I’m back! Well, sort of

Posted on December 13, 2011 by Manoj

Well, it’s been a while since I posted anything on this site. Drafts galore, but posts no more! That should be my new tagline!

So we’re into the end of the year. 2012 is almost upon us, but before then, we have Christmas and the New Year to celebrate! This year, for the first time in 8 years, I am going home. Back to South Wales to celebrate the holidays – something that I am looking forward to. One thing that I am not looking forward to is flying. Don’t get me wrong – flying doesn’t scare me, but it is a pain in my ample rear end. Taking off your shoes for security – annoying but not a deal breaker. What gets me are the comfortable seats in economy. Being a larger than normal human being, they were never comfortable, but one can only assume that I will have to force my big butt into the seat that probably has its origins in some medieval torture chamber, and hope that I don’t suffer the disgrace of asking a steward(ess) for a seatbelt extender. I also feel sorry for those that are forced to sit next to me!

I did enquire about an upgrade to Business Class, just in case it was affordable. My $1000 ticket would be increased by over $4k just one way, so let’s just say that it’s not going to happen!

Other than that – well I have my Christmas shopping to complete, and I’m also trying to lose as much weight as I can before I go home. Irrespective of how much I do shed, I know that my folks aren’t going to be too happy, as I haven’t lost as much as I should have. My fault, but nonetheless, not a conversation that I am looking forward to. I’ve told my mother that I will lose weight during the 3 weeks that I am there – as they have a multi gym and an elliptical at home, I think that I can make that happen.

I’m not taking my work laptop, so this should prove to be a good vacation. I plan on taking lots of pictures as well as lots of video. Hey – it’s been 8 years – things have changed!

Anyway, that’s all for now – need to get back to work. I hope that you and your loved ones have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy and Prosperous New Year!

Given the time of year, it’s only fitting that I post a Christmas Song. I choose War is Over by John Lennon, because his legacy is one of peace.

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Dreams of my grandfather – part 2

Posted on June 14, 2011 by Manoj

This is a continuation of yesterday’s post, that I was unable to continue, due to a combination of the lateness of the hour, and the dimness of my spirit.
Quite a morbid topic, I’m afraid, but I have to continue.
During the summer of 2009, my parents were in India visiting their families. My father’s mother, whom I would call achamma (in Malayalam, achan = dad and amma = mum, so my father’s mother would be achamma) was having her hip fixed. She was quite old, but still sprightly. My dad went and saw her in the hospital before the operation, and had a long conversation with her. Once they had her sedated, they made the incision for the surgery that was planned, when they discovered that she had bone cancer that had spread throughout her body, and that had weakened her hip, causing the problem in the first place. This was totally unexpected, even though she had a double mastectomy some years ago. So they stitched her back up, but while they were doing so, she had a heart attack. Unfortunately for my father, she lapsed into a coma, and was declared brain dead not long after that. My father took the decision to keep her on life support for a while longer, in order to give the rest of the family time to come and bid her farewell. Part of me feels sorry for him, but another part feels glad, because he was able to spend some time with her before she passed. In addition to that, her death was sudden, and not a long, slow, drawn out affair. There’s another reason too. When I was born, my father flew both sets of grandparents in from India to see me. Upon their return journey, his father had a heart attack and died. My mother once told me that it was the first time that she had ever seen my father cry. As I was just a newborn, and my father had spent all that money bringing both sets of parents to the UK, he was unable to go back to India for the funeral. While he has never said anything about that to me, I know that not being able to attend his father’s funeral must have hurt him. So I’m glad that he was there when his mother passed.
My achamma and I had a very strange relationship. There were times when she told everyone how good I was, and then there were times when she told people how bad I was. When I wasn’t. She once told some friends that I had actually pushed her over in front of my father. To put this into perspective, I am bigger than both my father and my grandmother, but never in a million years would I even dream of laying a finger on either of them. There was a time in my life where I felt that she didn’t like me, and that continued until a discovery that my mother made one day. While cleaning out my achamma’s prayer room, my mother found a prayer for me wrapped up and placed in front of my achamma’s deities. She actually wanted nothing but good things for me, and the prayer was placed there for my well being. After that, our relationship improved immensely. When I went back in 2002, she was very happy to see me, and that feeling was mutual. I haven’t been back since she passed, and it will be odd not to see her again.
Now we come to my grandfather, or ammachan. Last October, my mother had a strange dream in which she felt the need to speak with her father. So she did. The next morning, she called him up, and they spoke for hours. A couple of days later, he was at a wedding, when he complained of a shortness of breath as well as pain in his left arm. He was rushed to hospital, where they said that he had suffered a heart attack, but that it was mild. Since he was 91 years old, my mother changed her ticket (she was initially due to fly out in the latter part of November for my grandmother’s birthday) to a couple of days later, which was the first date she could get. That was on a Saturday. Initially, the doctor said that he was responding well to the medication, and that it was only a minor heart attack, They said that he would be discharged soon, but as the doctor on call was a junior doctor, he wanted to get approval from the senior specialist on call. That’s when things changed. The specialist examined my ammachan, and found that the heart attack was more serious that previously thought. Luckily my mother got back and was able to see him and speak with him. He was in the ICU with tubes in him, and was not really comfortable. Who would be? My brother Navin also flew out to India to see him. Then a day later, he suffered another heart attack, and they were unable to revive him. Rather than wait, they decided to have the funeral straight away. My brother wanted to see him before that, but my mother didn’t want to keep the body on life support and then have my brother see him that way. That should never be the last image he had of our grandfather.
I didn’t go. It was the week of a big launch at work, and to be perfectly honest, I was numb. I had been planning on going to India in December for my ammamma’s 84th birthday, which was going to be a big deal, and had looked forward to spending some time with my grandparents. My sister Sandhya couldn’t go either. She had just moved here from Korea was waiting on her Green Card, so she couldn’t travel.

