"People are always saying, 'Think out of the box!'

But I say, 'What box?' "

HAHAHA i believe i coined that line back in junior college during math lecture one day, and maybe i should patent it or something. dont laugh. i really think that line is quite zhai, and if you say that in an interview the person will confirm go phoar!

of course i wont actually use that, not unless i'm trying to get into the creative industry, which is probably also known for quirky personalities and gay people. but i'm not quirky or gay or even creative, so i probably wont get to use that line but i still think its awesome. cheesy awesome. heh.

12 December is a really important date for me (and hafiz) and i'm determined not to screw up the interviews. because if i get this job, my life will automatically fall into place nicely and i dont have to worry about finding a job which (a) i like and i'm qualified for, and (b) in the least amount of time, or worry about the teaching thing abroad. which isnt to say i dont want to be a teacher any more, because i still do. but at least i can put off worrying about it.

so in anticipation of that date, i have vowed to

1. moisturize my face and arms everyday

2. stop picking at the scab on my elbow

3. stop peeling my fingers

4. use some hair conditioner

weird, but i have also subconsciously started to talk to the wall and conducting invisible interviews with myself whenever i sit in the toilet for a long dump, or when i'm alone in the lift, been trying to create more cheesy-but-awesome-(according to me) lines for my speech in the middle of the night, and i've also been practicing my smile and pose whenever i bathe.

schizo much?

hung out with the sisterhood after work last week, and then with the class girls for hwee & huiwen's birthday. apart from that my social life = zero.

gonna use my lunch break tomorrow to run down to the canon head office for a casting for some photoshoot. i hope i have enough time plus some left over to grab lunch. the canon photoshoot and another photoshoot for l'oreal are both held on the same day sometime in december, so i hope i'm not shooting myself in the foot for accepting both jobs (i mean, if i actually get past the casting part, which, if they only require cute girls with long eye-lashes, i'm definitely out.)

i really want to do both though, because i am a greedy person.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING Y'ALL!


i'm blogging from the office again. today i have decided that since its the season for giving thanks (really? i need to wiki about thanksgiving) i'm going to share with everyone a list of things i feel i should (its not the same as saying i am. see: mom, dad, assholes, being who they are) be thankful for.

okay here goes nothing.


Sandie's Thankful List for 2009:


1. graduating from school. to be honest, i love going to school, just not the latest one i enrolled in. studying for subjects i didnt enjoy and not having many friends in school (i didnt bother going out of my way to make many, like i would have if i'd gone to a cooler school) was equivalent to being dragged through hell.

2. my dad and mom for being who they are. they can be real assholes, they piss me off alot, and i'll never miss them if i ever have to be away from home, but at least they're good people, and i'm glad i grew up not being messed up or something. edit: I TAKE BACK WHAT I SAID. i'm not the one messed up, but right now, my mom is. she's shouting like a crazy woman because i told her i'm too full from dinner so i'll eat the fruits awhile later, and she just dug out all my shoes and threw them out of the house (i know! madness!) even though her shoutings are directed at my dad, he's ignoring her. in fact, nobody is paying attention to her little attention-seeking tirade. tomorrow i shall take her new pair of shoes and throw them down the rubbish chute. and i really dont care that she threw my shoes out -my shoes arent worth much anyway. i care more that i didnt have enough time to take a video of her acting like a lunatic. if i did, she can kiss her 'Sandie's Nice Mother' title good bye.

3. technology, Apple Inc, and the invention of the Internet. i eat my meals in front of the internet (breakfast + internet is usually why i'm late for work.) i practically sleep with my macbookpro, and i take my ipod with me into the toilet every day.

4. music and (story)books. i cant live without either. apart from the internet.

5. Melvin. even though things have been kinda weird recently, he's the only one who knows to save the tiny crisps of MacDonalds fries for me because those are the only kind i like, knows that i prefer soup over any other kinds of drinks, automatically peels prawns/crabs for me because i dont know how, and knows just how much i hate the shape of my legs and the size of my hips (the rest of you who dont know me wont see that because i know how to work my angles in photos yo.)

6. my Sidekick phone. because even though sometimes it gives me shit, its the only thing remotely cool about/on me.

7. annoying people, people who deserve to be hated, and girls other girls love to hate. without them, entertaining conversations as we know it wouldnt exist, and we will never experience the relief from complaining about idiotic douchebags, joy of mocking people behind their backs or the amusement after a bitching session.

