Giggles, Guffaws, Beer and Obama-mania.

Webcomic courtesy xkcd.

Jokes apart, I'm a big fan. I'm still completely and rapturously in awe of Obama. And considering a man who can be a talker as smooth as THIS, for the love of brilliant oratory(if nothing else), allow him the odd foot-in-mouth for once!

What's more? The president settles a scandal over jugs of ale!
I mean, this just escapes comprehension. The Harvard professor(Mr. Gates) , the cop(Mr. Crowley) and the Prez himself, bonding over beer like a bunch of college jocks, in all their post-minor-fist-fight glory. In the rose garden at the White House. That, my friends, is something truly amazing.

All that glitters...

and that which glows.
trinklets, threads, beads.
and memories.
some collected, some received.

Sometimes, I Think.

That libertarians exist in power only so that anarchists and authoritarians can peacefully bludgeon each other to death.

Governance is a pitiful excuse for ordered chaos.
Yes, I know that's an oxymoron.

No wonder.

Word of the Day.

apocryphal \uh-POK-ruh-fuhl\, adjective:

1. (Bible) Pertaining to the Apocrypha.
2. Not canonical. Hence: Of doubtful authority or authenticity; equivocal; fictitious; spurious; false.

Apocryphal ultimately derives from Greek apokruphos, "hidden (hence, spurious)," from apokruptein, "to hide away," from apo-, "away, from" + kruptein, "to hide."

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Days like these convince me, that Dictionary.com daily subscriptions are far more prophetic than the horoscope.

Because...

It's raining. Water falling on leaves, on soil, on the ground.. on everything that is and everything that can be. And the sound of it(and the scent) is so thrilling, it's surprising.

Nature does such wonderful things to the senses sometimes.

And this is the most beautiful thing I've come across in ages :

Amazing. In ways far more than one.

Truth Hurts?

"Parliamentarians on Wednesday demanded that TV reality show Sach Ka Saamna be banned, terming its content as against Indian values and morality."
Source : India Today

"NEW DELHI: Hours after the furor in Rajya Sabha over the reality show 'Sach Ka Saamna' broadcast by Star Plus, the government on Wednesday issued a show cause notice to the TV channel.
Source : The Times Of India

The TV show in question is an Indian spin-off of the American one "The Moment of Truth". It features participants being hooked up to a polygraph machine and asked questions about their lives, which may vary from being slightly embarrassing to highly controversial. And as long as their answers tally with the results of the lie-detector test, they move on to win greater sums of money. So yes, there have been disclosures tantamount to people admitting to peeing in a public swimming pool and cheating on their spouses. Ordinary people, that are exactly what our society is made of.

By no means do I think the show deserves applause. I personally hold the opinion that this trend of large-scale dirty-laundry washing is just plain tacky. But this is what this multi-million dollar industry of reality TV churns all the moolah out of. Voyeurism sells. Period.

And this is what society is about. People making personal choices regarding their lifestyle. And instead of cowering under a guise of dutiful adherence to what is considered "decent", if they have it in them to unapologetically speak about it, then so be it. No one has any business telling them what they should or should not do. It's a free country.

Having said that, I wonder what caused Mr. Maini to file a public interest litigation in this regard. Does he really think that a shroud of feigned sanctimony does not amount to hypocrisy? Would he rather have people pretend to be pious little heaps of virtuous jackshit, while their days and nights remain tales of culpable damnation? Or rather, what he likes to call "culpable damnation" in his view of things. Is the concept of Indian morality so vague and non-existent, that it needs pretense to support itself? Is it so fragile that they can't hold its own in the face of true-to-life fact?

The way I see it, any purported sense of values that completely excludes facts of urban existence is, in effect, nothing more than play-act. So, what character do you want to be?

These Lives of Quiet Desperation.

My words are never found
where you like to look for them.
But in the 20 inches
of sparks and smoke in between.

Draped on bare walls,
spilled on the red carpet.
Or perhaps in your black coffee,
that tasted like Quinine.

Mute, and silent.
My words still hang in the air.
Though they would rather
be wrapped around you,
than nestle in melancholy.

You ask me why
I do not speak.
My silence is awkward,
jarring, and indiscreet.

And yet those words of mine,
will still wish upon a lost cause.
That you grasp them soon,
and stay.

I Am a BEETROOT.

Yep, right there. Neck-deep in ****.

I'm growing roots. Sitting right in front of my computer all day, I'm turning into one of those tuberous vegetables that grow neck-deep in the ground. They get food and water staying right where the are, never moving an inch. That's the life I lead these days. The only difference being that the beads of sweat that sprout on my forehead aren't quite indicative of transpiration. They are the result of having spent all night staring at source-codes and being unable to trace the single error that causes a script to crash repeatedly. Never before have I felt more like a computer-geek-moron. Fifth semester is already getting to me. Which is bad, because it hasn't even started yet.

To add to the idiocy of the situation, my gmail theme is the one that displays an animated view of the sky, depending on location. So, that is how I know whether it's bright and sunny or raining cats, dogs and cows outside. Yesterday, there was a rather formidable-looking thunderbolt sprawled across the mailbox. Trees were getting uprooted right outside my house. Today, gmail looks like tufts of white cotton candy floating in blue. I reckon, the city must be on fire. Isn't technology just awesome?
*sigh*

I Think

There is something to be said
about the finality
of a small black dot.

