Recap! (And this may get long!)

Considering this god awfully long tag of mine wont be done before the end of this year, I might as well do the traditional year end recap post right now.. So. 2014. Wow holy fuck its almost over. When did THAT happen?! :/ This year was filled with all kinds of ups and downs, but like always, lots of learning happened. 

You always have a choice, when you’re letting others make the call for you, you are CHOOSING to let them take control. 

I have never really talked about this publicly before, because I want to avoid drama, but after 3+ years of working in the animal welfare community, it finally came to a point where I threw my hands up in the air and said fuck this shit. This community is filled with the craziest, bitchiest… plain weirdest people I have ever known, and what bugged me the most was their refusal to listen to someone younger than them (read, me). Inflated egos, disorganization and politics - its all there. Like any other non profit sector I suppose, but this was just… unreal. I kept trying to not let it affect me, but full disclosure, it did. Badly. I do not like being hated for no reason (its not even the jealous-hate or the hate-your-guts-hate… its the I-truly-think-you-are-evil-hate!). My personal life which includes my friends, my guy.. is NOT available for flippant discussion. It made me irritable, upset and always so anxious. I don’t like feeling that way, because I LOVE being happy and witty, spread joy and confetti all around… I’m that kind of a sing and dance person. So in totality, life sucked.   

So I quit. And just to be clear, I quit the community, not my work. How can I ever abandon the responsibility of helping an animal in need? If I have motherly feelings for anything, its the fur babies.. and quite obviously, I can get fiercely protective about all of them. :)

Growing apart is sometimes a natural course of growing up. Accept it and move on. 

This epiphany happened this year. Something I had felt bitterly upset about for years now - growing distance between me and close friends / family, I have known for more than a couple of decades. I kept trying to find… reasons, why it happened or why it was happening, until randomly one July day I realized that there is no reason. We all just grew up, and we are all very different people. I am glad that despite people drifting away, I still have some besties who have stepped in to fill the shoes… and life is okay. Nothing major broke, everything works fine, distance grew but bonds haven’t been completely severed… they are just there. Keep calm and move on. 

Every once in a while, get away from everyone. Switch off the internet, TV, phone. Disappear. Feels fucking brilliant. 

I did this for two months earlier in the year, albeit for a study break (I did not do very well lol turns out I am… less smart than what I used to be with Math :P ). I ACTUALLY went off Facebook, people emailed to ask me WTF happened? Awww. :) Two whole months, it was awesome. I came back with the hugely appreciated ‘Minions, I am back. :D’ status and life got back to crazy haha. 

Even the most confident people have their moments of weaknesses. Sometimes you need your friends to be strong on your behalf. 

When I made the decision to quit, I was suddenly engulfed with this feeling of not knowing what to do next. I doubted EVERYTHING about myself, simply because I had been in the company of people who constantly put me down for so long. I have NEVER doubted myself - I was always confident in my abilities, and I knew exactly the kind of things I was good at, the kind of things I was okay at and the things I absolutely sucked at. It was always very clear. I had my life planned out, because I am that person who makes lists and thinks of 5 years into the future… and then suddenly one fine day, I woke up and I didn’t know who I was anymore. Cardiac-arrest scary. 

What do I do next? I wallow in self pity for a long time before Best Friend #1 calls me out on my irritated-ness and general bitchy attitude and we end up having a heart to heart where we practically break down all the problems to find solutions. Then Best Friend #2 tells me about how she believes in me, and how she tackled things when she was going through something similar. Then Best Friend #3 who didn’t really have much advice to offer, simply sent me a stream of jokes and made references to our situational jokes to lift spirits. And so on. I feel like the luckiest idiot in the world to have these people care for me so much. I love you all itna saara. <3 p="">

Take a leap of faith. Life will work out, and even if it takes longer for it to work out, its OKAY. Its a new experience. 

I had to redo resume for the first time in YEARS, and then I took up the next first fancy job I got offered. Haven’t sold my soul to the corporates back, still in the NGO sector, still changing and saving the world yo! :D I feel lucky to be around people that really do want to save the world. :) 

Do activities with your friends. Drinking yourself to a stupor does not count as a group activity. :P

I did beginners French with the guy and friends. We had SUCH A GREAT TIME. :D Also, makes for some pretty great FB updates lol. 

Age is just a number. Or so I will have myself believe, okay? 

I am not ready to consider that I am closer to 30 than to 23 (hitherto known as the heyday year). :/ On the bright side there is no one who has met me and guessed me to be above 25, which is both a blessing and curse, because on one hand, yay you think I look like a fresher, how cute, and on the other hand, aye! take me seriously, technically I am your boss! :P

Make time for doing what you like in life, and happiness will follow.   

Truly the biggest lesson of em’ all. Every time I have made time to do something that made me feel good, I have slept better, felt better, behaved better… just generally being a ray of sunshine for everyone around me. Such a happy thing to be no? 

TV shows with the best soundtracks, are my absolute bane. Wait, make that TV shows in general.

I am such a TV show whore, its not even funny! …. :/ I am OBSESSED, someone needs to compel me to forget how to erm.. get these shows in the first place. (TVD reference haha, and no you may not judge me for watching this inane show, because Ian Somerhalder okay?). This may also be the reason why I do not read, write, have much of a life outside of my TV and my HDDs anymore. Ugh. 

Much love,

Annie. 

P.S.: There were obviously a lot more learnings, but in the interest of time, reader sanity and dying laptop battery… :D

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Now Playing: Unbreakable | Jamie Scott

Quirks (some)

Honestly, I could not get a decent word for 'Q', and then halfway through a LOTR post on 'Quest', I wrote 'quirk' and that was it.

Quirk #1: Unless, I am absolutely satisfied with it, I will never publish a blog post. 

Life has been pretty hectic lately. My sleep schedule is all fucked up, thanks to a new job that is the farthest away from home I've had to travel (including the time in college!), so I leave home at the odd hour of 8.00AM. Seriously, I've spent the last 5 years of my work life, waking up at 10.00... so this was hard to do. Thankfully, I manage to get home at a decent hour, so I have been OD-ing on some pretty good TV series.

