Truths of Old

And then as they danced, she put her arms around his neck and said quietly, I'd better not fall in love with you.
He looked her in the eyes, and smiled.

Wednesday, December 28, 2005
Happiness and Grief
Happiness?"after (the ex), have u been happy?"Happiness, like grief, is such a subjective thing.Have I been happy? I think I've been happier. I learnt to laugh again, and I learnt to appreciate my liberty, and my own company more.In between I've had the usual share of frustrations, almost attractions, disappointments, and peroids of anger and upset.I've laughed a lot, but I haven't really been laughing for real ... from that elusive place deep inside me where true happiness emanates from.That's something I've been missing ever since K.

*****

I found happiness again, after K.
I really did.

Tuesday, February 28, 2006

Life in mono- is waking up alone, and going to work alone.Reading the messages that appear on my mobile, and grimacing to myself, sometimes.Driving past Brazil (all you can eat meat) and smiling absently to myself.Remembering what it was like to hold, and be held by her. Especially when the world seemed to be crumbling apart around me - somehow just being in her arms made it all seem all right again.Somehow things really did seem easier when she was around.

Life in mono - is tiding through the still of the night with a paper in my hand, and a void by my side, where she used to be.

*********

Monday, December 25, 2006

I was so wrong.

Without Grace

Life in Silence -
Waking up alone, going to work alone.
No more messages on my mobile.
Battling the demons in my head, alone, now.

Driving past :

Brazil, and watching you, and I, laugh, and eat till we were exploding
Detlef's old place, the flat above, and good friends, and laughter and watching their love for each other, watching them dance Tango Argentina, and taking the lift down to the carpark beneath
Catherine's place, upstairs, and downstairs, being held gently by you as my world tumbled down around me, wanting to be held by you forever
The Botanic Gardens, fingers at the ready, eyes taunting each other, circling warily but laughing so much inside, and out loud
The junction at Raffles City where you spoke about Rinaldi, and my heart broke for you
The Oriental Hotel, and Mortons, the bar, Morton's, the restaurant
The National Durian Center
The Ugly Fat Bird on the Waterfront
The walk near the Esplanade, sun on my skin, dozing with you
St Ignatius' Church, which you found cosy
The Fullerton Hotel, rushing hand in hand with you, battling through the New Year crowds and ignoring the placid fireworks in the sky
The Bar in the Fullerton, where we took that photo, you, in the hat, gorgeous witch
The Pool Place, watching C and V with you, my equal, my love. Discussing them.
Que Pasa, watching you charm my friends
Casa Roma, D and C giving me the eye when you went to the toilet, a lovely lady, he said, and I smiled and looked down
Loof, you were so beautiful, in white
Harry's, waterfront
White pepper crab
Cantina
Iggys
The plastics on call room

...no more absent smiles now.

Life in silence is tiding through the hectic swarm of yet another on-call, with a void by my side, and an ache in my heart, and asking God to please quell this rising fear within me, each time it rears its ugly head. She left my side, but she hasn't left my head, and my heart.

I am your soldier now God, I give You my faith, my sword, and my heart; do as you will to me, but protect Her, guide Her, keep Her happy, and warm, and safe, and calm, and keep her laughing, and keep her faith which broke for us, in You, forever.

It's a human sign
When things go wrong
When the scent of her lingers
And temptation's strong

Into the boundary
Of each married man
Sweet deceit comes calling
And negativity lands

Cold cold heart
Hard done by you
Some things look better baby
Just passing through

And it's no sacrifice
Just a simple word
It's two hearts living
In two separate worlds

But it's no sacrifice
No sacrifice
It's no sacrifice at all

Mutual misunderstanding
After the fact
Sensitivity builds a prison
In the final act
We lose direction
No stone unturned
No tears to damn you
When jealousy burns

Cold cold heart
Hard done by you
Some things look better baby
Just passing through

And it's no sacrifice
Just a simple word
It's two hearts living
In two separate worlds

But it's no sacrifice
No sacrifice
It's no sacrifice at all

Cold cold heart
Hard done by you
Some things look better baby
Just passing through

And it's no sacrifice
Just a simple word
It's two hearts living
In two separate worlds

But it's no sacrifice
No sacrifice
It's no sacrifice at all

Hail, Mary
the Lord is With Thee
Blessed art Thou amongst women,
and Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus

Holy Mary,
Mother of God
Pray for us Sinners, now,
and at the hour of our Deaths

amen

*****
Our Father, who art in Heaven,
hallowed be Thy name,
Thy kingdom come,
Thy Will be Done
on Earth, as it is in Heaven

Give us this day
our daily bread
and forgive us our tresspasses..
as we forgive those who tresspass against us,
and lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil

amen

*****
Pater noster, qui es in caelis,
Sanctificetur nomen tuum.
Adveniat regnum tuum.
Fiat voluntas tua,
Sicut in caelo et in terra.
Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie.
Et dimitte nobis debita nostra,
Sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris.
Et ne nos inducas in tentationem:
Sed libera nos a malo.
Amen.

Oh, my Lord
I give Thee my heart,

grant me the grace to pass this day
in Thy holy love
and without offending Thee

Amen

the slightly dusty car
the tired house
the homemade wiring
the old books, and pictures on the wall

i looked around me

it is so little

they have so much less

and yet they are so rich
so very rich in their love,

and so rich,

they have you, forever

you're a little late
this is how I feel
I'm wide awake and I can see the perfect sky is
torn

I held her close, and for a brief moment things were better again.

I didn't want to let go.

She has your eyes.

*****
Oh My Lord,

in my darkest hour
help me

Today was just another day.

Except that in the morning Jade brought me out to go shopping, visit her flat (many beercans on the table from her and her husband drinking the night before), and cut my hair. She is very supportive, seeing the sadness in my eyes. It's strange but many people can see it; people I didn't even know existed or cared, including some of the clinic girls.

Jade got her hair permed while I fell asleep waiting. We were so late for clinic as a result.

After that I had night OT, and I was so numb, I did several silly things including clean the patient before she went under. (That should sound funny, but somehow it isn't right now)

My heart and head are not really in right now.

Tomorrow I'm going to do one of the saddest things of my life.

It was so simple once, I only had one story; the saddest thing was flying over to say goodbye. The saddest moment was seeing her turn around in the carseat.

Now the saddest thing will be what I do tomorrow, I think. And the saddest moment hearing your voice break as I said all those stupid words, which I really really meant you know, thanking you everything and telling you it had been my honour. It was. And you asked me not to speak like that and your voice broke, and my heart broke too.

I had meant not to speak to you ever again.
It was easy once, I was principled, and I had a system of values to protect myself from myself, and the person I thought I loved from myself too.

Now, for the first time I am so weak.

And I hate myself for it, but it also tells me something real.

I thought true love was selfless once.

Now I have learnt at last that it is selfish.

I need you.

******
I guess at any other time this would be funny.

I know something is really wrong with me, because I've lost my appetite.

I can count the number of meals I've eaten this week on one hand.

*****
I didn't get to finish the other day, the words were all jumbled up in my mind; I was in shock I think.

Anyway

Thank you

for every smile we shared
for every moment we had together
every moment our eyes met
everything we ate together
every touch
every kiss
for being by my side, and making me proud
for being ahead of me, with my friends, and making me prouder
for falling in love with me
for trying to warn me to be more affectionate, and that you are manja
so sorry dear.
i failed you
for giving me yourself, for the time we had

It was the happiest year of my life.

