One For The Men

One For The Men

Yesterday was International Women’s Day and my whole blog roll was filled with posts praising women, many of them even written by men trying to impress the ladies (really guys? that desperate?) not that that works. Anyhow reading through at least a few of those syrupy posts in addition to causing a dry-retching made us of the AAP- simply mad at all the male bashing taking place in the guise of women-praising. So in effect fulfilling our primary USP of AAP- Hear the other side, we have decided to set the record straight with a point by point rebuttal. This one is for everyone- male and female.

(Drum roll)

1) Myth : You Can’t Beat Women At Arguments

     Fact : Hell Yes, you can. It merely takes time, patience, long fingernails and a strong bladder in that order. Don’t believe popular propaganda- if you put your mind to it, you can beat anyone at any argument, as long as you are provided with adequate ad breaks, tea breaks and optional pee breaks. When an argument with a woman breaks out, you should first of all take a comfortable seat (in anticipation of being there a long time -so why not get comfortable) and then you just need to chew off those long finger nails (while pondering over the question of who will replace Sachin Tendulkar at no.4 in the test squad)) till they run out of arguments and then have the satisfaction of having the last word. Or in my case the last laugh. By the time they realize that all those swear words and screaming has had no effect and that you are still nonchalant as ever, they are on a slow burn and then to give a finishing touch you give them the benefit of your last laugh, a long bellyaching one (just imagine Suresh Raina at no.4 replacing Sachin) and then the woman will self-combust spontaneously. Mission accomplished -walk away with an evil laugh.

      Of course this only succeeds when you are not within touching or striking distance. If you anticipate any violence start off by announcing that you have not bathed that day and that will keep them at arm’s length and save you the trouble of a visit to a orthopedic doctor to treat broken bones. If you are caught in an argument unaware at a dinner table, try to poke holes in the table cloth or place mat with your fork. That will help the waiters to effect an emergency rescue by evicting you immediately from the place. Plus it will have the collateral effect of diverting the argument away from the intended topic and into the immediate provocation. Don’t worry, women always have a long list of pending topics to argue about and it takes very little to divert them from the main topic at hand, to well down the list to your minor faults.

2) Myth : Women Are Better At Bargaining Than Men.

     Fact:    This only applies when the seller or shopkeeper is a man too. And that’s because women get down to the level of the shopkeeper to bargain while we  men always bargain in a stand-offish way. We never squat or bend or distract the attention of the shopkeeper in any way while bargaining. In this women have a natural advantage for very few men learn the fine art of bargaining and how to clinch a bargain with a little cleavage show on display. Unless the man has some man-boobs too. In that case both are on equal ground and it simply requires stamina to wear the shopkeeper down. In the rare occasion of a female seller, turning on a little charm (from the reserves of your abundant charisma) and a leering smile has them offering bargains you never dreamed of (in fear of being hit-on or stalked?). Job done.

3) Myth: Women Are Better At Multi-Tasking.

     Fact : Really? What makes you think that? Definition of Multi-tasking: Doing more than one task at a time. Oh we agree that women work at the office, work at home, take care of the husband, the kids etc. but is that strictly multi-tasking? its all uni-tasking done simultaneously. For true multi-tasking think like a man. wake up  with a hard-on, brush, shave, and work hard all day with a hard-on and then you can learn what true multi-tasking is. When you are mind is always on something else, even carrying on routine chores become multi-tasking. And all men do this every single day without boasting of being accomplished multi-taskers.

4) Myth: Women Are Better At Showing Affection

      Fact: women are better at DISPLAYING affection; not in showing it. Two men, when they meet can show more affection in single syllables than two women with pages and pages of emotion-filled dialogues. If you have ever seen two guys talk, the first greeting, that single "Dei" speaks volumes in guy talk. But that’s the secret of the bro code and i cannot in good faith explain trade secrets anymore. Plus men never have the irrepressible urge to dress up women in the name of affection. Women have a natural inclination to dress up men like they are a Barbie play doll or something. This even extends to being forced to wear long sleeved shirts in madras summer or to buying totally tacky checked shirts, just because Simbu wore one in VTV and it looked good on him. If you want to imagine yourselves as Trisha and wear starched cotton saris all the year around please do , but why torture us into copying Simbu of all people?

