Ghost

I was a participant in an online course on creative writing, twisted text once again, conducted by Frida. This blog has some useful references, including links to Douglas Adams' The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy series of books.

At that time PeeJ was a co-participant. PeeJ, according to me, has excellent writing skills - even at the time when he was a participant in the said course. He turned in the following short story, Ghost, as homework for one of the sessions. One should go over his different writings.

Frida 'disappeared' from the blogworld midway through the course; I wonder what happened to her. :(

What do you understand by the term - Hinduism?

Surprisingly some of the recent posts that I've read had to do with religion and more specifically about Hinduism or being a Hindu.

Hinduism! - I think it is very difficult to have a common definition of what it is. If a set of Hindu's are asked to define what it is - I am of the opinion that there are likely to be as many different perceptions of the term as there are respondents. This difference could be in the God(s) worshiped, rituals followed, religious texts followed etc.

That is part of my comment on Hip Hop Grandma's post on her understanding of Hinduism. Personally I dont have any belief or non-belief in religion or hinduism. Given below are a set of links to posts about different people's understanding/views of Hinduism/Religion:

Hip Hop Grandma on Hindu way of life

Kurrodu on To hug a tree

Bharathis on Being a Hindu

Noble Savage (Jay) has several posts on Hinduism. Among these her post on God/belief system probably reflects her own beliefs. Another post (drawn from another source) gives a general overview of Hinduism.

Mister Pregunto - asks a very general question - If you were to create your own religion, what would it be like?

Do you have your own take on the topic?

Note:This is a topic I'm a little wary of touching, because of the emotions that it is likely to rouse and the differences of opinion possible.

Blogs and Identity.

The virtual world, blogs, anonymity/identity, true/pseudo self all seem inextricably linked. Here are some posts that discuss these issues:

Blogs and Identity - this post by Kasthuri Srinivasan and the comments below make interesting reading - regarding how much a person reveals about him/herself despite, or perhaps due to, the anonymity that the virtual world provides.

Cyber Personality - Madura's take on her own blog persona.

Who is Mad Momma - she asks us and herself. (I've taken some liberties with the title).

Are you your real self and Identity crisis are old posts on this blog.

Cult of Bad Mama

The redoubtable Ammani is at it again. This time around she has created The Cult of Bad Mama, a forum, for the less than angelic moms, to give vent to their feelings.
Read how it all started.
Note:Yummy-mummies not allowed. LOL

She amazes me!

Do you belong here?

I was reading the profile of a blogger - Musaphir. The About Me appealed to me, which I reproduce below:
Caught in a life where nothing makes sense, I am from what I call the "transistor generation", who has grown with TV and now trapped in the WWW... I am of the lost generation, the one which fell between the cracks when my Parents' Age makes the decisions and the New Age makes things move... So, who am I? I travel along unknown paths to find out...

Musaphir - if I may - why do you think that you've fallen between/into the 'cracks' of two generations; why not think that you straddle two mountains? Of course, it's an individual's perspective and each has a right to one's own perspective. :)

Musaphir authors 2 blogs

• My Dreamlets


• Tasveer-e-Musaphir

Half-yearly review

That was the title of Sidewinder's post. That's a positive way of looking at things. You look at yourself and ask:
What have I done?
What should I do?
'Where' am I going?
Is this 'where' I want to go?
'Where' am I now?
Should I do course correction?
Is the destination important?
or is the journey more important?
and so on.

Sidewinder's post - Half Yearly Review - reflects on some of these questions. He also gave me a link to a video about happiness - Dan Gilbert: Why are we happy? Why aren't we happy?
Relevant to the topic is the post by Adrianne Tan - What Am I Doing Here?

There are others who call this kind of activity - a post-mortem. A negative view? LOL.

Nomenclature might have something to do with age also - those who believe they are in the last leg of their journey might call it as above. But again - 'Looking Back' - is a positive way of saying it, isn't it?

Age too might not be an important factor, because an elderly relative of mine does only 'reviews' periodically. So its a matter of attitude, I guess.

What do you think? Do you want to do a 'Review', a 'post-mortem' or a 'Looking Back' activity/post?
I'd love it if any of you could do this as a tag.

Tags and tags

Blogworld never seems to run out of ideas when it comes to tags. I have a suspicion - that tags are generated when people run out of blogging ideas. Atleast that would seem so reading Tagged.

Anyway tags are useful to the Tagged, as a time for some introspection as well as an opportunity for creative writing.

As for the readers, tags are useful in giving an insight into the writer's mind, how they interpret tags, their perceptions, attitudes and values in life etc.

Right now several tags are doing the rounds, of which the tag on judging people caught my eye. I am presenting two tags here:

Itchy's - The Judgement Day - because, Itchy's lists are incomparable.

