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Showing posts from 2004

Dad is ill

The situation is very serious, but my folks at home won't delve into the details as they fear it will be pernicious to my studies. I pray and shed tears for the person I love the most.

Something Beckons!

A quick trip to the Training & Placement Department sufficed. Parts of this image file have been deliberately diffused to preserve privacy. The hype had been gradually building up over the past 4 months. The big day finally arrived! History ought to be preserved.

At last!

Dad received my speed post. His constant queries on the status of my project sometimes irk me. Well intentioned, but awfully irritating. No offence meant, Dad!

Spaces for the underprivileged

Lord, save Microsoft! MSN has come up with a poor immitation of Blogger. Come on, Bill! You can do better. Blogger can throw tantrums at the most unexpected of moments. I wasted a whole hour trying to upload this image (via Hello)...with futile results. Perhaps it was the Microsoft factor that condemned me to that miserable hour! Intimidation at its sinister best!
Yahoo! Messenger...playing my radio station.

Abhishek

Called up Abhishek in Jampot. The bugger is tying the nuptial knot on the 27th. I was shocked to learn that Balraj is now a divorcee. Sudip met with a similar fate. His case was apparently more vitriolic.
Making last minute preparations to abdicate this place. Shifts are a bit unnerving for me. Samir visits. Finalizing contact with TataTechnologies.

Addicted...once again!

This time, it's Wikipedia. Here's the deal: I intend to be a lifelong contributor to it. Wikis had me perplexed for a long while, and in some ways they still are pretty enigmatic. But they are very much like blogs, really! Wikipedia is the best manifestation of wikis.

Getting archived

Why has WayBack Machine forgotten my site? After archiving my blog for a few times in 2001, it conveniently proceeded to forget me! Yesterday, I submitted my URL for archiving. I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

Coincidence

Isn't it funny that Gulmohar High School, Jadavpur University and BIT,Mesra are all celebrating their Golden Jubilees in the same year? I am an alumnus of Gulmohar and BIT Mesra. Jadavpur Univ is just a stone's throw away from my parent's place!
...in 2001
Music is the best company one can keep in solitude. Yahoo! Radio is doing a fine job towards this end. I fear getting addicted to it!

Finale!

It's for the very last time that I'm accessing the net via the BIT lab. What a harrowing experience it has been for all these years! Here's what surprised me: We now access the web via IE 6. I was sick and tired of version 5, since many sites were off-limits. We actually manage to change...sometimes!
Gurdas in Nainital circa 2k. One of the naughtiest of my batchmates in Gulmohar School, this fellow has made it big in life. He was a baby-faced guy back in school, but now he has turned into a turbanated and bearded fellow. This image is a shocker of sorts for me!
Bhuwaneshwari Temple in Jamshedpur Railway Station in Jamshedpur.

Barber and Masseur

It was supposed to be one of those trips to the barber's, but I got in return a lot more than what I had bargained for. The barber, the thorough professional that he was, managed to persuade me for a massage after the haircut. What I suffered during the next half-an-hour or so, which seemed like an eternity, still sends a chill down my spine. I was reduced to a hapless chap at the mercy of a messenger from hell! Never again will I volunteer for a massage!
Badri (in blue shirt). One of my best buddies in school.
Tata Motors (TELCO). This is where dad worked.
Golden Jubilee celebrations at the Gulmohar School.

Free Reader 2.7

Downloaded Free Reader 2.7 from Sourceforge. It's for the very first time that I downloaded anything from there. Free Reader is very simple. The virtues of Open Source are many! I can read this blog from the RSS reader.

Kublai Khan

Few people are as abominable as Kublai Khan (name changed for obvious reasons). I ran into that piece of junk in the lab. The scum should be buried alive in the deepest pit.
Yanni . A contemporary composer of rare stellar magnitude.
ClassicalArchives is the classical music aficionado's must-have in cyberspace.
Santosh has lost a lot of sleep over his opportunity to participate in an RD draw. Poor soul, he can't differentiate between a brower window and a mail-client window. Dashing emails to the editor proved just too futile!
Yahoo! LAUNCHcast happens to be the most popular internet radio station in the world. I'm head-over-heels in love with it.

My 3 Gurus

Bertrand Russell Nirad Choudhury Beethoven
This was my very first CD. I had bought it in '97! This was even before we had a CD player!
A lot of wannabe Miltons from BIT are opening Blogger accounts. Will they be posting regularly? No, they won't...and you could bet my pants on that!
Someone has anonymously sent me a message via my blog. Who the hell is it? Is it Sebastian? If yes, please reply.
Mars! This is as beautiful as beauty can get. This is yet another view of our celestial neighbour. My love affair with the heavenly planets and stars continue to this day. It's a tragedy that I didn't have an IQ commensurate with my love for the heavens.

