Bhéjaa Fry

You Tube? Part II

2009-07-10T12:55:00.004+05:30

What you absolutely must youtube:

George Carlin

The man's a genius. Watch everything by one of the world's greatest stand-up comedians. Religion is bullshit, Airplane Demo, Old age, Similarities, Stuff - everything.

For more, see: You tube? (Part I)

Also see: Saudi on a treadmill!

Back from the dead

2009-06-29T13:06:00.006+05:30

Had to revive my blog for something you might find hilarious.

I overheard two guys in my gym talking about the following in the changing room:

Guy 1: "Tell me something. What was Gandhiji called before he was called Gandhiji?"
Guy 2: "Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi!"
Guy 1: "Arre (insert expletive here), it's a joke yaar."
Guy 2: "Oh. I don't know."
Guy 1: "GANDUji. Hahahahaha."
Guy 2: "Er... why?"
Guy 1: "Arre, when he was working as a lawyer in South Africa, he was a big time womaniser. Complete player."

(My attention had started drifting by this time but...)

Guy 2: "What? Nonsense. How do you know?"
Guy 1: "Arre, it's on the net!"
Guy 2: "So? Even I can write something somewhere and it will show up in your search and you'll believe it's true."

(Aaaaah! The sweet smell of sense... NOT!)

Guy 1: "DUDE! It's on Wikipedia!"
Guy 2: "What? Wikipedia? Can't be."
Guy 1: "Serious, man."
Guy 2: "Naaaa. It can't be."
Guy 1: "You want to bet?"
Guy 2: "Sure. I'll give you this brand new phone of mine if it is on Wikipedia!!!"

Here's what Scott Adams has to offer:

Story of stuff

2009-02-17T13:11:00.002+05:30

Thank you, Asha. :D

Give a man a book...

2009-02-03T12:20:00.042+05:30

…and he’ll read for a day.
Give him a bookshelf, a few toys and a kickass camera and this is the result!

Ladies and gentlemen, presenting, my bookshelf.

“I love this place, Marty!”

“Look at all these books!”

“Alex, do you have any idea how many forests were sacrificed to print these books?”

“Who cares! We live in a fricking zoo, Marty. Anyway, lookie here, the Copy Book!”
“It isn't the original, Alex. It's the Indian one.”
“Ok. So it's the copy of the Copy Book! Haha. Getit?”

“I like ma books just da way I like ma boyz. BIG! REALLY BIG!”

“Woah! Looking at all these books makes my head spin.”

“What? WHAT? Why did we stop?”

“That guy’s staring at us. You don’t want me to Kung-fu your ass, now do ya, boy?”

Audi TT Coupe: “Did you see that, A4? So many books and just one Walter Moers!”

Audi A4: “And they call us racist! Where the hell is a matchbox when I need one?”

“22, my sore ass! I’ve caught only one since morning.”

“So much to read…”

“…so little time.”

“Just the cover makes me feel all knotty.”

“Vase uuuup?”

“What the? One minute I’m enjoying a nap on a log on the riverbank and the next minute…”

“Where can I find books on skincare?”
“I don’t know. I’m puzzled myself.”

“I don’t know, man. She says I'm stone-cold. Says I don't tell her anything.”

“Maybe she's right. Maybe you need to open up more often.”
“God! I feel so empty. Like there's this big void inside me.”

“Sigh! How I wish I could get the hell out of here and sink in an inviting couch somewhere.” – Calvin’s Dad.

“Yes, just like this one.” – Calvin’s Dad.

Please excuse my extra excitement, guys. I’m on a high. Thanks to some close friends, I’ve become quite passionate about books over the years. Got myself this bookshelf last year. And, hey, just last month, I got myself a Canon Powershot SX10 IS. Also, I bought a Royal Enfield Standard 350! You might see a post on that someday.

Tripping!

It's only words... and words are all I have...

2008-12-05T10:18:00.004+05:30

Here's an interesting idea I thought of while chatting with a friend of mine.

