when men became boys...

2 days back it was raining quite heavily here. It was 4 in the afternoon and the last place we wanted to spend in such a beautiful weather was in office. Suddenly Samby came up with an idea. Let's play football. As it is we had no work for the day so we all readily agreed. Within minutes, all 5-6 of us, bunked out of the office, picked up the ball from a friend's place, rushed to the nearest Hiranandani Play Ground. The ground would have been a paradise for promoting Tide detergent powder. Slippery and muddy, it would have served an ideal place for mud wrestling. In our office clothes, we played football for around an hour.

6pm. Time to leave. Kept layers of newspapers on my seat and plastic bags on headrest and drove back home. On route, picked up Suvi and her colleague. They were shocked to see me all soaked up, and shirt soiled with mud. Got a good grilling from both of them on my 'childish' behavior. Their concern was that since I had just come out of jaundice, I had to take it easily and not exert myself, something which even the doc. had told me. But inspite of all my apologies and my reasoning couldn't convince them that it was an impulsive decision :)

Next day came to know that all my friends got 'talofied' by their parents.

Well...it was a good game :)

Thank God for the Electric Rice Cooker

For the past 3 days we have been facing a peculiar problem. There is no Gas at our place - which means, no cooking. It so happend that we ran out of gas on Sat morning and the spare cylinder was also empty. Inspite of repeated complaints - the delivery man has still not come. Now this gave me an excuse to plead with Suvi to order some grub from outside. Now coming out of jaundice, that's a taboo - a strict no-no. But finally she relented and we grabbed a yummy sizzler at The Grill in Mulund while we waited to catch up with a 11pm MI3 show at the newly opened PVR at Nirmal Lifestyle.

On Sunday, put the electric cooker to use and cooked dal chawal. On realising that the gas won't be coming b4 Tue. evening, we started putting the cooker to more innovative use. Like boiling my drinking water, boiling potatos for chutni sandwich and yes - my fav one - using it to make 2 cuppa tea every morning :) ...without which my morning rituals are left incomplete :)

Why Sachin would sympathize with Ronaldo

If Sachin Tendulkar would be keeping track of Brazilian football, he would definitely feel sorry for Ronaldo. What cricket is to India, football is to Brazil. Or perhaps, more than that. Like Sachin, Ronaldo burst into action at a young age with a series of exploits. He became the centre of attraction and in a country where football is more than a religion, where a holiday is declared whenever Brazil plays important matches, where even training sessions of the team is beamed live back to Brazil; the pressure to perform is tremendous on players especially those who like Sachin are more of demi-gods. No wonder Ronaldo's every move, every action is monitored under microscope and the weight of the country's expectations at times show in Ronaldo's performance. A few bad performances and the critics and fans are wagging their toungues on what's going wrong with Ronaldo. A little increase in the bottomline and the president of Brazil himself jokes on Ronaldo's weight. Though Ronaldo silenced his critics with his recent 2 goals against Japan but he would be fully aware of the constant expectation of his countrymen. He would surely hope that it doesn't reflect in his game. Such are the pressures of being a gifted player. Sachin can surely understand that.

WHAT!!! No more booze??!!

A few guys in office told me that post jaundice, you can't touch booze for atleast an year or so. I passed out....

Thinking of clarifying it from my doc this week about this booze 'myth'.

I am back with a leaner look :P

Joined work 3 days back. Right now basking in the glory of loosing 6-7 kgs. All trousers/jeans are loose now. A few of the short shirts/tees that I used to wear b4 marriage and I had tucked it in somewhere in the wardrobe (after they got a bit tight) are back in the open. :) Now trying my best to keep it that way! :)

The best goal in world cup!

Just watched the best goal I have ever seen scored in any world cups so far.

It took total of 24 precise passes to create this goal scored by Cambiasso of Argentina against Serbia & Montenigro. Brilliant goal! Absolutely the best. As I blog this... Argentina leads 3-0.

The only good thing about jaundice

I can catch up on late night matches of my fav. teams withou worrying about going to office next day!

when will they build something like that over here?

 

If India is there, can pakistan be far behind?

As India announced Shashi Tharnoor's nominationfor UN's top post...within hours Pakistan also announced that they too will field someone for the post. The race would get very interesting now :)

India's FIFA connection

Ok. So we have not managed to send our team to the world cup and most probably won't send it for few decades. But we have managed to do something we are really best at.

Agar teamnahi bhej saktey to kya, FIFA ki world cup ki site to maintain kar saktey hai:-)

FIFA has outsourced its website maintenance work to a Chennai based company. The company would look after its day to day site maintenance.

Togo? Is that a country??

Did you manage to catch Togo's match against South Korea? On their debut, they played exceptionally well. Too bad that lost 2-1 but they played really well. To be honest, before coming for the world cup, I never knew that there was a country called Togo. Did a bit of googling and found out some stats about the country.

