Well................

A huge thought is whooshing around the surface of my ever-imposing brain that I just cant seem to forget....

No no, its not anything to do with my nearly non-existent social life... nearly extinct blog life, or disgruntlingly short Orkut life....

It has something to do with Monty Python. This is a sketch on pornographic bookstore...


The cast:
SECOND ASSISTANT
Eric Idle
NID
John Cleese
FIRST ASSISTANT
Terry Jones
MAN
Terry
GASKELL
Michael Palin
FATHER
Terry Jones
MESSENGER
Terry Jones
ELIZABETH GENT
Eric Idle
SPANIARD
Terry Jones
VOICE OVER
Terry Jones
WIFE
Carol Cleveland
MADDOX
Graham Chapman

The sketch:
(We see a bare room with a counter and magazines in racks on the walls at eye-level. Three drably dressed men are thumbing through books. One of them is a vicar, one of them is gathering a huge pile. Behind the counter is a Soho toughie in Tudor gear showing books to Mr Nid a tweedy, rather academic, respectable-looking man of senior years. The customer goes through, and the wall slides back.)
Second Assistant: There's a 'Bridget - Queen of the Whip'.
Nid: Yes..,
Second Assistant: Or 'Naughty Nora'... or there's this one: 'Doug, Bob and Gordon Visit the Ark Royal'. Or there's 'Sister Teresa - The Spanking Nun'.
Nid: Mmmm... I see ... you don't have anything specially about Devon and Cornwall?
Second Assistant: No. I'm afraid not, sir.
Nid: The one I was really after was Arthur Hotchkiss's 'Devonshire Country Churches'.
Second Assistant: Well how about this, sir: 'Bum Biters'.
Nid: No ... not really ... I don't suppose you have any general surveys of English Church architecture?
Second Assistant: No, it's not really our line, sir.
Nid: No, I see. Well, never mind I'll just take the 'Lord Lieutenant in Nylons' then, and these two copies of 'Piggie Parade'. Thank you.
Second Assistant: Right, sir.
First Assistant: (voice over) My Lord of Warwick.
Second Assistant: 'Allo?
First Assistant: (voice over) Raise high the drawbridge. Gloucester's troops approach!
Second Assistant: Right.
(He presses a button below counter and the wall slides back. The man with the big pile of books comes up to counter.)
Man: Just these, then.
(Enter Gaskell in Tudor gear. The wall closes up behind him.)
Gaskell: All right. This is a raid. My name is Superintendent Gaskell and this is Sergeant Maddox.
Second Assistant: Ah! Sir Philip Sidney. 'Tis good to see thee on these shores again.
Gaskell: Shut up.
Second Assistant: Your suit is fair and goodly cut. Was't from Antwerp?
Gaskell: Shut up. It's a disguise. Right! Confiscate the smutty books, Maddox.
Second Assistant: Sir Philip!. Prithee nay!
Gaskell: Listen, mate! Don't come that Philip Sidney bit with me. I'm not a bloody Tudor at all. I'm Gaskell of the Vice Squad and this is Sergeant Maddox. ',
(They all look at him blankly. He looks to Maddox for support and realize he isn't there.)
Gaskell: Maddox! Where's he gone?
Second Assistant: Sir Philip, prithee rest awhile.
Gaskell: Look. This is the last time. I'm warning you, I'm not Sir Philip Bleeding Sidney. I am Superintendent Harold Gaskell and this is a raid.
(Everybody resumes their book-buying and ignores him. At the counter the assistant is still totaling up the huge pile of books.)
Second Assistant: That'll be 540 quid sir.
Man: Oh, I'll just have this one then. (takes top one)
Gaskell: Maddox! (addressing everyone in shop; they ignore him) Look, this is a raid. (no reaction) Honestly, I promise you. (people start to leave through the rear door of the shop; Gaskell blocks it) Where are you going?
Customer: I'm going home.
Gaskell: Right. (looks for his notebook but it's not in his Tudor clothing) I'll remember you. Don't you worry. I'n remember you...
Customer: Pray good, Sir Philip, that you...
Gaskell: Don't you start! Maddox! (the customer leaves; other customers start to leave) Listen, I can prove to you I'm a policeman. I can give the names of all the men down in 'F' division at Acton: Inspector Arthur Perry, Superintendent Charles Frodwell, my best friend, police dogs, Batch, Wolf, Panther, Maudling. How would I know those names if I was Sir Philip Sidney? (the vicar comes up to counter) Look, vicar, you know me. The Gargoyle Club - I got you off the charge. (the vicar leaves guiltily)
