Monster House

I am waging a war against my house. We moved in 13 days back and since then the "house" has been upsetting me with something or the other EVERY day.

The first day i realized that i had not seen the house very carefully when i had said yes.. The master bedroom was the ugliest room in the house!

Then i discovered broken trays in the fridge, door windows which do not lock, less than required space, kitchen cabinet shelves sagging, dinning chair seats were unclean, etc.

The first day i decided to cook i almost cried because the gas stove was  dirty and all the pores were plugged. I was forced to clean it with a toothbrush in order to cook a meal.

Then came the cable and internet fiasco. 2 months back there was a fire in this building which led to all cables getting burned so everyone got the wiring redone. But no! Not the great ones living here before us.. The electrician took most of our saturday the first weekend in to put the cable in. Same happened with internet phone line last saturday.

Sunday last i found out that the door windows (the ones that do not have locks) mysteriously swing open during the day. Now i wonder whether i should have fired by earlier bai..

And today! While i was cooking i opened the shelf where all the plates were stacked and it broke and all the plates tumbled onto my head X-(

I am upset, this house is falling apart and i am paying through my nose for it.

I am so resentful of the owners attitude, she does not care. Wont fix anything.. Aarrggghh.

Monday Blues

When i anticipate a Sunday morning on a weekday, it always seems like a breezy bright day. But in reality Sunday (the entire day) is shadowed by the looming prospects of the Monday coming.

I did not bake cookies this weekend but i did do a lot:

a) We got internet connection at home (finally!)

b) I got a new bai

c) We caught up with one of our old friends

d) I caught up with my sleep

Resolution for the coming week, i will try to be upbeat about everything..

Feeling Grumpy

I think it was the hardest i have worked on a weekend.

I did the dishes, then saw that the tiles near the washing area needed cleaning, so i cleaned them. While bending to clean then i realized that the under surface of the kitchen hood needs cleaning so i did that next. Then i noticed the long trails of ants marching across my counter top so i attacked them. Then i went after all the doors in my house to clean the bottom part which was looking whitish after all the recent painting. (i have discovered that wooden stuff- table, door etc tend to look cleaner if their lowermost extremities look dusted & clean).

Then of course i realized that we needed some bulbs to be changed and i started making a list for "household" shopping.

I am tired, very very tired all because I fired my maid today, on the eve of Rakhi when i had a ton of dishes to do and all very sticky & grimy.

Yesterday after i returned from work, i found one of the full length windows in the lobby open. It was the second time in a week and so I called my maid, asked her how come she left it open. I gave her an earful on how she cannot be careless. And she in return asked me to find someone else (aarrrghh). I asked her to go and come back tomorrow for dishes early.

So she turns up today morning and tells me that she needs to go to her village and she will go after doing the dishes.

I asked her to go take a hike, i will manage my own dishes thank you very much!

I am so tired, and now i need to look for a maid.

My weekend is doomed, irredeemably.

Weeeeeekend

Weekend is here!!

I think weekend is the most anxiously anticipated event of my entire week.
I am certain that if weekend was a man, Ambuj would have gone mad with jealousy. But given that he thinks weekends are good too i am safe :)

My motto every weekend is to get up early and spend the entire day doing absolutely nothing. And i mean nothing.
It should start with a lazy laid back breakfast, preferably with friends (i miss you Aditi! every damn weekend i remember IHOP); and then be spent resolutely doing no productive work.

So u can imagine that most of my weekends go by with me disappointed with each wasted weekend.
I get up late, very late most of the days and then we have a very late breakfast (thank God for LPQ). Then more often than not we get some work done, that we cannot get done in weekdays (because we both work, humph!).
Then as it gets dark a feeling akin to dread starts taking me over, the day is being wasted, i haven't read a book, or caught up with an old friend or done some senseless shopping. If it is a Saturday, the dread is overcome by a promise to live Sunday with redoubled vigour.
But Sunday comes and goes pretty much the same way. I get up late again and realize i have missed the cool morning breeze because i was sleeping till late, i haven't baked that batch of cookies i was planning to... etc etc

This weekend however, I will get up early; open the windows of my home and have all teh cool morning breeze, i will have a cuppa on the balcony with Ambuj. And i will bake a batch of cookies, let us say in celebration of rakhi.

Next blog I will put the recipe up if it turns out edible :P

Happppy Weekend!

Patel Controversy

When has anything come out of violence?
How can anyone expect that government will kneel to demands made at gunpoint. If they had to, they would have ceded Kashmir a long time ago. If they had to, we would not be one country today.

The perceived authenticity of ones claim is affected by the way one puts it to everyone.
Threaten to burn the world; How is that going to help?

I am not even going to start on propounding my views on caste based reservation. Or about politics intervening into education.
This is a different discussion for a different day.

Today, we are talking about the methods, the means to an end.

What are Gujarat riots?

