Halloween!!!

Had a nice halloween experience at work. Although not everyone at work were dressed up for Halloween, there were a few nice innovative costumes / masks / etc. There was Dr Evil, The Ghost, some witches and wizards. It was fun. To provide some build-up, watched a few scary movies till 4am the previous night on TV.

But the amusing part is the story that we are supposed to dress in these scary costumes to scare off evil spirits. :-) If only it were so easy.

Fast for the nation

Read this – Something I got in the mail today. Really funny.

Here is a personal experience, as well as a moment of national pride, which I want to share with you. Hope you find it worth the time you put in reading it : "In the middle of 1965 India-Pakistan war, US govt - then a close friend of Pakistan - threatened India with stopping food-aid (remember "PL-480"?). For a food deficient India this threat was serious and humiliating. So much so that in the middle of war, Prime Minister (Late) Lal Bahadur Shastri went to Ram Leela Grounds in Delhi and appealed to each Indian to observe one-meal-fast every week to answer the American threat. As a school boy, I joined those millions who responded to Shastriji's call.

I continued the fast even when the war was over. Over a period of time, India became self sufficient in food. Hurt deep by the national humiliation suffered at the hands of the US govt, I had vowed to stop my weekly fast only when India starts giving aid to USA. It took just 40 years. Last week THE day arrived. When Indian ambassador in Washington DC handed over a cheque of US$ 50 million to the US govt, two plane loads of food, medical aid and other relief materials were waiting to fly to the USA. Time to break the fast? With no bad feeling about the USA, and good wishes for the Katrina victims, this humble Indian feels proud of the distance India has covered in 40 years. Let's celebrate a New India!"
- Vijay Kranti. Dean - IIT Madras

Can it get crazier than this? Continue to fast until India starts giving aid to U.S and Let’s Celebrate a New India!. Whenever there is a disaster in one country, other countries irrespective of whether they are richer or poor offer aid in time of need. I remember a number of times when Bangladesh offered food and other aid when disasters struck India. Did that transform Bangladesh make it superior to India.

Harry Potter mania

This is actually a database password in our client site. It's been tweaked slightly though. Spelt as harryportermania_03. How can you ever forget such a password? And if you don't know the password, how can you ever guess it? Not sure if potter to porter transformation was just a clever trick or the work of some ignorant.

Here's a funny Desi-Version of Harry Potter - Hari Putter from Punjab.

http://talkradio.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1180056.cms

Ocean City Camping

Early September (Memorial Day weekend), me, Santosh and a few of his friends headed towards Ocean City. With the weekend rush, we were finding no hotels with reasonable nightly rates. So we decided to go camping. What a smart idea it was?

As preparation, a couple of days before the D-Day, we went to Walmart and bought a 4 person Tent. We weren't sure how many of his friends were joining us. But we thought, better be comfy and this was more like an investment right.

The D-Day arrives. Head off early from work giving some stupid excuse. While I go shopping for Camping essentials like Coal, Lighter Fluid, Vegetables, Corn, Beer, etc, Santosh goes to pick up a friend (Hmmm, friend's wife would be a better description) from Dayton.

Fast forward to the next evening. We are in Ocean City. After lazing around the beach for some time (obviously treat for the eyes and the eyes), we decide to go hunting for our campsite. Two of Santosh's friends (Girish and Milind) join us. The Campground we booked turned out to be a real shady place. One person we met, it turns out has been living in this Campground for years. Luckily for us, the owner had packed up and left for the evening, even though he'd promised us that he'd stay till 8:30pm. Called Directory assistance and found the number of a nearby Campground whose Banner we had seen as we were coming over to this shady place. This one turned out to be a real campground not some RV parking site.

After the registration formalities and buying Wood and Bug Spray, we headed off to the campsite looking for a good location. Since it was pitch dark, at the time, two of us started setting up the Tent while the other two started a campfire.

Once done with that, we made the most amazing Vegetable Bath along with roasted Corn. Then sat around the campfire just chatting away, gulping down beers. That's when we decided that we should go camping more often. One more of life's simple pleasures.

The next day, we decided to camp in a place closer to Ocean City. This time, we set up the Tent in minutes. Anyway the tents that we get here are so easy to set up. I'm surely getting one when I'm coming back to India.

We then sat around the campfire gulping beers down. Then we decided to go out and enjoy the night life of Ocean City. After all that was the reason we decided to camp closer to Ocean City.

Virus division

This article on fake google and some Panda Software finding that out makes me wonder if this is all the creation of Panda Software (where in hell did they come from), to come into the limelight. Note the line about Microsoft, Yahoo and Google refusing to comment.

Infact sometimes, I wonder, why shouldn't Anti-virus companies have a Virus Division which lets loose the most dangerous of viruses. Then they'll have a head start over the other anti-virus companies in finding a anti-virus patch upgrade for it. Maybe they already do.