Modern Day Imperialism

I came across this ad today.



I immediately suspected it was for some carcinogenic-laden triple-powered skin bleaching treatment combined with methylene blue injections to the irises of the eyes.

I then proceeded to ignore the ad.

Easy, No Bullshit Tactics To Safeguard Your Heart

Oh so you met someone. Possibly on a plane or even barside. You hit it off and talk for endless hours. That infamous "spark" never seems to dissipate and feeds that burning hope inside that he might be the next target for your cupid's arrow. But if the world of dating were just that straightforward. That kind gesture of letting you wear his coat when you were chilly may not been kind after all. Maybe he was finding a tactful way of brushing up against your boobs to assay their net worth in gold, trying to estimate if they are worth the investment of a couple more drinks to be able to see them bare that night. Or he pulled out that chair for you to see the spread size of your backside while you were sitting down, wondering if he should offer to buy you dessert so he'd have something more to grab later down the line. That's right you assholes. I know what tricks you are up to and i have come up some tricks of my own tucked away in my bra cups to fire back at those blank bullets.

Tip #1: Never program his number into your phone. Never.
He may be nice at first, but you never know when he will inevitably turn into an inconsiderate asshole. It may be a week from now, months, or hell, even after 10 years of marriage. But when you know it is all over, do you really want to sit around wondering what went wrong and fighting the urge to call him for god knows how long. So unless he's your husband AND your emergency contact on your health forms, don't even bother trying to memorize his number or keeping it handy. Let him do all the calling and when YOU are done with him you can stop picking up his phone calls.

Tip #2: If he doesn't want to make plans with you for the weekend, go ahead and let the other guy take you out instead.
I cannot stress the importance of maintaining a quarry of single men in your life. Because lets face it. All men are practically the same. In the end, they will fail at something or another when it comes to women. This way, you will always have a fresh guy to turn to after you have become bored with the previous one. And since you never had the first guy's number anyways, why even try rescuing something that wasn't even worth saving?

Tip #3: Keep men that you have hooked up with too soon in purgatory.
Ok, so we've all been there at one degree or another. Never let these guys out of the darkness. Keep them at a distance from your life and make sure you shut the door very tightly after you are done with whatever your agenda was with them. Just admit to yourself that these guys cared about you only because you were giving something to them in return. It was a give-and-take relationship as if he were buying a set of melons at the grocery store. Which isn't a bad thing because melons are tasty, but they also spoil very quickly.

Anyways thats it. Follow these tips and you will probably never experience heartache and stay fabulously single for the rest of your living days.

DSM: Desi-itis

Desi-itis, not to be mistaken for Arnaz mania, is condition inflicted upon South Asian progenitors of children. The characteristics of this disorder are fraught with hypocrisy, double standards, and social biases towards caste, religion, and race. If you believe that you or a loved one is suffering from this disorder, the results of this quiz will once and for all confirm that you are insane as always suspected.


Question #1
You have lived away from home for over 5 years and in addition to taking an overload of graduate school classes, you have a part time job, leaving you with very little spare time for phone conversations. Your progenitors call you to say hello in the middle of class and you are unable to pick up. Do they:

A. Leave a nice voice message and equipped with the knowledge that you are incredibly busy, know that you will call once you have a free block of time?
B. Make 3-5 additional phone calls to you, getting you to frantically search for your phone in your backpack since you forgot to put your phone on silent that day and the class is beginning to get weirded out by your "Sexy Lady" ringtone?
C. Make 10-15 additional phone calls within a 1 hour block of time, leaving the same exact voicemail every time, resulting in a full voicemail box that keeps potential employers from leaving messages about interviews?


