Property Is First In Line

Well, it’s happened. I’ve chalked out my study schedule, and it’s put the fear of the God I don’t believe in in me. Goodbye, cruel world.

**

I came home from my last basketball game of this academic year (it was, incidentally, terribly boring, although my shooting wasn’t bad) to find that the taps have gone dry again. That depressed me more than anything else this month, and that’s really saying something. My body and my weak left patellar tendon (knee, basically) are aching, and I was looking forward to a cool shower. Now I have to wait until tomorrow morning, when I’ll go to Aneesh’s place and ablute. Another night of sleeping dirty. This can’t go on indefinitely, and it won’t. Aneesh has committed to another year in Delhi, and after our exams end in the middle of May, we’re going to find a nice flat with NO water problems and move in, together with another chappie from law fac. Only then will I go home for some R, R, and my birthday.

A corollary is that we’ll all save money on rent, because it’s always cheaper to share. But that isn’t the main motivation. Won’t it be nice for you to not have to read about water and loneliness woes?

 **

Did you know Coldplay debuted Fix You on The OC? Quite an expression of faith in the show’s music, that.

I’ve been listening to the radio all day, and it’s quite apparent they rotate songs in the same manner that tv channels rotate shows.

**

I can’t seem to come up with proper endings for posts these days. ‘S it ok if I just leave you hanging?

Writing To Reach You

You’re going to wash your hands. Take off, clean, and store your lenses. Tomorrow’s Sunday, so you won’t need them again until Monday morning’s 9:30.

You’re going to change into your frayed basketball shoes, the short white-and-blue shorts, and whichever basketball top is on top of the pile. Take out a Coke bottle of water from the fridge, shove your towel and your gloves into the dirty cream jhola you use as a gym bag. Trot downstairs and walk to the tree under whose shade you parked in the afternoon. Turn right at Gupta Stores and ride helmet-less to the gurdwara. Park outside the provision shop and hurry down the stairs before too many people stare at your terrible un-colour-coordinated outfit.

Say hello to whichever idiot is running the gym this fine evening. Give them your photo for their records like they’ve asked you to. Stretch for ten minutes. Spend an hour or so trying to emulate Stallone in Rocky III — uuurghh, mmmphhh, if Sylvester could do it to Eye of The Tiger, so can you. Stretch again afterwards. Do ten minutes on the treadmill if it’s available. Ride home and park in your usual spot between the scooter and the Cielo.

Come upstairs, put on the light and fan, and check mail, facebook, comments, and reader. Sit in the beanbag and smoke a Marlboro. Bathe, because there’s water today. Wear the Amsterdam underwear, the cream long-shorts, and the holey Dream Theater tee.

 

Check mail, facebook, comments, and reader again.

Now here’s the tough part. You’re going to select 3 cd’s of comfort music. I’m thinking you should start with The Music of The Movies– The Love Songs. Then an Andrew Lloyd Webber– perhaps Joseph. And a Dream Theater. Not SFAM today. Perhaps Octavarium, or Train of Thought. Even Systematic Chaos might do. Alternatively, Meatloaf will serve just as well, as will Isis.

Then, my friend, you’re going to close the laptop lid.

You’re going to fucking close the laptop lid, and play the cd’s through the cd player. That’s what it’s there for. You don’t have to turn off the computer, because your download will get interrupted. But you’re not going to check it again until dinnertime. Then, you’re going to take one of the pseudo-year planners and circle your exam dates. Best to use the NLS calendar, I think, then you can actually scratch off the days as they go by, and write the portions you’ve done every day. Stick that shit on the wall above your study desk. Shove your pillow between the arms of the chair, and sit on it.

And study, in all seriousness, because this really is your last chance to pull out of it and prove them wrong.