It used to be a stupid year back in uni, talking on the phone or telnet or whatever. old story, dont care now.

The happiest year of my life now was with the Queen of my heart; my Ice queen.

Do you see what is happening here, in this blog, my love?

I do not write about my sadness, or my pain as I used to.

The more I write, the more I sit and think, the more time passes I know the truth

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

I don't care about my sadness anymore; I don't care about adhering to principles, I don't care about my sense of betrayal.

I love you so much, and I want to make you love me again.

I want to make you love me again so that I can never, ever let you go again, and so you will never leave again; I want to spend my life with you, till the day I die.

There are several reasons why I cannot do my exam this february.

partly because it's hard to work and study, and go on call

partly because all... purpose... has been lost

and mostly because right now, when I pick up the textbooks, the words just wash over me, and I can read the same paragraph over, and over, and over again.

I need study leave; more than that, I need some time to be alone, to think

JY asked me out for dinner today; ostensibly to try to cheer me up.

As I watch her as she talks, and she watches me, I see that she is funny, and nice. She is tall - the same height as I, and well groomed, and really quite pretty and attractive. She tells me abour her breakup to try to empathise with me, and I do feel sorry for her.

And I talk to her and yes, she does cheer me up a little..

But at the end of the night she looks at me and says I still look miserable, and that she has failed. She slaps me on the shoulder, and asks me to smile or all her efforts will have been in vain.

It's not her fault.
It's just that I remember you, funny, and alive, sparkling, vivacious, nice, tiny; I remember your lowish, huskyish, yet sometimes nasal voice, and I wish.... silly wishes from another time. I remember how we met; I remember you at TCC, I remember us, and feeling a little hesitent, and shy at first. I remember something young, and innocent, and special. Something I would have died for again, until I met you, and I wonder how come I could ever have taken it and you for granted... and I feel so sad.

She asks me about my past, and I tell her about you first, then go back and back until K, and as I tell the story of K, I stop, and say god this is such an old story... it doesn't really matter; and I stop there, and dont wish to carry on.

My heart doesn't belong to you anymore, you want it no longer.

But it doesn't belong to me, either.

Oh Grace,

how much I have wasted

how much I have squandered

I was in clinic today, and it was so, so hard to see my patients, and care about what they were saying

and suddenly I remembered EVERYTHING, in full colour detail; it was hard to breathe, and it has only happened once before

but I did not have to make myself feel sad; or regretful, I just felt

devastated

It was instantaneous

and It makes me realise how much you are and were


Sadness

I watched you with my little group of friends, at Que Pasa, and you sparkled as you spoke to them

I felt so, so proud

I watched you get into the car in your cream-white dress and you were magnificent, and I smiled

We ate white pepper crab, and you were too busy eating to talk, and I laughed

We sat in the car, you and I, as you drowsed, and the radio host said something about the way to a man's heart is through his eyes, and the way to a woman's heart is through her ears, and I said...
the way to Grace's heart is through her stomach

and we laughed, and laughed and you threatened to poke me

We circled each other like children at the Botanic Gardens, like twin praying manti, fingers raised to poke, and our eyes were wary but we smiled, and when we walked again, I threatened to poke you and we laughed

I put my hand on yours by my side as we drove, and it felt so real, so clean, and so good.

We started poking each other in the car, in the carpark, and I leaned over you to pin you down, and we paused for the longest time

I wanted to kiss you... the moment was perfect

I remembered your boyfriend
I... pulled away.

I put my hand in yours, and in the rearview mirror, D and Cs eyebrows went up, and they smiled; D looked at me, and I looked back, and smiled

I was so proud of you

I put my arms around you through your raincoat and we watched the niagara falls in awe, and I tried to hold you close, through all that material.

We put on our coats together, leaving the hotel room, and I looked at our reflections in the mirror, and thought to myself... I am... so lucky.

You drank the seven sins with me, and started to get tipsy, I assured you that you were not.... and you hid it very well

Oysters galore at Rodney's, and watching you enjoy them together with me

I can't go on, it's hard to breathe through all these memories washing over me

Oh my God.
I miss you so much.

And I wasted us, and you.

I have some photos of you left on my computer.

I looked at them tonight, because the ex whom I'm now friends with again asked to see your picture.

And I can see that you aren't gorgeous in my eyes; but you are a pretty little thing that many guys will fall for.

And my heart bleeds.

I guess I didn't care how you looked

I just loved you

and it made you beautiful to me

I don't know how to show you that I'm real...

.. and now you just ignore my words

Maybe we turned into echoes on the phone

but behind my echo, all the words unsaid that I left,

I feel

still
and despite.

Oh, my Lord, I give Thee my heart
grant me the grace to pass this day in thy holy love
and not offend Thee,
this day, and always.

******
It was strange, looking at the dates; it almost seemed like a Sign.

I see now what must be done.

God, I pray that You guide my hand. Let my aim be true, and let my words be Thine.

Still here.

Not crazy yet.

The silence continues.

Hmm. Everything seems to be in working order.

I guess it's hard to believe that I'm no longer missed, or thought about - but I know that must be the case.

It must be easier for you, you have someone new to dote on you and the thralls of a developing new relationship to spend your time on.

I am alone, at my computer in this little room that we once knew together, trying to forget the promises that we made each other.

I guess you're not the kind of person to look back. And in such an astonishingly short time I feel like I've been sidelined; I'm yesterday's news.

Something vaguely unpleasant now to harden your heart towards?

Or someone to forget, not worth complicating your life with anymore?

Distance is always hard; we both knew it at the start; but we both wanted to try for some crazy reason, sitting in that car.

Once upon a time you were grateful for my calls; and I was always ---- and I'll let you in on a secret --- I was still --- grateful for your calls - even just before the breakup. You were happy that your friends were jealous that your boyfriend called you so often; I was just happy to hear your "haallo??"

Regardless of content, the simple act of your calling meant something good to me;

not so apparently for my calls, I guess I was just ordinary on the phone, just irritating because I was too sleepy, too tired, too mundane for you.
I'm guessing maybe my voice and mind grew tiresome to you.

So sad, because my voice and mind are different when you are nearby - you knew it at the start. When you are near I come alive with you, and the troubles around me that cloak my eyes and mind fade away. It seemed that way for you too, once.
I guess maybe time passes and we forget these things.

No chance for us to even meet again; and I suspect even should or when your current relationship ends you will have slipped seamlessly into another guy, another story.

Why did you fight the distance with me all this time just to give up on it at the eleventh hour? What made you give up on us?

Yes my dear, I have so many more questions for you, but unfortunately I will never stop asking; I will always have more on my mind to ask you,
or to want to share with you
to laugh with you about

and I am no longer the appropriate person to do all this with.

I have some pride still. I wont admit to being a puddle on the floor; it's hard for me to concentrate at work, and I've lost the ability to study (for now) but I'll be okay soon. And its not just pride that makes me write here, or continue to want you back... sometimes people feel this way because they were the one that was dumped, and they want revenge, or to be in a position to dump the other person. I don't feel that way now, at all. Perhaps I even feel a strange relief; I have no timeframe now; no need to do my exams in february (and I can't right now... just too sad missing us, and you, to try to study) no need to prepare to sort everything out in time to see you... Perhaps in a different life I might have felt the strain and found my houseman too attractive to me, and thought about breaking up, who knows?
But you know, I think I would have waited. Two months isn't that long... it passes in a snap.

