The Nomenclature!!

 did not have a name till the age of 3, yeah this means i did not have any proof of my entry into this world(in other words… a Birth certificate!) & no evidence for existence till that tender age! Since my father was an auditor working for the municipal governing bodies, getting a proof of my birth wasn't quite an issue at all.The only paramount problem that troubled my parents from the time of my arrival was the task of "embedding" a suitable name on my self! Since, it is a normal practice to put 3yr olds to school, this naming nuisance bothered them even more….They spent dark sleepless nights & equally gloomy dreary days trying to decipher a suitable, sensible name for me! Now, the question that arises in the mind of all ya readers must be…. What the hell was this devil called then, all these years? or whether people never bothered to call her at all?!! Hmmm… well… i was called Hooty, Tooty, Tweety, Sweety, Inky, Pinky, Ponky, Monkey, Donkey & a host of other cute names…..  the most commonly used & the most familiar assembly of phonetics being…."MANI" (no not mini  ) till the formal christening happened… To this date, my parents & all my blood relations call me & know me as MANI!! And some of the not-so-close relatives (belonging to the back-biting league) call me "Mani Kutty" just to project their closeness & fondness towards me! i dont know whether my parents meant the delightfully rhythmic ding-dong bell (or) cute tiny beads that resemble my beautiful eyes (or) the omnipotent much-admired "money" when they took to addressing me by that awful name "Mani"!! Only when i grew up, i came to realize that this name is mostly attributed to the male population…. and is a bit tooooo common in our locality! From ages of yore till current date, the situation at home is such that… whenever my father calls out for me "Maniiiiii!!!!!…." from one end of the house, it is usually a 40-yr old Mr.Mani (our tenant) or my ever-obedient mom Sasi or our cute dog Blinky who comes leaping & running to my father in response; similarly, when my father summons our little Lhasapso Blinky, it will most probably be my mother or self who answers his call fervently!! To add onto all this clutter & confusion the milkman, the newspaperman, the postman and the "coconut -plucker" (hope you understand  ) are all known by the blasted name Mani!!

So, as i was saying…. by the time i was 3yrs of age, my parents were on a full fledged hunt for a befitting name for their darling child! It so happened that some very distant (about 682.32kms i believe  ) relative of ours landed at my home…. cast his eyes on the "Apple of everyone's eye" and in the click of a second, suggested this disastrous name "Sowmini"!! And sources say that he was much appreciated & acclaimed for this stupendous invention & his hyper-brilliance for having named me after my maternal grandmother…. just by removing the "dha" out of the name Sowdhamini!  Thank my stars! he didnt think of a nomenclature based on my paternal grandmom's sweet name…. "Chellamma"!! My heart bleeds in its chamber, my eye balls pop out of their cavity & the haemoglobin freezes in my veins… when i imagine life with any kind of permutation or combination of that name assigned to me!!! (For eg: Chellam,Chamma, ammache, ellamm, lama….) I controlled my craving desire to bite him (& tear his flesh apart)…. only bcoz he also presented me with a beautiful glowing gold ring….. which I proudly wore for 10 more years, before it broke off! Throughout school days, i used to wince with pain & shame… when the teachers ask me to explain the meaning of my name, coz it sounds very strange & different & interesting (& yeah piggish)!! During the initial phase of my career, i worked for a Technical call centre for a couple of months… and then, every time i picked up a call i had to clutch my eyebrows, grind my teeth, but still adorn a sweet smile… and say "Welcome to . I am SoWWWmini! How may i help you?" Gosh! pronouncing that name everytime was one terrible exercise for my vocal chords and eventually-twisted tongue & mouth!!

