There's been a heat wave here in Northern India for the past week or so. It's been bad. Really bad. The maximum temperature recorded at Delhi on Saturday at 45 °C almost broke the June 1945 record of 46.7 °C. It was predicted that Sunday would be worse at around 46 deg. Some weather sites even predicted a maximum of 48 °C! Thankfully, that didn't come to pass and the temperatures seem to have stabilized now.
If you haven't been in these temperatures, then it's hard to imagine how bad it can. The heat just saps you of all energy. You’re drenched with sweat all day. It's too hot to even eat. You just don't feel like doing anything at all but sleep isn't an option because the touch of the warm sheets makes you feel even worse. Even a bath brings no relief; the water at 0600 in the morning felt as though it had been heated.
With such high temperatures, it's hard to imagine why anyone who has access to an AC and a fridge would not make full use of it. I imagine one would be hard-pressed to make them see the importance of saving power and making do with traditional methods of keeping cool and do their bit to save the environment. But I think it is these very sacrifices that can ultimately tip the balance in the fight against global warming.
Anyone who doubts the seriousness of global warming and thinks that it's all a big conspiracy should spend sometime in this blistering weather that seems to be here to stay, and give it second thought.
I've been ranting about the heat. But I spend almost all day in an air-conditioned office and only a few hours facing the wrath of the weather. I shudder to think how those who aren't as fortunate as us cope. The ones who contribute almost nothing to the decline of our ecosystems but bear the brunt of the aftereffects.
Scorcher
Handshake
Shaking hands is such a common act; we all do it often enough everyday. And yet, it's so hard to get right. It's an important part of your body language and it's supposed to show what kind of a person you are.
I always wonder, after every handshake, if I did it properly; if it portrayed the right ( or at least, a good ) picture of me. Was it too limp? Too firm? Too short? Too long? Too damp? Too rough? And shaking hands with members of the opposite sex ( read women ) is cause for even more anxiety; you don't want to crush her hand in a seeming display of your testosterone driven virility but neither do you want your hand to lay like a limp, dead fish in hers.
And just how many times do you shake? Twice is how much I tend to; though it seems just a wee bit short but then 3 seem too many! And I get really conscious if the shake goes on longer than 3. Some people just don't seem to let go ( read men )! They shake a couple of times...and then just hang on! It's just weird! I mean, the guy meets me, shakes my hand and starts talking about something and I'm not paying attention because, all the while in my head, I'm thinking, 'Umm. Hello? Can you let go, please? Right about now would be nice, thank you. I'd like my hand back dude!'. It makes me feel like one of those pairs of guys you see walking on the road, hand-in-hand. It's just such an un-manly thing to do! Not that I'm all into macho-posturing or against homosexuality. But that hand-in-hand walk is just so, girlie. It is. Really.
There's also thing I have about offering my hand first; I don't. I'm not quite sure why but I think it stems from the fear of rejection; I don't want the person to ignore my offer. But that often leads to situations where we're both clearly wondering if one of us will take the initiative and offer a shake but ultimately neither of us does. It gets a little awkward. Not quite as much as when someone offers a hand and the other person, quite innocently and with no malicious forethought, misses the gesture and then, does a double take on realizing what happened and tries to shake except now the first person isn't paying attention anymore. You get the idea.
But nothing can quite beat the weirdness having your hand shaken when you're not expecting it to be. My friend and I were walking out of our hostel when we met the warden walking in the opposite direction. We stopped and greeted him. He nodded and stuck his hand out pointing back towards the way we had come ( apparently he was about to mouth some sort of a question ); a gesture which I mistook for an invitation to shake hands and so, I grabbed his outstretched palm with great gusto and gave it a couple of shakes. He could only nod in his flabbergasted astonishment at being caught unawares and wonder silently, just what the hell was wrong with me!
Laptop Woes
I finally got my precious laptop back from the service center yesterday; after an agonizing wait of a week. But wait. I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me take you back to when it all began.
A couple of months back, the LCD panel on my laptop went dark. Turned out that the backlight had gone kaput and so it needed to be replaced. Luckily, I'd extended the warranty on my machine and so it was completely covered. I went over to the service center and got it looked over and placed an order for the new screen.
