Of Narcissists and Mice

Now that is a lot of sand

jomanlk — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 04:35:45 +0000

Elephant house is too trendy! I’ve given up their drinks.

jomanlk — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 03:24:06 +0000

After watching The Dark Knight, at Liberty (twice I might mention), I have come to the conclusion that I’m just not trendy enough to drink Elephant House (hereafter referred to as ‘Aliya’) soft drinks. You know what I’m talking about, that ad that shows all those groovy and trendy people dancing and drinking Aliya soft drinks. I’ve seen this ad occasionally on tv but not being much of a tv person I didn’t pay much attention to it. But seeing an advertisement on a 20 foot screen is different. It makes you…..think.

And I thought about it. I’m just not trendy enough. I mean look at the people in the ad! There are bunches and bunches of young people singing and dancing and gyrating and whatnot. Not a non-trendy person in sight. The only overweight person in the ad was Ashanthi and even she was wearing trendy clothes. These people looked like they had been born wearing denims and friendship bracelets. These are the type of people who would be able to pull of a look that you wouldn’t be caught dead in. And come on, how many of you have ACTUALLY danced on top of a fountain while drinking any brand of soft drink? Soft drinks don’t make you dance on top of fountains, a few stiff shots of whiskey do. Trendy drinks for trendy people.

Click to see image in full

The above image clearly shows what I’m talking about. This image was shot unbeknownst to the vendor with my special Canon VB-291 voice bubble capturing camera.

Note - I now have less hair. Also, I do not know why I’m holding the vendors hand. Also, most people call me ‘aiya’ regardless of how old they are. All 3 wheel drivers and shopkeepers call me ‘aiya’.

Ever since that day, and incidentally the day I watched Batman the second time, I decided that I would not go without soft drinks because of my un-trendiness or non-trendiness. I now make my own soft drinks from sachets.

Say NO to TRENDINESSколи под наем

I’ve launched a new blog :]

jomanlk — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 12:59:50 +0000

Yeah so, here it is : RandomCoding.Com

I haven’t added any content yet. It’s a development blog so most people might not find it useful. Anyhoo, all comments, criticisms are welcome.

Also, does anyone know how long the inactive period is before kottu kicks you off the list?

10 Things You Should Not Be Doing While Drunk Or Drinking

jomanlk — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 03:53:07 +0000

NEVER keep your phone with you. You’ll just regret it. Actually, the Never Keep Your Phone With You rule is actually more of a meta rule. It describes three more mini rules. I’ll get into details on these rules somewhere along the line. Just keep in mind that if you bring your phone with you, there is an INCREASE of 83% of your chance of doing something you regret the next morning.
NEVER call or text anyone while you’re drunk. This is a fundamental law of the universe. I can’t believe the amount of people who actually make calls while they are drunk. It just totally cracks me up. Note that the ‘anyone’ mentioned in this rule do not include any of the following,
1. Taxis or other forms of transport supplying services
2. Emergency medical services or other life supplying services
3. Hookers or other satisfaction supplying services
4. A cool friend of the SAME sex. (Never EVER call a cool friend of the opposite sex. Because the reason that you think that friend is cool is BECAUSE you secretly like him/her/me)
This is what I mean by ‘don’t text anyone’. Scenario: You hear a joke while your drinking and you think it’s incredibly funny (Most things are funny while your drunk, irrespective of whether it’s a joke or not. Drunk people can laugh along to a weather report on a tropical cyclone. Back to the scenario..), so you text someone the punch line ONLY (You send only the punch line because you’re too far gone to type anything on that tiny keypad. The more drunk you are, the tinier the keypad). Anyway, your friend suddenly gets a message saying, ‘PANTS!’ or ‘HOTEL CALIFORNIA!!’ or something like that because that’s the current joke or song or whatever. Do yourself a favour and cut off your thumbs. It’s less trouble in the long run.
NEVER pull out your phone while you’re drunk or drinking. If you must bring your phone with you, do everyone a favour and keep it inside a pocket. Preferably one with a breath analyzer that won’t open until you’re sober. Having your phone in your hand is a recipe for disaster. Scenario: After an otherwise uneventful trip to Sigiriya I noticed that I had completely replaced my browser software on the phone with REALLY old software. Also I’ve now forgotten my PIN.
NEVER give your phone to a friend. A drunk friend will ALWAYS do one of the following with a foreign (not his) phone,
1. Drop it
2. Dial an IDD call (If you have IDD enabled on your phone and you give it to a drunk friend, then you’re lucky to have lived so long)
3. Look through messages or past call records and dial the most frequently used numbers.
4. Drop it.
5. Call a hooker
NEVER EVER take up a dare. Scenario: Friend says, ‘Why don’t you climb this 10 foot ladder like structure and jump down from the top?’, if you ask yourself ‘why not?’ then you have no right to be drinking. Or walking around without an attendant. What you should be asking yourself is ‘Why doesn’t he/she so that?’. Also don’t drink at anyplace that has large bodies of water or easily climbable trees/structures, you’ll thank yourself later in your old age when you DO have an old age.
NEVER make passes at women. I didn’t include ‘Don’t make passes at men’ for the simple reason that men like women making passes at them. Drunk or otherwise. We aren’t finicky. When you are drunk, you are
1. NOT as funny as you think
2. NOT as smooth as you think
3. NOT as smart as you think
4. NOT as desirable as you think

