Joey: Hey man, how you doing?
Chandler: Man, I feel really bad after that break-up (with Janice).
Joey: Aw man. Here, I will order some pizza, and we will watch all my taped re-runs of Baywatch, OK?
Reality:
Friend: Hey man, wassup?
Me: Man, I feel so down.
(Soon to be former) Friend: Hey man, shit happens. Suck it up.
I am just kidding about the soon-to-be-former part, of course. I feel a lot better now. As Ruby said, apparently yesterday was the most depressing day of the year. I have one of those days. Life, everything, seems to be at a stand still and for some reason you feel the weight of the world on your shoulders.
At those moments you take a deep breath and start counting your blessings. Your family, for one. I look at all the wacky families I know and repeat my thanks that my parents and siblings are all normal people. Your health, for another. And so on. It starts making you feel a lot better.
I watched Shah Rukh Khan host Kaun Banega Crorepati (the Indian version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire). He is a funny host, except when he tries to talk to the computer (Compaq Da?).
* * *
A family friend came over today, including his ten year old son. While perusing the house he came across my PS2 and the games collection.
"Can I play?" He asked, pointing to the console that was beneath the TV, locked in the stand.
"Um, no." I replied.
"Why?"
I quickly thought of an excuse.
"Some of the games cannot be read." I answered. It wasn't a lie. Some of the 4 year old game CDs, that has been scratched really badly, could not be read.
"Oh," the dude paused, and then replied, "well you know what you can do? You can take the CD and wash it with the soap they use in dishwashers, it works great."
I looked at him in shock. He's ten years old. He's not supposed to know anything except Yu-Gi-Oh.
"Well," I tried to bluff, "what if the PS2 itself cannot read the CDs?"
Notice I didn't lie. I just asked a question.
"Well," the little dude answered that question, "then it's probably the lens. You need to clean the lens with a special solution."
"How the hell-" I caught my language in time. "How do you know all this?"
I am telling you, kids nowadays. They should ban How Things Work and the Discovery Channel from some houses. I let him play the PS2 for sometime, he seemed to know his stuff.
Trust me Mezba, it always seems as though the generation after you knows way more than you do. My sibblings kids know so much more than I do about technology that it's INSANE! I felt so insecure in Pakistan last time when I had to ask my little nephew and niece for help switching on the telly and reciver...
ReplyDeleteDon't worry, you're not the only one.
Lovies,
S
My dear Sir Mezba,
ReplyDeleteYou are so precious. Shit happens, "wash" it up! If it still bothers you, write to me. We'll chat and I'll show you my awful baby photos and I bet you you'll laugh :) Or we could remember our school!!!!!! That will surely make you happy.
Your depression brought out an awesome poet out of you - that's a good point!
Love,
Suroor
Good to see you are back on your "Happy Feet".
ReplyDeleteAt least it wasn't the little terror you had visit on Eid! But yes, kids these days know a lot about technology, and here we are thinking we are all up to speed with it!
smart kid eh? :)
ReplyDeletekids nowadays know alot more than half of us! lol
kids these days are way ahead of us. YouTube, Facebook, mySpace - you name it, they know ALL about it.
ReplyDeleteWelcome back! It's good to hear that you are feeling much better and yes, sometimes @#$% happens, it's part of life. Anyway, I once read this thing that February was the most depressing month of the year,guess why? well, that's when all the bills start coming in after the december shopping spree, and of course, the WINTER! My 5 yr old whom I have not bought a single video game seems to know enough that sometimes leaves me baffled. :( sf
ReplyDeleteGlad you're having a better day! Kids are waaaaaaaaaay smarter than we were at their age though...makes me worry a bit
ReplyDeleteNow I know it was probably just an accident, but I couldnt get my remote control programmed, so I just left it and used the old one.
ReplyDeleteSinan, about 14 months old at this time. Get it and starts playing with it. Within the space of about ten minutes he has it working.
LOL!
Samosa, no kidding. I was in Bangladesh couple of years ago and the kids knew all about cable splitting, routers, GPS on phone and of course how to steal electricity from next door! It was mind boggling in a way. My sibling has a computer now at grade 7 (and they need it for their 'projects' too). Not to mention an ipod, a gameboy, a PS2 (shared) ... the only thing he doesn't have (to best of my knowledge) at his age AND I didn't have at this age is a girl friend.
