Avian Invasion

The last week was a week of extreme emotions and mental stress and strain, but there was only one happening of note.

I got a big cooler on my balcony, which means the corner behind the cooler remains relatively untouched. I decided to clean it one day and look what I found!

Pigeon eggs! And on the floor too.

They're cute and all that but the mother and I don't get along very well. I respect her space and I expect her to do the same but nothing of the sort. It starts cooing from daybreak, and I'm a light sleeper. And I thought pregnant humans were the worst, but you should see this pigeon. She's jumpy. Plus she thinks she owns my balcony. And it's not like it's a big balcony, but still, I thought there's ample space for the two of us to cohabitate peacefully.

However, she's already given me several minor heart attacks. When I say she's jumpy, I mean she's easily startled and she also startles people. For example, it's morning, the sun's coming up, and I wake up feeling great and I want to step outside and breathe in that early morning cool, fresh air. I open my door and inadvertently startles her. And she jumps! Out at me with a loud flutter and flapping of wings and feather all over my face! Or I've had a relaxing night staying home reading, nice and warm and happy in my bed. I get up to close my window and again - sudden loud flapping jumping at you from the dark. Believe me, it's not a pleasant experience particularly when you've just finished reading 'The Classic Collection of Victorian Ghost Stories.'

But the last straw was when she decided to 'cross over'. I'd gotten home late, and I was just out of the shower - feeling all fresh and daisy-like. It was around 1:30 AM, and I was not sleepy so I decided to sit out on the balcony and write a bit. I opened the door and again, she apparated out of the dark with her usual clamor and after making me jump out of my skin, proceeded to invade my territory by blithely flying into my room.

Talk about 'avian flew'!

I, naturally, chased it. It flew around, perched on my my desk, my chair, even jumped on to my bed and dawdled around on my clean linen. I was afraid it would get hurt so I turned off the ceiling fan (I know, I know. I'm such a saint :P) Thinking back, I wonder why I bothered because I don't think I would have minded very much if it had died. The fat bird headed towards the window and hung on to my flimsy curtains with its sharp claws. That made me involuntarily scream "Don't!"

After 2 AM and I still had the pigeon in my room. I was sweating and messy. The bird shat mid-flight several times - out of fright, I suppose. I had cleaned up bird poo off my floor several times already. And the bird was now hiding under my bed, and I was tired, and distressed, and felt like a failure. ''What kind of a woman am I that I can't even catch a pigeon?! I'm hopeless". Too late to wake watchman up. However, Amrita, my roomie, woke up in the commotion and came in to help.

She said 'pigeons can't see in the dark, so maybe if we turn off all the lights, it would fly out on its own' (??? Go figure). It didn't make sense but I was willing to try anything. So we turned off all the lights and waited. It didn't budge. Not a peep.

Seeing it was not helping, she again suggested we turn on the lights in the dining and living room, and leave it dark in my room, and leave the door to the living room open, so that light from the other rooms would flood into my room and kind of like 'wash or flood out' the intruder. So we ran about switching on dining room and living room lights. And waited. Still no peep.

I resorted to having light in my room. Clapping a bit. Stamping on the floor. That roused rogue pigeon yet again. It came out from its corner under the bed and panicked and flew around and fell and then flew again like a beast possessed. At last, it landed on my dressing table. Creams and lotions went flying and clattering and crashing to the floor. I was so tired by then I just stood and screamed "Stop, stop, not there!"

(I felt stupid about that part later but at the time it made perfect sense to tell a pigeon to stop doing something.)

I will also admit that I was not completely 'unscared.' It would perch somewhere where I couldn't reach it and look at me. And I swear I could see 'emotions' - human-like emotions reflecting in those beady eyes. It kept on giving me long, meaningful, reproachful glances. Making me feel like a female Judas. I didn't know pigeons were capable of such meaningful looks. I also saw it was frightened. Its chests were heaving. But damn, I was scared too. Her chests were not the only ones heaving for pete's sake. Why was I feeling guilty?!

And then, in the midst of all these glances and warring with eyes, it headed towards the dressing table yet again, thrashing around and knocking things over and down to the floor again. Then in the midst of the havoc, I saw my new Elizabeth Arden perfume fall to the floor. As if in a trance. I LOVE that perfume, and it's expensive! That was it. Enough was enough.

I marched out, re-entered with a broom and an old jacket and started chasing it with renewed vigour. It ran for dear life (note: Ran. Not flew. Guess it was too tired to fly). Scampered. Scurried. But it was not so adept at running like it was at flying. It ran straight into a corner. Cornered, it turned back to face me meekly. I felt so powerful at that moment. It was meek and mild and it had surrendered. To me. And I loomed over it with my weapons - old jacket and broom in hand. Yes, I loomed. Like a true victor.

(Even though I was the vanquisher and not the vanquishee, I had to take a shower again and change my sheets before I could retire peacefully to bed - not terribly becoming things to do for a surviving warrior. I am not sure but I believe pigeons could easily be bearers of a whole sort of deadly fleas and diseases.)

I mercilessly threw the jacket over it like a net, preventing it from creating any further chaos. I picked it up and discarded it outside, hastily locking the door after it. I made it a point to leave it on the kitchen balcony, hinting to it that I did not want it to return to my side of the house.

I saw it hovering near the eggs the next day. I checked several times last night, but the eggs were alone. Besides being dumb, it's also a bad mother.

Now I'm stuck with two pigeon eggs. I'm thinking of putting them up for auction, maybe even adoption on the net. eBay maybe. If anyone's interested, let me know. Price on request.

-

Tasty Bear Recipe

..is not here, it's here. Only a day old but you'll still find fun stuff like bear recipe of the month and sage sayings to light your way in this dark maze we call life :-)

Now on to more serious stuff - messy, serious stuff but I will not make any attempt to sort, sift, organize or anything of the sort. I'll be mean and dark and vindictive - full of negative energy today. I will focus only on the dark forces.

* Darky 1: I hate the TV people - for treating us like morons by subjecting us to ridiculous commercials and parading siliconed-botoxed-collagened-restylaned females as your average girl-next-door and making the rest of us real girls-next-door look like circus clowns.

I have never been fond of the idiot box. I spend maybe roughly an hour or two sitting in front on it in an entire week, and yet I always find a million reasons to hate it more each time. The fact that they actually believe that subjecting us to dumbass jingles like 'Sip the coffee, lick the cream' (Worse than Kindergarten nursery rhymes!) would *actually* con us into buying their stuff is beyond me.

