RACONTEUR-ESQUE SCRIBBLINGS

The good news is, I now know what catenative verbs are... As for the bad news, my initial amusement towards a certain title in an online paper seems to have disappeared. (see picture below)    It happens all the time, you see something *interesting, and you make a mental note... " I shall blog about that" . And you do. In my case, I click the Blogger button at the bottom of my sidebar, which then takes me to the dashboard, and I proceed to create a new post and happily type into it. For this post, I needed to print screen (lovely feature, I must add) the site I was on.  You see, something about a hurricane avoiding oil rigs tickled my funny bone. Now, I've always used the word 'avoid' in the context where the act is done on purpose. You avoid someone, or you avoid going to a certain place because it gives you diarrhea. But you can't really picture a hurricane avoiding oil rigs. In my mind, it looks like a particular thunderstorm cloud, with rain pouring in...

And probably in the wrong time... I made a sudden decision some time ago to register with an online job search service in order to look for some freelance and part time writing gigs. It was a tough process determining what category to put myself into - should I look for something technical, or try out editing, etc, but I made it as wide ranged as possible, because at the end of the day, it would be me who filters through the vacancies to choose what to apply for. I got the first ever job notification a few hours ago - and they're apparently looking for an assistant editor (hardly looks freelance or part time to me), but here's the catch... It's for the Chinese Language Edition of the Magazine. And I don't even speak the language. Oh well, I'm sure others will surface soon enough :)

No... I'm not talking about spam in the tin. I got this in my mobile phone message inbox the other day, and figured why not have some fun with it. And just to make it clear on why I'm calling it spam... it's because this is the second message I received from the same number. "Em quen roi! the ah gap luc nao ah noi cho em mot vai thi du de em de nho ra hon co dc kg ah?" The strangest part of all is that it was sent via a local number, and it actually got me thinking if there are any foreign workers of Vietnamese origin hereabouts. Or could it be a distressed Vietnamese bride seeking help? I mean what are the odds of you receiving a message from a foreigner (whom I'm assuming to be Vietnamese but I could be wrong!) And yeah, sympathies to the sender, a question was asked but there was no reply. Translations, anyone?

It's just a few days past 3 months since I breathed a sigh of relief that my attempt to learn a new language has come to a close. I sat for a nerve-wrecking examination that lasted for like what felt like forever, and missed out on a friend's important day because of clashing schedules, and stopped my NaNoWriMo novel at 32000 words to study! Anyway, the exam was fast forgotten, what with the mad rush to get other things finished and general mundane stuff such as work and all... until one day a paper with a few of our names was passed around, seeking our opinion on taking further classes, to upgrade our level from 4 to 3 (it's backwards, I know) I nonchalantly crossed the space next to my name... No way am I gonna put myself through that torturous process again. Yeah, so, the results came out the other day (Thursday) and it was opened by the people at work! What embarrassment! However, I suppose after all the good luck wishes that I received from you all, I kinda need ...

It was a pledge by 20 odd students. No skipping classes, no dropping the subject. Full commitment required. Not too bad a deal if you look at it logically... But all logic begins to crumble to dust. There was a unanimous decision to get rid of the self absorbed, arrogant snob whom they had not much of a choice but to face for four hours weekly. Get themselves called stupid, and having to listen to how great he is at golf, or how his students at a local university score the best scores in the external exams. Have him stand by their sides during tests, reading their answers as they write, and giving sudden announcements as to answer so and so of person so and so is wrong... please correct it, followed by an elaborate attempt to help the poor unfortunate soul who had most probably lost everything they had crammed into their heads the previous day. There were promises that things were bound to be better. So, armed with thoughts that the silver lining from the dark and stormy clouds wer...