Thursday, August 31, 2006

About FM radio station

With another FM radio station, Radio One opening up, the competition in the air is heating up. I keep switching radio stations while I drive (all males are genetically programmed to switch TV and radio channels at the rate of 1 channel about 5 seconds, sometimes just 2 seconds) and I have noticed that I am more often stopping at this new station to listen to a song or a conversation. So for now, Radio One is my favorite. But my loyalty can change very fast.

I wonder how people in Radio City feel about new stations coming up. They once had a share of 90+% of market, but I guess they don't have that much anymore. Radio broadcasting must be a very difficult field to innovate and stay on top of the heap.

Sunday, August 20, 2006

Mad rush on Aug15

This year on August 15th, I committed one of the gravest mistakes that can be committed by a Bangalorean - Visiting Lalbagh flower exhibition on a weekly holiday, that too on the last day of the show. When I arrived at the gates of Lalbagh after several minutes of painful waiting in the traffic jam outside, the authorities there snatched Rs.50 from me and told me that I could park my car inside the bagh. They have a crooked sense of humour, I now think. Let alone park the car, I could consider myself lucky if I could just drive my car through the dense population inside! Once I (miraculously) found a place to park my car, I found that people pulling and pushing each other, cursing, grabbing each other by hair and so on to be able to make their way through the thousands of trying to do exactly the same! All this was not even inside, but on the way to the glass house. Situation inside the glass house was much more grim. Once we managed against all odds to get in, the only thing my wife wanted to do was get out of the glass house! Once we did that, the only thing she wanted to do was get out of Lalbagh!!!
To give credit where it is due, flower show was probably very good. I don't know exactly, because all I saw were the heads and backs of other people who were trying like me to see the flowers. However, being a person who allows some time to smell the flowers, I did snatch a couple of pics on my camera before we left.


You would think that we learnt our lesson by this time and headed straight back home and spent the rest of the evening in frong of TV, but no sir, we don't learn so easily. We went straight to the new Big Bazaar just half kilometre away. They were running some sale that was ending on that day, hence large crowds eager to buy anything in the store were thronging the place. This place seemed to be an extension of Lalbagh as far as crowds are concerned, but with more spending opportunites. But it took us just a few minutes to learn our lessons this time. We decided not to venture to any such places on any such day ever again and headed back home.

The city is now filled with people who desperately want to have a good time and are ready to spend for it, but the infrastructure is not catching up.

Duh!

First, South Africa pulled out of the triangular cricket series in Srilanka and the series was reduced to 3 matches between India and Srilanka. Next, the rain gods decided to pour cold water on the excitement and the series got washed out. This is probably one of the most disappointing cricket series for cricket lovers. But was this the right time to hold a cricket series in the island nation? I don't know, but it looks like they decided to hold it bang in the middle of their rainy season. Wasn't it like holding a world ski competition in Chennai in the month of April or a golf tournament in, say, northern Canada in January? I guess we need to tell the Srilanka cricket authorities: "See guys, if this is your rainy season, it probably _will_ rain (surprise!) and it probably _will_ affect cricket matches adversely. What you need to plan is a swimming competition in your Colombo cricket stadium during this time of the year" How can we pay back the Lankans when they tour India next time? Plan some matches in Chirapunji? Or probably Jayanagar Swimming club? ;-)

Saturday, August 12, 2006

A new blog!

It has now been a bit more than an year since I started this blog. As an anniversary gift to 'devout' followers (I hope at least one person other than me is reading this blog), I am presenting, hold your breath and control your excitement, a second blog! The only thing better than having a crappy blog is having two of it ;-) I hope two bad things cancel it out. The second blog has been in my mind for a while now, but I was not sure how it was going to take shape. Now that I have decided to take it out of wraps, why don't you have a look at it and give your suggestions?

Please please please please please please please please please please please please please please please please have a look at it :-)) http://v-chitra.blogspot.com

Saturday, August 05, 2006

Angry weather gods

Don't you feel the weather is turning out to be too extreme, too often in the last few years? In the last couple of years, I have heard about record-setting weather conditions all around the world. Last year, it was the deluge in Mumbai and Bangalore, the kind we had not ever seen. We also heard that the US had a record number of hurricanes last  year, highlighted by Katrina. We then heard about the unusually heavy snowfall and cold in eastern parts of US and Canada. This year, there has been a never-heard summer in Europe and North America. I read that weather reporters in Europe have been forced to get new thermometers because their existing ones were not designed for temperatures this high. Many countries are recording all time high temperatures. The evergreen England too is drying up!

Is it just my imagination, or am I seeing far too many such incidences in the recent past? Record rainfalls, record heats, record deaths, especially in the more 'advanced' northern hemisphere of the Earth. Is it all a part of global warming? Or are these the early signs of the impending obscuration/cataclysm that Hindu mythology describes as "Pralaya"?