(Editor – Ok; that’s totally off-track, suggest you return to topic)

5) Myth: Women Make Better Cooks.

   Fact: That might be, but we men make better eaters and that evens out things. Have you ever seen women peck at the food they themselves cook? Makes you wonder why? And worry whether they still remember that last fight and have some grudge to get rid of. You can never eat at peace until the cook fills up their own plate substantially. Anything else is risking food-poisoning. And yet we men do it every single day at the risk of our lives. Don’t we deserve a pat on the back for that?

 But this restriction to hearty eating only applies to self cooking. Take a woman out to dinner and watch her demolish ice cream after ice cream after ice cream with relish while you sip cold water with a still-gnawing stomach, because of your never-ending diet and curse your slow metabolism on your  genes.

 So those are the reasons we feel that men deserve to celebrate this day too- share it in a sense. And Women, ask yourself honestly, do you really think a single day is enough to celebrate as your own and do you really need the validation of men to do that? (Especially as most men who wish you that day will be closet-chauvinists who spout wishes in public and treat the women at home as dirt?). Take a call and celebrate the year through. More power to you. And before I forget - wish you a "Belated Happy Women’s Day" on Behalf of Audi Altem Partem.

Café, Coffee and Sex- An Erotic Short Story

Disclaimer: This Post was written for a friend who was raving about the Fifty Shades of Grey books and how they defined erotica for her. I wrote this just to prove a point- the point being that fifty shades is in no way a great example of the fine art of erotica and I could write better with my eyes blindfolded. So I leave it you readers to judge whether I can indeed write Erotica or not. As always this post contains explicit sexual description, full frontal nudity and heavy sex acts and hence not suitable for anyone under 18 years- reader’s discretion advised…

Café, Coffee and Sex- An Erotic Short Story

He was pissed off. She should have been here by now, however bad the traffic was. She wasn’t. So that meant she had stood him up and also maybe found someone else. An entire day ruined, especially this day of all days- Valentine’s day, when he should be with someone or anyone instead of alone. It was too late to go find if anyone else was free. Unless. Unless he could find that someone else here itself. Controlling his irritation at having been stood up, he took a few deep breaths and cast a practiced eye over the other patrons of the coffee bar. There. That one looked good to go. She was not too young, but still good looking. And she was fidgeting around with her tablet while she kept glancing alternatively at her watch and the entrance to the coffee bar. She should do he thought as he left his un-tasted coffee at the table and getting up sauntered nonchalantly over to her table. He stood beside her table for a minute, eyes boring into her until she looked up startled and almost dropped the tablet she was holding in her hand. Satisfied that he had got her attention he put a hand on the table and gracefully swivel-dropped into the seat opposite her. Surprise was etched in every line of her face as she stared mouth open at this imperious stranger who intruded on her privacy. “Mind if I join you for a cup of coffee?” he asked as he stared back into her eyes with an intensity to match her stare. “Hell yes, I mind very much. Go sit somewhere else. Don’t disturb me or” she didn’t finish as he signaled the waiter to come over with a wave. “One Irish for me” he said giving the waiter a knowing look and “refill for madam whatever she is having”. She was flabbergasted at the nerve of the man “no thanks, I am fine, I don’t want you to get me anything. Look, this is harassment. Please leave before I call the security. I don’t want to make a scene here” even as she was saying this he cut her of mid sentence and “And you won’t. Won’t make a scene, that is” he assured her as if he knew somehow. She went on as if she hadn't heard him, for two can play at this game she felt “look there, there are plenty of other free tables. This is a private table I am waiting for someone”. And he smoothly stepped in “and been waiting long enough for someone who is not going to turn up and why are we even discussing this now? The absent people of our lives. Haven’t we got anything better to talk about? Like us?” he asked as the waiter stepped in smartly between them to pour their respective orders.

She let the waiter leave before she started talking again and that surprised her. If she really had been serious about having the guy evicted from her table she could have just asked the waiter to help. But she hadn't. And why was that? She asked herself. Something about the cool confidence of the man opposite had unsettled her. With not a little surprise she realized that her heart was mildly pounding inside her chest with excitement. She had resigned herself to disappointment when her soon-to-be-ex husband hadn’t turned up with the divorce papers. But that was so typical of the man. He was never on time for anything. Even for his wedding bed. But this man, the man opposite her, a cool customer if ever there was one, was promising to make her evening different. With a small shudder of excitement she found herself drinking the coffee he had ordered for her and checking him out over the rim of the cup. 

