One day at the movies

Few days back, my son and I had decided to watch "The Guardians of The Galaxy". He got his mandatory bowl of popcorn, after confirming with me that I was not hungry and that I would not eat multiples of five popcorns at a time and eventually finish half his tub. He exaggerates, I have no clue where he gets that trait from!

We entered the audi, took our 3 D glasses and settled ourselves, cleaned the glasses with wipes, and got ready to watch Chris Pratt in action. and Baby Groot. (love that little creature,  rooted teeny soul that he is)

Few minutes into the movie, I was pretty disappointed by the quality of the print. The images were blurry and the print quite dark. I poked my son once or twice to ask if his 3 D glasses were okay. Figured out from his impatient nodding of the head, that they were. I took one look at the filled seats to my left and resigned myself to watch the movie with my defective glasses at least till intermission. When I couldn't take it any longer, I channeled my inner ' crouching tiger, hidden dragon'  spirit, muttered a series of "excuse me , so sorry", (who in the world booked our seats right in the middle of the row?) , and hobbled to the bored looking attendant, near the exit. Cornered him and in my perfect blend of an accusatory and a hurt, 'How could you fool me? ', tone, whispered,  "these glasses are spoilt, please replace them."

The guy peered at the glasses, and then at me and then said "Erm..Maam, you've been watching the movie through your sunglasses." 

Uhoh!  I touched my head and sure enough, found the ugly square rimmed 3D glasses, perched unapologetically on my head. I grabbed my sun glasses back from the 'trying very hard not to laugh" attendant,  and went hopping back sheepishly to my seat, with as much dignity as I could muster.

The son when he heard it , rolled his eyes and laughed : "Why am I not surprised, Amma?"

I've always been err, to put it politely, quite absentminded.  I married a guy who's equally so. He's misplaced 3 sun glares, one of which he placed on the roof of his car and then drove away. He used to forget which grades the kids were in (I NEVER forget that!!) We've forgotten flights and luggage and lived to tell the tale.

As the years pass us  by,  thankfully, he seems to have toned down a bit, thereby balancing the family sanity scale. I, on the other hand,  seem to be aiming for some doctorate in the science  of forgetfulness. 

There was this time when I opened the door of my parked car and sat down, only to see a stranger there. His jaw dropped. My eyes popped out. It happened to be someone else's car. He was too busy sweating(probably his wife was due back any minute) by which time I had made good my escape to my own car,  where my driver (a necessity since a car in my control is always out of control) was hyperventilating because he thought I had lost my mind!! In my defense, it was not my fault, it was a white car, it seemed the same size , I just hadn't noticed it was from a different company.

This syndrome seems to have rubbed off on my driver too. The other day, after buying the week's groceries, I walked back to the car, dumped my packets on the seat, and had barely walked to the other side, when the car lurched forward. A long 5 minutes and 500 metres later, the car slowly reverses back to a gaping me and a sheepish face pops out " I thought you were already sitting in the car".

Sigh,  he thinks too much. 

Three thoughts occurred to me.

1) So that's how it feels to be on the receiving end.

2) Goodness, could this absent mindedness be contagious?

3) Poor poor G!

Oops, we did it again!

It is exam season here and I've been working extra hours in the kitchen to satisfy those "I'm hungry' cravings. Understandably, my mood's not that great. So yesterday was a holiday in between his exams and S was sleeping in. I was at my sudoku puzzle, sipping my tea and G, was busy doing what he does best , asking for the zillionth cup of tea. The point I'm trying hard to make here, is that Ive been working hard, very very hard, not hardly like certain people who I live with, would like you to think!

So there I was, listening to old Hindi numbers, and solving my Sudoku puzzle, when my mobile rang. Annoyed at the disturbance, I glanced at the number. Unknown! I generally avoid picking up calls from unknown numbers,because then I have to tell the caller who is generally peddling some scheme or other,  to go to hell, and I do not want to spoil his/her day and mine too.  But this call I did answer, probably because I was in the exam mood and hence jusified in wanting to give someone a piece of my mind. Besides, I've been working too hard for my own good.

Female Caller: "Mrs R?"

Me (in my gruffest tone, already annoyed at the audacity in presuming that I was a Mrs) : "Haan ji?"

Caller : "Mrs R, I wanted to know if S is coming to school today?"

Me(spluttering) : "erm..whaat?"

Caller, patiently " I'm T, his teacher"

Me,( in a total unrecognizable squeak)  :"Good Morning, Mrs. T. No, No, S doesn't have any exam" while my mind feverishly tries to recall his date sheet which he and I had glanced through two days back.

