Silicon Valley Leaders Meet Allah

It was one fine morning for Allah! He had just made the first set of two humans, Adam and Eve! Beaming with pride, he sat on his comfy bean bag, made himself a nice cup of hot chai and started sipping it. Being God himself, Allah had "love all, serve all" philosophy. Anybody could "knock, knock" on his doors and he would never feel that his leisure time was being disturbed. Like what Jim Carrey does in the movie Bruce Almighty, how could God be afraid of the citizens of the world for approaching God seeking help! So, when Allah heard the door knocking sound with the first sip of his tea, he said "who is there?".  The reply came "Tim". Allah said "Tim who?". The reply came "Tim Cook". 

Wow! The creator of iPhone 6 Plus! Allah was enthralled. He had been watching Tim Cook worriedly for a little while after he ascended Steve Jobs' unparalleled throne. And now that Tim had proved his mettle, Allah was happy for Tim. That too, Tim had overruled the Steve Job's fixation on the then iPhone and iPad screen sizes (3.5" and 9.7" respectively).  So, Allah saw Tim as a man who was growing his own legacy independently, well outside the shadows of Steve Jobs! So, Allah happily opened the door to greet Tim! Much to his surprise, Allah found that Tim had brought a consortium of other Silicon Valley leaders along with him. That included Intel's Paul Otellini, Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Microsoft's Satya Nadella, and Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg!

And before we go into this story, let me bid farewell to those religious intolerant of you, my readers! While I am just a nature worshipper myself, I can see that some of you are already very angry at me! You don't like the fact that I am using the word "Allah" so daringly! And you don't like my farcical blabberings such as "Allah made Adam and Eve". Let me explain to you why I did that. God has different names, doesn't he? I chose to use the word "Allah" in my blog today to denote "God"! Thus, my use of the word "Allah" here is literal (meaning "God") and not religious (meaning "Islamic God"). I thank the rest of the readers, the religious tolerant ones for staying with me! Like the vegetarians substituting "beans"for meat when ordering their Chalupa Supreme at Taco Bell, please substitute the word "Allah" with the word "God" wherever it appears in this blog.

Some of those Silicon Valley leaders had brought their latest gadget achievements to show to Allah in their first divine rendezvous. Allah looked at his own brain children that he had just made - Adam and Eve! Sophisticated human features sculpted with such wonderful artistic splendour, sitting on his work table lifelessly. Allah thought he would brag about his creations to the Silicon Valley leaders in return for hearing them brag about theirs! So he waved his magic wand at those two brand new humans and gave them the wonderful gift called as life! The muscular and naked Adam, looked at the curvy and naked Eve and instantly fell in love with her. Both those first generation humans, unclad, primitive, unpolished intelligence, didn't have any option but to sit in that room as dunces. They sure were terribly intimidated by the possibility for a highly cerebral discussion that was about to ensue in that room.

Amazon's Jeff Bezos was the first one to start the discussion. He said, "Allah, we think you must have been a little dim-witted when you made Adam and Eve because you gave each human only two eyes". Allah was shocked at the opening statement. But he kept his cool and tried to mask his disappointment! Jeff Bezos then brandished his Fire phone out of his suit. "Allah, look what I made!" and showed its multicamera excellence. Allah said "Jesus Christ, how many cameras does this sucker have?". Jeff Bezos said "we have incorporated numerous front facing cameras in our fire phone to give you the dynamic perspective - our patented 3D technology to give you 3D vision from wherever and however you look at the screen". 

"Wow" Allah exclaimed in awe! So many cameras all in one phone, Allah couldn't but wonder.

Then came a loud voice to be heard in that room. The familiar voice that said "And one more thing" to the amusement of its audience for so many number of yesteryears! Steve Jobs! Everybody in that room was surprised! The voice said, "Allah, don't you praise Jeff's stupid fire phone - till now they have been able to sell only 36000 units of their Fire phone while iPhone has been sold more than half a billion times"! And not only the voice of Steve Jobs, but also the accompanying friendly turtleneck figure of Steve Jobs slowly emerged right in the middle of the room. How the heck did the dead Steve make it up there? Steve Jobs said "oh, I didn't want to miss this historical technological meeting with the divine, so I chose to beam myself from heaven using hologram technology". 

As soon as Steve Jobs entered the room, Allah courteously stood up and honored him. Even though Steve Jobs was initially dishonest and failed to disclose the fact that he stole GUI idea from Xerox company, Allah decided to forgive him anyway! In fact it is God's duty to forgive and forget, isn't it? And also, Steve Jobs was, and is, the irreplaceable Steve Jobs, isn't it?

