what is the difference between animals and humans?

what is the difference between animals and humans? somewhere, sometime i'd come across the idea that it could well lie in the human ability to imagine and engage with death. it sort of resurfaced and i can't stop obsessing.
not the ability to imagine and create love - well some animals can do that, not the ability to imagine and recreate sunsets - some primates can paint, not the ability to embrace and live life - every organism does so; but to think about the the cessation of life, to be able to imagine what death is and to arrange life around the absence of life - that is being human!
i'm seriously thinking of sending a chain mail to all the entries in my address book and ask people what they think could the actual difference be. for this, surely, can't be it. can it?

christmas heartbreaks. deja vou? perhaps. tired.
it seems like the right to remain clueless comes with a shelflife. and the best by date is coming perilously close.
light a candle for me and send a stinking rich marwari lover my way ye gods.
but on the sunny side, i got a towel and a kitkat for christmas.

i miss more than one thing, more than one place, more than one person and more that one life. my capacity to miss sometimes amazes me. i miss you. i miss me too.

my mother and uncle asked me to stop smoking for the sake of my children. i asked them, quite logically if i may say so, "what children?" they were cross. sometimes i wonder if i am the only sane person living in this entire world. probably yes.
sometimes i really feel like taking them apart to see what makes them tick. but i'd do that only if i could put them back together. even though they are very clueless.

i have become alarmingly good at lying. not even white lies. great big hulking jet black hairy ones too. and it feels so good. particularly when i convince myself to believe one or two of them.
even my normally clueless progenitor couldn't help remarking on that when he was subjected to hearing my side of a phone conversation this morning on the way to work. his work. i was cadging a lift so i could go and watch a movie. and on the way concocted 5 different lies for different categories of people. it gave me such a high.
and what's even more scary is that it's so much more of a delight when it's a lie without a reason. when it's 'just a lie'.
god save my soul, or whatever has been left shriveling inside.
but for the time being, i want to give truth a miss. it's nicer.

23 pairs of shoes last counted - but can wear only 1. and it's hideous too.
but that's not the real issue.
in the last few months 7 people quit from work. i am quite tired going through repeated cycles of separation anxiety. one subsides only to let the next one begin in an even more vicious note. it was especially bad today, because P left yesterday. she was a friend.
and i am even more pissed because she was my smoking buddy. and it's not really that big a sceret that women need their smoking buddies even more than the restroom buddies. they are needed too, but the smoking buddy is a different thing altogether.
particularly in our delightful little shady alley where you get spare motor parts, roti tadka, overripe fruit, great chinese food, butter-and-pepper-and-sugar toast, chhamiya dance after 6 and raw rum in a kerosene can after 11, the smoking buddy is your fellow trooper protecting democracy.
they help you stake out your claim on the particular little corner just right of the parked amby, point out which particular brother of the panwallah is stingy about lighter fuel, what exactly to scribble on the flat brown paper bit torn out of a carton on which somebody has written KNOT SMOKING, how to lock eyes and smile engagingly at the irate mothers walking past with the kids and the special strategy you need to whip out for marwari matrons. they also let you have that 5 minutes of zoning out, lend a willing ear and almost always sage advice (except when it comes to fashion), a cup of coffee or tea and a bite of whatever it is and pre-order your two o clock smoke for you before giving an irate call. they also lend credence to the truism that the inside stories are actually the ones you get outside the office.
anyhoo, the new recruit is frighteningly proper, has a health food fetish and gaped open mouthed at the rogues'gallery when she came in to pick up her letter. the hideous-one-we're-hearing-rumours-about does all that and more and the third-one-whom-everyone-can remember-but-can't-quite-place is supposed to be mental. november is going to be interesting.

why the break? because i can.
and other stuff too, but this makes me sound cooler.
this apart, if you wish on a fallen eyelash and then rediscover it in a few seconds and wish on it a second time, does it work? blowing hard may get you some wonderful results otherwise - but when it comes to acts of faith does it work?
which begs the question, if the blowing hard involves monogamous, exclusive partners then can that kind of blowing be termed as an act of faith too? whatever.
this is the reason why this space needs to be pristine and blank.

