A couple of more wallpaper snaps

We had an office day out on Sunday, and we all headed to a place called Splendour Country. Excellent view and lots of oppurtunities for good wallpaper snaps. Here are a couple:

On the moon

Well I did say earlier (a long long time ago), that I was a capable wallpaper photographer :p. The fact remains that I need to be under the influence to click them. That's when the creativity flows. Some people might disagree, but the fact remains...

To be a good wallpaper guy, one needs to see the micro side of stuff. It's pretty simple really. The way one goes around doing that is by seeing things minutely. That means that you take a macro scene and recognise a small part (if you are lucky) or the whole thing (if you are extremely lucky), to be something that you'd want on your desktop. You need to see it.

The question is how you do it. The following picture is an example of the macro kind. No cropping or manipulation needed. The subject is pretty ordinary, but the overall picture makes a good wallpaper.













Then there are those photos which would make good wallpapers if cropped. It's not as easy as it sounds. More often than not, one needs to recongnise that only a small part of the "bracket" is going to look good. That "bracket" is often hidden in the noise that surrounds it and wit a little bit of practise, one starts looking for it.

An example of the cropped kind follows:













I'm particularly proud of this one becuase it didn't need much cropping. Let me give you a hint... "just the corners". A free beer to any one who can guess what the object really was. By the way, I call it "The Crevice".

P.S. hese photos aren't wallpaper quality. If you want 1600x1200 images, either post a comment (for those who know me), post a comment with your email address (I won't spam you, I promise).

Like father like son

I can't believe it. After all that there is for the sake of difference, I and Hobbes are a lot similar. We both like to lounge around, we prefer to rest rather than work, we regard sleeping as one of the way that we are contributing to the world's betterment, and we both love Tum.

And if we were normal human beings, there would have been some jealosy and resentment between us. But luckily, Hobbes is a cat. And I don't mean just any cat. Hobbes is one of those feline creatures that have perfected the art of living without earning anything more than love.

He's a cute creature. And arousing "aaawwwww" feelings is in his nature. I wonder what it takes. No one ever said "aaawwwwww" to me the same way that they say it to Hobbes. Maybe I need to grow some fur.

But jokes apart, there are certain attributes that he does have that really endear him to anyone. The way he says "meeeeeeeaow" in this high alto voice that he specially reserves for his begging. I wish I could "meeeeeeaow" my way through my appraisals... if it worked it would have a double meaning, wouldn't it? Not only am I not hungry, but so is my cat :D.

And I really don't want to mention how caring he is. When he was really young (less than 6" long), he and Tequila used to sleep around their Mom. In the middle of the night, Tequila would get it into her head that she wants to bother Mommy. So she'd start biting her. Hobbesey to the rescue. Despite being tiny, the little runt would go and plop himself on top of her, and refuse to let go until Mommy finally woke up and acknowledged her debt to him ;).

Bole to ekdum apne baap pe gaya hai ;).

Cycling in Nagpur

Quite a few of my readers know that I've studied engineering in Nagpur for two years before I was forced to quit due to eligibility problems and ended up doing my graduation and post-graduation in Pune.

Well, I was a different type of person when I was in Nagpur. I used to study for one ;). Another of my traits was cycling. For two years I rode my bicycle of Japanese origins a lot. I would peg it at around 15-20 kms a day on average.

It was a beauty of a bicycle, if I may say so myself. I'd bought it in Colombo when Dad was posted there, and it was one of those all-terrain things. With a light MgAl frame (the same stuff that's used in making airplanes), I could lift it from the hub with no effort at all.

I used to ride pretty fast. I remember once, when I was cruising down a road, pumping my legs hard as usual, I'd chanced to look at a motorcycle's speedo while passing it. It showed 40kph. :) Still brings a smile to my face. I remember his face as well... no smile there :D.

Once when I was visiting my classmates on the other side of town (hell I don't remember the names of places anymore, its so long ago), I'd bragged to my sardar friend (Harpal) that I could race him to the south-indian fast food joint around a km away, and would beat him. The bet was on. I'd been slightly lucky. The traffic was a bit heavy, and I had access to the footpaths that he couldn't get onto :). I got a free milkshake.

