TWTW :-)

The title... just an acronym for "The Week That Was". Make anything an acronym and people feel its gotta be important. :-)

Another week whizzes by and this was one of my better weeks this year. We solved a very critical bug at work and this would go a real long way in making the product we are working on a big success. We also had a new boss at office and till now its been an effort at initiating him into our ways before he initiates us into his ways. :-). So far, so good. With so much Wi-Fi around, I wonder, would this fly in a city like Bangalore? A city-wide or at least Central-Business-District wide access? I can quite a few people walking around with laptops? Wouldn't they want all-time access or is it meant only for show-off value? I wonder if and when this will get underway, but sure would make life easy for the laptopwallas. Talking of life being made easy, I happened to be writing a few cheques last week and I realized that I "cross" all the cheques. Now, this seems like a wasteful exercise. I say so because if I am going to cross every cheque, why can't I get a cheque book that is already crossed? Why make it obvious to the banker that I am "parallel line drawingly challenged" ? Can I go to Citibank with this idea and make some money, as this can be posed as a value added service? I am sure many time starved techies would catch the fad. :-)


Another Friday goes by means another cricket match between Developers and QA. Now, y'all must be bored of this, and so are we(developers)! We whipped their ass.. AGAIN! Well, We have now beaten their minds, not their bodies and to say the least, the matches now are sheer torture and unfair to them and us. ;-).

Since there was nothing good in the screens today, I am going with "TV only" this weekend. As a start to this, I have been watching "Sa Re Ga Ma Pa" and Debojit just won it! Now, to be frank I feel, of the boys, Hemchander had the best voice and Himani the best among the girls. Hence the final between Vineet and Debojit was not really fun. Anywayz, another reality show with an Indian touch ends and again proves that India's obsession with SMS had resulted with a strong regional bias(North India - 40% votes) for Debojit/Vineet robbing Hemachander (South India- 15%) from being the worthy winner. This voting system definitely sucks!

There are quite a few net musings to go by this week, but thanks to my workload I didn't collate this neatly enough. :-(. Nonetheless, being busy on the net has never been difficult, especially with so many sites that are next-gen. There are also some eye-catching but yet useless information out there that needs to be filtered. Without our knowledge the way the net moves, the world moves and hence we move and change.

Even if the presentation of net happenings was lame, I did try..... :-)

Overpowered

This week started very busy at work and has stayed true to form till now. What this has ensured is minimal personal emailing, almost no browsing at office and 2 days of absolute bloglivion. I wanted to change this trend, and here I am blogging at 8:00AM. :-) I think I will make up for the lost time by not reading the newspaper. Anywayz, the only things in the paper anyway is Bird Flu or controversial cartoons. Is it just me or is the 'daily' print media losing its bite? As it is we are numbed by all the violence around and the death of 4 persons in some part of India(or the world) doesn't necessarily move us. This I feel is indicative of us getting into our cocoons and our disconnection from worldly human affairs. I remember not so long ago, a chain-snatching or robbery in Bangalore would have us reading hard at what, when, how etc. Today such crimes are common place and we need a murder or two to get our attention. I hope this situation doesn't progress into one where we are not moved by even murders and need catastrophes to happen. Is a more sophisticated materialistic lifestyle degrading our socio-emotional framework?

Lighten up...

After that charged presentation of my inner frustration, I felt I needed to lighten up. So....

Natures Child:




Adjustable Spoon?





All important Fourth Monkey:





W950i :





How Green can Green get?






Moto-Slider:





Senseless Fashion:




:-))

Living... an art?

What has definitely consumed Bangalore and maybe a better part of India over the last couple of days? You won't have to think hard that it has nothing to do with politics, movies or cricket(not even the series at our office!). It has most definitely been the celebrations of Sri Sri Ravishankars 50th Bday and 25th Anniversary of "The Art Of Living" foundation.

Ok... So there was a celebration, so what? Why should I bother myself about it, let alone have y'all read a blog entry about it? Well, the answer is quite simple, it irks me! And I ain't coy about it! I had my uncle and cousin from Dubai coming over to attend this celebration and also had my mom going on one of the days and come back totally engulfed in the "aura" of the whole thing(charade?). I happen to "have" to watch the whole thing on TV and for some unforeseen reason I don't seem to be moved as many others claim to be? Why is it so? Is it coz I am one of the infidels as the fanatics would have it? Or is it that I actually know how to live my life and don't need the "art" to be taught to me? I hope I don't come through as being arrogant but no point being modest either!

So, lets give the benefit of doubt to "Sri to the power of 2". What is he teaching here? Inner peace? Good. Love thy neighbour? Good. Be kind and loving? Good. I work with a bunch of people (who form my social circle) who already are aware of all this. So, this is not for me or the people close to me. I am yet to see a person who "actually" needs this kind of an education attend the course, and trust me, I know a few. Why does he take Rs.3000 for an initial course and much more for the advanced courses? How many in India can afford (without guilt in their heart) to pay that kind of money? So, does this "art" only belong to the relatively well-off or rich? Should India be charged for its spiritual advancement? Should he be kept in parallel with someone like Mother Teresa? This comparison is only because I thought I read somewhere that he was being considered for the Nobel Peace Prize! Making spirituality fashionable does not warrant this honour.

