2008

Some call it annus horribilis...

It would be more appropriate for the world to call annus anus!

Heart bleeds

Long after...

* the shrill talking heads turned silent
* a meek speech was mumbled
* a Deshdhrog's head rolled

..pain of hurt to a city whose attacked landmarks have personal memories & attachments will linger on.

Moon mission

I know this sounds cynical and insulting to our great scientists...

I would rather that the Indian government looks at the craters on the road I travel to work than worry about the geological composition of lunar craters.

How are you doing?

As yet another call began with an inane "How are you doing?" from the other end.

I muttered silently "If you find me on the road in a pool of blood, would you rush me to the hospital or worry about the upholstery of your car"

Three coffees one conversation

One said "I don’t invest in stock markets and keep money in fixed deposits, see I am insulated from all this chaos"

Other said "You should never look to time the market. You should buy at each fall and sell after you have reached your target gains"

I realized why they ask people to be silent at a funerals.

Retirement

Good thing about cricketers is not their million dollar bank balances, beautiful bollywood women in their lives, travel around the world.

It is their ability to retire when they have had enough of the job they are in!

Sloth

In TN people have கால்
In TX people have கார்

San Antonio

What do you call a place

* Hotter than Chennai
* More laidback than Pune
* As much public transport as Antartica
* More Mexican restaurants than Chihuahua...

Home without family!

Meeting at the Airport

He met at her at the airport,serendipitous though. Words, college nostalgia, crush trivia & poetry later, they parted with each other's contact info.

He hurriedly got online, found her blog had nothing but tastefully laid out recipes and elaborate food photography. He reminisced the intense verses and rabid prose she embellished the college mag with. He got offline as swiftiy as he came in, when he realized the only person she was linkedin was her husband who surprisingly had 250 contacts. "oh loser" he muttered before he turned the TV on.

With a slight trepidation she opened his blog to find nothing but psycho-babble and wretched monologues. Wondered where his vivacity and wicked wit disappeared. Sadly, he had less than half the number of contacts that her hubby had in linkedin. "Poor one" she mumbled as she approved yet another comment from a desperate male on her blog thanking her for the recipe and asking her email address.

Job Changes

He was thinking about the various jobs he had been in and thought he wouldn't have been in so many jobs had he been thinking then

Business Exceptions

When the rules are exceptionally strong,business begins to run on exception as a rule!

F5

F5 button should be renamed as "depress" from "refresh"...as it keeps eroding wealth by the minute that one had accumulated over a lifetime!

Spirit of the game

"Only one team played in the spirit of the game" Kumble's statement had layered connotations. By using an intensely Aussie line (Woodfull's line against Bodyline bowlers) Anil demonstrated that cricket in India is beyond just cricketers.

It is about script writers, media moguls, incredible money and fleeting fame.

As I watched the series I could see enormous well-oiled commercial machines in action. A TV channel trying to build the hype cycle to fuel its viewership, websites trying to outdo each other calling cricketers "wild dogs", news channels airing Rahul Dravid's dismissal as though it was someone pointing a pistol at the Prime Minister.

Any one with a semblance of cricketing knowledge would agree that the umpiring was rough. If you have watched Anil Kumble's 10 for against the Pakis you would remember the first wicket of Afridi (When Pakistan was 104 for no loss chasing 400 odd) was a shocker. If you have seen matches lost on bad umpiring decisions, you would shrug your shoulders and move on.

India should introspect into
* Why Dhoni was playing soccer having escaped 4 or 5 LBW shouts
* Why someone cricket "expert" Arun Lal famously sound bited "If I pick an Indian team, I will pick Yuvraj first and the rest next" takes more time walking on and off the crease than spending time in it?
* If Kumble can stay not out in the crease batting manly, why can't the superstar batsmen in the team survive even a reasonable duration

Having said all that the best way to redeem yourself is to prove to the world that given a decent pitch and even umpiring, we can draw with Australia in Perth.

Else, we can ask a clever spin doctor to come with an even punchier line in the next press conference!