come see, come see!

pictures of my flat, including newly-installed lemonade sauce, here.

would write more, but got to rush off to work now.

happy weekend, everyone!

conversing with Mum

me : i fixed the laminate floor in my kitchen yesterday.
mum : what?
me : laminate flooring. the previous tenants left packs of it behind and i fixed it in yesterday.
mum : oh that's nice. what did you eat it with?
me : what?!
mum : the lemonade sauce. what did you eat it with?

i present to you, myself. in 30 years.

on another note... Becky if you're reading this, i just finished reading your book today (i guess you can guess how much work i've gotten done!). makes me want to fly to Japan and be a glam geisha girl. or fly to New York and be a glam geisha lady at the Waldorf. and man do i have high hopes for this movie!

can we fix it? well, sort of...

guess what i did today. fixed laminate flooring in my kitchen, that's what! the previous tenants left behind a few packs of laminate flooring that they never got around to fixing, and i thought, well since it's free i might as well fit them in myself. so i went over to Rapid, bought a little saw, a hammer and some wood glue, and in my kitchen all that stuff sat for about a month until this afternoon, on a whim, i thought i'd get off my lazy ass and get DIY-ing. worked for 6 hours (!!) straight (!!) and fixed about a third of the flooring in. hey, give me a break - first DIY job i've ever done, ay! it doesn't look too bad... the uneven edges have been nicely placed to parts of the kitchen where other things will be covering it up, like a table, or a rug. i think there may be quite a few rugs in my kitchen soon...

anyway, here's where my story gets kind of funny.

i finished fitting in a whole pack of laminates, and when i went to the store room to get the next pack out, i realised that they were in another colour! so now a third of my kitchen floor has orange-ish brown laminates, and the rest will be brown-ish brown laminates.

and i was feeling so proud of what i'd accomplished this afternoon.

anyway, here's where my story gets kind of painful.

no, actually, really painful. because of the sawing / hammering involved in this the first DIY job i have ever done in my entire life, my arms, shoulders, fingers, are hurting like a sonofabitch.

so the first person who enters my kitchen and dares to comment on the not-sameness of the floor colour is going to get majorly ass-kicked.

"a stylish illegal immigrant"

that's what Ben called me in his last e-mail, when i told him that i was tempted to screw my visa extension application to hell and spend the money on a new pair of boots or a bag. £250, people. that's how cruel the Home Office is. and with Christmas coming up too!

the longest e-mail he has ever sent also included some recipes, crazy hobos, pseudo porn, and a dollop of "what if's" and "remember when's". which got me kind of thinking about "what if's" and "remember when's" too.

you see, it's been a kind of miserable week for me here at Freezingmytitsoff Central. it all started with a sick Monday, Day 3 of my flu. i say flu, but it's actually just Flu : Stage 1. you know, the dry cough, sorethroat, perpetual tiredness stage... the one that comes before the running nose, sneezy, can't sleep because of my stuffed nose, wish-i-was-dead stage. i'm sitting here, on Day 7 of Flu : Stage 1, wishing that it would just progress and get worse already so i can blow my brains out of my nose and get it over with.

Tuesday was the start of my back-ache. the past 4 days i've been moving around like a heavily pregnant lady (no offence, pregnant ladies) - keeping my back straight, squatting instead of bending. it has not been fun at Camp Iciclesareformingonmyceiling.

oh, and it's getting colder too. summer is most definitely OVER.

so. can i blame me for getting all sentimental and wistful?

because if things worked out differently, if i had learned to for once in my life swallow my damn pride, maybe i'd have someone to tuck me into bed with a back massage, a hot watter bottle and a bowl of his comfort food (chicken with oyster sauce). i would then say "Don't fuck about." and he would go back to the kitchen to fix me my comfort food - waffles with ice cream, maple syrup and strawberries. and a big steaming mug of strong black coffee.

but things didn't work out differently. and who am i to deny me my pride? so i wrote an even longer e-mail back - an 18-paragraph ramble about shopping, Paris, new cars, non-stick pans, cranberry juice and snuff films (among others).