If You Have Twenty Minutes…

… check this out. Tell me what you think.

http://www.storyofstuff.com/

I see beyond the cute animation and see an overly simplistic doomsday warning built entirely on statistics that even I, a lay person, can immediately question as inaccurate or misleading. You can’t ever base an argument on statistics. “In the United States, we now have only 4% of our original forest area?” Define ‘original forest area’, bastard. BFRs, Boromised Fire Retardants, are “a neurotoxin” and “yet we spray them on our computers, our couches, our mattresses, and even our pillows?” So what? Some components of BFRs may indeed be neurotoxins, when applied in sufficient quantities into the bloodstream. But not necessarily when they are part of synthesised compounds that are sprayed on inanimate objects. Do you really think the health risk wasn’t considered by the manufacturers? Sure, there’ve been fuckups before– asbestos ceilings and thalidomide for pregnant women come to mind. But on an average, most things we use every day won’t hurt us more than a bed-bug bite.

Is it that I’m smarter than other people? Or is it simply that they are unable to apply the scientific temper they were taught in school to real-life situations? (Which is in effect the same thing.) Why then do so many people fall for such rubbish and believe that the Earth is in crisis? (Aargh, I hate hyperbole.) Show me an argument that ‘global warming’ (if it even exists) or climate change is caused solely by humans, and I’ll show you the flaw.

I’m convinced I’m right in holding that there’s nothing to worry about as far as Mother Earth goes. The true reason for all this environmental hoo-haa is because we’re worried about ourselves as a race. Which is fine– except don’t go moaning about how the beauty of rainforests and pristine lakes and magnificent tigers and our precious natural resources are being lost. Admit that all humanity cares about is its own propagation. Admit that you only care about exhaustion of natural resources because they’re finite– and not because trees are felled, mountains are quarried, and animals are killed in the process of their extraction. Admit that you’re only worried about a rise in the average global temperature insofar as it affects global food production patterns, which in turn affect the economy. Let’s get real, it’s not like ANYONE who has the werewithal to be on the internet today is going to starve to death in their lifetime because there’s not enough food in the world. But we might suffer from increased food prices; that I give you. Among other possibly severe economic implications. It’s all about the economy. Get that. The economy drives human behaviour, on a global scale, more than anything else you can name. Pollution and other environmental ‘damage’ only come into the picture when they form possible detriments to the economy. 

And if you have the decency to admit that much, you can also admit that the environmentalists are therefore as selfish, if not more, than I am. Or rather, that you no doubt consider me to be after reading this little diatribe.

So no, I’m sorry, I’m not going to turn off my lights for one hour today or tomorrow or whenever it is. And while we’re at it, Tibet can take care of itself too, can’t it? What the hell are they going to do with their freedom?

…

…

…

Alright, alright, I’m just being provocative. I’m still not going to turn off my lights, because I’ve already had a 2-hour power cut today. That’s my contribution. But the Tibet thing I take back. Excommunicate me not.

It is a cute-ish video, though.

Update

Kingfisher and Raffles XXX rum it was. I had one of the birdies; the other resides next to 6 litres of water, 600 ml of Sprite, and 50 ml of cough syrup in the little Videocon. The cheap rum is for some future time.

I’m fucking bored ya. My phone is unnaturally silent. I watched some Family Guy and a bit of Juno over dinner. I totally love the Juno girl, by the way. She’s 16 in the movie… I think it’s illegal to have (even consensual) sex with a girl under 16 in India, unless she’s your wife. Or is it 14? The twist that you can’t marry a girl under 18 is a loophole the size of the fucking NCR. You can’t marry someone under 18, but if you do, you can have sex with her as long as she’s over 14. Underage marriages are only invalid, not void. {The difference between invalid, void, and voidable (contracts, marriages, what have you) in law is preached right from the first semester.} Or some such. And let’s not even go into marital rape…

My room neighbour plugged in a laptop in addition to his PC, and his electricity meter (it’s in my room) started sparking like there’s no tomorrow. This house is such a piece of shit. No water… terrible wiring. He switches on his switches, and my lights flicker and my speakers pop. I can’t wait to get out of here. The only thing going for it is the size of the room.

