Personal Weblog of Deepak Vasudevan

Thunderous Name to attract customers Today I travelling to workplace in V51 , I caught a glimpse of a nice Tea-Stall which had a very interesting name. It had a name 'TSunami Snacks'. TSunami is actually the powerful tidal waves which struck terrors in Chennai sea coasts about two years back. Being new to this region, the effects of TSunami still strike terrors in the minds of people. We are still in the process of TSunami rehabilitation in many of the small fishermen villages. With this current situation, I would really like to appreciate the Tea Stall owner for making the effective use of the name to give to his shop as 'TSunami Snacks'. We use words like 'It Rocks', 'Awesome' etc. In a way, we get used to these repeated words. Thanks to Redhy Issac, for introducing a novelty in the word to convey awesome ' Deverastic '. However, this tea stall owner still impresses me for his thunderous name to enthrall, entice and enchant the customers to his...

Pain becomes pleasure with B51 and V51 We have long time back discussed about the route re-calibrations in Metropolitan Transport Corporation for route numbers B51 and V51 plying between T. Nagar and Tambaram. After a while, just got an opportunity today to travel the V51 route. I personally feel (again reemphasizing our previous discussion) that the new route makes the travel more pleasurable. I would like to outline this in the following reasons: The route that V51 takes currently is Tambaram - Kovilambakkam - Madipakkam - Velacherry - T. Nagar. Since this route is a bit long route and the bus has comfortable legspace, faster engines, comfortable deluxe seats and clear view windows, it makes and gives the passengers a comfortable travel luxury as if travelling in the luxury bus. The charges are still less compared to taking a private share auto service, where you are squeezed like one in a big tomato bag. The re-calibration of route also greatly helps the commuters in Adambakkam wh...

Inter-month Busy schedules A while back we were discussing about Monday Blues and Thursday Teals . Just I was curious and thinking if the calendar and time-organizing applications that we normally use can help us in some way to make up and streamline our time-management practices. Alongside, I have also observed that with month-wise credit submissions in websites like Community-Credit , where you can observe typical peak loads for even the moderator of the website. The peak loads cross insurmountable limits during month ends and month starts during the periods of March and April, where we also have Tax planning practices, summer vacation plans and child education plans for the next academic year. I think this is one such option that calendar utilities can consider as a good feature request that should be incorporated into. What do you think? One-click Webmail Access - Easily monitor & access your email accounts! Visit http://www.inbox.com/notifier and check it out!

Early Start and Late Returns in Chennai Summer The daylight savings was actually introduced in the various states of United States and elsewhere so that the longest day time that is available can be made a productive use for the various activities besides conserving a lot of artificial electricity and energy. I feel that knowingly or unknowingly, we are also following this custom in Chennai to an extent, at least within the hot peak summer (Kathiri). To elaborate on the topic, to avoid travelling in hot sun, we try to start early to work and while returning to avoid the crowd and the hot sun, we start back home late. Also, our other policy of 'Stay Safe ... Indoors...' that we have outlined over here , seems to be very much valid too. What do you think about this? Share your views...

Finally summer starts to recede... The acute peak summer that has started to heat and fry Chennai from May 4 this year is finally giving way to normal hot temperature from today. No more Kathiri from May 29 till next year. But there would not be an immediate cooling effect on the earth like flashing a magic wand but you can for sure be free of the acute heat waves frying you up live. And more good news is that today morning Sun News they were announcing the onset of South West monsoon to Kerala coast. This means more cooling up of the land from the reels of hot summer.

A Sunday Evening at Bikes and Barrels As part of Chennai MVP meet yesterday, myself and Naresh were discussing with our Community Manager in Chennai. Sunday seemed to have dictated not much people to venture out besides I guess the gruesome summer too. After starting from Taj Connemara at about half past five, we had some quick bowling game at Egmore. We then headed straight to Bikes and Barrels located at Residency Towers, T. Nagar, Chennai. We had a brief session of soft drinks and some quick bite dinner. We then started back to Taj Connemera and then disperse off to respective homes and on the way had some quick touring around the city-centre chat shop at Ispahani center too. The Bikes and Barrels was really a very interesting thing. With a good ambience it was a good calm atmosphere. Interestingly Bikes and Barrels restricts you severely in the way you come to the pub. Women are expected to come in good decently covered dress and men are expected to come in full sleeves, fully cl...

