Arithmetic Progression of posts

If you have noticed, in 2005 there were 40 posts, in 2006 30, and including this post, in 2007 we will have 20 posts !

Oh yeah, only the first 80 posts were labelled, the last 10 are not... thats okay !

I would not deny that part of the reason I came back to post something is to complete the arithmetic progression

In 2008, if we have 10 posts, we will hit a 100 !!! Atul, Vindo, Don et al.... keep up your goofs even in the "nervous nineties". Happy New Year !

classic pics

One of Don's night - "outs" !!

Raja Simmha ! - The one sitting is Atul, and the ones standing are his "prajaas" ... I anticipated protests if the faces weren't masked, eventhough atuls face expression actually adds to the Raja-part

catch phrases and mannerisms

Just trying to think what is it that I cannot forget about some of my old roomies

saurabh : "dimaag kharaab ho gaya bhai"

vishal : his obsession with the postal mail, postman, postal service :) ... he keeps coming out of the room every hour and "has the post come" ?

despo: t shirt, up and down in a blowing air fashion .. ( not many of the current roomies know him)

vindo: well, his umpteen number of "activities" , we say given a chance vindo will do a skydiving, directly fall onto a horse top and ride it to a river, jump from the horse onto a boat, raft across the river to the other side, get out and run a marathon to the volleyball court !

don: sleeping off on the couch

atul:..... boy, its way too tuf to pick one..... isn't that we started this blog in the first place ? recently I heard that atul left MD to NC ( 4.5 hrs drive) on a morning and reached there only by nite.. reason ? he sept on the way, thank God, in a parking lot !

folks, keep adding more, in the comments

Vindo's marriage trip :)

So I come back to post a best wishes note to Vindo on his marrige trip to India....

Well, more than that I could not hold back after seeing this leaving (for a month) note from Vindo to the house google groups ( which as an "alumnus" I am still part of). Here is the email - read carefully the lines in red (which is my emphasis)

Too egg-sited abt marriage eh ? that don't have the time to type proper sentences

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Hi Guys,

3 movies will come from netflix in my absence. Plz resend them as soon as you have watched, which I doubt considering the kind of movies I get. I have put my ac on hold so there won't be any more movies coming after that.Also cud anyone start my car for 2-3 minutes in my absence in case battery dies down. Guys plz take care of raking leaves before I come otherwise everyone will get fined!!!!!!! I will leave my room open in case of fire, flood, tornado etc.......

Vinod
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Don and his checks

We have a table in leaving room where we keep old letters in case someone forgets to pick theirs. One fine evening in July Tandeep was shuffling through old letters and he came across nice Christmas card for Don. The card envelop was open so Tandeep peeped into the card he saw a 100$ bill in Don's name. Don too was there and he pleasantly shocked. As it turns out Don never carefully opened the card in last 7 months and so missed 100$ gift, which, if Tandeep hadn't noticed, would have gone to trash. Later, Tandeep regretted that why did he disclosed his revelation to Don:))

Thats not the end of story. Recently Mitesh was browsing through old receipts kept on top of freezer and he found a really old check with oil splotches on it. As expected it belonged to Don and it was tax refund from IRS. The check seemed to have been void long back and Don says, "it was just 50$, man!".

As history repeats itself, Don was going through his back and "discovered" a really old check from time before he just started his TA. It was around 4-5 months old and after getting TA after hard struggle he never bothered to cash his library checks. So, inmates! keep on lookout for old uncashed checks before trashing junk posts and receipts.

-vinod

Ciggie and Don

When Don came to house he used to smoke very less but since then his stamina of smoking is on steady rise. Now one pack is barely enough for a day. When we used to play soccer he used to pant and on my pressing he even tried to quit smoking. Once I tried to keep his packs in my room and I would give him few ciggies per day as ration but it didn't work. And he is also very generous in offering cigarette to others. For some days even I was afraid of developing casual smoking to habit. One of our friends, Anmol, sometimes comes to house to smoke. Now he doesn't come that often. I asked why? He said "yaar jab bhi tumhare ghar aata hoon Don cigarette pila deta hai aur mein to kabhi kabhi pine wala aadmi hoon. I can't bear that much.", where other things failed Don's generosity worked.
Today I asked him when will he start quiting. He said "shaadi karne ke baad chhod doonga. ab tak single hoon peeni padegi". So no price in guessing who, rather what, is Don's current soulmate.

Do langoor!

Kya ameer kya gareeb, hum sab bhai bhai.

20-20

Don would put it in better way but since he is not here right now. Let me write it even though its about me.
I woke up one morning and Don was watching some 20-20 Cricket match online. I watched for some time and it seemed to be some players are not young. I asked "Isn't 20-20 for players below 20 years of age?"... Of course I blamed it on sleepiness. Well, that much for my cricket GK.

