Doing Nothing

It's been a while since I came here to rant. Well, actually this is not going to be a rant (hopefully). I just noticed that I came here to babble long time back and since today I am in that mood, why not babble and "contribute" to a blog? 

So the weekend was a big active deal, compared to what it otherwise is, and left me quite tired. This is saying something for someone in the "prime of their youth". I went for a party on Saturday night and went out in the evening for a good time on Sunday. Both had their share of good times and Saturday night had its share of fun and yuck-ick-flack-ness. But I don't want to go on about that here. So yes, both these left me quite tired by the end of the weekend, and Monday morning I just didn't want to get up and go to work. This is a state that usually accompanies every morning, when you get up and wonder why you have to go to work, what if you didn't go today, what would you do if you didn't go to work today, and then, after practical questions were asked and dismissed, you'd ask yourself the question - What if I never had to get up and go to work? This question when asked first brings about the best answer one would ever like to come to be real, "I'll do whatever I want". This goes away as soon as you begin pondering on what it is that you do want to do, and how, and when, and where and so on. I doubt any of us actually get beyond wishing for whatever it is that we want.

So there I was, waking up at an hour which would bring much rebuke and lecture from parents, and indifference from many others who have the same lifestyle that I currently do. I woke up at the indecent hour of 2 p.m. That is the time by which I should be at work, sitting in front of my machine, checking mail, trying to sort out the day and see what meaning could possibly be wrung out from a day that seems no different than any other. But today, I checked the time, asked myself if I wanted to go to work today, answered a very simple "no" and went back to sleep. After that I got up at around 6 in the evening and decided I'll do nothing at all today. Which is what I did all day. I made tea, drank a lot of it, read a nice soppy romantic book, avoided people at home the best I could, ordered for groceries, made dinner that no parent concerned for their child's health would allow you to eat, watched a movie, avoided some more people and came online to see what other people were talking about. 

DOING NOTHING:

Making Tea: Here's the thing with making tea. It should be the simplest thing, but it rarely is. I for one can never know how much tea to put in and always end up drinking something that should kill me but doesn't because I'm stronger than that. So I've now resorted to using tea-bags. I was going to make tea because I was too lazy to go make some real food that could serve as lunch/brunch/snackrunch whatever.. I did the usual boiling water, putting fancy things in it to boil like ginger that looked so dry and twisted that it made me feel as if I was really concocting a herbal drink, adding sugar etc, when the flatmate who was "helping" me out with this asked aloud that making tea with tea-bags is so much work as you have to boil the water too. She said some other things too, but they left my mind before landing on it. I was so indifferent by then that I didn't even want to think of other less tiring and demanding ways of making tea. So, tea was made, and since I made her a cup too I thought I'd go sit on the couch and watch TV with her and see how the evening goes. The pointless banter that almost always seems to accompany "chai-sessions" and which many a times is very entertaining and interesting and all things nice, didn't really happen this time around. I never understand how and why people expect others to listen intently to what happened to someone who's not famous, and by the sounds of it not interesting nor worth the listening time. Which led me to politely excuse myself from the company by expressing my bored state and slouching back to my room to read this soppy novel I picked up on the weekend in peace, with my tea and tea-bag and the pleasure that comes with finding you tea's still warm. 

Reading Soppy Romantic Novels: Of late, I'd not read any simple, romantic type book. I used to read a lot of those in school, as one of my mother's best friend found it in my best interests to read all the Mills & Boons, Nora Roberts, Danielle Steels available. I'm sure she thought they would play a great role in educating my mind and I can safely say they did. For one they gave you the power to predict what is going to happen in a novel by reading just the first chapter, or in some occasions, the first four pages. Second, they reinforced beliefs that all women, even the most ambitious, feminist, and independent women, at the end of the day, want "love". Everyone needs LOVE. No living without that, no Sir, not at all. As I grew up and learned many other things, these novels ceased to interest me, even remotely. Even the snippets featuring a man claiming that he wanted to take the woman, there and then with no heed for the world, stopped arousing any interest. And thus it was for quite some years, where reading "romance" novels just didn't happen, mostly out of lack of interest and because by this stage I believed my education to be adequately complete. But on Sunday, I found this tiny bookshop and I picked up this book called Kate Kincaid by Henry Denker. I picked this up because I'd read one novel by Mr.Denker before, when I was quite young and was very moved back then. Based solely on that, and without even reading what the novel was about, I picked it up and began reading. Kate Kincaid is the story of our heroine by the same name who's a nurse and feels very oppressed by arrogant young doctors and how she's torn between two men who love her and all bangaboosh that happens in such novels. I don't think it's well written. But I'm liking it so far. There's always something to like about a "pretty nurse who's overdetermined and fiery" and wants to change the world. It's always pretty faces changing the course of history, innit? That aside, I think one major reason why I like it is its purpose is clear. It's aimed mainly to please and distract and provide escape. It doesn't want to make you think too much, or at all at places. It doesn't want to educate you, doesn't want to spark ideas in your head, doesn't want to push you under a running train, and all those things. It's plain and pure, use and throw entertainment. (Ok, maybe not that harsh. Maybe I will not really throw it away, but am not sure. ) There's something about your heroine struggling with choices, struggling to resist the kiss from a man who makes her forget things and to see a man, fall in love with a woman he can't take his eyes off. At some stage in life, that something might have meant wishing and dreaming about such things happening in real life. At this stage, it means that there's nice things happening, doesn't matter if it's "real world" or not, but that it's there, that things belonging to reality and fiction aren't necessarily exclusive of each other, that being happy at the prospect of it doesn't necessarily mean wanting it. 

