∑ (Three, Two, One)

Day Zero breaks and I wake up at 12:30pm, arms sore from sculpting those perfect sand abs, face slightly singed from the sun and grinning  like an idiot at how impossibly great the last few days have been. What really took the cake for me is that everyone just did whatever they wanted, to hell with inhibitions. In the end, it was all worth it and I don’t regret doing or saying anything over the last few weeks. And so when I lay there thinking this morning, it was just so nice to realise that, because I wouldn’t have it any other way. There can never be too many hugs or moments where, all homosexuality aside, we say what we truly mean. I know I’m still owing Day Ten through Four and I’ll get to them, it’s mainly because my mood’s been all over the place recently and I wanted to coast along and enjoy everything rather than trying futily to piece together something coherent. Pretty much, I just got really lazy and had crazy mood swings, as Marcus knows better than anyone. It was really hard to start this because I’ve been gone for a while, but I figured I should open with the most important thing and what I really needed to say was- Thank You.

Next off, all my love to Winnie and Carol who turned 18 yesterday, pretty much the best day in the entire year to have a birthday. Carol, I know you don’t read this but I will always be in awe of your story-telling and I know you’ll meet lots of pretty boys in the future. Winnie, the rest of this paragraph is for you since I haven’t written in your book yet and everyone else can avert their eyes for a little while. When Bryan needed help for your message yesterday, he asked me ‘If you knew you were never going to see her again, ever, what would you tell her?’ I still have no idea about that but I’ll try my best. You are my best friend and I love you. There has never been a time when you couldn’t make me laugh and I just can’t get my head around never sitting next to you in Maths again and getting busted by Doyle for bitchin’ or laughing. Swami can call us conjoined twins and say we have no independent thought and I couldn’t give two shits because as far as I’m concerned, I would never find better company. You don’t give yourself credit for how strong you can be, you’re my rock and to shamelessly rip off Bryan’s personal statement, you give me hope.

Okay, everyone you can start reading again. I guess I’ll start recapping now otherwise I’m never going to end. At 9:00am yesterday, roll classes were marked for the last time and buses left for Balmoral beach. Perfect weather hit off the day and everyone just chilled and played on the beach for a couple of hours. I don’t know whose idea it was for the last day of school to be on the beach, but they’re a bloody genius. Winnie brought her sand-board and nobody could play it properly except Jeremy and eventually we just used it to get sand for our ab-sculpture. Belle gets props for making the most perfect abs I have ever seen (Sorry Peter). After that we had the beach picnic and everyone sang Happy Birthday before the food melted or went off or whatever. I don’t remember much else except heaps of people got dunked, I got buried and Kris went shirtless to the horror of everyone in the vicinity. Someone said they expected it to be worse but that’s because Kris’ boardies were strategically placed level with his belly-button and he was probably Hollywood-taped like crazy underneath. Sorry Kris, couldn’t hide the love handles. I also tried learning the technique for flicking a wet towel/shirt and as Bryan was trying to show me, he accidentally hit Sandy (sorry Sandy). Raging ensued when Sandy was in pain and everyone told Bryan to dunk himself in repentance and he did. Then everyone told him to go stand in this massive hole Thomas had dug and he did. Basically, victory to Sandy.

After a massive grade photo, everyone piled onto the bus and we headed back to school. The day felt really short but you know what they say about time flying and having fun. I always hated that saying for some reason, it just sounds so stupid. Anyway, after school Annie, Sy and me went to Macquarie Center to finish buying Winnie/Carol’s birthday presents while everyone chilled at Swami’s house. Uneventful except we managed to blow $89 on food alone and Annie wanted to walk through a wall to get out of the elevator. Hitched a ride with Peter to The Ranch where 50 of us met to celebrate with the birthday girls. I don’t have much to say except it was just an incredibly nice dinner followed by even nicer spam-huggage as people were leaving. So much love going around, it’s too hard to describe. A little fuss about alcohol and ID’s and a lot more about Winnie’s A4 farewell message to Bryan and Bryan’s struggle to match it. In case you’re wondering, he didn’t. After that, a couple of people headed to kareoke in Eastwood but me and Annie had to leave early. All in all, I can’t think of a better way to end the 6 years we’ve had together.

I just realised I’m counting this down backward but I can’t be bothered to change anything so, whatever. Tuesday was luncheon and everyone skived a bit on breakfast to make room for free food. Burned into my memory is the moment where Edward Lu walked up to my brother and shook his hand, more than vigorously, saying ‘Hey, are you Leeanne’s brother? Hey, I’m Edward, Edward Lu, Wsup?” This was in front of my parents so it was probably the biggest awkward party I’ve ever encountered. After thinking he was just a whackjob for the last day or so, I now realise he probably thought it was my brother who works at EY and that they’d be working together next year. Too bad for Edward that’s my other brother.

Shirt signing was pretty insane but Vinson’s analogies really cracked me up-

“Good memories will be lost like a needle in a haystack” and “Good memories will be lost like tears in the rain.” Another round of height jokes was also good haha. Not much else except more camwhoring and the boys going skins while playing NFL. I heard Ada and her friend checking them out and telling someone that they didn’t see any abs anywhere, except for _________.  I missed the name and so the mystery continues. Annie and Jackie hid their shirts and blazers  but in the end it was only Bryan who was left half-nekkid and searching, poor boy. Can’t say I’m going to miss that.

Another thing, when I chucked my uniform in the wash on Tuesday afternoon I started thinking about what it would feel like on November 2nd. In Jeremy’s blog a while back, he mentioned something about the security of school and how the routine really defined that for him. For me, the uniform’s a big part of that and I can’t imagine what it’ll feel like to put it away in a closet or drawer, never to be worn again. Weirder still, to dig it out months or even years later when all those memories and emotions aren’t fresh anymore and we’re all at different places in our lives. Who knows what we’ll remember then or what’ll have changed.

