Neilogism

Ask Abby: Bollywood Relationship Advice

Namastey! Aap kaisey hain my dear girls and boys?  My Indian daknam is  Abhinavaparnali Vinayavigneswarneoydas but all you silly DESI Westerners can call me Abby! Every week I’ll be reading your eeh-mails and answering your questions about dating, relationships and vat is love, using the most important and most true source—Bollywood!

Dear Abby,

What can I do to help find Mr. Right? I’m inexperienced with the entire “dating” scene and could use your expert help!

— Sarah

Dearest Sarah,

Oh chokree, your six-fingered, see-through shirt wearing, smooth chested Indian raja is out there somewhere! Now like any modern-Western-MTV like issue, one should consult the classical Hindustani texts and strive for most perfect balance of body, mind and soul. First for your body, you need to make sure your skin is most pale and there isn’t the slightest tinge of darkness (weakness)—there is an old saying in my village that says “Apne kaala bo pani sharanlinga” which translates to “Seriously, go bleach your skin until you look like a ghost”. Now you must most perfect your mind and I find that yoga helps sharpen the brain, and also a practicing the “slow-motion-dramatic-zoom-camera shot”. You can practice walking at most slow pace, periodically pausing to whip your hair in a fluid motion and then freezing your face with an overly expressive look—putting your hand over your mouth in surprise works great as well! Practice in front of mirror yaar, it is most easy. Sometimes I like to practice walking in and out of rooms, hours on ends—one time my immediate family thought I was most dead or most kidnapped since I spent 10 hours in slow motion. Finally and this is most important, you must make sure that you are less than 29.999 years of age, otherwise you must relinquish your soul and become a nun.

Pyar,

Abby

Dear Abby,

So I have been talking with this one girl for like three to four months. Things are going to well but she hasn’t slept with me yet! I mean we cuddle and all but what can I do to help get some action?

— Benjamin

Benjamin,

Sex? Vhat is this the Kardashians? There is no hanky-panky-sexy in Bollywood! Kiss her on the cheek once (preferably in slow motion) ,go read the Vedas and then pray.

Pyar,

Abby

Dear Abby,

My girlfriend says that I’m not sensitive enough and that I need to be more “emotional”. What does she mean?  

— Neal

Neal,

This is a common complaint—guys today are all “dishoom dishoom” and “muscle shirt” but they do not know vhat is love and how to veally connect with a woman. Emotions are not complicated; they are actually most simple and easy to understand. First, do you have a tragic back story that you can use to help win over the viewer’s sympathy? Maybe a little brother who’s only dying wish is to become a first class cricket player but he can’t because he witnesses a horrible murder perpetrated by evil Indian gangsters, who then paid off a corrupted police officer to intimidate his family as well as your entire village school who tease him relentlessly, and now his only solace is spending time with his brother while hiding from the community that he’s actually a little girl? Or perhaps you have a simple minded uncle who raised you like you were his own son and traded all nuances of success in order for you to thrive, and then will later be killed by falling rocks in a freak accident, in order to deliver a final message about following your heart, which was painfully obvious from the title? Get creative—maybe you can befriend an orphan from the lower caste and then slowly teach the village that prejudice is wrong, unless they have dark skin. If all else fails, wear a collared shirt and start singing slowly in the rain. Also—have you tried dancing to a musical?

Pyar,

Abby

Dear Abby,

I need serious help. So my boyfriend and I have been dating for months but he suddenly broke things off with me on my wedding day because he feared that terrorists were seeking to exact revenge on him and that he did not want endanger my life.He told me that he loved me but he needed to go far away forever and then broke into song for 2 hours. I have spent the last week crying and bleaching my skin—I don’t know what to do. How long will this heart ache last? Is this normal?? Help!!

— Natasha

Natasha,

This is quite normal and you’ll be back together after the intermission. 

