Of Blogs and Oranges..

Yeah, so we have a slight chicken-and-egg situation happening on his blog. Turns out that while Thomas Alva Edison was no doubt a great man, he didn’t invent electricity. Just the light bulb. Apparently, James Watts-his-name invented the steam engine, which led to Michael Faraday inventing the Faraday (no wait, that’s just a unit named after him) or something and then Edison finally invented the bulb. At least, that’s what the Boy had to say. Bah, humbug. Why do I need to know this anyway?

So for everyone who missed me (you missed me, right? Right? RIGHT?):
1) I’m back from Delhi! Yes yes, you can now rejoice.
2) I missed you too!

My vacation was brilliant at that – two weeks of doing nothing but chillin’ (you didn’t really expect me to toast my skin in the sun, didja?) and catching up with my reading. Still, I do think my brain is rather fried all the same.

Here’s why. I was having a conversation with the Boy the other day and this is what it went like:
Me: “Why did the chicken take 20 years to cross the road?” (The answer I was expecting was – because he refused to stop and ask for directions. Lame joke? well then, just wait for his reply.)
Boy: “Because maybe the chicken was travelling at the speed of light and the road was 20 light years in width.” I’m not kidding, those were his exact more-or-less words.
Me: “Ha ha. You think you’re so funny, do you? But if I wanted to talk to a bulb (on acount of how smart people have a bulb go off over their heads when they come up with something smart,) I’d call Albert Einstein!”
Boy: “Albert Einstein?”
Me: Yes Albert Einstein. Are you not listening to me?”
Boy: “Oh, you mean because he came up with the theory of relativity and light?”
Me: “No silly, because he invented the bulb! No stop acting like a dim little tubelight.”
Boy: *Silence*
Me: ”No wait, didn’t Thomas Alva Edison invent the bulb and electricity?”

Arrgh. What is wrong with me? I used to know that! And why am I posting this tripe anyway?
 

Surprisingly, not only is this possible, it’s *very* easy too. Personally I would consider this a serious breach of privacy and a security leak, but apparently people do need to look this up often after trades.

http://search.ebay.com/ws/search/AdvSearch?sofindtype=10#RequestUserID is the magic link.

Why do I think this is a breach of privacy? Because if someone can find out my eBay user ID using my email address, they instantly know what items I’ve purchased over the past 90 days. This is an instant peek into my shopping habits and my lifestyle. If this isn’t giving away my personal information to strangers, I don’t know what is.

I hope eBay fixes this soon. Ideally if you have an e-mail address, you should ask the person directly (for their eBay ID), innit?

eBay India doesn’t seem to have gotten it’s act together yet. EBay took over baazee.com in 2004, and merged it’s userbase into eBay’s Indian website, www.ebay.in

Surprisingly, 3 years down the line, http://ebay.in still does not redirect to http://www.ebay.in; the connection just times out.

More seriously, eBay.in only supports PaisaPay, the local equivalent of eBay’s own PayPal. The site does not support PayPal to such an extent that you have to log in through http://www.ebay.com to pay by Paypal if you have purchased an item from a seller in the US. You can purchase the item through ebay.in, but you can’t pay for it through there.

eBay.in support? That’s probably another blog post!

Some merchandise I ordered from CafePress.com last 24th arrived today (in Mumbai) by ordinary post today, the 12th. CafePress is a website where you can design t-shirts, mugs and other stuff with images or text of your choice.

iTasveer, PicSquare and PrintCamp are Indian counterparts for one-off prints. Of course, I looked these up later.

Rectangular magnets, a pack of ten for $10.99

Basic Polo T-Shirt, $16.99

Printing on the back on the shirt.

Overall, I’m very happy with the magnets. Time will tell about the tee, as I want to see if the print will crack, peel or fade over time.