When he felt that cool appraisal, he knew he had won. The balance had shifted decisively to his side. He knew now that she would not ask him to leave. And he knew too that when he left later on, she would be leaving with him. He knew that. And he knew that she knew it too, at some level, even if she didn’t acknowledge it   to herself. Well, the evening was not such a waste after all, he thought, as he let her sip the coffee and look him over in silence. The bitch who had stood him up would have taken more of his time and effort- the usual three ring dating circus- an hour talking her up over coffee, and hour feeding her over dinner, and an hour getting her drunk at some night club before he could get inside her panties. But this was woman looked someone who knew her way around. He was sure that he could cut off the entire circus and get right to the chase with this one. If he didn’t muff up after this, and he was pretty damn sure that he wouldn’t, then maybe inside of an hour he would be buried deep inside the woman opposite him, the one staring at him and waiting for him to give her more rough treatment.

“So?” he asked her and dragged that word for a few seconds more than necessary “are we gonna sit here all evening slurping coffee? Or are we gonna move on to bigger and better things?” he asked as he gave her a lopsided mischievous grin “things like having dinner?” he signaled at the same time to the waiter and silently mouthed bill towards him. As the waiter hurried on to get them their bill, she felt that she should assert herself at this juncture at least, as she didn’t want to be thought too easy a pickup, although some part of her inside was salivating at this description of the bigger and better things promised to her that evening. “And what if I have plans otherwise?” she asked in what she hoped was a nonchalant voice. But he wasn’t fooled she could see. He stared wordlessly at her a few seconds and she squirmed at that close and penetrating stare, a stare which started at her eyes and penetrated to the depths of her soul. And then he said “but we will change them wont we? Whatever other plans we have? We have more important things to do now” with a big stress on the “do”. And as she heard that she felt her mouth go dry. This is it. She thought. Crunch time. She now knew what he was after. What the evening promised. She could pick up her bag and walk out now and save herself further complications. Or she could go with the flow and end up in this stranger’s bed. But she had to decide now. 

And even as she was thinking this over, she saw that he had paid off the bill and was standing beside her waiting expectantly, looking down at her cleavage with a hunger which frightened her and oddly felt exhilarating too. She could feel a hot burning glow spread warmth over her entire body as he effortlessly hauled her on to her feet and with a proprietary hand placed on the small of her back, guided her between the tables towards the entrance and beyond to the car park. When he got to the car park, he purposefully walked her unto his car without taking his hand off her back the entire way. He knew that his victory hung by a small thread and any lessening of the intensity and she might revert to her senses. He had to attain complete mastery over her, here and now, and then he could relax. And what better place to do that than his car. Thank god, he had had the good sense to bring his bigger vehicle, the Honda SUV tonight. Of course, he had known this evening would end with sex even as he had left his house earlier. But he had thought it would be the hot girl he was chasing after and wrangled a date with earlier. But not this sudden treat with this exotic stranger. He opened the door and gestured her to get inside and without pausing to see if she did get in or not , he walked over around the vehicle and got in on the driver’s side. There. She was in and seated demurely beside him. Round one, for the men’s team he exulted. He turned halfway towards her and ran a finger down her face starting from her forehead lightly trailing his index finger and increasing the pressure as he passed her ear, right down to her jaw line and her upper neck and back again to the corner of her mouth. And then, he slowly inserted his finger into her mouth past her compressed lips. Just a little way in and he waited. She licked it tentatively at first with small flicks of her tongue and then as she started to roll her tongue on it and suck, he pulled it out abruptly with a moan she let it go and looked at him accusingly. “Not here” he said pointing at the security guard watching from a distance “let’s go somewhere else” he said softly. “Where?” she asked him with a sudden impatience which surprised her but not much as her surprise to realize that she was soaking wet down there and he had not even begun. He smiled at her and asked “does it matter as long as it’s private?” she gritted her teeth as she said “not far away then, my cars still parked here, I have to come back” he grinned savagely at that and said “don’t worry I will make sure that you come” he paused and said “back. But tell me, how about lovers lane?” she shook her head with obvious irritation, “too early,  it doesn’t attract a crowd till later on, and from here you can get there in 15 mins, you just have to cross nungambakam and then the chetput bridge and we would be almost the only car parked there if we go n..” she was hurled back into her seat as he savagely pulled out of the parking lot with burning rubber and a sharp turn and headed into prime time mount road traffic “I just know right the spot, near to here, private and kinky as hell, I know you will enjoy doing it there” and ten minutes later they were parked in the rooftop parking terrace of the biggest multiplex in town. 

