Yet another appeal.

"The S paper list is out already!" - Abel

So, I've been offered to read Maths S and Chem S. Hm. I didn't half expect myself to be offered maths S, since I've only managed to hit the A mark. Just! But whyohwhymustbelikethat. Grrrrr. I wanted so desperately to do econs S. Oh well, I shouldn't be grumbling. At least I've been offered chemistry S! So that's a good sign, thank God. Now I've to appeal to do econs S. Keeping in mind that maths S is likely to be easier to nail a distinction since it's more right/wrong, I'll have to consult Mdm Kua tomorrow to see whether I'm up for econs S, since I'll be essentially pitting myself against the best from the humanities programme. Lord knows they're such good writers.

***

I can't believe you actually had to stoop down to doing that. I trusted you better. And the worst thing is, you actually think I don't know. *rolls eyes* Evidence, baby, evidence!

Some people drive me mad.

Bad timetables.

RAWR. I'm here, stuck in the school library for the past forty minutes or so. There's nothing seriously wrong with the school library. It's open and spacious and frankly, I think it's one of the nicer libraries around. Just that, I've got this colossal break between morning assembly at 7.20am and the next lesson at 11.20am. Drives me raving mad, I tell you. I spent the past few hours surfing the web aimlessly, browsing sites like dotaportal and abrsm, in a faint attempt to curb the stiffling boredom. I've done a pretty good job at that and there's only about 1 hour 20 minutes left. Go me! Time to hurry off to Shawna to grab my score for today's practice.

***

It baffles me why people would ever consider stealing the ball of a mouse. By that, I mean a computer mouse, all you sick maniacs out there! =P

I was at the student's lounge this morning, wanting to use the computer as I was too bored reading John Grisham's The Last Juror. Quite a good book, but you can only read a book for that long, right?

Turns out that ball of the mouse was missing.

Tell me what's more frustrating than that. Now I understand why the Dean is coming down so harsh on those mentally unstable buggers who do stuff like that - stealing the ball of a mouse. What a joke!

***

My conversation with Dr S today was...enlightening, I'd say. It's surprising how much I've left about myself in just a brief conversation of 5 minutes. Hm. I should avoid that. Wouldn't want him to think that I'm getting overly friendly with him. *shudders at the thought*

***

There, 5 minutes spent! Only 1 hour 15 minutes more to go. I can do this.

Ask me a question

I'm bored, so I'm going to do a silly little survey. My first one on any blog I've ever had! =)

1. Where do you go to shop for clothes?

I don't normally shop for clothes, you know. Afterall, I'm a guy. Yeah. But I think I do pretty random shopping, when the need calls for it. Haha...Nope. Not a shopping addict in anyway. More a "get it and move it" guy.

2. Do you buy your own groceries?

Do I look like I do? *stunned*

3. Do you think people talk about you behind you're back?

Well, sure they do! I'm guilty of it sometimes as well. Oh hell. I just leave them to say all they want. Can't really be bothered about it.

4. When's the last time you had a sour gummy worm? What's that again?


5. What's your favourite fruit? Hm. I'm pretty partial towards strawberries and mangoes.

6. If there was a fire, what would be the first thing you would grab? Almost nothing if only to save my ass. Probably my ipod mini, since I can't possibly save all my scores which I've accumulated since primary 5.

7. Do you have a picture of yourself doing a cartwheel? Nope nope and nope. Can't do a cartwheel properly.
8. Have you ever tried to build something? Yep! Was into lego when I was young...until I realised how much of a pain physics was. Thank God for the absence of physics in my life now.

9. Do you play with legos? Haha...played. Used to have boxes after boxes of them!

10. Do you play with barbies? *speechless* Ok. Once. But only to appease my sister!

11. Who's your favorite Disney Princess? Ariel, although Belle from Beauty and the Beast comes in as a close second. I can definitely feel how much Ariel feels trapped in her world and I can understand how much she longs to be part of another world - one she knows she doesn't really belong in. SIGH. Love the song "Part of Your World", but that is largely irrelevant to this question!

12. Do you have a boyfriend/girlfriend? Obviously not.

13. Would you rather have blue skin or purple skin? Blue! That'll be uber cool! So Mermaid-ish.

14. Have you ever gotten a sunburn? Like DUH! Once, I had this sunburn and I could hardly carry my bag to school 'cause the skin on my shoulders were peeling off so badly they stung when touched! Ouch!

