To Feel Good

I think music nowadays has become disposible.

with the advent of the digital music movement, along with mp3s and ipods, people tend not to listen to the same things too often. play something you've downloaded cheaply off itunes five times and you're ready to buy a new tune online again.

and so to cater to fickle consumers, music factories have had to churn out more artistes, more songs and more albums just to keep up.

jay-z calls them "auto-tunes", and i think i'll have to agree. there are less golden melodies and more forgettable white noise dominating the airwaves these days.

i miss the days when i made my own mixed tapes, and when i mulled over which cd to buy because they were too expensive for a 15 year old.

some feel-good songs that you hardly hear on the radio these days:

Lenny Kravitz, "It Ain't Over Til It's Over" (and here he is, looking incredibly good in this live performance)



Mark Morrison, "Return of the Mack"



The Cranberries, "Linger" (i can still remember all of the lyrics!)



East 17, "Deep" (i loved east 17 before i ever began to like take that. my idea of the best boy band from england.)



PM Dawn, "Set Adrift on Memory Bliss" (i think i only ever liked spandau ballet's "true" because of this song)



ah, the simple bliss of nostalgia.

Exposed

My cyber-stalking tendencies, thrown open to public scrutiny.

moral of the story?
if you are following someone this closely, you either:
1) let them know
2) cover your tracks so they won't ever find out

obviously i did neither and she found me!!

edina, if you're reading this, i want you to know that i'm happy you did. i didnt really have that much fun in secondary school because a lot of people simply assume that you arent made of much just because your grades are pathetic, and some of my best memories from that time are of us in class laughing and talking.

i'd be more than happy to meet up. it's always much much better seeing a person in the flesh than from across a computer screen : )

Dreams

Last night I dreamed of someone I havent met in the longest time.

we were almost best friends in secondary school. by "almost" i mean i wasnt meant to be her BFF because she was already promised to another. the realization that we were never going to be exclusive best friends upset me and made me jealous of the other girl, who was naturally, as do most stories go, bright, talented and popular.

but we were close. and she shared with me the details of her every crush, the one where she fell in love with the back view of a boy she happened to be on a tour bus with while she was holidaying in indonesia with her family being the most memorable of all.

i was always at her house, an apartment in geylang with its very own elevator landing that opened up into the living room. she had a poodle named alpha, and while i was never a big fan of poodles i cried along with her when alpha died.

she loved keanu reeves and boyzone, so we watched every movie that keanu reeves starred in and i listened while she raved about the latest boyzone single.

then when we left secondary school, she started a relationship with a boy she met every morning in the train on her way to junior college and i met my first boyfriend in school. we were young and didnt know anything about juggling priorities in love, school and friendship, so we drifted apart.

for the next six or seven years our contact was reduced to the random phone call, the rare text message. she quit JC and switched to polytechnic while i entered university. from there, our paths forked.

a year before i was to come to okinawa, she asked me out to dinner. it turned out that her relationship with her divorced boss crumbled when he fell for the new secretary, and she was looking to rebuild her friendships, which she said she had neglected over the past years. but for some reason, dinner didnt blossom into a resurrected friendship and until today, i still dont know why we never became more than almost-best friends.

ten years on and we've moved on to new friendships and new lives. last night's dream reminded me of how straightforward everything used to be. perhaps it's because i've forgotten what it's like to think simple. or maybe it's because some friendships dont last past a certain expiry date.

in any case, i do hope she is doing fine.