This is a rave. And a rant. And any other name you might want to give to the activity where somebody’s jumping up and down on the spot, clenching her fists and screaming with rage. So seriously, things are so bad that I wish I had rage issues, just so I could pull a Rachel Bilson and say, “Don’t mess with me, Cohen, I have rage blackouts.” Okay, I’m calm. I’m taking deep breaths. But to those of you who’re still reading this, could you please, for the love of God and all things sane, tell me how to get rid of those incredibly annoying telemarketers!
My current phone number used to be my Mom’s before I got it. You see, I’d lost my phone (yet again!) and I was using her phone temporarily, but she kept using her work phone so I decided to keep this one. Big mistake. Stupid Citibank people keep calling for her. Fine. You didn’t know about the new number. I get it. I politely give you the new number, a whole of 344534 times. But you call again. And again. And again and again while I’m trying to keep my cool at work and bother me with questions like, “Is this Mrs Gupta?” No, you fucking retards, like I told you a million times before, this is not Mrs Gupta! This is her DAUGHTER. The person you call and harass a million times a day, remember?
So one day I got really pissed off and told them to actually USE their extensive database which tells them to call me at the exact time I’m having a bath/ in the middle of a phone call/ doing work, and change the Goddamn number. And they listen to me go on and on and you know what they say? “I’m very sorry for the inconvenience, Ms Gupta.” What the fuck? Stop being sorry for the bloody inconvenience and do something about it!
And to make matters worse is JustDial. I call them occasionally for numbers that I need, right? And every time they ask me for my details and I very obligingly give it to them. Sure, you need to expand your database. Before giving me the number, they ask me if I want an instant SMS or an email notification, and I say no thank you, just give me the number instead. But you know what – I still get the messages and emails! And when I ask them why they don’t take note of me telling them I don’t want a notification, they say that’s just the way the system is. Again, what the fuck? What is the bloody point of wasting your breath asking me what I want (or don’t, in this case) and then doing whatever the fuck you want anyway?
Aarrghh… I’m so pissed off I could scream! Oh wait, I think I’ve done that already…
 

Which one of the following is definitely true?

• Mice love cheese. (Circa 1800)
• HIV causes AIDS. (Circa 1984)
• The Sun revolves around the Earth. (Circa 1634)

One? Actually, none of the above are known to be definitely true. These are all ‘facts’ that have been globally accepted at one time or the other, without definitive evidence either for or against. In fact, these could even be outright lies.

Let’s start with the mice. A mouse is a generic term for any rodent from the Muridae, Heteromyidae, Cricetidae, and Zapodidae families, which is omnivorous, and is generally found in forests, savannahs, grasslands and rocky habitats . Cheese is a solid preparation made by curdling and acidifying milk. Milk is a liquid secreted by the mammary glands of female mammals. If a mouse manages to naturally acquire cheese in the wild, surely it must be one of the hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional variety! Yet, when one thinks of a mouse eating, one automatically thinks of cheese.

If you must know, cheese began to be associated with mice was because no other food blends as nicely with rat-poison, and the smell of the cheese masks the odour of poison when used in a mousetrap.

HIV and AIDS are used interchangebly today. But did you know that HIV is only one of the suspected causes of AIDS, and while it is generally accepted that HIV causes AIDS, this has never been scientifically proven? And that AIDS as defined, is a collection of diseases and symptoms. And that a person can suffer from all the diseases and symptoms defined as AIDS without carrying HIV in his body? By definition, he won’t be said to have AIDS.

Yet, a person carrying HIV who suffers from a few of the symptoms will be said to have AIDS.

People seem to have an innate need for authority, for a command to follow and a rule to obey, a creed to adopt and an icon to look up to. All that’s fine, as long as you remember the reason for authority – better co-operation in human endeavours. Any other reason for authority is just another excuse for bullying. 

What’s rather scary is the propensity of people to accept authority unquestioningly. As has been proved in the Milgram Experiment [see 'The Perils of Obedience', brief version.] and the Stanford Prison Experiments, people don’t seem to mind extrapolating the validity of authority and precept to situations where this is wholly unjustified. (Unfortunately, my impromptu experiment in this regard was cut short because of the same reason the Stanford experiments were – a partner unsympathetic to the cause.)

As Milgram concluded, “The legal and philosophic aspects of obedience are of enormous importance, but they say very little about how most people behave in concrete situations. [...] The extreme willingness of adults to go to almost any lengths on the command of an authority constitutes the chief finding of the study and the fact most urgently demanding explanation.”

Can misuse of authority be equated to solicitation on the part of the authority itself? I am not qualified to make an informed judgement on this, but my best guess would be that it is an inchoate crime. I’m also neglecting any effects of the doctrine of merger here; that is left as an exercise to the reader.

