Part Of Being Sane Is Being A Little Crazy

Dictionary:   hec·tic adj. Characterized by intense activity, confusion, or haste. That's exactly how the past week has been. Not that I would exchange it for anything in the world. I've got 2 weeks to leave Delhi and report at Agra and I can hardly wait. Far enough away to escape and close enough for essentials like access to good food and a washing machine. But before I run away there's a looooot of things to be done like bank accounts, phone numbers, shopping and what not. Unlike what they would have you believe in Bollywood or in any of the other woods for that matter, running away takes a lot of prep work and/or careful planning. Especially if like me, you are doing it in broad daylight and with the full co operation of your mother! In between all the madness I need to somehow make time to go to Gurgaon to meet, greet and treat my friends. They are, after all, one of the few things I would miss about this heap of stones called Delhi. Them and my unlimit

After months of incessant ‘Job O Job, wherefore art thou?’ ing, I got one, even if it did take quite a while. And at LIC no less. Phew, now that that’s over, I can look forward to the training and getting paid for doing something rather than the other way round. Aristotle might have said ‘All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind’ but I say, if I’m going to be absorbing and degrading my mind anyway, might as well get paid for it! Besides the more I like doing something, the less I call it work (don’t remember who said this one). And to think , I was on the verge of applying for the Indian Bank and Bank of India POs. In one month I’ll have to move to where ever the training is scheduled and of course the biggest headache is getting a new cell phone number. Let me rephrase that. Getting a new number is not the problem but switching to it certainly is. Gah! Where is number portability when you want it?  So how do I feel after getting a job? Excited, ecstatic, nervous (jus a lil’

That’s the name of the book I just finished, by Richard Dawkins. After a long time of reading religious apologist literature in everything from newspapers to magazines, Richard Dawkins came as a breath of fresh air. And it’s not just me who’s impressed. The New York Times Book Review has hailed him as a writer who "'understands the issues so clearly that he forces his reader to understand them too"' & he was recently awarded the distinction of "'public intellectual"' in Britain. This is a summary of the book, from his website : He critiques God in all his forms, from the sex-obsessed tyrant of the Old Testament to the more benign (but still illogical) Celestial Watchmaker favored by some Enlightenment thinkers. He eviscerates the major arguments for religion and demonstrates the supreme improbability of a supreme being. He shows how religion fuels war, foments bigotry, and abuses children, buttressing his points with historical and conte

Finally I did it. I made myself a bootable USB flash drive which can run Linux. I’ve always been a fan of Linux and wanted to try it out. Kubuntu, using Wubi , was my first foray into Tux land. While it went quite well, I lost the installation to a format. Then I tried Ubuntu, this time by actually installing it on my HDD. I did find Gnome better then KDE, but there was still something lacking; not to mention the fact that my wi-fi didn’t work. Then last month I stumbled across Mint. It seemed like a good alternative for me to try, it looked way better than the default theme that Ubuntu comes with. So off I went & downloaded the ISO. Little did I know that my CD drive had decided to take a hike, leaving me with an ISO image and nothing to burn it onto. I thought my Mint foray was doomed. Except I found LiLi (Linux Live) Usb Creator . From the website: LiLi USB Creator is a free software for Windows that allows you to create a bootable Live USB key with a Linux on it.

I just finished reading Dan Brown’s latest effort ‘The Lost Symbol’ and it feels exactly like my post title implies. One explosive secret that could destroy society, a secret society that protects it, one man who is determined to find it and our professor who must stop him along with the subsequent chases and thrills.  *Spoiler Alert* In fact, it differs from the previous book only in that the murder isn’t in fact a murder and the possibility of marriage for our irrepressible bachelor hero. * End *. Looks like Angels and Demons will continue to rank as my favorite book from Dan Brown, even better than The Da Vinci Code . Sometimes I wonder if the only reason I once thought highly of that book was because I read it before its predecessor. Angels and Demons was a riveting, action packed thriller with quite unexpected twists and turns.  While The Da Vinci Code had an explosive secret at its heart, it definitely lagged behind in the action. And The Lost Symbol comes across

