The Run

AA

Well, haters, I did it. And by "haters" I mean at least 98% of you punks. I ran the fourth annual Soldier Field 10 Mile run, which means that all 175 muscular pounds of me [cough, cough] and my poor lil feet ran a complete 52,800 feet last Saturday morning at 7:30 am (mashaAllah).

How it started...

A couple months ago or so, Taha had forwarded me a link (www.soldierfield10.com) that called for people to participate in a ten mile run in honor of our veterans of These United States of America. Within five minutes of receiving the link, I had signed up for the 10 mile run. I was totally mesmerized and motivated to sign up because of the opportunity and dream to finish on the 50 yard line of the historic and beautiful Soldier Field where all the Bears Greats have played, so I really didn't know what I was getting myself into. All I knew was that I was going to be in the "presence of" legends like Butkus, Ditka, Halas, Luckman, Sweetness, Sayers, Singletary, Hampton, Urlacher. The list goes on, mashaAllah and inshaAllah.

So, after signing up, I was pretty excited and told everyone I knew that I had signed up for a 10 mile run. People were impressed. "Wow, Imran! That's awesome!" It felt great hearing that. Before I had even begun thinking about my training program, I was already receiving accolades of my coolness and sheer bravery. After telling people about the run for a good week or so and finally getting over the hype of me doing something like this, I finally decided to actually train.

And train I did. The feeling was phenomenal. I was getting back into shape! This was going to be the spark in my life to send me back to sophomore year of DePaul - the peak and glory of my physical self. The days where running at least 5 miles/day were all part of the daily SOPs(standard operating procedures). I was on Cloud 9 and felt like screaming in the gym, "I BELIEVE I CAN FLYYY! I BELIEVE I CAN TOUCH THE SKYYY! I THINK ABOUT IT EVERY NIGHT AND DAY, SPREAD MY WINGS AND FLY AWAY............YOU REMIND ME OF MY JEEP! I WANNA RIDE IT!............CAN WE GO HALF ON A BABY............I DON'T SEE NOTHIN' WRONG WITH A LIL BUMP AND GRIND............"

(Okay, apologies, people. Once I get started on R. Kelly, it's hard for me stop...)

So, my first week of running was intense albeit challenging. My second week of running, however, was much easier and that's namely because I didn't do much running. You see, for a good solid week I ran. And then I stopped for a few days. And then I ran for a couple more days. And then I stopped again. I started to find out that the new Modern Day Imran was at odds with returning to Sophomore Year Imran (indulge me here for a few, will ya?). It was like I was Anaikan Skywalker struggling between the Dark Side (= Modern Day Imran) and the Jedi way of life (= Soph Yr Imran). The eternal battle of good versus evil; zabiha versus non-zabiha; marrying a hijabi versus marrying a non-hijabi waged inside of me. It erupted like Mount Vesuvius did on Pompeii. Like Urlacher fighting his own shadow. Like Umar overcoming his nerdiness. Like Ali fighting his fob-like tendencies. This, folks, was serious and emotionally draining on me.

At this point, enter Devon Avenue and dinner with friends at Khan BBQ. As always, I became the center of attention. No, not because everyone loves me, but because everyone loves making me the butt of all jokes. It's a crown I wear proudly much like Miss Japan wearing the Miss Universe crown. Sigh. She hot...

Anyways...

So naturally my boys ask me about my training progress. I conceal the truth of my inner jihad and tell them that it's going okay, but that I should probably step it up because at that point in time I had just over a month left for training and the most I ran was 3 miles. They then proceeded to make fun of me for having dinner instead of working out. This then was followed-up with jeering remarks like, "You've only done one 3 mile run so far?! You're screwed!" And so the "LOLs" soon followed. After they estimated what my mile time was averaging, they all started to burst out in tears laughing at this bechara masoom bacha.

Chief among the crowd was Sami Haque laughing along. But after a while, he sensed that despite me laughing all the jokes off, I was growing insecure on the inside. Holy fricken crap, I thought to myself. What if these mofos are right? What if I can't do this? I can't bring myself to run 10 miles with relative ease in less than a month! So, using his Spidey senses, Sami stepped up to bat for me. "No, guys. My man Pac can do this."

