That's the sound been coming from my nose since about 5 p.m. yesterday. Buh. Went to the doctor today, and it's viral flu. Again. The third time in as many months. One of the risks of teaching in an all-boys school, I suppose, but I am getting damn tired of being sick so often.

I also have conjunctivitis (ie Pink Eye) in my right eye and a little in the left, so I got some drops, which seem to be helping. At least they aren't nearly as itchy as they have been for the last couple of weeks.

So today I missed school, but this is sabbatical week; instead of conducting a course like the fiction-writing workshop last term, I'm helping out my colleague Nick with one on filmmaking. Today and tomorrow should be fairly light, as the students will be out wandering the campus with cameras, so if I had to pick two days to be off (and I will be doing so; no more going back to school before I'm well), these were two good days to do so.

With Vesak Day on Monday, this has unintentionally become a five-day weekend. Although feeling as shitty as I do, I'm not sure how much I'll be able to enjoy it.

That said, I'm postponing the official start of Reader Request Week to next Monday. I hate to keep putting it off, but if I'm going to answer a different question each day of the week, I want to be well and coherent before doing so.

I'm off to take a nap now. Cheers.

My apologies, but Reader Request Week will be starting tomorrow instead of today. This afternoon and evening was spent marking papers (still have about 20 to go), and I just got off Skype with a long overdue convo with my parents, so I'm wiped.

However, here's a teaser, a single-serving Singapore Observation, Jonathan Carroll style...

46. They board the train at the Orchard MRT stop, tall, statuesque, one blonde and the other brunette. It would be easy to think of them as models, in Singapore for a photo shoot and returning from a high-priced consumer spending trip at Orchard Road, but this also makes a lot of assumptions that may not be true. Dressed casually both, though the blonde wears her shirt unbuttoned to her sternum, revealing the edge of a lacy pink bra. They speak English with Eastern European accents, possibly Russian, intensely involved in their conversation, paying no attention to the rest of the crowded train car. The other riders, however, male and female alike, cannot take their eyes off of the two young women, so bright do they shine.

(for jeffsoesbe)

More tomorrow!

Previous observations: 1-4, 5-8, 9-13, 14-17, 18-22, 23-25, 26-30, 31-35, 36-40, 41-45

Just a reminder that you've got one more day to ask me a question about any topic you'd like me to write about for Reader Request Week. Feel free to post your comments here or in the original RRW entry.

you : organ grinder :: me : monkey

Thanks!

Some great questions have already been asked for Reader Request Week, and I'm hoping for even more. To give you a little extra time to rack your brains, I'm extending the deadline until Sunday, 11 May.

This coming week is the final crazy week when all the tests and assignments that have been piling up need to be marked so that I can input the grades next Monday (although I would prefer to do it before then). I may pop up occasionally during the week (such as with the NIN news in the previous entry), but blogging will most likely be light.

So get in those questions! Make me dance for my banana!

I've quite enjoyed blogging (almost) every day this week, and want to see if I can continue to keep it up. But to do so, I'll need your help.

Earlier in the week, jeffsoesbe asked if I wouldn't mind writing another entry in my Singapore Observations series, and I'm happy to do so (and am quite chagrined that the last of these entries was in September 2007). So that will be my next actual entry. But instead of just blathering on after that, I'd like to answer any questions or discuss any topics that you, my smart and beautiful readers, might be interested in. Back in March and April, scalzi ran a Reader Request Week, and I'd like to do the same.

So here's your chance to ask me anything. It can be serious or silly, political or geeky (or politically geeky), about writing, publishing, expatriation, living in Asia, being in an interracial relationship, whatever. The topics are completely up to you. I'd like to be able to do a week of these, so if I could get seven questions at the very minimum, that would be perfect. It's your chance to, as Scalzi says, "make me dance like the proverbial monkey."

If you're worried about duplicating questions I've already answered, you can search through the blog archives and/or double-check yourself with the following interviews: Ecstatic Days, The Story, Behind the Wainscot, Tobias Buckell Online, I Should Be Writing (audio), The Spoken Alexandria Project (audio).

Requests should go into the comments for this entry.

Thanks in advance!