Guys like me can make their entire careers out of making mountains out of mole hills. No wonder then that it has never happened. Partly because as a race we do not appreciate mountains enough, but mostly because there aren't guys like me. And do we even want to get started talking about me? We could but then we would never get to the point where the conversation ends, such is my all pervading aura that binds those around me. How aura should relate to end points in conversation I cannot elucidate as of this moment. Suffice to say, that it is there. The aura, that is.
Now that we have brought that thought out in the open, I am not sure there is anything that as a race we appreciate enough. As a non-race? Well, that is completely left open to interpretations depending on one's predilections. What those interpretations and predilections should be I should not say. Not that I 'cannot' say, I 'should' not say for there is not much that I believe I won't be able to say about. But if you believe that keeping your mind open and your legs closed if you happen to be a woman or your legs open and your mind closed if you happen to be a man is the road to eternal happiness and bliss then I must say that someone went wrong terribly somewhere or something went wrong'ly' terribly somewhere, depending on (what else?) your predilections.
For the longest time, there has been this eternal confusion about predilection and predisposition. I am not one to rant and rave over incorrect usage of words. I usually bite anyone's head off who does not know the basic nuances of language. Say for instance, the difference between beside and besides. I would definitely love to sleep beside Mary should Mary happen to be a smoking hot biologically active woman. And I would definitely more than love to sleep besides Mary should Mary happen to be a cold frigid maid. If you don't get the difference now, you are never going to get it in which case you will probably end up sleeping beside a cold frigid Mary, and sleep besides the smoking hot biologically active one.
Followers of my blogs (I am not sure she is alive any more - may her soul rest in peace - but it is the thought that counts, right?), would recollect that there are things in the paragraph above that I have already stated before. Actually, they wouldn't for anyone with a memory span greater than that needed to remember where the bookmarks are stored would have a life. That would make the exercise of sojourning on these pages redundant unless they are one of those self-righteous masochistic sods.
PS: This post is dedicated to Twigrl. She seems to be the only reader I have left. Attagirl!
Monday, October 15, 2007
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Losing my religion
There are events in a man's life that make him lose his faith - painful heartbreaks, bankruptcy, and E! becoming a subscription channel. Note that I have spoken entirely in the masculine gender on a blog that is completely anti-sexist. No, I have not changed my outlook. I am only talking about the male of the species.
Why don't we talk about men? All 'they' seem to be bothered about is the fairer sex - glass ceiling at workplaces, unequal pay, exploitation, trafficking, etc. Has anyone ever thought about the everyday agony of men? Trying to find a pair of matching socks, dishes piled a mile high, eating without the tie getting into the soup bowl, getting through office firewalls to find the good internet porn, picking out curtains that go with the sofa? Okay. Strike the last one. Let us pretend I never said it and move on.
In the midst of all this, there is an image to cater to. We are not supposed to cry during a movie. So what if I cry buckets even in movies that can only be termed plain pathetic? At least I don't not cry in movies that are truly moving. No pun intended, intentionally or otherwise. That brings us to a bigger question. Is something happenning better than something not never happenning? Sample this.
An optimist and a pessimist are walking down a street. A pigeon does its thing on the optimist, and he is smiling about it. The pessimist looks at him quizzically. Basically gives him the 'you must be freaking out of your mind, gone bananas, lost your marbles' look. The optimist is simply happy that elephants can't fly. This goes beyond the 'half empty and half full' shenanighan. It is plain nuts. QED.
Except that, there is more. There is always more with me around. More not sugarcoating, presenting things as they are. That is why children are so difficult to please. They see things for what they are and not for what you want to make them out to be. There is nothing more misleading than the phrase 'child-like innocence'. 'Grown-up ignorance' is more like it.
Why don't we talk about men? All 'they' seem to be bothered about is the fairer sex - glass ceiling at workplaces, unequal pay, exploitation, trafficking, etc. Has anyone ever thought about the everyday agony of men? Trying to find a pair of matching socks, dishes piled a mile high, eating without the tie getting into the soup bowl, getting through office firewalls to find the good internet porn, picking out curtains that go with the sofa? Okay. Strike the last one. Let us pretend I never said it and move on.
In the midst of all this, there is an image to cater to. We are not supposed to cry during a movie. So what if I cry buckets even in movies that can only be termed plain pathetic? At least I don't not cry in movies that are truly moving. No pun intended, intentionally or otherwise. That brings us to a bigger question. Is something happenning better than something not never happenning? Sample this.
An optimist and a pessimist are walking down a street. A pigeon does its thing on the optimist, and he is smiling about it. The pessimist looks at him quizzically. Basically gives him the 'you must be freaking out of your mind, gone bananas, lost your marbles' look. The optimist is simply happy that elephants can't fly. This goes beyond the 'half empty and half full' shenanighan. It is plain nuts. QED.
Except that, there is more. There is always more with me around. More not sugarcoating, presenting things as they are. That is why children are so difficult to please. They see things for what they are and not for what you want to make them out to be. There is nothing more misleading than the phrase 'child-like innocence'. 'Grown-up ignorance' is more like it.
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Spoon and Lemon
Some of us are born with a silver spoon in our mouths. I am not sure why anyone would want to be born that way. Does it not get in the way of breast feeding? Come to think of it, may be that is why the silver spoon people have traits of retards, delinquents, sex offenders, child molesters, serial killers or a multitude of other things that even I consider unprintable. That does not happen. Ever. That is not to be constructed to mean that I don't consider many things unprintable. I do. I print them anyway.
For instance, my sojourn in a strip club. I would never have put that in black and white, or in zeroes and ones as is the case here, had it not been on this space since this is a space where I consider nothing about myself unworthy of being put on. Besides, the very notion of losers being the only frequenters in a strip joint is as real as George Bush's balls for the green you splurge can only rival Swiss bank account balances.
Having used two most over-abused metaphorical references in this day and age, and topping it up with a phrase only more hackneyed than 'From time immemorial' (which is not all that cliched save for the teeny weeny fact that I have used it often enough to cause permanent brain damage in a friend of mine) things can only go one one way. Downhill. And not only as far as the quality of this post is concerned. My life too. But that is not something people are usually bothered about.
Even if I have said this before, I am jaw-droppingly apalled at the increasingly falling standards that we have started making peace with. As if the boy bands were not enough proof of the decandence of the human race, we now have the onslaught of the ugly people to contend with. Lest anyone should misconstrue that statement (a feat that would need the thought capacity of an amoeba or that of Einstein depending on the level of misconstruing), I am a staunch believer in having only beautiful people in showbiz. Seriously. Fat rappers? Balding newscasters? Wrinkled grammy winners? Or Oprah Winfrey? Hyuk! There used to be a world where genetically favourably disposed people ruled. What have we done in the name of progress?
To mangle a quote from 'The Third Reich', a thousand years shall pass and the guilt of equality shall not be erased.
For instance, my sojourn in a strip club. I would never have put that in black and white, or in zeroes and ones as is the case here, had it not been on this space since this is a space where I consider nothing about myself unworthy of being put on. Besides, the very notion of losers being the only frequenters in a strip joint is as real as George Bush's balls for the green you splurge can only rival Swiss bank account balances.
Having used two most over-abused metaphorical references in this day and age, and topping it up with a phrase only more hackneyed than 'From time immemorial' (which is not all that cliched save for the teeny weeny fact that I have used it often enough to cause permanent brain damage in a friend of mine) things can only go one one way. Downhill. And not only as far as the quality of this post is concerned. My life too. But that is not something people are usually bothered about.
Even if I have said this before, I am jaw-droppingly apalled at the increasingly falling standards that we have started making peace with. As if the boy bands were not enough proof of the decandence of the human race, we now have the onslaught of the ugly people to contend with. Lest anyone should misconstrue that statement (a feat that would need the thought capacity of an amoeba or that of Einstein depending on the level of misconstruing), I am a staunch believer in having only beautiful people in showbiz. Seriously. Fat rappers? Balding newscasters? Wrinkled grammy winners? Or Oprah Winfrey? Hyuk! There used to be a world where genetically favourably disposed people ruled. What have we done in the name of progress?
To mangle a quote from 'The Third Reich', a thousand years shall pass and the guilt of equality shall not be erased.
Monday, May 07, 2007
Save the planet
'Save water - shower with a friend'. Oh, the brilliance of that statement! It almost pardons the travesty of making covers of eternally immortal songs. Almost, not quite, especially when it is a Floyd cover. But that did make me think of the friends I would love to share the shower with. Perv, am I? No. Just a man.
Statistically, a man spends one-third of his waking hours thinking of sex. No wonder that statistics are like bikins - what they reveal is exciting but what they conceal is vital. Men don't trash their time on such banal activities. They make the best of it. The remaining two-thirds is spent thinking of ways to think of sex.
Over the last almost twenty six years that I have spent on this planet (I say 'this' planet because whatever I did outside it is irrelevant) I have come to the one conclusion that usually takes years of dedicated meditation to come to. Thought is the cause of all suffering. Any surprise then that there is a phrase in the English language for it - Eyes lit up like a child's on Christmas. Well, okay. No context there either. But is not a beautiful statement made out of context better than an ugly one made in context?