I do admit some are witty and entertaining, even persuasive and coaxing. But it's a sad fact there are more crappy ones than fun ones. In fact, I think I'll make a list of the ones I really hate, all over the place and unprofessional but heartfelt:

1. Sip the coffee, lick the cream. Tra-la-la. Coffee cream gets on the tips of their noses and they lap it all up. Would've been better if they'd shown people licking it off each other's noses instead of their own. (Get up and make self tea.)

2. Nivea whitening cream/lotion (?) for men. (Change to channel 5 and watch National Geographic in Hindi.)

3. All Hritik Roshan commercials. That look, the amused half-smile in the corners of his mouth, the suavity... Overdone, and he's not steak is the problem. I like my steak overdone but it about stops there. From the looks of it, I believe he thinks he's too sexy for his shirt, his cat, or whatever. Can NOT watch anything with the guy in it. (Switch to channel 7 and watch a Telegu religious program. Or close eyes.)

4. The really bad Shampoo ad of Bipasha Basu & John Abraham. That was so bad it was almost amusing. 'It's hot' 'It's not' 'You're hot' 'I'm not' - something along those lines. (Admire hair in mirror during this commercial.)

5. All Airtel commercials. (Make phone call.)

Hutch used to be fun. I'm wary about the new Hutch-is-now-Vodafone ones though. Haven't seen anything interesting so far.

* Darky 2: Yahoo's acquisition of MyBlogLog. I couldn't change my profile pic for a while after Yahoo engineers tampered with it. Any disruption is always unwelcome.

* Darky 3: The Wisconsin shooting. It's sad and all that, and there's no way anyone can justify what the killer did. But as bad as this may sound, I wonder how good it must've felt to shoot someone who just called you a worthless pig.

* Darky 4: Misual is getting boring. It used to be a hot spot for lively, heated, and even once in a while, intelligent discussions. Now it's become a place where someone can't speak his mind or say what he thinks without a whole sinister bunch ganging up against him and shutting him up with a sharp reprimand about how he should not think/talk/theorize/make unchristian-like judgments about other people et al. Very SSS-like. Not at all conversation-inducive. Well, it's true that people don't necessarily cower and curl up in the corner and die after such a rebuke. They still talk. But it's boring to read through a discussion where 8 out of every 10 comments are over-conventional, self-righteous, precaution-packed, and too politically-correct...

A word a day -

For one weird reason or the other, we all have this thing about words. There are some that you’re just really fond of, and some you’d want to be shot first for before using it or having to hear it being uttered. And yes, weird, weird reasons.

Like for example, I suddenly asked Shirley one day what her most favorite word was. ‘Possum’, she said without hesitation. I asked her why. She hemmed and hawed a while before admitting that she doesn’t have a clue why. ‘Maybe it’s the two S’s’ she said. Seems she likes words that have a letter appearing twice back to back, like pee, poo, loo, moo, coo, etcetera.

Usually, I’m not that technical about words. For me, it’s more to do with what the word makes me think of. And some words make me think of the darndest things. Some examples of words that I like and dislike and the thoughts they invoke in me:

1. P’s

+ Percussion – Music. Peace. Hot guys. Handsome, long-haired, guitar-strumming guys with beautiful, slender fingers, to be precise.

- Peruse – Drab government offices with lots of paper, smoke, dirty teacups. Bad English.

2. J’s

+ Jangle – Christmas. Santa & Rudolph. Dancing.

- Jocund; jocular – Merry and all that, but yech! Chubby. Stout. Busty. Lard. Round. Me.

3. V’s

+ Venison – Why does this word make me think of Genevieve? She’s some heroine from some play I saw when I was a kid. I believe it was pretty popular, but I don’t remember a thing from it, except that she suffered a lot.

- Victual – Dry, tasteless meat. Dry, bad wine. Dry, mostly.

4. I’s

+ Indomitable – Some part of me :-). The Abominable Snowman.

- Increment – Excrement.

5. S’s

+ Swoon – ‘Home they brought her warrior dead’

- Spouse – Unhappy marriage. Unhappy couples.

6. H’s

+ Hither – Graceful little steps I’ve never been capable of, like a Ballerina’s. Shirley ('Come hither, young one' she likes to say.)

- Husbandry – Mud. Dung. Soggy. Foul odors.

That’s all I can think of for now. I could probably come up with a way bigger list if I give it more thought. Some of those words and the related thoughts are obvious, some have no link whatsoever. You can play Freud and try to decipher them. [Guessing you’ll all come up with crap though :-)]

Also check out the desktop picture on my laptop. I have exactly four monitors in use, including this - maybe a little obsessive behavior but all adorned with pictures of the same man – a perfect example of what ‘Percussion’ makes me think of!

He's so hot. I'm not ashamed to admit that I, the humble, modest, nondescript & forgettable one, am stalking him. Yoko Ono is a great inspiration at this time. Who knows, I may get lucky by some bizarre force of nature like she did. And I would even go so far as to admit that I even think that I, as plain and charmless as I may be, am still prettier than she is.

Meet Venks

This is Venkata Subramaniam Swamy. But we call him Venks. He's an ownerless mongrel that hangs around near a cemetary about 10 minutes away from our office. He is really beautiful for a stray, as you can see. He looks regal and dignified. I seriously contemplated taking him home with me and adopting him at some point but he's too old and he's too wild it just wasn't feasible.

We swipe food from the cafeteria and go down and feed him once in a while. The first time we did that, he ate heartily and barked at us ceaselessly after he was done. He was always wary, looked at us with distrustful eyes, stand at a distance and refuse to come closer. Only when we put the food down and moved away would he move closer.

But yesterday, I didn't even see him but he bounded and leaped out from behind a truck when he saw me, all excited. He found me! I didn't have to stand there and coax him with food. I was so thrilled to see him yesterday.

We wanted to name him and Sohna thought he looks like a wolf so should be called Wolverine or Logan, but we decided Logan's too human a name. I wanted Mungojerry but again it was decided that it's derogatory for a dog to be named after a cat. Shirley came up with his current name. We all love it, he's a South Indian dog, and should have a South Indian name.

I can't wait for the day he'll let us pet him!

How marred I am and withered too

Give me the lowest place: or if for me
That lowest place too high, make one more low
Where I may sit and see
My God and love Thee so.

(Christina Georgina Rossetti)

'Lowest place' dil takngial pawh hi in in thlahrung ve thin em?

Make one more low, and one yet lower, and lower still ....

