by NINAD JOG
"Ma'am, I'll be with you in just a moment," said the man behind the counter as he attended to the customer ahead of me in line.
I was peeved. How could the man have mistaken me for a woman? Granted, I was wearing a long winter coat and a fur cap as I battled my second winter in Washington D.C. But I thought my outfit made me look like a frail version of the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, than that of his wife Raisa.
I decided to forgive the man behind the counter. He will know in a moment who I really am, I figured.
I didn't have to wait for long. "Ma'am, what can I do for you?" he asked when it was my turn.
I angrily took my fur cap off and thrust it into my jacket pocket. "My car has a flat tire," I said brusquely, in the deepest and most gravelly voice I could muster. "I need it fixed." I didn't tell the man his remarks had also punctured my ego and knocked the wind out of my sails.
"We'll take care of it, sir," said the man. "Give me your car keys and take a seat."
I retreated to the waiting area of the tire store, a large bandage over my ego.
***
This wasn't the first time I had been mistaken for a woman. The previous occasion had been more than a dozen years earlier, when I was eight.
"Is that your daughter?" a woman had asked my father. "She's so pretty!"
"No, that's my son," my Dad had explained. "He looks like a girl because his head is covered with a shawl. I'm taking him to the doctor, since he has fever."
Being mistaken for a girl was the last thing I needed when I was sick. I had felt like giving the woman one tight slap on each cheek. But all I could do was squirm in the scooter's sidecar and hope the woman would leave.
***
Bad as it was to be mistaken for a girl, being teased for being girlish was no better.
"Ninad, let me tell you something," the drawing teacher told me when I joined a vocational high school in Mumbai in eighth grade. "If any boy ever hits you, just pick up a rock and lob it at him."
I laughed heartily, for never could I have imagined an adult would give such bizarre advice. Only later did it dawn on me that the drawing teacher had been half-joking, for he had surmised that I was too girlish to withstand any bullying, beating and rough-and-tumble play.
***
While people have mistaken me for a woman over the years, I too have mistaken a few women for men. But thankfully, I've always managed to avoid the gaffe of calling them men to their faces.
Back when I took a public transport bus to high school at seven in the morning, I would run into a cute guy at the bus stop. Effeminate that he was, he appeared to be a year or two older to me. We smiled when our gazes met, but we never spoke to each other.
I saw the boy's mother accompany him to the bus-stop one morning, and overheard them talk to each other. I was surprised that the boy had a girl's voice, and was even more surprised when his mother kept using the female form of Marathi verbs while talking to him. Only then did I it dawn on me that the feminine guy whom I had a crush on was actually a masculine girl.
I'm not sure if I was feeling drowsy that morning, but I do remember that the realization made me wide awake.
***
Years later, when I told my parents I was gay, my mother did her best to persuade me to marry a woman and have kids. The mid-twenties was a perfect time to start a family, she said. My mother and my grandmother weren’t sure if I was truly homosexual or whether I had been brainwashed by someone who had forced himself upon me against my wishes. But they couldn't comprehend how I could use my homosexuality as a reason to refuse to marry a woman. To them, it was no more than a lame excuse. They told me my ability to sire my own kids was too precious a resource to waste.
I could see why my mother insisted that I have kids. India has no Social Security and no social safety net, so having kids is an essential investment for the future. One’s own children are the only ones who can take care of people in their old age.
I explained to my mother that I wasn’t physically attracted to women; in fact I was physically repulsed by them.
But it was a while before she understood that being homosexual meant being attracted to masculinity and being repulsed by femininity. "Why don't you marry a lesbian?" she finally asked me. "Many lesbians look and act like men, so you'll be as happy with them as you’ll be with a man!"
I told my mother lesbians were still women, no matter how masculine some of them may be. Besides, I had no desire to enter a marriage of convenience, and I was sure no lesbian would want to marry me either.
What I didn't tell my mother was that looks and physical bearing apart, I barely got along with the few lesbians whom I knew, for reasons that were hard to fathom. Most of my friends were men, evenly split between gay and straight.
In fact, there were times when I wondered long and hard if I was a misogynist. For not only had I not succeeded at striking anything beyond a nodding acquaintance with lesbians, but the few straight women whom I was friends with were co-workers or family or my male friends' wives or sisters.
I didn’t have a female friend whom I could point to and proclaim in all honesty, "There's a woman who I became friends with on my own, without any middleman's help."
***
But circumstances can change, and so can people. With enough will-power and effort, something that lies hopelessly in the realm of the insurmountable can slither silently into the reign of the possible.
Earlier this year, I was goofing off at Washington D.C.' annual Gay Pride Parade Festival, pretending to man one of the booths of the Asian and South Asian gay and lesbian groups when a woman approached me. Fair-skinned and flat-chested, she was a couple of inches shorter than me. Her hazel eyes twinkled as she smiled at me and tilted her neck to throw back her long black hair.
I recognized her instantly, although I didn't remember her name. We had met at the Heritage gay and lesbian event a couple of months earlier, where I had seen her sitting by herself on the staircase by the bar, lost in thought.
She reminded me her name was Pat, and I reminded her of mine. We started chatting, and she told me she had grown up in Cambodia, and had come to the U.S. as a refugee after living for weeks or months in other Southeast Asian countries along the way. We swapped stories of childhoods spent in India and Cambodia, talked about what we did for a living and asked each other where we lived. I learned that Pat too lived in a northern Virginia suburb of Washington D.C. In fact she had also parked her car at Falls Church metro station, so we decided we would leave together.
I noticed that Pat was quite content in chatting with me. She wasn't mingling with the Asian lesbian's group, whose booth was adjacent to the one we were standing in. "Aren't you a member of AQW?" I asked her, using the group’s acronym, Asian Queer Women.
Pat shot me a quizzical look. "It's only my second time at a gay and lesbian event," she said. "The Heritage event was the first."
That made perfect sense. I flushed with pride that she had preferred to chat with a known gay devil than with the unknown lesbian angels sitting at the neighboring booth.
Just then there was a sudden cloudburst. Pat and I huddled together as people rushed to take shelter in the booths. We watched a few hardy souls strip to their shorts and dance in the rain.
The cloudburst ended just as suddenly as it had started, and my friend Vuong joined us. I was aware that Vuong and Pat knew each other, for I had seen them chat at the Heritage event.
About thirty minutes later, Pat and I decided to leave the festival. I offered to drop Vuong home, since he lived close to me. As the three of us left the booth and headed home, we ran into Kevin, an old acquaintance of mine who was taking pictures of people for Metro Weekly, Washington D.C.'s gay magazine. Vuong and I posed for a couple of pictures, but Pat preferred to stay out of the limelight.
