6.06.2004

 

[My Little Big Adventure]

ever since i started work, seems like all i ever do on weekends/offdays is go gallivanting all around our merry little island - a far cry from what i used to do. maybe it's a sign that i'm finally growing up. or that i just can't be bothered to just idle around at home - especially given the hours im working these days, though on second thought that's probably not surprising to those who know me [and my style of working!]. which incidentally leads me to the question that PP posed recently - what is it about [me] that makes me gravitate towards working in high-stress environments (or something like that).. but truth be told, i don't choose these places, they choose me! *bhb* nah, really, i think its coincidental, plus im kinda high-strung myself so when you put two and two together, the whole winds up being more than the sum of its parts.. anyway im trying to become more laid-back, to take things easily and as they come. by necessity, though, that also entails becoming more confident, which may not necessarily be what i want.

so today i had the practical of Public Transport 101 trying to get to, but mainly from, the PC Show at Expo. met a lot of people there as usual (hello!), most of whom were working part-time, and hence can land better deals on equipment ^^; (what are friends for, right.. =P ) but didn't really buy anything other than ink refills for my printer, since i'm not exactly leaving yet, and the prime rule of technology always applies - if you don't need it now, you can always pick up a newer, faster, better, cheaper model a few months down the road. i wasn't expecting any laptops at the show to meet my stringent (as always) future-proof criteria - fast Intel processor, 80GB HDD, 512MB RAM (must upgrade to 1GB), 128MB dedicated mobile graphics card, DVD-ROM/CDRW drive, etc - but there were! the prices were astronomical, of course, to match those specs. but im sure by the time i leave the price will normalise somewhat.

so my dad decided to impulse-buy a HDD/DVD recorder to replace the VCR for taping shows and stuff, and that wasn't exactly a good idea because the box was HUGE and from noon onwards the entire exhibition hall was a thick, viscous mass of people trying, with varying degrees of success, to shuffle in their intended direction of motion. boxes and tiny luggage trolleys (mode of transport of choice, helpfully provided by printer vendors to assuage people that their printers are portable via whatever public transport they choose to take) just get into the way of elbows, faces, shoulders and the like.. sorta like one of those "living experiments" that are the rage these days, on brownian motion. *jostle* *squeeze* sorry! excuse me! *shove* *squish*

if the hall itself was bad, the queues at the eating places were far worse. when i arrived at 1130, fresh out of bed and hungry, the queue at the Expo BK stretched just past the glass doors and took half an hour to hit the head of the queue. not to mention the fact that the service was slow (i dont blame them, mind, anybody doing a $5-an-hour job would be intimidated by the unending hordes of ravenous shoppers, straight out of some zombie B-movie) and i didn't get to have what i wanted because it was either sold out or "there was something wrong with the french fry machine". needless to say i was sorry i didn't have a full meal while i had the chance, because when we came out again at 1400 hoping to beat the lunch crowds, the queues were thrice as long as before. we hightailed it out of there are hopped on a bus to bedok food centre to eat (yes, opposite TJ.. and im sorry to say this but it does look rather run down from the main road). the japanese food stall there's pretty good, far better than yoshinoya. *stamp of approval* if you're keeping count, thats the warm-up exercise to the practical part of Public Transport 101.

on the way back from bedok, we passed something like a km-long tailback of cars all trying to turn into the Expo carpark. i don't know how many of them finally made it in (my guess is not much), but my dad wound up parking at Changi General Hospital, near Simei station. and yes he's as clueless about public transport as i am. =\ so he took a cab down to Expo. but taking a cab *out* of Expo necessitates a $2 surcharge. so we decided to take the train down to simei (insert tale of struggling to get a ticket deposit refund out of the single-use-ticket dispenser), and finding no shuttle bus from the MRT station, proceeded to take 38 to CGH. which was a horrific mistake, and 5 stops later, in some remote part of tampines, after asking directions from the 38 bus driver, passengers, a condo security guard and waiting at the opposite bus stop for bus 9, we eventually flagged down a cab, and - to our horror - sped down the very same road we had came, past Simei station for another 500m before we emerged at CGH. ^^; that's cutting a long story short, but if you add in struggling with a box half your size.. this almost ranks up there with the time i took the east/west train to kallang when i intended to take it to jurong east (sorry pris!)