because no one does avoidance better than me.

which also explains why i will die alone, my body lying undiscovered until the smell becomes unbearable, and even when i am found, it's with half a face because my cat got hungry.

oh to have a paper bag with which to cover my face up

so i'm sitting here, in the computer lab of the university library, nicely typing away a really long e-mail to a bunch of my friends Down Under, whilst, with my multi-tasking abilities, catching up on my blog-reading, and also checking out the goings-on around the world, when i overhear a conversation from across the aisle:

guy : ...so why don't you come join us, we'll go out, have some drinks, some alcoholic beverages, would that be okay for you?
girl : yeah, can do.

so the busy-body in me is curious, mostly because of the way the guy says alcoholic beverages - like it's sinful - and why would he have to say it like that unless the girl he's trying to convince to come out on what kind of sounds like a cool night out, is a prude? also, the girl spoke in accented English, in an accent that sounded very familiar, with a voice that sounded very familiar. so i turned over to look, and turns out it's my friend (we'll call her Emily, to protect my safety, should she ever Google her name and find this post, and then decide to hunt me down and murder me in my sleep). so i see Emily, sitting in the middle of the row just across the aisle from me. this fills me with dread and fear and quakes in my panties (and not in a good way) because i just know that if she realises that i am in the same room as she, she will come right over and ask me to go for this thing at church this evening, which i am so not keen in going for. at this point you may ask, "What's so wrong with saying 'no'?" to which i would respond "Nothing." because hey i should have the right to not attend something that i don't want to attend but well, she (the prude) would then ask me "Why not?" and i would then have to make something up like "Oh, because i have something on. I'm busy. Haha" because i'm too chicken-shit to say "I'm just not interested." because i know that that would be followed by whisperings and discussions behind my back about 'how i am', or whether or not i need 'encouragement' and 'support', which totally pisses me off because why won't they just leave. me. alone. or at least have the balls to ask me to my face if i need 'encouragement' and 'support', when i will then say to them "No." and ask them politely to get lost.

it's not that i have anything against God, or church, or religion. in fact, i have no problems with God. not right now, anyway. it's just this group of people who create labels and distinctions and judgement about how people should live their lives, and god forbid if you spend an entire night out drinking and fornicating, you heathen, you are most definitely destined for the fiery bowels of hell. except they never say it to my face. all i'd hear would be a gasp or two, and a "Oh, haha, you're crazy." *chuckle* or "Oh, haha, you are such an alcoholic." *chuckle* which totally pisses me off because it makes me feel like a heathen who is most definitely destined for the fiery bowels of hell. and it makes me mould myself into this person who frowns on things that i'd normally be doing, because i'd like to avoid those gasps and uneasy chuckles. and i don't like that me one bit, because it feels completely fake and hypocritical. which is a quality i totally despise.

so that is why, instead of walking over and saying "Hi, how are you doing? Haven't seen you in a long while." like what i normally would do when i see a friend that i haven't seen in a while, i am, sliding down as far as i can go, shielding my face with the computer screen, turning away from the aisle so that i'm almost entirely facing the wall, and the guy next to me thinks i'm trying to check out what site he's surfing on to, and hoping, praying, wishing to God that she wouldn't see me. and stuffing my earbuds into my ears, although my iPod isn't even on, so if she does see me, i can pretend to be immersed in my music and pretend that i didn't hear her, and act really surprised to see her.

oh, and also, typing this post just to kill time until she leaves, which is when i will leave. not before.

which is sad, cos i'd like to not have to hide from my friends, because, apart from the Bible-pushing, Emily does have some nice qualities. like... well... she's always jolly and laughing. and... yeah. well i'm sure there are other things too.

well she seems to be immersed in her work now, and speaking to some guy, who's blocking her view of me, so if i just... move really really quick, i may just be able to get away. cos i've been sitting here like this for an hour and a half, and i think my butt is now paralyzed.

an explosion, sand dunes and church camps. or, my week, in summary.

