Of Night Jamming with a Stranger :)

Did we realize how the small unexpected events in our life brought to us by some unknown strangers could also be God’s way of cheering us up when our days are gloomy or when we are drowned in our own mundane life? Just at the point where we almost give in to our sucked life while anticipating the next heart break, something or someone just popped from nowhere offering us sweet temporary solace motivating enough to get us through another day in our lives. I had a taste of this great surprise last night and it lasted till early in the morning.

 There I was, still numb from work experience and all the personal chaos that either happened due to my own mistake or the acts of others from the past few weeks. These two days was the worst because I was battling against my own demons yesterday and finally buried the carcass of my own guilt and unrequited love under piles of bitter remorse. I was tired from the whole affair that I could not go to sleep that night and killed my time by browsing the net. Then I saw a familiar name appeared on my chat list and greeted half-heartedly.

“Do you have a speaker? Can I call you? I want you to listen to something”.

I had met stranger souls during my short 30 years stint so being asked to listen to something at 3 am by a person who only utter a few syllables during our encounters was no biggie. I let him call me and then I heard the strumming of a guitar.

 “What song do you want me to play?” He asked. This is definitely a first. Receiving red roses at 2 am in the morning-checked. Mediating a friend-cum-mistress with the wife of her lover-checked.  Having a man sing while playing the guitar at 3 am through the YM Phone Chat-this was a first. Within a few minutes, a string of Metallica and Nirvana songs sang passionately by an unknown man accompanied by skillful but slightly awkward rendition of the guitar filled my empty hotel room that morning. I lay on the floor, eagle spread, with the earphones intact, listening to this man displaying his raw emotions without any barriers.

“I don’t know what to say”. Of which I wasn’t exactly lying. Seriously I did not expect him to disclose his personal side. What prompt him to do so?

We continued our chat through the YM, getting connected not through cyber conversation but only by the music that he put on for me on the other side ranging from the Weird Al Yankovic up to King Diamond. Not my type of music but his eagerness to share overrode my regular music preference. Then after a while did we communicate about our losses and gains in life. We shared personal stories like two old friends when in fact we were only properly introduced to each other that morning. “I am sorry I talk a lot,” I apologized after sharing what I felt about life at the moment. “Its fine, you listen when I talk and now I will listen to you,” As we continued to enjoy each other’s companies, we let go off our futile hopes and nightmares and let it float and vanish in the universe above us. I stood up, said good bye though after those momentous cyber jamming session and talking, saying goodbye seemed to be very hard

I smiled broadly, peeped out and  saw that it was already light.

Of C4 Puaka and ISA7

 The arrest and detention of two university students charged for vandalism a week ago seemed to receive lukewarm attention from our quiet public. The charge was a result of their act of spraying the wall of a certain faculty in their campus, a brief unoriginal message deemed controversial and political: C4 Puaka. I was informed that they were slapped with three different charges, one funnily accusing them of obstructing traffic and were later bailed by their family at the killer rate of RM5, 500 after almost a week in the lock-up.

What a sweet coincidence that on the 18^th, a week before this incident, the seven students who were put on trial for involving in a peaceful assembly were found guilty and were imposed with a fine of RM3, 900 or imprisonment for 3 months. I was at the trial and listening to the magistrate and Deputy Public Prosecutor championing public interest with no regard for the people’s human rights makes me wonder if our judicial officers were ever exposed to the ideas of fundamental liberties. My best bet was that perhaps during their Constitutional Law class, Chapter II of the Constitution was conveniently skipped to give more time for issues such as public order and national interest.

Both incidents are pitiful reminders of the consequences our university students have to endure for expressing themselves. One case is through peaceful assembly, with or without permit. The other is through graffiti, an act normally associated with vandalism rather than a medium of expression. Whatever the method is, what is more pathetic is how the role of educating or in this case “disciplining” was left to the police rather than the university itself. Criminalizing acts of dissent such as the ones above are successful approach to deter the rest of the students from standing up for what they believe in. I was even told, way before the seven unlucky heroes were convicted, their names are notorious in the campus because a certain university for example, used them as examples of ungrateful students while their pictures are officially displayed during these “explanation sessions”. Not only the seven were fined for RM3, 900.00, they were also denied education for eight years and a better livelihood, as a direct impact of that, what was even worse, they have to endure character assassination and were labeled as criminals and an ungrateful lot even before the Court issued its verdict.As a student once, I understand the frustration of being suppressed very well. I need not look very far to identify the source of suppression. We have AUKU to thank for that matter. It does not help either that Universities in Malaysia do not really embrace the concept of campus autonomy or academic freedom. University administrators played an aggressive role in dictating the direction of democracy in campuses. Campus elections are set up events where the regulations meant for the so called democratic processes are actually technical strategy to defeat anti-government candidates. With such unhealthy environment, wouldn’t one in every ten students (at least) realized the great intellectual sham they are dedicating themselves to, and pulled out from the herd and daring enough to call for reform?

