song's been playing in my head for an entire week.

Aaargh. The gods are conspiring. And trying to put me in place for admitting to being vain (coz lets face it I’ve been vain for long. And wasn’t punished before.).

Have acquired hideous looking clot in left eye. Which isn’t infected as yet. But optometrist says it might get so if I wear lenses. Which means that I have to wear glasses to work for two god damned weeks. And did I say when my glasses were made? Circa 2001. Yes, very fashionable. Lenses as thick as bottle glass. Immensely flattering. Very good for the self esteem. I love being the Indian female answer to Drew Carrey


And of course what is even better is how the standard of small talk has improved after I started wearing my glasses. In my pre glasses day it was “god it’s so cold. How come you’re wearing sleeveless *insert piece of clothing* . Are you not cold?

Post glasses: “you have glasses? I didnt know. God you look soooooooo different.”

Yes people, please do tell me what kind a geek I look like. Am down on bended knees asking you to please please please tell me how “the spectacle-look does not suit me”.


Am made of sterner stuff I think. I shall not give in and spend all the money I have left on new pair of glasses. I shall resist. This too shall pass. Or so I tell myself.

Thank god for small mercies though. At least there is no-one in Calcutta who I’d really need to pretty self up for. Sigh. (hush. I just forgot. Tis conspiracy time. No no no. no mercies. There is nothing to be thankful for)

the only song that I can make a pretense at playing on the guitar. (just the bass by the way) one of the songs without which girl bonding with S is incomplete. the song that reminds me of her. and of how we used to be. miss you.

Mirror Mirror…



Have never quite thought of myself as vain. I figured that I was quite balanced. Healthy sense of self esteem. Occasional bouts of feeling like shit. But mostly, quite balanced. Until yesterday.

Girl talk with S (this be different S) made me realize me that we women, (or well just the two of us, then) are ridiculously vain. And it’s not a conscious sense of vanity. It’s just there vaguely, at the back of my head. Like on a good hair day. With that slight shampoo smell. The scrunchy/band never stays on. Every five minutes a strand of hair must be tucked in behind the ears. Or be twisted around a finger. And if no-one’s watching be sniffed at. Does it still smell of shampoo? Eww… no smells of cigarettes now. And the funny bit? I don’t even know am doing it. And won’t know until you actually point it out to me.

Or the day when you wearing a particularly nice shade of lip gloss. Granted it doesn’t stay on for two long. But it doesn’t actually require “blending” every five minutes. You know what I mean don’t you? That discreet way you press your lips together to supposedly blend lipstick in?

Or the n number of times you press the tip of you fingers to the corners of your eyes just to check if the kajal has smudged or not.

And god help me on the days am wearing nice earrings. am accused being overtly partial to earrings. But what can I do? they're so pretty!(Bought a pair yesterday too. Bronze-ish. Really pretty!)

It’s not vanity really. May be its just that I like being a girl. Or may be the ugly duckling phase has left its scars. So am overcompensating by telling self that look am duckling no more. Or may be am just very restless. Must always fiddle. (bleh now I sound like a pre-pubescent)

What bothers me is this. Is it just me? Am I really that vain? And if I am, should I not be more bothered? And why am I still fiddling with that silver jhumka then? And what makes me smile when the bangles jingle while am tapping away at my key-board.
(And please note the bangle thing isn’t as theatric as it sounds. It isn’t exactly bollywood heroine-esq chanak-chanak. This is more subtle. You can barely hear it. Even the person beside me can barely hear it. It’s true. Seriously! You can’t.

OF CHOCOLATE CAKES AND WONKY OVENS


There is this amazing recipe for chocolate cake that I got from S. It’s the nicest yummiest cake ever. In fact it’s perfect. Except that the perfect cake requires a perfect oven and an eggbeater. You can obviously make the batter manually but till date the cake hasn’t quite turned out as perfect as it did on S’s oven and with S’s egg beater. And so every time I get cravings for that special chocolate cake, I deprive myself saying that I’ll make me the perfect cake once I get that eggbeater, and a better non wonky oven.

Though the times I have actually given into cake cravings and baked me cake it hasn’t turned out that bad. Just less than perfect.

And so there I was dreaming about cake, not baking cake, depriving self of cake. And today was hit by moment of epiphany. I realized that the only person who was really bothered about whether the cake is perfect or not is me. Every one else, including S, quite like my cake.

Moral of the story? Don’t wait for the perfect cake. Enjoy yours. Don’t deprive yourself because it’s not spongy enough or because you have to scrape of the 1 mm thick burnt bits.

So there. I have said it all. This is my story and am sticking to it. Not only am I sticking to it, am also going to tell my future grandchildren this story. Even if they roll their eyes and change the topic. Some day they’ll realize that the perfect cake is not worth waiting for. The eggbeater might not ever happen. Your oven, like mine, might always be stuck on 200 degree centigrade. Or not. But do you really want to wait that long to find out?

Take my advice. Don’t.