Slime is a 5 letter word

It was a rainy day in the middle of the monsoons. The kind of weather you would want to stay in bed and sleep for '10 minutes' more. But as we all know. '10 minutes' is never 10 minutes and evil never sleeps. This greatly angers superheroes like me, who love their ’10 minutes more’ sleep more than anything (well, almost anything).
Knowing this fact, the then prevalent evil in the city decided that this was the best time to strike. Hence, during the monsoons we saw the evils of potholes, dirty clothes, leaky roofs, stolen umbrellas and not to forget the most feared of them all, wet underwear. But this monsoon was different. Apart from the water proof undies, we saw the return of Slimeball. Now for those of you who have not subscribed to the Know Your Villain weekly, here is a brief about him (nothing to do with the water proof undies).

Slimeball was born in a well to do family and was the only child. As he grew up, he discovered a knack for making slime out of anything. He landed a dream job with the global slime giants Goop Industries, (who ironically slipped their way to the top) which ended up being a dead end job extracting slime from snails. This pushed him toward the evil side. Today he is one of the most feared villains in the world and has even shared the top spot with The Joker at one time. Today he resides in his two room flat with his two dogs and 1022 snails (and counting) which he rescued from Goop Industries one snail a day.

Now getting back to the problem at hand, the city suffered from major traffic jams every time it rained. No, it was not your regular traffic jam. These jams were caused by a red substance. (No! it was not real jam) On closer inspection of the substance in question and days of analysis at the lab, it was determined that the substance was definitely slime. No one but the infamous Slimeball could be behind this. By some ingenious method, Slimeball was able to add gelatin to the rain which caused it to become slime once it hit the ground. This slime, due to its thickness, would not flow down the drains and would remain on the roads causing the traffic jams.
I had to catch this slimeball Slimeball and put him behind bars for good. The city could not afford to suffer any more traffic jams. I remembered I came across a fellow superhero a few days back and decided to give her a call. Let’s face it; we superheroes need to stick together. So drawing a plan with Double S, we set out to get our hands on that no good slimeball.
“How should we go about catching this fellow?” I asked. “May be we should follow the slime trail. It should lead us to Slime HQ,” replied Double S. Such brilliance from such a young superhero. I see good things in her future. Anyway, getting back to the topic, we started following the trail of slime. It lead us to a television studio. Now, being a little camera shy, I was hesitant going in at first, but I had to find this Slimeball. I stepped into the studio walking closely behind Double S. What I saw in there blew my mind. It was the studio in which the popular dance show ‘So you think you can dance’ was shot in. They were shooting a show as we entered. We followed the slime trail to one of the dancers changing room.
“That’s strange,” said Double S. “Could one of the dancers be Slimeball?” Being a huge fan of the show, I had not missed a single episode. It struck me, that a dancer named ‘Slides Alot’, one of the best dancers on the show, bore a striking resemblance to Slimeball. Even his dance involved a lot of quick yet smooth sliding on the floors. As we spoke, we heard the host announce his name “Give it up for Slides”, she said. We ran to the stage, but Slides, errr.. I mean Slimeball was on the other side of the stage. He recognized me from across the stage and made a run for it. Double S and I decided to give him the chase. Not realizing that we were running across the stage, we suddenly heard a roar from the audience. The judges looked as us and said “So you think you can dance?” My stage fright combined with my camera shyness was all of a sudden overcome and I yelled, “No! I don’t think I can dance!” Now it was difficult to lose Slimeball, thanks to his slimy tracks. We ran and were quickly behind him. But just at that moment, the rain started to pour and the slime started to build on the roads, making it nearly impossible to run. Slimeball lived to see another day.
Finally getting back home and into come clean clothes, Double S and I sat to rethink our plan. The weather report said we were in for some heavy showers the next morning. Knowing that the weather reports are always wrong, we decided to go after the slimeball in the morning. Rightly so, the sun was shining brightly, bright enough to have to apply sunscreen before going out in the sun. (Hey! A superhero also needs to take care of his looks ok!) Knowing his weakness for suffering snails, we decided to lure him with a ‘Snail sale’. I will not lie to you, business was slow but only till Slimeball visited our sale. After selling him every snail (and covering our costs), we decided to confront him. “So Slimeball, we meet again”. Slimeball replied in his shrill voice, “Oh no! It’s you again Double S.” “Ahem ahem,” I cleared my throat. “Oh SuperCraig, didn’t see you there,” he said.
He made a run for it. But within 2 minutes, the sun had dried him out. “That’s what happens when you don’t wear sunscreen,” I thought to myself. He was a wrinkled statue, and would remain that way till he got to soak up enough of water. We carried him to the nearest jail and locked him up in a room. Not taking any chances, we added a dehumidifier for good measure.
Satisfied with a job well done, we decided to celebrate. However, it started raining once again. Slimeball had planted some gelatin just before coming to buy the snails. For the last time, the city was faced with slime on the roads. Just then an idea came to me. I made some quick calls and within a few minutes, a number of helicopters were hovering around the city dropping sugar and flavor on the roads. This mixed with the slime made a delicious jelly, which the citizens of the city enjoyed! The city was saved once again by SuperCraig. But of course, I wouldn’t have done it without Double S.How did Slimeball manage to spread the gelatin across the city without anyone noticing you ask? Well, years later we discovered that he cleverly added gelatin to beetle leaves. Thanks to the number of people spitting out their paan on the roads the gelatin was spread all over the city. Kinda gross, now that you think about it.
This is SuperCraig saying bye for now, reminding you that a donut without u is don’t.

