In Limbo

The Light never came. The Darkness never fell. Dark, insidious masses rolled across what, in time immemorial, had been azure skies. Noxious fumes that never dissipated, the black dust that never settled, this was the miasma that blanketed the air. Freakish winds sometimes swept apart cracks in the clouds, seeming to offer some respite, only to reveal the permanent pale crimson iridescence of the skies above. The deathly light was not something borne of the Sun, but of Man. Perhaps not only of Man, but of things beyond this world.

The clouds parted again, bathing the world below in blood red, revealing the decay and gloom that rivaled the skies above. Where once lay swathes of trees, bustling cities and the energy of life, all that was left was the carrion of Earth. Vast plains spread all around, dessicated and dead, serrated with gaping chasms. The Black Rains had created predators of a new kind on these plains. Shrouded in sulfurous mist, lay small pockets of muck that pulled down anything that fell into it, slowly engulfing into the abyss.

A lone road remained. Passing through an arcade of rubble, mountains that were the remnants of a civilization long dead, the strip of broken asphalt cut its way across the barren wasteland. This is where he walked. He was the last one. A man, whose will was weathered as the stones around him, but still not broken. More bones than flesh, hair shriveled and blanched gray, he trudged on passing from shadow to shadow of the heaps of history around him. The wind swirled all around him, whistling and howling. Mocking. The rage never died down in him, the flames fanned, as they were, by the wind. As he shuffled out of the shadows, he looked up at the skies and raised his middle finger up to it, screeching with his broken voice, "Fuck You!"

And he walked on...

Random Scribbles

Inspiration - Sir Humphrey Appleby of Yes Minister & Yes Prime Minister fame

---

Dear colleague,

Kindly note that all the literature beyond this point or including this may be disregarded if the moments that you spare may be used in more productive activities, for all the verbal data that is given in this particular communication will show no possibility of being collated, analysed and presented in any fashion that may be considered, with due importance to the relevant criteria of course, to be comprehensible to any other industrial professional who may happen, delibrately or by coincidence, to glance or indeed peruse through the entirety of this document. At this juncture, it is important to include the possible exception of a hypothetical scenario, wherein a individual residing in a dimensional parallel to the environment currently occupied by the author, or perhaps indeed, an individual who occupies another volume in the same dimensional space as the author, who when subjected to the same parameters, within acceptable tolerances, of suitable duress and pressure on the relevant aspects of ones mental and emotional composition, would, in the course of time, acquire a verisimilar outlook which closely resembles the main subject in question, which would enable him or her, with no particular significance to gender preference, to perceive the intended purpose and the motivation that underlies this particular literary composition.

I sincerely hope that you are not one of those individuals. If so, all I say is... Join the club

Thank you

"Anything that can go wrong will go wrong."

In case you didn't know, that's the Murphy's Law, something I swear by. That and 
"Procrastination is the greatest laborsaving invention of all time."

Now, what if there were someone who had made the Law the core of his existence, talked to imaginary companions named Murphy and balked  at the sheer crassness of the words of the Law and
and rephrased it to his suiting. What would be the Law according to him...
 
"Life is a 3-D space. Each activity that we perform is a vector ie. it has a magnitude(relevance) and direction(aim). There is no vector(activity) that is perpendicular to MURPHY VECTOR. Accept this law. But try to challenge it…"

Before we spend some time with this certain someone, we gotta give him a name. Norman N P sounds good.

Disclaimer: From this point on, everything is fiction, based on truth. Resemblance of fictional characters to real life people is coincidental, to an extent. Artistic freedom grants me absolute impunity.

Many of us wake up to three different mornings. We either have a reason to get up, a reason not to get up, or worst of all didn't give a damn if we got up or not. Today, Norman didn't start his day like the rest of us. He woke up staring at the same pale ceiling he had slept staring at, wishing that the night wouldn't pass so soon. But then again, the past week had put him through enough that he no longer cared. What's another day gonna do? What always got him up was the one thing that wasn't one his ceiling every night. A crack in the window let in a streak of sunlight across the ceiling, sometimes pale, sometimes dazzling, but always there. "Might be the start of something good", thought Norman.

He got up and hurried to his computer. The day was picture perfect, the sun, the sky, trees, everything. Norman only caught a glimpse of this panorama in the reflection on his computer screen, before the artificially generated colors of the desktop wallpaper drowned out everything else. He checked the mail and saw what he had been waiting for. His appointment request had been granted and today he would be presenting his project to the board of directors.

To understand his anticipation as well as dread of this day, requires an insight into the events of the past week.

D -6: Lightning strikes Norman's office building. Fifty million volts surging through the lightning conductor suddenly sees Norman's LAN wire, which has been attached to the conductor for support. Decides that the computer might be a happening place to be and takes the detour. Fireworks ensue and the only copy of Norman's project presentation is in smokes.

