NPL - Day 1

Ahh..it was the d-day today...Day 1 of NPL (Nec Premier League - "inspired" by the IPL) was to be held at Noida Stadium. There are 7 teams in total, comprising of 8 players and 1 girl (:D) fighting to be the champions of the game of Cricket and to be crowned as the NEC champs. The game is 9 over a piece with 1 over to be bowled by the girl player ( yah..compulsory :( ).
Anyways, f*ck the rules..the following was how the day went.

Match 1: SECKS vs Linux Dare-evils:
The first match was between SECKS (Support and Enablers Combined Karma for Success...or something like that) and Linux Dare-evils (weird name!!). SECKS team comprised of players in the HR, Finance and Admin team and Linux Dare-evils comprised of the Linux team. So first up, SECKS was asked to bat. They scored a decent 74 runs in 9 overs. Their first wicket fell only in the 8th over!! Linux Dare-evils bowled badly, fielded miserably and batted even worse. They lost the game after making 50 odd.

Match 2: Hydra Hooligans vs Warwel Warriors:
The second match was between the Hydrastor team and Warwel (both teams sticking to the names relating their respective projects). Anyways, Hydra Hooligans were like the strongest team in the competition on-paper. And on-paper they stayed. They were bowled out cheaply after scoring 51 runs. Although Warwel Warriors bowled ok sorts..but the thing which helped them was they dint drop any catches. They won..all thanks to a guy named Shrikant..he made sure the runs were scored. Although Hydra Hooligans came close, Shrikant made sure they stayed far enough from the finish line.

Match 3: Whats in a Name (WIN) vs Embedded Eagles
The third match was between a team called WIN (Whats in a Name) and Embedded Eagles. I was kinda interested in this match since my friend Shruti was playing. I was really interested in her mess-ups so that I could make fun of her later. And I have to say she dint dissapoint me. They bowled pretty badly and the Embedded Eagles, after being put into bat first, scored a massive 93 runs to win! WIN, did everything that the name dint suggest. If their bowling was bad, the batting was not good either! I dont know how much they scored but they were beaten quite badly.
In fact the Eagles also wrote a slogan for WIN: "Whats in a Name, Worst in the game" :D .

Match 4: Block or Bleed vs SECKS
By the time the third match was over, it was 1:30 in the afternoon and hot as hell!!! I swear I was radiating heat by that time. I had to forget about the heat since it was my team (Block or Bleed..yah we took the first name that came up on google search) vs SECKS. Anyways, we were asked to bowl first. I was exhausted by the time I finished bowling the first over. I gave 2 runs in my first over. However I was totally exhausted after that. It was sooo damn hot that I was feeling really uncomfortable. By the time I bowled my second over, I was gasping for breath. However our bowling was very tight. We gave 30-odd runs till the 6th over. That was pretty good considering SECKS had a good batting order. However it was the last two overs that went for 30 runs and made the total a competitive one. The second last over was by Eshita (the mandatory girly over). It went for a whopping 18 runs. The last over was by Subhash, who was already tired as hell. He also went for 10 runs. Anyways they ended up with 61 runs. Our batsmen were as cool as a cucumber..they dint feel the need to go out and hit every ball out of the park. They ran the singles and took the doubles. There was the occasional boundary and we won pretty easily. So, in short we f*ckd SECKS.

After the match we were all sooo tired. We dint even have lunch..I was hungry as ever. Anyways although I wanted to celebrate with the team..everyone else seemed to be too tired to go anywhere. Thus, only me, Bhupesh and Subhash went to Pizza hut for a late lunch. The weather by this time had got much better..it was cloudy and stormy!!
Phew! our next match is against the Eagles next saturday. I have a week's time to raise my fitness level..hmm..lets see about that! Hopefully, we would beat them nice and easy and secure our place in the semi-finals. Go block or bleed!!!!

