Gandhi

And today’s sketch is Mahatma Gandhi…

Reality shows

The other day my room-mate and I were discussing the reality shows. We wondered how the participants of reality shows get so many days off from their work in order to participate in these absurd shows (neither of us had any idea!).

Anyway, today I found this gem:

[In response to the question: "Have you ever seen 'American Idol'?"]
“No, I have never watched it. But I’m thankful we’re living in a world where we can actually afford to waste your time. What a great thing that is.”

— Arlo Guthrie, “Questions for Arlo Guthrie,” The New York Times Magazine

Bing

The new search engine, oops I mean the decision engine by Microsoft has been in market for 2 months now. I haven’t tried it yet. The simplest reason being, my Mozilla Firefox doesn’t have it as an option in the tiny search window at the top. Though I have doubts that I will use it even if I had the option. I am a loyal Google user.

My loyalty to Google is multifold. On the superficial level, Google is a Mountain View company (again I use the phrase: it’s in my backyard.). It provides free wi-fi to the entire Mountain View town. Then the founders of Google are Stanford Alumni. And Google treats it’s employees really well. It’s a dream company even though it’s not from my field.

On the deeper level, lies my abhorrence towards Microsoft. We all know how Microsoft treats us when it’s the major holder of the market: remember the way they forced Windows Vista on us? Google, on the other hand, started as a small company that came up with an amazing search engine and provided it for free and still earned money. Almost all the products from Google are available free of cost: Google Earth, Blogger, Gmail, Google Search engine, Picasa, Google reader, Google Videos (except the premium version of Google Earth, everything else is available free). Even the products like Google Earth and Picasa are free!

But in all fairness, I haven’t tried Bing yet. And Microsoft did have a few policy changes in recent time, like providing Windows Live Writer for free. So may be I should give Bing a try and then reject it. Oh Yes, I am pre-disposed to reject the product. I am heavily biased when it comes to Google. Can’t help it!

Princess Diana

At least now I can tell you who I was trying to sketch. She is not perfect but she does come close, don’t you think?

 

 

Dreams

Have I ever mentioned that I have an over-active imagination? Especially when it come to dreams. I have had dreams like a movie and movies like dream. At times my dreams have sequels. No kidding. I have had dreams that were continuation of a previous dream. And at times they are so real that they feel like a forgotten memory in my waking hours.

Anyway, the point of the post (or the point of my current pointless rambling): for past few days I have been dreaming about snakes. Now I don't have any special affinity or animosity with snakes unlike cockroaches or mosquitoes (I have inexplicable urge to kill them whenever I spot one). So I have no idea about reason behind my subconscious’ sudden fascination about snakes.

Anyhow, I am dreaming about snakes these days and I remember, from my superstitious days, that dreaming about snakes means I will get some money. And since I have got any so far, I called up my mom to confirm the superstition. As it turns out dreaming about snake isn’t enough, you need to be bitten by them in order to get that money. Now this goes against all my instincts. My subconscious won’t allow it (thankfully). In all my dreams so far I have been trying very hard not to get bitten by a snake. I duck, I run, I scream, I hide and once I even exorcised in order to avoid getting bitten by one of those snakes. Yes that’s right, exorcism. It was actually a rather interesting dream which involved my whole family and Sridevi’s character from the movie Nagina. Basically, in my dream, she possessed my mom (like exorcist possession). My family and I were trying to get rid of her (no laughing. It was a very serious thing when I was dreaming it.). And finally I (the heroine of my own movie, er, I mean dream) was able to exorcise her out of my mom. Though before she went she said that she will be back and take her revenge on me. I am still waiting for the sequel.  

In any case, no snake-biting again so no money. Poor me! Guess I should get back to work and earn it instead of dreaming it. :)

Ta da…

… and all that. I am finally done and here is the new look. Oh wait! I never mentioned I was working on new template. Well I had been working on this for past week.

I was tempted to use the freely available templates but somehow they weren’t personal enough so I tried my hand on making my own. So here it is. Will appreciate your comments…

Weekend doodling

After a long long long time, I picked up my pencils again. Wasted a lot of papers before I got back some of my rhythm. I know its far from perfect and may be should be allowed on the net but nevertheless here is one of the product of my weekend endeavors. Don’t ask me who I was trying to sketch. You won’t believe me if I told you!

