Perspectives

The origins of Thanksgiving are multiple -- from giving thanks for safe passage over the seas, to harvest festivals and even a helping hand from an unexpected source, when a drought threatened death...
Today, Thanksgiving is a time to get together with family and thank Man and/or God (depending on how religious/spiritual/who you are) for what you have, your blessings and to pray for peace and happiness.

As I said above... who you are may affect your perspective as to what to be thankful for...

Get Fuzzy!

Get Fuzzy is another strip I read from time to time. However today's the first time I felt like sharing one. Darby Conley, the artist of this strip is a friend of Stephen Pastis', who draws Pearls Before Swine. Perhaps Pastis is influenced by Conley in some way as we have two misanthropic animals central to each strip. Yet, where Rat can have a tender side... Bucky Katt must be almost pure evil. Satchel Pooch is simple but not a dunce like Pig.

I like the third and the last panels in today's strip...

Star Trek Trailer

The 11th star trek film comes out next year. It takes us to the beginnings of the cast of The Original Series. I came across a trailer. I approve and am excited.

Meh

For all people who may wonder what I mean when I say: Meh

Click here

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A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

You can never understand one language until you understand at least two. -Ronald Searle, artist (b. 1920)

Blog roll!

If you like cricket and enjoy dry sardonic humour, click below. This writer might just be my hero!

The Confectionery Stall

Reflections on...the end of a semester

So it's been three months since I've been in Tallahassee and nearly three since classes started. My classmates have been ready for a break for the last three weeks. I wasn't quite sure about myself... however I think I am now.

Roughly three weeks ago, my classmates started praying for a swift end to the term. These are people who have taken 5 classes because they have to finish in a year. I can imagine and understand the kind of frantic manicness that they must feel round about this time... However, with three classes for me, I was being kept sufficiently busy and occupied, without wanting to jump into any nearby wells.

Then we had an entire week of no submissions and things were entirely laid back. It's like someone pulled the rug out from under my feet. Now, starting anything is slightly painful. Deadlines are cut close... but the good thing is that there's only two final projects left to submit now and I should finish a practically complete draft of one by the end of this week. That leaves me two whole weeks to steadily work on the last one. I just need to make sure that I do steadily work on it and not leave it hanging. However, finishing the one project two weeks before it's due will motivate me for the rest.
Just another four meetings left for this semester and year... next week's off and then only the last week of meetings and a test.
I think I'm ready for a break... there seem to be other symptoms of it as well... I just hope the break will be rejuvenating and then starting afresh from next year will not be a chore.

I never thought that lack of "busyness" would be so damned annoying...

Word of the Day

Today, I paste an entire entry from my A Word A Day email. It seems especially apt since I'm wondering whether the essay I'm currently writing will be adequate and to the point or prolix.
There's a good chance that it will be posted here at some point of time, so you will be in a position to comment on it then. For the time being, I'll let my teacher worry about that and share this email with you.

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prolix

PRONUNCIATION:

(pro-LIKS, PRO-liks)

MEANING:

adjective: Tediously wordy.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Latin prolixus (extended, poured), from liquere (to flow), which is also the source of words such as liquid, liquor, licorice. Now you see the connection -- why consuming liquor makes people prolix.

USAGE:

"No one has ever called him prolix. At a future-war seminar that he sponsored, Mr. Andrew Marshall mumbled a few introductory words and then sat in silence, eyebrows arched, arms folded, for the remaining two days."
James Der Derian; The Illusion of a Grand Strategy; The New York Times; May 25, 2001.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

Martyrdom has always been a proof of the intensity, never of the correctness of a belief. -Arthur Schnitzler, writer and doctor (1862-1931)

Something to ponder about...

Whenever two people meet, there are really six people present. There is each man as he sees himself, each man as the other person sees him, and each man as he really is. -William James, psychologist and philosopher (1842-1910)

Hi! I'm the guy who writes the blog

This is dedicated to everyone who reads and has a blog of their own...

