The Funk of 40,000 Years

There are albums that have stood apart from their inception, including Jay-Z's The Black Album and Mariah Carey's Music Box, just to name 2 critically and popularly acclaimed records. None, however, compares to MJ's Thriller, a 9-song LP that sold 100,000,000 copies. Watching This Is It was good simply because of the music - completely original and inspired by things that are real. There's a line from the eponymous song that goes "I never heard a single word about you/Falling in love wasn't my plan"; it just holds too much truth. And from me, that's saying something.

Toggling from messenger with 27 contacts online in the sunlit hours of a lazy Friday to receiving one more invite to another fright-themed party at some club tomorrow under its moonlight, I'm left hanging because I anticipated so much from these 3 days, and apparently they could be so simply and indifferently brushed aside, without adequate reply at that.

We don't celebrate halloween/Heart of Darkness

Sometimes one finds in the midst of good literature, or in observations of one's friends and company, or from events beyond the realm of human control or cognizance, a moment of catharsis or epiphany, of revelation and clarity that, more than anything, leaves one in a state of unknowing because of all there is to know. I have found that, in this moment, in this space I occupy, I know beyond the shadow of a doubt that I think untowardly of death not because I fear it, but because I know that I put myself out there completely and utterly, and I live life in absolute intensity that I shun the emptiness of it's end. I know that I cannot love because I will do so with such abandon that even a glance at its inconceivable end will leave me more void than distraught, an immensely scarier prospect. And a mere mention of even part of a name or alias, or picture of something related, or a memory of an event or time or day brought up in conversation, will bring to mind and heart the full spectrum of emotions as if I were right there again. It's because I embrace everything totally that I enjoy all positivity and am subject to the reverse in equal measure. Life for me is making sure the former tips the latter, even if by a fraction of a fraction; while a seeming impossibility, I'd like to think I get better every instant.

3 X 5

The rarity of class gatherings bears uncanny similarities to the sighting of a manual car or a carpark without a toyota wish. I was IM-ing Joash on MSN 2 nights ago, and we agreed that this cannot continue; it is downright unhealthy in my opinion. As a pre-cursor to organizing this, I'm thinking of consolidating where everyone is at the moment, like overseas or local unis, where in the armed forces etc. Should be enjoyable to put this together.

These last 24 hours have been immensely satisfying, chatting in the MRT from Jurong East to Pasir Ris, gaming till 4 in the morning, iPod sharing on an hour-long bus ride, and lunch/pool/dinner as well. Mostly with ET and XQ, the last parts with Ron and Sean too.

I liked the chat XQ and I had at Starbucks best. I've mentioned on this domain before that we have landed in similar positions, and that has not changed. Metaphors aside, I've not told anyone about how with what little faith I have the position that I'm in has been extended in truly blessed fashion. Plus on the bus I invited to YAM camp; thinking of one more.

My 100th Tweet

Was, again, about the same thing. Strange, no one's asked me about it recently. Welcome I suppose, different from the last. And the one before that.

I think I can handle a 3-day week, starting tomorrow ending friday. I think I can I think I can.

...taking all I want

"The weather outside is frightful" describes a little of what today seems of the surface, but really, it is one of those special weekends. Saturday with Clarence and Xinquan watching (500) Days of Summer, having dinner at Chomp Chomp with Wing Hing and Ryan, then staying over at Clarence's place to watch the BPL and play DotA. (This is the limit of my computer gaming if you're wondering, once in 2-3 month overnighters.) Sunday with the church frisbee gang at Tanah Merah Field for almost 3 hours, followed by lunch at Thai Express, Siglap and later Church Anniversary service. I can point out so many things that are special about this weekend, starting simply from the differences in routine, but I find they aren't necessarily made any better articulated. I think I have expressed it as best as I could in the 2 sentences above =)

A Funk

I admire how on Daphne is with the weekly frisbee facebook event. I also marvel at how louis and i are usually the first to who rsvp "attending". And finally I wonder why, with lack and want of consistency (let's leave prowess for the while), I so promptly click. I do hope it's more like 3 Sundays ago this time round, less so the past 2 (ok, maybe a little of the epic scrimmage; i'm a sucker for that sort of thing) Do ignore if I sound a little more pessimistic than usual. Stranger still, but in a very nostalgic turn of events, jake turned up and joined adriel and I after our usual apple-orange picking exercise; bernie said we should be able to read one another telepathically, which is the reminiscent part of the whole thing I suppose. Ahh, flashbacks.

Today is known as the Deadline in the UCAS universe, and I have watched it slip by with intentional bench-warming cheers. Do advice, anyone, if you have any idea, besides UC (University of California, such as those in Los Angeles and at Berkeley), what colleges and universities in the US of A are not part of the consortium that is the Common Application. Many thanks.

"I've had it with unresponsive posts/I don't think I'll bother ever again"

2 weeks ago I played the best frisbee, but today just wasn't there. Just as in other activities, I seem to play upwards to the standard of those around me, especially when there is a more condense group.

To look forward to:

YAM Camp Comm Meeting, tomorrow

Gathering/Stayover, saturday

Early morning frisbee, sunday

Please let tomorrow be a slow start, especially without the drama about leaving work.

If you know then I'm half-and-half with relief and with apprehension; if you don't and this is the reaction I think it's just uncouth; whatever it is you're not worth it.