Around the same time, I had started going to the gym on a regular basis, and had also signed up for sessions with a personal trainer. Not that it is any easier now, but after my weight training, my trainer had me use the treadmill for an hour. Naturally, at the beginning, I was struggling to do 10 minutes. I found inspiration from my ammachan though, closing my eyes, and seeing him smiling down at me from heaven. It may sound a little corny, but if you’d ever met him, you’d understand. He was a man that no-one ever had a bad thing to say about, kind of like my dad. He had a great sense of humor, and even though he was a vegetarian, would go out and buy some chicken curry for the three of us. That’s the kind of man that he was.

So his death anniversary is coming up, and my mother was talking about it. I have a cousin getting married a month later, and I was telling her that I didn’t think that I could do both. Given a choice, I would want to be there for my ammachan. That’s what I told my mother, and then the dreams started. I was already having trouble sleeping, but my dreams were consumed with thoughts of my grandfather. In the last one, which was the most vivid, I was with my ammamma in her house, and my ammachan was there, smiling. But he wasn’t really there – it was like his ghost was there, telling my ammamma that everything would be alright, and that he loved all of us very much. I started to cry and tried to explain to him that I was sorry for not having visited him for so many years, and for not calling as much as I could have. At this point, tears were streaming down my face, and he just turned to me and smiled. Then he turned to go, and as he walked away, I was calling for him, crying all the while, and that’s when I woke up. I was crying.

They say that dreams are often manifestations of our subconscious mind, and that in essence, we are trying to tell ourselves something important. The only thing I can take away from these dreams is that I really miss my ammachan, and it pains me to think that I will never see him again.

I’m sorry if this has seemed a rambling, disoriented post. While I never proof read any of my blog posts, I do try to stick to a pattern, a structure, but in this case, I just wrote what I felt.

So for a video that would match this post, here’s Luther Vandross with his moving “Dance with my father”:

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Peace!

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Dreams of my grandfather

Posted on June 13, 2011 by Manoj

Over the last week or so, I’ve been dreaming of my grandfather. I’ve come to believe that the reason for these dreams are partly due to a conversation that I had with my mother about my grandfather’s first death anniversary, which falls at the end of October. I say partly because I believe that guilt plays a role here too. Guilt because I hadn’t seen him since January 2002.
Let me take a step back here and say that I don’t handle death well. Not that anyone really does, but in terms of people that are close to me, both friends and family, as an adult, there have been 5 people that have passed away. Five people that were close to me. I guess that qualifies it somewhat.
In September 2001, a couple of weeks after the sad events of 9/11, my uncle Unni passed away suddenly. Uncle Unni was my father’s youngest brother, and was someone who had been unwell for a few years. I was very close to him, and his family, as they lived with us in my grandmother’s house for a while. One of my strongest memories of him are during a visit to Bhatkal (where I briefly went to Engineering College) to attend a court case that was nothing more than an attempt at extortion. Uncle Unni was a lawyer, so he accompanied my parents and me as we went up there to have the case dismissed. He and I shared a room, and one night, after a couple of drinks (him, not me), while I expressed my frustration at the way things were going, with tears in his eyes, he told me that he considered me to be his son. I hadn’t expected him to say something like that, but it has stuck with me ever since.
He had been asthmatic for many years, and it had taken its toll on his lungs. He built a home in Aluva, close to where his wife’s family, very close to a nice river. He retired there, and I actually stayed with them when I went to India in the later part of the ’90s. He had been looking to get himself a dog, with his preference being a bulldog. Wanting to do something nice for him, I found a guy that was selling doberman pups, and took his sons Raju and Kithen to go and pick one up. The reason for a doberman was because they have short hair and thus the chance of long hair being shed by a dog aggravating his asthma was not as much. We picked up a female pup, and I named her Buffy. After Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I made a joke about what it, but with reference to someone else, but that is a story for another time.
He loved the dog, and she was a welcome addition to the family. When I was last in India in 2002, she had grown up and growled as soon as she saw me. I did approach her kennel, and as I got closer she stopped, and then licked my hand. She did remember me, as I spent at least a week with her when we first brought her home. She also fell ill at that time, and we had to take her to the vet. Dogs are like that, they don’t forget those that have loved them!
Speaking of his children, I am also close to his sons, Raju and Kithen. To give you an example of how close I am, back in 1992, I was involved in a serious auto accident. Van meets concrete block. I broke most of the bones in my right foot, and my achilles tendon in the same foot was partially severed. I had an operation to fix it, and was unable to put any weight on my right foot for about 3 months. During that time, as I had a rather large plaster cast on my leg, I needed help taking a shower. Especially since I couldn’t get my cast wet. So it was Raju who used to pour water over me as I washed myself, something that I’ve never forgotten either. He’s now married with a lovely little daughter, and even Kithen is married, and I believe that his wife is expecting. They still remain as close to me as family can be, and I would do anything for them.
So back to September 2001. Uncle Unni was on his way to a wedding with the family and a bus or a van had driven past their car and splashed dirty water in through an open window. Uncle Unni was upset as they were all dressed up, so he got out to give the driver a piece of his mind. I think that the exertion took its toll and he collapsed, dying in his son’s arms.
My cousin Roshan sent me an email, explaining what had happened, asking us to get my dad to call his mother and other brothers immediately. To be honest, it took me a while for it to sink in properly. I was already rattled by the heinous events of a few weeks earlier, and Uncle Unni was the closest person to me that had ever died. I didn’t handle it well, and turned into myself. I stopped calling my parents, and avoided any sort of social gathering. I just wanted to wake from this dream. I wanted things to go back to normal. It took me about 6 weeks to get over myself, and start talking to people again. It’s a very unsettling feeling, knowing that someone close to you has gone, and that you could never see them again.