There is not much I can say about this post except that making it felt like a good idea at the time. That and it was Sunday evening. Outside of a Monday morning, the Sunday evening is the most clinically depressing time of the week. You are too wasted with all the drinking on Saturday to go out, and too bored with all the cranial atrophy to keep your sanity. The latter does not apply to me. I lost mine a long time ago - it is easier to live that way. And I rather enjoy intellectual inactivity. What I enjoy even more, however, is vanity. Shocking then that I have never mentioned it on this space. At least not in a vehemently offensive way. Anything else does not count.
Shall we dance? Over my dead body! No, no. I have nothing against dancing. I rather enjoy it myself. But that movie was sickeningly mushy, and I say that despite not having seen it. Make no mistake. I am a sucker for those over the top mushy romantic comedies that the dream merchants dish out to us off an assembly line. I draw the line at 'How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days'. And only because I saw it in a theatre where I was the only man. Everyone else was a woman.
Whoa! That was nearly as emphatic as 'Indira Gandhi was the only man in her cabinet' descriptive. And yes. As Einstein said, 'Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love'. Neither is Sir Isaac Newton who in his most famous speech said all of two words three times, "I conceive. I conceive. I conceive." It took a woman to tell him of the futility of that sermon. He conceived thrice and produced nothing, and a woman conceived once and produced Newton.
Statistically, a man spends one-third of his waking hours thinking of sex. No wonder that statistics are like bikins - what they reveal is exciting but what they conceal is vital. Men don't trash their time on such banal activities. They make the best of it. The remaining two-thirds is spent thinking of ways to think of sex.
Over the last almost twenty six years that I have spent on this planet (I say 'this' planet because whatever I did outside it is irrelevant) I have come to the one conclusion that usually takes years of dedicated meditation to come to. Thought is the cause of all suffering. Any surprise then that there is a phrase in the English language for it - Eyes lit up like a child's on Christmas. Well, okay. No context there either. But is not a beautiful statement made out of context better than an ugly one made in context?
There is not much I can say about this post except that making it felt like a good idea at the time. That and it was Sunday evening. Outside of a Monday morning, the Sunday evening is the most clinically depressing time of the week. You are too wasted with all the drinking on Saturday to go out, and too bored with all the cranial atrophy to keep your sanity. The latter does not apply to me. I lost mine a long time ago - it is easier to live that way. And I rather enjoy intellectual inactivity. What I enjoy even more, however, is vanity. Shocking then that I have never mentioned it on this space. At least not in a vehemently offensive way. Anything else does not count.
Shall we dance? Over my dead body! No, no. I have nothing against dancing. I rather enjoy it myself. But that movie was sickeningly mushy, and I say that despite not having seen it. Make no mistake. I am a sucker for those over the top mushy romantic comedies that the dream merchants dish out to us off an assembly line. I draw the line at 'How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days'. And only because I saw it in a theatre where I was the only man. Everyone else was a woman.
Whoa! That was nearly as emphatic as 'Indira Gandhi was the only man in her cabinet' descriptive. And yes. As Einstein said, 'Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love'. Neither is Sir Isaac Newton who in his most famous speech said all of two words three times, "I conceive. I conceive. I conceive." It took a woman to tell him of the futility of that sermon. He conceived thrice and produced nothing, and a woman conceived once and produced Newton.
Saturday, May 05, 2007
Hair today gone tomorrow...
They say a Nation can show her might but for this she has to fight. Who are 'they'? And why do they keep saying things? Kirsten Dunst did manage to satiate a part of my curiosity when she said that 'they' are the inimitable collective or something of the sort in Elizabethtown - a silly romantic flick starring the chick Orlando Bloom.
That reminds me of facial hair. Basically, of guys who need to keep facial hair to constantly restate their fledgling manhood. I know of at least two of the male species who are like that - Aftab Shivdasani and Abhishek Bachchan. And not only am I not in the habit of mentioning anyone by their names on this blog for the very simple reason that even my whining gives them a higher rating on search engines, I don't ever wear a habit either. Whether that statement is grammatically correct is questioning (I have read and re-read it a thousand times over and I still am not certain of its grammatical integrity) but I am too darn fogged up to reconstruct. So it shall stand as it is, which is a first. It is also a testimony to the standards I am now willing to put up with. Perhaps five and a half months of celibacy does that to a man.
I don't like hair of any kind unless they happen to be on the head of bald women. Since I have not come across bald women other than those who have gone bald of their own volition, I can't say that I like hair. I certainly don't like armpit hair (really, what was Julia Roberts thinking when she wore that lovely dress on unshaved armpits!), and I don't want to talk about hair in the nether regions. I shall only say this to all the women out there, 'if you don't want men to treat you like animals then please don't look like one down there'.
Being a man has its advantages. For one, we can pee standing up. We can pretty much pee anywhere we want. And we can pee just for the heck of having a contest. Not like I am saying that I do any of these things or even that I do not. But that is about the only upside of being a man. Whoever says it is a man's world has no idea what she is talking about. Look around you. Who does the world belong to? Brock Lesner or Jessica Simpson's perfect breasts?
And with that, I rest my case.
That reminds me of facial hair. Basically, of guys who need to keep facial hair to constantly restate their fledgling manhood. I know of at least two of the male species who are like that - Aftab Shivdasani and Abhishek Bachchan. And not only am I not in the habit of mentioning anyone by their names on this blog for the very simple reason that even my whining gives them a higher rating on search engines, I don't ever wear a habit either. Whether that statement is grammatically correct is questioning (I have read and re-read it a thousand times over and I still am not certain of its grammatical integrity) but I am too darn fogged up to reconstruct. So it shall stand as it is, which is a first. It is also a testimony to the standards I am now willing to put up with. Perhaps five and a half months of celibacy does that to a man.
I don't like hair of any kind unless they happen to be on the head of bald women. Since I have not come across bald women other than those who have gone bald of their own volition, I can't say that I like hair. I certainly don't like armpit hair (really, what was Julia Roberts thinking when she wore that lovely dress on unshaved armpits!), and I don't want to talk about hair in the nether regions. I shall only say this to all the women out there, 'if you don't want men to treat you like animals then please don't look like one down there'.
Being a man has its advantages. For one, we can pee standing up. We can pretty much pee anywhere we want. And we can pee just for the heck of having a contest. Not like I am saying that I do any of these things or even that I do not. But that is about the only upside of being a man. Whoever says it is a man's world has no idea what she is talking about. Look around you. Who does the world belong to? Brock Lesner or Jessica Simpson's perfect breasts?
And with that, I rest my case.
Monday, April 16, 2007
A lotta nonsense...
Oh, well. The last two days have been spent under house-arrest. And, no. That is not to be taken to mean literally. My life is not that exciting. Sad!
This one time I am being sensible about it all. That is the difference. The gubernatorial elections were held on Saturday. What amazes me, nay baffles me, is the sheer gazzel-like swiftness with which the results were declared. On Sunday! See, I am from India where we use Electronic Voting Machines. Even those take about twice as much time to pronounce the verdict - the calculations are checked, re-checked, and then checked a few times more just to be absolutely sure. And here they could manage to hand count the paper ballots in a jiffy. Fast, like George Bush in the Lincoln bedroom.
Forty-eight hours of confinement makes a man think. He starts to wonder about the existential theories of treadmills that clock a lot of mileage without getting anywhere, of the futility of intelligent conversations that have the power to enthral but leave you with that sense of longing, and of the brilliance of Baywatch. In short, he starts to question all that is of no consequence whatsover. With the exception of Baywatch. That show started a whole new debate on the importance of floatation devices, sun tan oils, and skin cancer. Well, the first two anyway.
Either I have a sense of appreciation for a varied spread or I have no opinion of my own and choose to be moulded by the elements. The other day I watched Dirty Dancing and Blood Diamond in quick succession, and the day before that I went for 300. Loved them all. 300 left me with goose-pimples, Blood Diamond filled me with a sense of speechless frustrating despair, and Dirty Dancing gave me that glow of a pregnant woman. Sometimes, I am not certain if I am coming or going. At others, I am in a conundrum over sugar and cream. And occasionally, I talk sense.
Like today. I opted for Indomie with egg over Khichidi. Okay, not many would label that sense. But they would not have the complete context of there being no Ghee and Dahi at home. Khichidi without Dahi, Papad, Ghee and Achar is like having sex without a condom. The pleasure is not considerably greater but the thought of potentially contracting STDs means you spend many a night tossing and turning. Just not worth it.
Instead, I will tell you what is worth it. Nothing. Nothing is worth anything other than itself. We all pay for the consequences of our actions. There is no escaping karma. But there is escaping mediocrity. And with that thought, I shut up.
This one time I am being sensible about it all. That is the difference. The gubernatorial elections were held on Saturday. What amazes me, nay baffles me, is the sheer gazzel-like swiftness with which the results were declared. On Sunday! See, I am from India where we use Electronic Voting Machines. Even those take about twice as much time to pronounce the verdict - the calculations are checked, re-checked, and then checked a few times more just to be absolutely sure. And here they could manage to hand count the paper ballots in a jiffy. Fast, like George Bush in the Lincoln bedroom.
