Results for Sem 3

Yay! i got 3.86! improved by 0.06. haha. slim victory. but still good, much better than i had expected (3.5).

Results:
Dosage form design: B-
Pharm Law: B+
Pharmstats: A-
Principles Econs: A-
Samurai/Geisha: S

cap for this sem: 4.0

not too bad i think... better than last sem.. 3.5. think last sem i was dreaming.

well i've been diligently asking around and discovering that most of the people i know have CAP scores in the >4 range. which is, good for them! haha.

really screwed up DFD. ha. well on that day had a super major aura which like left me incapicitated for the last 15-30 minutes. (that aside, well i think i get enough rest and time the previous day to memo a lot, so well....)

getting old. haha. losing the will to fight. i hope i still retain some of that will before i get my degree...

i was thinking, maybe if i could get a good-paying job as a regular pharmacist, then get nestled away in a quiet corner of Singapore looking after a pharmacy or some desk job in some company, well, that wouldn't be too bad after all...

...looking after kids in a family. letting each day pass by... seeing them grow up.. like my father did all these years. all along, its been me, me, me and never anyone else. when u really learn to care and share... maybe personal glory doesn't seem so great after all.

Labels: ramblings

On the first day of Christmas

... my true love gave to me... a hot bowl of chawanmushi.

Allow yourself to Grieve

Taken from: "How to Heal your Heart" by Elizabeth Hickey, MSW

For a friend.

There are five stages of grief that most people go through when suffering a significant loss: denial, anger, bargaining, sadness/depression, and acceptance. Become familiar with the stages as a reminder that your emotions and thoughts are not abnormal, but are, in fact, healthy and normal. Even cycling back in the progression is to be expected. From one person: "I noticed that it was possible to go through the entire process in one day, and then start over again the next day. I would start out each morning in 'denial,' the first stage, and by the end of the day, I would have reached 'acceptance' again."

Stage One: Denial
This is only a mid-life crisis. He's going to come to his senses soon. I just need to be supportive and allow him freedom to go through this phase. After all, this is outlined in books. It's a predictable life stage! Give him space.

Stage Two: Anger
How could he be so cruel? I have been patient and supportive, only to be rejected. He doesn't deserve to be happy after what he did to me. And I will make sure he is never happy again.

Stage Three: Bargaining
Okay, maybe I haven't been compromising enough or attentive to his interests and needs. He always wanted more companionship and I was always too busy with my projects. I'll take up fly-fishing and plan some romantic times together. That will get things back on track.

Stage Four: Sadness/Depression I called to tell him I had made some special plans for us. He is not interested. "I'm sorry. It's too late," he says. I feel so sad, so alone.

Stage Five: Acceptance It hasn't been easy, but I do understand that things were not great between us for a long time. He seems more at peace with himself now, and my heart still loves his heart. He's a good person and I want him to be happy. I can't make him feel happy with me. I don't want him to be with me unless he means it. And the truth is, he doesn't mean it.I don't feel secure... At this point I feel a sense of relief that he initiated the changes that are going to move us both ahead. I have faith in the future, and I am actually excited to see what may be in store for me.

Resist the Desire for Revenge
Going through a breakup floods you with some of the most intense emotions you may ever feel. The intensity of these emotions can cause you to react in ways that you never considered yourself capable of -- and which you may later regret. During the times of greatest stress, you will find it difficult to sort out choices in your best interest for future happiness from those motivated by a strong natural impulse for revenge.
In the interest of healing your heart, talk to yourself about how you are feeling. The more aware you are of your emotions, the clearer you become about your motives. It is much easier to make wise choices when you are clear about your feelings and motives.
At one point near the end of our relationship, I was filled with a strong rage at my boyfriend. I had several almost irresistible opportunities to exact revenge and hurt him back. I understood the phrase "sweet revenge" as never before.
But I chose not to react. For one thing, I didn't want to be known as a vengeful person. But it was not easy. I had to remind myself of who I was and how I wanted to be remembered.
Remind yourself of who you are when you are in a vulnerable emotional state. Take steps so that you don't compromise your future and live with regrets.

