that they. couldn't. take. my. blood.
......
I was like, wha..?
My veins were too soft, both the left and the right. If they took my blood, my vein would collapse half way and I'd be just wasting my blood. Maybe next year.
I walked out of the place feeling totally and utterly dejected. When I got back to the office Yuen and Kristy couldn't understand my utmost disappointment and proceeded to laugh at me. I was like, "I don't understand why you don't understand me," and they were like "it's just blood" and I was like "it's not just blood, it's my blood! Good AB positive blood!" And then they got tired talking about blood and talked about university applications instead.
It's just that... I really wanted to make a small difference somehow, outside my daily routine, that would help someone somewhere out there. And all the effort I put in - just wasted. I felt quite inconsolable. You get what I mean? OK fine noone understands me.
I shall stop here.
Let's start over. I'm feeling restless today - the good kind though. Like my mind's racing 100kms per hour and my body's just sitting in front of the computer, letting my mind be, knowing full well that it will come back when it's exhausted from all the racing. But in the meanwhile the mind's just darting in circles, dabbling a bit here and there, jumping from topic to topic in leaps and bounds.
OK there's this thing about learning a new language. Some time within the week I decided that I will take up an European language. I don't know where it came from but it came and it stuck and then I figured that I would do something about it. So I googled it and found out, to my utmost joy, that NTU actually has a language school that teaches some languages. I could choose from French, German or Spanish. So then I shot an email to the German coordinator, just for the heck of it, to ask if I could participate as a postgrad student. Turns out that NTU DISCRIMINATES POSTGRADUATE STUDENTS ACTIVELY. Yes you can quote me on that, in all its capitalized glory. We have no buses after 9pm though our classes end at 9:30 (so we have to walk), postgrad students are excepted from exchange programmes, we have to pay to use sports facilities while staff and undergrads don't, the list goes on.
So anyway. I have to get private lessons or join a group class. Private classes cost about $70 per hour, which is something I obviously can't afford - and group classes are held extremely far away so the commuting will be a killer (like 3 hours to and fro). I don't know. After taking into account Val's suggestions (and he doesn't have one ounce of national pride in him) maybe I'll take French instead and commute every Saturday afternoon. Kristy thinks I am nuts. Maybe I am but I am a cheerful and happy nut.
*break for a while to check through some group work*
I don't like it when people change my stuff. Fine if you're some editor who's good at what you do. But - oi - "confidential" is not equal to "confident" ok. And a series of other idiotic mistakes that I don't want to reproduce here. Thanks for doing something completely counterproductive, wasting more than 30 minutes of my time, weeding the questionnaire of spelling, grammatical and logical errors, basically restoring the whole thing to its original form except that yours is in Excel and mine is in Word, and yours has pretty little boxes that people put ticks in and mine didn't. Appearance does not surpass substance. Fuck you. RAGERAGERAGE.
I hate group work. Did I ever mention that I hate group work? I hate it with all my guts and intestines and - well, my entire digestive system. Anyway I sent him an email which was quite blunt and curt, i.e. "I hope you shrivel up and die" or something to that effect. Actually nothing to that effect lah. I'm too nice =_= . But blunt and curt nonetheless.
*back from the Blood Donation Drive*
So. After lunch I realized that I didn't bring my passport and hence would not be able to donate my blood. But since today's Friday and Friday's Blood Donation Day I decided to go back to the hostel to get my passport. Hence began my arduous journey of waiting for the bus for 20 minutes, getting my passport, waiting for the bus for 20 minutes again, getting on the bus, getting lost in the labyrinth of North Spine, finally finding the Blood Donation Drive place, realizing that the process would take "one hour plus plus plus", walking back to my office, getting some reading material, going back to the station again, and finally registering myself.
Then I waited. Then I queued. Then I waited. Then I queued again. Finally I got to the last station where the nurse would mark your vein. The nurse tried my left arm. Then my right. Then she took off the blood pressure thingy and told me that they. couldn't. take. my. blood.
......
I was like, wha..?
My veins were too soft, both the left and the right. If they took my blood, my vein would collapse half way and I'd be just wasting my blood. Maybe next year.
I walked out of the place feeling totally and utterly dejected. When I got back to the office Yuen and Kristy couldn't understand my utmost disappointment and proceeded to laugh at me. I was like, "I don't understand why you don't understand me," and they were like "it's just blood" and I was like "it's not just blood, it's my blood! Good AB positive blood!" And then they got tired talking about blood and talked about university applications instead.
It's just that... I really wanted to make a small difference somehow, outside my daily routine, that would help someone somewhere out there. And all the effort I put in - just wasted. I felt quite inconsolable. You get what I mean? OK fine noone understands me.