I'd had a couple of accidents on it. Nothing serious (serious means broken bones). I'd a habit of always skidding to a stop. It used to work like this. My front brake calipers were slightly loose. So when I used to apply the front brake even slightly, it used to cause the calipers to go inside the fork so that the front wheel used to lock. This used to cause the rear wheel to go light. If I hit the rear brakes at that instant, the result used to be a beautiful skidding stop.

My tyres always wore out pretty fast. One other time I'd claimed to the aforementioned Harpal and his roomie Sanyam that I could do a 360 degree skid. As chance would have it, a patch of loose sand on a smooth road happened at the right time, and I managed to perform the only 360 degree skid in my life :). More milkshake :D.

Nice memories actually. I left the cycle back in Nagpur along with some other of my stuff, intending to go back and pick it up a couple of weeks later. Never went :(. I don't even have any photos of those days, only memories. But as I said, nice memories actually :).

Look Ma, extra heads!

A colleague in office (Navneet, methinks), responded to my fire writing post with an idea of his own. The result is here for you to see. The trick is to set the camera steady on a 8sec exposure in a dark room and use a flashlight to light up your face in different locations. Cool no?

The cartoons of yesteryears

I have a recurring dream. There's a hole in the ground from which animated bugs are coming out. I can't see what kind of bugs they are. But they are of different shapes, colours and sizes. They all seem to be in a trance. All except one, who is helplessly shouting away to glory at all the others, telling them not to do it. And they all take to the sky... one after the other soaring towards the sun. Just to fall back dead.

I have this dream once in a while actually. When I say recurring, I mean once every 3 or 4 months. But it is there for the remembering. I saw it the first time after watching it in a cartoon. And the scene stuck. The cartoon was one of those Japanese variety dubbed in Arabic, so I don't even know the words. Just the images. Must've seen it when I was around 6 I think.

Another cartoon I remember is the Thundercats, about whom I've blogged at length already, so I won't bore you with them.

Then there's Tom & Jerry. Absolutely the best comedy pair ever. I know their cartoons down to each scene. Touche Mr. Pussycat :).

And there's Bugs Bunny. I really like him. And I hate Mickey. Wiley Coyote. Elmer Fudd. What a set!!!

And last but not the least, my video cassette of Pink Panther cartoons, that my Mom and Dad recorded the movie Masoom over. I hated the movie for 4 years, and watched it 25 times before I finally understood it. Then I didn't hate it as much, but I'd still love to have those Pink Panther cartoons back.

Dead ant, Dead ant :p.

The sanity of numbers

He waited for the star to fall. Which one was it to fall next? Maybe it is that blue one that he can see only from the corner of his eye. What's that smell? He turns his head around... The stink of treason, cunning, betrayal. He had almost learnt to stop anticipating it. Seeing shadows and ghosts at every turn, at every step. He turned and took a step. And fell. And fell...

He was rising. Fast. Faster... Everything was a blur. All the stars. Except one. It was blue.

A different world

The recent hulabaloo about the Prophet's cartoon has prompted me to think how different the world might be if instead of having just one dominant species in this world, there were two. Imagine for an instant, for example, that the dolphin too had an opposable thumb and an underwater fire. It would really have been a very different world wouldn't it?

There would probably have been no countries. Mankind would have been united against dolphin-kind, regardless of whether dolphin-kind were a threat or not. Or maybe there would be dolphin-countries that were defined in the oceans just like ours are defined on land.

There would have been bilateral agreements to curb land and water pollution.

The olympics would have had a different meaning.

Dolphin-kind would have offended humans by depicting walking bombs, and humans would have offeded the dolphins by drawing cartoons of swimming ones.

Guns would be quite useless in wars.

There would be underwater rock shows.

There would be seaports/airports at the same place, or maybe planes that turned into submarines.

There would be a cigarette that can be smoked underwater.