A little bit of distrust is okay, if not downright necessary. Why should you trust this article, even? The real reason cheese began to be associated with mice was because no other food had the required firmness and elasticity to be used in a spring-loaded mousetrap. Food in mousetraps isn’t usually poisoned. If you’re using poison, why use a trap? And then, mice don’t even like cheese. They seem to prefer cornflakes.

Quick, who was the first man in space?

This month two years ago:

• I was fucking broke.
• I was fucking heartbroken.
• I was fucking mad.
• I was fucking stupid.
• I was fucking self-destructive.
• I was fucking smelly.
• I was fucking reculsive.
• I was fucking moody.
• I was fucking interesting.
• I was fucking lazy.
• I was cleaning up my language.

 How things change. Or not.

American Idol is the news these days, and how! First with AI reject Jennifer Hudson basking in the glory of her Oscar for Best Supporting Actress (I wonder how much of her glow can be attributed to smugness though. It’s not many people who get the best of Simon Cowell!) And then for the huge ‘Down with Sanjaya’ thingy that’s making headlines (jeez! What has the news come to?) over the world.
I think the season where Carrie Underwood won AI was the last one I followed avidly. Seriously, I was like an AI junkie; no one in the house dared to talk to me or even drop a pin when I was watching. I must admit, a lot of my craziness was ‘cuz of the incredibly hot Constantine Maro-something. I pretty much lost interest in the show after that, although I do watch snippets here and there if nothing else catches my fancy. (My current obsession is Hannah ‘look at me hamming it for the camera’ Montana. Just so you know…)
This time around though, I don’t think I can avoid AI if I tried. Whenever I log onto MSN or Yahoo or something, there’s always something or the other about AI and Sanjaya scrolling along the bottom of my screen. MY GOD! People need to get lives, I tell you! For a nation that’s quite ruthlessly and egotistically plundering all the world’s resources and painting the world in red, blue and white, the Americans are obsessively well, obsessed with Sanjaya – some of them love, some of ‘em don’t, but they just can’t stop talking about him.
His looks and his voice aren’t stellar by any means, but they aren’t spleen-tearingly bad either. In my opinion, this year’s Idols are mediocre at best, and this is something that shines through after watching just five minutes of the show. Sanjaya might not be that good, but none of them are. Maybe he was chosen because he’s brown, because he’s an underdog, or because of sheer talent (with competitions swinging the way they are these days, one can never tell!)
Anyway, I don’t know what everyone is complaining about. Simon’s threatening to give AI a skip next year if Sanjaya gets crowned, but dude! You were one of the three jackasses who chose him in the first place. And as for the American populace – if you don’t like him, don’t vote for him. Simple. Starving yourself to get him kicked out is just a pathetic excuse on your part to get rid of that baby fat by taking to anorexia. You want someone else to win, vote for them. A couple cents here and there won’t kill you. If anything, you’ll be spending that much less on cheeseburgers, and let’s admit it, the cows you eat have nothing on you in terms of weight.
So what am I beating around the bush for and trying to say? If your favourites get voted out instead of Sanjaya, it means more people like him than hate him. Either that, or his fans are rake thin already and are spending their allowance on voting for him.
In the end though, the producers of AI must be laughing their way to the bank. Their marketing gimmick has really paid off. After all, they had me going on and on and on about AI for the last 8534070 pages, no?

