A Christmas Story

Though Christmas technically finished a few hours ago (is that cheating? it's cheating isn't it?)

Once there was a boy named Nicholas, and perhaps by the name itself you immediately assume this is a tale about Santa Claus' childhood and sharing etc. but he was just a boy. Named Nicholas.

Nicholas wasn't particularly the nicest child, in fact he was the complete opposite; he hated anything that brought joy to children or old people or even his dog, Ben Kenobi. Often he would go out of his way to cause trouble to people by doing horrible, and unimaginable things (e.g breaking snowmen and stuffing postboxes with peanuts... the maniac).

An old woman then approached him and promised that he would have the worst Christmas of his life ever because the old woman was allergic to peanuts and she couldn't approach her postbox for days. Imagine not being able to read your post— no, I do not want you, my reader, to even suffer the traumatising state.

Christmas was fast approaching, Nicholas-- taking no regard of what the old woman said--continued to spread havoc around the town. Until, alas, it was Christmas morning.

Nicholas walked slowly down the steps... not like he believed what the old woman said, it's just... general caution. Maybe his eyes were slightly closed as he neared the tree, carefully peeking... the sight in front of him elicited a gasp from his mouth...

THE AWESOMEST PRESENT EVER POSSIBLE. It was a Nintendo 64!

But there was no cable to plug it to his screen.

He sobbed, gently hugging the cable-less console as he promised never to be bad ever again.

On the other side of the room, his dog Ben Kenobi happily chewed on the cable.

The end.

Merry Christmas.

Old School Timetable (Year 9 edition)

As I procrastinated from studying by cleaning up my room I found all of my old timetables. It's interesting that this is about 3 years old and how most of those subjects are ones that I detested with every fibre of my being but I now thoroughly enjoy. Also, music was the BEST SUBJECT EVER.

5 stages of studying for an exam

I go through several stages, I'll summarise it in 5 ( as illustrated by internet memes)

1. Optimism. (Blinded by powerful speeches made by your teachers)

"YES! BRING IT ON! I WILL REVISE THE SHIT OUT OF THIS!"

2. Planning. (Often this gives a slight sense of accomplishment)

3. Procrastination (this doesn't always include laying around, often I find myself planning unrealistic projects or randomly rearranging and moving massive furnitures and putting them all back)

4. Panic. (AHHHHHHHHHHHHH)

5. Acceptance. (The only thing to be done is study and maybe when you get that paper and open the first page you wouldn't go into a psychotic rage and rip it apart godzilla-style.)

The Stress Song

C Am Em G

I am so stressed

All of my songs start with a C

And I don't even like the sea

I know I should be revising

But I just can't

Open that fucking book

I want to set it on fire

I hope my dog will tear it, take a piss on it

or even do horrific things to it

I know I should be revising

But I just can't

Open that fucking book

I don't even have a dog

This is a shit song

This is my stress relieving song

Silly Things

I was just watching an advert (I must admit the purpose of my watching was not solely for the advert) and I was thinking about how much it would've cost them to build that set and for all the people involved in it to be paid. And what was actually the purpose of that? To display the product and give the company publicity, sure. And a way to do this is to make it interesting to the audience but I thought that wasn't really something I found personally engrossing.

Then I was surfing around the internet

and stumbled upon a gif of a tree with leaves slowly falling down, I looked at this image for about 30 seconds (is that weird? that's weird, isn't it?) and realised this caught my attention more than that expensive advert. I guess that doesn't say much about the quality of the advert but more about my personal weirdness. Why did I find leaves falling down so fascinating, though? Does this suggest I'm incredibly sadistic and enjoy a tree's loss of its parts?

I need sleep.

Ethical Dilemma.

There always seems to be a bombardment of discussions particularly in lessons about ethical/moral issues and most of them have been raised for many years where people still haven't come to an agreed conclusion where everyone is happy and no one is harmed and we all keep moral integrity and live in rainbows forever gliding in a hue of colours.

I guess a lot of them could be applied to simple problems and maybe we're often unaware that we face them everyday. I just never thought I'd have to apply it in real life.

You know when you're informed of something that is somehow indirectly significant to you? Having to pick between two things could be the hardest thing in the world.

/ramble

Numbers are universal (a slightly philosophical/ mathematical post)

A long, long time ago I was met with an argument that 'numbers are redundant'. This argument was sloppily thrown into my face and so many things entered my mind to say back to this ridiculous notion that my head felt like it was about to explode. However, it's incredibly stupid to have an argument based on pure, personal logic because, let's face it, that will most likely go on a repetitive loop which will leave both sides unable to say anything appropriate but still too stubborn to desist.

