29 September 2007
13 September 2007
Stress-Balls
We have a group of people at office who organize all these 'feel good' activities so that the average employee thinks our office is a great place to work in. Recently, we got an email which mentioned that this team would be giving away a surprise gift to all employees. Later that afternoon, these people came around, giving away yellow smiley-faced stress balls to everyone with a noble smile on their face and all, as if they were feeding a thousand kids at some goddam orphanage.
All this was pretty much okay, and I was feeling pretty neutral about this whole business, when I realised they were cross-checking from a list whether a particular employee had already received a stress ball or not. I mean, here they were, 'donating' stress balls to everyone, smiling widely and all, as if they found no better joy in life than giving away stress balls to everyone, only to turn around, stone-faced (add a few more of those 'cold, steely' things that Roger Waters keeps talking about in his songs), to tick against someone's name in a goddam list.
The goddam icing on the cake was when these guys took photos of employees when they were accepting these stress balls, and when I say that, I mean these guys took photos of employees exactly when they were accepting these stress balls, you know, both of them in contact with the stress ball in the photo. And going by the preciseness of the moment at which the photo was taken and considering the fact that there was no motion blur in any of the photos, it only means that they actually posed for this.
Posing for photos. That's gotta be the phoniest thing you can ever do. You may argue that photos are good if, twenty years later, you wish to look at them and see how happy you were and 're-live those happy moments' or some other happy-shit reason, but then, from a logical standpoint, I think it's pretty pointless. You may become happy after you've transported yourself to the past, but when you transport yourself back to the present, you're left feeling more melancholic than before.
Anyway, coming back, I had no clue that photos were taken until we got an email the next day with a link to the photos. People smilingly giving away smiley-faced stress balls, and people smilingly accepting them. I had to go out for a short stroll to kind of get back to normal after seeing them photos. I was secretly happy they didn't ask me to pose for a photo or something. I might have had this grim expression of impending doom, or might have 'accidentally' shown a finger or something.
People, I tell you. They're always making a big deal out of things like stress-balls. Try telling them this, and they'll give you some lame, shot-to-shit crap about little things like this making life interesting or making a difference or something.
All this was pretty much okay, and I was feeling pretty neutral about this whole business, when I realised they were cross-checking from a list whether a particular employee had already received a stress ball or not. I mean, here they were, 'donating' stress balls to everyone, smiling widely and all, as if they found no better joy in life than giving away stress balls to everyone, only to turn around, stone-faced (add a few more of those 'cold, steely' things that Roger Waters keeps talking about in his songs), to tick against someone's name in a goddam list.
The goddam icing on the cake was when these guys took photos of employees when they were accepting these stress balls, and when I say that, I mean these guys took photos of employees exactly when they were accepting these stress balls, you know, both of them in contact with the stress ball in the photo. And going by the preciseness of the moment at which the photo was taken and considering the fact that there was no motion blur in any of the photos, it only means that they actually posed for this.
Posing for photos. That's gotta be the phoniest thing you can ever do. You may argue that photos are good if, twenty years later, you wish to look at them and see how happy you were and 're-live those happy moments' or some other happy-shit reason, but then, from a logical standpoint, I think it's pretty pointless. You may become happy after you've transported yourself to the past, but when you transport yourself back to the present, you're left feeling more melancholic than before.
Anyway, coming back, I had no clue that photos were taken until we got an email the next day with a link to the photos. People smilingly giving away smiley-faced stress balls, and people smilingly accepting them. I had to go out for a short stroll to kind of get back to normal after seeing them photos. I was secretly happy they didn't ask me to pose for a photo or something. I might have had this grim expression of impending doom, or might have 'accidentally' shown a finger or something.
People, I tell you. They're always making a big deal out of things like stress-balls. Try telling them this, and they'll give you some lame, shot-to-shit crap about little things like this making life interesting or making a difference or something.
PS: Couldn't resist posting this photo of an over-stressed colleague's stress-ball.
Random Question: What do stress-balls do when they are over-stressed?
The poet in me awakens...
You are two parts hydrogen,
And one part oxygen.
Pray tell me, o mighty rain,
If you had a headache, would you take a Novalgin?
--Guru "Wordsworth" Smaran
And one part oxygen.
Pray tell me, o mighty rain,
If you had a headache, would you take a Novalgin?
