Don't take it seriously!

Roughly this was what happened to me many years ago.
She: 'You know smoking is bad for your health right?'
Me flustered and red faced: 'Yeah I heard about it somewhere!'
She: 'And still you smoke'
Me looking for a place to hide: 'Yeah I know, I'm pretty sad am I not?'
She walks away with a condescending air.

Whenever I think about this incident I am deeply flustered and have to go for a cigarette to soothe myself. This incident has left me deeply scarred. It felt like the pants and the pussy were not where you would expect them to be in a normal boy facing girl situation. I replay this incident in my mind over and over again. I particularly like this imaginary retort my dim-wit self apparently comes up with!
Me: 'You know we are all going to die one day right?'
She taken aback but her supreme confidence allowing her to collect herself: 'But that doesn't mean we kill ourself a cigarette at a time while waiting for the axe to finally fall!'
Me: 'No, I won't keep you waiting that long sweetheart!' and saying so I whip out my remington magnum 55, point at her head, and laugh like a maniac while she stares at me with terror stricken eyes as I bitch slap her.
If the perfection of the crime is judged by the amount of relief it provides the offender, this should be the perfect crime. There is just one minor flaw. I don't know much about guns. Is there something like a remington magnum 55?

A square meal!

The other day I came across the movie 'Office Space' where a character comes up with the most crazy product notion. He conceives the 'Jump to conclusion mat'. Actually it is a simple mat with 'Conclusions' written all over it, and the owner of this mat can jump onto it. A 'Jump to Conclusions' mat.
I was wondering on the same lines and tried to come up with the entire breakfast line which I would package as the 'square meal' with specially made square plates.
We'd have a Jam called 'Faith' so you could Spread the Faith onto your bread. The breakfast could be called 'Justice' so mothers could announce 'Justice will be served' in the mornings. Milk could be packaged as 'Truth' and so you could answer to anybody who cares to ask, that you are having nothing but 'Truth' and 'Justice'. Mothers could also ask their wards to have their 'Truth' with a grain of salt.
Sugar and fat free breakfasts could be marketed as 'Dive' instead of 'Justice', so diabetics and skinny girls could be asked to take a 'Dive'.
Leftovers and discards from the meal should be called the 'Upper hand'. It would be fun to watch street dogs and cats fighting for the 'Upper hand'.
Looks like a revolutionary idea!

LIFA

The Licensed International Financial Analyst Program is an international financial certification program. It is a series of three exams, with each exam taken successively. The exams are the GRE type of online exams with some seven finance sections and one section on ethical business (have to countercheck). In case you already are an MBA, CA, PHd etc, you could opt out of the first two exams and sit only for the third stage. You could visit http://www.the-ira.org/ for more information.
It is a new certification program and so LIFA is offering a fee waiver scheme for some initial applicants. To enrol yourself for the fee waiver program visit this link http://www.the-ira.org/scholarship/waiver.php?ct=16&r=46930. If you can avail the fee waiver option, and you are eligible to skip the first two stages, you pay some 3k (rupees of course) max for an international finance analyst certification, which I thought is a risk worth taking, so personally I enrolled for the course.
As I already said, its a new certification program so I cannot vouche for its industry acceptance, but its definitely worth a look.
Sam (Disclaimer: It looks authentic, thats all I can say.)

Unlucky charm

Can there be something like that? If there can, then one such star crossed chinese curse lies dumped somewhere between other such junk in my cubicle desk. It's a gift so I don't have the guts to throw it away. I have had my share of bad luck this last year and I don't feel like inviting more. Guess you learn new things about yourself every passing day. Also I don't feel its only me. I mean superstition is inbuilt into our system, as a defense mechanism against the unknown. Its said that if more of your superstitious behaviours (crossing fingers, touching wood etc) are designed to bring you good luck, then you generally consider yourself lucky. Unlucky people dread and avoid more than anything.