Panthera Sapiens Ellipsis: The Blog

I just passed my driving test. It seems incredible that I could’ve passed, and I have sneaking suspicions that my instructor has been passing money around behind my back to get me through the exams; but since he hasn’t confessed, and I haven’t any idea how to prove it (if it’s true), I’ll just live with it. In any case, the examiner said I can drive pretty well when I’m not busy trembling in fear. (What he thinks about my braking the car, you will see.) The Section Two was easy enough: going up and down a man-made mountain, side-parking, the triangle maneuver (although the mountain was scary, and I did backslide once—but they allow each candidate two tries before failing them), all were completed in a little less than three minutes. Section Three was my bane: the on-road section! I memorized the map (they were kind enough to tack up a map of the route to take) and then mentally went over my routine. I find it helps if I think of this the way I think of piano exams: go in, smile,...

I’m going to dedicate this, my wonderful new template, to some HTML-loving genius at blogskins.com. If not for him/her (the nickname and avatar were androgynous), I’d never have gotten it to work at all. Kelvin also gets some credit for pointing me in that direction. (You see, MSN chats can be educational after all.) However, I must say that this whole thing was sparked off by the person at deviantart.com who drew that Nazi spoof. It’s a lovely picture—and, you know, awfully telling about my personality, especially the “Death to Typos!” statement. My grandmother is back at my house now after a stay in Plant, her hometown. As a result, (to her) I have just arrived, and so (to her) I am still underfed, malnourished, and languishing for home-cooked food, even though I’ve been eating nothing else (well, almost nothing else) for the past week. Everything’s settling back down into its pre-me-going-away rhythm: grandmother dominating the TV with her soaps, my mother as busy as ever w...

It’s now roughly one week (one week and a day, actually) since I’ve been back from KL to Patience, and I’ve racked up enough annoyances to last me the rest of the holidays. Well, nobody ever said my life is a bed of roses. And in any case anything that has the word roses in it usually has thorns in it as well. Well, it’s nice, of course, that I’ve been able to meet up with some of my old friends in Patience. This has, unfortunately, been limited so far to my church friends since most of my old classmates are in Shining Institute and facing exams. Maybe I’ll try and meet them up after their holidays start. (For some unknown aberration of reason, their holidays are determined by the school itself, while my holidays are very sensibly timed to coincide exactly with government schools’.) And I’m not going to complain about the weather. It’s absolutely heavenly, sunshine and rain coming down in good quantity and in pretty good proportions, too. No haze, what’s more: no need to worry a...

I just got my hair highlighted. I’ve been planning it for almost three months now, and accordingly my hair hasn’t yet been cut since August when I went down to So Hour. Well, it hasn’t been cut until two hours ago, anyway. However, I’ve been asking for opinions from people since the idea occurred to me. Most of them decided that I should get something more conventional, conservative, or normal. (By normal and conservative, most of them meant red, yellow, or green.) My mother said I should get something that stands out against black (so everybody knows I’ve been spending money on such frivolous things as hair!) like red, yellow, or green. My reasoning went something like this: red, yellow, and green are accepted as the colors ‘cool’ people use. I am most definitely not ‘cool’. As such, it’s only fitting that I choose the color most opposite those, right on the other end of the spectrum. So when I went to the shop this morning, I told the hairdresser to thin my hair down, leave...

As of today, I have five days left before I step onto a plane and go back to Patience. It's a night flight, so it'll be six days before I arrive home. So far I've been advertising it on my MSN nickname (14 Days! 12 Days! 10 Days! 7 Days!) but now that it's less than a week to go, I'm getting a bit nervous. After all, there're so many things that can possibly go wrong! I refuse to dwell on the possibility of missing the flight or getting lost in the airport or missing luggage or any such dismal thoughts. Homecomings are supposed to be happy times, not times when you exclaim, "Oh poop! I've gone and forgotten my toothbrush." Of course, it depends on your actually arriving safe and sound and in one piece. And besides, I've still got plenty of things on my itinerary. There's the exams (English essay tomorrow and Chemistry some time this week), hostel fee payment (I'll rant in depth on this later), and of course the packing itself. So far I...