Song Chat!*

Requirements:
1. Fairly decent knowledge of music (Hindi, English, Swahili, Pushtu, whatever)
2. A friend with a fairly decent knowledge of music
3. A chat application (or a coffee shop, if you prefer a tête-à-tête in person)
4. Loads of free time

Instructions:
1. Go online (or enter coffee shop)
2. Start chatting/talking to your friend
BUT
3. Make sure everything you say to your friend and everything that your friend says in reply is the name of a song!

It is great fun.

Try it first. Thank me later.

*Patent pending

Meankind

2008-11-21T22:59:00.002+05:30

I think the sole purpose of our existence on earth is to destroy everything in sight.

Forget Satan, I think humans are the opposite of God. God’s the ultimate creator, and Man, the ultimate destroyer. God creates things out of nothing. We create things by destroying or cannibalising his creations.

We consume forests to make paper. We tear the ozone layer as we create faster modes of transportation or refrigeration. We pollute the sea in our quest for fuel. We destroy reefs to feed our own kind. We damage the ecosystem to satisfy our avarice. We destroy God’s architecture to make room for our own.

Yes, we’re the destroyers. And we seem to have accepted it as a fact.

We ask for a warranty card on everything we buy. We might not be sure if we really need a particular product but we’re very particular about how many years’ warranty we should get on it.

Come to think of it, we insist on a bill too so that we can pin the blame on someone. As if that is not enough, we insist on a list of after-sales service centres.

So there you go; we are subconsciously sure that we are extremely capable and very likely to put things out of commission, sooner or later.

Everything we buy breaks down at some point, which is usually exactly a week after its warranty period ends. But we sometimes fool ourselves by believing that a product is unbreakable. It’s usually a sales tactic used by entrepreneurs, who I’m sure must be laughing to themselves as they use it.

We might know a few well-to-do divorce lawyers but when it comes to a priest for a wedding, we might need to make a few phone calls.

Year on year, we pay hefty premiums towards our health and life insurance policies.

We buy insurance for our car at the same time we buy the car itself. We might not be sure if we’ll make any fatal mistakes but we can almost guarantee that someone of our kind will do them for us.

We insure our homes and build fire exits because we know that either we or someone is bound to be stupid enough to bring it down someday soon. Interestingly, we sometimes agonise over the safety of our worldly possessions more than that of our loved ones. Life is up to God but material things? Oh, some of us are sure to destroy it one of these days.

We buy spares of everything we possibly can.

We back-up data on our computer’s hard-drive, store the same on an external hard-drive and also have a collection of back-up CDs & DVDs. We’re sure that, if not us, our creation – the computer - will definitely royally screw up things for us.

There you go. I just destroyed this blog post and possibly your peace of mind. Mindless destruction, I say.

Anyway, I got to perorate now lest my comp gives up on me.

Load of crap

2008-10-16T11:56:00.012+05:30

In the business that I'm in, I've seen people pile crap sky-high. But never so beautifully! Thankfully, the pictures are self-explanatory because they left me speechless.

To cut a long story really short

2008-09-29T14:21:00.001+05:30

I do a fair share of reading to have an opinion on a thing or two but I won’t say I am an authority on books. So, if you find anything I’ve said off the mark, please feel free to correct me.

I love short stories. Apart from collections of short stories from various writers, many a times, I pick up a short story book by a single writer to familiarize myself with his/her writing style before I buy his/her fattest tome. I did that with Haruki Murakami, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Ernest Hemingway and Satyajit Ray among many others.

I used to love only the twist-in-the-tale variety of short stories by Roald Dahl, Jeffrey Archer, Satyajit Ray and their ilk. But that was before I discovered Haruki Murakami. While some find his stories rather exasperating and unsatisfying for they leave a lot unsaid, that is exactly why I find them interesting. There’s the obvious benefit of making whatever you wish to of them.

That brings us to this gem by Ernest Hemingway. When asked to write a story in just six words, he wrote one that he says is his best work: 'For sale: baby shoes, never worn.' Get what I’m on about?

The Guardian once challenged some contemporary authors, laypeople and even some master graphic designers to be (in The Guardian’s words) “equally economical. Sure, Arthur C. Clarke refused to trim his ("God said, 'Cancel Program GENESIS.' The universe ceased to exist."), but the rest are concise masterpieces.”

Here are some of my favourites from their shortlist.