And the
continuity of three...

Amusing,
that hope comes in shapes
of bent teardrops.
(,)
Not of beginnings
and not of ends.
Separating instances of many,
and mildly disfigured sentiments.

Try Twenty.

I turn 20 tomorrow. For someone who hit the proverbial quarter-life crisis at a ripe old age of 17, I'm quite looking forward to the event.

Because everything comes with a best-before date. Everything is stagnating.
This is going to be me starting over. New people, new places, new paradigms, new beginnings... many ends.

Tonight, at midnight, I know that I will be smiling. With the knowledge that there is one single fact that makes be über-happy.
Two decades on, still living sans regrets. And I intend to keep it that way.

Happy Birthday to me.
Cheers.

Approximation. Not Quite.

These almosts.. I think,
have a knack for quiet.
I tell you, they are muted taciturns.
Unkind, almost.

The fault, I believe
is not their own.
Disappointment, after all
was never clamorous.
Settles in melancholy,
breeds in silence.

It rained today.
Well, it almost did.
The sky did turn gray.
Winds did blow.
Birds did crow.

But that's the thing about almosts.
Almosts and half-promises.
Uncertain. Dangling in between..
of is and isn'ts,
of have and have-nots.
And among losses,
of an entirely different sort.

Smoke-Signal or Fortune-Cookie?

You were one of those pretty little things. Ones that occur in nature only by sheer accident. Yes, you were astoundingly pretty. With bright innocuous eyes that sparkled like an onyx, glistening hair that made people stare open-mouthed. You looked like you were carved out of marble. You inspired awe.. or jealousy. Mostly both. And as is the norm de rigueur, your prettiness was your first class ticket into the charmed circle of manicures and eyelash curlers. Tomes of knowledge were replaced by Cosmo, and friends by giggle-brigades and disposable boyfriends.

I am merely an observer, and I choose to view from a distance. But I feel sorry for strayed, lost souls, even though a part of me is convinced that their own stupidity called for it. And now that I am convinced that you have acquired dysmorphia and no longer have any concept whatsoever of how you are perceived by others, there is something I think you should know. The cakes of makeup, bleached hair and mere inches of clothing make you look like a trampy transvestite. And none of the farcical dolts you surround yourself with, will ever have the heart to tell you that.

Sad. Because you really were very pretty.
Beauty is wasted in the most distasteful of manners. Sheesh!

A Song For The Occasion.

Because Morrison was a great man. And because I find myself wishing I had been a part of the era, when he was still alive and kicking. (Quite literally, considering the on-stage histrionics. The man wasn't called Dionysus for nothing.) But alas! Even my mom was a young tyke of 8 when he died. And would never have heard of him, had it not been for the errant juvie daughter born about 2 decades later. And I feel sorry that there just isn't enough audio-visual media documenting him.

So, he had an IQ of 149. Sang in baritone. He wrote absurdly profound poetry, spoke like an erudite philosopher, and walked like he ruled the world. He lived to taste the heights of success, and yet adopted a self-destructive lifestyle. It fascinates me. Having been the sort to deride celeb-monomania in the most explicitly graceless of terms, I still speak of Morrison in hushed, reverential tones.

“People are afraid of themselves, of their own reality; their feelings most of all. People talk about how great love is, but that's bullshit. Love hurts. Feelings are disturbing. People are taught that pain is evil and dangerous. How can they deal with love if they're afraid to feel? Pain is meant to wake us up. People try to hide their pain. But they're wrong. Pain is something to carry, like a radio. You feel your strength in the experience of pain. It's all in how you carry it. That's what matters. Pain is a feeling. Your feelings are a part of you. Your own reality. If you feel ashamed of them, and hide them, you're letting society destroy your reality. You should stand up for your right to feel your pain.”

-James Douglas Morrison

Yeah yeah.. I'm a borderline masochist.
But what this man achieved, my friends, is as close to immortality as it gets. Period.

Eternal Sunshine of the Inscrutable Mind.

"Blessed are the forgetful: for they get the better.. even of their blunders." -Friedrich Nietzsche

Needless to say, I love the movie.

Summer Loves.

Owing to the daily perils that come as a part of the existence of an engineering student(to call it "life" would be most unforgivable) , I have had to sacrifice a great, torrid romance. The stuff that dreams are made of. Drama, thrill, ceaseless obsession, smiles, tears, sleepless nights.. all of it. But having known a love so complete, and having to go without it, is not easy. It's like something is missing. Something indispensable. Irreplaceable.

And now that summer is here, and what we techies get as an excuse for a vacation is on, I am going back to what still waits for me. In the face of nefarious, abominable evils such as summer training to be completed, and massive projects to be coded.. I will now have what I've yearned for, all this while.

I will read like there's no tomorrow. Like I'm a crazed lunatic. Like I'm a starved piece of trifle, and have just acquired a decade's supply of butter chicken. And I will know bliss. Amen.

P.S. The pretty things you can see in the picture, were what I brought home today. Original, pirated, second-hand, brand new. But then, I've always had a fascination for the "older" ones. *wink* Nothing beats the appeal of a slightly aged book. The musty, woody scent. The paper that gets a little darker at the edges. The delicate fraying. The tiny history it has of its own. There is much love to be found in this tiny,skewed world.