Notes From the Notebook

First things first, I'm entering a 3 on 3 tourney on Friday, August 3rd. It's going to be held in the KDU auditorium. I can't bring outsiders, so Budin and Mislan won't be playing with me. I got William and John. William's short, but he's got decent handles and quickness. John's played for the Sarawak under-18 team last year, so he's good. His shooting's a little off because he haven't played in a long time, but he's got mad stamina and athletic ability. Plus, he's an excellent perimeter defender. I'm expecting to get a top 3 finish.

On with the post, I'm in the middle of re-reading all the books I have and writing notes about them. These are things that I thought about, or lines that I liked, and wrote down while reading the Notebook by Nicholas Sparks.

My two loves are talent-based, but that's about all the similarities that they share. One talent comes from my fingers, the other comes from my heart. At least that's how it started out. My initial skills in basketball came from the heart. I don't remember picking up a basketball and learning how to dribble. It just came to me. Of course, what I play now is a mixture of passion and practice because to truly love basketball is to commit yourself and that includes practice.

Will I find a woman that can understand and appreciate my two passions? Will she make up excuses to make me play the guitar by saying something like, " I'm bored and I want to listen to something. Or maybe she'll ask me to go play basketball because "I dont' want a flabby husband". It's a long shot, but I need to find love that not only understand and appreciate my passions, but encourage and complement it even if she doesn't necessarily like it.

These are lines from the book that caught my eyes.

• a gentleness that not even the war can take away.
• in every girl I met, I found myself looking for you in every single one of them.
• the reason it hurts so much to separate is because our souls are connected.
• I do not ever ask them because I've learned that we're all entitled to have our secrets.
• I know what it's like to be day and night now, always together, forever apart.

That's about it. The Notebook touched me in a lot of ways, making me think about old age, timeless love and passionate talent. I've gone through the book twice, and I don't remeber the first time but I cried near the end of my second time reading it.

P/s: I'm in the middle of remixing The Fray's "How to Save a Life". Trying to give it more of a rock edge. If I can only find someone to sing. Oh, well. Shall upload it when I'm done.

Menjaga Rahsia Bumi Sunyi

I've been trying to upload this song but the whole song is around 8 minutes long, so it's too big to be uploaded on youtube. It's not too big actually, but it'll take too long to upload. This version is the abridged version. 5 minutes, give or take. Coheed & Cambria's "In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth".

still thinking of a suitable title...

The cosmic law of French toast(from now on referred to as clft) is against me. Or specifically, clft's against me watching Transformers with my friend. 3 well-thought out plans, all failed at the very last moment. Damn it.

The first time didn't work out because she had family over at her house, the second time didn't work because her parents had transport problems. The third time takes the cake. Guess what her excuse was. Period pain.

Period pain?

Period pain!

Argh!!!

That's it. It's obvious that clft doesn't want me to watch a movie with this chick. I'm not exactly pissed off with her, or pissed off with her inability to go out, but simply because all 3 times she cancelled, it happened on the morning of the same day we were supposed to go. It's a "less than 6 hours' notice" thing. Damn it. Will continue cursing excessively for the next few days. Thank god basketball has not betrayed me yet.

Love Story

Forgive me blog for I have not written anything over the last few weeks. My updates are so irregular that they should be called downdates(ayat zain putra).

I first read Love Story by Erich Segal around five years ago, and I've never failed to cry everytime I read it. Does that make me a little bit too feminine to be called a man? Maybe, but that's beside the point.

The last time I read it was at least a year ago, and I decided to go through it again last week to see if the book's still have that same effect on me. I've done my fair share of growing up over the past year, and maybe I'm not as soft as I was in early 06. I don't know if this is a good thing, but I cried again after reading the book. I went through the last couple of chapters with this feeling in my gut that tells me I shouldn't cry but I was trying hard not to. The last few pages really got to me.

On to a different story, I've been depressed for the past few weeks because I've been deprived of basketball. My sister came back for her winter break and she's using the car most of the time. Can't wait for next week. UiTM's going to open soon and that means that I'll be able to play every weekday again. Can't wait for next week. I miss the competitive nature there. I miss waiting for my turn, anticipating what I should do in the next game. Can't wait for next week. Can't wait for next week.

I was supposed to go see Transformers last Saturday, but I didn't because my friend who was supposed to pick me up cancelled at the last minute. Do you know how hard it is for me to arrange for transport at the very last minute? I won't go into detail about her predicaments, but it wasn't really her fault. I was still pissed off. She called me 45 minutes before the show, apologized and asked if I still wanted to see the movie during the weekdays. That made me feel better. Now instead of seeing the movie with my classmates, I'm going to see the movie with just her. My girlfriend's going to get pissed off. Jessica Alba isn't really that understanding when it comes to other women, you know. Hehe.

