2001-10-22 - 12:22 a.m.
#91: No Need for Renewed Vigour. FIGHTO! FIGHTO!
Note to self: A rather disturbing Dragonball Z parody awaits you at this link. It's so funny 'cause it's true.... And it'll really make your eyebrows hurt from quirking them upwards so many times. And while we're on links, this one will take you to (what I think) is one of the more interesting online personality tests that I'd almost completely forgotten about. Long ago, I started off as a White Knight (which was neat, in a sappy-heroish sort of way), then that changed to a Black Knight when I tried the test a bit after that (which was even neater and evil to boot!), and then when I tried the test again I was, of all things, a Shepherd (which was neither neat nor evil). This is most suckage.
Well, in order to try and make this journal a little bit more lively than it has been in the last couple of months, I'm going to challenge myself to write an entry every day from this day onwards! I'm hoping that this will somehow free this sense of writers cramp I've been getting for a while now and open the floodgates to some form of creative writing. And boy is that sentence vague. But in any case, this is it. I will accomplish this! No more of a self-depreciating and defeatist mood shall I fall under by saying "but all that might chnage when I have nothing to write about"! For I shall! FInd something to write about! Even if I have to go outside into the cold and wet under my own volition and LOOK for things to write about! Even if it kills me! I wonder if that was the declaration of the worlds first journalist before he was burnt at the stake for being a heretic.... I could do research and find out! Or I could just quietly find something else to interest myself in, instead of leaping on every subject of interest that comes to mind. As well as thinking up of sentences to write which don't sprecifically require the use of exclamation marks on the end. Plus, I'll need to find some way to excise myself from these moments of so-called "cleverness" when I talk to myself in a form of self-running commentary as a diary within a diary that simply makes people think I'm more eccentric than I already am. Come to think of it though, is it really that bad? Probably is if I've used it often before. Let's just find something else to talk about right now before ALL the voices in my head demand to be put in print.
Well, I wrote all of the above about three days ago and no, the irony of that does not escape me. On the otherhand, that interim period did see me doing something exciting! Something wild! Something completely out of the ordinary! For on Friday, I went ice skating! And there is silence amongst the audience. Well, it was fun for me.... After I started being able to propel myself forward without the use of the guardrails, that is. ^^;;; Many thanks to Clara and Joe who patiently explained the basics of ice skating to my less than responsive synapses, and watched as I completely ignored their sage advice and fell flat on my back multiple times. You can lead a horse to water but you can't tied a lead weight around its legs and toss it in, I suppose. I did okay on the forward motion thing after a while, but discovered that I was probably doing SOMETHING wrong when I changed my boots for more comfortable ones and found that I had mysteriously lost my ability to balance while maintaining any sort of heading. Methinks I need practice, but I seriously doubt I'll be heading to an ice skating rink under my own volition any time soon. Not unless lots of people I know were going to share in my embarassment. Like there were for this particular event! Total tally of people for that night: Amy, Clara (*wave waves* long time no see! good to see your alive! both in a literal and an educational sense, of course. O.o), EB, Fergus, James, Joe, Natasha (semi new girl from the AAC club), Steve and a guy who I think also attended a few AAC meets but I'm not entirely sure of his name yet.... I'm bad like that. If you ever meet me in real life, make me repeat your name several times to make sure it's permanently lodged in my memory, otherwise it just flies in one ear and out the other. Unless of course, you plan to be relieving me of my wallet and precious personal belongings from my unconscious form and you don't WANT me to remember your name.... In which case just introduce yourself the once. I'll be highly suspicious of you though. If I remember to be, anyway.
But yeah, that was fun and more or less debunked the theory I had about evil Fridays out to get me. Not counting the number of unexpected aches and pains I was heir to a bit after the ice skating, admittedly. But hey, that was to be expected! So what if my feet and ankles are sore and tender from the frequent amount of bendy footwork I utilised to keep myself upright? So what if I can't move my head properly without feeling like my skull is rotating on a spinal column made of sandpaper?! So what if my stomach muscles feel like they're stuck in a permanent vice-like cramp?!! Oh wait.... That last one was already in place before I went ice skating; probably didn't help the rest of my aches and pains any though. But the point IS: It was fun and it was different. I should do something like that more often. I probably won't, but hey! At least now I know that option could be as inviting as my usual "Staying home and examining my toenails for lint". BUT! (and there be many "buts" in this paragraph.... And I don't mean just of the posterior kind!) what if this is all just a ploy by the dastardly forces behind Friday to lure me out of protective blanket of fear.... Slowly allowing me to gain confidence to venture out on that day, onlt to STRIKE! when I least expect it! Oh yes, I can see it's plan now! Such dastardliness! Well, I'm not going to fall for that! Next Friday, I'm going to spend the entire day in bed and I ain't moving! Except to go potty. But even then, that may not be an option worth considering in light of my personal safety.
