Just Friends

Guy and Girl meet. Become "friends". Go out. Movies. Dinners. Parties. Drives. Talks. Gifts. Have 'moments'. Guy proposes. Girl rejects. Guy is perplexed. Girl is annoyed.

I can count, off the top of my head, at least twenty cases of this syndrome that I have been witness to. With a few variations maybe, but with inevitably the same ending - tragic. For either or both the parties. God, I should know. Very much been there and done that, you see. And it is ugly, I'll tell you that. Coming out of it suspecting every friend you got, measuring every word you say, fearing (and hating yourself for even worrying) that your friend is going to tell you one day that he's in love with you.

Today though, I saw a guy's side to it. The thing that impressed me the most was that he owned up to it. He didn't flinch. Didn't discount his feelings or retract once even in face of her blatant rejection. Just handled it with a sort of dignity that is rarely found in men. I was more proud of him than I can ever remember being of any male friend I ever had.

Until now, I never saw what the whole fuss about dating was. I thought it was pretty much the the same as hanging out with a friend. I get it now. A 'date' is a declaration of intent. It is like saying, " Hey, I think there's something between us, wanna give it a shot and see where it goes?". It's coming out in the open and saying here's what. As compared to going out with a friend which can be so many things. Amongst others, it can either be genuinely platonic and completely innocent. Or it can be with one or both wondering all the time what the fuck the deal is between them.

I hate knowing these things. Because every time you learn something new, it robs you of your faith in the old. Of the warm and fuzzy comfort that ignorance allows you.

I hate growing up! Absolutely, completely and totally hate it.

A Potpourri of Posts.

Okay, so I know it's crazy but I can't seem to stop myself from obsessing over it. Man, I'm so hooked. I've been playing it for an hour now and I can't get past the second stage. What?! Yeah, you think you can do better? Go ahead, try it. I dare you. Pacman awaits. Tell me if inky, pinky and blinky didn't bite your ass by the end of stage 1. I swear, I used to be better at this. Demon Kid and I would game for hours as kids and yes, he would fuck my happiness in games like Contra and Street Fighter but I was always tons better at Mortal Combat, TMNT and all!

Oh, if I didn't tell you guys already, you should know that I have an addictive personality. Coupled with an OCD, if you want to get technical. Seriously, I do. I'm hooked on to so many things, its not funny. Thankfully, they dont include coffee, booze, dope, sex or cigarettes. Yet. Well, the cigarettes mainly coz I know I won't quit if I start. Still, I'm entitled to be extremely proud of myself, I think.

Now about the things that I am addicted to currently. Let's see. Travel & Living. Batman. Orbit. Ayn Rand. Pani Puri. Yahoo Pool. Moon Sparkle. Cell phone. Day Dreams. Money. Sarcasm. Lidor truffles. Slothiness. Floaters. Laptop. Dove. Happy endings. Dexter. Cold Stone. A/C. Undercolors. Crossword. French Open. Superlatives. Wet wipes. Memoirs of a Geisha. Fight Club. Volini. Trebuchet MS. Passion Berry. Lists. Pac-Man. Blog.

Phew!

And this is just the censored stuff. Excluding the OCDs. What the hell, I might as well admit it, this is pretty much it. Not too many additions to that list either. What can I say? I'm in this weird never-been-in-before phase of crushlessness. It's true. Not one single reel or real life interest. And that has never happened before. Then again, that was a time when Roddick hadn't married some bimbo named Brooklyn (C'mon! that isn't even a real name forgodsakes!!!) and I was stupid enough to get involved with Blue Shirt. Mercifully, those days have passed and I'm now free, free, free.

>>Aside: Note to interested parties, if any. If you strongly think that I might even think you remotely interesting, write to me with your particulars. (Height. Elder brother, dimples, surname. Almost forgot - Rich, yes? That sorta thing.) If not, please just disappear! Now, if on the other hand, you satisfy (all the stuff mentioned in the last parenthesis), please ignore this tiny little outburst. I'm usually the gentlest of creatures, really. I would never hurt anything except a cat. And, I never lie about anything. Except for trivial things like lying. But that's the only one, truly!

Aaaha! Something else I've been dying to write about but could never remember. So, here's what. Boxer sent me a link to a real story recently, in which this chic got hitched to one of the commentators on her blog! Admittedly, only a handful of people read the blog. Even fewer bother to ever comment. I don't even get a few anon comments. How rude! And how damn depressing! I think, I will stop writing altogether or start a new blog which I'll keep completely anonymous and maybe silently market until I'm getting at least 20 comments a post. At least that way, I'll know my readers are all not just sick voyeurs and care maybe just a teeny weeny meeny bit about what I write!!!

