Remote Control Day
2005-06-29 @ 5:56 p.m.

History wasn't a disaster. It was a major disaster! Haha. The only question where I actually knew where I was going in my essay was the one on globalisation, because it's so similar to something Mr Kwok gave us before, so I just gave him whatever I remembered of his template. That should have to offset the flop that was my source-based answer. Didn't like either poem for the practical criticism, so I did the drama extract from King Lear. I think the lines "Out, vile jelly!/Where is thy lustre now?" are quite freaky. Something about Cornwall's behaviour struck me as not very human, and it sent a chill down my spine every time I read it during the paper. Shooting people, carving people up, that kind of stuff I can deal with. There's something unspeakably disturbing about calmly putting out a guy's eyes just like that. Can't explain it to you, I just find it so. Felt happy with my answer, but it probably isn't good. Think I didn't really concentrate on the question being asked, about the characters and the situation. Sigh. Being self-critical sucks big time. It doesn't help that I'm usually right about myself. I guess it's better than being self-important, like that prick who told us to take a hike on Monday. I thought adults were supposed to behave more maturely than teenagers? Some teachers can be such unreasonable pains in the arse...

I have never passed an Economics essay during a Common Test, and it doesn't seem like I'm about to start any time soon. It was freaking cold in the hall today! Either the thermostat's malfunctioning, or the school still hasn't got one. Came straight home after the paper, because being the indecisive people that we are, my friends and I couldn't decide whether to have lunch, let alone where to have it. Ate lunch, and promptly feel asleep for the rest of the afternoon. I think falling asleep in the afternoon doesn't do anything for me, because I just end up in a daze for the rest of the night after I wake up. Have gone back to reading Ishiguro, this time The Remains Of The Day. Talk about thematic obsession! More flashbacks and unreliable narrators, but this one's a dignified English butler, so it's quite amusing, especially the part where he starts going on about how English scenery has a grandeur that nowhere else possesses. Doesn't that remind you of Kitson? Haha...

Damn. I can't believe I forgot to talk about humour for the passage-based question on Hardy. Hope the Frost essay can help pull my grade to a comfortable B. Must get at least maintain four Bs this time, or compensate for a C with an A in Mathematics. (Ah, the lofty aims we aspire to at the last minute!) Don't feel like studying very hard for English 'S' tomorrow, especially after Chernise told me that when they ask you to look at texts, it can be a poem. Then again, Claudia says we have to bring printed texts into the examination, so I need to rifle through my packed boxes to find poetry anthologies, or I could just borrow the Collected Poems of Larkin from the school library after the Mathematics paper in the morning. I think I'll do that just in case, although I'm still hoping to use Love, Etc. and The Hours tomorrow. I hereby salute Julian Barnes for being one of the few authors to make me reach for a dictionary, only to find that the dictionary doesn't contain that word. Erudition has its drawbacks. Try "gravid" or "steatopygous" on for size. Then there's "crepuscular", which is a really gross-sounding way of saying something possesses qualities associated with twilight. Oliver in Love, Etc. is such a pompous git. Clever, but annoyingly so. One day to go...

Oh yeah, just a little bit of bragging because I want to cheer myself up. My copy of Graphic Poetry has finally arrived! Yes, I have been published. If they ever do a second volume, all of you should really submit stuff, because most of the submitters outside the West were from Singapore. I just checked out the other Singaporean contributors, and they've all worked in some way with the Quarterly Literary Review Singapore, to which I've been meaning to submit something for a while, just to give it a shot. There is something very gratifying about seeing your name in print, especially in an international collaboration. Yes, definitely very gratifying. Plus the book was a complimentary copy! Happiness...