Quirk #2: I cannot do the watch-one-episode-a-week thing with TV series. I have been known to watch entire seasons back to back, not knowing what to do with my life anymore once it has all ended.

Also, a couple of weeks ago, I was out grocery shopping (ugh, so... domestic), and I happened to notice the absolute bane of my existence sitting pretty in a display window. I went in and got ...5 pairs. And then came home and started a new series.

New Series: The fascinating Californication, which I religiously avoided all these years because someone told me a long time ago, I should totally watch it, because I will understand Hank in a heartbeat. Which obviously, I did. Sigh. 
Bane of my existence: SOCKS! I am a sock whore. Period. I mean look at that pair, thats my new favorite one. Isn't that yellow adorable?!

Quirk #3: I must wear socks, all the freaking time. I would attribute the lack of any kind of scarring on my feet, thanks to this quirk. 

Someone on my TL shared about the FRIENDS movie. Come on people, just Google things up when in doubt. Clearly a hoax. But FRIENDS. Its comfort series, just like comfort blanky or comfort food.

Quirk #4: I can recollect every dialogue, from every scene, every gag reel, from every single FRIENDS episode.  

Speaking of FRIENDS, I do believe I have the best ones ever. India is being a huge dick, and has banned my favorite FB page - God - so I was pretty annoyed and disgruntled most of today evening. I started a thread about #ManCandyMonday because really, hot men with hot abs and hotter smiles are my morphine to the idiocy that is the human race. However, friends decided to throw in this -

*Khokla - Marathi for coughing/wheezing :P 

I was laughing so hard, I was wheezing for breath. Think I can go to sleep smiling, as opposed to angry out of mind as I was 3 hours ago.

Quirk #5: Its not very difficult for my best friends to take my mind of tough times. Its only lately that I have truly come to realize the value of having someone like that in your life, because most people don't.


Much Love,
Annie.
P.S.: I think I will do a whole rant on how it sucks to be Indian right now, sometime later.
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Now Playing: Breathe Me | Sia

Pearl Jam

It's public knowledge how Pearl Jam is one of my very favorite bands. I have worshipped them ever since I heard the second track by them (the first did not catch my fancy too much).. and will continue to do so forever.  

Future Days 

One of their newest tracks. Now I am not too fond of it per say, because it is not the vintage Pearl Jam, its a bit too… soft? But. It featured on the HIMYM season finale, and some other show, and I was hooked. It reminds me of Ted & Tracy and all the happiness I had imagined for them… until.. argh!!!^&%*&!@# HIMYM rant for another day.

Black

Back in college, I had saved up what was a small fortune for me then, to buy a new mp3 player as a birthday gift for the boyfriend. I ended up using it more than he did haha! He put his music collection on it, and this was one of the songs - I have been hooked ever since.

Yellow Ledbetter

Many people do not recognize this song as the soundtrack to which Rachael chooses to get on the plane, after Ross tries to get her to stay, in the FRIENDS series finale. This song reminds me of that exact kind of sadness that transcends tears and heartaches and just leaves a hollow ache you do not know what to do with, in its wake.

Nothingman

I was unaware of this hugely underrated PJ song, until the aforementioned boyfriend passed me this video from Californication, of Hank reading a letter he had written for Karen. You have to see the video (above) to have your heart broken a little bit. Go on, give it a try.

Alive

This is my favorite Pearl Jam song. That guitar riff, its brilliance. I will never tire of it in this lifetime.

Annie.

P.S.: The first song that I heard of theirs which did not really wow me, was clearly the most overplayed, overrated Last Kiss. I've never been too fond of it, but considering every band in every college show HAD to butcher it.. it came to a point that I stopped liking it altogether. 

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Now Playing: Losing Your Memory | Ryan Star

Obituary

He was like smoke. 

Every once in a while, you'd think you could see him clearly enough to reach out and touch. He had a way with strings and words you know? He would balance his Fender on his knee and strum something ever so quietly. He would play for us sometimes. And when he was in the mood, he would sing too, in that beautiful deep voice. For a moment there, you'd think you could see him for the person he was, through all that obscurity. Just a blink, a heartbeat - you'd reach out, and he was gone. We all stayed there on the sidelines, strangers to him and his mysterious life. 

New List

Less than 4 months away from turning 27 (wow, when did that happen?!), I am far from “young” and since it is no secret I am an obsessive list-maker, its time I finally got started on my 30 before 30. There is not a shred of doubt that its been one hell of a trip so far. I loved my 25 before 25, and my 26 before 26 wasn't too bad either - the guy calls it my “boast list”, which I think is fairly accurate! What can I possibly put on my new list? 

I am in the middle of planning something SO exciting that it makes me weep with happiness just to think about it. So knowing fully well that at least one major item (and a few minor ones too!) of this brand new list is going to be crossed off soon, here is my new - and ridiculously ambitious too, for I will have to discover a treasure and/or trade a kidney for some of these things! - life list. 

