Out

The Scud is out. :`-( But he played quite miserably, really.. I don’t like Henman, but he deserved to win. Won the first set very easily 6-2. I began watching from the second, which he had to fight to win 7-5. Mark upped his game to win the third 6-7.. started the fourth badly, climbed right back into the match with a reverse break, but lost the tie-break 7-6. The prob with Mark is.. he didn’t break Henman‘s serve- except once, n’ it didn’t matter much then. Quite a moody guy he is, n’ didn’t fight for points at all. Sorta over-confident at the beginning, probly intended to equalise with aces.. but lost heart when it didn’t work the way he planned. Double-faulted at the worse possible times.. in tie-breaks n’ all, when he could’ve actually turned the tide around in his favor.. Crap performance, in short. I’m sure Goran would have played much better. Well, whats gone is gone.. I’ll support Roddick now. Tho’ I’m pretty sure its Federer whoz gonna win Wimby. He’s God now. Just like last year. In one word, Unstoppable…

The Scud

Mark Philippoussis is the man I’m rooting for this Wimbledon..

The site says that his best performance till date is Runner-Up (2003).
However, one site remembered 1999…

Excerpts:

Audio: Pete Sampras admits that he may have caught a break when Philippoussis retired.

Sampras, aiming to win a record sixth Wimbledon title in the modern era, was trailing the giant Australian 4-6 2-1 in their quarter-final on centre court when Philippoussis felt his left knee “click” and decided he could not play on.

Philippoussis had become the first man to take a set off Sampras at the 1999 championships.

“It’s been a strange, strange day,” said Sampras. “I can’t sit here and say I’ve fended off Mark. He was outplaying me and I can’t feel good about it. There’s mixed emotions, obviously. I’m glad I’m playing in the semifinal on Saturday, but I feel bad for Mark, because he was playing well enough to win here.”
In my opinion, that fateful day was the only thing that stood between Mark n’ the greatest Grand Slam title.. the Wimbledon Men’s Singles, which Sampras went on to win..

Goran Ivanisevic

I love lawn tennis, ‘cuz the grass makes big serves more potent. I have always backed big servers at Wimby. n’ my all-time fave guy in tennis is the irreplaceable:

I’ve been rooting for him for the past decade.. I never backed anyone else..

He lost to Andre Agassi in the Wimbledon 1992 finals. 7:6, 4:6, 4:6, 6:1, 4:6
He lost to Pete Sampras in the Wimbledon 1994 finals. 6:7(2:7), 6:7(5:7), 0:6
He lost to Pete Sampras again in the Wimbledon 1998 finals. 7:6, 6:7, 4:6, 6:3, 2:6

He never gave up without a fight. If you notice, they were all, except for 1994, five-setters..
n’ then.. he gave me what I was waitin’ for..

He beat Patrick Rafter in the Wimbledon 2001finals. 6:3, 3:6, 6:3, 2:6, 9:7

He‘s gone now. n’ I back underdogs. So now, I support The Scud.. If he loses, I support Andy Roddick. Yeah, I do have this thing for big serves..

Weekend – Euro, Troy, CBE

Well, the Euro Cup is staging a series of upsets for the top teams. France n’ England, the top two contenders, are both out of the race to the cup. My fave man Zidane ran out of tricks n’ handed the match over to Greece.. n’ his was no match for Charisteas‘ charisma.
Becks hit a penalty outta the frame! n’ actually had the gall to blame the penalty spot. The Schumi of football if there’s one! The cameramen dutifully focussed on the grass n’ the FIFA have agreed to think about alternatives to the grass or whatever’s present at the spot.

Hmm.. talkin’ of Greece, I watched Troy on Saturday, with a whole lot of juniors- Rakesh n’ his roomies, Sweta n’ Chandra. Great movie, which succeeds in deifying Brad Pitt, something I’d considered impossible. Now I’m ready to publicly accept that he does look like me.. 🙂
Paris however projects himself as a coward, n’ I’d have hated Orlando Bloom if it weren’t for Legolas also being portrayed by him in LOTR. Fie on Troy n’ its superstitious cowards.

Only Hector is worth a mention. I revere Sparta even more now.. and
Achilles is my hero

I’d been to Coimbatore y’day for the Vasanth-Sreedevi wedding reception. It was fun.
I met Hari whom I studied with a decade ago. He was a puny fair kid in school whom everyone used to bully. He’s turned out into a handsome hunk, I must say.. He has a thick moustache n’ stubble n would fit any sensible gal’s image of a dream guy.. Got back to B’lore at dawn today in a Qualis which Vasanth’s dad sent here to drop me n’ a few others off.. Went to MG Road to drop off the others n’ came back to BTM via the Intermediate Ring Road..

Gmail

I’ve got Gmail

Blog

Most of the Internet is buggy..
1) My blog profile photo doesn’t load.
2) XioServ (my free image hosting server) doesn’t work.
3) Gmail gets stuck loading, more often than not.