Second Assistant: Farewell, good Sir Philip.
(He goes out carrying a pile of magazines. Then the vicar goes, followed by the Tudor man.)
Gaskell: Hey, stop! (the door slams; Gaskell turns and looks round the empty shop; pause) Maddox!
(He rushes up to the sliding wall and beats on it. Then he turns and makes for the little back door and goes through.)
Gaskell: You'll never get away with this, you porn merchant. Blimey!
(He stops and gapes. We cut to his eye-line to see he is standing in a beautiful, green, Tudor garden. In the distance a Tudor house. A girl is sitting on a stone bench, sobbing. Gaskell walks towards her, bewildered.)
Gaskell: Maddox!
(The girl looks up at him with beseeching eyes. She is young and beautiful.)
Girl: Oh good sir, how glad I am to see thee come. Forgive me weeping, but my love has gone.
Gaskell: Er, listen. My name is Caskell ... Superintendent Caskell of Vice Squad. Myself and Sergeant Maddox are on a raid. We are not Tudor people. We are the police.
(An Elizabethan gentleman appears through the trees.)
Father: Frances, what idleness is this? Why, good Sir Philip Sidney, (he bows extravagantly to Gaskell) What hast thee here?
Girl: (turning to Caskell with bated breath) You are Sir Philip Sidney?
Gaskell: ... Possibly... but I may be Superintendent Gaskell of the Vice Squad.
Father: Ah good, Sir Philip, thy sharp-tongued wit has not deserted thee. Come. Let us eat and drink. Stay with us awhile.
Gaskell: All right, sir. I think I will.
(They walk off together am in am into the idyllic country garden. The girl looks after them with hope in her eyes. Bring up Elizabethan music......)
SUPERIMPOSED CAPTION: 'THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY'
(Mix through to a Tudor dining room. At the table a group of Tudor gentry are sitting listening to Gaskell. Evidence of a banquet, and two minstrels in attendance. Gaskell has obviously just finished a story. Applause and laughter.)
Gaskell: . .. then did we bust the Harry Tony mob, who did seek to import Scandinavian filth via Germany. For six years they cleaned up a packet - the day I got whiff of them through a squealer and within one week did a mop-up right good. They're now languishing doing five years bird in Parkhurst.
(Applause. They are all very impressed. Cut to exterior. A messenger on a horse rides full pelt straight towards the camera. It is dusk. He stops outside the Elizabethan house, leaps off and dashes into the house. Cut to interior again. They are still all laughing from his last story. The messenger bunts into room.)
Messenger: Sir Philip. The Spaniards have landed in the Netherlands. My Lord Walsingham needs you there forthwith.
Gaskell: Let's go.
(Cut to exterior. Gaskell is seated on the back of the messenger's horse and they gallop off. The dinner crowd are standing waving on the doorstep.)
Dinner Crowd: Good luck, Sir Philip!
(Cut to a British standard fluttering in the breeze against the blue sky. Fanfare. Two Elizabethan gentlemen, and four men dressed as Elizabethan soldiers are standing on a cliff top. Gaskell strides up to them, and takes up position on topmost point of the knoll.)
Gaskell: Where are the Spaniards?
Elizabethan Gent: Down below Sir Philip, their first boats are landing even now.
(Shot of a sailing-galley seen from above.)
Gaskell: Right, you stay here, I'll go and get them.
Elizabethan Gent: Sir Philip! Not alone!
(Cut to the beach. Suspense music. Gaskell strides up to the camera, until he is towering over it. The music reaches crescendo.)
Gaskell: Allo allo! What's going on here?
(Cut to beached rowing boat piled high with bundles of dirty magazines. Two Spaniards are unloading it.)
Spaniard: Ees nothing, Senor, ees just some literature.
Gaskell: I know what literature is, you dago dustbin. I also know what porn is. (pulls out a loose magazine and brandishes it) What's this then eh?
Spaniard: It is one of Lope De Vega's latest play, Senor.
Gaskell: 'Toledo Tit Parade'? What sort of play's that?
