Day 45 : Loyalty

Loyalty. It is something that is always thrown on somebody's face just to remind them of that little favor that we've done for them, while feigning it was not a big deal, but now have come in cash in on that.

Loyalty. It is that is thrown on a spouses face when he/she is caught lewd texting a co-worker while we ourselves sniff and eyeball every attractive person of the opposite sex that we come across.

Loyalty. It is that thing which is shoved down your throat every time your favorite team plays, you've been rooting for that team for so long that right now it doesn't even makes any sense why you started in the first place.

Loyalty. It is that thing that your soon-to-be ex-bosses uses while pointing fingers at you when you put in your papers. While they themselves have switched at least half a dozen companies in a just as many years.

Loyalty. Is overrated.

There was a time when it really meant something to support and feel true to a cause. Or to a country or a creed or a person. There was a sense of right in it. A sense of honor of sticking to your faith in something. But as the sense of honor in anything lost its importance. So did loyalty.

Today loyalty is just used as a baton to lash you into submission. You didn't like this thing that we as a mob believe in? You are not loyal. You are a dishonorable piece of frog dung.

Well, the truth is I don't believe that anyone can be that loyal in this day and age. At least not to an entity that they don't see or touch or have to go home to each night. I believe the loyalty to the abstract belongings of the past era is gone. Today is more or less a barter system at best. People will be true to you only until they will see any profit in it.

Don't get me wrong. I do believe if you are loyal to something that is a good thing. If you have a rock solid faith like that in something then you are a much better person than I, and kudos to you.

I just believe that people have change today. Things don't happen to people just because they are entitled to it. Most of us have to work for it. Only the top 1% gets things handed to them on a silver platter. And people really aren't even loyal to them. The moment some genius figures out a way to rob these guys off of their riches, it is hello Mr. Richie Rich Turncoats.

I believe in action more than words. Somebody saying they are loyal to something or someone doesn't merit for a lot if they are busy badmouthing the same thing behind their backs. Actions count. If you are loyal to something. Stick to it. And before committing your faith to something, let it prove to you that it is ready to go the extra mile to earn that right.

Today, be loyal. But also let people know that they to earn it.

Day 44 : Indian World Cup V/s Indian Internet

Yesterday was devastating. It was actual quantifiable physical torture, watching us getting thwarted around like that.

(If you didn't already figure out what I meant by that you aren't from India, or you don't follow cricket. In either case, this post has nothing to offer you. Goodbye and a good day to you, kind ser.)

For others still reading this, man, did we ever feel more close to each other than this day? They say people who revel together are brothers till the night lasts, but those who weep together are bonded for life. And did we weep, and by word, did we bond.

The whole freaking country was having a fit of the nerves during those last few overs. When our MVP Captain Dhoni was in the pits fighting the Yellow Beasts single-handedly. He was like that last guy in every pulp war movie ever made, the guy who is so beaten and tired and torn bur still keeps standing up for another punch till the end with inspirational score playing in the background. He still kept on coming back to strike for more. And those last two sixes he beat into the stadium! I’d bet, all the womenfolk of in the country  went weak on their knees watching those shots and all the men proceeded to excitedly throw things on the walls in their TV room.

Wickets were falling around him up until that point. Rahane’d succumbed. Raina gone. Jadeja gone. Ashwin stuck around a while, but we all knew he will also surrender to the might of Johnson and Hazelwood soon enough. Our specialist batsmen couldn't face them, how could our bowlers?

But all that didn't actually worry us yet. We still had hope. We still had Dhoni. He was still standing, and until he was there all was well.

Then he got run out. The whole country's hearts skipped a couple of beats. The whole population was shell shocked and was praying to all the Gods they knew of, that one of the umpires show up and change the verdict. No one did. Dhoni has to go back to the stands.

He bowed down his head and walked briskly back to the dressing room never looking up. No one would. Emotions were too high as it is. I am surprised the audience did not storm into the stadium rioting.

What came next was more or less expected. The wickets fell fast in a blur. The match was done in just a few minutes. India had lost its World Championship.

People for obvious reasons were upset. The camera crew showed people hugging each other weeping. Old and young folks with tears flowing down their faces. People were sad and in shock. Heartbroken.

But then something else happened. Every mobile with internet connection was flooded with messages and memes and jokes and insults about the Team and the playing eleven. Not one was spared. Not even Dhoni for getting run out, for not running fast enough. Really guys?