Well, I completed 20K words on my blog 🙂 Y’day Murali [ju] came over- his PCS joinin’ date has been postponed. He’d been to Manali, Delhi, etc. Cool! I called up Prem today n’ he said he’d just been to Goa. I wanna go there too.. Well, I’ve been denied pemission to shift to the corner-seat at my cubicle.. ‘cuz it seems I’m not in the TI team anymore.. Can’t do much about it, can I? Deepu has passed all his graded papers.. I just hope he has the %age ones as well! After that, it will be celebrations galore! I couldn’t be happier..

Btw I found out why my blog profile pic wuzn’t loading. It cannot display those saved with uppercase characters in their filename.. crazy, huh?!

Pic

Due to popular request, I changed my pic.. but in this one, I don’t have my hair falling over my forehead like I usually do.. characteristic of a LEO.. well, this will have to do for now anyway.. till I procure a better one. What else? Yeah, Chechi bought a used Hyundai Accent GLS y’day. Prime Beige color. She’s also collected my guitar which has been newly repaired. So it won’t be long before I leave for Chennai 🙂 This wknd Anoop n’ I are plannin’ to go to Coimbatore for Vasanth’s wedding reception. His wedding’s tomorrow, but I didn’t go ‘cuz I’m not to take part in any celebrations till after June 26th. Planning to go on to Trichy to show Anoop Wild West – Anil also could be there.. well, thats it. I’m leavin’ for the day..

WAHOO!

Discovered that Anil has passed all his suppleez! Too good! 🙂 ‘cuz I dunno how many papers Deepu had, I dunno whether he is an engineer too.. but I sure hope so! 😐 Well.. went to Hangout as usual today n’ ordered the same things that I did y’day- 1 veg. burger, 1 mushroom noodles, 1 gobi manchurian, 1 mayonnaise sandwish n’ 2 lime juices.. which I shared with Sangram as I did with Sudarshan y’day- cleared my outstanding credit too.. 🙂 Hungry? Well.. what’re you waitiing for? Go out there n’ catch some grub.. Today I am happy!

Loser

OK now I feel like a real loser.. after checking out the pic of a space shuttle. Why? Well.. Anoop, Vittu n’ I were ‘valip-adikkaling‘ n’ the conversation turned to rockets.. n’ then space shuttles. Well, Anoop claimed that space shuttles resembled aeroplanes n’ I asked him.. ‘ha ha n’ they have wings also?’ n Anoop said ‘Yes’ n’ well.. I started ROFLing in mirth I’ve never experienced before. Tears came out of my eyes n’ my tummy started aching. Anoop was really hurt n’ said to Vittu ‘you can make out he’s just acting.’ Well, I defly was not. I even reasoned saying wings are of no use ‘cuz there’s only vaccum in space, n so there’s no use of aerodynamics. I repeated this to Nelson the next day, but he also didn’t find Anoop’s statement funny till I gave him this reason. But now I feel like a fool, ‘cuz.. Look at the pic I got.. :`-(

Just a few days back I claimed to be a man whoz able to laugh at himself n’ regard himself impartially. Guess I just proved that now. I must admit I searched for the pic with the intention of blogging about what a fool Anoop is. Pride comes before a fall, huh? How true..

House

For a change, I wuz selfish n told Rakesh to screw up GRE so that he wudn’t apply n go for MS.. so that he wud be here in Bang w. me for co. Hmm.. Guess what? Yeah! He really did screw it up! He’s not even sayin his score! Anywayz..

Hmm.. seemz Venki suggested to Anoop that hez shiftin outta our house.. someplace else- ‘cuz his frenz from punjaaab are comin down. Vittu will get his VISA [god-willing] n go for his MS, which leaves just me, Anoop n Subbu in that big house! Wish it’d happen sooner than later, ‘cuz now therez Yasas n Naval too.. hope they get jobs really fast. Only then can I get Giri to stay w us comfortably! Sandeep [ju] n Shabin [Anoop’s frend] are also comin down to join Infy. So what started off as Venki Vinu Vittu [sounds like veni vidi vici ;)] Subbu, Basu n me.. will soon have Anoop, Shabin, Sandeep, Giri n only me n Subbu from old! n we thought he’d be the 1st guy to leave! Heh heh. Wonder what’ll happen when Vinu n Basu get back! By then Sandeep’s n Shabin’s trng will be over.. n hopefully they won’t get posted in Bang.. so that it’ll almost be back to old.. n I really hope Giri lands a job very soon! 🙂

What else? Yeah, the guy sittin next to me is leavin for Belgium today for a few months, so I’ll get a good place in this cubicle finally! Yahoo! n’ hey Rediffmail‘s also offering 1GB now, so I have 2.1 GB across Gmail, Rediffmail n’ Yahoo!