Update: Fantastic post by Anti over here. I am surprised how he is able to put so many pieces together and come back with a tremendous hit back! Great job there! –
Inzamam has raised some issue with Indians appealing for his wicket in the last match. He obstructed the ball while he was out of the crease. That is one of the reasons handling the ball is a wicket. So Indians were not wrong in appealing since it is within the rules of the game. Of course, Courtney Walsh has shown in the past that just because there is a rule does not mean you implement it and assume it is sportsmanlike.
I still don’t know what stand I take in terms of the appeal itself. But what I don’t like is the noise it has managed to create. First Inzy writes about it, then Moin Khan (never liked the guy, btw) says it is ‘deplorable’ and then Dravid responds to it saying it was fair and square.
Again, I do not believe Moin can justify that Indians are there to win ‘by hook or by crook’ because of all the teams in the world, I would say the Indians are the most tolerant and much to my dislike, the most docile. They are quite the opposite of ‘by hook or by crook’. And if there is one team which will try to win by hook or by crook it is England. So Moin should first of all apologize for the nonsense and then evaluate his position as a writer/analyst.
As for Dravid, I think he did right by justifying his position.
Thanks to FreshBlog, I came to know of CoComment, an interesting tool that lets me track all the comments I make on various blogs, in one place. It also ‘tracks’ the comments so if there are other users who post comments after I do, it lists the entire conversation there.
Sounds interesting. I got an invite almost immediately after I emailed them asking for an invite. I started using it and realized that it does not work for pop-up comment windows. I am not 100% sure why blogger started the pop-up style comment boxes. I know Haloscan does that already. But not sure I know the real purpose of that.
Anyway, it is a neat tool and I will use it regularly. In fact I also got the Greasemonkey script to automate the process.
I just found out (thanks for the heads up, Reza) that the idiot who has nothing else to do in life has been posting on other blogs in my name, spreading his/her filth everywhere.
To the people whose blogs I visit or link to, please be advised and please ignore the piece of crap. And sorry about that, in advance.
And that of course raises an important question - how does one identify a commenter? Since different blogging systems allow different user names, and in fact since blogger shows ‘display name’ rather than ‘username’, there is no guarantee that it won’t be repeated.
After staying at home for a week, it is back to the grind starting today. And Southwest changed their schedule this week onwards and I no longer get the convenient 9am flight and have to take the 7.40am flight :-(
I have turned on comment moderation so I can decide which comments make it to the blog. That way, I don’t have to delete 50 or so comments at once.
Someone’s got a lot of free time. Wish they would be helping in Katrina relief instead. Or maybe digging a hole to hide somewhere instead. Or cleaning their own mess up. Or brooding over the LSU’s National Championship Crystal Ball. Or drooling over Britney Spears.
Recently, out of nowhere, some idiot has started posting unnecessary stuff on the blog. Many of the readers of this blog would know this person and I am not going to put the name or anything here.
It started with some random comments about how me agreeing to donate to Katrina relief in addition to supporting the USCDynasty.com idea was bad. I responded, even though the comment was on a completely unrelated post. This person does not know that a comment is meant to relate to the original post to which it acts as a comment. Anyway, going from the subsequent comments I see from this person, it does not look like I should expect ANY intelligence from them.
Then, today was the pits. To my post about Rang De Basanti (watched it the second time), I saw 31 comments from the same pathetic loser and once again, the comment did not connect with the original post.
I have not lost it yet. I will patiently delete inappropriate comments from this person. When it becomes too much, I will have to report it to blogger (google) and get their email address blocked off for commenting!
Saw the movie for the second time last night. Enjoyed it even more. Saw some subtle stuff that I missed the first time around. Some jokes, some sentences, etc.
What I really liked in the beginning was the picturization of the Jeep and the bike(s) going to that ‘happy place’ with ‘Lose Control’ in the background.
I also liked the song around the India Gate.
Did you notice that Alice Patten wore one top in two separate scenes and the same jeans in two other scenes? I did. Watch closely :-)
Today I had an argument with someone who seemed to say that the movie looks very good because of the lack of quality movies around the last few months. I totally disagree because the movie is good in absolute terms, not relative. It should be given its credit because it is a well-made movie and is doing well because of its own quality.
Working from home felt quite good this week. But I have concluded that I will not choose this option too much in the future. I don’t have a proper, comfortable desk to work at and I invariably ended up working on the bed or on the dining table. Also, I started work pretty much as soon as I woke up and ended it well into the night. Which is unhealthy.
Combined with the fact that this week was quite cloudy and dull through the days, it gave me very little motivation to keep pumped up.
Can’t say I am looking forward to the travel, but at least it will let me work at specific times.
Sorry, this is highly delayed, but I have been busy of late. But nevertheless, here are my thoughts on the third test between India and Pakistan.
I thought India had a dream start to the series-deciding match with Pathan taking an incredible hat trick. I think the best wicket was of course the hat trick taking wicket. Getting a clean bowled is so satisfying in general, but it was basically a cherry on top for Pathan because it was a hat trick.
