The verdict is in

So like, I forgot to tell you. The DB paper was an A. But the GE paper was a measely B+. To lead to a cumulative semester gradepointaverage of 3.65. Hah bloody hah.

And I got the consulting job. Booyah!

I did miss him

Artraj: wotsup !?
Wolfe: hello, she smiled sweetly

Artraj: hello, he says boldly as he walks upto her and kneels down ..... 
Artraj: he pulls out a glass slipper
Wolfe: she files her nails randomly
Artraj: he looks up at her and asks - dear lady ... would you be ever so kind to try on this slipper ?
Wolfe: she gently lifts up her lovely zari sari and extends a perfectly pedicured foot..
Wolfe: the one with three toe rings
Wolfe: and slips on the slipper.. it's a perfect fit! she looks down at him, beaming..
Wolfe: balancing a baby on her hip.. she pushes up her black rimmed engineering glasses higher on her nose and with a gleam in her eye to match the one bouncing off her nose ring, she says, thank you ji..
Wolfe: and screams into the darkness, munnu ke papa! chappal mil gayi!
Artraj: he stands up .. and says .. that will be 450Rs
Artraj: thankyou .. come again please 
Wolfe: bil mere husband de denge..

Artraj: err..mam ... your husband is currently trying on our latest fall collection of stilletos
Artraj: he insists that no matter what the problem in life.... a size 34 will make it go away
Wolfe: she spits paan into the distance, thrusts munnu into his arms and runs off screeching..

I know you missed me

Hello dahlings! So sorry I haven't written but I'm on vacation. In Dubai. I have no time for you.

That last week, you see, was murder on my brittle bones. But all done with finals and interviews and papers, I board my flight to lovely Athens and onwards to good ole DXB. The bags did not get lost. The flight was bumpy. The food was terrible.

The past 10 days have been spent mostly eating, sleeping and watching tele. Oh, and going back and forth to RK's place. Where we mostly eat and watch tele. There's more of that on the horizon.

Met Albert Pinto the lovely yesterday. Had an enjoyable chat over coffee and shawarmas with Black Cobra (who says hello, btw) and that's pretty much it in terms of outings. Perhaps I shall meet Vakson today. Art is too busy being creative for friends. Salad arrives from Seattle tomorrow. Life is good.

I hope you're well. Did you have a nice Christmas? I did. I went to the Grand Hyatt to sit unter the chocolate fountain greedily clutching profiteroles. I know you missed me, you came here every day looking for me. Except on the 16th. You didn't come on the 16th. But you did come twice on the 18th. But I thot you had bloglines that alerts you when posts are posted? Perhaps you wanted to look for yourself. Aww, you did miss me, didn't you?

The weather is very strange today

Or maybe I'm experiencing some strange sort of near-mid-life menopause. Sometimes it's cold, sometimes its hot. I don't get it. I take layers off when I'm outside. I put on my giant winter coat when I'm in class. It's very strange.

Also, my parents are mad. My Dad just called to tell me that apparently me Mum has a stomach ache because of Black Cobra's flight timings. She arrives at 6:30 am, I don't see wot they're stressing about. I didn't have the heart to tell them that I arrive at 2:30 am. You would think they would send a car to the airport instead of waking up to come and get me.

Did I mention I'm going to Dubai for a month? I am. In 5 days. 113 hours to be precise. 113 hours from now, I will be on a flight to Athens. Warmer weather. Ah bliss.

No grey cells, Holmes

I'm watching Heroes on NBC and I can't understand it! Wot the hell is going on in this show? Have I become so uncool that I don't understand television anymore?! No seriously, this is freaking me out.

My mood today

The future of advertising

Here's a good article on how companies are starting to advertise in virtual worlds like Second Life.

Are brands applying the same strategies in the virtual world as they are in the oxygenated world? In the oxygenated world brands try to connect with their audiences for the purpose of creating a relationship and a call to action: buy. Do their audiences exist in the virtual worlds, and if so, is it a place they want to see you? These are the types of questions that must be considered before entering virtual worlds.

Read it all here.

Here's a very smart ad campaign for IWC's Big Pilot watches. Very innovative.

Chiranjeevi at his best

I swear you are going to keel over laughing.

I'm taking 22 credits next term

Well 3 of those are Project Management and 3 are the internship so they technically don't count.

Oh, and I'm taking sailing. Yes, that's right, you heard me, sailing. Hah! I decided step and tone was for wussies and well, I kinda miss being on a boat (ah fond memories of taking RumRunner out under the moonlight). But Wolfie, you say, this is a class and it won't be at night. One step towards getting a certificate I say. Don't bring the mood down. I'm feeling quite brave and bold, stepping out of my element like this. Notice how I could have taken stroke improvement (not that kind of stroke you perv) but I didn't. All in the spirit of stepping out you see. Of my element that is. Although, since I'm pretty much shaped like a buoy these days, one could argue the water IS my element. All in all, I'm feeling rather pipped about my decision. Albert Pinto has already made a joke about me in regattas but I shall ignore that and blithely march on into unchartered waters. Look out Charles River, here I come! I'm all atingle with excitement.

I might even get out of bed today!

I wish I got presents

Don't you miss getting presents? I do. Big boxes wrapped in nice shiny paper. I like the solid shiny colors. Like silver and golden and metallic blue. The printed ones are nice too but the solid ones are better. Or I guess if you mix and match, they'd both look good. But only if there were lots of them. Sitting nicely in a pile waiting to be opened. Preferably by me. With big bows on them. Big bows with the nice small curly ends. I like that. I'm going to make it mandatory for people to give me presents on my birthday. I like American holidays better than desi ones. More presents. How come we don't have presents for Diwali or something. I feel jipped.

Won't you send me a present? Go to Amazon and buy me something and get it gift wrapped. Make it speedy delivery so I get it this weekend. Pretty please?

I've finished my paper

And it's brilliant! BRILLIANT! The key, Jimmy, is to shut it down and put it away and get to bed and sleep for 7 hours and then wake up at the crack of freakin' dawn and be amazed as you write it all in 36 minutes. An additional 10 to proof-read, save, print, bang, slap, Bob's yer uncle. It's brilliant I tell you. I'm going to get an A and get a fabulous job and make lots of money and rule the world! Hah!

The Angel Gabriel, I'll have you infidels know, is not dead. So there!

I need a muse

I have a strategy and business analysis paper due tomorrow and I'm stuck for inspiration and my lips are burning because it's 1800 degrees below freezing and I have no chapstick. I had two you know. The Glaceau ones. Those were so good. I gave one to Black Cobra. She stole the other one. Loser. Now she's lost them and I can't find a single place that sells the damn things and my lips hurt. I've been staring at this damn blank screen for hours now and I can't come up with anything compelling to say on my paper.

Arrrgh!

High class spam

Here's some of the better spam emails I've received. It's put me all in a tizzy. It's from Urvakhsha Hermsen which in itself is mind-blowing.

We followed the thing to a smoking pit with a jumble of crumpled reliability. Do I assume that you will cooperate? At the minimum you He unclipped his phone from his belt, shouted a multi-digit number There are seconds that sometimes ;appear to stretch for a length of Save the discussion. Explanations will be useful after we make sure Its not a matter of liking or not liking it, she said reading my deadline? Now-please. Dont ask me any questions. Hell know what you We quickly worked out a routine. We would land and he would be away. contact with her, Madonette was now completely alone. I kept telling hers. It has just been so long since we discussed these things.

I mean to say, don't you want to know what was the multi-digit number?! I need explanations! Wot if the deadline passes?! Poor Madonette, will she be alright?

It's been so long since we discussed these things.

I'd like a camel please

Check this out. Oxfam America has this wonderful program where you can buy gifts for people and the cash goes into the general charity pot. I believe if you buy from Oxfam England, the actual gifts go to the recipients. But, as Meg puts it, we can't send cows to everyone.

You can also send a can of worms, a hygiene kit, plant 50 trees, irrigate a farmer's land for 4 months, sheep, or build a shelter. There are lots of other great things you can give so check out your local Oxfam website.

Ok, I just did something REALLY scary

On Elm St. between High and College. By the New Haven Green.
Ocean Ave. overlooking some sort of forest.
Off of Technology Drive across the street from a parking lot.
On Wood View Drive.
Middlebury Lane.

Know wot these are? Your location. I now know where you're reading me from. This is not good. Not good at all. Imagine the power. I don't want this power. No, no. Not good.

Ok, don't panic. I can't see the actual address. Calm down. Wolfe's a good 'un. She won't track you down and rob you in a dark alley. She's nice that way.

I had an interview today

It was awful. I can't stop mumbling. Maybe I need diction lessons. But I've interviewed millions of times. Ok, maybe not millions but plenty enough. They asked me about the one year gap in my resume. I told them a personal family problem made me take a year off work. They looked at me questioningly. I couldn't tell them any more. I said it was a private issue. Then I looked away. I couldn't look at them anymore. I steadily focused on the plastic plant in the room. They moved on to the next question. There were three of them. The short agressive Indian woman intimidated me. I interview so much better with white guys. I can make the prejudice work for me. Brown black and pink guys too. And most women. But not Indian women. They're scary man. They wanted to know why I wanted to work for them. I told them. They didn't get it. I asked them why they wanted to hire me. They couldn't say. They gave me the marketing pitch. If they believe it, they think I will. I won't. It's all so confusing. I'm confused. It's so hard to spin a story around 4 paragraphs. Why? It's my life. I know it inside out. I know more about it than anyone else. Why is it so hard to tell someone about it? I know wot I want. Do I know wot I want? Maybe I don't know wot I want. Dammit, will I ever get the job I want? I hate self-doubt. It's a killer. My Achillies heel. Fear is the killer. Must not fear.

