Variety is the spice of life

America vs France seems to be the battle in whichever media I check into in recent times. Ever since they tricked themselves into a deal with Australia, its battle of bickering between the 2 nations. In the recent Netflix series “Emily in Paris” I had ranted about how they’ve shown French customs in poor light while spotlighting the beauties of Paris, out comes this book ,where the American equivalent of our Rajeshkumar, James Patterson, collaborates with Richard diLallo. Though the book might’ve been couple of years old, the timing of its recommendation curiously coincided with other items mentioned above. I often wonder how 2 authors collaborate in coming up with one novel!! Even for a thesis presentation it is quite challenging and confusing as to who would’ve contributed to which section unless clearly demarcated. In a novel that runs by a single theme, its hard to imagine how two authors could’ve collaborated with the wors!! Either its ghost written by the lesser known author pigg

The last week of December is fast turning out to be the 9th / 11th standard syllabus across all types of schools in India. Just like how they skip/fast track those two years and focus on Xth and XII th standard related portions, it is assumed as universal off period for any IT company worker. No major activity happen in this window, but for poor production support folks, who are part of the “skeletal” crew needed as insurance cover, if in case some system decides to “take off” in this period. Imagine the plight of those newbies who are mostly assigned this graveyard equivalent of a shift, where in experienced folks would be out having their break period, where in people new to the setup would be posted to man the systems when there are relatively less number of users. Depending on their birth horoscope, they may or may not have any major issue to deal with. God forbid if something does break down, they would be literally on their own, for neither their onsite counterpart, nor their loc

  I’ve been a big time fan of Keifer Sutherland, ever since I saw “24”. He was the Bruce Willis of TV shows and every single episode of that series was testimony to that fact. The way he blinks his eyes, looking down and up like a bobbing head, his choice of coolers and his angry reaction to most of the situations (have rarely seen him smile across any of the series!!) and even though every single person on the set/scene might be atleast couple of feet taller, the way he carries his character which was devoted to the post of president in 24 and the president himself in this series, is a treat to  watch. Having seen chasing bad guys  and protecting president after president in the 24 series, he gets to play the role in this series. Guess more than any politician, this man must be quite aware of the layout of white house with half his series seems to be set on that location.  Designated survivor begins with a bang, literally and couldn’t have been anything bigger to kick start a series!!

Been quite busy in binge watching the idiot box the whole of last week 😊 Stumbled upon this movie which started as a satire and turned out to be down right scary. The problem with being sarcastic is beyond a point the line between bitter truth and sarcasm vanish, leaving behind stark reality. Don’t look up falls in that category where the makers ran out of witty spoofs for the real life situations and ends up projecting the actuals, which has resulted in messing up the ending. The story starts with a bunch of scientists huddled in front of their systems, observing the sky, where one bright lady, spots a comet. Despite repeat checks of the path and projections, the scary scenario hits them hard that the comet is a planet killer, headed for earth in 6 month time. They rush with their data to White house, obviously the savior of free world and every doomsday scenario, where they are made to wait for hours. The military guy even makes them pay for what was supposedly free food on the hous

First up, wonder if this Netflix drama will be released in France!! There is so much of animosity and mocking of French customs and way of working that, it is borderline cynical/abuse. The fact that work life balance being taken so seriously in that country, where weekend working is illegal, no business discussions on parties and meets outside of office hours, relaxed in-time and out-time setup, their love for their mother tongue (I really liked that part, even though as a tourist would’ve been quite difficult to converse) their way of seeing relationships, even their movies, every single thing have been shown in poor light. Irony being, while she views the infidelity of her boss as an aberration to US way of living, she ends up with her own and conveniently tags herself as being accustomed to French ways!!! What is surprising is, for a person into marketing and supposedly a maverick social media user/content creator, the lead character is oblivious of the expectations while taking up

I had postponed watching this series for a really long time, thinking it would be yet another dull drab British series. But was pleasantly surprised within few minutes into the first episode. It is as goofy a series can get around murder investigation almost bordering on illogical, making one logical deduction after another, with things literally falling in place by themselves, aiding in solving the jigsaw for the lead trio. The “investigative sleuth trio” are a weirder bunch in themselves, comprising of the goofiest guy who played pink panther better than the cartoon character (steve martin), the other one being the short Martin or Martin short rather and Selena Gomez(surprise of surprises). Of the three, Selena is the more reasonable one with the 2 martins trying to relive their glory days. Martin short, who plays a down and out theater director is amazingly original, leveraging extensively on his stage experiences. I was waiting for Steve to enact his Pink panther shenanigans somewh