Friday, July 31, 2015

Fuck Marry Kill

Surprisingly very few have heard of it! Though I count myself as probably the last person to hear of a growing fad, it turns out there are some far worse than me. Even something as old as Fuck, Marry, Kill. Simple enough since it basically it offers a hypothetical scenario with three options to choose - whether to fuck, marry or kill.

And no, there are no two options for one. You have to choose. And I mean Mad Madison.

Since we usually have a mixed group of straights and gays ( not to mention those still in hiding / confused / etc ) whenever we meet, it does come up with the most eye-opening conversations. Along with the inadvertent outing.

Paul : Let's start with the Avengers. 
Grizz : Oh I'll start with -
Shawn : Hold on! Who are we gonna pick? There's only one woman on the team so far, well unless you count in the Scarlet Witch. 
Grizz : Oops yeah. 
Shawn : Bet you didn't catch that, bro.
Paul : Bet he didn't.

Like I said the last time, we are starting to wonder how generally sensible folks can't even tell that Grizz is a full-out gay bear. It's as glaringly obvious as the various shirtless bear parties - chock-full of hairy growling beasts in skimpy Speedos - that he openly posts up on Facebook.

But back to our game! For some inexplicable reason all Engineer Girls tend to want to marry Robert Downey Jr. Definitely not me though! Simply can't stand the snarky, pretentious Ironman so that would be the first I would push off a bridge. Make that aggressively drop-kick off a bridge!

Of course fuck Chris Hemsworth as Thor. I mean, would anyone even the slightest bit inclined towards men say no to the brawny blond godliness of Chris Hemsworth? Fun times on the bearskins for sure. But that arrogant Norse god machismo could get a tad grating at times so definitely not for marriage of course.

Imagine waking up to this!

And of course I would marry the dreamy Chris Evans as Captain America. Was there any doubt who I would choose? Despite what most might think, I like my men a tad serious, polite and old-fashioned so who else better than a soldier straight out of the 1940s? The ability to fill out a tight tee with those awe-inspiring pecs and tear off wood blocks with his well-muscled bare arms is just a welcome bonus.

Tuesday, July 28, 2015

Five Stages

Should be glaringly obvious by now - but just in case, don't ever tell a doctor bad news if you're expecting an overwhelming display of sentiment.

Calvin : I've got something to tell you. 
Paul : Yes? About the medical exam? 
Calvin : My cholesterol is sky high. 
Paul : We can deal with this.

From the severely perplexed look on his face, perhaps Calvin expected a more excessive response to his unprecedented proclamation. Maybe I should have changed my response and fallen to the ground in a swoon after an artful shriek instead.

Unfortunately most doctors have schooled themselves to maintain a blank, strangely serene expression on their faces at all times regardless of the situation at hand. Think I could handle most predicaments, even the most wildly outlandish, with quite a lot of equanimity. Learned behaviour at work possibly since we know nothing much can be solved with a screaming bout of hysteria.

Apart from sheer exhaustion.

That's certainly not the underwhelming reaction Charming Calvin received when he announced it during dinner at the Forteresse de Borgia. Since I wasn't the wished-for fly-on-the-wall, I can only imagine the evening revelation brought upon a keening wail not see since the excessive lamentation of the prefiche.

Madame : Oh Dios Mios! It's the end of the world as we know it!
Benedicta : What has befallen the familia!
Paul : Wish I could record this.
Calvin : Don't you dare.

Of course I imagined his mother acting through DADBA dramatically at near lightspeed. A simple acronym I cooked up way back in medical school for what we would call the Five Stages of Grief from Kubler-Ross ranging from Denial, Anger, Depression, Bargaining to Acceptance.

Certainly applied to Madame Borgia when she was dutifully informed of the news.

Calvin : It is true, alas!
Madame : C'est impossible! Surely not!
Calvin : Yes I have it. I can show you the results. 
Madame : This is all your fault! All the meals! All the work! All the stress! 
Calvin : Maybe? 
Madame : Sigh, can't believe this is happening! C'est tragique! 
Calvin : I am trying very hard to -
Madame : Maybe the results are wrong? Maybe you could repeat the test? Did you drink a bit too much sugar? 
Calvin : I rechecked twice. 
Madame : Allons. 

