My ChaTTerBoX

Some of Barney's most Awesome and wait for it....Legendary Moments..

2010-08-12T02:08:00.000-07:00

1. Three Day Rule
The Three day rule explains why we should wait 3 days before calling a woman.

Jesus started the whole wait three days thing. He waited three days to come back to life. It was Perfect.
If he had waited only one day a lot of people wouldn't have even heard that he died. They would be all "Hey Jesus....Whaddupp??"
Jesus would be probably like "Whaddupp?? I died yesterday!!!!"
Then people would be all..."Err..you look pretty alive to me dude !!"
And then Jesus would have to explain how he was resurrected and how it was a miracle and then the dude would be like... "Okkk!!!....whatever you say bro!"
And Jesus is not gonna come back on a Saturday. Everybody is busy doing chores, working the loom, trimming their beards.
No. He waited the exact right number of days....Three!!
Plus its Sunday and so everybody is in the church already. They are all in there..."Ohh Noo...Jesus is dead"
Then BAMMM!!!... He bursts through the back door, runs up the aisle....
Everyone's totally pysched and FYI , thats when he invented the High Five!!!

Three Days! We wait three days to call a woman because thats how long Jesus wants us to wait...

True Story.

2. The sexless Innkeeper
T'was the night before new year's,
And the weather grew mean.
It was 3:00 in the morning, And I was stranded in Queens.
The tavern grew empty, The gas lights grew dim.
The horse-drawn carriages were all but snowed in
Last call was approaching, And my fortunes looked bleak.
Then I turned to my left And stifled a shriek.
She had a peach fuzz beard And weighed 16 stone.
She gobbled up hot wings And swallowed the bones.
I muffled a scream And threw up in my mouth.
I asked, "where do you live?" And she said, "one block south."
I swallowed my pride And six shots of whiskey.
And prayed to the gods That she wasn't too frisky.
Back in her cave, she prepared us a snack.
'neath her mighty hooves, the floorboards did crack.
But when she returned, She found a sound sleeper.
And thus she became The sexless innkeeper.


3. It's gonna be legend-... wait for it... and I hope you're not lactose intolerant because the second half of that word is DAIRY!”

4. God, it's me, Barney. Whadup? I know we don't talk much, but I know a lot of girls call out your name because of me.

5. When I get sad, I stop being sad, and be awesome instead... True story !


6.Ted: Do you have a cold?
  Barney: I'm fine. My nose is just overflowing with awesome and I had to get some of
       it out.

7. Three Rules of Cheating
There's three rules of cheating: It's not cheating if you're not the one who's married. It's not cheating if her name had two adjacent vowels, and it's not cheating if she's from a different area code.

8.Marshall: [after the stripper breaks her ankle] Now we'll have to spend my bachelor party in the hospital.
Barney: Then we'll see her X-rays. The ultimate stripping. X-rays? More like triple-X-rays.

9.Standard letter Barney uses with some of the women he sleeps with.
“Dear Resident,The time we spent together, however long it was, meant the world to me. I would love to see you again but unfortunately I cannot. You see… I am a ghost. I can only materialize once every decade on the anniversary of my death. I chose to spend my one day among the living with you, sweet resident. Perhaps we will meet again in another decade provided you keep your fitness. Until then, all my love from the beyond,
Barney”

10. The Cheerleader Effect
The Cheerleader Effect is a situation in which not so hot or awesome people who do not appear hot as individuals seem hot when in a group. This is very common among cheerleaders. Hence the name; cheerleader effect. The origins of the cheerleader can be dated back many years ago when the great Barnibus Stinson discovered the Bro code. Since then the cheerleader effect has evolved in different shapes and sizes. Among some very poplar examples of the cheerleader effect are; the Brazilian soccer team of the 1990's, the cheerleading team of Oklahoma. It was only in the late 1990's that some very few cases of the cheerleader effect in men were observed. Some common examples are the England football team and President Clinton's Cabinet. So the next time you see a bunch of hot looking women at a bar, take a good look at them one by one.

Am I the only one not getting it?

2010-08-05T23:18:00.001-07:00

A friend recently posted a status message supposedly by Abraham Lincoln (or Mark Twain according to some sites) which goes something like this

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.

At first glance I thought, yeah its been very well put. I left it at that. However being pretty much an emptyhead these days, today out of nowhere it struck me that there is something really wrong with this quote. It just doesn't feel right.

I feel the quote is a big paradox in itself in some context. We are to remain silent and be thought of as a fool. However even if we speak something people will still think we are a fool. So basically we are a bunch of fools and nothing else. Maybe this is the case if we don't look at its hidden meaning which I assume is

Only speak about something if you know about it.

Suppose this is the intended meaning but still it doesn't make any sense to me. If I am ignorant about a particular subject then am I just suppose to agree with someone else's opinion without doubting it even for a moment. Its no use forming an opinion because I cant discuss it and clear my doubts, And so even if someone's completely wrong, I should just take it blindly just because I am oblivious. But then this the not the way world works. Without a perspective we would've still lived in a world where Earth was the center of the universe because Aristotle believed so. We would still be living on DC current because Edison thought thats the only efficient transmission. Schools as of 1900s or maybe earlier would've cease to exist. People would've been dumb as ducks(no offense to them).

Lets take the other case too. Even though we are Experts at something, we remain quiet. Whats the point of knowing something and not letting it out. If the world would've agreed to this, earth would've been round for some and flat for others. But nobody would've dared to correct others cause they didn't want to come across as fools. And still people would've been dumb as ducks(the ducks are going to kill me, they must be thinking look at the audacity of this guy, cannot crack a quote and calls us dumb).

So what exactly is the quote trying to convey still remains beyond me. If Mark Twain is the father of this quote, then maybe it was meant to be satirical but people didn't understand the hidden irony underneath it. But why Abe Lincoln would say anything like this is quite mysterious. I don't think he was known to be a humorist.

I have been scratching my head over this for almost a day now and all I can conclude is its a big irony. What you folks think? Am I the only one not getting it or I am the only one who cracked it (or atleast that's what I think). According to the father of quote I should have remained quiet and be thought as a fool, but hell I would rather put myself in a fool's shoes and learn something.

The Messenger

2010-07-28T00:00:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you need something to pass some time and a true movie buff that I think I am loves to spend it watching whatever movie I can lay my hands on. This was one of those movies. Even though I had read rave reviews, I was, for some unknown reason, avoiding watching it for quite a while. I was surely missing out on a gem.

The Messenger tells the story of a Iraq war hero(Ben Foster) assigned duty of Casualty Notification Officer, under Captain Stone(Woody Harrelson) wherein if a soldier dies in conflict he's suppose to be the first one to inform his/her immediate family members. The story on the outside doesn't promise much, but when you see it being enacted on screen, you can actually feel the pain;Pain the CNO undergoes, while breaking the news but more importantly the pain a family undergoes upon hearing the news of loosing their dear ones in the war. The director captures these heart wrenching moments beautifully. It also involves a budding romance between Foster and Samantha Morton(widow of a fallen officer) and the dilemma both face.

The beautifully woven storyline is aptly supported by superlative performances from all the 3 lead actors. Specially Woody Harrelson with his portrayal of a mountain stone officer deserves special mention. He was rightfully nominated for an Oscar.

My sister-in-law thought it was pretty depressing, but then when was a war fought without such moments. A must watch in every sense.

A timeline of Recent Team Orders in F1

2010-07-26T17:15:00.000-07:00

Below is a list of Past team order incidents(courtesy BBC Sport) and all this time we thought it was F1 "Racing", its more of Manipulation rather than actual racing. Atleast to hide all this hypocrisy, they should tell the drivers in advance not to race their teammates or to let them pass without making it too obvious.

If all this continues, then F1 will sooner than later loose its status as the pinnacle sport for racing. Such team orders are seldom heard in Nascar, Indy500 or even in Formula 3. I really hope WMDC heavily fines Ferrari for its acts and to further discourage other teams to indulge in such tactics.

Jerez 1997: McLaren order David Coulthard to let Mika Hakkinen past to win

Australia 1998: McLaren order Coulthard to let Hakkinen past to win

Belgium 1998: Jordan order Ralf Schumacher not to race Damon Hill for the lead

Austria 2002: Ferrari order Rubens Barrichello to let Michael Schumacher past to win

Monaco 2007: McLaren order Lewis Hamilton not to challenge Fernando Alonso for the race win

Brazil 2007: Ferrari manipulate Felipe Massa's pit stop to put Kimi Raikkonen into the lead so he can win the world title

Germany 2008: Heikki Kovalainen lets McLaren team-mate Hamilton through so he can win the race following an error in team tactics

Singapore 2008: Renault order Nelson Piquet to crash to cause a safety car period that helps Alonso win

China 2008: Raikkonen hands Massa second place behind Hamilton so he is in a better championship position heading into the final race

A Tale of two Cricket crazy countries

2010-07-22T13:28:00.000-07:00

If you've been following the ongoing tests between India-Srilanka(I know its worse than watching a Ranji match, but what can we do,a friend in need's friend in deed, no one wants to play with them so we as good neighbors are always ready to help) and Australia-Pakistan, you will notice that, while Australia and Srilanka have more or less a pretty balanced line-up, India and Pakistan on the other hand have only one department working for them. Well Batting (a bit exaggeration) in case of India and for Pakistan their bowling has been clicking.

Lets take the case of India first. As all the cricket pundits like to put it, Batting has traditionally been India's stronghold, except when we are playing at home where conditions suit our spinners. This is true to a certain extent, they are right about playing in India part. Our bowlers do inspire us to wins. However once we leave India, its like they get struck by some kind of virus or something which prevents them even stopping the flow of runs let alone take wickets. Even in Srilanka for that matter. The pitches there are even more conducive to slow bowling, but still our spinners fail to make a mark. Consider this, in the just concluded test, our frontline spinners "failed" to take even a single wicket. Only Sehwag managed to take one. Harbhajan Singh, considered by many a world class bowler couldn't produce even a nick atleast to blame it on the fielders. He along with Ishan Sharma is one of the most over-rated bowlers in the world today. His current average per wicket stands at 31.28 with a strike rate of 66.4, which is too high for even the lowest of international standards. Murali's average is 22ish with strike rate of 55. So for every 10 wickets Bhajji concedes almost 100 runs more than Murali and also takes 20 overs more. 100 runs is a lot of deficit when you are playing good test sides. And yes he only takes 4 wickets per match vs. almost 7 for Murali. And we are talking about India's premier bowler here. Ishant and Zaheer fare much worse. With such kind of bowling attack, Dhoni should not even dreaming of winning outside India, let alone subcontinent. Its acutally a miracle that we have won test series agains New Zealand and England away. And no wonder we have failed to win a series in Australia, South Africa and Sri Lanka. It doesn't matter even if your top 4 average more than 50. We might score 600 on a really good day, but whose gonna take 20 wickets required for winning a match. Fun fact: For every match, number of wickets taken by Bhajji + Zaheer + Ishant equals 4.22 + 3.36 + 2.88 = 10.57. We are still short 9 wickets short. Even if the fourth bowler manages a generous 4 wickets, who will take the rest 5. Thats why we haven't won a series against the strongest test nations away from home that often or in some cases none at all. Ultimately the math beats us. The only reason we've won a paltry test against the big 3 because they had an off day at office. But I did forget to mention, we still are the number one Test playing nation in the world. Looks like we surely know how to work our way around the ranking system.

Now take Pakistan. They have been known thoroughout their short history to produce world class fast bowlers.They never have a dearth of talent at their disposal. Even India doesn't, afterall we are 1.2billion strong. But the difference is their talent lives upto its name. Imran,Wasim, Waqar, Shoaib and the current crop of Aamer,Asif and Gul. They even had a few good spin bowlers in between; Saqlain and Kaneria. All these bowlers have fired consistently. They've delivered when the team needed them to. Their records speak for themselves. Even in the ongoing test, their new bunch produces a marvellous display of fast bowling to bundle out Australia for 88. The last few years, their major concern has been Batting. Since the retirement of Inzamam, their middle order has lost its spine. Younis Khan and Mohd. Younus are more busy bickering rather than let their bats do the talk. This has taken its toll on Pakistan cricket. Their horror showing in Australia is a testimony to that. They get in new batsmen ever series, they make their retired folks come out of it(I lost my count of Afridi retirements ages ago), but it just never clicks for them. None of their current batters have an average anywhere near 50(which I feel is a fair parameter to judge a batsman's quality). Hell their top 4 don't even average 40 runs per game, which really is a shame. It is going to take them a fair amount to time to build a good bunch of batsmen, who can serve them for the long term. They do have a lot of time on their hand, cause Pakistani players never ever age. Afridi in any other country would've started his coaching/commenting stint by now. But in Pakistan, he's only 30. In few years I might grow older than him. But that's Pakistan Cricket for you; Always in Shambles and Never grows old.

