'Over the moon' list.

Being in Madras is turning out to be very convenient so far – wish I could go on living like this. Khair..since we have introduced MC in this blog, I don’t mind ‘documenting’ more stuff.

So here are some strange and random facts about MC that makes me love him to bits (in random order, of course!):

1. has no tact whatsoever – in dealing with people in general (can’t really say why this is endearing but it is)
2. his poetry is my Achilles heel
3. has the most amazing collection of books (not just in numbers but in substance too) – is slightly snobby about it – but then… :-P
4. is comics/cartoon freak
5. takes more time to bathe than most women I know (again, not sure why this is nice. Maybe, because I seem to enjoy teasing him about it endlessly)
6. has OCD (checks car locks like crazy)
7. has the cleanest hands and feet I have ever seen on a man at all times – WITHOUT pedicure/manicure (probably has something to do with #5.)
8. smells good WITH or WITHOUT deodorants (#5 again?)
9. doodles completely original and funny cartoons
10. is not fussy about food
11. doesn’t snore
12. cannot fake a single emotion
13. can make un-color-coordinated clothes also look cool
14. has the coolest design sensibilities
15. randomly mimics voices of inanimate objects - (phishhhhshheewww!) :D
    

16. Hates public display/confession of love- so, God forbid he reads this!! :-\

Till next time!

Love in the time of Swine Flu

It is time – to bring mr.write out of the closet (well, not completely) – so, for the purpose of this blog, he will be referred to as MC (no, not the Master of the Ceremony or err..the hindi bad word) – it stands for Mr.Coma. This comes from the fact that it is as hard to get a reaction out of him as it would be from a person who is in coma – very unimaginative, but who cares.

Ok, moving further from the naming ceremony, it is time to bring him out of the closet not because I am ready to “take the plunge” – “tie the knot” – and other such clichéd hints about getting married – I think it is time to put that part of the brain on to the blog because:
a) a considerably large size of the brain is occupied with him
b) since a very long time there is nothing worthy putting here from the other part of the brain

So…without further ado and background explanations (you figure it out!) -

I am quite excited to go stay with him for a week – which will be like a REAL “live in” for a change. Not just spending an odd weekend and then going back to our work schedules but going to work and coming back to each other. I cannot state in words how much that means to me. If my folks weren’t around and I did not have to show a calm exterior – someone would have to put me on Valium.

In preparation, I took off from work for the much needed trimming of my facial hair.
Then decided to go for a complete deforestation session (read waxing) and in the end also went in for a VERY rare manicure and pedicure. Ladies and gentlemen, the flip side of having younger men as boyfriends – no amount of prepping can prep up the sagging confidence (you are most welcome to read between the lines!)

Also, started to pack 2 days in advance – this again is rare – because the attention with which I pack stuff is directly proportionate to the interest in the place I am going/ people I would meet there. Mostly, I push it till the 11th hour, then throw in clothes randomly, forgetting to carry the matching dupattas/churidaars. Forgetting to carry my toothbrush and enough pairs of undergarments is by far the most frequent.

But not this time – everything is neatly folded and packed. Not only that, I have also been ‘ironing’ clothes this time before I pack – IRONING! This is almost equivalent to insanity in my world – since I am going to a house where there will be an iron and I can easily skip it.

I have completely ignored the Swine Flu threat and will be going ‘unmasked’ to the airport. I am sure all the oxytoxins are toxic enough to kill the virus. (Please note the hopeless optimism!)

Sadly, MC lives up to his name and shows very little signs of enthusiasm/inclination/invitation.
This has quite pissed me off and I want to cry a bit but I also know that this will all vanish at the very sight of him after almost 3 months.

:-D – Yes, MUSH all the way – but it is nice – the warm-gooey feeling!

Till next time – from Madras land :-D....

The "Baaghbaan" post

Today, as I was sorting out another squabble between my parents, I realised – they are turning into siblings. Which makes me terribly angry at times but mostly mellow with a strange happy-sad emotion.

Maybe, because I have started to think of my parents’ marriage as how marriages should be – and how all couples should be.

I think they survived 35 years of marriage and are still going strong because:

• they TALK……………about all the things their lives touched or touches
• they argue ……but decide to make up within 24 hours without bothering who will make the first move to apologise
• they never force their religious beliefs on each other
• they respect each others intelligence by flaunting each other’s talents
• they keep the money-discussions very transparent; till the last penny!
• they show their affection without any restraint – a tight hug and kiss has been the accepted greeting
• they keep the humour going – even after a fight
• they are each other’s support at all times

(and in retrospect…)

• they changed themselves for each other
• they decided they will take off for a vacation once a year – money or no money
• they accepted each other’s parents with all their flaws – maybe not happily but never flinched either
• they accepted very early in life that in the end, it is each other who will matter to them - rest of the things/people will come and go

and of course, because:

• they belong to the ingenuous generation where phrases such as “women’s lib”, “I need my space”, or “quality time” “double income no kids” – were not yet born.
  