Question #2
After having no luck in the job market post-2007, you decide to go to graduate school as a way to make positive use of your free time while awaiting for the job market to improve. You figure, at least meanwhile you are improving your credentials and increasing your earning power down the line. Do your progenitors:

A. Applaud you for sacrificing immediate gratification of having a small income from a full-time job in an industry in which you had never intended to enter such as fast foods or retail for a greater, more financially stable and intellectually challenging career in the future?
B. Wonder why you aren't an accountant like cousin Raj even though you majored in the sciences?
C. Have no idea what graduate school is, the challenges it presents, and doors that it will open for you, but are still nagging you about focusing on career and a positive financial future. When you remind them of what you are doing, they will immediately forget all the details, including the name and location of your graduate school, and the nagging returns by the beginning of the following day?


Question #3
You casually mention to your parents that you are now lactose intolerant in passing one day. Nothing more is said about it, until months later, you go on a last minute trip to visit family across the country. Do they:

A. Wish you a safe trip and to come back home with a refreshed spirit to tackle the upcoming school year with full force?
B. Wonder why you chose to spend your free time with anybody else other than them even though you had just visited them for a week two months prior?
C. Accuse you of being completely irresponsible and having no direction in life and to add insult to injury, bombard you with inquiries of what you've been eating while you were away from home since "they worry" that you are lactose intolerant?


Question #4
After going through three stressful months of nothing but work, school, and sleep, you get an invitation to an anniversary party out of town thrown by a friend who you met while traveling overseas. After arranging transportation, you inform your progenitors out of sheer courtesy that you will be out of town for a friends anniversary celebration. Do your progenitors:

A. Say thanks for letting them know and ask you to pass on a congratulations to the hostess?
B. Worry that these supposed friends are bad influences, and try to convince you not to go?
C. Begin calling your phone incessantly, demand that you tell them the first and last names of everyone you will know there, the address at which you will be staying, and a detailed description of how you know these people and for how long. They spend the rest of the weekend staying up at night because they are upset that they haven't met this friend and therefore have no basis of passing judgment on them?


Question #5
You are called by your progenitors on Friday evening to see how you are doing. You inform them that you are at home knitting a pair of socks and watching TV as usual and plan on going to sleep by 10pm because you have to work and go to school early the next morning. They then call you on a Saturday night and you inform that you are the gym as you usually are those nights. Do they:

A. Beg you to go to a bar and have a beer to take the edge off and to also pull the dildo out of your ass?
B. Applaud you for leading a very low key life in order to focus on things they find are the most important?
C. Are extremely happy to see that your focus has been purely on school and a job you hate to boot and reward you by offering to let you fly home for a weekend to spend time with them?


Results:
Mostly As:
Hold off on the Fair and Lovely, your parents are most likely white. These types of parents encourage their children to have a well-rounded life and see them through with any challenges their children are facing.

Mostly Bs:
Your parents are most likely desi. They are overbearing and critical idiosyncratic of most desis, but in a way that is largely ignorable and/or forgettable.

Mostly Cs:
Desi-itis. See a mental health professional.

Ladies, Has This Ever Happened To You?

You're at the gym. Perhaps on the ab machine trying to sculpt a 6 pack and as your swinging up and down, you spot a hot guy. You suddenly become mesmerized by the way his arm muscles flex as he's lifting those dumbbells, even notice the way he purses his lips at every jostling rep. You begin fantasizing about the naughty things you'd do to this Michael Scofield lookalike. How you'd rip his sleeveless shirt off to reveal the Statue of David underneath (but with much more hefty package). How you'd put your lips to his caramel skin. How you'd bounce quarters off his chiseled ass when he wasn't looking.

Oops. He turns and looks at you, realizing that you've been staring. All flustered, you suddenly look away... and your eyes meet those of a middle-aged obese man in chucks and hairy legs on the hip extender machine. He smiles and waves. You proceed to go home empty-handed once again.

Never in my life had I felt so humiliated. Ok thats a lie.

5 Things I Learned About Gujus in New Jersey

Gujratis are a notorious clan. They are known to be cheap, tacky, and... vegetarian. Yuck! Having taken a long, extended hiatus from such people in hicksville otherwise known as Portland, OR, I was a reacquainted with my people, those to whom I have the closest genetic and cultural ties, during my two week stay in Edison, NJ. The findings were shocking and eye-opening.

