The One Who Beats Shakira

Often I've said that I don't like to keep drafts. However there has been one lurking in my, err... drafts section for quite a some time now. Note 'has been'. Yes dear reader, I killed the bugger, which was named Things Never Turn Out The Way You Think They Will and so you will never get to see what was it about! Muhahahahahahaaa! Now I feel so relieved (NOT what you think though) that it's gone. I always like to type out what's in my mind and hit the publish button, but all this time that post has been troubling me. Like a little pebble inside your shoe. Whatever you do it keeps coming back to me, continuously nagging me; "Hey dude, did you forget? But I'm here, see, in your drafts! What're you gonna do? Are you not gonna publish me? Pleeease Sach, don't ignore me! PUBLISH ME!" Drafts are such drama queens.

Speaking of drama queens, my dear old friend Milla is a very good one. She's been, since forever, asking me for a post by all the dramatic ways possible but I still didn't do it for her. But then few days ago she did the sweetest thing and put up a post about me in her blog. I was expecting it to be dissing me all throughout, which is what she usually does, but it wasn't so. A very nice post and I would link to it even but for the fact that it has a picture of me. I don't really entertain the thought that every Tom, Dick and Harry out there finding out what I look like. I'm ugly you know. Anyway, Milla, this is for you! Oh and as I always say, Shakira doesn't stand a chance if she is to compete with you. With that body part I mean.

Finally, I'm bored to death these days, because having no TV series to watch kinda sucks. Why did they have to end House, Lost, Flash Forward, 24 and Survivor all withing friggin' two weeks? Why can't they plan them so that they air at least a couple of good series all throughout the year? Oh well, these Americans. So finally I decided on Fringe, which up to now I avoided watching because it, for me, isn't that interesting. It's like they tried so hard to beat The X-Files but still miles behind. Honestly, it's like the poor man's X-Files. And the cast sucks big time. But when you have nothing better, even that looks OKish.

Later

Football and Jap Chicks

The other day, Japan played their first world cup game. Not only they played, they scored a goal and won the game as well. Of course you need to score at least one goal to win, but sometimes stating the obvious helps you increase the number of words in a blog post. But I digress, the point is it saddened me immensely. Not that I hate Japs or anything, but if you live in Japan, and if you're a sports fan but not a fan of the Japanese team, then the norm is to wish them fail. If not anything else purely for the peace of your mind. Let me explain; in the last Olympics held in China, the relay team of Japan won a short distance race. Though I said they won, it was only the second or third place, which I don't remember exactly. Apparently it was their first ever track event medal in Olympics and this is what followed; immediately after the race they showed a replay but the camera focused on the Japan team. Then another replay from another angle, still only the Japan team. Then the baton exchanges, again, only the Japan team. Then their finish. Again footage of their runners. Meantime, the team started a victory lap and the camera guy followed them all around the ground for another five minutes. Then personal interviews of each of them. Then they showed another couple of replays of their team for good measure before finally showing just one replay of the race with all the teams in it and only then I could find out who won - a good 30 or 40 minutes after the race. All this while other races were going on and we didn't get to watch any of them. And now the same fears have returned to haunt me; what if they win another game? Will they show that game every time there's another match being played? Will they somehow make it so that footage of the goal they score will appear on every web site you go to? Will they make it compulsory for everyone to have a CD of the game, bought for 10,000 Yen, at all times? These are fair thoughts you know.

Moving on, I was on a train station yesterday evening, as is the case with every day that I go to work. So then all of a sudden this Jap chick appeared in front of me, and no she didn't just appear there like Harry Potter, just that she came into my field of vision. Now there's nothing unusual about a Jap chick in a train station in Japan, you might say. Of course there isn't except for the fact that she had a perfect arse, one that any straight guy or a gay chick wouldn't mind sparing a second look. This in itself is a rarity, a Jap chick with a perfect arse that is, but that's not exactly what caught my attention. On the back pockets of her pants which were pure white, in big red block letters were the words;

FEEL ME

It takes a guy a lot of courage, determination and will power not to oblige, but yours truly has them all. Unfortunately.

Cooking 101

For the first 27 years of my existence I knew only three things to cook. Or rather three ways of cooking one thing; boiled eggs, omelets and bull's eye. Then I came to Japan and survived on Jap food for a week. But any food prepared without using a few spoon fulls of rocket fuel isn't really food. Thus I set my hands upon the fine art of cooking Sri Lankan dishes.

Now my mom being the wise woman she is (despite being scary at times - especially when it comes to marriage related stuff), not only did she think it was good to send a bucket load of spices and all the other cooking ingredients with me, she also saw it necessary to write me a little 'how to' booklet of cooking and put it in my bag. So then I was fully armed with everything I needed I set to work. Now, my mom was all wise and good, but she forgot that she's a woman and I'm not. So, the whole booklet was full of phrases like "add a little salt", "heat the pan a bit" or "boil appropriately" or similar instructions. Now I don't know what these mean to women but I sure as hell know that they sound to men as comprehensive as calculus is for baboons. We know what it means when you say "add one tea spoon of salt". It's clear isn't it; you get a tea spoon, you pour salt powder into it once and add the thing into whatever it is being cooked. Or if you say boil for four minutes, then that makes sense. But what is "little" or "a bit"? Those words should be banned in cooking instructions and should be subjected to severe penalties.

