Today's Muse: Popping Basketballs

I sit here, staring at this screen, drinking something that burns each time it travels down my throat, and does painful things to my stomach. I really ought to get some water instead.

I destroyed the third draft of An Exercise in Obsession an hour ago.

As I look over my notes for the gazillionth time, crossing out points and reworking others with a scratchy red pen (I really ought to get a new pen.), I wonder dully, why am I putting myself through this? It's been months since I embarked on this project. And still nothing.

There's a five-dollar note in my wallet.

I ought to sleep more.

Today's Muse: Where's my other sock, damnit!


"So, you're baking how many cakes? From scatch?"

"Don't worry, piece of cake." (Mein Gott, I actually said that.)

"Well, aren't you going to use the machine? To, er, mix the stuff?"

"No! I'll beat it by hand."

"With a wooden spoon."

"Yeah. No problem."

"That batter looks really sticky."

"No problem."

Two hours and a couple of cakes later



"Your hand is all purple."

"..."

"Fuck off."


I'm so sick of cake it's not even funny.
Party tomorrow. Woo. I haven't got anything weird to wear. Shit and knockers. Where the hell did I put my glasses? I liked today, apart from turning my hand into mince meat. We went to Toys-R-Us, but there weren't any screaming children to trip and I tried one of those expensive ball machines and it spewed a Japanese interpretation of a Punk Minnie Mouse, with boots and everything. And I saw Natra and a lovely art exhibition. And I had beef noodles later. It was very good, but now I am in pain.

Thanks to everyone who sent me birthday wishes today (and those who didn't but wished it in their hearts or dark and musty regions). Love you lot, except for those of you I don't love. You know who you are. Or I know who you are. Whichever, if ever. Orgh... the pain!

Today's Muse: Stupid subtext!

Today is the last day of my sixteenth year. Aw. Too bad. I liked being sixteen. Around half-past six tomorrow it'll all be gone.

What will being a year older bring? I don't know, and I really don't care. I'm sitting here trying to figure out how I can bake a gazallion items in one morning. I have two ovens, with extra shelving... a toaster oven...

Man, I'm spending way too much time at scans_daily. Here's one of the reasons. And another. And one more.

The Goddamn Batman, indeed.

Today's Muse: Ninja!

This video makes me happy. When I was seven or eight we used to jump off the low balcony at Tiong Bahru and land on the grass. Wei Loong used to be able to jump onto the ground from the top of the three-metre high "Rocket" jungle gym, too.

We also used to roll down the steep grassy slope curled up into balls, but that was just dumb.

Today's Muse: Noise.

I didn't sleep very well. Most of today was spent writing down and analyzing some crack dream I had, instead of working on more pressing matters.

I hate it when that happens.


PS: Found thirty-five bucks in a pair of old shorts. Looks like I can afford to throw a party now. Man, I'm whaaaacky like that. Wanting to throw a party. Fuck it. No apologies.

I promise to write something more substantial next time.

Today's Muse: Bah. Humbug. Bahug.

I put off getting tickets for Jason Mraz's concert, and now they're sold out. So much for b'day treat. Hmph. It doesn't matter. Just a, y'know. Just a little show; a chance to hear the music live and see what exactly is so attractive about the Mraz live show. Yup. Never mind. Rest of the Mosaic Festival to hop about.

I missed the Franz Ferdinand show earlier, too. Didn't kill me.



Excuse me while I go sob in a corner like a little effeminate boy.

Pooks and Ta! Come July, Sicki's gonna be blazing at Lasalle! Fuck yeah!

The school called just as I was getting off the train at the ridiculously noisy Orchard Station. I heard like, three words - "Lasalle", "Next", and "Congrats".

Kids: Don't attempt to dance a jig whilst in a crowded train station.

PS: I gots me new fwee sockings. The Japanese have tiny feet, don't they?


PS2: The new Gorillaz video makes me happy. In a, twisting blade sort of way.

