Anjali - First List

Here comes Ms. Organised. Her first list of things to do before we start out for a small road trip tomorrow. I'm pretty impressed.

A better pic later but for now it reads like this - Haircut (mine), packing, jewelry (hers), chapals (chappals), food, swimsoots (you get it), nities (easy again), pajamas, dresses, chabis (this is not so easy), sunscreen and something else. It's stuck on the wall next to the computer so I don't forget!

I wonder what I am up to face in time with such heavy duty organisation taking over my life. Right now, can't complain.

Anjali - Children at Work

Here are Anjali and Mansi at play - or work - difficult to make out which is which. The complete concentration and focus that children bring to something like playing with mud is what I fear I've lost as I grew up.

That involvement is what brings on the smiles. That is what makes work seem like play - or makes play so intense. Thanks girls.
 

Checking out the mud

Off we go

So, what do you think?

That could be a problem...

We'll use these...

Right, let's get down to it then

Hmmm, I'll strain the wet mud this way

Yes, that's the way to go

Oh oh, someone's watching

See....

Booo to you

From both of us here

Story Idea - When The Fake Is Better

Disclaimer: This story idea might be an old one.

Ordinary girl (heroine) is obsessed with a star. She creates a complete world of her own around the star, makes him the king of her dreams. Nice and bubbly stuff initially but it gets to a high personal plane where she cannot do without the virtual him. In fact as she gets on in her life she realises that she can actually use this creation of hers (in her mind) to propel her life forward. In conversations with her virtual star boyfriend, she finds a lot of clarity and new thought. Her life hits a high thanks to the considerate and knowledgeable star she has trapped in her mind. At the pinnacle of her success she actually bumps into the star and they meet. Interval stuff.

She cannot think of a better way for her life to go on now with her star coming alive. But she soon realises that the star behaves in a manner that is distinctly different from what she has trained him to do in her mind. She cannot take these changes in her boyfriend and the constant dilemma he is putting her through. Her work starts getting affected and she starts losing control. Until she realises that it is the real boyfriend who is the villain and the virtual boyfriend who is the hero. Now she has to get rid of the real actor from her life. But he seems obsessed with her.

How does she deal with this problem?

Two Original Jokes

I laughed loudly at these two original jokes recently.

We were discussing the bad news that newspapers dump on us the first thing in the morning. Some said they did not wish to read newspapers anymore, some said they wished they stopped soon, and so on and so forth until Milind came up with this solution. 'I think we should tell the newspaperwala to take the newspaper and deliver it directly to the raddi shop (the shop that buys used newspapers) instead of delivering it to our doorstep. I'd pay him gladly for that service.'

On another occasion while out at dinner, Krishna was having a tough time ordering. He was done with the drinks and was running through the menu. The waiter was somehow insistent on on our ordering starters and kept on bugging Krishna about them. After the umpteenth question from the waiter regarding the 'starters' and noticing Krishna's bewilderment at this starters business Shobhs quipped - 'Tell him you're a non-starter'.

Silver Linings Playbook - Movie Review

This is a most unusual movie and hugely entertaining at that. A medley of the most unusual characters, some of them who have been diagnosed with disorders (and some who have not), show us that our world is one where we are all generally on the edge - one cannot make out who is which side. But the movie, adapted from a novel of the same name written by Mathew Quick, is full of unusual twists and turns right up till the end. Not to forget some powerhouse performances by all the actors, especially the leads.

Pat (Bradley Cooper), coming back from a mental asylum where he had been sent for his bipolar disorder and a consequent attack on a man he catches with his wife, meets a sex-addict widow Tiffany Maxwell (Jennifer Lawrence) at a dinner. The two neurotics hit it off in an unusual manner with Pat refusing all invitations from Tiffany to have sex with her and making it clear that he wants to get back to his wife Nikki. Tiffany uses Nikki as a bait to convince Pat to enter a dance competition with her. Now this dance competition and the fact that she and Pat are good luck for the Eagles (as she proves to Pat's bookmaker father) become the key points for an all or nothing bet that Pat's father places, much to the dismay of Pat's mother and her whole family. But the bet is on. There is drama in the dance hall as Nikki comes to watch the dance, Tiffany gets drunk as a consequence and the couple ends up doing a decent job. Will they get the 5 points required? Will the Eagles win? Will Pat get back to Nikki? What happens to Tiffany? Ah, watch this funny, romantic and crazy movie to find out. For certain you will be entertained no doubt.

