During my college years, I stayed with a family who took me in like I was their own son. Their son was my closest friend, and we did everything together – from flying kites, racing bikes to enjoying music.

Later in life, we parted ways over ego issues and petty fights, and though I have remained in touch with the family, he and I never really managed to patch up.

He moved to the USA, where he died in an unfortunate accident a few years later, and I was never able to set our relationship right.

Today, the 6th of June, is his birthday, and I would rather remember my friend full of life, sitting on the doorstep of the outhouse we occupied, drinking his mother’s heavenly coffee with me, than the fact that he is no more.

Happy Birthday, Jaikishan

I don’t know if you can hear me up there, but if you can – I am truely sorry.

On with life…

Thanks to a tip from Jyoti Bhargava of J Design Lab, I brightened up the colours of this site a bit. Hopefully, everyone will stop cribbing about this place being unreadable because of the dim colours.

Yesterday’s entry seems to have triggered off bunches of people who called or wrote in, enquiring if I was OK. Relax, I am. Some of the things happening to me are unavoidable, some of them could have been avoided, but weren’t.

You can take me off the suicide-watch now, thank you.

Recently, I ordered “Pink Floyd – Echoes” from Fabmart. When the CD was delivered, I was shocked to see an advertisement for a cigarette company stuck both on the outer sleeve and the inner jewel case. It turns out that the company marketing the CDs (Virgin Records) had got into a promotional tieup with this cigarette company, and plasters these stickers on every CD they sell. When you try to remove the sticker from the outer sleeve, it tears, wrecking the sleeve.

This is something I will not accept. I don’t want to come across as holier-than-thou, but I completely support the ban on tobacco-related advertisements, and will not tolerate having a tobacco company advertisement stuck on CDs that I spend good money on. Worse – the quality of the jewel case the CD came in was so cruddy that it disintegrated on arrival, scratching the CDs it was supposed to protect.

So if you are buying CDs in the future, avoid any that are sold by Virgin Records that fall under the Charms Collection campaign. If you order one unknowingly, complain and return it.

I have complained to Fabmart, and they should be marking such CDs in their online listings as being part of the Charms Collection. Watch out for them, and avoid them at all costs.

Today was not a good day, and I suspect it isn’t going to end here.

While I cannot go into any details, it is clear that I am about to face some serious changes in my life – changes I had not anticipated and am therefore not specifically prepared for.

This does not mean that I am caught flat-footed – I always have a contingency plan in place – but it is going to be a struggle, and it isn’t going to be pretty.

So please excuse me while I go ruminate on things.

For those of you who don’t often check my writings section – I have recently added two articles, an old one, and a new one.

The old one is my classic Rock with our PC that appeared in Computers@Home in October 1998. C@H has recently started hiding articles behind a subscription “firewall”, making many articles inaccessible. Since this is a strict no-no, I rescued the article and put it up on my site.

The new one is a small rant about Linux compatible equipment, and how even a little bit of checking will ensure that you don’t get into trouble with stuff you buy.

While on the subject – I recently received a warm email from a past reader of mine, asking about my older articles, and why PCQuest isn’t putting them up, or if I could do that, and also if I had the rights to my articles.

If you have read any of my past articles, you will know that I usually wrote about contemporary things – things that mattered at that moment. Today, many of these articles are outdated, hence it would not make sense to PCQuest to put all of them up.

But for historical and personal reasons it does make sense to me, and I am working on it.

Some articles, however, are relevant today, but don’t hold your breath waiting for PCQuest to put them up or make them easily accessible on their incredibly badly designed and mismanaged website. These articles I will slowly weed out and add to my Writings section.

Some of my articles were part of a package written by my company, Exocore Consulting, such as the incredibly successful PCQuest Linux issues (which were all done by us in-house, including the CD mastering). It would not make sense to separate my articles from the set. However, Exocore has now decided to make at least the most recent article sets available online, so when that happens, I’ll drop a note here. I have to invoke a slavery clause to get Exocore’s website under control and manageable.

The answer to the rights question is – yes, I have the rights to every word I ever wrote, because all my articles are given to publishers with “First Publishing Rights”, not ownership. That means that the publisher has the right to publish the article, but after that (typically a month later) I have the right to use the article in any way I deem fit, including republishing it.