Scissor sister

I tried using only pictures of people I know and whose pictures I took myself. But I couldn't leave Lauri's eyes out. Too beautiful to not be included. Now look at that closely and tell me how many girl's eyes are there? Not counting my own of course, too obvious :-)

The only thing that will keep me at home is a very, very, very, very, very good book or extreme exhaustion. I've been trying to enforce some form of discipline. Get home. Stay there. It's really very difficult. When I do stay home, I read so much my eyes hurt. I do the laundry, I end up washing clothes that don't even need washing at all and I end up with blisters on my fingers. So I've come to the conclusion that I'm just inherently self-destructive.

I also end up cutting up people's good pictures in absence of good book or dirty laundry.

I love the pink-eared one :-)

I've noticed while doing this that among the people I know, there are hardly any women who wears glasses, while there are quite a few among the men.

Hunting for pictures and cutting them up is a very good way to kill the time, and I can do them like I'd read a book, lying down with no intense physical injury to self. Besides burning eyes if you overdo it. They're pretty fun to do though. I have eyes, noses, ears, teeth, lips, watches... I look at them the next day and I'm not even really sure which eye/nose/lips belong to whom. And they're all people I know very well.

I really want to do something a little more scandalous, like busts, or butts, or belly buttons. But I don't have enough pictures for those :( Am open if anyone's got anything to contribute!

Ozzy-mandius of Egypt

Isn't Shirley's 'Khumbeu' cute? The Fedora of my ancestors. She really likes it. And I must admit hat and wearer looks like they were made for each other. Could it be that Shirley is one of my long-dead ancestors reborn? Thinking much about reincarnation these past couple of days :-)

AAaarrghhh! It's review season - the season of nightmares, deadlines, and unappeasable appetites. That's what kickstarts the goofing-off ball. You do anything and everything except all that you're supposed to do! I'm either stressed out or having the time of my life or too tired I can't keep my eyes open all the time. Any one of those three.

*Tip: Soft toys, soft birds induce a peaceful mind.
I have tons of reviews to write, so much so that I can't write anymore (Nags, you know what I'm on about). I just came back from a 2 hour lunch (Barbeque Nation's lunch buffet - free beer and your very own barbeque kit on your table). I already wasted the whole morning building paper ships during meetings. I piled candies on it and smiled at my candy-laden ship while everyone else looks grave with serious business matters. It's the ship that will take me to Holland and will take me sailing over the sands of Egypt. That's what I think about during meetings. That's what I think about at night!

I'm losing it. Iwannagohomeandsleepsleepsleepsleep.

*Tip: Stress-buster of the day: Bite off birds' heads. Yum.

Psyched!

The weirdest thing happened last night. I was out having dinner with some friends at this beautiful restaurant near a lake. We were waiting for some other friends to turn up so we were sitting at the bar. There was this one guy sitting next to us who looked exceedingly familiar. I didn't pay him too much attention but wondered a bit where I'd known him before. And it struck me later that he had a strong resemblance to a guy I used to date. The friend who sat next to him struck up a conversation with him, and they started talking. We were talking about something else so again, we didn't join in but I heard him talk, and again, he sounded terribly like the ex. And it was just weird because more than his resemblance to the ex, it felt like he was someone I used to know really well even though I was sure I'd never set eyes on him before.

I saw him talk and look at me. I couldn't hear a thing but my friend also turned and looked at me so I knew I was being talked about. I pretended not to notice even after the friend rejoined us later. The friend told us a bit about the 'stranger' he was talking with, which country he's from etcetera, and there I was, having all these weird, indescribable, swirling, smoky, deja-vu-type feelings because of him when my friend added 'And oh, he said his girlfriend looks just like you.'

Well, that sounds all corny and lame-assed and everything but it just felt so out of the ordinary...


.

Trying not to burn

They never tell you truth is subjective, they only tell you not to lie
They never tell you there's strength in vulnerability, they only tell you not to cry
They never tell you you don't need to be ashamed, they only tell you to deny
...So is it true that only good girls go to heaven?

(Something Else - Gary Jules)

I can be strong too even when I cry. I don't need to be ashamed of anything. I'm not responsible for the genes I inherited. I've never been that kind of good, but I can try not to burn.

I'm trying to embrace the truth of who I am, what I am, not always easy but I don't hate myself. I may have momentary lapses of self-loathing and shame, but that's about all. But I do tend to stray.

Can I get away with just facing and embracing simpler truths like Shirley's vertical milwaukee portable saw trax and men with fur balls down their throats? Or maybe even Mongolian Death Worms or Bryukhonenko's living severed dog head...? They are so much more easier....

.

Guess what!!

Jens Johansson wrote to me!!!!

Well, it doesn't matter that it was just one line and he was just being nice to ardent fans I guess, but I don't care. It may not seem like much but it means a great deal to me. A personal MySpace message from one of the Stratovarius guys. Wow! It's so eff-ing fantastic!
I've been hunting each member down on MySpace. I never really expected anything. Just to see who their friends are, read their stuffs, their blog entries, and everything that I've seen's just made me admire the guys more. They all sound so down to earth. Now I can admire them as musicians and as human beings.

Yesterday, we saw Timo Tolkki glowing online. Shirley and I just stared at the screen, sighing "Can you believe Timo Tolkki is there, sitting in front of the computer, logged on to MySpace right now? Wow!!"

In some ways, I think I deserve that little message. I've introduced and turned many people into Strato fans :-P You know that's not an easy thing to do in a country like India where metal's never been popular. Anyway, that's all. Think I'll go and brag some more. I've told everyone on my floor, now I'm going up to the 6th, 7th, and 8th floors to tire everyone's ears out.

UPDATE: Timo Kotipelto also just wrote back to me! Yayyy! Best day in months!!

UPDATE: 1:06 PM, 7th Sept. Lauri Porra replied to the message I sent him last night. He wrote:

Hi jerusha,

thank you for your kind words. they made me happy

-Lauri

(I swiped this pic off some site, I hope I'm not doing anything illegal!)

It was while Googling for Lauri that I found their MySpace pages. Lauri is so hot but I'm not going to go into that. I read what he wrote about VIP tickets on his blog and that was enough to make me see him beyond hotness. I remembered the VIP-ticket-holding-smirking people at the Aerosmith concert and how painful it was watching them being herded in before you when you'd been standing there for HOURS.

We are all good human beings. Doing unto each other and all that. Anthropos! I'm so-o crunked.

My New Retro Sari :-)

Out of extreme boredom, I watched one very old Hindi movie one day. It was a dumb movie but there was this one scene where the heroine danced in the hills wearing a yellow flowery sari. I fell in love with it.