After thanking the so-called benevolent soul for solving their itching problem and having derived this sad name, my parents christened me "B.K.Sowmini" – B for Bhagavathy alias Sasi, my mom and K for as-u-know Krishnamoorthy! i roamed around the world (Ok… only India… the southern part to be precise  ) with this peculiar name, hearing several abbreviations of it (most of them abusive)…. till the time i was in 7th or 8th std. Then came the turning point in my life…. when my parents consulted a numerologist, who suggested absurd variations in the names of all three of us (in fact he changed half of my father's name! 8-O) based on some Name-Value pair & associated algebra he had learnt in his Pre-school! As per his superior analytical theory, it was decided that only my initials be changed to "S.K." and my horrible name be retained as it is…. (for his numeological quests could not find a even more pathetic variation of the already spooky name!) My parents happily agreed to this…. coz we always had the convenience of saying S stands for Sasikala, my mother's pet name  or even for "Sankarapillai" my father's father!! So, this novice name with modified initials came into effect, with some publications in the official gazette (dont know if this appeared in the BBC, CNN, NDTV & leading newspapers….  ) Till completion of formal education, no darned soul asked me to expand my hideous initials… and i thought i could live happily ever after!

But alas! as if to test my memory retention capacity & respect for family heritage, it is the Cognizant ppl who for the first time asked me to state my name fully, with detailed expansion of both the initials! Little did they know that the first initial indicated nothing but the skewed intelligence of a funny, disoriented numerologist who attempted playing around with innocent people's names & lives!  Thus, everywhere inside Cognizant i came to be known as "Sankarapillai Krishnamoorthy, Sowmini", a name lavishly longer than my self! i was alarmed on seeing my Mail ID for the first time…. and so were people outside the organization, who wanted to mail me the resume of his/her sister's husband's brother's nephew's sister-in-law's son for a suitable opening with this esteemed concern. Also imagine my fury & resentment when the client in my previous project gave me the mail Id sankarapillais@schneider.com!! I would have loved to spit fire on them….. but my professional ethics & code of conduct prevented me from doing so!  No soul, alive or dead, bothers to send me a single mail to my Cognizant ID even if it means a short courtesy email saying Hi or Hello or Bye, for fear of recollecting & typing the entire email ID containing all the letters of my expanded name! The only relief is that the login for all the internal network sites can be done safely with moi Employee ID and does not need the exhaustive typing of the complete name! My passport too has the name written in full glory…. and so…. little Mani is gonna be called Ms.Sankarapillai Krishnamoorthy Sowmini all over the world….wherever she goes 

As we have reached the end of the story, here are some pictures of the main characters in this post!

The author of this post, with her parents, all oblivious of the impending doom…. errr…name Sowmini!

The ever-inquisitive Blinky, deeply involved in her research of the world below!  

 

Sorry, i did not get the exquisite opportunity of photographing the inventor of this name, the numerologist who gave it a trendy twist, my namesakes….our tenant, the milkman, mewspaperman, postman & coconut-plucker!!

Update: To all you ppl who commented about Blinky….. BLINKY IS NOT CAMERA SHY!!!

P.S.: Now, i dont want any excited goof to go about counting the number of words in this post…. nor do i want any PJ kings (read: Aravind & Sudhakar) to eat my brains… by stating that a picture speaks a 1000 words and hence, the length of this post = 1000 + 1000 + 1000 + the no. of words counted by Goofy = 3000 + X!!

Love's labours lost...

Slowly & softly rolled the tears
Down the frills of her gentle cheeks
Stressed & submerged in unknown fears
Sleep had deserted her eyes since bygone weeks

Her head quivered every passing second
buried in the fathoms of the pillow, moist & sullen
No hand to caress, no soul to depend
She drifted deep into her world of pathos & burden

Fond memories of childhood, misty & green
Rose before her like imposing shadows in the gloomy night
Many a butterfly, many a daffodil had she seen
past gleeful lanes of golden summer & spring bright

That mystique August evening, amidst kith & kin
When heavens watched & angels whispered wishes with a wand
Feathery dreams took flight, lost in the clouds, lost in the din
The loving hearts walked down the aisle, both hand in hand

Years fled silently in peace & gay abandon
As their children grew entwined in a bond of blissful harmony
Life swept them to far away shores, with prizes laden
She thrived on lonely lands meekly… with little love and no money

The skies wept & the storm roared with furious might
when they brought home his body, cold & blue on a lifeless bed
A faint gleam shone, a dead leaf stirred that frosty night
When her heart bled, life choked & an ocean of salty tears she shed

Little had time erased, the memories of seasoned woes
which she bore with fear & agony, close to her bosom
Through the window, a stream of stealthy air touched her toes
As she lay fallen, on the dusty floors… of the Old age home!