A few years later, my Nana passed away. Nana, real name Marion Roberts, was one of my father’s first patients. Back in the early ’70′s her husband had passed away, leaving her as the sole provider for her young son. My father had asked her if she could help my mother, who was pregnant at the time (with me), and so that’s how her relationship with my family began. She soon became indispensable, and was no longer someone my father had hired to help out. She became part of the family, my Nana. She came to India with us on more than one occasion, had a great relationship with my grandparents and often told them how my mother was her daughter too. I have many pictures of her with me, especially when I was younger. She was a big part of the family when my sister and brother came along, and we all loved her very much.
Things with her son became problematic. She supported him all her life, and he became a doctor. After he got married and had a son (John-Paul), their relationship faded. I think that during this time, even though I didn’t think that it was possible, she became even closer to us. She eventually moved to an assisted living home in Hirwaun, and we used to go there to visit her. She even came and stayed with us in Cardiff a few times, but as she got older, it became tougher. Then came the fateful day when she passed away too. I was last in the UK in January of 2004, and have a video that I took of the both of us. After she passed, I haven’t been back to the UK, so I haven’t been able to pay my respects. She was a big part of my life growing up, and I can attribute part of the man that I am today to her. I can’t imagine going home and not making the drive to Hirwaun to see her. I may just make the drive and sit outside her old flat for a couple of minutes and reminisce about days gone by.
Third on my list is my friend Bill Groski. I have written about him on this blog, so I won’t go into great detail about him, but I will always remember his unmatchable work ethic, his friendship and especially his laughter. You can read about him here.

It’s almost 2am, and I am tired and feeling a little low. So I am going to stop here, and will add another post tomorrow to complete my thoughts.

Given the mostly sad tone of my post, here’s a song by The Proclaimers, a cover version of Steve Earle’s My Old Friend The Blues:

 

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Peace!

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X Men First Class

Posted on June 8, 2011 by Manoj

I just came back from watching the new X Men movie, which takes us back to the beginning, when they were originally formed. I loved it! I thought that it was absolutely brilliant, because it shows you the motivation for each of these characters, along with their flaws, because after all, we’re all human. They may be mutated humans, but they still have emotions, just like all us normal folks.

The movie starts off with Erik Lensherr, a young Jew in a concentration camp in 1944 being separated from his parents. They are moved to a different area, and a gate is shut behind them. We see young Erik screaming for his mother, as he is held back by a couple of guards. Then you see the gate start to shake and then bend and buckle as this young boy reaches for his mother. You see as more guards try to help, they are being dragged towards the warped gate, being dragged along with young Erik by some invisible force. Then another guard steps in an uses the butt of his rifle to knock Erik out.
We are then introduced to Kevin Bacon, who plays an evil Nazi doctor, Dr. Klaus Schmidt, trying to get Erik to move a coin. When Erik is unable to do so, Schmidt has this mother brought in an murders her before Erik. In a rage, Erik kills the two guards by crushing their helmets on their heads, and rips apart all the metallic furniture in the room, much to the delight of Schmidt, who realizes that anger and extreme pain trigger his mutation.

The scene then switches to a very different area – Westchester in NY, where a young Charles Xavier is wakes from his slumber and heads downstairs carrying a baseball bat. When he reaches the kitchen, he sees his mother, who tells him that she was looking for a snack and tells him to go to bed. When he doesn’t answer, she smiles at him and says “I’ll make you a hot chocolate”. You then see her clutching her head as she hears Charles asking who she is, because his mother would never look for food herself, and would never offer him a hot chocolate – she would get the maid to do it. His mother then transforms back into young Raven, who is a shapeshifter. Charles then stuns her by smiling, and telling her that she never has to steal again, and that he is so happy to find someone else like him – someone different.

