One thing I like about the new placement is that the monitor now faces away from the hallway which people pass through. So instead of my parents being treated to a half naked Elf when they walk past, they can instead see my beaming face.

Pillow talk can get quite awkward

I can’t even count the number of times my mother has walked in on me just when the movie decides it’s had enough of people being clothed. It’s the same with games, Dragon Age (1 & 2), Mass Effect (1 & 2), GTA and many more besides. They never give you a hint that they are going to hit you with some steamy pixelated scene filled with either sex or sexual tension. The dialog options give no clue, one minute you’re exploring all the dialog options with Morrigan and the next you’re on the ground making sweet and noisy love to her beside the fire.

As you can see, love making in games is not for the faint of heart (creepy face!)

Strangely, googling for ‘morrigan sex’ actually returns a bunch of results for some Japanese girl with wings coming out of her lower back. I do not know who she is, I’m not into manga. Also, the results are totally NSFW.

Anyway, I have completed the act of christening this new placement. I would never have been able to ‘research’ for this post if it wasn’t for the new layout. Let the uninhibited gameplay begin.

I was going to pontificate on how you illiterates misuse the word FML, but then I got bored and decided I’m going to talk about my sleep patterns. Maybe I’ll be point and laugh about it some other day. I’ve decided to be whimsical about my blog posts from now on.

So yes, my sleep patterns. As you might know, some people are known to sleep walk. According to Wikipedia, this is

Sleepwalking, also known as somnambulism, is a sleep disorder belonging to the parasomnia family.^[2] Sleepwalkers arise from the slow wave sleep stage in a state of low consciousness and perform activities that are usually performed during a state of full consciousness.

Sounds exciting! You know, if you’re a 70 year old man wearing fluffy slippers and falls asleep in front of the TV. It’s probably the most amount of excitement that will happen to you.

Cool people like me don’t sleep walk. We do the following

Sleep Orate

Carry out a monologue with a person near your bed. Person optional, I’ve known just to speak to myself. And I don’t mean mumble in your sleep. I mean talk. Loud. I’ve also been known to question my brother when he’s working late (the desk where he keeps his laptop is next to my bed). I don’t remember what the questions are, but he tells me I can get quite peeved, which leads me to

Sleep Attack

Ask my brother and he’ll tell you how tenaciously I guard the plug point when I sleep. Every time he tries to unplug the laptop power chord I hit him. Most of the time it’s with a pillow. Let me tell you, it’s unnerving to get attacked by a pillow wielding person when all you’re trying to do is unplug your computer. Positively puts you off the midnight porn. I’ve also been known to kick my bed. These battles usually end with me waking up with a bruised shin and wondering what the hell just happened.

Sleep Note Taking

Sometimes I take notes on my phone. I don’t know how I do this while I’m asleep, but I find these notes on my phone in the morning. By far the weirdest one I’ve taken down is

horriff norieff

That’s all. To this day I don’t know what that meant and I’m still confused as to what my intentions were. Even the big G doesn’t know what I’m talking about. Sounds vaguely Mediterranean or Middle Eastern. I shudder to think of what my sub conscience is up to when I’m asleep.

Sleep Sprinting 

If you had a camera in my room, apart from all the glorious nakedness you’d also see me rushing to either the bathroom light or the room light in the middle of the night. I basically get up, hit the bed with my pillow a couple of times for good measure and then rush to the light and switch it on. And then my brain wakes up and wonders what I’m doing near the light. It’s like I’m an old person with short term memory problems. I should probably stop reading all those fantasy stories before I go to bed. Give the old noggin some relax time.

So there you go. That’s what happens when you’re too cool to sleepwalk. Pretty much all those activities happen when I’m in a state between full sleep and full wakefulness. My eyes are open, but nobody’s home!

P.S. – By ”Which seat can I take?”, I was referring to Rebecca Black’s Friday. It was all the rage when I started writing this post. As I submit the post, her second single has come out. So yes, it’s been awhile but regular transmissions begin now.

My narrow sized blog can’t accommodate the proper orientation. A correctly aligned notice is here. And for those of you who want the text to be selectable, the pdf

I sooo know how that feels

Off Penny Arcade.

In other news, I’ll think of something to blog about soon. Facing a state of complete apathy at the moment.

