Anyway. UPDATE TIME!!!!

What have I been up to the last two weeks?

Like I blogged before, last Monday I went to catch 300. I spent the first half of the week taking a nice break from thinking about story ideas.

The second half of the week I wasn't feeling well.

There were some lovely moments when the whole world was spinning happily around ("But the earth always spins around..." I know. Shut up.) so I was cooped up at home for the whole weekend.

On Sunday night I found out that Monday was the deadline for the proposal.

!!!!!!!!!! I didn't even know there was a deadline.

Somehow we managed to get the deadline pushed back till Thursday morning (hahaha), but I had to get started on an excerpt of the story to include with the proposal.

I was having a big problem getting inspiration, so on Tuesday I finally left the house again to clear my head and get some air. Had lunch at Funan's KFC and wrote part of the story. Wanted to finish the whole thing but there was this exceedingly noisy bunch of secondary school students playing some stupid game nearby, so I left before I could throw my cup at them.

Finished the excerpt on Wednesday night. Thank goodness. I was getting fed up with trying to capture the atmosphere of being at NDP - since I have never attended one, sans the Pri 5 one, if that can be counted. I have, however, a lot of experience in watching fireworks, since there is the occasional display over Sentosa which I can watch from my window - and the fireworks display at the Vivo grand opening was one of the best I've seen. Still had to do some research on colours and shapes of fireworks though.

Thursday morning I woke up early once again to go out, this time to Orchard to check many things out, starting from Borders, to Zara, to Topshop, to F21, to Kino (more about that later), to Paragon, to Heeren (I was hoping QC still had the purple Barney "Too Cool to be Blue" shirt in stock, but no luck :P - oh, and I didn't know they sold Tsubi jeans there!! Of course, the jeans also happen to cost $389, so the knowledge is not exactly of much use to me)...............and back again to Marina Square, where I got a shirt for my mother (on discount - and turns out it's too small for her, which doesn't make any sense because it's her size AND the tag says "STRETCH"). On my way to the bus stop I passed through Esprit, which had a nice pair of grey shorts on sale. Was tempted but went home without buying anything for myself. :P

(Oh, and btw, in one of my earlier posts I said I had to lie low - in fact, I can't even remember the last time I bought a shirt...so yeah, have enough to splurge now!)

On Friday my mother woke me up early (which was annoying because I hadn't had enough sleep in days). We were supposed to go to Great World City for lunch, but she was having problems with washing the pillowcases in the washing machine, so I went to Vivo first. We finally met at Great World City at nearly 2 p.m. even though I had left Vivo at 1 p.m. and it usually takes less than 20 min to get there. I had the misfortune to miss both buses and have the next ones taking their time to arrive. :P

Lunch was at Crystal Jade. After that we got stuck at Zara for some time because I found formal black pants at $34.95. In the end I bought a pair but my mother didn't. (On hindsight they crease waaaaaaaaaaaay too easily so maybe I'll exchange it for a pair of jeans).

Then we took the shuttle to City Hall, where I finally got my shorts from Esprit (figures that I have to splurge the first time in weeks that I buy clothes!).

Next it was tea (dessert, not the drink) at TCC where I couldn't shut up throughout our conversation. I really should learn to shut up about things I've been planning for a long time. It takes the surprise out of everything when I finally announce my evil plans.

ANYWAY. After that we walked around Marina (starting to get tired of that place) and Suntec, before having roti prata for dinner at the convention centre.

Then it was back home again, where I remembered that I had bought the National Treasure DVD on Tuesday and left it in my drawer.

Spent the whole night watching it and later browsing the DVD features. There's deleted scenes, the original opening animatic (a bit too complicated to explain here) an alternate ending (which I like better than the actual ending), and short featurettes on real-life treasure hunters, the Knights Templar, and filming the movie on location. After each featurette a number appears on the screen. You next have to rearrange and enter the 4 numbers, then you get more featurettes and two different 3 code numbers. One of the new featurettes is "Riley Poole's Decode This", which is an animation about codes and ciphers through history, after which you have to play this game and get 4 more code numbers.

