Life has come a long way, since yesterday.

This is scary. Balls to bones. Must be similar to the cold-feet that people are said to develop before the wedding :) But I've done it. Finally.

Welcome home Laska! (And she blogs HERE!)

I have been wanting to bring you home. But aah the doubt! The anxiety! That from now on, you're going to be part of every one of my plans - small or big. Almost like I were a parent. Well, it is almost indeed.

Now Curry Leaves is intelligent, perceptive and honest. And knowing that she knows that I know that she loves me, I've to trust her advice more than I trust myself :). Thank you for the push pal.

And for any little room for doubt there was, Ziggy did a nice job of singing True to Myself.

Life just got sunnier!

And Though You Fight To Stay Alive

Remember the line from MJ's Thriller? And with it, the one hell-of-a-voice-over to remember - arguably Vincent Price's best??

I had plans for today. Funny how crazy alternatives pan out only on such days. I blame it on -

1. This talk with K at work in the coffee room that reminded me of the first ever thing that I wanted to become when I grew up - a voice-over artist! What with my voice being the least bent-out-of-shape thing about me :) That should also explain why Vincent's my God.
2. This could've happened on any day like today, except I have a cold. It makes me sound so very good inside my head like it does for Phoebe from F.R.I.E.N.D.S in that particular episode.
3. This other blog has a podcast for its latest post; something that I've for a while been wanting to try. (If you really have to read this other blog, I recommend about 5-6 posts starting about 10 older than the latest. The ones before and after are no match.)

And so, I decided to drop everything at hand that's important and record a little gig for my own amusement. But then, you'll hear me out, won't you?

Parental discretion advised!

And here's the ORIGINAL if you'd like to grade my work. :)

Of Incremental Compromises and Happiness

I for one, ain't the type who'd haggle over the arm-rests at a cinema. Several times that I've been (much to my amusement) judged submissive, while I know better as I don't take 'every little thing' as a judge of 'the whole big thing'. I truly believe that bile and bromide aren't the opposites of each other. Just two simple and very different things. And that neither of them describes me.

But then it comes! One super rare weekend with a lot fewer exciting things than usual and I feel like the monkey who's dropped one too many bananas. Does it really work that way? That incremental compromises add up into one grand sum to ruin your happiness in total? Naah... I just know that monkeys when hungry, have poor memory of all the trouble saved in not picking those bananas that'd have slipped anyways. They're happy in time for the next catch :).

And from what I know of them, they love listening to the guitar that goes with:

It’s a restless hungry feeling
That don’t mean no one no good
When ev’rything I’m a-sayin’
You can say it just as good.
You’re right from your side
I’m right from mine
We’re both just one too many mornings
An’ a thousand miles behind
- Bob Dylan, One too many mornings

My Books

My reading list.. and my personal rating.

16.Oct.2010	****	One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Márquez
24.Jul.2010	****	Purple Cow - Seth Godin
05.Jul.2010	****	Descent Into Chaos - Ahmed Rashid
13.Jun.2010	****	Behind the Cloud - Marc Benioff
27.May.2010	*****	Inspite of the Gods - Edward Luce
12.May.2010	**	The Museum of Innocence - Orhan Pamuk
20.Apr.2010	****	The Black Swan - Nicholas Nassim Taleb

My Songs

I've a weakness for songs that take me away, to distant happy places. Sometimes slow, sometimes full of energy! The words mostly have MY very own meanings :)

(18.Dec.2010) Four Seasons In One Day - Crowded House
(18.Dec.2010) Wicked Game - Chris Isaak
(03.Nov.2010) Jumper - Third Eye Blind
(26.Oct.2010) These Are The Days - Van Morrison
(27.Sep.2010) I'm too Sexy - Right Said Fred
(15.Sep.2010) Good Feeling, Won't You Stay With Me? - Violent Femmes
(11.Jul.2010) True to Myself - Ziggy Marley
(04.Jul.2010) Untitled - Interpol
(20.Jun.2010) Singing in the Rain - Gene Kelly
(16.Jun.2010) I Can See Clearly Now^## - Jimmy Cliff
## This one's a close contender :)
(15.Jun.2010) I'm the Hoochie Coochie Man^# - Muddy Waters
# This is my personal anthem!
(14.Jun.2010) Tell It As It Is - Aaron Neville
(13.Jun.2010) For Sentimental Reasons - Nat King Cole
(07.Jun.2010) One Too Many Mornings - Bob Dylan
(04.Jun.2010) Did You Ever Have to Finally Decide? - Lovin' Spoonful
(02.Jun.2010) Maria Maria - Carlos Santana
(25.May.2010) What a Wonderful World - Sam Cooke
(24.May.2010) For What It's Worth - Buffalo Springfield
(23.May.2010) Goodbye My Friend - Karla Bonoff
(21.May.2010) No Stress - Laurent Wolf
(17.May.2010) Nowhere to Go, Nowhere to Be - Kenny Chesney
(17.May.2010) That Lucky Old Sun - Kenny Chesney
(07.May.2010) The Weary Kind - Ryan Bingham
(28.Apr.2010) I've Got Sunshine - Otis Redding
(02.Apr.2010) I Gotta Feeling - Black Eyed Peas
(15.Feb.2010) If You'll Hold the Ladder - Robert Duvall

