Malignant Monday #1

Malignant Monday #1

As part of my ambitious resolve to blog more consistently, I introduce you to a weekly series of stories of how Mondays generally hate me and are scheming behind my back to destroy me. What Monday doesn't know is that I hate it more than I hate doing my laundry. And that is the highest possible level of hatred in this world.

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I know you didn't know so let me just tell you this first: I'm pregnant.

(long silence)

Really?

Yes, really.

Oh, wow... um, congratulations? Hope you'll get a plump, fat, healthy baby.

Oh, that's very nice of you, you naive idiot.

But actually, no, seriously, I'm really not pregnant. But I might as well be. You see, I'm a clucky man. I generally love kids, especially the not-throwing-the-tantrum kind and babies. Aww, babies.

I'm doing my paediatrics rotation at the moment. So far, I've done four week of it at a hospital and have been absolutely disappointed when my imaginations were shattered by the brutal reality that only a handful of kids are in the wards and newborn babies sleep like ALL THE TIME.

Translation: I couldn't show off my natural charm with kids which means I could make paediatric physical examination anything but a nightmare, and also I couldn't play with babies because otherwise I would be chased out by the nursery nurses flailing pins in their hands (not the rolling kind, but the prickly ones) for waking up a baby they've just put to sleep.

Four weeks I've endured that unbearable suffering of not seeing kids enough. But no fear, today I continue my paeds rotation at another bigger hospital. I shall see and play with kids all I want.

That was at least what I thought when I woke up this morning a la Disney Princess with bright optimism and sunshine. I hate you, Monday.

See, I start off with my paediatric emergency department (ED) roster this whole week. As I was walking off to the hospital, noticing bouncing squirrels and singing along with colourful birds, I imagined myself being so happy and all high in the ED tending to kids coming in one after another. The excitement of paediatric emergency was palpable.

Then the orientation told me only two students are allowed in the ED at any one point because otherwise "it would be too crowded" when there are seven of us in my roster group. Now I know exactly what Maleficent was feeling like when she wasn't invited by the royal king and queen to attend Aurora's birth celebration when other fat fairy godmothers get to come and eat the cake. (Oh, wait, the green one isn't that fat, but she's a cake gobbler just as well.)

God, I hate Monday. And Disney Princesses. Go Team Disney Villains!

We, seven of us, divided the shifts each of us could go to and I get to be lucky one - I didn't manage to get any shifts until 1 p.m. tomorrow. Just when I was already psyched up for ED for a long time.

In my angst, I went down to the staff cafeteria to get some free hot chocolate to cool down my inner fiery dragon. Little did I know Monday had been scheming with all the three vending machines to deny me of free hot choco. I could almost hear a voice saying, "IN YOUR FACE!".

Feeling guilty of not doing anything on my first day, I went to the library to study, which I did for a hour before deciding to walk back home and vent my frustration on food (read: lunch), wait around until about 4 p.m. when I have a lecture at the hospital. After lunch and practising on my acoustic guitar for a full hour, I felt really tired and quickly decided to take a quick nap.

Turns out Monday purposely woke me up at 5 p.m. to spite me.

And my hair's messed up.



P.S. As much as I am clucky, I'm both not that clucky or even ready to have my own babies. But I'll steal your baby anytime.

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Home II

Home II

I reached home. Mama was there to greet me first. Her face was filled with a thousand emotions that magically resonated within me as well. It wasn't simply "happy" or "relieved". The concoction of emotions splashed into a unique colour that is rarely ever seen.


She stood there as if waiting to be hugged. I embraced her and closed my eyes. I could feel the rest of the world didn't exist as I was locked. It was just... us.


Then there was my dad together with my brothers all rejoicing in the reunion. I hugged each one of them.


I gave one of my best hugs to my dearest younger sister. I can see how she have grown into a mature woman.


But one was missing. And I missed him dearly.


Then they told me he died. From their faces, I could tell it was a truth. My brother was really gone.


Slowly I kneeled and I cried.


I cried very hard. And it was very hard to control.


My sister sat beside me later that night. She said three years ago, I was supposed to die. I didn't wake up for a year and my dead brother made a selfless deal so that he could trade places with me. Ever since then he was slowly dying, but he never showed it to anyone.


The worst part was that I never realised any of this ever happened. I didn't even know I was out cold for a year. With this newfound knowledge, again I cried. My sister hugged me differently this time. It was as if she was trying to embrace my broken heart to prevent it from chipping away. I think I felt her tears on my shoulder.