Monday was Single Ladies and our final assembly which I loved even though the rest of the school (other than our grade) probably didn’t. Injokes weren’t all too hot for me but watching Victor sit with split pants in front of the whole school made up for it. Learning the actual Single Ladies dance was so much effort just for the 2 minutes on stage but so unbelievably fun when we got up there. Thanks to Winnie and Annie for being our leading Single Ladies and Phat, their prodigy, for making it everything that it was. I would like to take the time to say, although it was fun while it lasted, I never want to see boys in leotards and leggings again. Ever. To quote Anthony, ‘Ball Cleavage’ does you no favours.

The assembly really confronted me with how much talent we’ve got in our grade. All the singers blew me away, especially Four Chord which broke my heart each and every time I watched their rehearsal video on the weekend. You had me worried that I would start bawling after the assembly but strangely enough, hardly anybody really felt sad enough on the day. Destroy-Swami-and-Desecrate-His-Grave plan succeeded in revealing his fruitiness to the whole school and while this may make me sound like a creep, I loved ogling at the baby photos in the slideshow. Thank you to Belle and Gaby for all their effort. Another thing, I don’t know why we never hug at school, all day, every day.

Anyway, I think that’s all I got for now, this thing ended up pretty long after all. The last few days felt way too short, but I guess the magic lay in that. I’ll miss you guys for now but for some reason, I’m not feeling too worried about losing contact and such. In reference to Fight Club, we are not Single-Serving Friends. Between Year 7 and 12, we’ve had our time together but that isn’t all we get. I’m not just talking about ATAR-bbq (it’s on, Phat), Formal or Schoolies right now because I know I’ll be seeing at least some of you in the years to come. I don’t know if that’s enough, but I’ll deal for now.

See you on the other side, where being clever will work out for you.

Intermission

Yeah, I never kept up with that One-Post-Per-Night thing because I got sick of counting down after what, two days? This is just a short photo post because I’ve spent the better part of a week ogling at peoples’ beautiful baby selves. After some consideration, the most adorable would have to be a toss-up between Sandy and Justin, although Justin had a mini tux and that is  just awesome in itself. Most of my baby photos have been on Facebook since trials but I chucked a couple of new ones in here because I know all of you want a share in my childhood. Totally.

 

 

I remember somebody saying that Jeremy Tan had a Melon head in his baby photos (in a good way, if that’s possible?). Well here, my brother has a turnip-face. Don’t worry Jeremy, it just means you look better now.

We were making those high-pants work, a true fashion statement if there ever was one. If you’re wondering why we all kind of have the same haircut, that’s my Dad’s doing.

I think this was at some Chinese School recital? Why am I the only retard dressed up and how come my feather-thing is upside down ? God, what did I get right?!

Guess who’s that sook bawling in the corner? I cracked up when I saw this because I have no idea what happened and I feel really sorry for that random kid sitting next to us. He’s got the whole shifty-eye thing going on as well.

Moving on, Irealised my parents used to get us really awesome cakes-

 

 

I’m getting so jealous. Oh, and I found this ‘report’ thing my primary school made us give to our parents, something about strengths and weaknesses or whatever. Check out my Year 1 report-

Cause I get it all right, hells yeah! Apparently, I had cross-eyes that year as well.

I dug out our Dural Primary photo and I love Kevin’s hair in this- Dracula incarnate! Apart from that, nobody looks drastically different, I don’t think. For a closer look, Click http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/8218/dps2.jpg

That’s about it for kiddy stuff, if you’re into something of a more sinister nature, I hope this doesn’t disappoint-

I’ll be going now, expect me back soon because I actually saved drafts for Day Nine and Eight but I didn’t have enough for single posts and everything came out a little weird because my mood was slightly off-key.

All my love, especially to Sim, Belle and Douglas, birthday children of the week.

Eleven

This is a day late but there’s a story behind it, so I’m hoping you’ll forgive me. At precisely 9:30pm last night, I was having this massive MSN rage about something, which in hindsight, I don’t even really care about. Whatever, so I was hammering away at my keyboard for about 3-4 minutes and the lights in my room start to flicker, I’m so caught up that I barely even notice. I keep going and about half a minute later, it happens again. This time, I notice enough to have an irritated thought about Dural’s shitty electricity provision because I get black-outs at least once every two months. That lasts about half a second and then I just get right back into raging. The thing about raging is that, even if you don’t really care at the beginning, once you start, everything just snowballs and blows up out of proportion. So at this point, I’m getting kind of worked up and the whole snowballing thing’s happening and everything’s going crazy.  Suddenly, there’s this ‘pssfttt’ sound and all the lights in my house, the TV, everything just switches off. Even my laptop screen flashes black for a second as it switches to battery. During this time, it’s completely dark, everything’s gone silent, all that random anger’s dissipated and I just sit there thinking, this is so freaking awesome. It’s like I was Micah from Heroes and all that negative energy caused everything to cark it and the circuit breaker to trip or whatnot. Probably one of those things where you know it’s not possible but you start imagining it anyway, just because it would be so cool if it was true. Anyway, my dad checks the circuit breaker and it’s fine but when he goes to call the electricity company, we realise our phone line’s dead. Then, I forget about all that cool stuff and start getting weirded out because we’re in the middle of nowhere. After about 5 minutes of shitting myself, our power comes back but our phone line and internet’s still out. Nobody has any clue what happened. Coincidence? I prefer to believe my negative energy theory ;D

Anyway, what else happened yesterday? Tuesday started off at snail’s pace as we sat through that really long, life-sucking assembly- I had to retrieve my sandwich halfway through just to sustain myself. Watching the Japan slideshow brought back a few memories but generally, it just made it feel like ages since we went. For some reason, everyone was cracking short jokes yesterday as well, I counted about 13 by the end of the day and 3 in the first 6 minutes I was at school. Don’t really remember much else of assembly except a heap of presentations, Richard and Frances singing ‘Come What May’ and the audience getting berated a million times for talking. Highlight was probably the end of Prefect news, a remake is pictured below, featuring Thashan, Douglas and Nathan.

Homosexuality, Yum.

