One down...an umpteen more to go!

26th October 2006. 9: 43 PM. (I've developed the habit of writing down the proper date and time 'cos blogger always gets this WRONG.)

I've just finished my physics O' Level practical exam today. The timing of this is really sick, today is/was(?) the last day of school for the secondary one, two and three kids. Yuck.

The exam was difficult as it required much precision. One involved finding out the focal length of a lens using two very finicky methods (one was measuring the thickness and diameter of the lens using a ruler and two set-squares). The other was about rolling marbles down a rickety ramp (made with two rulers, a wooden block and some Blu-Tack (the name is copyrighted). I think I just as good as botched the (2) whole darn experiments. For the lens thing, I had to keep on adjusting the retort stand and it was--just a little this way...no, more, more...fuck, moved it too much...move it back...shoot, overshot...palms getting sweaty and wrists are sore...damn, just a little more, just a little more...yes, just right, just a bit... I was so slow that I couldn't finish the questions that came with this experiment in the first forty-five minutes. After that, we had to go on to the next experiment--marble on the ramp.

Double F_ _ _.

My reaction time was very slow as I could not see exactly when the marble stopped and all that. I took readings over and over and over again. And still, when I got down to drawing that graph... ...it came out wonky. And even before any actual graph-drawing had taken place, I mucked up my scales (x-axis and y-axis, kids, and both being equally Ee-vill). I tried asking for another piece of graph paper, so the invigilators scurried around asking each other if it was possible to give me another piece...in the end, no one came back with a piece of shitty graph paper (gee, I knew the MOE was stingy, but not that stingy...shades of my skin-flint grandpa). So I had to draw a graph which had a ~squiggly~ border all along its sides.

I took so long that I didn't finish the paper...

...almost. That was close. I was just putting the finishing touches to my design-experiments question when the time was up. And I left another one-mark question out. Typical. I have never finished a science experiment within the given time.

I was shaking all over when we left the room. Jelly on a plate.

My O'Levels are cumyng!

In the Secular Night
Margaret Atwood

In the secular night you wander around
alone in your house. It's two-thirty.
Everyone has deserted you,
or this is your story;
you remember it from being sixteen,
when the others were out somewhere, having a good time,
or so you suspected,
and you had to baby-sit.
You took a large scoop of vanilla ice-cream
and filled up the glass with grapejuice
and ginger ale, and put on Glenn Miller
with his big-band sound,
and lit a cigarette and blew the smoke up the chimney,
and cried for a while because you were not dancing,
and then danced, by yourself, your mouth circled with purple.
Now, forty years later, things have changed,
and it's baby lima beans.
It's necessary to reserve a secret vice.
This is what comes from forgetting to eat
at the stated mealtimes. You simmer them carefully,
drain, add cream and pepper,
and amble up and down the stairs,
scooping them up with your fingers right out of the bowl,
talking to yourself out loud.
You'd be surprised if you got an answer,
but that part will come later.

There is so much silence between the words,
you say. You say, The sensed absence
of God and the sensed presence
amount to much the same thing,
only in reverse.
You say, I have too much white clothing.
You start to hum.
Several hundred years ago
this could have been mysticism
or heresy. It isn't now.
Outside there are sirens.
Someone's been run over.
The century grinds on.




Well anyway, I'm going to have to work like... ...hell when I get my arse off the chair. My chemistry practical O'Level is on the 26th, that's like three days away.

Wonder if I'm in deep shit or anything, feel free to inform me if I am--leave a comment.

I'm going to re-read The Blind Assassin after my O's, my idea of a beach read. First read it when I was in sec one, but I don't think I got all of it.

My next few days will be terribly rushed...

...so pray for me. Do hope that I will survive.

With the O' Levels drawing closer by the day, the rush to prepare for them is really hotting up. I'm going to be totally worked to the bone--don't know if that's good or bad, I hope it produces results.

On the fate of Man:

1) "naked I came howling in, like the moon into the cold sky"

2) Toilet-trained and weaned.
Abused by kindergarten teachers.
Rejected by peers for not being able to turn a cartwheel like the rest of 'em.
Experience existential angst and wonder whether or not to Believe.

3) Go to REAL school. Majorly homesick for hours. Go home and study.

4) Years go by.

5) Major exam.

6) Cycle repeated one or two more time/s.

7) Graduate. Get rid of angst. Become "gainfully employ".

8) Marry and have children and start a new cycle.

9) Years go by.

10) Retire and pray that CPF will tide you over.

11) Become senile, arthritic, demented etc.

12) Die.

Grrr...you OWE me, Indonesia

Right now, in Singapore, the haze is terrible.
The newspapers this morning reported that the PSI is 80.
The air is clouded up by smoke and dust.

It's the forest fires from Indonesia. The trees are burning, the land is burning. The forests look densely grown with fire.

Burn, baby burn.

They're clearing land for houses and farmland I guess. The people there have been doing this each year for years and the fires are so serious that it'll take a sustained period of heavy rains to wash it all away. The Indonesian government either can't or won't do anything about it.

I'm getting a sore throat. I know it already. It might be due to the late nights but I feel that this is part of the problem too. And my O' Levels are less than a month away. I hope the haze and my throat both clear up soon.

My sympathies for the people of Indonesia too. The forest burners as well as the city-dwellers.

It's really late at night...

...and I feel kind of guilty. It's 12: 43 am--Thursday-f_ _ _ing-morning for F_ _ _'s sake! Ahhh!

Really guilty for staying up so late. It's not good for me, especially with my eyes going funny and all that. I always promise myself to sleep early but I never do.

My dad's asleep on the chair behind me; the computer's in the livingroom, so this is pretty normal.



The house was quiet and the world was calm.
--Wallace Stevens; The house was quiet and the world was calm