With friends like these...do you really need enemies?

Reflections of America...

Reflections on... The American Presidency

So... Barack Obama is the President-elect for the USA.
He said it's time for change and that "Yes, we can!" change... and now people are saying "Yes, we did!"
History has been made, no doubt.
History was made when George W took up his father's mission to go after Saddam... and he came up a cropper. The entire situation would likely have been much different if they HAD found WMDs in Iraq.
Though for all that is said and done... it's all bygones.
Bush couldn't have come back for a third term. Any Republican candidate would've distanced himself from Bush as McCain did... Apparently, the American people are tired of cowboy politics and they voted Blue. Florida's voted Blue for the first time in years, as have other previous Republican leaning battle ground states.
It's all good. All is well. I think. I suppose.
For... I don't care!

Why should I?
I don't belong to this country. I never shall.
I don't vote. I don't pay taxes at this time... when I have to do so, it will be with the intent of being law-abiding in general...
I've had people asking me whom I support... why should I support anyone?
If I were to make a forced choice, I'd root for the underdog.. in this case it was Obama. [And for the record, it was George W when he first came to power... especially after the whole intern mess that Clinton got into]
I read an article on some news website which compared the candidates and asked which one was better for India... the verdict was that technically, McCain was better... Obama wants to cut tax breaks that would affect outsourcing of jobs, cut H1B visa allotments (or at least not increase them) and the Dems are more rabid about non proliferation. However, McCain was a potentially irksome challenge in his being confrontationist... Also, people like Obama because he's a signal for change and the world is hoping for "a less arrogant America".
Good luck with that... Some part of me almost hopes that the new administration crashes and burns... now THAT is something that WILL sober up America... apparently, there might not be a lesser of two evils. Though... I hope I'm proven wrong.

The bottom line, however, is I don't care.
Why should I? I repeat this because... as much as we kowtow to and brown nose America, we're a nation now who doesn't need to be in awe of too many people or things. We're quite capable of asking why we must do something in the international arena... and not just toe America's line... and we do it!
I was discussing this with a Chinese classmate and told her the same thing. India and China... can't be affected too much by a regime change in America (except perhaps economically - but a regime isn't going to get the country out of the economic mire it is in, nor the rest of the world). America's too scared of China and they couldn't give a damn... India... is growing fangs and horns and is becoming an international adolescent perhaps. That's not meant to sound condescending... just that it signals positive growth and change. My friend mentioned that they don't have the same kind of freedom in China that people here do. That's besides the point... internal struggles can't affect foreign policy... won't... shouldn't be allowed to... Strife or not, I'm sure the entire Chinese population would respond to a "call to arms" by whatever entity rules them and that scares America.

So yeah... India and China... all good.
We shouldn't care.

Something bugs me though...
It's all well and good for American people to be relieved and saying "Praise the Lord!" and some such things... they are responsible for this result, they are accountable for the outcome and hopeful for the future. What gets my goat is... all people who are in America (or not), are not American and are all going "yes we can!" and "obama obama obama" -- what is all this about?
International students (who, I should add, were told specifically to keep their heads down during this time) getting rabid about it. People from back home asking me about it. People who would almost never talk politics any other time. What do they care? What do they know? How does it matter?

Do you want to know who I support?
I'm all for making history. I'd say - make double history. They should've had Condy Rice run for the Republican candidacy. First black woman President. There you go.
However I'd made a small oversight. One of my classmates corrected me and I had to agree.
He said I had the wrong woman. There's one woman, he said, whom he'd vote for, regardless of party affiliation. Whom are we talking about?

Oprah Winfrey for President!

And you know what? He's not far off. She's popular enough to get into Office. Even if she doesn't have the credentials, she'll have the right kind of staff around her to get her the required info and put on a good show. She's got 20+ years of experience at that...

vOte for Oprah!

Reflections on... Facebook

So I've become a facebook fiend in the last couple of days... Suddenly decided to crawl out of the woodwork and go adding old cronies from address books... getting in touch with quite a few.

