One Fleeting Moment

I really have no clue. I had barely gotten over my joy at having two entire days to myself that I found myself cooking for the week ahead -not good. Horrible time management skills I tell you, specially given the fact that I wasted two and a half hours yesterday night watching a terribly average movie called "Batman Begins". The fact (another fact!!!) that the movie was free happens to be its only redeeming feature, atleast in retrospect. Cliched dialogues, B grade special effects which are so fast that they leave you confused and a so-so looking hero are only some of this movie's many weaknesses. I am still not quite sure why Liam Neeson's character was so angry and what was the deal with the League of the Shadows anyway? Strangely, this movie had some very good reviews and I kept waiting for the story to suddenly morph into something smart...well I waited for 141 minutes that's it.

And before I forget here is a picture of the my new toy standing beside the old one.

Don't get me wrong, I love cooing over babies and pulling funny faces at them. I have also patiently watched over petulant two year olds, nefarious eight year olds and the odd gurgling infant (no diaper change involved though). But what is proving rather annoying is the "joys of motherhood" prattle of new parents that I am subjected to quite frequently nowadays. And when the lecture is delivered by a proud father ("Yeah, tell me all about pushing out your nine pound bundle of joy will ya!!" ) -as I said Gah!!!. People -the last time I checked copulating with the intent of populating was still a highly personal decision and not another case of keeping up with the Joneses.

So we hit a deer (or put another way, an overtly suicidal deer ran into us) last Saturday. Luckily for us the only casualty was the deer (stupid thing!!!) and our headlight. Most of you who visit this blog might have noticed that on more than one occasion I have tended to rant about my car troubles. This is hopefully the last rant because two days after the accident we brought her home. SHE is a 2006 Toyota Corrolla LE with 5 speed manual transmission and lots of other cool features that I am yet to figure out. She packs a mean 126 hp of power compared to the 92 hp of our older Honda Accord. Her mileage figures are super cool and her turning radius ...wooo haa. And I have a sneaky feeling that she has more brains than some of the people around me!!!

It was quite an experience going from slime-ball dealer number one to goof-ball dealer number two before settling for dealer number three. And just when you think its over they spring the really creepy (think backbrushed, oily hair types) financial manager on your unsuspecting self.

Another thing, an accquaintance was a little dissapointed by my rather common choice of car* and this reminded me of Sagnik's hypothesis. Some men really look upon cars as an out-of-body, for-the-viewing-pleasure-of-thronging-masses-type manifestation of their private appendage.

PS: Go watch Lord of War if you haven't.
*Declaration of the Day: I have no problems conforming to any racial stereotypes as long as it makes my wallet and the environment happy.

Here's a question for all those given to casually perusing lifestyle magazines...have you ever noticed that in all the pictures of lovely homes, picture perfect work places and "the-kitchen-colors- are-so-great-that-you-will-feel-like-cooking -24/7"kitchens there is one thing conspicous by its absence? And that one thing ladies and gentleman defines our very existence. Where would the human race be without the miles and miles of wiring that it needs for its daily survival, I ask? How do the people who populate the Pottery-Barn-catalogue like homes light their three hundred dollar lights?Even the humble Ikea-catalogue-like kitchens don't seem to have one stray wire out of place.
Just in case you are wondering why I am ranting about this at precisely 1:34 AM, well I spent the better half of the last couple of hours cleaning up and a considerable amount of that was devoted to organising the bundles of wires that run from my latop to the surge protector, from the scanner to laptop, from the scanner to power source,from the room lamp to the power source, from the desk lamp to the power supply...I am sure you get the idea.
I really wanted my work station to like the dream in brown, totally inspirational workspace in the catalogue of Crate and Barrel. Unfortunately, like size 2 clothes even lifestyle magazines and furnishing store catalagoues are not made for real people. Real people have flab and real people have ugly wires sticking out from all their appliances.

So I got tagged (yew! the word reminds me of horrible mangy dogs in cruel leashes) with the 55 word short story chain by Sagnik and here is what my addled brain could come up with at the end of the work week.

FREEDOM

“Do you want to keep these?”, he asked.
She took one last look at that bundle of tattered letters from another time in her life.
“No, throw them away”, she said and walked away with an enigmatic smile to help the packers.
She had waited long for this day.


PS: This exercise reminded me of the awkward précis writing exercises that were foisted on us by our evil school system ages and ages ago.

PPS: Yippee...now its my turn to pass on the bug!! So will the following people:
Anoop, Antara, Ayush, Subhamoy and Vishnu
please consider themselves tagged.

The last few days have been very very hectic. My parents were wrapping up their visit which usually means the following set of events will unfold with clock work like precision:

1. My Dad will suddenly get obsessive compulsive about packing...mind you he is totally incapable of packing two shirts neatly into a 36" inch suitcase.
2. My Mom will refuse to listen to Dad's rants about packing and go about with life rather nonchalantly.
3. Event Number 2 will lead to some more frustrated ranting from Dad ( this is when I normally step out for some fresh air).

Needless to say the above protocol was followed religiously this time around. My Dad walked about muttering something about the possible disaster scenarios involving unpacked lugggage while my Mom and I went shopping (I needed the fresh air and Mom had to do something unrelated to packing). On the way the car started making weird noises in the middle of the highway and I had to pull over to the shoulder. As I stood peering into the engine, my knight in shining armor arrived (or so I thought). Apparently checking out the innards of your car infront of the NSA exit qualifies as suspicious activity and might categorise you as a homeland security threat. To put it plainly, the friendly, good looking guy who materialised out of no where was there to check if we were the Bin Laden clan!!! To cut a long story short, we cut short our trip (that is funny!!) and headed home where Mom proceeded to tell Dad about the CIA guys who...the US visit was now officially complete!!

The car trouble turned out to be some harmless little plumbing issue. The house seems vaguely empty now. The block of German cheese in the refrigerator is lonely and I need to go and get him some friends.

The trip to New York was great fun and taking the bus instead of driving turned out to be a really good idea. The weather gods were smiling and the crowds in Times Square were milling as our group of four walked around aimlessly through NYC. My dad was pleased as punch at having found an American city that closely resembled Calcutta-only cleaner. Washington DC is way too clean and organised for his taste. We did the usual tourist-y things like walking through Times Square, going to Rockfeller Center and clicking pictures with the celebrities at Madame Tussaud's (I made a ghost in the Chamber of Horrors at Wax Musuem very happy by jumping out of my skin at the sight of him!!). We went into the Empire State building and walked straight out after being told there was a 4 hour waiting period!!! What else?...hmmmm...we gave Central Park the royal snub by walking right by it without going in. "There is no way a city park can compare to our own Buddy Attick Park", declared my Dad. Subhamoy had a wonderful time chatting with the cabbies (each of our five cabbies came from a different country)...unfortunately he refuses to write about that.

One more thing, we managed to catch the late night show of "The Constant Gardener" before leaving. The movie raises some very ethical questions about the value of human life against the painful backdrop of an AIDS ravaged continent. From just a love story it quickly becomes a movie with a conscience. I would highly recommend it to anyone looking for something other than sob stories of forty year old virgins!!!