On Tuesday afternoon my mother calls me and informs me that I am to make my presence felt at – at this point my brain goes into hyperdrive mode and comes up with suggestions (much like Google Suggest) like ‘a wedding’, ‘a relatives abode’, ‘a hotel’ but sadly no takers – THE POLICE STATION. The only way I would have been more surprised is if she’d told me to attend a gym. It turns out that a policeman had dropped off a summons at the house saying that I was cordially invited to an inquiry at the Ragama Police station on Wednesday, RSVPers get warranted. Not having committed any criminal activity apart from jaywalking in a long time, I was suitably confused as to why they would require my august presence at this inquiry.

The next day, filled with confusion and a tiny bit of dread (this _is_ Sri Lanka after all, justice sometimes sits it out) I made my way to the police station with one of my best friends tagging along. I haven’t even been to Ragama in years and didn’t even know anyone from the area, so I had no clue as to what awaited. After arriving at the station, I show a policeman in a separate room my letter and tell him I’ve come as requested, but I’ve no idea what’s going on. He asks me to wait and sends a minion to dig up the charge against me. What’s interesting is that there are lots of people about even though it’s a poya day. Most of the complaints revolve around ‘I cannot live with this man/woman/parents’ or ‘I cannot sleep because this man/woman/person makes a lot of disturbance in the night’. I was starting to dread whether I had suddenly slipped into a parallel universe where I was married and separated from my wife (who would naturally be really hot, smart and raven haired not to mention funny).

In due course the WPC returns with the complaint, and it turns out that I’ve been making death threats against someone! Suffice to say, this is all news to me. Now this is the real kicker, when I ask for the number, it turns out to be a SIM registered to me but used by my friend a while ago! The number isn’t even in active use anymore. After sharing a telepathic moment where we discussed our next move, we got the number of the person who placed the complaint. Not so that we can call and actually threaten the person, more so we could find out who the hell I was supposed to have threatened!  After informing the police officer that the SIM is not in active use and that I will disconnect it immediately, I go to record a statement.  And there we find our next clue! Next to the complaint by the complainant is my friend’s actual number as well! So this complaint was apparently against my friend!

The complainant having given the police two ‘anonymous’ numbers, the police call Mobitel up and request for a name and address (since all numbers are now tied to the NIC). After having gotten the address of only one number, the police hi five themselves on a good day’s work and go home. At least that’s what I can surmise from all of this because it’s incomprehensible to me that they only investigated one (random) number. So anyway, things become much clearer to us.

The other policeman (I think he’s a second in command or something) then gives me a lecture on how smart they are and how I shouldn’t make death threats because it can all be traced now.  I would have liked to say ‘no shit Sherlock’, but I am quite attached to my freedom of movement. And all this in front of Mrs-I-Can’t-Live-With-My-Husband and Ms-My-Neighbor-Makes-Too-Much-Noise-In-The-Night and a myriad other people. And since I’m bigger than any three people in that room combined plus an unruly beard, I look the part as well. And the most insulting part in that whole episode was him thinking I’m some kind of idiot to have committed a crime with a big fucking finger pointing right back at me. I’m not even the type of person to actually threaten anyone with death! I have, on several occasions, willed fire to burst forth from my fingers but the aim has always been to singe rather than burn to death. And no, it’s never worked. They didn’t even get a warm feeling.

If I _did_ want to threaten someone with say a gruesome chocolate covered death (admit it, you’d rather die covered in chocolate than without), I would have used Google voice or some other VoIP provider with a clean account. At the very least I’d have used a public pay phone! I’d like to see Mr-Second-In-Command tell me how smart he was tracing a call through one of Google’s datacenters and routed through several telcos that ends up with an IP in bloody Tanzania because I used Tor.

Also, I’d like to point out that during the whole time nobody actually cared whether I’d made the call or not. No one checked phone records, the complainant didn’t come forward and I was simply assumed to have been a miscreant.

Yes, so. My outrage has suitably been vented.  I quiver like jelly no more.

After leaving the police station we head to Mobitel head office to get the detailed bill for my number to ascertain the veracity of this complaint. Can’t really trust the police to actually check whether I had called this number before summoning me, no, that would be more like real detective work and we all know the boys in khaki don’t detect stuff. Once we go through my call records for the past three months, that number doesn’t even show up, so my number shouldn’t have even been on the list. Tomorrow, my friend will get his call records and we’ll be looking at that as well. My friend maintains that he hasn’t threatened anyone and although he does some really stupid stuff when he’s drunk (we all do!),  I for one believe him.

