Ain't no Baloney, Mistah!

The Gita

2007-11-15T00:56:00.000-08:00

I have taken to reading the Bhagavad Gita and also a book dedicated to the 3rd Chapter - Karma Yoga: The Path Of Action (Thanks Arjun!). While I probably need to finish reading the books in their entirety to write about that the thoughts that it invoked and the effect that it has had on me, I would nevertheless like to dogear certain verses here from time to time:

"The Yogi who is established in his Self and who is even minded all the time and at all the places develops the equal vision where by he sees the Self in all beings and all beings in the Self".(Chapter 6: Verse 29)

"Restless senses can forcibly carry away the mind of even a wise person striving for perfection. One's intellect becomes steady when one's senses are under complete control. One develops attachment to sense objects by thinking about sense objects. Desire for sense objects comes from attachment to sense objects, and anger comes from unfulfilled desires. Delusion or wild idea arises from anger. The mind is bewildered by delusion. Reasoning is destroyed when mind is bewildered. One falls down from the right path when reasoning is destroyed." (Chapter 2: Verses 60-63)

Apparently the not-quite-the-right-fit works!

2007-10-22T03:00:00.000-07:00

The media is abuzz about Bobby Jindal's being elected the governor of Louisiana. Now, I can't proclaim to make a confident political commentary nor am I inclined to make any sort of personal comments, but thought I would quickly jot down some of the facts that you can ponder about!

1. Louisiana is one of the states with lowest immigration stock.
2. It is also the nation's poorest state, measured by per capita and one of its unhealthiest; the worst in infant mortality; and the least educated. It is last in attracting new college-educated workers (Source : The NY times)
3. Bobby Jindal, in his owns words, is 100% against abortion. He originally belongs to the country with the second highest population in the world.
4. Jindal is an enthusiastic supporter of the war in Iraq. In 2005, Jindal led other freshman Republican House members in dipping their fingers in purple dye to celebrate the 2005 Iraqi national elections (Source : Wikipedia)
5. His comments on the Hurricane Katrina "The storms didn’t cause all of our problems —they revealed a lot of our problems. It’s an incredible opportunity to change the state.”

A Brief Sojourn at The Coffee Kingdom

2007-10-19T23:57:00.001-07:00

You would think writing about a blissful holiday should be something that one would normally jump at...But then again, you are also probably one of those kinds who does not know how to get an assprint permanently embossed on your chair. So trust me, you would not understand!

Late last August, we decided to take a break from the oft-repeated off-beaten tracks of Goa and venture into something that we have not tried too much together. I could only muster up a couple of days off and so the war between coffee kingdoms was won by Chikmagulur. Honestly, I have been very keen on doing Coorg, but we thought it would be better if we could try that when we have more time on my hands and more dough in our pockets (I don't know whether that will EVER happen!).

Chikmagulur, for the slightly intiated, is Cafe Coffee Day County. For the totally uninitiated, is nestled between the big and beautiful mountain ranges of Baba Budan Giri, about 260 kms off Bangalore. Known for its rich coffee estates on its outer fringes, it is actually a quaint little town with little country clubs where the rich coffee lords and their plump wives get together and drink anything but coffee!

We took an overnight KSRTC Volvo bus from Bangalore (started at about 11.30 p.m) and the journey to Chikmagulur took around 6 hours. So in the wee hours of the morning, we found ourselves in the middle of a quiet bus stand. Luckily, I had earlier managed to get some contact details of hotels on karnataka tourism website and had done a phone booking at what seemed (online!) to be a decent place called Planter's Court. It turned out to be fairly decent hotel, with a nice Udipi restaurant bordering it. That place served the best coffee that I have had in a very loooong time(Not counting Mum's..) - strong, dark, not-so-sweet and more importantly, non-stringent!!

Armed with a very scanty knowledge about the town , we set out to check out 'Ratnagiri Park', which was part of the town itself. This park had its own little toy train, tree house, a pond and the likes. Pretty much the standard stuff, but the main attraction was the breathtaking view of the surrounding hills.

It was about mid-afternoon, when we made our way to the bus-stand again to enquire about how to get to either Mullainagiri or Baba Budan Giri. From whatever little information we could gather from the locals, the former was the highest peak in Karnataka and the latter was the main point of attraction. Given the time we had on our hands, we decided to rent a jeep to head to Mullainagiri. The ride was quite torturous thanks to the generous monsoon-induced potholes on the road. Couple that with the absence of any sort of barricades on the mountain paths, beyond which there also seemed to be abyss all fogged out, the ride was quite a memorable one!

We reached the point from where we had to trek up a flight of stairs to get to a little temple. This was supposed to signify the highest point in Karnataka. The trek turned out to be a bit more arduous than we expected, simply because it was VERY chilly AND it was raining!! We didn't have windcheaters and since we didn't want to get out sweatshirts wet, we had to endure the climb wearing only our t-shirts. Needless to say, we were soon soaked to the bones due to the rain! Not to mention, we were virtually unprotected against the cold wind. We eventually managed to get to the peak and as it turns out, the temple itself was closed! We would have ideally lingered on there for longer, but for the rain and cold wind...So we got our asses back to firm ground soon!

Dinner was at the Club house in the hotel itself...Being a Sunday night, there seemed to be a lot of the usual family dinner outings in progress..Most of the tables there seemed to house people belonging to either one of these categories:

a) the newly-wed kinds crouching towards in barely-visible corners.
b) the quintessential nuclear family types ( You know..with the husband staring jealously at the men who get to smoke, the wife stealing glances at the fake jewellery of the woman in the next table, the children looking ever so bored even while staring at the TV screens)
c) the oh-so-long table - with all the uncles on one side and all the aunties on one side and the conversation same-sex based!
d) And One table for the resident "tourists"! Us! Our camera, our extra layers of clothing in otherwise warm room, the hoots of excitement at finding a peg of premium whiksky for less than 50 bucks et al - think all these gave us away ;)

We began Day 2 with what else but filter coffee!! After a nice Udipi breakfast, we headed again to busstand from where we were to take a bus to Baba Budan Giri. After a wait of nearly an hour in the bus, which was spent in reading aloud a play and gathering some "why-don't-you-just-shut-up" glances, we began our nearly two hour journey to the hills..

The picturesque ride was quite worth all the effort! The road winds and unwinds through the green ranges..
We passed a few estates and were told that the monsoon is not the best time to visit these estates because of the impending danger of leeches! The mid-day mist seem to a large icing on the big green cake that the ranges were! We reached the point beyond which we had to take a jeep to reach the waterfall, which was about 3 kms up...We could have trekked this journey, but for the lack of time - we had to be back by 4-4.30 in order to catch the return bus back to Chikmagulur...

More than waterfall itself, the instant thing to greet you were the amount of clothes strewn around near the waterfall!
We suspected it to be chaddis which people flung after taking a shower in the waterfall! There were also these stones which were being worshipped as a deity...In true southie style, people broke coconuts before this deity..Of course these seem to be offerings more for the monkeys in and around the place than for the God!!

The view of the valley from this point was so breathtaking and it was made even more enjoyable by the hot chai and pakodas! We then headed to this cave shrine which was popularly known as the "hindu-muslim" temple! It actually turned to a beautiful dargah tucked away beneath the ground in a cave, where natural rock formations were being worshipped..Although Photography was prohibited, I couldn't help sneak in a couple of shots of the place!

We began the journey back down and were back in Chikmagulur by the dusk...Dinner was back at the Clubhouse..But it was a lot quieter that day! And this time, we ensured we didn't look the part of tourists so much! After sleeping for a few hours, we were up before dawn to catch the bus back to Bangalore...It was a trip unlike anything we have ever had and we are sure to remember the beautiful town and its heavenly surroundings for a looong while!

I remember....

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

The smile that this evergreen opening credits inspired..

Off you go..down the memory lane!

P.S: Sidd/Nitin - This is for you guys!

Last Kiss

2007-07-30T05:08:00.000-07:00

Much as I am a sucker for movies with good soundtracks, the real reason I wanted to pick up the DVD for this movie, 'Last Kiss' was the whole plot surrounding the big ‘3-0(h)’ crisis. True, it’s probably NOT the most original of concepts (It’s also adapted from an Italian movie called ‘L’Ultimo Bacio’) – The protagonist is fast approaching his 30th birthday, has a job that he is good at, has a girlfriend who just seems perfect in more ways than one and is going to have a baby with her. It’s sort of like the ideal situation that he has always wanted to be in when he hits the 30 mark. But of course, not all is fine. The fact that life seems too programmed and planned out is a little too scary for him. There doesn’t seem to be any lofty surprises in store in the future too. So he chokes, acts on the first temptation that comes his way and then everything comes crashing down hard.

So what’s interesting about a ‘rosy-life-suddenly-turns-sour’ story, you ask? Well, for one – the movie is a mere instrument to tell the story, as it is. It’s completely brazen in its honesty. While the story unfolds with the choices that the protagonist makes and the repercussions that it has on his relationship with his girlfriend, it does not falter into taking sides and getting into an unnecessary imbroglio of pity-induced patronage of the victim and unabated bashing of the wrongdoer. There’s no good vs. evil spin here and most of the characters are in some sort of fix when it comes to their relationships. All due credit needs to be given to the right casting choices as well. Zach Braff is just right for the role of the guy who is thrown into the throngs of confusion by how well life has worked out and how not very happy he is with that situation. Even though he visibly screws up by sleeping with a college girl, he does not immediately end up becoming hate-worthy in the eyes of the audience.

