i was vacuuming my room in the morning just now the when the machine suddenly stuttered to a stop. i wondered why though, and i pressed the 'on' button again to switch it on and suddenly smoke started to billow out from its back. it reminded me of cars that break down that have smoke suddenly coming out from the front. anyway the smell was really strong and quite a lot of smoke was being emitted. all i did was to go out of my room and tell my dad the vacuum cleaner had smoke coming out. eventually the whole house was drenched with the odour of the smoke. the 10 year old vacuum cleaner finally spoilt, confirmed by the fact that it tripped the curcuits when we plugged it in and tried to switch in on. it was quite shocking to see smoke out from the vacuum cleaner - certainly it jolted me from my slumber haha.

anyway the last i blogged it was going into the 2nd week of ivp. sadly i didn't better my performance from last year - again i bowed out at the semi-finals stage. another bronze in the bag, and 2 bronzes in 2 years would probably represent stagnation. Personally i think i've come rather far from being a nobody, but i know there is always a whole lot of room for improvement. maybe next year. that's what everyone else says too. i hope they keep their word - no action no talk.

so the past few weeks have been occupied with nothing meaningful of notes. had that 33-day preparatory course for my internship, a 9 and-a-half hours karaoke session (from 1230pm to 9pm!), and several days spent going out here and there. and making time to read books in between, and playing winning 11..

oh and of course - watching the world cup. i'm supporting the oranje this time round, like i did in 2006, though i hope they do better this time round. actually to be honest i don't really support them, 'cos i don't really really have a side that i fancy. i do have an affinity towards the netherlands, but that's about it. but let's just take it that i support them then haha. well there have been many upsets so far - the most significant is that the 2 finalists from the previous edition of the world cup are out! that also means there will be a new world champion too. starting next week though, i won't really be able to watch as many games as i would like to considering the fact that my i've to report daily at 725am for the next 5 weeks. though i won't want to miss the final - a point i've adhered to since world cup 1998. the final match would be on early monday morning, so i will have to schedule my sleeping schedule accordingly.

the other day i was almost tempted to waste 80bucks on their away jersey, which i thought was very nice, but i didn't in the end. fab bought the ghana jersey though, which cost 89bucks. we later went through piles of old jerseys, and he bought another 2 while i couldn't find any that had my size. i nearly bought a bolton jersey, but fab did ask a good question - who would ever want to buy a bolton jersey? and i replied, bolton fans la. an apt answer. i realised that if i was going to buy that bolton jersey, it was only because it had my size and at 29bucks it was dirt cheap. not really because i was a bolton fan anyway. luckily later on i actually used my head to think, and instead i go myself a white drifit polo tee at 23 bucks - something much more practical than any bolton jersey haha.

so the internship starts next week, and i'm somewhat looking forward to how things will pan out. it's quite exciting at times, but i know there will be plenty of challenges. might as well make the time and effort worthwhile. at least some of the teachers do actually still remember me. haha.

hanyalah satu yang bertakhta di hatiku.

ivp

the last i blogged was i think 3 weeks ago. in those 3 weeks the most awesome-est of stuffs happened.

the week that was 2 weeks ago was the most fun and meaningful that i've had. a coffee session with an old friend from my ns days, a day trip to jb with the silat people, a karaoke and supper session with my jc classmates, and a picnic at botanical gardens and then dinner with my primary school friends - all within a week. i'm thankful i still meet up regularly (i think once or twice a year is considered regular enough) with these different groups of people. i think the value of such meet-ups cannot be underestimated. it is the rekindling of old ties, the remembrance and commemoration of old deeds and occurrances, and opportunities to further strengthen existing ties, and still be able to laugh about each other. priceless, i assure you.

in the space of 3 weeks all i've been doing was going to school for training, and just playing games at home in between. i made it through the first round last weekend for ivp, though tomorrow it's the quarter-finals and potentially the semi-finals later on. i'm not exactly psyched up for things, but i shall find my own ways to motivate myself.

2 days ago i got silver for ippt! surprisingly i got 21 points, at least 2 points higher than i could ever achieve even during my ns days. the 2.4km run was excruciating - the only thing that kept spurring me on was that i was not going to be happy if i only managed a pass for the timing and not the silver standard - a difference of $100 mind you! so i pushed and pushed and i barely made the cut - 7 seconds more and i would have gotten only $100. as usual when one goes for ippt one will notice old men and fathers with round bellies struggling to clear the ippt. i'm thankful i still have a bit of youth on my side and my silat trainings at least condition my body better for gruelling physical sessions, even if i don't think i'm that fit.

my exam results were good i would say, since i equalled my best-performing semester, which was way back in my 1st ever semester. i'm thankful for that too, considering i was taking the real estate module that i've been cursing about on my blog in the past few months. yet surprisingly i got an a for that, the best result overall. i really wonder how bad one must do for the exams for that module, since i didn't even finish the paper, which constituted 60% of the overall grade, and i believei scored 0 for participation marks in tutorial. jerome says don't question good fortune, but i mean i still want to know how bad one must do to get a bad score. sometimes we do so much yet we achieve so little.

so i've supposedly conquered the many battles - the 1st weekend of ivp, my ippt, my exam results. next up is tomorrow and potentially sunday. one at a time, slowly does it i guess. once that is over a little while more time to rest before the next challenge - teaching. it's isn't particularly a career option for me, but it is an avenue to spend my holidays on something meaningful and on something that pays well. haha. oh well, by the looks of things i think it's english and history for me. but we'll see about that.

back to research on the thesis paper! i've already thought of the title somewhat, and i hope that's enough to kickstart this arduous journey.

it's a quarter after one, i'm all alone and i need you now.