Life is an illusion

You are not looking at a place in a nice forest. It is actually a scene from my terrace, as you can see from next photo. I need to be grateful for this greenery.

Klutz - a clumsy and awkward person I had just finished eating dosas with chutnipudi and jaggery. This jaggery is different. We malnad people make and use liquid jaggery. We use it for cooking as well as an side dish for dosas. So I put the lid to jaggery bottle. Then I realized I had instead put the lid of a smaller bottle, which fell inside jaggery. So I was in really sticky situation. And my immediate reaction was "klutz". Wow, for a person whose mother tongue is not English, who is not "convent" educated, who nowadays rarely reads anything which does not appear on a screen, I do know my words. Such uncommon words. So does it implicate that my mind is smarter than I am, my subconscious mind that is? And it takes pleasure in using its wonder vocabulary on me! OK. That is it. Also it has been a while since I wrote a self-deprecating post.

There was a north Indian family living in our neighborhood. I did not know anything about them except for the fact that the wife had dyed her hair red using henna. Or was it the husband? Anyways, the lady had planted some plants on the roadside. I had assumed they were mehendi plants. Wow, I am so narrow minded. Now the plants have grown into large trees. Every year during this time I will be anxious, looking at trees which are looking beautiful with new green leaves. Worrying about one of them looking dry and leafless. I worry whether this tree will dry? Shall I go to that road and water the tree? But then universe tells me you are being silly Usha and decorates that tree too with beautiful color and design.

I do watch  "The Great News" in star-world or zee cafe? I don't remember. I don't like it. I compare it with "The newsroom" which was serious and dealt with the actual problem journalists (with integrity!) face. This one is more like romcom. And the title - The great news!!! When was the last time you heard any great news. When was the last time you heard any news? All the news gets swarmed over by shouting, screeching, name calling and bhakti. The anchors have learned from same school and use same approach - everything is fair in love and war and TRP. It does not matter that a few riots happen here and there. It does not matter much that a few people face discrimination, verbal abuse and attack here and there in the name of their caste, creed, religion and eating habits. As long as it brings good TRP, every thing is fine. That's how I started watching youtube channel newslaundry. They have great shows clothesline, why so serious, constitution and...

I finally finished verifying coding questions of DS. For the third time, I think. In spite all these verification, some bugs will still creep up. I was searching for some linux course in Coursera. I came across this one in John Hopkins university. And I was told that today was the last day to submit 2nd week assignment. I tried some regex, then decided I can not finish everything today. And like every other Indian (unless you are a student), I review the course - that is I don't pay for the course. Not that it is a large amount. But are all these things freely available some where in the internet? That is how we think. But may be another day, I am bored, and there is nothing on TV, I might complete some other assignments too. No, let me try to complete the quiz now. I do know some Unix - having worked on Ubuntu laptop for years.

Greed need not mean desire for material things always. It could be even recognition.  I do not usually keep greeding(!) about fancy cars, nice bungalows etc. Sorry, wrong setup. I do not desire silk sarees, diamond necklaces, jewelery, new gadgets for the kitchen etc. Usually. Now that I have many phones, I don't drool over mobile too. So have I achieved that zen like quality?  The other day, I was taking some skill tests in Techgig.com. I thought, it is any way better than playing freecell for long time. Then when glanced into leader-board, I saw my name some where in 25th location in one C++ test.  But strange thing is every time I take a test, the website will tell me that I have missed bronze medal by 31 points and many times it will show me a score of 0. I had doubts about some answers, anger over some questions. But I was sure I would not have scored a zero. And now my name in leader board. Ok, ok, let me try to get in the leader board of android....

What I realize is that I need to be working - no matter what. Because God has given me capacity to learn and my parents have educated me and I have learned many things myself. So this knowledge need not and should not go waste. But trouble creators? OK. Let them get some happiness by creating something at least. I have written, updated and published 7 android apps in these 7 years I am at home.  In spite of all the bad events almost every day.  And I am proud of that fact.

What happened to my sense of humor? Is it lost, trampled, crushed and broken into million pieces just like my dreams, hopes and will to live? Or has it been engulfed by tons of ice-creams, pizzas, laddus and cookies, turned into a mushy ugly mass of meat? Or has it slid down into gutter, to bottomless pit, just like my aspirations? Where did it go? And how do I find it? No, no, all these metaphors are not completely true. I have taken some parliamentary poetic license. I think, I know why. I have stopped reading anything other very short quotes. So mind does not expand and no creativity. 

I searched in my old now lost blog for that particular quote. But could not find it. "Have some patience. Life will eventually get tired of troubling you." The quote was something like that. But looks like that is not happening any time soon. Life does not get tired of troubling me. How can it? I am same. My house is same. My neighbors are same. So what has changed in the equation so far? Nothing. People want me to stop blaming them for my problems. I want people to stop creating me problems. It is a very vicious circle.