1. Go bungee jumping or sky diving. Heights are strange - half of me is pee-in-your-pants terrified, and the other half wants to scream with joy at the adrenaline. This should be… interesting. 
2. Take a foreign language class. I have been putting this off since I was 22. FIVE years is a long time to procrastinate!
3. Visit New York. I have been such a fan since FRIENDS, I cannot wait to actually be there, overrated as it may be. 
4. Visit Paris. This beats NY, so thats saying something. When most people say Paris, they think of the Eiffel Tower or the Seine, but for someone who worships F. Scott Fitzgerald, Hemingway and Camus, Paris is a whole new level of special for me. :) 
5. Attend a concert / music festival. I have come close to doing this twice before, both times in college, and the opportunities have just vanished post college. I need to do this pronto before I actually get too old for such things! :/
6. Attend a comic con. And meet Jared Padalecki, Jenson Ackles, Misha Collins & totally freak the fuck out during the photo op.
7. Have enough savings to actually start generating interest on them. Seriously, its high time. Being in actual debt, can make a person truly understand the meaning of a penny saved.. 
8. Go on a road trip. Live out of a car, drive endlessly, eat at diners and pick up lots of postcards. Whats not to love?
9. Take a dance class. Any dance class. I have been meaning to do this since I was 15 (since everyone went nuts about Shaimak’s Summer Funk, which sadly I could not afford!)
10. Sell something that I made. I have been making things for friends for years. Time to bring out my crafting things just to strike this off, if for nothing else. My 64-color-set of Copic Markers need using. 
11. Get a new tattoo. Time to stop whining that my tattoo artist moved away, me thinks! 
12. Do the Leh - Ladakh trip. Yet again, one of the few things I did not do on 25 before 25, so planned to do it before 26, but then the cloudburst happened and my plans (and tickets) went for a toss..  :(
13. Make new friends. I want to be my 15 year old self again, who made & kept friends so easily.
14. Throw a self-made cupcakes party. Love cupcakes, hate cooking, love throwing parties, again, did I mention, hate cooking. Must find a balance with this one. Strangely, I really enjoy cleaning. Weird right?
15. Do ANY Project 365. Tried once before, did not make it past day 43? :P This is much more difficult than it appears, so I think I will have to get creative about this one.  
16. Read 52 books in 52 weeks (or more) from my reading list. I think I’ve read most iconic books of all time, but there is still a ton to read, many of which are just sitting by themselves on my shelf. This is a book per week challenge that I am looking forward to starting anytime now.
17. Design & code my own blog. I have designed many websites, and separately coded a few too (front end things, nothing too major, except my first project). This has been a dream project for too long, simply because the geeky me really really loves these two things thrown in together!
18. Go on a trek / camp under the stars. I am a city girl through and through, even though I do enjoy the great outdoors.. from a distance. Mostly, because having a clean washroom around is a mandatory condition on which I travel. I have never trekked in my life (I realize that reflects very poorly on me..), though I have always wanted to.. 
19. Character dress up. Maybe a Halloween party or Comic Con. Sadly theme parties and/or costume shops are so hard to come by in Mumbai. :( 
20. Go watch a Broadway musical / ballet. I have seen too many Broadway / ballet performances online, and have always being left mesmerized. Imagining what it would sound like in real life gives me goosebumps. Cannot wait for this one. 
21. Either start painting again or give away goodies to nieces & nephews (or people who actually paint!). I have not touched a paint brush in about three years now, and I refuse to part with all my lovelies. Result? My brushes, my easel and my beautiful messy palette gather dust under the bed. De-clutter. 
22. Be absolutely happy & satisfied, career-wise. I had a great career start, and seen a bunch of ups and downs since then. The quest for the "one" has been on for a while now. Sincerely hope I get this part right by the time this list is done. 
23. Visit a Wonder of the World. I have never even seen the Taj! Quelle honte!! :(  
24. Learn to whip up 5 different cocktails. While both the guy & I exclusively prefer Glendfiddich or Merlot, every once in a while I enjoy a nice cocktail. It all started with the Black Russian at TGIF about… seven(?) years ago, and it has been something of a tradition ever since. I want to learn how to mix em’ all up like a pro at home now! 
25. Study abroad. This has probably been one of my oldest dreams. Screwed up my chances the two times I came close to accomplishing this earlier.. thankfully life worked out okay. I am trying once again now, third time lucky hopefully eh?  
26. Finish our photo wall. Renovations done, amazing colored wall ready, all that remains are the pictures. Between the two of us, we have about 5 TB of pics. Joy.  
27. Pay it forward for someone. Just to see what it feels like. :)
28. Teach again. Teaching was my first job. Giving it up was very tough, but I did it anyway…. but I have always wanted to do it again. Someday... someday.  
29. Forgive. It is so much harder to close the door on a friendship than a romance or a family. A friend is supposed to be your family and your soulmate all rolled into in. Maybe, its time bygones were bygones? I dont know. This will need some soul searching..  
30. End my 29th year in style. Taking a page out of my 25-before-25, bringing in my 25th was pretty fucking amazing, so this calls for a repeat. :) 

Annie.

P.S.: Browsing through other 30 before 30 lists is making me chuckle, because.. well, been there done that. "Kiss in the rain" seems to be a popular choice. Wow. Crossing that off with flourish (and raging hormones) at 19, I thought it was more of a broke-college student with hot new boyfriend/girlfriend goal... :P

P.P.S.: I fully expect this tag that I started in APRIL, to take the entire remainder of the year to actually finish. :/ 

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Now Playing : Back Where I Was | The Hereafter (OST Grey's Anatomy)

Miscellaneous Things ..

... I do when I am procrastinating. Like right now.

• Stare into nothingness (I do this. A lot. #weirdoalert)
• Excessively cuddle the boys. Case in point - 

Dusk's "HELP MOMS GONE ROGUE AGAIN" expression 

• Write silly things.
• Make lists. 
• Watch a new series. Ended up watching TVD season 1 - season 5 in two weeks. Please do not judge me, I was undergoing serious TV series withdrawal because I had nothing to watch, and also, Ian Somerhalder is fucking beautiful. (Needless to mention, he gets a million addition likes for the fact that he is an animal activist and has an adorable Scotch-lookalike boy called Moke. Aww raised to infinity yes?)

So. Hot. 

• Remind self that hot men will come and go, but Jensen Ackles' eyes will be greener than ever & he will always be the original A-bomb. 

Mm. 

• Re-watch old TV series. Ahem-Supernatural-Ahem. 
• Get a sudden spurt of creativity. Get crafting.
• Browse through college pictures and get nostalgic. 
• Invent scenarios about possible futures.
• Wikipedia random shit. 
• God help me if I get on Listverse....
• Eat like a crazy person. Does binge eating have a nice-sounding disorderly name?
• Read depressing news, watch depressing things, despair about the worthlessness of life (I am not kidding, if I get on the bad side of the internet, especially where puppies are dying, I cry. For hours..)
• Read amazing news, watch inspirational videos, get freakishly happy about the prospect of being alive (If I get on the good side of the internet, I end up creating something beautiful. Usually a happy list or art..)
• Clean the house like it is Diwali. It's not my fault, its my mothers genes.
• Get an insane desire to call people I haven't spoken to in a while
• Spend resultant next couple of days doing planned lunches, dinners, movies and unplanned hangovers 
• Take a long bath. How this helps is beyond me. 
• Secretly drink wine & smoke up while taking said bath.
• Despair about how so much time has got wasted and now I do not have enough left to do the work I was supposed to.