Continuing with the ongoing sandwich saga, there was sweet revenge in my second free yesterday. Bryan grabbed Douglas’ lunch box (containing a rare sandwich) and gave it a spirited and well deserved punch, in the memory of my sandwich, Swami’s sandwich and anybody else’ lunch  massacred at the hands of Douglas. Anyway, Deva, Doug and Bryan also started playing that game where you roll half a jelly snake into a ball, throw it as high as you can and catch it in your mouth. Marcus kakked himself laughing at me because I suck but in my defence, I warned everyone that I sucked. It reminded me of when we went to Teppanyaki and knowing how uncoordinated I am,  I got so nervous everytime I had to catch something. Luckily, I had Sy as a buffer that time  After lending Doug my camera , I also learnt that he really sucks at taking photos. Flicking through them now, all I got was a shot of Marcus’ ass and many of his blazer.

Bryan's failed luvo attempt with Marcus

Marcus giving his blazer some lovin'

 

These are just some more I had from the rest of the week;

Anthony's earring

Milo gets eaten by light

 I still don’t know what’s happening with the Single Ladies dance for last assembly. I don’t want to do it because it’s crazy hard and I can’t dance to save my life but the terms of that bet with Bryan are still kind of hazy. In hindsight, closing with that will probably mean comments channeling Kanye West.

See you tomorrow, guys!

Twelve

I’ll start by stating the obvious- I’m losing creativity with titles. I was thinking of visiting Wikipedia and listing every known fact about the number twelve but I got distracted by the ‘ listen’ button on the first line. For some reason, automated voices crack me up, especially on the youtube comment box. Sad, but true.

Anyway, on to the juicy stuff. Even though Belle’s got this covered, yesterday Belle, Winnie, Sharon and I embarked on a formal shopping adventure, bound by a pact which stated that someone, anyone, must buy something before our return.  About an hour after arriving, Winnie had only tried on one dress and all we’d done was shit around and burn time. Sharon called to say she slept in and we decided that we’d go to Birkenhead’s Point factory outlet since Chatswood had nothing to offer. Inside, I was actually heartbroken that we’d never see her try on the kinky studded black vinyl numbers we’d noticed everywhere. At this point, we sort of gave up on serious shopping and decided to try on the ugliest dresses that have ever seen the light of day. So as we were getting changed in the same dressing room and kakking ourselves as quietly as possible, the shop lady sticks her head around the curtain and, seeing only Winnie, asks her to come out so she can see herself in the mirror. Five or so random white chicks were already out there, decked out in the dresses they were seriously considering and as Winnie steps out into the open, conversation literally froze mid-sentence. I continued to explode silently behind the curtain, global warming could destroy the world and Winnie’d still be thawing out from the looks they gave her.

I don’t think the photo really gives justice to how ugly that dress was. Anyway, we moved on to another store and when looking around I heard the store ladies fully talking someone up-

‘ You have such beautiful shoulders, you need to show them off!’

‘Your skin is gorgeous.’

So I look up out of curiosity, expecting to see some really hot girl. Instead I cop an eyefull of this 50 year old lady with the whole wrinkly/cellulite/ age-spot thing going on. Nice mental image, I know. I also know that it’s their job but seriously, they were so full of shit it made me giggle a little. Anyway, the rest of the day was kind of uneventful, we met up with Belle, her dad drove us to Birkenhead’s point where we finally met Sharon. Nothing there except the best fish and chips I’ve had in ages. Then trained to Central in time to watch the shops close and there’s not much else to say except we did a helluva lot of walking for nothing and yes, we broke the pact. Photos-

What we thought was sold at $0.00

Who needs eyes?

Citybeach's gay hats

 

Birkenhead's point

 

The only Winnie the camera knows

This morning Anthony unveiled GI Sharon, an 80 page(?) tribute to the strongest remaining person on the planet. Unfortunately, the entire population of James Ruse collectively could not restrain her and the centrepiece was pulled down before recess. Later, Douglas declared war with Swami by destroying his sandwich. As a previous victim of Douglas’ sandwich brutality, I would like to extend my condolences to Swami’s ham sandwich. I believe a minute of silence is in order.

His words of victory were brutal, truly.

AD- After Douglas

Happiness Personified

Swami's revenge

 

A billion bags got nuggeted but the most memorable was Aryan’s which was sitting right in front of his feet. Also, for the entire duration of the sandwich commotion, Sharon’s bag fell victim to the greatest phantom nugget of all time. Swami, Douglas and me were sitting right in front of it for the entire time and didn’t even realise it got nuggeted until Sharon came in, throwing blame around. None of us had an answer for her and the mystery remains, although we definitely suspect Milo had some involvement.

Anyway, I figured I’d keep this short since I’ll be visiting more often.

Stay safe.

Triskaidekaphobia

While that fateful day has passed, we now arrive at a time of reflection. Consider below, the evolution of all that is Bryan Tran.

Disheartened, Bryan could only comment “It tickles.”  Enough said.

Anyway, I guess my title needs some explaining since it’s harder to sound out than Deva’s last name. According to Wikipedia it means ‘a fear of the number 13′  and it seemed appropriate since we officially only have 13 school days left. Ever. I’m not in the mood for reminiscing so don’t worry, any homosexuality in this post will be limited. Starting from today I’ll be posting every weeknight until we hit the holidays, some sort of countdown I guess. Probably digging myself into a hole since I’m usually so lax about this thing but whatevs, I figure ‘unlucky’ 13 is a good place to start.

Right now I’m sitting about a metre from the computer screen and I still can’t read clearly thanks to those eyedrops. In the end, it was definitely worth it for the free movie ticket, an unprecedentedly awesome day and the giggles I got in between. I realised on the bus home that after arriving at 8:30am, I stayed on school grounds until 3:05pm without attending any of the seven scheduled periods. Free for first period, Myopia for the next two, double free between recess and lunch followed by double maths which I absented since the world was still a big, fat blur. I don’t know if it’s been done before, but it was just awesome.

Even better, Myopia shed some light on a few things, the most important of which regards Douglas being a girl. When the first set of eyedrops hit the surface of his eyes, his eyelids locked shut and wouldn’t open for years afterwards. Screams echoed through the corridors of L block-

“It burns! It burns like fire!”

Faced with steely eyelids, the lady called for backup-

“Stop fighting me! You have 3 sets to go! Relax!”

Eyes still shut, hands flailing, Douglas replied-

“It’s reflex. And it burns, burns like fire!”

