Warhead

http://www.radioblogclub.com/open/82983/warhead/UK_Subs_Warhead

Soldiers of Islam are loading their guns
They're getting ready
but the Russian tanks are mowing them down
They're getting ready
There's children in Africa with tommy guns
Getting ready
While the Islam armies are beckoning on
They're getting ready

[Chorus]
There's a burning sun
And it sets in the western world
But it rises in the east
And pretty soon
It's gonna burn your temples down

While the heads of state are having their fun
Are they ready?
We're looking at the world through the barrel of a gun
Are we ready?
And you stand there beating on your little war drum
Are you ready?
And it won't be long before your time has come
Are you ready?

[Repeat Chorus]

[Repeat Chorus]

Warhead, warhead, warhead
Warhead, warhead, warhead
Warhead, warhead, warhead
Warhead, warhead, warhead

Well I don't know what it is but i feel something coming
Stuck in the middle of the Yankees and the Russians
Better get moving guns are getting loaded
Fast to the border where the tanks are a rolling
There's a nation in fear another nation crying
One nation killing and another nation dying
Talk about guns and escalation bye bye planet let alone a nation.


Funny hearing this "Russian-tanks-in-Afghanistan" era song in our current context. Found this from "This is England".

life's a butterfly's flutter

all ur life u gather 'friends'. people u can talk to, or relate to. people u can unload with. the doomsday here would be the day when they decide tht they wana be completely hitched to someone u dunno. for better or for worse. that's for the future to unfurl. i'm just a drunken monkey doin his thing. well;.. alcohol, cannabinoids, et al make me lucid. but, life is so screwed up. u see ppl change like crazy. as in crazy crazy. u don't belong heah for sure. find some other place to hang out homie. maybe there's a parallel universe with ur kind of world around, even tho it might be in ur dreams alone. still that's a world. life with ur pals. life liven. not compromised. not on any given principle stated by any mofo. just a kingdom of sheer conscience. ppl u ve known most of ur life might be scornin / spurnin u. but u have passed the point of the caring abt their viewes. u might have transcended into an animal or something superior. i suspect that the animal is now in full control. a hyena in prowl for it's life force...

T51

Every morning I perform the same charade. The customary shave and other ablutions, followed by a half hearted trudge to the SRP Tools bus stop, through tree-less avenues made golden by the ascending sun. A crappy tea and a cigarette of some brand, are what I take from one of two tea stalls on the way, before I embark.

Every day I wait for her, to come in her full glory. She is a cool breeze in the brazen sun. She is a roaring lion who makes your heart melt. She is any bus which carries proudly the name tag of T51 Thiruvanmiyur-Tambaram. She comes in many shapes and sizes, and colors. I care not, as long as the soul within is the same. The soul of the T51. She is a whore, for she charges me different rates for riding her, when she dons different colors. At times, she is a deluxe bitch, at other times green and mean. Mostly she is over sized in the form of the vestibule bus. To see her sway, to see the hinged middle part, rotate left and right, is mind blowing. She knows belly dancing, for sure. But, I have seen her kind. She won’t even take a second glance at my kind. I’ve seen her ilk in various attires in different cities. The two KSRTCs, the BEST buses and PRTCs. And, T51’s other compadres in MTC, SETC and TNSRTC. Just a speck of dust on her path, am I. If I don’t watch out, she will raze me to death, and splatter my innards on the burning tar with her multiple running wheels. Maybe one day, I will offer myself to her.

Fire breathing dragon

I am the smoke breathing dragon,
I am that serpent on steroids.
I am the one who spreads the tobaccaroma.

My veins are brimming with vigour,
My brain is bursting with dopamine.
And my adrenal is tired pumping,
Gallon after gallon of epinephrine.

My roar is a half lunged rumble,
Yet I am more capable than most.
I can wreak havoc,
Or make the world a better place.

My days are numbered,
We are endangered, we dragons.
We used to roam free and smoke,
But, are now confined to minority smoking zones.

They say I cause the green house effect.
I have nothing against plants.
Plant them more I shall,
And all of them tobacco, since that be my food.

For thought, and for life.

She floats in chaos...And I love the way she floats.

She floats in chaos.
The world around her vibrates in crude ways,
And yet it bows its rude head, when she passes it by.
For, she floats in chaos.

Serenity emanates from her,
As she goes about attending to chores,
Lending kind ears to distressed souls.

She seems so fragile,
That the wind might claim her for its own.
Yet, she holds her ground,
For she is strong within.

Everyone has their own problems,
And she is no stranger to that.
Her sharp senses help her around,
Her intuition, her saviour.

It’s hard to believe that this floating lady,
Was once, a gangling little girl,
Only a few summers back.

I still remember her,
In pinafores and blue checks,
Fumbling around the school,
Afraid of the wind abducting her,
Any moment.

But she has come a long way,
In so few years,
And she has learnt to float.

To dance in peace,
With the bloom of youth upon her cheek,
In spite of the permeating chaos.

The little red rose has blossomed full,
In all its radiance, and honeydew fragrance.

The asylum seeker

Is it madness?
To be in love with a girl,
Who can never be mine.

Is it madness?
To be in love with a girl,
Who floats 339 kilometres away.

Is it a folly?
To be in love with a girl,
Who has given her heart to another.

Is it lunacy?
To try and share my meagre slice of life,
With some one whose life is so different.
So beautiful. So bitter. So different.

