A Recommendation

I am not one who pours out free advice (FYI, consultation fee: $50 per hour), but I hope I'll be forgiven this time. I have been consciously avoiding listening to Roger Waters for some time now, though Floyd is one permanent fixture on my playlist. But after getting slightly monotonous, I tried out Waters few weeks back. Man, isn't he a genius! I found Amused To Death way above Radio K.A.O.S and Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking taking the album as a whole, but they too have some bright spots.

My suggestion is to listen to the whole album in one go and to have the complete effect, closet yourself in a nice, cosy dark room, put some high quality headphones on with full volume. I bought this CD about a week back and I still haven't had a chance to savour it that way, which I propose to remedy soon. True to his style, the songs are no more than conversations put to tune, but powerful ones nevertheless. Perfect companion on a gloomy evening when you are pissed off with the world!

Houston, do you copy?

After a looooong gap, I've watched an English movie in the theatre. This afternoon we went to 'Apollo 13 - The IMAX Experience' and since I haven't seen the original, the giant screen greatly added to the excitement and experience. For whatever reason, it was deeply ingrained in my memory that Apollo 13 was a failure and was anxiously awaiting the spectacular blowup in mid-air which was never coming. Somewhere towards the end of the movie, my friend told me that it was a 'succesful failure' and all 3 DID come back. What a disappointment! it was a great movie and worth watching -- the nauseatingly self-glorifying 'failure is not an option' statements and 180 bucks ticket notwithstanding. And, dash it, I didn't notice that James Lovell himself was one of the writers!

I hope they have plans of releasing IMAX versions of LOTR too. Those breathtaking landscapes, deep gorges, huge creatures will come alive on an IMAX screen. Btw, when the hell is LOTR-ROTK coming here?

Crush of the Day (or may be week...or month...)

The brunette of the Paola & Chiara pair.

Hang all the Saint's followers!

Darn all the followers of St. Valentine! Probably the old man meant good, but I propose to banish all the lovers of this world to the Fourth Dimension, or Hades or some such place.

Had an extraordinarily tiring day yesterday and so took a long ride to a quiet place far away from the city. It is a small lake with the road approaching it high from a cliff with lots of curves offering a nice view of the lake from its edge. I wanted a peaceful hour or two all to myself resting on my bike by the side of the road overlooking the lake, hopefully with nice evening breeze away from all the pollution. And what do I see when I reach the place? Loads and loads of couples nestling in the dark corners of the streets, whispering sweet nothings, or whatever crap they whisper, into each others' ears. Nary a centimeter space left on the whole stretch of the road. All my hopes of a peaceful evening out in the open air dashed to the rocks. And adding salt to my injuries are the happy, often giggling, faces of these blasted couples. They must be laughing at my helplessness, my complete failure, my sheer inability to pick up each one of them and throw them into the lake below!

Death to Love! (on the lines of Calvin's battlecry "Death to Oatmeal")

Calvin (or Watterson, the way you see it) is God. No less!

Here is one of my all-time favourite Calvin strips:

The above image will not be kept on the ucomics server forever. So, I am reproducing the dialogue here:

Calvin: I used to hate writing assignments. But now I enjoy them. I realized that the purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning and inhibit clarity. With a little practice, writing can be an intimidating and impenetrable fog! Waht to see my book report?
Hobbes: "The dynamics of interbeing and monological imperatives in Dick and Jane: A Study in Psychic Transrelational Gender Modes."
Calvin: Academia, here I come!

Turkeys? No thanks. Threesomes? Oh sure!

I've been made to read this article written by Ms. Arundhati Roy titled 'Do Turkeys enjoy Thanksgiving?' - her opening speech on the eve of the opening of World Social Forum on January 16. Here is the link for the complete text in Hindu's archives. It's quite long and read it at your leisure. Some excerpts that I thought worth quoting here

Occasionally some of us are invited to `debate' the issue on `neutral' platforms provided by the corporate media. Debating Imperialism is a bit like debating the pros and cons of rape. What can we say? That we really miss it?

In the new era, Apartheid as formal policy is antiquated and unnecessary. International instruments of trade and finance oversee a complex system of multilateral trade laws and financial agreements that keep the poor in their Bantustans anyway. Its whole purpose is to institutionalise inequity. Why else would it be that the U.S. taxes a garment made by a Bangladeshi manufacturer 20 times more than it taxes a garment made in the U.K.? Why else would it be that countries that grow 90 per cent of the world's cocoa bean produce only 5 per cent of the world's chocolate? Why else would it be that countries that grow cocoa bean, like the Ivory Coast and Ghana, are taxed out of the market if they try and turn it into chocolate? Why else would it be that rich countries that spend over a billion dollars a day on subsidies to farmers demand that poor countries like India withdraw all agricultural subsidies, including subsidised electricity?

One more thing. Today's date will be etched in the History for one significant event - I had my first threesome (*gasps* *blushes*)....in a dream, that is. And two more world famous personalities too played cameos in the said dream - Dubya man and John Kerry! No, no...they are not the 'two' of the threesome, u pervert! Their exact roles are now blurred but they are mutually exclusive to ours. Come to think of it, I don't remember the 'two' of the threesome!

So, I feel much lighter with this thing off my chest. The important date of my first threesome (need I repeat 'in a dream'?) is saved for the posterity!

Seeking some redemption...

Haven't been writing frequently. Not terribly busy either, that I can't drop a few lines. Either it is the lack of enthu or this new sense of uneasiness that is creeping in when I try to express something on this blog. One thing that, atleast I, treasure on the Net is the anonymity it offers. I'd wanted to keep my identity on this blog fairly untraceable, not that I am upto anything nefarious, so as to express my candid thoughts. But since then at least one friend of mine is reading this crap regularly and I've this sudden complex about putting my maajar stud level thoughts down :) Anyway......

And some very warm thanks are due to cveejiehe, for presenting me with a DVD of "The Shawshank Redemption". Man, I know you are mad at me for not watching it till now and please accept my apologies. But dude, I propose to rectify it as soon as possible, my slightly cramped schedule permitting.

And to close the post, a small poll - how long will it be before US would turn its eye on Indian nuclear programme? Will it ever happen?