Past few weeks I've been involved with the Good Friday/Easter weekend preparations in one way or another, some are intentional and some are just unwittingly incidental haha. First up and the biggest involvement is I am leading worship on SAY service on Friday night for youth! Which is a role that is fast becoming a fixture haha, cos this year will be the third consecutive year I am leading worship on Good Fri! I don't think Min Jie or anyone really set out to put me in for all three years haha it kinda just happened to be. But part of the stress means not being tempted to just repeat all my songs from the previous years and to come up with something fresh and something new to say. 

The other lesser involvements include painting of banners and setting them up (together with lights) in our hall! We've had a new corps officer since the start of the year and Major Paul had this really grand idea of a walk-in exhibition and activities for an entire week. The youths were then commissioned to do three "graffiti" banners which will be hung up in the hall.

This is what my group did after two weeks!

And this picture was the trial experimentation of what it might look like after we adjusted the lighting positions. There will be an actual banner raising this Friday I think!

Took to the stage again to lead worship this morning, and this blog is fast becoming a whinge about how I am leading worship a lot lesser now and blah blah blah. Haha but it's true! The number of times I've been onstage last year and possibly this year too has been a lot less than half of what I used to put in, and I am just thankful there's still something for me to do.

Anyway, I think I put this morning down to nerves and mishaps, because on first strum I realized my guitar's horribly out of tune, which makes this like the third occasion my guitar's out of tune right before worship begins. So anyway I had to tune it midway, and I forgot chords and some of the song arrangements, but the team was great in covering up. AND I SNAPPED A NEW PICK! I only got the pick like a few weeks ago, this is the first time I'm using it, and I was just telling everyone that I think this pick feels real good and all, then halfway through it just broke into two. But I am grateful for the way it turned out, it is all of God and not me.

Other news, I barely scrapped through my two mid-term literature tests last week. To be very honest I didn't prepare much, because one was open-book and the other was some visual appreciation response test. My consolation was that if I studied hard I wouldn't have made a lot of sense also. But there was a lit presentation too, and my topic was gender and space. Which is what we talk about all the time in GEOG classes, not as much in the LIT classes. So you can imagine, I laid it down with such aplomb that my prof had a special praise reserved for me after the class. Haha that was at least one good thing that happened, and I'm glad I'm not a lit major. I enjoy studying literature and I love the concepts, but I cannot write essays from it. 

This might just be my craziest week so far this year. I have two mid-term tests coming up on Thursday and Friday, and I am not doing the best preparations for both of them. I don't have much of a choice actually, because I already am taking lesser modules this term. Studying isn't as agonizing if I don't have all these tests getting in my way. 

Was out with Joanna today at this quaint cafe near Thomson Plaza. It's truth that we never see eye to eye ever, she has a million different perspectives that run contrary to mine and she's always annoyed by me. And it's likewise for me too heh. But for once, this short outing actually made my day, for the lazy reprieve away from work, strolling along the neighborhood and conversations over coffee. I've come to conclusions that she is totally asexual hahaha. 

Can't quite imagine how much of this I would be doing any longer. 

Sometimes I look back at all the times I have tried to connect in some ways with the little girls in my cells, I am really amazed at how I am still barely hanging there after so many noted failed attempts. Haha okay I really must admit that it takes me all the patience and the constant goofing around just to understand somehow what goes on in the mind of a young teenage girl. With guys it's always a lot easier, possibly because I was at that age before and I know exactly how it feels like, but for girls it seems like I take an eternity to learn, and then each girl is different from the other, and it's just such a gargantuan effort to remember a million things I ought or ought not to do.

And I can safely say that all the books or magazines or articles I've read before does not at all prepare me for what really happens. Yes, that's right, I actually spend time reading about how to reach out to teenage girls, because that was what I was thrust into when I first began lower secondary school cell leading, and nothing in the books told me what to do when they start crying or having opposing views (only to change them years later hahaha) or just having unique perspectives. How in the world am I supposed to hang out with the girls without being a total perv hahaha go shopping with them???

I know she's reading this, but the mentee is back and I am so relieved. Not that she does a lot la hahaha, but then occasionally I really have no idea what to do with the girls in my cell and I'll be like Jolene please settle this, and voila everyone's happy. Maybe same-gender cells function precisely in this way, but I've always been a firm believer of the opposite gender playing important roles shaping the person you are. Haha I'm the kind of person that will encourage people to go date around and get into relationships and experience break ups for themselves, okay that's another blog topic for another time.

Okay, patience.   

It's 5.15pm now, and I think today is the best Monday school day ever for the past few months. There was quite a bit of rain this morning I think, and usually it would have been a tremendous drag trying to haul myself out of bed. And usually my Monday classes start at 2pm, so I have quite a long sleep-in, but I had to be at school at 12pm today, and surprisingly that made my day. Okay la maybe because it's a good hair day too. HAHA. And, I haven't received a single email from any of the frequent spamming departments. For a Monday, I think this is rare. Maybe all the admins are busy clearing email backlogs from over the weekend. Or maybe I really succeeded in my solo quest of trying to get them to unsubscribe me. Whatever it is, it's a good Monday.

And, last night I was at airport with a few of the young ones meeting Jolene (and Joe Yong) from their return from Shanghai! This fully makes up for not being there when she first left 6 months ago, and it's good to see the mentee again after she ran away.

Okay that's it, printing readings that are more than 2 weeks old. 

Not in the best frame of mind because of severe lack of sleep. Submitted a 1000-word review last night (or should I say morning) at 6am, and I'm reeling from the repercussions of pulling an all-nighter. Okay technically no la because I still managed to get some sleep in the end. It's my first assignment submission for this term, which is quite rare because it's more than midway through the term already. Haha a 1000-word is a no brainer for a wordy nag like me, I have no problems meeting the word limit.

Anyway speaking about numbers, I've just hit my 8,888th tweet on Twitter today! To celebrate, I've invited the first three respondents to take a picture of themselves with the number 8888, and just for participation alone they'll get a free drink! I'm too lazy to compile the photos that I've received here, but they were hilarious and ingenious, thanks to Shi Hui and Lynn and Amelia for indulging my crazy gimmick! I kinda figured that I need to do giveaways like these more often, because it makes people happy and it gives me a chance to spend money too! As it is now I have an idea for the 10,000th tweet and can't wait for my tweet count to reach there asap! At the rate I'm going it will probably take another two months haha.

Okay bed I need.