I Touched the iTouch March 23, 2008

I had a confusion in my mind since a long time. In December I was thinking thinking and finally didn’t execute it. Nothing great! It was just that iPod vs iTouch vs iPhone. My brother was more on to iTouch. It is cool and looks damn good.

Well! the thing is iPod classic has 80GB costs $250 and iTouch $300. If I take iPod I can store lots and lots of data, songs and movies. In iTouch I just get 8GB seems to be less. I don’t want to pay another $100 just to get 16GB iTouch. But I have 500GB hard-disk. I can watch movies in iPod too. What else is great in iTouch, nothing more just Wifi and calculator and other stuff. How much to I use these Wifi stuff in India. If I setup the WiFi network in India, I would rather use laptop to browse the net rather than doing it on iTouch. One more thing is that if I take iPhone then iTouch would become redundant. I don’t want to take iPhone from here, by breaking that AT&T contract and do the exercise of cracking it for Indian mobile network. I would be at the risk of guarantee of iPhone.

Yesterday was a Good Friday, So I thought I should do something good. In the evening went to Plaza and then to the Apple Store. Apple store always looks so good, everything white looks royal, sleek, Hifi(Wifi was there) and techno atmosphere. Especially the new MAC Air is just awesome so thin. Then focusing on my requirement I went to the place where iPods were kept because the store was about to close in another half an hour. I went on with initial thing of pressing all the buttons and hearing bits and pieces of what was there in iPods. I was thinking white iPods looks better than black iPods. It was good.

Then turned towards the place where lots of iTouch were kept. iTouch welcomed to its interface with a big screen. It just looked awesome, big screen, so sensitive, all 3D glossy icons, the maps, calci, safari browser, music quality, photo viewer. The interface is just too good, you can pinch it and anti pinch it(I don’t know what is the opposite word) for zoom in and zoom out. Just for satisfaction I checked my gmail on it, luckily it went to my actual mail account. It is like a big room inside (a web page or anything) and you can just by moving your fingers you can reach the ends of the pages top down left right. Man! This damn whole thing impressed me a lot.

iTouch: Hey! How am I?
Srini: Too good man! Steve Job and your engineers have worked a lot on you to the most minute details.
iTouch: What do you think, I am better than iPod
Srini: Yeah! I am feeling but space, and your big brother iPhone and all….
iTouch: Man! Don’t think too much, For everything so much analysis, you feel good about me, just take it, I will be loyal to you . Moreover see I am new and cool, iPod by its name ‘classic’ it is pushed back to old age now.
Srini: Ok! Da! enough of your marketing, I will buy you now….

So my credit cards was swiped just like that and iTouch was in my hand. My friend exclaimed Welcome to the iPod family!. Get out! you are telling as if Steve Jobs is your uncle(He has a iPod that’s why all this style). Well! One more thing, iTouch or iPhone is not the Resistive touch screen unlike kiosk, PDA, ATM machines. It uses the Capacitive touchscreen technology where a thin film conducts continuous current to the sensor. You know human body is also like a electrical device, your finger touch would create a capacitive field and this change is the capacitive field it create distortion which can be used to execute an action. That’s why iTouch or iPhone works with your fingers only not with stylus or even your hands with gloves. If you don’t understand don’t bother or ask questions back to me, this is just to show off that I am electronics engineer hahaha .

End of the Day “I touched the iTouch”…

Long Weekend & Nowhere to go March 21, 2008

It is a long weekend this weekend. The whole of this week our greatest topic of discussion is “What is the plan for this Weekend?”. I don’t know how many times we have discussed about this. To plan any trip is not a difficult thing, it is very easy; just decide on what is kind of requirements you have or type of fun you want to have, freeze the place, take the maps, book the motel online, start your car(Ofcourse if it is a road trip). I like road trips because it is fun to drive. But there are some things like in a group, some one has to take the initiative, some one has to do all the arrangements, some one will drop off in the end, some one has to maintain the enthu in everybody, now these kinds of things are not easy.

Actually in my last visit I have covered the possible places in the north, east, south, west of Kansas. The places which I would like to see in US are Las Vegas, Los Angles, Yellow Stone National Park, Niagara Falls, Miami Florida(any Florida beaches), Hawaii. I mean these are special. If I try to plan for any other cities around it would be again typical tall buildings, some observatory, zoo, aquarium, museums, park. So for the places of my interest I have to fly.

So I am in a fix situation, I feel like going out somewhere and really feel relaxed, rejuvenate and reset the health state of the mind. I have to do some of my work too which are to be done from my side. Going out also gives happiness and accomplishing the work that we have in mind also gives happiness. Doing nothing, just killing time is the worst thing to do, it is very boring, frustrating, it is like flowing as the wind blows, and then regretting that I did nothing. I feel 80% of the time in our life(by making a generic statement I am not trying to drag everybody) we do nothing, it like death waste, killing the time just like that, rest 20% of the our life time is what something remarkable we do or which remain on the top of the head that we did something. For the time line it is not required to consider a whole life time, just considering timeline of a year or 3 years is good enough to do the analysis. Suppose suddenly you ask me what significant things did I do in the last 5 years, or if you ask me what do I know, I just go blank… aaah aaah aahh.

What crap am I talking about. Some crap man! Actually I am bored I am searching for happiness. There are lot of these Maahaaan sayings “Happiness is within”, “you can be as much happy as much you decide to be” blah blah… After knowing all these still you won’t see or get the happiness. Bliss is a long way to go, as I believe it is advanced stage of a happiness. Man! then it gets spiritual. One has to realize himself to be in a blissful state. One will be happy when he finds what makes him happy, what he loves.