Ujwal

Ujwal is smelling money! He is spending most of his time surfing the net(even though he is not an addict) simply to mint some quick money thru some shoddy deal via cyberspace. The whole affair looks too fishy to me.
This is my coveted Gmail account!
This is a snapshot of my Blogger account as it was a long time back. I deleted the contents due to some reason I can't recall now.
Alltheweb still happens to one of my favourite search engines!
Aishwarya Rai, the most beautiful woman in the world.
Planet M in Pune. Their selection of music CDs is simply not enough to satiate me.
Portal to Fergusson College, Pune. The most happening college in India!
In Lonavala
In Lonavala
Snaps from Pune and Lonavala.
Yeah, that's me way back in December '97.
IUCAA, Pune University Campus, Pune. I visited this place on a few occasions. Fabulous place to persue a career in Astrophysics in India. I had also attended a few lectures by some of the scientists from IUCAA, including its director Dr.Narlikar.
Mutha river, Pune during floods.
Mutha river, Pune. Flood affected.
An aircraft model lodged in Kamala Nehru Park, Pune. This is where I had my first romantic rendezvous!
Laxmi Road, Pune. The middle class family's shopping haven, this place comes alive @ night with it hoardings and neon lamps.
Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune. Very close to my place of stay in Pune.
Good Luck Chowk, Pune. This is the junction between Bhandarkar Road and Fergusson College Road.
Food World, Bhandarkar Road, Pune. I visited this place very often.
Fergusson College Road, Pune. This is how the most hustling and bustling road in India looks like during the day.
I can't forget this place. Fergusson College Road, Pune. The life infused by nature into this place has to be seen to be believed. This most vibrant place in Pune.
MG Rd, Pune. I was wowed the first time I came here. I especially remember a very chic babe accompanied by her beau. She was wearing a black mini skirt.
Path leading to the main ground, Fergusson College, Pune. Our institute could have better utilized the ground.
Kimaya, Fergusson College, Pune. What this weird structure was actually meant to do I don't know.
Fergusson College, Pune. I walked thru the hallowed portals of this institute.
Senapati Bapat Road. I used to frequent this place while in Pune.

Total Solar Eclipse

Can I forget this sight? I was in Jamshedpur which unfortunately only enjoyed a 92% eclipse. Diamont Harbour would have been a better spot to witness this marvelous view. October 24 1995
Again, I can't recall the exact dates, but I guess this comet was visible in the year 1997 Hale Boop
I don't really remember the exact dates when I witnessed this comet. I was in Jamshedpur. Hyakutake March-1996

Q&A

Q : What's the biggest advantage of having a career in computer science? A : Most people aren't aware how illegible my handwriting is!

Floods

Santosh is caught between the Devil and the Deep Sea. Trapped in the apocalyptic floods, the poor dunce is faced with Hobson's choice.
Placement season is hotting up and I am having sleepless nights ! I am actually experimenting with the new rich-text interface of Blogger. I am getting tired of keeping up with prolific Blogger upgradations. It's a futile effort!

Businessworld issue dated 19-July

My phone number, what's left of the hair on my head, my seven-digit IQ, my eternal gratitude, a nice and cute kiss, your name on a cloud, the address of any celebrity, amazing music, my mother-in-law... That, and more, is what Netizens are willing to swap with anyone who'll give them a Gmail account. Take a look at gmailswap.com for a longer list of bizarre offers. I got mine after three lunches with my boss - plus a promise to not bother him the rest of the year. We'll have to see about that one, won't we? However, in the meantime, I'm now a member of the G Club. Not a small exclusive set but a rapidly growing flood of people who've managed to get themselves 'invited' to the great big Google party where webmail is free and you get a whole 1 gigabyte of space, if you only know what to do with it. The 'Google approach' is, apparently, that you must never have to bother deleting your mail - it can just sit there for all you care. Free email s

Gmail

Accessing Gmail is proving to be a pain in my ass. The ubiquitous but antediluvian IE5 does not support it. Opera helped create the account, but accessing Gmail was still impossible since Opera did not support ActiveX. I finally managed to gain access to it via Mozilla Firefox today.

Businessworld issue dated 28-Jun

Ever since Faust made his pact with the Devil, many have longed for things they could would willingly trade their souls for. The Holy Grail would have worked, but nobody could find it. The Philosopher's Stone was a contender, but gold lost its shine. Marijuana had promise, but couldn't make it past the sixties. Trendy dotcoms that served free latte to employees came close, but didn't last long enough. The lost tribes of the information age needn't despair anymore. Move over Faust, Google is here. An account with Google's email service, Gmail, with its 1 GB of storage, fantastic search facilities and innovative storage options is something every Net user has been dying to get his hands on. Till now only a chosen few have been invited to sign on. But they, in turn, can invite three more to sign up. So high is the demand for these invites that a whole marketplace has come up around it. Sean, a Canadian, has started a website, www.gmail-swap.com, which lets people w

Venus transit against the backdrop of the Sun

Space

Santosh and I were witness to this heavenly sight from Ranchi. Semester exam was impending, but we managed to squeeze in some time for the visual fiesta. Total Lunar Eclipse