My Thoughts !

Took it Ravi's Digicam. It didn't support B mode. So kept the camera in the lowest possible speed and shot a bus speeding up near my apartments. One of my teammates didn't believed that it was shot here in India. She was so sure that it was a photo of some sort of a bullet train, that I shot when I was in US :-)

Forget the techie blogs and the regular life blogs. Here are a list of blogs that I read which are different and stands away from the crowd:

http://sifybroadband.blogspot.com - This says all bad things about Sify broadband. Although I experienced problems on the very next day of installation, I really don't think its that bad

http://drive.blogs.com/driveblog - All about cars and bikes in India

http://www.gizmodo.com - The gadgets blog. All about crazy things which you don't see in your normal life.

http://insertfunnyname.blogspot.com - A group blog by two people called Aarthi and Sriram. Interesting.

http://gmailgems.blogspot.com - Not updated for a long time :-( Talks about gmail, gmail and gmail :-)

http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com - A blog by a gal from Baghdad. I really suspect whether she (!) is really in Baghdad. Nevertheless, its damn good.

http://journeywoman.rediffblogs.com - This has not been updated for almost an year. Still its the best life blog I've read.

No! not with a gun, but with a camera. The fact is I don't shoot people much as I shoot other objects. With a passion on photography, I've been thinking of having a digital album. Couldn't get time to scan all my negatives. (yeah, I'm the laziest idiot you can ever imagine) One day I'll do it. Meanwhile, I'm trying to upload a few of my best shots, with whatever I have in digital form.

Keep looking at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/grprakash

Firefox. The Ultimate browser, which is going to beat IE soon. The story of firefox is impressive. When AOL decided to abandon Netscape, due to its tie up with M$, it created a consortium and opensourced it. The developers initially didn't even have funds to create a website for it. When they sent a mail across to asking for funds, it flooded in. They went ahead and created a brand new cross-platfrom rendering engine Gecko and started developing apps above it - a browser, mail client etc. The browser was aptly named as Phoenix, but then as it been a brand of another software, they changed the name to firefox. Yes, it rocks.

I decided not to install firefox at office, as the free disk space is just around 100 MB. But got net @ home and first thing is to install is Firefox. One of the primary reason is security. It doesn't support any ActiveX fundas and so lot more safer than IE. I'm starting using it and while gazing some blogs, saw some funny looking orange icon in the right bottom. Later I found that when a site supports RSS syndication, it denotes like that. Clicking on it, you can add the site as Live Bookmark, which turns your browser into a RSS aggregator. Wow. Cool!!! I tried several tools for RSS tired of everything, I left using it. Now I've to rediscover it. Surprising, blogger supports it by default, and now my blog is also RSSed in my bookmarks. Another big surprise was Gmail also had an RSS feed !!! So now I don't need Gmail Notifier at all, I've added it to my bookmarks I've to click on the bookmarks for new mails without going to Gmail site.

Another cool feature is 'Find in Page'. When I pressed Ctrl+F I was looking for a small window to popup to find some text in the page. It didn't turn up. I was about to file a bug then noticed a small find bar about the status bar. It highlights the words in the page automatically, when I started typing in. Another cool feature !!! It works in the source view also.

Almost all of the sites, I browse, supports firefox. It has plugins for most of the needs - from Acrobat to real player. Its nearing 10 million downloads. Impressed much by this browser, now I've added a link for spread firefox in my blog. So don't stay back. Get firefox and rediscover the web :-)

At last!!!!!! I couldn't believe that I'm blogging from my own PC at home :-) I was looking for a net connection since I bought this comp on Jan 2003!!! When I asked Sift at that time, they told no connections in my area. Touchtel & other DSL connections require a phone connection, so obviously they were rejected. I tried iquara. Again no connections @ velachery. I gave up. Last sunday when I was in Food world saw Sify stall. They said its now available in Velachery and already they have a switch in my apartment. Wow. Signed up immediately. Today they came and installed it. One Sify guy and two more guys from the franchisee cable company came. It took them around 2 hrs to install the cables. When I asked them whether they want tea, they politely refused. They I've to change the question: would you want tea or coffee? they were now hesitant. I said ok I'll prepare coffee and without expecting answer, I went an prepared. When they finally finished and were ready to leave, to my surprise, they didn't ask any tips. I asked Ravi, how much shall we give. We decided to give 100 bucks totally. When Ravi gave them the money, they refused to get it !!! I don't know whether they have strict rules not to get anything, but that was quite surprising. People normally expect tips for doing these kind of stuffs and usually I wont give any. These guys came @ 8.00 in the evening and when they completed it was around 10.30 and sure they have not had their dinner yet as they come directly after completing an installation in another block in our same apartments. I was impressed by the way they behaved and talked and more importantly the way they worked. Despite this, they refused to get any tips. mmm. no words to say :-)