Shortlisted!

Sachin Tendulkar

A.R.Rahman

Jaya Bhaduri

Yasser Arafat

Napolean Bonaparte

Margaret Mitchell

S.K.Sowmini

Can you spot 1 "unique" but common feature among these celebrities (including the ultimate one… i mean the one at the end of the list  )? Come on guys, think.. think.. think… till ur thinking hats catch fire!!

Puzzled?? Dumbstruck?? No clue?? OK… to all you dumb fellas out there.. the mystery unveiled:

Though all of these stars have reached great heights in their own "Centres of Excellence", each one of them scored really low in terms of their own physical height!! Yeah, all the afore-mentioned dudes & dudettes are/were pathetically short!!

One secret dream that i have nurtured, ever since i was a toddler, is/was to grow up as highhhhh as the Bachchans!! But, what to do…God moved in mysterious ways, his wonders to perform!! I sometimes think, is it 'coz of my name that nature has restricted my growth beyond the "mini" size?!! i have been eating loads & loads of chalk pieces since age 8, bcoz somebody told me that Calcium plays a vital role in enhancing one's height! I have tried skipping, hopping, jumping, hanging from the Qutb Minar & even drinking Complan!!! But nooooooo….. not even the remote signs of growth in the vertical direction  I even started climbing banyan, mango, jackfruit, palm, coconut trees in a desperate attempt, to climb err.. grow higher!! But, the corollary of all these efforts was me establishing cordial relations with the monkeys, squirrels, sparrows & crows residing in these trees and they offering their deepest sympathies for my dwarf-like stature….

To say that Julie, my labrador, is of the same height as self, when standing on four legs… would give you a vivid picture of my terrific build! She too, sometimes insults me, by standing on two legs!!  To add on to the sorry state of affairs, i am quite on the plumpy side (or shud it be quite plumpy on the sides??!!). Great researchers at Harvard & Texas have been spending sleepless nights trying to ascertain whether my exact shape is spherical, cylindrical, cuboid or amoeboid!!

During my school days, my class teacher never noticed me standing up & frantically waving my hand, too eager to answer the tough math questions she shoots out at the class. During college, i used to blush with shame, when the professors ask me to explain the electromagnetic theory, Planck's law or Maxwell's equation (hey guys, you dont have to give me a standing ovation here…. i perfectly understand that you guys are awestruck at my profound knowledge… but please guys control urself  ) on the board…. the fact remains that my hand has never graced the upper half of a black board & it NEVER WILL… in this lifetime  Whenever i stand in a queue, be it at the Cognizant canteen, EB office, Tirupati darshan, railway reservation counter or the like, i can hardly see the proceedings in the front, unless of course, a equally short person stands before me. On the day of our marriage, my husband had to bend down sooo low, to fit into the photographs… that many people mistook him for playing cocoa (or is it koko??) in the marriage hall!! One of the prominent "allergies" that i have is – i just cannot "stand" tall people! they bring out the dozing devil inside me (my infy compex  ). So, the moment i see someone tall (even if it is Big-B or the giant Khali) approaching me (of course for an autograph of mine), i dont stop to shed a smile… i just flee the place in a my-pants-are-on-fire pace!!

