Awesome ad !

Shoot! I better write something soon or my captive eager audience will desert me!

Kiwi!

Olbermann: The Beginning of the End of America (video)

Video of Olbermann's special comment on the "Military Commissions Act" and the end of Habeas Corpus. Aired Wednesday, October 18. "And if you think this, hyperbole or hysteria, ask the newspaper editors when John Adams was President, or the pacifists when Woodrow Wilson was President, or the Japanese when Franklin Roosevelt was President."

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Absurd is the word.

Is this the best the Indian Government can do ??!!

Wow!

Wonderful concept alright but is it really desirable?

Zidane !

What happened to Zidane saddens me. I did not watch the world cup in it's entirety and am definitely not a football fan. But I happened to catch the overtime in the final match of this dull edition of the world cup (before falling back to sleep btw) and what happened was certainly something which is now common in the world of sports.

Yes, he head-butted that "poor" guy and yes it was an unwelcone act from this great hero of this supposedly great game (I am sorry I cannot acknowledge it's greatness simply because the whole world thinks that way. And that's only because I have never followed it. It might be of course.) but give the guy a break for God's sake. You will see what I mean when you read this. I sincerely believe that a method has to be established to trap and punish players who resort to verbal abuse to get their way. Verbal abuse inflicts as much damage as physical abuse, perhaps only more. Verbal abuse distracts players, poisons their mind and renders them unable to perform to their fullest ability. Isn't that what physical abuse does too and hence is considered red-card worthy?. Then why punish only those who resort to physical abuse?.

I applaud France and its Prime Minister for welcoming their hero home with the glory and affection he deserves. You cannot discredit a man of his stature for something which was not his fault.

As for Italy winning, I have my doubts about their worthiness after watching this :)

I am in a violent mood today. Dare you not abuse me verbally !

Mumbai !

It pisses me off! It pisses me off so bad that I want to hit someone, someone from Mumbai preferably. What illusion are these people living under? Over 150 people were dead and several injured in the latest Mumbai blasts but what is the common refrain! - "Don't worry, Mumbai will be back on its feet tomorrow.", "Mumbai people are resilient! Mumbai rocks!". Oh my god! I can't believe my ears when I hear people say this. It's as if mumbaites and perhaps the whole of India is waiting eagerly for some tragedy to befall on this once great city just so that they can get up, give a standing ovation, pat Mumbai on its back and say "Well done Mumbai! Once more have you survived a terrible tragedy and stumbled back to your feet. Congratulations! keep it up!". Fuck you all ! 150 people are dead! can't you see that? tomorrow it might be you!

It's not the Mumbai spirit, it's apathy is what it is!. Force the government's hand to take more security measures, perhaps educate the people on how to watch out for the perpetrators of these heinous acts, be alert citizens... this is what people should be thinking. But nooo!! Mumbai people think "Oh this is so terrible! but not to worry, this won't happend to me and my family, so let this reside in my memory as a figment of somebody's imagination and let's go on living our life.. and Oh! by the way so that the rest of the world doesn't think we are such cowards that we cannot try for a safer environments for our loved ones, let's give this apathy a glorious term - ah! I know.. the Mumbai Spirit !!". It is nauseating.

When I was googling for some information on Mumbai Blasts, I came across this site which is dedicated to Mumbai Blasts. It's called the Mumbai Blasts Homepage.. wow! Do I hear Mumbai people thinking.. so cool.. we have a site dedicated to our oh so great city! Atleast there's somebody who agrees with me (and lo behold! it's a mumbaite!). He articulated what's boiling inside me well (better than me). I haven't taken his permission yet to quote him but couldn't resist. If he refuses I may take it off.

"No one i know has been physically affected by the blast. But my father was in *** hospital that day - some conference stuff. and he described the grusome scenes: He satyed there till midnight with te resident doctors....X-ray dept. He had never seen anything like
this....In the CT-MRI scans, he saw that someone's kidneys, liver all split....robs punctured the
lungs....he came home at around 2:30 AM....he wasnt able to eat for the whole day.

