Yeah, that’s my desk. Yes, it’s a calm, peaceful, academically inspiring little cranny in the corner of my room. Yes, that is John Mayer blazing out of my speakers; a feeble attempt at self defence. I cower behind the lens, trying to drown out the sonic pain.

Evolution has its eccentricities; did you ever realise that it’s a different breed of virus that infects you every time you’re down with cold? Not unlike the fashionable virii mucusi, terrorism too seems to be in tune with the trends, the rate of change following a frightening inverse relation to that of Akash Gupta’s bathing frequency.

I wonder how behind the times Bush and Co. were when looking for WMD’s, expecting to see an arsenal of AK47’s and hand grenades to lick the rust off of, while technology subtly snuck in WSMDUT’s right into our campus. How blind do you have to be to ignore someone sneaking in a guided missile in the front pouch of their laptop bag? As it turns out, even the most discerning eye would give it a miss, when the missile is the Acoustic Base and Bullet combination; 5.1 surround speakers and Telugu music, as rumour has it. WSMDUT’s: Weapon’s of Selective Mass Destruction and Unbearable Torture.

Symptoms of this acoustic bombardment follow a similar pattern to that faced by the indirect victims of the Hiroshima catastrophe; subtle, chronic, and utterly incurable. Effects have been reported to range from temporary dementia to high fever, and in some cases, fitful bouts of pelvic thrusts accompanied by shreaks of “Yelluru yelluru lanja”; or whatever.

I suggest we evolve too. Move on from assigning Arabic names to every fictitious terrorist organisation that springs out of our imagination. Take a break from digging in the bunkers for those soiled machine guns. Let’s pay a little more attention to the decibels.