State of mind

Out of control. panicking, unsatisfactory, disgusted, lonely, fear, anger, shame, fear, cold, murderous heart, lonely, lonely, unresolved, regret, numb, dumb, insecure, shame, trapped, no where to go, on an unstoppable train.

out of control: I have a hard time to reign my desire.
panicking: future seemed to be unknow, but deep down there is a prediction.
unsatisfactory: always.
disgusted: must be me.
lonely: i want to play.
fear: windy in the night.
anger: explosive inside of me. fragile with a dip.
shame: speak no evil.
fear: done.
cold: ignore, boxed inside out.
murderous heart: volcano inside looming.
lonely: friends.
unresolved: to have or not to have
regret: writing this
numb: calm on the outside. make no facial movements.
dumb: move, you dummy...
insecure: what if?
shame: out of toilet papers...
trapped: old man and the sea
no where to go: are there safe?
on an unstoppable train: do I lose grip? or am I not able to?

外婆的故事

這是舅舅跟我說的一個故事. 他說這是外婆說的.

那時, 大陸剛剛淪陷一兩個月. 外婆懷著舅舅, 大概待產期也已經剩下一兩個月了.

這天為了要去看醫生, 走出蘇州市沙皮巷, 他們家那時租賃的狀元大宅去找黃包車. 找到了一個車夫在路旁, 他們跑近前跟他說要去醫院, 好像有一個外婆的妹妹跟著.

車夫看看他們, 很神氣的說, "現在解放了, 人民翻身了, 該你們這些資產階級載我啦."
外婆一聽, 氣炸了. 外婆的小妹可能還在旁勸, "他不載就去找別人. 別跟他鬥!" 外婆拗了起來, 硬是要評個理.

捧著個大肚子, 竟然跑去找警察問: "是不是解放了, 所有人都不用工作啦? 我一個孕婦要坐車去看醫生, 竟然有車夫跟我說現在人民翻身了, 要我這孕婦拉車夫去醫院?!"

警察和外婆他們找到那個車夫說, "你還要吃飯不?"
車夫說, "要."
"要, 那就還得工作啊! 你以為解放了, 就不需要工作啦?!"

言迄,　車夫才把外婆他們載去醫院．　　

古代採風

西門行
出西門，步念之，今日不作樂，當待何時？逮為樂，逮為樂，當及時。
何能愁怫鬱，當復待來茲。釀美酒，炙肥牛，請呼心所歡，可用解憂愁。
人生不滿百，常懷千歲憂。晝短苦夜長，何不秉燭遊。
遊行去去如雲除，弊車贏馬為自儲。


東門行
出東門，不顧歸。來入門，悵欲悲。盎中無斗米儲，還視架上無懸衣。
拔劍東門去，舍中兒母牽衣啼。他家但願富貴，賤妾與君共餔糜。
上用倉浪天故，下當用此黃口兒。
今非，咄！行！吾去為遲，白髮時下難久居。

Kids are quick

TEACHER: Maria, go to the map and find North America .
MARIA: Here it is.
TEACHER: Correct. Now class, who discovered America ?
CLASS: Maria.
____________________________________

TEACHER: John, why are you doing your math multiplication on the floor?
JOHN: You told me to do it without using tables..
__________________________________________

TEACHER: Glenn, how do you spell 'crocodile?'
GLENN: K-R-O-K-O-D-I-A-L'
TEACHER: No, that's wrong
GLENN: Maybe it is wrong, but you asked me how I spell it.
(I Love this kid)
____________________________________________

TEACHER: Donald, what is the chemical formula for water?
DONALD: H I J K L M N O.
TEACHER: What are you talking about?
DONALD: Yesterday you said it's H to O.
__________________________________

TEACHER: Winnie, name one important thing we have today that we didn't have ten years ago.
WINNIE: Me!
__________________________________________

TEACHER: Glen, why do you always get so dirty?
GLEN: Well, I'm a lot closer to the ground than you are.
_______________________________________

TEACHER: Now, Simon, tell me frankly, do you say prayers before eating?
SIMON: No sir, I don't have to, my Mom is a good cook.
______________________________

TEACHER: Clyde , your composition on 'My Dog' is exactly the same as your brother's. Did you copy his?
CLYDE : No, sir. It's the same dog.
___________________________________

TEACHER: Harold, what do you call a person who keeps on talking when people are no longer interested?
HAROLD: A teacher

No Sunday Paper

This is dedicated to all of us who are seniors, to all of you who know seniors, and to all of you who will become seniors.


