Taken from the Oxford University Press blog:

Elbow bump--a greeting in which two people touch elbows, recommended by the World Health Organization as an alternative to the handshake in order to reduce the spread of germs.



You've gotta be kidding me.

(A little blogging to distract me from unwelcomed but necessary intellectual pursuits. I love euphemisms!)

Was compiling a list of to-do things after the dreaded exams. Realised that I'm in for alot of present-shopping cos of the overwhelming number of friends whose birthdays are in December. Some have wishlists *cough Jyang cough* so that makes things a little easier. (Btw dearie if you want something else, must say hor...) Then most others dun have wishlists so I can forsee weekends spent perusing shops in a crowded shopping mall. Hurrah.

I'm not complaining, I love my friends. The jostling and elbowing is a small price to pay for the friendship we share. Yesh, I am sometimes capable of such sentimental emotions so dun look so shocked. Close that jaw.

But I do want to declare that most of the shopping done this year was for other people and so in the last month of Year 2006, I am determined to pamper myself. In other words, retail therapy for me, myself and I. I want twinkly, dangling thingys for my ear piercings, dammit! Rooaaarr!

Okay. End of rant. Thank you for reading. *bows*

Once upon a time, a little girl who learnt how to talk earlier than how to walk was, well, learning how to walk. Her difficulty was that, well, her head was a bit over-sized for her little body. (Which affects her centre of gravity, if anyone out there is asking...) Eventually, she learnt to walk tiny steps and not trip over her own two feet. Well, not too many times that is. Once, she did trip. When she picked herself up, her mother, who witnessed the embarassing episode, asked her why she fell down. The little girl replied with a little pout, "Because you never hold my hand."

Lesson 1: It's okay to be slow, just as long as you get there eventually.
Lesson 2: It's okay to fall down, just remember to pick yourself up.
Lesson 3: Don't blame others when you fall down cos your head is big and that's really a personal issue.
Lesson 4: But I guess it's okay to grumble a little, just bear in mind Lesson 2.

Hope this quirky (Zing: qwrky? heh) little thingy cheers you up a little. Exams are around the corner, everyone's feeling the stress. Good luck mugging and may Starbucks never run out of coffee :)

I think it was something that Prof KH said. Has been nagging at the back of my mind since then. When a scientist tells you to "increase your oxygen intake so that your synapses do not overwork", he really means for you to "take a deep breath and calm down". If a scientist declares that there is "a specimen of Drosophila exploring fluid dynamics in a solution comprising 5M chicken and 2g of salt", he really means to say "Waiter, there's a fly in my soup".

My sorry attempt at being witty. If I failed, just tell me.

Thank you Denise for inviting me to your party and happy hatchday to you :)

I removed the tagboard and have yet to find a replacement so meanwhile, just leave comments.

I lied.

Ok I didn't tell the whole truth.

I scratched the car AND cracked the bumper.

The aftermath of the incident wasn't too bad. Spent an hour polishing off the paint marks. Can't do anything about the crack though.

Kor confirm will suan me. I can just feel it coming.

*bleah*

Die. I scratched the car. Summore it happened when I was driving the car into the porch.

Sheesh. What a great way to end the hols.

Dear blog *pat pat*, I have sorely neglected you. For that I sincerely apologise. Aww dun pout, that's so unbecoming. Behave yourself.

Right now that's done, all I have to say is:

Aaaaaahhhhhhh.

The hols are here. It's been going alright so far, all 3 days that have just passed. El's should-have-been-a-surprise party was on Saturday and Sentosa. I must say she has a really funky family. Father offered everyone beer, mother dyed her (El I mean) hair red, brothers goaded El and JS to french, woo hoo. Then on Sunday I had a competition and won myself a $30 Takashimaya voucher so that will probably go towards a nice pair of shoes. Earlier tonight I had dinner with Jo, El and Zing. We spent most of the time thinking back of NCC days and *gasp* I realised I couldn't remember a thing about UDI camp. Safe for sewing press studs onto 5 sets of uniforms, I can't even remember which platoon I was in. I keep saying that those 4 years were the best years of my life, but on retrospect, heh, I can't remember much of it now.

