Arsenal 1 Leicester City 1

Alexis Sanchez scored his first goal in the English Premier League after joining Arsenal to give the Gunners the lead but it was neutralized quite quickly as hosts Lesicester City looked good enough for the 1-1 draw. In a match that saw a now somewhat typical Arsenal – strong in possession but awful in scoring for a top 4 club – waste plenty of opportunities yet again and also saw some sloppy defending at the back.

Arsenal lost centre-back Laurent Koscielny to an apparent head injury early during their Premier League clash with Leicester City, as the French international got the worse end of a clash with Jeffrey Schlupp. The experienced defender received extensive treatment on the pitch, but he didn’t look well at all. The treatment continued in the tunnel as Arsenal were hesitant to go for an immediate substitute, and Koscielny returned to the field wearing a protective wrap on his head. However, Koscielny was clearly out of sorts and lost his positioning when Leicester scored, prompting Arsene Wenger to bring on Calum Chambers.

Really awful performance by Arsenal. Where are the goals going to come from to balance our weak defense? Monreal in particular looks prone to sloppy defending although he does provide some width going forward. Merterzger Unfortunately we have a lot of “deliciate darlings” in the squad. Giggs, Walcott, Wilshire esp. With just a day left we still need at the least a holding midfielder – which scares me as with the exception of Oxalade-Chamberlain, the midfielders look fragile – another defender and yes a striker! Urgent! But can Arsene Wenger manage a trio of signings to sort out our shaky looking squad? I highly doubt it.

Neighbors (2014)

Neighbors or Bad Neighbors is a 2014 American comedy film, directed by Nicholas Stoller and written by Andrew Cohen and Brendan O’Brien. The film stars Seth Rogen and Zac Efron, with Rose Byrne, Dave Franco, and Christopher Mintz-Plasse. The film was released in the United States on May 9, 2014 to positive reviews and grossed over $266 million against a budget of $18 million.

The premise is pretty simple; couple in their 30s with a new born baby daughter are upset when a fraternity famous for their wild partying move in to the house next door. Initially everything goes nice as the couple, Mac & Kelly Radner, go over and offer the members some weed and ask them to politely keep the noise level down. Fraternity leaders Teddy & VP Pete promise to do so and ask the couple to always come to them first if the noise is too loud instead of calling the cops. The Radners are invited over for a wild night of partying with booze, grass and magic mushrooms and the couple are happy. But the next night Mac is unable to get Teddy on the phone during another loud party and the baby wakes up crying. Mac calls the cops but the cop goes away after Teddy shows him a video of Mac partying with the fraternity. The next day the fraternity members continuously haze the couple and make life miserable for them. They go to the dean (Lisa Kudrow) to complain and learn that the school has a three strikes policy; burning down their old house was Delta Psi’s first strike.

Mac & Kelly hatch a plan with the help of their divorced friends Jimmy & Paula; they go to the next party pretending to patch things up but while Mac distracts Teddy, Kelly manipulates Pete & Teddy’s girlfriend Brooke into kissing and then have sex, which Mac sees. The two best friends fight which causes a bbq grill to roll onto the street and hit a passing professor. This causes the second strike against the fraternity and they are put on probation, meaning Teddy’s plans of having an end of college term blow out party is shut down. Mac, Kelly & Jimmy also bribe a freshman to secretly record the fraternity’s hazing ritual, which they can show to the Dean and close the fraternity down. But Teddy shows kindness to the freshman when he acts out causing the kid to tell Teddy about the whole recording. Teddy begins playing violent pranks on the couple, stealing their car’s airbags and placing them in hiding around the house. This causes a little rift between the couple but they patch things up.

Mac & Jimmy forge a letter from the dean allowing them to have parties again, and Teddy begins planning their end-of-the-year bash. They also hand out flyers announcing the party to the local neighbour gangs and hobos. Once the party is in full swing the cops are called by Teddy sees a flyer and guesses what is going on. He stops the party just as Watkins shows up. Jimmy throws himself from the balcony to distract Teddy, allowing Mac and Kelly to sneak into Teddy’s bedroom and restart the party using the breaker box. Teddy catches them and fights Mac, while Kelly lights one of the fireworks and shoots it at Watkins’s patrol car to provoke him into action. With the lights back on, all the partiers returns and the cop calls for backup and Teddy is arrested but he talks Pete, a good student, into leaving. Teddy takes the blame for the party and the dean shuts down the fraternity and the members leaves the house with Mac & Kelly adjusting to their old life and the quiet neighbourhood.

