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Gravity

This is now one of my favorite movies of all time. Just blew me away.

Missing you

Tunes for now

I'm drowning the silence with some Bill Evans trio. Dad still speaks to me through music. Asha left for Dubai last night where she'll stay for a couple of days before flying to New Delhi. She almost didn't make it to Heathrow on time. The huge traffic jam caused by an accident only added to our anxiety. But that's hardly an excuse for being late. I hate to see someone being chronically behind schedule. It's probably one of the most difficult habits to beat. The exertion at the airport scrambling for everything left me panting. The return to home via 105 was a much more tranquil affair. The gridlock had opened and I returned home just in time to afford me 5 hrs of sleep before leaving for work. I miss Ari and his mom.

Dad

Discovered this photo today!

Turrentine

Most of the jazz greats known to me were introduced to me by dad. In return, I managed to do the same for him with some discoveries of my own. Stanley Turrentine was one of them. I'm listening to Turrentine as I type this post.

Keyboard

The thought of getting a Bluetooth keyboard has been on my mind ever since I bought my Nexus 7. But there's a problem. I don't see any Bluetooth 4 keyboard specifically made for my tablet. Then there's the other factor to consider as will. The onscreen keyboard that comes with my tablet is a charm to work with. The swipe action is so fun and accurate, I'm almost tempted to do away with the idea of getting an external keyboard altogether. But then again, my Nexus feels like it's missing a limb without the keyboard!

Arihant Sleeps

India has launched its 1st mission to Mars. The launch was a success. I hope the long trip to Mars stays on course. It won’t be easy. Most missions to the red planet have ended in failure. All the best, Mangalyaan!

Rabindra Sangeet

I’m listening to some Rabindra Sangeet sung by Shreya Guhathakurta, a brilliant singer from Kolkata who globe trots most of the time. She happens to be my senior from Fergusson College, Pune, and a family friend of a paternal relative of mine who stays in UK. When I first chatted with her, I didn’t know she was a celebrity. She dropped no hint either, such was her humility. I am surprised at my appetite for Rabindra Sangeet, which has been growing since the past few years, ever since I left India. I guess I’m missing my own culture real bad. The language of my heart finally speaks loud and clear and I am no longer deaf to it.

Windows 8.1

Last night was spent nearly sleeplessly as I was busy downloading Windows 8.1 over an excruciatingly slow internet connection. From what I have seen so far, Windows 8.1 is a worthy successor to Windows 8 and was well worth the wait. I still miss the Start Menu though and wish Microsoft hadn’t been so aggressive in forcing a change that few people appreciated.

It’s Arihant’s 1st birthday!

Arihant’s first visit to a university: University of Oxford

Love the Telco Colony group!

I created the Telco Colony group on Facebook less than 4 years ago expecting 300-400 members. The group, however, has amassed more than 6000 members and shows no signs of stagnating in terms of content or membership. Makes me happy.

Visited the Winchester Museum today

Jane Austen spent her last days and died here

WHY WHY WHY?

I was stunned to learn today that Google will be shutting down its Google Reader. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I read it. How could this be? Has Google gone insane? Why did Google have to abandon its loyal ‘reader’ users? Over the years, I’ve grown accustomed to using Reader for virtually everything technically possible – reading the news and blogs, keeping an eye on comments, house hunting, job hunting, video searching for Indian Railways…the list was limited only by my imagination. Unfortunately, RSS requires a populace that’s a little more tech savvy than the current load of iCrap fed retards. RSS fell victim to an entire generation too used to a brain-numbing social-networking and share-everything phenomenon. My heart is broken. Goodbye, Google Reader. You will be dearly missed.

London to Manchester & back in 1 day

Manchester VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL       Manchester reminded me of Montreal. The tram, however, flashed images of Kolkata. Loved the ride.

Alarmed

Waking up to the ringing sound of an alarm is probably one of the most annoying ways to begin the day. But it really elevates to a human rights violation when you are robbed of an easy means to stop it. This morning, this was how I got violated. I’m reminded of the nostalgic days of DOS, when the GUI was only an approaching fad and computers weren’t all that graphic. Textual pleasure was reserved for the ones who actually learned the esoteric commands to get something useful done by the PC. But even the most die-hard fans of the operating system couldn’t always dodge the dreaded question at the command prompt: Abort, Retry or Ignore? I’m sure Microsoft earned a bad name from this infamous and blunt question. And since DOS was ubiquitous, tech journals sought to humor their bored readers by carrying jokes on the question. I remember one particular joke where an imagined futuristic car is just about to have an accident due of a brake failure. The dashboard pops the magic question just

Hitting a new high on Andromeda! Thanks to Windows 8!

Windows 8 drastically reduces load on Andromeda

Windows 8 on Andromeda!

The old lady has just won a new lease of life, thanks to an application that corrupted the .NET runtime on my Windows 7 system. I’m not fond of the new OS. Microsoft has tried too hard to merge disparate concepts into a single platform. As a first attempt, Windows 8 is commendable, but I suspect most Windows users won’t take too kindly to the forced hybridization. Windows 8 is ill suited for a desktop OS. Banishing the Start button didn’t help things either. The forceful fallback to the tablet interface is a serious annoyance. Yet, I’m happy Andromeda, seemingly on her deathbed, has sprung back into life.

My little doll

Co-inventor of RSS commits suicide at the age of 26

Aaron Swartz was just 14 when he co-invented RSS.