KingMaker !

Assembly polls in Bihar were truly entertaining. The whole exercise of polls in Bihar are usually a mockery of democracy and a farce, but Mr Ram Vilas Paswan has just added a new dimension. He is the kingmaker now. And look at his cunning! He went through the process of elections, campaigning and now that there's hung assembly, he has the nerves to play hard ball and demand presidents rule ! Why? he quotes ideological differences with both RJD and NDA, but every deaf, blind and dumb Indian on electoral roll knows he needs more time to bargain a good deal. A railway ministry berth, Oust Laloo and family, and Snub NDA by asking for muslim CM..now thats what I call being a Kingmaker who can bake a cake, get an icing done, have it and eat it too !!

New Look!

yes, my blog sports a new look. I was too bored with the old one. I opted for a standard blogger template, it looks sporty, hip and yet suits a married man;-) I hope I can justify the new look and be more regular at posting tit bits from the weeks gone by!

Say Cheese!

Honesty is a virtue. After Marriage I am trying to be more honest. It pays, you know, accpet your mistakes and save hassles or pay the price! Otherwise also I am being honest with myself these days. I have accepted the fact that I have put on some extra kilos (10 Kgs extra to be exactly honest!) and badly need to shed them. I have started some honest efforts at reducing intake (food) and increasing outflow (sweat) by giving up on yummies and picking up my latest hobby of playing basketball respectively. AK (my wifey) is good at basket ball and she is giving me some tips at being nimble footed on the court. It is a addictive game indeed, especially the shooting part :-) Though she keeps shouting at me for running my ass around the court more than just standing and aiming at the ring with one eye shut and toungue peeping out the corner of the lips. But its fun to play on basket ball court at night in floodlights and that too just the two of us..Infact thats quite romantic! ever heard of romantic basket ball! Dream team will commiy mass sucide if they read this...Anyway, I hope to improve on my dribbling and shooting very soon...and I will beat AK at her own game..maan she is good in dribbling..and yes will shed those layers of flab too !
BTW, these few extra kilos have given a whole new meaning to the photographers catch phrase "Say Cheese"! You ought to flash your dentures when someone shoots thru lense at you and is about to click ( btw, ever noticed that your eyelids are craving to blink at that precise moment?) but for me "Say cheese" means inhale deeply and hold your tummy in until you hear a thanks. Needless to say that you cant give a good smile while you are holding your breath (try that right now!)..so folks crux of the story is that I look like a man in desparate need of potty in most of my wedding n H-moon snaps. Thanks to cheese, It has cheesed me off!

~Amit

I am back..just for a moment!

Life is keeping me busy. Conspiracy theory!
Anyway forget my news they are all stale. Real good news is that Sidin is back. I was polling his blog and he is back!! with a bang! The guy has topped IIMA ! Now thats throws an area of research open for a different kind of nerds- medicos/shrinks. How can a homo sapien with that caliber of humor be a IIMA topper??
Let me know the results when they are published!

more soon..
~Amit

Have to recommend this fellow!

Visit this mallu at http://sidin.blogspot.com/ . He comes from Planet "Hilaria". Some of his posts are real gems..I have read most of them...Keep it up sidin.

Thnx to Neeraj for giving link to these masterpeices...

BTW, this guy also figured in Indian Express some months back for his great blog fan following see this link:
http://sidin.blogspot.com/2004_07_11_sidin_archive.html

Enjoy siding!
~Amit

And The Wicket Falls !

Finally, I am getting married:-) It was decided just in last two weeks. There are too many trivial details and its not worth burning pixels with story that I have told to so many over n over again. But just one thought: I have lost my freedom forever! Now a naive reader may not understand the gravity of this statement..but just think..its a scary thought :)Especially for a bachelor of 8 yrs experience on living out in the 'jungle'. But yet, marriage is a lovely thing to happen to anyone, give or take some fun....So i'm getting married in Jan'05 and bidding adios to this nomadic bachelor life forever...