Shirdi Sai Baba Darshan During my routine temple trip yesterday , I got a pamplet that was being distributed in the temple. It was highlighting about tours to important pilgrimage destionations like Shirdi, Pandaripur, Mantralayam etc. I called the number and they gave me more info too. They were glad when I told them if I could share across to other readers as well. Here are the details of the tour. Disclaimer: The details are being published as a humble service to interested pilgrims and devotees. I do not vouch for any claims. I am also not associated with the advertiser. You are advised to cross-check with the advertiser regarding the details yourself. Tour: Shirdi Sai Baba Darshan Organized and Managed By: Indian Railways Bharat Darshan Tourist Train (Indian Railway Catering & Tourism Corpn.) The tour tries to address a direct tourist train from Chennai Egmore to Shirdi, Kopergaon. Alongside, they have also planned to cover Mantralayam and Pandaripur. Tour duration: 6 da...

"Ithu Oru Ponmalai Pozhudu" Yesterday I was describing you on the effect on Sun as a diluted sun stroke effect over here . Well. I started to the routine Triplicane temple only in the good pleasant late evening at about 1700 hours. I know what you are thinking now. The weather effect is offset by city crowd. But actually, now Metropolitan Transport Corporation  has been meticulously planning and arranging a good amount of high capacity deluxe, trailer, vestibule and a spectrum of buses that are even envy to neighboring states. The MTC buses are striving hard to become neighbor's envy and owner's pride. :) I think the cool evening like this only has made Illayaraja to compose the 'Ithu Oru Ponmalai Pozhudu' in his Nizhalgal film song. Of course, the actual song describes parks but here it is concrete greenery. You can listen to this song from YouTube wherein the song is managed by Rekha Bharat. Well! The evening after the scorching baking frying hot sun seem...

Evergreen Memories (Album Collection) :: Awards and Felicitations It is my new concept to share across the moments of pride in getting all the moments of celebration across. Currently my photos are scattered across. Rather than keeping the thought hidden in the minds and my calendar, I am just rolling it into action and instituting an album right away. You can check out this album here . Feel free to share your views either as comments in this post or in the album itself.

Grihapravesam Offer The other day while I was travelling through Udayam Theater road (Ashok Pillar traffic lights), I saw a hoarding that was really interesting. 'Grihapravesam offer'.[Give your homekeys and we would arrange for the Griha Pravesham]. I observe that the package offering has become a very promising business opportunity taking into advantage of the fast-moving lifestyle and busy schedules of the people. The other common bundle offer normally you on weekend newspapers is "Personal Computer (PC) sales". You get all accessories related to PC and some multimedia gadgets in one single rate. The only thing you must be careful in such things is that you have to have a good drafted Excel sheet, work out by putting in black-and-white the various components' prices in individual and in bundle offer. Only if you feel that there is significant saving, you should try considering it. And there was one very promising bundle offer and an innovative of kind which Aho...

The Sun Drove Me to AC Shelter It is a regular Saturday. What? Still not recalling? If it is Friday, you should be sure of not missing the interesting classic 'Friday' post in CodeProject Lounge . And Saturdays, it normally makes our routine temple visit. Today, I had a long list of tasks in my calendar. So I have been addressing it step-by-step and cleared all the backlogs. I started at about half past two in the afternoon from home to Triplicane temple. I was afraid that I had to wait for a while in the hot bus stand besides needed to squeeze myself into a crowded bus. The buses on Velachery - Tambaram freeware are almost crowded throughout the days since it has become like a very important arterial segment connecting Tambaram (developing suburb) to Chennai metro. Both of my apprehensions turned false bringing great smiles. No sooner did I reach Kamarajapuram bus stand, than a 5A (Tambaram - TNagar) flew near me and stopped. And as a pleasant double (or quadrupled :) ) surpri...