I shall stop here.
RAIN!!!!
I know it causes floods and stuff but I love heavy blistering rain with dark gloomy clouds and magnificent thunder and lightning outside my window! =D Precisely what that's out there now. Kristy said that I look like a happy little puppy gazing out at the torrents of water pouring down.
OK have to continue to work now =)
OK have to continue to work now =)
Writing to take a break from writing.
Random ramblings to procrastinate from doing actual work.
I got stabbed in the back lately, as a result I am losing a friend. Although the person who's walking out of my life is relatively unimportant, it is still irritating to observe the ease of which he is taking the side of the backstabber (a bitch, if you must know). I'm not even bothered to clear my name, since it's only his loss that this friendship is over. Everyone knows (okay maybe only Yuen knows, being the horoscope junkie she is) that Taureans make the best friends because they're unwaveringly loyal. Well until they give up on you anyway. And I'm giving up on him.
Yesterday I got the most delightful email. I'm still basking in the afterglow of it. Maybe I'll blog about it later.
I spent five hours in a karaoke session yesterday, with a roomful of people who could not sing. God bless my eardrums. Having not sang for more than a year, I found that my voice range had shrunk remarkably, so I am also guilty of off-keyness - but at least I knew that I was off key, and was apologetic about it. How could someone sing an entire song, three keys above the original pitch, and remain completely oblivious about it? Urgh my eardrums just winced thinking about that. And I just noticed yesterday, that a lot of songs from Taiwan have really crappy lyrics. "I love you, you are my Juliet, I want to be your Liang Shan Bo" like how corny can you be even I could write better lyrics than that.
Only after I broke my IKEA mug that I found that I am not able to find another mug as good as it is, at merely 90 Singaporean cents and good, solid clay thickness. I am going to IKEA this weekend to get a new mug.
I also had an epiphany on the MRT the other day and decided that I would lay off men for the time being. Because boys are disgusting, that's why.
Class - Somewhere you go when skipping is not an option. Toodles.
I got stabbed in the back lately, as a result I am losing a friend. Although the person who's walking out of my life is relatively unimportant, it is still irritating to observe the ease of which he is taking the side of the backstabber (a bitch, if you must know). I'm not even bothered to clear my name, since it's only his loss that this friendship is over. Everyone knows (okay maybe only Yuen knows, being the horoscope junkie she is) that Taureans make the best friends because they're unwaveringly loyal. Well until they give up on you anyway. And I'm giving up on him.
Yesterday I got the most delightful email. I'm still basking in the afterglow of it. Maybe I'll blog about it later.
I spent five hours in a karaoke session yesterday, with a roomful of people who could not sing. God bless my eardrums. Having not sang for more than a year, I found that my voice range had shrunk remarkably, so I am also guilty of off-keyness - but at least I knew that I was off key, and was apologetic about it. How could someone sing an entire song, three keys above the original pitch, and remain completely oblivious about it? Urgh my eardrums just winced thinking about that. And I just noticed yesterday, that a lot of songs from Taiwan have really crappy lyrics. "I love you, you are my Juliet, I want to be your Liang Shan Bo" like how corny can you be even I could write better lyrics than that.
Only after I broke my IKEA mug that I found that I am not able to find another mug as good as it is, at merely 90 Singaporean cents and good, solid clay thickness. I am going to IKEA this weekend to get a new mug.
I also had an epiphany on the MRT the other day and decided that I would lay off men for the time being. Because boys are disgusting, that's why.
Class - Somewhere you go when skipping is not an option. Toodles.
Oi focus focus... (Update 3)
If I can finish this paper by today I will go skating/biking at the East Coast tomorrow morning with Jia Ling and post some pictures on this blog.
Root for me, whoever's reading my blog on this Saturday afternoon!
Will report back tonight.
**
Update: OK I realise that it's impossible to finish the paper tonight. Data collection took me the whole afternoon and I've just started to write the analysis. So I am reducing my resolution's scope to finish writing the data analysis. Then I will rest tomorrow. It's Sunday for crying out loud!
Aircond's frigging cold. But I think they're gonna turn it off soon then it'll be warm.
Conversation between me and Kristy (of the "Just soda" fame) yesterday:
Kristy: "I wish they'd invent a new video camera that would minimize your flaws instead of maximizing them, you know."
Me: "They have. It's called the radio."
Kristy used to work with Phoenix Television as a news reporter.
Marten and Robert just replied my email! Wahahahaha happy =D
Will report back again before I leave office. Shit it's almost 9 already. I think I'll be stuck here till 11pm. On a Saturday night! Aihhhh. Back to work.