Jennifer Lawrence got a well deserved Oscar and Bradley Cooper deserved one himself. Robert DiNero as Pat's father was good  for another. Overall, fast-paced, full of life, and as unpredictable as life can get if you let it rip without trying to control it. Go watch.

A Better Life - Movie Review

I was trying to watch another big star movie with lots of names and lots of gunfire but it just would not interest me. And then I switched to this movie 'A Better Life' and was instantly hooked. It is about a Mexican immigrant (illegal as it turns out) who works as a gardener in the US. He lives with  his young teenaged son who is studying in a school. His son, however, has friends who are related to Mexican gang leaders and is drawn to their life.

The gardener is a single father and works hard to bring up his son and educate him. The son is ashamed of his father's low lifestyle, his way of begging for work while standing at street corners, and is more attracted to the gangs and their tattoos. The father buys a truck to propel his dream of earning more money and getting a better life, the truck gets stolen. The father and son go out to recover the truck and in the process, the father gets arrested. The father is deported back to Mexico but the son is allowed to stay with the father's sister. In the jail, the father and son discuss their lives, and the father tells his son how his mother left him and how he hoped his son would make a good future for himself.

It's a simple, lovely movie with no frills but all the drama in the world. I could not take my eyes off the screen for a moment and was totally drawn into the father's struggle, his honesty in the face of his hardship, his son's dilemma and his acceptance of his culture. The song that the father sang to the boy when he was a child, the pain when the father breaks down before his son thinking that he has failed his son and the son's comforting words that he had always been there for him are such simple stuff that one can always relate to any number of times if they are told the right way. I loved the movie. 'A Better Life' is a good watch on one of those lonely evenings.

Spineless Show by the Aussies

For all that we expect of the Aussies this was a truly spineless performance. I was disappointed with what they put up at Hyderabad in the second Test. I watched part of Day 2 - when they started bowling their fourth over to the Indian openers. (On Day One they batted atrociously and got out for a paltry score - there is not enough batting in that lineup that can play positive cricket.)

As Pattinson and Siddle bowled and bowled, save the wicket of Sehwag, there was no respite, no penetration. And I was hoping there would be some sort of an imaginative play by their skipper Clarke. But he did not change their ends, nor did he bring in the slow bowlers and attacked the batsmen, nor did he ask the fast bowlers to change their  angle and bowl around the wicket, nor did he bowl himself or Watson on to change the bowling. He just kept at it predictably, doing nothing and hoping something would happen. It did not. Finally all that happened on Day 3 happened when the bowlers switched ends and bowled around as Glen Maxwell did. You need to be imaginative and create opportunities and I was clueless why Clarke let it drift along happily. With their sharper pace they could have bounced the ball a bit more, created uncomfortable angles for the batsmen and forced a mistake.

One thing for sure is that this batting line up lacks application as they showed in the way they are getting out playing odd shots. I cannot understand a test calibre batting lineup giving three wickets the way they did to Bhuvaneshwar Kumar (who bowled well nevertheless and got us a stranglehold in this game). It just showed bad application to get bowled to a medium pacer or get lbw playing a pull shot or get bowled round the legs playing a sweep shot.

I also suspect that they are imagining too many things in their heads. They should play a bit more positively and not play spin bowling as if it were some live bombs being hurled at them. When the ball is there to be hit, they are better off hitting them.

Similarly when they bowl they should show some more imagination and adjust to the condition quicker. Pattinson and Siddle cannot bowl the same length and expect wickets on these surfaces. They need to get further up and perhaps even cut their pace to get the batsmen to play that length on the front foot. One cannot help a side that lacks imagination. he way things are going, they will go back with a 4-0 drubbing.

Hyderabad put up a good show in terms of number of spectators but one does wish the Aussies put up a better performance. I only wish there had been more shade for the spectators left in the sun. In these times, the sun can be a killer. Despite all the batting heroics, my vote for game changer goes to Bhuvaneshwar Kumar who got three wickets and put Australia out of the game on Day one on a wicket that was a beauty. And if that edge of Clarke had carried to Dhoni Australia would not even have made 200.