my daily routine now can be just simplified as school, work, sleep. ok, i shouldn't be complaining because at least i'm keeping myself occupied and earning money, though it's damn damn boring. and i really shouldn't be complaining since i'm quite enjoying my life now, especially the crazy things i've done these few days. food hunts through the night, board games cos we're bored, and finally ktv and even pool for someone who has totally no ball sense!
FYP is progressing slowly, now that we're done with brewing herbs, most of my time is spent in the lab office reading and writing. and occasionally going down to visit my mice. i have 2 wildtype pups now!!
i didn't know i'm so good at summarizing, or should i say i'm just lazy to blog

long weekend's over and it's back to school, back to the lab tmr. although it's only been a week and although it's otot, the thought of going to sch everyday is kind of sian. yeah, that's the perfect word for it.
just found out today that round ubin is in june, which clashes with seniors camp!! seriously for the past 3 years no matter when is it, it will clash with something. a bit tempted to row but i haven't been exercising at all! and by right i can't touch water for another 2 weeks.
for general health purposes, i think i should start exercising and get A BIT of sun again. believe it or not but the last time i gymmed was before MR, the last time i rowed was more than 2 weeks ago. and on the average i run once a week now. that's all.

why are there still so many people in school when it's holidays now? and the morning traffic has not changed a bit. luckily i'm quite free and easy, can come and go anytime i want. brought my lappie today for research and to keep me company in lab, and here i am, waiting for time to pass.
went down to the animal house for the first time yesterday to take a look. it was quite smelly and ppl working there have to be covered from head to toe - cap, mask, gown, gloves, socks. (so environmental unfriendly right?) mice to researchers is just like any other specimen or reagents, what do you do to the excess? throw it away. what do you do to the unwanted mice? pick them up by their tail, put them in a yellow plastic bag, write and sign a termination form, into the gas chamber they go, the chamber closes, co2 is turned on, they struggle and tried to jump out for a few seconds before collapsing and lie motionless. off to the biohazard bin they go eventually..
went down again today, got a cage of mice for myself and today is day 1 of their mating. now i'm just waiting for my mutant baby mice to arrive...

Yesterday was my second time walking into an operating theatre. (The first time was about 8 years ago when in actual fact I limped in and out of the OT to excavate an ingrown toenail.) This time was for lasik.

Booked the appointment last week and decided to conduct the evaluation and the surgery on the same day to save trouble. As with all operations, no lotions, creams, makeups, perfumes whatsoever was allowed. pretty easy on the getting ready to get out of house part, but i felt so 'naked' walking around in town. (when was the last time you went out to town from home with nothing on your face or hair?)
Reached there pretty early for the evaluation, which lasted more than 2 hours. this is how it went briefly. First, I was asked to fill up my particulars and then waited to be called into the examination area, where a series of eye-power, eye-pressure and cornea tests were done. Eye power test was easy and quite standard. Eye-pressure test was 'shocking' in that a sudden gust of air was shot out into the eye multiple times, i couldn't help but jump at each shot, but luckily it was fast. the cornea test was quite tiresome. it's basically a test to measure the thickness of cornea and hence deduce the suitability for lasik. i don't know if it's the problem of my eyes or is it quite standard for everyone, but it was a long process of "blink, blink, blink followed by open your eyes as big as possible and don't blink for 5 counts". the optimetrist even asked me to rest my eyes before continueing. alright, maybe my eyes are really quite small. after that, some eyedrops were instilled to dilate the pupils and a video on lasik was shown. it was then followed by the last round of tests to confirm the previous results after dilation, before a counseling session was given on the procedure, risks, post-surgery care etc. Lastly, I got the see my surgeon, who recommended me to do the intralase standard, which uses laser to cut the cornea flap instead of the normal blade, because my cornea is slightly on the thin side. Of course, it's slightly more expensive but I decided to follow his recommendation since this wasn't the time to get 'suntie' and go for the cheapest possible. The whole procedure, inclusive of waiting time lasted until about 12 noon when i made my payment and went for lunch and some aimless walking for 2 hours before washing my face and heading back to the clinic for surgery.
Upon reaching the clinic again, I was given a final eye-check on my pupils before going into the resting area right outside the operation theatre. there, i was asked to sign the agreement and escorted to my own little cubicle while waiting for my turn. the nurses helped me wear the surgery gown, shoes and cap, and explained to me how to use the eyedrops after the surgery. I must say they are really friendly, polite, young and pretty! Very soon, it was my turn.
The surgeon greeted me and I was asked to lie on the bed. After that, my head was secured by 2 barriers at the side and the nurse instilled some anesthetic eyedrops. I was then pushed under the 'cornea-slicing machine' and the doctor placed a round circular plastic thing in just the right shape to cup my eyeball. It wasn't painful, but rather quite uncomfortable, as though someone is pressing against your eyeball. it momentarily blinded my vision and i heard the doc reciting some numbers and directions and i guess he's looking at the screen when the flap was created on my cornea. The same was done with the left eye.
That was stage 1. Following that, I was pushed and placed under the other machine, which does the actual lasering. The nurse pasted a huge sticker across my face, with a hole in the centre exposing only my right eye. and i felt the doctor pasting 2 more tapes on my upper and lower eyelids respectively, then using some kind of metal tool that keeps my eye opened. I was then instructed to look straight up into the red light while he carefully flipped open the flap and did the lasering. the laser process only lasted for half a minute. I could hear the "tac-tac-tac" of the machine and smell a burning rubber smell. It didn't feel as bad as the first stage, and my sense of sight wasn't removed. When that was done, the doctor put back the flap, smoothened out any possible bubbles and placed a protective contact lens over it. Then came the most painful part - the tearing off of the sticker! I think they helped me with facial hair removal too! haha
The whole process was finished within about 15 minutes, after which my vision was still blur but i managed to walk out of the OT back into my resting area. I sat there for about half an hour, closed my eyes to rest, listened to what the nurse has to say as she helped me out of my OT attire, placed eye shields over my eyes and waited for her to book my appointment for the first review the next day.
Then i was done! That's how simple it is.
I think i must have looked like an alien as i walk to the taxi stand and waited for cab. The cute and pretty nurse was nice enough to send me into the cab.
being an obedient patient, i tried to sleep right after i got back, but it was quite impossible to at 4pm when i had 10 hours of sleep the previous day, and so i took one of the three sleeping pills prescibed and had a good rest till dinner. and having nothing better to do, i went back to sleep at 10 and was wide awake before 4am! i never knew time passes so slowly when i lie on my bed doing nothing. It's definitely not insomnia, it's the symptom of having had 'too much sleep'.