I.N.S.O.M.N.I.A

"It couldn't be better!" used to be my answer. Always. The slide from there to coffee spills on my shirts (even the not so fav ones!) evoking a "Can't anything go right, anymore?!" whimper has been painfully slow but certain and without respite. It is nearing a year now and worse since I am without a reason I can put my finger on. But then, mountaineer Boukreev says and I quote -

To cite a specific reason is to claim an omniscience only gods, drunks, politicians and abstract writers can make.

So, if the puzzle were for me to match cause and effect on the left with reasons and depressed insomnia on the right, I'd never be able to crack it. I guess every sailor's got to go under the weather once a while.

There's something in the quiet dignity of those scenes from the movies where if I'm sad, I'd be having my back to the world while there's some soulful guitar strumming in the background as I watch the ripples on the lake sitting on a park bench. That isn't the scene that's playing!

Then there's the hilarious-when-you-look-back if I were to spend days filled with gaffes. Like falling off bar stools, coming under the path-of-drop of bird poops, braying along a popular slow song until the neighbors knock or losing the wallet to a transvestite hooker... Get the idea? But nope, this isn't playing out that well or I'm not looking-back enough yet :p

Mine's more like that adventurer lost on an endless desert with vultures hovering above. Too many things in life demanding my best (okay, my most) and punishingly so. Like there's no escape. Even stopping for a moment's the same as giving up. Well, I'm staring to cut quite a sorry figure, ain't I? Then, let's get to what's changed, and quick!

Usually, if I were to be jolted out of a dream in which I'd almost convinced Katrina Kaif and Winona Ryder (yes, both!) that playing hard-to-get isn't what'd work best with me, I'd be mad as a rabid dog. But I guess I am not that when it is Led Zep singing

And a new day will dawn
For those who stand long
And the forests will
Echo with laughter

I'm not quite back to "It couldn't be better!" but from a "Can't anything go right, anymore?!", post one brief restless slumbering on a chair in the balcony, I've hopped back to a "It could be worse.". And now, zzzzzzz....

Love's like that.

Yes, the idea for the title's borrowed from RD's "Life's like that" column.

A pal tells me that having a personal blog and not writing about Love isn't done! Here's my attempt, the best I could make, hate it as you will :-)

From what I observe all around (shrewdly, if I may proudly add :p), Love's a little like those Tele-Shopping gigs.

The models are pretty,
The presenters are witty.

Things work until they're dry,
Right from the very first try.

You reach your happy ending,
Never having to need a mending.

So that makes it almost like putting the meat of your ego on a fancy light-weight, easy-clean, energy-saving, long-lasting, space-saving, environment-friendly, flavor-retaining, electric, garden, BBQ-grill!!! Yes, from the very same mail-order commercial :p. A golden-brown, crisp-shelled, juicy inside type of a sausage is only one of the superb variety of outcomes. All of `em very messy barring just the elusive one, which you'll realize as you tear your hair and yell, "THIS IS NOT WHAT I ORDERED!" :)). That makes you hate romantic movies, until such time when you admit to being a secret, inveterate fan ;-). Also makes you wonder why they won't make movies that are as messy and complicated as real-life, ain't it?

Fancy having caught exactly three such superbly well made dramas on love. All in the same month! I'd say give them a watch, sometime you can.

1. Playing by Heart - Eleven articulate people work through affairs of the heart.
2. Closer - If you believe in love at first sight, you never stop looking.
3. Little Children - Lives intersect as they struggle to resist their vulnerabilities and temptations.

