Well I did it, I completed an entire month of blogging everyday and multiple times on several days. That is a blogging achievement not to be taken lightly. I have seen people who get a badge from a blogger who gives it only to people who blog atleast one entry per day for 30 days. Well, I didn’t need a badge or a reminder; just the excitement of getting my own domain & server space and installing wordpress. That was more than enuff for me.
Tomorrow I have two assignments & presentations to do at the new job, as part of my training there. Like I was telling Halie, I am fully confident that I will do well cause it is easy and I have three years experience in this field. Just the names of products and the charges & codes will change, that is all. Most of the stuff is the same.
While working on my presentation, I felt thirsty and decided to head out. I needed to get printouts anyways, so I dressed and went to the nearby places – all were closed! There are 5 places with internet & computer related businesses and they were all closed by 6:15 today! What jerks! I decided to use slides instead and skipped the printouts. So I came back and bought a seven up on my way home.
Song for the day – “Drug Like You” – TODD KERNS
One of the greatest novelists of our times, Sidney Sheldon passed away today at the age of 89. He was an award winning Broadway playwriter, A tv & movie screenwriter & a novelist with the prestige of being the most translated author in the world. He only started writing his engrossing best-sellers at the age of 50. One of my first read proper novels was Master Of The Game.
As we expected – Shilpa Shetty emerged, from behind the tears and racial torture, as the winner of the Celebrity Big Brother. The event, which earned a staggering 40,000+ complaints being lodged against the racist bullying by Shilpa’s fellow contestant Jan Goody and two others, was heavily covered in the UK and in India. The support for the Indian beauty was staggering to say the least. Host Davina McCall stated that Shilpa won a majority of 63% of the total votes cast by viewers of the show.
The 13th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards were held earlier today (last night in the USA). I have rarely seen this particular award show in it’s 13 year history, but it is rather unique as this is the award winner is judged by his / peers and is therefore considered highly prestigious. What better award that to be given a big pat on your back by your talented peers. Again here, I haven’t seen most of the award winning movies or television series. But Forest Whittaker won again for best actor, which means that he will be a hot favourite to win the same category @ the Oscars. And that is a good thing! Helen Mirren also must be a shoe-in for best actress at the Oscars as she wraps up another prize. So must Eddie Murphy, finally in line for major awards in his storied career
I was always a big advocate for using ATMs. I started using an ATM primarily since 2003, when I worked for Aspinwall and they gave us salary accounts (zero balance) with HDFC. Since then I have always used it and rarely ever been inside a band unless I absolutely had to and if there was not option to do it from an ATM. The past year, since I changed my primary cell phone number to prepaid, I was also using the ATM to recharge my connection. My former company had a tie-up with HDFC and hence any of the customer’s using my former company’s connection could recharge via an ATM (of selected banks). This was one of the coolest aspects of using the ATM as well. And practical! Since moving to Kacheripady I would often get down, late at night, near the ATM and do my recharges before coming back home. And since two ATMs were less than 5 minutes away, there was a certain comfort level in it. I could use it in an emergency or even otherwise like if there was a total bandh or a hartal or a bus strike! Yes people, if you live in Kerala these kind of thoughts are very, very normal everyday thoughts. You’ll know once u settle down here for a few weeks or so. Hell, people not from here, notice that during their first few days in and talk about it a lot.
For the first time in three years, the NHL AllStars was held and the Western Conference AllStars beat the East 12-9. Although the East lost, Daniel Brier (representing the Buffalo Sabres in the Eastern Conference) was voted the MVP of the game. The Hull, Quebec native had a goal and four assists, playing mostly on a line with Marian Hossa & Dany Heatley. Hossa also had four assists, just like the West’s Joe Sakic. Calgary’s Dion Phaneuf scored perhaps the longest empty-net goal in All-Star history when he banked a shot off the boards from behind his own net and the puck rolled into the vacated Eastern net. However, disappointing to the average fan, Sidney Crosby was held scoreless in this, his first ever AllStar game. Alexander Ovechkin was also quite in his Allstar debut. For the Western Conference, Minnesota’s Brian Rolston and Columbus’ Rick Nash each scored two goals and two assists. Chicago’s Martin Havlat scored two goals and an assist, while Phoenix’s Yanic Perreault netted two goals. The Coyotes’ other All-Star, defenseman Ed Jovanovski, had two assists. For the East, Boston’s Zdeno Chara scored two goals for the Eastern Conference, while Ottawa’s Dany Heatley scored a goal and two assists. Montreal’s Sheldon Souray picked up a goal and an assist and New Jersey’s Brian Rafalski had two assists.
Happy Republic day to all Indians. What did you do today? Did you show your patriotic best? Hmm! Well I was actually surprised at the number of people out on the streets and the number of businesses that were humming with normal day activity. Hey, isn’t it actually a national public holiday? Well it didn’t seem to bother the majority of our population as most people went about their normal routines, I guess. Everywhere I looked people were bustling about. I had promised a friend that I would go with him to look at a house that was on the market. His parents & him are planning on moving & settling down in the Cochin area. They are from Thrissur but his mom has most of her family here. With his father now retired and my friend working here, it makes more sense for the move. We were supposed to go yesterday evening but my friend got caught with something at work so we kept it aside for today.
Today evening I had to buy some stuff for my mom. I hadn’t been out to the nearby stores in almost 2 weeks now and was glad for the change. Among the things I had to buy was bananas. Bananas to be eaten after dinner or lunch as desert and also as a digestive assistant. Bananas are the fourth in human consumption (rice, wheat and maize rank above it. It is also supposed to be a berry or seed and not exactly a fruit. So as I have a banana, I would like to blog about the yellow fellow. Bananas are a valuable source of Vitamin A, Vitamin B6, Vitamin C, and potassium. They mix well with anything like ‘puttu & kadala’ or ‘uppumav’. People eat them with their evening tea & paripu vadas. And they make u go to the toilet in a much calmer manner! :)
Ok new tv series on the horizon. I rarely get to watch the beginning of a new series (new as in showing in India for the first time) these days so I was happy about catching the premier episode of this one. Heroes is a new tv series altogether (started in 2006) and it looks promising. I hope that the episodes are capable of keeping the same standard throughout. I really enjoyed the first hour of this new series. Heroes is about a group of people who are just realizing that they have extra-ordinary abilities like time travel, telepathy and flying! In once case we have Claire Bennett, who jumps of a high bridge, is burnt in a fire while rescuing a man trapped and gets her hand mangled in the waste disposal – but she is not affected as she has the power of spontaneous regeneration! Nathan Petrelli & his younger brother Peter are also highlighted – the former has the ability to fly and the latter can mimic powers of people he is in close contact with.
