"A glorious 100, yet another blogmark..."

Thunderous applause! Take a bow! Wow! What an astounding feat! How did I manage it? 10 months with minor sabbaticals here and there. A blog-hater to a blogger. A 100 posts? My God! Can you believe it?

(Ok ok! Enough of blowing my own trumpet! No legion of adoring, idolizing fans. Just I, me and myself. Sigh!)

E & OE - I've been peremptorily corrected by a reader saying it's not Dean Jones, but Tom Jones in my previous post.

(A 1000 apologies sir. I absolutely agree sir! I am so so so sorrry sir. You weel not be the 2 unhappy no for my miss demeanours? Pliss do not at the mouth froth sir. Take thees tissue and do not make much of the issue sir! See See, it is rhyming no? Issue, tissue...tee heee heee, c c!)

I think I've finally lost it! (No wonder no one wants to dance with me.)

Come, dance with me!

....It's a Sunday... ta ra ra ra ra!

... The 'retro' show on Radio City has Dean Jones singing, 'It's not unusual to be loved by someone...' hum hum hum. (No smart alecky asides here).

...Mangala Mangala Mangala! ...yeah yeah, I'm off to be a couch potato with The Man...Aamir Khan as Mangal Pandey.

...In the meantime put your hands together, hum 'Who can it be now?'...put one foot in front of the other, do a cha cha cha and twirl...

...Banish the thought that tomorrow is a Monday (damn! but do I care?)....pa ra raaaah!

Yeah! Just let go and move your body to the rhythm. Feel the music. Swing. Sway. Twirl.

...Yeah!

Obsession!

Smooth, butter-like, petal-soft, flawless, oh so flawless!… Skin.

Squeaky clean, bouncy, shiny like a 22 carat carbon unsheathed!… Hair.

24-inch (preferable), curvy, with a button that could be an erogenous zone or such a turn-on if it’s pierced… Waist with a belly-button.

Slim, tapering, small, strong, long, creamy smooth, hairless... Legs.

Luscious (clichéd I know, but it’s the only adjective that best describes it), bee-stung (yup! This is another, especially after Mme.Jolie gave lip service to it), pouty, pink, and oh so kissable… Lips.

Round, perky, tipped to perfection, firm, no stretch marks, just enough to hold… Breasts.

And the sparkling, long and thickly fringed eyes, delectable, deliciously suggestive arse, fanny, bottom, butt, or tush or what-you-will, the smile and you get the picture.

We’re obsessed. Obsessed with being perfect. This I know has been debated ad nauseam by feminists, male propagators of female ‘liberation’ and Germaine Greers all over the world. But I just felt I had to make my point of view known too.

I have warts. My skin is not honey smooth and has blemishes.
And my breasts are not the perfect 32-B or a 34. They’re not the perfect stress-buster-ball shape either.
I have legs which have cellulite and my body is not hairless.
My hair is limp, short and just about crowns my head.
My ankles are not slim and my toes are not pretty.
My fingers are short and stubby and I have gnarled feet. No varicose veins yet.
I have a gummy smile and eyes that even with L’Oreal’s Shimmer whatchamacallit eye-shadow will still look bare.
I have a laugh that echoes around bare walls and a voice that will be called raspy.
No high-angled cheekbones or the perfect moue, the chiseled nose or the delicate but stubborn jaw.
Naah! I don’t have none of this.

But I have a brain. I have a voice inside my head that asks questions. I do. I work. I write. I listen. I hear. I shout. I give a high-five. I don’t write like Shashi Tharoor or Arundhati Roy or The Unknown Guy (with or without his penchant for obscenities, his humour is a gift) and use high brow words like ‘revanchism’ (what in the name of Merriam Webster is that?) and no didactic, unleavened prose for yours truly. Well, to cut a long story short – I am who I am. A thinking, feeling, loving, caring, doing, human. Like you. Like the multitudes of real people. Why do I forget that I am beautiful as I am? Why do I give in to the artifice? The pressure of fantasy and superficiality gets under my skin.

