Aliens have abducted my sibling

Warning: the following excerpt is written with loads of sarcasm and should be taken with a whole fistful of salt.


Although upon further reflection, that may not be entirely true. It's more like the aliens have made a few tweaks to her hard drive and reinstalled Win XP with some other renegade programme in there that I haven't encountered before. Or possibly not installed Symantec so there's some virus running around loose in the system.


And before I get bombarded by said sibling again, I wish to reiterate (as I've said in her Friendster profile): she is ANAL with caps for all four letters of the word. But only her family gets to see that bit of her, not the rest of the world.


I should know. I get the brunt of it. And for the life of me, I can't imagine why. Maybe it's because I'm too direct and blunt and she's too hypersensitive to take barbs or constructive criticism or even statements of fact about her character without flying off the deep end.


Anyway, back to the alien hard drive reinstall. See, when she's at home (or when I was still living at home and was around to see her at home, as she'd put it), she'd be moping or grumpy or monosyllabic.


"Hey, I heard you're going out? Where are you going?"

"Out lah."

"Yeah, I know. Where?"

"Out lah! Why must I tell you?"

"I just want to know. Kehpoh lah!"

"Out lah!! Why do you want to know?! Why must you know?!"


See, typical sis behaviour. As if telling me where she's going would kill her.


Usually most attempts at asking her plans for after hours, who she's meeting up with or details about her personal life ends up in a conversation similar to the one I've just illustrated. It got to the point where our mother couldn't bring herself to ask her where darling sis is going out as she didn't want to get snapped at.


I should give her a new nickname: snapping turtle.


Anyway yes...and sis is not the type to hit the dance clubs or socialise excessively. She's more of the stay-at-home person (during the time I was still living at home, of course. I wouldn't know now as I don't live at home and I wouldn't want to ASSUME I know everything). However, since her introduction and induction into salsadom, all that's changed. Not only is she a social butterfly, she's even picked up a penchant for Joe Satriani. Satriani? What next? I'll probably hear her screeching her lungs out to The Darkness or headbanging to Metallica? This was someone who didn't have a clue about or showed any interest in World Music either. Next I suppose she'll be raiding my CD collection for Ruben Gonzalez, Ibrahim Ferrer, Celia Cruz or The Buena Vista Social Club. The greats certainly been sitting there a long time without her noticing that they were there.


I think it's great she's expanded her music repertoire from Josh Groban and Russell Watson to Satriani and salsa/latin. The transition somehow just seems to have been done at triple light speed. What transition? Hahah!



Oh, the social butterfly bit. Not that I ASSUME to know what she was like before, but she was less of a social butterfly than a social misfit (yes, I'll be getting yelled at again for this). Never known her (here again I go ASSUMING) to be very much of a conversationalist or sociable person. But hey, here she is now: fluttering from one end of the dance floor to the other, pals with almost everyone.


Which is cool, of course. No problems with me. If only she could be more sociable with yours truly and the rest of the family and less of a snapping turtle. At least the family have seen the crazy, insane, happy side of me together with the grumpy, moody bits. I doubt if the parental units see much of sis' bubbly side at home.


I think the aliens didn't do a good enough reinstall job. They reinstalled her skills at socialising outside but left the networking with family bits to rot. Sure, I annoy the hell out of her. For the life of me I don't know why. Except for the fact that I ASSUME everything and that I ASSUME to know everything. And that somehow seems to annoy her. Because she assumes I ASSUM to know everything.

However, I have it on good authority that ever since she took up salsa, she's become a changed person. Socially, that is. She reserves the worst bits for her family and some of her close friends (hmm, sounds like somebody I know...). Which brings me to ponder that change. It's all happening a little too fast, too much. What was the name of that movie? Too fast, too furious? And not overall, but only a selected side of her. A friend put it succinctly. "It all seems rather superficial. Maybe we should treat it as her mid-life crisis." Well, I would except that she's not even reached her thirties yet. Hahah! And no, said friend and I do not spend all our time bitching about how anal she is as we DO have better things to do with our time, such as enjoy Banoffee pie and exchange wisecracks about life and work in general. Not everything we do and say has anything to do about anal sis.


My two cents' worth about the whole alien abduction/hard drive reinstall?

1. Finally, she's learned how to socialise. Great!! Shows that you can pick up more than just salsa while learning how to dance (some guys have picked up gfs too!). Social skills always come in handy.

2. She's into Satriani? Hahah, she should raid my CD collection. And Jus should loan her The Darkness. And she should give Green Day a try. Since she likes All American Rejects, Good Charlotte, etc. Green Day is, in my opinion, THE pioneer of the genre. And then on to some Metallica. Rock Rules!! Oh, and to Latin music. See, there is more to music than Josh Groban and Harry Connick Jr., not that I don't simply adore the latter.

3. Too much socializing makes Jill an exhausted girl, eventually. I've done my share of it in college and university. Now's her turn I suppose. She always was a late bloomer.

4. Despite the socialising and the added social skills, she is still as ANAL as ever. I still can't, for the life of me, figure out why the hell she finds me so annoying (she hates my guts?). Sigh, like I said, there must have been something left out during the reinstall.

5. Oh, and yes, there are a myriad other worlds of fiction out there, Neil Gaiman would be just one of them. I would recommend Clive Barker's Abarat, Piers Anthony's Incarnations of Immortality, a douse of Steinbeck, some Salman Rushdie (East Meets West is a good start), Terry Pratchett, and lots more actually.

6. She'd better learn how to take sarcasm at face value. And learn how to either accept what people say about her or learn to let it just roll off. And to accept statements of fact as what they are: statements of fact. You either take it or learn from them and improve where you can.


All I know is, she used to be a cute, smiley, good natured albeit quiet kid with an aversion to strangers. Somewhere along the way growing up she morphed into a grumpier, more introverted version of yours truly. And then suddenly now, she's a social butterfly, but at home she's as reserved as ever. At least I can lay claim to being a moody, grumpy, obnoxious kid (with sudden bursts of bossiness and energy and effervescence) ever since I've been born (I really haven't changed that much).


Again, these are just statements of fact and personal observations. I make no claim whatsoever of complaining (I should put a disclaimer here and reiterate that).


Maybe the aliens should just rebuild her entire system. Switch her from Windows to Mac OS. She'd be cool on the inside as well as on the outside.


Oh yes, and I am expecting to be fried for this piece. Oh well...what's new anyway? After all, the blood connection allows for and forgives transgressions by and from both parties. I dunno about her but my motto (unless you've done something so unspeakable) is forgive and forget. But that may be due to my exceptionally bad memory anyway. Oh, and of course she has her good side too. But I'll leave that for another day and another post. :)