IPL Madness

The Indian Premier League - a Twenty Twenty aka "T20" format Cricket tournament has been generating a lot of buzz lately. For the less informed - this is Cricket gone commercial, Cricket gone mod, Cricket gone bonkers!

It is fast paced, colorful, eventful and absolutely entertaining. I, for instance, was skeptical (we purists are - right Cricket fans?) and maintained a healthy distance from the news coverage about the IPL Player Auctions and team layout etc. Well once you have supported India for half your life, it is hard to break into a regional/franchise support mode.

And that is exactly what Mr. Modi & Co are hoping to do with the glitz, advertising and glamor that comes bundled with this format of Cricket. I think the only think that did take the attention away from IPL was the tabloid reports of Aussie captain to be Michael Clarke and Laura Bingle ... yeah Sydney news papers sort of went crazy on that. Wonder if it was the same when observed from other parts of the world?

Anyways, the "for instance I used to be" above should always follow "and now I am" ... so yeah now I am an IPL convert ... ummm sort of. I stayed up one night watching the Delhi Daredevils vs Mumbai Indians game (go Sachin!!!) and write one blog entry about it and claim to be an IPL fanatic ... huh?! Who am I kidding? Once a purist always a purist.

...but once a cricket fan, any format of the game is fodder for the idle mind. No matter how busy you are. Gotta go IPL highlights are on.

Ah so sick of it!!!

I am so sick of it,
don't want to talk about it any more
or about it until I have it
purged from my core
It has been your and my favorite topic
and their too
It is their past time just to let
dig into it with me and you
Oh! I have had it!
It has to stop
Somebody find the darn rest button
or a knife ...and give it a chop!
It is building so much gunk in my brain
that I can feel it clog
look I cannot escape it
not even in a blog.

- Alok Mishra

Running MySQL and Java on your desktop for development

So you have have a business idea and you have to have a web application that interacts with your clients, helps them place and order and lets you full fill that order, get the payment, ship it and do post processing etc. Where do you start from?

Lets start with the core - your database, because if your business is going to grow you need to be able to be dynamic, scale well and manage information (that is the "I" in "IT") - yeah?

So ... the easiest thing to do is to start by running a Database Server and then write a program in Java, PHP, Python and Ruby to connect to it ... just to understand what it takes to do all that.

I will start with Java in the example below and download XAMPP that will run the DB server for me and help me do PHP stuff later too.

1. Download XAMPP - It has Apache, Tomcat, MySQL in a single install
   
   • XAMPP Link - http://www.apachefriends.org/

1. Download MySQL Connector for Java
   
   • MySQL Download - http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/
   
   
   • MySQL Connector J Download - http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/connector/j/
   
   


2. Download Eclipse
   
   • Eclipse - http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/

Let the fun begin ...tinkering with Linux, Device Drivers and basic circuits with no fear!

I finally have taken the leap from being curious to being hands-on with stuff I have always wondered about but never had time to do. Installing Linux on my laptop helps me develop device drivers and with those device drivers I want to be able to eventually read and write information into and out of a machine.

And ... you want to be able to do that so you can write fun games which you can play with hacked-USB inputs and control things around the house and monitor stuff.

First things first:
Bought Arduino Duemilanove: http://www.amazon.com/Arduino-Duemilanove-Starter-Kit/dp/B001N1EOT8/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=toys-and-games&qid=1266004486&sr=8-5

Installing Ubuntu: TBD


Buying basic parts: TBD

...watch for pictures/updates and notes as I learn more! Write to me if you are interesting in DIY stuff and especially if you happen to know much more than I do ... could use all the help. Let the "Warranty Breaking" begin!!!!

Door Country - May 2008

Door County - http://www.doorcounty.com/

...it is only 1 hour away from here and a LOT of fun to go to in spring and summer and fall seasons।In the summer we can go Kayaking, camping, hiking and see "Shakespeare in the Woods" which is an open air theatre and so much fun!!!! Since you all will not join me, I took Vaidy, Phani, Ravi and went today and we had a GREAT time.

A while back, at Wembly (I think) there was this concert that was held after George harrison from the beatles had died. It is on DVD titled "Concert for George" .... and is a must have!

