The Turtle Picnic

(sourced from the internet):

The Turtle Picnic

A turtle family decided to go on a picnic. Turtles, being naturally slow about things, took seven years to prepare for their outing. Finally the turtle family left home looking for a suitable place. During the second year of their journey they found a place ideal for them at last!

For about six months they cleaned the area, unpacked the picnic basket, and completed the arrangements. Then they discovered they had forgotten the salt. A picnic without salt would be a disaster, they all agreed. After a lengthy discussion, the youngest turtle was chosen to retrieve the salt from home. Although he was the fastest of the slow moving turtles, the little turtle whined, cried, and wobbled in his shell. He agreed to go on one condition: that no one would eat until he returned. The family consented and the little turtle left.

Three years passed and the little turtle had not returned. Five years... six years... then on the seventh year of his absence, the oldest turtle could no longer contain his hunger. He announced that he was going to eat and begun to unwrap a sandwich. At that point the little turtle suddenly popped out from behind a tree shouting, "See! I knew you wouldn't wait. Now I am not going to go get the salt."

Go Zlatan!

So who's gonna win Euro 2012?
My pick is a Germany vs Spain final, with a victory for...Germany.....no Spain.....err...Germany....no Spain.........don't know!

Pity that Zlatan scored the above beauty in a game of no consequences!

Pencil-Box

It was a trip down memory lane as I reminisced the good old primary school days when the classroom was a melting point of the middle class and the extremely affluent.

Given than everyone wore the same uniform, a kid's net worth was well represented in a few essentials: the water bottle, the lunch box and its contents, and the pencil-box.

Back then I had a simple pencil-box. The kind where you would open the box and stuff in all your pencils, eraser ( or 'rubber' as we called it) and the sharpener.

I never really had to buy a pencil-box. Most of my friends' parents were creatively challenged so for every birthday party I would have atleast 7-8 different types of pencil-boxes as birthday gifts.

Frankly speaking, buying a gift for your kid's friend's birthday party is one of the most agonizing routines Indian parents have faced since Manmohan Singh opened up the economy. Thus gifting a pencil-box is the safest option for an Indian parent taking their kids to their friends’ birthdays. It always comes across as well-meaning- "You should study well beta. Ok?” (Yeah! and then give you nightmares as the kid studies hard and scores more marks more than your son)!

The stock of pencil-boxes at home were also the supply of gift ideas for birthday parties my sister and I went to. So it would often happen that a pencil-box I received as a birthday gift would travel across 2-3 homes and again wind up in our house as a birthday gift for my sister.

I particularly remember my green metallic pencil-box in class 5. It had the cool dude 'Fido-Dido" character from 7-Up laced all over it. I would carry one ink pen and 2 pencils, along with an eraser, an ink eraser and a sharpener. Oh and a ruler!

The box had 2 compartments. The upper tray had my precious Hero ink pen (we had just graduated to ink then), and my ruler tucked underneath that. Not surprisingly the ruler always had ink stains. The lower tray had more room; it housed the 2 pencils and the rest of the armory.

Most of the time though, the bottom tray would be full of pencil shrapnel. Buried inside the shrapnel would be stickers collected at the local kirana store upon buying Britannia, Lays or Cadbury goodies. I remember wanting to collect 1 more sticker so that I would win a jackpot to meet Sachin Tendulkar and drink Pepsi with him. Or a chance to fly to Australia and get a kangaroo ride. On one occasion I had even packed my bags.

The rich boys in the class had hi-tech pencil-boxes. You pressed a button and a lever opened out to sharpen the pencil. You pressed another button and the upper tray opened up. You pressed one more and a side panel opened up to pick up the eraser and dump all the pencil shrapnel). It was classic Toy Story! Years later it would inspire Rajnikanth.

The version for the girls, I remember, was in pink and had a button which when pressed would throw open a mini mirror. Girls often carried little candy in their pencil-boxes.

Pencil-boxes also found another use in pencil-box fights. This was in addition to the pencil fights, pen fights, rubber-fights, sharpener fights, and rubber-sharpener fights.  Today we call it the IPL.

Most boys would use their pencil-boxes to hoard chalk-pieces for throwing at each other. The girls would steal all the colored chalks, so they could help their mothers with rangoli at home (as i learnt from my sister) Sorry teachers!

In high school, the pencil-box became a little less relevant. Most people carried what I would call a pencil 'pouch'- a bag like carry-on, the shape of a pencil-box, with a zip and string to ply along with. My sister loved these because she said it gave them early introduction into what would later become their handbags. They had gorgeous colors and varieties of different designs. Most guys had black or grey ones.

