Sunday, June 22, 2008

Addiction revisited

What it addiction??? It is something that you do, that you do not need to do yet you have to just do it. According to dictionary.com, it's the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, as narcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma. And today I discovered that I was addicted to the most unlikeliest of things, the morning newspaper. I got up a bit early for a Sunday, and like every other day, I went to get the days newspaper, but it wasn't there. It was 7 n I decided to wait, n I was pacing up and down the road, waiting for the newspaper guy. Finally at 8, I had given up hope n had my morning glass of milk without the paper. It was then that I realized that how much I needed the newspaper. I considered going out to buy it, but gave up the thought out of sheer laziness.
Is it just me or has the quality of the newspaper (Times Of India) gone down. The comic strips have had the same strips printed since I was 12. I don't read the comic strips anymore, I just glance through em. I am yet to come across one that I haven't read since the last 5 yrs. I now subscribe to a few comic strips online instead. Even R. K. Laxman's strip, and the other one that's there has repetitions. I did go through the e-paper today instead, but it's not at all fun. It only reminded me I had missed the Formula 1 race again. Just the other week, there was an entire page that was a repetition from the previous days paper. It was the section called Times Trends and in case you really like that section, do check out the last page of the Classifieds section, that is where you can find it on most weekdays that you have the classifieds section on.
This was me a week ago, I forgot I was writing this post and come next sunday (yesterday) I was reminded of this post as my paper didn't show up again. What is it with the paper guy and Sundays? Is it his day off? Any way, I didn't repeat last weeks mistake and sent for someone to get me the paper. I am at home n my parents are away for a fortnight, so I have to take all the tough decisions :D Any way, the paper cost 5 buck, which is considerably more than what I remembered it to be. May be because it was the Sunday paper. It was filled with crappy news, n crappier gossips. I read a few reports that made me sad, some kid who couldn't cycle in the common wealth games because he was run over by an under-age driver. There was stuff about people who were duped, people who were rioting, people urging others to fight for their cause. It's really depressing sometime. They should probably put news relating to tragedy and crime on seperate pages/sections. I switch over to the Mirror, which is being provided as a complimentry copy for the past... damn it, it's been so long that I can't even remember. Being a Tabloid, it is usually entertaining, but the cover story here too was that of the CYG dream being shattered. I wonder how the paper has survived this long without having to face the wrath of the Thakreys. With the images as well as the investigative reports they publish in the papers, I wouldn't be surprised to read about their offices being trashed. Though it is probably the power to influence the readers that provides them this immunity. Any way, crappy or not, I am in a sense addicted to it, n i need it with a glass of milk each morning. Another one of my addiction.

2 comments:

no.good.at.coding said...

Heh, I know the feeling, waiting for the paper to come so you can start your day.

>>has the quality of the newspaper (Times Of India) gone down
It definitely has. They're printing more inane articles and there are tons of spelling and grammatical errors; the supplementary [insert name of city here] Times is especially vacuous.

>>The comic strips have had the same strips printed since I was 12
That's not true; Garfield is current, as is Dennis the Menace most of the others. Peanuts is rerun (hehe, get it?) since Charles M. Schulz is no more. And yeah, You Said It has definitely deteriorated over the years and quite a few are pretty much the same thing with different cartoons; but you've got to give the man a break after all these years, huh?

And I completely agree that the main copy is really depressing. I usually just read the international section and the cover page.

Wolfestine said...

Yeah, I totally forgot to mention the grammatical n spelling mistakes.

I checked out the comic-strips in the supplement of your city, n they certainly seem new. No Dennis the Menace here. I wouldn't be surprised if they were coming up with new Peanuts there in ur town, since these popular cartoonists usually hire ppl to draw for them when they can afford assistants, atleast that's what that Davis n Laxman have done. But I am pretty sure the one (Peanuts) here is a re-re-re-re-run.

I prefer going through the Tabloid (The Mirror) that they have been providing complimentary for the past 3-4 months, here. Though there isn't much News in it.