Mrs. T(really really patient) " erm..ma'am, he has his Art I, Paper today!"

Me: "Are you sure? oops, didnt know. Thank you for letting me know. Sending him right away".

Mrs. T (In a very relieved tone) : "Yes, Im sure, Thank you," 

She kept the phone down before I could utter a syllable more. Yes, she is a very impatient lady.  I thought so too.

Knowing S would be  shocked, I sprinted off to wake him up, resolving to break the news to him gently.

Threw his bed sheet cover off and shook him, (whaat? that's as gentle as I can be) screaming "Get up, get up, get up, you have your Art paper today"

S : "Amma, don't joke, let me sleep"

"Seriously", I think to myself, " this child has chosen the wrong day and time to be like me!" 

Shook him some more till he got up, still in disbelief that we had forgotten about an exam. Both he and I were convinced that surely his teacher was mistaken. We pored over the date sheet intently and then looked at each other.  Oops, we had looked at next week's schedule. In our defence, who puts Art in between heavy duty subjects like Chemistry and Geography. Who?! It's all the school's fault. Always!

I pushed S to the washroom and sprinted  to the other room and barked at G : "S has an exam today, get the car out"

His eyes popping out assured me that he had heard and I sprinted back to the kitchen to make a sandwich for the boy. And then sprinted back to S and then to G again.

10 minutes later, they were on their way to school, and I heaved a sigh, partly from relief and mostly from all that sprinting. Thought for the day, sprinting in the morning is injurious to breathing. Please don't try it. 

Then I remembered this, and this (click on the links) and I chuckled. Nothing had changed much since then, and the Apple hadn't fallen too far, from this tree either!

I then practiced  a suitably chastened and apologetic expression to face G, when he returned from the impromptu school run.  He should be happy though, both S and I are not likely to forget an exam ever. I have it all planned out. We just need to print the date sheet in bigger fonts. Maybe color codes will help too.

Yes, that should work!

Yes, poor G, indeed!

Head banging moments, anyone?

I've been having these little moments where all I seem to do is either pick up my remains of my jaw from the floor or bang my head at the wall steadily.

The 9yr-old seems to be in a hurry to reach 14. And it is not very easy on me. Not at all.

He likes Slipknot Psychosocial! "Slip knot what?" I spluttered.

He nonchalantly replies: 'Oh, its heavy metal!"

and then he gently goes a step further "and slipknot is the group's name. Psychosocial is the song's name!"

OHHH! *drops jaw, first checks to see that he is still 9 and then rushes off to google

He wants a pet, any size, any kind, any make, any shape. I offered myself, since i do dance to all their tunes and love them unconditionally. But he was not amused.

"If it makes you feel better we'll get a girl dog, okay?" he says

Sigh, i had no answer to that except  the urge to say "erm not girl dog, bitch" then thought better of that! Who wants to willingly fall into the fire from the frying pan? Who?

and then, he dreamily says " I'll name my dog Metallica!"

Aiyyo! *drops jaw, sees a dog named Metallica dancing with a kid who likes unpronounceable bands and bangs head on wall

Every time something like this happens, I let go a little bit. He is growing up, I just need to grow up a wee bit more too. But my heart breaks a bit each time.

Then something like today happens.

I had been out yesterday, and I received this sms. It was from him and it said "Amma, my thoot fell out and I didn't cry" *he's been having major dental issues and has had almost every tooth extracted. this was the second time he had pulled it out himself.


I reached home much later and oohed and aahed over the gap in the smile. Managed not to mention the wrong spelling of tooth (I'm nice like that) and the day ended.

Next morning, it was the usual morning drama. I had just donned on my 10 arms and feet, and was perfecting my art of magically appearing in all the rooms at once, waking up the entire block in the process of waking up two kids, and I hear an outraged cry.

"The tooth fairy didn't come. My tooth is still here!"

Three things made their way into the fog of early morning dimwittedness that lingered over my eyes.


1.  this particular tooth-fairy must have been a male. Someone's going to have a lot of explaining to do!

2. This hard metal loving 9yrold, believes in the tooth fairy? Really ? He actually looks devastated.

3. Gosh, I don't want to be the one to dismiss a childhood belief. I have like 5 minutes to do damage control!


So I hurried him inside to change into his school clothes, and morphed into my tooth fairy avatar.

Two minutes when he came out, I straightened the bed and said" Oh look, S,  i think the tooth fairy has after all left u something, it seems to have gone inside the pillow cover.  Must have been in a hurry"

An absolutely delighted 9 yrold put his hand inside the pillow cover and drew out a 10 rupee note.

