A hilarious summary of 2010

Got this as a forward mail and it was an awesome read, so I am putting it out here for the rest of you to enjoy too.

THE YEAR THAT WAS - 2010

By Dr C Andrade

So here's the year the way I saw it.

January

Jyoti basu dies at 11.47 a.m., yet again almost making it to P.M.

UPSC increases civil services intake from 580 to 965. Ouch. 385 more bureaucrats each year. A real Babulation Explosion.

 Kerala gets 3G services. Now they can call themselves "GGGods own country".

 February

Kishenji announces his phone number : 9734695789 . Now we don't need the army to fight him. ICICI business calls will finish him off.

Lok Sabha meets. Noise. Confusion. Lok Sabha adjourns. It's time we rename our parliament - the Joke Sabha.

 India says no to Bt brinjal. An auberginity lost?

March

What's common to Iceland & Abhishek? Both are wondering what to do with ash.

Sania Mirza announces that she's going to marry Shoaib Malik. Thank God,
Sania doesn't have to do 7 pheras with Shoaib. She'll never get past
the first round. Anagram of "Sania has a Malik" - "Asli aman ki asha".

April

ND Tiwari may have to take DNA test. Ha. So far for him, a double-helix was just an interesting position in bed.

Sachin Tendulkar's birthday today? Let's celebrate it as runmashtami.
The good thing is that Sachin has turned 37. Which means, for the next
365 days,he will be in his prime.

 IPL-3 happens with much glitz, glamour & goris. Definite Punjab
victory over Mumbai today. Mumbai may have the X-factor in Sachin. But
Yuvi gives Punjab the XXL-factor.

Matthew Hayden to change his name to Matthew_Hayden. After all he is a chronic under-scorer.

 If Vijay Mallya had his way, after the quarter-finals, IPL would have the half-finals & full-final.

And the post-IPL party starts. Unfortunately, all the recent happenings
only go to prove that an honest politician is the exception rather than
Tha...roor.

 If an aquarium can have water and a planetarium, planets, why can't a consortium have a consort?

Lalit Modi possessed drugs as a teenager. What?! No way we'll let him
run a cricket tournament. Let him go stand for parliament instead.

 BJP, RJD & BSP want JPC probe into IPL so that NCP will get caught  & UPA will be in trouble.

-       Acronymous scenes in parliament.

May

If India were a gym, Delhi would be the sauna, Chennai, the steam-room
& Bangalore, the a/c reception. Mumbai will be the pool in 2 months.

 The IPL saga continues.

I've heard of "suspension of disbelief", but LKM's behavior suggests
that he's experiencing "disbelief of suspension". LKM gets threats from
the underworld. Looks like organized crime doesn't like competition.

 Kasab gets sentenced Like all sentences, Kasab's too ends in a full stop.

If he's sentenced to death, Kasab will be 51st in the queue. "Capital" punishment just means your file is stuck in Delhi.

Subhash Ghai was ahead of his times. He introduced 4G in 1989. A-G, oh-G, lo-G suno-G.

June

FIFA World Cup provides a lot of kicks

Hope Greece is not given a penalty. They'll say they have no money to
pay it. I don't think Mexico will make any attempt at the Argentinian
goal. A Mexican can't take a shot without salt and lemon. I think Italy
should be allowed to have an extra player on the field. After all,
Azzurri usually comprises 12 people.

 The feeling of having heard a damn irritating noise before - Deja Vu-vuzela

On the offside, first there is God, then there is Ganguly. And then sometimes Argentina.

If  India had qualified for the World Cup, Chetan Bhagat would have been
 goalie & Mamata the forward. He can block, she can strike.

 Germany, Uruguay, Netherlands & Spain. So the big G.U.N.S. have made it to the semis.

TN may free 500 convicts to mark Tamil conference. Why, may i know? Did classical Tamil have shorter sentences?

Ahmedabad to celebrate World Blood Donation day. Hopefully, this time around, they'll keep it voluntary.

 Karunanidhi turns 87 today. He will henceforth be called Dravida Munnetra Kazhavan.

July

Bopanna & Qureshi to play tennis match with Wagah border as the net. Thereby showing that there are faults on both sides.

 Petrol price increased again. An optimist will now look at his tank as half fuel.

Just realized that M.S. Dhoni's wife will be called Ms. Dhoni.

CWG fun begins

Now i  understand why the CWG mascot is called Shera. They want a Shera
this, a Shera that, and a Shera everything that makes money.

 New HR rating scheme- 5: Exceeds Expectations, 4: Meets Expectations, 3: Average, 2: Needs Improvement, 1: Kalmadi.

