Strokes of Jean..I..Us

It was this girl Jean last night. It was sultry outside.

She said, “Go ‘Home’”. I pushed and went ‘Home’.

Then she said “Unlock” and I did that with the last but one “Lock” key.

Then with that voice she said, “Press ‘Up’”. I did that obediently.

I could see something coming up…

Now she said softly, “Gently press ‘Down’”.

My tired fingers did just that.

Seeing nothing happening, she asked me to keep doing it.

Now, she said, “Please ‘Enter’”. But before that, she reminded, “Go to that ‘End’”.

I went to the wrong ‘End’. I think I pressed the ‘Colon’.

She was cursing may be.

She stressed, “The other ‘End’”

“Which ‘End’?”, I asked.

She growled, “The ‘End with Number 1 on it”.

With a big disbelief she asked, ‘Could you please ‘Insert’ now?”

Then at the right place, I inserted “Hmmmmn”.

Then she said, “‘Pause’ now”.

Everything froze. Everything became blue.

Now, she said “OK ‘Shift’”

As I was about to ‘Shift’, she screamed, “Press the ‘Backspace’”.

And right at that moment she moaned, “O with a grave accent’”

Then I did “Control ‘and Shift…..O”………Voilà! …….I got my “Ò Ò Ò Ò Ò”.

She giggled and said, “Escape”. I was tired by then.

One last thing she said, “$$$$ please”. I contentedly “Shifted Four” for her.

And that’s when she said “Thank you for calling Dell Support Services, your keyboard seems to work great”.

Confronting basements....alone

Objective: You live alone....in a house...it is cold and gusty ...the shingles flap ...the windows rattle...the floor beneath squeaks...you want to know whether you are really alone...you are paranoid ...you want to check the basement...What do you do...how do you do it.

The 19-point plan:

1. Take a deep breath before opening the door leading to the basement stairs.

2. It is always good to be armed with something, just incase somebody is already standing there. I use a mop.

3. If no one is there, breathe out. Actually breath could be used as a weapon, but it depends on how much onions we eat.

4. Now, take a deeper breath. Look down at a 45 degree angle and gauge the number of steps in the stairway.

5. If they are multiples of 2, plan on taking two steps down at a time. If not, step one step down, before you start. Either
way, two steps at a time is the way to go.

6. Once you are in the basement, turn around and see whether someone followed from the top. We don't want to be spooked you see.

7. Count the number of corners you would expect to see in the basement before hand.

8. Now, start looking at those corners real fast. It always helps to use our standard trick of looking at two corners at the same time to save time.

9. At that moment, count the corners that we have secured. If we have that matched with the count in (step 7), we are ok.

10. Just incase we don't, we have to do the corner checks all over again. The last thing we want is to be worried about that one corner we missed.

11. Always, there would be some corners that we need to look twice. At that time make sure, you look at that corner, blink three times and look again. That counts as doubly secured.

12. By the way, we need not check the sump well all the time. Twice a day should do the trick.

13. Depending on the season, the A/c or the heater might turn itself on while we are in our reconnaissance mission. Always plan for the bad-da-da-da-droooooom sound. Fainting on hearing that sound is not a good idea.

14. Now to the most important part of the process...."CHECKING THE WINDOWS".

• If it is sunny outside, smiling at the windows while looking at it, is permissible.
• But if it is dark outside, it is a MUST that you frown, look serious and threateningly at the windows.
• That way, we will scare someone who is looking inside while we look outside.
  

15. Especially when there are two windows, we want to check them at the same time.

• Take a quick look outside one of them and run (sprinting is better) to the other window and look outside the other.
• But as usual, to clear all doubts, we would want to run back to the first window, just incase any person outside is trying to trick us with the same moves.

16. Now, rush back to the stairs. Keep in mind, that you need to do one last glance before stepping up the stairs.

17. Irrespective of how many steps you took at a time while coming down, it is mandatory that you take three steps at a time while going up. I understand that if the number of stairs is not divisible by three it might look a little awkward while taking the last step. Believe me, it is better to look silly than to be foolish. We know we want to be secure, right.

18. Breathe out.

19. When we master to do this check in 6.3 seconds, we are quite secure.

Sensationalizing the Unsensational - Mount Hood

Three climbers lost on Mount Hood in December 2006. The media tracked the case as if humans were stranded on a different planet and the whole world was revolving around that particular incident, for one full week. Hyped up words, technological overview, expert analysis, religious inferences, weather tracking and even a tribute for the missing men made up the news for 10 days. Reporters on the scene frivolously overact while describing the scenario. Silly delays in attempting controlled-release of information and a fake sense of political correctness numb the sting of the actually rivetting storyline. CNN at times delivers news like a gaudy cheap suit. The CNN anchor pounds out words of peril about the climbers. Previously 'lost and found' climbers are called-in to describe their ordeal. A pastor from a congregation to which one of the climber's belong to, talks of the climber's human spirit. The sheriff heading the search, talks as if every word that comes out of his mouth is perfectly scripted. CNN's medical correspondent explains "Hypothermia" for the 20th time. A lame sounding reporter on the scene is battling a snow storm unnecessarily to accentuate the scenario. Almost all grieving families need a spokesperson to do a media briefing these days. Why this obsession with drama? Did the media miss the sincere emotion in orchestrating the delivery of the news? Is it me who is not able to see the humaneness of the situation or is everyone trying to overdo what is expected of them. Why does it all seems so plastic.