True story, albeit I did take some creative licence. In other news, Bobby revealed to me that the Myopia tests showed Devesh has near perfect vision (20/10) and his glasses are merely an accessory, worn solely by choice. That stuck me as odd but hey, if it makes you look smarter… Whatever, I also brought my dad’s camera to school today and took photos using instinct alone since I couldn’t see anything on the screen. People have been saying that Winnie never has a straight face in photos, but I found a better candidate; (Thanks Sandy for the first photo)

Hi John. Speaking of weird photographs, Winnie was playing around on her new iPhone on Tuesday since Doug put his photo as the contact photograph of everyone on her contact list. In an attempt to fix this, Winnie tried to get a photo of me and typically, I resisted. The end result was a really weird angle and I turned out looking like a Down-Syndrome kid. I don’t know how it happened but we (Me, Winnie, Sharon, Eddy, John?) kakked ourselves for a little while about that.

All in all, this week was pretty damn great and I remember saying that I felt like I was ‘walking on clouds’ more than once. For one thing, I had dessert two days in a row and that never happens. For another, the lecturer finally replied with our Philosophy exam ranks after a billion hours of  nothing. After sitting scared shitless for half an hour  waiting for Bryan come back and tell me what he got, I finally opened the email and realised we had all come top 10. Call me a monster but it was more than satisfying to know that, by some miracle, we beat all those kids who talked themselves up after the exam and motor-mouthed throughout the residentials. Ahwell, there are many other things I could mention but I’m tired and ’walking on clouds’ pretty much covers everything.

I’ve reached the end of my yarn, a little shorter than usual but now I’m drawing on nothing. Heads up, the new Cash, Cars and Stars will be up this weekend, slightly harder this time. Shoutout to Ambert for finally giving me the videos, they’re much appreciated.

That’s all I got,

Sleep tight guys.

P.S. I don’t think Ben reads this but I finally uploaded the video for his surprise party. Minimal editing and a little repetitive but watch ’til the end for a rare sighting of Marcus Wong in his natural surrounds. Andrew Tsang is also featured for a whole minute.

On the Line.

Let it be known that on Monday the 7th of September 2009, Bryan “Lil T.I.T” Tran will enter the grounds of James Ruse Agricultural High School a changed ‘man’.  Sporting what is commonly regarded as the “child-snatcher’ moustache, Bryan appears oblivious, perhaps selectively, to the opinions of his peers. Yet, questioning  and polling of the student body reveals that only a single individual in the sample of 840 did not deem his facial hair “unattractive”. Investigations are ongoing to determine if this vote was entered by Bryan himself.

” If I had children, I wouldn’t  let him near them,”  Janette Siu of year 12 emphatically informed our reporters.

“It’s disgusting!” added close friend Sharon Ngu.

Specialist Rohan Swami also informed us “It lacks the consistency and thickness typical of male facial hair and he can opt for one of two pathways. First, there is the mens regrowth program aimed at stimulating weak hair follicles and conversely, the laser removal program more commonly chosen by women. In my professional opinion, his situation is most suited to the latter.”

Nevertheless, when informed of these statements, Mr Tran defiantly declared “I’m taking it as props!” He proceeded to ask our reporters “Do you have children? Yes? How about you raise the kid for six months and abandon it in the wilderness, never to be seen again. Then call me and tell me how you feel. Maybe you’ll finally understand.” His brash and crude metaphor has left onlookers appalled.

Despite these strong words, it has been confirmed that on Monday morning Bryan will indeed replace his current look with an unprecedented trend dubbed “The checkerboard.” This involves cleanly shaving the left side of his moustache and the right side of his goatee, creating a deliberately uneven effect. Depending on events occuring on the day itself, it is also unknown whether his eyebrows will remain intact. Readers are encouraged to mark this date, for it will undeniably be a pivotal and joyful moment in history.

This is not a hoax.

Okay, I’m not sure how many of you know that a bet was placed on who could read the most Philosophy in one night, Bryan or myself. Unfortunately, it eventuated that we both finished the module and no one won. We shook hands that both of us would do as previously agreed and so Bryan will be shaving come Monday morning. Even more importantly, someone please bring a camera because he also has a very personal confession to make. If these events does not happen as stated, I encourage any and/or all of you to acknowledge him as a “Pansy”, “Pussy”, “Fruit”, “Queer”, “Poof”, “Faggot” or other terms of such derivation. Remember, bullying is not acceptable at our school, but Bryan has fettered his rights away on a bet and so, appropriately, he is an exception. I feel gay typing up the rest of the terms since they are incredibly stupid but I’ll probably do that later anyway, for shits and giggles, if nothing else. Anyway, just had to get the word out.

I realised that you’ve probably read enough of my soppiness for the time being and so I wanted to play a game to change things up a little. It’s a shameless ripoff of Kyle & Jackie O’s “Cash, Cars and Stars!” although slightly altered for James Ruse Class of 2009 where there’s no actual cash, cars or stars involved. A minor technicality I’m sure. Well basically, the rules are that the audio has 5 short clips featuring people in our grade and you have to guess who’s who. A couple of these are dead giveaways and if anybody doesn’t get the last one, kindly guide your cursor to the little red cross on the top right hand corner of the page and leave immediately, we can’t be friends. I kid, but you should definitely get it.

P.S. All of these clips were taken from AzafaTV if that helps any. If you’re one of the featured voices or you were there and remember the event, please don’t give it away, I would rather people guess from listening (if it’s possible?). Thanks to James for giving me the account, John and Joseph for putting up with my technology noobing ;D And finally, Marcus for brainstorming with me and being an inspiration, always.

Guess Away!

Cash, Cars and Stars! James Ruse Edition

Marcus Wong rocks at life, better luck next time;

1. Dan

2. James

3. Jeremy Tan

4. Anthony

5. Sharon

I realise this post is quite a bit out of character but normal broadcasting will resume sometime in the near future. Belated birthday wishes to Ruilong and Deva and proper ones to Kel for today ;D Enjoy the big one eight, guys.

See you in a few hours!

The things we think but do not say.

