Ho Hum......

Terror! Terror?

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 06:28:00 +0000

Mumbai was all over the news because of the terror attacks. Yeah! But these attacks were from a foreign hostile group. While the entire nation/world seemed to be so disgusted/shocked by a bunch of trained terrorists holding a part of the city hostage, isn't this something that we have been used to for ages now?

My friend's parents have told us how they had to live in fear sometime in the 70's due to the anti South Indian movement enforced by the Shiv Sena. Later that shifted to anti Muslim activities. Then we had the moral police banning innocuous things like Valentines Day, the blackening of signboards for not displaying signs in Marathi. The latest incidents are the attack on a hotel over staffing issues and then the attack on girls in a pub by the SRS. Political parties were quick to jump in and politicize the whole issue with their holier than thou attitude. All that happens is mud slinging and namecalling without any action taken against the hooligans who have caused all the misery.

PAH!!

Gun control!! Is there a point to it?

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 06:43:00 +0000

A recurring point of debate since the tragic events of 11/26 has been the strict gun control laws in India. Would the innocent civilians have had a better chance of defending themselves if they were empowered to carry?

All the sporadic massacres over the past few years pale in comparison to the mayhem caused by the 10 militants/terrorists (170+ dead, 300+ injured). In a situation where awareness/response time of the armed services/police was questionable at the best what is the point in holding on to the archaic gun control laws that were put into place by our former rulers (the British empire) in order to take away the peoples chances of mutiny. The main reason for us to have such Draconian laws was so that the British Empire would not have anything to fear from a nation armed with rocks, sticks and the crude weapons.

This is not to say that the police/armed forces' actions were incorrect/not appropriate; however the sort of infrastructure that we have is not very conducive to an effective response. Why does the government take away our right to protect ourselves. All the weapons used by the attackers are on the government list of restricted weapons ie. there is absolutely no way of a private individual owning them. The problem here lies with the inherent capability of a terrorist to not give hoot about the laws of the land and to go ahead and break everyone of them with impunity. The civil, law abiding citizens who have let a sleeping/apathetic government take away their right to defend themselves find themselves staring down the barrel of an assault rifle the likes of which they have seen before only in movies or on TV. The results of this confrontation have been predictable.
Images from http://www.olegvolk.net

Charlie

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 06:53:00 +0000

Blowing Rings

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Tue, 13 May 2008 09:59:00 +0000

For whatever reason I haven't posted anything in ages. While I still don't have anything to write about I just came across this video of a dolphin fooling around. I loved it and so....

Dolphin Blows Bubble Rings

Love the intelligence/playfulness of the creatures.

Cya sometime.

Jingle Bombs

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 07:05:00 +0000

I Can't Stand Christmas

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 10:28:00 +0000

Not Always Right

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 06:15:00 +0000

Call Center | Virginia, USA

(I was working for a call center that exclusively dealt with UPS)

Me: “Thank you for calling, how may I help you?”
Client: “I need to track a package.”
Me: “I would be happy to help you with that. Do you have a tracking number?”.
Client: “Yes, I do…” *proceeds to read off the tracking number*
Me: “I’m sorry, however that’s not coming up as a valid tracking number…there doesn’t appear to be enough numbers. Could you read it to me again?”

(The client gives me the number again, to no avail. I spend the next few minutes attempting to use what information was available to try and locate the package…with the client coming close to tears when I am unsuccessful. Finally, her boyfriend comes on the line, proceeds to yell at and berate me, using all sorts of expletives; due to my inability to find this package.)

Client’s boyfriend: “Look, I can’t understand why you cannot locate this package. I mean, I have the tracking number. It says right here, FEDEX TRACKING NUMBER!!!”

*pause*

Client’s boyfriend: *sheepishly* “This is UPS, isn’t it?”
Me: “Yep. Is there anything else I can help you with?”
*click*
____________________________________________________________________

Pizza | Newcastle, UK

Customer: “I’d like a Chicken Kiev pizza, without chicken, garlic or sweetcorn. And throw some ham on there.”
Employee: “So, you want a ham pizza?”
Customer: “Yeah, why not.”
____________________________________________________________________

Debt Collection Call Center | Rancho Cordova, CA, USA

(A young man from Fullerton, CA calls to get our address in Rancho Cordova, CA)
Him: “Rancho Cordova? What coast is that on?”
Me: “We are in California, just like you.”
Him: “Oh…so, East?”
____________________________________________________________________

