The Public Diary

Test check: Writer living or dead?  This one is not coming straight from the writer's heart, but out of the urge to break the blogging drought that seems to have shaken up (or rather deserted) this space for quite a long time now. There are a lot of things that are happening for the first time, and I believe if I start to gather my thoughts, I'll pen something worth recording. Starting with the 10-day long trip. It must have been evident from my blog posts that I've lived a boring, not-so-outgoing life so far. All I have are routine life experiences - how it went on in school, college diaries turning into office memoirs and general observations. So, when I got to know that I'd be out of home for more than a week at a stretch, instead of getting excited, I got a bit worried, given the fact that I keep on falling sick every month or so. To elaborate, I get tired easily; I mean, I feel like 60 in my late 20s. Will I be able to walk long distances? (Yes, I did. I, who had e...

If I have failed to establish a geeky image of myself until now, let me reveal some facts about myself from childhood that would surely help you make some progress, and my image to digress, from the ideal version that some of you may place me in (just imagine the scale of my expectations from you guys about my image amongst my readers) One of the popular posts on my blog is ' First benchers '. But that wasn't without struggle. As a kid, we siblings went to school on dad's scooter. I'm the youngest so I would stand in front, whilst the other two would sit behind. But, one of them was so slow, if I aimed to reach the class as early as possible -say 20 mins before the start of the school- she would get ready and be out of the home only at 20 mins or 15 mins to school. That was a bothersome thing for the kid wanting to sit at the first desk. I would impatiently wait for her on the scooter and take mental stress if someone else secured the bench. Each minute, I would sil...

Serial liar I have this habit of lying to kids. And this is not the worse part. I even forget about telling them the truths after lying. Once I fooled my niece that the printed coffee mug in our house had the picture of her mother/my sister on it. Later on, I forgot telling her that it wasn't her mother on the mug, but me. Next time, when milk was served to me in that mug, she cheered, 'See, that's my mom on it.'  I was like, "No beta. That's me."  She again says, 'No, it's my mumma.' I thought she was getting confused between the siblings as her mother and my face resembles quite A LOT. It was then that my sibling reminded me of how I had told the kid that forgotten lie. I don't remember this one in detail. (But I do trust my writing skills that even if I don't remember I can cook up stories.) Still I have this saving grace in the form of reading-out-loud partner (who is simultaneously reading this blogpost as I write - BLOG LIVE ki...

Disclaimer: If you are a fan of the Cricket sport and have visited this post for satisfying sport buds, please don't proceed with these expectations. About an year ago, we heard somewhat familiar sound in our house, but not so familiar that we could decipher exactly what sound it was and from where it was coming. What was more disturbing was that it wasn't once in a while noise, we could hear it on a daily basis that too at an almost particular time.  To track its source, I would failingly go in the direction from where it came until one day night. I flung open the door of washroom and the buzzing sound went silent. After a few seconds, it started making noise again. I moved it again to see if made any impact. It went silent again.  So, I closely inspected the door physically to see any presence of a bug. Nothing. I called my nephew to confirm if even he could hear the sound from same place or I was being mistaken. He affirmed the source. Now if it was something on the inner ...

Sometimes we just act on an impulse, not giving enough thought to what it actually entails and its consequences. Many  of these instances are related to childhood when we don't possess knowledge to process the real meaning, only to realise it later in life. One such memory that I have is of the house in which I spent my initial months. My parents used to talk about that house saying 'सत्तसोनौसी'. I used to believe that it is a name of a city where they must have resided in. I had even imagined a milestone board that we see on highways marking directions for a particular city. Despite having seen the house from a distance, since we shifted soon after my birth, I could never connect the dots to decipher it actually. It was only in teenage roughly, that I understood what my parents referred to was सत-सौ-नौ-सी 'House no. 709-C' just like numbers are said in Punjabi. Needless to mention the messed up lyrics that only kids have the confidence to sing out aloud. Given the ...

