Last night, I was supposed to go and help two friends who were moving into a new flat. And what happens? It was a dark and stormy night, and laziness reigned supreme. “We can move tomorrow”, I propounded. “Let’s go for a movie instead.” – was the response as to what we should do instead of packing and straining our cumulative muscles. And since that was on my mind all along ( I mean, it was Odin’s Day, and I hadn’t seen any movie other than Bruce Almighty ), off we went.

On Sunday night, I got an SMS from another dear friend, which read “just saw 3 deeware. (sic) Kukunoor is god,da.”
I have to say – I agree. Wholeheartedly, at that.

The only flaw with the entire switch-plans-in-favour-of-movie was :-
1) I had to wake up early in the morning. 6:45 AM ( after going to sleep at 2 AM) is so early in my book, it’s freakin’ criminal!
2) Go to their place and help with the packing. OK, so most of the packing was already done, so I had to sleepwalk around the house holding sealing tape and scissors. I hate it when the end of the tape sticks back on the roll and I gotta scratch around to get hold of it.
3) Load aforementioned packed stuff on two lorries.
4) Tag along.
5) Unload aforementioned stuff.
6) Come back home and get ready for the office.

Did I just say only flaw?
To be fair, I wasn’t the only one doing all the work. But I feel like cribbing a bit, so there. :-)
It’s still not lunchtime, and I feel like singing – “It’s been a Hard Day’s Night, I’ve been working like a dog”

I found out that eating a pomegranate with honey is absolutely out of this world.

That was it. My exercise quota for the next six months is over and done with. In the “light exercises” section, I will have to remember not to take the lift, two days every week. That is, only when I am headed downstairs.

Yesternight I was showing Mons a demo of Max Payne, the opening cut-scenes and the prologue, and I suddenly realized it’s been quite sometime since I completed that game. So after dropping her home, I sat down to play it again. It’s FUN! I had forgotten most of the details, and I found that it’s quite hilarious at times, like when the goons run away and I can hear them talking down the corridor –
Goon#1: “Hey, it’s Payne. Go and shoot him.”
Goon#2: “Why don’t you go and shoot him?”
Goon#3: “Let’s all go shoot him.”

Or a TV show, which is playing a French medieval love-story.
Dashing Guy:”Oh, my love, do not leave me. I have come to take you far away with me”
Harried female: “No, my lord, I have to tell you something.”
(Kissing sound)
Harried female: “No, my lord, this is not right.”
Dashing guy: “Why, oh, why?”
Harried female: “My lord, I …I am your sister”

Heh heh. Though not as fun as the NOLF conversation about the monkey.

A list of games I have to play. Most of them (‘*’)I already have ( as in, possess), but laziness, and till late, a lack of proper hardware stopped me from playing these. I have completed a few levels of nearly every game I have.

1. Clive Barker’s Undying.*
2. No One Lives Forever 1*&2
3. Enter The Matrix.*
5. Nocturne.*
6. GTA3*
5. Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness.*
6. Postal 2.*
7. Batman: Vengeance.*
8. Black and White.*
9. Escape from Monkey Island.*
10. Age of Mythology.*
11. Half Life 2 (when it comes out)
12. Serious Sam 1 and 2.
13. Unreal 2003/Unreal Tournament 2003
14. Return to Castle Wolfenstein.
15. Baldur’s Gate II*

Hmmm. I need time. I need to be less lazy. And I need to take better care of my eyes.

Last night I finally figured out how to make Fruity Loops work! But except for stupid trancy loops, I can’t seem to make any music. No creative sparks. I think I should listen to Making Music a couple of times. ( Ha ha, nice joke. )

Read Andrew Vachss’ Dead and Gone over the weekend. “Dark, “Rivetting” and “Gut-wrenching” are a couple of cliches I might use for this, but I will end up sounding like one of those back-cover blurbs. Which, just for the record, say all of the above, and more. My favourite Vachss-blurb happens to be “Vachss makes Hammett, Chandler and the rest look like choirboys”.

This is Vachss’s thirteenth Burke book, and I guess my eighth. Always loved the character, although the last one I read ( Sacrifice ) made me feel like Mr V was getting stuck in a rut. This brought things back to a whole new level. The book starts with the death of a major character and an attempt to kill Burke. Which he survives because of sheer luck.( and a Kevlar jacket) Loads of character-driven prose, I see more of the man Burke was – he has always dropped hints about his dark past, and this is the closest he’s come to revealing everything. Cool!

An Andrew Vachss novel available online is A Bomb Built in Hell. Written way back in the 70’s, this could not get published because the protagonist ( an antihero named Wesley) did something which publishers felt was “too gruesome”. I read ABBiH, and it was chilling. The kind of stuff that comes closest to giving me nightmares. You feel morally corrupt after reading it. I am not joking. Wesley later turned up in the Burke books, as one of Burke’s friends. This is what www.vachss.com, his official website has to say about the book: – “A Bomb Built in Hell is Wesley’s story, intended, according to Vachss, to be “a doctorate thesis in criminology without the foot-notes, exploring such ideas as the connection between child abuse and crime, and the desperate need of unbonded, dangerous children to form ‘families of choice.’”

Something I read to offset the “seriousness” of Dead and Gone – and whoopie, was it funny – was Noel Langley’s The Land of Green Ginger. A son is born to the lovely Empress Badr-ul-Badour and the Emperor of China, Aladdin. But this is not Aladdin’s story, it’s the tale of Prince Abu Ali and his quest to find the Land of (what else!) Green Ginger, a country that travels by itself, having been created by a Wizard who wanted to have a Ginger garden in his backyard, wherever he travelled. (The Wizard has been transformed into a button-nosed turtle, by the way, because of a spell that went a little awry) Abu teams up with the Djinn of the lamp ( or rather, the son of the Djinn of the lamp), named Bomballaka Wee. And a mouse-that-was-originally-supposed-to-be-a-donkey. Onward!

Finished it in a night. And it was hilarious, to say the least.

Am reading something called Pump Up The Volume, which is a history of House and Garage music. Electronica, so to speak. It’s pretty interesting so far!

Tip of the Day: DVD-Audio does not play on PC DVD-drives. So bring out the ashes and sack-clothes and repent, all ye sinners.

India’s first DVD-Audio title happens to be Boys. Fine, so I’ve heard Aiyyo, Love is Full of Pain from all five speakers. ( YUP! FIVE! The center speaker is ignored with stereo mixed tracks. ) But just for the heck of it, I decided to hear Vasundhara Das singing for me the way she sang in the studio. That’s what they say about DVD Audio, don’t they? The exact replica of a studio-recording, no compression, etc etc. (Funny, that’s what they said when cds came out the first time, exact replica and all) Anyways, I bought the DVD for 125 rupees. Even though it said “This item is not for sale” in bold on the cover. It also said – “This does not play in CD/VCD players”. Took it home, popped it in the drive, and waited, with bated breath and lustful ears, for the glorious Dolby Digital TM5.1 sound to strike my ears.

What struck my ears was 5 plus 1 speakers full of glorious static. That’s when I play it on the Creative Player. When I try the PowerDVD player, it gives me 5 plus 1 speakers of silence.

WAAAAH!

Warren Ellis, creator of Transmetropolitan has boarded LJ as mistersleepless. Seems he has decided to write a book in 60 entries on LJ.

And i thought I would be cutting down on my lj-addiction a little.