Plastic Surgeons Have Lost an ATM

Well, I see marks of interrogation on your faces. Yep, if you guess who/what I'm talking of, I'll get you a pizza, and I'm sure you can't guess. :)

I'm talking of MJ. Well, he deserves a mention at least once in my blog. :) Dont gimme that look, you! I'm nonchalant to MJ's music, neither a fan, nor a hater (I know its a strong word).

What is striking is the media hoopla we have been noticing since his death. It's almost 2 months that the person has died, and people have been trying to get famous by supposedly seeing him here and there. TRP(television rating points) hungry news channels have tried to create a spooky air by showing a shadow of MJ walking in his home. Apparently he has been seen enjoying with his friends by his pool side. Friends, err...u mean souls or humans, I'd love to know! Or is that what we mean by soulmates?

The latest from the media stable is that MJ was supposedly a reincarnation of an Egyptian Princess. A statue of an ancient Egyptian Princess kept in Chicago's Field Museum has all of a sudden started making news from August 8, 2009. There are suppositions, ideas, thoughts that MJ was a reincarnation of this Princess. I wonder why it didnt make any noise when the supposed reincarnation was alive? MJ died on June 26, 2009. Was this Egyptian Princess excavated after this date? Or was the Chicago museum built between June 26 and August 8?

I fail to understand why the media has created this story after MJ's death. I'm sure had this story been unraveled earlier, the museum would've got a lot of coverage. A lot of people would've made tonnes of moolah too, keeping aside the plastic surgeons. A pic of this princess for your hungry curiosity:

Phew! My first Wedding Anniversary

Rolling back to July 9, 2008, Wednesday.
Sravani Saha and Sandeep Giri are married at Arya Samaj Mandir, Kolkata.

Fast forward (a little faster, please) to July 9, 2009, Thursday.
Sandeep Giri and Sravani Saha are still wonderstruck how one year has passed by. Nevertheless, now that it has already passed off, no use thinking how.

No, no, thats not how I (Sravani) am. I really traced back to find out that I spent 6 months with books, 2 months cooking, 1.5 months talking on the phone, 1.5 months fulfilling my basic human needs, and probably the remaining 1 month with Sandeep undisturbed. I still have to ask Sandeep about his breakup of the 12 months.

Now, Sandeep and I were okay-ish excited about our first anniversary. We didn't really plan anything though. I think that's why we were given a surprise by life :)

At 12 am, July 9, we cut a huge, cherry-rich, yummy black forest (yes, the pic you see up there).

Next morning, Sandeep took an off from work. I had already taken one. :)
We were tossing ideas at each other as to how we could spend the day together, and finally decided to take a long ride to Shamirpet Lake close to Hyderabad. The lake is 30 kms from our home, and both of us absolutely love long rides on our two-wheeler. I packed off some crunchy apples, some sweets, and a bottle of water for a small afternoon together. The lake was beautiful. We saw a few men fishing. When we asked about their catch, all of them said with pride: 'Pomfret.' Later, I came to know the black-skinned fish were nowhere close to pomfrets. Probably thats the one word that could make jeans-clad people feel proud about those fishing!

Cool lake with a cooler breeze, lots of rocks and very few people were the highlights of the place. We toured the entire place, climbed all the rocks we could, Sandeep even pulled me into the water to a distance, we clicked pics, munched on apples, I slipped on two slippery rocks in the water, Sandeep happily and bravely stood on one though. Some happy pics here.



After about 4 hours, we decided to make a move. We had another cake to cut when we'd get back home.