sunny afternoon, pink evening sky, stars on a velvety dark night after a long time. yet, i have a rainy day inside me.

the progenitor counted three reasons to feel macho. top of the list - near death experience, tied for second place - the skull cup of bandages to cover up his split head which makes him feel like a gangsta thug and the shaved chest which makes him feel like a "classier" salman khan.
so far he's cribbed about the diet, the tv remote, the poor little resident medical thingy's lack of fashion sense, the tea - make that thrice, chinese food (unconnected, but that doesn't stop him) and life in general.
if my mother doesn't go to work tomorrow, he might just get into a situation that's even more life-threatening. so far i've been lying about visiting hours being shorter than they actually are. but she got the full blast today and passions ran high. blazing eyes, gnashing teeth, monosyllables and the whole works. well there were polysyllables too, but necessarily contained to the sibilant variety.
god, or anybody else, help.

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alone. scared.
very.

every day i live in fear of someone asking me the simple question "what perfume are you wearing?" i either duck my head and pretend not to have heard the question at all or i look blankly and pretend i have forgotten it's name. this blasted thing is going to see me dragged to the hr bitch one of these days and heavens help me, there's worse fate yet if the khaki and the navy and the charcoal dorks think i'm coming on to them collectively.
my new perfume's called:
that breathtaking moment when the heart stands still.

i've been having very morbidly fascinating dreams lately. the latest seems to be series - a story unfolding in my dreamscape.
i woke up very sad the other day and when i tried to figure out why, i remembered that dead people had to wanted to talk to me desperately. their desperation was still almost palpable. i knew they were dead. i knew they wanted to talk to me. but they couldn't. i couldn't understand what they were saying. but they seemed to be very sad. and i was sad for them.
probably because i couldn't stop thinking about it, i dreamt of a conversation with these same dead people again. except, i couldn't remember what it was about and had a feeling that even in my dream i knew i'd not be able to recall it, once i get out of the dream.
but i want to.
it is strange to be waiting for an unknown moment, for a largely unknown state of mind, for unknown, unalive people, for a conversation to happen about an unknown topic. but at the moment, it seems eerily urgent.

i have thrown up seventeen times. S said "she's feeling slightly nauseous".

oxy has put herself in a position where she has to choose between being a good friend and being a good person and both choices yield damage. major damage. what is scary that it is a pretty black and white situation with just one logical option. yet, oxyacetelyne thought there is a choice to be made here.
this one slip is going to be a heartbreaking mistake.
no matter how i look at it, i can't help feeling like a base person.

for all of three and a half days this week, i got to live in my yellow submarine. coming back to surface is something i didn't like, i hadn't quite anticipated the extent of which. but i did come away a little richer, knowing my friends - old and new - better, knowing how strong they are. i also came back with reinforcements for my long-held belief in what goes towards building my own yellow submarine.
mine differs from yours, yours differs from the next person's, but it is very necessary that you have your own submarine and refuse to let it go. even when it hurts to fight for it. even when it hurts people you are fighting for. it is very strange, but the only people who you can hurt are the people you care for. the chaff doesn't matter. you don't need to convince the chaff, you don't need to win them over, you don't need to agonise over being heard and understood. the heartache is meant only for people whose hearts you care for. but you still have to do it, don't you?
for, a life without an yellow submarine is surely not worth living.

colours of the day : pink, yellow and grey, sunny, green, KFC red, white, grey, steel grey, black.
i watched the clouds closing in, the rains coming to a distant hill, sending the storm our way and then lashing rains coming out of nowhere. the first raindrops of the season on an upturned face, feeling the wetness on the tips of your fingers, piercing rain that soaks through your skin like mini-shafts of happiness - could you have enough of it?

