thinking it through...

Watched a very interesting movie yesterday - The 11th Hour. watch it whenever you get the chance. Informative, eye-opening - and very, very scary.

It got me thinking - let's look at the future, logically.
The Earth's ecosystems are collapsing under the pressure of human civilization. We use too many resources, generate too much waste. We do this because our culture has a built-in greed; a desire to have more things. We don't treat clean air, genetic health, fresh water, and a future as things. So, we have our cars, houses, entertainment, possessions, and desires that come at their expense. It doesn't affect us - yet.

Take this to it's logical conclusion.
The first world -
Will we, as individuals, choose a slower, less versatile, and more expensive car because it's electric? Eat premium, organic foods? Probably. Will large corporations do the same?
The developing nations -
No. They aspire to the first world. Making all the same mistakes, but at a scale several hundred times greater because of the populations.

The Earth will continue to warm. Ice caps will melt, forests will vanish, weather systems will collapse.
Flooding. Famines. Natural disasters. Plagues.
Huge losses of life.
Desertification.
Markets for the first world literally die, or slide into such a wretched condition they are no longer viable. Companies collapse.
Food supplies - and natural resource supplies - dry up.
Economic systems collapse in the first world.
As resources get more scarce, large scale wars will erupt over those few remaining resources. The first world will inevitably win, because they have greater technology. The third world will continue to subsist in unwanted areas until they die.
But the Earth doesn't differentiate on economic parameters. Living conditions will worsen equally everywhere. Developed countries may use tech to stave off the worst of it for a while - but that's expensive. Resources will continue to shrink to the point that wars will come to the developed countries. And plagues. And failing health - sterility. Drastic population decline. Coupled with a collapse in Law & Order. Anarchy.

Regression to self-sustaining systems. When large-scale systems fail, in an anarchic system, it's very difficult to rebuild them. But self-sustaining systems - unless seeded and very, very well-prepared - don't really use very high-end tech, or don't need it. A large global one must be technologically developed. A self-contained community need not be.

But even after a complete collapse of large scale systems, the Earth won't heal so fast. A couple of centuries, possibly millenia. Will unused tech be remembered until then?

This is, of course, assuming that life-sustaining conditions can survive. If the average temperature rises to over 250 degrees C, there's not much tech can do, in a failed economic system.

Space habitats? Unlikely. On Earth? Maybe. Sealed communities. Generation ships in the desert. Working on history's second terraforming project, trying to undo the inadvertent first.

And yes - 90% of all existing life on Earth will die. I really don't see any way that can be averted.

The Drake Equation states - mathematically - that intelligent life will arise, again and again, in the universe. Observed evidence shows there isn't. So there's some factor missing - either intelligent life doesn't arise so easily, or dies very easily. And I guess we can see why.

And as they said - this is our finest hour. We know we can beat this, solve the ecological crisis, develop spacefaring ability, and go out there. And find thousands of dead or barbaric civilizations, who couldn't do what we did.
It can be our destiny to be Gods. And if we succeed - but that's another story.

Read this. It's awesome.
Rare Earth Hypothesis
The Drake Equation
The Fermi Paradox

listlessness

'what's up,' they ask

somebody was biking through snow and hail
somebody was taking pictures
somebody was upgrading
writing
playing
traveling
chains and hooks, and a huge rusty weight on the other end
pinned like a butterfly on the board
dust settling, slowly, gently, and always
sick
tired
exhausted
i miss the crystal air
wings wheeling across a blazing, cool sky
stars come out

heaviness constant
dead zone
stagnant silence

'chal raha hai,' i tell them

Vote for the Vogons

Adsense used to come up with howlers pretty easily, since the only real reason to display an ad was whether someone's talking about the subject, rather than listening to what they're saying.
With SEM, the bar has just jumped a notch higher.

So as of today, the top 3 contenders for your vote (in the digital space) stand before you arrayed thus -



Am I the only one who is actually reassured?

Playing God

This was a completely random post, inspired by a friend's status update.

Why did God place the Tree of Knowledge in such an easily accessible place? Why does He make it so easy for humanity to face temptation? Why does He, to put it bluntly, screw around with our heads with the whole issue of 'Does God Exist?'
The whole concept of Faith - believing in something greater than ourselves, moral codes, denying our natural instincts - raises some pretty deep questions. Foremost among which is that if He really existed, wouldn't it have been all too easy for him to completely and unequivocally answer all these issues once and for all? Why does He screw around with our heads?

