Losers

Don't think

2014-06-17T20:02:00.001-07:00

At times there is the need to write without thinking. You won't face a problem with writer's block or whatever it's called. It's like automatic writing. Infact the best in you is quite likely to come out and shine if you only don't stand in it's way. So, give up your foolishness by not allowing your foolishness to be routed through your thoughts. Enter the realms of wisdom.

Be thoughtless, be cool.

Beer and Brandy

2009-09-14T07:40:00.000-07:00

It's not very usual to find a beer drinker who drinks brandy. Infact the other day I seemed to have offended a brandy drinker at the bar. I was drinking beer and not having much to talk about I was also making fun of his brandy. It's not that I don't drink brandy myself...but I certainly DO NOT drink brandy with hot water on a hot afternoon! I am appalled at the thought that such fundamental stuff is still not part of our lower KG syllabus - what's the education minister doing??

Anyways, the reason I thought I had to talk of these two drinks in the same breath (talking of breath reminds me, that no matter which one of them you had, your mom will immediately be able to smell you out and give you the dirty look...mom's don't differentiate between drinks...for them, it's all sharaab...and don't try giving her the 'doctor told me to drink brandy' BS...it'll do you no good), is because I actually ended up consuming a decent amount of absolutely chilled KF blue yesterday noon. Believe you me, I haven't stopped sneezing since this morning....damn! Hope people don't mistake the symptoms to mean swine flu!! Anyways, the point is, and this I am only telling you and I won't tell my mom for reasons stated previously, that I really need to take some brandy tonight....no BS...seriously, I need it. It's not for the high mind you, I know you don't trust me and so I emphasize, it's not for the high (though I don't mind the high, but that's secondary)...purely for medicinal value.

Here's the bigger idea that you should keep in mind: Always have extremely chilled beer...almost frozen stuff...coz everytime you do this, you are also creating an opportunity to gulp down a lil hard liquor the next day for perfectly valid reasons...people say it should be brandy but hey...if you insist that whisky cures your cold faster than brandy ever will, well so be it. Cheers!

Highway of Life

2008-07-31T06:05:00.000-07:00

There's heavy traffic on the roads, heavier still on the net but heaviest on the highway that is life! At times I envy people who know their destination even before they hit the highway but most of us are travelers who don't know where we are going and where we want to land up. But hey, it's good fun at times.

It's actually fun till the time when one day you suddenly stop to think where the road leads to. That day it becomes less fun.

Think about it, you are traveling on this highway, enjoying the drive, whizzing past all the signs, hoardings etc. Then suddenly a thought comes to your mind, 'Dude where are you going?'. You slow down at that point in time - unsure about the answer.

Then you start thinking if you want to go to a hill station or probably a beach or maybe a remote village or maybe a bustling city. Then you watch out for the sign boards, then you stop by a person you see walking and ask, 'Dude, where does this road lead to?'. If you decide to go to a beach then you start thinking if you want to land up at the nearest beach or do you want to go to the beach where most people go on holiday or is it gonna be the lonely beach where you sit with a bottle (or crate) of beer and do some serious thinking! What have you achieved in life, what have your friends achieved, what do you want to achieve and what do you 'really' want to achieve! There, now you aren't simply out there, you are out there and going someplace.

I chose the lonely beach and the crate of beer. Whenever I think of resuming my journey, another thought comes to my mind which warns me not to drink and drive. So, I drink some more. As this goes on, the beach seems like home. Hmm...guess I have reached!!

Love, Tennis and Relationships

2008-07-29T11:21:00.000-07:00

Have you ever romanced tennis? Might sound a bit strange but the fact is that terms used in Tennis have a lot of hidden meaning. Obviously you might need a little help in deciphering the code. That's where I step in!

Glossary of tennis terms are explained below with their meanings as per the Love Dictionary (LD):

Tennis: Love all (scoreline)
LD: The most fundamental rule

Tennis: Game
LD: Love is a game of hide and seek, of hunting, where the lover hunts his game

Tennis: Set
LD: A couple!

Tennis: Match
LD: Same as Set.

Talking of set reminds me of upset. A 'point' worth mentioning here is if there is an upset then there is basically no match as far as Love is concerned. However, in Tennis, first there has to be a match for us to know if there will be an upset. If there is no match, the spectators get upset for sure!