The movie going crowd had all disappeared inside an hour ago and would not reappear for at least two more hours, which should be plenty of time for what he had in mind. It was just about turning dark but from where they were, they could still see the river cooum down below or the spires of Loyola college in the near distance. That is, if they had been looking out, but they weren’t. They were looking at each other like savage beasts ready to tear at each other’s throats and eat up raw. When the moment for lust arrives, we are stripped down to bare essentials, the animal spirit overriding the veneer of humanity. He looked at her and she looked at him and it was getting steamy in there. She couldn’t stand it any longer and made a move towards him then, but her caught her hand and held it off with immense strength “hold it, let me check something he said and reaching back he pulled out his wallet looked in and then brought out a condom “there” he said with quite satisfaction “now you are safe” . She shrugged and said “I don’t mind either way” he looked surprised “really?”   And she murmured “yes, I pretty much know when not to”. With a sudden jerk which surprised her, she found that her seat had been reclined back, and he was bending over her, even before she could recover from her surprise. He pushed her hair back from her forehead and started kissing her at the temples and then as he went down her face, following her hair line right up to her ears, his tongue flicking in and out making little licks she again brought her hand up to his head and moved her fingers into his hair. By then he his tongue was doing all sort of things inside her ear and she gave a little moan of pleasure as he lightly bit her earlobe and teased it with his teeth pulling on it. As she turned her face towards him to get that probing tongue into her mouth, he again surprised her by firmly turning her face away from him With practiced ease his tongue went behind to her neck  to the spot where her hairline ended and he gently pulled on and teased the skin there with his teeth. She found herself shivering with the unexpected sensations his teeth and tongue where having on her hitherto unexplored pleasure spots. No one else had gone where this man was going and nothing she had ever experienced could match what she was feeling now. She found her palms clenched tightly and hurting her even as he alternately licked, bit and suck all over her neck and collar. Too much, too soon she thought as she felt the familiar tingling coming on. She couldn’t take it any longer but let go of her control, as her body spasmed suddenly, her eyes clenched tight and she felt her entire frame shake with orgasmic bliss and she screamed aloud, even over the soundproofed car windows and the music player turned on.

When she recovered after what must have been a few seconds but felt like hours to her, she found that she had been turned towards the guy beside her, who was looking at her with a sardonic smile, “thank god, they have a horror film running tonight” was all he managed to say as she savagely hooked her fingers in his head and brought his lips down to her. So you want to play rough baby? Let’s see how tough you are he thought as he crushed her mouth with his and brought his tongue into play. As his tongue moved deeper inside her mouth he was surprised to taste a little saltiness, she must have bitten her tongue in her orgasm and was bleeding he decided, so he started to suck a little and then harder and harder on her tongue as she gagged with fright and  tried to pull back to get her breath. But he held on and on until he could see panic in her eyes and then wrenched back his mouth and tongue suddenly out of her as she gulped in air in large ragged breaths. As she recovered her breath, he suddenly bent down and inserting his hands inside her LBD, he tugged at the waist band of that execrable piece of garment called leggings which some women wear (under their dresses) to cover up their long and shapely legs. With one smooth roll of his wrists, he brought it down and she wriggled her bottom up for him to pull it off her completely and he draped it on the gear box between them. When she made a move to get up and help him unzip her dress in the back he firmly pushed her back into her seat and said “honey, that won’t be necessary, I have ways of getting inside there, which do not require you to make a move, just lie back and watch me” and he slowly slid her dress up to her waist and hooking both fingers at the sides of her panties he brought it down her legs and off her ankles and bunching them up he placed them on the dashboard right over his GPS unit. 