"WHERE is my SUNDAY paper?"




The irate customer calling the newspaper office, loudly demanded to know where her Sunday edition was.


"Madam", said the newspaper employee, "today is Saturday. The Sunday paper is not delivered until tomorrow, on SUNDAY".



There was quite and long pause on the other end of the phone, followed by a ray of recognition as she was heard to mutter,



"Well, shit, that explains why no one was at church today."

不能忘的台詞

電影常常會有不能令人忘懷的地方, 有時候是某個角色, 有時候是某個故事情節, 有時候是鏡頭手法, 有時候是音樂. 但是, 在眾多的東西裏, 唯一可以為人們不斷重複在日常生活裏的, 那就是台詞... 當然, 不是每個人都會把電影裡的台詞都放在嘴邊. 可是當大家談電影時, 台詞卻是最好的笑料之一, 而且可以即興表演. 一旦有人念了出來那段台詞, 電影裡的畫面, 演員的扮相, 面容, 背景音樂, 場景色調, 故事情節等等也盡都浮上腦海裏.

舉例子來說, 如果有人提教父, 你想到啥? An offer you can't refuse? 如果有人提英雄, 我的腦海裏是, 好快的劍. 如果有人提 霸王別姬, 我想到的是我本是女兒生那一段台詞. 這樣講, 是否會有畫面浮上你的腦袋呢?

公無渡河

崔豹《古今注》曰：「〈箜篌引〉，朝鮮津卒霍里子高妻麗玉所作也。

子高晨起刺船，有一白首狂夫，被髮提壺，亂流而渡，其妻隨而止之，不及，遂墮河而死。
於是援箜篌而鼓之，作〈公無渡河〉之曲:

公無渡河，公竟渡河。
墮河而死，當奈公何？

聲甚悽愴，曲終，亦投河而死。
子高還，以其聲語其妻麗玉，麗玉傷之。乃引箜篌而寫其聲，聞者莫不墮淚飲泣焉。
麗玉以其曲傳鄰女麗容，名之曰〈箜篌引〉。」










1.《古今注》卷中〈音樂〉 〈箜篌引〉，朝鮮津卒霍里子高妻麗玉所作也。高晨起刺船，有白首狂夫被髮提壺，亂河流而渡，其妻隨止不及，遂墮河水死。於是援箜篌而鼓之，作〈公無渡河〉之曲，聲甚悽愴，曲終，自投河而死。子高還，以其聲語妻，麗玉傷之。乃引箜篌而寫其聲，聞者莫不墮淚飲泣焉。麗玉以其曲傳鄰女麗容，名之曰〈箜篌引〉。

2.《先秦漢魏晉南北朝詩‧漢詩》卷九〈樂府古辭‧相和歌辭‧相和曲‧箜篌引〉～255～ 一曰〈公無渡河〉，崔豹《古今注》曰：「〈箜篌引〉，朝鮮津卒霍里子高妻麗玉所作也。子高晨起刺船，有一白首狂夫，被髮提壺，亂流而渡，其妻隨而止之，不及，遂墮河而死。於是援箜篌而鼓之，作〈公無渡河〉之曲，聲甚悽愴，曲終，亦投河而死。子高還，以其聲語其妻麗玉，麗玉傷之。乃引箜篌而寫其聲，名曰〈箜篌引〉。」


公無渡河，公竟渡河。
墮河而死，當奈公何？


3. 影片中的歌是韓國歌手李尚恩在 1995 年唱出來.

silent slippery, boom

silent slippery, boom. That is what all I remembered about the last time I totaled a car. That was on a high way. I got very impatient, for the reason was unknown to me this day. I was driving my mom, my sis, and my mom's friends, Shu Ching from Kingdom Hall. It was lightly showered road though the shower had ceased. When I am driving with my mom's friends, or other people while my mom is on the car, she is always nervous. She would tell me to slow down, watch out, or be careful, or some other things. And I would get very annoyed. The more she anxious and uttering, I got more the angrier. I would never understand the reason. That's probably what happened that day.

