I Say No to Videos on Flickr

I am a huge fan of flickr [the photo sharing site] and photography is a part of my life. I like to keep a vivid memory of everything that happens around me and that’s how my craze for photography began I think and it dated back to my college days. But at that time, I only had a conventional camera, which uses films. You have to buy the films, take the photos and develop it which is a costly process. There was no place for errors. So my interests stayed only in moments with my friends and relatives. Even then, I have around 12-15 albums with all the memories of my college days.

Then came the digital revolution, everything was digitized. (ofcourse digital cameras existed long back also, but I couldn’t afford it) Then I saved for a digital camera and I searched for it for long time and acquired my Canon Digital IXUS 800IS, the first camera of Canon in the IXUS series with IS feature in it. Its been almost 2 years since I had it, and what more to say, I have taken more than 15000 photos in it. Now you know what I am talking about. I am looking forward for the day I will acquire an SLR.

I got the freedom to do all the experiments I want to do with a photography, I began taking pictures of everything of interest to me. I always loved the details of our nature. The beauty of leaves, the mighty clouds, the colourful sunsets, the intensity of flowers, everything was small wonders to me. And thus I got involved in photography and what do people say about happiness, it will grow when you share. I wanted to share my experience and satisfaction with others and that’s when I heard about flickr. First I thought flickr as a bit complicated, but slowly I saw the potential flickr offered. The flickr community! Also the flexibility of flickr, the things you can do with your photographs. They were not just photos anymore; I felt more than that, much more. You could share it with millions of people, you can place your photos in the world map, you can write comments, you can classify and categorize, and many more things. I became and admirer of flickr very fast. The quality with which they provide us with their services, it was superb.

But now, I have some disagreement with what they are doing now. They have added the video sharing feature in flickr. An ordinary person might wonder what I am complaining about. I have to be happy with it, ‘cos I have more features. But ask a true ‘flickerian’, you’ll know. There are groups which say, ‘We say NO to videos on flickr’ and ‘No videos on flickr’ and many administrators of groups are banning users from adding videos to their group. I feel I also have to do something about it.

Here it is… My protest to videos on flickr!

They are changing the true vision of flickr (the way I see it), by adding videos. May be people say I am afraid of change. But for sure Yahoo could have started another service like flickr video or yahoo video. But the chances of something like that to gain momentum in a short while, [competing with YouTube] are very small as compared to adding the feature to already existing, widely established, flickr. I can give you an example. What will you feel if the favorite flavor of icecream, is modified for better results by changing or adding another ingredient to it? [I know it’s a terrible example, but that’s all I could come up with when I tried to convert my feelings to words] I hope something will be done about it.

Lazzzzzzzzzy for 2 Days!!

What would you prefer to do, if you are given 2-3 days and nothing much to do? Well there are so many options, you can roam around the city, you can watch some movies, go to your friends place & have some fun, or visit some places/trips etc. But what if you are too lazy to do any of these things? But at the same time you want to do something also. Its the same thing which happened to me and other 3 of my friends last weekend.

Due to Ugadi [a local festival], we got a long weekend. Nothing in particular to do, even if there was something, I hope you all know the feeling of being lazy, that satisfaction you get when you have something to do and you just sit idle, not doing anything, anything at all. But I wanted to do something, something adventurous and decided to go on for a trip, a road trip - in bikes - to Coorg. The main reason - you may have guessed - not for trekking, not for sightseeing, not even for riding that long [a small %], not for mere adventure but for being lazy. Just drive 250-300kms and get to the place, you stay there for 2 days without doing anything, not even bathing, just because you are lazy, is the peak point of craziness, I can tell. But we did that.

In the brief, we started on Friday evening, reached & stayed at Mysore [~150kms] that night, continued to Coorg [~110Kms] the next morning, found a stay and settled there by noon Saturday, and then we started 'practicing laziness'. Our stay was in a small house inside a coffee plantation around 45acers in area and there was a small veranda there. All I did till Monday morning till we left was mostly sitting there idle looking at the foliage infront of the house, enjoyed music for sometime, ate and drank and thats it. Didn’t go out to visit any places [except after a few couple of drinks that we felt like climbing a mountain], no trekking, no movies, not even bathing, since the water there was too cold, just sat there talking to each others and the most important point is that, we absolutely enjoyed laziness for 2 days. :)

This trip was one of its kinds, out of all the trips I have gone for. After coming back, I was soo much in to laziness, that I didn’t even wanted to walk from where I sit to get some drinking water. The only thing we did against the ‘laziness agenda’ was riding that 250kms, but that was really adventurous, a really good road and a bike that can reach 110km/s easily, and the next thing you know, you are flying. Ok, I am not talking much, here are the photos, most of them are self explanatory I guess.