I could go on and on about this... but I guess you have all got the point I am trying to make. I don't intend to offend anyone, just exercising my free speech and I welcome the readers of this blog to exercise theirs (via comments) and let me know what they think about the blog entry. Till then...

We win.. again!

The update I promised on the keenly contested match at our office is here. I can't put this in any nicer tone, "We kicked their butt"... AGAIN! We have now won the series 3-1 doing an India on Pakistan. Unlike our more famous counterparts(did I just compare our series to the Ind/Pak series in a very casual manner?) we will not be playing the match after the dead rubber and would start a new series. I am not too sure if the QA folks have the stomach for it though. If any of the QA folks are reading this, its just a game boyz. ;-))

I was looking at some property ads on paper and Bangalore is still hot! In fact, too hot to handle for me. Buying property seems out of range these days anywhere in Bangalore, unless of course you make money outside of work. I tell you, once you come up with a real good idea, then it makes money for you. Of course, the novelty of the idea is bound to die some day, and even apple ipod or itunes can get competition.

I am right now waiting for the movie "Kaal" and "Chronicles of Riddick" to start. Unfortunately both are at 9:00pm and my wife has made the choice easy for me, itz "Kaal" and we don't have TiVo yet! :-(.

Ok y'all, the movie just started....

Sweet Victory

Last week has been very good for Indian cricket. Yesterday we drubbed the Pakis for the 3rd time in a row and is that a special feeling or what! More importantly we have the next match of our office challenge happening today. We made full use of last weeks victory and made the past week a living hell for our QA folks. Hopefully they will not hit back off-field with bugs. :-) The crescendo has built up well and we have another keen contest on our hands. Trust me to keep you all posted. ;-)

Remember me writing about the French ship coming to India for getting "cleaned", well, I am sure no one thought that this news will hit the front pages of the leading newspapers. As they say, all is well that ends well, another victory for Greenpeace and us! Seriously, its about time we stood up to such high-handedness by our "one-world" (though very well developed) neighbours. If we don't stand our ground, things can get much worse.

On a lighter note, have you guys checked out the new GTalk interface as part of GMail? Finally something innovative and different from google with respect to GTalk, it was way off quality or utility compared to yahoo messenger! I believe google should take more time before they start releasing these apps. We are getting bombarded with so many apps from them, we hardly have time to test them! Oh well, not to complain much, its free after all!!

Wish us luck people, we have an important match on our hands! :-)

Deceptively Bad Movies - 2

Hope all those who had to get lucky got lucky yesterday, on the oh-so-important V-Day. I do feel that itz been blown out of proportion this time around, or rather for a few years now. Almost every infotainment source was glaringly pointing towards one question, how well you have geared yourself this year for V-Day? It should be no surprise from my viewpoint that I didn't do much on V-Day. My intention is not to discourage people who did have a blast, but rather solace for people who chose not do anything. Before I make it look totally unromantic, WE did do something last weekend, call it a pre V-Day celebration. :-)

RDB (Rang De Basanti) happened last week in no less than GOLD CLASS at Forum. First, the movie, it was definitely not up to my expectations. As it is these days, Aamir Khan(The modern Day Manoj Kumar!) ensures that every film of his is a big event and RDB was no different. To add, I got *only* good reviews from whoever had seen RDB. The movie is well made and is boring only in small patches, but the story is very shallow. The solution that the protagonists thought up was not realistic, practical, logical or even possible! But then, its just a movie I suppose and hopefully the attempted message gets through.

Now, why Gold Class? If it is as good a film as people say and since gold class was something we were planning, why not make it a "nehle pe dehla". As it stands, Gold Class was excellent. The whole movie viewing experience is out of the world! I suggest all to give it a try for a really looong movie, to get maximum value for money. :-) The food part was very disappointing. They give a 150 rupee food voucher and almost everything in the menu is 150 or more. To even decently fill your tummy you will end up spending more than what you would at the 100 item lunch course at Taj Residency.

My recommendations:
1. RDB - Why not? It doesn't hurt much.
2. Gold Class - Definitely.

Also, a tip, if you get to Shoppers Stop on Saturdays before 10:30AM, free breakfast is served. Guess who had his fill. ;-)

Inbox peeks

I don't receive as many forwarded(junk) mails as I used to a few years back, but I still seem to be in the rolls of many a youngling. To be frank, these junk mails sometime help.
1. They get you away from serious stuff(not necessarily work)
2. You can vent your frustration of a bad coffee day at a junk mail.
3. They act as important connection points, or keep alives from the person who sent them. Its like telling, "I am alive and forwarding mail, hopefully you are alive and trashing mail. We are too busy to call eachother or send a personal email, but not busy enough to totally let go of our acquaintance".