An emerging Super Power or World's Poorest Country

2010-07-14T11:40:00.001-07:00

Recently a study was published by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative with UNDP support, which states that 8 Indian states have more poor people than 26 poorest countries. To quote numbers, the 8 states in question here have 421 million poor people versus 410 million in Africa. These numbers are staggering to say the least. This means that more than 30% population of India is poor. And this is counting just the 8 states. If we add up the remaining 20 states and 7 union territories, an rough estimate would put the number close to 600 million. Thats 50% of our population. Officially the Indian government puts it up somewhere around 26%. This is a huge difference. And I think I will side with the larger percentage here considering the fact that the government always tries to hide information.

The Government figures and the UNDP reports do have one major difference. While govt considers population to be poor if they earn less than $1.25/day, the UNDP also considers other factors apart from just your daily income. It also includes areas ranging from education to health outcomes to assets and services. I do feel this is a more useful criteria rather than the absolute income factor. The point here is not the way how these figures have come up, but rather its a shame for a country which claims itself (and many others support it) as an Emerging Superpower, has half of its population poor. How can we have the audacity to make such claims, when so many people don't have the means to support themselves and their families. None of the 36 (state/union territories/Central) governments have in the past or now for a matter have any schemes in place or any Yojanas so to speak to work towards bringing more and more people out of poverty. The government had launched some employment scheme a few years back, which entitled people to earn 100 rupees a day, but I doubt if it ever materialized. They claimed it to be a success, but the numbers tell an altogether different story. When we have 2900 crores for UID project, don't we have a few more crores to implement some work scheme for these people. I was hoping with the massive road development taking place throughout and so many infrastructure projects at some stage of implementation many people will find more means to earn their living, but sadly it doesn't look to be helping. I guess, the notoriously low wages are to blame here. I read few reports that even the workers, who are toiling day and night to get all the stadiums ready for the Commonwealth games are being paid the minimum or even lesser at times and are also subject to harsh working and living conditions. And to rub it in the face, all this work is being done by the Public Works Department of Delhi. Government Departments should be leading by example on fair wages and working conditions for laborers, but its doing the opposite here. Thankfully, GMR took much better care of people working on T3 at IGI. But organizations like those are few and far to find.

All these big and small examples prove just one thing. No government for the past 60 years gives a damn about the economically backward people in India. There is no exception to this. If something would have been done, the number of poor would not have remain the same(or increase, I am not sure). Just because we have 10-15 Metropolis corroborate that we have progressed. I feel we haven't stepped even a feet further than 1947. Rich have become more rich, while poor have become much more poor. I know its easy to blame the government or the system for everything and while it seems I am doing the same, I feel each one of us is equally to blame for this situation. Take for example the Press. They are suppose to be voice of the people the world over. But not in India. All they care about is Dhoni getting married(as if he is the only one ever to have achieved the feat) or Akshay-Ash being stranded in Manali. Seriously guys, thats all you care about? What about the other 1.9billion people who also happen to live here. Nobody tells their stories. Even if somebody does, the government either doesn't care or it plays it down. Even some political leaders, the so called Messiah's belong to the same league. Shivsena, every week comes up with some shit just to keep them in the limelight. They will stage protests, violent acts for all sorts of stupid things and justifying everyone its for the betterment of people. How is making people leave their job and sending them home, forcing Radio channels to play marathi songs helping anyone. Has sending a worker from Bihar home and making sure some marathi manoos gets a job helped? Not even a percent. What do you think happened to the Bihari's family. They are even more poor than they were before or in the worst case, they might be dead already. Is this the way a civilian society should act. I don't think so. Its worse than the ancient times. We are suppose to be more intelligent than those, but the f*cktards at Shivsena and other similar minded organizations think otherwise.

Another example is Mr. Rahul Gandhi. What the hell is the use of visiting and staying at some farmer's house for the night. Its not gonna help him eliminate his poverty. Instead of spending millions for such useless trips, he could've spend the money much more wisely by actually doing something for them. A million bucks can help build a school. But no it was used by Mr. Gandhi to visit 2 villages in UP. And people think that he cares for them. Maybe he does, but this is not the way to show it. Instead Do something for them.

Even we as educated people and the so called Future of India aren't further behind. We may not have the monetary power to do something directly for them, but the least we can do is for a change go out on election days and elect some good leaders(I feel out of 525 MPs atleast 52 care for the country and its people). We can join some NGO's. Some of them work towards educating the poor. This way, the children won't have to suffer as their parents. There are plenty of other things which can be done. All it takes is a will and a small amount of time.

I really hope, we awaken as a nation and try and do something about it. Otherwise 60 more years down the line, the condition will remain the same. We will still be living in our illusion of being a Super Power, but in reality We still will be The World's Poorest Country.

Dil Bole Bas Karo Yashappa

2010-07-13T07:42:00.000-07:00

Two days before, I happened to catch Dil Bole Hadippa, another crapper of a movie from the Yashraj Stable. I really am at an extreme loss of words to describe it. Don't understand why anyone will on one hand spend crores on such "big" starcast and 50 bucks or so in renting a Hollywood movie(read script), but then will hire the neighborhood Beautician to do the makeup hoping that audience will never notice that Veer and Veera are one and the same. One can be as hammered as one can really get and still be able to tell that its Miss Mukherjee only, that bad is the makeup. Hiding her breasts and making her wear a fake beard doesn't change the fact that she still squeaks, worse than a duck this time.

The story is pretty straightforward, a wannabe cricketer Rani "disguises" as a guy to make her way into some 3rd grade nobody really cares cricket team and play in the Aman cup(seriously dude, you pay your writers money for coming up with such cheesy names and btw when international cricket doesn't help in Aman a local league will really help?, are you freaking kidding me), while Shahid plays the NRI this time around. And surprisingly he doesn't have the word Defeat in his dictionary, don't know what kind of weird dictionaries they sell these days in London. So Shahid , an accomplished county cricketer returns to our beloved Punjab to rescue his Pop's(yashraj lingo) 9 time loosing team against the Pakis. So the movie focuses on how he builds his team, how he woos Rani and ends with the Aman Cup. I won't ruin the ending for you. You'll have to see the movie to see if he manages to break the loosing streak and if the romance survives the pressures of Aman Cup ;-)

There are as usual few side angles to the story. The yearning father(Anupam Kher) who wants his son to settle in India (so innovative huh), Miss Chandigarh. Sherlyn Chopra (she must;ve slept with the whole jury to win the title) trying to score with Shahid (First time in bollywood , pyaar ka tikdam) and some Nautanki owned by Rani's father (The company owned by him puts most of the Broadway companies here in New York to shame). And to accomplish the task of completely turning it into a B grade movie, it also has Rakhi Sawant playing you guessed it right, an Item Girl. I am still not able to understand why all of the so called Item Girls in Bollywood look so ugly(Koena Mitra, theMunnabhai Girl and others). The Dialgues don't help the movie either. They have just picked them from random movies and stitched them all together. Also the scene where Rani tries to speak English is more of an insult towards village folks rather than a comic situation. Who in India starts a conversation in English with a fellow traveling in a truck, specially some village fellow. Its beyond me. There are countless such mistakes throughout the movie. I can probably write a best seller recounting those.

Yashraj Films are still stuck in their 70s mindset. Just like Coca Cola have locked their recipe in some safe, so have Yashraj; Their guaranteed recipe of a Box Office Disaster. Their track record is phenomenal to say the least. Out of 30 odd movies that they;ve produced since DDLJ, only 5 clicked at the box office. Thats a success rate of a measly 16.67%. A job well done. They are mindbogglingly stupid and they think the Indian Audience is the same world over. Not anymore Yashji, not any more.

P.S: The only reason I went through the torture was because the remote was missing and I was too lazy to go and manually change the channel. And I wanted to write another movie review ;-)

Thanks Unthinkable

2010-07-01T09:19:00.000-07:00

I never thought diffusing a N-Bomb will be this easy; I had the tools and the codes all along with me. Pause to 0:07 to find out yourself.

Interesting Thought

2010-06-30T02:01:00.000-07:00

I wonder why I never ever thought on these lines. As someone who always thought I was good with probability and numbers, I should've figured it out long time ago..But its never too late to learn now is it..

Its Quarter Final Time

2010-06-29T14:41:00.000-07:00

The World cup is down to its last eight teams. Its time to notch up the performance to carry yourself to the next level and be one of the 4 best teams in the world. The FIFA rankings really don't matter at such times. The quarter final line up shows just that..At one hand we have the world no. 1 Brazil bracing us with their presence(i think winning the world cup is always expected from them, you gotta hand it to them, Brazil really knows how to perform to their expectations) while we also have world no. 31 and 32, Paraguay and Ghana making up the top 8. All the four matches look super exciting.Like every football fan, I too consider myself to be a Pundit, and like they do, I too came up with my own analysis on who will advance and who will not. Here is my very own version

Netherlands v Brazil:

Both teams like to play attacking football. There is a lot of flair involved with Netherlands playing with a new version of Total Football, while for Brazilians, even a wayward through pass always seems to find the right players. Skill wise, its really hard to choose between the two. But if Maicon can score goals like this (quality not so good), then Brazil surely hold the upper hand. Goal wise comparison also shows Brazil faring much better; 8 vs. 6 scored by the Oranje. And if you compare the quality of the goals, Brazil's been mind-blowing. First touches and through passes, they've got it all. I don't say Oranje lacks such qualities, however they have not been able to play as openly as they want. It only takes one match to find the groove, hopefully its this one, else they are definitely going out against a much superior team. My vote: Brazil

Uruguay v Ghana:

I've been very impressed by Uruguay in this cup. Starting with France, they showed their intent was very clear. The team looked like they believed that they can go all the way. For me its very important to have that kind of confidence within the team. It has helped them produce some good football. Ghana on the other hand really need to work on their play in the final third. As soon as strikers get the ball, they just mess it up. Unless they work on it, I don't think they will get to play any more part in the cup. Based on current form, my pick is Uruguay.

Argentina v Germany:

This is without doubt the biggest match of the Quarters. Both teams have been playing football, the way it was meant to be. Attack after attack, no matter what. The only thing on their minds is to score goals. Each has scored 9 goals, both would've scored much more had it not been some terrific saves and some bad luck.

Argentina has Messi ofcourse. He has showed on the world stage , why is he currently the best player in the world. He's ruthless on the field, he cracks open the opposition defense on his will and although he hasn't scored any goal yet, it doesn't change the fact, he has setup so many of the 9 that they've scored. He's a true team player a lesson Mr. Christiano Ronaldo should learn. Apart from him, Argentina still have tons of attacking options in Higuan(joint top scorer), Tevez, Rodriguez, Di Maria, Aguero, Veron, Milito. The list is pretty much endless.

Germany hasn't played bad either. They along with Argentina were the only team to show flair in the opening round of matches. Although they are a young bunch, they play beautiful football. Uzil at this rate can easily become Germany's new playmaker. Muller ofcourse is very good on the flanks. Then they also have two world cup specialists Klose and Podolski. Both very skilled and very good at hitting the target.

There is hardly anything to choose between the two in attack, but Argentina definitely have superior defensive skills. And this just might be enough to take them to the semis.

Paraguay v Spain:

This one is a fairly straightforward one. I am a big fan of Spain. They along with Brazil (as a dutiful Indian I cant help but love Brazilian football) are my favorites to reach the final. I would love for Spain to win it this time. Not because I like them, because they have shown exceptional form the past 3 years. A 35 match unbeaten run(equal to that of Brazil's) and a Euro cup to their name, its hard not to pick them as one of the top favorites here. They have a dazzling attack, their passing is impressive and inch perfect, defensively they are strong and their keeper is one of the best in the world. They boast of a certain David Villa who has scored 42 int'l goals in just 62 matches. Its a team having so much talent that Cesc Fabregas starts as a substitute in most matches.