I can't stop trembling. I have the shakes. Like some ex-Club Med junkie. I can't stop. Emily's interview was terrible too. She couldn't divide 10.something by 10.something else. It was awful. Maybe it's a bad day for interviews.

I don't even want this job that bad. I wish I had someone to talk to. You're all at work. Nobody will answer my calls. I really do need someone to talk to. I should get me a therapist. Or maybe a Captain Awesome (and the Wonder Friends) t-shirt to wear inside my maroon suit.

Post post note: I'm in my Systems class and have been talking about GRASP patterns and I'm feeling a lot better for wallowing in my geekiness. Thank you, very nice bald-headed wrestler-type professor. You have very nifty ballet moves.

You will also be pleased to know that my white winter jacket has been returned by drycleaners in spotless condition. Yay Izzy (for women)!

"The cold metal, like a cold heart, does not come in contact with any balls" - Hunter S. Walsh

I have just written 4 nifty macros in TextPad. I'm feeling very pleased with myself.

I rock.

They will take care of it won't they? I mean to say, it IS white.

Ding-ding went the annoying over-the-door chime as I opened the door and slid in.
"Hello", said I.
"Hello yes", said little Chinese woman.
"Do you dryclean?", ask I.
"Enh?" spits little Chinese woman.
"Do you dryclean?", I persist in my pursuit of knowledge.
"Yes, we dryclean shop", affirms little Chinese woman.
"Fair enough, I'm convinced. I need this white jacket drycleaned", I say, courageouly pushing the lovely white winter coat across the counter, heart on sleeve.
"Yes, ok, we dryclean for you", the little Chinese woman grabs the article in question greedily.
"Splendid. You see these stains on the cuffs? Can you remove them?", I venture bravely.
"I not sure. Maybe. Sometime it no come out", says little Chinese woman, trodding painfully on my exposed heart.
"Alright, but can you make sure you pay extra attention to the cuffs?", I beg silently with my dark limpid eyes.
"Maybe. Maybe not." She's rather definite about her stance on the cuff issue.
"Oook. What about the inside? Can you clean the inside of the jacket as well?", say I, standing a clear foot and a half over her, making the distinction between me as customer and she as service provider distinctly felt.
"You want inside? Dry clean only outside", says her of little Chinese origins, very cautiously.
"Yes, I'm aware of that dry clean is only outside. But can you dryclean the inside as well?", persist I. I'm relentless today.
"We clean outside one time. Outside only. One time." You know, in case there was confusion on the issue.
"Yes, well, after you've cleaned it outside one time, you could, turn it inside out and clean it again. Couldn't you?", say I, ever logical.
"You want clean outside one time and then two time?", says she, not understanding the complicated techincality of my request.
"Yes, clean outside one time and then inside two time. Can you do that?" No need to lose my cool. Alls I have to do is speak her language. Soon she'll come around. Nobody can be that unfeeling.
"No no, we only clean one time", she says, unfeelingly.
"Alright, will the one time cleaning take care of the inside?" Perhaps I've been going about this all wrong.
"We dryclean only."
"Nevermind."
Ding-ding went the annoying over-the-door chime as I stormed out of the door.

It's not so bad in here

Happy Thanksgiving all. Lots to be thankful for. Mum, Dad, Black Cobra, friends, Resh, Pooky, Vegas, Walshy, cozy home, furniture, food, money, limbs, clothes, hair, laptop, the Internet, flowers, two-minute noodles, Niku, frozen vegetables, instant hot chocolate, microwave popcorn, the big blue bus, fuzzy warm slippers, MSN, large bedrooms, hardwood floors, big closets, warm winter coats, snappy interview suits, candles, incense, Victoria's Secret, Em, television, movies, bedside lamps, windchimes, toilet paper, mobile phones, satin sheets, big beds and fireplaces. To name a few. You know, I'd be more miserable without these. So I'm thankful for them.

Wot are you thankful for?

It's going to be alright

Took off early yesterday. Couldn't sit through classes. Don't think I can today either. Called in sick. I need a break. This is taking over my life. Yes, I know this is my life but this is not me. I used to be better at this. They've broken me down and made me reconstruct. Or maybe I did that to myself. Baptism by fire. Only I think I didn't make it through unscathed. Bit singed at the edges if you ask me. All the pieces don't quite fit together like they used to. It was meant to be better but now it's gotten worse. Much worse. I'm like a demon. Only not evil. Wot does that make me? Maybe when I go on vacation I'll deflate. But no, I'm going home for my vacation. It'll be very inflating. Well, maybe when I come back I'll deflate. Walked round and round my room telling myself that it'll be alright. Don't panic. It'll all be alright. That's when it hit me. I'm having a panic attack. I hyperventilated into my closet and sat with my shoes, telling them not to worry, I'd take care of them. I'll take care of everything. I can't. I lied. I lied to the boots and to the pumps. It's ok to fail. It's not my responsibility to make sure everything is perfect. Perfection is not required. Just get the job done. Try and have fun. But you're not having fun are you? You've haven't had an ounce of fun since you got here. Since you started this escapade. Stop it. Don't start panicking again. It's not that bad. It'll fix itself. It has to. The alternative is not an option. I'm not going to lose my mind. It's the only thing I've got left. Everything's going to be alright.

Yes, I'm better today

I'm not quite as morose. Things are a little bit better. More calm. I'm afraid it's all going to blow up in my face again but other than that, I'm alright.

Although, in unrelated news, I do think I'm coming down with the flu.

Thank you, Resh.

It's all going to be alright

Numb. Like being underwater. Everything moves in slow motion underwater. People speak in bubbles and you think you should understand wot they're saying because it's in English and you... well you speak it.. but you don't. Sometimes your eyes swell up so much they won't open. And your face feels like a puffed cheese ball. Went for a long walk. Went to a few places before decided on the Union. Strangely enough, he walked in a minute after. Just coming from his long walk. We sat there and laughed for a while. The situation was so sad it was almost ridiculous. I suppose this is life's way of saying don't cry, it'll be alright.

Ah the joys of public transportation

Don't you just hate it when you have to sit through an entire train ride with an old man sitting across from you trying not to stare at your face. You know he's looking and he gives you sympathetic smiles because he's thinking to himself if I could only speak to her, if social norms didn't prohibit talking to strangers on the train, I'd tell her that it gets better. That it's not the end. That there is light at the end of the tunnel. And the young hip chick with her fake Prada bag and torn stockings sucking on the tonsils of her greasy goth boyfriend looks at your oversized sweater and puffy eyes and unkempt hair and knows you're listening to the blues with a one way ticket to heartbreak hotel. I'm better than you, she's thinking. I have a man. Watch me investigate the innards of his throat.

Mouton Cadet Bordeaux, 2000

Sometimes life is a waste of a Saturday night with nothing better to do than sit at your desk champagne glass in hand dressed to the nines playing Checkers online while your mascara runs down your face waiting for the phone to ring. Have you ever felt so pathetic that you wanted to leave? Just leave. Walk out the door and never return. Start anew elsewhere. And the only thing that stops you from doing that is the knowledge that this could happen again. What if it happens again? Then where will I be? Weeping my eyes out again, that's where. Reduced to a pile of sodden tissues. Why do I let them do this to me?

I think I'll get completely plastered now, thank you.

Casino Royale - 8 thumbs up

Played hooky today and went to see Casino Royale with James, Bryan Adams and Pey. Very good movie. Highly recommended. Daniel Craig is gorgeous. He has the thighs of a god. The stunts are frickin' awesome. The one-liners are brilliant. That movie is so good, I'd buy it.

The happy bits in the movie (don't worry, I won't ruin it for you) were about 20 minutes longer than they should have been but can I just say, the scenes with Craig and Eva Green (the shower scene and the drowning scene) made me absolutely ache inside. No, really, they did. Daniel Craig is actually a very good actor. He does sometimes look like his face is stuck in a perpetual moue but there's something about him that makes his acting compelling. I can't quite pin it down. I think it's the eyes. They're very reflective. Perhaps it's the fact that he doesn't smile much and then when he does, it's so beautifully eye-poppingly spontaneous that you believe it's real.

The clothes in that movie are lovely. It made me fell like such a frump in my jeans. Craig's wardrobe person deserves an award or something. The music was mediocre. It did the job. The opening number for previous Bond movies have been so strong, this one just seemed lacking. The locations were snappy. The casting for the bad guys was very good. The nakedness was... well, not enough. Eva Green's makeup (and accent) was atrocious. The fight scenes are very nicely directed. The website is fairly annoying. Every click seems to open a new window. Which is daft. If you're going to first launch a new browser window to a Flash website then why do your links launch further browsers for HTML content? Daft. Also saw the trailer for the new Spiderman movie. Dude! I think I had a mini orgasm. Well then Daniel Craig came on screen and I had about 18 more.

I shall see it again soon.