I kinda like the last one, thatz as good a reason as any to send forwarded mails around, hell we all know nobody reads them anyway! >:-}. On that note, here is some stuff that landed in my inbox/comp. Please don't try relating them, there is none. :-)

Dilbert Union:





Mother Nature:



Nano, if you are clumsy a big NoNo:




Finally, this pic demands a little more than just a heading. I got this via email indicating what would be obvious from the pic, the jewellery the girl is wearing. What was not needed to be as obvious were their faces. Some friend whom either one of the couple or both trusted sent this mail out on the internet to a bunch of friends who he/she surely did not trust as much! A simple action like this and a total no one to the whole scene, me, gets it and is now blogging it! I have done the little I could to keep their anonymity, but none the less, the jewellery on the lady was something to be seen to be believed! :-O



Lemme know if you like this kind of media(image or video) stuff on the blog and I can scrounge for more. :-)

The week thats been...

It was a pretty mundane week upto friday. :-) We have a 5 match cricket series going on at our office between the QA and Development folks. The series was squared 1-1 till yesterdays match and as you could guess from the buoyancy of the post, WE WON!! And did we kick ass or what! Without gloating too much about the teams performance, lets just say, the score is 2-1 in our favour and there are 2 more matches to go, their misfortune. :-)) There was a less important match that happened today between India and Pakistan, if anyone is interested.

We had some tech news hitting us this week. Lucent saves Riverstone just before it went under, while Larry Ellison was busy making himself richer, his people take the brunt. Inspite of such bad news, we do live in very interesting times. There is always a "worth a mention" innovation round the corner.

I happened to be at the Garuda Mall, Bangalore today. There were some 20 somethings walking around wearing a 'Times Now' T-shirt and a portable media player (more like a TV) showing off the latest news sensation. I am sure in todays over zealous infotainment age, this would also be used as propaganda material by a BJP friendly channel. :-)

So little news, so many channels to show it... :-) Have a nice weekend folks.

Whats happening in Bangalore?

If you expect a post of crib, you are quite mistaken. :-). Believe it or not, I haven't read the newspaper in 3 days! I do go to my usual net jaunts, but those rarely cover Bangalore happenings. So, what is going on? The roads any better? The people any safer? The traffic any lesser? This reminds me, whatever happened to the Lalbagh flower show this time? I didnt see the usual coverage that is usually garners. Maybe all the good ol' things in Bangalore are taking a backseat. :-(

Google seems to be everywhere these days. From releasing an array of small apps to getting spanked in China. Everybody knows that Wi-Fi is hot! But looks like google has plans of making it hotter! Gotta love their sense of humour though. Google has reached where it has because of surprise innovations. Just going to prove that the world is never short of ideas and people squeeze a product into any available market space, and this is a good example.

I wonder how many phones Sony Ericsson plans to release this year! We already have the W810i, K800, W900 and the P990! Here is a sneak peak at their latest offering: M600. The phone touts 3G and GSM co-support and RSS reader. It also has the rest of the goodies that the current crop of phones have. Impressive!








When will I buy one of these and not guilty about it after 6 months... Sigh! Sigh!

Deceptively Bad Movies

I am still very much captivated in the remorse of having see a really bad movie. I saw Narnia over the weekend and it was deceptively boring to say the least! Trusting all the movie rating sources didn't do me any good this time around. There is computer graphics, but not good enough. There is a story, but not good enough. There are some good performances, but not good enough. The witch does an OK job, the wardrobe is exactly a wardrobe and nothing more and the Lion is nothing more than a guest appearance. The whole movie is dotted with oh-seen-that and oh-guessed-that kinda plots.

The realization dawns that I don't like the children genre of fantasy movies. Will most definitely stay away from them the next time around!

On the subject of deception, don't you guys think this man epitomises the word! His coup was creative but will his governance also be so? If the new government in Karnataka comes good on half of the promises they have made, we will be very very happy.

All we can do is wait and watch...

Unhealthy days

This week has been pretty bad for quite a few people I know. I had four of my colleagues going down with some sort of food poisoning and/or viral fever. Just yesterday one of my colleagues had a pretty nasty bike accident. I think she will be out of commission for a couple of days, if not more.

Still talking of sick, but in a different vein. We lost the match at Karachi! :-((( After the very promising start to the match and an equally gutsy bowling fight back from the pakis, they buried us with their batting. The rumour mills are now doing overtime with claiming the end of sachin to the monotonous captaincy of dravid to the last days of saurav in one-dayers. Well, its been a bad cricket week and a pretty boring-to-bad series.

One thing that caught my attention after the misery at karachi was the way the TV channels go out of their way to ensure that we don't lose interest in the cricket team, not even temporarily. Ten Sports and ESPN/Star Sports are showing all the old matches were India has won comfortably or where Sachin has played some of his oh-so-long-ago masterful innings! Manipulation people... manipulation.

I need to run now... getting late for work. Maybe I will edit this post with Internet bytes later.

Adios