Four months later Mac & Teddy meet at a mall where Teddy is working as a shirtless greeter for Abercombie & Fitch. The two greet each other warmly, having put aside their fight and Teddy tells Mac that he is attending night classes to complete his degree. Mac takes off his shirt and jokingly acts as a greeter with Teddy.

Funny and gross humour – baby putting a condom in it’s mouth, Kelly’s sore breasts and milking it as she was drinking the night before etc etc. Lots of yelling, falling about and bad rap & hip hop music. 6.5 outta 10!

No Pain, No Gain

Do you agree with Jane Fonda’s favorite exercise motto, “no pain, no gain?” Is it impossible to attain greatness without considerable hardship?

Other than ways like inheritance, winning the lottery or just plain ole good luck (that fickle little bitch) yeah I guess unless you are willing to put in the pain factor you aren’t going to win big. Only thing is I see a lot of these bastards – like rich motherfuckers, who don’t do much work and are not willing to do any either – who always seem to get the lucky breaks and make money and prestige with the good stuff coming their way. They have the best jobs, paid well and live in luxury. Why can’t I have that?

So no, for schmucks like you and me, unless we put in extra, extra with a liberal dose of overtime and pain, we aren’t going to get the gain. Blood, sweat and tears for that little bit of honey that will ease the pain. Stuck in a rut, windmill of chaos, treadmill from hell, lonely road in the dark and miserable rainy night – that’s what we need to do.

And if we are lucky, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow awaits us!

Prompt from the Daily Post at WordPress.com.

Heard It While Passing By

We often hear strange snippets of conversation as we walk through public spaces. When was the last time you overheard something so interesting, ridiculous, or disturbing you really wanted to know what it was all about?

That happens quite often enough. It can’t be helped you know.You’ll be walking along – on the streets, in a mall, in a coffee shop, at the post office, at the bank etc and suddenly there will be people who suddenly spoke up a little too loudly than they expected and what little snippet you heard make you wonder and go “Hmmm”.

For instant, the two college age girls I passed by at the bank, who were mock punching each other when one girl apparently punched her friend too hard and the friend went “Oh my ovaries! ” and my heard turned. Or something like “and he had a really big…” and you stop and try to listen to the end. “She then went down on…” and my mind wanders to territory that is so pleasant that there is no coming back. Or even something as innocent as “and then I swallowed some of it and it wasn’t all that bad!”

So people be careful when you raise you voices at the least unexpected moments for people like me who happen to be passing by and didn’t mean to eavesdrop but since the volume is high enough and the phrases sound interesting enough to make us want to know the rest :P

Prompt from the Daily Post at WordPress.com.

My Fav Infomercial

No infomercial makes me laugh as much as this one for the Magic Bullet. I believe it’s from 2003 and once they started showing it here on Indian cable tv, I’ve loved it. 11 years of watching this silly infomercial that never stops to make me laugh. They used to show this informercial dubbed in Hindi for the AXN & Sony channels and everytime it was shown I would stop to watch it. At first because it was funny to watch this stuff as if being said by Indians (only with Caucasian bodies) and I laughed a lot.

Then I watched the original version and loved it & laughed at it even more. Who the heck starts doing a sales demo for your invited guests/friends while they are at your home for a weekend of fun & parting? Here’s part 1.

Mick & Mimi are the married couple who are the hosts and they seem to be aggressively pushing the product to their 6 friends. Also they seem to be competing with each other, pushing away their spouse to do the demo for each item they are making! Lol, they scare me. If I were one of the friends I’d frighteningly ask “Do you guys sell these?” Here’s part 2.

Also they seem to be picking on poor Berman who clearly has a hangover. Also when the blonde chick on the right gets up to offer making the coffee rude Mick says “Oh shut up and sit down bitch”! Hahaha. and who makes breakfast, lunch, tv snacks and dinner in a 10 minute span. And oh, these people love their drinks. Watch how the 3 on the left spring to life at the mere mention of “frozen drinks”! I love this infomercial!