Be Open to the Chance to Fly Solo Again Being in a relationship alters your identity, blending it with another's. Both partners make compromises and assume new personality characteristics to balance the relationship. When that melded identity is dissolved, you need time to rediscover who you are now as an unalloyed, independent self. Give yourself a chance to grow accustomed to the new you.
Beware of dragging old baggage with you into a new relationship. Now is your chance to sort it out. Decide what interaction patterns or personality traits may have impacted your last relationship. Change the things you don't like, and avoid bouncing into a new relationship too soon. Above all, give yourself time to heal.
Equally important, treasure what's good about yourself. Now is the time to identify strengths and traits that perhaps were not valued by your partner. Possibly you love to ski, or read novels, or hike, but always felt guilty because your partner considered that activity a waste of time and resources. What parts of yourself have remained dormant or self-censured for the sake of other goals? Let your next most important new relationship be with your Self.
Many social functions not only include couples but are also structured around couple activities. If you are not at ease in that setting yet, don't accept well-intentioned invitations to couples' functions. Take time to become comfortable hanging out with yourself. Get back into enjoying your own company.
When your feelings are surfacing, write them down. Let them flow. If your feelings are conflicted, let the different parts of yourself argue it out with each other. Don't worry about being consistent. Don't worry about how you should feel. Find out what you do feel in all its contradictory richness. Scribble over each line or tear the paper to bits when you are finished. You want to release the feelings, not re-read and recycle them.
Scream into a pillow.
Escape into the movies and the relief of caring how someone else's story will turn out.
Sing songs matching your feelings. Read poetry.
Attend sporting events.
Learn to ask for what you need. Perhaps you need some time alone -- or even time-out so you can calm down! Make your needs known.
Renew your connection with the earth -- desert, lake, mountain, ocean, even a city park. Spend some time alone, even if you go with friends.
Apologize to your friends about any pain you may feel you have caused them: "I'm sorry I've been so grouchy. It's not your fault."
Practice deep and slow breathing. Use sighs and stretching to let go of stress.
Daydream about being in your favorite place with your favorite people.
Commit to an exercise program tailored to your lifestyle and needs. Brisk walking is as good as a run. Being physically fit helps you feel and be emotionally resilient. A good workout also helps you let go of anger and anxiety.
Make a list of all your interests and a wish list of things you would like to do. Prioritize and begin. Walk, swim, kick or throw a ball. Run, dance, jump on a trampoline. Go to bed sweaty and exhausted instead of teary and sleepless.

As time went on, I realized that I still loved him, for the person he is. Even though I no longer want our relationship, I can appreciate his kindness, his love for nature, his sense of humour. He is a person with character flaws like the rest of us. I can focus on his goodness, which will benefit my daughter, him, and myself; or I can focus on his faults, which will only hurt us all. Harboring bitterness and anger at others or yourself catches you up in the double-stranded nets of guilt and blaming.
Start by forgiving yourself -- for not seeing it coming, if nothing else. Then extend the circle as you can. You will regain your balance and forward momentum as you stop berating yourself for the past. Your new task is to be open to the future and the possibilities it holds for you.

Recipe: Filling breakfast before flight

Wanna make your loved ones a nice filling breakfast before he or she flies off to another country? Better still, have a last minute meal together? Try this:

Ingredients:
1 loaf foccacia bread (alt. hamburger buns)
1 tin tuna mayo
2-3 fried eggs
1-2 tomatoes, sliced thinly
a few pieces of lettuce

also: fish fingers, chicken breast fillet, potato cutlets

all your ingredients can be got from NTUC Fairprice the day before!

Method:
slice the foccacia bread a la Subway style
toast if u like (but i didn't.)
put the lettuce as a base, then the tomatoes
then put the eggs
then spread the mayo on top of everything
double-wrap everything
cut into 4 pieces
double-wrap every piece
pack and go.

makes enough for two guys, four girls or two couples. =)

Honey or Saccharin?

