i am spending money that i haven't earned

monday: adventureworld (is this supposed to be one word or two words?)
i think i nearly died halfway up that stupidly huge slope that i was climbing for about the millionth time.

wednesday: checked exam results
watched "The Heartbreak Kid" at garden city in the afternoon. it's so obscene.
ritz's bank card was declined at Woolies, and emily and i gave him a bit of crap for that XD. so embarrassing right. but at least he had cash.
then i missed not one, but TWO buses. the nice thing was, ritz missed his bus too, so misery had company.

thursday: shopping
...should be considered a serious form of exercise. i wasn't shopping for myself, but managed to have a lot of fun anyway.

today: sharon's birthday
i woke up so early...... to cut sushi. okay, so i didn't really help her prepare much, seeing as i'm about as useful (and obstructive) as a tree trunk in the kitchen. but there was plenty of food, people had fun, and we all ended up in northbridge, despite initially splitting up and heading off in separate groups.

and karma turned around to bite me in the butt when my bank card was declined today... and i didn't have any cash left on me.
thankfully, mo - the hero of cashless kims - was there to save the day... and i went to an ATM and paid him back immediately, so we're all good now.

sigh...
i am tired.

give and take

love
anger
loyalty

...

i'm lost for words.

and on to the dishes

i just spent hours going through Fair Trading Policies, Diversity and Equal Opportunity, Health and Safety Procedures, Core Selling Techniques, the art of Visual Merchandising, Loss Prevention, Customer Service and Satisfaction, Returns Policies, Bullying and Discrimination, Emergency Procedures, and a whole lot of other workplace related stuff that jumbles up my already jumbled brain.

and then i did assessments.

three, to be exact.

i passed them all, of course. it'd be a bit sad if i could pass Chemistry and not work.

but i can't believe i actually read all that, then got tested.
it's just like being at school, only i actually get paid for the time i put into this, which is a definite bonus.

but they never mentioned the headache that comes with it.

FINALLY! I'M FREE! IT'S OVER! and any other post-exam cliche you can think of

sorry.
i know some people haven't finished yet.

but i have XD.

this is the first night in a long, long time where i haven't felt guilty for not studying.
i feel so free... so liberated...

...so buggered.

after a lot of happiness and jumping around and general mad-hatter grinning, i'm just spent. i think it's time for me to REST. it's not exactly well deserved, though, considering i didn't actually study as hard as i should have for the exams.

but it's over now, and thanksgiving dinner at Pastor's place was so nice. Jono makes the most amazing BBQ chicken marinade. yes, Jono. there was cake, rusty bit me, and Tiff's almost 18.
there, lovely summary of the night.

happiness makes me want to help people.
it's weird, i know.
and then helping people makes me happy.
so it's like a whole chain reaction thing.


lesson #0505 in battling stupidity

on a day where the temperature reaches 36 degrees Celsius, no matter how happy or how excited or how free you feel (e.g. after exams), if you do not have a car and have to rely on Transperth and/0r the two stumps you call legs to get around, do not go to the city unless it is absolutely necessary. otherwise, you can and will suffer.
in fact, it is recommended that you stay indoors in air-conditioned areas far away from the ever stealthy reaches of skin cancer.
the fun in the sun just isn't worth risking melanoma.

point worth mentioning:

Tze-Chiang (a.k.a. McBastard) got a freaking crazy 98.6% for his intro calc exam. that's crazy. in moey's words "bastard... he got the mark i need to pass for the YEAR".

point that super PWNS the point worth mentioning:

it's okay. cause Tiffany Foo got 100% in her year.

bahahaha... it's people like these who screw the rest of us up for TEE.

tomorrow is officially my first day of the holidays, and much of it will be spent cleaning my room and picking up the books and notes and any miscellaneous crap that is currently strewn across the floors, tables, carpets, benchtops - indeed, any previously available flat surface - of my house.
i am not a neat student.

i keep hearing my phone ringing from the kitchen but it's sitting right next to me and not ringing. i think i'm going crazy.

i have been listening to a few instrumentals on repeat for the last couple of days.
it's nice sometimes to just listen to music, without words to distract you.

a few favourites:

Wing Stock, by Ashley MacIsaac.
apparently he's a bit of a weirdo in person, but a brilliant fiddler.