Tennis: Mens Singles, Womens Singles, Mens Doubles, Womens Doubles, Mixed Doubles
LD: Stags, (Man's dream!), Gay, Lesbian, 'Normal' couple

There are more but will leave you to discover them. Love is all about discovering (and seldom finding!).

Finally an ode to the umpire:

Tennis: Silence please!
LD: Say Nothing at all

The Great PG Wodehouse

2008-07-28T09:30:00.000-07:00

My house of wood (body of bones if you will) has often been set on fire by the laughter 'riot' better known as P.G. Wodehouse

The reason why I happened to remember him today is because I was planning to share something about men and women. Relationships, breakups, candle lit dinners, movies, love, hate, arguments, marriages, divorces and the endless list of things you attach to the phenomena of a man and woman trying to share time and space is quite extra-ordinary.

My favorite topics often feature these two specimens and what each thinks and how they interact with each other. I think they make wonderful loser stories.

Women are these days fighting for equality. I find this trend disturbing. Why do they want to take a step down from their pedestals (on which they often place themselves with the help of lover devotees) and want to be equals? Anyways, if that's what they choose, then that's what they will have coz which man (in his right senses and remembering the mantra: 'live in peace or die in peace but peace, peace, peace') has ever denied a woman what she wanted.

The whole idea of a basic conflict in persona types of men and women that neither of them understood was very matter-of-fact'ly' presented by this great man Wodehouse. Let me quote him, "At the age of eleven or thereabouts women acquire a poise and an ability to handle difficult situations which a man, if he is lucky, manages to achieve somewhere in the later seventies."

This age difference, this generation gap is never bridged. Ofcourse there are some 80 year old men who have relationships with 18 year old women but those are rare cases of a man meeting Life for the first time on his deathbed - but not all are that lucky.

Anyways, more tidbits on the specimens will keep coming your way till the time I reach my 70s'. After that, I guess my poise may not allow me this luxury.

And yes, Wodehouse fans may please take some more inspiration from his quotes:
Quotes

Loser Relationships

2008-07-28T08:45:00.000-07:00

People who know me know my fascination for the word 'Loser'. It is actually a very generic term that I use to describe almost everybody. My definition of the word is very generic - not a one size fits all, but rather something like 'available in all sizes' :) It's a way of recognizing that everybody has his or her own faults. It hints more towards the comic elements of the human anatomy which reassuringly indicate the presence of the 'L' gene in everyone. It's a quality which enables people to make fun of themselves and thus gives a certain right to make fun of others as well (in keeping with the adage 'do to others as you would have yourself do to yourself' - ah , ok I know it reads differently in it's original format!). Anyways, the point is that to me it's a pretty endearing term.

The reason why I am talking about the definition and connotations of the L word here is because a lot of people see this word and it's meaning very differently. I read a very detailed description of losers and how they behave in relationships - quite depressing for those who would look at it seriously but quite funny in terms of the detailed analysis done in the portrayal of an incorrigible beast as it were! Hmm, anyways, to each his own but an interesting read none the less.

Here's the link: http://www.mental-health-matters.com/articles/article.php?artID=157

Ambition

2008-07-27T06:03:00.000-07:00

As a child how many times have you been asked this question, 'What do you want to do when you grow up?' or 'What's your ambition in life?'

A typical child usually gives answers which I think are chiefly guided by what they have heard their parents say eg. becoming a doctor, engineer etc. These could be their parents ambitions for them or more unfortunately their parents unfulfilled ambitions.

I wonder why we feed children with such suggestions. I feel they stop being in touch with their feelings very early in life because of these suggestions.

If someone asked me that question I would probably say 'Not much'. That's an option that a lot of people would choose but unfortunately it doesn't even figure in the list of options that society/ educational institutions/ family etc. ask you to choose from. Not doing much or not becoming that elusive 'Someone' is looked down upon by the masses. This is crazy coz if you think about it, a lot of people today wait for their retirement. They aren't happy with what they do. They want to retire early. Why do you think people want to retire at an early age?

Think about it. Retired folks are usually people who 'don't do much' in terms of what society values. So, if you want to take an early retirement then basically understand that all you really wanted to do in life was 'not do much'. That has always been your goal but a lot of dust settled on it because of what others wanted you to do and thus you never saw it.

Remember, when you don't want to do much then actually you gain the freedom to do anything which you feel like doing at that point in time. When you don't need to be 'someone' then you can start being 'one' with yourself. Believe me, that's all that matters.

I wasn't doing much when I wrote this piece.

Loser Rhymes

2008-01-23T07:44:00.000-08:00

Had written this poem in a somewhat philosophical mood but then it does capture the loser's spirit in the first four lines itself ;)...so worth sharing over here!

Let some dreams be such

that can never materialize,

It's like running for joy alone

and not hoping to win a prize;

Let us stay thirsty for a while,

just staring away at the clear blue nile;

For once let's give without any restraint,

just to know how it feels to be a saint;

Let me and u perform a deed so true,

that ur greatest enemy falls in love with u;

Just for once lets try to live apart,

to feel the pain of a broken heart;

Let our hopes for once be so insane,

as to hope the clear blue sky shall rain;

Let us for once live without any fears,

and meet our ends with cheers not tears!

Work?

2007-09-04T13:29:00.000-07:00

Earlier they used to say "work hard" and now they say "work smart". Let me tell you this, times have changed again. Now the mantra is simply "smart!" So basically you needn't work as long as you are smart enough to know how to get things done without working. I have been watching people, observing them and thinking about them. People who are doing very well for themselves aren't working, they are simply talking. But hey! They sure do know how to talk crap endlessly, how to postpone things endlessly, how to survive and grow and prosper without working. I tell you it's a skill. You must be really dumb to think that these people don't have any talent. Infact they actually have what it takes - the ability to bluff.

Losers actually have an edge in this. Their inner being resists any kind of work in a very natural way. As such they are not really cut out for hard work. They can talk a lot of crap too, though not too good at lying. Fooling people is a tad bit tough. I mean I can tell a gal," Hey you look really charming", but then what gives it away is the fact that I am not even looking at her....you know, simple mistakes like these make it difficult to bluff. Anyways, the good news is that the world is becoming a work free zone and if only we can be a lil bit careful of our shortcomings, I think we can have a blast.

The world has typically been segregated into blue collared and white collared workers. In order to make a statement that the age of any kind of worker is over, I have been wearing round neck (aka collarless) casuals very often. You could say this falls under the catergory of "symbolic statements" that I make but no one notices. A better way of looking at it would be to think that I bluffed them into not noticing!

Death - the wait

2007-08-20T11:39:00.000-07:00

Uh oh...another day went by and it didn't come yet! Some extremely wise people have assured me that it will come one day, no one knows when. I must say people don't give death the kind of love it deserves. The nice dude that death is...it has made us a promise that it will come ...and in today's treacherous world if there is someone who makes a promise and definitely intends to keep it then I must say that I definitely respect this chappie.

I am reminded of an incident in college when I was listening to what the prof was saying with my eyes closed. There have been other occasions I must admit, when I have only watched and pretended to hear... but those were rare occasions when a lecturer turned out to be a beautiful woman. Now the incident that I am currently recounting was one where an elderly gentleman was saying things which my ears could aptly pick up without necessitating any interference from my eyes. Anyways, the reason why I bring this up is coz this professor asked me suddenly,"Are you dead or dying?". He just wanted to make sure that I hadn't dozed off. Now I did open my eyes and gave him a nod to reassure him that he wasn't as boring as he thought he was.

Interestingly, I just thought to myself...we are all dying every minute....we keep dying till we are actually dead. It's just another way of looking at things. I mean we say we are alive and living, we hardly say we are dying, though in a way, living and dying are the same thing. If we make birth our reference point then we are living and if we make death our reference point then we are dying...but both are basically the same thing. One defines from where we are coming and the other talks about where we are going.

Yet, as I mentioned earlier, people don't really seem too happy with this chap. They prefer to say they are living. Never mind, let them have it their way. Death doesn't have an ego you know; even if you neglect it completely and don't want to have anything to do with it, still it will come to you. It loves you! ...it's waiting for you!

Memories

2007-08-19T12:06:00.000-07:00

Memories are funny things aren't they?...often showing up uninvited and even more often failing to show up when most wanted!
Crazy, the way a phrase, a tune, a picture, a place, a smell and just about anything that might affect any of our senses might suddenly bring back a train of thoughts relating to the past - actually at times it brings back only a bogie...my memory is a bit weak.
Aren't we all losers? Don't we all, every now and then slip into this phase...often wantingly...replenishing lost memories. Mind you, our mind plays tricks too. It adds it's own masala to memories at times - for eg. maybe you are having pizza at Dominos and suddenly you get reminded of the time when your mom had made a pizza for you...and you remember your mom's culinary skills...and suddenly feel this wave of love for her - all this is fine but for the fact that your mom had actually made a big burger, it wasn't pizza at all...you are getting me?
Anyways, masala or no masala, memories still do capture our attention. Memories of our first love for instance. They say people never forget their first love. It's kinda funny coz it implies that everyone's first love usually ends up in a memory and nothing more...anyways, more on that sometime else. My point here is that people actually don't have an attachment to the person who was their first love as such - it's just that we remember the feeling. First love conventionally happens at an early age (this is not true for everyone...I know of people who fell in love for the first time only after they retired coz they didn't find time before that) and love brings forth a completely new set of emotions. Emotions which are equally tender and strong at the same time. Now all these emotions basically get directed to this one person (the one who would be on the way to becoming only your memory in future) and thus this idiot manages to stick to your memories of those feelings for a long time. It's the discovery of the emotion called love which is actually remembered though we are foolish enough to always link it to the discovery of this idiot.

Anyways, next time you remember something, make sure you also remember what I told you about remembering things and how they might not be what you think they are.

If in doubt about how to interpret your memory or if a certain memory is haunting you and you would want me to help you get rid of it, I am available. There aren't many things that a loser has...but hey, he has time!

L's V-day

2007-02-13T10:40:00.000-08:00

L1: Hey what plans for today bro?

L2: The usual maan...nothing

L3: C'mon guys what's wrong with you folks...

L1&L2: Oooooo, looks like someone's got plans!

L3: Tch, tch...u guys just don't undestand!

L1: What?

L3: I did some research...this Valentine guy was no dude, he was a saint...Saint Valentine. Stop thinking about gals. We should light candles in front of this great man's pic and meditate on love...universal love, platonic love, love for the entire mankind...we need to transform our basic instincts to something much higher

L2: WOW man...that's profound

L1: Oh great guru, tell us more about it...

L3: Saint Valentine was a martyr.....Crap man, what am i saying...when is the party???

The "L" incident

2007-01-23T08:41:00.000-08:00

It was probably the fault of one loser that another loser got into a bit of a mess. The inappropriately high levels of waste fluids building up in his body demanded a quick exit and Loser, succumbing to the "pressure" did not take much notice of the sign-board outside the toilet. The loser guy who put up the sign was to be blamed for this. The sign read "L" and supposedly stood for "Ladies" (which was written in such small letters that even if a person was looking for it he may not have found it) while the other door had "G" for "Gents". In his haste to release his waste, loser interpreted "L" for "Loser" instead of "Ladies" and was pleasantly surprised at this special treatment being meted out to losers...a toilet specially catering to their untimely needs.

Anyways, when loser entered the loo (and L could have stood for Loo as well), he was stopped on his tracks by an elderly lady.

Lady: hey you, where do u think u are going?

Loser: am not going anywhere, I have reached

Lady: don't u dare try to be cheeky with me!

Loser: listen old lady, i don't know what u mean but i didn't come here to be cheeky...it's far more urgent

Lady: what the hell do u think u are doing in HERE?

Loser: now c'mon, i ain't doing nothing yet but if u keep questioning me like this then i might

Lady: who let u in here?

Loser: my need....and now old lady i think ur being cheeky...ur talking about "letting in" whereas u know very well that i have come here to "let out"

Lady: i urge u to leave this very second!

Loser: don't tell me about urges lady...u don't understand the ferocity or maybe velocity of my current urge!

Lady:hey!!...u!!!...wait!!...

Without waiting for any further debate, Loser charged inside one of the toilets whose door was being opened by the lady who was about to step out...but our Loser friend got in so bloody quick that the woman trying to step out was still inside when Loser stepped in and locked the door from inside. He opened the door after exactly a micro-second and one slap later as the lady walked out hurling abuses at him.

