Leisurely reviewing a dictionary in spare time is an old hobby with me. The procedure, in combination with an occasional consultation of a thesaurus, has always made me delight in the sheer beauty of word power. No excursion through the dictionary has ever failed to impress me with the realization of what words can do to man. You can move, maneuver and mould a man with mere words !

If the last statement has not already succeeded in stirring you up, please do (t)read on. Making an allowance for the fact that the effect of your previous night’s slumber may not have worn off yet, it will be in the fairness of things to allow you some time to shake off your tardiness.

Well, I can almost see some of you beginning to scratch your head. Perhaps you are wondering what impels me to write what I do. The answer is : “nothing but the desire to drive home my point”. Do let me dilate, please.

I would perhaps appear to be digressing from the point I made about mere words being able to move, maneuver & mould a man. If such is the case, it goes to show the desirability of withdrawing from the scene a bit so as to grasp it in its entirety. So do take the trouble to re-read the last two paras and contemplate a little. If you have made this move, you would have caught the point. You agree it was rather like being unable to see the wood from the trees? Well, so much for moving & maneuvering !

The skeptic in you, I can sense, has taken guard in the face of what it might be considering the risk of getting enmeshed in a rigmarole. Makes my task difficult, it does ! Since I still have to prove that one can ‘mould’ a man with mere words.

A little aid from my favorite English dictionary – a standard one , I assure – is going to sort the problem out. It describes the verb (transitive) form of ‘mould’ to mean variously as ‘to give shape’, ‘to alter shape’ etc. So that altering the shape of a man (or whatever ‘a man’ stands for) would be tantamount to moulding him. It should require no great scholar but a dictionary again, to tell you that the expression ‘a man’ means not necessarily a man’s corporeal self but also what he represents.

The situation, I feel, needs a little more help; this time, from a thesaurus. Any thesaurus will proclaim ‘guise’ to be a substitute for ‘shape’ in a suitable situation. And a dictionary further reveals that ‘to alter the guise’ is what one means by ‘disguise’ (when used as a transitive verb).

Having proved an equation of ‘disguise’ with ‘mould’, my task becomes simpler. It gets reduced to proving that mere words can be used to disguise a man (or whatever a man represents). Ripe time now for making you a revelation.

My intentions about words are not exactly what I have been professing to be. What I intend is merely to pretend that my words are pretentious enough to claim the attainment of the unattainable through the employment of hitherto unemployed tactics. Don’t get me wrong, though. This is merely what I pretend and not exactly what I intend !

There are only two possibilities now. Either I have succeeded in disguising my real intentions, or I have not. If not, could you please enlighten me on what you think they are, please? But if I did succeed in the camouflage, you will agree I merely used ‘words’ for the purpose. And I certainly am a man who represents his own intentions !

Well, what do you say to this? Have I been as good as my word? Even if you choose not to say a word, I think I know better. Reticence is often more revealing than what one says !

SANTA-n-BANTA STYLE BANTERING WITH MY FUN-FRIEND MEHUL!

STATUTORY WARNING: THOSE AVERSE TO RISQUE & RUSTIC, REFRAIN !

Truly An EYE OPENER :

MEHUL
A Woman has
Sued a Hospital
Stating that After
Recent Treatment
Her Husband had
Lost Interest in Sex

The Doctors Replied
~ All We Did Was
Correct His EyeSight !

ME 
Ankhein khol di us bechaari ki bhi !

Taste of Bhrasht-Achaar !
By Dr. Sudhir Bhushan ~ Doctor of Humour

Recently  a friend of mine with whom I have a Santa-n-Banta style fun-bantering relationship asked me, “Anna’s movement against Corruption seems to be fizzling out again! Kya is ‘Bhrastachar’ ko kuch le de kar band nahin karwaya ja sakta?”.

To which, the fun-doctor in me replied , “Why not? After all Anna bhi to is Bhrasht Achaar ke lene or dene walon ko band karwana chaahte hain!” (http://www.humourmedicine.com/mehul-n-me-fun-maska-v-4/)

But we have all been a somewhat disappointed witness to the lame & longish ‘interval-halt’ to this mov(i)ement against Bhrashtachar by Headmaster Anna that had proved to be a huge hit with the masses last year in its first Avatar. The interest in the subject was sought to be kept alive by the parallel cinema of Baba Ramdev, which had not fared so well in its ‘Jism1’ last year but managed to become a marginally better hit this year by allowing predators (for that’s what ‘opposition’ always is to the ‘ruling’) to ride on its ‘Jism2’!

