ahaha! i have just introduced my roommate to the wonders of hello panda. haha. she agrees it's addictive. i think i finished off 3 packets today. :| oh well. at least i'm not daryl who bought like 5 (rather huge) packets of bin bin. and then when we were at ranch99 yesterday daryl was like "i heard from sean you told him to go outside and wait cos u were going to take a long time" and i'm like !!! that guy.. i'm sure daryl heard something else too but i forgot wat.
lunch was good! haha. i have discovered the joys of honey walnut prawns thanks to sean too. joel was like "his three favourites: honey, walnut, prawns". and then i don't know how come they served us bubble tea, but then daryl was drinking his bubble tea and sucked too hard or sth cos suddenly a pearl shot out of the straw and ricocheted to the back of his throat and then he jumped slightly and looked very shocked. it was so funny la he's forever so ridiculous..
oh here's a pic frm yesterday's dinner
back (l - r): zhihui (i'm v sure she was tarbet mass dance capt or sth.. anyone find her familiar? i know she was an spsl though), sean, daryl, wenzheng, kevin, kevin's gf (i'm not sure how to spell her name), me!
front (l - r): xianyi with the two birthday boys joel and ruixiong
okay i really should be doing work not doing this but ahh.. i listed out the stuff i have to do. it doesn't seem like that much, but i know it's a lot. ugh. too unstressed for my own good
ohhh i just remembered sth else that happened yesterday/today thanks to kiat.
yesterday during dinner sean was in ecstasies over this bak chor mee place, and decided that we were going to lunch there today. so we went there and then found joel and daryl standing outside. cos the place closed down and there was another restaurant in place of it!
they (sean n joel) were so disappointed..
sean "brother.. the sun has set.."
joel "yes brother.. it is a dark day.."
and they went on in that line for a while.
then when we went to their house to visit and ailin came along with the most fabulous egg tarts i've eaten.. (from chinatown in SF! 1029 grant street! haha) and apparently she knew that place closed down but didn't tell them so they were complaining. and saying they should go into mourning; rend their clothes and put on ashes and sackcloth. it was SO funny.. oh and their freezer is very full of meat.
yesterday joel defined chicken and fish as vegetables, i don't know why.
ruixiong "do you think you'll be okay?" (walking back to my dorm from his, which is like 50m away)
me "no, i'll get mugged on the way"
ruixiong "that's okay"
me: !!!
i was being sarcastic, but still. haha.
oh, one from sean last sunday i think.
zhongjie (hopefully that's the way his name is spelt, hmm) was talking about going to the gym and sean was saying he had to do reps as a swimmer. and i can't remember if it was zj/jon who said "oh you were a swimmer?" and sean said "yeah but now i'm a blobber"
it kind of reminded me of lydia though. the word "blob". maybe cos it used to be her msn nick.
daryl, yesterday, on his phone which wouldn't receive/make phone calls. "my phone is incognito" (he meant to say incommunicado)
i couldn't stop laughing even in math after that.. cos the image of a emperor riding in a sedan (or on a horse) to the countryside appeared in my mind. and i was wondering what daryl's phone was pretending to be.
and i thought this nonsense with the alarm clock was over. if i didn't have to wake up early to go for melody i'd be severely annoyed. 7am, 7.40am, 8.20am (and this one went on for like 15mins cos she refused to get up) and then 8.40am.. i think i'm going to be deaf by next fall. unless by some happy chance my classes start earlier than hers.
ah. i see. she has just informed me that she intended to wake up at 7 (!!) to do work but she couldn't get up. cos she wants to do work so she can go out and do other stuff. hmm. anyway, its kind of weird she doesn't seem to feel bad. maybe i expect too much.
i think i'm very capable of just holing myself up in my room given there's so much work to do. bah. actually i know i thought i had a LOT of stuff to do yesterday night but now when I list it out I feel like I'm forgetting something.
oh. and dining hall food is quite sucky half the time. should go to wilbur more often haha. at least they have chinese food. and at least i get to eat something nice every sunday:D
chim's coming over today! haha. but that horrible girl didn't tell me, i had to hear it frm wang ning.
