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A quick chat with Louie, the pet dog, on this quarantine life

Posted on by nishanth

In an exclusive, Louie, my aunt’s pet dog, spoke up on behalf of all pets on having to spend extra time with their human families during this quarantine life. They don’t seem too pleased.  

(As told to Nishanth S Coontoor)

Louie’s 5th year birthday celebrations

The humans I stay with have a routine. There are four of them. Two smaller humans can keep up with me on my runs chasing the brown little things with large hairy tails (squirrels) that move fast. The other two only want to take short walks to see other black things with long necks floating on water (ducks) that make weird noises when I try to talk to them.

Every day, we wake up when I hear sounds from outside and see colorful things flying (birds) around. We then go for a short walk to the green land (garden). When we get back, I have observed the humans go up and down the house, from one room to the other and finally go away for a long time. Initially, I found this odd. We always go outside through the same hole in the wall (main door), but it was always different when I was not going out with them. They did not immediately come back to talk to Louie.

At this point, my home gets very quiet. I go from one bed to the other and ask if someone is around. When no one talks back to me, I know my home is safe. I go to the bright room and take a nap. I have lunch at noon. I take a nap again till my evening walk. Don’t get me wrong, I am always also alert and guarding!

But something has changed. Even after waking up three consecutive times (weekend), they did not leave Louie alone. Initially, I was thrilled, to be honest. I could not stop wagging my tail all day long. I got extra treats every morning and now in the afternoon as well. Hurlikayi, (Green beans) the tastiest of all treats! We also went for extra walks which were more chances for me to be friends with the brown little things with large hairy tails that move fast.

I am slowly beginning to lose it though. I don’t want to constantly wag my tail anymore. I miss my alone time and naps. I miss saying hello to my friends who walk by my house to visit during the day with their humans. I need a haircut. I have so much hair that I am beginning to look fat. What will my girlfriend think when meet up in the park? She is always so proper and smells nice. I really need a wash and professional shampooing please! I won’t agree to take a bath at home or outside in the open for everyone to see!

The humans don’t want to play anymore with Louie but they want to keep going on walks every time I want to sleep. The moment I try to get some peace and quiet, they say ‘Louie!’ and want to go out in the hot.  

I also noticed they look at other humans who magically show up on flat, black things (laptops) and make sounds at them all day long. Sometimes they are smiling but other times they are tensed. When they start to get sad, I must go and sit next to them so they will relax. They don’t seem to know how to handle the situation. It is again up to me to keep them sane and happy. They are work. Sigh. But I still love them.  

I’ll try to keep this going for as long as possible or until the treats run out – whichever is earlier.

“Louie!”

There we go again.

I now understand what you mean when you say your toddler annoys you. I just adopted a robot vacuum cleaner

Posted on by nishanth
Image by NickyPe from Pixabay
Image by Eduard Reisenhauer from Pixabay

Nishanth S Coontoor

I am a reasonable person and you should know it by now. But what kind of a crazy person wants to clean the house and do dishes every day? There is a reason behind buying more than one dinner plate and wearing 99 cents bathroom chappal at home, right?

But no. Since I moved in with my sister because of the Corona virus situation (family blah, blah), she needs the house vacuumed daily – twice! After multiple rounds of me ignoring her pleas, she purchased without insurance, a robot vacuum cleaner – ‘Guddu.’ Yeah, that’s the name.

I was very disappointed. Vacuuming is my main job description at home that lets me earn my daily bread while in quarantine. Yet another job lost to automation, sigh.

At 7 am sharp, ‘Guddu’ woke up and began its morning routine of vacuuming the living room first. I was making some chai and did not appreciate the lack of silence. It won’t last long, I said to myself, observing the bot from the corner of my eye. As soon as I made the comment, it started to approach me into the kitchen.

There was no one around me. This was my chance – to test it folks! (No insurance, remember.) It also comes with a specific return policy. I ‘accidently’ dropped a spoon of sugar on the floor, you know, near the corner, where even I could not reach. Oops! Check mate, Guddu. Muahahaha!

As I sat down and stalked the bot cleaning the kitchen floor, it approached the corners and effortlessly picked up the sugar! It was okay, I guess. A few minutes later, it picked up the salad scraps that had fallen as well.

It was this shared hatred toward salad that brought us together – Guddu, my (now) adopted baby.

Since we all began working from home, I often hear my friends and colleagues complain that their kids are annoying them, and they cannot wait to return to the office. Since Guddu, the vacuum, came into my life, I think I understand exactly what they mean. This bot is like your annoying kid.

I was on a conference call today and Guddu started play time early in the morning.

“Siri! Please stop Guddu!” Where does it get all this energy?

“I AM SORRY. I DO NOT UNDER….”

