Music meme

Tagged with a music meme by A.Ball.Of.Yarn, and although I'm in the throes of my exams, I decided to take a break after finishing my second last paper this afternoon. One last paper on Thursday, and I'll be a free bird. :)

I decided to change things a little, though, because the songs were making zero sense as answers to the meme questions. Here's a list of the songs that the random feature on WMP churned up, but I've listed snippets from the songs instead. So just for fun, see how many of these you can figure out -- without the help of search engines, of course! Leave a comment if you can guess any (or all!) of these song titles. (I think there was a similar meme on LJ some time ago.) Let's give it, say, a week? I'll post all the song titles and artistes then. :) Go nuts. For the person who can guess the most number of songs, your prize is... um, pride and satisfaction. That's enough, right? ;)

[Edit: Oof, didn't realise they were that difficult to guess, but my exams are finally over! So answers are up in bold! :) I have officially joined the ranks of the unemployed. Hur.]

1. Hey there Mr Songwriter
   Come visit in my home
   Then tell me about life being perfect
   And a love that goes on and on and on
   ("Same Old Song" by Blake Shelton)


2. All the angels exalt You on high
   What a kingdom to depart
   But You left Your throne in the sky
   Just to live inside my heart
   ("All the Heavens" by Third Day)


3. A crown of thorns, a crown of hate
   For all You had
   For all You gave
   The king of all would rather serve than reign
   ("Many Crowns" by Jeff Deyo)


4. Not just a song
   That I sing to You
   And not just some motions
   That I'm going through
   ("Be the Praise of my Heart" by Phillips, Craig & Dean)


5. Your ways are not my own
   But I long for them to be
   So this is what I pray
   ("Pray" by Rebecca St. James)


6. I am reaching for the highest goal
   That I might receive the prize
   Pressing onward, pushing every hindrance aside
   Out of my way
   ("I Want to Know You More" by Sonicflood)


7. Through Your love and through the ram
   You saved the son of Abraham
   Through the power of Your hand
   Turned the sea into dry land
   ("El-Shaddai" by Amy Grant)


8. I can't light no more of your darkness
   All my pictures seem to fade to black and white
   I'm growing tired, and time stands still before me
   Frozen here on the ladder of my life
   ("Don't Let the Sun go Down on Me" by Elton John & Billy Joel)


9. She carries the act so convincingly
   The fact is sometimes she believes it
   That she can be happy the way things are
   Be happy with the things she's done
   ("The Tower" by Vienna Teng)


10. How can I forget when each face that I see
    Brings back memories
    Of being with you
    ("You are Everything" by 98 Degrees)


11. Just because I'm sorry
    Doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it at the time
    You're the only thing that I love
    It scares me more every day
    ("Chocolate" by Snow Patrol)


12. 爱你穿越时间
    两行来自秋末的眼泪
    让爱渗透了地面
    我要的只是你在我身边
    (<<枫>> by Jay Chou)


13. God, I admit I haven't changed
    Playing cardhouses still covering my landscape
    I never expected You to stay
    When I'm grabbing for these crumbs and cold loose change
    ("Grace" by Jars of Clay)


14. Better than getting what I say I need
    Better than living the life that I want to
    Better than the love anyone could give
    Your love is
    ("Better than Life" by Hillsong)


15. Your God will undertake
    To guide the future as He has the past
    Your hope, your confidence -- let nothing shake
    All now mysterious will be bright at last
    ("Be Still my Soul" by Rob Graves)

If you really want the answers to those questions, you can go ahead and match them against the questions, but -- yeah, as I've mentioned, zero sense. I've tried to make sure that the titles of the songs don't appear (or not conspicuously anyway) in the lines posted. ;) #12 almost killed me because I had to read through the lyrics, ahem.

No tagging from me this time, but feel free to go ahead, with either the original meme or the modified one. :p In the meantime, this will probably keep me from piling any other entries on top of it, so that should ensure minimal blogging temptation. ;) See you guys after Thursday!

Nope, not yet

Just because the backdrop of one particular clip that I was watching looked a bit familiar...

Me (acting nonchalant): "Hey, you know the guy who won Campus Superstar? Does he by any chance stay in your estate?"

Mr Mogu (genuinely nonchalant): "Zhiyang? Yah, he stays in the block next to mine."

Me: *hyperventilates in disbelief*

Mr Mogu: "Why? You like him?! My brother knows him. You want an autograph?"

Me: *faints*

Guess where I'll be camping out after exams.

***

You would think that I'd be over it by now. You would think.

You'd be wrong.