First of all, there will be no excuses. I know I mentioned a hiatus in my last post but I definitely intended to write a little more often, or at least, a little sooner after trials had passed.  I guess good intentions really only get you so far and so I apologize, again. In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have written it to start with since I took it as free license to blog later and later and later and well, my discipline’s always been a little shot. But now I’m back and struggling slightly, to be honest. How to summarize the last few weeks? Hectic? Stressful? Painful? All of these words apply at some point, but they hardly fit with the whole experience. Trials came and went a lot faster than I expected and while I may have bitched and whinged for the majority of those two weeks, I can’t bring myself to describe them as negative in its entirety. I really don’t know what it is, but it’s only amidst extreme stress or when the seriousness of what you’re doing reveals itself to you, that you have periods of clarity regarding what you really want and where you’re really heading. In a nutshell, it’s in these moments that you learn more about yourself and in some sick way, I enjoyed that. You may disagree with me, heck, it’s probable that you do, but that’s just how I see it. If nothing else, it makes you really appreciate doing absolutely nothing. And that’s how I spent Thursday and Friday, undeniably savoring every minute of doing absolutely nothing. It was sick. 

Then again, one thing about exams is that there really isn’t time to slot in my usual 3-4 hours of TV and that left me feeling a little under-stimulated. Also, right after Advanced English Paper 1, I had this huge desire to watch Jerry Maguire for no reason at all, and as a ‘good student’, I kept putting it off. Come Wednesday afternoon, I couldn’t wait any longer and I figure it’s the perfect way to reward myself. Worth it? I’ve never made a better decision in my life. 

Some may say it’s predictable, others describe it as sub-par, even IMDB only rate it as 7.3 out of 10. But honestly, it does all you can really ask for. A couple of winner lines spliced in with your occasional heart-wrenching moments and undoubtedly, winding up at that elusive happy ending. Or maybe not so elusive in Hollywood, but whatever. It also has a really cute kid so, instant winnar for me. I refuse to believe people haven’t watched it, even if it’s not mindblowing, it’s the kind of movie everyone has seen. So just to jog those memories, Tom Cruise is a successful sports agent working for a large corporate company where there is no compassion, no consideration, there is only one focus; money.  So he grows a conscience, pours his heart out into this ‘mission statement’ titled “The things we think but do not say” (go figure with my title) and distributes a coupla hundred copies around his office. Almost overnight, he’s fired with only a single client sticking by him and you know the rest- they struggle to the top, Tom Cruise and Renee Zellweger end up happy together, his client (Cuba Rupert Gooding Jr) hits the bigtime and you’re smiling as the credits start to roll.

What did I take away from that movie? Maybe how quickly everything can change? Maybe how we should start saying what we mean? Probably a little of both. Yes, I’m corny. Anyway, don’t take it wrong, it’s not like I actually believe that if I suddenly spill all my unspoken thoughts, I’ll nab my own Renee Zellweger or something stupid like that. I just figure, what can it hurt.  I guess now’s the time to disclose that the next few paragraphs will be a little homosexual, but that’s the kind of mood I’m in. Please don’t take that literally.

First of all, even though I’ve really enjoyed the last (almost) four days, I feel mixed. Actually, I think bittersweet covers the entire year for most of us, except you odd heartless bastards who want to run off into the future without looking back. Six weeks left of school, ever. That really hit me in the face as soon as trials finished and it feels kind of like, there’s this shrinking window where we can actually can be kids or whatever and not feel guilty or weird about it.

Second, I’m scared shitless. I think yesterday really opened my eyes to that because next year, the plan is for me and my brothers to move out into an apartment so we don’t have to trek from Dural to the city every day. And yesterday, I couldn’t be bothered to travel home after RICE at like 11,  so me and my brother slept over at my other brother’s dorm in the city. Since I’m not allowed to sleepovers, this was the first time I slept away from home when not on a camp or Japan or something and it was just weird. Weird and exciting and new and scary. We’ve already established from the beginning that I’m a chickenshit so that shouldn’t surprise you. A small taste of what the future holds I guess, and it was weird. I think the weirdest part was waking up and having to travel 1+ hours to meet my parents and yes, no matter how many times I say it, I can’t really express how unbelievably weird the whole thing was.  The whole of year twelve is really just a long, challenging obstacle course and it doesn’t just comprise of external assessments but also those little tests you set for yourself. It’s like, at the beginning we’re locked in a room at one end facing all these obstacles to get to the door at the other end. At first, all you see is the hurdle or block staring you in the face and then somewhere in the middle, you start to catch glimpses of the door. Where are we now?  Well, we’re at the other end of the room and there’s just one last obstacle in the way. The door’s locked, and all we can do is wait and stare through the keyhole at what’s lying out there. All we can get are these tiny, unsatisfying, key-hole shaped glimpses of the future but everything else is just black. And when I think about about all that black, I shet myself. Wow, reading back on that I really feel gay. Too late, it’s out now and I refuse to let myself backspace any of this.

Third, I will miss this year and everything it stands for. I try not to be a sop but the extent of my sentimentality really does surprise me. It’s not just the people I talk to either, although they matter a heap, it’s just the whole atmosphere where you meet and see the same faces every day. That makes it sound bad but you get the gist. It’s funny how there’s the people you’ve ‘known’ for six years and you just never talked to, because there wasn’t the opportunity or there wasn’t a reason or it was just awkward. Probably mostly the latter for me since I’m allergic to awkward. Deathly, deathly allergic. Haha, anyway, it just seems so stupid.

Well, now it’s nearly 6pm and I figure I should start channeling my creativity or whatnot toward my English speech and philosophy essay. If you read all of that, congratulations, you should realise I’ve thoroughly out-gayed myself. Oh, one last thing, something which I really do not say, at least, not often- Megan Fox’s body makes movie’s happen. Yeah, I talked about this trailer a lot and even described it a coupla times, but if you still haven’t seen it, I’ll make it easy for you;

Hot.

I’ve reached the end of my yarn, hopefully it didn’t bore you too much. It was nice to be back and write over 1300 words on absolutely nothing. Haha, I’m still appreciating it. This will probably be something I look back on and regret, sometime in the near future. Damn, hindsight is a bitch.

No goodbyes. And please take care of yourselves.

