Dunkey...

...is what our English teacher would call us when he thought one of us had failed to live up to his lofty ideal of a good student. On other occasions, depending entirely on the severity of our crimes, we were either asked if we thought we were "lards" (lords) or gleefully informed that we were "maunkeys", fit only to swing from trees, like our betailed and, often, red-assed, cousins. But, thanks to thick skins, steely determination and very short attention spans, the sundry corrective measures that he, and others like him, employed to rein us in usually passed us by. But, it seems that the spectre of dunkey-ness is back to haunt me. Because that's pretty much how I'm feeling these days...like the sorry beast of our burden. Overworked, underfed, sleepless and unpaid.

This was supposed to be my time off from work, to relax and do nothing for a while, before we get down to business. These ten days were meant to catch up with some friends, put my room and all the lousy papers in it in some order, water my plants in peace, make some of my (Chinese) orange marmalade, burn some music CDs, watch a film...But then you know what they say...the best laid plans of dunkeys ad maunkeys oft go awry.

We had barely finished with our script last week when I suddenly got saddled with this massive and impossible task. Not only has it robbed me of all my free time here in Delhi, it's threatening to take up all the free time in Bombay as well...but, trouble is, there's not going to be any free time in Bombay! Because, now that we're barely one week away from our shoot, I doubt I'll be able to devote any time to this boring, godforsaken assignment. I really don't know how I'm going to finish this job or what I'm going to tell them if I can't finish it. Truth be told, I have this very strong urge to turn it in and apologise profusely for not being able to see it through. Because, as this Sidhuism goes, a man who runs away from a fight, lives to fight another day.

(Hmm...now that I'm beginning to refer to that raving lunatic's pearls of wisdom, I think I need to get some help!)

Seriously, I suppose I deserve what I'm getting for not having refused the job. But, like someone I knew used to tell me, my problem is that, sometimes, I just can't say no. To be fair to myself though, I think I had made my reluctance quite clear, and even added a few difficult clauses, but, sadly, the man refused to take no for an answer. So, here I am, toiling away, robbed of even the simple pleasure of celebrating another trip to Bombay, which starts...today! And, where Bombay begins, Cribbing ends :-)

I'm leaving in a few hours and, somehow, this silly assignment is going to have to work itself out...because I don't think I can. But, there's no getting away from it, is there? With the amount of work we're going to have to do in the coming days, either way, I think I'm going to live up to the faith that the good Mr. S. reposed in me many years ago and do a dunkey-load of work :-)