--Guru "Wordsworth" Smaran
03 September 2007
Uncle & Aunty
The first words I heard last morning were "Hello uncle, is aunty around?"
Some middle-aged woman had not only dialled the wrong number, waking me up at a godforsaken hour (8-something AM on a Sunday morning), an hour when the whole goddam world sleeps, but also thought I sounded old enough to be her goddam uncle.
Uncle, influenced by sleep and the previous day's alcohol, the effects of which hadn't yet worn off, replied, "If uncle had aunty, why would he be like this? Uncle still searching for aunty. Lemme know if you find her", hung up and went back to sleep.
Some middle-aged woman had not only dialled the wrong number, waking me up at a godforsaken hour (8-something AM on a Sunday morning), an hour when the whole goddam world sleeps, but also thought I sounded old enough to be her goddam uncle.
Uncle, influenced by sleep and the previous day's alcohol, the effects of which hadn't yet worn off, replied, "If uncle had aunty, why would he be like this? Uncle still searching for aunty. Lemme know if you find her", hung up and went back to sleep.
20 August 2007
Reader's Digest and the 3 Mystery Gifts
Recently subscribed to Reader's Digest. This is what was written in the Registration page when I subscribed:
To enjoy the Reader's Digest throughout the year or to Gift a Friend the experience, just fill in the form and we will get back to you right away. Remember, 3 Free Mystery Gifts are waiting to be picked up! You can opt to pay through Credit Card or VPP.
The 3 Free Mystery Gifts was something I was really looking forward to. Images of beautiful RD hardbound books flickered in my head, those RD hardbounds found in much abundance in all the second-hand bookshops, and I grinned inwardly, for books, especially hardbounds, excite me like nothing else. There's something about those hardbounds that make them irresistable. Is it because they are beautifully bound and a pleasure to look at, or because they feel lovely when the tips of your fingers come in contact with them, or because they smell so nice? Or is it because all these things come together to become this beautiful experience of sight, smell and touch?
Anyway, a couple of weeks later, I got my first RD copy. There was however no sign of the 3 Mystery Gifts. I waited a while longer, mentally composing an email to send to the folks at RD meanwhile, thinking about all the wise-ass* things I would say, like, for example: "The 3 Mystery Gifts still remain a mystery", or using "The Mystery of the 3 Mystery Gifts" as the mail subject.
While pondering thus, I completely forgot about the letter box in my office, and when I checked today, I found the 3 Mystery Gifts. However, they did not turn out to be the lovely hardbounds I had dreamt of, but three small booklets printed on cheap paper. :-(
They were these three tiny booklets that were put together in a transparent plastic covering and thoughtfully tied together with cheap, coarse string to hold them together, lest they fall out and I get deprived of my 3 Goddam Mystery Gifts. Reader's "Customer Satisfaction" Digest. I now feel I'd have been happier if they had fallen out, but then, if that would have happened, I would've continued thinking that they were gonna send me lovely hardbounds, and I'd have probably emailed them a stinker or something and wait even longer, only to get these 3 Corny Mystery Gifts in the end. The feeling of writing a stinker, the very thought of investing time and effort and even attempting to infuse word-play, all for 3 goddam booklets would have depressed me no end. Hell, it might have even driven me to suicide.
Anyway, these are the 3 Mystery Gifts, and I can't do anything about it. More depressing than the booklets were their topics:
1. How to Lose Weight and Keep Fit:
Printed on cheap paper, this book has a lot of diagrams of this black-bikini clad girl doing these exercises, and the paper is so bad that you can see the black bikini from the previous page(previous exercise) kinda merge and become a part of the bikini-clad woman in the current page. I dunno why, but bad paper and their effects on diagrams always have a very disturbing effect on me.
2. Time Management: Make Every Second Count:
Yeah, you're right. It does have the dial of a clock on the cover. Apart from the clock, it does have four pictures, three of which are of people wearing official attire and staring at laptops, etc., while the fourth picture is of this guy sitting with his son on the banks of a goddam river, you know, just to show that there is life outside office, and that this book will teach you how to plan your time so that you can sit on a goddam river bank with your goddam son, thus, achieving in the end, a proper work-life balance. Work-life balance. That has gotta be the corniest word I've heard in a very long time.
