Weight and watch

“You need to put on a little weight,” a cousin told me recently. I nodded. He was not the first one to tell me that.

A little after my son turned six months, I lost all the extra kilos I had piled on during my pregnancy. Even as I thought this must be about it, my son ensured that I lost the extra stuff and more. That left me with much lesser flesh on my person than ever.

Till late in my life, I did not know what watching weight meant. I thought it was done only by those in the show business or at the most by a few friends, who I anyways thought were crazy. Most importantly, I did not have much weight to lose in the first place leaving my mother wondering where all the food I gobbled was going.

Then I moved out of my parents’ house and started living on my own.

I thought I was doing fine till a colleague commented, “You seem to be in an expansion mode.”

I was shaken out of my sweet reverie. Rest is history, as all those who know me might say.

I now watch every morsel of food I eat. Fried stuff makes me cringe, sweets make me feel sinful and I have started using terms like ‘brown rice’ and ‘multigrain bread’.

It’s not only food that I watch, I even watch the timings. I avoid rich food late in the day. Some might think I am a loony, but if I do feel like eating, I eat dessert with breakfast because that’s the time the digestive system is at its best (I can cite facts like these also now)

Sundays are the only days I let myself indulge (There was a time when the word ‘indulge’ did not exist in my dictionary)

My family thinks I could do with some weight. Only sometimes when I do feel like binging, I take their words seriously (that makes me feel a little less guilty).

And then of course there’s my son who seems to have taken on the onus of keeping me ‘maintained’ by making me run around all day long.

People exclaim, “You don’t look like the mother of one.”

I tell them I look like this because I AM the mother of one!

So much for so little…

Last week, I bought some popcorn and a couple of soft drinks at a multiplex. The bill came to a whopping Rs 400. That was more than how much we paid for a whole meal for a family of four not less than 5 years ago. I thought it was a total rip-off.

But, I did buy that popcorn and ate it happily. Now I do feel a little guilty, but it won’t last long. Why blame anyone for selling this stuff at such steep rates? Let’s say the culture of paying through the nose for a simple packet of popcorn (now it has a fancy variant: a popcorn tub) or coffee has been ushered in by people like me.

Things were different not so long ago.

I went to a coffee shop for the first time pretty late in life. I must have been 20. We chose a coffee that was the least priced. It was watery and tasted like a potion. And we shared two cups of coffee between three of us. The next time I visited the café, I didn’t know what to choose of the list because the names made no relevance to a coffee. So I just refused politely.

Now, I know all the names on their menu and what each one of them exactly consists. I even enjoy sipping what I would have once termed as insipid coffee.
I can’t say what prompts people like me to buy such stuff and later regret paying so much for so little. It must be that spur of the moment.

The saving grace perhaps is that I earn, I spend and THEN I crib.

My ‘non-happening’ way of life

For almost four years of my life, evenings meant nothing to me. Literally. They were just about languishing in a morbid office surrounded by gloomy pieces of news and the clock ticking away towards a deadline. I would hear friends discuss evening plans and family lament my absence for social dos. I would quietly resign to my fate (or rather my profession).

Now, one child and a change of profession later I have access to a bunch of evenings.

From Mondays through Fridays, they involve finishing work and rushing home to get busy with the sons’ chores. The mind is occupied with whether I get to catch the bus on time, whether I manage to get off the several signals on the way and whether the roads aren’t too crowded.

Yes, I work in a ‘9 to 5 job’ (okay 9.30 to 6.30) – a term many my age look down upon as boring, non-happening and non adventurous. There was a time when I was one of them. When did I change?

Well, the answer is I haven’t really. It’s just the situations around me that have perhaps changed. I have just learnt to adapt to them. For four years, when I had only one life to look after (obviously my own), I had my way. Waking up at 10, lounging around, walking into office not before 4 and sleeping late, mine was surely a nocturnal life.

But now, life is different and let me say it’s nice. Waking up early to hear the birds chirping, to see the family scurrying around for morning chores, to rush to work when the whole world does and to return with it, to be able to make plans for evening social dos if need be and most importantly to be with people I so want to be with.

I never knew living the ‘non-happening’ way could be so much fun.