Went to eat at that Turkish place with Pey after and reminisced about the good old days when there was a diner in every neighborhood. Decided to form a 'Bring back the Diner' action group but then decided that we were too lazy. Went to the grocery store after to get cake because Pey wanted dessert. He then proceeded to make suggestives moves on a box of unsuspecting mini carrot cakes while I ogled the shinyness of the chocolate cream rolls. We ended up getting a bundt cake and Propel water.

Was s'posed to go to Avalon to see Cedric Gervais play with the Eastern Bloc but didn't get much sleep last night (thanks to Random Lifer) (btw, I'm sorry I fell asleep in the middle of a conversation - it was rather odd that you were still there 2 hours later) so decided not to.

Watching Jeopardy, the college edition. There's this wicked smart desi guy on from I don't know where but Pico from Stanford makes me wanna take cold showers. Dude, I don't know if you've seen this show but they guys know a helluva lot.

I shall now finally watch Munich.

I hate the word 'diaspora'

I'm particularly tired of it being used in the context of the Indian subcontinent. Yes, Indians move out of India. They've been doing it for more than a century now. Get used to it. It's hardly diasporic now. People have settled down. Grown new roots. Some of us don't live in India anymore. About time people got used to it. And why the hell do people keep emailing me articles about the damn Indian diaspora?! I bet you they've keyword tagged it in Google or something and trigger email me anytime there's an article written on the subject. I know the diaspora. I'm part of it. Leave me alone.

In other news,

Soaring rents in Dubai have led to accommodation being offered in exchange for sex, according to a report by Gulf News. It found that adverts were targeting young, single European women with the promise of lower rents in return for favours. Rents in some areas have increased by 50% in the last twelve months.

as reported by AME.

Can't get out of bed

So tired. No sleep. Right hip hurts. It's going to rain today. Have class at 11. Can't get out of bed. Yawn. S t r e t c h.

Feel like something fun this weekend. Black Cobra wants to go to D.C. or Connecticut. I think I want to go to Maine. Or maybe we'll just potter around Boston. Any suggestions on wot to do this cloudy, rainy, cold weekend?

Angoor

"Bahadur, jabh maine tujhe kaha tha ke kamre se bahar mat nikalna, to tu zabzi mandi kyon gaya tha?!"

"Mooli lene"

"Mooli kyon lene gaya tha?!"

"Aap ne hi to kaha tha, ke shaam ko mooli ke parathe khane hain."

"Mooli ke... MOOLI KE PARATHE?!"

Kis kadar yeh haseen yeh khayaal mila hai.. rah mein ek reshmi rumaal mila hai..

I love my bed.

I like leaping out of it in the morning, ready to check my email, read my news, turn on the tele, look up the weather, do my Sudoku, wash my hair, wear red plaid skirts with long black blouses tall red boots homemade glass bead earrings and long black coats, put my funky dj headphones on and head out to life. I like walking briskly over city sidewalks littered with Fall leaves. Sitting in the train looking out the window thinking over last night's dreams of killer fava beans and email lists. I don't like boring classes full of techno-speak and arguing with bald wrestler-type professors over syntax and convention. I like walking with my friends to UBurger for lunch and laughing the entire way. I like it when the chap behind the counter yells out "Hot Chick!" when my order is up. I don't like sitting through an hour and a half of income tax preparation but I do enjoy reading an annual report to "look for the sleaze in the company". I like running from one meeting to another being productive and important and loud with my tall red boots resounding on the tiled floor. I do enjoy evaluating media campaigns and coming up with them. I like the Dew Dudes. I used to like Fido Dido too. I like walking briskly in the windy wind with my skirt lapping at my calves. I like egg rolls immensely. I don't like the spaghetti in my head. I like coming home to a clean room and feeling glad about being single so no one can ruin the serene calmness of my space. I like it when the girls take the trash out so I don't have to walk back down two flights of stairs and back up again. I like my crisp sheets and the smell of incense filling up my sleepy nostrils. I like how you keep coming back to my blog. First thing in the morning, twice again during the day and then when you're home from work. And then you come back again later in the evening. But you don't spend much time on it. Almost as if you're disappointed at the content. Not good enough you're saying to yourself. Random news articles again. Some mundane shit. But nothing I can really sink my teeth into. Oh yes, I can hear you. Your clicks say a lot to me. I can read clicks, I can. If I could expostulate (if expostulate is the word I want) this talent into reading tea leaves perhaps I could make five bucks from every passerby who wants her fortune read. No wait. I don't have any purple skirts or silver jewellery. I do like making my own jewellery. I like lying here in bed anticipating sleep. Stretching my legs out and owning the double feng shueiness of my mattress. I like the excitement of loading my Gmail looking for email from you. I don't like being disappointed when I find there is none. Sometimes I wonder about you. I don't like looking in the mirror and finding out that somehow age and all those bad food choices have caught up with me. I try not to look in the mirror. It's not a pretty sight. There's a strange non-pimple bump on my cleavage. Or is that in my cleavage? It won't go away. Mars the landscape so to speak. I like my white wispy curtains. I should watch Munich and return it to the good folks at Netflix so they can pass it on to some other deserving poor. I like my wind chimes hanging by my bed. Sometimes when I wake up in the middle of the night to go pee I tinkle them before I go back to sleep. I like how when I get home and let my hair down it curls softly at my neck. I like combing them through. I don't like lying in bed waiting for sleep. Tossing and turning and not finding it. I don't like the loneliness that inevitably accompanies insomnia. I don't like getting out of bed at 3 am to read a case that I don't understand because my mind is tired but my body won't cooperate. Or sometimes it's the other way around.

But I do love my bed.

Dinner

Who's up for Bertucci's tonight? Email me.

"Don't be a waiter. Be a chef." - David Lubars

Lubars popped down to his alma today to speak at Conversations with Comm. The room was packed with Comm. undergrads (mostly girls), all blonde, pig-tailed and Ugg-booted toting Macs and looking seriously creative. It was fun. I love it when creative types give presentations. The slides are much more interesting. I think I'm going to adopt that format for my next presentation. Cream background with black typewriter type, one sentence a slide. Lubars actually plugged Phil Dusenberry's book 'Then we set his hair on fire' (which I highly recommend, btw). very enjoyable.

I'm listening to Alanis Morisette. Only she's not screaming angrily about her tofu turning or having affairs with married men or pimple angst or wotever it is that she usually sings about. This is almost akin to pop. Or is it rock? I can't tell. I'm just in shock of hearing Morizette's voice not screaming maniacally about spoons and other assorted cutlery. Most of it is pretty bad. This one song isn't so bad. Now is the time is the album. Has a certain Flashdance-like element to it. Very 80s.

Saw Borat the other day. Please don't waste your $10 on it. It's a perfectly useless movie.

I've lost all respect for Anand Jon

I used to think he was hip and happening especially after meeting him at HBS's SABA. Now I just think he's a moron. I mean, I get that Paris Hilton draws crowds which is good if you're trying to sell clothes that don't usually sell but this is beyond moronic.

Hotel heiress Paris Hilton is to model for an upmarket American fashion line in India next year despite her music video being banned in the country for being too explicit, a newspaper report said on Monday.

The 25-year-old heiress to the Hilton hotel fortune will shoot for her friend, Anand Jon, an American fashion designer of Indian descent who is introducing a line of high-end evening wear for India's stylish elite.

"Paris is a very close friend of mine. We have known each other for a long time now. So, when I told her about this visit, she was pretty excited," the Times of India quoted Jon as saying.

"For her, India is the land of exotica and beauty. In fact, her response was: 'I finally get to visit the exotic'. She loves Indian culture and the Indian influence on clothes," he said.

As usual Adrants gets it bang on.

Paris Hilton Tapped as Ambassador to India
Well no, not really, unless you think vacuous infamy exerts the same social influence as political diplomacy.

*long pause*

She's actually going to appear in an Indian campaign to introduce a new fashion line from Anand Jon, an American fashion designer of Indian descent. Moving on, AdJab points out Hilton's music video was recently banned from Indian airwaves but her sex tape is still widely available for under $2. AdJab adds "I'm not sure what's more embarrassing, having your sex video available to the public or the fact that it costs less than a king size Snicker's bar."

Provocative point. We're sure it won't hurt her modeling career. It might even help. Don't models do dumb shit all the time? - Contributed by Angela Natividad

How does this work?

As part of its partnership with the Susan G Koman Breast Canver Foundation, Ford has teamed with the organization's Race For The Cure Virtual Quilt project which allows people to create their own message on the quilt. JWT Detroit along with interactive firm Firstborn created the project to coincide with this month's Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

Explain this to me. How does this aid the Breast Cancer cause? I mean, awareness is all well and good but at some point isn't the aim to get money into these foundations that work on research to solve these medical problems? All gimmicks I think. Publicity stunt. How come people don't catch on to this?

I want this

Sonos is the first wireless, multi-room digital music system that lets you play digital music all over your house—and control it all from the palm of your hand. With a wireless Sonos® Controller in hand, you'll have plug-and-play access to millions of songs—from music services, Internet radio, your personal digital music collection, or all of the above.

And, with Sonos® ZonePlayers in the rooms of your choice, you can play the same song in different rooms, or different songs in different rooms. To start listening, just grab the full-color Controller and simply pick a room, pick a song and hit play.

Buy it for me.

I got a 68 on my Systems midterm

I. Me. ME!!! I got a 68 on my Systems midterm! How is this even possible?! This is not possible!

I'm going to go yell at my professor now.

Ok, who rang me at 4:45 am?

Didn't leave a message. Woke me up. Blank caller ID.

