Interim

A lot of interesting things have happened in the space between posts. I shall attempt to summarise them because I can.

1. I have seen someone hyperventilate over chocolate. Just at the mere mention / picture of chocolate. It is an amazing, wonderful, entertaining sight to behold.

2. Realised I have forgotten half of what was taught to me in Philosophy, and have accordingly made plans.

3. Resolve to cut my spending.

4. Saw Seven recently. She seems to be doing well. Realised I haven't seen her for almost two years. Eight for even longer.

5. Trying to register myself to be a public nuisance is expensive, guys, what the - ?

6. My manly friend's sisters have revealed to me that he is actually a huge fan of K-pop. Nothing wrong in and of itself, but it's just sort of internally funny.

I suppose I've found something even worse than Twitter-like blogposts. LIST-LIKE BLOGPOSTS!

LIST-LIKE BLOGPOSTS.

The worst things since sliced bread!

brought to you by shatteredviews.blogspot.com

Rethought

Wanted to post a longer post but decided to heck it for now.
Plus was nursing a bad cold on my last day. Sigh.
Well. Every bit as euphoric and bittersweet as I imagined.

Almost fairytale. Almost unreal. I know it intellectually but I think the truth of the matter is sinking in. I just have to remember myself: standing on the steps facing the exit, slowly putting down my bags, literally raising my arms and shouting.


ORD LOH!

Wikipedia

Hm.

I'm an uncle now.

This led to myself, Eleven and Twelve rooting through "Chinese kinship" on Wikipedia to figure out what the kid has to call us and our immediate family. Makes me feel traditional, modern and old senior all at the same time.

X

GODDAMIT CATHERINE OPEN THE GODDAMN BOOK AND READ ME THE LINES.

Reading this passage brought to mind a conversation with Zeyu, containing an argument where perceived beauty was influenced by personal attachment. I suppose this distills to a general rule that some thing hold more significance for some people because of a personal experience, personal reason, which may or may not be shared.

(Beat.)

Sometimes these connections are willingly (more or less) formed - as evidenced when people form relationships with fictional characters (occasionally bordering on fanaticsm, see craze about movies etc.) Far be it from me to judge them, I'm just using them to prove a point.

(Catherine opens the book. She reads slowly, without inflection.)

But some are less so.
Connections formed not by choice, but the association stays there all the same. Good or bad memories alike stick in the mind, easily called up by a certain string of words, a sense of déjà vu, a short melody.

"Let X equal the quantity of all quantities of X. Let X equal the cold. It is cold in December. The months of cold equal November through February. There are four months of cold, and four of heat, leaving four months of intdeterminate temperature. In February it snows. In March the Lake is a lake of ice. In September the students come back and the bookstores are full. Let X equal the month of full bookstores. The number of books approaches infinity as the number of months of cold approaches four. I will never be as cold now as I will be in the future. The future of cold is infinite. The future of heat is the future of cold. The bookstores are infinite and so are never full except in September..."

And sometimes we never really appreciate the connection we had back then because that's how things are: we never really do appreciate them until they're almost gone. I now understand what Mr Auggy said about Duffy's $ on the breakdown of language, although I feel it might be a completely different understanding that what he intended to convey.

(She stops reading and slowly closes the book. Robert is shivering uncontrollably.) It's alright. We'll go inside.

- Italics excerpt from Proof, David Auburn (2001)

Counterweight

HEALTH WARNING
The post below contains:
(1) arguably bad original writing.

If you are allergic to these abovementioned ingredients you are advised not to continue.

---

Recently found a scrapbook where I had written some disjointed paragraphs. Some were on a plot I never finished, while on other pages I had written lyrics to Chinese songs. Among the mess of stuff I found a corrected, cancelled and amended monologue on time travel(lers) spread across a couple of pages. It was vaguely amusing to read what I had written years prior.

I have reproduced it word-for-word below. On hindsight, I would like to change some bits but have decided against it. The below work is fiction and does not accurately represent my views on time travel / travellers.

---

People and pscyhological tests often ask the what-wouold-you-do-if-you-can-turn-back-time nonsense. We, as a species, often wonder about what we have done and all the what-ifs and would-it-have-turned-out-differentlys. Perhaps it's our distinguishing trait - that we can feel regret. Innit something?

