Waking up to a huge surprise

Posted: 00:02 hrs (GMT+8)

I woke up around 9 this morning and felt rather good about it. Looking forward to a relaxing day, my peace was soon shattered by an SMS from my classmate. Apparently my tutorial tomorrow had been shifted to this morning and my classmate realised everyone else hadn’t found out when she was the only student in class after an hour. After confirming the change in timetable, I rushed out of my house without stopping for breakfast. I’m not sure if it mattered much, as in the end nothing substantial was covered in class.

This stupid hiccup happened as the students were expecting email updates from the school when changes were made to the timetable while the school expected us to login to the school website and check for updates on our own.

Misunderstandings are troublesome and just make everyone annoyed.

Although I will be checking the school website more often from now on, it doesn’t make me any less annoyed with the school.

@_@

Posted: 03:00 hrs (GMT+8)

GAH I AM TIRED. DIE, DRAFT FOR ESSAY DUE TOMORROW, DIEEEEE…

Truth be told, it’s not as insane as when I was doing my Final Year Project.

When I graduate, I’m going to shred it.

Redundant

Posted: 12:58 hrs (GMT+8)

I recently had trouble accessing a website that’s required for my current module. I thought I was the only one but turns out several of my classmates had similar problems. The technical team sent a mass email after they fixed the problem. Here’s an extract.

Dear Valued Customer,

We would like to apologize for the outage of our web products this past week. We know this may have disrupted your and your student’s schedules, and for that, we just feel terrible. In fact, we’ve made a huge investment over the last year to ensure that our Web environment is scalable, redundant, and secure.

Initially, I wondered why they would want their website to be pointless and obsolete. A quick check with Answers.com gave me this definition.

“Computer Desktop Encyclopedia: redundancy

Having a secondary peripheral, computer system or network device that takes over when the primary unit fails. See fault tolerant, mirroring, RAID, hot standby and backup types.”

Well then. I learn something new every day.

What did I expect for $2?

Posted: 20:19 hours (GMT+8)

It was only today, as I made concrete plans to use it for the first time, that I realised there was a slight possibility that my bento box was way too small. I had forgotten to factor in the huge appetite of the intended user.

Sigh. Time to make another trip to Daiso. I might as well get myself some sauce containers and a bento belt while I’m there.

No, that’s not a cupcake - But it can be!

Posted: 20:21 hours (GMT+8)

This is the humble kueh pie tee cup. I’m in love with how it tastes (like keropok or rice crackers). It’s great how you can put whatever filling you want into it! The last time I made potato salad, I put it into these cups and they went very well together. I regret not taking a picture that time. Now that I’m into experimenting with food, I’m planning to get more of these to experiment with other recipes.

I’ve joined a Livejournal community about bentos. Granted, a bento is really just a fancy lunchbox, but usually there is a great deal more of creativity and effort that goes into the presentation. Just looking at the pictures of other people’s inventions has me itching to try my own. I don’t really know how to cook but that won’t stop me from trying to improvise.

Sick

Posted: 19:30 hours (GMT+8)

On Saturday, 31st May, I went for the SPDJ F.O. Camp. I had the option of taking a taxi home… But as you can guess I didn’t. I stayed over and I’ve been regretting that decision for a while.

I spent 3 hours sleeping in a cold classroom. Instead of using my jacket to cover my body, I used it as a pillow. I caught a cold (but I wouldn’t find out for a while).

The next day, Sunday, I met Mr Random and Ming Yang to watch Indiana Jones. I went home feeling rather feverish.

I spent the following week sick. I had a fluctuating body temperature and ended up popping lots of paracetemol to counter it. It didn’t quite work. After coughing the whole night, I demanded that my father bring me to see the doctor.

So Tuesday we went to the polyclinic near my house. Bad idea. The (possibly inexperienced) doctor didn’t even listen to my breathing. She just concluded from my (verbally-given) symptoms that it was the common flu. So I went home with somewhat useful medicine that didn’t really help much.

2 days later, I went to a private clinic. This guy did everything that a doctor should do and sent me home with antibiotics.

Since I felt better, I went for Lime’s dance recital on Saturday (7 June) with Ming Yang. It was strange to wear shoes again after being stuck at home for so long. He observed that I was coughing the entire time. I went home with a fever.

By Tuesday, I thought I was indeed getting better so I went out for another movie. Kung Fu Panda was so totally not worth getting a high fever for. Ming Yang was quite fed up with how sick I was and dragged me to the doctor for a second time. This time, he pulled out the big guns and prescribed me an extremely expensive box of antibiotics. There were 10 pills in total and averaged out, I was paying $3.50 per pill. Being sick is expensive.

It’s Monday now and I guess I’m finally better. My parents aren’t too happy with me falling sick repeatedly so I’m banned from going out until after my exam this Saturday.

Bah.