Suresh Kalmadi plans to give us the Common & the Games. The rest, he'll keep.

The latest form of humour : Stand-up Kalmadi.

 So Amit Shah is behind the Sohrabuddin fake encounter uh?  Makes sense. His name is, after all, an anagram of "a sham hit".

If Sherlyn Chopra met Rakhi Sawant, would the CBI call it a fake encounter?

August

 Manmohan becomes third PM to hoist flag at Red Fort for 7th time. Sigh. So many hoisters, so few pearls.

If life gives you lemons, be very happy. They're now Rs.100 per kg.

I'd like to start a paper factory that supplies clean chits to the CBI. Big business potential.

 Congress to have elections to decide its President. Ha. That's like
 Robinson Crusoe conducting interviews to select his assistant.

It's a great day for our planet. All the top places in Miss Universe are bagged by earthlings.

 Spot-fixing controversy hits Pakistan cricket Pakistan is the world champion in book cricket.

There's actually a website that does nothing but spot-fixing. It's called Foursquare.

I'm looking forward to Arnab on spot-fixing tonight. I bet that he'll
interrupt his first guest on the third word of his second sentence.

September

CWG action continues. Finally some positive news about the CWG - 5 athletes test positive for dope.

1.6 million meals to be served during CWG. Oh. No wonder they have created such a big mess.

 Delhi gets hit by Dengue.

 What Delhi needs is some Ram Sene folks. They won't let the mosquitoes breed till they get married.

I propose that we make mosquitoes our national insect. Then the government will try to protect them and they'll become extinct.

 Kasab case drags on. Sentenced terrorists have a good time in India - They are footloose and phaansi

free.

UID launched. The first person gets an aadhar number. The second gets anaadhar number. And so on.

I guess, in Jalandhar, people will soon be bidding lakhs of rupees for a premium UID number.

 Ayodhya verdict happens. Seems to be on the basis of Share-ya law. This
Ayodhya issue is quite complex. Hindus want a temple, Muslims want a
mosque, while Mayawati actually wants a statue.

Off to Google Maps to mark Nungambakkam as Rameshjanmabhoomi so that there's no confusion in 5510AD.

 Raymonds wants to sponsor the Ayodhya verdict, because it turned out to be a 3-piece suit.

October

Obama's goal seems to be to see as much of India and as little of Indians as possible.

In TN, a million more TV sets will be distributed. Our whole country seems to be in an alms race.

 Advice to Arundhati Roy : if at first you don't secede, cry, cry, cry again.

Mukesh Ambani is not the first to stay in Antilla. Centuries back, Valmiki used to hang out in one.

November

Today  is the day Krishna slays Narakusara, Rama returns to Ayodhya,
Mahavira  attains moksha, and Airtel makes a killing. Happy Diwali.  The
more the number of Diwali sweets in your house, the faster they get
spoilt : burfi's law.

 Raja scam explodes

A Raja is living proof that there is a pot of gold at the end of the
spectrum. In India, scams have an alarming frequency. And now, with
Raja, frequencies have an alarming scam.

Dear Manmohan Singh, it would be apt if you could sack our telecom minister using radio language :

 Raja. Over and out.

Manmohan Singh continues to do nothing about anything

Manmohan Singh's First Law of Motion : Everybody stays in a state of rest unless acted upon by Soniaji.

Manmohan Singh's Third Law of Motion : Every action has an equal and opposite inaction.

 One day there will be a movie made about Manmohan Singh. And the director will go, "Lights. Camera. Inaction."

Manmohan Singh's personal integrity is unquestionable. Mostly because he never attends question hour.

 Yeddy allots land to his children

My  name is Yeddy. I'm a great father, a cool deddy. Politics has been
 bleddy, but be happy i am steddy. Cos else you'll be stuck with Reddy.

The nation finds out that Radia : Government :: Sonia : Manmohan

 Q : How do you fit 1000 media people in a hotel?

A : 998 in 499 double rooms. And Barkha & Sanghvi in the lobby.

Why does phone-tapping make India a banana republic?

Isn't tapioca republic better?

December

Wikileaks threatens national security, or rather politicians' security
What with wikileaks & payback, the governments of the world will now
unite to face their common enemy - the public.

 TIME had a difficult choice for Person of the Year. Assange, who
 attacked governments' privacy. Or Zuckerberg, who went after people's.

Sarkozy is a VIP Frenchie, right?

To protect against hacking, DRDO instructs all government officials to change their password from sonia123.