Steve Jobs looked at the corner of the room and said "who are those two naked people standing there?". Allah told Steve Jobs, "these are my two creations" and then proceeded to increase the room temperature as he noted those naked couple to be shivering.  Steve Jobs then said, "I see that you gave them front facing nice camera's - their eyes, but how about rear cameras? Don't you think Adam needs both front and rear eyes". Steve Jobs looked at the rest of the CEO's in the room and said, "hey guys, did you all know that I was the first one to incorporate both front and back camera in my iPhone 4 design. Nobody in the phone industry had done it until that far, Apple was the first to do it". He looked at Allah again and dismissed his human design as a poor one because there were only front facing cameras for facetime, but no rear-facing high megapixel cameras for general picture shooting.

Allah was feeling bad now at the way the tech entrepreneurs were treating him. He wondered who was going to deride him next.

Elon Musk finished munching his pretzels and took a sip of wine that Allah gave him and then walked closer to Adam to inspect him. "Hey Allah, so, this is your latest creation, uh?". "Tell me about his locomotion, can this guy move around? Or is he part of the plant kingdom, just stuck to one place?". Allah said, "oh no, I gave Adam 2 legs, he can run fast - perhaps, 10 miles an hour". Then Elon Musk showed a sad Emoji face to Adam. "Oh, dear Adam, being Allah's creation, look at you, poor you! You can run only 10 miles an hour! If I had designed you instead of Allah, I would have made you go at 700 miles per hour like my hyperloop. I have even learnt how to overcome Kantrowitz limit". Adam had no idea what the heck hyperloop was, or what was Kantrowitz limit, but he understood that Elon Musk was making fun of his performance. Since he had plans to do something naughty with Eve that night , he didn't want to be belittled by Elon Musk anymore. He turned his face away from Elon Musk. But the audience couldn't take notice of Adams obvious self-pity for having been made by the inferior Allah, instead of the obviously superior Elon Musk.

Since everybody was criticizing his design, Allah thought that Satya Nadella would probably have something negative to say about his creation as well. Allah curiously looked at Satya. Like always it happens in American business meetings, Satya feared that they might run out of the few vegetarian items available in the meal menu! Why go home hungry after the meeting. So Satya was quickly gobbling up all the cashew nuts in the plate. Allah asked him "Do you have anything to say Satya". To that he responded "At Microsoft, at this time we have no confidence in anything that we do. Nobody uses our Internet Explorer anymore. We had bundled it so tightly with Windows 98 and now we can sell neither the Windows nor the Internet Explorer. Even when we discount Surface Tablets by 50% off, nobody buys them anymore. We had Surface Mini made, but couldn't perfect it in a timely manner to put it on sale. I am going to go into infamy as the guy who sunk the Microsoft Titanic, but Steve Ballmer is the guy who hit the iceberg and I am only trying to steer the ship away to safety. They put me as the captain of the sinking ship and what else can I do? I have no idea if we are competing against Android, or Chromebook, or iPhone, or iPod, or iPad, or Macbook Air. I am going crazy because nothing is selling from our store. I have upcoming Windows 9 launch event and I am scared to go on stage and talk. What do I have to brag about Microsoft sales lately? I have even started selling Nokia branded low-cost Android phones to get some income. I wish I could resign from Microsoft and go home to Hyderabad". 

Allah realized that Satya Nadella had his own problems and then went on to look at Mark Zuckerberg. While Adam and Eve were uncomfortable in that cold room, Mark was feeling really cozy in his hoodies. "Boy, this feels real comfortable, you should have worn one too" he said to Adam. Mark didn't seem to be interested in talking to Allah at all. He was talking directly to the consumer - Adam and Eve. Mark said to Eve that he was planning to run that old guy out of business (who comes on TV and advertises for eHarmony.com as their founder). He then told Adam that he had a new feature added to Facebook to see if a man or a women was available for dating. He suggested to Adam send Eve a friendship request via Facebook and then told him to Poke her via her FB account! If she was available then she would respond appropriately. Then Adam could change his Facebook status as "engaged" in Facebook. Also Mark said that he was in a buying spree after buying Whatsapp and Oculus Rift and asked Allah if he had any companies for sale.

Allah then realized that Mark was in his own world and felt kind of glad at that. One less person to talk bad about Allah! Then Allah focussed on Intel's Paul Otellini. Allah asked "Paul do you have any comments about my creation - Adam and Eve". Paul asked Allah "Do you have any microprocessor in this guy?". Allah said, "yeah I put 3 pound worth of brain microprocessor in them". Then Paul said "where did you put that brain" and Allah said "inside their skull". Then Paul said, "so, when the humans breath, would the air flow through the brain to cool the microprocessor?". Allah said, "no, when they breath, the air goes into their lungs and not the brain". 

