Cell-o-feign

I think I'll just cease to exist. Too much I don't know about. And the more I get to know, the more amazed I am.
Mobile phones now have a new kind of cover I'm told. And guess what the covers are known as? Hold your breath ( Yes Lali, do your pranayama :P)! Condom Covers.
So much info packed into those two words.
Did you know, your cellphone was male, did you? No, I didn't either. But now I do.
I now also know:
Why we women just can't do without one;
Why we are oh sooo emotionally and physically attached to one;
Why more often than not we are so busy fingering, smooching and caressing one;
Why we just can't take our eyes off a goodlooking one;
Why it invariably dies on us just when we have some interesting gossip to pass on;
Why we can never find it, just when we need it;
Why we get so irritated with their ringtones;
Why we get bored of one so easily;
Why we need to change one so often;
Now I know!

Just how much can it really cover up? All that MMS'ing prone to spreading STD, eh? Iye maane, what next?

Dangling conversation

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high….Where words come out from the depth of truth…

I’m no patriot, thank you. I have a habit of taking words at their face value and making them suit my purpose. These words are just some of them. I’m told I have a tongue sharper than the sharpest knife and a mind so transparent that you can see through it. Hence, I call a spade a spade, a bitch a bitch and an ass an ass, sometimes with a smile on my lips, sometimes gruffly and at other times with a straight face. Hello, I am an extrovert. What did you expect? Some interpret it as tactlessness, others think I’m too brusque while there are still others who think I’m conceited, hence condescending; and my fistful of really close people, don’t think, they know. They know me for what I’m worth, thankfully.

Unfortunately, the number of people I cannot hold in my fist is an overwhelming majority. The miserable sods! More often than not, my humour falls flat on them, they choose to misunderstand me and then fabricate vicious yarns that are delectably pickled as they trickle down from one to another, irrevocably complicating matters. And all this post a personal chat or some such.

But this is the age of virtual communication. And most conversations are happily left dangling. People talk to near, dear and loved ones through Skype, as much as we chat with total strangers, through MSM &Yahoo messengers, over Gtalk or in virtual chatrooms! They, in fact, talk, chat, flirt, even fornicate online these days! (Fuck leaky condoms, someone tell those latex manufacturers, it can't get safer than this!) They have the license to avoid, ignore, scream at, kiss, hug, and even kill:P just by keying in the right words, with little or no emotional scruples whatsoever and no shelf-life. So, if you are mad at someone or totally in awe of another one day, you can kiss and make up or boot the infatuation out the next day. There is hardly anything personal in things virtual. And, the intonation of written words is easy to misinterpret. If the way you talk can stir up a hornet’s nest, imagine the damage that a written word can cause, if misinterpreted.

It’s happened with me. Something written in good humour has been taken to heart and nasty emails have landed in my unsuspecting mailbox, only to screw my Monday morning. It must be my inability to use words correctly, or my vanity. I don’t know, I just say what comes to my mind, you like it or not. I can’t say something and feel/do another. I wasn’t born Janus, so where do I get another face from? Hyprocrisy isn’t a word I take to very kindly. I am what I am. Don’t talk to me if you don’t get my sense of humour, or if you can’t withstand my honesty. The choice is yours, just like I have the right to approve or disapprove with your point of view. So let’s just:

… sit and drink our coffee
Couched in our indifference,
Like shells upon the shore
You can hear the ocean roar
In The Dangling Conversation
And the superficial sighs,
The borders of our lives.

Memoirs of a Lifetime

Calcutta’d been on my mind for the past few weeks. The change that resident Calcuttans have been propagating and visitors have been singing paeans about had to be experienced first hand. But more importantly, I had to meet the people, who still find the city so eminently livable and wouldn’t dream of leaving it for any other bilious coloured pasture. So there I was on an extended weekend.

I’m back now from the most hectic but lovely trip to Calcutta. From the moment I landed, till I was ready to board the flight, again in just 72 hours I think I have lived almost three-fourths of my life with people I’d never met before and would surely have died a deprived woman, if I didn’t make the effort this time round. Oh and must add, I’m very glad certain self-important people stayed away thus saving me a whole lot of impolite and unsocial behaviour.