By the day's end. My mobile gallery had nearly twice the pictures and audios it did when the day started. Not one of them good. Most of them poked fun at Kohli and his supposedly-girlfriend actress Anoushka, blaming them for the defeat. Sure Kohli not scoring enough contributed a lot to our failure that might be called logical. But why bring his personal life into it? Some of these audios even a bit too vulgar at that.

There were jokes being sent across by the hundreds. The frequency by which new once were being transferred is actually quite amazing. Is there actually some sad frustrated dork sitting in a basement somewhere churning out all of these? I mean how does somebody actually find the time to create all of these jokes? They really must feel they're not getting enough credit for this. Let me congratulate all the trolls creating this memes, good job. Losers.

We are all a generation of cattle brains. When we are even the least bit distraught or bothered with anything. Without thinking over it or mulling over a possible solution. We mob up and populate the Internet with lousy japes and snarly comments. We've become cheap and trashy with our thoughts and mentality. Everyone wants to be that smart ass that always has a one liner to break down the biggies to shame. Inferiority complex much, trolls?

I am distraught too. I am sad too. But then I also do realize this is a game. I do realize there has to be one winner and one loser. This time we lost, so what? We've been on a winning streak so far. Our players, all of them, had had a role to play in each of these past games that we've won. I only hope they prepare better for the next time, and perform to qualify for further glory.

And I also hope they and the people around them turn off their mobile data for the next few weeks.

For others.

Today, we will surely be spending a big part of my day deleting jokes and meme's from our devices. Bloody buggers.

Day 43 : The Biryani Party

I love chicken. Serve it to me fried, roasted, stripped, minced, baked, spiced, in gravy, in rice, in/on bread, in any way. And you will be my friend for life.

Today was a biryani party at work. Which really comes down a dozen guys joining a few tables together and gorging down as much rice and chicken that would feed a family in Africa for a week. Yes, we of IT be loco.

I am not actually writing this to describe what actually biryani is or give review of the restaurant that prepared it or tell you about the talk around the table today. This is actually a different sort of post.

During feasting down a bird, have you ever had your mind wander off to think about the life (that was) of the animal you are eating?

That really sounded insane, but I didn't know how else to construct that sentence.

During in the aforementioned party I was lavishly helping myself to generous servings of biryani rice and deliciously cooked chicken and sour salad, all of it washed down with cool cola. Sometime into it, while I was eating this especially sumptuous chicken leg, this voice comes up out of nowhere inside of my head and says, "This chicken tastes pompous."

Umm, what? Chicken are not supposed to taste pompous, is it? I mean, pompous is definitely a human trait as good as any. When did poultry presume to hold such an emotion? But seeing all that food in front of me, I just put a pin on that thought and  continued with my experiment on how much a human stomach can be filled without bursting open.

Now an couple of hours later, after five kilo of biryani and at least an equal number of chickens consumed between all of us. Here I am in my break and that queer thought comes to mind again. What if the chicken and the fishes and the lambs were to actually have a side narration going on while we are all consuming their body parts? ‘Suppose then our lives would be like them TV shows and teen movies; that have this side commentary going on and at the end of each episode they spurt out some big finale thoughts on everything that had happened in that session. Like in Scrubs, or Desperate Housewives. What, there was a time when I actually thought Eva Longoria was hot.

Also, I had this other friend when I was in Chennai; a life-long veggie. Each time we were having anything that used to have limbs before coming to our plates, she would soon leave our company and move on to sit with somebody else. Her complain was whenever she used to see us eating that stuff she'd visualize of all of that we were eating as actual parts of a living chicken. Well, I confess not a pleasant use of one's imagination. I should've just asked her to think of something/someone. Why not perhaps Eva Longoria?

Anyways. I guess it is just the meat-eaters guilt talking. Or just the big fat satisfied stomach juices playing tricks with my mind.

Apart from all that.

Today does seem like a odd but beautiful day.

Day 42 : You Are Your Own Best Friend

There always comes a time in a person's life when he comes to terms with what he/she really is. Sure there is a decent possibility that what you must be today would be a lot different than what you would end up to be tomorrow. We are all each day evolving and reacting to the things around us and happening to us. Our turmoil and joy never really stays the same year round and so neither does our personality.

If you were to look back at the person I was even last year and what I am now. You wouldn't really notice any stark differences. I'd still be the tall, big, loud guy who laughs at his own jokes. But once you get more than just skin deep, you will find a lot more things amiss. For instance, I abuse far too less now. People from my college used to have a wager on how long I could go on without abusing someone. I never lasted more than a couple of hours. But now my language has become so tame, I even use the respectful forms of all verbs in the sentences. I only abuse around a handful of people. The ones that I am really close to. Once you get a swear word out of my mouth; Dude, you're in the inner circle.

