*******SPOILER WARNING*******

"The British are coming… The British are coming……" Garfield is seen chased by British guards. That's the funniest scene in the movie. To say it right, one of the very few funny scenes in the movie. The first movie itself showed a different Garfield from that of the original character. John was shown as a lucky guy and he found a GIRL for him. But somehow the story was good and it was funny. But come on, you can't take the same formula for the next movie. Garfield plays a dual role in the second movie. And both the characters don't have any resemble to the original Garfield. Please try to think. Garfield enjoying the life by RUNNING AROUND THE HOUSE???? If you say that he enjoys walking two steps from his place, I would suspect if that's the original Garfield. Here he plays with his animal friends and there is a new sidekick too. A competitor to Odie? Nah… It's a bulldog and an intelligent one. For a difference, even Odie acts intelligent in the movie. Odie could spot Garfield in the newspaper and show it to John. What more. Now we have a big group of animals, talking and planning to save the world….sorry… planning to save Garfield. Sometimes, it makes us wonder whether Garfield is the main character in the movie. He is shadowed by the other animals. To make things worse, Garfield even hands over the ring to John. Does this mean Garfield is ready to accept a woman in John's life? No way. I want a full health check up on Garfield soon. He must have got hurt in his small head (you know it's just his tummy that's big). To sum it up, I think the movie name should have been changed from "Tale of two kitties" to "Tale of two other kitties" for there is no Garfield in the movie.

Disclaimer: All characters and incidents told or inferred in this story are fictious. Though this might appear as a real incident to some persons and they may have experienced themselves, this is completely imaginative. Only the underlying theme is real.

"Who is it?" the voice came from the house. It was the familiar voice. A voice that I have heard for more than 10 years in my young age. I didn't say anything. I just knocked the door again. "Cant you hear that I am asking who it is?" the voice came again this time growing louder. I didn't know how to answer. How should I answer? Should I call her in the same way as "Miss" or should I say "I am here to see Srimagal teacher". I don't know. It's been 12 years since I saw her. The door opened and I saw Srimagal miss coming out with an angry look. She saw me. I didn't know how to respond. I just stood there smiling. She has grown older. But still looked very familiar to me. Seeing my smile, she was confused. She might have thought I am some mad guy. Then she raised her eyebrow and began to think. I couldn't control giggling. She started to recognize me. I said "Miss….." to help her know me. Immediately she knew who I am. She felt happy and called "Dai...Vinoth!". I laughed. I was actually surprised she can still recognise me. She opened the door completely and invited me inside the house. I could still remember the days in which she will not allow me inside her house when I come late for the tuition. Our house was only next to Srimagal miss's house. Whenever I go late,  she used to shout the same words, "Will it take one hour to take 10 steps from your house to here for you?" . And I will just look on the floor and the dog on the road. I think this is the first time, she is inviting me inside the house.

She was very happy to see me and started asking questions continuously.

"When did you come to India?". "Yesterday", I answered.

"How are your parents?"

"Fine"

"How are you?"

"Fine miss"

"How is the work?"

"It's good"

"Where is your mom?"

"In home"

Watching me answer in single words she laughed and acted like being angry "… dai tell something?"

I laughed. "Miss, what can I ask if you keep on asking questions like the one mark questions in Geography"

She again laughed. "Vinoth… you have learnt to talk well".

I realised that I have never answered in more than one or two words before to her.

I just smiled. And this is the first time she has shown happiness in talking to me. I was always afraid of her in school days and will avoid facing her at any time. Even if I had come to her house to play with Tommy, their pup dog, I would run back to my house if she enters the house. And she would shout "Dog came to play with dogs while there is lot to study" "I would start crying and run to my mom who would laugh and say "That's why we didn't buy any dog in our home". Even I would start laughing at that but will try to cry to show that I don't want to be said as dog". My mom will always make me laugh at the end. Only Srimagal miss's mother used to support me. She would say "Why do you have to scold the small boy even on Sunday?"

We just stood without knowing what to talk. "Vinothu!!" a voice came from behind. It was her mother. She identified me even without seeing my face. "How are you aachi?" I asked we used to call her before. "Everything and everyone are fine. How are you da Kanna?" was her reply. The same old reply. Nothing has changed from her. Srimagal miss asked what I was wondering in my mind, "How did you identify Vinoth, ma?" She answered, "I was in the market and saw Vinoth's mom. I was thinking about him all the way and seeing a big person inside our house thought it must be our Vinoth". We all laughed.

