Desi Boy = 15 Yr Old Caucasian Girl

A freshly graduated Desi boy is the same as a fifteen year old Caucasian girl. India's sub-hundred years of independence and the over two hundred years of dependence is to blame.

I realise that the above two statements are pretty bold and I will lay down my case. I am talking about a recently graduated desi boy in the US of A with a fresh job, trying to soothe terrible wounds of being separated from those other guys that were his friends and family for the entire course of his master's education. In a new city, all people are alien, and he only has one roommate's shoulders to seek comfort rather than the ten plus pairs of shoulders he had in his little university town. He starts his social life in the new city with two commandments...all americans are the same and they have no culture. This implies that there are no American new friends to be made and no culture to explore other than movie and cartoon oriented theme parks. Then he proceeds to get himself a cell phone with unlimited in-network calls to be in-network with his lost buddies.

India is not blamed till this point.

Then calls are made. From everywhere and every time. That is where they push my 'Jack-ass' button. The phone is glued to the ear making that desparate call to his soul-mates from driving to work to eating dinner. "I understand that you need to keep in touch, but damn son, there is a difference between keeping in touch and being an active part of the life of your male friend from 600 miles away!" Americans, with their super-duper-sensitive radar for fruit-cakes call such behaviour 'Gay'. Anyway, one needs to have a riding lawn mower, a truck with either a gun-rack or a fishing-rod-rack in the back to qualify as straight in this free American society.

The worst a desi boy can do to me is talk incessantly on his cell phone about mundane stuff with his BFF while in the car with me driving or while at my dinner table. If that desi boy is an old friend, I will ask him to mind himself, but if he is an acquaintance, I cant even tell him what an asshole he is. "No one gives you the right to make me look like a damn chauffeur and isolate the rest of the occupants of the car because you decided to have your chat at this very moment." I am not talking about making or taking a courtesy call. Desis talk about everything under the sun when someone else is driving. Moreover, they do it so naturally. Did I miss a course at school or a secret all-men-clan meeting in India because that behaviour is highly dis-respecting and ridiculous.

This is where India comes in. I blame the immaturity to the sub-hundred years of independence for this dis-respectful lack of etiquette.

And when he is not on the phone, he is on Orkut scrapping the very friends he spoke to for hours or finding cute girls to drop stupid scraps to.

That is the exact equivalent of a fifteen year old Caucasian girl who, if not texting her friends is on MySpace commenting at their profile. Caucasian parents, please be a little liberal on those H1B laws and increases your chances of finding a daughter in everyone of us.

Carbon Output

I took a survey here: link
My carbon output is 17 tons a year.
I am ashamed of myself.

Latina Hottie

Zelaya is a hispanic name, a last name. Read about its origins here: link. That is the name my Laya came with. I thought it was one of those weird racing dog names and cut the 'Ze' part out. I think other dogs understand her heritage and that is why her butt gets sniffed the most at the dog park. She is a Latina Hottie. The doggie equivalent of Eva Longoria. I love both Laya and Eva though, in very different ways!

Anyway, she is pretty popular at the dog park. All the ruff-and-tuff dogs want to woo her, sniff her butt and run circles around her. They try to hang out together but Laya takes off after a few jogs and they are left behind in a cloud of dust, feeling dejected and humbled. Not many men can hang out with a dominating feminine partner who is genetically more proficient than them. This one time, a great dane was at the park and thought he was it. The ultimate man. The supreme dog at the park. Towering over every other dog, he was running the pack...till he met Laya. The wooing started when he tried to unsuccessfully out-grace her but trotting around her. They ran together for a while till Laya decided to sprint, and sprint she did. The great dane was left standing. Every dog and their owners were left standing as they watched Laya finish a complete circle around the doggie lake with so much grace to shame a peacock and ease to shame a Leapord. It is the effortlessness of her strides that make it so much beautiful to watch.

She is on a liquid diet now that is easy on her stomach but is making her lose her tautness. My Eva is turning into J.Lo.

stinkfist

The 104 degrees hit my face like a hammer, knocking me out of my jet-lag as I left the office building after work on 19 July, the day I returned from England. I am back and a little changed. Every little trip I take, every person I meet and every post I read is making me change. I sometimes feel like a dis-formed object searching for form. This is something that I infer and not what someone else tells me. No one sees what I see. I speak to no one what I think and feel. Laya is the only close living being that is a witness to my metamorphosis.