What does it mean? It means no newspapers. That’s right. Nothing. Zip. Nada. ET, The Hindu, Eenadu or The Daily Mail. It’s the worst nightmare to be stranded on a Sunday without the morning paper(s). Those papers would have normally kept this family of four busy for at least 3-4 hours. But alas! We might have to look at other avenues for entertainment. View Full Album What happened? Diwali happened, that’s what happened. Thankfully this is one of those festivals where the puja is at a minimum. Deepavali in Chennai is a feast for the eyes and ears…or maybe not. But it was definitely more fun. Festivals are supposed to be occasions of joy, celebrations and thanks. When I was still officially a kid, it meant all that and more (school holiday for example). Now all it means to me is yet another opportunity for tempers to flare, tensions to run high and moms to get exasperated. As far as I’m concerned, Indian festivals have way too many rules, at least in my house. Every fes

I just noticed that my last post, Who needs God? was my – get this – 50th post here! And of course this is cause to celebrate. Not only do I get to write about it but I also increase my post count by 1. *insert maniacal laugh here*. Ok. Gloating done. When I first started this blog, I probably didn’t imagine that I would actually stick with it. After all I’ve started blogs before and abandoned them just as quickly. I’m one of those people who has a great idea/insight whatever (imagine a bulb lighting up over my head), rushes off to do it and then because it takes a lot of effort to keep going, I quit.  Nowhere is it more obvious than when it comes to video games and web projects. My sister and I will both start off a game at the same time. I usually stop playing once I hit a difficult level and start looking at another game. My sister on the other hand will not only keep playing till the end, but she will also replay   it till she makes expert on all levels *shudder*. That j

I just ran across this blog post on a subject close to my heart. It is about the book Society Without God: What the Least Religious Nations Can Tell Us About Contentment , by Phil Zuckerman (New York University Press, New York and London, 2008.) What I noticed first was that the title of the book is ‘ Society Without God’ not ‘ Life without God’ or some such nonsense. I've always found it curious that while many people would readily admit that their lives could be happier and certainly more convenient without a constant presence looking over their shoulder (aka “God”), the very same people are reluctant to admit that society itself could be better off without Him. It’s the ‘holier than thou’ attitude that always manages to annoy me. As in “I’m good enough that I don’t need a moral compass but the rest of humanity sure does!” Which reminds me of a sentence from the book ‘ The Necessity of Atheism ’ by David Marshall Brooks. In the book he asks ‘If religion really helps us

Well after an exhausting trip down south, I’m back! But not for long. I’m leaving tonight for my interview at Kanpur. Yet another nerve wracking trip. * Sigh* What with all the tension and pressure, it is a wonder I haven’t lost my already tenuous hold on sanity. Hopefully I’ll get this job and put an end to all the uncertainty. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

Yup, that’s were I’m off to. At least that’s what it feels like. No phone (roaming ain’t cheap) & no hi-speed internet (I’ll be lucky to get dial up) means no chatting & talking to friends (I’ll miss you guys), RS(S), email and all the rest. I cannot even imagine the avalanche of feeds that’ll be waiting for me when I get back *shudder*. On the other hand, maybe this time away will do me good. Online is not my life after all. I could read dead tree books, watch a movie on something more than 14” & meet long lost relatives – who should have stayed lost – and …oh what the hell,who am I kidding!!? Its my worst nightmare come to life and then some. I know God won’t give me anything I can’t handle, I just wish he wouldn’t trust me so much.” –Mother Teresa Remember, she said it first folks…and I’ll be back on the 8th of next month. Ciao!

Yes! that’s me. Finally, two years of hard work & toil (read: fun & games) have paid off. My 20 year career in the field of education – 2 years of kindergarten, 10+2 years of school, 1 year of engineering, 3 years of bachelor studies and 2 years of graduate school - phew! that is a lot – is now complete (hey, kindergarten counts too).  So how did all this go down? At a solemn ceremony called the Convocation, I and the entire graduating class of 2009 were conferred our degrees on September 19, 2009. It was a page right out of my dreams as I walked up on stage & received my diploma while my parents, teachers and friends looked on. Of course, I felt like singing and yelling that I finally finished school, but I settled for taking pictures and laughing my head off. And thanks to my sister, my day was chronicled right down to the minute. And what a day it was! Meeting friends again (some of them for the last time, maybe), favorite teachers (definitely not the last