Paul Otellini got angry at hearing what Allah had to say. He said to Allah, "Jesus Christ, what the heck are you doing, a microprocessor with no heat dissipation system. You are going to blow that transistor man!". Then he asked if the brain used "Haswell Technology". Allah answered in the negative. Paul Otellini laughed hysterically and said that Allah should have come to his office in Portland OR before he chose to put the brain in that closed skull. He went on to brag about his new line of Haswell processors. "We offer i3 with the basic processing speed, and then with i5 we will offer you speed boost and with i7 we will also offer memory cache within the processor in addition to the speed boost". 

And then Paul went on to add that Adam and Eve were just going to be idiots with such poorly ventilated brains that didn't have any Haswell technology. By now Allah was tearful. It was too much for him to bear all in one day where all these Silicon Valley giants were making fun of him. 

He looked at Tim Cook, his primary guest who rang his doorbell initially. He asked him if he had anything else to say about his creations. Tim said "Oh, I am unlike these technical guys! I am just a supply chain manager. I happened to be a sidekick to Steve Jobs and ended up in this position after the untimely death of my mentor. But anyway, I am handling this okay. Following Steve's advice, I released iWatch now, and I know it will be sold out on day one on the release date! People love Apple stuff Allah! As long as they continue to be doing that, then Steve has told me to be releasing various i-devices - one every year - like iToothBrush, iCondom, iShoes and iDiaper etc". And then he told Allah "if Adam bought my iPhone 6 Plus for $ 949 contract free, then I will give him U2 music album via my itunes store for free".

So the last person in the tech group leaders had spoken and Allah was glad that the meeting was finally about to be over. All of his guests had eaten all the food that he served, especially the plate of cashew nuts (which Satya finished up). It was time of relief for Allah! Hooray! He sighed and ushered them all, the egotistical maniacs, to the door! 

And that is when fate intervened to do its job! You see, like what they show in the Final Destination series of movies, "death" as a character, I have created "fate" as a big character in this blog. In fact, it is a bigger character than God himself in my blogs. So, fate chastised Allah for having been sheepish in front of the Silicon Valley leaders. Fate told Allah "look at you God, your creation of Adam and Eve is the most beautiful thing that happened in the whole universe since the day of its creation. Tell the greatness of your creation to these ignoramus people"!

Fate ordered Allah to be brave and speak up! And HE did! Bashful Allah became all brave, mustered up all his intellect to support his infinite wisdom! It was almost as though he was a new God!

He said "look you silly Silicon Valley guys! You might be triumphant of your achievements now, making your 128GB iPhone 6 plus, your Mars Rover and Hyperloop etc! But one day you will realize that my creation of Adam and Eve was the greatest thing that ever happened to all of you collectively! After creating both of them, there was only one last thing that I had to do to finish up the job to perfection".

"What was that", quizzed all the tech leaders. Then Allah said "I created Adam to have his nuts inside his abdomen initially. But I had to pull it out to let it hang outside the body". That was a crazy answer and tech leaders were stunned. Allah then added "you see, the testicles can't handle body heat of 98.6*F and they need to be cooled. So I pulled it out of his abdomen where it was too hot and brought it out!". Intel's Paul Otellini was surprised at what Allah had to say about cooling the nuts and not the brains. He had never heard of that before! "That is nuts" Paul exclaimed! Allah then continued "the nuts are the the only organs that can't tolerate the normal body temperature and needs cooling. If the nuts stayed hot, then the whole world would perish without any sperms!".

And now all the Silicon Valley guys were shocked at the revelation of this dark truth about the perils of the nuts in hot environment. They mellowed down in their attitude and listened to Allah.

Allah concluded "Giving you the mind was the genius of my creation. I gave you the ginormous cosmos to live and I you gave the tiny little mind to perceive the cosmos. You will never be able to fathom the full depth of neither the mind nor the cosmos. And you will never be able to even figure out if the cosmos are inside or outside of the mind! You will use the very mind that I gave you, and try to fathom me, your creator. And you can't figure me out either. Each man in this world will live and die sadly without ever knowing the infinite scope of the mind, the cosmos or the creator that created all of these!"

The tech leaders were stunned and dumbfounded hearing this. Like Steve Jobs famous "one more thing", Allah went on to add this last statement to end his monologue:

"IOS, Windows and Androids are all just different platform to essentially do the same thing. And similarly different religions are just different platform to SEE the same thing - the one and only one God. So quit talking bad about each other and just do your duties in the world. The whole world will become peaceful that way. And last, but not the least, always remember that if I hadn't cooled Adam's balls, then none of you would have been born here in this world!".

As the tech leaders left his house, Allah looked at you, the reader of this blog, emitted a quick wink at the corner of his eye, and shut his house door with a sly grin!