After describing all these, I realise I can't remember what happens next, but finally you enter the master code and unlock the special Trivia Viewing Mode, where instead of subtitles during the movie, you have bits of trivia. Couldn't be bothered to rewatch the movie though. :P But the DVD was fun to play with.

I wanted to sleep after that, but I decided to give my timetable a quick check - and it was up.

Don't know what to say about it though. I end mostly late but that's because the classes all start late. As I've said before, I'd rather start early and end early. Blah. Plus I have no idea when's spec dip, because Monday ends at 5 p.m. and isn't spec dip supposed to be at 4 p.m.???

Oh and I have five more hours of classes not on the timetable yet. I hope Friday stays clear. Currently there's only one lecture from 3 - 4 p.m. for the whole day. I expect that if our elective isn't held on that day, then the attendance on Fridays will be..............erm.

Anyway, speaking of school, one thing I noticed about my spec dip exam results was that the credit unit (for the uninitiated, that's basically how many hours you spend on the module per week) for Scriptwriting for Film & TV was "0".

I was like, "#$%^&!!!! I did NOT NOT NOT spend zero hours on scriptwriting!!!!!!!!!!!"

But I figured that it was some stupid printing error and I should just forget about it.

Then on Thursday morning I got a call from school about a mistake in my exam results. (WAH! Giving me more A's izzit????) My spec dip results, that is. (Sigh) So it was the credit unit thingy after all. The person said the new slip had been sent out and I was required to either go to the examinations office and return the old one when school starts, or to just send it back.

Firstly the office is at the other end of the school so I am in no mood to walk there. And secondly why on earth do I have to pay for postage when it was their mistake? Bleargh. Oh and thirdly: why do I even need to return the old slip? It's not like they accidentally gave me higher grades and I can use it to fake my grades for any future application. In fact I would be just plain stupid to use the old slip.

ANYWAY. So when I woke up from my nap for dinner today, there were two letters waiting for me.

One, as expected, was the new result slip. As it turns out, the error had affected my cumulative grade! My cumulative was supposed to be 0.125 points higher than on the old slip. Wow. Why oh why wasn't it the actual diploma course instead?????? Hmmmmmmmmmph.

Now, about the second letter. It was from..............

................the POLICE!!!

"Dear Jessica, we wish to inform you that you are a threat to society."

Sadly, nothing so exciting.

But the letter was an invitation to join the police force! Wow!!!! I feel so...wanted. Hahahaha.

In the letter there was this continuous mention of me becoming a diploma graduate soon.

I WISH. But in case no one told the police, I haven't even started my final year. :P

Then there was some other stuff like diploma graduates get direct entry to the rank of Sergeant, and a booklet was included listing all the perks police officers get, what different work they specialise in, height/weight requirements, etc.

So interesting. However I don't like the sound of the training programme. Physical training? No thanks.

P.S. Realise I was supposed to blog about what I was doing in Kino. Next post maybe. It's nearly 5 a.m.

Jessica wrote home at 3:17 am

I've wanted to watch 300 since I first found out about it on Yahoo! Movies months ago, and it was partly why I had to finish Persian Fire ASAP. Although now that I come to think of it, the latter wasn't such a great idea. After a few rounds of I thought there were only 3 ambassadors...didn't he say that during dinner and not breakfast...didn't they cut off his head...I decided to just concentrate on my movie. And nachos.

Too much nachos by the way. I was feeling a bit indulgent. And btw, it was not funny carrying the box of nachos into the hall. I had to sit down outside and (very slowly) get out my ticket and EZ-link. Amazingly I didn't get any cheese on my shirt.