After about 3 days they called and told me I could come get it changed. So I went over, got the screen replaced and headed back home. At home I realized, to my horror, they had given me a standard, matte-finish screen and not the BrightView that I had had. So I called them and the guy was a little suspicious. I think he thought I was trying to get an upgrade for free. I told him that he still had my old screen and could check it out. So they placed an order for the new screen and I went and got the correct one this time.
After about a few weeks, the newly replaced screen started flickering. I went back to them and they kept the laptop under observation for a day and then got back to me and told me that this screen would also need to be replaced. Sigh! So I waited for a couple of days while they got the replacement and went back again to get it changed. Except, this time, they were sent the wrong part! And they didn't know when they told me to come over because they only opened it once I got there! Another 3 day wait followed before I, once again, reached the service center.
This screen lasted a fair bit lesser than the previous one; it started blanking out when I opened or closed the lid. To make things worse, my DVD writer seemed to be not burning DVDs. I tried out 4 DVDs before I decided it wasn't the software ( I'd recently reinstalled Windows ) and took it over to them to get it checked out.
They kept it under observation ( yes, again! ) for another day and then called me to say that the motherboard and the DVD writer would be replaced. I was thanking my stars I spent the extra 7k on the warranty! Finally, the parts arrived and I went over to get my laptop. I hurried back home so I could finally get back online after a week of forced abstinence.
About 15 minutes into surfing, the machine just powered off. Just like that. It didn't shutdown or anything. It just turned off. I turned it on again and this time within about 10 minutes, it did the same thing. I'd faced something similar with my desktop about a year back; the heat sink’s vents had been totally clogged with dust and the processor would overheat and just switch off. I suspected it was the same thing and so, downloaded SpeedFan, a nifty little utility, to track the temperature.
Sure enough, it started off alright, and then steadily climbed higher and higher till the machine powered off. Completely crushed, I took it back the next day, expecting them to order yet another set of parts. They kept it for observation but said I would probably be able to take it back that evening. So I waited. Evening came and I called them. They said it was fine and I could collect it. So I rushed right over and the technician told me that there had been dust in the heat sink and that he'd cleaned it up properly so there shouldn't be a problem anymore.
I took it back home and, well, it's still here :D So I guess all's well that ends well. Though, it wasn't, so bad without it. I got all my stuff done in time. And I got back to reading a few books; hadn't done any reading for a long while now. But I still missed it and the convenience and comfort of being able to sort my files and folders and just escape from the confines of reality into the limitless world of cyberspace.
Anonymity
But after a while, things got, well, a little boring. The whole deal of having no one know about my blog also meant that no one visited. The whole fantasy of people coming across it and marvelling at my literary skills and prowess with the written word began to fade fast.
So I told one person. And it stayed that way for some time. Then I happened to mention to another that I had a blog and they 'forced' the URL out of me. And then another and another and yet another. So now, a fair number of people have knowledge of the presence of my blog.
Which is good; but it also means that the original purpose of the blog is lost. I can no more write exactly how I feel and what I think; I have to tone it down a notch since these readers of mine also know, or can hazard a fair guess as to what/ who I'm ranting about and it may not sit well with all.
So what do I choose? Anonymity and the enormous power that comes with it? The means to write what I want, when I want, about whatever I want; all the while hidden safely behind the all protecting shield of my nom de plume? Or do I let everyone know who's behind the mask and let them feel compelled to reply and post comments so I can feel pleased with the fact that I do, in fact, have some readers and my pages are not relegated to the dusty, hard-to-reach, virtual upper shelves of cyberspace's library of innumerable blogs? Tough one.
And I'm not the only one who ponders this dilemma; I think all start out with the need to publish anonymously, moving on to the want to be read and finally reaching a crossroads where they must decide which way they want to head. Whether the desire to be heard outweighs the requirement to remain safely hidden in the shadows.
For the time being though, I think I'll be content with just a few, loyal subscribers of my prose while keeping my true identity a secret from the masses.
SMS Spk
Ppl cnt seem 2 difrntte btwn wen its alrite 2 use it n wen its absolutly 4biden. Ive seen ppl use it in apps n on thr blogs n jst about evrywhr dat dey employ da English language as a means of comm. It jst reeks of wannab-ness.
