I think I caught a slight cold… from the air-con. :S

You see, the old one we had didn’t seem to be working properly, so it was sent for servicing. No matter what temperature the old air-con was set at, it never felt cold at all, and sometimes we even had to switch on the fan in the room so that it would be cool.

When the repair costs were said to add up to half the price of the air-con, my parents decided to just get a brand new one instead. And now that it’s been installed a few days ago, the room is practically freezing! I set the temperature to a slightly higher one, and leave the door open, but that doesn’t seem to make the room any less cold. And it doesn’t help that my seat is right in the path of the air-con either. So… that was how I ended up sneezing the whole of yesterday and today as well, though i’m feeling much better right now.

I think I really can’t take the cold. I don’t like feeling warm either because of that sticky feeling that comes along, but I think sometimes that is more bearable than the cold.

The class schedule for next semester is out, so I guess it’s time to sit down and figure out what elective I want to take next semester.

The good things so far:

• 3 8.30am school days. Sound’s like a lot, but it’s an improvement over the 4 8.30am days I had last semester.
• Lab is the only thing I have on tuesdays, so that’s an early day for me. And there are some weeks with no lab too! :) Hopefully I don’t end up having to put an elective on tuesday.
• No exams for “The Art of Academic Writing”. The fewer exams I have to write the better.

The worst thing:

• 3 5.00pm exams, and all for my core papers too! T_T

I’m hoping that i’ll manage to get the electives I want for the coming semester, so I don’t have to do it in semester 2 instead. Semester 2 is well known to be a killer semester. Sigh. If I do pass my Jap 2, should I continue with Jap 3?

I was watching American Idol last night, and my dad happened to be sitting out in the living room as well. Katharine was singing, and my dad suddenly went “she’ll look even better if she was a bit slimmer”. -.- I know that was just an innocent comment, but what’s with men anyway, and the notion that slimmer = prettier? I think Katharine’s really pretty, and though she may not be the slimmest person in the world (she’s not fat either - she looks perfectly fine the way she is), but so what? At least she can sing, and she doesn’t look anorexic like some other people out there. If she was much skinner who knows whether she can sing the way she does today.

I don’t understand why society embraces the kind of thinking where slimmer = prettier. Is that always true? On many occasions this is what drives people who feel insecure about their body or weight to eat less, start on all sorts of dieting programmes and whatnot. To “look better”! Some even go to the extent where they end up being anorexic or bulimic, which is really sad.

Even to people who say that it doesn’t matter what others think, and that as long as you’re of an acceptable weight you’ll be fine, that you don’t have to be slim by the media’s standards to look good, can we say that we have not been the slightest bit influenced by the slimmer = better kind of thinking? From time to time I find myself thinking that I shouldn’t be eating so much when I think of snacking (especially when it’s late at night), or sometimes be like “oh my goodness look at all my increasing amount of fats!”. And then you know, people around you will say that “hello, you’re not fat! look who’s talking here” or some variation of that. If you say that when you’re around your friends that is. And I know that i’m certainly not the only one that says things like these! ;)

Anyway, back to talking about American Idol, I shall not spoil the results for those who are only going to watch the replay tonight. I would have been glad with the results either way, because I like both Katharine and Taylor. I would say I like Katharine slightly more (don’t know why either), but Taylor has something special about him, and he’s done better on the performances.

Was watching Clay’s appearence and performace on the results show, and I realised that despite having not listened to his songs for quite a while, I still really do like his voice. It’s got this certain effect on me that I can’t really put in words. Hmm.

1. Specify the gender of the perfect lover: Male, duh.

2. List down 7 qualities of the perfect lover:

1. Loves God, loves me. Only then can he understand where i’m coming from and why I do certain things.
2. Respects my opinions.
3. Able to cheer me up.
4. Able to engage me in a good conversation. Must not be quieter than me! (If that was the case, no one will talk. :S)
5. Sporty. I really really like guys who do sports, especially if they excel in them. (Though they would have to bear with the very unathletic me.)
6. Stronger than me. Physically and mentally.
7. Caring and thoughtful.

3. Tag 7 people

(Hmm I don’t know who still reads this, but here goes… if you want to do it that is.)

Winnie
Adel
Hui Yian
Amenda
Yong Sian
Dayna
You!

After having to fill in that tag 7 people section, I kind of realised that I read quite a lot of blogs belonging to people I know, but i’ve never told a lot of these people I have a blog, and I have no idea if somehow they have found it either if they still haven’t commented to date. (That was a long sentence!) I won’t be surprised if some of them do though, considering that people have been getting here by searching for “Jing Ling”, or just somehow ending up here. Now, how many people have that name in the first place, plus in this case the name is correctly spaced.

I don’t mind people I know offline reading my blog of course, and I do welcome them to do so even if they’ve found it by accident. Except for maybe a certain person, only because some of those very old entries are extremely embarassing. :blush: But well… the past is the past and it shall remain as that.

My internet connection is so crappy again these couple of days. Something’s wrong with my MSN as well, and I can’t log in to chat unless i’ve already logged into my hotmail account. Didn’t have this problem until I upgraded to the newest beta version though. Just when i’m so free to chat these days… :(

Went grocery shopping with my parents last night, and on our way back home, while my dad was driving, my mum suddenly told me that if I wanted to drive, drive when she’s not in the car, and practice in the carpark near my house before driving outside.

Knowing my mum, it’s not at all surprising that she would say something like that. She’s the kind of person that gets nervous easily and worries too much, and she’ll probably be on high alert the whole time if I were the one driving around. And then if there ever comes an occasion when I step on the brakes a bit harder suddenly (like sometimes when you’re just about to turn into another road and you see another car approaching), she’ll probably freak out and have an heart attack or something. Dad was joking about how she’s always worries too much as well. That’s the precise reason why my mum doesn’t drive, and I really think that she can’t take it when she’s behind the driving wheel.

But surely you should have more faith in your daughter! Of course I know that i’m extremely inexperienced, but I don’t think there will be too much of a problem driving when the roads aren’t too crowded, and my dad will be sitting beside me as well. Remember on my 4/5th driving lesson when my instructor took me to bukit timah road, and at that time, there was still road works going on and I had just started driving out of the driving centre… that was one of the scariest driving lessons, mainly because I still couldn’t control the car well back then, but well… both the instructor and myself survived.

So when she’s in the car, and my brother’s not around, she’ll us me to sit in front to watch my dad drive and learn from him. Though I seriously think my dad isn’t the best person to learn from… driving over the speed limit most of the time, not signalling, late braking… but I think that’s the case with most of the experienced drivers, because no one is going to tell you to remember to do this and that, or fail you if you don’t since you’re not going for your driving test anyway.

So… that means that i’ll have very little chances to drive. :( My mum should go to church more often on weekends, so that when we want to go out for dinner I can drive to church and then we’ll pick her up from there or something. ;)