Post #153

This post was typed a few days ago sitting in my home when i had nothing to do. I think I'll jus post it as it is. ;)

First day at my native starts with no power! And thus i get a a very "warm" welcome on a supposed to be winter morning in the northern most part of coastal Kerala. In the era when we [read as our democratically elected government] are speaking of computer engineering penetration and rocket science [If you remember the much debated Chandrayan], there is shortage of power. I don't want to make/take political stand here. But it is quite debatable topic if we think of the consequences we as a nation would have to bear in years to come. I'm not sure how the GDP is projected by the authorities when there is such a challenge facing us that will surely eat into our success.

Now after all this and a "couple off" couple off days later, the state of the electricity on an average day, reminds me of my digital electronics experiments in my engineering days. The ON/OFF states off the electricity is practically annoying when they alternate every now and then causing enormous amount of pain. By the way when it is happening inside every chip of my computer successfully, it is something that is pleasurable than annoying! ;) He he..

And as i type this, i see rain drops slithering down the roof of my house and forming a sort of sweet lullaby. This, makes me want to stay indoors sipping to hot cup of tea and watch this interesting match! But i decided to hold on a interesting read by Chetan Bhagat, "2 States". I suggest you buy it from here if you are looking forward to it. Flipkart has given me good service whenever I've ordered books through them. :) Now let me get back to finishing the book. It's cheesy... :)

Post #152

On a ten day long vacation starting today. Reminds me of the winter vacations i used to have as a school going kid. Feels like life has come one full circle after leaving school. The employer i work for has a Christmas break and there won't be any work carried out for another ten day. So all the employees have some peace of mind knowing that no one would be calling them on their phones even on vacation. This is bliss for another ten days. I plan to do "nothing" for another 10 days other than lazing at my home. Ah!.. I've to stop.. ;)

Post #151

It's been quite sometime that i've really posted anything other than cricket. Let me promise that this is one post that will end posts on cricket if not for ever but for a while.  ;)

We won the quadrangular series that was held over last month and this! A close 15 run victory meant that we'll cherish the hard earned one for a long time to come...

Chasing our target of 155 in 20 overs, Zak solutions our opponents in the finals, fell short of 15 runs when they lost all of their 10 wickets. Thereby giving us reason to cheer in a year that didn't go well in terms of cricket all through out the year. First we had to fight the fact that our teammates were going through a lean patch all at once. Then we had to do away with the fact of "no budget" for our cricket team from the employer and play a series on our own. And then at last we get some good returns for all the hard work in the nets to end the year on a high as a win and to everyone's surprise, we get the budget for the series approved by the employer. Now the hopes are high for the upcoming series starting January second week in the new year. A big 16 corporate teams based event. I'm looking forward to it as much as my eager teammates.

Here are a couple of snaps of our winning team





Cheers!

Post #150

I gifted myself a Macbook on Sunday. So, here i am typing away my 150th post into my blogger account on my newly acquired "cool" piece of hardware. It's been quite sometime that I've waited upon to get my hands on my own Mac hardware. Though i have earned every penny till date working on Mac, it took me a while to actually think of owning one. Well, thanks to a annoying OS maker which lives mostly beside the doors on the wall, i was motivated to buy a Mac.

Right now the battery seems really amazing. Though i have not yet performed any processor intensive work, I think it is close to living upto the tall claim of 7-8 hours made by Apple. Awesome boost to the mobile users if it so. The multi touch sensitive trackpad is something that amazes me as much as i use it and it always brings that happiness whenever i use it. My heart felt thanks to the original designers of this amazing piece of feature. And yea a thanks to Apple too for getting it on Mac from the iPod/iPhone platform. Other than that it is the same old piece of the mac hardware that i've always laid my hands on. It's fine fit and finish makes it a class apart and i never can stop admiring it's every detail.

Now let me stop at it for a while when i enjoy computing on my Macbook....

post #149

I'm elated! Our team just did fine on last Sunday again! We beat Zak solutions comfortably with a 42 run margin. How much better can it get than 2 back to back victories after a 3 months long break. On my personal front, I could hit some valuable boundaries which were much needed at the end of the game. My keeping standards need to be a notch higher than it is now. Though I have been collecting all the wide balls, the collection is not as neat as it used to be. The extra weight that I've put on seems to be a slight problem here... ;)

The next match is scheduled in 2 weeks time. And am looking forward to that match. That match is sort of a practice match for us with out team already in the final with Sunday's win. The quadrangular series seems to be suddenly interesting again to me as we are going to be in contention to win the series now!