After my one week absence from the blog world, I almost feel alien to everybody I knew before the trip. New posts, new comments, new tags floating around make me a little uncomfortable. I feel like getting out of this stinkfist and immersing myself in my own world. I have over 1300 pictures to look at from my six day trip and I think that is what I will do.

All I have to do is take the right trip, meet the right people and read the right post.

Gone Fishing...

I will attempt to enjoy an 'English summer' vacation starting tomorrow till 18 July. My involvement with the blogger world would be spotty but I will guarantee to make up for the lost action when I get back.

I also discovered something today about myself. I get very annoyed and somewhat emotional when I see child abuse on tv. I saw this movie tonight and it put me in a not-so-good mood. I need to stay away from such movies. I guess I take a very aggressive stance against child abuse and abuse of women.

The Headache

Eating Chewda right now. I had to buy the damn packets for $2.99 each because someone consistently refused to make and send them to me. Not only that but the someone that I am speaking about had the audacity to send me a link on how to make Chewda!!! I am Bengali. Laziness is my birthright no one should ever attempt to change regional stereotypes! Gone are the days of goodwill and charity. The world is a cold and harsh place now! Where is the love 

I wonder why they allow headaches in today’s society. Of all the things they find a cure for, mankind has not found a cure to persistent headaches. They invent Tylenol go-tabs though, to suppress that headache anytime and anywhere till it is time to buy another packet. I wonder if this is a conspiracy, because it is surely a kick-ass theory. You can not tell me that our parents got vaccinated with small pox vaccines due to which we young’uns didn’t even need to see that needle but the best they have done is sell Tylenol in a jar of 200. You can not tell me that five theories exist (Bouyancy Theory, Bernoulli Effect Theory, Horizontal Vortex Theory, The Coanda Effect and Condensation) on why the shower curtain blows inward during a shower but no one commissioned a successful study on that one super-tylenol that will eradicate headaches. Not only migraines, even simple headaches.

I dedicate the above paragraph to the fact that there was critical bit of analysis regarding a mile long list of excel files and access databases for a customer to be done with a splitting headache. I was however successful in locating the problem and finding the answer. I brought the lingering headache back home to see a letter casually jammed between the door and the frame. At first I thought it was the leasing office complaining about my dogs peeing in the grass. Yes, a few weeks back some Indian dudes (my kind of Indian, not the 'Red Cloud At Sundown' named kind) who play volley ball outside my apartment made a fuss to me (very rudely, I might add) that my dogs peeing on the grass is pollution. These guys can be found standing outside their apartment, talking on their cell phones and flicking their cigarettes casually, spreading second hand smoke and undegradable ashes. Anyway, the letter was about a fine for not paying rent on time which successfully blew off a few more fuses in my cranial matter. The fine being a total of $100, I immediately rushed to the leasing office to sort out the problem. My cheque was not processed because they couldn’t find out what apartment I was in using my name. I am on the freaking lease!

“Your name is not in our system, Sir.” My roommate made it to the piece-of-shit state-of-the-art-system that manages the useless and inadequate complicated and intricate functioning of this organisation. “We will wave off the fine this time, Sir. Please make sure to put the apartment number on the cheque the next time, or I won’t be able to help you again.” A threat! A god damn threat!!! I couldn’t believe it. By this time, more sparks had flown off my butt indicating that the standby fuses in my head have blown off. Quoting Bill Engvall, when I woke up today, I didn't want to be a Jack Ass. They just pressed my Jack Ass button! “I have been paying you rent promptly. Please make sure my name appears in the system. Your system is retarded not accurate. That should not be any of my problem you lazy ass people”. In their defense, the manager did take down notes to talk to tech-support to fix this issue.

I then walked the dogs while successfully losing enough sweat to water a small back yard. That’s when I slipped into my shorts and t shirt and went to bed. Laya took the cue and cuddled in beside me. Eddie managed to find a thrash bag and I woke up to eager groans and licks on what was left of a plastic bottle and some empty cans of Laya’s food in the very middle of the living room.

