Devil’s Workshop

People say Monday mornings suck. I have close to a month’s experience in unpaid unemployment and I can tell you it just ain’t monday mornings that suck. Every afternoon that I wake up to sucks. It always begins with me asking myself the all important and possibly day altering question: “What should I do today?” This question is always followed by the realization that it has been a month since I did something ( Don’t start with “Its been 2 years since you did something”. At least, I got up early and traveled 40 odd kms. That is enough work for a day).  The tea arrives with a reminder: “Enough. Switch that thing off. Go back to the IT company if you want AC through the day.” If only somebody respected what we do. Hmmm. 

Time for me to go through the various options available. A lot of DVDs at home but then my CD/DVD drive doesn’t work. Try playing it on TV using the player? A complicated menu pops up on TV and no matter what I do with the remote, the cursor doesn’t move an inch. “An insult to the IT professional ” I tell myself. After around 30 minutes of meddling around, I understand that the remote doesn’t have batteries. I finally get this thing working. “Chotaa bachhaas” I tell myself, sit back, and finally the movie begins. Few minutes later, I realize that the video and the sound doesn’t synch. Well, a for-the-degree-certificate engineer can’t do much about it. What else? I feel like reading a book but don’t have one(except Statistics for management by lewin & rubin. No, Thank you.). Computer games? My computer doesn’t have the minimum requirements. At this point in time two weeks back, I came up with something: Watching random videos on youtube. Anything I could find. Even that came to an end when the phone bill reached home. 

I start getting restless. Commentary inside my head: “The World is moving fast, people are dying faster, why am I sitting so damn jobless under the hot sun? (Assume the roof on top and the house on top of that doesn’t exist ). I shouldn’t be thinking. I should be doing something. Panic isn’t the need of the hour. I must stay calm.”  Seconds turned into minutes. Before minutes turned into hours, my cell beeps. A friend of mine; the paid unemployed youth (PUY). I call back.

Moi: Hi da.

PUY: Where are you?

Moi: Home and you?

PUY: Almost home. Come to the usual place in 15 min.

Moi: Sure.

I drag myself out in the hot sun to the not so nearby teashop and order garam. For those who don’t know what it is, it is just another way to say “Hot Tea”. And for those who know “Shut Up”. After about a brief discussion on how the PUY’s day at office went ( tea, coffee, cafeteria, dorm and the likes ) I head back home. After some time I decide its been a real long time since I visited Adayar, the beach,Thiruvanmiyur,etc. So, I quickly head in that direction. Spend two or maybe three hours roaming aimlessy and then return back home.

Dinner’s on the table. It remains on the table for an hour. Random search on Orkut looking at what people who I kinda knew in school/college are upto. The same feeling comes back “I should be doing something.” Go through my video collection on computer before I hit the sack. Tommorow is almost the same except of course the remote has batteries in them.