1. Gujus do not understand, or rather, want to understand what orange cones mean on the road.

I came across this poor bastard when I attended a Friends of Gujrat event in nearby Brunswick. After having to roll down my window and yell at the Patel parade that rolled out of a clown car that literally blockaded me from finding parking for a good 15 minutes, I felt for this poor guy when I was trying to escape the circus. Yes, they basically needed to put human flesh in front of an entrance to a full parking lot because drivers couldn't clue in on the row of orange cones in front of it. Leave it to us Gujus to have to be threatened with a wreckless driving and manslaughter charge to keep us having our own way. "Friends" we may be, but not of the "Friends of the Road" variety.

2. Guju women flock to sales like hyenas feeding off of a single kill in the middle of a famine.

At "Friends of Gujrat," I was excited to find junk craft stalls. However, this was the booth that took the audience by storm. I tried to get a piece of the action. I mean at $15 per salwar kameez, who wouldn't right? So I squeezed between two overweight middle-women to get my own piece of that sweet sweet pie, and not only did I leave empty handed, I was elbowed in the side and kneed in the groin. Ok so I wasn't kneed in the groin. But might as well been.

3. Gujus like to tip in terms of Indian currency using American currency

This was my cousin's tip jar at a popular restaurant at the end of a hard day's work. After splitting it between 5 employees, he had enough money to buy a gumball at the mall. That is, after he traded in all those pennies for a shiny silver quarter. Nice going, chaiwalla!

4. Gujus take professional photos like they are mug shots.

This was the photo that was chosen by at dentist for his ad in the local paper. Thanks, Dr. Patel, but I think I'll pick someone else to remove my wisdom teeth. I'd like to spare being molested while under general anesthesia.

5. Lastly, Gujus think I'm white. Not ABCD. White.
It was okay though because that somehow made me feel quite superior. Even my cousin was shocked when they'd roll out the red carpets, crown me with a tiara, and hand me a fresh bouquet of red roses every time I went to the local Cash and Carry. I was a celebrity without having to do anything! I guess this is how Lindsey Lohan feels. Or Julia Roberts, post-"Eat Pray Destroy", that is.

Online Dating Advice

Admit it. You have turned to online dating because you got no game in person. It's cool. I don't either. We are all not born with the gift to charm the pants off a member of the opposite sex. Thank our lucky stars that we are living in a time that all we need to do is put up a photoshopped pictures of ourselves taken under very flattering lighting and write a description of "how we wish we were" to lure poor souls into our lair of dating mayhem. Unfortunately most of you assholes aren't getting it right still.

I have created a flow chart of how I approach online dating to summarize how I go about my selection process.



I find this flowchart to simplify the selection process incredibly. Unfortunately, after all the time investment, I have yet to find a man amongst the 200ish that actually have reached the level of "Acceptance with Reservations." I may possibly be too picky. Nonetheless, I do not think there is anything wrong with not wanting a guy that thinks that best picture of himself is one of him wearing some aviators leaning against a wall to accentuate his girlish figure. Neither do I feel that I am too picky to want a guy that has had at least a junior high school education, as indicated by his ability to speak proper English.

Whatever.

Caucasian People Better Recognize

The other day, I was cooking, well rather, chopping up some veggies to make a delicious salsa. I skipped on purchasing one of the "musts" of making a perfect salsa - cilantro - because I was told by my roommate that he had some in the fridge that he wasn't using. So I get home and unfortunately, he was not present to help me locate my favorite leafy green in the fridge. His girlfriend was, and having been bragging that she has been working in a Mexican restaurant as a line cook for the past few weeks, I thought she was the right person to command to fetch me the cilantro from the fridge.

Instead, she brings me a different vegetable altogether. Parsley. Reasonable mistake at first glance, we all know that, but then I said something. "This is parsley," as a I examined the vegetable. "No, honey, this is cilantro." She appeared so confident, indicated by her use of the interjection "honey," as if she harnessing all the culinary knowledge of the world.

What a bitch. I wanted to slap her. Who the hell tells a DESI person what cilantro is? White people. That's who.