Hip Hop Gmom's - Judgementally Yours!
Now, G'mom isn't one who talks only of negatives, so here's another tag on An Admirable group!, a tag that very nicely complements her other tag. Very rarely do I get to see such a point of view as hers. If I were to do that tag - G'mom would be there on the list, for this quality of hers.

Though I haven't done the tags mentioned - I would like to tag Alpha to do the above tags, just to see she her 'perspective' of the tags. :) One might wonder at this sudden love for Alpha that I've developed, but you've just got to go through her picks to understand. I dont know how to put an appropriate emoticon here.

Biology between two persons...

Biological relations - nope; Relations in Biology - terrible; Relationships explained in Biology - hmmm; Nomenclatural classifications of organismal interactions in real life - yuk - sounds like a title of a research paper. Biology between two persons... YES!

That was a tough one - I mean - getting the title for this post right. Finally I gave in to sensationalism rather than to correctness. After all we bloghoppers need to live a life - and the number of hits/comments do make our life.

After having met
Alpha The Storyteller
Alpha The Intrepid Host
now meet Alpha - The Biology Teacher in her post La Symbiose à Paris

PS: Don't blame me if you didn't get what you expected. I too was expecting more, only to see that the narrative, after a gripping start, ended rather tamely. :(

1001 ways to have a social life...

You are in a new town/country; you have no friends, atleast none who fit your expectations as friends - what do you do? Forget the 1000 ways that normal people would prefer - here's the one idea that makes you one in a million. For those who don't understand the math involved, please contact me.

You put up a friendimonial [the word is already copyrighted :( ].

Now who would ever answer such an advertisement unless they were_____ (fill in the blanks as per your perception/choice).
Alpha might qualify for whatever word you've chosen to fill the blanks with. For she did respond to the friendimonial - read her account in One Desperate Soul to Another.

But, there are the doubters, who say that the entire episode is a fast one pulled off by Alpha, and would not believe it unless Alpha put up the reply, which Alpha has promptly done and is documented at - Only Fools Rush In.

Have a nice weekend preferably looking at some of the Pieces of The Puzzle.

Update on 'Are you rational'

The problems of inadequate research, jumping to conclusions, and the need to meet a deadline are all evident from this post and the earlier one. This has necessitated me to post another separate post with an update.

I wanted to post the earlier post last evening, so to meet the deadline I went ahead and posted with insufficient material (which would have been available had I looked at Arunn's posts a little more in detail.

On a more leisurely look at Arunn's posts, I found that there was a separate link to a post and a site where you could have your worldview 'assessed'. That might have been a more appropriate link than the link to the discussion of rationality vis-a-vis, Godel.

Enough of the blah... here are the links:
What is your Worldview ?
Arunn's Worldview quiz.

Now here is a link that would justify my haste in producing an 'incomplete' post - Worse is Better.

Where do I stand as far as my Worldview is concerned?
My results are given below (on a max score of 10):
Your rating regarding science/non-science: 8
Your rating regarding values & humankind: 7
Your position on the worldview spectrum: (7,8)

Are you rational?

Arty has come up with a dilemma - is she rational or irrational? Have you done any of the things she mentions? .. or anything similar to it. I confess that I have done many similar things. Read Rationed Madness.

A related post by Arunn in nOnoscience, where he asks whether it is possible for a rational being to know whether it is rational or not - Rationality and Gödel.

And The Question is...

All those who have read the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy probably know the answer to the great Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. For those of you who don't know anything about it please read the background in the link given above. A must read.

However those of you who know the answer and are now pondering about The Question might have your own hypotheses. Here Arunn gives his own Question, which is a totally plausible and convincing question. And The Question is...Read here

Amazing commercial!

I saw a link to this video on a "friend's" blog, who I am not at liberty to disclose.
One thing is true about it's claim:
... You’ll replay it more than once trust me.
Amazingly Brilliant Commercial.

Publish or Plagiarise, else Perish

This is an blogpost by Prof Arunn Narasimhan, a faculty at IIT, Madras. Though this post is related to plagiariam in science, I think it could apply equally well in any other field. The post is about what constitutes plagiarism, and what pressures drive the plagiarist.

Well worth having a look. Read on - Publish or Plagiarise, else Perish.

The post appears in nOnoscience, a blog(?)/site "on Science, Math and related research, educational and social issues, with occasional humor and personal asides and plain blah", maintained by contributions from Arunn and Lakshmi.

Storytime with Alpha and Rhyncus

Alpha & Rhyncus - sounds Greek? Sure does!

Apart from seeming to share a common heritage, they also seem to share a literary bond, in that Alpha ('s real life incidents) has proved to be the muse of some of Rhyncus's writings.

Alpha's - Good Samaritan under Trial - poses a Great Dilemma. One can only speculate what could have been, had Alpha.....
Now stop tut.. tutting and read what Rhyncus has to say - Chivalry is death.
Ah, Now you understand!