Days later, I found myself staring out the window into the dark midnight sky. There were strands of stars dangling in the moonless dark blue canvas. It was indeed a beautiful sight but I failed to appreciate it. I might be looking at the stars, but my eyes truly staring into a lifeless void.


Then he came into my room. I looked to him and felt a gush of tears wanting to stream down my cheeks again. To see him again after all the years, after all the news, after all the tears, after all the guilt, was an overwhelming experience that I could not describe in existing terms. He approached me slowly and stroked my right cheek. He never said a word, but I could understand him. His gentle eyes and bittersweet smile said it all. He wanted me to know that it is alright. "Everything is going to be alright..."


At this point too much tears had streamed that I could not feel them anymore. I had never cried so much in my entire life.

Then I woke up - eyes opened first - but I was still lying on my bed. I wasn't sure if my eyes were wet, as I was too engrossed in the emotions I felt at that moment, and it didn't matter to me. Strangely (or not?), I knew it was just a dream within seconds of waking up.


Sometimes I have incredibly vivid dreams such as this, and I could retain the memories of the emotions that I felt within the dream. They all felt exactly like the real thing; the emotions were not blunted in any way at all. As horrible as the dream I had last night was, I was glad to live in that dream. The experience of such intense emotions I have never encountered before in my real life. I was given the opportunity to go through it before a real scenario hits me. Maybe this will prepare me. But then, maybe you can never prepare.


With that said, I felt a strong longing to be at home with my mum and dad, my brothers and my only sister. I really wished I was at home where I don't feel alone.


When a person misses his family, meeting them, seeing them with his own eyes, kissing them and hugging them are not the only things that matter - it goes so much further than that. In essence, it is their mere presence around him that his heart asks for.


In other words, when you are with your family, you don't even have to say anything. It is enough to just sit quietly beside any of them and look softly at the faces. They might be puzzled at your rare gaze, but keep on looking and just give a slight smile. They might then understand.


How I wish I could sit at my usual spot at home with my mum and sister right now. With the sound of scissors and sewing machine and baby and trivial chat filling my ears. Ridiculously noisy at times but I can always escape to the kitchen.

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(credits to desertman @ deviantART)

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"We bake our own iPhone"

"We bake our own iPhone"

When countless technologies are condensed into such a small device the size of roughly a short stack of business cards, it becomes extremely difficult not to bring said device everywhere you go. If you own such device, you might say, "I bring and use this incredible device everywhere simply because it makes me a productive person," and you continue to ramble on with reading online news, typing notes and ideas, and organising schedule. Perhaps more often than not you just want to look cool and be the subject of admiration among aspiring, trendy teenagers. But whatever, the reasons don't really matter.

What matters is that you do bring the magical device literally everywhere as if it is actually surgically attached to your body. That includes bringing the device to a dark storeroom to shine your way around, and to a kitchen to look for a French recipe (stupidly ambitious, considering you don't even know what tarragon is).

One day I carried my iPhone with me for a visit to the toilet in my own house, thinking I might as well be "a productive person" and read some news while I'm at it (or maybe I just wanted to look cool, not that anybody is there with me in the toilet to admire my coolness). After I was done and all and had flushed the toilet, I was punished. My iPhone slipped and "splash!" it went straight into the toilet bowl.

My iPhone must be so proud to be honoured as such.

It took me a full two seconds before I decide to fish it out from the (thankfully flushed) bowl. After patting it relatively dry with some tissue, my medical knowledge told me to sterilise it in some makeshift way that I can try in my house. I sanitised it with a liquid disinfectant (read: Dettol) and dried it again. My iPhone screen was dark and blank, as if the brief swim had taken its poor soul out of it - you could pretty much call it a diePhone now. To be honest, I'd probably be left soulless myself if I had that kind of a swim.

The whole process seemed to turn my iPhone off unintentionally. I didn't dare to turn it on immediately in fear of short-circuiting my iPhone in case the water had already went deep into the electronic circuitry. Operating under the assumption that the worst case scenario has happened, I thought of ways to dry it.

I placed it in front of my room heater switched on and left it there overnight. Then I used my hair-dryer a bit (I can't believe I just said that). There was still some water underneath the touchscreen, but I was somewhat confident that most of the moisture had evaporated from the circuitry, so I tried turning the iPhone on.

(A partially chomped off apple appeared on the screen)

My iPhone survived the horrible ordeal, but the water underneath the screen was a massive annoyance to me as I didn't need a less-than-sensitive touchscreen and I certainly didn't need an abstract artform to permanently shadow the screen. I needed a way to drain those moisture out.