8. judith chen. three cheers to 11 years of friendship! even though we bicker alot when we are in each other's faces for too long (and there are a lot of things i cant stand about her, vice versa) she could be considered to be my only friend from my secondary school days. the rest have become aquaintances which in all honesty, i dont really wish to keep in touch with.

9. a sense of humour. i think i'm a funny person. ha- ha.

10. the arctic monkeys. only for today. because i've been listening to them all day.


one question-
why do people eat turkey for/on thanksgiving? why cant it be like, kangaroo meat?

Team Jacob, because Edward sucks.

The question is... does he swallow?



I've been seeing Twilight everywhere lately, especially with Vampire Teens II New Moon's release, so I thought I'd break down why chicks go apeshit for it.






First off, the author creates a main character which is an empty shell. Her appearance isn't described in detail; that way, any female can slip into it and easily fantasize about being this person. I read 400 pages of that book and barely had any idea of what the main character looked like; as far as I was concerned she was a giant Lego brick. Appearance aside, her personality is portrayed as insecure, fumbling, and awkward - a combination anyone who ever went through puberty can relate to. By creating this "empty shell," the character becomes less of a person and more of something a female reader can put on and wear. Because I forgot her name (I think it was Barbara or Brando or something like that), I'm going to refer to her as "Pants" from here on.





So after a few chapters of listening to Pants whine about high school, sucking at volleyball, and being the center of attention, the second major character is introduced. Imagine everything women want in a man, then exaggerate it by ten thousand - and you've got Edward Cullen. The level of detail that the author goes into while describing our Eddie's appearance is remarkable. At one point while reading I started counting the number of times the author used the expression "Edward's perfect face," and it was far into the double digits. The author excruciatingly details his muscular pecs, clothing, hair, eye color- even his goddamn breath (I'm not joking).






Eddie intensely listens to everything Pants has to say, and as far as the reader is concerned, Eddie cares about nothing in the world more than Pants. What the author has done is created a perfect male figure - a pale Greek statue which the reader can worship and in turn be worshipped by.







So what about men that like Twilight? If you're male and you like Twilight, you're gay. I don't mean that in the derogatory sense, I mean it in the "you want to put your testicles against another man's testicles while gripping handfuls of chesthair" kind of way.

And the movie? The movie is just the same uninspired crap shat out onto a film reel.

Beyond that, it's just a romance novel with the occasional vampire teen drama bullshit peppered here and there. It doesn't really break any new ground in the realm of vampire fiction, other than portraying vampires as a family of uncomfortable retards who prance around the woods eating deer and bunny rabbits. There's lots of nervous lip-biting, tender kisses between Pants and Eddie, and lengthy descriptions of every feature of Edward's body. Pants is a static character who never really progresses beyond being an insecure vampire fangirl who obsesses over Eddie.

Like the rest of the world, I'm looking forward to the second installment.






(excerpt stolen and edited by yours truly.)

The Story of How Judith Got Her Bruise.
Illustrated by Judith Chen.

first week of work went great, although for some reason, i get really tired every night, even though it could be said that i get paid to do nothing. sort of.

because i was working in the CBD area, i thought it'll be fitting if i dug out my heels (from way back) to parade around in, because its kind of weird to be wearing flats among all the high-heeled corporate ladies. in my half drafted post earlier last week (its becoming a habit- i save all my half written posts as draft and most of them never get to see the light of cyberspace either because i've forgotten about them, or they've become outdated and irrelevant.) i was gushing about my heels, how it feels nice to be tottering on 3 inches of shiny metallic spike heels, even though the design of the straps looks a bit dated (well i did say its from way back, 3 years ago to be exact.) but i guess i'm not going to complete that post and publish it anymore because my fear of all things heeled has been warranted when i

1) stumbled into a guy on the train on the first day of work. consolation is that he was tall, taller than me in my heels, so at least it doesnt look like a giant (aka yours truly) accosted a poor little boy man in front of everyone.

