Hello Again World

Oh sweet reader. At long last and after many trials and much pointless tribulation it has come to pass. The purveyor of this tiny bit of digital domain has moved on to graze on the other side. You don't have to cross a mighty ocean, a broad river or even a tiny brook to get to him. Nay, all you need do is click here. Rejoice o' reader of this long standing bit of digital daftness for Mr. FortyOne now lives on live journal. Fare thee well blogger.com, one of Le Google's most disappointing creation to date.

Blogger is Spent

Salutations! After having held out a long long time I am now seriously comtemplating the thought of moving my dear dirty thoughts to livejournal. Yes, that's right dear 2.5 readers, I am thinking of making a move to LJ. In no particular order, following are the pretexts I shall be using for my move:

• all my friends are on zee elle jay
• the comment system on blogger sucketh like stinky dog hindquarters. LJ offers forum like threaded goodness. Mmmmmmmmm...
• LJ is now almost as customisable as ye blogspot. I can carry mein beloved layout with me.
• I can turn up on people's friend pages and annoy them all I want
• LJ offers more programming goodness. I get to write cool tools that only I use!

Thats all I can think of for now. I promise you that any serious comments on the matter will be given due consideration. Which is to say they will be completely ignored. Also, disclaimer time, I might just end up being lazy and not do this. Anybody who pulls me up for not doing this doesn't know me well enough to pull me up for not doing anything.

The Life and Times of One Mister Forty One

So I notice that these blog posts are becoming kind of a weekly thing. Don't think this is some sort of routine though. I still haven't completely defined that word for myself. The last post ended with me having a puncture. Because I have nothing substantial to do at the moment I shall regale you with what happened next. Maybe the tepidity of my life will inspire you to live yours more interestingly.

For the record, that's a picture of my new car. Not a very good picture mind you, but notice how good it looks even in that bad picture. I am smitten. The next day I couldn't really go get the puncture fixed. It was wednesday you see, and apparently all the markets in my area stay closed on that day. You wouldn't believe how depressed a flat tyre can make you feel. You wouldn't believe it until it happened to your brand new car. Anyway, thursday evening I get back home and promptly bully the local tyre-wallah into coming down to my house with a pressure jack. The tyre detached, we go down to his workshop and he hands me a 3-inch screw that has apparently travelled right through the tyre tube. Screwed by a screw. The irony in the air is so palpable I could churn it into buttermilk. As I contemplate the screw my good friend the puncture guy silently labors away at fixing my tyre. His business concluded, I pay him and we troop down to my place to re-install the tyre. That done, profuse thanks are issued and much admiration/information concerning the new car exchanged. He gives me his views on the new car and kindly tells me that the model I bought is probably going to be phased out soon. I (not so kindly) tell him that when he has his own money, maybe he can buy the "new" model and park it up his driveway. As I walk into the house I can't help but wonder whether telling the guy from the local workshop that I own a new car and then showing him its location might have been a good idea. Dissing his opinion on my purchase might even have kindled hatred in his heart for my kind soul. Yes, I am paranoid. No, I don't trust people.

The next morning my dad tells that the tyre's gone flat again. I am, for lack of a better word, bamboozled! There and then, I decide to wage a personal jehad against the bloody workshop wallah. Can't believe I called him my good friend in the last paragraph. Vengeance must be extracted. Knowing that I'll get back home late in the evening I ask my father to give him hell and let him know that this will not go unpunished. The wrath of a thousand disgruntled accent owners be upon him! I shall have my revenge.

I come back home a bit tipsy the next morning. The fact that I've had about 8 pints of beer doesn't stop me checking the tyre for non-flatness. True to his promise, my father has gotten it fixed. On second thoughts though, maybe getting down on my knees and actually touching the tyre was a bit too much checking. I might even have yelled out an impromptu hallelujah. The people who dropped me off sure seemed to think that (or maybe they didn't see it at all). Nevertheless, I go to sleep a sound, happy and thoroughly drunk man.

The next day I am rudely awoken by my phone. I promised to meet a friend who's here from out of town. We meet up, beer is drunk and KFC is had. Car showing off commences and results in rides (although no drives) offered by myself and accepted by others. Much happiness. No flat tyres and zero smoking bonnets make the world a nicer, happier place. I drive home preparing for a life-changing (or should I say life-threatening) moment that is soon to come: Pun23's engagement party. More on that in the next post because its 3.10am on a Sunday morning. I really shouldn't make that promise though. It is quite likely I won't manage to get anything out for a long time. But hey, I've got no editor and you've got plenty of time to waste. Do I look bothered?

