Category: Crib

Untitled. 18 Jan 2014.

Crib Alert. This is a whiny piece of text. You may not want to read this. 

We are almost 20 days into 2014 and I am already hoping that it gets over fast. To me, it seems as if the world is out to get me. To drag me down. To create obstacles in my path.

I know that I am wrong and this is never the case. Almost.

But these many coincidences can’t really happen at the same time. Mathematically, its impossible. A coin toss can’t continue to fall on the same face all the time. There are so many things that are going in opposite direction (from as planned) that if I made a list, it can reach the moon.

I can actually make and submit a long list of things that are dragging me down.

But to what effect? To whom? How would it help? God up there would look at it and help me fix things? I am not sure about God. If He had to help He would’ve helped already. No? Been some years that I have been drifting around here.

But I’d rather not.

I want to fight this battle with time. The one we are losing with every passing second. The one we are lagging behind in every minute. The one that takes us closer to the end with every passing year.

There are two kind of things that affect me (or anyone else for that matter). Things that I can control. And things that I cant. I can work on the first set of things. And ignore the other.

So the fact that I have been lazy and busy, I can fix it. I can blame is on preoccupation with a freelance project that I’ve taken up. I can blame it on weather. I can blame it on things at home. I can blame it on my general boredom with life and all that. I can blame it on a lot of other things.

But the fact of the matter is that I am singlehandedly responsible for my laziness. No one else is. I need to stop wasting time. Our time is limited and I can not spend it in not doing things.

Further, this laziness is already affecting everything that I want to achieve in 2014. My health, the book, career, money, love et al. I don’t know how its affecting my non-existent love life, but I want to believe that there is some karmic connection somewhere. Again, the affects are evident. In last twenty days, the story hasn’t moved a lot, I haven’t posted on my blog, I haven’t written my ten ideas a day, I haven’t met new people, I haven’t stopped spending money on frivolous things, I haven’t become any slimmer or wiser, I haven’t even made any attempts whatsoever to lose weight, etc etc.

Apologies. I said I wont crib and I wont make a list. Let me leave this hanging here.

Coming to  things that I can’t control that fuck my head, its again a very long list. It may not reach the moon but it would reach zero gravity for sure.

Sunanda Pushkar for starters. I heard about it and was shocked beyond words. She was in news just a day before and I cant explain the extreme step. I don’t know what really prompted her to take her life but I sincerely believe that overly intrusive social media has had a role to play in her decision. If I could, I would really really try and stop those jokes and quips that the world made on her.

Even though I did not know her and I did not make any of the aforementioned jokes on her, as a participant on “social media”, I feel responsible for her decision. I have been trying to write about her, to her for more than an hour but I haven’t been able to. There are a very few occasions when words fail me, this is one of those. I just hope that these incidents are not repeated. I hope that all the funny people learn a lesson. For our five minutes of fame, we have abetted her in killing herself.

The other thing that has left me numb in my head is the gross unfairness of the world that we live in. I dont want to write about the specific thing at a place that is in public domain but I am deeply moved by it. Its proof enough for me that God is merely a figment of our imagination. If He were around, I am sure He would not appreciate the unfairness. No no, I am not blaming God. I am merely saying that things around me are unfair and I need to start living with those.

Then these is this thing about shit happening at home. I can’t control it. The fact that I am too poor to afford a house that I want to live in, in Mumbai, I am left at the mercy of landlords and brokers. More than anything else, these things drain me out of my energy. And what do I do to get this energy back? I try eating junk food. To get that temporary kick from carbs and sugar. What happens in the long run? I go down the spiral!

You see my point? No? Ok.

Anyway, enough of a rant. Gotta get going and get some words written on the Nidhi Kapoor Story. It’s so close to the finish line.

Before I end this, I just hope that these 20 days are not an indication of the entire year to come and things improve as we go along. If they dont, I wont know what to do.

P.S.: Yet another reason why I blog. I don’t write personal diary and this blog is hardly read by anyone (may be excluding prospective employers). Ranting things out of my system help me get back on the track. Imagine climbing on a really high, tall place and screaming on top of you lungs. So loud that your throat hurts. Despite being that loud, there is a good chance that no one hears you. But then do you scream for others to hear you? No. You dont. You scream because you want to throw shit out of your system.

This blog, this rant is my attempt at screaming like that. On top of my voice. Loud enough to clean my system. Clean the shit going on in my head. That.

Thank you very much. Why? I dont know.