Annie. 

P.S.: My mother once told me how if I would apply as much grey matter to studies as I did for things that had zero value in life, I would become really famous and earn a shit load of money. She lost me at studies.

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Now Playing: Broken (acoustic) | Lifehouse

Love - Part 3

[Part 1 here]
[Part 2 here]

How do we know that "the one" is, the one? Frankly, isn't it all too much pressure? Being a missing piece of a puzzle, magic and stars, confetti in the air et al. I do not believe in "the one". Atleast not in the romantic sense, no. I do believe in having a soulmate. Or many of em' idiots, if you are anything like me. Every single one of those soul sisters / brothers / friends / friends with benefits / ex's / that virtual entity you have never met, but felt a connection to. I truly believe in the magic of finding your own people - ones you can be completely insane & also uncharacteristically sane with.

- -

I was sitting at work, a wee bit tensed about a big presentation I was supposed to make. Ironically, it was supposed to be a "fun" presentation. In the middle of the day, I heard a guy coming out a cabin directly behind me say loud enough for me to hear ".... Nadal is the best thing that's happening in tennis right now!" Before I could stop myself (dammit woman!) I turned in my chair, to face this complete stranger, and add in what I think was a slightly annoyed voice, "Please! Nadal will never be Federer."

[Pretty much everyone knows this story, thanks to it being in my wedding card. No kidding, check this. We are awesome like that. Its pretty much the short version of how we got together. Continuing further, is the long version.]

I got back to my work, desperate to finish it within time because I did NOT want to stay back late that day. Earlier that day, this other guy I had been hanging out with over the last few months, had had flowers delivered to the office. Seriously. This was 2011 and I was getting flowers delivered for me. I was fucking thrilled. Said guy had formally "asked" me out for dinner that night, and I intended on not carrying my work with me when I met him. After all, this was the first time I was officially going to go out with someone in a long fucking time.

Know how sitcoms and well meaning books and magazines say, that before you find the "one", you have that one last romance that is a total and utter disaster? Yep. This was the one. Little is to be said about aforementioned romance, because it fizzled out soon. It was my second proper relationship, and at the end of it, I was.... really angry! I was so angry that sadness did not kick in for one second, before I wanted to throw something heavy around and break things. Which I think I did. Like what the fuck is wrong with the damn universe?! I was so done with rom-coms, and flowers (cringe), and chocolates and shit. So. Done.

So for a brief few days, I was no heels all sneakers, hair pulled up, barking into faces, getting more work done than ever workaholic. Did not take long for Nutties (tennis guy, for people who haven't yet caught the drift) to ask me over messenger why I looked like I was on a warpath, I said, and I quote, "Look, I am crazy. I have deep emotional baggage, I apparently drive the men in my life to near madness. I am so DONE with intense relationships, from now on, I declare that I am staying clear off men until I am like 30!"

About 10 months later? Engaged! Another 6 months hence? MARRIED. So much for sweeping declarations, right Marshall*? :P

*what up smooth HIMYM reference!

~

I have often been asked, why did I marry so young? I have always been told that I am by far the most-likely-to-try-comething-crazy, superbly impulsive, decidedly anti-family and annoyingly bratty wild child. After my previous trysts with romance, I was never too keen on commitment and all that jazz. So why now? Why so soon? Why this guy? What happens next? Why do we seem so perfect? (lol!)

We are not perfect people. Ours is NOT a perfect romance. We both are just so astonishingly different, that sometimes I wonder if this is what makes this work. We have many flaws, and there have been days when we simply cannot stand each other. But then it hits you. Remember all of your flaws that you were left to face all alone once the love of your life walked away? All those flaws that made you desperately wish you could have a do-over? A different kind of life? A whole new universe where none of the horrible things you have gone through that have ended up shaping you, never happened? Your flaws are no longer getting the better of you ... because this guy is with you through it all. This is not just a boyfriend, this is a guy that is so above the rest, that the others before him appear so ridiculously incompetent now. This guy is not just some random dude you are shacking up with, this guy splits the bills, cuddles the cats, watches the matches WITH you. This dude is the real deal. He is, your person.

Anyone who says marriage is easy, is probably not having enough fun. :P Okay kidding. Mine isn't easy. But through it all, here is this guy who has been my rock though so much, that I am an entirely new person. My best friend told me a while ago, that it looked like I had matured overnight. I laughed and said it was the side effect of being in major debt. :P (Buying a house is shit. Don't do it. Live off rent forever.) But its true.

We dance in hallways in the middle of the night. We crack lame jokes and watch sappy TV shows on Sundays in our jammies and eat left over fish curry until we pass out from bliss. We plan trips, we get drunk, ahem-high-cough with friends and party on like we are 16. We bicker like an old married couple of silly things like the laundry or his gazillion socks lying around the home that I like kept neat and tidy. We photograph together, late movies is our thing. He watches his matches and I write. We cuddle with the boys. On some nights, we act like a bunch of kids on a sleepover and talk about utterly random things in the darkness, ranging from religion to parallel universes. This is literally as good as it gets yes?

Nutties has done many amazing things for me - ranging from something simple like flowers to something so symbolic like holding me in the middle of the night, while I was having a mother of all meltdowns, sobbing like an idiot about how life is not working out for me (which it totally is, but I overthink everything!).. and telling me that no matter what, he will always, always, have my back.

In some ways, this moment perfectly describes us, so in conclusion, I leave you with this.

~ Annie.

