Monday, January 30

once a year

How lucky I am that my birthday falls on the second day of Chinese New Year and I happen to have to work while the whole world is watching chingchong variety shows on TV? And gorging on bak kwa while I have to munch on biscuits because the canteen isn't even open?

Life's a bitch.

post party

I lost count of the bottles of champagne we popped. Or the calories of chocolate consumed.

Photos coming soon. I'm not worried, though there are five crossdressers out there who are breaking out in cold sweat at the thought.

I'm sorry if I flashed anyone in my too low-cut dress, but I was having way too much fun to care. Thanks to everyone who came, even after a horrible hard day of work!

And no, he didn't turn up. His li xing won over my gan xing at the end of the night.

While discussing the sad state of [non] affairs with a friend the morning after, I recovered my own li xing.

ME: What is it with me and these inappropriate men?
HE: You just have to get these bad boys out of your system and find a nice guy.
ME: He is a nice guy! Except for the small detail of his girlfriend, heh
HE: You ah. Make things difficult for yourself only.
ME: We're just friends and we're just talking as friends do...most of the time anyway...haha
HE: Well, remind me next time when I'm having phone sex with another girl while I'm attached, k?
ME: We're not having phone sex!
HE: You know what I mean
ME: The phone sex is too good. I can't make myself stop! Sigh...He makes me laugh
HE: Stephen Chow makes me laugh but that doesn't mean I wanna be with him!
ME: Stephen Chow makes me laugh and I wouldn't mind being with him! That body in Kung Fu Hustle!

But seriously. I have to be more li xing, now that I'm older [if not necessarily wiser].

Wednesday, January 25

my favourite things

I've been tagged by Oclouds, so here goes. Woohoo...

Four jobs you've had in your life
1. private tutor who put students to sleep
2. salesgirl at Stockmart (remember?) who lasted one day
3. exhibitionist (hahahha, not that sort lah, the World Trade Centre Expo sort)
4. intern (various publications, with varying success)

Four movies you could watch over and over again (not to be confused with favourite movies)
1. When Harry Met Sally
2. While You Were Sleeping
3. 10 Things I Hate About You
4. Mannequin

Four TV shows you love(d) to watch
1. Buffy The Vampire Slayer
2. Doraemon
3. Sex And The City
4. Any Nigella cooking show

Four places you've lived
1. Singapore
2. London
3. Holland [Village, haha]
4. NTU, Hall 11 [does this qualify? It's a world unto itself!]

Four places you've been on vacation to
1. New York
2. Kyoto/Tokyo
3. Barcelona/Sevilla
4. Venice/Florence
[Haven't been vacationing much lately, but I've taken out the less "exotic" ones like Bangkok, Batam and Phuket.]

Four places you would rather be
1. Mandalay
2. on the Trans-Siberian railway
3. some Greek island
4. in bed with another warm body next to mine

Four of your favourite foods
1. BBQ sotong
2. Mum's chicken soup
3. Any pasta, but especially carbonara
4. Sharksfin soup

Four websites you visit daily
1. televisionwithoutpity.com
2. guardian.co.uk
3. gmail.com
4. blogger.com

I lurve such surveys! Those who lurve them too, please take part too in the comments section!

Sunday, January 22

four weddings and a choy

Attended the first of four weddings that I've been informed of already so early in the year.

Some random thoughts:

-- The cold dish march in never fails to crack me up. The dry ice! The music! The waiters pretending to be solemn!
-- Men should wear jackets more often. They just look better. Whether there is a Superman outfit underneath is another story.
-- Brides all look naturally radiant. As do pregnant women.
-- Principles be damned. I'll take that extra bowl of sharksfin soup, thanks!
-- Deep-fried mini buns with crabmeat sauce is a truly inspired dish for the lazy.
-- Who ever said that weddings are the best place to meet people? They're the best place to catch up with old friends.

Saturday, January 21

the heart wants what it wants

The line suddenly came to mind as I was, once again, lolling in bed on a Saturday afternoon, feeling a wee bit gan xing and not at all li xing after yet another text session.

I tell him I'm about to do something stupid...like going to Borders and buying up half the store. He tells me he was just there.

My life is nothing but a series of near misses.

Someone once told me, in Mandarin, that the most beautiful memories come from regretting that which never happened. Me, I like to see things to their [often bitter] end, because I can't stand to live with "what if...".

[Who can tell me where "The heart wants what it wants" came from? Googling not allowed.]

Tuesday, January 17

fine print

Oh, did I not mention it before? He has a girlfriend. Whom he has cheated on before.

But after a talk, we decided to act like responsible adults from now on. Or was it act like nothing ever happened? Which, of course, nothing did.

As I told him, "Attraction is so over-rated anyway."