***
As we walked towards the Metro station, I patted myself on the back for breaking a big barrier. Here was the dawn of a new friendship, a relationship that had sprouted without the need for a middleman to sow the seeds. I hadn't sought out Pat; she had approached me. But it was a promising start nonetheless.
The Metro train was crowded, and the three of us sat on separate seats as and when they became free. We got off at the Falls Church station after thirty minutes. While Vuong and I had to make our way to my car, Pat had to head to hers. I gave her a tight hug and kissed her on both cheeks, as is quite common in the gay and lesbian world. "See you next time!" I said.
"See you!" she said. I looked at her as she sauntered towards her car, her long black hair swaying ever so gently in the light afternoon breeze.
"Pat is so sweet!" I told Vuong as we walked towards my car. "I was surprised that she hadn't heard of the Asian Queer Women's group."
Vuong gave me a blank look. "Pat's not a woman," he deadpanned. "He's a guy."
I could have fainted right then and there. I would have, had I been a Victorian-era society lady.
"Really?", "Really?" I asked a couple of times just to make sure. “Yes, really,” said Vuong.
I was largely silent during the ten-minute drive to Vuong's. My ego was punctured and the wind had been knocked out of my sails. At least I didn’t have a flat tire.
Having chatted at length with Pat at the gay Pride event, only to learn that she was a he, Pride had truly come before the fall.
***
I've exchanged a few emails with Pat since that day, but I haven't seen him. He has told me he would like to get together at some point, but he has said he has been too busy.
I’m not sure if Pat knows that I mistook him for a woman when I cozied up to him on that dog-day afternoon. He probably does, although I like to think he doesn't. Whether he does or not, I plan to bring it up and say sorry to him the next time we see each other.
For few pleasures are more supreme than asking someone if they had noticed the swift kick I had given them during our previous meeting, and having the gall to apologize profusely months after doing it. Justice delayed may be justice denied, but an apology delayed can cause malice to fester.
When all is said and done, boys will always be boys.
Showing posts with label Humor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Humor. Show all posts
Friday, September 3, 2010
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Swedish 101
NINAD JOG
January 1997
Here's a brief lesson in Swedish, a language in which Java is pronounced Yhava, where the entrance to a car park is called Infart and the exit is called Utfart.
Many languages have words whose meanings in other languages are absolutely hilarious or downright offensive or plain different, and a recent stay in Sweden acquainted me with several such Swedish words and phrases.
As if infart and utfart were not enough, Maximum Speed is called Top Fart. The word for vacation is semester, and a dinner jacket is called smoking. That could be one reason why there don't seem to be any non-smoking restaurants in the Swedish capital Stockholm.
Shopping for shampoo in a suburban Stockholm store, I chanced upon a bottle that advertised its contents in bold letters as BAD SKUM. It sent me into paroxysms of raucous laughter, much to the alarm of a couple of dear old ladies shopping nearby. Face it: you would too. I later learnt that Bad Skum (pronounced Bahd Skoom) meant Bath Foam or liquid soap.
A bookstore yielded another linguistic gem: the Swedish title of author-in-hiding Salman Rushdie’s novel The Moor’s Last Sigh translates to Moors Sista Suck.
When someone greets you with the Swedish equivalent of How's It Goin'?, a common response is Bra!, which means good. If you're feeling real good, you say jättebra, which is Giant Bra, or very good. The goodbye greeting is Hej då, pronounced Hey Dough. Now that I'm back from Sweden I use the expression to greet any piece of dough: upon getting my paycheck I go, Hej då!
As in Britain, the preferred Swedish morning greeting is Good Morning rather than the informal Hi of America. Written God Morgon, it is pronounced Goo Moron. Calling people morons to their faces the first thing in the morning can be a supreme source of sophomoric satisfaction.
Swedish is notorious for concatenating compound nouns into tongue twisters of formidable length, and the entry for the longest word in the Guinness Book is allegedly one such word. Smaller examples abound: boxershorts and restaurangparkering (parking for restaurant patrons).
A Swedish colleague mentioned a compound word that is strange even by Swedish standards. There's a town in Sweden named Rå (å is pronounced aow), through which flows a river named Å, in which lives a species of fish named ål. Fish caught in the part of the river flowing through that town are called Rååål, pronounced raw-aow-aowl, stressing each syllable. (How appetizing does this sound: Hello there. I just had some rååål for dinner.)
Fortunately the hilarity is not all one-sided. Swedes point out that Skor, a brand of chocolates sold in the U.S. means shoes in Swedish. "Americans eat shoes!" was their excited refrain.
It was Swedish colleagues who first pointed out the signs saying Slut on juice dispensers in restaurants. "Press it and see what happens", was the risqué exhortation. I did, and in addition to getting a glass of juice learnt that slut is the Swedish word for operate or finish.
While hyphenated family names are common in many cultures, Swedes go a step further. They even have hyphenated first names such as Ann-Sophie and Karl-Axel Axelsson. More often than not, both first and last names are hyphenated - as in Ann-Sophie Eriksson-Lindgren and Anna-Stinna Glitter-Johansson. (And here I'm violating an unwritten precept that people with last names such as Jog shouldn't make fun of Glitters and Car Axels.)
Having added the three characters å, ä and ö to the script, which foreigners have trouble pronouncing, Swedes have replaced most W's with V's, gotten rid of Q's except in names such as Lundqvist, and supplanted unpopular C’s with massive doses of K's. Thus Cuba is written Kuba, and China is written and pronounced Kina. Kinda kute, kinda kool.
Part of my daily commute to work involved taking a bus headed for Hagalund after passing train stations with interesting names. One snowy October morning I reflected about how my journey had brought me from Maryland to Hagalund via Stadshagen and Hagsätra, and I wondered where it would take me next. All those destinations have unprintable meanings in Hindi and that reality was sobering.
As my stay in Sweden drew to a close, I launched a frantic search for Bad Skum in the stores. Apparently word had gotten around that evil foreigners were mocking the product and the skum had been cleaned off the shelves. Swedish colleagues at work anxiously tracked my progress: "Did you find any Bad Skum over the weekend?" became the preferred Monday morning query in favor of the more pedestrian "How was your weekend?"
Despite my best efforts I was not able to get hold of a bottle, so I settled for the next best alternative and bought a bottle of barberskum. To this day it produces a smooth shave.
January 1997
Here's a brief lesson in Swedish, a language in which Java is pronounced Yhava, where the entrance to a car park is called Infart and the exit is called Utfart.
Many languages have words whose meanings in other languages are absolutely hilarious or downright offensive or plain different, and a recent stay in Sweden acquainted me with several such Swedish words and phrases.
As if infart and utfart were not enough, Maximum Speed is called Top Fart. The word for vacation is semester, and a dinner jacket is called smoking. That could be one reason why there don't seem to be any non-smoking restaurants in the Swedish capital Stockholm.
