Excursions

Apple also wants to serve exclusive podcasts now. This recent craze of everyone coming up with their own exclusive content - movies, shows and podcasts now - is really nonsensical to me. Netflix and Amazon started it with their original content and, although arguable, achieved some moderate success.

However, we are already seeing trends - if Netflix’s recent quarter’s earnings are any indication - of people losing interest. One reason I believe (and suffer from) is the sheer quantity of the content available to be consumed. After all, there is only so much time a person can spend glued to their screens- in addition to the time he already spends scrolling through the unlimited stream of bite sized posts.

As I had argued earlier, podcast is not a light medium for consumption. It is not music. It is not audiobooks. It is a medium known for culturing the relationship with the listeners over years. Listeners choose whom they form that relationship with by subscribing to a podcast.

And they are already weighed down by the choices they have to make.

Do people use cases or covers for their smartphones? I am always split — keep the perfect weight and feel of the device or keep it safe (or at least convince oneself that it is). And then there is that decision of military grade or thin or ultra thin cases even if if want one. I can never make my mind what exactly what I want.

My old SE could bear the military grade protection. The larger devices just can’t — they become too bulky. Super ironic.

We had a nice little family dinner at a cozy, laid-back barbeque restaurant. It was evening full of delectable food, soothing music and lots of laughter & chatter. Plus some learning 😬

So I finally jumped the ship - upgraded to iPhone XR from SE. As much as I liked the smallwe form factor, it was always tempting to use and find comfort with the larger screens of all the available screens around. And just a couple of hours in, I see why these are preferred 🧐

The ICC World Cup deserved a better end than what played out on Sunday between England and New Zealand. All the debates and controversies around the match marred what was a very well fought match. It soured what England achieved and left New Zealand with lots of ifs-and-buts 🏏

So India lost to New Zealand in Semi-Final of the ICC world cup 2019. I have some thoughts.

1. It’s heartbreaking as hell. Almost at a level of 2003 Final defeat to Australia.
2. Fact that India lost doesn’t make it a bad team. They had a couple of shortcomings — all surfaced together at the most inopportune phase of the tournament.
3. India had a light middle order, fear was top order failure would be challenging for them to handle — exactly what happened.
4. You can’t call yourself the champions as long as you keep depending solely on your top 3 and bottom 3 players for majority of the matches. It was always risky going in. There are no bowlers who can bat or batsman who can ball. Something that 1983 and 2011 WC winning Indian cricket teams have in common.
5. Players like Sachin and Sehwag and Yuvraj and Raina who could always spring a surprise and give you a wicket - in addition to the runs they score - were dearly missed.
6. Specifically this match was a series of wrong choices - review lost unnecessarily on the first ball. Tweaking of the settled bowling unit, and also the team towards the later part of the tournament. Dhoni’s batting position, especially after early wickets - he had to have walked in at 5/3.

Anyway, all said and done, India remain a very good cricket team. They need to work on the middle order - identify those players who bring in a secondary skill. They haven’t lost any respect — it’s a sport afterall. For someone to win, someone’s to lose.

This ICC Cricket World Cup is of One Day International (ODI) cricket — one day. Deciding finalist via a two-day match just doesn’t make sense - plus it isn’t fair to either side. But then it is the price to pay for scheduling one in England 🙄🏏

Came across this essay on how it is never too late to be successful and, hence, happy. It made me wonder what exactly is the relation between success and happiness? What leads to what? I continue to believe success is subjective, happiness, the state of mind.

It’s good to be back to a healthy lifestyle. For past few months, my routine had been completely screwed, plus I had a mind full of stuff. Eventually, it was the health that got neglected. No control on what I eat, minimum exercise. That does not bode well for one’s spirit.

If you have watched or are watching the Chernobyl series, you just can’t miss the companion podcast where the creators talk about the show. It is absolutely fantastic - thanks @Bruce and @vasta for recommending it. Makes me wish every show out there had such a podcast.