Lot of activities on work front too...but they all are in-significant in view of the afore mentioned big news! Looking forward to the new life and trying to sink in the feeling:-) Cheers and bliss to all!
~Amit

Indian Ordinance Factory

I bought a toy gun for myself last weekend. It is a fake plastic Air pistol with 6mm plastic bullets for kids older than 16 Yrs. Its a cool looking black pistol with all real life functions such as push button sliding magzine, laser (bulet proof cheats) and awesome power which can be harmful from very short distances. It resembles the 9 mm pistol which cops in India carry and I am told that Mumbai ka bhai log also prefer that gun. I had fortune of seeing one closely while in college. I had a penchant for nasty looking guns and toy cars as a kid and remember having a collection of at least 5 toy guns and about 15 hot wheels cars, all working models...Old memories came alive when I saw this gun in Walmart and just bought it for a cool 45$. I was tempted to buy a real air rifle with metal pellets, but it was little expensive and I am not sure if I could carry it back to India and will I ever be able to use it there..so finally settled with this toy gun. It will look neat in my shelf!
OK, now coming to the title of this post, Indian Ordnace Factory, I saw a advt in Times of India today that IOF is inviting application for its 0.32" revolver and has given its website http://www.ofbindia.com for downloading the form. Well I have no intention of buying this revolver (dont have a licence anyway) but just wanted to tell everyone to visit this website and see how advanced our ordnance factories are! Iwas surprised by the quality of the website as well! good job IOF....

Zakhm Dikhne Lage Dararon Se!!
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Came across this Gazal Today, Excellant Poetry!

Zindagi is tarah se lagne lagi
Rang ud jaaye jo deewaaron se
Ab chhupaane ko apna kuch na raha
Zakhm dikhne lage daraaron se
Main tere jism ki hoon parchhaai
Mujhko kaise rakhoge khud se judaa
Bhool karna to meri fitrat hai
Kyoon ki insaan hoon main, nahin hoon khuda - 2

Mujhko hai apni har khata manzoor
Bhool ho jaati hai insaanon se
Ab chhupaane ko apna kuch na raha
Zakhm dikhne lage daraaron se
Jab kabhi shaam ke andheron mein
Raah panchhi jo bhool jaate hain
Voh subaah hote hi milon chalkar
Apni shaakhon pe laut aate hain - 2

Kuch hamaare bhi saath aisa hua
Hum yehi keh rahe ishaaron se
Zindagi is tarah se lagne lagi
Rang ud jaaye jo deewaaron se
Ab chhupaane ko apna kuch na raha
Zakhm dikhne lage daraaron se...

Gaayab!!
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Haaaahaaheeeeehoooooo...this film is a riot....noooo I mean its a riot of mind numbing medley of incoherant shots born out of overly pregnant thoughts of some crackpot script writer who just lost his mind one fine day and met an equally nut case director on his way to mental asylum. At the asylum they got as lucky as that one speacial sperm and found a deranged producer who had money to burn. Then onwards it was a piece of cake...they just picked up other inmates such as Tusshar kapoor, Antara Mali et al at random and lo behold! masterpeice 'Gaayab' was made! The movie leaves you with a lingering feeling of being mentally challenged, dumb struck, awestruck, shock and numb to the extent that your jaw drops to the floor and rolls right unto the screen until your toungue is lapping up meekly what ever is dished out to you on the screen...ypur fingers will be too numb with the shock to even dare to press the stop button on the remote once...
HOW, I mean HOW can any legally sane person even think of making such a movie and HOW can any erstwhile normal person like me (remember I have already seen this movie and so do not count in the normals) even think of seeing it!! maaan....three hours of sheer torture & pain, ..go watch it and join me soon...I will be waiting at the asylum...will read your comments their...
boo hooo hoooo...

