Have you ever wondered how much you’ve changed over the years? Ever realized how much your tastes, likes, dislikes and preferences have matured (or in some cases, become more childish) since the time you were in your early teens?
While aspects such as your choice of apparel, cuisine etc can be attributed to the maturity you gain over the years, I don’t think any such explanation exists for a person’s musical taste. Or at least, there is none that I know of.
Since the time I first gained exposure to music, I’ve listened to numerous artistes. Some of them became instant favourites while the others faded away from my memory instantly. Today, I find that my choice in music has evolved (or devolved, depending on your point of view) to such an extent that I can hardly imagine myself listening to artistes that used to be my idols only a few years ago.
I’m not ashamed to admit that I used to be a huge fan of boy-bands such as Boyzone, Backstreet Boys, Blue and Westlife, back when they were all the rage. That was largely due to the airtime provided to these bands by the music channels on TV. Owning a cassette (yup, CDs were way too expensive then) of these bands used to be a sort of status symbol and ensured that you were always in demand. Those were the days…
Then, I moved on to Linkin Park, whose mania lasted for a little over 3 years. After that, came the lostprophets, Green Day, Franz Ferdinand et al. The next phase in my musical journey saw A Static Lullaby, As I Lay Dying and Finch take over my headphones. And right now, I’m mostly listening to Daughtry and Fightstar.
So what makes me reminisce over these things now?
The reason is, the Backstreet Boys are gonna be performing live in Bangalore on the 21st of this month. This could be my only opportunity to see my one-time favourite band in person, on stage. So now I’m mulling over whether to attend the gig or not, considering that I’ll probably have to go alone since most of us have spunked our cash on our weekend trip to Coorg. The tickets are not exactly dirt-cheap at Rs.1000 apiece, but that is a fair price to pay to see your boyhood favourites, right?
I’ll see if I can entice someone to part with his dough, and if I can’t get someone to take along, I’ll probably go solo (or not go at all, depending on what my mind tells me then).
So if you’re in Bangalore/Delhi and have fond memories of the band, do go and watch them live. It’ll surely be ‘larger then life’. 
Let’s be honest. We all make it through five working days just because we anticipate a relaxing and fun-filled Saturday at the end of those five days. I actually start the countdown on Monday – “Just 5 more days to go, so hang in there!”. And it actually works! At the end of each day, I proudly say to myself that I’ve survived another long and boring 10 hours. This pride turns into unbridled joy at the end of Friday, for obvious reasons. That’s when I start planning for Saturday, one of the 2 days in a week when I actually don’t curse the whole world when I wake up. 
This Saturday though, was different. The apartment where all of us live, wore a deserted look since most of the people had left for nearby tourist spots on Friday night itself. I didn’t accompany my friends to Tirupati since I’d already been there once. I also didn’t have any intentions of sight-seeing in Bangalore, since there was hardly anyone to accompany me. So I thought I’d deal with some of my responsibilities as the unfortunate Class Rep ( more on that in a few days), namely getting a file photo-copied for the entire class. And for that, I needed to travel to the Academy from the apartments. Our bus leaves at 9 AM on Saturdays and as I had feared, I woke up at 10:30. I took along another friend of mine, Subhash, who needed to get some things done. And as if waiting for a bus wasn’t bad enough, it started raining. Luckily for us, we didn’t have to stand in the rain for too long. The photo-copying got over pretty quickly, Subhash got his chores done and since we had nothing else to do over there, it was back to the apartments for us.
By the time we reached our dwelling, it was time for lunch. Now lunchtime is a time when we actually get to see scores of people, some of whom we might have never seen before in the Academy. But today saw a record turnout of just 30-35 unfortunate souls who were left behind. On top of that, there was no electricity since morning. So our usual TV and lunch routine had to abandoned. Instead, we had Subhash playing his cellphone on full blast, churning out some of his all-time favourite songs. 
After a rather sumptuous meal, again we had nothing to do. The weather was very gloomy thanks to the constant drizzle. There was still no power and none of our laptops had enough juice to last the length of a movie. The best we could do now was to go to our rooms to sleep and wake up only when it was tea-time. I had already exhausted my sleep quota for the day so it was almost impossible for me to take a nap again. So for 2 hours straight I lay on my bed, listening to the radio. Tea-time couldn’t come soon enough, I thought.
In the evening, the numbers fell even more – only 20 or so were left by now. Thankfully, we were able to watch a bit of TV and then a few of us went for a stroll in the street. Soon it was time for dinner and TV. After another walk in the street, I sat glued to the TV, watching Hellboy-II. Actually this was the most interesting and exciting thing I did all day. The movie got over at around 11:10 and I rushed back to my flat.
And as I turned on my laptop to check my mails, I felt a sudden urge to document probably the most boring Saturday I’ve ever spent since I’ve been in Bangalore. The result is this post and a prayer – a prayer so that may I never have to write such a post ever again. 