Anyway, five minutes into my cooking adventures I was baffled as I could get, and I was sure nearby restaurant was going to get another order. But, yours truly isn't a man who gives up so easily. I did the only sensible thing I could; picked up the phone and rang mom. We went through the whole cook book, this time me noting down amounts and times exactly though it took more than a good few minutes for the process to complete. Simply because my mom continually failed to understand why I fail to understand what a "little bit of salt" means. Women, I tell you.

As you may have already guessed, albeit my determination the first meal was far from being edible so had to throw it away with much sadness and an empty stomach. But I took the advice of Thomas Edison, who was unsuccessful for about thousand times before finally coming up the perfect way to make a light bulb, that he did not fail thousand times but discovered thousand ways not to make a light bulb. It paid off, because soon I was OK and later quite good at making my rice and curry. However I'm glad that I did not have to wait thousand times like the poor dude or I would have starved to death or killed myself. Such is the fine art of cooking.

Growing up, Men and Women

Finally, I get around to blogging again albeit having nothing in particular to write about. You see, due to a combination of having to actually work at work, being lazy to blog in my spare time and having no interesting things happening around here of late. It's strange though - when you go a few days without writing something it keeps coming back to you. Like a particularly nagging girlfriend. From time to time you get the feeling "I must write", but in no time my laziness takes over and the result is only four blog posts in a month. But it's better not to write at all rather than writing something utterly crap, so I didn't bother. But today, after a hearty lunch I'm dozing off here when in fact I should pretend to be working. That's when a blog can come to your rescue. Writing it is then. Bear the random nonsense and read on, dear reader.

Firstly, it was sad that LOST ended. For so many years I was a huge fan and didn't miss a single episode. Every Wednesday was a cause for a mini celebration because it was the day you get LOST. No pun intended. But the way it ended was so disappointing - for a drama of such epic scale it was such an anticlimax. My good friend, D (who by the way is going to be a commercial pilot and make skies unsafe for us) put a status message saying D watched LOST and is LOST. Exactly. I mean, it's like even they, whoever this they might be, didn't know what to do with the story or how to end it. In a nutshell, they unplugged some kind of stone, killed the bad guy and plugged it back. Then everybody died or nobody died. I don't really know - I'm lost too. However, there's light in the distance, as our good old LadyD said that it has a deep meaning and kind of hard to explain. LD, I'm not mocking you, please do explain. I really want to know. And then, apparently, 24 ended too. Thank god! That guy never seemed to die and did not die even at the end of the last series. But at least it looks like it's finally over. Phew.

One of my very good old friends' father passed away this weekend. We haven't been in much contact of late, but the news kind of shook me so I called the next day despite having nothing to say. I mean, really, what is there that you can say to someone who lost their close ones feel better? So I dialed and told her that I don't really know what to say but just that I wished I could be there with her right now. I really do feel that way. It was really heartbreaking to listen to her - I can't even imagine the pain she must be going through. Hope she'll get through it, and may you rest in peace, uncle D.

Oh and on a lighter note, though getting old is not a thing to be taken lightly, yours truly turned 29 a little over a week ago. See, I was thinking of posting something about it but was so lazy I totally ignored it. Anyway, the 30s are getting closer and it is time to, err... adjust your thinking. From now on anyone who's younger than 40 will be considered a youngster so that I can relax thinking there are ten more years to go before I'm officially being declared 'uncle'. However, couple of days after my birthday I had a kind of a funny conversation with my cousin sister, P, who's my favorite one too. Funny because I'm 29, she's 18, we were talking about marriage, having kids and stuff, and she was being serious while I was not. This is how, as I can remember, the conversation went.

P is my sis and S is me.

P : Hey... so when are you going to have kids?

S : WTF! I'm not even married.

P : So get married and have kids soon. I want to see your kids.

S : Why the hell should I get married so soon?

P : It's not 'soon' anymore you know. You lived almost in stone age.

S : Shut up. I have time.

P : Oh come on don't be selfish.

S : What do you mean selfish?

P : When are you going to have kids? Do it quickly or when your kids are at my age you'll be 60 and retired and you'll have no means to support your kids education and stuff. How are you going to send them to good universities and get them married and stuff?

S : WOW! Hold on you young lady! Are you mad? I haven't even thought of getting married and your planning about MY kids' education and their marriage? You surely are crazy!

P : But it's true!

S : So you admit you're crazy?

P : NOO! You should think about getting married and those stuff. You should be responsible.

S : No way. Not now at least. You know, I have thing that I want to do. I want to travel the world, see the world. Enjoy life. How am I gonna do all that with a noisy kid by my side? LOL. No way lady, I'll have kids when I do at least a little bit of those things I wanna do.

It's so true isn't it, when they say that girls stop being girls and grow up when they become adults while men... well they never grow up.

Have a nice week all!