 India has got an old, rich and glorious tradition in hacking. It started with Parashurama.

MMS & team are busy blowing balloons for Sonia's birthday. They've told their staff that they're tackling inflation.

 Many bills were passed in the parliament session. Travel bills, food bills, etc.

 We should also screw China by issuing visas that are attached by mere gem-clips.

Obama,  Sarkozy, Jiabao & now Medvedev. If india can't get to the
Security  Council, at least the Security Council is coming to india.

Refreshing the Dataprovider of a chained combobox

I work with Flex 3 and was recently trying to implement something like a chained combobox, whereby the selection in one combobox filters the options that are available in the next one. Simple enough. But alas, I was in for an unpleasant surprise.

In an ideal scenario all that was supposed to happen was that I select a certain value in the first combobox that triggers a filter for retrieving data that populates the second combobox. The data retrieval was not an issue at all but when I had to assign the dataprovider for the second combobox it did not work. No matter what I did the combobox would not refresh and display the content. While debugging I could see that the dataprovider had the correct data in it.

All efforts to explicitly set the dataprovider, refresh it, validate the control failed to deliver the desired result. I spent a LOT of time trying to figure out what could be the possible reason for the problem, didnt get anywhere and when I say a lot of time, I mean a day and a half after which the whole thing got extremely frustrating. I had been searching to find some help or a post for someone who had run into a similar problem. Didnt come across anything.

I posted a question on Adobe Forums a couple of guys suggested some stuff, didnt help. When I had given up all hope I came across this link by someone who seemed to be having the exact same issue as me and SURPRISE it had a solution.

The issue as I came to know from that was with the SDK. SDK 3.5 to be precise, I checked my version. No surprises it was 3.5, the root cause of my misery was a bug in that version. Its not present in SDK 3.4 and below but only in 3.5. The same  has been fixed in SDK 3.6 but it does not have a stable build yet and only the nightly builds are available on the Adobe site. You can get it here.

I got SDK 3.6 and tried doing the same and it worked like a charm. Didn't have to do one extra step to make it work. The binding took care of everything. BUT BEWARE, the SDK 3.6 does not have a stable build yet and has a few bugs of its own. As I realized because it broke my language modules code. So, give the 3.6 a try but make sure you go back and test throughly, it might leave a little trail of destruction of its own.

Also, since Flex 4 is out. I guess the development of SDK 3.6 might have been stopped altogether.

Anyway, I am putting this post out so that it can possibly help someone who is stuck with the issue of the chained combobox not displaying the data assigned to it by the dataprovider and probably save a lot of time trying to hunt around for a possible solution.

It is extremely frustrating when you know your code is right and it still doesnt work. Thank you Adobe.

Grumble grumble.. hmmmpphh !

Yea.. today was one of THOSE days.. I start work at 8.. i had a parking ticket on my dash at 8:10.. even before i could go to Starbucks to get my chaa.. i mean.. gimme a break... dear law enforcement officer.. where the eff were you .. hiding in the bushes ??? I agree it was my fault :(.. i didnt read the street cleaning board.. but c'mon.. we just moved into that neighbourhood.. cut me some slack.. will you ??

Then I had been stuck on a piece of code since yesterday.. like seriously STUCK... STUUUUCCCKKK.. you get the point.. right.. I get my team mate involved, its a basic operation that should work out of the box.. its BASIC.. but no.. it wont work.. it JUST WONT... JUUUUSSSTTT WOOOONNNTTT ... it was frustrating to say the least.. i spent nearly the entire day trying to make it work.. tried everything under the sun that i could to make it work.. to no avail.. turns out... it was a bug in the prgramming language.. by Adobe.. hey thanks for that Adobe... thanks a ton... now gimme my day back >.< !!! ridiculous nutcases.. its open source... not bug source.. NOW Microsoft... so yea it should work.. anyway... I get my stuff done... finally .. i update my SDK to get the bug sorted.. lose my entire day's code coz the merge fails for the last head in the tracking system... I screamed at that... i did.. no kidding.. and yes i was annoyed... !

KXIP had lost in the morning.. so I wasnt too happy.. and the Canucks just lost .. to who ??? the Islanders.. who loses to them ??? WHO??? The are 12th in the Eastern Conference .. 12th out of 15 teams.. No Eastern team had won in Vancouver this year.. NO ONE.. and we lose to the Islanders.. *sigh*...

Today was indeed one of THOSE days.. the only relaxing thing was the easy 20 min run in the rain.. Thank God for running..

Happy Monday ...