Now that I am awake after an early evening nap, I have to hunt down this Chewda that I am suddenly craving so much and just have to eat. Sometimes, I feel like a spoiled trophy wife! Therefore, I had to fish out this factory made bag of chewda when I could be eating home made chewda made by someone who knows how to make it and maintains a food-blog to brag about cooking skills.

Save the Cheerleader Carbon, Save the World

Just like a carbon offset, this post offsets the previous post, my fine evening out in Jacksonville. Such close proximity in posting should successfully over-shadow the last post, more so because this one is a little bit more serious than a bit of rain, a bad coffee and cognac. This one, though being written on 08.07.2007 is about my thoughts from the Live Earth Concert held on 07.07.2007

I have been aware of the green house effect as a kid and I feel unsuccessful in doing something about it when I am hopefully all grown up. But we humans have that problem. Being aware is one thing. Acting on it after careful thought is another. Keyword(s): careful thought. Then there are always others who act without thought and solely on misdirection, but we thinkers are not talking about them, are we?

The concert worked. At least on me. It kick-started this dormant chain of thoughts and ideas that have been trying to bubble up for a while. I want to contribute to the effort, so here goes the list. Global warming is evident. The hypocrites argue that it needs more research or that it is non-existent on a cold day (ha ha ha), but they also accept creationism and intelligent design completely disregarding all scientific proofs and hypotheses. So, they can all eat the proverbial dirt.

I gathered the following list from the National Resource Defense Council (NRDC): link
I will go along the list and write my views under the points.

1. Raise your voice.
This is what this post is about and my voice will not stop in the confines of these css codes.

2. Chose an efficient vehicle.
This is a sensitive topic for me and I will come back to it at the end.

3. Drive Smart
I get my engine tuned up professionally. The monthly prompt email from my car (one of those onstar thingies) lets me know what tire pressures are and what they should be. The last one said they were the right amount. The air filter is working great. I will have the dealers check on it in another thousand miles at the next oil change.

4. Drive less
Jacksonville, Fl has a bus system that is not favourable to the everyday commuter unless your places to go revolve around the bus stop. Mine does not. The roads to the grocery store (Publix, Target) are not designed for pedestrians and bikers. It is absolutely ridiculous the route I have to take to go to Publix. Southerners love privacy too much to do effective carpooling. I do try to bundle my errands together to reduce the amount of driving. I need to try harder.

5. Buy Energy Efficient Appliances
I live in an apartment complex that is the oldest in this area. They are trying to make as much money as possible on rent before they get leveled and the land is taken over by a developer. I do try to turn the thermostat up during the day so it does not run while I am at work and is not too hot for the puppies. I will however plan my finances around energy efficient appliances when I buy my own house.

6. Replace light bulbs with compact fluorescent tubes
I will run down to Walmart Target tomorrow. Update: 8 July, replaced four 100 watt and four 60 watt bulbs with eight 60 watt energy saving bulbs

7. Weatherize your home or apartment
We check filters regularly. Like I mentioned, this is an older apartment complex. I will check with the management this week to see if they can do any further insulation.

8. Chose Renewable Energy
As far as I know, JEA does not have any renewable energy options. Suggestions are welcome.

9. Buy clean energy certificates
I will do that after consolidating all my credit card debt. Yes, Mr Citibank, I do not love you as much as you love me.

10. Join an awareness group
On further research, I will join a group that does the most efficient work towards the prevention of global warming. I will be a member of a group by the end of August 2007.

11. Recycle
I buy recycled toilet paper, kitchen napkins and organic food. I try not to print anything at work or at home unless it is absolutely essential. I switch off monitor screens, unplug chargers when not required and switch off lights when not in use. I have to stop using those styrofoam cups for coffee at work. Also, it will be paper, not plastic when I go grocery shopping next.

Now we come to number 2. Chose an efficient vehicle
Here it goes. The normal roads in Jacksonville are good for cruising along at a comfortable 45 mph at which my car gives me around 33 miles per gallon (mpg) or 14 Kilometers per liter to my metric readers. That is a sort of good mileage. I love driving long distances and thats where I get 26 mpg on highways. Not too bad. It is the crazy driving I do, the accelerations that affect my mileage. On a quick zero to whatever, the mileage drops to 19mpg which is way better than the Suburbans, Expeditions and Hummers that seem to have filled the landscape. I would really want to buy a Toyota Prius (55 mpg or 23 kmpl). Actually a Honda Insight would be ideal but Laya wouldn't fit. The problem is that I love acceleration. It fuels my life and I want it every day. It does have something to do with my age and raging hormones or maybe it is something I will grow out of. Therefore, I am presented with this moral dilemma. I want to do something for the environment but I don't want to give up my car. If not anything, I want a quicker car. Now, the option to buy clean energy certificates sounds relieving.