P.S.: In short, I should be a case study for marrying ridiculously young, and doing it right. :)

P.S.S.: I have way too many people on my FB so I am not too worried about my name out here. If you are going to add me, do drop a message so I know who you are :P
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Now Playing: Never Let Me Go | Florence & The Machine

Love - Part 2

[Part 1 here.]

Engineering college. The time for epic love. 

Beginning of second year, cupid properly struck me with one of those damned arrows. I met and fell in love (the at first sight kind) with this amazing guy, not from my class, and by the end of college, we were one of the most well known couples in college. After many ups and downs, snogging ensued over out-of-city class trips from Goa to Shimla, through many valentines, traditional days, sports festivals, cultural festivals, one very eventful scavenger hunt, a hundred plus public displays of... rage :P (back in the day when I had serious anger management issues), making up over cheese omelettes and Iranian tea here (Best. Irani. Cafe. Ever.) .... by beginning of my last sem, my very first relationship had crashed and burned to the ground.

You know how they say that intense love has the capability to change you? Well it changed me. I was nothing like the person I was when I joined college by the time it ended. To be fair, it had a lot to do with the miserable time I was having in college (18-22 was probably the most difficult time I've had in my life). Out went the happy go lucky, carefree, ability to laugh at myself and in came the deeply cynical, sort of pathetic and doubt-ridden me. At the end of it all, my first relationship had stripped me down to my very core. When it ended, I couldn't breathe, because there are nothing happy and sunshine-y for me to hang on to. For the first time, I was faced with the prospect of examining every wrong call, every mistake, every hole in my life. It was hard getting to know me, and it was harder because no one told me how to climb out of the hole I had dug myself into, when the break up happened, and I was left dealing with this mess I'd created on my own. 

~

In the story of my life's greatest fuck ups, the year 2009 should be given an award. In the summer of 2009, I was churning out sad, cough-poorly-written-cough blog posts like nobody's business. On some of those very first mopey blog posts, landed the people who would end up shaping the rest of the year & a large part of 2010 for me. One of those first people was a guy, who was living away from home, seemed really nice to talk to and had a great taste in music. We started talking, and before I knew it, we were talking all the freaking time. This was before, the guy became Blogger celebrity and every single female blogger wanted to be his "friend". :D

Needless to say, this was a rebound. I was extremely lonely, and I had managed to push every single friend away by giving them all sorts of excuses. I spent all my time in this virtual world, and ended up depending more and more on this guy for some much needed humor and comfort. Within no time (and a huge telephone bill, ahem, this was ISD calling), I was pretty attached to this guy, who I was slowly considering to be one of my closest friends. I never told him anything, because I figured it was just a phase that was going to fade away, and I valued him too much as a friend.

Sometime soon after, I found out that this guy was in fact interested in this awesome girl on Blogger (who, funny story, ended up being great friends with me, and it all started with hate mail I believe hahahahhahahha... you know who you are, wink wink), that essentially put a stop to any feelings I had. Obviously it took some time for it to wind back down. It helped that I had just started working, so I was swamped with work and enjoying every minute of my new found freedom, making actual money :P ... and I was slowly reconnecting with my friends again.

Then before I knew it, this guy, this really nice witty humorous person.... changed into this completely different guy I did not know anymore. I do not know if it was all the internet fame or what... I figured it was probably best to let the drifting away happen, so our talks pretty much boiled down to music and maybe catching up once in a while. Then out of the blue, one fine day, out of nowhere, this person ends up humiliating me by calling me a variety of things. Here I am, minding my own business, listening to songs, talking about work.... and then suddenly... BAM!!! a whole barrage of abuses. It really really hurt me to hear those things, coming from a friend! It crushed me to hear this person say all these things about me, because I am almost ashamed to admit this, I DO NOT know the appropriate way to respond to meanness! I have never been mean to anyone in my life -  like the bitchy, mean just for the heck of being mean, mean because I am having a bad day so I will take it out on someone, kind of mean. (okay I did once joined in the laughter when the entire class was making fun of this girl in 6th grade, but I felt so guilty later that I went up to her and made lame jokes to make her laugh.... yes I am THAT nerd girl ugh) It sucked that I was being told all these horrible, judgmental things... from someone who had never even MET me!

That day, I shut down everything and seriously contemplated deleting the blog and everything else. I felt like all of my online presence was this disgusting thing that I wanted to get rid of... icky cooties! :P I was ashamed that at 23, I had acted like I was 10 and blindly trusted someone, and set myself up for this kind of hurt. I did NOT need this reminder that I am not "strong", considering some jerk from behind a computer screen could actually make me dissolve into tears & hyperventilation like that. I honestly believed then that everyone online was as fake as he had turned out to be.

Obviously, I am thankful I didn't go through with my grand plan. :)

Because eventually, I realized that this jerk was no reason to say good bye to everything I had actually gained here on Blogger. There are so many things that would not have happened, had I actually thought of turning away from everyone I had already met / was yet to meet. Those people who showed up on my birthday with a printout of an email, with a chocolate cake in tow, and random yelling over the phone most of which constituted "OMGOMGOMGOMG". Those people who I have spent hours talking to, and nothing changed when I actually met them in person (maybe we put the crazy a notch higher, by sitting on roofs of houses and scaring the shit out of random people at 3AM). People who showed up unexpected in the middle of the night at home (yes that has happened, the joys of living in your own home also come with unexpected arrivals at bizarre times), because a friend is needed, and I always have alcohol. :P Someone who gave me a shiny TIARA for my birthday and walked around the mall with a styrofoam sword with 'Hermione Granger is awesome' written on it, because just, we are crazy like that. The same someone who I suppose is responsible for making me pursue a serious relationship with the man I would eventually marry (A, this sound familiar? "Aw come on you so totally have the hots for him!!!" "WHAT?! NO!" "Yes you do. You are texting him now aren't you?" "WHAT?! NO! YES! I hate you!" you totally reverse psycholog-ied me you smartass!) People who showed up for my wedding, like one giant Bloggers meet :P People who helped my friends get ready for the temple wedding, and some others who explained why waiting for spoons or forks was useless. People who I helped shop for their weddings a day before the event, and ended up being treated just like family at their special day. I am so kicked that pretty much half of my very best friends are people I've met online, and when online best friends met real life best friends, whether its a wedding or playing a board game at my home.... it is always LEGENDARY! The awesome times we all have had, driving random people on Facebook NUTS with our antics! I am grinning like an idiot just thinking about things I cannot mention in here because of ... er.. reasons... :P

One bad experience vs a whole new family of awesome people is a pretty fair deal huh? :)

Love,
Annie.
P.S.: I love you guys so much, I will totally dedicate the book I will eventually publish to you all. :P
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Now Playing: Mahi Ve | Faakir (SUCH an old song.... what the hell happened to Pakistani pop?!)