ooh okay i saw chim already:) anyway she mite be coming over with jane nxt week! how fun! haha. wish the rest could be here too though. bleah. if i had my way i'll probably wish for half my sec 4 class to be around.
and i was telling jon just now.. it's so sad.. when teaching lil kids piano you feel SO happy when they manage to get through a page of sheet music. at least i didn't have to figure out how to teach her about time signatures haha. i really wonder how my teacher managed to teach me last time.
ah i forgot to add something else. just now during math section i was telling chuansheng that during ihum, when we were analysing joyce's dubliners, one guy was like saying that american kids feel stifled by the education system - follow the prepared path through grade school then college then get a job.. and that is exactly wat everyone says in spore. looks like it really applies universally.. the notion of "once you get out of your country (or state or hometown) everything'll be fine".
definitely there's a difference in perspective and all, but after a while it does become the same situation. it's the mindset you have to escape from. like my feeling of wanting to go for a holiday.. it's the same as it was in rj. so what has changed, really?
this is partly why ihum is depressing sometimes. it points out things one is normally in denial about. like the stuff we read from tolstoy was about how people're obsessed with material stuff and only realise they ought to have lived otherwise when they were at the brink of death. okay baldwin wasn't so depressing, possibly cos i still don't really understand/like it. and joyce's dubliners is about paralysis/epiphanies and actually tolstoy n joyce write a little about social convention too.
okay i'm going to think about nxt quarter courses and sleep cos i can feel myself zoning out already
moderately eventful week. actually. no. the only event was getting sick. on monday night i decided i desperately needed sleep and therefore purposed to sleep before 10. unfortunately, after happily thinking i had no more work to do/..., i suddenly realised i hadn't written my introsem essay yet. freak. so i wrote 2 pages worth and then it was 11pm so i decided it was time to sleep.
woke up at 4.30 with the feeling of inevitability. throat/nose/watever felt weird. 37.6degrees! yay.. go back to sleep. wake up, still around there. toyed with idea of skipping introsem later (while editing/finishing my essay). went down to breakfast, ate fruits and padded along to econ lect. in no condition for running so better leave earlier. econ lect was okay, not particularly illuminating that i remember of. back to nice warm dorm.
during lunch had to go look for all the nonheaty stuff (not that there's alot to begin with). oh before that i finally decided i was going to skip introsem and dance and come back and sleep. i decided i couldn't survive 1h15 of pointless discussion and 1h30 of moderate exercise. thankfully no midterms this week.
came back after math, which was also only slightly useful. and slept. roommate was like "are you taking a nap?" and i'm like "i'm sick! i have the right to sleep!" and she's like "watever roomie.." cos she's forever taking naps (and most of the time she's not sick)
anyway thankfully by wed i was quite alright and today even better yay~ my toes were cold on mon/tues night though. random comment. haha. and i had this really weird dream on monday that i was back in spore and i forgot to pack anything (i.e. no luggage or sth) so all my stuff was still here. and feeling an acute sense of annoyance/despondency cos i'd left all my stuff behind and i wasn't about to get on a plane back here to get all my stuff. crazy stuff that dreams are made of.
have to choose classes for next quarter soon and i am torn between so many things! rather equates to being totally clueless. am seeing my advisor tmr, but i'm not sure he'll be of much help. all he's going to say is to advise me not to take 20 units again. actually when i went to see him i said i was gonna take 18 and he was already advising me against that. ahh.
not in a very good mood tonight.. don't feel like doing my work especially cos i know i have so much stuff to do. bah. tmr there's the performance, then sat morning there's melody (i almost regret doing this) sat night dinner out, sunday church, ihum thesis and introsem outline due monday, ...... how depressing. and i desperately need to practice math. ahh!!! i want to skip next week and go straight to thanksgiving. "like monopoly", chuan sheng says. haha.
man. i'm so glad that midterm is over. i'm not so sure how i did though, sigh. hopefully it'll be good to make up for all the nonsense i've been handing in for econ. it was a rather terrible realisation that there're only a few more problem sets to boost my grade. and i was so zoned out after it i didn't even recognise xianyi when he biked past haha oops. until he called me and i looked properly and was like oh.. haha.