Since we had to take NH9, we came across lots of roadside eateries (dhabas). We had a spicy meal and started back. We had almost started to see civilization (yes, all this while we hadn't) when a three-wheeler overtook us from the left. Imagine, from the left! Simultaneously, there was a big SUV that overtook us from the right and hit our two-wheeler! I just had a glimpse of Sandeep falling, and before I could realize anything else, I found myself on the ground, and being pulled up by Sandeep. Standing on my feet, I could feel myself very dizzy, and suddenly our eyes fell on the blood all around me on the road. My eyes immediately darted towards Sandeep, fearing him injured. However, I hadn't realized it was my own right thumb that had got crushed with the skin, nail, and underlying tissue hanging from the rest of the finger. Soon, I realized something warm tricking behind my ears. I touched it with my left hand to see blood flowing from somewhere in my head. I looked at Sandeep and found him limping. He was injured in his knee and in his left hand. I then looked at my left hand and saw a huge bruise that was bleeding too. Sandeep seemed very tensed with the uncontrollable bleeding all over, and I tried to tell him that we'd be fine. All we wanted to do was rush to a hospital.

One helpful guy offered to drop us at the nearest hospital because Sandeep could hardly stand straight, leave aside riding. I tried to keep my hand raised to keep the rest of the thumb intact and also to reduce bleeding. We got to a hospital after around 3 kms, received first aid, only to know that I'd need an immediate surgery in my hand. Unfortunately, the two surgeons in the hospital were out. So, we had to rush to another hospital, where I had a plastic surgery in my thumb, a stitch-up of my head injury and other medications for 45 hours. I was almost immobile with my right hand in a cast, and my left with cuts and bruises. Sandeep didnt sleep a wink in those 45 hours, attending to all my needs and looking after me, and without seeing a doctor for his injuries! He turned absolutely immune to himself and his injuries, and I feared the injuries would harm him. However, he seemed absolutely nonchalant about himself. I still don't know how he could tolerate the pain!

We came back on Saturday evening. Sandeep was limping, and I was all in a cast and bruises. We finally cut the cake that we were to cut on Thursday. :) I felt so happy to come back home.

Its been 33 days, and Im still healing. I'm yet to resume work after all these days. Sandeep is still feeding me, helping me change, and helping me with everything. His injuries too haven't healed completely, but he hardly bothers. I'm completely in awe of this guy who has been doing so so much for me. Thank you dear, and love you immensely.
Some happy sad pics here:





We had not realized when we spent one whole year together, however, we'll forever remember how we spent the first day of the second year together. :)

Back after a Hiatus

Finally, I'm back after a hiatus. My last post was in May, 09. June whizzed past through a-better-not-talked-about-exam. Come July, and I was exhilarated and damaged the same day! Damaged? Sounds like a motor part. Yes, but Yes.

Will talk about it tomorrow in my next post.

Tricking Myself :)

There are times when I feel the need to trick myself. Yes, dont give me that look. I do trick myself often. I'll mention one trick I experimented and found that it worked!

It was a heavy-hearted rain-swollen Wednesday morning. I'm sure you know how professionals feel on week day mornings like these. Not to mention, I was sleepy (that's just an understatement, unwilling to move out of bed, absolutely irritated at the thought of having to go to work! Nevertheless, I pulled myself out of my sheets, got ready for office and got back to bed, waiting for my cab, and hoping to make the best use of the wait time.

Sometime later I was a zombie at work. Like all other days, I made a to-do list, though lousily. It included lots of things topped with some boring procastinated tasks from the last week which had to be sent out asap. And I was least in the mind to work.

Un-determined to finish my work, I facebook-ed for sometime. 'Sometime' turned out to be exactly an hour because you dont realize how much time you have been jaywalking on facebook visiting the viral strings of profiles and innumerable links! Looked at my to-do list. Screamed a "NOOO." It didnt work. It didnt make me any more kicked up to work than even an hour ago. Finally, rubbing my hands together, I geared up to trick myself. I pulled out the to-do list for the previous day (Tuesday) which had all pink-highlighted to-do's. Pink for me means done. Pulling out a bigger post-it, I wrote down all of Tuesday's to-do's and all of today's in one sequence. Marked each of Tuesday's to-do item broad pink and kept the list right in front of my eyes.

8 hours later. I rechecked my list. All of today's were marked pink too! Ruminated on how lazily I had started the day, and now all my tasks were done! Yep, I had managed to trick myself by saying this to my mind: 'See all the tasks in point # 1,2,3,4,5 are done. Wow. Just 10 more to go for today. Take baby steps, one at a time, and see you will have all 15 pink soon.'