Because you see, I’m weak too. I can be influenced, I can be brainwashed, I can be conditioned. By me. By my environment. And then the inexorable downward spiral commences. And my resilience and strength are called to the fore. How long can I hold out?

Obsession is sinister. It is insidious. It is odious. It is delirious. It is notorious.
Obsession. Of women by women. Of women by men.
Obsession of beauty. Obsession of wealth. Of fame. Of illusion.
Obsession with perfection.

But perfection is so boring. Who wants Utopia? (And so how goes it for men?)

The post with no name!

Does every post have to have a name?

Does every cyclist have to come within a hair's breadth of my car?

Does Sunday have to turn over and let Monday take over?

Does Aamir Khan have to look so hot, act so well, and give me goosebumps?

Does life have to have so many complications like deciding the attire for the day?

Does aspiration have to rear its ugly head every once in a while (once in a while being as often as twice a week?)

Does love have to happen over coffee, tea, dinner and many dates? (Actually what is it that men really look for in women? Mystery mystery! Like the mythical 'perfect man', the answer to that ladies is we'll never know and guess what? they don't either!)

And does this and does that and blah blah blah...yawwwwwwnnnnn!

Boring eh? Yup, I know.

TGTIF (Thank God Tomorrow Is Friday!) Hallelujah!

Bless the Saint, ‘tis Fuchsia Pink Day!

Oooooh! Cho chweeeeeet! Flutter! Flutter! Come Hither!

Sigh! The world’s gone fuchsia. The tabloid aka Times of India tells me the colour of love is pink this season. So we have pink ribbons, pink satin bows, pink lips, pink eye shadow, pink perfume, pink lingerie, pink cushions, pink eiderdowns, pink pink pink…pink Pina Colada, pink Margherita, pink Cadillacs, pink hair, pink (after a while it sounds like Oink Oink right?) nails, pink pink pink! And can the pink condoms be far behind (the colour of love, LOL, how apt!). But love is expressed by the ubiquitous red rose. Where’s the pink I say!

Valentine’s Day is celebrated like it’s an age-old tradition and ‘Happy Valentine’s Day’ rings out of your ears and everywhere you go like it’s going out of fashion. Well,…er, ..yeah, come to think of it, love is going out of fashion, methinks! It’s all about the quickie. After all we’re in the age of instant nannies, instant noodles, and instant fame, instant notoriety, so can love be far behind?

How did the St. bless my day?
Having a moronic uncouth pea-brained chauvinistic p(r ) ick of a lout ramming into my car. So you get out of your home, not necessarily looking forward to going to work, rush down to your car after having the most important meal of the day, kiss your ma goodbye (ooooh! I love the song being played on the radio right now – White Flag by Dido – ‘I won’t put my hands up and surrender..there will be no white flat above my door, I’m in love (who me?)…and always will be…hmm..hmm..ain’t that cool?) ok sorry to digress, so you kiss ma goodbye, get into your car and have the radio blasting some nice mushy (pink) music keeping with the theme of the very special day and heading towards the first junction en route to office. Whoa! Slow down, no no, brrrrrrraaaaaaake! Big boulders and bricks bang in front of my car. Didn’t see it as it was hidden by the f&^%$ truck in front of me. And 10 seconds later, rammm!

My rear fender is rammed into by another car. No traffic behind nor in front. I get out to inspect at the damage. And then there’s mayhem. Abuses in Kannada fly by, a crowd gathers to watch the tamasha (see ma, girl fighting, in English ma, see see, what guts, what fun, ma, see see!). No khaki clothed betel leaf chewing, tobacco stained bribe-infested conscience wielding lech of a cop anywhere in sight. Then this lout grabs the keys off my ignition and heads off. There’s a minor scuffle between him and yours truly. Now I believe men are truly stronger, truly more powerful. What would we do without God’s gift to mankind!!!