I do see myself in the future with a hybrid car and a motorcycle to fuel those speed-desires.

All you thinkers are tagged. I will not mention your names here but I will personally drop messages. If you are an activist, consider yourself tagged. The rules are to write down what steps you are taking today and would like to take to reduce global warming.

Glycodin Mocha

Rain poured on my hopes of photographing the Dames Point Bridge today. The light was almost perfect with darkening clouds with spotty sunlight streaming through. I thought a wet suspension bridge lit by the evening sun with a background of dark clouds would be perfect. This time, the clouds decided to move in a little closer and rained stegosauruses and diplodocuses. If it rained enough to slow me down to 35 mph in a 65 mph zone, it must have rained a lot because I am usually the idiot driving at 65(ish!!!) mph in a 65 mph limit under torrential rain when everyone hide in the slower lanes (I call those ‘retard’ lanes).

I did manage to snag some pretty pictures on the way to the quite little coffee shop: link which was closed at 6pm on a Saturday! So, the owner decided to shut down a place (usually) meant for the younger generation who (usually) come out of their Friday induced hangover by noon (if not later) on Saturdays. 6 pm on a Saturday is like mid-morning. Next stop Starbucks, but who put the Moes next to it. I had to get a Quesadilla before quenching my Mocha-on-ice thirst. The special of the day in the mass-produced coffee shop was Raspberry Mocha frappuccino. Ordered that. $4.55. The person behind the counter handed the large cold drink that I accepted with high hopes and esteem. I pushed the dark green straw through the whipped cream and a foot of ice cubes before hitting the actual coffee. It did smell funny. The first sip confirmed my scent-based-hunch. It tasted like Glycodin and didn’t even cure my sore throat or get me high. I just ordered a relatively expensive coffee that tastes like common household cold syrup (that gets you high if an entire bottle is consumed. Mom and Dad, it is all hearsay!).

On the other hand, I was managed to occupy one of those comfy lounge seats in the coffee shop and probably even managed to look ice-cube-cool to the three Indians that walked in a few minutes later. In the next 30 minutes, I walked around in Target with a list in my hand and managed to look like a married (or maybe taken) desi man. Most married men end up with lists in their hands at the grocery store if they are not accompanied by the list-maker. The dudes walking every aisle with no list in their hand and no idea what they want are usually single (my girl-readers, here is your clue for the day).

Safely back home, the Hennessy is calling my name. The seductively tanned liquid requests to be let out so I can refresh myself on this rainy day. On the rocks or neat? Life is full of hard choices!

Dessert - Drink - Entre - Dessert - More Dessert

I have been treating myself today. It all started by finding the all evading chicken breast pieces with bone. Publix always seems to be out of the with-bone variety and the boneless variety is devoid of all taste. That’s where the joy ride started in Publix today. Already fueled by the $5 off coupon, the with-bone chicken breasts were the perfect booster rockets. I also brought some organic minced chicken (kheema) for dinner today. Those breasts were meant for cooking only after extended periods of marinating.

Over at the produce section, I picked up some peaches for the first time, maybe just to show off to myself that I can eat healthy. Then onions, baseball-big, yellow and a promise to produce enough tears to dehydrate Nicole Richie to death. Last nights promise of Mojito pulled me towards the Mint leaves. A few frozen packs of veggie, guava jelly filled puff pastry bites and Publix’s finest Pecan Pie later I was out to claim my $5.

Dinner started promptly at 7:50 pm with munching up some (most) of those guava filled puff pastries. Those are like little drops of heaven. To die for! Then came the Mojito. My bartending diploma (I have a certificate to prove it) betrayed me when Wikipedia suggested the use of Club Soda which I did not buy. Something had to compensate for it and what better than the rum that was already going into the drink! Just hold the bottle up a little longer! The kheema was simply mind blowing, almost as good as how bad the Lamb curry was. More puff pastries after dinner pretty much anchored me to the recliner. The sight of Laya running around playing with Eddie depressed me because she probably converted more fat to muscle running around the dining table four times than I'd ever do running endless miles in the gym for a week. Anyway, the pecan pie has been warmed in the microwave for thirty seconds till the insides just started to simmer and now it sits on my plate, all pretty and fragrant. The puppies are eying the pie, now only if they could fly!

