THE CRAPBOOK

The law mandates that the two passengers who occupy the front seats has to wear a seat belt. Well its only a law, which is seldom enforced. I have seen many of the young in flashy cars wearing it. But the older generation never wear it. I guess it because they are not used to the seat belts in their time and consider it to be an irritant.

Seat belt has its on woes. Once I went home and took my dad’s 800 out. As a reflex I put on the seat belt everytime I enter a vehicle, or atleast my hands search for it. I put on the seat belt. After coming back I realized that I have a Slanting ‘L’ mark on my shirt. The seat belt was never used and dust was accumulating on it.  After that I gave the law a skip while using his old 800.

My office mandates that all employees and cab drivers wear seat belts when they exit from the building. The security folks make sure that all are strapped in. The minute the cab drive out of the building premises, the cab driver removes the seat belt in a easy fast motion. “Difficult hai” he said to me once. I stayed strapped in.

The cab driver at my wife’s company wouldn’t even bother to buckle. He will just pull the belt over his chest and drive with one hand. Once the car moves out of the building he just let go of the belt !

I recently had an argument with a relative of mine on using helmets and seat belts. His argument was that helmets and seat belts are an irritant. He went to the extent of saying that there is no use of getting a preserved head if the rest of your body got thrashed in an accident.

I guess there is no point in enforcing these laws. It should be what the people should be taking as precautions.

Consider this scenario, an Indian check the gas connection, check if the fan/bulbs are running, check if the iron is ON before locking his house. And then he pulls the ‘Godrej’ lock twice to see if it was locked right. Then he ride on his bike without a helmet. We cover all gadgets in cover/plastic. (check this post out) to protect it.

I guess we take many precautions to take care of our belongings than ourselves!

*Update : The relative I talked about is an advocate.

The garib rath is supposed to be the ‘Poor Man’s Chariot’ .  Its the ‘Lalu way’ of giving the poor a chance to enjoy benefits that the upper class of the society enjoy. I liked the concept, this also meant lower AC fares.

I once boarded a green colored Garib Rath from Kerala- Yeswatpur (Near Bangalore City). The 3AC interiors to my suprise was a lot cleaner and fresh than the 2Ac compartments of most trains. And to add to my surprise I have to pay for the blanket. Rs 25/Blanket,which obviously have to be returned back.

Nevertheless, the ticket was cheap and I get all the benefits of the 3AC travel.

Now you would have realized that I don’t have anything interesting to write.

Let’s analyze the news

“MJ’s kids are his” says MJ’s dermetologist : Well can’t these guys leave the kids alone? Their granddad is busy selling them for tours and the media is busy finding their real dad. !!

The longest and the last solor eclipse for this century is over : And I din’t wake up on time to watch it. The astrologers say that the outcome of the eclipse would be total doom. India would be at war. The recession would continue.  Financial situation will worsen.

hmm all that analysis with a solar eclipse, I guess the analysts at Moody’s and economy.com can retire.

40th Anniversery  of Moon Landing : Forty years back the Apollo team landed on the moon and Armstrong took the giant leap. With all the consipiracy theories around, which says that the film was shot at a Hollywood studio and noone actually landed on the moon, I guess it was one of the most remarkable human achievement. (Watch Apollo 13 Movie starring Tom hanks,which features the third attempt from Nasa to land on Moon)

Rakhi will definitely marry on Aug 2 Thats good news, finally we can get rid of her from TV.

Cheers!

I was traveling by train the other day on the Lalbagh Express (Chennai – Bangalore) . I managed to get a confirmed ticket on Second Sitting, which is the second class sitting compartment – reserved. The train starts at 1530 hrs and it was not crowded at all. But when the clock struck 1525, there was a huge gust of people rushing in and occupying whatever seat they could find. This did not amaze me; well I have been traveling in trains for a long time now. But there is one another thing that is common in all train journeys.

The seat adjustment.

Consider a family of 4 or a large group of 6, since most of the time we book tickets at the last moment the seats would be allotted scattered. The first one hour after boarding the train would be spent by the leader (whom we can assume as the one who has the tickets and keeps on counting the seats and berths, shouting out his seat numbers, indirectly asking the people sitting or leaning on his reserved seat to MOVE) to move people (read other passengers) around the compartment so that he can get his group sit together.

A well dressed man approached me and said

“   “

“I am sorry??” I said and removed my ipod headphones.

 “Are you traveling alone?” he asked again. Smiling at the silliness.

“Yes” I said.

“Do you mind moving to another seat.”

“I don’t as long as there is one, Sure ! “ I said and picked my bag.

He directed me to another seat pretty much closer to mine.

He approached the old man sitting (or was sitting) next to me and asked the same question. And in a while the old man was with me in our newly allocated seats.

“Koncham adjust pannunke” (Please adjust a little) he said again and kept few of his luggage under our seats.

The adjustment.

I am a victim of seat adjustment every time I travel alone. They target the single travelers who fall easy prey to their questions. How do they identify that you are traveling alone?

If you are armed with a book and have head phones glued to your ears. You are traveling obviously alone.

I am okay with adjustments. It’s okay to move. It’s okay if the family wants to sit together.

But I get moved every time! Every single time!

One of our family friend was stopped by police on his way back from a party. He was drunk and the police charged him for driving under influence. The police man was so generous and kind that he allowed our family friend to drive back home.

At the court our family friend challenged the policeman’s claims that he was drunk.

“If I was driving under influence, then why did the policeman let me drive the car again? Either I should have be arrested or the car confiscated”

The court accepted his claim and let the man go free of any charges.

The policeman would be still wondering what he did wrong.