That evening, I went out, walked into a Sari shop, told the guy I wanted a yellow sari with flowers on it.

It was not quite like the heroine's sari but I still love it, so I just wanted to proudly show it off here :-)

(Almost forgot, wanted to add that I look weird in the picture because I had paan in my mouth :P. And no, I don't normally eat paan! )

Okay, I'm realllyy bored. I CAN NOT wait for people. Well, I can but it drives me crazy. I'm always on time. Why can't people be on time?

I'm gonna find some pictures I like to post. Not the most brilliant way of killing time, but there's no rule that says one always have to strive for brilliance in all things.

Picture 1: The Ring Part 3 starring Sailopari. I took this picture but all credit goes to the subject.
Reason for posting - Funny, makes me laugh every time I look at it.

Picture 2: With Smriti & Katrin
Reason for posting: Genuine smiles with teeth showing hard to come by these days. This is one of few.

Picture 3: Mentioned-many-times-before, Shirley & Sohna of the Bear & Peacock BDSM fame.
Reason for posting: Shirley's smile. That's how she always smiles. She's got the most beautiful and freshest and cleanest smile ever.

Picture 4: Kush and I helping someone move.
Reason for posting: Kush's venomous eyes and healthy teeth. But eyes mostly. Aren't those eyes deadly?

Pictures 5, 6 & 7: Joe & Sam. No need for words here.
Reasong for posting: Cute. Plus, proof to show how easy it is to get men to do what you want them to do :-) 'Play with your nipples' 'Show off your biceps' - and ta daaa!

I think I should go find something else to do. I have a feeling I'm gonna be hearing from Sailopari and Joe and Sam pretty soon. So to ward off unwanted phone calls, I'll go back to safer topics.

Back to my sari now. So I only wear it inside when I want to smell something new and I want to feel all ladylike and feminine. I would love to be able to wear it outside, but I can't because of this:
It's easy posing gracefully for a minute. But in reality, I have to bend down and do such squatting exercises every once in 5 minutes :( But I practise every day. I will learn in time to wear it on my next big dinner out.

Where's the Pied Piper when you need him?

'To see the townsfolk suffer so
From vermin, is a pity.'

[ Vermin without tails, walking on their hind foot and with a love for explosive devices. ]

The recent bomb blast has completely skewed up my life. Well, I know I shouldn't be complaining when there are so many people who lost so much. My 'tragedy' is nothing. But I'm still complaining. We leftovers are now scared to venture out. I can't even work late, my boss forces me or anyone else who tries to stay overtime to go home. Many plans canceled indefinitely. Bummer.

We've had bomb blasts here before, but this one was particularly scary because I was too close for comfort. However, this is a good way to find out who really cares for you :-). It's good to know there are people in your life who cares if you're dead or alive. It's also a good way to find out who reads/watches the news. Some people of course didn't call because they didn't know about it. I think that's just dumb when people learned about it and called from across the globe only a few minutes after it happened [yes yes, am pointing fingers here :D]

Mostly, I'm just mad. I'm so sick of people who believe bombs are going to solve things. What exactly are they bombing us for? To solve things? Put their points across? To prove something - whatever it is that's their cause.

I'm also sick of so-called state leaders who have the temerity to say stuffs like 'the state couldn't really have done anything to prevent this as the attack came from abroad' (!!!!!!!) and believe they can get away with that kind of bullshit statement. This is why my mind keeps going back to these lines from Robert Browning's 'The Pied Piper of Hamelin' -

" 'T is clear," cried they, "our Mayor's a noddy;
And as for our Corporation - shocking
To think we buy gowns lined with ermine
For dolts that can't or won't determine
What's best to rid us of our vermin!
You hope, because you're old and obese,
To find in the furry civic robe ease?
Rouse up, sirs! Give your brains a racking
To find the remedy we're lacking,
Or, sure as fate, we'll send you packing!"
At this the Mayor and Corporation
Quaked with a mighty consternation.

I wonder what will get our leaders to quake likewise....

The Strange Case Of The Missing Lighter

My very valued cigarette lighter went missing from my desk where I thought I'd left it. I looked in my bag, rummaged and rummaged. No lighter. Emptied bag's entire content. Still no lighter.

I ran to the security desk, and in the process of getting up and pushing against my chair, something heavy from my jacket pocket which was hanging on the back of my chair swung against my knee. I ignored it. I wanted security! I wanted my lighter back!

Once there, I frantically reported the case of the missing lighter. Also missing along with it was a packet of cigarettes which was also duly included in the report. In a place where people report lost mobiles, iPods, expensive cameras et al, I could see that the security guys didn't think much of my missing stuffs. I was also a little embarrassed so I told them that I didn't care about the cigarette packet but that the lighter was wanted back in all earnestness.

"Uh-huh." They grunted.

"It was a very expensive lighter." I added, hoping to earn some sympathy.

"Uh-huh."

"And also holds a lot of sentimental value for me. So please, it's really important that I get that lighter back."

"Uh-huh."

I gave up and dejectedly went back to my desk. I couldn't work. My mind was on my cigarette lighter. My poor baby! In some stranger's grubby paws. It was unthinkable! (Yep. Fiercely and sometimes even absurdly possessive about certain stuffs).

I moaned, I whined, I sighed and I fretted, finally causing the noble J to stand up and pick up the phone and bark at the security guys. I had a slight suspicion that he did it more out of concern for his own self (he and I sit in close proximity so he suffers most from all my sighs and moans and whines). But I was anyway happy to see someone else take up my cause so strongly and bravely.

"Have you done anything about her lost lighter? Have you searched? What have you done? The security cameras must have caught something. Check that out!" The noble knight barked.

Men always bark better. The security guys sent a couple of guys in to sniff around my desk, in my drawers, pulled and tugged at my phone lines. Threw my tissue boxes around. They knocked my stuffed Koala off its nail. They tapped at and skewed my Celtic cross. They knocked my pen stand over. And tripped around and over several times on my headphone wires.

Of course, I thought it absolutely ridiculous, but I held my peace. They were, after all, there to help me. And they're supposed to be the experts - the Holmes, and I, the mere Watson.

They came. They rummaged. They didn't find any lead. No suspects whatsoever. I half-expected them to ask me 'Do you have any enemies?' 'Do you have any idea why anyone would want to do this to you?' 'Do you think whoever took your lighter has malicious intent to cause you bodily harm?'

They didn't but left with a promise to do all they could to return my lighter to me. They were going to see if the security cameras had caught who so shameless swiped my precious one right off its perch.