On the topic on flavourings, my DFD lecturer Prof Chan said thus:

Honey is a natural sweetener, saccharin is an artificial sweetener.
Most people call their other half "honey". But no one calls "saccharin". Why?

Saccharin is sweeter than honey, but it leaves a strongly bitter aftertaste. Hence if you call your better half "saccharine"... you'd probably get a slap in return.

***

I'm really so scared that i'll be like saccharine - extremely sweet, sweeter than normal in the beginning, then give a strong bitter aftertaste.

I still think everything's proceeding too fast. This past week was such a nice dream, from monday when it was agreed, tuesday at the library and the beach, calling and smsing during the camp, bought shoes on saturday with concert and friends, sunday at settlers.. it is just too good to be a dream.

And when will this dream end? I really dread the day when it does.

Honeied Moon

Well...
Maybe it's going on too fast? Everything still seems like a dream...
But it is not a dream...

***

Traditional Scorpio traits

Determined and forceful
Emotional and intuitive
Powerful and passionate
Exciting and magnetic

Damn.. make me seem like a mini-nuclear power plant.

BUT

Jealous and resentful
Compulsive and obsessive
Secretive and obstinate

Guess what's my fave colour? green. =p

Traditional XXXXXX traits

Adaptable and versatile
Communicative and witty
Intellectual and eloquent
Youthful and lively

Sounds like supercritical fluid mixed with nitric oxide.

Nervous and tense
Superficial and inconsistent
Cunning and inquisitive

Cunning?? haha...

Xperience Pharmacy Camp (con't)

organised by ppac, nusps. duration: 11th dry run, 13-15 the actual camp.
role: games IC.

14th December
quite free today, woke up with niron (slept with him, haha!!) then back to dispensing for one more time of demonstrations. luckily, can fit the capsule in this time. did i? haha. didn't get the paste i wanted but still a bit more experienced. went to check on my group. heard they aced the DFD labs! proud.

more boring talks up ahead then was lunch. ok this time talked a bit more than yesterday (nil). basically when you have a "leader", you tend to open up a bit. people like dawn (focc 05, hooga), sean (focc 06, ahnehkin). the leader in this case was quite nice-looking gal from HC, meng tian. ok after lunch, zoomed off to SGH. we were showed around by this pharmacist from SGH, some of the places that even doctors don't wanna go to. pharmacies, main and satellite, storage areas, laboratories. basically nothing very interesting to the campers as they are JC students, but very interesting for me, lisa, and laynee cos we were just out of year 2 and it's quite nice to see what we learnt put into action. well, a bit. saw this nice gemini bear, wanted to buy but didn't have enough time.

after that it was prep for game of life. it was great, basically it works like station games with choice. you are XXX, you have so much $, u can get education, work, do illegal stuff like casino, or buy stocks, wives, cars, etc to earn points and etc. basically i think, if u have such a game which allows 120 crazy JC students to run around like freaks as if they really have 80 minutes to live....... it's fun. just let them run around, don't care what they do.

at night... supper with the CG. not much talking either, mostly me and lisa. i think we're really getting close together (are you reading this =p?? hehe). i'm not very good at entertaining in a group, but we went to fong seng for prata (we could really have ordered macs and went to satellite carpark and watch the meteor shower that was apparently coming at 1am). found out that some really wanted to come pharm, some didn't but well it's ok.. think they were a bit tired and retired early; walked the long way back to pgp where we stayed. it feels so much like hall days again, where we make pilgrimages to fong seng to satisfy our hungry stomachs (and to talk cock).

