Two..

.. emotions I'm experiencing right now!
1. Joy
2. Expectation

Because its July 28th!
And I think my A7X collector's edition box is all wrapped up in a plane somewhere above the clouds and on its way here into my arms!! (Yes, I'm very excited)
We couldn't order it in Kinokuniya as planned, because its only available in Revolver's official webbie, but Lyd's sister was nice enough to loan us her credit card to buy it online! Of course, now I owe her my gratitude, and a lot of cash. But she says I can pay back slowly, so I will not have to starve as much...
...
... until I found out yesterday Danny Elfman and Tim Burton are releasing a limited edition box set (another one :S) commemorating 25 years of partnership, which includes a DVD, 14(!!) cds' worth of Danny Elfman's scores, and of course loads of interviews on the both of them. Awesome possum. Its not out yet, but I've signed up for the newsletter to receive news on it. Will probably be out around Christmas-time, so if I starve from now till December, I will probably have just enough to get it, since I think its going to cost a lot.

Five...

.. emotions I have been experiencing lately:-

1. Exhaustion
2. Solitude
3. Doubt
4. Sehnsucht*
5. Frustration

If I could have one wish right now, I'd want to be isolated from everyone else for a while.
I feel that the people currently around me are somehow influencing me to turn into someone I don't want to be, and I'm losing sight of myself.
Change is inevitable, but I occasionally find it hard to accept, especially if said change is not done willingly.

I wish it would snow here.
I wish it would snow so hard,
it would cover up every single crack on the pavement, every broken heart, pain and hurt and sadness.
I wish it would snow so hard,
it would muffle every scream and cry, and it would freeze all the blood and tears
so that the sun will rise the next morning,
and turn everything pure again.

London when it snows..

Source: tumblr

Out of sight, out of mind

Yesterday I had a bit of free time (procrastinating) and suddenly, I thought of Jimmy aka The Rev, so I went surfing around the net for news on Avenged Sevenfold and I read that they'll be releasing a new album next week, their first since The Rev's passing. I'm holding my breath and looking forward to it. Hoping nothing has changed, although I still think the absence of The Rev's drums would be very palpable. But hey, Dream Theater's drummer can't be all that bad, considering I like that band too.

I've also seen the video for one of the songs, Nightmare. Pretty awesome; it was shot in an insane asylum-like place. I keep seeing blood and all that. Think that video may also have some link to their older video, Afterlife, probably in tribute to The Rev. Because there were shots of a fallen drum set and a spider crawling over it, reminiscent of the spider on The Rev's face in Afterlife. Also, Zacky (with gorgeous red hair!!) is dancing with a skeleton, also something he did in Afterlife (the dancing part, not the skeleton).

In conjunction with the release of the album, Revolver magazine is releasing a limited collector's edition special issue on everything Avenged, and they mentioned interviews with the members on the death of The Rev so I'm reallyyyy hoping to get it. Wonder if we can pre-order in Kinokuniya? Need to get my bum there asap. Please don't let me have to go back to college again this weekend. I'll scream.

"There's an empty space here where you used to be. And that is where you belong."

2 months late.

Nut and Lyd cooked dinner for me the other day to celebrate my birthday (yes, even though its already July). They were busy with their finals back in May. I should know, since I stayed up to help Lyd with her work a few times during my holiday.
The kitty up there is Bentley, one of Nut's cats. I really like... uh.. her, I think. She has absolutely gorgeous and thick fur, and is a damned good model for me to try out my B&W photography skills (or lack of) because technically, she just lies down on the couch and sleeps. Or stretches. According to Nut's mom, she's a bitch in the attitude department though. But she didn't attack me, even though I kept flashing my camera in her direction.
This is my favorite because she looks really regal in here or as Lyd says, the "Bow down to me, you bitches" look (._.")

I desperately need to sleep.




After Design on Thursday, I was expecting a really nice and relaxing weekend, going to Bon Odori, maybe shopping, until someone said to me "Do you know we have a presentation for Building Science on Tuesday?"
"Holy crap, no!" is the answer.
A lot of rushing and sleepless nights again after that. Was at college till evening both days during the weekend, Saturday for accreditation set-up and Sunday to do our presentation. I'm kinda sick of that place. As soon as I graduate, I won't be going back to Cheras anytime soon.
For a loooong while.

Bon Odori 2010 was.... adventurous. We didn't really get lost, which is an achievement. The adventurous part came at night. Also kinda freaky. Everyone knows I'm really afraid to speak of the supernatural, but there doesn't seem to be any explanation on the incident that happened. We were on the way back, at the roundabout and Lyd asked where should she go, so I suggested we turned back the same way we came in so it'll be easier to find the way back. So she did, and then we drove on and on, neither of us noticed anything until suddenly Lyd grabbed my arm and I (may have) screamed her name, and we went up a curb. Quite a stretch, I might add. And the weirdest part? After we got off the curb, we realized that was a one way street, with the traffic coming from the opposite direction. Basically, the road we were on is off the highway and cars turn in at the turning, and the road slowly gives way to 2 lanes. And we were on the second lane.
And we noticed quite a few cars turning in (who may have also noticed our curb-climbing incident because one car stopped).
Its weird, because neither of us saw 'anything'. No curb, no cars from the opposite direction. We just saw a straight road that went on and on. Including CY, I think, who was also in the car. And we were sober, even if Lyd did have 5 cans of Asahi beer.
Freaky much?
Of course, it didn't help when my friend said "Do you know there's a graveyard nearby that area?"
"Thanks, man. As if I wasn't afraid already".
Even now, the both of us are still wondering exactly what happened that night.