  

Miscellaneous

I accidentally opened my own blog and realised I haven’t blogged in 4 months! I have a lot to write about but when its all typed and edited, it reads like someone else’s life. And sometimes words fall short to express the whole range of emotions at various things/people and I scrap it all.

So, just to “get the groove back” – I will just rattle on and see if it works to remove the block. (bear with me)

I was reborn this January, as my divorce came through. Took me 3 years to wriggle out of the fake marriage. The divorce proceedings were quite a humiliating experience and I still get goose bumps when I think about the court scenes- more real than any realistic court movie scenes. I hope NO ONE has to go stand like a criminal in presence of strangers and give out personal details of their lives to a conservative unforgiving stranger (the judge) and see their parents get humiliated of not convincing their child enough to “save the marriage” because they are the parents of a girl in a “society that does not approve of divorces.”

I am not sure if it is another battle won or lost but the whole drama at home and in the court room was nightmarish and I am glad it is over.

So, although I have been reborn I still get run over and over by another truck full of emotions – so although I am supposed to feel all rejuvenated, I feel sort of all battered and bruised on the inside. There are bouts of balmy days (more like hours) but do not long last enough to heal the soul. Apparently, the masseur is really confused.

I tried adopting Buddhism in an attempt to find myself and just calm down a bit- but I realised I run away from any kind of “religious binding” just like some men I know who go into a coma at the mention (or sometimes even an implication) of the word “marriage”.

But I discovered, just like in a marriage, it works only when you walk in willingly and whole heartedly. So, I dumped Buddhism and moved on.

Therefore, the only routine-altering experience in the past 4 months I had was joining a fitness program like no other till date.

It is called Tough Love Fitness – read MPT’s (My Personal Trainer) blog here where he introduces me.

What is unbelievable is that just about when I was looking for some exciting out-of-the box fitness regime, I somehow bumped into MPT. The whole “ask and you shall receive” works for me, I guess.

If you bothered to check the above link, you will know that it’s an outdoorsy thing. So, my initial thought was, how difficult can it get without all the dreadful gym equipment? Just to realise that it is a bitch of a training – the muscles I never knew existed in my body were sore to core!! The soreness so sore that it took not a day or 2 but almost a week to heal. It is tough but in a way that you don’t feel like quitting rather challenging yourself more.

I would recommend it to all the people who hate gym’ming but want to be fit. Go to a park/beach near your house and rough it out.

On a more vanity’ish note, having a personal trainer is so totally cool. Makes you feel like a celebrity, almost. The constant attention and dedication for one hour only to get your body in shape is amazing. The good thing with MPT is that he is very comfortable to be with and puts a whole lot of fun in the workouts with his good humour and tons of encouragement with his frequent “Come’on Sharmaaaa, you can do it” and “that was good, Sharma, not bad for a smoker, eh?!”. It is almost mandatory for your trainer to be a fun person because otherwise without the gym mirrors to preen into or the music to pump your adrenalin, this can be the most boring workout ever. So, kudos to the mozzi bhai MPT.

Another good thing that came out of this – I got back to my long lost love – cycling :-)

Went to school for 6 years on a cycle and I know it more as a form of 'transport' than 'a sport', really – but it was so awesome to ride a bike almost after 15 years for a warm up . Hopefully, will have more of that in the coming weeks in the form of biking trips etc.

There is lot more to write but I am suddenly tired of altering between typing and scratching my feet and arms from all the mosquito bites and flailing arms to shoo away the blood sucker mother fuckers!

Till next ......SLAPP…**squishhhes a mosquito** - (Hallelujah!!) time!

Wass Happening....

Good things and bad, as usual

Goodies first:

 

Good-thing 1

Finally, I am back to reading…I realise I read more when I am busy as opposed to when I have all the time in the world.

 These days I am reading Murakami (AGAIN!). What I like about him is that he fucks up my head. To explain this a bit more: Other authors I read and on some pages, I go “hmm..nice” and on some “oh! so awesome”…then I put the book down and I forget....but Murakami stays in my head enough to mess up my dreams and haunt the shit out of me. He makes me believe that with all the real’ness of the world there is something surreal, which we pretend to ignore and justify with science and logic. The fact that he makes me believe this is enough for me to award him “my favourite writer’.

 

Fat cool!

 

The book I am reading currently (The wind-up bird chronicle) is about to end and I think I am going to have withdrawal symptoms for some time.

 

Good thing 2

Work is keeping me really busy and so I have no idea where the time flies – this is super good for me because the moment I am ‘un’busy, I am bored and sulky and cranky. I think I am sort of a workaholic but I am not really sure yet, because I don’t really jump with joy when I am immersed in work. It is just a good way to keep away from unnecessary emotions smothering the brain.

