Monday, September 1, 2014

Chronicles of a forced bachelor...

... so mom's gone out for a long pilgrimage and wife's gone for a while as well.. so here i am back to bachelor life.. just a couple of weeks in it though with many more weeks to go before it changes back to normalcy.. before i get into the couple of weeks thing ( had its good and bad moments, saving it for another blog though), penning down events as they occurred in last 24 horrendous (exaggerated though) hours....

So its 1pm on Aug 31st Sunday.. our maid has happily gone on a long leave since a week so the home's in a mess.. i target tidying up 1 room a day so start working on the living room and balcony today.. putting things in right places and clearing up the room... not having a maid is a biiiiiig challenge as we all know and maids hold more importance than even our family members at times... its ok if the son/daughter is not home till wee hours but if the maid doesnt show up within +/- 30mins of her scheduled time of visit it is chaos in any home.. so i have been trying my luck to get my neighbors to send in theirs for a day atleast once a week to mop up the floors atleast... somehow asking someone for a maid is like some goon is asking for your daughter's hand... the privileged (the one who has a maid) will give you the looks and assess you carefully to decide if they should share the maid with you.. what if you just poached her or offered her a higher pay and she walks out on them for good.. anyways, so somehow i convince the neighbors to send over their maid and they agree... after several "promises" the maid doesn't show up and come today (Aug 31st) i also realized that i haven't used the washing machine for a few days and have run out of clothes to wear!! So after am done tidying up the living room, i put some clothes in the machine and I see that i am not gonna utilize the machine's capacity adequately so i pull out all sorts of stuff and put it in the machine and start it (very proudly as i feel i have just done a smart thing of getting some bed sheets also washed) and behold! - The machine refuses to start washing and displays an error that indicates that the door open!! So i bang the door in every angle and degree of intensity to see if it works and after about 15 mins of trying i finally give up.. then it strikes me that i have been procrastinating on the washing which has now resulted in me not having much to wear for the week starting Monday! So i raise a ticket with my washing machine company (wondering how will i be able to attend to the technician if i go to work from Monday) and in the mean while again start maid hunting, now not just for mopping the floor and washing utensils, but also to wash my laundry - which included bed sheets that i proudly/foolishly put in.. somehow i get an assurance that one maid will come at 8am the next day and i should be ready to receive her (yes, receive, as in receiving a celebrity)... So Sunday evening i have enough problems in hand already and i go to sleep hoping Monday will be a better day (let me omit the bit about food related issues and other misc challenges.. will save it for a blog another day..)

Monday morning (Sep 1st) i wake up at 7.30am as i had set up the alarm to wake me up in anticipation of receiving the "bai".. its 9am and there are no signs of the maid (again!!) and so i call her up and get to know she would be on leave on account of rains! So here i am on my last pair of clothes which meant probably in the evening i would have to just give up on maid hunting and get into it myself - sweeping the floor, mopping it up, dusting the furniture, washing utensils, washing clothes... and am sure some more unexpected chores.. So its time to put the thought behind and rush for work as i have an important personal event to attend to in evening for which i have to leave from work early.. so i rush to my car and open the door and just before i step in, i notice a small flower lying down on the floor mat near the clutch! so i bend down to pick it up wondering how did it land up there and whoa!!!! I discover 3 tiny mouse pups laid on some sponge (eaten from my car somewhere obviously), probably born overnight in the car (as i had driven it at 11pm the previous night and it wasn't quite a maternity home then!). I was just too awestruck to decide what to do and it took me a few mins just to figure out what to do.. i could not lay the pups out in the rain as that would be too cruel so i carefully lifted the carpet and dropped the mouse pups in a safe place, hoping they would survive somehow and their mum would find them and take them to a safer place... with that, i go back to the car and try starting it... now the mice and my car go a long way.. its a routine for me to find that the mice have either cut my wires that start the ignition or the water hose which sprays water on the wind shield.. just a week back they had nibbled on the water hose (they do so when they are thirsty and dont find a place to drink i guess) and this time they even nibbled on my car's ignition wires! Now don't know if its thinking too much or probably the mother mouse and nature's way of protecting the new born... first i find a small flower on the floor mat which ensures i don't step in the car directly without noticing the pups, then the fact that they are laid on a mat on the car floor due to which i could just move them to another place.. and then the mouse nibbling on the wires as of to ensure i do not start the car and take it away (no mum would want the maternity ward just moved away i guess!). To top it off, i try calling the mechanic and he is not reachable as well.. so i have no option but to take a rick to work... now if you stay in Mumbai, you know hitting a lottery has a higher probability then getting a rick to the place you want to go to.. so I face rejections after rejections from rick-wallas and i walk nearly 2 kms in rains in search of a savior.. finally after umpteen rejections i decide its not my day and walk back home thinking of taking the day off from work instead of facing more challenges... just then near home I flag down an autowallah just going thru the motions and voila! i do find my savior.. just got into the auto and just to clear off my mind thought of penning this down and so came this impromptu, unstructured blog post (blogged after a year again).. This one is more like an outlet for my woes so might not be that enticing a read.. but then if you read up-til this line then guess it wasn't that bad... reached office after a bumpy auto ride so calling it a day on this one! Until next time.. if i come up with chronicles of a forced bachelor part 2..