Insomnia

I can't sleep.

It's past my bedtime and I can't sleep. There are too many thoughts swirling in my head. I feel that chill coming back to me and there's an empty feeling inside my heart again. I'm drinking a glass of milk now because somebody told me that milk helps to induce sleep. I hope it does.

I just realized that there's nobody I can talk to right now. Almost everyone has gone somewhere. To Europe, to Hong Kong, or back home. My friends in Malaysia or Singapore are working, and my mum's out somewhere. Noone that I want to talk to is available.

I miss talking to you. There's no pretending about it. I've been talking to you for so many years, it's already a habit. And you know what they say about habits. Easy to pick up, tough to drop. How true. I've been trying to stop biting my nails for 4 years and I still haven't completely stopped.

So there's no way I can stop just like this right now. After all, this 'habit' was learned over 5 years. Yes, I know we are still friends and we don't have to stop talking. But what I mean is, I don't have to care the way I used to. I don't have to ask about some things anymore. Yet it's hard to distinguish that fine line between caring as a friend and as a lover.

The hardest part is recognizing that some things will never happen again. Some places I'll never go. Some stuff I'll never do. Are we supposed to forget them? Or just store them in a corner of our minds and never talk about those memories again? I don't understand. Am I allowed to fondly reminisce? Or is that a sign that I haven't moved on?

I do want to talk to you. Like friends who have grown older and wiser with each other's company. I want to go back to how it was before it all began, but with greater understanding and more inside jokes. And I hope that when life picks up its pace again, we'll keep in touch.

I think the milk has worked its magic. I'm off to bed.

Happy New Year!!

Happy New Year everyone!!! *fireworks display*

And with a spanking new 2007, comes a new blog layout! Ta-dah! What do you think? I love it! Best I can do with my copying and pasting skills. The background is supposed to make it look like I'm writing on recycled paper. And the tulips in the header, well that's because I like tulips. :)

Oh, press F5 and watch the "Quotes" section in the sidebar. And the row of tabs at the top are clickable and link to the blog posts with the corresponding labels. Isn't that cool? I have no idea how to write the code that does that.

So since this is the first blog entry for 2007, I figured I should start the year in the right path and do........ my new year resolutions!

First of all though, I need to revamp my lifetime goals a bit. I read somewhere that the best way to set lifetime goals is to figure out what I want people to say at my funeral. But that's just depressing. So I decided that I will write my goals as far-ranging as I can.

Here goes...

In my lifetime (as far I can see), I want to

• learn French, Russian, Spanish, and Japanese and any other language that I can
• travel the world, especially Greece, Italy, Argentina, the Caribbean islands and France
• learn how to dance... properly
• have enough free time everyday
• find my soul-mates
• stay close with my family, relatives and friends
• love someone with all my heart
• have someone who loves me with all his heart
• have a fulfilling and challenging career but not let it rule my life (this cannot be a 9-to-5 job!)
• meet people from different places and different cultures
• have an interesting story to tell my grand-kids when I become a cool grandma :P
• be fit and healthy and look good
• give generously without expecting anything in return
• follow through with my plans and not procrastinate
• be satisfied and at peace with who I am

The cross-outs are from my previous lifetime goals, italics are new additions. The goals are all pretty vague and general, except the first two. But I'm going to come up with a way of measuring how far I've achieved each one. Like say if I'm once again in an airport and late for my connecting flight, and I can run from gate A10 to D12 without feeling like my heart is going to burst, then I have achieved the "be fit and healthy" goal.

Alrighty, I'm not going to write my new year resolutions here because it's too personal. Oh but I want to say I've found a way to motivate myself to reach my goals. For every day/week/month that I follow through on what I plan to do, I'm going to put $1 into my imaginary piggy bank for vacation funds. E.g. if I plan to exercise twice a week and I did it this week, $1 is in the fund. Yeah I know $1 is not a lot, but I have A LOT of goals. And I'm not going to take out money if I don't reach my goals. I don't believe in denying oneself of pleasures. :P

At the end of this year, depending on how much is in my "piggy bank", Europe / Hawaii / Pulau Redang here I come!

(I sure hope it's Europe.)

My Winterfest dress

I got two new dresses!

Went shopping with my colleague after work yesterday. Our department has a semi-formal event next Saturday called Winterfest 2007. So we went out to look for a dress (for me) and accessories (for us both).

Well I got not one, but two dresses! Hehe, wasn't planning to buy two, but then it was really really cheap. 75% off loh. Will 对不起自己 if I didn't buy both.

One is a cocktail dress which I will wear to next week's event. It's black with a halter neckline and has a flower motif made of beads on one side. That one wasn't that cheap. It is 100% silk though.

The other one is more formal and sooooooo pretty. Makes me look taller and slimmer, too! It's a strapless gown with a corset. Erm, don't know how to describe the color. Light champagne? The nicest feature is around the lower waist, don't know how to describe also hehe. But it's nice lah. This one was super cheap, cheaper than the other one and looks much nicer. It fits me 'ngam ngam' (ie. just right) now so I cannot gain any more weight. Especially my tummy. Actually I should firm up my tummy some more so it will fit better. And then maybe I can actually breath while I'm wearing it.

