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| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ Sunday, October 30, 2005, 2:43:00 AM | permalink |
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Well, at least they work for me. Bic Runga - Sway David Grey - Babylon Gin Blossoms - Hey Jealousy Gin Blossoms - Til I Hear From You John Mayer - Comfortable John Mayer - My Stupid Mouth John Mayer - Love Song For No One John Mayer - Not Myself John Mayer - Something's Missing Plain Sunset - Closure Plain Sunset - Do I Plain Sunset - Find A Way Plain Sunset - Girl On Queen Street Plain Sunset - Plain Sunset Save Ferris - Come On Eileen Save Ferris - I Know Surreal - Bedtime Story Surreal - Proposal Song Third Eye Blind - Blinded Third Eye Blind - How's It Going To Be Vertical Rush - Hello Goodbye Vertical Horizon - Sunrays And Saturdays Every single song has its own little story. |
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...| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ Saturday, October 29, 2005, 8:43:00 AM | permalink |
 The clouds were serenely quiescent. I laid back and watched them laze by, doing mental sums in my head. "6 x 15 = ... 90." Hmm. A hard thud on my head shudders my view jolting me from daydreaming back into accelerated motion. "Eh! You all run up in front and clear away all those people blocking!"I tried to raise my head up to survey the commotion all around. People were running all around me, currently tied down on a stretcher. My helmet-protected head bobs up & down from the lack of suspension system of my mode of transport - 4 huffing puffing running guys. Out of every 15 guys 1 gets picked to be the "casualty" to be ferried by the others. Guess who got lucky. 5 other "casualties" from my company are similarly horizontally chauffered. We were doing this as a race, 2km+ around Keat Hong Camp, as part of the 40th SAR Battalion Games Day. You know, games and fun. The heavy footsteps, mad dog speeds and rushing air, the shouts and profanity hurled back and forth, the atmosphere is more like as if we were hurrying through a ritual procession because the primal gods are pissed that we've missed the deadline to provide them their quota of human snacks. The experience of being shuttled at breakneck speeds around the camp was exciting I must say, but everytime one of the Finally I'm carried pass the finishing line, landed on the ground and unfastened from the straps. The dog-tired guys walk off to rest or get a drink, some look at me in a mixture of elation and exasperation. I know a couple of my fellow mates felt inclined to strangle me afterwards - the literal burden on their shoulders. Sorry lah. |
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...| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ Monday, October 24, 2005, 3:19:00 AM | permalink |
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Update: Some additional photos from our climbing trip on 30th October were also included. Over the weekdays last week I called up the guys so that we could meet for a climb session on Saturday. Through last minute screw ups and circumstances, "we" ended up becoming only Boon & me. When we got there we warmed up and did our climbs. (note to self: muscles have weaken alot. need to reinstill weekly climbing regime) Then I realised I haven't really taken any pictures of the place despite being there so often (in the past at least) So here's a pictoral introduction to the Climbasia rock gym. The place is an 2 storey ex-shophouse converted into a workout centre.    After walking in from the main entrance through the back door (confusing?) you'll see the admin office/shop.  On the ground level there's a climbing area which is more for the advanced level type people, with its steep slopes and cave-like rock holds that extent to even the ceilings.
Maybe one of these days when I'm free I'll go attend the Sport Climbing Course Level 1 course.   Going up the stairs leads to the lounge area on the 2nd floor, equip with kitchen, TV, magazines, cushions, guitar, etc.   The rock gym's home to a few cats which were adopted by the owners. I watched 2 of them grow up from kittens into aristocrats. The latest addition to the family is an adorable light-grey cat named Yin.  This narrow walkway leads to the toilet and shower room, and also to an open-air balcony for outdoor chilling out.This area is great for smokers and there's a swing installed too (not all that smokers are natural playground going swingers) Sometimes after some intense rock-gripping all you want to do is find some where to sit down and stone for awhile.   Another shot of the lounge area. You can see the 2nd climbing area through the window grille.   This area's kinder to the newcomer with its friendly walls that are less angled, ample and well-distributed large rocks. For training and building up strength to take up more challenging obstacles.  The climbing session itself was quite OK.. a good wake-up call to start training again. The adrenaline must have really been pumping when I lost my grip & pummelled to the mat because its only when I looked at my hands that I realise that a Tic-Tac sized piece of skin was dangling from my left ring finger. Its at this point that I became acquainted with OWWWW. The cute cushion in the background was purposely positioned there to help visually lessen the grotesque quality of the picture. |
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Ouch on the last pic.
