An Accountant, a flask, his wife and her tailor!

Dear Geetha,

Welcome to IL. Happy to note that you belong to the same lot as Indhu, the wives of accountants' club.

Let me answer your last question first. Indhusri has not yet got her blouses. She is busy with her work and does not want to risk entrusting the job to me.

The blouses are now at least safe with the tailor, is explanation, no, exasperation.

I am happy that thanks to your husband you are talking of opportunity cost and all. I make the choices difficult for my wife and daughter. I tell them, either you now take a saree for Rs.1000/- or I will add twice that amount to the Diwali budget. But Geetha, I am not as smart as your husband. Or should I say, my wife is smarter than me. I invariably end up getting her a Rs. 1000 saree now and also add the promised amount to the Diwali budget.

I am very proud when you say that your husband is your backbone. That shows that you have the capability to recognise the real worth of your man, in spite of minor disappointments.

Welcome once again. This forum when it started in 2005 was just a single bed room flat. But today it is a huge colony, a vibrant community of ladies (and a few men like me) the world over. Make yourself familiar with every part of this site. Should you have any questions feel free to ask me or any other ILite.
Convey my greetings to your CA husband.
regards,
sridhar

 

Dear Proud Mom of Astro Physicist and Race Car Driver,

May your children's aspirations come true. May Ani discover something in astro-physics which will bear his name. Like the nobel-winning scientist from India Subramanian Chandrasekar in whose honour there is Chandrasekar's limit which tells about a critical mass of a star necessary for it to become a black hole.

An accountants humour is there but often times it is so subtle that it is missed. I am trying to bring into this forum all those aspects, just to break the seriousness of SHE which will be on stands by this Saturday.

Let me have the honour of welcoming Mr.Shankar into the Societies of Husbands Who Mess Up With Their Wives Tailors. A real mouthful, isn't it?
regards,
sridhar

 

Dear Sri,
I do know about SP's film ventures. The film he produced was Arivali starring Shivaji Ganesan, P.Banumathi, Thangavelu etc. I have heard all the jokes concerning 'behind the scenes happenings' of that film.
Once in Kodaikanal Golf club we were closeted with SP and a good friend of his, who happened to be Actress Devika's ex-husband. The discussion we had was not only entertaining but also gave us some deep insights into the workings of a human mind.

Thanks for kindling those sweet memories,
regards,
sridhar

 

Dear AGRji,

I am very happy that my writing has brought you back here. Nice to see you, professional colleague.

I fully agree with you AGR. Desire is something which we cannot escape out of. At least not in the near future. Unless God bestows a sudden enlightenment on us. But we have our own way of working towards the fulfilment of our desires.

I do the same thing when it comes to loans and all. When I borrowed for my car I calculated the IRR on my system and I arrived at the EMI. I told them that it is the EMI I would pay - not a Rupee more. They reluctantly signed the MOU with me.

My experience in this is that it is better to be upfront in money matters especially with friends and relatives, so that the relationships are healthy. We have a typical accountants tradition in our house. As all the three of us brothers are CAs and our father is an Accountant, we are very clear in our money transactions. For example if my wife takes a saree from my father's shop, he will just inform me and debit my account. And if I dont approve of the purchase her account will be debited. We do exchange gifts, go out for dinner, when any of us host and so on. But other than that accounts are clearly drawn and money transactions settled.

In many families the problems come because money and affection are messed up together in one unidentifiable lump so that in the end, neither of them survive.

AGR, being conscious about money, I feel, does not make us any less human. I would say it makes us even more so.

Thanks for sharing your views on this,
sridhar

 

Dear Chitra,

Nice to know about your accountant hubby. Messing up with the simplest of instructions especially from one's wife is a typical masculine quality spread over the entire male sex, and not necessarily confined to the Accounting tribe.

I have almost propounded a Varalotti's Law (why should we give credit to that poor aeronautic Engineer Murphy, when he is perfectly innocent of the goof-ups happening here) that simpler the task assigned by the wife, greater the chance for a goof-up.

I dont mind sharing with you another goof-up which happened yesterday. In this case we, (that is I and my wife) had a perfectly equal share. I used to read during breakfast and yesterday I gave the book I was reading to my wife, asking her to keep it in our bedroom. I left for office, came back, had dinner and wanted to continue with the book I left in the morning. It was a collection of Jeffery Archers short stories. And I had stopped in the middle of a particularly interesting story.
The book was not to be seen. My wife swore that she kept it on my table in the morning itself. She told me that I should have taken the book to office or elsewhere and like I messed up with her blouses, had forgotten where I kept the book. Endless arguments and futile searches followed. Both of us went to bed in a foul mood.
Early in the morning she woke me up with the book. She hit my shoulders with the book shouting, "here it is."
Then she sheepishly told me that she had been to my parents' room and had left it there yesterday morning.
I started to shout at her irresponsible behaviour when she curtly signed me to stop.
While searching for the book I had taken the key to the main door of the house and had kept it in our bed room. I had opened the maindoor to look for the book in the car.
Our parents who woke up early in the morning could not open the main door. Their schedule got delayed by half an hour.
Now it was my turn to bow down in shame.
I had to apologise to my wife for the shouting the previous night and had to compensate her with some monetary gift to bring back the smile in her face.

Moral of the story, Chitra, is that accountants can no longer claim goofing-up as their exclusive professional privilege. Nor can men claim that as the exclusive privilege of their sex. Goofing up is a human privilege. Men own up. Thats all.

regards,
sridhar