semi-hardcore
i may write, but i don't think enough to write. y'know how sometimes you find all this avant garde stuff lying around the internet, how post-modernism and the downward spiral are arcs we could all be looking at for inspiration? well, sometimes i feel so attracted to it, like how it inspires me to want to do something in that same vein, and other days it disgusts me to the core. quite frankly, my answer to all this, is never make up your mind. or make a decision and stick to it. whatever.

it's late, i should be sleeping.

fortold shams shaping our world today
hmmmmm.. i don't know how many of you come here looking for wise words, but suffice to say, it probably doesn't happen everyday.

i haven't exactly done anything productive when i guess i really should have been. if you count freeing up space on my C:\ productive, well, then maybe i have. and i feel rather good about it. maybe i'll defragment it over the night. yes, that is what i shall do.

things to look out for this week are playing the gig on friday, and well, whatever happens in between. i hope something pleasant happens, i've been having too much heartache with the whole immigration fiasco.

i don't know if i'm losing a zest for life. it's funny, that when you're in singapore, you have so many things around you, but still you remain rather unsatisfied. there are many plans, just not enough moments to live in.

it's a cryin' shame
hmmmm.. i haven't been writing in here because i've actually been trying to get one of my other typed entries to work, but it just doesn't because, well.. i don't know. guess i'm not l337 enough to know. it was about driving in singapore, and how i think certain things could change, but i guess not enough people care, so there wasn't a real need for the internet to make it work.

so be prepared, jamie will be playing a stellar two sets at the esplanade outdoor stage this friday (february 2nd) with a couple of his friends. if you like cheeky, sweet and mellow pop rock with a fresh twist of working with one of the more impressive backing bands in towne, come round this friday before 0830PM! and we'll have a blast throughout the night!

oh. my. gosh.


in light of the australian high commission not being overtly enthusiastic about entertaining my appeal for a tourist visa just so i can collect my personal artifacts, or even pay off any outstanding bills (theoretically speaking of course), it has basically left me somewhat downtrodden and short-changed that my integrity and courtesy in such matters cannot be exchanged for even a fibre of sympathy.

i think i cheer myself up by watching the latest transformers trailer, and if this doesn't make you go "fooooooooooooooooo... if i don't watch that, i might as well eat fifty pieces of pig liver dipped in absinthe!" of course some of you might actually find that rather enjoyable, and the lesser of two evils. but i stand by my original claim, transformers the motion picture might turn out to be a lump of turd, but WHO CARES?? it's still the frickin' transformers at the end of the long drawn out day. and i do wish one of them would decimate the australian embassy conveniently located at no.25 napier road. and no, i don't think the sercurity guards will have much to say about trespassing on sovereign australian soil (in singapore no less).

needless to say, i am peeved. i contemplate writing a commentary into the straits times once this thing sorts itself out. if it ever sorts itself out. dammit, belonging to a country never felt more real. us and them or us or them?

regards,
brian

i'll walk where the stars shine


okay, i'm sorta looking at this photo, and i'm thinking to myself, "man i was much slimmer then!" well, i think i should make an extra effort to actually try to get back to a healthy weight. hoping the mid-week night runs with my sister will materialise just so i can go back to looking "rockstarish" again as opposed to a beached whale playing the bass guitar.

in a flash
if you follow this blog as obsessively as a sociopathic serial killer, then you might have noticed that i managed to revive the entire omnibus of blog entries since its inception on the 31st of january 2003. some might call me a genius for figuring out a way to circumvent getting a new blog and start anew, but i managed to do a bit of java-script hunting and found myself tweaking this constantly breaking down machine, and i guess it just gives me an enormous sense of well being. so please, a genius's genius will suffice.

well, apart from me rattlling on about the exclusivity of this blog, it really doesn't mean anything. numbers dwindle as they rise, and i just type in here to let people know i'm still alive. it's like a distress beacon in space, it bleeps every now and then, hoping that someone will pick up on this last transmission for signs of life.

so in about 10 days time, this blog will be four years old. wow, four years worth of shared words, i hope it means something.. and even if it doesn't, i'm glad i do it, and i'm glad i did it. if you've made it this far, thanks for sharing your lives with me, and i guess giving me something to blog about. believe it or not, each entry probably has some significance to you because sharing lives is the inspiration behind almost every one of these entries.

if not for this, then for that
hello everyone. i'm shutting this blog down.