I think there are 2 answers.

• The sociological answer: God does not exist. We created an anthromorphic personification of the needs of society, some rules to make sure society can survive, with guilt and fear as the stick and life beyond death and paradise as the carrot.
  
• The gaming answer: God does exist. He created the universe as a gaming map, laws of nature as game rules, and intelligence as a collective AI. He then created scenarios that unfold according to those rules, just to see what happens.
  Think about it. Ever played Red Alert? Or any RTS war game? Scenarios, rules, behaviors, certain responses to certain stimuli. Get too close to an enemy soldier, and he will shoot at you. Built-in speeds and firepower. Objectives and goals. But the fun comes from the randomness created when large numbers of these rules interact with each other. When you do a tank rush, are you really controlling each unit? No. You've just unleashed them. You can send a spy into an enemy base, but even though you have the power to make him invulnerable, and the enemy deaf, blind, dumb, and weak as kittens, would you do it? It takes all the fun out of the game.
  When a game protagonist plays with cheatcodes, he knows that God exists. God is stopping the bullets, letting him fly, achieving superhuman feats, untouched by fire, falls, teeth and claws. But is the gamer having fun? No. Fun comes with the unexpected. With setbacks. With risk. When you have something to lose, you feel that you have everything to gain. Winning is a rush. When nothing can kill you, you're just a rat wandering through an empty maze.
  

Maybe there were super-civilizations, masters of the Earth and all creation, intelligent, aware, kind, caring, responsible, in harmony with nature and with each other. Enlightened, perfect, and utterly, butterly boring. What more is left to achieve? A perfect civilization will never go beyond it's city, it's kingdom, it's planet at the most. Even planet is unlikely; they will be smart enough to control birthrate, eradicate threats, handle all contingencies. A civilization under constant threat of destruction fights, struggles, spreads, creates backup plans, fallbacks, contingency bases. DNA spreads. Launches generation starships, sets up lunar bases and buried bunkers with hibernating colonists. Reaches for the stars because the planet is on the edge, reaches across galaxies in the face of all-destroying interstellar war, slips into parallel dimensions when the fabric of this reality is likely to be torn.
Perfection is stable. Imperfection, combined with intelligence, explodes like a bomb across creation.
Sweden, with social security, order, sufficiency, and all amenities and comforts has a negative birthrate, because people have all they need. India, with it's near-billion starving and barely able to feed itself, has a population explosion.
A perfect, harmonious civilization, at it's pinnacle with no possibility of a fall, looks like a giant bulls-eye from space, with cosmic arrows all around pointing to it marked Asteroid Strike Here.
Innate imperfection. A flawed human being is unhappy, greedy, fearful... and drives ambition. Knows that life is unstable. Knows he is surrounded by other flawed creatures, by frightening randomness and intransigence. Knows he must amass resources far greater than his immediate need to prepare for this randomness. Establish his escape routes.

And for a gaming God, this is entertainment. Not perfection. Not stability. With an entire universe to explore, why would he tolerate a game protagonist who does not go beyond his own self? Wouldn't it be so much more fun to watch how the randomness manifests in extraordinary leaps of intellect, art, beauty, strength, achievement, skill, discovery... beyond even what He may have originally conceived?
When we do leave the planet, we will meet Others. They will be like us. They will be flawed. Galaxies will sparkle with a million wars, extinctions and escapes, dominions and insurrections, and everything else that is this infinitely varied, kaleidoscopic, random, churning, intoxication explosion called Life.

After all, anything else is so boring, isn't it?

chaddi-buddies

And while we're on the subject of morals, values, freedom of speech, bully boys and monkey men -
The media talks about what's in the news and advertises what's currently hot.
inadvertently creating - dare I say it? - chaddi-buddies of the two most unlikely partners.

Pramod Mutalik shares screenspace with his greatest enemy, and it's not design or conspiracy; just hot news and ad sales, coming together in beautiful harmony...

First, an unintentional endorsement from cupid...

then begins the search for the life partner...

then the inscription of the initials...

and finally, the happy ending.

Don't it jus' wanna make you cwyyyy??

No screenshots were harmed in the making of this blogpost; what you see is what I got. Photoshop not involved. :)

And now I sign off with another hilarious take...

Discovering Anarchy

Until a few days ago, I was like any one of you. I existed in a cocoon of placid self-belief and faith in my world. I had dreams and hopes, some expectations in life. I had plans.

Increasingly, it's becoming obvious that what I think doesn't matter, doesn't even exist.
All of us are living in a state of collective self-hypnosis. We have convinced ourselves that we have rights, freedoms, privileges. We have the right to dream and the freedom to pursue that dream, and now, in the last decade, we have the resources.
Here's some of the basic myths we all live under. Tell me you disagree.

1. The government will take care of me if I pay my taxes, vote responsibly and follow my duties as a citizen. They will maintain and develop infrastructure, healthcare, education, law & order, national security.

2. As an Indian citizen, I can live anywhere in India without prejudice or discrimination if I do not deliberately offend my neighbors.

3. My children will be safe in school, in a park, at malls and multiplexes, in public transport.

4. If someone hurts me illegally, or cheats me, or robs me, the police and the courts will give me
justice and punish the wrongdoer.

5. My vote counts and my taxes are used properly.

Do you really believe that? Really?
It's all a delusion. I'm beginning to understand now. We live in a concealed anarchy, a state where a semblance of order is carefully laid on top of chaos, and served up to us in media, in opinions, in implicit and explicit education, in socialization.
There are no guarantees in life, and we all know that all of the above may or may not apply to us at random.
Someone with power and connections can do exactly what he wants and get away with it. Whether it is evading crores of taxes or casually raping, killing and throwing away the body of a child on the road.
I can die anytime - by terrorist hand, by drunk driving, knifed by the addict on the footpath, of dengue or malaria, in a collapsing building built with substandard material, in an armed robbery, of fake medicines in a hospital, anything.
I can just as easily die in a genuine road accident, have a heart attack, be struck by lightning, slip and fall downstairs.
And I'm using death as an example - but it applies equally to success and failure at work, in studies, in business, at relationships.
Chaos is everywhere, around every corner. All we do in life is try to limit that chaos, by creating rules and order. By creating certain support for life. That's why we believe in dial-100, in ambulances, the operation theater, in anything.

But the truth is - what we thought was order, structure, rules, isn't really there. We just thought it was. What is there is anarchy, chaos, lawlessness, where the strongest person always wins, and the weaker one is eaten up or dies.
I can choose to be weak - or be strong. Choose which way I want to live. I know what I deserve out of life; I know I can make that happen.
But in understanding that, I'm also acknowledging the death of a dream. It could have been better, it could have been wonderful.
It's still going to be good, but just for a few of us.
And all the rest are going to hell.

A Moving Story - moved, shaken and stirred. And setup.

It's over. I Am ensconced in new flat snugly, and wandering around, uttering child-like cries of wonder at every new discovery.

• Strange, disturbingly vivid, cartoons in rubber all over the walls.
• More glass and china than produced by entire generations of the Ming dynasty. Considering that there will be a Taurean living here shortly - and 2009 is the year of the Ox - this is not a good idea.
• A stack of tiles and a twenty-kilo rock in the window seat.
• Small, six-inch high cane chairs in the loft.
• A giant roll (six feet across and god knows how long) of bubblewrap.
• Crystal decanters.
• A sewing machine treadle.
• A genuine VCR. Remember, the ones that used to play those rolls of magnetic tape... before mp4, before xvid, before blu-ray, even before dvd and vcd...
• A giant furry tiger-print blanket.
• Giant plastic sheeting, lovingly colonized by pigeons.
• Something that I still can't figure out, but it looks like the pelt of a capybara, or a four-foot orange rat. Shedded so much hair and dust I sneezed for an hour.
• Stone vases and extraordinarily realistic plastic plants - two of us watered them for a week before realizing something's off.
• Mysteriously sealed cupboards
• Commemorative mugs of the Royal Wedding.
• 3 small ivory balls
• 25 combs of varying fineness, a hair dye brush, and a pack of morning-after pills. How such small things tell the story of an entire life...
• A pack of cigarette filters
• Thirty feet of coaxial cable
• Wind chimes
• Forty feet of guano-encrusted network cable
• 3-disc CD player with speakers
• An address book populated with Macs, restaurants, and beauty parlours
• A complete bar kit - corkscrew, opener, tongs, etc - made by Sanyo (??)
• A set of six full-length thick curtains that don't fit any window or door in the house
• And finally - The Last Supper, made of plaster, embedded in one wall.

And, as you would no doubt have realized, on top of all this I shall be adding my unique sense of taste and decoration to an already unique foundation. This should be fun.

A Moving Story, neverending...

My arms ache. Individually moving a quarter of a ton of clothes, books, DVD's, electronics, and assorted household goods has left it's mark - but has fortunately not fucked my spine like last time.
And I have a partially functional new apartment. No cable, but 650 movies; no internet but 250 GB of pics, videos, comics, and games.
And finally, at long last, parking.
I have spent the last 2 days packing, moving, shopping, moving the shopping, unpacking, rearranging, and screaming like an enraged orangutan at the shocking lack of storage space. Not that the new flat lacks it; there are cupboards, shelves, minibars, lofts, cabinets, and box beds galore. Unfortunately, they all appear to be used. I have never seen a larger collection of glass and china in one place together. It's crammed. Plates, cups, saucers, humorous coffee mugs, mementoes, beer glasses, steins, creamers, bowls, wine glasses, shot glasses, chalices, dishes, mugs, lids, baking thingies you make veg au gratin in, platters... I am exhausted. I need to banish all these somewhere and I have no clue.
Photos coming soon.

A Moving Story, Reloaded

It's that time of the year again, the annual event that happens every 11 months.
There's a nip in the air, the birds are chirping, the cellphones are ringing, and as my lease expires, I am out again, back on the Hunt For House.

An elusive beast, it hides in the concrete jungle, brilliantly camouflaged in dug-up roads, malfunctioning lights, absent owners and unavailable keys, ensuring you don't get to lay your eyes upon it.

But if you're patient, persistent, and have a healthy dose of sheer bloody-mindedness, you can penetrate this first layer of defense and see the house.
That's when the second line of defense gets activated - leaking roofs, the worst possible neighbour to have (i.e. the owner), termite-ridden beds, a dead rat in the kitchen (I swear there was one, and it had been eaten by other rats. I know what a patch of coarse black fur, bones and a stain means), A fairly deaf sadhu baba in a short-short kurta and nothing else answering the door, a continuous low growl coming from under the sofa with a harmonic that says 'I've nearly chewed through the leash, just take 2 minutes and check the loos again please', pigeons (!!!), dust allergies born of some spore imported from a pharaoh's tomb, violent red walls and silver furniture... the list goes on and on, often too painful to talk about.

But finally, you will find the perfect place. Like a presidential plane knowing there's missile launched at it's tail, a last-ditch countermeasure is deployed - financial chaff. Deposits, rent, brokerage, registration fees, parking permissions. Owners are ok, but the brokers are all-out to increase the rent so they benefit. Thank God I have access to one of the few good guys.

But as of last week, it's all behind me - agreement, registration, biodata, police verification, thumbprints and passport photos, society letter, reposession letter, Form 20-A and Form 29, witness signatures, receipts, et al... and I am the proud possessor of a heavy pair of of keys (and appropriately enough, on a golden keychain) which shall lead me into my perfect apartment.

Now comes the shifting... but that's another story.

The Indian Politician

Let's take a deep breath for a moment, and hard as it is, think dispassionately.
We - the Indian People - are in deep shit. The machinery and infrastructure that is supposed to care for us is, at best, ineffective. There's a lot of anger, frustration, and disgust in us - and most of all, everyone is asking - what can we do?

I am trying to create an answer.
It may not be the right one. A lot of you may disagree with some of what you will read. And I admit I'm not either qualified or in any way, or have any special access or information, that entitles me to do this, save for one reason - I'm just one more person on the street, one more passenger in the train, one more tourist in Kashmir, one more traveller in an airport... and every time something like this happens, the first thing that comes to my mind is - it could be me. It could be someone I know.
I've been lucky so far - but you and I both know that if things continue, it's just a matter of time.

The reason why these things keep happening - in my opinion - is because the infrastructure isn't sufficiently equipped to deal with management of porous borders, a billion plus population, understaffed, underpaid, under-trained and underequipped police, and specialist agencies too caught up in political games to be allowed to function effectively.
But that's not really the reason.
The political class - our so-called 'masters' and trust me, even saying that word brings the bile to my throat - is not doing it's job.
A politician enters the system with a clear objective. Power.
Power equals money, status, assets, previliges.
But NOT duty, responsibility, accountability.

