Mirror, mirror on the wall

who in the land is ugliest of all ?

And the truthful answer is us. The Grimm brothers might not have envisaged their folktale being applicable so many years after conception, that too in such a negative way. Grim it is indeed. For those who are unfamiliar or wish to refresh their lore, here is an outline of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Unlike the queen who used the mirror as a tool to pander to her vanity, we ought to appraise and uprise ourselves.

<rant>

This thought entered my mind when I was penning the cell-pain post, but I didn't want to take a detour there. So what exactly is my latest screed ? Simply put it is the amount of ignorance, indifference and insensitivity we seem to spew knowingly or otherwise. I'm not talking about incidents of political unrest, regional divide ,communal discord, environmental apathy, corruption or any such largescale and generic factors affecting public at large. My grouse is about the small things that are very much in our control but which we carry on without impunity and compunction.

There is absolutely no consideration if we are inconveniencing others, or worse, not caring even if we realize it is an inconvenience. Roads, restaurants, movie halls, offices, airports, trains. You just name it and we have at least half a dozen ways to behave callously at each. If we are behind the steering wheel, we have no respect for signals or lanes or pedestrians. In a restaurant, we don't feel the need to rein in our children so that their racket doesn't annoy other patrons. In movie halls we don't care if we are disturbing everyone with cell-talk in the middle of the screening. In office it is acceptable to shout and talk loudly or put our phones on speaker at our desk. We have complete disregard for queues and rules everywhere. When traveling in a train, we assume that playing songs on speaker is entertaining to other passengers.

If all this sounds like an utterly cynical view of life and making a mountain out of a molehill, you aren't obviously subjected enough to these. Yes, in a way none of these are follies of such magnitude as to deserve this tirade. But what was it about little drops of water making the mighty ocean ? The simplistic remedy would be to spread awareness, but like I mentioned earlier, at times we seem to relish annoying others. What else then will work ? May be we should follow the lead of the queen's red hot iron dancing shoes.

</rant>

A salt and battery story

McDrive

For those unaccustomed to my rabid sense of humor, I thrive on bad puns, use lots of homophones and am always on the lookout for phonetic humor. But then anyone reading these posts in sequence would have discovered it by now. With that priming in place, it won't be hard to guess the title has anything but to do with physical violence.

I'm surprised at the number of people who ask me the same question as soon as they discover that my wife is away for a month. "What do you do for dinner ?" I find this amusing or annoying depending on my hunger level then. The feeling has nothing to do with Amudha's culinary skills which mercifully are more than sufficient.

Instead, its the tacit suggestion that when in town she is or ought to be the one taking care of alimentary needs at home. Without getting into my views on equal rights and giving the benefit of doubt to the innocent enquirer's sympathetic query, I can safely state that we both are perfectly happy with our dinner plans. We eat in, out or pack food as we please depending on the mood and time.

One of the things that I pester Amudha to make at home is dosa. We get the batter readymade and all it takes is to add some salt and get going ... or so I thought all this while. The other day on my way back from office, I bought the batter and set about making them. Almost immediately I realized I had no clue how much salt to add or even how or where to make them.

So using the age old trial and error method, I managed to blend the batter in salt (in retrospect that's how it felt) and made shapeless blobs in the pan. In the mêlée I neglected tiny details like spreading the batter or using oil to smoothen the edges and ended up with burnt salty yellow lumps sticking to my non-stick pan. That was when I drove over to McDonald's.

Cell trill

Mobile menace

It is so easy to be condescending towards others while we commit the same mistakes. Its a case of bylaws being applicable to other lesser mortals while we play Gods. I'm not being sarcastic, but saying this feeling chastened.

We all know how cells have permeated our collective lives. Like its poor relative the landline and TV, the cell has filtered down the luxury layer into being a necessity. But at what cost ... ?

We no longer care to talk to a person sitting next to us while we are busy texting or calling someone else on the phone. We don't think it is rude anymore to use the phone when in the company of others or in public places like restaurants, cinema halls. We feel it is OK to talk while driving. The list is endless.

My point is not as much about a 'holier than thou' stand as it is about flitting between the roles of the perpetrator and the victim. I for one have done all of the above things at one point or the other, with a strong possibility of being a repeat offender. I have also felt harassed when other people do these same things !

We are so attached to our gadgets that we find it impossible to live without them. A missing charger or a forgotten phone is enough to upset us.

I just can't figure out when and how did I trade my privacy for this constant tracking in the name of being reachable at all times. Like my friend Anu says, its akin to being tagged and tracked with an RFID.

One of these days I'll probably just throw my ... hold on, brb, my cell is ringing : )

Her absence makes my ...

... head go flounder?

Old adages and sayings are obviously seeded in a grain of truth. Credit must go to those who coined these phrases for they preserved bitter experiences in pithy statements. What else explains the existence of a handy proverb to describe any and every situation or emotion?

Having rambled my way through a pointless introduction, let me get to the crux of this post. Off late I have been missing her. As the caption implies, some things are not valued until you are deprived of them. Strictly speaking calling her a thing might not make sense, but lets not split hairs here.

There were many times when I felt annoyed with her appearance because I wanted to do something else. I used to yield reluctantly to her wish, but now I'm wiser that it was the right thing to do then. And just as I'm musing here about her, she beckons and I can't refuse. So off I go to collapse into her arms. Isn't she bewitching indeed, this beauty of sleep ? z z z z z