the tiger came again last night. not the dusty, tan sort of tiger, but a bright lemon yellow and jet black one, much like the ones that used to be on the cover of camel water colours. it had come into the house and i tried to shoo it away with some gardening tool and when it backed into the staircase, we shut the door and called the police. the irritating policeman (with a moustache) refused to believe that a tiger could come into a house in the city and i was extremely frustrated. for i could also sense how unbelievable it was, but it had happened.
then i don't remember much, but i was in my (another) white and dark blue and darkwood house with a big kitchen and glass windows and a garden. i knew if i went out through the door i'd get to the backyard which overlooks the sea. but i had to give them water first. it was very sunny oustide.
i woke up feeling terribly tired today.

it's not funny. i am dying. how can this cause so much mirth amongst so many different people? if i die, i'll come back and haunt everyone with a vengeance, i swear. today i produced multicoloured snot, copius enough to equal in snot-litres the yearly per capita water usage of some of those strife-ridden angsty ghetto-teenager type african nation.
and my mind indeed is dead. my body craves vegetable soup. like vegetables. not two-legged, four-legged, multi-legged, multi-boned creatures. vegetables. despite my attempts at reasoning, my recalcitrant body tried to drown itself in hot slimy liquid with green, orange, yellow and limp botanical exhibits, half of which i couldn't identify. there was some mushroom, some baby corn and something that looked pale green and ribbed and crunchy to eat in it too.
but before i log off and die (with fanfare, i don't think i'm the quiet, classy exit sort today) tell me what is the difference between mind and soul?

i have fever, backache, blocked nose, sore throat, a/an yearning to be a prima donna and order about everyone in a feeble voice and see their faces light up to see they can provide me with the slightest comfort like fluffy pillows and jimmy nail numbers and something drippy and cheesy.
instead i was made to do a story ideas session with the toad who's conveniently taking time off and going to nether ends of the world with everyone and everything including the tadpole's stuffed toy.
i was also made to drink warm milk and handed out a pill that i know has an expiry date marked 2006 and told not to be paranoid.
i have a good mind to throw a tantrum. if only my throat didn't hurt so.
i am a poor baby. i am a poor little baby. oh i am soooo sick (like ill, not that kind of sick) and suffering so much. i want fawning attention, cloying sympathy, a new rubic's cube and mtv to show that sania badnam number once more.

i am tired of stonewalling people. so now i am stonewalling my blog.

my mother tried her best, but...

You Are 84% Spoiled

You are a total spoiled brat, and you're probably proud of it. You always get want you want - even if you have to whine to get it.

Are You Spoiled?

and this is not the reason why i am up till two in the morning. i just can't sleep.

confused.
it's a matter of order that i stonewall (at times, only very infrequently). if i do not stonewall, then i wriggle out of the conversation. if i do not wriggle out, then i give out the wrong impression and determinedly neutralise and distance myself.
however, when it has the desired effect, why do i end up being the unhappy party?
but that apart, vacation rocks. i think i've found my life's calling. i want to be unemployed.

georgie peorgie pudding and pie,
kissed the girls and made them cry

i was subjected to another one of those personality thingummies. and this rhyme has been playing in my head in a loop. snigger, snigger, snigger.

while i am not in the mood to ascribe any particular state of mind to myself, the following brought it as close to mellow as it could get under the present circumstances:
i ate crabs and didn't get allergies. yet.
i got a white linen tunic top that's fabulous and sets off my silver clutch to perfection. (FYI, clutch is a kind of wallet that women carry). *
i went and watched a movie. i was fed lemon butter masala corn too. however,when that mandatory idiot with irritatingly loud ringtone and louder voice simply had to take a call from whichever pathetic lifeform cares to socialise with him, i was not allowed to throw the cup or the spoon at him.** but i elbowed someone in the gut, so it all sort of balances out.

