We didn't have school today, so me and Sara decided to go for a lunch-&-movie date together :)

We decided to go to High Cafe for lunch. Sara said the portions there are huge, so we decided to share a prawn tagliatelle and falafel starter.

My pretty lunch date :)

The food was sooooo good! And Sara was right, the portions are huge. We felt so full after finishing it. And the price was very reasonable, we paid 15 euros altogether only. So worth it :) I'm definitely gonna come back and try out their other dishes! Their fish kebabs look good, and I wanna try their Moroccan stew.

After lunch, we walked to Omniplex to watch "The Bourne Legacy".


Turns out we are both huge Jeremy Renner fans! :D He's so hot, honestly. The whole time the movie was playing, I was just staring at his face. I can't believe he's 41!! I first noticed him as Hawkeye in The Avengers, and I was like, o.O Haha. The Bourne Legacy is pretty good though, and now I kinda wanna watch all the Bourne movies. I thought the ending was kinda abrupt though, I think there's gonna be a sequel, which I hope so- more Jeremy Renner doesn't hurt! ;) Haha.

Labels: High Cafe Galway, Jeremy Renner, The Bourne Legacy

I am feeling like a total, complete slob these days. The weather's been brilliant outside, all sunny and warm, and the only thing I feel like doing is staying in my room, either hooked on scrolling through useless websites or feebly attempting to study. It's like my ass just refuses to budge from the chair. This is so bad. I 'blame' my current slob-like state on my ongoing period, and that when it's over I'll revert back to my more energetic state, but I know I'm just making lame excuses for laziness, LOL. And what's worse is that these days I keep feeling like eating carbs, so I've been eating bread and pasta for my meals. And on top of my three main meals, I've been allowing myself to eat one snack everyday. Yesterday it was one and a half egg tart shells, today it was a small bag of Popo Ikan Muruku. So you can tell I've really not been watching my diet at all, lol.

I've been trying to let myself go a bit like this, because I've been hoping that by making small concessions on snacks and allowing myself to eat "bad" foods like carbs at meals, my relationship with food will not be as restrictive and turbulent like before. I want to have a 'happy' relationship with food. I don't want to feel like I'm counting every single calorie that I put into my mouth, or that I must stay away from certain foods. And I don't want to beat myself up every time I 'fail', and then double cut back on calories the next day to 'carry the excess calories over'. So I've been eating what I like most of the time, just in smaller portions, and not going yo-yo on my diet (binge-eating one day and starvation the next). I'm improving, I know, I can tell it in the way I view food and my body now. I still have some way to go though :/ Sometimes I still relapse back into my old way of thinking, like if I eat a chocolate bar for a snack I'd be tempted to skip dinner altogether, or when I see my body in the mirror, I'd go back to hating it and wishing I had skinner legs, or a smaller waist etc. But most of the time, I don't think like this anymore. Everytime I feel these negative thoughts creeping up in my head, I push them away and thank God for blessing me as a whole and healthy human. I know I'm not perfect, but then again, who is? I'm really trying to be more focused on being happy and contented now.

On a separate and completely irrelevant note, I finished my book "The Wicked Girls" by Alex Marwood.

 
It was a pretty good and gripping read (can you believe it's her first book!), I couldn't put it down once I started and had to use a lot of willpower to pry myself away. The plot twists a lot though, but I think it's good cause it gives a little variety to the storyline, but it got a bit confusing at times, because of the double identity issue with the protagonists, the many supporting characters on both sides, plus new people constantly being added in. They all make sense after a while, but when you initially read it you can kinda get confused about who's who and finding yourself backtracking on them. The ending was unpredictable though! I would never have seen it coming. So that's one book done. I now need to get my hands on a copy of Rachel Maddow's "Drift: The Unmooring of American Military Power", I desperately want to read this book. I've heard so much about it, and the reviews of the book are all so good, plus it touches close to home for me, so I want to read it so bad. I wanted to buy it online at amazon but the copy being sold online is a hardcover version, and apparently there's a new paperback version coming out next March which has more pages in it. I don't know what the difference is between the 2 books, and what the extra pages are, and I don't want to spend 14 bucks on a book only to have a new version coming out soon. So maybe I'll find a way to download it for free online first or something. But I really really really wanna read that book. 