The crowd (or mob, rather) fell silent.

"Yeah, Pac can totally do this. You'll see. He's going to step up his training, lose weight, and then he's going to post pictures of himself on Facebook and girls are going to look at his profile pic and be like, 'What! What!' And then some hot desi chick will write him emails that are 3 pages long and love his blog. All because of this run."

Never more did I ever respect and admire a man for doing what any good person (you hear that, Hassan, Taha, and Sayeed?!) would do: defend their brother.

The silence was deafening. But Sayeed was not going to let me have this moment. For it would not be Sayeed if he did not let me have JUST ONE FRICKING HAPPY MOMENT in my life (sorry, had to get that off my chest...). Sayeed looks over to me in a very suspect way and asks, "Okay, so how much time do you have considering you're running at this point practically a 15 min mile average?"

I answered, "About 3 hours."

The giggling that ensued once again busted out in uncontrollable laughter. Hassan was hysterical and got up out of his chair to bring re-focus himself. I smiled and laughed, but my eyes looked over to the only person I cared about at that moment: Sami. He would support me. He wouldn't let these laughing hyneas feed on me anymore. I look over. Our eyes connected. Sami's lips move...his mouth opens...he pauses...looks at everyone...looks back at me...and then he closes his mouth and begins slowly shaking his head. His eyes said everything. Pac, I tried, man, I tried. But you're just too damn fat to do this in that time. I can't help you...

I was disheveled. Distraught. Disgruntled. Disappointed. Dissed.

But I continued laughing and was still defiant. "I can do this, punks!"

One of the guys then suggests that we place some sort of bet on this. Enter Taha (and his nose).

"Dude, we need to think of something. Alright, we're here at Devon and we somehow gotta include it in the bet..."

"I got it," T says enthusiastically. "Since you're so confident that you'll do this, if you don't, you have to walk up and down Devon...without a shirt."

"Ooooooh!" "Daaaaang!!" "LOL!" came the chorus.

"Done and done. But the same has to apply to you. When I finish, YOU will have to walk up and down Devon without a shirt." Taha, after putting this back on him, hesitated. But, with all the pressure on him, he agreed and we shook on it...

At this point, I can easily conclude this epic story by saying, "And the rest, as they say, is history." But...hold on...

I continued training the next two weeks intensely. I even mustered up a 5 mile practice run. I would bring that up the next week to 7, then 8. If I couldn't get to 10, I'd be satisfied with consistent training and running up to 7 or 8 miles. Unfortunately, Modern Day Imran kidnapped Soph Yr Imran and the last two weeks prior to the run was basically lost. Maybe a day of training here and there, but nothing remarkable. I was going to enter the race without proper training and having run half the distance I was expected to...

to be continued

Everything I Learned, I Learned from He-Man...

Hi

By the Power of Gray Skull, I kid you not! Here's proof positive:



I mean, cartoons these days - heck, TV shows in general - don't teach you meaningful messages the way He-Man did. Not only did you want to strap on some leather underwear after watching He-Man (umm...right?) and fight off the evil forces of Skeletor (Skeletor's laugh reminds me of Hassan's, by the way), but you could apply the lessons learned from He-Man to your own life! And it was spelled out for you at the end of the show for the sake of viewers like my brothers who may not have connected to Adam/He-Man the way I did.

Anyway, this blog entry is also a semi-tribute to Umar's latest blog entry (he's back, we think): http://ushakur.blogspot.com/2007/05/forgotten-shows.html

LONG LIVE HE-MAN AND THE MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE!!!

WTF Cubbies?!

Hi

Man, this is utterly DEPRESSING! I'm so frustrated and straight up depressed with the Cubs. WTF ARE THEY DOING?!

Today's dugout fiasco between Zambrano and Barrett pushes me to the brink of wanting to flirt with Sox fandom. Sure, I've done that a little bit in the past, but to the core I honestly love the Cubs. Wrigley. The team. The hot blonde chicks at Wrigley. I mean, the Cubs are a big part of Chicago.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, here's a link from ESPN that also has a video clip:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/recap?gameId=270601116

Basically, the frustrations of the game due to stupid playing errors got the better of Carlos Zambrano and Michael Barrett in the dugout. They got into a shouting match which was quickly followed by pushing and shoving. Utter gayness.