Spaniard: It's very visual, Senor.
Gaskell: Right. I'm taking this lot in the name of Her Gracious Majesty Queen Elizabeth.
Spaniard: Oh, but Senor.
Gaskell: Don't give me any trouble. Just pile up these baskets of filth and come with me.
(The second Spaniard leaps out of the boat with a drawn sword and they both engage Gashell in a fight. Then we start to draw away from them, leaving them tiny dots in the distance fighting. Fight music over all this and voice over.)
Voice Over: The battle raged long and hard, but as night fell Sidney overcame the Spaniards. 6,000 copies of 'Tits and Bums' and 4,000 copies of 'Shower Sheila' were seized that day. The tide of Spanish porn was stemmed. Sir Philip Sidney returned to London in triumph.
(Cut to stock film of Elizabethan London street during celebrations.)
SUPERIMPOSED CAPTION: 'LONDON 1583'
(Cut to side on close up of Gaskell riding hard through woodland)
Voice Over: Covered in glory, Sir Philip rode home to Pensburst to see. his beloved wife... but all was not well.
(Gaskell runs up outside another Tudor house and strides in. Cut to interior of an Elizabethan room - paneled walls, log fire, latticed windows, etc. Sir Philip's wife is sitting reading. Gaskell enters.)
Gaskell: Good evening all, my love. I have returned safe from the Low Countries. (she hurriedly hides the book she is reading under some knitting and starts whistling) What an thou reading, fair one?
Wife: Oh, 'tis nothing, husband.
Gaskell: I can see 'tis something.
Wife: 'Tis one of Shakespeare's latest works.
(Gaskell picks up the book and reads the title.)
Gaskell: Oh ... 'Gay Boys in Bondage' What, is't - tragedy? Comedy?
Wife: 'Tis a... er... 'tis a story of man's great love for his... fellow man.
Gaskell: How fortunate we are indeed to have such a poet on these shores.
Wife: Indeed. How was the war, my lord?
Gaskell: The Spaniards were defeated thrice. Six dozen chests of hardcore captured.
Wife: (trying to look innocent) Hast thee brought home any spoils of war?
Gaskell: Yes, good my wife, this fair coat trimmed with ermine.
Wife: (without enthusiasm) Oh, lovely, nowt else?
Gaskell: No, no fair lady. The rest was too smutty.
(He settles himself down in front of his lady's feet and the fire.)
Gaskell: Now, my good wife. Whilst I rest, read to me a while from Shakespeare's 'Gay Boys in Bondage'.
(The wife looks a trifle taken aback but reluctantly opens the book and starts to read with a resigned air.)
Wife: Yes... my lord ... 'Gay Boys in Bondage' . .. Ken, 25, is a mounted policeman with a difference... and what a difference. Even Roger is surprised and he's... (she looks slightly, sick with guilt) he's used to real men ...
Gaskell: 'Tis like 'Hamlet' ... what a genius!
Wife: 'But who's going to do the cooking tonight? Roddy's got a mouthful...'
(Enter Maddox - a modern-day plain-clothed policeman.)
Maddox: All right, this is a raid.
(The wife screams, Gaskell leaps to his feet.)
Wife: Oh! We are disgraced!
Gaskell: There you are, Maddox!
Maddox: Cut the chat... and get in the van.
Gaskell: Maddox! You recognize me...
Maddox: Indeed I do, Sir Philip Sidney, and sad I am to see you caught up in this morass of filth, (he picks up the book) ooh - that's a long one.
Wife: Oh oh... the glorious name of Sidney is besmirched ... all is lost ... oh alas the day.
Gaskell: Shut upl I know this man - this is my old mate Sergeant Maddox...
Maddox: You'll do time for this.
Gaskell: Oh Maddox - it's me - Gaskell ... 'F' division down at Acton ... Inspector Arthur Frodwell.
Maddox: Come on Sidney. (he bundles them both out) And you, miss.
Gaskell: I'm not Sir Philip bleedin' Sidney .... and where were you? We could have mopped up that Tudor shop...
(They are bundled out. Maddox pauses only to pick a book from the bookcase near the door.)
Maddox: Ooht That's a good onel
(Cut to outside a modern theatre stage-door Gaskell, still protesting, and wife are bundled out and into a police van. As it drives off, it reveals on the side of the theatre a poster saying: 'The Aldwych Theatre, The Royal Shakespeare Company Presents "Gay Boys In Bondage" By William Shakespeare'.)

