Monday, January 07, 2008

Should I or shouldnt I?

It is a tough call

I am considering to move Mundane Stuff lock stock and barrel to a new location

If anyone objects to this, please speak now or hold your peace forever(and of course continue reading)

Saturday, January 05, 2008

Chicken soup for the dieter's soul

Channel 1:

"Diet Now, Real People are losing real weight"

"Diets dont work, weight watchers does"

"Big Loser- brought to you by Jenny Craig"

Channel 2:

"Think Dip Think Arby"

"Bacon Sausages and cheese for breakfast"

"Eat all you can ribs for only $10"

Channel 3:

On a news channel for New Year

Donor gives money to congregation for every pound lost by the pastor. Lets hear how he did it.


Channel 4:

Buy XYZ cholestrol controller. Lipitor doesnt help. XYZ does.

Side effects can include nausea, weight gain, sore backs, blindness in the right eye, stomach pain. Some patients have gone into coma. Consult your doctor.

Channel 5:

Are you drowning in your credit. Call 865474286987693 to free yourself of this burden.


What is with this country called the United States of America?!


Apart from being convinced that the standard of average Indian advertising is way much better than America's, I have come to realise that people here are obssessed with losing weight and at the same time eating as much as they can.

Apart from the Gem and Tele shopping network,the couch potato is beseeched by the food companies- low fat, no fat, high fibre, no trans fat, chicken soup for the dieters soul and the cheesy dips comes free. Then the pharmaceutical companies take over and woo people to try their products starting from weight loss pills to bladder control.Finally the credit and insurance guys step in and kiss away whatever is left of the TV watchers soul.

So you eat all you can and gain weight, then lose all your credit worthiness by squandering on various weight loss and dieting techniques, and to save your loved ones you pay for insurance which will take care of your family once you die of obesity. That is one hell of a karmic cycle!

Every food menu heralds hope for the health conscious with a motherhood statement of "Healthy options available " only to serve grape fruit and apple along with cheese sticks.Breakfast/brunch buffet spreads can put a King's feast to shame.

Go to any ihop/breakfast place and I can assure you that the only reason why anyone is eating that cheesy omlette is because there is an omlette to finish apart from the 4 pancake platter!

If you havent had enough then dedicated TV channels showing extremely well maintained people working out only adds to the agony of the obese.Has anyone here stopped to wonder why do you need an all you can eat dessert counter in a breakfast buffet?

Wonder which channel plays the path breaking advertising which is always talked about. The last one I saw was in a McDonalds outlet playing on loop in a TV installed by Coke!

At the start of this vacation, I swore to myself I would soak in and watch as much TV as I possible could. Midway through the soujourn I have already switched off the TV and started blogging. I just pray fervently I dont become one of those them TV haters
by the time I leave.

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Reading causes affliction

Read her

and got the feeling that we are all suffering from the Ostrich Syndrome

* Ostrich Syndrome- ostrich-like approach of burying the head in the sand hoping that the storm will pass.

Friday, December 07, 2007

Juliet Morris at home in Gurgaon!

My cook Nisha is a busy soul. She just cant find the time to do a favour for me. But finally today she wasnt her busy and hoitty toitty self and I managed to gather an audience with her for 15 mins for a good champpi(head massage).

Nisha is from Bangladesh and she cooks decently.As she parted my hair and poured warm oil on it, she asked me in her broken Hindi," Didi how many continents are there?" Of course she didnt sound as straight as that and it took me about two mins to decipher what she was asking me.I proceeded to name all the continents for her.

Thought the quiz was over when she proceeded to ask me which was the smallest of them all? About two questions on Iraq skidded and passed by. When she asked me a question on India I said," You are a Bangladeshi, why do you want to know about India?". Pat came the reply in a voice which sounded hurt," India is my country."

Finally I asked her if she was writing an exam of some sort, to which she replied, "These queries of mine have made me wiser for the day. When I go back home and teach my kids, I can tell them these points and they know something more than they currently do."

A good part of the last week I have been preparing for a real geography quiz of sorts. Think the champpi session made a week of my efforts worthwhile.

Tuesday, November 06, 2007

Realisation of the day:

I am sure a lot of you are waiting to agree with this.

I am a Klutz...

klutz (klÅ­ts)
n. Slang.
A clumsy person.
A stupid person; a dolt.

Monday, November 05, 2007

Random thoughts from the mind of a random number generator

Random thoughts:

Heard over Radio:

If you have the alphabets in your name to form the word mint you stand to won prizes worth Lakhs from i-mint.

Thats easy! I have enough alphabets in my name to spell mint, ant,hash,lakhs,aim, halt, sham, list, last,lash, mash, hint, lint, knit,hit,aha(the expression)tail,shit!!


thought no.2:

Every scripture written was a code of living of sorts for the age in which it was written. The Ramayana Mahabharatha, Thirukkural Guru Granth Sahib. What have we written? Isnt it high time we wrote something to capture our ways for posterity.

thought no: 3

I am reading a travelogue in which this very interesting character travels along a route tracing the Himalayas. He meanders into China and meets a very interesting character who conducts operas. He recollects a scene from the opera in which the old man plays a soothing tune and asks the audience,"Was it peaceful?" to which the audience agrees. Pat came the reply from the performer to their nods-"Then why not play it in the Isreal-Palestine border." He was playing to a high profile audience which included American Diplomats. I sometimes wish I could say something like that to someone. Sad part is no one is listening.

But it almost heartening to know that the firing on the Isreal Palestine border affects this man in China as much as it affects me to hear about the emergency in Pak.

thought no: 4

I had a very interesting conversation with a young man from a premier business school. He was of the opinion that during campus recruitment, recruiters should not ask students their grades.

I say, students should not ask the compensation figures once they join an organization!


Thought no:5

The baseline expectation of people from life has risen. Makes it that much more difficult for me to cope.

Thought no: 6
Have you wondered why cities/areas which once flourished in trade/learning are in ruins/decline now?
Persia, Egypt, institutes of learning-Nalanda and many more.

Wonder what will happen to Mumbai, Delhi Pune soon.

Thought no:7

DLF is considering, taking in construction workers on their rolls, providing them good housing facilities and thus dissuade them from going back to their villages during the peak harvest season. Is that a good thing or a bad thing?


thought no:8

I look forward endlessly to the day before any festivity. The anticipation is palpable in the air and the actual day of the festival pales in comparison to the evening before. The preparations, the hope of enjoyment excites me to no end.


Happy Diwali ppl!

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

I could learn a foreign tongue just to read these lines they way he wrote it:

Treacherous
generals:
see my dead house,
look at broken Spain :
from every house burning metal flows
instead of flowers,
from every socket of Spain
Spain emerges
and from every dead child a rifle with eyes,
and from every crime bullets are born
which will one day find
the bull's eye of your hearts.

And you'll ask: why doesn't his poetry
speak of dreams and leaves
and the great volcanoes of his native land?

Come and see the blood in the streets.
Come and see
The blood in the streets.
Come and see the blood
In the streets!