Ah...Finally...

Run and hide, America. Run and Hide. The Idiots are coming, the Idiots are coming....

Yes folks, the idiots won the Major League Baseball championship today (October 27, 2004) sweeping their opponents (the bumbling St. Louis Cardinals) away in impressive fashion.

These idiots were a fitting bunch. They had to be, in their refusal to subscribe to the pathetic excuse theory called the Curse of the Bambino - a rather disingenous creation of a sports writer to explain what in effect was the sheer failure of professional ball players to play at their best ability.

Pretty interesting that they exorcised the curse on the night of a total lunar eclipse - symbolically enough, the lunar eclipse represents the serpents of the night sky "eating" up the moon (aint that a bogus story?)

Honestly no surprise that the Sox won - they had the best team chemistry of the eight teams that made it to the baseball postseason. Indeed, it was surprising that they even went down 0-3 to the Yankees, them with their god-forsaken starting pitching. But then, with the clarity of hindsight, I can now proclaim that it was all part of a grander scheme of things to get the Sox faithful to start believing in the can-do nature of this team, and to start thinking rationally and logically (I mean, come on, it is hard for Sox fans to be rational about anything, obviously, ever since they started believing in curses).

Effectively though, thank goodness the Sox won cuz now we do not have to hear that pathetic excuse for mismanagement and terrible play. How many times have the Red Sox even been good enough to play for the title since 1918? Four times. And they failed all four times, twice on fielding errors and twice on not-so-good pitching as compared to their opponents. And oh, facing failure four times and not bouncing back to thumb nose at it indicates not a curse, but a pathological affliction for failure.

Now, we will have to just put up with the pathetic excuses of one team - those erstwhile loveable losers from Chicago, the Cubs. In the meanwhile, my love for the team that I started to follow in 2002 has been cemented - my loyalties are now officially divided between the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Boston Red Sox, unless of course when they (eventually, I hope) meet in a championship game, at which point I will simply root for the National League team.

In the meanwhile, at the risk of committing blasphemy, here is a take with which I sorta kinda agree.

Lessons to be learnt from the Red Sox' improbable 11 day run to championship glory? It aint over until it is over. Something that A-Fraud and the Yankees have learnt the tough way. To rehash a cliche, when the going gets tough, the tough get going, and the rest just get ground to the earth.

Its a snake..no no..its a fish...no no it's a..its an..

...Octopus..a Mimic Octopus.

Now, for all fans of the underwater animals it is a well known fact that Octopus are intelligent sea-faring creatures with remarkable ability to adapt to their surroundings, at literally a blink of the eye.

These intelligent invertebrates with the special skin pigmenting cells (chromatophores), can blink their cells into different colors to adjust to their surroundings. They also exhibit remarkable problem solving ability, especially through the process of trial and error. This author has seen a controlled laboratory experiment where an octopus just brought in from the sea was put into a tank with a corked bottle containing food. For a while the octopus tried doing everything to get into the bottle, and then remarkably enough uncorked the bottle to get at the food!

For all the remarkable nature of their intelligence, this Mimic Octopus is just a tad too much. I mean come on, being able to play a game of charades? Aint that amazing?

This Mimic Octopus, not discovered until 1998 or 2001 (pick your take, I have read about their discovery during either of the two years, were found off the delta areas of the Indonesian islands and South East Asia. And amazingly enough, in lieu of its rather recent discovery, in the Latin name world of "proper" speciology, the Mimic Octopus does not have a name.
Apparently the reason for this rather late discovery of a rather remarkable ocean species is put down to the fact that they inhibit what is considered a rather bland piece of ocean topography, something that is not as colorful or with the variety and splendor of a coral reef.

While mimickry is often part of natural adaptation of many species for sheer survival purposes, this is the first time that the scientific world has had a chance ot observe a species mimicking more than one species - in the case of the Mimic Octopus it has been observed to mimic atleast three and maybe more species.

Sole Fish or Flatfish(mimicked by aligning its arms in a flat oval and swimming close to the sea floor), Sea Snake (by sticking 6 tentacles together with body and undulating the remaining two to mimic the balck and white striped sea snake) and Lion Fish (by holding tentacles out in a "burst of sunlight" like spines of the poisonous lion fish) were the routine victims of this tricky charading octopus. See here, here and here for visuals of this amazing creature.

One thing is for certain - if this creature is able to imitate a bunch of species, it did pick it up as an evolutionary upgrade in terms of its ability to protect itself from the environment. And it is just as highly likely that the three species of sea creatures that the Mimic Octopus has been observed to imitate, are part of a larger range of creatures that the Mimic can imitate.

Personally I have been impressed over the years by the various social and survival skills seen in various animals - both land and sea-borne. But aside of the family tendencies of a herd of elephants, this is the only other animal that has impressed me so. So much so, I have my MSN sign-on name is Mimic Octopus in honor of this tricky creature, which seemingly has the ability to take a disguise at the drop of a hat, and in response to the situation at hand.

Mesmerizing Organized Chaos...why Mumbai can be exasperating and exhilirating all at once

MSNBC - Mesmerizing Mumbai and the Big Bazaar

To people that have gotten stuck in Mumbai at the wrong end of the stick (the riots of Jan 1993 or the serial blasts in mid 1993) I feel sorry your experience of this vibrant city is limited to something that you would never want to wish on your worst enemy.

But Mumbai represents everything that is India, and then some. Organized chaos in what is arguably the world's largest slum can be depressing. But just don't tell the proud Mumbaikars that, as they go about their business in what is IMHO the world's most throbbing city. Sorry New York, sorry Paris, sorry Rome and sorry London, but you are all the glitz of the high and mighty and rich. This is sheer citizenry at its varied and earthy non-sophisticate best.

Beat that if you can!

The New Yorker: Fact

The New Yorker: Fact

What Kerry doesn’t say—and cannot say—is that when it comes to real threats, like North Korea and Iran, Bush’s fixation with Iraq may already have made it too late for any American President to find a peaceful solution..

Fixation..just like a stubborn 5 year old who is fixated on a candy in a candy store and would go to any lengths, throw any and every tantrum in the book and call others names. Fixation...that should be treated with a good dose of spanking, just like you would do to your disobedient kid.

Come on America, you are better than this. You deserve better than this. You dont need a whimpering crybaby up at the White House. Vote Bush out!