Forty-eight hours of confinement makes a man think. He starts to wonder about the existential theories of treadmills that clock a lot of mileage without getting anywhere, of the futility of intelligent conversations that have the power to enthral but leave you with that sense of longing, and of the brilliance of Baywatch. In short, he starts to question all that is of no consequence whatsover. With the exception of Baywatch. That show started a whole new debate on the importance of floatation devices, sun tan oils, and skin cancer. Well, the first two anyway.
Either I have a sense of appreciation for a varied spread or I have no opinion of my own and choose to be moulded by the elements. The other day I watched Dirty Dancing and Blood Diamond in quick succession, and the day before that I went for 300. Loved them all. 300 left me with goose-pimples, Blood Diamond filled me with a sense of speechless frustrating despair, and Dirty Dancing gave me that glow of a pregnant woman. Sometimes, I am not certain if I am coming or going. At others, I am in a conundrum over sugar and cream. And occasionally, I talk sense.
Like today. I opted for Indomie with egg over Khichidi. Okay, not many would label that sense. But they would not have the complete context of there being no Ghee and Dahi at home. Khichidi without Dahi, Papad, Ghee and Achar is like having sex without a condom. The pleasure is not considerably greater but the thought of potentially contracting STDs means you spend many a night tossing and turning. Just not worth it.
Instead, I will tell you what is worth it. Nothing. Nothing is worth anything other than itself. We all pay for the consequences of our actions. There is no escaping karma. But there is escaping mediocrity. And with that thought, I shut up.
Friday, April 13, 2007
Vodka, Rum or Me?
Those who know me, and I mean really really know me, are aware that I am usually one for making tall claims. It is a different matter completely that I, more often than not, live up to those claims. But when I make a claim to the only woman who I have never had anything but platonic thoughts about, and I do something completely to the contrary, then that is something to be reckoned with. In fact, it is more a force to reckon with than Naomi Campbell bending over in that oh-so-hot pic in German HQ.
The claim is not important. Well, it is. But I am not up for discussing it on this day in time. Or night, depending on which side of the international date line you are on. But the fact remains that I am in serious danger of becoming one of those I despise. They are the ofay people. Put simply, they are those who behave like Simi Garewal does in that schtick of a show of hers called Rendezvous. Sample this. Whenever I can blow my trumpet, I do. It is either the house I live in is fabulous or, wait, I just got the bedrooms carpeted. Look at me. I am so cool, types. Wouldn't you love to kill me? Or if you are kinky enough, make love to me!
That said, let us not walk down the road of making love. I have been bloody celibate the last few months, and much of it is of my own volition. Basically, I am in love. Yes, yes. I have already dedicated enough disk space to proclaiming it to the whole wide world, or at least that part of the world that happens to chance upon these pages. But the thing is this. I am at a place where I am happy with the way things are, even if she has made it more than clear that I am standing against on-coming traffic. And, though I have said it before on this space, didn't The Architect say, 'Hope. It is the quintessential of all human emotions consequently the source of your greatest strength, and greatest weakness.'?
At any rate, when you have had as much Vodka and Rum as could otherwise have taken care of the needs of a small country, even if that country happens to be Vatican City, then it is completely pardonable if your fingers choose to type against the grain of your thoughts. Seriously, are there any thoughts once an alcohol-induced mindfreeze sets in? Then again there is no mindfreeze as of this moment, provided I am not held accountable for whatever has been said so far or will be said from this point on.
Pity that I have to resort to old theories to fill up pages these days. Or what is that stupid song? Nikamma kiya is dil ne... Now I know how.
The claim is not important. Well, it is. But I am not up for discussing it on this day in time. Or night, depending on which side of the international date line you are on. But the fact remains that I am in serious danger of becoming one of those I despise. They are the ofay people. Put simply, they are those who behave like Simi Garewal does in that schtick of a show of hers called Rendezvous. Sample this. Whenever I can blow my trumpet, I do. It is either the house I live in is fabulous or, wait, I just got the bedrooms carpeted. Look at me. I am so cool, types. Wouldn't you love to kill me? Or if you are kinky enough, make love to me!
That said, let us not walk down the road of making love. I have been bloody celibate the last few months, and much of it is of my own volition. Basically, I am in love. Yes, yes. I have already dedicated enough disk space to proclaiming it to the whole wide world, or at least that part of the world that happens to chance upon these pages. But the thing is this. I am at a place where I am happy with the way things are, even if she has made it more than clear that I am standing against on-coming traffic. And, though I have said it before on this space, didn't The Architect say, 'Hope. It is the quintessential of all human emotions consequently the source of your greatest strength, and greatest weakness.'?
At any rate, when you have had as much Vodka and Rum as could otherwise have taken care of the needs of a small country, even if that country happens to be Vatican City, then it is completely pardonable if your fingers choose to type against the grain of your thoughts. Seriously, are there any thoughts once an alcohol-induced mindfreeze sets in? Then again there is no mindfreeze as of this moment, provided I am not held accountable for whatever has been said so far or will be said from this point on.
Pity that I have to resort to old theories to fill up pages these days. Or what is that stupid song? Nikamma kiya is dil ne... Now I know how.
Friday, March 16, 2007
Stupid E!
When E! makes a list of the 101 most shocking moments in entertainment and chooses to place Michael Jackson's burning hair ahead of the day the music died you know that the world is no more a safe place to live in. Well, when you start watching E! you know that, safe or unsafe, you are no longer sane enough to live in the world.
Good for me then that I have neither been sane nor been alive. But more about that later. Partly because I like keeping people guessing. Mostly because I have no idea how to go about reasoning that. As a friend of mine once told me after he made a grotesquely unbelievable statement, "I have said it. I will think and tell you how it can be." And voila what do you know! He actually managed to give me a plausible explanation. Don't expect that of me, though.
Whoa! That was my first non-woman quote on this blog outside of the person being Douglas Adams. That really does not mean that I have oodles of respect for him. I have called him non-woman after all. Just that quoting him felt like a good idea at the time, and I don't like using the backspace key. I would much rather go back on what I say. There is a certain charm in doing that.
The same way there is no charm in feeling exilarated during a world cup cricket game not because the underdog is winning but because the team you hate is losing. But there is not much else that charmless people do. Either way, do they have to take it to the extreme by strutting around the house in flaming red tracks and a white vest? And that when they happen to be men? Hyuk! Not satisfied with that they keep up with their endless chatter. Blah blah blah blah blah.
What do you do when you come across the matrimonial ad for someone you know? Probably no different than making such extremely disconnected statements. No, seriously. Do you tell the guy she was dating that her parents have put her on the marriage market? Or do you hold back for reasons of preserving personal dignity? Who would want to be known as the kind of person who reads matrimonial advertisements? Especially when they appear in the Sunday papers! More importantly, what are you supposed to do if the ad is for the girl you want to spend the rest of your life with? Obviously she is willing to go through the pains of screening three million guys just so she does not end up with you. Does it mean you are really pathetic or is she being plain stupid? Questions. Questions. Questions.
Good for me then that I have neither been sane nor been alive. But more about that later. Partly because I like keeping people guessing. Mostly because I have no idea how to go about reasoning that. As a friend of mine once told me after he made a grotesquely unbelievable statement, "I have said it. I will think and tell you how it can be." And voila what do you know! He actually managed to give me a plausible explanation. Don't expect that of me, though.
Whoa! That was my first non-woman quote on this blog outside of the person being Douglas Adams. That really does not mean that I have oodles of respect for him. I have called him non-woman after all. Just that quoting him felt like a good idea at the time, and I don't like using the backspace key. I would much rather go back on what I say. There is a certain charm in doing that.
The same way there is no charm in feeling exilarated during a world cup cricket game not because the underdog is winning but because the team you hate is losing. But there is not much else that charmless people do. Either way, do they have to take it to the extreme by strutting around the house in flaming red tracks and a white vest? And that when they happen to be men? Hyuk! Not satisfied with that they keep up with their endless chatter. Blah blah blah blah blah.
What do you do when you come across the matrimonial ad for someone you know? Probably no different than making such extremely disconnected statements. No, seriously. Do you tell the guy she was dating that her parents have put her on the marriage market? Or do you hold back for reasons of preserving personal dignity? Who would want to be known as the kind of person who reads matrimonial advertisements? Especially when they appear in the Sunday papers! More importantly, what are you supposed to do if the ad is for the girl you want to spend the rest of your life with? Obviously she is willing to go through the pains of screening three million guys just so she does not end up with you. Does it mean you are really pathetic or is she being plain stupid? Questions. Questions. Questions.
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
Tom, Dick, and Harry
I make no attempt to mask my absolute dislike for corporate gyan. Nay, make that abhorrence. I could never understand for the life of me why anyone would ever spew away so many hours of their lives penning down literature on the subject. More than that, it completely boggles me why anyone should choose to read those books. Ever! I mean, did your mom drop you on the head or something?
Talking of kid-dropping parents, what really goes through their minds when they come up with names for their offspring? Goldie. Dick. Chandi. Shanna. Seriously. The kid has to go through her entire life with that name. What were they thinking? Perhaps the same thing that they were while conceiving the baby - nothing, for had they put that cranium through its paces they would have used birth control.
