Wine and Roses

The poet on my dining table .......

First: the dedications to the people
who make this individual's existence on the third rock from the sun
a tad interesting

Here's wishing Kaustabh: the poet the equanimity to deal with the things
he cannot change, the courage to change the things he can, and the common sense to know the difference.

To Allen the typewriter guerilla... the tripewriter gorilla: good health, good humour, and when he finally gets to kick the proverbial bucket after having lived riotously to the age of Methesoolah, may he spend half a year in heaven before the Devil gets to know he's dead
To my friends who were honoured by the Queen (not Freddy Mercury): OBE's no less!!! Shivanda Khan and Jenny Jha , one working from Lucknow, and the other from Ranchi, both places in Indyeah: may the fruits of your labour be as sweet as the grapes pressed in the vineyards of Sicily, and may you never be too diabetic to enjoy them

For Yams and Sainik, my inseparable siblings from a not so-long forgotten birth, this year should bring reunion, roses, fresh mountain beer and momos....

More power to all of you who strive hard to make this world a slightly more liveable place than it was yesterday: Sanat Sinha and his team working with street children and children on the wrong side of the law in Bihar and Jharkhand, The Catholic Sisiters working with the AIDS patients at Nazareth Hospital in Bihar, the pioneers: ARMAN, The Network of Male Sex Workers, the prople at Humsafar Trust, Lakshya in Gujarat, and my coleagues and friends on the AASRa anmd BiHan teams working in Bihar

And for all of you guys and girls who take time out to prowl around and read these pages
happy blogging and hogging for the new-tear oops I mean NEW YEAR....