Tuesday 7 June 2011

Swift and Pink

The missus had something to say about my driving playlist recently. I had purchased Taylor Swift's Fearless and Speak Now CDs, as well as Pink's greatest hits. And I've been cycling through these three for days on end. Apparently, my wife wonders at my sudden change, from what used to be a predominantly gothic & symphonic rock playlist.

Quite honestly, I don't really know how this came to be. Pink's lyrics are biting and harsh, despite her catchy melodies. Taylor Swift's music seem saccharine sweet, but there are some songs that hide a dark side, a bitter pill that lurks among the innocent-looking lyrics. White Horse, in particular, is a tale of betrayal. Not quite the sort of song that one expects from the one who sang Love Story.

I think I'll throw Avril Lavigne into the mix next. Black Star ...

Monday 6 June 2011

School Daze Again

Well, it has been six months since I last worried about the sprog's progress in school. I suppose it is appropriate, given my work, to do a mid-year review. So here it is:

1. She is not the shortest in her class. (she missed that honour by a hair.)

2. She is rather good at math, although she does not check her answers and therefore loses points in careless mistakes.

3. Her mandarin is passable, though the teacher had mentioned on two or more occasions that her spoken mother-tongue has a rather western twang to it, if and when she deigns to use the language in conversation. My fault, I suppose. I really must make her watch more local chinese dramas.

4. Her english is ... This one is hard to judge. She speaks well and fluently, and her ability to answer questions is undisputed. However, she is very lazy when it comes to those open-ended questions. Her answers are usually too short and lacks completeness to score the full marks. Offhand, I'd say that she is just too lazy to copy out the 'whole' answer. Oh, well.

5. She still persists in eating far too little. I have attempted to rectify this by tempting her with scrumptious chocolate cake and delicious bak kwa, along with other goodies. However, with such matters, a longer period of assessment shall be necessary. I shall need to keep track of this.

6. The teachers have agreed that my daughter is a very helpful person, who likes to assist the teachers and her fellow students. Apparently, she regularly helps to move the chairs and tables around when needed, volunteers to collect papers for handing up to the teachers, and other such duties. She has also confessed that she was rather disappointed at being passed over for the class monitress job - due to her lack of inches, which prevents her from cleaning the top of the whiteboard. (I promptly exploited this to coax her to eat more and grow taller).

7. More astonishing is the fact that she has declared that her goal is to become a prefect! Goodness gracious! Where did she get this from? The missus and I have both avoided public office our whole lives! Is this a way of the Fates getting back at us? Sigh.

Apart from this, the little girl has persisted in her love of the colour green, boy cartoons like Ben Ten and Generator Rex, and a preference for jeans over dresses. However, just this saturday past, she suddenly cosied up to me and asked for a Hello Kitty hairband. Ah yes! The princess syndrome finally kicks in!

Heh heh heh.