Not everyone is born with the intellect of Einstein. That said, not everyone needs the intellect of Einstein. You would not want someone rattling on about the Schroedinger Wave Equation when you are on a date. Unless you are in the habit of dating people like that in which case you must re-evaluate your lifestyle choices. Either way, with all the technology of internet search engines at our disposal is 'Guy' the best we can come up with for a boy's name? Jeez!
The most famous bard could say 'What's in a name' and get away with it. Writers tend to get away with a lot. Besides, 400 years ago there was not much in anything let alone a name. Except in the gunpowder treason. That had an idea behind it, an idea so strong that it became the foundation of modern day democracy. And please! Not those mutilated versions that US presidents have passed down through generations.
We live in very shallow times. What you can pass off as your own is of the essence. Basically it makes more sense to own the keys to a Ferrari and not the Ferrari itself. Kinda hard to flash the car inside a restaurant. Oh my God! I finally got it - the true depth of the message of 'The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari'. Sell the Ferrari, but as long as you still have a set of its keys you can remain a part of that pseudo intellectual socialite crowd.
See what I mean? I never had to read the book to understand its message. In a nutshell, that is what corporate gyan is all about. No one understands it, not even the CEO who spreads it around.
Talking of kid-dropping parents, what really goes through their minds when they come up with names for their offspring? Goldie. Dick. Chandi. Shanna. Seriously. The kid has to go through her entire life with that name. What were they thinking? Perhaps the same thing that they were while conceiving the baby - nothing, for had they put that cranium through its paces they would have used birth control.
Not everyone is born with the intellect of Einstein. That said, not everyone needs the intellect of Einstein. You would not want someone rattling on about the Schroedinger Wave Equation when you are on a date. Unless you are in the habit of dating people like that in which case you must re-evaluate your lifestyle choices. Either way, with all the technology of internet search engines at our disposal is 'Guy' the best we can come up with for a boy's name? Jeez!
The most famous bard could say 'What's in a name' and get away with it. Writers tend to get away with a lot. Besides, 400 years ago there was not much in anything let alone a name. Except in the gunpowder treason. That had an idea behind it, an idea so strong that it became the foundation of modern day democracy. And please! Not those mutilated versions that US presidents have passed down through generations.
We live in very shallow times. What you can pass off as your own is of the essence. Basically it makes more sense to own the keys to a Ferrari and not the Ferrari itself. Kinda hard to flash the car inside a restaurant. Oh my God! I finally got it - the true depth of the message of 'The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari'. Sell the Ferrari, but as long as you still have a set of its keys you can remain a part of that pseudo intellectual socialite crowd.
See what I mean? I never had to read the book to understand its message. In a nutshell, that is what corporate gyan is all about. No one understands it, not even the CEO who spreads it around.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Of wit and the people who don't get it
It gets a little unnerving when even someone you have slept with for over a year does not get your witty remarks. Ordinary mortals would begin to question the very genesis of their sense of humour. It is one thing to have your wit bounce over those you work with - they usually have the IQ of a Microsoft Windows computer and it is quite acceptable to look down upon them. Quite another, however, when that happens with someone who is aware of how many moles you have in those regions of your body that you never saw yourself.
Thank the devil for life's small favours then that I am neither ordinary nor a mortal. So what if I choose to work the numbers on my laptop in a Salsa club teeming with hot women tapping their feet to some lovely music? Could any ordinary mortal resist the lure of giving in to the temptation? That I don't know Salsa from Dirty Dancing (not much difference, or is there?) notwithstanding.
I have made it abundantly clear that I don't discriminate on the basis of race, colour or marital status. Up until yesterday I did not know if I actually believed in it or if it was an illusion I had built up around me. Anyway. The woman in reference called me at what can be described as the best time of the day - the 15 minutes before wake up time. We are still on good terms though now there is nothing between us. Not even a sheet! He he he. Could not pass up making an innuendo. My bad.
So we get talking about this woman I meet at the club. Not like I want to grow old with her or something. I have an eye that tends to appreciate the finer aspects of life, and let us leave it at that. She is married. In fact, that was the first thing that I noticed about her. Did not make an iota of a difference. But that is all supporting information. Here is the part about the wit.
I tell the woman who called that the woman who does the Salsa is exactly my type. She knows what my type is - any woman who knows what she wants and is not afraid to get it. She asked nonetheless. That was all the invitation I needed. The conversation went something like this:
Woman on phone: "So what is your type? Tall, beautiful, demure?"
Me: "Married."
C'mon. That was a good one. But it sailed right over her head. Or may be that is what happens to women post me. Withdrawal symptoms perhaps? Whatever it is, let me not try to analyse it lest I should get a thump on my skull.
Since I have never bothered with order on my blogs, let me continue with the tradition and digress. I think I am falling in love all over again. With my feet. I was giving myself a foot massage, and the skin was oh so soft! Like I was touching a baby. If there is ever such a thing as masturbating your vanity, then feeling your smooth feet would be it.
Thank the devil for life's small favours then that I am neither ordinary nor a mortal. So what if I choose to work the numbers on my laptop in a Salsa club teeming with hot women tapping their feet to some lovely music? Could any ordinary mortal resist the lure of giving in to the temptation? That I don't know Salsa from Dirty Dancing (not much difference, or is there?) notwithstanding.
I have made it abundantly clear that I don't discriminate on the basis of race, colour or marital status. Up until yesterday I did not know if I actually believed in it or if it was an illusion I had built up around me. Anyway. The woman in reference called me at what can be described as the best time of the day - the 15 minutes before wake up time. We are still on good terms though now there is nothing between us. Not even a sheet! He he he. Could not pass up making an innuendo. My bad.
So we get talking about this woman I meet at the club. Not like I want to grow old with her or something. I have an eye that tends to appreciate the finer aspects of life, and let us leave it at that. She is married. In fact, that was the first thing that I noticed about her. Did not make an iota of a difference. But that is all supporting information. Here is the part about the wit.
I tell the woman who called that the woman who does the Salsa is exactly my type. She knows what my type is - any woman who knows what she wants and is not afraid to get it. She asked nonetheless. That was all the invitation I needed. The conversation went something like this:
Woman on phone: "So what is your type? Tall, beautiful, demure?"
Me: "Married."
C'mon. That was a good one. But it sailed right over her head. Or may be that is what happens to women post me. Withdrawal symptoms perhaps? Whatever it is, let me not try to analyse it lest I should get a thump on my skull.
Since I have never bothered with order on my blogs, let me continue with the tradition and digress. I think I am falling in love all over again. With my feet. I was giving myself a foot massage, and the skin was oh so soft! Like I was touching a baby. If there is ever such a thing as masturbating your vanity, then feeling your smooth feet would be it.
Monday, February 12, 2007
Leaving on a jet plane
It is no secret that I was meant for a different era. I have learnt to accept it with time. It is not easy to come to terms with it. Not effortless at all to finally make peace with the fact that you skipped a generation or two. In fact, quite demanding. Only more painful than writing a whole paragraph saying the same thing over and over again.
I love the old world, the world of the 60s and the 70s, the world of free sex, rock and roll, Ursula Andress and Sophia Loren, and no airport security. Anyone who has spent more time getting through baggage screening, metal detectors, and frisk searches than in flight would have the good sense to concur. Whether it is all for "our security" is questioning, especially since I did manage to 'sneak in' a can of deo in my cabin baggage just for the thrill of it. This woman I know has been carrying a cigarette lighter in her hand bag with elan.
Anyway. This is not about airport security. It is about the absence of it. For a good part of last week I have been travelling. Nigeria has no baggage screening in any of its airports. No aero-bridges, either. You just walk on the tarmac! Fantastic, isn't it? To still find the old world. I especially loved the Owerri airport. Well, it is a cargo airport doubling up as a passenger one since the Port Harcourt airport has been closed for what seems like forever. It is green all around. Lovely.
Abuja is the perfect example for lopsided development. In a country where three-fourths of the population lives below the poverty line, is a capital city of broad expressways, glittering hotels, and magnificent landscaping. It is the bride of Nigeria - all decked up as if she walked straight out of the bandbox.
We went to Dome, the only bowling alley in Nigeria. I don't know if bowling is a silly game or if it was the five double shots of vodka but I managed to score three strikes without ever having played the game before. Nah, it must be a silly game. I have consciously kept off bowling. I believe it is a game for the superficial snobs.
Flew down to Owerri the next day. The drive from Owerri to Port Harcourt is beautiful. Green everywhere, and a smooth stretch of the road too. Just try not to get involved with the booming business of the region - kidnapping for ransom - since you would mostly be on the wrong side of it. When you are not unnerved by the sight of burnt vehicles dotting the road, the sight of highway police greets you - they stop you virtually every two kilometres or so.
Port Harcourt is called the Garden City. Make no mistake, it is not like the garden city of India. The gardens here refer to the natural growth. It is gorgeous, nonetheless. Went to Choba the following evening. One of our instant noodles plants is in Choba. Basically did not do much there except have a jolly good time. Went to the plant sometime after midnight where I was quite the bundle of joy to discover that I still can recognise a shell and tube heat exchanger when I see one. Yes Dad, all that money you spent on my education did not go down the drain.