That pretty much covers it right?

NEVER sing alone. By all means sing along to the band or to the crowd, but never sing alone. There is no way anyone is going to hear your terribly pitched, horribly rendered, word swapped (going ‘na nuh na naa’ when you don’t know the words) version of ‘Sweet Child of Mine’ (hint hint dude ) when the band is playing, so that’s your chance to go at it. Unleash the inner rock star. But NEVER EVER alone. You’ll just make an ass of yourself.
NEVER talk. Seriously. Don’t talk and you can’t get yourself into any regrettable situations. Also don’t do stuff like slapping yourself in the face to show that you have perfect hand eye coordination. Slapping yourself in the face or walking into walls are a sure indication of being piss drunk.
NEVER EVER EVER take your credit card with you. Unless it’s already overlimit. Take whatever amount of cash you think you will need to cover the expenses. Taking your credit card to a drinking session is like having your own personal banker who is ever so helpful to pay the bill when it comes but will kick you in the nuts the next day when you get your credit card bill. It’s easier to just wash dishes or something like that rather than paying the bill. Also, since you’re drunk you won’t even remember it. Remember, your credit card is NOT your bitch.
NEVER DRIVE!
NEVER make lists of what NOT to do for some hypothetical situation since you can’t count or put together coherent sentences in the first place. WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?!

Back to normal broadcasting

John — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 11:32:06 +0000

My life has settled down. After my promotion, I no longer do three different jobs at work. Which means I can pretty much focus on my own work as well now. The upkeep and maintenance of this site being one of them :]

So, before regular broadcasts begin I bring you a teaser trailer in the form of a picture I took at Sigiria (went there on an office trip recently)

The North Star in My Pants.

Thanks to Juggy for inspiring it.

More pics and amusing commentary soon…..

Spread FireFox! And set a world record!

jomanlk — Fri, 30 May 2008 02:45:59 +0000

Just a little post asking all you surfers and bloggers to spread FireFox!

Sounds like a good deal, right? All you have to do is get Firefox 3 during Download Day to help set the record for most software downloads in 24 hours - it’s that easy. We’re not asking you to swallow a sword or to balance 30 spoons on your face, although that would be kind of awesome.

By the way, the official date for the launch of Firefox 3 will be posted here soon - so check back! Join our community and this effort by pledging today.

