Dec 21- 27

I must confess, I have made my most stupid decision in the past two years by taking up a ‘spiritual’ subject. OK, OK maybe not the most stupid, but I was definitely acting like a retard when I made this choice. And no, it is not about to significantly change my life. So while it may sound like an interesting class from the outside to many (Well, with the professor talking about Old Monks and Hangovers!!) but in essence, the class is about as profound as Bozo, the clown. Sample this masterpiece- "Before enlightenment, Rivers are rivers and , mountains are mountains. During enlightenment, rivers are not rivers and mountains are not mountains. After enlightenment, rivers are once again rivers and mountains are once again mountains." So you see, we are supposed to absorb, not think an awful lot to truly enjoy our meaningless lives. But then again, toilet paper absorbs.

On Christmas day, our mess decided we need something special. I thought something was up when I saw what I later realized was a Santa puppet on our mess doors welcoming us. Now you may think why i didn’t realize that immediately, but you see this is Bengal. You see a man with a beard, you see red and your first thought is,’Oh! Karl Marx.’ And well that puppet and some artificial undecorated Christmas trees were the only sign of Christmas in the mess. The food wasn’t special, it was regular, by which I mean horrid as the mess is still not serving chicken.

While consuming a Sizzling Brownie, if you have finished all the ice cream, never attempt to have a go at the chocolate sauce. It’s flaming hot and burns your tongue. (Yes, yes it happened again. But not to me and not this week. Though this happens with me every week in winter. I am dense enough not to ever learn.)

It is so cold here, that I could see fog lift off from a lake. And yet, when you tell people who are not here they say, ”Oh, You have fog there because the humidity is high.” They conveniently forget that it has to be biting cold for all that humidity to condense. With my toes turning an unpleasant shade of blue, I cannot afford to make that mistake.

Watched Slumdog Millionaire this week. Good movie. But I seem to have a grudge against Mr Anil Kapoor( IS that how he spells it still?) So I shall proceed to say, that though he makes an effort in an attempt to not sound like a ‘dehati’,( rolls his r’s and all), his “Who wants to be a millionaire” sounds more like a “Who wants to be a milliner”.

~catchingupwitholdfriendsmakesforagreat week

Apologies

Well it’s been a long break indeed. I would like to say that great earth shaking changes have taken place all because of the effort I have put into my work with such diligence and blah blah…. But I cannot. Some things have changed, though I am not sure what, I say this only because I have been told ‘Change is Constant.’

Anyway, let me bring you up to speed. You remember the exams I was talking about in January? With such a pathetic attempt at preparation, I barely passed most of them. End terms were like the proverbial salt on the wound. But at least they brought the year to a much awaited end and I headed home for holidays.

After this I was off to Mumbai for my summer internship. Time flew fast and again I did absolutely nothing productive as I spent 2 months in the lap of luxury. I made it a point to religiously follow all the IPL matches. Which team did I support? Why, whichever one was winning of course! After all the point of watching the matches was not as much to revel in the excitement and entertainment (by either the cricketers or the cheer leaders, how does it matter?) as it was to kill time in office. Mumbai , inspite of its traffic, I love. It’s safe, the people are nice and (hallelujah) it’s a foodie paradise.

Come June and I was back on campus. Changed my room, but it has not made any difference in the number of bugs that annually visit me. The two mosquitoes from my previous room have also followed me here. And I have finally given them names. The one that hums near my ear to keep me from sleeping is Lup and the one who bites is Dup.

On the academic front, I resolved to undo past sins and somehow study. That lasted about 5 minutes, after that I was back to what I do best, procrastinating, which has been the root cause of such a long break. But fear not. I am back now and you can expect me to spew venom here regularly.

And now for overcoming my inherent laziness, I shall pat my self on the back( no help needed) and treat my self to this ( help needed but only during procurement)-

Of bajjis and kozhukattais

At long last… A blog to take one’s mind off the general miseries of the world and especially that perl code back at office (it has got everybody talking excitedly in hushed tones. Too bad they wont let me know what it is) while I sit here nursing a runny nose and an equally fluid mind.

I learnt a lesson today. Never bunk office unless and until u have someone to take of your lunch and dinner. I write this as I watch that cold rasam left out in the hall. (Another lesson – never add ginger garlic paste toa rasam even if u have a blocked nose. It does absolutely nothing to the cold and it permeates the mucous block.) A couple of updates from last week.

• Had a swell last week in TN. Honored a couple of weddings with my presence and got lots of athirasam to eat too. Also had this ear-piercing ceremony for my little cousin, during which the entire set of my female ancestry condemned me as not religious enough. And had a good look at the saravana stores building that had fired up the previous Monday. (For the uninitiated, it is the Harrods of Chennai)
• Got this fancy water bottle that I have seen sports guys use. It has this lift to open type of cap. Since then I ve realized that the design of the burette was inspired by this bottle. But then they removed the sucking sound (what with all this silence in the lab and girls-boys-separate-groups things). Got too enthu with it and downed some 5 liters from it in spite of the fact that I had to make some 8-10 adjourns to the restrooms. And repeat of the latter at night. Since then it has been found to be a good compliment to my mobile holder which stood alone.
• We had to shift our house the week I left. So while the roomies sweated it out, yours truly was eating kozhukattai while lounging on the sofa with the TV tuned in to travel and living and rd classics collection in hand. They make u feel good. (Not classics, the kozhukattais) It was quite a culture shock with the new house, when i came back sunday morn. Can you believe ppl live without heaters in hyd in September? The other extreme is getting lost in the Sahara with diarrhea (You have an alternate choice in both the cases - stove heating and, let's call it recycling, respectively, but u wouldn't wanna take that)
• On the technical front, by which I do NOT mean office work, had this invite on orkut from a body builder guy which I turned down. You might think – yet another snobbish FCP. But alas, dear reader, it is not so. I have once accepted a request from a guy who was looking to get placed in my company. The thing that made me refuse was that the guy was looking for someone who could develop his English skills. (No laughing, wait till I complete) Which set me thinking that this was so because he thought that I could do with some body development myself. So ended what could have been Armageddon.
• My brother’s got this funny name on Orkut. Roughly translated it means Gom Bull. Don’t ask me what Gom means. But I am more concerned with the bull part. And he has some scraps from girls too. He’s definitely growing up.
• On the work front, things have been pretty bad lately. Not much work to do. “But patience brave heart. The world will be yours one day.” And readers, yours too. Then we ll ask Shiv Khera how to divide it up cos if 6 billion (if they supposedly read his book) can own the world, can’t two nitwits and their readers (which is also two, if u count us) do so?
• Been watching this video again and again. Enjoy!!!