actually my head is still a bit woozy right now. i better sleep early tonight, who cares if i finish reading introsem. haha. and thankfully i managed to get the dance tickets.. and i talked to my ihum tf about my paper.. it was very reassuring:) maybe i'm not so bad at ihum after all, given that that first paper was written in virtually two days or less. (although chuan sheng keeps saying that doesn't matter, hmph) but anyway i'm feeling proud of myself for now yay
oh i tried jamba juice for the first time today. it's.. interesting. and it was so funny.. i suddenly heard "clarissa lin!", whirled around, saw sean and wondered what he was doing there. "yeah.. monday morning right" (cos he watches webcast instead sometimes) anyway he started telling me all the good flavours.. haha he really is synonymous with good food. oh we went to coldstone creamery yesterday! it was fantastic.. it reminded me of the dairy queen thing last time at mobil petrol station where you can choose what you want to mix into the ice cream.. ahh. different, but still good! and i was late for econ review session but who cares. haha. food is more impt! oops.
i'm hungry! :( but i don't think i should be eating dry/heaty stuff. oh dear. guess i'll just starve.
ah i just remembered i had to do laundry.
i'm so freaking annoyed.. i forgot to hand up my econ problem set and only realised it after the solutions were posted, so they aren't going to accept it and i have to drop the grade.. which totally sucks cos this was probably one of my better ones since i went for office hours and got most of the stuff explained. and it also doesn't help that i got the median score for econ midterm, even though i'm relieved it wasn't any worse. and i have so much stuff on this weekend i haven't studied, nor do i feel like studying at all.
okay i think part of the annoyance is cos i'm sleepy, and i can't even figure out why. i think i'll give up and go sleep. i'm very glad for my new stanford sweater though its nice and furry inside and warm. thanks to wangning's discount coupon. oh and i'm also glad jane's gonna come over and stay the night before big game! yay!! okay. i have cheered myself up slightly. but i'm still tired.
crap la i just tore part of a page of my econ txt cos my hair dripped water on it and i rubbed too hard at the page trying to dry it. i really need to sleep before i start destroying more things and getting even more pissed off.
i think chuan sheng is right. it all depends on my attitude. anyway, i was blog surfing, sort of, and came across some stuff in judith's blog which is so true. so i koped some phrases from her. replace H with stanford and you have it. my sentiments exactly.
||One of the hardest things about college is having to start from scratch. Then, the fact that you're starting from scratch at H, where you -are- scratch, also doesn't make things any easier.||
it's so easy to forget that though. like when i talk to pple i don't realise that these are like super-smart pple or anything.. the way i forget age differences and all. and i didn't realise like everyone who's here was valedictorian of their class. haha.
||My time here feels so precious and so tedious at the same time (...) And I'm not even bonded to any particular job when I get back. It's like the whole account is accountable to myself, and that makes it all the more frightening. If I don't make good, it'll really be my own fault.||
i don't really think about it (like many many other things) when i'm swamped in work. but sometimes the realisation just comes and hits you. i really should be doing my work. okay nvm, lemme finish this. so yeah, as with many other things, sometimes i just suddenly remember that its my parents who are paying for all this (hell lot of money too, i might add) and i don't even think i'm living up to their expectations at the moment. which of course they don't know, but that makes it even worse.
i'm not driven the way so many people i know are. although actually i'm quite sure that's a defining characteristic of any student in a university like stanford. i haven't the foggiest idea what i want to do.
i'm really glad i'm here though. i realised it is really different. my time is entirely my own; there's no mom to nag me to stop playing around/wasting time and study. not that i really needed that much nagging but sometimes i do tend to not do my work. heh. anyway i guess i'm getting more used to the reading textbook thing..which is gd.
alright, ranting over. yay i have understood my math. i feel better:) oh. i think cs & ser are right too, nxt quarter i better find courses that i actually like.. although given that pwr n ihum are compulsory.. hmm. must find some way to make them appealing (haha)
bah. i'm so sleepy. but i haven't done much work today:| last night was frosh formal! we were SO late, haha. but dressing up is fun. and i don't really think i would have wanted to stay very long. this partying thing is really not me. then we went to jonathan's room to eat ice cream! yay. pity the ice cream was sort of melted though haha the sorbet became a (rather thick) smoothie. but it was still good:) and i only remembered jackie was sick after we finished most of it. but nvm, i'm not going to get sick.
