Posts from — November 2002

Buggin’ you

Check this out! … cutest song ever!! ;)

Put on your earphones (or simply turn on your PC speakers)… then, click here. A new window will open. Right click your mouse in the window and click on Play from the menu that appears subsequently. Then, sit back and enjoy!! … I guarantee you’ll like it! ;-)

You’ll need Flash Player for the above application to run. Click here to install Flash.

Haunted House!

Have you felt spooked out lately?! … If no, then let me do the honours! … If you have indeed been spooked out lately, then I guess you wouldn’t really mind getting spooked out once again! … wot say?! ;)

Ok… I don’t know if you’ve seen this already, but this really spooked me out … honest!!
Try looking at this picture… i mean specifically at the door at the back of the room in the picture. concentrate really hard on the door for about a minute and I assure u that u will see the ghost! … but u have to look at the door… and really try to concentrate on it… to the point where you block out everything else and all you can see is the door. And as I said… you should keep on looking for about a minute.

and one important thing is to open the picture in a browser… do not open it in any of the picture viewers like MS Photoeditor or ACDsee or something like that… it has to be opened in a browser!! … this is important!

Ok … so click here.

… enjoy getting spooked! ;-)

cheers!

Radio Ga-Ga

Today, while coming back from office, while sitting in the bus, I was listening to radio on my cellphone. I was tuned into Win 94.6 FM, one of the several radio channels that have captured the imagination of the average Mumbaikar since the Government threw open the Mumbai airwaves to private radio broadcasting, earlier this year. The time was just about 9:00 PM and a chirpy duo of DJs gave way to a deeper baritone of Roshan Abbas.

Roshan Abbas hosts a delightful programme called Khanak, which focusses completely on old Hindi film songs. The best part about it is that they stick very religiously to the condition that songs only upto the 70’s decade will be played on air from 9:00 PM to 12:00 midnight, the duration of the programme. Any song, however good or famous, but released after the 70’s will not be played. This condition means that for old Hindi film music buffs like me, it presents a veritable feast for the ears. Old, often forgotten, but very melodious songs are the norm. Once the programme starts, I lean back on the backrest of the seat, in the bus, close my eyes and submit myself to the heady magic of those tunes, of an era past!… Mohammad Rafi, Kishore Kumar, Mukesh, Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhosle, Geeta Bali transport me to the time when melody was king. :-)

Completely at an antipode with respect to Khanak is the programme that is broadcast at 7:00 AM on the same radio channel. Hosted by probably the chirpiest and most effervescent DJ on radio, Malishka, this programme starts off my day on the right note!… Well, it managed to drive away my Monday blues today morning, as a result of which I was in a good mood for the rest of the day.

Hmm… that’s enough about radio, I suppose!

Well, today I downloaded the trailor of The Two Towers, the second instalment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy (actually, its not a trilogy! … its just one story split up into three parts!). I’m currently reading The Two Towers and as I was seeing the trailor, I just couldn’t help but feel amazed… since what I saw in the trailor was the exactly the way that I had visualized the scenes while reading the book… exactly!! Now, I just can’t wait for the film to be released so that I can go and see it!!! :-)
Thanks to Teshu because it was from his blog that I came across the link to the trailor of this film!

That’s all that I can think of at this moment! … suddenly my brain has clammed up and I have hit a writer’s block… for the moment! ;-)

cheers!

A little bit of good old Sunday blogging!

This post is a first in a couple of ways. This is the first time I’m posting a full length blog from home. All my earlier blogs have been from the office. The reason for this has been the fact that I invariably return home from office at around 2130 to 2200 hours daily. After which, I’m too pooped out to start the PC, let alone sit and write. Oh well! … enough of cribbing! … So! … this is my first post from the home!… that’s one of the firsts!

The second first (if ever there is such thing as a second first!… hehehe) is that this is the first time I’m posting a blog through any place other than the standard web-based blogging interface available at Blogger. I’ve posted this blog using w.bloggar, the freeware tool that makes the blogging experience so easy. The biggest advantage of using w.bloggar is that it provides a one-stop solution to write a post, edit it, format it, do a spell check on it, connect to Blogger and post/publish the blog there… all using just a single application!… and without having to connect to the Net except to post/publish the post. The text editing and formatting facilities in w.bloggar are extremely powerful and easy to use. Most of these features that it provides are available only to premium (read, paid!) users of Blogger. It also provides a way to edit/change the template or the layout of your blog page. Moreover w.bloggar is available for blogging on many blogging systems, e.g. Blogger, Movable Type, Nucleus, Blogworks XML, etc.. Wow!

