Idiot!

I am an idiot. I think the biggest contributor to mistakes is not incompetency but hubris. Believing you are right doesn't count anywhere except in religion. What counts is systematic effort and analysis, and infinite scepticism. Assuming you know something is infinitely worse than admitting you know nothing.

Random Culture Vulture (Sepulcher) Observations

My favorite few paragraphs in all of literature must be Tom Sawyer getting Ben Rogers and a bunch of others to whitewash his fence.

I saw this play "Strange Interlude" by Eugene O'Neill. It must be the strangest play I have ever seen. It has 9 acts and goes on for 5 and a half hours. We started at 2pm, had a dinner break at 5pm and the play finally finished at 9pm. The basic premise is that life is lived in the past and the future, and the present is but a strange interlude. Also, what is the "right" thing to do may not be the "moral" thing to do. Very dark with characters that launch into inner monologue soliloquys every once in a while. Leave the play with the feeling of having been privy to a crazy neurotics mind. Its like Freud + Jung with a background of hideous screams.

What did the comic say about his life?

Life is a stage, but mine is a joke.

By the way, if you are ever looking to write good comedy use 30 Rock, Arrested Development and The Office as templates. Its all about developing wacky interesting characters, letting them interact with each other and allowing the magic to be made! The Ha ha one liners are for the escapists who don't want to do the real thing. Its a gourmet meal compared to a McDonalds hamburger.

Art Institute

• Firstly, and most importantly its free for the month of February!
• New and improved impressionist galleries. Fortunately, most of the modern mumbo jumbo paintings have been carted off to the yet unopened Modern Wing. Unfortunately, that includes the Picassos and Dalis.
• One huge gallery of art from the Indian sub-continent.
• The Munch exhibition. Doesn't that make you want to Scream? (Get it? Get it? 'Scream' is Munch's most famous painting. Get it? Get it?)
• Daily museum tours at 2pm on weekends. Did you know that this painting by Toulouse Lautrec (left) and this painting by Renoir (right) are both at the Circus Fernando? Now you do. Use that information wisely next time you want to impress someone at a museum.

Generalissimo

Did anyone see the investment banker dig in the new 30 Rock episode? Ha ha very funny. They have the show nailed. Good comedy is like a great meal, a beautiful painting or an exquisite narrative - entrancing but you just can't figure out how it was done.

Never bothered...

..to listen to Coldplay and Maroon 5, until now that is. Love the sound.

Like Maroon 5 a little bit more though. Coldplay sounds too much like U2 at their melodic best (e.g. Angel of Harlem) - in terms of vocals, lead guitar, drums and overall song structure.

Benefits of a vacation, slow internet and being forced to listen to the hard disk music collection.

2 weeks off

In Chennai, away from the warkpalce for doo weaks. Wayy too much Counterstrike. I mentally note down vantage points as I walk down a street, and stay away from open places.

Saarang. Shobana in a creative rendition of the Ramayana entitled Maya Ravana. Opeth, the Swedish death metal band rocked us into Republic Day. A good way to save costs in this tight economy would be to purchase a pig, tie to a board, stick in front of a mike, and then torture assortedly, to obtain the music generated by the aforementioned human forms.

Knock knock who is there?
Me.
You who?
DMV the Death Metal Virtuoso.
Who?
Bahhhrrgggwwwwaaarrgghhhhharrghhhhaarr
Ahh, DMV. Do come in.
Thanks.

American Dad

Has anyone seen that show? Seth McFarlane has it nailed down. The main protagonist Stan Smith is the extreme right wing alter-ego of Peter Griffin in Family Guy. Many of the characters are also similarly set up - hyper dad, relatively passive and sane wife, talking animals and 2 kids (one guy one girl). All in all, they form a vehicle for some extremely witty social commentary.

Guess the book!

Nous acheterons de bien belles choses
En nous promenant le long des faubourgs

Les bleuets sont bleus, les roses sont roses,
Les bleuets sont bleus, j'aime mes amours.

We'll buy some lovely things
Walking down the avenue.

Violets are blue, and roses are red,
Violets are blue, and my love is true.

Hint : Eugene Delacroix meets Liberty in a book.