A normal Monday morning. I was in the bus on my way to office. The bus was inching its way through the morning traffic on Old Mahabalipuram road. There are a lot of petty shops and vegetable markets on either sides of the road. At one point, the bus had to pull up for a traffic signal. Seated near a window, I saw a vegetable wholesale shop. A man was loading a crate of red, ripe, fresh tomatoes to the back of his tricycle. With a heave, he hoisted the crate onto the tricycle back seat. As he did so, one tomato catapulted out of the crate due to force of the hoist. This tomato landed on the road, a few feet away from where the man stood. The man tried to come over to the road to pick it up. A car came by and he backed away. The car missed crushing the tomato. I felt relieved. Then again the man tried coming forward to pick up the tomato. After all, the price at which tomatoes sell, every fruit must be precious to him. But this time, a bicycle crossed his path and he had to stop. Someone called for him from behind. He turned. Another bicycle came by crushing the tomato both by its front and rear wheels. The tomato was dead. The man turned just in time to see the rear wheel of a bicycle run over the red vegetable, causing its juice to splash on all four directions. He smiled wryly at the other guy near him and continued loading his tricycle with the next crate. After all, he had tried his best.

I had the feeling of having watched a fatal accident. The victim had been a weak tomato, holding out to the man who had thrown it to the road, hoping that he would come to its rescue. Hope for life had risen and fallen with every attempt that the man made to walk towards it. It has died a sad death. Its fellow tomatoes in the crate were awaiting its return. They would never know what happenned.

Yippeee. Am so happy and relieved for the jumbos. The Union Ministry has intervened in a timely manner. I am really so happy for the elephants. Though I am not an animal rights zealot, it sure hurted to see the way the elephants were tortured to take up a forced vacation, when they were quite happy the way they were. The intentions of the state government may or may not have been noble, but when the consequences were noted, immediate steps to review the original decision should have been made. The way the media channels vie with each other to cover such news is all the more disgusting. The sight of the elephant with its foot bleeding is still in my eyes, making them moist. On the other hand, I am also happy for those compliant jumbos which are enjoying a government sponsored vacation in the scenic locales of the Mudumalai Wildlife Sanctuary. Guess there are two sides to just about everything in life! Sigh.

This news comes just when I am reading Robin Cook's Chromosome 6 ! What a co-incidence. Or was I interested in such a news because am reading the book? Anyways, its a real scientific breakthrough to be able to create a virus that can multiply. Though Craig Venter says that creating a human form is far away, he puts it safely that it wont happen in this decade. Does that mean we can create humans by next decade ? Wait, wait...what am I saying ? We can create humans....that sounds very odd. We are the humans, right...ugh....whatever.

Btw, 'Chromosome 6' is a page turner. The events delving deep into micro-biology are woven beautifully. Robin Cook's a natural at taking his readers on a virtual tour through the micro-biological components of the human system.

In my opinion, turning one's weakness or bad habit to an advantage or strength is smartness. There are so many people in this world who do just that. People who were technically way below average have scaled corporate heights in no time by leveraging their people management skills. Like what I read somewhere, its attitude and not always aptitude that decides your altitude. Here, take this case, where someone's afternoon siesta turned out to be his powernap to work longer hours and subsequently succeed.

Well, I really try hard to keep myself from dozing off in front of my computer after lunch. My catnaps will never turn out to be as short as Al's powernaps. Anyways, I seem to like this concept of powernaps. Wow, the term powernap sounds so stylish, bearing no remote likeness to the crude word 'sleep' which is more an embodiment of lethargy and sluggishness. I bet everybody agrees with me that just after lunch, you feel more snoozy and less productive. Why not have a powernap ? After the hurried quick lunch that we have, we do deserve a powernap ( I am using the word often on purpose!).

These midday breaks are a way of work with many American executives, though things have pretty much changed post-recession. They even have powernap accessories - like bags with built-in pillows! So next time you are at work and you wanna sleep ...oops... I mean take a powernap, get your powernap pillow and hit the sack, but hey, remember, no snoring allowed on powernaps !

Disposable cameras then, disposable cellular phones now, disposable-what-next ?

A site on Interpersonal Skills Development and the how-to-live-life kinda stuff. A Good read.