Chaand sifaarish jo karta hamaari deta woh tumko bataa
Sharmo haya ke parde giraake karni hai humko khata
Zid hai ab to hai khudko mitaana
Hona hai tujhmein fanaa
Humse door jaaoge kaise
Dil se hamein bhulaaoge kaise
Hum woh khushboo hain jo saanson mein baste hain
Khud ki saanson ko rok paaoge kaise
Saw Fanaa. Finally! I was wrong, and it is not often when that happens. They still know how to pen lyrics. And they still know how to write good Urdu shaayari. As the song goes, 'Subhaan Allah'!
I love the old world, the world of the 60s and the 70s, the world of free sex, rock and roll, Ursula Andress and Sophia Loren, and no airport security. Anyone who has spent more time getting through baggage screening, metal detectors, and frisk searches than in flight would have the good sense to concur. Whether it is all for "our security" is questioning, especially since I did manage to 'sneak in' a can of deo in my cabin baggage just for the thrill of it. This woman I know has been carrying a cigarette lighter in her hand bag with elan.
Anyway. This is not about airport security. It is about the absence of it. For a good part of last week I have been travelling. Nigeria has no baggage screening in any of its airports. No aero-bridges, either. You just walk on the tarmac! Fantastic, isn't it? To still find the old world. I especially loved the Owerri airport. Well, it is a cargo airport doubling up as a passenger one since the Port Harcourt airport has been closed for what seems like forever. It is green all around. Lovely.
Abuja is the perfect example for lopsided development. In a country where three-fourths of the population lives below the poverty line, is a capital city of broad expressways, glittering hotels, and magnificent landscaping. It is the bride of Nigeria - all decked up as if she walked straight out of the bandbox.
We went to Dome, the only bowling alley in Nigeria. I don't know if bowling is a silly game or if it was the five double shots of vodka but I managed to score three strikes without ever having played the game before. Nah, it must be a silly game. I have consciously kept off bowling. I believe it is a game for the superficial snobs.
Flew down to Owerri the next day. The drive from Owerri to Port Harcourt is beautiful. Green everywhere, and a smooth stretch of the road too. Just try not to get involved with the booming business of the region - kidnapping for ransom - since you would mostly be on the wrong side of it. When you are not unnerved by the sight of burnt vehicles dotting the road, the sight of highway police greets you - they stop you virtually every two kilometres or so.
Port Harcourt is called the Garden City. Make no mistake, it is not like the garden city of India. The gardens here refer to the natural growth. It is gorgeous, nonetheless. Went to Choba the following evening. One of our instant noodles plants is in Choba. Basically did not do much there except have a jolly good time. Went to the plant sometime after midnight where I was quite the bundle of joy to discover that I still can recognise a shell and tube heat exchanger when I see one. Yes Dad, all that money you spent on my education did not go down the drain.
Chaand sifaarish jo karta hamaari deta woh tumko bataa
Sharmo haya ke parde giraake karni hai humko khata
Zid hai ab to hai khudko mitaana
Hona hai tujhmein fanaa
Humse door jaaoge kaise
Dil se hamein bhulaaoge kaise
Hum woh khushboo hain jo saanson mein baste hain
Khud ki saanson ko rok paaoge kaise
Saw Fanaa. Finally! I was wrong, and it is not often when that happens. They still know how to pen lyrics. And they still know how to write good Urdu shaayari. As the song goes, 'Subhaan Allah'!
Monday, February 05, 2007
Kan o!
I have had my fingers in a few pies - both the metaphorical and the American variety, if you get my drift. This post is not about the latter. Partly, because my sister reads my blog. Mostly, because I really really really wish to avoid being run over by a mob of pissed women should I choose to discuss their pies or my fingers in them out in the open. Also, that would be crass. I like to maintain the delusion of class, not only as far as others are concerned.
That is important to me. For instance. You won't catch me dead with an unattractive woman. So what if I don't go out with women at all, or rather they choose to not go out with me. The point is you won't catch me dead with an unattractive one. In fact, that statement is oxymoronic. I have not come across any woman who is unattractive, though there are those with unattractive feet and those with unattractive minds.
May be that is a delusion too. No matter. The charm of delusion lies in that with time you do not know if you are deluded or if reality has moulded itself to fall in line with your delusion. That does not mean you are not able to differentiate fantasy from life. There is no difference, save that fiction makes sense. Besides, nothing exists except atoms and empty space. Everything else is an opionion.
But this is definitely real. I have the plane tickets to prove it. I was in Kano last week. Beautiful place. As different from Lagos as the colour of Jenna Jameson's hair on her head is from that between her legs. It is a medieval kind of place, one frozen in time. It was the biggest centre of commerce in Nigeria. The political power and the money still wrests with the people here. The weather was lovely - cool and breezy like Pilani in late October. The atmosphere of the city is laid back, and it has a very welcoming air to it.
I realised something this Saturday. I have very strong thighs. I have lovely feet too, and I am not the only one to say it. I know a gorgeous woman who concurs. Anyway. About the thighs. I did not take a moment to sit from 10 in the morning to 7 in the evening on Saturday. There was the year end customer party we threw. Huge guest list. 1200 people. Kept moving around all the time, talking to customers, doing the PR, things of that sort. Took a few shots of flaming B-52s at the end of the day to feel the blood running through my legs again. But it was all worth it.
I need to invest in a mosquito net. Nothing else keeps these blood suckers at bay. I have slept with LGMFs (Little Green Motherfuckers). They were bad, very very bad. But African mosquitoes are goddamn fantastic. Usually Indian mosquitoes respect air-conditioning. The bitches here laugh in the face of it, even when my room is cold enough to keep meat fresh for weeks.
All whores are bitches but all bitches are not whores. Interesting aside I came up with today while I was in that wonderful period of drifting in and out of sleep. A whore is a bitch because she does not care which dog rams her for she gets what she wants when it is done. A bitch is not a whore because she gets what she wants before it is all done. However, the act is always done. It is the chronology that differs.
Aside bonus: Why is love so hard to get once you find it?
That is important to me. For instance. You won't catch me dead with an unattractive woman. So what if I don't go out with women at all, or rather they choose to not go out with me. The point is you won't catch me dead with an unattractive one. In fact, that statement is oxymoronic. I have not come across any woman who is unattractive, though there are those with unattractive feet and those with unattractive minds.
May be that is a delusion too. No matter. The charm of delusion lies in that with time you do not know if you are deluded or if reality has moulded itself to fall in line with your delusion. That does not mean you are not able to differentiate fantasy from life. There is no difference, save that fiction makes sense. Besides, nothing exists except atoms and empty space. Everything else is an opionion.
But this is definitely real. I have the plane tickets to prove it. I was in Kano last week. Beautiful place. As different from Lagos as the colour of Jenna Jameson's hair on her head is from that between her legs. It is a medieval kind of place, one frozen in time. It was the biggest centre of commerce in Nigeria. The political power and the money still wrests with the people here. The weather was lovely - cool and breezy like Pilani in late October. The atmosphere of the city is laid back, and it has a very welcoming air to it.
I realised something this Saturday. I have very strong thighs. I have lovely feet too, and I am not the only one to say it. I know a gorgeous woman who concurs. Anyway. About the thighs. I did not take a moment to sit from 10 in the morning to 7 in the evening on Saturday. There was the year end customer party we threw. Huge guest list. 1200 people. Kept moving around all the time, talking to customers, doing the PR, things of that sort. Took a few shots of flaming B-52s at the end of the day to feel the blood running through my legs again. But it was all worth it.
I need to invest in a mosquito net. Nothing else keeps these blood suckers at bay. I have slept with LGMFs (Little Green Motherfuckers). They were bad, very very bad. But African mosquitoes are goddamn fantastic. Usually Indian mosquitoes respect air-conditioning. The bitches here laugh in the face of it, even when my room is cold enough to keep meat fresh for weeks.
All whores are bitches but all bitches are not whores. Interesting aside I came up with today while I was in that wonderful period of drifting in and out of sleep. A whore is a bitch because she does not care which dog rams her for she gets what she wants when it is done. A bitch is not a whore because she gets what she wants before it is all done. However, the act is always done. It is the chronology that differs.
Aside bonus: Why is love so hard to get once you find it?
Monday, January 29, 2007
Hyuk! There goes the chomu...
The blank page! I never thought I would admit that the blank page staring back at me could be intimidating. And thank whoever controls the universe that I never did because it is not going to happen. The admittance, of course. I have spewed enough gut on this blog. Why add to the gore?
There are chomu (Chomu: 1. Anyone whose parents should have had the good sense to abstain since their ten minutes of pleasure produced nothing but an annoying irritance. 2. Anyone who is lesser than you, more specifically in their fashion sense, personal hygiene, eating habits. 3. Anyone with intellect limited to the extent that you risk spontaneous head implosion everytime you ask them a question.) people everywhere. I don't think very highly of chomu people. I believe they should be exterminated, a la ethnic cleansing.
Everytime I see this male (yes, yes I mean that as a highly derogatory reference) my anal hair stand on their end almost jutting out of my pants through my underwear. Whether I have very coarse hair or I wear silk underwear I shall let the women who read my posts decide. But that male is the quintessentially real chomu. Pardonable chomus are those who have no qualms of being otherwise. The anal-hair raising kinds think that sliced bread is the next best thing since they happened.