I do feel betrayed and abandoned, and I don't wish to speak to you again - partly because I can feel you don't wish to speak either - we've run out of words for each other I guess.

And I won't beg more than once; I tried the other night (for the first and only time in my life) and sensed to my sadness that your mind had already been made up before we spoke. I guess you snapped somewhere along the way - we all do during medical finals - only you told me later, after you had rationalised me out of your life and D in.

But right now I still miss you, and hearing you. Even if you don't miss me.

It's not because you're so amazing; or wonderful -- I tried to explain myself the other night but my words were incoherent; I was trying so hard to think on my feet while feeling so so afraid, and tired.

Perhaps your previous exs - some of them - begged without dignity... without Grace.

I didn't fall in love with your face, or your smile, or your body (big butt) or the way we "talked"...

... I fell in love with the person behind all that; I fell in love with her soul...

... she just felt right for me, and worth waiting for, and building a life with.
... and she was incredible

And I guess one day, as silly as this sounds - since nothing will ever be the same now, and many things have changed in my head with your choosing of someone else over me, so that you can "be with him" -- I guess I'm feeling betrayed and abandoned right now, for good reason --

-- one day I'd still like to meet you again. And see if we can talk, and maybe "talk" ? again... and smile.

I'm not comparing anybody or anyone, but this is truth - I didn't. Not in my past, not with anyone before -- have a wish for a second chance.

Until now.

It's so bizarre that it takes for one of the worst breakups of my life, and for a stalker to put me back in touch with an ex.

*****
I knew for sure K was part of my past, because somewhere along the way you became the only one on my mind.

And I kinew it for certain a few days back, when I re-read patchwork paddington and behindthebear - someone needed the URLs and I gave them to him - and I felt sad.

And of course I felt sad, I was so, so sad when I wrote them. I was breaking in two - the way, I suppose, I am right now.

It's only natural that re-reading my pain reminds me of my pain then.

And after I read part of it, I closed the page, and that was that. I felt quite happy that I had something good and clean, and I didn't dwell on my past.

And then Things fell Apart.

Maybe I shoiuld have told you, but I guess maybe it was already too late.

Nine days ago you missed me and longed to see me again in london.

Yesterday, you didn't love me anymore.

Everything is so dark, right now.

I'm hurt,

I won't deny it.

I'm trying to make sense of things still, and they don't add up.

As I read the messages dated 24th and 25th november, and I remember the emotion i felt on receiving them and replying to them - how much I wanted to meet in london too, how much I missed her too

... I just don't understand.

And then I think, as I said to J over drinks tonight (that helped, to be honest, just to sit, drink and be quiet for a while, to not think about things anymore)

I don't really want to think about her and her new guy right now

I just dont really want to know

And I'd really rather just move on.

Maybe it was all a pleasant dream, whispered sweet nothings, insubstantial

perhaps you never intended on making them real.

It doesnt add up with the person I felt so priviledged to know then, and that I still remember now, and things don't really make sense.

I just know that I need to sleep

and that I dont think I'll be going to london after all.

I can't.

*******
It feels like my eyes are opened now, and I see the truth - perhaps we didnt drift apart, and maybe... you stood back because you wanted to be with him.

Maybe our relationship didn't fail to mutual distance... maybe the distance was created, so it could fail, and give way for something new.

I have everyy reason to hate you.

And yet I don't.

I don't, at all.

As I remember the times we shared, I smile, and as I remember how much I still felt for you a mere nine days ago, I feel a pang.
I remember you well. And right now, right this instant,

i still miss you.

*******
I did this, I imposed this silence; it is my cowardice and my consideration. I want for you to move on well, without me incessantly bugging you or making you feel guilty; and I want to somehow quell the questions in my mind, by just not thinking about things.

And right now the silence hurts me.

The silence in my head... is deafening.

I can't presume it hurts you too; you're probably happy where you are now, and so, so relieved. :(

I could sense it when You called, somehow. I knew your mind was made up, and I could feel that you wanted - no, you needed an escape.

And so I gave it to you, my dear. As I did once before, I gave it because it was the right thing to do. I set you free, to be with him, because I loved you.

Selfishness kicked in; for that I apologise profusely. I had to ring up and fight, and I made you ill at ease for far too long; I had to give it one last shot - I had to - what man does not fight for his lady love?

And for that am so sorry my love, we did not part on the best of footings.
Right now I am feeling a little betrayed, yes - because it was you! You, fiery, funny and smart. You whom I trusted and thought you were so strong. You, who are so alive and vivacious.

But then I see it was not your fault, nor mine, perhaps his. These things happen; time happens, distance happens. And I love you too much to blame you.

Mostly I guess I just feel so, so sad. We were, and we could have been. But you have Chosen.

I suppose in retrospect it was easy to see; he was near you always and I could not bring myself to try to control the woman I loved. You did not feel for him at first, but time and persistence and proximity always win. Absence makes the heart go wander.

Easy to see; you moved nearer him, more time together. Your exams, my work schedule; we fell away from each other.

But all this time I have continued to tell people of the day we would meet again; all this time I dreamt that in just a few months we could be nearby again, and let the magic begin once more.

Goodbye, my funny Ice Queen.

Farewell, my lady.

Finally, a reprieve.

The Other Half has been asking me to write for the longest time. Well, here I am at last.

It's not that I haven't wanted to; I'm sure many of us know the feeling - you encounter a particularly inspiring or frustrating person, object, or situation and think - this would be so perfect to write about, when I get home I'm going to write... "..." and the words begin to fall into place in your mind.

Only you never really do get home till it's too late and the moment has passed, and then the words are either forgotten, or exhausted into nonexistence.

Work's been a killer, and when I haven't been working there's been so much more out there to do other than to write - perhaps it's habit-forming, not-blogging. Playing on the computer, visiting the gym (or not), seizing the few moments I can to catch dinner with or talk to a friend... blog? Where got time.

And now, a reprieve.

Not from the mundaneness of ordinary life - I've come to accept, and enjoy that.

These last four days have been hell. I shan't go into too much detail; it's... a lose-lose situation all around. But for the last twenty four hours my mobile phone hasn't been ringing every ten minutes, and I haven't had to live in fear for my family's sanity -- or even their well-being. And it feels good.

This blog may not have much time left to exist.

If the colleague I spoke to was being candid, I have about two weeks left before I should pack this place up and shut down for good.

It's sad, really. These are my memories, written by me, for me - not for an audience, not for art, not for poetry. It will be sad to lose them all.

Anyway.

I just watched "a beautiful mind tonight." Now there's irony for you; it was completely unplanned.
Here's a little something for the few of you who know why I'm writing this.

********
Bipolar Affective Disorder ("manic depression")

Clinical Features
The cardinal clinical feature of a manic episode is alteration in mood which is often elated and expansive but may also be characterized by intense irritability. Associated features include increased psychomotor activity (rapid thinking and speech, distractibility, decreased need for sleep); decreased social inhibition and disregard for potentially painful consequences (sexual overactivity, overspending, indulgence in poorly considered or inappropriate business, religious or political initiatives); and exaggerated optimism and inflated slef-esteem, which may be reflected in grandiose delusions or hallucinations. Mood incongruent psychotic features may also be foundl indeed one or more Schneiderian first-rank symptoms (symptoms used to define schizophrenia) are occasionally present but may indicate a schizo-affective disorder. Heightened sensory awareness is common. More specific speech abnormalities include uninterruptibility and sound rather than sense-triggered speech content (punning, clanging)
Insight is often variable or absent.