Sunday, January 15

decadence

"So would you rather me cave in, grab you and do horribly decadent things to you?"

I was all languid limbs and heavy eyelids that can only result from lolling in bed the whole day, when his text messages nudged me awake on Friday night.

I never knew the word decadent could send such delicious shivers down the spine.

But I resisted and instead told him, "Not tonight dear, I've got a headache."

The word stuck in my head, though, the entire Saturday, through a three-hour lunch with Fann Wong -- delicious but too boring to recount -- and an indulgent pedicure which I could ill afford and instantly chipped when I got home.

After more lolling in bed, it was time to head out to Happy for a girls' night out for TPL's birthday celebration. I didn't set out to get so completely wasted, so I can only blame it on the decadence of the second bottle of champagne -- foolishly downed by two already rather happy girls.

There was a short moment of sobriety when we looked at each other and thought of the people texting and distracting us throughout the night. And then just as quickly, we snapped out of it and continued hurtling towards oblivion.

I remember wanting to remember certain things, but try as I may, only fragments come to mind.

L singing "I'm a little teapot", because so many of the men were short and stout. The mamasan at the bar sweeping his arm and proclaiming that all the bartenders were straight. The industrious cashier with the shyest smile whom we kept badgering. The Frenchman who told everyone "I love you". The numerous topless dancing males, many of whom should have remained dressed. Learning a new Korean word -- pugah -- to assume the position. Me wailing to TPL, "How? Should I have a fling with him?"

I look at my phone's message history and I can barely recall what I was thinking when I sent them. There was one where I accused him of being a terrible kisser, and he agreed, "Yes, I'm a terrible everything. You should run away from me."

Things got more terrible as the night progressed.

Seperated from everyone else after a trip to the loo, I stumbled tipsily around this gay club where disinterested men rudely pushed you aside, where every corner there seemed to be a nook for making out, and where there were too many green Exit signs which led nowhere.

Ended up sitting on the curb in some back alley and finally gave up all pretence of being sober. So I called him. I wonder now, do I do things I know I shouldn't when drunk? Or do I get drunk so I can do things things I shouldn't?

"Hey..." I murmured in slow motion into his voice mail at 3:31am, according to my phone log. Then I paused. Then I hung up.

Someone else came and found me and sent me home and made me take out my lenses and put me to bed.

Being decadent isn't as gratifying as I imagined.

Friday, January 13

Thursday, January 12

fishing expeditions

When feeling depressed over upcoming birthday -- somehow worse than hitting the big 3-0 last year -- make yourself feel better by having such conversations:

TODAY

Me: I still can't believe I've already crossed the big 3-0 mark! I feel old!
He: You crossed it already ah? You don't look over 30 for sure.
Me: That's the best thing anyone has said to me today! I can't believe it's been a year already since the pajama party!
He: Oh shit... That was a 30 year mark birthday party hor. You don't look it for sure lor. Still young and beautiful. Hahaha
Me: And my day just keeps getting better and better!
He: And that wasn't even a pick-up line...

LATER

Me: I feel old to be over 30! No offence to you...hahaha
She: Are you over 30? You really don't look it ok! How old are you?
Me: I'll be 31 at the end of the month! Ugh!
She: That's young!

FEW WEEKS AGO

He: So you're very close to your sister. How old is she?
Me: She's 26.
He: And you are...?
Me: I'm...errr...30.
He: Well, you don't look 30 to me.
Me: Yeah, yeah, I look 35, right?
He: I was going to say 32, hahaha.
Me: Idiot.
He: Seriously, you don't look 30.

heh

Being the Queen of SMS -- mind you, it's SMS, not S&M, I'm not Queen Amrita -- I've been fascinated by one of the most succinct and powerful words you can use in messages.

Or rather, it is a non-word -- heh.

The difference it makes, when appended to something like "Don't toy with my heart", is the difference between being too close to the truth and just the right touch of nonchalance.

Like laughing in the face of the little inconveniences life throws at you, the heh is like the sound of a breath being expelled not silently enough, to signal that you don't take things that seriously.

"I'm getting rained on here while waiting for you. Heh"
"I'm a big girl. Give it to me straight, I can take it. Heh"

It may seem similar to its repetitive, naggy aunt -- heh heh -- but its purpose in life and in text messages is quite different. While the heh heh is so blatantly trying to make mirth, the heh is entirely more subtle. Skim a message too fast, and you miss it.

The beauty of the heh is that it is only three characters long, therefore it often finds its way into the 160 characters I'm afforded with every text message.

But sometimes, a heh is just a heh. Like when your message is too short, too abrupt, too curt, and you want to soften the blow, but there's no time and you mean business.