The movie then shows how each man grows up, and the different paths that they take, before their eventual conclusion. We meet Moira McTaggart, Sebastian Shaw (whom Schmidt has now become), Emma Frost, Henry McCoy, Havok, Banshee, Darwin, Angel, Azazel and Riptide. We get to see what Magneto fears more than anything else, and that is man turning against what they don’t understand, which are mutants. This is a view that Xavier doesn’t subscribe to. As Magneto tells Xavier, “you think that all humans are like Moira,” to which Xavier replies, “and you think that all humans are like Sebastian Shaw!”.

Events include the Cuban missile crisis, and how Xavier gets injured and loses the use of his legs. It was very well taken, and the plot was quite interesting. Unlike other comic book adaptations that have hit the big screen over the past few years, this movie had a good story, good acting, and stayed true to the X Men theme. Overall, an enjoyable experience, and I look forward to the sequels, as they have set the movie up really well for the storyline to continue.

So for a video – I was going to post another one from Due South, but instead will post a video from an episode of another one of my favorite shows – Supernatural. This show follows two brothers, Sam and Dean Winchester, who follow in their father’s footsteps, hunting all sorts of evil, from ghosts to vampires to wendingos to demons. In this particular episode, they are hunting a werewolf, and Sam falls in love with a woman named Madison whom they believe is being stalked by the werewolf. Towards the end of the episode they discover that she is the werewolf, and are at a loss as to what to do. Afraid that she will hurt someone, Madison asks Sam to end her life, as there’s nothing else that they can do to prevent her from hurting someone during the next full moon. Sam can’t bring himself to do it, so Dean offers to do it for him. Sam realizes that he has to be the one to do it. All of this plays out to the beautiful “Silent Lucidity” by Queensryche.
If you can watch this without shedding a tear, then chances are you are devoid of all emotion!

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Yet another Sarah Palin “gotcha” moment

Posted on June 7, 2011 by Manoj

(Takes deep breath before starting) So this past Sunday, we were treated to another one of Sarah Palin’s interpretations of history. That she made a mistake is something that people can laugh at/comment on/discuss openly. The fact that she made a mistake is not the reason why I don’t really like her. The fact of the matter is that the next night, on Fox News Sunday, she said that she didn’t make any mistakes, and that she “knows her American history!”
So what exactly did she say? Well, while being asked about her tour, she made a rather alarming statement about Paul Revere. Why alarming? Well, it shows an almost Bachmann-esque lack of basic American history, and for someone who wants to be considered as an average, every day mama grizzly, she’s making other average, every day mama grizzlies look bad.

Here’s what she said:

“He who warned uh, the British that they weren’t gonna be takin’ away our arms, uh by ringing those bells, and um, makin’ sure as he’s riding his horse through town to send those warning shots and bells that uh, we were going to be secure and we were going to be free. And we were going to be armed”

Now that in itself is incorrect, because Paul Revere is known for warning the colonists, i.e. the Americans, that the British were coming. His mission was one of secrecy, and even though he has been mistakenly attributed to riding through the countryside shouting at the top of his voice that “The British Are Coming”, his mission was one of secrecy, and conducted mostly under the cover of night. Revere actually travelled under the cover of darkness, and took precautions to avoid the numerous British patrols while on a mission to warn the colonists that the British planned to march on Lexington and arrest Samuel Adams and John Hancock. Oh, and I believe that it was lanterns and not bells.

Considering what he did, and how he did it, how exactly would he ride through the countryside ringing bells (??) and firing warning shots (from a front loading musket no less with only one hand, as the other hand would be ringing that bell!) to let the British know that we were going to be free and that we were armed. As asinine as that sounds, he wouldn’t have made it to where he was going if he was riding through the country like that!!

So she made a mistake. She’s only human, isn’t she? We have all been there before. Maybe not on national television or across the computer screens of millions, but we’ve all made mistakes. It’s part of what makes us human!
However, Sarah Palin went on to show another regrettable human trait. Hubris.

On Fox News Sunday, when host Chris Wallace asked her if she realized that she had messed up her Paul Revere story, rather than admitting that she made a mistake, she stuck to her guns and said that she didn’t make a mistake!!
“You know what, I didn’t mess up about Paul Revere! Here’s what Paul Revere did. He warned the Americans that the British were coming, the British were coming and they were going to try and take our arms, so we gotta make sure that, uh, we were protecting ourselves, and, and shoring up all of our ammunitions and our firearms so that they couldn’t take it. But remember that the British had already been there, many soldiers for seven years in that area, and part of Paul Revere’s ride, and it wasn’t just one ride, he was a courier, he was a messenger, part of his ride was to warn the British that were already there, that hey, you’re not going to succeed, you’re not going to take American arms, you are not going to beat our own, well armed, uh persons, individuals, private militia that we have. He did warn the British, and in a shout out, gotcha type of question that was asked of me, I answered candidly, and I know my American history!”