December 15th
more talks in the morning. boring. though this is information that i will probably see in the next few sems...

lunch. i will not comment on how much they talked...

joined them for the patient counselling and the medical health screening workshops. think the former was fun, the latter a marketing gimmick. for the patient counseling, they had to counsel this patient who has cough, like a pharmacist (deja vu? i think i dry-runed the workshop for xinyi before, haha). think they had some fun here cos they chose to present a skit with cross-dressing, and i think they must've not seen this before in their various JCs, and probably thought it was damn hilarious or something. well, me too.

anyway, along the way i think i got them semi-hooked on bridge or something, i think it was during breakfast. bridge, as we have all suspected, bonds people together, as the name suggests, regardless of whatever JC you come from.

then the health screening workshop, basically it was urine dipstick and 3 glucometer tests, no one had to piss for the urine so it wasn't very fun but then everyone had a prick on the glucometer, including me. still negative. whew~ lisa left before the glucometers could get her, haha.

left LT32 and its glucometers before reaching LT25 for the "facilitation session". means, Time To Say Goodbye. well, in the midst of the picture taking and whatever speech that was made, we were still (omg) playing bridge. haha.... and when they announced that the group had got second prize.. we were still (guess) playing bridge. haha.. so much so that we had a 1.80 sec lag time that made it darn obvious that we were playing bridge. luckily we weren't bidding.

yup! and after all the speeches, everyone left... goodbye xperience pharmacy 2006.. i think me and lisa experienced pharmacy the most though. haha

Xperience Pharmacy Camp

organised by ppac, nusps. duration: 11th dry run, 13-15 the actual camp.
role: games IC.

12th December:
a day out at west coast park filling sand and buying items at jurong point. =)
met my sec sch friends for a late night dinner.
thought of icebreakers.

13th December:
reported at 0800, LT25. icebreakers was quite ok, since it was a last minute affair then i just whacked everything from last year's focc.. which was quite good. hmm. maybe can make into a pharmacy game. performed a banana dance. haha. should make a song out of it.

bananas of the world unite!
peel banana, peel peel banana (peel)
peel banana, peel peel banana
shake banana, shake shake banana (shake)
shake banana, shake shake banana

etc.slacked a bit with CG, joined them for lunch. think they're the quiet type cos i tried to crack some lame jokes and they didn't really reply. none of them made a sound during lunch. so sad.

joined them for know your drugs workshop before going as a demonstrator for xuefen's dispensing workshop. so malu!!!! we did capsules and inhalation. my hands keep shaking and i can't close the darn capsule after filling it!!! argh!!! then had to smoke my way through with "oh, hmm this needs skill, it is relatively hard to do" or some crap. well this needs skill, obviously i didn't show it. classical dispensing style. haha. then with inhalation i can't make the paste that should be formed in the manual, instead a soupy like mixture of light magnesium carbonate and menthol formed instead. oh did i mention, i got like C or F for that preparation in year 1?? haha.. was then told to grade their performance. i think, they should have graded my performance instead.

games at night: it rained. with lightning. so darn sien. but execute wet-weather plan. went to pgp to source for wet-weather ground. found it, so started preparing without dinner, without checking in. didn't prepare fast enough and well enough, think that got the boss pissed a bit. nvm~ anyway, got about 120 students squeezed into the table-tennis area of pgp, quite a crowd. to make it worse, the rain stopped, so we moved 2 games into the open. then it started again!!! so have to cancel these two games. sien. but then some joy came out of it: we had this chair-sitting game where u have to sit on chairs towards each other and play scissors-paper-stone and this captain ball game with legs tied. both scored well with the campers. well at least they had something good to look forward to, rather than totally slam the whole event... sigh. what a downpour.

shag night. msned her.. then went to sleep. left my hp in jw and xuefen's block kitchen, bummer.

tears of joy

oh my god i can't believe this is happening...?

The New Carebear Countdown

rofl

more timelines

just when i was beginning to feel bored.. torrents of work start gushing towards me...

30th Nov: Stats Paper. Celebrate.
1st Dec: Wasted a whole day, mostly looking through newspapers. Saw alot about the Philippine disaster (Typhoon Durian) victims.
2nd Dec: Wasted a whole day. Forgot what i did for today, probably nothing interesting.
Sien.