I’ve been doing a lot of afternoon napping on the new beanbag. I plonk myself on it and put my legs up on the bed. The music sounds nice closer to ground level; I think I’ve said this before. I invariably fall asleep wearing my lenses, then wake up an hour later and hurriedly remove them. Bad for your corneas, you know…

The Struggle Within

See, it’s a fridge. It calls out to me. I do keep water and (today) a 600-ml bottle of Coke in it, but what good is that? I’m in college. I have a fridge. I needs stock it with beeeeer.

That would, though, entail drinking alone in my room– something I haven’t done since early January. And a path I don’t want to go down again. And I know, were I to get on the bike and ride down to the Hudson Lines teka, I’d end up buying a half of Old Monk or Sikkim or even Bermuda XXX instead of a couple of Kingfishers or Sandpipers or even RC’s. Buy a 2-litre of Coke, and shove that in the fridge instead. I’d sip the first couple of drinks while studying (I have actually begun, but with Article 14, not 19), and it would be good. But eventually I’d get up (just for a minute) to check the darn computer, just like I am now. (I can’t turn it off– I want the music playing softly in the background. It’s a nice setup, with the fan gently whirring, the balcony door ajar, only the table lamp lit, The Corrs playing softly, the room clean, the bed for once not heaped with clothes….)

And I’d never go back to the table. Smoke, drink, listen, write, remember, miss, lone.

Writing about it doesn’t mean I’m not going to do it. But I have sacrificed the gym to study, which is something. I may hold out yet.

I’ll let you know how it goes.

Quickie

I’m here wonly. Went to Madras last Wednesday; spent a night with relatives. Worked out with my half-American cousin, who’s 6′ 1″ in 11th grade. He does body-weight exercises more than weights, and curiously watched me heaving a bar up and down the front of my body… and proceeded to effortlessy replicate my panting struggles. A tad demoralising it was, the realisation of just how much height contributes to strength, far more than age does. I thought it was only on the basketball court that I was at a disadvantage…

The next day I happily drove my mom to the passport office, and sat in the car reading a very interesting autobiography of RHCP frontman Anthony Keidis (man, what a druggie) while she stood in line for hours and hours. (I did relieve her now and then, despite technically not being allowed to– applicants only, was the rule.) In the evening we picked up my darling friend Ash and went sandal- and blazer-shopping before I drove home in a half-hearted drizzle. Half-hearted or not, combined with nightfall it was enough to force a reduction in maximum speed from 120 to 80 (the Qualis simply doesn’t go faster than 120, I’ve tried), which isn’t really fun on a Golden Quadrilateral highway. But we eventually got to Vellore and dropped Ash to her family, who’d stayed up in anticipation. She refused to tell them I was driving; they’re a tense lot when it comes to their daughter being on the road at night, it seems.

Dumbo was pleased to see me, but quickly ran off into the night and returned bearing one of her usual bones. I messaged my doctor friends, but got no replies, so the Vellore night was spent sleeping quietly in my room instead of getting up to our usual escapades.

A/C Chair Car-ed it to Bangalore the next morning. Man, it’s so much more comfortable than regular 2nd Sitting. Landed up at NLS, checked in with my teammates who’d come from Delhi and Pondicherry the previous night. Met my friend Anil Gay, who let me ride his Unicorn (edit: I’m not going to bother disclaiming the sexual innuendo where there is none, and his name is K, not Gay) and took me home to show me his beloved 350-cc Yamaha. That’s even bigger than MY beloved Jawa, which I learnt to ride on and which was quite the studly thing for a high school senior to be roaming around on. Double exhaust pipes and all. Hmm.

