End of year reflection...

It's the 30th today, and I doubt I'll be updating this tomorrow (seeing (a) I'm at Pete's and (b) I'll be busy cooking and getting ready for the New Years Eve party...), So I thought I'll update this today. :)

This year has been a very interesting year indeed. I've crashed my car: twice, my house got burgled, and oh! I got engaged in the mist of all chaos. :) I would call this a good year, at the very least, even though there seems to be quite a few misfortune, I actually showed myself I can actually handle things. I called people up to sort out the details and all, and in a way that's very important to me, seeing I have a very over-protective mother...

And above all, what's really touching is that every time I fall, I can turn around and count on Pete to be there for me. :) That shows that I didn't say "yes" for no reason huh? :) The fact that I can rely on him and him being a constant support shows that I haven't picked the wrong guy. :)

Here's to 2006, may the year bring everyone joy and happiness. :) And remember: look for the silver lining :)

Small shadow in the mist of happiness...

Well, firstly I just found out mum put a letter on a desk about 2 moths ago... so I missed the deadline for re-enrolling for 2006. *sigh*. I'll have to head into uni to deal with that when they're back I guess.

Then one of our close friends decided to tell us that he rather not come to our engagement party. *sigh* Sometimes I just don't know what I've done to piss him off really. Pete's sure it's not my fault, but meh, I can't help but to blame myself sometimes. It's still kinda sad, it's not like I get engaged everyday you know. I can probably deal with a birthday or something. It's my engagement party man. I already have two of my best friends overseas and won't be making it (they're coming to the wedding, I hope!).

Just the other day he pretended to be his French roommate on MSN just so he won't have to talk to Pete and me. I just don't know what I've done wrong. Sometimes it's just really frustrating that I do try to maintain a friendship, but he just doesn't care.

Kinda like a rejection, really.

Like Petey said, I probably should try my best not to get too upset, afterall I'm getting married to my soulmate. It's one of the happiest day in my life. I shouldn't let other things to ruin my day, I guess.

"I'll start my diet tomorrow"

After knowing how I have to start looking towards planning a wedding... I suppose I should really start getting into shape. But really, it's Christmas, I've already had like big meal after big meal. ARGH!!

My brother actually got me a gym ball. Should I take that as a hint? :P

Still VERY excited really. :) I'm still jumping around :P

I'll float back to earth sometimes. :)

A VERY Special Christmas, and my Firefox is broken :P

Okie, I was so very tired this morning, as expected, and the day turned
out quite different
from what I envisioned...

Short version: Pete proposed, and I said yes. :D

Long version: Well, I'll spare you the details. :P

Anyway, the whole day was then packed with people's warm wishes,
laughers and hugs,
(LOTS of hugs) and people asking me when's the big date. :)

It's been a tiring day, but it's really worth it. :D

So a VERY Merry Christmas from Lisa over here. :) And hope your
Christmas is one that
fills with love and joy. :)

P.S.: If you find the line breaks a bit funny, it's because I can't
update from the web GUI.
I have to email this in, and my Firefox lost its ability to form text
fields at the moment. I
don't know why.

P.P.S.: Petey, you are just THE best. :D Weeeeeeeeee!!

1 day! 'Tis a season to be sleepy

It's now... afternoon on the 24th. I've got red eyes, and I am FAR from being energetic.

Have been really busy lately. Catching up with people, writing emails for family, blah blah blah. Tonight we're heading to the midnight mass, and then Christmas day I gotta be at Pete's place by 8am.

I'm exciting about opening pressies, but man... I'm so tired. o_O

Oh, and seeing I probably won't update this tomorrow: Have a FANTASTIC Christmas everyone. :) Hope you won't be as sleepy as I would be. :)

4 days! I need more hours in a day...

Yes, I do. I thought I didn't do much today, but I actually did...

• Wrote two levels of my HTML puzzle (Level 6 is JUST up, btw :P)
  
• Figured out why there's a Fourier of the ACF in the Algo I'm working on.
  
• Figured out I might have to butcher the algo to get it to do what I wanted
  
• Solved level 28 of Enigma puzzle
  
• TRIED to solve level 29. And failed
  
• Helped my brother and Pete to do their Christmas shopping
  
• STILL haven't guessed the pressie though :(
  

Maybe I should call it a productive day instead. :P

5 days! And VERY unproductive.

I've done 4 levels of my HTML puzzle! And NO WORK on thesis. *sigh*

I know I'm stressing for no reason really. I don't really have a deadline. But I can't help but to think I've been wasting too much of my time. Maybe I'm just being a workaholic, as I am... :P

I came up with all 4 levels last night when I was trying to sleep. To be honest I think they got hard rather fast... maybe it's just me. But that's a good thing right? :P I'll try to make it all logical. I hope.

After a few more levels, I'll post of on some forums :P tehehe...

6 Days! :)

6 days to go, and I haven't done any work :(

Now, here's all I've gathered so far on the pressie from Pete. (That's after intensive poking and squeezing and shaking)

- In the middle there's something that seems like a thin small hard covered book.
- There are two tubes on either side of the book, slightly offseted
- They're attached to the "book"
- It's not TOO heavy. It's almost as if they're made of cardboard...
- Pete ordered it on the internet...

I'm stumped. :|

6 more days, and I'll find out :P

A very cruel form of torture (10 Days!!)

Pete and I stayed up til 1am to fix his system... not to mention we then had to send the spreadsheet over via dial up...

It wouldn't have been that bad, except he was using excel. *sigh*

Here's what we've learnt so far:

• If you're making a "less than" comparison, and the cell you're checking is empty, it'll assume it's zero.


• Under VB, the operator "&" can be used as a boolean AND when it's a simple statement (e.g. (TRUE)&(FALSE) will give you FALSE), but not when it's more complicated. (e.g. ((TRUE)&(FALSE))&((TRUE)&(TRUE)) gives you "FALSETRUE". I kid you not.)


• Has anyone written a program to transform the psuedo base-26 column assignment to numbers yet?


• Nested IF-statement, or just an IF-statment with a lot of ELSE IFs, are very very VERY evil to code in excel

Honestly, I haven't been THIS frustrated for a long time. Although it does bring back some memories. Ah... thold undergrad days.

At least it's all done. We can ALL have a merry christmas, in 10 days time! :)

13 days, and no U2 tickets...

10 Reasons why it's better to see the Vertigo concert on DVD (Sour Grapes Version)

1. We don't have to line up in and camp for a whole night


2. Probably see more of the band from DVD than if we're in the GA places


3. We can hire a projector, and that'd be even better!


4. With surround sound and sub, the sound might be better than at the concert. (Taking into account the noise)


5. You can sit in the comfort of your own home to enjoy U2


6. You don't feel self-conscious when you want to sing along to the songs


7. ... or when you forget the lyrics of some signature songs


8. No parking problem!!


9. Endless encore!!


10. And it actually works out A LOT cheaper...

*sigh*...
*sob*

16 days!!!

So, a bit over two weeks til Christmas. All pressie sorted, I think. Just need to wait for a parcel, get my folk's pressie, and then go get some other bits and pieces. So, the only other thing need to be done is to make sure I've done enough work between now and then. *sigh*...

Stupid research isn't going anywhere, so I've decided to write my paper now instead. That shoudl at least be okay on the productive scale. I think.

Christmas in the Park tomorrow, it's basically an excuse to have a big picnic with half of Auckland. But it's kinda a tradition. Evermore's playing, then again I'm not a huge fan of Evermore... (It just reminds me of OC. o_O And I don't even watch that show!)

Alrighty. Maybe I shoudl take my friend's advice and just chill this month. Plenty more stressing to come soon anyway. :P

Christmas Countdown!! 18 days!!

That's right folks! We've got the tree up (it's a tiny tree, since my cat sees Christmass trees as her nemesis. You should've seen her attacking that thing.) and I'm starting to get people's mass email forward about "Remembering Jesus in Christmas". (Pete has some pretty scary statistic on that one. But I won't bore you much on it.)

Christmas always gives me mixed feeling. I hate Christmas carol. It makes me ridiculously depressed. I blamed it on the fact that for one December I was working in a HK department store, for 10 hours a day, with Chritmas carols playing over and over and over again. the only carols I can stand is the Little Drummer Boy. Because of the "pa ra pa pum pum" part, and because it wasn't on the playlist.

But it's also a GOOD time. It's the only time of year that I don't feel guilty about doing no work. I don't know why, coz I feel guilty even if I don't do work on a holiday. Comes Christmas I feel like it's my birth rights to bum around and do nothing. :P

Well, sadly that doesn't kick in until around 20th, so I'll better get back to working. *sigh*...

Spud, Part II: Satanic Potatoes

JUST back from the bach, and it was a REALLY cool trip. Although there IS one tale to be told. The tale, of the Satanic Potatoes.

*cue mysterious background music*

Story goes, Pete's decided to make baked potatoes for dinner, and popped a few potatoes on the oven tray. He was then off to the bathroom, and I kept reading. Suddenly, strange sound came out of the kichen, so I went over to ahve a look. And there it was, the potatoes all shaking on their own. And then, one of the potatoes tried to jump off teh tray, or at least shaked its way to the edge. It didn't succeed. But then Pete came back from the bathroom, and saw the same thing. I'm not seeing things. *phew*

But really, I'm having WAY too many strange tales with potatoes. Maybe they're trying to tell me something...

We are going on a Summer Holiday!!

Well, kinda. Not quite. Almost. :P

Pete and I are off to his bach for a long weekend!! Yay! Probably still ended up doing work there, but meh, close enough. :)

See you guys when I'm back!! :D

Weeeeee

Harry Potter mistaken as a Hobbit.

This article is almost delightful to read. I always say those two looks alike. And there!!

I particularly like this quote from the article: "So often people shout out, 'Hey Frodo!' as they think I'm Elija - who frankly is a very good-looking guy so I take it as a compliment."

So Daniel thinks those freaky eyes are cute huh...

