Handed in Reaction Paper on Friday. One down, four to go.

My eyes are quite tired, reading stuff on the computer screen, reading stuff from books, reading readings from course packs... argh. Tired, period.

Shall draft my American Law Research Paper tonight and maybe let Prof Chng take a look if I have the time and she's in her office tomorrow. Just changed my premise this afternoon, which makes it a lot easier for me to focus on my topic of choice. Meh. Looks like I'm not sleeping tonight. But I can.. sort of afford it. 8 am Emotions lect tomorrow has been pushed back to 9 am; review lecture. And I'll never have to listen to that woman lecture again for the rest of my life in NUS!! Wahaha.

At least, I hope so.

Last training this Thursday. Thank you, thank you, all that is holy and sacred out there. Not that I hate archery or anything. In fact, with all the regular training this sem, I think I love it even more. It's just that... we're archers, but we're students too. Yeah. You get what I mean.

Stumbled across this article sometime last week about the different kinds of headaches (apparently there are 6 kinds, including "hangover" and "caffeine-withdrawal"); it says that headaches that only occur (is that the right word for it??) on one side of the head are migraines. Does that mean I have migraines?? O_O

Coz all my headaches only ever happen on one side. Never both sides at once. Or in the center. Huh. Oh well.

I'm not speaking/typing in complete sentences. Sigh. Well, I'm tired. Half-rambling coz of the mocha I drank an hour ago. If not, I wouldn't even be typing.

I need a laptop. Desperately. Makes it so much easier to get work done, you can put all your own stuff on it and nobody but you has a right to do whatever you want with it, and well... I've come to the conclusion that this sem has been ESPECIALLY laggy for me because my home desktop was down at the beginning of this sem, then it came back with its RAM drastically reduced to 64MB, thus making me very afraid to even switch it on for fear that it wouldn't even be able to handle opening the programs, let alone me using them. And then when I finally learned to cope with the slow processing speed, the monitor went *POP*. Yeah, a very loud pop. It was a very old monitor that was a bit wonky; we've been using it ever since the original monitor that came with CPU spoilt. So now we have a CPU which can't be used because there's no monitor. And we can't get a new monitor right now because of the usual financial problems.

You've probably figured out by now that in my household, when misfortune happens, unlike opportunity, it strikes more than once.

So I've been living off my mum's and dad's laptops. Problem with that, though, is that I can never actually use them for long periods of time, so ... yeah. That's self-explanatory, isn't it.

Archery stuff... my cell report is long overdue. Sorry Huiting and Nick... My attendance record is overdue as well. Sorry Imy.

Upgraded my bow limbs to 30 pounds. Then decided to shoot on Saturday without my arm guard. Figured it was pretty safe since when I shoot *with* my arm guard, my bow arm doesn't get hit anyway. Apparently though, psychological barriers are pretty powerful things. For some reason, without the arm guard, I end up getting hit.

F***, but that hurts. I haven't been hit by the bowstring for a VERY long time. And definitely NOT with a 30 pound bow. And NOT with a fast-flight string. Finally decided to wear the arm guard when it looked like if I hit my arm just one more time, the skin would burst right then and there.

Uh. Sorry for the gross image.

One small spot on my arm is still very brown and blue though. And slightly swollen.

Was looking at my MSN contact list. Suddenly my Archery group makes up the biggest group of contacts in my list. And Zhan Tao's nick is particularly... inspiring? Hm. Inspiring some deep thought, that is:

"We do what we must. Sometimes we can choose the path we follow. Sometimes our choices are made for us."

Sigh. My choices were always made for me. And when I thought that I could finally choose my path, the choice got made for me when I wasn't looking. Then it got handed to me and I was told to deal. Again.

And I can't help but let my mind drift sometimes and it wanders to how some people tell me that I'm a strong person. And I remember what Meiji told me when we were in J2, when she told me that she felt that I was an independent person. And I wonder. Am I really? Or is it just that I don't have anyone to rely on, so I don't have a choice? Or is it just that I never trusted anyone enough to rely on them, so I felt that I had no choice but to be self-reliant? Maybe I just thought that no one would care enough to bother about me.

I wonder if it's self-pity. It was something that I came to realise in J2, when I finally warmed up to my class (out of the blue and for no reason that I can think of, but they seemed okay with it); I realised that I could fit in almost seamlessly with all the class cliques, I could talk with them, joke with them, hell, even make the people laugh with my notorious sarcastic wit. But when I left, I somehow had this innate sense and understanding and even acceptance that I wouldn't be missed.

Is it self-pity if it's something you accept as a fact of life and you're not even complaining about it or anything? Hm.

Well, to quote one of the many inspirational nicknames that Zhicong has used on his MSN, "The truth will set you free. But before it does, it will make you miserable."

Suppose I'm at the miserable stage. Suppose I'm somewhere nearing the outer edge of it. Suppose it doesn't really matter and I just live my life the way I always have, just being happy to be where I am at the time I am.

Have taken to reading a bit of the book of Plath's poetry that Kenny gave me, every night. She's a fantastic poet. I completely understand when people say that she's just a mad, sad, depressed woman, but at the same time, I think they don't understand. It's that madness which is creativity. It's the madness which inspires it and is it all at the same time.

I completely understood what she meant when we were in JC and we were reading Plath for Literature, and she wrote "The blood jet is poetry".

When Rudolf Nureyev died in 1993, I remember the paper running a simple piece on him, with a picture of him and Margot Fonteyn in a ballet pose; and next to the picture was a single quote, wherein he said that dancing was his life, and he would do it "till the last drop of it leaves my body".

And I understand that too. I want to write. I want to write until there's nothing left; just give me the time. Give me the time to write till there's nothing left in me that I can put on paper and maybe then I'll stop.

Mr T. used to say when he was teaching us Plath that lots of writers don't live long. Isn't it ironic that when so many people create, they destroy themselves at the same time.

Have always loved Plath's writing. Have wanted to be her ever since I first read her work when I was 14.

Guess that's not a very good thing, considering she stuck her head in an oven when she was 33.

But, her writing. That's what I mean.

Am now for the first time actually seriously considering publishing. Maybe I'll ask Kenny if he knows anyone. And in the meantime, I'll get back to another sort of writing, which distracts you from life in another way by telling you that it's urgent urgent urgent, and that you just have to finish it or you'll be so screwed seven ways from Sunday that you won't be able to tell up from down.

Huh. I have no idea where that came from.

*Shrugs* Oh well. It's just me. Sitting here all by my lonesome. Typing. Nice of you to drop by. Thanks for reading. And listening, maybe.

And it's funny, but when I first started writing, I never wanted anyone who knew me personally to read what I wrote. Writing is.. awkwardly personal stuff, after all. Anyone who reads it would know what you're feeling inside, under all those layers. Also makes it a lot easier for people to criticise your work if they don't know you. And if they don't know you personally, well... then they can't place all those emotions to a person, a name, a face, and you're safe really. Because they can't get to where you are and look at what you wrote and look at you and put two and two together and they'll see through and through, inside and out.

But I suppose that's why half the time, this blog is coded in abstract half-poetic prose and stunted, paralysed verse.