language_pen

Choose a language to write with -- said the billboard. I was impressed. Didn't I have eighteen already to choose from? That ten amongst them did not have scripts - is not a laughing matter.

The ball point pens were slightly expensive. But I could now declare that I wanted to write poetry or an obnoxious stinker. No other pen in the world could offer this variety. It was a bargain that could not be dismissed arbitrarily.

Besides, I was losing my pens frequently in the commuter trains, in the parties or simply as bookmarks in the libraries. Most of them were given away in charity -- as though -- being donated at post offices and in the nationalised banks to souls who systematically refrained from bringing their own marking machines. My veritable pen set has at least four pens, now, respectively to write - invitations, you-are-welcom, eulogies and abuses.

Why is this pen priced so expensive -- I inquired sincerely, while trying to impress the shopkeeper with my earnestness. He said it was a pen used to write only cheques. Sorry, he informed, it does not come with an expense account. He added that there are pens that function only on Sundays and holidays. The pens that think religiously are yet another class -- he volunteered.

Just then an irate customer stormed in and announced that the cheque writing pen failed him. Why so - he demanded to know. "Naturally", volunteered a convinced shop-keeper, "you do not expect this pen to write cheques for paltry sums. It is guaranteed to write well for amounts more than a million rupees". It is for the crorepatis -- we ought to know!

On way home, my business friend explained that they are now "offering" to choose your very own telephone number. According to him, it is such a simple gimmick that any non-descript telephone administration could have used as a ploy for luring customers. "After  all", he said, "each telephone ought to have a number in order to be addressed. Why would they not allow the subscribers themselves to choose from the thousands they have?"

Yes, I mused - one would like to have all sevens, or all nines. Another may like to have the combination in such a way that the digits add up to eight or seven and three quarters. Some numbers can promise business. And others that may not guarantee so much business, but bring a flood of profits. Some will invite interesting wrong calls. Naturally there will be some others that connect you to juicy cross talks.

We do not yet know what the stars are going to foretell. This week for me is going to be so dependent on the numbers. That is why the lucky numbers are announced in the dailies and the TV. I take great pains to choose a right registration for my car, the specific seat in the morning plane and also the joining instant in the new job recently switched to - all only to secure the desired good result at the end of the respective event.

I can go on endlessly. But stop I must, here! Else I will not be able to post this material exactly at thirty seven minutes past three p.m -- that is the auspicious time decreed by my Jyotish for mailing this middle.