Shopping for shampoo in a suburban Stockholm store, I chanced upon a bottle that advertised its contents in bold letters as BAD SKUM. It sent me into paroxysms of raucous laughter, much to the alarm of a couple of dear old ladies shopping nearby. Face it: you would too. I later learnt that Bad Skum (pronounced Bahd Skoom) meant Bath Foam or liquid soap.
A bookstore yielded another linguistic gem: the Swedish title of author-in-hiding Salman Rushdie’s novel The Moor’s Last Sigh translates to Moors Sista Suck.
When someone greets you with the Swedish equivalent of How's It Goin'?, a common response is Bra!, which means good. If you're feeling real good, you say jättebra, which is Giant Bra, or very good. The goodbye greeting is Hej då, pronounced Hey Dough. Now that I'm back from Sweden I use the expression to greet any piece of dough: upon getting my paycheck I go, Hej då!
As in Britain, the preferred Swedish morning greeting is Good Morning rather than the informal Hi of America. Written God Morgon, it is pronounced Goo Moron. Calling people morons to their faces the first thing in the morning can be a supreme source of sophomoric satisfaction.
Swedish is notorious for concatenating compound nouns into tongue twisters of formidable length, and the entry for the longest word in the Guinness Book is allegedly one such word. Smaller examples abound: boxershorts and restaurangparkering (parking for restaurant patrons).
A Swedish colleague mentioned a compound word that is strange even by Swedish standards. There's a town in Sweden named Rå (å is pronounced aow), through which flows a river named Å, in which lives a species of fish named ål. Fish caught in the part of the river flowing through that town are called Rååål, pronounced raw-aow-aowl, stressing each syllable. (How appetizing does this sound: Hello there. I just had some rååål for dinner.)
Fortunately the hilarity is not all one-sided. Swedes point out that Skor, a brand of chocolates sold in the U.S. means shoes in Swedish. "Americans eat shoes!" was their excited refrain.
It was Swedish colleagues who first pointed out the signs saying Slut on juice dispensers in restaurants. "Press it and see what happens", was the risqué exhortation. I did, and in addition to getting a glass of juice learnt that slut is the Swedish word for operate or finish.
While hyphenated family names are common in many cultures, Swedes go a step further. They even have hyphenated first names such as Ann-Sophie and Karl-Axel Axelsson. More often than not, both first and last names are hyphenated - as in Ann-Sophie Eriksson-Lindgren and Anna-Stinna Glitter-Johansson. (And here I'm violating an unwritten precept that people with last names such as Jog shouldn't make fun of Glitters and Car Axels.)
Having added the three characters å, ä and ö to the script, which foreigners have trouble pronouncing, Swedes have replaced most W's with V's, gotten rid of Q's except in names such as Lundqvist, and supplanted unpopular C’s with massive doses of K's. Thus Cuba is written Kuba, and China is written and pronounced Kina. Kinda kute, kinda kool.
Part of my daily commute to work involved taking a bus headed for Hagalund after passing train stations with interesting names. One snowy October morning I reflected about how my journey had brought me from Maryland to Hagalund via Stadshagen and Hagsätra, and I wondered where it would take me next. All those destinations have unprintable meanings in Hindi and that reality was sobering.
As my stay in Sweden drew to a close, I launched a frantic search for Bad Skum in the stores. Apparently word had gotten around that evil foreigners were mocking the product and the skum had been cleaned off the shelves. Swedish colleagues at work anxiously tracked my progress: "Did you find any Bad Skum over the weekend?" became the preferred Monday morning query in favor of the more pedestrian "How was your weekend?"
Despite my best efforts I was not able to get hold of a bottle, so I settled for the next best alternative and bought a bottle of barberskum. To this day it produces a smooth shave.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Run of the Mill
Ninad Jog
I was a lowly and humble computer programmer when I first started working years ago. Things have changed since then. I'm no longer humble; I've lost my humility. But I'm still a lowly programmer.
***
'Unexpected surprise' seems like a tautology, keeping company with needlessly redundant phrases such as 'repeat again.' What's an expected surprise anyway?
Well, a surprise birthday party that someone throws on your birthday is an expected surprise. But if they throw the party for you two months before your birthday, that's an unexpected surprise.
I wonder if the explanation was needfully redundant.
***
I can't imagine why visitors to my home complain that I don't offer them any drinks. In fact I offer them a choice of three drinks: tap water, carrot juice and fat-free milk.
***
I wish I wasn't as vulnerable to the cold as I am. A dip in the temperature freezes my fingers and my toes, and my nose starts running like there's no tomorrow. It's a flow that's as copious as the Ganges, but isn't quite as holy.
***
I recently bought a weighing scale with an electronic display. It helps me learn how much I eat. I weigh myself before dinner and after. The difference is the answer, and the answer makes all the difference.
I learned this technique from my friend Dip; he used it to weigh his Bengal cat.
***
When my roommate Luther moved out, he didn't take all of his belongings with him in one go. He returned several times during the following months, and took a couple of items with him every time. It worked well for both of us; it gave us an opportunity to meet and catch up.
I didn't mind that he hadn't taken all of his belongings in one go. But one item bothered me. Sitting in the kitchen cabinet was a large glass jar with powdered sugar."Luther, take this sugar with you," I told him the next time he visited.
"It's not sugar," he said. "It's flour."
I don't know why, but my ire melted away. Just when I thought I was a sugar daddy, he turned out to be a flour child.
***
"I'm the only one at this table who rents an apartment and doesn't own a house," I said to Tom, as he and I had lunch at Olive Garden with half a dozen of our colleagues.
"What does that tell you?" asked Tom.
"That tells me I'm an exception," I said.
Tom shot me a quizzical look. It didn't seem like the correct reply. I wonder what answer he was expecting.
I was a lowly and humble computer programmer when I first started working years ago. Things have changed since then. I'm no longer humble; I've lost my humility. But I'm still a lowly programmer.
***
'Unexpected surprise' seems like a tautology, keeping company with needlessly redundant phrases such as 'repeat again.' What's an expected surprise anyway?
Well, a surprise birthday party that someone throws on your birthday is an expected surprise. But if they throw the party for you two months before your birthday, that's an unexpected surprise.
I wonder if the explanation was needfully redundant.
***
I can't imagine why visitors to my home complain that I don't offer them any drinks. In fact I offer them a choice of three drinks: tap water, carrot juice and fat-free milk.
***
I wish I wasn't as vulnerable to the cold as I am. A dip in the temperature freezes my fingers and my toes, and my nose starts running like there's no tomorrow. It's a flow that's as copious as the Ganges, but isn't quite as holy.
***
I recently bought a weighing scale with an electronic display. It helps me learn how much I eat. I weigh myself before dinner and after. The difference is the answer, and the answer makes all the difference.
I learned this technique from my friend Dip; he used it to weigh his Bengal cat.
