Remembering a weekend at Pines

I shouted, pass the ball, here, here. In came the pass, I was right below the basket and all I had to do was jump. And swoosh.
Chamath complained laughingly.. He was fast but not tall enough to guard me and I had done well enough to create a toe-crushing fear (literally), if they get too close. I was this tall clumsy guy always hanging out near the basket. I could irritate even the usually quiet guy in the group with some rough play.
We won yet another game and headed back to the apartment. We showered and it was time for some dinner. Chaat house? California Pizza? the usual list was tossed around and one of them got selected. Randomly.
After dinner, we used to bid farewell to those friends who would head out to SFO for nocturnal activities and the rest of us would go back to the apartment, watched TV and joked and laughed at Suresh’s subtle humor, played cards or in-room cricket. One pitch catch was out. Supi troubled us with his flippers. Suresh was the aggressive one. He didn’t care if my TV broke as long as he was not out. Rama would always get out to a surprise full-toss. Dumb Charades or Pictionary used to be clean fun till late into the night. Rama used to be the most fun with his pictures and his incessant pointing to the same unidentifiable picture that he drew in first 10 seconds of the minute. Was it bird or was it a bottle? We would find out that it was an elephant. We would fall asleep eventually, to wake up late on Sunday morning.
After 11 am, all of us headed out for coffee. A short Mocha for me, a short latte for Rama and regular black coffee for the dude wearing sun-glasses. Suresh was always the dude among us. The black coffee eventually gave the dude, acute acidity. We hung out at Starbucks for an hour or so, reading the news paper left behind by others (occasionally buying one), looking at white girls and salivating at brand new cars parked around there.
We would get groceries and cook, eat, and sleep without even realizing another delightful weekend had come to an end.
Eventually Supi got tired of the routine and got married and would not join us for coffee. Luckily for us, though, the spouse turned out to be as much fun as Supi was, after the initial dislike for some of us! )
Long weekends had to be travel weekends, even if it was the same place that we had visited several times.
I came back to my current world when my little one, shouted with glee. Pointing at the sky, she said “Appa, Birdie”. I said “Yes, Birdie”.