15. Have you eaten snow? Nope! But I'd be glad to, anytime! And make snow angels! Wheee!

16. Have you watched Star Wars, any of the six? Yes. Enjoyed it, but I'm in no way a rabid fan of the series. Just cannot understand the craze about the lightsabres! Jedi mind tricks are cool though. Imagine what one can achieve with them!

17. Do you have a fuzzy pen? Ewwwwwww.

18. Do you fix your bed? At times...but only once in a blue moon! I do change my own sheets though, like once a fortnight or so.

19. What color are your bedsheets? Presently they're grey. Very boring, very mundane colour. I used to have them in shades of green and they rocked! Haha...I don't usually coordinate the colour of my bedsheets with that of my comforter though, so the colours might clash. But then again, who friggin' cares? =P

20. Do you wear slippers? My slippers rock! I bought them Down Under for A$14 and I love them to bits.

21. What is the coolest lamp you own? Nothing but the normal Ikea designs I guess. I don't have a lamp fetish.

22. What's your favorite flower? Hm...I think lilies are nice. But I don't really take notice!

23. Did you go or do you want to go to prom? Nope, I didn't go. But I'll definitely go for my college prom. Won't miss it for the world.

24. What does your tissue box look like? Oh well, the normal crap.

25. Did you ever open a lemonade stand? Nay.

26. Were you or are you in ballet? Nope. I do admire all dancers though, the way they carry the form and they just have this different air about them. Even their daily strides look good. Sigh.

27. Do you listen to classical music? Yes siree! I love Bach the most, even though I'm quite hopeless at playing his fugues. Drives me mad! Mozart is pretty impressive to listen to too. Most of the time, I'm mighty inspired to practise really hard after I listen to recordings of piano works.

28. What's the longest book you've read? Hm. I figured it should be Dreamcatcher by Stephen King. It was so long and so confusing!

29. What smiley best represents you? The double chinned one. =)) I'm guilty of using it so often.

30. What do you do when you are stuck? Hm. Get myself out, duh?

31. Do you have a "wacky noodle"? Seriously, get a life!

33. Do you have a website where you put your pictures on? I do, but I hardly use it 'cause I'm no tech-geek and I'm far too lazy to wait for pictures to load.

34. Do you watch Spongebob? Sing it along with me! "Who lives in a pineapple under the sea? Spongebob Squarepants!" *nods nods*

35. What kind of car do you want? A black really stylish Jaguar or something. I've always had this thing for the Jaguar on the tip of the car.

36. Last food you ate? Satay from the satay club. Yum yum.

37. Last nice thing you did for someone? Taught my sister how to sing a song and for all the raving popstar-wannabes in the world, she can't sing for nuts! OH man.

38. Do you make presents? Nah. I would if I had the time though.

39. Do you make your own jewelry? *coughs and sputters*

40. How any questions are left in this survey? I wish I'd know.

41. Are you in advanced classes? Nah! There aren't any advanced classes. There are advanced placement classes though, where you can choose to do some modules to gain credits while you're in college so that you can do fewer credits in university. But oh well, I think I'll leave university work to university. We already have enough things on our hands right now!

42. Do people consider you as smart? Hm. I think so, but I'm quite perplexed why.

43. Do you collect anything? Yes! I seriously hoard scores so now I've an appreciably amount of scores to play from. Go me. I use to collect stamps and stickers as well, but that's so primary school! *rolls eyes*

44. Do you collect a series of a certain book? Nope, even though I do read books in a series. Gives a sort of a continuum to a plot as you see how the character develops. I love the finality to a series. The feeling is bittersweet.

45What time is it? 10pm. Early considering the time I usually go to bed during the weekdays! My biological clock is extremely screwed especially in the wake of the devastating promos. lol.

46. Is your away message on? No. I don't usually go on MSN nowadays.

47. Do a lot of your friends have livejournal? Nah, but I do know people who have one.

48. Do you have a paid account? Nah. I'll never pay for a journal on the internet. It doesn't make sense!

49. Have you ever been to Jamaica? hell no.

50. Do you make your own cards? *shakes head*

51. Have you ever tried gluing your fingers together? Hahahahhaa. YES! That's one of the cheap thrills of those art lessons, huh!