***
When my roommate Luther moved out, he didn't take all of his belongings with him in one go. He returned several times during the following months, and took a couple of items with him every time. It worked well for both of us; it gave us an opportunity to meet and catch up.
I didn't mind that he hadn't taken all of his belongings in one go. But one item bothered me. Sitting in the kitchen cabinet was a large glass jar with powdered sugar."Luther, take this sugar with you," I told him the next time he visited.
"It's not sugar," he said. "It's flour."
I don't know why, but my ire melted away. Just when I thought I was a sugar daddy, he turned out to be a flour child.
***
"I'm the only one at this table who rents an apartment and doesn't own a house," I said to Tom, as he and I had lunch at Olive Garden with half a dozen of our colleagues.
"What does that tell you?" asked Tom.
"That tells me I'm an exception," I said.
Tom shot me a quizzical look. It didn't seem like the correct reply. I wonder what answer he was expecting.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Ninny's Inanities
by NINAD JOG
Here are some of my thoughts and quotations. I post them to Facebook as and when I think of them, starting from July 2009. They vary from profound to downright ridiculous, although not necessarily in that order.
The proof of the bedding is in the sleeping.
Overheard at Yellowstone National Park, "Honey, this is the Beehive Geyser!"
There's little to be gained from not counting calories, other than weight.
A promise unfulfilled is a promise reneged upon.
You can beat a cook, but you can't eat a book.
I wish I had time on my hands when I'm called upon to think on my feet. It shouldn't cost an arm and a leg.
Is "Freudian sleep" a Freudian slip for Freudian slip?
Never wear your mind on your sleeve when you have an ace up your sleeve.
Caramelized is a euphemism for burned, just as sauteed is a euphemism for fried.
A emailed B: "Are you back? If yes, welcome back. If not, I take the welcome back!"
I don't mind running around in circles, as long as it brings me back to square one.
Sneeze three times in a row, and you'll be thrice blessed.
Statistics isn't a synonym for lies, and theory isn't synonym for fiction.
An orange a day keeps the nurse away.
I don't mind going fishing, as long as it is for compliments.
Fish was no red meat, but I had always chickened from trying it.
When you get tanned, isn't it fair and lovely that fair is no longer lovely?
Do lesser mortals have more trouble understanding when less is more, more or less?
I must jog my memory to decide which errands I should run and which ones I should skip.
I don't mind pushing an elephant up the stairs as long as it's not a white elephant.
Different strokes for different folks: Embolic for some; hemorrhagic for others.
I'd rather pander a pet than pet a panda.
What I need to do is stop making a to-do about making a to-do list.
I don't like to hem and haw about anything. I prefer to haw and hem instead.
I let go of an Accord, only to gain some Insight.
If your insight serves to incite, I'd be wary of seeing it anywhere in sight.
When you have a bone to pick, it's best to make no bones about it.
I may not be a bull in a china shop, but I can't be easily cowed.
The pen may be mightier than the sword, but the pun is deadlier than the gun.
I'd rather push an elephant up the stairs than leave it in the room.
If you can't stand sitting down, standing up might sit well with you.
It's impossible to feel homesick when you're home, sick.
History has a knack for repeating itself when you are fixated on letting bygones be bygones.
Eclectic mix: a euphemism for hodgepodge.
Laughter is good for health, especially when it's all the way to the bank.
With enough will-power and effort, something that lies hopelessly in the realm of the insurmountable can slither silently into the reign of the possible.
Inappropriate laughter is seldom planned, but crocodile tears are seldom spontaneous.
I'm pretty good at reading, but I'm quite poor at comprehending what I've read.
I'd rather be a wolf in sheep's clothing than be a black sheep in a lone wolf's garb.
Good publicity is better than bad publicity, but any publicity is better than no publicity.
A bad pun is an oxymoron.
A man is better measured by what he gives than by what he acquires.
Wisdom listens when knowledge speaks, but ignorance smirks when folly fumes.
I look forward to getting my feet wet with some hands-on experience.
Influence is power without responsibility.
I may not be good at blowing balloons, but I don't mind deflating windbags.
May the won't of the minority trump the will of the majority.
The best cannot be bettered, but it can be bested by the bestest.
Someone who rubs you the wrong way and steps on your toes can be quite a pain in the ass.
Your life may well be an open book, but it's Greek to me.
I'd much rather split infinitives than split hairs.
If you have a bone to pick, pick the funny bone.
Of the numerous diseases, disorders and syndromes I'm afflicted with, two have been confirmed beyond a shadow of doubt: hypochondria and foot-in-the-mouth disease.
Can a tightfisted person be strong-armed into setting aside his ham-handed approach and mending his footloose ways? (Chinta's answer: Depends on how headstrong or spineless the person is.)
I like someone who is a friend, and I cherish anyone who is a friend friend. But I can't stand a friend friend friend or a friend friend friend friend.
When you come to a fork in the road, take it. When you come to a spoonerism, leave it well alone.
Tell me something you like about me, and I'll be your acquaintance. Tell me something you don't like about me, and I'll be your friend forever.
Being overtly aggressive beats being passive-aggressive.
Past failures guarantee future debacles when you're a pessimist.
It's easier to delude oneself than it is to deceive others.
Fantasy and reality are interchangeable when you're a child.
One who calls a spade a spade is a sheep in sheep's clothing.
You can show me the ropes, as long as there are no strings attached.
Gift me a house, and I will live forever in the present.
I can't make up my mind whether I'm indecisive or not.
I'd much rather face the music than play second fiddle.
An empty mind may be a devil's workshop, but an open mind is creativity's fountainhead.
Conservatives can spot proximate causes, but liberals excel at pinpointing ultimate reasons.
Donuts: a sugar-coated term for poison.
Simplistic simplicities are no more palatable than complicated complexities.
Dogs can be bitches, but cats are pussies.
Better late than never, but better early than late.
Only when I'm ravenously hungry do I not mind eating crow.
Homostasis is when a gay couple sticks together in the face of threats to their relationship.
Filled am I with ire
With my mind afire
As I read the collected works
Of William Safire
A stone contains one tone.
Rolling stones may gather no moss, but sliding fortunes can rack up a big loss.
Hindsight may always be twenty-twenty, but forsythias in spring are a dime a dozen.
Everyone in the gay world has a Richard. But few have spherical objects.
It's easier to be in the no than to be in the know when you're in denial.
Pay no attention to what I don't say, disirregardless of whether I say or don't say.
Early to bed and late to rise keeps a man from being sleep deprived.
One man's profundity is another man's inanity.
A superstitious atheist is no less hypocritical than a devout criminal.
Planned spontaneity is something that I'm decidedly ambivalent about.
I wonder why no one ever taught me the age-old proverb that I was clueless about for several years, "When ignorance is bliss, it's folly to be wise."