This madness cannot persist,
And has to be nipped at the bud.
Alas, that it happens to be my heart.
This lonely heart which can never taste your bliss.

Commit me to an asylum,
dear one.
Fit in me a straitjacket,
little one.

Grant me a place where I can do no harm,
In the deep recesses of your warm heart.

The kohl river

Expect nothing,
And give everything.
That’s what that some say about friends.

But, we are no friends, my love.
You can expect everything from me,
Anything that you would desire.

I want you to be happy,
I want to make you smile.
Make you so desperately happy,
That you may want to cry;
Yet, please shed no tears,
Not even out of joy…

Each tear you shed,
Unleashes oceans of murky fury,
And heavy misery in my heart.

Never shall I forgive myself,
For that little tear,
Which escaped your diamond eye prison,
And streamed down your soft cheek.

A rivulet of darkness,
Stained dark by your kohl.

L.O.L!

Beautiful mirage,
You are the life of the world.

As I crawled through the deserts,
In search of relief.

You revealed thy presence,
To my sand caked eyes.


You became my zahir.
My aim. My strife.

My life.
And hopefully, my wife!

The light at the end of my tunnel

He could hear the distant train of ugly life,
Growling its way through the depressive labyrinth.
And the reek of diesel, malaise and death,
Was nauseating.

A seraph from high above, shuddered,
And glided out of her Pantheon perch,
Floating on gossamer wings.

Hearing his silent cry,
Which had pierced the electronic clouds.

The pristine one had set out,
To help the distraught trainspotter,
Who was stuck between the rusty, brown rails.

He was blinded by her white light,
The shine of purity and selflessness,
Which caused his eyes to water.

He thought to himself,
Maybe angels do exist.

She had no reason to release the fool,
From the misery that he had created for himself.

Yet, she did. She did,
And that the made the difference.

The difference between madness and reason.
So clear, so beautiful, so pristine.

She soaked up his tears,
And blew them away to infinity.
He was spellbound;

For he was witnessing perfection.
The only being perfect,
On the face of the earth.

The unknown pain

There is pain within,
Within my husky thorax,
Somewhere beneath the heart,
Yet slightly above the tum.

What ails me,
I do not know.
It’s not misery,
It ain't real.

I am happy,
And content more or less.
I am lucky,
I make my luck.

Yet the agony hurts.
Hurts more,
Being an unknown hurt.
What’s ailing me, I know not.

It’s a murky feeling,
A mind borne one.
The body is fit,
Ready for battle.

Still the mind,
Treads dangerous paths.
Creating troubles anew,
In physical manifestation.

Is it the devil?
Since I am all idle.
Is it god?
Aham brahmasmi.

I enjoy waddling in this.
I am obligated.
There’s no other way.
But to endure, and enjoy.

The unknown pain.

Bubbly

I hear the sound of a military jet flying past in the night sky, as I sit here, wondering at the world, listening to 'The End'.

Desperately in need of a stranger's hand in a desperate land...

Wish the aircraft was a Pakistani ace on a kamikaze mission to nuke the city and blot me out. To melt me into the curvature of the earth.

A life lived ordinarily doing ordinary things is still extraordinary since nothing is really ordinary. There is too much complexity around. And chaotic beauty. The sounds of beetles and warplanes. Intermingled with the throbbing which arises from a beating brow, a thousand kilometres away.

And the dogs keep fornicating, for it is their season. The happy time of the year, for the dogs. Maybe every year is the year of the dog, or the rabbit, or the rat.

Surrounded by walking prats, I am a zombie in a ghost world. The scriptures are probably right. Unless you are cut from the world, unless all your obligations and pretenses are nullified, you will remain a part of this world, like it or not. And unfortunately, this world is your world for the moment. Sad, isn't it?

Walking around on manless hillsides somewhere in the south western corner of Andhra, it was a relief to scream 'Fuck you' aloud at the world. Call it escapism, or anything else which suits you. But it felt good.

It's hard to scream your heart out. Let out all the anguish, agony and frustration, in an animalistic scream. The primal cry. I envy the dogs now, for they bark, when they please. I can't. I am tied and constrained by man made rules. It is suffocating. It is nauseating.

I want to scream. I have to go to some goddamn shit hole where no man walks, and scream my heart out. To get those pairs of scissors, and cut all the strings which make me a puppet to the blood world.

Colbie's singing now.

The Unknown

How the hell do people exist? Or rather how the hell do they convince themselves to live?

Well. I think that when they run out of reasons, they try to get entwined in the world. Create more strings to be strung up with. Become obligated. All in the quest to feel...wanted?

Maybe. Still, if they go to a quiet place, and think about things again, they can always see through the fabric of life and become 'enlightened' or 'depressed' with the fact that their existence was inevitable, and probably no one could change the way things are, have been and going to be.

I cannot agree with that simply because there is no concrete proof to support this theory of your's. Still I have to concede that things do appear to be pre destined sometimes. The whole cause and effect thing.

Yeah. That's the shadow which follows us around. The feelings of pre destiny, and destiny. The feeling that nothing is really unpredictable.

Things appear to be chaotic and upredictable simply because of the assymetry of information. Since we don't know all the information about the factors which influence the weather, we call it unpredictable, and term it as a chaotic system!

Meks me cringe because of our ignorance.

Heck, rejoice man. For ignorance is bliss.

Nah. It's scary. The unknown is always scary.