  Personas is a component of the Metropath(ologies) exhibit , currently on display until Sept 09 at the MIT Museum by the Sociable Media Group from the MIT Media Lab (Please contact us if you want to show it next!). It uses sophisticated natural language processing and the Internet to create a data portrait of one's aggregated online identity . In short, Personas shows you how the Internet sees you. Intrigued? So was I. Enough to check out the website and I came away impressed. Go ahead, check it out . I’ll wait. Once there, enter your name. Then sit back and be amazed. As is explained on the page, it is not meant to be utilitarian or even accurate. After all, unless you are relatively famous & have an obscure name (like say Lifehacker founder - Gina Trapani ), it cannot build an accurate description. But the process itself is amazing to watch. I for one, learned that most of my doppelgangers are doctors (my pet hate in school was biology, quite the irony). T

Why I prefer video games to real life: Someone has already written a walkthrough, FAQs, guide or something . If you don’t do well, you can always delete your profile and start over. If you don’t get expert score on a level, you can replay it. If you still don’t make expert, it doesn’t matter. If you don’t like one game, just move on to another. If you do really well, you get shiny trophies. Practice does make perfect. You know how its going to end. You have to pay just once for a game (or even free). You can always RTFM!

What do you get when you mix technology and food? Why, cool futuristic gadgets like the ones below of course! Guess what’s in the pictures above. Go ahead, I dare you. Give up? The first picture is of a Self Contained Biosphere (from Philips) while the second one is ‘le petit prince’ , a miniature greenhouse for - get this - Mars . Biosphere: This Philips non-spherical-biosphere is a self-contained farm that produces hundreds of calories of various food sources a day. Its five-level design breaks down like this: Levels 1 and 2: Plants Level 3: Algae Level 4: Fish and Shrimp Level 5: Organic Waste The system is designed to cascade nutrients from the top to the bottom (back to the top). Optical fibers capture and redirect light to the plants during the day, while methane capture from organic waste can power lights at night. The algae create oxygen for the fish. Cool or what?! Le Petit Prince: We all know that high solar radiation on Mars mea

September 2, 2009  was the fortieth birthday of an invention (do inventions have birthdays?). Well this one sure does…if I can figure out when it was actually invented.  40 years ago, on September 2, scientists connected two computers together which could communicate. The talk was meaningless but hey, at least they talked (kind of like kids?!) So would this be the birth of the Internet? Of course, technically the World Wide Web as we know it was invented in March of 1989 by Tim Berners-Lee. We’ve come a long way since then. The WWW was born 20 years after the first ‘communication’ between two computers. The first email was sent in 1971 while the first free web based email service, Hotmail, was launched as late as 1996. Mosaic became the world’s first browser in April, 1993 while  Firefox – King of Browserville – was launched only in 2004. Currently of course we’re rather spoiled for choice here with Firefox, Chrome, Opera, Safari and definitely last on my list, IE.  So

…my true love gave to me - two interview calls from LIC & Federal Bank! Well strictly speaking not my true love & it was more like the last day of August but this just sounds better. After the looong and I mean really long wait, I’m getting results so to speak. 2 out of 3 isn't so bad right? The interview for LIC is on October 10, while Federal is still unclear. And certainly the odds for LIC are pretty good in my favour. At the very least 1 in 4.  And to celebrate, RS had the day off and he came to Noida and we watched the Taking of Pelham 123 (predictable storyline but some scenes were pretty good). Too bad the day started very late and had to end early (by normal standards). At least I’ve got the Sunday to look forward to…Movie Time!

Well maybe not but remember back in school, when you wondered what exactly an atom look like? You didn’t? Well I did. Looking at bugs under the microscope in biology was exciting for sure, but what I really wanted to see were atoms, at the very least molecules. After all how was I supposed to understand how they work when I cannot see them? Well it took a long time but it’s finally here. IBM has gone and done it now.    This is the 3D image taken by an IBM scientist. Unimpressive huh? Now lo and behold! This look familiar? Impressed now? I was. The above image was taken by what is known as an atomic force microscope . Like the venerable electron microscope, but more powerful and with an eye for the third dimension, the AFM is able to make the nano world something we humans can appreciate visually. Using a silicon micro scale cantilever coated in carbon dioxide (tiny, tiny needle), lasers, an "ultrahigh vacuum" and temperatures that hovered around 5