As far as Paraguay is considered, the lesser said the better considering the fact that I haven't seen them play yet, although I have read they are a resilient bunch. Well, we'll see how much it helps them against the Spanish Bulls.

My pick from this fixture is pretty clear.

So, as far as my prediction goes, here is the semifinal lineup.

Brazil v Uruguay

Argentina v Spain

Gum ka saathi... Andaz Apna Apna

2010-06-29T14:40:00.000-07:00

As my previous blog entry suggests, I am not a very happy person these days. Life has its ups and downs and its down time for me. Today it was worse than the usual (few more people for jobs...I know I should be happy for them..but as Madhavan says in 3 Idiots..when your friend flops, you feel bad. When he tops, you feel even worse) . what i want to say is.. it was a mixed feeling.

When nothing was cheering me, I was browsing through to find some movie to waste time..and as luck would have it, Andaz Apna Apna came to mind. I have and will always be a big big fan of comic capers, so decided to go ahead with it. Although I have seen the movie more than 25 times, but it still cracks me up every time as if its my first watch. The chemistry between Aamir and Salman is amazing. And it is backed by some rib-tickling dialogues. More than the acting, the credit, for me, should go to the dialog writers. Some of my favorites include..

tum jo ho woh tum nahi ho, woh woh hai

woh jo hai woh nahi hai, woh tum ho

tum jo ho woh tum nahi ho

woh jo hai woh nahi hai

main jo hun main main hun

ya main bhi woh nahi hun jo main hun

main kaun hun...

Sir lakh lakh ke pachas cheque hoge...

and ofcourse the eternal favorite

Galti se mistake ho gaya

I finished the movie around 2 in the morning and it sort of completely rejuvenated me. I finished the movie in a pretty jovial mood. That's how movies should be made. To sum up Andaz Apna Apna... When you're down and sad and nothing the world seems right or makes you happy, its time to see *Andaz Apna Apna*...150 minutes later, the world is a Beautiful Place once again!!

Unfortunately these days comedies are rather loud to make them sound funny. It lacks the punchlines and the acting to support it. But who cares as long as we have Andaz Apna Apna!!!

336 hours of utter uselessness leads to...Blogging

2010-06-27T18:42:00.000-07:00

Well, the decision to again visit my 'beloved' blog and take it up once again has been out of sheer boredom. Its been 2 weeks since my visit to North Carolina and I think these 14 days have been the most utterly wasted days of my life. I don't have anything to look forward to.

My daily activities include, watching the world cup games, check the status of my OPT multiple times in the hope that today might just be my lucky day. But itne hum lucky hote toh phir baat hee kya hoti...Murphy Bhaisahab ke toh hum itne chahete hai ki, woh hamara picha kabhi nahi chodte..but thats another story...

So here I am with another one of my comeback and hopefully this time it is for the long run..

P.S : With so many new templates jazzing up the Blogger network, it just might give me the added motivation. :)

Some useful websites

2010-02-13T21:31:00.000-08:00

I found a collection of some rather interesting and useful websites, thought should share them..

http://slickdeals.net/ , http://www.deals2buy.com/ Deals from all around

http://www.pipl.com Find people

http://www.tineye.com/ Reverse image search engine

http://ninite.com/ easy application installer

http://academicearth.org/ Free online video lectures from leading universities

http://gigapedia.com/ Ebooks

http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page Ebooks

http://www.livemocha.com/ Learn Language for Free

http://www.gliffy.com/ Draw diagrams online

http://pixlr.com/ Online Photo editor, no need to spend a fortune on photoshop

http://www.dirpy.com/ Convert your youtube videos to mp3s.

http://www.rainymood.com/ When you want it to rain and nature doesnt answer

http://listen.grooveshark.com/ Listen music online

http://www.bugmenot.com/ For all those annoying sites which require username/password

http://www.mailinator.com/ Temporary email when we dont want to sign up using our gmail/yahoo accounts

http://www.scribd.com/ Ebooks

Hope these are helpful..

Social networking overkill

2010-02-10T01:03:00.000-08:00

Oh! I so miss the old internet; the one which was in existence 6-7 years before. All it could do was , atleast the useful things were shopping, look for news, hunt for jobs (monster.com ruled those days) and yes as far as i know the only social tool that people used and cared about, Chatting. It was a great way to connect with old lost friends, people living in other side of the world, meet up with new people. It was going great. Internet was perfect. The internet was a nice calm place. But as it turned out, it was as we say in hindi, Aandhi ke pahle ki Shaanti thi (Calm before the Storm).

The Aandhi(Storm) in this case ofcourse are the plethora of social networking tools that have since flooded the internet. One of the early leaders being Facebook and myspace here in the US and orkut in India and south America. No idea if China ever had one or even if it has, the government probably runs it. Even that was acceptable. I mean the world could handle it. now we had a better way to connect to friends, share our pictures, get in touch with them and what not. I was happy with my good old orkut. Back then we did not have facebook in India. So orkut was the Rage back then. Then as we(Indians) always do, we decided to copy and come up with a dozen more variants of orkut. All of sudden everyday I was being invited to join a new social network. And I too just like the others was riding on the big wave and I was a proud member of all the networks that existed back then( dont know if any of them are still alive). Be it the Hi5s or the zorpias or the ibibo's, you name it..I was on it.

Fast forward six months. I was tired of daily checking into all my accounts and see if anybody cared to send me a message or if someone had done something interesting. As the time went by, I had lost interest in almost all of them barring Orkut. You see it had the early player advantage in India. So i didn't mind keeping track of the first one. And in any case, the new must use social network, where you could express your opinions freely without any restrictions and the whole world could read it (again when i say the world, i mean all countries except China, no offense) was Blogs. How could I have resisted it. Next thing you know, I am on blogspot too. I think I did it dutifully initially, but then work and gre piled up and blogging(too liberal with english) took a backseat.(i still have close to 20 half finished posts). Since then I have been planning to restart my blog career hoping to win a nomination for the best blog someday ;-).

Fast forward another year or so circa Fall 2008. I now lived in New York. So I had no choice but to kick start my facebook stint. I mean thats what all of US was doing. So to be like them I had to be one of them. My affair with facebook lasted the least, the reason being most of my friends were back in India and they loved their dear old orkut back there ( Back then atleast according to mail forwards the founder of orkut was making shit loads of money, at that rate he could've bailed out all of the US during the great recession of 2008 single handedly). Another reason being facebook was still only by invitation and very few people in India know someone here. So facebook faded away pretty quickly. But then facebook opened it gates and indians to look as much cool as the rest of the world came in and crashed the party. So now facebook was back on my radar, not just because of my friends but also thanks in largely to farmville. Even games have become part of the social networks and are their cash registers are ringing. So now I had my IM tools, orkut, blogspot, facebook and its numerous the so called social games and lastly my social news network reddit.

I wasnt finished in any sense yet. Somewhere around 2009 another startup came up with the idea of microblogging. I thought instead of writing boringly long posts, i'll try and express my thoughts through 140 characters. Here i come twitter. I had nicely settled into it. And i did feel complete now. I had everything social going in my life. Forgot to mention I was also part of Linkedin, ofcourse to maintain my professional connections (sadly though barring 10-15 people, most of them are my friends).

And around 24 hours before, I also became part of Google Buzz. I had to, it was like obsessive compulsive disorder. Just because its there, I had to be in. I have sort of become addicted. Not just me, its people all around the world. I mean these days instead of handing out their resignation through mail, people tweet that too for the whole world to see. One of my friends in facebook gives out quarterly updates of his life(Off to lunch, Off to work, Off to bed and what not). I am sure just like me everyone else too will join the bandwagon on Buzz. Some will persist with it while others will go back to their old trusted ones; but that besides the point. The important thing is today there are too many of these social networking tools. While i agree it has been useful at times, the bad thing is it has been a mere waste of time and resources at most other times. Take for instance Reddit (there are many others like it...digg,stumble-upon, so on and so forth). Every day i see people there literally wasting their time. Be it office or be at home. Every little thing is posted and commented upon. While its good to have fun at times, but people don't realize that the amount of time spent on these networks has increased exponentially. So instead of say actually working during daytime, people spend time looking for new stuff on internet and then post it on reddit. Instead of spending some quality time with their friends or family or even with themselves they are completely hooked onto it. It seems with the arrival of so many social tools, Our actual, our REAL social Life has shifted into a Virtual social world. While the corporations owning them are having a field day at the office, we as their users are becoming their slaves. We are more or less ruled by them. Something needs to be at the earliest to ensure that they are confined.

Thats why old internet was so much better. You had fun for few minutes/hours each day and then you were off to your real life.

AgniPankh – A Hidden store of Ultimate Mockery

2009-05-01T12:35:00.000-07:00

At times I wonder when will bollywood grow up. When will they start making movies which make some common sense atleast. I agree action movies are suppose to be over the top, but Bollywood takes that meaning to a whole new never been before perceived level. In the same league of extraordinarily disastrous movies is a new entrant – Agnipankh which I happened to see all thanks to UTV movies(the only source of crappy to ultra crappy Hindi movies here in the united states) who claim to have the most amazing list of movies under their banner. The movie includes Jurm, Angaar. Main Chor tu Sipahi...The list to say the least is endless.

Coming back to Agnipankh, its a story about three Air force Pilots namely Jimmy Shergill, Rahul Dev and the third guy and a regenerating Pakistani Army led by the effervescent Ashish Vidyarthi aka Quereshi (I somehow loved this name...the name has a kind of super villainness associated with it). This concept of respawning has been the mainstay of computer games. But the director has awesomely reinvented it to the big screen. Kudos to the guy.

The movie starts off in the air force base in Kashmir, where Jimmy and the third guy are already posted and Rahul is the new entrant. Jimmy is the uber playboy who keeps an album of all his previous girlfriends and who likes to blame everything bad on god. Shamita Shetty is in love with the third guy but the guy think she's a boy...dude its Shamita Shetty for heaven's sake not Amelie Mauresmo...And Rahul Dev is happily married to Divya Dutta, while his friend(Tim Robbins lookalike) still flirts with her and dreams of marrying her....bhai dost ho to aisa...The romantic side being all taken care of, the dushman side is played by a Janitor who as his name goes is a cleaner at the air force base(so that he can overhear all the secret meetings) and also works part time as the leader of some terrorist organization. I have never seen a terrorist organization being so humiliated and disgraced. Pakistan has a plan to attack the air force base and so they want the terrorist to take out the radar installation at the base. However even if the radar attack fails they still want to go ahead with the attack. I tried to decrypt this complex logic but could never come to terms with it. Ultimately I realized the director just wanted to make the movie 30 minutes longer. So as expected the radar attack at the base fails miserably, with the air force pilots showing off their ground combat skills too(Our govt should seriously think of getting rid of the army altogether...we have the air force...we don't need anything else). They manage to kill all the terrorists, but do they manage to diffuse the time bomb which only had about a minute to go off remains a mystery throughout the movie. Air force is good at diffusing the bombs too...we dont need bomb diffusal squads too. Pakistan still goes ahead with the attack. Now its time for India to retaliate. And so goes our Jimmy bhai and the 3^rd guy with a trusted sidekick to take out a Pakistani oil base(wtf??) why can't we attack their air force base...Are we too scared or we plainly put not interested even one bit...The Oil base is closely guarded (the paki prez can use such kind of security)..And so our veer jawans instead of directly taking out the oil well and with it everyone around, start killing the Pakistani soldiers one by one and that too in putting US to shame style. While US uses carpet bombs, India sacrifices one cruise missile per soldier. So the funda for attack..take a aim at a soldier, take him out with a missile...One man One Missile...At this rate I estimate India must be having atleast 3 million missiles(Strength of Pak + Chinese Army). Coming back to the story Pakistani soldiers use their AK's to fire at the Mirage's and they manage to shoot down 2 planes...Jimmy's and the third guy's. The inventor of Anti-aircraft missile on watching this drama unfold died again. Well Jimmy and the third guy safely eject out and are caught by the Pakistan Army and are put under indefinite arrest with no regards for the Geneva convention..hehe...Jimmy mentions this to the Paki general...its a bollywood movie...no one cares about Geneva buddy. The two of them are constantly questioned about their battalion and number of planes their base has which to say the least is ultra lame...why is the army interested in the battalion to which the soldiers belong...They are asked no further questions...In prison they meet another old war veteran the indispensable Kiran Kumar...who has tried to break out of the prison 17 times without luck...At one time he managed to reach the Afghan border where he was caught again...what an idiot..when you are near the India Pak border why in the name of god would you start running towards west when India is definitely on the east...what a loser...running for 1100 miles when the Indian border was only 11 miles. Well taking inspiration from him, Jimmy and the third guy plan to break out of the prison Shawshank style...They get a small scythe hidden in a book from Brijesh Hirjee(a supplier in prison). They manage to put Tim Robbins to utter shame by making a big enough hole in the wall in days...who the hell thought of wasting 28 years in prison...After a showdown with the Pak army, they manage to run away and this time in the right direction. They are being constantly chased by a pack of Pak soldiers lead by Ashish Vidyarthi aka Quereshi...And every 5 minutes they run into a 8-10 Paki soldiers(not more not less) which they kill off showing air force's superior prowess over the army. They also manage to run into Rahul Dev in the jungles who now after his fatal crash is living alone in a cave killing rabbits with his pistol for food...As the group of 4 now near the Indian border, its time for some Qurbaani's baby...As is everyone's guess...Kiran baby its time for you to go...And Rahul baba...bahut hua rabbit meat...ab bhagwaan bula rahe hai...Both of them are killed by Quereshi's sniping prowess who need a sniper to kill them only 100 feet away...Well done lad...While Quereshi is bus sniping, Jimmy and third guy kill off all his goons...but Viola!!!...All of them Regenerate...not once but twice...India needs to develop this technology super quick or otherwise our fate is sealed...But ultimately they die the third time with Jimmy and the third guy both getting shot in the legs...When they are about to be sniped in comes Shamita with her Chopper and kills Quereshi and saves the day.

