Subscribe to RSSTime for Lime Part Deux
I’d been down for a while now, for various reasons.
My family is moving into my brother’s place. It’ll be nice to have everybody in one location again, but as nice and roomy as their apartment is the loss of space and privacy is something I’ll feel. Especially since I’m still unemployed. Which is another sore point. I didn’t get a job I’d thought I’d get (having gone through several levels of applications), although I’m not so much upset with that as I am with the fact that I actually still have to keep looking for full-time employment. Separately all these things probably wouldn’t have been that bad, but together they just compound to make things seem far worse than they really are.
But as it turns out, all I needed was to get out of the house and spend some time with my friends. I think being cooped up in the house with only my PC and a copy of the classifieds for company and surrounded by all these boxes is just a downer in itself, and doesn’t help matters at all. So last Saturday I was at the Lime Flea Market for the second time with the help of the lovely and talented Winda. For the sake of money and space, I had to let go of some clothes, CDs and comics.
The Roots - Rising Down
75 Bars (Black’s Reconstruction)
Get Busy
The Roots get incredibly gully with it. The new album drops 29th April. I hope everybody who’s going to the show enjoys himself/ herself. They’re incredible live.
And on an entirely different note, Birthday Girl. By the Roots. And Patrick Stump. Seriously.
Blue Boy - Remember Me
I’ll always get flack for owning a copy of Avex Trax’s Power Dance 7 but back in the days before MP3s you needed some way to get hold of songs you liked, and I really liked this one back in the day. I suppose there were the singles, but even back then they weren’t always easy to come by. I’m sure some of you will remember it. It’s a pretty cool video too, although the effects have dated a bit since they were used in the Matrix. The sample used is Marlena Shaw’s Woman of the Ghetto (a pretty trippy track in itself), and apparently she’s been sampled a little bit.
So, thumbs up for Blue Boy’s Remember Me.
Peace.
those who cannot
I’m still without gainful long term employment at the moment (barring a spot of freelance writing and insya-Allah a glimmer of hope for what seems like a great prospect for the future) so at the behest of my mother I found myself at Orchard Hotel for the Ministry of Education’s Teaching Seminar a few weeks back.
I’ve always had my apprehensions about teaching and I’ve always told people that while I felt comfortable with the academic aspect of it (I didn’t mind the idea of doing lesson plans and what not) I never felt quite right with the idea of having to discipline kids. I gave it more thought before and after the seminar and it struck me as to why I felt like this. I know teaching wouldn’t necessarily be a Dangerous Minds type of situation (although apparently that’s not far from the truth) but the main mental obstacle I faced was that I never really had a teacher whom I genuinely respected and whom I could say really changed my life for the better beyond textbooks and exams. To break it down, I had some teachers in primary school whom I liked because they were nice people, and I liked a number of my teachers in junior college because I was studying subjects which I enjoyed (although I wouldn’t wish the A Levels on anybody; they’re the toughest exams you can take as a student in Singapore and you only have two years to prepare for them) and they on the whole treated students with more respect, given our age and (supposed) maturity.
When it comes down to secondary school though, the pickings become much scarcer. Maybe it was because I never got into the kind of trouble that would get me labelled as wayward youth in need of a reality check. I considered that it was simply a case of my not being able to appreciate the character building wisdom I was being given as a teenager, but that wasn’t it at all. I don’t feel like I ever had the sort of positive role model in secondary school who would inspire me to follow in his or her footsteps. And that’s why it feels like it would be disingenuous of me to teach. I’m terrible at influencing other people and to have over a hundred colleagues none of whom respect you is a scary prospect for me. Both of my maternal grandparents were teachers, but they were more career teachers than anything else and I don’t think they inculcated in their children a desire to become teachers.
I’m not saying never but I guess at this point in my life I don’t see myself teaching in the near future. Maybe one day things will change for me… or maybe they won’t.
As for the above-mentioned ‘glimmer of hope’, do pray or send good wishes and positive vibrations my way. I’d really like to see it work out.
Peace.
Nokia 6120 Classic
I’ll admit a degree of loyalty to my old phone, the Nokia 6230i. It had lasted almost three years without any hiccups, and to frivolously change it seemed wasteful to me considering how good a phone it had been. However I left it behind in a cab (I’ll explain why I was in the cab in the first place soon enough) last week, losing not only one of my favourite gadgets but pretty much all my contacts in the process.