The next morning i switched on the TV and the fuckers were barking something about the spirit of Mumbai--- i say its already dead. Because we have resigned to the fact that life must go on and there is nothing we can do about it.

Spirit of Mumbai, i believe, is nothing but a concoction of sterile innocence and absurdity, and
false building of hopes....There are reasons why people go to work the next day - they need that salary cheque, or that wad of cash....Its not spirit stupid, its fear of 'no work, no pay.'
What will happen? Considering the 'spirit' of Mumbai, people will go to work the next day, and the days after, and finally within a fw weeks, the dead will become only statistics, and the government will set up committiees and will wait for the reports....In the meanwhile, we will hear the stupidest reasons for the blasts - gujrat riots, general dicontent, poverty among muslims.... and the cycle will repeat...it has repeated 6 times since 1993

Dumb spirit of Mumbai - what could be more convenient for Government? Normalcy resumes Look at what happened in US - 9/11 - in its aftermath, was there normalcy? or was there the talk of spirit of NY? no. instead there was the united blasting of intelligence failures and the impotency of govt...whether they should have attacked afghanistan is a different story...Here, the govt took a long time in trying to blame the terrorists... that soft our
govt is...cant even build a national rhetoric SIMI is banned in India. What the fuck was its chief doing givin press interviews 2 days after the blasts in Mumbai? Spirit of India? no. i think it is this that makes India a soft target...

Lemme know what you guys think

yeah yeah, i know you may call me cynical, but really, i too believed till now in the 'spirit' of mumbai -- but what has that spirit given? not even false hopes that this wont repeat. coming to think of it, the above cycle that i mentioned has repeated 6 times -- so did the 'spirit' give the message to teh terrorists that mumbai will not stop come what may? no. else they
would have chosen some other targets. Infact, it presents India as a soft target...it reduces the pressure on govt to step up the security measures..."

People just never stop amazing me.

And you know what? if and when a mumbaite read this, his/her first reaction won't be "He might have a point" but would rather be "F***in b****rd how dare he abuse Mumbai and its people. Doesn't he know how great we and the city yaar. Where does he live? Iska to patta abheech katna padega"..

God help us all..

Edit: Oh! I almost forgot.. to quote someone I know.. "Why don't they understand that the city will be back to normal tomorrow morning?" .. So what man? so what? It's not about Mumbai and it's "spirit".. It's about the scores of people dead.. nobody outside Mumbai cares about its spirit. We are just happy that we live in relatively safer environs. Thank you, but please keep this "spirit" to yourself.

What my birthdate means !

Your Birthdate: March 10

Independent and dominant, you tend to be the alpha dog in most situations. You're very confident, and hardly anything ever shakes you. Mundane tasks tend to drain you - you prefer to be making great plans. You are quite original. When people don't "get" you, it bothers you a lot. Your strength: Your ability to gain respect Your weakness: Caring too much what others think Your power color: Orange-red Your power symbol: Letter X Your power month: October

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

Life: Update

You would think that one would update his blog when he is relatively free. But no, such things do not happen. Even when the person is absolutely jobless during his weekends and should spend time constructively reading books (which he misses) and writing more, he would rather stare at his computer day and night, downloading stuff from the internet and what not.

Below you will find a post which this person had started almost 3 months ago in the heat of frustration and anger over the university. You will find that its incomplete and this is only because 3 months have been enough to change the author's viewpoints and he cannot recall the emotions of that time required to complete the post.

Speaking of downloads, this person found a new thread of timepass called "Scrubs". Its a TV series featuring a hospital and the quirky doctors and staff in it. Scrubs-ER duo is analogous to the AllyMcBeal-ThePractice. Its a really funny and touching TV series and I would recommend it to anyone who has the time for such worthless pursuits.

Speaking of pursuits, this person has started his internship in Mentor Graphics Corporation and has already completed two weeks of it. He is posted in Wilsonville, Oregon which is on the west coast below Washington and above California. The place is scenic and breathtaking. He is enjoying it a lot and can't believe his good luck in landing such a great job with a superb group. The people in the group are brilliant and make their interns very comfortable. The company knows how to take care of their employees and this person already has several testimonials to that effect. In short this person is having a great time.

