Sweet basil

So I killed the basil plant. I dragged my Internet feet on checking how to take care of it and let it die.
That's just useless of me.

Ledger

A couple of days ago, my bank balance was around the lowest it has been in the last 5 years or so.

Ah, well.

A trifle

I realise I have spent the better part of my life saying troofle not
truhffle, for truffle.
Hmmm.

a state of english

On a slow day at the office, I happened upon this essay by George Orwell. Apart from the general thrust of the piece which is the role of language in political writing, I was struck by how the opening paragraph sounded so 'current'. Hardly something that has come from the first half of the previous century.

Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way, but it is generally assumed that we cannot by conscious action do anything about it. Our civilization is decadent and our language -- so the argument runs -- must inevitably share in the general collapse. It follows that any struggle against the abuse of language is a sentimental archaism, like preferring candles to electric light or hansom cabs to aeroplanes.

sty

I have a sty in my eye
An ache in my head
A laze in my brain
“Oh, sigh”, he said.

Blink, wince, droop
Ho, hum, ooh, aah.
Stroke, clutch, leak
Push, pull, poke, ah.

I have a sty in my eye
I’m too tired to write
I have an excuse now
But I still type this shite

instead of 25

Yesterday,Feb 21, in Bengaluru airport. I thought I would do the '25 things' thingy on FB (finally), but this happened:

Instead, I'll do 25 15 20 21 things about now.

1. I am in an airport
2. I'm writing (not smoothly) with a pen, in a notebook that's proving to be flimsy
3. I spent the last ten minutes writing'25' in 4 different ways.
4. A rather large man is eating biryani next to me while his wiofe looked on oddly, and has now joined him.
5. I am listening to the Dev D soundtrack. I like it.
6. I love my iPod.
7. Charu Sharma was having coffee here a while ago.
8. My hand baggage is 11.5 kilos! Blame it on trying to ensure my suitcase is within 20kgs.
9. My suitcase is 20.5kgs. Blame it, among other things, on two bottles-in-tins of Jim Beam Black.
10. I need to go board my flight in about 5 minutes
11. Bengaluru airport is abouit 40km from my Mum's place.
12. I paid 100 rupees for the rather ordinary Frappe I'm having.
13. I want to continue reading Ubik on the plane but I know I'll probably fall asleep.
14. I know my brother is unstocked. :(
15. Its going to be one helluva week.
16. My mum toldme about a parent in her school who belts her 7 year old dyslexic daughter.
17. Emotional Attyachaar rock version rocks.
18. Predictably, my 'lifetime' Vodafone sim bought last August in Mumbai is completely dead now. The phone doesn't even read the sim card.
19. I'm looking forward to time in Gurgaon tomorrow. Maybe even Bikanerwala.
20. Its going to be ONE HELLUVA week!
21. 21 Feb. Apart but :)

redeye

The eye is tired and achy, red and swollen, and sheds water; but hey, I’m not crying.

smudge

Is it not common knowledge- and if it isn't, it should be- that you don't touch the LCD screen on a laptop?

After ages- and I mean ages- I did a series of clicking on the 'next blog' you see tab in the top right. In about 20-25 blogs i went through- at least that many- I found not more than 4 or 5 blogs in English.
Wow.

another productive day at work

oh what do you know. This is Post # 102.

as for the last post....
"oh, crap"

ah

My my.
Today's shufflesongs worked like a dream. the music from home to work:

David Gray
Rabbi
Coldplay
U2
Dave Matthews Band
Simon & Garfunkel
Joni Mitchell


:)

FYI

better mood. much better mood.

[I din know these many people even read this thing! :) ]

I am in a bad mood. Crap.

steady, o greedy heart

Sighpod.

kapoof

You know there’s a degauss button or a degauss option in all your monitors, right? Ok, here’s what it does. I wish we could have a little degauss button the side of our heads. A little refresh, rejuvenate, kickstart sort of thing.

