Sorry la for being so quiet...

I'm writing from my college PC. My PC is zonked.

It all started some time ago when my PC fans did not work and I had to depend on an external fan - the stand fan - to ventilate it. And because the stand fan was very near the kitchen area, its blades were covered with oil and grease and dust. So on Saturday dad cleaned the fans, but the PC was still very slow. Sunday morning came, and dad dismantled the CPU cover and cleaned the components with contact fluid. I think one of a few of the components must have come out loose, because when I turned on the PC, the current was running, but the boot screen did not load ! I felt heartsick ! No blog, no Mind Distortion, no e-mail, no YouthSays for the next few days or perhaps, weeks ! I called the computer repairman yesterday night and it still was not ready.

Anyway, as to what happened over the past few days, I returned to the Sunset Band for mass after four months of absence. I didn't get to go for yesterday's practice but because the responsorial psalm is just like that of the 12th of April - Psalm 23, The Lord is My Shepherd - I had the tune in mind already, they have the chords, and I will be playing it on Saturday evening. I was happy, but I did tell Aunty Sharm about my absence - I wonder when dad will be back from Singapore for good so that more things can be done.

I had full days for the past few days. But the best was Literature class yesterday. We were doing Julius Caesar and we were getting questions - sixteen of them - on the play. And as usual, my paper would be decked with colours. Only this time, there were colours all over. Over the weekend I got a full set of coloured G2 pens and metallic G1 pens (I did not fall for the pastel range, sorry) and a new set of highlighters to replace the old ones. So you could imagine what I started drawing on the papers....... Even Ms Sunbeam started commenting on my colours. Yes, fine, I know I can't use colours for the Cambridge examinations unless I'm drawing illustrations, but yeah well, I won't be using a single coloured pen. There won't be any time for me to use those colours !

Anyway, back to class yesterday. For homework, we had two questions, we had to draft out some points. One was, "Describe how important the supernatural is in Julius Caesar" while the other was, "Relate how Caesar was persuaded to go to the Capitol and what ensued there." The questions we did in class were, "Describe the opening scene in Julius Caesar, what light does it throw on the mob, Caesar, the tribunes and generally, the Roman citizens ?" and "What are the contributions made by the two women in the play ?" Truth be told, I have the paper in hand so I can tell what exactly happened yesterday (it was all written in the paper, and Ms Sunbeam was holding it today). The kind of English many of the students used towards the end of the year - oh Lord ! Thrice Ms Sunbeam had to repeat the order on the test paper, "You are reminded of the need for proper English and clear pronunciation."

Another funny part in the class was this : we were talking about Brutus, and how he had to choose between his love for Caesar and his love for Rome, and he killed Caesar because he loved Rome more. Melvin called Brutus "cold" while Harvey said "It was winter !" The whole class was roaring. I just grinned from ear to ear.

Here's another thought : for every literary question we have to compare, say, Julius Caesar with related tragedies like Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello and King Lear. When told that we had to refer to Hamlet, Melvin asked, with a blank expression on his face, "Who is Hamlet ?" And since Hamlet is the protagonist, Ms Sunbeam had no choice but to give him a circular definition, "Hamlet is the protagonist, the hero, of the play called Hamlet !" The whole class roared in turn. Okay, back to reference, some were comparing with other literary works (i.e. not from Shakespeare) like The Mill on the Floss (George Eliot) and such. But Harvey had only one reference : Tom and Jerry (and I am talking about the cartoon series) ! Ms Sunbeam was astounded, surely, because out of her few hundred students over the years, he was the only odd one who loved referring to Tom and Jerry ! We laughed to high heaven.

Now, after seeing all that happened in class, the incompetency in writing, the kind of subject-verb confusion and misuse of tense in class, Ms Sunbeam had the impression that many of the students came with the assumption that Literature was easy but now, we all have had a picture of it. Now, this time, Krishna intervened - yes, the one who wrote "The Duke of Orsino" on the day before mom died - and said, "Teacher, I came to Literature class to improve my English !" but when we look at his English, trust me, it has not improved a bit. After all, I marked his paper once, and Ms Sunbeam has to correct his paper more often than I do. I wonder what hell she goes through. I only know he's become more philosophical ever since he entered Literature class. I guess that's a good sign. :)

I wrote all this on top of my Literature notes so I wouldn't lose anything, and at least I'd remember who said what. Na, I don't do this all the time, but this particular lesson was hilarious. If I could have more lessons like this, it would bring life to my mundane routine and perhaps, help me to get on with life even better.

By the way, I just recorded three crappy .AMR files - My Bequests, Sunrise and another impromptu piece which I have not named yet. I will put the .AMR file up online only if I can find somewhere with a QuickTime plugin and a Creative Commons licence so that no one will claim it as their own.

Honestly, wonder when I can get my damned PC.

Yesterday night, for lack of anything to do (after studying so hard, that is), I connected the PlayStation 2 to my TV, and hoped that the Kingdom Hearts II disc would work, but it didn't work eventually... So I spent the rest of my night playing Kingdom Hearts Final Mix, Tekken 5 and... Jak 2 and Jak 3 (in French, but I replayed the scenes in several languages just to have a good laugh at the comic relief). Now, the remote controller is not working, and Maaji pressed the wrong button on the TV, so the TV is zonked too.