Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Power cuts

With no rains in the places where it has to rain, the power production in the state (and states like TN and MP) has dropped. The result is power cuts.

We talk about India moving towards a newer industrialized economy. But the monsoons coming on time is a question of Rs.9000 Crores. That's the impact of weather.

Wake up citizens of India! Let's do the rain dance.

UPDATE: I did a few quick rain dance moves here (with fellow concerned pseudo environmentalists here at the office), the rain god is pretty pleased and it is raining here in Bangalore. Hope it is raining elsewhere too. We need the power and the water. But I will not have a nice trip back home :-(

Michael Jackson

The beat, the music, the voice....there was only one, Michael Jackson, a legend that passed away and left millions of people with tears in their eyes..

Well I have been listening to non-stop Michael Jackson...I guess many of us are doing the same....What a genius and what a loss to the world of Music. Off the Wall -> Thriller -> Bad -> Dangerous -> HIStory The last four albums happened right in front of me (unlike the Beatles or Jimi Hendrix or Led Zep )..... Really felt sad. He was a good guy and not many of his songs needed skimpy dressed women....I really would like to remember MJ as the King of Pop who also expressed his music through the moves and passion rather than the mess of his later days...I disliked all the forwards which showed his degenerating and changing look.....RIP MJ...I will always be your fan....

Current song :- not as well received as the other ones

Friday, June 26, 2009

MJ

MJ is no more. The news is there everywhere, but I felt like saying it. The first English song I ever heard was in 3rd std "Beat it" by MJ. One of the last few remaining great icons in music industry.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Personal E-mails

have almost become inconsequential now. All I get on a daily basis are promotions from banks, updates from subscription sites. The rest and majority of the new mails are Spam. This truly wasnt the case 3-4 years ago.. is this part of the growing old phenomenon??? or the effect of social networks, mails, chats and cheaper tele-communication costs??

If so, this sucks .. there is nothing to look forward on the e-mail..

I am currently secluded, sitting in a cubicle staring the mountain and thinking about methanol ( well actually ..not even that.. the priority is more like how will I spend the next 3 long hours.. ) and soon I will not even have a neighbour (due to the redesign in the office)

I think I need to get back on facebook/twitter and reconnect to the world......
ps:- looking fwd for the dinner today.. hebbar's going back to blore in a week..thats quite sad.. one sould who looked spirited enuf to stick to the stressful hk world.. will miss him around...

Some Science News blogging

In the wake (or rather the laze) of the afternoon hour I present you my dear reader, this piece of information. What are the latest "sciency" stuff happening around :-

#1
Scientists have found that if you want to get someone to do something, ask them in their right ear. Known as the 'right ear advantage,' scientists believe it is because information received through the right ear is processed by the left hand side of the brain which is more logical and better at deciphering verbal information than the right side of the brain. 'Talk into the right ear you send your words into a slightly more amenable part of the brain,' say researchers.

Keep that in mind. OK. I repeat it, in your right ear. And next time do not bother whether the right ear has more wax than the left ear.

#2
Some other scientists are wondering how to greet an extra-terrestrial (link) ?
I remember the wonderful movie "Contact" when I saw this latest research topic-Interesting but hopeless in my opinion. Also I had interest on this topic sometime ago after seeing Contact and I had stumbled across the way Aricebo Message has been coded. This was a message which was sent into outer space with the hope that atleast 0.0000000000000001% chance somebody could decode this... The more interesting part was how it can be arranged to be decoded. Not sure whether such an intelligent life exists. In earth only we can take years together to decode such a signal

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Well, the lunch break is over at office and I sit here.The whole day you are busy attending meetings and teleconferences and all that and the work accomplished at the end of the day is NOTHING. Waaaaaaawww!!!

I remember the days when I used to blog with passion and keenness. Today I am blogging for the sole purpose of staying awake in front of this monitor. As I type this I am falling asleep, but I mind my spellings you see :-). The red spelling mistake lines marked by my browser are distracting.

I was thinking about Yograj Bhatt today morning. The Mungaaru Male director claims he has found out a method to generate electricity from the pressure of vehicles moving on the road. I am not making this one up. Check out Yograj Bhatt and his electric idea. How about having a broadband service based on the car horns ? Or heating water after starting a quarrel ?

Heheh, jokes apart this is a good idea at least for the movie.
Life goes on in the corporate circle. I shall wait for the afternoon coffee (and biscuits)

Saturday, June 20, 2009

Sat Evening Random ramblings

Sat evening and night means party to many people, but not me. I don't avoid it but I do not make an effort to party. Especially one of those days when I just am tired.