P.S. Who’s your mofokka? (If you feel like commenting, please begin with ‘You’re my mofokka”. I’m not joking.)

And if you didn’t get that, I urge you to watch Jerry Maguire again, for all its valuable, cliched stupidity.

A Vision’s Just a Vision.

Can I get a hands up for anybody who’s flicked to Channel Nine recently? Amazingly, I’m not talking about the illustrious ‘The Farmer Wants a Wife’, although it is returning for its fourth season, which is amazing in itself.  No, with the recent addition of  ’The Perfect Couple’ and my favourite, ‘Dance Your Ass Off!’, the goodies no longer stop at seven lonely farmers looking for love.  I know TV quality has been low for quite a while and Channel Nine heads the pack without question, but this really hit me like a tonne of bricks. There’s no other way to put it, I feel cheated. I feel cheated that I wasted 2 minutes of my life watching a preview of people Dancing their Ass Off! I feel cheated for the people who wasted their time producing a show of people Dancing their Ass Off! And for anyone thinking I should’ve just changed the channel, I feel cheated that people Dancing their Ass Off! are being broadcasted nation-wide for an hour every week.

Okay, I don’t actually care that much but I felt like getting passionate about something. In all seriousness, I enjoyed it. And now, with just a click of a button, you can too. Action starts at 1:04, 1:06 and 0:56 respectively. Those with pre-existing heart conditions and other health concerns, please look away or leave the room.

And just in case you haven’t had enough,

Personally, my favourite part was one of the judges’ shiny bald head. Okay, don’t get me wrong, I’m not poking fun at overweight people. If they love dancing and want to lose a few pounds, that’s great, I’m all for that. I just have a couple of problems with the show itself;

First, a Dance/Weight loss Program? Really? I don’t know why but I really dislike it when two genre’s (the correct word evades me) of shows combine. Mostly it’s because they all suck major ass but it also infuriates me that the failure of these marketing ploys is so apparent to everyone except the producers of the show. It’s like a group of executives were brainstorming for a new show and just asked “So, what’s been successful so far?’ ‘So You Think You Can Dance’? ‘The Biggest Loser?’  Then wham, we’re stuck with ‘Dance Your Ass Off!’ and they giggle to themselves in the corner, thinking it’s the formula to success. Of course we can’t blame them, but still, the sad part is that they actually expect it to succeed when the thought process is so obviously lame. For the consumer, it’s just like getting Aldi chocolate instead of a Mars Bar, Seduce instead of Mentos, Mike instead of Nike. A cheap copy which is somewhat similar, but altogether unsatisfying. That being said, Aldi chocoloate and Seduce are pretty good and I saw ‘Mike’ T-shirts all over Hong Kong, even on people. Granted, old people who wouldn’t give two shits, but still, people.

Second, I find the costuming, choreography and music unnecessarily raunchy and exposing. While it’s good for a laugh, in the end, the whole show could’ve been made a lot more tastefully. I mean, come on, is the episode title ‘A Bouncy Good Time’ really that appealing or appropriate?

I had a third point but it completely escapes me so I’ll leave the hating for now. On a much happier note, Happy Belated Belated Birthday Jatz/Janette! Haha, I think Sim is the only one who still calls you that.  I’m so happy you were surprised and even happier that I wasn’t the only one to jump and yell ‘Surprise’ like a fagtard

Although we didn’t get a picture of Janet’s surprised face, we got this;

And this;

So all in all, doubly worth it. Photos stolen from Jeremy’s tumblr since I never bothered to take my own. I also made my first trip to Cabramatta yesterday and managed to completely noob transport; missed a bus to Parramatta, ran for another, got warned for not having a valid concession card (unlike Sharon, who got fined $50 ;D), missed a train and a bus and finally got there. Actually, I make it sound worse than it was since the 603 bus to Parramatta was 20 minutes late and made me miss the others. So technically, half of that wasn’t my fault.

Anyway, I had fun and shouldn’t end on those disgusting photos ;D

The beautiful ‘birthday’ girl,

And her beautiful cake with the not-so-beautiful Girl candle. They labelled it ‘Girl’ just in case you weren’t sure.

I decided to listen to Swami since I was thinking about the food we ate anyway. We waited from about 6pm til 6:30pm when Jeremy and Janet finally showed up, sopping wet. Before this, there were a number of Janet-sightings/scares, most of them started by me. You must understand that these were purely for your entertainment and never, at any time, was I actually deceived myself ;D  Totally. The last one, I maintain looked and sounded exactly like Janet from a distance. Heck, she even walked like Janet (Winnie will back me up here). But on closer inspection, she was actually a lot older and yes, it was almost exactly like Communitychannel’s video Thought it was you. I’m sure Janet will have a similar reaction when she reads this.

Many of us, in an attempt to save money/our stomachs hadn’t eaten much during the day and our half an hour wait was only punctuated by these rare sightings and more frequent tummy-rumblings. When they finally arrived, Winnie and I were the brink of starvation and all of us ordered two serves of Chicken Satay, two serves of Beef Rendang, two serves of a Calimari dish, Chicken Curry, Serai Pork, Black Pepper Chicken, Rice and a total of 12 Roti. The Calimari was unquestionably the star of the meal and since we had cake (Chocolate Truffle Gateau?), none of us ordered Ice Kaching this time. I ate until my stomach physically hurt, I don’t know if this is because the food was that great or I was starved, or both, but it was good.

Jeremy was on a mission to take stealthy photos of Sharon and succeeded, at first. Swami, his partner in crime spent 5 minutes eyeballing Sharon and sending sleazy looks her way while Jeremy quietly captured her ‘wtf’ facial expressions (figuratively) on film. Unfortunately, Sharon later out-stealthied him and deleted them when he gave her the camera and stood close to Janet so he could nab a birthday-kiss if the knife came out dirty. Later, Swami was passing around a perfume sample of Calvin Klein cologne to get second opinions and Gabriel, obviously disapproving, started to question his manhood. With perfect timing, Mindy reveals to us that Gabriel owns perfume and a stillness falls over the table. Gabriel, now thoroughly owned, begins to protest that his sister gave it to him, to no avail. The damage had been done. There were a heap of awkward-but-funny moments except I don’t remember them with enough clarity to write about. All in all, it was a good night except Temasek seriously needs to invest in better ventilation. The room got a little steamy and at times we had to go outside to cool off. This was actually kind of pointless as they have those gas heaters in the alley as well, damn them.