To provide a brief match summary,

E F I v / s ZAKSOLUTIONS
-------------------------------------
Toss won by E F I & Elected to BAT

E F I : 159 / 7 IN 20 overs
Batting:
Satish 69[52], Anand 36[32], Naveena 24*[12]
Bowling:
Ajay 4-28/3, Vikas 2-13/2, Unnikrishnan 4-16/2, Anand 3-20/ 2.

ZAK : 117 / 10 IN 20 overs,
batting:
Srinath 25[29], Ali 21[24], Raja 24[20]

M . O. M: SATISH from E F I
Match Won by E F I by 42 Runs.

Post #148

Our sometimes office sponsored and sometimes self sponsored cricket team that i play with more often did great on our first outing (15th Nov ) after the rainy season. This series was sponsored by the company me and my teammates work for. It was not like the earlier series where we had to shell in a lot of cash to enter the series and then went crashing out in quarters after doing well in the initial league matches. Everyone is now pumped up after a good 27 run victory which is a big margin in 20-20 format of the game. The role for me in the team has changed from the last series in the team. I'm now a wicket-keeper batsman who comes down the order to bat. The opener's slot which i used to enjoy for about an year is now taken up by another teammate. With the next match on 22nd Nov, me and my teammates are waiting for the clock to strike 8 Am this Sunday when the first ball would be bowled for the next match. Opponents this time would be Zak solutions and this is one team we have never played earlier unlike the first match where we knew the opposition (MC & A) from a previous match where we had lost to them. Let me hope for the best.

In the mean time the rainy season was a good time we bought some cricketing gear especially the cricket bat which needs seasoning before we play the cricket ball. Hours of knocking with the mallet went in to the bats we bought. Hard work did pay off as we got bats ready in time for the match. I did buy a Kashmir willow bat and it's now seasoned in to be played this season. Hope the sponsorship money pours in and we play more of the matches over the weekend :) And here are some snaps of me knocking in my new bat.

Post #147

Finding a title for blog is a little head scratching affair every now and then. And now i found a permanent solution for it! Ha!

This song from Cat Steven's is so simple yet very melodious. I just love it.... watch it and enjoy! This song has become a regular in my playlist! And i wish i could play and sing this song along! :)



The life of then Cat Setvens and now Yusuf Islam is very interesting! Read it here.

Hooks and crooks!

Imagine a giant hook with some good mouth watering food hanging from it. And say the giant hook is attached to a big crane. Now, imagine yourself as very hungry and you ran to take a bite from the food that is lying on the hook!! This seems mouth watering at that moment isn't it! But, say as you lay your mouth on the food and the hook, the crane operator pull you up into mid-air putting you into unbearable pain. You are now stuck and cannot free yourself from the hook and you are struggling with the pain hanging in air! Well, you may now wonder why i'm trying to be all filmi here... But all this because, i came across this! Imagine the fish's plight! Poor thing's only fault is that it is born a so called game fish! And yea, it's going extinct too in some years!

I can understand if the fishing is to feed a dying hungry man! But for fun, you are not supposed to kill a living being! What is the difference between the terrorists and these game fishers!

I wonder what happens when all the game fishes are extinct! Who will be hanged by hook by these game fishing crooks! ? Han?

Commercializing cricket....

This is a beautiful article on what would happen in the near future or it nicely reflects upon the changing player's attitude in international cricket scene. I'm totally for commercializing the sport. And players staying independent of countries. This also is good for players. No player can be igonered by any country's governing body. A player who wouldn't suit a scheme of things in a particular team, might very well be a good option in another team. The possibilities are far too many. The competition in the sport will do a lot good to the quality of the sport. Innovations happen when there is competition. For example would ever Dilshan had played his strange looking but very effective over the wicket-keeper's head shot if it was not for the T20!

The biggest problem though i see is the fact that these big corporates who bring in players for exponential amount of money compared to the individual's cricketing consistency might one day lead them into doom! So it's all upto the group of corporates who have good sporting idea to take care of it. And not just spend large amounts of money on buying too many star players. After all it's not the number of stars in a team that matter. It's the combination of individuals who eventually play contributing effectively by making up for one another's weakness and strengths that win! I don't want to see a star studded team of the "real Madr!d" style fall dud.. ;)

I hope more tournaments like the ongoing Champion's trophy take place.... I'm bored of seeing the same national teams playing each other.