3. The Assertive You:
The cover of this goddam booklet displays the two hands of this guy. One hand, the left one, is open, the palms facing upwards, while the right hand is formed into a fist, and is held above the left hand. Like the fist is gonna come down on the open-palmed hand. You get the picture? An assertive symbol and all. Know who were the authors? Stanley "Body" Phelps and Nancy "Language" Austin.
Anyway, the more I look at these books, the more they depress me, because I always think about how I expected hardbounds and how RD fucked me in the end. I therefore intend to dispose off these books to members in my team who're either overweight, non-assertive or don't give a shit about time. Have already found a taker for the "How to Lose Weight and Keep Fit" book (the taker was this girl who didn't need to lose weight at all. Girls, I tell you. Even if they're thin as a goddam pencil, they still think they're overweight and would want to lose more weight), but not for the other books.
Therefore, people reading this, if you have read and enjoyed this blog immensely, please leave your name and postal address to win 2 Mystery Gifts.
* - At that time, I thought they were clever statements to make, but I now realise that they are like those corny attempts at wordplay that all those retired "Letters to the Editor" type of old people try in order to show off their superior command of the English language.
PS: Doesn't the title sound a little too Harry Potter-ish?
To enjoy the Reader's Digest throughout the year or to Gift a Friend the experience, just fill in the form and we will get back to you right away. Remember, 3 Free Mystery Gifts are waiting to be picked up! You can opt to pay through Credit Card or VPP.
The 3 Free Mystery Gifts was something I was really looking forward to. Images of beautiful RD hardbound books flickered in my head, those RD hardbounds found in much abundance in all the second-hand bookshops, and I grinned inwardly, for books, especially hardbounds, excite me like nothing else. There's something about those hardbounds that make them irresistable. Is it because they are beautifully bound and a pleasure to look at, or because they feel lovely when the tips of your fingers come in contact with them, or because they smell so nice? Or is it because all these things come together to become this beautiful experience of sight, smell and touch?
Anyway, a couple of weeks later, I got my first RD copy. There was however no sign of the 3 Mystery Gifts. I waited a while longer, mentally composing an email to send to the folks at RD meanwhile, thinking about all the wise-ass* things I would say, like, for example: "The 3 Mystery Gifts still remain a mystery", or using "The Mystery of the 3 Mystery Gifts" as the mail subject.
While pondering thus, I completely forgot about the letter box in my office, and when I checked today, I found the 3 Mystery Gifts. However, they did not turn out to be the lovely hardbounds I had dreamt of, but three small booklets printed on cheap paper. :-(
They were these three tiny booklets that were put together in a transparent plastic covering and thoughtfully tied together with cheap, coarse string to hold them together, lest they fall out and I get deprived of my 3 Goddam Mystery Gifts. Reader's "Customer Satisfaction" Digest. I now feel I'd have been happier if they had fallen out, but then, if that would have happened, I would've continued thinking that they were gonna send me lovely hardbounds, and I'd have probably emailed them a stinker or something and wait even longer, only to get these 3 Corny Mystery Gifts in the end. The feeling of writing a stinker, the very thought of investing time and effort and even attempting to infuse word-play, all for 3 goddam booklets would have depressed me no end. Hell, it might have even driven me to suicide.
Anyway, these are the 3 Mystery Gifts, and I can't do anything about it. More depressing than the booklets were their topics:
1. How to Lose Weight and Keep Fit:
Printed on cheap paper, this book has a lot of diagrams of this black-bikini clad girl doing these exercises, and the paper is so bad that you can see the black bikini from the previous page(previous exercise) kinda merge and become a part of the bikini-clad woman in the current page. I dunno why, but bad paper and their effects on diagrams always have a very disturbing effect on me.
2. Time Management: Make Every Second Count:
Yeah, you're right. It does have the dial of a clock on the cover. Apart from the clock, it does have four pictures, three of which are of people wearing official attire and staring at laptops, etc., while the fourth picture is of this guy sitting with his son on the banks of a goddam river, you know, just to show that there is life outside office, and that this book will teach you how to plan your time so that you can sit on a goddam river bank with your goddam son, thus, achieving in the end, a proper work-life balance. Work-life balance. That has gotta be the corniest word I've heard in a very long time.
3. The Assertive You:
The cover of this goddam booklet displays the two hands of this guy. One hand, the left one, is open, the palms facing upwards, while the right hand is formed into a fist, and is held above the left hand. Like the fist is gonna come down on the open-palmed hand. You get the picture? An assertive symbol and all. Know who were the authors? Stanley "Body" Phelps and Nancy "Language" Austin.
