people get ready
there's a train a-coming
you don't need no baggage
you just get on board
all you need is faith!

The 2012 leaves in about 22 hours from now. We do not know where it will take us, or what we will end up doing; who along the way we will love, and who we will hate; who will make us smile, who will make us cry; who will break our hearts, and who will bring us joy. But we have to get on.

And I, as usual, will be standing in the doorway.

Taylor Hicks with a version of this song I love. Enjoy the ride!

I knew a man

who could see the future.

He didn't have much of a past.

What is this
we drink away?
Pain, disappointment, regret, or
just the memories?

The King of Good Times sure got some balls, don't he? Your fucking airline, you went overboard, and now you want the government to bail you out! Wah! Shut the bludy thing down and have 240 girls in your damn calendar next year instead of 12! Moron!

***

2G scam. No bail, only jail for the bludy rascals. Good! Every time I start to feel sorry for Kanimozhi having to use the toilet in full view of her prison guards (unless the old walrus has had the latest European crapper and bath fitted in for her), the Anna Hazare in me springs up and says, -- No! It's because of scum like her that we have people shitting on the streets! No sympathy.

***

Metallica kicked ass! Though I have to say the Palace Grounds is no place to hold a rock concert. Because you do not make 50,000 people wade in and out through the muck from one entrance and exit like cattle. Not unless it's bludy Woodstock. In which case we'd have been more appropriately under-dressed.

I gotta say this for the Bangalore girls though - those beer drinking, chhota kapda wearing, babes with their cancer sticks: You rock! But the next time I go there I want an automatic pistol with plenty of spare cartridges to shoot some of those bastard rickshaw drivers in the head. That'll be more fun than watching a bunch of beer guzzling chicas going about their business.

And Koshy's. Yes, you know how they say no trip to Bangalore is complete without a meal at Koshy's ... well, I'm pretty sure that if I tried hard enough I'd be able to turn out a better plate of biryani than the cold shit they served us for lunch that afternoon. The locals might be docile and understanding and may take it all sitting down, but God help you if you fuck with a guy from out of town who's hungry! Like in the old Westerns, he'll whip out his guns and shoot you bludy dead. In fact I quite imagined doing that at Koshy's. First to go would be that condescending head waiter who claimed their biryani is not heated up again once it is made because it destroys the flavour! Yeah, and I'm a Kingfisher babe with nice bazongas!

This place on the other hand was awesome!

***

Ryan Adams and Whiskeytown - Dancing with the women at the bar.

It was the start
of a beautiful love affair --
he was in love
and she needed an affair.

For Cara

If freedom had wings ...
someone would shoot it
out of the sky.

Theirs was a love so strong
they kept it out in the sun
and in the rain and the snow
till it got brittle
and broke.

To me getting rid of corruption in this country is like a project to clean the river Ganges. There is only one way to do it -- drain the river completely, clean the thousands of years of shit collected at the bottom, and shoot all those bastards who will waste no time in dirtying it again. Does Anna have any clue how he's going to do it? Or does he merely stand by the banks of the great river proclaiming that something is rotten, all the while hoping that the river will drain on its own, get cleaned by itself, and that all those filthy bastards we can do without will be so obliging as to shoot themselves in the head?

I believe that as of now the only thing Anna Hazare has done is to become a symbol of hope for those who actually believe there is some hope. But for things to change it will take a cleaning up the kinds of which has never been seen before. How many of us are willing to get our hands dirty?

Having said that, I have to say I am terribly excited at the prospect of what lies ahead post this new inquilab. Perhaps we shouldn’t even be talking about a big change. Perhaps the little changes would work just as well. Let’s wait and see. Or rather, let’s not wait and see. Let’s go out there and do our bit.

How I wish guns were freely available in this country!

So the Pakis have very cleverly managed to sideline all issues relating to dialogue and bilateral mumbo-jumbo by shifting everyone’s attention to their new babe Foreign Minister! Because the truth is they don’t want dialogue – they want Kashmir, and whatever else they can get their hands on. As for their choice of young lady, we have to say, bravo! South Block must not have seen so much excitement in years!

The press as always is the first to be distracted. I can just imagine the scene at the joint press conference when it happens:

Madam, can you tell us in brief your foreign policy on India?

In brief, it is not to let the Indians into my territory.

But what if they manage to sneak in and infiltrate your sensitive installations??

I can assure you all sensitive installations are well protected. Penetration attempts of any kind will be met with swift action!

…. But the Americans penetrate at will!

Do not compare yourselves to the Americans. They are a lot bigger than you!!

***

Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara. When a guy decides to surprise a girl by proposing marriage, as we so often see in the movies, how does he know beforehand if the ring will fit? And in ZNMD the ring that he buys for his mother slides effortlessly on to his girlfriend’s finger! I wonder.

But the worst part of the whole movie – or should I say the most depressing - is when Katrina (who looks so gorgeous you want to reach out and grab her ... in a nice way of course!) rides off on a Bullet behind their car and then proceeds to kiss that reptile Roshan smack on the mouth. Ewww!

Apart from being a visual treat (I can see a whole bunch of rich Delhi/Chandigarh types and possibly even the more thrifty Mumbaikar already booking their tickets to Spain), ZNMD does nothing but to promote tourism in what is a near bankrupt country, and gives us delusions of how wonderful life would be if we risked it all and 'just did it'. But where's the sense in showing a bunch of rich folk doing this? They've got nothing to bludy lose! Show me instead a hard working, loan paying, average everyday Joe who says to hell with everything, and just goes out and does what he has always wanted to do, and I will applaud louder than all the crowds at the Tomatina put together.

From The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter, this is Right Moves.

Frankly I have to say I’m a little disappointed that Aamir Khan, from whom we’ve come to expect more (given that the rest of our filmmakers barring one or two are all a bunch of idiots) would decide to dive into what I call the 'Tapori humour' genre. But judging by the hoards of (presumably intelligent) people queuing up outside cinemas to get a piece of the action, I’d say business-wise at least he has made a good decision.

Watching the trailer you know just what to expect – a ridiculously contrived plot, buffoonery, and crass, sometimes juvenile humour passing off for comedy. But when you have audiences that will laugh at practically anything, it works. In fact I reckon If I got up and cracked a joke while the movie was running, people would laugh at that too.

And have you noticed how in almost every so-called Hindi comedy there has to be a trigger event where something gets inter-changed with something else or passes into the wrong hands – be it money, jewels, a human being even, or in this case - shit! Without that mix-up nothing happens. I wonder why.

As the name of the movie itself suggests, its makers had no clue what to call it. Smelly Potty might have worked just as well!

***

I need to buy a new phone. The thought did cross my mind to buy one of those ugly black contraptions everyone seems to have these days but I will not let myself be 'Blackburied', no matter how handy those damn things are.

Even if they’re handy, are they value for money? Because really there is no greater satisfaction than getting value for money. And that’s the problem: most manufacturers will never give you value for money. Because then you will end up being satisfied for longer than they’d like. Which is not good for business.

***

My first post published using Windows Live Writer. Which is pretty cool, I think. Not everything Microsoft makes is bad!

Here’s a track that came pre-loaded with my new laptop - from a band that call themselves Assembly of Dust (wonder if they had naming issues similar to the makers of Delhi Belly). Featuring banjo maestro Béla Fleck this is Edges.