Personally, I don't know why sliced bread is accorded an exalted status. Trust the yanks to come up with something this banal. I don't approve of many things as it is but if the yanks were the last things (things only - they are an accident that happened to the human race and let us leave it at that) left in this cosmos I still would not approve of them. The same way I would not approve of chomu people using face creams or people sharing bathrooms/loos. Who does that?
That brings us to something very tragic. I have had to share my housemate's bathroom the last few days because the drain of my bath has become a Centre for Study in Transport Phenomenon. It has re-engineered itself to work the reverse way. So what if I am all for personal toilets? I am not very approving of casual sex either. The point being?
It was not very long ago when this woman ran her hands all over my tight ass. A near repeat occured two days ago at a bar. I say a near repeat because this woman went a step ahead. She actually felt me up. I don't know how drunk she was, which is not to say that I don't have the stuff that deserves feeling up even if at that moment in time it very much preferred to be by itself. What happened next? I can't say for my sister reads my blog. What I will state, however, is that I don't have in me what it takes to take advantage of a drunk woman, unless she is that former colleague of mine. For her, ethical issues are good for only one thing - to be flung out the window. At the same time, I am not saying that the woman who felt me up was drunk or even that she was not.
I put two and two together the other day. And voila! I realised that during the first half of business about 300 people walk in and out of my office. The abrasion on the tiling mocks the manufacturer's claims of 'scratch resistance' like Neha Dhupia mocked the Miss India contest when she entered it with those atrocious teeth of hers. That she won it quantifies the foul odour there would have been due to the collective bad breath of all the contestants. In some cultures, France for instance, bad breath may be a turn on (come on, show me a French with good teeth) but good sense prevails elsewhere.
Thank you and goodnight.
There are chomu (Chomu: 1. Anyone whose parents should have had the good sense to abstain since their ten minutes of pleasure produced nothing but an annoying irritance. 2. Anyone who is lesser than you, more specifically in their fashion sense, personal hygiene, eating habits. 3. Anyone with intellect limited to the extent that you risk spontaneous head implosion everytime you ask them a question.) people everywhere. I don't think very highly of chomu people. I believe they should be exterminated, a la ethnic cleansing.
Everytime I see this male (yes, yes I mean that as a highly derogatory reference) my anal hair stand on their end almost jutting out of my pants through my underwear. Whether I have very coarse hair or I wear silk underwear I shall let the women who read my posts decide. But that male is the quintessentially real chomu. Pardonable chomus are those who have no qualms of being otherwise. The anal-hair raising kinds think that sliced bread is the next best thing since they happened.
Personally, I don't know why sliced bread is accorded an exalted status. Trust the yanks to come up with something this banal. I don't approve of many things as it is but if the yanks were the last things (things only - they are an accident that happened to the human race and let us leave it at that) left in this cosmos I still would not approve of them. The same way I would not approve of chomu people using face creams or people sharing bathrooms/loos. Who does that?
That brings us to something very tragic. I have had to share my housemate's bathroom the last few days because the drain of my bath has become a Centre for Study in Transport Phenomenon. It has re-engineered itself to work the reverse way. So what if I am all for personal toilets? I am not very approving of casual sex either. The point being?
It was not very long ago when this woman ran her hands all over my tight ass. A near repeat occured two days ago at a bar. I say a near repeat because this woman went a step ahead. She actually felt me up. I don't know how drunk she was, which is not to say that I don't have the stuff that deserves feeling up even if at that moment in time it very much preferred to be by itself. What happened next? I can't say for my sister reads my blog. What I will state, however, is that I don't have in me what it takes to take advantage of a drunk woman, unless she is that former colleague of mine. For her, ethical issues are good for only one thing - to be flung out the window. At the same time, I am not saying that the woman who felt me up was drunk or even that she was not.
I put two and two together the other day. And voila! I realised that during the first half of business about 300 people walk in and out of my office. The abrasion on the tiling mocks the manufacturer's claims of 'scratch resistance' like Neha Dhupia mocked the Miss India contest when she entered it with those atrocious teeth of hers. That she won it quantifies the foul odour there would have been due to the collective bad breath of all the contestants. In some cultures, France for instance, bad breath may be a turn on (come on, show me a French with good teeth) but good sense prevails elsewhere.
Thank you and goodnight.
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Monday, January 22, 2007
Momentary enlightenment
There are moments in my life. Of course, there are moments in all our lives. Just that I am more interested in my moments. I am self-centred that way. Actually, I am self-centred in every way but that is not the point of this post. Come to think of it, I have suddenly started making points in my posts. From having a natural flair for being completely pointless, I am at a place where I cannot but make points. What a fall! Let me not harp on a point again. Sigh!
Speaking of my moments, today for instance, I was in conversation with an intelligent woman. Well, okay. That statement is laced with redundancy. You can only have a conversation with those who are intelligent. Anyway. I tend to have better conversations with women. The more I talk to them, the more my conviction grows - any woman who aims to be equal to a man lacks ambition. That gyan too was given to me by a woman.
So. During the conversation in question, I started to wonder about the true depth of the phrase 'scare the shit out of someone'. What does it mean? I proposed that you scare someone to the extent that you constipate them. The woman came up with an alternative reasoning - you scare them so much that you give them the runs. See, I could never have thought of that in a thousand years. The same way I could never have thought that intelligent conversations could be more a survival necessity than food. Or even good green tea.
In my two months in Lagos, I have sorely missed my survival tonic. I have searched and searched. I cannot locate green tea for the life of me. If someone knows where I need to look, please pass on the information. It will be your good deed for the year. The thing is I am not a frequent tea-drinker. I am the avid variety. The tea has to be just right. I am more accomodating with coffee. It is not even a real drink. You cannot expect from artificiality an experience that transcends living.
Whiskey and tea are like that. They have more in common than Johnny Walker. Legend has it that Johnny Walker never had a sip of alcohol. His movies, however, are replete with his drunk idiosyncracies - scenes of him holding a bottle while he is doing his thing have made us laugh and cry. He filled the bottle with tea. I don't know if he got high on tea or not, but tea can have that effect. Green tea more so. If water is the whiskey of life, then tea is certainly the Absinth of it.
Aside: Woman without her man is incomplete.
Woman. Without her, man is incomplete.
The difference punctuation makes!
Speaking of my moments, today for instance, I was in conversation with an intelligent woman. Well, okay. That statement is laced with redundancy. You can only have a conversation with those who are intelligent. Anyway. I tend to have better conversations with women. The more I talk to them, the more my conviction grows - any woman who aims to be equal to a man lacks ambition. That gyan too was given to me by a woman.
So. During the conversation in question, I started to wonder about the true depth of the phrase 'scare the shit out of someone'. What does it mean? I proposed that you scare someone to the extent that you constipate them. The woman came up with an alternative reasoning - you scare them so much that you give them the runs. See, I could never have thought of that in a thousand years. The same way I could never have thought that intelligent conversations could be more a survival necessity than food. Or even good green tea.
In my two months in Lagos, I have sorely missed my survival tonic. I have searched and searched. I cannot locate green tea for the life of me. If someone knows where I need to look, please pass on the information. It will be your good deed for the year. The thing is I am not a frequent tea-drinker. I am the avid variety. The tea has to be just right. I am more accomodating with coffee. It is not even a real drink. You cannot expect from artificiality an experience that transcends living.
Whiskey and tea are like that. They have more in common than Johnny Walker. Legend has it that Johnny Walker never had a sip of alcohol. His movies, however, are replete with his drunk idiosyncracies - scenes of him holding a bottle while he is doing his thing have made us laugh and cry. He filled the bottle with tea. I don't know if he got high on tea or not, but tea can have that effect. Green tea more so. If water is the whiskey of life, then tea is certainly the Absinth of it.
Aside: Woman without her man is incomplete.
Woman. Without her, man is incomplete.
The difference punctuation makes!
Thursday, January 18, 2007
The ass of all things
Single guys don’t need much to survive – food, clothing, shelter, house-help, and sex. Ah well. If you are a guy you need sex, preferably with another person. That is not to imply that women don’t need sex. They are just prudish about it. Also, they don’t have an appendage dangling between their legs raising its point periodically.
No wonder chauvinists tend to believe men have more brains than women. I am not one to concur with people for I believe concurrence exhibits a weakness of character. The fact remains, however, that men do have two centres of thought, though the one between our ears has atrophied due to eons of disuse. To make up for it, we think from our balls. We keep it simple too. We think only two things – sex, and ways to think of sex.
I don’t know what women think. I don’t wish to get into a woman’s mind. I would rather get into her bed, thank you very much. It took me 19 of my 25 years on this planet to realise the obviousness of the truth first distilled and sublimed by Harold Robbins. Tits and ass – they make the world go round. Of course, pear-shaped tits like those of Cindy Crawford, Sharon Stone and Elizabeth Hurley, and heart-shaped asses like those of Kim Basinger, Kylie Minogue, and Naomi Campbell do a far better job.
More than the blatant sexual connotation, there is a deeper significance to that statement. It is simply another way to word the ‘carrot and stick policy’. Obviously, tits are the carrots. They are usually all the motivation men ever need, and usually cause for all the self-esteem, or the lack of it, in women. And nothing works more beautifully than a bamboo up the ass – the deeper the bamboo the louder the moan.
