Of a Sitcom and an Addiction

The theme music has played on my computer at least a thousand times. Non-watchers of this show have been driven to madness listening over and over and over again to the same music, the same words being looped every 23 minutes as we incessantly shuttle from one episode to the other.

We're feeling young today. Like it's 1995. Twelve years old. Season 2.

My CD pack is neatly stacked and labeled with a diligence that I have shown nowhere else, and to no one else. Flipping through the rack I finally find myself... Season 2, CD #1. The episode selection is random. Both of us don't care. We never did. Everything's been enqueued on Winamp anyways.

Shuffle.

Episode 2-06 starts. The One With the Baby on the Bus.

The outside world's gone. We're lost now.

...

Chandler: Please tell me you know which one is our baby.
Joey: Well, well that one has ducks on his t-shirt, and this one has clowns. And Ben was definitely wearing ducks.
Chandler: OK.
Joey: Or clowns. Oh, oh wait. That one's definitely Ben. Remember, he had that cute little mole by his mouth.
Chandler: Yeah?
Joey: Yeah.
Chandler: Hey, Ben, remember us? OK, the mole came off.
Joey: Ahh!
Chandler: What're we gonna do? What're we gonna do?
Joey: Uh, uh, we'll flip for it. Ducks or clowns.
Chandler: Oh, we're gonna flip for the baby?
Joey: You got a better idea?
Chandler: All right, call it in the air.
Joey: Heads.
Chandler: Heads it is.
Joey: Yes! Whew!
Chandler: We have to assign heads to something.
Joey: Right. OK, OK, uh, ducks is heads, because ducks have heads.
Chandler: What kind of scary-ass clowns came to your birthday?

Laughter. Disastrous. Uncontrollable. Infectious. Clutching each other. Holding our stomachs. Tears in our eyes.

Cynics smirk. Like we care.

Of course, everyone is entitled to an opinion. That's why when someone says "Dude, how can you watch that show, the humor is so retarded!", all we say in reply is "So are we!" The way these six characters have influenced lives and our humor sense is out there for everyone to see. Not that we disrespect these varied opinions. There're no "This is the best show EVER!" or "HOW can anyone not like it!" lines that you'll hear from us. But if we have a bunch of these CDs and a couple of hours to kill, we won't have to think twice about what to do. :)

Just caught this video on YouTube... nothing great about it, but if you've followed every season with as much devotion and emotion as we have, then the sentiment will not be out of place...



For us, it's changed life in the perfect way... made every day a little happier... kept away every sorrow a little longer.

Ten years. If it's lasted us that long, it will last us forever.

Heeeeere, Kitty Kitty Kitty!

Try this with any feline that walks on four legs. But never try this with the CAT... there's no way you can get away with it. This is one kitty you can never tame. With every passing year this national test has made a habit of throwing a surprise in every test that not one of those coaching centers can think about. And these dudes (the guys who frame the paper HAVE to be called that!) are throwing the challenge wide open.

Think, junta! Think your brains out! Speculate. Take tests. Practice all you want. But on that fateful third Sunday of November, it's going to be anything but easy. We're going to give you something that will require you to keep your mind wide, WIDE open. And we're gonna make sure that's the only way you get into India's best B-Schools.

Every year the CAT has thrown in the most unexpected of surprises, ones that would make the most prepared of candidates marvel at the way these test setters never seem to be short of ways to open the gift wrapper. That's why it's still the most marvelled-at admission tests of the times.

CAT 2003: "Each question carries one mark. In distributing your time across the various sections, you are required to demonstrate your competancy across each of these sections."

Coacher line: "Whatever the case, each question carries the same marks. Scan the paper and do the ones you think are easiest..."

CAT 2004: "Questions x1-x2 carry half a mark each. Questions x3-x4 carry one mark each. Questions x5-x6 carry two marks each."

Coacher line: "Umm... Two mark questions. Best scoring. Make sure you attempt as many as possible. But the two markers are gonna be few. Make sure you get loads of them one markers, they're the ones high on the numbers! Half markers... do them in the end..."

CAT 2005: "In all there are 90 questions. Each section has 10 questions of one mark each, the remaining 20 questions are worth two marks each."

Coacher line: "Err... So, we hope you attempted all of those two markers..."

CAT 2006 bulletin: "... The test will be of 150 minutes duration..."

Coacher line: "Join us. We prepare you for anything that's in store!"

It's anyone's guess how much they can prepare you for! Everything just comes back to the same thing. The way, year after year, how the paper makes you go "Man!!"
You guys sitting there and framing the question paper, I bow to thee! :)

Home.

Well, a break of two and a half months again. And not without a reason.
Home, sweet home, could never have been more appropriate as it has been in the past ten weeks. So you have all the time in the world. So why don't you mail everyone you know, talk to everyone you would like to, and blog everyday and let the world know about what is happening in your life? Well, frankly, I couldn't care less! Who cares what you have (or don't have) to do at home! It's the best place on earth, no matter whatever you may think at any point in your life. Two months at home at a stretch, at this age... I won't say I haven't been irritated with the constant postponement of my joining dates on my job, but I keep telling myself: "When can you DREAM next of another two months like this?"
And I know the answer to that. At least not soon. Definitely.
Years later, when you get back from the places you are, things would have changed. People would have changed. Lives would have changed. But Home remains. Somehow it's the perpetual non-changing entity... something that lasts forever.
You have to leave home, but someday you'll to get back to it. That's when we all realize there's no place... like home.