The "Chappell" Effect - Just for laughs

Someone sent me this pic a day after I wrote about the state of Cricket in our counrty.......its nice and brings a smile to your face even if you are not a cricket fan ;)

We can't Play

Sorry as I feel for Md. Kaif beacuse of what people did to his house, I think the blame lies with us, The Audience in our country. We build up these huge expectations from our teams and expect them to Win everything where ever they go..

I don't think its the fault of our players that they can't Win.....may be the blame lies with the selectors who can't find 16 inform players in the entire country.

Why just blame and torture the cricketers, weren't we champions at Hockey once upon a time ? I remember staying up late at night during school days to watch India battle it out in a Hockey World Cup - doesn't even sound like a fact anymore.

I believe that the problem that needs fixing is in the basic administration of sports in the country and the sponsership models.

Why else would Sania still be strugling between the 50-100 rank, Narian working as a test driver in F1, Hockey - [do we still have a team ?], Leander & Bhupathi - don't want to play together [They were doing well together, weren't they ?], Anju Bobby George can't seem to get it right when it matters ??

I seriously doubt if we can be world beaters in Kho-Kho & Kabadi anymore.

Golf, they say, is the new high in Indian Sports - All I can say is - Wait till our sponsors & advertising guys find out :)

The Beginning

Before I start telling you about my successful vacation to Goa, let me tell you about the fiasco I almost created before going to Goa.

I personally blame the domestic Airline in our country for this....but then there are others who believe I messed up.....On second thoughts maybe I did....just a little bit...or a little more than that...:) Here's what happened:

We had received an SMS from the airline a few days before our departure stating the flight was rescheduled to 1350 hrs instead 1230 hrs. When we told some of our friends about it...they said - "ha ha - Low Cost Airline - No Frills : no Thrills - its gonna get further delayed".

So here we were on the day - All packed and ready to go.....i called an Auto - D & I got started on our trip to Goa. 500 meters to the Airport and my phone went - beep beep - You've got a Message. With a disgusting grunt I pulled out my phone and read -



"Your flight number ### from XXX-XXX has been delayed and will now depart at 1530 hrs".



I asked D to check with the Fat Fashion Freak [:)] where he was (he was coming with us on the same flight). I even asked the Auto chap to stop on the side.........the idea was - with 2 & a half hours to go - we might as well turn around and go to his house for an hour or so.

Our friend however was almost at the airport too.......so we thought we'll meet up there.

Once at the Airport, My darling D asked me to find out why the flight was delayed and I, in my usual disgusted tone responded - "what difference is that gonna make ?"

We were there for about 10 minutes when our friend arrived and we debated for a little while to what our options were - and then decided we might as well check in our bags and grab a bite.

We walked up to the check-in counter and asked, " is the flight gonna get delayed any further ??"

Prompt came the reply, " Your Flight is on time, Sir."

OOOPSSSS - I said and pulled out my phone to re check the message. The problem was i had read the message exactly like i wrote it above.

The ### read 644 & the XXX-XXX read - Goa - Blr.

I said Sorry to D & the Fashion Freak and we went on to Board the flight.

We landed in Goa at 1450 hrs, and I couldn't help but think - if these 2 had listened to me and we had gone back to his house......we'd be catching a cab for the Airport around the same time that we landed :0

I would never have heard the end of it --- I don't think I have have even now.

However, I would like to dedicate this write-up to the 2 wonderful people in my life who made my wonderful vacation a reality.....by making sure I went for it.

D - you are scary when u get excited - but I should still listen to you - Thanks for being there all the time.

Fashion Freak - I will no longer call you Fat :) You've been working hard to burn it off and have achieved much better results than I have.


What happened in Goa - will be written about soon - until then write in some comments about the ratio of fault between "yours truly" & "our domestic airlines" ;)

One hell of a vacation

I am back....Back into the same old grind.....the corporate rat race. Have loads to write about from my few days in paradise...but not enough time.

So here's what i plan to do.....I am gonna break down my trip to Goa into 2, 3 or 4 seperate entries starting from tomorrow.

In the meanwhile make do with Savvy and Deeply Dippy .

For those of you interested in pictures from out trip, please visit my new webpage -
Roots, Branches & Trees

GOA Calling

Deepti & I are heading to Goa tomorrow....will be hanging around Baga till Sunday :) We have been really looking forward to this Vacation for a long time...

Savvy's coming from Mumbai, Lata from Pune, Nealesh is going with us, Kishore and his wife will join us on friday. Even Vicky might come over on the weekend.

Lets hope this holiday lives up to what everyones been thinking.

My Agenda for the next few days is fixed....I am going to relax like never before. The whole idea is to do Absolutely NOTHING during this vacation.

Will write about the trip and put up some pictures once I get back.

Until then - Asta-la-vista - Baby.

Baby Tracker Updated

Have updated the tracker with some new pictures of Deepti. For those of you who would like to view the pictures one at a time, I have also uploaded these snaps on my yahoo album