A bird, a plane.... or is it just me?

``Jimmy! How are you ever going to get into a second childhood when you don't get out of your first one?!''

This happened last week. My dad was the one doing the yelling and his victim was little ol' me - doing something as harmless as reading an Incredible Hulk comic.

Can't blame him ... I mean .. how would you feel if you had a kid who worked someplace as serious as a newspaper but came down every vacation just to laze away his hours with Spiderman and Wonder Woman?

Can't blame me, either. Coz I just happen to love them guys in tight nylon and colourful underwear - whether they are saving damsels in distress or reducing whole cities to rubble with huge swipes of gigantic green hands and HULK SMASH!! war cries.

And many a time have I sat and wondered which superguy I would like to be ... and for some reason, Spidey has always been my hot favourite.

Mebbe its because I am a journalist, just like ol' Peter Parker. Or mebbe its coz I have an editor who bears an uncanny resemblance to J Jonas Jameson (especially when he roars at me with his mouth wide open). Or mebbe coz I have also lost a Gwen Stacy from my life (though I guess this one did not go tumbling from the Washington bridge).

Or mebbe ... just mebbe it's coz my wildest fantasy is to swing from skyscraper to skyscraper leaving loads and loads of gooey webbing in my wake.

Superman? Naah! His might be a pretty boring job... fighting green aliens, grovelling under rays of ozonised kryptonite every other day and last and worst of all, telling idiot schoolkids to avoid littering the place with chewin gum wrappers.

But really, the big blue is a bit too nice, a bit too perfect and a bit too invulnerable. Nothing nutty about him - so unlike me, so unlike anybody I would ever like to be. And there are times when I actually wish that Brainiac wins a bout, for a change.

But what really beats me is why Spiderman curses life as much as he does. C'mon, he's got a job, he's got webbing, he's got Mary Jane and he's got funny guys like the Green Goblin and Venom keeping his life from getting too boring.

Someone help me on this one.

Genie in a Basket

About three months ago, I became an uncle. And guess who was responsible! Well, thought I should put the li'l chimp in my blog - lend it some colour and stuff.

HOME AGAIN ....

Last year’s December was my worst ever.

The days were going slow … the flowers seemed to be having a good time frowning at me and … more importantly, I had come down with a hell-of-a-monstrous writer’s block, which had made me distance myself from blogworld for quite a while. Later, a good friend of mine - S – had left for some greener pasture, abandoning me to a very lonely feeling.

Thought Santa Claus and his merry season would change all that.

Wrong again. December 26th brought with it a gift that nobody would have expected: a gigantic tsunami that came, conquered and snuffed out thousands of lives. The survivors, including me, were left with a feeling that was not very Christmassy…

I just needed a break. A 200-mile journey back to my native place. To meet my folks. To play around with my cat. To watch HBO 24-7. To indulge in the joy of stuffing myself with food without having to pay for it … heh.

I am writing this from home. Mom’s watching something on TV and dad is out there, feeding the goats (Oh, didn’t I tell you – they are the new additions to my dad’s assortment of farm animals). And there’s a big crow sitting on my windowsill and the stupid bird does not seem to know the meaning of SCAT!

My house’s located in a quaint little country-side, with greenery all around and a cute little stream that has little fish jumping in and out of it at regular intervals. Little wishing wells dot the scenery and if you look closely, you would be able to see little brown pixies jeering at you from beneath the leaves.

Well, kidding … really. I have never seen any pixies – at least not when I wasn't drunk. But pssst, let me tell you this, GOBLINS exist! If you don’t believe me, come over to my office and take a look at my boss sometime.

And right now I am living the good life … I wake up at seven every morning – coz my dad insists that I accompany him on his morning walks. My mom has me eating my fill and though it’s been only four days since I reached here, I am already stouter. So, really! Life's going just perfect for me - which is why I don’t know what else to put in this one …

There are no tough policemen here and there ain’t nobody in particular to mistake me for a plumber. My hair’s grown back (well, most of it, anyway) and people don’t refer to me as a bogeyman here – in fact, they all know me.

And I still have a few more days to enjoy myself – before a train takes me back to the big bad city, where I would find lots of stuff to curse (and later, blog) about ... AHAAA!