I'm not really a fan of yellow dal (moong dal). So, whenever it finds place in our pressure cooker, I have to cater to my hunger needs myself. I prepare some alternative that I would be having as a full meal, which was red sauce pasta this time. Whilst others ate their dal and roti, they tasted my pasta too, but dad wasn't even tasting it. Upon my insistence, he took full spatula of pasta and poured it into his bowl full of dal.  This shook me to my core. I mean what taste would he have gotten of either pasta or the dal. Leave alone individual tastes of both, I couldn't even think of eating such a mixture. (While searching images, I found Moong dal pasta recipe. Where's the world going?) But I guess this lack of choosiness in meals is a blessing. Imagine how easy life is when you can eat about just anything eatable. Even I myself get tired of my picky nature. I often complain to my family that at least you have the choice to corner me out and eat your pumpkins, chana da...

Don't worry. This is not a doctoral post that would go above your our head. Living in this body sometimes makes you wonder about the alternative ways in which this body could have formed, doesn't it? I call them 'Anatomical wonders', which these are not per se.  Or am I only one getting these weird thoughts? I hope not. Starting right from the childhood, just like any other kid on the block, I used to be scared of darkness. The transition from sleeping in a room with so-called 'zero watt bulb' lighting as a baby to sleeping in a completely dark room, relying merely on moonlight or may be street lights, instilled a sense of fear. Especially, if everybody else in the room is asleep but you aren't.  Add to it the fact that my sibling, with whom I used to share the quilt, had this habit of sleeping with the quilt covering her face all upto her head. It used to make me feel like the ghost would notice me outright. To solve this potential trouble, I too tried to ...

Somebody tell google to not keep expectations. They hurt. But I guess it's such a bad student. It keeps on notifying, "Expect rain around 8AM" and then be so brutal to my sentiments that all I can see out of the window is bright sunlight. Don't know how Google is dealing with its own life, given these high expectations.  Limited knowledge is a blessing in a way. Imagine the kind of scenarios Google would be evaluating, given it is aware of all kinds of diseases - the causes, symptoms and consequences. You don't have to know everything everytime. But this Google is stuck with endless knowledge base that is only growing  day by day  second by second, I must say.  And here we are. Still going into thought clouds and questioning ourselves endlessly in mere happenings of daily lives. For instance, a few weeks back I was afraid if I have kidney stones. I searched for its symptoms, I had one or two of them. I checked our anatomy and placement of kidneys, the pain was rou...

Unexpected arrival? So is the comeback for me. However, I couldn't keep myself from sharing this amusing offering of the technology, to be specific, of Google. Awakening the writer within me. How many times has it happened to you that you were humming a song, or maybe a tune, but found it hard to completely recognize the song, or were unable to remember the main lines? Google has found a solution to exactly this crisis , if I may say. It asks you to sing or hum whatever part of the song that you remember and then tries to match it to the closest melodies it has in stock. Wanna give it a shot? Just say "Hey Google" to your phone, (Obvious alert: if you haven't enabled Google, enable it first) And say:- Find a song The screen then asks you to sing or hum whilst displaying an equaliser-like thing, trying to find the song (or judging your singing capability as well.) Trust me, it wouldn't work that well if you are a pathetic singer, or it may work also. How do I know?...

All of the world is entangled in an unending cycle of gaining weight naturally and then trying to shed it, but none can feel odder than me.  I mean when I was younger I didn't realise that I was way thin. I considered myself to be an average weighted girl. But I guess, media channels available today - to be specific - Videos, along with people around, have made me acknowledge that I'm so thin that it may be categorised as malnourished. It so happens that whenever someone meets me after a long time, a comment is bound to come that I've become more skinny, even if my weight hasn't dropped a gram. In my growing up years, those comments were not as frequent as they are now. Perhaps because back then we were growing in length, but as grown-ups, we generally tend to gain weight horizontally. As of now, living in this body for more than two decades, I've accepted my body type and know, for sure, that it is more inclined towards shedding kilos than gaining them. Some say we...

Raise your hand if you are also lost in the complexity of online security? I know this protective bubble has been built out for our safety only, but given the mental pressures of today's age, isn't it only adding to the burden? You must have definitively understood what I'm talking about.  A multitude of platforms means a plethora of ' usernames ' also to remember. On some platforms your name is available, somewhere it is already taken. So, you have to come up with something unique name, if you don't have one already. Another rising challenge is in passwords . You don't need just a passing word, it has to contain a minimum number of letters (preferably 8), a special character and a numeric also.  One drawback of this situation is that you can fulfil all these requirements at the time of setting a password, but when you log into the account after days or months, it doesn't show the same requirements. So, one normally ends up entering the wrong password, w...