The one line that really hits home is how much that boy's worth now. And the thing is he can't even act that well. Ron is probably the one who was best with acting in that series, but alas, he's not Harry Potter... *sigh*

Anyway, aside from this, life's not too bad. Stuck in research as usual, but yeah, heading to the beach soon this weekend. Can't wait! :D

Curse Chuck Palahniuk...

... for being so damned good a writer!! Couldn't put down the book, it was 1:20 in the morning. I wanted to sleep early and wake up early... but NO... he has to write a damn good book and I just kept saying to myself "just one more chapter"...

In case you're wondering, I'm reading Lullaby. Fantastic book, and Palahnuik's has yet to disappoint me so far. I've read Survivor as well, which was also bloody good. I managed to stop myself from finishing it. I'll probably put up a review of the book later. :P

Speaking of reviews, friendster now has this review function, where you can go and review what you're reading, listening, watching, etc etc. Maybe I should put it in a blog as well... :P

We'll see. :)

Christmas comes early for people who wants free software!!

With all due respect, no everyone likes to pay for software like anti-virus, spyware removal, and whatnots. Now here's a nifty list of freeware, from free broswer to free software suite to replace clippy's kingdom (aka MS Office). Go on. You know you wanna click the link. Even just to look at the list, it's worth it. :)

At the very least I'll highly recommend you to take a look at the free anti-virus and spyware removal software to protect your computers. I dunno how many computer I've heard of that's plagued with those nasty little spyware and slow the whole thing down. While you're at it, go download Firefox! Do your computer a favour. YES I realise it's probably just because not that many hackers are targetting FF as opposed to IE, but the fact remains, it's better.

That's is from me. Christmas countdown will officially start soon. :P

The problem with drawing faces...

Human's brain is funny, and it has a very intricate network to process information about faces. Which is why it's bloody hard to draw a sketch of someone's face and make it look like the person you're supposed to draw. *sigh*

Take this for example. It's another one of my midnight impulse sketch. (Most of my good drawing were done after midnight. Go figure.) I took a nice picture of an actress (Petey if you think I'll say who the actress is, well you're wrong. Muhahahaha :P You can keep guessing.) and try to render it in pencil. It looks like a face. But doesn't look like her face. Even the smallest difference makes the face completely different.

Maybe I should stick with drawing imaginary characters. :P

Feel free to guess who she is. Bet you can't. :P

But it does go to show how good human's brain is in recognising faces. Fascinating eh? :)

Various thoughts on "Love"

Recently I've been talking to various people about various relationship. These rank from "She's so lucky to have found him" to "Just why the hell is he putting up with her again?" (I'm not naming names. :P) And that sorta sparked some thoughts in this little head of mine...

True Love

I still remember when I was in high school, and the priest who was taking the religious studies class made the statement that "There is no true love, only an imitation that you think is true love". Now, if you are going to teach a bunch of 16 year olds, and you happen to be a priest (and/or never married), DO NOT attempt to make that statment. It was amazing that the priest survived that class.

Anyway, now that I'm a bit older, and hopefully a bit wiser, I suddenly came back to that line, and think on it a bit. I think I'm starting to understand what he meant. If God is the essence of Love (Which I do believe, read the Bible! Clues are everywhere.), then we, as human, in our flesh and bones, and with our wants and desire and a biochemical plant in our head, would not be capable for the True Love in the sense that God loves us. Makes sense?

I'm not saying we're not trying hard enough, I'm saying we wouldn't even be able to comprehend that. Am I saying we should, and we should try to approach that sense of True Love? No, I'm not. In fact, I don't even think it's God's intension to understand and mimic it.

I once read a novel with the idea that it's our bodies that limits us to perfection, or Nirvana. Sometimes I think that's true. But on the other hand, you will never be able to experience this level of emotion without one. Enjoy it.

Selfless Love

People seems to glorified this term. I used to think to love is to only think of the other person, and it's about sacrificing myself. And then I realise there's some flaw in that logic.

While there are heroic acts, such as a mother sacrificing herself for her child, Love should not be completely selfless. Because the person whom you should learn to love first, is yourself. Out of the love for yourself then come love for others.

At first glance that sounds extremely selfish, but do bare with me for a little bit more. The person you know the best, whom you spend most of your time with, is yourself. If you can't even love yourself, and take care of yourself, how are you going to love and care for others?

The problem with us mortals is that we try to think that we're immortal and can be perfect. We aren't and we can't. Don't expect us to be.

Loving relationship

Here's a short list of what I consider as signs of good/bad relationship. The list is composed using experience from myself and friends alike, and Dr Phil :P

• A good relationship is a partnership


• A bad relationship is a dictatorship


• A good relationship helps both of you to feel better about yourselves


• A bad relationship makes you doubt yourself even more


• A good relationship makes you feel like you're the luckiest person


• A bad relationship makes you feel like you're a martyr of Love


• A good relationship is where you think he/she is the one


• A bad relationship is where you think that would do

But the number one rule, or paradox, of good/bad relationship:
When you're in a bad relationship, you probably wouldn't have realise it. But If you're in a good relationship, you'll know, right away.

Speaking of bad relationships...

It's funning how when I look back, I always thought those bad (or not so happy) relationships were going to last. I always thought he was the best, or at least whom I'm meant to be with. Forgetting the fact that half the time, I'm not even happy there.

In Conclusion

Those are just some of my thoughts and observation. I don't claim to know everything. To be honest I don't think we can ever tell what "love" really is, and how to actually tell whether it's a good/bad relationship we're in. (Let's face it: when you're in the middle on something, you can't really tell what really is going on. Blame that biochemical plant in your head.) The best advice I can give is to look after yourself and love yourself. You know that much. And if something doesn't make you happy, try consider taking a step back to analyse it. Chances are nothing is really worth you making yourself to suffer.

Gothic ring. Tada!!

ONe of my best friends, Caz, came back to the country after being in HK for 10 months. Bought me my first birthday pressie :D (Which is... ridiculously early. :P But hey!! :D) It's a cool metalic gothic ring. :D It's slightly too small, but it kinda fits my pinky. :)

You know, sometimes I do think I'm a goth at heart. But then again, sometimes I feel like I'm a goth, sometimes I feel like doing the whole professional elegant look, or just victorian (Well... gothic lolita. Maybe :P I'm a Japanese goth at heart :P) I feel like doing some Goth drawing for a while.

I feel like doing a lot of things.

Anyway, right now I think I'm just gonna be happy with my gothic ring. Wee..

(Going into uni tomorrow too.. gotta plan what I have to say to my supervisor..)

Didn't get burnt!!

Yay me! I spent yesterday at teh beach, beautoful weather, and I didn't get burnt!! AND: no allergy to the sunscreen either. Yay me indeedy. :)

Anyway, went into work today. Pretty good productive day, chatted with the peopel there to see whether they think I'm on track, and what they think of my ideas and all. ALL pretty good. :)

Alrighty. Me off for today. Still pretty tired today. Don't know why, I shouldn't be THIS tired. Ah well. Still. Hopefully weather would be nice like yesterday when we're off to the bach :D

My Brother's Friend's Brother...

Stephen (my favourite brother... also my only brother) told me today his friend's brother is currently in the hospital, becuase his lungs collasped, and suffered internal bleeding. Apparently he was completely healthy before, and just suffered some chest pain. The first doctor he saw told him it's nothing, he'd be alright in 2 days. The second doctor told him that he doesn't undergo surgery immediately he'll die.

Charming.

Anyway, as soon as I heard that, my ears started hurting again. It's scary. They haven't hurt for a long time. It's like... they just hurt on cue now!

If it's not painful and creepy it's almost cool.

Anyway, it's going to be a slow day today, I knew it. :P

tired. :|

I think I've been bumming around way too much. Now I can't sleep until like 3 in the morning, and feel sleepy if I don't get my 10 hours of sleep. That's really not good man. :(

As for work... I think I actualyl need to do some creative work here. Which is good in a way, I quite like it. So hopefully by the end of this week (which means, er, by tomorrow) I get some good ideas that I can implement.

*yawn*... I got a feeling it's going to be another unproductive day :P

A Discworld Wedding!

I was just thinking (while I was reading Art of Discworld... LOVE Paul Kidby's work btw. I wish I can paint like that :P) why not, instead of a fantasy wedding, we go all out for a Discworld theme? :D

Feel free to drop in any suggestion of table names. :P So far I have the idea of sticking everyone from Auckland in table names related to Ankh-Morpork, so, say, head table can be the Patrician's palace, and other places like Unseen University, City Watch, or even the Assassin Guild. (heh) Anyone from Aussie can be stuck in the XXXX table :P Counterweight for all my friends and rellies coming from Asia or something...

I got a feeling I might run out of names too quickly though. Or that people may either object to being seated at a certain table, or want to sit at a particular table. (Funny enough, both of these can happen to the table labelled Death's Domain. Death rules.)

(I can dress as Susan!! Can I? :D Petey you can be Lobsang :P Although it's not really clear whether those tow are actually together, but meh.)

Not that it's going to happen anytime soon... I still got ages to go in my research :(

Quick and dirty blog update

It's another day of mind blank out. So I think I'll use one of those "email survey" template that I saw in someone's DA journal, as a snapshot of how/who I am at the moment :P

(I did say it's quick and dirty :P)

[My name is]: Lisa Wong
[in the morning i was]: Sleeping in. :P
[all i need now is]: More time to paint, or motivation to work.
[love is]: a verb, a doing word. ;)
[i'm afraid of]: Slopes, spiders, insects, height, acceleration.
[i dream about]: making a ground breaking discovery in my research.

You:
-- Middle name: Nope
-- Birth time: 2 minutes before midnight.
-- Birthplace:Hong Kong
-- Last place traveled: within NZ: Coromandel. Outside of NZ: Paris
-- Eye Color: I call it black. On a good day you can see the brown...
-- Nail Color: ... white-ish? That's the colour of nails right?
-- Height: 165cm I think
-- Zodiac Sign: Capricorn with moon in Pieces and Libra rising

Describe:
-- Your heritage: Asian
-- The shoes you wore today: Teddy bear slippers. (Ah... research student is all good)
-- Your hair: Long straight black and boring. With split ends.
-- Your weakness: Cheesecake!!
-- Your perfect pizza: Seafood with extra cheese. :P

What is:
-- Your most overused phrase: "My shoulder hurts. My whole body hurts"
-- Your thoughts first waking up: "It's only 9. I'm sleeping in."
-- Your current worry: Finishing the segementation by end of month.
-- Your plans tomorrow: work at home, and maybe to the bank...
-- Your best physical feature: Fingers? Pete said I have pianist fingers... (tehehe... pianist..)
-- Your bedtime: 1 ish I think.

