118 thoughts on “Further Conversational Excursions with our Community’s Future”

1. sexxy5@biPrinc3ss u abortion, THAT IS HER NAME

   Make it stop! Make it stop! Anna is killing me! I’m going to die! I’m too young to die!

   Or apparently, I’m not that young anymore.. . .time to go gently into that dark night. . .

2. GujuHottiee120586: dum ass my cuzn shital was born in 86 wtf not my fault her parents were so f ing slow to pop out lil patelz

   Great post Anna! (yet again)

3. Koffee with Karan is actually a pretty entertaining show — there’s certainly nothing like it on American TV. So it figures that your friends, GujuHottie and NJDesiQt, are addicted.

   The recent episode with Sanjay Dutt was actually kind of riveting at times — somehow K-Jo knows how to make melodrama out of even two people sitting around, making bollywood shop talk.

4. “U abortion”! Damn, I must be old if I didn’t know it could be used that way.

5. Heheheh. No IM conversation is complete without the ORLY owl. Wikipedia link. LOL SRSLY? YA SRSLY. I take exception to one thing though. I’ve never heard anyone fluent in IMspeak use bumblefuck in any capacity.

6. Oh and both this and the Kal Penn post made me do this.

7. Oh and both this and the Kal Penn post made me do this.

   Ditto. And I haven’t stopped yet. Anna, your writing has real power. And it only gets better when read a second (or third) time. Thanks so much.

8. My lack of IM skills forced me to Google half of the words used in this post 🙁

   ANNA, you made me cry for the second time today, I wish u wud rot in hell 4 doin dat 2 me 😀

9. sexxy5@biPrinc3ss if by “friendly’ we mean slutty

   GujuHottiee120586: ima virgin u bitch

   sexxy5@biPrinc3ss ONLY CUZ U LET IT IN EVERY HOLE XCEPT THAT ONE! ROFLMAO!!!

   Dying. DYING!!!

   P.S. I was there too!

10. What is this long conversation? Who is it between? Confused confused confused

11. This is amazing!! But i feel like im not in on the joke—Is this real?!! Where did it come from? Brilliant nevertheless. I have yet to see The Nam-E-Sake.

12. GujuHottiee120586: omg. OMG. O>M>F>G. that is SO satc when big surprised carrie in frisco!

    It so is. Your posts are making me miss all the instant message conversations of 1997 and my very first AOL account.

13. OMG. O>M>F>G. that is SO satc when big surprised carrie in frisco!

    O Ram. I just realized: I understand this sentence in its entirety.

    I feel a deep deep sense of shame that, no, not all the goodness in the world can absolve me of. I go to my bedchamber now, with a heavy heart.

14. GujuHottiee120586: dum ass my cuzn shital was born in 86 wtf not my fault her parents were so f ing slow to pop out lil patelz

    As a Gujrati person, this might be my favorite line of the entire dialogue. (Also, my brother Kapil is named after my grandmother Kapila. How apropos!)

15. Mr. Kobayashi, I too noticed that I understood that sentence in its entirety. The difference – I was proud. Says something about your standards and mine.

16. Damn you Kobayashi. Damn you! I would not have understood that sentence had you not forced me to focus on it. Aaaaaah!

17. am i the only one that doesn’t find this amusing? wait, now i’m going to get hell from all the anna lovers saying that i’m an anna hater…please, do something better with your time..

18. al – if you aren’t familiar with contemporary American youth culture you might not get it. I think it’s a perfect and hilarious rendition of IM-speak. I’m damn proud I understood all of it. Though I swear to god I don’t know how they got into Penn and Columbia either, with the probable SAT verbals 😉

    I thought the JayaPrada reference was inspired.

19. No al, you’re not the only one. I too was bored not to mention that I was squirming in my seat as I sat reading this. No offense Anna! You’re really gifted. I actually liked yesterday’s post written in the same style…but I guess this one just went overboard 🙁

20. Really brilliant, Anna. I just feel so old cos I struggle to abbreviate my IM’s. Thanks for the embedded minitexting lesson

21. just awesum………dis along wid d previous IM post are d most intelligent blogs ive cum across ….but must say, d first one was much much better….Hats off newayz

22. am i the only one that doesn’t find this amusing?

    In all sincerity, I am sure you are not the only one. You are, however, the only one who felt the need to declare your opinion, in a way which might provoke others to do similar. If you don’t find it amusing, that’s fine, but asking if you’re the only one is like throwing out chum, which only happens in the dangerous waters which flow beneath MY posts.

