Not.

Okay it wasn't all that bad, but restarting trail running for the first time in the year is a very painful thing to do when you immediately kickstart it with 10km of trail. My ankles feel terribly taxed now and I'm pretty much tired.

As per normal though, it was a crazy run with Ben and the old rule that something weird will act up whenever I run with Ben decided to appear. This time however, it was Ben the Devious Slavedriver.

After about 4km of trail (and really tiring painful bits), up and down and up and down really steep slopes with a lot of blasted rocks and potholes you have to play Jumper around, Ben turns to me and grins. He politely informs me that now, we have two options (I originally requested to do 8km). Either we run back 4km the way we came (bad bad idea with crazy trail), or we go ahead and forge 10km, which was what he wanted me to do anyway. And then he casually added that he thought that the 6km extra would probably be easier.

...

Driving's pretty interesting to be honest, I'm learning stuff that's useful at least. Though I must admit that I really hate the clutch and biting point stuff, because I'm not great shakes at it (though I'm improving yes) and I can park properly now! Though after driving I can be like omgomgomg my left leg is tired from holding the darned clutch.

Courtesy of really intense lessons, where in one week we cover about 500 minutes of pure circuit driving, 6 hours of parking lessons and practice, then a mindboggling 25 hours of pure theory. Oh well, I'll be out on the roads on Monday anyway, with my Provisional Driving License and passing my Circuit Assessment with 6 demerit points! The main attraction that the instructors pitch to us though, for passing and going to the roads is so that "we can all drive pass Temasek Polytechnic or Tampines JC and look at pretty girls. Circuit only got one fat auntie, then you drive all day around and see her super jia lat!".

Right, off to the roads then!

Today's attempted 11km run stopped short at 9km, simply because I figured that the first solo running bit would be supplemented with another 1-2km when I met up with Natalie, but it kinda tanked when she got tired after 600m x.x. Still, 9km in a day's not bad, especially when I consider that I took about 1 hour exactly.

It's definitely better than my previous attempted timings, but there's room for improvement still. And running up Bukit Timah Road's definitely going to be something fresh, I'm getting a little tired of my regular route up to KAP, which caps out at just 8km. The extra 1km that I covered was new territory and I wonder what it'd be like to run past Hume Avenue and all, so I'm going to try it soon!

Running alone gives me a certain amount of time by myself when I just let myself drift into thoughts about what I really need to do. I used to dislike time by myself since I tended to feel lonely, but somehow after I hit 17 I started enjoying little moments by myself from time to time. My legs do feel comfortably sore now and it's somewhat a very content kind of feeling to just lounge around waiting for the time to go out for lunch.

I do love long weekends so!

...

For those who are done with their jobs for various reasons, like H1N1 retrenchment and all, there's two things I'm going to recommend doing!

1. Sneeze!: This game's epic. Sneeze is a game I discovered from someone's post on the LJ biology community and it's pretty fun trying to infect everyone on the map with a single sneeze. It's quite pretty watching people randomly walk around though and then sneeze after they've become vectors.

2. Listen to Jon Schmidt's music. I stumbled upon this and it's pretty good! I'm personally a fan of Coldplay's Viva La Vida album and this song especially, so hearing it mixed with Taylor Swift's Love Story's rather interesting. And of course, it doesn't detract from the fact that Coldplay's piano bits are just wonderful by themselves!

Booking in tonight, but at least it was a pleasant weekend I've enjoyed outside without crazy amounts of running around as it is, and more of real running. 14km mileage for the win!

So this weekend was a long weekend, in a sense a truly long weekend because I got to book out early for Medical Appointment! Which was really good, since I got my clean bill of (dermatological) health and our dear Singapore Gahmen picked up the tab completely. I decided to go for a run after that, which proved rather dumb because the traffic along the roads was choking me with exhaust but when I hit Hwa Chong in 25 minutes (which is rather fast, given that there were 3-4 minutes of waiting for traffic lights), I got to meet Zoe and Jaya and catch up. One of the smaller pleasures of life is really just talking and catching up with friends.

...

I got accepted by NUS Science, which is a relief since I got a bit worried after not hearing from them at all. That's exactly what you get for not submitting except at the very last minute I guess. In a way, I'm glad to be given the chance to study what I really love; it's something that I have been passionate about for years.

While it's not quite the be-all-end-all thing I hoped, at least it's something I can be thankful for and look forward to. Life Sciences it is then!