**
10:55pm. I have bloodshot eyes. Still writing. Walking back later with a fellow no-lifer.
**
12:30am. I won't be going to East Coast tomorrow morning. Aside from the fact that I haven't finished my work, I don't fancy waking up at 7 to make the appointment at 9am. I am going out in the afternoon though. Sunday. Gosh I'm too exhausted to even string a sentence. But at least I did focus today.
Root for me, whoever's reading my blog on this Saturday afternoon!
Will report back tonight.
**
Update: OK I realise that it's impossible to finish the paper tonight. Data collection took me the whole afternoon and I've just started to write the analysis. So I am reducing my resolution's scope to finish writing the data analysis. Then I will rest tomorrow. It's Sunday for crying out loud!
Aircond's frigging cold. But I think they're gonna turn it off soon then it'll be warm.
Conversation between me and Kristy (of the "Just soda" fame) yesterday:
Kristy: "I wish they'd invent a new video camera that would minimize your flaws instead of maximizing them, you know."
Me: "They have. It's called the radio."
Kristy used to work with Phoenix Television as a news reporter.
Marten and Robert just replied my email! Wahahahaha happy =D
Will report back again before I leave office. Shit it's almost 9 already. I think I'll be stuck here till 11pm. On a Saturday night! Aihhhh. Back to work.
**
10:55pm. I have bloodshot eyes. Still writing. Walking back later with a fellow no-lifer.
**
12:30am. I won't be going to East Coast tomorrow morning. Aside from the fact that I haven't finished my work, I don't fancy waking up at 7 to make the appointment at 9am. I am going out in the afternoon though. Sunday. Gosh I'm too exhausted to even string a sentence. But at least I did focus today.
So this is how it feels like to spam people.
Vomit blood. Finally was able to harvest 100s of emails and send them all out. If the Nigerian scams were done like that (i.e. manually) I have respect for those people. Then came a round of delivery failures - as expected. This one from Jerusalem Post is really sincere though:
Hi. This is the qmail-send program at jpost.com.
I'm afraid I wasn't able to deliver your message to the following addresses. This is a permanent error; I've given up. Sorry it didn't work out.
Hahaha nice. Well anyway if anyone is interested to participate in a J0urnal1sm F3ll0wsh1p in NTU (I jumbled the characters a bit so that people who google it will not end up here, hopefully), 3 months in Singapore (the horror!), funded (yay!), visit this website.
Yawn. What's next on my to-do list? Right. Find out more about films about homosexuality in Japan. Have a good night y'all.
Hi. This is the qmail-send program at jpost.com.
I'm afraid I wasn't able to deliver your message to the following addresses. This is a permanent error; I've given up. Sorry it didn't work out.
Hahaha nice. Well anyway if anyone is interested to participate in a J0urnal1sm F3ll0wsh1p in NTU (I jumbled the characters a bit so that people who google it will not end up here, hopefully), 3 months in Singapore (the horror!), funded (yay!), visit this website.
Yawn. What's next on my to-do list? Right. Find out more about films about homosexuality in Japan. Have a good night y'all.
Wednesday grump.
I am pretty bored. Why noone update their blogs? Talking about you, Asa. Val. Chindian. Nex. Mana kamu pergi. I am even reverting to read the blogs that I vowed to boycott. Then I decided to update my own blog to humour crazy F5 pressers. ('Coz it's a cold, hard world out there - I know.)
Actually I am busy, with a number of administrative tasks and some stuff that I don't really want to think about. I am tasked with ordering pizza for a pseudo-potluck our research students are having this afternoon. It is pseudo because if it were a real potluck, we would have to bring our own food. I am glad that I just need to make a phone call and the good folks at Pizza Hut will take care of us. No this is not an advertorial, I have not stepped over to the dark side yet. Not that the folks from the dark side have called me - wahahaha.
I skipped class yesterday night. Turned out that the lecturer gave some sort of content analysis group work during class, so I am busted. Yeah. Whatever. This seems to be the prevailing sentiment of late - a shrug, tilt of the head to the right, whatever. See if I care. Screw up a group presentation? Shrug. Wasted a weekend's hard work done on the presentation? Tilt of the head to the right. Pile of undone laundry? Whatever. OK. No. I really have to do my laundry tonight or I will have to overturn the shirts to rewear them. I don't think overturned shirts look nice on me.
Sparks of life, where are you? I have been watching a lot of movies lately to supplement my nonexistent life. Like, when you reach your room at 11pm, disappointed with how the day has been wasted on routine and monotony, yet again, what do you do? Watch movie loh. Not that I have many updated blogs to read. *squints meaningfully* Bleh. I am a grump I know.