So we wait on confirmation for my friend’s call log and if it comes up negatively, it proves that someone out there is out to hassle my friend and I was collateral damage! Possibly we’ll be able to get Mr-Second-In-Command to take a closer look at the complainant and reverse the tables and do some actual detecting, instead of sitting in his chair and making snarky comments. Apologies if this played out like a Hardy Boys mystery!

Google Divides by Zero

A reload fixed the problem. The cause was probably the wrong image being served. As you can see, going to the link now actually gives you a bigger picture. http://bit.ly/aHmg4T

Robots are intelligent, cuddly creatures with a heart of gold. Sorry, I was actually talking about myself there. Robots are emotionless. They can be cuddly or not, they can be shiny, they can be smart to a certain extent, they can be fast but above all they are emotionless. By the end of this post, you will come to realize that Edward Cullen is in fact a robot. He could be built by Sony and he could be the second cousin of Aibo, I won’t know till I get into his programming.

Lets take this step by step.

Robots Are Shiny

Ok, granted that Edward is more sparkly than shiny. This could mean that his skin is actually a synthetic mix of rubber and titanium. Either that or he really likes sparkles a lot and Bella is actually barking up the wrong tree.

This is Edward in the sun

This is a terminator before he pwns your ass

Notice both faces are distinctly reflecting the light? The one on the right is the advanced model because it’s got rid of the sparkles and is smiling in a totally emotionless and badass way. The one on the right cannot be mistaken for an emo tween. Even without the Gatling cannon attached to it.

Robots are FAST

Will Smith - 0 : Robot - 1

Edward Cullen is fast. Apparently faster than most vampires. Being that fast means that you’re definitely one of the robots. We’ve seen fast robots galore in I, Robot and Starwars. Nevermind all those Japanese cartoons.

More fast robots from real life. You should really click this link.

Robots are Emotionless

This doesn’t mean that they don’t express it of course. They just don’t scale well. Apart from the most advanced robots from the future (WALL-E et al), most robots are cold calculating machines (not like a calculator in a fridge!). Ok, I admit that Edward does occasionally crack a smile but my belly button can portray a bigger range of emotions. Keanu Reeves has nothing on this dude.

It’s like whoever programmed him spent all hist time on the despondency classes. Bella kills herself? sad. Bella jumps off cliff? sad. I need to leave town? sad. Bella is horny? sad. Ham sandwich for breakfast? sad.

I mean he’s an almost indestructible, immortal with an SUV. He’s got a chick who is generations younger to him fawning over him. He can rip the arm off a guy and beat him to death with him. And yet, he’s emo.

Some pictures of Edward being all despondent and stuff.

I'm sad because I'm pale

I have huge eyebrows

This is pretty much how he looks through most of the movie. The only thing that changes is his complexion (from pale to paler) and his consistency (solid and sparkly to smoky). With this information we can pretty much predict how he will look in any given situation. These situations may or may not be included in the new movies.

Edward and a tiny duck

Edward and a Rabid Beaver

On the left, you can seeEdward Savaged by a Savage Duck/Drake. Ducks are tasty animals but can turn vicious in the beat of a heart.

On the right, you see Edward facing down a rabid beaver. If you look closely, you can see that the beaver has angry red eyes!

While writing this post I realized that I actually dislike the Bella character the most. Like all time worst character. But I’d already written this post and I’m hungry so I’m not going to go back and rewrite stuff just so you guys can go ‘FAIL’.

All in all, at this point I don’t really care whether Edward’s a robot or whether Bella is soft in the head. I’m going to go watch some testosterone fueled movie to make it up for myself.

My pre 17 look

See below for how I look like now.

My post 26 look

Edit : I have now shaved and gotten a haircut ~ August, 2010

Now you might ask why in the world you need to see a ‘before’ and ‘after’ pic of me read a movie review about kites, and I’d give you two reasons.

1. It serves as a frame of reference to gauge how long a time has elapsed since my last view of a Hindi movie.

2. Do you really need a reason to look at my picture? No, you don’t

Now that we’ve established the background to me watching the movie, I’ll get on with the review.