Read the answer a couple of times and let it sink in!! What I found really funny was the look on Chris Wallace’s face towards the end of her statement. If I could read his inner thoughts, I get the feeling that I would be hearing him say “what the hell is she talking about?”

As ridiculous as her statement sounds, her comments prompted her supporters to start updating the Paul Revere Wikipedia entry to reflect her statements!! I can understand people’s faith in their leaders – that’s a good thing to have. However, blind faith? That’s not right! When your leader makes a mistake, wouldn’t you want them to stand up and admit the mistake, rather than compound it by trying to rewrite history?
Paul Revere was a courier. His mission was to warn the colonists, who were British subjects that no longer desired to be British. His mission was not to warn the British army that they couldn’t take our freedom! Perhaps she had just watched Mel Gibson play William Wallace in Braveheart?
Either way, this has not stopped others leaping to her defense. Andrew Malcolm wrote in the Los Angeles Times “You know how Sarah Palin said Paul Revere warned the British? Well, he did. Now, who looks stupid?” His article goes one to make many interesting claims.
Like, for example:
“Less known, obviously, is the rest of the evening’s events in which Revere was captured by said redcoats and did indeed defiantly warn them of the awakened militia awaiting their arrival ahead and of the American Revolution’s inevitable victory.”
While what he said is true – to a certain extent – that is not what Palin said. Revere was captured by the British, and with respect to warning them of the awakened militia – does Mr. Malcolm believe that the British weren’t already aware of that fact? Actually, I believe that he Revere misrepresented the size of the colonists’ forces in an effort to mislead the British. So the notion that Palin was right is just too difficult to fathom.

Oh, and the “gotcha type of question” that she claimed prompted her initial faux pas?

“What have you seen so far today and what are you going to take away from your visit?”

That’s no more “gotcha” than asking you what newspapers you read.

That’s my opinion at least. I’m not arrogant enough to say that I am correct, but I am intelligent enough to believe that I am.

Anyway, here’s some music from one of my all time favorite TV shows – Due South. It’s called Cabin Music.

 

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Peace!

Posted in Politics | Tagged | 3 Comments

A surprise baby shower, and an enjoyable drive home

Posted on June 7, 2011 by Manoj

Last Saturday we held a surprise baby shower for my friend’s Shyam and Rithula, who are expecting their first child towards the end of July. It was held at a clubhouse in Cary, and was a pretty good event! I would estimate around 40 people showed up, with families and it was a good day too – weather wise. A little hot initially, but it cooled down after the sun went down. Once the party was over, and we’d cleaned up the place, it was time to go home – around 10:30pm or so. This was the part that I had looked forward to, because as much as I love to drive, driving with the windows down on a warm summer night is even better :-) .

So the windows came down, the sunroof was opened, and I picked some Bryan Adams on my iPod and started the drive home. Something about the air rushing through your hair, caressing your face as you drive into the night. It’s an ethereal experience, to say the least. I was reminded of when I first moved to the US. Not knowing that many people, I used to wake up at odd hours, and if unable to get back to sleep, would get into the car, pick a direction and drive. Traffic is light, and the weather is conducive to opening all your windows and turning off your air conditioning.
The only drawback is that you hair looks like it’s been styled by Stevie Wonder, but I can live with that. I’m not out to win any beauty competitions anyway – I’m out to enjoy myself.

You should try it – driving with the windows down with some nice music playing – can’t be beat! Actually, the only thing that could come close would be to have some friends or family in the car singing along with you as you drive into the night. I’ve been fortunate enough to have had that happen a couple of times before, and they were a lot of fun!

So here’s a song from Bryan Adams that I was listening to – Fearless:

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The video is a fan based video of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, concerning Buffy, Angel and Spike.

 

Peace!!

Posted in Family, Friends, General Ramblings | 3 Comments

Selective Amnesia

Posted on June 3, 2011 by Manoj

Over the past few years, shows like “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” and “The Colbert Report” have increased in popularity due to one major reason – in addition to being really funny, they have a team of top notch researchers who prove that politicians and public figures should be careful what they say in public, especially with cameras abound, as words that you have spoken can (and will) often come back to bite you in the arse!

I was watching the Colbert Report last night, and his opening segment was about the debt ceiling and how Republicans have made their stand by linking any increase in the debt ceiling with substantial spending cuts, most probably to appease their Tea Party counterparts. Colbert then went on to state that under the previous president, George W Bush, Republicans voted no less than 7 times to increase the debt ceiling. As then Vice President Dick Cheney declared in 2002, “Reagan proved that deficits don’t matter”. I guess that’s only true until there’s a Democrat in the White House!! Remember, President Bush inherited a surplus, i.e. the Government was “in the black” when he took office. He made his (in)famous $1.4 trillion tax cut in 2001, followed by a $550 billion round in 2003. Even before the Wall Street Bailout, President Bush was responsible for a mind numbingly $4 trillion increase in this country’s national debt. That is an increase of 71%!!

