Saturday, June 23, 2007

Clubbed House

"A good lecture class is like a good skirt. It should be short enough to garner interest, but long enough to cover the contents."

Some lecturer from some other college,
during the pre-UTSAV Faculty Skit Competition,
which, according to Kit Sze, recycled the quote
from something Winston Churchill said


The Block 1 Examination had finally finished its loathsome run. Never mind that I've probably flunked everything (thank heavens our batch still can drop the scores of one block exam from being considered into our internal assessment average). What's important is that it's over. Done with. Finito. Kaput. There's important lessons to be learnt from this debacle of being woefully ill-prepared for exams, and the deadly evils of procrastination, I know. I'll put that on a post-it note and learn those valuable lessons tomorrow.

Today, I just want to relax.

The first order of business is to purchase 100 rupees worth of semi-synthetic junk food and watched all the old Disney classics I've downloaded during the course of the entire past week. You guys should try watching those flicks again now that you're adults. It's like you're watching entirely new and different movies! Really, I kid you not!

So watch cartoons and eat junk - that's the plan.

And plans have a tiresome habit of going awry.

It was about 3 pm in the afternoon - I was already fifteen minutes into The Emperor's New Groove and halfway through my second packet of Cheetos - when I heard a thunderous crash so loud I'm sure my ancestors buried all the way in China would sit up in their graves and go, "OMGWTF?" I paused the movie, went upstairs and headed for the door to the balcony (where I fancied the source of the din to be).

Once I opened the door the insane wind grabbed the door out of my hands and flung it wide open, I saw this;

05
See the smashed railing of my balcony?

Of course, at that time I surveyed the scene, it wasn't nearly quite as tranquil as it is in this picture. Here's a video (yes, I took one!) of the meteorologic mayhem that got my lil' homestead besieged;

It's called the 'force of nature', I believe.

So here's the situation, if you haven't worked it out yet;
  • The massive wind-power of the storm managed to snap a tree's trunk (not uproot - but snap) midway. Anyway, the tree had no business growing so tall anyway with a trunk that disproportionately slender.
  • The falling foliage pawned the railing of my balcony. "Slender" was a relative term. It's a fucking LOG, I tell you.
When the typhoon slowed down a little a quarter of an hour later, I decided to check out the damage from outside my house. This is what I saw at my front door;

01
Let's play 'Spot the Timber'.

Here's the broken bits up close;

07
The bit still attached to terra firma.

06
The aerodynamic bit.

And for an idea of how far the two parts were separated;

04
Some wind, huh?

While I was pacing about the courtyard trying to get a good angle, Fifi decided to join me in the drizzle. I think she must have heard the shutter-sound effect of my camera and decided to come and camwhorebitch. She's a vain one, that Fifi. I mean, just look at this shameless display of canine charm;

fifi
Fifi, shooting electricity from her eyes.

Anyway, back to the story.

Aside my balcony, that length of lumber also body-slammed the roof over Vincent's room and smashed some tiles to bits;


03
The devastation perpetrated by Log-zilla.

The biggest bother, of course, was that the electricity line was snapped. If they don't get some repair-bloke on that soon, we'll be sitting in the dark tonight. Then, I can neither read nor find out what on earth is this 'New Groove' thing belonging to the emperor. This is a serious code red, grade A1 tragedy!

And I doubt that my inverter and battery can hold out much longer now. Pretty soon, I'll be cut off from the Great and Beneficent World Wide Web as well. Consider this post a shout for help before I am thrust into a modern day's equivalent of the Dark Ages.

Sigh. There I was, thinking that I could finally loosen up and relax after the exams.

Considering my run of calamity this entire year, I won't be surprise at all if the broken half of the tree chooses the precise moment I'm walking under it to slip from its perch and bean me for keeps.



EDIT: Hey, the power's back! Huzzah! I get to watch my cartoons animated movies tonight after all!




UPDATE

Okay, I was going to start a new post actually regarding the aftermath and sequelae of the maiden flight of the tree-who-was-Humpty-Dumpty - but I decided to just write the update here.

I was wakened sometime in the morning between 8 am and 12 pm (it's Sunday - does it matter?) by what sounded like a tree falling from someplace very-high-up. I bolted straight up in my bed, shook the sleepy-clouds out of my head (I physically do that everyday I wake up actually - funny habit, I know) and debated whether the crash I heard was a figment of a particularly noisy nightmare or that my brain exploded out of my ears.


Then, with a small and private "Eureka" moment, I remembered that I actually did have a tree (or half of it, whatever) perched on the rather very-high-up second-floor balcony.

Case closed. I went back to sleep that very instant.

When I really woke up about noontime, I saw that all-the-King's-horses-and-all-the-King's-men was still hard at work chopping our botanical Humpty Dumpty to ickle, teeny bits. Here's a photograph;

panoramic cleanup
All the King's lumberjacks.

See that bloke in a clean white shirt and a pair of black slacks at the top right quarter of the picture - the one diligently and industriously watching everyone hard at work while not lifting even a pinky to help? That's the King. The Patrician. The Landlord-in-Supreme.

The King owes me a new railing for my balcony.

jiffy roof
Vincent's new skylight!