Anyway, the more I look at these books, the more they depress me, because I always think about how I expected hardbounds and how RD fucked me in the end. I therefore intend to dispose off these books to members in my team who're either overweight, non-assertive or don't give a shit about time. Have already found a taker for the "How to Lose Weight and Keep Fit" book (the taker was this girl who didn't need to lose weight at all. Girls, I tell you. Even if they're thin as a goddam pencil, they still think they're overweight and would want to lose more weight), but not for the other books.
Therefore, people reading this, if you have read and enjoyed this blog immensely, please leave your name and postal address to win 2 Mystery Gifts.
* - At that time, I thought they were clever statements to make, but I now realise that they are like those corny attempts at wordplay that all those retired "Letters to the Editor" type of old people try in order to show off their superior command of the English language.
PS: Doesn't the title sound a little too Harry Potter-ish?
06 August 2007
Loo Behaviour
If there's one sect of people I hate, it's gotta be those who, when peeing in the loo, spit in the urinal.
Urinal. That's gotta be one of the most disgusting words in English. Think about it, and you'll know what I mean. Life is unfair, probably thought the guy who came up with the word, and therefore coined the word "urinal" after much deliberation, deciding that this was probably the best revenge that a guy who was not at peace with the world could take.
Not to be left behind is the word 'urine' and related words used in conjunction with 'urine'. Like how some people say 'pass urine' instead of using the word 'pee'. "Please pass urine into this small container so that we can do the tests". "Excuse me.. I need to pass urine." Yeah? Don't pass it onto me.
It especially sounds very crude when someone's talking tamil and say stuff like "oru nimisham sir... urine poyittu varen", which, when literally translated, means "one minute sir.. i'll go for urine and come". Go for urine. It's extremely disgusting when people use words like 'urine' in a sentence and end up making a grammatical mistake.
One word I've given a lot of thought to was 'Urine Culture', a word commonly used in laboratories. I've always wondered what the hell 'urine culture' meant. Was is something like folk culture? Did pee samples in labs get together and do something? Or did those lab guys really dig those samples so much?
Anyway, like I said, I hate people who spit into the er... umm... bowl when peeing. I also hate the thick 'thhpt' sound they make when they spit and the 'splat' with which it lands. Whenever I hear these sounds, I instinctively get this strong urge to push them forward towards the bowl, but since we are an evolved species, I find other ways to take revenge.
So if you're reading this and realise that I have, in the past, busted your balls for no good reason, you now know why. Muahahahahahaha!
PS: Girls, steer clear from guys who do this. They're usually assholes. Make sure 'He shouldn't spit while peeing' is one of the important points in your 'My Kinda Guy' list. And in case you were wondering, no, I obviously don't do this. :-)
Urinal. That's gotta be one of the most disgusting words in English. Think about it, and you'll know what I mean. Life is unfair, probably thought the guy who came up with the word, and therefore coined the word "urinal" after much deliberation, deciding that this was probably the best revenge that a guy who was not at peace with the world could take.
Not to be left behind is the word 'urine' and related words used in conjunction with 'urine'. Like how some people say 'pass urine' instead of using the word 'pee'. "Please pass urine into this small container so that we can do the tests". "Excuse me.. I need to pass urine." Yeah? Don't pass it onto me.
It especially sounds very crude when someone's talking tamil and say stuff like "oru nimisham sir... urine poyittu varen", which, when literally translated, means "one minute sir.. i'll go for urine and come". Go for urine. It's extremely disgusting when people use words like 'urine' in a sentence and end up making a grammatical mistake.
One word I've given a lot of thought to was 'Urine Culture', a word commonly used in laboratories. I've always wondered what the hell 'urine culture' meant. Was is something like folk culture? Did pee samples in labs get together and do something? Or did those lab guys really dig those samples so much?
Anyway, like I said, I hate people who spit into the er... umm... bowl when peeing. I also hate the thick 'thhpt' sound they make when they spit and the 'splat' with which it lands. Whenever I hear these sounds, I instinctively get this strong urge to push them forward towards the bowl, but since we are an evolved species, I find other ways to take revenge.
So if you're reading this and realise that I have, in the past, busted your balls for no good reason, you now know why. Muahahahahahaha!