A tragedy etched in wood

That writing table that I got, remember? I even wrote it and the pic that you see on the left. So that table, is of no use no more!

Its got infested with termites and the wood has already started to chip. I thought furniture was meant to last generations and all that but this table had other ideas.

I paid a mini fortune to buy that table, thinking that I would recover my “investment” in it by penning (aka typing) my best seller. But thanks to my world famous addiction with procrastination, I havent been able to. Of course I’ve had excuses for not writing but since I am jobless now, I shouldnt have no more excuses and I must complete a book. Before the table is rendered useless by humidity, moisture, termites and boredom.

Oh, by the way, I bought the table from Shoppers Stop, you know that big retailer? And despite repeated calls to Shoppers Stop, no one seems to be doing anything about fixing the table or giving me a refund. I dont know what to do about it, except making noise on the Internet about it. And since I am Joe Nobody, dont think my voice noise would get heard.

Longer than the longest day of my life

Today, whoever is reading, ladies and gentlemen, for the records, was the longest day of my life. No wait, longer than the longest day of my life. One of those days when you spend one entire day, about 12 hours of your life doing something and yet there is no output to show for it. Not show it to the world but show it to yourself. Like when you are lying awake in bed late at night and you are talking to yourself, about things your did during the day. Those things. That output. And the worse part, its not even a step in the general direction of output. More so, now, when I am apparently the master of my own destiny, days like this suck even more. I should be on my way to greatness, riches, pursuit of vain hobbies, wild parties, world travels and other such things. But here I am! Stuck and confused and dazed likes its nobody’s business. Or as Siddhu would say, as a child in a topless bar.

Sigh!

Jul 27, 2013. Ajeeb sa din.

Bill Gates, on a couch, cooking up ideas. Source: Unknown

Today was day 1 after that july evening. And I had told myself that starting today I would watch every penny paisa that I spend. And I would be super selfish about my time. And Id become nobody’s fool. And other such things.

But destiny, or rather I, had different plans for me. I dont know why but I decided to go to a mall and I ended up wasting half a day. I did nothing at the mall. Just walked and window shopped. I did not even eat there.

I then had to run a couple of long overdue errands that I got finally out of the way today.

Then I booked a wrong flight and ended up paying twice the fare that I should have.

Then I accepted a meeting request from an acquaintance and then I ended up waiting for a couple of hours for a friend, for dinner.

And in between, since I was so bored, I spent money. And lots of it. About a week’s salary. A salary that I no longer earn get. And on things that I didnt need. And on things that are of no value to me and things that I know I would not use.

But then, the meeting with an acquaintance went really well. I got a few ideas that I could work on in the next few days. It actually made that light bulb in my head spark. Like that image of Bill Gates where all he does is cook up ideas. That was a favorite when I was growing up (posted with this post). I then connected this acquaintance with a friend (taking Altucher’s advice) and I know the two of them would find each other interesting. And in the end I am really happy that I accepted that meeting request. What if I had to rush like crazy, park my car at a metro station, take the metro and spend an hour to reach him?

The friend I had to meet, she was fun as always. I wish I was even half as cool as her. She does not read blogs or something. She things blogs is for wusses (whatever that means).

And finally I was worried that I had lost papers of my car but I hadnt. I found them in the glove box.

And on top of everything else, I managed to move the Nidhi Kapoor story a bit further.

And yes I read some pages from Eat Pray Love and I am totally loving it. You must read it as well. If there was a man’s version, it would have been great. Maybe I’d write one?

But this was an ajeeb sa din. A strange sort of a day. A day that kept me on my toes and kept me cribbing and yet made me content, as I am writing this. Would love to have more of these.

Fancy my fancy life?

So, when I took this fancy place on rent in Mumbai, along with it, I got a fancy club and a fancy swimming pool. Ofcourse at a fancy price. And since I work out of my home for the time being, I spend a lot of time in my fancy apartment, which it not too fancy once you step inside (that’s another problem I have with these fancy apartment complexes in Mumbai). Club the two together and all my close friends think that I have a facny life where all I do is sit at home, watch tv and go swimming. Little do they know that all these are really really tough things to pull off, when done at the same time.

Lets start with swimming. Of course all those who read this blog (yes, both of you) may remember my earlier attempts at it (documented here). I am sorry to report that its been three years now and I am still a struggling swimmer. At this rate, I would still be learning how to hold my breadth in water when my great great grand kids would be crossing the English channel. The thing is, it looks easy. All you need to do, is to lie flat on your belly, move your legs too and fro and shake your arms and you are on your way. The trouble is when you are trying to move all four limbs at the same time and breathe. I dont think I can ever master that. Its been almost a week since I have been going and there is not an iota of difference in my weight (which should ideally have come down by now) or in my swimming skills. And the cherry on cake, everything that I touch starts smelling of Chlorine (despite using a soap as strong as Medimix to clean after a dip).