Some of my papers came back on Monday, but since the school's computer lab closed early that day (stitch Deeper Valley!) I couldn't post them up to gloat. But since I've got a few free hours before class begins today I'll put them up. So far I'm guaranteed to pass Math, since half the paper came back and I'm somewhere in the top ten, I believe. Biology also came back, for which I'm second in class--a first! What's more, I've lost to Jowl. He's this quiet guy, quite stocky (about 70 kilos if he was right) and about half a head shorter than I am. You can picture him... oh, and he's the closest thing to a metrosexual I've seen so far. I mean, who else would carry around a comb in their wallet for those awkward moments when the wind blows your hair three millimetres out of line? He'd probably carry a protractor if he could too, just to make sure his hair curved exactly so many degrees and no more... but I won't criticise. If he can ge...

It's been an awfully stressful week for me. I don't like having exams. Who does? Even the adults I talk to sometimes admit that the best thing about being grown up is that they don't need to sit for any exams any more. May they have joy of it. I certainly don't. The Applied Math exam, for example. I do declare Mr. Eek sees exams as a way of getting back at the students who mock his speech impediments. There's no other logical reason for his setting killer questions in every examination and awarding them enough marks to pass or fail everybody. Everybody usually fails, of course, except a very few who somehow, inexplicably, strangely, are both on his good side and have a talent for Applied Math. And the Biology exam! Heavens, I admit that the human body is wonderfully made, and I know plants are incredibly delicate and difficult to understand... but why oh why are scientists so stitched egotistical? The chamber of Me, the You-ian fibers, the bundle of His... hello. W...

I have officially changed my least favourite day of the week to Monday. I hate waking up early. In fact I hate it so much that if I were to list all my most hated tunes, the alarm clock song my handphone plays would tie for number 1 with The Cheeky Song. Unfortunately, this also means that I often choose to ignore it and end up rushing off to school without breakfast in a mad panic, caused by waking up one hour too late. I have noticed that recently I've become rather more voracious than usual. Anybody who's seen me eat will know that this is not a good sign, but there you are: I'm eating more now, or at least getting hungrier more frequently. I took an inventory of my eating habits over the weekend, and I've found myself capable of devouring a large bread roll in less than 5 minutes. That's a rough estimate of RM2 per 5 minutes, which equals about 40 cents per minute, or almost one cent every second. It's a good thing the holidays begin in 19 days' time and...

ARRRGGGHH. I just spent ONE HOUR typing this post, and then my stupid server went and conked out on me, and now I've got to type the whole blasted thing over again. Grr. Don't blame me for possible vitriol. My fingers hurt. Anyway, it was Cheeky's birthday yesterday, so a bunch of classmates decided to go for a movie and dinner (in that order). That bunch included me, which at first surprised the others because I have somehow acquired a reputation for being a Super Geek. You know, the type of person who sees skipping classes as a hanging-and-quartering crime. But I tagged along anyway. Besides, I didn't mind an excuse, however lame, to skip Applied Math class. Squinting has never been good for the eyes. We got to the cinema and bought tickets to A Sound Of Thunder. (I would have preferred Sky High, but Little Bear has already watched that and we didn't want to risk snores or spoliers cropping up.) We bought popcorn and Coke and went and watched the movie. It was hor...

Today's post will be a rant against a select few people who've ticked me off recently, so it'll be a longer post than usual and will probably take a rather long time to load, so my apologies beforehand for all inconvenience caused. And now for the recipients of my ill-will, in chronological order. First of all, Psycho . I've been saving this up since Friday when I found out that he hasn't filled up the attendance register for two months--since the last holidays. As a result, the whole class has been absent as far as the office is concerned. Lovely situation, isn't it? 30-plus students, all ganging up together to defy the school by boycotting all their classes simultaneously. I must say, if he thinks it's his life mission to destroy anything and everything that other people have built up, it's his own call to make. If he wants to sow chaos and reap the consequences, hey, who am I to stand in the way of his destruction? But the fact is that by becoming the...

