The Open Book

Sunday Blues

2011-06-12T23:59:00.000+05:30

Another father-son moment:

"You've been buying english newspapers for a week but I've never seen you read them. Are you reading them or are you wasting the money?"

"Yes dad I am reading."

"Well then go read it now. Don't watch TV all the time."

"But I've read it already!"

"Everything?"

"No I just skimmed it..."

"Then read it again, this time, in detail."

"But dad! I-"

"No buts. Go. Now. And hand over the TV remote to me."

Perfect Sunday.

***

This holiday thing is getting a bit exhausting. Then again, I'm not exactly on a holiday, there's no next semester for me, I'm technically a B.E grad once I get my provisional certificate. And then I am falling into a deep and empty void of nothing.

Seriously, will this holiday ever end?

***

In my quest to avoid boredom in the unconventional way (conventional way would be watching TV, gaming and just sitting on the couch and staring at the roof), I have been experimenting for the last few weeks. I've been trying sketching, my childhood hobby, but my nemesis, an 8 year old who claims to be my nephew is interrupting the process. I was going to make my comeback in deviantART with my drawn and inked Batman sketch, but the brat tore it off while I was sleeping and took it home to stick it in his wall. He'll probably show off to his friends that he drew it.

But I got my revenge. I've tuned out all the cartoon channels from his TV set. You don't wanna mess with the Eggman. I'm pure evil.

Next is my new found passion to read newspapers. Not that I didn't have newspapers before but now I'm buying english language newspapers and tamil activists might protest against me for not helping tamil to grow. Sorry, but tamil newspapers are marginally costlier with less content when compared to english dailies. And the editorials in The Hindu are a learning experience. Do you know that 80 crore people in our country live on Rs. 20 a day? That's less than how much we spend for a coffee at a coffee house in the city.

Then came cooking. It actually started out like this. When I try to watch TV at around 6, my mom will snatch the remote from me and watch a cooking show (somehow all channels have a cooking show around that time), and I thought 'What the hell? Does it matter what I watch, as long as I watch it in a TV?'. TV is entertaining and educational. Even Kalaignar feels that way.

Then I started coming across many cooking recipes while browsing for ~~playboy centerfolds~~ arts and paintings, and I took it as a sign. I cooked Paneer Shabnam and for the first time I liked something I cooked myself (except Maggi noodles). Then I tried to cook Chinese with Schezwan Noodles but I didn't get the sauce right. Its okay, baby steps.

***

This anti-corruption thing is actually gaining momentum and the only thing its missing is a skinny bearded yoga guru who can't stop blinking his left eye. Actually we do have one of those, and its name is Baba Ramdev, who is fondly called 'dhongi baba' by Mahatma Gandhi's grandson. Aptly named one would say. I don't like anyone uses religious means to a political end. Dhongi baba is making ridiculous demands half of which cannot be done overnight and the other half is too silly to even consider a possibility. You've gotta blame Congress though, for acting like a wuss with him from the very beginning. He's a yoga instructor for heavens sake! You don't send 4 cabinet ministers to make nice with a guy like him.

If you think he's doing something noble, let me tell you this. The Ramlila grounds, which was used for the protest, was actually booked by the dhongi baba claiming that he was going to conduct a yoga campaign. He tried to make under the table negotiations with Congress and if Congress ministers didn't read out his letter in the press conference on the night of the hunger fast, the so called fast would've ended in a day.

BJP thinks its right to back him, but its gradually giving its ground as the opposition party to these so called civil activists. Its one thing to support Anna Hazare, but if BJP gives support to ignorant manipulators like the baba, it will be hard to please him if/when BJP comes to power. A word of caution to Congress: an RSS backed religious leader is a loaded weapon with a hair trigger.

***

Okay I've written something about current affairs. Now will you believe that I've been reading newspapers?

Until next time.

The Eggman.

The Lesser Evil

2011-05-19T00:41:00.000+05:30

MMMMUUUUAAAAHHHH :*

This kiss is for Mylo, my dear computer, who's SMPS was fried by TNEB's notorious voltage surge last Friday. She was finally fixed today and during the last 4-5 days during which she was knocked out cold, I missed her very much and realized how much internet is essential to us and how costly GPRS is.

***

This image was made when JJ became CM of Tamilnadu the 2nd time and it was actually used in the ADMK website. Who would've expected those fellas to have a sense of humour?

On the day of voting I was very much indecisive about who I should vote. No doubt ADMK is as corrupt as DMK is. But the deciding factor was that the whole of Karunanithi's family is knee deep in the muck of corruption and it seemed that it might be good to give JJ a chance and see if she has seen the error of her ways.

I am pretty sure everyone except ADMK was surprised by the fact that they actually won. Even though everyone hoped that DMK shouldn't win, they thought it was impossible since DMK has proven its mettle in rigging elections. Alas, if it wasn't for BHEL's homemade electronic ballot device, DMK might have won this election (I've always wanted to use the word 'alas' in a sentence). Kudos to the election commission for conducting this election with least noise and hindrance to the public and at the same time having 80% voter turnout. with respect to voter turnout, any number above 50% is good.

To make a list of surprises,

ADMK's huge majority
DMK's low vote share
TN people's nerve to stand up against corruption
The look on Vadivelu's face

Actually, Vadivelu's face should be on top of the list.

***

It has become almost a common thing that all major games these days cannot be fit inside a commonly available 4.7 GB DVD. Games like GTA 4, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Total War Shogun 2 well exceed the 10 GB mark while most other "serious games average around 6-8 GB. However there are some games which can be fit inside a CD and still get higher ratings in comparison to these games. And I'm not talking about Super Mario and Contra. Here are the top 5 so-called casual games of the recent times that pwned the serious games.

5. Angry Birds

One of the highest selling iTunes app of all time, when Angry Birds for PC came out I found that it had the niche to bring out the person inside you who never gave up from beating the level even after seeing the game over screen so many times over and over. The objective of the game is pretty simple - knock out a bunch of funnily drawn pigs perched precariously on top of unstable structures. The difficulty ramps up pretty smoothly and you should be a master of projectile physics to get 3 stars in every level of the game.

4. Plants vs. Zombies

Plants vs. Zombies was the first game that I've played in the tower defense genre. Brain eating zombies have taken over the planet and you have a bunch of plants that can protect you from them. You get easily hooked to this game as I found that my time was better spent playing this game than to prepare for TCS placement test (oh, that explains why I didn't get placed in TCS).

3. Anomaly: Warzone Earth

Anomaly is a hybrid of strategy tower defense games. The alien invasion theme also follows in this game but all instead of zombies you have huge mechanical things that zap your ass to kingdom come and instead of plants you have tanks and missile launchers and people talking in British accent. This is a thinking man's game and the gorgeous visuals will protect you from your friends making fun of you for playing children's games.

2. World of Goo

Being a casual game hater for most of my younger and ignorant life as a gamer, World of Goo was the first casual game that I played because of the rave reviews it got. It was designed by 2 programmers who used to work for the gaming mogul Electronic Arts. They started a company called 2D boy and their first product was this game. The game used simple mechanics such as gravity and wind. Numerous tiny balls known as goo balls can be used to construct makeshift towers and bridges and they should be made so that they lead to a pipe's open end. Structures should be made with minimum number of goo balls because the more goo balls you save yields you more points. All this means endless hours of puzzle solving fun.

1. Super Meat Boy

Forget about everything I've said above. None of these games even come close to greatness as Super Meat Boy does. THIS IS THE SHIT.

***

Yawn. Oh so sleepy. Until next time.

Super Egg Boy.

I'm ba...no I'm not gonna say that again

2011-05-03T08:00:00.001+05:30

This is strange. I've been here before. Oh yeah now I remember, its my blog!

I know what you're thinking and I can explain why I haven't been blogging. Its just that for the last one year I was tailing Osama in a special joint operation with the CIA and finally we killed that douchebag. So now I finally got some time to blog.

No! I was just being lazy you know...playing video games, watching TV and movies and other stuff and I forgot to write about all the embarrassing stuff I did in my everyday life.

But now I have realized the truth. I'm a grown up now (sort of), so I shouldn't spend my time playing games and watching TV. I should take charge of my life and perform some responsibilities. Here's what I'm gonna do now. I'm gonna find a job, maybe do some research about higher studies, try my luck with GRE, apply to some universities abroad and decide what I'm gonna do with my life.

Oh wait a second...I got a job, I aced GRE and I have applied to some foreign universities! So I guess I'll just figure out what I'm gonna do with my life...I'll just stay home, play video games, watch TV until I get my call letter. But I guess that's what I was doing already.

***

Hope that answered what I've been doing since my long absence from blogging. Right now I got almost everything an early ty-ager would want from his life. I am twenTY one, making me a TY ager. See I just made up a word for my convenience just like that guy in that HTC Pulse mobile phone ad who makes up a word called zoot for the convenience of a game of scrabble. Do ad film makers actually think before making ads like that? Isn't it just ridiculous, thinking that if you have a mobile phone with an internet connection you can do anything? Maybe even start a revolution to topple a government? (an exception would be Libya...think about it for a second, their government was so weak that a social networking site was responsible for its downfall.)

Another ridiculous one is the Kellogg's Special K ad in which they say if they eat that stuff twice everyday for two weeks you can lose *upto* two pounds. Then the narrator with the cool voice says that research has shown that by having healthy eating habits people can become slim. Now, the people who watch this ad maybe stupid, but they gotta be real dumbasses if they haven't figured this out themselves. If that piece of information was found out using research then the researchers were real dumbasses.

But the ads which really make my blood boil are the cosmetic ones which really sound as if to make women have a really low self esteem. There's this anti-ageing cream ad in which two couples are having dinner together and one of the women tells the other that there is no need for such creams at the age of 30. 5 years later the woman who uses the advertised cream is living happily with her husband while the other woman is sad because her husband doesn't pay attention to her enough. And the happy woman says its not too late and gives her the cream. What is wrong with this ad? First of all, here's a little information for some woman out there, if your husband doesn't pay attention to you, its probably because your his wife, its bound to happen. You can dress skimpily, that might help (but not in public places, that's perceived a little differently). Second of all, if your husband does not love you because your old, then he probably didn't love you for your character, you should figure that out yourself. So you can divorce him, get yourself an older husband who will find you new, and your ex-husband can get himself a newer wife who will eventually get old, but hey, you'll still get half of his assets and alimony!