Speaking of having a great time, this person rented a car last weekend (for which his company paid even when not asked for!) and decided to explore the place. He went to the Evergreen Aviation Museum and the next day, Multnomah Falls. It was amazing to see the SpruceGoose and the B2 Bomber side by side. It was an overwhelming experience. Check out the photos here. The person you will see in front of the falls is Willy Joseph who is his current roommate.

This person will not be able to visit India this summer because of his internship commitments (in other words: greed). He will be in India in december most probably.

This was meant to be an update of his life. He should be posting more. Pray for him.

Piled Higher and Deeper

http://www.phdcomics.com

Never thought sad truth could be told in such a poignant manner. I guess I feel the same way when I read phdcomics as a new office-goer would feel reading Dilbert and actually relating to it for the first time.

I started reading this comic 2 days back and boy is it addictive. I have already finished 703 strips and the number 703 only because Jorge Cham is on his PhD Winter 2006 Tour and doesnt contribute to his strip on a regular basis. Most of you reading this who are not pursuing graduate studies will not relate to the comic just as I can't still relate to Dilbert. But if you wanna know what kind of life grad students lead, then there cannot be a better indicator than this strip.

Its true to the dot. The sustenance on Ramen noodles, there being no life outside the lab, professors treating you like dirt and making you feel miserable and a low life.

Procrastination - now that's a word which has become an integral part of my vocabulary after coming here. Is it grad school which does this to you or is it a phase which everyone goes through? If the answer is yes to the former alone, then why? My reasoning would be that somehow grad school doesn't enthuse and doesn't drive a person enough to overcome the constant tempatation to slack off, to not do anything and leave everything for tomorrow.

"I think I will start my own company. Anyways I don't get to implement my ideas here!", said I, to which a to-be-PhD friend of mine replied, " Then do a PhD ! You can most definitely excercise your ideas there." Can I? After encountering professors and their sick attitudes here I am least inclined to believe that.

I came in with a passion for technology, a passion to learn, and to implement my ideas. The University of Michigan has very effectively nipped any ideas/passion I may have had in its very bud. I have become this person who now detests any mention of the word tech, who will do anything to get away from it asap.

(Started writing this long back.. will finish sometime..)

An apple a day keeps the love doctor away?

I know this is going to invite very sidey comments, but still.. had to put it up.. found it in one of the apples I have at home.

Guess who got a foosball table baby !!

Yipppeee !!!

Yesterday, we actually got a foosball table home ! Can you believe that ?! an actual foosball table ! Our dear roommate Siddharth "Fundingwalla" Athreya gave us a pleasant surprise and bought this amazing table for $60 only. Its a steal for 60 bucks.

Anyway, we have been at it since yesterday. Hours and hours of backbreaking foosball play. The point of this post of course is to make all of you extremely jealous ! heeheehaahaahooo (evil laugh). I hope I achieved that purpose.

In any case, if any of you stay in Ann Arbor and wanna play a game or two, you are always welcome to 11B1. Yes Arnab, that means you ! :).

(Aside: notice the really cool effect when u scroll up and down and look at the bottom pic)

My blog goes public.. well.. almost..

Dear All,

For some insane reason, i have decided to make a part of my blog public. I have removed the personal stuff and retained stuff which might interest general junta. Actually, i was never confident of my writing and therefore didnt want to make it public. But recently i showed it to a certain someone and she said that it was pretty decent. So, i thought - "Why not!". In any case, i felt like writing again and write stuff which public needs to know. Hence the IPO :).

Keen eyes will notice that all my posts have been put up at approximately the same time but on different dates. I wonder why... hmm.. :)

So there it is.. shekisms.blogspot.com .. yet-another-blog.. do leave comments - good or bad.. i welcome criticism and would like you to point out things which would improve my writing.. or in general if u just want to give me gaalis, thats also ok..