Avoiding people: This is something that I've been pushed to exercise in extreme over the past few days or maybe months. I'm not completely serious when I say I hate people, nor am I joking in hyperbole. I don't really want to avoid people, I just want them to avoid me. (That's such a classic "It's not you, it's me"!) As you grow up you realize how much more fun it was being a child. Yeah, I know EVERYONE says that, but this time my reason is something else. When you were younger, and knew lesser people because you had lived for lesser years and had thus accumulated lesser number of "contacts", no one really cared much where you are as long as you made to school and meals on time. Now, if you stay at home, your office people will ask you where you are and why you aren't where you should be. If you are at home, your people at home will also ask you why you aren't where you should be. When you are not at home on weekend, then everyone wants to know where you went. If you are home on the weekend, then they ask why you are at home and not outside. I mean what is it that they really want? I know what they do, but that doesn't stop me from being pissed at it. So today, I had to answer three flatmates about why and how I was home and I have a strong suspicion that would have led to more questions had I not escaped in time. From work, colleague asks where I am and even the answer leads to probing for reason. Why can't one stay at home without a reason? Why have we begun to give so much importance to reasons? Why does it matter where and why someone is anywhere? To what use are you going to put that information? How much money are you going to make out of that knowledge?

As a child, when you sulked, someone will entertain you and give you some candy and get you to stop sulking. Now, people would rather talk. Yes, talking is the solution to everything. Everyone wants to talk about it. Sure, even I do want to talk about things and non-things, but I have people for that. And I go to them for that. And I tell others when they are not part of that unfortunate group. But then, they assume that because I'm closed to talking, I'd probably be open to listening. Which I am not, either. I was going under the assumption that "talking" covered for what is generally assumed to be a conversation (–noun: informal interchange ofthoughts, information, etc., by spoken words; oral communication between persons; talk; colloquy.) and thus expected people to get it when I say "I don't want to talk/I don't talk much". But it seems that most people don't really understand this definition, and going by other things, this probably holds true for the definition and meaning of a lot of other things too. This comes as a surprise to some people I call friends, those who comprise that unfortunate group to whom I do go to "talk". I used to be a talkative person, was also considered very social and friendly and all those things. I use the past tense because I believe the way it was said then is very different from how it is now. I still like to talk, to be social, to be friendly and all those things. But I have become more selective about the space and time in which I am so. Yes, I have become "boring", that,  in fact, should be the biggest reason for people to avoid me. But it doesn't seem that way. I don't think I'm that popular or deserve to be so. Deserving or not, it is undesirable right now. And that should not be seen as such a major change nor challenge. 

Recently while telling some people that I am going to join TFI, the response that I got in return was quite confusing, at times funny, and plain annoying in some cases. What has being social got to do with being able to teach kids? Are all our professors and teachers social butterflies buzzing from one party to another? I was also called "cold and distant", something which I do not challenge even once, but how does that come into what I am going to do? Were all the teachers who contributed to your life and learning warm, friendly and personal? Do you write "warm and lovely person" as one of your talents or achievements on your resume or CV? I know that personality matters affect how you work in any organization. But I've seen terms like "team player" and "leadership traits" being dropped around too many times to believe that everyone who's termed as that can do his/her job damn well. So why enmesh a person's behavior and attitude with respect to their personal life with their work? I agree teaching might be one of those jobs where a person's disposition makes a big difference. But do you really assume everyone to be uni-dimensional personalities, that the way they behave with you, they would behave with everyone else too? In that case, with the majority of the people, there's a reason I behave the way I do and take recourse to avoiding people. Think of it as your good fortune. 

Ordering Groceries: It's one of the biggest delights of our age- to order stuff and get it delivered to your doorstep. Even though it might be more economical, faster and healthier to just get out and buy things, but it's also another delight of our age to live in active denial. And reveling in its admission. That should get some brownie points. 

Making Dinner: This in my opinion is the single most enlightening indicator of how your life is. You know what kind of person you are and the life you lead by the way you make and have your dinner. Families eat dinner together, in front of the TV, while watching something, where the only noises are made by cutlery and crying women in the tube. Sometimes you have dinner outside, with friends, over laughter and conversation, but that's not a regular thing. It can never really become a regular thing. Dinner is a regular thing, and it follows patterns. It is as regular and representative as brushing teeth- what time you do it, what toothpaste you use, and how much time you spend over it. If one begins your day for you, the other brings it to an end, never relinquishing its grip on making it a part of your routine. 

For some days now, my flatmates have been making dinner for me. Before that it was my colleague who used to get dinner for me. Something which I'm thankful for, but more anxious because that means paying back that favor. Somehow, whenever someone makes dinner for me, unless its my mother, I feel as if something's owed between us. The debt to my mother for it is too great to be ever paid off, so I don't ponder upon it. But anyone else making dinner for me, even if it's not specifically for me, bothers me. Don't do that, because I won't do it for you. Even if I did, I'd expect you to make it back to me. It's a transaction in which I don't wish to be either party. Hence I like making dinner on my own, for myself. And that is rarely the healthy thing to do and which speaks a lot about my life and me, as a person. Left alone, I'd make dinner out of bread, eggs, instant noodles and anything that comes packaged and takes least amount of time to prepare and consume. Dinner is always a hasty and necessary affair. It is the cruelest of affairs and the most easy of them all. It's all gain and so tasteless. 

