Taggedelic!

I’ve been tagged by Belt Mathai. Don’t you know Belt Mathai, the rowdy who was banished to Hamburg by the locals in Trivandrum for brandishing a Malappuram kathi and coercing poor souls to gobble down the experimental food he concocts. The fed up authorities sent him to Hamburg in hopes that he’ll re-invent his culinary skills and boy! look what happened. Not only he metamorphosed into a master chef but he also started a cooking blog, which seems to be a hit with the gourmets and gormandizers alike; plus he started another blog where he concocts rib tickling posts and this seems to be a hit with the humour loving mortals of blogosphere as well. 

The tag says I’ve to write 10 honest things about myself and then pass it on to 7 other bloggers. Actually I don’t mind talking about myself (there isn’t much anyway), but I don’t want to bore anyone with it (which I’m sure you will be). So I, for one, would not even contemplate blaming if you’ve thoughts of skipping this one.  

Here goes the tag: 

(1) In a class, the first benchers and last benchers are the popular lot, the former for their academic studiousness and the latter for their pranks and mischievousness. I belonged to the breed of those pedestrian mid benchers whom no one would even barely notice (for most of my school and college life). We were like almost non-existent in class. I still remember the first time I tried to talk to Jes, my neighbor plus my classmate in college - about 2 months after we entered college, one fine evening, en route to home, I caught up with her and tried to spark up a conversation.

Me: Hi Jes, I heard there’ll be strike in college tomorrow. 
Jes (with a quizzical look): Are you in my college?
Me (completely taken aback; ego shattered; self esteem humbled): I’m in your class! 
Jes: Oh I see. Don’t remember seeing you in class. 
Me: I think it’s high time you start wearing specs. 
Jes: Where do you sit in class?
Me: Somewhere in the middle.
Jes: Aah. That’s why. 

(2) I was a fan of Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew and Goosebumps when in school. In fact, those were the widely available books in our library then. I guess there’s hardly any Loyolite in my generation who hasn’t read Hardy Boys. 

(3) I hardly had any friends until 6th grade or so. Then came Abe and Rohit. Abe who was a lil stout and I who was skinny, were known as Laurel and Hardy in class. 

(4) I like lolcats. (Don’t think that just because I like lolcats I’m a sweet lil childish boy; my knuckles are fucking hard you know; better keep that in mind.)

(5) My handwriting is really small. And I never drew margins in my notebooks. 

(6) I occasionally make lemon tea, keep it in fridge and drink it at midnight; a habit that developed recently.

(7) I like jokes with sexual innuendos but not downright dirty ones.  

(8) I like Stanley Kubrick, Padmarajan and Siddique-Lal movies. And my favorite actor is Sreenivasan. 

(9) Jes says I’m mentally backward; I said she’s dentally forward. KP says I’m nuts; I said he’s balls. Chottu says I’m pig; I said he’s chicken (a.k.a. kozhi or poovalan in Malayalam).

(10) I don’t have any spectacular hobbies, just some usual reading and movies stuff. So when I used to attend job interviews during placements in college, I used to bluff that I had a crystal collection. I would study all about crystals - different types, properties, color, texture, uses et al. Then in interviews I’d mention my hobby and the interviewers invariably asked about it and at this point I’d route the interview in my direction. This technique always proved successful with zero failure. (I’m least interested in crystals but even if they asked to show the collection, I wouldn’t falter, coz I know a person who really has a crystal collection – my dad) 

Ok that's it. Now you can wake up from your half sleep state. :|

I tag Praveen, Philip, Hari, Sakeeb, Jane, Thoorika & Devil incarnate. Hey I don’t want the tag to be a burden to anyone and it’s completely your discretion to do it. No hard feelings if you want to skip the tag.  :) 

Retrospections & Prospections

Well well well, look who’s talking now? Yup it’s me, with a brand new tag sticked onto my forehead by the Evil Queen of Blogosphere alias Silverine a.k.a. Anjali. 

When I started this blog, the only readers were my classmates from college. And I would’ve wrapped up this blog once college was over; but somewhere down the line, on a bright sunny day, bang came the comments from Anjali, Deepti and Mathew, the first bloggers I met in blogosphere (apart from school-mates and college-mates). The first people you meet in any place, are special, and they’ll always remain special to you. Now college is over, the classmates are all long gone, but these bloggers are still there, then and now, to read all the moronic stuff I write. Thanks a heap! And when I decided to take a break from blogging and keep a low profile, BAM!, Anjali gives me a stimulus in the form of a spanking new tag. I can’t think of any wisecrack replies for this tag, so I better be serious about it. 

The Tag: Questions from the past, present and future. Answer them and then tag your friends from the blogosphere. Leave a comment on their blog letting them know they have been tagged and you are done.

YESTERDAY:- 

Your oldest memories:

• Screaming out “Plane inte dyeroodu para plane thirichu vidaan!! Enikke Ammachiye kaananam!!” at the top of my voice. (My Ammachi looked after me when I was really young as my parents were not here. And I wouldn’t go with them when they finally came to take me with them.)

