Popagandhi

Some time ago, I was eating dinner at an Indian place in a back alley somewhere in Petaling Jaya, Malaysia.

I raised my hand and said to a waiter, “Can I have raita?”

He nodded, and scurried off.

Ten minutes later, I still didn’t have my raita, and I noticed he hadn’t even entered the restaurant storefront or the kitchen in search of any. Instead, he was scurrying around his colleagues, flitting from waiter to waiter, asking for something, they all looked into their pants. I was trying to figure out why he’d think he would ever find any raita (a yoghurt) off another waiter, especially if they were looking into their pockets for some.

Someone next to me picked up a cigarette.

Said waiter came running over, and came skidding to a halt, flicked what he had in his hand, while saying, “Ma’am! (heavy Indian accent, mind) Ma’am, your… RAAAAIIIIIII-TTTEEEEERRR!!!!!” Lighter, raita. Sounds the same, I guess, depending on who says it.

Maybe many of us geeky types live in our own worlds where we take for granted, as ‘normal,’ the things we know and love (or things we hear about a lot). Like GTD(Getting Things Done), for example. I’m not a huge practitioner of the GTD philosophy, but I read enough blogs about it, and as a Mac user/follower of Mac-centric software and tech news, am constantly in the loop about… GTD applications. I’ve tried just about every GTD app there is in the Macniverse, but seldom persisted (isn’t it strange there’s hardly even one equivalent GTD app on Windows that’s… near the quality of the many GTD apps we have on OS X?). Today, on a whim, I decided that implementing iGTD into my workflow would be a great idea. I had to tell someone about it on the phone.

Me: “Check your email, I sent you a screenshot of how I’m serious about doing what I promised you I’d do!”

Someone: “How do you go about proving that you’re serious about doing something you promised me.. in a screenshot?”

Me: “I downloaded this application, created a new project for you, and added the two tasks I was supposed to do under it. Marked it as high priority, even.”

Someone: “Instead of… actually just doing it?”

Me: “That’s right. Funny how I haven’t… thought of that.”

Moral of the story. Every once in a while, look up from your RSS reader and your GTD applications, and… actually try to get things done instead of blogging about getting things done. That is, if you’re a regular geek like me and not one of those not super-efficient GTD kungfu masters who can code beautifully, write really well, take great photographs, run a highly successful online empire, all while writing code that can change the world, and organizing the bits and pieces of your life using GTD applications. Alternatively. Use any combination of the following: pen and paper, pen and sweaty palm, a real stickie note stuck on computer screen. Because I could really do with getting things actually done right now, with the million and one projects I’ve very ambitiously taken on, being hyper-efficient might not help as much as having maybe eight extra hours in a day.

Surreal: Someone came over saying, “I got Italian Vogue for the both of you!”

He skipped past us, the only two girls in his line of vision. Two tall dashing boys picked up the magazines, flipped through them excitedly, occasionally saying things like, “Is that Galliano’s latest?” “Amazing.” “This dress is so hot.”

I love them to bits, but… gay men make me feel so.. inadequate.

Happy Diwali, everybody (especially all 100 000 of you from India :P).

This afternoon, somebody added me as a Facebook friend while I was next to her.

She took a quick look at my profile and asked, “WHERE’S THAT THING TO POKE YOU AND THROW SHEEP?”

I didn’t have it.

The conversation took place among a collection of random people at my university who were going to graduate in the next 80 days (including yours truly), and concerned itself with what our respective plans were. They had job offers and such, and concrete plans involving the moving of cities/countries in exciting jobs.

A: “I don’t know why, but when I think about what you might do after university, I always have this mental picture of you parachuting into a house in the jungle, rescuing Aung San Suu Kyi from the junta, liberating Burma, and riding off into the sunset with her and James Bond.”

Me: “Great idea, but why James Bond? Can I have, say, Angelina Jolie.”

A: “Sure. But I doubt you’ll be able to get any work done if she came along. I picked James Bond for your story so he’d still look good in the movie, but not distract you from your mission.”

I do have plans. Many! They won’t immediately make me a 5-figure monthly salary, but I have a good feeling about them. (Hint: NYC.)