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Aunt: so I heard about your signal
Me: what signal
Aunt: Oh I thought you said you have given green signal to your parents
Me: no way
Aunt: Really?, so when is it gonna happen?
Me: another year or so
Aunt: No it can’t be an year, it will end up being two
Me: why?
Aunt: Guys get married at odd years of their age, and women in even
Me: Really?
Aunt: my son1 got married at 25, two at 29, your dad at 29, your uncle [my dad's elder brother] at 23, I got married at 18, your mom at 20. Do you need more examples?

I was argument-less, how am I going to prove this wrong?. really, how can one argue this statistically proven fact, do you guys thing I had a chance of winning this battle?

Yours lovingly…..

Gone are the days when the signature at the end of the letters gave away mood of the person who wrote the letter, or may be for the person with acute observation gave a lot of information regarding the human behavior. I say that those days are gone, mainly because, nobody seem to hand write letters any more. I do not blame people at all, with a faster cheaper alternative called email, who would really mail a snail mail letter.

Coming back to the topic of signature at the end of the letters, the concept is also extended to the email etiquette. On a normal day I get huge number of business emails, and each one of the people have a different way to sign off the email. I personally go with

Thanks
-<name>

Regards
-<name>

Thanks & Regards
-<name>

Its very rare that I do not sign off an email, only when I send out off the record official emails, that too some really close associates I send out on liners without a signature.

I have seen people attaching a quote of sorts to their official emails, even though I find it amusing to read the quotes, I sort of find it non – professional, may be that’s how the casual working style works, but then somehow I find it a little too casual.

The other common thing I have found people attaching to their signatures are their contacts, specially their phone/fax etc. I generally avoid doing this, mainly because within the organization the address book which comes when one clicks the email id has the information, and for people outside our organization I hardly send emails, and when I do I would like to shield my contact information until it is absolutely necessary to give out.

One thing which I absolutely detest in the official mail signatures are use of any references to the religion one belongs, or probably use of nick name for the self. I think its again way too casual.

Lets keep aside the official emails, lets talk about personal emails. Yes I do write personal emails, one perk you get because of your close friends staying away in a different place. So when you send out an email to a close friend, I generally tend to use the language we use when we speak face to face, throwing in words of kannada in between, a few slang, a couple of curse words [I am sure they would disagree with this ] . When it comes to signing off, I have a dilemma.

With love – sounds cheesy isn’ it?
Cheers- Well it sounds so much unlike me, as I never use that word
Regards – sounds so formal.
Yours lovingly – sounds straight out of a chic movie

I guess I am running out of signatures, not sure what else can one use.

I am no doctor – Heads or Tails #49

I have a confession to make, I am guilty of self medication for a long time now. I have screamed at my parents and grand parents for doing the very same thing, trusting their experience and popping pills, but a little sniff of cold or a little trace of a fever I pop in a mild anti biotic and a paracetamol.

I tell myself “I am not a doctor” every time I do this, but then I cannot really afford to fall ill during weekdays, not that my country is going to crash or my company without me in there, but it always feels good to the male ego to have a feeling of being absolutely wanted.

You may ask what has male ego got to do with self medication, because I see this happening with my mom too, but may be its just that we both are of the same breed of sorts, and it seems we are gradually beginning to think alike, relying on medicine more rather than the natural healing, which at one time I was a big fan off. I never took medicine back in school when I fell ill, I remember going to school even when I ran temperatures of 102. Somehow the idea of not taking risk has gotten into my head.

This time around, I have been careful. I had an upset stomach from last couple of weeks, one thing I swore this time around was “no pills”, I totally relied upon hot water and other home made food to get out of it. I must admit that I did have to suffer for two full weeks, [If suffer includes weekends of eating out who minds it ]. Anyways the whole point is that one should be really careful while self medication, we might end up aggravating something, or even end of treating and hiding symptoms making the problem even more hard to diagnose later.

So next time you catch yourselves popping in a pill or two, remember “we are not doctors”.
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The prompt over at skittles today is “doctor”, and I chose this confession as the response.

Meanwhile over at pure pursuits.

Guys its been a two months since I wrote something over at pure pursuits, and finally I think I found a reason why I was afraid of posting anything over there.