Arsenal 1 Besiktas 0

It was really scary watching Arsenal struggle to hold on to a narrow 1-0 win at home over Turkish side Besiktas last night to qualify for the Champions League group stages. Scary because we almost drew and had that happened we would not have qualified. Arsene Wenger must consider himself lucky to have won and if he doesn’t see that then he is an idiot. His squad is full of holes and a slightly stronger opponent would have drilled holes in our defense.  Alexis Sanchez’s first goal for Arsenal since his £35m move from Barcelona claimed the prize of a place in the Champions League group stage for the 17th successive season on a tense night at Emirates Stadium. The Chilean scored after some good work by Mesut Ozil & Jack Wilshere – who did play with some resolve. Those were positives. Also, once he scored Sanchez looked to have a weight lifted off his shoulders and seemed to gain more confidence. May this be the start of more goals for him.

Another positive is Carzola looked more dangerous as well as Alex Oxalade-Chamberlain but the Ox must learn to gain composure in front of goal. He charges like….well like an ox to the 3rd of the pitch but then makes a mess outta things. And that is Arsenal’s problem there. They are good at keeping and even retaining possession but the moment they sees the goal area the player does some funny stuff and the chance is gone. And Arsenal need to do something with their players constantly getting injured and out for months – with Giroud, Gibbs, Walcott out injured and I’m sure more will follow soon as the season progresses. The midfield needs shoring up and this is where a strong holding midfielder like Carvalho or Khedira is needed.

Defense is shaky as well. Where is the new defender we needed Wenger & co? How can you just let Vermalen leave for Barcelona without replacing him till now. We need 2 more solid full backs pronto! And a striker. Where are the goals going to come from? Giroud is out for 3 months, Sanogo is still finding his legs and Alexis is still settling in. Things do not look good for Arsenal! Which is why I’ve keep saying that Wenger should have been let go last season. Time for a fresh outlook for the club.

Our Robot Friends

Congrats — you’ve been handed a robot whose sole job is to relieve you of one chore, job, or responsibility you particularly hate. What is it?

What else? Cooking and cleaning and the hard work stuff. Going to pay the bills, buy the grocery, fix the car, clean the yard and manual labour. Make the robots do all the hard work and stuff that could potential be harmful for you but is easy to do for a mighty robot made of iron and other metals and cannot be hurt.

Make the robots or rather program them for these things and for easy & quick construction of buildings and making food that can be easily distributed to everyone. Well just to be fair with the help of these robots we could automate everything and make life easier for us. Program the robots to also be good nannies for our children and help in animal care. Make them gentle and nice.

I see robots in our future. Might not be in my lifetime but it’s coming soon.

Prompt from the Daily Post at WordPress.com.

Notes For 27th August 2014

Here are some notes for today:

  • As I got into the bus this morning I dropped a couple of coins on the floor of the bus. I picked them up but the rain water on my hands and the mud on the floor made my hands sticky with dirty. I gave the bus conductor the money for my ticket and he gave me some water from a bottle to wash the mud off my hands. After all the experiences with a lot of the idiots who work in the city buses in Cochin, this nice guy was a refreshing change.
  • I reached South Kalamassery just before 12 pm and stopped for a lemonade and a snack. 15 minutes later I was at the SBT bank branch in the Cochin University campus.
  • I was there to cancel a PPF account (Public Provident Fund account) and transfer the amount to my savings accounts. I had to wait just a little bit until it was done but then there was a large group of people ahead of me at the tellers counter and so I had a long wait before I could withdraw some money.
  • The ticket or token machine was out of paper and so we had to wait until a lady came and replaced it. I was #40!
  • Once I took the money and placed it safely in an envelope and tucked it away in my pocket, I left to go find a return auto to take me to the South Kalamassery bus stop.
  • While I was waiting for a bus, a man in his late 4os heading towards me from the left waved and started talking to me. As he finally reached close enough he realized that he had made a mistake and that I was a total stranger to him. He suddenly took his phone from his pocket and yelled “Hello!” into it, pretending to have a phone call. A minute or so later, the guy he was looking for, and who he thought was me, turned up. The guy was wearing a similar shirt as mine and black pants, was about my height and size. No wonder he mistook me for him.
  • I reached back into the city and went to KFC for lunch as it was well past 2 pm. After that I bought some medicines for mom and an Asthalin inhaler for myself and went to the corner store to buy some stuff before I came back home.