The movie just brought back the thoughts that I have always had about relationships. After being in one for close to four years now, I have come around to accepting one thing - ultimately you cannot escape that one truth about relationships– More often than not, it does not come easy. Sometimes, you just can’t expect it to assume its natural course. It does not all fall into place and you have to work very hard at it. Especially if you are one who has always lived life on your own terms, there will be times when your priorities, desires, ambitions and even inhibitions INDIVIDUALLY would threaten to gain more importance over the pathway that both of you have laid out for each other as a couple. When it comes down to a collision path such as that, I guess compromise works. But then again, I do believe the answer is finally lies in – well, the choices you make. Sometimes they are hard, sometimes they are plain friggin’ obvious. But heck, one way or the other, you have ‘em!

'ALJ' Residency!

2007-07-25T05:00:00.000-07:00

Heck...It's been an awfully long hiatus from blogging that any excuse, how much ever valid I can make it to be, would probably not work!

Anyway, I just had to write about this! An excerpt of a typical conversation that I find myself in the middle of, over and over again! As you will soon see, I really don't need to be wearing that " I am with Stupid" Tee !!

Act I/Scene 1- It's a Tuesday Evening at about 7.30 p.m. I was, not surprisingly, still stuck at work when my pal Sidd buzzes me.

Sidd : Give me a good word beginning with 'J'
Me : Jazzy! But hey, wait a minute, what the fuck do you need it for?
Sidd : Just tell me please!
Me : What is it for?! You are in the one in need!
Sidd : Bitch! Stop analyzing things so much!
Me : So why do you need it?!
Sidd : Argh! We are trying to come up with what ALJ could stand for... (ALJ Residency is the name of the apartment that Sidd stays at and we have no friggin' clue what ALJ stands for! You are probably wondering at this juncture as to why Sidd wants to expand the abbreviated form..That's probably because you don't know him and you also don't know that he takes special pride in saying outrageous things like "I have made out with (insert fabricated number) women! So what if I haven't gotten laid in the last two years!!" )
Me: Ahhh well...Lets see... It could be 'Association of....'
Sidd: No, no..we are looking at something like 'All about..'
Me: There aren't two A's in ALJ! It should be 'Association of Losers and....'
Sidd: Shuddddup!!!
Me: Jokers! There you go! How more appropriate can it get!
'Association of Losers and Jokers' Residency!! You are born so that you can live in this house!!
Sidd : What nonsense! Don't forget the other occupants! Especially Mr. Sandy 'Don Juan' G! We are talking about the studs of Bandra here!
Me : All the more reason for it to be called 'Association of
Losers and Jokers' residency! It's like the house for the socially handicapped!! I think I am gonna start publicizing this name now!
Sidd: You don't know who you are messing around with! After all,
you are talkinga bout the neighbours of Katty Kaif!! (Incidentally Ms.Kaif is 'supposedly' staying at an apartment off Waterfield Road, which is a good three lanes away from where these guys stay!
Me : Neighbour, my left ass! Oh hey...You guys can have another
roomie too! Kelly Dorji!
(About two months back, Mr. Dorji was alleged to have been shopping for veggies at the Pali Market, which is next to ALJ. A swank Lexus was also seen to be standing near with Lara Dutta sitting inside and sipping a frappe! Once Kelly Dorji was done shopping, he climbed back into the driver's seat...)
Sidd : Kelly Dorji is also a stud! He will fit right in!
Me : Right-o! A stud who shops and drives for his girlfriend! Now that he has been dumped and is staying at Versova, you guys should ask him to move in! After all, it's the house where the socially handicapped stay!
Sidd: Get lost! Women throng to our house! You are also one
of 'em! It's because it's the most happening spot in Bandra!!
Me : We visit so that you socially handicapped folks won't feel
left out! We show you some sympathy!
Sidd : You wretch! We will come up with a cool name...You just wait
and watch! Bye!
Me : Cya loser!

Act I/Scene 2 - It's about 10 p.m the same evening.I am lazing on my beanbag at home when I get a lameass SMS from Sidd. It reads 'Hi! Congratulations! You have been chosen as one of the esteemed friends of the occupants of the 'Absolute Love and Josh' Residency!' (LMAO! It should have probably read friends of 'esteemed' occupants...but then you have to excuse my friends...They are after all Losers/Jokers!) Then my phone rings again..

Sidd : So, did you get our SMS?
Me : Yeah! And I am still in splits..You guys are such losers!
Sidd : Shuddup! Thank your lucky stars that you are on our list and
you got this SMS!
Me : Lemme talk a not-so-wild guess! There were two people on that list...Me and Mishti (Sandy's girlfriend)..If Mishti's around at your place, then probably the list had only my name!
Sidd : What nonsense! We have such a long list!
Me : So who else is on the list?!
Sidd : That's classified information!
Me : Haha! You guys truly belong in the 'Association of Losers
and Jokers' Residency!
Sidd : You wretch! It's 'Absolute Love and Josh' Residency! Good night!

(Yes, yes...the rest of our conversations are also as pointless as this!)

The Sophisticated Beggar

2005-11-19T17:45:00.000-08:00

"He may be cantankerous and opinionated but through all this he remains a highly intelligent poet and a hopeless romantic blessed with a remarkable voice. Mostly, his entire recorded output is hugely underrated."

Lots have been said about Roy Harper - his prowess with the verses, his vehement self-indulgence, his lack of commercial success at a time when new arts and music movements were taking shape in a rampant manner, his stubbornness and uncomprising attitude when it comes toning down his opinions and according to me, mostly his opinions itself...But few and far between have stood the test of time as singer/songwriters who carved their own place in history by virtue of their poetical words alone. And Roy Harper tops my personal list of such people.

It's ironical that much of his popularity came thanks to the tribute paid by Led Zeppelin in their track, "Hats Off to (Roy) Harper". According to the band's axe man, Jimmy Page, who had collaborated with Harper on a few occasions, he was known best for his unflinching revert in the face of heavy pressure for being a sell out and a sucker for commercial success. A man who refused to tone down his views came to known more this act of his, rather than the views itself. In fact this part of his persona seemed to befit the message behind Pink Floyd's hit, "Have a Cigar", a song for which he lent his vocals.

While his biggest hit till date remains to be "When a Cricketer Leaves the Crease",a song where a cricketer retiring from the game is used a metaphor for life itself, the song which defines him and his music to me has been the track " I hate the white man", from his album "Flat Berserk and Baroque". This album was his first with his long lasting record label, Harvest Records, which led to him to Peter Jenner, the guy behind Pink Floyd's records, who would eventually start producing Harper's music too.

The track starts off with a monologue about the difference between the rich people and poor people with the background of their distinction being seemingly brought out by music.Harper maintains a very serene tone throughout the message while the undercurrent of the speech, the message itself, is anything but subtle. Here is the song which follows the speech. The man, when he opines, makes sure he leaves us gulping and how! Like any song with a strong message, this one is long. But the part that I always tend to concentrate its sheer poetic brilliance and the melody it has been constructed on. Boy! If I had a nickel for everytime I can come up with something like...."where the barefoot dream of life Can laugh and cry its fill ", "teargas happiness", "plastic excuse", "And sits to warm his toes around A fire made up of useless thoughts"!!

History 101 by Paul Simon

2005-10-14T21:15:00.000-07:00

I been Norman Mailered,MaxwellTaylored.
I been John O'Hara'd,McNamara'd.
I been Rolling Stoned and Beatled till I'm blind.
I been Ayn Randed, nearly branded
Communist, 'cause I'm left-handed.
That's the hand I use, well, never mind!

I been Phil Spectored, resurrected.
I been Lou Adlered, Barry Sadlered.
Well, I paid all the dues I want to pay.
And I learned the truth from Lenny Bruce,
And all my wealth won't buy me health,
So I smoke a pint of tea a day.

I knew a man, his brain was so small,
He couldn't think of nothing at all.
He's not the same as you and me.
He doesn't dig poetry. He's so unhip that
When you say Dylan, he thinks you're talking about Dylan Thomas,
Whoever he was.
The man ain't got no culture,
But it's alright, ma,
Everybody must get stoned.

I been Mick Jaggered, silver daggered.
Andy Warholed, won't you please come home?
I been mothered, fathered, aunt and uncled,
Been Roy Haleed and Art Garfunkeled.
I just discovered somebody's tapped my phone

- A Simple Desultory Philippic(Or How I was Lyndon Johnsoned into Submission) by Paul Simon

Oh! Play that thing!

2005-10-13T19:30:00.000-07:00

Maybe it was those years of NEVER forgetting to sign off a post on a forum without a N.P postscript...I have decided to tattoo my now playing list onto the side bar. It might not be very up-to-date (Where's technology when you need it? You have saunas in belts and T.Vs on your wrist, but those geekiod dudes haven't still figured out how to get my CD player to talk to my blog!), but hey, at least then, the oft-imposed "stop embrassing yourself" routines, would make me stop listening to Fiddy Cent ;)

Rockin' with a Southern Twang

2005-10-11T15:52:00.000-07:00

After one of my most adventurous shopping sprees, I found myself staring at a list that definitely needed a categorization called "Miscellaneous" in my CD rack. One among them was a more contemporary buy - Drops of Jupiter by Train.

