Motivation - Just a phone call away....

Often times I wonder, why am I even blogging? Who am I blogging for? For me? For others to read? Who else reads my blogs? Will I ever come back to read these blogs? All these questions linger in my mind and sometimes, dampen my spirits for blogging.. It was one of those times this Saturday night when I received a phone call from a friend of mine in Houston. The call was totally unexpected and the first words from me were "What are you doing calling me this late??" Then I immediately thought to myself, how rude of me to ask that question? He has taken the effort to call me(which I did not even think of) and now I am asking this question to him? Shame on me..
Well, the reason he called was to appreciate my blogs. I had sent him an invitation to visit my blogs a while back and looks like my email managed to get noticed. He said, "Siva, your blogs are very good.. I enjoyed reading them.. Please continue to blog and I can guarantee that you will have atleast one visitor..".. Now that was something.. I have had friends and families appreciate my blog through comments and emails. But this was the first phone call from a first time visitor on my blog site to appreciate my blogs. That's when I realized how motivating a simple phone call could be. I just wanted to convey to that friend of mine that the phone call meant a lot more to me than he intended for.
That phone call made me realize that unsuspecting, out of the blue appreciations like this goes a long way. I read a lot of good blogs and articles and come across interesting things in life. I comment on some and just appreciate the others(in my mind). If only I could send an email or call up that person and pass on that appreciation, it does goes a long way.. In ways that one cannot even begin to fathom. That phone call made me resolve that I should be vocal in my appreciation whenever I could... My motivation to continue blogging was, indeed, just a phone call away....

Scroll lock...

Have you ever used this innocuous key named "Scroll lock" in your keyboard? In my 8+ years of using the beast, this is one key in the keyboard that I never knew the use for. At times I used to get curious and press this key to see if it really means what it reads. When scrolling through a web page, I press this key and then try to scroll, and it will scroll just fine. Then I would give up and forget about it. Today, I set out to find what this key really means and I did find out that scroll lock key is intended to temporarily stop the scrolling of text or halt the operation of a program. Today many programs commonly do not utilize or function properly with this key. However, an example of a program that this key may still commonly be used in is Microsoft Excel. I can press the scroll lock key to move the window without moving the selected cell or visa versa. I also found out that this key is used in Unix and Linux flavors to freeze the terminal screen during an output. Some KVM switches also use scroll lock to select the CPUs(Looks like they preferred this key since they realized no one uses this key and its just lying around for nothing). I was even surprised to find out that there are some keyboards around without this key.

So now I am peace with this key now. Many a times I used to wonder why they would waste a key in this tightly packed keyboard which no one really uses..

Once bitten twice shy..

Google introduced its instant messaging application with voice capability today. Having had a bad experience with google once, I was in this anti-google thing for the past couple of weeks. I changed my search engine to Yahoo and I used Yahoo maps for my directions. But today morning, as soon as I saw the article on this new application, I was immediately tempted to try it out and the first hand experience of the google's midas touch in new applications that they launch.
The UI is really impressive, I should say. One feature that is now pulling me back towards google is its VoIP capability over my company's VPN and proxy. No other IMs VoIP works over my corporate firewall and proxy and Google's is the only one that works. Kudos to them for that capability.. Spoke to a friend in Seattle while logged into my company's VPN and the voice quality was very good. But have to wait and see if it remains the same.
I understand that this application is not as mature as YM and MSN and so I did not expect a feature rich beta version. True to my expectation, it has just given the barebone essentials for chat and VoIP. A good start I would say. Lets see what they come up with in the future versions of this product. I have already sent out invitations to a few friends email address. For those reading this blog, you can download it from here and can reach me at my ID mailsiva.
I could not resist writing about this and here I am shamelessly singing praise of google for their latest web gadget. Looks like its hard to crack that google bond out of me for some more time.

Live concerts... An introspection!!!