Went back for my first review today and the doctor took out the protective contacts. yay, i'm done! although my eyes are still a bit red and i've to use those lubricating eyedrops every 2 hours and constantly remind myself not to touch my eyes, everything feels and looks good. can't wait to wash my hair and face tomorrow since i'm not allowed to wash them for 48 hours in case of infection from the water. and no water sports for a month, in other words, no trainings!

Yes, I know I should be busy hiding in the lab doing FYP or at least searching for a huge pile of research material to read up on, but i'm doing nothing! Let me just enjoy the last few days of my holiday...

yawn...
the piggie slept from 9pm to 7am last night. the piggie just woke up from afternoon nap, had dinner and thinks it should go back to sleep again. vision's still a bit blurry and eyelids feel heavy and i shouldn't even been looking at the comp screen..
shall update when i'm awake again...
goodnight

tell me how different i am from a pig when majority of my time is spent eating and sleeping, and the cycle repeats. on a typical day i take morning and afternoon naps, and satisfied my ice-cream cravings with 3 big cones on b&j free cone day! ok, i know, at least i read newspapers, watches tv and movies, goes out to shop, and i don't roll around in mud. that's about it.
let me be the pig before i don't get a chance to. and wth the school's system is damn screwed up, now i am suppose to cut myself into 2 and do 2 fyps???
and oh yes, i never learnt my lesson. will i ever?

finally had a break from sleeping one hour a day on the table, locking myself up in the puny study room, door closed, curtains drawn, no clock, no internet etc for 2 consecutive days. sounds like hell doesn't it? and my 'reward'? going into the freezing exam hall, finding 5 answer booklets on the table so that we can use 1 booklet for 1 question, and i'm quite sure the total amount i wrote wasn't even enough to fill up one booklet. didn't we just celebrate earth day not too long ago? obviously doctors don't really care for the environment, and not to say for the student brain. (if i had any to start with).
oh well, it still feels good to be one of the first to finish exams. and looks like my prof is quite nice (or rather slack) to give me 2 weeks of rest before going back to the labs again..
so for the past few days, i've finally paid orchard road a visit, had nothing better to do so went grocery and household shopping with mum, caught a movie and had a good laugh, started on tidying up the files in my lappie, and work so as to gain back the financial lost incurred.
meanwhile i really think i should start exercising again soon...

yayness to wireless to keep me company and being my fastest, though not the most trustworthy dictionary!! i still don't know what network i'm connected to, it says 'default', err.. so i guess i'm not koping anybody's right?
the computer idiot here has just discovered that the screen resolution can actually be changed so that everything would look normal instead of stretched. yes, after almost 3 long years of owning this lappie, and suddenly everything looks so much sharper and more proportionate. everybody in all photos looks so much taller and thinner now.
hahaha, i'm been entertained by my stupidity again...