Our skipper, Piniella, sent them to the showers and told them to go home. Supposedly the situation continued when they went in with both of them trying to start up more drama in the clubhouse. That's pathetic! You may not like each other, but fricking play and tolerate each other to some degree, "professionals!!" (Thnik Kobe and Shaq!)

Barrett's lip was busted up and he was sent to the hospital apparently. I mean, how great is that?! WHAT ELSE DO WE NEED TO DO TO MAKE THIS SEASON WORSE?!?!

At times I find myself mad at Piniella. I was expecting big things from him. But now I don't know if I can blame him completely. I mean, how many more changes in the line-up does the guy have to do! So, I support him when he said in today's post-game interview:
" 'I only have so many players that I can play. You know?' manager Lou Piniella said during a postgame media session with reporters that escalated into shouting. 'And it's about time some of them start playing like major leaguers! Or, get somebody else in here that can catch the damn ball or run the bases properly! All right? That's all I can say!' "

Poor guy. I don't know what to say.

What's kinda sad and a bit humorous is that the Cubs can still turn this around and take the NL Central because all the other teams (including STL Cards) SUCK!

One can only sit back and watch and hope that the Cubs somehow use this as a catalyst to turn it on (inshaAllah).

bye

An Ode to Z (kinda. ok, not really)

Hi

Just wanted to give a holler out to Zareen (aka "Zareeny" by some lonely people):

Happy Birthday!

I can't forget this day ever because it also happens to be the same birthday as my wife's, Samar (aka Z's twin sister). This is also the same day I asked Samar to marry me (via Facebook) without her knowing who I am and coincidentally the same day Samar said "Yes" strictly based on my blogging styles and charming ways.

So, Z, today we commemorate you...the sister of my wife. Happy Birthday.

Now that you're 38 or whatever, I really hope inshaAllah that you find your Prince Charming. As long as your Prince Charming doesn't refer to himself as a Prince, then you should be set. I mean, LOL, who the hell actually refers to themself as "Prince?" Haha! Hell, even the artist Prince changed his name to "The Artist Formerly Known as Prince" because he, of all people, realized how dumb it was.

Sorry for the "random" tangent. I will iA try my best to hook you up within the next few months. Money back guarantee...

;)

Raja: Not Living Up to His Last Name

Hi,

This morning I opened my email and was delighted to see a rare email from my fellow Punjabi puthr, Faisal. The subject of the email was "Birds," so right away it caught my attention because I figured that it had to do something with girls and for some reason he decided to go with a more British flavor slang than his usual inner city thug life slang. Instinctively, I opened the email right away in hopes that he had attached pictures of hot desi girls that wanted to marry me. And that's not something to be unexpected with a guy like Raja. I mean, you all know him. He's this city-living desi Punjabi thug that is twice the size of me but all muscle. He's the type of guy that would rather run from the law than give a guy a hug. He also has a smoothed out shaved head (well, more like a ghetto fabulous buzz cut). That's the Raja we know and love.

But today, I can say that I don't know my man Raja anymore. Without further delay, let's get into the email we (he sent it to me, T, AH, Lord V, and Beast) received this morning:

"So for the past few weeks everytime we go up the stairs at home...some birds jump out of th bushes and fly off...so it was weird cuz they were never there before. Well my mom took a peek into the bushes and noticed a nest...with 4 BLUe eggs. I see this robin in the nest all the time...she is not scared of us anymore..she just looks at us...but before she would run...well sunday we woke up..and noticed teh eggs have hatched. pics are attached...birds are soooo small. yesterday i was lookin at them..and they all had their mouths wide open like they were trying to scream...but since they are babies no sound.

crazy thing is...2 weeks ago landscapers came out to tear out front and back yard including all trees/bushes..but they canceled cuz it was raining..if they did then that tree/bush would be gone and that bird would have never layed her eggs..crazy.

nature is just amazing...i'm sounding gayer and gayer...sorry

call me the BirdMan."