Yes, yes, I should admit that I could just as well have said - "Watch these three brilliant movies to see love from different perspectives", in stead of the annoying opening paragraphs and a stupid poem. But do tell me...

how else could I have shown-off the rhymes?

What's getting warmer, again?

Global warming's something that I don't so much disagree with as much as I am skeptical about. Correlation's too weak to explain it all, if you ask me. Well, my skepticism can have a post of its own, but I can't make it read funny. So, this one's really about attributing a pattern to hypes. So you'll have your own guide to know when to run; right before the Shit hits the fan!

If I had to propose a theory, I'd say the stages progress like this -

At first, those dumb weeklies (or the center-spread tit-bits of tabloids) make a mention or two before the very last page.

Then, the kids in high-school forever looking for cooler things to add to their identities acquire card-carrying allegiances. Or is it more like signing up for groups on FB, these days?

Then, some politician incapable of effecting any change'll cover it in his speech to sound intelligent and global. (Do you really need examples, here? I bet just about anybody from the EU shall do!)

A little later, there's a James Bond movie with this new thing as its theme, (you're excused if you don't remember Quantum of Solace.)

And then, the next-rated action flick tries a me-too, (Yes, I'm guilty of watching Transporter III one lazy afternoon).

And finally, your next date mentions it, just to sound intelligent. (Feeling lazier than ever? Watch Dare to Date on Channel V, it IS hilarious!)

You really wish your Sunday magazines would lighten you up with nice cartoons but those aren't working for you. Your only option mid-air is a semi-respectable daily's literary section to encounter this dumbest interviewer ever! Read this -

"The Museum.. is a love story. When all around you, there is war, recession, poverty, and terrorism, not to mention climate change threatening the planet, how can you possibly sit down to write a love story?"

Gosh! If that sounds stupid enough, the author being questioned is the acclaimed Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk!!! That can shake you off your seat and send you rolling on the floor laughing! Happened to me.

The point is, the nut-heads have successfully turned the problem on its head. From being our responsibility towards caring for the planet (And those who still think of it as such can't imagine the fight!) into a scarce-resource allocation problem on how much CO₂ can each nation emit until a certain date. Now argue all you want, this is a Cake Cutting Problem; and I'd say it with certainty that it will not find a solution anytime soon. A just solution isn't simply single-valued.

So if you ask me; I'd say, before someone turns that fan on... Run for cover!

THIS is what happened on Valentine's day..

This Valentine's day was different. I mean, REAL different. There was no year when any chocolates or flowers or heart-shaped balloons were exchanged, so that wasn't any different. But then, there were years where inflatable-sheep were received as gifts which weren't this year; so that's ONE difference. But that isn't what I'm talking about, but of all the special attention I got and you'll know where my blog gets its name from!

Mr. & Mrs. Tashan!
If you've ever seen a monkey play on a piano, tell him of me and he'll be shamed! And if it were a kid with his new toy, I'd shame him too around a piano! And to talk of a really incredibly expensive synthesizer and so very dear to you Tashan-bhai, and which you loaned me nevertheless while you break new ground oceans away... I'm so damn grateful! All because you care... "Thanks" is grossly insufficient! I am going to miss you two every one of those late evenings of mine that you've enriched! (Yeah, the same ones when my neighbors will be cursing.. )

Azeez dost mere..
So many firsts this Valentine run-up week, all thanks to you buddy! I mean.. THAAAAANKS! Do you even know how it feels when someone writes you a poem? Try multiplying that a zillion times over, when it not just for you, but on you!! That is one hell of a gift there!

Call yourself a grown-up all you want but I'll still want to pinch those cheeks! And try fighting your best with me but I bet you're still not going to get off my hook, ever! Comprende?

Dear Lotus, my name is Mud!
Even when it is only a witty joke and you know it too well, if an "I Love You" were the first ever thing you said to a total stranger, it still'd be something! And if that weren't good, try getting a "I Love YOU!" for a ready reply!! All because tomorrow's Valentine's? Heady!! A man's got to get his wiring checked real hard if that didn't feel a little too good for a minute on the least. Me? I felt good all day ;-). Thanks dear Lotus that you gave me that day before you broke to me your age! Your age sounds like an oxymoron! (and me? a plain moron.) I know.. I know.. you can drive, you can get drunk and you can elope if you wanted to. But just about! I blame YOU there...!! How could you be SO very smart, mature and write things about a sibling about as much younger to you as you are to me; and tag it as "parenting"!! When I signed up for your Waat Lagao, Sabki Bajao mission; you never told me that the joke's on me!