You prefer:
-- sunrise or sunset: Sunset. I'm never awake at sunrise. But the colours at sunset!!!
-- gore or horror: Horror. Hate gore.
-- eastside or westside: Live in East for WAY too long... HK East, Auckland East...
-- stripes or polka dots: Stripes. (polka dots?! o_O)
-- Planes or trains: Planes I guess. They're cleaner.
-- metal or hardcore: Alternative? :P
-- Pools or hot tubs: Hot tubs. :)

Do You:
-- Do you think you've been in love: I am indeed.
-- Want to get married: Yeah. :)
-- Type w/ your fingers: no, with my toes. o_O Of course with fingers!
-- Like to take baths: kinda. I always ended up soaking for too long and get dizzy.
-- Get motion sickness: Big time.
-- Like talking on the phone: Not really. Scared of the phone.
-- Like thunderstorms: Depends. Am I inside? Or out on a field holding a metal rod?
-- Play an instrument: Piano. Kinda guitar.
-- Workout: No pain, NO PAIN!!! What's the matter with you people? :P
-- Like reading: Can't live without books.

Favorite:
-- Body part: Eyes maybe?
-- Kind of fruit: That's a hard one.. maybe mango actually.
-- Music to fall asleep to: Can't really sleep with music on... or any sound for that matter
-- Car: One that moves! :P (or my cute red integra :P)
-- Number: pi. 3.14159.
-- Thing to do: Bumming in Borders with Petey. Or maybe painting.
-- Horror movie: I dunno.. Sixth Sense maybe?
-- Color:Blue, bright fire engine red.
-- Food: Cheesecake! (Or pavlova... it's a tough call.)

The Future:
-- Age you hope to be married: ... not QUITE future now is it? Maybe 26? That's saying I should finish my PhD by the time I'm 26... T_T
-- Numbers and Names of Children: 2, 3 max. Girl would be Sophia, Evelyn, or Maria. Boys would be Arthur, Dominic or Marvin (tehehe). Or Lucifer Cheesecake. (CHEESECAKE!)
-- Describe your Dream Wedding: Think we've decided on a fantasy wedding so far. :P
-- How do you want to die: In my sleep. When I'm old.
-- What do you want to be when you grow up: Grow up? :P (I'm working on research now, that I know)
-- What country would you most like to visit: Japan (done that), Croatia, Italy, England (done that), Egypt

Opposite Sex:
-- Best eye color: Green eyes. (*cough* or blue *cough*)
-- Best hair color: .. ginger? :P
-- Best personality trait: Caring and romantic. And a bloody genius :P
-- Best height: Yes. :P
-- Best articles of clothing: ... (This is getting TOO teenagey...)
-- Best first date location: ...
-- Best first kiss location: ...

Finish:
-- I eat: Cheesecake!
-- I think: Now how the hell do I improve this algo?
-- I am: a geek.
-- I adore: Petey :)
-- I suck at: Sports
-- I am obsessed with: Penguins!!!
-- I can: BS a lot in my meetings with my supervisor.
-- I can't wait: til I have a break next!
-- I am annoyed with: The mortgage rate keep going up. o_O


--
That's it folks. I wasted half an hour. Yay me! :P Back to work :P

Big Boys Toys, Sushi, Art Exhibition, and other bits and pieces

It's time for an update about my weekend :P

Big Boys Toys

It quite quite fun, besides a few oddities like having a little remote control cars in the condom stand (Lots of little kids where there, that's what confuse me) and the Garnier stand (I got my freebies though :P But I thought it's Big Boys Toys... skin care product doesn't quite come under that does it?) And there's a long queue to see the XBox 360 (Didn't got sucked into that. You don'teven get to play it anyway. Kinda waiting for Revolution actually. :P I'm getting more and more obscure by the day.) Other than that, it was all good. I get free beer, cheap jerky, see cool cars and gadgets. It was a good day on the whole. What I liked most though was this art sculpture made entirely out of car parts. They got some very impressive looking model of the alien from Aliens vs Preditors. Me like! :D

And that was my weekend... and now, today:

Sushis

I've decided that 6 sushi isn't quite enough and today I bought more. Now I'm really full... I thought I'd share. :P

Art Exhibition

Also: it's the opening of my friend's art exhibition thingy. :) It's quite cool... having an art exhbition when you're an engineer. :P (I think it was mostly the robotoic/fine art project stuff...) Too bad he told us today, and I don't have my camera with me today. :P That sucks.

Other Bits and Pieces

I'm really tired today for some reason. I've been tired for a few days now anyway. Also kidna stressed about nothing too. *sigh* Maybe if I focus on my work a bit more it'd get better... me hopes. :(

Encrypting your paper. WTF?!

Holy. Friggin. Farking. ARGH!!!

I can't believe I spent a whole week to try to understand the maths in this paper, and when I finally figured out what they're trying to say, it's basically saying that the energy of the signal is the square of the signal's voltage. (Or something similar)

REALLY not amused.

I'm sick and tired of people writing their paper in the most convoluted way!! ARGH! I know that easy maths isn't as impressive, but dammit if you want to present your paper just write the bloody algorithm out and explain rather than dressing it up with more integral signs that I can count with my fingers. ARGH!

Sadly my supervisor told me to do similar things before: write everything out in maths equations. Yes it looks very impressive. But ALL I wanted to say is just "sum the damned thing", I don't need no summation series or whatnots.

Sooner or later maybe I too will lose my ability to speak in plain English. And THAT is plain scary.

Low motivation

I've got quite a few different things to do in terms of my research, but so far, I've got nothing. No motivation or anything. Sat in front of the computer, and words aren't forming meanings. ARGH! I hate these days! It's as if my brain's on strike. I could hardly type, let alone trying to parse all these maths formula in my head. :(

Hopefully I'll get my motivation back tomorrow. I need to get this done before Monday afternoon. :(

ARGH! :(

Art: Now and Then

Had two very interesting conversations about art the past few days, with very different views on the issue of "art" these days.

View #1: Art is about feeling
The first view I came across was that art isn't what it was back in the days before photography. It's no longer about technique and realism, but about expressing feelings and emotion. It's art, not documentation. It's about putting feelings into shapes and colours.

View #2: Art is about what you write about it
The second view, which is a wee bit more cynical, basically say art nowadays has nothing to do with art anymore. It's all about what is said about the piece of art. That accounts for the fact that nowsadys it's hard to tell apart a masterpiece, and something a 4 year old painted. (There was an article on that before, but I can't seem to find it now)

In my case: I paint things that are neitehr skillful or too emotional. In fact, it's more for decorations. So maybe it's should really be called art at all. Just... colours that look good around the house.

*sigh*... Probably shouldn't quit my day job eh?

Child Prodigies

Came across this one one slashdot today. Eight year old boy going into uni to study physics.

You know, when I was young, all I ever wanted was to be a prodigy. It's a little secret of mine. I don't really know just exactly in what field I want to be a prodigy in, and by the looks of things I don't think my folks do either. I thought it'd be cool to be a prodigy in music, until I realise by the age of 9 I still haven't master having instrument to performance levels (my dad tried by "letting me" learn violin at the age of 4. Then again, I probbaly did ask for it. Knowing me.) I also thought it'd be cool to be a prodigy in poetry, Chinese poetry to be exact. I did memorise A LOT of poems by around 10, and know the stories and lives of quite a lot of different poets. What about art? I loved to draw... maybe I can be an artist! Or maths maybe? I was the top of the class afterall... When I was around 12 it hits me that I would never be a prodigy.

I was somewhat annoyed at the fact Mozart wrote a bloody symphony at the age of 14 (Or something like that. I never aimed to be a prodigy in the field of remembering historical details, or any details for that matter). And knowing that at the age of 16, my piano teacher still complained about my harmony exercise.

Over the years, I'm still somewhat obsessed with IQ tests, desperately trying to proof to myself I'm smarter than average. Right now, however, I think I got over that obsession. Purely because I disagree with the way how intelligence is measured.

Now I'm wondering whether it's because my brain isn't all crammed with some sort of special talent, which made me come up with that conclusion. But given the choice, maybe growing up and getting ridiculous philosophical might actually be better than being obsessed about one subject from a young age.

Maybe it's just me.

Guy Fawkes

Guy Fawkes night found us in this really terrible weather. The rain stopped a little when we get to Bucklands Beach. Man it was more like eating sand. It was SO windy that's almost impossible to play fireworks. That didn't stop most people, just stopped us that's all. I managed to actually take my picture though: my experiment with light and photography. This one is entitled Dancing Fire. You can see the path of those little sparks, it's so pretty. No doubt more of these will be available. :P I'll upload to DeviantART when I got it. :P (This one is on DA already)

Anyway, I'm still confused about Guy Fawkes. Why are we celebrating because some guys try to burn down the parliament? I'm sure there's a good reason for it, but right now: I can't think of any. Probably because it's late, and I'm tired. :P

More rambling later. :)

Cleaning the shower with a toothbrush

Mum handed me a toothbrush and told me to clean the shower today. Yup. An old toothbrush.

I swear she must be in the military in a fomer life.

Anyway, I didn't know quite what to say when I saw the toothbrush: it was my old Macleans with those wipey thingy that "polish your teeth as you brush!" sort of "new and improved" toothbrush.

You know, modern toothbrush is not made to be used to clean shower. The nice "bendable joint", which is there to protect your gum, means I can't scrub hard. Mind you I do like the diamond shape head, it does make it easier to scrub the "hard to reach places", like all those corners and stuff.