Save Shri Ram Sethu Bridge Shachi Rairikar (shachi_rairikar@hotmail.com) has done a good commendable job for having pioneered the effort in bringing up an online petition in support of saving the Sethu bridge. The problem has cropped up because out of political and ulterior motives the ruling government in Tamil Nadu is firm is getting a canal deepened between India and Sri Lanka, which has been identified by NASA pictures of holding a man-made bridge dating back to millions of years old. This coincides with the Sethu bridge that was constructed by Vanara Senas during The Ramayana. Let us join together and make as little effort of at least signing the petition and supporting to save the cause of Sethu bridge. Check out the petition online here .

Shri Shirdi Sai Baba Online Darshan Thanks to Sreedhar Katikireddy, who was my colleague in my previous organization , I came to know of Shri Shirdi Sansthan Trust website which provides online darshan (Live Webcast) from Shirdi. You need to have Windows Media Player 9 or higher installed in the system to view the Live Webcast. Check out this link to have the online darshan of Shri Shirdi Sai Baba . Related Posts: Friday Lunch turns pilgrimage discovery Adhi Rudra Maha Yagnam in Thiruvanmiyur

Cold Water after Hot Sun Chennai is reeling under extremely hot weather as we discussed over the other post . The day before yesterday, I needed to visit Adyar State Bank of India, which is just about 10 minutes drive from my workplace. But even that made things feel hotter. In a sense of exasperation and extreme dehydration, I gulped about half a gallon of ice cold water. Wow! I guess that is enough for triggering enough of common cold and nasal congestion symptoms. Yesterday I had to call my physician, who is just next door to me in my same area (Dr. Leena Ranjit). A few quick and powerful drugs were administered to bring it under control. I guess, there is one more hidden lurking danger from weather in Chennai. Parts of Chennai are witnessing strong gusts of winds and light hailstorms. With these in place, it would for sure, trigger a lot of summer diseases. The simplest mantra for Kathiri summer of Chennai is Stay Safe... Indoors . By the way, when I said HailStorm, I would also ...

Wishing TN HSC Students and Professional Course Aspirants The Tamil Nadu Higher Secondary examinations are over and the results are declared here . These examinations are deemed to be turning points for students as they decide thier career into respective specializations and streams -- be it arts, science, professional engineering or medicine. At the juncture of results announcement, let us join together to congrats the students who have put thier heart and soul to cross this hurdle in flying colors and wish them all success in every sphere of thier life. This year, Anna University does not seem to be conducting the Common Entrance Examination test and hence the cutoff marks are purely calculated only on the basis of marks earned in the Tamil Nadu Higher Secondary Examinations. We wish all professional, medicine and other college aspirants good success for thier bright career. Related Posts: Free Entrance Examinations TN HSC Examination Dates Announced

Hearing Tamil @Frankfurt   Following the three-month long stay at Dallas (US) , with little hearing to Tamil television channels, in one way it would be a like an alien experience. During my return flight to Chennai  (India), there was a couple of hours halt. While I was waiting, I was in a company of a good Indian Tamil family who was travelling along and just the next back couple of rows in the Frankfurt - Chennai flight. It is always a safer company to travel with a good native family when you are travelling alone, since you feel secure. Also, after three months of less-Tamil exposure, it was some sweet Tamil flowing. As the famous poet, Sri Subramania Bharathi also celebrates " Senthamizh nadennum podhinile, Inbath Then Vandhu Payudhu Kadhinilae ".   Again, there was an interesting incident before I started from Dallas. Just two days before we were starting, there were new television channels that were being introduced in the hotel offering. Till then ...

Those who envy show themselves with a negative face This post had been written after due compilation of information from various eminent scholars and experts. Besides theoretical facts, mythological comparisons, we have given due realtime examples too. To protect the privacy of people concerned, as far as possible, we have restricted the identities to generic representations. We also have made and taken greatest attention cum yeoman efforts and due care to the minutest fact that it does hurt any body's emotions or ego in whatever form be it. I agree the information presented is a bit sensitive and even derives-cum-attributes its sensitivity to various adhyayams in Srimad Bhagavad Gita. While we can not give the entire saransh of Bhagavad Gita as cross-references, at least, we humbly hope that this mental though process would serve as a key-start information, a candle light to eradicate the darkness in the room (, the mind). Should you find through a post is offending anything, plea...