 

Good thing 3

Some windfall gains have made their way into my life in the times when the world is gloom’ing about money. I am ecstatic and almost about to faint with materialistic joy! I am not sure if I should be singing the money song on such a forum. So, shush…!

 

Good thing 4

…..?

 

(I guess there were only 3)

 

Moving on to the bad..

 

Bad thing 1

 

Because of “Good thing 2”, I am not able to continue my aerobics classes for almost a month and it makes me really unhappy and stresses me some more because it means going through the agony of the body-pains-of-a-fresher-at-the-gym once the workload at office comes down. It is terrible and I hate it.

 

Bad thing 2

 

Though it is not a recent development, but nevertheless a bad thing – the smoking – cannot seem to stop. The thing which makes it bad thing to worse thing is that I have always managed to stop when I wanted to but not this time. Every time I finish a pack, I try not to buy another…but then one fine weekly-grocery-shopping day, my feet automatically stop at the cigarette counter and all will-power goes to the dogs…damn!

 

Bad thing 3

 

I seem to be losing my cell phone more often than people lose their pens, and often enough to be the author of the book “How to lose your cell phone is 10 days”. Quite ridiculous!

 

In fact, more ridiculous is the fact that I just do not remember a single phone number from my fat phonebook list of 90 people. Not my parents’, not my sister’s….or anyone I claim to love deeply. I guess the brain needs some ‘defragmentation and disk clean up’ to accommodate more useful information.

 

Bad thing 4

 

Very shamefully, I confess that I can have “Maggi and kurkure” for 4 dinners at a stretch (maybe 5 or 6, if I hadn’t run out of 4-in-1 pack of Maggi on day 5). Combined with ‘Bad thing 1’ and “Bad thing 2”- this can result in quite a disastrous health scene and even more disastrous waistline.

 

Bad thing 5

 

Bad thing count always exceeds the good things count.

 

 

 

Till next time….

 

 

My Swing-0-meter also has “BLUE” in it…

Tears are welling up in the eyes at the slightest mention of emotion within 10 feet.

I just switched off the television – when Matt Damon tells Minnie Driver in Good Will Hunting that he doesn’t love her. Picked up a book and I stopped reading it at the paragraph where the protagonist is mourning his dead wife in the loveliest words ever written (or so they seem to me now.)

It’s not even close to PMS…so don’t know what can it be …menopause…? I read about it hitting some women sooner than it should…I guess internet is not such a good invention for the hypochondriacs.

Maybe, it’s the fear of dying alone…unnoticed. It is a recurring dream I’ve had for years. Seems to be an omen in these scary times.

Or, maybe, it is just being tired of entering an empty house that’s sitting quiet and morose like you left it when you come back tired from work… …day after day…month after month…years altogether now. When you are a “wannabe loner” instead of a "loner by nature", it does take a lot of time adjusting to a hollow routine.

Folks from home haven’t called up in three days. They think I like my ‘space’. But that is maybe because I made them believe so.

I could have called them too… but I don’t feel like listening to a sympathetic sentence or two about being brave. It annoys me.

I anyway don’t like to talk much on the phone…it makes me uncomfortable and shifty'ish, I don’t know why. I realise I have become quite weird lately.

Or, maybe, its just that I want to be fussed over once in a while.

I also just realised all of the above sounds like notes about me in my psychiatrist’s log (if I ever had one).

Do not feel like sleeping yet…so thought might as well jot this down. Anytime I write something (even as crappy as this)…and hit the "Publish Post" button, it feels like a burden off the chest. The sort of feeling you get when you finally unpack a long ignored packed luggage lying around from a vacation and tuck it back into the place where it belongs.

Revisiting

The boobs have deflated back to their normal self (I felt a sort of obligation to inform this because of the voracious commenting on the previous blog) Quite strange that this happened! My theory is that maybe God was giving me one last chance to feel young and voluptuous before it snatched away my glory of youth forever and I so disrespected his favour. He got really mad and did this.

Let me change the subject before I get anymore melodramatic about ‘aging’.

I do not feel up to this blog anymore. It takes a lot of effort to reconstruct the sentences in my head on to this pad.

But then again, today I just went through some of the older posts like this one ….. I guess this is the reason we all want to keep writing journals/diaries. So that we can read it after a few years and keep a record of how life has improved/degenerated and feel good about some things or mourn the loss of others.

So compared to then, this is me now:

• Wake up at 7 (or earlier)
• Sleepily cook breakfast and lunch
• Half heartedly get ready and leave by 8:15
• Grudgingly drive to work hurtling all possible abuses and then some more to find a good parking spot in the office basement.
• Work diligently
• No smoke breaks at work
• Reach home at 6:15 sharp
• Get ready for the aerobics class, get a new set of muscles aching every time
• Get back home – cook
• Eat in front of the TV
• Watch some mindless TV waiting for most awaited phone call of the day
• Sleep

And in between all these days, pay my bills and run around for groceries and wait for the “alternative weekends”, which carry me over through rest of the week.
Sounds like a good responsible single woman’s life.