Hmmm… Now coming to corporate matters, I often peep into the next cubicle (of course to discuss the effect of Service Oriented Architecture on Entreprise Application Integration and XML/WSDL usage in a heterogenous computing environment… pheww mummyy!! what else did you think,eh?   ) by placing one foot on the chair, the other foot firmly rested on the ground, my torso leaning against the cubicle, my head dangling in front of his monitor…. And despite this elegant posture, all my friend at the other cubicle says is "Sowmini, i cannot make out whether you are sitting or standing! When will you ever grow up?!!" hmmm… a cruel world!! What more can i say? i try to tell these people "Attitude is what matters, not the altitude!!"but, they just dismiss it as one more of my usual ramblings…. and continue to make fun of my "short"comings  , little realizing the fact that dear Sowmini is a living example of the phrase "Good things come in small packages" 

Of late, some of the readers have been complaining that i write very longgg posts, that consumes a hell lot of time to read…. So, friends this time… you would be overwhelmed to find that i have taken care of your concerns  Now now… please stop scrolling madly up & down the post!! Read the post once again & note the number of times i have mentioned the word "short" in this post!! (psst… those of you who are weak in counting, can take the help of dear ol'Goofy, who spent one whole day counting the letters in my name, just to ascertain that his name "Seetharaman Trichur Narayanan Iyer" is shorter than mine "Sowmini Sankarapillai Krishnamoorthy"  ) Coming back to the point, the count is 7. So, dont you think this is an amazingly "short" & sweet post??!! blink… blink…

The Step Cut!

This weekend, I had subjected myself to a hair cut.

To those of you who are blinking, thinking why this beautiful girl wanted to chop off the cascade of black flowing tresses adorning her head… well let me tell you i have these things called hairs on my head… which look more like an assortment of the Giza pyramids, randomly distributed all over the expanse of my skull… These hairs on my dumb head are idiotically curly… by this i mean… they are neither straight, nor curly… nor by any chance wavy… these idiotically curly hairs, on the aftermath of every wash, entangle themselves & transform into a brush of sorts…. capable of cleaning the hardest of all stains on any surface!!Everyday, i wake up to find more hairs on the pillow, more more hairs on my dress & even more more more hairs on the floor, than what is present on my cranium!! i was constantly reminded of the famous saying "Hair, hair everywhere, not a strand on my head at all!!" (heard of it na??) Now i was soo despo about all these hairy business, that i decided to dethrone all these stupid string-like creatures from my holy head…. so that at least for a few more months, i can stop moaning about hair fall!With such noble thoughts in my mind, i shampooed & washed my hair and headed towards the abode of every pretty woman… the beauty parlour!!Now, being new to Bangalore (now dont ask me whether 8months is actually called NEW….) i had no idea where in the neighbourhood was located a decent (yeah i visit only decent places  ) friendly beauty parlour… With much effort, i managed to find & set foot on a glamourous, sofisticated parlour pretty close to my house, with high hopes of cropping & grooming my hair in the best presentable way…. but alas!! my dreams were shattered when the inmates of the glamour-room looked at me as if i were an alien from Jupiter & had come all the way down to earth, for the sole purpose of cleaning & moping the floors of their damned parlour!! i flew away from the place in a mad rage, to escape the effect of their condescending looks & mocking smiles!

The journey continued…. my husband & self roamed about the roads of Indiranagar, Jeevan Bhima nagar & similar surroundings for more than 2.5hrs…. and finally figured out a simple humble salon befitting my image & personality i went inside the parlour after giving clear instructions to my husband to pick me up after half an hour from the same spot, reminding him of the dire consequences if he failed to do so.The lady at the what-remotely-looked-like-the-reception nodded her head & smiled at me, when i told her that i (badly) needed a haircut. She came near me, touched my hair & felt the intricacies of the locks. There was silence, absolute silence in that little space for the next 120seconds… guess she must have fainted!!After recovering herself (strong immunity i must say!!) from the brief coma, she enquired in an exhausted tone when was the last time i had washed my hair or something to that effect…i told her, promised her, convinced her, reassured her…. that i had bathed in the morning & washed my hair with gentle shampoo! She seemed to disagree… and told me that my hair was quite oily,sticky, greasy & whatnot…. (thanks to the two & half hrs journey around Indiranagar in the hot sun  ) She told me that it'll be impossible to do the setting… and that i'll have to come back after washing my hair the next day…. Disappointed & frustrated at the "treatment" meted out to me & my hair, i walked away with a vey sad & sullen expression on my face, towards the door…  just then, the lady sprang up from behind & bolted the door! She clarified that they would do the hair-cutting at once… but only the setting was the problem! Now now, i didnt know what on earth was a "setting"! i agree my hair is a hard, horrible substance to percieve… but that doesnt mean one should equate it to mud or cement or concrete!! Setting, bah!!!