This record has served as a much needed respite to my otherwise progressive-music-obsessed ear drums. Train's sound is very definitive throughout the course of album, bringing back flashes of reminiscences of altie bands bordering classic rock such as Counting Crows . Yet Patrick Monahan's southern twangy vocals give that not-so-somber edge to the tracks . And what is the most surprising element to the record, the band and the genre as a whole is their extensive employment of orchestrative elements to certain tracks, including the title one, which has apparently gone platinum. Somehow I could so imagine Michael Stipe aceing this track with much ease in a vocal trip which seemed (to me) to have been composed with him and only him in the mind. But not taking anything away from Monahan, who has thankfully not tried to do too much with the vocal bit and hence not taken the fizz away from the ensemble arrangements ( With all due respect and awe to the vocalists of progressive music, reaching the crescendo while the violins, the cellos and the piano hits the highest notes is something that does not always pay off). The record opens with the quintessential breezy rocksy number called "She's on Fire", replete with the singalong chorus, strong background vocal verses, a couple of groovy bass grooves and an otherwise uncomplicated melody, which Monahan takes from countryish to towering a little often ,before smoothening into a more classic sounding " I wish you would" with its "toda-todos". Drops of Jupiter comes in next and scores highly on good positioning as it distinguishes itself with its uniqueness from the first two tracks. The follow-up to this freshness is a very ordinary rendition of a straightforward melody called "It's about you". Next on the list "Hopeless" has this peaceful acoustic riff for a beginning, which resurfaces now and then in the track. The song called "Respect" took me aback with a drum roll akin to a song out of 'My generation' at the start, but that's where the similarity ended and so did my respect for the track, until the climactic verses where the pace of the song heightens rapidly without any warning or indication, much to your pleasure. "Let it roll"is a subdued ode to the vocalist's late mother,which has a longish instrumental patch uncharacteristic of their earlier tracks. Orchestral accompaniments rear their heads in "Something more", making you wonder and debate upon whether it should have been used in a more uninhibited manner or whether these fleeting glimpses of them which actually make them work. Near the tail end, 'whipping boy' has an expected structure with its forced soaring verses. At the tail end of the track list,"Getaway" has a melody line, which is pleasantly different. The last track would be my pick from the CD along with the title track being a close second. "Mississippi" has a strong bassline, which conventionally gets a lot of brownie points with me, an uncaged killer of an acoustic progression and sproadic saxophone trimmings, which leave a lasting impression and wins the reclusive presses on the "repeat" button.

I must reiterate the sound of Train is compact and very definitive, but the song structures and the genre itself to a great extent leave room for nothing than predictability. Something that I am not so used having been accustomed to my fair share of Steven Wilsons, Robert Fripps and Trent Gardners. But in its own rights, most of the songs have a crunchy overtone which is accentuated by Manohan's country singer-ish voice, with which he does not over strive too much and hence does not go for an overkill. The CD might have just a few brilliant sections, but more importantly it does not touch the sub standard curve ever. Whether or not, it would be spinning in my deck would be another question altogether, but it does reek in a 3 point on the 5 point scale quite comfortably.

Urgent Need : A reality check

2005-10-06T23:00:00.000-07:00

An article on one of the city's tabloids so read:

"Sexy actor Hugh Grant says he looks like a ‘butch lesbian’ with his hair cut short. The handsome star says he tried to change his trademark floppy hair style but it made him look “ugly”.

The Notting Hill star told Now magazine: “I tried to change. I had my hair cut off by Elizabeth Hurley’s hair person. Unfortunately I looked like a butch lesbian. I’m plug ugly with my hair cut off. Even Elizabeth couldn’t look at me."

What is Mr. Grant trying to imply here? That he prefers to look like a 20-years-too-late-to-be-in-a-boy-band dude, with his Botox-ed face, reading all of two expressions all the time and endorsing the word "sissy" ?! And hey, somebody please tell the man that his hair has as much to do with him being ugly, as much as my baggy clothes have to do with me looking fat. And going to an ex-girlfriend's hairdresser with a hope of getting a good hairdo, c'mon mate, what were you thinking?! Seriously?!

In hindsight, what was I doing with that tabloid anyway?!

Arrrrrrgh!

2005-09-29T11:10:00.000-07:00

Why?! Cuz I am turning 23 in another 3 days!!

An Over-dramatized Account of a Crush

2005-09-24T02:30:00.000-07:00

Wretched protocols!

First, they create borders. Borders intentionally made as thin as a sheet of ice. As invisible to the naked eye as the elves on Earth. They challenge to walk along these borders. You fall over the edge. You learn it the hard away. You swear never to repeat it. Then it happens all over again.

Latest substianted evidence of this theory:

These architects of this cruel stage play called "Your Deplorable Life"....They take one of those dudes, straight out of the "Your kind of a guy" factory (Mass customized operations prevalent here, of course...At least, that's the one presumption that I hope does not get annihilated)..They predictably throw a plausible background to him...IT dude with an overdose of Bangalorean-ness (Y'know...carrying an overdose of contempt of crowded trains, places being miles apart et cetera)...Implementing yet another "We-cannot-do-without-it" application (which will gradually gather cobwebs in its internal algorithm and soon the only hints of its existence would pop up when potential shareholders or overtly inquisitive auditor digs deep down the "operating expenses" bit of the company's P&L)....And they strategically plant him a couple of cubicles away from you....You, as anticipated, would walk into the 'man-trap'...First with coy glances which climbs the forthrightness charts slowly, steadily and willfilly...Then, due to accusatory glances and sometimes angry retorts from (so-called) friends nearby, you try to pipe it down...Sometimes, even that the ugly reminder of you already being hooked pops up, only to be squashed like a bug...And so...soon, this small crush takes a larger than life form and these architects put on their impish smiles and bring one more cruel twist to the tale...They move the puppet (Otherwise known as the oomph guy) to a cubicle in some farthest corner, to where you cannot venture to, cuz you would have no excuse to contrive in order to go there! So, the sine curves that your high school teachers tried so much to get through to your head flashes before you with a bell pin on the biggest crest with an IDEO Locator saying "You are here"...And then, you pass many a days without the pleasures of a heavenly distraction..And then right when you think your life is moving along its straight line, which refuses to get out of the pits...They fling another boomerang right at you...This dude finds his way to your desk, makes conversation deliberately ( It's a saturday and no one else is around in the vicinity..so he couldn't have come for anyone else)....So the straight line called your life makes another straight-line trajectory to the peak and you are overwhelmed with this abrupt attack of that rare emotion named ecstacy...Oh no, just when the thought crosses my mind that "life is not that bad after all", I stumble upon that anticlimatic hurdle placed - He has come to tell me he's leaving...His implementation is done...

And so, I am left waiting for the next snare to come my way.

There are instances where the recall function in your memory could have been of some help, if you had ever planned on using it..You would then recognized the drill...The border is close by...You are gonna tip over...You could have shunned away, averting your eventual downfall...You could have either chosen to "Hell No!" and get back to base camp (Boyfriend is camped there!) or you could brave the onslaught and go out charging...But naay! You follow the protocol religiously..to perfection! One more time....

Of Idiots, Idiot-boxes and Idiots-in-boxes

2005-09-20T22:20:00.000-07:00

Eeeooow...What's with the flashing ticker on the home page of Blogger? Blogs updated at 8:57 AM ?! random blogs ?! Where/when did all that come from? Is it just me or have I fallen hook, line and sinker to those solitary blimps of respite that us nine-2-niners have in our otherwise mundane life called the "auto-login" option?! C'mon..you gotta admit...Gmail.com - whoosh! You are in, Orkut - Hell! You are already staring at your stuck-up scrap count before you can reach out and two-time 'alt' and 'tab', Naukri.com - *Blink* Your "32198321672 job openings which are of no use to you" stares back right at ya...Aaah, you gotta hand it to these Internet dudes for this force-majeure in our lives....Or else, it would have been your sheepish smiles that could have saved your ass from Mr. Bossman(If you are me, you would know that's NEVER an option!)...

Something worthwhile's on TV for a change...What with all the 'simple lives' of dumber-than-thou blondies (ALL puns intended...But of course) and the 'popcorn'y gossip items, I was beginning to wonder whether the term was the "idiot-box" or the "idiots-in-the-box"...And then, like he had done time and again before, Cosmo Kramer stormed in through the front door and onto our television sets...

Was reminded of one of those quotes of George ( a.k.a the short guy with glasses, looks like Humpty-Dumpty with a melon head - according to Jerry), which has done its turn of forwards and has had its more than fair share of exchanges/discussions...If you have seen it umpteen times before, I am sure you wouldn't choose to grimace when you see it one more time..so here you go...

"The most unfair thing about life is the way it ends. I mean, life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time. What do you get at the end of it? A death. What's that, a bonus?!?I think the life cycle is all backwards. You should die first, get it out of the way. Then you go live in an old age home. You get kicked out when you're too young, go collect all your super, then, when you start work, you get a gold watch on your first day. You work forty years until you're young enough to enjoy your retirement. You drink alcohol, you party, and you get ready for High School. You go to primary school, you become a kid, you play, you have no responsibilities, you become a little baby, you go back into the womb, you spend your last 9 months floating with luxuries like central heating, spa, room service on tap, then you finish off as an orgasm! Amen."