Like so many things that our hearts desire, there is a counterweight to this in real life: the unstoppable march of time. Try as we may, most of us don't even come close to being able to deflect the mighty river of Time. It is a rather quaint realisation that our unique ability to obsses about the past is balanced by a complete inability to do anything about it. No matter your greviance with the past, time treats them all with the attention and concern of a block of lead - not only does it do absolutely nothing useful, there's a 50-50 chance it'll poison your brain.

This conveniently relegates us to obediently shuffling forward in time. I suppose that it's a good lesson in learning how to just "deal with it" and move on with life. When you think about it that way, you shouldn't be surprised that your average time traveller is a little worse at dealing with difficult siutations in the same way difficult kids expect to get their way because their tired parents let them.

There you have it: time travellers are like spoilt children.

Dimes

Last night outside Cathay, I decided to indulge myself in an ice-cream sold by one of those uncles with their portable ice cream stands with a giant shade / motorcycles conveniently attached - even though it was selling at $1.20 and not the usual $1.

Inflation plus city prices leads to unimaginable price hikes, no?

Anyway. After handing me my bread, I passed him the money, but the uncle said "nevermind, see you so young, $1.10."

I tried to refuse the offer but he still insisted, so I thanked him and went off.

The peppermint ice cream aside, I suppose that last comment did help to lift my spirits after a crazy two weeks. Though, I'm not sure whether to be happy I still retain my youthful looks or whether I simply look too immature.

Ah well, always positive.

---

Invites later and I'm still awake.
It's been quite some time - am going to want to see familiar faces.

---

1. e4 c6
2. Nf3 d5
3. d3 dxe4
4. dx34 Qxd1+
5. Kxd1

No witty commentary today.

...hahaha, it's over already, right?

Rain

or, Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head
or, Blogpost about Rain Why Are You Reading This

Recently, due to different circumstances, I have found myself walking along foreign HDB estates for relatively long distances (roughly the distance between two MRT stations). I found this rather quaintly serene, especially when I wasn't rushing for time or anything.

Just a leisurely stroll, occasionally with a friend. Ambling along the lesser travelled parts of Yishun: sounds nice, no?

Anyway. Was ambling along a part of Singapore that shall not be named, when suddenly it started drizzling.

As I was on my way to the MRT already, and being the strong man that I was who would not condescend to use an umbrella, I decided to heck it and go ahead. I hadn't moved for more than a minute before the rain started to get uncomfortably heavier.

Maybe I should take shelter? I thought.

And then the sky fell down.

Yup, maybe.

In the end I broke into a sprint for the nearest HDB estate about 200m away, then scrambled around in my bag for an umbrella. Still had to keep walking, even though I had lost sight of the main road and was in an unfamiliar maze of HDB.

In the end, came to a T-junction where the MRT was either on the left or the right. Right then, I don't know why, I was feeling somehow downright miserable in the bloody rain and not knowing which way to turn and walk and everyone else having the sense to be indoors. Imagine being alone at the traffic light junction in the middle of a pouring (admittedly diminishing) rain; pretty much that.

I decided to go right, but I saw a bus pull up at the stop. I took it to the station (it turned left; thank goodness I was delayed) where I realised my shoes were completely soaked through.

Long story short, I stayed in my wet clothes, wet bag and shoes for another ten hours in air-con, then proceeded home to discover that my umbrella had leaked some water from its supposed waterproof bag. A pack of cards that happened to be next to it was affected; but the cardbox heroically absorbed most of the damage and crumbled, leaving the cards dry and intact. How touching.

---

Shall post up the chess moves some other time as I am tired and wondering why I spent all my time typing about ths.

Point

Thank you, bow, for reintroducing me to the author of Geocide. Rediscovering the blog and reading through everything - from Ra, his Troll Pi article, 100 Minutes and all - I can say without irony that his writing style (and subject matter) is absolutely compelling.

...seriously, seriously. Someone should bring his ideas to life.

...except for his Geocide ones.