OK to "cut" a long story short… the maids at the parlour dissected & dis-oriented my already dishevelled hair…. trying their best in executing what is well known as the "Step cut"! i came out with "flying hairs" after the experiment…. the hair had been shortened & was made to grace the blades of my shoulder. My husband was visibly displeased at the appearance of moi tresses & exclaimed "Doesnt seem like you've had a hair cut at all… just looks more hen pecked!!" Hmmm… what can i say… im no authority on hairstyles & little could i say/do when i saw the result of my hair-cropping…. i could just mumble "Thanks!" when the parlour maid appreciated my looks & the new hair-do created by her!! Anyway, we went back home…. my husband continuously blaming me for having messed up with my hair…. and me constanly gazing at the mirror on the bike…. trying to figure out whether i resembled the style icon T.Rajendar or his son Simbu the most!! Back home, we agreed upon the inevitable fact that my hair needed further repair & re-engineering, to ensure that I somehow resemble the homosapien breed! Hence, we had a quick lunch…in the next half an hour and set out on the mission to be accomplished.

This time, we took a different route & reached a parlour in the vicintity of Thippasandra market (yeah, the same one where encounter specialist Sowmini had a battle with a brave fella of the cattle  ) Hmmm…. The lady at the parlour was one of the serious kind…. asking me in a stern voice whether i wanted a hair cut…. (as if I had come there to watch a full reel of Jodhaa Akbar with my family & was waiting to order the pop-corn….) I was offered a high profile chair (I mean 1 which I had difficulty in climbing up) & made to sit there for 20 minutes, gaping at birds of the same feather… err… hair.. flocking all around me! The ladies at this parlour were decent (read: clever) enough not to touch, feel or smell any part of my hair to find out its "settability"!! They plunged into action right away… spraying water and playing around with scissors, clipping off bunches of hair from the most sound & stable head on earth!! After what seemed like an era, I got up from the seat, looked at my reflection on the mirror and couldn't believe what I was seeing in front of my eyes!! I looked more like a puzzled boy scout at the army camp, who has had his debut hair cut done and is ready to subject himself to further disciplinary measures at the hands of his superiors…. i stepped out of the parlour triumphantly, amused at the metamorphosis a hair cut can bring about to a small sweet girl in town….. As I put my feet outside the parlour, i was so surprised & dumbstruck at the proceedings in the market. There was music…. the one they play during the last journey of a man/woman, there was hell lot of dance, fireworks, rejoicing, shouting, screaming about the road…. that i wondered why my husband had taken soo much efforts to celebrate my hair-cutting ceremony!! This hyperactive crowd with garlands & lotuses (now you know what it was all about  ) & crackers, started approaching me in full fervour…. that i wasnt sure if they mistook me for Monsieur Yediyurappa in his yester years…i ventured to explain the state of affairs to them…. but they moved past me… towards the Party office on the farther end of the road.

My husband welcomed me with a smile, obviously delighted at the new look…. even more delighted at the thought that there wont be the ocean of hairs on the floor (which he has no other option but to clean) for another couple of months…. I too feel a lot more relieved now… though this hair style gives me the appearance of a Lhasapso pup, with a heavy curtain of hairs clouding my eyes, disabling me from viewing the proceedings of the world around me…. My team mates were startled to see me at office today…. Some of them clutched their heart… someone there swooned…. some girls were green with jealousy…. And yet some others are still throwing loving glances at me every now & then….