Thank you for waking me. I overslept my alarm.

Interview was alright. Good questions were asked. Good answers were given (if I do say so). Now we shall see.

Walked into my DB mgmt class 10 minutes late and was rendered confused by strange Chinese man talking about something that seemed important. He had code up on the screen and was making boxes on the blackboard. I didn't understand a word he said for the next 40 minutes. It disturbed me greatly. Then he suddenly stopped talking and said something (which I suppose was a joke) and then he laughed. To pin-drop silence. Then he stood there and stared at us for about 20 minutes. I felt his pain. I would have offered to help him through it but I was afraid he would talk to me and I wouldn't understand him. He was smiling so I suppose he wasn't too uncomfortable. Smiling at some private joke about ASP.NET in his head. Very strange.

If you're a professor, here's a tip, make sure the server is up before you send a TA to teach your class. The poor chap can't do much once he's actually in class.

I'm wearing my grey suit with the pink striped shirt and I KNOW Kunal will wear the same thing. I must message him and tell him not to. We'll be the desi twins that applied for the same job wearing the same clothes. Maybe the interviewer will think I'm back only this time as a man. You know, double my chances of getting the job. Very disturbing.

I shall now read for my 2 pm.

Tums don't work. I use Zantac.

Blogger's gone to Google. Very nifty. Spent 3 hours on the IMC marketing campaign. Clark Kent, while easy on the eyes, is perfectly useless. Tired. Watching that show on the tele with the investigators. Not CSI. The other one. That Hispanic woman is hot. Ugly man was sneakily drugged with scotch. Need dinner. Hungry. Too tired to make dinner. Should order in. Alls I wants is to go to bed.

Went to HBS's Cyberposium yesterday. Should've gone to the Marketing one today but was too tired. Apparently free stuff was being thrown around during Victoria's Secret commercials. Have applied for job at Cirque du Soleil. Drat, have interview tomorrow. Must iron pin-striped suit.

Want to go to Paris. And Sikkim.

Sushi would be nice right about now. Don't suppose one of you lurvelys want to show up with lots of maki?

Wotever happened to Doogie Howser, M.D?

I have a 50 page article to read for tomorrow. Identity theft did not lead to fraud, btw. All one big misunderstanding.

So does this mean you've bookmarked me now?

Now if I only knew who you are. I don't know anyone in New Haven, CT. Do I?

Found me through Tamiami, didn't you? Had a lot of time on Wednesday last to read nearly a year's worth of blog posts. Forgot me on Saturday last and had to search but found me alright on Monday. Did you enjoy the blog? You know it's rude - you know all about me but I don't know about you. That's wot the comments are for, you know. And I promise, I won't use the fact that you use a Mac against you. Well, maybe, ok, just a little bit.

Come out come out whoever you are. Can't hide behind Comcast forever.

Ok, that sounded creepy.

On a side note, I am now officially a victim of identity fraud. Details to come.

MSIS, MBA-Marketing, Strategy and Business Analysis

That is going to be my official dual degree. Hah bloody hah! I got all the classes I want for next term and lovely lovely SBA department has approved an elective switch. So in summary, I will be taking -
1. Mastering IT Strategy, Management and Delivery
2. Project Management (yes, I know I don't need this one but it was either this or Technology Tools for e-Business)
3. Competitive Decision Making
4. Global Strategic Marketing
5. Product and Brand Management
6. Managing Technology, Country, Political and Environment Risk

That makes 6 classes. And then there's the Mobile Marketing project and the job with the biometrics company plus the fact that I will prolly be looking for a full-time PAYING job as well. You think I'm stressed now, wait till next term.

Booyah! I get two concentrations! Yahoo!

Oh, and I have an interview with a consulting firm on Monday. No, I won't say which.

I should wear warmer socks

The good thing about Election Day is that there won't be anymore crappy political ads on the tele anymore. Man, those things are annoying.

Yesterday my neck, back and shoulders hurt so much that when I got into bed I thanked the Good Lord out loud that I had the Sears' Feng Shui mattress. Promptly fell asleep and didn't wake until 8 hours had passed. I had a dirty dream about a tall chap who left me an origami heart on my pillow in the morning. Sadly, when I woke, there wasn't one. But all the pain was gone. Lovely, lurrrvely.

Today has been another harried day. I'm in my IMC class now. She's wearing a large purple tent. The Communist isn't in class today. Did I mention there's a Russian Communist girl in my IMC class who just won't shut up. It's amazing. There must be nothing she has no opinion on. To her credit, she does know a lot of things.

My neck, back and shoulders hurt again. I'm looking forward to going to bed. Tall origami man would be a bonus.

Can I just say that I don't get all these people harping on and on about how the Mac OS is better than the Windows OS. I don't see the Mac OS running half the programs I couldn't do without, it's slow, clunky, hard to recover when it freezes up, has poor memory allocation. I mean it has its uses for the creative types but isn't necessarily a better OS. I'm also particularly tired of advertising types going on and on about this. Dude, it's not like you're going to convert me. I like my Windows. I'm not going to switch. Deal with it.

One of the Taiwanese kids just asked if the Canadians feel inferior to Americans. Too funny. I must add that we're doing the Molson Canadian - The Rant case. The professor sitting fatly in her purple tent replied, "I don't know what sort of issues are going on up there. Canada may just need a good shrink."

Also, I don't know if you know this, but I'm addicted to Gatorade. I eat breakfast and dinner and in between I suck down the 'ade like there's no tomorrow. Like it's going out of style. Like we're all going to die and this stuff is the only thing that will save us. Which, you know, may very well be the case.

I speak on my phone for an average of 1,697 minutes per month. That's about an hour a day. And I'm paying close to $100 a month for this. That's 5 cents a minute. Is that good?

I have only 2 gigs of hard disk space left

Because the rest of it is currently occupied storing over 1000 songs, most from Black Cobra's iPod and some from Kataria's iPod. I've been going over them one by one to debate if I want to keep them for my own listening pleasure. On my iRiver. Yes, that's right, I have a non-iPod mp3 device. Why? Because iPods suck. They're big and ugly and break when you drop them. This one I've flung across the room many a time (mostly when I get home from another tiring day at MBAWorld and explode out of my clothes). There are songs in here that you would kill to have. Like 'main se meena se na saaqi se' and 'baat hai yeh mamoolie, joooolieeee, i love ju'. No, seriously man, Black Cobra, you need to really upgrade your taste in music.

I have reloaded trustly iRiver with MC Solaar and Afro Celt.

So I've been on this couch all day, in my pink jammies and fuzzy slippers, working on papers. Dre and Megan are not in and the place is dead silent. I was talking to myself earlier just to test my hearing. It's getting a little boring.

So like, I have this large complicated intense paper to write for my Strategy class and I'm so stuck for inspiration. Think I'll play a game until 6. Damn procrastination.

I want to go to the Boston Bhangra thing. If I could only find someone to go with.

Niku is in India buying up Nainital candles like they're going out of style. Wot are the chances I'll actually get some?

Say, Niku! Wanna go with me to the Boston Bhangra thing?!

Boys suck.

And that's all I have to say on the subject.

The heat is on!

Lisa, my little Chinese landlord, has finally gassed up the furnace and the heat is on. The radiators are clickity-clanking. Joy. I shall be cold no more.

Moving on.

Did you know that you can get postage stamps with your bootha on them? You can. Here.

Apparently b-school students are more likely to cheat than any other kind of student. Which, I can understand. GPAs may not matter in some professions but you can't be an i-banker with a 2.7.

Oh and yeah, you did read the BusinessWeek article about how Indians are the model immigrants? Hilarious. True but hilarious.

Apparently "the level of water consumption in the UAE is one of the highest in the world. According to statistics from Middle East Electricity 2006, the UAE consumes more water per capita than any country in the world with the exception of the US and Canada." Can't say I'm surprised. Plus we waste a lot too.

Ads from India

Are very funny.

Also, Wild Wadi uses RFID tags in their water park. Tres cool.

This next link is not work friendly. It's about Remington's Pussy Parade at Kontraband. Don't even dream about clicking on it at work. No, don't. I know you're consumed with curiosity but trust me, you'll be in deep deep trouble if you do. So go home and then click on it. It's ... well.. it's strange.

Now here's a good article

Stephen Corley does a good job of asking the questions we are all wondering about but don't dare to voice. Read it at ITP - The Costa Del Chaos: Dubai's Growing Pains.

This picture is of the Lighthouse building that's mentioned in the article. Here are the details about the scam.

Speaking of scams, isn't it interesting that "a US embassy that will be the largest in the world" is being built in Iraq? No really, why is this happening? Don't they see what's going on?

It's alive!

Wolfie! You're back! You're blogging! Has hell frozen over?

Shut up. I've been busy. But I never did forget about you chickie-poos.

Sitting at Starbucks quite warm and cosy (but my feet are still cold) on this gloomy rainy day and I figured I may as well attend to the 95 emails in my inbox. Yes, 95. In the inbox, that's right. That means they haven't been read. Because, you know, I read them first and then I file them away. This way it creates a sense of urgency in me to read my email. Which, as the 95 lonely unattended items will attest to, doesn't happen very often. Stop gasping in horror. Oh yes, I know you are. Imagine the travesty, you're saying to yourselves. She doesn't read her email everyday. Nope, I don't. Deal with it. There's more to life than email. Thank you Mr. de Veer.