Today's Muse: I got wrist burn from this laptop.

Woo... Trivia night was bitchin'.

I'm getting transferred, since they apparently don't need that many people on set. Maybe desk duty, or get stuck inhaling paint fumes at production. Who knows? Mmm... fumes.

But, it looks like my birthday day will be free. Goddamn I think I killed my elbow.

On Saturday I saw Marium at the library at Victoria Street. We wandered upstairs, meaning to go to the reference levels, when some dude with a fistful of tickets gave us two free passes to Army Daze, playing at the theatre upstairs. We ran and got in just as they were closing the doors. Pretty good seats, too.

Yup. March is shaping up to be a good birthday.

Now... Food.

Today's Muse: Man, Aunt May's a tough old biddy. Gwen Stacy didn't even survive that height.

I need a new pair of glasses.

And a haircut. And a new pair of walking shoes. And socks. And brussel sprouts. Good god, you don't just take someone's brussel sprouts and slather soy sauce all over them! They were my sprouts!

I need to finish the draft, the design proposal, the clothes patterns, pull together a team for the Margaret shtick, organise the closet, pay off Da Jie, find an excuse to contact Lenny and deftly bring up the July trip, plan the July trip, finish dicking around with the hat and the shirt and the bag, finish reading the robotics book and the school shooting study, get paint for the walls and the furniture, oh bother the paint!

I also need to pull together a decent bash for Da Jie, get Natalie's present, memorize goddamn Evening, stop putting off stretching (Spiderman flexible? Hah.), call and haress the work-a-lady (Two agonising weeks and no reply!), stop worrying about Lasalle (Why no call? Why no call? They said they would call last week!), get my cracking knees looked at, pack Kim's junk, buy the cat new eating utensils (Argh! Have to take the train up there to give him a bath!), ask Mother where the verdamnt sunblock is, put together on-set kit (Safety pins, what else, what else?), and somehow get cash.

This turned out long. Now I feel dirty.

Today's Muse: A Stiff Wrist

I'm a little ill today.

I found some old paints left over from when I was thirteen? Fourteen? and still took art in school. Seeing as I needed samples to give an idea of the colour for the walls, I started mixing paints, hoping to finally use them up - I had to pound the paint out of the tubes, and ended up cutting them open.

I ended up making the picture you see above. I started running out of the mixed purple by the time half the paper was covered, and I ended up with one side smooth and solid and the other all streaky. So I wet the brush and just made streaks everywhere.

The green bit didn't quite some out the way I wanted it to. The whole shades shit turned out more shit than shades.

Ach. Painting isn't my strong suit, at any rate. I was making it up as I went along. But it was just the thing for an otherwise ill sort of afternoon.

Today's Muse: My glasses are held together with wire.

Each time I attempt to articulate my disappointment or anger, or those more, emotional, moments, it always seems to come out contrived and whiny. It feels insincere; that I'm simply making mountains out of molehills. I mean, what do I know of unhappiness?

I've always meant to address the issue of "venting" on a public domain like the internet - I think it's, in short, stupid. It's like advertising; one is looking for sympathy and attention.

But we do, don't we?

So, as I go on to vent, am I looking for sympathy? Attention? Why do I write here, instead of on paper, never to be shown to the world?

Why am I dwelling on the discomfort, anyway?



Some dreams disappear without our noticing. They ebb away, bit by bit, ever so slowly. Those sort of leavings never hurt. Perhaps a dull sort of surprise from us when they're gone, but never hurt.

Other dreams we cast off ourselves, usually for bigger, shiner dreams. Or we build on the original; embellishing and expanding until the tiny, humble idea is hidden under flourishes and baubles. We forget them, eventually, moving on.


And certain dreams are ripped from us.


It's made doubly painful by the fact that you knew the dream was doomed from the start. Haven't you had dreams like that? Dreams you knew, oh, knew very well would never come into being. But still you persisted, hiding the truth with optimism and maybe, just maybe...