NOT!!

sorry, that was a Borat joke, but i suppose you already knew that. and i don't really think it works in terms of text reading. but that should be the least of your concerns.

i have concerns, concerns that some may find unfounded, but whichever way one looks at it, they are the things that plague my mind at times. and the thing about concerns, is that i don't know if one set of concerns for one person can ever be more important for the other. for example, do you honestly care about the starving people in africa? would it be better if the media did not report such happenings, and we would just live in our own little bubble. either way, no matter how much concern we have for such people, we are here and they are there. we have rising cost of living, bills to pay, mouths to feed, future prospects to worry about. each geographical location comes with its own set of problems.

but now i appear to be rambling, and indeed i am. because i don't particularly know today what it means to blog. you might say i'm a tad unfoucused in my typing of late, and i suppose i am. i don't do anything special nowadays, i work my part time job in a guitar shop, settle delivery orders and talk to customers and feel bad when they play better guitar than me.

it doesn't make me feel special. and the real question is, are we?

i think we are. fearfully and wonderfully created. it's a gentle reminder for some, but each day as i try to make sense of my life ever since coming back to singapore, trying to carve myself a place in society, find a job, find a career, a special someone, a scene to give back to, a community to be a part of, a social circle to ease into, i find that it all comes to naught if it isn't being lived for the glory of God. it may be fun to not include God in certain things in your life, but that's only on a very surface level. if you scratch the surface, what do you find underneath all your material possessions, your family, your friends, even your good heart and how nice a guy you are.

what do you really find when you cast your crowns, take off your clothes and are merely a man? well, when God did that, Jesus came as man, but he was God within. and so i urge you, do you find God within you? or do you find absolutely nothing?

it's not over yet
i get in and out of the shower, but somehow the day doesn't feel over yet, and so the shower seems somewhat premature. showers are like little bookmarks in your scheduled day, where you sort of put down your book and take a breather. and that's how i usually like to end my day.

so in my compartmentalised life, i put down everything after the shower, and come online and see what i can fill the blank space with.

when does the day end for you? i only started writing this sentence after a 45 minute gap from the previous paragraph. some people worry about bills and the future, i guess i worry about when i'll run out of things to say on this blog. that just kind of shows the the sheer upside-downess of my priority list.

but i am rather concerned as to what kind of work i will be doing in the hopefully very near future. i sort of feel like hanging my production gloves up and concentrating on media management and creative endeavours. i mean, i reckon i'm good at production, but i'm not the best, and in a sector of that sorta work, i think you have to be the best if not you just end up being mediocre for the rest of your life. and there's also the thing about.. when work takes over your inspiration, your inspiration becomes work, and sometimes.. just sometimes i think it loses its edge.

perhaps i'd like to be involved in music, like work in a record label or something, of course visuals and music would be the best and i wonder if MTV is the best option apart from it being so commercial.

and so.. i leave you with all the tentative goodness that is my life. i guess everything is doomed to implode upon itself if it isn't founded on God's word. and even if by some of my own effort i make something good of this life, good job, wife, career and craft.. what good is it for a man to gain and world and yet forfeit his soul?

bless us with the secrets to the answers, and the faith to believe.

bolstering confidence making compromises
are you talking to God along a busy street with a bluetooth headset or sitting down and having a coffee with him?

drawing lines
and so i sit here, drawing lines, connecting dots.. seeing how things work so that we can see how those points make sense.

why shouldn't we know these things? the world at large and unfamiliar keyboards.. please be patient with us as we right out wrongs.

facelift
hello one and all, it has been a rather long pause hasn't it? well, as with all things in the living realm, breathing or some form of resperation is in order. maybe this is it, maybe each post that i churn out is a sort of breath, a response, something to let out so that something may come in, a transaction, and so our machine trundles on.. seemingly into a black abyss, or perhaps into glorious light.

i've upgraded my blog under the reccomendation of blogger nothing has really changed, but you may have noticed that the archives are no longer there. in fact i don't know where they are. i thought this might happen, i'm guessing the javascript on my original template just isn't up to date with the new blogger interface. i may or may not sort that out. i thought i would be fretted about losing my memories, but i remember (how ironic) that i start this blog to be spontaneous, not to chronicle things.. whether good or bad. so then i didn't feel bad anymore.. for all my glorious explosive posts in the past, all we really have is now. and yesterday is just a ghost.

or the ghost of tomorrow.

a bad thing happened to me today. i almost got into a head on collision. i feel bad, and even worse because a good deal of the fault can be attributed to me. i'm seriously doubting my driving ability, and no.. i don't know wanna go in a car crash. i have grander ways of ending my life, namely fireballs and infernos along the ECP.

i also just started work at ebenex music to give me a little something to do during my holiday time. i'm still free after 7pm, so lets make all our plans then.

and that just about wraps it up for this post. i really feel like moving on to a new domain.

