HNO3 + HCl

Sleeping for the next day's big gig is a PAIN. I lied down at 10, after an hour or so of packing and unpacking. Slept at 1.

November is awesome. Especially when you cuddle in  inch-thick blankets with the windows open :)  Woke up by 8. Bruv had just returned from one of  his LONG pan-India Yatras.  He returned from Chennai, I was going to Chennai. Irony,eh? Got ready by 9:15. Dropped at school by 9:30. Wandering inside the school without worrying about Exams or classes is a BLISS. Met  PT sir. I was standing with a rucksack heavy with clothes and stuff and ogling stupidly at him sitting there with a TINY bag. What could possibly fit into that thing?


Had to wait for PR. Ass, he is. Told me to come by 9.30, came himself at 10.15. And also forgot his tiffen.  Why, I ask."I'm a Hypochondriac", he says.We stupidly hoped for the Principal to drop us by his Innova. After all, *We* paid for it. Indirectly.
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The bus journey was long. It became warm, and I wondered why I wore my jacket. I still think that a bus-ride is the cheapest roller-coaster you could ride. You know, with the bumps and the rickety suspensions and all? Finally a few seats freed up before we reached the station. PR wanted to know why I love Harry Potter so much. "Convert me from a non-believer to a believer", He said. I love explaining complex Harry Potter plotlines. It was SO much fun.

At the station bus stop, Sir went to charge his phone, and then wandered off someplace. We called him asked him where he was. " I'm over here. Come."  the Genius says, and cuts the line. But we found him and hence, went to Platform 3.

The woman who announces the train arrivals. I always imagined her to be some sorta middle-aged woman. Kinda sweet voice.

I love Tinkle. I still read it. It's right up there with The Deathly Hallows and The Bourne Supremacy. But we refrained from buying it at the stall. Good thing, as we were about to realise.

PT Sir is overreactive. The train stopped for a whole five minutes. But for unknown reasons, we were running like madmen to reach B1.

The train journey was long and quite uneventful, except perhaps when PR prank-called me. He got down at some station.I had just  bought some vadas, and was eating them when his Cell rang:

"Dei Banthia, We've caught the wrong train."

Yeah right. I swear, we must have read the whole ticket atleast some 10 times.

"Oh right. Are you sure?"

"Yeah." I could hear the train moving behind him.

 What should I do? Get down at the next station? Meh, I'll just finish my vadas.

Then came PR smiling like a prat, with PT Sir following suit.

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Chennai is fricking HOT . And Humid. It was raining cows and buffalos and yet I was sweating.

I so wanted to eat at Saravana's. So I dragged them to the upstairs restaurant.  3 Chappatis, 2 biryanis and a curd rice later, the bill came to 250 bucks. That's when I realised we were short on Money. Uh Oh. And to top it all, the Auto fellow charge a hundred bucks to get us to the hotel.

Palm Grove is a sucky hotel. It's atleast some 80 years old. I'm not talking heritage-style, ancient-design old, I mean OLD old. The room was tacky, to say the least. And bell-boys came every hour to ask for tips.
 This time, it was easy to sleep. We were so damn tired. 
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8 AM. Humid. What kind of a cruel joke is Chennai? But Devvarman kept us entertained. Yes, the room had a TV. Thankfully.  We dragged ourselves to the in-hotel restaurant for the 'complimentary breakfast'. Now here I was, wearing a jersey and shorts, and in comes the Bangalore team uniform-dressed. With the fancy school blazer and all. I could almost see the scorn on their faces. Nevertheless, I wanted to keep it cordial, so I talked to them:

" We're the team from Bangalore. We were the national runners-up last year. We're gonna kick your asses over here."

Okay, they didnt actually say the last line, but they as well might have. Stupid tactics, as PR says.
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Finally went to the venue.  8 teams for the City finals (:O) and the competition was damn close.  Some team with green shirts made it through. And the Regionals started.

I'm not going in detail about the fiasco at the quiz, as I can only remember the Bangalore team prancing in their seats to tell the answers. But from nowhere, the Vizag team won. Woah.

At first, yes, it was disappointing. But then, hey, Fourth place isn't so bad. We still have loads to look forward to.
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Returning home. Cash in pocket: 300 bucks. But we still went to the Cybercafe in the station, to do some *ahem* life-changing online work. But apparently, the cafe was hacked, and everytime we tried to log in, it redirected us to some other site asking for the password again. So we gave it up and just went to the TIME website to gleefully look up our names.

The train was a nightmare. COCKROACHES! Ohkay, I'm not much of a manly man, and I cant bear watching those creepy little nightmares crawl upto my food, or to my sleeping body. *shudder* But I miraculously went to sleep, somehow.
What else, woke up, went home.

An uneventful end to an eventful little trip, eh?

PS: Hope you get the title of the post. It's an inside joke.

The secret quiz.

1. Sitter. Willem de X (6 May 1872 – 20 November 1934) was a Dutch mathematician, physicist and astronomer. He came up with the concept of the de X space and de X universe, a solution for Einstein's general relativity. Gimme X.

