In Continuum.

I have no idea where this entry will be going, because that is kind of what you get when you take a break from a habit like that. Things happen, and they aren't written down somewhere like it should have been. So they kind of crashed together into this multi-car pile up, and the vehicles were towed away before reporters could take a picture of it for their tabloids and newspapers. I hate that feeling though, whenever I sit down in front of my computer, the blank editing screen stares back at me, beckoning me to type something. I like the feeling of feeling up that space with words, it makes me feel somewhat accomplished for some strange reason. Yet, there are times when the topic of the day slips my mind, and I forget what I wanted to talk about. The feeling of letting something like that slip away is agonizing, at least for me, someone who holds so much importance in typing everything down onto an internet website. Anyhow, like I said, I have no idea where this entry will be going, which is normal after such a break. Any breaks, really, induces such a disorientation somewhat, whether or not you are taking a break from school, or work, or just taking a break from taking a break. You almost always take some time to get back on your own feet, to get that continuum going again. 

Oh, let's begin with Monday. The Academy Awards happened on Monday, and I missed the actual telecast like every other year because I had something less exciting to do - school. Then again, it's not like award shows are very popular any longer, everybody seems to be bored out by its length and its predictability. Which is also why, in recent years, people have been focusing a lot more on what the celebrities are wearing, what are they not wearing, what kind of hairstyle they have, who they brought as a date to the event, all those trivial little things that we really shouldn't be caring so much about. So the awards were given out, and I suppose there are very few surprises this year, since the nominees are generally rather weak for the most parts. I don't think there were any movies last year that came across to me as being a definite classic in the years to come, but I suppose we have to make do with what we have. The nominees are not the strongest, but I suppose the best film won the category for best picture. I'd say that the Best Actor category this year was probably the surprise, though not exactly a shocker. Sean Penn definitely deserved the award, but I feel that Mickey Rourke deserved it a whole lot more. It's not like Penn hasn't already won the award before, and it's just sad that he is going to be remembered as "the guy that stole the Oscar from Mickey" instead of the guy that actually deserved it. 

I think hosting an award show like that is a difficult thing, and planning it is even more difficult. At such, I feel that people can be overly criticizing of these award shows, calling them predictable and boring. I think it is unfair to say that an award show is predictable when the format hasn't changed for the most part. Like, it really isn't their fault if you can correctly guess the winners of the categories or something, or that there aren't that many good films to be nominated in a given year. It becomes slightly annoying to me how, after every Oscars in the recent years, you get people on the internet complaining about how bad the show was, and all those nitpicking starts to come up all over the internet as well as the morning paper the very next day. It's just that you really only get five nominations, at best, in most categories. And with every nomination, some other film is going to be displaced, and people are going to be pissed off no matter what you do or say. Hugh Jackman, on the other hand, did a fantastic job. I think he did such a great job, that he is even better than all the other previous hosts who are supposed to be hosts in the first place. To be honest, I think the show doesn't really need a host. But it isn't his fault that he had to play the role, and I think he played it tremendously. 

Oh, the December rain is here at last, delayed for a full two months or so. It has been raining, without fail, every afternoon of the past week, and I am a very happy man because of that. Sure, the bad weather makes my knees hurt like I have a screw lose in there between the joints, but the weather does call for good thoughts and nice naps. With the afternoon rain coming down hard almost as if it has been scheduled, I tend to be trapped in school when it happens, especially on days when I have afternoon classes. That also led to a lot of work being done in school, researches completed ahead of schedule, and long bus rides home on crowded buses. But things have been kind to me for the most part, seats are usually readily available. By the way, a big shout out to bus services that end with the letter "e", because they really do save a lot of traveling time in the mornings. I took 151e for the very first time this week, and let's just say that I have never felt a speedier bus ride in my life. The "E" stands for "Express", and it completely lives up to its name. From where I boarded the bus, it went straight from there to my school without stopping anywhere along the way - how amazing is that. It was like a magic school bus all for myself, and the other passengers were there because I allowed them to. OK, getting a little egoistical here, but I live for cheap thrills at times. Who doesn't like the sight of passing bus stops one after the other anyway. 

Speaking of bus rides, perhaps it'd be interesting to move on to the things that I have seen lately. I love cold bus rides in the mornings as well as the ones on rainy days. As long as I am properly protected against the cold, I find long trips like that rather enjoyable for the most part. There is something about long bus rides through a storm that I find to be particularly enjoyable, the way the rain is reduced to a thin strip of water as it hits the windows at high speed. They are like needles on a compass, all pointing in the same direction for a moment until the winds decide to change. Then you get the great big puddles by the side of the road, and the way the water bursts out into a pair of wings on either side of the passing car for a split second. It almost always brings up the memory of my drama instructor standing underneath an overhead bridge in high school one day while waiting for a cab to go home. A car passed, it spread its wings, and he happened to be in the way of it. He was quite a distance away when it happened, but we all heard him curse so loud and with such rage - it was so funny. So like any other week that involves long bus rides, I have been observing the human conditions, from the kind school girl that gave up her seat to a blind man, to the woman that shoved me aside because she wanted to talk to a friend of hers at the back of the bus. I've seen it all, until this morning. 

I was fortunate, or unfortunate, enough to sit behind a crazy man this morning, and by "crazy", I mean exactly that. He didn't look particularly different from the other passengers, but his constant beating of his palm against his left thigh singled himself out. Aside from that though, he was talking to himself in a language that nobody else understood, with a bit of English here and that which I managed to discern every now and then. He seemed to be particularly fascinated with buses and bus stops, often shouting out the bus numbers and then saying something like "I told you!" in the mean time. He had his ear phones plugged into his ears, and I initially suspected him to be this overly enthusiastic man about the music he was listening to. That was until I realized that he wasn't exactly singing, nor was he speaking in a language that anybody understood. The beat that he kept with his palm was the same for the entire length of the journey. Once in a while, he'd run his head into the seats in front, then continue talking to himself about buses and, well, things. Three things, he repeated throughout the conversation with himself. 1) I'm dying! 2) Handcuffs! 3) I will go commit suicide! He said all of the above in that order, with intervals of about five minutes, and almost always with a smile on his face. It was a little disturbing, and I sat behind him throughout the way, wondering what drove him over the edge. 

I saw something really beautiful this morning while passing by a park. It was a small park, so nobody ever really goes there in the mornings anyway, and then park benches were deserted when the bus passed by. There was a wooden table and bench set in the middle of it, the kind that you see around schools where people would be studying all the time. The flowers from the tree right next to it must have fell overnight, because they formed a neat pink circle at the bottom of the tree where the table was. So, half the table was completely covered in those pink flowers, while the other half remained completely the same as before. The ground around it was also covered in them, like some kinda carpet somebody left behind and forgot to retrieve. It was a beautiful sight, even if it really only lasted for a while. It made for a picture perfect photograph, but it was a pity that I didn't have a camera better than the one that came with my phone. Anyway, it was a pretty sight, something that cheered me up a little bit on my way to school. The same for the rainbow in the skies on Wednesday evening after the storm when I came home. Everybody started taking pictures on the bus right before I got off at my stop, and I was just wondering what the fuss was all about. So I turned the corner, got through the gates, and then there it was - a rainbow shooting out seemingly from a balcony on my block and into the skies. Simple things like that, I felt, make me feel good, even if it was just for a little moment. So right there and then, I took a picture of it, and sent it to the one person I wanted to share the moment with, like every other moment before and after that moment. This is what I sent over: