Monday, October 26, 2009

Bajne de zara!

Bhelcome!! You are extremely privileged to get a FREE (if you discount your internet browsing charges, the electricity bill and the cost of the strawberry popcorn you are munching now - kya kahan? no popcorn? Sheesh! What a cheapskate!) poolside view into the mind of the last living individual remnant of the band of geniuses ( one of the former members of the band being a certain Einstein gentleman ). Haanji. This is another of my random blogical ejaculations, that have now attained quarterly frequency. To tanik attension pay karke padhiyega. Mind it!!

Note - If you haven't spotted the humor in the above lines and are reading this abnormally long (tall!) post in the hope of stumbling upon gems of wisdom, keys to world peace and all that, I assure you, you have just keyed in the wrong url. A better way to attain the above would be listening to 'Mann ka Radio' on full blast or better, watching Karzzz (I have watched it twice and let's save that story for another day.. err.. era).

The past couple of months have been crazy at work. I had been entrusted a new responsibility and I took it to heart, to say the least. Late working days had become the norm and I don't remember reaching home before 9 pm. While there was the compulsion to finish the work against strict timelines, I think, to a certain level, I had become so involved in the responsibility that I didn't mind staying back and working. And that is very scary. Period.

A number of consequences have come up as a result. For one, I have been subjected to barbs from a number of friends and colleagues, not to mention the 'Kya milta hai tujhe yeh sab karne se' look on Mom dear's face when I reach home at unearthly hours. A colleague on her way out at 8 pm stopped by my desk and asked, "Not leaving?" I looked up and said, "Maybe 9". She - *Rolling eyes* "You workaholic!" and walked off. I was left gaping. Workaholic is not something I thought I'd be called ever.. I mean EVER. Besides she had mouthed 'workaholic', the way Dharmen paaji would have said, ''Kutte kamine, agle 5 saal mein jitne burgers khaoonga, sab mein ketchup nahi, tera khoon use karoonga."

Another colleague asked me if I liked dogs.

Me *unsuspecting accha baccha that I am* "Yes dude"

He - "Hey, then why don't you get one. It'd be great to have a dog at home."

Me - "No man. I don't think we could manage it in a flat."

He - "Well then find some way to manage a dog. You don't go home anyway. Get a dog. Atleast your mom'll have some company."

Me - *Sheepish.. Tail-between-legs-patli-gali-se-kalti syndrome*.. "He he"

Then there was this time we were celebrating traditional day at work. I, ofcourse, remembered it only when I walked onto my floor and found people decked up in an assortment of colors. Yours truly was clothed in the highest traditions handed down to us by our Angrez rulers and immortalized in song by Tramp Kapoor ji - shirt, patloon and joota (there was more but let's not get into that). Within a minute of me settling into my seat, a colleague draped in a resplendent 7-yard-long symbol of Bharatiya naritva walked by, retraced her steps, eyed me, said 'Waste!!' and moved on. She didn't even say it; the word was hurled out of her mouth with maximum contempt. She later lectured me on how I need to look at the good things in life and that work was not everything.

J, my good friend and break-mate has been at it for over a month now. In person during lunch breaks, over the internal IM at all other times, she's been alternating between dark humor, sarcasm, name-calling and downright displays of rage to let me know what a bore I've turned into.

Thankfully, the craze is now waning. A good deal of the work has been done and my life is showing traces of returning to normalcy.

On the home front, Age of Viruses is the latest craze and the battleground in question is my PC - PC here meaning Personal Computer (clarification lest a certain KISs-the-HEN-JI mistake me for a very big fan of our honourable clad-in-the-symbol-of-Dravidian-Purushatva Gruh-Mantri). So, I turn on my computer and then go read the day's ToI (Bombay Times, Navi Mumbai Times, Times Property, iDiva included), get engaged by Mom in one of our 'Why isn't it yet time for her to become a grandma' debates, succeed in stalling off shaadi.com for the time-being and then come back. Bingo! My monitor announces - 'Windows XP is starting up'. Something needs to be done. Quickly.

I missed attending the shaadi's of 2 of my friends - one in Mumbai and one in Kerala, courtesy kaam-ka-chakkar. I felt particularly bad about not being able to be there for the Kerala wedding. We were good friends at college and continue to be so. It's a shame I couldn't be there for him when he really needed me. After all, don't we expect our friends to be with us at our lowest ebb. The saddest part was conveying to him on the morning of his wedding that I wouldn't be there. He said he understood. I'm hoping he did.

It's interesting how much our friends matter to us. I have come around to the view that when a person nears his end of days and looks back onto his life, it is not the wads of currency he earned that matter the most, not the positions he held, not the people he commanded; it is the number of people who continue to love him, the number of people whose lives he added some value to, the people on whose faces he put a smile or a grin (even if it meant acting the clown at times) that matters the most. Aakhir, isn't that what the Creator wired us to do - love God and love people around!

Whoa! That is some gyaan. If feeling dizzy, do spend a moment in silence and ask yourself, 'Isn't it right?'. If still feeling dizzy, plug in your earphones, turn the volume to full blast, set the playlist to loop and add just one song to the playlist. No prizes for guessing - 'Mann ka radio bajne de zara...'

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A BIG thanks to good friend, B for coaxing / bugging me into getting back into the habit of posting here. I really want to post more often. I hope it happens. I also hope Osama Bin and Obama Bar meet up for dinner, kiss and make up.

8 comments:

jijnasha said...

Finally you found time to blog...Monday, June 15, 2009 and 12:27 AM..yeh mahurat ko apne diary mein likh le..hazaar saal mein ek baar ata hai..
Wese congrats you finished a good deal of work..hopefully we can see u often now..
And u missed out one more shaadi (u didnt miss that shaadi for workload)..

B said...

Ha! Guess who gets to comment first?!!:)
Bhelcum Bhelcum...Bhelcum back mr...err...(wonder which one shud I use from the many descriptive avtars???...I think i'll go with "Gentlemaan"!! :) [Oye! abhi jyaada nahi udne ka...it's just coz of the "p" factor!]

But good job mate! I don't have to tell you more about the writing..the talent..etc etc..I think uv heard enough already in the 'taana's':)
So soak in all the appreciation..collar wollar uper kar le...but ya..when's the next one coming?? :P
Keep writing Dost! God Bless!

p.s. You read idiva too?? That's scary.period.

B said...

Sorry! Guess by the time i finished writing the comment..i became second..:( ....Girl! when will thou learn to write 'short' comments??!!

Congrats again! Secund time!

Rj said...

gud 1 J.. do write more often :)

Vaibhav said...

Good Post :))

Unknown said...

Good One Jack...as usual...:))

The Magnanimous said...

nice piece of work buddy :) especially "This is another of my random blogical ejaculations, that have now attained quarterly frequency."...LOL
try 2 increase the frequency dost..people r eagerly waitin..

Ranjana Thanvi said...

dude ..keep blogging.. whenever i read your blogs .. i feel like standing at my place and clap .. plz don't miss your friend's marriage coz of work ..:)