D -5: Norman frantically works on rebuilding his presentation, pressing Ctrl-S more often than typing anything. Colleague trips over computer wires, causing a reboot. Scandisk sees the broken PPT files and proceeds to methodically delete it bit by bit. Norman's scream drives away stray dogs in the area.

D -4: Norman brings project documents back home. Takes a bath and comes back to his room to find more paper shreds than at a ticker tape parade, with his pet cat, claws still drawn and purring contently, right in the middle of it. Makes a mental note to change his cat's name from 'Garfield' before bursting into tears.

D -3: Presentation almost complete. Sends a appointment request to the Board of Directors, before proceeding to revise his work. Spots a small conversion mistake in his calculations and corrects it. Sees that the new projected results will drive the company into the ground. Blankly stares at the screen for half an hour before rushing out to borrow the neighbour's son's math textbook.

D -2: Gets presentation approved by his guide. Elated, Norman rushes out to celebrate. Crashes into a director knocking him down a small flight of stairs.
Office workers report hearing strange noises in the offices' ventilation shaft for the rest of the day.

D -1: Norman puts one copy of presentation in the National Bank's safety deposit locker. Takes an insurance out on another copy. Unable to convince insurance agent to include protection against Acts of God in the clause.

The week that passed had taken its toll and paranoia had made him a partial insomniac. He downed a cup of tea to help soothe his nerves. Good tea, he thought and made a second cup and took it up to his room as he readied to head out. He sent a copy of his PPT to his office mail and carried three copies on his person, a hard copy, a copy burned on a CD and finally one on the ubiquitous USB.

As he walked towards his car, he took some time to look around. It really is a beautiful spring morning, he thought. He lifted his face and let it bathe it the morning light, feeling his spirits rise along with the sun. Feeling much better, he got into his car, looked around one last time at the the blue sky, the branches of the oak swaying lightly in the morning breeze, the neighbour's kids playing with garden hose, laughing and said out loud four little words, the same words he had been saying everyday morning for the past week...

"What could go wrong?"                  

It took 20 days of isolation, imposed on me by chicken pox, for a realization to finally drill its way into my thick skull.

College life is over. I won't be going back.

I never did get too senti whenever stuff like this happened. To my school mates, most of whom I have not seen since my last day at school, I had bid a cheery 'See ya later'. My bro, who left for the States some five years back, I saw him off with a 'See ya later, bro'. Being one of the last guys to leave college, you get to see your friends leave one by one, bags packed. And to each and every one, I had bid farewell with smile on my face and a slap to the back , saying 'See ya later'.

See ya later. Aint much truth to that, is there...

Thinking back, I think it started to hit me a couple of days before I was to leave for home. Most of the guys had already left or were leaving that night. Manu had received some money from home for last minute expenditures. And he told me about it. He's a nice fellow really, smart most of the times. But sometimes he tends to make a idiotic mistakes like this. Needless to say, around an hour later, his account was missing some 400 odd bucks and we were sitting in his room along with Rejith and Amal enjoying the 'shevarmatic' experience, music courtesy of Manu's brand new, fully Linuxified comp. Picked on Rejith about his future Hydrabadi adventures. Will have to keep track of what happens there. Polished off a lot of chicken and fed the scraps the scraps to G.R.C. Patti, the dog with the Attitude....


-- This incomplete note has been gathering mold in my blog's cold storage for some time now. Don't remember why I never completed it but wish I had when I still remembered the details.

What did you say? I'm getting old?! Why, you whippersnappers.... where's my cane! I'm gonna belt youoof....dwamfn... fmah teefh pell outf....

Angel

I smile,
but I know not why..
They say the world is dark..
Why do I see the light?
Might even dance in the rain,
I wonder why..

All I know is a hope,
to see her smile,
of the angel who haunts my dreams
when I sleep at night..

The Pirate Song from POC3



The king and his men,

stole the queen from her bed

and bound her in her Bones.

The seas be ours

and by the powers

where we will well roam.



Yo, ho, haul together,

hoist the colors high.

Heave ho, thieves and beggars,

never say we die.



Some men have died

and some are alive

and others sail on the sea

– with the keys to the cage...

and the Devil to pay

we lay to Fiddler's Green!



The bell has been raised

from it's watery grave...

Do you hear it's sepulchral tone?

We are a call to all,

pay head the squall

and turn your sail toward home!



Yo, ho, haul together,

hoist the colors high.

Heave ho, thieves and beggars,

never shall we die.



One of the actual Pirate Songs:

The Pirate Song

To the mast nail our flag it is dark as the grave,

Or the death which it bears while it sweeps o'er the wave;

Let our deck clear for action, our guns be prepared;

Be the boarding-axe sharpened, the scimitar bared:

Set the canisters ready, and then bring to me,

For the last of my duties, the powder-room key.

It shall never be lowered, the black flag we bear;

If the sea be denied us, we sweep through the air.

Unshared have we left our last victory's prey;

It is mine to divide it, and yours to obey:

There are shawls that might suit a sultana's white neck,

And pearls that are fair as the arms they will deck.



