Credit-ed

Well, I got my very first credit card not too long ago. I haven't made a payment yet, so it definitely hasn't been a month yet. I am not too comfortable with the idea of being in debt even temporarily. Call me naive, but I feel that spending money that I don't yet have is unsustainable, and hence a bad idea. You have to pay up sometime, don't you? When I was activating my card, the customer service representative almost talked me into buying employment loss protection for "just $8.99 a month", which I definitely don't need. In fact, I had no idea I was being signed up for it. It just seemed like a sales pitch till the person said; "So yes, I have just enrolled you into the programme". To which, I replied, "eh..... what?" That's my standard response when people start thinking things I haven't said (happens to me at Subway way more than you'd think possible). Note to self: come up with better surprised response. Anyway, I feel increasingly tempted to use the card as the days go by and my initial reluctance wears off. Credit now, think later. More updates as the story progresses.

In other news, my cooking has picked up somewhat after my husband's visit. The objective during the first few days was to completely mesmerize him with my culinary skills (i.e., the opposite of 'eh....what?'), after which it dropped to the much more reasonable hope of not having him remember this vacation as the 'Summer of Starvation'. I wonder what he thinks of his 45 days down in the south of.... oh wait, my location is top secret. I do think I'd make a great Hagrid, what with keeping secrets and all that. My brother and I were on a Harry Potter marathon last weekend, and the effects haven't worn off yet. Might as well stop before my thoughts start meandering even more. Goodnight!

Parenting 101

There's nothing that will teach you to be a parent faster than living with a younger sibling, whether a minor or otherwise. Because the truth is, siblings never grow up, at least not in your eyes. Where everyone else sees a 5'10" 21 year old man, I see a 4 year old, with a shy smile, who needs me to hold his hand while crossing the road, and loves bedtime stories.

Sharing an apartment with my brother for a little less than a month has made me realize that this 'kid' has long ago stopped throwing tantrums, saying cute things almost on cue and is also too big to be carrying around (yeah, I am a little slow sometimes). Being in college for the past 8 years (wow!), I've missed this little guy's transition into adulthood almost completely.

Now, having to do all the cleaning, cooking, ironing and clearing up, I do feel like a mom. Also, I begin to appreciate the effort that my Mom had to make when we were kids. Between telling my brother to get off the computer, helping him plan coursework, trying to think of new dishes to make, arranging stuff around the house and doing grocery shopping, while balancing regular lab work during the week, I have little or no time left to waste on the internet and generally laze around. This, more than anything else, is what will prepare me for managing my own future family.

However, in spite of all the extra work and responsibility, I am very, very thankful to have a family member in such close proximity. Oh, I almost forgot to mention the one childhood quality he still hasn't lost (and this is very important): the ability to laugh at all my jokes, however poor they may be. God bless little brothers and their capacity to care.

March Madness

I love how they call it that. Like, yeah, let's get mad about the college sports season; and forget about other stuff. Not literally, of course. That would be disastrous. Like forgetting to send results to your professor for review. I tend to take the literal meaning of acronyms like A.S.A.P. Yeah, when you say it like that, it sounds like something you want done Right Now. But if you expand it, it means, do it as soon as possible. See how much more relaxed that sounds? Maybe that's why people use it like a word in conversation these days: I want that report Ayesap.

Knowing how these things work, I can now say (to no one in particular, because I'm a very lonely person) that I want my next vacation to come asap. I miss home-cooked meals. I live in a home and can (ahem) cook, but it's just not the same. Home-cooked meals are meals you want to eat, not tomatoes floating in slightly spicy water and overcooked rice. I hope my one and only reader won't be put off by this. All I can say is: you brought this on yourself. You should have considered the consequences of eventually living with me when you signed that paper. [Now, in case I am wrong and more than one person reads this blog for whatever reason, just ignore that last line].

I tried playing stick tennis today. I have played tennis on a PS3 before, so having my ass handed to me is not a new experience. I try not to let that happen in real life, with a reasonably high success rate. It was infuriating to be on the receiving end of 4 aces in a row. I mean who does that automaton think he is? Ivo Karlovic? I wonder if he knows it's illegal to even drive a car at 251 km/h. I meant Karlovic, not the computer. The computer really doesn't need that kind of fire-power to outclass me- yet. I can never give up on lost causes. I have a feeling I'll be playing a lot more of that game in the coming weeks. Till I get a game. Maybe even a set. So watch out for me, computer man.

Pooky Speaks (Again)

Looks like I haven't written in the past 3 months. Well, that's what happens when I finally have other things to do in life. And this last statement, dear reader, should be the text-book definition of wishful thinking. Now that our English lesson for the day is over, let me tell you what I have really been up to. First, I prepared for a conference, and then I attended it. (Make no mistake, I have been known to do it the other way around occasionally). My only clear memory of that trip is of being charged for excess baggage because of a poster I was carrying. Oh, I just thought of another one: seeing a homeless man dressed more warmly than I was. Of course, I should have known better than to wear a skirt suit with no overcoat in sub-zero temperatures.

Then, when I got back, my laptop was stolen by some very professional thieves. I say professional, because they did an extremely thorough job of finding not just my laptop, but also the charger, which was in another room, and my headphones (which were attached to the laptop). They also managed to make off with both my roommates' laptops, presumably so that these could keep mine company, in case mine wasn't happy enough being reunited with its soul-mate, the charger (On days when I felt particularly sadistic, I would intentionally keep those two apart). I just have a few last words: Dear laptop, you were sorely missed (for two weeks, till I got a new one). But I'm so over you now, I've even stopped electronically tracking you. Farewell, my friend.

