i was so buoyed by my success at falling asleep last night and not waking up till past eight this morning, i wasn’t quite sure what to do with myself when i did finally get out of bed. the cheerleaders are going at it as always, but i feel as if i could forgive them today. i could forgive the trains too. i haven’t felt this rested in a while; i can forge ahead again, and the world is such a beautiful place.

my boxes finally came after an agonizing two-month wait. books, at long last! they took up all the space i had alloted for them, and i cannot quite tell what to do when i have to get new books, but will cross that bridge when it comes. more worrying, though, is the fact that these shelves lie directly above my bed, and i sometimes fear that i will be struck dead one night by a bookalanche.

but the crowning joy in those boxes was this:-

this, is also known as my grandma blanket. it is a very simple, very random coverlet made up by layers of cotton and old clothes patched together, and i believe grandma has made several for every single one of her children’s families. there is nothing artistic in these blankets – nothing like the fancy patchwork quilts of the west. but they are the only things i can live with in the summer (cool, yet warm at the same time). they smell so lovely – a little piece of home, a little piece of my childhood.. so comforting i went to bed hugging it instead of sleeping under it the first night i got it. i remember using a really tiny one when i was young, which went to my brother when i outgrew it. he passed on, and i forgot about it until the first time i came to japan, some 9 years ago. it made a sudden reappearance then, and stayed with me throughout my first 7 years here. now that i think about it, it may have been around that time that i started sleeping curled up like a shrimp, because that was the only way i could fit snugly under that tiny piece of cloth.

grandma is too old now, and her eyes far too weak to work the sewing machine. i suppose our existing lot of blankets will have to last us till the stitches come undone, triangular patch by triangular patch… like everything else in life.

fell asleep in the middle of a skype conversation last night, and woke up to a chat screen filled with hello? hello? HELLO? how embarrassing.

in between falling asleep on friends, singing, and working on ridiculous assignments (more on that later), i am trying to finish mark haddon’s a spot of bother before i embark on my 56-book project. i might have bought this much earlier if i hadn’t thought it were the same book as the curious incident of the dog in the night-time (which i already own and really enjoyed). they need to stop using the same color schemes on his novels. it is so misleading.

a spot of bother

the curious incident of the dog in the night-time

the seemingly endless rains have finally ended (i think), and it is insanely hot out (i can’t let go of the word now…). i had this idea i might faint or do something equally dramatic out there on the streets earlier as the heat from the asphalt and the afternoon sun overhead hit me. but fainting would be an enormous waste of time considering all the work i have to complete today, so i made a quick escape to the cool comfort of home.

oh yes, the work i have to complete today – that insanely ridiculous assignment. i do not get it at all! these people send me something to translate, and a glossary that i have to follow strictly. that is all well and good. but when i got down to work, i realised that just about everything in the document could be lifted from the glossary. why are they spending good money asking me to do a copy-and-paste job?? why?

most people would tell me to stop complaining and be grateful for the easy money, but the fact is, i do not like easy money, so to speak. not this kind of easy money. winning the lottery and all is another matter, but when people pay me to get a job done, it really irks me when i know i am not giving them what they paid for. it would also be silly to point that out to the agency, because they are a profit-maximizing entity. as i should be… i think.

it’s such a strange world. you see glimpses of it as a student, but when you start working… things just leave you… speechless. and not always in a good way.

monday really isn’t any better than sunday. i think that’s just how life works. i think garfield really got it right. what is the point of trying to do anything at all? eat, drink, sleep, and the merry bits will come.

fried fish smells are floating around my room and wafting toward me intermittently. i hate that smell of old oil and… something very chinese. it clings to curtains and bedsheets and any other fabric you might have lying around, and make you feel like a dowdly old hag who has just been washing dishes in some dingy restaurant kitchen. no offence intended – blame it on monday.

i have put my lux aeterna album on loop again, and it is strangely comforting. baroque music always is. a little staid, a little pompous, a little sad, yet always calm. some consistency and assurance amidst the unreliable and unknown, here in this harried city i call home.

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four hours down the road. we’re into tuesday, and i do not feel any better. i seem to be sickening for the flu – not exciting given that my voice has been in such fantastic condition these past few weeks.

i have been thinking and thinking about how i can get myself up to scratch for a return to the hallowed institution of higher learning. a couple of months back, i figured i would try to clear one book a month. that never kicked off. i just did another calculation and realised that if i read a book every week, i would only manage to clear 28 by the time i leave singapore (assuming, of course, that i would leave singapore!). 28! that’s barely enough for a good honours thesis. so i decided to double that and do two books a week. now we’re talking 56 thick, scholarly books. i don’t even have that many to begin with. i will have to start next week (because this week will have to be spent on speed-reading training). how is this possible? i simply cannot keep my spirits from flagging. day after day after day, i spend so much time and energy convincing myself that i am not making a colossal mistake – already, it doesn’t seem worth it, does it? imagine how much i’m going to spend on coffee alone.

the thought makes me hungry. i’m just going to go to bed and dream of fat cats.

ps: i have completely stopped tagging and categorizing my posts. there is really no point, considering that i’m just randomly cruising from one whine to another half the time.