This kind of tragic email was immediately followed by another one that reads as follows:
"Birds at 5 days old...pics attached..They grew so big so quick...mother wasn't there...probably out trying to findfood....I moved one branch to get a better look and they woke up...and started opening their mouths thinking mom was back to feed them"

WTF? Where do I begin on this one? I'd like to think that with the Bulls loss, Raja has gone into some form of depression where it's manifested by his true inner gayness with all friends. I can accept that because losing can make you do or say the stupidest things. But, I'm inclined not to give him that one.

I guess I shouldn't make fun of the guy for expressing his appreciation of nature, right? And especially with his loving and poetical words like, "she is not scared of us anymore..she just looks at us...but before she would run..." Vah! Kya shiari! Now if that's not a haiku, I don't know what is, folks.

Raja, the thing is, it's not bad to express your fondness of nature, but you have to do it differently when you send an email out to five of your male friends. Tell us something about tigers. Those are fierce, manly creatures. Tell us how you saw a documentary where a tiger attacked an entire herd of elephants and roared like you do before eating spicy gyros pizza. Or how two lions fought each other in a bloody battle to win over a tigress and claim its territory. At least the five of us could relate to and appreciate that. We would've responded with, "Hell yeah!! Tigers rock!! Faisal, you ARE a tiger! You are the Raja of Tigers!! Long Live Raja! The Raja of All Things Manly!!" But instead, you emailed us about how some cute little baby birdies needed their mommy. What went wrong, Raja?

Are you trying to impress us in a totally deranged manner? Like, do you think that we'll somehow reply back with, "Oh, Faisal! You're soooo cute! Hehe. Your love of nature shows how much of a caring guy you really are. You're so sensitive and have a very pleasant demeanor." I mean, I'm genuinely at a loss here!

Ok, look...tell me that you at least accidentally sent that message to us. That instead it was supposed to go to one of your cousins in Pakistan you're hollering at where you know that they'll say something like, "You're so sweet. I love you." Just tell me that was the case, my fallen brother. Because other than doing ridiculous things out of depression of a Bulls loss, I can at the very least come to terms with a guy saying horrifically uber-sensitive things to a girl to show some sort of compassion you may have despite your rough exterior. Okay? Just tell me that was the f-ing case!! Don't make us question your manhood all together.

Quick question for you, Raja: When the mouts of those birds opened thinking that you were their mommy, did you quickly dig up a worm, put it in your mouth, and feed them?

Ever so eagerly, I am now anticipating another email with the following subject line: "The Birds: Today, They Called me Mommy! Yay!"

Cheers

Mothers

AA,

A brief article written by esteemed Shaykh Gibril Haddad on the importance and rank of our mothers. InshaAllah, we are all able to understand our mothers' worth and implement an unconditional love for them that may at times be blinded by our own nafs. May Allah bless us with success. Ameen.

Motherhood and the Ideal of Filial Piety
by GF Haddad

"Who deserves my love and care most in the world?" A man asked the Prophet Muhammad, upon him blessings and peace. "Your mother," the Prophet replied on the spot. "And who else?" "Your mother," the Prophet repeated. "And then who?" insisted the man. "Your mother," the Prophet said a third time. "And then??" "Then your father." Al-Bukhari and Muslim narrated it.

The Quran in several places commands filial piety but its focus is on the mother: "We have enjoined goodness upon man concerning his parents. His mother bears him in weakness upon weakness ..." (Surah Luqman, verse 14), "We have commended unto man kindness toward parents. His mother bears him with reluctance ..." (Surah al-Ahqaf, 46). The Quranic archetype of the pious son has no father but only a most distinguished mother the Prophet 'Isa (Jesus), upon him peace, who describes himself as "dutiful toward her who bore me and not arrogant, unblessed" (Surah Maryam, verse 32).

It is in light of the above emphases in the Quran and hadith that we better understand the generic "parents" in other verses, such as "Worship none save Allah, and be good to parents" (Surah al-Baqarah 83) – the first two Commandments of the Decalogue, also common to Christians and Jews – and that we can say Islam, second to its theocentrism, is matricentric as well.

