A few years after I was born, my Dad met a stranger who was new to our small town. From the beginning, Dad was fascinated with this enchanting newcomer and soon invited him to live with our family. The stranger was quickly accepted and was around from then on.
As I grew up, I never questioned his place in my family. In… my young mind, he had a special niche.
My parents were complementary instructors: Mom taught me good from evil, and Dad taught me to obey.
But the stranger… he was our storyteller. He would keep us spellbound for hours on end with adventures, mysteries and comedies.
If I wanted to know anything about politics, history or science, he always knew the answers about the past, understood the present and even seemed able to predict the future! He took my family to the first major league ball game. He made me laugh, and he made me cry. The stranger never stopped talking, but Dad didn’t seem to mind.
Sometimes, Mum would get up quietly while the rest of us were shushing each other to listen to what he had to say, and she would go to the kitchen for peace and quiet. (I wonder now if she ever prayed for the stranger to leave.)
Dad ruled our household with certain moral convictions, but the stranger never felt obligated to honor them.
Profanity, for example, was not allowed in our home – not from us, our friends or any visitors. Our longtime visitor, however, got away with four-letter words that burned my ears and made my dad squirm and my mother blush.
My Dad didn’t permit the liberal use of alcohol but the stranger encouraged us to try it on a regular basis. He made cigarettes look cool, cigars manly, and pipes distinguished.
He talked freely (much too freely!) about sex. His comments were sometimes blatant, sometimes suggestive, and generally embarrassing.
I now know that my early concepts about relationships were influenced strongly by the stranger. Time after time, he opposed the values of my parents, yet he was seldom rebuked
… And NEVER asked to leave.
More than fifty years have passed since the stranger moved in with our family. He has blended right in and is not nearly as fascinating as he was at first. Still, if you could walk into my parents’ home today, you would still find him sitting over in his corner, waiting for someone to listen to him talk and watch him draw his pictures.
His name?
We just call him ‘TV.’
He has a wife now….we call her ‘Computer.’
Their first child is “Cell Phone”.
Second child “I Pod”
And just born recently was a grandchild called “IPAD”

Ys
Dhirasanta Das Goswami

Personal note:

Dear Dhirasanta Maharaja,

Please accept my humble obeisances and my humble congratulations for this acerbic article on modern life, even though personally, I would rather give the computer a very positive rating in Krishna consciousness. All glories to Srila Prabhupada!

I also need to thank you very much for the good, uncontrollable laugh your article provoked.

Additionally, I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate dandavats.com for showing some bite, as this article was originally published by and is still available on dandavats.com

Moreover, I found another funny idea and sentence on dandavats.com as follows:

Why don’t Hindu gods have as vehicles non-Indian animals such as kangaroos (audio)
By Chaitanya Charan das.

I live in the kangaroo country, Australia, and have had ample time to observe them. I would say kangaroos are not at all smart animals. Birds, for example, are smarter than kangaroos.  The crow is a much more cool-headed animal than the kangaroo. That could constitute one of the reasons, if not the main reason, why Hindu gods dislike kangaroos as mode of transport. On the positive side we may say that kangaroos are extremely tolerant of heavy rain, as they will not try to take shelter, even if the opportunity for rain protection is right in their front. Snakes will seek to take shelter. But again is that really intelligent behaviour? They also get crushed to death, one by one,  by moving vehicles by the hundreds if not thousands, often due to their stupid behaviour on roads.  They also reproduce profusely. If my memory is correct, Srila Prabhupada indicates that high reproduction means low class. ( Contribution on this point are welcome.) And they definitely use their tail as a fifth leg. Some rarer and tall individuals are to be feared for their attacks on humans.

On the whole, I may say that I spend some very joyous moments this morning on Dandavats.com and got into a excellent mood to start my Sankirtan book distribution day and other items of Krishna conscious business.

Thank you very much and

Hare Krishna