Fancy pal Jim and I are trying to solve a crossword.
Me: Jim what’s a type of melon
Jim: Water
Me: It’s 4 letters
Jim: Pani
Me: Neat… so what’s a word for aggressive behavior
Jim: Grr
Me: It’s 12 letters
Jim: Put 11 Rs and a G. Grrrrrrrrrrr
Me: Great! Next is place of uproar and confusion – 6 letters
Jim: Oh you know that one
Me: Yea! My-Room
(Just noticed it is my 400th post! Hurray for me!)
I was watching this movie 500 days of summer with fancy pal Jim.
Me: Jim I like this Gordon guy and you know what I just realized?
Jim: It’s unfair that a fella like him should get a gorgeous girl like that?
Me: No. I just realized I have a thing for architects.
Jim: You do?
Me: Gordon here acts as an architect you see. Then I liked Ted Mosby and what is he?
Jim: An architect?
Me: Yes! You see the connection here?
Jim: Hard to miss Cris when you put it like that.
Me: But there is a problem.
Jim: What?
Me: I wouldn’t understand much of what architects say.
Jim: Ah but you don’t understand much of what anyone says anyway.
Me: Ah yea, there is that.
I wouldn’t have thought the sea waves at Shanghumugham could sprinkle water so far away. For I was at this sand hill way far, watching the orange sun and the tiny crescent of a moon play hide and seek – when one appears, the other hides under the clouds. But when I licked my lips I could taste salt. Yum!
I planned to walk cause the breeze seemed unwilling at first to …
“Oh lord would you stop already?” fancy pal Jim raised his sleepy head.
“What?”
“All this stuff about breezy seas and starry nights. Haven’t you been writing too much about all that already!”
“But it’s fun stuff. You should listen to the lazy breeze slowly get up from the north… err south… err ahem, a faraway point and bring their tiny little… err”
“Asses?”
“Jim! Language! This is a universal blog, I don’t wanna certify it with an 18 plus!”
“Right! And what about the north south wind? Oh wait, it was a far away point rite? How romantic, how poetic!”
“A minor vocab handicap”
“Of course. And the salt part of it was?”
“The description. Ye always describe every taste and smell and sight when… err when…”
“You try to be Mills and Boons?”
“I wasn’t! Argh! I had some serious stuff coming up. But now cause you interrupted, no one will ever know how good that was going to be”
“Let me help you out here Cris. Inject some more waves, some music, some twilight darkness, a few couples walking hither and thither holding hands, while you slip into a world of imagination…”
“Ok ok I get the picture. Hmm maybe I was overdoing it a wee bit”
“Wee bit?! Cris, you forgot what an unmushy world was like!”
“That bad?”
“That bad”
“Okay then! No more mush!”
“No more”
“No more lovey dovey cushy tushy stuff”
“No Sir”
“No sun or moon or stars or sky”
“No breeze either”
“No beaches, no buses”
“No… err why buses?”
“You like them?”
“Very friendly beings if you ask me. Keep honking and hopping all the time.”
“Creative little things aren’t they?”
“Creative, yes. Little, not. But ye they are the best”
“Hail buses!”
“Hail buses!”
“From now on we write about buses. And bus stops. And bus bays. And bus conductors”
“Err we?”
“Of course Jim, we love ‘em”
“Oh we do, but writing – you do. I will do the sulking.”
“Oh really? In that case I am bringing back the seas and skies and trees and all!”
“You will, will ya?”
“Yes I will. Unless you agree to do half the writing.”
“Half?”
“Half. 50 per cent. One by two.”
“Woah considering your number of words, that’s long!”
“Yep”
“Emm Cris”
“Yes Jim?”
“Maybe the nature thing is not so bad after all. Ol’ Wordsworth did it, didn’t he?”
“Sure did.”
“And people love Wordy”
“Oh yes they do”
“Maybe the universe is not all that bad then. I mean what harm could a few waves and tiny bits of sand do?”
“As I said, creative little beings those things are.”
“Friendly too.”
“Oh yea, very.”
I was on a lift and as is usual when I am on a lift (by self), I started singing, acting, dancing, talking. “I wonder how, I wonder why, yesterday you told me about the blue blue sky and all that I can see…” I sang.
“Is just a yellow lemon tree,” chipped in fancy pal Jim. We went on a chorus: “I am turning my head up and down, I am turna turna turna turna turning it round, and all that I can see… is just another lemon tree.”
“That wasn’t too bad was it?”
“Absolutely not. Absolutely nothing”
“Uh ah… is everything alright?” – in singing mode again. “Absolutely nothing,” Jim sang. We had our tough guy expressions on which meant a lot of frowning and teeth clattering – for some reason.
“What would I do without you Jim?”
“Very little Miss Cris, very little.”