In the hadith, the archetype of the pious son is the Yemeni herdsman Uways al-Qarani, who sought permission from his mother before visiting Madinah to see the Prophet Muhammad, only to find the latter away on a trip, whereupon Uways, broken-hearted but bound to filial duty with hoops of steel, returned without further delay to Yemen and resumed caring for his mother. Later, the Prophet told his Companions of Uways' superlative rank among the Just and told them he would be a major intercessor on the Day of Judgment. Indeed, filial piety comes before even Jihad in importance, as shown in the many hadiths translated and listed by Aliah Schleifer in her 1986 book _Motherhood in Islam_.

The Prophet himself never got to enjoy the company of his parents, having lost his father just before birth and his mother a few months after. One of the most touching scenes of the Sira or Prophetic Biography shows him standing wordless at her grave, weeping profusely, surrounded by a large group of hushed riding-companions, all of them weeping at his sight.

Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi – the most un-Taliban Afghan imaginable – coined the rich conceit of worldly loss and change as the pains of mutually unaware, multiple motherhoods in all things created: "Everything in this world is a mother, each unaware of the birthpangs of the other." It is a measure of the Prophet's consciousness that when he saw by the wayside, in one of his military campaigns, a mother of pups with its new litter, he stopped and posted a guard by its side to make sure none of the troops marching in his wake harmed it. I have no knowledge of any other civilisation in which its key figure stops his marching army and reassigns troops to ensure a dog is protected from harm.

Another time, pointing to a woman cradling her child near a bonfire, the Prophet told his Companions: "Can any of you imagine this woman throwing her baby into this fire? Yet your Creator has more mercy and compassion for His creatures." Compare these two paradigms to the fascist Spartan and bloodthirsty Easterners of yesterday and today; then wonder how far we Muslims and the rest of the world still have to go to absorb the motherly model of the Prophet, who possessed the most virile soul of any who ever walked the earth.

On the contrary, we seem to be going the other way fast. From the Subcontinent to Iran and the Arab world, the matrix of reverence, gentleness, good humour, balance, patient wisdom, and basic human justice with which the Prophet had single-handedly superseded brute patriarchy, has just about disappeared. Worse yet, these regions now witness a descent into sexist violence of such unprecedented repugnance as even the pre-Islamic pagans – make that the Cro-Magnons – would find blood-curdling. Goya's horrific _Saturn devouring his sons_ has become true of our brethren devouring our mothers and sisters. How "arrogant, unblessed"!

Yet a more memorable passage of the Mathnavi is Rumi's quip about the mother: "What did you call her? Your sweetheart? She is a creator! Almost uncreated!" Cambridge's imam and one of the foremost living writers on Islam in English, Abdul Hakim Murad (Timothy J Winter), began his essay on feminism, "Islam, Irigaray, and the Retrieval of Gender" with the line "Can men any longer write about women?" But he epigraphed it with Rumi's verses:

"The Prophet said that women totally dominate men of intellect and possessors of hearts.

"But ignorant men dominate women, for they are shackled by an animal ferocity.

"They have no kindness, gentleness or love, since animality dominates their nature.

"Love and kindness are human attributes; anger and sensuality belong to the animals.

"She is the radiance of God, she is not 'your beloved'. She is a creator - you could say that she is not created."

Another Persian poet, Iradj Mirza (d 1926) wrote this moving poetic verse about his mother: "Staying awake, she taught me even how to sleep."

So the mother is at the heart of Islam on several levels: literally and legally, but also poetically and mystically as a reminder of Allah Most High.

She is also there historically and symbolically in the persons of the Prophet's wives, as the Quran says: "The Prophet is closer to the believers than their selves, and his wives are as their mothers" (Surah al-Ahzab 6).

Of all the Mothers of the Believers, it is Lady Khadija, the Prophet's first wife and 15 years his senior, whom he loved and revered the most, and who gave him several daughters, among them Lady Fatimah al-Zahra, the *woman* through whom his noble bloodline survives from East to West to this day.

