Caution: Men at Work #3

The previous posts in this series can be accessed here and here.

After weeks of being in a solemn mood (to do justice to the short story that I finished last Fri), it's time again for me to indulge in some light banter. I will pick up from where I left last time, and give you five more specimen to add to the male-trail! :-D

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Exhibit - 6 (The Mint Factory):

Whadya say? He mints money for the firm and makes enough to feed his next seven generations? Oh, quite the opposite! He spends what seems like every penny on packs and packs of ci****ttes (yes, that's a cuss word!) and roams the streets corridors chewing endlessly. I always thought these people were aiming to be "cash cows", what with all that ruminating/chewing the cud! Or perhaps following Kareena Kapoor's last-season-diet (eat small meals every hour)? Only in this case, they pop like-a tiny meal every few minutes.

But I was brought out of my ignorance one fine day when this guy begged me for a chocolate 'cuz he was starving. (Say, how do you starve with such subsidized food options at the office-cafe?!) He reiterated how badly he needed to eat something, told me what he had wasn't good enough, and pulled open his middle-drawer. I can swear that in all my 13 months here, I haven't seen anything scarier in anybody else's drawer! Every space in that 20cm*40cm*60cm drawer was filled with packs of mint. He might as well have shown me skeletons hanging in his closet! That guy was hoarding chewing gum like it was gold flake (pun unintended). He gave me a toothy smile and I fled in the direction of (what I presumed would be) safer drawers.

Don't even ask me why I'm wary of smokers! For a girl who's been haunted by asthmatic bronchitis since she was 7, any devil human who takes a drag (or gives you the second-hand version) is synonymous with a murderer. Seriously dude, if you wanna die, go die! Why're you taking me with you?!

Exhibit - 7 (The Closet Dancer):

He looks harmless and keeps a low profile on a daily basis. But invite him to a party, play some I'll-never-be-caught-dead-listening-to-this-type music and let him have three drinks (just three, please!), and he'll burn the dance-floor! There'll be arms flapping everywhere (and other party-goers moving away in fright), shirt ends (which are so very crisply tucked in at work) coming out of the pants, and buttons bursting off the shirt! He'll dance like no one's watching (as the others watch like no one else is dancing). He gets all fired up if there's a prop (usually the bottle he emptied). All my sympathies lie with the guy who acts like a David to the Goliath and tries to calm the dancing-demon (we all know he'll be smashed into a wall as the next dance move involves spinning with the bottle). But then again, drunk-dancers are always better than drunk-drivers.

Exhibit - 8 (The Metrosexual Man):

He was a rarity when this term gained popularity (in India) and I was still in high school. But today, the offices are teeming with this type. He has a man-purse/briefcase-ish bag so chic that it makes me wanna trash mine. He asks for a spare lip-balm after he's done eating and makes us girls wonder why we don't gloss up often. He also keeps up with the latest hairstyle-trends and tweets pictures of him pouting (oh wait, guys don't pout! Or do they?) with the just-in look (this time, I really didn't mean the pun :-p).

You can see he can be a good shopping companion as he whispers to you how that lady's shoes don't match her skirt. He can also tell what brand of shirt you're wearing (and that's scary because women's shirts don't have monograms like men's do...you actually need to read the buttons to tell the Allen Sollies & Van Heusens apart). The best thing about the metro-man is his ability to notice little things. It feels wonderful when he compliments you on your new shoe instantly (which your girl-friends notice only after the compliment), or when he can tell you the new hairdo looks better than the old one. (I bet, my boyfriend won't be able to tell any difference if I went bald!)

Exhibit - 9 (The Dude-on-a-Diet):

He comes in all shapes and sizes but with only one resolve: to keep off the calories. He counts calories like they're hickeys (Note to self: Keep the blog clean) scores on a 100-mark Math paper, or tells you he'll skip breakfast as his dinner was too heavy.

True-incident alert:

So this happened during my first month at the first full-time paid job (I really wonder why the guys at internship-firms aren't as entertaining). I was walking with my food tray across the cafeteria in the hope of finding an empty table or at least a familiar face I could sit next to. I spotted a bunch of guys who were training with me. Only one kind guy nodded in approval (as the others looked up from their plates, gave me zombie looks, and got back to poking at the food) when I asked if I could join them. After the initial exchange of pleasantries, the table was creepily quiet. I noticed then that all but one guy had little other than salad and soup on their trays. I've never felt fat lunching with celery-chewing girls but the guys made me feel like I was obese. What was I doing eating carbs, proteins, fats, vitamins, minerals AND roughage - all in a single meal?! They looked at my plate and I showed off my rotis by dunking them for an extra second in the yellow-dal. The lone guy with a complete meal on this tray smiled at me as if he understood the joke that the others would never get.

It's obvious why most girls survive on bird-food, but the men?! What forces them into this act of abnegation comparable to self-flagellation? Have all the girls suddenly started digging size-zero men? Is bulking up dying a slow death? Are those men auditioning to model for Abercrombie & Fitch? (not Fitch-the credit rating agency, you banking-snob!)

Exhibit - 10 (The Shy-Guy):

Now this one's my favourite type - The classic omega-male! He keeps away from women like they're wet paint. He avoids eye contact and conversations and walks all the way around the conference table so he can sit away from any girl of suspect character. By comparison, he makes all girls look like coquettes. (Thanks, Anand Mahindra, for the vocabulary lesson :-P) But there's the man who brings out all the "alpha"ness in me and makes me wanna slam the meeting-room door shut, un-clip my hair, let all the curls lose and go "and where do you think YOU'RE going, young man?" :-P (Disclaimer: The previous line is for special effects only and must not be misconstrued in anyway to be held against me.)

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This post ends my cheekiness towards men. I can only hope they spare me the caustic remarks and choleric looks when they run into me tomorrow! :-P