*Takes deep breath*. Mutters So-ham (meditation AOL style) repeatedly until she's can't make out if she's saying so-ham or ham-so or ho-sam .

*Shakes head in disgust.*

*Gives up*

*Goes to Bed*

*Is Still Fuming*

He said...I said.

I don't remember much about people. Except for the conversations I have with them. One such happened today. We met, talked, exchanged numbers; the works. It was interesting because I talked. Quite a lot. Today was different coz I didn't get bored, I was interested. In fact, all the time I was talking to him, I wished my hair would stop sticking to my scalp so much. And that I didn't turn pink in the Sun. That was a first. Since when did that happen? Sheesh. Thankfully, before I drowned in my home-made self loathing solution, "How about I call/write (to) you sometime," said he. "Sure" I said.

And, that was that.


I realized then how much I miss it - meeting new and interesting people. Yeah I know, I can meet tons of new people at work if I wanted. I'm the HR after all. But the point is, I don't want to. Most of the guys I meet there are so stereotypical and fake and above all so utterly boring, they make me want to cry. Then again, I can't in all honesty complain either because I'm an another me at work too. A very polite, dull, indifferent, introverted and censored version of me.

Blah. I completely lost track of where this is going. Who cares about all that anyway? Especially when I saw us creaming Royal Challengers in the IPL just now. I'm so kicked! And, for all those who laughed when I said we were going to win? Two words - UP YOURS!


Random Ramblings

Things I hate just now :

1. Guys who use too much of "I don't know's" and "hmmm's".

2. That damn Pacman game.

3. The injured arm which refuses to heal.

4. Not having money to buy a new cellphone.

5. Work that I have to wake up to go every effing morning.

This and That

I promised myself that I won't broach the topic of relationships any time soon, what with so many bigger and more important things like the elections and all happening; the outcome of which by the way, I'm glad I didn't bet on at the dinner party last night. I'm mightily pissed off at all the people who didn't vote. And at those who didn't know who to vote for and so just voted for the prettiest symbol on the list anyway. Bloody Buffaloes. Thanks to them, I have to endure another term of that despicable man as Chief Minister. I'm quite kicked about the Gandhi scion and the latest Deora though. They look deliciously promising. What they'll do is quite another matter altogether.

Oh and yeah, Madcow threw us that random dinner party. It was quite nice. And, I should totally stop calling him that. Now that I know him a little bit, he seems kinda cool, fun almost. Even if he's responsible for our stationery room at work going barren. But then again, companies like ours would not be afloat without people like him. So, I guess, he's alright. As much as I'd like to, I can't say the same for Mr. Pumpkin. Every time I see him, I fantasize a large bulls eye sign painted right on the center of his super large ego-inflated head. Imagine. Considering the sheer size of it, I would never even miss. With that record, what do you know, they might send me to the 2010 Winter Olympics and award me a platinum medal too. Hey! Impossible is nothing. Aishwarya Rai became an actress, didn't she?

More seriously, while on the topic of sport, I just have to write about IPL and ergo, the brand new love of my life - Rohit Sharma. I was at Sports Bar watching our match today and I could have kissed him till the end of time for the way he played tonight. I'm a fan alright. And some more, if he wants to know. Also, since I can't seem to spend two hours without someone talking about them, here goes. Yes, I like Zoozoos. And yes, I know they use real people in those ads. No, its not FYI anymore. For godsakes, everyone knows. Yeah, everyone. Even the real Zoozoos existing on another planets.

Relationships!!! Right. I was coming to that. So, I spent most of the week watching Ha worry herself sick over Grapher. She loves him to pieces. Then, I saw Pink Panther cry over someone. And, there was Jughead who couldn't stop fretting over Ice cream boy. I don't get it. These are some of the nicest people I know and they care deeply for the people they love. When most people of the normal world, even blind bats such as me, see it, why can't them jerks?!

Lady In Red

About this weekend, my God, where do I even begin. I waited for it almost every working minute of every hour of every day this week. It came and it went. I did precious little except goof around. At this rate, fat chance of all those things on my life changing “list” happening. But then, what am I to do? Hard work and discipline go against my principles. Mum says you should never do anything that goes against your principles. And you know, you should always listen to your mum. See?!

Anyway, so I might as well tell you about how it went.