The movie ended with plenty of questions unanswered. Why in the name of god Pakistan decides to attack India. Why does the airforce retaliates by taking out a Oil base..so that Pakistan cannot refuel their planes and attack us back?? Why is the name of of the movie AgniPankh when all these planes do is enter the Pakistan territory and get shot. After losing 180 precious minutes of my life watching the movie I've wasted several more thinking about and ultimately writing about the mockery going on in Bollywood. I mean seriously guys do these directors think we are that stupid...or they themselves are that stupid that all they can come up with all unconnected story lines and ultra pathetic subplots to take the already crappy story forward. God Help Bollywood!!!

My Recommendation: You cannot and i quote "cannot" afford to miss this movie...

2008: A Great Year; 2009: High Hopes

2009-01-06T05:45:00.001-08:00

Its 2009 already...2008 was quite a whirlwind..31st dec 2007 seems just like yesterday...I was in probably the saddest mood I had been the whole of 07 thinking about another year wholly wasted...but ended up welcoming 2008 with Aboli and Mayank splurging 500 bucks in doing so...Now that its 2009 I feel those 500 bucks was money well spent...2008 was in many contexts an awesome year...Mid January to March was in many ways the best time of my life...Many special things happened...Never had things or rather Life looked so wonderful and beautiful...If only I get another chance I would readily relive those 3 months...

Some Things which more or less sum up my last year --

One of my life ambitions, Study in US, came true. I don't know I had this big urge of finishing atleast some part of my education here in the states;

At the same time I had to leave behind my family.

I had to leave behind all my friends in Pune and in Bangalore. The only reason I was living a Happy Life for the past 6 years was because of you dudes n dudettes...

It was actually pretty draining emotionally to leave so many things behind in India just to add a Masters Tag to my name. I spent quite a few nights after coming here pondering whether it was the right decision to leave a good life. Time will only tell...

As part of my transition phase starting from Amravati to Pune to Bangalore, I moved to New York. It is a city with great people,with great culture. It is a city that never sleeps. Even if I go at 2am in Manhattan it feels like 7pm. One of the best cities in the world...I guess( I Hope) this is my last stop :-)

After covering all of South India in the past 2 years, last year had few trips. Chikmaglur in Feb was an awesome trip. Have some great memories of this trip. Other than that Boston, Atlantic City and Raleigh finished off the year.

I discovered the emotional side of me, which was rather unexpected although a welcome surprise (gave me the confidence of me being a human not a Zombie ;-) )

Well cant think of anything more, still 2008 was one of the more satisfying years both emotionally, professionally and personally. It made me realise the power of Love, power of Friendship and lastly That the World has truly in every sense has become Flat.

With hope that 2009 recreates atleast some, if not all, the magic of 2008 I wish you all a Happy, Wealthy and a Healthy New Year!!!

I do plan to write much more frequently than the past 2 years. I hope I succeed at which I failed for the past 2 years.

Peace!

First Few Days in the STATES

2008-08-28T01:30:00.001-07:00

Well..i had almost given up on blogging...bt partially thanks to Onkar's persistance n remaining to my good writing skills ;-) i've decided to take it up one more time...this time much more regularly and much more seriously...n wat better way to start than my first few days at Uncle Sam...
Life, as of now , is not as smooth as Delta Fl.17 landing on August the 13th...Immigration was a breeze...then went my first dollars...My precious $3 for a luggage cart... I was like Holy Mother of God!!!(to be more frank it was a much more abusing expression)...Arrivals got me a great surprise...The so called Seniors who were s'pose to pick me up never showed up..n with that started My Great American Adventure...n it was a long treacharous one...
Not sure what to do, I decided to change course and goto my Brother's at Cary,NC...bt then it was me..how can it be smooth and easy...
Obstacle 1: Dint have quarters to call my Brother.. :(( had to buy expensive mineral water(more dollars wasted) to get some change...
Obstacle 2: Loaded with quarters, I called my bro...but couldn't get hold of him till 11(i had been calling him since 8)...
Obstacle 3: I had 65kg of luggage with me...and If I had any doubts remaining on less luggage travelling..they were wiped out of my mind forever n ever n EVER!!!
Well like a true survivor...I passed these obstacles with relative ease...hehe...kidding...around 1.45 reached Penn Station to catch the next Train to Washington DC...btw i was roaming around all NYC hungry with 3 big bags...Reached DC around 6.30...still had an hour before the train to Rockymount...bt as luck would have it...the train came at 9.45 in the night instead of the usual 7.30...bt this time I was overly stuffed with the extra cheesy pizza from Sparro...
Around 3 in the morning I got down at Rockymount, which was still 60 miles from Cary...thankfully My bro was there to drive me...n so around 4 in the morning MY FIRST DAY CAME TO A FINAL REST!!!! (never had the chance to experience jet lag too :(( )
What a Rocky start to the Great American Dream..whoo...
Next 7 days were awesome though...had bro's big place to enjoy..plus a 46 inch LCD and a unlimited net and fone connection and lodds of coke to go along with movies...hehe...bt as always good days dont last long and so were mine...I was back in NY on 19th..at least this time had a place to stay...a place called Whitehouse Hostel in Manhattan...the place is always buzzing with people from all around the world...met some wonderful people during the 3 day stay...
College started on 20th Aug with orientation lasting 2 full days...well to put it in simple words...2 full days of Napping...haha..dint attend most of it n slept through rest of it...dint miss free lunch thou...including one with the President of the University...haha...as they say...Old habits die hard...
Days were getting hectic and hectic...21st Aug was the last day when I had lunch...after that it has only been dinner...n considering my health...not a very good thing...
Course registration and getting rest of the college docs done took 3 full days...followed by another day of applying for oncampus jobs(Update: Screwed up a Maths exam big time...need to revise Taylor Series and Convergence of Series...trust me its very important)...
Days are getting longer and longer... This was the 1st day when i came home before 9pm...avg. dinner time is 12.30 in the night...n consider this My classes haven't even started...n with class times from 6pm to 8.30pm...no hopes in the coming future also...The avg time to travel from home to college is 60 minutes... need to change a train too to reach there...but NY subway absolutely Rocks!!!.. just like Roti,kapda and makaan its a essential lifeline here...cant survive here without MTA...
Next few days look relaxed though...Having finished all college stuff today..looks like i have earned myself a 5r days rest before the classes start...
Apart from this hectic lifestyle...My House here is absolutely beautiful...5 mins walk to the Rockaway beach... gr8 place to relax after a long hectic day...roomies are all great fun...just the kind of ppl i like to hang around it...m lucky in this part alteast...always had great roomies..in Pune...and in Bangalore too...
Most Important thing...New York is Amazingly Awesome...Its a great great city to live in...Manhattan ke toh kya kahne...if only i had enough moolah..i would have been a proud manhattanite...Need to explore NY thoroughly though...

Wanted to write bit more...bt its 5.30 in the morning...n i need to catch up on much needed sleep... :-)

Will keep you posted...this time I PROMISE!!!

Sumthing of a MockTale

2008-04-03T04:06:00.001-07:00

I got hold of Sumthing of a Mocktale by Soma Das a few days back. Found the name of the book on Salil's blog. After some googling and stuff came to know its a college story. I am a big fan of Five point someone...So thought why not give it a shot...The book just like five point someone costs 100 bucks...The art work on the front and back cover has been done impressively...
Coming to the storyline, its a story of 3 girls doing their Masters at JNU...It starts with their 1st day in college...moves along thorwing light on various aspects of JNU...The hip hangouts...the lover's point... Fashion trends followed...the teachers...n ofcourse the diverse students...
Some of the incidents in the story are hilarious...While some parts could have been done better...but its a pleasant read nonethelss...I could relate to this book...maybe because i am hardly out of college n miss those days like crazy...bt then that is the main target audience of this book...It may not be as good as five point someone but still is a worth read in its own sort...

RACE: Endless journey into Insanity

2008-04-02T02:25:00.000-07:00

Race had just released that morning...Bcoz of a impressive cast and more becoz i had nothing else to do i went to a nearby theatre to catch the action unfold in front of my eyes...

The movie starts off in a frenzy...too much happens too fast as compared to bollywood standards...Akshay Khanna plans a viscious plot to get rid of his older brother(Saif) and get $100 million as part of his bro's insurance policy...Meanwhile bade bhaiyya is broke like hell..he can't even pay his bank mortgage and has a insurance cover of $50 million...i think even i should get insured by the same agency :P...Akshay takes help of the sultry Bipaasha to make his plan work buying her out for a cool $20 million (tats a lot i s'pose he paid her...All she did was sleep with Saif once) Meanwhile the story moves on and by the end of 1st half, we have a decisive plan of Saif getting killed (he has also survived a massive car crash earlier in the movie...n Voila...he just escapes with a Neck Band..god damn Mercedes have amazing safety features(Akshay should have known)...even when you are hit with a iron pipe upfront all you get is a neck strain...hats off to Merc engineers)...coming back to the main point...Akshay has married Bips and after that forced her to sleep with Saif...So the plan is to call up Saif on the 20th floor of his office...accuse him of sleeping with Bips...While Bips is s'pose to hit Saif from behind...so that she can get her $20M... what akshay doesnt know is that Bips is doubling timing him..n is actually with Saif...but at the end of 1st half she throws Saif out of the building..giving the viewers "WTF" feeling...

Second half starts with the entry of RD(Anil Kapoor) and his ultra dumb assistant Sameera Reddy...who are the investigating officers for the murder of Saif... Havent ever seen a police assistant so glamourous n who wears such low necks,cleavage showing dresses...i wonder if the SA police ever get time to work...Anyways RD has this habit of continously eating fruits...he has been given some very crappy lines...the lines are not funny at all...Both of them suck like hell...

But Finally Katrina gets to play some part...She starts off with dropping a big bomb...Saif has married Katrina...she also has the proofs for that..This is just one of the many ultra stupid twists and turns the movie goes through before ending its torturous journey about 60 mins later...I know I am not suppose to give out everything...but i just cant resist giving away all the twists...So here they are arranged in Chronological Order...