Now, coming to more important matters of work, I am in Mumbai to create a company from ground up. That in layman’s language means that I am expected to hire people, manage them and find enough work to pay for their salaries. I would reckon its slightly too much for someone like me who hates getting into operational details. And add my compulsive introvert nature on top of it. Makes for a heady mix of dreams (that have no way of turning into reality) and harsh reality (of the pressure of making ends meet and justifying the move to Mumbai). I, being the frivlous and easy going me, dont really bother with details too much but its really tough to resist the temptation to think. And then sulk. And when you are trapped in a pseudo fancy place for home and a fancy hobby that you cant seem to master, it becomes even tougher.

So much for my fancy life. Fancy taking part in it?

The cost of a short fuse

I have to have the shortest fuse that anyone has ever had in the entire universe. I love what I do and I put in a  lot of effort and heart in my work. I am not the greatest in what I do but I more often than not I do good work. And I have been able to create a reputation, atleast in my office, if not in the market. And as a result I have things going easy for me.

But once in a while, there comes a client who is a total moron and has no respect or regard for things. The client assumes that he is no less than the God himself and loves to assert his God like status. But forgets that God is God for a reason. Today one such thing happened. For no fault of mine, I was dragged into a melee. I hate such skirmishes and I refuse to get into an argument. This guy was persistent and got me into it.

Little did he know that I am the kinds with total disregard for rules and I dont give two hoots about authority. I know I am correct and I refuse to budge. And its come to a point where I think we would lose his employer as a client. Thankfully my office understands the stand I am taking and they are with me on this. But it sucks to be a part of such a stupid thing. Need to quickly find a way out. May be its time to bring back Cyntax. And my hunt for a boss has drawn nil 🙁

Yes, I am a corporate bitch and this is one of those posts that I wanted to share with my boss and client but dont have the balls to do so. Blame me.

A mess called Gurgaon

For work, I travel to gurgaon almost everyday. And I have been doing it for almost three years now. so much so that I am at the verge of breaking down. I can no longer tolerate this place. Here is a list of issues that I have against Gurgaon.

  1. Its too far from my home. Takes me atleast 90 minutes either ways, if I am lucky. Most days its about 120 minutes of ordeal through heavy traffic and angry drivers. The good part is that there is so much traffic that I am supposed to use clutch and brake after every 2 milliseconds. I think its Gods way of punishing lazy bums like me. Imagine all the muscles that I am working on, everyday. My legs must be that strong that I may even defeat Usain Bolt, or even Paan Singh Tomar in any race they chose! 
  2. Traffic on the Toll Plaza. Its legendary, how bad the traffic is and how mismanaged the entire thing is. You could come in at any hour you wish to, you would have to wait for atleast 15 minutes on the toll to be able to get moving. On Mondays, its like a black hole. You can get in the toll lane bt you cant get out. It’s a never-ending stretch. If there is one thing that I could fix as God, I would not do anything about poverty, hunger, malnutrition etc. these are simpler issues with easy answers. I would rather fix the mess called Gurgaon Toll. I’d get more disciples and bribes. May be even bomb it if I could. Not a bad idea, come to think of it. 
  3. Civic conditions. I have been “subjected” to Gurgaon since 2004 when I came here for my MBA. Its been 8 years and the place is perpetually under construction. In 8 years, you could have built Rome all over again, make three lifesize replicas of the great Pyramids and erect Taj Mahal in Noida, Mayawati almost tried. China could even create a new Earth altogether and hang it in the solar system if they wanted to. 8 years is a lot of time if you ask me. 
  4. Amenities. There is not one day when we don’t get power cuts. Wait. There is not one day when we get power. Cuts will happen if there is power. Apart from power, there is never any supply of water. We have to rely on private water tankers. Even at 8 in the morning, when I come in, there is no electricity and hence no ACs and hence all the frustration. If I ever kill someone in Gurgaon, it would be because of the fact that my head got over heated cos of the damn power situation. 
And then there is the traffic in city, the rudeness of residents, the brashness of taxi drivers, the incompetence of policemen, the vanity of rich businessmen, the wealth of land owners who sold it all to builders, the arrogance of of the uninformed and worst of all, the compulsion of someone like me who has to work, to pay the bills.

