Scribble 10:42 AM 4/2/2008 : After the rains..

Well, the clouds did deliver after that, and we saw close to a week of rains! Not only in this part of Karnataka, but in Kerala and TN too. It was heartening to see heavy rains and thunderstorms all of a sudden. However the unseasonal rains caused great damage to the crops and crores were lost in the deal. It was nearing harvest time for paddy, for example, and imagine the plight of farmers when they see their ready-to-harvest crop washed aground in the rains. Very sad.

I drove with family to Karkala and Kudremukh on a rainy Sunday. The trip was very rewarding, the sights a treat to the eyes.

Scribble 11:26 AM 3/14/2008 : More nostalgia

This morning started with a promise and didn't deliver much. The ambience was promising to be just the type I had been longing to see. Cloudy sky early in the morning and an unexpected drizzle. But it didn't pour. It just drizzled for a while and stopped. But it gave the surroundings that dark, damp look so typical of dry earth and trees washed in a summer rain. The rain had stopped by the time I stepped out of my house to catch the company bus to office. However the atmosphere induced a lot of nostalgia. Waiting at a bus stop, water dripping on my head from the electric line above, cinema posters on the walls all wet, the road very damp and shining, buses that come and stop by wearing a clean look shorn of the usual coating of dust - I dont know what all these reminded me, couldn't pick anything specific, but I did detect some memories of the feel and smells of those monsoon days during my school and college days in Kerala.

Scribble 10:09 AM 3/10/2008 - After the bike trip

The weekend is over. And yes, I went ahead with my adventure on bike. Went all the way to Palakkad from Mangalore. It was an awsome experience, and I want to do it again! So powerful and reassuring has been this experience. Powerful because it was a good confidence booster and it gave me a sense of achievement. Reassuring because it gave me the realization that my youth isn't lost yet. I did not have a back problem after 9 hours on the bike. Ok, my bum ached a bit on the last leg (Malappuram - Palakkad), but that too was temporary. Once I was off the bike, it was gone. God I have it left in me still!

This experience has rekindled in me the desire to go for a Bullet. I have this special liking for the Royal Enfield Bullet, an emotional soft corner to be more precise. I learned biking on it, though I had taken my first lessons on Hero Honda CD100 and Yamaha RX 100. It's an expensive bike now, I will have to shell out almost a lakh for a new piece.

Scribble 1:30 PM 3/7/2008 : The idea has stuck.

The latest is that I've decided to go ahead with that ambitious bike trip to Palakkad. Alone. Will be an experience to remember. I should start early in the morning so that I can cover some distance before daybreak. Have some coffee or tea at Kasargod, breakfast at.. ok let me not plan these things, let them just happen.

Now that there is some excitement lined up for the weekend, I am already straining at the leash.

It was very foggy this morning around Mangalore. At 8 am the visibility was so poor that I couldn't see the water below from the Nethravathi bridge. It was like I was on a bridge leading to nowhere in a totally white space.

Scribble 1:38 PM 3/6/2008 : And suddenly this!

I have a bike in Mangalore and I have to send it to its owner in Palakkad. I will get it done through one of those parcel service people this weekend.

Suddenly I am overcome with tempting thoughts of riding the bike all the way to Palakkad. Won't it be an experience to remember? Will my body permit it? I mean, I am 36 and overveight and not quite used to such long bike rides. My back can act up. I am not even sure if I will be able to finish that journey. What if my back and bum start aching so much by afternoon that I can' t ride anymore for the next two days? I will have to park the bike somewhere in Calicut and come back home!

But I know one thing for sure. The ride won't be boring. Let it take a whole day, even then. Only physical fatigue and pain can make it uninteresting.

Scribble 10:48 AM 3/6/2008 Nigh-impossible thoughts ;) Or are they?

A small take from the above stream of thoughts. About being healthy, energetic, enthusiastic.
My top priority right now should be to get back in shape. In really good shape. The kind of shape and fitness that only hard work can bring.
From 86 kg to 75 kg. From soft and fluffy to hard and muscular. From lethargic to energetic. From laidback to enthusiastic.

Scribble: 10:15 AM 3/6/2008 Summer Rain

I'm sitting at my desk in the makeshift work area in the basement of the building. I am completing 6 months here in another four days. That's good enough time to become integral with the organization, and to have enough work to fill all my time if I so choose.

But my mind is elsewhere. The inability to focus on office affairs have been with me since I started my career in the basement of a small private company's office in Baroda twelve years back. I keep drifting away from work unless there is considerable work pressure to keep me pinned on work.

I want to be elsewhere. I had downloaded one photo of Uthralikavu near Vadakkancheri from an online forum, and have been engulfed by a strong sense of longing to be in similar environs. To be somewhere in a Kerala village, when dark rain clouds gather and the strong cool winds announce the onset of summer rains, sweeping dry leaves all around and making more of them wither down from the trees. Dry teak trees against the backdrop of a dark cloudy sky. Giant evergreen trees dancing in anticipation of the rain.

And I soak in the ambience, I am part of it all, with not a worry about the world's affairs. I am healthy, energetic, enthusiastic and happy, and in complete oneness with nature.

Then it rains. Like never before.
I soak in the rain.. that's ultimate deliverance, salvation, nirvana.

Scribble, scribble

My blog isn't growing. I hardly sit down and type anything for my blog. So why not use those randoms scribblings that happen when my mind wanders away from work? You see, I have this annoying habit of letting my mind wander when it is least desirable. At work, for example.

Sometimes I scribble down my thoughts in a notepad (I mean the virtual type). Mostly crazy, nonsensical stuff born out of boredom and frustration or the 'desire to be elsewhere at the moment'.

I will post some of these here.. hoping it will add some content, though it's all nonsense.