Opinions, Perspectives et al

Enjoying my holidays and watching lot of television. Cricket of course takes the maximum share of my TV time now. For me, had it not been for cricket, Travel & Living channel would have walked away with the lion's share of my screen time! It is definitely one of the better channels out there. Disagree with me at your own risk. Grrrrrrr........

TV commercials have also come of age India: my favourite being HSBC's series of advertisements emphasizing 'different perspectives' and HSBC respecting it which enables them to call themselves "The world's local bank". It is by far the best I have seen by any financial services company.

A close second would have to be the MOTOFLIP advertisement. Compared to any Nokia advertisement, the sheer recall value it has is just phenomenal. It is so much about today's India: a hardworking young adult coming home late at night and his middle class parents having no idea as to what their son is doing. As a result his parents are disturbed about the 'more-than-he-could-afford' look of the phone. The best scene is when the mother takes her pallu and covers mouth portraying absolute dissapointment. Brilliant eye-for-detail on the director's part. Kudos!

Better Half....Indeed

I was having this general conversation with one of my friend about things that only girls can do and things that only guys can do etc. Somehow the conversation drifted towards, how each and every word any guy utters can be twisted and interpreted as a MCPisque statement. Out of nowhere she mentioned root cause of most problems are women...I was stunned to hear it from a girl but chose not to make it obvious.

Now when I sit back and think about it peacefully maybe she was right. Consider these examples; Mahabharata-Draupadi, Ramayana-Sita, Homer-Helen of Sparta/Troy(highly debatable which place she belongs to), Egypt-Cleopatra, Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky.......anyway. I strongly believe women are the most beautiful beings that God ever created. Dear God, if you are listening you have my vote of confidence.

Boss Told Me So..

This is a funny incident and foolish to say the least. Only I can get myself into such a situation. My boss invited close to sixty people(from all the divisions that report to him) to his house for a get together, as he was feeling very good about stepping into thrilling thirties. I drove down that evening and I was trusting on my instincts to find a nice parking place near his house. So I did.

I was having a chat with him at his terrace, he looked down and said "That is your car, right?". I said (under my breath) "Wow, he is got a good memory and he remebers my gleaming-red, sex on the wheels", (out loud) Yes you are right, you are looking at my darling 'Eleanor'. He replied, I have neighbours who are quite fussy and they are not particularly fond of seeing 'Eleanor' in front of their driveway. I sprinted downstairs and as I was approaching 'Eleanor' to park her elsewhere, there was a middle-aged man peeping out of his car and waiting for me to move 'Eleanor'. I turned back, and said "Boss has asked not to park the car here". He had a weird expression on his face which screamed, young man you are suffering from foot-in-mouth disease, he remarked I am the owner of the house in front of which you have your car parked. Do I have your boss's permission to park my car there..at least?

Vaninsh Vinayakan, Vanish....

Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away....

Of late people close to me have casually remarked, "Vinayakan you are always in control, you need to let go yourself frequently and by doing so you will be able to enjoy life more"...I am trying my best to do the above but I still have doubts whether I am committed to doing so 100%. I think trying is at least is a good start.

Here goes the half-hearted attempt:

I have really forgotten the last time I engaged myself in a 'let's eye-ball each other' situation with a stranger in a public place. I have loved doing it since my hotel days. It is saying so many things without saying anything at all. I try to keep my eye-contact as disarming as possible(or so I believe it to be!). It is more of 'I appreciate your hairdo, dress-sense, smile etc...' Last evening at TGIF(near Priya theatre, New Delhi) there were two girls seated diagonally across the table I was sitting in. The one which was facing me had a simple yet really stylish hairdo with a nice toss of the same at regular intervals. It was nicely resting on her slender, denim clothed shoulders. Initially she was completely engrossed in a conversation with her friend, but when she noticed me *eyeing* her(just eyes..), she would have probably thought "well this guy is cute and there is this tinge of nicety about him, let me enjoy the evening and return the glance". Me and my fertile imagination! After 15-20 minutes we exchanged glances...sigh...sigh...sigh... We continued doing so for close to two hours. I somehow felt there was more to it than we looking at each other. I felt it and and I am sure she felt it too. OK let me hope against hope that she gets to read this post sometime!

I was accompanied by two of my old friends from my hotel days. The conversation was on the lines of we being so open about discussing a lot of things even though we have not met for close to three years and we enjoyed the camaraderie that was there. I talked about blogger and promised there is going to be one posting dedicated to the great evening we had...