Well, after that, I worked a bit. And as I got up for lunch, that thing that knocked against my knee, well, that knocked again. That was a small detail I should have paid more attention to sooner. I picked the jacket up and thrust my hands inside its pockets, determined to find out what it was that was so hell-bent on doing damage to my knees.

My hand touched something...

Something solid.

And black.

And looked extremely familiar.

**Oopsie**

Now I'm sitting here and praying those stupid cameras didn't catch me putting the lighter in there the night before.

Who came first?

Nope. Not the chicken, nor the egg.

The question now is - Was it the hagfish or Darth Vader?

Solutions anyone?

Jason's email forward today was very touching. I'm guessing most of you must've already received the same forward, maybe a couple of times over. You know how forwards are. But anyway, for everybody's reference, the message at the end of the forward was this :

"Are you aware that if we died tomorrow, the company that we are working for would easily replace us in a matter of days. But the family we left behind will feel the loss for the rest of their lives. And come to think of it, we pour ourselves more into work than to our own family an unwise investment indeed, don't you think?"

I am aware. Again, I think most of us are. But what the hell is the solution? You can't work and do a half-assed job, you can't not work, yes, we need money. Also, lame-assed work = loser. And nobody wants to be a loser.

I'm thinking binary fission. Divide thyself and let one of you pour thyself into thine work, one into thine family, one into thine romantic interest, one into thine society, one into thine church, and so on and so forth.

What irritates me is hearing words of wisdom that are indeed oh-so-wise to hear but has no logical solutions to them. Somebody pops up and says "Hey, do you realise when you're short and tiny, it's that much more difficult to reach cabinets and cupboards and you have to stretch a lot and you may even be putting yourself in risk of hazardous back pains from all that stretching? (Underlying message would be 'Don't be short, be tall')." It's worse than the Confucius-y 'Think yourself out of your height' thing...

Rumps are red and the Sky is blue!

Sometimes everything falls into place so beautifully you can hear your heart purring with contentment. And life is so good and perfect and beautiful it scares me. The calm before the storm?

That's LV. I asked him last night if he could chose, what he would chose between having absolutely no one in this world that finds you sexy or having pigeons finding you sexy. He picked being wanted by pigeons. I asked Jim the same thing today, he found being found sexy by pigeons offensive so he chose not to be wanted by anyone or anything at all.

Bitch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid :P.

I wouldn't mind being leered at by a pigeon so much. But they've never done it so I can't say for sure. I mean, leering is leering and it's always revolting. Maybe I might get offended and lose my temper and break all their eggs. But lecherous pigeons are hard to come by these days. No self-respecting pigeon would leer at a human nowadays.

Anyway, since the world's so beautiful and peaceful, there's not much to do except go walking in the park and play cowboys and robbers and take daft pictures. The park's my 'Isle of Innisfree' - no nine bean rows and no hives for the honeybee, but it suffices.

And if you don't mind a little damp, it's beautiful after the rain, and it feels liberating to be out there while it still drizzles.These are rosefinches right? Why does red rumps look so cute on birds and so revolting on monkeys? In the same way that animals get cuter the fatter they get but it's just the reverse on human beings. We call them 'Tlaiberh' in Mizo. [Kan hmuh veleh, 'Awi ka ei chak lutuk, han buhchiar ila' kan ti :)]
Check out the muscle all that walking has given me! :P You'll be seeing me on the Indian Weight Lifting Team pretty soon.

Does your cup runneth over?

(er, I meant bra cups :P) If yes, I have good news for you. Yes, despite the gloom and the mundaneness of this weepy Wednesday morning, I have found something on the net to considerably cheer me and a million other women up. Which is this -

Bra scientists find formula for that

perfect fit!!

Yep, yep, am not joking!

(To be frank, I didn't even know there were 'bra scientists,' 'bra specialists' maybe...)

According to the Telegraph.co.uk, 'researchers in Hong Kong have come up with a different mathematical equation which they say will produce shapelier outlines and greater comfort..'

Also, 'the Hong Kong Polytechnic University team says that a "woman's breast is a very complex 3D geometry" and the existing sizing system may be "inappropriate in the categorisation of breast sizes for bras".'

Hear that? Inappropriate! Not appropriate, which also means unsuitable, unfitting. Hah! I knew that already, without any form of research or study done.

We poor women, through the ages (since 1953 to be exact, since bra sizes have followed a formula devised in America in 1935, according to them) have been inappropriately categorised and inappropriately clothed, or bra-ed, or brassiered, to be precise.

This must be why it is so difficult to find the right bra. This must be why you so often feel like there's a parasitic living being attached to your chest. This must be why you feel that constant constriction against your rib cage, cramping your breathing style by mercilessly squeezing your oxygen passageway and therefore turn you prematurely blue. And also why that hot new top just won't look right!

Apparently, the team uses 3D scanning. That sounds good. I already have faith in what they're hinting at. I see some light in the future, and hopefully some new reasons to go lingerie shopping some time soon in the future.

I love human intelligence. The incredible things they study, discover, learn and come up with. I mean c'mon, breasts and mathematical equations?!? I guess maths really isn't all that boring after all.

What's our President's name?

See if you can answer that without googling it!

I'm ashamed of my ignorance of what's happening in the world around me. I do vaguely remember reading something somewhere about our new president, but realized I don't even know her name. I pinged Sohna and Shirley, and was relieved to find I'm not alone in the dark.

Me to them: do you know the name of our new president? not allowed to google!

Sohna: ummmm

damn

no :P

did u?

shirleyg: yes yes

umm

shes a woman

Sohna: it's a female??

shirleyg: a woman

damn

with the name beg with p

patil

some patil

me: did you google shirley?!

shirleyg: padma patil

shirleyg: noooooooooooo

never

shirleyg: prema patil

shilpa patil


So, we finally googled. Pratibha Patil is the new President of India. (Yep, Shirley definitely didn't google.) Three cheers for the lady! We're glad to have her as President.

I'm politically demented, I can't even form ideas on what she will be like as a leader. I know absolutely nothing about her. I wikied, found some things I liked, how she handled the Rajasthan Dharma Swatantrya Bill for instance. And some unnerving stuffs -

"Patil claims to have spoken to the spirit of the deceased leader (Baba Lekhraj) of the Brahma Kumaris World Spiritual University at their headquarters in Mount Abu, Rajasthan.

"Dadiji ke shareer mein Baba aye ... Maine unse baat ki (Baba entered Devi’s body and he communicated to me through her)," she said on TV camera. Reporters began to report on the message she received of a “divine indication“ of great responsibility coming her way.

