A Notable Quotable In A While...

This is a pretty good one to restart that habit.

It could actually be applied to pretty much any kinda understanding with any kinda aspect of life... But the fact that it's on this particular subject coming from this particular book makes this lil quote particularly awesome. =)

Physics is not about having memorized all the answers, but rather about asking the right questions.

- James Kakalios, The Physics of Superheroes, pg16

Whoops...

The pace of life out here means that I'm constantly having to think 10steps ahead in pretty much every aspect of life... this is especially easy for those of us who have good time-management and organisational skillz. Those lucky bastards... (¬_¬)

The problem here is that by always focussing on step 10, I find myself rushing through life a lil bit faster than most and then I'll occasionally forget that steps 2, 5 and 7 are not always foregone conclusions. Which kinda messes things up. These past 10days I've definitely messed things up.

Whoops.

Guess I was due for a good cockup around this point anyways. There're always my trusty psuedo-cliche philosophies to fallback to... in this case:

Perceptively Nutz, Addendum A:
"Within every failure is a lesson/opportunity to be gleaned."

The results of my goddamn impatience led to an illuminating insight into a personality which had previously baffled me before, with very little chance of a resolution. I got my answer from that case so suddenly and unexpectedly that I almost missed it in the whoosh.

It's a shame though, coz it woulda been a pretty fun journey to discover the answer the long traditional way. But of course, I apparently have a pretty "special" way of looking at things. Can't really expect everyone I meet to get that.. =)

"你想得太多了!" (¬_¬)

I have a pretty obsessive personality, always have done - known it for quite a while.

For the most part, I've been able to turn it into a fairly positive character flaw; I'm extremely thorough when thinking decisions through, I tend to see all my projects right through to the end (at the cost of all else), I always keep my (grown-up) promises, I've never (knowingly) let my friends down, I'm good to my word in that whenever I say I'll do something for them, I'll damn well sure will do it.

But there are times when all that analness...obsessiveness doesn't half come and bite in the arse. For instance in the situations where I take to an idea a teensy lil too quickly, but then doesn't pan out as intended... Where the normal thing to do is to shrug it off with a nonchalant "meh" and get on with the next teacup storm... My damn brain will cling on just that lil bit longer and work through every detail of just what the hell might've gone wrong.

The danger here is that if there is no definitive answer, then we go into an infinite loop of endless "What The Hell Happened?!" scenarios... and my damn brain refuses to let go until it comes up with something good enough to rationalise into a reason solid enough to achieve closure.

But lordy help me if I ever come across a situation so befuddling that no amount of mental jiggery can come up with something that can conclusively match whatever the real reason may be...

..Seriously... Help! All it takes is a lil txt/email/msn/note/phonecall to explain just What The Hell Happened? and then I can be done with this.

Pickup the damn phone! (=_=)


Update: Holy crap! Though I told myself that I'd stop after three strikes... turns out the sixth time would be the charm... (0.-)

I finally got my answer! And while I know definitely that I wasn't completely unjustified in my reactions, in the end as it turns out; I'm still my own worst enemy and the title of this post has never spoketh truer.

But at least I can finally lay the matter to bed. Ahhh, peace once more. (^^)


......until the other part of my OCD starts to take steps to try and rectify the situation.

Candy!

I got this from the dentist after he pulled my wisdom out...

This seems to happen alot over here... (¬_¬)

And I Can Barely Talk English Too...

For all the obvious reasons, I find that I tend to use the Cantonese and Hakka parts of my brain more in my Mandarin Chinese classes. It's a lot easier to understand the concepts and grammar quirks when thinking from the perspective of their related dialects. However it does tend to drive my teacher up the wall when I try to reply quicker to improve my fluency - as my speaking then goes towards Cantonese tones and nobody understands what the hell I'm trying to say.

The exciting thing was when I could actually see those classes paying off when I went to HK last month and discovered that I could actually read a lot more around town than I ever could before. However the weird thing was that when I was reading all those road signs and ad-boards, I was actually reading in Mandarin first and translating to Cantonese second... (¬.¬)

So when I'm learning, I'll think in Cantonese/Hakka first and then figure it out from there, when I'm actually practising Chinese I'll think in Mandarin first and then convert to Cantonese...

Confused yet?!

Also, when talking to my Grandad in Hakka, I find I'm beginning to fill the gaps in my Hakka vocab with Mandarin words over Cantonese (since my Hakka is dying but I still find it more grammatically similar to Mandarin than Cantonese)...

I want my eventual 8 kids to speak Chinese too... but in the future I'm thinking they're gonna end up speaking some horrible amalgamation of Cantonese/Hakka/Mandarin/Chinglish coz their dear old papa's brain melted down and decided to just clump the whole lot into one lobe entitled "Just. Chinese." (>.<)

Life. Forwarded.

I'm a digital packrat, as I go through different computers and laptops over the years, there are some folders that I'll always take with me. Photo's, emails and documents that I'll always have on my drive. There is one particular folder entitled "Cool Stuff" thats been with me since my very first email account... its mostly a collection of cool little images and flash files that I've come across on the internet or were sent to me in fwds way back before sites were setup to display these random misc images.

A lot of the files are also simple txt files copied from the email fwds I used to get back when ICQ and AIM was what MSN/Skype is now. Every now and then I browse through some of these for pure nostalgia and also coz its always weird to see what fascinated you when you were younger, there's always something cringeworthy worth preserving. =D

This poem is from a file dated 14th August 1998. It was probably sent to me by one of my brilliant American cousins. They can be a bit of an inspirational bunch... (^^)

Not much changed in 10 and a half years then (0.-)

---

Life Is...

Life isn't about keeping score.
It's not about how many friends you have
Or how accepted you are.
Not about if you have plans this weekend or if you're alone.

It isn't about who you're dating,
Who you used to date,
How many people you've dated,
Or if you haven't been with anyone at all.

It isn't about who you have kissed,
It isn't about who your family is
Or how much money they have
Or what kind of car you drive.
Or where you went to school.

It's not about how beautiful or ugly you are.
Or what clothes you wear, what shoes you have on,
Or what kind of music you listen to.

It's not about if your hair is blonde, red, black, or brown,
Or if your skin is light or dark.
Not about what grades you get, how smart you are,
How smart everybody else thinks you are,
Or how smart standardised tests say you are.

It's not about what clubs you're in
Or how good you are at sports.

It's not about representing your whole being on a piece of paper
And seeing who will accept "the written you."

Life just isn't.

Life is about who you love and who you hurt.
It's about who you make happy or unhappy purposely.
It's about keeping or betraying trust.
It's about friendship, used as a sanctity or as a weapon.

It's about what you say and mean, maybe hurtful, maybe heartening.
It's about starting rumors and contributing to petty gossip.
It's about what judgments you pass and why.
And who your judgments are spread to.

It's about who you've ignored with full control and intention.
It's about jealousy, fear, ignorance, and revenge.
It's about carrying inner hate and love,
Letting it grow and spreading it.

But most of all, it's about using your life
To touch or poison other people's hearts
In such a way that could have never occurred alone.

Only you choose the way those hearts are affected,
And those choices are what life's all about.

...