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Showing posts from 2013

How I know I am a good person?

They say that you must visit your dentist at least once a year. So I do. Less for getting them cleaned and scaled in the places I wasn't able to reach; but more for the compliments that I get from the pretty doc about how nice my teeth are and how well I have kept them. And so I continue my annual visits to my dentist. Even if I don't have a problem. Its just plain old Preventive Maintenance .  On the same lines, docs at the Radiology department of Kokilaben  are beginning to get accustomed to see me every 2-3 years - for a renalscan. I was born with a single kidney which is in perfect health - and I would like it to stay that way. SO I visit the docs even when I have no complaints - a fact that amuses many of them here in India - A doc I visited regarding advice for running long distances actually asked me "Agar koi problem nahin hai toh kyun aaye ho?" No I am not a hypocondriac . I have a doc friend (who also has a webcomic ) to whom I transfer my worries over

Misappropriation of scientific words by spiritualists

I have spoken about this before , and am speaking about it yet again. Next person who starts ranting about spirituality and uses the word "energy" - which has a very precise scientific definition - to explain some "spiritual" concept is so gonna get it from me. All you spiritualists, please invent your own words and stop misappropriating scientific words in your discourses on spirituality. Its seriously irritating. I am going to start taking revenge and at the same time expose how this misuse of scientific words seem to scientists/engineers. I will start using "spirit" as an alias for "faeces". And our day to day communications would be like: "I have diarrhoea flowing all over my legs, let me go cleanse my spirits" or "I haven't had a good spiritual movement today" or "My baby's spirits are smelly and mottled, she must be sick" or "I have constipation, my spirits refuse to come out" I am so

Driving and Religion

Remember the time when you got yourself enrolled at a driving school. You had already ridden in a car many many times before but never drove it. You had observed how to grown ups had been drivings, what issues they faced - traffic jams, breakdowns, accidents and most importantly scuffles (verbal/non-verbal) with other drivers - some of which went almost out of control. Different groups - different syles of driving, different outlooks towards fellow drivers and different ways of dealing with on road issues. But now you yourself are at the wheel. You are apprehensive of the instructor at first - you wonder if he is any good? Do you really need him in the first place? Maybe your elder brother could teach me better! You set aside your apprehensions and begin focussing on what he has begun saying "Adjust your seat, you rear view mirror etc etc... ". You follow like a robot, like a wannabe star student. A day or 2 into the course and you have already learned how to op

Being really good at what you do

Its summer and the sun can really be bright and when it reflects on and off the uneven surface of the road in the mornings and evenings, it overstimulates the photo receptors intermittently. This causes discomfort to your eyes as they have to repeatedly adjust to the changing brightness resulting in increased response time which can be fatal at high speed especially on expressways. So the other day I bought a pair of sunglasses. The shopkeeper seemed helpful but in retrospect I think he was only being convincing to make a sale. I already wear spectacles of around -1.5 D in each eye. Both cylindrical. So I asked him to use powered lens for the sunglasses. And so I started using the glasses and acquired a smug look on my face. Two days ago, a gang of six rowdy guys all in their 20s in a speeding auto-rickshaw tried to overtake me from the wrong side as I was slowly making a left turn at a signal. Their auto hit the front of my car and the left side of the front bumper came off. The

It begins with the first step

Exercise To exorcise the fat person in you Run And be done with the lethargy in you Stretch And retch the rigidity in you Pushup To giddy-up towards the new you Crunch To lose the hunch in you Jump As the fat lump leave you Smile And run an extra mile for you

Miss Sunshine

Best memory of last sunday's half marathon: There was this uphill road with tall and nice apartment buildings on either side. 6 pairs of parallel overhead power lines going across. Lots of crows sitting on them. Their pattern was random and chaotic but against the backdrop of the rising sun, it was a breathtaking site. Few meters before we saw that scene, when we had just turned on to this road, there were no wires to block the sun as it rays fell on her face. As she ran besides me, I looked at the sun and then sideways at her face and for a moment I wondered if it was the sun that shone on her or was it the other way round. As I held my breath for that moment, I knew a precious lifelong memory had taken birth.

Storytelling

I am an obssessive compulsive collector. A collector of firsts. A collector of emotions. A collector of moments. A collector of moments of first encounters of each emotion. My brain has limited memory. But emotions left to experience are still infinitely many. Living the stories to tell my grandchildren, When I become old and zany.