A Midnight Rhetoric

2005-09-13T00:04:00.000-07:00

Excruciating, Gut-wrenching loneliness...

It's hard to ignore when it strikes...especially when you least expect it to....especially when you are in conversation with the one you are closest to..

Is it the suppressed desire for occassional and unanticipated gratification? Is it the mutinous tactic deployed to combat the discontentment caused by unwelcome responses? Is it the instanteneous reaction to a fiery arguement that you are fast losing? Is it the unrestrainable annoyance to long enduring monologues?

Even worse....

Is it a sign of things to come? Or is it an inhibited but often experienced feeling which has just not been emoted?

Is it true that you feel closest to this person? or Is it time to scrutinize everything ?

......Or Is it just another bad day?

Far from maddening crowd....

2005-09-11T21:15:00.000-07:00

Sunday being the archetypal "lone-wolf" day of the week for me, I had been planning out for an exploratory journey through the streets of South Bombay, for picking up forsaken books from the literature departments and libraries of colleges, which are amassed by street vendors and sold out at ridiculously nominal prices...But then, the rains continued to play spoilsport and I postponed Plan A for the third week in continuation...

But apparently, the early September showers refused to dampen the spirit of a truck(s)-full of Bombayites especially since they have been treating the "sitting-at-home-sipping-hot-coffee" us to live entertainment with the pulsating strikes on the drumskins, boisterous ganpati chants and unrestrained foot works..Meanwhile, my head was treating me to even more frenzy, thanks to the demise of Plan A, especially when the last few pages of my last hard cover book (What good are e-books anyway?!) were fast scrambling for closure..

So I decided to brave the latest attempt of Mr. Rain God and more importantly the unforgiving monsters of the traffic striken highways and ventured into the crammy jungle of book reward points, mauve leather coaches, "cracking the code" enthusiasts and the not-so-helpful can-I-help-yous..In other words, the big bad retail book store...(The last trip didn't turn to be too useful - Reference my earlier post)

A new book by Hornby was in the offing, leading me to half-believe my trip to the store was not that big a waste of time..But then this was before I beheld the dreaded barcoded strip which quoted an astronomical two digit number (Before you take the jugdement calls, you should know this was not in rupee count, but in euros!)...So I continued to wander around aimlessly before stumbling onto the books of a Portugese author called Jose Saramago...I would like to think that the tag of "from the nobel prize laureate" had nothing to do with the fact that I was lured into his books, but then again I got to admit, it was a sight for the sore eyes amidst the Sanders' and the Sheldons..The more powerful reason for eventually picking the book was my quirky interest in trying out authors from distant lands, whose works are hard to unearth in this part of the world, unless they cross the threshold of popularity and their books get translated...

A credit card swipe, a messy subway sandwich and a long walk later, I arrived at the one place the tourists always have on their itinery - the Juhu beach...While I fully knew this was probably the wrongest time to be there (In fact I am actually unsure whether there is a right time), I had been curious to see what the thronging followers of Bombay's favourite God do there...The party was on in full force and so I meandered around to a relatively empty part of the beach ...Now this is definitely not one of the prettiest beaches, but no matter what, the sea never fails to engulf me within its calming arms..Unlike most other beaches, the Juhu beach does not have mounds of sand, from where you can overlook the waves....From where you stand, you are at perfect sea level...Inspite of the reverberating rhythms emanating from the maddening crowd on one side and the relentless bellowing of the horns behind you, it's quite a remarkable feeling to gaze into the dieing tides...And just like that, you manage to block out all that cacophony around you and feel total harmony...Funny, Isn't that the ultimate purpose of life? Heaven knows Juhu is the last place you would expect to find it...

Bracketing my world....

2005-09-06T14:00:00.000-07:00

The first trip to a new bookstore brings with it the need to spend the first few minutes in the store trying to cross the length and breadth of it to understand and digest the system of classification there. There is normally the universal classification of academic books from non-academic ones, which are further categorized to fiction, non-fiction, magazines, comics etc. After this, it gets difficult to draw everything into a tree structure ( Sorry, the evil Visio-enabled work side of me takes over..) So, there's children's literature, there's classics, there's literature (what the heck is the line of demarcation between the latter two? Or the methodology for classification is the sophisticated "eeny-meeny-miny-mo"??), there's science fiction, there's fantasy, there's theater, there's biography/auto-biography, there's music, there's arts, there's romance novels. And then it becomes a bigger maze...There's the system of classification based on the first name or it could be on the second name within each section. If it's on the second name basis, it's of course easier ( except if you are a fellow Southie with an intital and the presumption that the second name basis rule can be bent so that for such cases, it could be your first name...)But then this particular book store that I visited had the classification on the basis of the first name. So, where's the trouble now? I wanted to pick the great gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald! So is it a classic or a literature or is it fiction or is it under " recommends" ??And if I manage to solve that mystery, where do I look under? F or S?! Now don't even get me started on the non-fiction genre/sub genre classifications!! I would expected a Calvin and Hobbes to be cozily sitting on a rack in the comic book section, but somehow these torch bearers of this maze called a bookstore guided me to the management section for it!!

Also this entire compulsive need to bracket everything and put it under a header got me thinking...If I were to put the story of my life under a genre, what would it be? As much as I am a fan of thematic stories and concept albums, I think I would rather that my stories resembled that of a comic strip of jughead lieing on a hammock, with the highs being all those tasty munchies that are perched up and balanced on his belly and the lows being all those efforts to shoo away or swat those flies aiming from a crumb of those precious potato chips...No seriously, I don't want no damn Dan Brown thriller (?!) or a rib-tickling Hornby comedy for a life..There are absolutely no frikking way that it can be like racy adventure like " The Beach" or whatever...And it ain't like I have a confused upbringing in a foreign soil ala one of those Jhumpa Lahiri protaganists...There are some streaks of a sci-fi/fantasy novel whenever the boss' ugly head pops into the cubicle and I substitute that sorta plain ugliness with a sorta ugliness which gets some cookie points on the coolness quotient (So out goes the creature formerly called The Boss, and in comes a Jabba the Hut-tish creature - only thing he has bigger warts on his face and he also comes with what looks like heavy labyrinth of horns, but it's actually his hair and oh yeah, he also has very VERY floppy ears :D)...Of late, there has been a continuous occurences of tragedies, what with my daily trips to the ATM and the subsequent discoveries of ever dwindling cash in the account...And of course, there are escapades to Romance-shire on rare occasions, limited to Gael Garcia Bernal movies....But then notwithstanding all those uncharacteristic lapses, I would like to continue my typical "bum-on-chair" routine, thankyew...So,maybe that can be the name of a new genre be the "unclassifieds"...Hell, so much for the modern day contraptions! I think I would rather order my books online from now on..

Invisible Monster

2005-09-03T12:07:00.000-07:00

" Brandy Alexander, the long stemmed latte queen supreme of the top drawer party girls, Brandy is gushing her insides out through a bullet hole in her amazing suit jacket.You wouldn't believe how much this suit cost.The markup is about zillion percent.The suit jacket has a little peplum skirt and wide lapels and shoulders. The single breasted cut is symmetrical except for the hole pumping out blood.

Then Evie starts to sob, standing there halfway up the staircase. Evie, that deadly virus of the moment. This is one cue to look at poor Evie, poor, sad Evie, hairless and wearing nothing but ashes and circled by the wire cage of her burned-up hooked skirt. Then Evie drops the rifle. With her dirty face in her dirty hands, Evie sits down and starts to boo-hoo, as if crying will solve anything. This rifle, this is a loaded thirty-aught rifle, it clatters down the stairs and skids out into the middle of the foyer floor, spinning on its side, pointing at me, pointing at Brandy, pointing at Evie, crying.

It's not that I'm some detached lab animal just conditioned to ignore violence, but my first instinct is maybe it's not too late to dab club soda on the bloodstain.

Most of my adult life so far has been me standing on seamless paper for a raft of bucks per hour, wearing clothes and shoes, my hair done and some fashion photographer telling me how to feel.

Him yelling, give me lust, baby.

Flash.

Give me malice.

Flash.

Give me detached existentialist ennui.

Flash.

Give me rampant intellectualism as a coping mechanism.

Flash.

Probably it's the shock of seeing my own worst enemy shoot my other worst enemy is what it is. Boom, it's a win-win situation. This and being around Brandy, I've developed pretty big jones for drama."

Guess what Mr. Palahniuk...we have developed pretty big jones for drama too...and for the morbid and the macabre...for the exceptional originality and the equally terrifying inventions...for the no-holds-barred imagination and the intellectually ferocious fiction...for the eerily precise factual overtures...Not to mention the killing effect of his famed one-liners...Esoteric maybe, but No siree, it doesn't get better than this..

Note - the quoted passage is an excerpt from Chuck Palahniuk's Invisible Monsters - my favorite fictional piece of all time. For more snippets/reviews/fanlore on this work and more, watch this space...

