We've Had Some Letters*

Dear Middler,

I have been following your blog regularly, though, even I do not know why. The blogs are long and rambling. The sentences are jerky and have too many commas. In addition to that you choose to inflict upon us some "art". Despite that I follow you, because like me, you too like to start sentences with "Basically". (Psst... Are you Tam-Brahm?)

I beg to ask a question. I find it difficult to maintain a sunny disposition. I feel blue whenever I think of myself. How is that you cope with the existential dilemmas that come upon one like waves on the shore that leave only to return?

Yours,
Feeling Blue
Male, Dustbin near Independence Park

Dear FB,

I am touched by your insightful letter. Basically, the fact that you observe so much indicates either a) you are an astute observer or b) you really ought to find a job. Anyway, coming to your problem many people think alcohol is a way out of the blues. I would advise otherwise. I used to resort to alcohol once. Yes, in the good old days, when I did not know of things better, I used to swig Old Monk with Pepsi a la rickshaw-puller, as I did my homework. But, I do find a definite correlation between developing what is cutely called a "traffic police mama paunch" and the perusal of alcohol. Ergo, with much sadness I have cut down on the habit. (sigh)

In the absence of -OH beverages, what then are the options? If you can read this blog, you can access the internet. Hence I recommend Youtube videos of the kind below to "beat 'em blues".

Exhibit A

(I got this video through Raghav :))

Of course, before you cluck your tongue in disapproval, you must know that I believe, in the manner of Bertrand Rusell, that the intellect while giving man many advantages gives one singular disadvantage; it makes him anticipate sadness and when that sadness transpires he still, paradoxically, feels sad though one would expect him to feel happy for having anticipated that sadness. Hence, when negative thoughts enter, I resort to means that drain the blood from my head to judiciously allocate it to other parts of that body that may use it more fruitfully. Seeing the wholesome goodness of two babes cavorting away to a kuntry song in itsy-bitsy clothes is indeed the meaning of life. (Tears of Joy)

{joke}
It is said that Nayanthara visited her tailor and gave an order for a dress. By mistake her kerchief slipped out. When she came to collect the dress, she found that the tailor had made the dress out of the kerchief and such was his honesty he also gave some bit of the cloth that was unused.
{/joke}

Thanks for writing in. Not that I give a Rat's Arse.

____________________________________________________________________

Dear Middler,

I find that in addition to being an engineer and worshiping Pink Floyd I also love Monty Python. Will I get laid before marriage?

Yours,
Very Anxious,
Male, Computer Club

Dear VA,

No. But you, son, have known a rare pleasure that few men know of, so take that you biker dudes! Now that you are not going to get laid, why don't you spend some time on "A Bit of Fry and Laurie". In some parts, they are even better than the Pythons!

Exhibit B,C, D:







Thanks for Writing In. Not that I give a Rat's Arse.
____________________________________________________________________

If you have any such profound questions on life, relationships, academics then fire away to the following address:

Subject: Dear Middler
c/o middlergivesaratsass [at] gmail [dot] com

(read as middler-gives-a-rat's-ass)

If on the other hand, you need money from Africans or male enlargement pills just check your spam folder.
____________________________________________________________________

*This was too one of their sketches though I am not able to locate the video now

The Diary of a Traveling Salesman

(I came across this competition from Sidin's website for flash fiction two hours before the deadline. I have not been too excited by the prospect of writing very short short stories as my belief is that often the descriptions are as important as the plot. But anyway thought of giving it a shot and cooked up something real quick. Have posted my entry here. Hope it is fun)

Jun 26th

I cannot believe it! She agreed to my proposal! I cannot believe that I am going to marry the one whom I have been wooing so ardently for the last year. I am besotted by this woman and so intoxicated by her that I have not touched a drop of alcohol since I met her.

I must be the luckiest man on earth!

Jun 27th

When I looked at myself this morning, a troubling thought struck me. While my lady-love looks like a Nordic Goddess, I look like her pall bearer! I am short and of a dusky complexion. While I was earlier proud of my perfect teeth, I just realized that in the night they are like the headlights of a vehicle.

