After reading Blink I began to connect the dots. Ten minutes later I was proud of a giraffe.

[Advertising & Jobs]

I had been sitting at my corner desk, brandished with a self-imposed designation OCD (Oddly Creative Director) on the pin-up board, surfing in a paradoxical wave of ideas.

*Or daydreaming porn in other words. Funny how my boss would call me in on it every-freakin-time.*

As a copywriter, working in an advertising, I was given the challenge of coming up with erotic content for a condom brand.

[Yippee! Followed by a victory dance, is what happened in my head earlier during the week, when this assignment was handed over to me.]

The kinky-led-porn-education-lasting-three-whole-days that followed only gave me a handful of jerky conclusions. I realised I hadn’t been inspired, nor had I been transported into an elevated state where the mind can seamlessly forge kick-ass words to form beautiful lines.

With only an hour left to the deadline my boss stepped up to my desk, scanned the lines I had been chasing in hope of brilliance to strike any-moment-now and in the blink of an eye connected line four to nine to three to eleven (scrapping away residue), making one giant mental note as if being spiritually taken.

Three and a half seconds later, he was out smoking in the hallway because he’d put together the most stimulating copy before our eyes like a magician seconds before.

[While others, used to such displays of genius, labelled it experience, I was convinced that my boss was secretly Superman.]

Only after reading Blink many years later did I realise my boss was the perfect example of instinctive thinking. He would, like a snooty designer, decide if something would work or not in seconds of sight.

Even Steve Jobs took snap decisions throughout his career and followed a similar school of thought. From discovering a mouse at XEROX to introducing the iPod, Jobs defied experts and consumer focus groups. He was known to walk into a room and have his team work on something because he knew what experts with tons of data could never imagine.

“Consumers cannot tell you what they need,” – Steve Jobs.

Malcolm has outlined this with a beautiful Pepsi & Coke challenge. Its the perfect example of market research experts funnelling millions of dollars into an orgy of ambiguous pursuits.

A sweeter drink will always pass the taste test and Coke never realised their victory was at the bottom of the can. (Read the book to know more.)

Often graphic designers or advertising-folk fight with clients over ideas because their gardener (apparently better perspective) or two-year-old, suckling on a nipple (sarcasm intended) have better foresight of their business. In other words, if you were to ask an architect to write you a prescription for migraines, you better be prepared to deal with a whole new set of problems.

[Women & Clients]

If you were to ask a girl what kind of a man she’s looking for and then have her meet ten different men, you’d be surprised she’d pick the one far off the list. Hey! There’s research to prove it. Said Malcolm himself.

I personally enjoyed this chapter for the obvious reasons but also because Neil Strauss (The Game) from the pickup-artist world had a similar theory on the subject.

[Book review on The Game also coming soon. BTW. In a matter-of-fact tone.]

How do you impress a hot girl at the bar or a boss in an elevator in less than 30 seconds? By effectively understanding how people thin-slice you can overcome this anxiety of pitch. In both scenarios you’re trying to sell yourself.

And I think Guy Kawasaki had the best solution to the new client/boss problem (not mentioned in the book). If you’re going to pitch to a client with only 30 seconds (assume time taken in elevator to travel from ground floor to the 2nd floor) then you better focus on selling the idea of what it is you do.

[Jobs inspired people in the same time in an elevator.]

Neil Strauss teaches you to frame and prime girls with anecdotes, memorised lines and some practiced bar tricks. In short, 30 seconds and you blow the girls mind. BANG! You’ve scored “A” on first impression as the most interesting man (like, ever).

Simply put, women have no idea what they’re chasing (like consumers who’ve got no clue of what they want). And because we thin-slice (make snap judgements) based on stereotypical prejudices you can be rest-assured this affects us all.

[Conclusion]

Blink is nothing short of genius. The book illustrates with various thought-evoking examples of how instinctive-thinking or snap decisions can do extremely well or go horribly wrong if born from a naive and unexperienced expert.

The heady hours of NYE were spent sorting my room and packing for a trip to Australia. A rendezvous comprising of bikini-nude women, sand, sun and sea was all that I needed to get through the night. I clocked an hour of sleep, had a quick bite and boarded a bus to Delhi.

// The bus departs.

Call it lack of sleep or the morning rush of blood between a sober pendulum set, my gears were switched into a code of fantasy meet erotica. Memories of a hot ex and her best friend cross-wired resulting in an hot boner-inducing pornographic-breathing storyline.

I was no longer sitting next to a snoring man in a bus or at-least my imagination had me thinking otherwise.

This is what I saw or can gather from that morning.

// Two girls. One bus.

The first one is a chiseled face, long black hair, slender body (post years of Olympic training), draws the smile of a slutty goddess and eyes of a virgin angel (which leaves me pondering over the illicit bedroom memoirs of an angel). She opens a boner in your underpants like a water hose waiting to burst at site in flames.

*Sirens goes off. Mmmm… She wears black slacks, a tiny little skirt, covering only the essentials and strides the earth like a princess.

The other one.

She exudes an Arabic princess, does a fondle-me-tickle in the panty (don’t know what that means either). Make a flint of eye contact and you’re in for a pendulum shiver.

With her you need to speak in an intellectual orgy. Pull that off successfully and you’ve got yourself a very intrigued tigress. Rrrr… you’ll want to have her in the stairs from behind (with partial clothing withdrawn). If not, she’ll remain in a state of Catholic-nun.

// The bus reaches midway, halting at a restaurant by the lake. I step off to get some air and focus on the real world. Unable to do so, anticipate the next chapter of this slutty storyline.

*BTW. Slutty storyline clearly defines the true sentiments of this peace. Swallow the criticism, dear reader, if any.

// The bus is back on the road.

I am back in the perverse backwaters of slutty-in-bed-only-otherwise-virgin women. There they are, in a surreal foreign land, roaming about hand in hand, quietly flirting, giggling and spending their day in a state of infatuation.

// Scene.

The two sit across the table (lit by a candle for effect) by the sea, unknowingly fishing in their bowl of soup when one becomes conscious of the other’s indisputable beauty. The friendly glances turn into a sensual gaze lasting many minutes. The soup is cold hovering only deep breathes and greedy flies.

*A reason for them to call for the bill and walk back towards the hotel.

The fire. Kindled. A romantic ballet ensues.

In the next scene, the two are lying side by side on a bed dressed in white linen. The penthouse-like suite opens to the sea through it’s archaic windows and a beautifully grapevine-decorated marbled balcony.

The sound of the sea is followed by a gentle breeze. The sweet tickles are a marriage of strokes on the extremely-short-skirt-exposed legs of these two, now aware of their breathing, ladies.

It reminds me of the scenes from National Geographic when a predator is waiting patiently behind the bushes for the perfect moment, ready to attack it’s prey, catching it off-guard. Or the mood in this room can described as a buffet of muscles contracting and squeezing together in sexual-tension.

Minutes later, the two begin by kissing each other gently, caressing and licking each other like kittens dirty from a pool of milk. Every inch is salivated and restored with the vibrating intensity of a washing machine.

The bare minimum skirts have been pulled upwards, exposing each other. They’re tongue-deep into the moist and warm bodies (holding each other’s head tightly between their thighs, taking control over their maddening desires).

One requests the other to pry her moist finger into the backdoor, only gently at first but with squirms turning to moans, she quickly changes the pace. The sweaty bodies rub and grind for an hour before they both cum to one of the most satisfying conclusions.

The two gorgeous bodies lay nude side by side, pleased with their little discovery…

// The bus reaches the airport. More later. I’ve got a long flight…