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.