the whole problem with the world

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts. -Bertrand Russell

hi

I'm making yet another attempt to rejoin the blogging community. Mainly because I feel no other community will have me as of late and also because this community feels more like a party of one most of the time. But what's the difference if you're writting letters to yourself as if someone would read them or if you're speaking aloud alone as if someone is talking back.

I have been working very much and I decided to take a 5 day vacation. Last year, I worked non-stop and took only 5 days of my anual paid leave, because I was never certain when exactly to plan my vacation. So I made a point to use up more of my anual leave this year.... And here I am, at home. I have no life, no friends and nowhere to go. Not only that but I got sick on the day before my last day at work and cut my last day short because I felt awful. It's only started to get better now, but I cannot leave the house as my eye is swollen (it happens often). Funny, eh? I think I became ill because they suddenly turned on the air-conditioning that had not been used for several months, but I may be wrong. Do people get sick of airconditioning?

But apart from this, lots has changed in my life and nothing at all.

I got a computer a few months ago. It was one of my goals as I had to share a computer with my brother - my complaints about his World of Warcraft regime were something that appeared often on the blog when I had the chance to actually write. I also got a camera, my mother and brother gave it to me as a gft last Christmas, before I even had a computer to transfer the photos to. But I have only recently started photographing and getting back to different online activities. I have yet to set up accounts in order to showcase the pictures, although there's nothing there to show. I took some very nice portrait pictures of my mother in some new clothes and jewelry she had bought at that time. I was also responsible for taking photos at my brother's graduation ceremony when they gave him his University diploma and did a fantastic job (in my opinion) considering the heat of the day, the people all around and my relative inexperience with a camera. I also took pictures at a graduation party of a girl that invited me and my mother to celebrate her high-school graduation. I managed to take some decent shots at every event, thankfully, and will try to upload some here.

In less grand news:
I just read Murakami's "After Dark", and started "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I like anything by Murakami that I've read and I am enjoying Marquez's famous novel IMMENSELY. I'd like to read more (and more quickly, hehehe) and also maybe write about the books I've read. I've been thinking lately, what a world we have become. We get taught that our opinion matters and everyone writes and everyone speaks out and everyone voices their thoughts no matter how stupid they are.... is that true? does my opinion of something as trivial as a book I read matter? Silly thoughts, yes. I don't think I am even looking for an answer.

I'm studying Japanese, albeit intermitently and not at all as seriously as I think I should. I am embarrassed now, I'll write about it some other time. :)

I stopped biting my nails, to the great delight of my mother, and I'm taking care of them now. I paint them in a beautiful colour that is almost transparent but yet has a tinge of cream in it - french manicure nailpolish, they call it. :P But I've also bought some dark red nailpolish but it must wait for a special occasion or for when I am daring enough to wear it with nothing special going on. I also bought a perfume. Oh this is all such old "news", but some weeks ago, I suddenly expressed a desire to give myself a beautiful gift like that. I should take pics of the it as I am really happy with it.