I want a copy!

And it's yet another Friday. The weeks are honestly flying by, but I like that. I want February 2013 to come around sooner, for obvious reasons. But I don't want to just sit around and mope, I want to enjoy all these days leading up till then; after all, I'm only 21 once. And I am enjoying myself, trying to make full use of my days (but there are days that I can't help but just want to procrastinate and do nothing at all lol). The best thing of all is, I can tell that psychologically, I am improving, I am soooo much better than I was this time last year. I am no longer paranoid, I don't get depressed as much anymore, and even when I do, it's mild, something that I can keep under control and not let it affect my moods. My emotions are not as turbulent and unstable like before, I don't see things like food and people in extremes anymore, and as such, my relationships with them both have improved so much. With food, I no longer classify foods as "good" and "bad", I no longer beat myself up if I binge on "bad" foods, I no longer starve myself on "good" foods only. And with people (friends), I don't see them as "good" or "bad" anymore, and my views of them don't suddenly change at the drop of a hat, like they do before. Really, my emotions and outlook towards everything used to be a yo-yo from good to bad and back, changing constantly, which made me paranoid about everything. And then you add depression into the mix. But I'm doing so much better now, when I reflect on last year and my mental instability then, I can honestly see what I need to change about myself.

I've got nothing planned for the weekend, I'll probably just stay at home and chill... I wish :( I have to catch up on my school work, I'm about one week behind. Ahhhh, med school. I wish I have the push to study though, I feel so unmotivated about school work, and yet I know I need to study. Haha, the paradox of it all. My USMLE First Aid Step 1 book came in the mail 2 days ago, that's like my push to really really work hard now. And yet here I am, blogging! Plus, cardstore is having their free card promotion again, so all of last night and today, I've been designing cards online and sending them to people in USA. Babyboy got one as well, haha yeah, just ONE. The last time I sent him like 4? I'm not gonna spoil him this time round! But I've sent 7 so far, you can tell I'm really taking advantage of their free card promotion! :p I introduced it to Geraldine as well, and that crazy girl stayed up till 5AM this morning designing cards for her bf! Siao (crazy)! I think she ordered like, 6? But the promotion really is very good, cardstore.com, if you're reading this, I LOVE YOU ♥

Aslam came around just now, and left us with a whole box of Portuguese egg tarts :) yumyum! He was in Portugal the whole of last week, on some Interventional Radiology convention, and he came back last night, with a souvenir for us ♥♥♥ Haha. The egg tarts were superrrrr sweet though, whoever baked it has a VERY generous sugar hand, lol. But it was really nice and thoughtful of him to do that for us though.

My Friday night supper :)

Okay, I'm just blabbering here, I don't even know what the point of this post is. Nights everyone :)

On my way home from town today, a guy asked me for my number. I was walking behind him and his friend, my earphones plugged in and jamming to Train's "Drive By", when I noticed that he was turning his head back over and over again and looking at me. I pretended not to notice at first, but then it became too obvious, so when I caught his eye the next time he turned his head around, I gave him a polite smile. He smiled back and asked, "How do you do?" Or at least that's what I think he asked, Pat Monahan was bawling "OH I SWEAR TO YOU, I'LL BE THERE FOR YOU" into my ears. I yanked out one of my earphones, and said, "I'm good, how are you?" He said he was good, and then asked me if I was from Galway. I said no, so he asked what I was doing here and where I lived. I replied that I was a student at NUIG, and that I lived near school. He nodded, and then turned to me and said, "You're a good-looking woman, I think you are good-looking." I was momentarily stunned, and I didn't know how to respond, so I just said, "Thank you, that's really nice of you to say that." He then asked me if I had a boyfriend, and I said no (something I'll elaborate on later), and he asked why not, why doesn't a "lovely girl" like me have a boyfriend. How do you answer a question like that?? Obviously no guy wants me, duh! So I said that to him (leaving out the duh part), and he went silent for a moment, and then suddenly went on and on about how looks don't matter in a relationship, it's all about the personality. I agreed with him, naturally, and I said so. And then he asked me for my number, and if I wanted to go out sometime with him.