Meri toh bajj gayi!!

This one's for you Buddy Joey!!

The conversation on the phone...

Me: So how're YOU Joey!
Joey: umm...errr.. I don't know.
Me: I know.

Now Joey's the type who's got a head that throws out thoughts faster than what his vocal chords can handle.. The gesturing, groping for the right words type. But mostly it feels like we communicate perfectly alright!! (though hardly agreeing on everything.. but then, isn't disagreeing communicating?) When he says he doesn't know; he doesn't just not know.. but also doesn't know that he doesn't know.. and when I say "I know..", I also know that he doesn't know that he doesn't know...

I'm sure not drunk today, but heck I feel just as high. Exactly what I'd have asked for after a grueling day at work :-). Thanks for the little chat Joey!

So what if we make an utterly unintelligible exchange at times,

Joey: So how's work?
Me: You know how all of us look for something to blame for the lack of a personal life? My work fits exactly!!
Joey: And how's studies?
Me: Well, it's supposed to BE. And how's your work?
Joey: Well.. you know...
Me: Like what?
Joey: Err.. things are a.... little quiet..
Me: As in? What's everybody up to?
Joey: Err.. busy.. just busy doing something on something they don't usually like doing.
Me: Business as usual then!

Thank all sweet things for the Omnipresent Jack Daniel's! Mine's snug in the cabinet, while's yours's waiting! Go grab it!

Cheers Joey!!

Why Prince Charming Stayed Single...

My dad's a funny guy. After trying the nagging trick with me for a while, he moved to his famous quoting of "I'd be happy even if you married a lamp post!". And when that met with a guffaw, he just had to give up :-). And now that I've to face endless poking in the ribs by bed ridden grannies, arthritic aunts, retired uncles and the odd please-yous; he's even given in to a little sympathy towards me :-) Mostly for my patient hearing and my unbroken smirk!! So the exchange has lately changed to a very knowing, very understanding, very sympathetic, repeatedly enacted scene like this:

Dad (Raising of eye brows): -
Me (Smile + Side-ward movement of the head): -
Dad (Shoulder shrug): -


And then the channel on the TV flicks. Thank God for the interesting ads!!! For without them, the awkward air'd grow thick like the Knorr soup leftover in the bowl lying in the kitchen sink unwashed for 3 days. And'd stink worse!

But on my last visit, the big man had devised a little tactical questioning. Having asked me to join him on a walk, he dropped a line from no where and I had no idea how to react to it! "You know, when I was very young and whenever I'd be depressed and feel lonely; I'd lock myself in a room and dance my own thing to the music until I was all sweaty.". A full two minutes later, he knew I was still mulling my reaction so for the sake of everything we both hold very dear, he attempted a little more direct a question, "So what's your thing when you're depressed?" Wow, what a relief. I made the sheepish admission that I could make the fixtures in my car vibrate with my singing along with the radio! To quote William James, We do not sing because we are happy, we are happy because we sing. And for his amusement, I narrated the anecdote from last week when a girl in the car behind me got exasperated with the time it took to get my attention (and then my lane... :p) that the first thing she did after getting her way was to give me the finger! If dad's face had fingers, I would've seen him twiddling them all with impatience, he he. "What about anyone you might have.. you know, developed a liking for?". I had to remind him I wasn't beyond the particular human emotion we were both referring to (ahem.. relief!), and then again of the dog we had and how he chased his tail at times.... (ahem.. relief no more!) If he ever did catch it, he'd but look all silly on his own!! I couldn't quite make out what dad meant by his blank stare.. Only that it was definitely the moment when we turned back towards home :))

I imagine that must be the look if Bill Watterson had drawn the rest of the strip, where Calvin's dad mocks a story on "Why Prince Charming stayed single" to which his mom retorts: Prince WHAAAT?!

What'd I ever do without C&H!

Calvin: Well, it's a new year.

And I'd say the first 10 hours haven't been up to snuff.

Hobbes: Did you make any new year's resolutions?

Calvin: You bet! I resolved to quit hiding my feelings so much! From now on, the world's gonna know exactly what I think of it!