Pyar,

Abby

Other unsung heroes

• Corporal brave driver who selflessly allowed you to cut in front of him, only to get stopped at the red light while you zoomed past.  
• First Class bartender who accidentally put two shots instead of one in you and your dates drink.
• General Google Chrome who clears your search history, browser cache and allows incognito mode. 
• Sergeant mutual friend who listens to your significant other’s laments about you and then kindly texts you how to resolve things.
• Private drunk boisterous creepy guy who shields your temporary faults with a barrage of douchiness. 
• Gunnery Sergeant Febreeze—dear god the things scents you have covered up.
• Unknown “oh I have a friend” who coincidentally needs advice in a situation very similar to yours but like, I swear, it’s for a friend and not me. Totally.  
• Warrant Officer Autocorrect who turns drunken “ogdm i lobe yuo” into coherent poetry. 
• Anyone who survived the “Guess what’s different about me” or “How do I look in this dress” war of 2011.

Legal Tender

With inflationary pressure, a troubled Eurozone and the specters of a recession, it is difficult to gauge how much money is worth—here are some handy conversions!

1 penny

• Free massage from TSA
• Existential inquiry on penny’s place in society
• Bar stool or uneven furniture leveling device 

1 dollar

• A hamburger from McDonalds
• Used 2 Buck Chuck from Trader Joes
• A pack of Starbursts
• Nasty look from your waitress if your bill >10$

5 dollars

• A feast from any fast food establishment with a side of guilt for not going to Subway (I’ll start the diet next week, I promise).
• A pint of beer
• Enough bread to be elected undisputed king of any duck pond 
• A pack of Starbursts (from Airport

On Google Maps and Driving

I should do contract work for organized crime.

Oh no, nothing of the macabre nature—as a lean Indian guy who enjoys the occasional mimosa, I’m as intimidating as a bucket of kittens with rainbow sprinkles. Instead I have the uncanny ability to misinterpret all conceivable forms of driving directions and get hopelessly lost—I can make myself and the unfortunate inhabitants of my car utterly disappear. I imagine an aged Mafioso, his face creased with both battle scars and wrinkles, calling me up and asking me to take “Vinny the snitch” to sleep with the Fishes.

Two hours and 45 wrong turn later; we are somehow in Bermuda. 

Now a horrible sense of direction by itself isn’t a cause for alarm but when coupled with my reckless sense of adventure and my decoupled aloofness, I don the complacency of a stoner finishing his 20 Taco Bell chalupas. Mundane tasks such as getting milk, picking up my little sister or trying to exit a parking lot become epics of Homeric proportions.

Sing muse—Sing of Pankaj’s son inability to ask use Google Maps and wasted fuel economy. 

I’d like to trace the genesis to some watershed moment in my childhood. Perhaps it was the time I got lost at the Houston Zoo and rather than find my parents, my sisters of course had cooties, I wandered aimlessly from the reptile booth to the lion’s den. Maybe at some point in my kindergarten class, I kept coloring outside the lines to my exhausted teacher’s silent resignation- ingraining an adolescent anarchist mentality to “fight the man” by ignoring  written directions.

And occasionally eating paste.

Regardless of the origin, for the last 6 years, Neil Shah has tried to travel from point A to point B and indirectly ends up at ¥.

My journeys always start out the same. I Google Map my destination and visually walk myself through it. I play a little hardcore rap to psyche myself into believing I can do this—my very geographical testicles are always at stake. I repeat calm but firm phrases to pump up my ego and gets my blood flowing.

“I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul”.

Once I’m in my car I try to re-imagine the Golden route in my head but to due to my short attention span and NPR on the radio, I’m destined to fail. Typically I’ll maneuver my way an exit or two from my destination and then for some reason completely miss the sign, turn or bridge. A normal person would pop a U-turn and get on with their normal life but not I said the Neil.

Instead I convince myself, like a recently dumped individual,  that “everything is okay” while the entire space-time-complex collapses on my car. You see, I come from the Sim City school of city planning and assume that all streets and intersections meet at clean Cartesian like bisections, and a few simple turns will get me back to my original destination.

False.

Instead I’ll haphazardly take turns and become so committed to the idea that my destination HAS to be nearby that I continue with my misguided turns until I’m in an entirely new zip code.

Normally this wouldn’t be a huge issue but my car has a propensity of leading me to shady neighborhoods that shouldn’t exist—I’m like FourSquare  for the Ghetto. So now in addition to being lost and hungry (I have probably been taking strange turns for 4 days by now), I’m driving around regions where the local dialect is “What choo say Bitch” and the legal tender is “cap in yo ass”. Even if I tried to stop to ask for directions I’m sure through some dumb luck I’ll accidentally say a code word and find myself in the middle of a gang war or drug deal.