I finished reading The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole for the second time last Saturday. The first time I read it was when Chronicles lent it to me, and we spent a bit of time wondering why Adrian Mole was so obsessed with sizes of various bodily parts. We were both 12 at the time. Now it's 6 years later, and I can understand most of the obsessions. However, those are not my main point at this time, firstly because those obsessions took place years and years ago. Right now I'm just bemused by the fact that Adrian Mole even decided to censure various X-rated words from his diary. Whatever happened to 'a diary is where you are completely honest and write whatever you want'? The guy's gone and put little asterisks, euphemisms, and little italics all over the place instead of properly detailed references to... whatever. It has just struck me that perhaps the language I have been using on this blog is a little too PG for my readers; after all, everybody else seems to swear ...

It's amazing how the sight of this blank form turns my creative juices off like nothing else can. It must be the sudden depressing sight of so much white space to fill up. Then again, I don't recall being affected by blogger's block while typing onto MS Word, and there's plenty of blank space there too... maybe it's just some other factor that I haven't identified. Given that exams are just another three weeks or so away (my lecturers have just begun announcing it) and my Chem can be quite safely pinpointed onto next Monday or Tuesday (bye bye, there goes my weekend), I should really be experiencing more stress than I am feeling right now. It could be that I'm just suppressing it, or maybe that I'm repressed, or it could just be that I'm being proud again, which is dangerous because I don't want to fail anything again. One very strange thing that's just occurred is the sudden removal of the login forms on my school's computer lab's co...

Well! My exams are, at long last, over, and I've got a little more time on my hands than I did last week--which, all things considered, still isn't much. But at least I do have the time now to catch up on my manga reading. Not, of course, that I've got a deadline or anything to catch up to, but it's fun and it's the only entertainment I've got. Unless you count watching my room-mate study. By the way, I had a rather amusing encounter on Saturday night, on the way to dinner (I always go to the same little corner shop for dinner on weekends because it gives half-price dinners after 8 pm). It was, I think, shortly after turning into the junction. This little red car blinked a light at me, which I paid no attention to and went on walking. When the car stopped inches away from squashing my foot, though, I did pay attention. And then this little Malay guy hops out of the back and circles the car to come and face me. By this time I was pretty sure that they wanted me, ...

I'm assuming Way tagged me with this, since he unfortunately did not put a surname on the list and I'm assuming I'm the only Jonathan he knows. Not that the name is that unique... Seven things I can do: 1. Totally irritate the hell outta people with neverending questions. 2. Correct people's English. 3. Give a really good tongue-lashing. 4. Sing in tune at perfect pitch. (Really. This is all that saved me in piano exams...) 5. Make farting noises by clasping my hands together and squeezing 6. Write lots and lots of crap in English essays... and get an A 7. Twist my little finger 270 degrees on the horizontal plane Seven things you plan to do before you die: 1. Finish reading every single fantasy book I can find. 2. Fall head over heels in love (to see if it's really everything it's supposed to be.) 3. Accumulate at least 60 different specimens of frozen and preserved insects. 4. Carve a screwdriver out of ordinary chalk. (I've never been able to; the chalk k...

My Physics results came back yesterday afternoon, and when I saw the teacher's face I knew nothing good was in store. I've said before he can look amazingly sarcastic. Well, he can also look angrily disappointed. (This was proven when he later asked me why I'd scribbled nonsense all over the answer sheet.) I hate being right about things like that. Well, I failed miserably. And now I'm being quite miserable about it. 14 marks out of 39, which gives me a whopping percentage of 35--5 marks below grade. My parents are so going to flip when they read the email I've sent to inform them, and I can almost see their faces when they read it. And well, why wouldn't they? Considering I kept telling everybody how absurdly easy I found the exam, this is the perfect opportunity for anybody to get a few jabs in. Not, of course, that I won't jab right back. Nobody hits me when I'm down and gets away with it. Well, here's my own analysis of my failure: I underestimat...