Key Shop | Chicago, IL, USA

(Note; electronic ignition keys sell for $25 to $90)

Customer: “I want to return this key. Here is the receipt.”
(The electronic key is worn from use; the receipt is 2 years old)
Me: “What’s the problem?”
Customer: “It doesn’t work.”
Me: “Well, let me go out to your car and see what the problem is.”
Customer: “I sold that car.”
Me: “OK, but it looks like you’ve been using the key for a long time. It must have worked.”
Customer: “Well it did work, but I sold the car and I don’t need it anymore, so I want my money back.”
Me: “Well, I’m sorry sir, but we sell keys; we do not rent them. When you sell the thing the keys fit in, you either give the keys to the new owner or toss them. And even if we did rent keys, the rent for two years would be more than the purchase cost–so actually you would owe us money.”

*customer runs out the door*
___________________________________________________________________

Bookstore | Ottawa, Canada

Customer: “Hi, I’m looking for a book.”
Me: “Yeah, I know. You called a bookstore.”
____________________________________________________________________

If you have ever worked in customer service or retail you will have had experiences like this for sure. All these are now cataloged on one brilliant site.

Check it out here

SpongeFish.... The sea of knowledge

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 07:00:00 +0000

There is a new site around that has been popping up in a lot of places lately. SpongeFish is a fresh startup that focuses on Knowledge Sharing. Hmmmm.. with a twist. Here is what they have to say about themselves.

" Your knowledge can't exist without you. Sounds obvious, right? We make sure that you are always front and center when someone looks at what you've shared, because we think you are what makes your knowledge interesting. We also make it easy for you to broadcast what you know to the world beyond SpongeFish, via email, easy posting to other sites, and social bookmarking."

The site has a lot of stuff on a lot of topics like Football, Computers, Cooking, Gaming, Marketing and a lot more. The number of contributions is growing real fast. The USP of the site is the fact that you can share your knowledge in whatever format you like. You can have a Powerpoint presentation, a video, an article, photographs etc. They have a good online publishing tool too. I had a few problems working on editing large pages and moving stuff round but I guess that will improve over time.

Dive into the Sea of Knowledge

PS: These are a few articles/lessons I have put up on SpongeFish

Hunk or Junk.........

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 04:01:00 +0000

The latest entrant on the biking scene is the Hero Honda Hunk. I swear I am not making this up. Hero Honda has gone ahead and given the very good looking bike a very, very gay sounding name. For all those who were hoping that the Indian biking scene would improve this brings yet another disappointment. The initial impressions seem to put it in exactly the same place as the CBZ Xtreme with all the same specs. So in effect what we have here is yet another 150 cc. wannabe.

Hero Honda also seem to have taken a step backwards with the omission of a digi-dash and LED lights which have become very popular since Bajaj started using them on the Pulsars. The reason given is that since this is a 'Macho' bike they have omitted the 'Delicate' parts. YEAH SURE.

The Hunk takes on bikes which have been around for some time now and are quite popular.

The HH CBZ-Xtreme - This seems like a really stupid move by HH as it has a very good chance of cannibalizing the Xtreme's market share.
The HH Achiever - No real news on this bike. I think it bombed, so no competition here.
The Bajaj Pulsar 150 - The undisputed market leader. Almost every third bike on the road seems to be a Bajaj.
The Honda Unicorn - By far the most refined bike in this segment. A reliable and smooth ride have ensured that this Honda has a good following who swear by the stability and comfort offered. It seems to have the least market share and judging by the crappy updates the company has provided it might just disappear soon. A good bike that would have been great with a peppier engine.
The TVS Apache RTR - The latest upstart on the block. A good bike backed by one of the most aggressive, in your face marketing campaigns ever seen in India. The RTR followed on the heels of the Apache with some good improvements which really caught the eye of many people. TVS also has a FI version lined up so hopefully we will get much more out of this. The Apache is the bike that a lot of people have their hopes pinned on.

Guess we can count the fact that this is not just a sticker update among our blessing, but all said and done we are sick of getting repacked engines too. When will HH come out with an 'All New' bike. All that remains to be seen is if the Hunk can take on the might of the Pulsar, the Xtreme and the RTR without fading into oblivion.

Images taken from Rearset.
Head on over there for a nice detailed report on the bike with some more pics.

Blank Noise...... A different view..