Social Clubs In Kerala Face A Harsh Future

So as you might know by now, we have this rather idiotic & unnecessary decision of the Kerala government to ban all liquor in the state buy closing down all the bars and then reducing the number of BevCo each year until total shutdown in 10 years to make the state a dry state! Other than bars in Kerala the other main victim will be the 30 or so social clubs in the state that have bar licenses. There are about a dozen blue-blooded clubs in Kerala that comprise the cream of about 30 clubs with bar licences where the snob-value of membership comes at a cost of around Rs 5 lakh (or $8,333 plus change). About 40,000 members of these exclusive clubs are waiting with bated breath to see what the state government proposes to do with the FL 4 A licence clause under which these clubs also double up as watering holes, arguably the single-largest draw for members.

Gaming facility _ two each in indoor and  outdoor _ rooms, food and parking are some of the mandatory items in the list for affiliation to the the Association of Registered Social Clubs of Kerala (ARSCK). Gaming facility _ two each in indoor and  outdoor _ rooms, food and parking are some of the mandatory items in the list for affiliation. According to the office-bearers, each club used to cough up Rs 15 lakh per year for the FL 4 A licence . There are nearly 30 clubs in the state with bar licence and 25 of them are members in ARSCK. The total number of members would come to around 40,000. The clubs fear that their earnings will suffer drastically with the alcohol ban as members will not come as frequently as they used to.

My personal memories are mostly with the Cochin Suburban club, Lotus Club and just a little bit for the Rama Varma club. Suburban club in Thrikkakara was the one that was a firm family favourite as it was just minutes away from my former home. My dad took a lifelong membership with them in the 80s when they had just started and it was so much cheaper than what they charge now. As a result my folks, sister and I plus my cousins, uncles & aunts all had many dinners there, a few functions and for my sister’s wedding we even had to book a couple of rooms for relatives to stay in back in 1995. The club has a play area for smaller kids, a library, table tennis area and later added a swimming pool, badminton courts. For special evening like Onam, Christmas, New Year’s and a club annual day function, they would have games as well as live bands performing. The food was mostly really good and we all enjoyed going there. Heck when I was 14-15 I even volunteered to work at the token counter for drinks (I didn’t handle any alcohol, I just told the members how much and collected the money and gave out drink tokens) for one function. I’ve hosted a couple of my birthdays there and invited friends.

Since our move to the city and that of most of my relatives in Cochin also to the city area the Lotus club became to de facto gathering place. Since 2006 this is the closest place to a lot of us and hence has seen family gathering, a couple of parties for pre weddings and reunion style functions for us. They have tennis courts, badminton courts, a large library, tv area for sports events, outdoor, balcony and indoor dining as well as a couple of halls that you can hire for special event if you want to. I’m not so crazy about their food but hey it’s fun when you have a lot of your cousins around for an evening. I prefer their alcohol selection and their snacks which are really good. By my reckoning we’ve had around 20 or so functions there in the last 3 years.

The Rama Varma club is one I’ve only been to a few times because only 2 of my cousins have membership there or affiliated membership which got cancelled and haven’t been there since 2007. But it is a nice place and I’ve enjoyed the few times I’ve been there drinking with my cousins. The drinking is ofcourse the main attraction for members in these clubs and now it could well be all gone in the next few days. Screw the government’s backward thinking. You paid good money for club memberships so you and your relatives/friends could meet and relax in a happy, homely atmosphere with a lot of space and the kids could play around and the men & ladies who don’t drink can still enjoy. You can’t meet your friends and drink at the BevCo lineup!

Godzilla (2014)

Having seen the 1998 version – which I wasn’t so happy with – I wasn’t expecting much of this new and most recent tackle at Godzilla. The 2014 film is directed by Gareth Edwards and tars Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Ken Watanabe, Elizabeth Olsen, Juliette Binoche, Sally Hawkins, David Strathairn, and Bryan Cranston. Richard T Jones, Jared Keeso (19.2), Ty Olsson & Gary Chalk have minor roles.

