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Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Nothing in particular

Okay, this is going to be a rambling post about nothing in particular.

I am currently reading "Rage" by Jonathan Kellerman. Interesting in parts. Just happy to find some time to read again. Also reading short stories by Stephen King written under his pseudonym, Richard Bachman. And about to begin on the third book of the Millenium trilogy by Steig Larsson. In the middle of Sherlock Holmes' "A Study in Scarlet" too.

When I was younger, I had this rule of reading one book at a time so as not to dilute its essence. Now I find that I rarely get much time to read and when I do, I'd rather go with the type of story that fits my mood at that point in time. I mean, if I'm reading at 11.30 in the night after a gruelling day at work, I cannot bear to read anything too heavy. I'll probably miss the nuances or the beautiful use of language and fall asleep after the first paragraph. What I read then is a fast paced bit of fiction - just a story nothing more, nothing less. Over a lazy Sunday afternoon (or a day like today, when a bandh disrupts any chance of going out), I read books that require more attention. Just having all these books to read makes me happy. Never mind that I read them in bits and pieces and infrequently.

The last movie I watched in the theatre was "Lafangey Parindey" Read my review here. I have been wanting to watch "Byomkesh Bakshi" - a Bengali movie based on the detective novels of Saradindu Bandhyopadhyay. While I enjoyed the Doordarshan serial starring Rajit Kapoor, my main motivation for wanting to watch this is because it stars a friend.
I also want to watch "Dabangg" - promises to be a seeti-bajao type laughathon. A movie to be watched with a group of close friends ready to laugh at the stupidest gags and corniest lines of Inspector Chulbul Pandey (yes, that's Salman Khan for you). And with a song like 'Main Zandu balm hui, darrling tere liye!' can anybody even doubt its eccentric humour! also directed by Anurag Kashyap's brother, so there's a recommendation right there.

A close friend is in town and we will be catching up soon for lunch. I have been missing a Peter Cat sizzler for some time now. *Dreamy grin* Gorged on pizza again over the weekend. Sometimes I think my life can be divided into Before-Domino's and After-Domino's phases. More festivities lined up in the coming days means more good food. Donno when I am going to diet! Eid is this weekend - brings to mind all the delicacies that our Muslim neighbours would share during Ramazan when we lived in Park Circus. Fresh fruits, spicy Chana, keema puffs, potato and onion pakoras, sewai...yumm!

On a different note, read in the papers today that some politician justified today's bandh saying that "people face problems for 364 days in a year, so what's 1 more day? That too when its for a good cause!" There are so many things wrong with that statement that I'll get too agitated before I can articulate anything properly. By the way, the "cause" is price rise, Centre's policy of divestment, petrol price hike and more...

5 comments:

  1. 1. Stephen King & Richard Bach are the same people?? Really??? You mean Stephen King wrote Jonathan Livingston Seagull & The Bridge Across Forever???

    2. How's the Millenium Trilogy? I've bought 'The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo' but am yet to start reading it.

    3.Please tell me that politician did NOT make that statement!!

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  2. Sounds like a nice kinda day :-) enjoy.....btw, about the third in Millennium trilogy - do not expect anything. Read it only as a conclusion of a story which started out on an interesting premise.

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  3. @ Scarlett:
    1. Here's me saying 'oops!'...Stephen King wrote under the pseudonym, Richard Bach'man' not Bach.
    2. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was interesting...the second book much less so...but since it's a trilogy, I have to continue reading!
    3. And featuring as part of Ripley's Believe it or not: Yes, that politician DID make that comment. It was on the front page of yesterday's Telegraph.

    @ Bluestocking: Thanks for the warning! Hasn't Twilight taught us just how bad a franchise can get!

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  4. On the topic of trilogies, I'm currently reading 'The Immortals of Meluha' which is the first book of the Shiva trilogy. I have a very bad feeling that the sequels will disappoint but I'll have to read them anyway since I've started reading the story! Doesn't that suck? I think trilogies are a smart way for an author to get a captive audience for the sequels.

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  5. Yeah...sequels make it difficult for the poor audience to let go...but I think the author must also be suffering...first, he'll get a loyal following only if he writes a super book and secondly, he'll spend his life trying to better that book!

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