R-Rated

Notwithstanding the disastrous year that Team BCCI (aka Team India) has been having over the past 12 months, here is a recap of the glorious stream of events in 2011. http://rajkir.blogspot.com/2011/04/world-champions-once-again.html New blog to follow soon...

Destination: _ORLANDO, FL Targets: _UNIVERSAL STUDIOS, EPCOT, SEA WORLD, DOWNTOWN DISNEY, MAGIC KINGDOM Subjects: _R, K, Sa, Su Mission: _HAVE AN AWESOME TIME WHILE NOT MAXING OUT THE CREDIT CARD Yes, the goal was that simple and every detail was hashed out to perfection (K gets the credit here). We reached Orlando late night on Thursday with the expectation of a Magical ride for the next 4 days and we were not disappointed. In fact, we were thrilled at the prospect of spending the next few days away from the hassles of work and the not-so-cold winter of the Northeast and Midwest. Checked into Disney's Pop Century Resort, which was the cheapest of all the available resort options. While it certainly hurt the pockets (partial Mission failure #1 - there will be more), the amenities were sufficient for 4 adults. DAY 1: UNIVERSAL STUDIOS With great expectations, the 4 subjects reached the hyped Studio attraction. Great expectations stemming from the fact that R and Sa had already exper...

So last time around, I missed writing about a new thing that we did for the first time. We went to a stand-up comedy show at The Improv in Schaumburg. We went to Anthony Jeselnik's show (those who watched the Roast of Charlie Sheen on Comedy Central should know who he is) and it was amazing. Non-stop jokes with a dead pan expression kept the audience in splits throughout the show. He even picked on someone from the crowd and made us realize never to mess with a professional. The woman who got singled out surely learnt her lesson. One thing with these comedians is that no one and no event (however tragic) is off-limits. Case in point, a joke about Casey/Caylee Anthony. So to use the second of our 3 coupons, we watched another show, this time by Greg Behrendt. The profanity-laden show was just average, clearly not the bar set by Jeselnik. And we are still debating on whom to use the final tickets on. So this past week, we had a baby shower for V & S. S, mainly. The surprise party...

So after an unintentional sabbatical from blogging, today seems an appropriate time to reflect back on the second half of 2011 considering it's the NFL playoffs and there are no night games scheduled. Let's see, since the last post, the following happened, in no particular order. - Made a trip to the Northeast (Boston) and to the Northwest (Portland) in a span of 2 weeks for professional and personal reasons. - Moved from Vernon Hills to Prospect Heights, leaving behind a fully-furnished apartment to a clean-slate whiteboard (literally, the paint in this house is snow-white). - NFL season started and ended (September to January) and thus the exile from blogging. - Joined a Fantasy Football league and for a change, won the regular season and finished 3rd overall for a rookie season. - Gave in to a long-standing demand and got a good deal on ...wait for it....An Apple product. We are officially in the Apple cult. Proud owners of a 4th generation iPod Touch. Somewhere Steve Jobs i...

DISCLAIMER: The post is ridiculously long even for my standards, continue at your own discretion. Just kidding. Ahhhh - the joy of July!!! 4th of July weekend, a trip to NY/NJ to meet who else - you guessed it. S, S, Y and A {identities protected as these folks are VIPs and are in the witness protection program of a high profile case}. With that out of the way, K and I left town on Friday night in a highly tension-filled ride to Milwaukee with traffic problems ensuring that we almost missed our flight to LaGuardia. But, of course we made it to the airport on time (got to say, Kirti ran like a deer to the terminal) and we were on our way. Flew with Frontier for the first time and must say, in spite of staying true to the words "Discount Airline", the warm and delicious chocolate chip cookies was a welcome surprise. An hour's drive from LGA to Mahwah gave the 4 of us some much needed face time. It is always fun to meet Sam and Such and this time was no different. After a g...

With the summer - or sort of summer - kicking in, pollen season is in full bloom. And just like Phoolan Devi wrecking havoc in her heydays, Pollen Devi was leaving a trail of sneezers and wheezers on the war path. Your's truly truly had a disastrous few days beginning of June emptying boxes of tissues along the way and making Walgreens a tad bit happier with my spending on medications. I cannot remember the years prior to this whether my health was this bad, but I am thinking I am not immune to these allergies. Sundays have been particularly bad - for K - considering I have been bed-ridden almost 2 straight weekends - while she took on the regular Sunday-tasks upon herself. Poor soul :) But (hopefully) I have conquered the elements now. To celebrate that and the fact that the Taste of Chicago was happening this weekend, K and I decided to make a trip to the city to have some fun with cuisines from Chicago. After a round of samplers from various outlets, we took a lesson in making ...

Between India's World Cup victory and now, there have been quite a few significant "world" events - like the Royal Wedding and the death of OBL - but I just thought there is nothing new to share about these topics anyways. For one, I still hold a grudge against England for all those years of colonial rule and the bloodshed that resulted in splitting an undivided India. Secondly, writing about OBL was just too sensitive (even for my blog) but more importantly there was nothing that I could have written that would have been even remotely interesting. So finally, with the advent of summer, it was that time of the year when the sunrise feels just a little bit happier and the evenings a lot more longer - Memorial Day Weekend 2011. Just like last year, Kirti and I met with few of our closest friends from New Jersey (Sam and Such) and from Nebraska (Yogesh and Anuja). The planning for the trip began much earlier in late March when a casual conversation turned into where to do we...