Movie Time: Doing nothing without watching a movie is such an incomplete experience. I remember in college, especially during second year, not going to class and doing nothing meant staying home and watching movies all day. I watched the Social Network today. Quite liked it. Used to hate Jesse Eisenberg before this, but I think I might change my mind about that. All slick-slick-talk-talk, and an immensely entertaining movie. Something that might have been a lot better had flatmates not found it necessary to interrupt me and talk trivialities as if life and death depended on it. This is my latest grudge- that of the movie watching experience being spoiled thanks to company. Why can't movies be watched the way they are supposed to be watched? Especially good movies. Why must you question and explain and point out and discuss and talk during a movie? I see that happening in the cinema so much these days that I think watching it at home might be a better solution. But even at home, there's the thing about people asking what you are doing when they can see you are watching something with headphones plugged in and asking further details after you tell them that you are watching a movie. The most annoying experience was maybe last Sunday when I was watching a movie on TV, and people saw that I was watching a movie and still talked around loudly till I had to tell them to take their talk about matrimonial prospects of Engineer+MBA types somewhere else and sod off from where the TV and I were. 

Watching a movie should be like reading, you get lost in it and forget the world outside you. People don't let that happen. People don't even let you get lost in your own head for that matter.

Online People Watching: This I guess is the most time consuming act of our lives. We listen to and watch and pry and learn a lot from people online. Some we know, some barely, some not at all, but we feel like we do. The number of times we chance a visit to Facebook and Twitter may definitely outnumber our visits to the restroom in a day. I guess it gives some precious pleasure to see what others are eating, picking out, reading, drinking, sharing and talking about. To some extent it's quite informative, and it provides for the distraction that helps you keep away from work that you so fear to embark upon. It's the perfect procrastinator and one rarely ever complains about such things. I won't. I like it. It helps me being hypocritical. And learn, at the same time. The number of times I've clicked on the Tweetdeck icon and gone to check on Facebook is something that is helping me live with myself better. Which is zero. As much as is it is a big attraction to go and check, it is an equal triumph in overcoming that need to do something that might be infinitesimally better. Overcoming addictive practices, I gather, always give such joys, and are also necessary, if one were to ever move from knowing to thinking, from experiencing to living.

That was I think most of doing nothing. I had hoped it won't be rant, but if it turned out to be so, then, who cares? Doing nothing and describing it seems to have done a whole lot of good to me, and, and I've also "contributed" to my blog and kept up with my diatribes.

Things I Really Like But Never Got A Chance To Mention

It's been a while since I've come here and posted. It wasn't because I didn't have time or material to whine about, but life has been such a whirlpool of flea-feces ridden events and incidents that I could only express my feelings through long sad stories about sleep and dreams. But now that I've recovered somewhat, I can talk about the latest irritation plaguing my life- people telling me what they like, on Facebook. Without me asking them. About things no one will ever ask them.

So today, I'm going to make a list of things, animals, people, emotions, incidents, emoticons, fungi and miscellaneous items that I like and share it with the world. If and when I have time and even less of a life, I will go create pages for each of these so that all of you can let your friends know that you and I, best buds, both like the same things, animals, people, emotions, incidents, emoticons, fungi and miscellaneous items.

No, wait. I can understand liking these things, but not some of the things that I see being liked and I'm incapable of putting them into any of these aforementioned categories. But since I assume human intellect is capable of understanding, empathizing, liking and sharing these statements, I'm gonna list down things, of similar nature, that I really really like. I'm not even sure if I like them, but I think if I ever saw some of these, my hands will automatically click on "like" the way yours do when you see anything with "<3".


Here they are:

- When I have a lot of work to do and yet I goof off my time by doing irrelevant things (like writing such posts) and telling everyone about it because that is the best way to let my employers know what a valuable asset I am to their organization.

- I hate it when no one likes the video I shared about a monkey throwing its excrement at a baby and a 200 year old Chinese woman.

 

- I feel elated when I see a cute guy with glowing skin and sexy hair-do approach me so that I can ask him about his brand of facewash, body shower gel and shampoo and then tell him what a girl he is.

- When I give you a missed call at three in the morning, it means something. It means that I'm throwing all over the place and none of my friends will take me back home and you're the only person I know who will respond to a missed call at 3 AM.

- "Lol" "Yeaaa" "Okkk" "Hahahah" "Hmmm" convey all the expressions, emotions and opinions required in any conversation. Be it about the latest quiz you took to find out the reason behind your birth or Third World debt.

- When I message you, it means I'm thinking about you. If I'm thinking about someone else, I'll probably be messaging them.

- You can save energy by being switching off your computer for three hours everyday. But, you can save time and energy by excluding all words from your vocabulary that involve vowels or have more than five letters.

- Why do we close our eyes when we pray? When we cry? When we dream? When we kiss? Because all beautiful things can only be felt. Vision not required at all. And yes, crying is a beautiful thing.

- Why type out things when what is on your mind, at any given time, can be conveyed through one click? It will only make your parents think they have achieved something by educating you for so many years.

- It hurts when someone you used to talk with everyday doesn't talk to you at all. It hurts even more to know that sharing this piece of private information on a public platform has not made any change.