I think that reaction is trained into us from young; to believe even though we know it is futile. Think about the stories we were fed - the endless Christmas movies! Conditioning us to hope for the impossible. As we grow older there are more stories - A band of unlikely heroes defeat the greatest power in the land? A scrawny boy transformed into a superpowered hero? A terminal patient miraculously cured? - and so on and so forth...

And so on and so forth.

And you know, oh, you know very well that it was a silly thing to hope for, and you're being foolish putting so much emotion into it. You shouldn't feel like you've been torn to pieces; you shouldn't feel like you've been emptied. You should be laughing it off, like a grown, mature person. You should be shrugging your shoulders and rolling your eyes.

And yet you find your eyes a tad too wet.

And you know, you know all too well that you will eventually be laughing at and shrugging your shoulders and rolling your eyes at your current grief. And this knowledge saddens you; that one day your dead dream will no longer matter to you. That you will cease to care.

And there is nothing you can do.

Oh, go to bed Missy, you melodramatic twerp. Don't you dare start sniffling.

Today's Muse: This onslaught of giggles

Sooo... This is the month of March.

She scuttles off giggling to do many secret glee-inducing things that have absolutely nothing to do with birthdays.

Today's Muse: The fairy of frivolity - there she goes again, kicking up her skirts.

So, it's just after midnight and I still need to finish the damn essay for Tuesday, plus I still haven't memorized the monologue. I just can't seem to bring myself to read it the way it's supposed to be read. It's frivolous and cotton-headed and vacuous, and oh, I want to slice it thinly and dump it into boiling oil.

It's fustrating, seeing as I know I'm perfectly capable of doing the piece - I just don't want to. I want to ace the interview. I want very much to put up good show, if simply to satisfy my self-imposed standerds. I hate watching playbacks of my performances; so many mistakes I didn't see then, so many ways I could have done that or this better, shoddy, shoddy, shoddy. Akin to scrubbing my skin off with bleach and a scourer. With Simple Plan playing in the background.

I want to ace the audition, but I don't want to do the piece. I don't know how this works, either.

Oh, for fuck's sake, Missy, you buckle down and do the speech. If it's meant to be read by an empty-headed, moronic twit in crinolines and lead, you jolly well read it like that.

Complaining here, instead of doing the rest of your 'in' pile. Go off and be weepy about comic books instead of tottering about on the inter-web.

Today's Muse: Wobbly Elbow

I had that steampunk-Chinatown-esque cowboy dream, the same one I had one I was a wee Missy. It was like watching an old, favourite movie; you know what's going to happen next but it still fills you with glee.

I did step in and change a couple of things; got the cowboy to make slightly different decisions this time round. It still ended up in that cramped Chinese restaurant, opposite the dastardly but buxom Snow. With the cowboy's mother in tow, of course. The cowboy never went anywhere without mother.

And I still woke up before the the key gun battle, damnit.



I keep forgetting to write this up. A few days ago I was at the MRT station, waiting for the train when I ran into an old neighbour and playmate. He was meeting his girlfriend (Ickle Pat has a girlie?), but opted to stay and chat briefly.

It was strange. I kept staring at this fellow, trying to see the little boy I used to push off the swings. Sometimes I could catch that boy, just briefly! in the way he would cock his head, or tap his finger. Good grief, I used to tower over him - and he's grown out his hair!

We had lost contact over the past year or so - I was nursing a grudge against his brother. Every time I spoke to the old troop that anger would flare up again, so slowly I stopped seeking them out. I suppose I didn't really feel their absence too keenly, what with secondary school life.

Everyone changes. Nothing can ever stay the same.

So we sat and talked at length. Trifles. Before he left, he told me how weird it was for him seeing me with short hair, since most of my life I've kept a ponytail. Before I could think of a (hopefully) witty comeback, he said something that left me at a loss.