The speed of the net is not so satisfying. Infact very less than office. As per the scheme, there will be no net during day time, but then browsing is legal and can keep the IE window open without any fear :-)

I remember, in my college days, we had a paper and a lab on Television! The staff was explaining the class about how the degauss in the picture tube and a button for that. Nazir, the witty guy of our class, was telling, "if you can't avoid a bug, keep it button and name as a feature. looks like the marketing guys of the TV company are intelligent". Forget the TV companies. Look at Apple. First they introduce a hard disk based player. Following it enormous success, they plan to introduce a memory stick based player. They created it under the same brand and named it as iPod Shuffle.

The interesting thing is while every other memory stick based players push in every available feature, they removed every feature in it. Except, play, pause, forward, rewind buttons, the only other button is Power On. Clever. They removed the display. Wonder how the use will select the song? Well, they can't. The player will arbitarily load a song and play. Its keeps on playing the songs in Shuffle Mode. They removed the display and saved some $ and they save more $ by having no functionality for managing playlists, selecting the songs etc, and call the shuffle mode as a feature. The intelligent idea is that they stress that its the important feature in the product.


The another nice product from Apple is the brand new Mac Mini.





At $600, its very tempting me to buy. I've fallen in luv with Mac when the first time I worked in it. Let me see, whether I get it or still wait till some G* cube, which is affordable. Of the G* things, G4 was the cutest one. G5 is also ok & its the latest. May be I'll get a G9 or G10. The Mac Mini is called BYODKM - Bring Your Own Display, Keyboard and Mouse. Mac enthusiastics already started a website called byodkm.net :-) Just like the Apple guys, the apple devotees are also crazy. Don't think so? Look at the iPod Shuffle Jewellery:



The funniest thing is not that just the fans are crazy. Even the people from the opposite gang also !!! Look at this pic:

For a long time, I've been looking at the hoardings on the road on. They have improved a lot now-a-days. Lot of creative work is put in them. Recently, I'm looking at the ones by Pondi Tourism all along the ECR. They express Pondi as a silent, slow and relaxing place where one can rejuvinate. The ones that I like very much:

• A watch & one arrow pointing to hour needle saying Chennai & the other arrow pointing to the minute needle saying Pondi
  
• WeekENDS at Pondichery (yes, here is where I suttified for the blog title)
  
• www.pondichery.calm
  
• PONDissssssHERY
  

The last two are displayed on the other side, so you see them when you come towards chennai

• Traffic jam? take a U turn
  
• You can always come back next weekend
  

Apart from the pondi ones, I simply luv the Kuber Jewellery one, which is kept in the Cathedral road - Mount road junction. There are three reasons for me to like it:

1. Asin looks great in the 1st picture :-)
   
2. Asin looks great in the 2nd picture :-)
   
3. Asin looks great in the 3rd picture :-)
   

Ha. That was a wonderful day. Actually during the afternoon got pissed off with the code and stuff. By 5PM, left the office and directly went to my cousin's home and was playing with her kids. Called up guys and decided to go somewhere. By 7PM I left her home and went to sub-juns home. Hema, Yuva, Sandilya darling, Arun & Ashok joined me. Called up Vetti Prabhu but he said he is celebrating the new year with his school friends. 'Good' I said 'I don't have to see your face on the first day of an year' :-)
Initially we decided to go to some resort in ECR. Only calling up we came to know that the Collector has ordered all the ECR resorts not to conduct any kind of functions during New Year's Eve. So after a long discussion we went to Radha Park Inn for a dinner. Sadly Sandilya's dad called him and asked him to come back home as he has to donate blood for some urgent need. I did miss him :-( As the ball room was bit costly, we decided just to have dinner in the restaurant. Luckily when we went there it was 9.30 PM and since there is no much crowd in one of the ball rooms, they brought down the prices. So we are in!
The food was not so great, not up to the normal Radha Park Inn standards, but decent. There were few games and a dance performance by an externa group and of course they opened the dance floor for everyone. We were enjoying with those games, dances and everything - esp. teasing Hema for his new "venture". He has to leave by 11.30 as his mom was alone. Surprisingly we got a call from Vetti Prabhu, for saying a HNY. When we asked where he is, he replied, Radha Park Inn !!! Hmmm. Fate. We have to see him on New Year :-( He was in the bar with his school mates.
We came out and was thinking where to go. We decided to go to Marina. We drove to Marina only to find out every other inch a police man was standing and guarding the entire beach road. No one was allowed to go to the beach. We were stopped by the police, as we didn't booze, we didn't have any problem. We could see many people like us were coming in bikes and cars and going away with dissappointment. No place to wander after that. So straight away we went home. It was almost 3. Went bed and welcomed New Year :-)

