The story of the VAP

Yesterday, I went to watch 2046 with Wayne, despite us both having so much work to do. It was... depressing, something like tragic all wound up and contained in every bit of the 130 minutes. Some bits make you go "huh??" as is typical of WKW films but then you watch the whole thing, and you remember his other films and you think about the way he usually says what he wants to say and then it's "hmm...." and then it's "oh." Heh. :P

But that's not exactly the point of this post.

We always read about it in the papers or magazines - there are increasing numbers of Singaporeans who are closet cases of depression, anger etc, complete with statistics and what not. Then it happens to you in real life and that's nothing like what you read at all.

I was at the food court at Plaza queuing for food and there was this guy who was one person ahead of me in the queue. When he got his 2 bowls of soup, he complained that the soup came with the little pieces of fried onions and pieces of spring onions when he specifically asked for none. So the shopkeepers took out the bowl and offered to change it. While he was waiting, the girl after him got her order in the meantime and left. So I moved up the queue (on his right) and reached across him (on his left) to get a tray while waiting for my food. He looked at me and said something like "Hey I was fucking here first ok?" I froze and thought, "What did I do?" And then I realised he was one of those VAP - very angry people. He was very unhappy that his soup had onions in it, even more unhappy that other people after him were getting their food while he, being first, was still waiting. So at this point, he promptly asked the shopkeeper, "I'm going to get mine first right?" Yes, he eventually got his order before me but it came back with the spring onions (in Chinese, the same word can apply to both the brown and green stuff). He got tired of waiting again, so he just left with his orders. 2 seconds later, his girlfriend came back with the bowl and demanded the spring onions be taken and he followed right behind saying that there was a strand of hair in his bowl and demanded his money back, saying that he wasn't going to eat there anymore and walked off in a huff, girlfriend hot on his heels.

I told Wayne when I got back to the table and one of the first things he said, "Why are you always getting into this kind of situations?" *bewildered grin* I wonder why myself actually. Oh well.

THE END.

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Your Husband Generator by Lady_Galadriel
Name
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You Met	in a fish and chip shop
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Time seems to have stopped. It is 5 and evening approaches, casting everything in the sleepy shadow of the dying afternoon sun. I am sitting in the honours room, at a grey-coloured table surrounded by white-washed walls. Here, even the air is still.

it's all quiet...almost.

I've only about 24 hours or so to complete a 20-page essay on realism and state behaviour, officially due on Friday. Two hours ago, I started doing my readings for the paper. Reason: I had a public policy paper to do that is due later today, Thursday, one day before said realism paper is scheduled to be handed in. Policy paper is finished. That, on its own, is historically unprecedented by the way. As an unfortunate result, Realism paper is nowhere close to materialising. Not even a hint or a whiff or the slightest, vaguest, haziest notion. Nopers.

I sit here and think to myself, I should be panicking. I should be freaking out. I should be feeling abnormally high levels of anxiety, like I usually do in such situations. All the more since I'd asked Benny for an extension, swallowing my pride and being as pathetic as I can imagine myself to be short of literally grovelling on the floor, and was very politely rejected. The pain.

But instead, I feel strangely calm. Like the calm before a storm.

Edit at 2:37am: SirR who has almost finished his realism paper (he was on page 21 the last we talked 20 minutes ago and he was cursing over what he thinks to be 21 pages of rubbish...) keeps calling me to ask for my opinions regarding what he's written. I find the intense irony of this scenario superbly funny.

Edit at 2:09pm: I refuse to panic. I must not panic even when there are people who try to tell me I should. I must not give in to undue anxiety even though I have every reason to, given my current predicament. I must not allow the words of those who are done with their paper to send me into a frenzy. I must simply...keep on reading. God help me.

There is life in the strangest places.

Sunset over Kent Ridge.

This is the way things will look for me this week.

It hurts so much.

the long ride home...

I guess I asked for it.

It's 7:18pm and I'm in the library with the silence and my books, and the same thought of what happened today running through my head. For many reasons, I feel completely alone. It gets to a point where you are the only one who can help yourself and nobody really knows what to say that they haven't already said to you or that isn't obvious. On everybody's part, there is nothing more to say.

What am I looking for anyway? Advice? Reassurance? A hug? To know that there are people who love me despite who I am and what I'd done, and would protect me from these hateful bastards? All of the above maybe. Maybe I want someone to be there with me, in the darkness of my guilt and shame and the awful memories, to hold my hand and tell me it's ok. But that's not really possible. Does God know what's going on? Of course He does and I know He loves me but I just can't bring myself to believe it. And I cannot see or feel His presence. I just feels...empty.

I hate you and what you and those people are trying to do to me and my life. I hate all of you bastards. Leave me alone! What do you want from me? You want to humiliate me and try to take away my dignity? It's already working. Make me feel bad to pay for what I'd done? It's already working! So leave me alone! I hate you and who I was those 2 months. Get away from me and my life!

Nothing like the real thing.

I just heard Sheryl Crow's version of Sweet Child of Mine on the radio. She has successfully turned one of the most famous rock songs this half of the century into a country number. Don't get me wrong, I respect the woman and her music. But sometimes, some songs, there just ain't nothing but the real thing.

Sometimes I get a craving for something. Sometimes it’s strong enough that I go right out there and get it, whatever it is. Sometimes it isn’t quite intense enough and then the deliberation begins and goes on for a few moments, a couple of days. Is it worth paying the price it costs to satiate my desire at the level that it’s at? On occasion, the craving grows over the thinking process. Then it comes to this. It crosses a point where it no longer matters how much value I’m getting for the money I’m paying. That’s how I ended up with a precious box of Post Maple Nut Crunch cereal, which I held protectively in my arms as I made my way home today.