Friday, April 29, 2005

Thursday, April 28, 2005

Fumbling Towards Ecstacy

stayed up late last night waiting for a sarah mclachlan torrent to finish downloading and im beginning to resent the fact that torrents are determining my waking hour. i have no idea what it is that prevents me from shutting the comp down and sleeping, but no, i can't leave for the life of me when 80% has been downloaded and the time remaning comes to an hour. this phase for me become psychologically critical, im hoping and praying fervently that the download rate continues, that no additional leecher comes and spoils my perfect world, all i want is for that bloody download to end, yes in this phase i start morphing into an obsessed psychopath

after getting broadband, i've noticed a huge change in my existencial well being. my state is determined by the health of my precious downloads, when one of my downloads is going particularly well, getting 15 KB/s, i feel so elated, rather like god's specially anointed angel, for whom the red sea of downloaders has parted to make way for an unobstructed download (DL from now on), and when some of them remain poised at 0%, life is filled with anxiety and existencial queries. i've noticed a rather scary phenomenon, when the DL reaches 99% i become really nervous, hoping that no destructive force on earth will come between that DL and me. i don't feel this possesive of any guy for that matter. these days oddly most of my DL's are getting stuck at 99%, leading to a whole day of restlessness, and sometimes even questioning the ineffable plan, (i did that for the CSNY DL)

thats half the story, once the album has been listened to, and if its not particularly enticing it opens another flood gate of issues, damn im unlucky in life or why do i get rotten quality etc, so i've devised my own method of time and more importantly emotion management. artists like alison krauss, REM, CSNY, rufus wainwright, fiona apple, pearl jam are generally good return on investment (time & emotion), where as radiohead, portishead, mazzy star, well it can sometimes get weird. i think i've become a sort of guru about the art of downloading and one cardinal rule is to read atleast 6 music reviews to really gauge how excited you must get about the album.
wait, am i really that weird?
well coming back to my sarah mclachlan DL, i can't express how excited i got about it. i almost nurtured it, made sure my other DL's didn't get in the way, kept the comp open for 7 hours refreshed my connection when i thought the speed was slowing down... well im extremely happy to state that she didnt disappoint, fumbling towards ecstacy is stellar, but then i've been in love with sarah's voice, i almost want to fall asleep enconsed by her voice, ah theres nothing like a good diva's voice first thing in the morning( ok i admit its noon now)
well im off to lunch with kay, and well the lil psycho me is happy, thanks sarah

Saturday, April 23, 2005

Agaetis byrjun

i've been wondering how to describe Sigur Ros's music. someone called it " whale in heat music", while k called it "the music of radiohead and enigma's mutant child", but methinks it has a rather pagan wombish quality. like the ideal background music for the floating ophelia.i first heard Sigur Ros's Svefn-G-Englar on the OST of Vanilla Sky and the odd thing about it is how free it makes you, so free that you want to save the rain forests, baby sea lions, erase third world debt.... hmm its a pagan music that makes you feel like Bono at Davos.
i've never understood why all these people "in business" scramble off to a posh ski resort to talk about business and irritatingly third world debt. Bono talks of it, Bill gates talks of it and most annoyingly Koffi annan talks of it, in switzerland, where all they are concerned about is the alacrity of the cuckoo in their clocks.when you are in a place where everybody is talking about the "pooahrest of the pooah" (POP, for convenience) who gives a damn, when everybody is pretty much giving the same soundbites ? now if Bono ( lets not forget the shades) went to the hinterlands of mozambique, among the semi clad natives and rallied for third world debt erasure, that would make for good television, but when you're in a ski resort the only thing one should do,is ski, me thinks.
well anyhow, heres the link for Agaetis byrjun, its a free download, (many thanks nag)

