Saturday, January 26, 2008

Randomvenom. Blackmood. Discontent. So Sue Me.

I made myself a promise a long time ago.

Okay, cut the pompousness. It wasn’t long ago, and it wasn’t exactly a promise. It’s just that I didn’t want my blog to be an online diary where I posted everyday and went “I went and watched irrelevantmovie today, do go watch it, it has flatulentactorA and flatulentactorB who are doingthesamethingalloveragain.” I didn’t really know what I wanted from this web page – I’m not even sure it exists (I mean, I can’t feel it like I can touch solid paper, can I?). But I had a few things settled. No diaryness. No mention of friends and what they did and what I did. No gushing. No poetry. Perfectly simple rules, I thought.

All of which, of course, I have conveniently broken.

So I am here, here at the juncture where I have finished sticking my tongue out at the screen and started on another promise – I’m not going to make any more stupid rules. I am going to do pretty much what I like, and if I want to tell the world how many glasses of juice I had in the morning and how many pebbles I own in my collection, so be it. Juice and pebbles are, in their own sad little ways, extraordinary.

I’m in a proper temper today, typing out nothing in particular because I am well and truly annoyed. At everything. At the carpenters in each and every flat of my building who are slowly and insistently hammering a headache into my head, at my father who’s nagging at me to do something about my mess (on occasion it’s called a room) and at my mother who’s frying fish in the kitchen and coming in every two minutes to ask me, in a hopeful voice, whether I’ll eat it. No I won’t, dammit. I hate fish, and I don’t care if I die young with glazed marble-like eyes and bald patches all over my head. It seems to me a very stupid reason to eat fish because it makes your eyes and hair and skin and possibly even your earlobe stronger.

I’d rather eat chicken because it makes me feel good. But no, now that Aishwarya Rai’s married and Shah Rukh’s looking haggard and the whole Indianteam-Australianteam-acting-like-sissies catfight has blown over, the hens have to act pricey. When did it come to this? And to top it all, the washing machine’s rattling away like some blasted high-range machine gun, and my grandfather’s watching shrill Malayali videos on Asianet – the kind that have heroines running coyly away from the hero. Who, by the way, has a handlebar moustache and sunglasses. Very cool, I know, but he's also dancing around in a lungi and sandals.

And now I’m reminded of this time when I spent an entire afternoon watching He-Man on Alpha Telugu for no reason other than to hear “By the powers of Greyskull!! (thundersound)” being distorted into something quite unpronounceable. And I’m feeling even more annoyed because it was the most hilarious thing I've ever watched, and I’ve never been able to catch it again, try as I might. And the last time I checked the channel wasn’t even there.

I would have thrown up my hands in despair and done something drastic by now, maybe written some deepdarkmorbidpoetry even, but I can’t because it’s deliciously cold and I can’t feel morbid when my one regular wish – that Kolkata would be cold enough to wear a pullover all day – has come true. I hope it gets colder, and I hope I have to resort to wearing socks all day next. And now I’m annoyed because I’ve stopped feeling annoyed, because ranting sometimes is so easy and so gratifying, because I’m so fickle that I can’t even brood. Where does that get me as a romantic heroine? Gah.

Sunday mornings, I tell you. Very overrated. No matter how cheerful you are, one Sunday morning always comes along and throws you into a feeling of niggling exasperation, like an itch that you get sometimes - you know it's there, but you don't know what part of your body it's on because at that moment almost all your body is tingling with some sort of vague distaste. For itches, for fish, for bloody Sundays everywhere.

The only thing I have working in my favour today is that Djokovic will be playing Tsonga in another two hours or so, in what should be an engaging match, and tennis is always a balm for all ruffled feelings. And now that the washing machine’s stopped making my house sound like a minefield, I think I shall venture out of my mess. And tell my mother, very firmly, that I will not eat the fish, even though I know she’ll surreptitiously try to slide it onto my plate when she thinks I’m not noticing. I don’t blame her; I’m usually shoveling food down my throat with my nose in a book. Oh yes, book. Must finish book, must start other book.