---

Today's chess commentary is brought to you by pointillism and puns.
...and half-disguised Morse code
point point POINT point pause POINT point point POINT pause point pause point point point point point

Computer

Finally being able to play TF2 on a computer at home means/taught me a couple of things:

Inprimus, my TF2-withdrawal symptops can be more easily curbed - but they've been on a decline since five months ago, only occasionally flaring up. Still this does not exempt me completely, because of:

Secundus, the importance of human communication and actually keeping in touch with people;

Tertius, that I have relearnt/rediscovered my fondness for ostentatious Latin-esque phrases where it might be mildly awkward, and (along with recent events) reawakened my pedantic choosiness about ending every clause in such a list/resolution with a semicolon, or indeed any other form of punctuation other than a fullstop, while trying but not-really-trying-tonight-because-of-fatigue and also because of awkward-laziness-to-correct-my-own-typing to keep grammatical rules intact throughout a particular piece of work;

Quartus, that I can sleep at five in the morning;

Quintus, that, try as I might, I still find it very hard to wake up early in the morning and thus "waste" away a good deal of my next-morning sleeping;

Sextus, that my newfound hyphenation-obsession unfortunately remains resolutely sticking on to me for the time being (I'll show that bugger, in time, maybe);

Septus, that aside from TF2 (see where the topic has gone to now?), I feel much better this week, and realise how weird a mood I was in the last;

Octus; to devise an ingenious plan to ensure I wake up early today morning.

---

1. e4 c6
2. Nf3 d5
3. d3


Today's chess move is brought to you by the Acrostic Poem

Inprimus we knew of
Death in the certain future;
Unclear thinking, just following orders
No-one - with a capital En - yes -
No-one knows how when who
Or what came up; paper.
Hushed whispers spreading
On the ground, on your ears, just
Waiting to be unleashed not
Towards enemies but
Ourselves; asking why
Play this bloody childish
Lovers' quarrel, dragging
Armies of innocents for
Yesterday's reasons
Cooled and reheated
Hear now, orders are
Echoed, and the one
Soldier takes one
Step

Musings

Perhaps it's time I rediscover what my blog is for.
"Feeling confused" is goes some way in answering the kind of mental and physical stupor I have sunk into in this current period of time, so I suppose I shall go ahead and thresh everything out by typing.

I have always believed in giving people chances, the benefit of the doubt.
I have always believed that there are some fundemental rules, there are some basic tenants of being a thinking rational human being.

Like a First Proposition who has sat down and realised that the debate is starting to teeter, one wonders what went wrong. Sort of like what has happened in the Octos, when you realise that the rules you set down weren't clear enough / were clear enough but were misinterpreted or misheard. It's like creating a world to realise that you've accidentally set the universal constant slightly off.

So far I've been teetering between two real emotions this past month: an unhealthy and sometime stifling dedication to work and an equally unhealthy and less-than-sometime stifling desire to unleash varying flavours of fire and brimstone on opponents' arguments.

---

Okay, as anyone who has been reading this for any period of time know, I don't usually do this, but I need to get this off my chest.

First off, let me apologise to my friends who have tried to contact me / have posted stuff on Facebook expecting a more motivated response from me.

So far I've also realised that my ability to socialise has dropped to an all-time low. Each successive faux pax sinks me deeper into pseudodepression (I recognise it as pseudo, at least - I do not claim to be an emo kid) and probably get me into deeper trouble if it isn't reined in.

I am starting to lose my grip on how to properly treat my parents, my peers, my attached peers and their boy/girlfriends. I am starting to lose patience with telemarketers and blind buskers on the streets. I have increasingly violent daydreams of shouting down others and the occasional physical nature of my assaults. I start to mouth words while standing in the MRT. I plan vicious tirades in my head against Channel 8 drama characters.
All this time I have been imagining myself governing myself through a certain set of personal ideals. In that sense I feel that I was very predicatble. In the past, deviations from those ideals were put down to lack of self-control. Increasingly I am losing my grip on what some of these ideals are, watching my reactions fall further in the cesspool of random luck and see-mood, and my vocabulary into increasingly absurd extensions of ideas reflected in hyphenated words.

I've watched my English fall into ruin to the point where I struggled to make a single point clearly, and watched it miraculously make a good comeback (not good enough) in time for Hammers. I've felt so tired I've actually fallen asleep mid-sentence or while doing physical tasks.

But if I were to give a single example of a mental and physiological decline I would suppose this current period of time would be it.

I suppose it's only a temporary decline and not an all out shutdown across the grid. Right now I'm shoring up my mental barriers for that defense against the screw-this-whole-thing argument, and waiting for - my - inevitable recovery and rise back to form.

I chronicle this because I want to see how much I've changed after a few more months have passed. Also it's something to get off my chest, on a part of the Internet I'm sure not many actually see.
Also if you call me an emo kid I will destroy you.
TL;DR: Till then, I hope anyone whom I've offended over the past couple weeks can understand. I'm not in the best frame of mind now. Right now as I type this I have this sinking feeling that something up there probably will offend someone. Nevertheless, I shall post it anyway and hope - through the fog in my brain - that someone will read this and understand no offense was meant.