    I point all of this out because when other mutineers take a risk and do something creative or different, no one bothers to tell them how they didn’t like it or it sucked, etc.

    wait, now i’m going to get hell from all the anna lovers saying that i’m an anna hater…please, do something better with your time..

    If you’d like, I can provide some context for why the “anna lovers” sometimes sow hell; it’s because they are annoyed and frustrated by what they have seen, since such “lovers” are inevitably mutineers who’ve been here for long enough to notice disturbing patterns.

    SM has existed since 2004 and I’ve been here since post one–in fact, I wrote our first post, and it was also something creative and anomalous. Since our inception, I have always been singled out for more negativity than any other blogger. In comparison after comparison, which I have neither the time nor energy to dredge through three years of archives to find, it’s been pointed out that I get criticized for things which the guys are “allowed to do”. As much as this truth pains me, I’ve learned to just accept that I’m always going to have crosshairs trained on my abundant ass, even when I do exactly what the guys do.

    I’m not sure if you’re asking me to find something better to do with MY time, but I’m hoping you weren’t, because that’s just mean.

    No al, you’re not the only one. I too was bored not to mention that I was squirming in my seat as I sat reading this. No offense Anna! You’re really gifted. I actually liked yesterday’s post written in the same style…but I guess this one just went overboard 🙁

    First, thank you for the compliment you sandwiched in there. Second, you are new here (I think?) so I don’t expect you to have the context I offered above. Third, do you announce that you were “bored” every time a post here doesn’t interest you? All I ask is that you treat me just as you would treat Abhi, Amardeep, Ennis or anyone else in the bunker. That sincere request is a plea from me to all, not just the two commenters I responded to here.

    Thanks for reading my little experiment (which I was so nervous to post, my heart rate spiked…it’s not easy to take “creative” risks or to try to duplicate something successful). If anyone is curious, this took TWICE as long for me to write than a “regular” post. If anyone is even more curious than that, it’s not easy to put yourself out there and whenever I try something “different” like this, I almost always hit “delete” instead of “publish”, but then, my anxiety is my problem, not yours.

    I just want to remind some of you that there’s an actual, fragile human who writes this stuff, who takes these risks, who gets hurt when the criticism doesn’t come from a sincere or well-intentioned place. You don’t have to love or like me, but if you can be fair to me, I’ll be eternally grateful.

23. The risktakers, who are creative yet reviled, are the mavericks that move our society forward.

    Long live the mavericks!

24. Humour is always a subjective thing, as is any form of creativity – I don’t much care for Rushdie though that makes me a philistine among my friends, but surely not caring for a particular piece of writing doesn’t mean you’d have to march up to the person in question, as it were, and announce your negative opinion of it? I think anyone who writes knows that what you write can feel like “your baby,” and criticisms of it can hurt more than criticisms of, say, a project at the office. Skim over to the posts that interest you more, it’s a free country, no-one is forcing you to read anything. That’s my chavanni’s worth.

25. If anyone is curious, this took TWICE as long for me to write than a “regular” post.

    wow! great post. your creativity is always inspiring. and your hard work … keeps us coming back to SM.

26. First, thank you for the compliment you sandwiched in there.

    hehehehehe. guess he is too scared to diss your writing outright.

27. hehehehehe. guess he is too scared to diss your writing outright.

    Oy, I thought they might be sincere. 🙂 I was.

28. Love the post. u abortion.

    I didn’t get this line.

29. for ANNA

    निंदक नियरे राखिये, आँगन कुटी छवाय। बिन पानी साबुन बिना, निर्मल करे सुहाय॥ 🙂

    and for those who criticizes ANNA

    शब्द सम्हारे बोलिये,शब्द के हाँथ न पाँव । एक शब्द औषधि करे, एक शब्द करे घाव ॥

30. sorta like that rule which forces ur mom to ruin raita wit sugar?

    gasp! you went there!

    ANNA, darling, goddess of written word… i’m a bit frightened that you do this IM-speak stuff so well 😉 I feel like a toddler trying to read; I have to sound it all out instead of trying to read actual words.

31. Since our inception, I have always been singled out for more negativity than any other blogger. In comparison after comparison, which I have neither the time nor energy to dredge through three years of archives to find, it’s been pointed out that I get criticized for things which the guys are “allowed to do”.

