Very Funny Ads

Saw the Very Funny Ads of 2007 on TBS last night. Some of my favorites:

• Statoil: Snow
• Hahn: Super Dry
• Brylcreem: Effortless
• Ikea: Ordinary People
• HBA Insurance: Asleep
• Renault: High Jump
• Mentos: Dog
• Dentyne Frost Bites: Frost Bitten
• Oslo Horse Racing: Cocktail
• Dale Carnegie Training: Robber

Defiance

Saw a beautiful movie today that tells a story of how a housewife overcomes adversity in Defiance.

The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio

When life treats us an unfair deal, our response to it is typical - anger, despair, finger-pointing, lying, cheating. Based on a real life, the story is about Evelyn Ryan, who displays defiance in place of the above, makes the most of every situation and refuses to give in. She is a mother of 10 kids, and a wife of a man who has plenty of despair and excuses that make matters worse. She chooses to enter different jingle writing contests and use her creativity to win small and big prizes from time to time to make ends meet.

Towards the end of the movie, the Ryans realize they have to vacate their home. Kelly, her husband, takes out a second mortgage without telling her, and it's due. They can't pay.

Evelyn: Just put it all on the front porch. Thank you, girls.
Kelly: Davey, go outside with that.
(The phone rings)
Evelyn: Hello?
Dr. Pepper spokesperson: Hello. Is this Mrs Evelyn L Ryan?
Evelyn: This is she
Spokesperson: Mrs. Ryan, it's my pleasure to inform you that you are our first-prize winner in the Dr. Pepper "Time of Your Life" contest.
Evelyn: Oh, my word.
Spokesperson: You've won a trip for two to Switzerland, a Ford Mustang, his and hers Longines watches and cash in the amount of $3,440.64.
Evelyn: Goodness, well ... these prizes couldn't come at a better time for my large family.
Kelly: Kids, get in here!
Spokesperson: I'm glad to hear that Mrs. Ryan.
Kelly: Come here.
Spokesperson: You have every reason to be proud because your entry beat out 250,000 others.
Evelyn: Thank you, thank you for telling me that. You've brightened my day considerably.
Spokesperson: Thank you, Mrs. Ryan. Good day.
(Evelyn puts the phone down)
Evelyn: We won!
(Everyone shrieks with joy)
Kids: Mom, can we go tell the neighbors?
Evelyn: You can tell whoever you want.
(Tuff, their teenage daughter, sits down crying)
Kelly: Tuffy, it's OK. Everything's going to be OK. We're all going to be OK.
Tuff: No, we aren't.
Kelly: For cripe's sake.
Evelyn: You go on outside, I'll take care of her.
Kelly: Come on, let's go tell everybody. Come on.

(Cut to Tuff's room)
Tuff: He's never gonna change.
Evelyn: You're absolutely right. He's not... Do you know what that man said to me on the phone just now?
Tuff: No.
Evelyn: He said that I beat 250,00 other entries. And do you know what else? It wasn't even my best one. Honey... Honey, you have your whole life in front of you, and you can make of it whatever you want. You have a marvelous mind. And a beautiful heart. And you can accomplish anything. Everything is possible. Do you know that? ... Forgive him, Tuff. Forgive him so that you can embrace this truly remarkable day.
Tuff: I love you, Mom.
Evelyn: I love you.

All Things

Saw an interesting and unusual (for the series) X-Files episode today - All Things, Season 7 (1999). Written and Directed by Gillian Anderson, the theme of the episode is my favorite topic - What If.

The Scully-centered episode starts with Scully's voice over ...

Scully: Time passes in moments. Moments which, rushing past, define the path of a life, just as surely as they lead towards its end. How rarely do we stop to examine that path. To see the reasons why all things happen. To consider whether the path we take in life is our own making, or simply one into which we drift with eyes closed. But what if we could stop? Pause to take stock of each precious moment before it passes? Might we then see the endless forks in the road that have shaped a life? And seeing those choices, choose another path?

The episode is riddled with bizarre coincidences trying to prove the new age philosophy about how everything happens for a reason. Overlooking that, the episode is really well done. Get to see another side of Scully, introspective, pondering about her choices, her past. It was awesome! Just when I thought I couldn't love this character any more, Gillian Anderson takes over the writing and directing and shows her even closely.

Most of the series has Mark Snow composing the music. But I guess Anderson decided to go another way for this new age style episode. Moby's The Sky Is Broken plays throughout the episode, which just renders the slow, contemplating story beautifully.

I constantly wonder about where my life is going. About what, all the routines I've inundated my days and weeks with, will lead to. How do I know that I'm not just wasting time, when I am not thinking harder about what is going to be meaningful to me in 10 years?