And oh the fairness creams! First they said you didn't look fair so you needed to use that cream. Now they're saying that your face is fair but your body doesn't match the fairness of your face so you need another cream for that! Now if these ads were shown in the US or any other country with black people having an appreciable amount of self esteem they'd have sued these companies for offending them by pointing out racist differences. Well if these ads could be applauded for not showing any sort of discrimination then that would be gender based descrimination because there are fairness creams for men also. As Virat Kohli points out, performance off the pitch matters just as much as on the pitch in his Fair and Lovely ad. If Martin Luther King thought that having a darker skin complexion is in someway not good then black people might still be considered inferior to white people. Which is in fact true in India as I know of some people darker in complexion made fun of because they are darker in complexion. Black chicks would dig them if they went to the US or the Caribbean.

So what I am trying to say is, ad makers should take some social responsibility when making ads and not just do what they are told to. The whole strategy of advertising is to make people believe that people think they need something even if they don't and scare the living shit out of them into making them buy. If you look at the moral of the story for each ad film this is what it will be: If you are not fair then use a fairness cream; otherwise you'll never get a date, never fall in love, never get married and you will die a virgin. If you don't have this mobile phone then you won't be able to update your facebook status and your other friends with cooler phone will think that your so yesteryear. If you don't have a pension plan, after you retire, your children will abandon you and you will live in the streets. If you don't have insurance you will die and your family will be left nothing.

Hope you think about why you are buying something before buying it before you fall for this corporate conspiracy.

***

"I decided to keep this post short, so that I don't run out of stuff to write about next time. And hopefully next time wont come a month later."

This was how I ended my last post on Feb 2010. I'm frankly surprised you haven't killed me for my lies. I'm even more surprised you have taken the time off your day to read my blog. Thank you very much. I'm hoping to blog even more. Lets see how that works out.

The Eggman.

More Fun, Less Blogging

2010-02-13T22:36:00.004+05:30

Yes, more fun, less blogging. Nice to write to you all once again my dear eggs.

Guess what I got from my brother? A Nintendo Wii and an Xbox 360 Controller for PC. Actually its his Nintendo Wii, which he decided to give it to me since he's getting an Xbox 360 Elite (which is way cooler than 10 Wiis put together, but his generosity is much appreciated). That should explain what I've been doing for one month without blogging.

Its too late to wish you a happy new year. So what was your new year resolution? I took...none. It's for a pretty simple reason actually. Every time I take a resolution I don't stick with it for more than 3 months...okay, not more than 3 weeks.

Why should I take a resolution on new year anyway? Why should anyone take a resolution on new year anyway? With some Google-ing, I found out that there's a god in Roman mythology named Janus. Now this guy had 2 faces, one to look into the past and one to look into the future. So those Romans dedicated the first month of the year to this guy and made resolutions to make things right so that the two faced god won't punish them for their past deeds.

I also found out that

Of the 28million taking an oath of self improvement for 2010, a remarkable seven million will have given up – within a week.
30% of all resolutions are broken within the first week.
Recent research shows that while 52% of participants in a resolution study were confident of success with their goals, only 12% actually achieved their goals.
Men achieved their goal 22% more often when they engaged in goal setting.
Women succeeded 10% more when they made their goals public and got support from their friends.

If you have also given up on your resolution, I hope the above facts make you feel better. You have 7 million others like you.

***

I rarely watch a tamil movie twice. Heck, I rarely watch a tamil movie. Its usually because I can guess most of the story by knowing who's the lead character - especially Vijay movies - man from village goes to town, falls in love, single handedly fights hordes of gangsters, throw in a friend's death in the hands of the villain, a kuthu paatu, and then not so surprisingly, the hero is victorious. Seeing the pattern you can even write a C program for it (gotta try that once).

On the other hand, you can tell whether the movie will do good by watching its trailer. Take Sakkarakatti for example. My friend got epileptic fits after watching the trailer. People knew very well that Aayirathil Oruvan is a rip-off of Indiana Jones, Gladiator, 300 and other half a dozen adventure movies from Hollywood from watching the trailer. And still they complain that the movie is not good. Trailers are a warning to people. They should realize this.

And there will be some other movies with a great trailer, like Aasal. But when you see Ajith's dance in the song Athiri Puthiri (also known as "to-to-doin"), you get dizzy.

So the last tamil movie I saw was Tamil Padam. It made fun of every stereotypical character in tamil cinema. In fact, I liked the movie so much that I saw it twice. The picture on the side is a wallpaper for the movie. You'll get the idea on how the movie will be after looking at it. So no review this time. Just a score.

4.5 stars out of 5.

***

Colin McRae DiRT2 as revolutionized racing games. It is one of the first games to support DirectX 11, and the environments look awesome. The car damage is real enough not to get in the way of having fun in the game, but at the same time, gives you a professional feel to driving the cars. Other drivers react to you when you bump their car with yours, appreciate you if you drive well, congratulate on your victory. Racing in many different locations of the world in many different off road races such as rally , rally cross and some fictional type of races too.

DiRT2 has revolutionized racing games, a genre in which EA Games' Need For Speed franchise was on a higher ground. NFS Shift might be good, but its not as good as Codemasters' DiRT2. This time they've really outdone themselves.

***

I decided to keep this post short, so that I don't run out of stuff to write about next time. And hopefully next time wont come a month later.

Ciao

Eating Spree [Includes Vettaikaran review(s)]

2009-12-30T08:11:00.005+05:30

Since my last post I've been having so much fun that I forgot to blog. Not that blogging isn't fun, actually, its a lot of fun, you know...sitting before computer, looking at the monitor, pressing all those keys, clicking the mouse and resisting the temptation to see some skin. On second thoughts, blogging is gruesome.

***

I had about two weeks of holidays when my semester ended and I spent one week watching all those movies I missed, 4 days in a factory where they make wheels and the rest of the week in the bed as I was suffering from fever ~~I won't be able to attend the class on~~. Sorry, old habits die hard.

And so I was saying, my fever ruined my 3 days of fun during which I could have done a lot of things (You can ask why I didn't do all those things I wanted to do in the first week but please don't. I don't have an answer.).

So for Christmas I made a list in my mind to do the things that I missed during those three days. They are:

Eat at McDonald's
Eat at KFC
Eat Hyderabad Biriyani

Though it may seem lame to you (you were probably expecting climb the Everest, resolve the Copenhagen issue, assassinate Vijay...actually the last one isn't such a bad idea is it?), eating something tasty is very improtant to me. Meals at the above places are something people should experience.

Eating at McDonald's is an American tradition. Where else can you can feed your whole family for 5 dollars in the US of A?(not that we are in the US of A but I'm just stating a fact. In India, a meal for one costs Rs. 121 only) Where else do kids get a toy with their meal? Where else can you take a photo of you with a statue of a ridiculous man wearing yellow overalls, red striped sleeves and white face?

KFC is the second best thing from in Louiseville, Kentucky, the first being cervical cancer vaccine. I'm sure your mom can cook chicken, but is it crispy? In KFC, it is. To my knowledge no other restaurant gives a bucket to carry your chicken.

Enough of America, lets talk about India. I know that there's a lot of stuff going on in Hyderabad like hunger strikes. But fortunately, Hyderabad isn't the only place where they make Hyderabad Biriyani. Its available in Chennai too. Since I have never eaten Hyderabad Biriyani (In fact, I have never eaten Hyderabad-anything), its third on my list. Hopefully I'll eat it before it becomes Telengana Biriyani.

I struck off item one on the list - McDonald's. I had a mexican chicken roll, some fries and some Coke. It wasn't my Coke actually, I spilled mine and got stares from the sweeper (probably because I'm irresistible) and my friend gave me some of his Coke.

There are still two more items on the list. 5 more holidays. Wish me good luck. And a good appetite.

***

After reading my Kanthasamy review on my blog, an avid reader asked me to review Vettaikaran. My heart was in no condition for it though. However I did get a sneak peek into Vijay's intro scene. It goes like this: A man is running. I know its Vijay. I hear sirens. Then I see a police jeep racing up. I think the jeep is chasing Vijay. But lo! Its not the jeep that is chasing Vijay but its Vijay that's chasing the jeep! Somehow, the policeman in the jeep manages to lose Vijay using his horse-powered engine. Would Vijay give up? No! He finds a horse, takes a short cut, and catches upto the policeman with his horse's power, jumps directly to the backseat, some dialogues, then jumps directly to the front seat and drags him to a hospital. Then I learn that Vijay is teaching a lesson to the drunk policeman who ran over an old man. Cut to a song sequence, in the beginning of which Vijay breaks a pillar stone with his bare hands.

Since when did Vijay start doing superhero roles?

Since I couldn't get the genre right for this movie, I can't review it. But I did find some praise for the movie in some popular review sites:

www.tamilnow.com: "...But, it's slightly average than his previous flicks - 'Kuruvi' and 'Villu'. Possibly, you would be curious to know whether Vijay has imitated anything from Telugu actor Mahesh Babu. Of course, he has aped certain style of uttering dialogues as the same way he does. Indeed, there's a particular shot of breaking a pillar stone just in bare hands (Mahesh Babu in 'Athadu')."

entertainment.oneindia.in: "another B grade flick from Vijay's factory of Mass Masala!...Hard times continues for Vijay.. better luck in Sura!"

I did find one positive review from www.merinews.com which said "If you don't get a chance to go to the theatres, do download the movie Vettaikaran."

Too bad for Vijay, even he wouldn't have thought competition would come from a movie like Avatar.

Ciao

Need Is The Father Of Invention

2009-12-12T19:11:00.004+05:30

Its as if some ad-film maker has read my blog. Remember my post about insurance ads? Well, I was watching TV that day and I saw an ad which reflected almost exactly how I felt about these ads. YouTube Link : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4az0SydydJE

****

Another glorious first day in college, this being the first day of the sixth semester. Highlight of this semester is that we have one elective subject, which means we get to choose one subject from a list, which is not a very long one. We had two choices, one was Numerical Methods. Since it had the word 'Numerical' in it, I automatically chose the other option, which was Unconventional Machining Processes.

Though the title sounds a little sophisticated, the text book is only around 100 pages and that's something rare for an engineering student. The first unit was already covered in the first week, which means 20% of the subject was covered in 5 days. That's record time in college standards.

