Watching soyouthinkyoucandance on tv reignited some passion for reality tv. Good old reality tv. It brings the best and worst out of people. And it brings out the couch potato and tv addict in you.

There's something about watching people quarrel, breakdown, celebrate, cry or make a mess of themselves on television that captivates and enthralls the average audience. It's not like you even have anything to do with runways, dance floors, photoshoots, board rooms; or even isolated islands or globe-races. Nothing really close to the daily grind we trudge through, or the unimportant, self-obsessed activities that characterize and give shape to our weeks. Yet, reality tv moves, and raises you. It brings you back to basics without realizing it: the very foundations of the appeal of tv. It's about living another life; stepping through a wardrobe into another 'reality', so to speak. And the google box brings us places, brings realities to us on plates.

And it works its magic in ways we do not comprehend. Even with its contradictions: in spite of the way it moves you as you watch the contestants rise and fall, reality tv hardly effects any change in your life. It's the safe-ness of tv that we succumb to: a diehard subscription to tv-lives lived vicariously, but never made our own. Where we can still switch off, literally, and walk away - back to the bored moments, and boring motions in our lives.I guess there's always magic in a life not yours

You know the feeling that someone is watching you in the lift, although you're alone? This has come true.

A short account by #32

day one -
the Management installs CCTV that watches the lift lobby, and video-feeds to the LCD screen. this means that while you are waiting for the lift, the screen shows live footage of your back view, from the camera at the top, the eye of an owl that never, ever sleeps. but watches, and records. every move you make.

same day-
the Management sends a note to every doorstep:
Don't worry, we're watching over you.

days later-
the new lift they were constructing? completed. bright, fast, and new. mirrors around so you can inspect yourself, tweak your appearance, un-mangle your hair, pose, and prepare. problem is, it has a camera installed inside. problem two: the camera feeds to the same LCD screen in the lift lobby. imagine the horror! paranoia grips you while you're in the lift. people are watching. it's the people. it's the Management. they know about Us. there is no escape. We decide to put all meetings in the lift on hold, to see if it's safe. the Heads are at discussion. we await their decision.

days later-
what does this all mean? you may ask, young reader. it means our movement is restricted. the sole place we could transmit valuable encrypted notes is lost; our networks cut. Agents cannot appear friendly, for fear the Management would suspect liasons. we cannot sing to ourselves in the lift, talk to ourselves, dance like a rockstar. we cannot even change out of our Everyday clothing into our supersuits. Management sends another note:
Don't worry, we're watching you.

unknown time-
we've fled the premises. the Agency sent a burn-after-reading note, instructing us to do so. shortly before this, Management were sending forces down the corridors, cleaning out houses, checking genetic codes. escaped out of the window while i still could. suffered a cut on my knee. heading towards location P. god knows when i can write again.

(partially based on the true events of the installation of the lift CCTV)

today in camp i said:
"this feels endless. I feel like I was just here yesterday". but the irony was just left to tend to itself; people paid no attention. It was not a sense of deja vu, more a sense of endlessness. like a looping record - someone needs to change the disc please

The moment when you just snap out of a dream is magical. In that instant you are washed with loss, and left futilely grabbing for shreds of a memory, or rather, moments that flee from the 'Present' created in the dream, towards the Past and the Future. For dreams seem to spin yarns and weave stories about the future, drawing from the past, and the canvases of recent Presents. We're often left hanging, eyes still sleep-filled, for endings and conclusions of these dreams. If only endings came that easy!

Recollection (not out of nostalgia, or pretence) :
I remember this one dream from a long time ago vividly; I was at a stairwell in bras basah complex, with xx, and the ceiling turned into this sky of stars; a swirling sea of bright lights. Very much Harry Potter like! Stars in stairwell sky. stars familiar and unfamiliar; stars that point the future, with light from the past. And the stars danced to an infinity. I pointed out Orion.

And that was all i remember when I woke up. It was a cool scene. Someday I'll have it in a film! Maybe.

The Sun's Inching Closer

Crazy, cruel, relentless, raging, unbearable, unbelievable GLOBAL WARMING.

It's here. And it's hitting us hard. Beginning with the hottest summer yet. melt-your-bones, crave-for-cones, stay-at-home, iced-water-guzzling, fans-a-blasting, 3-baths-a-hour, desperate-for-a-shower kind of hot.