binary codes play tricks on replicating souls
"taste as a replay device that permits us to recall memories of our past."
- togusa, ghost in the shell

so what does brian do just before he blogs? well, usually he just stares blankly at the screen wondering what went through the day and sieves through events of interest, but usually he can't be bothered to go through the details.

then, he may look at some online material and see if it jogs a response from him, but then.. nothing really begs responding, possibly due to the fact that his brain is starting to shut down. so yeah, you might have caught him at the wrong time.

then, he muses as to the italised text above.. usually somewhat philosophical and wanky at the same time. being cryptic helps in creating meaning from.. and then he might say something like how poetic it is to actually taste one's past. and that taste is one of the experiences that the current media cannot replicate but merely suggest thru visual or oral means, or stimulate the taste glands to recall.. the warmth of one's skin, the smell of someone's hair..

then he might share abit of what's happening in the realm of music. that he's basically listening to jamie michael in preperation for a gig on the second of february. gear news would entail that he might procure a line6 filter modeller because it's cheaper than the EHX bass synth, and might be more versatile in switching with the guitar as well. he also bought a pedalcase to house his bass pedals, and cannot wait to use the more streamlined model.

apart from that, tomorrow beckons and he should go to sleep soon.

why i love the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy
"Number Two's eyes narrowed and became what are known in the Shouting and Killing People trade as cold slits, the idea presumably being to give your opponent the impression that you have lost your glasses or are having difficulty keeping awake. Why this is frightening is an, as yet, unresolved problem."

le originale


as per request by one concerned member of the public.. perhaps seeing the original will allow you to see the edited in a new light.

will i get in trouble for adbusting?


i've been meaning to do this ever since i saw the giant-sized poster in the city-link mall. i don't know if it's been done before. maybe not. for starters, i hope there are no copyright infringements because i think even a neutered monkey could trace this back to my IP address or whatever tech-speak tracing terms they use to scare the rest of us with. either way, i don't know that much tech and so i am quite afraid. but i'm doing this anyway in the name of culture (what?)

well, let's put whatever prejudices we may or may not have against nike aside and just see this more in the sense of, "why are some people allowed to scream in our faces telling us what to buy, do, think, act, subtract.. in a public space, and we aren't particularly allowed to?" unless you count that they bought that public space and now its private. so as a disclaimer, i don't mean the art department that came up with this concept any malice. and i don't think that the individual words of "just, do, it" should belong to Nike, it's not even a new wor.d.

so yeah, look around you, think about the messages people keep trying to tell you (like what i'm doing.. how insidious), and maybe you might have something to say back. heck, i've gotta comment box for that reason.. i like conversation.

which way?

which way?


a fine snap by sodabug.

well, i initally thought i'd talk about some stuff, but now i just feel tired and indirectly cryptic because now you're not going to be able to hear what's on my mind.

i did however go to the library to get myself some books. and props to sodabug for gracing us with her wonderful pictures. apparently i can blog her pictures anytime i like! isn't that sweet! we'll take those free lunches while we can, and thank you while we're at it!

frame upon frame

maybe i'll be over you. but chances are, i'll be all over you. hmmmmm. remind me to not say that on a first date. i wonder what dates are like, do you just pretend you might be mildly interested in her, or pretend to what you think she might mildly like about you? i don't know, heaven knows i haven't asked a girl out in ages. why am i bringing this up? well.. i guess i'm not getting any younger, and somehow i sense the next chapter in this book i'm writing is to be serious about my job, my contributions to king and country, my family (how they drive me nuts and vice versa), and also my health, music and tech fantasies. i could compartmentalise everything, but then i wouldn't particularly be walking the wire.

plus it's funny how just less than a month ago i was walking by faith and believing that God would help me through all my battles, and right now.. once everything's rather stable, rather comfortable, i actually have grandoise plans on how to run my own life. careless humour, i think it's time to start trusting in God once again.

and i found a black abyss
i didn't i'd find it, but apparently i have. if you've always wondered where you could find good snooty indie-style music ie. belle and sebastian, the smiths, jens lekman.. well, look no further than FM 93.8, and no.. it's more than just a news station. believe me, i was as surprised as a wayward duck when i heard mojave 3 on the radio, and by gosh! i think i may have found some sort of solace in singaporean radio. so remember, you heard it here first because i AM cooler than you currently are.

i'm telling you because
(a) your life is a novelty act and what happens when a better one shows you up?

(b)you will always look different in a mirror when you're not looking at your own reflection.

forever seems like a long time
maybe i come online because i'm looking for something or someone, and blogging feels so contrived because i just can't seem to force the words out. which is why i started typing this, because it's been on my mind, but i always tried to forget about it. but now it's here, and i don't know where it'll take me. i try not to be afraid of things, but then it stops me from going any further. tomorrow is our new day -)