Patil claims to have received the mediumistic message during the last season in which the spirits they call "Bapdada" communicated with the faithful of the Brahma Kumaris sect. She had gone to seek the blessings of Hirday Mohini, also known as Dadi Gulzar or Dadiji."

Source: Wikipedia

You're kidding right?!! I don't mean any disrespect, but c'monn...

I don't have anything against divine interventions and other-worldly conversations but I just want our President to be clear in the head if she's going to lead the country. Of course, if it's just 'cutting ribbons', I guess then there's no harm.

But anyway, the fact alone that we have elected a female President will show people that India doesn't mistreat its entire female population and that we women don't just meekly walk behind our men. Because there are people who think India is full of savages who kill female babies. We walk ahead too.

And let's watch our President walk ahead and the men following her. I'm going to enjoy this.

Hampi - Close Encounter With The Third Kind!

A picture of Hampi first, by way of an introduction -
Was there last weekend with Katrin. I always hated history and all history-related subjects in school. Going to Hampi made me realise my feelings haven't changed. Smriti says she's not interested in Hampi because there's nothing to hump in Hampi :P
We got there pretty early, it was still dark out and we took a rickshaw from Hospet, and it was complete wilderness, with just us two girls and our rickshaw driver. I was a little uneasy, but it started to get light while we were on our way to Hampi. And I was beginning to enjoy the sights and sounds when bam! our rickshaw's tire got a puncture! In the middle of nowhere.

Our valiant driver, Shiva, took us to a nearby temple on top of a hill, and further took us up on the top of this hill (?) (more like a dollop of boulders) near the temple so we could sit and watch the sun rise while he goes to fetch another rickshaw. We asked him several times while on our way there if there were monkeys around, because we are both terrified of them. And each time Shiva would say, 'No, no, ma'am! No monkey here, haha, no worry.' Assured, we sat down and lit cigarettes, ready to watch the phenomenal event of the sun coming up on the horizon.

Then I heard Katrin's voice, sounding Katrin-like but with a new, exciting tremor to it. 'Jerusha!' it whispered. 'Jerusha! Oh god! There are monkeys here!' I, whose eyes had been fixed firmly on the distant horizon, turned and looked, and saw she had not lied or was joking as I wished she had been. There were two little monkeys, just sitting there and staring at us. And what was worse, there were more coming out from behind a big rock, in a single file, who came out and sat down around us, staring at us like we were the famous little green men from Mars.

Katrin froze and blabbered something about how she can't let 'anything' happen here (I assumed she meant 'death' by 'anything'), not here in the middle of nowhere, not here in Hampi, not here in India, separated from her loving parents' arms by endless miles of the yawning ocean. I think I would have bolted and ran if I had been with someone who was braver. I watched those little buggers, more of them coming out and placing themselves in a circle round us, like we were sacrificial lambs, and all I wanted to do was hurl myself down the boulders with not a thought of broken bones, and even possibly, 'anything'.

'Don't panic, get up slowly, grab your bags and walk. Walk, don't run' I said, but all I wanted to do was run myself. Somehow we did as the voice coming out of my mouth told us to. And we easily scrambled down rocks which we had climbed up with so much difficulty. At one point, I turned back and didn't see a single monkey. I thought they'd stopped following us, relieved, I even relaxed enough to take this picture - our distant beacon of hope, the temple.Tree branches above us swished again. We scrambled down further. They followed us till the temple and stopped. We hovered somewhere around the temple's entrance, too scared to go back up and too scared to venture further down the road where wild, stray dogs and buffaloes roamed - both of which we are both again terrified of.

We sat there near the temple and waited for Shiva to come back with the life-saving rickshaw. It was like Psychology class all over again. The devil and the deep blue sea. The monkeys on one side, and the buffaloes on the other. And the temple had several towers, all of which had fearsome demon-like statues. It was not a very pleasant thing, sitting there with these statues glowering down at us. I, however, meekly got my camera out and zoomed in on one of the statues and hoped he wouldn't mind if I took one picture of him. The hyperthyroidic statues with the protruding eyeballs. No I didn't like them at all.

It was getting later, there were priests on the temple who must've just gotten up and were walking down towards us. It seemed the monkeys had destroyed our trust in our own fellow creatures because K asked me if they were going to attack us :-). I said I didn't know for sure but most likely not. They didn't.

When Shiva came back, the first thing he heard from us was 'Shiva, there ARE monkeys on that hill!!' Reproach loud on our voices. And what did he say? 'Of course ma'am, here monkeys everywhere. Is okay. They don harm.' Blithely. As blithe and as cheerful as a lark. He had no idea we had been treading on the very edge of death just a few minutes before. Thoughts of being bitten by a mad monkey, not to instant death but the bite sealing me to an eternal doom of leading a rabid life had also ran rampant in my mind. But yes, Shiva was hale and hearty and blithe and gay.

On a more serious note, the crumbling ruins made me angry that these people, who were once this powerful and ruled in such glorious magnificence, didn't have anything better to do than built elaborate stables for elephants and more temples than one could pray in in a lifetime. That's all well and good but look at us now, maybe there were things they could've done differently.

All that glory, power, learnings, skills and we, heirs of all that glory, are now third world citizens, forever stricken with poverty, where people come to play missionary and social worker and good samaritan and cleanse their conscience and dirty their feet. 'Developing' all the time, and I'm sick of the present-continuous-ness of this term. I wonder what the old Maharajahs of yore would feel if they can see us now.

Eagerly awaiting the day we, the once-developed and civilized, that by some ill-luck regressed to a developing state, can kick the 'ing' out and turn that gerund into a regular adjective once again.

Other than that, I think there were too many temples that looked alike, too much sun, too many monkeys and our driver, too enthusiastic - which was tiring for us, who were not interested and refused to step out of the rick in most of the sites, and also disappointing for him, who was obviously used to people ooh-ing and aah-ing away.

Aside from all these, I liked Hampi and the surrounding countryside, it's really charming, with bullock-drawn carts and sugarcane fields, and mobile phones that don't work :). Also easy to feel kind of detached from the world and a little lost. But I really did like the place.
And there were lots of colorful, friendly gypsies!