"Cromwellian", as we read in Soyinka

Falling asleep on a Saturday afternoon meant I missed out watching (500) Days of Summer with Elliot/Justin/Patrick, and instead I took some time to slowly flip the pages of this year's Booker Prize Winner, Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel. Unlike the other Bookers I've read (namely Arundhati Roy's God of Small Things, Roddy Doyle's Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha and Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger), it is a long book. Really long. With 5-page introductory notes. I think I will read some other literature before psyching myself up enough to read it. I'm thinking of Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children (which I will borrow from Gavin) or the Enchantress of Florence, or J.M. Coetze's Summertime.

The Exaggerators Club

Spent the night at ET's place after we met, with XQ, at BTP for pool after I finished work. I spent half an hour this morning sitting on a window sill watching a pigeon and thinking about how I would spend Monday when noon arrives till time for YAM Camp Comm meeting in SMU.

Getin' down with 3P

I have developed a very shady yardstick for music taste - whether you like The Ting Tings or not. My drift is that if you find them so weird to the point of loving them, then you've got taste. Sometimes it's the musicality, but usually it's the lyrics. I am the first to appreciate the depth of well-written lyrics, but also the first to heart nonsense tracks. See Britney's "3" for a good example.

A Sporting History of Yours Truly

Indulge me, dear reader, as I take you back to the beginning of my history in athleticism.

I am not, as you might have guessed from how I look physically, your consummate sports star. I resemble the run of the mill kenyan long distance runner when it comes to physique, but ask me to run a fraction of the distance they can and I will most likely be found passed out. Nevertheless, I am not without my share of sporting activity. The thing to note is that they have all been pursued with more or less the same intensity and commitment - that is, casually and recreationally.

Any good Singaporean child, among many other things, would have done these 2 things: learn to play the piano at Yamaha, and if you stayed in a condo like I did, learn to play tennis by an overpaid ex-national player coach under the evening floodlights in the comfort of your estate's tennis courts. I did both, and with regards to the latter, took these become-a-potential-Pat-Cash lessons very seriously, because I found it much more fun than the other athletic lesson we are all put through as condo dwellers - swimming. Naturally, this led to me joining Mini Tennis in when I was 10. I faithfully attended school training, gradually in place of those condo lessons as my age moved into the double digits. This lasted for all of Primary 4, and I took up new stuff in Primaries 5 and 6, the computer and science clubs respectively. That's it for the adolescent years.

In my early teens, my time was spent in the pursuit of the arts, both performing and communicative, leaving me little space to indulge in school team sport. This is the point where one either becomes a sportsman or not. I mean yes, I did try out for tennis and could have gone down that road, but I didn't have that same passion in me I suppose. Around this time though, I picked up squash and table tennis, adding to my racket sport arsenal. The beginning of badminton is far more nebulous, though with it my sporting identity was, as it is now, complete - I am a racket sports person, definitely much more than a team game person. By virtue of who my closest friends were, I also picked up rugby, both contact and touch, though the latter is the most recent variety I've played just at last year's end in Bintan with these same friends. My mid teens were marked by putting in time for my racket sports, and I took little else of physical education seriously. In my late teens, the need for a NAPFA silver meant 4 months of a little more regimented exercise, though after that it was back to the routine of racket sports.

Now at the tail end of my teens, I have since picked up frisbee as a recurring activity. This afternoon we, church folk who began this as an outreach outlet, were pitted against a school team from TP. Not the best school team, but a school team nonetheless. It was an experience indeed. I've not played any competitive sport, at least I can't remember any inter-school-inter-whatever matches from my primary school days, and definitely none after that. In racket sports, you alone determine the outcome, and there are 2 ways to do that - independently win points, or force your foe's errors. There are similarities when it comes to a team sport like frisbee, but there are also other things I've never really fully appreciated because I've never been so immersed in such an extended experience. Things like team dynamics. As a debater, school and professional, I know what it means both contextually and universally, but the spirit of sport, as athletes will testify, is something else altogether.

So in all my history I have not known what it is like to put myself out there so much, max-ing out all that is in my physical fitness strength for a sport to the point of ignoring pain and wanting nothing more than to sleep immediately after. Witnessing it today reminded me of this, and I struggle to remember witnessing it before, though I must have, seeing as I have as many athletic friends as I should. My pursuits, debate in particular, have made me a familiar bedfellow with drills, training, late nights, long days and mental tire you could not imagine. But truth be told, it has never been a matter of finding within myself that bank of stamina for that one more hard run that will matter for the outcome of a point. Do I feel any less for it? Certainly not, but it does mean I am aware of what I've not experienced, and actually want to. No better than to have started recently I suppose, though I know it will never be with the same sheer intensity of the sportsmen amongst us. And I'm OK with that.

Barreling down the boulevard, looking for the heart of Saturday night

We met early, each taking responsibility for our own task, putting together an evening of spirituality and camaraderie. Little talking, each knowing the scope of one's work, doing it uncomplaining, undaunted, fully in sync. Saturday night in church that ended too late for either Adriel or I to consider joining Sam/Paul/Jake/Al/Val. An evening to look at the full moon, eat its namesake's cake, and tote paper lanterns (of which the only memory I have is in Thailand where one floating paper contraption nearly burnt a hole in the roof we were standing under).