But the big question on everyone’s mind now is where do we go from here? And what’s going to happen to our tasty national Achaar, foolishly termed Bhrasht by those who don’t realize that an Achaar can get better (instead of bhrasht) with time by the frequent supplementation of ‘(mustard)oil is well’ to it!

The newspaper headlines this morning brought a fresh breezy breath of ‘Coalgate’ to refresh our stale mouths that had been the overnight ‘Achaar-akhaada’ to the many varieties of resident oral microbes. With this, our mouths have begun to wag in twisted tongues and our national appetiser-carminative-digestant Bhrasht Achaar has once again become the tasty ‘toast of the town’!

Here is a pick of the choicest pickle samplings from Twitter today:

PM’s Dilemma : “MumMum-Main COALGATE ToothPaste Se Brush Kiyaa Aur mereTEETH Jet Black Hogaye -HAINN !- Chonia se Poochtaa hoon-Gursharan Tu Himmat Rakh. OK” by Paramjit S Garewal ‏@ParamjitGarewal  

A Citizen’s Dilemma : “Thought only Salt was there in toothpaste #colgate but just found out that there is #Coal too in #Coalgate….One whitens the other blackens” by ‘Ushy Mohan Das ‏@UshyMohanDas’ (helpful hint for Ushy’s dilemma: “This, too, is a scam to keep the toothpaste companies in perpetual business!”)

A Comic Relief to our Collective Pain : “Colgate : Fast relief from the pain of sensitive tooth. #Coalgate : Fast relief from the gain of insensitive loot.” by  ‘Comedy Central India@ComedyCentralIn’

The Cry of the Cost Conscious : “Rs 1.86 lakh crores is mighty expensive for a toothpaste called #Coalgate :)” by ‘VerseCannon ‏@VerseCannon’  

The Excuse of the Datun Lover : ”Don’t feel like brushing after reading about the COALGATE scam! #shameUPA”  by ‘vikram sathaye ‏@vikramsathaye’

The Mirch Masaala of the Oral Sensorial : “Government to sell title sponsorships for scams; Vodafone 2G scam, Colgate Coal scam etc. http://www.fakingnews.com/2012/05/government-to-sell-title-sponsorships-for-various-scams/ #oldpost #coalgate” by ‘Faking News ‏@fakingnews’

The Arithmetic of the Record Keeper : “Will Congress beat its own record again? 1.76 lakhs (of 2G Scam) put to second place by 1.86 lakhs of  #CoalGate” by ‘Against_Pseudos ‏@Against_Pseudos’

The Announcement of the Corrupt (E)Umpire : “MMS (Man Mohan Singh) sets new WR (World Record) in Corruption by a small margin, Karuna & Raja muttering in anger.” Narayan ‏@Narainised

The Latest Chant of the Bhrasht-achaari : “Jai Gurudev! Saluting His Holiness of Corrupt #India #coalgate”  by Amarendra Srivastava ‏@amarsrivastava

The Frustration of the Uninvited Baarati : “After 2G now it is Coalgate. What is happening to the country? Sarkar hai ya Choron ki Baraat hai?” by Prakash Singh ‏@singh_prakash

The Call of the Devil-May-Care : “Dil coal ke looto. #coalgate” by  MP Singh ‏@NotThatMP

And finally my Dentally/Politically Correct Call to the PM : “Open your mouth properly, Mr. Clean” !!!

The JoinUs4Cocktail invite by the Illuminati Films (our favorite Saif Ali Khan’s Home production) was hard to ignore. So we (Bhuwan, Harsha & Self) found ourselves at a PVR near us in anticipation of an intoxicating fun treat this Saturday evening.There were no disappointments & this heady mix served crisply by director Homi Adajania lived upto its name.

This breezy RomCom is the story of Gautam, played with elan & verve by Saif Ali, an incorrigible flirt ready to serve on a platter his heart & tool to every PYT (both desi & firang) in London. His life crosses path with poor little lonely rich-bitch Veronica (Deepika Padukone) who has been entwined by fate with Meera (played by debutante Diana Penty), the newly arrived bride from New Delhi & the victim of a hoax marriage let in the lurch in the backstreets of London by hubby Kunal (Randeep Hooda). Meera & Veronica have become best of buddies in a relationship of shared empathy. Soon they are joined by Gautam, enticed by the charms of sexy & wild Veronica at her invite of a live in. The three start a friends-in-fun-and-fervour-staying-under-one-roof  life together. With Gautam & Veronica having a no strings attached agreement, Meera provides the perfect foil as the caring friend looking after them & the household, sort of a housewife with benefits (or ‘without’, depending on how you look at it!). Life is a roller coaster fun-ride for them all at this point. Destiny, however, arriving in the garb of Dimple Kapadia (playing Gautam’s desi mom from New Delhi aiming anxiously to help her son tie the nuptial knot) has arranged for a shift of benefits from Veronica to Meera as Gautam & his equally philandering mamu (Boman Irani at his usual comic best) are forced to mislead mommy Dimple into believing that traditional & sedate Meera, rather than Veronica is the love of his life. A more than sporty Veronica plays along for the sake of friends until, on the shifting sands of time, relationships start becoming murky & love confusing to them all.