More, More

I feel like writing more nowadays. I think about things to write about in this blog from time to time, and I can't remember the last time I've enjoyed writing this much.

redjumpsuitapparatus - cool debut album. i just had to mention it.

tourney last week - We got 2nd plc. Can't help it, though. Budin's the tallest in my team, and he's 5'10". The team that got 1st had a guy who was 6'2" and he was built like an ogre. Mislan got his layup blocked once by the guy and it was as if the whole auditorium resonated with the sound of the ogre's hand hitting the ball. Definitely Ben Wallace-esque. We were unbeaten if you don't count that one match. Damn it. We could've won the match but I guess I don't have enough chemistry with Budin and Mislan. It was the first tourney we entered together, so you can't expect much. Oh well.

I went out a couple of times last week, and I saw Shrek 3. It wasn't really that funny. Disappointing, really, but I had fun because I had good company. I guess this summer's full of those things, huh? Spiderman 3 wasn't as good as the other two, and the same thing goes for Pirates. Excellent trilogies are hard to come by. It's really hard to come up with three great movies, I'm sure. Come to think about it, I've never seen a trilogy with three great movies. The ones that I've seen so far are all mixed bags of mediocre, good and great.

UiTM's going to open next month, and I can't wait. Real basketball season is going to start. I've been getting rusty, and my steps are getting slower. I want to work on my mid-range jumper once I start playing there again. It's like waiting for summer, when you know that all the good players are going to play everyday and you'll spend the whole three months working on your game. I can't wait. I so can't wait. Argh...

a quickie

Just a quick one for today. I went to play at UiTM yesterday, and I called Saku on my way there. Found out that he's in Hospital Klang. He's getting his appendix removed. I felt like a dickhead because the only thing I could think of at the time was he couldn't play this Saturday. Well, I called him just now and I told him to get a lot of rest and get well soon.

I think things turned out for the better. Mislan asked Budin to take Saku's place, and Budin agreed. I know that I'm not really good at transferring emotions to words but I'm esctatic to say the least. I've known Budin since late '04/early 'o5 and I truly believe that he is in the top 3 best Malay basketball player that I've ever seen with my eyes.

From experience, I once entered this tourney in mid '04 and his team won the tourney with him terrorizing the court. Why do I use the word terrorizing? He was that good. Nobody could've guarded him. He was dropping points from all over the court. I remember seeing him scoring like 3-4 straight treys in a game, and then he started to drive to the paint and nobody, seriously nobody in the tourney could do nothing about it. Bank shots, normal lay-ins, mid-range jumpshots, self-assists, etc. What else can I say?

In Mislan's own words, "Budin kalau main 3 on 3 memang dia boleh makan tiga-tiga orang kat court. Sekali dia kuar dengan hook shot dia la, apa la, memang takleh buat apa ar."

Whatever it is, come watch us play this Saturday to witness Budin. 9th June, KDU auditorium, 9am til (since Budin's almost surely bringing us to the finals) 2pm. Oh, and me and Mislan's gonna be there too.

Rusty Fingers

Damn it. I have that thing where I feel like I have too much to write about, but I don't know where to start. How lah, bro?

Let's start by laying out the outline. My family from Alor Star and Gombak came over on the 27th of May, went to Port Dickson on the 28th, came back the next day, went to Cameron on the 31st, came back last Saturday. By the way, Port Dickson and Cameron was niiiiice.

My dad rented the company bungalow at Port Dickson so we got a pretty good deal. The bungalow had 4 rooms, so nobody had to squeeze in even though there was around 15 of us. We had a barbecue, played darts and pingpong, and had fun in the water. The bungalow rental even came with a butler, and he took care of all of the food. He's a pretty good cook, I can tell you that. The best part about the trip? I drove all the way from Shah Alam to Port Dickson and back. My first long distance drive in Malaysia.

So how was Cameron? Surprisingly cold. Reminded me of walking at night during summer break when I was a freshman. Took a lot of pictures with flowers, tea leaves, and I even had tea and scones. Felt English for a good 15 minutes. Food and souvenirs weren't that expensive, but I don't think that I'll be going back for a long time. I seriously don't like the ride. The roads were small and had killer curves.

Fadhlin, my nephew, was unexpectedly attached to me during the Cameron trip. He kept on calling for his Mamu(that's me) and starts crying everytime I'm out of his sight. My only break from him was when he slept. I'm not complaining. I've never had a kid so attached to me like that. Will my kid be like that? It's both flattering and flattening at the same time. Plus, it doesn't hurt that he's cute and I like babies/kids.

It's confirmed! My basketball tourney's been moved to this Saturday(9th June) from 9am to 2pm at KDU. I'll be playing with Saku and Mislan. Saku's a schoolmate of mine during my Projek days while Mislan's an all-ATU reject just like me, so both of the guys aren't total strangers. Saku's got the body of an undersized Power Forward. He doesn't post-up that much but he tends to hang around the elbows of the free throw line. Mislan's a typical swingman. He can bring up the ball if he needs to, got a decent shooting touch and killer athletic abilities. Since both guys are UiTM players, and I'm a pretty decent player myself, we're gonna tapau the tourney this Saturday. The only thing we have to think about now is transport, a team name and color. Come watch!

