6 metres of cable

 I bought a cheap lavalier mic that has a 6-metre long cable a year ago. I have never used all of that 6 metres of cable before. It being so long makes it get entangled really easily and takes forever to untangle. I tried making use of all that 6 metres today and made a video with it. Here it is!

I also made some comics about it today, inspired by a conversation I had with my friend Chris.

Todd and Peaches

 For Todd and Peaches! Inspired by Todd and Peaches, of course!!!

Well, I dunno what Todd and Peaches eat in real life but playing with food is always fun.
And eating them, of course! You get the feeling that Peaches might be the tidier eater here...

A bit of exercising to keep the mind and the body trim and happy. Mr. T the cat can learn a lot from this. Jon and Joo too....

oh, time to go up to the mountains to pick some mushrooms! Since Todd has decided to take his wonky old bicycle, Peaches decided to join him too. I am not sure if that is a good way to go UP a mountain, but Peaches is determined to keep his friend company. Actually, they have friends joining them on the climb. No one goes to the mountains for mushrooms alone, that's for sure!

we are all (not just a bit) screwed up

his buddha face and his sick sausage dog

He was my dad's friend. "Was" because my dad is no longer alive. No longer to be seen buying his bananas or Char Siew Bao. No longer to be seen walking so quickly along Serangoon Ave 3, cigarette in his mouth.... When I see this uncle, I think of my father. My father was thin just like him.

She looks very unhappy all the time. Angry, actually. I used to be scared of angry-looking people like her. My dad was that way too- always looking angry with something. One day, I said "Good Morning!" to her, and asked if she had her breakfast yet. She relaxed a little bit after that and seemed less angry. I saw her one afternoon carrying bags of groceries, head bowed, looking really troubled. Maybe she has some troubles at home ......But don't we all?

What I wanna say is - He looks like someone with a successful career. The way he carries himself, his skin, the clothes he wears. But I might be wrong.

The lady who sits around at the void deck all day long and asking for money to buy food and cold drinks. Her favourite drink is Coca Cola. She always wants to share her food with me.

 A young man whom I had never noticed before. I think he likes Mr. T. He seems a little ....strange. (I wonder if he thinks the same about me?) 

A lady who lives upstairs from me....I don't even have to think I am imagining anything up- I know that she is definitely going through something tough. She looks so unhappy.  How many people around me are truly happy? Perhaps I tend to notice the "unhappy-looking" ones more.

Oh, I think she is pretty happy mostly. She has 3 cats and a stable, high-paying job. And she LOOKS happy most of the times.

My neighbour downstairs. I call him "Handsome" 'cause he is. He has put on so much weight, but still handsome. His little boy adores Mr. T. He smokes a lot though.....Handsome, not his little boy. Although he, that little boy, might one day grow up to become a chain smoker just like his dad, who knows?

this week

 Well, it's Friday. This means the week is coming to an end soon.

I love the idea of calendar. 

We will be lost without it. I know I will be.

Not that looking at the calendar had made me feel less lost, but at least I knew my time was running out and I had to act ASAP.

So, I have been lost for a long time. Truth. Kind of plodding along not certain of where I was heading.

Fortunately, drawing and painting pull me back.

Here are some drawings I did of a few characters I encounter this week. Trust me, I encounter many, MANY characters each week, living in one of the most popular parts of Singapore. 

Some are memorable, many not so. But each one has a story I don't know. I see each person through my own eyes, and my words are not a reality that they might be living in. My words are just thoughts or reflections that I have when looking and thinking about them.

Here goes:

I often saw this tall, thin lady doing stretching exercises at a void deck nearby my flat, on my way to the library (when I was working there). She wore these really well-made, expensive looking, maybe designer blouses, with loose shorts that sat just above her knees. I could see her spine protruding when she bend her body forward.

She has a handsome face. And her eyes...she doesn't look at anyone. Face expressionless. I can also describe it as calm. 

Since I stopped working at the library I don't see her as much. But I saw her the other day, sitting on a metal bench at the elevator lobby, fanning herself with a brochure. I could not see what was printed on the brochure, but I caught the caption on her tee, on her chest - TODAY.

I remember that moment I saw her, because her eyes looked like they were staring blankly at some other day except today.

At my flat I hear the voices of 2 people trying their best to tell the other person that he and she isn't listening to him and her. Every single freaking day. When words that are not heard continue to vibrate through the air, they become noise.

There is so much noise around me and inside me that I go to this special corner to inhale the poison that can kill me, just a little bit at a time...

In a lovely house somewhere in Electrona there is a man who collects little dust objects. These objects are mostly globular, and they create themselves when dust particles get tossed in the air, aided by the shuffling of the man's feet on the floor. Think tumbleweeds, or the dung balls rolled and shaped by dung bettles.

I was on my way to Food Republic at Nex Mall when I encountered this uncle lying this way on the ground at the void deck. I know this uncle and he knows me too.  He has a severely hunched back, so maybe that is how he looks when he lies on his back. I am not sure why his hands were that way though, he looked like he was riding a Harley Davidson bike or something. Anyway, I looked at his face and he looked rather peaceful. I was so hungry I didn't stop to check if he might have passed out or was dead or was just lying there. He often sleeps on the stone benches at the void deck, so I didn't think too much about this. But then I went home and remembered this scene in my head. (I hope he is OK)

There was a lady sitting diagonally across to my seat, eating a bowl of yummy looking crushed ice dessert, topped with some red beans and ruby-coloured jelly things, and drizzled with what looked like milk, most likely coconut milk. She started talking to me in a soft, squeaky voice. Imagine mice whispering. I quickly realised that she wasn't talking to me, she was just talking to herself. 

I sat through my bowl of fish soup noodles hoping she would not do something crazy like jump up and strangle me. She kept talking and laughing and took small spoons of her dessert. She looked really, REALLY tired. I didn't wanna change table in case it might upset her.

In the little town of Wishram, witches are laying eggs in Todd's yard. His friend Peaches is very skeptical about them....

Back in Serangoon Ave 3, at a corner of a mezzanine level, Mr. T the stray cat is doing one of his favourite activities. 

shark boy

 I renamed my clothes peg SHARK BOY.

Here is a song to celebrate the essential, multi-talented Shark Boy.

renaming colours

 

I gave new names to these colours today. With these new names, I made up a song. These are the words of the accompanying song: Here's a message from the bees On a skylark morning Anything is possible When I put on my dancing shoes Bugs' eyes peering through a revolving door A brooch for mum on the tablecloth Yonder lightning flashes in the sky It's gingko summer Book a ticket to Sunnyville Poor weeping willow Let your troubles go like Erik's tumbleweed Stop taming wild hippo This is where my paintings live Mysterious objects like Juliet's eggs Put a tourniquet on my broken skull Grumbly tumbly bear