If you dig deeper into this, you’ll find that tax rates overall are at the lowest rates since the 1950s. However, if you listen to the Republican Party, higher taxes are what is keeping the economy from flourishing. It seems that the Republicans are for tax cuts for only those of us who really don’t need them. I’ve heard of this trickle down effect before – if you help the richer then the the poorer amongst will benefit from a trickle down effect. The only problem with that logic is that while the benefits to the rich are more or less immediate, the standard of their living is far, far higher than the average American, who can ill afford to wait for the wealth and prosperity to trickle down to them. To be honest, the only thing that is trickling down it warm and yellow and smells pretty bad. I’m sure you know what I am referring to.

My friend Jeremy once told me that it was unfair to expect the richest Americans to carry the burden of the rest of the country – that it was unfair to penalize folks for being rich. He did have a point – it is unfair to hate someone because they are better off than you. At that point I did change my thinking – but it has evolved to a more balanced point of view, which does lead me to the same conclusion. President Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans are unfair. We seem to be in a state where the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. To quote the Poison song “Something to believe in” :

I drive by the homeless sleeping on the cold dark street
Like bodies in an unmarked grave
Underneath the broken old neon sign
That used to read “Jesus Saves”

And miles away lived the rich folk
And I see how they’re living it up
While the poor they eat from hand to mouth
The rich is drinking from a golden cup

And it just makes me wonder
Why so many lose, so few win?

Anyway, to get back to the Colbert Report. He went on to say that yesterday’s vote on raising the debt ceiling, which was originally brought up by a Republican, was little more than a farce. They blocked an attempt raise the debt ceiling which was brought up by Congressman Dave Camp. He actually spoke up saying that it should not pass. However, that was not the most interesting thing that occurred – as the NY Times reported, Republican leaders called Wall Street Executives before the vote to assure them that the vote was just for show. So they essentially showed their Tea Party counterparts that they are “serious” on debt reduction but also keep their Wall Street supporters entertained with political theatre. As Colbert put it, Republicans can say one thing to their Tea Party followers and another to Wall Street executives. The only thing is that to one of these groups, the Republicans are talking out of their asses. As Colbert put it “don’t tell me which one, I’ve Tivo’ing the end of the economy”

Don’t get me wrong – political theatre is present on both sides of the idealogical divide. It’s unfortunately become part and parcel of today’s political landscape. However, the Republicans seem to be worse off when it comes to scaring people, as well as misrepresenting the truth. There are double standards today that the Republicans seem to be blissfully ignorant about, when it comes to talking to the press. I do hear the word “lame stream media” being tossed around when it comes to reporting on Republicans. Maybe there is some truth in that – that they are biased against a lot of Republicans. If you take that route though, then wouldn’t you also agree that Fox News is even more biased towards the Republicans? If any network were to be accused of bias and rampant pro party commentaries then good old Fox News would be top of that list.
Consider this – Sarah Palin is currently going across the country in her large bus with her family acting as if she is gearing up for her run for President. However, as was pointed out on The Daily Show a couple of days ago, she is still under contract to Fox News with a 6 figure salary, and as such, is contractually not allowed to give interviews to other networks. She’s not letting the press know where she is going next so that she can allegedly make the lame stream media work. Oh, except for Fox News of course, because as I had mentioned, she is an employee.

It was only yesterday that I realized something – if Sarah Palin had declared her candidacy, she would have to resign from her cushy Fox News job, They made Huckabee declare weeks ago – but not Palin – I wonder why?

Since we’re talking about Sarah Palin, let’s look at some of her more recent comments.

1. When talking about the national debt, she made a claim that was originally stated by Ms Pinocchio herself, another bastion of truth, Michelle Bachmann. Palin said that Obama had passed “a trillion dollars in stimulus package projects that still have resulted in record-setting unemployment, a heartbreaking number of home foreclosures, crashed markets left and right.”

So everyone knows that the Stimulus Plan was $800 billion – a large amount, but not $1 trillion. Maybe Sarah Palin has some otherworldly math that she can use to show us how $800 billion = $1 trillion ?
Record setting unemployment – in 1992, when Ronald Reagan was president, the unemployment rate had topped 9.7% – it reached 9.6% in 2010 – too high for anyone’s liking, but by no means a record.
I don’t see a connection between the Stimulus Package and home foreclosures or markets crashing “left and right”. Maybe in Sarah Palin’s mind, she can just say something and it will be true? Just a thought!

2. When talking about the impacts of the drilling permit moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico, Palin said “We are going to be looking at $8 billion a day that we are going to be pouring into foreign countries in order to import that make-up fuel that we are going to need to take place of what we could have gotten out of the Gulf.” From all reports, she was quite demonstrative when she spoke about oil, as she has the “drill baby, drill” logo over her bus’ gas cap, and obviously is passionate about this topic. It’s a pity that she wasn’t as accurate or truthful as she was emphatic. Her logic behind the $8 billion was that we were looking at “150,000 barrels less per day next year and 200,000 barrels per day less being able to be developer from the Gulf in the year after..”