So back to business shall we?

P.S. What the hell is this Fusion Band business all about? Crap mostly, if you ask me. When will people realize that just by playing Da-rude-boy in the background of their tinny voices whining about their women leaving them or rain or something trivial of that sort does not qualify them to be a fusion band.

Consumer-generated content

Ok, will someone please explain this to me? Why is consumer-generate content so hot these days? Consumers are, mostly, morons. This we all know. This is why we have marketers and psychologists. It is for this exact reason that those two professions (among many others like the person who's job it is to write directions on toothpick boxes) exist. So then why, suddenly and for no apparent reason, are we all going ga-ga over content created by these very same idiots? Adrants expresses my concern about this topic brilliantly -

With nothing better to do on a Saturday afternoon, we decided to follow a link under a really crappy Jeep spoof commercial on YouTube to morbeck's Biggest Video Response Chain Ever thing. We sometimes lead a very sheltered and quarantined life here in the Adrants high rise because, well, we're just too busy finding trivial advertisms and time wasters for you to enjoy so, we end up spending 24/7 trolling the Internet for crap like this that makes you wonder why the human race has nothing better to do that act like an idiot in front of a webcam. Oh wait. Sorry, I mean join the social ecocosm, and pump out paradigm-shifting consumer-generated media which, according to A-list bloggers, is transforming the world and causing marketers to drool uncontrollably like a male ad slut watching a Flirt Vodka ad.

Anyway, this guy who's a girl who's a guy who's a girl or whatever started this Biggest Video Response Chain Ever (who also did a Hottest of Youtube 2006 Contest) and it seems thousands of people with no life...uh...people who are adopting the new social methods of communication have responded from cute college girls to a girl pretending to be Christina Aguilera in her car, a girl who wrote a song about why she won't show her boobs on YouTube to a rabbit who plays with a stuffed animal to this dude who eats breakfast while adding his bit to the Chain to this pointless waste of 35 seconds.

Fuck. We want our Saturday afternoon back. Oh, and confirming the human race is surely destined to destroy itself and has no right calling itself a superior race, we find this despicable display of idiotic schoolyard behavior and rabid fan support for it.

Fuck 'em all I say. Show me one single piece of consumer-generated "content" and I will show you people who don't have anything better to do with their time being watched by people who are too stupid to know any better. Next wave of advertising my ass.

The Hyundai robots

Check out the very cool spot with advanced CGI for the new Hyundai Santa Fe. I believe The Richards Group made it.

I had a small nervous breakdown yesterday

Which involved me bursting into tears at periodic intervals in public surroundings. I will not blog about it so don't ask me to. I just thought you might want to know that it would be a good idea to pussyfoot around Wolfe for a few days. She's a little fragile.

Help me.

Monopoly goes mainstream

If Monopoly constitutes a reflection of contemporary U.S. culture, here's the world we now live in. Most of the game's famous tokens are reemerging as branded products. They include a Toyota Prius (TM), a New Balance sneaker, McDonald's (MCD) French Fries, a Motorola (MOT) RAZR, and a Starbucks (SBUX) coffee mug. The three nonbranded tokens are a laptop computer, an airplane, and a Labradoodle.

Full article here.

I meant to blog last night...

... but I fell asleep waiting for my snooze to alarm. You see, I had Marketing Research last night and this post-grad doctoral student of suspicious origin (either German or Cambodian, I couldn't really tell) was droning on and on about one-way ANOVAs and Tamhane's T2 and estimated means of scores. Deep down inside, I'm sure all she wants is to be loved but I still maintain that taking it out on us with regression analysis was not the way to endear herself to the masses. So I staggered back home and worked on my Database Management project and then I read for my IMC class and then I turned off the light and I couldn't sleep so then I switched it back on and read about ODBmesses and then my alarm went off at 6 am and then I thought I'd just lie down for a minute or three and next thing you know, it's 7:32 and I'm going to be late for my 8 am.

It's been a long day. Mondays and Tuesdays are long days. I'm in IMC now. I'm supposed to be paying attention but it's hard to do. Don't get me wrong, profitability reflections of promos are very interesting but I've read the damn articles and this isn't adding any value.

Had the first meeting of the BU Energe club. The distribution of solar energy panels for luxury homes project is on hold because I have no time for it right now but I still try and work on it sneakily on the side.

The prof. just said something about fatness of margins. It sounded key. I should listen.

Feeling.

Lonely today.

Do they have nanobots to scurry around and remove germs inside you?

In a cluttered laboratory on the outskirts of Paris, Gustavo Luengo peers at a human skin cell under a microscope so powerful that he can view individual atoms and poke at them with a remote-controlled probe.

The beauty products business as a whole is making a big bet on nanotech. L'Oréal, which devotes about $600 million of its annual $17 billion revenues to research, is the industry leader on nanopatents. But rivals such as Procter & Gamble, Estée Lauder (EL ) of the U.S., Christian Dior of France, and Japan's Shiseido (SSDOY ) also incorporate nanoparticles into their products.

Full article here.

You know I love you

I have tonsilitis again. Sucks.

Here's this term's schedule. Not very busy you say at first glance. But let me show you.



So if we take an average day to be from 7 am to 10 pm we have approx 50 hours of work time available for 6 days of the week (hey, a girl needs her coffee breaks and power naps). The 7th day is reserved for me time. Removing 10 hours per week for the stupid internship (see post below) and 10 hours per week for the research project gives us 30 hours. For each class we need about 4 hours of preparation time and I have 6 classes. That leaves us with 6 hours of available time. Per week. To be in meetings with team members, read industry journals, attend information sessions, go to interviews and eat lunch.

Which is why I haven't been reading your blog. But I will. Soon. Someday. On that insomniac night when I don't want to learn how to value patents. I'll prop myself up in bed, in my pink pajamas with the tele tuned to the infomercial channel and I will read all about your life. But until then, give me my 6 hours. To be in meetings with team members, read industry journals, attend information sessions, go to interviews and most importantly, eat lunch.

I'm a guinea pig

So apparently for the MS-glorious-MBA I am required to work on a project for a company. For which I don't get paid. I provide MBA consulting services for free. With no benefit to me. They have no statistics on past classes if students wanted to work for these companies full time after graduation or if these companies wanted to hire these students. And I can't work anywhere else because this will take up all my time. I get this sneaky feeling that I'm being jipped.

And the professor, when I asked about this, basically told me to fok off. Nice.

Teatime

Nothing like dunking matris into nice hot sweet tea and watching those little bubbles fill up with tea and take a big bite and feel them explode hotly in your mouth.

Yum.

Greed makes me Google

Is it strange that I want to get on Oprah's Favorite Things show?

Wait, I am wiser

As I said to Mum this morning - we quite often tend to force our obsessiveness onto other people. Quite frankly, they couldn't care less and they won't do it our way anyway. And it just makes everyone unhappy. So we must try and not do that as much.

On an unrelated note, Em called to ask wot 'detergent' I use to clean the bathtub with. I freaked him out by suggesting that the same brush used for the pot (or commode as it is also popularly known) can be used for the bathtub if washed properly. He squealed in disgust. It was fun.

Does this qualify as potty humor?

Philosophically speaking, all financial assets are operating assets

Here's a tip - if you want a job done right, do it yourself.

Took Lionel (the moron) with me to photocopy 30 odd cases to make packs of 5. The simplest job ever. An autistic child of 5 could execute this mission flawlessly. But not Lionel (the moron), no. He proceed to mix up all the papers and then I have to cart it all back home and spend 5 hours sorting the mess. Loser.

And then people complain to me that their pages are all three-holed punched on the wrong side. Get a life people. Punch it your own damn self. You didn't have to spend 2 hours at Staples with Lionel (the moron) who decided that the instructions for putting in paper face up was merely a guideline and not a strict rule. Moron.

School's in. One week done. Had my first Strategy Implementation class with Hatten this last week. He asked us to come up with the 10 rules we live our (professsional) life by. It took some thinking but here are my ten -

1. Integrity is important. Always do what you say and honor your commitments. This builds trust with your team and helps them help you when you’ve dropped the ball.

2. Responsibility is key. The only person responsible for your actions is yourself. You must always own your work. Not doing so is not only detrimental to the project you’re working on but also on morale.

3. Act towards others as you would prefer them to act towards you.
Everybody is busy and has tons of emails to attend to. Make sure you give people the time and attention they deserve. Not doing so, not only leads to poor morale but also could make your team lose faith in your managing capabilities.

4. Always fully define the terms and expectancies of your engagements – both in professional and personal life. When working on a project with a number of people, make sure that everybody is aware of what the other team members are doing. Not doing so, will lead to a chaotic project and stressful work environment.

5. Don’t sign up for something just because everybody else is – be convinced that that is the right thing for you. When someone is trying to sell you something, if you don’t make objective decisions about whether that is good for the project, the team and/or the company, question it. This includes directives from upper management.

6. Always research as comprehensively as possible before you make a decision. Then rest assured that you have made the best decision you could under the circumstances and don’t stress about it. Due diligence is important and the devil does live in the details. However, after you’ve done your due diligence, have faith in your skills and abilities to be able to follow through on the decisions you make.

7. Trust in God but tie your camel. Or alternatively, it’s ok to fail once in a while, but don’t make a habit of it. Have faith in your team’s abilities to deliver but don’t leave it entirely up to them.