The super boss is in town. The asses of all the other bosses are collectively on fire. It is great fun! It is not sadistic pleasure, mind you. It transcends sadism and reaches a plain hitherto unknown. What’s more, there is good whiskey – Royal Salute 21 years. Smooth, like wiping your arse with silk. Chivas Regal 18 years is bird vomit compared to it.
Have been in meetings with the MAN (Money, Authority, Need) the last two days. Good fun. He rams your ass in such a way that the only thing you can say once you have recouped sufficiently from your orgasmic spasms is ‘thank you’. I had more than my fair share of humping. There is more in the offing for he does not leave till next week. Yoo hoo!
No wonder chauvinists tend to believe men have more brains than women. I am not one to concur with people for I believe concurrence exhibits a weakness of character. The fact remains, however, that men do have two centres of thought, though the one between our ears has atrophied due to eons of disuse. To make up for it, we think from our balls. We keep it simple too. We think only two things – sex, and ways to think of sex.
I don’t know what women think. I don’t wish to get into a woman’s mind. I would rather get into her bed, thank you very much. It took me 19 of my 25 years on this planet to realise the obviousness of the truth first distilled and sublimed by Harold Robbins. Tits and ass – they make the world go round. Of course, pear-shaped tits like those of Cindy Crawford, Sharon Stone and Elizabeth Hurley, and heart-shaped asses like those of Kim Basinger, Kylie Minogue, and Naomi Campbell do a far better job.
More than the blatant sexual connotation, there is a deeper significance to that statement. It is simply another way to word the ‘carrot and stick policy’. Obviously, tits are the carrots. They are usually all the motivation men ever need, and usually cause for all the self-esteem, or the lack of it, in women. And nothing works more beautifully than a bamboo up the ass – the deeper the bamboo the louder the moan.
The super boss is in town. The asses of all the other bosses are collectively on fire. It is great fun! It is not sadistic pleasure, mind you. It transcends sadism and reaches a plain hitherto unknown. What’s more, there is good whiskey – Royal Salute 21 years. Smooth, like wiping your arse with silk. Chivas Regal 18 years is bird vomit compared to it.
Have been in meetings with the MAN (Money, Authority, Need) the last two days. Good fun. He rams your ass in such a way that the only thing you can say once you have recouped sufficiently from your orgasmic spasms is ‘thank you’. I had more than my fair share of humping. There is more in the offing for he does not leave till next week. Yoo hoo!
Monday, January 15, 2007
Randomised nothingness
I envy three kinds of people – those without credit cards, those without mobile phones, and those without laptop computers. They owe nothing to anybody. I have all three. And none of my own volition. Volition. Such a lovely word that is!
Moving on. I haven’t quite been able to zero in on the greatest evil that we have created for ourselves, though mobile phones have got to rank right up there. Unless you are lost in the Sahara, you are never off the grid. Therein lies the irony. You only really need to use your cell phone if you are lost. Good luck with finding a signal then!
Nah, this is not a crack on modern living and its terrible offshoots. Hell, I am all for the present world. Electricity, motorised transportation, treadmills –all joys that we take for granted. So what if we are dumping enough filth in the biosphere to completely destroy the world as we know it a couple of decades down the line? Hey, we did our thinking and got to where we are. Fuck the future generations. If they want to live, let them do their own thinking and clean the place up. Survival of the fittest, didn’t Darwin say?
Phew, I have this terrific disposition for going off on my own tangent! I don’t remember what I intended to say in this post. It surely was not this. It was to be about the last few days, my work, my women, my sex life or the lack of it, etc. Where do I begin?
The women at my workplace are a riot! Not just those who work, but also those who visit. Ask them a question, and expect nothing short of a smart-alecky answer. The more rhetorical a question, the more ripping a reply. You don’t know what to do. It annoys you. Yet it bemuses you at the same time. You just can’t help appreciate the wit. Sample this.
This woman customer of ours visits us very early one morning. So we ask her very matter-of-factly, “Madam, how come you are in this early?” Pat comes her answer, “So I could spend the whole day with you.” How do you deal with an answer like that? Right! You enjoy it. :)
Another instance. We do a de-brief every evening before close of business. Someone makes a huge faux pas, what I sometimes deliberately describe as a ‘blunder mistake’. To cover it up, she (used purely to make the language non-sexist – not indicative of the gender of the person in question) says it was a ‘topographical’ error when she meant to say it was a ‘typographical’ error. Either way, full points for presence of mind. That the report was hand-written and not typed notwithstanding.
There is something I have learned. The Nigerian loves to talk. That way, it is one of the easiest countries in the world to live in. You will never be socially challenged as long as you walk on two legs and breathe oxygen. If you are a bit of a prude, though, be prepared to have your brains knocked in every once in a while.
Like I discovered on Saturday. There was a staff party. A group of four dancers was performing. And, boy were they exotic! So hot that you could eat them with a spoon. So wild that they could give all those girls in hip-hop videos a run for their money. Anyway. They drag me to the centre of the stage and sit me down on a chair. Then they start doing their thing. Shaking their booty, doing the splits – that sort of thing. By the time they finished, I did not have any shred of my dignity left in me. Reminded me of this old Hindi song, “Hamein to loot liya mil ke husn waalon ne…” Whoever thinks that it is impossible to rape a man, please think again!
There are Sundays and then there are fantastic Sundays. Yesterday’s was a fantastically happy Sunday! Had nothing to do save vegetate all day long. Well, drove down to the Supermarket in the evening to get supplies but that is not a life-threatening chore. Would have loved it, in fact, if the car had been a Fiat. The only Fiats I have seen here are trucks. I don’t really intend driving them.
Aside: How do you win someone’s heart when she wants you to have nothing to do with her?
Moving on. I haven’t quite been able to zero in on the greatest evil that we have created for ourselves, though mobile phones have got to rank right up there. Unless you are lost in the Sahara, you are never off the grid. Therein lies the irony. You only really need to use your cell phone if you are lost. Good luck with finding a signal then!
Nah, this is not a crack on modern living and its terrible offshoots. Hell, I am all for the present world. Electricity, motorised transportation, treadmills –all joys that we take for granted. So what if we are dumping enough filth in the biosphere to completely destroy the world as we know it a couple of decades down the line? Hey, we did our thinking and got to where we are. Fuck the future generations. If they want to live, let them do their own thinking and clean the place up. Survival of the fittest, didn’t Darwin say?
Phew, I have this terrific disposition for going off on my own tangent! I don’t remember what I intended to say in this post. It surely was not this. It was to be about the last few days, my work, my women, my sex life or the lack of it, etc. Where do I begin?
The women at my workplace are a riot! Not just those who work, but also those who visit. Ask them a question, and expect nothing short of a smart-alecky answer. The more rhetorical a question, the more ripping a reply. You don’t know what to do. It annoys you. Yet it bemuses you at the same time. You just can’t help appreciate the wit. Sample this.
This woman customer of ours visits us very early one morning. So we ask her very matter-of-factly, “Madam, how come you are in this early?” Pat comes her answer, “So I could spend the whole day with you.” How do you deal with an answer like that? Right! You enjoy it. :)
Another instance. We do a de-brief every evening before close of business. Someone makes a huge faux pas, what I sometimes deliberately describe as a ‘blunder mistake’. To cover it up, she (used purely to make the language non-sexist – not indicative of the gender of the person in question) says it was a ‘topographical’ error when she meant to say it was a ‘typographical’ error. Either way, full points for presence of mind. That the report was hand-written and not typed notwithstanding.
There is something I have learned. The Nigerian loves to talk. That way, it is one of the easiest countries in the world to live in. You will never be socially challenged as long as you walk on two legs and breathe oxygen. If you are a bit of a prude, though, be prepared to have your brains knocked in every once in a while.
Like I discovered on Saturday. There was a staff party. A group of four dancers was performing. And, boy were they exotic! So hot that you could eat them with a spoon. So wild that they could give all those girls in hip-hop videos a run for their money. Anyway. They drag me to the centre of the stage and sit me down on a chair. Then they start doing their thing. Shaking their booty, doing the splits – that sort of thing. By the time they finished, I did not have any shred of my dignity left in me. Reminded me of this old Hindi song, “Hamein to loot liya mil ke husn waalon ne…” Whoever thinks that it is impossible to rape a man, please think again!
There are Sundays and then there are fantastic Sundays. Yesterday’s was a fantastically happy Sunday! Had nothing to do save vegetate all day long. Well, drove down to the Supermarket in the evening to get supplies but that is not a life-threatening chore. Would have loved it, in fact, if the car had been a Fiat. The only Fiats I have seen here are trucks. I don’t really intend driving them.
Aside: How do you win someone’s heart when she wants you to have nothing to do with her?
Friday, January 05, 2007
Ka-Ching!
The Holidays are done! So done that you can poke a fork. Can't even begin to describe that post-holiday feeling of emptiness. I like the holiday season. I like the delusion that I am getting paid for no work. Delusion it is because I inevitably end up working on those days. At least in Nigeria. In India, it was different. My working on a holiday meant the house was on fire. Ah, the good life!