Here goes the post

I am found guilty, are you?

If you are here from Sunday Scribblings, please check the post below titled A dreamy solace.

A dreamy solace.

You lay there,
on your strong legs,
With fleshy layer on top,
Carrying off floral patterns,
On those satins wrapped around.

I remember the lonely nights
Spent buried in you.
Assuring embrace of yours,
A calm ground amidst chaos.
The patient listener that you are,
Non-judgmental, Non-criticizing.

My bed,
My place for a dreamy solace.

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Prompt over at Sunday Scribblings for today is “solace”, and here’s my fifty five words on the topic.

I walked into this one day

Lines..Some more

Couple of days ago I wrote these “lines”.

Is it,
to protect
ourselves?,

Is it
to minimize,
the risk of
being hurt?

When I was thinking about these lines, what amazed me was the spontaneity with which these words came out. One thing which escaped my eye until much later was how similar these two lines were. Isn’t protecting ourselves and preventing ourselves from getting hurt same?.

When I said minimize the risk of being hurt, what I was really trying to say was trying to prevent pain that it would bring to me. Somehow my mind seems to have given a special stature to pain, from the rest of things from which I want to protect myself.

So what are the “other” things here, what do we really protect ourselves from?,  I thought about these possible things

• Loss of direction in life
• Greediness
• Bad company
• Waste of time
• Regret
• Overweight
• Underweight
• Loss of power
• Loss of dignity
• Madness for fame and money
• Losing humanity

In a way all of these would eventually end up hurting us in a way or other, causing pain. So what was my mind really thinking about, is it all we want to protect ourselves from, pain?, are we so afraid of the pain?.

What do you guys protect yourselves from?, do you think a separate status for protection from getting hurt was valid?.

Punishment fun – Heads or Tails #48

People who have studied in India would surely remember this from school days, well not so much with the current generation in school, but people my age, am sure would recall this. The most common punishment scene from a school back In my school days was, A teacher yelling at the student, “Stand up on the bench”.

Common guys admit it, there would be a day when you forgot to do the homework, or played a prank on a fellow student, or giggled during the lesson, or was caught chatting during a serious study hour and were asked to stand up on the bench.

As a young student I wondered, what was really bad about this punishment, I mean punishment should be something which causes pain physically, or atleast makes you feel shameful, so that you wont repeat the crime.

So what did the teachers really think standing up would serve?, I used to find it amusing to see a fellow student standing up on the bench, I used to get easily distracted watching what him or her was doing, and I am sure even he/she would be having a fun time standing up trying to look into what others were doing with a bird eye’s view. I remember in lower grades, we used to laugh and giggle at ourselves even more when one of our fellow was punished this way.

Even worse were the mass punishment we used to get for being noisy, all of us being asked to stand up on the bench, this was really fun you know, with cramped classrooms and benches close to each other, and fifty pairs of boots making even bigger noise climbing the bench, blocking lights from windows, and in a way making it more difficult for the teacher. As she/he continued to teach, invariably someone would drop a pencil, or a book, or an eraser or so, so you would listen the kid climbing down the bench, making the adjacent two to loose balance, making it even more funnier.

I never understood the what was really punishing in this punishment..

Ah good old school days ..

Heads or tails prompt over at skittles today was “sit” or “stand”, and I choose to stand, that too on the bench

Lines

Lines,
we draw,
around
ourselves.

Is it,
to protect
ourselves?,

Is it
to minimize,
the risk of
being hurt?

May be,
it is,
to avoid
others
from
getting hurt
by us.

Shortcomings

Small failures standing tall,
Towering over the larger successes.

An odd spray of dirty droplets,
Discoloring the ocean of the mind.

“Confidence” broken,
“Win’s” questioned,
“Will” out of sight.

Is this guy, really me?,
The only question on mind.

Why did you let me into this.
“Why?”, I ask.

“Inabilities”,
Ghosts that haunt us forever.

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I am missing the “writer’s island“, the one prompt which I enjoyed doing a lot. Today I came across a nice prompt “Ghost” over at Rash’s Graffiti, I have been aware of the prompt Sunday Scribblings from a long time, but somehow never participated. Better late than never right?. Here I go with my 55 cents.