Anyway, holidays have been boring and I manage to burn time and get nowhere with work. This weekend is our last philosophy residential and it should be fun awkward timing again. Hopefully I’ll have some stories to share with you guys but I’ll see how that goes.

Love and hugs all around,

See you guys at school!

The Pros and Cons of Breathing

While I wanted to start getting my act together this week, I just ended up taking a good, but definitely undeserved, break. Undeserving because I’ve been dragging the chain this term and after finally getting all my results back, I realised they’ve taken a slide toward the pathetic end of things. Whatever, those few extra hours of sleep did some good and I enjoyed the week, if nothing else. 

First, I will apologise again, and probably for the last time, for my lax and sporadic posting. Initially I wanted to post twice a week but I struggle to gather enough worthy material for one post of any decent length. So, with trials looming ever closer, I figured it’s time to disclose that you should expect the occasional hiatus. And until I stumble upon some deep well of meaning and feel the whim to write more often, you can hold me to my word ;D.

The week in review;

Monday was Muck-up day and for an hour or so, everyone had some rare, untainted fun. As you all know, the thing about year 12 is that no matter how much fun you’re having, there’s that little bastard inside which demands you get off your ass and go study. So it was good to let loose for a while and parade around wearing things we haven’t and probably, will never wear again. Anyway, in the aftermath of the Facebook-Photo-Tagging Mania, there’s just one thing left to be said, or rather, shown;

Left me with a little thrill, that one.

On the topic of thrills, Sharon, Winnie and I headed to Parramatta on Wednesday to make a dent in our ever-growing list of overdue birthday presents.  The highlight was definitely our visit to the Build-A-Bear-Workshop where we proceeded to create the greatest furry friend in history (for Lucy’s 17th).

 

 You can’t see in the picture, but he has skates and a recorded voice featuring Winnie, me, and if you listen closely, Sharon doing her own thing in the background. He also comes complete with an alternative costume (boxing gloves/shorts) for when his spidysuit needs a wash or whatever. Sorry if I just freaked you out with my excitement and immaturity, but I’m a little girl, if that excuses anything at all. And if you didn’t think that was the slightest bit cool, the kid residing in your heart must’ve been tortured and burnt at the stake by the flames of cynicism which come with adulthood. Okay, I don’t know where that came from but you’re still no fun.

Parramatta Westfield really didn’t pull through for us, we’ve wanted to watch Startrek for a billion years and haven’t gotten around to it, so we figured today was the perfect day. That is, until we realised Greater Union had stopped showing Startrek except in places like Innaloo which I have literally, never heard of in my life. So although we decided to man up, move on and search for more of the short-listed birthday presents, you could consider our parade truly rained on. Unfortunately, we were faced with disappointment yet again as there was no stock of anything, anywhere and even the photo-prints for Sharon’s VA were $5 overpriced. Really, if it wasn’t the melodramatic pinnacle of gay, I would’ve shaken my fist IRL. From here, things started looking up and since we’d spent more than $120, we nabbed a $20 Westfield gift-card and half-price Easyway. As always, we retired to the food court and had a fulfilling 3 hour long D&M over two servings of Hungry Jacks onion rings. Surprisingly, this was the redeeming factor, until all of us mysteriously developed stomach aches. Well, even though I probably made it sound like the outing from hell, there were a heap of laughs and I had fun. I also found this great TV box-set deal in JB, buy two get one free (selected stock only). I have every intention of going back and grabbing Desperate Housewives season 1 or 2 or both and if anybody wants something, we’ll do business.

Moving on, Thursday dulls in comparison. Pretty much all I remember is making butter and fairy bread in Chem, which was kick-ass. Winnie missed out and instead checked out firemen with big arms for the double period. That’s right, shake your head.

Friday was the last day of school, although it felt nothing like it. Prefect assembly had its highlights but games are always questionable since half the audience zones out and does their own thing. I do believe they peaked a little early at the Valentines Day Assembly, but still, I liked the tribute and the zombies so props to them for that. As the assembly drew to a close, we realised how lame it was that all of us were just going home on the last day of school. In the end, we grabbed a group of people for dinner and since Belle’s already got this covered, I won’t delve into it. 

On a completely different note, peoples’ cadetship interviews got me thinking about university courses, jobs and the like. In movies and even in real life, I hear people talking about how they had phases regarding what they wanted to be; fireman, policeman, astronaut or whatever does it for you. This may seem extremely sad but I’ve always been realistic and could never picture myself doing anything apart from paperpushing in some office. Even in our Year 6 time-capsule video thing, when our teacher asked us “Where would you like to be in 10-15 years?”, I was stumped. While I don’t remember that clearly, I think I said something stupid along the lines of “with a job” or “law”, for no other reason than that was what my dad did at the time. I had really, never considered anything else. Looking back now and realising that I’m still working toward the same thing with no real excitement toward the prospect, it’s a sad thought. As for the next question “Do you see yourself getting there?” I do, but it doesn’t exactly fill me with all the joy in the world. I think I convinced myself too early on that I wasn’t suited to Business, Medicine/Science or Engineering and holed myself in. Reading back on this, I figure I’m looking at everything a little too glass-half-empty and I’ll just get busy in December/January when I finally have to decide. Who knows, I might have made the right choice at the very beginning, but it’s the uncertainty that gets to me.

I guess I can partly blame all these thoughts on the daily horoscope which I receive for free on my phone plan. No, I do not believe in it and I actually can’t since mine are always so far off the mark. Anyway, for those who have never gotten their horoscope from Astrolife, they divide theirs into three sections; ‘General’, ‘In Love’ and ‘In Work.’ Today my ‘In Work’ section read;

“Aries, are you happy where you are now? If not, what are you waiting for? What if it never happens”

It closed with something gayer like “To find true happiness, it’s time to take action!” Yes, it’s a generic and probably recycled statement but it got me thinking about what I would do if I was stuck in a rut at work. It also made me laugh, I mean, would I ever find “true happiness”?! Really, the author deserves a pat on the back for his uncanny ability to make it sound like the sky is crashing down on us, daily. Even better, he never fails to heighten the gay by punctuating everything with an exclamation mark! Totally! You know what I mean.

