Grey sky, Dark green trees. Spacious government property. Black, wet tar. Fading yellow lines. Miles of metal. Rain drops all around.

It's very quiet. All of us lost in thought, finding 'space' in a traffic jam near Raj Bhavan. Some grumble, some fret, some dream... some remember.

I'm hunched on my kiney. One hand resting on my knee, the other clutches the right brake. I stare at the floor of my kiney's leg space. head hangs down, my visor lifted a little, so that I can breathe freely.

Two drops run down the right edge of the visor. I imagine them, gleefully squealing, eyes shut, teeth showing, hanging tight to the edge. The rush of speed.

Suddenly they reach the tip, and are launched adrift. In an instant gravity claims them. They stare back up, at me, bewildered. They realize, and their face begins to bear that classic reaction to betrayal... 'Why?'

They hit the floor, disintegrating. I imagine them, closing their eyes just before impact, trying to block out the pain. How did they know, without looking? Their eyes shoot open, and they're gone.

A distant rumble. Movement begins. The engines begin to roar, one by one. I smile as the wave passes me, my engine throbbing to life with the press of a button.

Look at me!

Whenever I'm walking randomly on weekends around town, I come across many women I find attractive. I stare at them, almost brazenly.

I receive a variety of reactions. Some genuinely don't even register my presence. Heck, most. Some are aware I'm there, but not too concerned. Some fastidiously avoid my gaze. Some of them catch my gaze, put on an annoyed expression, and promptly turn away. I'm fine with all that, I shouldn't be bothering them with unwanted attention anyway.

Now, some of them look away, then look back to see if I'm still checking them out. I guess they want to know if they're attractive. That's quite normal too. The part I hate is that they refuse to acknowledge whats going on. I mean, they act like they aren't looking at you, but they look at you just to know whether you're looking at them.

It's happened so many times, it's quite annoying. I understand most women would call me a letch or something. And argue that I should keep my eyes of the women. Hmmm. Well, that's all fine when you consider gentlemanly behaviour, and I can take a hint. The trouble is I'm looking for that one amazing moment that can really make my day once in a while. When an attractive person responds to your gaze, when both of us acknowledge each other's presence, and the hint of a spark forms between us, for an instant. I can safely assume I'd never see the person again. Yeah naturally, I don't expect such a thing to lead anywhere. That would be childish. It's just the simple rush of that very powerful moment.

A was saying that that's too much to expect from Indian women. Bollocks. I've had enough and more experience to know that it isn't Indianness, it's just something that makes us all take the safe and predictable path of avoiding confrontation. Fair enough, I guess. I'm not perfect either.

A bit of background: I've been single for quite some time now. Ah yes. So you've realised these are the rantings of a desperate fellow. Bloody loser. #&%@!*& MCP.

It's beyond that. I'm hoping for that one woman with the awareness and the zest for life that would enable such a thing. To connect with someone brave enough and interested enough to find pleasure in the most random of intersections. That's the day I'll raise a toast to a special kind of something.

Dawn

The bed shakes. He wakes up slowly. His brow lifts up, then down. 'Huh?' His face is a million dollar question, with his eyes closed. The eyelids open ever so slightly, and his face now bears a puzzled look. He half sits up. Suddenly it hits him. He groans and falls back on the bed. He lies there motionless for a whole minute, and then rubs his eyes, with an annoyed expression. Then he pulls on his eyelids, feeling inaudible pops as the air rushes back in.

He turns to where she's sleeping. Her back faces him, she's in the foetal position. She seemed quite peaceful. He was amazed at how long she slept. Things were always simple for her. It was he who had to go and live a grinding life. Annoyance crept back on his face. How he wished he'd been born a woman. He sells his peace of mind and she hoards it in bed. He gets out of bed, the covers are tossed aside in a quick motion that doesn't ease his irritation. He stomps off to the bathroom.