To Zanarkand from FFX by Nobuo Uematsu (who composes most of the SquareEnix game soundtracks). i know it's a little overplayed, but i still like it a lot.

Utada Hikaru's First Love (FFVII Advent Children) is also quite nice, but the build-up is a bit boring. once it gets to the - what's the equivalent of the chorus in an instrumental? - the middle part, i really like it.

but i can't get past River Flows In You by this korean dude called Yiruma (who IS this?).
it stays in my head all day long... but it's so pretty. one of the prettiest piano melodies i've heard in a while. i love it.


T-15 hours to the chemistry exam.
poo.



[edit] 9.32 pm
anonymous has very kindly corrected my initial assumption that Yiruma is japanese.
he is, in fact, korean.
they're everywhere.

THE LAPTOP IS HOME

:)

the lamp glows green

general consensus is that the physics exam was so sh*t crazy hard that...

we'll probably all get scaled.

172 marks in 150 minutes over 33 pages.

they're trying to kill us, i swear.


what kim, jane and rick had for lunch:

spicy beef rolls served with sauteed egg and leafy greens over poached noodles lightly tossed in brown sauce, courtesy of the culinary prowess of rick and kim.

translation:
sausage, fried egg and limpy lettuce with mi goreng.
kim made the mi goreng, rick made the rest.

we seriously need to go to TAFE.

kim is very the don't want to do the exam

kim is very the don't understand what the crap is going on in physics.

kim is very the strangely calm about this at the currentness of this moment.

kim is very the sure that tomorrow is not going to be a happy day.

kim is very the hoping that the exam tomorrow will be super the easy.

kim is very the annoying when she types like this.

kim is going to sleep.

the things i resort to doing in an effort to avoid studying are truly amazing.

yesterday, i spent at least an hour folding laundry (yes, we have a lot of unfolded laundry).

and i did the dishes voluntarily.

then i sat down and watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (the original) on TV for a while.

getting up at 11 in the morning meant half my day was gone already.

and i only had two meals yesterday.
that's less than half what i usually eat.

but... it's okay.

plenty of time to stress tonight.

not.

starts with stress, followed by depress. hope to God it ends with success.

there's this thing that people above the age of 16 like to say.
in fact, i don't recall having met anyone who's said otherwise.

"aiyah... it's only year 11 la!"

yeah, i know year 11 exams don't mean anything in the end.
but the crazed kiasu-ness in me still wants to do well.
it sucks to grow up passing primary school effortlessly, and then to suddenly crash and burn because you can't be bothered to put in the work required.

and at my school, failing anything is reason enough to throw yourself off a cliff.

actually, it's cue for the teachers to start encouraging you to explore alternative pathways to achieve the goals and career aspirations that best suit your needs.

so study we year 11s must.

many of us find this extremely difficult.

some attempt to study in groups at Alexander library. but with Northbridge literally sitting just outside the doors, i'd say it isn't very effective. the call of bubble tea (90 seconds away) is a hard one to resist.

others form study groups... but tend to do this in blobs of more than 3 or 4 people. this usually results in a lot of giggling and eraser throwing.

some stay at home and cram everything into their little brains until they turn into pinkish mush. it works. -ish. these are the ones that come out of the exam rooms with crazed smiles on their faces, laughing to themselves from time to time.

a few study minimally and get brilliant results. we call these ones the bastards.

personally, i say "poo... have to study".
then i bury myself into a little hole and proceed to cry myself into oblivion.