What follows is a tale that, after initially seeming to meander when it could have gone many, which ways is finally brought to a heartwarming finale (to all Desis for sure) in which Randeep Hooda’s character resurfaces to play a short but significant role.

The movie, despite being a part successor to the themes of Hum Tum & Love Aaj Kal, has plenty of freshness to it. Co-writer Imtiaz Ali (of Jab We Met & Love Aaj Kal fame) has helped with a script that goes minimalistic on melodrama & is high on fun-n-fizz. Fun dialogues like ‘Everything that’s in the house is on the house’ by the rich-bitch Veronica showing friendly largesse of heart to Meera, ‘Tum lonely ho aur main characterless’ by the ever-errant Gautam trying to explain away his indiscretions to Meera and Boman Irani’s  desperate mime to get scantily clad, barelegged Veronica ( in nothing else but a Gents shirt with hints of a missing panty, in stark contrast to Diana’s conservative character who is true to her name & sticks to her Penty) to respectfully cover her legs for a troubled & watching prospective mom-in-law in Dimple take the humour quotient to a high level! Pritam’s musical score is peppy & soulful, adding hugely to the fizz of cocktail. Angreji Beat & Tumhi Ho Bandhu Sakha Tumhi Ho look poised to become nation’s dance anthems of the season.

In the end, cocktail is a cock-y & fun, mock-tale of love, told well as we Desis like it, whether in London or New Delhi. And although our Desi samaj  may not yet be ready for a no-strings-attached Awesome Threesome friends-with-benefits  treatment to a triangular love tale, the end credits  song “Second Hand Jawani” redeems the ennui of a predictable, mushy outcome with a pointer to what we can yet be (given that we are the erstwhile land of Kamasutra & Vatsyayana) in a fun-frolic way! The lyrical expression of ‘teri band jawaani’ making room partly for ‘teri bhen jawani’ in the song is quite indicative of ‘teri bhen’ fast becoming the metaphor of Bindaas India since the times of Comedy Circus!

INFINITE RECURSION !

By Dr. Sudhir Bhushan ~ Doctor of Humour

Santa asked Banta: “What is infinite recursion?”

Banta: “Ok, what’s the largest number you know?”

Santa: “A Zillion!”

Banta: “Ok, add another very large number to it. What will you add?”

Santa: “A Trillion”

Banta: “Ok, what do you get?”

Santa: “I don’t know what this new number is called”

Banta: “Ok, so let’s give it a new name.Let’s call it TriZillion! Now add another very large number to it. Tell me what number do you get. Give it a new name if you don’t know it.”

Santa: “Ok, I add another Billion. And I call the new number a BiTriZillion.”

Banta makes Santa do this over & over again.The day passes. Then a week. And a month, two & three…..

Santa periodically revives his query: “But what is infinite recursion?”

Banta tells him we are not there yet.

Its end of the year.

Santa protests to Banta: “We have been in this ‘Infinite Recursion’ business for too long. I have been dying to get away from it for a while. And I want us to attend the New Year’s Eve party thrown by my therapist Dr. Sudhir Bhushan (literally ‘Jewel of Virtuous Patience’) who is always there to patiently humour me. Now when will our business together end?”

Santa: “Infinity, I am told, is a never ending business. We are hung up on it already and I am trying to figure out the ‘recursion’ angle. You haven’t yet come up with a number large enough to inspire me for a recursion because I can see there are more ‘BiT’s to pick up. You need to think outside the box but you are so inside it still. So don’t ask for a cop-out now that you’re in the business. You could have refrained from starting this whole thing in the beginning itself if you were going to be so tired in less than a year”

Banta (with a tinge of exasperation mixed with diffidence): “Actually my vocabulary for numbers hasn’t gone very far beyond just a ‘BiTriBiTriBiTriBiTri………………………………………………..Zillion’ this year. And remember we started this business only on the First of April which gave us just nine months. Anyway, let’s take a break now to be refreshed at Doctor of Humour’s New Year Party.”

Santa & Banta looked somewhat glum at the party because of their unfinished business that seemed ever-unfinishable.