"Then I heard that you are getting married. Is that true?" she asked. Srimagal miss started her questions again.

"When is it?"

"Next month miss"

"Which Place?"

"US only"

"American????" she asked shockingly.

I started laughing. "No! no! Indian only."

"Oh! What is she doing?"

"She is my colleague in office"

"Oh great!.......what….. Love marriage?"

 I laughed again. "No… no… actually.. yes.. but no. Mom only decided"

"What yes and no?"

"I liked her. But I didn't propose to her. Somehow mom found out and all was decided"

"Dai….. tell me the truth"

"Seriously, actually it's all mom. Not like a love marriage." Aachi also started to tease me. "I know about you. You will never talk to any other girl".

She was true. When I was a kid, I won't feel comfortable talking to girls. Everyone used to tease me for that reason.

I just laughed.

"You have really grown up" exclaimed my teacher.

"Don't praise too much. It's not good for health", aachi stopped her in the middle. Same old sentiments.

We talked for two hours. She was so happy to hear about my work and achievements in US. Tears fell down from her eyes when she heard that I am taking my parents to US along with me and will get settled there. She said that she knew that I will become like this one day. I don't know what to say. I have only heard her scolding me all the time in my school days. She used to say "That I should buy buffaloes and become a shepherd in the future" Aachi used to support me again "Don't discourage the small boy". Today, she is in happy tears hearing about my work. Seeing her, tears started coming out of my eyes too. She smiled and shook my hair. I stopped her from doing that by instinct. She laughed. "You have never changed". I don't like anyone to touch my hair from my childhood. My hand will automatically stop anyone touching my head. We all laughed. After sometime, I prepared to leave. I came out of the house and said good bye to them. Suddenly, some small kid ran past me faster into the house. He almost knocked me down. Teacher started shouting "Ravi. Go back to your house and study. No playing toda…." She stopped. She turned to me and laughed. "He is the new Vinoth here" He is staying in your old house. I saw him peeping from the door inside. "Ravi, you can play. Only for today" she said to him. The small boy ran again inside the house. I started hearing balls knocking the wall.

I smiled and got into my car. I waved good bye and drove away. Has she changed? No.... Teachers never change. They care even though you never know them.

My brain was suspicious. But my mind hesitated. I could be wrong and it will be embarrassing not only for me but for the other person too. But what if my instincts are correct? They say we should follow our instincts. But I am really worried about following that now. The question “What if I am wrong?” was bothering me again and again. I raised my face towards his direction and I saw him standing in the crowd again. He also noticed me. I pretended that I was looking at someone else behind him. With my brain still trying to make some logical reasons for me to think I might be right, my mind tried to do what it does best. Move away the thought and get distracted to something else. With the clock ticking, the train reached the second station. Should I get down of the train? No. That would be foolish. But who cares? Everyone will think that it’s my stop. But won’t I be fooling myself. Or is this a selfish act. Yeah. It will be a selfish act and also an irresponsible one. I saw him again. My instincts were telling that I am right. I don’t want to be right. I shouldn’t be. I hoped that I am wrong. He looked young. Must be below 25 years of age and wears the long kurta with a woolen sweater. The more the thought that he can’t be one of them, the more I got suspicious that I might be right. After all, you can never expect how a person like him would look like. I have never met someone like him for real. Or I hope I haven’t. My stop came. I was still confused what to do. I just got down of the train slowly. I said to myself tht I am wrong about that guy. He can’t be. The announcement went on repeating “If you find anything suspicious please report it to the member of the staff immediately”. Should I report about him? I dismissed the idea and went to my office. I felt ashamed that my instincts might have been correct, but still I risked the life of 1000 passengers including me. The next day,  I checked the news. There was no incident of bomb blasts or terrorist attack in the trains. I felt relieved. I was wrong. He was not a terrorist.

My fellow treatfreak Ramesh posted this message in our orkut community.

Ramesh: I was in Hyderabad, but i was away from all fellow treat freaks ...
But i'm now in japan talking to them more frequentlyu or as frequwntly as we were in Bnglre ...
It seems that distance from aussie tojapan to uk to Us accross the world is shrinking ...
Guys wht do u say ......:D

And here is my thought on it.