My keys gone, my frustration at suddenly feeling powerless engulfs me. I call a friend, call ma and wait. Friend lands up, the a-hole of a cop saunters from the junction with the f&*^%g b@&^%rd (is the blasphemous language the influence of reading too much of the Unknown Guy’s blog who also goes by the name of Snarky blogger sometimes anime chick) and just tells me to calm down. Calm down and me? Look at me you rotten sodden swine! Can you see my face apopleptic with anger, bursting at the temples, and ready to take a swipe at your nose and the stupid moron with my keys. I get my keys, shake my head in abject disbelief that this could be happening to me, assess the damage and realize it’s nothing, hear the cop telling the lout about ‘lady driver’ and almost take a swing at him, and well…nothing. Get to the nearest garage, right the wrong and am on my way. I get to office and the reaction sets in. Of the aloneness, of being the lone warrior unlike Xena, of having a bunch of onlookers looking at me grinning like it's truly a film shoot and I'm some cheap extra, and not coming to my aid, not even to remove the huge boulders out of the way, of, oh well, of the whole shebang. My body was racked by tears that kind of dried up somewhere. And then to top it, a colleague of mine gets flowers. And to top that, not one bouquet but two!

Tell me about Cupid! He’s been on strike for a long time now stupid!

Oh yes! I’m in the pink today.

Happy Fuchsia Pink day, but er…say it with roses! Red preferably.

Why not me?

OhmigodIdidit!!

You know there are certain things you think you would NEVER do or are in the realm of the unthinkable. Small things, not life-altering, nevertheless it’s stuff that you think is, well, simply, not done. But we all surprise ourselves. This weekend was my turn to be surprised! Here's how!

Episode I:
So here I am, in my jeans and kurti with my signature earrings – which in common parlance would translate into ‘those massive danglers and chunky junk jewellery I oh so love to hate or so hate to love’. I had my colleague’s wedding to attend. And being her boss, it was mandatory I attend. (Mandatory? My foot! Who the hell sets the rules? This is what I meant when I mentioned about certain things you would NEVER do, and in similar vein, you'd do because it's manadatory…well, you get the drift).

It was a Friday evening. It was meant to be a ‘different’ kind of wedding reception. Not the ‘mandatory’ flower bedecked backdrop with ‘Ravi weds Nisha’ in marigold and rose and god alone knows what other flowers. The bride and groom grimly grinning at the queue standing grimly to wish the couple ‘congratulations on a happy married life’, the mandatory photo-op and video lights blinding you as you are supposed to look your best when actually you are worried about the warts on your face, the blotched mascara and eye-liner and the all too visible tiered mid-riff that’d the camera’d be only too glad to capture. Ugh! No siree, this was to be a different wedding. All drama et al. I wanted to go. Did I?

Well, I had ironed out my Christmas tree look alike attire in red and gold and was mentally prepared to come home, change, and look suitably ‘dressed for the occasion’ – the occasion being the ‘Great Indian Wedding Tamasha’.

Then work happened. Just like shit happens. Everyday. Work always happens. I was through with cursing beneath my breath. Was there a point in cursing? Life goes on and so does work. Anyway, the other ‘heee heee ooooh…aaaah’ girls at office had brought their change and of course as is mandatory, showed it to their other girl friends. I being a senior, and not disposed to mingle with the hoi polloi (yes, am a snooty B), almost curled an evil lip at these mere mortals. I was beyond all this – I was sure they’d get a shock to see me in my changed avatar and go eye-popping mad. Yo, yo, yo! Sigh! If only I’d listened to my instinct and got my clothes to office and kept them in the car instead of having some brain-dead brainwave of coming home 12 km from office and driving again another 20 km to the wedding venue and back. Now I know why we’re called ‘dumb brunettes’. Sic!