As per my original plan, I'm supposed to leave Chennai last week itself with few of my teammates. First to Hyd to my PM's home then to pune for a big trekking and from there a good drive till Mumbai in the Pune-Mumbai high way then back to Hyd. While others leave Hyd, I stay there for 2/3 days till new year and celebrate the new year there. All cancelled. With a big face I've to go the staition and cancelled my tickets alone. So decided to stay back. Now the guys are back and telling long stories and I've missed all the fun, adventure and exp :-(

Hell with the deadlines.Today there is a code cut and I've quite a lot to complete. So I've to stay back. Now that I'm really happy because earlier what was thought that could not be completed, has been completed. This kind of happiness & work statisfaction is something that you rarely get and its worth trading for the fun and adventure I guess. Now after completing the official work, I'm blogging nearly after a month!!

Meanwhile, till this time there is no plan for the celebrations. First I've to take my bike from service. Last time when I left it for service, they called me up and said that 'Bike is ready; the amt you have to pay is xxx; you can take it'. Wow the customer care is good, but I was in a middle of a meeting. This time surprisingly I got an sms!! Thats cool. Customer care is improving in India. I'm about to leave and take my bike and go to my sis home. After that either its should be a booze party in my home/ just a dinner at my sub-juns home. Nothing decided. I'm yet to write few blogs about my past experiences in Silent Valley, Earth Quake, Tsunami etc. Will write it next year and post it. Till then Happy New Year :-)

When we were in Pondi some time back, I was telling guys, 'how about a big trip with more people during this yearend?' People, including me, thought that its hard to gather more people. But somehow we made it to wayanad as a 2 day trip. 23 people from people from Chennai, Salem, Palakkad, Bangalore & Hydrabad gathered at one place after two and a half years. Its simply funtastic.

Right from the Central Railway Station, the fun started. Everybody was teasing everyone else. We expected Srihari will be late as usual and miss the train. Luckily he came in to the train in the right moment - unfortunately to the wrong compartment :-)

When we reached Calicut, we were looking for the vehicles booked. Actually we were 16 and I booked a 18 seater. Unfortunately they couldn't get it and so they arranged for a 11 seater and a qualis for the same rate of 18 seater. We have to split up in two vehicles for from Calicut till Wayanad. No other go, so I went for it. When the driver picked up us in the station and led us to the parking lot. He said "this is the vehicle you can get it". "What!" I said. When they said 11 seater I expected a tempo traveller. What was there was a brand new Chevy Tavera with factory fitted Ac. "Wow. Thats cool!".

It took 2 hrs to reach the resort. From Pookad Lake, we have to take a different road to reach the Vythiri resort. Ok. It was not a road - just a path. The 4 kms was bad. Vythiri resort was cool. It was in the midst of natural surrondings, a small spring was running inside the resort spitting it into two halves. The only way to go to the other half was thru a hanging bridge. They have cleverly arranged the resort. In one half they had the reception, the rooms and the play ground. The other half had the restaurant, coffee shop, indoor games, swimming pool etc. So you have to go in the bridge quite a few times. I can see some kids staying there were exicted when they cross the bridge. Why kids? Even few of us were! They were so exicted & was very particular in taking photos in the bridge so that they can show it to their teammates!

One thing without which the blog wouldn't get complete is Sakthi and camp fire. He talked for around 2 hrs and everybody else was listening. He was teasing everyone in a round robin fashion. No one could talk anything against/with him. That was fantastic show and no one can even imagine doing like that. The touching punch dialog to him was 'nee ponnu parkum pothu ethum pesathada, apuram unakku kalyaname aagathu'.

The next day we went to the Pookad Lake and spent around 3 hrs up there. First we went for a walking and then we went for boating too. While walking I went to the place where I've scribbled my name on the moss. Last time when I went there with my team, it was rainy season and it was so greeny. Now all that got dried up and it was brown in color. I can see my name still. The surprising thing was there were lot of names written on that. Ha! I have lot followers :-)

On the whole the entire trip was fun. The place was good. The food was neat. We all had a great time together - that the most important point. We Chennai guys ended up travelling around 15 hrs for the destination and the Bangi guys spent just 6 hrs and hence spent less. Additionally on the way back they visited Mysore too. Next time I should select a place which is near the Chennai :-(