She meanwhile, found to her complete surprise, her hands on his pants, unbuttoning his pants, then unzipping his fly and slipping inside, way inside till she felt him. He gave a gasp then as he felt her firmly clench him and pull him out. As she clenched and unclenched her hand tightly squeezing him and felt him growing stronger in her hands she asked “you are ready?”  More a statement than a question as she held the answer to it in her hands. He grinned at her then and said “I was born ready” and even before the words were out, she took him inside her. Even as he entered her he moaned for he hadn’t expected her to be so tight and so hot and so wet that he felt he was about to explode right then inside. He eased off her again slowly, right back the way he had come and holding himself again at the entrance, he bit his teeth, clenched his jaws and willed himself to hold on to relax and not to turn a marathon into a sprint and finally as he calmed he settled down into a ready rhythm. And then there was bliss.

As she got out of his car and was about to walk away she turned to look at him one last time and asked I don’t even know your name?” he smiled at that and said “I am fine with the name you called me at the end”. She smiled in her turn and walked over to her care, got in started it and pulled out of the coffee shop parking. As she passed his waiting car she rolled down her window and mouthed in a whisper “Savage”. And with a last smile she was gone.

You Can’t Be Serious.....A Personal Rant.

 You Can’t Be Serious.....A Personal Rant.

I recently had an excuse to re-examine my sense of humor (or what passes for it) as some people had complained to the admin of a common watsapp group that my humor was offensive and my jokes off-color and it was common consensus that I be kicked out unceremoniously. That gave me pause. And plenty to think. Me? Offensive? Or did they just not get my jokes? My sense of SLY humor? The blame must be with me for what was the point of making a joke if people don’t get the joke at all? So I went back to the group conversations trying to do a post-mortem to see where and how I went wrong. And I confess that I was shocked to see how offensive I sounded compared to the others there. But first, let me share with the readers of this blog how icky and unpleasant my comments were when the others in that group were all so sweet and encouraging, like this (random sample):

You are great

No you are

You are the best

Oh no, not at all, you are

I insist that you are

No I say again it’s you.

Compared to all this sweet, syrupy and cloying conversations, my contributions were sounding tartly and tangy, I guess. I was more like the boy who shouted "but look, the emperor has no clothes on". Maybe true, but not required to be said out aloud. Very hurtful to the feelings, this blurting out of truth is. Lack of tact and diplomacy that’s what it is. And this made me think long and hard on how I ended up becoming like this and I resolved to take a long journey back into the past to see the key moments in my life which shaped me like this.

Ladies and Gentlemen, if you will just hop on to the time machine and come with me to the past. There, look down there, on a bright summer morning in September a baby is born laughing. Ok that’s too far back I guess. So let’s fast forward a bit to my residency days in college.

{The following episode contains a lot of blood and gore and is not recommended for the faint-hearted}

My first day on casualty duty at the old government general hospital in madras (opposite central railway station) was a unique experience- and not merely for the unique stink/stench of the casualty room or the unique size of the mosquitoes there, hanging around to feast on the abundant blood available. As i recall vividly even now, my first ever case i saw that day was a cut-throat case. The patient was a gangster and had been involved in a gang war and someone else had tried to chop off his head separate from his body but had only split his throat from ear to ear till his head was half dangling off his neck With the throat being cut through halfway and the main blood vessel in the neck- the carotid artery slashed, the patient was leaking blood everywhere in huge spurts. As i was on my first day there and the next senior person on duty that night was a greenhorn postgraduate from the general surgery department and this being sometime around 2Am in the night and both of us were feeling the effects of a whole day of work plus constant calls all through the night we decided to send for help from the duty surgeon on call that day.

But till he arrived to take over, we half-trained newbie’s had to keep the patient alive and there was no other option but to tackle the problems ourselves till the senior surgeon came. Between us we decided that the postgrad would suture (stitch) the wounds while i would assist in controlling the bleeding to keep the patient alive and also keep the area to be stitched together free of blood so he could see what he was doing. That was the plan. But once we removed the towel tied around the throat, which had acted as a tourniquet to control the blood flow our plans like all good plans, went to dust in an instant. The postgrad tried his best to suture fast, i tried my best to help him hold the tissues together and all the time to ignore the blood being sprayed on my face like a fountain every few seconds (arterial blood in rhythm with the heart’s pumping) and together we worked fast and desperate for the next half-hour or so till we finally gave up for he had lost too much blood coming to us and we couldn’t (or rather his body couldn’t) compensate even with the fluids (at first) and blood (later) we pumped into him to compensate for the blood loss. That incident taught me something about life, which I have never forgotten. Human life is fragile. Or rather the human body is fragile. Anything and almost everything can hurt us badly. Our body is one of the weakest of all in the animal kingdom and yet we do all the great things we do through two unique human qualities - an indomitable spirit and an unquenchable sense of humor.