• Sitting on dad’s lap while he was driving and honking horns for him.

• Sprinkling salt on the report card as teacher told “Veettil ninnum uppu ittoondu varanam”.
  

• Standing on the swings and flying to and fro, sliding on the slides, playing football during lunch breaks simultaneously carrying the lunch box and eating, playing WWF on the white sands of UKG park, and the entire school shouting out “Happy Holidays” rhythmically on the last day of exams.

• Fr. Pulickal’s cane and his ladoos.

• Slowly approaching mom when she’s about to leave for office and handing her my not-so-impressive report card, face down. 

• Thrashings with the chooral vadi from mom. 
  

What were you doing 10 years ago?

Well, 10 years ago I was in the 7th grade. Those were the times when I would get all the female roles in dramas and tableaus. For the youth festival that year, I was this French maid in an English play. And there was a scene in which the cop grabs hold of me, at which point, Abe got up from the crowd and screamed, “Avanee rape cheyyaatheda”, much to the dismay of the judges. Beat the pulp out of Abe after the play. 

The Lady, the Maid and the Cop. 
Photo Courtesy: Loyola Magazine 1998-‘99

TODAY:-

No job, no girl, no money!! But on hindsight, not joining the job was perhaps a good thing. I’ve got all the time in this world to do what I want to do. I’m reading all the books I always wanted to, learning cooking, planning to study a new language, and a million trillion pending things to do. 

If you build a time capsule what would it contain?

Nothing. Zilch. All my memories would remain in my inward eye. 

TOMORROW:-

Honestly, I have no clue where I’ll be tomorrow. But I know where I don’t want to be tomorrow. Life’s what happens when you make other plans. 

What do you see yourself doing 14 years from now?

Sitting in a yacht with my trophy wife and sipping icy cold bohemia style beer. Jokes apart, I’m not a very ambitious person. All I want is to lead a peaceful life without any enmity towards anyone, eat three meals a day, watch a good movie at weekends, and marry a simple girl who knows how to cook (Am I asking too much??)

There, the tageth is doneth. Now I need to stick it to someone else’s forehead. I tag Deepti, Hari and Praveen

Alive & Amplified

Long time no see. How art thou? I'm fine, thanks. First things first. I’ve been tagged by the Phlip Side flipper a.k.a Philip. His blog is one I can identify with coz of the character assassinations of Kunz, Santa and Banta, and the like; after all we both are among the Twelve Apostles, we have the same mission to fulfill, right Philip? 

But I’m modifying his tag to form a new “Quote Tag” (Hope you don’t mind Philip). It’s a pretty simple one. Here’s the tag: 

Jot down 5 of your favorite quotes from the various books you’ve read. If you don’t have the books with you now, googling (Wikiquotes and the like) can be used to find them. Tag five people and acknowledge the person who tagged you.

So here goes my shot:

1. “Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them. With Major Major it had been all three.” 
                                                              -- Catch-22

2. “He was a self-made man who owed his lack of success to nobody.”
                                                              -- Catch-22

3. "I'll tell you what justice is. Justice is a knee in the gut from the floor on the chin at night sneaky with a knife brought up down on the magazine of a battleship sandbagged underhanded in the dark without a word of warning.”
                                                             -- Catch-22

4. Toohey: “Mr. Roark, we're alone here. Why don't you tell me what you think of me? In any words you wish. No one will hear us.” 
     Roark: “But I don't think of you.”
                                                             -- The Fountainhead  

5. “It's said that the worst thing one can do to a man is to kill his self-respect. But that's not true. Self-respect is something that can't be killed. The worst thing is to kill a man's pretense at it.”

                                                             -- The Fountainhead


And I tag Anjali (the sterling Silverine), Deepti (the Mindspace mind boggler), Mathew (another “Spark”ling fellow Apostle), and Philip (yeah, that’s a reverse tag for the Phlip side). 

Eight Random Facts: Yet Another Tag

I got tagged by Ganesh. The tag is pretty boring but since I’ve nothing else to blog now, I’ll do it anyway.

Rules:
1. Each player starts with 8 random facts about themselves.
2. People who are tagged, write a blog post about their own 8 random things, and post these rules.
3. At the end of your post you need to tag 8 people and include their names.
4. If you fail to do this within eight hours, you will not reach Third Series or attain your most precious goals for at least two more lifetimes.

I don't care if I don't reach third series or attain my most precious goals because I don't have any. Anyway here goes my shot:  

Disclaimer: All the true things I’m about to tell are shameless lies.

1. I was a perfectionist till my 12th grade; had precise timings for doing all my chores and kept my room real clean with each object having specific positions. And after entering college, I became a lousy couch potato.

2. I’m a remote control abuser; I keep on changing channels on TV and people tend to get really irritated with that.

3. I love to take long walks at dusk.

4. I know this sounds weird but I’ve seen this same dream about 4 or 5 times when I was really young. There was a Rubik’s Cube on a table and it slowly moves to the edge and finally falls on to the floor; And before the cube hits the floor, I wake up.

5. I don’t think I’ve a rigid personality. It keeps changing from time to time; so different people have different perceptions about me.