Look at it like this – the entire world consumes 85 million barrels of oil a day. If you use a calculator, you’ll see that at $100 per barrel, 200,000 barrels of oil a day comes to $20 million a day. Can you make $20 million = $8 billion? I can’t.

To me, Sarah Palin is out for only one thing. And for one reason, and one reason only.
To get back at Katie Couric. Why? Well, she asked the one question that proved to be the beginning of the end for Sarah Palin, and no matter how you try to spin it, it’s just a simple question that has no “gotcha” attachments – what newspapers do you read? Palin could have said that she didn’t read one particular paper, that she got her news online or from the TV. Instead, she showed the world that she doesn’t read the news, (at that time) has never left the country and would say anything if it sounded good, irrespective of the facts ( I can see Russia from here).

Sarah Palin is not alone in this. I mentioned Michelle Bachmann, and everyone of course knows of Mr Newt “I had affairs because I am a patriot” Gingrich, who said in an interview that Congressman Paul Ryan’s Medicare Slashing budget was a piece of “right wing social engineering.” He took a lot of flak from fellow Republicans on that. So the next day he took it back, actually trying to make the case that if anyone tried to quote him on that interview, it would be a gross violation of ethics. He said “I want to make sure that every House Republican is protected from some kind of dishonest Democratic ad. So let me say on the record, any ad which quotes what I said on Sunday is a falsehood.”
Really, Newt?
As a matter of fact, you claim you no longer hold that view, but you can’t tell people that you didn’t say it. It’s a televised interview. You weren’t tricked, as it was a simple question that you answered, and answered truthfully. Like so many politicians before you, you are changing your view to benefit your chances – not because you believe it.

Part of me is worried. Someone like Palin or Bachmann or even Gingrich in power would make this fine country a place that would not be as welcoming as it has been. On the other hand, if that is the opposition, then maybe that spells good news for President Obama. I still feel that George W Bush didn’t so much win the election in 2004 as the Democrats gave it away.

Anyway, I’m done now – off my soapbox.

Here’s a song that I talked about earlier. It’s Poison’s “Something to believe in”

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Peace!

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A Touch Of Frost

Posted on June 2, 2011 by Manoj

If my memory serves me correctly, my friend Jamie used to watch a show called “A Touch Of Frost” starring David Jason. I must admit to having never seen it before, mostly because I loved David Jason’s character in Only Fools And Horses, good old Del Boy. Recently, I’ve been trolling Netflix to find something new to watch, and as it turns out, they have the entire series available for streaming. So I’ve started watching it, and I must say that it is absolutely brilliant! There’s a sense of humor in this show, even though it is a drama, and David Jason is awesome as the wily Detective Inspector Jack Frost. The show started in 1992, and ended in 2010. I’m only up to Season 4 now, but am enjoying it immensely.
The show is set in the fictional South Midlands town of Denton, and was shot around Yorkshire. Despite being an excellent Detective, Frost is a flawed human being, and I believe that only makes his character more lovable and believable. Take the first episode for instance – his wife is terminally ill, and he ends up a widower by the end of the episode. At the end, he is in a pub talking to the nurse that was helping his wife, and he explains to her that their marriage had been over long ago, to the point where he was planning on ending it. On the day that he was going to tell his wife, she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. So he went out and got drunk, because he knew that he couldn’t leave her. While drunk, he came across a situation with an armed man, and resolved the situation, but not before getting shot. For his actions (reckless as they were), he was awarded the George Cross, which is the highest civilian honor for bravery.
As the series progresses, we find out that his wife was never happy with anything that he did, as she was more interested in people’s perceptions of him, and wanted to be able to brag about him to her friends. That was one of the reasons why he felt that the marriage wasn’t working. When he was awarded the George Cross, that was one of the proudest days of her life.
Interestingly enough, Frost doesn’t have a single sidekick in this show. He is assigned different people of different ranks, and the chemistry between them is different. He enjoys a love hate relationship with his superintendent Norman Mullet, who Frost refers to as Horn Rimmed Harry. Mullet is Frost’s foil, and is more politically inclined than Frost likes.
Please remember that British police don’t carry guns, so it’s very different from the American shows with guns a blazing and car chases galore. Somehow, that would seem out of place for this show. The stories are excellent, the locations are apt, and the acting is superb. I really am enjoying it!

Instead of a music video, this time I’m going to leave you with one of the most famous clips from “Only Fools And Horses”. I dare you not to laugh!

 

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Peace!

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A smile from a beautiful woman

Posted on May 31, 2011 by Manoj

This past Saturday night, I found myself home alone again, and started to feel restless. Manchester United had lost earlier that day to Barcelona, and I was not really in the mood for any company, so I decided to go for a drive. I love driving on summer nights, mostly because I can drive with the windows and sunroof open, with some good music playing. After I got into the car, my restless mood turned slightly nostalgic, so I decided to pay a visit to the different places that I had worked at. It was like taking a trip down memory lane as I cast my mind back to the days that I worked in an office every day, and the people that I worked with. After a while, I started to feel peckish, and since it was a Saturday night, and I couldn’t be bothered cooking anything, I decided to call my local Indian restaurant and place an order to go.
So I called up Bombay Grille, ordered some dinner, and kept on my drive, finally ending up at the restaurant around 9:30pm or so.
As I walked into the restaurant, I noticed that they were setting something up outside the club next door. When I came back out with my food, there was a small tent, with an electric palm tree and some lights. There were two large gentlemen working on setting up more stuff, so I continued on to my car.
That’s when I saw her. Without a doubt, one of the most beautiful women that I have seen in a long while, with legs that seemed to go on for miles, walking up the path towards me.