But if i were to go back, there's only one place that I think is really worth going back for - the Mango Tree restaurant. Under the shade of giant mango trees, nestled close to the river Tungabhadra, quiet and peaceful and close to nature, you sit on mats on the floor and eat. They serve only vegetarian food, and it's REALLY cheap. I did not see a single dish that cost more than Rs 100. They also make very good tea, which is very important in my book. I had plain rice, dal fry and aloo jeera - served on banana leaf! It was probably the best meal I've had in a very long time. I don't remember ever enjoying dal and aloo so much. That meal was better than any I've ever had in all the fancy restaurants I've ever been to. That's Shiva, happy and full from his Thali dinner. You can see the river in the background. We ate dinner there, with the lantern and on the mats and fireflies overhead. It was just lovely!
Men with Coracles on the river. K asked me if they got those from turtles :)

Went walking further down the river and found this lone fisherman -
His catch so far -
The people are very friendly. The fisherman asked me 'What is your name?', the kids on the street asked me my name, everyone asks you for your name. I almost had to pay the foreigner price of Rs 250 entry fees, but I speak enough Hindi to save myself. I don't speak a lot but I can speak the little that I do know like I know a lot :P They kept on telling me I spoke 'excellent' Hindi. (That's a feather on your cap for you, Mr Kutty)

And oh, if you're ever there, you have to beware of kids that just jump in when you take pictures. Gypsy kids with wild hair and tattooed chins and foreheads and colorful clothing and beautiful eyes, they grab you and smile for your camera, and they all want to look at the pictures before going back to tending cattle or collecting firewood. And they look at their pictures, and give you a thumbs-up and say 'Super!'

Despite the harrowing encounter with the monkeys, the trip was super. I hope to make it back there again soon.

Questions for all who'd bother to answer

I got a couple of questions. I'll list them below, I'd like to know everyone's idea on these, so please comment if you have the time. Questions are not based on any particular thing or person or situation.

Question 1: Is love ever wrong? I mean romantic love in this case, and if yes, when?

Is it when it's between two people who don't embrace the same religious faith, who pray to different gods? Or is it when it's between two people who belong to different castes and/or communities? When and what makes love a 'wrong' thing? When/how can it be a 'sin' to love someone, no matter who that person is?

And if yes to either one/both of the above, why?

Question 2: Do you think the world would be a safer, more peaceful place if we were all either atheists or agnostic? If yes or no, I'd also like to know why you think so.

I'm neither. I believe very strongly in a one and only true God. But I still wonder. And like me, most of the people I know, most of my friends also believe in the same thing. It would be interesting to know what you, who could be an atheist/agnostic/liberal/radical/unitarian/Hindu/Jain/just plain spiritual/whatever thinks.

Peace!

Poppin' babies...

There's that song called 'I wanna have your babies' by Natasha Bedingfield. At some point, it was a hot subject of discussion during work. We sit quietly, me and my friends, staring at our computer screens, looking like we're very deeply engrossed in our clients' problems. But no, our fingers work faster on our IM windows, and sometimes I can even hear them giggling out loud, over my headphones playing Coal Chamber in full volume.

I'd rather talk about some dumb song than waste precious grey cells on ungrateful clients' dumb problems. Common factor here is the dumbness of both subjects, but lesser of the two evils, I consider, is discussing Miss Bedingfield's song. At least there's fun to be had while on the subject.

So anyway, if you haven't heard of that song before, the last two lines on the chorus goes 'I wanna have your babies, I see 'em springing up like daisies', which, me and my girls thought, was just plain stupid. Sohna, in fact, initially sang 'I wanna have your babies, they're poppin' out like daisies' :-)

'People write whatever crap they want and then slap some tune to it and call it a song. It's sacrilegious' said one. 'It's desecrates the word 'song' and all that it stands for and all that it signifies' said another.

But we learned the hard way that writing silly songs is much easier than writing really significant, profound works of art (as if it needs to be learned at all, but we did need to be taught!).

It also depends on the name one has carved for oneself. If you're an accepted genius all around, you can just about get away with anything. If a nobody like me created a "supposed work of art," and called it something like 'The flight of the bumblebee' I'm sure it'd get a lot of snickers. Only works for established geniuses like Korsokov. In the same way, if it had been Shakespeare who wrote 'I wanna have your babies, I see 'em springin' up like daisies,' people would be quoting it now and still quoting it for eons to come.

Anyway, we tried to better the Bedingfield song, with drastic results. I may brag about having never used Spell-check in my life, but songwriting is a different matter altogether. My friends too could not come up with anything song-saving. Shirley came up with -

'I wanna have your babies, and hope they don't get rabies'

Sohna's attempt -

'I wanna have your babies, what'll I do if they get scabies!'

So Shirley suggested they combine both and have something like 'I wanna have your babies, and hope they don't get rabies' with 'And scabies, and scabies..' as a part of the fading chorus.

Tried singularising it -

'I wanna have your baby, and watch him grow up to be a lady.' (This would be our way of showing our passive support for the gay pride movement.)

You can put your two cents in, if you think you can do better.

We, the newly humble and modest, now no longer scoff at songs. We have been given lessons in humility, and our prides have been squashed to bits. We are now epitomes of humility and peace, with not a harsh word or thought in our heads...I think.

Our new obsession - the Animal 1 vs Animal 2 videos on YouTube. Anaconda vs Jaguar, Python Vs Croc, Tarantula Vs Centipede, Sumatran Tiger Vs Wild Boar, and sometimes we pair our own fighters and that's usually more fun than real videos.

Like today for example, Shirley pitched a peacock against a bear. And I've been laughing for the past 2 hours because Shirley is a member of the duck-stealer clan and speaks like a true duck-stealer.

(Duck-stealer clan - People who use what I call Shakespearean language. Like for example, when she IMs someone, instead of the regular greetings like 'Hey, what's up?' Shirley would say 'Greetings, O ye noble prince of darkness.' Call them the duck-stealer clan because Shakespeare was a duck stealer.)