2. Identify, put fundae.

 

3. An anecdote has it that when Philip II sent a message to Sparta saying "If I enter Laconia, I will raze Sparta to the ground", the Spartans responded with the single, terse reply: "X". 

4. 

David Ginola-1997

 Beckham, Ginola, Lassiter, Moller, Raul -1998

Dennis Bergkamp-1999

Eddie Pope-2000

Paul Scholes-2001

Thierry Henry-2002

Ryan Giggs, Roberto Carlos, Edgar Davis-2003

Theiry Henry, Alessandro Del Peiro, Ronaldinho-2004

Patrick Viera, Andriy Shevchenko and Fernando Morientes-2005

Rooney, Ronaldinho- 2006 to 2009

Theo Walcott, Rooney, Lampard-2010

____ and Rooney-2011

List is exhaustive. Connect and FITB.

5.

X made his debut as Commander Abhimanyu Rai in the Doordarshan Series 'Fauji' in 1988. X?

6.  ____ __ __ ______ is a famous catch phrase from a famous science fiction TV series. Though it has numerous pop culture references, it is never actually spoken verbatim in the series. FITB.

7. 'We love Hollywood. We just have a funny way of showing it.' Tagline of?

8.

X is a project still in development. It calls itself  'the privacy aware, personally controlled, do-it-all, open source social network.'

The word X literally means 'to scatter about, to disperse'.

X also denotes the scattering of the Jews to countries outside of Palestine after the Babylonian captivity.FInd X.

9.

"Okay, should we get some coffee?" Fundae please.

10. Galena is the natural mineral form of lead sulfide. How is it better known as?

Unintentionally Funny: Hindi Soaps.

Hindi Soaps. Aren't they the awesomest? To tell thee what i'm talking about, here is So-not-stereotypical Soap on Famous Hindi Channel.
Butter-Run

Now, before you go all, 'how come YOU see so much of this show? You're just a hypocritical freak who doesn't have a life! *more trolling*', lemme tell you this: I might not a have a life, but I SO don't watch this crap voluntarily. It so happens that this show happens to clash with Phineas And Ferb National Geographic, at times.


Butter-run is a so-very-original story of Jealousy, Bitchfighting, and Shiny Jewelery. Like, no other Hindi Soap ever has these elements in it. Ever.


Enter Rich Man.
 

Rich Man: I'm rich and I wear a Pearl necklace round my neck. Because all rich men have to show their richness at all times. I'm also virtuous. I'm so virtous that, when I accidentally killed my maid's Husband, I'm taking care of her daughter. The maid has no problem with it. I mean, so what if I killed her husband? I can totally take care of her daughter without ever harming her!

Rich Man has a Daughter as well. She, so non-expectantly, is a Spoilt Princess.

Spoilt Princess: Hi, I'm Spoilt Princess. I rule the whole world and I want my Dad's undivided attention. But that stupid maid-daughter takes away all the attention! I must get rid of her! *scheme scheme devious devious*

The maid-daughter is apparently an Angel who can NEVER see that Spoilt princess wants her outta the way.

Angel: I'm an angel. I'm so very Pious and Virtuous. I can never see any one get hurt.*halo halo*

Now, after about a hundred episodes of Nonsense, they grow up.

Rich Man: My daughters are grown up! Must.Get.Them.Married.

Angel: I like Loser Guy. Can I marry him? Pweeease?

Rich Man: Sure. Looks like you two are in love. Go on!
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Spoilt Princess: Hey wait! I wanna marry Loser Guy!!

Angel: But you already saw him and said that you didn't wanna get married to him!?!

Spoilt Princess: I do now. Now gimme your Wedding dress.

Angel: Wokay.

Spoilt Princess: Really? You don't care about the hundreds of people outside waiting outside for you to get married to the love of your life?

Angel: Nooope.

Spoilt Princess: .............

 Angel: Look, Shiny Jewelery!

____________________________

So Spoilt Princess gets married to loser guy. Only after about ten episodes, he discovers that he married the wrong girl. Gasp!

Loser Guy: ZOMG! You ain't my wife!!

Spoilt Princess: I am now. *devious smile*

But you can't escape coz' the wedding vows are life-binding! And your family has already accepted me!! BWAHAHAH!

Loser Guy: Aww man. Alright then. But I ain't gonna love you or anything.

Spoilt Princess: Really? You're not gonna sue me or divorce me for forcefully marrying you without your permission?

Loser Guy: Nooooope.

Spolit princess: ..........

Loser Guy: Look, Shiny Jewelery!

_________________________

Now Loser Guy has an elder brother whose in Rehab 'coz he's a druggie. Now Druggie, wonder of wonders, falls for Angel.

Druggie: Ooooh. Shiny! Marry me gurl.

Angel: Wokay.

Druggie:Really? Eventhough I don't know that you're my bro's Ex? And bro would be devastated to see me score with you, whom he still has feelings for?