I'd rather be a forty-nothing than a forty-something.
Back when I was twenty-something, I thought I knew everything there was to know. Now that I'm forty-something, I know everything there is to know.
There's a thin line between picking up the gauntlet and picking a fight.
I'd rather have a smoothie than a roughie.
A vengefulness born of frustration can be mistaken for kindness.
The rational part of your brain can be cold and logical, but the emotional part can be mercilessly vindictive when you’re an object of pity.
I’m a teetotaler who totally avoids tea.
I don't watch what I say. I listen to it, but only after I've said it.
I'd rather be a tight cannon than a loose one.
A headline on the front page of the New York Times says, "Summers Predicts Job Growth by Spring." In the dead of winter, is the NYT making Obama's economic advisor a fall guy?
It's impossible to like or dislike something if you like what you dislike.
Fair-weather friend: One who remains a friend through thick and thick.
One can never be too thick to realize there’s a thin line between self-deprecation and self-denigration.
Short though my name is, people ask me to spell it out. Since repetition enhances learning, I tell them N as in Ninad, I as in Inad, N as in Nad, A as in Ad and D as in donkey.
Nodding acquaintance: A person whose name we’ve forgotten by the time we meet them at the next social event.
If you tell a joke in a forest, but nobody laughs, it’s still a joke. But if you tell a joke while you’re falling off a cliff, it’s not funny at all.
A person who is in denial never lets the facts intrude upon his beliefs.
I'm not a cry-baby anymore. I'm a cry adult.
If you'd rather not try your hand at being a stand-up comedian, try your butt at being a sit-down clown. (Just don't complain if you become the butt of all jokes.)
Wordplay is far more fulfilling than one-play, two-play and three-play.
When I turned forty, my narrow waist and narrower mind exchanged places.
Carwash: a synonym for hogwash
It's better to be safe than to wear a sari.
Discipline: a euphemism for rigidity.
Half a slice is better than no bread.
Never confuse learning something with believing in it.
Altruist: a politically correct term for sucker.
I may not believe in what you think, but I can believe in what you do.
Never let the price of your ignorance exceed the cost of your knowledge.
When diplomacy isn't your strong suit, you run the risk of getting caught with your pants down.
Critique is a euphemism for criticize, just as sauteed is a euphemism for fried.
Isn't it irksome when people repeat superfluous, redundant words again and again?
Who says I'm a non-believer? I'm a staunch believer in atheism.
I may not know all there is to know, but I sure act like I do.
Money is like religion: it creates more problems than it solves.
Nothing smells fishy to an anosmic person, and a rose by an other name is just as fragrance-free.
All red wines taste alike, just as all cars look the same.
I'd rather be a bit player than a byte player. There's no point in biting off more than you can chew.
Something unacceptable isn't quite as unacceptable as something that's completely unacceptable.
Workers enjoy the journey, while managers are eager to reach the destination.
Seeing is believing, unless you believe in not seeing.
I'm proud of my humility, and I'm not humble about my pride.
Bookworm: A person for whom a thousand words are worth a picture.
A holy man beseeches his followers; a holier-than-thou man besmirches them.
I would have been happy to hold a grudge, if only I could remember what the grudge was.
Unable: a euphemism for unwilling
Brevity is a handmaiden of levity, and tomes are the foot-soldiers of wonks.
Woe betide those who equate their rigidity and inflexibility with discipline.
Fury can disguise suspicions as facts, and cloak false beliefs in the garb of evidence.
The more things change, the less they remain the same.
Cautious: A euphemism for conservative.
You can't be gung-ho about a smoking gun if it forms a smokescreen.
When you enter a dentist's office, you're judged by your appearance. When you leave, by your wisdom teeth.
We seldom notice when our friends prove us right, but we never forget when we prove our enemies wrong.
Stating the obvious becomes a gift when we miss things hiding in plain sight.
Since nouns can be verbed, I fridge my groceries and gas my car.
Tough love is indistinguishable from soft hate.
Tough love and soft hate are the same side of the same coin.
Obliviousness is far too often mistaken for courage.
Breakfast like a pauper
Lunch like a prince
Eat a dinner large enough
To make a king wince
The wisdom of an old fart is no match for the zeal of a Young Turk.
Since rolling friction is less than sliding friction, it follows that truth is stranger than friction.
A vixen without vivacity has no virtue, and an iconoclast without insolence cuts no ice.
I couldn't bear to wolf down the fish, so I chickened out and had to eat crow. Oh, deer!
If you're wary of a storm in a teacup, wait till you come across a tornado in a teacup.
When metabolism goes south, the figure goes east and west.
When God is in the details, you can eat your cake and have it too.
It's better to have not loved than to have loved and lost.
'Good for you': A phrase whose superficiality is rivaled only by its patronizing tone.
The wise man forgoes medications in favor of medicines; the fool takes neither.
One man's medicine is another man's poison.
Some conundrums are best resolved by fools.
Tough times never last, and neither do tough people.
The converse seldom trumps the contrapositive.
‘I’m happy for you’ is a euphemistic way of saying, ‘I’m sad for myself.’
One who can’t dance to save his own life dances like there is a tomorrow.
Lanky legs: A euphemism for chicken legs.
If it ain’t broke, act to keep it from breaking.
Some things are easier done than said.
Familiarity breeds fondness, except when it breeds contempt.
Bachelor of three trades, master of one.
Master of all trades, doctor of none.
A cat’s meow is louder than a paper tiger’s roar.
The early bird eats nothing but worms.
The spoof of the pudding is in the eating.
Just For Grins
He who has the last laugh also has the most grotesque grin.
Grin from ear to ear, and groan from mouth to snout.
If you can’t grin and bear it, just groan and bear it.
When forced to eat a dish you dislike, you can either grin and bear it, or groan and wolf it down.
A grin is but a couple of vowels away from a groan.
Innocent Awakenings
While in every parting there is an image of death, in every sibling’s death there is an image of our own parting.
The memory of a single unpleasant childhood experience can be more tenacious than the recollection of a delightful daily routine.
Unpleasant surprises spawn uncharitable feelings.
Seeing is believing even when you’re an adult, but not seeing is not believing when you’re a child.
It's all too easy to mistake a swan song for a chirp; an eloquent coda for a mundane twitter.
Time may heal all wounds, but it is also adept at adding pages to a person's Book of Regrets.
Growing up lies squarely in the realm of fiction when you’re a toddler. Each day is interminably long, and if you can't grow up from one day to the next, what hope can there be for ever growing up? What do months and years mean, anyway?
Dwellings are cavernous when we are young, but time shrinks mansions to rabbit-holes, and morphs children into adults.
Personal Experience
As I turned forty, my narrow mind and broad waist exchanged places.
Some people read the New York Times to broaden their minds. I read it to confirm my prejudices.