Today I did not have anything substantial as the morning was hectic and it is nice to stretch my legs on the bed with the faint hum of the ceiling fan and the muffled noise of a great dane letting out ocassional barks whose dB is less than the hum of the ceiling fan in my room. May sound boring, but it is relaxing at least to me :-)

The next week is undoubtedly going to be hectic and I will have to sleep a little less than usual, but I hope I can balance. Coming to the morning, it was well prepared shaavige paayasam and then the long tiring drive along the hebbal flyover which has kept me from going anywhere.

Nowadays I know about the various cosmetics which women use thanks to Ruchira :-) Multani Mitti is a kind of some powder (it is mud from Multan...lol) which is applied onto the face until it dries. I felt it is very very similar in texture and the characteristic smell of Gopi Chandana which is the stamped on our Madhva foreheads.

Meanwhile my folks are watching some crazy kannada movie called "Dheera" - The hero is Rockline Venkatesh. And somehow my dad is fascinated with his histrionics. I watched a little bit of the movie, but I felt that script can be best described as "simian".

Apart from that , got an opportunity to catch up with friends from Sasken. Wonderful times spent on a friday afternoon.

As I type this, I remember the ant massacre that happened yesterday. By the hit spray I might have killed thousands of ants, but frankly there were too many ants. I heard that there is a population explosion of ants post rains and I have to find a quick remedy for this apart from the Hit spray. One ant was about to enter my ear when I slept at night .

As I type these lines I remember this lyrics :-

There's an insect in your ear if you scratch it won't disappear
It's gonna itch and burn and sting
Do you want to see what the scratching brings ?

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Sunday, June 14, 2009

Phase in Space

Found this hilarious short story somewhere (the link is lost- i closed the tab).

------

Phase was lost. There was no question about it. At first, the jungle had seemed a nice enough place - full of interesting birds and animals, and lots of smokeable looking plants growing all around.
Now, four days later, the plants had all been too damp to light, the birds kept him awake at night and Phase had yet to encounter an animal which did not try to attack him. Scratch that. He had yet to encounter an animal which did not succeed in attacking him.
Now he was lost in an uninhabited, alien jungle on a far away planet in a completely parallel universe and those drums were driving him insane.
The impossibility of drumming in an unihabited jungle hit him about the same time as the spear-butt from out of the bushes to his left.
He awoke to find himself sat in a clearing surrounded by about four dozen young women wearing the sort of fur bikini that would have made Raquel Welch give up and go home.
He very carefully didn't pinch himself in case he was dreaming.
"Hello," he said, still quite dazed from the attack.
Several of the younger ones (aged around 18) took flight across the clearing towards the mud huts that surrounded it. "My God!" he thought "They look almost as good from that angle as they do from this"
The eldest woman there (23ish) looked him up and down.
"You are male?" She asked.
"You can't tell?" he replied, trying to keep the tremor out of his voice.
"All our men were killed several years ago in a bizarre accident involving a herd of Tortoise. Don't ask. We have spent the last few years searching the jungle for more men to help with the whole 'having children' thing."
Phase quietly resolved never to pinch himself again for as long as this lasted, just in case.
"So, when do I start?"
"Right away, if you like," said the tall brunette to his left.
Phase rubbed his hands with glee.
"The children are over here." Said a redhead.
Phase was confused. "Children?"
"Yes," informed a blonde, "We have more than enough men for the first bit. This jungle was full of tribes whose males were only too willing to volunteer. But we're much too busy having sex to raise the children ourselves, so any other men are assigned the task of looking after them."
The first girl took his arm. "Don't worry, the rest of your life will just fly by if you concentrate on changing nappies and not trying to escape in any way." She looked puzzled. "Why are you pinching yourself like that?"

Tuesday, June 09, 2009

Mmmmm

I have started traveling in a two-wheeler to the office, I save a lot of time. Mysore Road is like a maze with walls created by the buses and the lorries and it is for the 2-wheeler guys to figure the way.

It is an interesting game but I have started singing to myself as I ride my bike. Long time ago, I was a bathroom singer having soap operas but all that stopped I guess when I was in my 8th or 9th standard when I started to listen to the English songs. English songs are not hummable by me for some reason.

In a car I typically tune in to a radio station which gives me non-stop music and also non-stop jabbering by the ads and the rjs. But when your head is inside a helmet and you sing loud enough it is fun.

Today I recollect, I was singing many songs which brought me different memories.
Notable ones include Kehna Hai from Padosan, Tere Mere Sapney from the movie Guide, Sun Sun Zaalima from Aarpaar and Waqt ne kiya kya haseen sitam which reminded me of my maternal uncle.

And then I was humming Megha banthu Megha, Naliyutha from Dr.Rajkumar and some songs like Cheluve nanna Cheluve from the movie Suprabhaata ....

Life is a musical journey. There are highs and lows. There is the rhythm of time and every song begins and some songs stop abruptly and some songs fade away...Memory lingers on....