direcow:trustfall 1.1

This nightmare occured about 2 days ago, but I thought I’d just finish it off since I’d already written most of it down – and if I took any longer any silk-thin thread from it would have totally disappeared. Perhaps the moral of the story is really not to sleep to much, since I got this after I’d slept for 7 hours for the first time in a long, long time.

So it began as a sneaky return to our half completed future married-life house, and even though it wasn’t done and really wasn’t furnished that well either AND we didn’t have permission to enter the place we decided to have a large party there with many friends, some of whom I was not that familiar with but what the hell, yeah? Time to party and all that – and my family was invited too.

So most of the time was spent walking around the place, milling with people, rubbing shoulders and downing drinks when I walked into our huge walk-in toilet (cum place to chill and have drinks). At that point I realised the bathroom was kinda badly done, with one ledge being somewhat uneven, but then on closer inspection they did install a stopper wall that wasn’t obvious until a different angle. I’m not very good at drawing so I can’t quite explain to you, but just imagine a wall stopping (hence stopper wall) cum deceptively helping to ensure the place works well. Also somehow everybody decided to toss their old clothes into the toilet bowl since there were no pails, and clothes tend to get dirty during a party. If you’re wondering I was having a normal party, nobody was running about nude. Maybe this party had been going on for days, since I recall that it was quite a bit of my and Viv’s clothes. I had to pee in there anyway, so I did. (Didn’t pee myself in real life!) The whole time I was rather worried since we weren’t supposed to be there, and now the laundry all over the place meant that somehow we had to clean it up before the workers returned.

After much food and drinks, the sun was setting, so I went out with Viv to party the night away.

This part is a bit of a blur, but we were trying to get to this club. Over there there was strong police presence, but as we were trying to get in I saw one policeman take out 2 guns, and shot the 2 policemen on each side of him. The policeman then went into the club behind him, presumably to finish off people in that club, at which I shouted for Viv to follow me. I ran ahead, and kept shouting so that she’d know where I was.

Then we decided to go to this rather more ulu pub, which might be safer. On the way there we took a breather at a small park bench, but when we were there I saw a group of 3 men walking purposefully. The lead was holding knives. I quickly grabbed Viv and we dived against a wall so that he couldn’t see us unless he peered over the wall. Then he started throwing knives, hitting 3 people, then he demanded, “you, you and you, I want those knives back.” One of the boys who got hit by the knives got pierced right into the roof of his mouth. I pressed both of us against the wall until we felt it was time to go, at which we crawled to safety.

I seem to recall there was one more incident, involving more violence of some sort, but at any rate we reached the pub. By then Viv was dead tired from all that running and escaping, so we decided to just go back to the hotel to hide it out.

Then, in real life I needed to pee, and so I woke up.

So I woke up twice this morning, each time with more of the same dream – same, but different. Dream blogging seems to be quite a trend these days, and I do suppose if I write it down more often I begin to remember them better. I think the first half is sketchier than the second half, but maybe that’s just both halves melding together to be lesser than a whole.

So what happens is my family, Viv and I – we’re all in China for some reason. I think it’s a trip, since we’re not running around like it’s a race – yet. So we’re walking on the great wall, seeing the sights, and this time the great wall branches out into little streets where we can experience some Chinese culture. Viv is quite excited about finding this book with her favorite author. Jack, who is all about getting into the mood, is dressed up. So we walk around, taking in the sights, something gets tossed towards my feet (I remember this because of what happens later) and after while I muster up the courage to ask Jack why he’s dressed up as Li Bai.

“You trying to get into the mood?” I ask.

His reply? “Yeah, I’m looking for the Li Bai exhibit.”

I give a little chuckle, and just then I see a rather long iguana fall off a touch-screen interactive tourist TV onto Jack’s feet. Jack jumps, and in fear the iguana snaps off… half it’s body, and both parts try to crawl away. I remember thinking “hey, that’s cool, this one is more evolved, and we’ll get 2 iguanas soon!” But in the end Jack picks up the lower half, tail, and hind legs and all, and tosses it towards my feet.

I wake up thinking – people have to got to stop tossing things at my feet!

So, tiredness sets in and I fall back to sleep. I think this is when I dream about scaling a large flight of stairs, kind of like how you do it at Angkor Wat. Snippets of the whole situation remain, mostly involving the climb up the stairs, my Aunt climbing back up (or was it down?) real fast after getting her hair washed, and suddenly we’re off – the race is on. So Viv and I make our way down the stairs, pushing past some of the other people and contestants. Halfway through Viv starts to get demoralised and listless, but I keep getting her to push on because we’re actually in first place. We get stuck at some silly small point and finally reach the final challenge, where we’re supposed to find out which of the old ladies in a room answers to a codeword, which is linked to Viv’s favorite author, get a flower from her, and dash to the final checkpoint, which is a room right next to the room of old ladies. So I dash right in, and watch in horror as team after team all work together to get the flowers and go into the final room. I quickly ask some random person what the codeword was, spot an old lady carrying a bunch of purple roses (and not hiding them very well), deliver the codeword and get ready to dash to the finish line when… Vivien isn’t there.

