Animated Stardust

I guess the first week of real A levels passed rather uneventfully, well maths was as easy as prelims and I will always cross my fingers for GP, so that comes as no surprise either. Life goes on rather monotonously now, if at all. Maybe I shall have a movie/TV series marathon after A's just mindless + junkfood activities. Hmm speaking of junk food, I dropped below 60kg for the first time in like 3 years, fear of NS ftw ><. Buying a Canon 50D with Tamron 17-55 f/2.8 soon, can't wait to try it, I feel pro just by reciting the specs . I had my second A level-related nightmare: Erm I took all the random subject (marine biology, for instance, and Hindi, for another instance) and needless to say I failed terribly, I don't know if there is any Freudian concept behind it, and I may not want to know it in the first place. I'm planning on a holiday booklist, mainly popular science, non-fiction, some science fiction books all ideas are welcome.
Leoninds meteor shower is coming on 17-18Nov, some rumours say peak ZHR rate exceeds 500 per hour, which is pure madness (or pure joy depends on your perspective), since I have no papers on 18 Nov (HAHA econs ppl), I'll be watching it.
Chem and physics left, shouldn't be much trouble, the worst is already over.
p.s.Week in review sounds very corporate for some reason. meh.

Three score and twelve months ago,
Perhaps it’s Fate’s imperceptible hand.
That let chance the nostalgic green tag
And unlocked the gates to a wonderful land.

 “Ruhe bitte!” Written on the floor,
In big bold blaring brushstrokes.
“Deutsch ist einfach.” Was her first phrase.
Oh well, Frau Tan and her little jokes.

Through the years we recited guttural words,
Like a horrible actor without his scripts.
With dear “Mr Nice guy”, and our DotA games,
Memories which recall smiles to our lips.

Came end of Sec 4, soon enough,
when some of us chose H2.
As our love for the Germanic tongue,
Slowly but surely grew.

As people always say, “save the best for last”
I guess sometimes it holds true,
For we ventured out of the classroom,
And donned our travelling shoe.

It was under a chilly Franfurter night,
Faced with a cosmos of stars,
That I realised:
That all the world’s a stage,
And ours, alas, is one without bars.

Apologies for the slightly contrived rhyming

German A level is over, and so ends my 6 years of thirs languae. I think certainly it has been extraordinary, when I stepped into MOELC I had never imagined today, with a group of extraordinary people learning an extraordinary language.Peerhaps as Josephine said, we may not wish to continue in the future, we may not even remember the language, but what we have is the priceless memories of the people and place and the things we have had together.

Feeling quote poetic, but can't come up with good lines :(

The walls, within which echoed our carefree laughter,
the paths, upon which we walked countless sunsets.

Crunch time has come. Krisenzeit ist hier.
For the first time in 6 years I am facing something as scary as PSLE, more scary in fact. My Rafflsian journey has transformed me in more ways than I can ever imaginge, and it surely left indelible memories of my deeds and misdeeds. But crunch time is really, really here, the very last game to be played in these grounds, and I am going to win.
Consequently, this will be one of the many periods during which I shall lose my life (figuratively). I guess this spells a hiatus for my blog here. Or I may call it an end to the secondary-school type of blogging, maybe I shall redesign a new blog when I have the time and effort and Dreamweaver CS4, and well, no more Windows Live Spaces. Maybe Wordpress, I'm leaving my options open.
p.s. All girls like pink, I am committing that age-old stereotype, ain't I?

Hectic week. Got back prelim results, ended on a low though. But if I tell people they'll probably scream at me, so yeah. SAT IIs this Saturday, trying to find some mugging time for that. And I only have 17 days left till A Levels. Omytian, that sounds awfully near. Exceedingly, unbelievably near.
p.s.Must settle GP, and I won't take no for an answer.

It has been a decadent week, and I passed my Napfa test finally yay!

Today is Mid-autumn festival, today's full moon, dubbed the "Harvest Moon" as it signals the end of harvest for Northern Hemisphere. It is a prosperous, happy occasion, with families gathered under the mid-autumn moon, sharing tales from time immemorial. There is just that  something with toddlers carrying lanterns and scampering around the dinner table that emanates that festive joy. Oh wells. Another autumn has passed, and in tropical Singapore you don't feel a thing, not a browning leaf, nor a sprinkle of frost, it's humid, monotonous summer all year round.

And this year's Ig Noble Awards came out yesterday, the ceremony, organised by the magazine Annals of Improbable Research, honours scientific achievements that first make people laugh and then make them think. here is the Daily Mail Article.

I'm especially interested in the biology prize - "Fumiaki Taguchi, Song Guofu and Zhang Guanglei of Kitasato University graduate school of medical sciences in Japan share the prize for demonstrating that kitchen waste can be reduced by more than 90% by using bacteria extracted from giant panda excrement. Taguchi suspected panda faeces must contain bacteria capable of breaking down even the hardiest of foods because of the bear's vast consumption of bamboo." Yes you read right, panda poo. Well We all know Pandas are soooo cute, but panda poo, nah I'll pass.

Had German oral yesterday, kinda screwed it, got asked by the examiner to describe F1 in SIngapore, like totally wtf ><. But the thing is, I had a dream (nightmare) on Thursday night that I was going to screw my oral, and I wrote it down in my dream diary, and it happened. *bitter laughter* Why is the future so hard to predict, when all our worst fear just keep on coming true?

Next Monday is judgment day, I'm getting most of my prelim results back, omsd I'm tense.