So why am I not going to wear the 2nd dress if it's prettier? Well cause it looks way too formal. The event says 'semi-formal' so I don't want to overdress too much. It'd be quite weird if I was wearing a prom-ish dress and everybody else is wearing a cocktail dress. Plus I'd rather breath and eat during the night.

Can't wait for Winterfest liao! :D

New haircut

I went for a haircut today! Love it!

Went to a salon/spa center called Z Salon which is half a block away from work (which means one block away from home). My hairstylist was so nice and friendly. I didn't have a specific haircut in mind. All I told her was I don't like my hair now because it's so "flat".

Now it's not flat anymore!

Yeah I know that girls supposedly like to change their hairstyle after "emotionally distressing events". But just for the record, I've been planning this salon trip since last week. :P

I didn't make any drastic changes lah, the length is still the same, just trimmed the fringe a bit. But it's more layered and much more bouncy. Yay yay! *ninja turtle hopping around*

On another note, aren't there more Chinese in the States than Japanese? How come people keep yelling "konichiwa" instead of "ni hao ma"? And I look Japanese meh? (I'll take this as a compliment though hehe)

My Christmas Day

When I woke up this morning, I spent a minute lying on my bed, wondering if I dreamt about all that happened last night.

Then I realized I didn't. That it was real. So I went back to sleep.

When I woke up next, again I thought if it was all a dream.

Again I realized it wasn't. But this time I got out of bed.

I didn't do much today. I figured I deserve a break. A whole day of planning to do nothing and sticking with the plan. Instead of planning to do something and end up not doing anything anyway.

So I did a Desperate Housewives marathon. Season 3 is pretty good. Much better than Season 2, though I still think Season 1 beats them all. Did 9 episodes today, 2 more left to go.

The day went by pretty quickly, watching the series kept my mind off some things. It still hit home everytime I stopped in between episodes though. But I'm glad for the way I spent the day. If I didn't mourn at all, I would be so worried about myself.

I wrote myself a letter today. Just in case days or weeks or maybe months from now, when I begin to forget, I can remind myself why this is the way it should be. It's stuck on my fridge door now, and I've read it three times. Not that I have forgotten, but it keeps me calm.

I feel a constant chill in my apartment. I don't know if it's because it's colder outside today or it's just me. The feeling that I always get when I'm on a rollercoaster that's about to plunge straight down? How my heart is just about to leap out of my body? I felt like that all day. But my heart won't leap out and let me be. It insists on staying put, tugging at me.

But I'll be fine. I am fine. Fine in the sense that I need to feel sad now so that I can feel happy next time. So don't ask me if I'm fine or not. Because you already know what I'll say. What else can I say? What would you say if I said I wasn't fine? I wouldn't know how to answer myself, so I won't put you through it.

Tomorrow I'm going to the office, even though it's still my vacation. I can't write my report in my apartment, and I really want to finish it. So let tomorrow come. And I'll deal with myself one day at a time.

谢谢你

终于放了。

我还是懦弱的。 还好我们之中， 有一个肯走出第一步。

谢谢你肯诚实主动地告诉我，我一直不敢问的问题。

我没有恨， 也没有怨。 毕竟是我曾经的决定演变成现在的局面。

其实当初就不应该走回头路。

我等这一天， 等了一年。

这一天到了，不用再等它的来临，倒还有种解脱的感觉。

说我不难过是假的。

心在隐隐作痛。

会痛，是好的。

我们曾经拥有的，是值得好好伤心一番。

五年了，你是我成长的一部分。不是，你是我永远的一部分。

我们还会是很好的朋友。

毕竟现在的感觉，不就是走向知己了。

我知道，我们会比现在快乐。

谢谢你。

What I did on Christmas eve

I just wrote a bunch of stuff which I decided to delete. Sounded too self-pitying and depressing.

I have so many things swimming in my head now. I think I'll burst if I don't jot it down soon.

So half of my holidays is over now, and what have I done? Nada. I've done nothing that I said I'll be doing during my holidays. My stupid STUPID report is still not written and I haven't thought of my new year's resolutions yet.

But I have finished watching Season 3 of Grey's Anatomy! Well 10 episodes to be exact since Season 3 is still going on. It's incredibly good! Just strikes a chord in my heart everytime. So funny too.

And I had Peking duck on Friday. Mmm.. it was good. Cannot compare to the one I had in Beijing, but still pretty authentic. Had dimsum this afternoon too. :)

It's 9 pm now and I have been telling myself to start on the report since 2.30 pm. This is by far the worst one. Eeesh. The instructions document is 12 pages long. By the time I get to page 12, I have already forgotten what's on page 1. And then I have to reread the whole thing. And the (intentionally?) vague wording doesn't help.

I don't like writing reports and I don't like answering questions that have no clear-cut answers. On the bright side though, I do get A LOT OF satisfaction when I finish one. And I am learning a lot. And I'll be such a proficient report-writer by the time I am done. (Eight reports to write in total.) But still!

Ah, I'll finish the report tomorrow. In the meantime, I'm going to look for more shows to watch.