Please don’t bother…

Come holidays and the usual annual round of family visits start. You walk into relatives’ homes unannounced and they come to yours. And following the rule, we went to one distant aunt’s place. There were only the two of them there- an old uncle and the aunt.

As we had barged in with no prior notice, the aunt said, “I have some nice home grown bananas and maybe your son will like it”.

I glanced at the two year old beside me and said, “Don’t bother. He doesn’t like bananas”.

“Let’s see”, said she and soon she came out with a platter of sliced bananas with a fork et al.

“I know him well. We buy bananas and it goes rotten but he won’t touch one”, I say.

The aunt takes my son on her knee and offers him a slice with the fork.

He gulps it down without hesitation. I blink

2,3,4, 5, …Soon the plate is empty and he is smiling.

“You just have to present it well” , said the aunt with a grin.

I tried it many times later with no success.

Kids, they really know how to make you look a fool.

Life is maid

I spent 4 harrowing days working my ass off, back at home. My maid was away on leave, and I was left with household chores – cooking, cleaning, washing the dishes etc. Though my better half helped me with cooking, still, it was a bit exhausting for me – considering kitchen is one of the places I detest, most! I had just one fervent prayer. Lord, bring the maid back to me quick! I am weary and on my knees.

Life without a maid is hell. When I get back home after a long day at work (after picking up my 6 year old daughter from my mom’s place), I see my li’l one jumping with excitement and putting out her arms for me to pick her up. So I spend some time coochy-cooing, then put her on a walker (she doesn’t like it much!) quickly catch up with family as to what happened during the day, do the ‘survival’ cooking – just bare basic stuff – rice, curds and one side dish, feed the baby, grab a bite myself, wash the plates, clean up and then drop dead – well almost, bcoz I’d sleep like a log if not for the in-between baby feeds.

That being my routine, almost every day, I’m really grateful my maid is back. I’m thanking the heavens. Now, I can at least put up my feet and relax for a while. Not think about what to cook. Not break my back doing chores I’m not really fond of. My life is made, er…maid!

- Espresso

The Boss is always .....

Well, it is a simple fill in the blanks. Come on, let's get the words: a moron, a fool, a pain, haughty. But the best still is RIGHT.
Any questions? Koi shak Koi Sawaal? Better not have one.
But as it is, us poor mortals, get carried away once a while and question the RIGHT BOSS.
Nothing gained by the exercise except that you lose whatever little privileges you had like walking in a bit late to the office.
Conditions today in most places of work are a bit taut. Just count your blessings and be happy and don't gossip and try to prove something.
Zombies. Back to work.
The lesson is THE BOSS IS ALWAYS RIGHT.
-KK

The malady of redundancy

I hate doing nothing!
On some other day I might have said exactly the opposite. Opposite not in the sense that I love doing nothing, but in the sense that I hate doing everything. Now, don’t look at me as if both sentences mean the same thing. There is a slight difference there. In fact, quite an obvious one, i.e. when you look at it intently. When you say, love doing everything it means that you are….oh..ok…I got a little carried away, sorry, I won’t go on, on that. Happy?

Well…it’s been a long week, the last one. Longer still, because there isn’t anything interesting to do. And that’s the reason why I am blogging away (a month ago, I was slogging away! Come to think of it!!!). And I don’t know if the recession is to blame. Ah…let’s leave the poor thing out of this. I am sure everyone’s sick of hearing that word now.

But I am so thankful to this little, teeny-weeny, itsy-bitsy, cozy-cuddly space of ours where we let down our hair, put up our feet and sit back in peace and type our way to relief. Er…the letting down the hair and putting up the feet part are used as the phrases they are meant to be. I mean, come on. We are in the office. How can we put up our feet?!

And when I am done with the blogging, I go back to work. Hit the key board and get bored(these days i.e. the story is absolutely different on hectic days). And that is when my eyes stray around. Not that there is a great scenery around but then, something is better than nothing.

I look right and there sits KK and typing intently. I crane my neck and look at her monitor. I stifle a yawn. She is lurking around our blog. Yeah, this one. I look left and I see Latte staring dazedly at the screen. I crane my neck again. Oh, she is checking the number of visits we’ve had on google analytics. Wasn’t she doing that a couple of hours ago too? Ah…whatever. I turn around and look at Espresso. Now she is doing some serious work. And then she yawns and gives me one of her animated smiles.