Clarity

Another day, another faux pax.
And causing the team to lose another high-stakes debate.
Way to go, benjy.

Poker

Excited for Hammers.
What will tomorrow bring?

---

Another MRT ride, another quiet fascination with life around me.
Picked up Wittgenstein's Poker from the library; seemed like an interesting read. Turned out a little dry, but the premise was interesting nonetheless: Wittgenstein threathening(?) Popper with a poker during a guest lecture with Russell trying to intervene.

Sounds like a piece of fanfiction with philosophers, but it's an interesting note that this (in some form) actually happened. Quite a jump, honestly, to realise - not to know, logically, academically, i- your-head somewhere - that the people we quote are more than just the soundbyte philosophical arguments we credit them for.

1. e4 c6
2. Nf3

Honest to goodness, there I was, minding my own business like a straight honourable gentleman when suddenly, this crazy idiot on horseback takes a mind to galloping straight past me as if I didn't exist. He just rushed out back from somewhere; I swear, it seems like he doesn't even look where he's going at times. Just a "whoops! Sorry!" and away he goes, lost somewhere in the mist ahead. I don't care if he looks absolutely dashing on a horse, he's going to get himself killed like that. But yeah, that's the truth and the whole truth of it, gov'nor, like it or not, and that's how your cat got run over by a horse.

Revamp

Well.

Blogger seems to have revamped their everything since I've last checked; I admit that I find it rather irritating to not have the old controls. Sure, maybe it's sleeker and more interesting, but I don't quite like having to hunt all over the place for the "edit whole blog in HTML format" (I still haven't found it). As a consequence this blog is hereby condemned to live with the scrappy HTML formatting that I did for it years ago until such a time where I decide to change the template.

---

If there's one thing I've learnt though the past couple of months, it's to never take anything for granted. Everyday I am reminded anew of the surprising strength that belies some people.

---

As of late, I've recently become more irritable, to the point where it's visible even to me. ...I suppose it's due to the stress; perhaps I should start to be more organised.

It's probably been a subconscious tendency for quite a while, but now I'm consciously channeling most of my held-back anger or impatience into a reserve of fire to use when debating (if and when the situation calls for it/I feel like it).

I've always loved doing Thirds because by then in most debates I'm sufficiently fired up to declare every single one on the opposing team a misguided idiot. On a logical level, I do agree it was for the better for the team and myself that I was eventually rotated out of that. Even now, when I do Thirds, I have to constantly remind myself, to keep myself on a leash.

On a lower, baser level, though, I love Thirds simply because of the sheer destructive potential. To me it's a strange "bloodlust" of sorts: to dismember an opposing argument beyond the point of saving. Even these civilised words don't seem to do what I mean justice: I'm talking about the likes of the legendary Seventeen-Tiered Rebuttal, razing an argument down to the ground from multiple perspectives; the kind of kick you might just get if your neighbour came up to you and self-righteously declared some stupid statement, the kind of argument that is just begging to be dismantled; the sheer malicious Schadenfreude, to destroy.

...honestly, I'm torn between behaving properly this Hammers or just letting myself go.

---

Have started a proper (hopefully) game of chess by tag with Darion, I intend to see it to completion. At a rate of a move or two a week maybe I'll even clear my army stint before it's all over.

...nah, who am I kidding?

Just so to make me update more constantly and also to try to regain some command of English, I shall chronicle this exciting match as it unfolds every week.

1. e4
The starting horn blares, and I trudge across the field. I keep my head down and walk, listening to the trudging of my unwilling feet across mud and sand and who-cares-what-else in this forsaken land. Misery loves company, though, and at the very least I have plenty of both. At the very least, I have those whom I can count upon to back me up, to fall back upon, to -

Silence.

I turn aroud, only to see no one else.

I stand alone in the middle of a blistering nowhere, watching dark clouds slowly swirl together overhead.

Bowling

In the end of There Will Be Blood, one guy calmly makes a priest-figure confess that he is a false prophet, and then violently bludgeons him to death with bowling equipment.

Having only watched that scene, I have only the vague feeling that something important happened here, but I can't figure out what.

Override

I keep talking about self-preservation instincts (or was it the lack thereof?) on this here blog, but an interesting article I saw recently caught my attention precisely because it showed that you can override self-preservation instincts.