Schneider's First Rank Symptoms include -
specific types of auditory hallucinations, specifically third person discussing the patient, making a running commentary on the patient);
thought echo (hearing one's own thoughts out loud)
thought withdrawal (thoughts "taken out of head")
thought insertion (thoughts put into one's mind)
thought broadcast (thoughts available to other people, the patient thinking everyone is thinking in unison with him/her)
passivity (made acts, feelings, impulses, ie being controlled by outside forces)
somatic passivity (bodily senasations controlled from without, eg "blood boils after being struck by lightning")
delusional perception to a normally perceived object, often preceded by edlusional m ood (eg "I heard a police siren and knew I was one of God's prophets)

Epidemiology
The lifetime prevalence of bipolar disorder is about 1%, with a female to male ratio about 1.5 to 1. Peak age of onset is in the early 20s.

Aetiology
There is clear evidence of a strong familial component. Rates are commoner than expected in first-degree relatives of bipolar subjects.

Management
Acute mania almost invariably requires hospitalization. Since patients lose insight early, this may require detention without consent, using appropriate mental health legislation.
Antipsychotics (in similar doses to those used in schizophrenia) form the mainstay of acute management of both mania and hypomania. Antipsychotics are effective in controlling overactivity and agitation, and (somewhat more slowly) in reducing elation and disinhibition. Lorazepam may be useful for rapid tranquillization. Lithium is also effective as an acute antimanic agent, although it lacks the potential for very rapid behavioural control. Electroconvulsive therapy may be effective in patients unresponsive to antipsychotics, particularly where extreme overactivity is a threat to physical health.
A number of anticonvulsants, (carbamazepine, sodium valproate and possibly lamotrigine) appear to be effective in preventing manic relapse, particularly where psychotic feelings have been prominent. Psychotherapeutic support is important in helping patients come to terms with their illness, and their remorse at their past manic behaviour.

Prognosis
The lifetime prognosis following a single manic episode is poor, with 90% of patients having manic and/or depressive recurrences (averaging 4 episodes in 10 years)
Long-term functional prognosis is almost as poor as in schizophrenia. A minority develop "rapid-cycling", with four or more episodes a year; they have a particularly poor prognosis. There is an overall increase in premature mortality, only partially explained by a suicide rate of 10%.

Thanks to a strange turn of events, I now find myself with altogether more freedom on my hands than I can cope with.

This morning was spent wandering around Holland Village and remembering what the Real World feels like - or rather, gawking at the mishmash "Real World" of Tai Tais, gangly teenagers and caucasians that Holland Village has somehow become.

Granted, something was still not-quite right in my head (that niggling sense of imbalance that resembles - but is not - an inner-ear infection, and that ever so gentle aching reminder that somewhere around the corner a rip-roaring earth-shattering headache lurks, threatening to overwhelm and conquer the instant one's guard is neglected...) but a nice leisurely sit-down at Starbucks, head back against the plush sofa and eyes vacantly staring out the glass window at the gray, gray sky, with mandatory mug of Starbucks (tm) Grande Latte grasped firmly in hand and all was right in the world, or at least my head again.

Somewhere along the way I stumbled (literally, haha) across a copy of Neil Gaiman's Stardust, and the rest of the day was spent consuming it, at first skeptically, then with growing fascination, till its - rather bittersweet - ending.

I swear, if they make this thing into a movie... well, at least a few grown men will cry. And admit it.

*****
And So The Facade Falls

I watched David fall beneath brute Goliath's club, and felt... almost nothing. I have been back too long.

You can taunt the three headed hydra all you want...
... but for heavens sake's beware it's bite.

Today, your column.
Tomorrow... who knows? Just remember your wife... and your child.

That, I suspect, is the message David received, albeit in far more eloquently masked terms. And perhaps the reason his friend Miyag...a threw in the towel.

And these are the reasons I hate this ridiculously childish country so. Yes, hate. No longer do I merely tire of it, or dislike it. I must leave one day.

We are not a maturing society at all. We are not, in any way a developed nation. We're nothing if not simply... retarded. In almost every way. Retarded of thought, of speech, and of freedom. And what of our well-fed... patricians - amongst the highest paid in the world?

Ah, amongst the blind, the one-eyed man is king.

*****
A friend of mine showed me something the other day which chilled me to the bone.

I don't remember if it was something about teen pussies or hungry huns or what-have-you. Either way it was a website which was redirected to a message from the IMA. Or was it IMB?

Have you ever wondered why your lightning-fast TXXX connection is so ridiculously slow? The bottleneck isn't coming from your fancy new Pentium XXXX system, nor from that sleek cable modem you just got. The internet only runs as fast as the proxies its being accessed through. Proxies which, for your safety, screen out undesirable elements, and in all probability make note of the individuals trying to access said undesirable elements.

I didn't think they would even try - the internet is too unimaginably massive, and too fluctuant - too dynamic - to censor.

Not until the instant that IMA message appeared onscreen.
So much for progressive, vibrant new world, new party, new everything.

George Orwell's 1984 may not be as far at hand as we think - yet we're not batting an eye. We're living in it - we, the perfectly conditioned sheep.

The newspapers bemoan almost annually that the youth of today are politically apathetic - but then they laud them for being fiercely interested in the country.

Stop for a moment and wonder - why are they politically apathetic? Ah, the conspiracy theories we could weave, eh? But no, they're fiercely interested in the country, meaning where next to go to eat, sleep, and fuck.

Politics have become separate from country.

But support the Party, for the country's sake - you hear it droning on and on like a broken gramaphone every year come election time.

Country has become inseparable from party.

Food for thought?

Nah, let's just get back to Neil Gaiman. What next... Hmm, American Gods, I think.

I've had a week that's probably best summarised as a week best forgotten.

Fortunately, with the state my mind and memory are in right now... that shouldn't be too hard at all.

Hello, bed.

Does it stop you from writing, knowing that the department is reading you?

*****
Something is very wrong with this country when a colleague of mine is told not-so-subtly by his superiors at work not only that his blog has been discovered... but that if he wishes to progress in his career he should stop writing.

There is a climate of fear in this country - sometimes I wonder who we fear though - the Omnipotent Men in White? Or perhaps we fear... ourselves.

*****
What about MrBrown?

Well, what about him?

Anyone who claims to be a star wars fan will doubtlessly have heard of the Star Wars Kid, who shot to notoriety much the way William Hung did, for a graceless, comical wushu-like video sequence with a staff. To be fair, he didn't intend for the video to be circulated, and err I suppose he just did it just to entertain himself.

Anyhow, as things go, his "friends" got hold of the clip (funny how people never learn... wasn't there some Tammy person...) and circulated it on the internet. Lots of laughter and vicious comments later (fat slob with grace of penguin, etcetc) the issue became moot until digital wizards revived the clip and cast their little spells, or in this case computer algorithms...

Here's one of the all-in-1 compilations. Unfortunately the resolution is a bit crummy.