It was our floor. I knew there was something odd as soon as I stepped out. Everyone was staring at me. Some of their faces looked familiar. Finally I reached a room where I saw Prithvi Raj. Ouch! I was on a shooting location, interrupting a scene. I ran back to the lift. “Oh no oh no oh shit shit shit”
“Cris you are using the s-word.”
“Shut up Jim. Aww gee that was so embarrassing. Do you think they will arrest me?”
“For being in a shooting location? Nahhh. Well it is a sort of trespass and considering that they took a whole floor for this very purpose… maybe they will give you a fine… hmm Cris I think they will arrest you”
“Forget I asked”
The lift opened, the security caught me and took me right back up.
This was it, I was going to be put in jail. “But I didn’t do anything wrong. There was no board saying no entry,” I was nervous.
When the lift opened director Priyadarshan was waiting. “Priyadarshan,” I hissed.
“Glad you recognized. Would you please step in?”
“Listen Mr P, I had no idea. Look I am sorry alright, but you can’t really hold me up like this. I am a journalist!”
“We were towards the end of a long scene when you interrupted. So we will have to do the whole scene again or explain your presence.”
“Oh. Does that mean I should pay a fine? I know the rules! I am a journalist!” I blurted out. I looked at Jim for support. The coward was hiding behind me.
At this point Prithvi joined and I reddened.
“Young lady…” he began.
“I am not young”
“Ohh. Ok Miss…”
“Everybody knows I am not married,” I sighed turning to Jim. Jim smirked.
“It is a big menace shooting the whole thing again”
“But you can’t arrest me for that!”
“Would you mind if we keep the scene that way?”
I reflected. Cool, finally my big chance to “act”. “No I wouldn’t. Wait let me think (had to play hard to get). Yeah it should be fine.”
“It should be, considering the skills we observed in surveillance camera when you were in the lift.”
At this point I woke up. Actually I woke up a long time ago. And willfully daydreamed from where I stopped. Jim is still smirking, the idiot.
Two conversations. Err dentists or docs, please skip this. No defamation charges shall be accepted.
Scene 1: Jim and Me in living room, today
Me: Jim, I am going to die
Jim: Oh?
Me: Yes. Next week.
Jim: Oh?
Me: I am against suicide
Jim: Oh?
Me: So I am appointing someone to kill me
Jim: I cant
Me: Eh?
Jim: I’d love to help you Cris you know I always do. But I don’t like the smell of blood
Me: Thank you Jim but you don’t have to take the trouble
Jim: Oh is there a back up killer?
Me: There is only one. My dentist
Jim: Oh he is not going to kill you. He will just drive some screws into your jaws
Me: Thanks a lot Jim! That helps!
Jim: Oh don’t be a baby Cris, its no big deal!
Me: But it is! What if he was bored and thinks a root canal will be a fun thing to do?
Jim: Err Cris
Me: It is possible you know. Half the time dentists do things out of sheer boredom.
Jim: I don’t think root canal is a fun thing for dentists either. Monopoly maybe.
Me: You are missing the point. We are talking about me, remember! Solve my problem first.
Jim: You could choose not to go.
Me: I cant. The pain is killing me.
Jim: You could distract yourself. Read Calvin
Me: How? Stick it to the roof?
Jim: Oh I didn’t think of that. Oh yeah mp3 player
Me: Jim! Well that is an idea. But he might confuse it for his stethoscope and throw water at it.
Jim: Dentists throw water at stethoscopes?
Me: All the time. They throw water everywhere, into your mouth, onto their knives and even the nurses.
Jim: Why nurses?
Me: Identification I guess. To know them from patients.
Jim: Oh. Maybe they like gardening.
Me: So coming back to my problem
Jim: Oh forget it Cris, lets just eat for now
Me: Hmm easy for you to say you cavity-less creature!
Jim: One day Cris one day I will get it too.
Me: Don’t worry, I will take you to a doc. Unless you like to stay alive a little longer?
Scene 2: Monday morning, coming Monday morning
Me: I have got 2 cavities
Doc: 2 of ‘em?
Me: Yes can you tell me if I will need root canalling?
Doc: Hmm you just might
Me: Oh I don’t want to die so young
Doc: Root canalling does not imply suicide as is the general conviction
Me: No I know
Doc: Good
Me: Its willful murder
Doc: I beg your pardon?
Me: I am letting you kill me.
“Jimmmmm”, I yelled at my fancy pal Mr Jim when I found him dozing in the middle of my interesting story.
And I got a very reactive reply. “Zzzzzzzzz”
“Well that’s just fine! You can pretend you are asleep but I’m finishing my story anyway”
Knowing he was in for it, Jim rose and said “Oh come on Cris! You know it’s boring!”
“It is not! You are just not using your imagination. Come let me take you to the place of action”
With that, the 2 of us, all enthusiastic and happy… BUZZ [Lie detected]! Ok one of us all enthusiastic and happy and the other literally dragged reached a cark parking zone.
