Yesterday I woke up pretty I went to play an acoustic set at a flea market at Crawlspace, which is a little tiny gig venue behind Straits Records at Arab Street/Haji Lane. (For those of you who don't know, I play in indie/pop-rock band Armchair Critic.) Our drummer Boon was stuck in camp and we hadn't rehearsed in months anyway, so me and my guitarist RG went down to improvise a few acoustic songs. When we reached the venue, we found that it was a small, cramped venue with heavy screamo and hardcore bands playing. It was all too familiar for us, and it felt like old times.
It's pretty cool that our name is still recognizable on posters. We're no Electrico or Great Spy Experiment, but it's still pretty pleasant. :)
I then went to meet my girlfriend, who had broken her sandal and was understandably in a bit of a bad mood. The weather was ridiculously, mind-meltingly hot, which got me in a rather irritable mood as well. Still, it was good to see each other, and I followed her around as she went around Tampines looking for shoes. I try my best to understand how women's minds work when it comes to shoes, and while I think I might have made some progress, there are certain contradictions within their rules that my poor male mind cannot logically dissect.
We then went to meet more friends for dinner, after which the girlfriend went home and the rest of us spent hours indulging in a game of Risk. I was initially an enthusiast of Risk, but not any more. It takes up far too much time and effort, is only moderately entertaining, doesn't provide much intellectual stimulation and is ultimately far too dependent on the roll of the dice. Give me poker, chess or even chinese checkers for some intelligent fun any day. I went home late, exhausted and generally burnt out.
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Today was a completely unproductive day. In terms of studying, technically yesterday was too, but today was one of those absolutely wasted forgotten days that you just draw a big X across. Which is bad, because I'm really running out of days now. I woke up moderately early but lingered in bed until past noon, after which I attempted to touch my books but simply couldn't, and spent the day on Facebook and YouTube and what-have-you. The reason, I feel, is because of my ridiculous position- tomorrow is my Maths Paper 1, and I am completely unprepared.
Let me tell you honestly that when I tell you that I am unprepared, I am honest. I do not know how integration works, I never even bothered to learn them in secondary school and preferred to spend maths lessons napping. (I got an A1 for E-Maths and a C5 for A-Maths, for those of you who are curious). I don't know how vectors work; I vaguely remember a simplified version of them in secondary school but that's it. I am going to be spending 3 hours in an examination hall full of students, and I am going to be twiddling my thumbs, doodling, napping and doing some serious soul-searching if I can get into the vibe. I am seriously that unprepared for maths, and it the ridiculousness of it all hits me so strongly that I can't even spend today studying International History, Economics or Literature, which are my other papers. (Incidentally, I still do not even own a copy of Great Expectations, which is my Literature text.)
I'm not trying to "boast" or "show off" my miserable position. I'm really quite disgusted with myself, and I have to come to terms with the fact that the disgust is so strong that I've developed a sort of indifference to myself. This is an interesting concept that I've never actually considered before. If you hate somebody, you obviously still give a damn about them for some reason such that you bother to take the trouble to think about them and put together a coordinated response. The worst thing you can do to someone is not to hate them, but to be completely indifferent to them, because that's when things are so bad you feel like it's not even worth your trouble anymore.
I need to prove to myself that I am worth the effort, because if I give up on myself then all is lost.
That said, life is still good. Things cannot stay down for so long! I am an optimist at heart. I realise that there are some interesting philosophical implications of my present situation, but I really don't have the time or energy to be concerned about them right at this moment. Normally I would not forgive myself for that, but right now I have more pressing concerns.
Routine, Visa. Routine, routine, routine. Get into one.
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