In the Blues...

Halle Berry

Britney Spears

Del Synnott

Besides being your average list of Hollywood’s beautiful people, the above names have done more than sparked off interest in their luck-kissed lives. They have quite a few things in common – having lent their names to million-dollar brand endorsements, flashed those pearlies, arm-in-arm with other beautiful people at red-carpet and other gala events, and graced numerous magazines and newspapers.

Additionally - they all, have some time or the other, attempted suicide.

Owen Wilson, he of the 13-times broken nose, twinkling eyes, and lopsided grin, considered Hugh Grant’s American equivalent of the archetypical romantic actor, decided to join the unenviable list above. Thankfully, he lives to tell his tale.

Three days back, he fell prey to a broken spirit three days back, ODed on sleeping pills, and slashed his wrists. Speculation is rife over the reasons that led him to take such an extreme action. The most prominent rumor doing the rounds is that he was suffering prolonged bouts of the blues, following his much-splashed-in-the-tabloids, very very public breakup with a popular blonde actress.

Which brings me to the all-important question. Why do such people, seemingly living lives that others would kill for, try to take their own lives? What led a prominent singer like Jerry Hadley to shoot himself in the head last month, an act that claimed his life?

Seems like the black feelings of rejection, gloom, separation and isolation spare no one from their fangs, doing Octopus numbers on all.

Get a (Second) Life

When I was in first year college (which seems like so far far away now), I read Sidney Sheldon’s “Tell Me Your Dream.” The story, revolving around a woman and her two alter-egos, stayed in my memory for quite a bit. And I often mused what it would be like to have an alter ego. Not violent, psychopathic ones that we get to see aplenty in movies like Sybil, Psycho, Primal Fear, X-Men etc. But just as an innocuous variation from humdrum lives.

Now before you shake your head, and give me up as a probable case of another person suffering from a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde syndrome / an MPD patient in the making, let me hastily assure you that being cited as suffering from Dissociative Identity Disorder is hardly appealing to anyone, not even quirky me, but hmmmm, it definitely would be interesting, to say the least.

For those who have wondered how it would all be, a website, Second Life, promises to deliver all that. Registration is relatively hassle-free, and lo and behold! You are a “Resident,” who can create motional avatars, hob-nob with other Residents, own property (virtual, of course), create buildings (now is the best time for you to build your very own private skyscraper dazzling in the azure sky), buy / sell an island (using Second Life’s own currency, termed Linden Dollars - L$- with 270 L$ = 270 USD).

Sounds neat, right?

Though parodies of the site are aplenty, and criticism / singgering rife, the site has managed to get more than 8.9 million people, oops, Residents, excited enough to sign up.

Besides finding a loyal fan in my niece, who is thrilled to bits since the time she heard about it from me.

I’m guessing she’ll buy an entire island to safely stack her army of Mattel blonde dolls, far far away from her elder brother who has a penchant for smashing all things even vaguely “girlie” to smithereens.

Go on, become a Resident here.

Quite Some Monkey Business This

There’s quite a lot you can hide from view under a hat.

Must be what some airport officials must be repeating to each other, and rolling their eyes in disbelief in the bargain.

Seems like an enterprising passenger, flying from Peru to the US, managed to conveniently smuggle a monkey under his hat.

I don’t blame you – I also shook my head in a) incredulity, and b) mirth when I first heard the news.

So coming back to the passenger in question, he smoothly walked past customs in Peru, reached Florida, and boarded another plane to New York. Quite a cool, unruffled, cucumber, I must say.

I'm certain he didn’t tip his hat off in respect to anyone. Or give a wobbly curtsy.

The monkey business wouldn’t have been found out, had it not been for the simian making up its mind to take a peep from under its hideaway, in teh middle of the flight, much to the other passengers’ astonishment, replaced soon by alarm.

I would have been startled too if I would have suddenly set my eyes upon my co-passenger, and seen another pair of glittering eyes peeping out from under his hat, when he had a perfectly normal pair perched on his face...

Understandably, all hell broke loose on the flight, and harried crew-members tried their utmost to hold down the hysterical passengers.

The errant passenger held the monkey in his hands throughout the rest of the flight.
It was only when the flight reached its destination – New York’s Guardia Airport, and the Police Department escorted the passenger and the monkey off the craft, that the others heaved a collective sigh of relief.

I’m sure the situ must have been grim for the answerable officials in Peru and Florida who, despite the snazziest of gadgets and stringent security methods, had failed to detect the grinning ape. One humble pie lesson that sure it would have been.

Me – I would have loved being on that flight.

It sure would have been more funny than a barrel of monkeys (pun intended);-)

She's got the Look...

I’m not in the business of deciding right and wrong, cos that’s not me.

But even I was surprised last weekend, when on my way out of an upscale coffee house with my guy, I chanced to settle my eyes on a PYT (Pretty Young Thing, for you uninitiated people), who, incidentally, had also decided to cast a look at me.
Difference was – mine was one of those nonchalant looks you bestow upon people, when you are thinking of other matters, and are seeing (or rather unseeing them). That may lead the person to actually think that you are looking at them, though is someone may ask, you may have even missed that David Beckham / Gisele Bunndchen look-alike, sitting in your clear range of vision.

She, on the other hand, was definitely casting more than one of those offhand, casual looks.

In fact, I was flabbergasted when I realized that the look she was giving me was one of pure venom.

Completely knocked for a six, I could scarcely fathom what the look was for.

Out of the coffee home, I couldn’t help but remember the unmistakable poison-stare that the red-lipped-pouting girl had decided to cast upon me.

Strange is the world.

Stranger are its people, I guess.

Since I am talking of looks that people cast on others, I was just thinking of some looks that we are familiar with:

The look which a person, asking for alms, gives you when you reach out for your wallet.

The look your pet gives you when you open the front door and walk home.

The look you give to the waiter who runs behind you to return the wallet that you had absent-mindedly left behind in the restaurant that you were dining at.

The look your subordinate gives you when you cover-up for his goof-up.

The look your friends give you when you reach out for that sinful tiramisu.
Calories: 1000000000. Taste: Pure bliss.

The look your friendly neighborhood store-owner gives you when you forget to carry the exact change yet again.

The look your dad gives you when you are glued to the idiot-box when you should be in your room, finishing that pending task.

The look your five-year old niece / nephew give you when you whip out that gaily-wrapped present from your duffel bag.

The look your best friend bestows at you when you pass your favorite store, and see bold-red lettering, screaming, S-A-L-E.

The look your beloved has when he / she sets eyes upon you you, though you might have had met the day before…..

Dash in a flash....

The other day a guy friend told me about the vanities of the female sex.

And about the more than ample time on their prettily-manicured hands to pander to these vanities.

Point in question – St. Petersburg hosted a run for women wearing...

Hold your horses, all you pervs out there.

The participants had to wear stilettos, with a minimum height of 9 cms (3.5 inches).

And if you thought that most would turn up their pretty noses at the event, think again.

More than a hundred Russian women turned up, to sweat it out for this 100-meter High-Heel Race.

What were they all running for, you might ask?

The prize was a $2,000 shopping-spree.

Not bad, eh?

Now if only they would hold such stuff here in India, I’m sure quite a few of my friends would sprint it out...