Of flayings and impalings and…

A virus from an infected flash drive infected my system. So I basically spent the last 4 days (including today) trying to clean out my system. Having run at the least about 6 different anti-spyware/malware/ware and 2 Anti Virus applications to scan my system, all of which show the system as clean, the system is still not usable. Any application which connects to the Internet starts using close to 100% of the CPU.

So this brings me to the topic of this post. If I found the author of this virus/spyware (whose name I don’t even know) I have in mind some very enjoyable activities to take part in, enjoyable being for me of course. Due to this infection, I have essentially wasted 4 days of my time when I should have been working. Office can be so boring if the comp is down.

And also thanks to this virus, I called the IT support at work to try and clean it. So this gentleman, brilliantly, manages to lose ALL my open tabs (numbering in the high 80s, low 90s). All gone, collected over a period of months. Oh, did I also mention that he suggested that I use Netscape Navigator. What’s that you ask? It’s the old, discontinued browser which was so crappy near it’s end that even Netscape developers would probably not use it.

Anyway, so apparently the end result is that even was unable to determine the cause of the system freakiness and I have to get the system formatted tomorrow. Which means that I will not be able to take it with me on my trip which further means that I waste another 5 days without managing to do any work which means that someone seriously deserves some nice, slow, delicious torture.

ooh

Ps. And no, I did not wish to bookmark those tabs because I had other uses for them and bookmarking them would mean I forget about them and I did not want to forget about them cos I needed to go back to refer info from them.

Free Hugs for Valentine’s Day

Republishing this here from my article in Desicritics.org to set the context for the next post.

A day without a cell phone

Oh more than a day.. I went without my cell for a week. And it was quite a good experience. No calls to disturb, no spam, just free..

I want to repeat that sometime soon again.. Perhaps soon

Opinions

I was reading this excellent essay by Roger Ebert and found it a very good read.

I really connected to the following words from that essay:

It is not important to be “right” or “wrong.” It is important to know why you hold an opinion, understand how it emerged from the universe of all your opinions, and help others to form their own opinions. There is no correct answer. There is simply the correct process. “An unexamined life is not worth living.”

This has always been very important for me. To have my opinions independent of others influence. Not always easy but I try to ensure that I keep my opinions uninfluenced until I have had a time to examine them and come to some sort of a conclusion. While this sometimes lead to being judgmental it serves me well as I can look at issues and ideas with my own perception and perhaps provide a different perspective.

Ps. Yes, sometimes I’m too strongly opinionated to the point of stubborness ;)

It’s been a while

So… I’ve been off the blog for quite a while now. Travel, work and other stuff have kept me away along with a general sense of lethargy related to blogging.

However, I’m trying to get rid of it, re-prioritize my activities and try and do stuff which I enjoy.

Anyway, a belated happy new year. I’ve been on two trips the past 3 month, and two more in the next 4 months. But none of them “travel trips” which is what I want to do. Swetha (who btw, got a Canon Rebel XSi, the 450D) mentioned that I have not mentioned my cam. Well mid-last year, I got a DSLR, a Canon 40D. It is an awesome cam, amazing features and amazing picture quality.
(Du..uh.. Of course it is, that’s why I purchased it ;))

Canon EOS 40D
Image via Wikipedia

Work wise, it’s been boring and frustrating past couple of months. Project mostly at a standstill and progress is sluggish if any. Almost like déjà vu.

My thoughts for 2009:
I think this will be a good year for me. I have positive feelings and expectations from the year. I expect a lot of changes in my life this year, mostly good ones. Hopefully ;)

I’m also participating in the development for a game that I’ve been playing for quite a while (Battlemaster), which is fun..

Well I had move to say but then I forgot.. Sigh..

Footnote: It took me about 1+ week to write this. As I said, had more to say but I forgot. Shit

Books I started and never finished

I don't know. Never got around to finishing it. It started getting deep into religion and philosophy and so I sort of tuned it out.

That is one of the very few books that I've started and never finished.

Another is Atlas Shrugged. BOring book. Could not get past 50 pages of the book.

But I guess the worst was Catch 22. Could not get past even half a page. Does that even count as starting? ;)

Elijah Wood Hilarious Music Video

Elijah wood of LoTR fame is featured in this music video. While the song is nice, the video itself is surreal with Wood and others doing a weird little dance with a straight face :D


How The Day Sounds from Miky Wolf on Vimeo.

Barcamp Bangalore 8

Barcamp Bangalore 8 was announced sometime recently. So I headed to the Barcamp Bangalore site to check out the details and was shocked.

The site’s homepage has been changed to something so tacky, and my first reaction was, wtf, it’s so fugly. Ugh.. C’mon guys, do something better than that..

Anyway, Barcamp Bangalore has been announced for March 7th & 8th.. I’m booking my calendar today ;)