Pieces of the Puzzle

I won’t deny the fact that I was an evil prankster, much more sinister than I am now. Cheap thrills make me do it. Apart from the ones I have mentioned in this blog before, here are some more-

 

When I was in high school (during the time when talking to guys was a big deal), me and a friend called a dozen of my classmates (guys) as Roshni from Adarsh Vidyalaya (a school known for hipper babes) on the pretext of doing an assignment on ‘school boys’! Yeah, the geeks fell for something as preposterous as that and answered all my outrageous questions patiently. Some guys who wouldn't lift their eyes off the books admitted that they would like to have a girlfriend. Scandalous! My other girlfriends would be thrilled with this info. Next day, every guy was talking about this Roshni and pitying the other guys who hadn’t got her call. ‘Sorry buddies’, I thought sagely, ‘Only if I knew your numbers.’ They were flying high having spoken to some babe who sounded much cooler than their nerdy classmates. Oh well, I just decided not to break the news that it was me lest they tie me upside-down from the basketball loop for playing with their minds and prying into their deep dark secrets. It’s OK that I didn’t receive any credit for that prank; wise decisions come rarely to me.

It became serious business when girls started out-sourcing crank-calls to me as I could pull it off without a wayward giggle. Me, my mom and my brother denied having anything to do with the staggering phone bills, so my dad’s suspicion lay on our cat. Before my dad had further heart attacks, some one smart came up with email. Email opened a whole new realm of opportunities. I could kill five birds with one fake id. If you happen to be a friend with a decent sense of humor, you could have received a mail from Shyla Krishnan, Sapna Bhargava or Sweety Baroness. If you haven’t, please work on your sense of humor. Or just be glad.

 

Recently, one soul thought that Sapna was an artist who wanted to paint his portrait, in Mughal clothes holding a rose, for an upcoming Indian restaurant in the locality. We even fixed the time for head measurements for the turban. The guy was in a state of shock when he ultimately came to know who Sapna really was, especially when he had just finished giving the mirror the 67^th look for the hour. A lot of egoistic guys out there, I say.

 

One day, I logged on to msn. I saw my then roommate. I logged off. I created another id, which resembled her boyfriend’s id. Just inter-changed a couple of letters and logged back on. As predicted she began, “Hi Kittu Puttu” *heart* *heart* *heart* 

 

I played along till I was almost gagging with the endearments and decided to stop this before it got too personal (yes, I do have a conscience sometimes).

 

So I typed, “You know, I think your roomie Alpha is very beautiful.”

 

“What??!!” *angry smiley*

 

hmm..she thinks I am not. Wait till I get home; no cooking tonight!

 

Before I could move on to Alpha’s clothes, she found out and gushed out, “Oh Gosh, Alpha! Its YOU!!!! Jeezzz! My God! I feel so dumb! Hehehe!” *embarrassed smiley*

 

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With all the enemies I have made, you can imagine why I stay alert and paranoid all the time to a point where I have started doubting perfectly genuine emails.

 

One Mr. Jay Something emailed me to my office address.

Sorry I couldn’t meet you the other day at the Future City Volunteering Competition. I hope we can fix another time.

 

Convinced that this was indeed a prank, as I had not promised to meet anyone by the name of Jay Something, I replied with a curt – WHY?

 

He replied with a one liner- To discuss sedimentation remediation process, of course.

 

Ha! Is this the latest pickup line, dude? The only sediment I am aware of is in my kitchen sink.

 

Yes, I am sometimes delusional apart from being dumb.

 

Mr Jay something was not very amused, “In my 20 years of service. I have never received such a harsh reply! I am disappointed.”

 

A rude jolt and a frantic search in google reveals that this guy is a grandpa who has been in the business for many years (20, to be precise), won a few awards and could ruin my career if he so pleased. This dude Jay Something had the worst sense of humor I have come across, not to mention an attitude problem. He didn’t even apologize for the identity mix-up, while I had to do all the apologizing while referring him to someone who had better knowledge on sediments in my company. Phew!

 

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I do live on the edge. In spite of all this, I haven’t been victimized (or conned) in a big way at all. ‘Oh look, there is a red mark on your forehead’ doesn’t count. I can find two explanations to this-

-People are in general are much nicer than me.

-They have much better things to do with their lives.