Pursuit of Happyness

Since I had a day off from work today..I decided to laze around to the maximum. I have a bunch of movies on my PC which I hadn't seen for various reasons (time being the foremost one). I started with the Will Smith starer "The Pursuit of Happyness.".I really wanted to see it when it got released here..but I never got a company.
Anyways the movie is about a struggling salesman..who struggles every day to make ends meet. Frustrated and helpless he tries very hard to keep his family happy. He has a wife and a 5 year old kid to complicate matters. Anyways, so angry with the situation around the house, his wife leaves him. That's when he kinda hits rock bottom. He is thrown out of his house and his motel room to literally wander the streets with his li'l kid. He decides to join a Stock broker internship programme at a local firm. Despite all odds and everything going against him, he finally gets the job and kinda ends his pursuit for happiness. The story is based on a really person named Chris Gardener. Will Smith and the boy who plays his kid (he's Smith's actual kid too) are awesome in their on-screen presence. The screenplay is really good. You cant help but feel happy for Will Smith at the end when he gets the job and tears well up in his eyes. A really nice movie to lift one's spirits up.

Holiday

Thanks to the gujjar agitation we are getting a holiday tomorrow! This awesome piece of news reached us at about 5pm in the evening. I am soo happy..I always welcome a li'l break. I wonder if the japanese (our clients) would understand what an "agitation" is! They were so f*ckd when they heard about powercuts..I really doubt they would understand the meaning of an "agitation". It was really funny..we had a Japanese manager in our office a few months back and while we were all working, the power goes off for like a few seconds till the backup comes on. By this time the guy is like out of his cube running scared as to wat the hell happened. Our GM had to make him understand the situation. They are equally amused when they see cattle on the roads! They really wonder who put them there in the first place!
Anyways, back home I saw "That 70's Show" after a realllly long time. I don't know which season it was..hell I dint even know it used to come on Thursdays..but there it was..still funny as ever. I would try reaching on time on Thursdays to catch it from now on! (although I doubt that's ever gonna happen!). I practiced the guitar a bit..and loitered around the net. I don't have much to do except have my dinner and go to sleep. Oooh..come to think of it, I might play the 360 after dinner..that would be fun. I haven't played it for a while now. Anyways that's it for now I guess. No more updates.

Aww..my neck!

F*ck wat a show!!! Prestorika kicked some serious butt at Superstars!! Me and Rajesh reached the venue at 6pm. The concert was to start at 8..but we had to make use of the happy hours. We entered Superstars to see Prestorika performing their sound-check. I like the sound-checks..its like a trailer before the big show. Anyways we ordered beer and my favourite Nacho Grande to pass the time. Although we had planned to finish the beer as slowly as possible but that dint happen. We finished well before the concert began.
Anyways there was another band by the name "Blend" which was to perform before Prestorika. They play alternative/nu-metal and were really nice. Their OCs were catchy. Their setlist was a mix of covers and OCs. They covered Limp Bizkit, LP and Mudvayne. I dont remember the names of their OCs but they did interest the crowd. Overall, I had a nice time.
Next up was Prestorika. The crowd got ..ehh.."crowdier". Suddenly there was less space to stand! Anyways they began with their new song "Exploding Anger" which was ohh my god!!!..so awesome!! Their new sound is soooo much heavier than their old ones. They were fantastic on stage. They performed their OCs Redifining Werewolf, Not My Way, No Sharps to B, The Destroyer and some other songs which I dont remember. They performed their usual Fear of the Dark and finished things off with a tribute to Dimebag Darrel - Cowboys from Hell \m/ . That was when a tiny moshpit happened..and things got really interesting.
Phew!..the show finished at about 11. With the echoes of the amps still ringing in my ears, I dropped back Jain to his place and reached back at around 11:30.
Overall a nice evening..there should be more days like these...with friend, booze and heavy metal \m/.