Those were good times indeed!

iPad for MPs

So there was the recent news that our Members of Parliament (MPs) would be given iPads and their so called 'computer allowance ' would now be increased to 2 lakh rupees per year.

Interesting times.

The government of India needs to rise to the occasion and send a representative to the Apple headquarters in Cupertino,California.

And make some changes to the iPad for MPs.

To start with, the touchscreen of the iPad is just not good enough for Indian terrain...err the floor...i mean the floor of the house!

The touchscreen should be laced with a coating of plexi-glass and other mind-boggling combinations of anorexic hydrates that will make the surface hard enough.

MPs are too lazy to clap when someone speaks in Parliament.

They bang their desks.(why do we still blame school kids)

So the iPad must be really strong and resistant to table banging.

The current design of the iPad will lend itself to being smashed into pieces of glass each time the Prime Minister stands up to speak.

The front camera must have an improved resolution. It should allow the back benchers of the opposition to look at the entire house and check if anyone is playing games on their iPad instead of focusing on the debate in parliament.

It will also allow women leaders to look more finely at the jewelry worn by other women MPs- since there are MPs from across the country, women can take pictures of other women MPs even as they pretend to be reading the manuscript of the speech being delivered by Union Minister of Masala Dosas.

iPad2 comes with Facetime.

This is extremely important for MPs. However the current design must be further improved to allow MPs to talk simultaneously with their husbands/wives, the members of the Rajya Sabha(who, oh-by-the-way are also going to be gifted by iPads) as well as people at Ramlila who do not have an iPad but are doing an iFast wearing caps that read "iAnna"

The iPad will operate only on wifi and not on 3G. That is because the government came up with this plan post the 2G scam. Anyways that is for another discussion on another day. 

The government actually does not want the MPs to use the internet while inside the parliament. I think thats a joke! Because one of the MPs will start a fast at Ramlila and soon there will be wifi in the Parliament. Its already there in the Parliament canteen, which is where long lost buddies who fought in the college elections discover each other and plot to bring the Government down when they get back to the Parliament building after finishing their tea.

We will also need the government to develop some critical applications or Apps for the iPad for MPs.

For e.g, the LokSabha Snake-n-Ladders game:

Basically each MP takes turns to roll a digital dice. Based on the count the MP climbs positions in the virtual Lok Sabha. The MP who reaches the Finance Minister's seat gets to take off for the rest of the day.

The only catch: Members who want to play should use their iPad and study the proceedings of the day when they go home. There will be an assignment and questions will range from "what was the color of the saree worn by the Leader of the Opposition?", to, "how many times did the Prime Minister blink his eyes?" to something pretty straightforward as "which MP was sleeping whole day?"

Another application would be a media application.

This is where each MP can get to interact with the media by sitting in his seat in the Parliament. All that they have to do is make a facial expression via Facetime each time a news reporter asks a question.

A social network application only for the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha should be preinstalled on the iPad.

This will allow members from obscure constituencies to network with MPs from more forward cities like the metros and basically learn how to wear their dhoti properly when they come to the parliament.

The government must select iPads of different hues.

Apple products come in a wonderful array of colors.

I suggest the BJP MPs get orange or red.

The Congress MPs can get white.

All women MPs can get pink along with a pink smart cover. It is also recommended that women MPs get iPads designed with a special metal casing that can double up as a mirror in preparation for their evening kitty party.

Sorry. No cricket apps.
Those still crazy about cricket must go to the Rajya Sabha and listen to Sachin Tendulkar.

Once the MPs have iPads there will no longer be any need for paper circulation of bills. Everything will be digitally available on the iPads.

However the Speaker must give periodic instructions to the members that they should use the iPad only after washing their hands. Else the oil from the samosas and the kachoris will basically create a mockery of the iPad screen (and of the LokPal Bill)

When there is a debate, the members of the opposition can download all the news articles from across the world and use them for their speeches.

They can also click photos and email them to each other and then raise a no-confidence motion on the government on the grounds that they caught the Union Minister of Pajamas watching a Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge on his iPad instead of listening the speech made by the Union Minister of Pollution.

Its important that MPs do not get too excited by playing with the iPads

Finally I propose that each member of Parliament return the iPad if they lose the election to the next Parliament. That way we can ensure that whatever happens in the LokSabha and RajyaSabha..stays in the LokSabha and RajyaSabha

PS: The views expressed are purely fictious and are of my own. They are not meant to influence or demean any political party or the other! Go buy an iPad!