Its like a tantrum thrown by a petulant kid to get something.

Whatever..

I am a tough person to work with and since i know my temper issues i try consciously to avoid being snappy.

But there are situations where my non existing patience is stretched to breaking point:

1) working with slow people

2) explaining things to stupid people

3) dealing with smug people who are wrong but wont admit it

I met each of the above today. It was a looooooooooong and hard day.

[Out there in the universe there will be someone (slow/ stupid/ smug) today writing about insufferable people at work.. I will seem to them as a highly unreasonable person.. Aaarrrggghh]

Naari

For long have women been a currency of honor for their male relations. 

Even after the emancipation and feminism waves; they continue to be the adornments of men around them.

What do emancipated women think about other women? I think there is less feeling of solidarity than could be. I think we look down on those who are less lucky. We forget that our own fortune has mainly resulted from a wild streak of luck.

Dont get me wrong; i am a feminist of the "no discrimination" sort. I dont want special rights or status (based on gender). I would like a meritorius society. 

But what did women in india do to achieve their emancipated status? We just shamed the men into following the west; which they are generally inclined to do anyways. 

We havent changed in much though. You will find that out after marriage. All your achievements vanish and the only qualifying parameter of your success in life becomes whether you are a mother or not. If u are then everything else is recognized, if u are not then you are "incomplete"

Religion & Faith

Few Facts First:

a) Human beings like to influence other human beings. Power is a great motivator.

b) Human beings instinctively believe that there is a superior power that can help them through adversity..

Faith:

I believe Faith is essentially hope that even if things are out of our hands, we can get through. 

Faith is personal. You cant measure/ compare it. 

It is the algorithm.

Religion:

Religion is the institution that facilitates some to have influence on many by exploiting their faith in God.

Religion is communal. It essentially defines the rules and regulations for people to express their faith.

It is the syntax.

Optimists feel that religion would have simplified expression of faith for "junta". It would have been instrumental in promoting community spirit. It would have started as a good thing.

I feel, it was always a power play. Someone found out that there is a weak spot and capitalised on it. They told you to measure your faith.

They told you to feel uncomfortable around those who express their faith differently.

They made some horrible rules that fed their egos and biases.

I believe in God, i like practising my religion. But i do not like them measuring my devotion or faith; thats personal.

Sales & Eggs

Went to LPQ for a late breakfast today. 
They also had the Sunday brunch option. With alcohol 1450 rs per head and without alcohol 1250 rs per head. 
Without alcohol the pricing seems almost prohibitive, because u cannot possibly eat 1250 rs worth of food in one sitting (at the current pricing of the outlet)
But then, explained my sales guru of a husband, the general tendency is to think of the second option as "only 200 rs extra and unlimited alcohol"; no surprise most people go with the 1450 option... They forget that it is prohibitive too!

Sales is all about the right perspective. 
A good sale is when customer is happy; they feel that they got the better out of the company or that they chose the best option. 
Remember that best option FOR YOU is sometimes not highlighted, but it still exists ;)

We ordered coffee & breakfast eggs, ala carte. Paid 1248 rs for entire meal.
I was happy that I, at least, din't fall for the "unlimited brunch" trap; then Ambuj reminded me that coffee and eggs can be made at home :-/

It's all in your head

What is the truth of things?

What is true to a "clinically diseased" mind? Its own truth or the "clinically sane" truth.

Who can say that the schizophrenic's "imaginary" friends don't exist? Why is it that Tyler could not have been a separate physical being?

Who knows if they see more, and we see less.

Who knows maybe their minds have transgressed the capabilities of our minds

All the thoughts, everything converges towards this one big truth; everything is in my head.

You, not you.

Your truth, my truth.

All my versions of this world.

I am alone even in a mob, alone in thought, alone in my head.

Quatum theory of friendship

One of my dearest friends decided this Friendship's day that she is going to get rid of some of her "pretend friends".
There were people on her FB friends page who (she decided) were not worth her patience anymore. So she chose 5 out of them, and struck them out of her life online (i think she means for only 4 of them to be permanently deleted, the fifth one is only being punished :-/)

Take note please, she is now on her way to equalize her online (fb) friends with her real life friends.

If she strikes out 5 of her online friends (who are no longer real life friends) every year at friendship's day; till all her FB friends are her real life friends; and at the end of this period the number of her FB friends remain the same as today, then solve the problem for:
Who is the friend i am talking about? Hah!

On a serious note, what is the difference between an acquaintance and a friend? Was a friend once an acquaintance or was an acquaintance once a friend?

I remember Vasav once theorized about the "s-p-d-f" orbitals* of friendship.
*[Muggles^ please refer to Quantum Mech]
^[Seriously!! You do not know what Muggles are? Read Harry Potter]
Theory goes that if you are an electron & your friend is the nucleus, farther you go (emotional distance) from the nucleus the easier it is to break away from the pull (less energy expended).