*i need new shoes. shiny silver slingbacks or matte ballet flats with the neat strap and mini-bow around ankle?
** it was quite interesting to see a friend remove his own cup and spoon with such speed and then grab mine before i could turn and for good measure, sweep up S' discarded cup as well and deposit it all on the aisle. under three seconds flat.

the toad and i had so far had a relationship that parallels a bad marriage just days before the D word has crept in. one where neither party are energized enough to call it a day. yet they fantasise about other people. wonder how life would have been if they hadn't met the other. and think. of options.
he lies. i fall for it. sometimes i see that he's lying yet i ignore it. he breaks promises, i hope there will be a next time. sometimes he keeps promises, i couldn't care less. it's an emotional drain, trying to believe one day it'll all be better. just when i reach breaking point, it does get better. and then he does an about turn with the speed of lightning.
today was the pits. i was tempted to pack it in then and there, but settled for a week off (it was a rare treat to hear him plead), wished minor disaster and major discomfort on the new bitch and walked away.
toad needs to exit my life. pronto.
is a good boss a myth?

if karma were on my speed dial 2 (#1 would obviously be shiraz for chicken biriyani) then i'd just call for a casual chat and promise to exchange my synthx Cd for something else and make him do the following to these people:
first caller today: make him listen to himself for 24 hours, non-stop and if he wants a break he gets a 3-hr detention with himesh plugged in his ears.
taxiwallah: nothing drastic, but needs a lesson so as to remember not to be so eager to please and return the loose change down to the exact rupee, just when one is spoiling for a fight
fatman: make him smell his socks, t-shirt, and general self and bottle the whiff and spray over him every half hour; consider full body waxing ( his body-hair is so lush that they have their own dandruff)
chipmunk: take away his speakers and watch him shrivel; gag and duct-tape him to the chair for four hours each day for two months
new bitch: wrap in a blanket, beat with rubber hose, administer forty pages of derrida each day and put her in the bihar polls
panwallah: heaps of money, bevy of women, any three cars of his choice and any six dreams of his coming true
random fuschia woman at three in the afternoon: two years of mandatory dressing in monochromes, make eat a large carton of charminar or some such strong stuff without water if facial expression directed at smoking junta is repeated
toad: there's nothing i can do. he's a toad. he has to live with himself. that should be enough by itself

B gave me a stepehn king. i read it. grew uncomfortable. read some more. then decided against getting out of the bed to switch off the light, because the clothesline outside on the terrace seemed too close, and there was an owl i'd never seen before. couldn't sleep with the lights on my eyes. so perversely, read on some more till i finished the library police. closed pages, turned turtle. what do you think caught my eyes? not one, not two, but three overdue books from the library - i can't find my card, it's 30 days overdue and my membership ran out on 9th march. and i lost the fourth one and can't remember what it was. mommyyyyyyyyyyyyyy.
i wanted to think if there are any famous last words i'd like to tap on, but my inner whines are too strong to be ignored. so know what bothers me before the library police come - it's frikkin' baking outside; i have to go to work and deal with retards till ten tonight; the bloody marketing idiots have stopped supply on normal silk cuts so the bat shit purple ones catch on; S slyly gave me the a dvd marked 300 and it only has the audio track on it, i mean WTF; i am hungry; i have nothing to wear; i have to buy a thoughtful gift and birthday cake; i haven't had coffee in eight days, i can't get more than 2 cigarettes a day; i have to take a shower that's scalding hot; i have to make my bed; i have been banned by the local dvd rentalwallah; i am late and i hate 90% of the people i interact with on a daily basis. some days, i hate all of them. particularly the ones with less facial hair than me.

have you seen people disintegrate piece by piece? have you seen people give up bit by bit, every minute? have you seen them lose what's left of the human they once were, in a constant, gradual process that never reverses? have you seen people lose their last shred of sanity? have you seen people abandoning the last touch with love? have you wondered whether there's a difference between the person and the personality dying? have you waited, watching on, wondering when it'll be your turn to join the ranks?
there's book out on the sale racks, dwelves on how many people will cry when you die. have you ever wondered about the answer? have you ever wished and wished it would be a null set, so you don't have to be so watchful, so vigilant, so guilty all the time?

what is the right way - do you express your fears for someone you love or do you express your hopes for them? why does it all seem like the wrong answer no matter how carefully you think it over?

i need new clothes, new shoes and those metallic bags, two weeks off from work, a windfall gain in six figures, a decline in temperatures by at least seven degrees and several things more that i decline to post here.