-vinod

Whats in a name?

After shock left 8309 in Aug 07 to join his job we got a new replacement, Mitesh Patel. After Atul had left the house Don tried to make up by providing funny incident but who can match Atul's capacity to make you laugh (Man, I can't take picture of Atul sleeping in his car at red signal out of mind!!). Anyway, after Mitesh came our hoped revived that finally we could have more material for this blog keep going. Number of funny incidents at house hasn't decreased though general enthu to record these incidents has decreased. Lets hope this revival works.

To start with,

When Mitesh came to the house no one cud remember his name... Don mistakenly called him Himesh, I called him Hitesh and Harish called Mahesh....
After that we realized this guy also has a knack of remembering wrong names... He once asked me "Who was that Bay you were talking to?"... I never knew anyone named Bay...
Finally we realized that he was referring to Wayne... then he asked who this Alok was?... After 5 min we realised that he is referring to Anmol...
Then he came up with Siddharth... Now this was limit. Siddharth meant Sanket.

Most funny incident was when Saurabh came to the house with his family. Everyone introduced everyone else but somehow Mitesh remembered Saurabh by his father's name, Rakesh... when Mitesh was leaving he waived towards Saurabh and said "Bye bye Rakesh"... May be Saurabh didn't get it but we laughed our stomach out later on...

-vinod

rebirth at 80 and "humsuffer"

So this is post number 80, and the good news is that some old and current residents of 9006 turned 8309 are now feeling a bit nostalgic about this blog and one or some may soon join as new team members :-) ... hope that rejuvenates this, and that I, shock, can now be a reader for some time than a poster ( one who cooks- cooker ; one who posts - poster ; etc )

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before I leave, I wanted to record somewhere ( a bit of self bragging) about that wonderful game I invented while in 9006 and 8309 ... (actually more like while in Chetak)... the idea came up when we have 3 people in a car, and we can't really play team antakshari... So I came up with this brilliant patentable idea that one of us hums the tune of a song and the other two have to compete to guess the song ( Some of my ardent fans say that I can very well sing the lyrics itself, and the other two will still have to struggle to guess the song.... what a talented me !!)

anyways, this best-for-travel game later was played even in bigger crowds, and was aptly named "humsuffer"... the person who hums suffers, and not just him, everyone else suffers .. i.e in Hindi hum (sub) suffer

so sayonara for a while.. a man at eighty needs some rest :-) .. and good luck to the new posters !!

dishwash....

remembered one of old atul ones !! every now and then we used to have a house meeting and become suddenly strict about cleanliness.... no more leaving uncleaned personal plates in the sink (cooking utensils are different....).. if found, the fellow will be fined.. etc etc

One morning, atul left the house early after breakfast.... and we find a plate in the sink, unwashed, and near the sink, a note on a paper napkin (yeah that used to be atuls favorite writing pad.. and that also torn not along the perforation, but randomly torn.... )

the note said... "sorry guys, I am in real hurry. will clean the plate once I am back. Please don't fine me"

the time he took to tear the napkin, find a pen and write it, he could have just cleaned the li'l plate

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Best wishes to Atul who is looking fwd to his marriage in Oct and his new job assignment also soon......

an innocent joke

Now that I am no more resident of 9006-turned-8309, the frequency of posts will be less, if any, unless atul or vindo or don send me material !! anyway, here is a little inncent one from my 5 yr old nephew "V"

Time's about 3 pm on a saturday afternoon

V: Mom, are you going to sleep ?
Mom: yes, but just for some time ..
V: Can I wake u up after some time. I want to go to the park
Mom: sure, wake me up at 4 o clock
V: Can u tell me when it is 4 o clock ......

Bravo Don

(click on pic to enlrage)

As I saw the address on the letter lying on the table, I thought that was funny - "Bunnoose". But then, soon learnt that there was much more to it, on what was inside





The story goes as: Our man puts 75 cents in a vending machine in front of the Taco(h)ell on campus and the product came to the edge and did not fall down. He called up the number on the vending machine, wasted about 6 of his day time minutes to make the guy understand what happened..





and finally, in a packet with 39 cent stamps, came his well deserved refund, 3 quarter coins, and a form explaining the deal





Bravo Don ...both in your fights for justice and in your catching up on Atuls legacy.. way to go :-)

old id gold

Some old jokes of atul, being recollected

1) Perhaps a repeat.. we used to maintain "I owe You (IOUs) " amongst our roommates.. and then settle it at the end of every month.. Once Atul wrote Atul owes X - 5$ , where X was not amongst the 5 roomies !!