6. I’m selfish.

7. I usually like the villains in movies than the heroes.

8. Do you have problems in life? If you do, I don’t give a rat’s ass, coz I’ve got my own.

And the tag is passed on to Karthik, Rakesh, Syam, Rohit, Kishore, Anjali, Deepti and Mathew. Some of these bloggers might have already taken up the tag, if so, ignore this one.

The Maiden Tag

I have been tagged by Karthik. The tag comprises 30 trivial questions. Here’s my shot at it.

1. LAST MOVIE YOU SAW IN A THEATER:
“Race”. It was worth the money though the plot was unrealistic. The film was replete with crosses, double crosses, triple crosses, quadruple crosses and double quadruple crosses interspersed with untimely songs. Anyway I liked it because the film had a fast pace with no unnecessary dragging and it was a breath of fresh air from the contemporary Hindi movies that had corny dialogues and slapstick comedies.

2. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING?
None.

3. FAVORITE BOARD GAME?
I haven’t played much as to brand anything as my favorite. Chess and scrabbles can be counted in.

4. FAVORITE MAGAZINE?
Readers Digest. Does Hustler count?? 

5. FAVORITE SMELLS?
I think this sounds absurd but I used to smell the pages of any newly bought book. No favorite smell in particular.

6. FAVORITE SOUND?
Voice of any girl who pronounces the syllables in my name, in a sexy way.

7. WORST FEELING IN THE WORLD?
When you spend the whole night studying for the next day’s exam and hearing that you have been studying the wrong subject, the next morning.

8. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU THINK OF WHEN YOU WAKE?
Darn, shouldn’t have drunk that much. Now, which of my girlfriend’s bedroom is this? Hmm, should be Teena’s. Wait, it’s Jen’s. No, it’s Nicole’s. Aargh!!

9. FAVORITE FAST FOOD PLACE?
Does thattukadas count?? Anyway, I’m not a fast food junkie.

10. FUTURE CHILD'S NAME?
Depends on the nationality of the girl I’ll be marrying.
Russian: Lavrenty(m)/Lyubochka(f)
Italian: Antonello(m)/Annunziata(f)
Spanish: Eusebio(m)/Esmeralda(f)
But I doubt whether my Irish girlfriend will allow me to marry any other girl.

11. FINISH THIS STATEMENT. "IF I HAD A LOT OF MONEY I’D...?
Gamble all my money on the Indian hockey team and bet that they would lose. I’ll be double rich after the game.

12. DO YOU DRIVE FAST?
I hate driving. The ruthless traffic and hopeless roads of Trivandrum has made driving a nightmarish experience for me.

13. DO YOU SLEEP WITH A STUFFED ANIMAL?
No, I sleep with Salma Hayek.

14. STORMS - COOL OR SCARY?
Scary. Because I haven’t experienced any. Would like to feel how it would be.

15. WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST CAR?
Haven’t had any; I’m still a student, boss. But the first car in our family was a Maruti 800 bought in 1991. We used it for 14 years.

16. FAVORITE DRINK?
Lime Soda.

17. FINISH THIS STATEMENT, "IF I HAD THE TIME I WOULD"
This is an irrelevant question; I already have lots of time and that's why I'm doing this tag.

18. DO YOU EAT THE STEMS ON BROCCOLI?
Yes, I do.

19. IF YOU COULD DYE YOUR HAIR ANY COLOR, WHAT WOULD BE YOUR CHOICE?
I find it despicable to dye hair. I’m pretty satisfied with my hair colour.

20. NAME ALL THE DIFFERENT CITIES/TOWNS YOU HAVE LIVED IN.
Trivandrum (1986-87), Thodupuzha (1987-89), Aachen (1989-90), Trivandrum (1990-present).

21. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH?
Cricket, MotoGP and Female Wrestling!! The ideal sport to watch will be a violent cat fight between Monica Belluci and Salma Hayek to decide who shall "service" me.

 22. ONE NICE THING ABOUT THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU
Very generous. He bought me a samosa and chocolate sharjah when he came to Trivandrum. Nice chetan, hehe.

23. WHAT'S UNDER YOUR BED?
Cockroaches, lizards and spiders!! It’s been a while since I’ve ventured down there.

24. WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE BORN AS YOURSELF AGAIN?
Yes and No. I don’t have a clear answer.

25. MORNING PERSON OR NIGHT OWL?
I used to be a morning lark. Now I’m mostly noctural. But I’m flexible enough to be either of them.

26. OVER EASY, OR SUNNY SIDE UP?
Over easy. I like it when eggs are mixed with onions and green chilis.

27. FAVORITE PLACE TO RELAX?
Beach during sunset. Love to gaze at the sun going down the horizon.

28. FAVORITE PIE?
Haven’t eaten any so far.

29. FAVORITE ICE CREAM FLAVOR?
Any flavor will do. But the most I’ve consumed might be chocolate.

30. OF ALL THE PEOPLE YOU TAGGED THIS TO, WHO'S MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND FIRST?
No idea.

And this tag is passed on to:
Ganesh, Rohit and Kishore.