ஜாதிச் சவடாலும் வீங்கிய மண்டையும் (Jaadhi Savadaalum Veengiya Mandaiyum)

கிறித்தவன் சிலுவையும் துலுக்கன் தாடியும் பிராமணன் பூணூலும் உயிர் உலவிடும் வாழும்-பிணத்தின் மீது வேண்டுமானால் பொருள் படலாம், அனால், உயிர் பிரிந்த பின்னாலே, பிணம் பிணம் தானே? மரித்தப் பின் அம்மணமாய் படுத்து கிடக்கும் பிணங்கள், பட்டையும், நாமமும் போட்டலங்கரித்த காரணத்தினால் வேறுப்பட்டு விடுமா? பூசிய அரிதாரத்தையெல்லாம் கலைத்து விட்டால் எவன் முதலியார், எவன் செட்டியார், எவன் பிராமணன், எவன் ஹரிஜன்?

ராஜஸ்தானில் தற்போது நடைமுறையில் உள்ள இடுகாட்டு ஜாதிப் பிரிவினை பற்றி கேள்விப்பட்டு இந்த கட்டுரையை எழுத தொடங்கினேன்.  இரண்டாயிரத்து பதினாலாம் ஆண்டு ஆகியும் இந்த இழிநிலைமை பிசாசு நம்மை பிடித்து ஆட்டித் தொலைக்கும் என்று நாம் நினைத்து கூட பார்க்கவில்லையே! கட்டையாய்  போன பிணங்களை இடுகாட்டுக்கு மக்கள் கொண்டு வந்தப் பின்னர், அங்கே அவரவர் ஜாதிக்கேற்ற மாதிரி பிணங்கள் பிரிக்கப்பட்டு, வேறு வேறு அறையிலே கொளுத்தப் படுமாம்! ஆஹா, பேஷ், பேஷ், கேக்கவே ரொம்ப நன்னா இருக்கே!

இந்த மாதிரி ஜாதிப் பிரிவினைகளைப் பற்றி பேசும் போதெல்லாம் வேற்றுமையை ஒழிக்க வந்த சில மகான்கள் நம் மனதினிற்க்கு வருவர்! தந்தையே பெரியாரே, மகாகவி பாரதியே, நிவீர் எங்கே போய் தொலைந்தீர்கள்?

ராமசாமி நாயக்கர் மீது எனக்கு அலாதி ஈர்ப்பு! சாதாரண சிறுதொழில் முதலாளியாகவே அறியப்பட்டவர் அவர், அதுவும் ஈரோட்டில் மட்டுமே! மனிதர்களில் ஏற்ற தாழ்வு இல்லை, எல்லாரும் ஒரே ஈடுதான் என்ற எண்ணம் மனதில் திண்ணமாக தோன்றியபின் ராமசாமி திடிரென தந்தை பெரியாராக விஸ்வரூபம் எடுத்தார்! பெருமாளின் விஸ்வரூபத்தை விட நமது தேசத்துக்கு முக்கியமாக தேவைப்பட்ட விஸ்வரூபம் அது தான்! அன்னாரின் புரட்சியால் சந்தி சிரித்த தாழ்த்தப் பட்டவனது முகத்தில் சந்தோஷ சிரிப்பு பூத்தது! அவலம் பிடித்த வாழ்க்கையை ஆயிரக்கணக்கான வருடங்களாக வாழ்ந்து அம்போ என்று மடிந்து மண்ணாகிப் போன நலிந்தவன் என்றைக்கு தான் முன்னுக்கு வருவான்?

வாமனாவதரமாக வந்த ராமசாமி நாயக்கர் வானளாவ எழுந்து நின்றார் பெரியாராக!

சமூக மாற்றத்தை உண்டு பண்ண வேண்டும் என்றால் தனி மனிதனாக இருந்து ஒண்ணும் பண்ண முடியாது என்று அவர் நன்றாக அறிந்திருந்தார். காங்கிரஸ் கழகத்தில் சேர்ந்தார். வெள்ளைக்காரனை வெளியற்றுவதர்காக உருவாக்கப் பட்ட காங்கிரஸ்ஸில் சமூக மாற்றம் உண்டாக்கும் நோக்கத்தோடு சேர்ந்த பெரியார், நாளடைவில் தவறாக, தான் தவறான கழகத்தில் சேர்ந்து விட்டோம் என்று புரிந்து கொண்டார்! மேல் ஜாதிக்காரர்கள் வியாபித்திருந்த காங்கிரஸ் கழகத்தில் பெரியாரின் உன்னதமான குறிக்கோள் மதிக்கப்படவில்லை. மேலும் காங்கிரஸ்சில் இன்னொரு பிரச்சினை. அவர்கள் இந்தியை தமிழ்நாட்டில் திணிக்க எத்தனித்தார்கள். தனது குறிக்கோளும் காங்கிரஸ் பார்ட்டியின் குறிக்கோளும் வேறு வேறு என்று புரிந்து கொண்ட பின்னர், காங்கிரஸ்சிலிருந்து வெளியேற தந்தை பெரியார் சற்றும் மனக் கிலேசப் படவில்லை. அவரின் சமூக சீர்த் திருத்த பாதை தெளிவானதாக தான் இருந்திருக்கிறது! இந்தியாவின் சுதந்திரம் ஒரு புறம் இருக்கட்டும், தாழ்த்தப்பட்டவனது சுதந்திரம் தான் தனது பிரதானம் என்று தனது மனதில் தெளிவு படுத்திக் கொண்டார் பெரியார்!