Sunday, Shubha and I, along with Kishore Bhargava and his wife Jyoti, went to 180 Proof (supposedly one of the swankier pubs in town) to watch the group “Rust” perform. The specific reason being that Mrinal was performing along with this group. The “previews” I got from various places, including from Live Journal indicated that I would probably have less than a good time, especially since Mrinal warned me of over-use of distortion and other effects (which I hate).

However, we were pleasantly surprised. Rust (pot bellies and all performed way above my expectations, playing a set that sounded like it was put together by me and Kishore. The Doors, Police, Grateful Dead and *lots* of Pink Floyd!

The last one was a so so. As Mrinal had already commented, the overuse of distortion and other effects on numbers like “Coming Back to Life” was painful. They started the song with the CBTL lead part with full distortion, auto-wah and flanger, at which point I couldn’t help myself and yelled in frustration. Evidently, that registered, because the lead guitarist stopped playing, reached down and switched off his effects box, after which things sounded the way they should. They played it well, but the lead singer (Gopu, the DJ of 180 proof) clearly had issues with lyrics and timing on this one. And by the time they finished the song, they were half a beat behind, and were playing in time with a beat that was straight rock instead of the march-like beat that the original song is played to.

Apart from this murder, they did pretty well. Issues with the mixer desk resulted in some songs just being drowned by bad settings, which drives home the fact that the guy sitting at the mixer desk needs to know the songs and the group, not just his equipment.

Rust completed their set with Comfortably Numb, which they played well, but Gopu definitely wasn’t the right singer for this one (or was just plain beat). Not that it mattered – throughout their performance, Kishore and I were singing along at the top of our voices, complete with piercing whistles after every song (that had everyone staring at us). We clearly the loudest table in the place.

But all in all, this was a most remarkable performance. I know that these guys didn’t practice too much (and both the keyboard player – Mrinal – and the drummer joined the band just days before , but the band was tight, their timing was good, their song selection was near perfect, the Bass player was God in a small package, the guitarists did a competent job (apart from the overuse of effects , the drummer was solid as a rock and precise as a swiss timepiece, Mrinal filled the background nicely with his keyboard (especially on “Comfortably Numb”) and lead singer Gopu did a great job even on songs that he wasn’t too comfortable with.

One final word to the lead guitarist – the “Smoke on the water” start-riff is played choppy, not flowing. And “if you are playing it as chords, you are playing it wrong” (TM, R. Blackmore).

I’d definitely go see this group again if I can.

I was happy that Shubha enjoyed the evening as much as I did. We rarely go out as a couple, but this time I put my foot down, and Anjali stayed home with dog, cat, maid and the Skywalker family. Because Shubha and I have completely different musical tastes, I was a bit apprehensive about how she would take to this kind of stuff, but she enjoyed herself, which was cool. Also, because I didn’t have to behave like an adult or respectable dad, I was free to let myself go, which I most definitely did.

Mrinal’s entire family showed up as well. Babu Kalakrishnan is a great dad – giving his son all the freedom he needs to do “his thing”, rather than trying to clamp down and force him into a mould the way my father tried. After the gig, we spent some time talking to Babu and Girija (Mrinal’s mom) about their son’s activities, and learnt to our surprise that Mrinal has 10 years of classical music training behind him! No wonder this amazing guy is so good at just about everything musical he touches – whether it is drums, keyboards or guitar! Girija told us how they asked Mrinal what he would like to do (including studying abroad) and how Mrinal indicated that for the time being at least, he was happy doing what he was (studying Telecom Engineering at PESIT), while at the same time getting to explore his musical side.

Mrinal really has the best of both worlds going for him. I envy him.

Hmm, I wonder how he felt having both his dads there last night!

On other fronts, I saw “Star Wars Episode II – Attack of The Clones” on VCD. I haven’t been to a movie theatre in 15 years, because I cannot handle the fact that there is no pause button (I get migraines that kill it all for me). I am one of those guys who actually enjoys commercial breaks on TV – gives me a chance to close my eyes and de-tense.

IAC, SW:AoTC turned out mostly what I had expected reading various reviews. There is definitely too much mush in that movie, most of it completely unnecessary, and in fact distracting. The last 30 minutes of the movie finally feel like Star Wars again, in the mould of the original movies (not the pathetic Phantom Menace). For the first time, you get to see scenes that actually link into the New Hope/Empire strikes back/Return of the Jedi story arc, including an image projected from a device Christopher Lee holds towards the end, Darth Sidious, C3PO, etc. And of course Yoda. Oh man, that little guy sure shows a different side to himself, though I think the Bruce Lee impersonation was a wee bit overdone.