uh. yeah. so we left jon's room at 2.30 (and therefore no more midnight express/shuttle, horror of horrors, had to walk!) thankfully it wasn't that cold.. but of course there wasn't much choice. and i ended up sleeping at 4. !! i don't think i've ever slept at 4 in spore. maybe that night when my sleep cycle was screwed up cos of being sick/trying to study for bio a level prelim mcq, but that's about it. and i've already done that 3 times (sleeping past 4) and it's only been 1.5months. man.
so i happily woke up at 11.30! actually i wasn't that happy, cos i got woken up at 8sth by my roommate talking to her family on the phone. why can't she get out of the room and talk? ... although maybe she thought i was still fast asleep and wouldn't hear. given that chuan sheng can spend 2 hrs on the phone outside his room cos his roommate was sleeping.. later she saiid they forgot about the time difference. and assume that she's awake. since they're always awake after 7 at home. but really, college is so different. how can one expect to keep the "go to bed early and wake up early" routine? forget it man..
i think i'm a terrible person to room with:| i'm very picky about sleep. if that's the way to put it. like, when my sleep is disturbed, depending on my mood, i can really feel like screaming my head off.
anyway. sigh my neighbour opposite threw a birthday party and the music's been going on for 3 hrs and it's giving me a headache. actually maybe the headache is also due to fatigue, but i prefer to complain. seems like people are more vulgar though, f*** seems to form a rather large part of conversations sometimes. and i also frequently hear "goddammit!" in the hallways.. maybe i was too sheltered before though
i hope there's nothing wrong with my computer anymore, it's so tedious to bring the whole freaking thing down to stanford shopping center and have to back up the hard drive.. thankfully ruixiong had an external hard drive to lend me.. yay for sporeans! haha.
oh wait i haven't explained why i haven't done any work. after waking up, went for brunch/lunch at lag (and met wang ning on the way, how coincidental) he was busy eating yoghurt or something and only looked up when i stepped into his path haha. then i decided to go visit chuan sheng since i'd never seen his room before. and he just woke up! well done man.. haha. it was rather amusing. then i figured since i was at lag i may as well walk over to frosoco n visit kiat (also cos his roommate isn't around for the weekend, like jon's). since if i were in my dorm i'd never trek over to either of their dorms. haha. killed two birds with one stone! then aft tt i decided i'd visit jesley too since i'd never seen her dorm either.. and i caught her just when she came back frm movie! lucky day:)
then i finally came back to my room. and did two weeks' worth of laundry. (this is what two midterms on the same day at the end of the week does to you). messed around a bit, decided to go shopping. alone. i think there's something rather wrong with me. find it tiring to have to create/continue conversation for long periods of time. i guess i just wanted some time alone. which is weird cos i'm mostly alone anyway. i must be becoming a hermit.
yay!! my midterms (well, first round anyway) are over. finally i get like two weeks before its midterm week again. not that two weeks is a lot but one becomes thankful for small mercies.
i walked out of psych introsem midterm into the quad and drank in the sunshine n cool air. that sounds cliched but really, such a blessed relief. now i know why time management is so impt. and "if you don't have it now, u'll have it by the end of (first quarter/freshman year - i forgot which)"
well anyway. now there's less work there's time to think about other stuff like ccas/socialising. both which are in a very sad state. and skype is driving me nuts with the lag.. my mom keeps repeating herself. and repetition really annoys me.
i still want to go to the zoo/disneyland. i think disneyland is more fun.
ooh i'm very happy:) went w sean to cupertino village and found khong guan biscuits! haha. okay. nvm. i already have too many snack as it is.. but anyway we had an interesting chat. as it was on friday night with jackie. speaking of which it's thanks to going shopping w jackie that i realised my SUID was missing, and thankfully daryl was nice enough to go over to stern and help me get it back:D
and i'm also very glad that i get to get off campus at least once a week. thanks to sean haha. and he was saying we're very lucky cos when he was a freshman it was either "lag or stern today ah?" haha. but yeah, i think because our campus is so huge, it's kinda hard to get out and everything. and like they were saying yesterday on the way to lunch, california public transport system is quite pathetic. this is when one appreciates spore. (and its size, in a way)
okay even though i was like "sharks" when my alarm went off at 0730. didn't wanna get up. but i guess the fatigue wears off after a while. although i think in spore i'd never wake up at 0730 to go to church. i shall try and sleep earlier on saturday nights
i don't think i had a very productive day but i'm so so SO glad jane came over. it's been so long since i've seen one of my girl friends. i mean okay here i have jackie and other pple but it's just different. this is why i know i can't stay here this winter and let my family come over. i need to go home. and of cos i have to bring stuff over which i thought i didn't need but now i know i want. like my multiple coloured pens haha. now that sounds superficial (i forgot the other better word for it) but well.