Pearls before Swine

Estranged

Keeper of secrets,
Lend me your ears.
Brother I am your's,
And yet we are far.
Never shall we talk,
Because of what we are.

Thank you for the quote

It occurs out of the blue, those elusive moments of beautiful clarity.

“Until you lose your reputation, you never realize what a burden it was or what freedom really is.” - Margaret Mitchell.

I don't know who Margaret Mitchell is, or was. Sometimes, some of the quotes made by people so far away from you, in so many aspects, befit you perfectly. Thanks Marge.

Robert Mugabe - He must be disposed

How long will it take the world to take any action in Zimbabwe?

Or will it shrug and say T.I.A? If only there were oil deposits in Zimbabwe. At least, America would have swooped down and have 'liberated' the devastated citizens of Zimbabwe.

Please have a look in the net about what is happening in Zimbabwe. www.sokwanele.com People like you and me are being butchered alive. Tortured to death sometime, and left alive at other times.

Robert Mugabe must be disposed and destroyed.

I wish that my feeble cry would reach some powerful being's ears.

Meanderings

I have come to the temporary conclusion that my aim in life at this stage is to be aimless. Frantic had suggested to me that I could take count of the number of times I have been shifting places, and people ever since I left home in 2006.

6 apartments and 2 hotel rooms spanning two cities. 13 people. And of the 13, I have been sharing apartments with 2, twice, in the same city. Seeing the numbers on paper makes me feel dazed. It is not paper per se, but a glaring computer monitor. But, that is irrelevant here.

The last to leave was James. He is in a different country now, and I think he might rewrite its history in some way. Quite a capable human being by any measure.

This Sunday evening, as Roy was going out to Nungambakkam on his modified GF125, I hitched a ride with him, and he dropped me at the base of the middle of the Gemini flyover, or Anna flyover, if you prefer it that way. I felt like walking.

So I walked to T Nagar via GN Chetty road, and came up on the hotel in which we had been shacked up when we first landed in Chennai. Old memories, but no nostalgia. I continued my journey, and explored Mambalam a bit, before backtracking to Gemini.

From Gemini, I walked to the Marina beach, crossing the Music Academy junction on the way. This was again a place where I had stayed couple of years back. I am a stranger in these places. Then, and now.

All that walking has given me a sense of arrogance. I hope that I could, maybe walk from here to Mahabalipuram this weekend, for the heck of it. There is nothing much to do. So why not.

All this walking, has however caused an idea to enter my mind. Why not buy a dirt cheap second (or third or fourth..) hand motorbike, and use it for this meanderings, instead of wearing out my knees.

FLoating this idea around, I have met opposition from all quarters. About the uncertainty about how long I might be here, and of my accident track record. Most people who have rode with me, or have seen me ride would agree that I am a decent rider. That didn't stop me from having around 20 accidents in different cities. I guess I am a bit less fortunate in that department. Still, nothing major, nothing fatal. Just a lot of near misses.

I guess, I would rather walk, and use public transport, and make Al Gore happy.

Hmm

Feeling more out of place than ever. I don't mind being led, but I don't like being manipulated against my will, even if it is for a greater purpose. This year hasn't been too good to me so far. So many things have gone wrong. I am becoming a loner, trying to seek solace in my shell. Three people have spit on me so far this year. And today, another has puked on me.

Patience was a virtue I could have boasted of. No longer so, alas. Small things irritate me, still my wafer thin tolerance keep me sane enough. What kind of days are these... I am not going to try to make sense of this.

Just another goddam Wednesday

Today was one of the freakiest days in May.

Let me begin by getting into the scene where I get out of my house. I had just got inside the parked car and started it, when a lady came knocking on the window, yelling something. On rolling down the window, I understood that she was yelling 'Naaayu', at me. That means dog in Tamil.

Not knowing much of Tamil, I was sitting there with an amused look on my face, wondering why in the hell is this woman calling me a dog. Slowly I understood that what she was trying to say was that there's a darn dog beneath the car!

So I got out of the car and took a peep underneath, and found a skeleton-like black dog, with froth on its face. It didn't look like a rabid dog, so I tried yelling at it, and poked it with a stick. The darn thing just would not move. Even on revving the car, or hooting the horn. Ah..what a wonderful start to the day.

I headed back inside and got my room mates out. On realizing that the dog was pretty stubborn, Roy gave a marvellous whacking to the dog, and the critter yelped and ran away. As it ran away, I noticed that its tail would look more apt on a mouse than a dog.

I try to read the signs that fate gives these days. Call me superstitious! So I was expecting the worst to happen today as I set out for office. By mid day, I was supposed to take Aaron to Thiruvanmiyur railway station, from where he could catch a metro train and go to the Chennai Central railway station, where he had a train scheduled to depart at 1600 hours headed for Trivandrum.

I got out of the office at around 1400 hours, but he was caught up in some work and we were able to reach Thiruvanmiyur only by around 1500 hours. I dropped him there and came back to the office, and was slowly settling into my seat when he called up. I looked at the time in the computer, and saw that it was almost 1530. The metro train hadn't showed up there so far apparently! This was going to be a close call.

It takes around half an hour to travel to Central from this station. A train came to the station while we were talking. I wished him all the best, and resigned myself to fate. Around 1630 hours, I rang him up to see what had happened, and was so damn happy to hear that he had caught the train, albeit in cinema style! When he reached the platform lugging two heavy bags, he saw that the train was moving already.

Somehow he ran up, threw the bags in and jumped in..to the Ladies compartment. Well at least he got in the train. Whew.