THEN i pray really, really hard.

this is not a targeted post, not even a generalisation. it's a moment of brain poo.

you can forgive someone their flaws by saying that they're really good people, deep inside.
some deeper than others -_-

but pretty much everybody is a really good person, deep inside. so being good inside doesn't merit them over anyone else in any way.

it's not a permit to be a bad person outside, as long as they're good inside.

it's not even a ticket to forgiveness every time they do something wrong.

being good on the inside doesn't really mean anything in the end, if they're gonna act like bad people along the way.

isn't that such a childish way of looking at it?

well, it's about to get even more childish.

because most of the time, i want to think people are good.
it's not so much benefit of the doubt as it is self-delusion.

i have my moments of lucidity.

but for the most part, i believe that everyone is a lovely person, really, deep inside (note punctuation, don't read it wrongly); that no one would really hurt another on purpose; that people sometimes just make decisions that end up to be... not so great.

they're all good people, deep inside.

it gives me a bit of hope, a bit of optimism.
and really, sometimes,

it's enough.

am suddenly feeling very tired and sleepy...
and strangely paranoid.
it's weird.

had a rather amusing conversation with sharon while we were walking today...
shar: you know, my mum said "i don't understand how kim can work and still do well at school."
me: hmmgh?
shar: yeah, she said she doesn't know how you can have a job and still study.
me: don't... really... study.
shar: then i told her that you seem sleepy in school sometimes, and she said "yeah, maybe... i saw her on friday and she looks very weak, and tired, and skinny. very weak ah!"

XD
that made me laugh for a while.


we were going through our poetry units in English today and i was reminded of a few poems that i actually really like.
that doesn't mean i understand them very well. in fact, my interpretation usually does the poet no justice. like how one poet made a brilliant statement on marriage using a lion eating it's keeper as an extended metaphor (The Lion's Bride, Gwen Harwood).
i took it literally.

(here comes the potentially boring part)
...proof that poetry isn't all lovey dovey sonnets written in a way that you're sometimes not sure if it's even in english...

Doctor to Patient Bruce Dawe

Please sit down. I'm afraid I have some
rather bad news for you: you are now seventeen
and you have contracted an occupational disease called
unemployment. Like others similarly afflicted
you will experience feelings of
shock, disbelief, injustice, guilt, apathy, and aggression.
(although not necessarily in that order)
and you'll no doubt be urged to try the various
recommended anodynes: editorials in newspapers,
voluntary unpaid work for local charities, booze,
other compulsive mind-destroyers, prayer, comforting
talks with increasingly less-interested friends.
It is small comfort to know that the disease
is universal and can accommodate
the middle-aged and thirtyish and strikes down
those in camps in Kompong Sam and Warsaw.
However you will discover, as time passes,
that your presence in itself will make others
obviously uncomfortable. Try not to let
your shadow, at this stage,
fall across your neighbour's plate; eat
with the right hand only; do not touch
others in public (this can be easily
misconstrued); keep always
down-wind, if possible. Please remember
you have now become our common vulnerability
personified. Oh yes. and, by the way,
you will be relieved to know the disease
is only in a minority of cases terminal.

Most, that is, survive. Next, please.

moey tells me to become a blogging machine.
this is usually a cue for the words to rush out from the depths of my mind, tripping over themselves to channel positive chi into my fingertips as they perform a rabid dance across the keyboard.

...
or not.


i finally figured out why i haven't been able to sleep during the first half of last week.

daylight savings.

that fleeting inability to adjust just makes me feel so... horribly... old.


it's okay tho.
been sleeping like a baby since thursday, and haven't been doing ANY work either, so the stress levels are currently under a somewhat unhealthy mode of repression.


so sarah says i have a disorder.
in her own words...

man, i'd really do psychology just for you.

you're weird.
and i really mean that.

people sometimes don't believe me when i say i'm weird. they think it's just one of those things people say because they're feeling a little embarrassed.
but when i say it, i'm usually not lying.


school in less than 9 hours.
what fun.