"due to technical problems, the light at the end of the tunnel has been switched off."

no. i haven't gone over the other side. i also bought a tom holt and a madhur jaffrey cookbook.
i bought a cookbook.
i. a cookbook.
i. cook.
i ...

We have lost even this twilight.
No one saw us this evening hand in hand
while the blue night dropped on the world.

I have seen from my window
the fiesta of sunset in the distant mountain tops.

Sometimes a piece of sun
burned like a coin in my hand.

I remembered you with my soul clenched
in that sadness of mine that you know.
Where were you then?
Who else was there?
Saying what?

Why will the whole of love come on me suddenly
when I am sad and feel you are far away?
The book fell that always closed at twilight
and my blue sweater rolled like a hurt dog at my feet.

Always, always you recede through the evenings
toward the twilight erasing statues.

there should be a ban on old dead poets.

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

(disclaimer: nothing topical, just found the dusty volume. there is something about neruda that makes you want to share what you read.)

it was a shame waking up to the headlines today. it was a shame realising there's no recourse. it was a shame to acknowledge that this carnage over land-acquisition is still a non-issue to the average citizen. we are apathetic, amoral, apolitical creatures who just exist, feeding on the benefits that passivity throws our way. it makes my blood boil to think that this incident too will go unrectified. there is absolutely no meaning to the word justice.
the muzzled bitch whose owner feeds on scraps thrown his way by the reds will go to work today and comment on the style quotient of giordamo watches. and will she gnaw at the muzzle? hell no. comfort comes first.

it's going to be a horribe day. just you see.

it's monday tomorrow. life is so unfair. moan, moan, whiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine.
i think they shortchange us on at least a couple of hours on sundays.

as usual my retardation comes to the fore. in case you're wondering, i tried my hand at global warming, then moved on to HIV and finally thought i might get the badge right if i support the cause of music. you can't say i'm picky about extending my supoort. all i need is a cause. and if i'm pushed i can believe in as many as six and that too before breakfast or after a vegetarian dinner, as it is.

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on second thoughts, its becoming more common for me to dream without images. i wonder what that means. the last dream i recall was this vision of a dark night and a pond beyond a church or a chapel. i was scared that my brother had drowned. but then i saw that the two of us going into a distant graveyard to find the man who tells stories to the dead. it seemed very urgent to find that man. did he have a story to tell us? probably not, we were both alive or so it seemed.
when i called him next morning, he listened solemnly and copyrighted the idea arguing that the dream would be nothing without his "starring role". he's going to write a very difficult-to-understand-and-hence-critique novella on the storyteller of the dead.

i dreamt of a smell again. i smelt that wood and sulphur smell of a fire lighting up. then i woke up. i switched on the light and could only smell the bud of beli on the side table. now i can't go back to sleep.