To give you an idea of 'duck-stealer' language, and also because it's just plain hilarious and I hope it'll make you shed your worries and laugh a little, I am going to paste my conversation with the duck-stealer here, as it is, laced with typos, as follows:

shirleyg: oh oh
peacock vs bear
who's side are u on

Jerusha: hahahha


shirleyg: hehehe


Jerusha: personally i like bears better


shirleyg: but wudnt it be more fun to see peacock eat bear


Jerusha: but ill be on peacock';s side just becos of its odd chances of winning


shirleyg: bear in tummy of peacock


Jerusha: yea yea
would l0ve to see


shirleyg: oh!!
yes yes we shud see


shirleyg: hahaha
so peacock seduces bear with his lovely feathers
he does an angelic dance
the dance of death


Jerusha: hahahahhahaha


shirleyg: calls the bear closer n closer n closer
bear then caught unawares in tiny beak of peacock


Jerusha: yes yes
very tiny beak
but in tye midst of the seductive dance trance, bear has no wish to be out of peacock's beak ill bet


shirleyg: oh yeah oh yeah
in his lustful ways n pure pleasure of being eaten by the peacock he does not see death approach
before long he floating down the peacocks gullet
to the dark abyss of eternal damnation


Jerusha: peacefully floating down the river of death through peacock's digestive tract


shirleyg: haha


Jerusha: he knew not that he was floating through the valley of the shadow of death


shirleyg: yes yes lost in his own pleasure death seemed but a sacrifice to eternal love
his love for the peacock that is


Jerusha: yet peacock was only sealing its own doom, for in the process of eating and swallowing the bear whole, it was commiting one of the deadly sins
gluttony
O gluttonous peacock
bring forth thy secret of never gaining weight even after swallowing bears whole


shirleyg: ah but forgive ye this sin....gluttony n lust hath come together in such harmonious ways. the peacock suffered greatly but the bear ... oh the bear
death had to come to them so they be reunited within the fires of hell


Jerusha: level 2 I suppose


shirleyg: i wud say so yes

-----------------END---------------

Poor bear.

Poor peacock.

(Also, the way Shirley described the bear's pleasure at being eaten reminded me of Armin Meiwes and his friend.)

Lustful Me :(

I took the Dante's Inferno Test just to see which level of hell it's going to banish me to. And I've been banished to the second level of hell. Where the lustful goes. I'd never have thought 'lust' to be one of my major sinning areas. It's just a virtual test developed by humans, but it does make you think.

The sweet light no longer strikes against your eyes. Your shade has been banished to... the Second Level of Hell!

You have come to a place mute of all light, where the wind bellows as the sea does in a tempest. This is the realm where the lustful spend eternity. Here, sinners are blown around endlessly by the unforgiving winds of unquenchable desire as punishment for their transgressions. The infernal hurricane that never rests hurtles the spirits onward in its rapine, whirling them round, and smiting, it molests them. You have betrayed reason at the behest of your appetite for pleasure, and so here you are doomed to remain. Cleopatra and Helen of Troy are two that share in your fate.


...old friends :-)

I remember years ago in school, we were reading out a play, Helen of Troy and I got to be Helen's voice. The girls envied me, and I was feeling pretty darned good that I was the 'chosen one' to be Helen. Seems teacher did a good job. He probably saw kindred spirits and picked me because of that. :P

Take the Dante's Inferno Hell Test

Whammy! Bammy! Thank You Maammy!

So someone told me this picture looks 'Whammy! Bammy! Thank you Maammy! - for whatever that's supposed to mean. What do you think that's supposed to mean?

That's Smriti, sloshed and sleepy and feeling naughty! Staunch Firaangi Paani fan, and swears by vodka and Sprite. Sohna's having fun without us livin' it up in Sydney, so we're trying not to be too envious and make up for the lack of hot, Aussie guys here by dimming our eyesights in Firaangi Paani so we'd appreciate what we have here more.

Kidding! Don't really need to dim the lights or my eyesight or go to Sydney to appreciate what I have. I appreciate who I have to bits - in the clearest of minds, in my highest levels of consciousness, in the brightest and starkest of lights :-)

Man, that's corny! :D

Let's Ramble

Do you think the stuffs that we were taught in school were relevant? Looking back now, I think we were taught more crap than stuffs that makes sense.

You ever have those cursive writing lessons way, wayyyy back in school, around standard 1/2? I remember I used to hate those so much back then, but I will admit that I write beautifully on paper, I mean the handwriting, not the content :P, and I think it's all thanks to those cursive writing exercises. At least not all the things they forced us to do turned out to be completely useless.

Did you ever get slapped around in school? Caned? I remember being hit flat on the face a couple of times, and I was even pretty proud to walk around with red, hand-shaped welts on my cheeks, laughing about it. Girls usually cried. I cried only once, not because I was scared, or the beating hurt, or I was embarrassed. I cried out of extreme hatred for the teacher. Extreme hatred. At such a young age. It makes me wince now to imagine hating anyone that way. I no longer have the passion to hate/dislike someone that intensely.

He pulled my hair and he pinched my ears, he slapped me with the back of his cold, clammy hands on my cheeks a bit, and it wasn't even painful, his beating didn't really hurt, but I looked at him, his oily hair, hair sticking out of his ears, his barely-understandable English derisively asking me questions he didn't want me to answer, and it angered me so much tears came to my eyes. And the tears angered me so much more came and so on and so forth. That was when I was in Class III.

I went to a school that believed very strongly in corporal punishment. It was a regular thing to hear sounds of flesh against flesh, wood against flesh, foreheads against blackboards, wooden rulers breaking on small hands. I was always a good student, I mean, I did my homeworks, passed all my tests and exams, always tried to be #1 etcetera etcetera. But I just couldn't stop yapping. Which was not too bad, but my refusal to yap in English always ended in me bending over a table and getting my butt whacked.

I watch these videos on youtube about 'violent' student-beating teachers, and everyone seems to think it's a colossal matter and I only ho-hum. Seen too many more violent teachers.

I remember getting caned so badly one time I couldn't sit. I had big, nasty, purple bruises on my butt, and I showed them to my mom and she had tears in her eyes and told me she's not letting me go back to the school. I've never been slapped or physically beaten ever since. I moved school the next year.

I'm now actually pretty close to one of my old teachers who used to beat me the hardest, go out for dinner and all that. Am I just stupid or am I just an extremely good human being?? LOL! I think I'm just thick.

But one thing I wonder about, now that I'm all grown up, and has had the experience of teaching in school a couple of summers, all I wonder about is how they could've possibly done that to little 9-13 year old kids? I taught Science to high school kids, and even to the students that irritated me most, physical beating was not something I would ever consider. And they're high school kids. And some of them were older than regular high school kids with kids of their own. But you're their teacher and they look up to you and they're your students, your kids, your responsibilities, and you just love them.

I wonder sometimes did we have monsters for teachers? How could they do that?? Maybe someone like me who always broke the rules needed a little beating, but there were some who were such angelic kids you wouldn't even think of speaking to them harshly, not to mention raising your hands on them. But they all got beaten too.

Anyway, I don't know how I got onto this subject. I was just gonna....ramble.

I think I'm in love. Or pretty close to it. Or not even close at all. Just obsessed. Well, just a little crazy at the moment. I don't know. I'm sick of trying to figure things out. Not just about love. Things in general. I am going to take things as they come. One day at a time.