Did they repaint the walls?
- by comrade 
Jeiel Aranal @ times 1:06 AM, October 25, 2005
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yea bro they did, along with changing the positions of the rock every now & then. evil.
- by comrade Thomas @ times 4:37 PM, October 29, 2005
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...| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ Friday, October 21, 2005, 6:09:00 PM | permalink |
I came home yesterday night feeling somewhat tired, but happy from a cool last minute makan & jamming session with Boon & the guys. So fuzzy-weary-happy me pops home just in time for my brothers to tell me, Eh Tom ah? Something happen to your com leh.What followed after this was 45 minutes of futile troubleshooting and much swearing. I roughly know what's the problem with the thing and can probably fix it by this week but dear siblings of mine, it doesn't take brain power to know that screwing up your brother's PC just before he come back home from a week in camp is not good for your personal well being. Please consider refraining from doing so in the future. Blogging at Toa Payoh Library somehow isn't quite the same. |
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...| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ 3:50:00 PM | permalink |
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Last week Sham did her signature run-leap-catch move aka "The Lassie" during our imprompto frisbee game @ Pasir Ris Park. Ultimate frisbee remains as the unifying sport among us. Last week all we old MI/OI people had a wonderful time catching up and chit-chatting about every other thing. It was one of those priceless moments for keeps. Last week I suspected Leanna stole the playlist of China Black's DJs to play on her CD player at the BBQ. Last week everyone wanted to use the birthday cake on the birthday girl. When I say "use" I don't mean "feed". Last week I wanted to tell Joshua that seizing the poor newly 21 year old woman and hurling her into the sea wasn't exactly an appropriate way to help her celebrate. Last week, Benny, Zhong Ren, every other guy who had ever gone into army and me drove everyone else nuts when we incessantly went on & on with army talk. Strange, but as warm-blooded males we never did take up Leanna's suggestion to "talk about SEX lah! At least I can join in!" Last week Cecilia's previously unknown zen bowling abilities absolutely owned our male asses. Last week I had a good time. This week I regret not taking home the heaps of unopened potato chips and assorted junk food to Happy Birthday Leanna. |
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...| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ Sunday, October 16, 2005, 10:13:00 PM | permalink |
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"Sad" doesn't really quite encompass what I'm trying to describe here but it will do since I'm too tired to rake my brains for better vocabulary. So yeah, its sad, these days that my bunch are going through. How your mood will be for a whole new week precariously depends on whether you had a good weekend, "Good" in turn is qualified by dubious factors such as how great/exhilarating/superb/high were the hours of freedom you had. If expectations were failed, well, wear your footwear down the next few days with the friction from dragging feet. But then again in this instance the difference between "good" and "bad" is subjective. What's IS the alternative to "bad"? A flippant trivial state of buoyancy maintained by adrenaline, alcohol, caffeine, endorphines, oxytonin, or usually a imaginary osmosis-blended body affecting frappicino of more than one of these chemicals listed. Fleeting temporal moments of gratification.. because "Happiness" is not an appropriate word to be used in this context. Such empty days these days, and here I almost managed to persuade myself that my bad-weekend-induced gloominess is justified behaviour. I'm being an self-sleep-deprieving idiot with a keyboard and a blog account, so I better log out now before I spoil anyone else's reading experiences further. |
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Don't know what might help, but cheer up and take it easy if you can.