All cars look alike, even during daytime.
"How would you like your coffee? Caf or decaf?" When I'm asked that question, I'm neither overwhelmed nor underwhelmed. I'm simply whelmed.
Losing one's sense of smell has its drawbacks. As I inadvertently step into a dropping while walking in the morning on a Mumbai street, it's hard to tell if the mound is a dog's, a cow's or a human's. They've made feces; I make faces.
I may be a walking encyclopedia, but I’m not an orbiting one.
***
A seasoned critic seldom mistakes creativity for plagiarism.
One's thoughts seem harmonious when one is madly in love with oneself.
Delight and disgust have a ditty in common.
Delight and disgust are opposite sides of two different coins.
When ignorance is bliss, the wise guy is as impotent as the wise man.
The cacophony of one's thoughts is as melodious as a diva's aria.
I bought a CD for a song, only to discover that it contained a dozen of them.
An imp is a flamboyant wimp.
You may practice what you teach, but you must publish what you preach.
What goes up must keep going up when you’re a windbag.
Only a devil can weave a story that an angel fears to thread.
Silence may be more eloquent than speech, but actions speak louder than both.
The gay world is a place where truth is queerer than fiction.
Brevity is the soul of a twit.
I’d rather be a smartass than a dumbass.
A smartass is a bigger pain in the ass than a dumbass.
Envy has a loud voice, but jealousy skulks silently.
Grapes taste sweet, until someone points out that they are sour.
Windbags post quotes; narcissists post status updates.
An absence of large-heartedness goes hand-in-hand with a surfeit of small-mindedness.
People living in wax houses shouldn’t turn the heat on others.
What’s difficult to memorize is often impossible to forget.
Ask not what I’m wont to do, ask what I won’t do.
Maturity: a euphemism for mellowing.
"American humor" would be my favorite oxymoron, if I wasn't decidedly ambivalent about oxymorons.
There's a fine line between a smartass and a dumbass, akin to the separation between courage and foolhardiness. But there's also a fine line between a profound statement and an inane one.
People don’t fall by the wayside, but memories do.
Altruism: a prime example of an oxymoron.
Where there’s a will, there’s a won’t.
Let bi-gones be bi-gones, and gaygones be gaygones.
The distinction between natural and artificial is purely artificial.
Time and tide wait for no man, woman, child or eunuch.
The pun is mightier than the word.
I may not have a sweet tooth, but I do have an acerbic tongue.
Here are some of my thoughts and quotations. I post them to Facebook as and when I think of them, starting from July 2009. They vary from profound to downright ridiculous, although not necessarily in that order.
The proof of the bedding is in the sleeping.
Overheard at Yellowstone National Park, "Honey, this is the Beehive Geyser!"
There's little to be gained from not counting calories, other than weight.
A promise unfulfilled is a promise reneged upon.
You can beat a cook, but you can't eat a book.
I wish I had time on my hands when I'm called upon to think on my feet. It shouldn't cost an arm and a leg.
Is "Freudian sleep" a Freudian slip for Freudian slip?
Never wear your mind on your sleeve when you have an ace up your sleeve.
Caramelized is a euphemism for burned, just as sauteed is a euphemism for fried.
A emailed B: "Are you back? If yes, welcome back. If not, I take the welcome back!"
I don't mind running around in circles, as long as it brings me back to square one.
Sneeze three times in a row, and you'll be thrice blessed.
Statistics isn't a synonym for lies, and theory isn't synonym for fiction.
An orange a day keeps the nurse away.
I don't mind going fishing, as long as it is for compliments.
Fish was no red meat, but I had always chickened from trying it.
When you get tanned, isn't it fair and lovely that fair is no longer lovely?
Do lesser mortals have more trouble understanding when less is more, more or less?
I must jog my memory to decide which errands I should run and which ones I should skip.
I don't mind pushing an elephant up the stairs as long as it's not a white elephant.
Different strokes for different folks: Embolic for some; hemorrhagic for others.
I'd rather pander a pet than pet a panda.
What I need to do is stop making a to-do about making a to-do list.
I don't like to hem and haw about anything. I prefer to haw and hem instead.
I let go of an Accord, only to gain some Insight.
If your insight serves to incite, I'd be wary of seeing it anywhere in sight.
When you have a bone to pick, it's best to make no bones about it.
I may not be a bull in a china shop, but I can't be easily cowed.
The pen may be mightier than the sword, but the pun is deadlier than the gun.
I'd rather push an elephant up the stairs than leave it in the room.
If you can't stand sitting down, standing up might sit well with you.
It's impossible to feel homesick when you're home, sick.
History has a knack for repeating itself when you are fixated on letting bygones be bygones.
Eclectic mix: a euphemism for hodgepodge.
Laughter is good for health, especially when it's all the way to the bank.
With enough will-power and effort, something that lies hopelessly in the realm of the insurmountable can slither silently into the reign of the possible.
Inappropriate laughter is seldom planned, but crocodile tears are seldom spontaneous.
I'm pretty good at reading, but I'm quite poor at comprehending what I've read.
I'd rather be a wolf in sheep's clothing than be a black sheep in a lone wolf's garb.
Good publicity is better than bad publicity, but any publicity is better than no publicity.
A bad pun is an oxymoron.
A man is better measured by what he gives than by what he acquires.
Wisdom listens when knowledge speaks, but ignorance smirks when folly fumes.
I look forward to getting my feet wet with some hands-on experience.
Influence is power without responsibility.
I may not be good at blowing balloons, but I don't mind deflating windbags.
May the won't of the minority trump the will of the majority.
The best cannot be bettered, but it can be bested by the bestest.
Someone who rubs you the wrong way and steps on your toes can be quite a pain in the ass.
Your life may well be an open book, but it's Greek to me.
I'd much rather split infinitives than split hairs.
If you have a bone to pick, pick the funny bone.
Of the numerous diseases, disorders and syndromes I'm afflicted with, two have been confirmed beyond a shadow of doubt: hypochondria and foot-in-the-mouth disease.
Can a tightfisted person be strong-armed into setting aside his ham-handed approach and mending his footloose ways? (Chinta's answer: Depends on how headstrong or spineless the person is.)
I like someone who is a friend, and I cherish anyone who is a friend friend. But I can't stand a friend friend friend or a friend friend friend friend.
When you come to a fork in the road, take it. When you come to a spoonerism, leave it well alone.
Tell me something you like about me, and I'll be your acquaintance. Tell me something you don't like about me, and I'll be your friend forever.
Being overtly aggressive beats being passive-aggressive.
Past failures guarantee future debacles when you're a pessimist.
It's easier to delude oneself than it is to deceive others.
Fantasy and reality are interchangeable when you're a child.
One who calls a spade a spade is a sheep in sheep's clothing.
