Verse of the Day

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

i give up...zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....

Shucks

Shucks, My exams, will they never end. I am tired. After more than 20 years of education, it is'nt over. The instinct for survival pushes me on. I probable will have to stay awake throughout the night to complete my syllabus. God save me.

This was a blog break that I took. And i need to get back to my studies soon. Anyway, watched a documentary on the 'Lion v/s Tiger battle'. Keep visiting, ill be posting an interesting article on the 'Lion v/s Tiger battle'.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

The Wind farmer's farms


This is one of the best pictures i've ever taken. This was taken on the way to LA from a moving greyhound. I was seated on the fourth seat in the bus, & shot this pic through the windscreen of the vehichle. All thanks to my Cannon Powershot S2 IS. The Pic was taken on full 12X optical zoom and 5 MP resolution.

Desire of an Ordinary Man


These are from one of my earlier writings... Found this old write-up, hidden in one of my PC backups after really long, and I decided to publish it on my blog. here goes....

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"It about time I actually did something significant. About time I contributed to society. About time I made a difference. About time I got up from my slumber" I thought to myself. "But... How?" Hmmm... a question that actually made me scratch my head as i crossexamined my life. What was I doing with it anyway?
Soon my mind was flooded with questions triggered of by "But ...How?", and I soon realized that I had simple answers to these baffling questions.

Q. Who am I?
A. A mere commoner.

Q. What could I do to serve the world around me?
A. Maybe give a beggar a rupee or abstain from pissing on the roadside walls (however bad the pressure may seem).

Q. Do I Have the money to start something?
A. No.

Q. Do I have the guts to go out and battle it out?
A. No.

Q. Why am I writing this?
A. Probably an outlet for my frustation...

Q. Can writing help?
A. Maybe...

Q. Should I stop putting up these stupid questions in my article?
A. YES!!!

I could go on and on, but lets move on to things of more substance.
After I grilled myself with those questions, I soon realized that a contribution to society would be something that would need my energy & efforts. I am lazy. Well ... what the hell!! everybody is! Set aside some guys who think that jogging in the wee hours of the morning is better than tucking your head into that cozy old pillow. The point is I have the energy inside me, but didnt have the will to gyrate it into something that could make a difference.

Therefore I decided that "I need to change." I took up jogging for starters. And when I did that, I knew why the early jogger running around a park like a nut loves that routine over precious sleep. I also went out and got a pair of dumbells. You get them at reasonable rates at a roadside shop in Ghatkopar west. Go get em!! I was soon pumping my arms whenever I got the time.
I also decided that I would be more religious. I started carrying the Bible with me. I stopped doing things I shouldnt be doing. And I decided to be a good fellow... and blah blah blah!

So will doing these things (that seem so right) actually help me out in my endavour to save the world? Maybe. Maybe not. But more likey "Maybe". Therefore I continue to do these things. And is it easy? No. Infact resisting something that your concience tells you is wrong is tougher than climbing mount everest, atleast for a weakly willed person like me.

Next, I decided that I would write. I always knew that my fingers speak better than my mouth. And I started exercising my fingers on the Keyboard. I started with short articles and extensively long letters, and a poem here and there. Well, reading was always a part of me, and it did help me write. And I wrote. I am still writing and it really helps me release all the crap that is stored inside me.

And then I decided to put up what I wrote on the internet. I decided to have my own blogs. Thats how this article got online.
So getting to the meaning of this write up "Desire of an Ordinary Man". The Ordinary person is me. Simple old me. Been just over a couple of decades since Ive been walking the face of this planet. My desire is to "To contribute positively" to anything that I can. From helping my mother grate coconuts, to saving the world from a devastating meteor. It could just be anything.
I have started my journey. Maybe I will succeed, maybe all my efforts would be in vain, but I atleast would have the satisfaction to say "I tried". This was a proclamation write-up to annunciate the arrival of ME.

There are many ordinary men like me who have similar desires. This is to encourage them to take up the battle against the dark forces that tend to push one and all down. Follow your dreams. Wake up and take up your swords. And let us return from the battle field victorious. Lest we perish, from one drop of blood of an ordinary man would arise a million more. And it takes just ordinary men to peform extraordinary feats.

"It is the Desire of an ordinary man that can move in the world in extraordinary ways".

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A road in Mumbai...


If you are a Mumbaite, you probably would know how the roads in Mumbai are, unless you are a fortunate train traveller. Well i wont be sarcastic, and would write about train travel in another blog, but right now lets sympathise with the roadies.

From beautifully carved potholes to puddles that give you that tingling feeling in your stomach. You really dont know whether you would make it out of that puddle alive. You dont know how deep it can be. Maybe it is the grand canyon in disguise, or maybe it is just a mirage (you shouldnt have had that extra peg the previous night). To sum it up, the roads in Mumbai are abominable. I dont say that all the raods all over mumbai are bad, there are some roads that are a pleasure to drive on. But the bad ones, ... they are now a cultural heritage of Mumbai. NGO's should take up initiatives to actually preserve these one in a million beautifying structures.

