Just Before The Year Ended...

Chat with old friend from college who ceased to be a friend the day he royally pissed me off. Decided to let bygones be since perhaps I'd overreacted at the time. Listen to his girlfriend woes and give him helpful suggestions. Start to feel smug glow in being able to give good advice in this manner. Until he asks me if I wish I'd been born a boy. Why, I ask him. So you can enjoy life like I do, he replies, drinking, smoking, fucking around. Which is when I get pissed off again and this time for good. Realisation that perhaps I'm not such a bad judge of character after all.

Signs You Might Have Died Never Seeing

Seen above a mirror slap bang in the middle of a Mangalorean ice cream parlour - didn't think they'd need it? Think again. Mangaloreans are a breed apart.

Someone let the inexperienced learning bus driver loose! Heaven help us all.

Just So You Know...

... I mean business.

The wee one unbeknownstedly posing for the camera

The Trip Home - with a difference

The visit home this time was doomed to be different. Because of the addition of what is technically known as 'a bundle of joy'. True to their unpredictable nature, my relatives decided to adopt a baby. So they grabbed the first good-looking one that came within reach. When enquired as to whether they felt adopting a baby was akin to buying a new pair of shoes, answers remained vague. Equipped with sensible and practical considerations, I made my way home.

While still maintaining that I cannot stand, the whiny sort of kiddies, I must say this child did much to soften me up. I was gagaing and googooing with the best of them. The kid was lucky enough to be introduced to Johnny Cash and Radiohead early on, with me murmuring these to her as lullabies. Oh what, she seemed to like them.

I suppose the point is that the 'i refuse to have kids' stand has now been modified to a 'not just yet' kind of view.. much to my boyfriend's relief.

What I also found was that it never rains, but it pours. There I was being dragged by my over eager uncle to attend a party where I didn't know anyone (the canada one, for those in the know). And what do I find? I am saddled with the responsibility of taking care of some cousin's 5 month old. What's more is I volunteered for the saddling. The events leading to this consisted of humanitarian intervention seeing as how this cousin hadn't had her lunch yet and her moron of her husband - another breathing example of why you should never marry a mangalorean man - was too busy gabbing to relatives to handle his own share of the looking after process.

As a result, I am going to post pictures of the baby. Yes, I. Even though all kids look alike and I am delving into corniness, you shall soon see pictures of the little coochie woochie poo... ahem.

Season's Greetings!

Ah the joys of mass media propagating how joyfulness and cheerfulness can be obtained by spending a huge chunk of your non-existent wealth on products you don't need and certainly can live without. Christmas is here again! I popped along to Spencer's the other day to assist a friend find clothes she can wear in the US, when an awful sight met my eyes. A hundred non-caucasian Santa Clauses stood on the ground floor waving merrily to shoppers on escalators. Were they being paid to terrorize shoppers into buying their relatives useless gifts? Reports remain unconfirmed.
Upon being asked why I am so eager to get home for christmas being a self-confessed atheist. Isn't it obvious? It's the food, moron! That and the fact that I can have scrumptious yums brought to me as I lie lazily on my bed as I attempt to annoy my dogs. And try to murder the cat.
I love this time of year...

How To Date An Airhostess For Dummies

Apparently, to be considered a suitable date by an airhostess you need to answer to the following characteristics:

- You need to share the same zodiac sign
- You need to ensure your pappy and hers have had the same occupation in their past prior to their subsequent retirement
- You need to be a platinum card holder

Sworn and attested by a person who inhabits the same living quarters as one.

My Hangover is Purple

Made it to bangalore in the wee hours of the afternoon. Shuffled off to friend's place and slept like a log till it was time to leave. Gates open at 5.30 - we were there at 5.10. But our ticket-holding friends weren't. Decided to join them at Mojo's. Enter smoke-filled corner where a huge bunch is drowning in beer and laughing their butts off at everything and nothing in particular. Decide this lot isn't so bad..

Make a grab for two Davidoffs and even manage to get a free LSE lighter in the bargain - it helps to have friends in high places. It's past 7, the concert's begun and the bunch shows no signs of budging. Further probing reveals they all have free tickets and aren't major Purple fans. After brief explanation of our Purple passion and the fact that we were holding tickets bought with blood and sweat money, we set off for the show - to be greeted by 'into the fire'. Man,these old guys sure know how to have a good time. Rapture of the Deep makes me sway, and the rest keep heads bobbing all the way. No one in near vicinity appears to have weed on them. Damn. One maniac out front decided people would much rather be entertained by him than the Ians on stage so played an air guitar - and basically acted stoned. Decided the back was more fun. Stop play after Smoke on the Water. What about Hush? I ask my friends - and then ta da - they're back.. Meet my manager at the concert and decide I like my new company after all.

Wrap up with huge dinner at someplace above Amoeba where we get a waiter serving us water who'd put Adam Sandler to shame. Apparently, as he explained, he wasn't the best person to ask about the menu items, or to get water - turned out he wasn't good for much. At one point he calls us a bunch of 'tight' people. All we'd drunk was water!

The IIT guy in the group was sarky and intelligent so decided to rip apart everyone at the table. Good fun to have around, that. Sad scandalously early return to chennai on a train that thinks it's a luxury airline. Sunday, bloody Sunday - I miss you already.

To Shoot Yourself

To give till it hurts. To give till you can no longer give anymore. To finally snap and clam shut realizing you've been the fool all along. To eternally wonder. To eternally indulge in self-doubt. To wait and hope anyway.

Don't you just hate life...

???