PS: Girls, steer clear from guys who do this. They're usually assholes. Make sure 'He shouldn't spit while peeing' is one of the important points in your 'My Kinda Guy' list. And in case you were wondering, no, I obviously don't do this. :-)
Parking
In case you're planning a change of profession, and have finally zeroed in on becoming a parking attender or a security guard who's in charge of a parking lot, here's the one and only thing that they teach you during training, the only rule you will have to follow to the point of obsession if you plan to stay in the race and/or garner respect from your future peers despite being new in the profession:
When people have found parking space after hunting for nearly an hour, and have parked their bikes/cars and are about to go about their business, finally getting a chance to forget about parking-related woes, tell them that they shouldn't be parking there, and asked them to park elsewhere. Most importantly, before you tell them this, make sure that they have taken the trouble of side-locking bike, and if it's a car, ensure they have locked it, and the entire family has gotten out and has walked about 3-4 steps away from car.
When people have found parking space after hunting for nearly an hour, and have parked their bikes/cars and are about to go about their business, finally getting a chance to forget about parking-related woes, tell them that they shouldn't be parking there, and asked them to park elsewhere. Most importantly, before you tell them this, make sure that they have taken the trouble of side-locking bike, and if it's a car, ensure they have locked it, and the entire family has gotten out and has walked about 3-4 steps away from car.
29 July 2007
Wanted: Karate Students
Saw "The Karate Kid" on Sony PIX a week or two back. If, by now, you still haven't yet figured out or seen the movie, it's about this bullied kid, Daniel, who learns Karate from his japanese neighbour Miyagi, and, in the end, kicks the bullies' asses. In the process, he also gets a girl, Ali [a very gorgeous Elisabeth Shue], who also happens to be the head baddie's ex-girlfriend [I wonder why all these bad guys in movies always have to lose their girls to the heroes... poor bastards]. Throw in a couple of 'bonding' scenes of Miyagi and Daniel, a 'date' scene or two with Ali, a feud with a karate school where the baddies learn karate, a Karate Championship ending (I'm sure you know who wins the tournament), and you have the movie.
One constantly gnawing thing about the movie... I wouldn't say irritating, but it was this constantly 'gnawing' thing, if you get what I mean... it's like you don't mind it, but it sticks out like a sore thumb, making you notice it everytime... was Miyagi's accent. I mean, any Japanese guy who's been in the US for a while kinda gets to speak normal english, you know, proper sentence structure and all. But Miyagi, despite living in the US for years, speaks the same goddam Japanese-English spoken by every goddam Japanese character in all of goddam movie history, doing stuff like referring to himself in the third person, and saying stuff like "Walk on road, hm? Walk left side, safe. Walk right side, safe. Walk middle, sooner or later *squish sound* get squish just like grape. Here, karate, same thing. Either you karate do "yes" or karate do "no." You karate do "guess so", *same squish sound* just like grape. Understand?" Also, in a scene, it's Daniel's birthday, and Miyagi sings "Happy Baaarrrrrsssssday to you". Baaarrrrrsssssday!! What the hell is a 'Baaarrrrrsssssday'??!!
One really bad thing about the movie was that since Miyagi has his origins in the East, the frickin' script-writer decided to throw in all this eastern philosophy shit at every goddamn opportunity. And when I say every goddam opportunity, I mean EVERY GODDAM OPPORTUNITY. I had to feel sorry for this Daniel character, who, apart from us, got a lion's share of Miyagi's strange-utterings-in-the-guise-of-philosophy. For example, there's this scene where the poor bastard, when taking something out of his wallet, drops, by mistake, a polaroid photo of him and his girl. Miyagi, who pounces upon every goddam opportunity to sound wise, likewise pounces upon the photo and says "Miyagi no know you have sweetheart. You both different. Different but same." Different but same. I admit that wasn't anything philosophical, but it sounded philosophical, if you know what I mean. Different but same. That killed me.
Another major letdown was that in one scene, Miyagi is trying to catch a fly with his chopsticks [Guru say Karate/Kung-Fu movie incomplete if guy no catch fly with chopsticks] and when Daniel asks him what he was doing, he says the following Confucious-like saying:"Man who catch fly with chopstick accomplish anything". Till then, I was drooping in my chair like that sunflower in ET, and when Miyagi said this Confucious-like saying, it was like ET touching sunflower and bringing it back to life. I sat up, excited and expecting more quotes like that, perhaps stuff like "Cow with no legs, ground beef" or "Man who drop watch in toilet have shitty time", but in the end, I had to make-do with that one Confucious saying, which wasn't even funny in the first place.
