Although I doubt anyone checks this old thing anymore, for any extremely bored, have-looked-through-every new trailer at Apple quicktime and funny pictures at engrish.com friends that happen to straggle by, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you!

Fall semester sure whipped by like a tornado, with all the associated speed and fury. Suffice to say, the holidays is the creepy, green-skied, all-too-quiet eye of the storm. Sure enough, the battering will be picking up as soon as the New Year dawns. I am full of optimism. (insert extra tub of bitterness here).

Last night a friend asked me, "How was your 2005?" Funny, I haven't asked myself yet. So I thought, an end-of-the-year evaluation should be in order.

I am looking back, all the way back to January, rewinding the events as one would an old videotape that had just rolled credits, without stopping the video first. I feel like an entire lifetime is backtracking before my eyes. (Is it like this every year? I don't know.)

In reverse order I can make markers -

of crushes: the squirrel, Mr. "Kylie", the abominable Aa, the cunning Canadian, the rockstar, the abominable Aa (recurring theme), the dance partner, Soles-san.

of places I was in: New York, Florida, Cambridge, New York, Florida, New York, (Japan), Manila, Punta Fuego, Manila, Boracay, Manila, (Japan), Cambridge, Chicago, Cambridge, New York

of memorable and other traumatic events: Universal Studios, Christmas, fall semester "ends", Pride and Prejudice, drunken response papers, English 159, Lolita, failing midterm, BS57, e-mails, senior bar (seeing A), HSA 27, senior bar (seeing Aa), mom visiting, MCAT scores, sisters visiting, birthday party, Florida with Ging and Nic, MCAT exam, summer summer summer, did I mention summer?, end of Junior year spring, Eliot Fete, Chicago, Ghungroo, Prado's visit, Cultural Rhythms, Chem 27, Final exams

of revelations: life will be OK, life will be dreadful, life is meaningless, life is meaningful, my life will be worth something, my life is worth nothing, friends are everything, love is everything, love is nothing, the future is bright, the future is bleak...you get the picture

of things I've purchased, of friends I've called, of friends I've avoided, of letters I didn't write, of people I didn't like, of places I didnt' see, of things I didn't do...

To move forward, one must look back, but how does one arrange the things and the nothings that were? What exactly does one have to do? I'm sure I am not alone when I say, I am trembling with fear when I think of the coming new year.

This is it. This is the battle I've longed for ever since I began obsessing over Lord of the Rings and other big epic we-must-save-the-world-or-die movies/stories; except the demon is within, as is the fear that needs to be conquered.

I hope you have a happy new year. A victorious one. A glorious one. I hope you overcome all the challenges that wait at your door and I hope that you'll still sing, when you're up to your neck in shit. (Beckett)