i thought it would be better coming here without people i knew. i thought it would force me to make friends. it doesn't turn out to be that simple after all. at least i'm not the only one feeling that way. but now i miss jane!:( boohoo. that means i ought to make a trip down to berkeley soon heh. oh well.
you can choose to make yourself miserable. or you can choose to be happy. but again that isn't that easy either.. maybe i'm just saying that cos i'm already here, and like jane said, a lot of people romanticise the whole overseas study thing. oh well. maybe i'll figure out wat to say tmr or another time.
hmm i wonder if i have too many things going on this weekend. there's lunch in a bit, then concert at night. and jane's coming over. and tmr there's church. and dinner at prof's hse/sas bbq. and my econ is in a mess n there's a midterm nxt week. and i also have introsem midterm nxt week. it also doesn't help that i don't think my econ problem sets have been done very well. and it's going to be week 5! crap.
anyway i just suddenly felt like going to disneyland. haha. sigh.
heh i just realised something. people are telling me college isn't all about studying, and my mom last night was telling me u better make sure you do your work.. didn't come to college to play. i guess she's afraid i'll spend all my time doing things other than work.
when the work piles up it's when you miss home. i wonder if it's because pple told me that, or i just happened to feel it. at night, when i'm in my bed reading ihum stuff and then i suddenly think of places at home. i don't know if that counts as missing home. which brings me to another point. last time, when pple (relatives/church) asked me if i missed my bro, i'd usually say no and then feel guilty. maybe i adapt too well in that sense heh. i know i just got used to not having him around quite quickly.
and my dormmates just went off to late night. amazing.. i wouldn't walk all the way there to eat at night unless i'm like really energetic/hungry.. usually i just bear with the hunger (if any) or eat snacks. oh well.
anyway today was a better day.. although last night i fell asleep and got up to find that it was 5.30 and my roommate was working on her ihum paper.. so i tried to read baldwin for ihum. but after 10 pgs i was like, forget it, i'm too sleepy to make any sense out of the book. decided i could go back to sleep and get up at like 8plus and still have time to finish reading.
so i got up. and didn't, after all, have time to read. so ended up reading it during breakfast and lunch and finally finished it at like 1pm b4 i had to go for math and then ihum. and i had things to say during ihum today! yay! haha. this is so silly. maybe it's cos i complained to more pple and they're like, you're sporean, sure can crap. but i think hk's suggestion of discussing the book b4hand is gd too. if i do get round to it.
the econ-math thingy was quite interesting. although i reaally really really have to go read the textbook.. sigh. midterm tmr and two nxt week. ah well at least there's concert on sat, should be gd!
i forgot to say something. it was kinda weird at lunch on sunday. cos everyone else there besides daryl was a grad student (or co-term) and they know pretty much the same people and all that.. suddenly was feeling young (as compared to feeling old cos i'm in college) but anyway the food was fantastic:p not as gd as yumcha (i'm probably biased though) but still
okay back to math. i really must go shopping. clothes-wise and snacks-wise. friday! we've to find somewhere to go though.
okay after that momentary lapse into abject misery/pessimism, i am now feeling better. at least, i have just thought about how it'll be interesting to go home during winter break and see things differently. and then i realised there are so many things here that i wouldn't get to experience at home. it isn't so bad after all. i guess music and mr white bear helped too. but besides that it's still really easy to push things aside (i.e. remain in denial) and go on with life. kinda related to church yesterday actually.