Angel: Yuuuup.

Druggie:........

Angel: Look, Shiny Jewelery!

________________________________

So Druggie marries Angel. But again, wonder of wonders, he finds out that she was his brother's ex.

Druggie: WTF! you're my bro's ex?

Angel: Uhm. Sweets?

Druggie: Dayum! Now I'm gonna so-not-inappropriately poke fun at your relationship with my bro! *poke poke*
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So Druggie starts getting more depressed.Finally it somehow lands up here:

Druggie: *points gun* Spoilt Princess, YOU'RE the reason Angel is not mine!!!! I keel you!!!

Spoilt Princess: LOL. I'm not the reason you're such a loser. YOU are, you drug infested, rehab freak!

Druggie: OMFG. Yer right!! *points gun at himself and shoots*

Spoilt Princess: Oh shit.
________________________________

So Druggie dies. After another fifty episodes, everyone else realize that Spoilt Princess was the reason Druggie was dead.

Rich Man: ZOMG! You killed druggie? Get outta my house, Biatch!!!

Spoilt Princess: Hey I'm a Princess. You can't do that!!

Rich Man: I'm doing it now!! *kick kick*

__________________________________

So Spoilt Princess has to bear the harsh outside world. Where cars, manicures, and hotels don't come to you at your command. Choo Sad.

Meanwhile, Angel becomes a widow and follows the widow lifestyle. Which apparently means that you can wear mascara along with the white sarees. And you have to eat boiled rice.

Angel: I'm a widow and I have to suffer because that's what widows do. *eats nothing for two days*

Loser Guy: Dayum! Eat somethin'. You'll fall sick, otherwise!!

Angel: GET AWAY FROM ME, YOU PERV!!! I'M YOUR SIS-IN-LAW!!! RESPECT THE RELATIONSHIP!!!

Loser Guy: What the bhen!?!?!

Angel: I actually have feelings for you but I can't show them 'coz like, I'm a widow...or somethin'.....

So I'm going to an ashram where I can ponder freely!

Loser Guy: Whatever. I'll get married again, then.

Angel: No wait!! *sets fire to ashram*

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(This katha is still going on, so......)

The FacePhases.

Facebook. You know it. It's THE social network. 

One fine day, sitting at home and ignoring that Chemistry textbook on my table, the Aristotle in me took over. 

If you observe idly (which is my favorite pastime), an average dude's social nework life can be classified into four broad phases:

 FacePhase 1:

You create a facebook profile with no profile picture, a fake year of birth and zero friends. It was either your friends pressuring you, or you wanted to give it a shot ("What IS it with this bookface, anyway?"). It's extremely boring, and poking is completely alien. Now, there are two ways this could wind up: 1. you end up bored and log in so rarely that you forget your password (thisisfacebook) OR 2. you keep going at it, and watch your life being taken over.

FacePhase 2: 

Change profile picture to Justin Beiber/ Justin Timberlake/ Rob Pattinson/  INSERT GAY HOLLYWOOD STAR as you think it's 'kool'.You receive friend requests from other misguided 'kool dudes'. (All the America THEY know are the stereoypical Americans from local movies, or AXN.) Feel encouraged, start sending more friend requests. Get accepted into the gay hollywooders community.

Now come the status updates. You start up by copying some dude's emo status, and posting it as your own: Life is nothing without your love/ I don't wanna love, because it hurts/ (INSERT RANDOM STATUS CONTAINING THE WORDS 'PAIN, LOVE AND HURTS' IN VARYING COMBINATIONS). Then you pester every online dude to comment on it. ('Dei, please comment on my status da!'). Recieve comments like 'correct da machi', 'you say the truth in life', etc,etc. Feel more gloated, more emo statuses. 

By this stage you would probably have sent a thousand friend requests to all the girls you could possibly could. One or two get accepted. More gloat. More emo.

 FacePhase 3:

Now the mania REALLY kicks in (read 4-5 hours on facebook per day). Your Farmville farm is fertile, Mafia is growing and the Cafe brings in customers.  Your wall is filled with " ____ needs you to help him fertilize his farm", "____'s Mafia needs more men", etc.

By this time, you gather up the courage to upload a personal picture. It's probably a crop of some group photo you chanced upon, or some picture taken manually through a cell phone.

Notes. You see  X gaining popularity through that Note he wrote about some exaggerated incident. You try writing you own. Tag all your friends in it. Pester them online dudes again. "Hey check out my Note! :link:"

BTW, till this time, pronunciation marks and capital letters are completely alien to you, and an excess of exclamatory marks is absolutely necessary to stress the importance of the sentence.

FacePhase 4: 

FacePhase 3 may last from anything between 6 months to one and a half years. After those months of comment-pestering, girl-befriending, etc, etc, you finally get some sense knocked into you. You realise the importance of punctuations after that embarrassing incident (whore you?).

Zynga fades away, online time reduces, you realize how much time you're wasting.

But you still have to ABSOLUTELY update that you won 5K in a science quiz.