goof-ups^9 = blunders

I get a strong feeling that my blunders have far reaching affects than my achievements.

Inspite of my addiction to 'attention to detail', I can still make mistakes!

The past few months have been extremely humbling, in light of all my goof-ups!

Movies of 2009

Yeah!, This comes almost a month after 2009. Still, I can't let the year go by without writing about my favorite Movies

In no particular order:

Avatar: Can you beat that? Well, sinking a ship is big. Terminator makes him a Sci-fi creator. What does creating a whole new world make him? Atleast for me, Cameron is the new, stylized, hip J.R.R Tolkien. Kudos to the new 'virtual-cameras'!!

Watchmen: I'm a total sucker for graphic novels and I go crazy with excitement when they make them into movies. Zack Snyder stole my heart with 300 and killed me lovingly with watchmen.

X-Men Origins Wolverine: It's always difficult to keep people interested in a prequel. What ever the critics say, personally I love Wolverine( My favorite X-Men). I love Jackman and Liev Schreiber baring their claws and going at each other.

Transformers-Revenge of the Fallen: What were they thinking at the end? Why is hollywood giving me glimpses of bollywood? Matrix of leadership!?.. Ok!.. Primes have souls whom Sam sees when he dies? uff!.. So the bad guys get Sam's parents to blackmail him? huh!... BOLLYWOOD!!!

The Hangover: Hmm!.. we can't pass this year without mentioning this movie. I can already see my guy friends grinning at the mention of it. What more can I say?

The Ugly Truth: Yes!, It's a cliche. But, I liked it. Common!, which girl doesn't like watch Gerald Butler? uff!.. Knocked me off with 300 and made me laugh in The Ugly Truth. A total popcorn flick.

Ice Age-Dawn of the Dinosaurs: Scrat finally found a fickle minded lady who makes him forget the acorn for a while!.. Aren't Ellie and Manny always cute with their enormous bottoms?! :P Oops! Sorry!

Inglorious Bastards: Quentin Tarantino does it again!..Wow! He let his imagination run wild and Hitler dies in a movie theatre?!! Finally the movies saved us from the 2nd world war!.. That is so hot!! You know what Mr. Tarantino?.."I think this might just be your masterpiece" :)

2012: Yet another movie, a mixture of mishaps, global-warming, introspection and hope. Cheers to the magnificent special affects. Balanced performances by every one. John Cussack is back and it's nice to watch him again. Special mention to Sidney Poitier.

Jennifer's Body: How could I forget this movie. Hmm.. Dablo Cody. She gave me a shocker when I read some of her blogposts. I loved Juno. Jennifer's Body is the same on certain things- the same un-apologizing tone in which the movie is told. But then I had a certain relish and fun watching a flesh-eating cheerleader!.. Trust me!.. It was exciting!! It won't go down as great cinema, but man!, who doesn't like some vampire, lesbian, pop killings - horror/comedy/thriller - all in one?

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince: It is difficult to keep the audience interested after 5 parts. It is more difficult to impress the audience if 90% of them have read the series and constantly discuss them over the web. Cheers to the director and the kids (Emma Watson, Daniel Radcliff et al). It's interesting to watch them grow up.

Rest of the movies I kinda liked : Up, Aliens vs Monsters, Star Trek - But they just din't touch the mark!

Looking back, half the movies I liked this year seem to be in the Fantasy/Sci-Fi genre.

My Mac

It's been six months since I started working on a macbook.

Some time last summer, when I held this little baby in my hands, I felt wonderful.

I called up my best friend and said "I just had a baby!.."

B: "Okay?..!!"

Me: "Don't you want to know who is the father?"

B: "Who is the father?"

Me: "Huh!.. Steve Jobs"

B: "Oh bloody hell!.. So got the macbook huh?"

The ensuing months have been constant exploration, wonderful posters designed, and pure bliss. I almost forgot some of the Windows shortcuts. Some times I keep looking for the Command button on my office system.

I can't stand the right click button on the mouse. I end up using two fingers on the other laptops' touch pads

It's been great all this time. Suddenly since two days, my mac has become slow. It has periodic snags and glitches. I'm sure copying all those files from external hard disks and other comps must've put some virus on my machine.

My 250GB is almost full with less than 1GB free space left. I guess it's time I organize things on the system, clear some space and check out if the problem persists longer. Hopefully, there are no viruses or bugs introduced, coz, I don't really have time to re-format the machine anytime soon.