I believe Universities should be humble enough to reflect on these two contemporary incidents and try to understand the reason behind the so called unruliness. State, as the guardians of our public universities must give up the futile attempts at battling the rise of culture of dissent in the universities. As the centre of knowledge and I would say, clearinghouse for young souls seeking for truth, culture of dissent will always exist in the universities. The priority now is to think on how to nurture these new ideas and views towards our nation building. We need these intellectual rebels to channel their passion towards strengthening social justice and democracy in the country. Why waste our time, living in denial?

 Abolish  AUKU! Long live Student Power!

Once Beaten, How many more coming?

I learned an important lesson about relationship over the weekend. That sometimes, once beaten doesn’t mean you are free from the second beating. Sometimes, you need to get knocked twice or ran over a few times before you actually understand how dangerous it is to make a dash across the road while the light is green.  it is not because you could not get enough of  bone fractures or disentagled limbs in your life.  Or, in my case- you wanted to test your immunity to heartbreaks. Sometimes, you just have to. So that you see things clearer.

When a man close to me reminded me of our early agreement that we are to stay friends no matter what and I questioned the sincerity of his words because his actions went beyond the “friends-tagline”, all hells broke loose. He defended his affectionate attitude, display of jealousy or overly gentleman demeanour as his way to mend our rough relation before we reconciled. “I did the best I could to make up for the rough time I gave you before”, He said.

When we rewind back to those “rough times” he mentioned, the bad experience he gave me was his rejection of my love. I question the integrity of his decision in reconciling and treating me more “romantic” than before. Obviously, he thought a casual one month cooling off period would make me get over him and then we could start all over again and he could cozy up to me again because his verbal assurance was enough to validate his intimate actions that most men would spare for their couples as “friendly”.

And the whirlwind of emotion started all over again. I was confused with his words and treatments. Let’s not forget his killer stare. and before I could swim back to the last spot I stood on my firm ground of reality, I was drowned again in his bona fide plan to “make up to me”. And when he was finally pushed to a corner that night, when I finally have the guts to demand him to take responsible for causing me this pain again for the second time, he invoked the “you are my best friend and I left my comfort zone for you” argument. By the way, I used the comfort zone argument against him 5 minutes before him. How unoriginal.

Is he naive? Nope. I dropped that justification because he dated before and I believe he understands the significance of body language in relationship.

The painful truth is-

I WAS BLIND. FOR THE SECOND TIME.

It was good that I got my wake up call the second time or else, I would struggle with my own dilemmas on what is actually wrong with our relationship. To men out there that think they are doing a great favour by offering better treatment to women after you reject them, hold your horses. Better does not means more intimacy. Better means drawing the boundaries firmly. I am sorry for losing an acquaintance but I felt more pathetic for thinking that he is turning into a new leaf all this while. Well, I am slightly revengeful but to reduce my stress for plotting evil plans, I let fate take its own course. Amin.

Of Being on the Left Side

Divided by ideology is like CROCS. Let me deliberate more on this bizarre observation. A diabetic fashionista would be torn to two in deciding whether she is brave enough to confront the cruel critics of how outdated Crocs are or drop the whole fashion worshipping and put on the crocs because those are medically endorsed footwear for diabetic patients. Make sense?

What I am trying to say is how having two ideological roads do not necessarily make sense in our multicultural world. Cold War was yesterday’s news. And what is more significant during this troubling contemporary time of ours is the fact that taking sides restrict our ability to reflect on our own weakness. We are privileged by the existence of “the others” in the sense that we have a perfect target for our moral blameworthiness. It’s like “yeah, I sucked at the peace talk but just because the other side did not stop yakking about the legitimacy of war”.