Anyway, as for the present, I started thinking about the pros and cons of Year 12. You know how ex-Rusians always say that “Apart from the work, Year 12 will be the best year of your school life”? I always thought that was a load of bullsh*t, but surprisingly, I’ve recently started to think it may be true. On one hand, there’s the work and stress but our grade has also gotten a whole lot closer in the last few months, which I doubt would have happened otherwise. Since I’m sure all of you have thought about this at some point, it would be kind of pointless to go into more detail and I’ll leave it at that. The only thing is that it seems a little too late since none of us really have the time to appreciate it. I guess that doesn’t really matter though, it is what it is and I’ll definitely miss it come the last day of Term 3.  Anyway, I thought the title was appropriate and it should be easy for those of you who like guessing games. Speaking of music, I’ve had ‘U Can’t Touch This’ stuck in my head for the last few days and since I only know the chorus, it’s the most annoying thing ever.

Wow, I’m surprised how long this turned out and how whingy/cynical I sound even though I was so unexpectedly cheery this week. Funny how the internet can do that.

Luck to you all for trials and remember;

If you can imagine it, you can achieve it; if you can dream it, you can become it.

Luls, I just outgayed myself, take care all of you.

Standing At The Crossroads.

Those posts were getting lonely and I know this one’s a couple of days overdue. At the risk of sounding like a whinger, my internet’s been down for two days and I’ve spent most of my time sewing like crazy. So while there’s no excuse, I just felt like chucking those out there anyway. Hope you guys are in for a read because this is a real long one.

Since I’m so excited about Muck-up, I’ll leave Philosophy ’til the end and if the daily happenings bore you, suck it up or skip it or something (Swami). M&M Costumes were perfected at Winnie’s house yesterday, but when we started on the gloves we faced a few roadblocks. First, the Viet guy at the material shop had a bogan accent and just creeped us out, so in our rush to get out of there we ended up buying too little white material. Second, the sewing machine needle broke after one glove. If you’re reading this Ally, never fear, I fixed it ;D

In the light of this desperate situation, there was only one thing we could do; handsew. It was like a real-life sweatshop with four unpaid kids sitting in a room handsewing low-cost material, except we had cushions, pizza and Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone playing in the background. Insert a heap of whinging and inner-crying and you get a pretty accurate picture. As for the material, some of the pinky’s on the gloves turned out a little mangled but no matter, our spirits would not be dampened. “Fun” would be the biggest understatement but unfortunately, my vocabluary vocabulary (tanks Milo) is limited to that. I really don’t know if I should be unveiling the finished product just yet, but whatevs;

If making it wasn’t awesome enough, trying it on was a whole new ball-game. My brother told me I looked like a faggot because he thought I was wearing it on the bus and for the whole day. So really, he was just concerned for my safety and getting bashed and all. I almost believed myself there.

Check the mangled pinky on the left hand and yes, that fug pink and white bedspread is mine. Winnie’s brother (Dickson) had a heap of fun making obscene gestures with these gloves, as you do.

Anyway, after talking to some people about their costumes, I’m really surprised our grade got so into Muck-up. Surprised in a good way, definitely. Heck, I can’t believed I sewed for this thing. Seeing everyone tomorrow, or more likely, running around like lunatics, should be good fun.

Now we grind down to the serious business, I thought I’d steer away from Time & Cause and hit up Morality since it’s my favourite module and I’m starting my option assignment in the near future. That was the plan, at least. Anyway, you guys don’t have to worry about that and for a taster we’ll start with The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas by Ursula Le Guin. Its kick-ass writing at its greatest and I urge you to go ahead and Google it since my summary will probably dull it down a little.

So we begin in the city of Omelas, a profoundly happy society where nothing destructive exists, there is no violence,  no slavery, no real kings or hierachy and no need for any of these. We might imagine their city as some far away fairytale place, but their happiness is not the naive happiness of a child or a fool, it’s the profound happiness of mature individuals whose lives are not wretched. They may share our technological luxuries, but then again, they may not, it doesn’t matter. 

Amidst all this happiness, a young child is locked in a dark basement, starved and separated from all human contact. It was placed here when it was 5 and while it can remember sunlight and its mother, it has been made imbecile through malnutrition, fear and neglect. This child is not hidden from the people of Omelas, when the citizens turn 12 they are brought to see this child and faced with a decision. The happiness of every life in Omelas relies wholly on this child’s misery, those are the strict terms. If the child’s conditions are improved in the slightest way, all happiness and prosperity withers. At this stage, the teenagers have two options; stay and do nothing or walk away and leave Omelas for good. There is no third option, you can not reform the society.

The point of the story is that we’re torn between the rights of the child and the overall happiness of society with no clear answer to what we should do. There are so many similar examples like say, you’re a train driver and you’re 5 seconds from a crossroad, on one side there’s 5 children disobeying the signs and playing on the track, on the other there’s a road-worker fixing a tunnel. Or you’re a tourist who stumbles into a South American town, 20 indians are tied against the wall  surrounded by armed men. The captain in charge tells you that if you kill one of the indians, the rest will go free but if you don’t, they all die. So what do you do, do you choose the happiness of one over the happiness of many? Personally, I would walk, kill the kids because they’re not supposed to be there and the worker is just doing is job (don’t judge me), but I struggle with the last one. The thing is, is there really something different between committing a crime or not doing anything and letting a crime happen? In his essay, Bryan busted out with “The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to stand by and do nothing” but still, I’m not convinced. As for the more common one where people are drowning and you can only save your mum or 5 strangers, sorry guys, me and my mum will wave goodbye as we sail into the sunset.

Anyway, sorry for the essay, there’s actually a more technical explanation to this thing but I figured it was long enough. I’m expecting a lot of “tldr”s but whatevs, Masterchef beckons;

Exeunt Exuent. Man, how many typos in this thing.