The Golden Jubilee of Kalaignar Karunanidhi's Political Career   This month seems to witness a great welcome celebration for Kalaignar Karunanidhi and his party (DMK). For optimistic and celebration purposes, let us shadow the black dark negative incidents from within the context of this discussion. The national leaders and worldwide political celebrities appreciated his 50th year in as a political legislator in the state of Tamil Nadu's legislative assembly. Let us take this opportunity to wish him all success and particularly towards the contributions to the rich and great Tamil Language.   A few bullet points regarding the Golden Jubilee are:   Fifty years as a Legislator in Tamil Nadu Assembly. He has chaired the position as the Chief Minister of the state at least five times. Strong voracious supporter of Thanthai Periyar's concepts, principles and policies. He pioneers and strives to give a strong voice to the oppressed community and OBCs ...

Dekhona -- Indian Video Website   Following up from a newsletter from Mouthshut , I visited Dekhona , which introduces itself as a new, novel, young, cool, temperamental video website from India. The logon screen, video display screens all seems to be following the style of YouTube . Currently they seem to be having some contest where you upload your video and you can stand to win a lot of iPODs too.   But my actual concern was how much Dekhona is going to enforce of copyright concerns. I like YouTube way of taking greatest amount of care on Intellectual property. I searched Dekhona up and down, making use of Google Toolbar Site search but I could not find convincing information how it is enforcing copyright restrictions, responding to copyright infringment calls. YouTube has a dedicated DMCA Cell and an email address copyright (at) youtube.com where you can take help from regarding copyright.   For those video publishers from India, you can try Dekhona and try p...

TV on Mobile The little handset mobile that we carry seems to be getting smarter and smarter each day. The latest innovation comes from Reliance . While travelling to Thiruvallikeni today , I saw a few hoardings and advertisements of Reliance mobiles now having the ability to even show Sun TV programmes. I did some background research on newspaper archives and here is the report from ' The Hindu Business '. Already with high power mobiles like Blackberry supported worldwide, communication is getting simpler. Now entertainment seems to be more charming too. Reliance seems to be bringing excellent innovation in telecom. While I was in US till last week, I was actually using Reliance India Call calling card service. It has really excellent call quality besides being economical and also with lot of seasonal offers bieng published. Should you have a debated issue, the customercare responds with the grievances and addresses them quickly too both on email and on the Toll Free numb...

After Thattukkada, now it is AappakKadai Traditional cuisine restaurants are getting famous now in Chennai. An year back, the city saw launch of Idli shops like Murugan Idli Shop near T. Nagar, Madurai Idli Shop near Koyambedu.  Redhy was telling me that he is crazy of the various Thattukkadai in Velacherry for cheap and hygienic food cuisines. Perhaps for those interested, we have discussed about a few thattukkadai in Triplicane too over here . While travelling to Thiruvallikeni today, I saw a new shop that has come in the same building as Vasantha Bhavan in Velacherry. It has a board called 'Nala Aappakkadai'. But it is a pure Chettinadu non-vegeterian restaurant. Now I think Velacherry has good diversity of restaurants of all kinds ranging from Triplicane Ratna Cafe too. It has almost become like a Mini T. Nagar.

Humourous Comparison of 45A and 21L When I started to Thiruvallikeni temple today morning and reached Velacherry, there were two buses waiting there (45A and 21L). Both would go to Triplicane. The former would get you near the temple and the latter would drop you at the Beach and you have to walk for five minutes. I got this very interesting comparison on the buses. There is nothing very deep thought embedded. It is just intended as a humouros comparison. 45A by virtue of being routed through all important arterial places in the city like Alwarpet, Royappettah etc with more traffic lights and intersections would take more time. Also it is a common bus (indicated by White Board) which means it would stop in all bus stops. Hence as the name implies, it would take 45 minutes to reach Triplicane. 21L by virtue of taking the route through Chennai Beach road (Adyar, Santhome) takes lesser time. So 21L takes less time like 21 minutes. :) Anyway, guess which bus I should have chosen? I took o...