on Friday, my friend Becky came over and i tried out my brand-new chocolate fondue set. i was supposed to melt the chocolate in the microwave first - remember the microwave in my kitchen, the one i wasn't sure was a microwave and didn't dare to try out in case it exploded? well, turns out it was a microwave, and turns out it did explode. well, kind of. while melting the chocolate there were sparks in the microwave, and smoke came out, and a funny smell. and the chocolate was burnt. so we continued melting the (burnt) chocolate in the fondue pot and continued dipping our strawberries into the (burnt) semi-melted chocolate.

on Saturday, i tried warming up my roast chicken and gravy in the oven. i'd never used the oven before, and wasn't sure how it worked. so i just popped the chicken in, and (i thought) turned the oven on. i smelled gas coming out. i heard gas coming out. so i assumed everything was working fine and left. 15 minutes later i went back to the kitchen, and found the whole place smelling of gas. i opened the oven door and discovered that the oven wasn't even hot. my chicken was still cold. and smelling of gas. so cold, gas-smelling chicken i had for lunch (beggars, we can't be choosers, aye?). and it took me the entire day to air the apartment out so the gas smell could disappear. later that evening Becky came over again, and took a look at the oven, and pointed out that i was supposed to use my lighter, and light some metal thing at the back of the oven, where the gas comes out from. so it works kind of like a hob. that is one old-fashioned oven, you guys. right out of the Flintstones.

on Sunday, i met up with a guy who's a friend of a friend of my mum's. my mum, she who match-makes from 4000 miles away, passed me his number, and gave strict orders to call him up. because he also studied architecture, and has been studying / working / living here for the past dozen years or so, and may be able to give me some insider job-hunting tips. turns out he's left architecture, having worked at a firm for a while and finding the profession "frustrating and a complete waste of time". way to spend 6 years at university and finding that out, mister. anyway we hung out for a bit and found out that we've been going to the same church for the past year and never bumped into each other. small world, this is. so we went to church together that evening (my first time in months!), and had tea and muffins after.

on Monday, i had therapy in the morning and found out more stuff about me that i didn't know about.

on Tuesday, i had a meeting with my tutors about my project. i didn't have time to prepare much, cos i wasn't around last week, and just could not get out of ben the entire day on Monday so i just printed some site photos, and crapped a lot. and it seems, my crap still gets me places, cos it went okay.

Tuesday night, i had the wierdest dream that i've had in a long time. i dreamt of my friend Marc. he was in the jungles in Borneo (where both him and i hail from), with an old, emaciated man with stringy grey hair who happened to be some kind of village elder. they climbed over stones covered with thick moss, and the old man pointed out an old railway track to him, "Remnants of our colonised past," he said. there was an old, abandoned railcar, and, underneath it, were a pile of corpse-looking bodies with pale, creamy-blue skin.
"Druggies," the old man said, pointing at them.
they watched, as a small girl with chubby pink cheeks and curly black hair crawled among the bodies. and then a baby, less than a year old, emerged too. the old man started getting excited, and angry.
"How can they allow their children to be exposed to this?" he exclaimed. he rushed forward, grabbed the baby, and started running back through the forest, Marc right behind him.
(seriously, you guys. i'm not making this up.)
so they ran over moss-covered stones, and they slid down sand-dunes. cos, you know, there are (apparently) sand-dunes in the rain-forest. two of the druggies from underneath the railcar were chasing after them, cos they realised what the old man and Marc had done. they had on bike-racer suits, one red, the other yellow, and got on their racing bikes, and were hot on Marc's and the old man's trails.
so then Marc and the old man (who, by the way, was dressed only in a soiled-looking loincloth) reached what appeared to be a city, and got in a Humvee. they sped along the streets, the two bikes still behind them. then they reached an army camp. got through the heavily-guarded gates with the baby, where the druggies were unable to follow.
they took the baby to some kind of hospital-looking place, with bed lining the walls. seemed to be some kind of drug-rehab place for kids. the people who worked there were my ex-studio mates, except this time they were doctors. and dressed in army cammies.