Thus my dear friends, my step cut done in two giant steps, thanks to the hard work & experiments of two fabulous beauty clinics, has been the slowest, shortest & most expensive hair cut in my whole life!!

P.S.: And as usual, sorry for the longgggggggggg post guys!! 

Updates from a tiny garden @ the garden city of India :)

Oooh its been a while since i wrote something... now i don't know how to begin a post :-|
well, let me start by saying... a lot has been happening (both good & bad) in the garden, ever since i posted about it here. i am gonna talk about the plants thriving currently, despite the harsh weather at Bangalore my balcony hasn't seen sunlight for the past 2months :( ) & the yield i have been getting so far - coz this is something eating my mind for quite a while now.

There are 7 tomato plants, 4 capsicums, 2 chillis, 1 brinjal, 8 carrot saplings, 2 small curry leaf plants & a pot of mint growing currently in my little balcony garden. Garlic is also growing(??) as comapnion plants in 3-4 pots. The rest of them (around 6 of them) are ornamental/flowering plants.
So far, i have harvested lots of tomatoes, 4 small capsicums, some beans, a very few green peas, a bunch of spinach, some chillis, a whole lot of mint, a tiny bunch of coriander, radish leaves, a few round radishes & 2 knolkhols. i was also lucky enough to get 1 out of 3 cabbages mentioned in the earlier post. The other 2 started growing in a weird fashion, with leaves curling outwards... and were removed after waiting for ages to see them mature. But, growing cabbages in containers is fun & a great learning experience.

Tomatoes are the ones which keep me happy all the time, even if they are not of "acceptable" sizes or shapes. i also carried a kg of tomatoes, when i visited my parents at my hometown, last month.
So, let me present to you a picture of the accidentally-grown-tomatoes harvested 3 months back. They have a sweet flavour and ideal to be eaten raw or as fresh yummy juice :)

The ones on the left side are the little-bigger-than-peanut-sized-so-called-round radishes and a handsome bunch of their leaves :)

Below are some images of my Tomato Tumbler (F1 Hybrid) plants. they did give a decent yield, though the fruit size is quite small. But, last month these plants (i have 2 of them) were attacked by blight (not sure if its early or late) and all the foliage was lost to the killer disease... the fruit set also has stopped after that. hmm.. nature is harsh at times!



What you see below is a INDAM Ruchi tomato plant - am growing 2 of this variety. Fruit set has started but many of the buds have fallen off probably due to the cloudy weather nowadays.

Those of you who are complaining that its been an overdose of tomatoes in this post, can eye the pic below - carrots growing in "companionship" with toms... am soooooooo very eager to see whats happening underground... how the carrots are growing, whether they are growing at all.. what colour they will be etc.

This is a variety called Early Nantes, but 4 months doesn't seem so "early" to me :P

Another view of the same plants, they are throwing up shoots every other day... and am waiting with bated breath to see the hidden wonder called the carrot :D

To the right - another of the INDAM Ruchi tomatoes. To the left - one of the 4 unidentified tomato plants that grew accidentally from the compost. this one is more than 6 months old and is still fruiting!

Finally (much to the relief of the readers :P), let me end this post with some flowers... these were actually yellow blooms 2 days ago, which have turned pale now :)

P.S.:  i am sorry about the bluish tinge in most of the photos above, this is because they were captured late in the evening

Pityriasis Capitis!!

Stumped? Flabbergasted?? musing that i am a part time research fellow at the Bhabha Atomic Research centre? wondering whether this is the name of a novel disease that has contracted my tiny brain cells?? secretly admiring my ability to have found out the key substance employed in the Big Bang project? Or completely dismissing this as another variety of ripe mango? well well…. dont strain urself too much guys!!