We ended up coming runners-up in the moot court which was the purpose of my south India tour… but it was highly unsatisfying for me, as the spare wheel. It was my idea to go for that moot, but being tied up with placement cell work in college in the weeks before the moot meant I had no clue what was going on with the rest of the team. I found myself itching to speak, to take different strategies as Claimant and Respondent. Next time. But the NLS people were very nice, and even organised a party at the newly-opened Sports Bar for all 32 teams, with free alcohol even. This Sports Bar is a franchise of the same Bombay brand, so I assumed its basketball ring would be safe to dunk and hang on to…. er, it wasn’t really. But I pushed the ring back up as much as I could, and scooted.

As usual, I found myself scouring the teams and organisers for the girl I would most likely have been with had I been in her college. I settled on a cutie with long curly hair and toned calves… she turned out to be from NUJS, who beat us in the finals. She won the Best Speaker prize as well. Mm-hmm.

At the airport heading back to Delhi, the SpiceJet check-in guy gravely informed us that, “Sir, one of the passengers has booked on [flight] 262, not 504… his flight left at 5 pm.” Poor A., he cocked up his booking despite V. having told him three times what flight we were all taking (8 pm, not 5). It was hilarious though, and we couldn’t help staggering about in laughter for a few minutes before heading to the ticket counter to get the fool booked on the proper flight. He lost far less than the price of a full ticket, which was very lucky for him.

I was in a window seat after a long time, and peered at the wing flaps, slats, and what-have-you doing their thing at take-off and landing time. Sigh. I would’ve made a good pilot, you know. My quibbling attention to detail would work in my favour there. Anyhow, as I’ve said before, life goal– PPL. And of course a hot nymphomaniac wife. You can all start to keep fingers crossed for me in a few years’ time.

Sunday and Monday were glorious days in my room, with water gushing out at the twist of a tap. I washed my hands just for the heck of it; flushed after every pee. The horror returned full-scale after that, though, and I’ve given up bathing in my room. All baths in Vijay Nagar or Roop Nagar, please.

Yesterday a team of NDTV producers, camerapersons, and interns descended upon Outram Lines en masse to get poor lil ol’ me’s take on social networking sites. I told them how I joined Orkut way back when only engineering students knew about it, and it was still cool. How I was the reigning Orkut Slut (–although I said Orkut King on camera, not Slut. Nasty dirty word ’slut’ is, I hate it and hate using it.) They were particularly interested in the fact that I’ve actually met and been involved with women I’ve met on Orkut, Facebook, and blogs. I didn’t volunteer that, by the way, it was pried out of me. How low do you think I stoop?

Is it weird meeting women/people after making friends with them on the internet, they asked? Are you a, haha, letdown? No, I say. There’s a natural transition from Scrapbooks and Walls to Text Messaging. Both mediums allow you to fully express your wit without the bothersome trappings of insecurity about your appearance. Mind over body. If you can talk that much to a person you haven’t met, it’s quite unlikely you’ll be a letdown in person. At least, I don’t think I’ve ever been.

Look at me talking like some sort of stud who swoops through the internetverse picking up women like moths to my flame. I’m just playing it up, you know that don’t you, dahlings?

Daddy dearest very kindly left me his almost-new external hard drive, which is bloody twice the size of my laptop’s. All my movies have been shifted there, all my documents and music have been backed up, and I’ve gone on a music- and movie-downloading spree. Pain of Salvation, which I’ve always told Varun I’d never get into (I don’t like the name) is quite appealing to me now, in the absence of new Dream Theater material.

I’m stilllll notttt studyyinggg as much as I should be! Damn damn damn. I’m going to go right now. Article 19 awaits.

Edit: of course I’m not going to study right now. Three cheers if you knew that.

Mmm Hmm

I’m actually skipping the gym in favour of my books. Spurred on by a Chris de Burgh cd that I’ve been listening to regularly since at least 9th grade. He did sing more than Lady In Red, you know.

The Automatic

What’s that coming over the hill
Is it a monster? Is it a monster?

Low self-esteem? Possibly. Probably. (Validation is always appreciated, recorded even.) But coupled with a basic belief in myself, in my intelligence, in my capabilities, in my affability, in my body. At heart, a good person. How could I not believe that?