Die another day

Firstly, sorry for making you wait so long for my next adventure. I was trying to figure out for so long what was wrong with my PC, but only just realized, that it wasn’t plugged in.

So any-hooo... perhaps the most notable adventure in the past few months would have to be my tiff with the one and only ‘K-Woman’ (or just K to make it easier to type). I am sure most of you haven’t even heard of this K, but let me tell you, it wasn’t a kake walk. Damn! Her effects are still showing. If you have not figured out her power as yet, read on. Even if you have figured it out, read on.

K loved to create havoc among the masses by screwing up spellings of normal words by including ‘k’ in it. May not seem like much, but believe me, it could turn into a nightmare, as I recently figured out.

The city seemed normal for a hot winter’s day. The muscular men with their tight sleeveless tops, non muscular men as well. However, I did notice something. A new AA center opened up just around the corner. I contemplated going, but decided against it. Contrary to what ‘Over-exaggerating boy’ says, I am not an alcoholic. It was disturbing to see so many people flock to the new place on the first day of its opening, all looking so weak, so fragile. Oh well, serves them right.

The city was devoid of any trouble for the next few weeks, so I regretfully tell you; I turned to the bottle to keep my busy. But after a week of drinking myself to sleep, I realized I needed to change. No good was coming from this habit. So I decided to check out the AA center. While casually passing the place, I noticed the people coming out. They all looked stronger, smarter and taller. I said, “Hey! I could do with some strength, increased brain power and definitely some height!” I decided to give it a shot

The next day, while casually walking past the AA center, I quickly changed direction and entered. Yes I was ashamed what I had become. When I went in I saw happy people, full of energy. They were playing basketball, riding cycles, doing their homework in record time. I was amazed. I had to join this place. So I went in for one of their sessions. The woman conducting the session was awfully familiar. I remembered her from the chemist. She was placing an abnormally large order for something. I distinctly remember her telling me, “It’s for the kids at the school”. I couldn’t remember what she bought. Anyway, sitting through the session I got out enlightened. But I still went home trying to remember what that woman bought at the chemist.

The next day, I went there 5 minutes before the session. I had to stand in the long line. But I was sure it would be totally worth it. While entering the center, I was handed a glass of a brown liquid. “Weird”, I thought as I took the glass in my hand and walked inside. Everyone there was gulping it down. I asked one of the guys there what was in the glass. He looked at me and said, “Who cares, it’s magical!!”

I walked outside and took a closer look at the sign over the entrance. It said “Enter”. I looked around and to the side of the door it said, ‘Alco-horlicks Anonymous’. It call came rushing back to me like the crowd entering the train at Dadar during peak hours. The woman was ordering 72 packs of Horlicks at the chemist. And then I recalled, she signed the receipt as ‘K-Woman’. It all added up now. She was building an army for herself right under Our Noses. Our Noses was a store on the first floor catering to the fake nose market. (This was surprisingly a huge market thanks to the late MJ)

It all made sense. The people in the center, playing basketball, cycling and doing their homework in record time was due to the brown liquid. The Horlicks!! I thought I would go into the session and midway reveal her plan to her unknowing victims.

As I entered, I noticed a weird stare from her. Thinking I had a Horlicks moustache I started wiping my upper lip. I looked back up and she was gone. All the doors and windows were locked from the outside. I was trapped in this room with about a hundred people who had been drinking Horlicks everyday for over a month. I had to get out and stop her. But how?

I yelled out, “Is there any one in here named Will?” One guy raised his hand. And just as I thought, right behind him, was a way. A way out. Running through the small passage way, I came out, and just in time, K was rushing to her bike. Just as she was about to ride away, I reached out to the bike ignition key and turned it off.