All of our mothers, and Fatimah with them, were scholars or craftswomen or merchants as well. The early Muslims describe Lady Ayesha in glowing terms as the most knowledgeable woman in the history of mankind and this is true, because she was not only the longest (with Sawdah) but also the youngest and most intellectually gifted spouse of the Prophet during his post-Prophethood years.

Etymologically also, the mother is central to Islam in many important ways. The Arabic word for mother, *umm*, is the root of the Prophetic attribute of *ummi*, all-too-hastily translated "unlettered"; it is also at the root of the substantive which denotes Muslimdom through the ages, *ummah* – a word also used for religion and, indeed, any living community including birds and bees. It is also homonymic with *amma*, "to guide and lead", from which comes the word imam.

Annemarie Schimmel in her 1995 book _Meine Seele ist eine Frau_ (My Soul is a Woman) cites Rumi's representation of the mother of the Prophet Musa (Moses), raised in Pharaoh's pagan court far from the Temple, as the archetype of human perfection giving birth to the Man of God, not unlike Meister Eckhart's quasi-Islamic (but, to Christians, unorthodox) interpretation of the conception of the fatherless but Synagogue-imbued Christ in Mary.

However, it is the Prophet Muhammad, upon him and all the Prophets peace, who is the jewel in the crown of such filial God-dependency, being the most completely deprived of the two normal means of human upbringing – parents and schooling.

An unschooled orphan, the Prophet was raised by God Himself. Like a baby latching on to none other than his mother who is his whole world, ummi stands for Muhammad's utter dependency on Allah as an incarnate proof of his God-given Prophethood. The Ummah's own relationship to its Prophet is in every way identical. So is, at a third remote, the congregation's relationship to its imam: "Al-Shafi'i is like the sun giving light and warmth to the people," Ahmad ibn Hanbal would say. "Our teachers are our spiritual parents, they give us birth in the hereafter," wrote al-Nawawi. So we can say, in Rumiesque fashion, that our Prophet is our mother, our religion is our mother, our community is our mother, and our teachers are our mothers.

As you treat your parents, so do expect to be treated in your old age. Each knows exactly how they would like their own children to treat them when they become old. This is why any time is good to pause and ponder not how to repay our mothers and fathers, for that would be impossible, but how to meet at least some of our obligations toward them. Perhaps, past experience of Divine generosity gives us hope we shall not be labelled Stone-Hearted in the Book of Life. As a certain man was circumambulating the resplendent Kaabah in pilgrimage carrying his mother on his back he met his teacher and asked: "Teacher! Have I repaid my debt to her?" The teacher only replied: "I hope."

What can you say? SubhanAllah.

FiAmanAllah

Google Voice: 800-GOOG-411

Hi

The continued dominance of Google. Soon, like the one ring, the shall rule it all. And I fully support them:

"Call 800-GOOG-411

Use the new Google Voice Local Search experiment to connect to local
businesses anywhere in the U.S. from your phone, for free. Just dial
the toll-free number 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411) and speak the
name of a business ("Giovanni's Pizzeria") or its category ("pizza").
You can choose to connect to the business directly over phone or, if
you are calling from your mobile phone, you can also say "text
message" and we'll send you the business's details by SMS. Google
won't charge you for a thing, but note that regular phone charges may
apply based on your phone service provider.
http://labs.google.com/goog411 "


Cheers

UNSTOPPA-BULL

you can't stop it

fear us, d-wade!

HI!!

BALLE BALLE! HOLY FRICK!! The Bulls bullied the f-ing Miami Heat today in the second half to SWEEP the defending world champions (92-79)!!!!

People doubted whether or not they could pull off a win in Miami against a team that was dealt with and overcame an 0-2 deficit in the championship last year. So much was made of that fact and the "Baby" Bulls paid it no mind; instead they played hard like they always do and won both games in Miami to simply say, "We have arrived."

Man, I can't tell you how awesome this is, mashaAllah. To have the Bulls advance to the second round after our playoffs run ended the past two seasons in Round 1. We haven't made the second round since '98.