It worked. Tried it many more times. Figured this out of the whole thing: The sudden unprecedented pleasure that the mind gets on seeing strikethroughs on to-do's or tasks marked 'done' is immense, and it keeps you going for the rest of the list.

Try it. It works wonders! :)

Half a Lettuce Leaf!

Ladies, excuse me for this post.

99% ladies- girls, women, aunts, moms, all of them are possessed with the idea of losing weight, no matter how much they weigh. Agreed that as many women as I've interacted with all my life, most of them needed to lose weight, however, this thought haunts them so much that they go to ridiculous extremes to have a few kilos off their arms or tummies! I understand that proportions can sometimes go off-limits, and this makes the N-dimensional individual the cynosure of all eyes, but often waif-thin people put me off by asking:'do I look fat in this dress?'

Nonsense.

Its, however, funny to see how these 'lose weight in 5 days' centers cash in on these people and earn gallons! Especially nice are their ads. I'd love to mention one of them here. So there is this fat-but-not-so-fat girl saying 'earlier people liked my face but rejected me for my fat body. Now they like me. Thank you xyz center.' I read it and this is the thought that strikes me: 'earlier people liked my face and rejected me for my fat body. Now they like my body but they reject my face'...ha hahaha...

I may sound sadistic, but yeah, these people, especially the women folk are easy cash-cows for these so-called-weight-management companies.

Especially funny are the things women do to lose weight, and in contrast, the funnier things they do under the influence of salivary glands. On one hand, they eat half a lettuce leaf for lunch and, on the other hand, ransack the icecream parlor in an hour! They order the sandwich guy 'ONLY brown bread please.' Leave them alone for sometime, and they'll gorge on vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce!

I'd say, eat well, but just stay healthy by exercising and not by starving and depriving the body and mind of goodies.

Please don't point fingers at me because I havent yet put on weight. The day I do, Ill remove this post. Promise. :)

Christmas Time

The last two months at work were hectic, lots of work and responsibilities. Think of all the possible reasons you can. The most important is that its the retail season, and therefore, advertisers had been gearing up since September. I realized how my advertisers get worked up since September, rationing up their sites, putting things on clearance, revamping their sites with offers galore, and asking me to create new campaigns for the festive season. Its a lot of fun, trust me, with the varieties of products on sale. They sell products which are so dear to a woman's heart, in fact, everything that a woman will love, right from flowers, cards, gift items (most of which are of no use), jewelry, designer clothes, non-designer clothes, fashion accessories etc. You name it, you get it.

This advertising mayhem involving me lasts till mid December, when most of the accounts are supposed to be well laid out and ready to take on the New Year shopping too. By mid December, advertisers too are happy with the sale of things, and most of them are out vacationing, which means allowing me to be lazy. :)

And so I'm now- lazy with not much advertising work to do.

So, let me tell you about Christmas fever at office. We have teams for each vertical and each team has around 15 members. Come Christmas, I found the teams were gearing up for some real fun. Most of the teams were high on a game Secret Santa, in which, each team member has an incognito Santa who leaves gifts surreptitiously at our desks until Christmas. Each one gets a Santa and is a Santa too. Its great fun getting gifts and wondering, 'Who is my Secret Santa?' On around 23 Dec, the cats are let out of the bags with big gifts. The Santas reveal their identity and also give nice gifts.

Some teams also had another traditional way of celebrating. They have their own christmas trees all decorated with the jazz pizzazz as usual. On 23 December, each team member brings a gift and places it on or under the tree. The entire team then meets and each one picks up a gift. I pity anyone who has got the same gift that he/she had brought.

All these enliven the atmosphere at office. People dress up with fancy. I found some looking like Christmas tress with all kinds of blings and danglers on them! On the last day of work before Christmas, we had awesome snacks organized by the facilities team, loads of programs and gifts from the office too. I was so happy to get a Swiss knife among other gifts.

