Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Flights of fright!

After a pretty relaxed and forcibly-been-idle Monday, I unwind on the way back home ( Is there such a thing? ). Doors' Jim Morrison was performing for me and I had him loud; blaring. At the traffic light a neighbouring driver slowly rolled down his side window and peered out at me. I became a bit apprehensive. Expecting a curse and a scowl, I inched my hand towards volume control. He just looked at me and took his head back inside. His fingers started drumming to the tune. He must have started humming too. Phew! .......
Relieved, I became all courageous again. :-)

Today, I enter my home and see a letter waiting for me. I idly look at the address it came from. It's from some court of law! Everything forgotten, shit scared, I claw at the envelope trying to pry it open. My mind gallops, mining for some past incident which plausibly now requires my presence in a court. No more signs of a tired tuesday, my adrenalin racing to an all time high, I finally get my frantic fingers to open the mail, lacerating the envelope in the process. Out jumps a cheque! For five bucks! Completely bewildered now, I manage to read through the covering letter. I learn that out of 100 bucks collected from me some time ago for over speeding, I am getting a refund of five dollars as the fine had been only $ 95! That incident happened nearly 8 weeks back. It takes some time for me to calm down, and calm I become laughing hysterically. Whoa! The very sight of a court address on the envelope has shivered my timbers.
Shaken but not stirred! :-))

Saturday, August 19, 2006

Chicken Run!

Today I found out that the keyboard has become mightier than the pen.
I had to send a mail. I could have typed the letter out and mailed it. But I chose to write as it was hardly a big one. And I discovered how worse my handwriting (it is illegal to call that; more of a scrawl) has become. My letter looked like crazy lines in sand caused by chickens running through it.

Even before, my handwriting was not something to write home about. But this was a nightmare even for me, to read back what I had written. I only hope that the person whom I sent the letter is well versed in hieroglyphics. If my letter is intercepted by someone, they will find it a tough one to crack. To my knowledge, a code is one which has a logic in its encryption. This cipher of a mail had no logic in either form or substance. The same alphabet got written in a different manner each time. Figure that out.

My letters were running across the page at a manic speed in different directions not unlike a riotous crowd scattering on being tear gassed. Or like the behaviour of the suburban train crowds of Mumbai and Chennai on reaching the terminal.
How addictive our (the plural is intended to spread the guilt) life has become to the machinations of the machines!

I believe in a future not so distant, the "hand"writing as we know would become non-existent. More and more speech recognition software makes me see a future where our fingers would be mere vestigial fixtures evolving into forks for holding objects. Without even our realising, we have submitted ourselves to the comforts of email and IM. Maybe I'll IM my friend what I wrote!

Thursday, August 10, 2006

Musings of the moment!

Every afternoon after 2 o'clock, I feel very sleepy. Sometimes it is difficult to just see the monitor, and having the cube in an aisle which is like a main street with everyone walking by, it is difficult to catch a shut eye. I wonder whether it is possible to have jet lag even after nearly a year of living in a different time zone?

When I lamented that I never got around to meddle with my blog template, my dear friend retorted, "you males are always lazy". !! Is being lazy a male trait? I never knew that. So are we males the weaker sex, handicapped by the "lazy" gene? Do any of you gazillion readers of my blog know of any lazy female? {Gazillion is number less than 15, I am told}. Or are lazy females actually men in drag? whoa! A simple accusation and my mind veers off into countless logical avenues! Ofcourse if laziness is a male trait, then I am the most virile and macho guy to be found! When a task is to be completed by the n'th minute, (n+1)th minute finds itself kicking me shouting, "Start on the task, yo man!".

Why the only day I decide to leave early has the manager sitting late?


I am trying for a full page post, but thoughts dry up as soon as they start. It is not that I don't get topics to write on. But the topics that come to my mind, come very shy, limiting themselves to one or two paragraphs at the most. Can this be the writer's trickle, the precursor to the much abused writer's block?

Friday, August 04, 2006

Signs

Today out of curiosity I walk to the ATM in my office. I swipe my Debit card and check my bank balance. A rude shock. My balance is less than $ 10! Not enough for even a tank of gas. Ofcourse tomorrow is pay day but still, I've never fared this worse before.

It's a languid afternoon and I crave for a coffee. Starbucks depletes me by another dollar and 39 cents. Praying that no misfortune should happen on the long drive home, I start from office. Safely I reach home. I have a mail. A credit card waits for me! I am informed that my application has been approved and after performing the necessary security ritual, I am bestowed with credit!!
I doubt whether this is a good omen!
:-)