on Wednesday, i ran around trying to get together documents for my visa extension application. went to the bank to print out my account statements, then went to the Senate House to get my status letter, where i found that, although the library has a record of me having extended my studies til June next year, the rest of the university only has records of me being a student til the end of September this year! after all that, i met up with an old ex-studio mate of mine, who's in town for 2 days (2 days!!) and took time off his "busy schedule" to see me. it was really cool to see him again, and talk about goings-on back home. we went to see a movie in FACT, becuase i met him in the afternoon and i don't know how to spend time without involving a cup of coffee or food (he's a Muslim, and fasting), except a movie.

Wednesday night, i had another dream. this time, with less detail, cos i can't remember it as much. all i can remember is being on some kind of tour bus, with my sister and her friends, on our way to a series of church camps. i made out with a liquorice man in the back of the bus, and we had to stay at some kind of motel with cold, damp sheets. then, i lost my bags, and to get to them i had to go to the other side of the motel. the motel was in some kind of camp grounds, where to get to the other side, i had to cross a river. there was a drawbridge, that could only be released from the other side. and to get the people on the other side to let down the bridge, i had to answer a series of questions. then i got yelled at when i got to where my luggage was, for leaving my bags in the bus and expecting other people to get them for me, "like i was some sort of princess".

which brings us to today, where i have, so far, been to the bank, found out that they can't stamp and endorse my statements and i have to instead order them and wait another 4 working days for them to get sent to me. seen Mary at the department office, and very nearly gave her the wrong information that would have meant that i would have to pay for this extra semester when it's actually just a submission that i'm extending, and not attendance-based (*phew* that was close!). on the way to the library, i bumped into a Mormon named Elder David, and when he asked me if i knew who Joseph Smith was i replied "yeah, i watched an episode of South Park all about him." and now, telling you all about it, as a sort of "hey guys, sorry i haven't been writing as frequently but here, to make up for it, is a long-assed post, with wierd dreams included!"

did you notice i was gone?

whether you did or not, i'm back! does slightly more than a week count as an absence? i don't know. i guess it does. before anything, hop over to Kaki Cucuk Langit's and check this out. it's too cute for words! trust me.

so i was away for a week-ish. my aunt came over from Singapore last week for a conference, and since she was in the neighbourhood she decided to pop by Liverpool and pay me a visit. and then she begged (begged!!) me to follow her on her trip around the UK so i could play tour-guide. she'd made plans to go to Yorkshire, and then to London, where my grand-aunt lives (a large extended family, i have). nevermind that i'd never even been to Yorkshire in my entire life, nor heard of the tiny little village she was supposed to go to, her rationale was that at least she'd have company to get lost with. so off i went, with my missionary aunt on her mission trips. oh did i mention that my aunt's a missionary? she left a cushy job which paid cushy sums of money to work for God for not so much money. something that i think i would never be able to do. cos i just love cushiness too much. so we went, with no trouble at all (cos i'm such a great tour-guide, or really good at faking confidence) to Yorkshire, where we spent a weekend with my aunt's missionary friends. they took us to a little village church, with a congregation of about 30, 95% of whom were elderly ladies. it was a nice atmosphere - the church, being as small as it was, treated one another like family. very intimate-like. the old ladies were very nice and friendly, and all looked like they could whip up a lovely hot batch of butterscotch cookies, but man i was glad to be back in civilisation after. we went to London next, where i at least knew how to get around, and didn't have to fake it so much. the weather was good, except for the last day, when it was really foggy. but then that's true blue London weather so at least she got to experience it, no?

all in all i enjoyed my impromptu break, but i have to admit, the second day into it i couldn't wait for my aunt to leave already! she's cool, but she nags like an aunt. so. i'm glad to be back in my "space". and shop as much as i want. and leave my clothes where i want. and not make my bed. although i do. and eat lots of sweets. and take cabs. and spend money sans guilt.

so what have i missed?