Crosswords

This post is a result of some pleasant and many unsavoury experiences I had while i tried my hand at cracking a few crosswords. Whoa! Whoa ! Stop it right there .Before you march down this post let me clarify a few things.This post is not a comprehensive list of do's and dont's of crossward-cracking.Why? Simply because no such list exists. Secondly I am not an expert . I have solved only a few crosswords ; but i must confess I relished those moments!
This post is about the discoveries I made during my humble endeavors. So here it goes:
Discovery 1: Getting a crossword is easy!
Most newspapers have a daily crossword and there is a high probability that the newspaper that you follow has one. Or there are numerous free crossword puzzles online which you can access after a simple 'googling'. The more serious among you can buy crossword puzzles books.
The New York Times Supersized Book of Sunday Crosswords: 500 Puzzles (New York Times Crossword Puzzles)

Discovery 2 : Getting started is tough!
Seriously, the toughest part of the crossword is not in cracking the clues but pushing yourself to attempt it. You might feel that you are not upto it or that the clues dont make any sense.Don't worry relax! It didn't make any sense to me the first time either. If you feel that the online tutorials will make you a 'crossie-genius' then the time has come to share my third discovery

Discovery 3: Online tutorials does not make you a genius
Yes they don't because they can't. If they promise you they can then definitely they CANNOT. Some of the online communities actually encourage discussion on crosswords and thus might improve your understanding but thats about it. The website www.crosswordunclued.com is a very useful website for beginners and veterans alike but ultimately you have to walk the walk yourself

Discovey 4 : Some clues
Most of the easier clues in crosswords, I have come to know,  involve anagrams and containers. Let me explain. Anagrams are words formed by rearranging the alphabets of another word. For example

dormitory = dirty room (how true!)

another example made popular by the Da vinci code is

Oh! lame saint = the mona lisa.
Click here for more on anagrams

Most clues involving anagrams are indicated in the clues by the words out, break/broken, mix/mixed etc. because anagrams involve breaking and
mixing to bring out new words.

Example ( from Hindu crossword : nita jaggi)
Old man breaks the nut(6)
Here the breaks is adjacent to the old man. so by rearranging we get
old man = almond ;which is a nut
Also notice that old man contains six alphabets as indicated in  the question.

Containers are clues in which the answer lies within the question, literally.

Example ( from Hindu crossword 9870 : nita jaggi):
Rabbit found in the Gurkha regiment (4)
Usually the words in, inside, within etc. indicate a container. So observing closely inside the phrase
Gorkha regiment we get the answer hare which is a rabbit.

for other abbreviations and clues:  Click here

Discovery 5 : Enjoying the process is the goal!

I had been very disappointed at my not being  able to crack the easiest of clues and overlooking the simplest of hints.I cursed myself for it. Then I realised that beating myself up was taking the fun out of it. So if you feel dejected while in the middle of a crossie-session  take a break , freshen up, and have a go at it later. Trust me it will a lot more enjoyable then.

Final Discovery : the atlantis
No esoteric lectures can replace the exhilarating experience of that eureka movement. So are you up to it?
 

Johnny gone down

Johnny gone down is Karan bajaj's( karan bajaj) second offering after the successful venture 'Keep off the grass'.
Johnny gone down is a racy, entertaining piece of fiction that resembles a taut Hollywood thriller that you  see often but soon forget.
The story unfolds in an Indian railways compartment, a famililar setting for most desis.But from then on the book takes a roller coaster ride spanning MIT, Boston, to Phnom Penh, Cambodia ,stopping briefly at a Buddhist monastery in Thailand racing forward to Rio de Jenero, Brazil, back again to the U.S before taking a final plunge in India.
The Protagonist Nikhil Arya, is believable and familiar at first as an MIT graduate waiting for a job in NASA. What happens to his life after his "innocent vacation' to Cambodia with his friend 'Sam' is unbelivable and overtly imaginative  even for a work of fiction. The hero sheds his skin from an ambitious young man to a genocide escapee to a monk with relative ease. But may be thats what the author intended. Nikhil and Nick and  Monk Namche and Coke Buddha and Johnny pass through our mind like a typical Bollywood heroine in a song video with her trademark costume changes. None stays with us.
The author has tried to juggle unsuccessfully with philosophy and mafia, family and detachment,friendship and karma yogaleaving too many balls in the air. The reader ends up confused while the story ends in a typical bollywood fashion.
Priced at just Rs 99 /- this book is aimed at entertaining the masses. One may even find a movie adaptation soon and then we will forget it. We have too many examples to prove that.
Search Amazon.com Books for johnny gone down

fastflip

In this blog i thought i will share something that i have been using for a while. Its a website from google called fastflip.googlelabs.com .This site is very useful since it brings to you feeds from all major newspapers and magazines
in one page. And whats more! you can search for a particular news you want.
More info from google blog  here
So start flipping!

