Hi folks, back with another post. Do you believe in Karma? Especially bad Karma? In Hindu religion and other religions as well, there is a belief that the bad deeds you do today will come back to haunt you tomorrow. I am not very sure if this is true, however, sometimes when things don’t go as planned, I can’t help but wonder. As usual, I have an example from American Football. The New England Patriots won the football championship last year. But to get to the championship they “cheated”. American Football is played with a ball that is oblong in shape and made of pigskin. It is difficult to grip the ball, especially in bad weather like snow, rain etc. If it is cold, the ball becomes hard. The league specifies that the football should be inflated to a certain amount of pressure. But what New England did was that they deflated the ball. The result was that the ball was easier to grip. The semi-final game before the championship was played on a rainy day. One of the defenders on the opposing team, intercepted the ball thrown by New England. He noticed that the ball was soft and underinflated. He mentioned this to the referees, but no action was taken at the time. New England won the semi-final and then the final and became champions. In the off-season, there was an investigation. It was determined that the ball was deflated. However, the investigation did not yield any concrete evidence that New England knowingly deflated the ball. This year, New England went back to the semi-final and lost. It was a close game. The only difference was that the New England kicker, who is normally automatic in scoring points by kicking the ball, missed an extra point. The kicker had made 500 successful extra points before that fateful miss. But there were other things too. Their opponent, the Denver Broncos, had a relentless defense that disrupted their game plan. New England could not get into any sort of rhythm. There were some crucial penalties on Denver that were not called. I think Denver outplayed New England and dominated all aspects of the game. But I do wonder. Was it bad Karma or just a coincidence?

Unless you are on a tropical island where there are no cell phone, internet, cable TV or other media outlets (please tell me where this island is, I am jealous), you are probably aware of what is going on with the Oscars.

For those of you who don’t know, here is some background. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) presents awards for all aspects of motion pictures like acting, directing, editing etc. each winner is awarded a golden statue called the Oscar. The story is that a lady working at the company that was making the statue observed “Oh, this looks just like my uncle Oscar” and then the rest is history. This is the 88th year that the awards are being presented. But this year is particularly memorable because the nominees are all white (meaning they are Caucasian). African americans (black or people of color)  were not nominated in major categories. This has created an uproar among the black acting community. Many prominent black actors and actresses like Will Smith, Jada Pinkette-Smith, director, Spike Lee, former Oscar winner Lupita Nyongo have expressed their displeasure. Will and Jada have decided to boycott the ceremony all together and not even watch it. Will Smith went on ABC’s Good Morning America and complained that there is a systemic issue. Chris Rock, who will be hosting the show is black and he said that the Oscars are White BET awards (BET stands for Black Entertainment Television). The story was similar to last years awards. Last years host, Neil Patrick Harris also took a shot at the lack of diversity in the nomination by calling the ceremony the white Oscar ceremony. At the 74th awards, the best actor and actress winners were both black. I did not see white actors protesting. That year I also saw the movies that the best actor and actress winners were in. They both deserved to win Their performance by far was better than the other nominees in their categories.

Let us look at the facts. About 93% of the AMPAS members are white. About 77% are male. There are no black directors of the board. However, the president of AMPAS is African american. There are some sweeping changes coming to AMPAS. In the future we should see some diversity in the nominations.

Now I personally have not watched all the nominated films so I cannot comment on the acting skills of white or black actors and provide an opinion about whether they deserve to be nominated. But I feel that the Oscars are not a quota system where a certain number of people from each representative groups should be nominated. The nominations should be based on acting performance rather than the color of your skin or your ethnicity. If that is the case, then does a particular community (either black or white) be upset. What about ethnicity? Should Indian, Chinese or Japanese actors complain that they are not being represented? What about sexual preference? There is a huge movement going on in the Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) community. What about overweight people? Recently Sports Illustrated magazine featured a plus size model. Why only target the Oscars? For the longest time, People magazine has been choosing the world’s sexiest man alive. But for many years, their pool of contestants were North American and European celebrities. If they are truly choosing the sexiest man in the world, then shouldn’t they look at all men in the world before making their decision. Forget about all the men in the world, why only look at celebrities. I am sexy and I know it. Why not choose me? But jokes apart, I do feel that the Academy needs to reevaluate their nomination system. However, I do hope that they don’t do it as a knee jerk reaction. They have an opportunity to overhaul the make-up of the Academy. I hope they put some thought into it and make sure that their proposals also take into account all issues that I mentioned above. What they need is a long-term solution that will hopefully not offend any community.

Good morning everyone. I took a long break from writing. I was on vacation. So I would like to start off by wishing everyone a Happy New Year. I hope you have a prosperous new year.

The American football season is coming to an end. The playoffs started yesterday. Again, some of you who are not familiar with American football may not be able to understand some things, but none the less, the message is still the same.

Yesterday’s game was between the Seattle Seahawks and Minnesota Vikings. The Vikings had the home field advantage. Both teams had very good defense. The Vikings got the ball to start the game and so after half time, the Seahawks would be getting the ball. As I said, it was a defensive struggle and the only points were scored by the Vikings. Scoring involves getting the ball into the opponents end zone or past their goal line either by passing (throwing) the ball to one of your players or carrying the ball (rushing). This is called a touchdown. You get 6 points for scoring. Then you get an extra point if you kick the ball from about 25-30 yards, through the opponents goal post. The extra point is almost automatic, but kickers do miss sometimes. So you get 7 points. But if you fail to get into the end zone, you can kick the ball from wherever your team is and get a field goal. Usually, teams try a field goal if the distance is 60 yards or less. You get 3 points for a field goal.

At half time, Minnesota was leading 3-0. There was still a minute left in the first half and Minnesota had the ball. The Seahawks were supposed to get the ball after halftime. But instead of trying get a score, Minnesota elected to let the clock run. That was a very conservative approach. If I was the head coach, I would have tried to score something. Seattle is a good team and you cant let a good team stay in the game. You have to put them away by being aggressive. In the second half, Minnesota managed to get 2 more field goals and were leading 9-0. Seattle managed to get a field goal and the score was 9-3 in favor of Minnesota. But at about 1 min 45 seconds left in the game, Seattle scored a touchdown and went up  10-6. Minnesota got the ball and were very close to the Seattle end zone. But instead of trying to score a touchdown by passing the ball, Minnesota elected to be conservative and rush the ball. Unfortunately they could not score a touchdown. So they elected to get a field goal. They let the clock run down to about 25 seconds and then stopped it by calling a timeout. They were at the 27 yard line of Seattle. Minnesota sent their kicker out to get a field goal to win the game. This should have been automatic, but the kicker missed and Minnesota lost the game. 

So the moral of the story is that don’t be conservative. Offense is the best defense. Be aggressive. Go after things instead of trying to settle for something.