However, they were cheered up by Doctor of Humour saying that if they decided to start all over again next morning with an initial ZILLION, not only will they have full 12 (their characteristic number) months during the year to make better progress, the very act of indefatigably starting all over will be an example of “Infinite Recursion” and an answer to their initial query even as they began!

PS: And that, interestingly, is pretty much the story of our lives until we decide to get out of the loop!

CHEERS!!!

PPS: Since Santa & Banta started their ‘Infinite Recursion’ business on First April, while remaining stuck on ‘infinite’ & being unable to get to a ‘recursion’ till year end, the joke is on them!

PPPS: Since I, too, started Humour Medicine on First April this year, the joke is on me as well but only as in ‘the treat is on me’! Glad to be of service in getting you out of the loop, if I did that!

“The obvious needs no mention” is the kind of remark that will find almost any man willing to vouch for its veracity. Others, in turn, would side with such a man and call him ‘a man of purpose’ for taking this stand. “Only a man without a serious and meaningful thought in his head would exert himself to describe a situation that speaks for itself” is how they would argue to support their decision.

All of which, I intend to prove, goes to show that appearances can be deceptive & conclusions drawn on first thought incorrect. I personally feel that there is often nothing like mentioning the obvious to help a certain situation. I shall venture to make it obvious!

Consider the man who, with a “Hello, nice evening”, tries to strike a conversation with a stranger at a party. For mentioning the obvious thing about the evening he could be accused of casting aspersions over the addressee’s ability to see things for himself. Yet, his remark most often serves admirably to break the ice.

The physician on a morning round of the hospital ward, while telling his patient “You look much better today” could be deemed to imply that the faculty of deriving benefit from a mirror is denied to the latter. Instead, the plain-speaking coupled with the reassuring reflection from the doctor’s face actually makes the patient feel better still.

A cross-examining counsel, thundering theatrically at the hostile eye-witness, often succeeds in winding up the case with a “….. and it is true, is it not, that at the time of shooting you were actually present in the same room, hiding behind the curtain now stained with your blood!”. It is the mention of the obvious, backed by sheer weight of rhetoric, which forces a vivid recapitulation on the guilty mind of the witness and wilts him into admission.

The fatigued husband who returns home from office with a grumbling “I am beat!” on his lips evokes not a reproachful look from his wife for having dog-tired himself but, in fact, gets served promptly with a stimulating cup of coffee. The fact that she would afterwards expect to be taken out to the evening show is not necessarily pertinent!

There can be none like a politician to play the game of obvious to his own advantage. You could trust him to lead the gullible with the air of a man who is telling the obvious.

A paramour whispering “I love you” into his sweetheart’s ear is employing a most unoriginal endearment to speak the obvious. But his sweetheart could be readily made to swear that she finds no other ‘three-words’ sweeter and more precious than these.

And that isn’t all. A ‘thinking’ man of letters, delving into in-apparent nuances of a remark can come up with connotations one would ordinarily ignore. Did you ask if I was attempting to mention an ‘obvious’? Well, you aren’t going to hear me complain of flippancy!

PS: To all my readers, attempting to be nice to me with “Thank you for the wonderful read”, my courteous response: “Mention not (the obvious)!”

PPS: Oh, btw, what’s the ‘most obvious’ fun-remark from you on this article? My answer, if asked the same, would have been: “So you wrote this stuff?”!

The fun-side of terror!

Immediately on entering my friend’s room, I discovered the presence of the terrorist inside. She hadn’t yet paid any attention to me. But there was something in the air about her that was obviously affecting my friend’s demeanor.

My friend, normally given to a spontaneous display of cheer on every occasion of our meeting was not his usual self. His face betrayed great uneasiness and an expression of fear marred his ever-confident appearance. Despite his having made an attempt to open his mouth, no words of greeting could emanate from it and his half agape oral aperture remained transfixed for some considerable time. His display of utter helpless in the matter of being able to maintain his composure made evident the awesome effect she had been exerting on him.

And it was all most ironical. My friend with his abundantly robust physique need have feared her little on account of physical proportions for she was too puny and diminutive in comparison. She couldn’t have been bossing him either for the simple reason that my friend, sitting in the air-conditioned room of his office, was himself the boss around. He owned the place.

The factor playing havoc with my friend’s psyche was the sure knowledge of possession of a frightful weapon on her person. And the manner in which she threatened him, keeping him covered from all angles, plainly made evident her intention of putting the weapon into use.

He was sitting too far from the solitary door to have any chance of making a successful attempt to escape from the room. In any case, so menacingly threatening was her presence that he was unable to stir from his seat.