    I’m a fairly new SM reader and this statement surprised me a little. My impression was that this community was slightly more englightened than that.

    Anyway, I liked both posts, the first one a bit more though, probably due to the novelty factor.

32. Say hey if you have younger siblings/cousins who actually communicate like this.

    Hey.

33. How about if you have cousins your own age who communicate like this? Hey.

    The funniest is that my cousins use IM lingo with half-Hindi half-English, which is pretty funny except that it annoys me that people who used to be able to form full words and sentences just ten years ago have now been reduced to ur and lolz.

34. <

    blockquote>ass opposed to avoidng him like a total phudi

35. ^^what happened to my actual comment.

    thank you for reminding of this brilliant expletive

36. “You abortion” ? Seriously? 😐

37. Anna, what’s up with post #22?

    So, your posts appeal to some people and not to others. You don’t have to justify your writing skills or resume. As an online writer, you’ve probably been through this.

    Anyway, as a writer you WANT to evoke some kind of reaction or emotion in the reader — good or bad. So, just go through the comments, but don’t defend WHY you wrote or WHO you are.

    I’m all for creative and experimental writing. Personally, these posts gave me a headache .. maybe because it reminded me of how much I want to reach out and smack kids who do talk like this!! (do people call each other an “abortion”? When Jane Roe fought for the legal acceptance of abortion, did she know it would end up as an insult on IM??)

38. Not to distract from the thread, but does anyone know the average age of people here at SM? I’ve always wondered.

39. Although I wouldn’t say that I’ve read here as long as others, my theory on why your entries have more negatively-prone comments than others are the fact that I feel that you are more vulnerable in your posts. Don’t get me wrong, not all posts are personal, but you seem to connect more with the audience and you capture emotions, insights, and malayalee inside-jokes with a lot of your posts. Not to offend any of the other bloggers on the site, but you seem like you put less distance between yourself and the commenters. That is why (I think) many people relate to your posts, but is also the reason you are more open to negativity.

40. but you seem like you put less distance between yourself and the commenters.

    I agree, 10-C Chuck Key. There’s simply a warmth in ANNA’s writing that’s not always apparent in other posters’ work, On Hybrid Vigor, Acceptance and Grace being a perfect recent example.

41. I’m a fairly new SM reader and this statement surprised me a little. My impression was that this community was slightly more englightened than that.

    The community is ever-evolving; at different points, different people found different insults acceptable to hurl. Thankfully, it seems like the era of “Anna you are too fat, too dark, too ugly and that’s why you’re a bitter unmarried bitch” as a response to her posts seems over.

    Anyway, I liked both posts, the first one a bit more though, probably due to the novelty factor.

    Now THAT is constructive. It’s not helpful to say “I don’t like it”. Why don’t you like it? What would have made it better? What didn’t seem authentic or well-phrased? Etc. Some people are clueless and think this needs to be an echo-chamber of ass kissing. No. Just an asshole-free zone, thanks.

    Anna, what’s up with post #22?

    Well, for the newer readers, it potentially explains a lot. That and the passive aggressive “now the rabid fans will attack me” bit isn’t just a self-fulfilling prophecy, it’s old. Hopefull “post #22” will stop that from being typed.

42. ANNA, I’m surprised you bothered to respond to the criticism. I’ve been writing humor columns for more than 10 years and have received my share of negative comments, as well as many positive ones. If I had listened to the critics, I would have given up writing humor a LONG time ago. Humor is very subjective. Since you received a lot of positive feedback from these posts, you obviously did something right. That’s what you should focus on. No matter how good you are, there will always be people who find fault. Hey, even my wife HATES some of my columns!

43. ANNA, I’m surprised you bothered to respond to the criticism.

    The day I stop being thin-skinned is also the day I won’t be able to write the way I do. If I am even slightly good at capturing anything, it’s because I’m hypersensitive. Sigh.

    I don’t think so much of myself or my writing that I feel above responding as I did in #22…not that those writers who are strong enough to resist such futile impulses are in any way arrogant or bad or inferior. Not sure if any of that makes sense.

44. What was the point of this post ? I don’t get it, how is it funny ?

45. To #17 and #19 : A N N A’s post is classified under humour – and what one finds humorous and what one doesn’t is a tricky matter of taste. Constructions like “am i the only one that…” (by #17) aren’t particularly…er, constructive. On the matter of taste: here’s why I was absolutely bowled over by this post. A N N A’s post isn’t merely an invitation to chuckle at how the female-ABD-adolescent crowd communicates/thinks. Its quality lies in what — for the want of a better expression — I can only call its grace notes.

