June 16, 2006

Except for 53 points

Full page in the Hindustan Times (June 15), from the Ministry of Shipping, Road Transport & Highways. "Four Laning Delhi-Mumbai Corridor of Golden Quadrilateral Completed: Why Not Kolkata-Chennai?" it asks.

Just below that, it tells us that the Kolkata-Chennai corridor's "Total length" is 1684 km, of which 1537 is "completed as on 31.05.2006", leaving a "Balance length" of 147 km.

So when will that "balance length" be complete? At the bottom, the ad answers that. Well, sort of.

"This corridor will be completed by 31st December 2006", it says, "except for 104 km."

Come to think of it, this corridor is completed right now. Except for 147 km.

***

Article in same issue of HT, about carpooling ("It is the best way to beat fuel hike"). Quotes someone called Anuj Desai who is now carpooling and says: "We not only cut our monthly fuel bill by half, but were also saved from the burden of paying toll tax per vehicle."

Then he says, "If the RTO makes this legal, there will definitely be an advantage, but one will also have to study the cons of the concept."

I'm lost here, Anuj. You mean you think carpooling is illegal now? Therefore you are doing something illegal? What must the RTO do to make it legal?

***

Photo in last Sunday's (June 11) Times of India is of a "friendly" rugby match between the Indian Army and the New Zealand Navy. The NZ Navy won the match ... 53-0.

Are our soldiers inordinately bad at rugby? Or are NZ's sailors inordinately good?

Also, how friendly were those soldiers likely to have been, getting thumped 53-0?

***

In the same paper, item from Rajkot titled "Skin show: Guj officials in a soup."

This is about a "valedictory function" of the Junagadh Mahotsav, at which some pop stars were asked to perform. "Meghna Naidu, Sambhavna Seth and Twinkle Vajpayee performed in skimpy outfits." (Note: can't say I've heard of any of these three "pop stars", but that's neither here nor there).

Then there's this from Pravin Tank, corporator in the Junagadh Municipal Corporation: "The programme was not worth watching and dancers were wearing only miniskirts and bikini tops."

Not worth watching at all. Oh no. Thanks Pravin, for watching and telling us.

3 comments:

km said...

..dancers were wearing only miniskirts and bikini tops

Like Jayne Mansfield (or was it Marilyn Monroe?) once said "i don't know why you boys get all excited about sweater girls...take away our sweaters and what do we have?"

That's the subtext of Mr. Tank's complaint.

Jax said...

heh heh... Maybe Anuj is a bored middle aged executive and is living out his life-long fantasy of walking on the other side of the law... by recklessly carpooling of course.

Anurag said...

53 - 0 is not too bad for Rugby, I am sure. The scores are claculated by adding the factorials of number of goals scored, or some equally crazy concept!