“This is where I use my imagination? In a car park? What do I imagine? Car marriages???”, Jim was loudly reproaching.
“Oh don’t be such a whiner! Let me start all over again”
“Here we go.”
“When it turns dark, and all the cars are left to rest, the cars slowly move out of the car sheds and look up. What do they see?”
“Car roofs”
“No! The sky! And stars. Unlike humans, cars have a gift. They could extract powers from stars”
“Brilliant. Why wasn’t I born a car?”
“Cut it out Jim. So these cars, they get the power to come alive. Zummmmmmmmmm”
“That’s their power sound?”
“That’s the background music! Zummmmmmmmm”
“I like that. Zummmmmm”
“Exactly. So what happens when they are alive?”
“Zummmmmmmmmm”
I looked at Jim annoyed, and continued “They become monsters!”
“Zumm Zumm Zummmmmmmm”
“Jim! Don’t overdo it!”
“Hey that was the only part I liked in the story!”
Ignoring him, I went to an orange colored car. “Look at this one. He stays all silent now, but night comes and he becomes the orster”
“Orange + monster?”
“Finally! Yes and that one there is the blaster, the other bluester and over here the whister and the grayster”
“How creative!”
“They start greeting each other. Unlike humans, car monsters treat each other with hugendousgouspus respect”
“What respect?”
“Just a word like humungous. Means big”
“There is no word like that”
“So who says cars talk English? I am just telling it so you understand”
“So kind Cris”
“Thanks. So with this, err respect, they say ‘Greetings Orster, you are up late today’”
“Neat”
“Wait till you hear what they say after the greetings.”
“I cant wait!”, Jim said sarcastically.
I eyed Jim angrily and went on. “Which human do we go and eat today?”
This time Jim showed his genuine surprise but broke the moment by laughing indefinitely. “They eat humans? Haaaaaaaaaaa haaaaaaaaa haaaaaaaaaaaaa”
“There is nothing funny about it. They take humans and put them on top of their carburetor, burn them alive, boil them and chew them up in the fuel injection”
“Wow Cris you know all the technicalities”
“Yea and this happens every night. They wink at each other with their headlights when they see a potential human victim. Then that night they would hunt her/him and eat her/him. They leave their engine on so that the noise would cover the human’s screams of pain.”
“You are a sadist”
“Not me! It’s them! They are car monsters remember? And this is not it. Once they have had humans they go to the sea to get rid of evidence and clean themselves”
“Sea?”
“Oh yeah they all drive together, reach the sea and swim. They’ll have the doors open and the doors will act like our limbs to waddle.”
“Nasty”
“Then they come back when its dawn and stay like innocent machines which knew just to honk and accelerate”
“And the humans just disappear?”
“Mm no. When the stars are not visible in the morning, the cars lose their power and everything they did just becomes undone”
“So what does the human feel like? Coming alive after dying?”
“Oh nothing except that they were in a bad dream. This is what really happens when you have nightmares! And you think it’s just a bad dream!”
“Very informative Cris. But look its getting dark. Maybe we shouldn’t stand close to those car monsters”
“Oh gee that’s true”
Jim and I strolled back, Jim now completely loosened up and laughing while he said “Oh gee am afraid if them monsters get me tonight!”
I just frowned and walked along.
Both of us didn’t see the orange car we leaned on having one of its sealed head lights half open, and turned towards the black car.
Author now realizes she had gone too far with the monster story and curses herself for writing it well past midnight! Now she has to go sleep. Gulp!
I saw it coming from far ahead. The shape and size was growing bigger every second. I knew it was destiny that put me here. The moment we were all scared of was finally here. It was man versus monster. And I was put in charge of the ‘man’ side. It was one woman against the monster. They must be sending their leader now and before you know it, a whole army of monsters would be at your doorstep. I had to do it. I had to save the human race. The monster had to go. There was no use sitting quiet. I had to talk to it.
“Hey you”
I addressed the ugly monster. It turned to look at me. No smile, no friendliness. This was going to be tough. But I didn’t plan to make it any tougher.
“Haha. Did I say ‘you’? I meant your honor, hullo.”
What? I had to be polite! Humans are renowned for kindness to other species.
“Oh no! Don’t fly! You are just an infant.”
There it was, those ugly wings all spread out, ready to attack any minute.
“I mean you are a baby. You’ve got to master your walking first before you learn to fly. Walking is fun. Move your left legs out. All of them.”
Monster though it was, it must be one of the good ones. It was walking just like I told it, but not in the direction or speed I had in mind.
“No no not so fast! You don’t want to do the boogie-woogie wrong do you? And not in this direction.”
The connection between us was broken now. It did not seem to follow what I said.
“Look pal, you don’t walk towards a human. Especially one that sings.”