So the real question we need to think about is, how do we force our MLAs, MPs, and Ministers to start doing the job they are supposed to, instead of creating private empires and fortunes and hijacking the state machinery - that we pay for, by the way - for their own perks.
The next time you're stopped to let a 20-car convoy with the flashing red lights pass, remember your salary is 33% less because of that petrol. Because they're on their way to some international event with family and press and shopping, sorry, 'expenses'. Because they need to stock up and furnish that 3000-square foot house in that 2-acre plot for which, unsurprisingly, the paperwork is proving... elusive.

Yet, we are a democracy. We voted. We put these ______'s where they are.
We thought, choosing the lesser of two evils will make it a little less unbearable. But it won't, because it's not the people, but the system that's ineffective. Apart from the fact that the power without responsibility it offers acts as a magnet for every criminal, low-life, unqualified, and plain wrong person for the job... in the ensuing dirty fight the good people get sidelined.
If you want to win, you have to play the game, and playing the game makes us all the same.

So - and this is where the ideas begin - can we do something to make the filtration better? Make sure the right people reach the right positions?

1. Make a mandatory requirement for standing for elections - a blood relative in the armed forces. On active duty. The minute he gets a desk job, or retires, you're out.
What will this achieve? A little more responsibility towards those people and that institution that keeps the country safe. A budget cut that cancels snow boots for the Siachen troops will be more debatable when it's your son's toes that are amputated because of frostbite.

2. Minimal security. Let the ministers and functionaries be moved to quarters attached to the offices and government centers. Let them even bring their families. But Keep it basic, minimal, and only what's necessary. It's the center and the position that is to be protected, not the man occupying it. If he has to leave the proemises, privately, give him a two-man civilian security detail.
What will this achieve? Fewer unpopular decisions. Ignore an illegal slum for years, and someone will throw rotten eggs at you. Renege on your promises, and the man in the street will walk up to you and spit in your face.
What's that? Criminal elements have it so much easier to kill you now? Well, you should have thought of that when you were drawing up the police training and equipping bill, shouldn't you?

Let 'Serving the Public Trust' actually have some 'serving' in it. And for someone looking to make a fast buck - shouldn't you be thinking of something safer?

3. Link their salaries to the sensex.
What will this achieve? If the country does well, you make money. If the economy falters, so does your own direct take-home.

4. Delink the police from political control. Make them independent. Increase their salaries to the point you're comfortable that they won't take a bribe from Dawood to kill you. Increase their training and equipment to the point that they can protect you if someone decides to pick up an AK56. Let the military handle recruiting and training - but they have got to be a separate, independent entity.

5. Get back the RTI, but in a much more effective way. The Right To Information Act currently allows anyone to request information from the government. But how many know what to ask for, and if they do get it, what it means? Set up a specialist media team that reads, interprets and reports on existing policies and policies under debate. Let them talk about it in a language that the average man-on-the-street can understand. Set up centers that can liase between the government and the citizen to give what information is needed.

6. e-nable EVERYTHING. Every bill, petition, paper, file, request, order, document has to be online, and not just as a scan; the world's largest democratic machinery will need the mother of all SAP systems. But every single document must be traceable, at any time, by any person.


That's it for now. I do not know HOW this can be done. The people in power right now are the ones who have everything to lose if they change the status quo; we can't expect any help from them.

This is a call to anyone reading this - if you have ideas, suggestions, advice, or even if you just agree - think about it. Think of what we can do. Some of us will know, will figure out how to make it happen.
A candlelight vigil, a facebook page, an email forward, a petition, a satyagraha, a peace march - these are good things. These are necessary things. But don't let them remain just that.
Think.
Think of how we can make these ideas work.

And many of you will have brilliant, revolutionary, and most of all, workable ideas. Make them public. Make them known. If you know what should be done, someone else can tell you how. Just make sure they know.

Update 03/12/08: Facebook group is up.

The Spirit of Mumbai

...is a sham.
There is no such thing.
When a Mumbai-ite gets back onto a local train the day after a bombing, gets back on the road after a flood, and resumes life in general - stop saluting 'the spirit of mumbai' that refuses to be cowed.
What option did he ever have, anyway?
The cost of living is astronomical. You live from month to month, hand to mouth. An unpaid week is a disaster, a month without a job, the end. Can you afford to lose even a few day's wages?
All the offices are in one place, and residential areas - at minimum - several kilometers away. And just 2-3 roads and a train line that connect the two. If you want to live near your workplace, you can afford it pretty much only if you own the workplace. The lower down the hierarchy you are, the further away you stay.