But then, nothing can beat the careless days spent in the shadow of your ever-suspicious parents. Those are the best and will never be back.

About the connection between bigger boobs and opening the legs

Been a long while I blogged. But to my surprise, I see 20-something boys are my latest audience. So, this post is dedicated to you all (as the title would have taken care of!)

So, I turned 30 last week (sorry boys, but its true.)

Life looks just about the same…just that the boobs look bigger (there u go boys, paisa vasool!)

On the bigger boobs note, since yesterday and all days in recent past when I have worn snug tops, I have a new found respect for the D size women who have been there for a longer time.

Went to a nearby mall yesterday wearing a ‘clingy thingy’ and at various points of time, I wanted to dig a hole in the ground and bury myself in it. It is unbearable - the undiluted lecherous stare.

So, I guess I will have to stick to middle-aged women attire of kurtas/kurta like thingys till I get them boobs to look more like a part of my body than extraterrestrial object of desire which people can stare holes into.

So, to attain this next to impossible goal and ....ahem…also to get all other fat to melt…I joined aerobics classes in my new apartments. These classes are more sort of a hyperactive kitty party sessions than exercise. A few highlights:

• The instructor dresses in formal shoes, jeans and a full-sleeved shirt – I have no idea why, especially because his full time job is to teach aerobics and dance.
• Apart from straining your muscles, you have to precariously avoid stepping on children because most women get their 2-4 year old children in the class. It gets me pretty mad at times. To make matters worse a certain 3 year old girl comes and hugs my butts – and looks up to smile at me. I just smile back and have to politely wriggle out of the ‘butt-hug’ to continue – which completely throws me off track from the routine.
• The participants (read overweight mothers of 2-4 year olds) decide what and how much they want to work out instead of vice-versa. If the instructor tries to be a least bit pushy, they let shout at him. Then, the instructor apologises and continues with a less stressful exercise.
• We exercise with the AC on. Or the instructor gets an earful from ‘the madems’ as one of them pants and yells ‘oooh…its so hot. I am sweating so much’ to which I so want to yell back “WELL…THAT’S THE WHOLE POINT OF IT…YOU (fellow) FAT ASS!
• The instructions of the instructors sound either obscene or funny. Sample these:
  “Wopen your legs, madem” “More wopen, more wopen”
  “Lie down, wopen legs. Stay there oni, I will come.”
  “Do it pukka”
  (took me two weeks to figure 'pukka' means 'properly'!)
• Not to miss the music on which we do the aerobics:
  
  “Cant get you out of my head” – Kylie Minogue
  “Its raining men” – Geri Halliwell
  “Slave” – Britney Spears

ONLY these three and it has been almost 2 months. I think I will kill someone if I hear ‘Naa..naa..naaa..nnaa’ from ‘Cant get you out…’.

Despite all this, I hope I will achieve what I have set out for. … hopefully, I will succeed..ONE DAY! **Sigh**

Rare moozik related posht...

There are some songs which run all the way down your spine and then up again till you feel you are floating a few inches above the ground...and then linger in your head and play in a loop..loud and resounding..
Strawberry Swing it from the album Viva La Vida -by Coldplay does all of that and a bit more!
Lurve-ly :-)

Also 'lurvely' are the words:
"People moving all the time
Inside a perfectly straight line
Don't you wanna curve away?"

How do they know what I am thinking?

Coldplay, you get a warm and cozy hug for such a warm -fuzzy song of the year.

**A win-win Grinn**

Just in time for another one of the things to do before I turn 30…

• Buy my own car- Check
• Go to at least one part of Europe - Check
• Live on my own - Check
• Promotion + big paycheck- Check

Another one that was on the list is not listed here because it cannot be checked, as it is not possible ‘biologically’.

But I guess that has been taken care of some other way ;-)

:oB

Word of the day

(Please note that this is also the response for the anonymous comment on the previous post!)

bird-dog • \BURD-dog\
*1 : to watch closely
2 : to seek out : follow, detect


Usage – Hey you anonymous, stop bird-dogging my posts.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.


(ab bolo!...bolo ...bolo..) :-D

Blashfemmy - new season - Starting NOW...

Okay! I am trying to do something new with this blog … its an experiment and it might fail, so all the smug people (or ‘discrete’…whatever you like to call yourself!) do not smirk or bring this up in conversations (even jokingly!).

Here is some background:

I realise as I grow in my profession of rehashing content from one deplorable state to another that my writing skills are not as good as I would like them to be. Bad vocabulary is just one of the things…even when I talk…I am fumbling for words and I end up using ‘street language’ish language. (<- there…you have an example of the bad vocabulary). I don’t think it is acceptable to invent your own words in professional documents.

But quite contradictory to this fact is another fact about myself that I discovered recently. I love playing all the ‘word games’. I began with playing crossword with dad as a kid, but again, I am not even close to good at it. My knowledge about most of the subjects is always 2 decades behind the current time and on a lot of subjects doesn’t exist at all, so cryptic clues or no cryptic clues, I am always ‘clueless’.