And they decided to work out a working solution which inevitably brings my poor Calvin back to the near-vegan dietary requirements exulted by his health-conscious mother. Vegetables, vegetables and more vegetables. But not before an entire litany of I-told-you-sos.

Sometimes I do understand where Calvin gets his uncharacteristic flair for melodramatics from.

Tuesday, July 21, 2015

Your Inner Voice

Am I the only one who has noticed it or do the dedicated gym boys confer in awfully loud, resonant voices?

I promise I don't have overly sensitive super-hearing - far from it - but when I can hear brash boys boasting about big barbells several walls across in the dark, dank depths of a running shower, that has to constitute loud. And these aren't even the lusty, virile moans of the frequent grunters who now seem almost piously hushed in comparison!

Nor are they the hyper-enthusiastic personal trainers cheering on their clients.

Seems to be an entirely new subset of their own. As the gym boys converse in between - and during - heavyweight sets, you can hear their cacophonous booming echoing across the cavernous gym. No doubt they have to raise their voices several decibels to compensate for the endless thumpa thumpa electrodiscotechno beat.

Even then their screams and shouts more than overcompensate to drown out the cacophonous music.

Boy #1 : AIYO. THIS WEIGHT IS REALLY HEAVY!
Boy #2 : YOU CAN DO IT! NO PROBLEM.
Boy #1 : WHERE YOU GOING FOR LUNCH AFTER THIS?
Boy #2 : NO IDEA YET. GIRLFRIEND MIGHT WANT TO HAVE LUNCH LA.
Boy #1 : NEW ONE KA?
Boy #2 : ANOTHER ONE! DON'T TELL THE OLD ONE!

Entire banal conversations are carried out at their loudest volume! Usually not that intriguing of course but every once in a while, I do hear some shockingly lurid gems.

Exhausted after a day of yelling

So without even trying to eavesdrop, I find myself involuntarily shackled to the seat privy to their innermost secrets and affairs told at top of their lungs. The usual wives and mistresses whine come into play along with the more outlandish stage whispers about moles and calluses. So much for leaving it to the implied privacy of the men's locker room!

Then again maybe all that shouting burns calories.


Friday, July 17, 2015

The Bane of Homework

As a school-going student, one of my endless horrors had to be the eternal bane of homework.

The occasional school project I was fine with - and in fact quite excelled in. Lots of extra time for preparation and planning, given deadline usually given some time away and a whole lot of creative input required; which is exactly what I was great at. Since these infrequent projects generally added to the final term results, kiasu me tried my best to outshine the rest of my rival classmates by coming up with terrifyingly extravagant showcases.

What the hell was I thinking back then!

But when it comes to dull dreary homework... they usually carries a shorter time lapse - frequently naggingly insistent on getting done by the end of the day at the very least. Though my parents never hovered over me to do so, I still felt this invisible urge to square it away before dinnertime. Many a time you would find me eschewing classroom antics - and the incidental prank - in between lessons just to furiously rush through several mind-numbingly tedious homework.

Well it's during these kinda times that I would be the one in the corner furiously doing my homework. 

Which honestly did nothing to improve my pitiable knowledge of said subject. More like filling up the given blanks mechanically as an unthinking machine would just to hand it up the next morning. Gasak saja as we would say in colloquial Malay. After all lousy lackadaisical homework never did crop up as a comment in our report cards!

Yes, I truly disliked homework; and never did see the sense in filling up my time performing these monotonous chores. Did anyone actually achieve a scholastic epiphany while listlessly getting through their assignments?

Thankfully those nightmarish school-going days are far behind me now.

Unfortunately that homework-hating trait seems to have spread to my niece and nephew. Though their methods of dealing with the piles of assignments aren't the same as mine at all. Whereas I would try my best to dash through the interminable sums, my niece and nephew tend to whine over their never-ending Kumon assignments.

Carmen : More homework!! Sob!
Raoul : I can't believe there's more!
Paul : Just do it fast and finish it!

Though I will admit the Kumon work does look seemingly endless. Tempted to tell them that there would be an end to all that monstrous homework one day but I guess when you're not even ten, that wouldn't be a comfort at all.