Velacherry - Tambaram Freeway getting busier and safer People used to advise that venturing past the freeway to Tambaram after Velacherry-Vijayanagar junction late nights is not safe since the road looks very lonely and deserted. If you could access any newspaper archives, you can see a good number of waylay robberies along this stretch. I think those things are slowly getting things of past. At least, I saw three important entities that are extending the busy stretch from Vijayanagar junction till Pallavaram - Thorapakkam radial road junction till Jerusalem Engineering College. The good busy entities that I could see along the stretch are: Dr. Kamakshi Memorial Hospital , Pallikaranai Cognizant Technology Solutions New Building just opposite the Dr. Kamakshi Memorial Hospital Jasmine Infotech software facility I guess all the above entities which normally work 24x7 would keep the area bright lit. Also, since there would be good security deployed by them, we can hope for more secure co...

Chennai wins over the Sun City in the Hot Weather Every year, it used to be Vellore which used to log record-high temperatures. This year for a change it was Chennai which seems to be witnessing peculiarly high temperatures even to the tune of 110 degree Fahrenheit besides scores of persons succumbing to sun strokes across the city. Sometime back last year, we discussed about ' Heat waves lashing Chennai City '. This year, the condition seems to be still worser and hotter.  And typically for me, the entire week had been a bit herculean effort to bear up and getting used to Chennai Hot weather returning back from Texas , which has a good amicable weather. It used to be hot there but immediately you also get showers and winds. The Sun God seems to be very merciful in bountiful fire showers through out the city. Even the drizzles and summer showers that used to punctuate the hot month of May in Chennai seems to be mysteriously missing this year. The red hot Kathiri of Chenna...

Thiruvallikeni Garuda Seva (from Irving, Texas) I have been regularly visiting Thiruvallikeni since 1999. Currently, as I am in Irving, Texas since Feb 14, 2007 on Saturdays, I try to at least meditate for a while; at least for an hour and listen to some divine songs. If possible, I try visiting the Dallas Fort Worth Temple. Amidst this interesting turning points, Thiruvallikeni Brahmatsovams are underway. Thanks to Tamil Murasu that I could get the snap of Garuda Seva in Thiruvallikeni. Here is the snap for the benefit of other pilgrims as well. Also, affectionately, I could recall when there were friendly reminders on Feb 10, 2007 (Saturday) that I might not be able to visit Thiruvallikeni for the next few months; I was kind of not disturbed but only left it to the Lord and asked Him to accompany me. I could fondly recall one of the poems (as a friendly order to Yatotkari Sonna Vannam Seitha Perumal ): KanikaNNan Poginraan Kaamaru poong Kachi ManivaNNaa! Nee Kidakka Vendaa Sennaap ...

Coolest Week with High Speed Winds A climate as unique to itself in Irving where a sudden change in climate is quite not uncommon. It was hot till forenoon and in the afternoon, sky was getting fast overcast like anything. Towards evening, when I started out from office, the sky witnessed high speed winds and incessant downpours. It was raining about till 8 PM and weather forecasts predict more rains and thunders for the next two days. If we could fondly recalled, we had been discussing about Hail Storms sometime back over here .

Blogrolling Webservice Outage I recieved quite a few emails stating that whilst loading these pages, a suspicious looking Script Debugger was getting launched with the error message 'Object Expected'. I was trying to debug the issue and found that the issue was caused by Blogrolling Webservice encountering technical issues. You can find the details over here . The backup handler has been activated with all the current ( old ) links that I was having. But once the webservice resumes normal in a day or two ( or in a couple of hours , depending upon the speed of blogrolling.com resolution), the normal Active Blogrolling window would get resumed automatically. The issue was reported only in Internet Explorer 5.5 and above. FireFox Browser was not affected.

One Day Blog Silence The blogosphere observed a day's silence on April 30 to pay tributes to the unfortunate departed souls at Virginia Tech Massacre . Furthermore, let us take a minute to pray to the Lord Almighty to give mental solace and strength to the kith and kin of the departed and to pray Him to ensure peace in the world. The silence mission is supported by OneDayBlogSilence.com Time and again it had been emphasizes that cruelty and violence never meets and gains anything. But there seemed to some people who never understand and now they have done it at a very holy place -- an educational institution. As we observe the silence, this page would chant the Shanthi Mantra praying and pleading the Almighty for peace in the world. Thanks to a friend in YahooGroups who shared me the link from AstroJyothi.