2) This used to happen more, in our first year in US . Atul would buy, say a bottle of juice.. put his name on it somewhere.. One week, the name writen would have faded off... Atul sends a mail to everyone "hey there is a bottle of juice in the fridge.. is it any of yours ?" .. everyone knows whose it is, but none responds.. next day comes atuls next mail "hey, if noone remembers whose it is, lets share it" .. and atul is so happy that he took the initiative ..

2 weeks later, the cycle repeats

kabse bol rahe ho aadhaa ghanta ?

Vindos birthday this year was on a sunday.. but since our man had plans for one of his biking/hiking.skating/skiing/horseriding/........../jumpingupandown on saturday, junta decided to give a surprise b'day bash on fri nite..

Fri eveng Vindo goes for a party.. says he will be back by 9

10, and vindo is not back, shock calls him.. vindo says "half an hour man"

11pm - shock calls again, and Vindo goes "arey, sab piya hua hein idhar.. koi na koi ride dega, par half an house more man"

11.45 pm, Junta assemble at Vindo's (and shocks) place .. only our man is missing

12 midnite - shock calls again and say.." hey I am going home.. so if u want i can pick u up".. Vindo goes "hey don't worry so much about me man... I will get home.. half an hour"

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12.30 am Vindo is still not there.. Junta are restless ..Among the gathered crowd, srilatha decides to call up, even if it meant spoiling the surprise .. without going into anything else, as soon as vindo picks up, srilatha goes..

sril: "kab aarahe ho ?"
vindo: "aadha ghanta"
sril: "kabse bol rahe ho aadha ghanta, aadha ghanta"
vindo : "arey sorry yaar" !!

vindo still din't get it.. he was surprised, when at 1 am, he finally got back home, and saw a crowd waiting !!

Atuls bhooth on Don

We have kept Don under observation for suspicion of Atuls bhooth having entered him - especially as stays in the same room... Don also burned a tavaa and like in atuls case, vishaal found out were the "burning smell" is coming from.. (well, some more, and he will catch up with atuls no:s) , like atul, he "accidentally" goes of to sleep in the couch upstairs, asking some one to wake him up in 15 mins (only to wake up the next day morning)...

and the latest... we got a pedometer (whatevere- that counts the no: of steps u take) with the cereal.. Don has clipped it on his neck and walking around all day every hour asking some one "Hey can u read the count?" ... "18" says the fellow.. "Yeah, its not working, I have been walking around from the morning, and only 18 ?"

in "sprite" of

One day Don (Atuls replacement) sees that the freezer of the fridge has developed ice here and there. Calls Vindo and shows him. After some investigation, Vindo finds the source of the problem. A sprite can that was kept in the freezer

Like a scientist who has just found out an explanation for the observation, Vindo started putting fundaes.. "Dekho, if you keep an unopened can in the freezer, it bursts and the vapours will then condense to form ice" etc etc

Don kept listening and in the end, asked "Who put it there ? ".... Vindo first goes, .."haa, who put it there ? ".. a moment of pause, and then goes "Oh damn, I only put it ..."

panchapandavas are like legs of a chair, 3 in number

Friday nite.. the umd_samskritam web team meets for some urgent updates.. Vindo is working on closing the MD feb workshop registration (due to overbooking) and put new registration pages for the March VA and NJ workshops

He dos a good job with the database, closes the MD registration.. alls done.. except that there was something undecided about the final information page for the VA (Ashburn) and NJ (Edison) workshops.. But then Vindo had to sleep, and so he said "Arey, I have done everything, have created a page also, the contents are not finalised, so I will, for now cut and paste some random info from the old MD workshop page and do some random additions. Once we have a decision on the pending things, we can update it and make the final page"

"Okay, good job and good nite Vindo", said the rest of the web team .. The next day morning, one of them "randomly" checked, what "random" data Vindo had put, and the info page read, among other things:


1) Click here to register for the workshop at Edison, VA
2) The venue is 6905, Cipriano Rd, Lanham, MD

and the bottom of the page said

3) Registration is now closed !!

Multipurpose laptop

Disclaimer: The following is NOT inspired by anyone else's action. It is purely an idea developed by yours truly. If any of the readers wants to lay claim for it, please post in the comments section your arguments, and how you hit upon the idea

Now for the main point. Here is a million dollar worth innovation. A multipurpose laptop or a laptop+digital weighing machine especially for all the dieting people !!

Imagine, how cool it would be, if you could just close and fold your laptop, and stand on it and it would measure your weight ! And not just that, automatically saves the data with a date and time stamp into a folder in the same latop !!

Soon to hit the market - watch out !