Anyway, after that, there were a few more blows and Pakistan at some point was reeling at 37 for 6! And then Kamran Akmal put up the fight that I am afraid makes Pakistan a team like India was at some point in the past few years. Never-say-die attitude is important and to come up with an innings like his, gives a lot of confidence to the team overall. At the end, Pakistan could score almost 250 whereas it seemed like it should not have been any more than 150 (from India’s point of view of course).
Then, it was up to India to create a huge advantage for themselves and virtually bat themselves to a safe position. If India was able to get about 450 or so, it would have shut the door on Pakistan and it would have made it very difficult for them to score freely in the second innings. But what happened was quite a pathetic display of batting by the Indian top and middle order. India ended at 70-something for 4.
The next day, India was all out and gave a 7 run lead. What happened next was unbelievable. Pakistan’s second innings was a superb execution of cool and collected batting. Pretty much everyone had a good knock and as usual Yousuf and Younis harrowed the bowling. What India did not know was that after those two were gone, there were more fireworks coming. At points, the bowling looked quite ordinary and it seemed like India was just waiting for a declaration. But what ended up happening is Pakistan scored so quickly that it ended up giving them almost 2 days to get India’s 10 wickets and gave India 600+ to win.
The second innings started badly for India and without much on the board, Dravid and Sehwag were gone. After some promising strokes, Sachin was gone and then VVS. And after that, despite Yuvraj’s century, it was only a matter of time before India were all out.
And so it ends a bizarre series. First two matches were quite boring with only batsmen enjoying their time on the pitch and the final one saw a spineless India batting give up and lose the series.
A lot of nonsense has since started coming out in the media and all I can say is that Saurav should stay and Sachin should stay. Stop the crying and just assume that this was a one-test series. Don’t say the series average is x or y because it is only one match that we should look at.
Now it is on to the one dayers and I am scared for the bowlers. With the kind of wickets they have in Pakistan, I am sure that 300 is going to be easy to score and 340-350 could be gettable. Oh well.
I did not realize that there was actually going to be an Indian ‘squad’ going to the Winter Olympics. What is ironic is that there are 4 athletes and 3 coaches! The proportion seems quite bad because the number of athletes is so small.
Narain Karthikeyan is not out of Formula 1 this year. In fact he will be driving, though as a test driver and that too #2 test driver. But hey, at least he will be in the car, and not looking for a job.
Federer won another Grand Slam, and this one was a lot tougher than his earlier ones. Tommy Haas took him to five sets, and Davydenko took him to 4 tough sets.
The finals was not easy either. He was down by 1 set and a 1 break and had to come back big time. I did not see the match but I was not surprised that it turned out like the way it did.
Congratulations to him … the only title missing from his huge collection is the French. Good luck to him.
Watched Rang De Basanti yesterday. What a movie! I loved it. Not only is it a very well made movie, in terms of production quality and all that, but the message/story is well done.
The merger of the two timelines is shown beautifully, with the early twentieth century British India being compared to the current day India. The youth of current day India is shown as the typical careless youth who are given a dose of the revolutionaries through a documentary made by a grand daughter of a Britisher who had seen these revolutionaries first-hand.
I had no idea what to expect of the movie when I went there. The trailer just seemed interesting enough to make me go. Of course, the controversies that I read about increased my curiosity about the film. And I was surely impressed.
The actors have all done a good job. Even Soha Ali Khan Pataudi (wow, is that what she is going to call herself from now on?)! Of course Aamir Khan as DJ was great, and that’s what you have come to expect of him. The rest of the guys were all quite intense when needed, and very ‘good for nothing’-like when they were goofing off. Alice Patten was alright, but her Hindi was quite good!
The soundtrack is superb and I think I may buy it! The scenes shown in the movie are quite beautiful too. Delhi city pictures with a lot of India Gate stuff and the amphitheater they visit, were all wonderful to see. Just like Bluffmaster made a lot of Bombay shots look classic, this one does the same to Delhi. And then when they visit the fields and the place where they watch the planes take off, is picturesque in a different way.
And the second half was so intense, and with such meaning, it made all of us boil our blood. The politicians have taken the country for a ride for too long and something’s got to change. The path that the movie takes is quite a radical one, given that the backdrop was the life of Bhagat Singh, but still, with the media so powerful in India now, it is not so difficult to get heard. It is a matter of initiative and boldness.
About time we switched to real administration and not politicking.
Amelie Mauresmo wins the Australian Open this year without playing 2 complete sets in the finals. Or without completing the semi finals. Add her earlier round win over Krajicek after she defaulted, I would say this was probably not the way Mauresmo wanted to win her first Slam.
But on the other hand, since it has been so long for her without a title, I am sure she will take this without batting an eyelid.
I lost my c: drive last night, trying to update my ipod updater software to v1.1! Unbelievable how bad the crash was - it would not let me boot. Upon every boot it would try to check the disk and fail at about 30% of the check and restart, and repeat itself.