Suddenly remembered an incident and I'm laughing to myself.

A while ago, a friend called me out of the blue and he started discussing a trip to Cameron with me.
And it would seem that I have apparently agreed to go, so we're planning on the transports to and back.
Except, I don't remember having any conversation with him on this trip.
And somehow I managed to stay on the phone with him for 15 minutes discussing a trip I have never even heard about.
And then suddenly he asked me "Wow....um, Rachel. Why are you being so nice to me?"
And I said "Uhh.. I'm... not supposed to be?"

And that's when we both realized he had called the wrong Rachel.
After the initial embarrassment (on his end) and his unconvincing denial ("Of course I meant to call you! So, how are you?"), he was amused and asked me "How could you spend so long discussing a trip you've never even heard about?"
Apparently, he didn't even notice my clueless-ness at discussing the trip until he thought something must be wrong because I was talking to him pleasantly, and the Rachel (he was supposed to call) is... as un-nice as a person could be, he says.

In the midst of stressing to meet datelines, this made me laugh.

After 43 straight hours..

.. of Sketch-up and autoCAD (yep, I counted) and presentation today, I am finally done with our first project.
I think I'm about to go blind.
Yet I'm still in the safe zone. Probably only slightly better that the last time.
Hmm... I need to find a way to break out of this monotony.

Today was the day of many firsts. As some of the things have been this semester.
I'm nervous as hell.
Is it just luck, or am I finally going somewhere?
Last week, again, a bunch of friends and I were picked to re-submit our previous works for accreditation, which I originally thought was for our college. Then today, the same bunch of us were called to attend a briefing to attend the interview for the accreditation this Wednesday, and will be meeting with the people in the Board of Architects Malaysia.
Its sounds kinda big, so.. I hope I don't screw up.

SPAIN WON!..

And not knowing why, I cried.
Considering the fact that I'm (sadly) not even Spanish.
I guess the moment called for it, when I realized it was (finally) a real goal, and that victory belongs to Spain :D
I may also have been screaming and chanting "ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod..", I'm surprised my Dad didn't run down to see if someone was being murdered in our living room.

The thing is today I had half the people coming up and saying "high-five~ Spain won~ I'm so happy~" to me, when (I'm pretty sure) a week ago, they were the same people who told me better teams like Germany, Argentina or Holland might win, but never Spain. The word "lalang" immediately comes to mind.
The other half of the people keeps telling me "Why are you still supporting Spain, Torres didn't score at all.." And the only answer I can think of (apart from "Why do you care?") is, if I was really watching Spain for Torres, then I would have given up at the beginning, because he didn't even start the first game, and it really is quite obvious he's still not fit to score.. probably still recovering from the knee injury.

I think people take what I say too literally. I don't know if that's a good thing but I'm thinking no, not for me, because you may or may not have noticed, I usually say a lot of silly things. Not because I want to, but because there is no filter between my brain and my mouth. So even though I say silly things like 'I love Torres', that doesn't mean every little thing that I do has to be because of him.
(Even if it was, I fail to see why it is anybody's business what I do)

Either way, I'm still thrilled Spain won :D

VIVA ESPANA~

Just found out something quite really insane.
A while ago, my mom asked me to collect all my book receipts this year for my brother, so I started going through all my books to get the receipts out (I usually use them as bookmarks).
Then I had a sudden urge to calculate everything and holy crap, the total is RM798.02
In 6 months.
And here I thought I spent less on books this time around.
I'm actually quite afraid to hand these receipts to my mom...
...
Very excited about next week's little photography trip for Minor class.
For our next project, we're going to be doing black and white photography, which is, yes(!), my favorite :D :D
For a green campaign.
Awesome possum! \o\|o|/o/

Let me tell you this..

Advertising?
Way easier than Interior Design.
It usually takes me Lord knows how long to decide on a concept for design, and then develop... develop, and develop...
...and develop.. (days of sleep go missing at this point)

My current assignment for Minor 3 is a newspaper ad for our college.
We actually had 3 weeks for it, but I've been busy with other works so I kept putting it off until yesterday.
It took me half an hour to come up with at least a dozen concepts.
Another 30 minutes to decide on which one I want to use, and finish the ad with Photoshop.
And the best thing is, they accepted my idea.
Only a few minor changes on the fonts, sizes and placement of tagline.

And.... I'm done for submission tomorrow.
Not much sleep to lose over.

Missed Archidex today thanks to Spain's match yesterday =.=
Was hoping I could finish all my floor plans by this morning, but I overslept.
I hope Mr Ariff won't ask us about Archidex on Friday, or I might get booted out of class.
I kid you not.
Lord knows why they're forcing us to go for exhibitions and all. If we want to, we'll go for it, 'nuff said.
The only good thing is they pay for our tickets for some design talks.
Last Thursday, me and another 6 classmates were selected to attend a paid-for design forum also held in KLCC.
So awesome. Currently very into Dutch and Singaporean designers :D

I found out Kinokuniya can actually order any Tim Burton books for me, as long as said book is up on Amazon.com
Wish I found out sooner.
Because I really want The Art of Tim Burton. But I didn't know they could order it, cause I read something online about the book being available only in UK or US or something.
Was going to bug Yung for Paypal or something.
Just as I was about to dial Kino's number to place an order when I thought I'd do a little currency converting of my own, and........ I think the book costs about RM400+ D :
I was kinda expecting it to be 100+...

Lordy. I don't know how I'm going to pay for that, so that plan has been put on hold for now.
Except I think they might have limited copies.
Trust me to always want limited edition anything.