Pretty soon, I’m going to go into a work cum boredom induced coma. Or kill myself, for the lack of a more interesting thing to do at work. Hmmm. Maybe, I should start accepting bets on it. About which will come first or something of that sort, you know. Seriously, who knows? If they find it interesting enough, I will have safely insured myself for the afterlife. Man, it sucks.

But that’s not to say that all has been so grim. Things have looked up on certain other fronts. I can’t really write about it here coz let’s just say I don’t kiss and tell. Well, not that that happened. Something, equally beautiful but.

I just can’t seem to stop smiling every time I think about ‘it’. Quite embarrassing dammit – this stupid adolescent school girl type behaviour of mine. Believe me when I say that I’m rarely like that. In fact, the last time I felt like this was when that cute guitarist at the hotel played Romeo & Juliet for me, “the pretty little lady in red.” Oh, just in case you are wondering if there was some other lady in red, there wasn’t. I checked. Carefully. Twice.

And today, I met this guy, when Dad and I went on our usual Sunday house hunting marathon. He opened the door to his house and it was a crush on first sight. I was more than half in lust with him when a woman walked in to the room. You know how there is this one endless moment when you see a woman with the guy of your interest and hope against hope that the word he’ll use to explain her is sister or mother or daughter or maid or hell anything, except a wife/girl friend? Well, I lived that moment. Wife, as it turned out.

Why God? Why?

Why do you throw me in the path of such happily married men and tempt me with forbidden fruit thus? I demand to know.

Paradise Regained.

I woke up with a fatalistic feeling about being in the same terrible shape that I was in yesterday. Ironically, it turned out quite the opposite. Because, I'm in one the best moods I've been in recent times. All my friends got together for me. Thanks to the blog, I didn't need to tell anyone anything. Most of them who read, got it.

Maybe because I pushed everything else to the back of my mind and got into kick ass work mode, or because the arm behaved nicely, I even had quite a good day at work today. I came back home and talked to the plants. One of them is flowering. I'm going to have a real garden, flaura & fauna et all. God, I'm so kicked. Anyway so then, Amen came over and we snuck up to the terrace to just lay back and watch the stars. It was, for the want of a better word, cathartic.

At that moment, I realised what a wuss I was being all this time. Cribbing about work and friends and well, everything. It's over now. Two months. That's what I'm giving myself. To change. A very "Yes, I can" type of change at that. It's about time too. Before you tax your sad little grey cells, of course, I have a list. And duh!, no, I'm not putting it out here. There is still such a thing as privacy, even if most don't know what it means.

Starting now, I'm going to go have some fun. Enough of fretting about why a certain 'friend' did that to me or how I'll ever get to do something interesting at work. I don't give a damn anymore. I have more important things on my list now. Things that are good for me. Things that'll end life as I knew it.

I can barely wait for tommorrow to dawn. For a new day, a new beginning.

Damn the Weather

Today was one of those days at work when I wanted to scream the entire place down. I thought, at least that way, someone will finally fire me and I can get out and do what I really want to do. At the last moment, sanity prevailed. So, I sat at my desk staring unseeingly at my screen for a long time, bored. Utterly, completely, mind numbingly bored. Usually, at this point, my mind automatically switches onto its wool gathering mode. This time though, I didn't want to think. I wanted to work. Only, the work I do these days is so crappy, I hate it. That's thing with almost everyone I know from work. They all hate what they're doing. No one will admit though. At least, not in public. Because then the happy work place illusion will crumble. And, there will be nothing left. Nothing.

The arm that I injured during the go-karting accident is getting worse by the day. It hurts so much I feel tears prickling at my eyes everytime the pain killers start to wear off. To add to this miserable state, I come to know that Ha has put in her papers. I can't stand the idea of work without her around. And, she's not even going to be in the city. Now, I have a brand new reason to hate Bengaluru. I do.

Since this is a whiny post, I can't really put stuff about Assy's trip here. Because that was fun. Both of us went bankrupt in the process which I think made it even better. He got me tons of stuff. I got him a Zippo. Damn, but I love Zippo's. I think they make the perfect gift for a guy.

Got a tarot reading done. Here's what - My career is apparently going to be excellent. My relationships are going to be a mess. Yeah! Like I needed the Knight of Swords to tell me that. Sheesh. Then, there was something about the shadow of the past looming large on the future stuff. Pilot Guy, New Kid, who?

My arm is throbbing again. Another bloody day at work tommorrow. It's sadder than I'm making it sound - My life.

What am I going to do about it? Live with it. What else?

PS: Those who didn't/don't intend to vote - SHAME ON YOU!