Australian Open - New year started lucky

New year started lucky for me. When i received a mail from Tania throwing open 6 corporate gold tickets i had no idea i will win one. all one had to do was open up a spreadsheet filled with figures of my client's performance and zoom in on the required figure and click the appropriate voting button in the mail. so i did, least expecting i will be a winner. after all it was a question to be answered easily. but i got lucky and got the tickets for 15th of jan 2008.

i was thinking of buying tickets and watching the game anyways. but i guess i can put the dollars for better use now ;). the ticket not only offered one of the best seats at center court (rod laver arena) but also free dinner at skyline dining room and free booze.

Few mails on getting there and also a mail on the dress code (damn you executives) were exchanged before we got there. Angela was kind enough to give me a lift to the court. but the two other men who had won the tickets had other plans. so it was going to be me and five other gorgeous ladies ( gorgeous..hmmm.. more by attitude than looks..)

When i entered the dining room with angela and julie we found tania, jad and paula already seated and sipping on red wine. i was more used to beer than wine and so ordered hieneken. after chatting with the ladies for more than 2 hours at the table ( i am more mature now :) ) and gulping in two beers ( wanted to go for more ) we left for the arena.

the first match was between venus williams and.. i didnt even bother to know the other player's name. the game was already in progress and venus won the game in straight sets. but i was more excited about the second match more than the first. Men would watch women's tennis for a reason (..you know what..) more than the game itself.

and so i was ready with the camera and there came roger federer.. man who has won 13 grand slams, 3 short of setting a world record. the court filled with applause and it was really exciting to watch him play live and real. he won the game in straight sets without even sweating much.

it was nice to see the blue plexicushioned surface and having watched two great players games i felt more than satisfied and felt good as i had missed to visit wimbledon when i was at london before.

calling it a night to cherish for more than one reason i walked back to my apartment and bragged a little to my friends who by then had bet 160 dollars on india losing the third test match versus australia. they wanted to be happy at the end of test match. if india won they will be happy for an occurence which is rare to witness. if they lost they will be happy for the money they will make. if they drew the test..well then its money gone for toss.

you can click through the snaps below. enjoy!!

Australian Open

Bill Gates retiring!!!

so the day has come. Microsoft co founder and one of the worlds former most richest man is retiring. in his last keynote at CES (consumer electronics show) he announced that it would be his last address.

throughout the world people have had a love hate relationship with him. guess his riches bought him more enemies than friends. no matter how buggy vista be or how many times apple claims vista to be a copy cat of OS X, bill gates in steve jobs own words was the first to make an industry out of software. Bill even wrote software for one of the versions of Mac in its initial days.

also at his last keynote he launched a video on what his last day would be like. it is really hilarious and features many great stars from hollywood and many politicians of america. Hats off to a great man and hopefully microsoft continues and improves in doing a great job.



you can also view slightly lengthier and better quality version of the video here as well.
http://www.istartedsomething.com/20080107/bill-gates-last-day-microsoft-video/.

So long Bill.

Australian cricket team equaled the world record??

Australia equaled 16th consecutive test match wins set by Steve waugh's team today. They defeated india in the second test match in the bordar-gavaskar trophy. But their win was not convincing and raised a lot of questions in my mind on the ethical behavior of the australian players.

Rahul dravid and Ganguly's wicket were clearly not out and the entire test match was a scene of foolish decisions made by the umpires which played significant role in their win. How much ever stressed or difficult it may be for the umpires to make decisions on the field they always have the choice of referring to the third umpire. But they continued to raise their fingers towards the sky again and again when not required.

I believe that the ICC should start thinking of imposing regulations on successive bad decisions of the umpires. I would also suggest giving limited chances of power to the players to bring in the third umpire and question the field umpires decisions, just the way it is in tennis.

By the replays it was also obvious that adam gilchrist and mathew clarke clearly had seen that they did not have wickets. but guess they were overcome by the greed to continue their winning streak and create a world record entering their names in the history books.

Like many games, cricket is also not a fool proof game but with so much of money being invested in the game and so much of high profile coverages being made guess the rules of the game has to be amended to make use of the technology used in the coverage. it will then be only the quality of the teams that will drive the outcome of the match and not bad decisions of umpires.

some articles which reveal the details more clearly
http://content-aus.cricinfo.com/ausvind/content/current/story/329392.html
and more
http://content-aus.cricinfo.com/ausvind/content/current/story/329405.html