Progress with technology, as expected, shall be dogged by misuse and overuse. There have been a lot of examples for this. Here is an incident that happened recently within the new community of “hospice girls” that illustrates the point.

Experienced and retired nurses usually float these trusts or organisations. A front desk with a telephone and a spare room with a bathroom, is sufficient to set up shop. Willing youngsters are trained for a couple of weeks in elementary nursing techniques and then kept on rolls for employment.

Families that require a 24 X 7 person to look after its aged, infirm and bedridden members, approach the trust and are bestowed with a person by the organisation. For a fixed salary that is collected by the boss herself every month, the nurse is allowed to be a full time boarder. Between two jobs she can stay with the boss. These girls maintain a neat network in spite of being stationed all over town, all on the cell phone. Their day off or time off is exquisitely planned and executed. Local gossip, news and personal updates are  sms’d regularly.

The heroine of this anecdote is a fulltime nurse staying at my friends place looking after her mother. Having received a so called authentic cell phone number of a movie star from another hospice nurse she set off on doing new things in life: call several times a day, send messages, experience euphoric trance like states periodically and write poems! The man who took her calls kept the passion alive with interesting twists and turns in his conversation and elicited whatever he wanted to listen from a young nymph.

One evening, during a talk show on the television, the movies star warned his fans of the 'impersonation' being carried out by energetic young men and that he had nothing to do with such people. This broke our nurse’s little heart and she had to mend it herself.

The beneficiary was no doubt the cell phone provider, yet, Kannada literature also got richer. For, her poems, I believe are worth publishing. Or perhaps the real movie star could include them as songs for his next film. That could perhaps be an adequate compensation for the disappointed lady.?