***

And because many people have been dropping by looking for Zhiyang downloads, you can get his songs here. :) See, I'm not the only one.

Announcement

I have a confession to make. In the past, I've given people a lot of stick for this, so now that I've gone ahead and done it, I'm bracing myself for the backlash. Here goes:

I've fallen for a younger guy.

And I don't mean that a couple of months younger, or even a year. Or even two. I mean, like -- SEVEN WHOLE YEARS.

You think that's bad? You haven't heard the worst of it. Ready?

He's from Chinese High.

Sigh.

***

Sit down. Watch this. And tell me how you could not swoon.

***

Okay, so anyway, he really is a cutie, and I went ahead and made MP3's of his songs (those that I could find on YouTube anyway) to put in my portable player. If my friends thought my Ace fever was bad, they're most certainly not going to like what's coming.

I'd only watched one episode of Campus Superstar (and I thought it was crap, that's why I didn't bother watching any further) -- I think there were three male contestants remaining then -- and Zhiyang stood out for me, probably only because he's from my alma mater. So I know I'm pretty late on the scene, considering he already won it and all; I don't know why the sudden surge of cuteness, but I've been watching the videos, and wow, there is so much cuteness there. I mean, Zhiyang makes Ace look like Shrek. And for probably only the second time in my life, I wish I were 15 again.

Man, I hope he likes older women.

***

I hope promise this fangirl phase will pass.

***

[Edit: I made Zhiyang's songs my mobile phone ringtone. The problem (if there weren't enough) is this: I don't pick up phone calls now, because I don't want the song to stop. Um.

If I don't answer your call, just... call again, and again, and again.

You can download a 30-sec clip of "Superwoman" to use as your ringtone! :D Or listen to the full song on YouTube. No, really, even my friends who are squirming in annoyance from my latest obsession admit that it was a really good vocal performance.

I think I'll, um, go pay my former teachers a visit after my exams. Never know who you might run into. Cough cough.]

Conversations with Dad

Dad and I have this nightly prayer routine; no matter how tired we are, or how much work we have to do, we make time for a short prayer together. Of course there are some nights where I don't come home, but that seldom happens -- probably less than once a month on average -- and even when I have to stay out, I try to call home, and we pray over the phone.

After praying, we sometimes follow it up with a nice chat. There are times when I have so much work that I circumvent this by acting distracted, and he usually gets the hint; I feel guilty, of course, I know how much he loves to talk to us, and I hate depriving him of that, but if you've met my dad, you'll know that he can manage regular three-hour marathon speeches conversations.

Tonight, as we let go of each other's hands at the end of our nightly prayer, he let out a sigh.

"What is it?" I asked.

"It just occurred to me that I finally understand why your grandma was always worrying about us." He stared out of the window.

"It's your turn to worry about us now, huh?" I grinned.

"Yeah, precisely!" He laughed.

"There's nothing to worry about, Dad," I assured him.

"I know, but then I still do -- I worry about all the worst things that might happen to you kids, and even the not so bad things, like whether you're coping with your studies, whether you have enough money, whether you will be able to find a good job, a good husband..."

"Dad..." I rolled my eyes.

"You know, Grandma used to stay up to wait for me whenever I came home late, even when I told her not to."

"And now you do the same! You're always staying up to wait for me, even when I tell you not to!"

"Haha, yeah. But Grandma was better at it than I am," he laughed. "She actually stayed awake waiting for me. Me? I always fall asleep on the couch when I'm waiting for you! HAHAHA!"

"..."

Oh well, it's the thought that counts, I suppose.

Everything

Me: "Ace sang really well tonight! And he's so handsome!"

M: "His hair looks horrible." (I'm paraphrasing.)

Me: "I like it! He can do anything with his hair and I'll still like it!"

M: "Crazy woman."

Me: "..."

Oh, and my Top Five's still intact, although I haven't really been watching much.

***

So, some things:

• We thought it'd be a straight write-off, but apparently not, or not yet. Estimated damages currently stand at $42,000. We'll see how it goes.

• The students' union gave out "exam welfare packs" yesterday. Among other things, we were given Campbell's soup which expires in a month's time, and Teenage magazine -- the February issue of, that is (and that's on top of the fact that we're not within the target age demographic). But we did get useful stationery, like pens, highlighters, flags, and post-its, even if they were sponsored by SDU.

• We're having this extra-curricular session for my human resource module where we're conducting a mock interview. Due to something I'd like to dismiss as The Unfortunate Incident some weeks ago, I've earned myself the reputation as one of those cut-throat, ruthless types, so I've been nominated to sit on the interview panel. When I posted about my rogue dentist some time ago, someone mentioned that I should've asked around for recommendations -- you know, make full use of the blogging platform, that kinda thing. So, dear reader, what are the most common and/or most difficult interview questions you've had? :) Don't worry, I'm not getting any extra credit for this, so you're not helping me do my homework. (I only wish you could!)