52. What was the stupidest thing you've done? Telling someone that I like her. Feels mighty stupid once you think of it 'cause it just changes everything between the two parties. Hell.

53. How many languages do you know? Quite a few. I can speak English and Mandarin fluently, french and cantonese "survival" standard. Working on my french now. My brother actually bought me this book to help me learn Latin. Gee!! Latin!! I'd probably do that and Japanese next.

54. Can you skip stones? Nah.

55. Where did you get this survey from? Some random person. Sorry for leeching this survey!

***

There. Left me breathless.

Openhouse was fun! Had a great time "killing" all those poor students and making them join the choir!

Lesson learnt : The central plaza really sucks as a performance venue! The light is mighty strong and it just stings my eyes I could hardly open them. Furthermore, there was something in my nose and my eyes at the end of the first performance. GAH GAH. So, I was blinking and tears were forming in my eyes and I couldn't soothe them because we were still singing! ARGH!!
Oh well. That's all for now, I suppose.

Exchange with NJC choir

Sans the seniors, that is.

If I don't recall wrongly, the last exchange with the NJ choir was roughly a few months back, when the seniors were still around (thank God for them!) and we were still neophytes to the new standard of choral singing. For me, that exchange was an eye-opener. And yes, it added a whole new dimension to the term "good singing". Ack. The male singers there are just plain good. And I had to stand beside this guy who blasted damn loud which extremely sound technique. I was struggling in the corner, trying to get a grip on myself. "They can't be that good!" Right.

Back to what I was planning to blog about today. The exchange today was helpful and in a way...well, stressful. Alright, I admit it. We've got a lot more ground to cover should we aspire to be as good as them in the near future (read: before our term ends). A lot. Basses, at least we have improved in terms of confidence. But everyone, me including, needs to improve our much deplorable technique! C'mon guys, we can do it together. Even if it means singing your throats hoarse and your voice croaky. It's friggin' worth it. Just picture the voice of Royston in your head. There, motivated huh? =D

Shan't go on and say how we performed during the rehearsal, but we're holding an "emergency" practice tomorrow to salvage whatever we can - sound and music. ARGH! We've been having such "emergency" practices ever since the seniors left us to geek out for the A levels and it says a lot about us! I won't hide the fact that I'm finding it rather pesky now, but hey, if work needs to be done, it needs to be done. Period.

***

There, promo results are all out in the sun. Exposed. Unchanged.

I suppose I have to be thankful for my results. Too many shocks. Notwithstanding the pleasant surprise of scoring A for maths (this is a day to remember! MATHS! It's actually maths!), I think receiving the papers was a largely distressing affair on the whole. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. I hate having to sit there as your mind goes into a frenzied state thinking about the possible grades. It's almost like "psyching" yourself up to be prepared for the worst. I hate receiving less than expected results, eg. economics. I can't believe I failed my essays. Yes, I scored 8 marks. I hate...

Grrr. I hate throwing a bitch fit here, but hey! 05S71, let's do it together next year, alright? Let's stop being the last class for practically all the subjects - save for maths, perhaps. Time to pull ourselves together for the final lap next year, which is going to be the determinant for the A levels. =DD

Just waiting for 2nd november to see how the results actually turn out. Seeing the results in black and white could be comforting, to a certain extent.

I have just survived year one of junior college.

Wow. Feels great.

Bringer of bad news.

Last week has been rather eventful, although not entirely in a good sense.

On the return of economics papers - I'm not going to hide my disappointment. Frankly, I didn't think I'd do so badly for economics. I mean, I was counting on it for at least a B, hello? Firstly, 23/50 for essays. Bad enough for me to warrant 50 bangs of my head against the wall. Had to manually lift my jaw back into place, really. 8 marks in total for the first essay, out of a possible 25.

"The average mark that I gave for the essay was about 14 to 15 marks." - Ms T

Looks like I reeeeally fell out of the average mark.

Looking on the bright side of things, at least I managed to score 64.5 overall for econs, which puts me a C. Again, I missed a B by 0.5 marks. I don't even know whether I should laugh through my tears. Lol!

On biology olympiad - Gotta admit I didn't think I'd get in anyway, but now that it's official ("my name's not there? oh."), just gotta live with it and cross my fingers and pray that I can at least manage an E for the paper.

On promos overall - I think I screwed it up. Darn it all.