1 paper down and 2 more to go. quite touched that my mom even called me yesterday morning to make sure i woke up for my paper. and i just proved my inability to read the professor's mind (in spotting questions) and to read instructions. well, i did read the instruction eventually, but it was only when time was up and after i closed the answer booklet and circled the question numbers on the cover page. and so it read "answer one(1) of the three questions", and i did 2. don't ask me why. i was stunned for a few seconds, read it a few more times and took out my pencil to draw a big cross over the last question.
i am once again so amused by myself.
had lunch at the new foodcourt in school and checked out the new sakae outlet. pretty cool and unique, if only they had student price, it'll be even better. i will miss the old canteen for their cheap drinks, fruits, sandwiches, paus etc...
last night i was so determined to go running this morning, cos the only exercise i've done for the past week was walking to westmall cos i missed the shuttle bus. and guess what, there was a thunderstorm early this morning! looks like even the weather is helping me turn white and pasty. haha.
feels good to have home cooked food in my stomach now and the other reason why i'm back is because i don't even have internet connection in my room now!! looks like my parents are either forcing me to study, or forcing me to move back. just one more week, before i can spend my entire day nua-ing at home. it will be time to ask tv back into my life. haha

and because i'm oh-so-bored early in the morning, staring out of the window and decided to amuse myself with the morning traffic.
lta may be smart in increasing the number of ERP gantries, and happily announcing that traffic conditions have thus improved from 'less than 20km/h to 21-24km/h' (somewhere along that line as what i heard on radio last week). i really almost burst out laughing. that is snail speed can?
and where do they think all those smarter drivers went? let me show you:

that's the view out of my window at 8.10am. see that long stream of traffic on the right? is it the normal peak hour traffic or are they trying to avoid the new upp bt timah erp??

and that's the view half an hour later....
wows..
ok, time to draw the curtains and switch on the aircon before i get roasted..
can't wait for phase 1 of my uni life to be over. just another 9 more days.. and kind of looking forward to phase 2 and 3. another 2 years to go....

looks like the 'blackout' was just a powertrip. and i searched high and low for the switchbox, and guess what? i found my longlost laptop accessories, including the recovery disk! (which my mom was so sure it was nowhere to be found ever again). and it turned out that the switchbox was just outside my room, hidden in the cupboard.
finally remembered to buy ant poison to feed those little deprived ants in the house. irritating little crawling things that are attacking everything.
die ants die! go to hell and never come back!

once again, i'm laughing at myself...

can't believe that i spent the whole morning cleaning my room, sweeping the floor, tidying up my table and bed, scrubbing the toilet bowl and basin, when i'm suppose to be studying!! and knowing that i usually do zero housework, i think i must really have woken up on the wrong side of my bed!
i can literally survive on bread alone, especially when it's the only source of readily available food at home now. and because there's no kettle, no fridge, no microwave oven, even making a cup of coffee means i have to switch on the stove and boil water the traditional way. and of course that applies for cup noodles too. so i had bread for breakfast and lunch, because it was raining and i was lazy.
now this is what i call simple life. to my utmost horror, i discovered that the lights in the kitchen, dining and living room and corridor died!!! luckily the ones in my room and toilet are still working, if not i don't even think i can find candles in the house now.
someone please teach me how to concentrate. please teach me how to be disciplined...

horrified by the fact that
1. i spent a total of one hour in total today on just waiting for the bus.
2. my big photo was actually on my school's website a year ago and all the info was wrong and they quoted me for something which i obviously have not said! luckily nobody really bothers to surf the website and i think it can't be linked from the homepage now unless by the ever powerful google search.
3. i probably failed my patho test (though i'll never know)
4. my dearest little sis has no lessons tmr and so do i.
5. 2 weeks to exams and 1 last week of school left.

轻轻触摸未来遥远的风
有一天你会找回你的梦
幸福是看得透而不是
舍不得他的所有

This is such a common sight after one day of lessons. I think the 'no eating' sign was being torn down long ago and perhaps a bigger dustbin should be provided in case the little mountain topples..
yeah, that's our second home!

i won't be me if i'm not so last minute, so let 2359 settle everything while hopefully i can put everything aside till then. major headache. major pain in the arse. already getting so sick of it even before starting it. yeah i'm talking about fyp, and it didn't take me too long to realise that my interest does not lie in bio. my fav modules are actually things like bio stats and organic chem and maybe plant bio, but things like genetics, molecular, cell etc etc just don't get registered in my head. pui! put me in a lab and i'll probably ingest the virus or bacteria unknowingly. bio-hazard huh? yeah i'm the hazard in the bio lab!