Google Blogger is turning 10 this week and the celebrations have already begun folks! After the teaser announcement a couple of days ago and an impromptu blog post later, we finally get the first gift in the form of label clouds . The label widget was woefully inadequate, with only two ways of showing labels. The blog post goes on to say that this was the most requested feature (why am I not surprised?) and now we finally have it. Not only is it possible to show the labels as a cloud, you can also select which ones you actually want to show up in it. Yippee! I’ve been waiting for this feature myself but for better or for worse, just last week I found this fantastic flash cloud widget for my blog from Blogger Buster . And while this new feature is definitely news, I think I’ll just keep the one I’ve got. Here’s how they both look: What do you think? Should I keep the old one or toss it?

Name: Ganesha/Vinayaka/Ganapati (don’t recall the rest) Parents: Lord Shiva & Goddess Parvati Residence: Kailas (unverified) Email: None – (please get with it! Gmail is good) Festival: Vinayaka Chavithi In short, this is the Ganesha whose birthday we celebrated yesterday.  While the precise origins/cause/reasons of this festival are as yet unclear to me (more on that later), it definitely is one my favourite festivals. “Why?” you ask…for the same reason I don’t like most of the others. Food! (what were you expecting? some deep philosophical treatise?) Most Indian festivals usually demand lots of sweets, not this god, leastways not in my house. This is one occasion where I wholeheartedly & unabashedly dig in. Another peculiarity about this festival in my house is that my dad gets to do it! And here you were thinking that festivals are a universal celebration of religious fervour. No sir. Not here. According to the in-house religious expert a.k.a my mother, t

Ever since Firefox introduced me to the world of tabs, I’ve often asked myself this question. There I am just browsing, maybe looking for something when a video or link grabs my attention. And before I know it, I’m off on a journey into the unknown …or a wild goose chase as the case may be. Usually I can get back to where I started without much ado but that’s only usually. The hardest route to trace back is when I get lost in Wikipedia , that vast black hole of time. And today I finally have my app for that ;). Wikipedia Diver is a Firefox add on that answers my question. From the add-on page: This extension creates an sqlite database in your profile directory, and then logs all clicks between pages on Wikipedia to that database. It adds an item in the tools menu titled "WikiDiver Graph," which loads a page that allows you to see a graph of your Wikipedia browsing, arranged into "dives" (where a dive is a series of links through Wikipedia). What this m

Couple of days ago, my sister came down with fever. Kind of sudden too, no heed, no warning. Tuesday she was fine and she had even gone to college in the morning. When she came home in the evening she had fever and wasn’t able to eat anything. At least eat and and have it stay inside. Pretty soon that night she had a fever of 103 F. After the usual round of doctors and tests she seems to be well on the road to recovery. But quite a tense couple of days. Good thing we’re not the panicky type of family! Moving on from the serious to the absolutely hilarious. Techcrunch ran this story on how Yahoo website users are directed to upgrade to the new safer IE 8. Now leaving aside the dubious and debatable safety of IE 8, it definitely makes sense to show this to the millions of IE 6 & 7 users. But surprise surprise, this is shown even to users of Firefox users! While just last year, Yahoo was touting the Firefox 3 release. Guess I finally found out what ‘alignment of business intere

A couple of weeks ago, I found on Airtel’s website that they had introduced new (unlimited) plans for broadband users. I was very excited since it meant I could upgrade to higher speeds for the same price. Unfortunately I also found out that they had imposed bandwidth caps in the guise of ‘ Fair Use Policy.’ I was puzzled. Had Webster’s changed the definition of unlimited? I hurriedly googled it. No, the definition was the same, so what was this all about? I decided to find out something about this so called FUP. What I found was horror, anger and betrayal. I’m not talking TV soap, just the reactions of consumers to the FUP. I found this petition going around with around 2000 signatories. Also one user had deciphered the FUP to layman’s language right here . Be sure to look at the spreadsheet showing deficiency in service. It would have been funny if it wasn’t so real. As I see it, the company can either remove the unlimited plans or at least charge us half the rates for hal