Then, I discovered Pythagoras (Greek philosopher/ Bad ass mathematician). I mean, I've always seen him as that guy who made that theorem that we all have to use and have grown to have a love/hate relationship with.

So, Pythagoras was this pre-Socratic philosopher who believed there MUST be one underlying element that could constitute EVERYTHING. And he was right (sort of). Numbers are universal and unchangable. Though I guess we can't really calculate and transcribe numerical data into our every move (it's not completely impossible... just time consuming), numbers seem to be quite important. Just a thought.

You hear that person who called numbers redundant? YEAH!

I just realised how I can never conclude any of my thoughts clearly. I suck.

Procrastination from Revision (that would make an awesome song title)

Whenever I open my textbook it feels like the pages emit a blazing spray of hot flames on my face that I have to immediately shut the book and go back to psyching myself to opening my textbook again.

It's a slow and painful cycle.

Creation (and my beliefs of how I was made)

Serious stuff.

Masks (are cool)

It saddens me when it seems like the era of masks is slowly vanishing. They've contributed to some major things in history like studies of deindividuation (although I think they used paper bags with two holes in them) and brought Romeo and Juliet together (... though the ending of that one seemed more bitter than sweet)

I don't like this.

We're all going to die someday. So what the fuck are we all doing right now? Sitting down or reading or watching television; these repetitive tasks that will soon be useless and leave no trace because when we die the whole universe doesn't just stop. It keeps going as it did when other people died and we have no clue who the hell they were because they probably spent most of their lives watching television or sitting down like we are right now.

So go out, breathe some fresh air and do something new (no criminal activities are hinted or condoned) that could possibly impact your life.

All this free time with nothing to do makes me think. Often thinking leads to depression.

Average (a colossal shadow of doom glowering down)

I hate getting average grades... I mean, I guess you look at a report and you either frown and vow to do better or smile because of its amazingness... but... what about the middle? I can't really complain because a lot of people would slap me in the face but I hate being average. Maybe I should do a half smile and vow to do better.

No Motivation (A complaint)

I dislike these different courses I seem to be travelling through, in the beginning of this school year I was incredibly motivated to do well but as the time went the motivation started to slowly slip away. I have constant work I need to do but ... I don't feel the same push anymore.

Like in an enzyme reaction, there's not much molecular collision that could do any breakdown of large molecules... yeah, I'm emitting large molecules that aren't being broken down and the large molecules are starting to suffocate me slowly...

Wait, that's not what I meant.

Unpermitted Conch Blowing (A reason for loving museums)

Suit up (A day of suit wearing)

Today was the first day of school and it's almost completely predictable to write about things or events like this , but I guess there is a reason to why a lot of people do things like that, maybe it's something funny or one of those clutch-your-chest-and-sigh-remembering-the-good-days kind of thing.

I don't want to talk about boring school things because I think a lot of people have experiences/will experience the excruciating pain that is school. I just don't like wearing suits.

To me, suits are like a double negative (yes, I'm making grammar jokes-- it's ironic) they're both redundant and people don't know why but they use them. I get that it's an idea of being formal and presentable but if we go back to cave-men times they didn't need to wear suits to do things. Although, I guess they also didn't need music and the internet... that must have sucked.

I hate suits.

Pins and Needles... except mostly needles (A short, redundant post)

You might wonder, 'Why is there a piece of marshmallow stuck on your arm?' to which I should probably correct but will never do because I like the idea of having a marshmallow stuck in someone's arm for some justifiable reason.

Best E-mail (A heart warming message).

You know when you buy something online and you get these really formal replies back?... this was not one of those... and I love this very much.

The Violinist in the Subway (An Experiment)

He emerged from the metro at the L'enfant Plaza Station and positioned himself against a wall beside a trash basket. By most measures, he was nondescript: a youngish white man in jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt and a Washington Nationals baseball cap. From a small case, he removed a violin. Placing the open case at his feet, he shrewdly threw in a few dollars and pocket change as seed money, swiveled it to face pedestrian traffic, and began to play.

Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried up to meet his schedule.

A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping continued to walk. A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work. The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.

In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the top musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written,with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars.

Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the seats average $100. This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste and priorities of people.

The outlines were: in a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour: Do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context? One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be: If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?

[source]

Challenge Accepted.

And so it begins.

The Results Day Cycle. (A visual representation)

Results Day. (event)

-A day in which teenagers across the United Kingdom join together and prepare for an abominable moment of being handed their entire life's worth of education in one envelope. Several use the term 'shitting my fucking pants' to describe their feelings.

We go through several stages of very complex emotions as we await for this event.