“Hey Google! Stop vacuum now.”

<No response>

I had to finally get up and pull the plug because the vacuum was somewhere under the couch.

And this is another issue. Why does it want to keep cleaning under the couch and get stuck in the wires behind it when the living area is wide open and there is so much space to ‘play’? In my opinion, if it can go under the bed or the couch and it gets stuck, it needs to be able to untangle itself on its own right? Take some responsibility. But no, it keeps craving for attention because it is stuck and cannot move. Aargh!

“Can you keep an eye on it? I am working on this important project that is due in an hour,” I told my sister.

“Eh?”

“Keep an eye on it. Balcony door. OPEN. It will fall off the space in the railings,” I repeated.

“Sorry, let me repeat, DVC and SFC….” continued my sister, ignoring me, her eyes glued to her screen, focusing on her conference call.

Oh well, I can keep an ‘eye’ on it because of the noise. Guddu, will be alright, I told myself, focusing on the laptop screen.

Guddu continued to clean the living room. I remember it bumped into my leg twice. Oh, silly thing! I smiled both times. It was kinda reassuring.

The thing about this toddler, I learnt that day, is that it is unpredictable. I took my eyes off for a moment, and there it was in the balcony, running toward the gaps in the railings! Oh no! OH NO!

“Guddu!” I immediately threw my laptop aside, and dove toward Guddu! With just moments to spare, I got a hold of it and pulled it back to the safety of my arms. “Sshh. It’s alright. You’re safe now. No need to cry.”

Love it or hate it, like every other family member, Guddu is part of my family now. Guddu can be annoying when it cleans even at 7 am on the weekends, but never fails to bring a smile on my face when it keeps bumping its head to the furniture. LOL.

I can’t wait to show Guddu, my robot vacuum, to my colleagues on the virtual family day celebrations coming up!

P.S. Guddu is camera shy. So, the pictures.

Weight, wait, go away. Come again post-corona day

Posted on by nishanth
Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay

Nishanth S Coontoor

I don’t know about you, but since this quarantine started, my photos have started to look like the ‘Before’ picture of a weight loss success story. There is a difference though. Weight loss success stories have an ‘After’ photo and a happy ending. My photos are just stuck in the same point in time – often sporting a constipated look. Sigh.

My initial attempts to ‘take control’ and get to a gym routine was met with several roadblocks.

It started when my shirt would not fit. Simple as that. I blamed it on the dryer conspiracy. As soon as I hit the permanent-press button on the dryer, I imagine a bunch of rats (I live in the NY area) jumping into action, cutting down and stitching my shirts/pants down one size. That’s the only explanation.  But then I realized I was running out of clothes to wear and a dhoti was not a preferred option to wear to work here.

Alright, that was it. I made my mind to wake up early next morning and start going to the gym at 5 am. 10 mins before 10 pm, while in bed prepping to sleep, I start to do the math.

If I must be in the gym at 5 am, I need to wake up at 4.30 am to drive to the gym.

But, if I must leave at 4.30 am, I need to wake up at 4.15 am to get ready.

But, if I must get ready at 4.15 am, I need to get my morning chai at 3.45 am.

But I should probably have a banana an hour before the workout.

But, should this be post-chai, or pre-chai? Or should this be on the way? No.

Its 11 pm now.

I am now counting down each hour to 3.30 am. If I sleep now, I will get 4 hours of sleep. If I sleep now, I will get 3 hours of sleep…

I finally woke up at 9 am!

“It’s okay. I will go in the evening.”

Who am I kidding? It was a constant battle between ‘Oh, I overate lunch’ or ‘Oh, I did not eat well.’

Finally, one day, things magically fell into place because I took the day off to go to the gym. It’s the small victories you know.

Weeks turned into months and the annual trip back home was here again. Imagine traveling and having to say no to tasty foods from MTR, Vidyarthi Bhavan, CTR, the dosas, the bisi-bele bath, the chole-bature, the rasmalai…what were we talking about? Yeah, food. I mean, diet. But I did it. I felt ‘light.’

I decided to weigh in.

When train number 12013 – Amritsar Shatabdi came to a halt at 8.37 pm in Ludhiana Junction (LDH), I had 3 minutes to weigh in before it departed.

I found a weighing scale on the train platform. The ones with a colorful wheel to ‘look into.’ I put a Rs 5 coin. Stepped on it. A small card printed and popped out. 100 kgs.

“Is there something wrong with this – maybe it needs a reset?” I asked a stranger running to catch the train, Shah Rukh Khan style, but no Kajol.

“YOU need a reset,” he responded, before catching the train.

Very soon, I got back to the train and got to my seat.

