I miss junk food. I also miss the lengthy excel worksheets and graphs of office.
The missus is still reading a book on ‘The Law of Attraction’, and reiterates the importance of positive thoughts, as they have the potential of taking shape in reality. I decided to count the number of thoughts I have about junk food every passing minute, and plot them in the form of a graph.
Voila, the graph actually took the shape of junk food. The missus is always correct. QED.
Suggested reading : ‘The Secret’ by ‘Rhonda Byrne’
Unfortunate news of the assembly in Nizamuddin Markez comes to light. More unfortunate is the blame game all around, and the kind of defence being brought forward, of which even Dravid would have been proud. I generally tackle controversial topics in my blog as Dravid would do to a ball outside off (“Well Left”). But if you still blame the authorities even after Delhi Police released a video of their polite requests to vacate; if you still blame the authorities after it took the NSA head of a nuclear capable country to actually ensure evacuation, then sorry to say something is as wrong with you as the public tussle between Sachin and Dravid after the 194* declaration.
Talking about the royal Sachin and the reliable Dravid, I had cooked Rajma Chawall for dinner.
Day 8:
The news of cancellation of Wimbledon comes. Could it be an April Fool’s Joke? Nopes it isn't. The news was just a matter of time actually. Never been a planner in my life, but I had been planning and saving up for a couple of years to watch Federer play in the Wimbledon. Have non-refundable tickets for London for July. Sigh. This time, the joke is on me.
I miss sports - the action, the scores, the trivias, the discussions and all the articles. To think that Kanika Kapoor alone has featured in more tests in 2020 than the likes of Kohli, Bumrah and Rohit Sharma combined.
Suggested reading : This wonderful article by Rohit Brijnath, arguably the greatest sports writer of our times, on what sports means.
There is news and video of some of the Tablighi Jamaat patients spitting on healthcare workers. People angry at the perceived victimization of the patients, no, this is not what “Gussa Thuk do” means.
Cooked risotto for dinner. Since the corona outbreak has made us all used to exponential graphs, here’s one from my side on time taken on various activities related to food.
Day 9:
It’s been Nine years since India’s World Cup victory. And it falls on Day Nine of the lockdown. Dhoni was Nine short of his century that night. Gambhir was short by 3 (which is the square root of - guess what - Nine). That shot to which he got out to would have rankled him at least 99,999 times since then, as is evident from his Twitter break-down. (The “misses” is what makes sports as beautiful as the “hits”, but that is for another day - Bradman’s 99.94 would be the perfect case in point). All numerologists can orgasm Nine times.
Suggested reading : This blog by Sidvee, summarizing the collective feelings of a whole nation on that day.
Stepped out of home for the first time since the lockdown (apart from a quick dash to a pharmacy across the street) - a visit to the departmental store to get groceries. The departure was reminiscent of the George Clooney - Carmen Electra scene in 300; and my arrival with the grocery bags was like Bahubali carrying the Shivling on his shoulders. I could hear the music playing in the background. There is no lockdown for imagination, and you are free to picture me in those scenes, just like I did.
The store had taken the necessary precautions in respect of social distancing and letting a limited number of people in at one point of time. But.. ok wait let me employ a cluster chart to explain.
News coming in about some Tablighi Jamaat patients making lewd gestures at nurses and roaming half-nude. No, this is not what the doctors meant when they were appealing for ‘complete transparency and not hiding anything’.
I had already said that I wouldn’t be playing Housie for a while, but Hemanto Biswa Sarma keeps on calling out new numbers at regular intervals :(
Day 10:
It is the missus’ birthday. Prerna Bhabhi compiled a video for her with messages from family and friends. She had not asked Modiji, probably thinking that he would be busy in other important tasks which the current situation demands. Err.. but then Modiji decided to come up with a video message of his own.
Suggested reading: This old blog by me, describing the day I met Gunjan Emma Watson’s ballroom scene in Harry Potter movie series.