So the time has come once again for the changing of the phones. I’m currently using a Nokia 7360 (one of the phones my family got but never used and is pretty much a ’standby’ phone) which looks good, but really isn’t that great of a phone in any department. My mum is using the Nokia E51 (don’t ask why she’s using a business model phone) which very honestly is an incredible phone, a smartphone in a really nice slim fashion phone design. Finally deciding to make the upgrade, I think I’m settled on the Nokia 6120 Classic. It runs on the Symbian 60 OS without actually being a smartphone (at the very least it’s not being marketed as one) and I think it finds a comfortable middle between all of Nokia’s different lines.
Cohen
Archimedes got his lever,
And the world moved him.
He still is, however, looking for a place to stand.
Andy Rooney - Organized
I hope it never gets this bad. From Lifehacker, one of my favourite aggregator blogs right now.
minimalist, not manimal-ist
Manimal 01
Originally uploaded by scottmw1971.
At a certain point, you have to look at everything you own and think to yourself “How did I let it get this bad?”
A Guide to creating a minimalist home
Corporate Shill
It’s weird to think so, but McCafe is probably the most value for money place to get “higher-end” coffee. It lacks the variety that other coffee joints might offer, and the muffins are a little on the dry side. Other than that, however, they make decent coffee (and great hot chocolate, complete with marshmellows) and if you go to an actualy McCafe location (not one that’s integrated with a “proper” McDonalds) you can get pretty good (albeit slightly pricey) sandwiches.
And the McCafe Iced Latte, besides being “just chew”, is the thing to get if you need perking up. I suspect it’s more the sweet sweet milk (or cream) than the caffeine that does it, but I rode the Iced Latte bus /buzz for hours.
bulimia of one’s surroundings
The new year(s) have helped instigate the great purge, or at the very least help push it along. I know I post about this every once in awhile, but this is one of the bigger efforts (I feel) in awhile to attempt to rid myself of as much garbage as possible that’s just been accumulating over the years.
Toys (click on the link for the entry over at UsDudes), magazines, clothes, books all made the cut to be tossed out. After which everything that was kept had to be rearranged. Not for the sake of feng shui, but simply because there’s an element of truth that we as human beings are affected by our surroundings and when the surroundings become cluttered and stale so do we.
One of the things I’ve realised in so doing is how much I don’t miss regular film photography. Beyond the fact that I’m a pretty crappy photographer as it is, so much about the quality of the print depended on the developing process which meant a lot of poorly developed photos which looked as though they were taken in the dark. Also, in hindsight it was horrible never knowing how a photo would turn out until days or weeks later, and also the ridiculousness of having to take photos of my house everytime I needed to finish a roll of film.
I’m very tempted to simply toss everything out (furniture-wise) and redecorate my room from scratch (I already have a rough idea of what I’d like to do), but I fear neither the logistics nor the financial aspects of it are feasible at this current moment. Perhaps the best way to approach this problem is frugality. Beyond saving money and combating conspicuous consumption, it really ensures you never hesitate to throw things out for the simple reason you never have much to throw in the first place. Also, fewer material possessions (God willing) means spending more time on the spiritual and the intellectual.
My room is still a mess, naturally, so this whole deal is a work-in-progress
And no, still no job prospects on the horizon. Yes, I have been sending out resumes by the scores but no luck so far. I can’t complain about 2007/ 1428 though. I earned my degree and I got my driver’s licence, two things that would’ve seemed unfeasible not too long ago. I’ve been able to take the time to reacquaint myself with my faith, which I’m glad about. Too often we sleepwalk through our religious beliefs (whatever they may be) without taking the time to understand what it is exactly our beliefs are and why we hold them. It’s difficult sometimes I’ll admit, but to expand my knowledge and to strengthen my iman can’t be a bad thing. If I gain nothing else from it I at least keep my prayers (the single most important thing you can and should do as a Muslim) and read the Qur’an on the regular now, and that is a blessing.
And on that note…
A little learning is a dangerous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring;
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again.
Although a tubercular, acerbic dwarf whose poetry is for the most part of only passing interest to me, Alexander Pope is immensely quotable, with so many phrases he coined so often being commonly accepted as proverbial. If it’s not from the Bible, Shakespeare or Tennyson(whom I really have not had much exposure to) it more likely than not comes from Pope. I think I’d like to pursue my academic interests once more. I don’t feel like I’m being intellectually stimulated anymore. It’s been well over a year since I’ve set foot inside a classroom (a secular one, at least) and I feel the mental lethargy setting in. I’m not sure that I’d study literature once more though, although I’d sincerely like to simply for the breadth of knowledge literature exposes one to. I think history or political science are other options I can pursue.
Peace.
Lifehacker: Getting To Done: Down With Piles!