Monday, July 13, 2015

Treasure of the Borgias

Honestly - though I would have easily scoffed at such a ridiculous notion barely a year back - I am starting to believe that the Borgias actually do have treasure buried under their family compound. Till now their blue-eyed boy Charming Calvin has explicitly refused to confirm or deny my growing suspicions.

Otherwise why the incessant need to fortify and safeguard their premises? Surely at least a couple of diamonds and pearls. Maybe a spectacularly jewelled tiara or two? A missing Rembrandt perhaps?

Or some clandestine family horror like a hellish pet demon that needs constant supervision?

Father : Always remember the family motto, Benedicta! Heed my words well!
Benedicta : What is it, father?
Father : Leave Not the House Unguarded!

Ever since I've known Calvin, his family has always had a particularly paranoid obsession over their barricaded fortress. Father Borgia especially can never ever bear to leave their mighty Forteresse de Borgia alone for more than a flash, preferring to have at least a sentinel, or ten, guard the precious premises when they are away. Leave Not The House Unguarded indeed!

Calvin : Could you send me to my sister Benedicta's chateau this evening? 
Paul : You're paying her a visit? 
Calvin : She has gone south to stay with her belle mere. 
Paul : So you're going to an empty chateau? What for? 
Calvin : No, I need to secure the chateau after a recent housebreaking. 
Paul : Oh dear! When? 
Calvin : Almost a year now. 
Paul : What?
Calvin : The Borgias don't take any chances so we always make sure the chateau is kept under surveillance. Even Forteresse de Borgia always has custodians to watch over it. 
Paul : So that the Ark of the Covenant isn't wrested away from the family? 
Calvin : What? 

Exactly what they do to secure the household, I have no idea. Since they are the Borgias, perhaps set elaborate traps for any wandering vagabonds? Or maybe Calvin stands watch on the roof of the chateau the entire night with a loaded rifle in hand ready to take them down?

Undoubtedly the rise in crime has me a little worried but to post a sentry at my door all the time even when I'm away is a bit... much. Never ever leaving Netherfield for more than a handful of hours just to prevent break-ins? Wouldn't that be just a tad extreme? Unless there are boundless treasures buried right underneath the floors.

An intriguing thought.

Since Calvin can neither confirm nor deny! No doubt one of these days I shall head over to the Forteresse in the wee hours of the morning with shovel in hand.

Thursday, July 09, 2015

Thou Shalt Not Crash The Other's Soiree

More likely the Duelling Debutantes these days - with the prim and proper petticoats sauntering out from their shared domicile at the break of dawn to settle their differences with deadly hand fans and snuff boxes. Not long from now, I'm sure.

Months ago, we all predicted the likely chances of a murder-suicide tragedy over at the domicile but much to our surprise, they seemed to be rubbing along quite tolerably till we were recently made to realize that it was all a polite regency farce. Exchanging amicable kisses over steaming pots of Earl Grey in the public while sharpening mental knives on the sly. Deliciously devious.

Did you hear? 

And all it took was a single misstep by Marvellous Mabel - seemingly the most clear-headed - for this deliciously devious bit of devilry to be revealed.

Mabel : Oh I don't come out in the evenings. 
Paul : That's odd. Fear of the dark?
Mabel : No! I just stay in my room. 
Paul : Cabined, cribbed, confined? Not even going into the living room? 
Mabel : Not when Sophia has her friends over. 
Paul : But why not? 
Mabel : It has been written into our Norms. Thou Shalt Not Crash The Other's Soiree. 
Paul : Don't you all share the same set of acquaintances? 
Mabel : Yes, but not during those times. 
Paul : During those hours, they are only her friends?
Mabel : Precisely. 

Let me get this straight. The housemate has your friends over for a convivial gathering but you can't come out? Mean Girls much?

If that wasn't enough to deliberately provoke a murder-suicide as above, a secret masquerade ball was later planned between the girls - without the knowledge of the third who obviously wasn't meant to be invited. But due to the fact that they all reside together in the same domicile, spend the entire day basically together, there was little they could do but reluctantly reveal all to the third.

At the very last minute.

Oh wait, there is a masquerade ball in an hour! Gosh, we must have misplaced the invite! Don't forget, ta-ta!