Anjali and I therefore turned out to love the movie for completely different reasons – Anjali loved it for the mush, and I loved it for the end.

Been a busy week. Looks like it is going to get busier.

Put up the long delayed photos of kittens. Naturally, they are now in good homes. Mama Honey discovered one of them next door, but so far that one (Misty, the grey one) hasn’t come back home for a visit, though Honey is extremely upset about it

Have also put up Gopi’s birthday photos – the party at home and at Windsor Pub.

Harsha, Samyeer and I hit Windsor Pub again late Monday night, and put away more food than should be allowed by the law.

Rains have started hitting Bangalore (thank God!) and the weather is totally great. Makes up for the fact that we didn’t go to Ooty or anywhere else this year.

Music is at a standstill. As expected, Mrinal is a long-lost memory, now that he has moved across town, and I don’t have a jamming partner. He and his group Phenom secured second place at their college fest this month, which is cool. Noella, their singer, got the best vocalist award, which is even cooler.

Dominos Pizza has begun refusing deliveries to our area (Sanjaynagar), which is a Bad Thing. They claim they are overloaded, going to the extent of saying “we will take orders from your area only after 9pm, and delivery time will be at least 1 hour”. How they expect to do business that way is beyond me, but for the moment, I (along with the rest of Sanjaynagar) am looking at alternatives. Maybe even Pizza Corner.

News from Germany is that my mom managed to junk her PC’s hard disk, and she is going to be offline until she can get it fixed and everything installed again. Since I was the one who set it up for her last time, I wonder what she is going to do now.

Tomorrow I have a presentation at the BLUG – lots of action, including Linux and digital cameras, Linux Bangalore/2002, a change of guard, etc. Man, am I glad that Jessie is back in the BLUG fold helping out with things.

Gopi is taking off for the USA for a couple of weeks. That means I get to run the show at work all on my own. Sux!

Later…

Got online, found Mrinal lurking there. He apparently has not grown a moustache, put on weight or got a girlfriend since I last saw him more than a month ago.

He has issues with the tape recording of the Phenom performance during the college fest, and we discussed for a while how to fix that. Gave him some ideas, let’s see if it works out. I got to hear a few seconds of the show live when Kallu called me on his cell phone, and I know it sounded great, so am eager to hear the full thing.

Hey, what happened – just yesterday it was the 11th of May, and now it is the 20th? What happened to all the time?

Ah well, time flies….

The past week has had its ups and downs, but in general it was mostly unremarkable, except for a few items:

Gopi turned 40 today, crossing the barrier to join me on the other side. We decided to make it a big event to make sure that it registered with him, and so we had a pre-40 pot-luck party on last Saturday, the highlight of which was Shubha and Sony baking two cakes – a date and walnut one by Shubha that was heavy enough to sink the Titanic and rich enough to outclass Bill Gates, and a chocolate cake by Sony. The latter had a mysteriously uplifting effect on us all, and we later found out what happened to that bottle of rum….

Shubha also made meatloaf and potato salad. *No one* makes meatloaf and potato salad like Shubha does. The Germans don’t even come close. Period.

Shef and Avi brought in a wine-soaked macaroni dish that helped lift the mood even more, and Shef’s trademarked Pepper Chicken that Anjali completely demolished, leaving only a few bits for us.

The afternoon before that was spent by Sony and me browsing in Habitat – the little hole in the wall shop on Church Street that has the best music collection in town, looking for CDs for Gopi. We finally settled on The Steve Miller band, Booker T. and the complete collection of Bob Dylan, but it took us *hours* to make up our minds!

Over the week, I have also had the misfortune of watching family politics take their toll, with some family members using their standard manipulative tactics, irreparably tearing apart already fragile relationships. The master manipulator wins again.

A major discovery this week was Anjali finding “skins” for her “The Sims” game, allowing her to create and interact with characters such as 7of9, Janeway and Chakotay from Voyager. Interesting possibilities….

Battling with BLUG-related issues, such as meets, management, events, sponsors, agendas….