*****
Okay this one is a lot funnier, and more up my street. haha.

Funny. :)

I'll admit that I've run out of time to write, at least on the same daily basis that I was doing before.
These days work ends too late, and re-minisce is too exhausted after work to write.
Or else work ends early, and re-minisce is too busy hitting the gym / swimming pool / getting a tan to write.
Or else work ends rather late (which is slightly less late than too late) and re-minisce comes home to his computer, and mmorgs. One of the simplest escapes from the mundanity of everyday life - fantasy. Having despatched too quickly of Terry Pratchett's Thud! I'm now cast adrift with very little to distract myself from the sheer inanity of daily living.
These days I've been playing Ultima VI Online. It's not aesthetically very pleasing with its dated 1980s bitmaps and there are no fancy 3d graphics or directx lighting effects. But it has that certain nostalgia-factor that characterizes an all-time hall of famer, that all RPG fans will cleave to as if by instinct, and a beautiful storyline. It also has an incredibly friendly community, and all in all... it's nice.

I've been meaning to write about something for a while though. Perhaps I haven't done, because I've been trying not to. Can anyone spot the pattern here? I, escapist.

*****
"Don't get involved."

As I watched the coming of the End, I couldn't help but feel saddened - who wouldn't be? There had been something magical there once, something special. Something involving Words. Something far from ordinary.

Two friends, two separate paths.

A friend, to me (and here, I emphasize me... the definition differs from person to person) isn't someone who dispenses gifts, or gives advice that someone wants to hear.

When trouble ails us, do we seek out friends who speak the truth, or people who reaffirm what we wish to hear? Perhaps we are all different, and have different needs and desires.

A friend, to me - listens.

Perhaps a fan listens too - but fans are blinded to certain truths and realities. Fans cannot see - or refuse to see the imperfections and flaws that are as much a part of ourselves as our strengths and aptitudes.

Friends, in contrast, acknowledge - and tolerate them.

Don't go and listen to me, and then to her, and try to change things.

I confess to doing the former.

Sometimes it is not the worth of the words themselves that are important as it is their simply being spoken. All people do deserve that right - that is true.

All people.

It would have taken a fool to be blind to the inevitability of it all.

Emotional bridges are burnt when people lose their inability to listen and to empathise with each other.
It's not a sin to be selfish... it's perfectly natural when the time comes. Who wants to see the other side of the coin, when one has seen it too many times, perhaps?

Sometimes, insight is a curse.
Yet sometimes... it takes two.

I listened, and I knew that there was nothing left to do - nothing left to change.

It saddened me, immensely.

I did not pass judgement... I will not take a stand. There was as much wrong in both of them, as there was right.

That is only natural.

And in the aftermath, I hope that I still have two friends I can still count as - friends. Perhaps now two separate friends, rather than the single entity you once were. And I wish you both well.

Heed not the thoughtless rants of your fans - or dissentors... after all, words are only words, and sometimes words are not enough...

They meet again many years later.

Another traffic junction, another city.

Perhaps she has lost the ephemeral sheen of youth, and perhaps he has lost the effortless coolness of immaturity. They are dressed in older, more subdued work-clothes.

The camera tracks her as she walks, focusing then panning in on her downcast, world-weary eyes - glancing up and widening in surprise... and then a trace of hope enters them. The faintest, most hesitent trace of a smile flickers across her face for a split second.

From the opposite side of the road, the camera watches as his eyes meet hers - dull, moody and uninterested; the eyes of a stranger lost in thought in his own private world - for a split second they engage, then they slide away. He does not recognise her.

The camera keeps pace, backing away as we see close-up the edges of her eyes crinkle, and the roots of her brow furrow as the two pass shoulder to shoulder, traces of tears welling up, but not quite falling. Her face dissolves in silent - subtle - anguish, eyes losing their focus, teeth biting down hard on her lower lip - no melodrama here, it has been too long for that now. Perhaps her jaw sets, or perhaps her distracted gaze focuses on nothing at all. We notice her head and shoulders bob faster and faster as she quickens her pace, straining to escape from her past... and then the camera slows to a stop and loses her as she walks into it, passing out the shot. As this happens he, out of focus and somewhat in the background now falls back into focus... turns his head to the side - just imperceptibly - a fraction of an inch - and slows to a stop - or perhaps he doesnt stop? He hasn't turned back to look at her - yet.

Fade to dark.

It caught me by surprise.

I was walking down the street, striding, really - alone for the afternoon - trying to absorb the sights and sounds of an alien city, and to reach the Brewery District before sundown. I'd underestimated the distance and time was passing alarmingly quickly, so really I wasn't thinking about much more than walking at a brisk pace. It was a lovely clear day, albeit slightly chilly, and birds sang from amidst what sparse leaves the trees were wearing.

I glanced askance at nothing in particular, and stopped dead in my tracks.

Toronto is a very, very flat, and very, very large city. I hadnt truly appreciated it from the air, since, well a sprawling city is just another sprawling city from that high up... but standing in the middle of that road close to the water's edge, I saw it then.

The main street - the central dividing dotted line upon which I stood - stretched away into infinity, further than my eyes could see, vanishing into a pinpoint of converging lines.

And dotted at regular intervals (for Toronto is also a very, very planned city - much like New York) every ten meters or so, at every junction, were traffic lights, identical in every way.

The lights changed before my eyes, from red, to green - a hundred - or perhaps even more - lights fading out in choreographed splendour, and a hundred - or perhaps more - fading in, as one.

The thought arose, unbidden in my mind. Perhaps that one off stint as producer has done something to what few brains I have left.

But I thought then - what a perfect, perfect scene for a shot. The protagonist, and his female lead deep in conversation - or not - eyes never leaving each others', speaking with more than words in a tiny almost-freezeframe of eternity...

... and in the background, in soft focus (or perhaps not in focus at all) - a road to infinity, with a thousand lights flashing change in secret symphony.

and so it comes to pass.

Words are only words, are only words.

Real life intervenes.

*****
I am so very, very tired. Work is murder, one slow, agonising day at a time.

You know it's been a while when you can't remember your own blogger-login moniker...

Sure, I've felt like writing - loads of times - but I just haven't had the time. Work, unwork, alien invasions, yadda yadda. And somehow when I have had time, I haven't had the inclination to write. You know how it goes.

The End came shortly before my first-ever call-up for national enslavement (reservist "training"). There's a lot to be said about that in itself, but I'd best leave that for another day. Again, I'm pressed for time as I write this.

Bang. Two-and-a-half weeks of real-life-time obliterated just like that. It was eerily reminiscent of the bad old national service (full time) days, except that particular episode lasted an agonising two-and-a half years, not weeks.

So I made friends, and the assorted bunch of guys gelled together as well as could be expected. Big deal. The people on survivor do it just as well (sometimes even better!) except when they're busy killing each other and stuff. Oh wait, that was Lost.

The uneagerly anticipated Homecoming to Work was marred five minutes in by being handed a presentation to sort out five days and an on-call later. On calls, for the uninitiated, cost two days of real-life-time, because re-minisce is getting on in years and the Need for Sleep has surpassed his Need for Speed, since, oh, about ten years ago. laugh.

Another five sleep-deprived days erased from memory without a trace.

And then it gets even blurrier. Lots of on calls later, I'm sitting here in the airport home-free and heading out of town.

It doesn't sound nearly as impressive as I'd hoped.

Somewhere in there I found the time to upgrade a friend's laptop, and to try my hand at reprogramming a windows-98 / 2000 inf file for windows XP (Intel website - all further support for this product has been discontinued, Windows XP ships with a built-in driver which is compatible with this product and hence no driver has been developedd. Ha. Tell that to windows XP, which is still to this day stubbornly refusing to see the device...)