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 04:04:00 +0000

'What is blank noise all about' this was a question asked by a friend some time back. We had been chilling out, going through the newspapers, watching some videos... just generally taking advantage of a day off. There was an article about the Blank Noise Project which turned out to be a Bangalore based initiative against eve teasing. Quite a laudable initiative, though the enthusiasm seems to be a little misguided or for the lack of a better word a little overdone.

In a city like Bombay, where traveling to work or study takes up almost 3 hours a day in crowded public transport the very lack of sufficient space can be very unnerving. This is the same whether you are a male or a female. No one really enjoys the crowded packed trains or buses. And most time what I see is a man being nice to a lady and giving up his seat. Which seems like the only sensible/decent thing to do. Now expecting not to have physical contact while making your way through gangways packed tight as sardines seems like asking for too much.

I must admit that I have been amongst the first to cheer a lady for embarrassing that touchy feely dude on the bus by turning around and giving him a piece of her mind. The same goes for the people that do that on trains. But just suppose that this person was conditioned to be aggressive, that the actual incident was altogether unavoidable. Maybe the guy was just trying to get to the front of the bus so that he could get off at his stop. And our lady just lost her head after spending the past 25 mins standing in a bus without getting a place to sit. Whose fault is it?

I am sure that most guys will agree that we have all at some point of time or the other been subjected to looks that made us wonder what we did wrong. How many guys have been subjected to angry stares for just accidentally glancing in the direction of a lady that we are sharing some form of public transport with. How many friends have you made just by seeing someone and talking to them, opening a conversation with a random person, something that started with simple eye contact.

This post has a very shoddy construction because I do not want to sit down and edit and re edit this to make it politically correct. What I do know is that yes, we need to take a look at how we react to people around us. Personal space is to be respected at all costs. But being militant about it and penalizing random people is not going to help. I hope that I have not opened a can of worms here. This post is not meant to be anti BNP or pro BNP. It is just something I am unsure about. Are we being overly aggressive or not. From the information I have been able to gather I think that the BNP is doing a great job and I fully support them. All I have to add is maybe they need to show some restraint.

Also please take the time to read 'The Other Side Of Blank Noise' a very well put together article on the same topic.

Foodies Rejoice...

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 07:58:00 +0000

Hey, it has been a long time since i posted anything, guess i have been too lazy to try to :D Anyhoo, was checking around for some good restaurants to eat at(was sick of eating at the same old places) when I stumbled on this excellent site called 'Burrp!' And no, that is not a typo.

Burrp! has reviews of most of the eating joints around the city. Being a startup they might not have 100% coverage. But that is changing fast. The best part is that they are community driven and anyone can add a business. People can check the site to see if their fav eating joint is already listed and if not they can add it.

Once a business is added anyone can go in and add a review... (thanks for that correction Anand)
Brickbats and bouquets are welcome.....

All the best to the Burrp! team.

You can let it out over here

This is CRAAAAAAZZZZZZZZYYYYYYYYY (duh, 300)

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Mon, 26 Mar 2007 10:21:00 +0000

Yay... finally watched 300. Actually did it 2 weeks ago. Was just too lazy to do a write up about it..... Booked the tix in advance for a 1030 am show at IMAX Adlabs. Did not want to end up seeing a house full sign and getting skinned after dragging the lil one out of bed that early. got to Adlabs at 10 [:p] was spooky seeing that place that deserted. anyway.. this was one of the few times that I have been in a theater before the start of a movie. The shocker was though the movie had been released only the day before, the hall was EMPTY... woo hoo.... there were a max of 20 odd people.... the movie was an awesome experience though at times the whole liberty and freedom and justice dialogs bugged the hell out of me. I mean why does anyone want morals and the freedom of the world thrown into such a nice crazily violent movie.....

The movie starts off with a history/cultural studies lesson introducing you to the Spartan lifestyle. Quite a brutal introduction... As it progresses blah blah.....

Okay... that is it. The movie is not about history, or morals or ideals. What it is about is very well done CGI, brutally gory bloodshed, lots of fights with lots of blood, chopped limbs and thrusting spears finding their mark. The fights have been beautifully choreographed , making them seem almost like a ballet performance (not that I have seen one of those). Some of the sequences seem straight out of a comic book (and that is with good reason, most of the movie has been shot in bluescreen), and that makes the experience all the more worthwhile. The soundtrack also is great, and if you are the type who sits till the last of the credits roll off the screen you are in for a treat.....

