holiday blues

warning: bitching blog

well, not really blues as in blues. it's supposed to be the middle of my mid semester break. but here i am in school again. it doesn't feel like a break at all lor. nus really cheat people of their holidays. and they wonder why the graduates don't donate money back to their 'alma mater'. one week mid sem break which we 辛辛苦苦 gotten from the school higher ups. imagine, last time, the supposed one week break was in reality 4 days long cos sunday is included in the week. *rolls eyes* anyway, now, they cheat us even more. the break was from last saturday till this coming sunday. saturday was CNY eve. sunday, monday, tuesday are CNY public holidays. *闯墙* so in the end, we only have in reality, half a week of holiday. AND immediately after the so-called holiday, mid term exams start. grr... let me say again: and they still wonder why graduates don't give money back to nus. i heard that ntu's mid term break is NEXT week. meaning, they get the proper CNY public holidays, THEN the official school break. how lucky is that?! sigh. haven't done any work so far this hols. and i think the rest of today is kinda going to be a wasted time.

tried to do EL3216 readings yesterday. I SPENT 2 BLOODY HOURS ON A SINGLE READING!!!!! i really did. and i wasn't like fooling around or what. i was really reading. it was like, i read and read and read and it doesn't seem to end. and then i look at the clock and it's like, what da hell?! where did the time go??! you know how depressing that is? it didn't help that all the other 3216 readings are just as thick. so, didn't accomplish anything yesterday beyond that one reading. this is unfortunately the module that i lag the most. in readings and practice. unfortunately also, this is the module with the heaviest workload. sad to say, the only module which i am more or less up to date with is nm2216, which is an 'extra' module. die lah! and i still don't find the motivation to study or do anything. i got the strong urge to hibernate right now. life is totally spinning out of control. i should go talk to ELIZA. haha!

next week is gonna be busy. monday music ministry meeting. tuesday, nm2216 mid term project presentation. wednesday el3254 mid term test. thursday el3201 test. sunday varsity voices concert. i wish i have a universal remote control to let me fast forward to the monday next. let me say again how much i hate this school.

church was weird last night also. tian didn't appear till 10minutes before mass was going to start, at which time i was panicking that i was gonna have to replace her. (i hadn't practiced the songs and they were difficult songs to me) anyway, she came, thank god. so that was the first weird glitch. after that. for the record, let me say this: the missal clearly stated, the penitential rite and gloria are omitted. despite this, fk started saying the 'i confess'. so me decided i better prepare the kyrie just in case. lucky i did, cos after his 'i confess', he gave me this look, so had to start playing it. dammit. at least, he didn't do the gloria. i tell you, of all the mass parts, the one i hate playing most is gloria. whoever invented such a long twisted and convulated *&%$#. no words to describe it. so that was glitch 2. and then! andrea's psalm. the organ began acting up. it was already sounding weird in the first place, now it was absolutely impossible to control. the sound was so erratic. as in, the sound, sometimes got, sometimes don't have. the loud-soft was not controllable. so i think i screwed up her psalm cos the organ sound wasn't good. glitch 3.

then, the imposition of ashes. we were going to sing "ashes", of which the animator obviously didn't know we were going to sing. note to self: remind andrew and andrea that the animators need to be spoonfed. so ok, glitch 4 was our fault cos the animator didn't know to announce the song. THEN!!!! screwiest of the screwy night. after the imposition, supposed to be the creed and the intercessions then the offertory. SOMEBODY decided to do the offertory collection first and told the wardens to come and start the collection before the intercessions. so left poor choir in a lurch...to sing the offertory song, or not to sing? is this supposed to be the offertory anyway? glitch 5. so we sat in confused silence. after the wardens finished their collection, THEN he decides to do the intercessions. and then, he starts the offertory rites. *wantstoslaphimhard* so we just did one offertory song. rest of the mass was more or less ok. apart from the screwy organ which makes me almost unable to hear the congregation at all, except during the 'our father'. it's like, i can hear bits and pieces here and there, but the rest, i have to imagine and fill in the gap myself.