• I got a 95% on my Crazyfrog essay. Um. Yeah. Don't ask, I don't know how it happened either. If only such pleasant surprises happened more often, and in my engineering modules! :)

Update

Let's start with yesterday. Let's start with two words: Smashed. Car. Now put them together.

We were on our way home from church, when we collided with another car at a T-junction about 500 metres from our house. You know how they say, during these near-death moments, your whole life flashes before your eyes? Yeah, that didn't happen for me, because I was asleep, in the front passenger seat; the crash was one hell of a wake-up call.

The first thing I saw when I opened my eyes was a car spinning to my left; we'd rammed hard into the other car. I froze in shock, and Dad's voice, coming from the back-seat, was firm and urgent all at once: "Everyone get out of the car. NOW."

At the corner of my eye, I saw fluid seep from beneath the steering wheel onto Mom's lap. Up until this point, I'd been completely calm -- possibly from sheer shock -- and it was only when I couldn't get the car door to open that I started panicking. The door was dented from the collision, and it took me a while to force it open. We stumbled onto the sidewalk, a crowd gathering around us now. I watched as a police car serendipitously arrived at the scene.

"Is everyone okay?" I asked. Everyone was.

We watched the driver from the other car climb out in a daze.

"Are you okay?" I asked him. He nodded, unable to speak.

***

I didn't know what had happened, but as I was standing on the sidewalk, assessing the damage, people started walking up to me to give me their eyewitness accounts. I was unbelievably touched, and I tried to gather myself as quickly as I could; I started taking down names and numbers, and thanking each one profusely.

***



That's us in the silver car. And consistent eyewitness accounts allowed me to piece together the sequence of events. (Probably the first and last time you'll get to see an MS paint drawing from me.) This explains why Mom said she never even saw him coming.

The drivers of the pink and green cars, who were waiting to turn right, both testified that Blue had overtaken them and dashed through the junction, turning from a no-turning lane, with the light green in our favour. Again, I am unspeakably grateful at their willingness to offer help, especially when they could have easily gone on their merry way; they were under no obligation, and I was all the more touched by their kindness and initiative.

***

I'm all for second chances, but I just find it incredulous that just because there's no injury and "no damage to any government property," the police could not file any official reports. We exchanged particulars and insurance details, and Blue apologised again. In between those moments, strangers actually walked up to him to berate him for driving dangerously. I was quite surprised at that; I'm not sure that was the best time, although I certainly did understand the sentiment.

***

When everything had settled down, I went back and watched as the traffic police, in their fluorescent yellow vests, directed the traffic around our cars. I scanned the front part of our car, saw that it was completely smashed up, and wondered how it was that we survived; I scanned Blue's car, saw that the left side of his car was completely dented in, and wondered what would have happened if he'd been carrying a passenger. I thought about all these things, and even though I was standing in the scorching sun, a chill ran down my spine. The fact that we had all come out of it unhurt -- it's something I call the grace of God and nothing else.

***

Sunday is typically Family Day; lunch or shopping trips after church -- nothing fancy, but always together. Yesterday, however, we headed home straight after, because I was rushing a deadline, which is also the reason for my blogging absence.

We had a huge project to turn in last Thursday. On Wednesday, they announced an extension, and we all had until Monday to complete our projects. I can't remember ever having been given an extension in all these years; that will tell you how much we've been struggling -- to the point that our lecturers have acknowledged that they have given us Too Much Work. We're the first batch to complete this project in one semester, where others had previously done in two.

That meant many late nights in the computer lab, and by late nights, I mean that the newspapers are at my doorstep by the time I get home; not that I had any time to read them at all. And that also explains why I was asleep in the car; grabbing every chance I could at getting some shut-eye.

We turned in the project this morning, and that's the only reason why I have time to blog. It's not over, of course, more deadlines are coming up next week. But today, today I rest, today I thank God that I'm alive. Today I catch up on a week's worth of news, today I clip my fingernails, today I watch Grey's Anatomy.

***



I banged up my knee in the crash, I forgot to mention. But that's fine. I've certainly had worse.

***

Me (concerned): "What was that leaking from the car earlier?"

Mom: "Something was leaking from the car?"

Me: "Yeah, from under the steering wheel. Was that the radiator fluid?"

Mom: "Er, no, that was my water bottle."

Me: "..."