On reading - Yay! I've read 2 more books this time in the week! It feels mighty wonderful to have time to read books now that there's hardly any work for me to do. Coping with the shocks of having to face my dismal grades is another matter altogether! But for the moment, I'm quite content spending my time reading. On to "Of Mice and Men" by John Steinbeck. When I first read the book, I couldn't believe that the characters were going to speak in weird English again. Like anyone knows what "that means we'll be bucking grain bags, bustin' a gut" means! Then again, it's one of the beauties of literature, isn't it? Appreciating what the writer wishes to convey without fully understanding it. Hm. At least that's what I learnt from attending two years of literature classes!

Doing some "quality control" for music on my IPod mini now. My library's pretty small, only a meagre collection of 1059 songs. I know! But there are people out there who have at least a mind-boggling 10000 songs! Which really leaves me to wonder how they ever manage to select only 1000 songs to put in their IPods. That's unless they have a 40GB IPod, which costs so much you can feed a dying child in Africa for a year. Sigh. Blame it on society, people.

I think I'll pop a few tranquilisers before I go to school on Tuesday. No prizes for guessing why.

ps. Weather forecast for Tuesday : Raging storms with thunders expected throughout the whole day.

(For my readers who are clueless as to what is going to happen on Tuesday, I'll be getting back my maths, chemistry (Good Lord!) and biology papers on that fateful day. Mood likely to be in the doldrums. Go figure.)

Unmitigated freedom.

Well, almost! Now that it's the end of the dreaded exam period, it's time to relive all the simple pleasures in life. I've come up with a brilliant list of things to do for tomorrow! Ain't I smart!

1) Finish reading Dreamcatcher. (ooo! Can't wait to see what happens at the end!)
2) Pack up all my worksheets which are currently strewn all over the floor. Utter mess!
3) Eat more Ben and Jerry's Choc Fudge ice-cream. Sinful, but oh for all the goodness, it's alright! I'm taking it in! =D
4) Borrow more books from the library.

There! All that I've gotta do. Listed down into 4 simple points. Makes it all the more easier to plan my day tomorrow. I hate wasting time - so for now, I'm playing all I can!

Can you imagine? I actually got sick of playing heroes 4 of might and magic today! Amazing. I didn't think that I'd actually get sick of the game. Sigh. Turned out I thrashed a hero with stacks of creatures that pounded my army to 2 bone dragons and 3 poison spawns. Thinking that I'd beaten the pulp outta the strongest hero of their colour, out popped out of nowhere another Hero (with a capital "H" for special emphasis!) with another throng of bone dragons and devils. Oh. Crap. That's when I clicked on "save game" and "quit". Heck. I hate being proven wrong.

Then again, I can't wait for heroes of might and magic 5 to be released!! *hops around the room* Look at the stunning shots of the angels below.

Angel with army.

Oh gee. I think I just wet my pants looking at the archangel. Isn't he gorgeous?

Angel in action! RAWR.

"Taste the tip of my sword, you flaming bugger!" *flaps wings regally* Awwwww!

For now, I think I'll settle with Heroes 4 and a good cone of ice-cream by my side. Don't forget the book! Cheerios! =)

So...this is it?

End of promos.

There, I've said it. And no - no cheering crowds, no scintillating fireworks after the *painful* biology paper, no laughter, no...

Just plain numbness. I didn't know whether I should really be happy now that it's the end of the promos. I know my results this time round are going to be abysmal, especially chem and bio. *shudders* God help me.

"You have fifteen minutes left."

How calmly she said it. I could have screamed there and then. Deja vu? I haven't even touched my essays yet. Turned out I did the photosynthesis question and managed to pull off the 6 mark question pretty well. As for the evil 14 mark question that went "Explain the structure of chloroplast in relation to its role in photosynthesis" or something like that, I just spammed everything I knew about the chloroplast. Sporadic ideas no doubt, but bio doesn't mark for fluency. Just points. ARRRRRRGH. They're marking the scripts of people in the Biology Olympiad first. That means they're going to see how horrible I did - personally. I'm faintly trying to suppress another scream.

Forgot about it for the afternoon. Call it selective amnesia - a good form of painkiller. Made a trip to the Esplanade and borrowed four really nice scorebooks. YAY! Norah Jones, Jim Brickman, Sound of Music and George Gershwin. Yippee!

Alright. Now for the results to be released. I'd roll over and shrivel up in embarrassment on the day itself. A mutation, no less...due to environmental stresses!!