In the pre-Google days, I would ceremoniously and optimistically sit with a pencil, eraser, sharpener (this is the optimistic part), and the crossword section of the newspaper. I would very confidently make a few words down and across, but soon realised, those were incorrect words and then there would be vigorous erasing. It would sometimes tear the paper or spread the newspaper ink all over and leave it a messy square. Then, I would just give up and feel miserable for another hour or so because I did not know what was ‘Simon Legree’ an example of or what was short for ‘Rodeo Steed’!

It would worry me endlessly that everyday out of 69 down and 69 across; I know hardly 6 or 9 (on a really lucky day)! There was no way of finding out until the next day and by then there was no way I would remember the previous day’s clues.

However, all these harrowing experiences have not demotivated me to try out different word games.

As children, my sister and I also loved playing ‘Boggle’ – I more than my sister (she was more of a Chess person! – which I was obviously terrible at). I could play Boggle for hours (for those who are too intellectual or sporty to play word games, this was a simple game of creating maximum words from 16 alphabets under a minute.) I was the undisputed champion (also, because I would create my own words – for a very long time my sister believed ‘dan’ was a kind of a medallion and ‘nad’ is another word for nudge.)

Then, one day on a mind numbingly boring day at work, I discovered Crossword puzzle on Merriam-Webster online and I got just what I wanted – HINTS! Now, this is just a more sophisticated word for ‘cheating’ but at least you are not left stranded.

So, although, I still cannot finish the crossword all by myself. But I like to play it still. At least I know that clues I crack are correct! And once in a while, I can ask it to ‘solve a word’ for me.

Anyhow, this is one day I also discovered a Word Jumble and then many more (http://www.merriam-webster.com/game/more.htm) [Bloody Blogger is not letting me format! :-(]

Err… wait, I am getting to the “something new” part. Basically, being a regular visitor of Merriam-Webster online, I am also getting used to the ‘word of the day’!

So, here it is… the blog will from now on have a word of the day and its usage (according to me). That is how, my teacher said you learn new words - learn it, use it, never forget it.

So, here is the first one:

The word of the day is…..

**DRUMROLL**

corvée • \KOR-vay\
1 : unpaid labor (as toward constructing roads) due from a feudal vassal to his lord
2 : labor exacted in lieu of taxes by public authorities especially for highway construction or repair

Usage 1 (for meaning number 1): I was so pissed at my boss the other day for not giving me my long overdue promotion that I wanted to tell him ‘Do you think, I am a fuckin’ corvée?’.

OR
Usage 2 (for meaning number 2): Where the fuck is all the corvée in Bangalore going?

OR
Usage 3: (my own meaning + for usage with bong friends): Tui ki corvée? (hidden meaning “Are u a corvée (as in meaning number 1)?”)


You are free to improvise the usage and suggest some of your own.

Till next Word!

Role Reversal (??)

Although, I was ecstatic to have my parents at home, but now it feels like my grandchildren are visiting.

I imagined I would once again feel like when I was 25 –carefree, lazy bum, tantrum thrower.

But I realise how things change when you are accustomed to fighting your own battles. You feel responsible for EVERYTHING and you accept that as the way of life. It becomes hard to distinguish between ‘care’ and ‘interference’ (for which I will have to write another post!)

Anyhow, I realised the whole ‘grandchildren’ bit when my voice echoed back:

“Please look through the fisheye before you open the door to anyone.”

I shouted this to Mum as I was hurriedly leaving for office and it sort of reverberated through the corridor.

All of the following gushed to my brains from remote corners:

I realised how I parental I have become. I constantly worry about:

• Whether they are eating properly
• Whether they will make it to the airport on time
• Will they board the flight safely
• Whether they will get a taxi to the house
• Will the be able to handle the taxi vendors ripping people off their money
• Will they be able to find my house
• Will they figure out the way around the apartment

I also have been doing other parental things such as:

• Stacking up the house with food and everything like a pack of hungry children are going to raid the house.
• Getting all medicines ready
• Removing all junk food from the fridge
• Trying to work out how to cover the sharp corners of objects around the house (like the corners of my bed which have injured me quite brutally in the past.) – to make it worse, I realise this is called ‘child-proofing’!
• Giving rapid and DETAILED instructions about anything and everything. The details of the explanation were such that I could have been talking to a 5-year old.
  Sample

“Mumma, please don’t leave ANY door-window open after dark because otherwise the mosquitoes will completely raid this place and in case you do, please switch on the ALL-OUT.

If that doesn’t work, spray this (points to Baygon)…spray it in the corners (demonstrates spraying) and shut all the doors for at least half an hour.

Please don’t be inside the room when you have sprayed this. ..and don’t forget to wash your hands after using Baygon. You may feel that your hands are clean but Baygon is Poison…….”)