So how do you work? You commute. An hour, two, three, and on bad days, four or five hours of each day go in just getting from home to work and back. Usually via multiple methods - buses, trains, bikes, cabs, walking...

This is the spirit of mumbai. A complete lack of any alternatives. When the average man on the street can choose to continue life as usual - or kill his dreams and leave - or starve.
Some choice, huh?

Do I want to get back on the train, back on the road, back at work? No. I don't. But can I choose to stay at home? Can I choose to travel by any alternative means, take a different road, avoid the train stations, the crowds that are an automatic target? Yeah, right.
I can't not work. I can't not travel. I can't even not take the same route through the same places!
Life is so fast, and so compressed... it streamlines. People that can fit in with this, who can streamline themselves, stay - they who can't, leave. But the pace keeps increasing, and increasing, and increasing...
...and you all know what happens when something at high speed twitches.

The whole machinery is racing along a catastrophe curve, a hundred miles an hour. We've been lucky so far - but we're living on borrowed time. What happened so far is nothing compared to what's coming, and coming it is.
Make no mistakes. It's just a matter of time now.

shaping dreams

not being figurative here.
had a nightmare last night that was actually disturbing enough to wake me up, and sit for a while with the light on. I could still feel it's aftereffects - the shadows, the dry whisper in my ear, that sense of gut-freezing terror...
Then I thought, if I find this so scary, I can use this.
So I wrote on it. Turned it into a fairly complete ghost story, with a central character, setting, mood, reasoning, logic.
And as I did it, I felt the terror melt away. Turn into a research project. I felt my mind catch hold of the darkness, twist it into a shape of my own choosing. Make it mine.
This was fun. Can't wait for the next one.
And yes... write a good final version. Soon.

Attack of the Pigeons - Biological War!

The office is now being tortured by what is practically a biblical plague - swarms of tiny flying insects, apparently hatching out from either dirt trapped in keyboards or from dustbins / under carpets. Initially everyone thought it was an optical illusion, just tiny black dots on the monitor screens.

Then, like a witch rumor in Salem, or a Bill Clinton sexual harassment accusation, all it took was for one person to speak out and the cacophony of voices agreeing and supporting was deafening.

Calling Pest Control - a venture confounded by the fact that till date, nobody except this team has been able to see the flying freaks.

I suggested dousing the whole area in Baygon.

And if that doesn't work, there's an opening for an imposing old man with a large white beard, robe, and staff. Similarity in looks to Charlton Heston will be a bonus.


Biological Warfare!

The source of the insects has been identified - it's the latest weapon in the ancient war between humans and pigeons.

Evil Pigeon Mastermind

The pigeons had colonized our AC ducts, and we would hear them scuttling around - but we never imagined that this is what they were up to. All the while we ignored them and turned a deaf ear to their scratchings, they were breeding mites and showering them down upon our unsuspecting heads.

Never mind Charlton Heston. We now need a crack team of the known experts in duct-crawling search-and-destroy missions. Bruce Willis and Sigourney Weaver - vacancies are now open! Bring your own weaponry of choice, or fill in a Capex form and submit to Priscilla on the 5th floor.

the wind on my face blows through my mind as well, like a hurricane

Feel... cleared.
Every day is the first day of the rest of my life.
Every day could be the last day of the rest of my life.
Thought that these would conflict, but they don't. Surprisingly.

There's always going to be things to do, and always things you wish you had done, and always things not done because other things were being done - but it doesn't matter, really.
That's the secret. The number of things that really matter, is very, very low. It's easy to do them. They don't have deadlines and expiry dates, they don't need preparation, they don't need investment.

Once you think this - once you believe this, deep down, it makes all the rest easy. You don't worry anymore. You don't run after illusionary mirages. Things always seem to work out, because you never compromised on what was important to begin with - unimportant stuff becomes irrelevant all by itself, and you can just spring-clean it. Important stuff gets done, and adds to your life.

Do what you really want. Know what you really want. Translate it into what you do. And...

No worries, mate.

pink haze

Background to the story –

Website is changed to bright, shocking, eye-watering, soul-searing, mind-numbing PINK.