 

That’s why I just take it with a pinch of salt when well meaning people advise me to "be serious". Followed often by "this is no joking matter" or "is this a laughing matter?" or "you find this funny?" or "can’t you be more mature?"...sorry, I just don’t look at the world the way you do. Show me the gloomiest of circumstances and I can always find a little humour in it. Might be black humor in the bleakest of outlooks, but its still humor and still funny to me. And that’s how I look at the world, this world around us with its pain and poverty and problems everywhere, where a good laugh is the only thing which makes this life reasonably tolerable for human beings. We live far too poor a life if we cannot have fun in almost everything and anything. And we live far too short a time to take life very seriously. I live by this principle and I can confide in you (in secret) that I have had far more of a fulfilling life (and fun life) than almost all the serious persons I know of personally.

And just in case you ask, it’s not a defensive mechanism I have developed to deal with the pain of disease and death all around me. It’s just the way I choose to be. Or rather the way I was born with. When I trawl my memory, I remember being sent to the headmaster's office when I was ten years old because I laughed aloud in class at the teacher when she said something absurd. Cut to 15 years later in college- when i was twenty five years old - and doing my first year post graduation, I was sent to meet the dean, because, you won’t believe it; I was caught laughing aloud in microbiology class at something absurd the lecturer said. This time I was responsible for taking along with me two boys and three girls of adjacent rows but I was blamed for being the main culprit who set off the laughing. Looking back on my long crime graph, I find that whenever a group of us got caught for doing something mischievous, somehow the blame always ended up on poor, innocent me for suggesting the idea of it all. Now, before you accuse me of not learning from my mistakes, I admit and confess that I can’t help laughing at absurd statements, absurd things and absurd people. I just can’t "not see" when something is too preposterous for words. I know that there are people out there who act blind and serious and fore go the pleasure of having a good laugh. But not me. I get my laughs when I can and as I can.

And I never spare myself too. If I find I have tripped over my own feet and landed on my own face, I would be the first one to start laughing, even before I brush myself off. And I don’t mind being made the butt of others jokes. In fact, I love it when people give back as good as they get. Even if I am ribbed continuously, I enjoy it as much as the ones pulling my leg. Which brings me to my doubt on why women don’t appreciate humour when it is directed at them and don’t like to be made fun of. Before you start abusing me as sexist, let me clarify that this only applies to pretty women (or those who deceive themselves they are). The prettier they are, the more intolerant of humour they behave. It’s as if they expect that every male should sing their praises, blinded by their beauty and anyone who differs and pulls their legs immediately raises their ire and they show a sharp temper. And as I am often the guilty party in such instances (for I rarely lack a retort), I keep getting the advice to "act serious""grow up" act your age" and all those standard phrases people use when they don’t have a good enough comeback dialogue. This attitude of finding fault with the person instead of the joke is something I find generally in most women I come in contact with. Except for the rare few women who appreciate humor wholeheartedly. If you find them, be best friends forever with them. Those kind of girls are rare gems- they exist rarely, very rarely in a minority while the majority are the hair-trigger temper types who don’t like to be laughed at. Well, it takes all kinds of weird to make this world and who am I to complain?

Anyway to get back to the premise of this post, I accept that my sense of humor was maybe too "different" for the group I was with and mayhap I should have toned it down. No one is infallible and we all live and learn each day. On the other hand, the only time you are ever going to see me serious is when I am strapped to a pulse oximeter in an ICU. The rest of my life I am going to have a big laugh treating life itself as a big joke, as it is meant to be treated. And no, I am not going to grow up or act my age and i am going to laugh aloud at everything I find funny or absurd including the emperor’s new clothes. I find this world incredibly humorous and you will too if you look at the big picture. Laugh hard, live happy, enjoy your life today, for soon you will be dead is my mantra and that what I advise to all of you. And I will continue to inflict my "unique" sense of humor on all the world, BE WARNED. Read me, talk to me, hangout with me or be my friend at your own risk. Company not responsible for consequences. Now is that a fair warning or not?