Version 1.1

2005-09-02T14:30:00.000-07:00

A new lease of life...Incessant boredom...method to handle post lunch drudgery...Rebellion for liberation from mundane work...Message of nonchalance to the big bossman...Ploy to invite envy from neighbours...Urge to ramble/muse/criticize/rant/rave/scream/snicker/sob more vehemently and frequently...
Am not sure what caused this redefintion the blog and the plegde to make blogging a daily routine...Whatever it is, I do hope I don't give it up..What with my efforts through an entire afternoon to customize the page...Damn! wish I could delegate that too :D

A sudden spate of altruism...

2005-08-31T16:14:00.000-07:00

Warning - The footnotes are as long as the original passage - Whoever thought the points put forth are self explanatory have another thing coming....

So, Why don't all these "a-business-opportunity-is-just-around-the-corner" folks* come with a guidebook for survival in the big bad corporate world/big bad..well..big city? Replete with all the should do's, the shouldn't do's**, the don't dos** , and of course with the 10 mantras*** to keep you on payroll..and not to mention the rules that when broken are glaringly visible even if you are however good at smiling sheepishly....I mean, with all due respect to the concept of "learning it the hard, a cruel fact to admit and abide by is - "Bosses do not believe in such ideals"....So, I am doing my bit to that abysmmally tiny lot of society who would come across this blog (Most of 'em are probably doing so after relentless coaxing on my part - :D)....Don't know why this wave of altruism has hit me all of a sudden...

Cold, hard truths, which when ignored/overlooked can result in ghastly experiences:

1. Timelines are what they are - Date/time fields which are absolute in nature. Barring Katrinas, Tsunami's, rain gods and lazy central-goverment folks, timelines do NOT have the property of expansion/elasticity. (Quick reference - the Income Tax Department, Credit Card Units of all banks)

2. Mandatory requirements always follow the AND logic. The OR logic is not a substitute. (Quick reference - Personal Loan Departments, recruiting agencies)

3. When it comes to fares, there's always multiple or an additive element attached ( Quick reference - Cab/Auto drivers)

4. Not all numbers are a result of balanced equations i.e Net take home basic pay+ HRA+..... ( Quick reference - The Cafeteria Subsidies/Miscellaneaous expenses column in your payslip, the auto-debit mandate of banks where EMI deduction always, ALWAYS happens the minute your salary hits the bank account)

5. Everyone who has the tag of Middle Management/Boss (a.k.a The not-so-affable, but definitely infamous Gyaanibabas) have dangerously low boiling points ( Quick reference - the junior management of any company)

6. Liquids do not have definite shape, but assume the shape of the containing body (Quick reference - Frequent floodings at my apartment thanks to taps who don't get closed)

7. Chocolates,ice creams,sizzling brownies, cheesy pastas, cheesier burgers, the results of the-experiments-at-my-kitchen et al do contain fats, carbohydates and the likes ( Quick reference - has anyone seen me lately?!)

8. Time does require management and gantt charts and what not...( Quick reference - the never-ending list of my "to-do" list)

9. Drinking a glass of alcohol everyday as against dunking the entire week's quota on the weekend is better, if you also fit the A-A bill****...Of course if you choose do both, it could be near fatal ( Quick reference - the all-knowing smile of the doorman when you walk into your favorite pub)

10. The chances of your boss visiting your cubicle between the time you started this blog and when you ended is directly proportional to the number of key deliverables in your job description ( Quick reference - the number of alt-tabs that I have done while writing this blog )

So, kids...hope this serves as an enlightment tool...And no,this will not lead you to Nirvana...After all, they have disbanded :P

* - Y'know, those overzealous dudes who fall into one or more or most likely all of these categories - A. The socializing radar is as dead as the bug they last swatted B. who spell life as w-o-r-k C. whose last woohooing was when they got two extra oregono toppings with the pizza they ordered when working late D. whose ID tag has these letters - I, C , I , C and I on them...

** Think about it..the shouldn't and don't dos are definitely different...If you are still digging thru all the overwrought gray matter or your answer is "Nyaaah"- even if doesn't sound exactly like it, then please, I beg you, get a life!

*** Note - It's not always only 10

**** Not the type of batteries silly, Alcoholics anonymous of course..

The Story of Human Grit - Lesson 101

2005-07-29T01:49:00.000-07:00

A few of "You Lucky Dog!"...Some "Oh! Good for you!"...A couple of "Make use of this opportunity..Go back to your home town and chill out"...ONE "Ok! Work on this and this and well..this too" ...And a lot of "Maan...you had to be there to believe it"...

My eventual homecoming was greeted by these and more of (not-so-)mixed feelings...I could have settled for "Oh! we missed you loads.." or maybe even "We skipped the weekend 'session' cuz you weren't here"...but well,I wasn't exactly returning back to page 72 of 'Krithika in Wonderland'...as bipolar as it can get from it, actually...I was back at Bombay..Bombay waking up to the aftermath of 28 hours when nature ravished its fury with one of the most fatal low blows...A bombay under siege by Rain gods, in the stranglehold of its poorly architected drainage system, at the mercy of its unsturdy roads, held hostage by the lack of a good disaster control system...A bombay afloat with debris of every kind and buoyant vehicles...A bombay, which lived to tell a oft-repeated tale of how the tenacity, resilience, grit and generousity of its people stood resolute and unfazed even in the most turbulent of times..

So what's the loudest news that is being heard?.... The fact that the waters ebbed to ten feet and more in certain areas? Or maybe the fact that they gushed in to most ground floor apartments washing away everything in sight? Or what about the fact that there had been no prewarning meted out by the authorities? Or..maybe the more universal of facts..the city having recorded the highest levels of rainfall in a single day ? Err....take another guess...Trust me you wouldn't even be able to get anywhere near the ballpark...

The only thing strikingly visible is the fact that irrespective of all of the above happening, there were people volunteering to get out of their dry grounds (if they have managed to find them, i.e.), in order to distribute biscuits, tea and food to all those unlucky ones who are still wading through water to get to their dear ones...What about this? You might just have a 10 * 10 that you call home, but that doesn't stop you from offering it as a refuge to those helpless who have no way to get home..and yes, you might have a handsome 7 figure amount smiling down on your salary account on the last friday of every month, but that does not stop you from accepting a corner of that 10 * 10 and a public toilet... And of course, if there are 150 people stranded on the top half of a double decker bus with the bottom half of the bus falling prey to seeping water, there are an equal number of people standing sure-footedly in the neck deep water with a rope so that they can pull the ones on the bus to safer grounds......

Its high density of population might be one of the reasons why the morbid images of overcrowded trains, jam packed roads and brimmed up buses surface in the minds of most people, but hell...without them, the city could not have picked up the salvages of their battered lives and reported in at 9 a.m sharp for work on Day 2! Kudos!

P.S - Definitely not an afterthought...wanted to postscript this bit...16 people died suffocated in their cars waiting for 30+ hours to get home, more than 50 people fell victims to landslides...20 odd were stampeded to death due to a false tsunami scare....I did not know 'em, but...R.I.P ...

This blog goes to the one person that I did know who did not turn up at work, like the others did today...He reached home after plodding through the waters for hours...He hit the bed and never woke up, passing away due to a cardiac arrest...Malay, May your soul rest in peace...

Coffee...and catching up...

2005-04-18T00:28:00.000-07:00

In transit between two locations...one of which is not home, but seems to with the amount of time spent purposely shuttling across to it...I realize I have a lot of catching up to do....with whom you ask...Aah well, me, myself and I....

Bliss was the order of the day yesterday...Throw in a truckful of serenity along with it...Some wilderness to taste...stir it with a spoonful of wildlife(the real ones...not the ones you would find on the B'bay locals :D) and voila - you got yourself a Sunday to remember :)

The funny thing is...I don't think I would have survived there beyond one day...Not that I was stranded in the middle of a jungle...anything but that...had a log hut which was not exactly a hut...It looked like a palace when compared to my studio apartment....And of course, the greatest possible invention of Mankind - the hammock...Yet inspite of all this, I left quite lost...Like a man throw in front of floodlights after being stuck in darkness for a long time, I waS clueless...All that silence was too much to take....Deafening actually...And I was struggling to keep my hands away from my discman, when the instructions on the brochure said " Sap in the sounds of nature..."

But well...I had good company and all this didn't matter ...

Till the next shuttle trip...over and out...

Near and yet so far...from heaven...

2005-04-02T05:11:00.000-08:00

"Apology is only egotism wrong side out"

So that's that...No need to conjure up excuses/explanations for my noticeable (I hope so!) absence from Bloggersville..Let me cut to the chase...

Far from Heaven is one of these beautifully drafted tell-tale of the societal issues most prevalent in the 50's American suburbia..Although it did leave a thought as to the main problems - Homosexuality, Equal rights to african americans and broken homes have been forcefully made cohesive, the fact that it had been done in a rather seamless manner did hammer down this thought to death...Touching performances from the three main protaganists who have been driven to feelings of shame, guilt and misery because of the uncompromising conventions and attitudes of the people around them....An intense devotion to make everything about the movie quintessentially 50's - right from the background score to the kempt hairdoes and floppy frocks....The exquisitely captured colours of autumn which makes the entire movie rather subdued in terms of the mood....It was all part of the package...

"Sometimes its the people outside our world we confide in best. But then if you do confide, they would not continue to be outsiders, would they?" - You might have heard in these in the promos for the movie....

