An Outlet - Part 9

4 May, 2022.

I've been waking up really late nowadays. I could justify it by saying that my sleep schedule is going to be fucked in 2 months tho.

Our maid has taken an off for a couple days (or weeks? I forget) so I ended up doing multiple chores including brooming, filling water bottles, putting clothes for washing and drying, clearing the table. Mom definitely did much more than me but this still felt like a lot.

Today is May the 4th, aka an unofficial Star Wars Day. (Ms.) Paula, someone who I haven't met since 2018 if I'm not wrong, has organised a week long Cosmic Fest via her new start up and one of the events today was a discussion on Star Wars and Sci-Fi as a genre. Now, I haven't watched even one Star Wars movie in it's entirety but I wanted to meet Ms. Paula once before I left so I decided to come for this session-accompanied by Kristen ofcourse.

The event was at 5:30 in the evening and I would've reached on time if I had taken a rick all the way through. But Kristen was caught up in traffic and I didn't want to be early so I decided to take a train and walk to the place from the nearest station. Taking a rick/cab has become such a natural since Covid that I have to remind myself that taking a train is much more economical.

On my way, I came across a lot of clothing stores that generally go unnoticed because there's a full fashion lane nearby. I wouldn't mind checking them out some day.

The event took place at a book store and I was surprised by the size of it. I never realised there was such a good looking big store hidden in this tiny lane just off the main road. I met up with Kristen and entered the venue.

Paula already seemed occupied but she managed to greet us. I didn't really expect her to be super excited to see us but I guess I would've liked her to say something other than a "hi" cause we met her for the first time in years. I put that thought aside tho, maybe she just had a lot on her mind at the time and had to get the event started.

And the event was nice! It was a discussion between an astrophysisist and a writer. Thankfully, most of the audience (hardly 10-15 of us) had not seen Star Wars so I was glad to have been given a brief explanation everytime they made a reference to the series.

The discussion went on for about 2 hours - well past the allocated time, so Kristen and I decided to go for dinner nearby. It took us a while to get out of the place tho. After the session, we were waiting to talk to Paula for a bit, at least let her know that the two of us will be going out of town for 2 years. However, she kept talking to the panelists even though they were going to meet again a few days later.

And when Paula did turn her attention to us, the first thing she asked was for Kristen to attend and cover another event for her cause she had no other "bakra" to latch that work onto. Not going to lie, I was taken aback too on Kristen's behalf. Imagine meeting someone (you shared a good bond with at some point in your life) after years and the person only looks at you as someone who can get his/her work done. And that too without enquiring about what else is going on in your life. Kristen used to do report writing for Paula but that was back in 2016. So much has changed since then. And turns out Kristen wasn't even happy doing that work after a point back then.

On that not-so-great note, we wished Paula adieu and went to have dinner at a nearby cafe - one that Kristen takes all her friends too. I can see why. It's a healthy-ish cafe with multiple seating options. The decor is nothing too fancy but it still feels tasteful. They've got a range of salads, sandwiches and other items which you have to order by going up to their long counter.

We had a 2 in one salad, a grilled sandwich and a pizza. It tasted quite good. We also went to a nearby Middle Eastern place and had baklava for dessert.

You can tell that the "Covid phase" is getting over by how the ricks have started declining customers again. I don't even remember the last time I had to wait for so long to get one.