Hobbes: Yes, you've certainly been the model of self-restraint and under-statement up until now.

Calvin: Well, no more.

...

And I've also resolved not to put up with sarcastic tigers.

Hobbes: If I see any, I'll tell them!

My Only Regrets.

Sitting by the open window on a bus with the wind in my hair and the crispy sun on me, oh such a nice picture. But it is the map in my hands, the places-to-go on my mind and the stops that I make that give me a purpose to it all. With all that lucky feeling inside, I've very nearly no regrets in life so far. But the few that I write below must be the only ones, but I like them. They're the stops I missed while I fell into a slumber and keep reminding me to sit up, keep my wits ever so sharp and watch out for exciting turns!

I regret outgrowing a few things. Dad used to ride a motorbike well until I was in school so I could ride on it seated behind him. And I loved it that I could smell his hair. In all those frightening moments, I could hug him like I'd hug a never-to-budge-rock that he is. While he watched news on TV with all seriousness, I could sit beside him and note all those features on his hands until he'd affectionately yell - "What're you doing?". That I could be endlessly lazy around my mum. Hide behind her, wrapped in the free end of her saree to feel safe. The love of one's parents is the one absolute version of it and I feel full of regret to have outgrown it. To the point that I perhaps don't need it any more. What a pity, indeed. But then, perhaps it isn't meant to be drawn out of for ever, nor returned. May be meant to be passed on. I think I am going to spoil my nephew :-).

Dad had a house with a huge garden. We had T, the four legged, tail wagging fur ball of an angel. Brother and I took turns in chasing him or being chased by him, and in walking him, bathing him and taking endless pictures of him in myriad poses :-). Mum did the part of feeding him and driving him to the regular visits to the vet's. All dad had to do was put his feet up on the coffee table, slouch on his couch reading the newspaper and have the obedient fur buddy sit beside admiring him! And I wanted to be my dad then! Wonder if kings had it any better :p. I have this unshakable perception that families with pets signify a certain abundance. You have enough affection to share it everyone else and some more to shower on other precious creatures. And to now have a life with long work hours, uncertainty as a built-in and travel as an inevitable feature; I hopelessly, very deeply regret not being able to have a pet. A real man's real pet of a dog. I hope I succeed in digging my tent deep enough some day and be able to do it.

The other last regret is also the much bigger version of the tiny little bit of jealousy I feel towards all those people who have serious hobbies that they've nurtured for all their lives. Some of my friends can play music, some paint, some do sports and some create endless nice things from nothing. I see such serious indulgence in things of interest to be one additional layer to one's personality that I so regret not having. Probably the last of the layers when one's denuded of all others; the one that lets you gracefully and self-assuredly use your time even when everything else is a little dud. I hope reading counts :p! And then, perhaps I should grow Bonsai :-)

See how nice it is to have regrets and also the remedies to it? :-).

Spooky

We must fall back upon the old axiom that when all other contingencies fail, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. - Sherlock Holmes, in The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans.

This must be how ghosts were born. When you can't explain some strange phenomenon; the para normal's like the wild card that'll always fit. Well I'm not the one to believe in any of it but that's not to say I haven't had those spooky moments.

I remember this one night when I was reading a particularly boring book in bed only to be shaken awake to a sudden rap of a noise. At once so loud and reverberating so hard that it startled me. I knew distinctly that it came from within the house but I couldn't find out the source! I'm alone in the house and the doors are locked alright. Windows are closed too, that being a cold December night. I just couldn't go to sleep until I'd found the source of the noise until I was out of my mind trying every possibility I could think of - dropping a book from the edge of the bookshelf, dropping the pen stand from the table, tumbling down a pot from the kitchen platform, pulling down the broom stick standing in the closet corner to a fall, what not! I remember it must be the end of the third hour that I finally discovered the source. You see, I have the habit of leaving the toilet seat up (yes yes.. yet another of the luxuries of being single :p) and the seat hinge is taut enough that I must've left the seat rightly in balance that it could fall back and land on the tank with a thud or fall over the toilet with a rap. Ummmm... I don't remember having more contented a sleep than the one that followed the discovery :-).

