Wow!! it feels weird visiting one's own blog after a really long time. I feel like an intruder here. But we've both come a long way..and frankly, I am surprised this blog survived for as long as it did.

Reading my previous blogs made me want to write again..if for nothing else than just to get my creative juices flowing again. And who knows, maybe the affair would last longer this time...

This blog had been gathering dust for a very very long time now. And I had really given up on it, never finding the right occasion or the setting to start writing again. Not even life-changing events could move me into writing. What did finally, was an invigorating meeting with my childhood friends.
I spent some quality time with two of my most dear childhood friends, A & S. We had lunch together, then watched a delightful dark Brit comedy called 'Death at a funeral'. After the movie we went to Costa Coffee, and recalled our childhood days over some blue berry mousse and chocolate twist.
It was the most satisfying, and enjoyable day-outs that I've had in a very long while.

The Shop Around The Corner

Its 11.19 am on a Monday morning.
I take a look around to find all my colleagues deeply engrossed in their work. Sure, after a long weekend, its a reluctant trudge back to work, but they are getting there.

Here I am, trying desperately to whip up a post, and in the process, remove a writer's block that set in last year, while Bryan Adams is screaming 18 till I die in my ears.
I too, would have been tapping away at my keyboard, had it not been for a extremely steadfast ennui. Last Thursday, work was slow in anticipation of a long weekend. Today, my work-related alacrity does not want to come out of the duvet. Earning a living can be quite a pain. Its just the thought of the money that keeps me going.

You've Got Mail -- the movie, must also take some blame for inflicting such lethargy on me. Everytime I watch it, I long to be in New York. Not the new-age Manhattan-maniac New York mind you. What I want to experience is the laid-back quality of life that the fim portrays. I know its blaspemous to associate any languidness with the Big Apple, but I'm very much taken by Kathleen's way of life. So please don't jump at my throat, I have no inclination to fight back.
Coming back to Kathleen, I love the way she walks to work everyday, with a Starbucks coffee cup in her hand. Not a worry about being late for work, neither for running into mood-altering heavy traffic jams.
My favourite scene is the one where she reaches her shop, only to exclaim loudly to her colleague, ''What a lovely day! Isn't it a lovely day?!'', followed by ''Don't you just love New York in fall?''
Her quaint little bookshop is almost to-die-for. The exposed brick walls, the light-coloured tables and chairs, and last but not the least, the books make the entire setting pretty and compelling. There's another scene in the movie where Kathleen is trying to untangle Christmas lights. I've never seen prettier lights.

There is no discerning point in this blog. I love this movie, and as is obvious, am very much taken by Kathleen and her shop, I only wanted to put my feelings in black-and-white.

Travel travails

The stupid autowallahs have become the bane of my existence. Not a single day goes by when I don't get into an argument with them - over money, the route, it's always either of the two irritating matters that make me hate these idiots more than anything else.
So car it is for me. Coz the other option - chartered buses - is almost as annoying. I'd always associated chartered buses with civilised office-going janta, aunty-uncles who were well-versed with etiquettes of travelling together. I should have known better, coz cheaper it might be, it is only second to blueline/DTC buses as far as the crowds go.
I once had an idiot sit next to me...the bugger boarded the bus while it was still waiting to move out of the compound, there were plenty of seats but where did the asshole have to come and sit, right next to me. Put off as I was by that, I forgot about it the next instant. In the course of the journey, this 40–50-something jerk kept pushing against my arm. Needless to say that I was seething with anger. After repeated scowling meant solely for him and even telling him in so many words to sit properly, did he get the message.
And you know what, women travellers shouldn't get any benefit of doubt either. They are not like the OMG-I'm-the-oppressed-babe-in-the-woods kind of traveller. They just want complete and absolute control of the buses they're travelling in. They're the queens of harassment.
They keep their bags on the seats, refuse to remove it to make space for another harried co-passenger. They'll perch themselves in a way, you'd thank your starts you didn't get a seat next to them. And by far the most irritating habit, they'll keep fidgeting. I mean, really, these women just can't sit straight for the life in them!
I'll just drive down....

Life's like THAT!