"You've got Tommy-boy hair now."


God. The unspoken question. You gonna be him now? You going to take over?

Every single fucking time.

"No, no. I don't, no. My hair, too long."

We laughed, and parted.

We were kids, back when we knew each other. But we've grown, changed. All of us, we hardly speak any more. What happened to the rest? Yolk went to Australia; after that we just sort of drifted apart. Then that shite with Thomas. I wonder what happened to Wei Loong?

And frankly, I'm fine with things the way they are. If you're so eager for a reunion of sorts you do it. I'm not going to try and be the one link and bring everybody back together again, or what have you. Things didn't start uravelling with Tommy-boy, they were coming apart way before him. Let's just leave the memories as they are, damnit. Let's not spoil them with a horrible memory.

Besides Thomas' fuckery, of course.

Damn, now I'm all frustrated and angry. I'm going for a walk.



Back, with new THINGS. Good THINGS, hence the capitalization. Nice thing about this place (besides the fecking nicest floors in the world) is that the shopping district is only a short trudge through bush and mud and along highway away. Saw a battered travelling suitcase in the bushes; flirted briefly with the notion it contained dismembered body parts.

Lost hours to the library. Still in a steampunk-Chinatown-esque cowboy mood, I pulled a battered copy of Trigun off the shelf. I've never read the manga or watched the anime before, but so far I like what I'm reading. My only gripe is the way it seems to be composed early in the book; too much being crammed into one page. That means much squinty-joy. But it appeals to the detail-hungry fangirl in me.

I've been keeping away from manga for a while, come to think of it. I think after reading Tsutomu Nihei's BLAME!, I became a little disillusioned with whatever manga I read afterwards. Everything I got me grubby paws on seemed so dull after the awesome that is BLAME!. [Unrelated: Just found out Tokyopop's doing English trans. Should we be glad?]

So far, Trigun's shaping up to be a good read, as long as I put away the little snickering voice that goes "What the hell is that he's wearing? What's up with the whole 'spare the innocents' shtick? Isn't that like so, '96?" and so on. I even let myself squeal "His outfit is so cooooool!", quietly, of course.

How'd I start talking about this?

To recap, I spent a while at the library agonizing over which books I would eventually take home. I miss being able to take home eight paper babies at a time. That done, I hopped over to the huge bookstore and floated in and out of the comic section. It really has grown; I remember when it was just three shelves with daily funnies. Aww.

Then over to HMV, to raid the clearance racks. Found that A7x specimen that put me in the reckless sort of mood the other week. Glee.

To conclude, one muddy trudge, dinner and a session of replaying Matrix-Robot-Battle-Carnage later, I sit here typing all this out instead of working on my interview for school. Bad Missy, bad!


One more thing. I've an internship working on some yet-to-be released show, and my brother has some secret top-notch animation destined for television. So, I am in the midst of much secret glee. Don't tell anyone.

I'm a little apprehensive about the internship though. I don't mind the prospect of slogging in our weather, or even overnight or graveyard shoots, or the odd hours - it's the interacting with people. When you're about to be in a position where everyone else is above you and will probably use you as a punching bag, you're bound to be a least a little bit nervous.

Ach. I always have Stupid MF to fall back on.

Today's Muse: The Neighbour's incessent drilling

Got me Interview Assignment today. Have about a week to prepare.

Damnit.

Parents, I have a confession to make. I am the one whom has been tripping your small children in Toys R Us. Yes, I, using the spindly limbs gifted to me at birth, have been quietly sticking said limbs in front of your precious little darlings.

Look, they wouldn't hit the floor so hard if they weren't tearing up and down the aisles at breakneck speed, screeching and waving plastic weapons. It's a store, not a play area. Most times they don't need my assistance; they end up crashing headlong into displays anyway.

How would I like it if someone did that to my nephews and nieces? If they were up to half the screaming and crashing I see these days, I'd trip them myself. The gladsome thing is that it's been reinforced over and over that they are not to treat the store like a free-for-all.