Starting our trip.

Taking a break!

We even had to drive through a paddy field to find a place to stay.

This is our place of stay. You have to travel around half a kilometer through steep mud road which is very slippery, from the tarred road, which is around 10km away from the main road, to get there.

Thinking whether to take a bath or not?

Helping with the cooking.

Being Lazy!

Discussions on different varieties of laziness, after dinner.

Doing some expedition just around the house!

I found some Mushrooms.

I don’t know what this is, but its definitely photogenic.

Again eating! You can notice the amount of fish [river fish] we are eating.

After the rain!

Nature is really beautiful after rain

Wild Rose - First time seeing real wild rose.

Again having food.

Tried another angle in photography.

Departing time.

Unlike previous trip, there are no expeditions, or trekking, just plain laziness.

ps: I will upload all the full size photos to flickr soon. Here is the link - http://flickr.com/photos/thedragonflyzphotos/sets/72157604449006636/

Anyone Can Cook!

Yes, I know; the title I have taken from the movie Ratatouille. From the day I saw that movie, I wanted to test whether its true. Then I saw the movie ‘No Reservations’ and made up my mind that I am going to cook something delicious [atleast I want to claim its delicious]. And that’s the beginning of it. Project: Chocolate Cake.

To begin with, let me say, my mom is the greatest cook I have ever met. May be its like that for most of us. We all grew up eating what our moms give us. Some of my favorites among her recipes are her tea cake, cad-berries [not sure whether I spelled it correctly], halva, and many others I don’t know the official name. Last weekend, due to the Easter holidays, I ve had a continuous 4 day holiday. When I started my journey home, I had decided that I am going to try out some of mom’s recipes. I was thinking hard which one to try out. My choices were cad-berries & cake. I have seen my sister making cad-berries [She is also a great cook even though I never acknowledge it ;)] and I thought its relatively easy. So I chose cake. I wanted to try something different. Whats the fun in trying out the exact recipe of mom? So I thought ill take her recipe of Tea Cake, do some ‘creative’ additions of my own and convert it to a chocolate cake.

With this plan in mind, I went out shopping for the ingredients on Saturday. As a backup, I bought the stuff for making cad-berries also, in case my experiment is a failure. On Easter day, I told mom about my intensions about making a cake. She allowed me to do whatever I want on one condition, I should return the kitchen the way it is [which is very clean, I will say]. I agreed on one condition, she should stay in kitchen in case I come across any doubts in the recipe. She also agreed.

I began cooking by first turning on the music on my psp. She started giving instructions to me. First I had to get 250grams of sugar and powder it. It very easy, I thought so. I took the weighing machine, measured 250grams of sugar and was about to put it to the mixer when my mom asked, ‘did you check whether mixer bowl is dry?’, I answered immediately, ‘I am checking that mom’. ‘But why do we have to check it?’ I asked, ‘Do you want to make sugar powder or sugar pulp?’. Now I got it. Ok. I took a cloth and cleaned the bowl. I started grinding. I put it there and went to the other room. Came back, its was not grinding. Oops, did something go wrong? I called out, ‘Mommmmmmmm! The mixer is not working’. ‘I switched it off, it was getting too hot’, came the reply. ‘Oh is it?’ I thought, I tried getting the bowl out of the mixer. Ouch! ‘My hand!!!’, it was infact too hot. But I didn’t make a sound. I took out the bowl somehow. I tried opening it gently, the cap was not opening. I tried giving more stress. ‘Tang!!!!!!!!!!!!’, the cap opened with a sound and half of the sugar was there at the kitchen table. I looked around, mom was not there. Silently I took some of it and put it back in the the pan. [Thanks mom for keeping the kitchen table soo clean, or else I wud have to go out to buy some more sugar]

That was the beginning, and then I had to get some flour [maida] same amount as sugar, then only I came to notice that the weighing machine was wrongly calibrated when I weighed for sugar. Anyway, thinking I am an engineer, I tried weighing equal amount of flour. And when mom came to kitchen, just by looking at the amount of flour she figured out that I weighed wrong. But I replied that I wanted to make a bigger cake. She smiled.

Things like that keep on happening. After mixing the sugar with butter, I didn’t know how much I have to mix. I called my mom finally and asked her whether this is enough, she took some of it and told I have to mix some more. I wonder how they know it just by looking it. But since she is my mom, she must have got that expertise from me for sure.