The Venitian Betrayal

This Cotton Malone thriller by Steve Berry along the lines of 'the Da vinci Code' is a part truth-part fiction thriller involving the lost tomb of Alexander, a draught that that can cure AIDS and the political turmoils in a
fictional Central Asian Republic formed by the union of states like Kyrgiasthan, Kazakhistan etc.The CAR is ruled by Irina Zovastina who fashions herself after Alexander the great and derives most of her ideologies from Homer's Iliad. Her quest to find the tomb forms a rather shaky crux of the story.
I found the book to be good in patches. The book is not a thriller per se. There are small chapters hanging in there without contributing to thrills. The chapters are small like the DaVinci Code but sometimes too small. They don't convey much. The characters are half baked and it would have been better if the story had less but strong characters than a multitude of 'ghosts'.The cure for AIDS , the politics behind it, etc together with the tomb of one the most enigmatic conquerors of all times makes an explosive mix of a storyline but it completely fizzes out especially towards the end.
I will suggest this book to anyone who just wants to kill time while reading a book. Not recommended for a serious reading.

witty quotes

I stumbled upon these quotes and found them witty. Hope ypu like them too

1.It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt.
- Mark Twain

2.Bad spellers of the world - Untie!
- Graffiti

3.Don't wish ill for your enemy, plan it.
- Syrus, Maxims

4.A vaccum is a hell of a lot better than some of the stuff that nature replaces it with.
- Tennessee William, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

5.The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you've got it made.
- Groucho Marx

6.It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do.
- Jerome K. Jerome

7.Experience teaches you to recognize a mistake when you've made it again.
- Unknown

8.Golf is a good walk spoiled.
- Mark Twain

9.The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.
- George Bernard Shaw

10.If life were fair, Elvis would be alive and the impersonators would be dead.
- Johnny Carson

Rise of Machines? i dont think so

It was 3.00 a.m and I was desperately trying to go back to sleep.Someone had suggested once that thinking of stuff you have done the previous day will help you fall asleep.
So I started thing of stuff i had done the previous day and i got a list that looked something like this:
morning - read newapaper watched a movie
noon - watched a movie
evening - watched a movie
night watched a movie.
I dont know why(:)) but I was not getting sleepy. So i began to think about what i had watched.
I had watched matrix and terminator. Both the movies had machines taking  over the world.
But why? I mean what will be there purpose of their  life?
Human beings have some purpose. It can be professional - I want to be an engineer, personal - i want to rule the world or pure fantasies -  i want to kiss lara dutta. What will machines wish for? life-long batteries?
Also if machines are created in man's 'image' wouldn't they be killing each other and fighting over metal color?

The Hurt Locker

I was fed up of watching ugly duels between wizards,mis-adventures of human greed on some distant planet, mythical creatures running havoc ;getting mauled by werewolves or vampires and some one( one man and only one man required for)saving the planet.( for your information this 'one man' is always a white american and in most cases has a military background)I wanted a break from all this and wanted to watch something real - an escape from all this eye candy. That is when I got 'The Hurt Locker'.
'The Hurt Locker' is directed by Kathryn Bigelow who now received an Oscar for this movie beating ex-husband Cameroon. The movie is set in the war ravaged country of Iraq and tells the story of a  bomb disposal squad. What makes this movie stand apart from the rest of the terrorist-bashing, all-hail-america group of movies is its no-nonsense approach of story telling. The movie wastes no time in introducing either the premise or the characters and takes us straight into the action. The restless camera-work makes us a tense witness to the action and at times even we feel the scorching desert sun on our skin.Almost unknown actors bring the characters alive on screen as they faceless and nameless enemies across the desert. The right dose of music works wonders and a tight script guides the movie to a realistic climax.
The movie may not be politically correct. But the directors effort to provide a straightforward narrative devoid of any gimmicks must be praised. She does not take any stand. She merely provides us an 'eye' in the bomb infested streets of Iraq.