- Every woman deserves a man who looks at her everyday like it's the first time he saw her. We all want to feel like Adam Sandler from 50 First Dates.

- I'm not beautiful, sexy or perfect. But I'm ME and I don't pretend to be anyone else. Never mind the photo of Zooey Deschanel as my profile picture.

- I AM UNIQUE. The rest 3,78,999 who liked this agree with me.

- Telling someone you honestly don't care but inside, you're dying. Of shame.

- "I'm fine" really means "I need a hug and someone to talk to, preferably a ridiculously patient person to hear the same story for the nine hundredth time. And special treatment, of course."

- Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you're wrong. Especially when you realize it after an hour of getting your ass owned.

- Waiting around for something you know will probably never happen, but still hoping it might..  Like Vogons demolishing Earth to build a hyperspatial express route through our star system. 

-Sometimes, you forgive people simply because you still want them in your life. And also because you are so lonely, insecure and spineless.

- That moment, when the universe conspires, when things go all movie-like and you just connect with the other person and know that they loathe you and hate your guts as much as you hate theirs.

- People actually love me and me liking wrongly worded profundity, but pretend otherwise because they can't match up to the awesomeness that is me. LOL.

There, I've put my heart out on a platter, laid bare my soul for everyone to see.I've mentioned some, only some mind you, of the things I've not yet had a chance to express. I hope you will see them, understand them, empathize and like them. I've also added tiny Like-like buttons so that you get the feel for them. They aren't real like buttons, but you know that. And you may not even like most of these banal statements. But you understand why, don't you?

I might lose many "friends" over this post, but then I'll gain a lot of wisdom and perspective to come up with statements that will help me win them back.

Of Birthday Bashing and Growing Up

It's an universally acknowledged fact that, after you turn 21, your increasing age is inversely proportional to the excitement with which you look forward to your birthday.

Imagine you are five. You look forward to turning six. Because it means all the adults will make a big deal out of it and get you presents and cake and let you do whatever you want, for the whole effing day!! Doing whatever you want kind of loses its charm when you are grown up and an adult and know that you can do whatever you want if you wanted to or weren't that lazy.

Imagine you are twelve. You look forward to turning thirteen. Because that means you become a teenager and have license to throw tantrums, behave badly and blame it on hormones, puberty and what-not. You will also be pleased to find yourself going higher in the school hierarchy, thinking too much about your appearance and on the brink of a long journey looking for the perfect and effective acne removal cream.

There you are, in your teens.You got voting rights when you turned eighteen, but who really gets excited about getting voting rights?? The elections didn't even happen that year, not the big ones anyway. You sailed through your teens doing everything you wanted to and didn't want to but did anyway because your parents didn't want you to, doing everything others seemed to be doing or avoided doing anything that any one else did because, yes, peer pressure works that way, finally landing on twenty, swearing to yourself to get over the teenage phase and become a real adult. But who counts twenty as a non-teen age group? Hell, you're still young, still in college, still under 21 and it is the only one year you've got to drink while not being of legal age. Nothing kicks a high like that, does it?

Now imagine you are twenty. And you are turning twenty-one. What are the perks? You get to drink legally. And surely, the day you turn twenty-one, you go get drunk and find it no different from all the other times before. So that perk stays for a day and then wears off. Then what? You are twenty-one, probably graduate or about to graduate. You now have to leave the comfort of college and go get yourself a job. In this universe, low attendance doesn't mean a talk with the Principal, here it's seeing your peanuts of a salary get reduced to shriveled skins of nuts. And failing in a test more often than not leads to a loss of means to livelihood and other comforts it brings, not to mention the fact that these ruddy tests happen too frequently and barely ever run on schedule.

Now imagine you are twenty-one and are turning twenty two. Or already have turned twenty two ten minutes back. What do you look forward to? To a day of calls, messages and wall posts wishing you fun, happiness and other nice things? To a day of more niceties and maybe an increased consumption of alcoholic beverages than what a normal day brings? To another year of sameness and minute differences? To another year of new resolutions that will be forgotten and discarded in a week? To catch up with other grown-up friends and whine together about growing older and leading a lackluster life? To put the sad moment of realization into words that will be the contents of a long whiny tirade against growing up? (check)

You know why kids look forward to their birthdays and adults dread theirs? It's not age. Well, not age alone anyway. It's school, college, a learning institution. With every passing year, you are glad to get the old year done with and begin a new one. Because you look forward to the next year to put you in a higher grade, to learn new stuff, to leave an old class behind, to forget old diagrams and definitions. With every coming year, you know you'll get a certificate, a parchment, a denouement in the written word that you have sailed through past year's storm of follies and failures and reached the shore of new undiscovered land, where there are yet unexplored territories and ample opportunities to make new mistakes.

It's not that we stop learning after getting out of schools. It's just that we stop getting as many frequent assurances and reassurances. Kindergarten teachers have time for their subjects, not normal adults leading busy lives. Your boss won't have the time to appreciate the efforts you took to color-code your complicated excel-sheet so that it's easy to understand. That's your job, you are not going to get a star on your dossier for every task you tick off your to-do list. Your friends won't have time to listen to you bitch about everyday activities the way they did when you pretended to be studying in the library. What used to capture attention before, will no longer dazzle your old, mature grown up audience. We're not kids anymore. We have lists to complete and files to organize. Who cares if you can't grow up and stop looking for a good word for every good thing you do, who has the time to care to what's happening to you when their own lives is, as the term nowadays goes- FUBAR?

