Word of the day: "opprobrium"

Every morning, I go through a charming little ritual during my pre-work smoke break. See, the place I work has a trolley in the corridor stacked with mugs and a couple of kettles of excessively sweet, condensed-cream saturated tea, coffee and chinese tea. A corporate charlady ensures these refreshments are miraculously ready and hot at certain times of day(morning, lunch, evening), so that us caffeine-overdosed executives can go about our daily routine of helping the obscenely wealthy become obscenely wealthier.

In the interests of hygiene, the company doesn't provide mugs. Rather, we staff bring our own mugs, dump them in the trolley, pick them up during tea-breaks, and leave them there to be washed. Initially, I suffered some confusion over this system - I thought the company was trying to be artistic and boost morale by providing a diverse range of drinkware. Or that it was some subtle psychological trick to help foster the illusion of free will and autonomy (hmm.. today shall I choose the green Kermit mug, or the one with the sunflowers?) Eventually when I figured things out, I resignedly had to pick a mug of my own to be permanently stationed there.

The insanity deepened, however, when I foolishly chose a Suntec City mug of average height and girth, with a fairly non-descript logo on the face. This was because I felt paranoid leaving my two favourite mugs to public view (one with Chinese calligraphy on it; a present from my biological father back when present-giving was still a thing our family did, the other a plain black mug that has no distinguishing feature other than having used it for almost ten years). The only other alternative was a massive pewter stein with an elaborate frieze of a dragon embossed on it - a biazarre New Years' trinket from days of yore.

Now, a chameleonic mug simply means that every morning, I have to spend an inordinate amount of time searching for my indistinguishable mug amongst 50 other indistinguishable mugs! It doesn't help that the mugs are stacked across two levels of the trolley - and while this whole episode sounds rather banal, it's highly embarrassing to be seen squatting in a corridor, fumbling around upturned mugs.

"I am not wasting one more minute of my life on prayer."

Andrew: will reserve judgement to private conversation, for a change. Besides, coming from a tradition of no moral fiber, I think you can guess what my answer would be be.

Also, a certain level of depression is good for building self-awareness and rounding out a person's character. Take me for instance, I would say that constant bipolar depression has built me into the mature, centered human being you see today. Oh wait...

Don't take it too personally - when life gives you lemons, grab tequilas and mix a margarita. A sense of humour is what's important in today's world. Failing that, try an utter disregard for the opinions of others. Those qualities are essential to sane living in today's world.

"The Associate"-y thing is to mindlessly channel appropriate quotes.

The attraction of blog is starting to pale again. I mean, it's a good(or should I say, only) proxy for the social life I don't have, or the conversations I can't make. But that notwithstanding, the first flush of writing again - however bloatedly and badly done - fades, as it always does, replaced by the faintly amused sense of.. pointlesness. I mean, it's nice to be part of a dialogue. It helps to keep the mind active by narrating trivial affairs that no one cares about on a page that no one really reads (other than those disappointed wanderers who were looking for Shuqi porn). It helps assuage boredom and loneliness a little bit by feeling part of a (sort of) community. I like using words too - however hamfistedly -they're all I've ever had. But upon greater reflection, it also highlights just how alienated one really is from the "real world" when one's primary source of social and cohesive interaction is through the masturbatory use of bad juvenilia depicting the sianness of one's daily life. Which again begs the hypocrisy - if I find it so distasteful, why do I keep coming back to it?

Don't have any answers.

Everytime I make a Lifestyle Decision - ie. stop going online; watch more porn, play more games, do more work, read more books, moratorium on digitalia and emphasis on cilia - I find myself drawn inevitably back to the tenuous world of interactions forged in a text-based environment. And each time after I go in, it leaves me feeling - contaminated, unfulfilled (the few real friendships I've managed to build notwithstanding). Go off? Stay on? Back and forth, back and forth. Fading attention span, replaced by sudden burst of newfound enthusiasm, and fade. Rinse, repeat and wash.

It's terribly possible to be pathetic and be aware of it, but still be too weak-willed to do anything about it.

The problem with not having an adolescence is that when you reach (sort-of) adulthood, you wonder where adolescence went, and while you're glad you skipped some of the more irritating rites of passage, you wonder what the hell took its place? After all, if what we are as mature humans is defined by our experiences and growth as immature humans; what happens if you skipped a few beats? At this stage - I really have none of the trappings of a life most people in my position should have - money, photo albums, CD collections, trinkets, phone numbers - and worst of all, memories that aren't burnt by years of vicious, reflexive repression. Memories of having roots, of having a place, time, ideal or family to belong to. Memories of friendships and lost loves. All I get are vague recollections which I keep damping down with alcohol, tobacco, and constant self-indulgence. All I keep is, to use that hideous cliche, "running from my past." Adrift with no resources, allies, memories, or friends - only an unrelenting sense of all that's wrong with this world. *insert Wagnerian melodrama soundtrack from The Flying Dutchman*

So I guess for the next few days I'll try to finish up Neverwinter Nights, get some work done, read a few new books I bought, maybe even go out for a meatspace drink in meatspace time with meatspace friends. And stay offline. Mood may shift then, and then I will hypocritically denounce the above act of weakness. I may even be embarrassed enough, post-angstus, to elide this post out, despite my own strong feelings about any form of censorship, even of oneself.

But maybe not. It's hard to be a personality with decisions when all you are is this - bitchy, whiny lack of anything more profound than immediate gratification. Moods may change. I may have something to write. Something to do. It may even, God forbid, be something interesting for a change. Something funny, readable, voyeuristic. Both to me, and the others around me. Something a little less hypocritical than self-indulgence in the kind of blather I gleefully condemn and indulge in equal measure. I doubt it.

Okay, okay, Gabriel, I *know* I promised I wouldn't get on this kind of vein, but hey, self-indulgence, right? Humiliating, but necessary.

"Can't remember to forget you."