My MOM’s Creative Designs on Sweater

 

 

Demoing one of My mother’s creative design.

Comments always welcome !!!

Guess What My Name Is Khan is all About

 

Several years ago, when I watched Kill Bill Vol 1, I was blown away by the motivation and reasoning given behind the ruthless revenge vendetta Uma Thurman followed in the movie.

Today as I got some time to have watch the trailer of another SRK movie My Name is Khan I could not help thinking about what the storyline would be. From the trailer itself it is clear that SRK plays an autistic person of the name Rizwan Khan. We see fleeting glimpses of a happy family including son to SRK/Kajol. Also shown is SRK is on a Journey to meet the President of USA. With some dialogues interspersed mentioning about the impact of 9/11 on citizens across the world.

My guess is SRK’s kid is a victim of hate crime and because of the inability of parents to feel safe, he starts on a mission to meet and convince the president to stop ‘hate’ across the world. So i guess the film is another tear jerker/happy feel good ending movie from the KJ productions.

I always love to watch the movies for their treatment and enjoy the moment and experience the concept.

Good luck to KJ/SRK and team for their movie’s success.

What Say !?

Reading “ASP.NET MVC In Action” book on our “Nook”

Finally My Wifey and I decided on the name for our Nook.

It took a wee bit of time to get reading stuff on it.

I was easily able to copy of PDF files into the gadget by simply hooking it to the PC with the provided charger cable.

The PDF’s formatted well but not as sharp and smooth as I wanted.

I recently had purchased a “ASP.NET MVC In Action” and “IPhone in Action” book by Mannings publication and was informed about the availability of ePub Format. I downloaded them and copied them to the Nook and voila guess what.. the Experience is Just smooth.

I have embedded some photos displaying the same.

ePub is the way to go !!!

 

 

If you already are into technical reading buy eBooks and get a reader. Even though it is not colour yet, eReaders make a great gift.

Anybody want one !?

Got My EReader NOOK

 

Finally after a weeks delay, my thanksgiving purchase this year arrived today by UPS.

It took a 20 minute tussle to unwrap the packing to lay my hands on it. It looks kinda cool and very much like kindle except for the iphone like bottom coloured bar.

I have kept it for charging now and will begin using it later in the day.

Here are the pictures of the NOOK captured on my iPhone 3GS.

 

 

Last week I finished hearing David Baldacci’s “The Christmas Train” and was put off by “The Accidental Billionaires”.

I am already in chapter 3 of “Superfreakonomics” and it’s introduction chapter (preface) is a masterpiece and highly recommended.

Smart things to Know - 2

 

In a follow up to my earlier post. I have recently learnt a couple more tricks to be smart.

Whenever my friends shop online for a technology product or even for a pizza, One of the things they always do is to scout for a Coupon Code or a Deal Offer.

It’s strictly no-no to buy a product without a deal or discount. Once the product to be purchased is decided on, Just Google the product or the brand name and voila ! Discover a valid coupon code or instructions to save money of the purchase and sometimes find alternative places to buy the product for a lot less. (Just be wary of phishing sites. Caveat Emptor). In face using Microsoft Search engine Bing is likely to get you Cashback offers depending on the season.

The second thing I wanted to mention is about Collection Agent. A friend of mine recently mentioned that he always escalates the bills to default and be forwarded to a collection agent where he negotiates a settlement amount on the phone without disturbing his credit score. I really don’t know how much truth is there in it, but next time I default and I get a collection agent call, I am definitely going to negotiate for a waiver.

 

What Say !?

Google Wave – The Impressions

Over the last one month, Google Wave has frequently been a trending tropic on twitter. Most of the time, it would be a ‘spam tweet’, luring unsuspecting users to unwittingly provide info and in turn getting them to retweet the same ‘spam tweet’ further encouraging the trend.

Finally when my friend SN gave me an invite, I invested a couple of hours in the last few days to investigate and jump on and ride the ‘Wave’. My friend already realized that Wave is no fun without friends and this is very true.

The User Interface of Google Wave does not look dazzling or out of this world for any regular social media user who sometimes chats and sometimes forwards emails to his friends.

“Creating a Wave” seems a unlikely phrase but I am sure it would be one of the future trends and be as common as “Googling”.

Today explaining a Google wave is not easy as explaining “what’s an email” or “what’s a tweet”?

What I have recognized so far is the potential for a “Wave Topic” created by you, to intensify and diminish as time progresses. By collaboration by friends and followers, the current trend is likely to have have the most number of posts.

An idea is worth itself if it generates more money than it promises. The Google Wave Idea is a potential money spinner for Google, much better than YouTube.

If not for the steep learning curve for new users and its redundancy of utility along with social media updates, Google Wave would indeed have been fasters to create a wave.

Best wishes to creators and developers of “Google Wave” to have recognized the potential of Facebook and other social media updates and developed an ‘probably’ likeable and ‘currently heavy’ tool considering future acceptance today.

Lets all see how the Wave goes.

TTCMM

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Sometime in 1979, We first got introduced to each other in kindergarten class.

There has been no looking back ever since, our friendship has grown strong and stood the test of time and distance.

My best friend and I were raised in a town named Roha in the state of Maharashtra in India (Asia).

Of all the imaginations and discussions we had about in our pre teen years of the way we would shape up, it never occurred to us that one day, we will meet up in the land of opportunities.

So here we are in USA, halfway across the world where we were born, like in a Jeffrey Archer novel, .

My Wifey and I are looking forward to their visit this week celebrating 30 odd years of friendship and life.