In the end, I divided the cake mix to 3 parts, one I put just like that in to oven, cos I was sure that will be good since I didn’t try any of my creativity on it, just mom’s recipe. The second part, I added 2 tea spoons of cocoa powder and some condensed milk. The third part I added 4 tea spoons of cocoa powder and more condensed milk. Also the baking times were different too. Just wanted to test. But the time the first mix was over, I put the second to oven. As expected the first one was perfect, my mom’s recipe. The second one, turned out to be cookies. It was rock hard, but it tasted fine, I liked it. Dad said, he needs only one piece since its too ‘soft’. The third one turned out to be ok since I didn’t put it in the oven for as long as I put the second one. My sister told that the cakes were not that sweet as mom used to make. Then only I thought about spilling some of the sugar. But I predicted that it must have been some problem with mom’s recipe, or some bad climatic conditions.

We all tried it that day itself since I had one more day break. So even if something happens, I can take rest. I gave it to one of my friends and next day I gave it to some of our guests and also today I gave it to my colleagues. They all said its ok. [Only after eating it, that I told them, I made it or they may not eat it]. Till now, no problems have been reported. Hope it stays like that. If there is no problems reported till the end of this week, I will claim myself as the great chef. I want to make the same cake again, but my mom won’t allow me inside kitchen for atleast a year I guess, ‘cos after that cooking, the kitchen was a mess and even though I wanted to clean it, I was too busy tasting my cake.

Why do people have to marry?

Why do people have to marry? When you read that question, most of you may be thinking what a stupid question that is. I don’t mean it in the general sense. It’s just that there are many friends of mine, especially woman friends, some of my very best friends, now they are all getting married. I am happy for that. But the feeling of loosing them through marriage is not that good. Some times we have to let things go, no matter how much you love or care for it. Still why is it like that? When things get too formal, or too serious, I don’t know, I don’t feel its too good. Van Wilder, the legend [a movie character I like very much] says, never take life too seriously, 'cos you will never get out of it, alive. May be its the social and cultural set up in India only. In western countries, people find their spouses on their own and then they don’t have to compromise on many things. Here everything is based on adjustments. It has its positive and negative side. I am not bothered about it. Let the things be like what they are. The only thing I am really sad about is that, after marriage, in 90% of the cases, people act like they have all the responsibility and never seems to get time for anything. Why is that? Sure you have to care for families and all. But I don’t know how to explain my feeling, now a days, when I hear any of my best friends, girls, are going to get married [unless its a love marriage] I get sad. Of course I am happy for them for getting in to their dream lives, but the feeling I get always is that I am going to miss them or more like, loose them. [In the case of love marriages, the feeling is different. I am not explaining it. Hope you understand.] We will never be the same again. I don’t know what happens to the "We all have to move on" theory, I really wonder why, why do you have to move on when you don’t like it. :( hmm.. I admit there are many things I don’t understand. Just writing some of my thoughts. And I don’t intend to make this a big debate or anything like that.

- Manu

Sleepless Nights

Your day seems to be so long and time seems to be standing still. You look around, you see blurred images only. You cannot concentrate on anything. You feel like going crazy. This is what happens if you are having little sleep[less] at night continuously for 5-6 days. Even when I am writing this, I am feeling the same sensation what I have just written. It took me around 1hour to write this paragraph.

It all started when I saw ‘her’ picture. I didn’t notice her at first. I thought she was way beyond my league. But soon I started dreaming about her. After she changed to her new ‘slim’ looks, I decided myself that, one day she will be mine. Oh man, she really is sexy, I admire her for that. There were only a few days I didn’t dream about her.

And finally, last week, I made her mine. And ever after, she is with me, no matter what and every moment I spend with her – well what more can I say other than ‘simply great’. Now you know why I am having sleepless nights for the past couple of days. Still I want to be with her than having a good night sleep.

I am talking about the latest addition to my gadget collection, Sony PSP, the slim & lite edition [PSP 2000]. I know it’s a bit late since they have released it. Always, better late than never. This is one of the best gadgets I ever had.

New PSP slim & lite [PSP 2000]

At first I used to think the game play will be boring due to its small size and getting a grip on the analogue stick will be trouble. But for someone with a gamer in their head, it’s just a matter of seconds. Its BIG display [compared to other handheld gadgets], is really really cool, especially when compared to the ipods. You can watch movies, listen to music, see photos, browse in net, and play fantastic games. Just for $169 [PSP only]. You need to buy a memory stick extra. But all within $200. Even if you just needs a gadget which will play music and show videos, this is the best one I think. And browsing in that screen is much better than browsing in a mobile phone. In the new version, they have even provided a TV out feature. You can connect to your TV and well, now you can use your imagination.

Simply visit this page to know how amazing it is…
http://www.us.playstation.com/psp/landing.aspx#/games/
http://www.us.playstation.com/psp_interactive/

I guess more and more sleepless nights are waiting there for me…