I am starting this post with a disclaimer that I have never been to a live concert ever in my life.. so far.. When I refer to a live concert, I meant the ones performed by the legends like Beegees, Eagles, Illayaraja and ARR(A.R.Rehman).. Now one may think why in the heavens name I am mentioning Beegees and Illayaraja in the same line.. Well, this whole post introspect the differences in the experience while watching the concerts of Beegess or Eagles Vs Illayaraja or ARR. My experience is purely through recorded concerts and I am a personal believer that I have a better experience while watching it on a DVD than in a live show.
Recently I had the first-in-my-life experience of watching Eagles perform live in Melbourne and ARR in Los Angeles. Before I start my introspection, I have to tell you how I came about experiencing the Eagles concert. Eagles is one of my favorite bands in the very few non-Indian music that I listen to.. So I have a DVR at home which I use quite often to record primetime shows. I have it pre-programmed to record during primetime from stations like NBC, CBS and ABC. During one such nights, NBC had aired this live concert of Eagles in their ER slot. So I guess you can now put 2 and 2 together... One of the very few times luck has been on my side and had come banging on my door.
As for the ARR show, I was in the public library the other day browsing for some Tamil movies, and happened to see this DVD of ARR giving a live concert in Los Angeles in 2000. So I picked it up to see how it was since, as you may know, that ARR gives very few live concerts. I will have to agree that this was one very elaborate concert with all the star playback singers like SPB, Hariharan, Shankar Maha.., Sujatha, Sadhana Sargam, Udit Nara... with Shivamani on the drums.. Now you can imagine what a wonderful lineup they had.. I was really impressed with the artists lineup...
Now comes the introspection... I saw the Eagles concert before I watched the ARR concert. The camera was just perfect, when the sax was playing, the saxophonist was the center stage, when the drum was rolling, drummer was in the limelight and when the Eagles were performing their magic on their guitars, you can guess where the camera was.. I can bet that I had a better experience of watching Eagles performing Hotel California than the ones who were dancing to the tunes in the auditorium. The camera was just impeccably perfect. I make it a point to watch that song atleast once in week.. It used to be once every other day and it has now come down to once every week or 10 days..
Now comes ARR's concert. You have to give it to him... He had about 75 people in his orchestra and it was conducted superbly. But the camera was just horrible. Shivamani was stellar on the drums during the Chandralekha song but he was nowhere to be seen on the TV screen. I was very disappointed. This was true for other orchestra members too. For one song, the sax was magical but I could only see green laser lights blinding my eyes.. The orchestra was doing a wonderful job but they were nowhere to be seen in the picture.. They have to take a lesson or two from the other concerts that are performed here. Its not just the singers that make a concert, its the whole nine yards that accompany them. Except for this technical glitch on the camera, the concert was simply superb. If you have not watched it, you should, atleast once..

The other concerts I have watched are of Beegees and Roy Orbison both with the same quality as Eagles... I love watching concerts on TV.. Never tried it live, so do not want to be too critical about it..

Whew.. Its been quite a while since I had written such a long one..

Fascinations to Animations...

When did I start taking a liking towards animated movies? I was under this illusion that animations are only for kids because that's how I grew up back in India. Anything that was animated are for ages 5 and under was the unwritten rule. My first exposure to an animated movie was in Bhopal, back in 1994, when I was doing my Engineering. A group of guys wanted to go see this English movie that was just released(Forgot the name of the movie, but I still remember why we are all so eager to watch the movie).. Anyways, to our dismay, when we reached the theater, we found that our informer had taken us for a ride(A very long one, trust me...). We look up the poster and see The Lion king... A bunch of lions standing over a towering hill looking at us as though asking to come and pay them a visit inside the hall. Half the group turned back and started hunting for some other movies. About 4 of us(I included) ventured into the theater bought the ticket for Rs10/- (that was a big amount for us during those days).
As the movie started, I was just amazed at how these animated creatures were full of expression and how their voices modulated so perfectly with the situation. The character of Simba is still vivid in my mind. All 4 of us, for the first time in our college life, felt that we spent the money on a good movie. A movie that sure will transform our beliefs on animated movies. It sure did make me a big fan of Disney movies.
The latest one I saw was Madagascar as I was flying to Atlanta last weekend on a business trip. Nothing as of yet has surpassed the captivation of Simba for me but the lion character(I forget the name again) brought back sweet memories of my first animated movie. Some of my other favorites are:
1. Antz
2. A Bug's life
3. Finding Nemo
4. Mulan
5. The jungle book
6. Shrek I and II
7. And quite a few others that I could not recollect now.

I am still waiting for one that will make me say, now this is something... (Just like Simba made me say back in 1994)...