Well. Back to work. The daily grind. To earn the Benjamins. I mean the Yusof-bin-Ishaks. And the other day when I complained about work to my dad - the endless hours of absolute boredom - he said that he had been doing it for the past thirty years. Kinda puts things into perspective. I shut up after that.
Actually I am busy, with a number of administrative tasks and some stuff that I don't really want to think about. I am tasked with ordering pizza for a pseudo-potluck our research students are having this afternoon. It is pseudo because if it were a real potluck, we would have to bring our own food. I am glad that I just need to make a phone call and the good folks at Pizza Hut will take care of us. No this is not an advertorial, I have not stepped over to the dark side yet. Not that the folks from the dark side have called me - wahahaha.
I skipped class yesterday night. Turned out that the lecturer gave some sort of content analysis group work during class, so I am busted. Yeah. Whatever. This seems to be the prevailing sentiment of late - a shrug, tilt of the head to the right, whatever. See if I care. Screw up a group presentation? Shrug. Wasted a weekend's hard work done on the presentation? Tilt of the head to the right. Pile of undone laundry? Whatever. OK. No. I really have to do my laundry tonight or I will have to overturn the shirts to rewear them. I don't think overturned shirts look nice on me.
Sparks of life, where are you? I have been watching a lot of movies lately to supplement my nonexistent life. Like, when you reach your room at 11pm, disappointed with how the day has been wasted on routine and monotony, yet again, what do you do? Watch movie loh. Not that I have many updated blogs to read. *squints meaningfully* Bleh. I am a grump I know.
Well. Back to work. The daily grind. To earn the Benjamins. I mean the Yusof-bin-Ishaks. And the other day when I complained about work to my dad - the endless hours of absolute boredom - he said that he had been doing it for the past thirty years. Kinda puts things into perspective. I shut up after that.
It's all Asa's fault
I am transfixed.
Source: here, click on picture to enlarge.
Too much angst lately. I've decided to take things in a stride. So I'm going to take up the student rep committee post, I'm going togrit my teeth and enjoy my stupid group project, get through this semester, work hard on my own research topic, then (somehow) go Europe and come back to Southeast Asia via train =D
Quote from a movie that I watched yesterday:
"What do wily temptresses do?
That's right. They tempt. In a wily fashion."
Hahahahahahaha.
Friday mood today somehow. Though I'll most probably be working most of the weekend anyway, it still feels good =) There's a Chinese orchestra performance that I'm going for in the evening, at Nanyang Auditorium, and it's free.
Source: here, click on picture to enlarge.Too much angst lately. I've decided to take things in a stride. So I'm going to take up the student rep committee post, I'm going to
Quote from a movie that I watched yesterday:
"What do wily temptresses do?
That's right. They tempt. In a wily fashion."
Hahahahahahaha.
Friday mood today somehow. Though I'll most probably be working most of the weekend anyway, it still feels good =) There's a Chinese orchestra performance that I'm going for in the evening, at Nanyang Auditorium, and it's free.
Grrrrrrrrrrr.
Why is the world bent on giving me stupid things to do???????
How do you say no when the reason for the no is "I don't feel like doing it"? Is having a terminal illness the only way to justify not doing something? Am I supposed to feel proud, honoured even, when some donkey tasks are thrown my way under the pretext of status?
Aarrrrrrrghhh.
Let me try to put it in a more eloquent way.
Aarrrrrrrrrrrrrrgghhhhh. *throws things around**stomp stomp stomp**karate chop table Haiiiiiiyah!!!!*
Words fail me now. In between a group project that I hate and this stupid new administrative task that the heavens (damn them) bestowed upon me and an imminent monthly bloodshed - I am feeling grumpy beyond words.
Ticusass san rumbere suprimpeddoctaintes milloproments reoffecal - generated by this random word generator - sums up my feelings exactly.
How do you say no when the reason for the no is "I don't feel like doing it"? Is having a terminal illness the only way to justify not doing something? Am I supposed to feel proud, honoured even, when some donkey tasks are thrown my way under the pretext of status?
Aarrrrrrrghhh.
Let me try to put it in a more eloquent way.
Aarrrrrrrrrrrrrrgghhhhh. *throws things around**stomp stomp stomp**karate chop table Haiiiiiiyah!!!!*
Words fail me now. In between a group project that I hate and this stupid new administrative task that the heavens (damn them) bestowed upon me and an imminent monthly bloodshed - I am feeling grumpy beyond words.
Ticusass san rumbere suprimpeddoctaintes milloproments reoffecal - generated by this random word generator - sums up my feelings exactly.
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