thisguy

every now and then i come across snippets of stories online which i suddenly "connect" to.

i have a weird fascination with the oddities of life and a tendency to romanticise both the ultra mundane and the peculiar.

take this story for instance : Drunken Swede tries to row home from Denmark

COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - A drunken 78-year-old Swede stole a dinghy after a night out in the Danish town of Helsingor and tried to row back to Sweden, but fell asleep halfway, Danish police said on Monday.

When the man discovered he lacked the necessary funds to pay for the ferry from Helsingor to Helsingborg in Sweden on Saturday, he decided to row the five km (three miles) across the strait of Oresund that separates the two.

He quickly grew tired and, trusting fortune and the currents to see him safely home, took a snooze at the bottom of the boat, where Danish police later found him out at sea, still asleep.

The strait is one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. Police said the owner of the dinghy had decided not to press charges.

i'm not sure what connected me. the drunken determination this old man had or his subsequent trust in fate that he would be drifted back home even after he grew tired of rowing.

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i'm back from a pretty eventful trip to macau and hong kong. many firsts, and new experiences as well as the familiar exhaustion that follows days of hitting the road with just a map, water, camera, (no lonely planet!) friends and conversation to get you through the day.

if you couldn't already tell, i'm feeling melancholic too.

disgruntled with this life that seems to throw us all against each other. like random molecules in a random gravitational pull that makes no sense at all. we collide, impact each other's lives, hold on as tight as we can with the few limbs we have and let go of so many others.

if i can't hold on, i want to at least make sure i made an impact big enough to be really felt. in this universe, with it's rules of chemistry, physics, biology, economics and social science, that'll have to do for now. impact.

took off early from work today for a change, got home and slept from 6.30-9.30pm. i had spent the weekend sick and working, whilst most of last week was spent working and preparing for a colleague's farewell do.

declared a mini holiday and veged out in front of the idiot box til 2am. had dinner at midnight. and here i am. a.w.a.k.e. for a change.

upon coming back from a trip i realise :
it takes 2 weeks to finally clear out pictures from my camera/hard-drives
it takes 2 weeks (sometimes more) for me to unpack a suitcase
it takes 1 day to keep my passport in a secure place (most prized possession)
it takes 1 week to unwrap my newly acquired FHM magazine
it takes 2 weeks to realise someone has stolen my bolster from my bed

i'm enjoying this moment of clarity at 4am, listening to stina nordenstam's little star on repeat. i need a new laptop. i need a haircut soon. i need to get my sleep cycle back in sync with normal human time.

it feels as if i've been living in time warps. time slowing down, then speeding up, then failing to move at all.

i'm in the midst of wrapping up a major project i've been working on sporadically since the beginning of the year. late nights, forgotten weekends and amazing support from some of my favourite colleagues and it'll all be over soon.

finished work late and couldnt get a suitable dinner buddy so i had a nice dinner date with my mom instead. nasi kandar for me and ice kacang for her. i try to eat with my parents at least twice a week, seeing they're my house mates. but i rarely get to eat with them "alone". tonight was nice. my mom will always stick out like a sore thumb in a mamak. but somehow, tonight with a ridiculously huge bowl of ice kacang she seemed to fit in. more so than her tired haggard looking son, in crumpled cotton workwear.

it's really too late and i'm much too tired to blog. but i'm letting my life fleet past too fast. i remind myself its important to sit still for awhile and capture moments.

i'll be heading off to a beach getaway. it's a company trip but i'm determined to get a suitable amount of "me" time or at least get wasted in the process.

looking forward to it. i'm already planning on my pack list :

• sunglasses
• beer money
• sunblock
• loose shirts to wear unbuttoned
• journal (finally found the perfect one in hongkong)
• iphone+music+headphones (need to bring this back from the dead - it's brickd on me)
• underwater camera (courtesy of pohsi)
• guitar (gotta get a new bag for it)

its only a weekend holiday but god knows i need it.

(dear god, please let us survive the bus rides)