Choice

Choice can be a good thing. Like when you walk into a bar or a pub and find 30 different kinds of beer on tap. Choice can also be a bad thing. Like when you order your favourite drink off the menu of a restaurant knowing full well that they're going to come back with "It's not available at the moment sir." Seriously, what is it with Delhi restaurants and the lack of Guinness? (On that note, this has to be my favorite Guiness commercial) Delhi needs more choice in beer. I'm tired of Kingfisher and Sandpiper. I can't stand the insipid, uninspiring Castle lager. No, I will not drink any of the extra strong types! Excise department, beer barons of the world, get to it!

Buying a car used to be an easy thing to do. You made sure you could afford it and then you went down the closest Maruti dealership and picked out your favourite color. If you were middle-class you ended up with a Maruti 800. The slightly upper middle-class got themselves a Zen and the hoity toity types could go for the Maruti "Esteem".

Well those days are gone. Choice and car loans have done away with the simple process I just described. Now there's more than one car for every budget type, sometimes from the same manufacturer. And then there are the variants for each car. These vary by the size of the engine, the type of the engine (diesel or petrol), even the number of valves in the engine! For some reason, the perfect package is always a breath away from what you can afford. Of course, with the availability of car loans, what you can afford isn't exactly easy to decide either.

Having overcome all these obstacles I finally managed to buy myself a car. Its a Hyundai Accent. Black. The cheapest model they had. I had to play deaf and blind to various people at various times to finally be able to settle on this one car. I'm sure they all had my best interests at heart. But I had to make a choice damm it! And this is what I want. As I drove into the petrol pump hailed by a chorus of hurrahs and congratulations (okay, so it was just that one guy) a couple of idiots chose the opportune moment to show me a few teeny tiny (read 3 cms. exactly) scratches on the front fender. Thank you, you frigging idiots. For your next act, why don't you cut each other's heads off Daniel Pearle style.

I'm cool though. I'm the cool customer who bought the black accent. Of course the old dog (my Maruti 800) needed to be driven home too. As I drive home ye olde battered jalopy (with my dad driving the spanking new acquisition) the poor old thing croaks. No, croaks isn't a good enough word. It smokes. Plumes of grey wispy stuff spew out of the sides of the hood. So I stop, work up the courage to open up the bonnet and am greeted by some more of the aforementioned smoke. I figure all it needs is some water. Its 44 degrees, I know I need water, so it must too. My dad parks and walks back to take a look. We agree on my brilliant prognosis.

Just then, Mr. Arsehole Mechanic From Race Car Care stops by on his crap ass scooter with half an engine and tells us that no, it doesn't need water. What it needs is the fan hardwired. And he promptly proceeds to do the same. When you're hot and sweaty, idiots look intelligent. Must be some sort of mirage effect. We pay him and he promply "scoots" off. I start the engine, put the jalopy into first and give it a little gas. It moves forward exactly 6 inches and promptly dies. Three more attempts yield another few feet. Of course, home being a good 6 kms. away doesn't help much. In comes another mechanic (I still think this was some sort of conspiracy). This one doesn't even posess engined transportation. No, he's on a bicycle. This time I am adamant that we feed the poor old thing (the car you idiot!) some water. So we do, and after a bit of fiddling on the unmotorized mechanic's part it appears to break the 2 meter barrier. Huzzah! We're off and home. I miss an office party. No worries. I'm still cool. In a sweltering 40 degrees sort of way.

Today, I drove my new car to the office. Much showing off. As much showing off as you can do in a dimly lit basement garage that is. I reach home driving more carefully than usual. Taking the longest route possible just so I can avoid the rowdy traffic. Get home. Dad shows up and says he sees a puncture. I go down and look and there is indeed a distinct flattening on one of the circular rubber appendages. Still cool. In a must get the puncture fixed, bridgestone is crap, japs must die sort of way.

Random Recollections

This is exactly what the title says its going to be so if you're looking for structure, I suggest you navigate away now. Right, that said, there's a lot of blogworthy stuff I've been going through. None of it deserves its own post though. Okay, so most of it is only blog worthy to me. It is my blog though. You still here? Remember what I said about structure? You have been warned. Twice.

They've been showing Anne Heche (people really shouldn't have the sort of surnames you have to google to get right) movies on TV the past couple of nights. That makes me happy. Yes, I know she's a lesbian. But I heard somewhere that she veers between a lesbian and a bisexual. Thats plenty for me. I won't even confirm that rumor lest it turn out to be exactly that, a rumour. Anyway, as you can probably tell from this bit, I really like Anne Heche. I still can't figure out how she manages to make that raspy (and extremely stimulating) voice out of that petite frame of hers. To top all that, she's a very talented actress. Ahh...yes, she is definitely on my people I like list.

