Are you obsessed with the right things?

It's going to feel like the first day of Primary One all over again - the trepidation in my steps, the wary glances from passer-bys, the strangled mingling as everyone tried to make small but awkward talk, staring down the person sitting next to you who'll be sticking by you for project work... I know I can be pretty cynical at times, but I simply can't blend into the crowd and be friends with everyone. And knowing the fact that I fought so hard with myself just to get my butts into the Honours Programme just makes me wanna kick myself even more sometimes.

On another note, I've been dying to talk about these campaign ads by the Singapore Breast Cancer Foundation. They've attracted both detractors (for the supposed nudity) and supporters (like me) since their appearance on clinic posters and postcards everywhere in Singapore.

You must be thinking I'm frickin' out of my mind for picking a random topic like breast cancer to drone about. But this became a real cause for concern following a scare in the family last week. While I'm thoroughly thankful that it was all a false alarm, we all need to know how real and close to home this could be. And I really appreciated the campaign ads' message - Are you obsessed with the right things? Women and men alike, we're all vulnerable to physical illnesses, not excluding breast cancer; who's to say who'll be spared the plank? So instead of deeming these posters profane, shouldn't they be the warning bells instead? Instead of kicking up a huge fuss over a bad hair day or a zit, why not remind yourself about the other invaluable things in life?

Yay to masochism

I think I might be masochistic, especially after one of the lecturers posted this on 4102's IVLE page:

"Level-4000 which undergraduates earn 5 Modular Credits (MCs) require undergraduates to do 25% more work, compared to level-3000 modules (4 MCs). Please get prepared for the additional work load."

YAY!

...though I'm much more interested in writing for the Campus Observer, as part of a mandatory requirement for my Journalism module. Dream come true!

While I've managed to accommodate my modules into just 2 days, it's the tuition assignments that are giving me the headaches because they occupy pretty much of the other free days. Which is totally disheartening. Oh well. Nobody said it was easy.

Damned post titles.

Indeed, Julie has been living life as it should be lived. Just like Yogi Bear and Bo Bo. And Justin Timberlake's impersonation of Bo Bo was sooo real, I couldn't believe it was him. :P



I've been skiving as I deemed deserved, because Honours Year is never going to be the same as the past 3 years. Work will get harder, time will become more valuable, and ties might get stretched even tighter. So I screwed vacation jobs and tuition assignments to spend more time with those who matter the most to me.




Holiday-ed in Desaru with family, and it's been the most fulfilling vacation for the mind and soul since... I don't know when. The last time the entire family checked out of the country was in 2007, before Dad hooked himself up with an overseas stint. It sounds crazy, but I miss his nagging, no matter how many times I hear the same lines. Plus hanging out at beach as a family only made the entire trip more meaningful and beautiful. Hopefully, another family vacation will come our way next December.


Don't expect Mr. J and Ms. J to swear off movie dates during the hols, even when we're broke to the core. The trailer of Tron Legacy coaxed us movie whores into coughing up 11 buck a pop to catch this in 3D.



At this point, it's just come to my realisation that, for $8 a pop for a 2-hour movie, movies are actually cheap. Think back on the days when you had to pay $5 for a 80-minute movie with cheap CG and bad acting, and you'll be laughing for paying close t0 6 bucks for Avatar if you leveraged on a credit card discount. So if the folks at home are complaining about you spending too much money watching movies, it's actually them.

Frankly speaking, Jake Gyllenhaal isn't the kind of guy you would expect to find writhing butt-naked in the sheets with Anne Hathaway. In fact, both of them could have convincingly passed off as a random friendly librarian... only if they weren't in Hollywood reeling in bucketfuls of remuneration from Love & Other Drugs. This film would have been great if it hadn't been 2 solid hours of emotion-tracing as the protagonists struggled with their ambiguous relationship. Plus I detested the character Hathaway had played so well - the Parkinson-stricken artist who's always wallowing in self-pity. We're all guilty of that, aren't we? But the over-arching message was convincing enough; that love could prove to be the best cure even when the physical self is incurable. But you have to begin by loving yourself.

I have loved beach vacations since the day my skin hit the warm waters off Tioman, so this time it wasn't very much different. My back and calves are still aching from the backpack I lugged there, but it had been a great getaway. People always wonder why we're always secretive about our vacations and seldom made it known even to our closest friends. I don't know. I guess we all have to have our little pockets of vacuum in life, devoid of all contact with the outside world. It's a good opportunity for us to relax, talk about weird stuff such as "what's the true meaning of living for oneself" and reboot our systems. Yes, we're decadent, irrational even, when it comes to spending on vacations, but who's to judge us?

If you do, screw you.