>There and back again.. an oddball’s tale..

>And so back again once more.. its been a week now back in Delhi, back in civilisation and all that it entails. Work has begun again, time has slowed once more – but nowhere near what it used to be.

I found that my last little jaunt where I just up and left everything in the lurch for two weeks and decided to kick off one of my ‘bucket list’ items has given me new life. Things were boring, repetitive, mundane – routine as tends to happen to us all. Even the little vacations and weekend trips in between served little purpose other then to give a slight recharge. Not so with this last one.

Somehow grabbing what you can and making a last minute decision to get a car, two friends and hit the road to drive the full circuit, Delhi to Himachal to Ladakh to Kashmir and from there down home was perfect! The randomness of it, the sudden decision, the freedom of the road, the lack of cell phones, email, being responsible for nothing save yourself and thinking only about the now was a great feeling. Throw in that the first ever Ladakh Confluence was taking place smack in the middle of our trip (right on my birthday too in fact..) and there was no reason whatsoever for this not to happen.

And so it was that I found myself on the road on a trip that for a number of reasons has given me a charge like nothing in the last few years has and at the same time re-affirmed a lot of things in my heart and mind that I was losing a grip on amidst the maddening mundanity of this society we live in today.

Ive returned to find that between us we have some 2600 odd photographs which Im trying very hard to sort right now, and once Im done, I promise to have the next chapter of my travel journals here for all those who come here and are kind enough to peruse my ramblings. And just so you know, even if you dont read a damn thing I write, the pictures alone will be worth a visit – spectacular doesn’t even begin to do it justice and magnificent is a word I used a lot this trip..

But in the meanwhile, I need to not neglect this my faithful blog and you my faithful readers as I have and so will continue to post entertaining tidbits here for you.

For starters, I leave you with these two little amusements – the first is a list I found from a friend on an online discussion thread for humour and felt it would be appreciated here – essentially a list of Random thoughts from 25-35 year olds, many of which actually almost cracked me up. Simple, funny yet showing a remarkable way of looking at things we often look past or little details we often don’t realise. And one must never forget that the devil is always in the details, as that old saying goes.. 🙂 Enjoy!

-More often than not, when someone is telling me a story all I can think about is that I can’t wait for them to finish so that I can tell my own story that’s not only better, but also more directly involves me.

-Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you’re wrong.

-I don’t understand the purpose of the line, “I don’t need to drink to have fun.” Great, no one does. But why start a fire with flint and sticks when they’ve invented the lighter?

-Have you ever been walking down the street and realized that you’re going in the complete opposite direction of where you are supposed to be going? But instead of just turning a 180 and walking back in the direction from which you came, you have to first do something like check your watch or phone or make a grand arm gesture and mutter to yourself to ensure that no one in the surrounding area thinks you’re crazy by randomly switching directions on the sidewalk.

-I totally take back all those times I didn’t want to nap when I was younger.

-I wonder if cops ever get pissed off at the fact that everyone they drive behind obeys the speed limit.

-Is it just me, or are 80% of the people in the “people you may know” feature on Facebook people that I do know, but I deliberately choose not to be friends with?

-Sometimes, I’ll watch a movie that I watched when I was younger and suddenly realize I had no idea what the f*ck was going on when I first saw it.

-I think everyone has a movie that they love so much, it actually becomes stressful to watch it with other people. I’ll end up wasting 90 minutes shiftily glancing around to confirm that everyone’s laughing at the right parts, then making sure I laugh just a little bit harder (and a millisecond earlier) to prove that I’m still the only one who really, really gets it.

-I would rather try to carry 10 plastic grocery bags in each hand than take 2 trips to bring my groceries in.

– I think part of a best friend’s job should be to immediately clear your computer history if you die.

– LOL has gone from meaning, “laugh out loud” to “I have nothing else to say”.

– Whenever someone says “I’m not book smart, but I’m street smart”, all I hear is “I’m not real smart, but I’m imaginary smart”.

– How many times is it appropriate to say “What?” before you just nod and smile because you still didn’t hear what they said?

– I love the sense of camaraderie when an entire line of cars teams up to prevent a dick from cutting in at the front. Stay strong, brothers!

– Every time I have to spell a word over the phone using ‘as in’ examples, I will undoubtedly draw a blank and sound like a complete idiot. Today I had to spell my boss’s last name to an attorney and said “Yes that’s G as in…(10 second lapse)..ummm…Goonies”

-What would happen if I hired two private investigators to follow each other?

– While driving yesterday I saw a banana peel in the road and I instinctively swerved to avoid it…thanks Mario Kart!

– Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.

-Shirts get dirty. Underwear gets dirty. Pants? Pants never get dirty, and you can wear them forever.

-I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t at least kind of tired.

– Bad decisions make good stories, always. Period.

– Is it just me or do high school girls get sluttier & sluttier every year?

-If Carmen San Diego and Waldo (remember them?) ever got together, their offspring would probably just be completely invisible.

-Why is it that during an ice-breaker, when the whole room has to go around and say their name and where they are from, I get so incredibly nervous? I know my name, I know where I’m from, this shouldn’t be a problem…

-You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work when you’ve made up your mind that you just aren’t doing anything productive for the rest of the day.

-Can we all just agree to ignore whatever comes after DVDs? I don’t want to have to restart my collection.

-There’s no worse feeling than that millisecond you’re sure you are going to die after leaning your chair back a little too far.

-I’m always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my ten page document that I swear I did not make any changes to.

– “Do not machine wash or tumble dry” means I will never wash this ever.

-I hate being the one with the remote in a room full of people watching TV. There’s so much pressure. ‘I love this show, but will they judge me if I keep it on? I bet everyone is wishing we weren’t watching this. It’s only a matter of time before they all get up and leave the room. Will we still be friends after this?’

-Why is a school zone 20 mph? That seems like the optimal cruising speed for pedophiles…

– As a driver I hate pedestrians, and as a pedestrian I hate drivers, but no matter what the mode of transportation, I always hate cyclists.

-Sometimes I’ll look down at my watch 3 consecutive times and still not know what time it is.

-I keep some people’s phone numbers in my phone just so I know not to answer when they call.

-I think the freezer deserves a light as well.

-Do you remember when you were a kid, playing Nintendo and it wouldn’t work? You take the cartridge out, blow in it and that would magically fix the problem. Every kid on the planet did that, but how did we all know how to fix the problem? There was no internet or message boards or FAQ’s. We just figured it out. Today’s kids are soft.

-I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello? Hello? Dammit!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and goes to voicemail. What’d you do after I didn’t answer? Drop the phone and run away?

-I like all of the music in my iTunes, except when it’s on shuffle, then I like about one in every fifteen songs in my iTunes.

-Even under ideal conditions people have trouble locating their car keys in a pocket, hitting the G-spot, and Pinning the Tail on the Donkey – but I’d bet my ass everyone can find and push the Snooze button from 3 feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time every time…

-My 4-year old son asked me in the car the other day “Dad what would happen if you ran over a ninja?” How the hell do I respond to that?

-There is a great need for a sarcasm font.

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And an amusing little picture for those so inclined – a parody if you will of myspace and facebook done quite nicely:

Thyspace

Cheers!