My two cents this time around has a lot to do with the revivalism of anti-communism propaganda in the country. It started off with the public furore over Chin Peng’s unwelcome homecoming, ironically with Malaysia-China’s diplomatic relation’s anniversary as the backdrop, the official raid of a poor fella’s hip stall in the Central Market that sells Mickey Mao tees, the attempt to filter and ban materials that are leaning to the left and finally…take a deep breath, the idea to erect memorials as reminder of the Communist guerilla insurgency in the country at strategic historical locations. I contemplate that the next move will be banning any items or objects (re: pencil colors included) that are red in color since it is a color associated to communism, but perhaps I overestimated our State’s mediocre attempt at distorting history, they stopped committing hilarious blunder just at the point where they claimed Chin Peng is a Brit. I suspect if he is, he would be a regular at those bars in Camden, planning guerilla wars in between indie gigs.

But, let us not be too excited about our lefty side. We felt in a way, a lot more better-conscience and moral-wise than say our corrupted nepotistic despotic right wingers. We are the subtle worshippers of the Superiority of the Victimhood Complex Syndrome indeed. However, that does not make us any more noble that our right winger when we fall short at condemning our comrades that in history, has been responsible for the death of thousands of civilians and the downfall of socialism credibility- Stalin, Mao,  and of course Saddam Hussein. Nick Cohen in his argumentative recent work entitled “What’s left?” has passionately  argued that in choosing sides during the first and second gulf war, the rule of thumb for the leftist movement during that time was “make sure we are not taking the west imperialist side”. Cohen argued how the failure of the Left to attack both the invasion by America on Iraq AND Saddam Hussein’s tyranny was not only a case of misplaced focus on the overall factors that led to the conflict but also a major blunder to the left intellectual culture. Priority might be offered as the underlying reason for allying with Saddam rather than the Empire, but try explaining about the priority of our socialist struggle to the hundred thousands of Kurds slain by the Baathists or millions of ordinary folks tortured under the Franco regime. Don’t expect thank you cards, will you?

The inevitable drawback of these would definitely be the difficulty to depart ourselves, the so-called left from fascism. The powers that be; mostly whom are right wingers find it easier to clamp down leftist ideals since now, they could just generalize all left ideals as causing public chaos and destruction as evident in history. The consistent propagandas on the evil of the left ideology won the hearts of many people because people, are exposed to the limited information of what leftist ideology is all about. Socialism, Marxism, Communism seemed like close siblings when in reality, they have issues about each other all the time. Lotsa issues.

Perhaps it is the fate of the left to stay marginalized. After all, victimhood provides the left the edge it needs to sustain its support from the oppressed. However, let us not romanticizes the left so much that it leaves us blind to our own wrongdoings. The State in all its attempts to cleanse Malaysia from the Attack of the Red Guards is actually relying on our lack of grasp of the whole issue to further its own national agenda.

 Reference of such: Nick Cohen, New Left Review, Franco, Republic of Fear

FACE TO FACE WITH THE MADCHESTER ROYALTY.

 

 

OASIS is not exactly a band that I thought I would see in action twice, but that was what happened. In 2004, I backpacked with Union Guy to Bangkok to watch the 100 Rock Festival and Oasis headlined the 1^st day, along side Ian Brown and Franz Ferdinand. I went back after they sang “What’s the Story, Morning Glory”, much to the disappointment of Union Guy especially since my reason for making that quick exit was “to beat the traffic”. In 2007, I was in Glasgow and paid King Tut’s Wah Wah a short visit, The Amphetamines were playing. I recalled making that cold dreary trip to the club because I read somewhere; this was the place where Oasis got their big break. I remembered trying to touch as many walls and tables as possible in the club, making a mental note, that this was where it all started for those Madchester boys.  My loyalty to the band was a combination of half-baked admiration because I think they are so full of themselves and down right fascination because the sound they churned was one of the most original ones I heard in mid-90s.

 

But despite the “love-hate relationship” I had with the band since 1995, I chose to make that trip to Singapore for the second time in April to watch the Gallaghers in concert.

 

It was ironic that when OASIS came down to Singapore last week, it rained rather heavily at about few hours before the concert started. Just in case we did not have the time to grasp trivial information about this band or maybe we are not really diligent Wiki researchers, the band’s original name was “The Rain” before Liam or Noel came into the picture. My bet was Liam had perhaps dismissed “The Rain” as not catchy enough, hence suggested a name that might reflect generous amount of rain but in a more exotic way i.e. OASIS.

