I had a dream of me being at the school's main gate, looking at the school, when suddenly a tornado appears behind the Clocktower. Being as gullable as I was in my sleep (now we all would be in the first place...), I turned around and ran for shelter, cautious not to turn around. I found refuge in an old abandoned house, and after the storm ceased, I went outside, finding a huge chunk of New Multi-Purpose Hall rooftop jammed into the backlawn.
I walked out and found my way back to the school, and boy was it torn apart. 3/4 of the Clocktower was gone, one of the minute arms of the clock was pierced into the road in front of me, the Music Technology Room was roofless, the Red Level Staff Room and anything above it colapsed and the Library was ripped off. Beautiful scenery, coming from a guy who loves architectual destruction. Ah, well...
Anyway, today started off with an early Church session. My Church was able to book two theatres at Eng Wah next door to accomodate for the huge crowds that come in the morning, and today my Mom, Uncle Alex, Uncle Eking and I tried it out for the first time. Felt akward taking Holy Communion instead of popcorn inside a cinema, but hey. God works in mysterious ways. But for today, the message was about how we should shut our doors of weakness from the devil before they get a foothold on us, but instead openig other relevant doors to God so He can opperate His miracles into our lives.
Don't want to go too far, but to keep a long story short, there are three important doors that we have to keep closed;
1) Discouragement - Loss of courage and faith in God and His works.
2) Division - Issolation or refusal to be with people God places into our lives.
3) Distraction - Dilusion of concentration woith God.
As long as you shut the door on the devil things should go fine.
After the service, we went to Carefour to buy some stationaries, then went downstairs to eat lunch and ta pao (take-away) desert. We then went back home, where everyone except me and Morriel would fall asleep. A nice opportunity for me to start on my DNA, I thought. Then came the troubles of the day...
You see, my original plan was to make the model using toothpicks, ice-cream sticks and clay balls. The clay balls would be the sugar/phosphate, the toothpicks as the chemical bonds and the ice-cream sticks as the bases. But apparently, I underestimated the drying duration of the clay, and so the structure couldn't hold for long while drying. Even when I tried to hold up the structure with strings like they would the exhibits in The Human Body, the thing would just slowly fall apart. So...
Failed
My Dad, who by now woke up after 3 hours of me working my best to sustain the structure, scolded me thinking that I intended to do this as a last-minute affair, since it was already 5.something and I'm still back at Ground Zero. He then brought me out to Bukit Panjang Plaza to buy new materails that might be easier for me to assemble. After an hour of searching and shopping (inclusive of Morriel's art materials and some deserts that the family could take after dinner), we went back home, while my Dad advised me on time management time after time on the journey.
I wanted to tell him that it was never a last minute affair, but more of a failed way to end off the weekends with an enjoyable project. You see, the last time I experimented with the same type of clay I used for the project, it took only a couple of hours or so till it became solid, so I thought that doing the project somewheere in teh mid-afternoon was no skin on my nose. But then I found out I was wrong, and now I'm in the position that of a late-worker. I wanted to explain, but I guess I was afraid of starting an argument with my Dad. I'd hold for that.
When we got back, I tried another draft; use ping pong balls as sugar/phosphate, staws as the chemical bonds and the same ice-cream sticks as the bonds. But the staws themselves, despite the lightness of the ping pong balls, couldn't hold on the structure's shape after 3 levels and started to topple at different directions from there onwards. Here we go again...
Project DNA II
Failed
I kept strugling and strugling to find an alternative on how to solve the situations that came with every solution. I really prayed that things would turn out good. Then my Mom came along and wanted to help, due to the fact that 1) I appeared panick and frightened and 2) Bedtime is drawing near; it was already 9. So she and Uncle Alex started giving me advise on how to make the structure more firm - Why not instead of glueing straws, pierce satay sticks? In great desperation, I ripped the model to it's components, opened my pen knife and started to pierce holes into the ping pong balls. My Mom then took over that, while I assembled the sticks into place. And to make it less 'sticky', we covered the sticks with the straws first before locking the balls into place.
After 5 levels, my Mom advised me not to over-do it and stop at where I was. Feeling tired, I agreed and started to spray-paint the structure white so as to make it easier for me to paint on the other colours later. Once done, I added finishing touches like the lines that seperated the bases and...
Project DNA III
Sucessfully Complete
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