[20] days before Results Day.

("Nothing to worry about, I have all the time in the world chasing ponies and playing with my unicorn")

[15] days before Results Day.

("Wow, I'm starting to run out of things to do... well...")

[10] days before Results Day.

("People are counting down? What a bunch of losers... I'm completely not worried... I'm not.")

[5] days before Results Day

(What if ...)

[4] days before Results Day.

("I'm probably fine...")

[3] days before Results Day. (Today)

(HOLY SHIT WHAT IF THEY CAN'T UNDERSTAND MY HANDWRITING I WILL FAIL MY LIFE AND HAVE TO BEG FOR MONEY ON THE STREETS I'M TOO YOUNG TO DIE)

Paper Towns (A Novel By John Green)

"High school is neither a democracy nor a dictatorship - nor, contrary to popular belief, an anarchic state. High school is a divine-right monarchy. And when the queen goes on vacation, things change."

I've finished reading this months ago, so maybe my thoughts about it is a little dusty (what a horrible metaphor). Also, I have developed a little hatred towards long paragraphs, not exactly the idea of reading them but more to the fact that I hate writing them because my words get buried underneath more piles of words and it doesn't look pretty. Maybe this hatred was there long ago and maybe this is a hypocritical long paragraph. I have just sucked myself in writing this. My words are now buried, as I sit and frown in self pity but still remain unable to stop myself from typing.

So here's a review.

Things I... not hated... but wasn't necessarily eager about

- Most of the book, I felt, was just about Quentin (coolest name ever) going around in circles following superfluous clues from Margo.

- It could be because I get bored really easily, but, seriously I got really desperate for something to pace the story along.

Things I liked:

-"Part Three: The Vessel" One of the rare feelings I get when reading is getting so into the story that it's difficult to physically put it down. This was the part of the book that made it difficult for me to put it down. I loved everything about this part that it took me overnight to finish (which is considered an achievement, with the fact that it took me weeks to finish the first two parts)

The predominant reason that I liked this part the most is just that it was the best road trip ever. All of the characters showed their personalities individually rather than just a crowd that would surround the protagonist.

- The random-ness (SPOILER!) I recall them almost hitting a cow. I don't remember that ever happening on any other books I've ever read.

- John Green's writing. There's something about it that makes me happy. It's refreshing to read because he's hilarious and witty but still remains intellectual.

In conclusion, it was wonderful.

Reasons Why Riots Are Stupid.

Dear Riot-ee,

What is an idiotic, moronic act that can't ever be justified because it's just -- a great word to summarise with-- stupid? I'd like to say that I would understand why these people go around smashing others' cars and burning buildings down but I see no other explanation other than utter stupidity. No, there's nothing I will probably ever have the courage to do to try and physically stop such foolish act. So, I'll just explain to you why I find riots stupid.

1. Destroying public properties doesn't mean that you 'get back' at the government, while it is true they have to pay to get repairs, the money comes from the taxes-- which is essentially EVERYONE's money. This could even lead to a tax increase, meaning the people who destroyed would still end up paying more because they wanted to break shit.

2. Destroying people's business is just fucking up with their lives. This achieves nothing, except maybe a few pumps of adrenaline in your veins you fucking psychopaths.

3. I guess given the chance, 'looting' off shops is very tempting, but it's fucking shameful and disgusting.

So I hope I've made my thoughts clear. Thank you. Go home. Lock your doors and shit.

Freeze Dried Ice Cream

So very terrifyingly real.





My mother's sense of humor is also very scary.

Day Trois.

I need to learn this.

Day Une.

It has been decided. I will do something productive with my life with what is left of my summer and each day will be documented. This will probably end up like a giant disaster but the only way to beat procrastination is facing the fear and starting something. I'm not even entirely sure there is something I'm procrastinating to. Yet.

Things to do:

1. clean my room

Which seems to be the shortest list ever conceived. Googling 'what to do on the summer holidays' I was bombarded with horrifying suggestions which also partially killed any hope I had for society. This is not a good start.

Why Is My Name So Shit? (a poem)

Austin Flegel stood proudly, the cloth in his shirt flailed very wildly.

The rock on his foot was a torch of unimaginable pain but he continued to stand because he was incredibly vain.

How long should he stand this excruciating torture? A strict tap on his foot-- he has such a bad posture.

That's fucking great-- it starts to rain and he feels droplets as they trickle.

Like a stream of gloom as he realised his name was Austin Flegel.

I'm running out.

