I have succumbed!

The new year approaching, which means a new beginning! With new and renewed hopes. Let my steps be guided.

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This is so beautiful!

My voluble heart speaks with a tongue too sublime for interpretation. It mentions you unremittingly.

from this tumblr

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Trying to get our research proposal approved by ethics boards is a nightmare - the red tape, seriously! This really puts me off working in any sort of research capacity within the field in my future career. Taking care of nitty gritty matter is not my strength and gets me irritated very quickly; I don't know how people in HR and administration deal with this stuff all the time. Ish, paperwork, why are you such a thorn in my side! 

If you truly want God, you want what He wants. And if you love something, you make much remembrance of it. 

Amen.

Maybe it's just lag time, so patience is the way.

At a moment’s notice you need a moment’s notice because something has changed. God allows us to see what is there after what had been there. We see the smile perhaps, but not the budding smile, and if that smile only buds and then quickly returns to its place of safety we may not see it at all. We see only some scenes in a play of reactions to our words or our pleas or our gestures. Light needs an object to shine on, so it's a shame if the light's not right, you may have missed something to the darkness. Better to not be too sad when someone doesn’t seem to respond exactly how we hope, just imagine something budding in the lag time.

from here.

Why is December always a pile-up of everybody's birthdays together! I think I'll go bankrupt with presents. Not to mention also holiday costs, yikes.

Been working on my granny's big birthday bash photo montage, and I also got a spanking new camera! (The real reason I'm going bankrupt, right, haha.)

Got the Canon Powershot G12 (which I'm sure is pretty common among consumers; I'm quite sure Marli has this same one). I personally think it's awesome because it's the perfect combination of lazy and pro, heheh. There are convenient knobs for one to tinker around with the shutter, aperture and exposure etc (knowledge I should try to brush up on and finally put to real use) but is not a real DSLR because the lens are fixed and not changeable. So you know, I can try to be a pro with my photos without having to deal with the clunkiness and confusing hardware of a DSLR. I don't see myself lugging around big cameras and lenses; I'm just not that disciplined enough. Think I might go borrow a photog book to read up a little, and refresh my old photog juices, if I had any.

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When one does this video/photo editing stuff, songs get stuck real easy.

I can't smile without you,
Can't smile without you,
Can't laugh, and I can't sing,
I'm finding it hard to do anything.
You know I feel sad when you're sad,
Feel glad when you're glad,
If you only knew, what I'm going through,
I just can't smile without you...

In that case, stay out of love? Not that one has a choice about it, right?

it's all, uh, whoops!

Umar, while we were playing Kalimat (Salman's Muslim version of Taboo): We all fall in...?

The rest of us: Hah???

Love.

Which earned him lots of teasing after that, hahaha.

December holidays!

But I have so many things going on, and despite a small social circle, so many people to meet up with, that for certain, this month will fly by like nobody's business, and then 2012 will roll around. The horror of another year passing by, haha. But I was chatting with Mini the other day, and looking back on 2011, I think quite a bit has changed. For one thing, I'm halfway to becoming a proper speech language therapist! Insya Allah.

I have caught up a bit with the movie and tv watching, and right now, this:

Watashi ga Renai Dekinai Riyuu (The reason I can't find my love)

What is this scarily realistic movie about single ladies! It reminds me of Freeter, Ie wo Kau!, Nino's drama earlier this year, which was so realistic with regard to unemployment in young adults today. And now this -- of course, I can relate, haha. It's enjoyable and fun and explores lots into the complexities of the lives of young modern women. A bunch of single ladies decide to room together, figuring it would be advantageous in many ways, and end up trashing out about love and helping each other out with single-dom. I'm liking it so far, although some truths will be thrown out that stab me painfully in the heart, ahakz.

A silly notion (from the drama) about calculating the "time" of your life on a 24-hour clock: just take your age and divide it by 3. It's 8AM for me; morning still. Ohayou, life! Ganbarimasu.