There are flasks which, unseal them, the air will disclose

Diametta's fair summers, the home of the rose.

I claim not a portion: I ask but as mine

'Tis to drink to our victory - one cup of red wine.

Some fight, 'tis for riches - some fight, 'tis for fame:

The first I despise, and the last is a name.



I fight, 'tis for vengeance! I love to see flow,

At the stroke of my sabre, the life of my foe.

I strike for the memory of long-vanished years;

I only shed blood where another shed tears,

I come, as the lightning comes red from above,

O'er the race that I loathe, to the battle I love.

Fifteen Men on a Dead Man's Chest Pirate Song

The most famous words are from the first four lines of this pirate song are :

Fifteen men on a dead man's chest

Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum

Drink and the devil had done for the rest

Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.

The
Robert Louis Stevenson novel "Treasure Island" was published in 1883.
The words and lyrics of the first line of the pirate song "Fifteen men
on a dead man's chest" are explainable! Dead Man's Chest is a tiny
island that forms part of the British Virgin Islands in the Caribbean
Sea. Pirate legends of the Caribbean claim that the notorious pirate,
Edward Teach ( Blackbeard ), marooned 15 of his pirate crew on 'Dead
Man's Chest' as a punishment for their mutiny and desertion. All
pirates had their own Pirate Code of Conduct. 
Article VII of the Pirate Code agreed by Bartholomew Roberts ( Black
Bart ) and his pirate crew in the Shipboard Articles of 1721 stated:

He that shall desert the ship or his quarters in time of battle

shall be punished by death or marooning

The
Pirate Code of Blackbeard stated that each pirate who was marooned
should be given a cutlass and a bottle of rum. The scenes in the movie
'Pirates of the Caribbean' were therefore based on fact. The pirate
hero, Captain Jack Sparrow, was given a pistol instead of a cutlass
when he was marooned by his pirate shipmates.

Powered by ScribeFire.

Excerpts from recent meeting on the Indo -Us Nuclear Deal:


(The chief figures are Walter. T. Hugo and Salahuddin Arumani, from the US and Indo side respectively.)

Sal.A : I believe that you mentioned some issues which need to be....resolved.

W.T.Hugo :Right. To be resolved. Yes. Now there have been some amendments to this little agreement of ours. Non negotiable of course.

Sal. A: (flips through the pages) But this is a very late stage for bringing about amendme.....What?!? This is preposterous.

W.T.Hugo: Just fulfilling our duty, as global leader, towards reducing greenhouse emissions....

Sal.A: By banning us from using petrol engines?!?

W.T.Hugo: Actually any fossil fuel based engines. You see, India contributes to over 3% of the global greenhouse emissions. That is just unacceptable....

Sal.A : The US spews more than 25% of all emissions!!!

W.T.Hugo: Ah. Yes. Irrelevant details. This is not about us. It is about you. Let us together take this small step....

Sal.A: Together?!? And what are we supposed to do without engines??

W.T.Hugo: Well, you have a lot of cows, don't you? Very efficient, I hear.

Sal.A: ........

W.T.Hugo: Glad you agree with me. Also, now you wont be needing that Iran pipeline anymore. So why don't you just call off that deal and while you are at it, brand them as 'Evil'...

Sal.A: What!! Why??

W.T.Hugo: Well....there was that incident at that place. And there was this guy. And they have that thing.....you know what I mean. Clearly 'Evil'.

Sal.A: ........

W.T.Hugo: I knew we would see each other eye to eye on this. Oh...and one more thing. We would like to re title these talks as Use-India....err....I mean US-Indo Agreement. A small thing really.

Sal.A: But....but....

W.T.Hugo: Oh my. Will you look at the time...well, have to be going now, ol' chap. Nice talking to you. Cheerio.

[With that, the US envoy hurries out.]

Assistant [to Sal.A]: Sir, what do we do now?

Sal.A: Sigh.....bring up the cows. Its a long ride back home.


[ The above excerpts and the characters involved are purely products of my imagination. The following, however, are actual excerpts.
Increased awareness of the scientific findings surrounding global warming has resulted in political and economic debate. Poor regions, particularly Africa, appear at greatest risk from the suggested effects of global warming, while their actual emissions have been negligible compared to the developed world, reports The New York Times.^[50] At the same time, developing country exemptions from provisions of the Kyoto Protocol have been criticized by the United States and been used as part of its justification for continued non-ratification.

The United States is the world's largest energy consumer and biggest producer of greenhouse gas emissions, spewing about a fourth of all global warming emissions, with emissions in the year 2004, according to a study, achieving record levels.Scientists in Britain condemned the increase, saying that it showed how the US was failing to take a lead in the international attempt to curb greenhouse gas emissions despite being the worst offender.

Sources: http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/38984/story.htm
.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming
. http://news.independent.co.uk/world/science_technology/article358583.ece