It is becoming more and more difficult, as people appear to be more interested in taking than giving, being entertained rather than lending a hand. The big event is about 6 months away, and it looks like everyone is again expecting me to do all the pushing and magic. This is so tiring. Why can’t people be more supportive and understand that if they totally depend on one person to make things happen, then they may not happen at all?

Today is Shubha’s birthday, so first and foremost

Happy Birthday, Shubha!

She doesn’t want me to let people know how old she is, so I won’t, but I am glad that I am not going to get any more jokes about my age from her side.

Yesterday, went to Nokia’s showroom and got my smashed phone fixed. Cost me Rs.1700 to have the LCD replaced, and that too only after I could prove that the phone was legal and not a grey-market acquisition. Felt like the spanish inquisition! Apparently, the government has been giving them grief for servicing grey-market phones, complete with sending them dummy customers.

Went and bought some trinkets for the wife to prove that I still cared (I do), and managed to blow the holiday budget. So its official – we aren’t going anywhere.

Over the past few days, we have given away the kittens to good homes. The first one (Tangy) went off with our maid.

The second one (the one that looks like her mother) we gave away just in time – another day, and I would have decided to keep her.

Luckily, she hasn’t gone very far – just next door. Mama Honey hasn’t discovered that fact yet, but I suspect she will, soon enough.

In the meanwhile, she is taking out her motherly feelings on JudoTheDog – and he loves it. Ever seen a huge German Shepherd being mollycoddled by a cat?

Today turned out to be a central-government sponsored strike (yes, this happens only in India), so office never opened. Been sitting at home all day basically doing nothing. Felt exactly like Sunday, and I have another Sunday tomorrow.

This evening, we are going to Ebony for dinner. Have reservations and all. Believe it or not – Shubha has never been there despite of being in Bangalore more than 15 years! Of course it is all my fault. Hope it doesn’t rain.

More later.

Hmmm, yesterday turned out disaster time.

Got home in the evening, and dropped my mobile phone (a Nokia 6210). Resulted in a smashed LCD that is going to cost me a packet to fix.

Kinda busy with all sorts of things happening. Should be able to update the diary later today.

Right now, I am thrilled to bits to have my old and faithful Thinkpad 770 working again as the Load intended. The guys at TVA Help.COM finally fixed the last nasty – and my low-end favourite road-axe is now humming away without any further problems.

Muchos Gracias to Guhesh Ramanathan, the TVA Help.COM chief, who took a personal interest in resolving my problems (and had *his* notebook Linux’d along the way – he he he!)

Argh! Time to head for home. More later, d00ds!

Got beeped by Sony last night – MTV was showing the Roger Waters show.

Frantically rolled out of bed, hurled myself at the TV, and settled in to watch…

…the great ripoff.

They first showed a half-hour segment about the Bangalore show, (including Amir Khan at the venue) to make it look like they were showing the DNA-(mis)organised show at Bangalore. Tons of ads talking about how the show was organised by DNA and BPL. Everything screamed “Roger Waters Live in Bangalore!!!!”….

And then they showed the Roger Waters “In the flesh” DVD, filmed in 2000 in the USA, carefully edited to remove all such “misleading information”, of course. If you don’t believe this, just look at the pictures in the CD inlay of the Audio CD.

Couple of things to look for to keep you rolling in the aisles

• The audience is seated (no seats even for the 2500 bucks tickets at Bangalore)
• The audience is white
• There is rock-fog on the stage (no such thing in Bangalore)
• The (lefty) lead guitarist is Doyle Bramhall II, who left the tour in 2001 (in Bangalore, it was Chester Kamen)
• The sole keyboardist is Andy Wallace (in Bangalore it was Harry Waters and Andy)

• The backing vocals included Susannah Melvoin (in Bangalore it was Linda Lewis)

Bah!

To make matters worse, they removed most of the songs, especially Roger Waters’ non-Pink Floyd songs. All in all, just like DNA’s publicity for the Bangalore show, they tried to make it look like a live Pink Floyd show.

I am sure there is a good reason for DNA chosing to be part of this deception. Could it possibly be that the organisation of the Bangalore show was pathetic and DNA wouldn’t want the world to see this?

Why does DNA have the monopoly on arranging rock shows in India? Don’t they have some competition? I guess they do not, and it shows – badly.