in unrelated news, my 256MB thumbdrive mysteriously died on me in the commute between work and home - aka it was working fine when i took it out of the work computer, but it was dead by the time i plugged it in at home, leading to a lot of ranting and raving (well, mostly ranting). it was 6 months into its 2 yr warranty, and luckily both the local distributor and the taiwanese HQ were prompt and helpful with their email replies; managed to get it replaced with a spanking new one off-the-shelf after they determined that they couldn't coax it back to life again. that went on far more smoothly than expected, and im a happy bunny now.. ^^;

also finally decided on my gmail nick. you can now email me at floetry at gmail.com. probably won't integrate the new contact info into the layout of the site - that's a long story. it's not as though im uncomfortable with CSS and stuff (i'm not [uncomfortable]), it's just that im too much of a perfectionist that it's gonna take way too much effort and more time than i have on my hands to really revamp the thing. not to mention that many people don't want me to link to their private blogs. so if i've said it once, i'll say it again, im really sorry i don't link to anyone on this blog.. but if you go back deep enough in the archives i provided a post with the links. ^^;

wow that was a long post. i had a lot to say! anyway i totally adore the Shrek 2 OST now, the good songs on the OST are really good, though the bad ones are downright irritating (for one, i don't like all the Fairy Godmother songs). ranks up there with Baz Luhrmann's R+J OST.

Counting Crows - Accidentally in Love
from the Shrek 2 OST

---

So she said what's the problem baby
What's the problem I don't know
Well maybe I'm in love (love)
Think about it every time
I think about it
Can't stop thinking 'bout it

How much longer will it take to cure this
Just to cure it cause I can't ignore it if it's love (love)
Makes me wanna turn around and face me but I don't know nothing 'bout love

Come on, come on
Turn a little faster
Come on, come on
The world will follow after
Come on, come on
Cause everybody's after love

So I said I'm a snowball running
Running down into the spring that's coming all this love
Melting under blue skies
Belting out sunlight
Shimmering love

Well baby I surrender
To the strawberry ice cream
Never ever end of all this love
Well I didn't mean to do it
But there's no escaping your love

These lines of lightning
Mean we're never alone,
Never alone, no, no

Come on, Come on
Move a little closer
Come on, Come on
I want to hear you whisper
Come on, Come on
Settle down inside my love

Come on, come on
Jump a little higher
Come on, come on
If you feel a little lighter
Come on, come on
We were once
Upon a time in love

We're accidentally in love
Accidentally in love (x7)

Accidentally

I'm In Love, I'm in Love,
I'm in Love, I'm in Love,
I'm in Love, I'm in Love,
Accidentally (X 2)

Come on, come on
Spin a little tighter
Come on, come on
And the world's a little brighter
Come on, come on
Just get yourself inside her

Love ...I'm in love

---

sometimes the more you run away from something the more it just keeps coming back, whether you like it or not. just like (*sigh*) public transport. its not true that i don't take it at all. just not often enough to constitute an easy familiarity with the system, especially buses, since i no longer refer to the bus guide. heck, most of my friends drive whereever they wanna go, though when it comes to expo the car should either be left at home or parked somewhere really far away. whatever it is, ive decided that i need to lug the pocket mighty minds around with me when i go out, it's not just for drivers anymore.

(my sixth sense of navigation works a lot better when i have a map to recognise telltale landmarks and orientate...)

on radio now: Morcheeba's "What New York Couples Fight About". haven't heard that in a long while, it's just as good as the first time i heard it. respect. ^^; also cool: Nick Holder & Gemini - "No More Dating DJs". wicked tongue-in-cheek look at DJ culture..

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