I also revived and refurbished Xena's old pentium III till it was purring like a cat on steroids, and then in a fit of drunken stupidity tried to work on it while it was still switched on. Never, ever try this at home kids. One slip of the finger, metal on metal, and your motherboard has just gone up in a shower of... okay, no sparks. No flames, no smoke. Just... dead. Welcome to real life.

After the initialy huge disappointment (I never even got to play a game on that antique!) I was fooling around with all my old dead computers (coming from a family that never throws keepsakes away, between my brother and myself we've acquired a museum of decrepit computing devices, including a fully-functional 486 DX-2 66... anyone remember those?) and being somewhat distracted while talking to the significant other on the telephone, inadvertently swapped one processor with another (sometimes my hands go on autopilot while the brain is hard at work)

And voila. Suddenly for some reason I now have an athlon-XP 2800+ on a 400 FSB motherboard working again. I can't understand why, since all it used to do before was whine softly then sputter to a stop... very bizarre. But I'm not complaining.

Now if only I could find a way to repair my old Geforce 4 Ti 4600 I'd be a happy camper. Unfortunately nobody seems to write anything about component-level repair of buggered video cards, and I doubt that asus will want to replace a last-generation video card when they can rip me of for a current generation card to the tune of a thousand bucks. Sigh.

Ah yes, I've also read all about hacking wireless LAN WEPs. It's surprisingly easy, provided you have a PRISM chipset. Gods I sound like a technogeek already. Must stop wasting time reading interesting articles about wardriving and hacking into neighbours' networks... I will not hack into the hospital network. I will not...

So here I am, on the brink of flying far, far away.

Oh yes, I've been waiting for this moment for a long time.

I may not have said it much - time has just blurred into one long on-call and post-call for me, somehow.

But yes I couldn't wait to go.

And yes, I've missed you very much - much more than I've said.

Hello. :)

******
Hongkong, 19/04/06 1109 hrs

As always I completely forgot to write about what I meant to, last post.

So during my long silence, several things have been bugging me.

One - did anyone check out those thingies about the government sharing its dividends with the people?

I logged on, to discover that the website already knew my name, ic number, and date of birth. And probably my bank account number too (which it pretended not to, and asked me to input... but honestly all they have to do is cross reference the SAF computers)

Which beggars the question : If the government is handing out pay supplement packets to EVERYONE...

... why to we have to login online and fill in a form to claim it? Shouldn't it just be credited directly into our bank accounts? Or is this a measure to catch out the few computer illiterate procrastinators that lurk out there?

Secondly... has anyone called for a cab recently? I'm sure you all have. Aside from the usual grouse about skyrocketing advance-booking and call-in fees...

... whats with the automated service that lets you know every one minute fifty seconds (I timed it) that no taxis are available, press two to continue holding or nine to end call (sic)

Surely someone taking the time and effort to hold on to the line is still interested in flagging down a taxi, barring unexpected exceptions like sudden myocardial infarcts of sleep narcosis. Or a flash fire, or perhaps a flood.

Okay, so I reckon maybe the powers that be are afraid of people abusing the system with autodialers, and *gasp* multitasking and doing something else in between. Perhaps the operators don't like waiting for people to get back to the real world from their storybooks or their sexual partners or whatever.

But one minute fifty seconds? Sheesh. Who comes up with these dumb ideas anyhow.

ps - iMacs suck ass.

Somewhere on my ward is a tribute to nurses.

Someone up there had the brilliant idea of making the nurses write all their names in little hearts.

They left the rest of the details of the displays to the individual wards.

The theme for this year was "making a difference".

Naturally, the nurses on my ward arranged all their little hearts in the shape of a huge heart, around the theme.

Which, equally naturally, they abbreviated to : Nurses - MAD.

I'm inclined to agree.

Still sick. Stood in OT all day sniffing. On the bright side my senior doc was even sicker than me. Listening to him hack and cough away I'm glad I don't have TB like him. ahaha.

So bayenor recommends this :

"3 teaspoons of honey, slice of lemon, generous dollops of whisky - top up with hot water. it made me feel a whole lot better."

I'll drink to that.

I'm probably not a very inspiring doctor. But heck, your body probably knows whats best for it, so who are we docs to argue? If you crave a drink... then you probably should have one.

For instance, if you take away an alcoholic's alcohol, he...

hey lookit that pink eleph...

blubber

shake

howlllll...

*****
Life in mono

- is waking up alone, and going to work alone.

Reading the messages that appear on my mobile, and grimacing to myself, sometimes.

Driving past Brazil (all you can eat meat) and smiling absently to myself.

Remembering what it was like to hold, and be held by her. Especially when the world seemed to be crumbling apart around me - somehow just being in her arms made it all seem all right again.

Somehow things really did seem easier when she was around.

Life in mono - is tiding through the still of the night with a paper in my hand, and a void by my side, where she used to be.

Does anyone else get a craving for ice cream when they have a fever, and for a shot of anything when they have a sore throat?

I suppose it's the old adage that doctors never practice what they preach, although in singapore they always seem to be infuriatingl pristine. I remember a kindly old GP back in birmingham telling me the Doctor's creed - "if you drink less than your GP, you're doing okay..."

so when I'm ill probably the only thing I do right is drink soup. Research has shown that chicken soup with pepper works better than cough mixture to get you better, which frankly, doesn't really do anything much. I guess as a doctor I know that the rest of it all is symptomatic relief, and the actual course of the illness won't be affected by anything much (other than chicken soup, which I firmly believe in)

So what the heck, this past week it's been lots of ice cream and chicken soup for me; I haven't really been able to muster up the energy to get myself a drink.

I may not be any better, but heck I sure feel better. That's what comfort food is for, isn't it?

Goodbye my lover,
goodbye my friend
you have been the one,
you have been the one for me.

Fate, it seemed, was laughing at me the day we left to shoot The MV for Sara-Ann K's MV, "Pei Wo Tao" (Run With Me).

Typically, I'd just come off an on-call. Perhaps it's age catching up with me, but each call seems to tire me out just a little more; being woken up for the umpteenth time after having just finally cleared everything and lying down for a bit of shut-eye (these days I cope by simply not sleeping. I've downloaded a little mindless computer game which I while away the breaking hours with - it almost gives me a little morbid satisfaction answering the nurse's telephone calls and disappointing them by sounding awake, instead of blearily exhausted. Ha. Didn't expect that, did you!

But each call leaves me feeling exhausted, nearly to the point of death.

It's not something I write or complain about; the solution is simple - go home and sleep.

Ah, but not that Sunday. That sunday sparked a memorable week of madness.

It'd take too long to run through, moment by moment - so here're some of the memories that I'll hold with me forever... or at least for a while more.
For the full story, either watch this space (if I can find the energy to write about it in detail) or go bug tetanus.

*****
The Good

1. Cascade Premium beer. I'd forgotten just how good Cascade was (although I did scour most of london searching for it, for several years) and it'd turned into an almost-myth in my mind, till the moment I put a mug of it to my lips.

The memories began to flood back - all of them - and suddenly I was in yesterdayland again, wandering across sydney with D, and visiting my elective Consultant, David, and my registrar... all the places I walked to on my own rose unbidden to mind. It was like perusing a thousand-page photo-album in half a second. The Rocks, Manly beach, Coogie, Bondi, The CBD, The North Shore, the RNSH, the stupid little fairground on the north shore.

