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Here’s hoping that 2009 will be happy (no shit) and prosperous.

It’s the start of the last day of 2008. Other than the human-conceived concept of the celebration of new calendar years, I see not much more to look forward to than as per any other day in this holiday period.

 

I’d like to to a tiny bit of recollection.

High points of 2008
* Japan Trip – superficially, the event was humongous fun. Outrageously long queues for outrageous roller coaster rides anyone?
* Manchester United winning the Double – yay.
* The purchase of my first electric guitar – I feel it was completely worth the long, dreary hours of standing around like a scarecrow, hands clasped and waiting to con the next man of their money.
* My August multiple-concert spree – It did expose me to new things, shall we say, and gave me some time to catch up with old friends.
* Laptop acquisition – Argh, this post already reeks of materialism. Anyway, the laptop offers me much more than convenience and whatnot – it’s faster than the house computer too! Shocker!

Low points of 2008
* Major exams – Blew them big time. O level results are yet to come; I’m sure that I’ll fare much, much better than I did as compared to, say, mid-years’.
* Singapore flopping at the Suzuki Cup – enough said.
* Singapore 3 Uzbekistan 7 - The match was a joy to watch from a neutral perspective, but when the corner kick from Djeparov sailed over Lionel Lewis’ head into the goal, my heart felt like it had been shattered by a sledge-hammer. Poor guy.
* Manchester United losing to both Liverpool and Arsenal 1-2
* Other assorted stupid trivial stuff that isn’t worth digging up and reprising.

Those are not necessarily the very happiest or unhappiest events that took place this calendar year, though they perhaps take on greater significance than most other happenings. These lists are by no means exhaustive – increase my powers of memory twentyfold and then we have a genuine case.

I’m hoping 2009, being my first year of junior college education, will be happy (no shit?) but more importantly, different from what’s been going on these past couple of years. Secondary education was hugely beneficial in terms of education, character building and so forth, but the sheer routine-ness of it all sometimes got to me. I do not at all want to describe at any length the unpleasant events (some of which, obviously, involved me) that took place as it’ll do no good for the mood. So anyway,

 

H A P P Y  2 0 0 9

yeah

The purchase of my first electric guitar was completed yesterday; I’m hugely enjoying playing the thing now. I adore the sounds that the guitar and amp combine to make – they’re heavier than most elephants. Metallica beware, I challenge thy fame. Leave the jokes aside and goggle at the pictures!

My first wife

Our babies

Random instructions on the back of some product at Isetan

My second wife

Do read the instructions, they give a good laugh. The standard of translation (and vetting, if any) these days has made the Marianas Trench look sky-high.

random things

It’s Christmas. Oh my.

So anyway, I’m ashamed to say that only just now did I notice this…

On calendars, the days of the week are initialised, giving..

M T W T F S S.

I think this is pretty apt, given any context. The only good thing about midweek is Champions League football.

Also, later today I will be holding a concert at the common area of my condominium. I hope it’ll be well-received.

Some people are just absolutely stodgy. There exist things that are taboo whether contextually or not, things better left unsaid and stuff, but sometimes when a simple joke flies by one (not even at one), one should just have a laugh, or tick off the joker should the joke prove lame or politically incorrect. By actually taking offence at a statement not even directed at them, that person just displays a.. guilty conscience perhaps? Not that I care.

I hate monkeys. Each time I walk towards and away from my  place of residence, I see an entire clan of the little buggers. Sometimes they snap at whatever foil packets (think potato chips) or even paper that I carry. I have on countless occasions resisted the temptation to pick up a pointy, gnarly stick and whip the living shit out of those lower primates. One may regard the act of eating chips while walking past monkeys as reeking of a lack of common sense, but it’s not as if I didn’t try my best to obscure the wrapping and ensure that I didn’t smell of consumables. Blast monkeys.

The weather has recently been quirky. Desolately rainy afternoons have followed picture-book sunny mornings perhaps on more than half the days in the past two to three weeks.

And I hope Thailand whack Vietnam in the Suzuki Cup final. Peace out.

merry christmas!

