only slightly pretentious.

ron's taking his 'o' level chinese paper this morning, and for what its worth, your sister is praying you'll do your best and be satisfied. i just got called emotionally incapacitated; but sigh, to some extent, its true – i adore you! As much as it is humanly possible for a older sis to admire her younger brother: sometimes, i secretly suspect you want to tell me that It'll be alright, and that It's okay, girl, to cry it out. But it'd have sounded patronizing wouldnt it? I could have imagined this. oh wells, just hope you know i've always adored you, lil bro (:

cant make that move anymore can you now? you would rather let your feet sting of cold,bleed with beer-bottle cuts, bruise with the scorching pebbles' fire, than for him to see any more than your feet. your shoes are just across the line, so is he. but your feet are the prettiest thing about you; the rest of you is the most hateful scum of the earth. he must only see your feet, hide all the rest! because you think the world of him; how can he ever love someone so vile? your feet are the best thing about you, say no more.

so thats it for now.walk away to a place where mirrors do not speak. heal, dear child, heal! look, the sun still shines, even when no one looks! and look, pardoned child, the vileness dies! the numbers disappear, the mirrors are mute, the eyes start to smile, and you know, you have already won. it wouldnt matter if you had cellulite on your arm, your big secret is out, out, out! because when all the tourists and their freak-dogs have left, and you put on nothing, for no one, you'd still be no less of a wonder than before. clean slate, pep, cleaned.

thinks.

i got so mad at myself on the courts today, and a mini tantrum would boil up inside me everytime a shot sailed past the baseline. its just a game, its just a game, no need to get worked up, i chant, but the tantrums seem involuntary. probably made a very disappointing rallying partner for jason across the net. sigh, and there was no excuse, the weather was quite glorious, i wasnt carrying baggage from the day's happenings – it was just unreasonable. i felt like hurling the racket onto the ground and swearing. verbally, not just thinking it. and just screaming, 'arghhhhhh! get it right!'

expectations can ruin a perfectly happy balance – i'd expected a longer email from you; i'd expected you to initiate conversations and wipe that blase look off your face; i'd expected you to read my blog even though we never bring up the subjects of my posts. [the 'you's refer to three different people.] and outside of relationships: i'd expected more discipline from myself – dont you sometimes assume this stasis in the world around you simply because you're in stasis, and then find yourself somewhat surprised when, as you walk into the gym or past the hockey field, you see that everyone else is in the midst of something, and have been in the midst of something, without your knowledge? shocking.  

a mouthful of trivia

Sparked off by another dinner conversation over at Halifax, where good food and idle chatter meet. So after finally wrapping my tongue around ‘hippomomonstro…’ argh, -goes to cut and paste from ailin’s blog- ‘hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia’ , i find out that it was snubbed in the longest-word lists!
Consensus seems to be that some of the longest words (mainly technical ones) recorded in the complete Oxford English Dictionary include:

otorhinolaryngological (22 letters),
immunoelectrophoretically (25 letters),
psychophysicotherapeutics (25 letters),
thyroparathyroidectomized (25 letters),
pneumoencephalographically (26 letters),
radioimmunoelectrophoresis (26 letters),
psychoneuroendocrinological (27 letters)
hepaticocholangiogastrostomy (28 letters),
spectrophotofluorometrically (28 letters),
pseudopseudohypoparathyroidism (30 letters).

30 letters! thats more letters than there are in the alphabet. [and note: 'pseudo' was repeated twice in the last word. a double 'pseudo'?]
___________________

In the United States couscous is known as a type of pasta, probably reflecting the influence of Sicilian immigrants. However in most other countries it is treated more like a grain in its own right. It is particularly valued for its rapid preparation time.
a double ‘cous’. aww, symmetry.
____________________

Earliest recorded version of the Little Red Riding Hood: Le Petit Chaperon Rouge and had its origins in 17th century French folklore. It was printed in 1697, by Charles Perrault. The story had as its subject an “attractive, well-bred young lady”, a village girl of the country being deceived into giving a wolf she encountered the information he needed to successfully find her grandmother’s house and eat the old woman while at the same time avoiding being noticed by woodcutters working in the nearby forest. Then he proceeded to lay a trap for the Red Riding Hood. The latter ends up eaten by the wolf and there the story ends. The wolf emerges the victor of the encounter and there is no happy ending.
_________________________

just a couple from the list of mental notes compiled tonight! conversations that take sudden sharp turns and have no end in sight – rumpelstiltskin; sofa lady; one-room flats with helpless old ladies; couscous; home-schooling; sumo wrestlers; multiple DNA; dyslexia; tarot cards; male shopping tendencies – good stuff!

a weekend in oxbridge

Weekend at Cambridge-Oxford was exquisite, even with the exasperating rain. And Oxford reassured me that no, I was not jaded yet – all twenty years of me was still susceptible to awe and wonder – i havent lost it. I cannot be sure that my assessment was objective, but it seemed rather indisputable that Oxford made a superior first impression.