Overall, Christmas is great at work.

At home, I've been thinking of baking my first cake, however, things didnt happen. I'll try something else, maybe some Indian sweets to compensate for it. And I'll nag Sandeep to get some rich plum and fruit cakes from the market. :)

Merry Christmas to All you readers!

Stream of Distraction

I hate keeping a TV at my home.

Not that I don’t have one, but I don’t watch it. Its better kept off on its stand, dressed and properly covered. It unravels itself only when my parents are here. It helps kill their time. Not for me though. I don’t mean to say that I just don’t have any time to watch it, I don’t want to watch it.

It seems I’ve developed an irritation for it overtime. This irritation is a well-cultured and well-researched and well nourished one. I won’t lie about it.

The reason I’m irritated with it is coz I’ve realized its immense paralyzing monstrosity. It’s got powers enough to paralyze your thinking faculties. I’ve noticed this in the simplest of my daily jobs. I’m about to make a grocery list. My eyes are fixed on the television, the yellow post-it with its eyes wide open is waiting for the first scribble on its face, my pen too is waiting eagerly to make its first move on the post-it. I’m not actually watching the television, I’m trying to tax and tax my brain while its digging into its grey matter for things needed in the kitchen, however, I just don’t seem to remember what I’m about to list. Instead of the kitchen, in my sub-conscious, I can see the same color, hear the same sound which I eventually discover to be emanating from the television. I can actually write down the same list in a jiffy just after pressing the red button on my remote.

More instances:

I feel I’ll turn on the television for some music while I’ll read the book which has a new found place from the store shelf to my bookshelf. Forget it, reading never happens. Like the world knows, the visual impact is always more than aural impact, my eyes always drift to the screen, and my book lies there disregarded. L I can however read if I just turn on my laptop or my music-system with nothing to distract my vision.

The family gets together at night after a whole day’s work. Mother, father, kiddos, uncles, aunts, grand parents..you name them, you have them. And you have the ubiquitous television, sitting prim and propah like the most obedient kid you’ve ever seen on earth. A light conversation starts, intensifies, and suddenly someone presses the red button on the remote. The obedient kid, disregarded all this while, suddenly brightens up in all its glee, silently promising to take its revenge for being understated all this while. It shows you all its colors, all the various delicacies it can offer you in terms of trashy soaps, unclad women, actors who cant stand straight for a moment because they are born dancing, innumerable budding singers & dancers begging for votes to win a certain contest, gargantuan creatures, spike-haired cartoons begging you to laugh, something black and white that you hate to look at for a fraction of a second and what not!

If you take one look at the room, you will notice a strange human silence. All the bickering of the aunts, the playfulness of the kids, the coughing of the grandparents, the baritone of the dads is suddenly lost, and artificial mechanical intonation has taken over. The family is not talking any more, everyone is absorbed expecting something better in the next channel. The only time when you will hear someone speak is when he or she hates the channel the tv is stuck at and wants to watch something else.

What do you think the family will communicate? Nothing. In a few hours, everyone will feel sleepy and doze off. No more open talks, no more bonding, no more of family time.

Do I need anymore instances? Look at you and your family just one night, if your family is in the habit of watching television, and you will understand what Im trying to say.

Like I said, the paralyzing powers are immense. It can cover you with its tentacles like an octopus, draw you in, suck you into itself and then let its digestive juices act on you to render you lifeless except for that index finger to press the remote mechanically.

Additionally, it’s paralyzing powers are so strong, a person who is dissatisfied with one channel will not stop surfing until the satisfying screen appears. The victim surfs and surfs happily unaware of the world around. He/She is so distracted and aloof of the surroundings that unknowingly he/she is drugged with that distraction. Its like a stream of distraction, moving on and on until it reaches the sea when the mind is completely taken over!

Do you think then that the TV is a great thing to kill time?

Excuse me, ma and dad, I really meant to keep you and all your kind out of the periphery of my venomous thoughts.