My MI Driving Licence & Other Trivia!
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Yeah, I got my michigan drivers licence on 19th Aug...this thing was pending for a long time...due to the SSN number which just seemed to elude me..well the test here is quite a serious thing, one major mistake and you flunk the test and loose 40$..and I made it without single mistake, first a reverse park, then parallal park, city roads with varying speed limits and turns, and then the freeway... not even a minor mistake! Quite unlike in India, where I got my drivers licence hand delevered to me :-)
On the work front, I am in a comfy position now, looking forward to my return back to homeland provided nothing new comes up here....
Btw, another news is that more friend 'P' from hyderabad has bitten the dust..he is getting engaged, it was a shocking news, till yesterday he was normal and quite OK!! :-)) ha ha...
I had a funastic experience of watching the best movie experience ever - IMAX 3D. One hour of documentary on NASCAR..the biggest spectator sport in the US of A. It was awesome...next week I will go again for spiderman-2...and now back to the grind...

Indian rock coming off age...
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I got introduced to metal and rock pretty late and am still picking up the threads..(for those living under a stone I'm talking about rock and heavy metal music). Couple f years back I accidently landed in a place called 'The Hell' on airport road (the place has disappeared now) , where local Bangalore band "Threinody (spelled Thre-Nerdy)" had put up a jam session of their own original-indian-metal-music. And know what? I was zapped by the wizardry of their lead gutarist and his monster of a guitar...I have heard metal since I waz a child and seen many good local guitar players over the years (also tried being one sometime in past life) but realized the hidden beauty of metal only on that day. From then on there has been a conscious effort to apprecite this form of art...now I understand when people say that hard rock sets u free...
OK, so coming to the point after the above preamble...Threinody has a mailing list on which they are now introducing upcoming Indian bands...one of them I discovered is called "Shrapnel" . They have recently launched their album "Intellectual persuit" which is available for just 100Rs in metro cities. Visit their website shrapnelonline.net for listening to their sound bites and to shop for their CD. I am gonna buy it when I return to india. The Threinody website " Threinody.com " is unfortunately dead now..but keep visitng it , I hope they get back in action soon...3 cheers to indian rock...!!

Two Rocking Cities
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Yes, I am elated to be back on the site I usually miss so much! Gallons of water has flowed under the bridge since my last blog, and unfortunately I waz stuck in its flow...But I desparately hung on to every bit and straw (read 'weekends') that came my way. So these breathers lead me first to the city where people live their great american dream - New York. I flew their for a get together with my college days roomies K & B. K has not changed a bit; still the same ol cool guy...B has become a typical american patel :) Honestly the guys treated me royally, we drove around generally in Dil Chahata Hai istyle and visited all the cool places : Empire State, Times Sq, Statue of Liberty (my 5th wonder of the world!) , Manhattan, Central park and the stuff. K's friend N and his wifey invited us for a cool dinner at his place. Thanks 'N', it was nice to know u..but all the time these guys kept rediculing me as a village bumpkin, and I kept calling them ABCD :) Well, yes for a Europe familiar techie New York is still an alien place..its a man made wonder...I could not meet my friend 'S' in New York whom I had met in France few years back..She is a school teacher in Ney York and teaches High school...she was out of town :-( 'S' hope to meet you some time in future!

The next straw took me to Chicago, the windy city. I had driven there with some friends here. Heavy traffic on I-94 on the way back killed some of the fun of driving but overall it was fun driving...I averaged 140Kmph:) Chicago resembles Venice in Italy. A river runs right through the city and gives a spectacular view of its modern architecture buildings. Sears Tower (the tallest in US today) gives a awesome view...Navy Pier is a hip place on the banks of lake Michigan. Cool and polished crowd, live music and fantastic road side cuisine completes the picture. But the higlight of this trip was the Inidan Independance day parade which we got to see un-expectedly. It was a complete desi show on the Devon Street (full of desis) like the one we have on Janpath on 26th Jan. Mrs Madhuri Sriram Nene-Dixit and Munnabhai Sanjay Dutt were present as Parade marshals. Took some nice snaps of them to send to some of my madhuri crazy sisters! As for sanju baba, I myself like him as a actor. Best of the breed in bollywood I would say...watch his old movie called 'Hathyaar' its pretty good..!
The water is still flowing in full force, lets see if I can catch some more straws on coming weekends..cheers people!!
~Amit