I must admit though, it's a little strange to see them brooding over a toy quietly while other kids dash at each other madly with plastic maces and doll prams.

On a seperate note, I really, really, really love Legos. Why are you so bloody expensive, my sweet?

Today's Muse: This Overwhelming Need to Bump Off the Last Post

Yesterday was Valentine's Day, wasn't it? It didn't actually sink in until I found myself running (in the most literal sense of the word) late for choir and had to leap over one of the many couples populating the district.

Oh shit. I forgot to take the candy the girls gave me last night out of my bag.

Today's Muse: You know, I don't know why I still do this "muse", thing. It seemed smart at the time.

Amusing story: I've been trying to get an internship with a media company. They asked me to call them back when I had my results (and thus, knew more or less where I was headed next), which I did. Over and over. For days (Bad impression.). Both numbers.

Finally, after a plaintive message had been sent, they called back today. Twice.

I was eating lunch upstairs, and just one floor down, in the basement, my phone tittered quietly. Unheard.

It's supposed to be funny, y'know, irony and all that? And I should be laughing, I really ought to be laughing. Why aren't I laughing?

Maybe it's because all those goddamned A's on my results slip has got people bombarding me with advice: Go to JC! Get a scholarship and go overseas! Your parents aren't young, you know! How're you going to pay? Lasalle isn't established. Waste, waste, waste.

We stood on opposing sides, belting out argument after argument, reason after reason, trying desperately to change our opponent's mind. I might as well have just said Fuck off, instead of all those long fancy speeches. We would have still arrived at the same standpoint.

No, I didn't fight with my parents. They've hammered it over and over into my skull that the choice is mine, and that they trust my decision. It's the rest of the world I've been giving the finger.

In hindsight, I have been unreasonable. After a certain number of people giving me the same long speech with the same reasons, it's a little difficult for me to continue to sit down and nod emphatically - Yes, yes, point taken, I understand, quite right. Y'know, they didn't come up and say anything when the preliminary results came out.

Yet, doubt. Damnit. Some of the incessant yammering must have gotten through.

Something good did come out of this whole fiasco. My Dad, quiet, gentle, neutral Da, actually convinced me to still go for Lasalle. He argued for it, shot my own feeble protests (recycled from the endless advice) down, pointed out where I could go from Lasalle. He was able to clearly articulate what I was unable to even identify. Good old Da.

I wish I was a self-assured as I was four days and one Matrix movie ago. The battle robots were, and are still cool. I love the battle for Zion. Bam! Bam! Woosh!



By the way, my family and I drove up to Malacca for the weekend for a wedding dinner for a cousin I didn't know I had. Kim and I spent the drive talking excitedly about cartoons we used to watch years ago.

Did anyone see that one Transformer movie with those stunted robots with the rotating faces and the huge bad-ass organic robot with the tentacles and everything? I remember being horribly scarred by that sequence; when one of the Transformer robots is captured and hoisted in the air by the zombie-tentacle thing, and he's just thrashing about and screaming bloody hell.

Damn, I can hear him now.

Today's Muse: Five A's and one perfect B

Pleasant suprise, really. Didn't think I'd get so many A's. The single B is for my Additional Mathematics, and is actually a huge leap from the D's.

This, though, changes many things.

Already there is dissent at my choice of post-secondary education. I find myself slipping, even though my decision is a good three months old.

I have until morning to decide.

Knowing Missy, I'll probably spend it reading comic books and me new issue of Play Times: Tokidoki Special. The flat colours, the rounded figures, the sleek lines - much love. That, and Entre Fashion Systems.

I want that corseted vest and trench.

Today's Muse: Bits of wool

One application accepted. One more application due on Saturday. One set of results out on Friday.

The bathroom plumbing finally died. I wash using a jumbo Star Wars cup now.