Sunday evenings

After all those interminable mondays and tuesdays and so on till friday, you're left with the impression that friday evening will never arrive. You feel like a persecuted saint waiting for the second coming. When finally (hallelujah!) it's there and you're a bit heady with the euphoria.

No one is more disgustingly cheerful than I am on a friday evening or a saturday morning. Two whole days. The possibilities seem endless. I plan to wisely space out all the work I have, go out with my friends, read a couple of books and still have time left over for lazing around in front of the idiot box and bugging my mom.

To be fair, I do accomplish about 90 percent of the above-mentioned plans but somehow the ones pertaining to work of any kind is invariably postponed till sunday evening. I believe it's psychology of the kind 'Never do today what you can put off till tomorrow'.

It's all going good until it hits you on sunday evening that you're facing another week full of mondays and tuesdays and the rest of it and you have a pile of unfinished work to boot. It's a poignantly resigned and remorseful outlook that grips me on these days.

So I pause, put my books away and my legs up. After that there's nothing to do but curl up with a good novel to cheer myself up.

Letting off steam

I’ve finally got some time to even think about writing another entry.
Oh no, I haven’t been incredibly busy. I leave that to busy people. It’s just that I can only work so much in one day, being naturally less inclined to do things I’m not very interested in, and going to college and coming back basically takes it all out of me.
My inspiration has been sapped. Drained. All creativity is being siphoned away from my mind in small doses for seven hours a day. It’s really difficult to think about blog entries when someone’s going on about finite automata and instruction sets right before your face.

Right. I feel much better now, thank you.

In spite of being sapped of all thought processes, I have been doing some soul searching. It’s not like I want to do it but there’s nothing else to do on an hour long journey every morning if you can’t sleep at the drop of a hat like some people.
The results are quite disturbing. No surprises there.

What I’m getting at in a rather nebulous way here is that sometimes things are all disconnected, like the join-the-dots thing kids do. My life is just one big page full of dots right now. Seriously, nothing connects. Like entities with no relationship. Like functions that haven’t been called. Like the unfinished bridges marring the city. I could go on but you’ve been tried enough already.

I just wish that I could have a few ‘Aha!’ moments. I’m not looking for anything huge like the purpose of life, only a few minor details. Is that too much to ask for? I think not.

Doodles

The weekend’s almost here and there’s still half an hour to go for The Big Bang Theory so here I am, bent over the keyboard furiously typing away.
All the optimism which bubbled over on Sunday night was vapourised into nothingness on Monday. One look at my class-in charge and the way she taught Theory of Computation effectively convinced me that the semester was going to be a huge trial. Add to that recurrent heat-induced headaches and it’s no surprise that I was a major grouch.

But no more! Yes, I had a great day today. All my professors apart from TOC are pretty okay, especially math thank God.

By the way, there are a lot of guys from training centers in the city coming around to our college to enlighten us about java and networking and stuff. The past two days have all been about how being a SCJP (Sun certified java programmer) or a CCNA (Cisco certified networking associate) would immediately guarantee us a high paying job.
It was hilarious and also brought home the ill-concealed truth when one of the guys in my batch yelled, “Kedaikalana?” from the back.

My mom is watching ‘Vijay Awards’ in the background right now. She’s having fun commenting on everyone from Parthiban to Jothika. I only saw the part where the woman hosting the show gushed over Nayantara and Nayantara went ‘So sweet!’
That was funny. Because I can guarantee that girls who gush so enthusiastically and say ‘so sweet’ in precisely that tone are really saying ‘God, I hate this female.’

Okay, okay, I’ve got to go. BBT is about to start. I will keep you updated on my fascinatingly boring life, as always.
On a Parthian shot, in Bahz Luhrman’s famous words, wear sunscreen.

Tempus Fugit - Part 1

I have just had a week to die for. As my too short holiday draws to an end, I at least have the satisfaction of knowing that I have enjoyed my holidays. Am I looking forward to the new academic year with optimism and joy that passeth all understanding?
HA. Not even if you paid me.

Oh, by the way, I am now a senior. It definitely doesn’t feel like I’m one. When I sounded a few people out on this very gratifying idea all I got were very sharp raps on the head for ‘presuming’ to be a senior. But I know why they’re all so cranky about it.
Damn ego problem. Every one of them. Can’t stand to see someone grow a year older and boss someone else around.

