AN IDEA FOR WEBLOG HOSTERS

All the BLOG hosters such as Blogger, Blogdrive, RediffBlog, ... have sites for online blog updates but no tool for offline blogging. How about a tool similar to 'Microsoft Outlook Express' that downloads the latest messages from the server (OR) updates the server with the latest blog message stored in it. By this way, the user can have a track of his own previous blogs and for offline reference. It would be good if any of the Blog hosters come up with plans of implementing this idea.

DOES MONEY ALONE CREATE VALUE ? ? ?

I personally feel that money as a standalone concept has very less value... Much more value will be added only if money is clubbed with time. I mean to say that 'Money at the right time makes more value than money at any given time'. This is a coupling similar to how information is clubbed with time. There is an old adage that says "You loose all your health to earn money and later, you loose all your money to regain health".

This thought kept flashing in my mind when some of my friends did not wish to join me for camping / sightseeing to neighbouring places (away from Dallas) this summer vacation due to the fact of loosing money. What good will it do when we save money all through our lives and hardly use them for enjoyment. May be later... when we have lots of money to spend, we may not find enough time, companions, spirits or fun as we find at the most appropriate age / time (especially in student life). Anyway, its all about attitude... I know that most of them might not agree with me. Anyways, hope I get a good companion to visit atleast one of the states in US other than Texas during the summer's 2nd intersession.

LOT OF MOVIES...

Now-a-days, I have been watching many many movies... the count is atleast one movie per day. Most of them are English ones from DVDs. My recently watched English films include 'Road to Perdition', 'Clueless', "America's Sweethearts" and finally "Catch me if you can". Other films include "Mallishwari" and "Ayudha Ezhathu".

'Road to Perdition' is a total slow but a classic movie that focuses at father-son relation. The movie screens the 1960's scenario with relevant settings. However, the film is slightly touchy at the end...

I enjoyed watching 'Clueless' and 'America's Sweethearts' as they are plain fun-filled hilarious movies. Alica Silverstone looked damn pretty in 'Clueless' and she played the role of a high-school gorgeous girl. Hmmm ! Feel like watching more & more of her films.

'Catch me if you can' is too good a movie which precisely outlines the real life of Frank W.Abagnale Jr. who managed to fraud many officials, forge cheques at all 50 states of US and many other countries, projected himself as a pilot, a lawyer and a doctor - all before his 21st birthday. After having been imprisoned for several years, this gentleman is now in a team with FBI to reveal Cheque Frauds, design cheques for several Banks & Fortune 500 companies and has a consultancy of his own. He told in an interview that the most incredible fact he feels is the positive career that he brought out inspite of his improper past ...(infact it is from his past that he made a great career).

'Ayutha Ezhathu' is a good movie that has a little story-value but has a big message to the youth of india. I really doubt what would have been the election results in Tamil Nadu if this movie had been released prior to the national elections. This movie has a touch of mass and politics though not in depths... The movie ended in a very incomplete fashion and the climax seemed to be a total let down by Manirathnam. I have no clue of what has happened to Madhavan (Abishek Bachan in Yuva) at the end of this film in the story.

NOW... LICENCED TO DRIVE !

Today, I got my Driving licence at around 10:30 in the morning. My friends who accompanied me (Vinodh & Naveen) also managed to get the driving licence without trouble. Well... let me tell you some cool stuff that we experimented with the hired car! We (my friends and I) shared the cost of hiring a car for a long-weekend (saturday-monday). We opted for an economical one... so, landed up with "Toyoto ECHO". Its a 2-door medium sized car that can just accomodate 5 guys (not too fat ones).

On friday, we came up with a clever idea of getting the licence on the same day of hiring the car. But unfortunately, we could not get the time-slot for the practical driving test as there were enough drivers in the queue. So, we had our lunch at Cici's on our way back home and I had my shift (job) in the evening. My friends gave me a ride upto my workplace, and then left to Walmart to purchase groceries.

By the way, Ajit had come that night from TAMU to spend the weekend with us. The next day, we all (5 guys) had our trip to a theme park named "Six Flags Over Texas" at Arlington. We lost our way to Six Flags at the very beggining of our trip, but finally managed to reach there in double the travelling time (1.5 hrs) than what is actually required (45 mins). At Six Flags, it was great fun with so many roller-coster rides for our pleasure.