"Samaritans!" "I'm listening." "Hello?" "Hel..." "Samaritans..."
- Michel Faber

"It can't be. I'm a virgin."
- Kate Atkinson

“Set sail, great storm, all lost.”
- John Banville

“Dream punctured. Build pyre. Curses... Adolf.”
- Beryl Bainbridge

“See that shadow? (It's not yours.)”
- Jim Crace

“Defenestrated baby, methamphetamine, prison, rehab, relapse.”
- Jeffrey Eugenides

“Juicy offer. Must decline. Still paralysed.”
- Richard Ford

“Bob's last message: Bermuda Triangle, Baloney.”
- Elmore Leonard

“Dad called: DNA back: he isn't.”
- Helen Fielding

“Humorous book: critic died laughing. Sued.”
- Alexander McCall Smith

"Kiss me." "?" "Kiss me.." "?!!" "Oh, sorry."
Jon McGregor

“Megan's baby. John's surname. Jim's eyes.”
- Simon Armitage

“Served the pie, watched him die.”
- Maggie O'Farrell

“Thought love must fade: but no.”
- George Saunders

“He didn't. She did. Big mistake.”
- AL Kennedy

“They awaited sunrise. It never came.”
- AS Byatt

“In the end, everything simply began.”
- Ali Smith

“Stop me before I kill again.”
- Hari Kunzru

“It was a dark, stormy... aaaaargggh!”
- John Lanchester

“Catherine had treasonable sex. Heads rolled.”
- Helen Simpson

"The Earth? We ate it yesterday."
- Yann Martel

“A&E, IOU”
- Toby Litt

“Funeral followed honeymoon. He was 90.”
- Graham Swift

“Womb. Bloom. Groom. Gloom. Rheum. Tomb.”
- Blake Morrison

"Mind what gap?" ... ... ...
- Hilary Mantel

“Computer, did we bring batteries? Computer?”
- Eileen Gunn

“Vacuum collision. Orbits diverge. Farewell, love.”
- David Brin

“Gown removed carelessly. Head, less so.”
- Joss Whedon

“Automobile warranty expires. So does engine.”
- Stan Lee

“Longed for him. Got him. Shit.”
- Margaret Atwood

“From torched skyscrapers, men grew wings.”
- Gregory Maguire

“With bloody hands, I say good-bye.”
- Frank Miller

“Wasted day. Wasted life. Dessert, please.”
- Steven Meretzky

“Cellar?” “Gate to, uh … hell, actually.”
- Ronald D. Moore

“Epitaph: Foolish humans, never escaped Earth.”
- Vernor Vinge

“It cost too much, staying human.”
- Bruce Sterling

“We kissed. She melted. Mop please!”
- James Patrick Kelly

“It’s behind you! Hurry before it…”
- Rockne S. O’Bannon

“I’m your future, child. Don’t cry.”
- Stephen Baxter

“Lie detector eyeglasses perfected: Civilization collapses.”
- Richard Powers

“I’m dead. I’ve missed you. Kiss …?”
- Neil Gaiman

“The baby’s blood type? Human, mostly.”
- Orson Scott Card

“Kirby had never eaten toes before.”
- Kevin Smith

“Rained, rained, rained, and never stopped.”
- Howard Waldrop

“To save humankind he died again.”
- Ben Bova

“We went solar; sun went nova.”
- Ken MacLeod

“I couldn’t believe she’d shoot me.”
- Howard Chaykin

“Don’t marry her. Buy a house.”
- Stephen R. Donaldson

“Broken heart, 45, WLTM disabled man.”
- Mark Millar

“TIME MACHINE REACHES FUTURE!!! Nobody there…”
- Harry Harrison

“Tick tock tick tock tick tick.”
- Neal Stephenson

“Easy. Just touch the match to…”
- Ursula K. Le Guin

“New genes demand expression - third eye.”
- Greg Bear

“K.I.A. Baghdad, Aged 18 - Closed Casket.”
- Richard K. Morgan

“Epitaph: He shouldn't have fed it.”
- Brian Herbert

“Batman Sues Batsignal: Demands Trademark Royalties.”
- Cory Doctorow

“Heaven falls. Details at eleven.”
- Robert Jordan

“Bush told the truth. Hell froze.”
- William Gibson

“whorl. Help! I'm caught in a time”
- Darren Aronofsky and Ari Handel

“Nevertheless, he tried a third time.”
- James P. Blaylock

God to Earth: “Cry more, noobs!”
- Marc Laidlaw

“Help! Trapped in a text adventure!”