8. Be nice to your family and loved ones. They deserve better. Working hard is nice and has its rewards but always have time for your family. They are more important than a paycheck.

9. Work hard, party hard. Always take the time to remove yourself from the project. This will help you and your project when you return to the job.

10. Don’t be self-destructive. Given your personality, you probably will be. But try not to. While company loyalty is a good thing, try not to be so loyal that you lose sight of your personal development.

I don't really feel much wiser after penning that down. Maybe it'll all come to me over 12 weeks.

Mum's here for the week. Black Cobra came down too. We spent Saturday shopping. Got me some nice suits at Filene's Basement. That place is awesome.

Here's another tip - don't pump petrol into your car while the engine is running. This could cause air to get into the innards of your machine and that, apparently, is a bad thing. This was determined by Black Cobra after spending $89.99 on a check up because her 'check engine' light came on right before her return to NY.

Took Mum out today. Went to Daph's to drop off nicely sorted aforementioned case pack and then to lunch at Super 88 for a large bowl of Viet Pho's noodle soup and a coconut drink. The soup was nice. The drink was not. Then to Shaw's for some fruit and back home. She's napping now, all curled up in my blue blanket, looking small. I'm lying here on the couch, trying not to bore myself with my Database Management book. Later I shall to school for a MEC meeting. Ah, the life we lead.

So, wot did you do this glorious Sunday?

Quotable quotes

"Cirque du Soleil is like Broadway." This one made me shudder.

"I was reading about India. Apparently all the businesses are going global. And the overall small time businessmen are getting out or run over by big US companies. So I can see US making world more global and making most chunk of the profits in the next 10 years. Since you are the major B school student with current information - what's ur opinion?" - Actually Niku said that. I'll blog about my opinion right after class today.

"Does anyone have OnStar in this class? No wonder GM is going out of business."

"Culture is power that is invisible."

"The rule may be fundamental - the speed makes it chaotic."

Also, if Mum bugs me about putting my profile up on shaadi.com, I shall do this - "Prefers food to most social interactions. Preferred mate must be an out of work chef. I am intrigued by fish filleting. My skin is strangely inept these days. It can't seem to absorb the meanest amount of cream. Must be all that drinking. Does alcohol close up your pores?"

"India - where sublime wisdom and supreme idiocy exist at the same time."

"They should make ties with mesh pockets so you can carry around things in it. I mean its just hanging there not doing anything, you may as well put in a few post-its and a muffin." - I think a professor said that.

"The CPU is the one that does the stuff to the bits." - says my Systems Architecture professor.

"Philosophically, the patient owns their own data" - Mickey Tripathi

"What do you call a professional Cro-Magnon? A Pro-Magnon."

"Privacy is a risk. It needs to be addressed. I'm going to punt on that." - also, I think Mickey Tripathi.

"This isn't flying. This is falling. With style" – Buzz Lightyear

"Sometimes the problem is the interface" - same Systems professor

"I can clean my carrots" - says my Financial Statements Analysis professor.

"Making turkey in 20 minutes is not relevant to anyone’s lives" - from my Integrated Marketing Communication professor.

Chew on this. I have to go to class.

Strange Days

Did I tell you about Walshy's blog? He's got one. Check out the Strange Days of Hunter S. Walsh. Good writer. Brilliant wit. I'm glad I... sort of... know him. He used to listen to my drunken ravings over long-distance. Now THOSE were Strange Days.

He's also bloody goodlooking. But don't tell him I said that.

From the couch to the desk to the bed

These painkillers are making me nauseous. Maybe I should lie on the floor.

Get loaded on Thorazine and get on a NY subway train. Now there's a trip.

Hello darlings. Sorry I've been away. Life gets in the way sometimes. Let's go back in time then shall we?

So work at the Hive is done and I was very gleeful about it. It may be for good, unless I take them up on the Director-ship suggestion. It felt good leaving a job on my own terms for once without the smell of burning bridges haunting me. Black Cobra and Mum came up from NYC for a rainy weekend. Cobra and I spent a lovely 6 hours in Harvard Square soaking up the intellectualism and bought 8 (yes, eight) books. Because, you know, I'm going to have so much time to read them. Bumped into Khan and that woman from Ukraine or some other Eastern Bloc country who Cobra (bless her) instinctively dislikes because her underwear was showing. To be frank, I instinctively dislike those people too.

Off we went back to the Bronx. Spent almost a week there. Was tres boring. I did make three pairs of earrings and rest my feet and read 3 books but it was bloody boring. Oh, and I wrote my internship paper. They make you write an internship paper if you're an F1. 8-10 pages. Would've been helpful if I had started working on it during the internship but then again, if I did everything when I'm s'posed to do it then where would be the challenge?

Have signed up for yet another research project involving mobile marketing with Prof. Venkat at school. Looking forward to it as it is EXACTLY the sort of project I've been looking for. Should be fun. Also, Khan and I and two other chaps were thinking of getting a task force together to try and come up with a commercially viable business idea. I mean, if you're not going to start a company while you're in b-school then well, wot's the point?

That was last weekend. Then last week happened. And I twisted both my ankles. Not together at the same time, you understand. One after the other. First one and then the other. I place the blame squarely on those blasted Payless sandals. So I threw them out.

Then Khan and I had a fight. Well not exactly a fight. More like a dissatisfied howl at each other. I'd been getting strange vibes from him all week (which is odd by itself because I'm hardly the most sensitive-to-other-people's-vibes sort of person) and his aura was decidedly blue. So while we're out illegally photocopying course packs (wot?! You'd do it too if they cost $140 a pop and you had to get 6. Don't judge me. HBS has enough money.), we howl over it. It made me quite sick. I hate relationship issues. This is probably why I should never EVER be in one. We talked it over at Espresso Royale and decide that it'd be best if we parted ways (actually, he decided that, I didn't). So that's wot we did. I went to the clinic and he went to rent a U-Haul to help Shipra move.

No, I'm not sick. I just had to get my shots. MMR, Td and Hepatitis B Part I. Remind me in 4 weeks to go back for Part II. Hurt like the dickens. Arms all sore. So I came back home to lie in bed and moan. Then Khan called and bribed me with icecream to go for a ride with him in the truck. Over some horrificly bad driving, we decide that we're not in fact going to part ways (actually, he decided that, I didn't). So that's wot we did.

Ordered dinner in from the shady place (of shady Middle Eastern origin) around the corner from Khan's place. He had a veggie pizza and I had a lovely chicken shawarma plate. The hummous was lacking but the lovely garlic lemon butter was excellent. But, horror of horrors, the jalapeno poppers were made with cheddar cheese and not, as they should be, with cream cheese. But still, they will get our repeat business.

After an extremely disconnected and large lunch at JMP, D'vya and I headed out to procure textbooks and course packs and other essentials for skool and I'm afraid I overdid the walking. By the time, I got home at 6:30, I was screaming in pain. But I'm a trooper. Put on my lovely new earrings and tottled off to Prithvi's for kababs and Bacardi (which I couldn't have because I was up on pain meds). Then, in the rain, on the way back, I stepped on a pebble. The pain was excruciating. And I may have been a leetle big mean to Khan. Which would probably be why we had the big howl at each other earlier. Right. Prolly shouldn't do that.

So I've been sitting on this couch since yesterday with my feet up and I'm bored stiff. I've got 85 pages of financial reporting and valuation to reach but I'm too bored to study.

The new roommates have moved in. They seem nice. Relatively normal. Keep forgetting to lock the front door thereby scaring the bejeezus outta me everytime I pad across the flat to go to the bathroom and see the front door gently swaying in the breeze. But normal. Hopefully I will not be murdered in my sleep.

Big Blue Brainstorm

The collective wisdom of crowds depends on your crowd, and IBM has one of the sharpest crowds around. CEO Samuel J. Palmisano knows this, and he wants to leverage it. He is pulling people together for the online equivalent of a town meeting. His hope: The opinions of some 100,000 minds will lead to catalytic innovations so powerful they will transform industries, alter human behavior, and lead to new businesses for IBM. He calls the project an Innovation Jam.

I'd be VERY interested to see how this turns out.

Today is my last day at the Hive

And I'm strangely not unhappy. Probably because I don't necessarily agree with their operating philosophy - "The people who are responsible are not going to execute and the ones who are going to execute are not the ones who are responsible. Otherwise, the various pieces will be fractured."

Also, can I just say, asking someone how much money did you make at the gambling tables in Vegas is very crass and extremely ugly American. Stop doing it. Once is forgivable but if you do it everytime you see someone, they lose all respect for you. Gambling is not a game, it's an personal art. And one's personal artistic talents should not be questioned.

I've been working on a help document for about 2 weeks now. Everytime I start, I start getting sleepy. Think I'll finish it today?

I've twisted my blasted ankle again

I'm going to throw these bloody useless sandals. Here's a tip - don't wear footwear without adequate support.

What is the point of Twizzlers anyway?

The PM just walked up to me with a Twizzler and said, "Bark like a seal". So I started singing Kiss from a Rose. He left the entire packet and ran away.

My tech lead writes very cryptic emails

* Pre-live event: CRM => CMS
* During live event: CMS only [for existing data]
* Post-live event: CMS => CRM

I just spent $150 on new clothes

And for those of you that know me, you know why this is significant.

It's Saturday night

And I'm at home. Watching Blade for the 18th time. Bored.

Dude, I so need to make new friends.