In 2002, Togo's armed forces numbered approximately 9,450. The army numbered some 9,000 troops including a Presidential Guard unit. Equipment included two main battle tanks and nine Scorpion tanks. The 250-member air force had 16 combat aircraft, and the 200-member naval unit had 2 coastal patrol vessels.

The population of Togo in 2003 was estimated by the United Nations at 4,909,000, which placed it as number 112 in population among the 193 nations of the world.

Situated on the west coast of Africa, Togo has an area of 56,785 sq km (21,925 sq mi), extending 510 km (317 mi) N–S and 140 km (87 mi) E–W. Comparatively, the area occupied by Togo is slightly smaller than the state of West Virginia.

Also found out that the country had seen many coups and counter coups and has a rather volatile and fragile economy & governance. Yet such a small & not so economically developed country manages to send a football team to the world cup finals. It's a case to ponder about.

To think of it, this world cup, most of the debutants are playing rather exceptionally well than much of the fancied names. While The Brazils & Englands revolve around individual names but teams like Togo, Australia, South Korea & yeah...Trinidad & Tobago are showing some real well game results. Though Togo & T&T ended up on losing side but not giving a scare to the big teams. Too bad, ysday T&T lost to England while holding them up to a draw till 80th minute or so.

Vinci Da Code :-)

Post contributed by my friend Chiran:

Punjab was one of the first states to ban the
movie...the producers / distributors were surprised as they were anyway not
planning to release it there as there is no market for English flicks in the
state which does not have any multiplex till now... The ban has however created
interest and people are flocking to the multiplex in Chandigarh which is doing
roaring business on this movie :) There is also an interesting cartoon by
Moraporia (chk spelling) in Outlook India which has a ticket counter in Punjab
with the movie name written as Vinci Da Code :)

Go Fida or Go Insane?

The recent Ford Fiesta ad shows Abhishek leading a bunch of friends from Mumbai to Goa in a fleet of Ford Fiesta. The ad shows the cars zipping on an express highway as they reach Goa. All is fine but when one of the guys ay that he doesn’t have a swimming costume, Abhishek, without blinking an eyelid says, we will go to Ooty! And all of them head back to driving. While the idea may be fine but was just wondering in practical terms, it’s insane. Mumbai to Goa – 600 kms+, from there to Ooty – god knows how many kms. Add fuel cost and what have you! Plus the roads are no makkhan as they project in ads. Wonder if Abhishek Bachan knows what the current cost of the petrol is.

Superman, Jughead &Rahul Mahajan

What’s the common thread between them? As per a gay activist in Mumbai, they all are gay or have gay like tendencies! A tabloid report recently said that how Rahul mahajan’s servants found him naked in bathroom with Vivek Moitra. The gay activist continued that within the gay circles this news didn’t came as a surprise as they always knew that Rahul swam the other way. Continuing ahead the activist said even characters like Superman & Jughead are gays. His analogy – Superman always tries to avoid his girlfriend and is not so comfortable with her and never marries her. Jughead? Well, he is a girl hater and always likes staying with Archie! Cummon…with Rahul, I can understand but leave Superman & Jughead out of it atleast!!

Notes from my bed side

It’s been more than 10 days now since I have been grounded to bed. The doc’s instruction to me on day 1 was –Boss strict bed rest for at least 3-4 weeks. You have to only get up for having food or going to loo. Well, I have managed to follow his instructions to the hilt, almost. So what if I connect to the internet wirelessly on my laptop from my bed, check my mails, browse stuff, play games, etc. The doc didn’t say I can’t do that. Or shift bed and sleep in living room watching TV. But it’s no fun stuff. I am bored to death. Trying my best not to let the frustration creep in. Getting to know what it means when they say an idle mind is a devil’s workshop.

Also keeping me company by my bed side these days is Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat, some usability workshop material and a couple of Archie comics. Though it’s a different thing that most of the time my time gets devoured mostly by playing cricket game on my laptop or reading Archies. With mom dad around, strict diet is insured. For the past 10 days, I am surviving on boiled stuff which includes rice, boiled palak, vegetables, etc. Not a single drop of oil is used while cooking, not even a slight hint of chilly powder. Most of the time I end up on dahi chawal or oil free pancake made out of rice powder. The doc’s instruction- no proteins for me.

Makes me feel like Sanjay Dutt from Zinda – surviving on fried wontons for 14 years. The good side of it has been that I have lost 3 kgs in last 10 days. Went for 2^nd blood test ysday. The results are encouraging. My enzymes level has come down but are still high. The doc says it will take another 2 weeks more. My whole month would be gone now in bed – what a way to waste off my PLs.

...and now it's jaundice

first car accident...then slip disc...then fever..and now it's jaundice. The year is not going good for me. Have been diagnosed with jaundice now. As per doc's instructions I have to be grounded to bed for atleast 3-4 weeks....which means some of my recent plans that I shared with a few of you guys goes for a toss. :(