In this reboot the existence of Godzilla and other large creatures have been known since 1954 but have been kept away from the public. In a mine in the Phillippines a colossal skeleton is found in 1999 and two pods are discovered near it; one lying dormant and the other has been hatched. Whatever was in the hatched pod, has crawled it’s way into the ocean and made it’s way to a Nuclear Power Plant in Janjira, Japan and causes a massive radiation breech causing an emergency shutdown. For 15 years the giant winged creature, a MUTO, eats the radioactivity and grows in size until it matures and breaks out. Meanwhile, at a Nevada nuclear waste facility, a second, larger and wingless MUTO, emerges and devastates Las Vegas. The scientists conclude that the second MUTO is female, the two were communicating and will meet to breed. Now, I know what you are thinking but shucks they did not show any giant creature sex – darn it!

Another larger creature, Godzilla an ancient alpha predator, was awakened accidentally in 1954 and initially the US military used nuclear weapons to kill it; it was in vein. As predicted by the scientists who lead Monarch, a project setup to study Godzilla, the large creature will hunt and kill the two MUTO as it in in it’s nature. Much devastation occurs as the MUTO’s destroy parts of Japan, Hawaii and California as San Francisco is where the two MUTO’s meet to form a nest and breed (ofcourse, eventually all extra-ordinary creatures and aliens will converge in the USA) and military forces are deployed with nuclear warheads to stop these creatures. Godzilla battles both creatures and is losing when one of the soldiers destroys the nest, causing the female to rush towards it. This gives Godzilla the edge and it kills the male and rests. The female kills a few soldiers and is about to kill the lead male character when Godzilla grans it and rips it’s head off after spewing radioactive energy inside of it. He then collapses, seemingly dead. The next day, as people rummage through the rubble to find loved ones and get medical aid to the injured, Godzilla suddenly awakens and returns to the ocean, as survivors cheer. He didn’t even stay for a photo op, what a hero!

Now for the human characters: the hero’s mom was killed in the reactor in Japan and his father kept on searching for the truth about the nuclear explosion leading father and son to sneak back into Janjira. They are caught and taken to the test sight where the male creature was kept and as it broke free, the dad died in the melee. The son, a military solider and bomb expert (the coincidences just keep on rolling) joins the military back (he was on leave) and heads back to Hawaii and then San Francisco and is in the team that carried the nuclear devices. He, ofcourse, is the one who burns the nest causing the female MUTO to rush back to it and giving Godzilla the gap he needs to kill the male MUTO. He is also the one at the with the nuclear device on the boat and about to be female MUTO’s dinner when Godzilla attacks again. Son soldier is reunited with his nurse wide and son in the end! Not much to know about the characters other than that!

I found the first half mostly tedious and nothing memorable. We are all hereto watch the giant creatures battle it out. The second half of the film is much better and the special effects are awesome. But that’s all there is to this film. 7 outta 10!

Weekend Planning

The upcoming weekend is going to be an exciting one for us – with that comes movies to watch, catching up on the week’s tv show episodes and ofcourse – football! There is nothing like watching the English Premier League matches at home on the telly with you friends or relatives and rooting for your favourite team. Somehow the English league is the one to watch and especially here in India, more football fans follow the English teams than the ones in Italy, Germany, Spain or other nations. Why? I’d say that it boils down to our connection with the British Isles, having once been under their rule, the charm of the English clubs, cities and town and perhaps the timings of the games as well (perfect for late evening watching in India) could also be a big factor! I plan to watch a few games over the next two days.

And ofcourse no game is complete without some good food. Just like our Western counterparts, we enjoy some good food and snacks as we watch the games on tv. And what food goes best with sports? Why pizza ofcourse. We plan to go get 4-5 large pepperoni & cheese pizzas from Dominos or perhaps barbeque chicken pizza and bring it to my place before the weekend. If we are running late and the match is about to start, we just order online and also look for e-coupon deals that e-coupon deals we can use for buying the pizza. Just look at a couple of the pics below – man my mouth is watering just thinking of the pizza!

“If we are running late and the match is about to start, we just order online and also look for e-coupon deals that we can use for buying the pizza. Just look at a couple of the pics below – man my mouth is watering just thinking of the pizza!”