From : http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord/

компютри

Step 2 in becoming a hot shot software engineer

jomanlk — Wed, 28 May 2008 12:03:34 +0000

Step 1 is obviously being born.

Step 2 is to become an Associate Software Engineer.

In other news, I am now an Associate Software Engineers (surprise, surprise). Which explains my prolonged absence in all forms of the Internet. I got promoted and I got assigned to an urgent project, which means I have less ‘john is doing stuff come again later’ time.

This post is just to inform any of you regular readers who still visit my blog (in case there are any in the first place) about my status. Regular blogging activity does not seem likely to resume at this juncture. Hopefully I’ll be able to work out something new.

On the plus side, I actually get paid to do what I was doing for free in the first place. Developing I mean. In case you get any other ideas.

P.S. - And those of you who tagged me for “10 things that make you happy” will have to wait a bit longer to find out what gets my freak on.

P.S.S. - Work on my new site has paused for the moment. You can get a sneak peak here - http://www.incrediblebulk.info

Woah! First mobile post AND bored out of my mind

John — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 15:32:49 +0000

After going 3 days without any human contact i’ve finally gone off my rocker. everyone has gone off to India and im stuck here cos i have exams! right now im bored enough to try to write a post from my mobile More gory details later!
P.S. - I haven’t had human contact cos I have to study for the exams next week

A post for the people I never met. Things that I missed

John — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 03:01:53 +0000

Yesterday I met a friend who had been on my mind for a while. I met the friend while on the bus. It was just a coincidence. And I got to thinking what would have happened if I hadn’t woken up at the unusually (for me) late hour? What would have happened if I had spent a little more time in the shower? What would have happened if it had been a shaving day (I shave every other day)? All these little seemingly inconsequential things came together to make two people meet in the bus.

But that wasn’t what really got my attention.

What about the people I didn’t meet because I woke up earlier or later than my usual time? What about when I gave up on a bus because it was too crowded? What about when I skipped shaving? Did I miss the future Mrs. Pereira because of these events? Did I miss meeting my future business partner? Did I miss meeting the person who would ruin my life (I don’t really miss meeting that person, truth be told)? That is what I was really thinking about? What did we miss in our lives because we took too long to wake up or decided to shave or decided to go back to get our wallet / handbag ?

I know these are stupid questions. None of these things happened so why should it bother us? It bothers me because I’m always in a ‘what if?’ mode. I can’t help it. Hopefully I won’t dwell on these things too much.
This post is dedicated to the people that I missed out on because I took too long to shave. You would have been great. Or maybe not. I’ll never know.

Temporary Break in Transmission and Why Plants are Boring.

John — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 05:11:51 +0000

I haven’t been blogging much these days (Not that I was ever a frequent blogger in the first place). This is because I have given up the frivolous and wasteful lifestyle of the decadent west.

I’ve temporarily halted blogging till events at work and SLIIT regain normalcy. Which should take a couple of more weeks methinks.

In case you missed it, the first paragraph was a joke while the second paragraph was not. In case that got you confused, this is NOT a paradox. It is not paradoxical in any sense of the word.

At any rate I don’t want this blog to go defunct so I will be posting random stuff that I might come across. This week I will be doing a discussion on why watching plants grow is boring work. So I’ll begin by posting this link to this awesome game/simulation/creative bit of programming that I came across.

This is the home page - http://www.kloonigames.com/blog/games/crayon

You can find the download link there as well (Size – 5 MB). I recommend that all of you download it and check it out. I’m sure anyone of any age can enjoy it – IT IS NOT TECHNICAL IN THE LEAST. It’s quite an entertaining and interesting project. It was apparently done in less than 5 days. That’s less time than what it would take my mom to get me to cut the grass. This is actually the prototype of the project that eventually won the $25k cash prize for the best independent game of the year. Pretty cool stuff.

And that is the primary reason why watching plants grow is boring. As soon I get a few more minutes of idle time I’ll post more facts to back up my theory.