3rd Dec: Went to Queensway to zap books for mum. Went to ikea and started getting ideas about home design. Ha. Wanted to buy shoes. But the shoes all look so expensive and i dunno how to choose shoes. Felt a bit sien, it's the hols, it's the weekend, but no one can come out. wang's having exams. leo and ws studying. all pharm people mugging for exams.

4th Dec: Felt more sien. Did the following things:
1) went to collect 192 x toothbrushes from Lion Warehouse at Kallang Bahru.
2) Went to Gan Eng Seng Pri Sch to store the toothbrushes.
3) Traveled back to school, attempted to pick lock of emed cupboard but failed.
4) Went off to YIH. grabbed lin qun's cca card. Ate lunch. Queued up for medical checkup for an entire 1.5 hours for a 5 mins signing of yellow form.
5) Went back to Sci, got the digital camera.
6) Met jw, grace and cuiqin after their Singapore Film paper. Passed grace linqun's cca card.
7) Went to library to borrow 4 books, 2 of them are about cooking from the "dummies" series (i haven't touched them yet).
8) went back and re-discovered Civilization II, a game which i played during sec 1-2. Still fun.
Still, no shoes.
Sien.

5th Dec: Went to Gan Eng Seng Primary School (GESPS) for filming of Children's Society Camp (CSC) with cecilia and jason. I let them myself and them off early. HA. Then Civilization II.
Sien. No shoes.
6th Dec: More CSC camp with the entire exco. Had a day of rehearsal and dry runs with the GMs. More filming, taking of pictures. More Civilization II.
No shoes... Sien as usual.
7th Dec: CSC camp: Telematch (of which emed is fully in charge of): running around like a crazy boy boy taking pictures and filming boy boys and girl girls. Pure innocent fun. Love it.
At night, went to wang's place for a really good gathering.
Alright, not so sien... but still no shoes. haha.

8th Dec: Typing this thing.

Coming uP:
8th Dec:
- return videocamera
- nusps welfare meeting
- secret objective #1

9th Dec:
- teach brenda guitar
- go out with wang to sim lim (?)
- transfer data out of videorecording tapes.

10th Dec:
- meeting with eesang for pharm yep

11th Dec:
- briefing + dry run for pharmacy camp

12th Dec:
- pharm yep meeting at ps room

13th-15th Dec:
- experience pharmacy camp.

18th Dec:
- outing with non-pharm friends

19th-23th Dec:
- overseas trip

Children's Society Camp

organised by emed - 5th to 7th december

As part of the emed main comm, i think i should feel a bit glad that the credits are rolling in finally when the job was done but i didn't. maybe it's cos i simply played a very minor supportive role (advertising, taking pictures and video) in the process. think got to know the main comm people a bit better esp laynee. funny person, that one, sometimes super lame.

the kids were fine; there were about 110 kids from various pri schs. some were very hyperactive, climbing all over the place like monkeys, disobeying the camp counsellors (CGLs), refusing to play the games allocated and making a fool of us; there were also the quiet ones who would just blindly follow the rest of the crowd, and refuse to have a single picture taken. The CGLs (excluding xinyi) were from SMU and rest of Science. Some were quite chio! haha. but most of them were quite friendly, i think i should have their faces in the footage.

however, the camp itself was quite boring. talks, whatever. no wonder the hyperactive ones felt a bit stunted. think they had some fun with our games (it's the last day), esp the thrill of making fun of about 20-30 nus pharmacy students. kudos to all who came down as GMs. and of course xinyi, who loves kids i suppose, for completing the near-impossible task of being simultaneous guardian of 10 crazy kids and being my model for free (though i was more interested in her CGL companion, haha).

Seeing all these kids really made me feel like going back to the days of primary school where the teacher was authority and friends, quarrels, homework and learning became a huge part of your life. Where we refused to hold hands with people of the opposite sex and treated them as some sacred beings which to stay away from. Where days of ting xie, spelling and mental sums surfaced to mind. Were i one of the quiet ones? I see some of my primary school friends assuming the roles of some of the kids and i smile to myself.