Well.. Happy Monday.. the name says it all.. so yea .. that's it.. I'm done :)

Well the first day after the time change.. I'm still reeling like the rest of the continent.. its nuts.. probably tomorrow wont be an issue.. also coz I will be so sore from training tonight that i wont have a clue till tomm morning..  so yea I wont mind it..

Just finished work and now getting ready to head to practice in an hour.. coach says its going to be a painful session.. *sigh*.. Dear Coach.. everything is painful... but till the time he can run faster than me.. i do not have the right to complain... hehe ...

The weather has been awesome.. spring is here already and summer aint too far either.. sooo looking forward to it.. Will be a busy one.. <GRIN> ...

Want to write more but i am scramble brained from coding all day .. so will probably get back here later..

Happy Monday guys :)

Thought

Easy Sunday going on, and a lot has been going on behind the scenes. All those things make me extremely happy. I feel so much better and relaxed about things now, its almost as if I have a new lease of energy and I am liking it way too much, that it becomes difficult to find words for it.

Now, when I take a minute to think about the past three weeks. First, time flies, I didnt even realize it was three weeks till I started typing out this sentence. WOW. No complaints, I like it that way. Second, the thought that comes to my mind after all this, and not just talking about the past three weeks, but a longer period of time is, how can some things that appear so small, make a change so big. A change which I thought could never happen and though it didnt bother me, there were times when it came to my mind and made me think... I'm losing it here... FOCUS FOCUS !!!

Lazy sunday.... thought.. change... THOUGHT... yea better... a million people might have said it before I did, but now is the time that i truly understand what they mean when they say :

The happiest person is one who is at peace with himself.

All of a sudden it makes the most sense in the entire world. Not that I was fighting a war within, but there are thoughts that come to mind and you think I wish it wasn't like that and voila one day it isn't. Can you imagine how beautiful everything seems that day ??? Ask me... but then I won't have words to capture it in. There are things which are music to the ears, then there are things which are music to the soul. Now you can paint the rest of the picture yourself =D Yes, it's that good.

P.S. just in case someone was getting ideas. No I am not in love. But just happy with the way things are right now, in love with myself all over again... ok fine if you must think thats its love talking :P .. now if she would only call... LOL =D

Happy thoughts everyone... :) and oh Happy New Year too.. first post of the year.

Sachin Tendulkar - The Genius

Hashim Amla:
"Nothing bad can happen to us if we're on a plane in India with Sachin Tendulkar on it."
Hashim Amla, the South African batsman, reassures himself as he boards a flight

Yaseer Hameed:
"Sometimes you get so engrossed in watching batsmen like Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar that you lose focus on your job."

"To Sachin, the man we all want to be"
- What Andrew Symonds wrote on an aussie t-shirt he autographed specially for Sachin

BBC on Sachin:
Beneath the helmet, under that unruly curly hair, inside the cranium, there is something we don't know, something beyond scientific measure. Something that allows him to soar, to roam a territory of sport that, forget us, even those who are gifted enough to play alongside him cannot even fathom. When he goes out to bat, people switch on their TV sets and switch off their lives "

"But the finest compliment must be that bookmakers would not fix the odds - or a game - until Tendulkar was out."

"Tuzhe pata hai tune kiska catch chhoda hai?" Wasim Akram to Abdul Razzaq when the latter dropped Sachin's catch.

Brian Charles Lara:
"Sachin is a genius. I'm a mere mortal."

Mark Taylor:
"We did not lose to a team called India...we lost to a man called Sachin" - Mark Taylor, during the test match in Chennai (1997)

M. L. Jaisimha:
"The more I see of him the more confused I'm getting to which is his best knock."

Glenn McGrath:
"The joy he brings to the millions of his countrymen, the grace with which he handles all the adulation and the expectations and his innate humility - all make for a one-in-a-billion individual,"

Anjali
"I can be hundred per cent sure that Sachin will not play for a minute longer when he is not enjoying himself. He is still so eager to go out there and play. He will play as long as he feels he can play,"

Matt HAYDEN:
"I HAVE SEEN GOD, HE BATS AT NO.4 FOR INDIA"

"Even my father's name is Sachin Tendulkar."
-- Tendulkar's daughter, Sara, tells her class her father's name after the teacher informs them of a restaurant of the same name in Mumbai

KUMBLE:
"I am fortunate that I've to bowl at him only in the nets!"

Shahrukh (quoting Shahrukh from an interview)
"Que: Who do you think as most important celebrity ?
Shahrukh: There was a big party where stars from bollywood and cricket were invited. Suddenly, there was a big noise, all wanted to see approaching Amitabh Bachhan. Then Sachin entered the hall and Amitabh was leading the queue to get a grab of the GENIUS!!"