And I’m always on the lookout for discounts that Dominos or other places can offer you; especially when they post them on Facebook or Twitter. And check this out, I also found a place that gives you a general discount for outlets that includes Domino’s. Any one who wants to avail of these offers from CupoNation can do so by clicking on the link. It comes in handy, especially when like us if you are planning on buying a few pizza pies at a time. We are a hungry bunch of guys, so we will surely finish the food by the first half of game one but then – hey, we can always order more, right?

RIP Richard Attenborough

English actor, film director, producer and entrepreneur Richard Attenborough has died at the age of 90. Attenborough was one of England’s leading actors and was also a director and producer. He’s probably best known for bringing Jurassic Park to life. He also starred as Santa Claus in the remake of Miracle On 34th Street. His 70-year career also included The Great Escape with Steve McQueen as well as directing the film Gandhi which won 8 Oscars. Attenborough’s son told the BBC his father died Sunday at lunchtime — he’d been living in a nursing home with his wife for the past few years.

He was the older brother of Sir David Attenborough, a naturalist and broadcaster, and John Attenborough, who was an executive at Alfa Romeo. During the Second World War, Attenborough served in the Royal Air Force. After initial pilot training he was seconded to the newly formed RAF Film Unit at Pinewood Studios, under the command of Flight Lieutenant John Boulting. Attenborough worked prolifically in British films such as Private’s Progress (1956) and I’m All Right Jack (1959). In 1963, he appeared in the ensemble cast of The Great Escape as RAF Squadron Leader Roger Bartlett. During the 1960s, he played character roles in films such as Séance on a Wet Afternoon (1964) and Guns at Batasi (1964), for which he won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor. In 1965 he played Lew Moran opposite James Stewart in The Flight of the Phoenix and in 1967 and 1968, he won back-to-back Golden Globe Awards in the category of Best Supporting Actor, the first time for The Sand Pebbles, again co-starring Steve McQueen, and the second time for Doctor Dolittle starring Rex Harrison.

He took no acting roles following his appearance in Otto Preminger’s version of The Human Factor (1979) until his appearance as the eccentric developer John Hammond in Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park (1993) and the film’s sequel, The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997). He starred in the remake of Miracle on 34th Street (1994) as Kris Kringle. In the late 1950s, Attenborough formed a production company, Beaver Films, with Bryan Forbes and began to build a profile as a producer on projects including The League of Gentlemen (1959), The Angry Silence (1960) and Whistle Down the Wind (1961), appearing in the cast of the first two films. He also directed Cry Freedom (1987) & Chaplin (1992) among others. Attenborough had been married to the English actress Sheila Sim since 1945.

Richard Samuel Attenborough, Baron Attenborough, CBE ( 29 August 1923 – 24 August 2014)

Arsenal 2 Everton 2

Last night’s game at Everton should be an eye-opener for Arsenal management. The squad is not yet complete. We need to make more changes before we can compete for the League on a regular basis and have a realistic chance of winning the EPL. Some players lack heart and at times it looks like they aren’t trying. Jack Wilshire, Nacho Monreal aren’t getting the job done. We need 1 or if possibly 2 solid defenders. Callum Chambers looks set to be a top defender in the league. Alexis Sanchez isn’t the great remedy….yet (2 games in so we’ll give him more time). Arsenal need another striker – badly. Aaron Ramsey is the heart of this team.

Two goals in the last seven minutes by Aaron Ramsey and Olivier Giroud denied Everton as Arsenal fought back to maintain their unbeaten start to the season. It appeared that the Toffees were to give the Gunners’ title aspirations an early-season reality check as they took charge of the game with first half goals from Seamus Coleman and Steven Naismith. Just as on their last visit to Goodison Park, a 3-0 defeat in April, Arsenal were being out-fought and out-thought by Roberto Martinez’s side and looked set to suffer the consequences. However the second goal by Naismith was clearly offside and it was a error by the linesman to let that go. It looked like Arsenal were on their way to another defeat against a top 5 club.