I am not particularly fond of crying over spilt milk, more so if it is milk that I have spilt. Aware I was of what I was getting into when I decided to move here. What's more is that I did not even do it for the money. Yes, mercenary that I think of myself to be the greens had nothing to do with it. I actually moved for better 'career prospects'! And I thought such terms were dropped around solely for making pseudo impressions in job interviews. Sometimes our own doings can be such eye-openers! Shocking.
Cliched though it may sound (isn't this phrase itself hackneyed?), each day at work teaches me something different. I need to learn fast too. For instance, if I bump into an Area Boy (a really flashy term for a local goon) then I must either choose to part with some of my money or all of my life. When talking to customers, there cannot be a slip between the cup and the lip. Vehicles drive on the right of the road - especially of note if you don't wish to have your body parts and you separated. And, most importantly, when eating spring rolls remember it is the temperature on the inside and not on the surface that determines how charred your mouth gets.
My workplace is chaotic. There is almost a method to the madness - how we Indians define a fish market. The hustly-bustly noise almost blows the wind out of your sails the first time. Takes some getting used to. When you do, you have only one reaction to silence. Huh? Silence means no business, which means no money coming in. We all love the jingling of coins, don't we? The smell of Naira bills tickles my nostrils like the nostrils of Jehovah were tickled by the burnt offerings of the Semites, to borrow a similie from Maugham (and please, it is pronounced 'Maum' not 'Maugham')1.
Today was good. Not orgasmic by any stretch of the imagination but good. I was out in the market (a big market called Agege) for half of the day, as has become the norm. I was passing by a Mosque just after the Friday Prayers were offerred, and I saw women coming out of it! From what I knew, men and women are not to pray at the same mosque. I guess my knowledge base isn't too sound. We live and learn. At any rate, we live2.
We are doing a consumer promotion for our noodles. It is the first time that such a grand promo has been done in Nigeria. There are loads of gift items to be won - wristbands, glasses, ipods, handsets, bags, footballs, even scholarships. The response is fantastic. Yesterday this four year old girl came to the office for she had won a scholarship of Naira 100,000. Makes one glad when such things happen. Such a tiny little thing she was but quite the brat! The awareness that kids of this generation have sometimes makes me wonder if I am living in a cocoon.
The week is almost through. Saturday is half a working day. Cruel, I know. I had taken two days in a weekend for granted for far too long, I suppose.
1. William Somerset Maugham; The Luncheon
2. Douglas Adams; The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
I am not particularly fond of crying over spilt milk, more so if it is milk that I have spilt. Aware I was of what I was getting into when I decided to move here. What's more is that I did not even do it for the money. Yes, mercenary that I think of myself to be the greens had nothing to do with it. I actually moved for better 'career prospects'! And I thought such terms were dropped around solely for making pseudo impressions in job interviews. Sometimes our own doings can be such eye-openers! Shocking.
Cliched though it may sound (isn't this phrase itself hackneyed?), each day at work teaches me something different. I need to learn fast too. For instance, if I bump into an Area Boy (a really flashy term for a local goon) then I must either choose to part with some of my money or all of my life. When talking to customers, there cannot be a slip between the cup and the lip. Vehicles drive on the right of the road - especially of note if you don't wish to have your body parts and you separated. And, most importantly, when eating spring rolls remember it is the temperature on the inside and not on the surface that determines how charred your mouth gets.
My workplace is chaotic. There is almost a method to the madness - how we Indians define a fish market. The hustly-bustly noise almost blows the wind out of your sails the first time. Takes some getting used to. When you do, you have only one reaction to silence. Huh? Silence means no business, which means no money coming in. We all love the jingling of coins, don't we? The smell of Naira bills tickles my nostrils like the nostrils of Jehovah were tickled by the burnt offerings of the Semites, to borrow a similie from Maugham (and please, it is pronounced 'Maum' not 'Maugham')1.
Today was good. Not orgasmic by any stretch of the imagination but good. I was out in the market (a big market called Agege) for half of the day, as has become the norm. I was passing by a Mosque just after the Friday Prayers were offerred, and I saw women coming out of it! From what I knew, men and women are not to pray at the same mosque. I guess my knowledge base isn't too sound. We live and learn. At any rate, we live2.
We are doing a consumer promotion for our noodles. It is the first time that such a grand promo has been done in Nigeria. There are loads of gift items to be won - wristbands, glasses, ipods, handsets, bags, footballs, even scholarships. The response is fantastic. Yesterday this four year old girl came to the office for she had won a scholarship of Naira 100,000. Makes one glad when such things happen. Such a tiny little thing she was but quite the brat! The awareness that kids of this generation have sometimes makes me wonder if I am living in a cocoon.
The week is almost through. Saturday is half a working day. Cruel, I know. I had taken two days in a weekend for granted for far too long, I suppose.
1. William Somerset Maugham; The Luncheon
2. Douglas Adams; The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
From this year to the next
There are some things money can't buy - good times and friends to state a couple. Okay. Bad examples. The fact remains that there is no life without money, whatever those suave Mastercard ads say be damned. And if you get to spend someone else's money, then you are in what I choose to call monetary nirvana.
For a change, this New Year's eve I had no intent to indulge in alcohol. Not like I have been ritually drinking each 31st December but it is the thought that counts. Anyway. I had intent. That does not mean I went through with it. Honestly, I think it is the feeble minded who carry out what they intend to. There is a certain charm in making a resolve and then going back on it. Not everyone can do it.
Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on which end of the spectrum you choose to belong to, most of the human race continues to believe in integrity, morality, and ethics. They tend to be straightforward - practice what they preach. Dull, I know. Yes, some don't do a one hundred percent compliance. That is dull too. It is doing a complete volte face that only the select few are capable of. Therein lies the magnetism of humanity.
Anyway. There was an office party at a disc. It would not be an exaggeration if I said that at the end of it I had enough liquor in me to stock a decent bar. Two Black Labels on the rocks (that is the only acceptable way to have scotch) started it all. This was followed by a few shots of whiskey, tequila, and vodka. Somewhere around midnight, a bottle of champagne was uncorked. Post that there were a few shots of rum. It was rounded off well by Flaming Lambourghini - hold Drambuie in your mouth, light it up, and then gulp it down. Almost like the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster - having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped around a large gold brick1.
Not too many babes around, though. The few that were were either taken, married or gay. How did I know? I already explained about knowing when a woman is gay2. It is easier determining a woman's marital status. Her left ring finger gives it away. Some married women don't wear a ring, and some unmarried women do. It does not matter. What matters is this. If she is wearing a ring, she is telling you to keep off. If she is not, then she is open to invitation. Why should it make any difference if she is married or otherwise provided she is available?
Went to a couple of clubs after that. A few women gyrating their booty to the music, but nothing that could entice me enough to park my derriere for any respectable span of time. Got home around four, went to my room, took my clothes off, and hit the sack. Woke up when hunger got the better of me. Around 1:30 in the afty. Ate. Watched Boston Legal. Ate some more. And slept again, this time only to wake up the next morning.
Life is good!
1. Douglas Adams; Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
2. Script Writer; Hitting the nail on the head; Of Travels and Travails
For a change, this New Year's eve I had no intent to indulge in alcohol. Not like I have been ritually drinking each 31st December but it is the thought that counts. Anyway. I had intent. That does not mean I went through with it. Honestly, I think it is the feeble minded who carry out what they intend to. There is a certain charm in making a resolve and then going back on it. Not everyone can do it.
Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on which end of the spectrum you choose to belong to, most of the human race continues to believe in integrity, morality, and ethics. They tend to be straightforward - practice what they preach. Dull, I know. Yes, some don't do a one hundred percent compliance. That is dull too. It is doing a complete volte face that only the select few are capable of. Therein lies the magnetism of humanity.
Anyway. There was an office party at a disc. It would not be an exaggeration if I said that at the end of it I had enough liquor in me to stock a decent bar. Two Black Labels on the rocks (that is the only acceptable way to have scotch) started it all. This was followed by a few shots of whiskey, tequila, and vodka. Somewhere around midnight, a bottle of champagne was uncorked. Post that there were a few shots of rum. It was rounded off well by Flaming Lambourghini - hold Drambuie in your mouth, light it up, and then gulp it down. Almost like the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster - having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped around a large gold brick1.
Not too many babes around, though. The few that were were either taken, married or gay. How did I know? I already explained about knowing when a woman is gay2. It is easier determining a woman's marital status. Her left ring finger gives it away. Some married women don't wear a ring, and some unmarried women do. It does not matter. What matters is this. If she is wearing a ring, she is telling you to keep off. If she is not, then she is open to invitation. Why should it make any difference if she is married or otherwise provided she is available?
Went to a couple of clubs after that. A few women gyrating their booty to the music, but nothing that could entice me enough to park my derriere for any respectable span of time. Got home around four, went to my room, took my clothes off, and hit the sack. Woke up when hunger got the better of me. Around 1:30 in the afty. Ate. Watched Boston Legal. Ate some more. And slept again, this time only to wake up the next morning.
Life is good!
1. Douglas Adams; Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
2. Script Writer; Hitting the nail on the head; Of Travels and Travails
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