- by comrade May-Lynn @ times 7:43 PM, October 17, 2005
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...| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ Sunday, October 09, 2005, 5:51:00 AM | permalink |
 I watched my ungelled hair rise like leavened bread into a mini-afro in the glass reflection on the MRT train, as the moisture from a quick shower evaporates into the dry air-con air. I make a quick call on my handphone and arranged to meet Boon at around 9:45pm @ City Hall.A Starbucks Espresso Frap Venti in hand and off we went to the Asian Civilisations Museum at Armenian Street.. except that the place seemed deserted. After circling the entire building once, another time, and another, (as if the walls of the place would collapse and the hidden gig treasure would magically appear Ali Baba style) a call to Jamie to check online maps.. finally we gave up our egos and asked the single bored/bemused security guard at the front gate. "Show? I think you mean the other ACM.Ugh. A hurried dash/hop/cab and we finally arrived at the correct place. Turns out that the first place we went to was ACM 1 (Armenian St) and that the performances were held at ACM 2 (Empress Pl). Actually, the gig itself was intended as 1 of the events celebrating the brand new opening of the place. Good news was that for our troubles we enjoyed most of the gig that night. My journalist-wannabe instincts even had me chatting with 2 of my favourite bands of the night - Surreal and Vertical Rush Summary of "interview" with Jon Chan (Surreal guitarist/support vocals, ex-Plainsunset lead) Qn: What is it that you're singing in the back during the bridge of "Bedtime Story" ? Jon: Well, that part's pretty quick so I have to sing fast, but to put it simply, the words are 'No more sleepless nights, when I am not your bedtime story'. Qn: What happened with Plainsunset? I think its still the greatest Singapore band. Why disband? Jon: Well, the band was starting to go in different directions in terms of musical preferences. So we decided to split while we were still friends. Me: Rather than breaking up from fighting? Jon: Yea. You should have seen the last gig we had, there was alot of crying. The other members of the band are still in the scene. Sham's in another band now, Shamejoannshame. Summary of chat with Vertical Rush band member Me: Hey thanks for playing our request for "Hello Goodbye", it was Boon's idea to want that song, it has alot of sentimental value for him. [sabohs] (Actually it was a mutual idea. The song's quite special to me too. Boon & me finally mustered our guts to yell for the song at the same time) VRush: No probs! But its been quite some time since we've performed that song live. I wrote it back when I was in BMT. Me: Wow. (And I'm still in my 1st year as an NSF :[ ) Qn: What is the band up to at the moment? Any gigs? VRush: We'll be doing a New Year's gig at the Esplanade, 2 sets actually. we're quite worried about it.. it'll be very tiring to handle. Me: Yea I can imagine. VRush: We're also recording material for an upcoming album! Hopefully it will be ready soon. Qn: Tonight's set was great! But we had some problems getting here. We thought the venue was the other ACM. I'm worried that some people were also confused. VRush: You too??? We also thought it was the other place. We found out and ran all the way from there over here, sweated like mad. Me: Well, hope that we were the only ones to be affected by this tonight... It was around 11pm-12am+ when the gig finally ended. A trip to ACM's loo & a tour of the place and we left at 12am+++. Photo opportunities were spotted outside. Being the   So, yep we had a fun-filled evening. And to reiterate for the last time, we've also learnt that the Asian Civilisations Museum is situated at two separate venues.. Now we know! |
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...| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ Friday, October 07, 2005, 10:12:00 PM | permalink |
"If I didn't knew better, I would be thinking that the place is on the verge of closing down already."It was a Thurday weekday night and exams were looming for JC students. What did we expect man, looking at what looked like a sparsely occupied Club Momo. Edmund, Remy and me stood outside undecided, looking at each other and our shoes. Chip Wee wandered out from inside. His face was semi-hidden by smoke escaping from his mouth when he stopped smoking to tell us that he already warned us earlier about the lack of people tonight, but we were still invited to join him and his friends for drinks if we wanted to.  Ah whatthehell. We did.Everything seemed to point to a night of ennui. The ear-splitting loudness of the R&B music was all the more poignant when you note that it seemed to be directed at no one, I estimated less than 50 heads in the place when we first stepped in. We toured around abit before finally getting bored and sitting down to get acquainted with Chip Wee's friends. "Hi!"Then Remy saw something at the dance floor. "Whoa. Check THAT out." A really cute girl with some hot moves. She looked familar. We sat around somemore and had a couple more drinks to loosen our dance-conscious inhibitions. but finally the speakers that were aimed at us like cannons were driving us mad with the throbbing booms of the bass, so we got up and got down. We went over to the dance floor and in no time really got into the mood of things. The guys were sneaking glances over at the girl who was still sizzling. I enjoyed the set done by the DJ - real tight music with no dead stops of humdrum. And it seemed like there were more people all of a sudden.  Chip, man of the night, successfully turning an awkward moment (tying shoelaces) into a cool camera pose Just when I was getting high, (probably the Martell) someone tapped me on the shoulder. "Hi!~" That sounded familar. I turned around, the rest gawked. THE Girl said 'hi!' I laughed at myself and the humour of the situation, she really was Fiona, 1 of my teammates whom I worked with for our schools' presentation for Pre-U Sem 2003. The next few minutes were spent catching up and mutual shriekings of "I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT YOU'RE HERE!!!" The rest of the guys could hardly believe it either. We left at around 4am, drained but merry, and went to get some prata supper before hitting the sack. A night that started off with a lack of lustre, but turned out unexpectedly awesome. Momo had some great sounds going. PS: Fiona, you were the centre of attention at Momo on Oct 7th 2005 lah. Next time you go clubbing must call me ;P |
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my gosh... i didn't know i attracted so much attention that night! *embarrassed* haha..
