The Nixon movie

"The assassination of Richard Nixon" - remarkable, remarkable movie. Sean Penn is mindblowing in portraying the character of Sam Bicke. You feel so much pity for him being a victim of the circumstances. I have never been a big fan of his but this performance changed my opinion of him. Somehow, I felt like I could relate to what he was going through, things getting out of hand through no fault of his, his staunch belief in a few principles that he had. Simple-minded fellow who, at times, is easily manipulated by other people. Much like myself. Poor soul !

Music

Such an integral part of human life (well, mine atleast). From the moment that I developed a modicum of musical sense, there has always been this association of a particular genre or an artist with a particular time in my life. And, listening to those oldies brings back such lovely and fond memories that I almost feel disgusted that things had to change to such an extreme degree. You never realise the true worth of anything until you have lost it & in this case, it's my past. Only memories remain. Even the most cheesiest of movies seemed awesome during those early school days, coz it was a new concept to me entirely. Tridev, Chandni, Tezaab come to mind immediately. And, the vivid imagery of the Queen Bee (a.k.a. Miss M.D.) dancing to the tune of "ek do teen.." will remain etched in my memory forever. I was so smitten by her that I made it a point to watch every single one of her movies. (That, she now lives only about 40 miles from my place is a whole another story for some other day.)

Anyhow, so time passed and so did my grandma. And in her last days at the hospital where I used to give her company, I listened to a lot of Iron Maiden & Metallica, a subconscious effort to wash away the pain of the inevitable loss.

A year later, I was not quite done with academics & landed up in Boulder, CO. And one of the first things I bought was an cd/mp3 player.

To be continued...

It's that time of the year again.....marriage mania!!!

Three of my bestest friends are getting married tomorrow...not too each other obviously...well..two of them are actually!!!

Such a joyous, wonderful occasion & I'm stuck here, half way around the world, in this godforsaken country.

Such is the irony of fate.

And these aren't the only weddings I have or I'm slated to miss in the future. These kind of moments, sometimes, make me question my decision to *move*...you know..those "What was I thinking??" kind. I haven't quite found the answer to logically convince myself that it was the right thing to do. And, I don't know if I ever will. I just hope I muster up enough *testicular fortitude* to do something about it one day.