I just read this Why I Don’t Use Twitter post by Devin Coldewey on Techcrunch. He managed to articulate most of my doubts on Twitter’s value, way better than I ever could. And he might have just invented a new word while he was at it. Impressive! But the reasons why I don’t ‘get’ the whole Twitter train are different. For one thing none of my friends are on it, which is not surprising (for most of them, Gmail is still the ‘latest tech’). As for news, I still get mine the old fashioned way via the paper. For another, I cannot post from my mobile as it is too expensive, so real time is out of the question. The best use I’ve come up with so far is to pass around links, sort of like a bookmarking service. Like most people, I have a lot of ways I consume information. For local news i.e about India (right now, national is local), my best source is still the newspaper. My favorite paper, The Hindu, still delivers the best content unlike the other gossip tabloids masquerading as pap

My sister and I just finished watching all four seasons of this fantastic series. One marathon viewing session with breaks for sleeping and eating, but now at last it is done. The series is called Bones , similar to police dramas like CSI, Numbers and the like. But what makes this different and infinitely more likeable is that it is funnier, more interesting and easier to understand. For someone who cannot even watch someone else being injected/operated upon on the TV , its amazing that I could actually laugh through an entire series where they show more dead bodies than a zombie movie. This series is definitely a must watch for anyone who likes funny and science! Now I get the unenviable task of waiting for the fifth season to premiere on September 17. Too bad. This one is right up there with my favourites like Friends, Happy Days, Gilmore Girls, Sabrina the Teenage Witch etc… Next up, I just downloaded Farm Frenzy 3 and it’s great! It’s a nice twist on the classic game

What is it with women and shopping? Any time I step foot into a mall/store, I see the women marching towards the merchandise with their men trailing behind. The women are intent on their next acquisition, the men on their ever diminishing wallets. Of course, come to think of it, Delhi isn't a patch on Chennai, where men can age visibly when they see their wives shop! Point of fact, I have seen stores where the management has been kind enough to provide chairs for the men and kids while the women exhaust themselves (mostly sari/jewellery shops). My mom aims to follow in the footsteps of her forefathers (or should I say mothers?!) How else can an innocuous request to shop for veggies and fruits turn into a 5 figure bill on my dad’s credit card? Gather around folks and I’ll tell how this came about. Once upon a time… Oops! wrong line. Ahem. Just last week, my mother asked “Take me shopping (veggies).” Simple enough. So I took out the car and we set off. Once we’re on the road

Every year, my mother’s birthday is the longest ever. Why? coz she was born on the 21st of June that’s why! This year, my sister decided she would make something for my mother as a gift. So she came up with this: It was really difficult to sneak away from home and get everything together but through sheer lying, we finally managed to get it framed. It did pay off in the end; my mother could not have been more surprised!  And best of all, I caught the entire episode on video :). What with the laptop giving up on me and having to be repaired, plus a couple of exams and what not, I’ve barely been able to catch my breath, let alone up with my blog.Next up – last date for Central bank is tomorrow and I’ve yet to take out the draft. Yikes! And so I go on another round. At least I have the trip to Manali to look forward to. If it decides to happen of course. Once I’m back and played with Shiretoko a bit (yes, Firefox 3.5 releases tomorrow too!), I have a huge project coming up.

I think I now know what Jack went through when he came tumbling down the hill. It’s no fun at all. Of course I didn’t exactly tumble down, rather I took the bus but it was still uncomfortable. And I like my comfort.  Why am I referencing nursery rhymes all of a sudden you ask? Remember the ill fated Haridwar trip that got postponed? Well I went and this time it was cut short and not even for a worthwhile cause. Let me begin from the beginning.   Once upon a time, there lived a girl…oops wrong beginning. Two days ago, that is on the 11th of June 2009, an air conditioned Innova left Delhi on its 5 hour journey towards Haridwar. It contained 8 people plus the chauffeur. Also included one 6 – foot monstrosity called my brother, who poor thing, had to practically bend over to fit in the backseat. Even then, we had a fun time yakking away nineteen to the dozen. Reached just in time to catch lunch at the guest house and off we went to see the temples (supposedly the reason we went, y