Love - Part 1

(I am continuing the tag that I abandoned a month and a half ago.... because 1. I ALWAYS get creative when I am required to focus on something more important, namely studying. 2. I would like to stress that I am anything BUT a quitter. So yea. And this is long, you have been warned. Also, some of these scenes are so dream like and surreal, I am thrilled that it actually happened to me! My friends at the time revered me for how my "perfect" life was unfolding... hahahah!)

Cliched. Love? Really thats the best you can come up with Annie? But considering my teenage and young adult life has been one heck of a roller coaster, I think a full disclosure is due. Mostly because it is healthy for a future 50 and probably boring me to read someday about the 20-something did-you-really-fucking-do-that?! me. 

I was in the 6th grade when I saw the person that is currently still the longest relationship(?) of my life. I had a tiff with a guy from my class (per usual), and was waiting after the home bell to go give him a piece of my mind. So I stomped over to his bus (no. was 17, jesus I have some memory), and demanded that a certain Mr. Rai come meet me. In a couple of seconds I was left stuttering like an idiot,  because instead of Mr. Junior Rai.. Mr. One-Year-Senior Rai came over curiously to see me. 

I kid you people not, this guy firstly... wore pants. (We had half pants till 6th, 7th onwards full pants.. :P). He was an Adonis to my just-turned-teen eyes. He had a voice that had cracked (read, husky as hell), and behind geeky glasses, he had smoldering eyes. I recognised him later as the guy who headed the athletics team. More on that er...fetish later. In short, I was smitten. I was a smitten kitten. ALL THE WAY TILL END OF SCHOOL. This crush on a guy who did not know I existed (because I fled the aforementioned scene in a matter of minutes without saying anything..... faceslap?) lasted a whole FOUR years till end of school (was I lame or was I lame?!).  

~

Moving over. I realised I had a type. Has to be tall (which is funny considering I am myself really short!). Has to play some sort of sport / has to be athletic. (again funny considering I was anything but. I am lazy as lazy can be.) Has to have a great voice. 

All through my school life, my celebrity crush included exclusively this guy.

Tom Cruise, in Top Gun. Remember this, he forms the basis of two VERY dramatic scenes of my life. 

DRAMATIC SCENE 1: 

Since this has already been explained in much detail (and my tendency for SMS language English) previously on the blog archives, I'll just cut it short. 

Summer vacations between 11th & 12th grade, I visited my brother who was living in Hyderabad at that time. I was 17, and yet, again in one of those crazy moments, had decided to take a train journey ALONE. On the train, in true Jab We Met style (I shit you not, I swear the moment the movie came out, my best friends called me and said dude did you sell your life script?!), I met a gorgeous, shy, did I mention ridiculously good looking, sweet guy travelling to Secunderabad. He was 23, AND A PILOT IN THE IAF! Apparently he was supposed to be one of the 6 best (news article was not out yet, came out in May endish). While I was skeptical on the train, the pictures he later sent on email of him standing next to his red-silver jet (holy fuck!!) in full army uniform (OMGOMGOMG) proved otherwise. Tall, nice voice, sporty? Check, check, and a Sukhoi-30 HELL YES.

Anyway, on the train stayed up all night talking. About Top Gun (hehe), aviation, books, life, crushes, careers, families. He was supposed to get off before me, but instead stayed in because I was getting off at last stop. :) Parted ways on the platform and never stayed in touch. Life was crazy. Got too busy with studies. Put him out of my mind when I returned to Mumbai, because lets face it. Fighter pilot and 12th standard super chatty college students aren't exactly the stuff fairytales are made up of. Sigh.

After recounting this story for engineering friends on one of our last college night outs, and after realising what a HUGE mistake it had been to not stay in touch, we did the stalker bit trying to find him on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Plus. Bingo on LinkedIn but dead profile. So yep. That news article of him winning the trophy from May 2005 TOI, remains the only link to him. Sweet nostalgia. 

~

DRAMATIC SCENE 2: 

For the 1st floor balcony of my junior college in 12th grade, I spied a guy walking casually across the volleyball court (my college was famous for its state level volleyball team). He looked JUST LIKE TOM CRUISE. I am not even kidding you. If it weren't for the fact that guy in question probably hates me right now, I would have uploaded his picture. Available on request on email? :P 

So what do I do about my blossoming crush? After a royally bombed Physics-1 exam, I handed in my paper 30 minutes before the bell rang, and stepped out into an empty corridor. Something you need to know about my college - we had a circular landing and a spiral staircase leading up. I walked into the empty landing, and saw the current real-life heart throb leaning casually against the railing on the opposite site. This was going to one of my trademark-Annie crazy moments... wherein well, I do something crazy. To this day, I haven't figured out why I did what I did next. 

I walk up to this male body of perfection, and say, 'Hi!'. He looks a little taken aback, and says, '...Er. Hi?' Obviously still under my crazy spell, I ask him his name (at that point, obviously, like all teenage college girls with a crush, I knew everything publicly available to know about him. Including his name.) He smiles, flashing pearly whites that would make K (my dentist best friend) swoon, and introduces himself. The exam final bell rings. He asks for my name. I reply. Then I say, "You know... you look like Tom Cruise. I think you look really cute!!" People start filing into the landing. AND THEN I FLEE THE SCENE. (seems to a recurring theme huh? I actually turn on my heel and walk away without saying anything... I suppose it has a humor factor to it, but god was I nuts or what?!)

