Herd behaviour

Well, I am now officially a project manager. I was shown my new desk and sent to scavenge everything else. So I went around looking for unused phones, monitors, cupboards and chairs. Lunch break is a good time to build your inventory. A lot of things in the office are unused when everyone is queuing for their roast (sliced pig bum). I also found something that looked like an iron whip with a lock at one end. I swear I don't know what it is but I have a suspicion that it could be something to induce bondage tendencies. A closely bonded workplace is always a good place to work in, isn't it?

My work is very simple. I have to come up with an idea that is as revolutionary as the iPhone. In the mean time,I have to take the other less revolutionary ideas, develop less revolutionary products out of them and get the hapless sales guys to sell them to unsuspecting customers.

If I come up with an iPhone like idea, my job is done. Why would the company want to keep me when it has got what it wanted from me? So I guess I will have to keep my mouth shut and not blurt out that one brilliant idea.

Getting the less revolutionary products out to the market is not as big a deal as I initially feared. I do not have to go to a workshop and build spaceships with my own hands. There are worker bees who will do it for me. My job is to make the worker bees build the spaceship that I want while they want to be busy collecting nectar. Similar to a Shepard's job making sure that my cattle graze only in the neighbour's property so I can sell my grass to him. At least now I can explain in a line that my job is similar to a Shepard's job but instead of the cattle, I Shepard men and women!

My herd is a motley group of friesian cows and break-inspector buffaloes.(Have you ever crossed a herd of buffaloes without slamming on the break? For those of you who have never seen buffaloes on road, you definitely don't know how mince meat is made. The burnt rubber after taste must have crossed your mind at some point of time).

Anyway, my friesian cows, like all friesian cows give me more milk than I would have ever imagined. And my dear buffaloes, like any thorough bred buffalo will not move an inch even if I threatened to whack his back.

Now I have this idea. What if I give one hard knuckle in the head if I can't get something done from them? I hope they are grown up enough not to complain to the teacher that I hit them in the head.

Short of brilliance

He was not the best player in the team. Infact, he was only the 7th best player in his 6-a-side football team. He stood by the sidelines and hoped that someone would ask him to substitute for them, as he watched the other players run around. Nobody ever seemed to tire. Or at least break a leg so he could play. He stood there as the cold winds tore into his jacket and crushed his bones. He stood there as the rains drenched him to the skin. He stood there for the entire winter and it was the last game of the season that day.

The captain walked in with a new lad and said 'This chap is new to town. And can apparently pass a thing or two. He will come in as first change if someone has to walk out.'

The captain broke his leg that day.

can't pee under pressure

"You have not posted anything for over a month now." I was not surprised when my one loyal follower asked me. Yeah! Apparently I have had someone follow my blog. That was exciting. But even more exciting was when another one said the same thing. And another, and another. And slowing the excitement marched away and in place was an unsettling eerie thought that I had to account for all these people. I know I don't have an obligation to write for anyone but I was once an avid reader of pagalak's blog where he was spinning a beautiful story (part 1, part 2, part 3) which he suddenly stopped and got married. It has been two years since then and I still longingly visit his blog with that little glimmer of hope that one day he will complete the story.

I don't compare my posts to his stories. My posts are neither heart rendering or thought provoking. But my posts were regular. And regular things take people's time and space that their presence is never really acknowledged but their absence is almost strongly felt. Just as how I have to open my gmail account every two hours to delete the only 5 spam messages I would have received in the last two hours but feel very dejected when the spam filter does a very good job on one given day.

But now with fingers pointed at me and echoes of 'where is my trash' ringing full and long on both ears I am under extreme pressure that the head does not spin any more junk and my fingers run to the delete button as soon as I muster to write a sentence or two. It is like, however hard you memorise the poem the previous night, when the teacher's polished cane points at you, all verses melt and flow out of the brain like raindrops seeking the sea.

Raindrops seeking the sea. That is a lousy similie. See, that is what pressure does and I am clearly wilting under pressure. But do you guys remember that girl who was in our batch and whose name was or is similie?

And to add salt to my wounds there was someone who has read some of my scribblings from a time when to write was to pick up a pen and draw impressions of what can achieved by the click of a button these days said that my writing lacks the passion from those days. Believe me, I am trying, it is just that the girls don't really get it.

To conclude, I am self-diagnosing that I have a writer's block. It is just that it is a big heavy block and someone has slammed it right onto my knuckles.

p.s. : The title ought to be 'can't pen under pressure', but you see, I am also afflicted by a very common attention mongering syndrome and vulgarity buys a lot of attention. It is also easy to tap 'e' twice then to search for an 'n' at the other end of the keyboard.