“Yo homes—did you just say you want some 59,ese?” 

By now my friends/family/girlfriend/ex-girlfriend/drugdealer are calling my phone and wondering why I’m 6 hours late to a surprise party. Swallowing my pride, I do what anyone else would do in my situation —lie through the teeth and keep on driving until I find a IHOP and ask the pretty white hostess for directions and a stack of pancakes. 

Failed Cover Letters Part 2

This one actually yielded an interview

Dear John,

Is it okay if I call you John? I’m going to call you John—referring to you as John X is sterile, cold and reeks of perfunctory resume bombing. So John (I’m assuming you are cool with first name basis), I’m Neil and I’m writing this cover letter to express my deepest interest in joining <COMPANY>—not as just an employee but as a valuable, ass kicking part of the family.  Hey! Get your mouse away from that red X in the top right corner—it’ll give you herpes! Easy now—nice and calm.

Now my name is Neil Shah and my middle name is LOGISTICS—well not really, I mean I can try changing if you hire me but to be honest it might get a bit awkward for my grand children. Maybe we can put an tilde somewhere in it and pronounce it as LOH-GEEZ-STEEK and make it sound royal? Anyway I digress—I, Neil Logistics Shah (how did that sound?) am an expert in logistics and can easily move objects from point A to point B with such deft and skill that you’ll think I’m David Copperfield.

But I’m not since Indian people suck at magic tricks and my ex made my heart disappear. See John, I feel like I really know you and can open up.

Let’s get back to the point and get the boring stuff out of the way.  I have multiple Mechanical Engineering degrees from the University of Texas at Austin and enough research experience to give the NSF a raging hard on. I have also worked for the past year as a commodities operations associate at <BLAH> and am directly in charge of millions of dollars worth of product with tighter logistic and time sensitivity than the sex schedules of an impotent fat man. On a daily basis I keep track of hundreds of railcar worth of product going to thousands of destination, interface with millions of customers on their orders, do battle with a billion of accountants on proper documentation and use extensive numerical superlatives for no reason what so ever. Feel free to look at my resume (right click on your Recycling Bin and press “undo Delete”) for all the nitty gritty details.

By now you probably realize that I’m not just any candidate! Of course I have stellar academic credentials and superb work experience, but as I said John, I want to be part of the <COMPANY> family—the exuberant and lackadaisical operations associate who will do whatever it takes, yes I’m looking at you Klondike Bars, to get the job done with a smile and a well placed “Fuck yeah”. I have included various references to prove my sanity and qualifications but feel free to refer to my unsolicited writing sample for more information.

I look forward to hearing from you John.

Love,

Neil Shah 

Worst Case Scenarios Part 3: Missed Call

A very real concern 

Scenario:  You try calling your significant other but she/he doesn’t answer.

Likely Scenario: Your beloved’s phone probably ran out of battery, silenced or turned off. Maybe they couldn’t hear it because they were sleeping. FACT: People regularly require sleep.

Worst Case Scenario: *Ring Ring* you wait patiently as the cold ring tone teases you and with every passing ring you mentally revaluate the tone you’ll use when the phone inevitably (she has to be there and pick up, right?) is answered. *Ring Ring* She’s probably in the bathtub reading a book or left the phone in her purse. Yep that’s it. *Ring Ring* Still nothing and then with a robotic jolt you are unceremoniously relegated to the voice mail. The monotonous voice spells out each number of your botched communication attempt—you always hated that voice. Now you wait, reassuring your escalating paranoia with supple thoughts of your significant other rushing to her phone to return your call, possibly throwing family members or friends out of the way since your call is that important. Yep—that’s it. 1 minute passes by. Another minute passes by and then 34.345 seconds—but who’s really keeping count? Trick question! Of course you are keeping count and irrationally tying your self-worth directly to a time, like a college frat boy who finally got laid. At the 5 minute and 35 second mark you know clearly something is wrong and rush to your car wearing stained basketball shorts and an oversized hoodie. The speedometer climbs to the high 50s as your car throws itself violently around the residential corners with misplaced angst and alacrity. BOOM suddenly tree appears in your view, completely out of nowhere, and you try desperately with one hand (the other clutching your phone hitting redial) to maneuver out of the way. Moments before the impact you open the car door and leap out, tumbling on the hard dirt and bruising every internal organ—except for your heart which already died during redial attempt 65. The wrangled metal wreck of your Toyota Camry bursts into flames, coating the once pristine flora with toxic ash. Nothing will ever grow here again. You hobble 2 miles down the road and finally arrive at her house. The lights are curiously still on and you hear laughter, her laughter through the window. Gathering all your strength you attempt to ram through the back door but you underestimate the strength of wood and rebound to the floor, on your back like an impotent turtle. The commotion summons bewildered voices to the door—as the door knob eases you rush inside awaiting to see your significant other safe and sound but more importantly with a valid excuse.