Mojito

The Pot by Tool. They are singing a song that is close to my heart right now. I quit writing for a while because I was addicted to it only to replace the object of addiction by photography. Now I can not think of anything significant to write. My thinking mind is changed to an observing mind. Ideas and concepts swirl around in my head but I don’t want to write them. I want to think. The physical ‘do’, the reaction to the action of the mind is achieved through the camera.

But still I write. I actually like this week. Being all by me in the company of two wonderful doggies is very nice. The house is finally in order. The eight chair mammoth dining table finally has some usable space in it. I can finally do more in the kitchen than open the drawer to take out spoons and forks to eat ordered food. The bedroom is spick and span though Laya managed to fish out my space bag, tear it open and explore the down jacket. No, she didn’t get into the layers and I didn’t have to come home to a bedroom snowing in imitation feather.

The Cruzan pineapple flavoured rum helps. It is the perfect drink to cool me down this summer. I did get a free Muddler from the liquor store; a Mojito is on the way.

Metro

Apparently a movie on infidelity in a busy metro goes well with lamb curry and rice over dinner. Well, that is the gist of the collection of electrical impulses sent to my brain looking at the array of movies while waiting to pay for the freshly cut lamb.

Anyway, the movie depicted this high level of infidelity in this busy city. People searching lust and love amongst others and blaming it on the city. The moral was probably something like looking at what you have than what you don't. It made sense to me but I couldn't stop thinking about what I dont have. I dont have tender pieces of meat sitting among this curry and rice mix. I dont have a better movie to watch to wash this one off my memory. I dont have anything sweet to eat after this incomplete meal and no, I dont want that jello in the fridge. I also dont have to watch a Hollywood film anymore to see a real sex scene, sound effects and everything because Bollywood (Hindi Cinema Industry based in Bombay) movies, probably starting with Metro managed to do away with copulation euphemisms (more information on those euphemisms here: link)

The mating scenes were executed with the fine expertise of a soft-pornography director. The presence of a delicate cross-over of talent from the Bombay Porno Industry to the Bollywood Film Industry is noticeable. No more do the waves crashing onto the rocks depict the big-O. Most of the ideas conveyed were over-emphasized from my point of view but maybe not for the common man in India. The common man relies on Bollywood for information in ethics, trends and social issues. They are probably one step behind the south-indian film industry where the people make statues of actors and pray to them. We will catch up eventually, now that Himesh Reshammiya is making movies...there is a whole new generation of 'low' that we are yet to see.

Cooking and Commitments

The well marinated and cooked pieces of rubber in my wok tell me a few things. One, cooked lamb when chewy sticks between your teeth so good that you tongue can do twisters all day at the frustrating crack in vain. Two, I have doubts on my expertise in successfully cooking meat. Three, I can’t really write with a show on Porsches playing in high definition ecstasy.

Looking back in time, I have had a fifteen day sabbatical. Not too impressive per sabbatical standards but then I am no Professor at a university. The sabbatical was aimed at self revelation and awakening from the addiction, but I am not sure if I have achieved it. As a matter of fact, I am not sure what I have achieved. I do feel in more control over myself but that is just my biased opinion, that too on myself.

Today, I feel like a twenty eight year old failed cook with lots of ambition and not much hope, a thirty five year old single daddy to Laya considering I have no night life and own a family sedan and a sixteen year old baby sitter to Eddie. And these are just my evening jobs! For the record, I am twenty four years old and am exposed to commitment and relationships and multi-tasking at a very early stage in life. The makings of the perfect husband myth! Did I mention I can cook too?

All these people in the movies complain about boys to be men running away from commitments. I have locked my hopes, dreams and travel plans in some glass jar and thrown it away already. All you people who look at my profile, gaze at my handsome face, the rock-star goatee and a sexy dog and then want a dog for themselves, the grass isn’t that green on this side. Life gets divided into four to five hour slots and they don’t always match with that evening on the beach or that rave party.