I no da language is evolving n changing wid tim. Ppl r even bng alwd 2 use dis 4m while writing exams n now u can rd ntire novels in dis 4m; its supposed 2 b a new, progressive 4m of literature. I never did get art n stuff.
Its nt dat its hard 2 decifer ( alrite, it is kinda ); I enjoy bng able 2 fathom wats bng said n occasionally its fun usng sum of da clvrer shrtnings of wrds; bt always? It jst seems so boorish n ilitr8.
Wid all dis incrse in bnwidth n dcrse in csts, ud tnk ppl wud tk da opportunity 2 b more verbose bt den life is often counter-intuitive.
For those of you who couldn't figure out what was written above:
You know what really irritates me? When people use sms-speak in situations that don't warrant it. In emails and in letters and other places. I've got nothing against shortening words and using acronyms; in SMSs, where they belong and help you save a few bucks or maybe every once in a while, while IMing to save time or just be quick.
People can't seem to differentiate between when it's alright to use it and when it's absolutely forbidden. I've seen people use in applications and on their blogs and just about everywhere that they employ the English language as a means of communication. It just reeks of wannabe-ness.
I know the language is evolving and changing with time. People are even being allowed to use this form while writing exams and now you can read entire novels in this form; it's supposed to be a new, progressive form of literature. I never did get art and stuff.
It's not that it's hard to decipher ( alright, it is kinda ); I enjoy being able to fathom what's being said and occasionally it's fun using some of the cleverer shortenings of words; but always? It just seems so boorish and illiterate.
With all this increase in bandwidth and decrease in costs, you'd think people would take the opportunity to be more verbose but then life is often counter-intuitive.
You Said It!
In America, you can kiss in public but not pee; in India you can pee in public but not kiss.
-Anonymous
From Contrapunto, The Times Of India Delhi issue dated 16 May 2007.
Soaps
"Right, so I've thought of a new direction that this episode is going to take the show. Those hour-long traffic jams really give my creativity a boost! I got today's story done in 10 minutes! Unfortunately, the material is worth that much airtime too. So, once again, lets fill up, let see, another 15, with inane dialogue that is offensive to the even the mildly rational, preachy, patronizing and, oh just so incongruous in today's world. How are we for glycerine? Because all the talk will bore the audience. Lots of weeping is the key to grabbing eyeballs and TRPs.”
“About 20 minutes would be advertisements. And let's have another 10 minutes of insane, roller-coaster-ride-like camera movements with lots and lots of zooming in and out; something that seems like we've let a drunken monkey loose with the camera on the deck of a boat in stormy seas. I want lots of rolling and pitching; I think it looks artsy. Don't you?”
“And of course we overlay that with those new synth-sounds we've been waiting to try out. We know that our major demographic is middle-aged housewives who have been found to have a low probability of having watched any science-fiction movies at all so they won't realize that our sound effects are a rip-off the latest space movie's epic war battle scene!”
“Oh, and let's not forget that we treat our audiences like a bunch of brain damaged retards and so let’s start with the usual 10 minute recap of the last episode's 10 minute story at beginning. We'll end with a climatic cliffhanger that'll keep the suspense till the next episode. All this stretching's got us at least 5 minutes over time so we can quickly end with no credits but just a splash screen of the production house, so that it looks like we had really great story that left us with no time for anything else! Alright! We're all set! Go team! Let's have another great shoot!"
Bah!
Colours
On the other end of the spectrum ( pardon the pun :D ) is white. White isn't a colour either. It is the complete opposite of black ( like you didn't already know that! ); it is the equal presence of all colours.
So the next time someone mentions that black ( or white ) is their favorite, you can sniff, turn your nose up in the air, look at them disdainfully and say, 'Well! That's not even a colour!"
Traffic Jams
My office is only about 6 kilometers away from home. It usually takes me 15 minutes; 10 on a good day. But today, it took me half an hour. And I travel by bike. That makes it possible for me to snake through the jam and ride on the shoulder of the road. Imagine the plight of four-wheeler drivers! Though, to be fair, they do have air conditioning!
The road that I take to work is, for the most part, in pretty good condition. There are two bottlenecks though. One, a crossing that is major in importance, but minor in road width. But it's just about manageable. But now, with the Delhi Metro coming here, they've encroached on about a quarter of the road. That takes away the buffer that we had and it's now perpetually jammed. Add to this the insanely long waiting times at almost all crossing and you'd understand why road-rage is on the rise.