Okay, enough of that particular paranoid fantasy. Let's just move on to Saturday, where more fun was to be had! The day started off with my mother and I driving to the airport to pick up my Dad who'd just arrived from Malaysia. I must have been in a particularly good mood, because most of my mothers comments about my jobless state, my half completed educational and my lack of Christian integrity just bounced right off me. Would that I could do that more often. Got some gifts from my dad, a usual token gesture to show that he'd been around the world on business trips and such. First up was a little red and white wadded paper box; within which were a cylindrical shaped crystal with a picture of the Jin Mao Towers carved into a part of the curved surface and a..... souvenir card (?) with a picture of the same set of towers. The crystal is supposed to "inspire me" according to my dad, but I'll be danged if I can figure it out. One side of it is slanted, so there's a slight prism effect as ordinary light sources are refracted through to produce a spectrum of colours; which from a certain angle makes the towers look like they're bathed in the glow of the setting sun. Hmmmm. Nope, it's not ringing any major "sudden compulsion to resume study!" bells in my head. It is a nice piece of desk ornamentation though. The second gift was a far more useful one, a brand spanking new Nokia 3310 mobile phone! Or for the uninitiated, jackalopes amongst you who don't keep up with mobile models (much like myself) "one of them dangfangled mobile phones with them screens that you kin play games on and they vibrate when they ring so's that you kin find them agin when ya lose them in ya pockets". Goodbye ye old mobile phone I dubbed as "the brick"! Hello hours of wasted time playing the little games on a mobile when I should be using it for its original purpose: namely communication! Yes, I'm fairly happy that I've got a new technological toy to play around with, though I was careful not to let my face know. I'm kinda a stoic that way. Except the moments when I launch into fits of wild arm flailing as seen on the weirder episodes of Ren and Stimpy.
But that was not the fun! Not by a longshot! The fun only started at 6PM in the evening in the city, where we were rounded up by Steve and herded into a small (well, okay LARGE) enclosed room with a TV, a jukebox-like device and a couple of microphones. Yes! An evening of Kareoke! Which we all heartily enjoyed without imbibing alcoholic beverages or resorting to the use of dangerous chemicals. Strange that. And 3 hours passed by surprisingly quickly, with everyone getting at least 2 or 3 songs of their own into the mix (except for Josh who came in a bit late and was probably frightened at the mass of people crooning horribly into their microphones and passing it off as entertainment. That's what you get for not coming in earlier when we were just loosening up! O.o). In the midst of all this, I discovered several things about myself: one was that I couldn't sing as well as I thought I once could.... With my NORMAL voice. Now, I could be completely wrong here, but I *thought* I sounded better when I decided to just let it rip in a rather high pitched, raspy male style for songs like Eye of the Tiger and It's my Life. Well I could hit more notes that way anyway.... I should check and see, but that opportunity's not going to come up until my parents leave sometime this week to go on a holiday trip to Dunedin; leaving me at home alone with my computer, a microphone and a pile of raw, processed meat in the freezer. I just hope my screeching, gyrating voice won't reach my neighbours when I decide to experiment.... And the other thing I discovered? NEVER pick a song that contain the lyrics "I love you!" ever again if EB is in the same kareoke booth as you. Chances are, he'll get his mitts on the spare microphone and you'll be forced into a duet with him; and when you reach those three little words and your eyes meet across the crowded room.... Well, I won't go on. Needless to say, I had to change the last lines of Fly me to the Moon to "I kill you!". In fact: Never let EB get his mitts on a kareoke microphone again, EVER. The consequences could be deadly and terrifying.
After we left we had a brief stop at the food court in the IMAX theatre for dinner, then used the remaining energy we had after the kareoke to go off for a couple of games of Dance Dance Revolution! Or at least, the others did. I decided to break off from the main group on its mission to pummel gaming machines into submission with their feet; waving bye bye to Steve as I doubted I'd meet him again before he returned to Japan and going home: Happy and sated by the large group outtings I'd participated in in such a short time. Ahhhh.... That was indeed most fun. Oh! Total tally of people for Saturday evening (ye elde usual suspects): Amy, Chris, Clara, EB, Fergus, Finn, James, Joe, Josh and Steve! That was a lot of people to pack into an enclosed, unair conditioned room. It was almost of sauna level heat by the time we left. I guess it's still fairly new and hasn't gotten all its facilities up yet.
I seem to have reverted to my older journal writing style of describing a day in minute detail.... I seem to have missed a lot though, and plus I'm taking to long to write something like this out (2 hours???). Oh well, if that's the way it must progress, so let it be. So let's see where I'll go with this "one entry a day" thing I've promised to myself. Speaking of which, since it's past midnight and TECHNICALLY a new day, shouldn't I get this day off? Huh? ^_^ *sighs* No, I didn't think so either. -_-;;;; Okay, okay an entry for today there will be....