You can show me the ropes, as long as there are no strings attached.
Gift me a house, and I will live forever in the present.
I can't make up my mind whether I'm indecisive or not.
I'd much rather face the music than play second fiddle.
An empty mind may be a devil's workshop, but an open mind is creativity's fountainhead.
Conservatives can spot proximate causes, but liberals excel at pinpointing ultimate reasons.
Donuts: a sugar-coated term for poison.
Simplistic simplicities are no more palatable than complicated complexities.
Dogs can be bitches, but cats are pussies.
Better late than never, but better early than late.
Only when I'm ravenously hungry do I not mind eating crow.
Homostasis is when a gay couple sticks together in the face of threats to their relationship.
Filled am I with ire
With my mind afire
As I read the collected works
Of William Safire
A stone contains one tone.
Rolling stones may gather no moss, but sliding fortunes can rack up a big loss.
Hindsight may always be twenty-twenty, but forsythias in spring are a dime a dozen.
Everyone in the gay world has a Richard. But few have spherical objects.
It's easier to be in the no than to be in the know when you're in denial.
Pay no attention to what I don't say, disirregardless of whether I say or don't say.
Early to bed and late to rise keeps a man from being sleep deprived.
One man's profundity is another man's inanity.
A superstitious atheist is no less hypocritical than a devout criminal.
Planned spontaneity is something that I'm decidedly ambivalent about.
I wonder why no one ever taught me the age-old proverb that I was clueless about for several years, "When ignorance is bliss, it's folly to be wise."
I'd rather be a forty-nothing than a forty-something.
Back when I was twenty-something, I thought I knew everything there was to know. Now that I'm forty-something, I know everything there is to know.
There's a thin line between picking up the gauntlet and picking a fight.
I'd rather have a smoothie than a roughie.
A vengefulness born of frustration can be mistaken for kindness.
The rational part of your brain can be cold and logical, but the emotional part can be mercilessly vindictive when you’re an object of pity.
I’m a teetotaler who totally avoids tea.
I don't watch what I say. I listen to it, but only after I've said it.
I'd rather be a tight cannon than a loose one.
A headline on the front page of the New York Times says, "Summers Predicts Job Growth by Spring." In the dead of winter, is the NYT making Obama's economic advisor a fall guy?
It's impossible to like or dislike something if you like what you dislike.
Fair-weather friend: One who remains a friend through thick and thick.
One can never be too thick to realize there’s a thin line between self-deprecation and self-denigration.
Short though my name is, people ask me to spell it out. Since repetition enhances learning, I tell them N as in Ninad, I as in Inad, N as in Nad, A as in Ad and D as in donkey.
Nodding acquaintance: A person whose name we’ve forgotten by the time we meet them at the next social event.
If you tell a joke in a forest, but nobody laughs, it’s still a joke. But if you tell a joke while you’re falling off a cliff, it’s not funny at all.
A person who is in denial never lets the facts intrude upon his beliefs.
I'm not a cry-baby anymore. I'm a cry adult.
If you'd rather not try your hand at being a stand-up comedian, try your butt at being a sit-down clown. (Just don't complain if you become the butt of all jokes.)
Wordplay is far more fulfilling than one-play, two-play and three-play.
When I turned forty, my narrow waist and narrower mind exchanged places.
Carwash: a synonym for hogwash
It's better to be safe than to wear a sari.
Discipline: a euphemism for rigidity.
Half a slice is better than no bread.
Never confuse learning something with believing in it.
Altruist: a politically correct term for sucker.
I may not believe in what you think, but I can believe in what you do.
Never let the price of your ignorance exceed the cost of your knowledge.
When diplomacy isn't your strong suit, you run the risk of getting caught with your pants down.
Critique is a euphemism for criticize, just as sauteed is a euphemism for fried.
Isn't it irksome when people repeat superfluous, redundant words again and again?
Who says I'm a non-believer? I'm a staunch believer in atheism.
I may not know all there is to know, but I sure act like I do.
Money is like religion: it creates more problems than it solves.
Nothing smells fishy to an anosmic person, and a rose by an other name is just as fragrance-free.
All red wines taste alike, just as all cars look the same.
I'd rather be a bit player than a byte player. There's no point in biting off more than you can chew.
Something unacceptable isn't quite as unacceptable as something that's completely unacceptable.
Workers enjoy the journey, while managers are eager to reach the destination.
Seeing is believing, unless you believe in not seeing.
I'm proud of my humility, and I'm not humble about my pride.
Bookworm: A person for whom a thousand words are worth a picture.
A holy man beseeches his followers; a holier-than-thou man besmirches them.
I would have been happy to hold a grudge, if only I could remember what the grudge was.
Unable: a euphemism for unwilling
Brevity is a handmaiden of levity, and tomes are the foot-soldiers of wonks.
Woe betide those who equate their rigidity and inflexibility with discipline.
Fury can disguise suspicions as facts, and cloak false beliefs in the garb of evidence.
The more things change, the less they remain the same.
Cautious: A euphemism for conservative.
You can't be gung-ho about a smoking gun if it forms a smokescreen.
When you enter a dentist's office, you're judged by your appearance. When you leave, by your wisdom teeth.
We seldom notice when our friends prove us right, but we never forget when we prove our enemies wrong.
Stating the obvious becomes a gift when we miss things hiding in plain sight.
Since nouns can be verbed, I fridge my groceries and gas my car.
Tough love is indistinguishable from soft hate.
Tough love and soft hate are the same side of the same coin.
Obliviousness is far too often mistaken for courage.
Breakfast like a pauper
Lunch like a prince
Eat a dinner large enough
To make a king wince
The wisdom of an old fart is no match for the zeal of a Young Turk.
Since rolling friction is less than sliding friction, it follows that truth is stranger than friction.
A vixen without vivacity has no virtue, and an iconoclast without insolence cuts no ice.
I couldn't bear to wolf down the fish, so I chickened out and had to eat crow. Oh, deer!
If you're wary of a storm in a teacup, wait till you come across a tornado in a teacup.
When metabolism goes south, the figure goes east and west.
When God is in the details, you can eat your cake and have it too.
It's better to have not loved than to have loved and lost.
'Good for you': A phrase whose superficiality is rivaled only by its patronizing tone.
The wise man forgoes medications in favor of medicines; the fool takes neither.
One man's medicine is another man's poison.
Some conundrums are best resolved by fools.
Tough times never last, and neither do tough people.
The converse seldom trumps the contrapositive.
‘I’m happy for you’ is a euphemistic way of saying, ‘I’m sad for myself.’
One who can’t dance to save his own life dances like there is a tomorrow.
Lanky legs: A euphemism for chicken legs.
If it ain’t broke, act to keep it from breaking.
Some things are easier done than said.
Familiarity breeds fondness, except when it breeds contempt.