I switched lane from second to the third. I did not think my speed was above 65 mph. The third lane came to a hold in front of me beyond at least 6 yard, I think. I tried to brake. I knew instantly what happened, the brake did not work, and my car started to slide, like a water jet on a lake. The rest was absolute silence. Until I hit the car in front of me and looked to the back seat for my mom and Shu Ching. I tried steer my car to the road side but to no prevail. Boom.

That was 7 years ago. I felt extremely panicky after reading my uncle's email about my mom's medicare thing just now. I have no idea why this silent slippery boom memory came up. I guess in a way, I feel I am in that situation again. Sometimes I feel I would like to swallow a bomb and let it explode inside of me...

Thoughts on Expendables

I watched expendables last night. I had a great time! As a no brainer action movie, it was awesome. All the casts were awesome, even Jet Li, although he was kind lame in there compared to others.

An action movie should be like this: a simple goal, actions has to have a real cause, emotions have to be felt. comedy is optional although I prefer it over something dark. I think the reason I liked the expendable is because, the interaction between the gangs were simple and humane enough; the plot line had good twist that caused the action to happen; the emotion was felt. All these above mentioned were not just means for eyes to catch something moving. The so called Action movie has to have some psychological impact, which caused our mind to agree with the action that was carried out.

There were some great scenes:

Fight between Steve Austin and Stallone, and how it was ended.
Randy Courture's fighting movement.
Terry Crews's big weapon and shaving knife.
Jason Statham is still Jason Satham.
Gunner Jensen.
Jet Li had some funny lines.
Air Plane assault.
"are you crazy?!"

It was just awesome! The only wish is to find a place for Jet Li. I felt that if the actor was not Jet Li, I would like nothing to improve. But It is Jet Li...

simple words have looming profiles on the wall

My cousin, Wendy, loves to read all kinds of things. She loves to explore and she has the ability and capacity to do so. She posted an interesting audio track introducing Federalist Papers from a CD, which is a college material for social science. I emailed to other people. One of them asked who's the professor for that track. So I emailed my cousin with the question. She kindly sent me the material. I did not know that it is college material at first. When I saw the attachment she sent me, I was a bit surprised. So I emailed her again expressing my surprise by saying, you must be preparing for your daughters, if not, I do not have words for you... Here is her reply:

"It is a college course. I am inspiring myself because I didn't have the chance to choose the major of my interest. ;-)

I borrowed whole course (cd) from library, and it is very helpful."

Simple words. But it is powerful, I think.

知命

論語最後一句話是:

子曰：「不知命，無以為君子也；不知禮，無以立也；不知言，無以知人也。」

命是啥? 我抄錄梁啟超于民國十六年在華北大學的知命與努力的演講. 梁啟超用三個來源:

"《孟子》说：“莫之致而者命也。” 意味並不靠我們去促成, 而它自己當然來的, 便是命.

《荀子》说：“節遇謂之命。” 節是時節, 意味在某一時節偶然遇著的, 命是命.

《禮記》说：“分于道之謂命。” 這一條戴東原解釋的最詳, 他以為道是全體的統一的, 在那全體裡面分一部分出來, 部分對于全體, 自然要受其支配, 那叫做分限, 便是命.

綜合這幾條, 簡單的說, 就是: 我們的行為, 受了一種不可抵抗的力量的支配, 偶然間遇著一個機會, 或者被限制著只許在一定範圍內活動, 這便是命...."