Bollywood surprises me ever time...

I came across this piece of news in some bollywood gossip site or whatever! I'm not sure if it is true. What is interesting about this piece if it is true is that the fact about someone saying a "no" to a composer like AR Rehman. :) People are bold enough to say that! Thats great news. For this song, which was eventually recorded by ARR, it did come out very well. I wonder how would it have sounded if Himesh had sung it ;) Two versions of the song would have had to be on the CD eventually which would read "Fiqrana (Nasal version)" and "Fiqrana(Operated vocal chord version)" ! Makes it interesting.... Almost every movie these days have different versions of the same song. Club mix, remix, rock mix and what not!! So we've a new dimension added to the mixing on song in music CD. Business aspect han! ;)

Metronome for mac

There are not many metronome software that a user could choose from when it comes to Mac. So i just took some time yesterday to write this and here is the first version of it. Please feel free to download and use it and comment about it. Right now, i think this is pretty basic. It allows you to set a beat per minute from anywhere between 1 and 240. If your Mac has a speaker in it or connected, the default system beep must be heard at the interval you set in the UI. Have a nice time practicing your guitar with it fellas.

UPDATE: I added another feature to this existing version: Please download it from here.

Cyclothon!

I'm planning to register for the this cyclothon to be held in Bengaluru on 11th October 2009 at 07:00 AM.! The elite 50Km ride sounds pretty much interesting... :)

Cycling to Bannerghatta

It's been a while now since i have cycled some long distance. Other than the short trips in the weekend stretching couple of kilometers i've not done  much. With lot of work looming over me in  the days to come at office i needed some break. Also i was tiered after the 3 week's haul of work. So me and one of my colleague decided to bike a  small distance early morning. We had done this earlier on a different route which was fun. So we did start early as 6 from my place and went all the way to the Bannerghatta national park. We couldn't anyways get into the park as it was too early. So we just circled around the park and then returned. A good 50 KM round trip did make me feel fresh mentally :)

Some of the snaps here...



This is meenakshi temple that you get enroute:



The tariff board hanging at the park! Should go for a safari sometime ;)



Well, the zoo's Map!!



Njoy!

Oh! Do i love this Judgement? I do.. :p

Reading this piece of news was fun. Aren't the judges right when they said that there are far more important issues in this nation to be addressed than thinking on "to ban or not to" a TV show! He he! I don't know what's with these people that this moral policing is so important to them! One thing that strikes me here is "Taliban"! Aren't we different from them guys or  are we the same? ! common! Let the society take it's course. I don't think moral policing will help anyone!

All said and done! If at all the program "Sach ka samna" is so "vulgar" to some then i think it just needs a flip of channel for those "some". Let me give a small example here, for me personally i don't like the program "Rakhi ka swayamvar". I can't stand the program not even for a frame! So did i go and file a PIL? No, i just flip the channel. I've more important things in life to do than file a PIL on a stupid program! I think the grown ups who understand simple logics can understand what i am saying here.!!!

Well, if the People are really worried about the future of our culture then let me put it this way. It's upto the people of older generation to provide knowledge to newer generation on consequences! And it is upto the individuals to chose what's good or bad for them. Culture cannot be forced. It needs to be coming from the heart.

Pulsar Mania! #!@#!

I was happy as well as sad reading this a couple of weeks ago!

Lets go back about 2 and half years in time. It was 2nd week January 2007. After selling my old Yamaha Rx-100 off which i had fond memories. It was emotional thing for me to buy a bike that was easily in the power segment then in the Indian market. The choice was simple as I'm not a guy who likes bikes with a lot of fairings. You know what i intend to say here basically ;) Sorry ZMA fans leave me alone!! Well, a walk into the Bajaj showroom in Udupi was just to select the color of the bike rather than to make up the decision on engine size! I asked the customer exec there if Bajaj is planning on a much more powerful bike too soon? To this his reply was an absolute solid NO! Ah! there, he made things simple for me and thinking so i made my choice of a gleaming red Pulsar 180. I got the delivery one week later on 24th Han 2007! All happy for the next 3 or 4 days being the proud owner of then new in market features of digital speedo and LED tail lamps i was in for a shock when i discovered that a 200cc Pulsar has been launched! Only i know how i felt cheated on this news! ;) A month or so later, i was again putting on a wide grin or atleast i thought so when news of fork damages in the new Pulsar 200's started pouring in. Then Bajaj it seems declared a free replacement of the defective forks in 200's. Everything became quiet for some time later a P220 came! And i had no words to explain the sheer joy i felt riding a friend's p220.