the hat fell into the sewers.
the cat and the hat discovered something fascinating (which is a state of mind when you think something is so interesting that you can't stop thinking about it, but preferably it shouldn't be something like dorritos or red crayons). the gardener was telling the cook that in new york, where the angry bearded man who regularly smashed up his old fiat had moved to, huge alligators live in the sewers and have a parallel city under the city.
now neither the cat nor the hat knew what an alligator was but it sounded like they could be some glamorous golden-scaled, rainbow-winged magical creatures. they were actually thinking about a dragon, but they didn't know that since both of them are very ignorant about certain zoological and mythical facts.
the two of them raced excitedly to the spider who was in the middle of a deep conversation with the crow. all the conversations between the spider and the crow tended to be deep. the crow was very intelligent and got very angry if people failed to recognize that. in order to keep his BP down, he devised the strategy of talking on intelligent-sounding things so that no-one would slip up and consequently make him angry. the cat and the hat sometimes thought the crow made no sense, but kept quiet since they didn't want to hurt the spider.
now the crow and the spider were talking about alphabets that sounded complicated like SEBI and SEZ and whatnot. so the hat and the cat grinned and waved and left without saying anything. it was really a pity because if they stopped to talk, they'd hear about urban legends and a lot of the trouble that followed would be spared.
the cat raced straight to the back gate that led to road and took up position on top of the sewers and the hat who didn't like being the second bravest (actually neither of them were very brave but didn't like to admit it) ran right after and peered underneath the iron sewers. that's when the bat came swooping down to see what the fuss was all about and the startled hat fell right in.
the cat and the bat were both stunned. then the bat started laughing and the cat started yelling. it went round and round the sewers, alternately yelling at the bat and screaming down to the hat. now the hat was very scared. it was very dark and smelly down in there and the hat could hear scraping noises, which could be alligators that suddenly didn't seem all that glamorous to encounter in a dank hole with no way out. and when it heard the cat making all that fuss, it became a bit more scared. after a lot of yelling back and forth, they decided that the spider needed to be called. the hat wanted the bat to go fetch the spider and the cat to stay. the cat didn't trust the bat and wanted to go on its own. the bat was a bit hurt, but it was also feeling a bit scared for the hat. so it agreed to what the cat said and stayed back. but that didn't stop it from looking down the sewers and making faces at the poor hat.
the spider came running along. though it did take some time to tick off the cat and the hat and point out that alligators do not live in sewers and nor are they particularly glamorous or magical. (it was wrong of course, but you can't expect a spider to know everything). it quickly spun a web and went down to talk to the hat and calm it down. the hat acquiesced and settled down to wait quietly. it also spent some time thinking how much better the spider was than toby maguire.
then the spider called out to the crow. the crow was smirking nastily all the while. it came dragging it's feet and a thin branch from the lemon tree. it held the branch on its beak and lowered it down the sewer. the spider helped the hat to get hold of one end of it and the cat helped the crow to pull it back up. finally, the hat was rescued and before anyone could turn nasty the bat fled.
anyway tired from all that excitement, the cat and the hat went to the back garden to take a nap and this time they didn't even have to count anything. they just fell asleep as soon as they closed their eyes. but before falling asleep, the hat told the cat that it had seen a pair of beady eyes and it thought that alligators do have a small village, if not a city, down in those sewers. what neither of them knew was that it was not a village, but a small municipal town with its own elected representatives and an 8-station subway system.

my heat rashes had been complemented by flaring red allergic reaction to peanut butter (or it could be bread, i'm not sure). now i have a matching set of inflammations triggered by the holi warpaint too. i am waiting to see if the drug allergy will come forth as well. not mood altering substances, but medicines - that kind of drugs. it keeps me on tenterhooks with a tantalising display of pre-symptoms and then disappears bashfully when i sit up and take notice.
but talking of mood-altering substances, i wonder if the toad would qualify as one. till date, all it takes is the subject of person toad, let alone a mail or call or his actual presence, to cause my mood to do a nose-dive.
but completely unrelated to all this, i want a beanbag and some good chocolates and that tom holt. and i really want didi to switch off the tv. if only i (and everyone else in my family and extended family on both sides) were not so scared of her, i'd watch vh1 instead of bengali megaserials. actually, that was a bit of inverted snobbery - i'd probably watch tom and jerry. i'm not too sharp that way.

i was very disturbed about certain things for the past couple of days. mainly concerning the idea of boundaries as far as friendship is concerned.

the idea of space dominates fairly largely in all my relationships with people, so it always stresses me out if i have to do something that i percieve as an encroachment on other people's space. i usually vascillate between being a detached bystander who keeps hoping that the adult in the other person will surface and being an overly protective mother hen.
so, in order to gain a perspective on things i decided to wiki friendship. here's what they say. its the third point at the end which is a killer though.