But all was not bad, for we learnt much while watching the training sequences. After Daniel nags Miyagi for a while, asking him to take him as a disciple, Miyagi extracts a promise from Daniel ["We make sacred pact. I promise teach karate to you, you promise learn. I say, you do, no questions."]. Poor unsuspecting Daniel agrees, and Miyagi, cruel bastard that he is, then proceeds to make Daniel wash and wax his car ["Wax on, right hand. Wax off, left hand. Wax on, wax off. Breathe in through nose, out the mouth. Wax on, wax off. Don't forget to breathe, very important."], sand his decks, paint his fence, and finally paint his house, all in the guise of teaching him karate.
When I said we learnt much, it was because after watching the movie, we decided that, considering the kind of money we have to shell out for a domestic help these days, this was the best and most cost-effective way to get someone to sweep and mop the floors of our apartment, wash the bike, do the dishes, wash the loos, cook food, get alcohol from shop, etc. Of course, we have to teach him karate one day or the other, but I'm sure that the three of us room-mates can come up with some karate based on what we've seen in other movies. In the worst case, I'm sure my '36 Chambers of Shaolin' DVD would help to a great extent.
After this, the only thing left would be to enroll this guy in some tournament and make him win it. This too, I think, could be arranged. Let me now go try convincing room-mate to act as opponent and get ass kicked. I think a bottle or two of beer should do the trick...
One constantly gnawing thing about the movie... I wouldn't say irritating, but it was this constantly 'gnawing' thing, if you get what I mean... it's like you don't mind it, but it sticks out like a sore thumb, making you notice it everytime... was Miyagi's accent. I mean, any Japanese guy who's been in the US for a while kinda gets to speak normal english, you know, proper sentence structure and all. But Miyagi, despite living in the US for years, speaks the same goddam Japanese-English spoken by every goddam Japanese character in all of goddam movie history, doing stuff like referring to himself in the third person, and saying stuff like "Walk on road, hm? Walk left side, safe. Walk right side, safe. Walk middle, sooner or later *squish sound* get squish just like grape. Here, karate, same thing. Either you karate do "yes" or karate do "no." You karate do "guess so", *same squish sound* just like grape. Understand?" Also, in a scene, it's Daniel's birthday, and Miyagi sings "Happy Baaarrrrrsssssday to you". Baaarrrrrsssssday!! What the hell is a 'Baaarrrrrsssssday'??!!
One really bad thing about the movie was that since Miyagi has his origins in the East, the frickin' script-writer decided to throw in all this eastern philosophy shit at every goddamn opportunity. And when I say every goddam opportunity, I mean EVERY GODDAM OPPORTUNITY. I had to feel sorry for this Daniel character, who, apart from us, got a lion's share of Miyagi's strange-utterings-in-the-guise-of-philosophy. For example, there's this scene where the poor bastard, when taking something out of his wallet, drops, by mistake, a polaroid photo of him and his girl. Miyagi, who pounces upon every goddam opportunity to sound wise, likewise pounces upon the photo and says "Miyagi no know you have sweetheart. You both different. Different but same." Different but same. I admit that wasn't anything philosophical, but it sounded philosophical, if you know what I mean. Different but same. That killed me.
Another major letdown was that in one scene, Miyagi is trying to catch a fly with his chopsticks [Guru say Karate/Kung-Fu movie incomplete if guy no catch fly with chopsticks] and when Daniel asks him what he was doing, he says the following Confucious-like saying:"Man who catch fly with chopstick accomplish anything". Till then, I was drooping in my chair like that sunflower in ET, and when Miyagi said this Confucious-like saying, it was like ET touching sunflower and bringing it back to life. I sat up, excited and expecting more quotes like that, perhaps stuff like "Cow with no legs, ground beef" or "Man who drop watch in toilet have shitty time", but in the end, I had to make-do with that one Confucious saying, which wasn't even funny in the first place.