There's probably no limit of things to talk about. But the more vast the options are, the more limited it feels. Which is some contradictory shit right there. So I got some ideas from Tom Slatin's 80 Journal Writing Prompts

4. What music album would be used for a movie about your life?

+

14. Name one thing you always wanted to do, but haven’t. What has prevented you from doing it?

My fear of death has prevented my from pursuing this (among other things)

17. What song was stuck in your head recently, and what were you doing at the time that made you think of it?

On The Bus Mall- The Decemberists

I heard it today. So good.

18. Describe 5 things you want to see or do before it’s too late.

(une) See American Idiot the musical.

(deux) Start a protest with no actual cause.

(trois) Learn how to play the banjo.

(quatre) Visit Africa. And befriend an elephant.

(cinq) Contribute (positively) to the world.

26. Name something you found; what was it and where did you find it?

I found a rock in this really rocky place.

41. What was the title of the last book you read?

Paper Towns

44. Describe your note-taking style and habits.

Lots of visuals.

Mostly unrelated to the subject.

Irrelevant Factoid.

This morning I woke up with complete and utter disappointment to the lack of cartoon animated Disney birds lulling me to wake.

Beards Make Great Instruments.

Is it true? Most people with beards make great music. I think. Probably. Right? Maybe it's because their beards radiate awesomeness which they then emit to their surroundings to make amazing music. Or the beard serves as a distraction to hypnotise us. Surely that's it. Don't call me Shirley.

5 Things We Need To Be Fulfilled

It's insane but we all crave this feeling of being fulfilled, but it's almost usually never reached. Money is a basic tool of survival but we want more than enough to feel secure or because we think it stretches the possibilities of the things that we can reach which we cannot otherwise.

So this man named Abraham Maslow came up with a Hierarchy of Needs which he thinks depicts all human needs (both physical and psychological).

There are things that are there for obvious reasons (the physiological part), but there are also things that are hard to measure (everything else). This is extremely fascinating (for nerds like myself and anyone else who would like to fill this gaping hole in their lives).

Mr. Blutac (The Adventures of)

There are a lot of things on my wall.

A bunch of pictures, posters, irrelevant and terrible things.

There are pencil marks, not too noticeable but enough to make me not sleep well thinking about their source.

I've collected him, with an odd gum-like consistency sans the irritating stickiness.

There are blue smears left on the wall, small parts of him that I ignore.

I roll a small, blue ball and create small limbs based on the human form. With that, he is alive.

However, just like any human created he questions his existence.

Was that it? All to be stuck back to the wall?

THIS IS NOT A GRAPE.

2 (3) possible thoughts while looking at this image

1. That finger is ridiculously small.

2. That grape is ridiculously elephantine.

**3. Wtf is that black ball?

I am not one to freak out over fruits, I mean, they're harmless. But seeing this weird grape on steroid sort of alarmed me. Is this the evolution that everyone's talking about? Giant, mutated grapes?

Seriously, that grape is really scary.

That Kid.

There's always that kid in class that you never really liked because they always asked questions. While asking questions do help answer them, I've always detested people taking this idea too much for granted and ask questions without even thinking about them. Yes, I'm a horrible human being and I'll go on in life not knowing about these tiny trivial things that I could've known and would've made a huge impact in my life.

But I'd really hate to be that kid.

And if you don't know what I'm talking about or you've never come across 'that kid'... it was probably you. Or maybe you're lucky. Or unlucky (depending on how you look at things... and a lot of other factors)

Perhaps I'm close minded and this behaviour should be encouraged more than ranted on by an uneloquently slow typer like myself. Maybe this would be a good character in your short novella; the kid that asked too much questions or the kid that hated the kid that asked too much questions.

Thinking about it after an unfocused pause (which I don't usually do when I'm typing... I'm such a hypocrite; I don't even think before typing stuff either) THAT KID (all in capitals, I'm screaming it..) is just ultimately ruining everyone else's life.

The average attention span of the human brain varies, but is generally very short, therefore that one moment in which a student was actually engrossed with a lesson would have been disturbed by some stupid kid that would probably go on to get some great grades and a good job and a happy future flying with unicorns and shit while the rest of us just mop the floors in McDonalds.

I need to go study...

Battling against my will...

Must... fight the urge... to draw a face on it... must...

The Problem.

Everyone has a problem, well, probably more than one problem. I'll rephrase that... Everyone has a lot of problems but most of the time, only one would be our dominant worry. Whether it be the book or phone or stupid object that we have lost or being stuck between two choices with one inevitably painful result. And it's an awful feeling to have a problem and for it to be in your mind constantly that it distracts you from living your human life which, in turn, creates more problems along the way.