And then she smiled. It was a genuine smile, not one that was the visual equivalent of “how are you doing” without waiting for the response. This was a warm, genuine smile that sent a warm feeling radiating out from the center of my being. She was tall, and nicely dressed, and looked like a hostess that was probably working at the club that night. So I smiled back at her, and as she came up to me, said “hi”. There was a moment as we passed when our eyes met, and I, for a second, forgot where I was. As I was that close, I could feel the genuine warmth that she was exuding, and it made me feel really good about myself.

So I did what I normally do under circumstances such as these. I kept on walking until I got to my car. I then got in and looked in vain down the path because I was hoping against hope that she would walk down the path to say hello. When she didn’t, I can’t say that I wasn’t disappointed, but then I just thought of her smile and I felt good again.

You’re probably thinking – why would a woman have this sort of effect on me. Well, to be perfectly honest, I am very rarely the recipient of a genuine smile from a beautiful woman, so when it does happen, I do tend to feel a little overwhelmed!

As I sat in my car, I went over a scenario where one of the large gentlemen setting up outside the club took offense at my smile to this beautiful woman, and started hassling me. In my minds eye I had witty retorts followed by some dazzling footwork to avoid his bull like attack. Then I slowly came back to reality and realized that I was being a doofus and drove home. I was still happy, because I had still had the memory of a beautiful woman to keep me company.

Now there are a couple of things that I have to mention.

1. I can’t remember what she looks like. She was beautiful to look at, but it was the smile that caught my attention. The smile was genuine, like she was happy to see me, even though I’d never laid eyes on her before. It’s not often that I am on the receiving end of one of those, so please forgive me as a ramble on about it!
2. Truth be told, if I had stayed to talk to her, I would have probably made a complete mess of it. I have no trouble talking to women normally – add some romantic interest and I would make a babbling baboon appear to be a Rhodes Scholar.

Anyway, I just wanted to share the fact that I felt really good afterwards, and for that I am grateful. A smile from a beautiful woman really made my day!!

Now, onto music!

Here’s a song by Gary Lawyer (I told you that I was in a nostalgic mood) called “Nights on Fire”:

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Peace!!

Posted in General Ramblings | 4 Comments

Paul

Posted on March 28, 2011 by Manoj

Well, it’s Sunday night, and I really wanted to go and watch a movie. I’ve only seen two movies (at the theatre) this year, and I have a list of movies that I would like to see. So tonight, I went and saw Paul, and boy I am glad that I did!

Paul is a movie from two of my favorite movie makers – Simon Pegg and Nick Frost. You may recognize them from Shaun of the Dead or Hot Fuzz, but if not, Simon Pegg was in Mission Impossible 3, as well as playing Scottie on the re-incarnation of Star Trek that was out a couple of years ago.

So this movie is about a couple of nerds from England who come to Comic Con in the US, and plan to hit all the famous UFO related spots with an RV. Oh, and by hitting, I don’t mean literally! Along the way, they are overtaken by a car that crashes, and when they go to help the driver, they discover Paul – an alien! While Simon Pegg’s character Graeme is somehow able to remain somewhat coherent, Nick Frost’s character Clive promptly pisses his pants and faints.

Paul explains that he is on the run, and needs their help. Rather grudgingly, they agree to help, mostly because their are sci-fi geeks, but also because they are scared of being probed!

This starts a great sequence with Jason Bateman’s shadown “Man in Black” character chasing them with the assistance of two inept junior agents played by the capable Bill Hader and the funny (and later creepy) Joe Lo Truglio. Our heroes meet up with the very religious Kristen Wiig (wearing a t-shirt with Jesus shooting Darwin in the head for being blasphemous, with the words “Evolve This” in bold letters below!).

I can’t tell you too much without revealing the story, but it was a great movie. I laughed a lot, and there were so many good references to other science fiction movies. It was just plain brilliant! I am so glad that I went to see it, and this will be a definite DVD purchase once it comes out!

So I am going to make myself some tea and watch a little bit of TV before I go to bed. It’s just past midnight, and I do have to work tomorrow. I’m feeling a little peckish, so I may snack on some raw almonds too!

Hmm – now a song for this post. Well, there weren’t too many songs in the movie, so I’ll maybe give you something else. How about P!nk’s “Raise your glass?” However, rather than give it to you as is, I’ll give you one better. Here’s a video from the Stritch School of Medicine in Loyola College in Chicago – it shows you the ingenuity of soon to be medical residents doing a flash mob dance at the Match Day Ceremony to the pleasant surprise of everyone there.

Enjoy!

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Peace!

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments