Life

Ever since i decided to pursue an MBA i've been seeing the other side of the coin in life.Everything i see seems to have an business oppurtunity attached to it.
I see the guys who flock to the retail shops when the discount sale kicks in and i see the power of perception and herd psychology in life.I see the crowds at the roadside stalls and see the fortune at the bottom of the pyramid.I see the population charts skewed and see the oppurtunity in education and internet space.
I see all this but the B-Schools i apply to fail to see the business man in me.ahhhhhhhh.

THE EPIC

To start with this was one of the best matches i've ever seen.Both teams gave it their all over the two legs.I was annoyed and feeling helpless when the teams were announced,no StevieG no Riera no Babel and Lucas!!! as the man in the hole.I dunno what Rafa was smoking when he decided to play Lucas behind Torres but I'd like some of that.OK i started watching the match resignedly,but Chelsea true to Hiddink's pre-match comments they will try and soak up the pressure were sitting back and inviting Liverpool to attack.

In the first 15-20 mins liverpool took total control of the midfield and the match was mostly played in the chelsea half,drogba was totally isolated and i was ecstatic.A brilliant goal from Aurelio and my hopes went up.Xabi took the advantage of some stupidity from Ivanovic and got a penalty and scored it too.Chelsea were in tatters now and Liverpool were raking up chances.We should've scored just before halftime but somehow the ball did not go in.

Ok 45 mins to go and one goal to get,I was very hopeful.But i was a bit apprehensive about Hiddink's team talk as last week too Chelsea were unstoppable in the second half so i was waiting with fingers crossed.Second half starts,Kuyt almost scores.Same story for the first three four mins.Then anelka is allowed to run easily through down the flanks and put a good ball in.Drogba gets a touch,overpowering carragher and reina messes it up.1-2.Shit ok one more goal we get extra time.But Skrtel gives away a dangerous free kick and Alex smashes it.Carvalho had blocked the wall away and ducked in time for the shot.Lucas[bastard!!!] moved away from the ball and reina could do nothing but pick the ball from the net.2-2.Now two goals needed in another 35 odd mins.Kuyt's goalbound header somehow clawed away by Cech.Tension mounts.The match was wide open now,with both teams throwing men forward.Ballack misses a good chance in the other end made by a Drogba playing supremely well.

Abramovich wanted entertainment dint he,it was being dished out in bucketfulls here.Ballack wins the ball,puts Drogba through with a superb ball.Drogba shields its superbly and lays it off for Fat Frank who toe pokes it inside.3-2 match over screams the commentator.Chelsea fans and Rafa[??????] agree.Torres off.Mash off.Ngog and Riera on. Chelsea sit back again.Lucas tries his luck and oh my god it goes inside off a massive deflection off essien.3-3.Some hope.After two min Riera plays nicely down the left flank and picks out Kuyt with a good ball.Powerful header 3-4.10 mins to go one goal to get.I cant believe it.Overjoyed.Delirious.Any semblence of order is thrown to the winds.Everyone attacks.Superb tackle by Skrtel to prevent Malouda from scoring.This guy is sensational under Hiddink.Power pace where the hell was he these last 20 months.Anyways resulting corner lucas gets the ball,foul on him by Malouda ref no go,ball falls to alonso he gives it to ballack who passes it to anelka to lampard GOAL.4-4.Huge mistake by ref and alonso and lucas not tracking frank.

2 mins later Ngog smashes the ball,essien somehow clears it off the line.3 mins added time.Cant understand how 6 goals can be scored but only 3 mins given.Plays out match over.4-4 second leg.7-5 win for Chelsea overall.Superb match.120/100 for all the liverpool players given they were playing 10 on 11[i am sick and tired of lucas].Not so for Rafa,who first made the mistake of playing an half fit StevieG in the first leg.Then leaves him out today.For once i agree with those jokers on at Ten Sports.Even if Stevie was half hit today,I would have thrown him on for the last thirty mins or so.Or atleast made him play the first half.Given how Chelsea were in the first half god knows what could've happened if Stevie was on. Also the formation for this match,Yossi on the left Kuyt right and Lucas in the hole.Imagine how it would have been with Kuyt upfront with Torres Babel/Riera left and Yossi on the right.Sometimes this guy seems a genius and sometimes a fool.