So there you are, twenty-two and still not much of an anybody. In some era, people used to start their lives at this age. Nowadays, people your age are getting into rehab for the fourth time or are being compared to legends. People much younger are becoming superstars by having a voice that only puts their gender in doubt, and here you are, sure of your gender, unsure of what you are doing with your life. The only thing you've got to celebrate is that your generation can now blame the phenomenon of quarter-life crisis when the going gets tough. Well, that's good for reassurances.

Growing up can be such a pain. How can one not like Peter Pan?



PS: I don't know if it's a good idea to be listening to this one now- http://listen.grooveshark.com/#/s/1973+Album+Version+/DjkDf

Image: My 23rd Birthday by nyu   (It's not my 23rd, but, same/similar sentiments)

Anger Management

Ok, high time I came here and ranted. Well, it's not ranting. It's just some anger management right now.

I'm being really patient these days. With everything. Yes, I don't really want everyone to understand it. In fact I don't expect anyone to understand or whatever. It's just that I feel if I kept repeating it to myself, I'd be good at it. Gosh, I can never get that thing out of my head. I have, for some reason, always told myself that I will become what I tell myself. If I told myself I'm being patient, I will be so. I need more convincing for myself than for others. Or maybe I can't convince others about how convinced I am because I can't convince myself. This doesn't help but prove only one thing- I CANNOT SELL.

So, back to anger management. It is particularly difficult when you aren't burning your lungs out. It's even more difficult when you can't call up your best friend(s) because your head's so swollen with fake ego. And listening to all your favorite sweet songs doesn't help in writing or as they say, channelizing your energy to create something profound, meaningful and deep.

So yes, I am angry. Pissed. Angry. Irritated. All of those things that I could otherwise blame on PMS, and which I could get away with if it was for less than 6 hours. But, never mind. Things are definitely not looking good, despite me listening to all the sweet/happy songs. Only I can lie to myself well enough and delude myself into anger or happy highs. And with all that anger channelization, all I've doing is setting a record for saving drafts (thank you google for autosave). So far the count is : 4 blog posts, 3 mails. All resting safely somewhere where they wouldn't hurt/harm/maim/injure/kill anyone. Or lead to the same aforementioned happening to me afterward.

With all of this, I've made a list of things one should not do when angry. Some are based on real experiences and some are things I assume would hold good in a hypothetical situation:

1) Do not email. Type it out. Don't hit "Send". Let gmail do the "draft autosaved" thingy for you.
2) Do not talk on the phone if you're home and are not sure if your parents are asleep. Your parents don't need to know you've improved your swearocabulary over the years.
3)Do not kick your CPU when you know your PC is recuperating from the crash it went through 3 weeks back. It wouldn't help to have no music, no e-books, no sitcoms, no movies, no xkcd, when you're fuming.
4) Do not go for a haircut. Just in case.
5) Do not watch movies where the protagonists look real cool stabbing themselves with needles in the first half and real sad-ass losers by the other half, and by which time you'd have probably given up on watching it.
6) Do not go down memory lane if you're angry in a combination- like angry and sad or angry and lonely or angry and whatever else. Remember- thinking about good old days when life sucked and you couldn't do anything about it would not help the days when life still sucks and you can do something about it but refuse to do so.
7) Do not drink too much coffee/alcohol/cola or eat too much of chips/spicy food/chocolate.
8) Do not keep precious objects within your reach. Do not keep them in the company of sharp/heavy/both objects.
9) Do not try those counting from 20 to 1 or saying the alphabet backwards kind of tricks. You'd only lose momentum in your angry tirade and miss an epiphany, if any.
10) Do not look for therapy from music-Listening to some chick singing about her boyfriend not understanding her or a crazed guy with laryngitis screaming about his skin bleeding and intestines boiling in bile won't help you. If anything, it will only make it worse. Go classical. Only instrumental. Listen to Beethoven, if anything. That is, if you have any of it or can be patient enough to download it.
11) Do not try that whole 'breathe deeply and break your ribs exercise". All you manage to do is create an atmospheric imbalance of some sorts around you. Not to mention, you feel more tired than before.
12) Do not get into the whole sweating it out drama. You decide to go loosen some fat and push all that anger through kick boxing or aerobics or whatever it is that you do in the name of exercise, and then you pull a hamstring, sprain an ankle or break your hip and get confined to bed rest thus earning yourself some more time to brood and work yourself into a frenzy.
13) Do not get angry at the beginning or middle of your weekend. Get into those furies just a day before getting back to work on a weekday. You can let it all out and only blame work. Or you'd get so mad with work, you'd sort of forget about the original anger situation.
14) And don't waste time blogging. And if you've done that already, don't let it go to waste by shoving it into "Drafts". And no, there are no funny scribbles, comics kinda things going with this one. Take it or leave it.
15) And lastly, if you are mildly sleepy, forget all the crap about not taking anger to bed. Just take it and go flat on it. Don't waste time thinking, blogging, reading, listening to music, watching stuff, talking etc. Just sleep. That's probably the best thing to do. Apart from burning your lungs and killing the germs inside with some well turned out ethanol. But, never mind.

How to get over Writer's Block.

We all suffer from this one. Well not all of us, only those of us who claim to be writers, or just write and when we are completely bamboozled as to what we can write that would amuse or mildly entertain us we transfer all the blame to this overused apology for lack of any creative brilliance called Writer's Block.