Anyway I originally wanted to catch the 9.30 p.m. on Monday (after realising, "Hey! I live 3 min from a cinema!") but my plans were spectacularly screwed up yesterday, so too bad. Besides YQ and I were supposed to go to Queensway today but that plan fell through too so I was free this afternoon. :P

Oh yeah and I thought the movie was M18 purely for battle violence. Hmm. Not very violent actually. Well okay there were two dramatic decapitations. But nothing else. And the film had all my favourite (real) quotes!

Half an hour before the movie ended someone from home called. I was like, "I already told my mother I was going to catch a movie!!!" so I thought maybe I didn't switch off the fan before I left or something.

So the movie ends, I wash my hands, stroll into Zara and return the call.

Mother: Your exam results arrived!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Somehow something prevented me from shouting, "CHEAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

After which my mother asked (enthusiastically) if she could open it, and remarked at the same time that I must've done very badly and therefore not told her that my results were out a week ago.

Seems she hasn't noticed that I never tell her when my results are out. :P

Anyway I was pretty annoyed with the school actually because I thought the letters were supposed to be sent out today and therefore not arrive till at least tomorrow. Spoilt my plans to leave the letters rotting on my desk. :P

That's all for now. Oh yeah and I finally finished Marie Antoinette: The Journey. Now reading The Courts of Love: The Story of Eleanor of Aquitaine. Just as thick.

Time to go off and do my stuff.

Jessica wrote home at 12:56 am

I actually accomplished a few things yesterday. Read Marie Antoinette: The Journey to Part V (the penultimate part) AND finished the second Sims Life Story (such a very tragic ending - thank goodness there are cheat codes).

The Singapore story, on the other hand, not much progress. Okay, none at all. Must go think some more.

Anyway I should be asleep. But since I am such a nice person, and YQ requested me to update, so I will! :P

Nothing has happened so far this week. Was supposed to go to school on Monday, but the meeting was postponed to Tuesday. So I woke up early yesterday and it was cancelled too. Not that I really minded (let's be honest), because I had a nice long nap after that (a bit too long though).

BUT I remember promising to tell you about my new friend in my last post.

So...........this is my new friend:

...An unazukin!

What the cute little thing does is answer your questions. You ask it something, and it either nods/nods twice or shakes its head/shakes its head twice.

It currently resides on my bed's headboard, but I like to take it out sometimes when I'm bored and want to talk to something that is responsive but doesn't actually talk back. :P

SO VERY CUTE. And it is so very accurate too - it agreed that Sam should shut up. :)

Jessica wrote home at 5:46 am

Secondly: People say I should voice out my opinions more often. Well they are WRONG. Because trust me, nobody wants to hear my opinion about being called back to school for an Attitude meeting in the middle of my holidays!

Thirdly: About said Attitude meeting. We're apparently rushing the next issue in time for the new school year (because it's sort of an "orientation" thingy for the newbies) so my two-page article is due...today. I'm supposed to be writing for the section called the "Stress Zone". Oh yes. I know all about that.

Fourthly: Technically I can submit the article on Sunday, BUT something possessed me to add to my workload with some proposal for a project grant. Meeting on Monday so I have to think of story ideas. Considering the fact that I've lost all faith in my writing ability (or lack thereof), this is going to be...interesting.

And here I thought I wouldn't have to set foot into SP again until the first week of April (for peer mentor training).

Oh, and what about the spec dip final project?

THIS IS NUTS.

To think that three days ago, my only agenda for the weekend was to finish Marie Antoinette: The Journey! And now I have to push back that date by at least half a week (I'm only slightly more than halfway through).

Although fine, I admit: I was playing The Sims Life Stories too much. I haven't even started the second story. Still wreaking havoc in the first neighbourhood. My experiments with alien genetics is not going too well. Basically all my Sims are getting uglier by the generation. Everyone seems to have HUGE nostrils, and I have no idea where they inherited that from! So I took a break for a while and experimented with killing a family of Sims. :P

I would like to go on and on and on about random stuff, but I have procrastinated enough unfortunately. In my next post I shall tell you all about my new friend! :)

Jessica wrote home at 1:10 am