Mulder: You're not listening.
Scully: I am... I guess I just don't see the point.
Mulder: The point is that a computer program has shown us that these are not just random happenstance coincidental occurrences. And that same program has predicted that in just 48 hours even more complex formations are gonna be laid down in a field near Avebury. Forty-eight hours, Scully, but I wouldn't mind getting there earlier, if you don't mind.
Scully: Getting where?
Mulder: England, I got two tickets on a 5:30 flight.
Scully: Mulder, I still have to go over to the hospital and finish the final paperwork on that autopsy you had me do. And to be honest, it's Saturday. And I wouldn't mind, I don't know, taking a bath.
Mulder: What the hell does that mean?
Scully: What it means is that I'm not interested in tracking down some sneaky farmers who happened to ace geometry in high school. And besides, what could you possibly get out of this? Or learn? I mean, it's not even remotely FBI related.
Mulder: I'll just cancel your ticket. Thanks for lunch.
Scully: Mulder. Look, we're always running. We're always chasing the next big thing. Why don't you ever just stay still?
Mulder: I wouldn't know what I'd be missing.

I constantly wonder about the things I'm missing out on. Things I ought to be doing instead. If only I could figure out what they are. I hope I will find it soon. I hope, although impossible to invest myself in more than a few endeavors, that if I tried enough crafts, met enough people, read enough books / blogs, watched enough movies, traveled to enough cities, captured enough photographs, learned enough philosophies, took enough risks, made enough mistakes, ...

Daniel: There are things you don't know-- things I'm not proud of.
Scully: What things?
Daniel: I screwed up, Dana. Things got bad at home after...
Scully: Bad how?
Daniel: I haven't been completely honest with you. It was hard for me ... when you walked away. I shut down from my family. Needless to say, it was very difficult for Barbara.
Scully: You divorced.
Daniel: Only after an interminable period of discomfort for us both.
Scully: Where did you go?
Daniel: Here. Washington.
Scully: When?
Daniel: Almost ten years ago.
Scully: Daniel, you didn't move here for me?
Daniel: I didn't mean for it to happen this way, of course.
Scully: Oh, God-- You've come at such a strange time.
Daniel: I know. I know. You-- You have a life.
Scully: I don't know what I have. I mean-- Your X rays were in the wrong envelope. I never would have even known you were here if it wasn't for a mix-up. It's just--
Daniel: What do you want, Dana?
Scully: I want everything I should want at this time of my life. Maybe I want a life I didn't choose.

SAG Awards

Hugh Laurie won again! I'm so happy for him and the show - House, M.D.

Favorite "House" Quote

"You wake up in the morning, your paint's peeling, your curtains are gone, and the water's boiling. Which problem do you deal with first? ... None of them, the building's on fire!"

This is my favorite quote yet of Gregory House from House, M. D.

There are some TV shows that I get addicted to and I hang by every word. This show is my current obsession.

Never Meant To Be

You won't get anything unless you ask for it. Then if you ask for it and you don't get it, maybe it wasn't worth having in the first place. Some things are just never meant to be, no matter how much we wish they were.

-- Dimestore Psychology from Gilmore Girls.

Occam's Razor

"The simplest explanation is almost always that somebody screwed up." - House M.D.

Micro Fiction: Devotion Under Suspicion II

"Do you wanna talk about it?"
"Talk about what?"
"Them. It's been bugging you. I can tell that it is."
"Why would it be bothering me? I'm the one who told him to ask her out, remember?"
"Look, I know something happened between you guys when I was gone. So just tell me."
"How did you know? Did he ... ?"
"I figured it out. Why don't you just tell me what happened?"
"Cause it doesn't matter."
"Well, it matters to me."
"I missed you and no one really understood. Then he came along, and he just got it somehow. And so we spent a lot of time together because he was the only one that I could bear to talk to. But I mean ... I know this is gonna sound lame, it was always about you."
"In the beginning, you mean."
"One night we went on this field trip and we got stuck in the mine. And ... he kissed me. I don't know how I let it happen or why. I was crazy that day thinking about your surgery. And ... I don't know what I was doing."
"Did it happen again?"
"Once."
"Did you know what you were doing then?"
...
"What happened between him and I amounts to about 10 seconds. Before you judge me for it I want you to think about the hours of bus trips that I took to go see you, the thousands of pages of books that I read to you, the hours of music that I played for you because they said that you might be able to hear it. I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep, I couldn't focus in school, I lost most of my friends. When you finally did wake up, you didn't even remember who I was and your own mother wouldn't let me go see you. What was I supposed to do because I don't know anymore."
"I don't know. I wish you had been this honest with me a month ago. See, when I got out of the hospital I didn't know who you were. But I do now. And I really like you. The only problem is you haven't been able to take your eyes off him all night."

(from a TV show)

Being good

"So you're treating her for African sleeping sickness... because you don't think it's possible for someone to be faithful in a relationship?"
"And you do?"
"Yes."
"And you need to tell me that."
"Look. I am not having an affair. I had lunch with someone I work with - at work. Once."
"I believe you. What I don't believe is it'll be just once."
"I love my wife."
"You certainly love saying it... I'm sorry. I know you love your wife. You loved all your wives. Probably still do. In fact, you probably love all the women you loved who weren't your wife."
"You can be a real jerk sometimes, you know that?"
"Yeah. And you're the good guy."
"At least I try. As long as you're trying to be good, you can do whatever you want."
"And as long as you're not trying, you can say whatever you want."
"So, between us, we can do anything. We can rule the world."