我不是梁啟超, 我對知命稍微有一點點感覺, 所以我現在寫下來.

昨天星期五我在 UPS 的車上, 要推二手車把四個很重的包裹推到一戶人家. 那四個包裹又重又大, 我又確定屋子裡有人, 於是我把它們放在車庫前面. 但是, 我看到包裹上有 perishable 的字樣, 我又看到屋子裡有燈. 我想做個好事, 所以就去按了門鈴. 之後, 我就推著二輪車回 UPS 郵車. 還無走出幾歨, 屋子的門打開了, 出來一個婦人. 他看到我就馬上說, 把東西搬進來. 我猶豫了一下. 因為我腦袋理閃過一個昨天的事, 那時我在客戶簽了名後, 又幫他放了包裹在那人門前. 當時我的 UPS 司機說, 要是他, 他才不理那個客戶呢. 我想他是開玩笑的. 但是, 這個往事卻真的讓我遲疑了一下. 結果我感到那個婦人不高興了. 我趕快又用推車把四個很重的包裹推到那婦人的前門樓梯下. 然後再一個個搬近他的屋子裡. 我的 UPS 司機看到了, 也來幫忙. 我那時是又窘又急, 因為我覺得平常我總是走額外的路到前門送貨, 如今這樣子好像我很懶. 另外, 我也不怎麼高興那個婦人一開始既無笑容也無友善表情的就叫我抬包裹. 我心想, it is not in my job description to do that! I don't need to go for that extra miles...

我想我真的是藏不住我的情緒. 回到車上, 我的 UPS 司機馬上跟我說, 有的人這樣做多半是因為他們有殘疾的人在家裡. 因為那樣的包裹, 多半是給殘疾人的食物包裹. 我想, 我是很幸運又這樣的司機. 他馬上看到我不高興, 說話來解我的不爽. 可是, 我還是不能高興起來. 我想, 要不是今天一方面是星期五, 另一方面我的腰在痛. 說不定我就不會遲疑幾秒鐘了. 我又轉念, 我這樣反應和動作, 有我的因素; 那個婦人那樣反應和表情, 自也有他的原因和理由. 我只能知道自己的原因, 而不能知道他的; 他也是同樣對我一無所知. 可是心裡究竟動了無名. 還好工作繼續不斷, 無名也只好拋掉.

這為啥讓我想到命? 就因為, 我知道我自己的背景因素, 但是那婦人的, 我無法知道; 反之亦同. 這樣的情形, 就讓我覺得這種情況或許就可以算是命的一個意義吧. 那婦人的言語惹惱我, 我自己也因為羞愧, 更是火上添油. 他的情況讓他說了如此, 由如此情緒說出. 我似乎感到我已做了許多, 而又有腰痛, 那婦人如此, 讓我感到不快. 其中種種, 我所能掌控的, 只有我的行動. 他也是一樣. 他看到我遲疑, 心中可能更增不快. 或者本來對他來說只是很正常的要求, 但是因為我的遲疑, 他也困惱. 各互相行其是. 其行各有其源. 雖如此卻又互相影響. 這種情況真是複雜. 但是, 說到底, 我們只能掌握自己的行動.

我老爸說我胸襟狹窄, 還是有點道理...

going forward, how

I am a writer. I write stories for myself. If people asked me, how do you sleep, a question my psychologist loves to ask. My answer was always good. It was not a lie.

I don't know when did this start, but it might start early, earlier than I would like to admit. My recipe of sleeping well is to make up stories as I slip into unconsciousness. It was intensified since my college year. At least that is how I remember now. I am writing this now because like the day I said to myself that my words had dried out. That was in my college year, probably last year. And now, my dream weaving before I slip into a real one has dried up gradually.