Friendship is a term used to denote co-operative and supportive behaviour between two or more humans. This article focuses on the notion specific to interpersonal relationships. In this sense, the term connotes a relationshipknowledge, esteem, and affection. Friends will welcome each other's company and exhibit loyalty towards each other, often to the point of altruism. Their tastes will usually be similar and may converge, and they will share enjoyable activities. They will also engage in mutually helping behavior, such as exchange of advice and the sharing of hardship. A friend is someone who may often demonstrate reciprocating and reflective behaviors. Yet for many, friendship is nothing more than the trust that someone or something will not harm them. Value that is found in friendships is often the result of a friend demonstrating on a consistent basis: which involves mutual

• the tendency to desire what is best for the other.
• sympathy and empathy.
• honesty, perhaps in situations where it may be difficult for others to speak the truth.
• mutual understanding.

it really freaks me out to find that sometimes people take me seriously.

woke up at some goddamed hour when it was still raining. vegged for two hrs trying to figure out something so insignificant that i can't bother to retrieve it from my memory now.
my neck hurts. i have an aching back. we've run out of coffee. i have committed myself to 3 holi lunches. alcohol consumption in last two weeks- nil, niccotine consumption - increasing in an upward graph that has an 85-degree incline. my teeth are going to fall out soon if i don't go for my dentist's appointment. i have to calculate my income tax AND pay it too. it's so hot that are my allergies are in three-quarter bloom ( it'll take an april to get to full bloom). my bloody wrist has a cramp. i have a grand total of fifty three rupees left. somebody's pre-empted my bid to steal that copy of tom holt. i can't take a single fucking day off till forever. the toad's gone raving mad and is blissfully unaware of it.
i don't have money, i don't have peace of mind, i don't live near a sea, i don't have flat abs or sculpted upper-arms, i don't have a single white t-shirt, i don't have a life-altering problem and while we're at it, i still don't have my own copy of the life of brian and i don't have the faintest desire to go in to work today.
though i have a very rare personality, i feel like shit. no, seriously.
and someone tell me, why the fuck should a label for this post be either scooter or vacation? dickheads.

no i am not a deranged person as i had point out fairly emphatically twice today, i'm just a very rare personality. FYI, this has been corroborated by blogthings

Your Personality is Very Rare (INFP)

Your personality type is dreamy, romantic, elegant, and expressive. Only about 5% of all people have your personality, including 6% of all women and 4% of all men You are Introverted, Intuitive, Feeling, and Perceiving.

How Rare Is Your Personality?

will somebody get me an irish flag? its two parts creme de menthe, two parts bailey’s and one part brandy. pretty simple.
but life has a way of denying simple wants.
now if i had wanted a happy ending to a love pentagon with an odd homosexual thrown in or the miraculous overhaul of the kenyan infrastructure or a film where tushar kapoor finally learns to act or a consensus on the kiyoto protocol or maybe an applicatory study on world bank data using a probit analysis model - that would have been a different story.
but my yahoo horoscope did tell me to follow my mood. an irish flag would have been sooooo convenient rather than going out to find a victim whose limbs i can hack off with a blunt saw, whose ribcage i can break with a hockey stick, whose head i can mash up like stoneman, who i can then put on an anthill and then later maybe douse with petrol and set to fire. and while i am doing all this, the victim can listen to himesh or crazy kiya re on walkman. i'd expect it to bring it's own of course. i can't seriously be expected to provide all the entertainment, i am sure.

a day is just another thing to get through - some cheesy line from a 90's movie keeps playing in a loop in my head. 3 things about my day stand out -
suddenly remembering perks of being a wallflower, snooping around facebook and finally watching borat.
the rest of it was stuff that might have saved itself the bother of happening at all. i wonder if real people ask each other how their day went. must try it on somebody deserving.

my spam mails and i have had a very fulfilling relationship. low-maintenance and relaxed, not inducing wild passion maybe, but tuned highly to my needs.
like when i hit rock bottom, spam always gave me mails from the nigerian lawyer who wanted me to inherit a million dollars. when my grades were slipping, spam gave me mails from online institutions that promised to make a competent psychiatrist out of me. there were also extremely supportive mails to assure me that my penile dimensions could be magnified (though how spam knew it needed magnifying is a wonder still, i am not THAT sort of a girl). it was a peaceful co-existence. of late, it has been entirely concerned with the libidinous aspects of me. but i treated that as a part of being in this close a relationship.
but today, the subject line in my spam has started reading liposuction instead of libido. i think the best by date has gone by for this relationship.
sigh.

