Comedy of Errors

Comedy of Errors. Was it Shakespeare who immortalized this expression? I am not sure about that but I first heard that expression when watching a cricket match, during the course of which a batsman, I guess, upon espying a bug sitting on the upper lip of the fellow team mate, walked down the pitch to apprise him of the same. But before the batsman could figure out that it was Hitler-esque mustache and not a bug, and make a bee-line for his crease, the wicket-keeper had done a neat job of collecting the ball and breaking the stumps, and he was declared run-out. It was a tragic moment indeed. One that knocks the sunshine out of one's face as one watches the batsman walk back to pavilion. But the commentator Ravi Shastri, who is well-known for saying 'the ball went like a tracer bullet" at least two dozen times a match, called it Comedy of Errors.

Since then I have come across this expression innumerable times and every time I end up making an ass of myself, which is a roundabout way of saying daily, causing people to laugh till their sides ache, it springs to my mind. Below mentioned are few events that fit the category, but since this is my blog and I can write whatever crap I want, I have carefully omitted the events in which yours truly was the source of entertainment.

What did you have for lunch, Jesu? : If you are of type that prefers nicety, I recently registered for office bus service, putting an end to three-year sojourn with public transportation. This left me with a lot of leisure for watching the beauty of nature while commuting(read between lines, paras etc.), which was earlier spent pulling, pushing, pinching, kicking and sometimes even yawning in the face of co-passenger to gain a foothold in outrageously crowded buses.

During one of those nature-watching times, my sight fell on an Art shop. I cannot say anything about the quality of the pictures in that shop because all my attention was grabbed by the name board. The owner being a beacon of brevity, had decided to abbreviate the shop name to a goodish extent with the result, what should have been "Jesu Fine Arts" read as "JESU F.ARTS". :-D

That would have tickled even Narasimha Roa I suppose. :P

Man of Action? Ahem! : Of all the simple pleasures in life, the one that gives one a sense of superiority is reading the answer sheet of someone who is not as bright as one. Being fully aware that my friend's brother, a student of class IX, was as strong in Tamil as Ravindra Jadeja is with bat, I settled down on a chair with his answer sheet, hoping to have a whale of a time. And I was not disappointed in the least. His answer sheet was replete with glaring grammatical errors, egregious spelling mistakes and what not. Making complete use of the opportunity to dole out free advices, I was telling him how I used to wake up at 4am everyday during my school days for studying and all that stuff, when I caught sight of another spelling mistake and almost fell off the chair. The chap had written an essay about one of the greatest politicians Kamaraj, who is known by the sobriquet of "Karma-Veerar", which, roughly translated, means "Man of Action". Owing to missing a dot above a letter, it became "Kaama-Veerar" (No translation required I guess). :-D

Kamaraj must be turning in his grave!

Too bad Pinki!: On our way back to our places after a coffee break, me and a couple of my friends were chit-chatting about this and that, and I don't remember how, but by the time we reached the journey's end the subject of our conversation was "Puzzles". One thing lead to another, and finally Friend A threw a puzzle, which he called a simple one, to Friend B.

Pinki's father has 4 daughters. Their names are 25paise, 50paise and 75paise. What is the name of the fourth one?

Friend B gave it some thought. He was sure that the answer wasn't 1Re, for these kind of puzzles always have a catch. After reflecting for a few seconds, he said the answer was 100paise, and beamed at us as though he'd just discovered the largest prime number. (Note: If you also thought the answer was 1re/100paise, give yourself a pat on the back, with an iron rod that is.)

It took a while for Friend A to explain Friend B, during the course of which he employed words like "dim-wit", "pea-brain", "flibbertigibbet", that the answer to this simple puzzle was Pinki. Friend B protested that it was not an easy one and, as if to prove this point, asked this question to the first person who passed by that way, but he took liberty to slightly modify the question.

Pinki's daughters have 4 fathers. Their names are 25paise, 50paise and 75paise. What is the name of the fourth one?

The expression of shock and horror on the face of that unfortunate passer-by was priceless. :)

There are many such events to write about but I'll have to stop here. The post is already painfully long and my fingers have started to ache(Did someone say "So has my head"? :evil: ) Perhaps I'll save them for future and make another blog post of them when my brain runs out of Grey matter and can't think of anything original. :-P Cheerio!