பெரியார் செய்த அனைத்தையும் நன்றே என்று சிலாகித்து கூற முடியாது! ஆனால் தமிழ்நாட்டையே புரட்டி போடும் விதமாக தைரியமாக பல காரியங்களை அவர் செய்தார்! சக்தி மிகுந்து கோலோச்சிவரும் உயர்ந்த ஜாதிக்காரனை எதிர்த்து பெரியதாக கொடி தூக்கி ரணகள படுத்த துணிந்து போராட யாருக்கு தான் இத்தனை தைரியம் வரும்? தாழ்ந்த ஜாதிக்காரனுக்கும் நூல் அணிவித்து அவனை உயர்ந்த ஜாதிக்காரனாக்கி விட்டேன் பார்த்தாயா என்று பாரதி பிரகடனப் படுத்தினான்! ஆனால் பெரியாரோ, அது என்ன உயர்ந்த ஜாதிக்காரனுக்கு மட்டும் பிரத்யேகமாக ஒரு நூல், அந்த நூலையே நான் அறுக்கிறேன் பார் என்று ஒரு வீராப்புடன் கிளம்பி அலம்பல் செய்தார்! பாவம் ஒரு ஓரமாக ஒதுங்கி நின்றிருந்த ராமருக்கும் கிடைத்தது செருப்பு மாலை!

சமூக மாறுதலை ஏற்படுத்த பெரியார் பின்பற்றிய முறை சரியா தவறா என்று நாம் ஆராயலாம், அதில் நாம் வேறுபடலாம், அனால், அந்தக் காலத்தில் சமூகத்தில் ஒரு மாறுதல் நிச்சயமாக தேவை பட்டது என்பதை யாராலும் மறுக்க இயலாது! மேன்மக்கள் என்றும் தாழ் மக்கள் என்றும் என்றைக்கோ மனுதர்மம் செய்த பிளவை எத்தனை காலம் தான் நாம் சமச் சீர் செய்யாது வேற்றுமை பாராட்டிக் கொண்டே இருப்பது?

பெரியார் விட்டு சென்ற பகுத்தறிவு பாசறையில் கருணாநிதி மாதிரி புல்லுருவிகளும் கபோதிகளும் உள்ளே புகுந்து தனது குடும்பத்துக்கு என்ன லாபம், என்று கணக்கு பார்த்து கொள்ளையடித்தது வேறு கதை! ஆனால், இந்த பாழாய் போன உலகத்தில் தாழ்ந்த ஜாதியில் பிறந்து கஷ்டப்பட்ட அந்த சோகமே உருவானவனுக்கு இந்த காலக் கட்டத்திலும் கூட சாவிலும் கிடைக்கவில்லை பார்த்தாயா சம நிலைமை! உயர்ந்த ஜாதிக்காரனின் உசத்தியான பிணம் சந்தனக் கட்டையின் வாசத்துடன் கமகமவென்று வெந்து கொண்டிருக்கும் போது தாழ்த்தப்பட்ட இவன் மாத்திரம் தனியாக வேறு அறையில் வெந்து தொலைக்க வேணுமாம்! இது என்ன நியாயமடா சாமி!

இறைவன் போட்ட லாட்டரி சீட்டில் வெறும்  அதிர்ஷ்டத்தால் மாத்திரமே சிலர் உயர்ந்த ஜாதியில் பிறந்தனர். நான் உசத்தி நீ தாழ்த்தி என்று வாய்ச் சவடால் பேசி ஆயிரக்கணக்கான வருடங்கள் வாழ்ந்தாயிற்று! வருடங்கள் மில்லேனியமாக உருண்டோட அவர்கள் மண்டை பெருத்து வீங்கிற்று! பாரதத்  தாயே, ஜாதி வேற்றுமை பார்க்கிறவனுக்கு நஞ்சு கலந்த முலைப்பால் கொடுத்து நசுக்கித் தொலைக்க மாட்டாயா!

கணிணிப் பேனாவினால் இணையதளத்தில் கிறுக்குவதை தவிர வேறு சக்தியற்ற  இந்த சாதாரண மானுடன் வேறு என் செய்வான்! கால தேவதையே! நின்னை சரணடைந்தேன், கண்ணம்மா! கால மாறுதலை நீ கொணர்வாய் என நான் நன்கு அறிவேன்! அதனை சற்றே சீக்கிரம் செய்வாயாக! இம்மாநிலம் பயனுறவே!