Wouldn't you like a levitating globe?

I know Resh would.

Pushing the new frontier

So like I'm sure you know about Virgin Comics. It's a comic book company owned by Branson. This is the new face of desi comics. Not your average Amar Chitra Katha. Leading comics creators include John Woo, Nicolas Cage, Guy Ritchie, Garth Ennis, Alex Ross, Shekhar Kapur, Deepak Chopra, Gotham Chopra and Samit Basu. I can't wait! Check out Issue #0.

Everybody should go to Vegas

At least once a year. It's splendid.

So like, 4 days of work to go and then I'm off till skool starts post Labor Day. Also, the number of emails in the inbox is getting outrageous so I simply must take care of this today.

Khan is off to Yale to meet long lost Badal. I shall listen to Pink Floyd now.

Miami Vice not so nice

I had a nice long post about how Miami Vice sucked and I lost the will to live for about 3 hours after I saw the movie (until of course I remembered that there are egg rolls in this world) and how Michael Mann must have been smoking the good stuff and how I thought the cameramen were rejects from a flop reality television show and that I needed to rent Heat and Collateral and Insider and mourn the loss of Mann's directive abilities. But Blogger ate it all. But still, you get the idea.

If this doesn't put CBS high on your list, I don't know what will

I still really do want to work for le Cirque du Soleil

Yesterday was nice. 6 more people have arrived. Just the sort of blithering idiots (Mr. and Mrs. BI with their son and his BI wife and their BI kid and cousin) you don't want around you. But still, they are RK's friends and must be tolerated.

After a leisurely nosh at breakfast at Cafe Bellagio by the Conservatory (seared pepper crusted ahi tuna on baby spinach and white bean ragout - quite mediocre, badly salted), I spent most of the day working. Which may sound like a drag but not with this view. Took a break to take the limo out to get kheema and zeera aloo with parathas from Gandhi and then back to writing damn specification documents. I'm tired of those. Any blithering idiot with half a brain can do those. Well maybe not this current crew.

Saw David Copperfield. Same show, same tricks as last time. He still does that funny thing with his unblinking eyes staring into the camera. Bloody good-looking chap too. His show is a little too theatrical for my taste but nice nonetheless. Those round tables are uncomfortable though.

And of course, we spent the entire evening and most of the night afterwards putting forth our own opinions on how the tricks were done. That gets old real fast. Would be nice to just enjoy a magic show.

A late night and a little lie in and it was back to damn specification documents at 7 this morning. Lovely sunrise over the mountains with the shadows of clouds falling on crags, slowly creeping up to the Strip, illuminating the blueness of the Bellagio fountain pond. Brilliant. Nothing like it.

Breakfast at the Cafe again (brioche french toast with orange butter, buttermilk pancakes with vanilla icecream) and back to work. Mrs. RK landed in today so that was nice. One more person has also arrived. The party is now 13 people. Two more are expected on Friday and one more on Sunday.

So like, I don't know if you've seen O but you simply must. It's spectacular. It's changed a little since the last time I saw it but it is still breathtaking. I also don't think it's physically possible to bend those sorts of ways like the contortionists in the show. I also wish I could dive like that. My God the hours of back-breaking practice that must go into that show. And they play 10 shows a week. Deserve a standing ovation just for that.

Have just had to go downstairs to the VIP Lounge to get Mrs. Blithering Idiot up to the suite since she does not have a key card to access the super fast (and I do mean fast) lifts to the VIP floor. Waited 5 minutes which is about 5 minutes more than I wanted to and then rang the room only to be told that she had already arrived. Stupid people were just going to let me wait until I was fed up. Yes, I know I would have eventually figured it out but still. It's not courteous to keep people waiting. Stupid idiots.

Can you tell I don't like them? Stupid incompetent mindless fucks.

I'm actually not even in a bad mood, mind you.

Now Mr. and Mrs. BI and RK and Pops are hanging out in the living room, snorting whiskey (except for Mrs. BI of course 'cuz women, especially Indian women, don't drink whiskey I was told. I wanted to laugh at that. Derisively. Out loud too. But I didn't. I just made myself a whiskey and tottled off to the bedroom under pretext of work. Stupid morons are now talking very loudly and disturbing the peace. Should open the window and throw them 32 floors to their death. That'll teach 'em.

Yes, ok, I know, I'll stop.

In fact, I'm sleepy so I'll head to bed. Maybe I'll dream about running away to join the circus :)

Neela aasmaan so gaya

So like, yes, I know its been a while but I've been busy with the 'rents. They're in town you know. Lettuce begin from the beginning...

So after having Black Cobra's car broken into and then my purse stolen at Infusions bloody Tea Spa on Brighton Ave., we decided to pick ourselves up and drive to Niagara Falls on the weekend. Pleasant enough drive with Pops very excited about the prospect of eating fast food from chain restaurants along the way. So with a car full of eager participants and the requisite bag of food, off we went. Saw the Falls. Oohed and aahed appropriately and then off we went to meet Pops's long lost cousin/nephew (the relationship is still indeterminate). Stayed one very traumatic night at their place (sleeping on hard floor in freezing room with mine hosts yelling at each other all night - don't ask) we hit the road again and Pops and I were dropped off in Boston while the two docs pushed off to NYC.

Now, let's talk about these Falls here for a minute. I don't know if you've seen them but if you have you'll know what I mean and if you haven't, shame on you. From afar you can see the clear crystal waters merrily plodding along a shallow-bed river, picking up momentum, the kinetic energy hurtling what looks like sheets of pure ice off a mini cliff. I won't give you the statistics because you can look 'em up yourself but I will tell you that no number of stats and pictures do it justice. It's sheer poetry. The water is so clear that you can see the green moss underneath on the river bed and the air is so crisp that it makes you want to dive right into the icy green-tinted wonderfulness of it all. Don't believe me? Here, see pictures. Er, only problem is that the pictures are on a disc at home in Boston and I'm in Vegas. I'll post them when I get back.

So then after a couple of days in Boston, Pops went back to Dubai. He missed us so much that he decided to come back after a week as a surprise to the docs. And surprised they were. Well, Mum was more suspicious but it all went over well. Carefully orchestrated meeting of flights (his from Dubai and mine from Boston) at JFK and a taxi ride home met us with screams and hugs of delight. Nothing better than to spring surprises on Black Cobra, bless her. And the next day, here we are in Vegas with RK.

Staying at the Bellagio in our regular suite on the 32nd (last time we were on the 35th but the dip in 3 floors does nothing for the magnificient view). Pops threw a hissy fit on the plane because I wouldn't play cards with him but opted to work instead (apparently I'm still his little entertainment monkey and must dance on command). He got out of that soon enough after we pumped him full of airplane pretzels and Coca Cola. Bags were out fairly quickly and into the waiting limo we went (manned by a lovely woman with immense bag carrying capacity). A short drive later, and into the Bellagio's VIP Services we are, having a snack (chocolate covered strawberries, cheese sticks and assorted dried fruit) and checking in. Had a chat and a cheese plate up in the room and down we went to give Mum the grand tour. The Conservatory this time is done up showing major American pieces of culture and history with absolutely lovely flowers. This is why I like the Bellagio better than any other hotel on the strip - the flowers. Lovely exotic orchids, plain pretty petunias, tiny little roses. Very beautiful.

A few hours of gambling and into the limo to Gandhi for dinner we go. Food was nice, much better than Gaylord at the Rio. Back to the room for a king's view of the dancing fountains. Spent the evening working and gaping at the truly magnificient view and then as was tired, hit the sack early.

Still on East Coast time so was up by 3 as usual. Lazed around in bed until I couldn't anymore. Did the usual morning chores - ironing people's clothes, scheduling laundry pick-up and making reservations for the day. Now I shall shower and head down to the excellent Spa and Salon for my facialpedicurehaircut. Mum and Pops are already down at the tables, gambling away. RK is asleep since he was up at 3 as well only he decided to hit the tables instead of lazing about.

Alright luvvies, as comfy as this bathrobe is, I must to the Spa.

Oh, and the reason this post is titled as it is is because Pops put that song on repeat on the iPod and I'm too lazy to get up and change it.

I got the soundtrack

I'm so pipped.

This album rocks.

I'm in the wrong profession.

I need to be an actor.

Update

Yes, yes, I know, I forgot to tell you that Black Cobra's car was broken into and her purse was stolen and then last week my purse was stolen and we went to Niagara Falls and I shall post pictures soon.

I'm too lazy to blog.

I want to see Miami Vice so bad it hurts. BTW, the soundtrack is kick-ass.

Overheard at the watercooler

"Nothing's backed up. Well, the Internet is backed up but nothing else is."

Said by a Production Manager mind you. Who is this 35-yr old woman who has a baby voice. It is SO annoying.

She just asked me what does VPN stand for. Sigh.

I should get me one of these

My Big Mac is bigger than your Big Mac

Following its recent "Not bad for a McJob" campaign, McDonald's UK, to coincide with this Summer's World Cup, will introduce, for a limited time, the new Bigger Big Mac which will be 40 percent bigger than the current Big Mac. The current Big Mac already has 560 calories and more fat than you'd ever want to consume. But hey, as we've always said, no one's forcing the food down anyone's throat so if a big ass burger works from a marketing angle, go for it.

Read more here.

My purse was stolen yesterday

Right from under my nose.

Now I'm pissed.

I am very disturbed.