June 9th, Auditorium of KDU, 9am to 2pm.

P/s: I'm thinking of putting up some pictures from the trip but I have to carefully select the pictures because I don't want to give my identity away(ala Spiderman, hahaha).

A Good Weekend

How good was the weekend? Really good, I should say. Let's start with Friday eve.

I was at home when Mislan texted me saying that there's going to be people playing ball at uItm later that night. I went there and played my heart out. Now this may not sound as good as it was, but You have to take into account that uItm is closed for the holidays and I won't be getting chances like that anytime soon. The best part about playing that night? I had a game against the Phantoms. They were having a friendly with the players there so I just joined in. You know what? The Phantoms are good. Real good. Proper execution, very few turnovers, tight defense. They were good. Damn.

Saturday - My cousins came and hanged out at my house. The best part about it was that I get to play with my little nephews. Cute. I took a few videos and pictures while they were there. What surprised me that day was that eventhough the kids don't know how to talk yet, they actually do understand instructions. I told one of my nephews to get me the grey remote and what did he do? He got me the grey remote. That was so cool.
Anyways, Saturday was also cool because Chelsea won the FA cup final in extra time. The match was crap, to say the least, but the goal was good and winning the cup does act as consolation for the Premiership loss. Oh well, back to drawing board, Jose. Next season's gonna be awesome! Oh, and Mila won AF5, so I'm happy. Hehe.

Sunday - Went to see Adibah Noor, Siti Nurhaliza and M Nasir's show to celebrate Mother's day. They were good. My mom had fun, so I feel good too.

The closer - Ended the weekend on a good note. I saw Ghost Whisperer and almost cried. By the way, I have had a huge crush on Jennifer Love Hewitt since the late 90s, and it was fun to see her having her own show and stuff. Why did I *almost* cry? Because the episode was about a ghost trying to find his son(sort of, it's just too complicated to explain). I'm a sucker for the whole father-son scenario.

Conclusion - What conclusion? I just had a good weekend. This ain't no academic essay man. Haha..

Blogging is crapping?

I read it in one of my friend's blog. Blogging is crapping. She was trying to justify how her blogs are all messed up in terms of grammar and stuff but I think that she does have a point. Blogging is supposed to be a stress-free outlet for one to write without having to worry about structure. Once you start thinking about how to write, you're not writing honestly. It's like writing in school as opposed to writing in your diary.

So what's the deal? I'm going to keep on crapping, writing without thinking about all the academical aspects of a "proper essay". I'm going to be honest with my readers, if there are any, because pointless cerita is my blog. Once I start embellishing my stories, it's no longer my blog. So trust me when I say that everything that I write about in this here page is honest to god true to my account.

p/s : i got a basketball tourney on the 24th in KDU. come watch!

My best game yet

Stop reading this post if you're not into basketball, or is offended by people talking about how good they are. Seriously.

I'm a basketball freak, and I play at UiTM Shah Alam on average 3 times a week. Despite my passion for the sport, I'm definitely a below average player there. I have a really hard time trying to compete with the players there, but I do so anyway because I love the game too much to not play. UiTM Shah Alam's got some wicked Malay ballers, W.I.C.K.E.D, and that's most probably the reason why I love playing there in the first place.

So here's how each day goes. Once there's at least 10 people on the court, we'll play a game of 5 on 5, full-court, 2s and 3s, first one to 21 wins, king stays. Every other game after that is only played til 15, all other rules are maintained. On Monday, 7th May, I had my best game in UiTM yet.

My team played 3 games on that day. We won the first two, lost the 3rd one. In the 2nd game, I was on FIRE(extremely rare). Out of the 15 points my team scored, I had 11 of them. A breakdown of my 11 points? 3 0f 3 from beyond the arc, and the gamewinning jumper. I shot treys like it was automatic, and my gamewinning jumper got off with a guy's hand in my face. Words just can't describe how I felt when I saw the ball went through the net time and time again. My stroke was smooth, rainbows every single time. It was the first time in a LONG time that I screamed out halahala on a basketball court.

The game was great especially taking into account that I'm absolutely terrible on most days, and average on my better days. That day was freaking awesome by my standards. I'm not trying to boast, I'm just trying to share my joy over something that (most probably) happens once every ten years for me. Bear with me.

After losing the 3rd game, I sat near the court and lit up a cig. In Mislan's own words, "Sial ar PG, shoot masuk je". Halahala...

P/S : The Spiderman 3 soundtrack is cool if you're into what American teenagers listen to nowadays. Sort of got the same vibe as the One Tree Hill-Friends with Benefits soundtrack.