"art is perfectly useless." - wilde
written: 8:53 p.m. on Tuesday, Jul. 19, 2005

Thankfully it was like, 8.34 a.m. or thereabout. Would've been atrociously late if it had been 1 in the afternoon.

I had a really, really nice time with Clarence today. I don't know how to describe it; it was just comfortable and fun. Time flew by quickly; before any of us knew it, 10.30 a.m. had magically morphed into 2.30 p.m. then 5 o'clock. I went over to his house with the intention to bike but it was pouring and I was shitting afraid of cycling on the roads 'cause I've never done it before and it's been years since I've been near a bike (I miss cycling at East Coast Park and going damn fast down slopes and humps and parking at the jetty, enjoying the sea breeze) so we hung out at his house for a bit. His dad was still home when I went over and oh my god, it was so weird and scary. Clarence was like, "Hi Dad, this is my friend" and I went, "Hello", and his dad barely nodded, like I wasn't there at all.

Meeting my friends' parents isn't something I like to do on a regular basis. Meeting his dad was just...really strange. Like when Clarence and I were in the kitchen, Clarence was making himself this weight gain chocolate drink (he thinks he's too skinny but I beg to differ), I was leaning against the kitchen counter and his dad came in, walked in my direction and I realised that I was blocking something, so I quickly moved away. That was definitely an Awkward Moment, no shit!

His mom - my civics tutor from last year - obviously wasn't home. I miss her actually. She was so nice to me last year, taking time out to talk to me about uni prospects and going to America, even bothering to talk to Pei and I when we were goofing off in her GP class (which I feel damn fucking bad about now, especially after my relief stint in that school and knowing how shitty it feels to be on the other side of the table when no one listens) and trying so hard to be patient about everything. Now I don't even remember why I disliked her. I guess people like me are just inherently stupid.

Clarence introduced me to his cats. They're so cute. He has this fluffy orange one that he picked up from Clementi which looks a lot like Garfield and when I stretched my hand out to her she sniffed it and rubbed her face against my palm. Awww! I love nice docile animals who don't get the urge to scratch you. His other cat almost scratched me; it's still damn cute though.

We went up to his room where I laughed at his IC photo - he had centre-parting hair and it just looked damn weird - and freaked out at the sight of this huge self-preserved beetle he has. He also has this oddball collection of squashed mosquitoes which was freaking gross to say the least. He used to keep this huge tarantula until he had to give it away or something; the tank is still in his room though, and I was eyeing it suspiciously, fearing that some weird creature was gonna crawl out of it and blah blah yeah I just really dislike bugs and the like.

After a while we headed out. Boarded a bus to that stretch of eating places opposite Beauty World. He paid for lunch! Haha what a surprise. He must've been feeling extra nice after I gave him a Dandy Warhols CD yesterday. He hated his curry chicken noodles (he's weird!) and I ate my seafood fried rice without touching the squid. Who the hell can eat squid anyway? It's all rubbery and gross. Clarence ate my prawns too. I hate eating prawns unless it's served dim-sun style, you know? The mere thought of it is enough to make me sick.

Boarded the bus again to Clementi where he bought some fish. His fish tank was strangely fascinating. I stood there staring at it, in a trance, and it's something that I really can't explain at all but there's just something about watching the myriad of fish languidly swimming in the tank that just sucks you in. It happens at home too, when I'm at the dining table, having dinner or something. You sit there staring at the tank for hours like you're watching a Tsai Ming-liang film in which nothing happens. Why is that so? I don't get it.

Anyway he bought a couple of really weird fish, called leaf fish or something. They're like normal fish sliced into two. They're flat and translucent at the bottom, such that you can see their skeletons and everything; they reminded me of amoeba, in fact (or the illustrated version of amoeba that you see in Science textbooks). So strange, like hell strange! But so unique too, 'cause I've never seen anything like that.