- Marc Laidlaw

“Thought I was right. I wasn't.”
- Graeme Gibson

“Lost, then found. Too bad.”
- Graeme Gibson

“Three to Iraq. One came back.”
- Graeme Gibson

“Dinosaurs return. Want their oil back.”
- David Brin

“Bang postponed. Not Big enough. Reboot.”
- David Brin

“Temporal recursion. I'm dad and mom?”

- David Brin

“Deadline postponed. Five words enough...?”
- David Brin

“Metrosexuals notwithstanding, quiche still lacks something.”
- David Brin

“Brevity’s virtue? Wired saves adspace. Subscribe!”
- David Brin

“Death postponed. Metastasized cells got organized.”
- David Brin

“Mind of its own. Damn lawnmower.”
- David Brin

“Please, this is everything, I swear.”
- Orson Scott Card

“I saw, darling, but do lie.”
- Orson Scott Card

“Sum of all fears: AND patented.”
- Charles Stross

“Ships fire; princess weeps, between stars.”
- Charles Stross

Mozilla devastates Redmond, Google’s nuke implicated.
- Charles Stross

“Will this do (lazy writer asked)?”
- Ken MacLeod

“Cryonics: Disney thawed. Mickey gnawed. Omigawd.”
- Eileen Gunn

“Clones demand rights: second Emancipation Proclamation.”
- Paul Di Filippo

“We crossed the border; they killed us.”
- Howard Waldrop

“Finally, he had no more words.”
- Gregory Maguire

“There were only six words left.”
- Gregory Maguire

“Weeping, Bush misheard Cheney’s deathbed advice.”
- Gregory Maguire

“Corpse parts missing. Doctor buys yacht.”
- Margaret Atwood

“Starlet sex scandal. Giant squid involved.”
- Margaret Atwood

“He read his obituary with confusion.”
- Steven Meretzky

Time traveler's thought: "What's the password?"
- Steven Meretzky

“Steve ignores editor's word limit and…”
- Steven Meretzky

“Parallel universe. Bush, destitute, joins army.”
- Steven Meretzky

Dorothy: "Fuck it, I'll stay here."
- Steven Meretzky

Tut-tut

2008-08-11T20:50:00.004+05:30

Finally succumbed to them Crocs. Got myself a pair of Peacock Blue ones. I like them a lot now that I've bought them. Looky here.

Andy McKee - not your average guitarist

2008-05-20T21:22:00.002+05:30

Retail Therapy, my a**!

2008-05-18T21:57:00.006+05:30

What's with shop attendants? I mean, do I have 'big doofus' written on my face? Do I look stupid or something? (No, don't answer that.)

It happens to me almost every place I go shopping for clothes, books, shoes or whatever else.

Say I like a particular shirt and look through the entire stack for my size and don't find it there. C'mon, I'm not that unusually large. Just XXL. But, more often than not, I do not find clothes I LIKE in my size. Yes, yes, it happens to all of us all the time. But that is not the infuriating bit.

After I look through the entire stack (and rack) and don't find that particular shirt in my size, I ask an attendant, hoping that they might have it somewhere in their store-room at the back.

What does he/she do? He/she walks over and rifles through the same stack right in front of me, turns to me and politely says, "No sir, we don't have it in XXL."

"Oh, thank you so much, Einstein. Never thought of doing that myself. Thank you. Remind me to punch you as a token of appreciation on my way out. Arrrrrrgh."

Matter of fact

2008-03-27T13:25:00.004+05:30

All men pay for sex. One way or another. Think about it.

:P

(My apologies if my unannounced MCP moment offends you.)

You tube?

2008-03-07T23:41:00.008+05:30

What you absolutely must youtube:

Jeff Dunham

Watch all the characters – Peanut, Sweet Daddy D, Jose Jalapeno, Achmed: The Dead Terrorist, Walter and more.