Break free - set up a WLAN

I gifted my mom a laptop yesterday (god please gift me some money). Although she cant even write an SMS, she had been cribbing to get a laptop for months now. I doubt if she would use it for long. Anyways I got to give her some credit..after all she's my mom!!.. maybe she'll learn....maybe i can teach her to write a blog or something.
Anyways, along with the laptop, I also bought a few more neat stuff. I bought a WLAN router, so that mom can get the internet without any wires. I bought a WLAN card for myself, so that I can share the internet connection with bro. I also bought a 160 GB external HDD (thats right, now I have space to store that extra porn ;D ). Back at home, I started right away. Not the porn silly...me and my bro set up the wireless router and the card in a matter of minutes and viola we have the internet even in our bathrooms!!!! Its simply awesome. The speed is good too..however I doubt the speed would be good if we three are surfing/downloading simultaneously. Anyways its fun to watch technology happen right in front of our eyes. 2 years back I was reading about WLANs and now I actually have it in my home.
Apart from all the extravagance, I also went for the weekly cricket practise and cramped every body part in my body (except the really useful ones :D). I would have to do some excercises at home so that it doesnt cramp up next week..cuz thats when I'd have my first match.
I would go to a rock concert today at my favourite pub in Delhi - Superstars. My favourite indian band - prestorika is gonna perform. I would have my stick-friend (he's reallllly thin) Rajesh and the lovely booze for company. Looking forward for an awesome ear-splitting, gut wrenching, beer drooling evening.

Pizza

We had a small pizza party courtesy Viral, since he's going to Japan on Monday. A bunch of us went to Pizza hut and literally tore the place apart. We were like one of those groups who always mess things up for other ppl. The ones who are constantly stared on and on. Of course it was all fun for us..we dint care. Unfortunately, there was no booze today mainly cuz there were loads of ppl who dont drink. However it was a fun evening. I cant wait for Sunday though. Prestorika would be performing at Superstars. My favourite band at my favourite pub (after Purple Haze..but since I aint in Bangalore so..). Rajesh would be coming along..mainly for the booze. He is not a gr8 fan of rock. I also have to ask Sam..he'd be interested. Anyways I guess I'd better go now..IPL is getting interesting.

Weekend

After a hectic week at office I finally got the weekend off. My li'l cousin came over to stay at my place on Friday and that kinda forced me, not to work on the weekend. My uncle and aunt are leaving for Kerala on Monday, so they decided to stop over at my place for the weekend. Its fun to have these small family get-togethers. The focus shifts from me and my day to day mess-ups to my lazy cousin Karan (and his mess-ups).

Friday ended on a "high" note. I went out with my friends for a boozy evening. And boy what an eventful evening. We were in our elements after 2 beers and a couple of whiskeys and thats when my friend Rajesh casually put his head on Viral's lap and ended up getting his ears burnt (as weird as it may sound). Since Viral was smoking..some of the ash went right inside Rajesh's ear!! The ash still had some fiery splinters and burned his ears a lil! ..umm..i guess the exact amount with which you can make fun of someone. It was really funny. After dinner we laid down on the lawns at Sector 18 and stared at the night sky..promising ourselves we would stay on the grass the entire night. However, the mosquitoes got the better of us and we had to go back home. We all stayed at Viral's place, since we had a cricket match the next day. Actually, we were highly inspired by the IPL and hence started our own league at the office. We also shamelessly named it the NPL (NEC Premier League). Anyways, saturday started early..5:30 am to be precise. We got up..all sober..and raring to go. We reached the place a li'l late as we stopped for some chai on the way. Anyways the match started with 8 ppl per team. I bowled after a loooong gap of 5 years..but I was happy I had not lost any steam. Although I bowled some wides at the beginning. They posted 70 runs after 10 overs...a target which was easy to chase. Although we did have some early flutters but we managed to win with around 5 balls to spare.

Back at home, I met my cousins..had a nice beery afternoon..and slept the afternoon away. I was tired as it is from playing. In the evening we went to my other cousin's place for dinner. Since my family firmly believes that "a family which drinks together-stays together", we happily finished up a bottle of Smirnoff before finishing things off with an awesome dinner.

I got up today at 7. My cousins wanted to play cricket. I was game for it cuz the weather was really cool in the morning. Plus I also have my matches next week.. so I would get a nice practice session. Back at home sweaty and hungry..we all had a much needed breakfast. The rest of the day is gonna be filled with video games...ohh..which reminds me..its my chance to play.