But that changed when Olivier Giroud came off the bench at half-time, and gave Wenger’s side a platform up front to haul themselves back into the game and, eventually, salvage a draw. Ramsey gave them hope when he converted Santi Cazorla’s low cross and the much-criticised Giroud capped a fine display when he headed home Nacho Monreal’s cross in the final minute. With Everton dropping deeper Arsenal pushed more men forward and, after Ramsey pulled their first goal back after 83 minutes, got their reward right at the end of the 90 minutes. Monreal salvaged an over-hit cross and turned the ball back into the area where Giroud beat Distin and nodded home.

Now waiting for any deals to come through.

Drink Of Choice :_(

Captain Picard was into Earl Grey tea; mention the Dude and we think: White Russians. What’s your signature beverage — and how did it achieve that status?

Funny that this should be the prompt for today, funny and ironic (read the previous post about the impending liquor band in my home state) but I am hit with a great deal of sadness and anger as I type this.

Not counting beer, I used to be a rum + coke guy. From the age of 19 when I first tried it out till probably the age of 27. That’s what I drank when I was at a bar either by myself or with friends. For 3.5 years I used to go to this bar in Edapally called Kairali and have a beer, some peanuts, some beef and porottas  and 3 rum + Coke with plenty of ice. I really liked rum and my favourite brands was Old Monk.

By the time I turned 27 I had already tried a few vodkas and I loved the taste of vodka on ice with a liberal splash of Sprite. That soon became my drink of choice and other than beer and the occasional brandy + coke or whiskey + coke, I would mostly drink vodka + sprite. The only other thing that I really liked was the odd Long Island Ice Tea which is kinda expensive and so I would rarely drink them.

So that’s my drink. No idea for how long I will be able to drink this anymore because of this stupid fucking ban. I may have to move states or even countries to drink now!

Prompt from the Daily Post at WordPress.com.

Kerala Moves Towards Total Alcohol Ban

It’s official. Kerala just became a shitty state to live in! In a big “fuck you” to nearly half the male population, this happened:

From newspapers: In a swift action, a day after Congress-led ruling UDF recommended shutting down over 700 liquor bars attached to hotels below the five-star categories, the Kerala Government on Friday approved the new liquor policy and also imposed a five per cent cess on liquor. Announcing the decision at a press conference on Friday, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said the Cabinet would formally ratify the decision in its next meeting. On another UDF proposal to declare all Sundays as dry days apart from the existing dry days, which include the first day of every month, he said.The Sunday Dry day would commence from October 2 next year. The five per cent cess on liquor sold through Beverages Corporation outlets would be used to set up a Fund for rehabilitation of employees who lose jobs due to closing down of the bars and for creating awareness against liquor among the people, Chandy said.

A total of 418 bars already remained closed, and the other 312 bars also would be closed this financial year, he said. Stating that the new liquor policy was a final phase to achieve UDF’s goal of taking the state to total prohibition in ten years, he said government had received legal advise that the now functioning 312 bars also could be closed during the financial year itself after completing certain financial formalities on licence fees. The new liquor policy makes it clear that only five-star hotels will have bars to sell Indian Made Foreign Liquor. The decision, taken by the UDF leadership meeting Presided by Chandy, ended a long-drawn feud in the state unit of the Congress and the coalition as a whole over the question of renewing licences of 418 bars which were found to be lacking in quality.

On UDF recommendation of phasing out Beverages Corporation outlets, Chandy said ten per cent outlets would be closed down every year to wipe out them in 10 years and this would come to around 39 shops per year. Chandy also said new liquor policy was a unanimous decision of the UDF and has the support of all sections in the society. Meanwhile, KPCC President V M Sudheeran, who had stood firmly against renewing licences to 418 bars, gave full support to the government in its new policy. After the ban on arrack by the then A K Antony Ministry two decades ago, this move has been seen as of a major initiative to make Kerala ‘a total liquor free state.

Meanwhile, State Finance Minister K M Mani put the total revenue loss on various counts due to the new liquor restrictions at Rs.1,813 crores. In coming years, the revenue loss would be much more than this, he added. The government was expected to earn Rs.250 crore on the five per cent cess on liquor for setting up the Fund for rehabilitation of workers in bars and anti-liquor campaign. To close down the now functioning 312 bars, an amount of Rs.39 crore was required to repay their licence fees, he said.

If I could get outta this place, I would and never come back!