Bachelor of three trades, master of one.
Master of all trades, doctor of none.
A cat’s meow is louder than a paper tiger’s roar.
The early bird eats nothing but worms.
The spoof of the pudding is in the eating.
Just For Grins
He who has the last laugh also has the most grotesque grin.
Grin from ear to ear, and groan from mouth to snout.
If you can’t grin and bear it, just groan and bear it.
When forced to eat a dish you dislike, you can either grin and bear it, or groan and wolf it down.
A grin is but a couple of vowels away from a groan.
Innocent Awakenings
While in every parting there is an image of death, in every sibling’s death there is an image of our own parting.
The memory of a single unpleasant childhood experience can be more tenacious than the recollection of a delightful daily routine.
Unpleasant surprises spawn uncharitable feelings.
Seeing is believing even when you’re an adult, but not seeing is not believing when you’re a child.
It's all too easy to mistake a swan song for a chirp; an eloquent coda for a mundane twitter.
Time may heal all wounds, but it is also adept at adding pages to a person's Book of Regrets.
Growing up lies squarely in the realm of fiction when you’re a toddler. Each day is interminably long, and if you can't grow up from one day to the next, what hope can there be for ever growing up? What do months and years mean, anyway?
Dwellings are cavernous when we are young, but time shrinks mansions to rabbit-holes, and morphs children into adults.
Personal Experience
As I turned forty, my narrow mind and broad waist exchanged places.
Some people read the New York Times to broaden their minds. I read it to confirm my prejudices.
All cars look alike, even during daytime.
"How would you like your coffee? Caf or decaf?" When I'm asked that question, I'm neither overwhelmed nor underwhelmed. I'm simply whelmed.
Losing one's sense of smell has its drawbacks. As I inadvertently step into a dropping while walking in the morning on a Mumbai street, it's hard to tell if the mound is a dog's, a cow's or a human's. They've made feces; I make faces.
I may be a walking encyclopedia, but I’m not an orbiting one.
***
A seasoned critic seldom mistakes creativity for plagiarism.
One's thoughts seem harmonious when one is madly in love with oneself.
Delight and disgust have a ditty in common.
Delight and disgust are opposite sides of two different coins.
When ignorance is bliss, the wise guy is as impotent as the wise man.
The cacophony of one's thoughts is as melodious as a diva's aria.
I bought a CD for a song, only to discover that it contained a dozen of them.
An imp is a flamboyant wimp.
You may practice what you teach, but you must publish what you preach.
What goes up must keep going up when you’re a windbag.
Only a devil can weave a story that an angel fears to thread.
Silence may be more eloquent than speech, but actions speak louder than both.
The gay world is a place where truth is queerer than fiction.
Brevity is the soul of a twit.
I’d rather be a smartass than a dumbass.
A smartass is a bigger pain in the ass than a dumbass.
Envy has a loud voice, but jealousy skulks silently.
Grapes taste sweet, until someone points out that they are sour.
Windbags post quotes; narcissists post status updates.
An absence of large-heartedness goes hand-in-hand with a surfeit of small-mindedness.
People living in wax houses shouldn’t turn the heat on others.
What’s difficult to memorize is often impossible to forget.
Ask not what I’m wont to do, ask what I won’t do.
Maturity: a euphemism for mellowing.
"American humor" would be my favorite oxymoron, if I wasn't decidedly ambivalent about oxymorons.
There's a fine line between a smartass and a dumbass, akin to the separation between courage and foolhardiness. But there's also a fine line between a profound statement and an inane one.
People don’t fall by the wayside, but memories do.
Altruism: a prime example of an oxymoron.
Where there’s a will, there’s a won’t.
Let bi-gones be bi-gones, and gaygones be gaygones.
The distinction between natural and artificial is purely artificial.
Time and tide wait for no man, woman, child or eunuch.
The pun is mightier than the word.
I may not have a sweet tooth, but I do have an acerbic tongue.
Monday, November 26, 2007
Where There's A Will
November 26, 2007
Hi There and Hi Hear (hear, hear...),
I wasn't planning on going to any of this weekend's shows of the play, "Where There's a Will" under the pretext of following the age-old precept, "Where there's a will, there's a won't".
But Honorable Subodh, aka Deepak R - who has a major acting role in the play - graciously disabused me of my miss conception (sic, sic). So I decided I would go this weekend after all.
I'm going to the Sunday 2 pm show and I know for sure that there are at least 4 of us going to that show. Their names are Nimbus, Juglandaceae, Salamander and Petrified.
I also know for sure that at least 5 others (their names are: Chipotle, Rhododendron, Pulchritude, BlahOfShah and X-Square) are also going to one of the shows.
Are any of you Famous Five - not to mention Sexy Six - going to the Sunday show? If so then we can meet at the show. Anyone else interested in joining us for the Sunday show?
(All's well that ends well.)
Well, well.
Ninny
--- In khushdc@yahoogroups.com, Deepak R wrote:
>
> Hi there
>
> yes the place is close to the White Flint Metro station... on the Red Line.
Hi There and Hi Hear (hear, hear...),
I wasn't planning on going to any of this weekend's shows of the play, "Where There's a Will" under the pretext of following the age-old precept, "Where there's a will, there's a won't".
But Honorable Subodh, aka Deepak R - who has a major acting role in the play - graciously disabused me of my miss conception (sic, sic). So I decided I would go this weekend after all.
I'm going to the Sunday 2 pm show and I know for sure that there are at least 4 of us going to that show. Their names are Nimbus, Juglandaceae, Salamander and Petrified.
I also know for sure that at least 5 others (their names are: Chipotle, Rhododendron, Pulchritude, BlahOfShah and X-Square) are also going to one of the shows.
Are any of you Famous Five - not to mention Sexy Six - going to the Sunday show? If so then we can meet at the show. Anyone else interested in joining us for the Sunday show?
(All's well that ends well.)
Well, well.
Ninny
--- In khushdc@yahoogroups.com, Deepak R
>
> Hi there
>
> yes the place is close to the White Flint Metro station... on the Red Line.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
The Nut Case
October 11, 2007
--- In khushdc@yahoogroups.com, "Daniel" wrote:
>
> Hi Praveen
> Welcome to DC. Only Ninad is the nutty person in the group. The rest of
> us are much more boring. ;p
> Dan
--- In khushdc@yahoogroups.com, "Daniel"
>
> Hi Praveen
> Welcome to DC. Only Ninad is the nutty person in the group. The rest of
> us are much more boring. ;p
> Dan
Welcome Praveen and all ye who moved recently to DC but unlike Praveen, were too shy to announce their arrival. I think Dan is being extra modest and humble. I am indeed nutty, but everyone else isn't much more boring; they are only just a little more boring. The difference is one of degree than of unkind.
Even bullshit has its limits!
--Nutty Ninny
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