Last night in the auto I was tortured, though. Kya kiya, maine? How could I have? Can I not trust myself at all? At twenty-fucking-two? Not like I’m a bloody teenager being told not to take the car out when folks are out of town. (Of course I did, don’t you know me at all?)

Home base is suddenly a radically different place for me. This may be the first time I’ll be in the city and meet no-one.

Another girl spent last night here. Dared to taunt the Buffalo Bill of Outram Lines. This time I slept on my pretty pink quilt on the floor. She escaped; not before some help with dexterous u-turning.

I now have a fridge! It looks so cute, sitting there. Of course I have nothing to put in it just yet, so I haven’t turned it on.

I now have a beanbag! It looks fucking huge, taking up the entire aisle between the bed and the bookracks.

I now have NO water stored! Had to flush the toilet due to the female presence, you see. I’m washing my hands and face with mineral water from a bottle now. All other water-related functions have been outsourced to friends’ flats. My toilet kit and a change of clothes have taken up residence in my bag, so I’m always good to go (somewhere and bathe).

But in a week or three, when there’s water, a mopped room, a slow fan, a lazy afternoon, The Killers playing, I’ll pop open a can of cold beer and smoke on my beanbag. Alleviate the torture wounds somewhat. Or perhaps cut them a little deeper.

A Change of Seasons

At nights, we sleeps without the fan and without a sheet. (We also sleeps fully clothed, with the lights and music on, and on one half of the bed, to avoid clearing it.)

But during the days, we wears our short pants!

Nice new template, no?

…

I’m sitting in my cream-brown plastic chair, legs on bed, computer on lap for once instead of on the folding table with the modem, speakers, multiplug, cd player, cds, and postcards of Spitfires, Zeros, and Delhi roads waiting to be put up. Thinking, thinking. Not particularly depressed. Just thinking. Last.fm was playing lovely Dream Theater-type stuff pehle, now I’ve changed it to “artists like Keane”, and it’s even better.

Did you know these .fm and .tv URL endings were not commercially designed, but belong to some tiny countries somewhere in the world, just like .in or .uk? The countries are so tiny I can’t even remember them, so this stroke of luck in being assigned high-value domain names has resulted in significant income for them. Or so said the newspaper article.

We had a newspaper article on our “successful” campus placements. 29 students out of 350 placed. Not worth the amount of work we put into it, imho. The principal lost his cool and tossed the newspaper across the room because his name wasn’t mentioned in the article. Rumour has it he’s trying to get himself appointed head of a central Indian 5-year law university. Petty, petty politics, this place is full of it. I’ve recently had to rethink the boundaries of my sliminess, but I hope I’m never so mediocre that such considerations matter to me. Imagine if my life’s ambition was to be head teacher in a college in Bhopal.

A news channel read the newspaper article and is coming to interview me and others on Monday. The last time I was on tv, a school senior sitting in Iowa caught me on a podcast and scrapped me about it. Orkut was still cool then. (It’s totally lost the plot now, hasn’t it?)

2007– the year I crossed over to non-heavy rock. Keane and The Killers are staples of my listening now. Travis is Writing To Reach Me. Alternative music, is this? Distortion-free guitars, high male vocals, simple but appropriate drumming and bass playing, and songs designed for keyboard parts– I’m hooked. Even though I think Death Cab For Cutie is far too pretentious a name.

Forget health, I simply can’t afford to smoke 40 rupees’ worth of Marlboros every day. This evening I surprised myself by not going down to Gupta Stores to pick up two more. I eventually went after dinner, of course, and goofed up (or did I?) by buying only two. Usually take three or four for the night, in case I want lots. I’m saving the last one for just before bed now, or perhaps for the morning, to have with Bingo over The Sunday Times (of India). I could get more smokes from the Blind Man if I were really desperate, but I’m not. Plus I’d have to wake up the chowkidar to open the gate.