    For instance:

    Wordplay : `shital an hetal. awesome. ur name is bad enuf, cant bleeive she hasn’t changed hers.’

    Bizzare but perceptive sociological analysis: ...bcuz he was all dpressed n shit since he dint have a son "hmmm...i like kapil…oh snap…i had a useless girl…oh well, kapila…’

    Riff on teen cluelessness :` “JayaPrada91989”? How getto is THAT?’

    Catching the Zeitgeist : `omg. OMG. O>M>F>G. that is SO satc when big surprised carrie in frisco!’

    and… for the absolutely, totally Ineffably surreal touch : `nooo…I cant…soooo meen‘

    Honestly; how many of us would be able to attempt this style, and strike that many grace notes??? Am yet again impressed by SM’s, and A N N A’s, eagerness to try something new.

46. From the story which our Anonymous Tipster originally sent in, which inspired this post:

    You may remember him fondly as Kumar, the hungry stoner from Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle,* and you’ve likely seen him pop up on this season’s 24, as “villainous” teen, Ahmed Ahmar. In fact, Penn, currently starring in Mira Nair’s The Namesake, is even slated to teach a course at UPenn (haha, no relation!) next year.

    But none of that has stopped him from doing what he does best: making bizarre cameo appearances at the New York Public Library, and managing to simultaneously ruin both The Namesake and “Catcher In The Rye.”

    Reports our Jossip spy:

    [Kal Penn] actually crashed an event I went to at NYPL for The Namesake. It was just supposed to be just Jhumpa Lahiri and Mira Nair talking about the process of making the book into a film. He quietly took the microphone to ask a question during the Q & A and then was like “Surprise! I’m Kal Penn!”

    But wait, that’s not all. Nono, that’s not all.

    Then, of course, Mira Nair told him to come up to the stage, where he awkwardly sat in silence for about thirty minutes, because no one wanted to ask him any questions. Then finally, someone took pity and said, “I guess I should ask Kal Penn a question. Umm… how did your own experiences as an Indian American affect your portrayal of Gogol?” He then proceeded to go on a weird, incoherent rant, the gist of it being that the character’s being Indian didn’t matter (if you read the book, or see the movie…you’ll know that it is actually extremely important and the source of everything dramatic that happens) and that the main character of The Namesake bore more of a resemblance to Holden Caulfield than to himself.

    And just how did the author of “The Namesake” take the analogy?

    The look on Jhumpa Lahiri’s face when he compared her book to “Catcher in the Rye” was quite delightful. I thought she might vomit on him onstage.

    ‘Amazing,’ we thought. And then, as we were searching the deep recesses of our minds for a clever closing line, we suddenly realized our source had already done our work for us:

    In conclusion, I would not pay $150,000 of Penn tuition to attend his class.

47. Were these postings purposely intended to target the ineptitude of current day gujarati youngsters? I was quite taken aback while reading both of these postings because of the constant negative “patel/gujju” theme, and it seemed to be less of a general commentary on “desi kids these days” and more specifically pointing out the lack of written articulation (extrapolitated into the lack of sensibility) of the “gujarati community’s future.”

48. it seemed to be less of a general commentary on “desi kids these days” and more specifically pointing out the lack of written articulation (extrapolitated into the lack of sensibility) of the “gujarati community’s future.”

    By jove, you’re right! I suppose Punjabis should be offended too, since the other fictional teen is Punjabi! And those of us who went to Brown and Columbia should be EXTRA offended.

    People. It’s filed under humor. Stop seeing evil where there isn’t any.

49. Were these postings purposely intended to target the ineptitude of current day gujarati youngsters?

    Funny, when I read the original post, my knee-jerk reaction was, “oh come on why they gotta be Gujarati?!” But hey, it’s a Kal Penn themed post so Gujarati IMers just fit the theme better…

50. I don’t think so much of myself or my writing that I feel above responding as I did in #22…not that those writers who are strong enough to resist such futile impulses are in any way arrogant or bad or inferior. Not sure if any of that makes sense.

    Well, I think it’s okay to respond to people who are fair in their criticism. But not to those who just say “You’re not funny!” or are clueless.