Seeing my friend reduced to a scared mass of protoplasm, I felt most bemused! I’d had some experience in dealing with her kind in the past, and although on the first few occasions my plight had been rather like my friend’s, I gradually learnt how to tackle the type of situation he was facing. Fright, therefore, was not the emotion that her sight could have evoked in me and it amused me no end to find my otherwise courageous friend feeling so totally unnerved.

She must have been a good mind reader. My amused state, and her inability to strike terror in my mind the way she could do in my friend’s case, appeared to have incensed her. She diverted her attention and proceeded to mount a furious assault on me. As she charged at me, I ducked out a range to avert being stricken on the forehead, mindful all the time of the serious consequences in the event of her being able to make use of that frightful weapon of hers.

Simultaneously, I brought both my hands up, with what my friend later described as lightning rapidity, and gripped her entire self between the flat of my palms. It took me a mere few seconds more to crush the life out of her. The tension in the room had palpably relaxed by the time I opened my palms to lay before my friend the crushed remains of his now dead tormentor – a bee with that most frightful of weapons, the sting!

My short, fun- Autobiography:

A seriously fun filled tribute to Narcissism !

Love is perhaps the most divine virtue the Creator has endowed mankind with. It is what differentiates a man from a beast. We all love someone or the other at all times. And we all love to talk about our loved ones, which is why I have chosen to talk about myself – the person I have doted on all my life !

I have always been intensely in love with myself. I remember the days when, even as a tiny tot, I wouldn’t let anyone bother myself more than I would allow. I would be the one to take permission from if parents wanted to do anything unto myself : be it bathing, feeding, caressing or fondling me. I always fought to a finish to secure for me all comforts which I considered befitting myself. Of course, I  would never allow them to spank, scold or even sneer at me; such procedures I regarded as flagrantly atrocious to be tried upon such a sweet child as myself !

For friends and relatives desirous of an interaction with myself, I was the one to have sanction granted from. All through my tender years, I strove unflinchingly to protect myself from their annoyingly belittling, teasing and ridiculing intentions. As a result, none could ever dare to take liberties with me – a state of affairs which I found eminently suitable for the sensibilities of the very special person I regarded myself !

When I entered school, I constantly felt threatened by that savage tribe of individuals that carry the designation: teacher. Its members would show vengeful vindictiveness towards me just because I could not spare myself enough time to do that most useless of all tasks, the ‘home-task’. They never could understand that I found twenty four hours’ time in a day too insufficient even to perform the task of taking care of myself. In order to escape their wrath, I had to learn to play a notorious, though most soul-relieving game, viz. playing truant. While playing that solo game, I could be totally at ease with myself !

College life offered deliverance from spiteful teachers and home-tasks. Just as I was beginning to enjoy the respite, trouble erupted once again. I found myself getting lured by the charms of the fair sex. A good many maidens appeared to be vying with each other for holding my attention; a few caught it keenly enough to make myself start feeling infatuated. I sensed that the situation was fraught with perilous consequences. Allowing a damsel to influence my feelings carried the prospect of losing hold on myself. I was not prepared for it; not yet, at least. Realizing this, I promptly proceeded to insulate myself from feminine attractions. And I was mighty glad once again to be all by myself !

I finished college achieving above-average grade and with the qualifications acquired was able to secure myself a safe job in a reputed concern. Life, from then on, promised to be bliss. I felt that for the rest of my days I could be all by myself and lead a peaceful, contented life. It turned out I had heaved my sigh of relief a little too soon!

Having greatly succeeded, throughout my life, in keeping at bay all sorts of infringements upon my person by parents, friends, relatives, teachers, members of the fair sex et al, I had come to regard myself as a ‘man among men’ when, on a fateful day, I succumbed to a temptation which is the bane of all men. I decided to get married, little realizing what it really might do to myself !

My wife proved to be a very loving person; but therein was the catch. Before long, her love for me appeared to be surpassing in intensity the love I had for myself. She would love to make me move according to her best judgments and coax me into becoming the kind of man she would want to see myself as. I would have to eat, drink and wear what she felt was best for myself. I would have to inculcate the kind of society she thought befitted myself. And to take up a spare job/side business to earn more so as to buy her more dresses, jewelery, home appliances and what-have-you to be one up with the Joneses next door. I appeared to be losing steerage over myself. A tussle ensued between us, with each trying to be in charge of myself !

The tussle continues to date and is likely to do so ad infinitum, unless….The prospects don’t look very bright with neither party relenting!

Narcissism, as a result, has become a truly serious business for myself !