Friday and Saturday were a Sinday

Oh Alcohol, thou art a heartless bitch!

The day had already started well on Friday, what with me forgetting my wallet at home and in general being an ass. But the evening turned out quite differently. Dad had left for Mumbai in the morning to make sure he was in town to celebrate his grandson's 3rd birthday, so we took the opportunity to invite a few friends over for booze, food and fun.

It started off with me and my buddy finishing almost the entire bottle of scotch while playing a few spirited hands of Teen Patti. The drinking session took us well past 2:30am at which time we decided it was time to eat before we all feel asleep in the living room. That led to a hogging session of some delectable food and eventually dropping off into the lap of slumber.

Unfortunately, the bladder has a mind of its own and wanted me to know that it didn't care whether I had slept enough or not. Thanx to it, I was up at 9am, wishing the watch was telling me the wrong time. But up I was. Then a bit of breakfast and all of a sudden, it was time for some beer and meat balls. Perfect saturday. And to put icing on the cake, there were fresh crabs cooked in my favorite Goan style which capped off another super weekend day. All that was required was to take some time of for siesta, but that was spent setting up my friend's iPad (I'm jealous, but am still waiting for v2).

Evening was spent catching up with another buddy so that we could complete some things that we have planned and which are coming up at the speed of light now. A few more drinks.

It truly has been a Sinday thus far. And it's not even Sunday! :D

What will tomorrow bring?

MuaaHaaaHaaa

Did a super stupid thing this morning. In my rush to get out of the house, I forgot my wallet at home! And that meant I had no money, no badge to get into the office, no driving licence, no identity card and no credit card. Not even my emergency money. YIKES!

So had to be careful not to get into any situation where my ID would be required or where I would have to pay. Made it safely to office and borrowed money from a buddy to keep me going for a day.

Here's the kicker. Had to go with another buddy to pick up a HDD and an SD card so that I can help him hack his Wii. Got a super deal on a 4GB CF card for the D200 at home :D Ended up saving more than Rs 1200 :D

It's been a good day, considering.

Mua Haa Haa! :D

Disconnected in a connected world

I can't speak for everyone, but I sure have gotten used to being connected all the time. Right from my morning session on the throne, my phone is my conduit to the world. Getting thro emails and catching up on sports news is essential for a good morning download for me.

And the net follows me from that moment on. For that reason, I was one of the people to sign up for 3G services from Airtel the day they launched. I need my network and I need it now.

What I have got instead is a crappy network which keeps bouncing between 3G and Edge and in the process, is screwing up my phone battery life! And to make matters worse, my office network is misbehaving with me. Can't even open the google page, that's how bad it is.

After getting used to being on the network all the time, this disconnection is unnerving. It is really getting to me.

Sent from my iPhone

I love my Nikon

I accidentally came across a feature Nikon put into my camera. 

Now I have been celebrating the one big difference between Nikon and Canon cameras. Nikonians are used to having a separate dial to twiddle both aperture and shutter speed separately. On Canon bodies, there's a dial for shutter speed, but you have to set up aperture thro the LCD screen at the back. 

When I last looked thro my viewfinder, I wanted to increase the shutter speed to take the picture. Instead, I noticed that the change was happening to the ISO! 

Huh?!? 

Was I missing something?

And then I realized...I was in Aperture Priority mode! And I usually shoot in Manual Mode, hence had completely missed this. So I tried doing the same thing in Shutter Priority mode...lo and behold, the aperture dial had become the ISO dial!

Oh Nikon, I love you so much. You are so thoughtful. 

I love my D90!

Sent from my iPhone

Stop calling it 26/11

Start calling it 26/11/08.

Yes, it's been that long. The tragedy to hit Mumbai in the November of '08 happened in '08. And we are in '11. That's right. It's more than 2 years and the case is still open. The wheels of justice are still creaking towards a judgement.

Just imagine. A criminal accused of the most heinous crimes, against whom there is enough evidence, who has been captured on surveillance cameras with an assault rifle in his hand, who shot The-Force-only-knows how many people, who was part of a group of terrorists who launched an unprovoked attack on innocent people, who was part of a group responsible for the killing of more than 160 people and many more injured. This criminal is still alive and justice has not yet been served.

Just imagine. When there is a mountain of evidence against someone and it still takes more than 2 years for justice to be served, what hope does the common man have? What about the millions of property disputes, the millions of oppression cases, the millions of rape and murder cases, the millions of tax fraud cases, the millions of simple cases that the ordinary citizen files in the hope that the law will protect him? What about the people?

Like in the movie "Damini", the character played by Sunny Deol was spot on. People who come for justice from the legal system only end up getting dates of postponement. A simple case drags on for years, even decades. People end up giving their legal cases to their children as an inheritance. How criminally negligent is that?

Is there nothing that can be done to correct this system? Is there nothing that can be done to correct one of the most fundamental tenets of democracy in the largest democracy in the world? Is there no one who will make a stand?

What hope is there for the rest of us if Ajmal still hides behind the law after killing so many people?

Are we only to watch movies like "Who killed Jessica" where all we can see is that the justice system can be perverted to favour one person? That the only time action will be taken is when the people get upset and stage protest?

The Indian Penal Code, I think, is suffering from Penile Dysfunction and needs a pill like Viagra to get it away from the impotent farce it has become.

Stop calling it 26/11. It loses context. The Americans called their tragedy 9/11 because quicker than anything, they had invaded Afghanistan and toppled the Taliban. We need to start calling our tragedy with the full date. Only then will we realize that it is taking far too long for justice to be served.

Stop calling it 26/11. Start calling it for what it is. 26/11/08.

It's been more than 2 years...

What illness and boredom will do

I thought I was getting back in the habit of posting once every day. Blogger was now part of my "always open" tabs. I thought I was back. Guess what? I was wrong.

Had a round of golf and then a drinkie session with my buddies and then came back and tanked. Was out cold! Two day of non stop coughing and another two days without a voice, not to mention a few lost kilos somewhere, not that I needed to lose them. Then a ray of hope and my body started to come back. I could feel the strength coming back, a sense of a vague memory of my appetite. And that gave me the overconfidence to agree to go for a movie with friends.

Aah, the misery of being unwell. Can't eat my favorite movie snack (Popcorn) because the salt aggravates my cough and can't have my diet coke to sip cause it hurts my throat. And to add salt to serious illness, I picked up an eye infection to boot. My immune system, already battered and bruised, could not take it any more. I could almost hear the Scotty in my USS Enterprise of a body screaming "I'm givin her all she's got, Captain. I cannae give any more". And so the Romulans were pummeling my poor body from inside.

Another week wasted. Sigh!

After I'm back, it takes a bit of time to get the clock reset and to restart the engines. This time the engines had been out cold for a while and so took longer to get to optimum operating temperature. Therefore the lag.

Here's hoping to more post on - fingers crossed - a daily basis. Stay tuned for more Bakwas to follow.