The task for the evening was to go to Kilpauk to collect a T-shirt that we had custom made for Fox. I started at around 1800 hours, went to Navalur and picked JK up. From there till Kilpauk it was hell of a drive. More of a hell than a drive, rather. The traffic was so bad that it took us 2 hours to get there. I was exhausted.

After collecting the T-shirt, I handed the keys over to JK and decided to relax on the way back. Unfortunately, I am a pretty bad backseat driver. We were caught by the police for jumping the signal in front of the Chennai Central railway station on the way back. It was unintentional. The damn thing goes from green to red just like that. I don't think there were any yellow lights present in that signal post.

To compound things JK hadn't taken his license with him. Somehow he cooked up a story saying that I was ill, and that's why he had to drive at short notice, without a license. The cop wanted money. He opened his wallet and found only a Rs 500 banknote, much to his chagrin. On seeing that the cop wanted 550 bucks. Finally since we didn't have change, we escaped from there with Rs 600 less. The cop had become really amiable after that.

We had some pretty close misses on the way back. Thankfully nothing happened. Finally we reached our usual hotel, and found that the damn thing was closed! Somehow managed to reach home in one piece without too much damage....!

The ghost in my shell

Many a time in my life, have I been mesmerized by certain motion pictures. Their celluloid realities could convey to me embedded messages which hinted at the meanings of life. Among such films, 'Waking Life', had a profound effect on me, my thoughts, and my perspective. I had watched this one a long time ago, in a city far, far away...

I had been waiting for a long time for a movie which would leave me spellbound again, and rearrange my visions. In the month of May 2008, I happened to come across another movie which changed my perspective.

Ghost in the Shell (aka Kôkaku kidôtai) (1995)


The core of the storyline is comparable to the paradox of the ship of Theseus.

"The Ship of Theseus, also known as the Theseus' paradox, is a paradox which raises the question of whether an object which has had all its component parts replaced remains fundamentally the same object." - From Ship of Theseus.

The object is a human being in 'The Ghost in the Shell'. Major Motoko Kusanagi is a cyborg, whose body has been enhanced through cybernetic implants, to such an extent that there is very little which can be said to be her own, in her body. Her shell has been replaced, and her life force or the ghost, residing in the shell, is what defines her existence, and makes the shell to be Major Kusanagi.

Every day, cells in our bodies are destroyed, and regenerated. I am told that there is nothing left in our bodies which was originally present when we were born. Still we do remain the same. The same ghosts reside inside our shells.

The ghost seems to be an entity which is beyond destruction and regeneration in the normal course of the growth of the body. Rather, it seems to grow its footprint by taking in the experiences it gleans while being in the shell. What exactly defines the ghost? Is it the brain? It might well be the brain, as once the brain is separated from the shell, the shell seems to lose life. I guess that the ghost gives life to the shell.

The shell doesn't really need to be entirely organic in its makeup. We do have walking examples among us, of people with pacemakers, artificial organs and prosthetics, who still essentially retain the core of their being. That is, they do not cease to exist as the entities they were, prior to the implants.

If the process is continued to such an extent that every part of the body is replaced by something artificial, while still maintaining the being as such, would mean that, that being has gained immortality in a way. As the shell degrades or becomes obsolete, the ghost could be transferred into a more able shell.

I could draw parallels to this with religion. About the soul, and how it is caught in the cycle of birth and rebirth, until it is liberated. A question which I have is, if the ghost is transferred into new shells via material powers, then what is the role of God in that? The cycle of birth and rebirth could one day, become something which is controlled by humans, or cyborgs.

Does the cycle of birth and rebirth in the Gita actually refer to the multiple times when the entire body is replaced by new cells as part of the body's growth? Is death really nirvana, while we are being reborn every instant a cell dies, assuming that the cell is the smallest entity of life?

So many questions. At a point in the movie, the Major tells Batou that she has been modified so much, that she doesn't know whether her ghost itself is real. I do not know how to end this post.

Blind Willow Sleeping Woman

Everyone but me has been reading through this one. Wonder when shall I find the inclination to savour it..

The ugly rut

Being in a rut once more, has begun to take its toll on me. Every morning I refuse to wake up. I force myself not to hear the screeching alarm emitted by my phone. My room mates say that it wakes up everyone except its intended victim. Waking up at 1030 in the morning in a city as warm as Chennai, is one thing. But the realization that you have to trudge one kilometer in the searing heat to reach the metro bus stop at SRP Tools, and then take the crowded T51 Thiruvanmiyur-Tambaram bus to Sholinganallur, is not exactly a pleasant one. Its downright depressing. So much so that I usually end up not going to the office. At this rate, I guess I should be readying myself for the surprise call from the HRs requesting me to sign my own resignation, or be dishonourably discharged, if I may use that phrase.

I have to go have dinner tonight. Watch a movie or two maybe. Play Dota. Sleep. Then again it is the same hot summer day tomorrow. I hope that some winds of change decide to blow my way one of these days, and lift me from this state of nothingness.

tag

took this tag from niki-chan.

