B'fast like a Queen

Today's b'fast:

• 2 sausages
• 1 plate poha
• 1 croissant
• 1 glass of freshly squeezed juice which turned out to be bitter and had to be thrown away

I came across a nice B'fast place in Galleria in the morning. Wish I'd seen it earlier... we could have gone there today.

I have joined the gym... freaking expensive. But all gyms around my house are expensive so I do not have an option. The trainer really pushes me hard. I am hurting all over but feel nice. Whether I lose weight or not, atleast I will be fit and increase my stamina. The best part is all treadmills, cycles and cross trainers have a personal TV. I catch up on my fav serials during gym time. It helps that most English channels have subtitles.

Last night we went to Earth Lounge. It serves Italian food. Good place but we didn't find the lasagne to our liking. The perfect lasagne is served at Little Italy... it has layers of the pasta with spinach, red sauce and covered with cheese sauce. Yum!!! The best part was the dessert- Chocolate Lasagne... chocolate sponge cake covered with a layer of white chocolate and then dark chocolate. Chocolate sauce was spread all over it. The white chocolate has a mild taste- not too milky or sweet. Heavenly.

Riot

Another masterpiece from Shashi Tharoor... not at the level of 'The Great Indian Novel' but much better than 'Show Business'.

It is the story of an American lady who comes to India to work with a NGO in a small town of UP as her research project. She gets killed in a riot. Her family comes to the town to figure out how she died. I loved the beginning... with newspaper reports on her death... the story moves forward through the diaries of various people. The only let down was the fact that the reason of the death was pretty simple. I mean, after all the build up... there should have been something surprising.

But worth a read.

Beatrice and Virgil

I was looking forward to reading this book since 'Life of Pi' was so damn good.

I gave up after 1/4th of it... which is a big disappointment for me. I hate leaving books half way...it breaks my heart.

The story is about a writer whose book newest book gets criticised by the publishers and he gives up on writing. He then meets a man writing a play on a donkey and monkey called Beatrice and Virgil (I can never remember which is which). Thats when I lost interest.

Read it at your own peril.

Chalo Dilli

This is what happens when you have commercial actors trying to produce and star in "art movies". They make a complete mess of it.

I know... I know... people have given good reviews. I just don't understand why. The movie begins well... with good jokes and acting. It drags in the middle and enters cliches at the end. Predictable.

For movies like this, the pace has to be fast... you cannot dwell too much on anything. Lara could not act "angry" in some scenes. I hated seeing Akshay in the end. Why?

Vinay was good, as always. Lara did not have to apply sooo much make up. She ended up looking uglier than she is.

So disappointed.

Tere Bin Laden

I was typing a comment on Madmomma's blog on the Osama death and decided to put it in the post also.

She wanted people's views on the incident. Here is my reply:

I do not believe it at all... everything sounds fishy:

- Osama conveniently dies when elections are near

- There is no proof- no photos or dead body

- If Islamic tenets mean so much, why was Saddam's body not buried at sea? Why was his hanging video taped?

- How could USA have enter Pak air space without PAK not realizing it?

- Osama was staying near the army and Pak was clueless?

- There was firing for 40 mins and Pak army was unaware?

- Was Obama tired of waging a war with 2 countries and withdrawing would mean USA is a failure and coward. Was this a clever way of ending the war? I hope so.

Even if pics are released, who knows what Osama looks like now? Wouldn't a smart man cut his beard and get a makeover after newspapers released his pics?

Sorry, I am not buying it. Will USA use this excuse to start a war with Pakistan? I hope not.

Anyway, coming back to India and specifically to Gurgaon...

Weekend was ok types... I caught up with a friend... caught up with movies... bought a GPS device (Yes... directions from people are completely unreliable)... we drove all the way to CP for a yummy dinner at Kake ka dhaba. Totally worth it and so damn cheap.

Shor in the city

Sigh!!! Its a season of disappointments. Another dud. Most of the movie was spent on introducing the characters and hardly any time was dedicated to the climax.

Don't watch it... the stories are nothing great even though they are based on actual incidents.

I am

Hiya... watched this flick on Friday night. Was disappointed. I had read extremely good reviews.

The movie is about 4 people- 4 stories which are not linked with each other.

Story no 1: Nandita Das is divorced and looking for a sperm donor. For some reason, she is not looking too good in the movie. She looks fine in her recent photographs. Anyway, she meets Purab who is her sperm donor. End of story.

Story no 2: Juhi travels to Srinagar to sell off her ancestral property. She has to confront the past which has made her bitter. Manisha is her friend and is looking good. Thank god, she has lost all the excess weight.

Story no 3: Sanjay Suri is gay and was abused as a kid by his father. He is expected to attend his father's funeral but does not want to.

Story no 4: Rahul Bose is gay and meets Arjun Mathur. They start making out in his car when the cop catches him. He has to pay him a bribe of 50k to get out of the situation.

I wish the movie was about only 1 of the above stories and as an audience I could connect with it. The last 2 stories had more impact compared to first two.

Avoidable. The acting is great but not the concept.