And the lecturer isn't a bad guy...if you can ignore his English. It was easy to determine his level when he said, "Need is the father of invention". For those who can't figure out what's wrong with what he said, the saying goes like "necessity is the mother of invention".

Everyone except my Heat and Mass Transfer professor claimed that their subject was very easy. If you'd paid attention while watching Vaaranam Aayiram, you might remember that even Surya had an arrear in Heat and Mass Transfer.

We didn't do much in most of the periods. Taking notes is strictly for problematic subjects and optional for the other subjects. Lectures for theory subjects were spent reading Chetan Bhagat novels (2 States is awesome) and partaking in recreational activities like Hangman and Bingo.

This semester also includes a Design and Fabrication Project for which we can spend 4 hours every week roaming around labs pretending that we're doing something important. There's also a Communications Skills Lab which includes watching movies like Battle Of Britain and The Pursuit Of Happyness. But the best time I spent in that lab was when I was told to pick a story at random from a list and read it. I got The Gift Of The Magi by O. Henry. It's one of my favourites because its about two people in love and to what extent they go to make each other happy (I'm not talking about boning). This story is a must read for hopeless romantics like me and for +2 students because its in their syllabus. Link to the story: http://www.manythings.org/voa/stories/The_Gift_of_the_Magi_-_By_O_Henry.html It also has audio.

On the overall, I think this was the best week of college so far, not because I did something cool, but I was happy without doing anything cool.

****

Observant people might have noticed a new link in the sidebar called Date A Gadget. It's a new gadget review site which is maintained by one of my friends from high school who shares my fascination for Prince Of Persia, Gadgets and hot women. Since there is not much to blog about the Prince and since there are already too many blogs about hot women, he reviews gadgets. And he's not one of those fakers who take reviews from other website but he gets the actual gadgets and breaks down specs for mortals like us to understand. Check it out, the link is on the sidebar.

****

This brings us to the announcement of the winner of the first contest ever held on The Open Book: one invite to Google Wave for the best comment! Now before I announce the winner, I would like to make one thing clear to you - my decision is final. And you can't question it. Actually you can, but I decide whether to answer it or not.

The criteria on which chose the best comment is...I'm not sure. The winner of last week is Mano, who was the only person of all the people who commented to have watched one movie that was on the list. Congratulations Mano...check your email in-box for your invite.

I've got plenty more invites and Google has charged me with the mission of inviting more people to Wave. I've got no contest this week but next week I'll have one and I'm planning to give away 5 invites. So leave a good contest idea in the comments and you might just get an invite.

Ciao.

Apparently it turns out that I had mistaken the Mano who comments with another Mano I know. So he got the invite while the winner Mano didn't. That problem is being sorted out.

Top 5 Movies You Shouldn't Miss This Semester...uh...I Mean This Season

2009-12-01T23:01:00.003+05:30

Back in the day dial-up modems were cool, when people were bored, they'd just log in to Yahoo Messenger, go into their favourite chatrooms and chat with some random guy. Now when you go into a chatroom, all you see is guys posing as girls who want to take your **** and **** you so badly your **** is sore for 2 weeks. There is so much evil in this world. Chatrooms are prehistoric. Tweets and scraps are the cool stuff.

All I wanted to know was how to fabricate a PCB...and they wouldn't tell me! Instead they want to take my **** and **** me so badly my **** is sore for 2 weeks. Well, **** them!!!

-----

After so much talk about movies, it should be obvious to you that I am a movie junkie. Before the exam started, I was supposed to prepare, which involves me in my room with a book in my lap thinking about how sexy Megan Fox would look in Jennifer's Body. During this same period, I also collected DVDs of movies that I shouldn't watch till the exams are over, like little squirrels collecting nuts for the winter season. Now I'm spending so much time deciding which ones to watch now because All the movies I got are equally good. But I separated the cream of the crop for you, my dear eggs.

So the top 5 movies you shouldn't miss this semester...uh...I mean this season are

5. State Of Play starring Ben Affleck, Russel Crowe, Rachel McAdams.

State Of Play is the sort of movie that gives you a feeling of reading a good novel. This one gave me the feeling of reading a Grisham novel, Pelican Brief to be exact. Ben Affleck plays a US Senator whose secretary is killed in a freak accident. Russel Crowe and Rachel McAdams are two investigative reporters who uncover the truth behind her death as Russel struggles to be both truthful to his own profession and loyal to his longtime friend Affleck.

Reasons to watch:

Rachel McAdams is insanely hot.
A damn good ending.
Lots of twists keep you watching.

4. Orphan starring some actors whose names I don't remember or bother to look up in the IMDB.

There's a not so happy family with a not so happy mother recovering from alcoholism and depression caused by their stillborn daughter. The mother decides to adopt an orphan to get over the sadness. They adopt a Russian born girl Esther. Everything seems to be fine in the beginning but soon people are getting killed and the mother struggles to find out the truth about Esther.

Reasons to watch:

Omen styled horror movie that you just love to watch.
Deviation from the conventional thrillers. Director makes intentional build ups and lets them fuzz out and you realise that its pretty cool.
Seems ridiculous in the beginning, makes a lot of sense in the end when the secrets are revealed.

3. Zombieland starring Woody Harrelson, Abigail Breslin, Emma Stone and a new guy whose name I don't know.

This movie is a makes fun of all zombie movies like Dawn Of The Dead, Resident Evil etc. The whole world is infected by a virus turning people into zombies. A college student unaffected by the virus, returns home to find out if his parents survived the epidemic. On his way he meets Woody and they team up with the other two girls and help each other survive and make us laugh in the process.

Reasons to watch:

A funny zombie movie in a long time since Shaun Of The Dead.
Good solid acting.

2. District 9 starring nobodies. All of them South African actors who speak in a funny accent. Fock!

Debutante director Neil Blomkamp was supposed to direct the Halo movie. But since that project was on a halt, he decided to make a movie about an aliens coming to earth. Its a completely different treatment of the alien concept. Its easy to forget that this is Neil's first movie.
An alien space ship lands in Johannesburg, South Africa. It turns out that the aliens are refugees, seeking shelter in earth. A whole district in Johannesburg is turned into a refugee camp. The district turns into a slum and humans don't cope up with the aliens very well and the government decides to move them to a new place with the help of a private weapons manufacturer. The leader of the team which is in charge of the operation is exposed to the alien technology and is forced to help the aliens save themselves in return of their help to save his life.

Reasons to watch:

Aliens don't land in Washington DC but instead in Johannesburg.
Really professional, serious movie making from the director.

1. Inglourious Basterds starring Brad Pitt, Eli Roth, Diane Kruger

Its World War 2 and a group of Jewish soldiers called Basterds led by Brad Pitt are in Germany whose sole purpose is to spread fear among the Nazi forces by brutally executing them. During their mission they come across cinema hall whose audiences are mostly Nazis. Basterds are immediately interested in the cinema hall. The owner has her own reasons for having a Nazi cinema premiere. And it all boils down to one evening that will change the course of history.

Reasons to watch:

Directed by Quentin Tarantino.
Do you need a better reason?

If you are wondering why 2012 didn't make it to this list, its because its a movie in which a large number of people die and the hero and his family mirculously escape. It has happened before in the movie Day After Tomorrow and its happening again now. Nothing special.

Leave your comments below. Enjoy your holidays.

Ciao

P.S.: Oh I forgot to mention. The best comment wins a Google Wave invite.

Paranoid Insurance Ads

2009-11-25T21:38:00.000+05:30

Hello my fellow eggs...it has been a while. I had my semester exams and I had to focus.

I'd love to write about all the things I missed because of these exams but there is an important issue that I have to focus on before that.

Insurance advertisements.

They've become a nuisance when you are watching TV. There was a time when insurance was just life insurance. Now there's health insurance, property insurance and other stuff. And they don't stop there, they've got retirement plans, pension plans, mutual funds etc. But do you know the worst kind? Child plans. The worst thing about them is not the idea of insuring a child, I think its a great idea actually. But the adverts...that's the bad part.

A family is having a happy dinner. Mom and dad are eating with their little kid. The kid suddenly asks "Have you thought about it?". Dad asks, "About what?". The kid says, "My future". The dad looks like he's constipated. Then some guy says that they can secure their child's future by their child plans.

WTF? I know the easiest way to secure an 8 year old's future - by making sure he finishes tomorrow's home work. What else has a kid got to worry about? Global warming? Are we to think that a school kid will worry about his career because of job cuts due to economical meltdown?

By the way, the best insurance ads are from ICICI. They always feature happy couples.

***

Most of you will be wondering what happened to my "Eggman Goes To Thanjavur - Part 2", I promised you. I really did try to write part 2 but I couldn't write more than 2 lines. I just ended up browsing something else on the net. So I thought I would drop part 2. There was a valuable lesson I learned from that. I could never write a book. I probably won't make it to chapter 2.

For those of you still wanting to find out what happened when we got to Thanjavur : We did the presentation but it didn't stand a chance against the path finding robot PSG Tech guys did - they even brought a working model. I spent the rest of the day at Thanjavur Big Temple (crude translation of Periya Kovil) with a friend. I did manage to get past prelims in quiz but I didn't want to spend the night for a crappy quiz. I left for Chennai that night.

***
There's a thing about remade movies that I hate. Remakes are the easy way to success. Some directors can utilize that very well. But others just make a scene-by-scene copy of whatever the original version was. The difference will be the language spoken. We used to do something simpler in the past. Its called dubbing.

Some are remakes are really good. There was a recent Unnai Pol Oruvan (A Wednesday in Hindi). Billa was ok. I mean, it was stylish, but there was just too much build up and you get sick of watching Ajith walk in slow motion and talking in a monotone in the first half. SRK looked as slick as the Big B himself in the Don remake.

There was a Vasoolraja MBBS (Munnabhai MBBS in Hindi). It had the same storyline. But the locales are different, the plot rewritten to suit Tamil audiences. You might have noticed that remakes with Kamal Haasan end up successful. Auvai Shanmugi was no exception (Mrs. Doubtfire in English).