You enter the door only to find she isn’t alone! Her ex-boyfriend, her new boyfriend, your boss, that “oh he’s just a friend” coworker and strangely, your ex-girlfriend, all parading half-naked around your girlfriend’s (or ex now?) living room. Any thoughts of this strange cast of characters planning your bizarre surprise birthday party are dismissed as you hear Marvin Gaye in the background—someone was getting it on. You start crying and wet your pants at the same time and then take off running into the night, pausing to change your Facebook relationship status to “It’s complicated” and then suddenly wake up and find yourself alone in your bed—it was all a dream and you remember that you don’t even have a girlfriend and proceed to pleasure yourself with the contents of a Victoria Secret’s magazine. 35 years later after a long career as an assistant deputy manager of a Video Rental store, you die alone. 

Updated Nursery Tales Part 1 

Jack and Jill were supposed to meet at the hill
To fetch a pail of water
But Jack didn’t show because he didn’t know
And now Jill’s relationship status is “it’s complicated”.
 
This little piggy lost it all in the 2008 market,
This little piggy has an underwater mortgage for her home,
This little piggy is obese due to eating only roast beef
This little piggy’s employment is none
And this little piggy went viral with Geico® saying wee wee wee all the way home.
 
@#BlackSheep-u got ne wool?
 
Humpy Dumpty has checked in @ The Wall
Humpty Dumpty has checked in @ The Emergency Room
 
Three blind mice. Three blind mice.
See how they run. See how they run.
They all ran after the farmer’s wife
Who cut off their tails with a carving knife
And now they have a syndicated reality TV show on BRAVO

Trader Letters: Part 3

I started coming in early for work, mainly to dispel my boss’s belief, like the typical college girl period, that I’m incapable of punctuality. 

However back in my days of showing up at 8:30  AM with a +/- 2 hour room for error, I would typically struggle to find 3^rd floor or lower parking in the company garage and therefore be forced to the 4th floor. Coincidentally I always was able to find  a parking spot next to this bright red Corvette Z06, always, as if the traffic gods (who probably got 5 MPH) willed my blue car next to the red—they are primary colors. Now I don’t meant to be sexist (wait, HR isn’t CCed on this, right?) but the Corvette is a very manly car—it takes a certain *pair*to be able to flawlessly shift a six liter V8 capable of running sub 11 ¼ miles out of the box.

This isn’t a pair of Manolos or a CHI hair straightener. 

However this particular Corvette was different—the license plate proudly said “LADYTGR”, replacing my imagine of masculine bravado with aggressive feminism. Lady Tiger? Where exactly does a Tiger fit on the spectrum of women-feline comparisons? Are they slightly more experienced cougars?

I wonder how this Lady Tiger hunts?

Does she pull up into the local sports bar, revving her engine to hundred decibels, hoping to deafen her prey? I’m sure she walks in with a certain swagger, eyes anything male within a 10 mile radius and stares at them while moistening her Revlon caked lips. She buys him a few drinks and then goads him into taking shots, watching as the liquid courage loosens his young psyche and leaving her liquor hardened senses intact.

This isn’t her first hunt.

As the night continues, her advances become more dramatic and sudden—her hand creeping up her prey’s jeans and conversations that for some reason return to her “sexual experience”. Finally in a moment of weakness she springs into action and makes the kill—dropping her keys nonchalantly in his lap and using a line from an 80’s action flick.