A few random thoughts here (since I'm on cloud 9 and can't think straight):
- Watching Shaq's depressing post-game interview was satisfying
- Seeing "End of Daze" with D-Wade and Shaq looking dazed and confused on the court on the cover of ESPN.com is phenomenal.
- A caption underneath that picture has a questions that reads, "Has Chicago just begun?" My answer is: We already have. At the very least, we started two seasons ago during our first playoff birth with this amazing team!
- I love Riley telling Skiles that he can go a "long, long way" with this team. Click here for that awesome article.- Ben Wallace's consecutive free throws in the 4th qtr were seriously spectacular!
- Ben Wallace against DET on this type of platform is going to be absolutely insane!!!

Seriously, I can't wait, man. This is going to be truly amazing inshaAllah'ta'ala. Detroit has more experience and is the veteran and very capable team, but we've got a team playing with phenomenal skill and amazing heart and endurance. I love (and hate) how everyone is now giving the Bulls their due props. I mean, I guess this is how we show it to the world, but, man...amazing times, people.

InshaAllah, the Bulls don't get complacent and don't let DET take it. When those guys are on, they're on. But, I believe we can do this.

BTW, if GS knocks out Dallas, how f-ing crazy would that be?!?! The game right now is tied up at the half. WTF?!! But, allowing myself to jump the gun here, could you imagine a world championship series of Da Bulls vs PHX?!!??! HOLY FRICK!!

May Allah bless the Bulls with success. Ameen.

BULLS!!!

Bulls Baby!!!!!!

Hi

Man, this is an amazing start to the Playoffs for Da Bulls, mashaAllah. Destroying the World Champions tonight was phenomenal. Going to Game 1 on Saturday afternoon was equally phenomenal (thanks to Fahad). I really feel like we can pull the first round win and advance to the next round of the playoffs for the first time since 1998. This is our third year in a row we're here and our guys can DO THIS!

Mad props go out to Luol Deng for keeping us in the game with maintaining our lead in the 4th quarter. Gasol WHO?! Honestly, I hated it when people were like get rid of Luol (aka "Blood Diamond," "Luuuuuuuuuuuuu") and get Gasol. FRICK THAT! We don't need anyone, man. We're stacked, mashaAllah, and still a very young team. It's an amazing feeling to being a Chicago Bulls fan. Guess you'd have to be one to understand (like the entire Punjabi thing).

I also have to give props to Tyrus Thomas, Thabo Safalosha (the black Swiss guy), and Noch, of course. Much love to Hinrich and I think it's bogus that he has to pay $25k for throwing his mouth piece into the stands in Game 1 (mainly because he got a lot of bogus calls).

Now a couple more great pics courtesy of ESPN and ChicagoBulls.com:

Memoirs of a Single Guy

Note: This post was written 13-Apr-2007 in an airport on my laptop while waiting for my flight back home to Chicago from Houston.

Well, here I am. At the fantabalous George Bush Intercontinental Airport here in rainy, humid, but still-better-than-Chicago-weather-wise Houston, Texas. I’m waiting for my flight back home which is still hours away. The Chicago Team thought that we would try to catch an earlier stand-by flight, but an unwise lunch stop at Godfather’s Pizza – not my idea – killed that possibility. So now we get a few hours of quality time to spend with each other waiting at our gate. Joy.

Okay, so I don’t mean to sound all too sarcastic about the current outlook. Fortunately, I get along with my colleagues really well. I worked with one of them in my previous job, in fact, so it’s all good. The Chicago Team, by-the-by, is not a large task force by any means; we are only three employees large including me [insert fat jokes here]. We’re a new division in an existing office for my company and they're looking at us to grow it considerably (inshaAllah).