(from a TV show)

I Wore Shorts to Work, and They All Laughed

I Wore Shorts to Work, and They All Laughed: "Women dress for the weather, but men still don't dare."

"It was partly a show of civic-mindedness, but also a way of redressing the disparity between men, who wear a stifling suit and tie to the office in summer, and women, who breeze by in ventilated cotton eyelet skirts with loose silk camisoles or the bubble silhouette dress of the season that barely seems to graze the body."

NYTimes writer Eric Wilson defies convention and tries wearing shorts to work in response to the sweltering summer heat, and reflects about how impractical men's fashion has become on par with women.

We always ridiculed women about how uncomfortable a fashionable woman would rather be, than give up her shoes or cover up her cold numb body in winter, but it is also true that men refuse to cross a certain line even in this summer heat.

"I wore a dressy pair of low-waisted, narrow knee-length navy twill shorts from Joseph, a white dress shirt, brown loafers (no socks) and a tightly tailored gray jacket from Thom Browne, another designer who put shorts suits in his fall collection. I found myself cooler, strangely confident and, because of that, walking more gaily than usual.

But on the street, people stared. Some took pictures."

We are all aware of this double standard, but we never question it.

“It is unfair,” he said. “Women wear flip-flops and miniskirts, and some of them even have their stomachs out. But if I wore shorts, they’d make a big deal of it in the office.”

The only difference in men's summer dress code is to remove the tie and an extra button near the collar. That is supposed to make up for all the heat. Most men even feel uncomfortable wearing short sleeves to work and instead prefer to wear full sleeves with a single or double roll. What is that? How conformist are we?

"The philosopher J C Flügel explained a similar reaction to dress reformers in the 1930’s as rooted in “man’s intense fear of appearing different from his fellows” and also fear of association with tendencies of narcissism and homosexuality."

I guess fashion is just as important for men as it is for women. We just prefer to dress more alike than the opposite gender and therefore prefer to be more boring.

Anger

Excerpts from ABC's Grey's Anatomy. Episode: 17 Seconds

Meredith: In life we are taught that there are seven deadly sins. We all know the big ones... Gluttony, Pride, Lust. But the thing you don't hear much about is Anger. Maybe it's because we think Anger is not that dangerous, that you can control it. My point is, maybe we don't give Anger enough credit. Maybe it can be a lot more dangerous than we think. After all when it comes to destructive behavior, it did make the top seven.

Meredith: So what makes Anger different from the six other deadly sins? It's pretty simple really. You give into a sin like Envy or Pride and you only hurt yourself. Try Lust or Coveting and you'll only hurt yourself and one or two others. But Anger, Anger is the worst... the mother of all sins... Not only can Anger drive you over the edge, when it does, you can take an awful lot of people with you.

Books to Read

Came upon some authors while reading a book. I feel this compulsion to read books that are referred to in other books. I guess it makes sense you get the references better if you had read them.

Currently reading Carrie Pilby by Caren Lissner (2003). She talks about

• Henry Miller
  
• Carson McCullers
• Sylvia Plath of the Sylvia Plath Effect fame.
  

SI Swimsuit 2006

SI Swimsuit 2006 edition is out. And Maria Sharapova looks great. She looks just as sexy, if not more, in a swimsuit on the beach making faces at the camera as she does when she is grunting on the tennis lawn, when she is slightly out of breath and staring at her opponent. Wow!

CommonCensus Map

Here's an interesting map of the U.S. drawn from votes of people who feel close/influenced by a major city nearby. May be some of the politicians could look at this before they argue about redistricting.

http://www.commoncensus.org/maps/national_1280.gif

CommonCensus Map Project
http://www.commoncensus.org/

Bloglanta

Found this blog about Atlanta's or rather ITP.
http://www.bloglanta.com/

Animated Knots

How many different knots do you know? I had no idea there were any other kind than the ones I use to tie my shoe laces. I mean I know they use knots for boating and climbing, but I've never actually done either. But apparently there are loads of different kinds:

Animated Knots by Grog
http://www.animatedknots.com/

CoverPop

Came across a cool website.

http://www.coverpop.com/pop/indie/

Contains a mosaic of various CD covers. Looks cool.

Wife Beater

Learnt a new phrase last week - Wife Beater. I had no idea and would have never guessed it could refer to an under garment. Only in this country...

E-Mail Time Capsule

Email To The Future
http://forbes.codefix.net/capsule/

Forbes has an application where you can send yourself an email and it will be delivered in 20 years. The project ends Nov 30, 2005.

I have to think about it. What will I tell myself in 20 years? What I am doing now? What my aspirations are now and for the future? I don't know. Let me sleep on it.

MTV Desi

MTV Desi
http://www.mtv.com/mtvsites/desi/

MTV Desi has been launched. This could probably be my only excuse to cut my cable and get a dish. I so miss Indian Pop music. Last time I went to India (a while ago, about 3 years and more may be), I bought a bunch of hindi remixes and desi pop CDs. I loved them.

But don't want to sign a year's contract with dish though. Planning to move out of my apartment in less than a year's time. MTV Desi will have to wait.