My friends come join me, and hysterically laughing at myself with my friends joining in (something I did often back then! I was always the clown of the group, thus never really taking life's many disappointments very seriously... man life was good.) - I tell them the hilarious and embarrassing tale of my flight. We giggle a lot and make our way downstairs. There, a friend of mine joins us to ask me how my exam went (funny story, I do not actually "know" this guy. he joined us in a crowded canteen one day because there was no place to sit, and me being me chatted nonstop. Ending up making friends). He overhears the story, and asks who I was referring to. I supply the name. He says, 'Oh, C?! He's in my Bio class!' And then he excuses himself. He came running back to me in 10 minutes. 

"Here's his number. He's asked you to call him." :) Thus goes the story of how I ended up dating a hot Tom Cruise lookalike in college. :P Long story short, dated for a blissful remainder of college life. First guy to meet my mom. She loved him too much! After 12th grade prelims, I was much too ambitious for him, and so er.. I sort of dumped him. Before state exams. He did NOT take it well. Ouch. I know I acted like a horrible person! I just was very bad with my timings and a bit of a foot in my mouth kind of person.... Anyway, reconnected with him a couple of years ago when I started working, apologised sincerely.

He did not buy it. Still hates me... :P  

~

Part 2 - to be continued, with more instances of my insane tryst with the men. Including a story featuring strangers from Blogsville. :P 

Annie. 

P.S.: Dedicated to that close group of friends who has witnessed this all, and have started many a conversation with 'Remember when Annie did/said/was.....) :D

P.P.S.: Popular opinion had dictated that I look for my Pilot guy, but really guys, I did everything a stalker can over that one night out with my gal pals. NOTHING turned up. Short of knowing someone actually in the air force..... there is no way. Also, lets not forget he is probably married with twelve kids by now. Relax. Baith jaiye.

Kindness

Such a rare value these days, somedays I feel. 

I could not post on schedule last Saturday, because I was superbly hungover when I woke up and then spent the whole day trying to be, what I wanted to write about that day. Let me explain. 

On Friday morning, I received a call at 7 AM from a guy about 3 abandoned kittens, barely half a week old. I was barely awake, and honestly I have no place to put them, so I promised I will post for him & get back by afternoon. I did post for them at that ungodly hour, and surprise surprise, I received a lot of calls. When I get a call for infant kittens, the first thing I do is look for a nursing mother. Usually mother cats take on abandoned kittens, and nothing beats moms milk. If I don't then, we need to step in and become moms. It is a really really exhausting, hard and an amazingly wonderful place to be in. I nursed my last three babies and Mouse was one of them (quite obviously mom's favorite). :)

 

Anyway, so thankfully, beautiful people of Mumbai swung into action and by late afternoon I had 3 calls from people who had nursing mothers. I remembered one more person who had called me a week ago requesting help for something else, who had mentioned in passing that her cat was supposed to deliver. I decided to try my luck with her cat. On Saturday, we drove over with our little babies, and within the first ten minutes, mommy cat hugged and kissed and licked our new babies. PHEW!! :) Such a relief. We all sat there for a while just stroking Cleopatra (mommy) and cooing over how tiny & beautiful the babies were (who technically are deaf and blind and scrawny at this point... :P)

Kindness gives us so many happy endings, doesn't it? I love meeting people who are nice, polite, compassionate and go out of their way if someone in trouble really needs their help. I like kind people. I meet my fair share of jerks working the job I do, but it also puts me in touch with people who are so beautifully compassionate & kind, it fills my heart up. :) 

Annie.
P.S.: I work with an animal welfare NGO. I head corporate relations, strategy & kitten adoptions... just incase you are wondering. Animal help in Mumbai? Get in touch with me anita@worldforall.co :) 

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Now Playing: Kahaan Hoon Main | Highway 

Just BRB!

So, I totally forgot I had this post to write because this has been a nuts Friday - new kittens, old puppies, one female dog who is having the fucked up of all labor times, and 3 new born kittens who someone has separated from their mother - so far! :/

I am hosting a fundraiser tonight (people in Mumbai, feel free to join the party at IBar, Bandra).. And I have no time to sit and write a new post. And the battery on my phone is running out. And I need to make some last minute phone calls to invite some more people... :P (choosing to update blog over calling more people to the fundraiser - I give you commitment!) Hahaha.. :) 

Annie.

P.S.: If you do decide to come, give me a shout out - in the pretty slightly old thing in black ;) :P also, I'm the hostess so you can well... just ask for me. :P

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Now Playing: Bittersweet Symphony | The Verve

Idiosyncrasies

It has been fifteen years since I first saw you, and some of the memories are a little rusty around the edges. For instance, I no longer remember if it was a Wednesday or a Thursday, that day when we sat on the table in the crowded college canteen, talking way into oblivion at friends watching us with poorly masked amazement at how we seemed to have hit off with each other. Some other details seem to have disappeared entirely, like the maze like structure of the ancient institution where our summertime romance had blossomed, spilling over into the rain and the frost. I don't remember anymore if it was on the second or the third floor, where we had discovered a small nook of a corner, and stolen that quick kiss in the weeks after we had started dating. Some of the last few months of us together in the final days of college, seem to have blanked out entirely. Maybe its the age, I am getting old.   

And then somedays - maybe on late nights like today, filled with the stillness of a warm summer air, something comes back to me. In bits & pieces, but so brilliant in its self-preservation, that it stuns me that so many years have passed since then. Small details that seemed so insignificant back then. Small things you did. Small things about you. Little idiosyncrasies that you were made up of, you who made me fall so completely and shamelessly.. so helplessly in love with you. 

Remember how you skipped over every third stone in the pavement laid with those pale yellow & red, oddly shaped bricks, on the way to the train station, the first day I walked you there? I do. It was your little thing. Like writing letters. You confessed once you liked how smooth gel pens glided over paper, every time you sat to write me a new letter. And that thing with your coffee - six times anti-clockwise and then once clockwise. I never asked you what that even meant, I realise. 