 

Trivia aside, the real deal was when they performed that night at the Singapore Indoor Stadium. Well, if I were to compare my previous experience at Coldplay’s show with the Madchester boys that will be like trying to equate Pakatan Rakyat’s chances of taking over Batang Ai with defending Bukit Gantang. True, Coldplay exploited their atmospheric stadium-friendly songs by bringing in props and technology to enhance their concert’s ambience but Liam, I could imagine, would sneer at those huge bouncing yellow balloons and shiny confetti and prefer to throw complimentary packets of crystal meth to their fans during Champagne Supernova.

 

But of course they didn’t do that last Sunday because it was not a rave party. It was pure rock and roll madness. No opening acts, no props except for a minimalistic use of a tambourine thrown in with some rock star frown, Liam surprisingly made his grand entrance right on time. In addition to surprisingly dumping his rock star bravado of being fashionably late, Liam need not sing that night if he wanted to. He could just stand cockily near the microphone, throwing that well known intense stare of his at us and let us, fans do the singing, because we sang almost all the songs with him throughout the concert.  In short, OASIS is a master of raw rock and roll energy when they performed live.

 

To sum up the concert: Brilliantly euphoric in the rawest sense of rock and roll. Hats off to you, mates.

 

Favourite song of the night: I wanted to go for Lyla or Morning Glory but seriously, it was OASIS’s delicious cliché – Wonderwall.

 

Setlist:

Fuckin’ In The Bushes
Rock ‘N’ Roll Star
Lyla
The Shock Of The Lightning
Cigarettes & Alcohol
The Meaning Of Soul
To Be Where There’s Life
Waiting For The Rapture
The Masterplan
Songbird
Slide Away
Morning Glory
Ain’t Got Nothin
The Importance Of Being Idle
I’m Outta Time
Wonderwall
Supersonic
Don’t Look Back in Anger
Falling Down
Champagne Supernova
I Am The Walrus

 

Coldplay Viva La Vida Tour!

Coldplay kinda sealed the Attack of the Indies or rather Attack of Former Indies on the Grammies by notching 3 major awards. I hated them for that without prior self reflection (to those who know me damn well, me? Self reflection? You gotta be kidding!) But yes, with Coldplay, I need to have some sort of in-depth reflection because “we” both went a long way together. When I was a fresh wide eyed intern with the only Islamic party in the country, my long endless nights of vetting and keying amendments for the electoral rolls were made bearable by “A Rush of Blood to the Head “cassette played with utmost caution and almost inaudible volume because I was still a poor student with no money to buy a walkman plus I was at the political party’s markas, for crying out loud.  But even before that, Coldplay triggered my curiosity when TIMES wrote a feature on their Parachutes album. Some of the stuff mentioned in the feature was how Coldplay is a bunch of clean cut boys singing raw poignant songs and Chris Martin’s favourite read was “Men from Mars, Women from Venus”. I bet that was way before he realized he will one day produced Apple and Paris with the so-called Hollywood royalty-Gwyneth Paltrow.

 

Coming back to Coldplay going mainstream, now, I took a step backward and asked this question: “So what? Let them be as big as they want it so long as they still produced good music”.

 

This purposeful ranting about Coldplay has a lot to do with the fact that I got to watch the band performed in Singapore last Monday. This time around, I was joined by the Kajang Motley Crew-Altaf and Irma. This was Coldplay third time performing in Singapore, making it a wicked hatrick of sold out concerts for the region. The band performed a solid combination of songs taken from all their albums-Parachutes, A Rush of Blood to the Head, X & Y and the latest Grammy winning album, Viva La Vida.  I was silly to ignore and not giving the new album any chance that as Chris played the opening song of the night from the new album, I was dumbstruck to say the least. “Which one is this?” I asked myself. Oh, never mind, it was damn brilliant, anyway. But later on, when he played the infamous intro of “Clocks” on the piano, I screamed my heads off. I know this one, I told myself and started singing together. From that point onwards, there was no turning back for me and also those two crazy Chinese girls seated in front of me. We embraced the atmospheric music of Coldplay as they performed those songs that I remembered so well from the Parachutes era up to Viva La Vida. This time around, Coldplay allowed the beautiful masterpieces of Brian Eno to be displayed on the large screens together with six huge globe-shaped slides installed to the middle part of the stadium’s ceiling to accompany some of their songs for that night. This added more to the grand ambience that would only suit Coldplay’s orchestral ambitious sounds especially their new songs such as Viva La Vida, Lost and Lovers in Japan. Not forgetting, huge yellow balloons, laser shoots and swirling confetti were some of the wonderful surprises that the audience experienced throughout the concert.