Here’s a quick recap on the past week:
(By the way, this is going to be one long post. I think I’ll split it into two. Or three.)

Day 1:
Woke up early, went to a Saravana Bhavan diner for breakfast, watched Star Trek in Sathyam (Yes!), headed out to City Centre for a huge lunch, dropped by the beach which was almost empty and scorching hot (but hey, why did God give us hats and sunglasses right?), sang karaoke in the car with no regard to the mental health of the driver, crashed in Remy’s place where we rediscovered the joy of messing up someone else’s room. Then my parents dragged me to my second cousin’s daughter’s engagement. (No, don’t try to figure it out. You’ll only go crazy.)
End of day one.



Day 2:
Went walking in the morning with three of my friends and scandalized the park by laughing too loudly. Seriously, laughing out loud is not frowned upon only if you’re one of those people who laugh for health purposes or yoga or something. Have you ever witnessed this? It is very scary.
And ridiculously funny after the initial shock has worn off.

I say, why make a fool of yourself over something which is not even funny when you can do it for something which actually is?

Then I landed up in Kay’s place where we went through all our old scrapbooks and almost died laughing.
It contained, among other things, descriptions of fat history teachers, misguided attempts at poetry and threats of incarceration in the school bathroom.
Now what can be funnier than reading your old scrapbooks?
Taking videos of people reading your old scrapbooks.
End of day two.



Day 3:
Operation Clean-Up. I pulled out all the contents of my cupboards and shelves, threw out junk, rearranged furniture and generally made a bigger mess before everything went back to its rightful place. By the end of the day, I was exhausted but proud.
Imagine.
I just cleaned an entire room.
Moi.
Amazing.


Day 4:
Went to the park and played Shuttle for a change. I’d like to think I did not make a complete fool of myself but when you see forty and fifty year old uncles playing better than you, it doesn’t do your self esteem any favours.
Later I got my driving license! After going through one heck of a long and incredibly stupid process.

After that, I went shopping with my mother and got a bunch of new stuff because mom was feeling unusually generous.
Loaded with my recent purchases, we headed down to my sister’s place. The next day heralded my niece’s initiation into the mysterious world of kindergarten so there was a full out photo session featuring her in her uniform posing with her bag and water bottle and what-not. Finally, I got back home totally exhausted after all that infectious kiddie excitement.
End of day four.

Day 5 : continued in next post...

Tempus Fugit - Part 2

Day 5:
Started the day trying to wake Charms up to go walking but was sadly unsuccessful. So I had to settle for a quick sunrise on the terrace whilst listening to Sara Bareilles belting out ‘Love song’ and ‘Bottle it up’. I spent the rest of the day lazing around and I visited the library in the evening. I decided to get P.G. Wodehouse on a whim and spent the rest of the evening chuckling to myself as Bertram Wooster and his butler Jeeves found themselves in unlikely but very funny situations.
End of day five.



Day 6:
It was the old shuttle cock fiasco again. But we played considerably better than the last disastrous attempt and did not draw as many amused glances as before. By the time we decided to leave I’m sure we were on the verge of being unceremoniously kicked out by the old and respectable citizens frequenting the park.

At home, after a couple of hours of doing nothing, my thoughts alighted on the magnificent keyboard my father had got me years ago which was in comfortable retirement in one corner of my room.

I printed out the sheet music for ‘Hey there Delilah’, hunted through my old books for ‘Smallwood’s Piano Tutor’, cleaned up the keyboard and settled down to dazzle myself with my latent musical prowess. Only after banging away half the song did I realize that the treble clef was wrongly printed one note higher.
I decided that I had played enough for one day and closed the whole thing up again.
Geniuses can’t over exert themselves you know.
I then spent most of the remaining time talking with my friends over the phone.
End of day six.



Day 7:
Shuttle cock. By this time, I shouldn’t have to tell you, we were pros. So there was just this slight bit of a swagger as we abused that poor cock.
We were regulars by then. Everywhere we turned we saw familiar faces. There seemed to be a resigned acceptance to our presence in the park. Maybe they realized they can’t really kick us off public property.

The evening was…different. We attended a meeting based on the word of one of our younger brothers who guaranteed an evening of fun. It was okay but I will not deny that I wished several times during the proceedings to be elsewhere.
But all was not lost. We decided to recuperate in Creamy Inn where I believe the topics of conversation revolved around Africa, gorillas and Phantoms (the car, not the ghost).