Indians…

Cute, isn’t it? May be you have already seen it but I just discovered it so I had to post it!

Reminds me of this song:

Hum logon ko samajh sako to samjho dilbar jaani
Jitna bhi tum samjhoge utni hogi hairaani

Apni chhatri tumko dedein kabhi jo barse paani
Kabhi naye packet mein bechein tumko cheez puraani
Phir bhi dil hai hindusatni, Phir bhi dil hai hindustani

(Understand us if you can
More you will try, more surprised you will be

We will give you our umbrella when it rains
And at times we will try to sell old stuff in new package
But still our heart is Indian)… Or something to that effect

Joke from 1930s

And it is pretty good one:

Teacher - “Johnny, what's the difference between a battle and a massacre?”

Johnny - “A battle is where whole lot of whites kill a few Indians, and a massacre is where a lot of Indians kill a few whites.”

Laughter Quota

Few people have amazing sense of humor. The person I am talking about today is the best when it comes to it. He has always been able to crack me up. So when I found his profile on Orkut, I had to go through the profile. It ws a pretty succinct and straightforward profile. So I clicked to the professional tab. You know where you need to write about which High School or college (the name of school or university as St. Ann’s or IIT) you attended, your occupation etc.

It contained one line:

High School: Passed

I donated blood…

...on last Friday. I know this is a belated post but I had been very busy this week. Add to it, the post-blood donation weakness... well long story short, I didn’t have much time this past week.

But honestly donating blood is an exhilarating experience. I have been jumping up and down since then. And then my hemoglobin level is 14.1, way above then it has ever been in my life. So I am happy. :) (That’s for the biggest smile ever..)

P.S.: 1. I lost my original stickers (another reason why this post is so late) so I took some artistic liberties to make these ones up.

2. Filling up their questionnaire, I realized I am so glad I am not a gay guy. It’s virtually impossible for them to donate blood.

Weekend Discovery

Although I have often said, I hate driving but it does come with it’s own perks. Like exploring the town one lives in. Last time when I took out my car on a whim, I discovered Japanese Tea garden in San Francisco. Today, I discovered something  much closer to home. In fact, one can say this beautiful place is literally in my back yard and I didn’t know about it. I have been living in this place for past 5 years. I have passed the gate to the Shoreline Lake quiet a few times but always thought it is a private property.

 

Last week while browsing through the internet (I think I was searching for Bird sanctuaries in Bay area) I discovered about Shoreline Lake. So today I gave it a try and was pleasantly surprised. Luckily we had a beautiful weather today. Not too hot, not too cold. Just perfect. There were clouds in the sky (it rained for 45 seconds, I think) which made for few interesting shots...

And these were just the places I could cover by walking (I still have restriction when it comes to walking). I couldn’t go to kite flying area. And since it was cloudy, I didn’t stay for sunset. I think I have found a new haunt and I will be returning there frequently.

 

 

P.S.: Okay, I admit it. I love Windows Live Writer. More specifically, I like the way I can change the layout and borders (Photopaper for the photographs here) for the photographs. Result: this post. I suck at writing travel post or any kind of formal post. Hope you at least like the photographs...

FB

A friend of mine on Facebook “wonders why developers insist on naming things using acronyms. Is there an advantage to calling a file FFFPSICQP.cpp?”  :)

I cried

watching this…

http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/showbiz/2009/07/07/sot.paris.jackson.aeglive

A daughter saying goodbye to his father. Initially I heard it on radio and it touched me and then I saw the video...

Block

Yet another writer's block, I guess. I had three unfinished draft in my list at the moment including the one of Michael Jackson's death and the one on Delhi HC decision on section 377 of Indian Penal code. The third draft was on nonsensical scale called BMI for measuring body fat. But they didn't make it to the light of the day on time and so now I have bidden them a final farewell.

Hopefully this post will break the curse and I will be back in the game. Keep your fingers crossed...