“So K-Woman, we meet again,” I said, with my hands on my hips. “Who are you again?” she replied. She was obviously playing dumb. I explained to her how I came to know of her evil plan. She replied, “Oh! You were here to stop me? I was running because I saw a man with a police uniform come in.” But then she explained what she was really doing, and she was not as evil as I thought. She was much worse! She was giving out the Horlicks not mixed in milk, but in water!! (Yuck!)

Not on my watch missy. It wasn’t enough that she was building an army of people without their knowledge, she gave them a sub standard drink. Below standard actually. But she did cure them from their alcoholism, which was a good thing. Now, come to think of it, she wasn’t that bad after all. I decided to let her off and give her another chance. Who knows, she may come to my rescue in the future. You remember the lion and the mouse don’t you?

I took over the ‘Alco-horlicks Anonymous’ from under Our Noses and turned it into an organization that gave underprivileged kids doses of Horlicks. We still catered to alcoholics who wanted to turn over a new leaf.

The End.

PS: This in no way is a promotion for Horlicks. None of the effects of Horlicks mentioned here are proven. Horlicks was chosen as it fit in perfectly, nothing else.

I also hope you haven’t turned to alcohol after reading this post.

Read at your own risk!

I woke up early that day my friend. The sun had still not risen; even the early bird who gets the early worm was fast asleep. While brushing my teeth I had sensed something was not right. Then it hit me like a bolt of lightning. It was way too early for anyone to be awake, too early for a superhero like me as well. So I unbrushed my teeth by gorging on leftovers from dinner and decided to go back to sleep. But not before brushing my teeth again!! I can’t afford to treat any cavities during this recession.

So anyway, waking up at my usual time I found myself in a dire situation. My hands and legs were tied up to the bed and I ….. umm… sorry wrong narration. Anyhoooo…. I woke up and went about my daily routine. Things seems quiet, a little to quiet for my liking. Usually during the Bandra Feast there is a lot of noise and commotion on the streets of Bandra, what was wrong this year? So I asked myself, if I was quiet, why would I be quiet? After hours of pondering and constant reminders to myself what I was thinking about in the first place, I decided to check it out for myself. So I made a trip to the Bandra Fair.

It was crowded as usual but still to my surprise, not a sound. So I decided to do some further investigation. After some candy floss and two giant wheel rides later I got back to my investigation. It took me far into the depths of the fair where usually you would hear the annoying ‘paaaw paaaw’s of the horns being blown, but this time there was nothing. I sensed something was terribly wrong. What’s the Bandra Fair without the noise? I wandered around the fair in desperation to find out what could be the cause of this terrible silence which was now starting to grow on me. I decided to get on the giant wheel again, but this time with the intention of getting a bird’s eye view of the events. (I never asked for the investigation to be so enjoyable)

While on top of the wheel, I thought I saw something in the distance. Something so simple and so primitive it never crossed my mind. It was a giant megaphone. Was it possible that this megaphone was sucking out all the sound that was being produced in the area? What kind of sick mind would do that? Actually a sick mind who didn’t want to be disturbed would do that. Actually, if I had the resources and the money, I would do it myself. It was brilliant! I decided to take a closer look, after stopping for some more candy floss and a bottle of coke. (WOW! That’s a lot of sugar!)

I reached the spot where the megaphones power seemed to be concentrated. As I stood there, looking at this magnificent structure, the clouds gathered. It was as if it was perfectly planned. Sudden lightening appeared in the sky and everyone was running helter-skelter once the rain started pouring down. But I still stood there, marvelling at the idea of having this at all the railway stations. Then all of a sudden, some weird noise emerged from the megaphone. It was as if it was opening up. I stood there, not knowing what to do. And suddenly, water started gushing out of the cone and flowed into a collection tank hidden underground. I had mistaken a rainwater collector for a megaphone. Knowing that I would never know the true cause of this silence I started walking home, drenched to the core.

Just then, as I saw the bolt of lightening in the sky I got an idea. I thought back to when I last heard sounds coming from the fair. It was when I had woken up early. I had trouble going back to sleep again because of all the noise; I decided to stuff my ears with ear plugs. I reached for my ears, and rightly enough the ear plugs were lodged in there, as if stuck with superglue. I yanked them out of my ears and there it was. The magnificent sounds of people ‘paaw paawing’, hawkers selling channa, people puking on the giant wheel and the hustle and bustle around. Ahh.. the sounds of the Bandra Fair. It was like music to my ears, only less appealing and with no rhythm at all.