Ah, the power of Beer.

2. Fields of Gold. Our director, Tetanus has a gift for his art. As we stood in fields of liquid gold watching the sun rise, I understood why he had insisted on this shoot-location. These were the fields of gold Sting had sung about... and I didn't even have to look into the viewfinder to appreciate what his director's eye must have visualised, even before we touched down in sydney.

Beauty doesn't begin to come close to what it looked like, out there in the flesh. The pictures he's posted on his blog... are beautiful in themselves, artfully taken and precisely framed... but to be there, in real life watching it all happen around you - indescribable.

He's the Blip.

3. Talking to our landlady at The Bunkhouse Motel and making sympathetic faces and patting her dog (a labrador with the saddest face imaginable) after he'd gotten mauled by an angry kangaroo... Iwas tempted to stitch him up - I could see that the laceration wasn't deep - and I offered to. In return, her husband brought us out to those fields of gold - that perfect place -- on which the Pervy Prince built his shots.

4. Our Male Lead Paul was simply priceless. It would take a blind man to realise just how much he did for us, and just how enthusiastic he became about the whole affair, after finding out it was all done pro-bono and out of goodwill for Sara. From driving our prop vehicle 900 km, to helping tirelessly to assist in creating those perfect on-screen candid moments : everything he did was far, far above and beyond what was required of himself. I only hope what we gave him in return was enough.

5. Our Sydneyside contacts, Jze and May were amazing too. Initially I'd imagined (company name removed) Sydney to be a full setup much like Tetanus's (company name removed) is - professionals working in a company to create corporate videos.

As I spoke to them I discovered that they were enthusiasts and had created one or two experimental videos on a handheld Super 8 camera... but that this was their first "big-budget" production with professional equipment. But watching Jze work, I saw a master producer in the making. He knew his role well, and tried to forsee problems before they arose, working tirelessly behind the scenes to keep things on-track, towards an eventual destination of success. That is what a producer does. Who knows, perhaps one day when I retire...

6. The Sydney Fish Market
I can't enthuse about this enough. Our one day of R&R was dominated by lunch at the fish market. Something like 30 oysters shared between three of us for forty bucks, and a huge slab of salmon sashimi for eight dollars... sitting in the shade of our table-umbrellas watching the sun come off the water, and a very insistent seagull performing a tightrope balancing feat just for us... everything in the world seemed all peace again.

7. Vamptress
Vamptress's role was "everyone's assistand" and she really was - helping each and every one of us out when she was needed to, even trying valiantly to combat the forces of nature and guide me back towards sydney central without the help of a map. And most importantly of all - keeping an even temper, despite having to molly coddle the whole childish lot of us, what with our stupid little inhouse temper tantrums and the inevitable cast / crew divide thingie.

Thank you for everything, vamptress.

*****
The Bad

1. The Budget
Still working on the numbers, but it came to a fair amount. Sitting down at the end of every night with my head in my hands trying to cut corners, and direct our budget towards - but not further - than my projected estimate was a nightmare. I began worry that things would spiral out of control. And all this was being funded - not by a company rolling in cash, but two slightly less than wealthy young individuals - myself, and blip. I began to realise that we didn't quite have the cash for a venture any larger than my initial estimates - and that if need be, every and anything else would have to be sacrificed : preserving only the integrity of the filming. This, I think is the headache of producer's around the world - staying within budget. I told myself - and sometimes Tetanus, and Jze at the end of each day that it would be worth it (more like "sigh, sigh. Nevermind, it will be worth it. sigh.) if we produced a thing of true beauty - which gave them something good out of it.

And I still believe it, in my heart. I can only pray that something good will come out of this, for everyone.

2. Evil Hotelliers
We discovered that the budget backpacker accomodation in Bega - wasn't really in Cooma - when we rolled into Cooma (the little truckstop village we called home for two days, to shoot the expressway and countryside scenes in) but a hundred kilometers away.

Considering it was two in the morning and nine degrees outside... well, you get the idea.

We wound up sleeping fitfully in our vehicles, and I can only thank everyone else for not holding it against me but putting a cheery face on it and telling me it helped to make the whole experience more memorable, more "road-trippy".

I rang the Bega man up for an explanation the next day, and he continued to maintain that Bega was really near the Monaro highway - as near as Cooma in fact, we just took the wrong route, that's all.

Strangely, looking at the map of new south wales, it didn't appear that way at all. Bega is south of Cooma. Cooma is south of Canberra, which is south of Sydney. The Monaro highway practically runs through Cooma....

3. Driving
I drove our mobile office around a fair bit, trying to find all-day parking, or our cast and crew at different times. It's tricky driving around an unfamiliar city - whilst I've been in sydney loads, I've never driven in it - and all the more so considering how most of the roads are one-way streets. I went wrong twice, once crossing the harbour bridge by accident trying to travel to our shoot location from our apartment - five minutes on foot, one hour by van - and once, crossing the harbour bridge again when trying to find that wonderful, wonderful parking bastion of motorists across Sydney - Star City (casino)

Ten dollars per six hours, instead of the CBD rate of twenty dolllars for the first hour, rising exponentially each subsequent hour.

4. Time
A single afternoon was all the notice Mr Producer had to come up with backpacker accomodation Sydneyside on day four, as well as procure a mazda five (ie, a sexy car) for the shoot.
It was insanely stressful, especially the bit involving finally managing to contact the sports car company and being told I had fifteen minutes to collect the car - which was in an entirely different part of the city.

The bit involving the UK credit card being steadfastedly rejected by the Ozzie cardreader wasn't fantastic either, nor the time spent gnawing my nails waiting for Jze to show up with his wonderful, wonderful australian visa card, whilst the sports car guy made nasty noises with his knuckles next to me, and muttered about having to stay past five...

I'm still wondering how it happened, but it did, and we had a lovely white car for the shoot in the end, somehow. Despite everything. Thanks be to God.

5. Time
A single day was all we really had to enjoy Sydney.
I remembered (after my first beer) just how wonderful Sydney was, and how much there was to see.... and our mad rush around it on the last day simply didn't do it justice.

We did well to visit the fish market, and wander around the rocks a little, and the CBD, winding up eventually at the opera house.

But how much more perfect it would have been, to have had another two days, to amble on the sands of Coogie bay watching the seagulls at sunset, or wander through the flocks of white cockatoos lining the grass of national botanic gardens like a large white blanket of sight and sound.

I miss Sydney, I truly do.

The Ugly
There are a few things I was tempted to write about when I reached home, and God knows I've been reminded about them all through yesterday - too much, I feel - but this isn't the place for them. Suffice to say that water always finds its own level, and the truth always becomes apparent in the end.

And to me, the truth has saddened me greatly.

shrug.

Nonetheless, it remains my sincere hope that something good comes out of all of this.

For Tetanus, for Sze, for May, for Vamptress, for Paul, and Sara as well.

A namecard I picked up two nights ago had precisely this line emblazoned across the bottom of it, in small print.

Silence is Golden.

(advertising agency)

I've been quiet of late. You know how it goes - when one is happy, there's almost nothing left to write about. And I've been happy.

Right now I'm in Sydney searching for budget accomodation for the motley crew we've assembled to shoot an MV.

Somehow the experience has soured a little, in truth due to differences between the "cast" and the "Crew", or in local lingo, the "talents" and the production crew.

In all honesty, the divide is rather artificial, and I rather like one of the cast who has been decent and helpful throughout it all.