After doing a bit of research in numerous forums (turned out I wasn't alone after all - I'm so happy), I found out some really rad and crazy methods of drying an iPhone (or any other electronic devices for that matter). I switched my iPhone off, took out my baking Pyrex, filled it with uncooked rice, and buried my iPhone in the middle of the rice. Supposedly, rice is just inherently thirsty, even going as far as sucking toilet water to quench that thirst. To speed up the drying process, I needed to raise the temperature. Since a microwave would just fry any electronic device and render it useless, I opted for conventional oven, as professionally recommended by some random people in forums. Setting the oven up on low temperature (about 100-120 degrees C; you don't want to melt your iPhone as I suspect it won't be very nice), I literally baked my iPhone for 9 hours.

(ding!)

I just LOVE the sound ovens make. This time around, however, it sounded even more pleasant than usual. I took the Pyrex out of the oven and digged for my iPhone. I turned it on to find that it worked perfectly fine and the touchscreen was devoid of water! It seemed that life has once again returned to the soulless device. Who knew a baked iPhone can make a man happier than a baked lasagne?

I know any normal person would now be traumatised enough to not bring such a device when visiting the toilet next time. Once is quite enough.

But since I'm not normal, I still keep bringing my iPhone to the toilet. What? I like to be "productive". Go away. (flushing toilet sound)

P.S. What do you think happened to the rice?

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Relocated

Relocated

This is my third blog. You might think that I don't have better things to do than open multiple blogs just for the fun of it and waste megabytes of spaces in the blog servers. That's if you don't know the real history.

Let's have some history lesson, shall we?

My first blog, the "Fwendster" blog (name of the blog publisher has been changed scantily to save it from public humiliation), was - let's be honest - absurdly unreliable, 'spam'mable, and utter nonsense. Apparently the publisher thought it would be super cool to augment a networking service with blog publishing. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, I can tell you. But to provide a poorly implemented blog publishing that would send some users to madness -  that's just wrong. Call me picky, but I honestly think that "Fwendster" would have even happier users if they never even conceive the blog publishing service. There would be less people literally dying of frustration.

"Fwendster" blog - one of the biggest mistakes of mankind.

And what gives it the right to-- (stops midway of a sentence after realising that I'm starting to sound like a girl)

Well, at least my jabbering reflects my disappointment with "Fwendster". Come to think of it, I haven't logged into my "Fwendster" user account for over a year.

Meh~ I guess this kind of stuff really isn't my thing. I have better things to do like playing PC/PSP/PS3 games, watching American TV series (i.e. House, Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, Prison Break, The Big Bang Theory), surfing YouTube, and reading medical books.

Anyway, before I begin to return to my habit of steering off the main topic, let us finish the history lesson, shall we?

The second blog of mine, courtesy of Blogger, was considerably cozy in comparison. I totally ditched the old one and was happy to start a new home. Months later came the unexplainable accessibility issue. Note the emphasis.

(Now what are you looking at? Of course I was talking about my laptop. What ELSE could I be referring to?)

Two thumbs and two big toes up for Blogger!

Strangely enough, I couldn't seem to log in to my Blogger account from my laptop, but I didn't have this problem when I use other computers. That means almost no entries at all and this went on for 3-4 months. I've wasted hours trying to figure out what went wrong. At last, I forced myself to acknowledge that the problem was simply unexplainable.

Then one day my laptop magically allowed me access to my account. That drove me even crazier to think that it is as if my laptop is playing some kind of stupid prank on me. I sincerely believe that the purpose of my laptop's existance is purely to annoy me. No, seriously, you haven't got to know this little guy yet. And don't even get me started on his other problems.

Months after I got access to my account back, I neglected my blog, but not before posting several entries first. I was continuously swept away by life's turmoil, one after another. So I dropped the whole blog thing even though I enjoy writing so much. And let's face it: who has the time anyway to type stuff on the computer when you're struggling to prevent yourself from being swept away even further?

Okay, maybe I'm a little lazy as well... (a little?)

So earlier this week I decided to start writing again now that the storm has cooled down significantly. Tried to log in to my Blogger account but there's simply no way I can do that when I've forgotten both the username and password. So that's how I got my third blog.

I kinda miss my old blog though. If you want to have a look (well, if you're feeling a bit sentimental, or you could just be curious), I've placed the link below and also in the column to the right.

"Take me to the 'Ye Ol' Shepherd's Blog' now!"

Well, I hope you will come to like this new blog (although you will also come to learn that it has the same look as the old one, albeit a bit neater). Peace to all of you!

- End to Lesson -

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