1. Where were you THREE hours ago? --- home.

2. What SHOULD you be doing right now? --- sleeping

3. Are you wearing SOCKS right now? -- nope


4. When was the last time you went out of STATE? ---- may 1

5. Have you been to the M0VIES in the last 5 days? ----nope

6. What did you see? ........ pass

7. What was the last thing you had to drink? .....rum

8. What are you wearing right now? --- trousers

9. What was your last purchase? ---- sausages, cheese, bread, tomatoes and onions

10. Last food you ate? ---- the McRoyal ( created by me and my room mate James)

11. Who was the last person you talked to on the phone? ---- mom

12. Have you bought any clothing items in the last week? ---- yep! some shirts and jeans

13. Do you have a pet? ---- not right now. have 4 cats @ my home.

14. What did you do last night? ---- played drunken dota

16. If you could be anywhere you want where would it be? ---- varkala papanasham beach

17. What is the last thing you purchased online? --- railway ticket to trivandrum

18. One thing you like about yourself? ---- the energizer bunny kinda walking ability

19. What's your favorite soup? ---- anything goes..

20. Do you miss anyone? ---- not really

21. Last movie you saw? ---- Ghost in the Shell

22. What are your plans for the day? ---- i guess there are some plans afoot for prince caspian.

23. Did you have fun today? ---- overdose

24. Who is your last text message from? ---- magneta

25. Were you an honor roll student in school? ---- what was that again :-/

26. What do you know about the future? ---- tomorrow is another day.

27. Who was the last person you rode in a car with? ---- james and fox

29. Do you have a tan? ---- tanned? i am fried by the damn chennai sun.

30. How old do you want to be when you have kids ---- dead

31. Did you meet anyone new today? ---- nope

32. Do you have any tattoos or piercings? ---- nope. gona get a tattoo

33. How do you like your soda? ---- with salt and lemon juice

34. Do you like hot sauce? ---- never had the chance

35. What are you doing tomorrow? ---- going for a movie

36. What day is tomorrow? ---- sunday may 18th

37. What is your current mood? ---- dazed

38. Why? ---- got messages from someone

39. What did you do today? ---- already answered this question.

40. What is your favorite class? ---- english

41. If you could be on a TV show, which one would it be? ---- whose line is it anyway

42. Why? ---- so i can laugh to death

43. Have you ever watched a movie and just "had" to do what they did? ---- i tried to bend spoons like the bald kids in the matrix

44. Do you have a "face" you make in the mirror? ---- too too many!

45. Ever use someone else's toothbrush? ---- not so far

46. Do you like/love the person you got this survey from? ---- yes she is awesome :)

47. Can you whistle? ---- kinda

48. Can you wiggle your ears? ---- yep!

49. You have a song that comes on that you just "have" to turn up and sing to? ---- of course. diabolo menthe

50. Who are you thinking about ? ---- nothing..sad to have nothing to think of :(

1. Where were you at 1am friday morning? ---- at home fiddling with a computer

2. Were you happy when you woke up today? ---- yes and no

3. What are you doing tomorrow? ---- how many times do i answer this!

4. How's your heart lately? ---- vigorous

5. Do you think you will be in a relationship three months from now? --- i don't wana be in one anytime soon.

6. What are you listening to? ---- fan

8. Do you need to say anything to anyone? ---- thanks for reading this silly tag! :-D

9. What were you doing at 7am? ---- sleeping like a baby

11. Do you trust easily? ---- yep..my biggest vice

12. When was the last time you were given roses? ---- i guess feb

13. Do you drink tea? ---- i am an addict. more than 5 times a day.

14. Do you wet the toothbrush before or after the ---- before, maybe....

15. Do you watch the news daily?? ..... nope. i am a stranger to this world

16. What's the closest pink thing to you?? ---- a cough syrup called chericof

17. Have you ever kissed someone with braces? ---- nope

18. How many pillows on your bed? ---- 5 (just one is mine!)

Déjà vu

The warm summer wind was caressing me as I walked along the shadowless footpath, making my way to the usual haunt. The heat sapped me, made me lose my bearings. Yet, I survived the day and made it back to my abode, only to be shattered by a vile fever. It was deja vu. Wired up with a tube, the hospital room my companion. I was in a different hospital in a different city one year back. Similar conditions. Felt pretty bad. Got discharged yesterday. Found myself too weak to go in today. Went and bought a copy of the gita translated by an Englishman. The only other translation available seemed pretty bulky to me. Maybe I should start reading this for some inspiration.

Deadly secrets tag

Well... I am bored. I am sober and bored. So I have lifted this tag rather unceremoniously from E-company. La!


1. LAST MOVIE YOU SAW IN A THEATER: 10000 BC... Went with two sober guys and two drunks. Was fun. Especially when the black tribe chief tells the hero - Hello p***amone! (It sounded just like that!)

2. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING? 'Blind Willow. Sleeping Woman' by Haruki Murakami, my new idol.

3. FAVORITE BOARD GAME? Carroms?

4. FAVORITE MAGAZINE? Business Standard Motoring... Haven't been keeping up lately. Bah.

5. FAVORITE SMELLS? Well. Petrol and women's perfumes.

6. FAVORITE SOUND? Diabolo menthe!

7. WORST FEELING IN THE WORLD? The despair of existence when there is nothing left to occupy myself with.

8. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU THINK OF WHEN YOU WAKE? Is this a dream? Fuck, what's the time..!