I have a whole box at home, thanks

Posted: 20:12 hrs (GMT+8)

Who are these weird people and why do they keep trying to sell me a single paperclip? I don’t know where they’re from, what game they’re participating in or what charity (if any, but apparently there isn’t) that they’re supporting.

I bought one for a dollar (you can give any amount you want) to see if it was magical. It was bent into a rounded “y” shape but otherwise was ordinary.

Craving for ice kachang

Posted: 02:01 hrs (GMT+8)

Today was the official launch of the Moberly Block at SP. Well that sure took long enough, considering the soft launch was over months ago.

It was themed to colonial times. There were (fake) soldiers as ushers and (real) ex-British soldiers. The guest of honour was Paul Madden, the British High Commissioner of Singapore. Ethnic or tradional wear was the dress code. I ignored it and went for the alternative on the list; smart casual. I needn’t have bothered as most of the other invited students dressed pretty casually.

Food was served from individual stalls, similiar to street hawkers from the colonial era. They had “traditional” food such as ice kachang, kueh pie tie, beef stew, barbecued meat and more. The queues were really long so I only managed to try the ice kachang (reminded me why I have a sweet tooth) and beef stew (…chewy).

We could leave anytime we wanted, which was a good thing because I was getting bored. The lights in the SPDJ clubroom were switched on so I went there.

Long story short, I realised again how much I love the turntables.

Today was also my last day at work since I’ll be starting class on this coming Monday. I’m excited, nervous and scared. I know for sure it won’t be anything like poly.

At least I’m moving forward in life somehow.

Coordinator

Posted: 22:48 hrs (GMT+8)

I didn’t want to waste my time before my school starts just slacking away. A quick phone call landed me in a temporary job as… A telemarketer. They call me a coordinator but it’s really the same thing, lots of calling all day. Yeah, I’m that annoying person that calls you asking if you want to sell or rent your hou-*toot* *toot* *toot*.

It sucks. I’m paid really little to be a nuisance to total strangers, some of whom decide they need an ego boost by slamming the phone on me. Call it karma but back in primary school, I used to hang up the phone on my classmate who expected me to act as his homework list… Every single day. He finally gave up after a couple of months or so.

Some of the people I’ve called are downright rude. I’m polite (really, if I weren’t I’d be fired by now) but they decide to vent their anger from being disturbed by scolding or yelling at me. The first few times, I felt rather down. However, I soon grew midly amused by it. Ooh, she just hung up on me! Score one for the bigots! Now there’s one more person in the world feeling much better about themselves for being an asshole to someone who won’t even care about it by the next phone call. I hope when you do decide to rent or sell your house, you get a total f***ing asshole as your agent. …Hello, am I speaking to Mr…, I’m Ruby from…

And so on and so forth.

Disclaimer: I’m just a bit offended, but only for these few seconds. I don’t really mean what I said. Because if I really wanted them to have a total f***ing asshole for an agent, I’d save their details and bide my time.

Sometimes, I’d come across a ray of sunshine. These are the nice and/or really polite people who answer my call. Now, I’m really convinced that it’s true; you are able to hear a smile over the phone. They have an instant uplifting effect on my mood. It’s like <fill in your own metaphor here>.

Fortunately, people are more or less just slightly annoyed when they receive my call. Unless you’re obviously some Ah Beng (chav, punk, whatever you want to call it) and you get a call in the middle of the day from a stranger asking for Mrs Ranju.

Sunned and dried

Posted: 21:00 hrs (GMT+8)

I disappear for a few weeks and WordPress changes it’s admin layout completely. I feel lost.

So yeah, I just came back from my trip yesterday morning. Went to San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego. You’d think that would be a lot of luggage but it’s not. You just have to be willing to wear the same shirt more than once and wash a few things.

I’m too lazy to unpack completely. There’s now a small pile of clothes and other assorted souvenirs on my bed. As usual, I’ll have to shove them somewhere else so I can sleep, then shove them back onto my bed when I wake up. My room really is that small.

I still feel a bit tired. Travelling takes a lot of energy. In America, everyone drives everywhere, even if it’s just for a few minutes. It feels funny to walk now.

I got both sunburnt and dry skin from the cold weather. The skin on the back of my hands is very damaged. The cracks have scarred so it looks as if I rolled down a hill and scratched myself against thorny bushes.

I have sunglasses now! It’s so damn sunny over there, it’s impossible to live without a pair. I’m wondering if I’ll carry on the habit here.

Ming Yang had given me a plushie to keep me company during my trip. I brought it back safely and he’s now plotting its demise in case I get a little too attached to it. Haha.

Did I mention I’m really tired?

* * * * *

I’ve confirmed my course for mass communications at MDIS. I’ll be starting next month. I’m nervous as I have zero background mass comm. I will have to study very hard during the next 2 years or so just to be on par with the others.

We’re almost 1/3 through the year, everyone. What does the rest of 2008 have in store? I don’t really want to be surprised.