After the semester exams, I went home for the holidays. For some reason, I never have anything to say about holidays. They tend to either rush by like a whirlwind, or creep along like traffic on the Dubai-Sharjah highway. Which makes them difficult to summarize. You know, it's strange that I can't think of anything slower than traffic on a random highway to compare uneventful vacation days to. I must be getting rusty.

I haven't made any new year resolutions this year, but it's too late now. You ask how I know that? Because people have already started to abandon theirs. I don't want to be out-of-date. Maybe I'll make next year's resolutions now. Like a pre-emptive strike on my excuse of not having resolutions, to avoid making lifestyle changes.

Lab Space

For most grad students involved in any kind of research-good, mediocre, misguided... whatever, the lab is their first home. Being a typical grad student with no life, I fall into that category. Our lab recently moved into a new building, and there was a mad rush to choose the best spots for hard-core research/ uninterrupted daydreaming. Being the last one on the scene I got the worst possible desk location, with my back and (more importantly) my computer screen facing the door. We lab rats (can't hide from the truth, can we?) are generally docile creatures who take what we get. Our professor, however, was outraged that all the (gentle)men of the lab had given the lady the worst desk. Well, it had been a while since we thought of ourselves in those terms. So long, in fact, that the words themselves seemed archaic and somewhat unnatural. Understandably, nobody offered to give up their seat, and the professor had told me to choose whichever seat I wanted and tell the person occupying it to move to my place. I did just this, and promptly got kicked out by that person the next morning, when he saw the new arrangement. That is the last time I move someone's stuff without informing them first. Fortunately, he doesn't hold a grudge. I kicked him out, he kicked me out, and we're even. I even learned a lesson in the process. Anyway, I like my new place now (I do not have a choice; after all, it is practically my home). It's actually got the most light, too. Not sunlight, silly. Corridor light. You really thought grad students get sunlight? Not unless we walk home for lunch because we need the Vitamin D.

Gender Stereotypes

We play a major role in shaping our toddlers' mindsets. I was reminded of this last weekend when I went out with a couple. We were shopping for baby clothes and I spotted a cute white t-shirt with a butterfly pattern on the front. When I showed it to them, they patiently explained to me that boys don't wear clothes with pictures of butterflies on them. Balls, vehicles, alphabets and teddybears were acceptable. I can understand that parents would avoid certain colours for their boys (like pink) but I had no idea it extended to patterns as well. Later, when we moved to the toys section, I saw that even here they had separate sections for boys and girls. The girls' section was filled with dolls, and tea sets, make up boxes and a lot of very pink things (I was looking at it from a distance, and it really did seem like a sea of pink from where I was standing). The boys section had aeroplanes, train sets, GI Joes... generally stuff that looked like more fun. Oh, I've played with a lot of dolls in my time, but the toys in the boys section seem infinitely more exciting to me as an adult. I wish we wouldn't program our kids into thinking a certain way. Girls should have both dolls and cars to play with (and baby boys should be able to wear butterfly-print t-shirts). It might actually make the world a better place; a place where women are less bothered about their looks and could change a tire if they really had to, where men stop thinking of kitchens as a no-go zone, and aren't afraid of expressing their feelings. I'm not saying there should be complete homogenization- that would not be a good thing. But do we really need to add rules about what a baby can and cannot wear or play with when nature has already taken care of the mental programming? Men aren't from Mars and women aren't from Venus: we are all from the same planet (duh!), we are just brought up differently. Sometimes, we repeat things- however ridiculous- so often that they become ingrained in our minds.

Viral Vocab

You've surely noticed how the English language has been changing rapidly with new words coming into use on a regular basis, mainly since the internet revolution. Well apparently, there is an Oxford Dictionary of English (as opposed to the more conventional Oxford English Dictionary) that allows the inclusion of these newly made up words. Here are a few examples:

chill pill a notional pill taken to make someone calm down
chillax calm down and relax
turducken a roast dish consisting of a chicken inside a duck inside a turkey
staycation holiday spent in one's home country
buzzkill a person or thing that has a depressing or dispiriting effect
automagically automatically and in a way that seems ingenious, inexplicable, or magical
exit strategy a pre-planned means of extricating oneself from a situation
overthink think about (something) too much or for too long
matchy-matchy excessively colour-coordinated
LBD little black dress
frenemy a person with whom one is friendly despite a fundamental dislike or rivalry
cheeseball lacking taste, style, or originality
hikikomori the abnormal avoidance of social contact, typically by adolescent males (in Japan)

They say the only way to remember new words is to use them in a sentence. Since we have so many new words here, I'm going to need an entire paragraph to fit them all in. Now, to begin:

I am totally overthinking this. Is it that difficult to find accessories for my LBD so that I don't end up being all matchy-matchy at the party tonight? The last thing I want is for someone to think I am a cheeseball. Quite apart from that being an insult, it reminds me of the lunch my LKG benchmate used to bring to school, the eating of which was followed by her wiping her cheesebally (yes, this will be my contribution to the ODE) fingers on my sleeve. Yuck! She was definitely the first frenemy I had. I wish there was a way to automagically erase all but the most pleasant childhood memories. Sigh. I need to take a chill pill, chillax and think of an exit strategy in case I get stuck with some buzzkill this evening who can't stop praising the turducken on the buffet table, which would make it impossible to eat a dish I might have tried had I not heard the name and mentally shortened it to... (I will leave that to your imagination). And who knows? I might even come across a more accomplished hikikomori than myself, although if (s)he were that good, (s)he'd be at home, enjoying a staycation instead of planning an exit strategy for a non-existent social event.