My status message becomes: pielphobic.

"pielphobia" , which means a fear of pink elephants. And let us assume that pink elephants do exists, are little and absolutely harmless.

And it is immediately understood.

Oxy: ponk elephant pink elephant pink elephant

Oxy Mitra is offline.

Myco: you are brilliant!!!

Oxy: no. google is my phrand

Myco: i know

but what is ponk elephant?

Oxy: one that narrowly missed being pink

Myco: ah

you have created a new word today

and it shall be duly added to my lexicon

Oxy: thank you thank you

Myco: ponk (p-aw-n-k) : something that is close to, but not exactly, pink; something that narrowly avoids being pink; nicole ritchie

Oxy: lolllllll

alt. oriya cool, equivalent of punk in common usage

Myco: loll

lolll

lolllllllllllllllllllllll

Oxy: all thanks to the person who said " baithe baithe edition ko phok kar diya tumne"

Myco: ahhh - the offspring of a fuck and a poke and a phoonk

Oxy: but i like ponk

Myco: me too

Oxy: when you're almost recovered from an illness, you say i'm in the ponk of health

in a ponk haze

spoof film, ponk panther

Myco: ponk slip

Oxy: the possibilities are immense

Myco: can we get some kind of a cash award for this?

enriching the english language?

Oxy: we should

ponk politics

sound so cool

Myco: ponko commie

Oxy: the ponk brigade

Myco: ponk gin

Oxy: yesssss

and then of course there will be wannabe rockstar ponks

you are such a ponk

Myco:

Ponk it´s my new obsession
Ponk it´s not even a question
Ponk on the lips of your lover, ´cause
Ponk is the love you discover
Ponk as the bing on your cherry
Ponk ´cause you are so very
Ponk it´s the color of passion
`Cause today it just goes with the fashion
Ponk it was love at first sight, yea
Ponk when I turn out the light, and
Ponk gets me high as a kite
And I think everything is going to be all right
No matter what we do tonight
You could be my flamingo
´Coz ponk is the new kinda lingo
Ponk like a deco umbrella
It´s kink - but you don´t ever tell her
Ponk it was love at first sight
Ponk when I turn out the light
Ponk gets me high as a kite
And I think everything is going to be all right
No matter what we do tonight
I want to be your lover
I wanna wrap you in rubber
As ponk as the sheets that we lay on
Ponk is my favorite crayon, yeah
Ponk it was love at first sight
Ponk when I turn out the light
Ponk it´s like pink but not quite
And I think everything is going to be all right
No matter what we do tonight

google is my phrand too

Oxy: ohhhhhhhh

this is the best

:) :)

Myco: :D

Oxy: this should go online

Myco: it shall

down the funnel

Is there any indicator that tells you when it's time to stop sticking to your principles, because they're wrong?

There've been times when I had been severely tempted - it's all too easy, and the kind of economy we have exploding around makes it not only easy to do, but also motivates - and your friends, your peers, people that you look up to, people you can't stand, and people that occupy zero mindspace - all create a set of conscious and subconscious standards. That's the motivator - that's what you try to live up to, because if you can't do even that, what use is all this anyway? And it is possible to do that, without compromising on what you believe in.
But recently, it's been getting harder and harder. The collateral damage is increasing, and I'm risking more than I want to lose in this. Maybe it is time to rethink the way I've looked at life - and let's face it, it's old-fashioned. Nobody does that kind of shit anymore. Maybe I'm obsolete. Maybe I'm doing the smart thing.

But one thing is true, though - options and decisions will come a lot easier once your back's to the wall.

Heppy burd day.

It's interesting to see how the number of non-human wishers has been steadily mounting over the years, and how they keep getting increasingly bizarre.

A brightly lit morning, as you nurse your hangover and wish you were dead, a perky young thing runs past in shorts and sweatband and chirps at you -
Spark people - "Don't count your years. Make your years count."

A group photo, sepia-toned, speaks out from the wall -
Batchmates.com - "We wish you a life time of success in finding great friends, peace, happiness & prosperity."

Vijay Mallaya, on the Indian Empress, in a tux flanked by assorted PYTs, raises his glass to me as champagne corks pop and streamers flutter -
King Club - "May you enjoy the good times not only today, but through all your days ahead."