I used to tease that no one ever told you how to use bookmarks. You never kept them in your books for their purpose, often much before or after the page you were reading. And I snuck a glance at you once or twice to catch you lovingly smoothening out the dog ears out of the old pages of books you really really liked... And the obsessive habit of collecting one too many books to read. The way you picked them out of old piles from pavement book stores, as if they were precious treasures, hidden away just for you to find. 

My chair creaks as I get up, shaking old memories out of my head. Heading towards the bedroom, I hear you call out from near the window, "I think I am going to make myself some coffee. Do you want some?" I look over and notice the book you just kept aside, bookmark stuck firmly in the middle. I smile. "Yes."

Annie. 

P.S.: It is amazing loving someone made of idiosyncrasies, try it sometime.  

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Now Playing: Falling Slowly | Kris Allen 

Happiness is..

A little face looking up at you with trust in its big beautiful eyes, and purring away in contentment. Knowing that you are responsible for this little baby in your hands. :)

Happiness is a wet nose kiss, and enthusiastic licking.. 

& the innocence that comes only with the excited tail wagging. 

Annie.
P.S.: Work = Happiness = Yay! :)

P.P.S.: Calvin & Hobbes strike a pretty pose for me, while Miley seems more interested in licking noses. Hehehehe. :P

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Now Playing: Boogie Shoes | KC & The Sunshine Band 

Grey's Anatomy

Really did you expect this to NOT come up on my posts? :D 

Okay let me just put it out there - I love Grey's Anatomy. I watched this show for the first time only a year and a half ago, and I watched it at a stretch season 1-8. I did not like where it was heading post that, and so I consciously went out and got a life and stopped watching it like an obsessed, deranged person. I am not kidding, I have literally (I mean it), locked myself in the bedroom, instructed the man and the cats to STAY AWAY, and have watched the episodes at a stretch, so much so that 1. I bunked work. 2. I had a severe severe headache. Yes. Crazy person alert. So if you have never watched this show, please skip this post because it will make no sense to you. :P 

Favorite Character? Every character on this show is fucking perfect. Well except the new ones. But nevertheless, everyone. Perfect. But my favorite? Easy. Meredith. 

I know.. I know. A LOT of people do not like her at all. But I am talking about Meredith, NOT Ellen. Meredith has easily been the most complex, brilliant character on the show from the beginning until around late season 7ish. I identify with her in a way I have never with any fictional character played or written. All her issues? Check, check & check. Make way for the dark & twisty. And Nutties is, as I've said before, literally the Derek to my Meredith. Which is also what makes us so perfect lol. :)

Favorite Scenes? This is obviously where I list a collection of my favorite scenes. Because obviously there cannot be just one. And to save us all the 'YES ME TOO!' I am going to skip over the usual favorites (marriages, confessions of love, proposals, etc.) and dig up some lesser known, lesser appreciated scenes.

The very first meeting. :)

The one with George's cute butt. LOL!

When Owen meets Christina for the first time.

This. To the soundtrack of Homebird, Foy Vance. I can't remember our last kiss. Needless to say, I bawled. A lot. 

Arizona talking to Callie's dad. Yes yes, I know what happens in the latest season, but damn this scene was perfect, when it happened. No disrespect, no attitude, just hey I love your daughter.

Meredith high before her surgery. "All my boyfriends are here!" :P Also, damn, Finn was perfect!

I hated Meredith's obvious rebounds with people she should have stayed far away from. And I hated how Derek is being all chill with her because he is being "friends". Like wtf is that? Stop that! And then this happens. Ouch. OUCH.

Meredith holding Cristina after Burke left. Completely being her person.

The chief apologising to Meredith. This one really broke my heart. :(

Mark Sloan meeting Meredith for the first time. And getting beaten up. Totally filmy.

Derek telling Addison that Meredith wasn't a fling. Cue few random sobs.

When this happened - And that sometimes, despite all your best choices and all your best intensions, fate wins anyway. "I miss you." ... "I can't." 

Meredith's confrontation with her mother.

Callie, just after she & George divorce. All the emotion coming out in one patients case. So brutally honest, I will be lying if I said I have not felt the same way at some point in the past.

Izzie, opening up to Sidney. That is exactly what happens when you lose someone, and there is no getting back. This is how much it sucks. 

Too many bawls happened when Denny died. :'(

That entire sequence. After it happened, noone could move Izzie from him, but Alex just comes and picks her up. Grace, Kate Havenik remains one of my all time fav songs from this show, just for how perfectly upsetting this scene is.

One of the very first scenes of the show I related with on a level that made my heart explode out of sheer pain.

"Oh you are staying with her." ... "Yeah. She's my wife."

A second later, "Dr. Shepard, she's crashing." And crash she did.... 

This was the most painful to watch. To the soundtrack of another of my all time favs. 

Today has been okay.

Knowing you love someone so much it hurts, and then knowing you cannot be with them, because the universe is fucked up and hates you. Being star crossed lovers sucks.

Owen telling Cristina that he will always love her.

I know this came at a really, really bad time. But there was no question about the honesty in his words. It took me a while in my life, personally, to know that people can make irreversible mistakes, and still be deeply in love with the person they wronged. Yes, it happens. You fuck up, and you live with it.

Mark's face when Lexie nears the end of her 'I'm infected with Mark Sloan.' speech. 

When it hits him, what she is saying, and how much she means to him too. I swear I thought, this would be a happily ever after, because obviously they both felt the same way..... This is one mistake, I will NEVER forgive Grey's for. :/ Which brings me to...

Mark & Lexie's last moments together.  I don't even want to talk about it, because yes, I actually stopped watching after that happened. I have no clue what has happened in the latest season, and I only watched season 9 midway.... fuck you Shonda. :/

Okay this will never end. So I am stopping now.

Annie.
P.S.: Time for a Grey's marathon all over again methinks.
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Now Playing: Let Myself Fall | Rosie Thomas