For the whole entire time, I can't help wodering whether the plastic wipey thingy is actually polishing the shower as I scrub...

I think there's definitely a whole market there in making bigger version of these toothbrush (without the bendy joint thingy) for scrubbing showers.

Human need more hands

I was walking back from the cafe where I normally get my pie from.. with a pie, a bottle of ginger beer, and my wallet.

Since you read the title of this post, you see the problem.

At the ends I ended up pressing the bottle onto my chest with my arm and pray it'd stay there, it did. But it felt weird walking on the street like that.

So: how about giving each human 4 hands huh? Don't tell me it looks weird, you only think so because you're used to 2-handed/armed human. But imagine the possibility!!

• You can do your nails AND drive at the same time!


• Eat a steak dinner while playing computer games!


• Stabilise youself better in rock climbing!


• Hold one of those really thick books open AND flip the page without risking losing the page! (okay... that one it's probably just me)


• Finally be able to play Debussy's La fille aux cheveux de lin! (Still convinced you need at elast 3 hands to play that one o_O)


• ... alternatively, you may just want to play Heart and Soul over and over again


• AND! You can carry your pie, ginger beer, AND your wallet at the SAME TIME!

Are you convinced yet?

Anyway, silliness aside, I thought I got better and got into uni today... nope I'm still sick as a dog. Should've stayed in bed. Stupid flu.

Who doesn't cough rhymes with dough?

It just intrigues me, you know. How some English words look like they rhymes but don't. So I just put that question to Pete, why doesn't cough rhymes with dough? (He was coughing a lot). I think his exact answer was *"Because! Dough is spelt d-o-u-g-h, and cough is spelt... oh."

And people wonder WHY I can't spell? Pfft.

In honour of my victory in proving English is a difficult, if not impossible, language to learn (and that "spelling by phonics" is a myth), allow me to blatantly plagiarise the following poem**:

Similar Sentiment

I take it you already know
of TOUGH and BOUGH and COUGH and DOUGH.
Others may stumble, but not you,
On words like HICCOUGH, THOROUGH, and THROUGH.
Well done! And now you wish, perhaps,
To learn of less familiar traps.

Beware of HEARD, a dreadful word
That looks like BEARD and sounds like BIRD.
And DEAD - it's said like BED, not BEAD.
For goodness sake, don't call it DEED!
Watch out for MEAT and GREAT and THREAT.
They rhyme with SUITE and STRAIGHT and DEBT.

A MOTH is not a MOTH in MOTHER,
Nor BOTH in BOTHER, BROTH in BROTHER,
And HERE is not a match for THERE,
Nor DEAR and FEAR for PEAR and BEAR.
And then there's DOSE and ROSE and LOSE -
Just look them up - and GOOSE and CHOOSE.
And CORK and WORK and CARD and WARD.
And FONT and FRONT and WORD and SWORD.
And DO and GO, then THWART and CART.
Come, come I've hardly made a start.

A dreadful language? Man alive,
I'd mastered it when I was five!

* Pete probably won't admit it. ;) Don't blame him... afterall he's supposed to be the one who can spell in this relationship... I still love you Petey!!

**Don't look at me for some of them... I always think dose rhymes with rose... is it just me? What about goose and choose? If they do indeed sound different, I've yet to be enlightened. Probably it's my Asian accent. Some Asians are still convinced that chip sounds the same as cheap...

SPUD!

Last night I got a bit hungry around 9:30pm, since I couldn't have too much dinner with my sore throat. So Pete, my brother, and myself went to Denny's for a quick bite. Pete and my brother ordered desserts, and I ordered potato and gravy. Coz I like their mashed potatoes. Plus it won't hurt my throat too much.

So we waited for a while, Pete's dessert came, my brother's oreo sundae came, and no sight of my potato. How hard could it be? Scoope the mashed potato they have, and add gravy. Done. And then, the waitress came to the table. With a potato.

Now let me describe the scene better: we were, sitting at our booth, and this waitress just walked to our table, with a whole potato (I assumed it's baked, although it does look quite raw...) on a dish. Nothing else. Potato, and dish. The potato was wobbling a bit. I could only do so much to tell the waitress I ordered a potato and gravy, which I assumed is mashed (since they never asked.. and I always got mashed potato if I order it anyway), and the waitress went back to the kitchen, and we just broke out laughing.

it's just something very funny about a whole potato sitting on a plate with absolutely nothing else on it. That made our days.

So there you have it: if you're having a bad day, go get a potato and put it on a dish. It might help if you say "SPUD!" a few times too, like we did last night, but that's not really neccessary.

We're WAY too easily ammused.

Sick. :< and HAlloween goodness...

Meh I'm sick AGAIN. While that's not entirely surprising, it's still a pain in the ass. Yes Stevie, I know calling myself sick is bad coz my body might hear me and start acting sick. But when I actually have a fever, I earned my rights to calling myself sick. o_O

Anyway, it's Halloween today. I don't know if I'm looking forward to little kids knocking on the doors, but I do like reading about what the US people come up with to make people spend money.

Like this: Play-Doh Halloween Trick or Treat Bag. What made them think handing out little box of Play-Doh to little kids wanting candies is beyond me. I can picture little kids eating those play-doh already... But hey, how else is play-doh going to cash in for Halloween?

There's more example of Halloween loolies here and here.

I like the white "spooky" nerds in the first link. That looks cool. (And I like nerds. Nerds are the coolest.) Too bad we can't get those here... Then again, right now with my sore throat, I can't have any candy.

Curse the germs.

The reality of race

So the insurance people sent the loss adjuster over and do the paper work. Lovely lady, and then she said she saw someone suspecious walking down the street with gloves on and a rubbish bag. We checked, it was actually our neighbour's son. Granted it was a bit suspecious looking, why the hell is he walking down the street with gloves on anyway? But the way the lady stressing on the point that he's an islander.... that's what got me.

I can't get rid of stereotype, I used to also have problem with dealing with racial stereotypes myself. But then what can we do?

By some amazing coincident I came across this page today on the idea of race, and whether it exist of not. I used to be very strongly against the idea of having racial boundaries. We're all human. But the guy who wrote about pro-race division said something there that does kinda strike me: "How can we combat racism if we don't acknowledge race exist?" Just becasue some of us deny it doesn't mean everyone does.

After reading about the antagonist's view, I was like "hell yeah!". But then when I read the argument on the other side, some part of the proponent's view was very valid too. It's not so much that there's race in the sense that it makes a race superior, but the fact that some of us are physically different enough to be told apart. I think in a sense, it does make sense that after being "confined" to our space for so long that we now look so different from each other.

Well, other than that random commentary for race, I haven't been doing too much. I think I'm still in the mist of the depression. (Then again it comes and goes I guess. This is just a particularly bad one I guess.) Kinda annoying that I've already used up the free couselling from uni. That's ok. I'll survive.

State of Fear

It's silly, I know. But right now I'm kinda scared to go anywhere. It hasn't been a good year really, with the car crashes and break in. And now my dizzy spell is back. *sigh*

Dosing myself on lemon and honey at the moment. See my logic is that if I can't make the drink for Petey right now (well, I don't think I can drive right now... dizzy spell is bad...) at least I can dose myself up on vitamin C :P

Anyway, I think I'm pissed off about the fact that now home doesn't seem safe anymore, than the actual loss of stuff. Granted a lot has been taken, but then again, in a way, it's just stuff. I know, I've never been really materialistic to start with. But compared with the fact that now I don't even feel safe at home, stuff doesnt' seem to matter. In a way I don't even care TOO much about my favourite watch. I don't wear it often.

But I can't even sleep in my own room now dammit! I woke up like... a gazillion times last night. Now I'm all tried and dizzy. *sigh*

Only stupid people goes into crime. o_O

Another break in

This is like the 2nd time we have a break in at my place. Man this is getting kinda creepy. This time they actually succeed in getting something: they got my favourite watch, mum's wedding rings, and about $1000 in cash.

The whole family is a wee bit shocked (understandably), not to mention paranoid. They gone through everything.

I don't know what to type really. I think I'll update again later maybe.

The Long Weekend

I was looking forward to the long Labour Weekend all last week, and when it finally arrived, it's one of the msot surreal and weird weekends I've had.

Okay, see there're these two friends of ours who've been together for 8 years. Perfect couple. Everyone thought they're going to get married soon. Living together for, well, a long time. They've been the universal constant. In fact whenever I got worried about Pete and I might have problems later he'll bring up those two and say "See? You can't imagine those two having problems can you?"

Saturday, the unimaginable happened. Got a txt from the girl, they broke up. Out of the blues. Every one was in shock.

Including the girl.

We haven't really talked to the guy, so I don't really want to comment. I'm sure he has his reasons. But really, it brought back A LOT of my own history, and suddenly it also put all my problems into perspective.

Not saying she can't make it through, and she's doing a lot better than I would if I'm in her place. But somehow my project progress seems to be a tiny tiny problem.

Besides, it's kinda moving along.

*sigh* I'm just in a strange mood. It's weird how much I get affected. But I guess that's just me...

Rat bating: REALLY not amused.

Ok, read this, and tell me what's wrong with it.

Finished? Can you find which part I have problem with? Here's a clue:

Different methods were used on Otata: buried traps, peanut butter, poison and even trained dogs. Not until more than four months after its release was the rat finally killed, in a trap baited with fresh penguin.

WTF?!

My dearest penguin minions: don't panic, I won't let you become rat bait. In fact I didn't even think you CAN use penguins as rat bait. But there you have it. I'm outraged. As the spokeperson for the penguin race (well, self appointed as I might be), I demand an explaination as to WHY they even think of that idea.

*sigh*, I know, the penguins would've been dead to start with. But really... somehow it still hurts a little.

Stupid rat.

Lazy day - again

I don't know how many lazy day I've had, but today is definitely one of them. And I think I deserve it dammit! I finally figure out the maths and why there's a difference between the two algo, today I just need to tweak the numbers to make it look okay...

So yeah, that's it from my for today. Now I'll go tweak those number to make them all looking shiny...

