First day of CNY! Happy CNY to you lovely people :)

According to Chinese belief, it’s the year of the dragon in the chinese zodiac. My dad’s a dragon, he’s been proudly declaring that for years. And he just told us today he’s going to be a 60 year old “water” dragon this year. Mum and I had a good laugh teasing him, cos he’s a water dragon who’s afraid to even go into the pool to swim! haha….say what!

Well, no getting drunk on orange squash and pigging out on bak kwa for me just yet. Currently preparing my 3 page essay for my degree application during this two day break. I remember now when I first blogged here about my diploma days (view under Diploma Days) years ago,and all the old memories started flooding back. Of late nights and great friendships and all that typing and editing and printing. My old faithful friend (Fujitsu laptop) was newly bought then and is still with me right now as I type on her keys. 6 years and still solid :) Hopefully she’ll last another two years to see me through my degree. That’s my girl.

Happy new year, pull your ear! Enjoy time with family and friends :)

And then there were 3. 7 absent from a fever bug. Gives a whole new meaning to the term “Monday Blues”, esp for them!

Mr E was amongst the 3 present today. Since there were only 3, I had more one on one time with him.

He relished the peace and quiet, coloured one of his best colourings and for the first time, chuckled loudly while watching me do a funny expression. He chuckled again at himself making a mistake over something. Great!

While disciplining him, most of the time it’s a stern, firm tone from me and my colleagues and a frustrated response from him as he wants to do it his way.  Today, more smiles and THE chuckle. It’s a really nice chuckle I have to say, starts deep and ends with a big grin on his face. Nice!

What does Mr E like? Well, he is a big fan of Lightning Mcqueen (character from Cars, the animated movie). Lightning Mcqueen bag, shirt, briefs even. Whenever he touches a car, he pretends it is Mr Mcqueen. Guess Mum and Dad were spot on in knowing his favs. Only odd thing is his Angry Birds waterbottle, which doesn’t go according to this theme. Haha. He can even say Mcqueen’s trademark phrase: “Kacheow!”

And one more in a series of firsts. He acknowledged me by name! No “teacher, teacher, look!”, but a nice: “Thank you, Ms J!”, and “Can you help me, Ms J?”. It made me just want to hug & high five him even more, which is what I usually do to encourage and praise my children. If i need to do 10 high fives till my hands turn red because they’re doing an excellent job, sure why not!

And he’s getting better at his self help skills. He’ll give me a comical look and ask:”Like that?” when wearing his briefs and pants. No problem with the shirt.

:)

Most of the time, I experience music as a musician. Out of sheer interest, I can’t help but dissect what I hear: the performance, the piece, the delivery. It’s the auto mode that my mind goes into.” – Ms Hahn

I’ve been thinking about how people listen. I think the context must be influential: the music that one grew up hearing, what the familiar patterns are, what inflections are pleasant to each person’s ears and how much ownership they feel over what they’re listening.” – Ms Hahn

—

I had the same train of thought before. Familiar tunes stuck at the back of my mind, title-less and yet they feel like old friends long forgotten. I’ve come to know some are great music works, only I didn’t have a clue. So did I hear them in the womb? When I was three? When I started music lessons? From my dad’s cd player? Lots of qns.

Dissecting a piece of music. Interesting description but that’s the mystery of what goes on in a musician’s mind/head.  Learning to play the bass made me sensitive to bass notes in bass lines, from whatever source. Sort of “opened” my ears to bass. Am I immune to treble then? Nope, still hear them cos well, they are more obvious. And the lows and highs. Wow. It amazes even me that we can be so attuned to the many different levels of music. Trust the amazing gift of hearing that our Creator has given us.

I see some of the things that I experienced in my kids. The sensitivity to different songs, the loud and soft, the repeated familiar beats and rhythms. Screaming when they dislike a song. Dancing in joy when they hear their favourite tune. Clapping in time. Amazing, amazing stuff.

More thoughts on this soon.