So I have just returned from the airport, where I stupidly fell asleep on the train from Changi station to Tanah Merah and got shuttled in my slumber to and fro at least once. I'm hoping it was once.

I was there to send Cai Na off to UK and somehow, the airport managed to get me consider university prospects. I'm actually half glad for NS, in that it allows me quite a bit to time to think things over, where to study, what and some buffer time to apply to various things. I hate the scholarship requirement from my parents, because it basically means I have to deal with what seems like the cart before the horse procedure of applying uni overseas when I might get in and yet fail to secure a scholarship. And waste a lot of time. But scholarship applications probably need you to have applied and all. And right now, I can't spare the time on that or I'll end up neglecting the real task of getting the grades.

It's quite a tangle. I don't mind taking a bank loan to study overseas, but I don't know which bank would offer such unsecured loans, especially in the recent financial debacle. I haven't applied for scholarships, neither am I considering much, without the requisite grades.

Thank God for NS.

...

I did the Lornie Trail today with a 29 minute flat run. Which is way off my best or even my average of 27 minutes. I guess I'm really out of shape, since I haven't run at all after Swing KPE.

Time is a luxury I can't barely afford to spare, so running will have to take a backseat. It was wonderful to start today though, there's got to be some sort of thrill to starting to run. It's magic, but I'm not about to get it much for the next few months. :(

1:17:26. Given that I paced myself on the slow side to make sure I completed it, it's not too bad I suppose. 30% tradeoff in speed for a 4 times increase in distance covered. Plus it was interesting to run within the confines of an expressway tunnel. Albeit, an unopened one. I'll probably never get that chance again anyway.

That said, I will try to avoid free runs like this one in future, because it's just insane at some points. Fighting goodness knows how many people to board the shuttle buses was crazy, I waited half an hour in line and got there late anyway, missing the flag off. And I thought it wouldn't be that nutty x.x.

The lack of an obvious starting point complicated things too, the officials told me to start running since flag off had started already. So I ran, for about two minutes before I arrived at the real starting line. Too lazy to reset stopwatch though, so I just continued.

The blasting of songs inside the sonorous tunnel was quite WTF. I could hear exhortations to keep my speed above 70km per hour and how we should not reverse suddenly all along the first half.

Thank God they mainly directed it at the Fun Walkers, so I got about 5km of peace. The standard of competition was the sad one though. I suppose it being a free run, no one really took it seriously, or all the people who'd never run normally signed up. So somewhere around the 7km mark, I encountered legions of runners happily strolling along. The determination to run throughout took a big hit then, fatigue was starting to leaden my leg. I guess StanChart should be better, the money paid for it will inspire people not to waste it and stroll all the way.

I crossed the finish line in a funk though, because I'd finally established a really nice rhythm then and then the huge FINISH appears. Anti-climax, so I just sprinted for it.

The real hell was getting home. An hour in the sun waiting for shuttle buses and another hour long trip home convinced me of exhaustion.

Good effort, LTA, but you could have done better, even for a free run,

...

Reading the Sunday Times over lunch, I suddenly started hankering for the good food that comes from Lai Wah. It's a gem of a restaurant that's super retro and quite cheap, but the food there always feels homely (ha irony) and awesome. I like Cantonese food, it's so richly layered in flavours. And maybe I'll make a trip there after prelims to eat. It's cheaper than Sakae. And the food kicks Sakae's ass anytime.

Off to study aromatic yam benzene rings.

So running with my dear Bench always brings me to stretch myself. Be it the timing for MacRitchie's Lornie Trail, which I still haven't broken in my solo runs :(, or otherwise.

So today, it was otherwise. He instructed me to meet him at Paddle Lodge and run past when he and his dad finished their first round. After twenty minutes, I figured it made no sense to assume he was still on plan so I hopped off to run. 1 hour 28 minutes later, after getting lost at Petaling Hut and almost running to Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, I completed the entire 11km route around MacRitchie Reservoir. Somehow trail running is just so much more different from normal road or track running. You have to skip, jump and swear when the ground gets muddy and swampy, and the uphill component is crazy. It's not just a push to get up and done, but more like trying to push yourself on and on. Especially when a hill appears again after finishing a previous one, before you can catch your breath. I ended up taking a 2km stroll after Jelutong Tower where another hill just sapped the determination I had left.

There's only two words for this: masochistic fun. But hey, I completed it!

...

In other news, I made a new personal best for the Lornie Trail yesterday, broke into 26 plus with a 26:59 timing. Ha ha ha. But it's still 26 plus!