The complexion cream Handsome&Handsome(TM) that I sell so well, does not work on me! I am overwhelmed by these thoughts. This has led to poor performance at work. I failed to sell a comb to a balding man! Will this union last? How do I make it work?

Jul 2nd

My friends think I am the luckiest man on earth. Little do they know the turmoil inside me. I have been thinking and I guess I am a victim of my own success! My job as a salesman requires me to understand my consumer’s psyche and exploit that. At the risk of sounding immodest, I must admit that I am one of the best. Did I just sell myself to her as if I were an insurance policy? Is this relationship based on love or does she think I am a "great deal"?


I have also been plagues by doubts on my performance. I feel inadequate and repulsive. Oh Gawd Help me!

December 2nd

It has been three months since our marriage and just as I had feared my performance has not been up to the mark. I can feel her losing interest in me. I do not like the way she talks to my friends, she speaks too much to them. Does she tell them of my shortcomings? Recently, I have been noticing that she has been extra attentive of the gardener boy. Must fire him soon. I am a traveling salesman and I am out most of the time. I get nightmares of being father to a b***tard son. Should I end this marriage?

January 1st

Dear Dear Diary,

I had the loveliest new year’s day I have ever had. My resourceful and intelligent wife figured out the solution to my problem. Just as we were lying on our backs after another frustrating attempt the other day, she spotted the picture of my parents in my bedroom which funnily lies in my direct line of vision. She removed it and seduced me yesterday and I must say I roared like a lion. Funny how small things can affect life so much. Anyway, must run, and guess I won’t be talking to you for a while. (giant smiley)

A Proposal for a Market for Trading Bunks

The inspiration for this idea is a certain course whose classes are quite drab. Much to my chagrin I realized that I had unknowingly exhausted my quota of bunks and am doomed to attend all the classes henceforth. The distant reader has no idea of the torture that yours truly undergoes! The torture is not so much the class itself, rather the fact that I had chosen this course as an elective i.e out of my own volition and hence have no one else to blame.

Then it occurred to me that certain individuals do not bunk classes at all or, at any rate never use, nor even intend to use up their full quota. Let us call these people who have the bunking quota to be “possessors of bunks”. Therefore, (the logical mind thinks), on the one hand we have people who need bunks and on the other hand we have those that are not particularly enthusiastic about the said bunks.

Eureka! There is a market here! Before we get into the details, there is an assumption here. The assumption is that the penalty for not meeting attendance requirements is hefty and it is strictly enforced. If it is not strictly enforced or the bunk penalty is not significant, there is no need for a market. Just suck up to whomsoever it may concern when you are in trouble!

The question begs to be asked and I shall ask it “Why do some individuals not bunk?” For us to build a market there must be an economic motivation underlying bunking/non-bunking which gives value to it in the first place. That economic value is value of time. If I think I would be better off sleeping that attending class then there is an incentive to bunk. This is important from the non-bunkers’ side. There are two species of non-bunkers.

There are some who derive a moralistic pleasure out of non-bunking i.e for these folks “non-bunking” is a way of creating a moral pedestal, a way of telling the world, “I am more perfect than you because I don’t bunk, you depraved turd.” Sadly, there is no cure known for moralists and these people shall grow on to becoming social activists, cause fighters, prohibitionists and other generally undesirable elements of society. In fact, my belief is that, as much harm is done by people who set out to do “good”, as those who set out to do “bad”. For who decides what is good and bad? If he who doth bad, doth not think it is good from his viewpoint, he would not do it, would he?

The second class of bunkers would be my target audience. These people go to class with a none-to-sure emotion. Years of being sincere makes them feel that missing class, would somehow do them harm, but basically they are kids who would like to have a good time in life. They just have a voice in their heads which keeps on chiming “After all, there is a chance that something significant could be done in class…” Correction, all of us have that voice, just that some of us have stopped listening to it a long time ago. However even they know that some classes are just a drag. More fundamentally, they have nothing better to do with their times. Nothing better to do with their time. Therefore, if these possessors of bunks could be compensated with something for their time, then there is a chance they would bunk.

Out of this crucial insight flows the market for bunking. As a first step, let us assume that only bunks can be traded for a particular subject. Therefore, is we have some course, say Creative Financial Accounting 101 and 60 people take it, then the bunks are traded only within these 60. We develop a software system where each guy in the class offers his bunks for sale or bids for bunks.

A system would look like this:


Since it is only one course, the same guy cannot buy and sell bunks. However, there is one issue here. What if someone sells bunks without having enough of them? Why would he/she do that? In an educational setting, you know everyone usually. But what if it is a huge campus? And what if the market for bunks is irrational and over-pricing it? Then maybe someone would profit by selling bogus bunks.

This is where the assumption fits in. If the penalty is strictly enforced, then the seller of bogus bunks does not have the incentive to sell it, because he/she is putting his degree in jeopardy.

But anyway, just to prevent any irrational behaviour, we can have an additional field for available bunks so that people boycott bogus bunk sellers.

But this kind of a system is really not very optimal. In our example, Middleton may not like Creative Financial Accounting but he may like the course “How to make Common Sense Sound Sophisticated” while Middleshwar may prefer the latter to the former. In this case, they end up taking these courses, and because of our first requirement, their pool of bunks is restricted to their respective classmates. To solve the problem, we relax the requirement of bunks being traded only within a section. Therefore, if an individual takes 5 courses and he/she is allowed 5 bunks per course, then that individual has 25 bunks to trade.

One thorny issue remains. What if Middleton takes Creative Financial Accounting as well as “How to Make Common Sense Sound Sophisticated” (HTMCS3) and the former course has marks for attendance while the latter does not. Can that individual transfer bunks to himself free of cost or should he pay the market rate for HTMCS3 bunks? Till now we have also implicitly assumed that there is no agency like an exchange.

Again, going back to what we have said, the 25 bunks is Middleton’s property. Therefore, he/she should be allowed to transfer it free of charge. But as such I am not in favour of it.
The better system would be to insist that Middleton pay the going rate for HTMCS3 bunks.

Voila! Again we apply the power of Adam Smith’s invisible hand to setup a most satisfactory system for allocating one’s time. Sigh, if only someone would implement it.

Because We Got High

A song written at the height of The Investigation into the incidents on the Night of April 9th, 2007. :P

Lyrics: Sanjay, Popa and Middle

Based on Afroman's 'Because I got High'. Please watch the song first if you haven't seen it before. (Sanjay did a good job of fitting in the lyrics so enhance your reading experience by listening to the original first.)

I was a muggu boy before I got high
I used to go to class before I got high
I've watched every movie on LAN, you know why
Because I got high (3X times)

I was gonna do my btp* but I got high,
I was gonna meet my prof but then I got high
Now I have an extension and I know why
Because I got high (3X times)

I was gonna buy the booze but I got high
I got bottles in my room, after I got high
Now I got a letter and I know why
Because I got high (3X times)

I was gonna meet the Bean until I got high
I coulda lied and gotten away but I got high
I am now doin’ service and you know why
Because I got high (3X times)

I couldn’t sit on the chair because I got high
But it was broken already someone was high
Gundu is with ol’ Bean now you know why
Because he got high (3X times)

It was 2 o clock in the nite when I got high
But the dance was still goin’ on, the DJ was high
Now I am at the D.I.S.C.O and you know why
Because I got high (3X times)

We tried to lie too much because we got high
But he knows everything that we were high
The Bean knows more than us and we know why
The Snake was high (3X times)

We went to other hostel nights and junta were high
But they weren’t confessing cause they were high
Now they are next on Bean’s list and you know why
Because they got high (3X times)

I hope to pass out now, cause I m not high
I hope to get my VISA, cause I m not high
I ve stopped touching alcohol, you know why
Because I can fly (3X times)

(The Single releasing to a website near you. Watch this space!)

Moral of the Story: Naanga Adangavey Maatom!

*btp = B.Tech Project (FYI)

The Tale of Princess Lavanya

(Slightly experimental. Ever since I first came across Bhaskara's Lilavati, it has been a fancy to attempt something like this. Would love feedback on this one specially.)

In the Great Kingdom of Maharanya,
Lived the famous Princess Lavanya.
She was of marriageable age,
Thus pronounced the Royal Sage.

The Princess was the epitome of refined glamour,
Her eyes shone with diamond lustre,
The radiant, dimpled smile could cause a flutter,
In the hearts of the most chaste Bhattar.

Her luscious tresses, the jet-black hair,
Cascaded down to her ample derriere.
However the secret of her beauty,
Stemmed from the quiet air of authority.

But one winter day Lavanya was overcome by dejection,
As she listened to Charulatha’s narration.
The fine eyebrows were knit in concentration,
With the full red lips curled in consternation.

"The Mighty Prince Vijayaraghava of Naimisha,
Had vanquished the noble Vikrama of Uttararishika.
However, he had got quite a scorch,
By the Agniastra in his sensitive crotch!”

“At this rate, I’m fated,”
The astute princess postulated,
“To end up drinking the divine payasa,
Just like the poor queens of Dasharatha.”

She galloped on her trusted steed, Vatsyayani,
To consult the Goddess Maheshwari.
After having obtained wisdom timely,
She came back feeling more easy.

The land was filled with great excitement,
As the day of the Swayamvara approached.
Princes came from far and wide,
To claim the hand of the fair bride.

The prospective suitors were seen practicing,
Rather frantically, arts like horse riding,
Sword fighting, archery and just to be sure
Some even brushed up on their cooking!

The day dawned bright and clear,
Even the squirrels chirped about the ceremony near,
Coming forth the brightly decked bride,
Announced the test for the groom destined.

“To avoid the fuss made by his Satraps,”
The Princess began her teaser
“The King decided to divide his taxes thus;
To each he gave a weight of gold,
Equal to the total number of Satraps.
This left the King with six thirty times what each got
And another seventy six for the foreign gifts.
Pray, tell me, O intelligent men here,
How much did the King keep for the year?”

The room filled with anguished murmurs,
The Princes stifled a collective curse.
“What use is thinking for one in the royal family?
Shouldn’t we be tested on things more manly?”

“This is a simple equation of the type quadratic”
From somewhere came thus a squeak.
“It can be solved by application of the formula,
Propounded by Sridharacharya”

While the shocked suitors looked in askance,
Vasudeva emerged with a quiet air of nonchalance.
The Princess, whose hands were slender like a creeper,
Garlanded the geek with a palpable ardor.

Contrary to popular expectation,
Vasudeva emerged a ruler of adequate competence,
And the couple lived happily ever after,
Not least due to all the activity nocturnal! ;)

"BTPology"

(Apparent Work = Energy spent on coffee trips to G'nath/Tifany's + Energy blogging + Energy IMing+....+ Real Work)

A Picture speaks a thousand words... So true! :)

Ever noticed...

Ever noticed that, in addition to the cardinal hierarchy in numbers there is a social hierarchy as well. As in, the numbers with zeros at the end of them are somehow special or cooler. These numbers are used as milestones, or people really want to get to these numbers, or if you get these numbers then you are given some credit.

It is understandable if 100 is given special importance over 99 because there is one whole digit more and the number is like bigger and all that.
But why should 274 get the raw deal with respect to 200 or 300. They are ALL three digit numbers. Heck, even 250 is more attractive than 274.

The 50 guy is like the freeloader.
Why is 50 worthy of mention?
Because it is half of 100 as if that half were magical in some sense.
Oh and why not 60? After all it is 3/5ths of 100.

But it is not enough that you have a 0, you should have it at the right places. So 304 has a 0, but,"Tough Luck kiddo, 310 is what the people want. It's all PR". All this is really unfair! I can imagine the following scene:

Mr. 51 and Mr. 52 are waiting to get into the newest, most happening pub in the town.

Mr. 52: Hey why is there such a long queue for a damn pub?

Mr. 51: This is THE most happening place in town! ALL the hot chicks come here. (Then with a wink and a secretive expression) Rumour has it that they got Paris Hilton to do it here for the opening!

(Suddenly someone cuts the line and goes in)

Mr. 52: Hey who is that mot%^$#@ who cut the line?

Mr. 51: Shhh! (In a reverential tone) He is Mr. 50!

Mr. 52: Well, what's he got that I ain't?

Mr. 51: Oh! He has got it! And at the right places!