So what do we do to combat this illness?

Wake up and brush and take a shower. Turn off the TV and get off the couch. Get a pet guniea pig. Go walk the dog. Walk and get over the block.

Go green and stop eating for a day or two. Make resolution to write a page every day.

Go bungee jumping. Do aventure and extreme sports. Dabble in the occult. Learn fang-shui and tarot and crystal-ball reading.

Participate in a reality show or a talent hunt. Sign up to enter a secret military intelligence gathering agency.

Drink soup. Or liquor. Anything, just drink. Something's bound to get you worked up and if you remember what you did, probably you can just pen it down and it may turn out to be not that bad for a start.

If these don't work, watch a movie or read a book. You might get suddenly inspired and produce a imitation or a review or either disguised under the other.

In case you are worried you might get influenced, albeit subconsciously, by the perusal of such iterms, then just stare. Have a good look at the world around you. Stare at the ceiling fan and think about the cycle of life and its futilty ( Try keeping images of people hanging from the ceiling out of your mind here). Look outside the window, see how people rush about their daily lives and for once, get over yourself and try, try really hard to weave a story about those random strangers walking in front of you. If nothing fails to grab your attention, look harder and find someone really good looking and just stare. This may lead you to two things- you might just find your muse and a story henceforth or you might end up being reported to the cops on grounds of harrassment and hell, that might be some experience to write about!!

For those who seek inspiraton within, stare at your diary with a pen stuck in your mouth, fingers tapping to some tuneless rhythm while you are drooling on the page. You may go back a fifty odd pages and find something to read and wonder why in the world would you bother to write something so trivial in your diary, and that too in such detail. Then you'd come back again to the blank page st taring back at you. Here you might want to doodle and scribble and draw tiny hearts or smileys or stars or you might just sign your name again and again till you move on to another fresh page. Do a small recap and think of all that has happened to you in the recent past- would you want to put down your encounter with the dentist or your seventy seventh failed attempt to start gymming into words and seal them for posterity and private use? If you are a person with feelings and emotions and acknowledgement of the same, you might as well pour out all that you feel, wanted to feel or think you could have felt. You can garnish this with some help from your pocket dictionary and voila! you have a heart warming account of whatever monumental event that occured in your life.

But for those handicapped by the very prospect of having to use pen and paper for writing, well, boot up! Stare at your screen, with that cursor blinking on that white background and resist the urge to do the following things:
*Open other old files and just read them.
*Watch sitcoms ( Those addictive things are pure evil, but more about them later)
*Go online on pretext of using reference or online dictionary, because once you are there you might get tempted to do these :

- Look up stuff for reference and one thing leads to another and you end up reading Lindsay Lohan's latest blog post about new shoes.
- Chat up with the never-ending list of online friends and you go on talking about what flavour of ice cream you had for dinner last night.
- Visit Facebook and check out photo-albums and upload some more photos and this goes on for days!!!
- Dabble in the piracy debate with someone while downloading movies and music by the dozen.
- Just "surf" (rather cruise) the internet and amuse yourself into boredom.

So there, once you have been staring at the cursor for more than eight minutes, let your fingers dance away on the keyboard and just type. Practise typing if you may, just type. You are bound to form comprehensible words and meaningful sentences after a while.

Ok, these are the standard issue methods. For the ones ready to go that extra mile here's what to do.

Talk to friends, foes and strangers. Go to cafes and work the coffee and conversation formula. Just talk, and discuss and argue and talk some more. Share, listen, laugh, cry, give all the appropriate expressions with the aaah, hmmm, oooh, yeah? and chat up with people. Engage youself in a conversation with someone who speaks a language completely foreign. Act like a journalist, complete with notepad and pen, and interview people. Pretend and lie and become another person and talk. Talk to shady characters, to indifferent ones, to the bold and beautiful and allow yourself to be bothered enough to take an interest in their lives. Steal away their small glories and convert them into magnificient tales.

Fall in love. Fall, go all the way and mess yourself up. Go through all those feelings and emotions capable of mention in your all time favorite phil collins or lionel richie song. Listen to all those love songs, sit and day-dream under the sun. Abandon work and lie in bed all day, doing nothing. Talk for hours and smile a lot. Fight and cry, a lot. Sing and scream. Make up and make out. Forgive and forget and reminisce. Walk the bed of nails and tread the carpet of roses. Wait and let go. Possess and permit. Give away and take it back. Take away and return the favour. Wear red.

If you possess a full pocket to finance trips and expenses or passion for places, travel. Go exploring. Venture into uncharted territories. Board a bus, train or a flight, hitch-hike a ride, hop on to a boat, go to unmarked destinations. Visit the seven wonders of the world. Swim the deep waters and scale the great heights. Live in suitcases and tents, in student hostels or luxury hotels. In the name of cuisine, experiment with local delicacies. Do a hula dance. Fall sick with food poisoning. Get frost-bite. Try living in the desert with one single flask of water for five days. Go without a raincoat or umbrella where it never stops raining. Go to a sunny beach without sunscreen. Cycle across countries. Swim across the English Channel. Go Natgeo!

All these methods can be adopted in different permutations and combinations, as deemed fit by your inner wrting advisor. And if you find time from executing all these magic tircks, you can sit down and just write and get over that uninvited guest of a writer's block.