I Guess the Bard never perhaps thought of it so well....

Its all in my Head...

"I repeat, is there anyone home???

Silence.

Claustrophobia drag me down. Inside myself, there is so little space.

So I try to summon my others to find the way out... unfortunately they were all covered with a brown mass of semi-solidity."

Inside every fat girl there is a thin girl and a lot of chocolate. Mine is called Panu.


And Panu comes out as a vivacious redhead, with a temper to match her inclination to have sex on the kitchen table during dinner. With Matt Damon or Hugh Jackman. Unfortunately, the mirror tells her another story. The mirror never lies. It just points out that though she might have been all the rage in an Arabic Harem, they are not really in high fash now...

So Panu decided to be bisexual to accomodate all her needs.

Hey presto! Flocks of females flocked around her... she promised love to all.... and at the end of the day realized, she was becoming as sleazy as any man. By the way, she loved it.

Butt then, reality check was necessary. One day, a handu gandu prince drove in his white innova and decided to make the woman, in which Panu recided, his bride.

And then he decided (poor doctor that he was) to give Panu a lecture on Hamlet.

Well... needless to say, all the bull he doled out led Panu to disagree. The woman tried to stop her, but Panu could not stop speaking.....

And well, they did not live happily ever after. No one really does, actually. Trouble was, Panu was too outspoken for their taste.

And the beat went on, the search continued..... And Panu was glad she was alone.

Ah the Pains of being Alive....

I did not see you today
Reclining in the shade of the tree
Rings of cigarette smoke swirling around
The white shirt clinging wetly to your sweat-soaked skin.



On a more prosaic mode, I dare say I have been extremely busy trying to avoid an ex-flame whom I have met up in JU.... Buggerit! As if I care!!

And we begin the Pujo Countdown

Panu the shameless bargainer has yet again begun her Eternal Quest for the Perfect Top. Those who come to their workplace everyday in the same pair of torn jeans with a scratchy crotch never knows what a buxom lady with an eye for Gucchi goes through before the ten-armed Goddess appears with her four semi-freak kids (one of them semi-bestial, I daresay).

On a cold day in end July, Panu was wandering lonely as a cloud near Gariahat, Kolkata, minding her own way, being delicately groped by an elderly uncle whose left foot was dangerously near her stilettos, when lo and behold! She spied from yon bus window the word Sale and 50% off on the doors of Pantaloons.

Oh Joy! Oh Glory! Oh Joyful Glory! What gratifying sight that was! A place to shop without the hassle of people pushing her sideways, no worry of a picked pocket, a safe place to keep her heavy bag, and above all-----------

the changing room where she could try out all the stuffs she carried.

YAY!

The very next day brought Panu to Pantaloons.

Oh no! How can this be?? Only yesterday did the sale begin... how come so many people stood before her, waiting for their baggages to be hefted in by the security people???

The interior looked no better.

People here, people there. People virtually everywhere.

She ran towards the Kurta section. Pantaloons (till very recently) sported a fab-u-lous kurtis. She had espied one a mere week ago. Oh please God! Let there be top.

No sign of the damn thing. Who was the dumbass who said God is great? Take it from me dude, he is'nt.

Suddenly, a glimmer of burnt orange beckoned from a faraway corner. Panu whirled.

Ohdearlord!!!

You ARE there!!

Thank you lord... thank you thankyou thankyou----

Oh damn, who's that fat-arsed cow and whats she doing staring at me like that there?? Why is she glaring at me??

Oh!

That was the mirror.

Well, she snatched the desired kurta and ran towards the changing room...

Twenty metres to touchdown...

Fifteen.....

Ten.....

Eight.......

Oh damn!!! Whats that line?

Caught!

A long line befell Panu. Saree clad women preceeded Panu. She stared helplessly at the long queue. Women glared. It would take at least an hour to get to the changing room.

Reluctantly she turned around.... resignedly she called the valiant Andromeda, her trusty sidekick.

So here I have a great question that I must ask you....

And here the eternal question of womanhood is asked----

Is it looking good on me?? Am I looking good in this??

Two questions with fabulously different senses....

Anyway, Andromeda shook her head and decided to be diplomatic.

You look good in both.

Just when I dont need diplomacy.

One desperate attempt was made. Panu picked up one and headed for the cash counter.

Payments made, she came out.

And Andromeda had to open her mouth.

You know, I think the other one was better.

OH Darn it!!