i just came back from town with my family, and i feel somewhat satisfied after a rather (relative word used) fruitful shopping trip... to kinokuniya and borders. that of course, was capitalising on the 20% storewide sale that kino had and the vouchers that we had for borders and the 15% as well. was a bit pissed because i was led on by my parents to believe they were in a generous mood, but i still managed to get quite a bit of stuff. my father was telling me how he'd increase the money alloted to me if i'd reach the entrance by a certain time. i felt like i was in one of those gameshows that were on TV when i was a kid, where people rushed through the supermarket in a minute grabbing as much as they could and everything that they could get within that time would be theirs for keeps. really requires precise thinking and a clear, focussed mind. such is the training of a skilled shopper. hahaha. whatever.

i bought 5 books, that cost slightly more than 60 dollars. and here is the list.

The Catcher in The Rye, JD Salinger
The Virgin Suicides, Jeffrey Eugenides
Sophie's World, Jostein Gaarder
The Picture of Dorian Gray and Three Stories, Oscar Wilde
The Plays of Oscar Wilde, Oscar Wilde

(after re-reading that list which i made without thinking i realise that it's in authorial alphabetical order! how coincidentally cool!! i didn't even mean for it to be that way!!!) (just realised after further thought that that was the exact order which i took them off the shelves)

now compare that with what my brother procured. (which btw, are all in comic form. wait. as if they could even be taken seriously in prose.)

Pokemon: The Electric Tale of Pikachu! Book 3, Toshihiro Ono (or some other Japanese man/woman/geisha)
Pokemon: The Electric Tale of Pikachu! Book 4, Toshihiro Ono
The Celestial Zone: Spirit Sword - Xue Xinling (Book 9), Wee Tian Beng
The Celestial Zone: Lethal Blood Transmutation (Book 10), Wee Tian Beng

i find it such a horrendous waste of money. money that i could have spent to buy more worthwhile books! omg. ridiculous. he's sec one and he's still indulging in such.... puerile........... things. i'm pissed that i had to share the voucher with him. ugh.

and he was giggling at the word "virgin". ok, that's excusable cos he's sec one but please! get a grip on yourself. and he mumbled something which only i heard, "not as if you are a virgin or suicidal". fuck, how stupid can you get. for one, it's not a bloody self-help or how-to or DIY book. and for two, it's damned fiction. and for three, the V word isn't exclusive to just the female sex. idiot.

my mom said i bought high-brow books, which i suppose is true. but they are bestsellers, and/or acclaimed books. she asked if those were in my reading booklist. what is wrong with wanting to read more literary stuff, that are probably more interesting than those in the syllabus? *coughsilascoughcoughmarner* ? at least she didn't laugh at me. -shrugs-

i like shopping with my parents. because it saves me money. but the endless questioning and advice that they bombard me with is the price i have to pay for that. that, and the censorship. i am glad that my father did not make any snide remark. imagine if i had bought bitch, porno, middlesex, or lolita. i would never hear the end of it.

hmm. i think that the old adage of money being the root of all evil should be revised. to me, it's jealousy. think about it. money can be a sub-heading under jealousy but not vice versa. it could, but you'd be pushing it. as someone once said, "the only reason why someone would hate you is because they are jealous of you". people want to be like others. have whatever they have. be it money, talent, looks, etc. and with that they become jealous of them. and jealousy leads on to anger. anger leads on to hate. hate leads on to.. whatever it was that yoda (it was him, right?) said it would lead to.

i think unconsciously hypocritical statements should be consciously removed. don't make promises if you're going to break them anyway through things such as procrastination, sloth etc. it really makes you lose credibility in other people's eyes. if you're not going to take the effort to achieve whatever you want, then don't spout or spill out lines about wanting "this or that". keep them all to yourself.

hrrmm. i used to say that terrible english is a turnoff. but it is not something that someone can help, due to cultural upbringing for example, or even race which science has proven develops into different tongue lengths suitable for different languages in different ethnicities. what, however, is inexcusable- is stupidity. or daftness. that whenever something higher flies over a person's head they just shrug it off, or worse still mock it, thinking it cannot exist in their puny little trapped mind. call me an intellectual snob then. i'm not denying charges. i think the attitude is important too. it influences the degree of disgust that i carry.

i mean, if people can look down on me for not being athletically blessed, or musically talented, why can i not do the same? human rights and prerogative of the human race, is it not? but then again, that's all a paradox. the various ideals that people champion all contradict each other. how can you practise ethics and morality in conjuction with human rights and free will? it just cannot work. i believe there's some kind of moral code that we should live by, but it is not the current one at status quo. in fact, human rights is just a cheap shield which many people use to justify their hideous acts.

anyway, enough philosophising (aka bullshitting or ranting). do not watch THE VILLAGE if you are planning to catch a horror film. the advertising does not do the film justice. to call it a red herring would be the most appropriate description. highly boring, with sudden moments of sharp spikes (both literally and figuratively). hauntingly beautiful background string music (good to see they creditted the musician in the credits). adrien brody's portrayal of a cuckoo is commendable, as well as one of the saving graces of the work of a filmmaker who's fallen from grace. i thought the monster was hilarious, a mutant wolf from the faerie tale with porcupine spikes wearing Red Riding Hood's coat. yes, it featured many themes worth exploring yet not delved into deep enough. however, i felt that the show took too many irrelevant detours. excellent cinematography though. haha. and i told off a gaggle of giggly girls behind us. telling them to "shut up", because they were irritating and trivialising everything. noisy creatures. i think i was a bit too harsh, but too bad. that's also the first time i've ever been rude in public. haha. one "good" turn deserves another!

had a weird, gross dream last night that freaked me out. shall not expound on it any longer besides the fact that such a thing would never happen in real life, and i don't want it to either! i believe dreams are symbolic and not literal so it's not that bad. as hadri said, "yucks of all people" and woochiao said "what a terrible dream". man.. ugh!!

bahhh. i'm really missing you. and all of you. i want it all back. days and hours that slip away from the fingers too quickly. tides of time that wash the footprints in the sand away before you know it. "i love you" messages scrawled onto the grains, obliterated mere minutes after they are uttered.

quixoticka eulogized @ 4:05:00 pm