book bitching

book bitching

Apr. 29, 2006, 11:17 am

went on lousy-book therapy yesterday, borrowing 4 good books from the library and spending an entire day in bed in their company, with chocolate to boot. lousy-book therapy is when you've spent an entire week reading shit books and you need to reverse the damage and restore the pleasures of reading again... to celebrate the postponement of my exams i thought i'd like a light read, a fluffy treat of sorts, so i thought i'd give chick lit a go. got olivia joules by helen fielding (author of bridget jones) off of sunny, and it was so abysmal i couldn't get past the fourth chapter. it was poorly-thought, superficial, annoying and most of all ludicrous. heroine is a working-class girl made good, who attends a glitzy skin cream launch party and suspects one of the schmoozers wining and womanising there to be osama bin laden after plastic surgery. the plot reminds me of something the sec 2 st. gabriel's boys would have churned out in the essays they wrote me whilst i was teaching them, right down to the osama bin laden having plastic surgery bit (osama was always a favourite character in their stories).

so olivia joules was tossed aside with a snort, and then i started another one called never change by elizabeth berg, author of an apparently very good book (according to fauziah) called open house. anyway. never change was the straw which broke the camel's back and sent me running out to the library to immediately begin my lousy-book therapy. nurse in her fifties finds herself caring for her high-school crush who has a brain tumour. they fall in love, and she cannot believe her luck. he decides to kill himself before the tumour takes hold of him and alters his behaviour and abilities. what this book needed was a different cover, one with the title in silly cursive fonts, a soft flowery background and some uninspired painting plastered across it, like those dreadful paperbacks you find housewives borrowing from toa payoh library. with a cover like that, i wouldnt have been fooled and misled into reading it. misrepresentation, i say!! there's no disguising an insipid weepy farce of a book once you've begun reading it. but do me a favour and publish it in classic trashy-paperback fashion, so i'll know immediately to steer clear of it.

ugh. need more therapy.

motorbike virginity

Apr. 26, 2006, 7:46 pm

just got back from my virgin motorbike ride, and it was fucking awesome... we went onto the ring road and did 120km/h on marissa (that's the name of the bike) and it was exhilarating! rolling green pastures on your left and right, the vast expanse of sky, the wind roaring past your ears and tearing into your skin, fingers numb from the cold, the bike humming beneath you-- your heart soars, and you've never felt quite so alive. was scared at first and i -so- have to learn to get on and off a bike gracefully (instead of heaving myself on and hoisting myself off-- not pretty, i can tell you. think my friend was trying not to laugh... it's a good thing he was facing forward and could only feel my indignity and not actually witness it) but once you've learned to trust the beast beneath you and its master, the fun begins. the first ten minutes were quite worrying, though... my friend had claw marks (yes, from my fingernails) on his nice leather jacket *sheepish grin*

and i want to do it again. over and over and over again.

immaturity

Apr. 22, 2006, 9:48 pm

when will i learn? so many mistakes have been made already. when will i become sensible? and why am i being so insensible in the first place?

in other words, when will i grow up?

in growing older i have become more jaded and cynical but i have gained none of the maturity, sensibility or discipline that comes with growing up.

and it scares me that i'm going to have to be taught a harsh, severe lesson in order for me to learn.

oh, to be sixteen again

Apr. 19, 2006, 3:59 pm

terrible, horrid day. 1 let-down, 2 punches in the stomach, 1 nasty reminder and loads of angst and inertia.

terminal sounds final, frightening and unreal. especially when i just randomly watched our class video yesterday, unaware of it all, and saw her on screen, exuberant, young, lovely. just like all of us were. we were sixteen, we laughed, we chattered, we goofed off, broke the rules, we studied, we played, we lived, we were invincible. and then this morning the news. it feels strange. but we were all so young. but we are all so young. are we?

i won't pretend we've stayed in touch; rgs came to an end, 406 dissolved and we moved on. but still there's an incredible, inexplicable sense of grief i feel-- as well as an overwhelming admiration for her bravery, her maturity, her stoicism.

fight on.

guilt

Apr. 15, 2006, 1:12 pm

last night i dreamt of you, i dreamt that i was so sorry and i yearned to make it up to you, to make it up with you. but you were crying, and then i realised that i'd hurt you enough.

and i woke up with a heavy heart, because guilt is a leaden weight.

i do miss you still, and if only you knew it did upset me as well, despite my rather callous handling of everything. and everyday i beat down the demons of guilt and regret.

i'd like you to smile for me, because that would assuage the guilt i feel. and it'd be nice to know that you're happy.

dosed

Apr. 14, 2006, 10:53 am

I got dosed by you and
Closer than most to you and
What am I supposed to do
Take it away I never had it anyway
Take it away and everything will be okay
In you a star is born and
You cut a perfect form and
Someone forever warm
Lay on lay on lay on lay on
Lay on lay on lay on lay on
Way upon the mountain where she died
All I ever wanted was your life
Deep inside the canyon I can't hide
All I ever wanted was your life
Show love with no remorse and
Climb on to your seahorse and
This ride is right on course
This is the way I wanted it to be with you
This is the way that I knew that it would be with you
Lay on lay on lay on lay on
Lay on lay on lay on lay on
Way upon the mountain where she died
All I ever wanted was your life
Deep inside the canyon I can't hide
All I ever wanted was your life
I got dosed by you and
Closer than most to you and
What am I supposed to do
Take it away I never had it anyway
Take it away and everything will be okay
Way upon the mountain where she died
All I ever wanted was your life
Deep inside the canyon I can't hide
All I ever wanted was your life

you can always count on the red hot chili peppers when you're fucked.

nuanced at 11:17 am

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