So if you're wondering what I'm building up to, its Kanden Kaathalai. The only reason I wanted to watch the movie was because Tamannah Bhatia was in it (Fact : She's only 19 years old. She was paid 50 lakhs to work in her last movie. I'm also 19 years old. You know where I'm getting at.). The director made it no secret that it was a remake of Jab We Met. Since I was already impressed with that movie, I wanted to see how the director had improvised. The only improvisation I saw in that movie was the inclusion of a comical relief Santhanam. Most of the dialogues are literal translations of the hindi dialogues and it didn't suit the characters.

If Tamil directors should ever think of making good remakes in the future, I advice them to watch Ocean's 11 (Yes, Ocean's 11 is a remake). And not to watch Ocean's 12 because it sort of sucked.

Ciao

P.S I'm in holidays and I hope to make frequent posts of short length rather than long ones once a week. But I sure could use a little motivation. Leave a f***ing comment!

Eggman goes to Thanjavur!!! -Part 1

2009-10-16T21:03:00.001+05:30

Hello my friends from the blogosphere! It' been quite a while since my last post. You probably won't believe me if I tell you that I was busy preparing for my model exams. So I'm just gonna say I was busy with some stuff. Oh I'm still suffering from sleep deprivation ever since I'd visited Thanjavur. Yes I've crossed the Chennai border which I haven't done in a long time. The last time I went out of city was like a year ago when my mom took me to a shitty temple in somewhere in on the way to Andhra. I never bothered to remember its name. And the last time I went out of city on my own was like...never. So why would a person like me who travels so little went to Thanjavur?

I know a bloke who knows a bloke. Now this bloke used all his leisure time to work on a paper while I was playing Prototype. This paper was surprisingly good, so good that he won a few paper presentation competitions, and made quite some money, close to five grand. Now you all know how my last attempt to make money worked out like. Yes, I'm referring to the interview incident. Compared to that, this method seemed very lucrative to me. I have to work on a paper which doesn't necessarily have to be my work. All I had to do was to convince the judges that it was really my paper. Like showing them some real references, make a circuit board or a model and there you go! An original paper by a 3rd year BE student.

And so started my quest for a suitable topic. Experienced people in this business said that a paper has more chance of getting selected if it is about a relatively unknown topic. So while I was googling for new technologies, MEMS caught my eye. MEMS stands for Micro Electro Mechanical Systems. It was perfect. Well, the name sounds sophisticated. That was good enough for me.

After 42 man hours of research and typing, my paper was ready: Adaptive Cruise Control system using RF MEMS (RF stands for radio frequency). I got it evaluated by a couple of my professors. Both of them said the same thing - I was going to have a hard time convincing the judges that it was my own work. They told me to make a circuit board or a working model. That wasn't going to happen because commercially available Adaptive Cruise Control system costs nearly $1000. Not rupees, but dollars. To make the modifications that my paper proposed will cost more. And it isn't available in India. So add some overseas courier charges and you have double the cost original cost of the setup. That's low cost technology for you. And me.

So with the working model out of the question, the paper was a goner. Now I wasn't going to throw away 42 hours of work just like that. So I sent it to this symposium they were conducting at SASTRA University called Sakshama.

7 days after sending the paper, I'd given up on the paper as no intimation was sent to me. But it turned out that they did send me one. Its just that GMail decided to play games with me. I didn't receive it but my team mate Chimbao got it. But he never bothered to check his emails because intimation will be sent to both the team mates all the time so if i didn't get it, so did he. One day before the deadline for confirmation, Chimbao went to play Mafia Wars in Facebook and decided to check his emails while he waited for the game to load. And there it was...like Meg Ryan in my bedroom...the intimation (I used the Meg Ryan metaphor to imply that it was the last thing we expected to see).

For those of you who didn't know, SASTRA University is located in the outskirts of Thanjavur, about 40 minutes from the proper town. All the while I worked on my lucrative money making scheme i never considered travel. 228 people were on the waiting list for the train to Thanjavur. Thankfully we got super deluxe bus tickets to Thanjavur.

And that was how I was in the bus to Thanjavur on 9th October 2009. And then what happened? Did I get to Thanjavur? Did my new money making attempt work? Did I finally get Meg Ryan on my bed? Log on to www.placeformwords.blogspot.com in 3 or 4 days or probably a week to find out.

Ciao

Life Is.

2009-09-25T22:38:00.002+05:30

Do you know that one of the best father-son moments happen in my life during the weekends when my father wants me to clean up the car?

"Hey son, c'mon lets clean up the car, we haven't cleaned it for a long time..."

"...er..."

"Open up the garage and take the car out. I'll be right behind you."

10 mins later:

"I see that you started cleaning up the car...good. You take the left side and I'll take the right. Just let me make this call and I'll be right with you."

30 mins later:

"Oh you cleaned up the car...great. You could've waited up for me. Now put the car back in the garage and lock up."

5 mins later:

"Ok, you're done. Now stop wasting time and go prepare for your tests."

"But dad, my tests ended last week!"

"Well then, prepare for the next one."

"But dad...."

"No buts. Now go."

Perfect sunday.

***

There was this really funny application in facebook. It will ask people a series of question and after answering them, it will tell you which important event of your life will be interrupted by Kanye West!

It all started during MTV awards. Taylor Swift got the award for best music video and she went up the stage for her acceptance speech and there he was, Kanye West, jumping out of nowhere. He grabbed the mic from a seemingly stunned Taylor and started talking about how Beyonce's entry for the award was way better than Taylor's and that it was Beyonce who rightfully deserves to be awarded. The incident ended with Kanye being escorted out of the award show.

So according to this crazy facebook app, what event of my life was going to be interrupted by Kanye? My marriage! "Beyonce's marriage with Jay-Z was waaaaaaaaaaay better than yours man!" But I feel sorry for one of my friends who's first time doing "you-know-what" with his girlfriend will be interrupted by Kanye!

***

Life is _______________.

Ever tried to fill up that blank? One of the most bizarrely spent time in someone's life, according to me, is thinking about the purpose of life. I use the word bizarre because you can't define whether it is useful or useless to think about the purpose of life. Because, when you figure it out, you wouldn't know if you got it right. Even if you did get it right, you might not be brave enough to change yourself to your purpose. Don't tell me, "I know what the purpose of my life is! I'm a dentist and my purpose is to rid the world the evil of plaque!". Say that out loud and it will sound stupid even to you. You probably ended up becoming a dentist because your cut off wasn't enough to get you a medical seat. You're probably a Hindu because your parents are. You prefer wearing briefs because your mom didn't buy you boxers when you were little. So many things we do, without thinking why we are doing it. And the beauty is, every moment you think about these things, in some strange way, you are also wasting time.

So as I was walking in the rain on my way home from college, I thought to myself, why bother? Its just going to be one life time for me (unless the creationists are right), so why bother? Just take a moment to appreciate life. Ever looked up the sky when it was raining and saw a rain drop falling down? I think its exhilarating. One part of you wants you to close your eyes because it will fall right on your eyes. The other part of you doesn't care of it falls on your eyes, it just wants you to see that spectacle.

So don't try to fill up that blank. It'll come to you. Until then, Life is.

"I love the rain. It helps me think."

-Violent Marv in Sin City Comics

Ciao

Kandasamy Review + An Eventful Saturday COMBO!!!

2009-09-19T06:29:00.002+05:30

Yes, I have watched this season's most expected film, Kandasamy, and boy...what a movie it was. But before I get on with the review, I thought it would be interesting to tell you how I ended up watching the movie that I was so sure I would watch it only on its TV premiere.

So here's the thing, its the first weekend after the end of my ever existing cycle test and I finally got a breather. So I decided to spend it with some friends. Let me explain my plan to you in a nutshell. Its more like an algorithm so I am putting it down in points. This is what was supposed to happen before that plan was sabotaged by God (whose existence is disputed by men like me):

Before sabotage:

Get on a bus and go to Ambattur.
Go to my friend Y's place and give him some softwares he needed.
Go to Hyderabad Biriyani Centre and gain 4 more pounds of fat.
Go to another friend Don's place and give him some games.
Show him how to play games.
Explore other ways to waste time. Improvise.
Get back home.

But this is what happened.

After sabotage:

I got into a bus and was on my way to Ambattur. But Y sends me a message that there was a power cut and there wasn't going to be any power till 5.
I use some of my quick thinking abilities and decide I'll go to the Don's place.
But he's not available. For some strange reason, the Don, who is incapable of speaking even Tamil without a Hindi accent, has gone to German language tuition.
So I head back home...to find it locked.
It seems one of my uncles got a heart attack and my parents went to visit him. How nice of them. The only problem with that was, they locked the house and took the key with them. Its going to be a solid 3 hours before they get back home. How not so nice.
So I employed my quick thinking powers again and come to a conclusion that it was best to go somewhere where I would be engaged for such a duration. A movie theatre seemed like a very good decision at that time.

And that's how I ended up watching Kandasamy. Now, for the review...:

Superhero Kandasamy - Review

Ever gone to a place and wondered why in the hell did you go there? That was exactly how I felt halfway through the movie.

Kandasamy was expected to be one of the big players in the movie releases this season. No other movie had so much hype. It was also the first movie to release a teaser trailer even before official shooting. Naturally people had high expectations. Everything was perfectly set for the director Susi Ganesan - an all-star cast of Vikram, Shriya, Prabhu & Vadivelu. So when you start wondering whatever could have gone wrong with the movie, the answer comes after half an hour of watching the movie - everything.

Vikram stars as a brilliant, young, charismatic blah blah CBI officer named Kandasamy. He clashes with big industrialists who stock up black money and ruin poor people's lives. Simultaneously, a mysterious character dressed up as a cock (a male chicken; no pun intended), named Kandsasamy helps people with their miseries, like sending money to the poor, beating up dishonest police officer etc. And you don't need to be a genius to figure out that they are both the same guy.

Ashish Vidhyarthi plays PPP, a run-off-the-mill ruthless businessman who is incapable of human emotions whose financial secrets are brought into the open by Kandasamy, the CBI officer. To delay arrest, PPP acts as a paralysed fellow even before his own daughter, Shreya. Shreya decides to take revenge for her father and uses her womanly ways. In the mix is an another IT mogul who likes to have mini bachelor parties in his travelling bedroom. They all get crossed by superhero Kandasamy and they all decide to hit hard on the man behind the mask.