9. FAVORITE FAST FOOD PLACE? Fountain Plaza, Fountain Jn, CST.

10. FUTURE CHILD'S NAME? Z. (Zee or Zed as the case may be)

11. FINISH THIS STATEMENT. "IF I HAD A LOT OF MONEY I'D...? give it away.

12. DO YOU DRIVE FAST? Yup. No apologies since I haven't rammed anyone so far.

13. DO YOU SLEEP WITH A STUFFED ANIMAL? No!

14. STORMS-COOL OR SCARY? Hate 'em. Bad memories get triggered by 'em.

15. WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST CAR? Fiat 1100

16. FAVORITE DRINK? Cannon 10000. Too bad I quit. Miss ya.

17. FINISH THIS STATEMENT, "IF I HAD THE TIME I WOULD ..... be asleep.

18. DO YOU EAT THE STEMS ON BROCCOLI? Never tried it, at least consciously.

19. IF YOU COULD DYE YOUR HAIR ANY COLOR, WHAT WOULD BE YOUR CHOICE? White.

20. NAME ALL THE DIFFERENT CITIES/TOWNS YOU HAVE LIVED IN. Trivandrum, Chennai, Mumbai.

21. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH? Formula One.

22. ONE NICE THING ABOUT THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU. bE whaT yoU wannA bE... dO whaT yoU wannA dO...

23. WHAT'S UNDER YOUR BED? An ant colony.

24. WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE BORN AS YOURSELF AGAIN? I can't even handle this stint..No, thanks.

25. MORNING PERSON, OR NIGHT OWL? Night owl.

26. OVER EASY, OR SUNNY SIDE UP? Sunny side up.

27. FAVORITE PLACE TO RELAX? On the beach. Shangumughom or Valiyathura or Vettukadu or Kovalam or Marina or Elliot's or Marina or Juhu or Chowpatty. Just love 'em beaches. Coming to think of it, I have always lived in seaside towns.

28. FAVORITE PIE? American Pie 1 - 5

29. FAVORITE ICE CREAM FLAVOR? I don’t like ice creams.

30. OF ALL THE PEOPLE YOU TAGGED THIS TO, WHO'S MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND FIRST? Not taggin anyone. It's open source now! Have fun!

Leashed

Life hasn't been kind. And I haven't been living either. In this losing battle, have I decided to throw the bloodstained yellow towel in, and call a truce with the ephemeral.

He stands in front of me, translucent and white. He has the power to invoke heaven's storm bolts down on to my sun stained head. For, he is malicious. For quite a while it has been a brute's game of chess, with him making all the crafty moves. And I like the naive I am, have I stood fast and took all that he could throw at me, begging for some more, yet breaking down too often too, alas.

It's too hard fighting life. The best course which has appeared to me is to give into this white force. Let it lead me to wherever it wants me to go. I am no magus. Yet I can be led on, like a beast on a leash. Willing to be dragged on, because it has no real will of its own.

god.. i am not sober. you know that i try my best to keep sane. keep me in workin condition plz.

Stupid prose

For how long will this flawed shell bear my soul?
There is little left functioning in the remnants –
What’s left has a hard constitution.
Always trying to keep breathing till the last.
To live and survive, even though steeped in misery,
Why?

The beard of bad luck

A long time ago, when I was recovering from an illness, I decided that I should change my looks. My friends in Bombay hadn’t seen me for around three months then. And on one fine day, I show up at the apartment and elicited some strange responses thanks to the new look. At the office, my manager didn’t recognize me. Once he found out, he wrinkled his nose and said – problem kya hai yaar?

In a matter of hours, I get the transfer orders to relocate back to Madras for another assignment there. In less than a day’s time, I am in Madras, reunited with old faces. Faces from college days, and some drunken parties. A couple of days went by, and things were far from rosy, on all fronts. Then I happened to meet this friend of mine who happened to be my new neighbor. She said that everyone gets sick in Chennai..So beware! Oh really? I haven’t been sick of food in years. I don’t think that Chennai can do me any harm. Ha!

Hardly had I said these words, when I started feeling a bit light-headed. While I was darting away to my new dwelling place, I had the puke of a lifetime. Shit. Ruined the front gate of a beautiful villa with blood red watermelon puke. Somehow kept on riding the bike, reached home and crashed. I could remember her asking me to get rid of the goat-like goatee beard I had cultivated on my chin. Something on the lines that my luck will be rotten till I shaved it off. Respecting the signs that nature had given me, I shaved off the damn thing that very night.

Unbelievably fortunes changed, for the better. Fast forward to the future. Things have not been exactly rosy. But things are within control, although out of control at times. I decide to take a chance and grow a beard again. A day’s growth, and already things are getting fucked up. People from the residents’ association back home, apparently went to my mother’s place and threatened her saying that they will knock down the compound walls. I just don’t get it. How the hell can bad luck spread across thousands of kilometers. And yeah, I have been making a lot of people’s lives living hell for quite some time.

History repeats itself they say. March has always been a month of acute people problems for me, historically. An year ago, at this point of time, I remember being propped up on a lousy hospital bed, with wires running out of my hands, hardly able to move around on my own, without blacking out. Those days, I used to wonder about death, and how long had I left to breathe. Hell, I am still breathing. Wondering whether to keep taunting fate with my rebel beard, or to pay obeisance to it and shave it off. I better.

Survive

The primary instinct of man is survival. The other instinct that I have is to make life bearable till it inevitably ends. These two have been in conflict lately. The second instinct has emerged as the winner most of the times. And every time that happens, the survival instinct causes dark cirrhotic thoughts to whirl like prophetic dervishes inside my haemorrhaging(symbolic, so far) head. Alas, I never learn from experience. The point being that there is no point in gaining experience.