There is a god. And he hates me. That’s right. The big guy from up there wants his revenge.  How else do you explain the fact that just as I was getting ready to enjoy the weekend alone, sans parents, their trip gets postponed? Now not only do I lose my hedonistic (rather optimistically titled) weekend but I also get to go along on the 11th to Haridwar. Yaay! NOT. So now you know.  Besides this isn’t the first time this has happened. My dad was to visit me at hostel, when Mister I Run The Country (aka the PM) all of a sudden wants to review BHEL, weak knees notwithstanding. Funny, last time I checked, it was doing great without any interference from him. So no trip. That last was quite some time ago. More recently it was the turn of the CM. I had planned out my entire trip to Jaipur with my friend MG (after spending the mandatory 2 days with the parents of course). Of course the CM picks this exact weekend to visit the site and view progress, when there is nothing to see but

A couple of days ago, I ran across this funny little piece & just had to share it– What we learn from the movies . An excerpt: -- It is always possible to park directly in front of any building you are visiting. -- A detective can only solve a case once he has been suspended from duty. -- If you start dancing in the street, everyone you bump into will know all the steps. And so on. It also got me thinking how many equivalent clichés would I be able to find in India Cinema, which to some people is like the mother lode of all clichés & stereotypes? So far here is a small list I’ve been ale to come up with. Of course it goes without saying that this is by no means a comprehensive guide, just something I could make up off the top of my head; I’m sure that others would be able to come up with better. This list is also not exclusive to just one language, having watched movies in not less than 4 Indian languages, I can assure you that almost all transcend boundaries of langua

…I’m not kidding. Only in my case it is the painters who’d literally taken over my house for the last month or so. Finally the deed is done. The walls are a riot of colours,  almost like a rainbow threw up in here; but I love it. My room makes me feel like I’m on the Starship Enterprise, looking out. Actually the whole painting thing wasn’t so bad to start with. They pushed the furniture out of a room, painted while my mom watched TV and I, well, I played games and read Star Trek. But then came time to paint the inside of the cupboards. It was a massive undertaking the likes of which I’d never (and never will again, god forbid!) seen. It is quite amazing how much ‘stuff’ and I use the term loosely, can fit inside such a small space. Imagine if you will, rooms filled with plastic covers and bags and suitcases. There was stuff everywhere. On the bed, on the floor with just barely enough space for one person to walk. All the time I kept wondering, where did all this stuff come

…voted, for the first time. And actually cared about the results. Well the UPA seems to be winning & that’s that I suppose. All the wishing in the world cannot change things as they are (how I wish!). If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. – Anon Now I can only wait & watch how this plays out for my Dad, which of course is actually the reason I cared. Coming back to the media circus that is the elections, the two most common scenarios propounded by the ‘ experts’ was either an NDA victory or at worst a highly fragmented LS. Turns out they were all wrong and the UPA is laughing all the way to power. While these elections saw many campaigns to ensure higher voting turnouts than previously see, it seems they failed to make an impact where it is needed. Many districts in the southern states especially TN, voter turnouts were a high as 67% while up here in UP, it was as low as 52%. Again as expected the urban middle class refused to participate in force thus losing

Window/Mac only: Social networking site Wakoopa tracks the applications you're using through a small utility and uploads that information to its web site, where you can track what programs you use, review your favourites, and find new software through recommendations based on what others use. When I read this piece in Lifehacker , I knew I had to try it out. I love trying out new software and applications, this app seemed to be a perfect fit. I signed up at the website a couple of days ago and the graphs it throws up are very interesting. I found out that I spend a lot of time using Firefox, duh! no surprise there. Still, I found the website quite good and it suggests new software for me to try out, which is probably why I’m going to keep it around. Lifehacker threw up another suggestion for me today and it was something I had always been on the lookout for. If you're looking for a simple way to catalogue your piles of movies, music, books, games, and software GuruL

How do I distil all the craziness of the past week into words? So many thoughts tumbling around, rushing to get out, of which barely one or two make it to the page. I’ve been meaning to get around to writing something, anything , at all these past few days and damn if something or the other doesn’t keep popping up to interrupt me while I’m only thinking of writing, let alone actually get down to it.  If it’s not the painting, then the IPL. Or maybe the elections. Or the looking for a job. Or the oh..just forget it. Suffice it to say the interruptions were many and varied. The house is shaping up quite well, in spite of the freaky color scheme my sister and I came up with (some might say a marked lack of one). I’ve managed to get my purple walls in the end and the whole exercise should conclude over the next week.  After a long time, I’ve also found a game worth getting excited about, make that two games. Both are casual games (avid gamers can roll their eyes and move on) an