Till next time...Be safe. LOL.

One last massacre - in 15 hours.

Down to the final paper!! Woohoo!! Actually, I'm not even sure whether I should be on knees bawling my eyes out or leaping for joy because one, I think I screwed up chemistry for good this time round. Say bye-bye to the chem "S" paper. Two, it's biology tomorrow and I'm suffering from Information Overload. Time to convince myself that I am going to be pass biology with a C tomorrow. At least. Or so I hope.

Maths turned out better than I thought! For once, I wasn't stoning in front of my paper, thinking how on earth people actually turn into mathematicians. That word should be censored. Good golly! All the tanx and secx and and...

Well. 'Nuff said about maths. I think if I don't make those careless mistakes that creep in from nowhere, I should be able to secure at least a C for maths this time round. One giant creep from the promos exterminated. Go me.

Then again, they say "promos are evil". How true - especially when you see the devilish level of the chemistry paper today. *rolls eyes* It was what I would call "a moment to remember". So deja vu, like my Geography O levels. Everything goes into a blur, you wonder why the hell you studied so hard for when you don't even have time to write down everything you know and you just feel like dying on the spot when the teacher announces oh-so-calmly over the mike that "you have 15 minutes left." My heart literally skipped a beat then. From that moment on, it was just a mad rush of words. Spamming as many things as I can before time runs out. There goes my paper. There goes my effort in sustaining at least an A average for chem CA. Great. Freakin' jump over the moon moment.

French was comparatively better. Monsieur Kou was a charm in asking such "easy" questions.

Do you think the youths in Singapore are particularly apathetic about politics? Is it a problem with the education system?

Stun number two...

You mentioned reforms in France. Do you think all the educational reforms make sense? What do you think about the streaming exam at primary 4 and at secondary two? Are they effective and beneficial for all students?

From then on, I can only remember myself going "dies. dies. dies. dies." and my speech became very much garbled and my grammar was so horrid I think my other examiner just cringed on the spot. She didn't ask a single question. Just sat down there and stared, penning notes from time to time. Something tells me there was much more to her stare. Glare really!

Oh well. That being that, monsieur actually said "c'est bon. merci!" (that's good. thank you.) at the end of the oral exam - which makes me half suspect whether he said it to half the other candidates as well! Haha...you never know. That false sense of security can actually prove to be a deceitful friend...making you think you made it when you actually didn't.

=)) Biology. I should smile more. Makes the tension go away. Indeed. =))

Hope I can pull through tomorrow's paper in one piece. No more screw ups.

I'm trying to talk to keep the tension away.

Temporary hiatus

Oh well! I'm officially sick of the loads of economics notes that I've gotta digest by tomorrow morning - by hook or by crook. As of now, I haven't got desperate yet to do it by the crook way. Let's hope it stays that way, yeah. ;)

Grooving now to Claude François' "Alexandrie Alexandra"! Totally rocks! Haha...One of the immersion programme guys sent it to the people in the programme. Yeeeeeeah, baby! =)

A look back on General Paper Promos on Friday. I thought I did ok...At least I made a very valiant attempt in trying to paraphrase and replace all the words in the passage to my own words. Tough crap. I was amused, to say the least, when I saw that the essay paper didn't contain even one question on the social moral issues that I studied so hard for the day before. =(( Muttered "damn" under my breath and chose the quote, "Nothing that is worth knowing can be taught" to do instead. Hope I didn't screw up my essay this time round! It's so crucial to do well for the essay paper since it's what determines a B from a C, essentially.

Kids are so funny. I went to church today as usual and in my church, there's such a thing as a community lunch where everyone stays back to have lunch in the church. So, I was waiting to get my dessert when there was this little boy, of perhaps 5 years of age, trying his hardest to draw as much syrup into his bowl using the ladle. Thinking that he was going to pick the peaches later on, he didn't. Not a single peach! Haha!! How amusing! It's like the same ol' "chicken rice without chicken" analogy. Lol!

Technically, I shouldn't be anywhere near this computer. But ahhhhh heck. =D I'm taking a fiver.

I hope tomorrow's econs paper isn't a boo-boo. Please don't let it be one!! I need my econs grade, if only to make my report card look better. You know what they say about the "D" printed in bold next to the blasted word "Mathematics". UGH.