We could see big queues for the roller-coster rides but nevertheless, they are worthy of our waiting time. Some great rides that I have been include Batman, Gaint Texas ride, TITAN, Superman, Mr.FREEZE, and Flashback. I infact desired to have a ride at "Shockwave", but fell short of time. We started to make our way back at 9:30 pm, and reached home late night at around 11:30 pm after having our dinner at a nearby restaurant. I had been to so many roller-coster rides that i was able to feel the momentum during my sleep tooo... It was damn good fun that we had that day.

Sunday morning, we made some shopping, I had my job, Ajit left to TAMU in the evening, and we practiced parallel parking that night. Infact Parallel Parking has to be done between the 4 polls at the TXDPS center during the test. So we (4 guys including me) went to the same spot, where we will give the test the next day to practice parallel parking. To our dismay, the polls were not fixed in place... So, 3 of us stood in the place of the polls and the 4th guy practiced parking the car. It took nearly an hour for all of us to get the nag of parking the car perfectly withing the polls in just 2 turns.

On Monday morning at 6:50 am, we left home to TXDPS and I was fortunate to get a cool inspector who graded me on my driving skills. I got the licence at last and the same is the case with most of my friends tooo.

CHECK OUT MY NEW PHOTOS...

My Splendid photos section is being updated with my latest photos at "Six Flags Over Texas" theme park. Check them out ~

FUTURE OF INDIA - IS IT A FATE/FORTUNE

Did you get surprised or shocked at the election results this morning? It was a frustrating moment for me to visualize India in the hands of a foreigner (Italian). BJP did not get the expected results from this election (inspite of scheduling it early). Yet another shock was that Chandhra Babu Naidu had also failed to continue his regime at Andra Pradesh. God alone knows what is in the minds of Indian people...

STEP TO PERFECTION

Here is an interesting site that suggests simple 20 steps to perfection of mankind. Another page of the same website tells about 'THE SCIENCE OF SEVEN CULTURES' for quick evolution of human being. This website is based on Indian values, philosophy and teachings. However, the above 2 links will be very useful and fascinating to also those who are not interested into philosophy. Do not miss checking them out ~

DREAM. PLAN.. EXECUTE...

The end of the semester is always a hectic routine. Same is the case this time tooo... I had my final exams, project submission and the new job calling my attention at the same time. Had busy schedules last month (March) and now, I am literally free as I have not taken any courses for the summer semester. Now is the best time to plan out my time for the long-stretch of vacation. May be this is the last time that I am given free time to make use of. Ofcourse, my first target is to capture in and out of Java's offshoots (I mean J2EE and J2ME).

Then to lay my hands on .NET which is now becoming the trend in the Industry. Finally and most importantly, I wana have Software Arch Design Patterns in my finger tips. Apart from all this self-study, auditing a few courses may further enhance my knowledge. But, what do i do for relaxation and entertainment... Skating, music & movies are always there. Hmmmm! everything is so mechanical and materialistic... getting bored..., I need to meditate atleast for 1/2 hr everyday. WOW! I finished planning my summers in the process of writing this blog. Let me start off executing each of them from tomorow.

VALUABLE LESSONS

The project work in my course "Computer Networks" is to simulate a network ambience using any high level language and file system. I planned my work in advance and completed the project to perfection in 5 days time. But, a very funny but a fatal thing happened just a day before the project submission day. You know what ? ? ? I accidentally deleted the entire folder in which i had my programs in :-( . How silly of me...! The unfortunate thing is that I did not have any back up of the project in my laptop, becoz of poor wireless net connectivity. So, I had to redo the entire project in 24 hrs to go. I got a little tensed within, but just managed to have a smile. Finally ended up completing the project in a day and submitted it atlast. I got an "A" grade in this course.

Anyway, this taught me a great lesson which I will never forget in life - "Have a BACK-UP of the work". This is the most obvious lesson learnt. But, this is not the root cause of my mistake. I really wonder how I could make such a mistake of accidentally deleting my files. I then realized that I might need a better co-ordination of my thoughts and action. The solution flashed in my mind and its nothing but "MEDITATION". I very well know the benifits of meditation.... but I failed to practice it daily... its just becoz I became lazy and hardly found time to experience solitude. However, no excuses to be given this time. I will take care of my mindfulness, and not to forget abt my physical fitness tooo.....