All right I'm just gonna do a bit of dry narration. We went back to his house so that he could settle the fish stuff, and I sat in the living room and picked up a book that was lying on the coffee table. It was his sister's Literature book, a literary criticism one written by Harold Bloom. I read a few paragraphs of the preface, Bloom wrote about Oscar Wilde, how he once said that "Art is perfectly useless", that all bad poetry is sincere, the purpose of Art, the longevity of literary greats such as Charles Dickens, Shakespeare, Goethe, Chaucer and how their legacies may be lost on today's generation of readers, and I was reading it and getting so excited that I didn't even know how engrossed I was until Clarence plopped down on the sofa next to me. I miss it a lot, the whole literary criticism thing. It was amazing while it lasted.

It rained the whole day. We walked in the rain to Video Ezy, keeping off the main, noisy road and cutting through the more tranquil housing estate, all the way to Dairy Farm Estate. I've never been there before, only drove past it in my mom's car on our way to Grandma's. It looks fantastic with its rustic colonial-esque charm; or maybe it's just me.

Haven't walked in the rain for so long. My hair is still slightly wet. Don't remember the last time I walked in the rain with someone next to me. It made the fifteen-minute walk seem like five minutes, and this is coming from someone who's used to being chauffered around. Easy banter and the feeling of being almost completely comfortable and at ease with another person made it the more easier, like I could do it over and over and not get bored at all.

We got some stuff from Video Ezy and then took a bus to my house. He wanted to pick up this huge book on evolution that he borrowed from the library on my birthday, which I brought home 'cause he rode his bike and hence couldn't very well bring it with him; as well as a taped episode of Lost that was shown last week which he missed 'cause he was working and polluting his lungs at IndoChine. So, yeah.

Okay, confession: Probably the first time I had a guy over to my house. My mom was home, as was my brother, so it was even weirder initially. Like, I banged on the door (family signal to let the others know that we're home 'cause nobody bothers to bring the keys, let alone use them), my mom opened the door, I went, "Hey, this is Clarence. Clarence, mom", he said "hi", my mom said something polite to him and gave me a look behind his back. Ah what the hell! Good thing I had the good sense to call her beforehand to tell her that he was coming over. My brother was silent as usual, coolly eating his beef noodles and ignoring the fact that I had a mate over. He ignores everybody, including cousins and relatives when we gather at my Grandma's. It's a wonder he even has friends.

Just kidding.

Anyway Clarence hung out in my room for a bit and I showed him my St. Nicks yearbook and he marvelled over how nicely done it is, with its colourful glossy pages and professional-looking binding and everything. I don't remember if I paid for it though; anyone cares to enlighten me? Compared to JJC's pieceofshite CD-Rom eyearbookwhatevertheycallit, the SN one is like a vintage copy of a Dickens novel. SN did have its perks; unfortunately, the downside overwhelmed the up.

He checked out my fragrances, sprayed two different scents on my plush toys, hence making my room smell horrid when the smells mixed together and formed this really weird, jarring one that disturbed my nose quite a bit. He likes my Escada Rockin' Rio. Haha! My mom is the weirdo for saying that it stinks.

He left at around 5 o'clock. He wanted to go back to NTU to check out the freshman camp but in the end, after much indecisiveness, decided to head home. It was funny, 'cause one second he was like, "Okay I think I'll go down to NTU" and immediately after that he suddenly changed his mind and went, "Then again I don't know leh." It was so funny and exactly what I do all the time. I hate making decisions so usually I go along with whatever my friends wanna do and I'm completely fine with that.

I realise today that I love my room. It's so lived in and messy and so me that I can't imagine sleeping anywhere else. Call this sentimentality (I agree) but my room is the best room in the world, thank you very much. Clarence said it's "nicely messy". Haha! He says the funniest things sometimes.

I had a lovely day today so it's all good.

My mom wants me to continue watching Kurosawa Akira's The Hidden Fortress with her tonight; we stopped halfway last night 'cause I was falling asleep, due to getting only like 5 hours of sleep. Today's no different so I said, "Tomorrow lah", and then she got all pissy. I attempted to suck up to her by offering her Nescafe's tiramisu coffee but because she was in the middle of a Debussy piece, she was like, "Later lah I'm still pissed with you by the way" (in Chinese of course). So I brought the coffee to my room and went on to slurp up the whole thing. Every single drop.

For some reason I found that funny.

before sunrise // before sunset

Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010