What? only 10 rupees you, my readers, say? Shhh...that's what the tooth fairy could get in the last minute panic!

I turn around very very happy that a crisis has been averted, and do everything but a jig there. I'm so so pleased with myself.

Then a puzzled voice says "hmm... strange... she forgot to take the tooth"

Uh-oh!*THUD...THuD...major head banging moment

and then the 9 yr-old reasons out, " must be absent minded, nah?"*he must really really be believing in this tooth fairy!

All I could do was give him a big big hug, he's so forgiving isn't he?

The walk

In her comment on my last post on commenting, JLT said "post maadi, jaldi!". I love the wonderful mix of three languages.

Why have I not blogged?

I'm being stalked by a lizard. The lizard must have been a snubbed romeo in previous birth, persistent as it is in popping up only when I'm in the kitchen. I'm quite tired of gingerly peeping into my dustbin before throwing any rubbish, or sifting through my laundry to avoid washing a lizard. And yes, the post of lizard chaser is currently vacant. My knight has returned his sword..err...broom.

This was not a reason for not blogging but irritating enough for me to include it here.

Vacations are on, the boys' days begin at 10, sometimes 11 (GASP!) in the morning and end forcibly at 12 midnight. I have no clue which day of the week it currently is. I do know that these kids of mine are having an awesome vacation, even though they think it could have been better!

Sometimes we go exploring. That's a fancier name for walking, in my son's unasked for opinion. One Sunday found us at the Mac Ritchie reservoir. Beautiful place, complete with water, dense foliage, tall trees, a monkey and humid, humid weather. There is a treetop walk (a walkway,250m, constructed over the natural canopy of trees) which we could not attempt because we reached a bit late. It closes at 5 pm. and we landed there half an hour before.
After much pointing fingers at each other for the delay we proceeded to walk on the 2.5km Prunus trail, a boardwalk which hugs the reservoir bank.

RUN! here comes the 'papa'razzi!

sigh...what drama!

G, of course, seemed more keen on freezing the beauty within his camera than earnest walking. Photography is his ongoing hobby. He is quite good at it, considering that he manages to make me look very presentable, which is a decent parameter to measure his skills by. On this walk, the boys as usual were keen on showing their backs, so i was the only convenient fixture he got.

It was "walking a few steps, stop, get photographed, take two steps to the right because he needs that tree, now continue" walk all the way, with him indulging his creative eye, completely! It sure is more difficult to be with a wannabe photographer than to be with a wanna be writer.

See the reflection? :)

All in all, we walked quite a bit, and I realised that nature walks and 11 yr olds don't go together, not if you are strong enough to take intermittent doses of gyan, given regularly, from the 11yrold.

Sample one such gyan : "I have a great idea. Take all the pics you want and photo shop us on everyone of the pictures, easy!"

Gyan 2: "good, i saw the trees, i saw the water, can we go now?"

Just to say that we have not yet learnt our lesson, we are coming back to walk the tree top ropeway soon!

The urban giraffe

Heard in the playarea, an exclamation ; "Look, giraffes!!!!"

The kids present there, came rushing to see...Giraffes in the condo?

Soon came the loud protests from the kid brigade : "Those are not giraffes, those are cranes!"

She insisted, "But they look like giraffes, see that's the long neck and that's the face...."

Five minutes later she continued her walk, leaving a few excited kids admiring the 'giraffes' with the colored faces!

Whatever happened to imagination?

'Break'in news!

I've had a dreamy week, that is, a week where i seem to have dreamt most of my quota of dreams! Dreams where the main players are mostly my kids and sometimes the hubby, just saying. (sheesh! i think i dig myself deeper everytime i try to explain *wry grin)

I get up in the very wee hours of the mornings thinking to myself that THIS would make a wonderful story/book/movie and then i fall asleep again. Needless to say when i finally arise, the dream remains just that! nothing but a vague dream! Because i just cannot remember what it was about the dream that was so interesting!

Most of the time, i've a sneaking suspicion that the kids see me as a giant mobile phone (why mobile phone? beats me! ) where they press various buttons to make me do a certain thing.

For example, press one to make amma dance...to their tunes. Press two to cook favorite food, press three to start a slanging match...press four to make her tear her hair out..., press five to test the karate kick..., press six to play 'bored' games..., press 7 to whine and whine till she gives in..., press 8 to put her on mute!

Can you tell that vacations are on?!!!!

A two week break for those wonderful teachers to catch their breath and for us parents to lose ours! I'm right now an 'always on demand' mom!

I bet they are having fun!