and to complain about the behaviour of the animators again. why is it that the higher they are in seniority, the blurrer they are? for instance, this one during the ash wed mass. AND, omg, i'm still so angry about this one. last sunday. after communion he went up and announced the thanksgiving song. i can see there's wardens getting ready for second collection at the back, so i don't start the choir yet, cos usually they'll announce that there's a second collection for whatever. BUT this guy didn't say anything. so i assume, ok, you don't want to say anything about the collection, fine. so choir starts singing. halfway through the song, fr paul signals timeout, choir stop singing. so we stutter to a halt. and wait while fr makes the announcement about the second collection. then when he's done then we continue the song from the halfway point. fucking cheebye lah! you know how much it looked like this was screw up was choir's fault??! for the record, the announcements are supposed to be done by the animator. AND choir gave the animator time to announce whatever he likes to announce. BUT HE DIDN"T ANNOUNCE. AND!!!! it's not as if he's a newcomer to the church. he is/was the head of the church PPC!

why don't he be more professional? this is such amateurish behaviour lah. if you're not sure of sequence, ask someone for help. other animators are not ashamed to ask for guidance when they need it. all this reflects so badly upon the church lor. (see, just blogging about it now makes me really mad) it's frustrating. and they also wonder why the youths are all leaving the church. i'm so tempted to leave also lah. what's the point in staying? it's really banging my head against a brick wall. i mean, i don't understand it. can't they see that it's obviously so...so...creating such a bad impression? sigh. like that proverb says: grant me the serenity to accept the things i cannot change, courage to change the things i can, and wisdom to know the difference.

and then, problems with cfa. i'm tired to tell the whole story here. but the gist of it is that we apparently didn't return the studio entrance key since last thursday. so cfa was nagging us. so hunting up and down, doing detective work about who last had the key and all that shit. finally we found the key. it was with a certain committee member who, god knows why the key's in his hands in the first place, forgot to return it and happily carried it around till now. please lah! you're not kids. i shouldn't need to nag. sick of it already lah. thank god, the year for choir is ending soon. can step down soon. this one year doing logistics and the church choir has convinced me of one thing: i am not a leader and should never even try to take up leadership positions. it'll only end badly.

sigh.

let's talk about more happy stuff ya? i borrowed the book "the prestige" from the library. yup, the one that the movie is based on. btw, i also bought the movie. :D cos the bro wanted to buy his transformers vcds, i saw this one and convinced mum to let me buy it. bought the 'phantom of the opera' vcd also. haha! anyway, back to the book. I LOVE IT! finished it in 2 days. rather, that was the one i brought to malaysia (if you could read my chinese blogging). i didn't really understand it the first time, but the second time reading made a lot of things so much clearer. cos this is one of those books where, the fates of so many people are intertwined and it's like, a series of flashbacks intercut with the present. so for eg, the front part of the book reads like the guy is schizophrenic. but, by the end of the book, i understand why he writes like that, and reading it again, i finally understand what he was trying to do. (hard to be more explicit without giving away the plot) anyway, i think the book is different from the movie. haven't watched the movie yet, but the book itself...the secret of the illusion in the end is jaw-droppingly wow! but the ending is a little...hanging. one of those unresolved mysteries. love it. go read! i give it 4 out of 5 stars. good book!

been watching american idol. there's 2 asian people this time. sanjaya malakar and paul kim. sadly, neither are much good though. i predict that sanjaya is not going to survive this round. his performance last night was a complete mess. everyone else was alright. it was like, the byword for the night was 'showmanship'. so showy last night was. not very spectacular performances though. the only person that i can picture in the top 5 at least is chris sligh. the fat guy with afro hair. everyone else was just average. the girls performances tonight. gonna be fun. :D

ok, i'm through bitching for now. haha!




mood: tired
listening to: dancing in the street - sister act 2