Spying would always be treason. You can't have human disguised as a dolphin, can you?

Beaches would be high security places.

A whole new range of salty cocktails.

Inter-species marriages anyone? (Hell that happens even now, remember that woman who married her dog or something :) ).

The possibilities are endless aren't they.

A Power Outage and a Camera

Things that run on batteries are the only entertainment when the power goes out. But this time it was quite a bit more than that. It inspired creativity (what little I had :p). A candle in a dark room with a digital camera set on a 3sec exposure. I moved the camera during the exposure for the desired effect. Presenting the new "Pyro"!!!

Clicking on that intelligent button

I often have this conversation with Tum after a few drinks. The topic is: What constitutes intelligence. The one I had today had two entirely new outcomes:
1. I agreed with her for the first time that eventually artificial intelligence will be possible (even if it doesn't arrive). I usually used to get stuck on the point where I argue that no amount of programming can ever create useful or otherwise emotions. Today I agreed that if we make a silicon based "brain" with enough connections, intelligence will automatically become a secondary venture. Infact if you let such a "brain" sit around long enough with basic circuits for getting energy when needed, it will eventually be intelligent because our own brain turned out to be so.

2. I came to the horrific conclusion that since our brain has been the same for the last 30000 years or so, we have effectively had the same intelligence potential for that much time. That means that if someone picked out a baby from those prehistoric times, and raised it here, it would not only survive in the world today, but it would also have the dubious potential to perform in our "intelligent" software industry. Horrors of horrors. You know why? Because that means that what's missing from today's artificial intelligence is a certain 'X' factor that time can certainly bring.

Hmmm, I'm probably not making sense. I'd had this conversation around 2 hours back and I've already forgotten the key points. So much for intelligence, huh?

Aniket's B'day Bash

We had a nice party on Friday night. It was Aniket's birthday on the 15th and we all had reason to celebrate. Aniket got a nice b'day surprise when his valentine wish turned up at the party. The faux-pax that ensued had better stay unsaid :). Some snaps from the party follow.










All the party people in the house sit tight :).










Gautam and Vai (the only married folks around, I was a married folk :p).










The camera-man and the host (Happy B'day Aniket!)










Khushboo saying "Wassup?"










Aniket, Aatish and Gautam (Oh no!!!)










B'day boy Aniket with Nikhil.










The Man.











Nikhil and I say "This is life!"

Creams

It has become an everyday thing, I guess. I prefer to wake up around half an hour after Tum. (Background story: I drop her off to college everyday, so my in-time in office is linked to the time of her first lecture). Even with my unusually long (half an hour) toilet routine (that's how long it takes me to finish reading the news), I can get ready in 40 minutes. Tum takes half an hour longer.

"Why?", you might ask. Well, its the creams. And moisturisers, and foundations, and brushes and selecting what to wear!!! I know these things are the culprit because I know someone else who takes just as long to get ready (ring a bell Nikhil? Okay, no brushes and foundations, but definitely more creams ;) ).

"So we take some care to groom ourselves!" And I'm branded as uncouth and as having no sense of what's good-looking.

Creams, its the creams. The unholy God of tardiness resides in its moist innards. And He casts a spell on all people who are otherwise good, making them forget that they have classes to attend!

Give me a can of deo anyday... and a newspaper :).

Ten Thousand!!!

We crossed 10000. And if you're not Indian, and quite possibly if you're not Indian, you won't know what "We crossed 10000" means. The BSE index crossed 10000 points a couple of days back.

What does this mean. The P/E ratio is good, so this isn't a bubble at all. What this does mean is that a lot of people stand to make money merely by investing in mutual funds. It also means that it really does help to have an educated person at the helm of our country. Okay, Atal Behari Vajpayee was educated, but he was a far cry from being an economics guru. What the Sardar and the Anna have done is established India as the financial destination in Asia, and nudged numerous small-time investors into trusting their money into this great economic destination.

I'm a Speedking, see... me... type!!!

Check out this really cool (and slightly nerdy ;) ) game that wants to know how fast you can type out the alphabet, and then ranks you in the world at it.