Good. And maybe I’ll stop wondering why you are still reading this, and go for a walk now. Which reminds me, you are now witness to the fact that after I have publicly declared to do whatever I want and gush about anything if I feel like it, my next post will most likely be about nothing all over again, which makes the whole point of this post so superfluous that I’m ashamed of writing so much for nothing, but I’m going to post it anyway to prove that I am now going to write about anything. I am like that only.

20 kindred spirits have swallowed my rambling:

SPIRITed! said...

Ah.Sunday evenings are the ultimate worst.You get this kind of deep knot in your stomach which screams and reminds you that Monday morning in just around the corner,and so is another school day.Gah!

Magically Bored said...

Shall I confess something?
You are, by far, the best writer I know.

Rajarshi said...

haha...subtle humour and u write sooo well....btw i love fish...(being a bengali i just HAVE to)....nd he-man in telegu??....LMAO..

Doubletake, Doublethink. said...

@ spirited: well, monday seemed a long way off when i wrote this, so pissed was i.

@ fishy: right. if you'r hoping i'll pay to get your camera repaired, you're wrong :P

@ tentacles: thanks, and if you ever do manage to watch the telugu he-man, do tell me when it's on.

heh? ok said...

oh my god. did you write every single word that came into your mind? i can NEVER do that. i edit endlessly in my head. which i why i think this is a really cool piece of writing. avant garde even. hahahahahahaha. okay, i'll stop.

ad libber said...

Your wish has come true with a vengeance, its cold enough to wear three pullovers now.
Blog promises never hold. It ends up being a desperate craze where you have to blog about nothing mostly. I am about this bit close to blogging about how much my nails have grown in the past two days. All those dashing vows could never be kept.

Ananth said...

Hilarious. And random.
Excellent combination.

Ananth said...

thanks(i think,:)) for the french lesson.
french in a bengali accent eh? Must've been brilliantly funny.

Doubletake, Doublethink. said...

@ heh? ok: avant garde? dear lord, i must learn to editinmyhead then :)

@ ad libber: you're right. no blog promises, just random insanity. best formula.

@ ananth: thank you, and it was. especially when the "zh" sound got distorted. as in "voyage" becoming "voiyaaaj" =]

Maximum Boy said...

Gaaaah!

i actually read all of it.

"i am like that only."
finally im convinced you're a teenager. :P

Nymphaea Caerulea said...

You seriously should write more when you are like this only. Fabulous writing skills compounded with great humor. Carry on!

Bone said...

this, megirl, is something you should watch, if you haven't already. very educational for young, budding minds xD

and there's another mark middleton chapter in p97 already, since you kinda sorta like him. when does himalaya avalanche into action?

Doubletake, Doublethink. said...

@ maximum boy: *sheepish grin* sorry if it was such an ordeal :D

@ nymphaea caerulea (wow, i typed that correctly!): thanksalot.

@ quietlittleshything: i've watched it already. around twenty times, tears streaming down my face each time. the weirdest part is that it's in Tamil and i speak it. so if i close my eyes and listen to the song i actually UNDERSTAND it :O

and now he plays the harmonica. how sexy is that, sigh. himalaya isn't behaving the way i want her to.

VelocityGirl (tm) said...

I LOVE this post. I LOVE it.
What kind of fish was it? =P

VelocityGirl (tm) said...

Wait, you speak Tamil? =O
I thought no one else did that anymore.

Doubletake, Doublethink. said...

@ the sound of silver: i forget. one of the nasty ones. =(

and yes, i do. haltingly and erratically, but my mum would have fits if i forgot how to speak it, so there =]

Elendil said...

*chuckle* Very entertaining, this.

Doubletake, Doublethink. said...

@ elendil: so is he-man :D

Aphrodite said...

wo hooo nice post u have goin thr...hehe had me rolling with laughter...lol

Doubletake, Doublethink. said...

@ aphrodite: my pleasure. =)