Sudoku, oragnic drink, and beign generally confused

Sudoku

It's weird: I've decided to waste more time of sudoku, and it ended up that I spend similar time on both the easy and medium level. I'm not too sure what that says about me. But nonetheless I'm confused.

Organic Lemon Lime and Bitters

Okay, first of all, I'm not to big fan of "organic food". Sure, I eat things that are carbon based. But the word used in the sense as "organic lemon lime and bitters" means jack all. Here's the list of ingredients:

Carbonated water

Organic sugar cane sugar

Organic lemon concentrate

Organic lime juice

Natural lemon and bitters flavour

Are you confused about the items? I am. In that order. Natural lemon and bitters flavour... huh?

Confused

Seems like I've been kinda confused way too easily, even on my standard, today. I think it's because I'm still kinda sleepy. But for some reason I actualyl understand the paper more today than when I was reading it yesterday. I wonder if it's because I'm slightly more awake today. Eitherway: I probably should take advantage of it and actually do some coding. :P

Petals Around the Rose

I'm WAY too sleepy today. Don't know why I'm so tired this morning, probably becauseit's Monday again. But it's just one of those days which is so very hard to actually work since my brain hasn't really woke up...

Anyway, after fruitlessly TRYING to work, I decided it was more productive to check on slashdot, as I do, and came across this riddle/puzzle called Petals Around the Rose. I was pretty much hooked on it and determined to crack how it works. I did. :P It took quite a while (well, good 20 minutes) and makign me feeling slightly stupid after I figured it out. But yeah, it's a lot better to make others suffer and try to figure out the rules too. It's one of those games. :P

And I've signed the register and sworn not to give the game away. :P Not even you Petey. Muhahahaha. *ahem*

This would also make a good drinking game I think. Or soemthing to play to frustrate the hell out of everyone. :P The story they put on there about Bill Gates playing this game was quite funny too.

Now, if only my research can be cracked just like that too...

P.S.: The folks on slashdot figured smart people takes a lot longer to solve this game. I'm not too sure the fact that I solve it in reasonable time is actually a good sign...

I am dyslexic!!

I swear!! There's no other explaination why I can't tell apart left or right, or callign Dan Brown's book "Demons and Angels"... (or "Demons and Angles" for that matter. I can just so picture it now: Demons taking over the world, while the protagonist try to save the world be solving geometric problems with a protractor.)

I also have a tendency to spell word as it sounds, or words with similar sound. My worst one have to be spelling "enough" as "in love". Why? I'm not too sure. My head's screwed up.

Or: maybe I'm dyslexic. Aha!!

This would also explain why I'm prone to motion sickness! It's true! I read it on wiki! People with motor dyslexia can't tell apart left/right, and are prone to motion sickness. That's me alright!

See! I'm right all along! I tried to tell people there's something wrong with me, they just won't listen. That'd show 'em!

Incidentally: I was also reading about hypochondriac... I think I'm one of those too. :P

Free membership for a week!

Wee! I get free trial membership in DeviantART for a week! :P Not that it's THAT different, but I'm still happy.

Anyway, I'm still having my dizzy spell. Hopefully it'll go away tomorrow when I'm back at uni. I think it's partly just.. stress. What stress? I'm not too entirely sure..

Will keep it short, otherwise I'm going to be sick again...

Stupid rain

Yesterday's rain was very impressive. When I left home, sky was blue and I was happy. Then 3 minutes later: it's pouring with rain. That's okay, but it doesn't stop until I got into my office, which means I was walking in that pouring rain for a good 15 minutes.The steps I normally take to go up into uni has turned into a waterfall. Pretty, yes. Annoying? You bet. It was almost like a water obstacle course.

So today: I'm sick. And it's like my brain's stuck in a lower gear, and it's just not moving..

I thought I JUST got better!!! Stupid Auckland weather. Grr..

Plan of Attack

Somehow I just desperately need to have some sort of plan to see how I'm going this month, so I think I need a plan of attack.

To be honest I'm kinda really scared about my research, which is why I need another plan of Attack I guess. After this I shall be a bit more relaxed, hopefully I'll get enough done to keep me happy by Christmas.

*sigh* I am just so very tired. o_O

Confession of a Engineering Postgrad

I've grown up to be quite arrogant. People might not agree but it's true. It's not like I rub it in people's faces: that would be immature. But I expect to be good at everything.

Problem is as you climb up the life's ladder, competition gets tougher and tougher. Once upon a time I was top in the school, then in engineering I was above average, and right now in postgrad, I'm almost at the bottom rig.

I suppose my problem is the fact that I get used to measuing my success by comparing myself to others. And it's how I've been since I was born. I win something in almost every competition I entered (except the sport ones). Anothing from art to drama, to maths and chemistry. So when I don't get the same sort of recognition for this current project: I panicked.

Not to mention all around me are now people much better than I am. I really doesn't help.

The research isn't going well either. Granted I seem to be the only one who thinsk that, but it doesn't change the fact that it's not going anywhere. And hey, others don't know how much I've actually done in the project now do they.

Today's lesson from the counsellor was not to compare myself with others, or at least see the whole picture. It sounds very good in my head, I just have to actually stop doing it. But when I've been raised to do so, it's extremely hard.

Curse the Hong Kong education system.

Yes... yes, I'm definitely sick. o_O (and hacking!)

Decided to stay home again today, and over slept, as usual. And what do you know, now I've got a headache and feeling kinda dizzy. Not to mention my usual muscle ache in every friggin place on my body. Yet I'm still not quite sick enough to justify not working on my project. I wonder if I'm just imagining myself being sick or that I'm a workaholic.

Either way, the little part I'm working on right now (which I'm not allowed to talk about in details thanks to my contracts and my very paranoid supervisor) is somewhat working. But not perfectly. I hacked it yesterday to make it better, and I THOUGHT I have a better way of hacking it. No I don't. I thought I do, but I don't. So right now it's back to yesterday's methods, which isn't very robust, and I would really rather do what I coined as "dynamic hacking", meaning put in an arbitary threshold, which actually changes according to some other arbitary measurement. That's how I passed my Master degree anyway. It almost sound legit enough to be put in a paper and say it's an equation. Heck, the paper I'm working on does something similar anyway, just not enough on it.

My friend and I were just talking about the whole engineering degree, how all we ever do is hacking. And it's true. He's doing his PhD in robotics, and a lot of it is hacking. Really. And a lot of the papers I read has this "trail and error threshold" which of coz differ from signal and signal. They still get published. That's why I proposed to use this "dynamic hacking" business, to actually calibrate the threshold on the go. (Some may want to call it an adpative threshold, but it's not quite the same. It's not. You know what I mean.) And maybe I can actualyl get my thesis done just by that!

Right now though: I can't really think, and my body hurts!! Tea makes me better though. And rightnow I'm drinking a nice cup of Earl Grey (which does NOT taste like soap!) and trying to perfect my hack.

Life of an engineering postgard is fun like that...

Sneezing fit

I've been sneezing all afternoon. Yup I think I might have a mild cold.

It's been an interesting day debugging my code. By debugging I meant hacking. It works. Kinda. Under certain circumstances, using the parameter I just happen to want to plug in. *sigh*

I think I can make it better, but it's almost 4, and I really can't be bothered. o_O So I'll see whether I can be bothered tomorrow.

It's hard to really start working when you're sick. But then again, knowing me, I should really be used to this by now. I'm almost always sick.

Stupid cold. o_O

Am I Sick?

I had a coughing fit just then, and I'm still wearing my big jacket. The technician in the robotic lab hasselled me about it but I just felt a bit cold. Maybe I DO have a cold.

Anyway, had a presentation today, and that went fine I think. I don't think I can get into the finals, but at least I didn't make a fool of myself. Plus you never know. But hey, I think I'm content in knowing I get a new USB drive. :P

Strange sort of afternoon, I think I am slightly sick, my neck is killing me too. Been trying to understand this paper with no luck. Maybe I'm just terribly tired. And I think I said before, I've just been extremely tired these few days.

LONG way away til break time. Until then I just have to hang on I think...

Dekita!!

Finally, after a whole morning of fiddling with the code (read: hack) it's working! IN fact it actually works better than the other one I implemented earlier on (which claims to be superior, but hey). So two more algo to go I think and I'll be done.

Met a girl from my high school whom I haven't caught up with since, well, since a long time ago. I can't help but to think I haven't done enough after my high school years, Pete assures me that finishing two degrees is something. o_O I dunno. I could be working and earning by now. But then again I actually like my research, so I can't complain.

I also promised work I'll look at this signal for them. ARGH I wish I have more time.

Other than that, life's business as usual. Besides the fact that I've decided not to talk to my dad again based on the fact that he said he thinks the Rolling Stones sounds like the contestants in NZ Idols. I think I can't communicate with him anymore. That's it. o_O

Free Food!!

It's the departmental BBQ today. I thought I was early, I wasn't. But I still got my food. So yay for me! :)

Anyway, I'm feeling quite a lot better about my research today. :) Possibly because once I've implemented the "thing" (remember, I'm not supposed to talk about my research :P) I know that at least it's started, and I can actually start doing something about it. Nothing's worse than no knowing what to do next, and I think I'm slowly getting there.

I was looking at Friendsters before to have to look at who I can find there, through friends and friends of friends and all. It's amazing what kinda of people you find there, especially when you find people whom you lost contact with ages ago. Curiousity prompt me to at least send these people a "hi" message. But meh, I don't even know if they WANT to get in contact with me anyway. :P

Which got me thinking, how would people whom I lost contact with see me as I am now? Did I actually change much? Or did I just more or less stay where I was? Would they kidna expect me to land where I am now, or would it be completely out of the blue? Have I actually gone as far as I think I've gone?

One thing for sure though: I know I was scared of the integral sign back then, and now they're my friends! :P

Okay, maybe not "friends". Close enough. :)

I'm a little pea

I can't believe Petey wrote an entry just to cheer me up. *sigh*. That boy is unbelievable sometimes.

I think it's a very bad mix of disappointment and just a sense of loss recently. Somehow I can't seem to think I can do whatever it is that I need to do. It just seems like I'm "faking it" all the time, tricking people into thinking I know what I'm talking about.