The bad stuff... Well, I might get my butt kicked for this but did they really have to have all those guys prowling around in their lil furry chaddis???? Wasn't there more armor and stuff that they used to wear around then?? Seemed a lil gay to me.......
The fight sequences sometimes got a little repetitive.... How many times would you want to see a spear go through a human body and then see the blood splatter around.... The storyline/plot was a little thin too.

All said and done, quite a brilliant movie, provided you are not expecting the story of the century with true to life details. If you want some nice entertainment with great visuals and a good soundtrack and are not queasy around limbs getting lopped off, gallons of blood flowing, dead bodies everywhere, including some impaled on spears etc. etc. this one is for you.

Score 4/5

Tonight, we dine in Hell

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 12:36:00 +0000

Just saw the trailers for 300. A movie based on the Frank Miller graphic novel which in turn is based on a true battle. The trailers are quite impressive. Lets see if this one can match up to the last Frank Miller work that was taken to the big screen (Sin City).

The comic downloads are available here

Been a long time

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 12:12:00 +0000

Well it's been a long time since I posted anything. Frankly there has not been much to talk about. Since the last time I posted I have seen few movies, The Departed, Blood Diamond, Happy Feet, Eklavya [:P] nothing great about any of them... Have been listening to a lot of Dream Theater (guess I might come around to posting some stuff on them soon) Roger Waters performed in town but I did not feel like going for the show... (actually was too bloody broke). Maiden is performing here in a few weeks; don't think I will be going for that either.

Already said bye to a couple of close friends... They have gone to NZ to study ... Miss you guys.. All the best... Been hoping to hit the books myself; wonder when I will get around to doing that.

Thats about all for now I guess.....

And yeah... I got a raise and a promotion... Was real happy till I realized that most of the salary hike will be going straight to the taxman...... AAARGH......

Sorry about the rambling, droning tone of this post....
Still bloody bugged 'bout working my arse off only to pay most of what I earn as TAX... PAH

That all....... Cya soon...PEACE

2007 is here, WOO HOO

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Sun, 31 Dec 2006 03:31:00 +0000

Finally 2006 has come to an end. It has been a very long year. The bomb blasts in Mumbai, the frequent power outages, water problems, traffic problems and everything else kind of got together and made it a pretty sad time.

On the personal front it has been a mixed bag. I finally sat down and wrote this blog (not that big a deal, I know, but it was a first for me). I stuck with my job, got a few good photos, listened to a lot of good music, got into a serious relationship with someone who means the world to me, got exposed to a whole new world of entertainment (anime). I also said bye to a few friends who left the country to study abroad while I finally got back to studying after a long long break.

I really hope that 2007 will be a good year. As is tradition I am not going to make any resolutions this year either; they do not seem to last past the 1st (month, week or day), but I want to get a schedule for updating this blog, go out and get some more good photos, read more good books, do not mess up my studies/exams and finally get my finances right.

I would really like to thank the people who have taken the trouble to actually go through my blog. And finally I want to wish you a very Happy New Year, and hope that the year 2007 lives up to its promise (of not being a shitty year, that is).

Happy New Year everyone
Love and Peace

Brain Damage, the definitive Pink Floyd radio show.

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 06:24:00 +0000

Since I am on a Floyd trip I would like to plug one of the best Pink Floyd sites I have ever seen.
Brain Damage is a podcast based site/show which encompasses the best of Pink Floyd's work right from the earlier shows (as early as 1968) right down to the last few shows that have happened in 2006(both, Roger Waters' and David Gilmour's tours). It does not cover all the live shows but still does an excellent job of exposing one to an excellent cross section of the band's work. Doc has done a very good job in cleaning up the audio on some of the old songs. One unusual post is Floyd's Worst Moments which takes you through a few of the band's on stage mess-ups, power outages etc. All the content is downloadable in the form of MP3s which are fairly large (100+ MB) but the length of the shows (usually 2 hrs+) makes it worth it.

All said, it is a very engrossing site. If you are a fan of Pink Floyd and have a decently fast connection you should definitely check out this site.

Edit: The above image is called Back Catalogue and has been done by Storm Thorgerson the legendary album cover designer.

Roger Waters, Leaving Beirut

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 04:12:00 +0000

This is an excerpt from the Roger Waters song 'Leaving Beirut'
Waters, who was one of the founder members of the iconic band Pink Floyd has been very vocal about his dislike for armed conflict throughout his career and this song just underlines his approach to the current situation.
This song has generated a very wide variety of responses ranging from acceptance by a lot of fans to a newspaper accusing Waters of being an anti-Israel artist. The live version of the song has some very impressive guitar solos and the video also has some very interesting images.