 

I loved the part when they did “Speed of Sound” in unplugged version. Later, Chris narrated on how he was not the better singer in the group. Jerry, their lead guitar would make a better lead, he alleged. Hints of breaking up and announcing his new successor subtly to his fans?  I hope not! Although rumors of Coldplay breaking up because Chris Martin wants to pursue a solo career was heard way before their Viva La Vida Tour.

 

Songs performed that night (not in proper order) were: Don’t Panic, Clocks, In My Place, Fix You, Scientist, Politik, Speed of Sound, Yellow, God Put a Smile on Your Face, Lovers in Japan, Viva La Vida, Trouble, Square One, What If, The Hardest Part, Lost and 42. I think I left a few other tracks but you know what? I am not a professional music critic or reviewer. Hehehe.

 

Kudos to Coldplay for such a great concert. At least, the concert experience instill enough confidence in me to go and buy Viva La Vida and gave it a chance it deserves. J

 

 

 

Hey, I’m 30! :)

El Che survived another 9 brilliant years of revolutionary struggle after he was 30, before he was shot 9 times and died a heroic death. Lennon topped him by one year, made it in time to came up with songs like “Imagine” and “Give Peace A Chance” before he met his end, gave the phrase  ”Life Begins At 40″ a whole twisted meaning. Well, some of the other icons like Jimi Hendrix or Morrison did not even reached 30, but were of course sorely missed by their fans. You must be thinking why am I yakking about these super iconic figures who either passed the age of 30 as legends or those who did not cut it at all but still, legendary in their own ways. Well, today I am 30. I am not legendary yesterday nor am I legendary today. Let’s not talk about tomorrow or else, I might be anxious with the whole I-will-never-be-legendary pattern I am seeing at the moment.

Unlike the previous years where I would be busy planning parties days before my birthday, the last few days was spent admiring my torn dirty Converse shoes and t-shirts with huge silly statements because I was trying to recreate my 30 year old image. I am 30 with a kid, single and has a mouth that does its own thinking, Converse would seemed too…. young. Some of the time in the last few days, were also spent scrutinizing my distorted hourglass figure in the mirror, thinking where else in the whole territory of  my body, would my future fats be hiding as I don’t see anymore available space.

In short, I was making myself miserable come 30. I self-victimized and willfully succumbed to the pre-conceived notion that 30 means entering the boring, un-hot matured realm of womanhood and I only owned a pair of high heels, for God’s sake. Am I ready for this?  Can I cope with the social expectation of how a 30 year old should behaved? Correction, how would a 30 year old act, by the way?

Until I realized that I had forgotten how to embrace life as it is. I am 30, so? I am still not a tycoon or owns a body that matches Beyonce’s. I am the same person yesterday, today and tomorrow. My anxiety that I might not achieved enough at this point of age has affected my regular dose of optimism.Until someone reminded me that all these do not matter because what matters the most is who you are as a person, be it at 30 or 60. Well, this is a pretty ordinary over-used statement, conjured perhaps to motivate some obese or ugly individuals about the importance of giving inner beauty a chance.

Kidding.

It might be a tiring cliche, but it is an accepted truth that we tend to overlook in the course of our daily life. Factors like age, size or social standing sometimes stripped us from our real selves. Thanks, doc for reminding me that.

So, there was no cake today. No parties. It was just like any other day in my life.

Hence, to another unfolding episode of my life, let’s kick more ass at 30! 

 

When Kelly Meets Butler… Crazy! :)

The crazy band that I am crazy about!