What you are about to read is a true story. And all the humour comes (for once) not at my expense but at that of the extremely adept (your first indication of any sarcasm in this blog!) police force.
Boy and I had spent a looooooong day taking pictures of a number of products for JLT. 34957895 pictures later, Boy was somewhat satisfied with his efforts (although I think he’s a better photographer than he gives himself credit for) and we called it a day. Boy decided to walk me home. Now let the record state that I’m no good at photography, which is why I love taking pictures of random trees in shadow and passing them off as works of art. Anyway, so it was twilight and I was taking pictures of and around the Parsi Gate at Breach Candy, when we were approached by the officer of a certain consulate in the region.
He told us that taking any pictures of the consulate was forbidden and since we were seen taking pictures in the area, they needed to check our cameras. Whichever snaps were ‘compromising security’ in his opinion were deleted. Then he asked us to give him the following details – name, address, passport number and so on. Well, Boy declined on the grounds that being Indian citizens, we’re not entitled to show our passport or our passport numbers to anyone. After all, we were just taking some f***ing pictures… we weren’t killing anyone!
After a couple minutes argument, we were taken to see the police in charge at the consulate. Amid a heated discussion about the Constitution and our right to the pertinent information regarding the whole procedure, we gave all our contact details. Some more Marathi later (I don’t understand one word of it!) they wanted our photographs for their internal database. Wtf? So Boy was taking care of it, when my Mom called, all hysterical about where I was. I tried cutting the call, but she got even more frantic and when I told her what happened, she was there faster than I could say well, anything!
Boy and me were talking things out with the cops when my Mom came into the scene, all guns blazing, with a shoot-now-talk-later attitude. She screamed at every person there, officer or not – how dare they question her baby like an ordinary criminal? – and she got me and Boy out of there. Then Dad came onto the picture and diffused the situation a little. He couldn’t do anything about my Mom though. Oh no! She screamed at the two of us – “Why didn’t you call me before? We could have helped you! We live just down the road! You’ll are such fools!” and so on. I was quite alright before, but seeing Mum so panicky really got me all worked up. And poor Boy! He’s never dealt with my mother before and this is not how I’d wanted to do the introductions!
Anyway, everything was quite alright in the end. But my point is how dare we be asked for our passports in our own country? Digressing a little, at dinner my brother was studying for a Civics test and he was trying very hard to learn up the exact words of the Preamble to the Constitution. But of what use is that when hardly any people are aware about their rights to begin with? I never knew about the whole passport thing; Boy had told me about it. What good is remembering the first line of the Preamble when most of us are unaware about our basic rights?
So anyway, back to the point. I’m glad that the police are taking an active role in security. I really am. But why only for the consulate? Why not for the stations and bus stops and other public places? Maybe there’s a whole chapter on International Diplomacy that I’m missing out on. Maybe I’m not educated enough about the situation to comment on it. But hey, everyone’s entitled to their opinions… at least for now!

Yes everyone, my exams are finally FINALLY over! Just in case the headline wasn’t incredibly and painfully obvious. But then I’ve been known to state the obvious more often than not, so no harm done. My exams have stretched on from the 23rd of Feb to the 8th of March though (thanks so some fucked up exam scheduling!) so grab a stool, sit down and let me update you on my life thus far, alright?

1) Gave my Economics paper on the 23rd. Messed up like 3/ 10th (my IMS professor would be so proud right now) of my paper. Whee! What a brilliant start! And to make matters worse, I messed up my very next paper, which was Advertising.

2) Flitted in and out of the office at random. Not because I’m a workaholic no. Then why? Just Like That. Sorry. Considering that everyone thinks that’s the best opening line to use simply because I work at JLT, I thought I might give it a shot too!

3) Ate in the college canteen a total of like, 20 times. So apparently a cheese paneer dosa and a Chinese dosa are one and the same thing. Hmm… I can totally see the connection. Not. But they both got puked out the same so it didn’t really make a difference…

4) Have slowly but quite steadily become addicted to Takeshi’s Castle. That show is just too funny! I know it’s not really nice to see people fall off surfboards floating 20 feet in the air or to throw themselves at random velcro strips, but if you watch the show, you’ll know what I’m talking about. Btw, did you know you need to do something 19 times before it becomes a habit?

5) Spent three hours before my Business Law paper playing Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban. What I can tell you, I love the game! I’ve played it a couple of times before and it’s just great. Specially the part where you have to find the secrets and all. I hate to be so immodest, but I gotta tell you, I can kick anyone’s ass at the game. Care to try me?

6) Discovered the brilliance that is the shopping at Colaba Causeway. Sure I’ve shopped gone there for food, food and random bits of trinket shopping, but they have some awesome clothes too! And at throwaway prices! And you can bargain them down further! I know I sound more than a little enthralled, but wouldn’t you be if you bought a lovely turquoise T-shirt with butterflies on it at a lesser amount than what you spent for lunch? I mean, how cool is that, man?

7) Spent an hour everyday between 3 and 4 in the afternoon watching first Tom & Jerry Kids and then Tom & Jerry. And I absolutely hate the former but the lack of good programming on TV leaves me with little choice. I mean come on, we get Fashion House and The Young And The Restless. And The Bold And The Beautiful. And Baywatch. And General Hospital. And the K-serials. Oh God, kill me now! With a blunt fork if you must.

8) Got tired updating the blog and decided to go out and celebrate my freedom instead! *runs away now*