Are these the people that we should bomb
Are we so sure they mean us harm
Is this our pleasure, punishment or crime
Is this a mountain that we really want to climb
The road is hard, hard and long
Put down that two by four
This man would never turn you from his door
Oh George! Oh George!
That Texas education must have fucked you up when you were very small

When I was 17 my mother, bless her heart, fulfilled my summer dream
She handed me the keys to the car
We motored down to Paris, fuelled with Dexedrine and booze
Got bust in Antibes by the cops
And fleeced in Naples by the wops
But everyone was kind to us, we were the English dudes
Our dads had helped them win the war
When we all knew what we were fighting for
But now an Englishman abroad is just a US stooge
The bulldog is a poodle snapping round the scoundrel's last refuge

Is gentleness too much for us
Should gentleness be filed along with empathy
We feel for someone else's child
Every time a smart bomb does its sums and gets it wrong
Someone else's child dies and equities in defence rise
America, America, please hear us when we call
You got hip-hop, be-bop, hustle and bustle
You got Atticus Finch
You got Jane Russell
You got freedom of speech
You got great beaches, wildernesses and malls
Don't let the might, the Christian right, fuck it all up
For you and the rest of the world

Not in my name, Tony, you great war leader you
Terror is still terror, whosoever gets to frame the rules
History's not written by the vanquished or the damned
Now we are Genghis Khan, Lucretia Borghia, Son of Sam
In 1961 they took this child into their home
I wonder what became of them
In the cauldron that was Lebanon
If I could find them now, could I make amends?
How does the story end?

Mix pix

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 04:05:00 +0000

This one is just gonna be random photos... no timeline, no details.....

Uttaranchal: 2003

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 03:55:00 +0000

Since I am putting up pics just thought I would pull out some old images from a trip to Uttaranchal a few years ago. Again, feedback is welcome.

GOA....

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Sat, 09 Dec 2006 06:17:00 +0000

Had gone to goa a few weeks back... tried to get some good pics.... had to do some color correction in photoshop.... feedback would be good.......

PS: Note to self, carry polarising filter on next trip to the beach.....

Gungrave

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 06:00:00 +0000

Hey, am back. This time it is an anime series. Just started off on a new series called Gungrave.
Gungrave on Wikipedia

First impressions: I think it is a pretty stylishly made anime. Good action sequences with an alright background score make for some kickass entertainment.

Downloads on Megaupload

Episodes 1~16 are avi format. Which means they are gonna be huge downloads.
Episodes 17~26 are rmvb format.
26 episodes in total.

1- Destroyer In The Dusk
2- Young Dogs
3- Rain
4- Go
5- Millennion
6- Big Daddy
7- 5 Years Later
8- Family
9- Dispute
10- Conflict
11- Heat
12- Kind
13- Betrayal
14- Die
15- Harry
16- Letter
17- Mika
18- Grave
19- Superior
20- Brother
21- Duty
22-Remorse
23-Daughter
24- Last Bullet
25-Then
26- Dusk of the Destroyers

Happy watching

Neurotically Yours

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Wed, 15 Nov 2006 06:15:00 +0000

This has got to be one of the funniest, freakiest, most irritating, obnoxious, irreverent cartoons out there.... It features Foamy, a neurotic squirrel with an attitude and a penchant for goin off on some very impressive rants along with his owner Germaine and a host of other equally weird squirels. You also have some other funny humans supporting the mostly squirrely cast, eg. an Indian dude working as a Tech support guy for the Smell Tech Computer Company which seems to be a very obvious jibe at Dell and some one else who works for Star-Schmucks coffee... In a nutshell... you will love this one.

Check it out at:
Official site : They have lots of goodies including transcripts of most of the shows and some really cool merchandise
Friends of Foamy : This is an awesome fansite which has a lot of other stuff like all the episodes (official/unofficial), trivia, MP3s......

Thats it for now......

A beginning

noreply@blogger.com (Frankinsmoke) — Wed, 15 Nov 2006 05:32:00 +0000

Well... here I am... the last person on earth to have a blog :p... I thought that this would be a good way to work up some half decent writing skills so i signed up. took me quite some time to post this intro so I dunno if I am even gonna keep writing that long.... if I do I guess it will be about books, music, bikes or anything else that takes my fancy.... I don't expect it be of any use or interest to any one else so... until next time.... cyall