When Loser finally emerged from the loo, he was a much relieved man.

Racing against time

2007-01-22T08:05:00.000-08:00

There is only one competitor that Time itself fears and that's a Loser. It would seem that time is in this amazingly irritating habit of competing with people....or maybe people start the race against time but either ways 99% of the time, Time wins. However, with a loser time doesn't ever stand a chance. Henry Ford had once said, “The competitor to be feared is one who never bothers about you at all, but goes on making his own business better all the time.” Ford was right (the first part of the quote makes absolute sense, the second part about betterment is a bit immature though...he should have put a fullstop and stopped where he put a comma and continued) and this is precisely why Time fears the loser. A loser does not bother about time at all...he has all the time in the world. Most losers don't even care to wear watches unless they have taken a liking to some cheap roadside ticking object which says loudly "buy me u loser" and the loser falls for it. But as a general rule they don't wear watches. Time gets frustrated with them, waiting for the loser to get into competition mode but the loser is blissfully unaware of any such crap. As such Time is at a loss, it keeps ticking and in doing so loses time/itself. At this point in time, the race is over...time has lost but thankfully the loser hasn't won (winning would be a disgrace)...so u might be thinking if the loser didn't win then what did it do....well....ur missing the point....throughout this race the loser actually did nothing. Time started a race and time lost, period.

Kashinath leaves home early

2007-01-21T10:21:00.000-08:00

Kashinath left home early today. He left a short while after 4 am.

Not that Kashinath is an early bird. In fact he enjoyed lazing till lunch was served but today was different.

When he was in school his mother used to pack for him quite a sumptuous lunch. There was enough oily stuff packed in his tiffin to feed the entire class but Kashinath would choose to consume all of it himself. He was quite possesive about things cooked by his mom....nah, actually he was quite possesive about anything cooked for that matter...he didn't enjoy uncooked stuff like fruits and vegetables mainly coz they didn't add to his calories and weren't spicy enough for his tongue to get drawn into saliva mode.

When he grew up, his wife took up the challenge and fed him till his belly touched the ceiling...he had to buy a table fan coz when he lied on his back there was imminent danger that his ponch would get sliced by the ceiling fan. Exercise was not his cup of tea...infact his cup of tea was laced with more than a cup of sugar and as such he used to have tea in a jug....otherwise the tea used to spill over when his wife added sugar.

Anyways, coming back to the point....Kashinath left home early today. He left at 4:07 am to be precise. As mentioned earlier, it wsn't that he was an early bird...circumstances forced him to leave early. He died of heart attack.

Rising to the occasion!

2007-01-21T07:18:00.000-08:00

It's always confused me to think about rising to the occasion...we rise everyday and so does the sun etc. but not because of any occasion in particular. Infact I don't remember having ever risen to any occasion. I have, at times, risen to an alarm clock...but that too rarely. Atleast the alarm clock gives a loud signal urging me to rise but the occasions must be having a decibel problem coz i have never heard them playing the fool with my eardrums in order to signal an impending rise. It's pretty strange that some famous people ...or rather most famous people have at some point in their lives risen to the occasion. As I have already mentioned earlier, I have also risen to the alarm on some odd occasion but definitely that is not what they mean by the phrase coz most certainly I haven't come even a few hundred miles of being famous. But when I give it some profound thought I do feel that rising at some God-forsaken hour when the alarm chooses to go off is actually a very big acheivement and maybe the way to become famous is to make sure that someone watches you perform the feat. Since I wake up alone, there is no proof as to whether I woke up with the alarm or not. Maybe those clever people who got famous out of rising to the occasion didn't go to bed alone...they had someone or the other watching them....or maybe they were part of some reality show where a hundred cameras follow your every move. So if you manage to rise to the occasion invariably some camera catches you doing it and you become famous coz now you have proof. Man, it was so simple to get famous....I just need proof...hmmm...since no reality show channel is gonna invite me (here's the irony, u need to be famous to be called in one of the shows in the first place!), so I guess I need to go the conventional way and find someone who would be willing to sleep with me...err...for the sake of proof offcourse!