But another member - for whom all this effort has been, and to whom both I and the director have created this gift for - has somehow, in some way begun to give us the impression that her purported gratitude - does not match up to her actions, and that she might somehow feel this gift of goodwill from us to her... has turned into some kind of obligation?

considering the running total as of 07/02/05 has reached S$ 11387.01, and is due to rise further...

... it really blows the mind.

There's really something to be said about local "talents". (big fish, small ponds vs small fish, small ponds... and diva-ism just about sums it up)

Yeah.

Kirk out.

Mixed Up Mother Goose

Confused confabulations. Heh.

The Ice Queen and The Beast.

The Wicked Witch and Prince Charming.

Somehow, for some reason when I'm happy I feel no urge to write.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not feeling sad right now. Just a little claustrophobic, trapped here in my little jail cell on the ward tending to patients' whims and desires. This morning was particularly entertaining, being badgered by nurses to complete nine discharges stat, because the patients were badgering them, because they wanted to go home right now. Nevermind that there was only one doctor around, and he had to see a patient on intensive care first... and nevermind that no amount of badgering would have made me arrive any sooner - in fact, if I could have my way the converse would be true.

So anyway.

*****
Circle in the City

I don't know if any of you have noticed but the ERP gantries are reproducing like bunnies.

Now a simple sojourn into the city for an essential life's amenity - such as a steak sandwich and a martini or five at Mortons - has one passing through the unpearly gates of not just one, but two ERP gantries.

I imagine the concept is much like Dante's circles of hell... I reached level two, yay me. What's the elusive prize that lies right at the heart of the myriad rings of gantries, one wonders? What price happiness.... twelve dollars? :)

*****
Unexpected
There was something about her that was simply... perfect.

It wasn't something easy to qualify, or quantify. It wasn't simply about that stunning (but deceptively gentle) smile that would flash across her face from time to time, like a much-awaited ray of warm sunshine piercing through clouds on an overcast day. But it was a fair dash of this.

It wasn't just about those large, remarkably alive eyes that stopped his breath once as he watched her watching him over the rim of a cocktail glass. But it was a large measure of this.

It wasn't merely the chocolately richness of her laugh, or the funny, nasal squawks and moans she sometimes emanated when she was clowning around. Nor simply about her witty repartee which she wielded with simple ease. Both of these were present in abundance though.

It did have almost everything to do with the way everything seemed so easy and natural around her; how she somehow drew out long-forgotten laughter and effortless conversation from him; how lunch, or dinner (or a... "talking session") could last forever if they weren't careful - how time flashed by both of them and left them pleasantly surprised in their mutual company. How he could just watch her watching him as they smiled, and laughed, and flirted with each other with their eyes... and feel happy simply to be near her.

How the movie moments he had forgotten how to experience, but learnt how to almost-create, like a director does before his video camera, but painting instead on the cluttered canvas of his life - "almost-create" because one can never truly capture the essence of the moment unless it happens absolutely spontaneously, and against our wills -- how those moments had sprung into his life again, quite unexpectedly - moment, after moment, after moment, searing themselves into his mind.

At some point he had started to fall - very much against his will - in.. more than like... with her.

*****
Wordless
There is a strange power in words, sometimes - like weaving a spell of thought and mind, casting into your readers - or, in my earlier days - listeners - one's thoughts and feelings or perhaps just giving them a little of your mirth and happiness... for them. Yet when that power is applied incorrectly, the magic doesn't just fail to happen - sometimes it fades.

Once upon a time the words came too easily, daily on the telephone...

I love you...?

I love you.

I miss you.

I can't remember it all that well now, the words seem long lost in the mists of time - or perhaps just in the seas between my ears.... but I remember that I was happy to speak them - it was a little like taking an intoxicating drug. I was happy to hear them as well...... it was as if the words alone were making us euphoric, to hear these secret confessions in our head spilled out across the seas of our souls a thousand miles across the world...

Except, somehow in retrospect the significance was missing - or perhaps the magic was used up... and the words seem hollow, and empty, and devoid of meaning.

It wasn't love, then... it was just infatuation. And when the moment passed....

... the words became, just words.

Point. Counterpoint. Query, answer, and refrain.

Empty.

I am afraid of those words again, the way I had been a myriad lifetimes ago with Her. I am afraid to speak them because that foray into self-discovery, into near hedonistic experimentation with the Words... led to disappointment, and an utter lack of significance and permanence... to a memory that was powerful for an instant, then lost, blooming, then fading away like a transient rose in the ever changing garden of time.

I couldn't speak them to Her often enough - if at all - because it seemed precious... too precious, like a drop of life's blood - only to be uttered in a moment of absolute sincerity... in an instant of absolute certainty. When the stars crossed a certain way, or the feng-shui calenders aligned... or whatever. Laugh.

And so if I do not speak those words often enough now... can I be blamed for wanting something... more than I deserve?
*****
Falling

Once upon a time, when I was very small, I used to have this strange dream of falling - just falling. Through nothing, through empty air, with my arms outstretched, and my eyes closed. Black, all around me.

No unpleasant thoughts of the ground rushing up to meet me... no nauseating sensation of vertigo or horrible visuals of rapidly enlarging skyscrapers... or even sheep.

Just wonderful, liberating tranquilty. Peace.

It was a nice dream.

Sometimes, listening to the oddly therapeutic sound of your heartbeat and drowsing off... it feels like that.

*****
Without Grace

You don't think she's beautiful? Why not? - she asked.

Because she is without grace - he answered.

She may learn how to be one day, but I feel she will never be able to... and hence she cannot be beautiful, to me. Do you understand?

She paused, for a moment, then replied : Yes.

Life is filled with strange ironies. A few days later, he found grace.

"What a horribly fat, ugly pigeon", he said, as they walked.

There was something about the moment. About her eyes, and about the way she was looking at him, looking at her.

They leant in.

I'm a peacable, law-abiding citizen, I really am I swear.

But once in a while something like this happens, and before you know it you've been miyagi-tomorrowed. Talk about an unprovoked double-whammy. Harrumph.

So my new year's resolution is to bump off mr miyagi be extra nice and return the favour.

Mr Miyagi has the girls, and the... best girls. You know you want to read him already. Go on then, http://miyagi.sg

there. take that you foul, fiendish publicity-spreading evildoer. You can have all 200 of my crazed, psychotc nutcase fans friendly readers.

In Good Company

Over the wild and wanton new year loonnng weekend (fri, sat, sun, mon), in a fit of drunken debauchery, I consumed :

1.5 glasses of champagne (with oyster)
0.5 measure of sex on the beach
1 glass of (rather nice) cabernet shiraz
1 shot of white bacardi (disgusting)
many, many glasses of coke

that's 4 units in 4 days.

And yet I've had the most wonderful, wonderful time I've had, in years.

... and then, suddenly, it was six am. Again.

*****
She asked how it could be that she could spend so much time with him...

... he had been wondering just that : how come it was so easy to spend so much time with her?

He wasn't a loner, per se - nor was she, that was obvious. But still...

*****
His guard fell for an instant, and she unerringly found the breach, attacking relentlessly with her finger-tip...

He tried to dodgy (futilely) and to counter attack (not very effectively) and in the end settled for just pinning her down by her wrists, laughing...

his eyes never left hers, as for a moment, they were still.

... then the battle resumed.

She had a very ticklish fingertip.