INJEY: Neither the world is shrinking nor the personal space coming closer. Its just the part of life. Being in offshore, we had lot of responsibilities. I mean it. We had lot of responsibilities. Weekdays are always working hours. And limited connectivity to the internet too. And in weekends, who wanted to sit infront of the computer (except me) and wait for the friends to come online. Everyone wanted a change. Now most of us are in onsite, the need for communication has increased. With connected to the internet and the long gap of less communication, has moved us in the cycle. we are back here trying to contact each other a lot. After sometime, this will come to a optimal level and stabilise. May be it will go for a fall. But it will raise again. Its all part of life.

Am I preaching????? ha ha. What to do. Sitting infront of the computer as usual today.

To the highest level of surprise for me, Shariq said that we can make sandwich at home. Shariq is my new housemate in London. He is a guy from UP. To tell about him, he believes that he still lives in India. For him, food means spicy hot curry with lot of masala and pulses in it. Anything else like burger or bread is a side dish. And most importantly he thinks vegetarian food is a speciality that we can once in a while. He is always at such a high level of diversification from my views yet I like to make fun of him most of the time. Coming to the story, he always discourages at the idea of having sandwich for a complete meal. But that day, he himself suggested we can make sandwiches. So with much enthusiasm I entered the kitchen. Though I like cooking, I rarely try it. He asked me to cut vegetables first. We looked into the fridge to find what vegetables we have. There were few potatoes, onions and carrot. Now the biggest question is what we should use for the sandwich. While I was wondering what to make, Shariq suggested mixing some masala powders to the vegetable mix. Oops. Here we go again. "Shariq, sandwich is supposed to be plain vegetables. Not your curry masala in it". He came back with his usual reply, "It will be good and it's healthy. We can make aloo baaji too". I know where this is going. It will end up in some potato curry and we will have to eat the curry with bread. It will not be a sandwich. His name for this idea was "Indian Sandwich". I wonder if that's another name for "Shariq's masala baaji bread". My dreams of having a vegetable sandwich started evaporating. Determined not to leave my dream, we had an argument in which he said he will show me how to cook. Oh oh. I can just recall the old story "Stone Soup".

Somehow I managed to make his mind to work on cooking sandwich and not sabji. It took sometime for me to explain him that Sandwich is different from sabji. But still his recipe for the filling went on with masala powders and included chillies too. And to add more on that, we were frying the vegetables. I thought he is teaching me how to make stone soup. After an hour of cooking, we finally made the vegetable mix. It was neither a salad nor a curry. And we stuffed it inside bread along with ketchup. With triangular slices of sandwich stacked on the plate, we started the dinner watching the movie "The memento". I felt that I am having sandwich at last. Good day that it didn't turned to be chicken soup instead of stone soup

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!HURRAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

KANGAROO FLYING TO AUSTRALIA

30^th July. It comes every year and I will be at the centre of the stage. It’s my birthday. Right from childhood, my birthday celebrations have all been big and wonderful. It will be a family union. Lots of calls with wishes before even saying Hello; Mom asking me to take oil bath; Myself and my sisters cutting the cake even though its my birthday only and the big breakfast and hefty lunch that follows. This is the way my Birthday celebrations will be every year. Birthdays in my School days had more memorable moments.

I like the part of distributing sweets to all the teachers in the School. Every class we enter, all the students will be singing the Birthday song. Sometimes I wonder if I should stay till they finish the song or not. But mostly looking at the staff who wants to continue class, I would leave as soon as she has taken the sweets. The most interesting part is keeping less number of chocolates in the box when going to the Nannies for they will take lot of sweets. We used to apply all our Mathematics skills to estimate the number of chocolates we have to buy and what to do with the chocolates left if any. That was great fun.

When I moved to college, the fun got changed from chocolates to treats. What is a birthday boy (or his friends) worth of if his wallet remains full at the end of the day! But something that I had in my previous birthdays at School wasn’t there. Family! I couldn’t go home on all my Birthdays in college days. I had fun with friends though. Every year, it would be different. Beginning from first year when I went to a temple and distributed chocolates to friends to the final year when I cut the cake at midnight and big treat to my friends in batches. :D. After leaving the college, the first birthday in office was really a wonderful one. The surprise party with 2 kg Black Forest cake from my friends, the big treat that followed with our college professor who happened to be in Bangalore on that day and of course, my first salary in my career given on that day.