I found the movie very tiring. It seemed as if a mix of Sivaji The Boss, Anniyan, Gentleman and other such movies is what Kandasamy is. The ridiculous costumes don't help the cause. Characters in the movie are all standard stereotypes. And the only thing that keeps you watching is Shreya's neckline which keeps dropping throughout the movie. Prabhu embarasses himself in Vadivelu's interrogation scene and Vadivelu has lost his talent to crack jokes.

To sum it all up, Kandasamy is the sort of movie which makes you wonder whatever the hell you are doing in the cinema theatre.

1 star out of 5

Ciao

P.S.: I wrote this two weeks ago but I couldn't publish it because of some problems with my pc.

God Might Exist, But You're Wrong

2009-08-28T06:48:00.004+05:30

Recently I read an article in New York Times about the on going battle between atheists and theists:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/23/opinion/23wright.html?pagewanted=4&_r=1&ref=opinion

It is actually a very interesting article on how both atheists and theists could be wrong. You see the products of evolution, i.e. us, was a result of thousands of years of a selection process called Natural Selection, more popularly known as Survival of The Fittest. It makes sure that the fittest organisms in terms of physical and mental ability are allowed to live. And so, the most successful organisms in the world are...

If you said human beings, nice try. But the answer is insects.

But human beings are the most advanced product of evolution, we being capable of doing fantastic feats such as watching HBO for 6 hours straight, using the word "simply" in all the wrong places ("What are you doing here man?" - "Just standing simply"), or enduring a Vijay movie. But the point this article makes is that how did we gain characteristics like honesty, sincerity etc., when survival of the fittest supports characteristics which are directly or indirectly selfish. Th article argues that this gap in the explanation of human nature could be the hand of a being above us, preferrably God (but I hope its the Flying Spaghetti Monster).

There is a flipside to this argument which is also mentioned in the article. This God is most definitely not the God that is in any of the holy books. That makes both theists and the atheists wrong.

What makes me wonder is, even after thousands of years of evolution, how did we ever manage to fool ourselves into believing religion? Wouldn't you laugh your guts out when you hear of God's own fantastic feats? ("Hey Bob, you remember that guy we stripped, mocked, flogged and crucified 3 days ago? Well you ain't gonna believe this, but he's alive."). Lord Krishna probably had Google Earth inside his mouth because when somebody saw his mouth open, they saw "the world" inside. Why does the Pope alone have a direct hotline connection to God?

God may have made sense to some people, but religion doesn't.

***

Got this from the Net:

Bill Gates recently gave a speech at a High School about 11 things they did not and will not learn in school. He talks about how feel-good, politically correct teachings created a generation of kids with no concept of reality and how this concept set them up for failure in the real world.1. Life is not fair - get used to it!

2. The world doesn't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something
BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

3. You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won't be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

4. If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

5. Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for burger flipping: they called it opportunity.

6. If you mess up,it's not your parents' fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

7. Before you were born, your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

8. Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

9. Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

10. Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

11. Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one.

Ciao

Independence Day

2009-08-15T11:37:00.005+05:30

Wow, today's a holiday because...its a Saturday. Added to the fact that its also the 62nd Independence Day, the day in which all the blood, sweat and tears of the revolutionary leaders who swore to end the injustice brought upon our country by the British came to fruition - it was on this day that India had broken free from the chains of colonialism and became a democratic republic. And it just so happens that its on a Saturday.

Is it too much to ask for a holiday on a weekday?

Well then, Independence Day is not just another holiday, its the day you are reminded that the indelible ink which is on the nail of my left forefinger is a result of a bitter struggle to be given the freedom of choosing a ruler of our choice. But even if we wanted to be reminded of such a thought, we have so little ways. How many TV channels broadcast shows that are patriotic? Its Kuselan on Kalaignar TV as I am typing this now. No one knows how many good patriotic movies came out in Tamil since the time of Sivaji. At least the Bollywood has Rang De Basanti to brag about. What do we have? Vijay Kanth?

Movies aren't the only way to express our patriotism, but what about books? Even in school, Indian history is given in detail up to the point of our freedom struggle but after that? Not much on the Indian role in formation of Bangladesh. Very little about the Indo-China war and the Kargil war. How many of us know that our national anthem was made official only on 1950 eventhough our country became independent in 1947?

Its sickening when you think about all of this, how easily we forget these things, things which had a huge impact on us even when we weren't a part if them...about how much it meant to those who took part in the struggle and how it has become a casual holiday.

I know that I sound preachy but when I think about all this, this is all I can be.

***

Many thanks to the Chairman of my wonderful college who didn't listen to the government's announcement of holidays on Thursday and Friday. You've been a real pain in the ass.

Ciao

Thriller

2009-08-04T17:59:00.010+05:30

Yeah...that last post was a little too long and a little too senti. But that was great typing practice.

In the last couple of weeks I was a out of action due to a dead phone line. But nothing great happened in the last 2 weeks. Events in the last two weeks ranged from very exciting to completely boring. The exciting part was I saw the Transformers 2 movie, and it was awesome. Probably they paid the graphics people more money than the actors, because the robots are so real. The woman who reviews movies on Pix TV channel (Chicks on Flicks), said that Transformers 2 makes Terminator : Salvation look lame. I say, the amount of CGI (Computer Generated Images) used in the movie makes Ice Age look lame. But overall, I would even go so far as to say Transformers 2 is the science fiction movie of the year. It has the best graphics since Michael Jackson's Thriller video.

Talking about Michael Jackson, it seems that I'm probably the only blogger who didn't write something about MJ after his death. So hereby I dedicate this post to Michael Jackson, The King of Paedophilia...er...um...sorry, I meant to say King of Pop.

I used to believe that MJ looked so white because of a pigmentation surgery. So does, probably, the rest of the world. But Wikipedia says he got vitiligo. So do I have to get vitiligo to if I want to become fair-skinned?

If your asking why I want to get fair-skinned, don't ask. Because you know the answer - almost all the women, starting from Shreya in Sivaji to the street vendor woman like fair looking men (don't ask how I know what the street vendor likes...I just wanted to exaggerate...really). So I was thinking about how I was going to get fair (getting vitiligo is not even an option you degenerate, vitiligo is a disease).

While I'm torn between using Fair and Handsome("Hi handsome, hi handsome!"), Garnier and Nivea, I also wanted to know your opinion. Do women really like fair-skinned men or could Karuppiah get a girlfriend without a face bleach? Does looks really matter?(of course it does, but how much?). Post you answers as comments.

***

Recently I found out that many of my readers from facebook don't know that I own a blog and that I'm typing it all out in facebook. For them, news flash : I do own a blog and what your seeing in facebook in just the RSS feed from my blog. If you don't know what an RSS feed is, its technology. If you don't know what a blog is, then you're probably from the stone age.

So here are some simple instructions for the no brainer on how to open my blog and post comments:

1. Open a browser window/tab and type http://www.placeformywords.blogspot.com/

2. You'll find the nice and not so nice stuff written by me. Read and get educated. If you don't know how to read, finish you school education and come back (on second thoughts, you should be applauded for getting this far).
3. On the right side of the page, you'll find the sidebar. It will contain the blogs I like, quotation of the day, National Geographic's Picture of the Day(where one day, even your pic might be there, keep your fingers crossed), stuff about me, Blog Archive where previous posts can be seen, subscription panel and the followers.

4. I'll be really grateful, if you become my follower. Just click on join the link and provide your relevant email id.

5. If you don't understand any of the steps above, sell your computer. Your better off with and abacus or counting with your fingers.

Hope you like what I wrote and become a follower. You can even suggest what you want me to write about. And don't forget to answer the questions that I asked you earlier.

Ciao

P.S.: Don't get pissed off with the stuff I wrote about MJ. It's just for fun.

Life's Worth

2009-07-20T19:36:00.002+05:30

WARNING!

Those who are not the sentimental type or not even the pseudo-sentimental type, just close this window/tab and wait for the next post. If you are convinced that you are capable of human emotions, then you may continue reading.

My last post had great response from readers in my college and they wanted more of it. Honestly I was surprised that people even like my writing because I've started focusing on humour so much that the whole post looks like the script for Russell Peters Show. And to be even more honest I got sick of writing about my goddamn (blasphemy!) college. But I wanted to write one more post about it to wrap it up, until 3 days ago.

3 days ago, a friend called. She's got a beautiful telephone voice but since she had got cold, I mistook her for a prank caller. After she convinced me that she was really her, we had some small talk. Small talk got into something more serious and set me on a trail of thoughts. But they were so random and incoherent and mostly full of anger, self-contempt and sadness that I promised to call her back later and tried to figure out what I was really thinking. And I promised myself that I will make a post on my blog about this. I started retracing on what actually gave me those thoughts.

We were talking about our plans after college. She was going to do a post graduate course. Good for her. What was I going to do? Hmmm. I am also going to do a PG, perhaps an MBA. Wait, I'm so sick of studying, so maybe I'll work. But then again, I thought, who was I to decide?

Huh?

Well, I'm Eggman, the master of the eggs. Who buys the eggs? My dad. Who cooks them? My mom. So what the hell do I do? I eat. Is that the only thing my mom and dad are involved in? No. Well, what else are they Involved in? Well, there are some things...actually a lot of things.

Practically everything.

Right from the shoes I buy, the clothes I wear, the money I spend, etc., if my mom or dad's better judgement is not involved then I'm not Involved. And readers, atleast those of my age will agree with me on this point. But have you ever asked yourself why this is so? Because you already know the answer to that question. Because that’s the way it is. It’s like gravity. You know that when the apple fell down, gravity was responsible for that, but you don't know why it was responsible.

Let me take you on a ride through my memory lane as I tell you my side of the story as to why my thoughts on what I was going to do after college made me sad with self contempt. I guess I was so happy in my childhood that I don't really remember much about it. The fog in my memory lifts as I can see some of my life in my mind when I was 10 years old. It’s like watching old black and white Polaroid pictures. I know that I was me when I was 10 years old, but I cannot believe that I grew up to be the same guy. I'm much less happier now.

12 years old, memory gets clearer as I can see myself transferred to a new school. When my dad filled out the application form, or when I wrote the entrance examination, I really didn't feel how much that this will change the way I lived. I thought I did the exam badly, but I was the first of the five to get selected. I got to go to school in a car since its 40 minutes from my home.