Well, this is not to praise his ignorance of law(driving under influence) and escaping from law(false claims at the court), but to let people know on how ignorant our policemen are. They do their job partially and never to the fullest.

If they want to charge a person they should be DOING IT not allowing the accused to find any loopholes with the system.

The New Year’s eve and the New Year’s day I found many cars running in zig zags, predictably drunk ! I wondered where the policemen were.

Happy New year everyone !!

No one ever imagined how you turn a plane into a flying missile. No one knew about suicide attacks. No one knew that setting up multiple bombs in a city can bring it to its knees. No one knew that you can just walk in through coastline and start shooting. No one knew that star hotels could be the next target. (well, not everyone!).

After the deadly attacks on the WTC on 9/11, the Unites States beefed up its airport security, so did the rest of the world. India also did it share by increasing security checks at airports. We learned a lesson. We are now increasing the security at the Hotels.

After the recent Mumbai attacks, we are thinking of how to stop terrorists from entering through our coastline.

One thing that our Intelligence Agencies should be doing is to think like a Terrorist. If you notice the pattern of attacks, it’s all new. They used the planes as bombs, now a few young men sprayed bullets on to the street. They come up with new tactics all the time. I guess our authorities are only trying to stop another terrorist attack in the pattern they know of. The terrorists would have already started working on the new pattern.

Now how do we find their pattern? Think like a terrorist. I know it’s hard for ordinary citizens like us, but for those in the line of duty, in Intelligence it shouldn’t be that hard.

In serial killer movies/books/real life stories (The one like CITIZEN X, an HBO original movie), the investigators morale get deteriorated after months of chasing the killer. With every new death, the investigator would be taking it as, his own personal loss and failure. That’s when they start thinking like a serial killer. Who would I target next? Who would be my next victim? How will I trap him/her? How am I going to kill him?

Terrorists are serial killers.

I guess it could be a tough process to think like a killer. This is nothing new, but the results would be good if used intelligently.

I apologize.

A BJP leader in Mumbai made a comment saying that ‘……lipstick clad women could go around and ridicule the politicians….’ What was the point he was trying to make? That everyone turned to the streets offering condolences and protesting against the politicians is a crime or that wearing lipstick is a crime????
Shivraj Patil “The burden is off my shoulders” said this soon after he resigned. Wow, that is the simplest thing to say after running away from your responsibility. Sir, we voted you in NOT FOR THIS !

Mr Deshmukh, the Maharashtra CM “If any responsibility lies with the Chief Minister, I offered to resign”

Sir what did you think you responsibility was in the first day you joined office? To spend time at party meetings and inauguration functions?

And the most outrageous thing I heard today was from the Kerala CM “ Not even a dog would have visited their house” in response to Major Unnikrishnan’s family not welcoming him to their house.

I apologize to the family of Major Unnikrishnan for what the CM has said on behalf of this country.

To the Kerala CM,

Sir, It takes courage to die for the country and it takes courage to see your son’s lifeless body and feel proud of what he had done for this country.

Sir, you sit at cozy a.c rooms enjoying the backwaters or the seashore when you little realize the courage the great martyrs of this country has shown. Its because you are not worth being a citizen of this country.
What you have said is outrageous and strictly not what is expected out of person who is holding such high offices.

Please don’t show up your face anywhere anytime..

The apartment dhobi was a good man. Lets call him Dhobi2. He would collect the clothes and return it promptly, well pressed. He was good at his job, never lost/misplaced any of my clothes and was always on time. One fine day he was missing.

I asked the security guards about him and came to know that no one had any idea about his whereabouts. But he left only after returning all the clothes to the people staying in the apartment.

One of the security guard explained how he became the apartment dhobi. He had a predecessor who was serving the apartment for quite a long time. He was a local dhobi who goes around the neighborhood pushing his cart. One of the families who stay in the apartment invited him to be the apartment dhobi. He was given a small space at the underground car park to press clothes. The on one fine day, the predecessor was missing and there was Dhobi2 pressing clothes. The family who bought him here questioned Dhobi2 about the predecessor only to know that he had sold the ‘rights’ to press at our apartment for 10,000 Rs. (yes ten thousand !!) to Dhobi2.

Now this story is true at the same time strange on how the ‘rights’ to serve the apartment was sold for 10k to a poor man.

Now my best guess is that Dhobi2 would have sold the ‘rights’ he bought to a third person who would be taking the post of the ‘Apartment Dhobi’ soon. Strange??

My brother visited a cousin of mine in the US. My cousin is settled at Washington DC.. My brothers went to see the Air and Space Museum, and then my cousin displayed his special ‘Space Pen’. This is one pen, he explained that could work under zero gravity. It cost the government some money to do research and make the ‘space pen’. The research started when the astronauts found out that they cannot use the normal ball-point pen under zero gravity.

After an hour lecture on the Pen, displaying 360 view of it. My brother said “I think they should have used a pencil instead”

My brother had received this forward, but my cousin definitely has not.

When NASA first started sending up astronauts, they discovered that ball-point pens would not work in zero gravity. To combat this problem, NASA scientists spent a decade and $12 million developing a pen that writes in zero gravity, upside down, underwater, on almost any surface including glass and at temperatures ranging from below freezing to over 300C.
When confronted with the same problem, the Russians used a pencil.

But is this true? Apparently not! Read this.

There is an open position at Microsoft. You can apply here.

We have heard about movie remakes….. now listen to this :

haha, sounds familiar?

Now this

haha again.

I have more links like this with me(got as forward), from Bhool Bullaiyya to Jab We Met, all the recent Bollywood Movie songs are inspirations (read COPIED).