*************************

Ever noticed how people have a tendency to coin nouns out of verbs or verbs out of nouns or adjectives out of verbs and so on. To use the present trend, people have a tendency to 'noun'ify verbs, 'verb'ify nouns and so on.

There is this Online Community called Orkut where people sign up and generally show the world how attractive, successful they are, what are their likes and dislikes and how they want to meet and keep in touch with friends and all that. The way to communicate on Orkut is by leaving messages on a notice board called a scrapbook.

This has led to some new terms. A scrap (noun) is a message left on your scrapbook and the verb is to scrap.

My friend joined and quit just as quickly, when one day his boss said,"Oh! I WILL definitely scrap you"

*************************

Oru Chemical Engineerin Kadhai (A Chemical Engineer's Story)

(This is a prospective movie script. People interested to be producers can contact the undersigned ;-)
Oh and suggestions for the roles of hero and heroine are also welcome!)

(Addition: Turns out that a lot of people who are not familiar with Tamil movies find this blog vague. Well, explaining these things spoils the fun, so just read it as some sort of surreal piece or something.)

A young man returns to his native village after completing his PhD (in chemical engineering,of course) in the US. Immediately on arrival he starts flirting with the more good looking of the village ladies and goes from lake to lake to see their daughters bathing, as these heros are wont to do. (These rural heros have all the fun I say) Then one day while checking out Thenmozhi, his former mathematics teacher's rather buxom daughter, he sees her suddenly turn red and fall sick. He is shocked.

On investigation he finds that the local soft drink factory is responsible for releasing more than the admissible levels of monosodium-arseolate. Shocked, anger written on his face, he storms the manager's office. Since he is just out of college he speaks politely, but the manager insults and sends him away.

He drinks local arrack to drown his sorrow. Unknown to him the factory also makes that same arrack as a by product! Tch tch.. speak about irony.

(Sad song - Oora therinjukutaen ulagam purinjikitaen kanmani en kanmani... An interesting feature of this song is that this is the only part of the film where the hero changes his costume to a cut banian and lungi. Throughout the film, to show that he has returned from the US, he always wears a Red Lacoste T shirt and Lee Jeans.)

The next day, our hero decides to show them who is the boss and he goes and beats up the factory people and gets to the main computer where the process information is kept. However, it is all stored in excel and MS-OFFICE has as usual cupped.

Hero: Oh What can I do? I left my copy of HISYS at the USA. I could not even design a MER HEN* for four streams in my undergraduate how can I do this... boo hoo...

Then suddenly as if to answer his prayers, something comes falling through the roof. It is so powerful that the roof falls off completely.

Huge Mass: Why fear when Captain Vijaykanth is here!
(Whistles, trumpet sounds, the sound of Thenmozhi swooning in delight!)

Hero: Dei, adhunaala thaan da fear. Normala entrance vazhiya vandhirukalaam illai! Kooraiya oduchundu vara... the^%@#!
(that is why the fear! Like anyone else you could have just come through the entrance. Like a maadar, you broke the roof. Now I have to factor in that cost as well. LKB, KS, TPV2K #@!!*&^)

Captain: Ha ha ha. You insult me without knowing my powers. Wait! Your problem is that you cannot open the Excel files.

Hero: And I don't have HISYS, you son of a what-not. What will you do? Write software for it? (Mockingly)

Captain: Wait and Watch!

He clicks on the file, Right Click.. Open With...Paint and simultaeneously says JHOOOM.

That is all, it immediately gives the optimized plant layout, optimized for waste eduction to meet environmental laws!

(Hero's face turns red in shame and falls at Captain's feet)
Hero: Oh great one! Sorry for having underestimated you! Do I have vimochana in any janma?

Captain: It's okay! When I can make Paint do Image Processing, what is Non-Linear Optimization, some Kuhn Tucker conditions. Peanuts... Poof.. Never underestimate the Tamizh Genius
(Whistles and kisses from Thenmozhi's ugly sidees also.. sometimes it just doesn't pay to be a superhero!)

Anyway, seeing the hero's exploits, all the women of the village offer themselves and our hero lives polygamously and happily ever after...