Suddenly, everything becomes all so familiar to me again.

Anastacia - One Day In Your Life

i saw this one performed by a band at ikea on sat. all the other songs were shitty, but this one stood out. haha.

Shakespeare sketch

leo's recommendation

Beyond Paradise

Excellent.

Full Metal Jacket Drill Instructor

AND YOU MAGGOTS UNDERSTAND THAT??

SIR YES SIR!!!

I CAN'T HEAR YOU!!

(full metal jacket: full of vulgarities)

full metal classroom

haha.. this is for leonard. ladies please DON'T click on this. DONT. full of vulgarities

leo remember the script from full metal jacket? haha..

The stats paper

woke up on 1045 in the morn of 30th november, not feeling too good. yup it wasn't till noon that i continued revising for my pharm stats paper.

drank one cup of coffee, which was suspected to be the cause of what happens below...

hmm after lunch, i managed to drag myself through the rest of inferential statistics. by the time i reached ANOVA was about 3pm.

however, my hands were clearly shaking. my teeth was chattering away. resting heart beat about 90 bpm. not good. in layman's terms, i was quite high. it lasted all the way to 4pm. by that time, i was blindly pushing my way through linear regression. last topic, but i didn't get much in.

4:20. showered. still, no use. still high. 4:40: asked my mum to fetch me to school. very high.

along the way, it worsened. i thought about how badly i'm gonna screw up this paper, especially when i've screwed up a paper the day before, real badly. i think, to study and know your stuff damn well, and get denied good grades is totally horrible.

shit. why did i drink that cup of coffee? but dunno lei. during the early days of the exam (pharm law), it really did good. i feel that i can really memorize a lot! but haiz. drugs work someday, kills you the other. caffeine is a drug.

anyway, along the way to school, it was evening and so there were damn lot of shadows along the AYE.. as we were speeding along the way it was like a moving picture of shadows, flickering around at high frequency. and it got worse.

and, my mum was the only person around, she has to drive the car.. so i took this jar of methyl salicylate ointment and usually what she did was to dab some on the region below my nostrils. hmm. a less painful method would be to dissolve the ointment in some hot water to form an infusion where the vapors are inhaled. damn painful. for those of you who have used stuff like muscle rub, u know how it feels. worse. i tried to rub the thing away with my hand, then ended up using the same hand to brush away the tears that were streaming down. result: some of it got into my eyes. agony, man.

almost went NUH. but for some reason i felt better and asked my mum to send me to KRH (where we had the exam) instead. reached there, asked the guys for advice and they told me to report it to the invilgilators. I told them i had epilepsy and "wasn't feeling too good, is there anything that can be done". How dangerous these words might sound. Immediately they sort of understood and Dr Bong beckoned me to a chair, telling me to "calm down" and "it's ok, relax". I asked them if they could quarentine me for the moment.

Then they let the rest of the pharm cohort in. Probably they was wondering, why was i sitting there and not looking up. Anyway, soon the HQ replied with that phone call that caught Prof Chan in-between his pre-exam speech. Said they were moving me to another place for students who are unwell. I guess, more or less they have some medical team standby there. Dr Bong was to be my sole invilgilator. How shiok is that, i don't know.

About 15 minutes later the NUS van came and off we went to LT23. Did my papers about 20 minutes later than the rest. Actually by this time my hand-shaking and teeth-chattering had stopped and i was feeling much better, thank god, otherwise i will really screw this paper. Did according to plan - did the structured questions first, then the mcqs. Luckily, the structured questions were copied directly from the tutorial. Can even remember some of the answers cos i tried it the night before. But the true/false questions were hard and mind-boggling and the thought of answering 60 of them is sheer torture.

In the end, i still managed to finish the paper. Even checked. But just very barely; sometimes for the questions which require some thinking, i just guessed. I guess that's a very good result in itself. And, i still managed to go out with yeelian, constance, hyeli, yuantai, victor, louis, jw, and grace for post-exam celebrations.

and this, i am grateful.