This post is just a result of the trouble & tension prevailing in my head, due to the almost omnipotent Pityriasis capitis! The subject matter of discussion here is the dry, white or grayish substance that appears in patches on the top of the head, when the scalp sheds dead epidermal cells in large clumps! Yeah, ladies & gentlemen, we are talking about the deadly dandruff!! Of late, i have been reading a lot about this irritating itching condition of the head… and the possible causes & effects of the same. "Dandruff is one of the great levelers of life. It knows no class, creed or race. It affects everyone but not in equal measure" says an author in a e-magazine. Whoa! what an optimistic "socialistic" outlook of the problem in hand!! i wish i could get hold of the fellow who wrote this… and make him scratch my head non-stop till he dies (which by all probability, wud be a few minutes after he contacts my head! :P) Almost all sources say that this condition is due to lack of "skin oil" in one's body…. this i admit is the most ridiculous statement i have heard in my lifetime! coz the amount of oil secretion from my skin is more than the output from those huge oilwells of all the Middle East kingdoms put together!! the layers of oil enveloping the exteriors of my nose is just enough to tackle this country's oil crisis for another 30 odd years (i.e. assuming iam alive & retain my nose for so long ;-)) Another reason cited in the world wide web is that of heredity predisposition which also remains null & void in my case, since none of my parents/immediate relatives suffer from this intriguing problem :-
It seems, dandruff could also be due to lack of rest/emotional stress/poor blood circulation. i have been telling my manager since ages of yore, to provide me an elegant Sony Vaio, a sturdy Volkswagon, company sponsored accomodation at Darjeeling & a french cook to accompany me during the stay… so that i can rejuvenate my system, relax my mind & soul, regulate my blood circulation, (if needed) do an effective work-from-resort and as a result, eliminate all rotten dead cells from my complacent beautiful skin!! well, he seems not so pleased with this scheme of things…. cant figure out why!! :rolling eyes:


Psychiatrists claim that this dandruff is not just a cosmetic problem, it can end up affecting even the person’s social behavior. How true this is!! My favourite pastime nowadays is to scratch my head vigorously & watch with spellbound admiration the beautiful white flakes unfolding their wings effortlessly & falling on the keyboard… just like autumn rain!! i can almost hear the "Pudhu vellai mazhai.." song from Roja in the backdrop, when i indulge in this act that is why elders said… "A keyboard is a reflection of one's head!!" err… didnt they?? i also keep scratching my head during team meetings, conf calls with client, defect triage discussions & appraisal meetings!! But, almost on all of these occassions, people attribute it to my hyperactive brain functions & ultra-efficient thought processes! nobody really thinks the reason for my hand permanently glued to my upper compartment, is a mass of lifeless useless skin cells! We (moi husband & self) also spend our spare time at home, sincerely scratching each other's scalps & adding glory to the Wills slogan "Made for each other!!" So, if any of you guys are planning to drop into my house anytime… (to get my autograph/pose with me for an stylish photograph that is), please give me a ring before you come…. this is for your own safety! :D Owing to the increasing workload at office & the prime need to maintain a decent work-life balance, im planning to hire a PSO (Personal Scratching officer) who would replace my hand-on-head! In case any of you are interested in applying for this esteemed position, please note the main eligibility criteria: the person can be Male/Female (with 99% reservation for TDH male candidates with a striking personality!), need to possess long, elegant nails on all 10 fingers (no colouring material/polish allowed on them lest u poison my hair!!), have high levels of patience & tolerance, extreme commitment, dedication and most important… willingness to work in flexible timings (what if i fall into a scratching fit, in the middle of the night? ;-)). Dont worry, compensation will be on par with the (dandruff) industry standards on my head!!