My father recently took a break off his job to go check up on all his family. He gets 5 days off each month or so, and since he hasn't taken any days off for the past year or so, he's accumulated a bunch of off days...so he took seven of them and came gallivanting here for a breath of fresh air (comparatively; the haze here is nothing to what's in the Big S) and a bit of a break. He naturally looked me up; in fact I was told about it by everybody else in the family until I had his travelling plans firmly engraved in my memory, and so I arranged for transport and dinner. Well, to be honest all I actually did was ask a couple of his friends to go pick him up from the bus station. There's not much I can say about the weekend with my father that would be of interest to anyone outside the family, so I won't say much except that we spent a few nights of quality time together, gossiping about the lecturers (the age of the College can be gauged from the fact that my father...

The haze is back. I'm going to suppress all my urges to tell you that I told you so, but anyway, I told you so. I do declare that the Australians invented the boomerang under a fit of inspiration from the haze. So, it's now busily clogging up the view from my room--already the hills are turning gray-- and is now bringing a wonderful message of headaches and burnt smells. I'm going to look up rain dances shortly, try them out, and tell you which ones seem most effective. My hostel block's washing machine broke down last... Thursday, I think it was. I only discovered it after lugging two buckets full of one week's worth of dirty laundry down two flights of stairs, and found out when I kicked the thing and bruised my toe. I decided to pray for a miracle and lugged the two buckets full of clothes and dirt back to my room while waiting for said miracle to take place. My room mate looked askance at the smell I brought back in with me (usually, I take smells out , not the ...

When I joined the school editorial team, I had this idea that I'd be sitting behind a computer churning out articles and doing research for said articles. That's what msot people associate with the idea of working for a periodical, isn't it? It turns out I was optimistic. The editorial is recruiting more members, and I got somehow drafted to help do that. As a result, I got entrusted with a thick sheaf of forms to pass out (I passed out as well, but that's of little consequence here), and a deadline by which to collect them back and prepare the editor to interview more potential slaves. That deadline is tomorrow, and I only just finished handing out those forms today. To the wrong person, it seems, because now Tee Four, who is also on the recruitment sub-committee, is hounding me to get those forms into the right hands. I told her I'd had enough stress for the day, but she didn't listen properly. My adrenaline glands are still pumping concentrated Essence of...

I got back yesterday from my grandparents' in So Hour, and I'm still missing them. I started missing them as of one hour after arrival at my hostel room yesterday, when I realised that it was lunchtime and there was no Teochew porridge and food waiting for me. (Typical me, I suppose.) The trip down was most certainly worth it, even if it cost me about 30 or so bucks and my facial wash (which I packed lying on its side) leaked and drenched half my stuff in strong-smelling liquid. After all, I did enjoy myself thoroughly while I was there. My grandfather is as hale as ever, my grandmother equally so, but my cousin (hereafter referred to as Lucky) rode a motorcycle over a cat the day before I arrived. The cat survived, but he fell onto the road and got scraped and cut in a dozen places, including three piercings on his left foot that went bone-deep. When I saw him he had more bandages on him than the typical Egyptian mummy. That was the beginning of my week in Three Waves, d...

It rained yesterday, after nearly two months of drought. If anything could've been a better way to celebrate the absence of haze, it was rain. A proper heavy drizzle, not too heavy, not too light, and leaving behind a nice lingering scentlessness. It's nice to be healthy. I've always envied other people their physical hardiness and resistance to sickness-- due to various factors, I'm not the strongest body on the block-- but all the same, a point was made and taken when I came down with eye pains, a hacking wet cough with phlegm, a sore throat (and consequently a creaky bass voice--I'm a baritone), a bad headache, and constant thirst, all at once, thanks to the wonderful guys over at Idiot-esia and their lovely lovely haze. And now that all of the above sicknesses are gone, I'm actually breathing with a renewed thankfulness that I'm alive. I'm just glad to be breathing without coughing every five minutes. And, of course, for the fact that the rain wa...