The Outlier!

Recently I was applying for a visa to a difficult country. Difficult because they take great pride in screening who visits their motherland. The screening is downright humiliating at times but then its ok, it’s a little price you have to pay to be an Indian.

So, these guys wanted copies of my income tax returns for last three years. Now I dont really bother about these official documents. I just give all my papers to my accountant and he files the requisite papers. I dont even check with him. I trust him blindly. Today was thus the first time in almost 18 months when I pulled these documents out. And I was shocked to realize that my total income in the last year was exactly half of my total income in my first year post MBA!

I passed out from MDI in 2006. I got placed on day 0 and was picked by GE Money. GE dint pay a lot of money but it was a lot for someone who had no clue how the world works and definitely had no clue what value could he add to a company that took pride in its 100 year old legacy. Obviously I wasnt complaining and I was happy with my 7 6 figure salary. Imagine being catapulted from a zero to seven six figures. And all you had to do for that was play Counter Strike and faff!

So, in almost 6 years since my MBA, while all my friends and peers have moved on to bigger, larger things post their campus jobs, I have moved sideways and actually went down. And went down how. I am on my third job right now and at both places (post GE), I took substantial paycuts. And as a result, I am struggling at low seven six figures (compare it to a few friends who are now at 9 8 figures). And in a world where you are measured by the amount of money you make, the car you drive and by the phone you keep, when I look in the mirror, I see an outlier, on the extreme left of the bell curve! Life is being what it is best at, being a bitch!

But then I dont think I cant blame anyone else for this. While moving on from GE and CLA, I decided that I dint want to work at boring companies and do shitty work. I mean am not too sure if what I do right now is interesting, but well, thats a debate for a different day!

EDIT… And just to prove that I am still a nincompoop, I calculated my measly 6 figure salary as 7 figures. I just cant get maths! Apologies for all the heart breaks 🙁

Anatomy of a bad day

So this is how a bad shitty day looks like. And this is a long post. After all I am going to talk about 24 hours!