So work happened and it was on a roll. And I mean a roll like those manufacturing units where the bottles keep coming at you on a conveyor belt, relentless, non-stop, for you to label,if you were a white collar worker, right? You just keep going at it, mindlessly till the quota for the day is over and done with. But here, it’s not even a mindless job. It’s high-pressure that freaks me out. And to deal with red haired, fat bottomed, aggressive, miss know-it-alls kind of gets to me. Help me please, I need rescuing! And when stressed out, my voice goes up a few notches. This chick (I hate the usage of this term, but in this case it's just so apt, forgive me O Lord!) and I got into an argument where I raised my voice and she kept telling me, ‘don’t raise your voice, speak normally’ and I (hilariously) kept insisting that ‘I’m not raising my voice, am just telling you to back-off’. It was funny only on hind-sight. Anyway, bottom line is I was up to my ass in work. And I so wanted to go for the wedding. And even though my head was splitting and my back which has been sore for a week now was sending me shooting twinges as signals saying, ‘not ok not ok not ok’….aaaaaaargh!!! I still wanted to go. And I could feel my plans, my enthusiasm all dimming by the minute like the rise of the moon in the night time.

Then strangely at around 6.15 pm or so, my boss comes up to me and asks me about plans for attending the wedding. I tell him with what I hope is a really pissed off tone that I won’t be able to make it and named all the others who I thought were going to go. He just said, ‘I’m ordering a taxi and you can come along with me or I’ll get lost in that part of town’ and that was that. Won’t get into details of what happened between 6.15 pm and 7.30 pm. The taxi came and 2 of my colleagues and I went in the taxi to the ‘and they lived happily ever after’ wedding of the season. In my jeans, kurti, big danglers and scruffy keds, not a trace of make up and none of the bling that is so necessary at the ‘Great Indian Wedding Tamasha’.

OhmigodIdidit!
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Episode II:
Went to pick up ma at the railway station at the ungodly hour of 5.00 am. Got up at 4.30 am, dragged on my jeans and pull over, grabbed the car keys and cell and headed for the station 6 kms away. Notice the sequence. Jeans, bra, t-shirt, pull over, cell phone, car keys, wallet, slip-ons, house keys and out of the house. Something missing? Of course!!!! I didn’t brush my teeth. And then I committed the ultimate blasphemous act. At the station I sipped on a large Styrofoam of hot chocolate. Without brushing my teeth!

OhmigodIdidit!!

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Episode III:
As if this isn’t enough, I surprised myself yet again. It’s bad enough to work on a Saturday. It’s worse when you’re me and can’t suffer hunger pangs. My mind’s warped anyway, and then when hunger calls at my innards, the alarm bells jangle my nerves with their pitch and I’m ready to bite anybody’s head off.

So, all said and done, however much I exaggerate, I do have amazing control over myself and my inner calling. (That’s one of the reasons I’m the failure I am, have never listened to my heart but have no qualms about masterfully advising young friends about always following the call of the heart, hah!) Anyway, had to go to one of those malls that now dot the city and have somehow become the panacea for all those at a loose end and don’t know what to do with their free time. Now Brigade Road is passé. Malls are so hip and in and happening. The chicks (that’s the 2nd time I’ve used this slanderous term, what’s with me?) and the hunks, the wannabes and the aunties and uncles with cantankerous children and the rest of humanity nowadays hang out at the malls. The place to be seen at. Ahem!!

Right! Having said that, I had to go to one of these very same malls that I’m so happily denigrating to the bin, to pick up a pair of trousers which I was hoping would be altered and ready. Again in a decidedly brain-dead decision to go on a Saturday afternoon at 3.30 pm when the ‘sale’ was on, on an empty growling stomach, on a fuel tank that was beyond ‘E’, I seemed set on the road to hell. After waiting for 35 mins., yes, 35 f$#%ing mins. for parking, mind you, my car suddenly sputters on the sloping gangway of the basement parking. What the …!!! Why the…!!! What am I…!! I don’t panic, because I’ve realized that at such times, my mind seizes up and a certain calm clutches my heart. I shrug my shoulders and ask the ‘am going mad’ parking attendant ‘what do I do, my car won’t start’ and he asks me the same bloody question in Kannada. ‘Your car won’t start madam?’ is his plaintive query and I’m ready to get out of the car and hit the klutz. Poor fella! Not his fault. I’m beginning to think of the stares, the honks, the angry mutterings, whom to call for help to push the car, and the jam that this is going to cause, how to get the fuel, and all the myriad things associated with a car that won’t start on the sloping gangway of a basement car park with 30-40 cars behind you. Normal day eh? Miraculously the car starts and I get parking and am inside the mall. Hallelujah!