i'm in such a terrible mood today.. i can't imagine why. maybe it was my roommate talking to someone on the phone at 6.30am, and the someone couldn't hear her so she kept repeating herself, which totally drove me NUTS. i was ready to get up and clobber her. okay i wasn't, but well. that was annoying enough. ah. apparently it's her ex-boyfriend whom she was talking to. and she assures me that as much as it annoys me, it annoys her to have to hold the conversation too. at least that's cleared up.
econ lect was okay i think.
got annoyed during ihum cos wolff was going on in all sorts of tangents and still talking about tolstoy when we're reading baldwin now. apparently he's supposed to link them, but somehow i find his lectures are so unstructured it's really irritating. and the problem with yearley is that he does say interesting things and he structures his stuff nicely, but he says it in such a boring voice that you fall asleep anyway. ugh.
so i had lunch w jackie (who's sick). misery loves company. so we sat around and complained together. she's still halfway through telling me about my imaginary boyfriend.. i bet ser would be amused at this.
math lect. i still get confused about stuff sometimes, and i was falling asleep at the end of it.
ihum section. i am in such trouble for ihum cos i can never think of things to say. i also neglected to finish reading the last 7 pages but i don't suppose that's such a big deal. i kind of wish the TF would say more instead of just letting all the others talk. or maybe that's not what ihum is supposed to be. but it doesn't really seem like i'm learning very much about the text. i mean, fine, people are sharing their intepretations about the thing but i would assume the TF knows more background stuff or watever.. i don't know what i'm talking about as usual.
last night i didn't finish what i planned to do, and i just couldn't be bothered to do it this morning cos i was in a bad mood, therefore now i have a lot of stuff to do. including reading for tmr, math problem set due tmr which i'm partway through.
i think jackie is right. it's about juggling the things one has to do (i.e. work) and the things one wants to do (everything else). not that it was/would be any different in spore.
it's depressing thinking about school/work/... today i didn't want to get up and go to school (i haven't felt that way about school since somewhere in the middle of the term for j2, but i have felt that way about going to work so that wasn't very long ago) esp when doing tolstoy in ihum, talking about how one should live life. life isn't exactly very fun at the moment, nor do i envision it to be when it's time to go out to work. so much for optimism.. just an off-day i guess.
i should really get back to math.
heh i'm suddenly feeling a bit weird. some of my dorm people are gathered outside in preparation to go for some party.. and my roommate was trying to tell people she didn't want to go cos she had to stay back and do her problem set but at the same time she wanted to go. and her friends from down the hall were forcing her to go. so after that she was like "why don't they ask YOU to party?" and i'm like, i don't party. which seems to be an anomaly here apparently. maybe it's just the freshmen, since my hpac happened to drop by and my roommate asked him to support her but he was like "go! freshmen should go out every week!" or maybe it's just my perception. but frankly, i see nothing very appealing about going to places packed with people either dancing/drinking/...
anyway for the first time in a month i can get up at 10.20am! haha. but man, chuan sheng woke up at 12.. oh well. but somehow today didn't feel particularly fruitful. or as i was telling kiat, "remarkably unproductive". i'm still puzzling over null spaces.
oh! i went to wilbur for dinner (on my own, cos every other sane person went to lag which is definitely nearer but it's so tiny!) and then went to daryl's room after that. his roommate was playing classical music. i think that's really rare. even i don't do that. haha. okay not that i'm a very classical person to begin with, but well. maybe he's one of those who really love it. anyway oh.. i just remembered i haven't listened to the mp3s wenyu sent. ooh. i love ravel. well anyway yeah it was a nice change to hear classical music, given my dormmates who like blasting rock/rap/watever you call that genre which they use at parties. it always conjures the image of some quiet high class carpeted luxurious place
finally i have time to upload photos! but not all of them, this is as much as i can take at one shot. i took a 1hr nap frm 12.30 - 1.30 and slept frm 4.30 - 8.00 in an effort to finish my very last minute econ problem set and ihum paper. i promise myself NEVER to let this happen again. man.
stanford has THE prettiest campus around.. these photos don't do it enough justice though.
entrance to the main quad
walkway in the main quad
inside the main quad
clock tower and hoover tower in the background
the claw!