And a few more things:

• My parents ask me when they want to go somewhere
• They take my advice on buying anything
• I drive them everywhere in the town
• I worry about my dad driving (he has been driving for the past 25 years as opposed to me just less than 2 years – on and off)
• I sort of… sometimes…. scold them! :-

It’s quite ridiculous when I think about it… these are the people who took me around the whole country and fed me and taught me all I know about taking care of myself and a house (apart from giving me birth and raising me for a good 25 years!)

Hmm? How much more weirder is life going to get? **SIGH!**

Parent Trap :-)

Mom – Dad visiting, which means :-) :

• Lesser smoking
• Someone to talk to at home
• Coming back from office to a non-empty house
• Not thinking about what to cook
• Getting cooked food
• Not being scared of falling sick
• Eating lesser junk food
• Not fretting about how to spend the weekend
• “Delegating” household work (so cheap, i know)
• Not having to go alone to buy veggies (maybe not going to buy veggies AT ALL!!!)

It also means :-( :

• Lesser smoking
• No TV
• Only K TV(not Karnataka/Kerala/Kannada TV but the K serials)
• Not sleeping on my bed (shallow but true)
• Keeping things more organised
• Being force fed (especially fruits and milk)
• Being lectured (especially when refuse to have fruits and milk)

STILL, I have never been more excited to have my parents around!

PS: Both the lists are subject to change depending on the experiences.

This weekend I discovered...

• Carrying your laptop from one room to another can be quite an ‘exercise’.
• I didn’t know how to spell exercise.
• My career would have been long dead without spell-check.
• It’s NOT SMART AT ALL to leave office work to finish on the weekend.
• Watching F.R.I.E.N.D.S back-to-back for 2 hours is STILL a good pastime.
• Rachel’s (Jennifer Aniston’s) nipples show through ALL her dresses.
• All channels have at least one anchor with fake British/American/Australian accent (including news channels)
• Even Hritik Roshan’s clone cannot beat the new Harman Baweja in ‘cloneliness’.
• I am addicted to this guy. (esp. Mr. Pitiful)
• If a man is staring at your boobs, that’s making you feel uncomfortable, staring back at his crotch may not have the same effect on him.
• Reaching for a glass of juice at a significant distance with a cigarette in one hand and a laptop in your lap can lead to burn mark injuries AND you can end up pinging the last person you want to ping saying ‘aaaass’. Not to mention the juice spilling on the carpet.

Eating Disorder(ly)

I don’t know if it’s some kind of reverse anorexia – because I think I have really lost weight but the weighing machine shows the opposite and the clothes only get tighter.

Besides this…there are some rather queer eating disorders I have developed:

ITSFS – The Intolerance-To-Stale–Food-Syndrome: I have developed this strange aversion to anything which is cooked more than 6 -7 hours ago.
This is a very very worrisome situation looking at my current state of affairs. The punju genes do not let me cook food for only one person so there are obviously leftovers.
Then, I let the leftovers linger for sometime in the fridge (as if the food will rejuvenate sitting in there). I open the fridge with the intension of eating the leftovers and end up taking out something equally unhealthy (read coke/chocolates/bread). At last, when the food has given up and completely rots on me, I scowl at it (as if it is the fault of the food) and throw it away. (I hope UNICEF, UNESCO.. Al Gore or whoever - environmentalists don’t read my blog!)

To rectify this situation, (please bear with the language, my appraisal is in process. I need to practice not using ‘street language’) I have tried several approaches – one of them being – TPA (The Phoenix Approach) –which is creating a new meal out of a leftover meal. This can be quite a rush if my creative brain cells are working (this is rather rare)… or else I can churn up really disastrous concoctions.

Like when I mixed the left-over khichri with left over mix vegetables, I don’t know what went wrong where (maybe it was the weird mix of soy sauce in the veggies and ‘heeng’ in the khichri ). I had to throw away my dinner and make do with a Mars bar and then tossed and turned in the bed for half the night.

Did you notice, how one thing leads to another? Meaning - how intolerance to stale food led to consumption of chocolate AND insomnia?

The next is:

INHS - The I’m-Not-Hungry Syndrome: For some reason the brain and stomach send exactly contrasting signals to each other. So, on a bright morning when I feel 'let me detoxify and introduce the body to nutrition', I begin the day by telling myself- 'today’s breakfast will be a fruit bowl – minus the bananas ofcourse!'

Then, as I walk up the stairs to the cafeteria… my stomach goes…beep-beep-beep-beep at the idli-dosa counter and my feet take me to the carb-rich but sumptuous looking idlis and oil-soaked-sinfully-deep-fried vadas. After I devour them with no recollection of the morning oath, I head towards the fruit stall (as if I have some debt to pay to the fruits!) I get a fruit bowl – bananas, mangoes and everything carb and glucose!