Memories of shuttle Columbia...

I am still not sure what made me interested in the NASA space programs but I started to closely follow the shuttle launches and its missions sometime beginning 2000. It was a quite weekend morning and I was returning from my routine rollerblade stint in a nearby park when I heard the shocking news about the breakup of shuttle Columbia during re-entry. Just a couple of days before that ill-fated weekend, I saw the movie Apollo-13 and understood the nuances of shuttle's re-entry into the earth's atmosphere. So I could actually make sense of what they were reporting about the heat sheilds and melting fuel tanks in the shuttle during re-entry. For some reason that was one of my most eagerly awaited shuttle returns for 2 reasons.. First, an Indian born Kalpana Chawla was on the mission... and second I read about the first Israeli astronaut aboard the shuttle and how his family is eagerly awaiting his return. I was completely shattered when I heard about the tragedy...
Why am I reminiscing about that disaster today? I was reading about the successful return of shuttle discovery(STS-114), and it suddenly transported me to that weekend and I decided to pen my thoughts about it. This time, I did actually said a small prayer before I went to bed on Monday for the safe return of Discovery. I am glad that they are all back home safe after a successful mission. I hope they fix the external fuel tank foam shielding for good before they send up the next shuttle.

kutti kutti aasai...(tiny tiny wants...) - Part II

1. Be spontaneous
2. Be selfish
3. Be ecstatic
4. Be complacent
5. Be enigmatic
6. Be enthusiatic
7. Be motivating
8. Be simplistic
9. Be complicated
and last but not least,
10. Be myself

all in a weekend...

I am a normal person...

You Are 60% Normal (Really Normal)

Otherwise known as the normal amount of normal You're like most people most of the time But you've got those quirks that make you endearing You're unique, yes... but not frighteningly so!

How Normal Are You?

Involuntary termination...

Did I ever tell you that hate the word lay-offs.. It sounds like Auschwitz to me... I would rather call it Involuntary termination due to indespicable planning of the industrious corporate buttheads.. Why am I so pissed off and why am I talking about lay-offs when this word has long been silently erased from the "Frequently used words" in the valley? You guessed it, some people whom I had known and worked with for the past 5 years were involuntarily terminated yesterday and guess where their jobs are going? You guessed it right again, to my own home country.. How ironical??
I have survived quite a few of these involuntary terminations in my corporate world but this one somehow hit me very close to home. 2/3 of my very close colleagues with whom I have shared my office space over 5 years are leaving me now. I expected something like this to happen sometime in the future. I never expected this to be so fast and so abrupt. Never got a chance to be warned. I feel very sorry for them and I am finding all ways I could to help them out.
How can this capitalistic corporate world be so brutally harsh with unassuming colleagues of mine? Our company had an extremely good quarter this time and have been having really good ones for the past 3 quarters beating analysts expectation in the wall street. No one saw this coming at this time. It threw everyone off-guard. I am slowly learning how harsh this corporate world can be to these unassuming people. I better prepare myself before they pull the carpet underneath me when I am least expecting it.
I can call myself a visionary for the first time in my life. I knew this was coming but did not know when. So I moved to a different group about an year back but was still very closely associated to my previous group which was affected yesterday. So when I heard the news yesterday, I was shell-shocked first but for the first time I patted myself on my back for having made that decision to move. Not that my current postion is forever stable. When I moved to this new job about an year back, there were times, I used to think if I had made a big mistake. But something inside me told me that I made the right decision. Exactly after an year, I see its results. I was actually reminded yesterday by my dear wife that it has been one year since I moved to this new position. I thought to myself how soon the time travels?

My first audio blog...

This is my first audio blog. Came to know about it from a blog that I frequent.. Click the below link.. I am just getting used to it and I am also using a VOIP phone. So please excuse the cracked voice..

kutti kutti aasai...(tiny tiny wants...) - Part I

1. Drive a 18 wheeler truck cross country.
2. Be a haighway patrol officer on weekends.
3. Act in a Sienfeld episode.
4. Drive a VTA light rail one of these days(I mean really drive it from the driver seat).
5. Work in Starbucks for a week.
6. Work in NASA.
7. Learn surfing
8. Skydive once.
9. Watch a perfect sunset.
10. Own a motorcycle

Assaigal will continue....