But all was not bad, for we learnt much while watching the training sequences. After Daniel nags Miyagi for a while, asking him to take him as a disciple, Miyagi extracts a promise from Daniel ["We make sacred pact. I promise teach karate to you, you promise learn. I say, you do, no questions."]. Poor unsuspecting Daniel agrees, and Miyagi, cruel bastard that he is, then proceeds to make Daniel wash and wax his car ["Wax on, right hand. Wax off, left hand. Wax on, wax off. Breathe in through nose, out the mouth. Wax on, wax off. Don't forget to breathe, very important."], sand his decks, paint his fence, and finally paint his house, all in the guise of teaching him karate.
When I said we learnt much, it was because after watching the movie, we decided that, considering the kind of money we have to shell out for a domestic help these days, this was the best and most cost-effective way to get someone to sweep and mop the floors of our apartment, wash the bike, do the dishes, wash the loos, cook food, get alcohol from shop, etc. Of course, we have to teach him karate one day or the other, but I'm sure that the three of us room-mates can come up with some karate based on what we've seen in other movies. In the worst case, I'm sure my '36 Chambers of Shaolin' DVD would help to a great extent.
After this, the only thing left would be to enroll this guy in some tournament and make him win it. This too, I think, could be arranged. Let me now go try convincing room-mate to act as opponent and get ass kicked. I think a bottle or two of beer should do the trick...
23 July 2007
Today's Cafetaria Menu
After supplying plain boiled rice with sambar and rasam for the last goddam 200 years, the caterers in our cafetaria decided to add more variety to their offerings and came up with the following:
Ghee Rice: A disgusting thing, in which rice is mixed with ghee [something I have a life-long hatred for] and garnished with all those tiny things you garnish stuff with. Truly pukeworthy.
Bisibela Bath: Sambar Rice, with a lot of special effects [carrots, boondi(one of those things that can't be translated), and peanuts]. Supposedly solid food but ends up being of a pasty consistency. When swallowed, it flows down your throat like radioactive ooze, like thick slime down a drainage pipe.
Lemon Rice: Bright yellow in color, missing the main ingredient: lemon.
Tomato Rice: Rice mixed with Tomato gravy within which lurk several million annoying long rolled-up spiky pieces of tomato skin which invariably get stuck between your teeth, or, if swallowed, miraculously survive the acids of your stomach, only to, like Andy Dufresne in Shawshank Redemption, "come out clean on the other side".
Vangi Bath: Brinjal Rice. Tastes as disgusting as it sounds. Brinjals mixed with some weird powder and rice. Need I say more?
There are more, but none come to mind.
Anyway, today, those guys finally ran out of things to mix with the rice, and in the end, you won't believe what they came up with. Take a wild guess. Not in your wildest dreams would you imagine them to come up with...
Milk Rice Bath!
Rice mixed with goddam milk!!
And before you ask, no: I obviously did not try it. But I did ask a few colleagues who did not see the menu and ate it unknowingly. I was like "Hey... how's the milk rice?", and one of them turned red in the face. I asked another, who I did not lunch with, and judging by her about-to-puke expression, I didn't have to wait for her answer to figure out that she had eaten it. A while after she came to know, she told me she was feeling low [strongly suspected as a side-effect]. I suggested a cup of coffee to cheer her up, and gave her the idea to have black coffee, and when she asked me why, I told her that the black coffee would mix with the milk rice in her stomach to become coffee rice, and that this was something the cafetaria guys hadn't thought of [atleast not yet]. Needless to say, she did not find this idea very appealing.
Anyway, I know you guys won't believe me that there indeed exists something called 'Milk Rice Bath'. So at the risk of being labelled insane by all and sundry, I took a photo of the goddam cafetaria menu when everyone was around. Here it is:
Ghee Rice: A disgusting thing, in which rice is mixed with ghee [something I have a life-long hatred for] and garnished with all those tiny things you garnish stuff with. Truly pukeworthy.
Bisibela Bath: Sambar Rice, with a lot of special effects [carrots, boondi(one of those things that can't be translated), and peanuts]. Supposedly solid food but ends up being of a pasty consistency. When swallowed, it flows down your throat like radioactive ooze, like thick slime down a drainage pipe.
Lemon Rice: Bright yellow in color, missing the main ingredient: lemon.
Tomato Rice: Rice mixed with Tomato gravy within which lurk several million annoying long rolled-up spiky pieces of tomato skin which invariably get stuck between your teeth, or, if swallowed, miraculously survive the acids of your stomach, only to, like Andy Dufresne in Shawshank Redemption, "come out clean on the other side".
