The neat Lj meet last night left me in very high spirits. The office work over, called up home after a long time, and had a nice long chat with mom and dad, and then another long call…came back home to find Rishi had prepared dinner, three packets of Maggi noodles with eggs and onions ( minus his favourite – tomatoes)….finished The Phantom Menace novel over dinner and listened to some more Phish – a brilliant band, IMHO. As is usual, went to sleep at around 12, to the strains of Carole King’s “Brother Brother”.

3:00 am: Rude awakening: the power had gone off and it was raining pretty heavily outside. It was a dark and stormy night (:-P ) and there were squadrons of mosquitoes doing the Danse Macabre around my ears. ( all the mosquito repellents we have run on electricity. Aaah! The preils of technology! ) Tried to summon zen techniques of falling asleep, but could endure it no longer. Rishi was up too. So was Abhi. And it turned out there wasn’t a single candle in the bloomin’ house! Cursed each other for a while, then cursed the mosquitoes, finally settled on cursing the landlord.
4:30 am, the rain had stopped, and it was semi-dark outside. Decided to go out for a walk with Rishi, came back after sometime – it was too hazy ,and both of were mumbling sleepily. Better mosquitoes than an ignominous fall in the mud!

5:00 am: what the heck!!! I smother myself in my blanket ( and Hyderabad is supposed to be hot, man! ) and concentrate on ignoring the buzzing and humming. It works!!! Somewhere down the line, the power comes back again, and I throw the blanket off.
8:30 am: Wake up. Look at the watch. Late for the office!!!!! Aww, man, this sucks…..

9:40 AM: am in the office now. Sleepy. A li’l hungry. More coffee required.