Then, as I am eating the fruit bowl, I hear the brain hurtling abuses to the stomach. It’s torturous and I leave the fruit-bowl half finished (more wastage..! I know!)

Then, because of such a shameless overeating at breakfast, I think ‘the lunch should be light..a small sandwich should be good’.

Then, I find myself returning with an embarrassingly largish plate full of pasta salad+Russian salad (I knooooo!!) and a sort of like a ‘club sandwich’.

Its appalling.

Such a pattern continues for the whole day..(sometimes for a ‘few days’).

The worst part is that through out all of this, there is no peaceful eating…as faint alarms keeps ringing at the back of the head:
‘for criss sake, you have a high-cholestrol history
oh please not all this junk- your knees are already pleading you to lose weight
no no…u just bought a size ‘M’ top! Stop ...STOP!

And to worsen it all…(and despite all of this..) I think I am losing weight! The fact is I am losing ‘it’!

back again- blahsfemmy's back- BETTER NOT TELL A FRIEND!

Phew! Seems like everyone has left. There is no site meter here but the number of ppl not complaining about the blog shutting is a clear indicator that there are no worthy / unworthy readers here.

This is good in a way. I needed this ‘space’.

What was supposed to be my ‘personal’ writing space turned into a firkin Facebook! But then, that’s what you ask for when you put anything personal on the ‘world wide web’.

Now that there is some breathing space, I shall continue the rants.

(Although I do not expect or want many reading this, I would still write this in the 'narration mode', as that is the only mode I know of. Also, other modes sound very documentary-like and hence boring.)

So, life has taken (yet) another turn and this was long due. I could always see it coming from the corner of my eye but it seemed too far or a little blurry.

Now, I see it clearly and in my face everyday and there are some pretty stark reminders in the day-to-day life – and it sometimes bogs me down but mostly I manage to lift my spirits.

Some days it feels like an accomplishment and some days I feel beaten up and defeated.

Yes, you guessed it right. ..today is one of the latter days.

Only add ‘bored to death’ to the previous two adjectives.

The problem isn’t that there is no work (I love NO WORK) but it is the fact that I have to pretend to work (without having access to any messengers/personal email/blogs etc).

So, believe it or not, I am actually typing a draft of this post in a storyboard format (hey, no kidding.. the filename is “ConfigurationManagement_Storyboard_Vpseudo.doc)

This is mainly to ensure that the PMs i.e. the Peeping -tom Managers etc. are under the impression that I am ‘utilising my time well’. Also, as a cover up I have a Wikipedia window open with Configuration Management details to quickly alt-tab to in case a certain peep-tom comes too close.

(On that note, O Wikipedia – har jawan content developer ki dhadkan-I take this opportunity to thank thee. Without your apar shakti and gyaanvardhakta, I would be lost in this tough world of rehashing existing crappy content into crappier stuff!)

To make the ‘cantankerous’ matters worse… a very annoying middle-aged man who joined recently in the HR division plonked right beside me. The sad part is that he has taken the place of a very quiet and docile Dutch girl, who spoke only when spoken too in her broken english and otherwise would mostly keep to herself - in short, everything a perfect neighbour in office should be.)

This new one has a (stinky) air of over confidence about him, which is so thick that it’s almost visible with naked eye - like a 'reverse halo' or something.

He peeps into my laptop screen and then lets out a big sigh or yawns intermittently. Then, looks at me to check if I noticed and will I make some polite conversation to ask him ‘whats the matter, dear?'

But I stay indifferent and maintain my ‘deep-in-concentration’ frown-like expression. This expression is just bordering the ‘do-not-disturb-or-I-can-get-very-rude expression.

(On a side note, I realise now that this is also my face when in a train/plane/airport/any waiting place. It saves me from lot of idle conversations. Not because I am not an idle-conversation person but because I divulge into too many details and before I know half of my life history (and personal email addresses) are shared with this random person who I may never meet again but who will send me spam ‘good morning’ mails for the rest of my life. Yes, it has happened to me.)

PP (Pesky Prick) mutters certain things (as if to himself)..but it is very clear from the things muttered that he doesn’t mean to leave it at that. Sample these:

“oh dear, where has this man disappeared to?”

“umm..humm..i like this song..(playing on someone else’s machine…) I like the artist, he is my favourite.. which was the one I liked?..”

“Aah..the food on the table is making me hungry…”

But I stay as indifferent as ever and type away.

Anyway, coming to the point where I need to record in this journal of mine why this morning (and yesterday evening) has turned the ‘new improved’ me to the ‘old cantankerous’ me.

"Being a single woman is a curse in most cities of this country." Now, that is not a very eye-opening statement, you might say.

However, a single woman living alone AND who is not good at bargaining is DISASTER personified.

I give in and resign too soon. I start off very stormily and an average non bargainer like me would think ‘whoa…easy woman!’…but with hardly any persuasion, I can hear myself saying ‘oh okay then. Sure’.

Where are my Mom's genes when I need them most? Where? Where?