Juhi Chawla, surrounded by backup dancers dressed as village belles, cops, animals, dakus, waitresses, and the mandatory line of firang tourists in shorts and bemused-but-vastly-amused expressions -
Seventymm - "Baar baar din ye aaye, tum jiyo hazaron saal, yeh humai hai arzoo. Happy birthday to you!"

Dark, quiet room, with a single table lamp shining on a empty tabletop in which a pair of scarred, heavy hands are visible.
Airtel. "The family wishes you a very happy birthday. We hope the year ahead is wonderful for you."
The next message said my payment was overdue.
What's next - a horse's head in my bed?

Tent with a crystal ball and a deranged, overexcited gypsy.
Bethea from tarot.com - "Birthdays should be a time of blossoming and it looks as if you have a wonderful year ahead."
She also warned me if I don't act now by buying her $18.95 detailed advice, I could miss this golden opportunity and forever ruin my life.

Open the door of my apartment, late at night after a bad day, and full family leaps out in matrimonial regalia accompanied by daughter and garland.
Shaadi.com simply yells - "Surprise!"

It keeps getting better. 11 months and my profile hasn't activated is the background to the image of the Cryptkeeper cackling with glee in a dark firelit, cobwebby cellar -
Times - "May your journey with us only grow longer, ahahahahahahaaaaa!!"

And as Oxy says - I'm just waiting for the next mail -
"I'm just an automated spammer program from Norway but I wish you had a bigger dick..."

Remember Yesterday

We've had our share of hard times, but that's the price we paid
And through it all, we kept the promise that we made

Through the sleepless nights, through every endless day
I'd wanna hear you say, I remember you.

A moment. Purple twilit sky, heavy with the promise of rain. Wind sweeping through the streets, the smell of sea. A single palm tree, lit orange in the sodiums, waving wildly. Free.
Traffic didn't matter anymore. The worries, the troubles - everything that had been preying on my mind like a dead weight - melted away, like it had never existed. I was as free as that tree in the twilight, leaves in the wind.
And I saw what I was becoming. How I was so caught up in every day that I'd forgotten to see the end of the road, where I was going with this. So lost in the trees, I couldn't see the forest.

I remember you. I remember how you used to be, how you used to think. How you used to feel. To live. Somewhere down this long road, I'd forgotten.

But I remember you now.

There are times when we need to step back. Regain perspective. See where we are, where we're going. Remember the people we used to be, the people we wanted to be.

And I'll remember you.

And I'll be you.

And I am you.

back on track

Things are looking up.

Thought I'd gotten badly jacked last month - our God Of All Things, the Almighty Finance, had miscalculated my taxes - giving me five months of grossly inflated salary and no questions asked; all very well and good, and deeply if silently appreciated, until it's July and time to file your IT returns and hey, you know what? you're screwed, buddy, you're dead meat, roadkill on the gravy train. (trackkill?)

But ok, still on track. A diet of chana for the next 6 months and I'll be fine. Good, too in a way; all the crazy eating out will get controlled.

Surprising how, at the time when you most need to save, you have the max unexpected expenses? It's like the universe knows that this is the only time you can afford this jhatka.

used to think it would be so easy

Windin' your way down on Baker Street
Light in your head and dead on your feet
Well another crazy day
You'll drink the night away
And forget about everything
This city desert makes you feel so cold.
It's got so many people but it's got no soul
And it's taking you so long
To find out you were wrong
When you thought it had everything

You used to think that it was so easy
You used to say that it was so easy
But you're tryin'
You're tryin' now
Another year and then you'll be happy
Just one more year and then you'll be happy
But you're cryin'
You're cryin' now

Way down the street there's a lad in his place
He opens the door he's got that look on his face
And he asks you where you've been
You tell him who you've seen
And you talk about anything

He's got this dream about buyin' some land
He's gonna give up the booze and the one night stands
And then he'll settle down there's a quiet little town
And forget about everything

But you know he'll always keep movin'
You know he's never gonna stop movin
Cus he's rollin'
He's the rollin' stone

And when you wake up it's a new mornin'
The sun is shinin' it's a new morning
You're goin'
You're goin' home.

Wish I could. There is no home, now - no place where I can get away from this - have to deal with it here.
Why'd it have to be such an issue, man... the whole world and it's great-uncle has their opinion.
Attrition
feeling myself getting ground down
little bit at a time
outside in and inside out