Today I witnessed an irony. I was at Vivocity hence I decided to drop by the soon-to-be close down bookshop that is Pageone. It was by far the larges crowd that I’ve seen inside. Shelves were empty and people all over. Reason being there is a closing down clearance sale of at least 50% off the price of any given book. If you are familiar with the layout of the store, the queue for payment extended from the cashiers all the way to the end of the store, all the way into where used to be the graphic novels and comics section. Now here comes the irony, if everybody was indeed that interested to own whatever books they were going to pay for, why didn’t they do so when they were full priced? Meaning which if the books remained full priced, they would not have purchase it? So it is a matter of purchasing for the sake of the sale, bringing back stuff that eventually you will not revisit? Just some random thoughts that I had while I was browsing. Everybody loves a good bargain, I have been guilty of such purchases from books warehouse sales. Books which sat neatly in a pile by the corner and collected dust after I bought them; books which I bought because I had half the heart to read them and because they were cheap.

I did clear the backlog of unread ones, slowly. I didn’t devour them like what I usually do. I learnt my lesson, eventually. For it was quite a torture to bring myself to finish something that I was only half interested in, and I was running out of space to store them. The latter is a more pressing issue. ROFL. If not for the email to renew my Kinokuniya card, I would not have realized that it had already expired for a good couple of months. Yes it was that long since I last visited the place, let alone purchase a book anywhere else. An improvement? I guess it is time to make use of the vouchers they are giving me for renewing it. I know I can be such a sucker for such stuff. Perhaps next week.


Feeling nostalgic, I dug out more stuff that I have written about 6 years ago. I shook my head in disbelief and cringed at the content. I laughed at how foolish I was despite claiming otherwise. I believed that I must have changed from then. We all do, right? Some things don't change though. Like how I can be a difficult person, I still do. Heh.

Halfway into February

There has always been this sense of idealism in my life, all aspects of it. Logically it is anything but possible in reality, still.

I did a little clearing up last night, cyberspace clean up. Came across some ramblings that I wrote back in 2007/08. I was both pleasantly surprised and taken aback at the same time. Back when I penned those I definitely had no intention to revisit them. I don't regret the spur of the moment to read them all again.  Anybody interested to read them? Heh. And when I was reading I could still feel the emotions hidden in the text. I must have left them there subconsciously. I doubt I can replicate any of those now. Thankfully? I don't know. Sometimes I do wish I can write that way again. I assume that we live a 'the more emotions you reveal, the more people can hurt you' kinda life. I guess this is known as protecting oneself.

Came across one of those numerology thingy in the papers. Won't share the entire thing, just an excerpt of my result. Goes something like this when translated over from Mandarin Chinese, "... the first impression that you give others is one that you are a difficult person. The truth is you are. But rather than being so, it is safer to say that you cannot accept the fact that you didn't strive to be the best." I almost stopped reading after the part about being difficult, because I probably am. Heh. Somewhat true with that last statement, especially on issues that I feel strongly for. Despite the effort to keep it under check, and you can't win it all, but I like to win. Convincingly.

Whatever that is left of it.

Gotta love that man who releases the balloon @ 1:39.

A little quiet these days.

元宵节 just past us by on Monday, it marks the end of the 15 days lunar new year celebrations. A little late, but it is already the second month of the new year already, talk about time flying past us. Old wives tales talked about how weird stuff happens on the night of the full moon, no I did not turn lunatic nor become a fang-baring wolf, instead I woke up to find my bowel in a state of disagreement with me. You can imagine the rest. Somewhat concluded that loaf of wholemeal bread is the cause and is contaminated somehow, since it was the only thing extra that I had from the rest of the household. There are also times where I had the urge to hug the toilet bowl, aside from sitting on it, to puke. Falling asleep at weird hours resulted in me being awake now. Sucks to be ill.  

Neighbour commented about how easily it is for our generation to call it quits and we make no hesitation about job hopping when we find ourselves stuck in a rut, who wouldn't, right? And how different it was from our parents seeking stability. I guess times are different. We are considered many times more fortunate than they were, at least we didn't have to worry about nation building and stuff that the men-in-white loved to constantly remind us about. Our generation tend to place a higher utility on happiness, at least I feel that we try very hard to. However along the years the line between being happy and feeling happy is perhaps blurred. Are we really happy with the change? Or did we trick ourselves into thinking that we are indeed? Random senseless ramblings when the mind is not functioning.