Miriam Makeba

Check out the Click Song; it’s in the famously amusing Bushman language.

Giant Robot & Fireball XL5

You found them amusing as a kid? You’ll laugh your ass off now at their tackiness. But they rock.

Fraggle Rock & The Muppet Show

What??? I still love them.

George Bush

12 out of 10 search results these two words throw up are achingly hilarious.

Sicaf

Sand art on like a glass… glass… Oh, go watch it. It’s indescribably beautiful.

British TV shows

Allo Allo, Black Adder, Fawlty Towers, Goodness Gracious Me, Yes Prime Minister, Mind Your Language, The Benny Hill Show and more. British humour at its wittiest. You’ve seen them before? Go, see them AGAIN! You’ve never seen them? Go, see them RIGHT NOW!

Woody Allen

Watch snatches from his movies like Manhattan, Deconstructing Harry, etc. Especially watch clippings from ‘Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex But Were Afraid to Ask’. Yup, that's the name of one movie.

Look Around You

It’s a comedy science series by BBC. Brilliant and Funnnnnnn.

MAD TV

The old spoofs are still quite funny. Plus, there are the Arnold parodies. Fuhahahanny.

Triumph, The Insult Comic Dog

Roaringly funny. I recommend: The American Idol - Hawaii Audition, Hawaii Weather Report and Bon Jovi Concert episodes. Kickass.

Ya Mama

I don’t know why I love this video by Fatboy Slim. Wait, I know. Cos it’s stupidly insanely funny! Also watch other videos by them. Bird Of Prey, especially.

Dan Dunn - Paintjam

Watch his paint tribute to the legendary musician Ray Charles. You’ll love it.

Thousand Hand Guan Yin

Thousand Hand Guan Yin is a performance by a group of (supposedly) deaf artists. Mind-blowing teamwork and co-ordination!

Aye! Hip Hopper

And, finally! When I first saw this video, I thought these guys were kidding. But they seem to be serious; saw them on Channel [V] the other night!

That's all for now, folks. You can thank me later.

If you know more cool stuff, send me keywords. If you don't, send me cash.

Extreme Measures

2008-03-07T16:53:00.002+05:30

I owe an apology to my readers (all 3* of them) for being absent on the scene.

I won’t cite lethargy, lack of inspiration, too much work, too little time or some such as an excuse. For I myself know not why I was away. It was probably a combination of many things.

Anyway, this blog isn’t dead. Oh no, not yet. Not without a fright.

I did a lot of introspection while I was away. In other words, I was busy twiddling my thumbs. A very rewarding experience, this twiddling of thumbs business, I tell you. Look what I discovered.

My ears are elephantine. They are so big I could slap someone with them. “I heard that, you asshole.” (PHAAAD!)

I have sharp fangs. Coupled with my excess body hair, they must make me look like a werewolf intruded upon in a changing room.

I have long eyelashes. I give women a complex. I have to apologise to frail people standing in front of me every time I blink.

I have big thick eyebrows. One could easily make a wig and a half out of the hair. I would do it but apparently it’s illegal to shave one’s eyebrows. No kidding.

I have wide shoulders. I cite them as the reason for my bad turnaround time. But my boss doesn’t believe me! @#$%&^*+{

I have knock knees. Knock knees! Knock-frikking-knees! I mean if I had got them now it would have been understandable, with the body weight I lug around. But I was fit as a fiddle back then!

I have these weird-ass little toes. I think they were originally designed for Quasimodo but then they thought they would make him look ugly.

“This little piggy went to the market.
This little piggy stayed home.
This little piggy had ice cream.
This little piggy had none.
This little piggy winked at a biker’s girl,
and the gang kicked him all the way home.”

Hahahahahahahaha… haha… ha…(sniff)… er… um… sorry. I really had nothing better to write about.

Uh-oh, looks like I owe you guys another apology for this comeback post. Damn!

(*This is just meant to be a self-deprecating joke and in no way reflects the state of this blog. Refer the visitor counter. Yes, every time the blogger himself refreshes the page, the counter does get pushed a notch. But this blogger’s too lazy to do that.)

The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits. Here's the evidence.

2008-02-28T12:57:00.002+05:30