Jennifer Lopez - the insured derriere!

You may have heard of a man's teeth biting his own buttocks! Haven't you? This guy took off his dentures before sleeping at night and instead of putting it on his nightstand, he accidentally laid it on his bed. In the middle of the night when he rolled over, the teeth bit him in the buttocks. That is that story. But have you ever heard of Coca Cola biting a man on his face and causing serious harm? Probably not, right? Let us talk about that today then! 

When I posted the picture of my injured face on facebook few weeks ago, my friends asked me if my peacocks became like Hitchcockian birds and pecked the heck out of my face. Those nascent little creatures are so small that they can hardly do any harm to anything at this stage in their life. If you had guessed that it was my wife who did the damage, perhaps a kiss that went wrong, then that could be a good alternative theory, and in fact I would have liked that to be the truth! But, that was not the case either. 

I got crossfired in dogfight between my two lady dogs (namely "Pepsi" and "Coke") and my brother's gentlemen dog (named "Lucky") and I ended up getting bitten by one of my own ladies!  I wanted to write about my experience in getting bitten by a dog today. 

A lot of people think that if a dog bites a human then it must be rabid. That is not true. If a dog appeared sick and started biting a bunch of people unprovoked, then it might be encephalopathic and may have rabies. But with the pre-exposure vaccination that most dogs receive nowadays, you hardly find a rabid dog. So, most of the dog bites that you see are not "rabies related".

Fear and anxiety are terrible feelings. Humans have learnt to mute these emotions long ago by downing a shot of whiskey through their throat, or perhaps a grain of benzodiazepine or SSRI medication in the modern days. But what can animals do? They don't have access to Royal Salute in the wild. The only way to conquer fear and anxiety is to face the darn provoking situation. Just be a tough animal and face the evil. That is the only way. 

When my brother got his dog (Lucky) as a 8 week old pup in 2012 my ladies were already a year old at that time. We should have gotten them to the dog park and allowed them to socialize right then and there. Instead what we did was to hold these dogs in our own laps to prevent them from biting each other. Now we have created a monster unintentionally! They have become archenemies for life (or death)!

Now Lucky is a fully grown up male dog. Whenever my brother visits me from Dallas, my ladies clearly show their intense urge to finish off "Lucky" for good! That is their current status. On the other day, when my brother came to visit me with his family, he had let his dog outside my house for a little pee break. Without knowing that, I let my ladies outside the house to take their pee break at the same time. And that was a disastrous decision. And when my ladies found "Lucky" right outside the door, they swore to defend their territory at any cost. They pounced on him and took a chunk of meat from his thoracic spine area. And I tried to save the unlucky "Lucky" by pulling him out of my ladies' mouth. And amidst all this chaos, I got bit on my face by one of my ladies, Coca Cola! It all happened in a split second and I had a big gash on my left side of the face. Boy, when fate decides to mess with you, just give it a split second, it can take your life away!

Anyway, all is well now. After $ 500 expenditure at the Animal urgent care, Lucky got few stitches and he is slowly healing. My face has healed well. It seems like I am going to have a big scar on my Sundara Vadana!

And that is when I got this idea to insure my face. Here in USA, insurance is everything. Whatever you can think off, just insure it. The whole society revolves around that. In fact the whole globe is getting insurance conscious and wants to insure everything that they have. And you see, now I am quite Americanized. So, it is time to get my face insured. Why, my face especially? In my profession, I need to have a very expressive face to talk to my clients. Obviously face is my asset. Since I have now experienced a bad dog bite right on my face, it is clear to me that my face is in extreme danger. Please don't think I missed my antipsychotic pill this morning and I am behaving delusional. I did take my antipsychotic and I am well. I am really speaking the truth! 

So, I ventured into getting my face insured! When I did a Google search about people insuring their body parts, I realized that a lot of celebrities have done that already. For instance, I read that Jennifer Lopez has insured her buttocks for $ 300 million or some outrageous amount like that. I may not be a celebrity yet, but you know very well that I am on my way there!

While some arse has been reportedly insured for such a multimillion dollar figure, then what the heck is my face worth? I am very confused about how much to ask for! Now I want the readers of this blog to think about the value of my face without any bias! That too, I am talking about my face here and not the silly behind like Ms. Lopez! Honestly answer my question. I don't want to insure it for $ 300 million like J Lo, but at least few millions, don't you think?

Please reply to me ASAP about my face's worthiness, because I am meeting my insurance agent tomorrow.

Belling the Fat Cat at Cici's Pizza

For those God believing ones, you certainly don't want to mess with two incredible desires that He gave you - reproductory and alimentary. The eyes and ears sure do bring pleasures to the mind, but those desires are never "irresistible". On the other hand, we get "irresistible" desires for certain things in life - for example - an intense desire to eat a bucket full of buttered up popcorn at the movie theater. Another example would be an intense desire to reproduce on some days (commonly called as "having sex"). For those that don't believe in God, let us just call these as "nature driven instincts". All life forms have these desires - going into intense heat to fornicate and getting intense desire to eat! These are "survival" instincts - without which a species would die and get extinct. You certainly don't want to mess with these two natural instincts.

I was at Cici's Pizza with the kids today. At a distant table we saw this obese couple, a man and a women, having lunch. They were fulfilling their intense desire to eat today. While no taller than me, at about 67 inches of height, each of that obese couple should a have weighed at least 350 pounds. Everybody at the pizza shop couldn't but help noticing that couple. They had two large pizzas on the table ready for their masters to eat them, while their plates were occupied by half of the ungobbled ones. It appeared that they were about to eat 2 large pizzas each, apart from the deserts and the ranch-laden salad.

And the family adjacent to my table saw them as well. That family appeared to be the liberal kind, you know, the kind that wouldn't hesitate to talk about pee, poop and fart with the same ease as wishing somebody "good morning".  You can imagine what that family was going to do after seeing those 350 pounders. They got into "fat mama jokes". One of them shared a joke - "your mama is so fat that when she sat on the iphone, it became an ipad". That was quite a technical one, 4" iphone getting squished to become a 10" ipad. The other one shared a fat joke as well - "your papa is so fat that each of his buttock cheeks have their own telephone area code". I changed the second joke from "mama" to "papa" to prove that in my blog I will never allow gender discrimination.

Of course the above kids stopped sharing fat jokes after the elders at the table reprimanded them for behaving silly. Those jokes got me thinking a little bit about the word "fat". We are now living in a society where euphemistic expressions have begun to replace offensive words. What would have been called as "handicapped" once upon a time, later became called as "disabled". Blind became "visually challenged", mentally retarded became "mentally challenged" etc. But even those expressions failed to say something positive about the challenged people. "Visually challenged" is still a negative word combination. And hence, nowadays I see people use other ways to denote a challenged person. For example, the expression "alternatively abled", acknowledges the negative aspect of being blind, yet, brings something positive about it by alluding to a probable alternative sensory hypertrophy to compensate for the visual loss.

And now, about fatness, it is funny how our society has come to consider this word as a very disdainful one. To get a fat check from an employer is a good one. But to be fat is bad. Actually, to be fat is not necessarily bad, but to be called as "fat" has become a very very bad thing. In fact, it has become so bad that you can even sue somebody just because they used the word "fat".

Then how about the word "obese"? I guess that is a bad one too! Who likes to be called as an obese person? That person at Cici's pizza probably wouldn't want to be addressed that way. He would have just wanted the world to look at him as a very "normal person". If you asked him if he was a "glutton" and ate indiscriminately, he probably would respond to you in the negative. I guess "gluttony" is a bad word as well.

And thus we have come to a stage in earth's life, where we can't even call a spade a spade. We probably would have to resort to using long sentences such as "people who have a lot more weight per square inch of their body compared to our forefathers". But that is an awful wastage of words to describe something that our sensible forefathers simply called as "fat".

Bhumi Devi is the Indian Goddess that represents mother earth. Her weight may be near constant, but the weight of people occupying the mother earth is growing at an alarming proportion. Mechanized world has created a monster out of us! Ambulating, cleaning dishes, washing clothes etc were once upon a time our chores, but now machines have snatched all these jobs from us. Soon we may all be very well like what they show in the movie "Wall-E". Horizontally challenged sloths, lungs not being able to expand against the restrictively opulent abdominal pannus, unable to breath properly, hooked to respirator, just adiposity all around, lacking muscular tissue, severely sarcopenic, sitting in motorized wheelchair, unable to locomote or fornicate! What a pitiable existence!

Anyway, for now, I feel like I have written a very long blog portending a very sad future for all of us - the humans.  When you are at Cici's Pizza after paying $ 3.49 for their "all you can eat buffet", the desire to eat more and more comes from deep within us! Who can bell the fat cat - the insatiety demon?!

Writing this blog has made me very depressed about the fate of our entire human race. It is the end of the day and I am tired. And since I also feel sad, I feel I am entitled to succumb to one of the two "irresistible desires" of life that I talked about in the first paragraph of this blog. It is a dangerous thing to try to reproduce without spousal permission, and hence I am going go the eating route, which clearly is an easier option! That is just between me and myself! So, I am going to get a nice cup of Banana split ice cream from my freezer and gobble it up like nobody's business.

Cheers and have fun y'all! Until my next blog - see you all later, alligator!

Death of a Dead Body

It is a sad thing for an already very dead body to die again. But, there sure was an element of dark humor in the way we saw it happen long ago. We were living in Choolaimedu in Chennai adjacent to Nungambakkam railway station at that time. There was a crematorium close to our home and all the Hindu bodies would be taken there for cremation. This gory death of a dead body happened while on its way to the above said crematorium.