To you, you and you. The entire atmosphere might have been tampered by the complete absence of snow, but at least let the lights and decorations be able to claim to have been used properly – eat them all.

acknowledgements

Thanks to all the people who bothered to exercise their fingers in wishing me; it truly made my day. To know that the majority of email in your inbox is not spam is comforting; to be aware of the fact that the messages are indeed birthday wishes is absolutely pleasing.

happy rant-day to me

Singapore lost 0-1 to Vietnam a couple of hours before this poster turned 16; it came as a huge disappointment to me. I was at work, messaging my sister (whom I had forced encouraged to watch the game) with regards to the happenings at the National Stadium as witnessed from our television set. Needless to say, when the message came in at around ten that Vietnam had beaten the Lions, I took a look at my red apron, shouted “MAJULAH SINGAPURA!!!” and slammed my head against the nearest pillar. Either that, or I looked really glum; I can’t remember which.

Being a salesbitch has also exposed me to the habits of many different types of people. That would exhaustively encompass hearing (and sometimes listening to, and laughing at) some extremely brainless things that people, especially locals, say. I’ll dissect a few phrases here, while trying to figure out how to “wake up my idea”.

“Wake up your idea” – As has been said, I wish I knew what that meant.

“That person ah, one kind” – Well of course, everyone’s unique; thanks for reinforcing that in albeit horrendous grammar. Unless of course I misinterpreted the sentence, which would of course be due again to the sheer ambiguity of its meaning.

“Ask your mother/father” – This phrase in itself makes perfect sense, but contextually, you’d have both spouses asking their offspring to refer to the other half of the mating ritual for an opinion. Which would, typically, lead to a mass brawl due to indecision.

“Time to go already” – Again, another perfectly sensible statement, but when its speaker hangs around for another 15 or so minutes to look at products (and usually, buy nothing), the meaning of the statement is devalued. This one might seem generic, but somehow it afflicts Singaporeans far more than people of any other nationality. Unless of course, people at Isetan outlets behave differently from people elsewhere.

I’ve only listed a choice few; I could go insane listing all the other hog-brained shite that has been spewed out of many a mouth. If this is the direction that local ’slang’ is going, good luck, mother country. Enjoy the fruits of the labour of your incompetent citizens.

bleeeeeargh

How extremely considerate of my boss to not tell me that work resumes Thursday (read: to-fucking-morrow) and not Friday. I had to call him last night (after receiving the news first from Kasi) at eleven, for him to actually say “You mean you didn’t know?”. HELLO, MY SCHEDULE CLEARLY SAYS THE EIGHTEENTH IS AN OFF DAY YOU FUCKWIT. Particularly galling was the fact that he had the guts to deem me ignorant when in fact he had never told me firsthand about the change in arrangements.

So bottom line is, my break ends today, and my boss is, well, something. Most of you know the in-betweens.

Singapore take on Vietnam tonight in the second semi-final of the tournament. Last night’s game between Thailand and Indonesia was worth the stay-up. Pity there was no walk-out from the ever-willing Thai team.

torrents

Torrents be good. I’m now flooding my computer with downloads of such. Should things proceed smoothly and properly, I’d have spent $0.00 and yet obtained Pro Evolution Soccer 2009 and Football Manager 2009 for PC.

The rain’s been coming down quite steadily these few weeks; it hasn’t at all been torrential, but it certainly has been downright unpleasant – depressing even.

The break has been good to me so far, bar the occasional sleeplessness at night. I’ve reacquainted myself with my PSP, and actually sent messages not regarding work-related issues. I’m quite chuffed that the most recent message in my inbox doesn’t go along the lines of “How was sales today?”.

Though of course, the complete paucity of non-mundane activities in my schedule (non-schedule?) startles me. I’d expected to ride on the backs of hippos with my family, eat sand at Sentosa with classmates and play soccer in back alleys with other friends, but perhaps disappointingly, I’ve been sitting around at home killing time. Hopefully, though, a call or message comes along soon with news of the confirmation of a planned trip to Belize.

Boggle has been my main time-consumer these days; I’ve somewhat become more familiar with ‘words’ like ‘eta’, ‘tae’, ‘hae’, ‘ahi’, and ‘aia’ than the names of everyday items. Boggle, while appearing simplistic, has major pulling power, as the 70000 active users on Facebook’s Prolific application will attest to. I literally slash hours each day anagram-mashing and complaining about accepted and non-accepted words.

Though of course, these next few days will be spent doing other things. Then comes the final, torturous stretch.

lateness

I’m up at 3am playing Boggle and shit; it must be at least the third time I’ve done this in the past month or so. It’s not like I actively and deliberately made the decision to not sleep, but since sleep has – shockingly – been hard to find these weeks, I guess playing would beat lying around, tossing and turning, and moaning like a man nigh on death.