Right now, I'm just tired. I wish I know how I'm actually doing sometimes. But then any measurement is subjective really isn't it? You cannot judge someone's achievement objectively, that just doesn't work.

Why is it I constantly crave recognition I'm not too sure. I just know that if I don't do well then I'm a failure. Blame it on my oh-so-wonderful fatehr who drilled it into me since I'm a kid that I have to be the best in everything.

And right now, I'm just really tired.

Nerves

I don't know why I'm nervous about tonight. It's only a prize giving thing for the poster competition. If I don't expect to win anything, I won't get disappointed. But you can't help but to expect to win something when you enter I guess. Somewhere deep down I still hope I'll win something I guess.

Spent the day so far doing nothing, and just reading and finding out what I have to do. Also went up to the robotics lab to muck around. :P Played some games on the PSP, and watched the first bit of the first episode of the new season of Lost :D (Yes Petey, I know what's in the hatch now. :P But I won't tell you don't worry :P)

Right, hopefully today I can at least get a little bit of coding done. :) Other than that, at least it'd be nice to do SOMETHING today... even if it's just reading. :P

Meeting people

Went to meet up with Davi for her graduation, and ended up just having a drink with her, and she was off to meet up with her family. So I ended up having lunch with her friend. And we just instantly became friends. It's funny how sometimes you can just meet someone through a friend and instantly click. (Petey and I met through friends too. Ah well :P)

Anyway, we were then talking about our study/work. She being a law graduate and me being an engineer, it's quite amazing how I couldn't imagine surviving in law, and she can't imagine working in engineering. But we are quite similar in a lot of ways. Odd.

Human is definitely an interesting species. :)

Lots of movies :D

Last weekend have been a bit of a movie feast, mostly because I can't be bothered doing anything else, so we just stayed home and watch things. :)

Battle Royale

We finally got around to watching it. It was actually better than I thought. I still love the video tape that they used to explain to the students what's happening. It was just... weird. But the movie was actually very good, and a bit less gory than I expected. :)

Silence of the Lamb

Also finally got around to watch that too. Read the book but never really got around to watch the film. Dad used to forbid me to watch anything scary and that's around the time when it came out I guess. But yeah, besides the fact that I'll always think the book is better (with the possible exception for Lord of the Rings), the movie was pretty good too I guess. It actually sticks with the book pretty well. :)

FLCL

Technically not to movie, but we watched all 6 epsiode in one go. I think calling it weird didn't quite cover it. It was... yes, strange. I'll still recommend that to people who enjoy something like Monty Python. Although it's not so much that it's not PC, it's more that... it's random. You can't help but to wonder how they came out with it. Watch it if you liek strange stuff as much as I do, but don't say I haven't warn you.

Underworld

I've already watched it in the cinema, but Pete hasn't. I thought I'll rent it out since he always wanted to see it. Probably the least noteworthy of this weekend's viewing, but meh: cool weapons and gothic clothes are all good. :)

Work and whatnot

Went to another counsellor meeting today, and talked about my culture issue problem. I think just by talking about it at least I can understand more about it. And the counsellor does help to understand the underlining problems with various thing. So that's good.

There's an overwhelming amount of work to be done these days, and it's hard to just get into it coz the maths is kinda icky. Hopefully after playing with a few things I can actually get somewhere. I think I have a vague idea of what has to be done, I just need to actually try to materialise it.

Also need to get ready for various competition. I was quite confident before but now I'm not too sure. Ah well, whatever will be, will be.

Various thoughts on "Happiness"

It's funny. I was going to write something on happiness, and the first thing I thought of was the song, and the various memories that went with it. It's funny how my mind works.

I still think life is all about the pursuit of happiness, which is a bit like bull fighting. You have to have the courage to just go for it, and grab hold of opportunities as it comes by, otherwise you're just going to end up being hurt.

Well, maybe not exactly like bull fighting.

I suppose it's a scary thought: to go for something that's outside of people's comfort zone, in order to pursuit this idea of happiness. But I suppose it's a risk you have to take if you want to be happy.

Life should be easier. I know.

Regarding the song: It's a sad song to start with. It doesn't hurt me too much anymore.

Serenity

Went watched the preview screening of the movie Serenity last night, and it was SO good! Even though I ended up being quite sick because we were watching it on mega screen and action movie on mega screen is bad...

Anyway. Was going into work today but at the end I ended up staying at home. That's okay though. I can catch up with people, and try to research. (yeah right)

Wish me luck :P

Better than Caffeine!

Well, maybe not better, but it certainly woke me up when caffeine didn't help. Today is one of those really icky days where it rains and feels like winter when it's supposed to be spring already. Very depressing. I woke up too early, and was almost falling asleep in the office, until I've decided to go get lunch. Yup freezing cold woke up me. I still perfer caffeine, but nothing wakes me up better than haivng freezing cold pierce into my bones. o_O

The election in the past weekend has been interesting. It was extremely close, and both of the major party claims they can form a coalition. Ah. The beauty that is MMP.

Okie, I'm going to try to at least do some work while I'm still awake. Wish me luck.

Ah... Youth

I know. I'm only 24. But seeing all these undergrads all dressed up for the final year project, I can't help but to feela bit old. I was there only a few years ago. All dressed up in my suit, looking all professional. Now I'm just trying to at lesat look like I'm a student rather than a staff. *sniff*

There are, as usual, some pretty nifty project. So I might pop down later to have a look.

Other than that I think today's going to be one of those really distracting day. I forgot to take my paper into uni, which means I can't summerise the abnormal babies EEG today. Ah well. I think I should have enough to keep me busy for a while though. That's lucky I guess...

Forcing myself to work...

Yesterday was VERY unproductive. I managed to solve the new Grow (with RPG goodness) with just a few tries. THAT I was proud of. Then Petey told me about SphereXP, which is this little app to make the WindowsXP desktop into this 3D version, so your windows are inside this sphere. It's very nifty, but also a big time time waster.

So I think today I'm going to have to actually force myself to work. I haven't even read fark or slashdot yet. That's how determined I am. Granted I also haven't done anywork. But it's just a matter of time.

Well. I hope. :)

Racism, Gas Prices, and other random readings

Ah... back at home today. Besides a MAJOR sleep in, I also get to do very little work and not feel guilty. Well, okay, less guilty.

Below is a list of articles I've read today which I feel I like to share, and a few other other random stuff I feel an urge to share. As I do. For best effect, read it with Bohemian Rhapsody playing. (Coz it's playing as I write this. :P)

Asians in NZ subjected to racism, study finds

A study shows that many Asians in NZ are subjected to racism of some sort. Most of what it says rings true. I do have something to say with this particular quote though:

Wellington Chinese Association president Steven Young said he was "not surprised" by the report's findings, but it was disappointing for new migrants to find themselves not wholly accepted.

"Racism is not so much a problem for Asian New Zealanders who have grown up here and gone through the school system and have Kiwi speech patterns," he said.

Okay, YES I think new migrants have a lot more problems, but for bananas like myself, there's still a certain amount of racism, and it's not actually that much better, if not worse. I've been here since I was 12, and I was picked on when I first came here, which makes me sort of resent the fact that I'm Chinese. It took me a long time to even learn that it's okay to put my last name in my email. And once I had a car accident, and bam: "bloody Asian driver". I still get patronised because people automatically assume I can't speak English if I'm Chinese. Granted a lot of the time, if not all of the time, people who automatically jump to that conclusion are peopel who really don't count, but it still hurts somewhere deep down.

Yes I'll talk to my counsellor about my whole cultural identidy issue. I'll get there.

Here's a way to force gas stations to lower their prices

Came across this from fark, and here is their advice:

But one of the best ways to fight gasoline prices is for consumers to boycott gas stations' convenience stores. Pay cash where possible; do not use an oil company credit card, because you are paying an even higher price when the interest rate is figured in at the end of every month.

Skeptical? I am. But then again I always am. I just wonder just how much they are earning because of the convenience store sales. Mind you I could only find The Dog mascot in one BP store though, which is annoying. Anyway, back to gas prices. I ahve to say even though I'm still a bit skeptical, it does seems more logical then the whole "boycott the station for a day" crap I've been recieving in email. I would LOVE to try the whole "everyone try to boycott ONE store" strategy but it's hard to get the whole country to follow suit you see. So yeah, maybe this IS the easiest plan to follow. Besides the stuff they sell are quite overpriced.

These is no free lunches

Speaking of email forwards, I got one that say if I sign up this list and get five others to sign up I get a free colour iPod. *sigh* Sometimes I don't know how people buy into these things. Not to mention the terms and condition already said you can only get the iPod if you're an US citizen. *sigh*. I got to give it to the guys who come up with this scheme though. But what process people to think you can get a free iPod for nothing is beyond me.

Novel way to fund raise

This is beyond novel, in fact it's cruel, but here it is:

Suggested by a few members of the student council, the school is playing Hanson's 1996 hit "MMMBop" through the loudspeakers before classes begin, between periods and during lunch. The idea? Annoy students into donating; have them pay to stop the music.

The goal is $3,000, which could be reached if each of the 659 students donates $5.

"MMMBop" has been playing since Wednesday, and the school has raised about $2,300 so far.

Hell, I'll donate straight away. *shiver*

Neonatal Polygraphy in Full-Term and Premature Infants: A Review of Normal and Abnormal Findings

No I haven't read it yet, but I have to read it today and summarise the whole thing. *sigh*. Which is what I plan to do now. All 50 pages of it. Yay me...*sigh*

Sleeping in

I found that, as I grow up, I don't really look forward to holiday as much as I look forward to a good sleep in. In most people's cases it's the same thing: you get to sleep in during holidays. But when you're a post-grad, well, you can pretty much sleep in everyday if you want.

Unless, of course, you catch a ride with your dear undergrad brother who has 9am labs twice a week.

But, lucky for me, today wasn't one of those two days. I get to sleep in til 9:45. And since I was SO tired the day before, it was just... blissful.

