A history of DBabb nicks

I have occasionally touched upon the topic of DBabble, our internal messenger, in this blog. For the first few months in WIMWI I had only two nicks in all - FiFo@7813 (7813 is my phone extension) and Dare D'Evil FiFo (during T-Nite, as a symbol of section solidarity). On December 10, however, I joined the bandwagon of the regular nick-changers. In the ensuing two months and a bit, I have had 37 different DBabb IDs (nothing exceptional about this - Khakee changes her nick every 12 hours, it seems). Me being whom I am, each of these nicks has been recorded. Most have little stories behind them - CCCFs, in WIMWI parlance. Some of the more memorable ones, I have described below.

Smoothening Consumption (Dec 17): After my unexpected placement into a well-paying internship, my principled notions of controlling expenses disappeared rather quickly. In Bombay, I could easily manage with 1000-1200 bucks a month. Now I probably spend thrice that amount. A concept that we learnt in economics comes as a handy excuse - I am increasing my present spending in anticipation of future income - consumption smoothening, it is called.





Juxtaposition (Jan 7): On my trip to Bombay during the term break, I finally managed to go to Town. Was blown away, as I always am, by the sight of the stone architecture and the endless sea. Clicked some great snaps, amongst which was one of the BSE building and the Rajabai Tower of Bombay University juxtaposed together. Way too beautiful!

Dice and Counters (Jan 13): One of our economics professors, Prof. Sujoy, regularly conducts experiments in economics (related to game theory, I think), where participants can win a few hundred rupees without doing much work. I participated in one of those sessions around that time, and was enamoured of the ten-sided dice used in the experiment. Those were also the days of the student elections, and I was the polling agent aka counter for Chhedi. Dice and counters suddenly became important words in my vocabulary.

Hoping to avoid joining the 67 club (Jan 28): India's sex ratio in 2001 was 933 females to every 1000 males. The 67 club was founded by those unfortunate 67 who would be left stranded. And I of course am very much hoping to avoid joining their ranks.

Gullible me (Feb 5): Thoku, Prostee and others called me to their room urgently the night before. I went there to discover Prostee lying on the bed almost passed out and ready to puke. They said they wanted me to take Prostee back to his room, since they themselves were too drunk to do so. After ten minutes of unsuccessfully dealing with an inebriated Prostee, I was told that it was all a hoax! Prostee is a damn good actor. And I am too gullible :)

Beyond hitchhiking at last (Feb 7): I had borrowed the Hitchhiker's Guide to the galaxy from Khakee on August 23. Almost half a year later, I was on the verge of finishing it. Two days after using this nick, I had finally completed the 800+ page long, but very delightful work, and I was beyond hitchhiking. The book that Khakee got back wasn't quite the same one that I completed though. Due to some unfortunate decisions on my part, her copy suffered some damage. I duly bought her a replacement in December.

Some other nice nicks whose CCCF is too high-context to be explained in public though:

Time and Space (Dec 18)
Mostly Clueless (Dec 21)
Strange Hangouts (Dec 27)
Pleasantly Lost (Jan 27)

I am sure I will stumble upon more nicks with curious explanations over the rest of my time in WIMWI. My curent nick is quite straightforward: "Sharing Galileo's birthday" - a reference to my birthday which coincides with that of the great Italian scientist.