While this rhetorical question might have a perplexing effect, I was wondering what triggers one to confide in the first place, let alone who to confide in...There's an interplay of course..If the need to confide is too overwhelming, we would naturally rurn to someone where we would find solace in the most desirable manner...But of course, the result of this might not be very helpful...Depends on whether the person who lends his/her ears, feels it is better that you find relief in the temporary refuge given by the comfort of his/her words/actions...or whether you need a dosage of reality much more than the brief alleviation....But ironically, if this were to be the case, it was always leaves an undesirable taste with the confider about his/her friend, as normally people are too myopic to look at the big picture and hence the altruism showcased by their friend....Also, there's always a certain degree of the subjective element if you confide in people of your own worlds - right from their view points to their relationship with you...All this points to just one thing...An outside perspective on things does help, I guess...

Or well, just grab a cup of coffee, some smokes and put the tissues to good use for scribbling :)

Here today...Gone..err, today itself ....

2005-02-25T06:58:00.000-08:00

Awrite...time for a pit-stop...Out of a breath thanks to 10 nightless days where all I remember is waking up at random airports and emptying gallons of coffee into the nicotine/blood stream...

Budweiser is getting older...The realization dawned in, while I took at what was supposed to be a "breather" at home(the original one..)...He does not enjoy prancing around to reach that distant fly on the wall anymore...He is more than content to watch the fly prancing around right before his nose..But he did yank at my jeans and almost tore it apart..Damn dog!

B & W TVs are not that too uncool...At least I wouldn't have noisy roommates arguing over which shade of pink Kareena Kapoor is wearing...So I airlifted meself one :) Okay..so ground reality...I don't have enough dough to get a new TV...I picked up the one which has been long since neglected at home....

Bangalore has the poorest of transport infrastructures...I absolutely abhor getting stuck in traffic...but even more so, in Bangalore! I quite like the Barista at that road parallel to Museum Road..the one next to Koshy's...But this is strictly for lazy Sunday mornings...

I am beginning to see mathematical models when I came across any number... I am also bargaining on arbid things...even on offers from friends (okay, it's actually singular :D) to write one of those "you are the coolest" testimonials on Orkut! I am evaluating glow signs of the ATMs and retail markets on how high/low they rank on the "Good Branding" quotient..Am also more harrowed by the fact that the calender month end is a wee bit too early this month, which means I need to push the sales forces to close out cases, add more numbers to this month's figures (Arrgh!! My evil work-obsessed other side is taking over again!!)...while actually I should be thankful about an early wallet refill....Christ, I have lost the ability to think non-manager like!

I still haven't listened to the Mercury Rave album loaned by a pal...I did spin the first Camel album that I bought (Pressure Points) a coupla times again on the deck though...

I have to move twice in the next 15 days...My new place (all to myself..Yaay!) is available only on March 15th..But the landlady has warned us to get our asses dragging out of her place by the 1st...So, am camping with the existing roomies at their new place for a while...

Of course...it's not all dismal..Far from it! MPD ( a.k.a the band I ..well..manage) are getting geared up from a resurrection again...March 13th is the D-day...Tomorrow, am scooting off to Pune...A coupla guys from MPD are doing a tribute night somewhere near J.M.Road...Have a "process orientation meeting" at the Pune office on Monday...*yawn*..

Oh hey...go to THE EIGHTIES BAR on Sunday evening for a Mark Knopfler Tribute nite...At the turntable is a pal, who knows his music and would not leave you with just a cold beer in your hand...

Time-out...the show at Regal starts in 15 minutes!

Post Lunch Slumbers and Original Soundtracks...

2005-02-11T01:10:00.000-08:00

NP: Too Young by Phoenix from the original soundtrack of the movie "Lost in Translation"

Who would have thought that I would have fallen hook,line and sinker for a popish/get-shoes-on-and-hit-the-dance-floor kinda track by an obscure artist on a movie soundtrack, while I got new stuff from Henning Pauly, Kevin Moore and the likes...Not to mention a surprise find of a Joni Mitchell CD at Planet-M and the timely delivery of online ordered stuff....And out of the blue comes this track, which seemed almost like a bright streak of light in an otherwise dull day so much so that I have had it on repeat mode for the past half an hour and I am still not bored....Apart from the fact that it is peppy, very 80ish, glaringly simple, it has that energy and tempo to take you back to your late teenage summer years where you taste the first traces of love...True to its title, it makes you feel "too young"....

But seriously, I can't remember the last time I heard a song which had a "baby" in it...Jeez! Guess I ~am~ getting too bracketed in my music....

Baby when I saw you turning at the end of the street
I knew a time was gone and it took me like ages
Just to understand that I was afraid to be a simple guy
I tried my best to smile but deep inside my heart
I felt it was shouting like a crowd dancing
I guess I couldn't live without the things that made my life what it is
Can't you hear it calling oh yeah
Everybody's dancin' oh yeah
Tonight everything is over
I feel too young
I can't lie on my bed without thinking I was wrong
But when this feeling calls this world becomes another
Nighttime won't hold me in your arms again
I got a very good friend who says he can't believe the love I give
Is not enough to end your fears
I guess I couldn't live without the things that made my life what it is
Can't you hear it calling oh yeah
Everybody's shakin' oh yeah
Tonight everything is over
I feel too young
Oh rainfalls and hard times coming they won't leave me tonight
I wish I knew what I was doing
Just do let this spirit survive
Can't you hear me calling oh yeah
I guess I couldn't live without the things that made my life what it is
Can't you hear me calling oh yeah
Everybody's dancing oh yeah
Tonight everything is over
I feel too young....

Unweaving the rainbow...

2005-02-08T18:00:00.000-08:00

My Frameshift CD has been delivered....Yaaaaaaay!!

Now that I have regained enough control over my senses, thought I would post in the breaking news...

Is there some other way to accentuate the "Yaay"?! Don't think I have made it cleat enough....

MY FRAMESHIFT CD HAS BEEN DELIVERED!!

P.S - For more info, http://frameshift.progrockrecords.com

Sunday Bloody Sunday....

2005-02-07T17:07:00.000-08:00

Apparently..any acrobatic move on my part to reach a high and stay there are usually combatted by an equal(if not,more powerful..) and opposite reaction...And any hopes of resting the butt on the crescendo and keeping it there for a while is met with a cruel reminder that I am riding a bell shaped curve and once you hit a peak, it is all smooth thereafter...Smooth way downhill, that is...

After a very "uplifting" Saturday nite, I decided to kickstart my regular lazy Sunday by scoring some CDs at Phoenix...But then little did I know that I am walking into the "woman-trap" called "The Discount Sale"...now these things are well-camouflaged (Ever noticed the proportion of font size of the words "Upto" and "50%") and of course designed to pull you into the chasmal vortex..I mean, look at the strategic positioning of these ads and hoardings!! Propped up to take into you into a hypnotic trance..sort of like "when you hear the word - discount sale, you will stand with your paws lifted up, on your hindlegs, with your tongues hanging out"..But then again, there is a downside to creating too many zombies, I guess...I put up a resistance and came out empty-handed out of...not one...but THREE of these sales...Yee Haw!!

Now this might seem to be a happy ending...but it was quite the reverse with the actual story...Like any woman with/without a heavy wallet (don't even get me started on this evil force called the credit cards!!) would do, I marched into these stores, telling myself that a momentary glance would do no harm...I had spent barely three minutes before which I came to a conclusion that I am not going to find anything that I would have picked when I am clear-headed...But since I was dazed and possessed by this greed demon inside me, I decided to keep my hunt going...Picked up a couple of Tees after what felt like an eternity of deliberation...then I headed towards the trial rooms...and damn!! the queue was longer than ones that you would find in a municipal ration store!! Summoned up some patience to take the last position in the queue...Minutes passed by and the crowd just lengthened its tail behind me but I hadn't moved an inch...This realization seem to have dawned up the rest of the women too and there was a visible unrest marked by loud murmurs and forceful tapping of the feet...Then the door of the trial room of my queue opened and this lady paraded wearing the entire ensemble of new kurta and long skirt and boots and accessories...Just when we were about heave a sigh of relief, she whisks into the room back again! Apparently, she had to show the dress to her husband standing outside (the clothes that he carried out in his shopping bag would have sufficed to create another retail clothing chain!!) for a nod of approval...from the commotion caused by the ladies in front of me, it was obvious that this lady had been doing this for a while now, which explained the stagnant queue...That was enough for me to come back to my senses...I rushed out of the store...

Shop #2 - Didn't have too much breathing space to walk around...and so I walked out...

Shop #3 - Well, whaddaya know..Deja-vu all over again....

And so, I visited Planet-M...was aghast by the discount offerings on the Floyd and the John Mayer CDs...they were priced at the rates of tapes!! Picked it up, in any case....then moved towards Big Bazaar to get drowned in the tsunami of people there...the mission was to flesh up my kitchen shelves..(Did I mention I am trying to cook these days ?! :D :D :D)...and phew! when I came out of the store, it appeared as though I had just come out of a downtown brawl ....

The high-point of the day was the pack of smokes that I indulged in at the end of the day...So much for the weekend, eh?

A lot can happen over coffee....

2005-02-06T01:05:00.000-08:00

What are the signs that you are spending a blissfully alone, buoyantly joyful and relaxingly peaceful midnight hour?