We played Antakshari online. We’ve come a long way - from Close Up Antakshari to Lock Down Antakshari. Legend has it that lights would be lit automatically when Tansen sang the Raag Deepak, and they would go off when someone else sang it in an unmelodious way. If only Modiji would have planned to play out the audio of our game at 9pm on the 5th, he wouldn’t have had to worry about people switching off their lights.
Cooked for the missus again on her special day. The standard has fallen so much that I’ve started liking my own cooking. Zomato, Swiggy and the ilk, sorry for the constant hiccups you would be getting. What better tool than a ‘pie-chart’ to visualize the number of times I have had ‘positive’ thoughts about them.
News and videos emerge about stone pelting across multiple states on health care professionals trying to help some Tablighi Jamaat attendees who could be at risk. Sigh, this is not what people had meant when they had asked us to ‘fight at all costs, and throw at it all we’ve got’.
Day 11:
Woke up to news of refund being processed for the missus’ birthday gift which the e-commerce portal had cancelled. Others, you can please ignore this message. It was very important for me that I put it here. Thanks for understanding.
Have managed to reduce my Feedly feeds (articles marked for reading later) to 40%. Some of the articles were more than 4 years old. No, didn’t read them, simply removed them because they had turned irrelevant now. The following Venn Diagram tries to explain the correlation which will always be there whenever I try to clean the feeds.
News and videos emerge about some likely infected people smearing currency notes and vegetables with their saliva and mucus. Morons, when my missus talks about spreading positivity, she does not mean Covid-19 positivity.
Had another Hangout session with college friends. Really fun times. We were careful to not share the meeting credentials with many people, else Modiji would have joined too.
Suggested reading: This old blog by me about life in college.
Day 12:
Weeks and months (or maybe even years) from now, when the whole thing passes away, stories will be written about peoples' deeds. Legends, on how the odds were defeated, will take birth. The world will see new heroes who played small or big parts in overcoming the situation. Songs and eulogies will be written on the deserving. Hagiographies will be made. The world will surely emerge better and stronger. What each one of us was doing during this war against Corona would become part of folklore. The women in my family would also be telling the future generations of how they accepted the Saree challenge, and emerged successful.
I had completed the IMDB Top 250 List in Feb 2013, and had kept the ever changing list completed till about 2016. During the past few days, I have been watching movies from here and plan to tick off all movies in the list by the time the lockdown ends. Some wonderful movies here, and it was, and is again proving to be an amazing journey.
Suggested reading: This blog by Poonam written on completion of his IMDB Top 250.
I will participate in the lighting of the lamp tonight at 9pm, because you know, spreading positivity is important, and this could be a way.
Coming back to Poonam’s blog, he says that a journey of this magnitude is tough and compares it to that of the Hobbit’s (a movie which used to be on the list). Now, after watching the LOTR saga what had excited me most when The Hobbit was announced was that Benedict Cumberbatch would be playing the voice of Smaug. With a voice so powerful and outreaching, he could have made Smaug one of the most powerful characters and a performance to remember. Instead, the script had left so much to be wanting. I confess to feeling the same way about Modiji’s last video message to the nation.
Another movie in the list which I had the chance of seeing was The King’s Speech (no longer there). A film where the heir apparent overcomes his stammering problems to deliver a speech as the King on radio when Britain goes to war in 1939; addressing the important issues, boosting the morale of those fighting and the entire nation; giving out assurances. The international media is biased against India (Exhibit: Instances of reporting from a journal based in a country which has taken the most botched up measures to the Corona outbreak), most of the national media has gone to the dogs (a section of it is also biased in the government’s favour), propaganda runs amok even at the times of such crisis, there is blame game (including by the ruling party). Real issues take the backburner and non-issues become important. Positivity is required, and in abundance. But before spreading positivity, the negativity needs to be quashed. Measures are doubtlessly being taken, but we need to hear about it. The court jesters will perhaps continue to amuse, but we really need to hear the King Speak - about some real important issues - and there is only one Man capable of delivering it.