Hello senility.

A bit sleepless now from all the laughing just now but I'll make up for it. It's the hols!

First things first: erm kor, I know I promised u the pictures. They'll come, but not so soon okie? Thanks for understanding :)

Right. On to the main topic. Which is essentially just some ramblings. Like my hair is straight now (yipee). I hope Mom knows by now that no matter what she says about liking my curly hair and natural curls being totally "in", I will rebond my hair when it's curly. Period. Twice a year I endure a one-sided conversation about the condition of my hair. Simply uplifting.

Then there's school. I dunno if it's getting more bearable or unbearable. It's sad that I have to use words like "tolerable" to describe what I feel about school. IMO, to excel in university isn't a matter of which JC or Poly one came from but more about the passion one has in his or her studies. I lack that passion. I really really admire my peers who keep up with their readings, do their tutorials seriously and source for supplementary material to study. For a person who lives a mere 20 min away from school, I think I'm awfully privileged. The scary thing is, I'm not taking advantage of it.

But that's depressing so let's not go there. There's always bliss in denial.

Had a few interesting lab sessions lately. Like the BS306 Developmental Biology lab where we observed worms copulating. That's the closest you get to pornography in lab. We had a field trip to Bukit Timah Nature Reserve. No report to submit, just plain walking and enjoying the scenery. Just like primary school, those sweet, lovely childhood days. Just yesterday was the BS309 Genetics lab and I learnt that rebonded hair cannot be PCRed. And dyed hair too. Since most girls and guys nowadays have chemically treated hair, I wonder how that will affect the data collection and determination of the genotypic and alleleic frequency. Hmmm.

My account balance is finally looking a little better. Soon, I'll be able to splurge a little on clothing, shoes and accessories yay. So that's something to look forward to :)

"Did you get love enough?" she asked.

"What's enough?" he replied wistfully.

--Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood

Mood: Glad.

Glad that my mom and dad are healthy and happy. Well ok dad caught the flu bug from me and mom is quite busy with tuition and singing but they are in good health and cheer so I'm glad.

Glad that kor has good frens to celebrate his bday with him and for him. 2 celebrations + hand-made bday cake leh... this little sis is very very jealous haha :)

Glad that jyang is having a great time in USA. I hope your days are fun-filled and worry-free. And if you dun think of us (or me), it's ok. I certainly didn't when I was in Cornell. *grin*

Glad to know I've got great frens. Although I dun have many frens (yours truly ain't much of a social creature), I have a special bond with every one of them. More or less la.

Yup so I'm glad. But I'm not content. My list of "wants" will go on forever so let me just say the number 1 thing on my list:

I want to be rich. Disgustingly rich. So rich that I can make sure every kink of my curly hair is ironed out before it even gets to peek at sunlight.

Don't laugh. I'm dead serious.

My dear sista left for USA yesterday. Almost one year ago, I did the same. To quote Cherlyn, "I wish it was 14 Aug 2005 now."

School sucks. What's new. From now on, blog updates will be sporadic. Full-time students have the full-time responsibility of studying full-time. So I'm a part-time bummer now i.e. slack whenever I can haha.

I wish.

Singapore Open Shooting Championships 2006, my third year participating. Coach told me last week that the 1st time is to gain experience, 2nd time to test water, 3rd time must "go there and whack!" I didn't whack anyone (pls, shooting is a non-violent sport ok) but I'm damn proud of myself.

yay :)

There were only 30 participants in my category. In the 40-shot competition, the moment I fired my last shot and lowered the gun, the timekeeper signaled the end of the competition. So I literally fired to the last second, "wasting no time at all" as what Mr Eddie Lim (ex-coach) said jokingly. The spectators applauded. I could only smile, still dazed by that fact. I thought I had a minute left. I came in 8th thus qualifying for the finals. Then I think I climbed up one placing after the finals. No prizes for being 7th but I think the knowledge that I improved and shot well is the best prize for me.