pigott hall or something, engineering building, part of main quad
one of the entrances to the main quad
my side of the room again (sorry kiat i haven't figured out where to put the bear haha)
roommate's side of room before she arrived
my room a few days ago 
my roommate's side of the room before she arrived 
the corkboard a day (or so) after i arrived
the corkboard on my room door when i arrived
college is crazy. these past few days i've been feeling so tired i fall asleep without intending to (and therefore do not finish my work). for once i'm thankful my roommate wakes up early so i get the choice of getting up to do my work.
i wonder if it's cos i've been wasting time doing things i shouldn't be doing. it's crazy! i have to figure out a (sensible) question to ask later during ihum lecture and send it to my TF.. and my ihum paper is due friday (i've hardly started, only have some vague ideas) and we're supposed to bring the opening paragraph to class today to share.. i suppose at least that forces me to get started, since one can't write an opening paragraph without knowing what one is going to say in the rest of the paper, but ... i have 1.5hrs to do all of the above
and then i've hardly started on my math problem set, haven't even looked at econ (not to mention still being behind on econ reading) and i have to read two articles for introsem tomorrow. !! and the entire cycle is going to repeat itself next week unless i magically find extra days during the weekend to catch up on everything. groan. math midterm next week.
i need to review what i've been doing with my time.
okay i'm having a REALLY hard time trying to find "a person who has reached a high level of achievement in an area i value" so i shall give it up for a while. i suppose this essay shouldn't be that hard to write since it's more about facts than opinions. although that means extensive research, i mean, who's going to tell you how much effort they put in/how much natural talent they had?? ugh.
so anyway, happy birthday to me! haha. thanks to everyone who remembered my bday:)
sporean juniors/seniors who came to my room last night.. it was so weird cos i hadn't seen half of them before, but it was really sweet:)
got up for church (not without being annoyed by roommate's alarm clock, she changed the alarm to radio so it blasts like rock/rap music.. but i think it's more effective cos she switches it off faster, but still)
dennis came by to get me, thankfully, then i didn't have to walk to escondido turn-about. haha.
church was interesting. it was rather touching, i wonder why. anyway i'm going back to campbell next week to see if i really prefer them.
and max called! haha. that was sweet too:) i was rather amused.. he thought i was his mom! man.. and by his tag on my facebook..
back to room, agonised over hero to write about for introsem (am still agonising)
decided to take a nap, kept waking up cos i was afraid i'd wake up late for dinner.
so at 6.25 i went to tresidder and was wondering where in the world jesley was. (haha, where in the world is carmen san diego). and i thought we'd missed the bus but it was in the other direction, thankfully:)
caught the bus to palo alto transit centre (hah, they refused to believe me yest when i said midnight express didn't stop there) and walked to university ave. looked quite cool.
then jesley walked into this restaurant which didn't even look like a jap restaurant, i thought it was like american or something. but then there was jap food on the tables so hmm. and i was still wondering why she walked straight in, then i saw everyone and realised haha. it was a great surprise though. and huge bear! haha. which yf said was as big as me. hmm. i wish wang ning n daryl weren't videoing me though, i must've looked v idiotic.
had a HUGE dinner. oh in the middle the lights went out and some guys got up on their chairs and drank some sake bomb or sth.
and then after dinner, lights dimmed again and kiat came out with a cake! which jesley bought from le boulanger at stanford shopping centre.. that shop is awesome.. haha. and i guessed as much those were trick candles.. the sparks were crazy.. so yf blew them out for me but they relit themselves after a while.. was quite hilarious:p
and the waiters made me stand on the chair and drink 7-up! haha. i was quite sure it was sprite or sth but the rest were speculating whether it was sake haha. thankfully not, wat if i end up drunk -horror- but anyway they gave me a photo of it! so funny:)
definitely a very memorable evening.
and then when i got back, jamie knocked on the door. tomi refused to open the door and stared at me so i was like, weird, okay, and i opened the door. and it was just jamie, which was even weirder haha. but anyway in a while they flung open the door so hard it hit the recycling bin haha. and more cake! man.. i'm SO full now i feel like a ball.
philip's poem was hilarious.. but anyway it was really sweet too.. pple gathered in the hallway singing. haha.
it was a very nice bday! yay:)
and now i better go figure out the rest of my week, can't believe i have an IHUM paper due fri, it's crazy