Category: Google Images

The Walking Stick.

My readers know that I had been using a walking stick since the past four decades due to both hips having been replaced and revised. Since the past six months or so, I have had to move up to using elbow crutches with which I am more stable and confident of moving about.

I am not the man in the picture but I have inserted the image to show what elbow crutches are.

Many people who have known me for long however, do not know that I have upgraded to elbow crutches and must be under the impression that I still use a walking stick. This must be the only reason for me having been flooded since morning with this video clip in my WhatsApp application.

I have been responding with the following message.

“I admire you for your memory remembering me with a walking stick. I however assure you that I am not capable of the acrobatics shown in this video.”

You can imagine the responses that I have been getting for that comment.

What would your reaction be to my response?

Questions And Answers.


Nick has inspired me to write this blog post. His take is quite interesting and I hope that you will go to his blog and read his post.

What is your greatest fear? Being dependant on others for normal day to day living.

When were you happiest? I am by nature a happy person and am unable to point out when I was happiest.

What personal trait do you deplore? Inability to suffer parvenus.

And in others? Snobbery.

Your biggest embarrassment? Being arrested during our Emergency and having to fight a long drawn court battle to finally get acquitted and the case against me dismissed.

Describe yourself in three words: Friendly, Considerate and Generous.

What do you dislike about your appearance? Acne scars.

What would your Super Power be? Can’t think of any.

Apart from property what is your dearest purchase? I haven’t purchased anything extravagant ever.

Your most unappealing habit: Needing solitude.

What scares you about ageing? Being dependant on others for normal day to day living.

Your celebrity crush? Maharani Gayatri Devi of Jaipur.

Would you choose fame or anonymity? The latter thank you.

Who should you say sorry to? Can’t think of anyone as I have apologised whenever I was wrong.

Who would you most like to be? Myself.

When did you last cry? I suffer from Epiphora.

Any brushes with death? Two. One major accident averted during a drive with family in the car and one flight when one engine of the aircraft that I was flying in caught fire and had to be turned off. For about an hour till we landed safely, it was the hardest time I have ever experienced.

Would you prefer sex, money or fame? None. I am too old, have enough to see me through for the rest of my life and am in my own way quite famous.

An important life lesson? Don’t smoke.

Tell us a secret: I am a nut case!

Crazy!


I will start this post with a bit of humour and end it on a very serious note. Both to drive home the thrust of this post.

I am a member of a number of WhatsApp groups and one of the problems of being so is the repetitions that one has to face every day. Some posts go viral so fast that I not only get to see them on various groups but, also through individual messages from contacts.

One such recent video is about a Super Senior gent who is past ninety and still going strong with daily physical exercises, marathon running, proper diet etc, etc, etc. In the clip he is asked about his longevity and he  advices on how to be fit irrespective of one’s age.

Good for him but, my funny bones decided to have a bit of humour with this post as, the gent shares the same surname, xxxxxx as mine. So, on many such posts I commented : “xxxxxxs are crazy. I am one.”

The responses to my comment amazed me. 43% wrote that they totally agreed, or indicated their agreement via thumbs-up emojis or simply by a grinning image.

33% responded with frowning emojis. Need I also add that bar just a few, all shared the surname xxxxxx.  I suppose that these indicated that all xxxxxxs are not crazy.

The balance 23% simply enjoyed the quip and indicated it via smile or grin emojis.

Innumerable contacts decided that discretion is the better part of valour and simply kept quiet.

I have concluded that most people in the world that I occupy consider me as crazy. So be it.

Now coming to the serious part of this post; Please visit Webwisewoman’s blog post I Was Never Old Before.

I hope that you will understand my response in the comments to that post – “No matter what one learns from others about ageing, one has to face up to realities of one’s own situation. In my case, my health issues prevent me from leading the kind of lives that many of my friends and relatives of about my age live. I have accepted this and have modelled mine to give me a contented life. And yes, blogging has been a great outlet for the creative part of me to operate.”

And just as I started to write this post, I received another message from a very dear friend who too is an xxxxxx and like me, a couch potato.

Nastik in Sanskrit means a Non Believer.

Now, you tell me whether I am crazy or not. Thank you.

Daily Routine.

A fellow blogger and  well-wisher,  Jean mailed me to ask if all was well with me as I had not been writing blog posts since early October. I had responded with:

“I am hale and hearty and enjoying being a couch potato.

I have not come up with anything to write about recently. I read your posts every day.

Thank you for asking.

Regards.”

Since then I had seriously been considering coming up with some ideas every now and then to blog more regularly and a golden opportunity presented itself with two running holidays for our newspapers following our five day long Deepavali festival.

As my readers know, my morning routine includes reading five newspapers and solving seven crossword puzzles. I was totally lost during the two days when the newspapers did not arrive and was quite frustrated trying to occupy myself with something else. It is a wonder that I survived.

The delivery of daily newspapers recommenced this morning and I am back on even keel. So much so that I indulged myself with a pedicure/foot massage and a hair cut/beard trim/ head massage as I was lucky to find a noon slot with the pedicurist.

I am feeling great with that indulgence and will now give serious thought to finding things to write about more often.

Surrogacy.


This article explains surrogacy as “is a legal arrangement in which a woman agrees to become pregnant and bear a child for the benefit of another person who will become the kid’s parent.

I am inspired to write this post as a friend, let us call him SMV,  contacted me earlier today to share a family secret about which I was not aware.

I have his permission to write about this, as he hopes that there would be others who may benefit as he and his daughter did due to surrogacy.

His daughter, who I have known since she was a babe in arms was married when she was 21 and was unable to conceive for many years. After investigation, it was found that she had a medical condition that made it impossible to conceive in her uterus, and the couple were advised to get a child via the surrogacy route which is legal in India.

I have met the grandchild who is now a strapping young lad full of beans and good cheer and I never knew that he came into their household thanks to the surrogacy programme available in India.

So, what inspired SMV to share this information with me after all these years? He compared the surrogacy process to the Koel in my blog post Invasion, begetting its chicks via the surrogate route using the Bulbul as the surrogate mother!

Strange how one innocuous thing leads to another!

Invasion!

Among the many things that I enjoy in the mornings when I sit with my mug of tea in our veranda, the sound of the koel calling inevitable brings back memories of an old Hindi song.

Two pairs of Bulbuls have nested in our home. One in the hedge bordering our garden and one on top of a window in our kitchen. You can see the latter below.
The one below is a google image of a nest with an egg, very similar to the one in our garden hedge.
I have been witness to the shenanigans of a pair of Koels who have hijacked the nest in the garden to dump koel eggs in it as they do either in these or crow’s nests. The hapless Bulbuls keep trying to chase the koels away with little success as the latter are much bigger and simply ignore the former.

Fascinating sight of one of nature’s phenomena. I have only heard / read about koels dumping their eggs in the nests of other birds as they do not build nests of their own, and this morning ballet is simply too interesting to ignore. It takes the allure of my morning dose of news papers to drag me away.