Then I collect the aforementioned trousers, and head for the food court. It’s 4.30 pm by then. Buy the coupons, and get ignored by the guy at the counter as I wave the coupon under his nose, am on the brink of grabbing his collar over the counter, with my back-side in the face of the other gawking hungry shoppers, and am actually amused by the thought of ‘what a picture’ and seems like it’d be a scene straight out of ‘Desperate Housewives’, continue to bide my time, and finally get my order billed, numbered and now it’s time to find a place to park my oversized butt, tired feet, grumbling tummy and screaming mind.

I look at the grubby children, the families with platesful of stuff and I’m silently asking them, ‘do you really need to eat so much’ and ‘can’t you see I’m tired, don’t I look like an angel and don’t you want to give me a chair’, ‘can’t you finish up quickly instead of looking lovingly into his eyes, and he doesn’t even have nice eyes and yes that dosa is dripping with oil, ugh,’ and on and on and on. I finally see a table emptying itself of its 4 occupants, but there are 3 guys who’re sitting by that very table and hoping to occupy it. So I go, ‘oh ok, you can take it, not a problem’ while I’m actually gnashing my teeth and wondering ‘where the hell is chivalry and why the hell don’t I look fragile where they would’ve gone, oh please, not a problem, take the chair, take 2…’ damn damn damn! So much for being the modern, independent, ‘I need no help and can take care of myself’ 21st century woman. Hrmph!!! But to be fair to them, one of them did make the right noises and offered me the table. Anyway, while they shifted their butts to the relevant chairs with one chair still empty, I cheekily remarked, while placing my bag with the trousers in them, ‘Now that I’ve been so sweet to you, why don’t you watch this bag for me while I get my order?’ and traipsed off to get my tray leaving the 3 dudes slightly bemused. Got back, and after parking my butt in the empty chair, I asked them, ‘may I, hope you don’t mind and thanks’ and dug in. Would I have had the audacity to do this if I was a few years younger? Not a chance! Age has its advantages.

OhmigodIdidit!
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I’ve written a blog of gargantuan proportions. And I got back after a mini sabbatical. I had a massage today, but my back is still sore. I got some pleasant surprises in the form of messages from friends. I’ve known all along that my mother rocks. Had Bacardi breezers with her today and she’s just got back from a ‘holy’ trip which meant a visit to 33, yes, three three thirty three temples! Phew! And topped by Bacardi. What a..er..breeze!
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Some of my friends and their messages:
‘It’s good to be alone sometimes.” S

“Friendship doesn’t occur with special people…people become special when they become friends.” J

“Dream, work hard and have faith in yourself – leave the rest to God!” A

“Absolutely unconditional always with you…” R

“We’re an amazingly strong sex. Think of all the shit we handle and how we still manage to keep going…” B

“One is what one wants to be. So one can be surrounded with people and still be alone. Boundaries are imaginary. You are not alone. There are 7 billion with you.” (Wow!) Ashu

“Life after all is maya. Nothing stays with us. Even batteries die.” Ashu

“…gunning for what I want to do in life..nothing else matters. Have ice cream and say hello R beautiful….” Asif

“I love the way you laugh and your great sense of humour. Don’t ever lose it.” J

And all the umpteen messages that my friends send to keep me going and give me motivation and inspire me, that mean so much to me. I bow to thee.

Er…did anyone miss me while I was gone? (I’m hoping, I’m hoping…I’m a hopeless romantic and I live on hope, however hopeless I might feel or be and however much people grin knowingly about my display of vulnerability and well, yeah! I like being missed. Am I not human?)

OhmigodIdidit!! (I wrote the blog which has been in my head all day. And now it’s time to go back and burrow my head in the sand and disappear in the deep gorges of a befuddled mind).