Kiran Jonnalagadda’s Blog

Coconut lane in Jayanagar.

From the editorial of a mutual fund newsletter:

Market was hanging like the pendulum of the clock swinging back and forth. The good news is hardly to be found and the hunt is on with sniffer dogs to locate the needle of faith in a haystack of disappointment and frustration.

If this newsletter ever had a copy editing team, I bet they died of asphyxia.

There he stands, poised on his elegant suspension frame. He’s a long way from the ground. He doesn’t know where he’s going, but he knows he must go straight up.

Up, up, up, as far as it goes, and then he will turn around and dive, streaming fine silk. Then he must do it again, laying another strand of the foundation for his future. And again, and again, until there’s enough framework to begin building in earnest. He’s a veteran. He’s been through this several times. His missing leg vouches for it.

But he doesn’t know what he’s up against this time. His versatile feet find no traction on the smooth ceramic. He struggles to find a grip to hoist himself with, flails wildly. The joints tire. He pauses, gathers his energy, heaves, releases another burst, but the surface still doesn’t yield.

He doesn’t understand what’s happening. This is supposed to be the easiest part. The hard work is yet to come. He can’t be losing already. Not after he’s gotten so far. Not after so much effort. He doesn’t realise that traction is easily found in the grooves, but to use them he has to take a step sideways for every step upwards. His adamant mind insists the only way to go is up.

And so he struggles, making painfully slow progress.

Maybe he’ll discover the trick to climbing this wall. Maybe he’ll give up and find another wall. The future is open-ended.

That is not mist or smoke in the picture. That is granite dust, from a borewell being sunk at the end of the street. The noise is all permeating. Glass panes and thick curtains are no match for it. It barges through, heedless of all barriers, barges through to the skull and numbs it.

Surely this sign isn’t promising a local call to Atlanta?

Q: How do you know about the hottest Internet companies around?
A: Look for posters on tree trunks.

This report on a monkey jail in Patiala is the funniest bit of serious news I’ve read in a long time.

Monkeys have invaded government ministries in New Delhi, ridden elevators and climbed along windowsills. Monkeys slapped students inside a girls school in a south Bengal suburb. A gang of monkeys in the city of Chandigarh ripped up lawns, broke flowerpots and yanked sheets off beds.

…

Two monkeys were picked up from the chief minister’s house, basically for loitering.

Since mannu is off to the US, we had a small farewell party for him. I was carrying a small tripod, so I took the opportunity to experiment with incandescent lighting. Pictured here is the lovely miss rashmiprasad.

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I was showing my camera to a friend last night and he was appalled that zoom was controlled manually, that I didn’t know what zoom it had (3x? 5x? 10x? 28-80mm lens = 80÷28 = 2.857x zoom), that there was no LCD preview to see what was being shot, that it had no night mode or macro mode, and that I had to buy a separate macro lens for macro mode.

“Film is film,” he declared.

At long last, the much awaited event. This week there are no girls looking for guys. Guess ToI got tired of printing the same stale messages week after week.

Badmash has an excellent strip this week. It’s eerie.

What is this? A water purifier cum cable modem? Maybe Dina Mehta can use it the next time she has water coming down the wire. Imagine the marketing offer: “for every hour you spend online, you’ll get a litre of Internet-enriched water, FREE!”

If you shoot a brainless copy writer in the head, would it make any difference?

Christian fundamentalists always have the best captions.

Where the duuds go to look kool.

Him of the spare blue forearm.

After the latest crash, my phone no longer plays a tone when I receive a new message. The only way to know is by looking for the new message icon that appears in the corner. Restarting the phone doesn’t fix it.

In a cobbler’s shop outside Madhavan Park in Jayanagar. I have a close-up with the cat staring at the camera, but the surroundings added a lot of character to the picture.

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Friends, bloggers, passers-by, give me your captions.

When God provides the apple, why do you need Eve?

The singing portrait will play your choice of devotional song. It even comes with a remote control.

How does one prosecute a poster? By stripping it off?

Mobile driving instructions, on the back of a truck.

Laundry in the drain pipe.