When the dominant problem has finally gone, there's always something that follows it immediately. Like a stack of dominoes, except more problematic. Now, I'm thinking about how many times I've typed the word 'problem' or any variation of that word so far which is probably starting to be a problem for me. Maybe problems are just much more horrible than the actual thing that we're trying to avoid or fix, it just seems more psychological because worrying about things doesn't affect them positively (more on the contrary, actually). Or maybe it is a good thing because it involves thinking about stuff, which could solve the problem. I don't know.

So, yeah stop worrying.

Blues.

Good Lord, just let me live 'til tomorrow,

I'm gonna send you another prayer

This is taped

Yes, 'til tomorrow,

...this black man's gonna send you another prayer

Mighty.

When I was little, I didn't enjoy playing with the other kids because they were all so much taller than me. Or maybe it was the fact that every single family that lived in my neighborhood planned to have a baby around the same time and my mother didn't get the memo so I wasn't as grown up as the other children.

So we had a dog- well, several dogs. From what I remember, when you get pets you just get them; there is no serious 'paper work' to be done as a transitional method, you just look into a bucket and see a puppy. The hardest part was just naming it. My mom and brother settled for 'Mighty'. What a cheesy name. It made him sound like some weird Moses of the animal world. Although, I guess they named him that because of his puffy fur that sort of made him look like a lion.

'Mighty' was a much better playmate than the neighborhood kids, because even though he was older than me (dog years-wise), we were still around the same height. I'll lead him down to the shallow river behind the house and we will play pirates. He was always the vicious and merciless pirate, chasing frogs and ducks that would wander around and I was just there to stop him from eating the ducks.

The end.

Lomo.

Words That Make No Sense.

Say, an alien walks to Earth for the very first time (please note that I do not know what the preferable transportation aliens as a general species would prefer, so, for the sake of this hypothetical situation I will assume that they walk) This alien does not know the idea 'language' entirely but just the conception of it. I think they will be confused however much knowledge they have about it or however much they've tried to study it and grasp it.

Words are a great way to communicate, it's great to wonder how they developed and evolved, I often imagine cave people just grunting out stuff as a communication technique (but I'm just as sure about this as the alien-transport-hypothesis)

So I've started my own dictionary for aliens (one word so far...):

Unicorn (u-ni-corn)- 'uni' means one. One corn.

e.g: How many did we harvest? I only got a unicorn.

Electrolysis of Copper

Oh my goodness, I don't even...



(... know what goes through my mind during study clubs)

Past-me VS Present-me VS Future-me

I have a horribly confusing way of thinking, this has been said in a million variety of ways that one can say such a statement (e.g: 'you present good points but your wording starts to get a bit confusing sometimes'-- one of those tiny scribbles that teachers write in the corner of your essays)... yet, they've stated it much more clearly than how I am stating it right now. I, therefore, prefer to express things using metaphors which is equally as ineloquent as expressing things in a literal way but more fun.

If I were asked to explain this whole point which I'm desperately and horribly trying to get across by using a metaphor, I'd like to say that it's like a 5 year old's mindless doodle (see what I meant about the bad metaphor thing?)... I mean, it all overlaps and seemed to make sense from the inputter's point of view but the outcome is just a mindless scribble.

So, I've split myself into three sections (not literally... that would probably result in some unsightly results... e.g: death, etc.)

Past-me- The most horrible, cringe worthy, laziest thing in the world. Past-me does not like doing productive things, but if we get too technical then Present-me (right now) will be past me every second... But Past-me tends to like to leave things for Future-me, which, then again would also be Present-me.

Present-me- Basically gets the worse end of the bargain. All of the work that Past-me has failed to complete. Present-me does not like Past-me very much... (I wonder why)

Future-me- Ultimately, the outcome of everything that's going through with me. Future-me is undetermined because Past-me changes decisions fairly quickly... so Future-me could be a supercool ventriloquist for a split second and then scavenging for food in trash bins with very rabid looking squirrels the next.

If this taught me anything, it's probably... wow, I need to stop thinking about things...

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow.

While I thoroughly enjoy watching old science-fiction movies, I'd like to think this is their modern 'retake' to how awful they used to be. Several things were going on my mind while my eyes were tormented with the sight of this film such as 'How did this manage to get publicised?' and 'Were the actors threatened by a secret underground association to show mind controlling subliminal messages hidden within this horrible movie which further justifies several government conspiracy theories?'

I guess in this generation, things that are a juxtaposition of being incredibly bad that it morphs sneakily into the category of 'good' are starting to surface (e.g: Rebecca Black's Friday video). I'll just stick to ET.

Old Soul.

It's nice to listen to old songs and look at times that seem to be completely different from now, to imagine how it would be and how people will look back after a few decades from today (I'm so weird).