You may think that this was a useless adventure to narrate but I think it was a huge disaster which was averted. I could have forgotten to put on my pants!!!

Well anyway, it was a great enjoyable day! Only hope that someone really makes a machine to suck out noise and install them at the Dandia events!

This is SuperCraig signing out, reminding you not to kiss the pigs. You may get swine flu!

Dude... wheres my eye?

It was his second surgery in a few months. The first was on his lip, swollen after a girl scout punched him and ran away with his money. Yes friends! The person i am talking about is none other than "long hair now short dude".So, coming back to his second surgery. This was surgery on his eye. Because of his super height, and the extreme proximity to the sun, his eye had gone bad. So filling his leave card and being promised reimbursement for the operation from the SuperHero Association, he went to the hospital. Little did he know what was in store for him. He was not going to be reimbursed. Anyway, that comes later in the story. Trying to save a few bucks, and probably with the motive of making a fake bill and asking for extra reimbursement, he admitted himself into a cheap hospital instead of the SuperHero Association recomended one. This would later come back to bite his butt. The hospital he was lying in, was the Villian Hospital. He thought Villian was the name of the place!

So they were prepping him for surgery. They asked him what he does for a living. He proudly stated, "I am a pansy by day, but by night, I am Super Pansy!" That was his undoing. The evil doctors now knew that he was not a villian, even though he looked like one. So they drugged him. When asked about his experience, he says, "All I remember are brilliant colors moving like i was so totally stoned man... it was awesome dude!"

While in surgery, the evil doctors took out his eye and kept it in the petri dish. Now this petri dish was not ordinary dish. It was the feeding bowl for the evil mastermind Dr. Know It All's pet eagle named 'Hairy Eagle'. Out of nowhere, Hairy Eagle swooped down and grabbed the eye in his talons and flew away.

Being evil, the doctors then left for their lunch break, laughing and joking as they walked out. The effect of the drugs were now starting to wear out, because Super Pansy is soooo coooooool! He suddenely realised that something was amiss. His one eye was missing! He didnt know what was happening or what to do. He paused to think, and as he closed his eyes, he could see nothing but objects that appeared like buildings. People on the roads appeared as small as ants. He could see what the other eye was seeing! So taking advantage of this 'birds eye' view so to speak, he contacted the only person who he knew would help, SuperCraig.

Now SuperCraig was out on a date with this super hot girl and he was about to.... ahem ahem.. this is a family blog. So jumping forward a few hours, (:P) SuperCraig called back SuperPansy to ask him what happened. He explained everything and SuperCraig was struck with a brilliant idea. (When have his ideas been anything short of brilliant?)

SuperCraig suggested that SuperPansy close his eyes and tell him what he saw. This way they could see exactly where the eagle was going and finally find out the secret hideout of Dr. Know It All. The eagle finally landed after 20 minutes of flight. To a place so obvious, that it would take a genius a hundred years to figure it out! Dr. Know It All was hiding out in Villian Hospital!!

SuperCraig was on his way to the hospital. SupeCraig also summoned a few doctors to meet him at the hospital. Meanwhile, Pansy.. i mean SuperPansy was still in the hospital, pretending to be drugged. At this time he could see exactly where the eagle was moving, and the eagle was on the shoulder of Dr. Know It All. The place seemed very familiar. A long corridor, an operation theatre at the end. Room 101 it read. Wait a minute! SuperPansy was in that very room. Dr. Know It All was nearing the room. He could now hear the footsteps outside. Dr. Know It All, being the person he is, knew exactly what SuperPansy could see. He purposely held a knife in front of the eye. SuperPansy was terrified. If his ear was besides Dr. Know It All, he would have heard "Fattuuuuuuuuuuuu". The door was opened with a bang. But SuperPansy stayed still. He later said he was pretending to be unconcious, but we all know he really fainted with fright. Dr. Know It All was about to cut open SuperPansy's eye when a stone broke the window and "Thud" his eagle fell down. Looking down at the dead eagle, he thought "How did i not know that was going to happen?" "I can not be Dr. Know It All anymore." as he continued to cry over the bird.

But wait.. who threw the stone? What happened to SuperPansy? Ok ok if you insist on knowing.. i will tell you.

The stone came from the road. SuperCraig threw it. It was just a coincidence that there was a mango tree outside. Dr. Know It All was no more evil, and he started dedicating his time and expertise to good. SuperCraig thought, why not go visit SuperPansy at the hospital while he was there.

As they say, Kill two birds with one stone... in more ways than one.

So another disaster was averted thanks to SuperCraig.

*SuperCraig does not recomend staring into the sun for too long. It is not good for your eyes, and besides... get a life!