Now more masochist fun calls. Argh, prelims.

Song Summoner: The Unsung Heroes by Square Enix sounds like a pretty cool game to me, I like the concept. It's always tons better for a game whenever developers take into account the features of the devices and not just release ports for the sake of porting.

This is an awesome idea.

...

My run of the standard circuit (4.6km apparently) on Tuesday evening was quite a pain actually. It felt like somehow I was just dragging myself along and it's quite horrid to try. Though I figure I've finally experienced my low day.

A 10km run will involve running from Newton all the way to about Hume Avenue. Sadly, I thought that'd be somewhere nearer 14km. But oh well, let's just give it a go one day.

...

I'm tired.

And so my body isn't that good :(. Yesterday marked the first time since I started running where I didn't have the willpower to push myself further. I think the run hit poolside cafe and that was it. I wanted to make it to Sixth Avenue but I just couldn't. So much for running to KAP. Maybe I'll just try pushing harder next time and see. 10km for the win! :)

So today I decided to attend Museique 2008, NJC String Ensemble's annual concert, at the invitation of Jia Fang (con_verse), who made me attend last year too. I normally refuse to attend concerts alone, either I find company or absent myself, but I do make an exception for Jia Fang, since she's probably the oldest friend I have that I'm close to and still in contact with, with the possible exception of Kat. All childhood friends anyway.

But anyway, this strings ignoramous attends and is quite pleasantly surprised by the choice of pieces and I must say I enjoyed myself more than I did last year. Spider Pig and the Theme from Simpsons were delightful, though I enjoyed Spider Pig for the sheer amount of fun there was; with the conductor (Han Oh) joining in and turning around to shout "Look out!". The Theme however, was nice because I liked the way Danny Elfman's style in composing this one. The extra sounds and stuff gave it the haphazard feel that any movie involving Homer Simpson would have. Credit must also go to the Ensemble for pulling it off.

When it came to the Serenade for Strings in C Major, Op. 48, Elegie by Tchaikovsky, this was another piece I enjoyed because somehow it had this haunting ability to rivet you and just make you listen. Now I understand why Jia said this piece was emotionally draining to rehearse.

Anyway, this probably will be the last Museique I'm attending, since Jia's graduating. But I'm quite impressed with NJ Strings.

...

Thursday, I watched Juno, courtesy Athena Faculty Committee who screened it, many thanks! And well, it gave me something to think about.

I didn't find it as funny as I thought it'd be, but I think it did bring up and make real the point of teenage pregnancy and helped me figure out and confirm exactly why I strongly believe fornication is wrong. In this modern age, I think it's useful to have a refresher course every now and then, with a world blasting its message ever so often.

let it go, Daisy let it go

I have this itch to wake up and run tomorrow morning, then come back and do lunges to train my thighs, which are rather rubbish. All at 5am.

Or maybe I can learn to do gun kata, like the guy from Equilibrium.

Then again, as bismuthbear Hong Ling pointed out, I'll need my alarm(s). Mhm, do you think the Big Ben can be brought to Singapore?

Okay I know, haven't been blogging for a while, but here's a little something:

( A little conversation snippet... )

And I actually quite agree with Bench. When he suggested doing the 5000m run, my first reaction was just "insane!". But after last week's 4.8km run, it felt pretty good completing the run and I figured I'd run this week. Of course, laziness nearly got to me when I saw the rain at about 3pm, and it was only as I was walking home when Bench SMSed to ask me if I wanted to run.

And so I did.

I cleared 6.5km or so today, perhaps plus minus 300m, maybe 7km. But the most important thing for me wasn't the timing (38:25, if you really want to know), but the fact that I managed to do it without stopping, and I managed to pace myself fairly well throughout the entire run. We did two rounds of a circuit from his house, out to the main road where it was opposite SCGS, down to Balmoral, running into it, pass Pines Country Club and back up to Whitley. 2x of them, my legs still don't hurt, surprisingly.

I think I'm enjoying running.

...

On another good note, the past week has been pretty good for me, thank God. It's been a week where I've been happy by the thought of you and spending time with you, and also all the good news that came and good stuff.

Stuff like the fact that I made it into the Final Round for DSTA JC Science Scholarship selection, even though I screwed the interview up today. At least I made it further than I expected to, and the space party at Science Centre was fun, meeting up with Audrye and Wei Lin and the rest of the RJ Astro folks, plus Venus was AMAZINGLY BRIGHT. :D

And there's always the awesome MNG, who brighten up my day! <3 you all!