Now, coming to the cure for this mammoth problem and to prevent it from deteriorating to serious & dangerous "Seborrhoeic Dermatitis":
One frightfully easy method is to use a shampoo containing a cytostatic agent (like selenium sulfide or zinc pyrithione - well dont ask me what these are… may be something like bleaching powder good for scalp anyway!! :D) All those horrid chaps who were dumb enough to not identify that it was the very ordinary "common salt" or Sodium Chloride that was being soooo hyped in the movie Dasavatharam, stop blinking…. try out all possible shampoos in this planet to conclude which would be the ideal one for your already deplenishing hair! It is recommended that eggs, cabbage, wheat, garlic & yeast be incorporated in our daily diet, so that it will enhance the supply of Vitamin B and B6, very important constituents in controlling dandruff! The only foods i can think of to be containing all these vitamin rich components are yummy sticky Pizzas & dry boring Garlic breads!! Alternatively, you could try applying garlic externally… errr.. on your anyway-stinking scalp…. so that'll effectively reduce dandruff generation and also keep ur manager & team members away!! :P Use alternating showers of hot and cold water while washing your hair, to improve circulation around the scalp. But dont overdo it, lest you end up with alternate patches of hair & football grounds on your head! Last but not the least, brush your hair kindly dont treat it like it were a naxal threat & u were the ruling party! :P Well, dont ask me if i have tried any of these remedies out…. im just waiting for responses from the victims errr… the bravehearts who attempted these experiments! Dear readers, you can also drop in some simple, "sensible" & useful suggestions, in the Comments section and help me have an itch-free scalp & life Thanks!

 
src: Lifted from my internal blog at office

Garden's day out :)

Pl find below a few snapshots from my little balcony garden, all captured with a Canon EOS Rebel XS. Let me declare with caution that this is my first experience with a DSLR & with gardening. For a person who cannot even click dejent pics using a zimble mobile camera, a DSLR was like Raj Kundra to Shilpa Shetty, a pricey catch.. a boon from heaven. So, if the pic quality is bad, lets blame it on the camera and its maker, if the plants quality is not up to the mark, lets blame the weather & the vaasthu location of my balcony

Alright now, a cellotape to the royal rigmarole emanating from my pungent mouth! And here you go…


i dont know if its the cute orange rose or the lush green beans plants that i love more.. both of them induce my adrenaline levels to soar high, hence this impartial click

A tiny ornamental (?) chilli plant trying to figure out if it has to grow tall & reach the bachchans or spread out its purple wings and expand like Adnan Sami (anyone who tells me, Adnan has reduced weight, will get a tight slap on their cheek! running around for adjectives & similies & metaphors is a painstacking job, plz understand!) or hibernate until further notice from the gardener

Cabbages which were pea-sized (Kozhi would insist that this adj be reserved for my brain.. hmm) in the prev post, expanding to unknown territories within its black residence and growing into a lovely monstrous flower. this pic is old by a month. in fact, there are 3 such cabbage plants which have completely enveloped the container with their huge huge leaves.

A red rose bud ready to open its eyes to the strange concrete world outside… i know this photo experiment has come out all weird n shaky. But, as always, plz bear with my assasination attempts

This is a ‘basal cone’ shoot emerging from the base of the orange rose plant, captured in the 1st image above. Basal cones are supposed to grow vigourously and produce a multitude of flower buds than the central stem.

Next on board are my lovely tomato plants, which have started flowering & setting fruits off late. All the “Pusa Ruby” variety tomatoes that i planted (refer: prev post) died a miserable death due to lack of adequate sunlight & probably an overdose of my horrible presence ;-) The plants you see in this pic grew on their own, from seeds accidently present in the organic manure i used!

The ground in the background, belongs to Oracle Corporation… and i have told them not to start any construction until my tomato plants yield generously The building in the back, back-ground houses JPMorgan, Nokia, Cisco & many such corporate jumbos… the only thing pending now is my to-be-updated resume

The same tomato senoritas with sleepy flowers dressed in pricky bright hair all over, making me feel they are related to Anil Kapoor or Karadi T.Rajendar in this birth or that of the recent past

A teeny weeny coriander sapling jutting its head out of the cocopeat medium, just to check what that noise was all about. Hey kiddo! that was just me, sneezing sprightfully Take it easy buddy & yes, say CHEEEESE

phewww… all of u can wipe off the sweat streaming down ur eyebrows, ease your facial bones, heave a deep sigh of relief & relaxation and get back to holy work. This is all from my plantville & photoville as of now… more tortures, on a later date. Until then, fare thee well!!