On Writing

Have you ever sat alone in front of a blank page or screen trying to coax words out of you, and the ghost of every memorable writer and the shade of every unforgettable piece you've read start showing up somewhere behind your right shoulder, jostling against each other, and start pushing your diffident fingers this way and that?

Yeh Mera India

Ever so often there will come along a really good reason for liking ye olde maadar-e-watan. They come far and few in between, for example you find reasons to like Sweden more often than you find reasons to like India.

But when they do come, it is bril. I would go so far as to say it is chelpark even. Be that as it may...

There is now a weekly train, 6687/6688 that connects Mangalore and Jammu Tawi, rejoicing in the dry sawdust like name Navyug Express. It plods for 67 hours over 3600 odd kilometres up and down the deathless vistas of the sub-continent etc. The timetable is magical. Thalassery, Tiruppur, Tirupati, Tenali, Sevagram, Faridabad, Tohana, Malerkotla, Phagwara, Tanda Urmar (!!) and Kathua all linked by one pantry car. And if that wasn't enough, one portion of the train actually starts in Tirunelveli and joins the mother ship at Soil Degradation, Tamil Nadu (also called Erode, sometimes).

The thought that someone from Kovilpatti may be booking a ticket to Kathua is giving me goosebumps this fine Saturday afternoon.

Dance Baby, Dance

For those who want to know, this is how I dance (when sober):



When not, however, this is how I dance. More accurately, this is how I think I dance:

With A Little Help From My Friends

It's apparently Ringo's birthday today. He's been interviewed.

A few weeks ago the Vatican finally gave its approval to the Beatles. How did you feel about that?

It didn't affect me in any way, but I do believe that the Vatican have better things to deal with than forgiving the Beatles. I don't remember what it actually said — it had some weird piece in it, too. That they've forgiven us for being, what, satanic? Whoever wrote it was thinking about the Stones.

Priceless. Man, I wish that band was still around. Peace and love. Happy birthday, Ringo. Seeing as it is the season of soothsaying octopi,


I do hope Panzerdivision Mannschaft runs roughshod over the cephalopod ("Paul is dead!") tonight.