So maybe overtime people drift away. Those who were real friends "once" shift from "s" towards "f" orbital; till one day they will be just names on the fb list, waiting to be struck off.

My heart goes out to the victims of Nisha Verma's friendship day celebrations :P
I am resolutely going to stay on as her friend, because she cannot delete me from fb :D

(she hates this pic)

If i do not lose you, when i loose you

then i know that you are a friend true

[Or i must have taken a loan i am yet to pay you]

It doesn't add up

For as long as i can remember i have loved my job and as far as i can look back i have always wanted to quit it... (i will get around to it maybe when they start offering me a good salary for sleeping)

Its a bit like you order a decadent dessert and while eating it you realize that maybe what you really wanted to have was a pizza... but then this is good too..

I guess i am wired like this. I am, in short, totally illogical when it comes to "what i want...".

Do you think that people who have more logical bend of mind (i hate dislike them) have no/ less self contracting behaviour?

Or is this just classic grass being greener on the other side..?

That Kind of day..

I have been poised in front of my laptop for the last 30 min trying to think of something funny to write.
You should know, this is not easy. Funny stuff just does not happen to me, i have to derive it out of the small nothings in life.

Ambuj is now tired of seeing me struggling and he has suggested i just describe my day today; and being the subdued obedient wife that i am, here goes.

Woke up in the new apartment today. There is something about waking up to find sunlight streaming directly into your face so that sleeping further becomes impossible. First conscious thought of the day, "Who the hell parted the curtains... oh right we do not have curtains yet". Ah, this is gonna be that kind of day.
Both of us got ready and started for work. Ambuj driving, me throwing a fit at any and everyone who dares to cross into our lane, or does not move fast enough in front of us, or moves too fast. Anyways somehow against all odds of the infernal traffic we reached office.
Office hours passed by in a blurr: ad hoc meetings, a few fights, discovery of a sloppily covered up blunder, in short the regular office day.
We started back, and were suddenly very late. Allow me to explain, our car was wedged into the parking due to the arrival of a fleet of buses who comfortably parked themselves in the driveway, making our escape impossible (i know i said "who", i hate those buses). So we waited in the car, Ambuj patiently, me resentfully for the buses to leave.
We arrived back to Powai safe and alive. I thank god for all His blessings that the day passed without me having committed a murder despite all the provocation offered by circumstances.

I am going to do better tomorrow, i am going to think of something really worthwhile to write about. Something inspiring.

Right time

What is the right time to give hard time to someone?

Is it on the day that one is happy, so that it only neutralizes his euphoria. But then his happiness is gone

Or on the day one is already unhappy so its over in that one day? But then he will be extremely miserable

Maybe.. Its never the right time..

Its a start!

However romatically we think of giving up what we have, its... Always difficult... Mostly stupid... Sometimes rewarding.

All this talk of startups gets me really anxious. I feel like a dinosaur, stuck with the same company since i graduated :-/

There are times people meet me and ask me where i am "these days" and then, on hearing my reply, their eyes go saucer sized and they blurt "still with schlum"then their brain kicks in and they utter "wow" (expressed much in the same sentiment like "stupid cow"..).

So when i heard that my company is going to do a pay cut i got all puffed up to go ahead and do a startup of my own. 

Why not working for a startup, u ask? Well because i dont do the sane thing, thats why, thank you for your interest!

Now whats required to start the best, most profitable startup? Ummmmm... 

Murphy and Bombay rains

Its raining in Bombay. 

Its unpredictable when its gonna rain.. 

But i always know when :)

It always rains when i forget my umbrella at home. I have not had to use it once in the last week because it never rains when i am prepared. 

Monkey Bars

As a kid i loved monkey bars...then they became inconvenient.. Ahem!

I see people wearing their IIT/ Cornell tees after college and i am forcibly reminded of monkey bars. 

Do u remember that kid who was stuck at one of the bar and couldnt go any further.. Until he dropped..

When we cling to our one big achievement all our life we are denying ourselves further achievements. 

Or..

Maybe i am overthinking it.. Maybe its just pride of having belonged to an elite crowd once. Its a subtle declaration that we are first among equals (in our own opinion).

Ambuj chimes in.. Maybe its just nostalgia..

Cafe Chatter Coffee

Incoherent phrases from various conversations drifting around like dry leaves in a breeze...

I am sitting in a cafe. It is weird that i am often able to think more clearly in this kind of "white noise" in the background, filtering through my ear into the very recesses of my brain where my thoughts lie hidden. They fill that space flushing all those thoughts out, so fast that i have to concentrate very hard to make sense of all of them together.
They never make any sense together, they are just ideas, teasing, nagging, coy. I have to weave them with facts and dye them with probability to form a decent theory.

Hmm.. Cafe Chatter Coffee... Bombay :)