And now almost 2 and half year later the all success bike which sold in volumes has been phased out! It's shocking for me. But then the bussiness stand point of Bajaj is understandable. As bajaj has this! Wow! I'm craving to buy the new p220! I would love to beat the shit out of the guys in ZMA's ;) Ah! a la 21 PS engine. I wonder what is stopping guys in Bajaj from rolling out a 30 PS with a 350 something cc engine. I would love to ride this bike as any biking enthu would. :)

But bajaj, if you are listening... please keep the bike styling naked.... please.... It's a request!

Yamaha did the right thing here by bringing out the Fazer 150! Basically people who want style can buy this nothing other than a cosmetic FZ 16!! And hell yes with a fat prize! I don't think it is worth it. Well, thats my opinion ;)

Hail Schumi!

Ah! I'm thrilled at this. I don't have any expectations of podium. But its sheer joy to see the man drive... :) And what could be better than in a Ferrari F1 machine. :) For now the news itself is very sweet on my ears. Another Schumi era to begin... atleast for a short duration. :)  

Some Chords...

If you have a guitar and would like to try some of the bollywood numbers, try this link... :)
It's fun.

Up and running...

Except for a few new comments here in this space nothing much has changed in last couple of months. And now today thanks to one of my friend i decide to post here in this space once in a while or whenever i can. I hope this time around i won't stop abruptly like last time... So, to new beginnings :)

The End...

I've decided to bring blogging to an end for now. It's not the lack of topics that I'm forced to take this decision. But it is the lack of motivation to write about things that i do feel like which has more to do with this decision. To take time off everyday to think and write about things that i want to say every day takes a bit of motivation and effort and I don't have it anymore in me to continue here. So here it ends (at least for now) very close to the day from where i started off an year ago...

Thanks to everyone who has been reading my blog all these days and taking time to comment in this space.... :) 

And i think I'll not delete this space for a while and the contents would still be available.... but you can stop refreshing this page for newer blogs as nothing new is gonna appear in this space.. ;)

Beware of what you blog!

Well, check this piece of news which throws some light on how things could take a turn if your blog content or view is not liked by some one!
Bloggers can be nailed for views-India-The Times of India

Happy blogging fellas! :)

WoW!

These particular lines from Elizabeth Stone impressed me.

“Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It
is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your
body.”

Well, I actually liked the second sentence. It does mean so much. The first sentence as of now is irrelevant to me. ;) I know this post would invite some raised eyebrows but then i would like you to take it in the right spirit. :)

Configure Google Talk account in iChat!

There are n number if sites which says something similar. And the google site too says this. I wanted to configure my iChat with the Google talk ID i've. Unfortunately, all i was able to see after configuring and trying to connect was a dialog box saying "Unable to connect to host talk.google.com". No progress! And after n searches on the net regarding the same, i was unable to login to my jabber  account in gtalk through iChat. Finally a friend of mine did rescue me when he told me to try 443 port. Thanks to Shivanand! The port 5223 somehow fails to  work in my office network. I'm not sure what would be the reason. Anyways, i thought i would put it up here in my blog.

Critic's obsessed with Indianess?

Just found this when i was blog trotting. What this post says is something that i definitely would like to write here again. But then i would not be able to write it again that nicely and so you better read it from source. :)
Wonder what's wrong with all the critics! Every other person has a right to critic a work but then totally ignoring out the work of an artist is not good way to critic too! I loved the movie Slumdog millionaire. The script is something that was very different and written beautifully. Not at any point in the whole movie did i want to stop watching it. Basically what would be a good movie? One that entertains you and walks you along it's run time without boring you. And this movie does exactly that. And i can't understand why people can see only bad things about it! After all what the movie shows is true!
I find a comparison for this instance with an instance in the recent past where Mr.Aravinda Adiga's book won the Booker's. Though the story was well written, most of the critics (from India) found the book was showing India in bad light! Well, i didn't find anything like that when i read the book. Whatever i read were the things that i could find, see or experience here in my nation.
Every single thing has goodness and badness attatched to it... so why do we express such deep anger on things that are portrayed in print or media which actually are real and factual! Probabaly it's hard to accept or is it ignorrance? I'm confused! And the best part is, all these critics finally become more famous and important than the person who actually has done the work which was criticed!! He he he... I see irony...