Umm Nothing Much..
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Ok. What do I write? Don't really know.. Well, I recently had a bad bout of self-introspection. A strain of soulful music and a leisurely drive in a car on a scenic road is enough to put me in that mode. I was on this wonderful "Hines drive" the other day. This time I was thinking about morality. Some email discussion with old friends on this subject few days back triggered it. We were discussing extra marital affairs (most of my friends are slowly giving up and getting married). I am generally the adventurous type and honestly think that I MAY fall for an extra marital affair given convenient surroundings. Why? I really do not know but I am just being honest with my gut feeling. I also strongly feel that any average indian man is pretending if he says that he loves his wife dearly and will NEVER try for any adventure and that too when his history has not been particularly clean! So here it was that some of my friends who had enjoyed many(so called) 'immoral' things in college days have suddenly turned saints after marriage! Almost an overnight change! Is it really possible? People do change its just that they don't want to accept it or realize! One more friend recently blogged (rather bragged) that he hasn't changed after marriage... :-) All I can do is wonder and smile...

Long due update
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Let me come straight to topmost points otherwise I will just go haywire since there is so much to update!
1. Had been to Niagra 2 weeks back. It was a GREAT unforgetable trip,S & M also turned up their. That's it, I am in no mood to repeat the story I told so many times. But would like to mention that with Niagra I checked the fourth landmark on "7 wonders of the world" list:-) Pisa, Eiffel,Agra and now Niagra..Statue of Liberty is next on my wish list...
2. Rented a car few days back, brand new ford focus ZTX, wanted to take a Ford Mustang, but budget beat me first to it :-( Wish I could buy a Ford V6 engine Grand Prix had my stay been a little longer here...Alas..anyway I'm practising my driving now, and may visit chicago and live my dream of driving on a US freeway.....wheeeeeee
3. Bought a nice, expensive digicam (yet another hole in an already ragged pocket),with that my picture in photography equipment is complete...a sexy piece of 35mm SLR and a digicam is all you need to shoot the world...handycam and AK-47 owners, go kick your A**
4. More later:-)

~Amit

Haah! Finally settled down in this place. US is a drag sometimes. I moved in with two other friends in their flat through miindia.com. One great surprise was that the flat is already weel furnished! broadband, TV, cable and all that...I will give my driving licence test next week, got to prepare for it! feels like giving my primary school tests, but still god knows why I am getting butterflies in my tummy! strange feeling...anyway I'm sure I will get through..Just finsihed with my breakfast, laundry, ironing and now back to more household work..Enjoy ppl!

Long time!
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Hey guys! long time I was out of action here. I have landed in US of Mr Bush. Came here last weekend and from day-1 was neck deep in work..blah blah..
Here I'm still trying to settle, this place sucks..its not like Europe, here you are just handicapped without a car! I have yet to get my Michigan DL. So no pubbing, no outings just office N work....haah...
Got to go..will blog more later

Hutch - Bow Wow!
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Urrrhh, I feel like tearing at my hairs everytime I get a call on my Hutch pre-paid mobile.The network coverage is so pathetic, 80% of the times the calls are dropped or I have to shout at the top of my voice (aka those very old days of BSNL landlines)..Have called up customer care 112200098373789 times but still not a single Hutch tail has wagged! I have also noticed that the kid & dog Advts have disappeared from the TV networks...Now you may ask why dont I change to CDMA, a much better technology, agreed that the idea makes sense,but I find prepaid hassle free and I like my number and blah blah.
BTW,If things don't improve soon I'm planning to take a 'Morcha' of all the dogs in my neighborhood to nearest Hutch office, any fellow Hutch sufferrer interested in joining??

