Incident Of the Famous Man

"There are grammatical errors even in his silence." - Stanislaw J. Lec

I was in a club with my friends when somebody who I had never seen before in my life walked in. But the rest of the crowd in the club must've seen him before, because heads turned, mouths gaped, jaws dropped in awe, the waiters held their trays in mid-air and whispered among themselves. He took a table and sat, and visibly reveled in the gaping.

The waiters who usually fawn over us ignored us. And we had to wait an extra 10 minutes for everything we ordered, so I finally dragged one waiter to one dark corner, held a knife to his throat and menacingly whispered "Tell me who that rat is that is holding up my drinks? Speak now or forever hold your peace!" I gave him a sinister grin to drive the message home.

Well, I exaggerated. I didn't use a knife, it was a table fork. 'Famous Man's name' - He told me. I had never heard the name before in my life, inasmuchas I had never laid eyes on his wretched form before in my life.

"Who???"

He whispered the guy's name in awed reverence again. I waited for a bell. No ringing whatsoever. So I dug the fork in deeper and demanded him to tell me what or who or when or how exactly he was (something) :D

"He is 'X', world-famous cricketer!" he said. His lips slightly quivered in divine adoration. He looked back at me and I could see his thoughts blinking - "How could you not know, you stupid moron!!?" (I am withholding 'his' name as I am planning to write more things about him - not all very nice. But Cricket fans, nobles, and countrymen, not to worry. He is not from the Indian Cricket team).

Anyway, the thing about me and Cricket is that we have never met each other at all. I don't like it, I don't understand it. If you make me watch a match by myself, I will never know who won or who lost. I think it's a lame game with lame players with unsexy (lame) uniforms (No offense, that's just in my unworthy opinion, and I am no lover of sports in general). And I care nothing for cricket players, no matter how famous they may be. And nothing about the game or the players can penetrate my thick head enough to impress me.

However, one of my friends turned out to be a fan, so he sprang up, and happily skipped and hopped away and abandoned us to join Famous Man at his table, who surprisingly welcomed him with open arms and they were soon immersed in conversation. We also forgot about Famous Man, and went back to our girl talk.

It was when I was talking about the injustice of only important people getting bribed and not us who needs the money more that I suddenly felt a hand on my arm yanking me back and next thing I knew, I was standing at Famous Man's table, face to face, gushing friend introducing me to Famous Man and friend.

'Gentlemen, this is blogger. Blogger, this is Famous Man, have you heard of him before?" I wanted to strangle him right there and then, and to make matters worse, before I could even lie and just say yes, he asked "You watch Cricket? Cricket yada yada..so you know right? You watch Cricket right? right right right?"

I thought about lying, but I didn't want them to start quizzing me about Howzzat and One-days (?) I decided to just be true. So I told them no, I don't really watch cricket. But hello, nice to meet you - shook their hands. They were as stiff and awkward as little boys. Benign, blank, staring eyes, and could hardly get 'Hello' out of their mouths.

Famous Man joined us on the dance floor. He danced like he was blind, didn't make any acknowledgment that there were human beings around him. Not in a rude way. Just in a stupidly hopeless way. He acted like he doesn't hear, and out of the blue, when something in the conversation caught his fancy I suppose, he'd suddenly throw his head back and bray in a laughter, making you jump out of your skin - brays echoing round the room long after he'd stopped braying..laughing I mean.

Anyway, I rejoined the girls the moment I could. Everything was fine - until a little later in the night, and Famous Man probably had had too much to drink, he started puckering up his lips and cupped his hands around his mouth, and blew us kisses (puckered us kisses more like)! Like the way sleazy drunks on the roads do.

At that moment, I was very glad that I was not a Cricket fan, or that I was not a fan of Famous Man. Otherwise, the disappointment would have been too much to handle. I can't imagine Fabio Cannavaro or Michael Ballack to ever do something like that. That's why I like Soccer.

Anyway, this story, like every other should have a moral. So moral of the story is this: Go home and read Alice in Wonderland and forget about the world. We live in Wonderland, if we'd only just remind ourselves. Mean-assed rabbits and mad hatters and grinning Cheshire cats everywhere. But in the end, Wonderland is what we make it to be. And you can get rid of all those crazies with a breath. The trick is in knowing when to close your eyes.

And oh..watch soccer! Safer bet :-)

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