Kites

Excerpt from IMDB

In the harsh terrain of the Mexican desert, a mortally wounded man is left for dead in the heat of the desert sun. This is J. Once a street smart, carefree young guy. Now, a wanted man. As death looms, the only thing that keeps him alive is the quest to find the love of his life, Natasha. A woman betrothed to another man, but surely destined for J. A woman who comes into his life like a bolt of lightning and changes it forever.

As you can see, nothing shocking or earth shattering there. And I’m told that as far as Hindi movies go, this was a below par movie for all the people involved. If you go into IMDB boards you’ll see a lot of people trashing the movie. But all that is irrelevant because I liked the movie. I don’t know what exactly made me like the movie, maybe it was the fact that it was bashed so much I went in just expecting to sit through 180 minutes of suckiness, maybe not. Anyway, the following elements can be found in Kites.

Primary Characters

He doesn't even look Indian!

Hrithik Roshan as Jesus

Don’t tell me you don’t see the resemblance. The first time I actually got to see his face (it was obscured by hay initially), I was like WTF?!

The character’s actual name was J, short for my suggestion maybe?

His acting wasn’t bad either, I was actually quite surprised by it. And he seemed to be a (believably) good dancer, which is required according to the plot line.

Spanish heat

Barbara Mori as the Fiery Spanish Spitfire

To explain the impact of this character on me, I changed the my definition of a perfect woman from “PHP coding, beer drinking, LAN gaming female assassin” to “PHP coding, beer drinking, LAN gaming female assassin with Spanish fire”. Obviously humor, wit, smarts and the rest are a given. But fire in her belly (and I don’t mean the type of fire in your belly when you’re hungry either) is prerequisite now because this character was awesome!

She plays the role of Linda in the movie.

A Bob

Kabir Bedi as Bob

Ok ok, so he’s not a primary character at all. He’s got all of 15 mins in the movie, being the father of the girl that J dupes and the father of the guy that Linda dupes. He’s an Indian named Bob. I kid you not. He’s included here purely because most of the imaginary conversations are carried out by Bob-like people.

Recurring Themes in the Movie

Hrithik’s Abs VS Barbara’s Cleavage

Obviously, neither of these pictures are from the movie, but you should get the idea. Thankfully, Hrithik is decently clothed during the latter part of the movie. Also thankfully, Barbara managed to be all cleavag’y during the whole of the movie.

EDIT : I managed to find a picture from the movie with both of them touting their stuff (Click through for full image).

Hrithik and Barbara touting their stuff

Indians

Seeing as how this is a Bollywood movie, I know I shouldn’t be surprised. But seeing as it was shot in America and Mexico (I think) I would have expected less Indians. But you’ll come across Indians in the form of Bob the owner of the biggest casino in Las Vegas, two unidentified con artists who cheat the casino, a delivery truck driver who’s truck is stolen by the dynamic duo, and the multitude of Indians serving the leading family and so on and so forth. Kites is actually the nightmare for every red necked xenophobic American out there who imagine all the Indians pouring into their country to take their jobs. Thankfully the biker gang did not have even one Indian. That would have been too much to stomach.

Another big shock to me was that they had full on lip on lip kisses. The last time I watched a movie they would never actually lip lock, it was more of a “I’m going to kiss you now, but you should quickly turn your head to the side to show that you are a chaste woman even though we are dancing in the rain and your sari may as well have been made of glass for all the hiding it does – never mind all the belly tickling”. Speaking of dancing, when did the leading ladies of Indian cinema stop wearing those ridiculous knee length biking shorts for the dance scenes? Those would have been totally out of place in the dance scenes for this movie.

And in Conclusion

I enjoyed the movie. I went in expecting a three hour rendition of the same old story of boy meets girl-girl is coy-girl warms to boy-parents are coy-parents warm to boy-boy marries girl, but instead I got to see a romancy movie that was just about 2.5 hours long and had cars blowing up. And it didn’t have too many songs either, and the soundtrack itself was pretty good.

The ending itself was quite a surprise and it actually got to me because I was in a bit of a blue funk afterward. It reminded me of the ending from the book Amber Spyglass (Book 3 of His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman), although in their case they did what they had to do because it was necessary.  In the case of the lovers in Kites, their decisions were forced upon by others.

All in all, feel free to trash the movie after you’ve watched it, because it could have been a lot worse.

Some of the images have been acquired from this site : http://satyamshot.wordpress.com/2010/05/13/an-image-from-kites/