Sometimes I just cannot encompass as to why the government loves digging. Every single employee of the government does. From digging for bribes to digging up the roads and digging their noses. If they adore digging so much why cant they dig into the fact that they are spoiling it not only for themselves, but for every person around them. Or should I call them gravediggers? Somebody get some sense into their blinded minds !!! Anyway getting back to the dug up roads, there always is a dug up road in mumbai around every corner. Probably for laying some telephone cables or some other stupid wire. And before they have finished filling up one hole, some other contractor has already started digging up the other end of the street.

Isnt it about time we coin a new term - "dughole". Potholes are holes caused by natural conditions and traffic. Dugholes are caused by the great indian diggers.Wow!! At this rate, we can say that "for every road in mumbai, there is a dughole".

And nowdays we have seen a spurt in conversion of the existing tar roads in Mumbai to the much stronger and durable concrete roads. I was really happy to see these developments. Atleast the digging business would slow down (anyone would have to think twice before digging a concrete road). But strangely, the western countries have realised that asaphalt roads are better than concrete roads. The are easier to maintain and the amount of noise a vehichle moving on them is considerably less as compared to concrete roads. Hope they dont decide to scrap all the concrete roads and get back to Asaphalt! On second thoughts, i dont think so. Concrete is more suitable for Indian conditions. cause even before they are completed, asaphalt roads look like the cheek of a pockmarked pirate.

People always say, It is you who should make a difference. Could someone guide me as to how I should make a difference in this situation. How? How? How Freakin How???

quote unquote - imagination


'There is a boundary to men's passions when they act from feelings; but none when they are under the influence of imagination'.

- Edmund Burke

Five point Someone...


This review comes in a bit too late, but better late than never.

A story about three youngsters at IIT. This is what the book is all about. Nothing more, Nothing less. Still, when you pick up the best-seller by Chetan Bhagat, I bet that you wouldnt be able to put it down till you have run through it. You Just have to complete the whole book at a stretch.

The book is simple, amusing, interesting, exciting, romantic, inspiring et al. Chetan Bhagat has scripted this simple story out in such a wonderful way that you can actually step into the lives of the three main characters this book revolves around - Hari, Alok & Ryan. The book starts of by raking up some nostalgia from within you, and moves on on to completely captivate you with three very average characters, with dark shades moving in and out at parts. The storyline also has a lot to offer and in combination with the writers ability, has churned out what Outlook termed as 'a book that could acheive cult status'.

The writer has a fresh new style of writing, and has in a very creative way, made the book autobiographical using the character 'Hari', who is the axel around which the book revolves. It starts with Hari's admission into IIT, an takes you through all the semesters and the ups and downs that Hari goes through. THe bonds of friendship that exist between Hari & his close buddies, the teasing, the friction between them and all their doings and undoings would surely strike a chord. Not too heavy, not too light, this book is a perfect blend of all the basic human emotions that push you on.

A must read for all those who have gone through college & hostel life and also those who havent!

Know my phone, the N73 ME.

One of the most balanced phones. The best you can get today.

I recently brought the N73 Music Edition and I am really glad with my buy. The performance of the phone has surely been beyond my expectations. My review is based on my personal experience & my research on the internet before buying this phone. Hope it helps...
The N73 ME is a smart phone that strikes a perfect balance between Ergonomics, looks, Photography, music, & basic & advanced phone functionality

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What extra does the N73 ME have over the N73?
- An additional 2 GB Memory card.- An additional music adapter for 3.5 mm headphones(any headphone that can be connected to your PC).- Widened stereo balance.- Black coloured exterior body- Upgraded firmware- Additional software functionality + added applications for music.- Rs.1500 more in the cost
In all other aspects, the N73 ME is similar to the N73.

Ergonomics & design of exterior body:
The N73 Music edition comes in just one colour, Black. And it looks much better than the normal N73. The phone has a very sleek and compact look from the front. Not too large I would say, but on the larger side. Weighs around 116 gms. Lighter than all other N series models. Just 6 gms heavier than the 6233. The keypad is small and one of the negatives of the phone. After a while you would get used to typing on it though. There are additional four buttons that surround the main keypad. These are 1.Menu Key 2.Edit Key 3. Clear Key 4. Music Key. These keys are really thin & small. You will have to almost press those with your nails. If you put on a crystal case on your phone, it would become all the more difficult to operate these keys, especially the clear key. The joystick is OK. I didn’t have problems using it, though it is smaller than the average phone joystick size. It seems a bit feeble though. Avoid playing games on this phone, especially those games that need a joystick. You don’t know when it will pop out. i say this because I have personally seen and heard instances of the joystick of the N73 coming out.

The backside of the phone looks good. It has a sliding flap that protects the lens. The flap works fine. People complain that it may seem a hint loose, but I haven’t had any problems regarding it.