I wanted to share this with you. Quite a few of you would have read the "The world is flat". And you know how Friedman goes on about India. Here is my story of trying to impress my friend who landed in the US recently during his visit to our place a couple of weekends back. I recently had my friend Bijesh who was our junior at school visit us in Lansing. He had been working in Bangalore for Oracle and now he works for a firm in Cleveland. He visted me say within 15days of arriving in US. Remember, this guy calls me "Annah" and has a lot of reverence for me. So, to show the big brother(not the reality TV) attitude and to show off the comforts of "The USA", I went to pick him in a sparkle washed car, with some super thumping music with some trendy clothes. I met Bijesh at the station, hugged and all but he never cared much to my so-called expensive attire. Ok...He wasn't impressed. Then, I took him to my car in which I had perfectly timed the stereo to play a super thumping number from "Enigma"(set beforehand). Reminded him of the Seat-belt, which he already had on. I zipped to show off my 265 horses. He did not batter his eyelid one bit. He said, "I make it to Cochin from Bangalore in 8.5 hours in my car". Hmmmm......He wasn't impressed. Then, I took him to my house which is my pride and my splendour (Yeah...in my mind). All I could get was a measly, "Nice house". Then, I said to my self, probably he will be impressed with my Liquor collection. I had bought some expensive Single Malt, some of all kinds of liquor and my favourite Bells Oberon beer. Being afternoon, he tried the beer, and said, "Nothing can match our Kalyani(Indian Beer) right!". Hmmm..He wasn't impressed. I asked him to open my cherished bottle of Scotch in frustration and he coolly replied, "we pretty much have this stuff in Bangalore". Then, just to pacify myself, I had to explain the rarity of single malts which he didnt care much. I talked about my pool league and how cool it is to hang out in bars and how we sometime sneak out during lunch hours to shoot pool. And he politely said, "Oh Annah! in Bangalore, we play snooker all the time. My office has two full size tables, and of course TT tables, showers etc". Now, instead of me impressing him, he has started to impress me. Still the fighter in me wanted to impress him some way or other. So, in the evening, I took him to a Thai Restaurant to surprise him with a frog legs entree. (Note: He is a carnivore and it was not my intention to suprise him by ordering anything repulsive). I ordered in Thai asking for "Gob(frog legs)" and stuff. The waitress bought a full plate of spicy gob. Bijesh asked what it was and I said what it was. Without a major comment he went on to enjoy the food but only to add a last minute remark that frog meat is very tasty in one of the toddy shops in his home town. So, no surprise for him there and I was the one to be abashed. Anyway, I took him to the bowling alley and I did not impress him much either. He just made a couple of turkeys and I blamed my loss on the beer. So no question of him getting impressed there. Finally, I wanted to play my trump card. Golf! I was very sure that Golf was not an easily accessible game in 'his' Bangalore. And since I have an heads up on the game, he will sure be surprised. I wore my golfing outfit, woke him up early and drove to the driving range. I had to teach him. Yes...I enjoyed every second of those10minutes teaching him. I asked him to line the ball along the centre line between the stance. Asked him to maintain an isoceles triangle between the toes and the ball and swing this way and that way. I could hit 75% of the balls to 150+ yards straight out. Then he started. He could not meet the ball in the first few swings. Glad was I to teach him again! And he started hitting 50yards etc. Suddenly, he walked up to me and said, "Annah! I figured out." . He went on show his shot. He just stood at the Leg wicket for an outswinger in Cricket. Put his left foot forward like playing "Front foot" in cricket and smacked the Golf ball as if hitting "a Six" and managed to hit 200yards every time. Rest of the bucket of balls were zooming towards the 200-yard mark. I gave up. For the rest of his visit, I was listening about our India from him and continued to get amazed. I am sure India is the most happening place. Ain't that cool. I still miss the crisply ironed shirts by our "Iron-men". I still miss the Dhabas and Road side shops. I still miss the variety of Bananas. I still miss Jasmine(not the girl...the flower). I still miss tons of great things our country has. I know it is very competitive in India these days and we always have the thought in the back of our mind that the guy next to you could be lot smarter than you. What say ye all.

Purpose

There are times when, what your heart feels, resonates with what your brain senses. Such instances result in a state of harmony - Chrystaletis.