Rain Washed

Srichand Arora

Srichand Arora is having to pay a price for his pathological aversion towards carrying an umbrella. He would much rather be drenched in the rains than be seen with the damn thing upon his head. For him, obviously, the multi-purpose club cap should suffice -- come rain or sunshine.
This was exactly what happened during the trip to Lonavala last Saturday. As the only one in the group to be without an umbrella, he was left dripping wet after braving bone-chilling winds and blinding rain at the Tiger Point hilltop. True, he went for a quick change into dry clothes once we found shelter. But that was too little too late. He has since been running high fever which refuses to subside.
But as is typical of him, Arora refuses to believe that the absence of an umbrella has done him in. He blames the “exertion and exhaustion” from the journey for his indisposition.

Scene at the start of exercises this morning

Added to these, his left arm has put him to considerable grief. It is over a month since he sustained a chip on his shoulder bone from a road accident and that too isn’t healing. End result: He is on an indefinite leave of absence from his morning routine at the Garden.
But then, Arora is not the only one to be missing these days. Today, 37 of the 44 members were absent because of the torrential downpour in the morning. In fact, there were only three to kick start the exercises, before Ramila Mistry, Ved Prakash Grover, Jagmohan Papneja and Monthi Serrao showed up. And Grover was frank enough to declare that he too wouldn’t have come today if it were not for the possibility of a luddoo treat from Ram Shankar Shukla (see posts of July 22 and 23). Since the latter was nowhere to be seen, Monthi stepped in again to distribute mouth-watering Bengali sandesh from Tian’s birthday. She had brought the sweets, each beautifully wrapped in palm leaf, for Arora, Harish Wadhwa and the others who had missed them yesterday. Their loss was our gain.
Harish Wadhwa:
* So sorry Tian, I could not collect my share, even though your grandma was so kind and thoughtful to bring it again. Actually some of my hungry friends forced your grandma and swigged away my share. Maybe I will take it some day from you in person when those hungry monsters will not be around.
* It is my humble request to do away with this stupid nail-rubbing exercise. It has not benefited anyone as more people are getting bald and some are sprouting 'flora' at places other than the head. Any suggestions?
* Get well soon Arora-ji. Can't live without your everyday jibes.
Srichand Arora:
* I am better today and will try to join you all the day-after tomorrow.
* Very soon the viewership of this Big Laaf blog is going to cross the 2.5 lakh mark. This is really an achievement of Blog Monster. Congratulations!