The first part features Pt. Ravi Shankar and his daughter Anouskha Shankar giving tribute with Indian Classical music, something that George Harrison loved .... and the second part features Eric Clapton, Joe Brown, Billy Preston, Paul McCartney playing some of the classics - and if you loved the original this is this version is even better!

Here are some of the videos from the DVD online on youtube.com ...enjoy!!!

Anouskha solo
Youtube Video Link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=3HqQoLq5c2c

Arpan Anouskha conducting
Youtube Video Link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=ZGmEu_9zkok&feature=related

Sarve Shaam
Youtube Video Link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=3FDsYDgdIFA&feature=related

Eric Clapton ...3-4 drummer ...a lovely piano and a wonderful orchestra playing this amazing song!!! This is one of the songs from Concert for George
Youtube Video Link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=FC1EZcrZEIs&feature=related

Hummm a little Gospel-lly but this song features the Late Billy Preston ( the African American Gentleman on the organ/the piano like thing)
Youtube Video Link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=VvH6fxP5hMo&feature=related

Finally ...this is how the show ended ...on Ukulele - "I'll see you in my dreams" wah!

Youtube Video Link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=pcphNHjwfGA&feature=related

Here are the lyrics to this heart warming song

"Though the days are long,Twilight sings a song,Of the happiness that used to be;Soon my eyes will close,,Soon I'll find repose,And in dreams you're always near to me.''I'll see you in my dreams,Hold you in my dreams;,Someone took you out of my arms,Still I feel the thrill of your charms!,Lips that once were mine,''Tender eyes that shine,They will light my way tonight,I'll see you in my dreams! "

Hope you enjoyed the videos and the lovely music!

I was bored, the canvas was a mess (I had spray painted on a Tee with the canvas under it) ...and had glue (regular paper glue in a squeeze bottle) ...and lots of paper ...Natl Geographic with the glossy pages and some absorbant-newspaper stuff ...some stiff paper from the MTU Alumni mag etc. I tore pieces of paper into tiny bits and started "seeing" things the more I stuck them on the canvas ... then I would go a little crazy and drip RED from the Acrylic paint tube from a height ....I loved the sensation of the drops on the canvas ...the splat, the drip the run the swirl ...and the more I felt the more I saw and RED wanted something YELLOW by it and Yellow wanted something black by it and there were pictures of Trees or Martian Canals with shadows - I am not sure what but they were in Relief and added some "depth" and then there were faces ... I wanted "humanity" in this sea of abstract - recognizable features, eyes, tibetian eyes ...african american eyes and MTU Alumni magazine had a ton of these and then i found pictures of Queen elizabeth ...in Sepia - like in stamps and it was such a wonderful "tone" to have ...so i added that and sat back .......something did not seem right. I had colours but no features and so i burned candles over it for texture ...the dripping wax created hills and craters and unequal shadows and filled the center and surroundings ....it blended with the swirl of red paint that i had dripped in circular motion on the periphery and then i felt that the wax was too glossy and realized that of all the little patterns ...I loved the diagonal stripes .......so the page with the Great Ships it was. A Lime-Green picture of a sea creature made the swirling expanding strips in the center while the pale stripes of the page of the great ships (it was an ancient map) made the diagonal stripe behind it ....together they "sat over" the rest of the wax, red paint and other layers upon layers of glue, paper and glue and paper and glue .... ofcourse the first and last layer were glue. Stripes were never completely covered in glue, just tips so that they would be partially free ... but my fingers were completely covered with glue and it made working on this progressively harder. I realized in the frenzy I had forgotten to call India, cook for the boys coming to eat, shower, brush and had paint and glue on my carpet and had wiped my fingers over a t-shirt of mine ...It was not just relaxing ...but it "satisfied" a craving. I have 4 blank canvases from years before and I dare not paint on them because I could not get myself to "think" about what I wanted to paint. And yet when I did eventually jump into it ...the canvas satisfied a hunger that was nagging and obsessive. it did not end even after I said to myself "done" .... I took a picture of it and later obessed with the picture for sometime and found that over-exposure with high-fill-light and focal-bw effects just took it one notch higher! I think the end-product is not just the canvas but also Blow-ups of the edited image of the canvas ....