GOD SAVE THE QUEEN'S LANGUAGE!

OK THIS IS AFTER A LONG LONG TIME.
BUT WHAT'S WITH PEOPLE BEING ADAMANT ON FORGETTING THEIR BASIC GRAMMAR AND COMPLETELY SODOMISING THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE?
I AM ALL FOR MODIFYING IT A BIT TO LEND IT A LOCAL FLAVOUR AND THE LIKE.
BUT WHY THE BLATANT ABUSE OF THE LANGUAGE TO SUCH AN EXTENT THAT A SANE PERSON WITH A MODICUM OF LEARNING AND LIKING FOR THE LANGUAGE DOUBTS HIS OWN BASIC UNDERSTANDING OF THE LANGUAGE?
I DON'T ADHERE TO THE QUEEN'S ENGLISH. BUT SUCH RAMPANT CORRUPTION OF IT?
AND SOMEHOW THE WORST MISCREANTS ARE THOSE WHO SAY ENGLISH IS THEIR MOTHER TONGUE.
CAN WE START A CAMPAIGN ON PRESERVING THE SOMEWHAT DIMINISHING DIGNITY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE??

THAT'S ALL FOR NOW.
I HAVE TO GO AND TRY MY BEST TO SAVE THE LANGUAGE.

The Last Resort-TAGS!

It seems impossible for me to keep my resolution of blogging everyday- which is obvious to NERs considering that my last post was a good 15 days back.
Since, I'm not really in a mood to whine and rant on about anything (being implicitly thrown out of my own room and listening to Jab We Met soundtrack doesnt really help matters) I'd go for this tag thingy - I really am not sure if its the right way..

1.Pick out a scar you have, and explain how you got it?
- There's on on my right foot. I've had it since I was 4 or 5. Used to love going on bicycle rides with someone ( LOSER ME- I still cant ride a cycle) cycling up and down. On one of these trips, fell asleep ( how for gods' sake I have no idea ) and some shit and happened and next thing i know is there's a wound and now there's a scar.

2. What does your phone look like?
- Bad. Really Bad. Its a Nokia 3200 or some other old crappy model like that. And now it looks worse for wear after I threw it just for fun (it never cracked before) and now its cover is all cracked up.

3. What is on the walls of your bedroom?
- Since am staying in an rented apartment in Pune now, and the house has got nice walls, the walls of my room are unadorned. Back home, the walls are a collage wall me and my bro created... part of it is visible in this pic.. bro's huge football fan..

4. What is your current desktop picture?
- It changes every 12 hours or so depending upon my mood, my mood and my mood.

5. Do you believe in gay marriage?
- Yeah, sure. Why not? What sort of troubles me is how do gay divorces work? The one who earns more from his day job pays the other alimony??

6. What do you want more than anything right now?
- to not be lonely and sitting here.

7. What time were you born?
- 2nd August 1988, 2.10 a.m

8. Are your parents still together?
- hmmm.. yes..

9. Last person who made you cry?
- the child actor from Taare Zameen Par. I cry in soppy movies. In real life I fear I possess an insensitive, stone cold heart.

10. What is your favorite perfume/cologne?
- err...but I don't use any much. I smell nice all day long :) On occasions.. Dunno.. Use whatever I have.. all of them smell nicer..

11. What kind of hair/eye color do you like in the opposite sex?
- Anything as long as they don't look as if they emerged out of a clown party..

12. What are you listening to?
- It was Counting Crows' "Big Yellow Taxi".. now its Robbie William's "She's the One".. after midnight my taste in music further deteriorates.

13. Do you get scared of the dark?
- only after reading, watching, thinking or talking about something scary...

14. Do you like pain killers?
- when they are helpful, yes. otherwise.. no.. they are not one of the ice cream flavors you like, you see.

15. Are you too shy to ask someone out?
- Yes, that too. Otherwise, I've never liked anyone that much to make an effort to ask them out and the other hazard is having a HUGE EGO.

16. If you could eat anything right now, what would it be?
- Choco chip cookies.

17. Who was the last person you made mad?
- List too long. To get down to specific would be my roomie and all those people with whom I talked in the past 18 hours.

18. Is anyone in love with you?
- No way. Why?

That's it. Too long a questionnaire man.. What I can't complain about tags???
Screw it. Tomorrow is my second meeting and lot of work on a holiday, I have all rights to crib.

Happy New Year(s)!

i don't think i stuck to my resolution of blogging regularly, reasons for which will be given in detail at some later point.
But i'm tryin real hard to keep my new year resolutions realistic and follow them:

1. Quit- Its time to get rid of those vices which arent really best for my health. i'm already on my way. stopped drinking- only beer now. and the other one, well believe me i have started reducing.
2. Wear a scarf while travelling in pune so as to protect myself from the harsh pollution and prevent asthama.
3. go to the gym and eat healthy. try to go to gym and try to eat healthy. at times at least.
4. thats about it.

gotta go, booze party on at home. im not drinking.

Back to Whining,

Ok, here I am again. Had been trying to delay this moment for as long as I could- writing that is. Changed my template for the nth time this month I guess. Reverted to my original template, though sadly I’ve lost all the links. That can be done sometime else though.

Following my resolution to write everyday, I think I’ll follow a pattern of sorts such that at least every blog of mine has one post per week. And maybe I should start sparing some attention to those blogs where in I’m listed but haven’t made any contribution ( especially the “Taking India Ahead” blog in which I’m really interested but have never managed to post anything). So I’ll be alternating between my blogs. Enough of my schedule.