Ha ha! … that looked quite like a marketing effort on behalf of w.bloggar. Well… let me assure you… it wasn’t! … I’m just very impressed by it… that’s all! :-)

So… back to the business of blogging…

Yesterday I had my second session with my dentist… and it lasted longer than the first one. Now I boast of a composite filling in one of my molars. It looks quite like the natural colour of the teeth and its difficult to make out that the tooth has been filled. But the process of filling, itself, was quite lengthy and complex. This composite filling forms a chemical bond with the tooth and that’s how it stays in place. So, the existing temporary filling had to be extricated completely. Even this time, the drill and the probe caused no pain at all, prompting the dentist to remark, “You came to me for treatment just in the nick of time. If the caries had progressed a little further, it would have reached the nerve and then there would have been no way out of it other than getting a Root Canal done, and believe me that hurts!”.
“Thank God!”, I said and the dentist nodded saying, “Yes!… thank god!”. Then, as I was lying, almost horizontal, on the reclined chair, she (the dentist) produced a an instrument that looked very much like a small hair dryer… with a thin glass tube sticking out of its front. I though that I would scream bloody murder if she put that thing in my mouth to work on my poor teeth! But all I did was to bunch up my eyebrows and show a frightened look in my eyes (I just couldn’t scream since my mouth was full of a suction pump and a probe).
“Don’t worry!… It’s just a gun!”, said the dentist, sweetly and matter-of-factly!
A gun!!?… Some more frightened expression in my eyes!… and the eyebrows… up and bunched together!
“Ahh!… don’t worry! … It’s just a UV-gun. Ultra-violet light helps the filling to bond faster with the teeth and helps it dry faster”, came the explanation. That relaxed me no end and I let the treatment continue till my tooth was filled and looked much… much better than it did a couple of weeks ago!

Well that’s it about how Saturday went… Today, i.e. has been as relaxed and Sunday-like as it can get. I had been watching the final one-dayer between India and West Indies. But after the abject surrender by the Indians facing a huge total, I lost interest and instead read the newspaper. There are a couple of stories in it that caught my eye…

The venue of the Miss World pageant has been shifted to London after the mindless violence that took place in Nigeria, the original venue. How dumb can people get!!? 105 dead and over 500 injured in rioting over a beauty contest!… oh c’mon!!! :-/

Priyanka Gandhi-Vadra, the heiress-apparent to the legacy of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty (ohh puhleeeze!) seems to be finally taking the long-awaited plunge into the murky world of politics. And how!! It seems she visited a police station in the high-profile Amethi constituency and forced the police officers there to file a FIR alleging that a BJP leader in the area had dismantled the house of a poor dalit named Shambhunath. “UP ki aandhi, Priyanka Gandhi”, it seems is the latest buzzword in and around Amethi.

Theres good news for all the Tintin fans (which includes me!!). Steven Spielberg has decided to bring the young cartoon detective to life on the big screen. He is currently negotiating the rights to the character with the firm that owns them. Well, finally!! … we will get to see Tintin on the silver screen… and who better to do it than Steven Spielberg!! :-)

On that happy note… I’ll take your leave!…

cheers!

Mind your language!

I managed to confuse people with that post yesterday! But as an old Hindi song goes… “… samajhne waale samajh gaye… naasamjhe woh anaadi hai!!” ;-)

Well… the cryptic sounding words mean the following…

To those who still haven’t figured it out, these are the words inscribed on the One Ring, the ring that is main protagonist of the great epic, The Lord of The Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien.

J.R.R. Tolkien was a great linguist. He had a deep knowledge of languages, both modern and ancient. He was at home with such diverse languages as, English, French, German, Welsh, Finnish and old Norse. It is this fascination with languages that resonates loud and clear throughout The Lord of The Rings. Not only was Tolkien an expert at known languages, but he was also an expert in one other unique ability… the talent to create his own languages. He created languages such as Elvish (both, Quenya and Sindarin), Dwarvish(Khuzdul), Entish and the Black Speech. He wrote, “The invention of languages is the foundation. The ’stories’ were made rather to provide a world for the languages than the reverse”. Wow!!

Consider the following points…
• Saruman’s name derives from the Anglo-Saxon, or Old English, root “searu-” for “treachery” or “cunning.”
• “Sauron” is linked to the Old Norse or Icelandic stem meaning “filth” or “dung” or “uncleanness.”
• “Mordor” derives from the Old English word “morthor,” which means “murder.”
• “Middle-earth” is related to the name “middan-geard,” which was the name for the Earth itself in Old English poetry and was considered to be the battleground between the forces of good and evil.
• Tolkien’s High Elvish language, Quenya, was inspired by Finnish.

Fascinating, isn’t it?! :-)

By the way, the lines that started this post, i.e. “Ash nazg…” are from the Black Speech. An example of Quenya, the language of the elves is, “Elen sila lûmenn’ omentielvo”, which means “A star shines on the hour of our meeting.”. Another example that can be taken is from the Dwarwish language… “Khazâd-ai-mênu!” which translates to “The Dwarves are upon you!” in the language of the Men! :-)

Its just wonderful! … the world of fantasy in The Lord of The Rings!!

Have you experienced it yet?! ;-)

cheers!