A. You are watching the glistening contours of the sea-side waters do a ballet-like act in the moonlight...

B. You are doing that, while sipping the perfectly-blended and ideally-strong coffee with just-the-right-sugar and of course the never-ending pack of energy sticks...

C. All this, while a bunch of teenage party-hoopers are squeaking like rats whose tails are caught in traps all around you and yet....you have no intention of getting up from the ever-so-tranquil moments which seem to have been transfixed in the history of time....

D. You know your night's just gonna get better than it already is...since you have the bestest possible movie library which never fails to fling one good movie after the other with every visit of yours there...This time around, it was "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" ....and to top it all, you still haven't touched your indigenously-mixed cocktail yet;)....

Aaaah...there's something about an unaccompanied saturday-night in Bombay that makes me feel inexplicaly concoted with the city...so much so that in order to prolong this harmony, I decide to take a bus trip which takes me to a place in the completely opposite direction to my not-so-secluded abode...Sure, it's the wee hours of a VERY bright night, thanks to the electrically-enriched neon lights..And of course,a gallon of coffee and Steven Wilson's inescapable voice (Not an evening in the company of Porcupine Tree again...this time it was O.S.I's out-of-the-world track called Shutdown) to keep my insomniacal tendencies up and running...But then again, in a city of free will, what better day/night to exercise it when the whole population is up and about?

The Healing Colors of Sound - Part II

2005-01-17T06:45:00.000-08:00

Peace - Undistorted, vehement, gripping, sullen and uplifting, sudden and paralyzing...developing an inner void of all the mundane thoughts and useless resolutions....engulfing you in a random fit of questions.....The "whys", the "whos" and the "hows"...

Clarity - Undiluted, honest,apparent, absorbing and daunting, unattached and alluring...leading you to the eventual assimilation of incoherent thoughts...attaching reasons to the initial hypothesis and assumptive answers....

Ecstacy - Consequential, potent, aggressive, appeasing and illusory, levelling and far reaching....Concluding the crest of the abrupt peace and the gradual clarity...reaching the peak in a smooth and uninterrupted pattern....

Are all drunken experiences so elevating? Or is it the...healing color of sound?

The Healing Colors of Sound - Part I

2005-01-16T01:00:00.000-08:00

If I close my eyes..
And fell asleep in this layby
Would it all subside...
The fever pushing the day by

The amber ends glow...Brighter than usual against the gloomy backdrop of the darkened room...The sporadic sounds of the glass meeting the cold marble...Breaking the insipid monotony of reverbaration in your ears because of the incessant and unanimated whirring of the ceiling fan...

Steven has a quite a lot to say apparently...His coherent mutterings are almost a distant echo...My attention is undivided, although my senses are clogged..He seems to get a brooding reaction to anything that he utters...Not that he would mind,though...He knows what to expect...from me and the rest....This is not the first time...definitely not...He always starts off narrating about his road trip east of Baldock and Ashford... That's because I want him to... Sometimes,I want to listen to his telltale of the summers slipping by first..Today it's about the heartattack in the layby..That's how we started, as you can see... I know what is going to follow...He's gonna strip the soul and fill the hole...He says that's because he has a fire to feed....

Steven, you always attach a bleak picture to the otherwise irrelevant things....I refuse to get buried in this forlorn mood...Now,you don't really need to expect us to assume the overwhelming sense of foreboding that you pervade, do you? Actually I know you don't expect us to do that..It need not necessarily be contagious...I guess I realize that and you already know that....And Steven, I'll continue to listen to you...You know I will....Have a couple of batteries to spare even if this set runs out...So you can keep it going...

NP : Gravity Eyelids
Written and Composed by - Steven Wilson
Performed by - Porcupine Tree (Richard Barbieri,Colin Edwin, Gavin Harrison
and Steven Wilson)

Murphy's Law...

2005-01-09T02:13:00.000-08:00

If anything has to go wrong, it will...

My own interpretation of this axiom reads - If there's anything that you don't want to happen, it will

My tryst with the Dune series began a couple of weeks back (Now this has taken a long time in coming...I realize!!) ...But once I embarked on my journey to dwelve deeper into Frank Herbert's world of Bene Gesserit witches and Harkonnens, there were no pitstops whatsoever...Even when I had managed to chance upon THE book that I always wanted to grab hold of, since the time I actually could spell the word "book" ( Wild exaggeration..yes! But you get the message!!) . This coveted book is "The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test" by Tom Wolfe (For the uninitiated, this is the most definitive book on the hippie movement and on Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters)....So what's the interlink between Murphy's law and me being the proud possessor of two masterpieces ?! Well...that's where my sob story starts...

I was careless enough to leave the book in the office loo( No...I don't take books to keep me occupied in the loo..This was because I was just leaving work and I had to carry my stuff home!! And Yes, this ~is~ true inspite of what my Mum claims!!) ...And I actually axccentuated this sin by realizing the fact that the book's not in my hand anymore only when I boarded the train !! So after a coupla days of ransacking ALL the store cupboards in the office and not finding the book ( Throwing many cusses at the thief/altruist in the process...), I decided ro take a trip to Crossword (the big bad retail book chain..), which is an even bigger sin in itself...(Honestly, I am not a " Retail bookstores suck!! " purist...I am just in a very masochistic state of mind right now..)

Anywayz, I do not come across the book, but Satan decides ro tempt me by throwing in 85% discounts on Heretics and Children of Dune and Dune Messiah ( D-uh...those are some of the others in the series...)..But I do not cave in ( He thinks he can tempt me, Ha!).....Then I frantically scramble to Flora Fountain where I had found the book that I lost...Now these guys pack up by 8 generally...So I nearly jog down from Churchgate station to these pavement shop walahs ( Err...okay...that's not too far...so BITE ME! :p)...I offer to pay as much as a first hand version of the same book would cost (As you can clearly see...I ~was~ desparate)....Unfortunately, all I received in return was a sheepish grin from these guys that they do not have any copies left...

Then I scamper to Oxford's, asking almost every Tom,Dick and Harry on the streets for direction..I manage to find the place and hastily I asked the dude at the counter as to where's the science fiction section and that guy guides me to the bloody kids science text books rack!! Disgusted, I decided to unravel the mysteries of the arrangement of the bookstore, all by myself, when I knew the clock is ticking towards closing time...I finally manage to find that dark corner where they have stashed the "H" author books...And as a detour, Satan plants THE OTHER book that I have been after, for what feels like an eternity no - Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby...This time, I stripped my soul, handed it to Mr.Satan and get hooked onto reading a coupla pages (When I knew I was going to pick it up any which ways..)I soon come to my senses and find the row of the Dune books...Now the suspense was mounting...I had to know whether my tale has a happy ending...No,siree! Wasn't to be...What I had in store was the Heights of all Ironies, folding his arms tightly around his chests and laughing out loud at me....Beat this, All books EXCEPT the first i.e. DUNE were there!

Why, God, why?!

Just one of those things that make you go "Hmm..."

2005-01-05T05:00:00.000-08:00

It's amazing how some things that you read even in one of those very matter-of-fact moods can leave you with some food for thought....

This one's out of Dune...Yeppers, am on the sci-fi trip again and boy! does this kick ass or what! I am kicking myself for missing out on reading the series at Pilani...but hey, it's not all over until...errr...the fat boss makes my life a lot more miserable than it already is...

" Greatness is a transitory experience. It is never consistent. It depends in part on the myth-making imagination of humankind. The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in. He must reflect what is projected upon him. And he must have a strong sense of the sardonic. This is what uncouples him from belief in his own pretensions. The sardonic is all that permits him to move within himself. Without this quality even occasional greatness will destroy a man. "

Talk the (Corporate) Talk....

2004-12-23T20:16:00.000-08:00

They say appreciation of anything comes with an instant identification towards it. Rest assured, the list that follows will make you go , "Been done, seen that" ;)

Assmosis
The process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement by kissing up to the boss.

Closer to home, that's usually the art practised and perfected by the dude in the neighbouring cubicle

Blamestorming
Sitting around in a group discussing why a deadline was missed or a project
failed and who was responsible.

For all of you who wonder what happens in those long drawn-out meetings of mine...well...:D

Seagull Manager
A manager who flies in, makes a lot of noise, shits over everything and then
leaves.

Read - BOSS

Salmon day
The experience of spending an entire day swimming upstream only to get screwed and die in the end.

^^ EVERY SINGLE DAY

Chainsaw consultant
An outside expert brought in to reduce the employee head count, leaving the brass with clean hands.

In other words, "strategists"

CLM
Career Limiting Move - Used among microserfs to describe ill-advised activity. Trashing your boss while he or she is within earshot is a serious CLM. (Also known as CLB - Career Limiting Behavior)

Ah-hah! Now I know why am still on the last rung of the corporate ladder (?!).

Dilberted
To be exploited and oppressed by your boss. A la Dilbert.

Note - This terminology is soon to be revamped as "krithikated".

Flight Risk
Used to describe employees who are suspected of planning to leave the company or department soon.

Mera number kab aayega?

404
Someone who's clueless. From the World Wide Web error message "404 Not Found," meaning that the requested document could not be located.
"Don't bother asking him . . . he's 404, man."

The all too familiar conceptualization of others by me...and me by others :D

Ohnosecond
That minuscule fraction of time in which you realize that you've just made a
BIG mistake.

