The Third Slip: Issue 73 - Shutter up and dams
Hello, Slippers! Welcome to The Third Slip - the weekly newsletter that’s like that guy who goes to the gym right before a date and pumps some iron in a bid to cover up years of neglect and body abuse with 15 minutes of buffing. But, for some strange reason, it just about holds for 10 minutes. And it appears that’s exactly what you shallow fellows need because our subscriber count is on the rise. Thank you for thronging to TTS like Hyderabad to IKEA.
What a week it’s been, one in which we wished the rain switched from Kerala to the home of cricket in London. Yes, we’ve been earnestly reciting The Lord’s Prayer. You know, the one that goes “Our father who art in heaven, Kohli be thy name”. Yes, being depressed worsens our sense of humour. Might as well get on with the news...
At Home
Dam-age Control: Last week, we brought you the nearly-perfect internet comment from the Kerala State Disaster Management Authority. This week, things took a turn for the worse in Kerala with relentless rains running riot, ruining and ravaging reservoir restrictions. For the first time in 40 years, all 5 shutters of the Idukki Dam have been opened, as have 23 other dams across the state. The rains are so bad that the Nehru Trophy Boat Race scheduled for this week has now been postponed, and will be rescheduled as per a date convenient for chief guest Sachin Tendulkar. Now you know why they call it God’s Own Country.
*Lowers Sunglasses*: Imagine winning all elections you contest in from 1957-2016 and still being referred to as Kalaignar (roughly, scholar of arts) because your influence extends to screenwriting (~40 films), books and stage plays - that’s Karunanidhi, the stalwart who passed away this week. A person who embodied everything that’s unfashionable in 2018, such as being knowledgeable, actually reading religious texts before commenting on them, fierce rationalism, and those sunglasses from Cheap Halloween Rejects 1970. But, such is our cocooned ignorance that most people outside Tamil Nadu would not even have heard of him. Including the predominant national media. Here’s a helpful tip.
Topic of Kanwariasation: Some rowdy ‘pilgrims’ who’ve become notorious over the years (and emboldened by a government happy to ignore anything as long as it’s wearing saffron) wrecked a car, trashed a police vehicle and generally created a massive ruckus in (where else) North India. The government decided something must be done, so spent 14 lakhs showering petals on them. Speaking of fringe groups emboldened by the state of things, the Sanatan Sanstha has moved on to making bombs now.
Judge-mental: The Rajasthan High Court (oh no) acquitted a woman (what?) of murder (YAY!) because she was PMSing (wait, what?) stating it causes temporary insanity. Till now, we thought it was impossible to take one step forwards but still ending up one step backward.
Irrational Numbers: Ours is a glorious nation where needless deaths happen so often that they’ve numbed us into accepting it as reality. A family in Delhi lost 3 girls to hunger because they had no ration cards. Of course, they’ll get justice. As soon as they figure out who is supposed to give it: The BJP, Congress, and AAP have created that most political of shapes: A triangopointus. Our primary school teacher never told us if when 3 fingers are pointing at others, one finger is pointing at you.
Rain of thought: In case you didn’t know about it, the monsoon session of parliament ended this week. To be perfectly honest, we have no idea what happened or what that means. Why did they stop? Someone get these guys a better weather app, it’s still raining outside our windows and even at Lord’s. We’re sure if anything important that affects the lives of the common man happens the mainstream media would keep us informed - y’know like if someone hugs or winks.
Reverse Bank of India: Some bhakt who believed a comedian’s obvious spoof video about a GPS chip in a 2000 Rs note is now on the RBI Board. The same board that no longer has renowned economist Raghuram Rajan. This is like Pink Floyd replacing David Gilmour with Aamir Khan from Aisa Kakhm Diya Hai.
The unkindest Kathua of all: Nobody likes the good guy You know, like that boy who reminds the teacher that there’s a class test. Or the cousin who confesses that yes we did indeed steal the jalebis. Or you know, the social activist who tried to get justice for the family of an 8-year-old girl who was gangraped and murdered. Yeah, nobody likes those telltales. All of them deserve to be thrashed by the police in custody (oh, just the last one? Yeah, ok. Frickin’ blabbermouths).
Putting the sick in Musick [sic]: In this week’s thing you didn’t think could be outraged about: Some Carnatic singers were abused on social media for singing songs about other religions! Outspoken artist TM Krishna responded by saying he’d make a song about Allah & Jesus every month!
Around the World
Trump’ll still skin: Trump told the EU to stop doing business with Iran. The EU told Trump to - excuse our French - fuquez le vous.So Trump then told LeBron James he was dumb. Melania then said - excuse our Slovenian - shut up, Donald.
Meanwhile, a Republican Congress member who bragged about being close to Trump is now arrested and charged with insider trading :P And for fans of white supremacist rallies - Charlotsville is baaaaaack (though it has a lot less support than last year, thankfully).
Drone ko pakadna…: The new Venezuelan President was almost knocked off by exploding drones! Er, yeah, stay away from that part of the world. In general.
Salad Days: In this time of political turmoil, right-wing populism and mass shootings, let us take solace in the fact that Brexit exists. Surely in the running for this year’s Best British Comedy Award, the latest news tells us that England might face a future with no sandwiches. Clearly, when they said ‘Leave’, they meant the lettuce. (Chee, bad one, let us try again. Given how they're doddering on this, surely they didn't mean rocket leaves. Okay one more, Remain sounds like Romaine… Ok, this is going nowhere. Like Brexit. BOOM)
Don't spare the road: The Bangladeshis are so pissed off that the government is doing nothing about their roads, that they’re taking to the, er, streets to protest - spearheaded by the youth. (Send some of that spirit Mumbaiwards when you’re done, please?)
The Audacity of Pope: Alas, Catholic-dominated Argentina voted not to legalize abortion. It’s one of the few topics an otherwise progressive Pope is 17th century about.
Business
You'll Never Balk Elon: Yo Musk so tired of employees out there gettin’ distracted by the stock price, he just wanna take Tesla private again by buying shares off yer capitalist asses.
Fizzling Out: In a blow to ‘Indian Pride’ Whatsapp forwards everywhere, Indra Nooyi steps down as CEO of Pepsi. Hang on to Sundar and Satya before they bugger off too!
Surge-ical Strike: In a first, NY City capped the number of Ubers & Lyfts on the road.
Stalk Exchange: In this week’s episode of Capitalism Doesn’t Give a F**k - Facebook wants to partner with banks to get more data from you. Investors were obviously shocked given all the company has been through recently, so they sent up the share price 3.5%.
LinkedOut
First, CricketNext brought back Sidvee to writing again and then they gave us Prem Panicker’s lovely piece on the great mental battle that sports produces. Joy.
There’s a study that tells you when to release your study about climate change (spoiler alert: hot summer)
How do you balance the line between freedom of speech and crazy internet nutjobs in 2018? That added silence you hear is the sound of (right-wing nutjob conspiracy theorist) Alex Jones being yanked off the internet.
Cricketer who turned prime minister? There's more to Imran Khan than just those two avatars writes Osman Samiuddin
That’s it for this week. Oh, an edited version of this issue first appeared in Arré as TL;Dr. In case you’d like to figure out our financial transactions via social media, follow us on Twitter where we still deal in the currency of “jokes” (Tony | Chuck). Like what you read? Have some thoughts or suggestions? Share with us over email. We'd love to hear from you. Until next week, may you open the shutters of your mind and find that the outside world is not so bad after all. Bye!