Those adolescent dreams. I have no need and heart to describe them here since they were both dry and boring. However, there was one point in the plot line which I was unable to pass through. I think it caused my dream weaving ability to dry up. I will briefly mentioned here. For most of the story, there of course were a boy and a girl. There were processes of these two got acquainted. They of course fell for each other. At first few stories, tragic endings of lives of either boy or girl assumed. After that, a few stories of unknown psychological reasons for boys, who were retarded in showing love. And as time went on, they all lost their chances. This one trend continue until now. I could not find a way to pass the barrier. It is a barrier too wide, too dark, too confusing. I could not find a reason to pass it. I had guts of feeling for those girls. But I could not rationalize to let those boys go forward. Although they were all better looking than me, stronger, smarter, more charming, more talented, taller...etc better than me. Some of them might actually got to kiss and hold girls for a while. But there were no way for them to be united forever. And this makes me crazy. There is no way to go forward! There was no results.

I hit a wall. I could not continue my story. So I created another one, and another one, and another one, and now I am running out of fancies. I don't have many fancies. If I could not tell myself a story to sleep, I have a hard time falling into one.

being alone, doing alone

I hate being alone. I hate doing things alone most. For me, the most fun is from playing basketball where I could contribute. For me, the most fun is doing something with somebody and at the same time I am contributing as well. But my problem now is that although I　ｈａｔｅ　being alone. When I am with somebody else, I feel totally outmatched, I am dwarfed, eh, how I hate that word, dwarfed...

I am working for UPS helper's program again this December. I tried to work hard. But no matter how much I did, or how hard I tried, I could not satisfy myself. There were always some mistakes. And some people always did more packages quicker. My driver is very good. I would like to feel that I did something well. And in fact, I did have that feeling last week until last Friday. When I did not feel outmatched, I always felt I was the best. Deep down, I can see the pattern. I could not stay in some moderate range, I could only see I am either awesome or terrible.

When I am with somebody, I could not talk. It seemed that it's not that I have words to say but could not utter. On the contrary, I have nothing to say, at least it seemed so. Is it because of my English? Is it because I feel fear of other human beings? I could not know. But one thing i am sure. I have nothing to talk about. When I am alone, I did nothing. Surfing online, reading some useless books... I have nothing to say, to show, to discuss with other people. Or maybe the only thing I want to discuss is something I read, books, online articles...all those far away from me as possible. There is no personal anecdote to share. There is no personal experience to exchange with others.

If I started to do something alone, would the situation improve? Like what? I don't know. Maybe I could take up drawing again? But what is the difference between that and reading a book? Well, reading a book leaves no print outside, drawing does. I don't know...how I hate that phrase too...

悲歌行

悲歌可以當泣
遠望可以當歸
思念故鄉 鬱鬱纍纍
欲歸家無人 欲渡河無船
心思不能言 腸中車輪轉



---------------------

李白

悲歌行

悲來乎，悲來乎！主人有酒且莫斟，聽我一曲悲來吟。
悲來不吟還不笑，天下無人知我心。
君有數斗酒，我有三尺琴。
琴鳴酒樂兩相得，一杯不啻千鈞金。
悲來乎，悲來乎！天雖長，地雖久，金玉滿堂應不守。
富貴百年能幾何，死生一度人皆有。
孤猨坐啼墳上月，且須一盡杯中酒。
悲來乎，悲來乎！鳳皇(鳥)不至河無圖，微子去之箕子奴。
漢帝不憶李將軍，楚王放卻屈大夫。
悲來乎，悲來乎！秦家李斯早追悔，虛名撥向身之外。
范子何曾愛五湖，功成名遂身自退。
劒是一夫用，書能知姓名。
惠施不肯干萬乘，卜式未必窮一經。
還須黑頭取方伯，莫謾白首爲儒生。

rereading a study in scarlet

I was young when I first read Sherlock Holmes. I don't remember much about the story. So I went to library to borrow it. But I guess the detective work has progressed so much, and the detective story is also been developed far more sophisticated. The main theme of the story was not that attractive to me anymore. Homes' skills in many things are almost common sense in today's plot line. The story behind the murder however, was pretty good. I was nervous about the fate of the father and the daughter. And when they got murdered, I did feel the revenge was justified.

It's kind disappointing to see a legendary book in my youth go down like that. And so do many things as well...