And she navigates her chair to a spot close to the three of us and we laugh over some stupid content we have been asked to edit. Like, ‘Resort XYZ is located on the absolute beachfront.’ Or, ‘the people of Kerala are gourmets. They not only taste different but are different in the method they are prepared.’ (Er, who? The people?! All of us gulp). Another masterpiece, ‘here you get many gastronomic opportunities…’ (haha! This is fun, yeah, really!)

After the giggling session that turns into a guffawing session, I go back to my seat. In fact, I am back at my seat now. I am looking at the graphic guys. One of them is scratching his head and staring at the screen(I must mention he has drawn something incredible, which I can’t make head or tail of), another one just belched loudly and he, on the far end, did he just try to pick his nose? I don’t know. Whatever, if he did, then my gaze stopped him right on time.

People, by now you know that I am having some idle hours. I wish to go on but suddenly, I remember one translation stuff I have been procrastinating. Lemme get back to it.
Will get back to you real soon. It’s a promise!

-Cappuccino

On carrots

It's swine flu everywhere. As is often the case, suddenly everyone is overtly health conscious. Organic foods, back to Nature etc etc are making their usual rounds. The latest was what was overheard on bus, "Carrots, my dear...never buy those fat ones. They are all dipped in disinfectants. Go for the slim tender ones prefereably from the retail chains like Reliance."
The thought of carrots somehow took me to the incentive I was expecting for some time. I felt like an ass after the proverbial dangling carrot. Recession is now a reason for them to hold it back.
Lost in thoughts for a while, I woke up to overhear the rest of carrot conversation.
"And carrot halwas should be in pure ghee. When you roast the cashews, be sure that they don't get too brown."
Brown the colour of earth. It is said to be the colour most preferred by fools. I was wearing a brown apparel. The dangling carrot was there again. I was ten minutes late for office. The carrot was still in front of me.

KK

Regarding waitresses, cooks, palmistry and other matters

There is a fine line between insanity and genius and quite often the four of us find ourselves on the other side of the line- er..no, not on the genius side.. Sometimes you will find us talking about very serious things that are meant to be rather clever, but which unfortunately would sound a little over the edge, making us doubt each other's sanity...

Yea, so here is something we have been talking about:

Espresso: What else can we do?

KK: Why? What?

Espresso: You know, what all job options do we have other than being copywriters?

Latte: Aha, I know! The four of us can start a business together! We will sell craft items! We will have this shop where all the foreigners can buy elephants and stuff!

Cappuccino: Elephants????

Latte: I meant elephants in wood!

Cappuccino: Ok, since it was your big idea, I thought it would be real elephants...

[Latte smiles sheepishly]

Espresso: Er...Maybe not...

KK: Oh! How about palmistry? I am sure it has a lot of scope nowadays...People would want to know when they will lose their jobs and whether they will catch swine flu...

Latte: Ooo Swine flu... don’t talk to me about that!

Cappuccino [Ignoring Latte’s apparent distress]: Hmm..Not a bad idea..But what will be our roles? We don’t know anything about palmistry..I think the best idea will be to start a drama troop! How about that?? We are all so good at animated conversations, aren’t we? That should help...

[KK and Latte exchange looks with the thought “My idea is obviously the best!”]

Espresso: Not bad at all...But how about starting a restaurant?? We can make it a really cool place where all these cool people can hang out... And we can all be waitresses...

Latte: Oooo good good!! Great idea! And we can make Suze our chief cook...

KK: And I will give palmistry reports to our dear customers...And maybe I should wear a gypsy skirt, tie a bandana around my head..and also get hold of a crystal ball..you know, for an effect...
[Everybody imagines KK in the said attire...]

Latte: And I will sell craft items in another corner...

Cappuccino: And we can perform a drama...?

[Everyone rolls eyes]

Cappuccino: Ok, we will sing then! That should keep our customers entertained!

[It was indeed another matter and way beyond the scope of the discussion whether those unlucky customers will run away on hearing us sing. So everybody felt satisfied and content and had their cuppa tea with no worries at all...]

P.S. Suze is another soul who roams our office and who is likely to make her appearance in our narratives often...So take note!
Latte