I am sure you'd find a lot many things in you as well that you feel has changed over time. And that is not essentially a bad thing. I guess changes are good. They keep you learning new things about yourself. You begin to recognize your strengths and weaknesses and also begin to gauge your thresholds when it comes to the many emotions your heart and mind is pounded with on a daily basis.

You see. One day, when the time is right. Your happiness and your sorrow will just come down to how much you have understood your own being. After all you are the only one who has the weapons to let yourself be hurt. And you are the only one who ever has had enough cause to keep you happy.

You will always have people around. People you love. People you hate. People you respect. People you look down upon. People you want to throw off the roof of Burj Khalifa. But in the end, none of them really matter do they?

You only live life with you yourself for company, and to hate. So why even try to understand anyone else thinks of you.

Today. Believe, trust, and love yourself. You deserve it.

Day 41 : Imagination

Have you noticed that when you sit silent for a few moments and you mind goes off wandering to some distant shore dreaming up things. How it always seem to climax into the past?

Our mind is an amazing thing, with powers beyond measure. We can live, die, procreate, decimate, grow, shrink, travel, anything inside our heads. There is nothing that we cannot do or create or visit inside our heads. With all of the permutations and combinations of universes and existences that we can imagine, almost all the time our mind always comes back to the past.

We are all anchored to our past. We dream of the future yes, but even when we dream the roots of that dream sprouts from our own pasts. We all want to be rich, because in past we have had felt the sting of poverty. We all want to look attractive, because in past all of us have felt a bit average compared to others around us. We all want to be intelligent, because in past we've been looked down upon as ignorant. We all have our own needs and desires. And nearly half of them are something that we had lacked in the past; or something that we imagined/known in the past.

I wish there was some way that we could just cut off the cord with the past so that our minds may simply go ahead and take us to the worlds unknown to us. Places and sights that is so strange for us that the very notion of them would be exhilarating.

For example, look at all the popular alien movies and books we see. All of them have limbs and eyes and consciousness. Whenever I imagine of alien existence, I think of some specie that do not have a body. They don't have need for eyes to see, nor any measure of right or wrong. They are alien creatures with alien needs and powers. Why should they ever even imagine being anything like us?

In a way, they reason the movies and books make do with such portrayal is not because they cannot think of weird beings. They do, a lot. But they still to sell their product better they feel they need to tone it down. In other words, they are saying the masses are not capable of imagining let alone accepting anything too out of the acceptable limits of unfamiliar. I feel that is sort of insulting.

There is this popular American show of the 70's called Cosmos. It is a semi-scientific documentary series about the universe telecast during the Space Race. It is quite good, some of the graphic might seem to campy by today's standard but honestly I find them a lot more open to imagination than a lot of other stuff we are shown or taught.

It is a popular belief ancient Indian scholars could calculate and predict eclipses, distances between the planetary objects and satellites etc just by looking at the stars. These scholars researched human body and universe out there by just imagining the whole way it functions. The whole science of astrology was an output of this imagery.

I love our strength of imagination a lot. I enjoy the sense of freedom that it gives us. I only dislike the way our imagination is limited by our known world.

Today, I am going to add a really weird alien creature to my horror story.

Day 40 : If Murder Was Legal

It must be a strange job to stand upon stage in front of hundreds of people and make jokes at them and insult them. No, strike that. It must be awesome!

I mean come on, who wouldn't want a job where you can just stand in front of people and poke fun at their expense, just plain insulting. Once you are on stage you can be as crude, racist or sexist as you like. And there is not really much anyone can do about it. People will even pay you for being able to be insulted. Sure, coming up with new materials every tour must be a lot of work, but I'd bet big bucks that the comedians get a kick out of the freedom to speak their mind being on the stage gives to them.

And some of them are real good at it too - George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Robin Williams, Eddie Murphy, Martin Lawrence, Joan Rivers, Kevin Hart. Some of these guys’ jokes are so good that you see it repeated in so many stages and copied at so many other comedians, you still end up laughing your butts off.

Off late I have been watching a lot of Louis C K. I think right now he is the smartest of comedians out there. He doesn't do the crazy antics of Dane Cook nor does he have to do the imitations like Jim Carrey. His sort of comedy is just figuring out the oddity in day to day life of ordinary people. And by the end of most of his jokes you say to yourself, "hey that’s exactly what I was thinking the other day!"