“It must be the food,” my aunt declared. “You eat very late. You need to have an early dinner.” She drew a card from the stack. We were playing UNO.

“Pass the chips,” I disagree. “Its all the carbs and rotis he eats,” spoke my cousin. “Give up carbs. Only lentils and veggies. No biryani either.”

“No, it’s the dairy. If you drink 1-liter milk everyday, of course, you will become a cow!” “It causes bloating.”

Keto came up. A juice cleanse came up as well.

“Arre bhaiyya, aap running karo na,” suggested the chai wala. “Chai?” “Biskoot?”

Post-holiday, back to the USA, I finally managed to get into a routine of balanced diet, calorie counting and exercise. There were occasions when a pasta would seductively look at me at Costco. I picked her up once, put her in the trolley to take her back home. Took a few steps and stopped to read the calories on it. 1000 calories? Sigh. I had to break up with her and put her back in the food aisle. Sorry. We aren’t compatible.

(Dear Costco security, if you ever saw me going back and forth picking up food and placing it back in the aisle, it’s because of this.)

Now, with the quarantine, it’s finding a new routine all over again. Gyms are online but finding the right equipment is tough. Then there is the motivation, or the lack of. While you attempt to get back to a routine, care to lend a pair of dumbbells?  

Glossary:

MTR, Vidyarthi Bhavan, CTR: Restaurants in Bangalore, India

Dosa, Bisi-bele bath, Chole-bature, Rasmalai: Various kinds of food.

Shah Rukh Khan, Kajol: Bollywood stars

Roti: Indian flat bread



Work from home, social distancing and virtual meetings: the new normal?

Posted on by nishanth

Image by thedarknut from Pixabay

Nishanth S Coontoor

Hey there, listen up. After 7 years of working in several roles, I am going to acknowledge something I used to either laugh off or change the topic on. I used to work from home – on and off, to manage workload and clear off my check lists.

Unlike my friends in the IT industry, work from home is typically not an option for most people in supply chain. You are required to be available in the office. And it makes sense to be available in person as well because it means face to face time with teams to get answers quickly, to build working relationships to move projects forward and learn how the product supply chain works.

Still, on occasion, when I noticed my to-do list getting longer and needed to “close out” projects, I stayed back home, went into solitary confinement and got things done.

Over the last few weeks, since the work from home became the new normal, it has seemed, how do I put it, odd! For someone like me, and possibly you, sitting at home on a weekday in shorts and working needs getting used it. It felt odd enough that to do a sanity check, I asked around how my colleagues were doing via slack. We’ve all heard the joke right – talking to your fridge or the television during isolation is normal. Its only concerning when they talk back.

Stevie, the TV, is doing fine. Thank you for asking.

Work from home now seems like the new normal. But looking beyond this, our adaptation to the corona virus situation may also transform other aspects of our life.

During World War II, when Japan invaded Southeast Asia, Japan cut off USA’s supply of Tin and Rubber. But since these were materials that were abundant in American homes and often thrown away, the federal government organized scrap drives or recycling drives. The World War II generation may continue to be weird about recycling for this reason. You and I may be the generation that will be weird about stocking up on Toilet Paper!

I started noticing the first signs of change when we involuntarily stopped shaking hands. This is a big change having taught to have a ‘firm and a confident’ handshake.

Then came the virtual meetings. I now login to zoom to attend work meetings and dumbbell snatches during my CrossFit class. I play board games and hangout with my friends online. My mom picks out veggies a Whatsapp video call without cash! Of course, she still asks for free coriander.  

I am also told ‘virtual dates’ are a thing now? I’ve got to get in on this and do a pro-gamer move asap. Anyone know how to throw in some filters and ‘fix’ my large nose to get a match? SOS, like yesterday.

There are bound to be negative effects from the virus and the quarantines. But there may be some positives as well. For starters, remember all those times you were striving for a work-life balance? This is your chance to get an overdose of that family you said you were missing. Another friend suggested that if your work allows for it, your work hours are kind-a in your hand. Your day can now start at 7 am if you are an early riser or at 10 am if you aren’t a morning person. Maybe you can finally get those 100 sit-ups before you sit down at 10 am? I, for one, choose to never snooze my alarm. Because I no longer need to keep one at 5.30 am to ‘get to work.’  

Isolationship: Lessons in the art of doing nothing and simply chilling

Posted on by nishanth

Nishanth S Coontoor

Ever since the Corona virus situation escalated into a global pandemic, people have been encouraging one another to follow social distancing and stay at home. I am impressed that most understand the importance of “flattening the curve.” You may be one of them right now with a “Stay at Home. Stop the spread” frame on your Facebook profile picture. Good for you!