I resisted using this American tool for the longest of times. Now it's become popular in India and much like AIM, which I had to use when I was active on scum, I need to use FB now to keep in touch with contacts I make here...
It's a little involved but can be quite fun if you don't go overboard...

And now I run into this... Hehe...

(The mousies crack is actually quite funny but you needed to follow the strip for that :-( )

Yes! again!

Every so often I post these small sayings or quotes I find lying around... either as I wander the intraweb or sometimes even on passing vehicles.
People have a habit of putting up pretty inane things in their IM status messages but this one former classmate of mine seems to have a knack of putting in really interesting ones. We don't talk a lot. We didn't talk a whole lot at school until the final few weeks but now when we do, it's pretty interesting and I realise that the interesting conversations are not just a fluke but she really has a different way of thinking/outlook on stuff... which reflects on her choice of quotes.

The gem for today is:

Dreams are not things that you see in your sleep. Dreams are things that don't let you sleep.

And all I can say is: YES!

A waking nightmare...

What do I mean by a waking nightmare?

Have you ever had a dream where you are doing something, saying something - which is innocuous and decently pleasant by itself but then you wake up.
You wake up with no familiar sensations of a nightmare...no cold sweat, no racing heart...
Until...
Until...you somehow remember the dream... realise that the dream was perhaps some part of sub conscious is trying to tell you something, dig up something which you've put away - something you've dealt with and you're happy about how you've dealt with it. You've modified your thoughts until your head wins over the heart... and then you go to sleep... your heart and your head conspire... like the Sirens' song and then you wake up!
And the nightmare begins...
You wake up and realise that what you were dreaming about is a nightmare... should be a nightmare and if you hadn't woken... you wonder about what you'd have heard, what you'd have seen...
And then the heart starts racing and the sweat starts beading...

*That* is a waking nightmare...


(Well, all of that is true except for the sweat - that was just caused by too many blankets on me :P )

Cruising the Nile...

Last week I was linked to a beta version of a new browser based game - Nile Online.
It's in beta right now, which means that it's not quite all ready but it's free (will remain so) and you can ask for a beta invite just by providing your email address. I started, I still play but it can get a little slow... though it's actually ideal if you have only a few minutes to play every day. Playing here means making decisions on development and coordinating with other players for trade.

Anyway... it got me to dust of the disc for its parent game - Children of the Nile. Incidentally, I never finished the game originally and since I have some downtime now, I thought it'd be good to give it a whirl. I've been progressing pretty well - this week is the first one without any assignments due in about a month and this was perfectly sedate way of killing time - nice music, not overly challenging (sometimes this can be good) and decent graphics.

I did notice something scary though...megalomania can strike in the weirdest of ways!

One builds a prestige rating in the Egyptian world by one's actions in the games. You can gain prestige by building fancy tombs, by exploring and establishing trade routes, by constructing monuments or achieving a high standard of living in you city. For every particular level of prestige you attain, you can hire more graduates and these graduates are essential to the administration of your society.

But yeah... to get back to the point... when I was playing on Friday, I was doing quite well at the prestige, in fact the scenario I was playing had a high prestige requirement. I just decided to go on and see how long it took before the game ran out of superlatives for my government. While I was doing this, my city started running out of food and the people were complaining. I had actually destroyed a tomb so that my victory screen would not come up because I wanted to build pyramids to see how far I could go. When I heard the people complaining, I actually didn't care! When I start a city, the focus is always on getting enough food in before any other development starts. It's all for the people then. Here, at the end of the scenario, they were asking for food and I didn't care! I was all like: they can go hunting for pomegranates in the wild. I want to see how far *I* can go and see how well MY prestige does. Also, I knew that the food problem would never cause concern or riots because I knew I could simply jump ship by rebuilding that last tomb I needed and get out of there. I might as well have been playing a lyre!
Does art imitate life? Does life imitate art??

Scary...