The hairy stink bomb..

I had to do 30 hours of community service in the first year of college. So the gang and i, went to this old age home in Porur, called Little Drops. Getting there was a task in itself. We met at college, took 2 buses to reach Porur, walked from the Porur bus-stand for 15 - 20 minutes to this godforsaken location. Once we reached there, all calm prevailed; we'd drink loads of water, freshen up and get busy with the old folks. Cutting their nails, feeding them, talking to them, making merry etc. Old folks are fun to be around.

At the end of the day, we'd bid adieu and head back home, back to this treacherous journey of 2 buses. By the time I reached home, I'd be so pooped, someone would have to bathe and feed me. And I'd recall the day's events in my head, and thank the good Lord, for giving me such a comfortable life. Eating on these days was out of the question, because all through the day my nose would be subject to the most horrible smells, and to get those bad smells out of my system took another 24 hours.

Today, i had a similar experience. Not at an old age home, at gym. A 15 minute run on the threadmill later, i was panting, puffing and breathing in huge gulps of air, when suddenly i smelt something, something worse than rotten tomatoes and rotten eggs combined. It was nauseating. I turned to look at the direction of the smell. He was big hairy and wearing too little clothes. Apparently he was quite proud of his disproportioned eye sore flabby body. I applaud the man for that, because if I was him, I'd be caught dead in that outfit in the loo, let alone a public place with civilized human beings around.

I looked at him once more, pleading silently with my eyes "go away, walk on another treadmill" and i gripped my towel tightly around my nose to emphasize this non verbal plea. But he mistook my plea, he conjured it up as non verbal flirting instead and gave me a huge toothy grin. I felt like a soldier fighting for her survival. I kept chanting in my mind "I cannot die, today, not here, not like this. I have too many responsibilities on my shoulder." And i took few deep gulps of air, (quite similar to what deep sea divers would do, before taking a plunge) and kept walking. Next, I tried breathing through my mouth, instead of my nose.

And lo and behold, there are moments in my life, when I truly realize the meaning of the words "Divine Superpower and Lord Almighty", the man thing fell off his threadmill, moaned for 5 seconds like a sleepy hippopotamus, clutched his sad excuse of a bum and walked away. Fresh air, never smelt so much better. *gasps*