First day at school. Remember it quite clearly...as if watching a high definition movie. Tailor did a bad job with my uniform, my trousers are embarrassingly short. Teacher asks me a question in English, and I don't understand what she's telling. The most embarrassing day of my life.

13 years old. I got a crush on a girl. Did a lot of things that when I think about it now, I can't help laughing at myself.

14 years old. Everyone's focussed on the public exam except me. People tell me to get serious but I don't. Life becomes harsh on me all in the sudden. I give up on my crush; decide it’s a passing cloud. Should've done it earlier. I am forced to go to school on MTC buses. My father must have thought I was a bad investment and decided to reduce transportation costs. Exam is over and the results come out and I pass with very average marks. Now my father was convinced that I was a bad investment. I meet a few old school friends. They ask my marks. I tell them. They laugh at me. They can't believe I went to a school 40 minutes away from my home to get these marks. I change the topic.

15 years old. I think I might be good enough to make it to the IITs. 3 months into the school year, I'm convinced I'm not even fit for school. I barely pass that year.

16 years old. I already knew what was going to happen at the end of the school year. I get marks so low that I get a counselling date a month after the counselling began. My father gets me a seat in a reputed college which, I find out after a week in it, is worse than a nut house.

17 years old and life is hectic. It was so much for me that I don't remember much about it except the good times I had with my friends. 18th year was a little easy on me. I get my driver's license and passport. Soon I realise that both will not be useful any soon. My dad says the only way I get to go abroad is for my studies. Useless passport. My brother advises my parents that I'm a rash driver and shouldn't own a bike, out of vendetta because I gave him a troubled time (tore his stamp collection when I was 4 years old, poured water on him when he was sleeping, that was when I was 11 years old) when he was back in India (He works in US of A now). Useless license.

19 years old, I have an argument with my mom about my love life, my point being that since I am the one who is going to tie the knot, I get the freedom of choosing the one I want to marry. Her point is that she gets what she wants...which is actually not a point but a suppressed expression of dictatorship.

And at this point of time I had the same feeling that I had 3 days ago and I looked back on my life just like this. If I had stayed in my old school, I might have scored better marks. When I left my old school at the end of 7th grade, I had the top marks for that year. I have a picture of me getting a prize for that. Now you may think that I blame my dad for getting me transferred to another school and eventually leading me into a pothole of failures, but I don't. He had the best intentions in his mind when he got me into that school. But shit happens. People screw up. Especially those who spend more than two hours on commuting to school.

Getting back to the present, I finally figure out, why I recollected all of this. It’s because I wanted to get reminded of how much my life is worth. I thought am not in control of my life but actually I was. Everything in my life happened with my silent approval. If I had told my father that I was fine in my old school, things might have been better. And I honestly I should not have poured water on my brother when he was sleeping, bad move. So to sum it up, I fucked up.

And I feel absolutely great. Now I know that i'm in control. I have a mom, who makes the best lunch for college (and I regret that sometimes because my classmates eat my lunch), a dad who can buy my bare necessities, even if they are branded. I passed math in middle school because my brother tutored me. I have great friends who expect nothing from me except to be myself. And for these reasons I am forever grateful to the above mentioned people.

Now I am happy.

So when you feel sad or depressed or simply "feel like shit", think about all those people that I mentioned above. They have all spent a chunk of their life for you, they have made an investment on you and some don’t expect returns. And to them you owe a lot. And for the same reason, pull yourself together and go on living your life. If bullies in your school beat you up, fight back. Even if you get your nose broken, you will feel great. Can't have fun in college because of too many rules? Break the rules without getting caught, it’s much more fun. Hate working at your workplace? Save up some money, quit your job and get a new one.

So whatever you do in your life, do it because you want to, not because you have to. You can say no when you don't want to do something. If they don't listen to you, say no louder. Say louder until they listen to you.

I fell great after writing this. Thank you for reading this. And thank you for being my dad/mom/brother/friend.

Ciao

Learn The Hard Way

2009-07-13T22:02:00.004+05:30

This college thing is more time consuming than I had thought. I now have less time to play games, orkutting, chatting, facebooking and doing nothing. So when the weekend comes I go all the way. Finished the game Prototype an hour ago and got bored already. So here I am typing away like I'm writing record due tomorrow but the difference is, this doesn't have a deadline but I have the duty of satisfying my fans who are now less than the number of fingers in my hand if both my hands are cut. So without further ado, as I promised you, I'll introduce my lecturers and professors.

No, not all of them, just the ones who deserve to be mentioned. Personally I think everyone in my college is a egocentric weirdos who don't even have the least bit of decency not to scratch their balls in front of female staff but there are some weirdos who can cause more damage than sleeping gas with their teaching skills. They are,

The Dumb Bums

I had great expectations from this guy who teaches me Dynamics. He's an author of many books which students actually like, not the usual copy-from-the-standard-text shit. Now this guy walks into the class room and everybody is like standing up and a good friend of mine just had to laugh after hearing a joke. The prof doesn't even bother greeting us with a customary good morning, he calls out to my friend, referring to him by the word which is the Tamil equivalent of "waste-land". I wasn't impressed. Turns out that the word was his favourite.

Then there is this guy who teaches me Gas dynamics. His problem wasn't his language, his problem was his mouth. He can't stop talking something as if its some kind of an obsession. In the name of recalling the previous day's stuff he repeats the same thing for a week. We were going no where with this guy.

Then comes the guy who tops them all. His was a problem of completely different sort. He graduated from the IIT with a degree in Chemistry. It was probably Fate's dark hand that threw him in this college but he seemed to enjoy every moment of teaching. The only problem was that we weren't. Actually most of us don't know whatever that goes on in his class because we will be sleeping. I try to avoid sleeping in his classes(not that I love to hear his lecture, I don't sleep in class because it disrupts my sleep-wake cycle), but since it is so difficult I try to distract myself from sleeping. This was how : instead of taking notes, I noted down every mistake he makes in his pronunciation. These are some samples :

"Forests act as a large sponse(sponge) absorbing all the rainwater".

A student irritated him very much and he decided to flaunt his knowledge :

"I have laand(learned) more than you".

He's probably a rich landlord from the country. The other day he was explaining the blue baby syndrome :

"Even the footus(foetus) gets affected".

Some other day he was explaining the dangers or using pesticides :

"Some pesticides affect both tarjet(target) as well as non-tarjet organisms".

The same day he was explaining how burning fossil fuels affect the environment :

"Banning(burning) of fossil fuels lead to pollution".

And how could I forget today???

"Deforestation leads to degrees(decrease) of rainfall".

God I feel sick already. Look I'll be honest with you, I didn't graduate from the Oxford with a literature degree but no one has to be to speak good English. Especially its got to be the teachers who have to be careful in these things because they're going to stay in the same college for probably the rest of the eternity but in a few years we will be going places and we don't want to show off in the office meeting what we "laand" in college.

I always thought learning by experience was the hard way and learning through schools and teachers was easy. And in the place where I study, its the other way around.

Ciao

RIP Poovaraghavan, 3rd yr EEE student who lost his life to a dreadful road accident. Loss of life could have been avoided if he was wearing an helmet. Once again it has shown us that a simple precaution like wearing a helmet can make the difference between life and death.

Update

I just got my result! And I passed!! I fucking passed!!!

Eggman Goes to College

2009-07-02T18:16:00.009+05:30

And I'm eggman. Hereafter I'll call myself by that name, so don't get confused.

Vacation was over and after that interview debacle there was this college debacle that i couldn't avoid...for 2 yrs and this is the third year.

I've always had a twisted view of college. And I was not to blame. It was Tamil cinema. They always showed students having fun. There wasn't a single scene depicting the amount of studying involved. And even studying is not my problem. Its the rules. None of the movie guys wore formals. Most of them had pony tails, french beards and piercings. And that created a lasting impression of how college life will be.

Let me tell you a story from my life. Or rather a page from m life story. Back in the day when we wore school uniform and started growing a rudimentary moustache, i.e. the high school days(or rather "daze"), there was more testosterone flowing in our blood than the amount of water our government(TN) gets from Karnataka. As a result most of my classmates (including me) and a few friends were trying to get a girlfriend(bottom line of the matter was that no one was successful but that was a different issue). After an unpleasant experience I reached a conclusion that my attempts at getting a girlfriend were futile(since most of the girls in my school placed themselves above Aishwarya Rai and thought that they were too good for us even though the fish vendor in my street looks better than them), and even if i did manage to get a girlfriend, school was just too early to make a commitment. So I gave up the womanhunt. One of my friends was really disappointed with my decision(he wasn't a quitter, unlike me) and asked me what better place was there to get a girlfriend than the school. Can you guess what my answer was?

"College".

At the end of high school, I guess I maintained my "average" performance which was not going to get me into a good college. Luckily my father came to my rescue with a case full of money. I was going to be an engineer. And where was i going to graduate from?

V for Velammal.

Touted to be one of the best colleges in the city, rumoured to be worse than school. But with my marks I didn't have much of a choice. Something was better than nothing. I didn't know what to expect since most of the guys who made out of the college did so well in their career but they never said a nice thing about the college. In the first week somethings were very clear to me. I've listed them out(it has become a habit since the first list).

1. No, I'm not going to get a girlfriend here.

2. No, I won't have a beard that I longed to have.

3. No, I wasn't going to bunk classes which seemed so easy in the movies.

4. No, I will not have that sense of freedom that school offered so generously.

5. No, wearing an ID card around your neck with a rope is not so cool(feels like a noose).

6. No, my love life is going to be an insignificant footnote in my college life.

and many other conclusions which have too many obscenities that I won't list for the fear of my blog getting flagged. But the whole thing was pretty much fucked up. My master plan for getting a girlfriend crashed and burned. And eggman continues his journey through the land of the barren.

Adventures of eggman will continue. Next time I'll introduce my lecturers and professors to you.

Post how our college life turned out in comments.

Ciao.

Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them

2009-06-23T06:29:00.004+05:30

Many of you will know that this is the title of one of the books written by J.K. Rowling other than the Harry Potter series, which is also a reason that you may not know about this book. And I also don't know anything about this book except the title. But its all fiction, by the time you finish the book, a strange thought appears that everything you just read is bullshit.

But there are a few fantastic beasts in real world and I will tell you where to find them.