Sunday evening with Lali and Rimi (and please ignore her comments about my looks, she’s just a myopic child) was by far the longest and the best, on hindsight. The dark chocolate icecream, tempered with some juicy gossip rendered a divine flavour, to put it mildly. In fact, so much so that I didn’t even feel the agony, of holding the most delightful conversation in impeccable English without interspersing sentences with kancha bangla khistis (err..sorry Lali dear, am going to desist explaining that for you;) Mustn’t taar my reputation, after all:P) And honestly, what’s an adda session without lapsing into profanities:P ?

The next evening, which was supposed to be a full fledged blogmeet was almost washed out, but for the locational proximity to the Khiladi No.1 and his accomplished actress. Discussions on Tamil film actresses and common acquaintances were sufficiently spiced up with Potato wedges in sour cream dip, chicken fingers and roast chicken sandwich. Toots was guileless enough to confess ( you little hog, u;)) she could be bought over with food, so I ensured they ate, while I nibbled and listened intently to most interesting nuggets of information, which I have been sworn to secrecy about;) Hence, you die a deprived lot!

There were other non-bloggers and my regular friends who made my stay immensely enjoyable. I was so engrossed in meeting people that I actually forgot to gorge on the rolls and phuchkas, people. Urmi says, she’s prolly going to disown me for “forgetting to eat” if I don’t kill myself before that, that is. However, I didn’t forget to go and collect my little pickle gift from Lali, which I shall savour till my next trip, whenever that maybe. Thanks dear.

As you can see, I really couldn’t care for the makeover or metamorphosis the city has gone through, but there are some people there, I would love to go back to, over and over again.

Coming of Age

I have certainly come of age. Bone degeneration has set in, so says my Ortho, who's been treating me for an excruciating back and neck pain for the last few weeks and my physiotherapist makes it a point to psyche me out every morning with the possible fatalities if I don't follow the doc's advice, while she's giving me the rubs ( I admit the men make far better physios, though I had the pleasure of his rub just for a day:P).

But it's my evil little G who makes me feel really out of place these days. She educates me about the ways certain things are done, such as folding and keeping her clothes and things in order, switching on the TV and the accessories to put in a Chip & Dale CD for her exclusive viewing pleasure, and follows it up with a sweet reprimand "Tumi jaano na?"(Don't you know?). She wants to help me in my chores, prolly because she senses the effort that I need to put in even to beat an egg. "I want to help you do the 'gulgul', Mamma". The resultant mess of course is none of her business to clear up. But she wants to be carried and shown how the omelette turns out. I love the proactiveness, especially since the other half avoids the kitchen like the AIDS.

She's also my in house fashionista. Not only does she know what matches with what, right from her undies to the clothes to her shoes, she also makes sure both N & I match up to her style before we leave the house! The other day I wore one of my weird mix adn match ensembles to work (a magenta short kurti with just a simple turquoise blue floral embroidery along the V neck and turquoise blue block printed churidaar with a turquoise printed chiffon dupatta), which she didn't see as she was away at school. But when she went to pick me up from work, which is part of her daily evening routine, her first exclamation on seeing me: " Eta ki porecho? (What are you wearing?) Eta ki match kore? (taking the dupatta inher hand and pointing to my kurti) Of course, I thought it did and told her so quite nonchalantly but was promptly glared back at and told "Na. Tumi kichhu jano na." ( You know nothing) Indeed! If only I knew what is to follow. Like a wet cat I mewed and accepted my ignorance about all things fashionable. Did you even know how to wear your undies when you were three years old?

The icing on the cake came last night. N came in really late and after the initial excitement, both father and daughter plonked themselves on the bed, exhausted. N, as is his wont, started irritating her by calling her sundry silly names. Unperturbed, the toddling young lady shot back at him with "Hey Sexy"! and shut him up for good. I hope N won't ever try eve-teasing again, at least not three-year olds!
As for me, I age humbly.