Camera & Photography:
This is what makes the camera cost so much! The excellent 3.2 MP Camera with Carl Zeiss lens. Today, no other Nokia phone can capture better still photos than the Nokia N73. The photos are really rich in colour. In fact the colors are unreal, ie. brighter than the actual colours. Photos of flowers and really bright coloured objects can become an eyesore sometimes, but different people react differently to the pictures. Personally, the N73 takes the best day photographs in the world (Even better than the SE k800i Cybershot phone). But the N73 cannot beat the K800i on night photography. The k800i xeon flash is too much for the N73 to compete with. But The N73 has a decent flash for the night. In the night portrait mode, the flash flashes harder and the photos come out quite good.

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There are 8 modes of photography, like scene mode, macro mode, night mode, night portrait, portrait etc. And other photography options really make this a great camera phone. You can take wonderful pictures of moving objects using the sport mode. The macro mode really works wonders on close-up photographs. The night mode is perfect for dim photographs of night scenes without flash. The night potriat mode will flash a flash that will blind you. You get decent photographs at night too. There is also the sequence mode that lets you take continuous pictures by holding the camera click button down. I have taken upto 15 pictures non stop. The k790i/K800i claims to take 9 pictures in that mode.

Autofocus really helps and can be fun to use. You can 'half-click' and focus before you click. This ensures that there are no smudgy images. But unlike how autofocus should work, it captures the photo 2 to 3 seconds and a few frames later. Ideally half-clicking should give you the image that you see on the display when you click all the way through. This is one defect that probably may be corrected in the future versions. (Which I am not too hopeful of)

Videos:
The video capabilities of this phone is decent too. It captures videos at 15 frames per second. Televisions have a minimum of 30 Fps to avoid flicker. But I wont complain as phones havent reached that level except the N93 which can capture videos at 30 fps. The video capabilities are better than that of the SE K800i but not as good as the N93 which is an exclusive video phone. But note that the N93 cannot capture as good images as the N73.

Music:
You cannot compare the music of the SE walman phones to any others, but the N73 isnt far behind. It has decent stereo speakers, not the best though. And you get a 3.5 mm jack adapter, that is nice. This allows you to attach headphones to the mobile. Any headphone that you connet to your PC would fit on to the adapter. The music OP is good. If you can get the earphones of the walkman series, the music experience would be better. Or if you get headphones like seiheiser or some other brilliant band, the music experience will be worth it. The 2GB memory card that comes with the phone enables you to store ample songs. I even found some hindi songs already on the phone, but I couldnt play them as their licences had to be updated. I dont know how much the cost of upgrading the licence is.

The N73 ME phone is supposed to be a music phone, but this is like Nokia has tried to make a football player play cricket. Photography will be the prime feature of this phone and music will be the secondary feature.

Battery Life:
The battery quality of the phone is decent enough. A whole day of flash photography and the battery is still full. Though talking a lot and listening to music can eat the battery, you can go one days with full usage. If you dont talk much or dont listen to music, i say that you can go longer, upto 3 days. The official standby time is 350 h and the talk time is up to 6h.

Sound Reception:
The sound reception of the phone is good. No problems at all. Never had problems with any nokia phones on the Sound reception side.

Image Gallery:
The phone sports a cool image gallery. The animation is nice. It lets you edit the image. Lets you add cliparts (funny stuff like moustaches, ties, hairstyles) on the images. You can create muvees(something like videos created using vindows movie maker) using your images. Also the image gallery is very slick and impressive. Nice animation. The only thing is you cant hide images from the image gallery. It picks up all the images on your phone memory and memory card.

Address-book:
The phone has a great phone book. Very easy to use and nice. Well equpped.

Software availabiliy:
The software availability for this phone sporting Symbian OS 60 v 3.0 is not that great. Though I was able to install all .Jar files, 90% of the .sis files could not be installed. But I guess this should get better with time with software availability becoming better.

The Price:
The price of the phone can burn a hole in your pocket. I think it should have been priced at 20,000 max. But the N73 ME costs above 24,000.

Overall Conclusion:
This phone is an awsome phone and one of the best equipped phones today. It has all you want. Ranging from terrefic music capabilities, to large storage memory, a good processor (one of the faster smart phones, faster than the 6233 which i didnt expext), Symbian OS which multiplies the capacity of the phone by infinity (this is the one feature that Kicks SE ass). But best of all the awsome camera and the functionality that you get with it. Overall, I would go in for this phone, though i think it is overpriced, cause its really got everything that you want.

If you are gonna be really using all the features of the phone, then go for it. If you are just gonna talk on phone, then you will find phones at cheaper prices that looks quite better.

Monday, January 08, 2007

Growin fatter!!

Im growing fatter by the day! Help me God! And I have decided im gonna shred grams by the kilo this year. I pray that he would hear my prayers. Started with walks & badminton. Lets see how it goes....