 I think I’ll start parking on the 1st floor now…

Neil Shah; Leader of men of sorts

Well—can’t say I did not warn them …

• “Guys, we are a team—a single cohesive unit dedicated for strategic victory! I’m just the quarterback, jockey, goalie, or whoever completes this team analogy. I’m not really into sports. I’m sorry. Not really.”

• “The next person that says ‘I am Spartacus’ is so getting fired. 

• “That’s it! Enough is enough Ross. No, don’t make that face at me. I’m changing your caller ringtone on my Blackberry to TLC’s No Scrubs because you ain’t going to get no love from me. You are on notice.
•  “DON’T MAKE ME PRESS REFRESH F9 ON YOUR EXCEL SPREAD SHEET MOTHER FUCKER, DON’T MAKE ME!”

• “This might be a bit unorthodox but I’d like to start this meeting out with a Haka”

• “Of course this is a very important and pivotal task Angela! Your contributions are highly valued—now back to the point, as a girl, which flowers should I send to my new girlfriend?”

• “Hey, I think we are having a communication issue—a “team road block” as they say in the management Wikipedia article I just Googled. Hold on—let me turn down this YouTube video. Ok, that’s better. What were you saying again?”

• “So apparently I don’t have the power to fire anyone but I DO have a very harshly worded tweet that I can post.”

• “Did anyone read my memo (late night drunken text message) about casual color coordination Fridays? There is no I in TEAM or CLOTHES NOT MATCH. Oh, don’t start about the heels Angela! At least I’m wearing matching boxer briefs…”

• “Welp its 12 PM on a Wednesday—who wants to hit the showers and then get some beers?”

• “Guys, I really need some help here—I have exhausted all my resources. What is a good word that contains the letters “E”, “Q” and “P” for Words with Friends? “

Trader Letters: Part 2

Welp, time to quit and make a start-up. 

Today, the social-media-poking giant Facebook purchased Insta.gram for a whopping 1 billion dollars in cash/stock. Insta.gram is an application that enables millions of users to take pictures with their camera phones and THEN apply a customizable color filter to turn their mundane shots of flowers into instant artistic bliss—all the while crashing their cars while texting. Now normally I would applaud innovation and temper my jealous tendencies but there is a key caveat that must be accentuated—Insta.gram is a free application and has no revenue what so ever. To put in other words, a company that could double their revenues by checking for spare change under fray couch cushions now has a larger capitalization than The New York Times or 1/20^th of the cost of NASA’s entire Apollo program.

So here are my billion dollar (pending Facebook take over) ideas that have the revenue potential of Insta.gram.

• Hot dog flavored pop-sicles
• STD Zoos 
• Edible home paint 
• Recyclable tooth-paste
• An application that replaces “red eyes”with “googly eyes” (Actually that sounds pretty cool
• Nerf Cutlery sets
• WNBA 2k13 for PS3

Trader Letters: Part 1

I’m in charge of writing the daily position/balance emails at my trading firm and like my TA letters, I have fun with them. Most of the emails have proprietary information but some of them are safe. I think. This one is an email welcoming the senior traders back from a conference in Florida.

Dear Florida transplants, 

Welcome back to the wonderful country of Texas—we hope you enjoyed your flight from Florida. We understand that the transition from Orlando, FL to Houston, TX might be difficult so we compiled the following tips to help placate and traveling issues.

·         You’ll notice instantly when you get off the plane in Houston that a swarm of Africanized mosquitoes WILL NOT attack your nubile flesh, drain your vitality or infect you with a rare tropical disease that will leave your destroy your body or the porcelain finish of your toilet. Rest assured that you are free to expose your flesh without retribution in Houston—however please be aware that you do run the risk of being charred by the Texas sun and thus render your white (you are from Florida, come on) skin to a few pigments shades between Dikembe Mutumbo and Mt. Doom.

·         For your convenience we have taken the liberty of corralling all retired denizens or anyone who looks to be over 60 and relocated them to the River Oaks/Tangle wood area. Be cautious when driving through these neighborhoods and if suddenly attacked by a gang of geriatric grandparents, we suggest throwing decoy grand-children pictures and driving away quickly.

·         The brightly lit signs with pulsating lights are not amusement parks. They are strip clubs and are definitely not children friendly unless you are into girls with daddy issues.