I proceeded to sing. “Lalala….. booga booga woogie… get yourself a woogie”
It stopped. I didn’t know if it has eyebrows, but I am sure if it had, it’d have them raised now.
“That’s right. Don’t talk to strangers and don’t walk to singers. Didn’t your Mama teach you that? And I must tell you. My singing have killed a few animals in the past.”
Now the connection was on again. The monster was retreating its steps slowly. And whenever it paused, I sang even more loudly and it had its tail on fire!
At this proud glorified moment, when I was all ready to give a brand new innovative Nobel Prize speech, my fancy pal Mr Jim appeared.
“Cris”
“Yea?”
Why did he come now?!
“You were yelling and jumping all around the room… and singing unusually loud”
“You are some pal! Did you see what attacked me?”
Jim was calm. “A cockroach”
I stared! “A monster!”
Jim was shaking his head. “A 2 cm long cockroach”
“Hey you don’t insult my monster that way. Err you saw it all?”
“Yep”
I thought for a minute. I knew when I was a Nobel Prize Winner. I also knew when I was a Nobel Prize Loser.
“Jim, remember that blue Denim jacket you wanted?”
“Ya”
“It is yours”
“Thanks Cris, you are a pal!”
We sat silent for 2 long minutes.
“Jim”
“Yes Cris?”
“This is not going out”
“For that Denim jacket Cris, you can keep all the cockroaches in this world”
“One Jim, just one!”
“Yeah one”
“And it is a monster”
“It sure is Cris, it sure is”
It seems the 2 AM miseries are becoming a daily thing for me. Maybe I should write a book on them. Today, contradictory to my previous entry, I had a bad vomiting sensation (V-S for future references) which broke out exactly when the clock gave out the 2 AM chimes. If this was a curse, I will have to change my opinion about curses. I always thought them harmless little pranks old witches played on princes and frogs.
“Not anymore they aren’t”, my fancy pal Mr Jim said, apparently walking in from the next room. I must’ve been loud about my curse-protests. I ignored him knowing he wanted me to ask why.
My V-S hung about for an hour. It had somehow a kind of intoxicated effect on me. Quite natural. I felt weak. My mind felt weak. And when we were both weak, me and my mind, we lost grip of things.
Troubles began when I, standing in front of the wash basin, all ready for action, moved my tongue around and got it stuck between my teeth. Problem with moving tongues are, they don’t know how to come out of places they go and get stuck at. I tried force. Ouch. I tried tactic. Double ouch. I screamed. But without the help of my tongue, my scream was as loud as a Jerry-mouse-squeal. Jim offered to play the role of Tom and strike my head with an axe – “shocks are good tongue-releasers Cris”. I said no thanks.
The pain was horrifying. I imagined the prospect of a whole life with a stuck tongue. It was not a good looking future. After a lot of struggle, I was free but I made the mistake of letting out a yelp of joy. It went “Bow Wow Wow Yippie Yo Yippie Yay”. I forgot I lost Jerry’s voice with the tongue loosened. Parents are always unpredictable. One would think they love to see their little ones have fun and do a joy-dance. It wasn’t my fault I had a dancing sensation at 2:15 AM.
Lot of explanations later, I was back in my room and my V-S was still working pretty strong. As mentioned above, it gave a heavy-head feeling. I wanted to sing. And when I sang I sounded like I still had my tongue stuck in my teeth. I chose Bryan Adams. “If you love a woman, zell her zat zees not a woman”
“That’s not how he sang it!”
“Shut up Zim”
“What’s with this Z-thing”
“Zim what was that noise”
“You”
“Zut up Zimbo. Zayer iz a zhief in the house. I am going to get him.”
“There is no thief”
I jumped up on my bed nearly missing the ceiling fan and sang aloud “Bad boys bad boys whatcha gonna do when I come for you”
“Hide is my guess”
“Nobody asked you Zimbo. I am going to make a zpeech”
“Cris go to sleep”. Somehow his line sounded affectionate. This was a touchy thing now.
“Zimbo”. I felt emotional. “Have I ever told you what you are Zimbo”. I sniffed.
“Sigh a lot of times and a lot of names”
“I will tell you what you are Zimbo. You are a goose boy. That’s what you are. A very goose boy”. This time I ejected out an ocean of tears.
I remember I felt very innovative for the next few minutes. I redecorated my room in what I thought was the perfect way. I should have stopped with mine. I also went and redecorated my living room. Mother, it seems preferred the mats on the floor under the table, and not the other way. And there was no appreciation for hiding the ugly looking sofas with my beautiful bed sheets. There is no place for aesthetic sense in this world anymore.
By morning my V-S was gone, my intoxication was gone and I called Jim, Jim. I did not like the happy look on his face when I called him an imbecile.
Life was becoming treacherous after midnight. Today I am going in at 23:59 sharp.
Story of a lost journalist 