2) by the middle of the week i've sprained my feet. i wasnt sure if it was a sprain because i thought only ankles get sprained, not feet. but my mom put some weird gel thingy on my feet and it got much better the next day. but still.

in conclusion, apart from making you look taller (if you need it) and giving you leg problems, there's NOTHING GOOD about heels. so there!

last week in the Life section of the straits times, a columnist wrote this article about her top five most disliked phrases/words said by other people. among her list was 'whatever' and 'anything'. if i'm gonna make my list, it'll be as such:

1. 'CHILL'

thats number one on my hate list, and if anyone says that to me, my first instinct is to ignore and turn away. for a simple reason- isnt it presumptuous of someone to assume that i'm anxious/pissed off, especially when thats not the case? more often than not, i'm never one of those two things until someone actually advises me to 'eh chill' which is when i start getting riled up for good.

2. nothing, really. i only hate one word, which is the word above.

yesterday i went shopping with my mom. it wasnt voluntary (obviously) all i wanted was to head down to chinatown to get some clothes altered and to return my overdue library books and then head back home to slum in my bed, but my mom needed a shopping partner and i am her only candidate (obviously) so i got dragged all the way to jurong point. (my fault really. i went there for the first time in my life a couple of weeks back and i kept gushing to her about how huge the place is.) we did a lot of shopping and, uhmm yeah, thats all. nothing exciting ever happens when i'm out with my mom or dad.

train ride was altogether an awful experience. i'm not getting into specifics, but i'm horrified at how some people make such terrible parents. so inconsiderate, and so oblivious to their inconsiderations. and why would the government/SMRT spend time cooking up stupid policies like No Sweets Or Plain Water on the trains but not No Playing Of Lousy Quality Music Through Handphones or better still, No Toddlers Allowed To Trample On Train Seats.

nobody could save me from the frustration of listening to lousy quality music (hiphop/techno, i cant really tell. its just one big mess of noise) from the cellphone belonging to the malay guy seated beside me who thinks the rest of the cabin actually enjoys that; and watching a malay kid (and sometimes with his brother) stomping around, lying across two seats, and then lying upside down and putting his feet up against the window. during peak period, no less. you'd wish he'd grow up to be a successful gymnast, or better still, fall off the seat right now and break his skull.

my mom says since i like to complain i should write to the forum page.

i will.

R & S Time last friday after work. i dont know what people are going to make of the photos, but thats all there is to it- someone napping, someone playing with photobooth. i have never felt more comfortable hanging out with another guy who is not a boyfriend, and i think there are only two people in the world who could say something like "go to the kitchen and find it yourself laa" and not sound impolite, and that is reu and ju. HAHA. talk about being BFFs lazy.

cant wait for Mark to end his exams, then we can finally reunite!

ghey people 4evazx.

Kobi the dog.

and he only comes out while you are sleeping

to smoke your drugs

and touch your butt

goodnight fellas.

today is my first day of work at the national population secretariat, prime minister's office. its a mouthful, but it'd be weird if you leave either part out. and i noticed that when i mention the latter, not-so-bright people will think i am actually physically working in the office belonging to the prime minister.

c'mon man, seriously?

from now on, i'll just call it the NPS-PMO. if you dont get it, its your own fault for not reading this entry.

today in the office i found a slip of paper in my hardly-worn beige blazer pocket and on it wrote "can someone revert what happended?" it was from the previous stint i did at the advertising firm (recall: here) i had copied it down to remind me to tell whoever who wanted a good laugh but had forgotten about it when i hung my jacket back up in the closet. and somehow, it looked very out of place in this new environment. for obvious reasons. i had a good little private sniggering session by myself, then i dumped the paper in the bin. good riddance.

tomorrow is my second day of work and i'm already bored of my un-coloured nails. somehow having really short and varnish-free nails makes a person me look a bit pathetic. i'm trying to slowly ease my black fingernails back into existence. i'm lost without it. i have also already exhausted all possible clothing options. shall raid my mom's closet tomorrow morning. looking for volunteers to accompany me to shop for work clothes this weekend. please raise your hands and do a good deed today.

guess what, christmas is the perfect excuse to make lists! (ohmygod i LOVE making lists) so here's my christmas list for this year. in no particular order. and i dont actually need any of those items, i mean, it would be nice to own, but i'm not like dying to have them. (except for the phone.)

(and maybe the books.)

(god, i am such a nerd.)

1. LG enV 2 cellphone -because.

2. the whole set of books by Sarah Dessen -because i lurvxz.

3. carolina herrera CHIC eau de toilette -because my issey miyake is down to its last spray, and i'm bored of my lancome.

4. Bloom SMOOCHY lip lacquer -because it ran out 2 years ago and i havent gotten around to buying a new tube, and i know i dont use lipgloss often, but recently when i wanted to, i found out that my Dior lipgloss has turned clumpy.