"Offstone. Go away. Heh"

Sunday, January 8

weather forecast

"Will the rain never stop, my lurve? I'm sad."

"My entire being aches. I wish the rain would stop...literally and metaphorically."

"Make the rain stop, please, lurve."


And yet it continues to pour outside. Inside, too.

Saturday, January 7

employee of the month



Not only do I have the Krispy Kreme T-shirt, now I also own the nifty paper hat. Thank you, GeeWee and Alfie!

a melancholy whore



It is not exactly the most helpful novel to be reading in the still of the sleepless night, especially in my current state of mind, but nevertheless I'm savouring every lush word. Deep in the throes, more like it, even though it is about a dirty old man's sex life, to put it crudely.

But confession time: I'm a shallow shallow person. I couldn't resist buying the book, even though I usually think hardcovers are a waste of money, because the cover was so beautifully dusky and the title so very -- sigh -- evocative.

Friday, January 6

private number

This morning, as I was frantically trying to crimp my eye lashes in time for work...

ME: Hello?
HIM: Hello darling...
ME: Who is this?
HIM: You don't recognise my voice?
ME: I think you have the wrong number.
HIM: I miz you...
Me: Wrong number!

How can it be, that the mere thought of him grazing my brain on New Year's Eve could translate into him calling me up out of the blue, after all this time?

A couple of nights ago, over the phone, someone confided that on New Year's Eve, in a fit of "loneliness or whatever", he had texted some of the girls he had gone out with before.

I told him I'd mentally gone through a very short list of my own, too, that night, but managed to stop myself from contacting anyone -- except the Liverpool fan.

His conclusion was, "You need to get laid." Perhaps he was speaking for himself.

But I speak for the both of us -- and perhaps the "wrong number" caller too -- when I say that it's the time of the year when everyone needs someone, but not just anyone will do.

Thursday, January 5

new order

I took a day off in order to get my life in order. Then it started to rain and I found myself telling C, "My life can wait while I take a nap..."

The tasks were almost too daunting to tackle.

Torn envelopes of bills were wedged into the triangular void of my desktop calendar, begging to be paid.

The laundry basket was overflowing with close to three weeks' worth of clothes I no longer remember wearing and squashed-up bras.

Elf work of sewing hooks, trimming tulle and cutting ribbons was overdue. So were the December accounts.

Grimy sheets on the bed. Mouldy food in fridge. Worm-ridden potatoes. Unrewound and unwatched video tapes. Unresolved issues about love and work.

I'm proud to annouce that, except for the last item, the rest of my life is now organised the way I like it. The sacrifice of the nap was worth it.

Sunday, January 1

31 days hath january

Not too long ago, as I was hitting my annual year-end slump, I had a semi-long mdnight phone conversation with a seemingly-perpetually-on-the-prowl friend, who is also a former-journalist-turned-wannabe banker. [Pardon my hyphens, I have no idea how to punctuate something like this, even though it's my job to know such things.]

As we were discussing my non-existent love life, he said something like, "The reason why is because..." and I almost had a brain aneurysm. What has happened to his English?

I told him that the forecast for my love life in 2006 wasn't fantastic. Very bad, in fact, according to some Taiwanese horoscope quack on TV. Aquarians apparently will have the second worst luck in matters of the heart, because they think too much, consider too many options, ponder too hard in general when they should just go with their hearts. [Don't ask me which star sign is the worst, because I wasn't able to decipher it with my poor Mandarin.]

True to form, I've been over-analysing me, myself and the various hims in my life. And to my horror, as I re-read this blog, I found a pattern emerging. I always get into scrapes in my favourite month of the year -- January.

Two years ago, I recklessly kissed a boy I shouldn't still be kissing on New Year's Eve and ended up eventually having to explain all over again to him why I couldn't see him anymore.

Last year, I got all tied up in knots when I had an epiphany and realised I could see myself marrying and growing old with a certain someone -- who would never be mine.

This year -- just one day into the new year -- and I've already told someone I'm not going to flirt with him anymore.

don't come easy

When your tongue is too heavy to form the proper words, say:

Whappened?
Sup?
Sall good
Mmmkay
Lemmelone
Goway
Comere


Remind me next year not to start the year with a hangover. I should have stuck to my original plan of doing two weeks' worth of laundry last night. Excuse me now while I take another nap on my keyboard.

sweet nothings

If he would rather watch Liverpool kick a ball around than have drinks with you on New Year's Eve, then no matter how many text messages he dishes your way the morning after, you must remain unmoved.

Or so I told myself.

But with champagne still sloshing around my system, when his SMS woke me up this morning, I succumbed. Again.

Why is it you can convince yourself that your eyes are wide open even when they are half shut? [This applies equally to my hungover situation now at work, as well as to the current state of affairs.]