ReplyDeleteDame chick, lol! Double lol on the school. Oh that sure brought out the cheers. I even remembered something I will post later, sure to send some middle east people into nostalgic mode.
Mousehunter, Oh no.. not the Eid terror. If that dude comes not only do I hide the PS2 I hide everything. It's like a mini operation that we (all siblings united on this front) have it mastered. We only take 7.3 minutes to complete it now.
Ruby, yep yep makes me scared too. I have more stories of this kid. My cichlids (fishes) had babies in the aquarium. So I was like, man these professional fish farmers must be able to know when a fish is full of eggs so as to separate them from other fish. And he, just standing there watching the aquarium, was like, no, for trouts for example they just squeeze the female fish's bottom to take the eggs out, then they take the male 'sperm' out from the male fish and its all in the laboratory. And I was like WTF... man some people have WAY too much knowledge.
Abu Sinan, see, they are starting at an younger age now. Soon they will take over the world. You must be on guard!
lol - hopefully he didn't change the language setting to Spanish!
bint muhammad, you should just see the amount of stuff my siblings know about computers. And they are not even techies. I can't even lie any excuses now for not being able to download some new games, they know where to get the torrent file and how to set the firewall and whatnot.
ReplyDeletekhonika, I was surprised to see my twelve year old cousin on facebook! It was supposed to be for Univ students only!
sf, It was a bit more than just winter, but that definitely had a role too. We were all enjoying such a glorious non-winter winter! Aaggh... at least I can go skiing now.
sometimes, a person feels down..but then re-visiting all the things s/he is thankful for in life, the sadness seems to go away because there are a whole lot of other people who are probably doing more worse than most of us. So, we can definitly be thankful for all that.
ReplyDeleteAs for the SRK hosting KBC, he is trying very much to keep the same hype as Senior Bachchan did when he hosted the show.
1. At some points he called the computer "computer da"
2. "Freeze kardiya jaaye?"
3. "Aa Galey Lag Jaa"
4. "Give me High Five"
-Behbood
Salamaat,
ReplyDeleteno one to put you in your place than a kid...did he call you "uncle" by the way?
:)
I flipped out when I went home and little kids were kissing my hand (the way we did with OLD people) and calling me aunty.
Talk about depressing...
This kid knows how fish farmers/breeders manipulate fish gestation? Wow... When I was a kid I knew Barbie needed shoes to match her outfit...hmmm...I must have been a really dumb kid but I turned out semi ok...
ReplyDeleteWhen I was his age Pluto was a planet!
Behbood, I never saw Big B on KBC so can't comment, but apparently he had more gravitas and SRK is more .. jovial. He certainly had many chuckle moments last night. Oh he totally butchered that Bangla song he sang, worse pronunciation than Colbert on Hindi. The music video was cool but if they showed it everyday that just takes 5 minutes and its too long. I hope it was a one-off.
ReplyDeleteMaliha, no he did NOT call me uncle. I don't have that problem. Not yet. I am still a "bhaia". I am ok with bhaia as long as its not young women who call me that. Then I am definitely depressed ;-)
Ruby, Pluto was a planet.. good one! And I had learnt that light traveled in a straight line (no longer true). About Barbie.. hehe... we had matchbox cars and Fisher price toolkits.
Wow, this kid is sharp. Dishwashing liquid? Who woulda thought! Does that only work on PS2 games or also Xbox stuff? Maybe I should call this kid and ask.
ReplyDeleteWAtch a Senior Bachchan hosted KBC episode which features Kajol and Ajay devgan come in and play for a charity.
ReplyDeletehttp://youtube.com/watch?v=Hiaktut-sOA
-Behbood
Maleeha I asked one coworker and he said the technique is right and works on DVDs with scratches. So I guess Xbox will work too. But use only if it is unplayable on the dvd player or in bad condition.
ReplyDeleteBehbood will take a look.
Kids these days :S
ReplyDeleteMakes you feel old doesn't it ?!
You handled your depression well. also start counting my blessings though in my heart I dont feel happy about it. It takes time. Glad you're on the other side now.
ReplyDeleteliya,Aisha: thanx for the 'best' wishes :-P
ReplyDelete