Also the way Drogba behaved was really disgraceful.Moaning,whining throughout the match.And the way he rolled back onto the pitch to stop the play was disgusting.Agreed he was superb in the second half but this kind of behaviour is not what a fan would want.And Chelsea fans man those jokers.Booing your team at half time, fair weather fans all of them.

But i am incredibly proud to support this team.The way they fought was unbelivable and those families who suffered unconsolable loss twenty years ago,we showed how much we respect your loss.We proved once again that if you are a Red Scouser you never will walk alone.

On Catbertian HRs

It was a dark and stormy night.Our hero stays awake working on new evil ways to torment the loyal cube dwellers.Then he strikes upon a brilliant idea to stop providing paper cups anymore.Coffee in mugs,only for employess.That way interns,contractors and house keeping cant drink coffee anymore.He goes to sleep purring satisfactorially.
Next morning he comes across Al Gore while doing random wiki search and decides to name this farce 'Go Green'.What more he decides the remove paper napkins too while he is at it.What an idea sirjee.

Gulaal - Review

Black Friday was very engaging,No Smoking was shocking and DevD was wonderfull but with Gulaal Anurag Kashyap moves into stereotype territory.A complete loser as an hero and a characterless woman as the leading lady.The so called brilliant lyrical songs were pathetically placed in the movie and tends to irritate you more than entertain.

The movie was made with the intention of poking fun at the communalism in India,broadbasing it on the struggle for Rajputana,however the struggle itself as depicted in the movie is too trivial.

The first half begins well enough with a stunning fireband speech by Menon and moves along tolerably with Dileep's life with the charismatic Ransa,his ragging and then his involvement with the student elections.Ransa,brilliantly acted and easily the best and most engaging character,gets knocked off by his illegitimate brother.So Dileep the loser he is accepts to become the dummy candidate and wins an rigged election.You can question why Dileep was made the candidate when the election was rigged but then this movie is not concerned with logic.

Kiran,Ransa's illegitimate sister,a losing candidate,then moves in on Dileep.Now till then he had this loser-loser love relationship with Anuja,but when another girl wants to have sex with him conviniently forgets her.From here on the movie goes predictably the girl manipulates the poor guy to confrontation with Menon and he gets thrown out from both politics and from Kiran's bedroom as well.She now moves on to Menon,the political veteran he is falls for this too.

Meanwhile Dileep probably the only living organism in this entire fking universe who does not understand why Kiran left him,familiarly spirals down into booze and sleaze and alienates Anuja[god knows why one would not cuddle up to a woman like that and go ravishing after meatier girls].He then goes psycho and decides to take revenge[!!!! why this sudden homocidal tendency??? two days boozing cant be the explanation],shoots Menon and his cohorts all the while demanding to talk to Kiran.

Meanwhile Kiran's brother is making grandiose plans to become Rajputana's senapati by bumping off Menon and his trusted sidekick Bati.Our hero now moves in on Kiran's hq and shoots everyone here too and has a dialogue with Kiran.The loser he is,he does not shoot her and lets her go while the other goons come in and shoot him.Then comes a long pointless walk back to his home,having a chest wound[dedicated to a certain captain perhaps :) ],and he dies.Kiran's bro becomes the new senapati movie ends.

I could not for the love of God understand all this fuss over a GS seat.It might have made sense some twenty years ago with the Govt Univ model but with the number of private colleges and better transparency in most govt. colleges too this does not make sense at all.And the comedy portrayal of the Rajputana moment deosnt help.

Piyush Mishra and Ransa provide the movie's tolerable moments however the much appreciated songs tend more to irritate than entertain.The two most promising characters,apart from Kay Kay Menon of course,in Ransa and Anuja remain undeveloped and wasted.Overall avoid paying money for this one.

And The (Real) Oscars Go To

I do know that no amount of cribbing on my part is going to change things but just to soothe a frustrated mind here is my revision of the oscar list.

