the little things

I procrastinated when Firefox wanted to upgrade itself to version 4 from 3.6.x and now, thanks to their new aggressive release plan, I had to jump right over to version 5. I'm still opening new windows instead of tabs thanks to "View in New Tab" moving up to number one in the context menu for a link -- It's amazing how I seem to have adjusted completely to moving to the second option automatically.

With just a stray kaa and the onomatopoeiac funaa, is the soundtrack of Luv Ka The End the closest a Bollywood soundtrack has come to having English titles for all the tracks? (the tracks are Love kaa the End, Tonight, Freak out, The Mutton Song (truly entertaining, I might add), F.U.N Fun Funaa and Heppy Budday Beybee #6).

Do you know what a DART is? The acronym, of course. Presumably, it's a Daily Activity Report Tool (which, no doubt, measures the litres of water that you used or the reams of a**wipe you consigned to the bin or the number of web sites you visited during the working day). And it's something Indians should be proud of, because according to the results Google gave me when I searched for it, it appears to be a PIO (Product of Indian Origin). I think there's a startup working on a spin-off based on the things you do very often during a working day. It's called the Frequent Activity Report Tool.

what film might have well been about DBAs trying to revive a dead Oracle instance? wake up SID.

72: what could have been

Would it have been like 1972, which boasted Apna Desh, Jawani Diwani, Mere Jeevan Saathi, Parichay and Seeta Aur Geeta among others? None featured in the nominations for Best Music at the Filmfare Awards for that year (conferred in 1973). Perhaps it is best to relish the music and pray that one discovers something new -- something in the arrangement, a forgotten unreleased version, outtakes, session recordings -- in all the soulful effervescent music he had produced. Time to go back and enjoy the complete version of one of my favourite RDB-Asha duets, sharaabii aa.Nkhe.n. As with a lot of his songs, I can't bear to watch what transpired on the screen (even though it's Helen, there's also Rakesh Roshan with that moustache and one of those funny mops). When will someone master this and toss it out on CD?

poetasteless: case study of yet another movie review from rediff

The review of Bheja Fry 2 hosted at rediff is written by Ankur Pathak, who, one fears may have studied English from some institution dedicated to imparting some training in the language to IT professionals in India. One suspects that the writer may also have some interest (or -- shudder! -- credentials) in some school of business. How else does one explain something like this:

And a host of mortifying mishaps follow, where a deserted emotion called humour is expected.

Alas, it never boarded the ship at first.

mortifying mishaps is the fruit of an adventurous foray into alliteration. The review is loaded with many such phrases that could serve well as rejected names for flavours of ice creams abound: overall evolution, bustling firecracker, sensual proximity, massive puncture, stressfully written, fittingly lifted, forcefully enacted, romantic inclination, brainless bummers.

flounders drearily swimming away into unending boredom works as an unintentional nod to the lyrics of Pink Floyd. falls horizontal lacking any kind of variations is the stuff of lyrics of yore, as is breathe the ocean-air easy (excuse the inappropriate hyphen), but mostly couriers his angst without any aggression and asks for an[sic] urgent medical help reflecting mental disability are just some of several signs of incompetent writing (another being It is exclusively separate what a rock star of an actor Vinay Pathak is). I am not sure I understand (aside from the misplaced hyphen) the point of a fragment like he is drafted scenes like showing his radium-watch to a freaking Talwar. Is a freaking Talwar a f*cking sword? What the dagger!

Was the editorial board (should it exist and be competent enough) at Rediff.com was on vacation or asleep when this article was submitted for review? Perhaps the editors wanted to let Mr. Pathak go ahead and make a fool of himself. There seems to be no other explanation for misplaced commas, the random use of double hyphens (when one or none would have sufficed), the incorrect use of hyphens (radium-watch, two-three), the incorrect use of apostrophes in plurals and the use of inappropriate verbs (how does one land a film? how does one over-stress on anything?)

In closing, one cannot help using a line from the article to describe the efforts of the writer of this inconsequential, boeotian, gaumless, insulse review: His intentions often unclear, his actions are misleading.

PS: Unless astrological malaise has affected him, Mr. Amole Gupte spells his first name as Amole and not Amol.

the good thing about loud people in the office

is that you can sometimes expect to hear them utter some gems that make your funny bone dance:

the end result is always to publish a result

first time a second field you have overridden

change that [X] also so we can see that how the [X] can change

Unless commitment is made, there are only promises and hopes; but no plans.. (the speaker was not Salman Khan)

englITsh: thanks for your input

englITsh: a neologism describing a variant of English cultivated and learnt in corporate IT workplaces.

Dear PersonWhoLearntEnglishInIT,
The phrase thanks for your input was born and sired in the world of specious corporate talk and has no place in regular conversation; regular conversation is the kind you have with people and not mendacious forms of life dressed in expensive wrinkle-free polyester with unrelenting vacuous smiles on their faces. Thank you so much for listening to me and Thank you for those useful suggestions are some alternatives that fall gently on the ears while also sounding more polite, more genuine and more meaningful. This is not a game of plug and socket. This is about talking to people. Get IT?