oh, what a wonderful world.

My kids at the centre have been planning for weeks for the programme next Saturday in celebration of Teacher's Day and guess what. We're all gonna get sabotaged on that day. Highlights include flour, water and even cockroaches! And I can't make it. Sigh. I just hope the psc seminar is going to be worth my trip down to town.

The kid I'm mentoring is showing progress so that deserves some good hurray-ing. He's pretty bright, but he's not careful enough in his work. What's with 12 year old kids thinking that their mental sums are as good as a calculator's and that they can multiply two two-digit numbers in their heads? And what's with them not drawing their models? Sheesh. I wish he'd just draw the models since they help so much. Ok, second best alternative to algebra, but seriously, 12 year olds don't exactly dig the whole idea of x being anything. Leave the real/complex number thing to another day.

Point being, I wish I could inspire him enough to realise that hard work comes from within, not without. At least that's something I've learnt over the years. I can throw him tough papers and slave-drive him by asking him to do 10 problem sums, but if he doesn't want the grades bad enough, there's no way I can ensure that he works hard enough to attain them! Is there even a way I can bring that across to him without sounding too preachy?

I wonder.

***

Life's been a great Bore and all I'm doing is mugging, mugging and more mugging. I've been alternating between chemistry and maths...and some occassional econs to break the continual drag of calculating pH or finding the area/volume of some complex looking integral. Yucks. Bio's been looking good, especially considering I can still remember what the hell "stabilising selection" is without looking at my notes! Another cause for hurray-ing.

***

SAT IIs are up on October 14th and I'm planning to take those. I know, I know, I'm fickle about whether I should go US or UK (assuming I can even pull together my finances to make it there), but fact is, I very much prefer a broad-based education that US colleges offer. Yep. And that's no point cutting off my options so early. I'm going to do Chemistry, Maths II and French (which is quite retarded, but oh well.). Variety is key. And since chemistry and maths II are pretty much A level, I shouldn't have too much of a problem revising for those. Yep.

Now the problem should be how I'm going to break the news to Miss Chua that I'm planning to apply to the US...without irritating the hell outta her. I know many students are plaguing her for references, but...ack. I just pray I don't give her too much trouble. Sheesh.

***

And just to remind myself.

- NJC chem paper 3
- Market structures (sloman + notes)
- Pack my table, which is in a complete mess!
- Read notes from "For and Against"

***

Coffee, yes.

just need that little spark.

I've been receiving quite a bit of mail from this Pangya (what a dumb name!) crap and it's tempting me to play! Can't afford that now at this crucial moment! I've yet to set goals for myself this prelims, but realistically speaking, I think I'm going to set higher goals for myself this time round to spur myself! Yes, go me.

Chemistry S today was great. You know what? I think the S papers are always a humbling experience. It reminds me of so much that I've yet to know...but I love the challenge. And it's kinda fun seeing how everyone in the whole lecture theatre gets stuck at the same part in a particular question, how some brainiacs can score like 18/20 for an organic chemistry test...and so much more. It's like, when I look at all the brilliant people around me, I'm motivated to work even harder to push myself to surpass my own limits. I know I have what it takes to score at least one distinction in chem S, I just need time (and a whole lot of it at that!) to revise thoroughly the core syllabus and revising the common extra knowledge needed. ARGH. A race against time, as always.

Ironing the clothes is a pain in the butt! I hate it. And I hate how there are so many holes in the pants especially since my brother plays football in them. Sheesh. Now I have to iron my uniform every single night and it's no fun trying to lug the iron board out of the storeroom and faithfully putting it back after ironing two pieces of uniform. Sigh.

Am watching the 9pm show on Channel 8! I think the plot's pretty dry, and people keep repeating what they say. Significantly, two of the characters, one of whom is married and the other is single and "fishing" for men, keep discussing about the roles of married women versus single women and how married women are disadvantaged at the workplace. Like every single time they meet. How corny is that? I swear I've heard the phrase "I believe women should get married" no less than 5 times in their conversation. Sheesh. Even real people get bored talking about the same thing everytime. I can write better scripts.

"we warmly invite you to..."

It's been a good month since I've written here and hell, I just feel like I need to release all that pent up thoughts over the past month. It hasn't been easy, what with all the rushed tutorials (bio!) and NAPFA worries.

Let's take it one at a time.

Hm. I passed NAPFA! Yes, I know, that is like a divine right of impossibly fit people in sports CCAs but for me, I struggle every year with this mid-year crisis. And this year, the trouble spots happened to be the Standing Bleeding Broad Jump and surprisingly, the run. I've never really had much trouble with my run ever since sec one but the SBJ...that one goes back a long way. And it's going to haunt me all the way till my National Service is over. So I'm just going to hop more. And hop further, damn it.

11 people in my class, including yours truly, were "invited" out of class to complete our bio(!) tutorial. 5 essay questions in about 45 min. Ok, given she didn't expect us to complete all 5 in 45 minutes, but it was a pain, seriously. Especially what with this being my second time. The first time, I really just clean forgotten the wrong assignment, on the wrong day. She usually doesn't get so mad as to throw people out, even if you don't complete your tutorial or come without your tys, but that day, let's just say she woke up feeling a little grumpier than normal. And she came up with that particular worksheet herself, so I forgive her for that "how could you not have done my work" outburst which eventually led to the Great Exodus to the library.

BUT TODAY, I don't think I deserved to be thrown out of class! I completed 3 essay questions, which is seriously more than what she can go through in an hour, much less 40 minutes. And she had to demand that we complete 5 questions. That's why bio is scary. It's like a Russian roulette...and I'm not sure whether I'm really ready to take a gamble every single tutorial. Well, most of my friends don't anyway. We complete her work. Then you have Tutorial Overkill - 204 marks worth of essays and you seriously think to yourself, she really expects us to finish all of that in one weekend?

Ok. 5 minutes of ranting up. Zip.

ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH.

***

Got invited to several other scholarship talks, like SAFOS, which I don't think I qualify for considering my scant regard to completing my 2.4km run in under ten minutes, and also the PSC scholarship. Alright, I do need the scholarship, but I don't think I'm exactly really hard up for one. Going overseas to study would be a wonderful oppurtunity, but at the end of the day, that's not half of the contract between you and the scholarship body. It's about choosing a career and not whether you can run along to your fancy, big-name university to rattle off in Philosophy, Economics, Mathematics (oh horrors.) or what have you. I think I need to give more thought to that. 6 bleeding years is a long time - and all it takes is one wrong step.

Just taking my time with that.

***

Piano has been coming along well. I can feel my Mozart sonata improving! Yay! It's more than just playing the notes, it's about the control, the touch, the whole simplicity in the playing that can only be achieved after rigorous practice. Just darn the fact that I have hardly any time to play the piano nowadays, except during the weekends to amuse myself. And to take a break from biology. (Now, we wonder why!)

***

School has been good. I met up with my church friends and my immersion programme friends and we had a good time playing A**hole Daidee and also, talking endlessly at Black Canyon Coffee. Oh yes. Good times. I just wish I could spend more time with my buddy, who's so unfortunately trapped in RJ. We made a pact that if I get into NUS medicine (oh dear Lord, PLEASE!!) and if she gets into Law, then we'll both go to NUS together and have a frolicking time. Afterall, I left RJ after three months and she had to enter RJ after 3 months. Most unfortunate timing.

***

Resolution : To read more after the A levels. And to read just a weeeee bit after the prelims. I need to tickle my brain a little. Figuratively speaking, of course.