You can imagine my utter shock when that happened, and my subsequent loss of spontaneous conscious thinking. I remember I just kept saying, "I don't know, I don't know, I don't know". He kept asking "Why not" and I just went "I don't know, I don't know, I don't know" over and over again. Finally I said that I was not looking for a relationship now, and he went, "Just as friends, we'll go out just as friends, how about that?" And lol, I don't know why I said this, but I went, "Yes, we can be friends." By then we reached the university entrance, and his friend gestured at him to walk in that direction, so he said, "We'll go out, yeah? Where can I find you?" And I just replied, "I'll be around school.", even though I'm hardly on campus.

No matter what that guy said, I am NOT a good-looking woman, not by conventional standards, anyway. I know I am not butt ugly, but I am certainly not pretty or anything. So in reality, the occurrence of such instances to yours truly are at the frequency of the appearance of a blue moon. In other words, I have hardly any experience in dealing with situations like these at all. I didn't know what to say or do. I was flattered, yes- it's a nice little ego boost when someone thinks you're good-looking and actually comes up to you and tells you that- but my lack of experience in dealing with such matters is not what's troubling me. It's the fact that when he asked if I had a boyfriend, I thought of Jr and decided to say no. 

I'm wrecked with so much guilt right now. Usually when people ask me if I have a boyfriend, I always say no because I don't want to have to deal with people's reactions on where my boyfriend is and how our relationship came about and how we're dating now. But that's to my family and friends, this is a STRANGER. I didn't owe it to him to have to explain myself and my relationship. So why did I lie? Was it out of habit? Or the fact that sometimes, I do not feel like I have a boyfriend, or that Jr exists at all? I know Jr is incredibly busy right now with IPTC and unable to write me as much as he would like to, so I don't get mail from him as often, and that doesn't help matters. Jr's busy with REHAB, I'm supposed to be encouraging and motivating him, not feeling hurt about not getting as many letters from him as before. Sometimes I can't help but unconsciously compare Jr's presence in my life as a boyfriend to the boyfriends of my friends, but then I instantly feel AWFUL for thinking this way. It's not like Jr doesn't want to be in my life- it's just that right now, he can't be. I knew that when I chose to be with him, so why am I childishly comparing right now? I don't know what's wrong with me, or why I've suddenly come to expect more of our relationship than what it can offer right now. I don't blame Jr for anything, but I don't know why I've suddenly come to crave more than what he can give me. 

I just feel so guilty right now. 

Also, I know that some of you might think that the reason I said no was because I liked the attention and just wanted to lead the guy on, but that was not the reason at all. I know because the ONLY thought that came to my mind when he asked that was, "I don't want to deal with any questions on my boyfriend.". Which leads me on to more problematic questions: Why do I really not want to deal with these questions? Am I ashamed of my boyfriend? Why would I rather deny his existence than to have to stand up and tell people that our relationship is right? 

The answer is: I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. 

I'm so confused right now, and drowning in guilt and shame.

Hello, I'm Mylene.

I love God, my family, my close friends, chocolate, Nutella, Nugatti, yam paste, Nonya kueh, baking, desserts, crunchy peanut butter, trying out new food places, books, travelling, airplane food, snail mail, vintage anything, medicine, wearing blood-red clothes, The Desiderata, stickers, hearts, making cards and origami, watching comedies, reading mystery/detective novels, playing mystery/detective games, mocha, yoghurt with fruits and muesli, dogs, quirky bags, soft & fluffy towels, pretty lingerie, Christmas, heels I cannot walk in, polka dots, smiles.

I try not to hate on anyone or anything because it's a waste of my time and energy. If I don't like it, I'll either try to change it or just ignore it.

I'm trying to live my life to the fullest, and be the best person that I can be.