Now having immigrated to the United States and lived here for a little while, I see how rules are obeyed properly. For example, if you missed an exit on the freeway, then you keep driving for perhaps few more miles and then take a U-turn at the next exit. But in India flouting a rule is considered a very joyous act. Especially road rules! If you missed an exit, not a big deal. Just stop the car, change your gear to reverse and start going backwards in whichever lane you are! Imagine driving in Indian roads for 10 extra kilometers just to take a U-turn. What a horrible thing, especially given the petrol price of Rs 57 per liter and poor gas mileage of cars. You may shock the brown crap out of few of those other unsuspecting drivers. But why do you care? It is their problem for not expecting drivers to use their reverse gear, which the auto manufacturers have so generously made available for drivers to use for free.

Now the hero of today's blog, some unknown man, had died in the streets of Chennai that day. There are many like that all over the world, you see, those people with no family or friends, just orphans of the state, if you will. Those orphans do lose their last breath of their uncelebrated lives one day to exit the world ingloriously.  And then some good samaritans have to show up from somewhere to notice the death of the unnoticed life and then do the needful to dispose off the body. I am sure you have come across such dead bodies laying in the streets of your Indian towns, covered with dhoti, with a bunch of onlookers around. In Tamil we call them as "அனாதை பிணம்" meaning orphan person who died in the streets.

That orphan man died a death like that. That was his first death. The collective camaraderie of the Indian people is amazing when such a thing happens. The Hindus, Muslims and the Christians and Sikhs and all, everybody usually get into a very helpful spirit quickly, to do the right thing for the departed soul. And so, a bunch of people got together that day. They collected some alms amidst themselves and decided to take him to the adjacent crematorium and have the last evidence of that erstwhile life doused off.

That was where the Indian rule-bending attitude played a vital role in that man's fate. You see, if they had followed the rules, then they would have had to take the body over the busy road (Nelson Manickam Salai) to the crematorium. But that would have caused them to spend more time on the road. But there was a shortcut - ie, walking on top of the railway track, that would help them bypass the Nelson Manickam salai and go to the crematorium quickly. So, amidst the group of those people who carried the body of the dead, there was one unruly one, in the sense of not wanting to follow the rules. He suggested to the rest, that they carry the body over the railway track to save time. And the rest of the crowd agreed to that idea to not follow the rule.

Our dead man was made to lay on his last earthly bed (பாடை), the easily bio-disposable sturdy leaves interconnecting two 6 feet long bamboo shoot. Four people carried those ends of the bamboo shoots on their shoulders and the funeral procession started. Since they walked over the railway track, bypassing the road, it didn't take much for them to reach the Nelson Manickam salai railway bridge. And now the big question was how to carry the body over the railway tracks over the bridge? There were just two railway tracks, one to go hither and the other to go thither, on top of the busy Nelson Manickam road! The funeral procession people used their utmost cautious judgment and looked either way. They saw no train coming and hence decided to cross the railway bridge like absolute dare devils!

That was one heck of a sight to behold, 4 people carrying a "பாடை" with a dead body laying on it across a railway track over a bridge on top of a busy road. And that was when the jarring sound of a Chennai Metropolitan Electric Train horn hit the ambience. And much to everybody's surprise, suddenly out came the train from nowhere! It was coming from Chetpet to Nungambakkam and emerged majestically out from the distant curves of the railway track! That train looked like Lord Yama Dharmaraja himself coming at full speed to kill all the good samaritans, the team of funeral procession specialists that were enroute to do their charitable job!

Oh boy, the sight of the train sent jitters through the funeral procession people. They quickly did some mental math and realized that they didn't have enough time to run either forwards or backwards on the railway track to get out of the bridge especially carrying the dead man as well. So, to save their own lives, they just put the dead body on the track and quickly escaped out of the bridge fleeing for their lives. They were unmindful of the impending assault on the dead body by the oncoming train. The dead man, laying in his paadai, kept his cool, left his fate to the hands of God and looked up to the skies! What could he do anyways, pray for the life and well-being of the people who cared for him thus far and carried him, or worry about the safety of his own body that was going to be assimilated by the fire shortly anyway?

And there ends the story of this blog, my friends! I leave it to your imagination about what happened to that body after the train ran over it. My younger brother was coming back home from Loyola College and he saw this whole thing happen in front of him. After the train passed by, the good samaritans searched for the bits and pieces of the body to still go cremate the left overs, but they found them all strewn over along the railway track.

Until my next blog, have fun and cheers! And if you had to go backwards in traffic in Indian roads, don't worry, just pretend as though you are worried about global warming. Unguilty, just go in reverse, save greenhouse gas emission and save the world!