(This article is an extended response to MasonM's article " Perfection Is Overrated ".)   When I started writing again a couple of years back, stuff just sort of flowed out of me like water. There was no effort and it was a joy to write, poems, stories, whatever. In my attempts to do well and to impress more people, I might have caused an injury to my own creative spirit. About two years ago, I embarked on a quest to get my poems published. Knowing...

Most of my friends can really throw a good party. And I really think today’s party was a success, for my friend. And for me? I just don’t like being at parties, especially when I’m alone in a party where there are many people already in their own groups. The host is a good friend and who has many groups of friends, and all which she invited to her place to today. What happened was: that I arrived, had something to eat, talked a bit with our group and went off less than half an hour la...

Last night on the bus on the way home from the city, a lady (office-attired, probably in her 40’s) sat down next me. I was playing on my PSP with ear phones on and quite engrossed. She looked over at what I was doing, tapped me on the shoulder and asked me what that was. “Is this a PDA of some sort?” she asked. I paused the game, took my ear pieces out and told her what it was. She was very curious, and asked more questions about it. After I explained the functions of the PSP to her, s...

What happened the other day was a child riding on the escalator in town had a terrible accident. Apparently, while riding on the escalator, the kid's rubber shoe had somehow gotten caught at the side and the escalator had dragged her shoe along with her big toe right into its machinery, ripped it right off. It was on the news. They showed the poor kid, face wet from crying probably, her leg in a cast, bloody end where the big toe would have been. Doctors had done her a graft, since she h...

Yesterday on the bus, I overheard a guy talking on his cell phone. I never knew a guy could be so chatty, on the entire trip he was talking loudly, trying to counsel his friend on how to confront a project teammate. Now I wasn't exactly eavesdropping, since this guy was talking like there wasn't anyone around. It's funny how phone conversations can do that to you when you are totally engaged. That, or that people are still used to shouting into their cell phones even though these days, cel...

Isn't it funny how online characters who tell others to "get a life" often seem to behave as if they don't have a life other than the one online? It's also funny when these same online characters would go on to post things like "I do this and that because I have a life outside of here." as if suspecting that somehow, people would think that they don't have a life. They have suddenly realised that what they are doing is the same thing as the one they have accused of "not having a life", be it ...

The one thing I can't stand about game forums these days is the number of stupid people on it. With games gaining popularity all over, one is beginning to see the same kind of stupidity you see in yahoo chat and news forums. - You can't ask a question without someone flaming you or belittling you. - someone always tells a lame joke, or some joke no one understands except for an exclusive few. In fact several of them will do so all in a row of replies in attempts to jump on the bandwago...

I really would like to go down to Chinatown before chinese new year (CNY) and have a look around. But to go down this weekend would be suicide, with the holidays being a few days away. I heard from my friends who went last weekend that there was already a lot of pushing and shoving. I do hate crowds. But... I would really like to get some of the food stuff. Of course I can get some of the same stuff from the marketplace near my place. But foodstuff seems to taste better when you ...

It's that time of the year again, with Chinese Lunar New Year (LNY) just round the corner (in a little more than a week actually). The time of the year when families get ready to come together again for a reunion dinner and that once-a-year visit to show respect to their elders. My father's side of the family is an empire of traditional aunts, uncles and grand-persons, who believe in strict adherence to such traditions. Most of them have given up on ever seeing me on these important holi...

I haven't had coffee at all since my last blog and I'm feeling fine. I seem to be sleeping better these past nights, so maybe the coffee habit was the main cause of my chronic insomnia all along. In the day time, I pretty much feel the same as when I do take coffee but I don't feel as grouchy somehow. I am free. But at the back of my mind, I still seem to want that cup of coffee. The urge is there, so I guess it does take longer to get off it mentally.

I'm off coffee all together since yesterday (12/1). Somehow, yesterday morning, I just felt like I could and so I did it. I didn't take my usual morning cup of java. In the afternoon, headache did set in but it was a bearable throb. I drank lots of water and cooled my head by wetting my forehead with a splash of water now and then. This morning (13/1), the headache was gone. In afternoon, the headache returned but was even less severe than yesterday, a mere annoying tick and nothi...

I'm on day 4. I have not yet given it up completely and am still taking half of what I usually take in the morning. (I only take coffee in the morning.) It's funny how one never realises how much one is dependent on the stuff until one is trying to give it up. I think I'm beginning to understand what addiction is. For the past four mornings, I have taken half the usual amount of coffee I use to make myself that heavenly brew and it's only self discipline that has kept me from just giv...

It's not good to be addicted to anything, even the necessary cup of coffee, a simple pleasure. And so, I have decided that I'm going to start curing myself of the need for that drink every morning. Note that me not drinking coffee in the morning = headaches, grouchiness for the rest of the day. So I'm not going to stop suddenly, I will slowly adapt by taking less and less coffee, until I don't need it at all. Yesterday, I took about half the amount of coffee powder I would usually use ...

Let's have more of it! Have you tasted this one yet, it's new and interesting. You know it's just between you and me. Have some and see what others are missing. Over here! Maybe we can gain some juicy piece of secret we can be smug about. Look at me, I know something you don't. Don't you wish you know what I know? Let's give them a hint, entice them with the smell of someone else's filth. Let's gather a crowd, let's go out and have a mob! Then we'll dance and celebrate our own great...