Sometimes life tries to play nasty little games with you.

Life, it seems, gets a kick outta s***ting with u. Gets a huge high from messing about your life. Practically squeals with glee each time it one-ups you. Yes, Life (whosoever he may be, damn him) has a sick sense of humour.

Take this for an example.

You need to top-up your phone. No, you desperately need to top-up your phone. You were unable to do so earlier because the mamak-shop behind your house has decided to go Maxis and stop selling Digi-prepaid. But you are still calm. You board the LRT to your destination.

So.

You arrive at the LRT station; you are confident that you will be able to re-activate your life-line, err, I mean, phone line, soon. After all, LRT stations are often equipped with little handymarts and news-stands. Easy.

Then.

You go to the news-stand, and you say "Digi, spuluh. (One must never say se-pu-luh. That's un-Malaysian. Must say spu-loh.)" The cashier-girl nods in your general direction, she pokes at the machine thingy and it beep and boops. You hand her the ten, but she holds up her palms, "wait", she indicates. So you wait.

And you wait.

And then, after you waited, you wait somemore. You suspect something (the machine thingy) is spoilt.

Hmmm.

After what seems like a thousand years, she speaks to the store manager/senior cashier and asks him what the heck is freakin' wrong with the freakin' machine. You too, want to ask what is freakin' wrong with the freakin' machine. (Only, in your head, you are not quite so polite)

They confer in low voices, poking the machine as it boops and beeps.

Then, after 5 minutes, she looks at you and says, "Finished."

Her expression is completely unapologetic. In fact, she looks rather amused.

You say, "Whhhhaaatt??" and she repeats, "Finished."

You are baffled. How can credit be finished?

What, did Di-freakin'-Gi run outta money? Did the Yellow Man demand a pay rise? What, yellow not doing it for him anymore so he quits and DiGi collapses and bankrupts?

You are resigned. But hey, you think, DiGi has that talktime advance thingy, right? You are hesitant to use it because you were unable to use it before due to the fact they only allow it for subscribers of above six months. But you try, because frankly, you are desperate.

So you type out *128#, and press 'call'. Then you press '4', then you press '1', and then....

Oh joy, it is successful!

You press 1 to confirm and then.....

'This transaction is available only for those with RM 0.01 to RM 2.00 balance.'

You are incensed.

Whhhhaaaatttt???

So you check you balance, wondering how come you have so much credit left and then...

Your balance: RM 2.05

My friends, Life, indeed, is a sick, sick thing.

Saddened and disappointed with your string of ironies, you trudge towards the pay-phones and, *sob*..... you reached the point of no return.

You actually USE the payphone.

The horror. The shame. The agony. The dirty handles and mouthpieces. The stupid coins you have to put inside.

So you return home, tired and disappointed. (Both by life and by dashed expectations of something much-anticipated.)

And you type this out to illustrate to the world that yes, Life is a funny little man with a twisted sense of humour.

Goodbye, all.