Again, the establishment did not look kindly upon our undignified mirth.

We (my friends and I) have often pondered the more unfathomable mysteries of our characters, the predominant feature of which being a marked absence of anything approaching dignity when more than one of us has gathered to wreak general havoc on the unsuspecting populace.
Is this natural? (We ask ourselves.) Now that we’re considered adults shouldn’t we at least try for a little dignity? Then we decided…
Nah.
End of day seven.


Day 8:
Having watched ’27 dresses’ into the early hours of the morning, I woke up at a suitably advanced hour. Then I was off to Rushi’s place for her mom’s famous cheese parathas and paneer pakodas for lunch. Then Charms, Kay and I decided to bug Remy again. It’s amazing how much fun you can have watching a movie with your friends at home even if you’ve watched it before. After thoroughly dissecting Wolverine on several levels and getting high on nothing in particular, it was time to go home.

At this point I’d like to thank Charms for trusting me with her life.
It humbles me that you sat behind me on that Activa as I endangered your life in heavy traffic without screaming even once Charms.
You are an amazing girl.
End of day eight.


And it’s a wrap people.
Tomorrow’s a new day. I’m going back to college. You never know, it might not be so bad.

Beam us up, Scotty

It’s the end of a dark era…er, semester. It seems like an age has passed by already. The fourth semester takes the award for being the most interminably annoying semester so far. Whether it was the PQT professor or the visual programming lab…there was always something to feel crappy about everyday. I’ve never consigned an entire semester to the devil before but I do so now with great pleasure. Goodbye and good riddance.

There are so many things I want to write about that it’s impossible to put it in one entry. First things first. Star trek is hands down the best movie I have seen in a long time. Zachary Quinto is a worthy successor of Leonard Nimoy as Spock and Chris Pine was amazing as Captain Kirk. The visual effects were stunning and the whole movie is worth it just to say the famous lines, ‘Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the USS Enterprise…’at the end in unison with the movie.

Also the Vulcan greeting is quickly gaining vogue among my friends as the hottest way to annoy each other. Only we substitute ‘Live long and prosper’ with ‘Die baby, die!’

Of course, there were the usual moments of hilarity like when I, the klutz that I am, spilt coke on my seat and had to mop it up with tissues and sit on one side of it for the rest of the time when Kirk was hanging off the edge of precipices. He seemed to do that a lot in this movie whether it was when he trashed his mother’s car, battled a Romulan on a signal jamming station above Vulcan or on the Romulan mining vessel from the future.

This one is a real fall-off-the-edge-of-your-seat kind of movie if you’re familiar with the television series. I grew up watching Captain Jean-Luc Picard and Kathryn Janeway steer their respective spaceships through alien assaults, time reversals and black hole threats in unknown quadrants of the universe while the crew attempted to have something approaching a social life so I felt like a kid on Christmas morning confronted with Santa himself.

If you’re even remotely interested in sci-fi I guarantee you will love this movie. If you’re not, it’s about time you boldly went where you haven’t gone before and head to the nearest theatre, ASAP.

The kids in my life!

I was just thinking about the youngest members of my family and they totally deserve an entry for being so cool and everything. So here’s the tyke update:

My niece Divya, is all ready to go to school armed with her Nike (or is it Adidas?) schoolbag, brand new uniform, foot fun shoes and charming personality. She’s going to knock ‘em dead. She can’t wait to leave home and she’s three. Kids these days are way too smart.

Her little brother Ajay, in the meanwhile, continues his ground breaking research on ‘What I can’t eat but tastes good anyway’ and ‘how fast can I crawl away from my mom before she catches up?’ These experiments are neither approved nor appreciated by the higher authorities.

My other nephew (the last one, I swear...for now) Josh, is learning to say very interesting words. His dad’s already taught him ‘mamiar’. A little premature but I’m sure it will end up in the annals of family history as being extremely hilarious and will come back to haunt him when he’s old enough to be embarrassed about it. Sometimes your own family’s out to get you and you don’t even know it. Watch out, Josh.

Ah, to be young and ignorant of what’s waiting for you in the big, bad, mad world...
Has to suck actually. No one tells you anything worth knowing.
If I knew then what I know now, I would have stayed three.