Apart from finally having thought of a brilliant idea on how to celebrate my big entry into the 3-0 realm, I also cooked up a  silly way of surprising my sorely missed soulmate in Glasgow on her birthday. Take heed that I never did this before but hey, I am in the mood of making as many firsts as possible in my uncertain period of life. Clue: I am reviving my artistic skill that I had proudly displayed to my schoolmates when I was 12. I directed a school performance and it was a Broadway Musical meets Moby..to a certain extent. So, I will shut up for now  about my March 10 Project. Hehehe

 

More on music: If I think Pratchett-Boyle combination is superb, I don’t know what to say about Richard Kelly-Arcade Fire combo! I would just go utterly speechless and faint! Anyway, Richard Kelly, that guy who is into abstract crap and directed the super-cult, Donnie Darko (2001) will have Arcade Fire, that Montreal Band which is also into noir abstract crap, writing the original score for the movie! What an awesome weng combo!

The new movie entitled “The Box” is a horror-thriller story adapted from a Playboy short story by Richard Matheson called, “Button, Button,”. Well, you have an edgy director, a morbid storyline plus a possibly noir film score…one thing for sure, I can’t wait for Nov.2009 then!

To Arcade Fire fans, check out their ”B-Side Tracks” for your personal audio adventure-Lenin & Burning Bridges.

 

Of Reconciliation. :)

I finally reconciled with the man that I thought I would hate my whole life. What was his mistake again? For not knowing a good thing when he has it. But who am I to dictate when or how a person sees the light or get a grip of his life? I am no one, exactly. Like what my therapist said, “save your drowning self first, Gee, that’s rule no.1 in surviving. Don’t play the martyr.”

I guess it is the bravest thing I ever did. To admit humbly that I am grateful because he rejected me. To admit that I grew up a lot since the last time we drifted apart. “I am dating again,” I told him nonchalantly. As usual, he did not show any expressive signs on his cool face. Again, pause on that sentence, I am over the stage where I sought his approval for what I did or long for that even tiniest flicker of his eye that told me he was troubled by me seeing other men. He doesn’t care, so why would I care what he thinks of it?

Am I sad that my first love ended like this? Yes and no. Like what I confessed to my therapist, it is a huge loss and sadness is never afar. But why mourn over the mysteries of God’s plan? Why fell and drowned myself in the anguish misery of frustration? Why be sad and anxious over the unknown tomorrow? Isn’t the present counts more?

No. I am not sad it ended like this. In fact, this could be a beginning of something. Do I need to define “something”? Nah, I let the events, choices and hopes I have define it.

Because what matter at the moment to me are these three things that I am sure of;

One, I am proud of myself. Fats, freaky choices and all. I am even proud of the woman in me who can say to the man that once, she was afraid of losing, “Sure, you don’t want me, so?”

Two, I love my daughter. When you have a lovely daughter like Safra, you could not stop being thankful to God for still having faith in making me a mom.

Three, I am sure whatever shitty predicaments that I had to endure in 2008 is a temp setback to prepare me for bigger things. So, why so sad, Shazeera? The music has just begun.

 

Of Saturday Morning & Pool Bash With The Li’l Gremlin. :)

 

I missed my blog so much. I have not pour all my deepest feelings of happiness, sadness, guilt and regret here for a while and that is because I am damn busy. Plus the fact that I was on Cloud 9 after I managed to secure my tix to see Coldplay in Singapore. The tix laid mutely on my working desk the whole day as I stared at it  excitedly. Speaking of  foolish display of emo over a band who I strongly feel had sold out and won Grammies. Oh Well….

Coming back to my not-so-Chris-Martin story, today, I finally get the plastic pool that I bought last week filled with air and had Safra splashing in the lovely pool for hours.  After playing the role of a mature, in control dry mom, I finally  decided such role is utterly boring and rolled my tracks and dive in to join her. Our loud wet splashing granduer attracted young passers by that they peeped at us from the gate, looking eager to join. I invited them in, but kids being the shy bunch they are, quickly sped off, giggling to themselves along the way.

Those are rings, dear, for the corals not for ur legs..:)

She was intrigued by the mini fountains, maybe she thought those were punctures…

If u want to fill the pool, it’s the other way around! :)

After convincing Safra that another minute in the pool would make us go all wrinkle and ugly, I pulled her out of the pool and brought her indoor. What a nice Saturday morning!

 

 

The Li’l Gremlin is zonking at the moment after a tiring exciting time having a splash. I gave her a wet sloppy kiss and  left her to rest in peace. Isn’t it a great way to start the day?