  • 0600. The alarm kicks in. You are awake before it rings because you have been getting very light sleep for last few days. You can see the alarm ringing but you are so tired, mentally and physically that you cant move your hand to shut up the alarm.
  • 0615. The alarm is still ringing. You can now fidget and move your hands around. You try to locate your phone, the phone doubles up as the alarm, the eyes are still groggy with sleep and you cant see clearly. In distance, you see a silhouette that has to be your phone. You make great effort to reach it. only to realize that its the TV remote. You curse and fling the remote as hard as you can. It lands 5 millimeters away. In the meanwhile, the alarm is still ringing. You give up and shut your eyes.
  • 0630. Its enough. The alarm has been ringing for more than half n hour now. You get angry at yourself and you throw your blanket and locate the alarm. You get up, locate the phone, which has somehow hidden under the pillow, shut the damn thing off.
  • 0631. The alarm rings again. You realize that you hit the snooze button rather than dismiss. You carefully, slowly, find the dismiss button and shut the alarm. Go back to sleep. 
  • 0830. You realize that you are late for work. And for the pitch that can potentially win your company 10 crores of business.You curse your luck and life and drag yourself out and try and get ready. Of course your favorite shirt is gone for ironing and you have to wear a boring shirt that you otherwise detest. You try to find your lucky charm and your pen and you cant. Since you are late for work, you skip breakfast. You dont even say bye to your ma. But you do miss the time when you called sgMS everyday before you left for office. Obviously, now you dont.
  • 0845. You reach your car parking to realize that there are a million cars parked behind your car and you cant take your car out. You make rounds to neighbors and plead to remove their cars. 
  • 0907. Finally all cars blocking your way are out. You call people in office and realize that the dependable kids in your office were partying last night and they havent done anything for the grand meeting. You wish, for the millionth time that you had people that you could trust.
  • 1017. You struggle for an hour in traffic and reach the client’s office for a meeting that was supposed to start at 0900. It may be put on record that the distance is mere 7 kilometers but the traffic makes the five minute journey a long drive.
  • 1105. The meeting hasn’t even started. The client is busy doing God knows what. 
  • 1155. You are still waiting for the damn important meeting to happen.
  • 1220. The client emerges from the depth of his office and he apologizes profusely for the “little delay”. Just when you thought that the endless wait has finally ended and you were about to get up and move towards the conference room, the client says “oh I forgot something. I would be back in a minute”.
  • 1245. You are still waiting for the minute to get over. 
  • 1248. Mysteriously, the client is back the moment you type this. Hands full of Samosa, chai and jalebi. Dunno hows he juggling the three things together. Ushers your and the team into a conference room.
  • 1249. Before you could present your stuff, fucks your happiness over the “mundane”, “kiddish” and “juvenile crap” ideas that you have presented. Does not forget to add “please take this merely as a feedback”. Even without reaching the second slide of your mundane presentation.
  • 1250. You are out of the meeting room. These were the longest two minutes of your life so far. You hope to eat something nice and end the bad morning. The boss wants to say hi to some old friends. He asks you to wait. 
  • 1315. Since you dont have any old friends, you cant say hi to anyone. You call your boss and ask him how long will he take. He says five minutes. Which translates into an hour, which thankfully you know, since you have been working with him for two years. You step out of clients office and go buy a Red Bull and some chips from a nearby petrol pump. You go sit on a traffic intersection and munch onto the chips. Thinking about sgMS and knowing that she would be eating a dabba from her mom.
  • 1400. You get a call from some HR consultant, with bad accent, and she promises you a job with a “leading media conglomerate”. When you tell her the money you expect, she hangs up, without saying bye. The boss is still nowhere to be seen. 
  • 1530. The boss emerges. You head back to office. Only to go for another meeting. But you have to drop the boss to office because he is too lazy to drive his own car.
  • 1630. You reach the other client. The meeting drags on forever. The agenda of the meeting is about peanuts and biscuits.
  • 1730. The meeting is still on. You are still debating the quantity of chocolate chips in the biscuits.
  • 1930. The meeting that you thought would go on forever finally gets over. You rush to the parking lot because you need to reach office and write another presentation. It needs to be presented the next day.
  • 2010. You reach office and get started on the presentation.
  • 2100. You have no clue. And you are staring at an empty document. 
  • 2230. You are still staring at the empty document and powerpoint because you cant think of shit. Your brain died after the afternoon when you were waiting for your boss to get free from his social calls.
  • 2330. The thoughts and screens are still blank. You give up and decide to go home. 
  • 0030. You reach home. Thankfully there’s no traffic around and you reach in record one hour. 
  • 0040. You gulp the dinner that has gone cold. Since you have been coming home this late most days, you dont even bother heating the food.
  • 0045. You try shuffling channels on TV and they are showing the worst movies ever. You fling the TV remote. You recall the episode of the morning when you couldn’t find the alarm.
  • 0050. You are fucked up in the head and you dont know what to do. You scroll through the address book on the phone and try to find someone who you could speak to at this hour. You realize that most of your friends are either married or they dont care. You fling the phone in the general direction where you fling other things, including the TV remote.
  • 0100. You sulk and sleep because there is no one you could call and talk about shit that the day has been. For first time in the entire day, you miss the fact that you dont have anyone to call your own. Not even #sgMS. 

And thats it ladies and gentlemen, for the time being! And no, this is NOT a piece of fiction. This is inspired from real life incidents.

The Compulsive Eating Disorder

Spoiler Alert. This is one of those rants that has been inspired by surfaced because of shit at work. Readers discretion advised, I tend to use profanities when I am pissed off like this. 

So, I work at a place where, in the words of the great Mr. Daniel, we are in the business of saving other people’s jobs. And I guess we do our jobs well cos the clients keep coming back to us and we have no time to go and chase outside business. And all this while, new clients keep queuing up outside our office and keep begging us to work for them. We are awesome.

But then this is not about my work place, or my clients or about all the things that we do to keep clients happy. This is about me. Its about how stressful my job is (apparently, what I do is second highest on the list of jobs that stress people out, after the Air Traffic Controller and no, there is no scientific evidence to support it). And its about how stress makes me hungry. And how much I can eat when I am hungry. And how the location of my office is not helping the cause, with a million road side vendors selling everything from Chole Kulche to MoMos (thats Dim Sums in English) to Maggi to Omelet (what? Omelet is not spelled as Omellette?) to ice cream to parathas to chaat to samosas. Like they say, in retail, the three things that matters are location, location and location, I am strategically located to hog like a pig. And the feedback and inputs from clients dont really help matters.