Vince suffered the most in this incidence of nature's vitriolic violence. His entire room was soaked and one of his nifty, pricey, electronic gadgets got killed in the deluge (I don't remember exactly what it was but I suspect it's an MP3 player or something like that). He had to move all his stuff out of his place and sleep in Nickson's room that night - or in their joint kitchen-come-dining room (I didn't ask).

It's raining now even as I write this update. I hope the insta-roof-fix held. Poor Vince.



A creature of technological comfort,
k0k s3n w4i


1 A for Apocalyptic.

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

Holy flying cows! 0_o

Literally, since I'm sure the wind would have been strong enough to pick up a hamburger-on-hooves or two.

Are they going to fix the railing (and possibly your neighbour's roof)?

Enjoy the animated movies =)

Anonymous said...

ps: Was this post also an an excuse to rub in the fact that you have a balcony? *sly grin*

pps: And how could I forget? Hi FiFi! *waves at Fi all the way from Oz*

niCk said...

you should look at vincent's room. it was flooded!
there's a bad leak due to the that tree.
everything's wet...

février said...

i don't wanna watch disney shows when i watch them at least once or twice a year pfft. and i listen to the songs a lot more than that. hmph!

o_O so free ka taking a video of the storm xD

Vishaal said...

Lol! And i thought only i had bad luck yesterday!

Some Showers yesterday!

Anonymous said...

what's his name???????

KUZZZZZZZCOOOoooooooooooooooooooo!

muahahahaha im your fan kok. cos u like the emperor's new groove. i LOVED that show.

lol

and btw, that skirt quote? it's taken from an ex american president, or someone famous from very long ago. it's so over rated, hear it everywhere

gaL said...

I've heard about the miniskirts theory from a lecturer here too. =) It's true enough isn't it? =)


ps: is that ur pet dog? he's so hot! haha.

k0k s3n w4i said...

@michellesy
I suppose they ARE going to fix my railing, but it does not really matter if they don't do it anytime soon - cos monsoon ain't the best time of the year for me to go lounging there anyway. My neighbour's roof's fixed - temporarily with some gunny sacks and plastic bags (i'll post up some post-disaster pics later).
Was this post also an an excuse to rub in the fact that you have a balcony? *sly grin*
OFCOURSE OMGNOOB! XD

@nick
Lucky I wasn't the one coming out worst from the storm. poor vince...

@bevE
Free? girl, it's post exam!
And I forgot! You are still a kid. OF COURSE you'd watch Disney several hundred times a year :p

@dr. vishaal bhat
Well, it isn't so much as bad luck as it is an unexpected bit of excitement. the landlord's paying for the repairs anyway :)

@kit sze
I didn't like the Emperor's New Groove till yesterday (cos I haven't watch it before). But KUZCOOOO!!! Love the character! And I dun usually like protagonists!
P.S. Oh dear, I didn't know the quote's a cliche! Darn, I gotta think of something new to replace it!

@gal
I dunno. I find showing the contents to be more efficacious in keeping interest. people would be talking about it for days after ;)
Fifi is the pet dog of everyone who lives in Acharya Compound. It's a she, btw LOL.

pinksterz said...

my am i too late in commenting? hahaha.

geez, india season is ganas. but i don't mind to have a bit of heavy rain though. haven't meet mr. rain for almost a year. only once met mr. drizzle in last december and that was for only a brief three minutes.

and fifi's indeed a vain bitch. -__-"

pinksterz said...

and i've just realised u spelled your name as k0k s3n s4i.

février said...

HEY ! *fumes* *repeats to self* I am above this I am above this T^T

k0k s3n w4i said...

@pinksterz
nah, this post had only been up for a day.
I pity you in Egypt there. I'm a rain sort of person and I'll be downright miserable if it don't pour for ages.
Fixed that, my name. It's a common mistake actually, esp. when I type really fast.
P.S. You used "Geez". I always try my best to avoid using that expression. Some people may not like it (I'm fine with it btw, but some people are not)

@beve
There there *ruffle bevE's hair*
I understand how you feel. Sometimes, when someone say something really clever and make me speechless, I feel like exploding too XD

Wickedsa said...

oh my god on the storm.
raining seasons = trouble seasons.

k0k s3n w4i said...

@baby sa
It's only the beginning of the monsoon season. Things will become worse quickly enough.

sXydeViL said...

emperor's new grooves=NOT classic disney la....

BAMBI=IS CLASSIC!

I think monsoon is subsiding temporarily. It has this on and off raging storm and downpour. What we speculated the previous 4 nights were the few amok-rain.

Btw, how old is beve? Once i was following the replies on the tagbox and you asked her how old is she and so on. I finally gave up reading the tag due to the emoticons tag-war. >.<

k0k s3n w4i said...

@susu
I watched Bambi so long ago that I already forgot what its about. But I know his Mom died and that many kids cried when that happened (I was too young to understand the concept of death at the time I watched it tho).
HUNCHBACK = IS CLASSIC!
Why the interest in beve?
You can ask her directly thru the tagboard u know. She's usually checks in at about 10pm at night. SHe's pretty young i think. not even out of her teens yet, me think.

sXydeViL said...

isit? kk. wanna socialize more. lol.
I onli enjoy those tiny animals scurrying around in the jungle.