Sick Bay...

"On a Day like today,

The whole world could change,

The sun's gonna shine,

Shine through the rain,

On a day like today..."

That's my morning status call from offshore which I take daily between 6:30 to 7. I woke up & found that my body temperature is higher than usual; my throat is hoarse, parched & I am barely able to croak words out! 

"Hello"

"Hello Rajesh, This is N here, this is the morning status call."

"Ok, N I have a sore throat & I wouldn't be able to talk much. So tell me."

"Sorry Rajesh. I was talking to V, come again please."

I just cursed him & repeated myself again.

"Oh, Ok... What happened by the way, you got drenched in the rain or something?"

"Everybody is going to ask me questions today, whose answers can't be given in yes or no" I thought to myself.

I took a bold decision! To use one of my sick leaves & rest for the day. 

"N, If there is nothing unusual, I would like to cut off the call now. I wouldn't be in today, so if you guys have any problems, call me"

I tried to compensate for the sleepless night. All of a sudden the bedroom door opens & a voice calls out 

"Are you not planing to go to office?"

"No" I managed to reply.

"Why? Some date?" the voice asks again.

"You moron, do I look like I am going out for a date" my mind shrieked; but I calmed the fury and replied "Not feeling well."

"Ok, enjoy the day." replies the voice. 

That's my friend Harsh.

Finally I was able to let myself go into the slumber of sleep. I was about to slay the dragon in my dreams when my cell phone went off again. I tried to clear my head, thinking who could be calling me. Fortunately it's just a reminder "Yesh's B'day"

"Damn the world, Now I will have to call her." 

I called her up three times, nobody picked up. Believe me, I have never felt so elated in my life that somebody missed my call.

I knew I wouldn't be able to get any sleep right now. So I dragged my wary bones out of the bed & crawled towards the bathroom. Splashed some water on my face, gargled. I left the idea of brushing my teeth besides the wash basin & headed for the kitchen. I had a couple of sandwiches, a glass of luke warm milk with honey.

"Ah, that felt better" I said to myself.

"Cr croak oak oohhk" I heard. "Weird echo" I thought to myself.

I came back & started to play "Crisis Core" on PSP. Hehehe... It was my lucky day here at least, I completed 7 missions in one sitting. By that time I had started sweating profusely & shivering violently. 

"Time for a break" I thought.

I took a paracetomol & dove in the blanket, heads down. 

And then it rang again. I cursed all the techies, the whole of the Bank's staff, the whole of my company, the mobile phone companies & all the network providers in the world in a single breath.

"That felt good, I must do it more often" I smiled to myself.

"Hello Rajesh, I have some doubt regarding what I have done."

"Why the hell do you guys call me once you already have done something?" I said to myself. "Yes what happened?"

...

The rest of the conversation was  totally technical & I had to convince the person that if he has screwed it up already, not to mess with it more. I told him to contact the environment manager & proceed only if he says it is important. 

"Else I will pick it up first thing tomorrow morning."

"Ok, I will talk to him then. Do you want me to give you a call afterwards?"

"Dude, for gods sake, you are not my Girl friend" I thought "No, call me up only if you do have any problems"

Of course by now, you must have guessed that he did call me up again. 

It was a bad-bad day. I talked to some 6-7 of my friends today on messenger or something & everybody thought that I was chilling out at home.

"Cool, Dude. So chilling out at home!"

"Sahi hai... mast ayyashi chal rahi hai scotland main"

"What happened, had too much yesterday night?"

"Who were you roaming around with last night, Man?"

"Hangover?"

Overall, I had a bad day. However, It did became better as the sun wore down & evening approached. 

"Ah, all's well that ends well."