Here is another episode from Alpha's life - Encounter in The Train, and Rhyncus completes the story by giving a gripping account of the other side - Close Encounters of The Train Kind.

Vaarwel. Does that sound Dutch? How right you are! It is indeed Goodbye in Dutch.

Firefox bug Blogger bug

The last couple of days, bloggers using Firefox have not been able to navigate to the Title textbox. This problem does not happen with IE.6.

After discussing with a friend - we found that you could reach the title using the TAB and/or SHIFT TAB keys.

Latest: Working around the problem. Move the cursor over the Title text-box, from below-upwards, when the cursor changes from 'arrow' shape to the 'text-select' shape (looks like a Capital I, click on the mouse, and you will be able to enter text.

Blogs - Comments, Disclaimers and other stuff.

Blogs- comments, disclaimers.

Recently I've been having a tete-a-tete with Sundar regarding various things. One of the things that came up was regarding disclaimers about the blog-content and the comments of others.
He has a Disclaimer on his blog as well as a disclaimer regarding other's comments. There is a history behind his move that can be read at Disclaimers. In that post he links to another useful resource - Crafting the Perfect Blog Disclaimer.

Sundar also has set of posts about blogging available in the side-bar titled: Blogggging. You can find information that may be of use while blogging. For the LBs I am giving a direct link to some of the posts:
Blogging should be easier
Me scared- are you?
Blog flu
Blogger comments
Blog Spam


Incidentally, the disclaimer on his blog was the smallest, that I couldn't see. See if you can spot it. No hints. If after searching you are about to give-up, just CTRL F Disclaimer, you might locate it.

Orhan Pamuk

Does the above name ring a bell? For me, it didn't. Shows how much out-of-date I am on current affairs. What happened to my aspirations for a career in the civil services. :(

Actually I first came across Orhan Pamuk's name on Madura's post about Appreciation of Art. Later I came across the name when it was mentioned by Manasi on her blog. The news (to me) is (or rather, was) that he had won the Nobel prize for literature in 2006, for his book, My Name is Red. Again, what happened to my aspirations of winning the Nobel prize? :( Manasi has an excellent review of the book in her post - Black, White and Shades of Red. Here is a review of another book by Manasi in her post Of Tears and Fiction. Sometimes I feel that I ought to have studied literature. *sigh*

Wanted: Humour Writers

s.b. (mentioned in the previous post) had posted this link at Terri's, in his capacity as anonymous commentor there. Quoting from the link:

If you can tickle a funny bone or two with your wit and sarcasm, do write for us.

For more details visit the above link. The author, Rashmi Bansal, of the above blog, Youth Curry, is the Editor and publisher of the magazine JAM.

Latest update on JAM: Sidin is Deputy Editor of JAM at the time of posting.

s.b. - My Guru

I created this blog primarily to be able to read AND comment on the blogs that I visit. This gives me a persona in cyber-space. Don't expect anything significant from the blog.

Does that look familiar?
If it isn't, then just read the description under this blog's name.

Why am I bringing this to your notice?
Well, perhaps to re-evaluate the objective of the blog and also to see if the author is sticking to the objective.

Actually the objective brought to my mind another kindred soul in the blog-world, s.b. This remarkable person, does rounds of different blogs, conscientiously comments and leaves.

In my travels, my path has crossed his/hers on several blogs, to the extent that we've become nodding acquaintances. (S)he also gives links to other sources / blogs in the comments where relevant. The most surprising thing is that s.b. is truly anonymous - does not possess a blog, a user ID or even a nick! All comments are by anonymous but signed at the end with the characteristic - s.b. The point that I'm trying to make is that - s.b. has been doing what I've proclaimed to do, but without any brouhaha. s.b. and I are now nodding acquaintances in blogosphere.

This post is to honor s.b. - my guru.

Some places where I've met him/her are:
Hip Hop G'ma's
Are we born women
Random Thoughts

Another common watering hole is Terri's turf (Terri, hope you dont take offence at the description :p)
Tourists Gone Wild
Senior Sampats

Surprising that I've never introduced Terri to you before! Read about Terri - The VIP

s.b. has also commented in this blog. :) I hope that s.b. notices this post.
I wonder why s.b. doesn't have a blog of his/her own!

Storytime

I haven't done any real bloghopping these days. At odd intervals I do check out my regular blogs. I then remembered a short story that I had read as a child, which had a huge impact on me. Though I did not remember the details of the story, I remembered that it had to do with moral values; I also remembered the title of the story, The Bottle Imp.

Then there was Google, and in a matter of a few minutes, I had a link to an online resource(link given above), in addition to having a Wiki entry. The story is by R L Stevenson, the author of Treasure Island and Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, apart from numerous other novels and stories.

Enjoy.

PS: Visited Itchy's blog just now. What a makeover! She has added a lot of timepass widgets. Good for a lonely weekend.