Maybe, I should face the fact that macs may not be as robust as they are publicized. Like a friend once said, "Just as people fall catch a fever and cold, systems get viruses. So get used to it and stop being over protective about your mac."

Let's see how it goes after I clear up some space. I've grown tired of the spinning wait in the last 2 days.

Google

I was an atheist, But a few things -Google being one of them- made me believe in God.

(Well, I found the balance. I'm non-practicing now!)

The latest news on Google's stand on China really made me happy.

Check this out:

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html

The guy who posted this, David Drummond is the Chief Legal Officer at Google.

Last November, I was shocked that Obama with all his honesty, plain talk and hope said "I'm a big supporter of non-censorship" in China.

I couldn't believe that he would not stand up and say, "This is not right"

But finally, Google's stand makes it clear to the world and especially China, that the right to information is the most important one.

It makes it clear that there are companies and corporates who wouldn't mind losing business, if their ethics and vision are compromised.

The story goes that Larry Page, Sergey Brin and Eric Shmidt had heated debates before they issued the ultimatum to China. Brin was the biggest supporter of the stand Google took, while Eric felt that they could do more good by continuing to work in China

The irony is after Google announced its "new approach to China", many Chinese websites and newspapers translated David Drummond's post into Chinese and published it (Oh btw, Google's official blog is blocked in China, so they can't see the statement even if they understand English)

But, the Chinese government issued a statement telling all the Chinese media (newspapers, websites, TV) to downplay the Google issue. Since then, the translated versions are not available. The news about Google's stand is vaguley mentioned.

Talk about Censorship over Censorship!!

Love you guys at Google. Thanks for being my own personal angels. Thanks for organizing the world's info for me!

Thanks for standing by the "Right to Information"

Running against time

Last week was frantic running,
very little or no sleep
Stuck to the system for more than 18 hours a day
Thanks vagabond, for helping out!... owe you on it
Finally 2 down, 2 more to go! :P

I = sum (..

There are moments in your life when you feel that, every small thing, every simple detail of the past happened for a greater purpose.

Today, I had this surreal feeling that, what I am today is a summation of all those tiny little chances, old wise men who never knew me, random acts which can never be pinned down.

1. I picked a book by the age of 2. I picked my first picture-story book and I never knew that books would change my life.
2. All my summer holidays, I had to exercise my writing skills, attention to detail, and imagination by reading an English story and a Telugu story and re-writing them in my own words.
3. My history text book was one of my favorite book because it had lessons about Harappan culture, Egyptian, Chinese and Mesopotamian civilizations.
4. I loved maths puzzles
5. I was into gymnastics for 3 years, into karate for 1 year, into music for 2 years, into craft for 5 years.
6. I went to college, worked on every club I could get into, spent half my time outside the classroom, in the group discussion room.
7. I picked my friends because they could think, and act on their own and understood the power of logic.

Results

1. Thank god for Alexander the Great, Thank god for Abraham Lincoln, for Steve Jobs, David Ogilvy, for 12 angry men, Oskar Schindler, Steven Spielberg, Gail Wynand, Ayn Rand, Atticus Finch. I'll never stop being amazed by books, stories, the power of creativity and imagination. I can proudly claim to be a excellent story teller for children, a decent writer and a constant learner.
2. I rarely forget something I read, I never miss out details. I know how to customize a piece of writing and pick out what I want. More importantly, I know how to connect the dots and get the big picture.
3. It humbles me to think about the generations which came before me, the power of their creativity, imagination and ideas. I am shamelessly addicted to museums, art history, architecture, science, discoveries, inventions and above all, the capacity of a human mind.
4. I owe my logic, clarity of thought and problem solving skills to this.
5. I'm a jack of all trades. Today I understand Chinese and Indian martial arts and the concepts behind them, the different forms of music ranging from Indian folk, Carnatic, Hindustani, Rock, Scottish, Jazz, Blues, Country, Reggae, Alternative-Rock and everything else.
6. I look back and realize that I have never used one theorem I learnt in the class. My outside class activities showed me the real world. I tinkered my logic. I learnt new skills. I met people and was humbled. I set the bar high and achieved things. I understood the power of team work. I learnt the power of argument.
7. This has been the most unconscious action which has sealed my chance at 'living life on my own terms.' Thank god for friends who give space, who understand my obsession to learn, who see my visions and help me, who catch me when I fall and most of all who share a high degree of mutual respect for each other.

Yeah!.. I sound like a pompous ass. But I couldn't help acknowledge all the random activities and conscious activities which define my 'I'