But this one experience totally takes the cake!! It was during those late hours you put in on the night before the big project submission at college, most of it spent arguing with your mates on who's to be blamed for the fiasco; until you're all droopy and slog over the very little can be done. Three of us in a apartment on the top floor of a high rise apartment with the door to the balcony open and nearly all of the town outside fast asleep. There was this sudden fluttering noise coming from the balcony that we just couldn't ignore anymore. We had to find out! The eeriest part of it was that the fluttering would stop the moment we went out to the balcony. Step In - flutter - peek out - queer silence. Step In - flutter - peek out - queer silence. Step In - flutter - peek out - queer silence. We tried all combination - close the door, toggle the lights, hush-up, rake up noise, and then try all of them in various other combination. None could either completely stop or expose the source of the noise. We must have been at our wits end when we finally decided to move all of the pile of boxes heavy with trash and lying in the balcony since Ghenghis Khan invaded India. And voila!!!!! Ooooout flew a pigeon when there were the last few boxes left. The fluttering was so erratic and inexplicable, that it totally slipped out of our senses that it could be some living creature. You just wouldn't think of it when all of the balcony is gated with a grill with barely a fist sized object that could pass through it. We must have been scared sweaty for a few hours right until the minute after which we were again sweating out our convulsive giggles and the rolling on the floor and debating who was more chicken. The project was a dud show but what a night!!!. We created the stuff for the reunions to come in place of reports that gather dust any which ways :-).

Watching 1408 late the other night, I was reminded of all those spooky-funny moments in life. What a promising start for a scary movie, for once almost make me look under the bed for monsters and check the front door :p But alas, the promises weren't kept for the entire length of the movie. But so long as you have such rich memories to bring on, you've still got those goose pimples!

Life is but a juggle..

I had a lot of balls in the air when this happened to me. Endless things I wanted to do in life, endless ones that I didn't want to do at work and endless ones that I couldn't do at the MBA. And then I dropped them. It caught up exactly like an itch-in-the-crotch would on a busy corridor at work. Seemingly innocuous to begin with, but shooting up to suck all of my attentions in no time. Without a reason, a rhyme, a cause, an inspiration or a damned warning!! It is that moment when in a single minded pursuit you find a near-empty elevator and not care about which way it's going and then hold your breath until it's empty. It is right after this involuntary, ignominious adventure do you realize that you don't even faintly remember what you were upto before. It then takes a conscious effort to get back your life. It is precisely in such a state that I began to juggle, so I could redirect my attention to something worth holding it; nay innocent.

Forget to catch, remember to throw.

The very first hurdle's this. Every juggler has faced this without fail. The fear of not being able to catch is so overwhelming, that one hesitates to release the next ball. Catching being more natural a reflex (and perhaps comes with more importance attached) to all of us, you end up catching the ball always! Funny that you'll ever so often break out of the rhythm not because you dropped, but because you never released the next one. It takes grit and self-assurance to keep sending those balls up in the air. But once you've jumped over the hurdle, you'll see how effortless it is...

Look beyond.

Being party to a situation is always judgement-clouding. It is sort of the Heisenberg Uncertainity Principle where the very act of measuring changes the quantity measured. Especially in a sensorially overwhelming act of keeping a watch on the balls flying about. It always helps to let your hands do the work. Your eyes can never keep pace. You watch, you lose. You look beyond and you shall thrive!

Think placement.

There comes this ahoy-moment, that clearly marks the coming of age of a juggler. And you can quickly graduate to any number of balls from there on. It is the art of placement that every expert juggler can relate to. All you have to think of, is not in terms of throwing and catching. You are self-assured enough that the hand-time-window that is supposed to throw and to catch will do exactly that. Your mind has just one thing left to think about, of Placing the ball in the right Order such as the one that everything in a system has. You can be sure the rest of the act works like you were an automaton.

If juggling were easy, they'd call it napping. It takes investment. But the gain is an amazingly beautiful reward - the pride in the way you spent yourself.

And it may just make for an interesting act in a party!


Since posting
Learning to Juggle can Change Your Brain

Single, Man, Homemaker.

You can take a man out of an MBA but not an MBA out of a man... He’s only learnt his 3Cs (for the uninitiated, there are no ABCs) in marketing and now a trip along the departmental store aisle can compare with the other things that he calls a pleasure ;-).. Being a man and buying things that are targeted only at women can be tricky to say the least. And I’m not even talking tampons here! Simple necessities like soaps. Can you tell me of one soap that’s advertised as a man’s soap? It’s always a kids’ soap, a beauty bar or those rare times when it is a piece of medication. If at all men do appear in an ad frothing one, it is usually a family bar. So I’m forced to feel like any one of them depending on what the store stocks.. The same holds true for ready-to-cooks or heat-and-eats (whoever thought working women are their only clientele), chakki-ground-atta, the vendor with his vegetable cart, so on and on..