5. new wallet/some more bags -ditto.

6a. Lady Daisy, by Dick King-Smith -uhmm.

6b. Sweet Valley University series -uhmm.

7. killer heels that somehow wont make me tower over people -so i can finally be happy again.

8. lasik surgery/breasts implants/hip-bone reduction/weight gain -because. (and i made the hip-bone thing up.)

9. a VCR player + my old tape collection to miraculously become mold-free -because i want to watch all the classic technicolor cartoons my dad used to buy for me whenever he went overseas on business trips, plus all the random un-named cartoons my parents used to tape for me when mediacorp was still called SBC.

10. the complete Dilbert Desktop Games for PC -because i used to play them all the time when i was younger, and now i cant find it anywhere.

well some of the stuff on the list is just wishful thinking, but thats the point of making wishlists right? makes you feel hopeful even though secretly you know they're unlikely to come true.

lets see what Barney Stinson wants for christmas-

YAY christmas is coming!!! <-- three exclamation marks is abit too much, because there's nothing exciting about christmas. i've never celebrated christmas properly before because i come from a free-thinking family, and most of my christmas nights are spent thus:

mom- catching up on her newspapers at the dining table with the radio on 95.8FM

dad- watching blockbuster re-runs on channel 5 and eating Hand Brand peanuts

me- DVD marathon in bed. and usually, it is imperative for me to watch Anastasia (or other disney classics like aladdin or little mermaid, but usually anastasia) because it is such a christmasy thing to do. (like in the 90s people watch Home Alone for christmas.)

i sound like a LOSER or an ANTI-SOCIAL (or even FRIENDLESS) i know, sadd.

OH OH the other week when i was listening to Nightwish on my ipod, i suddenly remembered this silent cartoon-film my kindergarten teacher let us watch once, but it left a deep impression (i remember being totally entranced) because of the soundtrack, which -i discovered about two decades later- that Nightwish did a cover version of. i didnt know the title of the cartoon so i randomly typed something on youtube thinking that its gonna be futile but I FOUND IT OMGGG.

i love technology!!!

i will set up a shrine in the corner of my room and pray to the Internet God everyday.

anyway here it is. i dont think anyone would find it remotely interesting, but it was part of my childhood so i guess it holds more meaning for me.

its called The Snowman, based on a children's book and adapted into film in 1982.





ps: i prefer this version. the original soundtrack (<-- if you're damn free and want to compare) is sung by some choir boy and his vocal wasnt that fantastic. he also sounded like a russian/somebody who articulates his rrrr.

so the past couple of days have been spent playing dumb. which was exactly what happened. my voice was just gone, and i couldnt make a single sound even i if i tried. i couldnt even hum along to the radio. i went to see a doctor last sunday when i started losing my voice and when my cough hadnt recovered after a week of medicine, and the doctor said my throat and vocal chords were inflamed.

normal people like us dont get alot of chances pretending to be dumb or deaf or blind, and when i lost my voice i realised how lucky we were. being dumb wasnt as bad as being deaf or blind, but it was still very inconvenient. i cant respond to my mother when she asked me a question from another part of the house. i had to get up from my bed and walk to her and signal my answer.

also, my mom is really bad at lip-reading. and she has a bad habit of pretending she understood something when she either 1) didnt understand 2) wasnt even paying attention. so when i had something to mouth to her, she'll go uh-huh uh-huh and i'll be thinking, ARE YOU SURE YOU GET WHAT I'M SAYING? so i get her to repeat to me what she thought i mouthed, and half the time its wrong.

hell, she's even really bad at reading hand signals. when she asked me what time i wanted to wake for my dinner, and i used my hand to signal six three zero, she went "six.. three.. six oclock? 5 minutes more?" i was really exasperated but i couldnt make any exasperate-ish noises. so i just banged my head against my pillow and she stalked away being pissed off that i was so impatient and rude. how can any normal person not be annoyed, especially if six, three, or zero didnt require five fingers. so where the hell did '5 minutes more' come from??

the upside to losing my voice is that i didnt have to talk to my parents, and when they ask me something stupid or make ridiculous comments, it is acceptable to ignore them. sometimes when they annoy me too much, its okay to mouth off in front of them (as long as i dont use the F word because that word is easily recognisable whether you make the sound or not, plus i dont usually say F words anyway) because they wont suspect anything. usually though, i just roll my eyes and huff silently.

as soon as they got used to me being silent all the time, they gradually left me out of their conversations, which is FINE BY ME THANKYOU. i have never wanted anything more than to be amicably ignored by my parents. being ignored when they're angry with you is shit, but being ignored due to a circumstance like this is great. it was the best few days of my life.