Anyway, let’s jump right into the point of today's entry: the older I get the more I realize that I’m single. Not only are most of my friends now married, engaged, or “spoken for,” but everyone at work is, too. Now, don’t get me wrong here, folks. I’m not getting on a soap box here crying about my situation. I just get a kick out of it. Namely because – like with people at work – people can’t relate to my singleness anymore. Or perhaps I can't relate to their non-singleness...
The first thing, for example, my manager does when we sit at our gate is call up her husband. And then later on her mom. The first thing my other co-worker does is call up his wife and talk to his sons. “Hey, Honey. How are you? I’m at the airport now with the rest of the team. We still have a few hours, but I’ll see you soon. Also, is it okay if I go use the bathroom?” Alright, obviously the last question I just randomly threw in there, but I'm making an important point. These married folks give updates to their significant others on every possible fricken minute detail. They have been programmed by their counterpart to think as a collective unit. They're like the Borg minus the cybernetics. It's disgusting, really...“Hey, Honey. I just used the bathroom. Yeah, it was okay. No, I’m fine. Now I’m watching CNN on the lounge tv and picking my nose, too. I know you hate that, but that's what I'm doing right now. And now I'm breathing. Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated, Imran.”

Meanwhile, back on Planet Earth, where I’m sitting a few seats away the first thing I go for is my BlackBerry. I check work email (standard practice for anyone that has one; BlackBerry = CrackBerry) and then immediately play Brick Breaker to kill time. When my colleagues are done giving their play-by-play updates to their better halves, they will talk endlessly about, “Yeah, my wife Jane is going crazy, Imran. We’ve been gone ALL week and she can’t believe that we didn’t get an earlier flight. Like I want to be here any more!”

I would think to myself, You don’t?! We’re in 80 degree weather and you’re in a rush to get back home to a nagging Jane and some little runts who are expecting cheap little gifts that you just bought at that overly priced gift shop in the airport? Instead, I reply back, "Yeah, Joe. It’s been a long week, man."

And it has been a long week. A long week of Imran listening to EVERYONE talking about what they do with their kids to discipline them. A long week of Imran listening to how these people have figured it all out (the secrets of raising the perfect kid) and how Neighbor X or Brother-in-Law X think they figured it out, but really haven’t because their kids are sooo spoiled. As the only single, non-child possessing human in the room, I felt like my mom put me through an episode of the Twilight Zone just so she could make a point: Go get a girl, go get married, go get me some grandkids.

[Disclaimer on behalf of my mom: She really isn’t the push over like that. I mean, it’s not to say that she’s not wanting us to not get married asap, but she’s not like the mother of an “aging” 27 year old daughter wanting her to get married like four years ago, thankfully. Oh to be a woman! Such misery!]

Oh man. Breaking News: So, like I prefaced above, I’m writing this all while waiting at the gate, right? So, my manager and co-worker went to grab something to eat. My manager comes back alone and just told me, “Yeah, Joe is coming back soon. He’s on the phone with his wife.” See!! It’s not me, people. I’m not making this stuff up. Who cares about the small point that his wife is pregnant and he’s being a good husband by checking in with her? Pray tell, mate, who cares?! I’m sure he’d be doing the same friggen thing if she wasn’t pregnant!

Getting back to my long week: So for a good 40 minutes, during our lunch break, everyone in training was talking about the adventures of potty training. Let me repeat that: So for a good 40 minutes, during our lunch break, everyone in training was talking about the adventures of potty training. (Or in some cases, the misadventures of potty training.) I mean, WTF?! I would occasionally interject a polite, “Hahaha. Those crazy kids! They’re so smart!” But as a single guy, which can be stamped on your forehead at times or, more appropriately in some settings, a big scarlet “S” sewn to your shirt for “single,” you have to be careful what you say. Because the old, disgruntled folks as I like to call them will spot you like a vulture finding a once free and spirited gazelle lying dead under the blazing sun (killed by a woman...err, savage lioness, I meant). Yes, married people are that far gone, kids. I'm sticking with that analogy.

I hope you all gained some valuable insight today from the Memoirs of a Single Guy. Basically, I just thought I would share some deep, insightful reflections I had. And you should know that such thought provoking...umm...thoughts don't typically come to me. I mean, the only time I get reflective is when I hear, for example, rap music like The Game’s song Doctor’s Advocate off his Doctor’s Advocate album. Like, Damn, ol’ g went thru some drama, man. He still love Fifty. I mean, he ain’t really left the family after all. He said he'd take the bullet for Dre. That can’t be easy...

Cheers