Going by the math, the number of ohnoseconds on my average day varies from 3600*12 to 3600*14 :))

Percussive Maintenance
The fine art of whacking the crap out of an electronic device to get it to
work again.

Oh well...these are those bright moments of the day :P

Try Whistling This...

2004-12-19T01:45:00.000-08:00

I am a sucker for melodies...especially those which are lyrically loaded... I must admit that's last thing that you would hear from a person whose mornings generally begin with a dosage of a "20th century schizoid man" or "6 o'clock on a Christmas morning" (Okay, it's not exactly christmas! And I cant remember the last time I saw dawn...I wanted to underline the fact that I dig prog rock/metal!)...But then there's something about what is come to be known as "intelligent pop" ( Contrary to my view a coupla years back, the term is not exactly a paradox!) that makes you want to stretch your legs, put up your hands behind your head and really, REALLY relax.... There are a flock of artistes that I have begun to check out at a retail music store/website these days...and beat this! I have begun doing this before even checking which Camel album I do not own yet! And one of the chief reasons for this sort of metamorphosis is this brilliant, brilliant singer/songwriter called Neil Finn...I just own one of his albums now called "Try Whistling This"..but it will probably outnumber the times that I have played my latest Porcupine Tree buy on my deck by a looong margin....So,what's so awesome about this album? Okay, here we go..some of my thoughts on some of his tracks...

1. Last One Standing - Kick starts the album with a jiggy acoustic groove...the tempo that this groove sets carries forward through the entire track with so much energy...and as far as the lyrics...well, wish I can get away smoothly with something like this...

"Lean and hungry with a fire in your eyes
I'll play catch up, you can show me where it's at
I'll go along with anything that you want to do
Everyday I'm making ground
So high I might as well be gone"

2. King Tide - Starts with a seemingly innocently gloomy four lines before it suddenly gets infused with strong chords and it takes a heavier turn with each passing verse...I like the way this heavy downpour hits the climatic note with the chorus rendition...Actually this climatic note is more anticlimatic, if anything...the last verses, the chord element gets so strong that Neil Finn is almost rapping along to keep pace!!

3. Try Whistling this - The title track is really toned-down in terms of the mood, the pace etc...But two things that I like about this song...the bass drum in the back ground and the soaring end to the song...Beautifully constructed melody and pulled off brilliantly by Finn...

4. She will have her way - My favorite track out of this album...whether it is the "ru-tu-ru" backings or the uplifting turn that the track takes when Finn starts the " Still no end in sight...though I travel far and wide" verse...Agreed, most critics would not rate this as the album's best track..my message for them is "GO PICK UP NICK HORNBY'S 31 SONGS, DUDE" !!

5. Truth - If not for anything, the fact that this track has the line " Truth is worth more than pride"

6. Dream Date - Memorable bassline..but I gotta nod in agreement with most other reviewers, the falsetto on the chorus is a definite turnoff!

7. Faster than light - Okay, I don't dig the melody on this track a lot, but then again, there's something about these lyrics which makes you remember the moral science lessons at school!

and praise will come to those whose kindness
leaves you without debt
and bends the shape of things
that haven't happened yet
close your eyes, colours changing like a lizard
I know where the sun goes
I have seen the world turning
in time you'll find that some things
travel faster than light
in time you'll recognise that love is larger than life

8. Addicted - He keeps a low note on most parts of the song..But I love the keyboard parts with " and you wait and it makes you feel strange...as if you were deranged...and you lie with a look to the side...and you say I was addicted to the drug...but I know when I've had enough"...

Now, Neil Finn is not a fantastic vocalist..far from it...Most of the times when he hits the lownotes, you wish you are hearing someone else...But his falsettos make you cringe your brows...but hey, this dude can churn out good , lyrically sound melodies and I maintain, am a sucker for 'em...

Top 10 reasons why I would not offer a media liability policy in India

2004-12-18T17:45:00.000-08:00

Okay, it's a frikkin' Saturday and I have been made to drag my ass to work cuz..Oh well, what other day can be better to ruin than Saturday by scheduling comfortably looong review meetings, where big burly boss types take out their wrath on the fact that they don't have a life and you seem to show the slightest trace of one! So these lumberjacks are out with their axes to nip these threatening hints of a life in its bud....whoosh, whoosh, whoosh..crash! Amen! But they didn't see a retaliatory reaction coming, did they?! They think they can make me work on a weekend?! Bah! Blog , I must and blog, I will!

Anywayz, I know I am trying to sound very ungeekish...That's b'cuz I am gonna start out on..err...slightly occupation specific topic...Sprung up as a consequence of a discussion over lunch where some chaps from the liability insurance business groups decided to make their presence felt...Is it a good idea for our company to go in for a media liability policy?!

For the uninitiated, media liability insurance protects any newspaper/magazine agency against claims made by the affected public, as a consequence of gathering and communicating any false/unsubstianted info...It generally covers defamation, personal disparagement or invasion/infringement of privacy charges...A more ground level example - you see some snaps of filmstars smooching splashed across the front pages of tabloids...and the filmstar is understandably livid because her "oh-but-I-am-the-typical-Bharathiya-nari" image is being shredded to pieces right before hers and a million others' eyes, she files privacy invasion charges against the tabloid/papparazzi...(Assuming she does end up actually filing a suit... more often than not, these are usually mere noises with declaration that she is marching to court...Before you know it, a coupla days have passed and everyone's forgotten about this controversy cuz some other actress' clothes-shedding gossip is more hot-selling news item now...)...so just in case, the court rules in favor of the plaintiff and the media company would have pay a handsome price for it, a media liability policy will come in handy..cuz it will be the insurance company which will have to empty its pockets...

So, if I had my way and I was the CEO of my company...would I recommend we introduce for media liability insurance for the media agencies in India? Even if I did prudently underwrite it and I also take the seemingly safest bet out of the media agencies...say, a Hindu ...I might not have too many filmstars lining up at my front door for claims on defamation charges, but I would sure as hell have politicians doing that with me! Same is the case with any political mag, I guess....
I would think twice before issuing any business magazine a media liability policy because they take too many big honchos head on...and they also usually lambast the government for poor infrastructure or sickly investment et cetera et cetera... Although these guys kinda play it safe most of the time by getting into the semantics and cleverly disguising accusations..They might be low risk...

I would definitely not even consider sparing a moment of thought for deciding whether to cover a TOI or a Zoom...

I would not cover any TV channel which has these " I am reaching out to the general public" kinda talkshows...The next thing I know they will be interviewing some gay activists ( or anti-activists!) movement and I am in a thick soup!!

A music channel is a high-risk profile too...The odds of an enraged parent knocking on your doors is heavy, with the number of booty-shaking videos that come out these days...

At the end of the day, I can think of only an inside/outside or zome health magazine that I might decide to insure...but of course, the chances of them coming to me for insurance in the first place are rather slim....So now, put yourself in my "assumed-CEO" shoes ;) Would you insure any media agency in India for liability?

Now again, please refer to the title of the blog....I rest my case herein...

Mass Hypnosis?!

2004-12-17T12:10:00.000-08:00

The early morning rush hour…

...The scramble to get a foothold in a fast local…the pushing and shoving to gather more leg room…It’s bad enough that you are holding onto your life by virtue of that door handle which is supporting a couple of other hands too…But hey, that doesn’t stop you from hollering to the privileged soul ( well, she DOES have the central pole to hang onto!!) to get in…”Jahag dhiktha hai kya andhar” comes the retort…And there we go…a few more fiery exchanges which increases in amplitude with every reply received…soon hits the high note when out comes some bellowing sounds which lasts just about a minute or so (natural progression, I say!)….before fading into oblivion with as much intensity as the ascending trip……The sine curve is drawn…

And your regular day in Bombay has begun…..

The men…well, they have their own version of these cat fights…It has some infliction of machismo, of course…So, there’s always the daily dose of fist fights and finger movements and bawling sounds, all replete with some colorful intonations…Either this, or the gleeful celebrations for finding that much desired inch of foothold near the mouth of the compartment…This usually comes with some “yee haws” and other cowboy like maneuvers which includes high-fiving some stranger on the platform who has not been so fortunate as the passenger himself, when the train starts moving out…

Leave the trains aside, lets jump onto the highways to hell and the rulers of this terrain – the cab drivers…If you have been in Bombay and not been stuck in traffic because a cabbie has distorted the already dilapidated bumper of the car in front of him, you must have had Lady Luck showing off all her molars on you, dude!

Oh no, you guessed wrong! This is not a preamble to yet another sob story of a poor soul stranded in this new-age jungle…the point is…I dunno about you, but I definitely marvel at the city’s innate love for attention…Anything that is remotely glance worthy is spared much more than just a glance….If there are X people who just love to draw attention onto themselves, there are at least 10 X people who want to give them all the attention that they crave and much more…..And what is weird is that fact that, at no point of time do these parties exchange their prerogatives….Will any of the “givers” of attention step in and intervene with the proceedings of the “takers”?! …No, sir! It’s almost as if they don’t want to steal the takers’ thunder…”The limelight’s on you for today and you can hog all of it” types….How many fights have you seen being broken up by spectactors? “They might as well pull their tooth out, but we are happy getting our free entertainment of the day “……This might not be very endearing, but aren’t you amused by the collective hypnosis that the people of the city are under?! I sure as hell am….