I’ll stick to the nature of this blog- which is whining. Its less of a habit and more of a lifestyle now. All my friends know I’m an incurable whiner.

Few days back I’d submitted my article to the college newsletter. There I rant about how people have these misconceptions about us since we’re very actively involved in college activities et al. While writing it I remember I was whining as usual and tried to infuse as much humor as I could manage to come up with. But I was so shocked when I found the whole editorial team found it harsh. Why? These guys are like me, I wrote that article on behalf of these guys and they find it harsh, asking if I really feel all that antagonistic and how I should voice my feelings, opinions etc. And all I could think was- am I the only one? Or is everyone else too chickenshit? The worst part was all these guys went on stressing about me having a platform (the newsletter) to “voice my feelings” and didn’t seem to relate to or identify with what I had written at all.

Everyday I meet people who ask me if I’m attending class and pass comments irrespective of what I answer. Initially, it was a joke. But hell the joke has become such a pain now. I’m used to jokes. I’m short and I’m hyper-active/talkative. So people get lot of opportunities to make jokes. And I honestly don’t mind. At least I’m making some one smile and laugh. But these taunts regarding college work and being busy seems so mean. Its like God made me short, so the joke’s on God anyways. But here, its my work and life which is being made the butt of these gags. And when I make any comments, it’s a big deal and blasphemous to them.

And sometimes I feel bitter. At the work that I’m doing and at the people. Its partly my fault. I got so busy that I started drifting away from friends and others. When you work with somebody 24/7 you start hanging out with them and inevitably your timetable’s such that you spend all your free time with them. And then friends don’t appear very generous to accept you as you are. And that sometimes seems to be the worst part. If “friends” don’t understand, how can you expect others to understand? So, once you become part of an organizing team or fest or anything, people just seem to wander away or you seem to get alienated. And somehow, it all seems so sad. I remember after third sem finals got over and everyone was planning vacations with their friends and group and I was just hanging around, shuttling between office and PCell, wishing shallow goodbyes. College is definitely not what I’d thought it would be. No boyfriends and large group of friends. No gang of girls and boys. No fun- romantic life that movies depict.

But then its my choice. I chose to work and get involved in college activities. So might as well accept the consequences. But I never imagined the consequences would be so drastic. Its not all that bad either.

Hell, I just cant help complaining either ways.

An excess of phlegm perhaps

Let me just type. Let me just write. I do not know what will result from this exercise.

But I need to do it, nevertheless. I hate not being able to write. That was my only outlet.

I feel suffocated, strangled, drowned, tied up and restless without it. There’s this inexplicable tightness clutching at my heart and I have no clue why and how to deal with it. There are these moments when you are restless and nervous. As if you know there’s something miserable waiting to happen, just around the corner and you don’t know what to do when you are face to face with it. That is how I feel. Any given moment when I’m not busy doing nothing important. Its physiological, mental, psychological and a lot of other things. There’s no word for it, yet.

There are no dreams. My mind’s become barren. Imagination has become infertile.

Does growing old do that to you?

Those days, when you were bursting with innocence, hormones, feelings, wishes. Those musings, pouring of words and tears, smiling into space thinking about nothing and everything, and those escapades into unreality- where have they gone?

The artist inside has ceased existing. There was no space for life. It was crowded with ambitions, mundane aims, selfish needs and walls. Walls around my heart, soul, mind. Nothing comes in, nothing goes out. Forever locked. Frozen. Yet burning within me every moment.

This is so juvenile. Still, its necessary.

There is this canvas waiting to be filled. But it remains white. White is a color? Or there’s such darkness that its black, impenetrable. Even grey fails to come on it.

Is it just that my outlets have closed or do I have nothing to express?

Either ways, I feel un-alive.

The entire world is an illusion. Do I just tread through this illusion waiting for it to end on my death? Or do I live it out? I have to live it out. Breathe in the scents and dust. I want to feel pain and happiness. Immeasurable pain and indefinite happiness. And express it the way I want to.

Nothing is stopping me. But I find myself incapable.

Something within is dying. There is the optimist lying docile.

There’s so much I want to do, want to achieve. But they all seem meaningless now that I feel incapable of doing what I thought I was best at and loved to- to write.

Maybe its my fault- I am lazy. Despite that, I just feel incapable otherwise. Its as if I’ve become handicapped, lost my limbs or lungs or heart or just everything.

Being sad and hurt allowed me to vent it out and write. Pain helps. I tried, in vain.

I think its true. As they say, external wound and pain are superficial and its when the heart is bleeding with sorrow and grief and misery that you really suffer. The turmoil within is worse than the injuries on surface. But I don’t have either. I tried the latter- got my ears pierced again in an attempt to “feel” the pain. Needless to say, it didn’t help matters much.

Even loneliness is something that’s so detached. Yet so deeply entrenched into the psyche. I feel miserably lonely at times. That solitude doesn’t encourage any creativity.

I think I’ve run out of reasons, of miseries to put blame on for my incompetence.

Nothing seems to help.

And I resort to whining, which just tires you out and saps your creativity further.

Maybe I should just continue to write. Somewhere, sometime I’ll find a way out or a way in. I must force myself to write everyday. I have to let things affect me. See, hear, feel and experience. And express everything. Maybe that will help.

I have to keep trying. I must.