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Somehow many of the things I do today have been inculcated into me since my birth. Like the habit of praying with my hands joined together every morning. Or always handing and receiving money with my right hand.

There were questions I had about certain things, most of them were answered logically or I had to figure them out on my own or from some story which has been passed on by word of mouth from generations.

One of the questions I had was about, why is it that Traditionally in the Indian family do the cooking ?

Recently as I saw my bloated tummy from the in-shirt dress I was wearing and this question again crossed my mind. You can imagine why.

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Halloween for me is still a day when enthusiastic kids go around dressed up in Costumes and ask for Trick or Treat.

Most of the snaps that day are very scary to see at in isolation.

Uploading the Halloween photos on Facebook made me think how will my friends react to finding my ‘wifey's’ photo in the album.

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For those who have come in late, TTCMM stands for Thoughts that crossed my mind.

What Say !?

Heavy Breakfast and Heavy Technology

 

Today morning I had home made vegetable puffs (instead of Wednesday waffles). Just two pieces have made me feel heavy in the tummy. They were excellent but as I am typing this I am feeling drowsy.

In my first job as a technical trainer, a colleague told me “Eat for yourself, but Dress for others”. From that day on, I have always put efforts to dress properly. But on the other hand, my eating habits relied on the principle “If it is on the plate, it should get to the tummy”. No real attention to chewing properly or the calories consumed. Strangely the consequence of this did not ever cross my mind.

Before I got married “Breakfast like a King, Lunch like a Prince and Dine like a Pauper” was a pretty good reference statement to adhere for eating.

After I got married, my wifey, an cook par excellence, allowed me to indulge everyday in smorgasbord of delicious food with encouragement to push my gorging limits.

Another dimension to it is the experimentation into newer recipes and delicacies. I had never imagined in my wildest dreams of eating a home made burrito, mind you, but one day I did and it was great. Lucky me.. Touch wood.

Today at the cusp of 14 months of marriage I am overweight by 28 pounds according to my wii-fit app.

Another aspect of my technological work is to be up to speed with the latest and greatest. Reading technical articles, directly off my Hi-Def LCD Screen has its pain points. It wearing off the eyes.

I sometimes jump skip some paragraphs to find myself staring at the brightly lit screen with my eyes wide open, reading words and trying to understand context and connect the dots which do not make sense if you lose concentration.

This is the same reason for which I have ordered myself the new digital reader “Nook”. I hope this will take care of the eyes not hurting them too much while reading digital copies.

The point I am trying to throw across is the idea that “the best way to read and learn new things” is to be in a relaxed state of mind.

I have learnt a few Meditation techniques in the past like Reiki and I hope to resume them this month and be back to my 100% concentration in everything I do.

What Say !? Am I focused on the task at hand ?

Smart things to know

 

Did you know, In a multiplex, you ‘can’ use the same ticket for viewing another show at another screen ?

Come to think of it, I never even gave a second thought to this anytime. But when I heard this It sounded crazy. But apparently there was some truth in it. Some of the present immediately acknowledged having done so.  No wonder many students might as well as use this information for getting into a screen which charges higher ‘ticket’ price by buying a ‘lower priced ticket’ and then switch to another screen after the show starts.

What Say !? Isn’t that smart ?

For quite sometime I was thinking about posting some of the smartest ideas I have learnt from my interaction with few of my friends in recent years.

Another friend of mine mentioned about considering ‘road inclines’ while driving in drizzle or rain time and driving in the highest lane to avoid encountering ‘hydroplaning’. Of course I should have known it, but It never registered until my friend mentioned.

The smartest mention according to me was to allow free entry into screening of ‘Bollywood’ movies and charging for ‘permission’ to leave in the middle of the screening. Come to think of that, the most tepid and stupid movies being made, this free business model might generate more amount of revenue than cinema halls running movie for less than 5 patrons. What Say !?

If you are aware that on Saturday mornings most theatres sell tickets at half the price, then another smart thing is to catch up with movies in theatres only on Saturday mornings.

Let me cut this post short here abruptly because I am beginning to sound a wee bit whacky !!!

Always remember ‘Information is wealth and/or power’, ‘Half Knowledge could be dangerous’ and ‘Look before you leap’.

Ciao again soon !!!

The Missing Decimal Point

 

Another weekend passed by and I had another set of interesting events and incidents.

I attended two sessions of NoVa Code Camp and both the session were extremes for my liking. While One was a slow and patient snail walk, the other was a roller-coaster ride without the safety belts on. Many interesting ideas presented just flew over my head before I could wrap my brain around it.

Was pleasantly surprised to see sparsely crowded temple, when we made it to the temple at an hour early than usual.

Learnt it the difficult way that Not all Costco’s have gas fuelling facilities, and It is best to avoid driving through Washington DC downtown on weekends even though the GPS shows a comparatively faster travel time.

When my Wifey read out the gas price to be 241 dollars, I immediately asked her to round it to the next cent up because of the 9 at the end. “Read that as 242 dollars coz its 241.9 where 9 is in superscript.”.

Strangely when she observed that people new to the country will misread that as “242” dollars instead of “2 dollars 42 cents” it makes me wonder who came up with this atrocious idea of dropping the decimal point.

I recollect now why my friend once filled up the car tank only to realize it later, it was the price of Milk ‘Gallon’ displayed prominently on the gas station board. Even I too had resisted from ordering wine at a local wine shop, when the labels on bottles showed 899.

I wonder how many people really correctly understand displayed price in any shop.

Think about this, Prices ending in .99 definitely have an edge than a rounded out price but the missing decimal point is can play tricks on the consumer. Time for a revamp.

What Say !?

:-)