Anecdotal Evidence

The airlines announcer can't say this the last boarding call , when it quite clearly is not. She can't say this is a final boarding call - which, while being the most honest thing to say is unlikely to achieve a thing. So the poor dear says: " this is final boarding call... ". And you thought Indians were just careless with prepositions !

When you take something unoriginal and put your stamp on it by trying to rhyme, then I guess that may be termed re-verse. I mean, what is original anyway... As it goes in Latin: prudens interrogatio dimidium scientiate - all that a scientist discovers in a fact is the language in which he enunciates it. So here's an old joke.... In another instance, quoted from the dictatorial regime of Gen Zia-ul-Haq of Pakistan, Mr Luther said Zia's barber used to ask the General when he would usher in the promised democracy.An annoyed General once admonished the barber for asking the question repeatedly and wanted to know how he was concerned with democracy. The barber replied: "General, I have no idea what democracy means, but every time I ask the question, your hair stand on end and it makes my job easy!" And now it is mine: அரும்பெரும் அண்டை நாடாம் பாகிஸ் தானம் அதற்கு ஒரு தலைவன் அரசது வமைக்கு மொரு முறையாம் ஜன நாயக மதற்கே செறு பகைவன் மறுமொழி கேளா ஜெனரல் ஜியா என்றால் அண்டம் நடுங்...

"Our sambhar may be sweet, our women too forward, our government right-wing, we may have opened the gates to a greater integration with -what the informed rightly call - the North Indies...But sir, at the end of the day, we have Cubbon Park. Your city does not." he said dipping a slice of his kadubu into a cup of liquid jaggery. I smiled patronizingly. "The reason for that is quite simple sir" , I said dusting the sand off my gentle moustache. "You see, a place like Cubbon Park with its deceptive sense of idyll encourages all and sundry to attempt poetry. Even I came within an ace of that this weekend about Eden, Fall of Man and all. Scary, no ? We - the Hindu reading population of Madras - take our role as protectors of our national language quite seriously. That is why we make do with Panagal Park and even build flyovers next to it. Even with that, our boundless imagination sometimes threatens to make us susceptible to poetic afflatus. Then, we sit down and...

Work is the curse of the drinking class - Oscar Wilde திங்கள் விடிந்தால் காதைத் திருகி இழுத்துக் கொண்டு போகிறது - Gnanakkoothan It's good to have land - Stewie Griffin

G.K.Chesterton most famously said Angels fly because they take themselves lightly Let's ignore that and celebrate the virtue of self-consciousness along the lines of Matsuo Basho the founding-father, so to speak, of Haiku. He once recalled something he wrote ten years earlier and mentioned to his pupil, how the last line should have been re-written. A poem is never really completed, only abandoned - Paul Valery via AKR Here is something abandoned in 2004, 2006 and 2007 and further scissored down further this morning Brittle Beauty A moment’s beauty is always there For every creature that was around It’s only those who’ve some to spare Who give hope of life unbound. But then there are morals, then there is shame And worse: ‘each one has an innate talent’ God! Whoever said ‘twas a fair game? It’s just us cynics who are gallant The rest go armed with handkerchieves That play purdah to the eager eyes Evolution indeed from the days of fig leaves But then, Adam hadn’t a choice So here ...

Often I feel like the girl in "If Tomorrow Comes" who plays chess with the American and Russian. To the technical guys I am the business guy To the business guys I am the technical guy I speak of Tamil literature to 'English medium' friends Moffusil politics to Chennaites I'm the conservative's liberal and liberal's conservative All that, I assure you -not in a show-offy manner. But in a simple what-can-I-bring-to-this-table contributory way. I could be the only screenwriter who plays the oboe - Charlie Kaufman, Adaptation But what's impressive about the iceberg is that we assume there's more from where it came from. We know we only see a part of its monstrous size and rest is below the water. The difference is, the knowledgable man doesn't sync enough. To be judgemental on this is being unrealistic. Biting off more than you can chew is a virtue in Tamil culture. So it took me some alienation to appreciate the wisdom in.. I'm always amaze...

The conscious man's smile surely is fake How else can he with his weighty thoughts bear The wide world's misery to which he's awake And smile as if, it is all quite fair I can only ditto what greats thus spake Content that the answer is somewhere there Had the cave man laughed, history would have been different - Lord Henry Wotton, Picture of Dorian Gray Gratiano : Let me play the fool: With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come (Act I, Sc I, Merchant of Venice) Why has my motley diary no jokes? Because it is a soliloquy and every man is grave alone. Ralph Waldo Emerson As a writer of light fiction, I have always till now been handicappedby the fact that my disposition was cheerful, my heart intact, and my life unsoured. Handicapped, I say, because the public likes to feelthat a writer of farcical stories is piquantly miserable in his privatelife, and that, if he turns out anything amusing, he does it simply inorder to obtain relief from the almost insupportable weight o...