This rational act has also brought with it some cribbing. I know; I agree – if you follow social distancing, you’ve earned the right to look to your ceiling every hour and constantly ask the One above – whoever listens to you – either God or most likely, the neighbor aunty, “When will things get back to normal?” “I want to go out.” “I want to do stuff.”

But, take it from a learned man like me. You don’t have to go out or even interact with people to “do stuff.” I’ve mastered the art of isolationship and simply chilling over several weekends. I’ve been sent to share my experience and teach you during these challenging times, my child.

I used to not be like this you know. Sigh. Or at least, I did not know I was gifted with the power of isolationship.

I grew up in Bangalore, in an apartment with the sights and sounds it brings with it. I took 60A from Vijayanagar to Ramakrishna Ashram every day to go to college. And when I missed the bus, I took the 59B bus to hop off at Mysore circle. (I had a bus pass). So, I know crowds. They gave me energy. I had to be out, doing this and that, going here and there. KR Market to Gandhi Bazaar.  

There were however occasions when I used to make a one-off comment like “Why are there so many people?” or “Can we all just be quite and sit in silence?”

Imagine walking into the living room from your room at 6 PM on a warm Friday evening where your mom is sitting with two of her friends and chatting about whatever mom’s chat over coffee and the dads rehearsing their dad jokes? “Ivattu tirga Uppitu namma maneli. Ha ha ha!”

“Ssshhhhh!!!?”

“Yen ayuthu? Bega oodu, swalpa cooker off madu.” (What happened? Quick, turn off the pressure cooker!)

“I want some quite.”

“Kaadige hogolai” (You need to stay in the wild)

“#$#$”

“Yen anthe?” (?)

Things took a turn when I visited a friend in Chicago while in the USA in 2014. On my first visit, we did the touristy stuff. But on my second visit, she suggested, “Let’s not do anything. Let’s just chill.”

Wait, what is “just chill?”

It meant do nothing. Eat. Watch TV. Assemble furniture. You know, “chill.”

I was lost.

Going by the logic of my Asian upbringing, if I went to a new place, it meant I needed to travel, go out, and “make the most out of it.” Even going to Mysore for the eight-time meant waking up at 8 am, getting ready to go see the palace and the animals in the zoo. It was a vacation but packed with activities.

So, this was hard. I assembled a chair that weekend in Chicago. And I did not even get to keep the chair.

I did not go back the next weekend for obvious reasons. But I called her from Indianapolis.

She was “chilling” at home – knitting a sweater. This 25-year-old was learning to knit. “I need to buy 5 cats and name each one with a Pancharatna kriti. I’ll turn into that cat lady on the 5th floor who knits bad,” she joked.

But slowly, I began catching the drift. No, not the drift to knit. That would be large project requiring several hundred meters of wool to make a sweater large enough to cover my tummy. And if it did, I haven’t worn a sweater since the P.E incident of 1995. I digress.

I began to catch the drift behind the “chill.”

Chill means doing nothing. But doing nothing is not really doing nothing. Hold on, let me explain.

Doing nothing at home meant spending time reading a book, writing, working (?), watching F.R.I.E.N.D.S or Amar, Akbar Anthony online. Or making podcasts on Spotify your bitch. With short naps thrown in between, of course.

Doing nothing meant picking up a new interest like knitting or Maggie or learning something new on Reddit. It meant not having to socialize. It meant spending time on yourself. It meant staying in.

Think about it. If you were doing nothing and watching Hum Saath Saath Hain on a Saturday afternoon and a friend calls you and asks what you are doing, you always say “Nothing.” Just to clarify, this isn’t me. I don’t watch Hum Saath Saath Hain on a Saturday afternoon. I still need to finish CID.

The first time will seem odd. It will not make sense. You won’t be convinced. But stick with it.

Even today, on my now hundredth trip to Mysore, my dad wants to go to the palace and the zoo. “Lets just chill in the hotel. I want to continue reading this book. We can go to the park in the evening,” I tell him. But he isn’t convinced. Yes, we did not have to travel from Bangalore to Mysore to sit inside the hotel room. But isolationship in Bangalore (before the Corona era) is not the same as isolationship here.

Now is the opportunity for isolationship without having to take a vacation. Now is the chance to do some chilling.

Anyway, I’ve got to go. See you in 21 days? Daya just broke another main door!

Glossary:

Ramakrishna Ashram, Vijayanagar, Mysore Circle, KR Market, Gandhi Bazaar: Locations in Bangalore, India

Mysore: a city in Karnataka, India

Pancharatna kriti: a set of five kritis (songs) in Carnatic classical music, composed by the 18th-century Indian composer Tyagaraja.

Amar, Akbar and Anthony, Hum Saath Saath Hain: Bollywood movies

CID: Hindi TV series