Katrina has married Saif in Capetown where they had gone to clear Bank's mortgage... i guess Saif had enough reasons to celebrate that success by marrying off his cute assistant...

Katrina has actually teamed up with Akshay(All of 1st half she says she's madly in love with Saif..Mr. Abbas and Mr. Mastan...you could have saved us a hell lot of trouble by just picturising a song where she tries n seduces Saif...indian audiences are intelligent enough to understand that..rather than trying to deviate us by showing how much she loves her boss)

Akshay wanted to Kill Saif becoz Saif has instilled Zeher(metaphorically) in Akshay since childhood..C'mon Mr.A.M. you should've though of something better...its no more 1970s...

Akshay takes Bips to a contract killer to give a apparent Supari for Katrina...but actually Bips is giving the Supari for herself...

RD is actually not a Deshbhakt officer but a Kamina under Disguise...When he comes to know of the actual Khichdi Akshay and Katrina have cooked...he confronts them and gets his share...

While Bips is being attacked by the Assassin(over exxageration i admit) Saif, the DareDevil returns from the dead does a Parkour and saves Bipasha...

Well these were the multiple twists that take place...All of them in the second half...By the time we reach Climax...most in the audience are Entangled into a never ending maze of Twists with no hope whatsoever of coming out...this obviously includes me...

Well its time to give out the final Twist which we had to encounter before Mr. A&M decided to call it a day...
Now that Saif is alive its but obvious of him to take a Badla on his brother...n boy does he do that in style...He confronts Akshay in their Poorkhon (ancestors) kaa Ultra lavish..ultra 21st century home(or shud i say Villa) atop a hill in Dubai...calls him names...in between also shows that the bada bhai he is...he would have given all his wealth to A if he had asked once...what a load of crap for climax after such a intriguing movie... he doesnt even spare Kats...calls her a Super Bitch implicitly(this was cleverly done..i guess i am the only one who got the hidden meaning in the saracastically uttered "Zara Zara love me...Zara Zara Kiss me" by Chhote Nawab)...He then points a gun at Akshay...And if you are still stupid enough to think that this is the end...well then you dont deserve to see this movie... There still hasnt been any RACE in the movie (barring the horse races that no one gives a damn)...and So Saif challenges Akshay to a Car Race through the winding from their Villa in Dubai to their Stud farm in Durban in South Africa...As i was preparing myself for the Marathon race, Saif says to Akshay while swaaping his sports car with Akki's BMW..."Race Car nahi Car Chalanewaala se jeeti jaati hai"... i guess Alonso can take a cue from this invaluable advice n beat Ferrari in the next race using his Kachre kaa dabba Renault...I just hope he watches the movie before the next Grand Prix...

Coming back to the Car Race...2-3 kms into the race..Saif realises there are no brakes in the BMW(another Twist)...But who the hell cares...Saif can still manoeuver the car on the winding roads just like Lucas Black did it in The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift...albiet Lucas needed Hand Brakes...but its Chotte Nawab...he doesnt need brakes for drifting...Brakes are for the Duds not for Dudes...He successfully takes the car out of Dubai..bt by this time Akshay has overtaken Saif...But the Dud that he is, he looses control of the Car on the 1st tunnel of the Katraj ghat (going towards Kolhapur)...the Porsche flips and bangs into the fuel tank of the Indian Oil Tanker idling on the entrance of the tunnel...The car explodes and this time all thanks to lord Almighty, Akshay and Katrina finally goto hell (Akshay had told his intentions of entering hell during the race itself...n kats being his janam janam ki saathi will obviously follow suit)..But we are still left with Saif and Bips in the other car...Saif bangs the car in the water barrels blocking the valley overlooking the magnificient Pratapgad...

There is one final twist in the Tale...RD a.k.a is working in conjunction with Saif...then follows the flashback of how Saif faked his death and RD his investigation...Saif and Bips get the $200 million and after giving RD his share hopefully live happily ever after without any more twists...

I dont think anything more needs to be said about the movie and that includes impressive Performances(the less said the better),Music(Pehli Nazar by Atif is an awesome song and the saving grace of the movie) and the likes...But I would definately suggest a better ending to this thriller...Why didnt Bipasha Kill both Akshay and Saif when both are on top of the building...She would've definately got $100M(Akshay's death) and by some legal counseling even the $100M from Saif's Death (As he dies, $100M goes to Akshay's account who is also dead)... I gues this would have made this movie worth a watch rather than the current effort which once gets over throws the audience into a Post-traumatic stress disorder

Well I have left one twist untold...Which circumstances force Akshay to overtake Saif...To unveil the secret get a ticket for the next show at the nearest Theatre...

EGGoFULL HOLI

2008-03-26T01:08:00.000-07:00

Holi is one festival I always look forward to so eagerly...I had some really memorable Holi's...being part of the one of a kind Water War..to almost getting in jail (we threw a Water balloon at a policemen just after my 10th exams)...to the Kapde Phadoo and mud splash holi during my engg years...What made the engg holi's even more special was the fact that we played holi twice...once on Dhulendi and once on Rangapanchami...Even last year holi was extreme fun...plenty of colors...plenty of eggs..plenty of Cloth tattering...but this year was something really different...instead of playing with Colors..we played holi mostly with EGGS n TOMATOES...with colors being served as a side dish...I bet Holi cant get more organic than that... :)

Actually to speak of...this year i was not gonna play holi..coz all the holi enthusiasts were out of town...but all thanks to Rinkesh's enthusiasm and energy we played holi after all...He came to our place arnd 10.30..got us up...n then the fun began...Armed with Colors, water bottles n ofcourse plenty of eggs...4 of us (me, Kaustubh,Rinkesh and Sahil) headed off to Scout's place...He got splattered with eggs n color...GOD!! he was smelling like $HIT... ;)

After that 5 of us went to smita's place...She dint have any idea that we guys were coming..n so unconcerned and unmindful..she had left the door of her house wide open...wat more we could ask for...by now I also had a specially made EGG pulp with me...mixture of eggs colors n water...After a initial outburst on smita with like 10-15 eggs..things seem to calm down...but then Smita decided to take it out on the guys...I was the 1st victim...I got a egg on my head...followed by a tomato...by this time i was out of stock wiht my egg pulp n so could not retailiate...Rest as they say is history...Got few more tomatoes...n to finish off the masacre i lost my beloved LEE tee...

I could not take it any more..n decided to call Truce...I had ruled the game for most of the time...bt cudnt keep my nerve till the last part n ended up getting a dose of my own medicine...

But all in all a eventful n funfilled Holi... :)

A Weekend in Chikmagalur

2008-03-11T02:27:00.000-07:00

(Clockwise from left Front: Chandni,Mohit,Paresh,Aboli and Smita Back: Gaurav,Vinayak,Amit and Mayank)

Considering the number of trips i had since i moved to b'lore..."another" one shouldn't be a surprise...bt this one was...in many ways...Almost the whole Gang came for the trip...Everyone's potential of lying and bluffing was put to a test n boy most of them passed it with flying colors (more on that later)..hehe...the "MAMTA" side of Gaurav...The Love Triangle...Driving skills of Mayank...The Trekker in Aboli...Super Sleuth Smita...The Photographer in Chandni...n many more...

The initial plan was to goto Chikmagalur..find some nice and cheap coffee estate...goto nearby places n come back...but as usual Plan fizzled n for the better...We left for Chik around 2.30ish and 30kms in the drive we were on the wrong way...quite a start considering we were more than 2hours late...Not the kind of start we wud've hoped for...bt considering our preparations...tat was an achievement...n as we wud later find out...It was the trip of getting lost..to put it dramatically...It was a test of endurance...hehe...

7.00 am , 8th Feb: We reached Belur, a sleepy town in Hassan district of Karnataka. It is famous all over the world for Chennakesava Temple , a temple dedicated to lord Vishnu. According to my knowledge its also one the heritage sites in India. The temple is a wonderful example of the Hoysala Architecture. The facade of the temple is filled with intricate sculptures and friezes with no portion left blank. While everyone appreciated the beauty of the temple, for gaurav it was a fogetful experience...he was looking for a Khajuraho in Belur (if you kow what i mean ;-) )

7.45 am , 8th Feb: The next stop was Halebidu, home to The Hoysaleshwara and Kedareshwara Temples. This is another amazing example of extraordinary sculpting. And the most astonishing thing is that no two sculptures are the same. Overall its a must visit place if you are in anywhere near.

8.45 am , 8th Feb: All of us were starving. We wanted to eat n everyone was asknig around to find a decent place to eat. And it seems there is only 1 restaurant in Chik which serves good food acoording to the locals. Dont remember the exact name but i can never forget the food that is actually served there. No idea if people there really like that place or they just want to make a fool of tourists. If thats what they are doing then trust me they are doing one heck of a job. The food there just cant be described in words. Well food there definitely is not the best part. Its the Restroom there that steals all the limelight. Its one of the most creepiest and scariest places i've ever been too. I'm not even scared of horror movies but i still get nightmares about this particular one...I'm having goosebumps while typing also...its that scary...

2.30 pm , 8th Feb: After much delibiration and much more treachorous travelling, we reached Kemmanagundi, a small hill station located amidst the coffee estates and maintained by the Horticulture Dept. Its a nice lil place to spend a quiet weekend. It is devoid of all the usual hustle and bustle we normally associate all our hill stations with. With population just about 500-600 and fewer tourists its a wonderful place to be in. It is surrounded by many hills which are a trekker's delight. After an unusual but nonetheless delicious lunch it was time to frehshen up. For the record none of us had even brushed. Most of us hadnt slept at all. Finding a good place to stay is another problem. There are just 2 govt hotels to stay and as expected the rush is frantic. But owing to Kannada speaking skills of Mohit, we got ourselves 3 rooms. One for the gals and other two for the six of us.

Around 6 in the evening Mohit Mayank and Gaurav went to get some gas for the cards and some booze for the nite. Meanwhile, the rest of us Aboli, Chandni (Chinge),Smita,Amit,Vinayak(Scout) and myself had a nice round of Cup noodles. We had just started playing cards when Scout introduced us to Villagers and Mafia. While at first it sounds like just another stupid game its one of the best games ever!!! You get to showcase various skills like lying, bluffing, guessing, debating and a plethora of others. You get to fight...You get to make hell lotta noise...You get to lie...You get to cheat....This game has all the right ingredients for that perfect timepass...All of us had an awesome time playing VnM...while Aboli and Chandni ruled with their Mafia cards...Scout was the most loyal villager..hehe...

Villagers and Mafia

After playing nonstop for about 2 hours when finally everyone's vocal cords gave up and the return of the trio from we had dinner at a nearby restaurant...Food again was delicious...

We had planned for a bonfire from b'lore...bt as was the case with this trip..none of the plans actually went to completion...this one fizzled out to...No effort were spared to get atleast a small bonfire..bt as usual the certain Mr. Murphy was right on our tail...we tried everything to get he woods to lite...paper...booze...but nothing could get them to burn...plus the rain dint help the matters much...n So a commendable and valiant effort by Mohit, Gaurav and Mayank proved fruitless...The booze party shifted inside...and giving it company was another round of bigger and better VnM...This was played with much more energy and fighting spirit...Scout again won the award for Villager of the Year...While Chinge...Mafia of the Year...After many rounds of VnM and many more of booze we called it a day around 1.30... Everyone badly needed to take some rest to gear up for the big day...

9.30 am, 9th Feb Room 202: Scout confessed his true love in his true Scouty Style ... captured live on the cam by the effervescent Amit(though he tried to be in high spirits...rest of us could see in his eyes...how sad he was)...
9.35 am, 9th Feb, Room 203: Gaurav vowed to win back his love this way or the other while showering MAMTA on his newly adapted dog...

9.37 am, 9th Feb, Room 204: This was her reaction....

Everyone was geared up for the battle that was about to unfold between the Trio...

11.00 am,9th feb: After a heavy breakfast at the local canteen we started for our trek...It was a 3km walk followed by a small climb...The road is quite scenic...deep valleys...small rivulets...a refreshing waterfall... The trek took about an hour or so...Enjoyed everybit of it...this is evident from all the pics we took on our way... The trek helped Scout in many ways...he rediscovered his passion for fossils and porcupine thorns...plus he n his true love now also shared a common interest...love for fossils...But his joy ws shortlived..he got a bite of his own porcupine thorn...courtesy ofcourse MAMTA...n Scout was lost in insanity forever n ever...This is the reason for this picture...