(Ending Song: Ilamai Idho - Sakalakala Vallavan)

*MER HEN refers to Maximum Energy Recovery Heat Exchanger Network. (Chemical engineering jargon :-))

On Relationships

Ever since a boy crosses the Rubicon and realizes the hand may be used for, ahem… well, other purposes, girls and women come to play a large role in his life. As he matures and comes into the early twenties, the desire to be in a relationship with a woman is a strong one, perhaps the strongest. (Of course, due to the surfeit of sex in cinema and television, the thresholds are reducing, but I speak of the average.)

Tune into SUN Music and every second one sees SMSs flashed on the screen which indicates that some X loves some Y. If you see SUN Music long enough, you would think that Tamil Nadu must be teeming with young couples. Whether that is true or not, one simple fact is that one sees a lot of people openly proclaiming their “boyfriend”hoods and “girlfriend”ships like never before.

It is interesting to see how all this starts. From common observation, I think the “Girlfriend getting process” is best classified as Darwinian. Every young man worth his salt starts off (or rather should start off) lusting after Aishwarya Rai or Bipasha Basu or whoever is the flavour of the day. After much struggle he realizes that the Ms. A. Rai or the Ms.B. Basu is out of his reach and downgrades to the Asin or Samiksha or whoever is the local babe. (An aside: I think what would put off a full blooded man from pursuing Aishwarya is not the threat of Salman’s muscles but rather the possibility of Vivek Oberoi’s effeminate “threats” over phone) He soon realizes that even they are out of his reach and now looks for the babe in his circuits. Even that is not so easy due to the “Hot Girls Date Only Losers” Theorem. Therefore, our wise and more importantly, horny hero settles for the policy of “Carpe Babeum” (Seize the Babe) and proposes to the first girl who laughs at his jokes and listens admiringly when he speaks of his tooth picking strategies.

Please do not mistake me. I do not intend any disrespect but I couldn’t help the sarcasm. And that sarcasm is because, I consider the “Boyfriend – Girlfriend” relationship as a strange one. For one, it is a loosely defined and predominantly convenience based relationship. If it were purely so, I wouldn’t have any problems. But for such a relationship the emphasis on fidelity is quite senseless. Due to this stress on fidelity, the relationship essentially is like a marriage without its main perk, the sex.

While the earlier part was quite frivolous, in the following lines I will talk about my idea of an ideal relationship. Put simply, the basis of the man woman relationship should be sexuality. But the problem is that sexuality encompasses many aspects namely, the attraction based on looks, intelligence, personality, fetishes etc. Therefore, it is highly probable that an individual (man AND woman) finds one partner inadequate. (Of course, if you are in a relationship and perfectly satisfied by it then you could be one of those one-in-a-million guys lucky enough to have found your dream partner. Alternately and more probably, your standards are too low.) Therefore, at least in the years before commitment, people would want to experiment in various kinds of relationships.

Therefore, in my “model” of the ideal relationship, we have at the core of the relationships, the “companion”. This “companion” is that someone with whom you connect and see a future with. But the future is distant and as far as today goes, the field has to be played and it is quite unsatisfying to settle for one person. Therefore, around this core you can build multi-dimensional relationship polygons. (Why settle for the old triangle when there exist polygons I say?). The aim is to experiment with various kinds of relationships. However, you have to work out an agreement with your companion wherein you agree to tell each other everything (a la Sartre and de Beauvoir) or choose not to say anything. The companion will also have his/her love polygon. Then each one explores relationships on his/her terms and after a certain number of years the both of them sit together and review the relationship.

Obviously there are many loopholes to such a proposition. The greatest problem is that of jealousy. It is for this reason that such an approach to relationships may not be suitable for everyone. Heck, in fact it will cause problems even to the most broad-minded. The next problem is the other partners in the loop may feel cheated, if they come to know, and this could lead to ugly situations. Therefore, the essential ingredients to such an arrangement are maturity and honesty. Another angle is marriage. Is such an arrangement feasible for marriages? I think not. I guess the willingness of two people to enter into marriage implies fidelity.

Despite all these safeguards, common sense suggests that such experiments, from an expectation point of view, are doomed to fail. Even a simple analysis of the situation indicates many emotional complications. Yet I wanted to articulate an alternative to the current trend of relationships, after all what are jobless thinkers for? ;-)