Click- poof- whoa- wow...
Y’know…

noir

It was another one of those days.
I sat brooding at my desk, the inanities hovered around with irreverent pokes at my brain. Coffee spilt on the table, but not really. Work consumed, but not really. I sat focused, but not really. Noises floated in and out, and I knew what was going happen. I could feel it in my nerves that weren’t tingling. I could detect it in my dull senses. Sooner or later, it would be a reality, I was sure. I really did know what was going to happen that day.
And sure, enough nothing happened.

For I had known all the time, it was another one of those days when nothing would happen. Nothing at all.

*if* you work it out

And ah, when you work it out I'm worse than you
Yeah, when you work it out I wanted to
And ah, when you work out where to draw the line
Your guess is as good as mine

Where do we go, nobody knows

-God Put a Smile on Your Face, Coldplay

Heterocera

Three days.
At the very least, it sat there for three days. In the same spot in the loo at work, on the ledge just above the (what do you call it- urinal).Going to the loo being the engrossingly exciting task that it is, I couldn’t help but notice this thing. Then, it was the next day. It was still there, so I started to think it was dead. I blew at it. I’m sick, I know, but I blew at it gently. It’s wings flapped a little in the breeze, but little else. Then it was the third day. When the a/c kicks in, it really kicks in. I pee a lot then. Er, sorta. And the moth remained in its position, unbelievably, for the third day. The loos are cleaned twice a day but obviously not one had bothered to pay some respect to this (dead?) moth.

What was it doing there, for three days, probably more? That’s 72 hours, god knows how long that is in moth-time. Years, perhaps. What would it contemplate. Life? Women? Cricket? 42? Was it people-watching? In a human loo? Was it noticing the groaners who recover from big nights through all of the next day, or the whistlers who distractedly looked at different tiles on the wall? Maybe it was waiting for some celebrities, who it could touch and have a story for the grandkids, or maybe it just wanted to know if the Legend of The Angelic Chinese Boy Who Peeps As He Pees was true.
Either way, I blew a little harder (er, at the insect), and it flew away. Yes, it flew away. After three frantic days of immobility, it finally had gathered enough energy to move its little feathery behind out of that charming place.

Was it just me, or is this really curious. Or maybe he was an employee in the building, and (also) just plain bored.

seduction

You are a guy and have just met a girl you know fleetingly. [you are a ‘cool’ guy, you totally know so, which of course must mean you are cool, right? Right. Whatever.] You meet at a club, and you get the feeling something could happen here. Like here and now. There might be a slight history of surface chemistry- the like you have in sputtering test tubes- or there might not. It’s a dark club (are there any other kinds), you’re pleased to note the girl in question is slightly under the influence. How convenient. You lean closer and she does not stop you. You touch her gently, you can see this being really charming, and she smiles. You know tonight is the night your underpants have been waiting for. You can feel it. Actually, they can feel it, but let us leave that for now. She is in a group of friends you have never met. None of them seem to be warming towards you, though. Some of them dance. She does not want to anymore. The music is terribly inspiring.
You’re at this ‘point in time’. The smallest of efforts could do it for you here, you know you’re so close. And what do you decide to do?

You move to the dance floor at its emptiest. You proceed then to attempt some sort of robot dance step. This is, of course, completely in keeping with the coolness that you exude. You turn toward the girl and her friends, trying to captivate her with a smouldering look, in the middle of that step. You know you are doing it, because you can feel your eyes narrowing just that little sexy bit.

Then you know its time for the final nail. The ultimate clincher. The time has come to impress her irrevocably. SO you whisper in her ear, to watch you a little more, as you will go back to the floor and levitate. Yes, levitate. She is just going to love this, right? Right.
A smooth walk back to the centre. A few more lovable robot steps. Another stylish turn (god, that was so stylish, you almost love yourself for it), another piercing look. Your hands move up, almost in slow motion, and say, in a vertically adjusted version from the Jack Rabbit Slimm’s Contest- how can you possibly go wrong with his step?- say “Look at me, baybee”. Then you turn your back on her mysteriously. It is the time for your move. So slowly, ever so slowly, you lighten your feet. Then you stand, oh so briefly, on your toes, before landing back on your heels.

That was it. She must be stunned. Surely, the night is now yours.