I have decided to use "the feeling of non-obligation to an arbitrary and over-commercialised festival" as an excuse not to send out any midwinter greetings to anyone around.
Yes, you see the title right. Updates, for real. No abstract sentences that only yours truly will understand, for this entry at least.
To make things easier for dear readers to read, I shall categorise what I want to update in topical order (which is also easier for me to write):
House. Yes, finally. We have moved over to our house at Tampines St 71 with effect from late August 2011. My brothers and I now share the same room, but since my younger brother is in Hong Kong for his exchange and I am in my hall most of the time, my elder brother will have time to get used to sharing a room (since he had his own room at ah ma's for a number of years). And plenty of time to get used to my semi-neurotic mum =X It will be interesting to see how our family's system will change over the course of time with new factors in the picture =P.
School. As expected, the amount of workload increases with the number of years tagged to my NTU identity. Not that I cannot handle them, but sometimes the lazy me just can't be bothered to be more hardworking in getting things done quickly. For this semester: 3 group projects, 6 essays of varying length, 2 more quizzes and many readings. Not a lot, really, but. But. When Steam is around... Many times, it is a fight between "ohhh the research article is interesting! I should read more..." and "One more hour, after I kick this bugger off his fortress". I will coin this the "knowledge sponge / gamer dilemma".
Fencing. I am very looking forward to the coming Fencing Novices next January since I feel that I have that bit of chance in getting something shiny back. But of course I will still need to get used to my new blade and its grip. I have switched to a new type of grip, from pistol to french (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grip_(sport_fencing)). It will give me a longer range of attack to further complement my height advantage, as well as my style of play (which is mainly avoiding the opponent's blade). But I will still be keeping my La Calabrone as my reserve blade in case anything happens to Glacial Rose (yes I gave those names to my blades). Meanwhile, I shall (and hopefully can) make my every training count, especially so when my J4 lessons end at 7 plus.
Toastmaster. I have finally reached P10 after chiong-ing for the past two semesters. But now, I have absolutely no idea what I can do for my 'inspiring speech' as a criteria for its completion. And thus the procrastination (as well as reluctance to cough out the membership renewal fees). I had an initial idea of "What's in your name?" as a speech title but... the overall speech idea seems to be lacking in punch. So... back to the blank page again. >.<|||
People. Many of us know that it is impossible to try to please everyone. And given my very limited social cognitive resource that consistently clashes with the illusional need to be on good terms with everyone, I am glad to say that I am slowly but surely learning to focus on who matters to me more while not be too bothered by my own perceived negativities around me (real or imagined). It is ironic that my sensitivities allows me to be aware that I am socially inept, yet couldn't do much about it. I suppose that I will have to align my awareness and skills along the way so that I can survive.
Meanwhile, for those who are still around tolerant of all my inconsistent bullshit, you have my greatest gratitude.
Matters of the heart. Twenty three years doesn't sound like a very long time, if I were to look back at it. I could still count the number of heartbreaks I have using my two hands, but I definitely hope that it will not go beyond that. I don't know. Even though I say to myself that I will go stronger each time I heal myself. Even though I remind myself of that story to keep myself going. Sometimes, I might dowse myself in the middle of the lake and let the emotions sink, again and again. Or I will swim up to the shore and snap out of it and move on with life.
And sometimes, I wonder. Is my heart really getting stronger after each regeneration?
Writing. Besides the new SMRT-SBS measure that I had tons of fun writing (see http://truestoriesnot.blogspot.com/2011/08/breaking-news-smrt-and-sbs-announced.html), I am in a writing drought, again. Haven't had the discipline to sit down in front of my laptop, open a new word document, and write (and I am already having some trouble trying to finish this entry properly). Again, the writer - gamer dilemma in this case holds true too, though most of the time the gamer manage to headshot the writer off his chair >.< At least currently, I 'commissioned' myself to write a story for my project as a base for a multimedia presentation. Therefore, I will have to force myself to write something decent to keep that little reputation that I have intact. Heh. Perhaps I should 'commission' myself to do more of such things in future to keep myself and my metaphorical pen going.
Future plans. I am currently quite decided on my top 2 career choices. The second choice will be to land a decent position in Health Promotion Board so that I could do something to help raise the awareness of taking care of ourselves. Of course I understand that it will not be easy to improve health awareness among people living in this fast paced society, and it took me quite a while before I could be convinced to do the same (and thus on my meatless weekdays as part of it). I am quite impressed by HPB's approach in getting people to become healthier one step at the time (using meaning short films and catchy ads), and hope to carry on their good work if given a chance to do so. And as for my first 'dream' job... heh. No fourth person will know until I really get it since I am not so sure if I am qualified for it in the first place =X.
The thing about meeting up with best friends is, no matter how much miscommunication resulting in 2 hour long wait, missed trains and long walking times, all the resentment and frustrations disappear at the moment we see each other.