At training this evening, I shot:

94+94+93+93=374 or 93.5%

WWWWWHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!

*grin*

Got woken up at 8am by Jyang. No I'm not angry or anything, it's just hearing juicy gossip early in the morning does tend to put one in a rather weird frame of mind. I just have one thing to say to Zing: Honestly girl, don't you know me well enough (or us for that matter) to NOT tell me wat you don't want the rest to know? Don't blame us for poking into it, you asked for it the moment you told me, Jyang and El. Hee.

Oh and thanks to you, I shall never be able to look at Lord of the Rings without bursting into giggles.

My social life has been rather active recently. FOC 2006 just concluded. Had alot alot of fun and got to know many people, especially my fellow programmers. It's also amazing how the Buccaneers actually have the most pple involved in this year's FOC. Why I say amazing is because we were such an un-happening group during our FOC. Xaviers and Zionites were way way noisier than us. Also got to know many juniors, those one year younger than me so it was a fun experience overall. I realised in the camp that I'm terribly bossy also... another character defect to add to the ever-growing list...

Then just this afternoon I met up with the Cornellians. There was this exhibition of USA universities by the Singaporean students studying there so besides meeting Cornellians, I met many of my ex-classmates like Si Hui, Zhimin, Adela and Wei Ying. Also met Jinyue, one of my 'kids'. Think her mom thinks that Jyang and I are both nuts. Think that both Jyang and I dun really care haha. Oh and I finally finally saw Anna. Dear dear Anna who ignored all my SMSes. Dear dear Anna who bought the Cornell T-shirt for me. Dear dear Anna who is thus forgiven. So now everyone is looking forward to the great big gathering at Jo's house this Saturday yay! :)

A quick update before I disappear for the week. I've been busy with FOC prep, work and some errands. Work is tiring, I'm having second thoughts about continuing but I want money too so sort of caught in a dilemma there. I missed FOC pre-camp yesterday, bet it was fun. I went Sentosa with El, Jyang and Qi. As usual, all 3 sent me "sorry jyin I'll be late" messages. We finally got to the beach at 12pm, walked about 20 min trying to find a good location. Found a good location and proceeded to nua for more than an hour, playing bridge and eating custard apples. Then we made El strip, played frisbee, acted silly, the usual nonsense. Went to cycle and ended up at Ben & Jerry's. Made our way to El's, washed up and had dinner with Zing. We taught her mahjong too and I think she has natural talent for it, just need to practice more i.e. play more mahjong with us. De arrived, we played more mahjong, then sent Zing to the MRT station at 11pm and headed out for a midnight movie at 12am. We watched Pirates of the Carribbean, returned to El's and chit-chat for a while more before we all fell asleep. Then this morning, I finally showed them my USA photos heh. I headed home first cos need to pack for FOC tmr so yup here I am now.

Ok I'll be back on Friday 21 July :)

Photos of Stong. Mostly people photos so I feature widely in them. Blot out my image if you get sick of seeing me.

That's us in a cave. The rock behind us resembles a kris, a traditional Malay dagger.

Us again with waterfall to the right (of the picture). We slid down the slippery rockface very fast.

I can cook, no matter where the kitchen is haha. From left, clockwise direction: Fish, Elton, Ridzwan, Yali and yours truly.

The beautiful sunrise. It makes the hike up all worthwhile.

My dearest tutorial groupmates. From left: Parhana, Kerui and Esther. This was the homebound train.

