Monday, September 21, 2009

I'm Buzzed. Notes on Electrocution.

Electrocution or Beheading? My vote goes to beheading, and I'll tell you why...

It was 4 AM-ish on one of the last days of Ramadan. Groggy-eyed, foggy-headed, I was heading downstairs for Sehri when I noticed my overnight downloads were complete and decided to turn off the computer. Shutdown accomplished, I reached out in the dark to turn off the main switch and.... ZARKING PHOTONS!!!!! Five horrible seconds of unbelievable agony and whatnot as the open wire (shitbums!) caught my finger and something went "Bzzzzzz" inside my brain for what seemed like forever. My finger was the unfortunate victim and, in tandem with my arm, was in pain for the whole day.

Have you ever been personally involved in an electrifying experience? It is not pleasant, let me assure you.
It begins as a teeny-tiny vibrating tug and suddenly WHAM! Try as you might, you cannot pull yourself away from the source of electricity. And none of that nonsense life-flashing-before-your-eyes stuff happens. It's all expletives and terror and pain, pain, pain. And "How the hell do I get away from this?"
Had it not been for That Special Someone up there who yanked me off the electric tug in time, I would have been late for Sehri and my parents would have been assailed with the unpleasant odour of Barbecue a la Saab. That would have definitely ruined Eid for them.
Anyway.
A moment's silence for my poor finger which was treated most abominably, and bears burn marks even today, days after the incident..... Ever so often I wake up at night sweating profusely and reliving the horror of those moments when I nigh lost my life. (That last part is made up, hyperbole and exaggeration. I just get occasional twinges of reminders from said finger. Ouch.)

Eeeks. Here is grainy shot of my Giver of Pain. I had been meaning to attach a three-pin plug holder to the damn culprit for ages now and of course still not got around to it. Instead, in a classic case of irony it got around to me.

Now, here's the thing. If a little jolt for a mere five seconds can have this effect on me (and I am NOT one of those namby-pamby girls whose lower lip trembles if she so much as scrapes her knee. I can take a good beating and in fact have done so many times as a child...), what horrors for a person in an electric chair, at the receiving end of far stronger wallops of wattage, having to suffer it till his brain is fried? It's all about extrapolation.

Ergo, when it comes to a more humane way of doing away with unwantable elements, I am all for beheading as instant and less painful.

(Please don't start with "CAPITAL PUNISHMENT IS WRONG". That's nonsense. I for one don't understand why sexual offenders and child molesters aren't done away with immediately. And in public. Bah!)

Thesis concludes.

(Personal painful experience and a little imagination goes a long way.)

PS: Still haven't fixed plug.

13 comments:

Ram Sharaph said...

Silent prayers for your well being. Loud admonishments for being a bum. With you on rest of the thesis, will add stoning as well to the public bit.

Fahad said...

Been there. Done that. *flicks speck off left shoulder*

On the contrary it's quite fun. Pure adrenaline. Can't believe you thought it a 'horror' experience. How namby-pamby of you. haha.

PS: The 5 seconds time frame is surely an exaggeration. It's usually 1 to 2 seconds, which seems like a lifetime.

longblackveil said...

@Raman: Bum accusation is totally justified. I accept.

@Fahad: Freak! I knew it. I knew it. You're one of those kids that has a shower and then sticks his finger in a socket for kicks.
Erm. Okay, maybe it was 2-3 seconds. I couldn't extricate self for the longest time.

Manoj Govindan said...

"Electrocution or Beheading?"

Methinks this question would not have come up if you had either read Stephen King's The Green Mile or watched the movie adaptation of the same.

I have had my share of electrifying moments. In my case though my body would almost instantaneously pull away. The pain when it came was from banging my head and/or elbow against something solid rather than from the electric current.

That said, I find that picture of the uncovered plug positively revolting (no pun intended). Three semesters of Electrical Engineering lab with the most safety paranoid teacher ever does that to you. IMHO whoever installed it and all high school or higher educated persons who saw it and ignored it should be sentenced to a week without electricity (please, don't start with cruel and unusual punishment).

PS: You should still watch the movie and/or read the book even though the question has been resolved.

Babur said...

umm...serves you right. shouldnt you be writing your paper instead of blog posts?

sai said...

I know exactly how ud feel., cause i experienced the same once, me trying it with wet hands, even dumb... u feel u nerves twisting from tip of ur finger to ur brain... horrid..

Lord Akoroth said...

ermm... I see the point of having a 'humane' way of killing them. I dont think their victims were allowed the choice of a 'humane' end. So fry em is what I think.

in other news GOOD GOD GET THAT PLUG FIXED YOU FREAK!!!!

sorry about your hand though...

Neha said...

Humane way of kiiling these a@#holes? At the end, they will die, either by beheading them or electrucution, or hanging them to death!! Why show any mercy towards them??

longblackveil said...

Oh, shit. Yes, am tending to agree with General and N. Electrocution as per faulty Green Mile standards is better.
What was I thinking?

Manoj Govindan said...

Looks like most people here have strongly held opinions about capital punishment. I'd like to add my 2 cents.

To begin with I don't think that capital punishment is punishment at all. Whether you believe in life after death or not, death is far more easier an option than spending say the rest of your life behind bars dwelling on what you did.

Next, regarding mode of punishment. I think that punishment should be about handing out justice, not making ourselves feel good. I do get my fair share of vengeful pleasure when I think of rapists being tortured or castrated. But in my case the emotion is short lived; when sanity prevails I see how handing out torturous punishment merely degrades the society which does it. I believe that human society grows or dies in accordance with its actions. If we cannot be just to our criminals, soon we'll find ourselves becoming incapable of being just to our helpless and disadvantaged.

Of course these are all strictly *my* humble opinions. Feel free to disagree.

Apoorv Gawde said...

Aayo jesht miss aa?

But tell me, did you get the new hairstyle like they promise in the oft repeated commercial?

If yes, please upload picture of the same.

Also as far as Capital Punishment is concerned, apparently the person at the receiving end of the beheading, used to bribe the executioner, so that they would bring a sharpened axe to work that day.

Punishment by Electrocuting someone in B'lore may mean certain areas get extended hours of load-shedding, so I think that's a no-no

Anonymous said...

evolution at work, thanks for watching

longblackveil said...

:) This is true.