Air India has the best food inflight. That is if you're an Indian. If you're not, then you're royally screwed. I suggest packing sandwiches and wafers. The booze is decent though, even in economy. The service overall is abysmal. They've got planes they bought/leased from some airline in Korea flying on the Delhi-London-NY route! Now you might think thats not so bad, except the Exit signs are in English and Korean and the plane's inflight entertainment system consists of a projector mounted up front. Exactly like one of those video coach volvos you get these days. Of course this is an economy seat view we're talking about.

Things actually might be marginally better in first class. And boy do they let you know you're in economy. The tattered curtain separating economy from first has a little piece of tissue paper stuck to it that says "First Class"! Heh, right, of course. Did I mention the food was great? Yes, right, keep saying that to yourself while you're checking in, staying at an airport hotel over a 12-hour delay and while you wait 25 minutes for a glass of water. Oh, and while you sit in the plane for an hour waiting for the more important flights to take off. On IGI airport! The home of Air India. Hurray for being served by government babus while flying. I just hope they outsourced the piloting to a private company or something :)

Okay, enough ranting. I can see Anne on screen and she does look great. Dammit I'm in love with this woman, despite a publicly espoused anti-blonde stance (whatever that means). I should tell you that when the 12 hour late Air India flight landed in Delhi the lady with the mike announced that it was 41 minutes past 8. Those in the know will understand why I found myself sniggering away like a lunatic. Those not in the know probably think I am a lunatic. But thats a risk I take everytime I step out of the confines of my home, so thats alright. You can still navigate away you know. I haven't figured out yet how to use Javascript to hold a person in place. Not yet. Oh, and she goes braless a lot. Anne Heche I mean. I'm sorry, I can't help but comment on what I see. Women's lib be damned (I do not live at my home and my parents don't know who I am. I am not Arun. Otherwise known as !Arun).

Delhi's gone mall crazy. I say that with the experience of a man who's been thrown out of (translated as politely refused) parking at 3 parking lots on a single Sunday night. Its so strange going into a mall, seeing it full and yet seeing all the shops empty. About 20% of the shops haven't even opened yet. Right now, Delhiites are in the bit in mall-goer evolution where everybody just goes to the mall in the evening to take their evening walk. On sundays, going to the mall is the equivalent of heading to India Gate in our times (yes, I am old enough to use the expression "our times" now. You got a problem with that??). I wonder how long it'll take to get to the time when the only people who hang around malls late on a sunday are mall rats. My guess is about a couple of years. But then it might not actually happen at all. Right, I'm done worrying about that.

If you're still here and haven't found what you came looking for there's no point blaming me for it. I covered my hairy butt with a disclaimer. Its 1.44am in the morning and I have work tomorrow. So go away and let me get my beauty sleep (hey, quit sniggering!).

Bastard! Bastard! Bastard!

Note the number of comments: http://www.myextralife.com/strips/05-08-2006.jpg

One of those things

You live, you love, you hurt and you move on
You go through each day hoping its the best one
But you know you don't want to live through your best day yet
Not while you're alone
not until someone you want to have met
has had the chance to change your life

Introspection is one of those things that seems very meaningful in a metaphysical sense, but probably isn't. You think about your life, the things you've done. You think you're sorting through your feelings and trying to understand why things in your life are the way they are. Then destiny/fate/god comes along and smashes your sand castle to smithereens and you wonder for an instant: was all the time you spent analysing your life worth it? Still, the next time you're alone and in a reflective mood, you can't help but go over the previous day, week or year thinking about your friends, family, that girl in the office, your last assignment or your job.

With so many of us having so much to think and reflect over, I sometimes wonder how we even manage to get on with our lives. But get on we do. Bumping into each other every day, sometimes acknowledging and at other times ignoring each other's presence. Evaluating and sizing each other up every instant based on our own peculiar criteria. And then going back home to do it some more. In the middle of all this critical social evaluation sometimes, just sometimes, a couple of people will get close enough to each other so that they will begin to share their introspection of life. They will begin to more than talk to each other. They will share thoughts, hopes and possibly, the rest of their lives. Eventually, it'll become what the rest of us know as love. It must be a great feeling, because it looks like a great feeling when you get to observe it up close. And when people like that who you know and love decide to stay with each other for the rest of their life, its a great feeling to know that somehow, somewhere, knowingly or unknowingly, you might have had a part to play in it.

Can't say I don't feel just a little tinge of envy. But thats also how I know it must be a good thing to have. I also feel happiness, incredible joy at being witness to something that doesn't happen very often. So this is my tribute to my friends, and to something that makes an atheist want to believe in miracles. You know who you are. Congratulations, and good luck on your new journey.