I can't be bothered to find the actual article, but it was about this virus that lived in rats, but only was able to reproduce in the intestines of a cat. (Strange choice for a reproduction site, but I don't think I can judge.)

And hence, in order for the virus to continue to reproduce, it has to get the host rat to visit the intestines of a cat - a visit the host rat usually does not survive.

So this virus apparently clamps down on the part of the brain that warns the rat of danger (for example, the production of panic in reaction to smelling cat urine). Tests showed that normal, uninfected test rats stayed away from areas with cat smells while infected ones treated them like normal places.

This of course leads to the result where a virus causes a rat to end up in the belly of a cat.

Interesting.

Retrospect

Two giant internet derps this week.

Failbook comment of this guy insisting the Titanic wasn't a real ship, calling his detractors idiots.
Intruiging share I got of this slightly-tricky math question: people calling the wrong answer and calling the people who got it right idiots.
"Idiots" being one of the most polite terms that got thrown about.

In the midst of all the "I DON'T WANT TO LIVE ON THIS PLANET ANYMORE" thrown by the members of the 'correct' camps I feel a little twinge for the people on the other camp, who are going to wake up tomorrow and realise what they said on the Internet.

...ouch, much?

Driving

The first time I was a public nuisance, I was freaking out.
But now it's kinda grown on me I suppose. How odd.

---

Dear Channel 8 dramas,

Why.
You know, I used to like you despite of your flaws; because of your flaws. Pointing them out and laughing at them was a family past time, a weekday 8pm tradition. There used to be good plots - at least, bearable plots.

But now why you do this.

The stock hatable-characters have no redeeming characteristic whatsoever. They're too successful - my hate for them is drawn out so well it spills over to the entire show (and the entire genre, if it can be called that). The plot twists are insane. Either go all the way and make it a supernatural drama, otherwise, keep it normal. Don't go half-half, it's annoying as anything.

---

Last time, in Council Retreats, we used to wake up in the chalet and sleepily spread Milo powder on bread. We declared it the best thing to go with bread, arguably so. I'd like to think the tradition has continued. (I'm not sure if we did it in debate - I think we might have.)

A couple of nights ago, I was hungry and decided to replicate the dish for old time's sake. But I was too lazy to use Milo powder, so I used a conveniently located packet of coffee powder and leftover CNY goodies.

...it wasn't that bad, honestly.
And it's a good way to get rid of your leftover cookies while kidding yourself that you're eating healthier!

---


I feel kind of infuriated that all these developments in the world are happening while I'm in NS, experiencing the slow deteoriation of my language skills, speaking ability and confidence. I want to see and argue in those debates that we would have had at SOPA's / Libya's height and whatnot, and to talk about the events from that piping fresh-hot perspective.

It's always good to bring them up as examples long after the things have passed, what with the benefit of hindsight and all. But now, when you can read immediately about what people are going through, what people are doing about it - the human struggle in all -

...I need to get us to an open.

...first a bakery. Then an open.

Yeahhh.

Freude

O Freunde, nicht diese Töne!
Sondern laßt uns angenehmere an stimmen,
und freudenvollere.
Freude! (men's chorus: Freude! )
Freude! (chorus again: Freude! )
Perhaps not surprisingly
O friends, not these tones!
Rather, let us raise our voices in more pleasing
And more joyful sounds!
Joy! (Joy!)
Joy! (Joy!)
Fallen in love with this again
Freude, schöner Götterfunken
Tochter aus Elysium,
Wir betreten feuertrunken,
Himmlische, dein Heiligtum!
Deine Zauber binden wieder
Was die Mode streng geteilt;
Alle Menschen werden Brüder,
Wo dein sanfter Flügel weilt.
I hope Windows reinstates it
Joy, beautiful spark of the gods
Daughter from Elysium,
We enter, drunk with fire,
Into your sanctuary, heavenly (daughter)!
Your magic reunites
What custom strictly divided.
All men become brothers,
Where your gentle wing rests.
into the next Windows' Sample Music
-- An die Freude
commonly known as Ode to Joy
(Schiller, Beethoven)

Resurgence

AND IT LIVES.

One lunar year after my enlistment, I finally return with a semi-vengence, having drawn a couple of lessons in the meantime.

The main lesson of recent days is: blogger, remember thy password.
...and now that I've got it back, I plan to try to get back into the swing of things in good time.

And, I think this might have been a long time in coming, but I have finally lost faith in Channel 8 dramas. I'm sorry, Mediacorp, but you're doing it wrong.