Vodafone mistakes me....for Vijay Mallya?

What would you do if you were given an opportunity to pick between Katrina and Priyanka?
Vodafone sent me a SMS before new year, giving me some rather tempting options for New-Year. No; I didn't reply to them, having received Pamela Anderson messages for the last 2 years has only made me wiser.
I planned to spend the evening with COA, (not to be mistaken for Goa). COA is one of third semester subjects for Computer Engineering Students. Again I couldn't stick with my plans and ended up watching Armaggedon on Zee Studio instead.
BTW Happy New Year!

4 ways to be a different person

Are you bored with your life? Are you tired of being nerdy or geeky or cool or cute or ugly? Do you want a new avatar?
Use one of the following get-ups to make the world look at you in a different way and notice the sea of change that will come into your life!

Wear Specs


Qualities that you will be automatically associated with:
hardworking, intelligence, more productive

Warning!
Male spectacle wearers have a tough time, picking up chicks. See pic above for further evidence.

Grow a beard


http://www.biggerbetterbeards.org/

Warning!
If you travel a lot, you are only going to be frisked even more

Smile!

People who smile are considered to be humorous, and playful.

Warning!
Carrying a smile all the time will only make you look psychotic.


Grow Your Hair

Right from Moses to Abdul Kalam all great Men had long hair. People with hair longer than 5 inches have a 73.2% greater chance of becoming famous. Did you know that 61.7% all statistics are fake and are made up on the spot?

Warning!
You could be mistaken for a girl, so keeping a beard may come in handy

Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)

I heard this on TV, and just couldn't get it out of my head.
Play the song and follow the lyrics.


Audio mp3 of Track

Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of '99: Wear sunscreen.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience.

I will dispense this advice now.

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth; oh never mind; you will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they've faded. But trust me, in 20 years you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked.

You are not as fat as you imagine.

Don’t worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubblegum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind; the kind that blindside you at 4:00 pm on some idle Tuesday.

Do one thing everyday that scares you.

Sing.

Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts; don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Floss.

Don’t waste your time on jealousy; sometimes you’re ahead; sometimes you’re behind; the race is long, and in the end it’s only with yourself.

Remember compliments you receive; forget the insults. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your old love letters; throw away your old bank statements.

Stretch.

Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you wanna do with your life; the most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives; some of the most interesting 40 year olds I know still don’t.

Get plenty of calcium.

Be kind to your knees; you’ll miss them when they’re gone.

Maybe you’ll marry -- maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll have children -- maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll divorce at 40 -- maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary. Whatever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself either -- your choices are half chance; so are everybody else’s.

Enjoy your body; use it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it. It’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.

Dance.

even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room.

Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them.

Do not read beauty magazines; they will only make you feel ugly.



Get to know your parents; you never know when they’ll be gone for good. Be nice to your siblings; they're your best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.

Understand that friends come and go, but for the precious few you should hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography, in lifestyle, because the older you get the more you need the people you knew when you were young.

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard.

Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.

Travel.

Accept certain inalienable truths: prices will rise; politicians will philander; you too will get old, and when you do you’ll fantasize that when you were young prices were reasonable, politicians were noble, and children respected their elders.

Respect your elders.

Don’t expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fund; maybe you'll have a wealthy spouse; but you never know when either one might run out.

Don’t mess too much with your hair, or by the time you're 40, it will look 85.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia: dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts, and recycling it for more than it’s worth.

But trust me on the sunscreen.


Audio mp3 of Track

American Rhetoric: Baz Luhrmann - Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)

Blog Action Day 08

Today's blog action day, and this year, the issue being dealt is poverty.
I have personally been doing some research on poverty for some time now, for next year's Imagine Cup. Poverty also happens to be one of the millennium goal that's been set by the UN and by far the most important one.

Coming back to Imagine Cup, that's one of the most prestigious competition held for students and is backed by Microsoft. Even though they pass it on as a non-profit event, everyone's expected to use only Microsoft software, so much for Open Source Movement.
I'm going to save my views regarding the Imagine Cup for another post.
Now looking into the blog action day issue, I find myself in a similar situation as while I was deciding for a topic for the Imagine Cup. Money is one of the four parameters required to be happy (the others being health, family and job satisfaction).

While the world goes all berserk over the financial tsunami, we find ourselves in such an ironical situation today. On one hand we have millions of people who have no guarantee for their next meal, and the other side we have the other half of the world who are worried about their extra-materialistic wealth. Even in a developing country like India, the city dwellers are relatively cushioned from acute poverty. Most people at least end up with a meal in a day. But the real challenging situation lies in the rural areas of the country. The number of suicides by farmers is proof that India is dying in its villages.

I believe there is a solution for poverty somewhere out there. Where? I don't know. But I am going to do my bit for looking for that solution.

Economics

There are 10^11 stars in the galaxy. That used to be a huge number. But it's only a hundred billion. It's less than the national deficit! We used to call them astronomical numbers. Now we should call them economical numbers.
- Richard Feynman (On the US of A financial situation)

.....and I always thought India was in a poor financial state

The last question

Life moves at its own pace. There are some people who keep pace with it and others who lose out. It is not possible for anyone to dictate the pace of life, but there is a way in which destiny can be chosen and not received.

Steve was once, attending a seminar. During the seminar, he noticed a pretty girl. He was immediately attracted to her. But like most people, he hesitated and didn't want to rush things since, it was an important phase in his career.
Then a thought struck him, he asked himself, "What if, this is the last night of life?"
Will I still live it in the logical way, or would I do something different? The next thing Steve did was go up to the girl and asked for a date. She did accept his invitation.

Steve Job's question is a great way to look towards life. It is the very instinct of 'no tomorrow' that compels us to live, our today, to the fullest.

It wasn't me!

As human beings, we are programmed to accept praise and repel criticism. Nobody likes to be blamed for another person's mistakes, but that doesn't mean he will be bothered if he gets another person's praise.
This can be seen extensively in group activities, where most often, one person walks away with all the credit. This just happens to be one of the cruel realities of life.
History is filled with people who have never been given their due.

Chinese Sailors were the first ones to discover the Americas, and Australia, but history favors the colonists and pronounces Christopher Columbus as the discoverer of America. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1421:_The_Year_China_Discovered_the_World)

Calculus has been explained in Indian texts dated back to 1500's long before a certain Isaac
Newton was even born.(http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2007/08/14/calculus070814.html)

Antony Meucci was the one who invented the telephone, Alexander Graham Bell only patented it.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invention_of_the_telephone)

Some of the above stories could be dismissed as urban legends but there's no denying the fact that not everyone gets rewarded for their work.

The emotions of denial

Stage 1-Something's fishy
No fingers are pointed yet, only the problem is examined and eyebrows are raised.

Stage 2- Why would somebody do it?
Everyone loves playing detective! Honestly speaking, one good crime drama series, is all it takes for someone to think their good enough to be the next Sherlock Holmes.

Stage 3-Whodunnit?
Now things start to get a little complicated. A lot of fingers are raised, and suspicious activities are followed all the more closely. Why the hell are you sweating so much?

Stage 4- It wasn't me
With or without evidence, someone is blamed for all the happenings, and his most likely reply would be...It wasn't me.