First of all not nominating The Dark Knight and WALL-E for the best picture and best direction seems really stupid and populist to me.The Dark Knight is rated as the 4th best movie of all time in IMDB and is one of the highest grossers and it is left out.Why? the movie is dark and sombre and is not in tune with the time.The message that a jackass can win a million bucks guessing an answer is more to the times than somebody being decent inspite of the times.Why WALL-E was not nominated in the best picture category i cannot even begin to fathom.
Anyways here goes the list

1.Best Adapted Screenplay:
Agreed the slumdog adaptation was fresh but does it compare to Benjamin Button? The movie is a stunning transformation from a complex short story by fitzgerald.To visualize a story where your two leading characters age in reverse
directions and to pull it off in the most convincing style is worth a oscar man com'on.
Winner : Benjamin Button

2.Best Sound Mixing
Dude you give sound editing to Dark Knight but sound mixing to Slumdog.I cannot understand the logic.Dark Knight clearly outscored here.
Winner : Dark Knight

3.Best Cinematography
If somebody has seen Revolutionary Road or The Reader or The Dark Knight then the choice would have been from the three.

4.Best Film Editing
Benjamin Button without a doubt.Stunning visual brillance.

5.Best Picture
The Dark Knight Or WALL-E.I cannot sing more praises for these films it should be evident to anyone with a +ve IQ.

6.Best Director
Christopher Nolan or Andrew Stanton.Period.

7.Best Original Soundtrack
The Dark Knight's soundtrack was way better than any other released this year.The music sustains the dark mood throughout the movie and keeps you on the edge of your seat.

8.Best Song
Should've been O Saya instead of the Jai Ho nonsense. or listen to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OSvJvSwmd4

So there it is and comments/brickbats welcome

Of Fools And Mad Men

This EPL season has been great with plenty of laughter points all over.
1.Joe Kinnear - never seen a fool like this guy.Charles Insomnia had me laughing so hard that i got stares from my colleagus.St James Park is much more a circus ride this year than in previous seasons so much so that Given that saintly magpie packed up and left for the other circus in town.
2.Chelsea going bonkers - roman's deep pockets can no longer be picked at chelsea anymore.They sell bridge and cudicini and sign quaresma [the leading contender for the serie a duckass this season] on loan.
3.Arsene losing his plot - no idea why he dint anyone in the summer and signs arshavin when they can do with some decent defenders and good midfielders esp. when veloso and bullard were available.
4.Aston Villa playing some great footie and leading the charge to break the top four.
5.Everton playing for so long without a striker and sitting at sixth.This guy David Moyes should write a how to manage book that all bankers be forced to mug.
6.Man City - need i say more?? 100m+ for one player earning 26m a year.Dude you can buy ireland + iceland for that money nowadays.
7.Hull City - joint leaders in October relegation favorites in Feb.Hmmm we need more clubs like this one.
Meanwhile another Madrid coach loses his job and a president soon follows suit.I think people are taking the Joker too seriously and are not being too serious anymore.

Some qns to keep the donkey alive

1.Until recently the German town of Herzogenaurach was divided into two bitter camps. ''There were always the ones who supported X and others favoring Y,'' said Hans Lang, mayor of the town.An X employee put it more brutally: ''You would be fired immediately if you showed up in Y.So strict is the line that locals claim even marriages between X and Y families were rare until the 1970s.Until the 1980s, children usually chose to join the firm where their father already worked, separating the city into X and Y families who visited their own pubs or played for their clubs. Explain.

2.X originally was a short story by Y that tells the story of Z attending a boring dinner party at the Government House in Nassau with a group of socialites he can't stand. While the story does not include action elements, as other Y tales do, it attempts to posit that Z’s adventures pale in comparison with real life drama.

3.______ was born in Hungary moved to the US in 1913 with his parents.He became professor of physics at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The original system used for something was developed in 1950 by Kenneth Harkness. By 1960, using the data developed through the Harkness Rating System, _____ developed his own formula which had a sound statistical basis and constituted an improvement on the Harkness System. The new rating system was approved and in 1960. In 1970 the governing body also agreed to adopt the _____ Rating System. Id the guy and for what the rating system is used.

4.He's every employee's worst nightmare. He wasn't born mean and unscrupulous, he worked hard at it. And succeeded. As for stupidity, well, some things are inborn. His top priorities are the bottom line and looking good in front of his subordinates and superiors (not necessarily in that order). Of absolutely no concern to him is the professional or personal well-being of his employees. He is technologically challenged but he stays current on all the latest business trends, even though he rarely understands them

5.In ancient China coins were circular with a rectangular hole in the middle. Several coins could be strung together on a rope. Merchants in China, if they became rich enough, found that their strings of coins were too heavy to carry around easily. To solve this problem they did something that evolved into a first of its kind in history.Id?