Ok ok,

With most mainstream films, especially in Tamil and all Micheal Bay movies, you know some fifteen minutes in, if they’re working for you (or not). But there are a few that leave you hanging until almost the end, and then, gradually, things begin to cohere and reshape your entire thus-far experience, and you slap your forehead and smile and say wow! This is one of those films.

Cheers.
ps: Actual Translation of the title being, “A chapter in the wild”.

Ok ok,

I hate the selecting, the trying on, the conversing with the sales help. There’s another oxymoron, sales-help. You’re either helping me or selling me but they’re not the same thing.

I hate carrying shopping bags. I hate receipts. I hate tags, pins, labels, hangers, buttons, zippers, drawstrings, lapels. I hate bleach, color-safe bleach, detergents, liquids, powders, tablets, stain lifters, stain fighters, stain neutralizers, special crystals, active ingredients, enzymes, whiteners, brighteners.

I hate hot water, cold water, warm water. I hate getting $1 off. I hate getting 1/3 more FREE. I hate fabric softener and static cling, so I lose either way. I hate detergents that are good for the environment, bad for the environment, not even aware of the environment. I hate carrying laundry bags.

I hate dry cleaning plastic, people that work at dry cleaners, talking about my stains to the dry cleaner. I hate and refuse to read any poster or notice about anything on the wall of the dry cleaner. If it was posted “We reserve the right to steal your clothes,” I wouldn’t care. I’m not interested. Just take the clothes. Just let me get the hell out of here and back to the world as soon as possible.

Let’s get one thing straight about dry cleaning right now. It doesn’t exist. There’s no such thing as dry cleaning. There’s no way of cleaning with dry, washing with dry, or doing anything with dry. Dry itself is nothing. You can’t use it. You can’t do anything with it. It’s not there. Dry is nothing. Are you listening to me? And we walk into these places with the big signs out front, “Dry Cleaning,” and somehow never question how they were able to put this absurd concept over on us.

If I gave you a filthy shirt and said, “I want this immaculate. And no liquids!” what are you going to do? Shake it? Tap it? Blow on it? Give me a break. You almost can’t get something dirty with dry, let alone cleaning it.

Cheers.
ps: That is a lot of hate. True Story

Ok ok,

One thing I find thrilling about living in a HDB flat is that it’s every different type of person piled one on top of the other. I am for open immigration, but that sign we have in the front of the Changi Airport, “Give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.” Can’t we just say, “Hey, the door’s open. We’ll take whoever you got.”

Do we have to specify “The wretched refuse?” Why not just say, “Give us the unhappy, the sad, the slow, the ugly, people who speak with an accent, people who love robbing Burger Kings, people who dump half bodies, people who can’t drive, people who have trouble merging lanes, if they can’t stay in their lane, if they don’t signal, they can’t parallel park, if they’re sneezing, if they’re stuffed up, if they have bad penmanship, don’t return calls, if they have dandruff, food between their teeth, if they have bad credit, if they have no credit, missed a spot shaving. Or simply just people who can’t fit the word “norm” … In other words, any dysfunctional, defective slob that you can somehow cattle prod onto a wagon, send them over. We want them.”

This list also includes doctors, pilots, students on “free” scholarships and hookers. I know that if i moved, i would be a wretched refuse myself, but i have not moved and i will not be refused.

Cheers.
ps: I have no idea what i just typed. I am high on flu medicines.

Ok ok,

In the old days people took years to cross the country. They did it the good old way. They walked. Now people will move thousands of kilometers for a wimp, like to see the Eiffel tower or something. I don’t think any of the pioneers did that. “Yeah it took us a decade to get there, and we stayed for the summer. It was nice, they had a pool, the kids loved it. And then, we left about ten years ago and we just got back. We had a great summer, it took us twenty years, and now our lives are over.”

Cheers.
ps: Did Adam and Eve ever take a holiday?