Fridays become expensive!

The employer I'm working for has declared four working days as off days in February this year. All the Fridays in this month to be observed as a off day. And these 4 days will actually be deducted from employee's earned leave account. Yea, it's holiday literally but then that's not the end of it. I've to pay for it as well ;) BTW, now i have all the time in the world to blog. :)

With all the letters in the word recession being clearly visible to everyone, our management decided to cut some operating costs. And with the down trend likely to continue in the near future, it seems we need to slow down a bit on what we are doing. I wish everything improves for good but nothing seem to take a positive turn in the economy graph as of now. :( It's been negatively positive year till date.

Let me see how to utilize these extra leaves to the best... ;)

Another year for me...

Ah! Today i complete 26 years of my life on this planet. Only change in me as a person is in my external appearance from last year as i see is I'm a little lighter than what i was an year ago.. :) Hehehe... must have to do with all the hair i've lost on my head ;)
I know I'm blogging less these days. Lemme see how can my posting rate be improved in another month. Right now I'm tied down with a lot of work at office and Guitar learning sessions at home... :)

A post after a while...

This blog of mine has been silent for a long long time now. Never been this silent from the day it started. It surprises me that i could actually not post anything here for some time now. Am just back from my trip to a lovely place called Hampi. (Will do a separate post for this later)

And for the blaming part of why not posting anything at all for all these days could well be part of this big propaganda from the weather god to suddenly make mornings very cold in Bangalore. And that I'm not used to it i got a little less of my free time in a day than usual. Ah! now i am happy that i do have reason to stop feeling bad that i could not write something here in this place for a while now. Truth be said and it was only work at office piling up from day to day that kept me in terrible or no mood to write up anything and make a post here.

Traveled home for 10 days in the end of December. Met up with a lot of friends and family whom I've not met in a while now. Had a nice time speaking to them. One of my very good friend got married. And it's becoming so common now with every other person who is single and that i know off are getting married. It becomes a huge get together of sorts. :) Other than that all i did was watch some movies.
 
Read 2 books. One was "Netherland" from Joseph o'Neil and the second was "Moth smoke" from Mohsin Hamid. Though reviews for Netherland were good, i did not find the read interesting enough. The story was bit of a drag. The other book "Moth smoke" was interesting and short like the author's second novel which was also short and worth a read.

Started to play one of the instruments that i always loved to hear. After some confusion initially i gave learning Guitar a go. I mean i cannot always contemplate as to whether i would continue taking lessons after the initial excitement sinks. I mean, if i always stay fighting myself, when would i learn. So here i am practicing it religiously everyday now. Though it's too early to comment if i would continue to have this amount of interest all through but i would say i feel so much at peace now since the day i held the box guitar and plucked the strings.

A major disappointment for me was not not being able to procure a Macbook. The friend of mine who actually promised to buy it for me before he comes down from US actually couldn't do it for me. Fortunately for him and unfortunately for me, his stay was extended this Jan. And my wait continues. Not sure if this will take some more time.. but my patience definitely is short lived in this regard.  

As to say this was not all the disappointment i had during this month, our cricket team did loose 2 very important league games.Now i am not reasoning why we lost. I did bat well in couple of matched but not so good enough that i could win matches single handed for my team. Now i can understand how difficult it must for someone like Sachin Tendulkar to have a billion anticipation on him during a match! So literally we are now out of the contention to pass to the next round. But we do have a league match left to be played next weekend. And hope we win it for some consolation. ;) Who knows this might be the last match we play for a while now as our last year's budget is exhausted and this year seems to be tough for the company in terms of revenue. This makes it very possible that our cricket budget be denied this year.. :( Sad but good if it saves some money for the company for real. :)

Well, i need to warn you before i log out... for people who have not watched "CC2C", kindly do not watch it. It's a blunder of epic proportions. I feel sorry for the people who have already watched it in theatre.. My heartfelt condolences for you... ;)

200 crores for a ...!

I'm amazed to read this now! 200 crores of rupees made by the movie since it's relase not even a month ago! Phew! While the actual movie from which this was "inspired" (like most bollywood movies these days are inspired from hollywood) made probably only so much world wide! Ah! I loved watching the Memento! I'm probably not watching Gajini for now. I'm just happy listening to the songs which are just awesome. :)

I wonder what would have happened to this movie if someone other than Amir Khan was in the lead role! Interesting isn't it?