Navjot Singh Sidhu:
"India me aap PrimeMinister ko ek Baar Katghare me khada kar sakte hain..Par Sachin Tendulkar par Ungli nahi utha Sakte.."

Waqar Younis
"He can play that leg glance with a walking stick also."

A banner once said-' I WILL SEE GOD WHEN I DIE BUT TILL THEN I WILL SEE SACHIN ' that quiet defines Sachin-The greatest.

Allan Donald:
"Sachin Tendulkar has often reminded me of a veteran army colonel who has many medals on his chest to show how he has conquered bowlers all over the world"

And i remember reading in one of Allan Donald's interview.
This interview was in Cricket Talk 7-8 yrs ago.

"I was bowling to Sachin and he hit me for two fours in a row. One from point and the other in between point and gully. That was the last two balls of the over and the over after that we (SA) took a wicket and during the group meeting i told Jonty (Rhodes) to be alert and i know a way to pin Sachin. And i delivered the first ball of my next over and it was a fuller length delevery outside offstump. And i shouted catch. To my astonishment the ball was hit to the cover boundary. Such was the brilliance of Sachin. His reflex time is the best I have ever seen. Its like 1/20th of a sec. To get his wicket better not prepare. Atleast u wont regret if he hits you for boundaries."

Peter Roebuck, Aussie journalist
"On a train from Shimla to Delhi, there was a halt in one of the stations. The train stopped by for few minutes as usual. Sachin was nearing century, batting on 98. The passengers, railway officials, everyone on the train waited for Sachin to complete the century. This Genius can stop time in India!!"

NKP Salve, former Union Minister (This was when he was accused of ball tempering)
"Sachin cannot cheat. He is to cricket what (Mahatma) Gandhiji was to politics. It's clear discrimination. "

Andy Flower:
"There are 2 kind of batsmen in the world. One Sachin Tendulkar. Two all the others."

Cussing at Work

Dear Employees:

It has been brought to management's attention that some individuals throughout the company have been using foul language during the course of normal conversation with their co-workers.

Due to complaints received from some employees who may be easily offended, this type of language will no longer be tolerated.

We do, however, realize the critical importance of being able to accurately express your feelings when communicating with co-workers.

Therefore, a list of 18 New and Innovative 'TRY SAYING' phrases have been provided so that proper exchange of ideas and information can continue in an effective manner.

Number 1
TRY SAYING: I think you could use more training.
INSTEAD OF: You don't know what the f___ you're doing.

Number 2
TRY SAYING: She's an aggressive go-getter.
INSTEAD OF: She's a f___ing bit__.

Number 3
TRY SAYING: Perhaps I can work late.
INSTEAD OF: And when the f___ do you expect me to do this?

Number 4
TRY SAYING: I'm certain that isn't feasible.
INSTEAD OF : No f___ing way.

Number 5
TRY SAYING: Really?
INSTEAD OF: You've got to be sh___ing me!

Number 6
TRY SAYING: Perhaps you should check with...
INSTEAD OF: Tell someone who gives a sh__.

Number 7
TRY SAYING: I wasn't involved in the project.
INSTEAD OF: It's not my f___ing problem.

Number 8
TRY SAYING: That's interesting.
INSTEAD OF: What the f___?

Number 9
TRY SAYING: I'm not sure this can be implemented.
INSTEAD OF: This sh__ won't work.

Number 10
TRY SAYING: I'll try to schedule that.
INSTEAD OF: Why the f___ didn't you tell me sooner?

Number 11
TRY SAYING: He's not familiar with the issues...
INSTEAD OF: He's got his head up his a__.

Number 12
TRY SAYING: Excuse me, sir?
INSTEAD OF : Eat sh__ and die.

Number 13
TRY SAYING: So you weren't happy with it?
INSTEAD OF: Kiss my a__.

Number 14
TRY SAYING: I'm a bit overloaded at the moment.
INSTEAD OF: F__ it, I'm on salary.

Number 15
TRY SAYING: I don't think you understand.
INSTEAD OF: Shove it up your a__.

Number 16
TRY SAYING: I love a challenge.
INSTEA D OF: This f___ing job sucks.

Number 17
TRY SAYING: You want me to take care of that?
INSTEAD OF: Who the f___ died and made you boss?

Number 18
TRY SAYING: He's somewhat insensitive.
INSTEAD OF: He's a pr_ck.

Thank You,
Human Resources