Can you tell me who´ll still care

I listened to this song some ten years back on a dirty cream-colored Fairmate stereo cassette player which had a raspy undertone to its output. All I knew was that the band's name was Hanson, and the tune settled down somewhere in the dusty nooks of my memories. Sad memories. It has been almost four years since the person who owned the player and I have talked to each other.


Very recently I happened to come across the song again, and of course, it triggered the awakening of a lot of allied memories. The lyrics now appeal to me asking for an answer to a fundamental question which we all face. And I had thought that this was just a hum-by song.

You have so many relationships in this life,
But only one or two will last.
You go through all the pain and strife,
Then you turn your back and they're gone so fast.

Oh yeah. And They're gone so fast. yeah

Oh, so hold on to the ones who really care,
In the end they'll be the only ones there.
When you get old and start losing your hair,
Can you tell me who will still care?

Quotable quotes

A long time ago, I had written a note to myself -

'Move on. move on, wherever you are.'

Of course, I am not an original when it comes to quotes. I had made a mashup from Lestat's dialogue from The Queen of the Damned.


Lifestyle Journalist: Do you have anything you want to say to the other vampires listening out there?
Lestat: As a matter of fact, I do. Come out, come out, wherever you are.

Looks like I gota relearn the art of moving on from the groove that I have carved for myself.

And yeah, saw yet another accident at OMR today.

The solution for India's population problem

Building more roads like Old Mahabalipuram Road is the solution to India's population problem.

Saw yet another accident on the way back from office. This time a car which mistimed its brakes and rammed itself up a truck's ass.

A different experience

I had gone with James and JK to check out 'We own the night', at Sathyam Cinemas, Chennai.

They had a pleasant surprise in store for me. They played the National Anthem prior to the movie.

Almost got choked up with nostalgic memories from Mumbai. I remember every theater I've been to, in that city, always kick starts things with the anthem. Everyone would stand up and be sombre as the National Anthem played on. It would be a moment of comradeship for the people who had gathered there from different nooks of the country. It gave me hope, gave me the feeling that I wasn't a stranger in this land.

I hope that Sathyam doesn't discontinue this practice. The anthem has the power to sweep away differences, regional or religious, and unite all under the common banner of our country.

Lady in the Water

This is one movie that the critics have butchered. What you see below are the comments from some top critics at RottenTomatoes.

Victoria Alexander:
Its official now. The Sixth Sense was a fluke. Shyamalan pompously gives himself the role of 'The Intellectual Future Christ.'

Angela Baldassarre:
The saddest thing about "Lady in the Water" is that it's more than just a bad movie. It's a career-destroying act of vanity by its director

Boo Allen:
Embarrassing. Stupid. Incomprehensible. A mess. Absurd. Fake.

Ethan Alter:
It's finally happened--M. Night Shyamalan has lost his damn fool mind.

I haven't liked Shyamalan's movies very much. I watched Sixth Sense with anticipation and was disappointed. Unbreakable was bearable. The Village was not even bearable.

With such a track record between us, I didn't have the inclination to check out the lady at all. Today, I was so jobless that I did dare to give it a try.

It is a decent fantasy movie. It has its faults. But it is an eminently watchable movie, which does not deserve the trouncing it has received from the critics. Poor guy. Good movie. I have lost my faith in the critics. Buggers.

Clock's running

In olden days, we(guys of my generation) used to go for movies without looking them up on the IMDB or searching for their reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. These days, we hardly do venture out for a movie before finding out what its all about. JK thinks it's a sign that we have moved past our youth. It took a minute to digest. But it kinda does make sense.

There is no longer that whiff of adventure, as one ventures out to new pastures. It's more like panting and grunting to get to the next place or happening, before our breath runs out. Though I don't realize it too often, there is this deeply set notion that every hour counts, since that implies that I have one less hour to live. Ought to make some use of it.

Yet, it seems to be perfectly alright to laze away time. It doesn't feel good to have a ticker counting backwards within your chest, as you take each breath of fresh air or nicotine.

Walking on heaven's edge

I know that I shouldn't be doing this. This would only accelerate my degradation. Still I am at it. Why do I have this gift of finding drinking partners out of vaccuum?

Wonder how long I have left. How long till the next liver related hospital stint. Unbelievable.

The somersault to apathy

20th February 2008, around 2200 hours -

We were on our way back from office in the designated cab for the day, cruising along the recently buffed up Old Mahabalipuram Road when a two wheeler crossed the road, cutting across our vehicle.

He managed to cross the cab alright, but another biker on an Enfield Bullet, who was on the left lane, hit him head on. I watched them somersault like ballet dancers in slow motion from the insulated environment of the cab. One of them didn't have his helmet strapped on. It flew across the road and landed in front of our cab. The cab dragged the helmet along with it for a while.

I was frozen in time. I could hear my colleagues urge the driver to move on, as it was already late. Also there was the risk that the bystanders would come to the wrong conclusion that the cab was the culprit.

As the cab moved on, the picture I had in mind, was that of me in either of the stricken bikers' positions. Not a single soul to care for whether they were dead or alive. The main aim was to escape from the site of the accident so that we could reach home fast. Shit. And I didn't do a thing.

The regional language & the honcho

Working in a place where people from different corners of the world converge, becomes a pain when certain individuals just don't get the fact that their mother tongue can be offensive when applied at the wrong moments.

There was this Algerian honcho who had flown down for a visit today, and everyone was cracking jokes and passing comments in the dominant regional language, righty there in front of him. Well meaning comments, of course. It's an office after all.

