Just for clarification...

I thought I should clarify this w.r.t. Nokia Care Center blues in my previous post:
They are NOT offering free service! All the shit even for whom the warranty has expired and have to shell out some money, like me!!!

Amazing Mimicry by Sonu Nugam

Until late, I used to think that Johny Lever and Sudesh Bhosle are the only top notch mimicry artists. Thanks to my chum, Amit, he pointed me to this link! Just amazing to listen how accurately can he mimic singer's voices, and not to miss those amazing expressions!

Weekend Update

After throwing shit on you, life does offer some respite. True that more often than usual, what it gives you is just a glass of water and stamp-sized tissue to clean up bucketful of shit thrown at you, but at least it does so. Enough to clean your hands and help yourself.

After recovering from bad health, though not completely, I could lead my normal life (read play football and roam about freely!). Last to last week, after recuperating a little, I thought I should go to my HQ, a visit I had kept pushing off for more than a month now. As soon as I reached home, we all (read family) headed for Mahabaleshwar, referred to as haven for people troubled by unnervingly tight work schedules and adulterated environment. Though not virgin, it still is beautiful. Thank GOD the crowd was low (the way we all like it) we could roam around freely without worrying about traffic. The first day it was pouring like there's no tomorrow. The other day while we were returing, rain had taken declared time out. Though we have been there several times, I still find it's beauty very mesmerizing. The wind at Sydney Point was so strong that one couldn't stand still to click the snap!!!

Amazing Waterfall on the way...

Fog and only Fog....

More Fog...

Amazing interplay of clouds and sun rays casting shadow on the mountains...

Then last week I was back on the field..... yes FOOTBALL!
It was our last match of the TMKM inter-IT tournament, against Cognizant. The fight was tough. We lost 1-3. What was reassuring, though, was the fact the quality of our game was far better. As a team, we were playing much better than we had in previous tournaments. The one goal that we scored was just worth watching! As magnificent was the goal, so was the pass! One team failed to turn up, so the refrees asked if we were interested in playing against the lone team. WHY NOT!!! We had another game, only this time it was FAR more satisfying and enjoyble! They way I walk now shows I had over played last Sunday :-)

The day I returned from HQ, my mobile phone died :-( 'Contact Service' were her last words. And she kept repeating it every time I switched her on. Time had come to do the most dreaded: Go to Nokia Care Center. Why? Hell, you don't know the infamously famous Nokia Care centers then!!! There's only one in the whole of Pune, it opens at 0930 hrs, you have to go at least an hour earlier, wait in the !@$#ing long queue to get the token, then wait for your turn to come, and then wait ONCE AGAIN for the technician to examine it and say what should be done. And this whole ordeal takes well over 5 hours!!! A nightmare for working professionals! Fortunately I could convince my younger bro, whose currently enjoying his vacations to do that job for me ;-) Of course, I now owe him a favour in return!

Update: Ahh... I missed out that this is NOT free service! All this shit even for whom the warranty has expired and have to shell out money, like me!!!

I was already planning to upgrade from Nokia 6610i and what I had in my mind was Sony's Walkman series. I ended up buying Sony W700i a week later. Review on that some other day. But in short, it's FAR FAR FAR better an equally spec'ed and priced Nokia phone.

I'm sick!

Thank GOD, only in literal sense. Not in the sense of 'A Sick Moron!' That explains another break in posts. And also those lousy statuses on messenger. Lot of things have happened meanwhile! None of them encouraging enough:-(

Football, as you can guess, will be amongst the first I'll talk about...
2 weeks back, at TMKM inter-IT tournament, it was match against PSPL, the bunch (please excuse me) of morons!!! Well, not all, but a major of them! We drew 0-0 against those bunch of arrogant beasts. They played well, pretty damn well, but only if the game was to be termed as American Football, which it wasn't! Referee awarded us foul kicks every 5 mins on an average! They kicked players and not the football, they hit one of the players so hard, that he puked on the field! Yeeks! Can you imagine playing against such morons :-( Anyway, with lack of full strength, we managed to just draw. Last week we played against was Wipro. I was so out of health, I couldn't even manage to be amongst the audience. We started with 8 players and reached 11 only until very late. They thrashed us 4-0 in the first half itself. And the score remained there for rest of the game.

I caught cold, rather, let me put this way, common cold got hold of me 2 weeks back. Trying to test my immunity (a big mistake as I would realize a day after), I thought I would take it. The very next day I was out of action, bed-ridden for most of the day. After a day's worth of dose, that my family doc prescribed, I felt confident and energetic. Having a big time itch of getting something done, I went to office on Saturday, hoping to cut on the backlog. Was right only about clearing backlog, for, this week, the cold came back & with vengeance!!! And hit really hard on me. Yesterday I couldn't take it any longer and had to leave office immediately to see my doc. Even while I tried to breath harder, forget about sneezing or clearing nasal tract, the result would be electrifying shocks through my head. Anyone having had severe common cold can imagine, withouth doubt, what I'm talking about.

With no sun for 3 weeks straight, constant rains, everything around wet and soaked in water, !@#$ing bad roads, maddening traffic, bad health for more than 2 weeks now, & last but not the least deprived of football has driven me crazy. But once a while, not very often, everyone should fall a little ill, because it helps drive right into your brain the fact: Health is Wealth. Though not completely relevant here, I'm tempted to quote something Sri Sri Ravishankar said, very aptly:

We spend half of our Health to earn the Wealth,
And then, we spend half of that wealth to earn back our Health!

That, sadly enough, is the typical western culture we Asians (esp. Indians) are picking up, all this while the rest of world, including Americans, are dying to catch on some of ours! Wherever the centuries old Oriental wisdom disappeared :-(

In the heat frenzied of activities, I did manage to finish off Bill Bryson's The Short History of Nearly Everything (TSHNE), watch Pirates of Caribbean-2 (POC-2), read through Arthur Hailey's Overload and maybe something more.

To keep it short, TSHNE, is an amazing book. Bill has done enough research and digested everything for us in a very concise form, TSHNE. He touches on almost everything, from birth of universe through birth of Earth, through the birth of humans and everything in between. How universe works, how our body works, Newtonian mechanics to Quantum, Geology, Astronomy, DNA, and only GOD knows what not. And oh, did I forget to mention GTR, General Theory of Relativity & the petty fights, differences, arrogances that existed (and still exists) in the scientific world that only hampers its and our growth, my personal favourites! It's difficult to be interested in ALL of above at once, but the book is really worth your time for the breadth of knowledge it exposes you to. And some very interesting anecdotes.

As to POC-2, it doesn't make the impact of POC-1, and find it only to be a teaser to the final (and hopefully) concluding part, POC-3. But what the movie is worth watching for is, as usual, Johnny Depp & movie's mind-blowing special effects. The movie sets & locations are just out of the world, very well suited to the movie theme. Well, of course, not as enchanting as After the Sunset!

Will talk about Overload later! Meanwhile, grab a copy of TSHNE, and a DVD of POC-2!