Oui Oui Oui!

Sometimes people, I think that my life is made for this blog. Those tidbits happen just so that I could have a post on my blog. You know, the things that happen, the way they happen, each day could be a post here. Thank God! I am lazy.

Consider the last weekend for example. It has been one of the most amazing, action-packed weekends I have had so far. It was a very special occasion. It was my best friend’s birthday. Varsha was turning 20 (she is err, ahem, 1.5 years younger to me) on the 20th (yeah T20 :P) and we decided to make it a special occasion, together, getting away from this zalim world to sea world, San Antonio. I was as usual super excited. So there I was all excited, planning things, buying lot of goodie snacks the entire week and as usual, not working.

Friday came and so did Varsha. And there were customary greetings on seeing each other - “HEY, HI!!”, “Kaisi ho!!”, “Tum dubli ho gayi”, “Haan tum bhi!” etc etc. We went to Walmart to get those last minute things. We were supposed to leave very early morning on Saturday. Yippee, we were super excited for this 5 hour drive and the prospects of seeing Shamu!

So we came home from Walmart and had the modest dinner I prepared. As was expected, I had not packed any of my stuff. My clothes were in the closet, my toothbrush was in the bathroom and my bag was no where to be found. And before I could even start to think where to begin my packing, it happened. Mother Nature called Varsha, a call she could not refuse and when she came out she turned the door knob the other way, the wrong way. And the door got locked! We looked at each other, then the knob, not knowing what to do or what to say or what to think. We were trapped outside! My toothbrush was inside, so was my perfume, my cream, my everything! We had to find a way out, rather way in.

You see, when two engineers are together, all they can do is screw up things and think of screwdrivers! So we felt that removing the knob itself from the outside would help us open the lock. And we drove the driver hard and all the screws were removed and before we could stop it the knob on the inside fell inside and the outer one outside. And in the middle was a nasty hole from which I could see my toothbrush, my perfume, my cream and my everything! With no other option, we decided that we would get up early, go to Walmart (thankfully it remains open 24 hours), get a toothbrush and paste and cream and perfume from there, use it there itself and then drive. So we get up at 4 AM and find ourselves being stared by all the Walmart employees. Never ever in my life have I realized the worth of a bathroom so much!

Finally we get on the road and forget about that entire ordeal! We were on our way to San Antonio. And we reached there on time – 10:30 AM! We had already booked a hotel there and were really looking forward to go to the bathroom. We go in very confidently and ask for our room keys. The front desk was a very kind lady. She looked at us and then the reservation and said almost apologetically that she cannot give us the keys. We were shocked and she explained that the checkin time is 3:00 PM and there was no other room available. We looked at each other and laughed!

Anyway, we used the hotel lobby rest room, got ready there and went to Sea World. It was so hot that day. I would have almost evaporated and after a few hours we decided to go to Riverwalk and see the rest of Sea World the next day. So we come back and go to our rooms and sleep! We were finally happy to have a bathroom and a bed! Aur kuch nahi chahiye tha life mein. We went to Riverwalk in the evening, took the cruise there, talked a lot and came back. I had some office work to do at midnight so I worked for a while and slept.

Only to be rudely awakened by a support issue at 6:00 AM. I worked for another couple of hours, had our breakfast and we were off to San Antonio. Sea World as usual was fantastic. Shamu soaked us, Viva wowed us, Sea Lion amazed us. After that great experience we came back to Dallas that night. The bathroom door was still locked and the maintenance would be available only in the morning. It was Varsha’s birthday on Monday so we thought we would stay at Veethi’s place that night! Veethi and family had gone to LA that weekend. And surely, she called up and said that they missed their flights and would be coming back late Monday night. So we had another bathroomless night in store for us. We came back to my place and used the apartment gym restroom. And thankfully next day morning the door was opened in 2 minutes by the maintenance guy who claimed he can do something about everything!

I had planned a couple of surprises for Varsha. Not surprisingly, none of it came to her as a surprise. One of the side effects of having a friend as great as Varsha is that there is no way you can surprise her anymore. She just knows me that well. While I can only thank God for giving me a friend like her, I also wonder what to do to make her special day a special one. It becomes tougher over a period of time. It is almost impossible for me now. Anyway, her other friends still managed to surprise her. She got a brand new phone, a wonderful dedication video, flowers and infinite phone calls.

We saw Ice age 3 that evening. A really amazing movie which finally got me over the Harry Potter shock! We came back home, more or less contended, very tired and we slept almost instantaneously.

And in the morning it was time for Varsha to pack stuff. She came, she locked the door and she was going back. Parting is never easy. It became more difficult for her because she was left stranded at the airport because of a delay. Varsha later told me that the airport staff joked something about the bathroom not working in the aircraft!!

Hey Varsha! Thank you for making this trip when you could definitely be having more fun with a lot of friends back in Iowa. And thank you for locking the bathroom door. I have a wonderful memory for the lifetime!!

God bless you and a very happy birthday!