It was nearing 3pm when we returned to our base and it was time to head back...we still had one last stop..Shravanbelgola...but as was the case with other plans...this too cudnt see the light of the day...The shrine closes at 6pm...n we had just 1 hour to cover the reamining 150 kms to reach there...I really miss the Autobahns at such times...However we did make one small and final pitstop at a dam near belur and were able to get a glimpse of this superb sunset...

11.30pm, 9th Feb, Food Bay: As they say the best part is always saved for the last...n so was this one...delicious food (On last count Mayank and Aboli have become a regular part of its esteemed vkend customers)... The kind of Service even Five Star hotels would envy of...n the best part its open till midnight, a rarity in bangalore...I guess no one can forget that dinner at foodbay...I can still hear "Sir...Ma'm...I'll serve..Thank you..." n the likes...

Dinner came and went...it was time to leave and go back to the routine...Even the raingod was crying...

2.30am, 10th Feb: Me, Gaurav and Scout are standing outside the Avis Office after settling all the accounts...

Life's at a new low

2008-03-10T03:05:00.000-07:00

Last 45-60 days of my life have been quite a mixed bag. December started on a high note... Curtains were to be drawn on my project after being into development for almost 2 years...was feeling ecstatic that wont have to work at all till new years...n then as always Mr. Murphy struck..bad..real bad...a small upgrade for the project was planned...the worst part...total developement time 30 days...time needed by india team...1 day...n from there it all started...

Until then i was always jealous of people who dint have any work...i use to think how cool that will be...u dont have work n the best part...U STILL GET PAID!!!...it cant get better than this...but heck...being jobless SUCKS!!!...n lemme add BIG TIME!!!

Once the lil development work got over..i was rhapsodic...i had so much free time which i always wanted...plus with the admission stuff still going on...it actually helped...i had plenty of time to work on various docs required for admissions....

Life was fun...my office schedule for several days comprised of meeting every1 possible...long duration mulitple trips to cafeteria n breakout areas...mails..n then if time permits work on admission docs...i was having the time of my life...bt as Buddha said...Nothing is Permanent...the feeling didnt last long...
Few days into joblessness...feels like I've been royally screwed...i've lost my appetite for not working...its actually goddamn tough to do nothing for 8 hrs...cafe n breakout areas are no longer interesting...admissions work's done...so nothing on that front too...meeting ppl still goes on...bt now a days i feel embarrassed as everyone around me seems to have some kind of work or other...I m so god damn jealous of them only i know tat...

Not working at all coupled with me not getting any admits so far has given me sleepless nights a plenty...my mood swings are exponentially rising...I get the feeling I dont have any future 3-4 months down the line...I am probably having the worst phase of my life...dunno how long its gonna lost...

The year dint start as epxected...n looking at the current circumstances...looks like it was just a trailor...Picture abhi baaki hai n unlike hindi cinemas which alwayz have a happy ending..this one sure looks like quite the opposite...

Still... I have some faith n hope tat ultimately this is just a passing storm...nothing else...

We dont need superheroes...we have Balayya...

2008-01-29T03:22:00.000-08:00

Chk the telugu superstar Balayya beating the crap out of baddies....I bet Neo(The Matrix) copied his style :-)

No1 knew Pulsar had so much power until Balayya took this bad boy out for a ride...

My Pune trip

2008-01-28T02:40:00.000-08:00

Well...its been ages since i have posted nething thanks to my busy schedule but mostly bcoz of ever growing laziness...but as they say Miracles do happen..so do i come out of my laziness once in a while...More on that later...
This post is for my awesome friends in pune who made sure i had a great time with them.. Thanks Fellas.. :-)

It had been gng on for a while...every time i planned to goto pune something or the other came up n i had to cancel my plans...But somehow i managed to accomodate a short trip to pune one fine vkend... ;-)
To start with the 1st day was quite a gruelling one...i had some work in university n it took up my whole day...Juz to reach univ took me more than an hour from nagar road...plus univ itself is so god damn huge...had a nice mini marathon inside...But heck!!..all efforts paid well in the end..tat gave me some relief...Managed to catch up with ashwin who was gng out for the vkend...He has turned into quite a dude with one heck of a bike...Avenger...Not juz him now almost every1 in my grp has a bike..n one of the unfortunate ones but nonetheless a dude is me...(i guess i can use my blog to praise myself... :-) )..Fri turned out to be quite a boring day afterall with so much work n not an iota of fun...From the looks of it even the vkend dint sound quite promising..u c we(me n my friends) have a habit of messing up plans..Doesnt matter wats @ stake we somehow manage to screw it up...
Sat took a turn for the worse when my college work itself consumed half of the day...but then after almost 72hours i caught up with my pals...n then the actual fun started..As usual the 1st Bakra to be culled was Mr.Rahul Tokase a.k.a Kelya...u c rahul has almost doubled from his 40kg in engg days to almost 70 now...n the secret of his health...eat lods n lods of bananas everyday...sure he had quite a few of them but i doubt after tat sat if he has even touched a single banana...or even if he has he wud still vividly remember me,mohsin n onkar for every bite he has...such was the intensity of his a$$ getting kiked...we were literally laughing our asses off... I would like to take this oppurtunity n THANK him for making tat SAT evening so goddamn awesome...m sure all my friends share the same feeling...so many jokes were cracked on him...u can write a whole book of jokes on Rato: The curse of the Banana...the best joke of tht session was ofcourse by me...
It goes like when u try n google Banana it asks u.."Do you mean Rahul Tokase"

In the evening we decided to go for a movie...but as usual it fizzled...but we had a fun time at the usual hangout place in pune..MG Road...
Sunday started off with much fanfare...We made 1 more plan..to goto Mulshi...but before tat we had a BIG cooking session...once again star of the show was Rahul...The guy decides to make Tea..he did manage to finish it...n to describe it in 1 line..."The sweetest 1/2 litre tea ever made by man"...no wonder we all suffer from diabetes now...but saving grace of tht morning were Vaibhav's Omlette...they rocked!!
12.30 in the afternoon: we managed to reach Mulshi...i had never been thr before...n it was a wonderful place...the area is so serene..u just feel like sitting thr all day listening to water hitting the rocks at the shore...Onkar captured its true beauty with some wonderful snaps...After spending arnd 4-5hrs we came bak to pune...went to pramod's place...freshened up...again went out for dinner to my personal fav.. McDee's...n after tat to Cadby's..the guy makes one of the best chocloate thickshakes u'll ever have...Now came the dreaded time...It was time to leave..everyone going their own ways after an amazing 48hrs...I could see in every1's eyes..how much they had enjoyed it n how much they were hoping this moment never came...With heavy hearts we said goodbye..promising to meet soon n redoing all the things which we cant becoz of our crappy workload...
Monday came n it was time to depart...with all those lovely memories of the last two days n the delicious Methi paranthas which Aboli's Mom had packed for me...i bid adieu to Pune...

Mounting Tensions: Appraisal cycle closer than ever.

2007-06-22T04:38:00.000-07:00

I am writing this article at 1.44 am on a chilly b’lore nite, nites like this when most ppl like the cozy comfort of their bed. But NOT ME!!! WHY??

Bcoz THE TIME of the year is approaching faster than a bullet train. The time when many careers are made while a equal number of them are broken. The time where your chances of becoming richer by hundreds or thousands is determined. No….its not the time a bumper prize of some lottery would be announced nor is time of finding some hidden gold. This is the time of APPRAISALS, the time where whatever u’ve done for the whole yr. is evaluated both in terms of money and position u hold in the organization. I being a fresher its specially a important time for me…this is my 1^st appraisal ever…its as good as a first impression…this will tell me what my peers think of me…am I worth, the company is shelling out each month, for my services?? These thoughts are more than enough to give a person sleepless night…so how can I be a exception!!

Nowadays no matter which part of the office I m in…every1 is talking about the same things…what will be my rating??(P…O…E?? some even get nightmares of being rated N…I am part of that group) what will be my hike??(10%...20%...some go as far as 40%...ppl are sometimes juz too generous in their thoughts) Will I get promoted??(Hmm…I can easily lead this team….I deserve to be a project manager). The problem is juz not the questions but uncertainty over when the meetings will actually take place. Bcoz of this uncertainty one more thought creeps into the mind…have I been left out of this year’s cycle?? Is that the reason my manager is hesitant to call a meeting and tell me!! Creepy…huh??

I’ve been having these kinds of nightmares for the past 15 days. It’s just like the times in college when our results were due any day. U get up one day all ready to start fresh, no sooner u enter the campus than u come to know of the results being announced that day. There are many more days like that until finally university decides to drop the BOMB without any warning… next thing u know u r severely injured(here I m talking abt the majority of the engg students).

This situation is almost the same as that of the college results, only names have been changed and this offers more incentives than college results…rest all is same…Mounting tensions…sleepless nights followed by nightmarish sleeps…time ticking slowly until that TIME BOMB called APPRAISAL finally explodes…whoz gonna be blown to pieces…whoz gonna be walk away one piece without losing a drop of blood…whoz gonna be the minor casualty…only time will tell…until that time, always be on alert…u never know what hit you until its too late…

Before signing off…one last question… WHAT’S YOUR RATING AND HIKE??

On the inside of a toilet door...

2007-06-04T22:41:00.000-07:00

Got this fwd...ppl can be so creative...

A budding poet trying his best...

Here I lie in stinky vapor,
Because some bastard stole the toilet paper,
Shall I lie, or shall I linger,
Or shall I be forced to use my finger.

Before he graduated to be a poet, he wrote this...

Here I sit
Broken hearted
Tried to shit
But only farted

Someone who had a different experience wrote,

You're lucky
You had your chance
I tried to fart,
And shit my pants!

Perhaps it's true that people find inspiration in
toilets.

I came here
To shit and stink,
But all I do
Is sit and think.

There are also people who come in for a different
purpose.. .

Some come here to sit and think,
Some come here to shit and stink,
But I come
here to scratch my balls,
And read the bullshit on the walls...

Toilets walls also double as job advertisement
space.......

(written high upon the wall)
If you can piss above this line, the Singapore Fire
Department wants you.

Ministry of Environment advertisement.

We aim to please!
You aim too! Please

On the inside of a toilet door:

Patrons are requested to remain seated throughout the
entire performance.

And finally, this should teach some a lesson...
Sign seen at a restaurant:

The hands that clean these toilets also make your
food...please aim properly.

Matka DeN

2007-05-22T08:30:00.000-07:00

It was at the mauharat of the Hindi movie “Matka Den” , that I caught up with director Anil Sharma and Sunny Deol.

So Mr. Sharma “Isnt this movie a copy of the English movie casino Royale ?” I asked.

Hearing it,Sunny leaped on his feet and started screaming on top of his voice

“Oye Khotte, this thing this bond does, I have been doing the same thing all my life. Infact for a change this hollywood is been stealing my scripts n making them into bond movies.”

“See my movie The hero: The love story of a spy”. In tht movie I fight all the baddies single handedly juz like ur 007 and also manage to romance with 2 beautiful females. Isnt tht what bond movies all all about. Except tht they have all the gadgetry.”

“But thts not real MARDAANGI, u know, for a real Mard kills with his own hands unlike the loser bond who has to make use of all such gadgetry.”

“In my movie gadar also, we have such a action packed train sequence, wherein I kill like a thousand ppl in 15 min n tht too with my bare hands”

“See thts wat a real Hero shud do, thts y I decided to teach this bond a lesson n come up with my own version of the movie.”

“And who will be the better person to direct the movie than Anil paaji, who crafted such a action-patriotic movie Gadar.”

Anil sharma was in 7^th heaven.

My next question was to Anil. “so wats the exact script for the movie...can u elaborate a bit??”

Again b4 anil cud utter a word,sunny paaji was back in full flow,with all the hand gestures n all..

