PASSED!

the word says it all. i'm driving to school for uni. and back. lifts for people who live near my area only :p petrol isn't free, seriously.

sadly, xiaohui qualifies. HAHA

the better end of the deal

so, in a stroke of what appears to be a good deal, in that i had to pay a reasonably small cost for a immeasurably larger benefit, i fell sick with a 38.4 deg fever sunday night, round about 1900 hours. for a small price of discomfort, extreme fatigue and the need to wake up every 6 hours to swallow pills, i got myself 2 days of MC.

and no regular two days, these past two were. washing ovm on friday (escaped with a smart decision to take the whole day off for a 100min session of driving), and extreme cleaning yesterday and today - granted by the 2 day mc I got. oh, the other end of my bargain i'll have to fulfill probably goes somewhere along the lines of buying food for them but then again, i'll find my own benefits from that :)

that aside, i now declare myself a proud (and equally deprived) owner of a Sony Ericsson k810i cybershot phone - armed with a 3.2 megapixel camera, everything a REAL cybershot can do (including the slide down lens cover heh), with phone functions, minus the auto-shaking that zhenghong's does. no, really. and it's least because of the image stabilizer function. REAL cybershots don't shake automatically so that the stabilizer's abilities can be er, manifested.

sadly, i shall have to revert to my puny (yes it's relatively smaller, ironically) nokia 1100. i shan't hide my distaste for nokia phones, really. they're horrendous. that being said, it's the only reason i'm using a nokia phone in camp. how can any decent phone be dignified by the number of times its brought outfield, especially in the pocket of a scout TC? utterly undignifying, treatment deserved only by a nokia phone. well, that counter down there counts down to ORD, and also the days from which i can use my lovely new phone full-time.

had the time to run through my song collection these few days since mc, or militarily speaking, attend c, doesn't allow me out of my home except for visits to the doctor and as i've recently discovered, meals. not that i mind - home is a nice place to be :) digging through a collection of incriminating file size inadvertently leads to me stumbling over certain tracks that haunt figments of my memory - some, sadly, i'd rather not recall. it's just this strange association that takes place, especially when i flood myself with certain songs at some points in my past that were pretty much inundated with extreme emotion or stress or whatever. pre a-levels, for example, was haunted by Aerosmith (thanks to the CD i had playing in my discman all the time we were mugging in the Hub), Iron Maiden (thanks, more, to eric and "Rainmaker" heh).

Oh, jolly, guess what's playing now. Angel by Aerosmith. Lyrics are the kinda things i'd really want to say but i guess it's not really relevant at this point in time.

Don't know what I'm gonna do about this feeling inside
Guess it's true - loneliness took me for a ride
Without your love, I'm nothing but a beggar
Without your love, a dog without a bone
What can I do, I'm sleeping in this bed alone

I shan't dwell, lest this ramble turns into a lyric post. yes, i do realize this is very much a ramble. heck it la, seriously.

I suspect my depravity is something i'll have to pay for one day. hmm..

NOT surreal.

it's a common thing, when milestones are passed, for people to start remarking "i can't believe it's over", "it's so surreal", "whoa, it's finally passed.. so fast.."?

NOT THIS TIME.

it's over. the outfield to end all outfields. trust me, i won't be there for reservist outfields. i will find 10 million reasons for me to stay in a tonner, tentage, bunk - anywhere but tvma. in reservist, i will be CPL - trooper, no responsibility, no obligation.

just like ben and yao guo :D

so now that it's passed, we count to the inevitable end. 112 days away as of date of typing, a day that cannot, will not be changed. sunday, the 4th of november 2007, will end the stasis of my life. enlistment day feels just like yesterday, and everything in between seems (rather, is) like some meaningless blur of time's passage. honestly, i can't even recall what we did on mission 2 (not without a significant amount of effort at least).

so, gentlemen, i'm now here to collect my off, clear them and screw off (as in, "Screw off" not screw -> off). get my pink ic back and that's the end of 1yr 10 months (of wastage, learning the unorthodox skills of life, getting our minds twisted and corrupted big time, becoming the scum of the battallion.. yea, what a meaningful time i'd say).

so yes, not surreal, no "i can't believe it", no "wah, so fast..".

of course i believe atec's over, of course i believe ord's coming, of course it's not "SO FAST". please, it's been too long. WAY TOO LONG.

Wei Xun says:
he's king of deaths man
Eugene; ORD LOH! 113 and counting. says:
wad he didn't just die ONCE?
Wei Xun says:
2 times in 1st mission 1 time in 2nd mission
Eugene; ORD LOH! 113 and counting. says:
wah shit
Eugene; ORD LOH! 113 and counting. says:
how to die twice?
Wei Xun says:
3rd mission they didn't get past our IDL so no chance for him to die

hmm.. i'm lucky then.. didn't die :)

Staring - straight in its face

We've come a long way - and for that, credit goes to every one of us who's survived till now. Tomorrow, we face our last outfield. (not the last physical thing for me, since i've still got SOC wth) Nonetheless, the beginning of the end is near. That adorable little counter at the bottom left of the screen says 118, and the next time i see it, it'll be 114. Maybe i should rename it to "days to end of ATEC" and relish the feeling of seeing "ORD LOH!!!" once the counter hits zero..

it's now or never. I guess CO's right, in some sense. Yea he's an army man, depending on this ATEC for the rest of his future. And he's a nice guy. So for CO, Sgt Peter, Dick, Berne, Ben and Yao Guo - Here's to performance worthy of redcon 1.

For the kick. More importantly, for the off. (this will piss sgt peter off big time but hey, the ends justify the means!)