Vangi Bath: Brinjal Rice. Tastes as disgusting as it sounds. Brinjals mixed with some weird powder and rice. Need I say more?
There are more, but none come to mind.
Anyway, today, those guys finally ran out of things to mix with the rice, and in the end, you won't believe what they came up with. Take a wild guess. Not in your wildest dreams would you imagine them to come up with...
Milk Rice Bath!
Rice mixed with goddam milk!!
And before you ask, no: I obviously did not try it. But I did ask a few colleagues who did not see the menu and ate it unknowingly. I was like "Hey... how's the milk rice?", and one of them turned red in the face. I asked another, who I did not lunch with, and judging by her about-to-puke expression, I didn't have to wait for her answer to figure out that she had eaten it. A while after she came to know, she told me she was feeling low [strongly suspected as a side-effect]. I suggested a cup of coffee to cheer her up, and gave her the idea to have black coffee, and when she asked me why, I told her that the black coffee would mix with the milk rice in her stomach to become coffee rice, and that this was something the cafetaria guys hadn't thought of [atleast not yet]. Needless to say, she did not find this idea very appealing.
Anyway, I know you guys won't believe me that there indeed exists something called 'Milk Rice Bath'. So at the risk of being labelled insane by all and sundry, I took a photo of the goddam cafetaria menu when everyone was around. Here it is:
12 July 2007
Captioned T-shirts
I have something against people who wear T-shirts with supposedly wise-ass captions. They'd have probably gone shopping, seen the T-shirt which has some lame, done-to-death quote like "The best way to avoid a hangover is to stay drunk" or "I went all the way to America, and all I got was this lousy T-shirt", thought it really funny and original, also thinking that they were probably the only people in the world wearing a T-shirt with that caption, and would have then bargained like hell for it and would've finally bought it, satisfied look on their face and all. And while buying the T-shirt, they'd also have thought about how everyone would look at it the next day and how people would think how funny the caption is and how cool s/he is and all.
The next day, just before wearing the T-shirt, they'd think about all that attitude they're gonna exude that day, and they'd wear it with a smug smile and all. And finally, when they come to office, they'd have this fake swagger of hips but very matter-of-fact and normal expression on their face, as if the T-shirt was some 20 years old, lying in some corner of the house somewhere, and they wore it because there was no other T-shirt available, and that they never really gave the caption much thought. But one look at them, and you know they're faking it, because the 'normal' expression is a different kind of normal, and you can instantly see through it because of this subtle-yet-obvious smirk plastered all over their face, and also because they act consciously normal, if you know what I mean... doing stuff like looking elsewhere whenever people look at the caption or talking a little more animatedly so that people notice them and eventually their T-shirt. And if someone actually goes upto them and says something like "Hey... nice T-shirt", they'd give this surprisingly amused look, as if they never expected someone to come upto them and compliment them on a goddam 20-year-old T-shirt, and they'd then say thanks and change the goddam topic immediately, as if talking about the T-shirt was trivial and that there were more important things to talk about.
People wearing captioned T-shirts, I tell you. They have to be the phoniest bastards on earth...
The next day, just before wearing the T-shirt, they'd think about all that attitude they're gonna exude that day, and they'd wear it with a smug smile and all. And finally, when they come to office, they'd have this fake swagger of hips but very matter-of-fact and normal expression on their face, as if the T-shirt was some 20 years old, lying in some corner of the house somewhere, and they wore it because there was no other T-shirt available, and that they never really gave the caption much thought. But one look at them, and you know they're faking it, because the 'normal' expression is a different kind of normal, and you can instantly see through it because of this subtle-yet-obvious smirk plastered all over their face, and also because they act consciously normal, if you know what I mean... doing stuff like looking elsewhere whenever people look at the caption or talking a little more animatedly so that people notice them and eventually their T-shirt. And if someone actually goes upto them and says something like "Hey... nice T-shirt", they'd give this surprisingly amused look, as if they never expected someone to come upto them and compliment them on a goddam 20-year-old T-shirt, and they'd then say thanks and change the goddam topic immediately, as if talking about the T-shirt was trivial and that there were more important things to talk about.
People wearing captioned T-shirts, I tell you. They have to be the phoniest bastards on earth...
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