By the way I was talking about trip for this weekend, totally forgot about the topic, but they are inter-related. Even if you go around if you don’t get the happiness then there is no point in a trip too. Man! A good company is required, not that I have bad company.

Whatever! I am not going anywhere out this weekend.

Memories with no delete option March 20, 2008

A month passed by since I am back to India. Suddenly in between I was having a different kind of a feeling. I was so busy in work at office and some personal work in hunting for the property. I was just living every day. Go to office, come back, sleep, do some work, fill forms and back to office, meetings and tracking. Just like salt or sugar when dissolved with water will loose its original form. I got dissolved in this busy world. Today I was listening to some of my favorite songs that I used to listen in Kansas. It had happened something like this that the USB memory drive of 1 year which was disconnected from my PC, suddenly got connected and started showing me off all the history files.

Initially Kansas was like a boring place, but slowly as I went on spending my days in here, I started liking the city. What was special about the city, the people I met here, the homely nature of the city, the plaza, the parks, the downtown, the candlewood suites, my running path, the office, the work, everything almost everything in here. As though I found it was not good for buying anything much of electronics items unlike the deals in Fry’s electronics of Phoenix. But I did roam around places here and went around lot of restaurants and pretty good hang out places. Though all along the time we went on blaming Kansas for its geographic position, it is like you won’t understand the importance of something that you have, until you loose it.

Initial one month went off in just getting settling down in here, getting my laptop, SSN, DL, car and things like that. Then when we 3 Honeywell guys (Bejoy, Arya and me) got together we started experimenting the roads and places around. After the Wipro guys and gals pitched in the Candlewoods, our group started growing. I still remember I had invited everybody to The Country Club Plaza, I had heard that it was a good place! that’s it. We missed the exit or a lane change and went altogether in a different route. Someone helped us in showing us back the route, but we were in doubt whether they are helping us or taking us somewhere. After the first visit to Plaza and then later discovery of this place, it formed our favorite place to hang out every weekend. Few of the places of Plaza I just can’t ever forget. The fountains around, the bridge over the water stream, the statues, the cheesecake factory, the starbucks, the America’s Pub, the Barnes and Nobels, so many other restaurants. Plaza is one such a unique marvelous place; it is so romantic, it so mystical and magical.

We went on trips to the cities around as far as possible. St Louis was the first trip. It was just 260 miles away from Kansas. It was good fun time to see the arch, the kiddy museum, the zoo and just roaming around. Only frustrating part for me was that I always missed the exits, may be as I still say it was because Vinod was helping me properly with navigation. The Chicago trip was just amazing. Man! Chicago, has its own flare, it own style and attitude for which I liked it a lot. Just after spending 3 days in Chicago I felt it is a city to live. The drive was just too long and memorable. My second profession was driving, I was a driver J, but since I love driving, I don’t mind this even as a profession. The Dallas trip was good, too long drive for 2 days, but it was a good break. The Rocky mountain trip was rocking. Rockies in covered with snow was like heaven, it was too beautiful to handle, the lake walk, the trees half covered with snow, the colorful lighting on streets, the thanksgiving parade, the starbucks over there, twin owls hotel. It was one trip with no deadlines and we watched so many movies while in hotel. It was the best trip of the year. The New York trip was fantastic in its own ways. These cities are just the best cities in the world. “I love New York” that is saying that goes around everywhere in NY and I really feel the meaning of it.

The friends I got here, I believe them to be friends for lifetime. I just hope so that we keep in touch till the last moment on this earth, but I don’t know. My Honeywell folks were Bejoy, Arya, Madhava, Harshad, Prashanth, Sachin, Enrique. From Wipro were, Anoop, Pooja, Vidya, Matangi, Nakul, Ayyanar, Vinod, Nirmal, Safeer, Srirajesh, Imran, Senthil… Well! I am not taking any attendance here J. Each of them came and went off for a period of a time. I always had a strange feeling why do people meet and depart. I used to kind of give them send off and I used the feel what the hell am I the host here or what. But I knew no one is permanent, even one day I have to leave from here. Anoop Pooja and Safeer were on H1, so in a way it was good for me with a thought that I will always have their company. Unfortunately something happened, Pooja left Kansas, unsolved mystery forever for me. All means of contact with her was lost just like that!. I wish even today Can God make some modification here. Anoop was always there, in fact he was a default person in all my trips and weekends. Dude! Thanks man!. Matangi is an amazing cook and she never feels bored to cook any day any time. She is like a radio (Mat don’t feel bad, it is a complement in a good sense), once it is ON it goes on and on. Nakul was cool, we all had a big adventure and worlds of fun was loads of fun. Arya is a cool person, I really had such a good time to have him in our company. He has his own typical style and philosophies. Something or the other thing would be going on giggling, laughing or some jokes when he is around. Madhava is one person who ultimately gave me a send off. On the way back to India I went through New York and New Jersey. Anoop came along and we roamed around a lot of places in New York. It has just too hard for me to say Bye to him, talking some crap and avoiding eye contact I ran off to my path next ahead at the Times Square. It is very difficult for me to stop writing for this blog, because I have so many more things to say. The strange yet another thing is that I started writing this post when I was in India and I am completing this when I am back in Kansas again.

 All these memories are buried in my mind and would remain green forever.