So today started as any other Sunday would. Woke up, got ready, had an awesome breakfast and left for office. The drive was brilliant. There is no traffic on Sundays. In fact while driving I thought what if I could work only on Saturdays and Sundays, it would be so amazing. More on this later. So it started like a regular sunday (p.s. another social experiment. I am linking each piece to the tweets that I posted and lets see how it goes) and it got screwed moment I reached Gurgaon. I wore my shoes, called the client, entered the flunky in the white shirt mode (more about being the flunky in white) and started to wait for the God client to call me. He did after a while and in the meeting, he took my arse royally. And then I came to the office and this is where I realized that all the effort that my team and I had put in last few days has gone for a toss. And this is when the hunger pangs first hit me.

And then, I made a choice. Do I give into the pangs and eat the next things that I spot. Or do I wait and do something to divert my mind and attention and save myself those extra miles on the treadmill (as and when that happens). The result, ladies, gentlemen and PD, is in front of you. I did go for a stroll in the sun but then I refrained from ordering anything stupid and here I am, in office, typing fervently on the keyboard, hoping that someday, the infinite monkeys inside me, actually start making some sense!

I feel Purple

Image Credits: Jerome B

The mood I am in, if someone asked me to describe it, I would say, I feel Purple. Dont ask me why. Though Purple is the color of creativity or ideas or something to that effect (a reason why CLA logo is purple), I am far far away from all such constructive pursuits.

I feel someone has sucked all the energy and vigor from me. Though I am suffering from fever, cold and cough and even a task like breathing is taking a lot of effort. So much so that I am wondering how cool would it be if we could recharge the batteries and then not bother about breathing, eating, peeing etc. In short, I really hate it when I am unwell.

I have noticed that in last few years, I get unwell at regular intervals. I have always prided in my immune system. I had stomach made of steel and I could eat anywhere and anything and still digest it. I dint have to wear any warm clothes even in peak winters. I could tolerate any extremes. But for last few years, I think after I went to MDI, my systems got fucked. Not that I do drugs or booze. I dont even smoke. But then something went wrong and I am now sick often. I need to do something about it.

Apart from that this is unrelated but I have been listen to Jo Bhi Main from Rockstar on a loop since morning. Hear it. Absolute bliss.

Dear Myself!

Credits: Hugh

Dear Myself,

Hope you are having a good day.

Normally I don’t write into you. More often than not, a polite conversation with you helps and we sort our disagreements. In extreme cases, I take you out for a drive or an icecream and we are cool after that. But this time, unlike all the other times, things have gone to such an extent that I don’t think a mere conversation would help. I think I need to put on record my opinion. At least it will help me put everything in one place.

I am writing to you, to officially (no I am serious) point out that I absolutely hate the fact that you make me drive all the way to Gurgaon every day. Agreed that Gurgaon is the millennium city and the land of opportunities etc but are you sure you want me to go through this grind day after day?

If there were just one or two bad things, I would have relented and not felt so fucked. I tried making a small list. Here are the findings. The traffic is bad. Traffic management is worse. Roads are probably the worst. Rampant urbanization and unplanned growth have created such a mess that I don’t think we’d be able to fix it ever. Public transport is non-existent. And whatever alternatives we have, the hand rickshaws and auto-rickshaws, they fleece as if we live in the banana republic. People, both on and off the road are rude and believe in public display of useless aggression and fake power. Electricity is a problem. Things are expensive. No one feels safe anywhere post the sunset. There is not a place where you can feel at peace. And many more. Why would then you goto a place like that everyday?

If you were doing some brilliant work, I may have let you go there everyday. But what you do, are you sure that’s the best utilization of your time and effort. I mean I understand that you are not the most brilliant sample of the homosapien spieces. I also understand that you are mediocre at best. I know that you want to defy authority for some stupid reason that only you can comprehend. I am ok with it. You know that I would support you through thick and thin and despite you have your quirks and whims, I have always been on your side. But this is something I fail to understand. Why would you even bother with all the hassle of the drive till Gurgaon everyday? Why do you put yourself and me through the torture everyday? How does your conscious allow you to kill yourself every day? And you have been doing it for almost two years now! Havent you?

Please know that I am not asking you to quit. Not for a single instant. I hate quitters. I really do. All I am asking for is an alternative. Or may be an option. Or something that allows you to stay sane! Like Hugh says, Life is short. Make it amazing!

You know, its your life. And mine as well. If not for me, please take time and think about things for yourself. You are a bloody gift to this world and it sucks to see you getting wasted like this. I think after 29 years of coexistence, my comments merit atleast one thought (if not a detailed inquiry into reasons)! Please do it. And if there is anything I can do to help you get out of the mess, I am just a nudge away. Actually closer!

Love you.
Your’s Yourself.