The second bottleneck is the construction of a flyover. I can't begin describing why it's so messy and chaotic. The road handles most traffic between Noida and Delhi and also Greater Noida. Because of the construction there are detours all around and the roads that have been put to use for them are really narrow. So they too are perpetually jammed. And to top it off, today they closed off another turning that provided some respite at the crossing. It really doesn't make sense; the turning wasn't that close to the crossing so it didn't cause some idiot looking for a shortcut to cause a traffic snarl; and the traffic passing it is pretty light anyway so they could have easily managed to let all vehicles that wanted to go that way, pass. But no! They want to force everyone to the crossing so that everyone can enjoy the pain of a gridlock. Why must they ( the faceless, and apparently brainless, powers-that-be ) do things in such a senseless way? You'd think they lacked a basic understanding of how drivers work. Or perhaps they've never really driven a vehicle through one of these situations.
It's not completely their fault though. Most of the cars I see have just one person in them. Huge, hulking SUVs taking half the road's width with just one person. That is simply dumb. Jakarta has a solution to this though; it has a three-in-one rule which states that a car must have at least 3 passengers when traveling through the restricted zone. Pretty clever. Except that people are smarter. So now you have unemployed youth waiting at the start of the zone who will happily help you increase the occupancy of your vehicle. For a small fee of course. You get to drive through that area and they get paid. Everyone's happy!
Nigeria had another solution to their traffic problem in Lagos. On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, only cars that had registration numbers starting with an odd number could use the roads. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, it was the turn of the even numbers. Again, pretty ingenious, you'd think. Well, Lagos had a booming oil economy and that allowed people to buy second cars so that they had cars for both days! How do you like that?
London's got a hi-tech solution to this problem. They charge people who enter the congested zones a fee. The cars are photographed using cameras and software identifies the license plates and the motorists are charged once during the day, no matter how many times they enter or how long they stay.
India will probably not have anyway out of it's mess for a very long time since there is no way that either the people or the enforcers will go that extra mile to make sure that the rules are not broken. We'll probably just end up going the Jakarta or Lagos way and cheat our way out!
More:
Mininova
Originally, when I was told to visit Mininova for torrents, I went to Mininova.com. Except that was a scam site. Some guy was asking people for $100 to use Mininova.org, the actual site!
Anyway, a few days ago, they were able to win a court case ( you can read more about it here ) and acquired the Mininova.com domain name as well. So now if you visit http://www.mininova.com/, you'll be redirected to http://www.mininova.org/. Do visit it, it's good.
And if you don't find what you're looking for there, try Torrentz.com. It's not a site for torrents but rather, a search engine. It searches quite a few sites, including Mininova, Meganova, TorrentSpy, Snarf-It to name a few.
Happy downloading!
What's This Life For?
I've read so many places about Life's tenacity and it's uncompromising instinct to go on. But to what end? What is the reason for Life to exist? What is the object of it's 'being'? Isn't it pointless, at least for individuals, to fight for survival for the ephemeral time they spend alive? What do they achieve? The satisfaction of a life well-lived? And what defines if you've lived well? Culture? What good is culture in the grave? In fact, what good is culture when all you do in life is suffer? How can you appreciate anything if all you ever do is struggle to survive?
Why all the suffering that one has to go through? A lesson that life teaches you? In preparation for what? More suffering? And with what we're doing to our planet with our accomplishments and technological progress, it doesn't really seem worthwhile to continue or even consider producing progeny to come into a world of chaos, hunger, strife and war; because that is what I see the world heading towards. There will be no water, not enough food, inhospitable climes, lawlessness and anarchy; the scenario of so many movies and books that take a look at the future.
In the vastness of The Universe and Everything, Life really doesn't seem to hold much promise.
Picasa Web Albums
Lazy
People are so incredibly dumb sometimes.
Spam
This has got to be one of the worst parts of being online. Such an immense amount of time is wasted on clearing out your mailbox that could be utilized so much more productively in some other activity.
The origin of the term is from the Monty Python sketch of the same name. The sketch featured a menu which had the processed meat product with every single item. The idea of it being all-pervasive lending itself very nicely to the electronic phenomenon of unsolicited, junk mail.