I scream at the top of my lungs for her to appear, getting a little worried, and she waves from outside the window, and then slowly walks back in listlessly, holding her book. “Hey! We can find the codeword in this book!” I have to rush her to come with me into the room, and after a while her listlessness finally drops as she realises that I’ve actually completed the challenge. We dash right into the room, finishing 2nd last.

Thinking back, I’ve not had the chance to ever celebrate the beginning of a new year with Vivien ever since we got attached – have we? I can’t seem to recall. Maybe my memory begins to fail me, the days blurring together. Maybe for some reason she WILL fall sick on new year’s day. But the very technology constantly blamed for making us drift apart sometimes manages to serve its proper duty – the countdown digital, but the warmth is analog.

So hey – here’s to health, here’s to joy, here’s to friendship, to family, and here’s to love.

Have a beautiful new year to one and all, and to the love of my life.

This is coming a bit late, but given the hustle and bustle of the past weeks (ever since I returned from Taiwan), I’m hoping it’s all alright anyway :) I had to drag myself to do this now anyway in my “free time”, as my left eye flinches from the pain of a sty… I definitely need that to be over soon, what with the number of events left in the queue. I’m hoping it’ll ripen tomorrow. It definitely doesn’t help that drilling (paint has fallen off the ceilings) has be ongoing for the longest time and my customs now prove that they’re worth their weight in gold. Noise isolation FTW!

Anyway, here goes nothing -

This whole post is set against the backdrop of Christmas, except the posting of this very post is happening after it, and the gift giving occured before it. Viv has been wanting some good headphones for the longest time, hoping that’ll isolate better against noise on the train compared to some ill(er)-fitting in-ears from Sennheisers (the IE8). But of course the headphones have to sound as good, if not better than the Senns, for if not that’ll pretty much defeat the purpose of getting a replacement – so its either sideways, or upwards.

There are still quite a few options out there, like the ATH-ESW9/10, for starters, even a few senns and others good brands. Suffice to say lower end audio-technicas and skullcandys are definitely shunned. SHUNNED!

So what happened was that we went to Studio Electronics at plaza singapore one day just because we were in the area and I wanted her to try some new models out to see if they suited her taste. After trying a few models we did come across one they she really loved – but the price was a little on the high side. Fast forward to December, when even though I had already got Viv as Sansa Clip+ for Christmas (she did want one, and said she’d start jogging the moment she had one) I got an email offering a really good price on the headphones, so thankful for having web access on the go, I put and order down on the way to watching Eva 2.0 (for the 2nd time, because I had missed all the fun bits with my tiredness the night before). Some waiting for vpost later we reached the very day when we pretty much agreed to do our gift opening early.

So getting into the mood of the whole eyes-closed-gimme-gimme…

And here I come with my gift – towards by very danky looking room…

And on her lap – Shure SH840. Their highest end model of their new range of headphones. Spoiled a bit of the surprise for you viewers here, but hey, er, that’s how the photos were taken.

Viv couldn’t quite figure out what it was. It was pretty heavy, and didn’t have much of a noise when you shoook it.

I’m not sure what she was doing here… Somehow she decided it was ok to… drop it? What if it was like swarovski crystal?! And other breakable objects, like expensive headphones! Which it was!

But at that point she opened her eyes to find out –

And with jaw agape –

Then the happiness sets in, with huggles!!

So it’s time to open it up…

And try it out on her little cowon D2.

And I’m guessing this is her happy face?

And I’d be remiss if I didn’t thank her for her wonderful gift this year –

A Where The Wild Things Are movie still – that will just look awesome in our new home. This isn’t a photo of it of course – best to have it taken once the house is done :)

Fog has settled on Singapore, the window barely exposing tiny buildings shrouded, stretching to be seen, and in the distance tall dark shadows threaten, loom, encroach. The rain falls, landing on those below as they run in search of respite from the unwanted blessing.

In the midst of the Christmas season, we find people helter skelter, a mad race to be involved or appear so – the reason for the season twisted into an excuse to dust off phone books and email lists that lay untouched. Hark now hear the bugle’s call that calls us all to gather.

It now appears impossible to synchronize time with those I truly care about – so now I will just wait till this blows over, till there’s a reason for us to meet again. For after all, when push comes to shove, I know we’ll all come running.

Merry Christmas one and all! Thank God for the break, for good company, for family, for friends for love, and for God.