yes we will go clubbing together soon!! then we can tear the whole place down together!!
- by comrade 
@ times 9:26 PM, October 09, 2005
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...| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ Tuesday, October 04, 2005, 2:03:00 AM | permalink |
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I woke up feeling phelgmy last Friday.. luckily rest and some meds did the trick. I felt better later in the day and decided it was a good day to go back to school to finally collect my A' Level cert. You won't believe the monster truck deja vu that hit me when I walked through the gates. For the rest of the day I keep feeling that I'm in a world of trouble for coming to school in a flaming red shirt and bemudas. Walking past my old classroom I met the curious eyes of dozens of students. I had to consciously remind myself to stop asking in my head and out loud "Why are these goons in my classroom?" Collecting my cert was a "Hi", "Sign" and "Bye bye" 5 minutes affairs at the General Office. And then I decided to go walk around the school for nostalgia's sake. That "short walk" turned out to take an unexpected 4 hours. I first dropped by the library. I was greeted by a pleasant surprise outside  That banner was done by my classmate Iris. Maybe its cos' the school's been laid back in getting new decor up, I don't know. But you have no idea how much of a warm fuzzy feeling I had to find out that our class banner was still around. I went in and found that good old Mr. Mastor (school technician) & Mdm Tahna (school librarian.. spelling correct?) was around. I chatted with them for quite a while before I found out that my history teacher Mrs J.T. was still around. Mwaha. Thankfully, even though it was quite late in the day she was quite happy to see me. Conversation was surprisingly easy and we merrily chattered over a myriad of things. There was Mr Raj's (My economics teacher + form teacher) table located on the left of hers. I thought my observation that his table's contents seemed to have taken on a life of its own and overgrown to cover the entire platform like some tropical paperwork rainforest explosion bordered on exaggeration until she agreed and went on with some disparaging comment about malekind in general. Sheesh. She then showed me some photos of her 2 kids. While looking at shots of her 2 chubby boys and listening to her gripe about the challenges of being a teacher and parent I thought about our class' first impression of her back when we were still fresh-faced Year 1 students. Maybe motherhood did a good job mellowing/tiring the woman, or that she maintains an tough emotional shell towards strangers, or maybe we were just a bunch of idiots. But try convincing me 3 years ago that I would be casually looking at baby photos with whom I thought was an "evil cold #$%@", and you'll have me in a fit of laughter. "What's baby no. 2's name?"Then the topic changed to the prospects of this year's Year 3s. (aka the people who'll be facing the A' Levels gauntlet very soon.) Almost immediately the buoyant mood left. JT gave me 1 of those looks that teachers always do - They look like they are trying very hard to suppress something, pursing their lips. When they finally mouth out their views, their words come out staggered, as if they had to rephrase and reprocess their original thoughts. Then she realised that she no longer has any teacher-student responsibility over me, and her straightforward honesty on this year's batch got even me scared. Then she mentioned that Taufik was still upstairs at the MPR doing history essay work. -_O   When I walk in, the poor dude was racking his brains over the essay plan. Obviously putting in many hours at 1 go only burns the mind out. Bad flashbacks man.. bad flashbacks.  