I can understand that hackers, crackers and seedy marketers would use it as a medium of deception and promotion. It is rather perplexing though, how educated and ( seemingly ) intelligent people can forward mail with information that is pretty obviously fake. I get so many forwards about sick and dying people, victims of accidents and fires, fantastically dangerous drugs, free money being given away that it's a wonder I get any time to check any of my actual mail! I actually get messages that read '...if you forward this sms...'. Alright. I've heard of convergence of different technologies. But since when did messages make the leap from telephone networks into email and remain ( supposedly ) trackable?
On Orkut too, people now forward spam as messages. I've started sending out mails to all my friends when I'm sent any spam ( and no, that does not count as spam! It serves a higher purpose! ). The latest ( but actually quite old ) trend seems to be forwarding messages claiming to be from someone at Orkut and warning people that if they don't forward the message, their account will be closed. Really? Don't they have a news page for where they make announcements? Doesn't anyone stop to think why a member of Orkut would contact some random person and hand them the rather big responsibility of telling everyone what is going on? What if that person doesn't login anymore? And wouldn't the person from Orkut, being in charge of Orkut and all that, be able to message everyone at one go without having to depend on some unknown member?
Similar messages come in on Yahoo! Messenger as well. And I've ticked people off for that only to be told that they knew it was fake all along and were only forwarding it for a few laughs. There is nothing funny about spam! It wastes time and resources and increases costs because providers have to compensate for the extra bandwidth use.
And how believable is it that some major corporation is giving away money for forwarding a mail? Seriously? That's just dumb. No one would just give away money like that for some 'test' ( ostensibly for checking if you're using a particular browser! I'm pretty sure there is no field in an e-mail’s header which tracks what browser you're using! And so much of mail goes through other mail clients like Microsoft Outlook; where does that fit in? ) which would probably not even give proper results. What if you just kept forwarding the mail to yourself? And how would anyone guarantee that the mail would remain trackable across networks, especially if it was converted to plaintext ( assuming that the tracking was being done by some active code; I can't think of any other way ). That said, there is no ethical, legal ( or even foolproof ) way of tracking an email that any major corporation could use. Imagine the privacy concerns.
How can anyone imagine they're helping someone out by forwarding a trail of electrons across the network? Maybe it's because we feel guilty about not doing anything and since hitting the forward button is easy, we take that option and feel like we've done our bit in helping out the world. I'd like to see how many people would forward these messages if they mails read '...your bank account will be debited $1.00 each time you forward this mail. Forward to as many people as you can! Thanks...' instead of '...will donate $1.00 each time you forward this mail. Forward to as many people as you can! Thanks...'. Not as many as right now, I think.
On the lighter side, Google's GMail show's links to Spam recipes on the top of the spam folder. That's rather cute, you must admit. :)
There are quite a few sites on the net that list out all these hoaxes and various, popular spam messages. Here are a few that I find quite useful when I'm sending out an enlightening message to all my contacts who forward spam.
- http://www.hoax-slayer.com/
- http://www.snopes.com/
- http://urbanlegends.about.com/cs/nethoaxes/ht/emailhoax.htm
- http://hoaxbusters.ciac.org/
- http://www.truthorfiction.com/
The next time you get the urge to send out some suspicious mail, do take a moment to check if it is a known hoax or not. And do use your common-sense. You are sensible, aren't you? Then prove it. And do your little bit for the good for the Internet community as a whole.
Now, send a link to this post to everyone in your email contacts list, messengers' buddy-lists, MySpace / Orkut / Facebook / Friendster / Gazzag/ or whatever else it is you use friends' lists in the next 2.5 milliseconds otherwise your newspaper will fall in a puddle of water tomorrow morning and you will have to read it all soggy-wet. You have been warned! :D
Hailstorm
On realizing that it was hailing, we all immediately dropped what we were doing and darted outside; anything to stop work! It was quite a pretty sight; hundreds of thousands of little white hailstones falling onto the green lawns of the company. We watched for a while and more people kept walking out and joining the crowd. When it was finally over, a rainbow appeared. It wasn't a particularly bright or colourful or indeed, in anyway special, rainbow. But it was a rainbow and that makes it worth mentioning. People then streamed into the lawn to take a look at the hailstones. Some of the more playful one's starting tossing a few at each other. Ouch! Makes you feel kinda sorry for the people who've never experienced snow.