I'm Back from my Hiatus!
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Yeah I was on a much needed 10 day holiday. Lazed around,slept,ate like a pig,snored,zipped across,visiting relatives,friends, booze etc, did it all.Scorching summer heat, books and long travels kept me company..I somehow like travels and especially enjoy travelling alone..reading books and gaping at the setting sun through the railway window..Wearing jeans and T-shirt and standing on railway door with cool evening breeze blowing through your hairs! That feeling of freedom is unmatched even by a Ferrari..

I finished reading Pupul Jaykars "Indira Gandhi" during my leave. Its the 4th Political biography/novel that I have read in last 3 months. It was a necessity, because I'm a original congressman who later converted to BJP after seeing the downfall and plight of mighty congress.But,I can indentify myself with 'secular congress' and saffron BJP simultaneously. And with the melodrama that unfolded on the Indian Political scene last week and the Joy to hear that Sonia "listened to her inner voice" and turned down post of PM I was forced to re-examine and revive my congress roots. And this book did wonders for it..It fills you with awe for that Iron lady called Indira and the congress that she raised.There is this episode from 1971 War where she gave a tactical defeat to even US!! Another book that I wish to read next is "Is New York Burning" by Dominique lappeier and Larry Collins, it is a well re-searched fiction on possible nuclear threats from terrorist networks in the backdrop of 9/11 and Israel/Palestine conflict. After reading "freedom at midnght" by same set of authors I'm sure I will like their new work as well...
Now I am back to work,trying to oil my lazy bones to start working once again and it is a herculean task..

Party #1
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Last night I threw an impromptu booze party (first one) at my place for colleagues from my office. Occasion? Well for my new house ofcourse! It was a decent get-together,especially being midweek,I guess it gave all a necessary break.But it had a flip side as well, M and P dropped out,we could not carry it late into night and even hard-drinks were off the menu to avoid hangovers.However A1,A2,A3,A4,V,P and R had come.Thanks guys N gals! However 'S' was the guest of honor:) Wny? just bcoz she is the latest entry into my list of friends! Thanks for coming over 'S'. you seem to be a true blue aquarian! Nice meeting you...

BTW,people did you notice that writing no-names does not affect readability of a story at all.It also augments privacy! I remember getting a forwarded mail on some 'research' done by someone that in any given word only the first and last few characters matter the most for readability by human mind. This fact can be used for optimizing computer AI. Though I was revolted by the absurdity of the idea [Who wants to read a word document full of spelling mistakes in each word!] But now I think,that it can be given a chance! I think by the year 2050AD, we all will be anyway called by some 20 digit number tagged with some pseudo code names! Can someone file a patent on my behalf for this 'original' idea of using pseudonames at least in blogs??

At The End Of The Day!!
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About a month back some magzine in UK conducted a survey to find the most hackneyed, widely used and most hated cliches prevalent in daily use English in UK/USA.Guess what? "At the end of the day" was the ultimate winner,and rightly so.I perfectly agree that this is indeed the most boring,lame and meaningless term that anyone can use! It always goes like this: "Anyway at the end of the day what really matters is who wins" :) Yeah you guessed it, In India, our cricketers abuse it the most. Ganguly, Dravid (especially), Tendulkar, Gavaskar,Sherry all use it very often. But what they forget is that at the end of the day (sic) we feel like hitting them at the end of their bums. Vinod Mehta, editor of Outlook, also conducted a mini survey in the last issue after taking a cue from the original survey..the response in India was also overwhelming.I cant remember which one was the winner. But surely it should be "India Shining" :) The whole idea of the original excercise was probably to pass a international law banning use of such cliches (I hope). Here is a list of top 5 cliches that I bear grudge against:-
1.At the end of the day[Instead say "In the evening at 11.59 PM what really matters.."]
2.India Shining [Needs immediate ban!!]
3.Cool [OK,I use it myself, but I'm trying to give it up]
4.Outsourcing [Why not call it "sourcing it out"]
5.Cliche [:-)]