Today, I came upon this little clip - Louis C K - "If murder was legal"

Damn good logic from the guy. Yes a bit too out there, but come on who could say they haven't thought about it even once in their lives. We all yell out "I am going to kill you" at people all the time. Sure we might not mean to carry it out, but then given the chance are you sure you wouldn't?

Suppose, some time into the future, some genius Supreme Court judge rules that murder is no more a crime worth of capital punishment. Suppose all you get for murdering someone is a fine of 50 bucks and community service for 40 hours. Something in the lines of a person gets for littering. Do you think you would be so averse to laying hands on someone? After all, if we are even going by the news channels and media, it sure does seem to me that we human beings are a real violent species and we simply cannot resist this animal urge to resolve conflict by just words. We are just too hungry for the blood of a foe.

It was just target practice!

We are naturally violent creatures. Every time we are into a heated situation we have our fist clenched, heart pumping, and adrenaline soaring and ready to smack something. It is the only fact that if caught we'd face dire consequences that we don't really go through with it. Gun sales would've been off the charts. And the world would've been a much less populated place otherwise.

"You stole my sandwich?" BAM!

"You hate my shoes?" BAM!

"You made out with my wife?" BAM!

"You made out with my best friend?" BAM!

"You said this jean makes me look fat?" BAM!

"You said Christopher Nolan sucks?" BAM!

I mean we would be just murdering off people just to get accepted by the people around us. Now when in high school you have to be a big sports guy or a genius to be recognized by the guys. In this particular future the path of imitation would be littered with dead bodies.

In the end of the joke, Louis did go on to say he got carried away to the dark end. I guess I did as well. See, told ya, we all are a bunch of nut cases just not yet discovered by the authorities. And I guess it just the little things like The Law that is actually keeping just us all away from them straight jackets.

Today, I think I will have to stop reading them dark novels and pick up something cheerful for a change. Harry Potter where art thou?

Day 39 : The Wicker Man

Remember my last post? How I was wishing and/or praying for less hours in office. Apparently that was something the universe’s still not ready to grant me. Half my weekend was spent in office! As would be for anyone who's had to work on weekends, I did not enjoy it one bit.

So, me having only the Sunday at my disposal, did what any (lazy) genius would do watching movies on laptop all day. And anyone who knows me and my relationship would've already guessed how that goes. Me spending a day with movies usually is like watching a dozen of them back to back, cocooned in my bed, potato chips all around me, with the speakers on high volume.

And since I am on a horror fix of late, the loud volume jumps that these movies have is not at all appreciated by my folks. But well, what can I do. Jump scares are the only way James Wan knows how to scare people. That, and new houses, and creepy looking dummies.

The gem of this specific spree was undoubtedly The Wicker Man. A really, really, twisted story of Celtic paganism versus Christianity. Coupled with  some grand storytelling!

It stars Christopher Lee, the British white haired villain you've seen a lot of movies but never really noticed enough to learn his name. And that's about it. Every other actor in the movie was largely unknown to me. But their performance was so good that I've now goggled up most of them. And have even checked up on some scenes from a cult TV show that hero starred in. I especially liked Woodward and Britt. Don't worry; they are not names you'd recognize right away either.

The movie plot seemed a lot like a routine B-movie story line. A guy comes to a new place, there is someone missing, a whole town gives him a cold shoulder, he sees weird things happening all around him, in the end he solves the big mystery behind the smallfolk’s behavior, and inevitably the unexpected twist during climax.

All that was pretty ordinary, but the way it was all detailed out for the audience was quite extraordinary. The whole thing flows on without a single dull moment. Every frame is utilized to give you more idea of what the Summerisle Island stands for and of crazy people living there. Some of the harbor-folk’s dialogues were pretty incomprehensible for me. But other than that I have no complains about anything in the movie.

I even liked the songs in the movie. And that is rare. The only musical I last appreciated was the Sound of Music and that only because it had the Plummer and Andrews’s combination in it. I despised the high school cheerleader musical fad that happened a few years back. (Yuck).

The end of the movie has a song as well. It is an actual hymn of the sea-faring folks sung by the islanders and also has the hero/policeman saying a psalm. This scene has live animals put to fire. Human being put ablaze. Crazed pagan worshippers yelling, and the hero yelling back threatening words from the Bible. And it has end shot with the setting sun seen shining through the pyre and flames roasting all of those within the wicker man. You cannot hope for a better end for a classic horror movie.

Love it!

Today, I am starting my first horror story.