I don't really think it'd help my productivity, but at least I actually don't feel half asleep all day long. I might possibly even do some work today! Well. Maybe.

Fun stuff to do

Since, as I said before, I'm not particularly motivated today, all I did so far was change my GUI to make even prettier graph, went to the robotics lab to play with the train model (which I named Train-zilla) and see Toby's optic-fiber "wobbling thingy", which isn't what you think (get your mind out of the gutter!). And submitted my poster to a poster competition, because it's A LOT more fun then working on my project. And then I came across this which is a very handy site to confirm your graduation status. I still don't know exactly what it's for, considering you have to be graduated to be on that site, and it gives the name and degree and that's about it. I suppose it's good to check for people's CV. But they people still can't check whether they are going to graduate.

Anyway, mindless rambling aside, I did a few searches on friends back in in my intermediate days whom I haven't heard from since, well, intermediate. I guess I've never been one to be good with keeing in touch, but it's still quite interesting to see where people end up, and see how much people change over the years. Well, maybe not THAT much. I'm still a geek, and probbaly always have been (and damn proud of it :P). But somehow it still brings an enormous sense of nostalgia. I can't help but to wonder where these people are now, and whether I'll ever see them again. There are quite a few of them that I'd really like to catch up with, but funny enough, with internet and all, I sitll haven't managed to find any of them.

Ah well. Life is funny like that. Maybe one day I'll bump into someone. (Then again, I wonder if I can still recognise them...)

Okie, back to reading papers. *sigh*

Lack of motivation and whatnots

It's Monday morning, and I've having a VERY low motivation day even for Monday morning. It's a strange mixture for being tired, stressed, paranoid, and overwhelmed.

As research goes, I think I'm up to the point where I can actually start to do some really decent work, except I'm starting to be ovewhelmed by the scope of the work. Everyone is scared to step into the unknown I guessed, but that's not particularly comforting really. I wish I know how this will all turn out, but I can't. And it's kinda this uncertainty that makes me kinda, well, edgy I guess.

I've also been sick for a good part of the past week, which doesn't help my stress situation.

It does help to read about comments left on this blog though. Somehow when I write this, I never really expect people to really read it, and it's quite touching to see that not only is it being read, people actually care enough to leave a message, and for that I'm grateful. It still makes my day to see that my thought reaches someone I've never met before, and they too share their thoughts. All thanks to the wonder of the internet.

I probably should go and get some work done now. Wich me luck. *sigh*

And Life has a funny way...

I know, I updated today already.

I just got a message on flork from someone I haven't been talking to, and he just commented on how he found it quite inspiring that someone who came from a completely different culture (not to mention language backgrounds) could overcome the difference and come back up to the top. I wouldn't say I'm quite "at the top", or anywhere near as far as I can see. But it does serve as a reality check. Looking back, maybe I have came a long way. In a sense, compared with what I did when I first came over here, and the struggle involved to get to where I am now, maybe the PhD research isn't as bad as I thought. At least I know what I'm doing. I think.

Life has a funny way to remind you of little things like that.

Self Doubt

Didn't update my blog in the past two days, since I was quite sick. I'm getting better now though.

I think I'm starting to doubt myself again, and I'm not even too sure why. I know my progress isn't going too badly, and I know what I need to do next. But somehow it doesn't really comfort me too much. Possibly because of the medical school episode. But I think I'll try to use that postgrad competition as a bit of a feedback as to how well I'm doing. I'm just worried that maybe it'd confirm my worst fear and actually makes me panic even more.

Maybe I'll be more productive if I'm not too paranoid, but really: I just ain't too sure about myself anymore.

A Matter of Faith

I sometimes think I must be one of the worst Christians on Earth. Not only do I not go to church, I also have a lot of issues with quite a few of the church's teaching. I even doubtes whether my prayer is being heard at all sometimes.

And then I think about how I act: maybe I'm not too bad afterall. I repect everythign and everyone, besides maybe when it comes to insects (it's my phobia...). I tried my best to love everyone, and not judge people.

But THEN I think: I DO judge people. I still gossip, and talks about people behind their back. Although I can't help but to do it, it's part of my pattern recognition system to teach me how to deal with people. Is that how us human works? Or am I just finding excuses?

Although I can't help but to think whether God really DO want us to go to church, or if the Church is the one who insist on it. It's getting hard to tell sometimes. That's why scares me.

Well, I suppose if I do my best, no one can blame me. It's just that my best is probably still not good enough. :|

Trivial Details.

Do bear with me today. I'm just a bit sick. (I think it's just a lack of sleep. Didn't sleep til late and woke up at 6 this morning. Not good)

Anyway, I've been thinking about why I want to write this blog at all. Especially when most of the time I ended up withing things like "I have sushis for lunch" or "I hate work". It sounds a bit like my daily email to Pete, bar the mushy part.

I started writing this hoping to share a bit of my thought, a bit of my life, and basically have somewhere I can talk my head off, and friends can read it to see what I'm up to lately. But really, reading it sometimes bre myself to death.

Am I spending too much time of life's trivial details and missing the big picture? I can't help but to think maybe I have. Sometimes I spend so much time thinking about what to have for lunch, or just worried about when I should do line up to get my sushi, that I don't really think I'm spending much quality time at all.

I hope I haven't made my work my life. It might be a wee bit difficult too knowing how slack I am sometimes. But I looked back, even my diary seems boring. I guess different things matter as I grow up, and now it's all just the little trivial things.

It's almost depressing. And sometimes I think it's a chronical disease that a lot of young people feels nowsdays. The world sometimes are overwhelmingly full of the trivials, and I heard countless of friend telling me about how they are unhappy about where they're at, or feel like they're in a rut.

I think the key just lie in getting your priorities right. Problem is how to stick of that priority list.

Back from trip :)

I thought I'll just post that photo there to make people feel a bit jealous. :P It was a very good trip, lots of reading and doing nothing. I also managed to cook for most of the trip and survived. It's quite relaxing.

Now that I'm back, I think I should really try to work on the next bit of my research. Exactly what it is I'm not too sure yet. But I'll find out.

Didn't really feel like getting back to work today yet, so I think I'll just settled for "brainstorming what to do next". With a bit of luck I'll get back to normal by next week.

Spam!

Honestly, they're spamming my blog?? You just can't get away with them can you? Well, besides going away for 10 days, muhahahahah.

Anyway, with a simple click the stock profile they so kindly gave me as a comment is gone forever in the cyberspace.

Went to meet with a few researchers in med school today. And realised that my ideas are still way too sketchy. It's annoying. I thought I have things sorted out until now. But then again it's okay, it's still early in my project and I can still rectify it I guess.

Also figured something interesting: since when do we divide our day into little one hour segments? It's funny isn't it. Everything seems to fall into this hour segments. I blame it on Outlook. :P

With a bit of luck this should be my last blog update until 1st September. Meanwhile eat well, drink lots of water, exercise, take care. I'll see you guys after my long over-dued break. :D

Chronic Laziness

For two days in a row, I'm just not motivated to do anything. I think it's just that my body finally catch up to the fact that I've been on overdrive for a while. It's quite a change, to actually have nothing to do for the day. Well, besides trying to figure out how to get into med school tomorrow.

And then, it's holiday time! To unwind and do absolutely nothing for 10 days. I assume after that I would be able to get back to working on my actual stuff. I honestly can't be bothered working at the moment. I've all the little bits and pieces that needs to be done. I think I should shut down for a little while...

Did you know...

• ... that the majority of readers of Catcher in the Rye are women?


• ... that airing of the American remake of The Office is cancelled in Australia after a week?


• ... but they're now making a NEW season of it??


• ... that the middle name of Wednesday Adams is Thursday?


• ... that in Fight Club, the name "Jack" (as in "I'm Jack's colon") was changed from "Joe" in the book to avoid conflict with Reader's Digest?


• ... that there are almost no legitimate licenced mechandise of Calvin and Hobbes because Bill Watterson hates the idea of merchandising?


• ... that 4'33" is 273 seconds, and that absolute zero is -273°C?

It's amazing what you can learn in through bordom in one day with wiki... :P

Busy day....

It's amazing how even though I've just finished all my 1st year crap I still manage to be busy for a whole afternoon. I've been busy trying to get competition application done, and organising meetings before I'm off to my break, etc etc. Lucky it's not really intesive work, and it's not THAT bad. Tomorrow I might even head into uni and start some real proper work. :P

For the rest of the day I think I'll just look at my poster a bit more and clean that up a bit. Hopefully that'd mean I don't have to look at it when I'm away on my break.

Alrighty. Back to trying to utilise my artistic skills... :P

Cookie overdose

Eeeeek! I was convinced to have cookies for lunch today, and I've only had two... it's already giving me a cookie overdose. I think I'm going to be put off cookie for at least a week. :P

Right now I'm doing the manial task of correcting my report. I can't wait til I can get awya... not long to go now. Hopefully I'll finish this today.

Okie, back to editing...

Weeeeeeeee :)

Yay I passed my provisional year for my PhD. :D Yay!

Not that it's TOO surprising, but it is still a big weight off my shoulders. Sometimes I'm not too sure why I stress so much, but hey, it worked :P

Anyway, people tends to think I have a very good seminar, so I'll just try to believe that and be happy. (Maybe I CAN talk after all) SO yeah, great :)

NOW I can think about holidays :P

31 minutes

Yay me! I've managed to cut 7 minutes off my presentation without cutting any slides. Simply by shutting up when I should :P

Anyway, I'm not REALLY stressing too much, but it's still on my nerves. But I think it'd go well. I hope so. :)

I think I can. I think I can.

The issue of seeking help

I'm not gonna say I'm a proud person, mostly because I do have an inferior complex, but I do have a thing about seeking help. Probably because I don't like bugging people. But finally, I got my first meeting with the counsellor, rather than trying to diagnose myself and getting someone to talk to me from outside the situation. And really, it helps a lot. It really does.

Admittedly I didn't talk about ALL my problems, I can go on for days. But just mainly on the ever so popular family issue. Granted compared to Dr Phil they are small issues, but it's driving everyone nuts and really, it's not helping. But today's session was really good, even just knowing I'm not the only one having this sort of problem. And just having some tips on how to deal with it.