My current rank is 1403, and my time is 3.164 seconds. Can you beat me?

http://frenzy.morpheme.co.uk/frenzy/index.jsp?gameId=0

Banking blues

I have ended up having like a gazillion bank accounts. And I have loan installments being deducted from 2 of them, my salary comes in a third one and the fourth one is just sitting there doing nothing because I can't figure out how to change the ATM pin :o (right, I can't find the option anywhere!)

So you can imagine my predicament. I have to juggle the money around from one bank to another so that none of the direct debits default (I usually love alliterations but this was too much). Besides I had happened to bump into someone from my previous company on the road the other day. Well if you want to split hair, I bumped into his car... with my car. So I wrote him a cheque to cover the damage. And it's the beginning of the year, so I had to pay my building maintainence. And the Life insurance premium, my car insurance premium, the list goes on and on.

The result is that I've gone and written a host of cheques in all directions, and I realized just now (literally 10 minutes back) that one of my bank accounts is short by some :p. So tomorrow morning I'll have to rush to the said bank and deposit some cash before one of the cheques bounces.

And I haven't even started cribbing about my credit cards yet. It's going to be a gorgeous year.

A question of probability

Over our smoking breaks ;), I and Tum have had quite a few discussions. 2 of them stick out right now because my mind was mulling over probability and chances:

1. Is there any difference between a pair of dice thrown together and one after the other? Well, this question arose when I was telling Tum about how easy it is to make money at the roulette table when you only bet on the outside. You know, odd-even, red-black and first-second-third-twelve. If you don't know what I'm talking about you can read this article about roulette on wikipedia. Anyways, what I was saying was that since the last 15 outcomes are displayed at the table, it is easy to be right about which way the ball is going to fall. She insisted that each game played is a purely random event, and as such does not depend on the previous results (obviously). I was talking about trends.

We simplified the problem to the roll of a die. If a die is rolled a hundred times, and the die is fair, each face should have come up on top ~16 to 17 times. Now if you were shown a streak of 6 even rolls (2, 4, 6) what would you bet your money on for the next roll? Odd or even? The real answer is that it doesn't matter which way, because it's a purely random event. But what I kept maintaining was that I'd keep putting more and more money (doubling it every time) on an odd roll, because an odd roll is bound to come up sooner or (rather than) later.

Eventually we decided that we are talking about different problems. But actually it boils down to the statement of the problem. She was talking about the difference between a pair of dice being thrown together, and the same die being thrown in subsequent throws. In the former you it is a single event (as it would be if a line of roulette tables were spun together), and the latter are distinct events and the bet depends on pure chance and no trends can be set.

2. The Monty Hall problem. Tum was reading "The curious incident of the dog in the night time" by Mark Haddon. This puzzle presented in the book as follows (pasted from wikipedia):

In this puzzle a player is shown three closed doors; behind one is a car, and behind each of the other two is a goat. The player is allowed to open one door, and will win whatever is behind the door. However, after the player selects a door but before opening it, the game host (who knows what's behind the doors) must open another door, revealing a goat. The host then must offer the player an option to switch to the other closed door. Does switching improve the player's chance of winning the car?

Now think about it before reading the next sentence, the answer is there.
.
.
Okay, the answer is yes. We had a lot of fun discussing this problem. While Tum got it instantly, I took some convincing. The answer is counter-intutive because most of us tend to think of the event as "choosing the door" instead of thinking of the event as switching. So...

• The player picks goat number 1. The game host picks the other goat. Switching will win the car.
• The player picks goat number 2. The game host picks the other goat. Switching will win the car.
• The player picks the car. The game host picks either of the two goats. Switching will lose.

So if you switch the probability of winning is 2/3 as opposed to 1/3 when you first chose the door.

You can read more about the Monty Hall Problem on Wikipedia by clicking on the link.

Quotable Quote

Caught this on a web clip in GMail.

Joe E. Lewis - "I distrust camels, and anyone else who can go a week without a drink."

Cheers! :)