So like, they've retained the services of two sets of freelancers to make these maps for the conference map room. And I just saw the first one. Israel is missing, Libya is not marked and neither is Iran or Iraq.

And they call themselves professionals. Ugly Americans. No finesse. No aching for quality work. Where are the interactive media companies that actually want to do a good job and why the hell don't I work for one?!

Bah.

I don't get it

So like, this image of mi casa shows no parking lot. But then this other image shows Emirates Towers. I'm pretty sure the parking lot was built before the Towers. Wot gives?


103F in Boston today. Damn.

There were little pieces of blue glass all over the seat

It was pretty. Pretty frightening too.

So like, I went to NYC this last weekend to help set up BC's pad for the parents were arriving from their Scandinavian cruise (I now have a very cool Russian wrap with tassels and a lovely orange and black kurta from Dubai). And we huffed and puffed in the terrible heat (100F it was) and we tore boxes apart and we swept packing peanuts and we did 13 loads of laundry. Then we went to the airport and promptly got lost on the way.

But it was nice to see them. They've got swollen feet, poor things, from all that travelling.

I was all set to leave on Sunday and get back to Boston. But then as we were headed towards the car to drive me to the subway station, we saw him.

There he was. Big, black and a menance to society. Breaking the passenger side window of BC's car. Grabbing the lovely doctor's bag. She was running towards him. I was running towards the getaway car. Which nearly ran me over in its hurry to get away.

Here's a tip. DON'T EVER DO THAT. They could shoot you with guns and then where will you be?

The cops came. The cops went. We put the car in a secure lot and tottled back home. Poor BC was very upset. They took her Palm Pilot you know.

Dad woke me up at 4:30 am by shoving a bowl with cubes of Kraft cheddar cheese (yes, the kind you get in the tins in Dubai) under my nose. I'll bet you he wasn't hungry, he just wanted the tin to use as an ashtray. I unpacked 4 suitcases and repacked them. BC went to work and came home and we went to the police precinct and got the latest on this senseless crime. The getaway car was stolen.

Went to Sears and got an air conditioner because the parents were literally melting away (there were little pools at their feet). Got lots of groceries too. No, not at Sears, at the ShopRite. Installed the A/C. Ate an aloo. Got on the subway to get to the bus stop to get home. Crawled into my own bed at 1:30 am and couldn't sleep so was playing with Google Earth.

I can't find MIT on Google Earth. I found the Greens and most of KMC but I can't find MIT.

I did find lots of places in Dubai. You know, it's a fun thing to do, look for familiar places on Google Earth. Did you know that Sh. Rashid building, Zabeel Road is not rectangular? No, it's trapezoidal.

Finally got to sleep at 5 am. Have a vague feeling that Dad called at 7 but can't be sure. Had terrible dreams of ... something.. can't remember wot now. Eating bread and cheese and working from home because I'm exhausted.

BC is doing better. Could have been worse. We need to get her a secure parking spot in that building. Poor thing. She is quite small you know.

It's hotter than I've ever experienced. And I'm from the desert, I know hot. I shall get me an A/C too. If I can find the energy to get out of bed. Took a cold shower at 9 but it didn't work for long.

Oh look. Dad's on MSN.

New Creative Director at work

And I just met him. And he totally creeps me out. He has an evil smile.

Yes, yes, I know, he's prolly perfectly harmless and a very nice man but still. He creeps me out.

Going to the Cambridge Center for the Arts to see Nat Simpkins and Henri Smith in action. Maybe do a late night movie after that. I've got Pirates of the Caribbean thefirstone.

Resh, send me that template. I'm all ready for it.

Spent the day designing requirements for the kiosks and entryway screens for the ASF. Found these really cool ones with infra-red sensors, proximity sensors, proximity mats, built-in thermal printers and overheard screens. On Zabeel Road too. Isn't that odd.

Suspicious daywalker activity

Have you seen Underworld Evolution? Can you tell me why suddenly at the end of the movie Selene turns into a daywalker? She is not burnt to a mrs-vickies-salt-and-pepper crisp in the morning sunlight. Why is this? What happened between having mad passionate monkey sex in an abandoned shipping container and spiking William's head with his own claw that made her all Blade-ish?

Explain! I demand to know! I take my vampires very seriously I'll have you know.

Flight tracking

So like if you wanted to know, say, which are the flights coming from Dallas Fort Worth to Boston's Logan you would have to go to the DFW website to see which ones are headed to Boston and then you would have to go to the MassPort website to see which ones arrive from Dallas because guess wot? There is no way of telling on either website both the arrival and departure times of a particular flight.

Daft bastards.

I need to stop grinding my teeth

Says the nice Persian doctor who filled my cavity.

Is it me or does the new Dove Refresh shower soap ad music sound like something Rishi Rich would do?

I shall now watch Underworld.

"The English Divide"

I have always believed that my school and college years were the first architects of my personality; like every middle-class Indian, I take pride in where I studied and what I was taught. And yet, the gentle idealism of this young girl made me pause to wonder: Had my public-school education been shamefully elitist?

Read it here.

You know they do background checks on incoming students in Delhi to enter kindergarten. To make sure they come from the 'right' families. Makes me ill it does. And then you people ask me why I don't want to live in India. Bah.

The emergency mocha

Is the sole reason for my composite filling eroding. Now I have to go get my molar looked at. I hate going to the dentist.

But it tastes so good.

Can you tell I don't want to work today? It would be nice if I had a friend to meet for lunch. Something to look forward to.

Good morning good morning good morning how are you?

So like, I've nearly finished making the necklace I started working on last night. Just one middle piece left. Thing is that the middle piece I want in there is a long one so I can't use a small ring to attach it to the links of the chain like the other pieces. Think I may have to do something nifty with a headpin. Which means another trip to the bead store. And this morning in the shower I had a lovely idea for matching earrings too. Maybe I'll try and finish them today so I can give them to Black Cobra when I go down to NYC this weekend.

Actually, they're too nice. I may just keep them for myself. :)

So like, my laptop died suddenly last night and checkdisk keeps hanging. Very worrying.

It's rainy and I'm hungry for breakfast.

The office is pretty dead. Half of them are on vacation. The other half are on a conference call with each other. Which is odd. Because everybody's cubby is right next to everybody elses.

I don't have a cubby. Which is fine by me. I abhor cubbies. I may go sneaking around to the Midpoint to stare out the window at the rain whilst pretending to work on functional specs.

Ooo, I could do with a bagel or something. Where shall we go for lunch today? Pick one for me.

Click. You know you want to.

NASA is a go for launch

Yes, it is. Crack in insulation notwithstanding. It's on its way. Watch the cam here.

Italy and Germany in Dortmund. Wimbledon on at the same time. Just ate a Dole fruit cup. All the fruits were square. Very interesting.

Holy Roma!

So like, Albert Pinto (who I must add is looking bloody good) went to Rome with la familia and took lots of lovely pictures. See them all here.

Explain this to me - in the land of geeks, how come I don't know any good-looking ones?!

P.P. Belkovich

So like the move to NY went fine. Very tiring but fine. Have 18 bruises and an achy left wrist and some sort of a strange cold but other than that, am fine. Black Cobra is fine. The new apartment is fine. It's all fine. I shall post pictures of the move just as soon as BC sends them to me.

So like, it's hot in Boston. Hot and limpid. Like a noodle. Not much work to do. Read that as not much income coming in. Still, there it is.

I like Adrants.com. Don't you?

You can just hear the model on the right in this United Bennetton ad screaming to the model on the left during the photo shoot, "Back off bitch! My boobs need more space than your sorry little boy chest!" Or at least that's what we hear in our sick, twisted mind.

I especially like how this has been tagged 'boobs' on Flickr. Nice.

So.. very.. tired...

Too many boxes.. too many clothes.. too many shoes.. too much being thrown..

Have bubbled wrapped everything in sight. There is no end.

Break over. Must pack more boxes.

Her sister's coming in the morning. Ding dong the bells are gonna chime.

Why is it that regardless of the culinary options available to Americans, they will still flock to McDonald's?

So like, I'm at O'Hare. Now, I don't know if you remember the last time you were at O'Hare but it's cooler now. I'll tell you exactly how in a minute but lets start with the book I was reading on the flight here.

Tip: When you have a 6 am flight, don't leave the house at 5 am. You get to the airport and they close counters on you and you have to run and apologize a lot. But they were nice about it. Melvyn Menezes was on the same flight in first class. They have hot breakfasts there you know. We should travel first class more often. It is fun.

I finished the book I had borrowed from Em - The Romantics by Pankaj Mishra. It started out engaging enough but then it dragged on a bit and now that I've finished it, I have mixed feelings about it. People's quest for serenity always baffle me. I can't relate to that. On one hand, I think there's someting to be said for the search for peace but on the other hand, if all we had was peace, wouldn't life be a bit boring?

So anyway. The coolness of O'Hare. They now have these huge screens which is nice but then they have the Accenture Interactive Network. It's a giant touchscreen that gives the news, weather, sports headlines etc. Tres cool. This is the sort of thing we should have for the ASF conference. Sadly, while they have wifi, it's not free so I can't dig up pictures or the website.

I've just bought Che Guevara's Motorcycle Diaries and I shall now get some egg rolls from Manchu wok for breakfast, settle in a corner, cover myself with my stolen American Airlines blanket and read.

Flight leaves in 2 hours. See you in Little Rock.