Rantings

Excerpt from Jane Austin's Pride and Prejudice

As I was browsing the channels during some late night TV, I ended up watching the end of BBC’s Pride and Prejudice production. I believe this is one of the best productions of Pride and Prejudice. Here is a literal copy and paste from one of the last scenes in the book. Lizzy is asking her father’s blessing for her wedding with Darcy.

Her father was walking about the room, looking grave and
anxious.  "Lizzy," said he, "what are you doing?  Are you out
of your senses, to be accepting this man?  Have not you always
hated him?"

How earnestly did she then wish that her former opinions had
been more reasonable, her expressions more moderate!  It would
have spared her from explanations and professions which it was
exceedingly awkward to give; but they were now necessary, and
she assured him, with some confusion, of her attachment to
Mr. Darcy.

"Or, in other words, you are determined to have him.  He is
rich, to be sure, and you may have more fine clothes and fine
carriages than Jane.  But will they make you happy?"

"Have you any other objection," said Elizabeth, "than your
belief of my indifference?"

"None at all.  We all know him to be a proud, unpleasant sort
of man; but this would be nothing if you really liked him."

"I do, I do like him," she replied, with tears in her eyes,
"I love him.  Indeed he has no improper pride.  He is perfectly
amiable.  You do not know what he really is; then pray do not
pain me by speaking of him in such terms."

"Lizzy," said her father, "I have given him my consent.
He is the kind of man, indeed, to whom I should never dare
refuse anything, which he condescended to ask.  I now give it
to _you_, if you are resolved on having him.  But let me advise
you to think better of it.  I know your disposition, Lizzy.
I know that you could be neither happy nor respectable, unless
you truly esteemed your husband; unless you looked up to him
as a superior.  Your lively talents would place you in the
greatest danger in an unequal marriage.  You could scarcely
escape discredit and misery.  My child, let me not have the
grief of seeing _you_ unable to respect your partner in life.
You know not what you are about."

Elizabeth, still more affected, was earnest and solemn in her
reply; and at length, by repeated assurances that Mr. Darcy was
really the object of her choice, by explaining the gradual
change which her estimation of him had undergone, relating her
absolute certainty that his affection was not the work of a
day, but had stood the test of many months' suspense, and
enumerating with energy all his good qualities, she did conquer
her father's incredulity, and reconcile him to the match.

"Well, my dear," said he, when she ceased speaking, "I have no
more to say.  If this be the case, he deserves you.  I could
not have parted with you, my Lizzy, to anyone less worthy."

2008 SuperBowl : Well worth the hype..

The NY Giants put on another exciting show tonight. I usually support the underdogs, and this was a case of the underdogs playing their heart out and winning the game. If I take data from the Superbowl party, I was at, as the sample data for how many people favoured the Patriots vs. the Gaints, I think 80% of the country is pissed off now that the Patriots lost..

Final Score : 17 Giants – 14 Patriots

I kept saying this line from the movie, The Replacements , throughout the superbowl party “Heart.. miles and miles of heart”.  That’s what it seemed the Giants had today. Congratulations to Eli Manning, on coming out of his elder brothers shadow and on being given the MVP award for the 2008 Superbowl..

Bollywood, Hollywood and copy cats..

Bollywood and the rest of the Indian cinema industry are pretty creative. Not only in coming up with original content, but also with copying :).. Back in the 70s and 80s, it was pretty norm, for most of the tunes to be copied from western tunes. I am in no way stating that all the content is copied, but quite a bit of it was. Starting from the movie plots, to the music in the songs. Here’s a good example (although the copy sounds a lot better to me 🙂 ).

ORIGINAL : “500 Miles” by Peter, Paul & Mary

COPY : “Jab Koi Baat” in the movie Jurm

Save XP!!

While, I am writing about couples smooching over each other!! :), my buddy Ray is writing something meaningful. As he states, Microsoft is planning on ending sales of Windows XP on June 30 2008. While Vista, has a lot of cool features, none of them are compelling for businesses to make the expensive migration. Not only does the new operating system require extensive planning for the migration and training for the tech support teams, but businesses also have to consider the expense of training end users because the interface has changed so much.

And not to mention the 100 different (I am exaggerating!! 🙂 ) flavors of Vista that Microsoft has come up with to make the decision even tougher.

Sign the petition here . [UPDATE : Link has been corrected.. Thx Ray for pointing this out.]

Insanity is…

having to watch a couple smooch over each other every two 2 minutes for 2 hours in the airport and 3 hours in the plane….And I swear, I could hear their smooches from two rows behind in the plane :). Get a room folks!!!

A moment of silence..

Sir Edmund Hillary, one of the greatest adventurers of our time, passed away today. Sir Edmund, was the first man to climb Mt. Everest along with the Nepalese sherpa Tenzing Norgay. I personally believe, his humanitarian deeds eclipse his physical achievements. Think the Prime Minister of New Zealand, Ms. Helen Clark, said it best “He was an heroic figure who not only ‘knocked off’ Everest but lived a life of determination, humility and generosity”

Pearls of wisdom from a Taxicab driver..

I took a cab recently, to get to the airport and ran across this very interesting cabbie. He was a Rastafarian and shared these pearls of wisdom.

  • Life is like the traffic. You need to know, when to merge to maintain harmony.
  • Life is like the traffic, there are always signs to look out for and a destination to reach.
  • You have two ears and only one mouth for a reason. Listen!!!
  • If you don’t touch the plow, you cannot taste the crop.

Whats more pathetic???

United rolling out a 1 meter piece of red carpet in front of the boarding gate and calling it “premium experience” or the guy, who insists on walking on that small patch of carpet, since he has a business class ticket????

Here’s a picture of the famous red carpet :).. You should understand my question, after looking at it 🙂

(Picture linked from Greg Virdano’s blog)