1. The Dragon

The infamous, fire breathing, flying dragon from Romania as in Harry Potter is based on a creature that existed several hundred years ago(the romantic version of the dragon found in Shrek is purely fictional though). A team of British Scientists found a preserved carcass of few medieval warriors along with a carcass of a large lizard. With a long snout and a longer tail which are characteristic of a lizard but also with pair of wings which are pretty unusual for lizards. Further research indicated that the animal's body is not suitable for flight as per physics. But they also found a large air sac in the animal's body apart from the lungs. Testing the tissue of the air sac, they found that the air sac stores hydrogen. Hydrogen being a lightweight flammable gas acts as a hot air balloon that helps the creature in flight. Flight - check. Scientists also found traces of platinum in the creature's teeth. Platinum noted to be a catalyst for combustion, helps ignite the flammable hydrogen from the animal's air sac. Fire breath - check. Few medieval knights' bodies found near the dragon also fits the imagery of myths speaking of brave knights fighting dragons.

So could the animal be the fabled dragon?

There is one point that has to be observed before answering that question. What is their period of origin? Did they exist along with dinosaurs? If they did, how did they survive the catastrophic even that dinosaurs didn't?

But one thing we can be sure of. Dragons didn't go along well with humans and that may be the reason why knights hunted them. And just like many animals that became extinct, dragons also became extinct because of humans.

2. Vijay Kanth

The superhero who doesn't require a mask. His speciality is keeping the left leg on the wall and kicking with the right leg defying all laws of physics putting Newton's law of gravitation to question. He's been shot at, stabbed, punched, kicked, electrocuted but no one has managed to make a scratch on his body. Unlike many other wannabes, he doesn't require six packs. Even though he has a lot of competition from his telugu counterparts, he has managed to maintain his supremacy, even has his own political party. And where to find him? In the cinemas near you!

3. Max Mosely

Let me introduce you to the most diabolical sports chief of all time, better than Sharad Pawar. This guy has done more damage to an F1 car with this ludicrous rules than a freight train that would hit an F1 car at 300mph. Take a look at the disfigured state of the cars used in this season. Remember how these cars looked last year? Better. This man has survived sex scandals that invovled a Nazi styled orgy. And he has stayed on to make more rules for the next year. And the rule is, no teams should be operating at a budget of more than 40 million pounds. And for you information, Ferrari's budget for this year is a little more than 6oo million pounds. How do you expect a 600 mil team to work with 40 mil? So Ferrari along with other 8 teams including McLaren have decided to break away from F1. So Max has accepted 3 new entrants for the next season. So seven underdogs will be competing for the world title next season, 3 of them who have never been in F1 before and other teams like Force India who have so far found it lucky to even finish a race. Who do you expect to see in F1 other than Ferrari and McLaren? Third rate drivers with cars less reliable than go-karts? You can find him in every F1 website since he has become talk of the motor sports world.

Do you think you know any other Fantastic beasts that I don't? Do post them in comments and best ones will be featured in the next post.

Ciao

Flying Spaghetti Monster

2009-06-11T06:05:00.007+05:30

Sometimes I wish I believed in God. Because I'm used saying things like "oh my God", "Thank God", "Holy shit" etc. But it doesn't feel right to say "oh my evolution", "Thank Darwin" or "Evolutionary shit". So I decided that I would believe in a religion that requires like least set of things to do... like not having to go to the temple or Sunday mass, not having to feed crows before we eat during festivities etc. And I found just what I was looking for.

Welcome to the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster was founded by a man named Bobby Henderson to oppose the Kansas State Education dept. for opting to teach Intelligent Design theory as against evolution. The Intelligent Design theory, for those who don't know, proposes that, "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." Thus it implies that the "intelligent designer" is God. This theory is the only defense for the religious men against overwhelming evidence of evolution.

But Henderson thought differently. The intelligent designer doesn't need to be God. It could be even a really smart omnipotent lawnmower. Or it could be the Flying Spaghetti Monster(here onward referred to as FSM since I hate typing long words). FSM created the world after getting heavily drunk. There are also other beliefs such as

1. All "evidence" for evolution was planted by the Flying Spaghetti Monster, in an effort to test Pastafarians' faith — a form of the Omphalos hypothesis. When scientific measurements, such as radiocarbon dating, are made, the Flying Spaghetti Monster "is there changing the results with His Noodly Appendage.

2. The Pastafarian belief of heaven stresses that it contains a beer volcano and a stripper factory. Hell is similar, except that the beer is stale, and the strippers have STDs.

3. The official conclusion to prayers is "RAmen".

It even has its own version of the Ten Commandments, but only eight.

The Eight "I'd Really Rather You Didn'ts"
1. I'd really rather you didn't act like a sanctimonious holier-than-thou ass when describing my noodly goodness. If some people don't believe in me, that's okay. Really, I'm not that vain. Besides, this isn't about them so don't change the subject.

2. I'd really rather you didn't use my existence as a means to oppress, subjugate, punish, eviscerate, and/or, you know, be mean to others. I don't require sacrifices, and purity is for drinking water, not people.

3. I'd really rather you didn't judge people for the way they look, or how they dress, or the way they talk, or, well, just play nice, okay? Oh, and get this into your thick heads: woman = person. man = person. Samey-Samey. One is not better than the other, unless we're talking about fashion and I'm sorry, but I gave that to women and some guys who know the difference between teal and fuchsia.

4. I'd really rather you didn't indulge in conduct that offends yourself, or your willing, consenting partner of legal age AND mental maturity. As for anyone who might object, I think the expression is "go fuck yourself," unless they find that offensive in which case they can turn off the TV for once and go on a walk for a change.

5. I'd really rather you didn't challenge the bigoted, misogynistic, hateful ideas of others on an empty stomach. Eat, then go after the bastards.

6. I'd really rather you didn't build multi-million dollar churches / temples / mosques / shrines to my noodly goodness when the money could be better spent (take your pick):

*Ending poverty
*Curing diseases
*Living in peace, loving with passion, and lowering the cost of cable

I might be a complex-carbohydrate omniscient being, but I enjoy the simple things in life. I ought to know. I AM the creator.

7. I'd really rather you didn't go around telling people I talk to you. You're not that interesting. Get over yourself. And I told you to love your fellow man, can't you take a hint?

8. I'd really rather you didn't do unto others as you would have them do unto you if you are into, um, stuff that uses a lot of leather/lubricant/Las Vegas. If the other person is into it, however (pursuant to #4), then have at it, take pictures, and for the love of Mike, wear a CONDOM! Honestly, it's a piece of rubber. If I didn't want it to feel good when you did it I would have added spikes, or something.

Since it is such an easy religion to follow, I've accepted and embraced it. Hope you will also to.

May His Noodly Appendage be with us.
RAmen

So Much For The List...

2009-06-06T23:29:00.003+05:30

After starting the holidays with an ambitious list of things to do, I did none of those things in the list...except sleeping. But I didn't have to watch a Vijay movie to sleep, that would have been dreadful. I've been getting hate mail from people who have tried that. They're complaining that they've had epileptic seizures after watching 10 minutes of his movies. Those who did see the whole movie have stopped believing that Newton's law of Gravitation exists. I sincerely apologise for suggesting that method.

The movie that I did see was called The International. It stars Clive Owen as an Interpol officer and Naomi Watts as a New York District attorney. Its about these two people teaming up to bring down a bank that makes money in illegitimate ways. The film may have appealed to those people who had accounts in Lehmann Brothers or some other bank which crashed and burned in economic recession. Its aimed to be an intelligent thriller but I saw only intelligence but no thrill. The film could have been better if not for its dragging pace.

Besides watching the movie I didn't do anything else that was interesting. I had hopes for getting a part time job in a nearby computer centre(for those who didn't know, I am a certified C programmer and an uncertified expert in AutoCAD). It started like this. I wake up in the first day of the vacation, have a cup of tea in the bed, take a bath, remember that I still haven't brushed my teeth, brushed my teeth and went to eat. As I started with the dosas, My mom told me to write a resume. I ask why. She says that I have to take it to a computer centre. I ask the same question again. She says that I had "an interview" in the nearby computer centre. I ask the same question the third time. She reminds me of the last vacation in which I so splendidly and effectively spent doing nothing and she didn't want that to happen again(she may have read the list, but I couldn't know for sure). So I reluctantly accepted to go and wrote a resume that could have been the most horrible thing written on a paper(except if you write the word "horrible" on a paper). I didn't have anything to write on my resume(except my certified and uncertified expertise mentioned above). And on the eggman went to the interview.

To call it an interview will be like calling a Maruti 800 a Ferrari. The stompy lady on the desk told me that I had a good chance of getting to teach during the evenings. You have no idea how elated I would've been. I was bound to have 3000 per month. I was told I would get a phone call to confirm it. I went to home smiling. Mom, I aced the interview ;)

But the call never came and the next day I checked with them someone had already been hired for the position that I applied for and the stompy lady didn't know that. So much for 3000 rupees. Then the International followed. And that's how the eggman's hopes of getting a job crashed and burned(damn I like this expression).

But I recovered from the failure. I said to myself "You have a destiny. Maybe you aren't supposed to get a job. It wasn't an accident that you typed that list. Maybe God(yeah, the infamous, notorious and pretty much non-existent God) handed it to you. Like the Ten Commandments He handed to Moses". Now I had a mission. I will watch Vijay movie. I will cook something... hopefully edible. And I will do all those things I wrote about in my previous post that I don't remember much now. But I will do those things and fulfill my destiny. I will keep you updated on how I go about it.
For now, I'll leave you.

Ciao.

To Kill Time...

2009-06-04T17:29:00.003+05:30

It happened today. At 13:00 hrs. 4th Semester exams for B.E students is officially over. Now its 18:31 hrs as i type this and I am already getting bored. After trying to think deeply about what I should blog about, and miserably failing in that, I've concluded its just as easy to type as it comes in the flow. Its not like my blog readers are going to protest if i write badly. In fact, I don't think they would even care at all. For those who do care, who are currently less than the number of fingers in my hand, and for those who are wondering what to do after a few hours of getting done with exams, here are a few ways to spend time (un)productively. Productive or unproductive, you decide. Right now, I'm gonna improvise the flow.

So here it goes, countdown to the top 10 ways to spend holidays.

