So yesterday was Rongali Bihu, the Axomiya New Year, and a holiday in the office. The upside – an unexpected break. The downside – everybody else I know were still at work. It’s a rare day when such a thing happens, so I ended up doing some…oddball things.
I cleaned up the kitchen in the morning. The place was being shared by the three of us with the denizens of the night – quite a few of them, I found out, because as I lifted a plate that hadn’t been washed since the Dwápar Yuga, a family of cockroaches scurried away. I let them go. I didn’t want to start the New Year with any genocidal activity. Scrubbed the dishes, cleaned up the garbage ( genocide was out of the question, but emigration was still possible), wiped the grime out of the stove and the cupboards – all to the tune of Trickbaby.
Quick decision-making time – do I stay at home and swig packets of Appy and watch Futurama until my brain explodes, or do I go out and get undone things done? Spent five minutes laughing at myself for even considering the first option, and headed out. Quick stop at National Market, just for kicks. And found…stuff. War-dance-inducing, Sinful stuff. Tra la la. Hopped into the office ( you’ll notice my unnatural mental perseverance at this point, because instead of heading home straight, I was taking a roundabout way. Prolonging the pleasure, they call it ), did hasty monetary calculations – and..
Oh wait, did I tell you about the hard disk crash that happened on Sunday? Graaah. Music most painstakingly downloaded was gone, GONE! And what was that they said about unheard sounds being sweeter? Ever since I lost those albums, there is this urge, more than ever, to listen to Ornella Vanoni singing L’Appuntamento ( That’s from the Ocean’s Twelve OST, one of the best albums I’ve heard this year, though the movie tried so hard to be over-smart it collapsed under the weight of its own setup, and the combined coolness of the (ahem) actors ). GRAAH! I can’t find the album anywhere now, suprnova.org having collapsed a long time ago, and the rest of the sites are all underground, and with seedless torrents. I swear, if I see this in any of the stores, I am buying it. No second thoughts there.
So that’s what happened, about 10 GB of stuff vanished – because I didn’t have them backed up. I generally do that by writing CDs and passing them on to Sasi or Vasu, who are smart enough to make copies for themselves. So anytime we lose anything, the other guy’s copy comes to the rescue. That’s foolproof, let me tell you. But what happened was – my CD-writer crashed sometime in October, so no backups since then.
Which brings us back to, boo hoo hoo, my plans for the day, and I decided to find my way to SP Road and buy myself a device that will allow my Hard disk to be backed up periodically, in short, a DVD-writer. Boy oh boy, SP Road was a mess, both in terms of the locality and prices. Didn’t really have much to bargain, because every freaking dealer was quoting the same, and once or twice, they even said “VAT” and made me sneer impudently.One of these impudent sneers of mine seemed to work, got a Samsung drive at a price I could call decent, but still 300 Rs more than what the dealers in Hyderabad are charging for it, as I found out. But what the heck, I OWN A DVD-WRITER!!!
Right. Now the problem was, the dealers now tried to overcharge me on blank DVDs. No deal, because I had already asked for prices at National Market, so I went back. The guy at Amith went a little pale when he saw me there – there must have been a lot of faulty discs among the ones I bought, for me to be back there so soon, or so he thought. Picked up some blanks, and found a couple more movies, making the man a lot happier. Nice!
The evening was spent in Commercial Street, where a nice time was had by one and all – partly because of a Book Fair in the wilderness, and a Singin’ In The Rain moment. *snicker*
And at night, when the world slept around me, I watched Sin City, mouthing Marv’s lines and Dwight’s and Hartigan’s and grinning every second. With two packets of butter-pepper flavoured popcorn, Appy and Soan Papdi. I have a feeling it’s going to be a Great New Year for this Axomiya guy. Woo Hoo!
You just couldn’t wait for Sin City to be released on the Big Screen, could ya? Could ya?
And a happy new year to you too! :))
Nope, I definitely couldn’t. Personally, after watching it, I don’t think it’s going to be released in India at all. Heh.
I didn’t even realise you were back in India until I read your post. :)
can you throw it to me now?
How cool was that eh ? How cool was that eh ?
I am still in a bloody trance. Rourke and Wood.
And two belated greetings — a happy Rongali and Vishu (from my end).
Arigato Gozaimas. :-D
Read Akira fast.
Happy New Year, man!
Curious : which model of the DVD-writer did you pick up?
How much does it cost? How much does a 10-pack of blank DVD-R’s cost nowadays?
Here, an LG 16x writer is 9,000 yen (Rs. 5400). 10 blanks are ….I forgot!!
This is the exact model I bought, got it for 4200.
A 10-pack of blank DVD-R’s can cost anything between 250 ( the cheapest ones, with oddball brand names, and 1000 Rs ( Verbatim, sleek black ones.) I suppose the average price is about 40-55 for Samsung/TDK/Sony DVD-R’s.
I asked for the price of an LG writer, these guys said that LG and Sony cost above 5500. In Hyderabad, a Sony DVD writer was being sold for 5100.
That’s damn inexpensive! Burn away!
The only track i’ve heard from Ocean’s Twelve is the Nightfox laser song, and that was an awesome track!!
All of them are superb. I am personally stuck on the Ornella Varnoni track, but I find myself humming one track or the other from the album.
Oh and a happy new year to you.:)
Thank you!
Have a great year ahead. :-)
Thanks! Everything seems to be going fine, except for the amount on my credit card account. ;-)
No point asking whether you liked Sin City. Which character did you like the most? I really liked Elijah Wood and would have loved more of him, and of course Rourke’s was awesome, and Miho too. Hell, everything was great!
I finally finished reading all the Sin City comics AFTER I saw the movie.
And I agree with you, I don’t think Sin City will see a theatrical release in India.
Everything was great, absolutely!
You finished reading ALL of the Sin City comics? Have you found Sin City: Family Values? That’s a book very hard to get in digital format.
wish you a good year ahead..
Thanks! :)
quizbusters..give the q’s a shot,mate.
I hope your office postman reads your blog?
Otherwise, he might be confuuuuuuused by the package for “Mr. beatzophreniac” from Japan.
:))))
:-O
Eh? What package? Eh? Eh?
Re: :-O
Jappu ladki log will love you man!
(When surprised, they shriek the same way…”eh?! EH?! EHHHHHHHHHHH?!!”
It’s very disconcerting, to say the least!)
Re: :-O
That’s why I said “Eh”, and not “Wha..” . :-D So all these Jap-movie-watching has not gone waste after all.
And you still haven’t answered, sir. What package? :-D