What is the best time to have critical experiences? None, right? It had been a really hectic month. Professional pressures and unfavourable events really take a toll on your health.  About a month ago, I had my first encounter with low blood pressure. That too at the time when I was driving activa back to home. I, suddenly, started to feel like fainting out of nowhere. Concentrating on one object was troublesome. I thought it will go away, instead, it rose with passing kilometres. Then, it dawned that not only am I risking my own life but of the others on the road as well.  So, I stopped on the roadside and felt like calling dad to pick me up. To get some relief, I closed my eyes, but it still felt uneasy; removed helmet to get the burden off my brain, literally but not symbolically. Then got my mask down to be able to breathe in more oxygen. Somehow, I got a little bit of control back and within minutes I was able to concentrate again. Source: iStock I'm not sure if it was du...

Given the knock of another Corona-wave, masks have made an entry back into our lives. For the good or the worse, effective or ineffective, it sure acts as a saving grace in some of the daily-life situations. I couldn't help but enumerate those incidents when I was grateful that I had a mask on.  Once I was sitting in the middle of an argument between two people. Since it was in the beginning years, everyone felt vulnerable on getting their masks even a little bit lower. Both of them shared a good bond but were in a superior-subordinate relationship. So, this superior person was conveying his objections on the work of the rest of us. Those objections were outright pointless. But who would bell the cat?  However, that immediate subordinate found himself in a position where he could show signs of disappointment on such behaviour of the superior. I saw "C'mon. Now you will point out such petty things," written all over his face. I was smiling ear-to-ear with no need to su...

I always try to make effort to acquire items of daily use on my own. But what if you are placed in a completely new place and you don't know the whereabouts of the store outlets offering those products? "E-commerce platforms come to the rescue," you may have responded in your head. No wonder it is a lucrative option, given the ease and convenience. (Supermarket also wins points in this situation.) Earlier I used to think that I'm the only one in this dilemma of finding the apt place for buying stuff. About a month or two ago, I came to know of some fellow companions. (Roughly around the time when I thought of writing a post on this subject and then started noticing other people. You know how our minds start making connections to some event once we know we are attached to such occurrence in one way or another.) Source: wheretobuy.biz So, my sibling needed a drink, particularly used for health benefits. She had seen my father consume it years ago, so she asked him to br...

When life happens to you, you can't help but only change your ways. Hold your sympathies. I'm not talking about something tragic, but only the natural changes in your enthusiasm over a period of time.  You may feel so deeply about a thing, a trend or even a person; give it enough time, you will outgrow it.  Married people related to this one at the drop of a hat, didn't they? This craze of these days is unmissable. Earlier, when a daughter took birth, parents instinctively started to save money for her wedding day. Gone are those days. Now, even the parents of sons have to start collecting each penny as sending your son to Canada (or insert the name of any other foreign country) is as much a liability as marrying your daughter off.  Pardon me for the unintentional patriarchism if I didn't mention sending daughters to offshores. Then, there are people who are crazy about old songs. They call it the golden era and the only melodious songs to have ever been composed. Somet...

I'm not much of a person who would like to be on phone calls for long. In light of my preference, a memoir of some notable on-call incidents is presented to you. Alphabets can be quite phonic over the call. Suppose, you are saying N but the receiver might hear M. A common practice is to give the other person a word starting with that particular letter.  There I was trying to keep the error to a minimum. "It is spelt as B-L-O-G. B for Bag, L for Lovely, O for Ox and G for... Uh... G for... Umm." Thankfully, she got that letter anyway. But how could've I let myself sneak out so gently? I made a fool of myself. I ended up speaking out aloud, "G for Grey. Yeah . Yeah. G for grey."  Unfortunately, my job is also of such nature that I have to take and make several calls during the day. So, I have devised pet lines to greet everyone and ask how they're, respond back to them and then start the business.  Source: Amazon Once it so happened that I was so occupied ...