2 highlights of the week so far:

1. Dinner on Monday with Jo, De, Jyang and Shu. Received Part 2 and 3 of my bday present. Yesh it's extremely belated but it doesn't matter cos I LOVE THEM! Thankew thankew all of you :)

2. Senior's Camp from Tue to Thu i.e. it just ended, I still need to catch up on my sleep but thankfully got a nice tan heh. I guess the camp was pretty slack, except for "Campfire" night. As a first-time costume mistress, I left some costumes behind *slaps forehead*. Good thing Edmund saved the day haha. I'm actually pretty proficient with the sewing machine now. So I can cook, I can sew, I'll have to work on my "keeping-the-house-tidy" skills but I'm on my way to housewivery and auntie-hood.

Someone save me. Please.

Looking forward to Sat (meeting platoonmates) and Sun (meeting Cornellians hopefully). Calmly accepts the rapidly-diminishing account balance. I love money, but I think I love my frens more.

I had a weird dream last night. I dreamt that platoonmates and I were gathered in a small dusty room at one of the upper levels of AMQ. It was late afternoon cos the sun's rays cast a yellowy sheen on everyone in the room. So the whole platoon of us were just sitting up straight minding our own business (a.k.a stoning) in our No. 3 uniform. Then out of nowhere, I decided I was bored and started kiwi-ing my combat boots because apparently NCC Day was around the corner and I was part of the marching contingent. Anyway, setting aside that odd discrepancy, a Mdm came up and wanted to have a few words with me so I told her to "hang on there for a moment, I want to get this side of the boot done". So when I was finally done, she was obviously rather vexed at me. Of course I had no idea where I got the guts to tell her to "hang on for a moment" but it happened and I braced myself for a scolding. She scolded me for dropping my beret on the floor and went on to harp about how I was a specialist already and still displaying this sort of atrocious behaviour. At that point, something snapped in my mind and I started shooting back at her. I admitted I was wrong but mistakes do happen and everyone will drop their beret sometime or other in their life as a cadet. I then rambled on something about my passion for NCC which was exemplified by my neat and smart uniform and lastly, I told her how I wished officer-cadet relationships could improve by the officers not nit-picking at minor mistakes. I excused myself and walked out of the door with my platoonmates, leaving that Mdm slack-jawed at my audacity. But of course, she had no grounds for rebuttal. Hee I even remember Zing, El and Jyang giving me a good pat on the back.

So back to real life. I can only describe the feeling as weird. Puzzling. Queer. That sort of thing. It also reminded me of all the times that I crapped my way (and my platoon's) out of certain uncomfortable situations. That's right, jyin the crapper. In fact, this whole dream was an ego-booster for glorious little me ha. I guess I'm likedat sometimes.

I have plenty of other stories likedat, real-life stories (Jyang and Shu simply love to reminiscise about me PMSing during Pt A camp). But I'll leave that for another time. Meanwhile, I shall savour this little dose of ego on a cold and rainy Sunday :)

Still waiting for Yali to post her photos on yahoogroups cos I think she has some nice pictures of me. Well as nice as they can get with me as the model.

I've resumed air pistol training after a 2 week break. Coach commented on how he felt a little apprehensive about me when he started coaching the NTU team.

Why? Because I am so small.

Well more accurately, compared to my teammates, I am really quite small-built. But he's glad that I'm reasonably strong. Well at least strong enough to hold the gun steady for 40 competition shots. And my stance is quite stable too, so that's good. In fact, it's also good that my toes and feet start to feel numb after standing still for about half an hour or so. Queer isn't it? Apparently, badminton is a no-no for shooters (sorry shu!) and playing piano is good for triggering. Then he also recommends swimming with one's arms only to build up arm muscles. I wonder if I can swim 10 metres likedat...

Guess I'll find out soon heh.

Meanwhile, it's nice to have met up with jyang, adila and shu recently. I think those 4 years of s**t really bonded us well. I really glad for those 4 years of my life. They were the best. But don't worry, I dun dwell on the past that much. I think "now" is pretty cool too. At least no ugly school uniforms yar :)