Now, I'm not one to complain about a few extra cool days before the scorching summers begin; but I just can't help but wonder - what in the world is in the works? All this weird weather phenomena has to forebode some disturbing changes in the climate. It sets me pondering as to whether it is the doomsday pundits who are correct or if it is the global-warming-naysayers and conspiracy-theorists who shall be proved to have been accurate. Only time will tell.
Images: Courtesy a colleague and her Nokia 6280.
Tridecennary
tridecennary (try-di-SEN-uh-ree) noun
1. A period of thirteen years.
2. A thirteenth anniversary.
[From Latin tres (three), from decem (ten) + annus (year).]
I'm a subscriber of A.Word.A.Day ( not that it does me much good! Though, admittedly, I don't really get time to go through the mails properly, so... ). Anyway, last week's theme was the number 13, as it was their thirteenth anniversary. This was the first word and Anu Garg mentioned that Google showed only one hit for this word. I'd run a search for it at that time and seen 3 results; the original plus the Wordsmith site. And a search now shows about 668 results ( with Wordsmith at the top! )
As a Sally Boyson noted in the AWADmail Issue 253, it is a great example of Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle which states that you can't observe something without affecting it in someway. Of course, it also reflects the immense popularity of A.Word.A.Day!
हिंदी Transliteration!
Police III
Really. What is it about the uniform that turns policemen so apathetic and indifferent? Why do they look the other direction, literally sometimes when the general public is in dire need of their assistance?
I was once heading towards office and at that time, the main road leading that way was being repaved. And of course, the work was being carried out in the usual bumbling, inefficient methods of road construction that all road repair/ construction teams seem to unfailingly follow. I suspect the authorities have documented and standardized these procedures that must be adhered to in order to cause the common man maximum possible hindrance, exasperation and just plain disruption of schedule.
Anyhow, of the two lanes, for traffic heading in opposite direction, separated by a road divider, one was being re-tarred. And the vehicles had to drive somewhere. So the traffic was redirected onto the wrong-way lane, adding to the already chaotic flow at the crossing. This, of course, was done without the utilization of apparently trivial things like road signs and/ or traffic cones. So one had no idea what one was getting into till one was neck deep in it ( it being the aforementioned chaos at the crossing ).
However, we Indians are now resilient; we have built up a tolerance for the idiocy of the bureaucracy and the public works departments. What got my attention was the lackadaisical attitude of the traffic policeman at the crossing. He was supposed to be directing the traffic; but instead he had chosen to stand aside and watch it get interestingly intricately integrated into one entity; which was unable to go anywhere.
One motorcyclist, as he crossed the policeman, gestured to him to do something about the snarl. The policeman responded with a shout at the retreating back of the rider, inviting him to come and do the needful himself. Alright, so maybe he was frustrated and irritated. But the rider had only pointed out what he should have been doing in the first place!
This picture on Nikhil's blog says it all!
Bad Day?
On the other hand, if you started off on the wrong foot, it can only get better, right? So you've got something to look forward to.
That's just how I see it.
Bathroom Cleaning Tip
The room that I'm renting had a bathroom that was, well, not quite that dirty, but not pristine either. The tiles and bathware were stained a bit and the taps seemed really rusty.
Well, I've got it all gleaming now! And today I'm going to share my secret with you! You too can have a bathroom that looks brand new! It'll make your friends wonder how you manage it! And all it takes is a little bit of shopping a lot of hard work! Not to mention regularly visiting this blog to get more neat tips on various things ( a little bit of shameless self-promotion there :D )!
You'll need the following:
- Harpic ( or something similar )
- Steel scrubber
Start off by generously coating the surface( s ) to be cleaned with Harpic. Let it stay for a while but don't let it dry. If you clean now, even with a plastic scrubber, you'll get most of the stains off. But the steel scrubber will definitely do the job better. I used this method to get the taps good as new and the basin and tiles squeaky clean.
Oh, and for those of you that don't know, newspaper is excellent for cleaning mirrors without streaking or leaving irritating little strands.
So go ahead, clean your bathroom and get a good workout at the same time. And when your friends ( or foes ) ask, direct them to this blog :D