A revelation. Because sometimes we got to ask ourselves, is it worth it? The way things go, at the end of the day, it is all for naught. In the dead of the night, you realised how deafening your heartbeat actually is; and silence is something you can actually. When the morning comes you will be leaving here. 

The lunar new year holidays went by as quickly as it arrived. Didn't really felt all that festive this year, perhaps due to it being too near the end of year holidays of Christmas and New Year.

Nothing out of the ordinary, except for the fact that I haven't had a single slice of barbequed pork this time round? Heh. The once a year patronising with the relatives, entertaining their easily anticipated questions, almost like a script. Though I did remind myself to make an effort to meet up more with some cousins that I have not seen in a while. Dropped by the flower show @ Sentosa with my aunt and sis too. Had a couple of rounds of yu sheng too, met some friends, pretty much summed up my week.

Spent some quiet time over the weekend, catching up, finishing the book, coffee, walking and stuffing myself with 2 bowls of rice over a late dinner.

I ran a couple of times, and I thought about stuff while at it. And you.

If you are to be stuck in an equivalent of a Groundhog Day, like in that movie, which will be your day?

I think I know mine already.

Time out reading with the oldest friend at the new hideout. What started as a hot and sunny day ended with it being wet and gloomy. The storm arrived just as I was about to leave the house, so the plan was postponed for an hour while we waited the storm out. Came across that rainbow in the sky as I headed out. Now where is that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? Or the leprechaun?

The peace that we hoped for was none to be found, for as long as that huge family was there. Their kids even started singing, thankfully their elders were quick to hush them. The outing ended with dinner at Chomp Chomp, a rather late one that is. Always nice catching up with the oldest friend.

Surprisingly all I had thus far since two weeks ago was a small container of pineapple tarts. Okay a few pieces of other snacks here and there, but I touched no barbequed pork this year. Sometimes I surprises even myself. Heh.

There are bits and pieces of everything everywhere that I am finding it hard to place everything together and come up with something logical. Top of my mind now, when one decided that he simply couldn't care less anymore; I am like that, at certain phases of life.

I'll continue later when I wake up.



The trouble is you can never replicate the exact emotions that you were experiencing when thinking about certain issues, on another separate day. What you want to say will most probably end up with a totally different mood to what you had in mind. It will linger, but from the moment I decided to think about it later, the desired effect was lost already.

The thought flow when typing versus writing it physically is entirely different. I am inclined to be ambiguous, patronizing or even politically correct when I type. I beat around the bush a lot, if you don't know what I was referring to. Opening and closing with no real conclusion in sight.

When one blogs, there is this part of us wishing for attention. It doesn't have to be in the form of compliments or criticisms; sometimes serving as an outlet whereby it would be a simple form of sharing, personal or not, with whichever random soul that may chance upon it. 


I guess it is the complete opposite when i write it down. It gets a lot more personal, no doubt, for I know the content will be safe from prying eyes and unintended recipients. Of course it will get emotional as well. After all, it is somewhere where we can finally remove the layers of armour that we piled upon ourselves to protect against this rough journey called life.

-edited.

Okay, this post is a week late. I started this on the night when the moon is full, and now the moon is already disappearing in preparation for the end of the lunar year next week. I finished the book, 1Q84, took a while to do so because I couldn't quite get into a mood to finish it up. But I stepped out of the world of Aomame, Tengo and Fuka-Eri eventually. I thought the book was at its best in the first one third. Things started to get draggy and characters were written off; plots that held so much promises but were not fully developed. It could have been so much more, but perhaps it was this abruptness that made it unique, his style, always leaving you asking the what-ifs and why nots. Opening and closing, that I can do.

If you can't understand it without an explanation, you can't understand it with an explanation.

One week to the new lunar year, the feast on the pineapple tarts has started. It has been a childhood favourite of mine. I can do without the rest of the goodies, just gimme my pineapple tarts. Heh. 

Have you looked at the moon lately? Is it any different? :)