10. Turn on the TV and tune into a music channel. Press the mute button. Now watch it. Word is that this is better than watching a dirty movie.

9. Get rid of your old semester books. Make sure you don't dig up stuff that you don't want your mom to see. e.g., Test papers. This sort of stuff is are a reminder of how things suck in life.
WARNING : For those who are expecting arrears, just think before acting.

8. Arrange your DVD collection in alphabetical order. Even if they're pirated.

7. Write a list of things to do to productively spend the holidays, like learning a new language. Then think about how fast your going to give up doing that after you started doing it and strike of those items in the list. If all items get struck out, continue reading below. If not try doing those things until you stop it and then continue reading this. If you are not getting tired of it at all then I congratulate you - you got yourself a way to productively spend time. (I think this point should not be in this list, but as I said in the beginning I'll let you decide.)

6. Can't sleep? Try reading a previous semester book. Or read the next semester book. Both methods have delivered good results.

5. Try writing a beautiful poem for your girlfriend. If you don't have a girlfriend, write it for a girl you want to make your girlfriend. If you are successful, good for you. If you're unsuccessful, you may end up drawing something nice... like a truck or a car.

4. Watch a really bad movie. Like Villu, Kuselan or Alwar. You may either have a great time laughing or a great time sleeping. Either way, you're bound to have great time.

3. If you're not a good singer, try singing. If you don't want anyone to get irritated do it when you're alone. If you do want to irritate someone(like younger/older brother/sister) sing when they are there. When they tell you to shut up, do it louder.

2. Get a cook book. Take a random recipe and cook. If it works out well impress the people around you. If it tastes bad, use it to kill the rat infestation in your place. You might stumble into discovering a new pesticide.

1. Highest rated method in the world. Guaranteed results. Sleep.

If you can think about more ways, please post it in comments. I'll be putting up new posts when I got some time to kill. Which I suppose will happen very frequently. Oh, I forgot to include this method in the list.

Ciao

Timeless Tales

2009-05-28T15:10:00.004+05:30

I'm so busy with the exams you have no idea how much time i'm pretending to study. Inspite of all my busy-ness I found time to blog. But I couldn't "author" much but i found some interseting stuff written by another author on good writing...

"...I think that in really good stories, the whole is always greater than the sum of the parts. If that were not so, the following would be a perfectly acceptable version of "Hansel and Gretel":

Hansel and Gretel were two children with a nice father and a nice mother. The nice mother died, and the father married a bitch. The bitch wanted the kids out of the way so she'd have more money to spend on herself. She bullied her spineless, soft-headed hubby into taking Hansel and Gretel into the woods and killing them. The kids' father relented at the last moment, allowing them to live so they could starve to death in the woods instead of dying quickly and mercifully at the blade of his knife. While they were wandering around, they found a house made out of candy. It was owned by a witch who was into cannibalism. She locked them up and told them that when they were good and fat, she was going to eat them. But the kids got the best of her. Hansel shoved her into her own oven. They found the witch's treasure, and they must have found a map, too, because they eventually arrived home again. When they got there, Dad gave the bitch the boot and they lived happily ever after.

The End.

I don't know what you think, but for me, that version's a loser. The story is there, but it's not elegant. It's like a Cadillac with the chrome stripped off and the paint sanded down to dull metal. It goes somewhere, but it ain't, you know, boss..."

-Stephen King in the preface of his book The Stand

Nice stuff isn't it?
I've been reading this guy's novels for some time (It & Dreamcatcher) and he writes damn good horror. You guys might wanna try.

Ciao.

Rules From Males

2009-05-04T14:56:00.003+05:30

Here's something that I found to be very much true. For a successful relationship, I recommend all the women out there to follow these rules. Guaranteed results.

*This is not a joke*

Note : These are all numbered '1' ON PURPOSE!
1. Learn to work the toilet seat. You're a big girl. If it's up, putit down. We need it up, you need it down. You don't hear us complaining about you leaving it down.
1. Shopping is NOT a sport. And no, we are never going to think of it that way.
1. Crying is blackmail.
1. Ask for what you want. Let us be clear on this one: Subtle hints do not work! Strong hints do not work! Obvious hints do not work! Just say it!
1. Yes, and No are perfectly acceptable answers to almost every question.
1. Come to us with a problem only if you want help solving it.That's what we do. Sympathy is what your girlfriends are for.
1. A headache that lasts for 17 months is a problem. See a doctor.
1. Anything we said 6 months ago is inadmissible in an argument.In fact, all comments become null and void after 7 days.
1. If you won't dress like the Victoria's Secret girls, don't expect us to act like soap opera guys.
1. If you think you're fat, you probably are. Don't ask us.
1. If something we said can be interpreted two ways, and one of the ways makes you sad or angry, we meant the other one.
1. You can either ask us to do something or tell us how you want it done. Not both. If you already know best how to do it, just do it yourself.
1. Whenever possible, please say whatever you have to say during commercials.
1. Christopher Columbus did not need directions and neither do we.
1. ALL men see in only 16 colors, like Windows default settings. Peach,for example, is a fruit, not a color. Pumpkin is also a fruit. We have no idea what mauve is.
1. If it itches, it will be scratched. We do that.
1. If we ask what is wrong and you say "nothing," we will act like nothing's wrong. We know you are lying, but it is just not worth the hassle.
1. If you ask a question you don't want an answer to, expect an answer you don't want to hear.
1. When we have to go somewhere, absolutely anything you wear is fine.Really.
1. Don't ask us what we're thinking about unless you are prepared to discuss such topics as baseball, the shotgun formation, or monster trucks.
1. You have enough clothes.
1. You have too many shoes.
1. I am in shape. Round is a shape.
1. Thank you for reading this; Yes, I know, I have to sleep on the couch tonight, but did you know men really don't mind that, it's like camping.

Sweet Surprises

2009-05-03T12:21:00.003+05:30

Hey people! As the world glorified the workers all over the world on May day, I celebrated it in the true spirit... by working on Worker's day. Yeah, I know, it sucks.

***
Its that time of the year... that comes every five years. I think there is a grammar mistake in that sentence. Never mind.
So its election again. 5 glorious years of Congress in power has come to an end and the people are given the option of having them in power or chucking them out for a better guy. Personally, I like Dr. Manmohan Singh. He was different, in the sense that he didn't come out with press releases of ramblings and retorts for accusations from the opposition. He kept very much to himself and his work. He handled the economic crisis as expected from an eminent economist. But what surprises me though is BJP's repeated accusation that Dr. Singh is a weak PM. But I have no idea on what basis should someone be called a weak PM. Or I don't know of any instance where Mr. Advani proved himself strong.
Well, its election, so 90% accusations are baseless. Its funny to note that both parties have remade Jai Ho from Slumdog Millionaire to suit their election campaign. Get creative dudes!

***

And it was on May day that I had one of my model examinations. I took a bus to college as usual, in one of those fancy deluxe buses... you know the ones with the so-called "automatic doors" and the "low floor". Fare being Rs. 7, I gave the conductor a ten rupee note. And to my surprise (this is the sweet surprise the title boasts of) the guy gave me 7 rupees back. At first I thought the guy gave me the wrong ticket, but it was correct. 7 rupee ticket is now 3 rupees. Minimum fare for deluxe bus is Rs. 2.50 from Rs. 4.50... One old guy started reminiscing of the days when a plate of dosas were sold at 80 paises. Such was the power of slashing bus fares. Of course everyone came to their senses and said that this was just an election stunt. Talking about election stunts, I couldn't but think of Kalaignar lying down in front of air coolers "in order to bring about cease-fire in Srilanka". Kalaignar sure knows how to woo voters. Anyway, the next day, on the Hindu, I found out that bus fare reduction was an election code violation and the transport minister will be facing the music.
Serves you right!

***
You know, this is the first time I'll be voting. For all those who are 18 years of age, have their names in the voter list, please vote. Those who don't want vote there is a register in every voting booth. you can enter our name during polling, to say that you don't want to cast your vote to any of the parties. This prevents people from doctoring votes int he name of people who didn't come to vote. So please exercise your right to vote. If you would rather listen to advice given by someone older and more famous than me, watch any news channel... Aamir Khan will be speaking on behalf of me (only during commercial breaks).

Ciao

The Pursuit of Unhappiness

2009-04-10T06:53:00.003+05:30

Everytime I say I'm back I'm gone for a couple of months. So this time I won't say I'm back. Hello World.

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Spending more than 19 years in this world, one of those many conclusions that I made about the human species is that more than 90% of us are thinking that they're having a happy life but they don't.
Happiness is a state of mind or feeling such as contentment, satisfaction, pleasure, or joy. Or thats what wikipedia says. Its not the feeling of happiness that misleads people, its what they do to achieve it. To come straight to the point, I believe we have to satisfy someone else to get our own happiness... or in more crude terms, kiss someone's a**.
Disagree with me??? Think about it for a second... You're getting a promotion or a bonus for a job - by impressing the boss. A student to get a prize, he has to satisfy the teacher. Every son has to satisfy their parents to get his first bicycle. Numerous other instances can be stated which all make the same point - happiness don't come for free.
I guess you'll agree with that too. And that's how it has been, its meant to be. Hard work pays, losers stay losers. But its not the hard workers or the losers that i'm flabbergasted about... its the guys in the middle. Lets call them the miserables. They burn the midnight oil, working their asses off, jumping off the roof, thinking that they'll fly... but often forgetting that they don't have wings. They land hard on the ground and think why in the hell they jumped off the roof in the first place. Because they always want more than they'll get. They take themselves too serious and end up getting too miserable. They'll sulk, they'll loathe, feel sick of the world around them. They'll hate the winners, get jealous of them and spend more time watching out for them than concentrate on their work.
The difference between the miserables and the other guys are that they get contented with what they get. Since the miserables want to beat the others rather than actually achieve something, they'll stay miserable.
For the miserables - they should be contented with what they get, and try to work hard the next time. That is the only way they'll become ex-miserables.
For the non-miserables - Think about what you are working towards. Think about whether it is worth all the hard work. Working hard for something that doesn't make you happy gets you under the miserable category.

For a more interesting version of the stuff i said above, I recommend watching a movie called Jerry Maguire. Tom Cruise and Cuba Gooding Jr., play the leads roles.

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I'm afraid I might be getting a little sanctimonious.

Ciao

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