Monday, April 18, 2005

Not with a bang but a whimper

i'm very happy that the cricket series got over. i was tired of having to see all my programmes on the second airing, or sometimes even the third, just because my cricket crazy family didn't want to miss a single second of cricket. i'm not as crazy as them. partly as a reaction to the affection shown by my family to the game. my brother, who was by all accounts the daimyo of t.v, would mercilessly switch from a paul newman movie (that i'd be watching) to a kenya- zimbabwe highlights faster than one could say kamikaze, mom on the other hand can belt out match stats that could make Wisden blush with shame and dad has sent the remote on so many aerodynamic journeys, following every middle order collapse, that im seriously contemplating putting shock absorbers on it. but me? im generally fruit cake, oblivious to any cricket brouhaha. simply because sports for me is entertainment and eye candy, and cricket has none of it. its grossly over rated me thinks.
entertainment is watching sportsmen display sublime fluidity of motion. like zidane's poetry etched football play or motion like a delicate brush stroke emanating from a maestro's hand, like roger federer's tennis. when i see cricket, it looks ugly.cricket these days is devoid of delicate wristy shots and more inclined towards ugly and loud slog shots. its obscene. like serena williams's tennis. entertainment, is watching unbelievable consequences of human motion, like zizou's goal vs england at the euro, or Hoogenband's desperate 50m dash to defend his olympic title, and watching these feats make you feel like a sinner redeemed, purged and pure. cricket just doesn't have that excitement. and as far as eye candy goes, i can't fathom how the women of this country voted tendulkar as the #2 sexiest man in the country(#1 was shahrukh khan, i can't fathom that either!), flanneled men are as charming as onion icecream on the female senses, unlike those footballers, in their cute shorts with a hint of finely cut muscle peeking out (slyly), now thats real eye candy *wink*
and finally, after what seems like an eternity of DD coverage, and an unpardonable assault on the english language, "the batter is now facing the baller", i really wish, black holes had a thing for DD's comentary team (post match analysis "experts" included)
wishing and hoping

Thursday, April 07, 2005

Irony is the best medicine.

few people can experience in their life times what im experiencing right now. the left butt is on a painkiller induced la la land trip, while right butt has no clue whatsover. so when i walk, things alternate between sensation and no sensation. like the butt (punster, funster) of a very obscene joke. so without further ado, i shall launch into how these things came to be.
i blame it solely on Oprah.
she flaunted this theory of substituting muscle for flab ,yada yada , long story, and which resulted in me lifting weights and i prolly lifted a little too much and i ended up with terrible back spasm. i thought it will pass in a few days, and heck a lil pain is nothing compared to what i shall experience bearing quadruplets, so good training and stuff. yes i know one day i shall end up writing a sucessful self help book , about turning negtives into positives and such. finally the pain was unbearable and i had to see the doctor.
i was adamant that i wanted to see a female orthpedician only, i didnt want some guy to fondle with my back, especially after my lecherous knee doctor. but as the receptionist at the hospital put it, " madam, if you want a female orthopedician, you'll have to leave the country!". pig!!. anyhow. my dad reassured me he'd blow the doctor to the moon if he tried anything hanky panky. and so we chose the oldest geriatric doctor available.
when the doctor heard that it was a gym mishap, he burst into peals of laughter,. bag of bones, enjoying himself goes, " you want muscles to become a female wrestler?" ho ho ho hahahahahahahahahha heheheheheheheheheheh hoah hoah hoah tsk tsk tsk. after a lot of needless mirth, he asked me what the need for weights was?. i can wax eloquence on a lot of things, but infront of a doctor who was laughing so uncouthly, i lost my confidence and said, lamely " ironically, it was a back strengthening exercise". hohohohohohoho hahahahahahahahahahahha hehehehehehehehehehhehe hoah hoah hoah hoah tsk tsk tsk and whole bit of phlegm ratteling also.
finallly, after he wiped his tears, he wrote me a painkiller, which a mallu nurse expediently administered to me. in the left butt which is now in lalala land, while the other is rather befuddled by all the fuss.
anyhow, part 2 of my magnum opus will be a little late in coming. my back is still weak and when the back is raring to go for a spot of strengthening exercises, ill get around to it.