Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Stupidity is a state of mind (Or, I had a good time this weekend)

You ever have the feeling that the cosmos is conspiring against you? But that's a question for later. Right now I want to talk about my amazing weekend.

Just so you know that I'm not bickering about nothing, I'd like you to know that as of now, I've been in Oakland for 42 days, and for 41 days I've done nothing but work and booze. Oh I went out a few times with Ashwin and his wife, but I'm not going to count that (it was 2 hours at a time, didn't really satisfy my appetite;) ). Every day was the same. That's why I'm blogging so much. In fact, if you look at my blog history, the days that I haven't blogged have been the days that I had some fun. Like the last 2 days :)

Subho came down from India, and I'd already set up some party time. I finally went down to Mountain View, met him on Friday. We went out to this brewery in Fremont I think. I blogged that earlier, but was slightly disoriented by Subho's snores and the asshole who was crank calling my wife. But now that I'm under neither of those influences, let me get on with the story. I met Manish and his wife, Priyanka, and all of us headed out to this aforementioned brewery. We had a great time. The beer was nice and chilled, and tasted different. We had something called Pirhana Pale Ale. It tasted mildly of herbs (or something like that). I enjoyed it. It was refreshing. Since neither Subho nor Manish liked it much (infact Manish had only the pint the whole night), I ended up finishing the pitcher. We followed with a couple of cocktails and a pizza for dinner.

Next morning, we'd planned to head out to Monterey Bay Aquarium, had a wonderful time yet again. Spent around 4 hours driving forth and back and around 4 hours in the aquarium. Subho had an interesting time. He'd call it harrowing, but at least... well it happened like this. We were at the aquarium for around 3 hours when we decided to break for lunch. We headed out to the cafeteria, and ordered our stuff. Since I was carrying all the food (a trayful of sandwiches, and a beer for me :) ), Subho decided to pay. While counting out the change he left the wallet on the counter.

Only when he sat down on the bench did he realize that his wallet was missing from his back pocket (State of mind ;) ). All hell broke loose, while I calmly continued chewing my sandwich. I was pretty sure that the wallet was still on him somewhere and he wasn't looking carefully enough. I told him as much and by the time it was confirmed that the wallet was nowhere in his immediate vicinity, or for that matter a larger vicinity (three trips had already been made to the counter and back), Manish had finished his food and he and Subho went to talk to the manager (or someone) in the place. He suggested they report it to the cops and at the information desk. They did so, and when they'd returned, I vaguely heard an announcement on the PA, paging Mr. Shubdip Di. We finally caught it when it was repeated the second time. Long story short, Subho lost around $200, but kept his cards. Lucky for him, and us. We could continue enjoying our tour. After a couple of more hours of penguins being fed (damn cute), varying varieties of jellyfish (beautiful), blue fin tuna (they are as big as me and twice as much across, satisfying), and sharks (alarming!), we finally ended our tour. I'll post snaps later. On our way out of town, we shared a sundae at Ghirardelli's.

Then was the bowling. We played one round, and I won!!! My first time (I scored 75 I think). And with zeroes on my first 2 turns (or whatever you call them). I had 2 strikes :D.

Overall a very well spent Saturday (except for Subho's $200). Time for Sunday. Shopping time!!! We spent 6 hours in Great Mall. Walked around it 6 times methinks. I spent $360 and some change. Subho pretty much put stuff on his credit card. Only 3 pairs of shoes this time (for those who don't know, last time I bought 7). Also a jacket, a shirt, a sweater and a jacket for Tum, and a top for Tum. And some knick-knacks and silly stuff. There were Hummers all over the mall. I think I counted 5. Some shoppers were sitting in them and getting their snaps taken. I didn't want to look any more desi ;). Now if that were a Harley :D, completely different story :D.

So, that's the story. Oh abt the stupidity part... I just washed my whites with a pair of jeans. All my socks are a slight tinge of blue now. State of mind, bliss :).

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