And along side of all this, while the other day I interview this lady for some house-keeping help, she is super suspicious to work for a household with a single man!! And for all you know it is the Shineys of the world with a wife and a kid who go forcing themselves on their maids.. Poor single men are really just hapless meek creatures, take my word for it. The really desperate ones among them may try hitting on the maid, but that’s about it J. If she can deal with dirt, she can deal with this type with even more ease :p

The most miserable is when you invite a charming company over for a home-cooked lunch; and you get a motherly “don’t fret about the place.. i’ve an idea of bachelor places and i’ll be all right. really.” – some words of pity it sounds like to me. Not a grain of expectation of a decent dwelling, ladies?? I sometimes feel discriminated against.. If pretty soon women can have babies without men (thanks to the bloody science), I feel a sinister pleasure in breaking it to women that men can run a home without a woman!

This worst insult is for last.. I intend to get myself a dog and consider it only prudent to check with my friends for their canine tolerance levels so that he’ll have a place to live when I am out of town or something... And all I get every single time is a – “A dog? You? Poor dog... Don’t do it, please!” advice. Uff!! Am I incapable of taking care of a pet? Is it unimaginable that I can stock dog food (yum, it happens to the craziest thing I’ve eaten so far) even if I go hungry? Really world, stop doing this to us.

But then, there are these good days too.. It was this weekend evening when a professional acquaintance had stopped over to have a word and tagged to him was his 5 year old. The girl kept pestering daddy for a bag of popcorn, when I swooped in and offered to make some for her. Thanks to ACT-II sachets, I had a bowl cracked up in 2 minutes, when the tiny mouth below two very large eyes lovingly bellowed – “Just like mom does it!”. He..he.. I’ve put my clothes on in the right order, but it didn’t stop me from feeling a little like her superman from the comics :p

So I guess I don’t care anymore if the rest of you continue to think that a single, man, homemaker - such a thing doesn’t exist!

Boom Boom Pow...

Most probably, of our decisions to do something positive, the full consequences of which will be drawn out over many days to come, can only be taken as a result of animal spirits – of a spontaneous urge to action rather than inaction, and not as the outcome of a weighted average of quantitative benefits multiplied by quantitative probabilities. Enterprise only pretends itself to be mainly actuated by the statements in its own prospectus... Thus if the animal spirits are dimmed and the spontaneous optimism falters, leaving us to depend on nothing but a mathematical expectation, enterprise will fade and die...

John Keynes, The General Theory.

 How would one feel when the newsbit reads – “Lamborghinis now selling in India?”. Makes one wonder what anyone can do with it on the crowded Indian roads, doesn’t it? My sentiments exactly. I cannot but find it an insult over the way I spent the last 3.5yrs shaping my career, if I did at all. I think I let others’ incompetence plunder it big time. But the guts to call it quits yesterday, came as involuntarily and effortlessly as a hiccup. Funny that not having figured out the next steps in even their vaguest detail (oxymoron?) isn’t bothering me anymore than a hiccup would. It’s just that when you’re out in the sea, you can’t wait for the right wind but have to unfurl your sail all the same. In me, I trust.

No surprise I find this song energizing...

Dear Auntie..

 (an open letter to my favorite apple-chomping agony-aunt who is oceans away studying something she's already smarter than...)

there've been so many agonies in life of late that it feels superb to hear from my favorite agony aunt!

atta girl, glad to learn of your accomplishments at studies. i've barely managed to survive a yr myself :-) but its at work that my studies have become a pain in the wrong place. see, today's a friday and after a yr i've got a well deserved break and dumb enough i'm at work. but for the life of me, i can't take it that not a single person who walks-in to office to spot me misses to express that - 'what the hell are you doing here?' look. dear aunt, never before in my life did i feel so unwanted... sniff.

that apart, i'm fast gaining a reputation as mr.clumsy. now who the hell would realize that when you connect to your system from a meeting; the net meeting client would grab & play out-loud the song you were listening on your comp. and ain't it natural that when you get up from your place & trip on the head phones disconnecting it; the song plays out loud in an otherwise quiet lab. things that could happen to anyone you'll see... but if you remember the SAD songs i listen to; you'll know how important keeping it private is.. sniff.

oh yeah.. what reduces in volume has to increase in intensity. so i'll say about my PJs... if only people understood what is a sophisticated sense of macabre humor would they realize how much ahead of the not-yet-ready-world that i am.... sniff.

i miss your couselling so bad that i chased an auto the other day for 7 kms only coz of what i saw from behind it - a feminine hand dropping a chomped-off apple out of the door!! sniff.. sniff..