“Oye in this movie I’ll be playing a indian super spy Agent 420 who works for the super secret indan spy agency SAI(spy agency of india). Now see this is my super secret name but I go around by the name Rahul Khanna.My main job is to nab all the terrorists cmg to india from pakistan and also the people who support them here.”

“hmm... Interesting...”

“Now I come to know abt this guy name MaKKu JuaRRI, who is a owner of a chain of Matka dens, who is supporting various terrorists organizations by giving them part of his income. Now he lives in the neighboring country, n he also has a Interpol red corner notice against him. He’s india’s most wanted criminal.”

“Now comes the interesting part... I have to get close to him so tht I can get hold of him... So I decide to romance his sister...so to clearly show this...we have some song and dance sequences with his sister...btw the music for the movie has been given by none other than the super duper hit Himmesh reshamiya.”

“While I dance around the trees the whole day, the whole nite I am at his dens, winning crores of rupees every nite n thus helping Indian govt pay back its loan...isnt tht so original???”

I am juz on the verge of fainting, when paaji screams again.

“Now bcoz of me winning crores every nite, Makku keeps a close eye on me. One day he comes n meets me. our introduction goes like this.”

Makku: Hello.Who r u??

Khanna: The name’s Khanna jo apne dushmano ko khilata hai Ganna(sugarcane)

“Now one day when I meet my heroine, I tell her tht I m the super spy agent n tell her all abt the sins his brother has committed. Now she being in madly love with me...decides to support me...But she has a habit of speaking in her sleep. So as u mite have guessed Makku comes to know abt my intentions....so he sends some terrorists to india to get my Mother.”

“Now I goto his den using all my super spy skills killing all his subordinates with my bare hands..see tht’s wat real mard’s do...I also do some dhishoom- dhishoom with Makku n manage to kill him somehow.”

“B4 killing him I also manage to get his locker key. So after killing him I get all his money n using tht money I manage to clear india of all its debts.............”

Next thing I hear is my Mom screaming (quite similar to Sunny paaji I must admit)... “Paresh get up...ur office cabs comes in 15 min....”

Big brands big money...

2007-03-12T05:45:00.000-07:00

Last sunday, i had gone to Metro,a wholesale mall...its part of the German Retailer major Metro...
U have to have a membership in order to shop there,as it is for shopowners only...
i had heard tht some of the stuff is dirt cheap thr...n believe it or not it was...i got a Puma shoe for 1000 bucks n its market price was 4000 bucks!!!
so the questions is do these big brands charge so much juz for the brand names?? or else how wud it be possible for a shop like metro to sell a 4K kaa item for a 75% discount n still make money on it...no wonder all these big brands like nike,adidas,puma,reebok,lee cooper(all the shoes were available for flat 800 bucks at metro) have become such huge companies n sponsor so many teams n have all the highest paid players on their payrolls...
we also as foolish as we get buy juz bcoz ur neighbour or ur friend has got some branded thing buy this stuff at exhorbitant prices when the same quality is available for much much less...imagine at wat price Puma must be making these shoes wen metro can sell it for 1K...
So next time juz think of how much extra u r shelling out juz to have tht Nike's swoosh or Puma's puma on ur accessory....
signing off..

Red Devils riding on their Luck

2007-03-05T02:25:00.000-08:00

Saturday evening saw one of the oldest n most fiercely contested football rivalries resume once again.... The ReD DeViLS vs. The ReDs n the match didnt dissappoint at all... 90 min of awesome display of football..though in the end Liverpool must be blaming themselves for not winning after dominating the major part of the match... until 40 min into the match Reyna didnt have to make a save shows how good football liverpool were playing...but football is abt getting it rite at the rite moment..rather than maintaining the momentum thruout...n MaN U did just tht by scoring thru a John O' Shea goal at the death n well then they had only 2 min to defend n they did it...The match was fiercely contested...with Liverpool having several chances in the 1st half but everytime refused by the in form Van der Sar...But Man U finally settled a bit in the 2nd halff with some chances coming their way...including the Loius saha fall in the penalty area, which i think was a sure penalty....Man U's frustration could be seen frm the reaction of Paul scholes after a tackle with Xavi Alonso which got him a red card...But in the end their persistence paid off n they won the game 1-0.
Man U have been really lucky this season...Last week also they won by scoring the winning goal rite at the death...ronaldo's brillant run getting him his 16th goal of the season....this week also Ronaldo was the architect of the solo goal scored by O'Shea...spot on free kick,but reyna failed to collect the ball properly giving the unmarked O'Shea a simple oppurtunity in front of the goal...n not many miss frm such close ranges...
Not only Man U have been lucky with the goals but also with their players...for every match sir Alex has almost everyone to select frm unlike chelsea who have their plates full with injuries...who until the end must be feeling good tht Man U wud be finally dropping some pts...but as luck wud have it....it was Man U's day n they extended the lead to a massive 12 pts,which chealsea by late evening brought down to 9 pts with a game in hand...
But to put it in his own(sir Alex) words "You need that bit of luck to win a championship, there is no question about it."

Microsoft first - then Google wants world domination

2007-02-26T03:00:00.000-08:00

This article is frm The Observer By John Naughton....Found It Interesting...

Psst ... want a $64 trillion question? Well, here it is: what is Google up to? I don't mean what is it doing in public; I mean what is the company really up to?

The simple-minded answer is that it's going after Microsoft. After all, this week Google announced that it was bundling its 'data in the cloud' applications (email, instant messaging, calendar, word processing, spreadsheets) in a commercial package called 'Google Apps Premier Edition', which will sell for $50 per annum and comes with 10GB of storage per user, application programming interfaces to enable data migration, technical support and a guarantee of 99.9 per cent availability. It's basically an online Office suite and is targeted at small businesses, schools, universities, clubs and social groups.

Google executives went to great pains to pooh-pooh the idea that they were targeting Microsoft Office. 'We are not in this to get Microsoft,' said Dave Girouard, general manager of Google's business software division. 'We are in this to offer more compelling choices for consumers and businesses.' Quite so. And it may well be that for some organisations, the prospect of being able effectively to outsource their office IT operations for $50 per employee per year may be attractive - especially when they realise that to get the Google services they don't need to pay for Windows licences either: all they need is Firefox running on Linux - both free programmes.

Recently, a Merrill Lynch analyst estimated that Microsoft Office cost companies $60 to $120 annually per user, assuming the software is used over a two- to three-year cycle. And that doesn't include the cost of the operating system or of the level of technical support needed to run a Microsoft-based network. It's been reported that Google already has more than 100,000 small businesses using Google Apps and that 'hundreds' of universities have allegedly signed up for the education version of the package.

On the other hand, Office has more than 450 million users worldwide, and we know from experience that the pace of transition from one computing paradigm to another can be glacial. So I can't see many people in Microsoft's Seattle HQ getting too worked up about the latest Google move, however many waves it causes in media circles.

As it happens, I suspect that Google's canny onslaught on Microsoft is just a diversionary sideshow. Something much bigger is afoot. It's about bandwidth, infrastructure and - ultimately - effective control of the net.

Here are two clues. First, Google is currentlya very profitable company. It has money to burn, and it's been burning it in some interesting ways. Chief among them is the purchase of colossal amounts of network bandwidth - the fibre-optic cabling that forms the backbone of the net.

PBS columnist Robert Cringely reports a recent conversation in which a bandwidth broker - someone who buys and sells bandwidth on fibre-optic networks around the world - told him that Google now controlled more network fibre than any other organisation on the planet.

Second, Google has been building large numbers of data centres - 'server farms' with tens of thousands of computers in each - and locating them all over the US and elsewhere in the world. The company is very secretive about this for reasons of security, which is fair enough. But people have begun to notice that some of these distributed data centres are situated near electrical power-generation plants.

So we have two curious facts: Google has acquired fabulous amounts of bandwidth capacity, for which it has no obvious use; and it's putting local data centres all over the place. Why would it be doing this? What's the factor that links these two observations?

The answer is simple: video. You may have noticed in the last six months how YouTube has transformed computers into a natural platform for watching video. And this is just the beginning. We're moving towards a world in which a significant amount of television programming will be delivered via the internet. Indeed, you could say that we're almost there already: it's been estimated, for example, that half of all internet traffic is now generated by BitTorrent, a file-sharing application that is being used mainly to transfer video files (many of them illicit) over the network.

But BitTorrent is a minority sport. Most people have never heard of it. What will happen, however, when getting hold of video via the net becomes a mainstream activity?

The answer is that the network, in its current form, won't be able to cope. And that's before high-definition television - which is even more of a bandwidth hog - becomes commonplace. The obvious solution to the problem would be to have an infrastructure that consisted of tens of thousands of localised data centres (which could cache video content), linked by high-speed fibre-optic channels.

Any company which had built such an infrastructure could effectively dictate its own terms, because only it could deliver what consumers had learned to crave. Such a company would, in effect, control the world.

If that comes about, we will have been well and truly Googled.

Bad Week...

2007-02-24T04:58:00.000-08:00

Its sat n its 6.30pm n i m still in office :( ...thr r hardly ne ppl in the office...the place daily buzzing is suddenly quiet n dull...feels like i m one of the last remaining ppl on earht..hehe..newayz this has been a very very long week...Even the work has been quite a handful...although thu was good...actually Music n Lyrics made my day....i skipped dinner for te movie...had my dinner at 12.00am at Empire...the veg food thr suks.. :( ...barring tht its been a bad week...didnt study a bit...didnt watch ne of the CL matched completely n to top it all had to come n work on sat... :(

one of my frenz here left the company today...she's getting married in april...i've known her for the past 5 yrs...she's been a good friend n i only hope she gets wat she wants her whole life n everyday of the rest of her life is juz as she wants it to be... :)

Its quite wierd though...Many of my pals are getting married....feels like i've aged too much...its been juz 6 months we've been out of college n ppl have already moved on at lightining speed...i dont want to say tht marrying at this age is bad..but somehow its weird..cant help it...

Newayz somethings are bound to change...cant help it...too tired to write nemore...even the song i m listening doesnt make me feel ne better....

Signing off...

POP! Goes My Heart

2007-02-23T07:07:00.000-08:00

Y'day i watched a movie(which btw is a custom widely known as DA THU RITUAL n ofcourse followed by FRI ALL NITE MOVIE MARATHON ). So as per the ritual yday's movie was Music and Lyrics starring Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore...grant's movies alwayz have something to offer n he didnt disappoint this time either...To describe the movie in one line "POP! Goes My Heart"...
The movie's about a former Pop start Alex Fletcher(Grant) who popularity has dipped miserably n his only remaining fans are the ladies in their 30's...Suddenly one day he's asked by the new sensation Cora Corman(Haley Bennett) in 4 days,who is just ahead of Shakira in terms of album sales...n is a Buddha freak...He's trying to compose a song when enters drew barrymore n ends up helping him to complete the song...She in between also falls for him...In the meantime Cora has created hjer own sensual version of the song composed by alex n drew...drew try n convinces her but to no avail...n as alex's future is at stake he goes ahead with cora with the song...this leaves drew devasted n so she leaves for miami to take care of her sis business...Altough she comes back for the cora's concert...n ofcourse surpised to see tht alex n cora r singing her own version of the song...so alex n drew after kiss n tell get together....
Well not much of a story but the dialogues n the songs carry the movie aptly forward...especially the one liners of Alex are awesome...
Alex: Theoretically, I could pick you up because I will be taking a cab.
Sophie: I could be standing outside at 9:40 in bright orange clothes, so you wouldn't miss me...
Alex: Oh good, you'll get some road work done while you wait then.

Even sophie has her own share...tis is the one after she watches cora's new version of her creation..."Are you trying to tell me that you enjoyed that orgasm set to the "Gandhi" Soundtrack?"

All the songs are awesome as well...The movie starts with POP! Goes My Heart The hip movement in the song by alex n his band are awesome...n they shake their hip so much tht All of them have to undergo a Hip Replacement...hehe....
The other notable song is Way Back into Love....Its a love song...i generally dont listen to this genre...but its a really nice composition...
All in all a good light hearted romantic comedy... :)

Did you felt this way on your last day in college?................