perahps the adventures of taking bus to school every morning will be something i will miss. and last saturday just added to my collection. i was initially quite pleased and feeling quite lucky with buses that morning since i didn't have to wait long for the bus. thought i could reach class early and do some last minute mugging for the test that day. and so i got on the bus that takes me to school, sat down happily and started reading notes. after a while, i realised the bus was still in the interchange and not moving. at first i thought the driver was waiting for the buses to clear so that he could turn out, but when it was all clear the bus remained stationary. after about 10 minutes, one of the passengers got impatient and went up to the driver to ask wth he's waiting for. apparently, someone sitting upstairs refused to pay the bus fare, and so he refused to move! right, this is what you get when you have two equally stubborn and persistent people. well, since they both refuse to give in, all the rest of the passengers got down to take the next bus, after about 15 minutes. i don't know how the matter resolved in the end, but are you sure making all the innocent people pay twice just because one idiot refuse to pay is the best solution??
still on the topic of bus to school, a few weeks ago as i was going to school as usual, this old woman got on the bus i was on, and not only did she not pay the bus fare, she went up to almost every passenger, stuck out her hand in front of their face and asked them for 2 dollars for her to buy kopi! and she stayed in the bus and did so for passenger who got on. yeah i'm just cursing that she'll get caffeine poisoning from overdose or something!
yawn... i think i need the caffeine more than she needs it.. yawn...
and once again i have the whole house to myself when exam's nearing, but this time i have no tv, no sofa, no fridge, no microwave, no dining table!! and no washing machine (so i guess i'm not expected to do housework, haha), basically i have my room intact and all the other bedrooms as well, it shall be my hideout.

happy april fools! i guess we're all too old for that already.

已经长大的约定 那样珍惜
与你聊不完的曾经
而我已经分不清 你是友情
还是错过的爱情

now i see how studying abroad is such a hassle, and that's because i didn't strike toto or 4d and have all the money in the world. well, more or less settled air tickets, accommodation and study loan and now left with the major headache called fyp. and everybody's "enthusiasm" (or more aptly known as "kiasu-ness") shocked the profs when we flooded their offices. wth, just want to settle it asap and not spend hours thinking about it.
yeah, i'm gradually transforming from a gym rat to a lab mouse haha..

如果天使下凡让我许下三个愿望，我希望她能抹去我一切的回忆，让我重新开始生活，我希望她能把忧伤从我新生活的字典中删除，让我快乐地度过每一天，我希望她能飞到你身旁，也让你许下三个愿望......
但现实生活中没有天使，也没有所谓的童话般的爱情故事。

heard the youtube anti-triple sharing song on radio last night!! can't believe they actually played it on public radio!! haha no doubt it has made headlines in the past few weeks but i must say it's pretty embarrasing to hear it on public radio. ok, i do applaud whoever who created the video, good one there, really, but i think they should get someone who can sing better. haha

honestly i don't really care about triple room or not, since it's not going to affect me anyway, but are students protesting for a real cause? or merely because every other guy says no with a capital 'N'? i dare to say with confidence that not hundred percent of the student population are against the idea, but facing a overpowering opposition force, who dares to voice out their opinion? i believe the solution lies in the freedom of choice, let students choose whether they want single, double or triple. there are poor students out there, especially international students who are just looking for a roof over their head with four walls and a door, good location and good price. yes i'm saying that because i am going to be one soon!! i seriously don't mind triple sharing if it cuts the price by a reasonable amount. come on, ntu's hall is really cheap as compared to 400 sing dollar a month for a 12m sq double room over at bj, and it's 10km from the hospital where we are going to intern at. freaking expensive la! well, keeping my fingers crossed...

seems like the cost of living has always been rising. everything's getting freaking expensive.. petrol, school fees, daily necessities, air tickets!! why don't i see my pay rising?? hurhur

oh yes, today is world down syndrome day. why? think trisomy 21. (really, not joking)

hmmm AHM anyone?

sitting in front of the comp waiting for the sun to rise, the sat 8.30am lesson to start and digesting the macs breakfast delivered at around 6am (very impressed by their efficiency and how the delivery guy managed to find his way here!) and still sipping the coffee that has already turned cold hoping that the caffeine can keep me awake for the long day today..
getting sick of school but do i have a choice. better treasure the last 4 weeks before it's over..
meanwhile i'm glad to be able to run again.. phew.. yeah time to not take those trivial things for granted..

最遥远的距离莫过于天涯海角，而是在身边却无法感觉你的存在。
如果说一切都是注定的安排，又何必去强求何必等待。
失去后才懂得珍惜，跌倒后才可以爬起。
把以往收集成回忆深埋在心底，
偶尔重温那美丽的过去，
毕竟那就是人生。
祝幸福。

ok, time to bathe and go for class...