The other day we received an official email informing us of a meeting scheduled with Indresh, with the subject line - Meeting With Indresh. Ok, said we the newbies, we shall accept and attend this meeting since that is what we come to office to do. The next day at the meeting, an old chap comes in and shakes our hands saying,"Hi, I'm Indresh" and promptly walks out again.

Corporate non-doublespeak? I am speechless.

I Just Called to Freak Her Out

Another groggy day at work. You sit there bleary-eyed sipping your coffee and trying to find something stimulating to do while staring at your monitor. Just as you have succeeded in warding off imminent drowsiness as the caffeine kicks in, the theme of Star Trek blasts into your ears. You look around startled out of your wits because until now you were under the impression you were sitting in your office. Star Trek music is suddenly cut and you hear a "Hello? Oh, hi da..."

You blink and decide to get more coffee for the headache induced by mp3 ringtones.

Would You Look At That Tree...

Driving by shamelessly on someone else's vehicle one day, I noticed a sign on tree saying "Puncher Done Hear", followed by a mobile number. Things one can infer from this include:


- The Muthupandian or Venkatesan who painted it actually managed to get one word out of three right

- Climbing a tree to paste this ad was something that gave them a lot of pleasure and free ad space

- Someone would actually contact aforementioned person to have their tyre punctured since they're incapable morons who couldn't stick a nail into their tyre all by themselves

- I really need to master riding my own vehicle

Amazing India? You betcha.

Revenge? Become an HR

Exactly why, just tell me why, anybody, are pre employment medical tests so damn degrading? For one thing, you're hustled about with the minimum of dignity from one test room to the next, have blood drawn out of you, have your weight taken embarrassing as the result may be; and then you're given a robe to put on to have your X-ray taken. With a sense of growing dread, you strip and find that the robe's fastenings don't really live up to their name and give way just as you're standing there flattened against the plate.
Just when you think things cannot really get much worse, you're handed a plastic bottle and told to pee into it. Pee into a plastic bottle. With an opening that has a diameter of 5 cm.
....
...
How does one do it... you don't really want to know. Having hastily gotten that over with cursing technology where it's lacking, you step out and are taken to the ECG room. God, the humiliation...

Yet again, men have it easy.

Hands Clean

My investment agent, who makes my money rapidly multiply in a matter of months, would like you all to know that he is willing to be of service to anyone else who requires it.

Be warned that he is prone to have little cash registers flash in his eyes and slightly slobber as he describes newer funds you can watch your money grow in. If interested, please call Prakash from ING Vyasa on 9841293905.

For The Blind, Deaf and Grossly Ignorant

Deep Purple tours bangalore December 17 2006!!!

Guide to Scooter-Riding or, How To Fall Off Gracefully

One of the inherent difficulties in learning to ride a scooter without first having learnt to ride a bicycle is, obviously, falling down. However, due to my own inherent weirdness, it is usually not I who falls down but my scooter that does so, as I calmly step aside allowing it to go crashing down; sometimes even helping it on its way with a blast of the throttle and a nervous yelp.
Needless to say, I feel sorry for my scooter. I have noticed that as a result I have a huge fan following, as a form of live entertainment to people in the vicinity - call me paranoid but I do not think it's a coincidence that larger numbers of autorickshaw drivers congregate in that street at an unfleeceable time and location.
While I'm doling out the sympathy, I might also mention that I feel sorry for my friend on whose foot the scooter inevitably falls every time. It is as I was losing hope of my ever getting the hang of it that I remembered Douglas Adams' Guide's little treatise on flying - which seems to hold good for riding -

There is an art, it says, or, rather, a knack to flying. The knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss...you have to miss the ground accidentally. It’s no good deliberately intending to miss the ground because you won’t. You have to have your attention suddenly distracted by something else when you’re halfway there, so that you are no longer thinking about falling, or about the ground or about how much it’s going to hurt if you fail to miss it.

Now there was a man who knew what he was talking about.

You're All Wet

Late fish (left) being intimidated by red oxygenator light (right)

The fish at my place died. Which is sad, but not very. Possible causes could be
- loneliness
- realisation that no one really liked it because all it did was swim around in a tank all day
- depression due to the above
- fear of the devil in the form of the oxygenator's red light placed in its tank days before its demise

Of course, it might also have been due to the fact that it kept banging its head viciously against the side of the tank everyday and believed in a daily dose of aquarium pebbles. I prefer the anthropomorphisms though.

Chai Pani, Boss?

Since Indians are so adaptable, we have long become accustomed to the concepts of bribery and corruption. Centuries of handing the acceptable denomination to an official in question and mutual scratching of backs has enabled us to obtain what we want, when we want it - and thus we have evolved. For instance, it is commonplace to be stared down by the parking attendant even if he only appeared after you were done parking at the particular site and manoeuvred your vehicle onto the street all by your sweet little self. Indians would merely dig in their pockets for small change and slip it into the waiting hand and get peace of mind. If anyone actually did us a service for free, we would look suspiciously at them while attempting to stuff a ten rupee note into their hand. So much so that even with friends, the average Indian tries to pay back helpful gestures via generous gifts. Embarrassment ensues when the friend realises what is being done but accepts anyway. After all, we Indians have also mastered the knack of never giving offence. God forbid we would have to -- express emotion. But let's leave that one for another day...

I Asked For It, Didn't I

Example of how dumb my colleagues are:

My lovely wonderful SMS: Everyone was always very friendly toward him, and no one was ever very nice; everyone spoke to him, and no one ever said anything. - Joseph Heller, Catch 22

Dumb Colleague's reply: What does this Bible verse signify?

It's Like Him

Men are so full of it. All talk and no action.