I tried to scare him with my own experiences of cramming for the A's (JT's orders) but I think I did a crappy job of that (opps. ;P) I ended up being a complete distraction to the guy by finding about everything that has changed or happened this year. "You know those security cameras around the school? And the guards?" "Yea?" I said, having to get a visitor's pass from the people. "Well, these things were introduced after a laptop got stolen in school. (!!!) ... I dunno.. the new intake of Year 1s is very big. They're very.. different from us." I think by different, he meant it negatively. True, during my 3 years there, the school's student population was very small. But from this small quantity we built solid relationships of trust and friendship, even with the teachers. In the end its the quality of my experiences with my peers rather than the quantity of social connections I had in school that really counts. I tried to ward off the feeling that with the event of the blantant laptop theft, a little part of the "heart" of the campus died. I continued to be a distraction to him and talked about other things, until JT came up to do a spotcheck but ended up joining in too. Eventually we packed up and left the place.  Stepping outside, the yellow rays of the 5:30pm sun cast down the corridor of the top level. Its a happy-sad thing, but I no longer walk down this all too familar path as a student. |
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...| by comrade commissar | Thomas | @ Sunday, October 02, 2005, 5:29:00 AM | permalink |
10pm - We were damn bored. Emphasis here is on the word BORED. (See Diagram A) Diagram A. "3 Idiots with absolutely no plans for the night" Pearl "Cinderella Clubber" Tan suggested that we tag along with her to join her friends at China Black. We decided to go after deliberating over it as if it was an issue of life & death. (Well.. turns out it sort of was, given that Edmund literally scared the shits out of us by konking out later in the night) 11:30pm - Pearl went in first. Edmund & me went to 7-11 to get things with alcoholic content to "warm up" 1st. We went in too after he had his b33r & me my Strobe. 12amaybe,nottoosurecos'thestrobegaveanewbuzz;P - Edmund found some of his friends were there. We got acquainted, (great bunch of people) talked abit then went to boogie. 1am - Us guys decided that the crowd wasn't hyped up enough & that we were still too conscious. We each claimed our complementary free drink. Jim beams gulped down double quick time. More haphazard movement of limbs soon followed. Somewhere after 1am - Edmund went off to chill with his friends again. They eventually chipped in $ & got a jug of Vodka Redbull. Everyone shared (I had a sip only cos' I felt bad for not paying for it) and Edm ended up downing roughly half the volatile content. 3am+ - We left the place & went to the overnight Macs to chill out. We ended up having to do casualty resusitation. I chatted with Edmund's friends about the night, as Edmund was already slumped over the table at this point. We shrugged and thought he was just dead-tired until he fell off his chair flat onto the ground. Yup, I said my usual "WTF!?!"! . He had us really worried at 1 point - We couldn't get him to reply to us. Dammit man.. wonder if ambulances are faster than dial-a-cabs. Then he got up and bleaaargh into 1 of the nearby potted plants. OK good, patient condition stablised. Now we know he's alright, we proceeded to capture the moment for posterity (See Diagrams B. & C.)  Diagram B - Me & Pearl. Fear my dracula mwahaha teeth of 3v1l.  Diagram C. There was enough ownage to spare for all. Can of b33r + Glass of Jim Beam + 1/2 a jug of Vodka Red Bull = 1 Edmund KO'ed + Sorry Macdonalds people for the vomit-filled potted plant. Maybe it will make good fertiliser =] |
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ahh shit...
gotta reallie thank thomas for whatever he did to bring me home.
on the other hand i wouldn't wanna see those pics man..boo! haha
and if im not wrong.. i took 1 out of the 2 jugs of vodka redbull man.
- by comrade @ times 11:10 AM, October 02, 2005
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I think it's Jim Beam, not gin beam.
- by comrade May-Lynn @ times 3:00 PM, October 03, 2005
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i'm not going to try & fake it & say tt's its a typo error. whoops. the thing tastes like bitter medicine.
- by comrade Thomas @ times 7:15 PM, October 03, 2005
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<--latest post-- trip to kl (20-22 july 2007)--one of these days--death and purpose--eulogy for a Sun--protest: a story--sparring--twenty-one--time to kickstart that dead engine--simple pleasures--nerd rock inadequacy-- --last post--> |