(the interview i was supposed to have with the national population secretariat was rescheduled to take place tomorrow morning. wish me luck, people.)

in other news, i went out with jerline last night and got down to some trigger-happy business. it has now become a habit that when we want to hang out, we always met at Borders. and whenever i go to Borders it is mandatory that i waste my money on another crumpled, overly-thumbed (and not forgetting overly-priced) issue of a music magazine. it is usually either Kerrang! or BigCheese, or Alternative Press, or Rocksound. whateverr.

jer says that of all the event-girls whom she has made acquaintances with, i was one of the few she has kept in touch with because i was real. likewise, my friend, likewise.

:D

more nonsense photos here.

by the way, if you have been a loyal fan of my crappy blog, you'll know that i usually have nothing nice to say about my hair. and i'm really surprised at myself this time because,

I THINK MY HAIR IS (CURRENTLY) SUPER AWESOME.

today is the day you go out and buy some lottery.

this has got to be the funniest photo from the past two days. does anyone have any idea how heavy that thing was, even when its empty?? its not just any container to be filled with liquid, there's a pressure tank inside. i almost fell backwards.

Nimrta my favouritest indian in the world came by on the second day of the health promotion board event to facilitate some inter-school competition thingy which was taking place, and i was so damn glad she was around. being with her puts at least some normalcy back in trying to live with an alternate personality, where beauty is kinda dictated by the size of your eyes and the length of your eye lashes. to be fair, it was a lot of fun, but it was also not very me. (god i sound like ris low.)

alot of 'talent/modelling' scouts were lurking, which means alot of name-card and number exchanging, but i cant help but feel like even that is stretching the term a little too far. i never considered girls doing events and roadshows as models, we were more like a bunch of average-to-pretty faces standing around smiling, or at the very most, in charge of performing certain odd jobs. even more startling is the notion that girls who participate in paid photoshoots from random guys are considered 'models'. even if, to a critical eye, the 'modelling' consists of looking sweet, and if looking dao is required, not-smiling with dead eyes (tyra banks will be disappointed.) i'm not going to claim to be good at it, but that is also why i will never peg myself as a model.

i just qualify to be a fairly nice-looking girl and who needs easy money.

i am in huge trouble.

i have an interview on monday for a part-time position at the National Population Secretariat, Prime Minister's Office (PMO). but,

1) i lost my voice. like, nothing is coming out of my throat. not being dramatic.

2) my cough hasnt recovered, and given my luck, i'm prone to breaking out into a coughing fit at the most important of events/public of places.

3) i have a huge henna tattoo i got at day 2 of the health promotion board event today. (hightlight of the event- taking a photo with tay ping hui. lowlight of the event- no voice = no fun)

you know how fussy government organisations are. i think that just because of the three problems listed above, i will be at a disadvantage. how how how! :/

speaking of henna tattoos, if i could get away with getting a real tattoo, i'd want to have either one of the following:

1) a cord-like thingy attached to the base of my neck, just below my hairline, with the cord snaking down my spine (so that i can pretend to be a robot on repair.)

2) an IV drip snaking along my arm, with a needle still stuck in my veins (so that i can pretend to be ill/emo)

3) vampire teeth marks on my neck (so that i can be a permament victim of whichever vampire-actor i'll be obsessed with in future. currently, said actor is Ian Somerhalder.)

4) a word/phrase/symbol on the inside of my lip

5) the Kill Hannah logo (from their latest album) on an undecided part of my body:

now that, would be sweet.

Health Promotion Board event at Expo today and tomorrow. here's a sneak peak. (and i think i always feel most comfortable in a tiny skirt and huge tshirt. no other event outfit has ever suited my personality better.) dont mind our shitty photo quality, all we had was our cellphones.

on a random note, my cough is not improving, and i'm frankly quite sick of having constant pain in my throat. i am also losing my voice. dang.

ps: doesnt my new fringe look better? "Your fringe parting has the power to make or break you." i think someone should commission that as a universal saying.