2007-02-19T06:32:00.000-08:00

raah dekhi thi is din ki kabse
aage ke sapne saja rakhe the naajane kab se

bade utavle the yahaan se jaane ko
zindagi ka agla padaav paane ko

par naa jane kyon ..dil mein aaj kuch aur aata hai waqt ko rokne ka jee
chahta hai

jin baton ko lekar rote the, aaj un par hansi aati hai na jaane kyon aaj
un palon ki yaad bahut aati hai

kaha karte the ..badi mushkil se char saal seh gaya par aaj kyon lagta
hai ki kuch peeche reh gaya

na bhoolne wali kuch yaadein reh gayi

meri taang ab kaun kheencha karega
sirf mera sir khane kaun mera peecha karega

jahaan 2000 ka hisaab nahin wahaan 2 rupay ke liye kaun ladega kaun raat
bhar saath jag kar padega

KAUN MERI gaadi mujse pooche bina lejayega kaun mere naye naye naam
banayega

mein ab bina matlab kis se ladoonga
bina topic ke kisse faalto baat karoonga

kaun fail hone par dilasa dilayega
kaun galti se number aane par gaaliyaan sunayega

Sadak mein Beer kis ke saath piyoonga
wo haseen pal ab kis ke saath jiyoonga

aise dost kahaan milenge
jo khai mein bhi dhakka de aayein
par fir tumhein bachane khud bhi kood jayein

mere gaano se pareshaan kaun hoga
kabhi muje kisi ladki se baat karte dekh hairaan kaun hoga

kaun kahega saale tere joke pe hansi nahin aai kaun peeche se bula ke
kahega..aage dekh bhai

movies mein kiske saath dekhhonga
kis ke saath boring lectures jheloonga

mere farzee certificates ko raddi kehne ki himmat kaun karega bina dare
sachi rai dene ki himmat kaun karega

achanak bin matlab ke kisi ko bhi dekh kar paglon ki tarah hansna na
jaane ye fir kab hoga keh do doston ye dobaara sab hoga

doston ke liye professor se kab lad payenge kya hum ye fir kar payenge

raat ko 2 baje poha khane aur cig pine station kaun jayega tez gaadi
chalane ki shart kaun lagayega

kaun muje mere kabiliyat par bharosa dilayega aur jyada hawa mein udne
par zameen pe layege

meri khushi mein sach mein khush kaun hoga mere gam mein muj se jyada
dukhi kaun hoga

Road Trip

2007-02-13T01:28:00.000-08:00

Well its been over 15 days since i came back frm kerala...but i ws a lil busy..so cudnt write about it...
Me n my friends had been planning a road trip for a long long time...but due to lack of holidays the plan juz wasnt materializing....but then came 26th Jan..thank god we became republic on tht day...As it was a friday..it provided an excellant oppurtunity for our long awaited trip.
Preparations started well in advance...we were a total of 8 ppl...now came the important que...which vehicle to hire for the road trip...after lots of debates we finally settled for 2 indicas... but as this being a start of new yr.....our beloved a certain Mr.Murphy was on a roll....we cudnt get 2 indicas :( ...n it was juz the beginning...As we were not getting indicas,we settled for Innova.This decision juz further aggrevated our problems(one of my frenz had already backed out bcoz of healt problems)...one more guy backed out...coz he didnt feel safe in such a big car..to say it in his own words...HE was not confident of other's driving...n if u think thats the end of it,one more backed out n tht too the day before we were leaving for MUNNAR...somehow we got another one of our frenz to come along....
So there were we...6 of us...Paresh Zawar(ChaCha),Gaurav Desai(Uncle M),Amit Aggarwal(ORCA),Vinayak Shete(Scout),Kaustubh Shete(Garam Gullu) n Aadish Katkar(ChopStick)...on the nite of 24th jan stuk nr. Forum waiting for the traffic to break free n to start our wat was to be one hell of a road trip....n i mean it...
After breaking free frm the Bangalore traffic which put us back by 3 hrs behind our orig schedule...we were crusing along the NH4 towards Salem...we stopped for a quick air pressure chk arnd 30 kms...wen the reins were handed over to Scout....n as all 1st timers...he screwed up b4 settling in...He coudnt find the gear lever while driving w/o lites!!!...n frm tht moment i knew we were in for a 1 hell of an experience...We reached Salem(203kms) smoothly except 3 police checkposts,where they checked our car completely n inspite of not finding a thing worng kept on demanding money n we kept on refusing it...One of the bastards even threatened us...but we remained adamant...Salem onwards we took the NH-47 till tirupur...frm whr we took the road state highway to munnar thru the Chinnar forest n some place called Poor Man's OOTY...hehe...In between scout also managed to kill a poor cat...the poor thing came under rear left tire while trying to cross the road...n after tht scout was all like,"Oh SHIT!! I killed a cat...."...he was hystrical to say the least...Around 5 in the morning we entered kerala...All of us were up n were on the lookout for elephants in the chinnar forest....but all we could see is....1 OWL :( ...alas...the road though is very scenic...we were around at Marayoor around 40kms short of munnar wen we had our breakfast at a road side dhaba...man the setting was perfect..a river flowing thru the valley rite next to the dhaba...we also discovered 2 Chai freaks amongst us...Scout n ChopStick...they can drink tea in their sleep....The road from marayoor to munnar is extremely scenic...vast stretches of tea estates on both sides of the roads...its juz to beautiful to describe in words... green green n more green everywhr u look... Kerala is truly GOD's OWN COUNTRY...
We reached Munnar arnd 8...then found a good cottage for 1000 bucks...we had to sleep...specially me n uncle M hadnt slept a wink...After lunch we decide to go to the tea factory...wen we reached thr we were told tht its a tea museum!!!...wat the heck does a tea museum have...50 yr old tea leaves or maybe older...we decided to skip it n instead went to some waterfall(sorry ppl cant remember southie names)...The ride as usual was some sight...tea gardens again donning both sides of the roads...but the road was juz too narrow n we were in the beast...The waterfall was a tad too short of water but nonetheless was a good place...Then we headed to the matipetti dam...set in a pictursque location...its one of the important dams in kerala...It also resembles of the Hoover Dam....It was getting quite cold n also nite was abt to fall...so we decided to goto the echo point n call it a day...The echo point was quite scary...all cloudy in the twilite reminded me of some horror setting...From the echo point wen heading back to munnar we decide to take a walk in the jungle...we went a lil inside n came across the lake of the matepetti dam...had to stop our lil jungle safari there only :( ....By the time we reached munnar it was nearing dinner time...we did a bit of shopping..teas n chocolates...n then ate at a roadside joint...Food was ok n the bill for 6 ppl was juz 136 bucks!!!...We had seen most of the other points on our way to munnar from marayoor n we were already out of places to waste 2 more days...so over a cup of hot steaming coffee we decided to hit the backwaters...so according to our new plan we'll leave at 5am on 26th...goto the periyar lake n then goto allepey...
But Mr.Murphy wasnt done with us yet...We were almost out of gas...n whoa all the bunks in munnar close by 8pm n by the time the new plan was official it was already 10pm :( ...n the bunks open only by 8am...so we decided to leave munnar asap the next morning...During the new plan formulation scout came up with a really awesome stuff...to put it in his own words "Lets not goto the backwaters...instead we'll goto tirupur n buy loads of briefs n vests"...i almost died of laughing at his god knows frm whr suggestion...
26th Jan: I got up at 6.30 in the morning n was trying to wake p all the others but to no avail..So i put on a malayalam music channel on full volume...All the others were up in minutes...That day i also came to know tht there has been a tamil remake of DON too..starrin none other than Rajnikanth...newayz after a real heavy breakfast we bid adieu to munnar "The darjeeling of South India" n headed south towards periyar wildlife sanctuary...The road to periyar was even more scenic than the one to munnar...we were cutting the clouds on our way... it was an amazing experience...cutting thru clouds,passing vast tea estates n spice plantations... After around 4 hours of driving thru winding roads we reached periyar at 12.30pm n we headed straight for the boat ride,where u can see elephant herds drinking thur the periyar lake,which by the way is a man made lake...Murphy was again on our ass...no sooner than we stood in the line for the than the tikets for the 1 clock ride were sold out...the next ride was at 3pm..so we went to the town for lunch...after lunch whr ORCA suffered a lot...tht juz wasnt his day....we went back to the lake..the counter had opened 5 minutes back n again no sooner than we stood in the line for the than the tix..i leave this to ur imagination...After what had started as an interesting adventure ended in a big disappointment...The only good thing tht happened all afternoon was a site of a 2 ASS ELEPHANT...It was a stone statue of a elephant n frm both sides u can see its ass...so the 2 assed elephant...newayz we again went to the town..did some shopping n then headed onto our next destination Allepey...It was anpther 150kms n the ride was good as had been the rest of it...While halfway thru the road we stoppedat a roadside teastall...scout n chopstick the kind of coffee freaks tht they r ordrered 4 coffees..n tht was the ugliest looking coffee in the whole world...it was some weird brown color with some white stuff floating on it...Chopstick had a sip n he made the worst face possible n i juz cudnt stop laughing...i cudnt ctrl it..i was literally rolling on the road with laughter...n tht coffee was a mere 3 bucks...Most of the roads in kerala are very well maintained...We reached allepey arnd 8.30...n we headed straight to the beach...the beach's infested with crabs...so we had to leave the beach..now it was time to find a hotel for the nite but one more disaster struck... our car got stuck in the sand n it juz wont come out...we had to shell out 200 bucks to the locals who got it out somehow...whew...now we had to find some place to sleep...gullu the gr8 bargainer that he is got us 2 rooms worth 2000 bucks for 1K :) ...n plus the room had tv's ...we also watched the man u's FA cup win over some side...
28th Jan: Morning came early...gullu n orca went to look for a boat for the backwater tour....meanwhile the rest of us had an awesome breakfast at the restaurant... i also tried my hands on the innova in the resort itself...Orca was scared to death frm my driving..he he... newayz around 10.30 we left for the backwater tour...if u goto kerala this is the 1 thing u oughta do it...without it the trip's incomplete...it was an awesome experience...u juz sail around njoing wat nature has in store for u...the 6 hr drive was amazing...plus we also had to chance to drive the boat..u actually drive it..it has steering,gears n all...i must say i m a much better sailor than i m a car driver...we also had lunch at a lakeside restaurant while going back towards allepey... we also had a chance to look at the worlds largest snakeboat...
After a long cruise it was time to pack up n head back towards b'lore... This drive also had its own experiences...Scout almost knocked out a man...i mean tht was real real close... gullu was in full blast after the incident... yelling on top of his voice....but scout was unfazed...i must say shete's are weird...then thr was the 27 hair pin curve ghat...but innova's juz cruised thru it....its 1 awesome car....n thts not the end of journey yet...the apparent National highway NH-207 sucks like nething...its not even a road...its a bed of craters!!...feels like u r driving on moon..even moon will have much smaller craters than this...Uncle M was driving n i was acting as his cleaner n the rest were sleeping like its was the last time they will ever get to sleep...to get the car back in piece to b'lore,we decided to take a little longer route..the mysore-b'lore road...with no more potholes i juz cudnt keep my eyes open n i too joined the other 4...i think even uncle M drove frm there to b'lore half sleep...n somehow at 6am on the 29th reached bangalore...n after a short nap of 2hrs again had to go to the office n had to stay back till 9.30pm :( ...
Watever may the small glitches we faced it was an awesome trip...Kerala's juz too green to believe...no doubt its GOd's own Country... :)

One hell of a Week

2007-01-23T22:07:00.000-08:00

This week started on a really bad note....The Red Devils lost and that too to Gunners :-( ... hello gunners... n they completed a season double... n it came at a time when they had a chance to go 9 points clear at the top... great great oppurtunity lost....but thats how football is... too much unpredictability...

But it was juz the beginning...My long planned Munnar trip was in for a toss too...One of friends had to be admitted...so he backed out...n 1 more was on the verge of it bcoz of work...the IT companies juz kill pp with work...BASTARDS... newayz after a lot of search found another guy..n lemme tell u it was no less than a herculian task to find him...but god bless him for coming in at a such a short notice....

i've been planning to go to Munnar for such a long time...finally the plan seems to be taking off...have heard so much about the place...very excited abt the visit...cant wait to get out of bangalore...this year been working a lot...never thought i'll ever work so much...so a much needed breather...