These are desolate times. We need to band together. It is a time when you get preyed on by advertising and make bad, subconscious decisions. Hold on while i go grab a bottle of ice cold coke from my fridge. And change my wallpaper to a picture of a bottle of cold Snapple.

It's times like these when we need the support groups. as a community suffering, not so much in silence, but in the apathy that pervades if we do nothing about it. Live Aid Concerts, Earth Hours, Earth Days I say! Just leave the air conditioning on while we cut off the rest of the power.

Everyone can contribute in their own ways. Be it well-meaning self-help survival guides for the weather (Summer Survival Guide, LamFunky) ; or pointless ranting with green messages not-so-sneakily inserted (The Sun's Inching Closer, yours truly), we can all make a difference.

Start today. Plant a tree; recycle the recyclable; live by candles at night; go on a week-long ipod strike so you don't keep charging it; watch less reality tv; keep the mini coopers at home and take the bus; plant more trees.

It helps. Let's begin. After American Idol.

a guy approached me on orchard road, handing me a sheet of coupons, explaining how purchasing it would help so-and-so charity. "sir, allow me to explain to you how..." I gave him half a minute, then told him "sir, i'm not interested". And he said "you're not interested in helping children?"

I stared at him, and said: "in that case, no". I swear i almost blew my top at him. the audacity to try and weigh my social conscience with a donation! but he gave up and left. and since generalized sweeping comments seem fashionable to him, i'll just bet he's drawing a commission from the company that hired him for the mentioned charity he claims to help. just because he looks like he is.

in any case, these are my must-do's when i have leave/off.
1. ask army-mates on msn, at night, "shouldn't you be sleeping? you have work tomorrow"
2. gloat at the masses going home from work/school - "you must be tired!"

it's great to be on leave. i have a million things i want to do with that one day, and the day ends all too soon

started to pour heavily, dramatically, when it was time to go home today. i peered out of the window and reported that the floods outside have brought in crocodiles. everyone rolled their eyes. It WAS true, they just chose miserable truth and logic over imagination. and they were just lucky the floods cleared before they stepped outside.

complained to my army-mates, and nobody in particular, that life is about to descend into a monotony that will kill us all, slowly, but surely, in the coming months. to demonstrate this metaphorical murder of our souls and selves, i collapsed to the ground, writhing in muted trauma. expectedly my dramatic expression was not appreciated, as usual.

people lack imagination! they succumb to the cliche of the eye-roll; they are tempted by the safety in numbers; the arrogant powers of opinions they do not own, but stole from someone else. they are who they think they are, but are not. mirrors!

i think we need to be less afraid of falling. if life's gonna be full of pitfalls, then all we can do is learn to land better each time. you can fall into the gap, but don't fall into the cliche.

I paid special attention to my bunch of keys today; apart from the house, gate and letterbox key, there is this one other key that i have no idea what it's for. It has baffled me for the whole day. My best guess is that it leads to a secret wardrobe that enters a parallel world, or opens a letterbox with letters from a lover from the future, or a treasure chest hidden beneath one of the loose floorboards in my attic. Which may subsequently contain either ancient spanish treasure, or a board game where animals magically appear with each clue, or a gold ring I should fling into a flaming mountain, or a book of secrets, or a guitar Pick of Destiny, or an invitation to a wizarding school and a 12 1/2 inch wand, or coded numbers, or yet another key. To another secret location.

First I shall find my attic with the loose floorboards

I decided change is good. In the sense that any conscious change made by a person would be automatically confined within normal human instinct to 'change for the better', as they say. And hence when a person decides to change a facet of himself, or his life - even if it's to be a goth rocker or soul-less gym rat or intellectual snob - his decision is driven by the belief that it will fulfil some part of his life; or make him happier, so to speak. The want to change in itself is a positive sort of fuel in a person: in a sense change is always good then, in general. weird.

maybe change is good, then.

my mum received the terr0rist search pic in her handphone and my dad complains: "eh, why i don't have". and he says something to the effect of:

dad: eh, s1ngtel and starhub should send people free smses on National Day saying "Happy National Day!"
me and my mum: er but this terr0rist thing important mah
dad: National Day also important what

such is the priority list in the great scheme of things for my dad hahaha

The Daily Prophet

Sirius Black is on the loose. all Hippogriffs are being watched. Call the authorities if you spot him.