You have my Word

This is a result of my continuing battle with word processors. All through collage, I suffered a false sense of security that I was well looked after. Its only after my first stint in the press that this realization had dawned upon me. I had to get my ax right, or my dreams of writing adds would reach a dead end.

Then began the long battle one of my short comings. Of being vary dependant on spellcheck on MS Word. And by the looks of it, my efforts have not gone in vein. This effort, for instance, was typed while completely overlooking what MS Word had to say, about my spelling; or even my grammar. And you could'n spot one period misplaced, could you?

Human 1 : Word Processor 0

Truly Plural

Apologies for the tongue-in-cheek twister. Read this recently, and loved it. Check it out:

We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes,
But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.
One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,
Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.

If the plural of man is always called men,
Then shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?
If I speak of my foot and show you my feet,
And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?
If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,
Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?

Then one may be that, and three would be those,
Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,
And the plural of cat is cats, not cose.
We speak of a brother and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,
But imagine the feminine: she, shis and shim!

Let's face it - English is a crazy language.
There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger;
neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
English muffins weren't invented in England ..
We take English for granted, but if we explore its paradoxes,
we find that quicksand can work slowly,
boxing rings are square,

and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing,
grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?
Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend.
If you have a bunch of odds and ends
and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?

If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?
If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?
Sometimes I think all the folks who grew up speaking English
should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.

In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?
We ship by truck but send cargo by ship.
We have noses that run and feet that smell.
We park in a driveway and drive in a parkway.
And how can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same,
while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language
in which your house can burn up as it burns
down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out,
and in which an alarm goes off by going on.

And, in closing, if Father is Pop, how come Mother's not Mop?

La Belle Dame Sans Merci

I suddenly remembered the poem by Keats. And I remember when I first read it as a teenager, there was very little that I could understand. I thought it's a good time to revisit it 10 years later. Here is how it goes:

Ah, what can ail thee, wretched knight,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge is withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.

Ah, what can ail thee, wretched knight,
So haggard and so woe-begone
The squirrel's granary is full,
And the harvest's done.

I see a lily on thy brow
With anguish moist and fever dew,
And on thy cheek a fading rose
Fast withereth too.

I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful, a faery's child:
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.

I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long;
For sideways would she lean, and sing
A faery's song.

I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan.

She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna dew,
And sure in language strange she said,
"I love thee true!"

She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she gazed and sighed deep,
And there I shut her wild, sad eyes--
So kissed to sleep.

And there we slumbered on the moss,
And there I dreamed, ah! woe betide,
The latest dream I ever dreamed
On the cold hill side.

I saw pale kings, and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
Who cried--"La belle Dame sans merci
Hath thee in thrall!"

I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
On the cold hill side.

And that is why I sojourn here,
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.


Now for my interpretations.

1. The 'Knight' is a guy who just got dumped by his significant other of many years. And he's going through that phase of self-pity, "I cant go through a relationship again" phase.

2. The guy just slept with a hooker and picked up an STD. And has no clue what to do about it.

3. The guy has a fatal disease, and this is a conversation he's having with his life, personified as a wretched knight.

4. The guy is a rapist, and now it's his conscience that is disrobing him.

Now help me add to this list, will ya?

A century, 77 years in the making.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen. A 100 wins! And 10 years ago, no cricket statistician worth his cricket blog and uninterrupted cricket coverage via Cricinfo would have guessed it would've been achieved within another 10 years. While the whole of India kept criticizing the men in blue of their inability of winning abroad and of falling standards in the 5 day game, Team India quietly managed to pull-off their best decade ever. No, seriously! What would say of a team's history of 77 years, when 39% of its success was experienced in this one decade?

On closer look, we'll find that there's a small matter of the matches against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe. But these will be dealt with too, when we try and capture the essence of this decade.

The 2000s started most disastrously for team India. After yet another Australian whitewash, it was the turn of Cronje's Proteas blanking India at Home. And then the most forgettable incident in Cricket's history, which threatened annihilation of the game itself. It left India reeling, with yesteryears' heroes, Azhar and Jadeja being proved guilty of match fixing.

But from the rubble emerged a new India, much like the Reneissance after centuries of strife. And leading them from the front was Saurav Ganguly. The Prince led his men to their first test win of the decade, and an overseas one at that, against debutants Bangladesh and followed it with wins against Zimbabwe.

And then the epic series that would probably define the team for the decade that followed. To their credit, Ganguly, Dravid, Kumble and Dhoni managed to do in the 2000s what their predecessors hadn't managed in 67 years - a win-loss ratio of 1.

So before we start criticize this team, I feel we need to look-up our history and then make an assessment.




Much in the spirit of India's 100th victory, I've compiled my All-time India XI.

Sunil Gavaskar
Virendar Sehwag
Rahul Dravid
Sachin Tendulkar
G Vishwanath
Vinoo Manked
MS Dhoni
Kapil Dev
Anil Kumble
Zaheer Khan
J Srinath
Ekanath Solkar(12th man)

Remember those great Volkswagen ads?

Surely you do. If you're in advertising or if you're an auto enthusiast. And if nothing else, you are old enough to have seen Dick Cheney with all his hair.

In the days when Sports Entertainment was no more than an hour of physical activity, and reality TV was a distant reality, people spoke of advertising. And they certainly spoke of Volkswagen ads.

That's because the Volkswagen and its advertising enjoyed a successful marriage. If you looking for evidence to verify the success of the marriage, see how every flaw of the car was spoken in such an affectionate tone, thus endearing the Beetle to the whole generation that was lost in space.

The honesty of the car was articulated through smart, honest advertising. It would have been a pity if such a successful marriage was without a family album. Hence the book.

And like any album worth its nostalgia, it's bound to elicit a few chuckles.

This book is a must buy for people who believe in the power of advertising, and those who believe in the power of their dreams. Afterall, don't we all like the fairy tale of the ugly ducking within us becoming a pin-up boy?

Juice

One of the best ads from India in recent times.

Inglorious Basterds

Quentin Tarantino is known to make films that are full of legendary contradictions, real-life references and imaginary events, inspired/borrowed elements and dazzling original plots, and mind-numbing absurdity and deep-layered meaning - often rendering them as brilliant as they are ridiculous. And we movie buffs love him for just that. Suffice it to say, Inglourious Basterds is Tarantino's most glorious attempt since Pulp Fiction.

Read the full review here.