Leisure

What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
- William Henry Davies
(1871-1940)

For once, I'm happy to say that I'm getting time for all of that and more. The mad rush that life's been the past two years, it seems as if now I'm sailing..watching all the scenery glide by me. And it's a terrific feeling!
I once watched a movie called Wimbledon, where the protagonist says ''all my life, I thought my life would come to an end if I stopped playing. But I was wrong, since it only began when I stoppped'' . I'm afraid I thought pretty much the same. I always thought journalism was my life, that if I stopped pursuing the profession, I would be a nobody. My job was, to a great extent, my identity. Then one fine day, I quit.
I had had enough. I didn't even think twice. Didn't spare a thought to my 'career'. All I craved for was some semblence of sanity in my life. I was tired to being at work mentally, even when I was out of it. Of my heart stopping momentarily when ever I saw 'Office' flashing on my phone.
And most of all, I was sickened by this terrible sense of foreboding that clung to me as soon as I pushed open the doors of my office building.

If there was ever a piece of advice that I passed on to the younger generations, it would be to never give unnecessary credence to your work. Work is a part of life, not your life.

My present workplace is a warm, friendly place. There lot of bonhomie among employees, a concept I never saw at my previous workplace. So much so, that the first day, I was bewildered.

And the work moves at a relaxed pace. There are deadlines alright, but you don't have to kill yourself to meet then. Which however, doesn't mean that they are relaxable, only that you're given the right amount of time and environment to meet them.

For those who've known me. I think it should suffice to say that I look forward to going to work each morning.

Wedding Blues!

I've been getting this rather disturbing feeling off late. I often feel that I don't want to get married. Sometimes, I ask myself what the heck have I landed myself into, and wouldn't I be better off without it? Is it normal? Are they bridal jitters or something? I don't know. But I often feel this way, ever since I got engaged that it. And I'd be damned if I say it aloud!
The very idea of going and staying at someone else's house make me nervous. I've never quite appreciated the concept, to be very honest. Several times my friends would try and organise this pyjama party of sorts, where they said we'd eat, chat, bitch and bitch some more. I'm always game for such enriching activity, only I don't want to spend the night at someone's place and do it. So, I'd carefully sidestep the issue, without (bless my soul!) offending any of my friends. My profession only helped matters, since there was always something or the other happening.
So, like I was saying, I would be utterly, completely, totally uncomfortable at someone else's house. And to think that I'd be living at their place for good. I shudder at the mere thought!
Also, I'm somewhat of an introvert, so that basically translates into me sitting in a corner and well, just sitting and watching others go about their activities. I'd be hesitant to move from one room to another, to stand in front of my in-laws or other relatives, God help me if I'm needed to open my mouth to say something. I'd even think 100 times before using their loo!
Plus, I've never stayed away from my parents. And I don't trust others easily. So, you see, all the ingredients for making my stay at my husband's place uncomfortale beyond belief.
My friends would argue that since my fiance is in the armed forces, I'd be moving around with him, and wouldn't have to stay with my in-laws.
But, I want to point out to them that it's only another cause for concern for me. I know that I'll be terribly homesick, would cry at the smallest of things and would want to rush back home. my home, that it.
It makes me teary-eyed right now, as I write this post to think of what the future has in store for me. And you can see how ill-prepared I am.
So it makes me wonder why was I so thrilled when I got engaged. May be it was because it sort of made our relationship official. or maybe, maybe I was just excited at the idea of being a married woman, married to someone I love. Whatever it was, I don't seem to want it much now. Oh! how I wish I could turn time back **sigh**

You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours

It's that time of the year again. How many times me and another colleague would have rated this one as the most boring, banal intros for a news story. It's the most befitting one in the current situation though. After all, it's time for appraisals. Wow, that was achieved with some flourish, I wish I could display the same amount of alacrity in filling up the appraisal forms. A kind-of-cute HR guy (I wonder if he was married...*sigh*) took us through a long and tedious process of what was their idea of fair judgment. I call it been there, done that...to no avail. No, the process hasn't filled me with any sort of dread, (I'm not a workshirker), but with a deep sense of cynicism. What's the bloody point?
To be absolutely fair, I and only I know the kind of commitment I have for my work. And the honesty with which I do it. Despite everything. My superior (to borrow a word from the cute HR guy's lexicon), really doesn't have an inkling of what I do and how I do it.
So, now the question is, how would he appraise me? Obviously, he'd find me disappointingly short of his expectations (if any). Yeah, this does sound like my word against his. So what's the solution? And the point for this post?
See, the solution is nothing. That I would get a less-than-flattering increment, that is if I get any, is for sure.
The point of this post, which I have been very inarticulate in making, is that I'm angry and disappointed at this system. A process where word of people telling absolute lies about their work and themselves, is taken as the gospel truth. Where people like me will probably die without a whimper.
But what I hate the most about this state-of-affairs is my inability to do anything about it.
And if you are wondering about the title of the post, it's what some people who will get an increment, do here.