Recently, I came across a blog that was funny. You could even call it hilarious. Crisp, and made a great read. I wonder why I can’t come up with stuff that can tickle the funny bone. My friends say I have a good sense of humour.

But I guess my sense of humour is what you could call on-the-spot-humour (if at all there is anything like that!). What I am really bad at is narrating incidents that I think are funny. You know when I narrate them to someone I myself realize that the funny part is really missing. There is not much laughter that I manage to elicit.

I remember a couple of times I have found something so funny and have badly wanted to narrate it to someone that I even ended up rehearsing how I would narrate the event. And was I successful? My so-called funny narration fell flat on its face. At the most my audience smiled, none laughed.

While on humour, it’s actually interesting to think about the kinds.

Like I have an Uncle who is a great example of deadpan humour. His face is so straight even as you are roaring with laughter at his joke. Then I have a colleague, who can give constant banter, make weird sounds, and come up with punchlines that are so catchy that you just burst out. I guess his could be called slapstick humour – a la Chaplin. I have a feeling he will make a damn good standup.

Then there’s my roommate who is witty. She is so amazing at one-liners that I sometimes even feel like making a compilation of them (just shows how jobless I am sometimes).
A friend has the habit of coming up with funny stuff at such an alarming rate that after a point you have to beg him to stop. Then there are so many I know who are good mimics.
So where do I fit in all this scheme of humour? I guess I am good at responding to humour. People are probably encouraged to display their comic skills when I am around :)

Drink to a lakh

So, have you thought of a gift for your beau/ spouse for Valetine’s? You haven’t? Ok, if you are in Delhi here’s a suggestion. Buy him or her Cupid's Love Punch. What is that, you may ask? It’s just a wine cocktail.

And all you have to do to before you clink those glasses in celebration is, shell out a couple of lakhs, that is if you are buying one for your beau and one for yourself. Else, a lakh will do. No don’t blink in surprise and read the line again. Because that is the price of the drink.

A leading Indian wine maker has launched the most exclusive and expensive wine cocktail that costs Rs 1 lakh as a special Valentine’s offering.

And before most of you purse your lips thinking what has the world come to, give the poor guy some benefit of doubt. It’s not just the Sauvignon Blanc, Peach Schnapps and orange juice that he will be charging you for. At the bottom of the drink served in an Italian crystal glass sits a pretty diamond ring waiting to be put into that shivering finger.

And well, according to the makers of the cocktail, the drink is solely made for people who are deeply in love and want to propose to their better halves or would bes in a unique way.

So all of you out there who are looking to woo your loved one, start saving. There’s still a whole month, after all.

Just felt like putting down these lyrics-

Abhi na jaayo chhodh kar ke dil abhi bhara nahi

Abhi abhi to aayi ho bahaar ban ke chaayi ho
Hawa zara mahek to le nazar zara bahek to le
Yeh shaam dhal to le zara yeh dil sambhal to le zara
Main thodi der jee to loon
Nashe ke ghoont pi to loon
Abhi to kuch kaha nahi
Abhi to kuch suna nahi

Abhi na jaayo chhodh kar ke dil abhi bhara nahi

Sitaare jhilmila uthe, chirag jagmaga uhe
Bas ab na mujhko tokna, na badhke raah rokna
Agar main ruk gayi abhi, to jaa naa paoungi kabhi
Yahi kahoge tum sada ke dil abhi nahi bhara
Jo khatam ho kisi jageh, yeh aisa silsila nahi

Abhi nahi, abhi nahi bhara nahi
Nahi nahi nahi nahi

Abhi na jaayo chhodh kar ke dil abhi bhara nahi

Adhuri aas aas chhodh ke
Adhuri pyaas chhodh Kar
Jo roz yuhi jaayogi
To kis tarah nibhaayogi
Ke zindagi ki raaha mein
Jawaan dilon ki chaha mein
Kayi makaam aayenge
Jo humko aazmaayenge
Bura na maano baat ka
Yeh pyar hai gila nahi

Haan yehi kahoge tum sada
Ke dil abhi bhara nahi
Dil abhi bhara nahi
Nahi nahi nahi nahi

Sometimes, some songs that you had heard so often before, come back to you - all new! You find new meaning and new melodies in the same old track. And then, times like these stay etched in your mind...forever!