I tried several things and finally, after about 8 hours, I think I may have something to get going. It was restored from a ghost image taken at the beginning of December 2005! :-(
I had to install Firefox, Greasemonkey, Scripts and extensions all over again :-(
Anyway, I may be back in action now. Fingers crossed.
It was only a matter of time! From Trojans Football News, I found out about the USC Alum has created the website USCDynasty.com to counter the stupid LSU fan who was planning to put up a billboard near the USC campus.
I will be contributing to this Katrina relief effort too.
I could not believe it. ESPN Sportscenter tonight had Cricket on their Top 10! #3 had 2 wickets - Afridi getting Harbajan and then a ‘wicket grab’ of a caught and bowled of RP Singh (“Could be related, who knows?").
They even mentioned that Pakistan was ahead of India by 137 runs or whatever!
Though they tried to make fun of it, at least they are making some mention of the sport. :-)
The Indian lower order came good, and India was able to take a lead in the second test. Of course, it is pathetic because we are at the end of the 4th day and the first innings barely completed.
Sigh. Now it will come to a winner-takes-all test match in the final test. Wonder what kind of pitch they will have there …
I don’t like what Dan writes, but here is a good one about Kobe’s performance tonight.
Some important points he makes -
Kobe Bryant scored 81 points on Sunday – enough to rank second all time to Wilt Chamberlain’s immortal 100-point game in 1962 and knock the NFL off the front burner of sports conversations – and yet people still will criticize him.
Count on it. They’ll say he should have passed more (he had just two assists). They’ll say he just did it for the spotlight. They’ll point to his 18 misses, not his 28 makes.
And something about "selfishness" ignored in other sports -
When Peyton Manning is trying to set a single-season touchdown record and calls for pass plays on first-and-goal from the 1, does anyone care?
Of course not, you expect it. You demand it, even.
It is a well-made, slick movie showing Bombay’s various spots in a completely different and a very classy way. Some of the shots of Bombay made it look like any part of Europe. That’s compliments to the cinematographer.
The story itself is fun too. The soundtrack is quite good, and the acting is well-done. Abhishek is now a dependable bet in various roles. Ritesh Deshmukh fits perfectly in his innocent and funny roles. This one was no different - very well done.
And Priyanka Chopra is such a bombshell! I had commented about it earlier, and this movie confirms it even more. Enjoy the pictures.
After much pushing from the wife, I agreed to go with her to see Memoirs of a Geisha on Friday night. Contrary to her belief, I did not sleep through it. I dozed off for about 5 minutes in the middle where her performance stretched for a few minutes too many.
The movie was interesting, but certainly not my type of a movie. There was a story and a few sub-plots (I have not read the book, so the story itself was not known to me). The settings were quite dark and after a long Friday at work, watching such a movie at 10.30pm can induce sleep easily.
Anyway, I did enjoy the movie and Ziyi Zhang’s presence certainly was a bonus. She looks quite alright and has done a good job in the movie. Quite a few other characters are ‘known’ (Michelle Yeoh?), so it really did not feel like an ‘Asian’ movie, except for the constant commentary by the lady sitting next to me to her husband :-)
The second test has produced another batting paradise, at least judging from the first 2 days' play. I read that the pitch has started showing variable bounce and that means the total of 588 may be a good one. But India at 110-1 should have confidence of at least putting up a decent first innings total so that draw becomes the only possibility.
So while the rest of the world has moved in the direction of result-friendly pitches, Pakistan, probably hurting from the last Indian tour, has decided to be as defensive as possible and have 0-0 as a better result of the series than anything else. And that is sad because test match crcket has become very exciting and entertaining after going through a dull 90’s. Such pitches don’t help in creating more interest in the game. Results are not critical, though important. What is more important is to see batsmen and bowlers having a chance at any point to win the match for their team. An equal contest is good to watch even if it results in a draw.
Tonight is going to be interesting and see how Indian batsmen face up on Day 3.
As I was walking out of the pizza place where I had lunch, I overheard two ladies. Seemed like one of them was meeting the other after some time, or for the first time or something. Point is, she did not know which car her friend was driving.
As they were walking, the ‘guest’ asked her friend which was her car. And the friend pointed in a general direction and said that one. The most noticeable car in that direction was a shining Hummer. So this ‘guest’ lady asked ‘What? The Hummer?’. And I did not like the response: ‘Yea, right. If only I could afford it’
Wrong answer lady. What you should have said is ‘Are you kidding me? A gas guzzler like that? No way. I would never.'
Perhaps even something sarcastic like ‘The American troops need something like this in Iraq, I don’t need a tank to get groceries.'
It is about time we realize the worthlessness of gas guzzlers like Hummer (1, 2 or 3). It is about time we consciously made a decision to spare the environment. Neglect will only make life more and more difficult for us when we are older, and definitely our kids when they grow up.
It is tough to make someone understand today that what they are doing is spoiling the earth because it is not clearly visible to their eyes at this moment. And of course, scientific studies and results will only be garbage to them. But the more we read, the more we understand.
Spare the earth. Stop driving cars that guzzle gas.