If I were in a land where the people spoke a language I didn't understand, and they started talking in their language, I would think that they are speaking about something which I am not supposed to understand. And they are doing it in front of me, kinda to make me feel right at 'home'. The honcho, however, appeared to take it in its stride and he made everyone feel well and comfy! I guess that's why he is the honcho, and the others are the...others!

Finally

Recently I have been behaving as if I am 6 feet under. I guess the reason was that I didn't really know what to do with life. I just wanted to survive. Of late, it has become rather a bore, so I have set sights on reuniting with my friend of twenty years - Greenhorn aka Kickassso, at some academic campus, and hopefully this should drive us on towards something. At least a couple of years of awesomeness reborn!

Becoming civilized!

The days were looking rather bleak as 2008 rumbled on. I was tired of all the bad luck that I seem to be magnetically stuck with. Hence came the decision to check out something different every week. Couple of weeks back, it started with a play 'The Art' by Evam, which aroused my curiosity, if I may say, like Rochester, from 'The Libertine'. Felt that real people can be more profound that mere images.

Yesterday, I and Divya had a chance to check out 'The EarthSync Festival', in which Incognito was one of the main vocalists. It was a melange of unbelievably diverse musical styles. It was beautiful! Classical Indian from Incognito, Sufi music from three great old men, two Buddhist monks chanting mystic lines, a jugalbandhi with the flautist pitted against the violinist, Makudam players who operated in a trance. Not to mention two beautiful dancers whose motion was poetry. And awesome tunes too. The Laya project seems to be getting better and better!

Unaware of life

I have found a defect which seems to be inherent in my mental make up. I live through life on auto pilot! I never give any conscious thought to most activities that I perform.

The downside is that I never remember if I did something...or not! There is no surety in my memories.

Two days back when I had reached office, I suddenly had this thought that I hadn't turned the power off for the iron box. I borrowed my friend's car and hurried back home to find that nothing was amiss.

His take is that one should be aware of what one is doing so that one at least knows what he is doing when trying to recollect something at a later point in time. Well. I agree. I should try to live consciously.

A lifetime of underachievements

I have always been termed as an underachiever. Or rather, have always been one. I never found any reason to achieve any more than the bare minimum which I perceived as needed for my acceptable survival. Why do I get the feeling that something is lacking.. Where do people find drives..

Unrest

There is this guy at the office,a manager who has absolutely no clue what he is doing, let alone what others are doing. His job is to keep cracking worn out jokes and laugh at them himself. His job also includes telling anyone who is willing to make a show of listening to him - old war stories from his previous projects. All of these stories are strung out of keywords which are in relevance in the industry which I currently am pitted in. Maybe this is why Dilbert's boss is who he is.

The Ox Cart

These days, there has been a recurring motif in all my dreams. A rickety cart drawn by a black and white mottled cow, making its way through black, muddy ruts, threatening to tip over every second. I would be observing the cart's unbalanced journey from a point very close to the ground. I would see the bobbing silhouette coming from the distance, shiver as it moved towards me, and finally be left puzzled on seeing the two sets of udders that the cow had, when it had passed me.

There is a certain modus operandi which can be observed when I search for pictures to illustrate my prose. I search for the picture I have in my mind (it could be say, yeti or crazy), in the Images section of Google. The first three pages of results would often suffice to satisfy my spartan needs. Today I searched for ox cart, and I happened to chance upon an ancient Van Gogh painting of the same name. It was almost a perfect match of my dream cow. The same dark settings, the same cart, the same colour of leather on the cow. I guess I might have seen the photograph of this picture sometime earlier in my life, and somehow it has been brought back to life, in my dreams, due to some wild reason. Unbelievable.

Lost

I have lost the ability to craft meaning from words. There no longer exists any magic while connecting words together to make sensible statements. Language has deserted me. And why shouldn't it? Rusting unburnish'd had seemed to be a sin to Ullyses. Here I am unburnish'd and rusted, tipping the scales closer to the 'Rot' mark. Things have changed a lot in so short a span. I once remember the Fox telling me about a movie (or was that a story?) where a man lives his life in reverse chronology. He would unlearn all that he had learnt, and become a day younger every day he woke up to see the sun shining on his face. I am growing old. And at a pace which I didn't foresee. And as the days roll on, my body is becoming weaker, and my mind is becoming duller. Four years ago, I was a better man. I feel ravaged by the elements today. Hardly can I contend 'me' from the past in any field of contest. Those closest to me still linger on, like the dried up petals of the rose, or rather the faithful bumble bees who wait to see if the curling flower somehow revives and relives its halcyon days, although the rot has visibly set in. Surrounded by faces which find it difficult to reconcile with the changes happening to their familiar one, I feel kindred to Kafka's Samsa when his transformation was complete. I no longer live all the time. I relive it most of the time. Every second, some action or vague symbol would spark in the recesses of my memories nostalgic thoughts. I live in the present past. Its heart rending always, to know that everything you do, has already been done, by you. There is no force better, to amplify the sense of rot that is seated deep in the core of your being.

I am part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherthrough
Gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades
Forever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make and end,
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!


From Tennyson's Ullyses..

So many dreams. So many pipes. So many pipe dreams. So many people. So few left. So much pain. So much life. So much disease. So much love. So much indifference. So much cluelessness.

One year wasted.

One year to waste.

How many more years.