allergic reactions, anti-allergy pills that make me hyperactive instead of sleepy, co-workers (of both genders) with fascinating degrees of obsession with facial hair styling, incessant drizzle, a million bucks in overdue library fines, a ban from local dvd rental people, valentine's day crap sprouting out of everywhere including a sanitary-ware shop and i'm not fucking kidding,switching over to milds from silk cuts and being proven wrong there, autos and fm radios, reading dalrymple and not being able to take a week off to go on a walking tour of delhi, flashing(unknowingly) my blue underwear to diners at kfc on sunday, three grey hairs, residual memories, stolen lighter and three glitter pens, lost copy of the memories of my melancholy whore, toad, toad again, toad one time more - and a few more things make for my current grouse.
not necessarily in this order though. the magnitude of the contribution of each of these factors fluctuate.
one day if i can manage to wake up very early, i'll walk out and keep walking till i get to the sea. but if i get hungry, i'll come back home and eat a pb&j sandwich. then i'll start out on my getting lost for life mission once more.

i think i did something very horrible to the comments settings of this blog. but i think i've set it right now. i wish though communication was still a simple thing like when you'd get out of the house after spending 15 minutes trying to get the latch to open, go and yell for someone below their window, put your point across and head back with a sense of job well done.
anyhoo, what is not be is not to be.
meanwhile, i live my life or just experience fragments of it that jut out like shards of pottery from amidst stretches of muddy chaos.

A sentimental blues
Will wet your eye
You wonder why
You heave a sigh
You start to cry
Each time that you
Hear these blues

i cried for an hour. then i realised the futility of choosing to feel sad instead of angry. then i cried some more.
its raining outside. round drops of rain suddenly find themselves squashed flat against the pane. they make a soft pop. grey days and wet winter nights make me feel very lost.

i got a miles davis cd and an italian movie. and the normal quota of existential blues and random flak and tummy cramps.
and i finally confessed that i'd always liked madonna, oh the relief of getting that off my chest and then laughed hysterically when chipmunk told us he likes kenny rogers. hee hee har har. BUT what i haven't told anyone is that i kind of liked paris hilton's thing too.
i hate the thought of tomorrow and day after , but of course not sunday, and most definitely monday. once that is over, i'll have a whole new week to hate. but there's always zoning out.
in the meanwhile, as an oasis of constancy in my life, my irritation with the weather continues. my next home will be somewhere that has a decent winter, maybe a couple of weeks of snow (only if there is central heating) and a coffeeshop at the end of the block and a pub with reliable grub for sunday mornings. proximity to sea is optional. if i can afford the home, then i'd bloody well be able to afford a beach holiday now and then. i hate seeing people dress up in 13 layers of mismatched clothing in this pathetic excuse for a winter, hah, winter, that the weather gods or the scary schizoids at alipore weather office has thrown in calcutta's way.
there was actually a man who wore a cable-knot sweater AND a fleece-lined parka walking by the office. he stared at my cigarette, i stared at his outfit. eyeball for fucking eyeball man before the heat makes the fluid evaporate and the shrivelled eye falls off the socket i thought. but then the paper truck came and spoilt my view.

2006 - emotional rollercoaster. utterly exhausting, yet extremely enriching.
2007 - have a feeling is going to be even more eventful. omegawd!
only baggage carried over from last year - a sense of well-being which is also intimately connected to people who i'm learning each day are hard to lose.
and this new year's eve - no i didn't get my 16 hrs uninterrupted sleep despite manic manipulations, but it was a night memorable for its intensity if not anything else.

on the wishlist - more time, more travel, more music, longer winter, more letting in, more getting in, less of aishwaya rai, vast quantities of sketchpens and sequinned slippers, more nicotine (yeah i wanna smoke, i won't quit, i won't even pretend to want to quit, so there, what can you do?)