IN a strange way it helps with my other issues, even without really directly talking about it. It's strange isn't it?

Well. That's my day. Now I'm all happy and stuff, I can start with my presentation again. :P

Lack of sleep

This update is brought to you by the email update. Be
VERY grateful if it appears. I know a few times when
it just get lost in cyber space. *sigh*

Didn't have enough sleep last night, So most of today
is a bit of a blur. Problem with me is that if I know
I have to get up early the next day I often stress about
not getting up early enough and then I can't get to sleep
at normal time.

I would've written more if I'm not so sleepy, but meh, I
AM very sleepy. So I think I'll just stop now and try to
wake myself up before I see my supervisor. *sigh*

How to be successful with women...?!

My dear brother told me his friend (admittedly a bit of a player.) sent all the guys a copy of an ebook called "How to be sucessfuly with women". After that enlightenment, my brother has came up with the following comclusion:

He needs a haircut.

I'm sure there's more wisdom in the book then get a decent haircut. But it's almost scary that they actually have a book on how to deal with women. I thought even us women can't figure out ourselves. And when I pointed that out to my brother, he just grinned and said "I know. The book said that too."

CURSE THAT DAMNED BOOK!

*ahem*

Anyway, I can't say the conclusion my brother came up with is completely unfounded. We would like to think that we aren't shallow. But the fact is, well, we are. We're just shallow in different ways from the guys. That's why make over shows like queer eyes is popular agmonst women. It's like giving us the reassurance that it's okay to be shallow. That's why women think Carson is a godsent. (Not just because I still thinks he's really cute, although I do have to say no to guys wearing pink. o_O) When it all comes down to it: heck, you still need a certain physical attraction you know.

Not that that's all there is to it. You don't have to be drop dead gorgeous to find someone, and you don't need to be a model to be successful with women. Besides, most of the pretty boys ended up just being a player and can't settle for something emotional anyway. The way I see it, those books teach you how to be successful with women, but if you want a real solid relationship with a woman, heck, just be yourself. You'll be better off in the long run.

The Waiting Game

The supervisor very so kindly told me that we still can't find a time that suits everyone, so the seminar is still being delayed indefinitely. Great.

Anyway, after that I've been somewhat discouraged. I mean, I've been looking forward to a break for SO LONG, and now they're telling me they don't know when I can have my break. *sigh*... Honestly this can't be good for my stress level. I want a break dammit. o_O

Right now I got the main body of my report done, just got abstract and conclusions and whatnot to do now. Wish me luck. :|

Lots of random stuff

I'm going to post all my random thoughts of today in a random manner. Take whatever you like to read.

Laser Pointer and the Cat

I got a laser pointer yesterday so I can actually point to things when I'm doing my presentation. Pete mentioned that the laser pointer drove his cat nuts, and for some reason I was convinced to try it on my cat. Ruby kept chasing the little red dots on the ground, and get rather confused when it disappeared. I can't help but to think it's cruel, the cat is chasing somehting that can never be caught. But no one else seems to share my view on this new game, and thinks it's rather good for the cat really. I just don't know. Pete said I'm thinking too much and assume the cat think like a human. Maybe I am. Maybe cats just like to chase things and I'd never understand it.

Creationism

Oh boy! Bush is thinking of teaching creationism (or "Intelligent design") in high school along side with evolution to expose the kids with different views. I kinda wonder HOW it actually fits in a science class. I quite like the way I was taught in high school: in religious studies we were taught creation stories, not just the Catholic model, but also the Maori ones, and taught about how these stories comes to be, and later on learn about evolution in Biology (well, I lied. Evolution was taught in 7th form, I dropped bio after 6th form :P). And I really don't see any conflicts. Saying evolution occurs doesn't really contracdicts with the belief that there is a God. And I went to a Catholic school! I just don't understand why Americans are so hung up on creationism and against evolution.

Pie

I'm just wondering how much money we could people are serveing pies for a wedding reception? Since food is the biggest cost, you'd think they'd try to cut cost there. Granted it's almost as tacky as that American couples who held their wedding reception in McDonalds, but it's just interesting to see... :P

Message to Baggy

I hope you had a bit of time to calm down a little. I haven't posted a reply to your blog because I thought it might be better for you to think things through and just read that again. I'll write an email to you later.

Message on a whiteboard

That reminds me of the whiteboard in the postgrad kitchen. A chinese message appeared, saying something like "Havn't seen you for a while. I thought I should let you know that evrything is real. I should let you know that I think I should go home. Goodbye". People were also writing on the board asking what the heck does it say (it's in chiense, not everyone can read chinese). I was gonna do a translation for the others, but it doesn't seem, right, I guess. I don't know. Although of course this could very well be some practical jokes. Not a very good one but hey.

Progress Report

Just realise I got more than I thought I had to do for my report, but at least I'm writing something. Should finish by the end of this week. I hope.

Background ambient sickness

My friend once said that I always seem to have some form of background sickness going on, with every now and again something more serious (being that I might actually have to take a day off for it). I thought that was nonsense before, but now when I think of it, there's probably some truth in it. I'm not too sure if it's because I'm a bit of a hypochondriac (fortunately one who's scared of doctors.), or maybe I never really take care of my body enough.

I lost count how many day I've been having this dizziness now. In a way I think it's stress induced, since normally it's worst when I'm stressed out (it was worst in my final year of undergrad, during the time which I called "Fortnight of Hell"). Mum thinks I'm not drinking enough water. I just think I'm just a bit run down and my body's telling me to slow down a bit. Whatever the reason is, it doesn't help that I have this report due and I'm trying very hard to finish it asap.

The family situation doesn't help, as always. And I think I've learnt to just ignore it instead of solving any of the problems. Probably doesn't help my stress level. But hey, what else can I do? It's not like our parents actaully taught us to face the problem. Heck dad distinctly taught me the best thing to do is keep quiet. Look at the amount of good that does. And it's not like dad actaully listens. So hey, the best I can do is just to nod along.

*sigh*

Petey has a blog! :D

Well, he started one anyway, and hopefully he'll fill that in every now and then. He just has a way with words (and I'm not saying that just because I'm baised) and well, I'm sure his blog would be less about what he's having for lunch and actually say something. :P (Unlike this humble blog you're reading now :P)

Anyway.

Just got another thing out of the way this morning, so now I can get back to working on my report. It's not that hard but it's just a matter of motivation really. And everytime I'm trying to start I start to feel dizzy. I'm starting to wonder whether it's actually psychological.

I think the more stressed out I am, the more I just want to avoid it. It's not healthy I know but I can't seem to help it. Sometimes I wonder if I'm cut out to be an academic afterall. But then again, maybe I am, I just need to stop trying to run away from it.

slight dizzy spell...

It's not too bad. I think it's just me sleeping too much. :P Or that stress is catching up. Ah well.

Anyway, anotehr VERY low energy day, can't get much done, but I'll try...

meh.

Hmmm... Chocolate....

Right now I'm munching on the new Wonka Bar. It's SOOOOOO nice.... almost heavenly really. I didn't really expect it to be that good. I thought it'll just be like one of those movie chocolate.

Anyway

I'm still really tired at the moment, but it's getting better. I'm just hoping to get the presentation sorted, then I'll just spend the rest of the time getting the report done. Ironically my supervisor wants to schedule the presentation/advisory committee meeting JUST before my first session with the uni councellor. I don't know about you but I still think it's a conspiracy. If they delayed it to the afternoon I WILL throw a fit.

Chocolate is still very good...

Anyway, I'll try to get something done. I just cleaned up the presentation so I'm just gonna time it now I think. Hopefully it'd be finished by end of today. :)

One down, God-knows-how-many to go

Just sent in my scholarship application today. I'm almost tired of it now really.

I didn't do anything on my report today, mainly because yes, I'm just damned tired. I have done a bit on my presentation for the optometrist though, and my second supervisor sent in some slides I can use for my presentation, and that is VERY good indeed.

I can't wait til I can finish my first year crap and go away with Petey... Man it just seems to drag on...

Mainstream Banana

Before anything: HAPPY BIRTHDAY PETEY~! :D *bounce*

Anyway

I've been wondering, while I'm walking through the university cafe, then whether bananas are slowly becoming mainstream. I know it's still a VERY long way to go. And just because a Chiense is going out with someone non-Chinese does not automatically become a banana (I know st least one somewhat traditional Chinese going out with a white boy, and a banana going out with a Chinese... anyway) But there are more and more couple where the two of them are from different culture. (I don't even know WHY I'm trying to be PC on my own blog...) That on its own isn't that surprising, I guess. But somehow I just can't help but to think whether there would be one day where banana will be the norm. Well it's just that especially in NZ the cultural boundary is blurring... heck globally it's blurring already thanks to the internet (and Sony inventing SingStar. But let's not dwell on it shall we?) .

Not that I don't want the Chinese culture to die. I mean, we do have... what.. 5000 years of history? Or is it just 3000? ANYWAY, the point is that I wonder if one day in NZ the Chinese would actually understand the Kiwi culture as well as the Chinese one (Even adopt it a little, and slowly evolve into a banana :P). Admittedly I'm not the best person to talk. My Chinese is so broken that I would have problem trying to carry out a conversation without turning it into English after a while. (Stevie was almost confused when he realised we've been conversing in English. But meh) Plus my knowledge of the Chinese/HongKong culture knowledge stopped at around the 90s (when I came to NZ). And I'm not that big on rugby (Then again I'm a JAFA :P And the Rock has shown Auckland girls in general just not as into rubgy as, say, our Canterbury counterpart.) Still, I guess I'm a banana, and proud of it.

Eventually though I think I want to actually be better than a banana and actually accept the fact that I'm also Chinese. Heck I almost agreed with Nghiep when he said All of the Chinese looks alike... I think if you ask me I'll still say I identify myself as a Chinese, but really in all respect I'm so westernised I don't know how much Chinese is left in me sometimes. *sigh*

Well, I guess at least I still eat disgusting things like chicken feet...