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

Suddenly her eyes fly open. Her face looks alarmed for a fraction of a second. She relaxes. A hard, dreamy look washes over her face. She turns over to where he's sleeping, the bed creaks. Still asleep, and still snoring. She resumes her earlier position, only this time she's hugging her knees. He begins to wake. She tries to enjoy the few moments of silence, that short peaceful waking period. The rest of the morning begins to play in her head. His crisp words. No eye contact. The criticism. A thump sounds behind her.

Her face darkens. She wonders how to change things. How to go back to happier times. In a few instants she dreams possibilities, her face calm. But his nature ruins every dream. Her face is of despair. He gets out of bed. She grimaces as she feels part of the tossed sheets hit her. The moment passes. His footsteps sound the beginning of another routine day. Her face turns bitter. She gets up, already the tiredness running through her body. She follows meekly.

The Law of Averages

Hmmmm well so today I went to work because the PhD student K in charge of the lab I work in and I had to go shopping for stuff we needed. Unfortunately, we weren't buying 5K shoes and cool threads in upmarket malls, we were buying bearings and teeny ICs from low, way low, Market. SP Road actually.

The catch was A had called us all home for lunch and her place was nearby the last stop on our route. So I thought I'd take the bike with K and go, but somewhere in Sheshadripuram life decided to even the odds and my tyre went flat.

So anyway, I abandon my bike and we head of by rick to do all the shopping. I will someday write about the wonder that is SP Road. For now, there are other things happening. Shopping takes us a good three hours. We had a long list.

After the last stop I head off to A's place and a whole load of people are there, generally chatting. S is leaving for Arizona tomorrow and that was kind of the reason we were meeting up anyway. Oh wtf, so that was Sunaad. Shruthi had also come down for two days all the way from Jhansi. Yeah, Jhansi. Even I was surprised.

I left pretty soon after lunch, because I had to go rescue my poor little bike who'd been left all alone in a crowded noisy spot. I finally had to travel by BMTC bus to sheshadripuram. Luckily got a direct bus, which wasn't crowded. Somehow I find my way back to the bike, and have to lug it all the way to the nearest mechanic, and that wasn't too near.

Now, Goodyear was a genius who made life SO much better when he put that little hose on his kide's bike. Cos it's a royal pain to lug a bike with a flat tyre. The last time I had a flat I asked for it, cos I went and said 'You know, I've never had to suffer a flat tyre,' two days before it happened. While this guy is fixing the tube, some joker bumps into my bike and sends it crashing on its side. The result of that was a smashed right rearview mirror. Sigh. Well anyway, after much trials and tribulations I'm back in IISc running simulations and writing this stuff.

Yeah so now I'm wondering why anyone would actually still be reading till this line.

Ah yes, picked up Rosemary's Baby from A's place. Err, that's the name of a book.
I'm off to enjoy the weekend, hopefully, bbye.

Today was quite a sweet day. A PhD student had returned form presenting a paper at the American Control Conference, held in New York. Name dropping aside, why I mentioned all that was because he brought a nice load of chocolates with him, with the added bonus that there was dark chocolate amongst the hoard. Yum! Later in the day I found the stash of chocolates another PhD student had brought on his recent trip to the UK. So it just got better :).

Meanwhile I was chatting with D. We spoke about how bugging it was when the latest fad happens to be one of our long-time personal taste or preference. So what we generally enjoyed doing, in a highly individual way, soon becomes a cliche. Sad.

In the middle of that conversation, I was trying to get my aerial robot built. There are many more names to call this little gizmo, but this one is the coolest :D. Anyway, we were building a test stand that would allow the thing to rotate along all axes, but not move, because if it didn't work things could get messy. It was awesome to see it all put together finally.

Went for a walk in Sankey Tank. Bumped into S and A, quite a surprise. Anyway it was fun chatting. Quite a peaceful place.

In the end I went home, strummed the guitar a bit. It's nice to play yourself some arbitrary tune. So after quite a good day, just slept dreamlessly. :)