Contentious? Wrong. It is spelled contentment.

My mother would treat me and my sister to one packet of bhel puri each on our way back home from the twice-or-thrice-a-week outing to the nearby park in Mumbai. Packet is a catachresis, because I don’t know if a word exists for the newspaper cut-outs that are rolled into things that look like a bad replacement for conical birthday-caps. Anyways. Now, as soon as I could lay my hands on that overflowing treat, trying my best not to think about the one-or-two grains of moori falling off the brim, and take my eyes off the children on the streets coveting my prize, I would try and make a mental note of whether my sister had received a greater bounty than I had. Then I would try to ensure that I ate as slowly as possible, for finishing last in this race meant that you enjoyed for a longer period of time, and that somehow gave me satisfaction. Satisfaction of what, I don’t have a clear idea. Because, even a crude estimate would tell that I had the same amount of moori as she did. Probably eating longer was confused with eating more. And in this process, all the attention would be on her packet, and I would try to make sure that I ate as slowly as possible.Then one fine day, I tripped, lost balance, and then had a hard time telling the moori from the dust around.

In life too, instead of enjoying what you have, you try to figure out what others are up to, crave for stuff that isn't yours, and that makes you sulk. Then one fine evening, you trip, and can’t tell the moori from the dust.

Brace yourself, winter has come!

Boro-Plus hasn't yet made the official declaration regarding winter. 

But the fact that rukhe-sukhe-twacha-and-phate-honth, which roughly translates into bone dry skin than turns into a blackboard when scratched, and lips that look like Indian roads, suggests that Mr Bachchan should have been chanting Pro-Boro-Plus hymns already.

It is, so as to speak, a strange period of time, especially so when you are talking about fans.

No, not the ones Salman Khan snubs, but the electric ones. 

Off or on, you need a blanket nevertheless.

Turn them off, and you find yourself perspiring under the blanket. No pun intended.

Turn them on even at the lowest possible rpm, and you’re gone for good, especially during the night when it gets nipple-hardening cold and you are cringing awkwardly while trying to avoid your own palms and under-feet because they-are freaking-ice-cold-and-you-would-rather-chop-them-off. 

Even the bed-covers get cold. Can’t think of any other time when fabric conducted heat, or the lack of it. And you find yourself powerless against nothing in particular, so you would bear the chill than switch that thing off. 

Relaxing in the caffeine-supplemented-hebetude resembling the quintessential Lord Vishnu pose, all people do is watch sitcoms and stalk people on Facebook and do nothing in particular the whole time. 

Shorter days and longer nights. You go to work/college when there is barely enough light, and come back when there is none.

Sweaters, jackets, hoodies are out and about and thankfully, nobody can make out whether you are wearing a clean t-shirt or not. (At times, one woolen garment doesn't suffice. In that sense, it's probably awesome being Anil Kapoor.) Everybody looks (sort-of) dandy. In that sense, winter is a great leveler. Same goes for beanies, they hide my dandruff. So much for hair products.

All this when winter hasn't struck us properly! It’s just the onset, and you can find people carrying out a MUL (Marginal Utility Analysis) every morning to determine the marginal utility of sleeping for some more time against getting up for breakfast or for the first class of the day. And sleep it is every time.

Okay. It's time for the second blanket to be garrisoned along with the first one. But it proved difficult last time around. The superimposition gets awry.The torso gets both, and legs get none and lie somewhere in between the two blankets, much like a thigh-cut-ensemble. Got to get this thing right.