So one fine morning, four of us tottered down to Cambridge, met up with Kenny, who obligingly
dispensed nuggets of touristy information about his university town while walking us around. He also dispensed less touristy information – like how the word 'punt' can function both as a verb and a noun; ah there is no shame in being more informatively-challenged than a cambridge undergrad. Anyhoo, we rented the punt, and yes, it was all rather nice – for the puntees ie slackers who sat back and huddled under umbrellas or photowhored.

[left: observe cui the punt-er at work there. she was the best female punt-er of the day, i can safely say. there wasnt much competition.]

so, being not much competition, ailin and i fed ducks, and wondered why we had more feelings of goodwill towards the ducks in cambrdige, as opposed to the ducks in york. we then also tried hurling bread at geese. It was inspired. Yea, it really was, by a scene in About a Boy apparently. But a combination of the softness of the bread, awful wind proved the task impossible. This was the story behind the etymology of the phrase 'to miss the goose', which we later decided, would refer to the failure to impress others.

Punting over, we loittered around the city centre, before prepping for the night's formal at Trinity. Quite an experience, gastronomic and otherwise. We were introduced to this mysterious tradition of penny-ing, where people would be evil and surreptitiously drop a penny into your glass of wine while you stood up for the Fellows to exit.Not quite, but you would have to bottoms-up the glas with the penny.It was an evil tradition.

Onward to oxford the next morning, where we met Tim who brought us to the Sunday church service. Where i spotted, Sheryl :) And felt like i needed photographic evidence to prove it. It was also thanks to this church service that i found a new favourite hymn, and also, realised how i've gotten rather attached to church-going.

lunchtime afterwards! we were joined by Louis's friend Caleb and proceeded to lunch at the eagle and child pub, upon Tim's recommendation. Well, a girl and her 6.75 pounds were parted, but the lunch was good :) i was touched that they served Yorkshire pudding. they dont despise us northern folk, good fellas.

[left: notice Louis holding a water jug labelled 'Pimm's', which is a gin-based liquor made in England. there is a story behind why he is holding it. im not dying to tell it, but uh, maybe he might blog about it. maybe not.]

anyway! see that very pretty photo on the left? it is stolen from someone's flickr. and it is a photo of christchurch college :) which was our last stop for the day [im not inclined to call Sainsbury's our last stop for the day].

Cui's friend, xinhui, was our tour guide for the last hour of the day, and she brought us into the college grounds. it speaks for itself. really, i have no words for it. ailin did: 'sigh, don't you wonder why York didnt put a little more effort [into the architecture]?'

me wonder if we were all guilty of judging the university by its architecture. hypothetically supposing oxbridge was nothing more than a pretty face, and they did not boast of those luminaries – supposing it was just another college, and not amongst the top – how many points would the aura-meter drop by? was i just awed by the grandeur and charm. no answers, no answers!

Thou shalt commit adultery

quick post before work! well, xy, you see, when other people have really really ridiculusly, infinitely better photos than i do, there isnt much choice is there? jtay, i miss you loads too. your term is ending isnt it? -wince- i feel like mine hasnt even started proper!

and received a call yesterday: it was an unknown number, but a familiar voice over the phone. and after those lil cells in my head snapped into sync, i doubtfully ventured a guess: 'eehui'? Lo and behold,yes, she was calling a certain Paul dude, but somehow, dialed Pep instead. Chance occurances like these have been happening so frequently its so hard to resist reading any meaning into them.

and oh, received a letter today, which made me grin from ear-to-ear! Written with RJC letterhead! No, haha, make that RJC foolscap paper. [hope you dont mind me posting it here, it just really made my day (:] Written mail beats email mail hands and legs down la. It made my day (:

a chat with louis yesterday got me thinking about the authenticity and authorship of the bible. the great book can be plagued with errata too: In the 1631 King James Version, the printers perilously printed: "Thou shall commit adultery" [Exodus 20:14], ommitting the 'not'.

There are 11 surviving copies of this edition :)