It's the third year...

Hmm.. I don't know what'd make a guy for sure a weirdo.. Can YOU tell?? lets try.. a guy who doesn't use a cell phone may be?? Oh no!! That's be me then!!! Plus this'd be the third year since I am one!!!

This puts me in a curious light some times; makes me a butt of jokes at other times. aaaand.... insensitive if the ones who love me are right. well then, why would I do it? i wouldn't want to get arguing that not having a cell phone's better than having one since i get to do that often enough. instead, i'd say not having a cell phone is exactly what suits me.

i happen to like it when i'm not available when i don't want to be.. especially when even not answering the phone's a message. would like to make and keep appointments over calling up enroute. would like to wait for and hug the loved one in relief rather than check on her when she's late. i like keeping the distraction away when i work or study. when there're bombs going out in the cities; i would rather breathe anxious inside until i know someone i love is safe than be paranoid until i an actually hear the voice. a million other things actually .. funny that not having a phone is not actually a problem at all. definitely not a tenth as much to me as it is to the person who's trying to reach me. in short; i just refuse to be rushed through life; and refuse to pay the cost of someone else being in a hurry.

but this situation does have its amusing momemts. imagine running into after 3 years, that junior from college who could make you go weak in the knees and not having a number to exchange. and the turn in your stomach when she asks back if its because you don't want her to call you!! imagine having to deal with an airticket booking portal that is dumb enough to mark a cell phone field as mandatory. the credit card support sweet voice that calls up on your home number every other month to make sure if her records are right in missing the number. and every other moment when you have to make a tiny little effort to straighten your back when the other guy pulls out his phone, and asks - "so what's the number?"

i am not sure how long i can be assertive enough with my life.. in dealing with all the men and women who think they HAVE to reach me when want to. but i do hope i could have as much of this unhurried sail as i can..

coming to an argument if i have to; the other day this friend thought i was so out of times when i pointed if there was no life before cell phones that he shot back - what's your point?? wasn't there life before men wore any clothes?

but then, i actually think it would not be that bad of an idea if this were the third year

since when fig leaves were back in fashion!!

 

Charging, do not disconnect...

the city's been colder this week compared to several weeks before. its darker until later, and the days are wetter. i've been trying to wake up at a respectable 6am for the past one week but without success. but call it a day; i was showered, shaved and in my work shoes at 0530 today. so lets make it a fine day.

if not the grander plan coming in the way of the day's tasks its just has to be the exact opposite. but with the early bird getting the worm, today just had give me a wonderful lead i've been looking for over myself. and the day begins..

genuiness is the most deficient quality in one-on-ones. but with a lot pushed out; some does rub on the people around. if a fine malt tastes great on its way in, trust me, it smells just as heavenly on the breath's way out.

lunch was unsually bright. i ended up being the only man at the table with six occupants.. this happening all too often, must find more about it :-). what ticked my brain is a witty comment - "humor is common sense rolling". take your time. think. taste and smell. its... simply... profound!!!!

and if such a fine mid-day break can't open your mind, Jehangir Pocha in the BW editorial wrote what sums it all up about it when one had all doors of the mind closed - "When what you have is a hammer, everything seems like a nail". Man!!! is the world suddenly on a roll or what!?!

getting back home early; i decided that it just has to be the day i take the Gallup's test. not sure how far i am on the "responsibility, strategic, futuristic, significance, input" package running one lifetime, but the beginning's sure very exciting :-).

hmm.. reading was just too slow an activity to hold my wander lusty mind in place; so a movie seemed just like what should be played before i retire this day. only; i ended up choosing a movie with a dialog that left me ever more lusty - "only pigs sweat; men perspire".

there are days when you relish the feeling of being unplugged. and then there are days your very existence throbs with a feeling of being firmly plugged.

and for crying out loud; its all in a day!!!.