Watched Inglourious Basterds yesterday, ended up in the Middle of Orchard Road at 12.15 in the middle of the night, no MRT, no buses, and no, I did not run home. Great film, outrageously ridiculous and yet quite funny at the same time, what's more there are swathes of German (and French) conversations which I try my best not to look at the subtitles, I can catch about 75% of what they are saying, and it's Hitler we're talking about here. Though I might have some preconceived ideas about bullshit joker war films, this one is an exemplary example of an exception to the rule.

Sometimes people do crazy things, against all their better judgment, against all reason, against the weight of history, all for the thrill of the moment, and the self-appreciative sense of achievement. But sometimes it is indeed from these crazy things that we learn lessons to better ourselves for what the future holds, when we throw caution into the wind, we embrace a whole new prairie of possibilities otherwise forbidden by the iron stronghold of reason, and the rest is simply magic.

p.s. Controlling my mooncake intake now, siao 1 mooncake is like 500 calories, that like 2x 2.4km runs!

Humans are collectors, rememberers, holders of the past. Our reluctance to give up one old pattern, one old thought, one old memory, is so deeply a part of our make-up, that the ability to move forward is already impeded beyond any further action.

Our momentoes become an historical prison, dooming us to the repetition, or near repetition of our past. What we believe worked no longer works, because we cannot go back to where we were. A memory is nothing more than than a myth of what we wish to believe, not a record of what really happened. What we recall is what we want to recall and the longer we are removed in time and experience from the original experience, the more distorted the picture.

This is one reason we keep repeating war. In time, no matter how horrible the war has been, we outgrow it. Instead of seeing the horror we change the picture to heroics and weave strange and mystical tales of our victories and conquests. And when the stories begin to lose their meaning, we have another war.

Well, (most of ) the prelims are over, chem was a three-for-the-price-of-one massacre, physics was easier than expected, so is math. Hmm I think I've secured a few A's, hope can get a good grade for GP. Speaking of GP, it Grand Prix Weekend! Fast cars ftw! Every F1 season is a reminder for me to get a better camera and lens, haiz, need to invest lots of money and time, which I lack both now (okay maybe not the money if I can talk to my father about funding).
WANT TO GO LAN OVER THE WEEKEND! Anyone organizing can tell me.
p.s. H3 Physics next monday, oh wells, always knew I was going to fail it.

Had some rum yesterday night . There is a rich bull-bodied smell lingering in my mug long after it is drained, no wonder it is the favourite for sailors (and pirates) on the high seas. Reminded be of "dead Man's Chest":

"Fifteen men on the dead man's chest--
...Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!
Drink and the devil had done for the rest--
...Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!"

a bottle of rum indeed.
p.s. Wish me luck for math tomorrow, I'll be needing all of it.

Taking a breather after mugging the whole prelim week, Math paper 1 was decent, physics paper 3 was rather easy but I'm not confident of either of the above; Chem paper 3 was horrible and plus all the stupid mistakes I made I don't dare to hope for much. Physics paper 2 was moderately hard but I finished with 10 seconds to spare so there is a lot of room for careless mistakes. Got an A for German, my highest A in like 5 years, which is somewhat a morale-booster, proves that my Deutsche Welle listening stuff actually worked. yay.
But the harder half of prelims is coming up, statistics will forever be a nightmare omg sianz, and there is H3 physics, which I'm doomed to fail. X_X.
p.s. I just realised it is really good stamina training to run from my house to CCAB and train there, but my calves have been aching the past day, pushed myself too hard I guess.
p.s. I can do 7 pull-ups now, what a zero-to-hero story!

So far so good I guess, though I am not exactly confident of the past two papers but I think I did reasonably okay. I just realised how much my previous posts were so mugging-centred and yet in the height of the prelims I don't really feel muggerish anymore, sianz. Lucas used to say "sianz" in Singlish functions similarly to "doch" in German, hmm but I think "doch" still triumphs in the diversity in meaning, haha.
The haze is really bad today, I think the visibility from my house is like 6-7km, sianz.
Nowadays the only thing separating a pro photographer from a noob one is the camera, the lens and perhaps just a tiny bit of skill, but all hail the Canon 7D! (and the to some extent S90, seriously, f/2.0-4.9 28-105mm lens, you've got to be kidding me)
p.s. This monologue sounds horrible.

Went running at CCAB just now, damn there are really hell a lot of good cars racing down Bukit Timah, just listening to those V6 or V8 purring away is enough to get one's heart racing. And the best part of the afternoon: I was THIS CLOSE to the bonnet of a Ferrari F599, like THIS CLOSE, omg. It looks splendid, absolutely splendid, confirm plus chop. The Ferrari red, the deadly powerful purr of the engine, the smoke from the tail pipe, it is like staring down a predator down the eye. Ohhh adrenaline, adrenaline. Hmph, I thought the Ferrari California looks really good, but the F599 isn't bad, isn't bad at all.
p.s. okay maybe I'm a little deprived of life here due to all the mugging that has been going on...

We face choices every day of our lives, and with every one of them comes an assortment of consequences, good ones and bad ones. It is rather like a set meal, no a la carte allowed. But it is indeed human nature to look forward to the summer of sunshine and gripe about the days of rain, it always seem that the greener grass grows on the other side, doesn't it? That is because one only sees its beauty when the sun is out, and one glosses over the overcast days which brings the water of nourishment. It is an imperative that one learns to accept the consequences of the choices, be it good or bad, and be detached from the choices forgone, the opportunity cost will remain forever as an opportunity cost. It is so easy for one to admire the heaven on the other side, but - when done admiring- realise also, that the hellhole one thinks he is living in, it may be heaven in disguise.