More birthdays passed and the current year birthday was something to be remembered. It was my first Birthday outside India. The first confusion about celebrating birthday is when to celebrate. Should I consider the Indian Time Zone or English Time Zone? And the decision was to celebrate on both. :D. My dad wished me early midnight at Indian time and my friends started wishing from UK midnight time. There are more things to smile about this birthday. Not able to spend birthday with family for the last six years, I wished this should be different. And it was. The surprise party that the Copsley gang threw at me was wonderful. I know there would be a Birthday card from them. But I never thought there will be Chocolate cake. I don’t even know when they bought it. To top it all, the presence of Kannan’s father and mother gave a family touch on me. The group of 13 members which appeared as both family and friends gave me the happiness I wanted to start my birthday. And it was the first time (trust me) I had my cake applied all over my face. Not even in my college days, I had this experience. (I didn’t like applying cake on face during college days). Blowing the candle and the birthday song that followed is a happy moment. And what’s more surprising was the T-shirt presented to me. I wanted to buy a similar T-shirt and was looking for that on that same day. Though I couldn’t find it, I got it from the Copsleys. Thanks to everyone for that. The day turned out just fine with playing my favourite games, watching Superman returns, replying to my friends’ wishes on the net. Another birthday has passed and reminds me that not only I am growing older, but also I am growing more friends. Thanks guys.

Birthdays are good for you.  Statistics show that the people who have the most live the longest. Waiting patiently for the next birthday!

Its 9.10PM now and I am stilll in office. Not feeling like going home. The day was tight as usual. Went for a training course for the whole day from 9 to 5. Then came to another office and was working for another hour. Talking with the PM. Nothing important. But the usual ones. some more tasks assigned for me. I am spending lot of time trying to find time to manage time. And now.... watching trailers in www.apple.com/trailers. Looks like lot of movies are on the way. And to my surprise, there is "TMNT" whats that??? Check out yourself if you dont know yet. And by the way, I have started downloading some movies too. Why am I saying these? Dont know. But I want to say something. Atleast to find a reason to stay in office. Why am I not going  home? Dont know. But I have a valid reason. I am writing this blog.

One more news. I have started writing blog in our Company's Intranet too. Posted my first blog about the successful two revolutions around my career. I can see that I have learnt a lot. And still lot more to learn. The journey continues and life will be going through a lot of experiences as before. Expecting some, dreaming a lot, waiting to see what the future holds. Or should I say, how I will shape my future.

"I must

give the impression

that I have the answers

for every thing

You were

so disappointed

to see me arriving so easily

Its solely changed

Its solely every.... thing I loved

Its solely changed

I am only chang.... ing

You want something thats constant

And I only wanted to be me

But watch even the stars above thinks that I am still changing"

The movie with this beautiful song. I saw the movie "Over the hedge" on recommendation from Muthu. With much liking to animated movies, I had lot of expectations from this movie. And it was satisfying every bit. The story of a Racoon teaming(cheating) a gang of forgers to collect food to feed a bear. Short and simple. The characters reminds us of the Toy story, the first 3d animated full length movie. But the story was really good. Is the racoon an evil one? Its just trying to survive. But it misuses the gang's stupidity or ignorance as Verm corrects to get the food. Leaving the question "Is RJ good and bad?",  the movie is a very funny one and some scenes are very emotional too.  Especially the scene where the squirrel Hamie pushing away the extended hands of Verm and saying "I'm not stupid" touches everyone's heart. Few things that could have been done better are giving more importance to the rest of the gang. The feelings between the possum father and the daughter could have explained better and same for the porcupine family. Overall, an interesting movie to watch and laugh. "The tail is tingling!"

Can anyone tell me why would they show not one but four best movies when the whole world is watching FIFA worldcup finals. With the major persons watching TV in UK tuned to BBC glued to their sheets cheering Italy and France who were making their best moves to lift the cup, I was watching the best movies I always enjoy to watch. There was "Stuart Little", "You've got mail" and "Honey, I shrunk the kids". But anyway nothing interesting happened in the match while I was watching the movies. I saw the two goals shot by France and Italy in the early part of the game. When the movie "You've got mail" was over, the extra time of the match had just finished and the team were getting ready for the penalty shoot. It was a disappointing ending though, will France losing the match at 5-3. Another game ended with "Anything can happen" penalty shootout. The other game was "England vs Portugal". That was a disappointment to the whole of England. I was watching the game from the street seeing the England fans with the flag painted on their face, wearing the team T-shirts and shouting "Go England!" It was fun. But again, a disappointment at the end. I couldn't understand why Beckam didn't go for the penalty shoot. May be he was afraid that he might fail. Too bad of him. It just left a thought, "Could England have won, if he had played the shoot" On the whole, it was a good tournament and everyone enjoyed it till the end. Italy won the FIFA worldcup 2006.