Lessons learnt: Home alone

I have been home alone for almost 4 and a half months now. The day after tommorow, my parents return. During these 4 and a half months, I enjoyed full freedom in whatever I did. I could sleep, wake up at anytime I wanted (Not quite, of course, I had to go to office so freedom on long sleeping hours could be exercised only on weekends !!). I could go out for a snack, go out and eat ice creams and pastries whenever I wanted to, and could cook at home whenever I had a 'chef's whim'. To sum it all, I enjoyed my days as a totally free bird. I am looking forward to meeting my parents too, of course. But, I'll be fair enough to everyone and say this......These 4 and a half months, have been one of those 'memorable times' in life. A perfect stretch of time for being alone. Just enough so that you enjoy and not long drawn so that you dont get bored and lonely. A few of the things which I learnt while I was alone were:
1) Dont put the milk on the gas and go for a shit. Its never certain which completes first, the milk coming to a boil and rising or you completing your download and rising. However if the former event occurs first, you'll have another mess to clean up !!!

2) If a maid servant comes to do work at home, adjust your schedule as per her timings. It is most likely that she comes at the most inconvenient of times. My maid servant always came 15 minutes before I left for office. On top of it, she used to ask me everyday, "You are leaving early today, is it?". This made me retort, "I am not leaving early, you have come late."

3) You are most likely to miss the most important couriers. If you do miss one, hurry down to the courier company and collect the package, otherwise, they'll send it back to the orginating company !!

4) Make sure you dont get friendly with your boss and tell him about being home alone and doing all the housework. If you tell him that, expecting him to go easy on you, forget it !! He's not supposed to go easy on you. If anything he'll bring the roof down on you and derive a sadistic pleasure !!

5) Always remember to keep an extra set of keys outside the house. (Most of us do this even otherwise !!) The fact is, if you are alone at home, you are more likely to forget the keys home. No point in going for a night time walk in shorts and then discovering, outside the door of your house, that the keys are not in your pockets. You wont get a keymaker at night and you cant sleep out in the cold monsoons in just shorts.

6) Always sleep with a thick wooden stick at your bedside. If a burglar comes in and does not carry a gun, you could get him first. If its a false alarm and you are just dreaming of the house being robbed, not a problem.....even if you swing that stick subconciously, no one would get hurt because there is no one else in the house !!!

7) Make sure you set the alarm for the correct time. I once set the alarm for 0700 hours on a weekend !! (Hope you understand my frustration when I woke up !!)

8) Dont watch hindi horror movies at night when alone. I did so and could'nt sleep .............thats coz I was laughing the whole night.

9) Be ready to make some statements like "I am feeling very lonely" and "I am suffering a lot, I dont get good home made food." on the telephone, even if you are perfectly fine and enjoying a lot . Thats coz, people normally expect to hear all this, and if you tell them rubbish like "I am enjoying.", they dont think its normal. They'll think that you are taking undue advantage of your freedom and doing "bad things" in the house !!!!