I can just imagine the murderous thoughts that went by in her head. Now where in the world - apart from a magical fairygodmother - would she be able to find a proper ball gown and mask in time? And where could she hide the carving knife?


Sunday, July 05, 2015

La Belle Mere Pars a Paris!

Much have I written about my erstwhile dragoness mother-in-law, the infamous belle mere Madame Borgia and her singleminded obsession to liberate the known world from the unseen horrors of meat and mirrors! Perhaps I could have elaborated even further if Charming Calvin hadn't put down his foot on the entire dastardly scheme. After all, surely our blue-eyed Borgia boy wouldn't like to have his own bonne maman gain such horrific notoriety online!

And perhaps I shouldn't talk ill about Madame Borgia since she has been feeling rather blue after the recent tragic loss of her elder son. So deep in her inconsolable despondency that her other son, Calvin, felt himself obliged to suggest some form of lighthearted entertainment to reanimate her pensive spirits.

Pardon, Maman.

It should surprise no one that it was Calvin who finally, lamentably stumbled upon the idea of travel.

Quelle folie!

Though I had earlier floated the novel idea of Madame Borgia enlisting in our regular travelling troupe, I had expected a far more familiar locale for her; at least somewhere that hints of the Orient perhaps? Certainly not our proposed destination for the next journey which is deep in the heart of Occidental Europe - Paris. After all it was high time my mother had her chance to do the Grand Tour so to speak.

Paul : Mon dieu! What is belle mere to do in Paris!
Calvin : Take a walk? Buy some baguettes? 
Paul : Quoi? Le madame dislikes art galleries, museums and boutiques!
Calvin : I'm sure she will grow to love it. 
Paul : Voyons. What if she - like my bonne maman - only seeks out nourriture chinoise?
Calvin : Then we shall have délicieux le riz cantonais !
Paul : Oh la vache!

Then again since Calvin frequently fancies himself capped with a black beret, twirling a slim mustache while sipping his un café at a chic French cafe, perhaps Madame Borgia has comparable dreams of strolling through the sun-dappled cobbled streets of Montmartre. Dreams of being the next Deneuve perhaps?


So a gay couple with both their distinctly dissimilar mamans on a trip to Paris. Surely the plot for a rollicking French comedy, non

Thursday, July 02, 2015

Obligations of Man

Friend : Oh I wouldn't want to put them through much trouble. 
Paul : Just to wait up for a little while? That small favour? 
Friend : Just don't want to trouble others!

不想麻烦你! Don't want to trouble you! Most assuredly it does sound altogether agreeable to the ears. Perfectly reasonable not to want a friend to be unnecessarily inconvenienced after all.

At least that's what they would like you to think. Perchance they think quite highly of themselves as well. Quick pat on the back and all.

Me, I call their supposedly magnanimous bullshit.

Perhaps it's my constant hobby of people-watching throughout the years. Or maybe just a cantankerous, cynical way of interpreting said perspective. However after years of endless voyeurism, I have come to the dismal conclusion that there are a few who won't put others to that trouble usually because they won't trouble themselves to do the same. Hence the inherent hesitation to find themselves obliged to return the favour.

Nothing altruistic about their behaviour in the least.; in fact there's a sickly sour note of selfishness underneath all that schmaltzy humanitarianism.

Boy : Could you do me a favour?
Friend : No.
Boy : You don't even know what it is yet.
Friend : Still no. That's why I don't ask anyone for favours.

Probably your first instinct would be to vehemently deny such a horrid inference - but just pause and think about it. That friend who frequently tries his or her best not to trouble others by asking for favours - well you usually don't find them doing any other people favours as well. At the bottom of it, they fear asking for favour because they fear returning it. Neither a borrower nor a lender be. In fact you'd probably have to straight out compel them with a sharp blade to the neck to proffer their wholly limited services.

Entirely manageable favours such as picking up something along the way or even bringing someone around a new place. Even then they would usually tentatively hem and haw before agreeing.

Really, who's the trouble now?

Basically for those in the small list I call friends, I would do all in my power to extend a hand if I can. Short of the shockingly extraordinary like lending a kidney, easy favours within my means are easy enough to fulfil. If they can't count on me for the simplest things, why would they even bother calling me friend?