·         Please avoid trying to buy that “cute abandoned house with the chain-link fence in east Houston” and then “flip it”. You will get shot.

Thank you and enjoy your stay in Houston! 

P.S. Fuck Dallas 

The Indian parent’s superlative

The good news is that Indians have made great strides in America! The down side—your parents will not let you hear the end of it…

So you are a ___? Why aren’t you ___?

Actor

• Kal Penn

Politician 

• Bobby Jindal

Comedian

• Aziz Ansari 

Banker

• Vikram Pandit

Lawyer

• Preet Bharara

Singer

• Norah Jones

Engineer

• Your father

“Doctor” or “married” can be substituted for any choice. Also there will always be some guy from the temple or a cousin, typically named Nish, Sean, Sachin or Neerav, that your parents will continue to benchmark you against. Seriously—fuck those guys.

Don’t Do Dallas

• Dante Alighieri’s primary inspiration for the “Inferno” was Dallas and it’s traffic infrastructure. 
• Friends don’t let friends drive to Dallas.
• The Dallas/Forth Worth airport was initially called only the “Dallas Airport” but was later changed to include Fort Worth, so people wouldn’t have to say they visited Dallas.
• The leading cause of death for inner city youth in Dallas is boredom followed by “soul crunching depression”.
• FACT: Historians have concluded that the city of Dallas and NOT a lone gunman assassinated President Kennedy.
• Portions of the city of Dallas have banned alcohol sales and instead legalized heroin so local denizens could cope with living in the city.
• The only good view of Dallas is in your rear view mirror.
• A spin off of “New York, I Love you” was originally planned for Dallas but scientists proved it was statistically impossible.
• The 1978 series Dallas ended with with J.R contemplating suicide. Just saying. 
• The only touchdowns that occur in Dallas are tornadoes. 
• Dallas rhymes with callous, malice and phallus. These are facts. 

Failed Cover Letters

It’s a tough job market out there—have to distinguish yourself!

November X 2011

Dear Mr. X,

Are you sitting down? No? Go ahead and grab a comfy chair. Something with cushions but not a bean bag. That’s bad for your back.

I’ll wait.

OK—so like my ex-girlfriends would say, let’s get the crazy out of the way! I’m Neil Shah, an energy trader who also enjoys writing witty copy, completing insanely difficult tasks by tight deadlines and blaming the Arabs for America’s oil problems (Seriously at your next cocktail party, just mention OPEC and shake your head and you are bound to make some friends). I have two kick-ass Engineering degrees, a minor in English and I can practically solve any problem you throw at me with a big-ole smile. 

More importantly—I, Neil Shah want to work as your X.

Good thing you have that chair, right?

Now I know you are thinking, well not completely since if I had ESP I would implant the idea to instantly hire me and compensate me solely with baked goods, but work with me here.

I’m a problem solver.

What does Neil Shah bring to the table? Well I’m damned smart—not to toot my own horn but let’s just say that I know a thing or two about rocket science and I can find Iraq on a map. I’m also an incredibly hard worker and ooze enthusiasm; I’m currently working at X and I do everything from supervise million of dollars worth of trades, schedule entire freight trains and manage a team of junior operations employees. Did I mention I am good with numbers? Quick, pick a number in your head. Got it?

Well the number is XXX-XXX-9320 because you want to call me for an interview. 

Now don’t pass me off as some quantitative junky who can only communicate in the form of beeps and eschewed Star Wars reference. Oh no sir/mad/whatever doesn’t offend you—I have people skills and I have the references (sans ex-girlfriends) to prove it. I can shoot the shit, wine and dine and have interacted with everyone from drugged out truck drivers to jet-setting C-level executives. I also have excellent time management skills and am a better team player than all of the Captain Planet Planeteers.

Yes, I have heart.

So before you reevaluate the X’s drug testing policies, peruse my writing samples that I quickly typed up in thirty five minutes (I’m all about the deadlines, right?) and then decide whether or not you want Neil in a comfy chair next to you. 

The answer extrasensory perception wise is yes.

Ballsy?  Maybe.

But as they say, everything is bigger in Texas…

Sincerely and seriously,

Neil Shah