I guess only around the waist! **Sigh!**

And, then I loathe myself for giving in so easily.

"This too shall pass" :-) …like the boring time passed while I typed this ‘comeback post’.

Till next time…

Just checking...

Yoohoo..

**peeks from behind the blog**

Has everyone left yet?

Appall-ogy

All readers,

Firstly, thanks for being the readers.

Secondly, sorry for the abrupt closure of the blog.


Had closed access to all except me but the dumbass blog says

‘This blog is open to invited readers only.’

– So I have to explain to people that ‘err..no, this is not open to ANYONE actually etc.’

So, I thought it is better to put an unapologetic apology and put it to rest (it = the questioning).

Bleah..

Bye.

Berlin - Day 2

We woke up at leisure at 10 or so (and God bless all these hotels/hostels to serve breakfast till 11:30.)

I don’t know why but we were in an especially leisurely mood, so we ate slowwwly and then sat with the map and slowwly figured out what-where-why. Berlin has shit load of museums and such. Lots of options are always a bad thing. And then, as usual, we made a plan and started off. I don’t remember the plan exactly, because as usual, we did not really stick to it.

Along with behaving leisurely, we were also a little out of our minds…as we left the hostel without fully gearing up for the chilly weather. In other words, no jackets/gloves or cap. I am not used to winters so I cant handle wearing layers of clothing.

So, we figured out all subway trains – this that and reached Potsdammer Platz. An area that relatively newly built but was central to most of the places we had planned to visit.

On reaching there, it struck both of us how brave we were trying to be and ended up really foolish. The cold was skull-numbing and we looked at each other like ‘brrr…lets go back and get our jackets or at least gloves and caps.’

And yes, we went back to get all those.


(I think cold also makes your mind contract and as a result maybe the blood flows really slow and you think very slow or something - Have to look this up. It could be true. Sounds like a theory.)

Anyway, so, not only did we quite shamelessly wasted our time in getting appropriately dressed for the winter…upon reaching Potsdammer Platz again, when we were purposefully walking towards the Brandenburger Tor , we got quite distracted by this whole fair sort of thing with all sort of yummy fried aromas wafting in the air. So like lil sniffy dogs, we hopped from one stall to another began to eat. It was pretty strange because both of us had a ‘complimentary-and- therefore- filling’ breakfast.

We first had fried champignons (button mushrooms) with spinach (highly disgusting), then, some sort of nice sweet-sugary-fried-but-light- balls you get those a lot here, and then chocolate crepe (which was the winner) –

(Notice how demented I look…I guess it was the sugar surge!)



(Also, because it was very windy day combined with bad-hair day! )

Anyway, we managed to wrench ourselves out of the wretched fair and walked towards Brandenburger Tor.

Walking up all those streets, you feel, there is something really eerie about the place. Maybe it was the weather, but I was thinking, maybe it IS true – something is really dreary and grey about the city. The air hangs heavy in that city. Quite inexplicable it is – how you feel.

Before Brandenburger Tor, we found the Museum of Holocaust – also called the Museum of the Murdered Jews. Was built recently – 2005. Looks like a cemetery, but isn’t. Just being there gives u the heebie-jeebies. I learnt later that it is deliberate – to give the visitors a sense of insecurity. Sets the mood for the museum.

Ironically, for us even the clouds matched the grey stelaes (steel-ays). Perfect mood setting.

And as we stood waiting at the entrance of this museum – it started snowing – The first snow in Europe!


Dint get a chance to really, enjoy it. Was too cold and we rushed inside and entered a different world. Snow, was long forgotten.

Took an audio tour this time – was worth it.

It is dedicated to all Jews murdered in Europe during the holocaust. It’s divided into 5 big rooms (or were there 7?) and begins with pictures from the holocaust period from 1931-1945.

It’s unbearable to look at some of the pictures and reading the descriptions. The next room has letters preserved from people in the concentration camps to their loved ones.

The lighting is so apt. Gives you goosebumps. I was trying hard not to cry as I read all excerpts and tried telling myself ‘It’s over, we should be thankful it’s over.’

Then I came across a letter from a 12 year old girl to her father just before she and her mother were being taken to the pit to be executed.

They used to shoot the people at the edge of the pits so their bodies fell right into the pits. Lesser work.

“They are taking us to kill us…
….I love you daddy.. "

The letter was dated 31, July, 1942.

It was quite blurry after that for sometime. So, I sat for sometime and trying to wipe off all signs of crying.

There were many such rooms and pictures, and stories of families which had all their generations wiped off.

By the time I reached the last room, my head was spinning. I couldn’t bear to be in the last audio room which shows the names of people who were murdered and then their biography is read out. It is a part of the Jewish culture … about how when they die..something. I don’t even remember it now. I was so dizzy with all the brutality and such organized mass murders over years. Mind-numbing in the real sense.

(PS:Day 2 shall continue… feeling a lil dizzy just thinking about it.)