[Dream] The Dystopian Society

I can't remember the exact starting point of the dream (as in all dreams, as nicely pointed out in Inception), but I was in a deserted place with deserted roads. I mention this because I knew what my purpose was there, despite not remembering when it started.

I was trying to get out of the deserted place, but I couldn't find a cab. I walked and walked, and came across an old, abandoned house. To my surprise, I saw 3 people stumble out, all covered with dirt from head to toe, their frames rugged and gaunt. One of them was my secondary school friend, B.

Right on cue, two taxis arrived. I was about to get into the back taxi with 2 of the other people, but decided to board the one with B. When I got in and the taxi drove off, I began asking him what happened, but the look in his eyes made me stop. 'I have gone through ... so much,' he croaked weakly.

I somehow understood this as a mystery higher organization had done this, and it was not my place to ask, nor did I really want to know what abuse he went through.

After driving for a while, I asked the cabbie: "So are you going to Potong Pasir (B's house) first or Boon Keng (mine)?"
He casually replied: "What makes you think we are going to your homes..."

My blood froze. I realized the taxi was not a place of refuge, and it was not taking me to safety. It was taking me to them. The organization. Whatever it was. I had to escape. I did not want to go through the abuse that B went through.

After observing traffic for a while, I found the opportune time and opened the door and dived out of the moving vehicle. I rolled to the side of the road, and began running. I ran for several minutes, and quickly flagged another cab that I saw.

As I got in, I began to say "Uncle, to -"
He cut me off with a grin: "to Boon Keng, -my address- right? I know..."

SHIT. He was part of this too! He knew exactly who I was, and where I had come from.

"You need to go another 2km to get out of the area we are in control of, boy", he laughed.

I resigned to my fate. If they had control over everything within a 2km radius, there was no way I was getting away if they wanted to catch me.

--

I was in a room with B, and some unknown individuals. This part of the dream got a bit fuzzy, as I think I was approaching the waking phase of my sleep cycle. From what I can remember, I wasn't tortured or anything. In fact, they explained to me how the organization functioned.

"From when you [he was referring to everyone in that world I think] are born, we will observe you. We will make circumstances occur for you. You think you got your job by your own merit? No, we arranged for it. Some people are meant to suffer -he glances over to B-, some, like you, are meant to succeed. Everything is decided by the organization. "

I recall being confused. Why was I earmarked for success? How did they decide what happened to who? How did they carry out their decisions? I had no idea, and would not receive any answers to these questions, as I woke up shortly after.

New Fitness routine

So... after a long hiatus I decided to start gymming properly again. Well, I was already gymming since I started work at the pathetic gym near my workplace, but it is missing a Squat rack and a Bench rack, so I couldn't do those two all-important compound lifts. Plus I still stuck to my 3 day mixed routine, which wasn't giving me any noticeable gains, apart from a slight increase in definition in my arms.
During this time, there was a period of maybe a month where I increased my diet too, eating an extra snack each day of usually chicken fillets and drinking a banana milkshake every afternoon. I'm not sure how much that really helped apart from packing on some stubborn tummy fat, but I did gain 3 kg in the 3 months.

This may or may not be me, with a slight post workout-pump, and sucking in tummy.

Now, I will be starting on a 4 day split routine - chest, arms, rest, back, shoulders (I do squats with chest day, and crunches with back day) - and hope this routine gives me more gains. I'll evaluate the overall routine again in 3 months. I'm a bit lazy to up my diet again, due to the extra costs/time, but I know this will limit my gains too. Sigh. It's tough to get bigger.

I will be logging my progress over at http://crazerkfitness.blogspot.sg/ , so as not to flood this blog with such boring posts. Ok bye!

[ad] NoQ - Order books online!

The Offer
A few weeks ago I received an email from a 'NoQ Bookstore' offering to sponsor me with a $30 book voucher because apparently I loved reading books and quoting from them (based on my blog)

This was quite ridiculous as the only book I mentioned reading and quoted from was Guidance and Voice of God. 

I would normally just click ‘Spam’ on such emails, but I actually recognized the company’s name on one of my friend’s blog (he received a similar offer) and it seemed pretty legit. Thus I had a look through, and apparently it’s real! Woo $30 to spend!

Regardless of their selection criteria, this is free $30 so hey, might as well help them advertise. I was looking through their online store and everything seemed REALLY cheap. Like not sure how come they can discount so much! And apparently they have a Price Guaranteed Programme http://www.noqstore.asia/PriceGuaranteedProgram.aspx, such that they promise that their prices for the books you want are the lowest (Read through that page carefully for T&Cs)

The Initial Browsing
I began browsing their website, and because I wasn't very familiar with the hot books, I clicked on their 'This week's specials' as well as their 'Bestsellers' links for a more streamlined selection. They seem to have all sorts of categories, from Humour to Christian Titles to Parenting and Puzzles.Quite impressed with their wide range of categories.

The Search
I eventually decided to get a Mitch Albom book (after seeing 'Tuesdays with Morrie' on their bestsellers list, which I've already read), so I typed in 'Mitch Albom'.... but the search results were pretty confusing.

Why were there four results for the same book? Upon further scrutiny, the first and last ones were hardbacks (at different prices?) and the middle two were different mediums (CD-audio and Paperback). 

Perhaps if there was some way to combine the same title...
Even for the book I wanted 'Five people you meet in heaven', the results were strangely scattered (not grouped together like this one) with random results among each other. And it's not apparent on first glance what the difference between them was.

Regardless, I placed the order, and in about 2 weeks or so I received the book at my doorstep in a cardboard box with some cushioning plastic... and it was in good (brand-new) condition! Would have been nice if they had plastic wrapped it though, to preserve the 'new-nest' a bit more. 

And because you somehow read this boring blog, you get another 15% discount off the prices! Just use the code CRAZERK at checkout. This offer is valid from now till 31 October 2014!