Russell Peters

Here's one very funny comedian. Enjoy!

True Story

Here's a true crap story. The maintenance guys placed this in a men's restroom, positioning it strategically over the urinals.


Notice

This notice is intended as a refresher course to all using the restroom.

1. Urinals are designed to accept only liquids. It is not a wishing well, so dont throw your change in them. It is also not a trash can, so dont throw your gum, paper, tissue or any other garbage in them.

2. Toilets are slightly more evolved and can accept some "solids". They can also accept a limited amount of toilet paper. Do not block the toilets with large quantities of toilet paper. If you think you need to use more, err on the side of caution and flush frequently.

You may think this is funny but unlike some people we dont enjoy walking around in sewage cleaning blocked toilets. If you like walking in sewage, please block the toilet at home where you can fully enjoy it without bothering the rest of us who are just here to relieve ourselves.

Interesting difference between men and women

Check this one out. I got this from a co-worker.

Google babble

Google new beta Gmail service has created quite a buzz. I dont see how they are going to make money off of Gmail. Would you actually put your valuable information on Gmail if you knew that there are privacy issues and you are basically signing up so Google can learn about your habits on the Web ? This would just dilute the information on Gmail.

Google's value for the web is search - the technology that makes it easy for people to find information they need/want - not in controlling the information Google or anyone else thinks you want/need. This is why people use Google. The premise that they need to store people's emails to organise and search it effectively sounds lame to me. My PC already does that for me. Its searching for information out there beyond my control that's an unsolved problem for me as WWW user. I also do not think private information should be snooped and organized by any service on the web - if i needed that i'd have it on the public domain anyway.

I do like one thing i read in Gmail's FAQ page - POP3 access to emails could happen in the future. Hey it will be like the dot-com times when yahoo and others had it for free.

Changes. What changes ?

And the years are rollin' by me. They are rockin' evenly.
I am older than I once was, and younger than I'll be. That's not unusual.
It isn't strange, After changes upon changes, we are more or less the same.
After changes, we are more or less the same.
- From 'The Boxer' by Simon & Garfunkel

This is one my favorite songs and i happened to hear it recently as Simon & Garfunkel are beginning another tour after a long time. These guys are OLD but the voices are as golden as ever.

The words jumped at me coz i somehow had the idea in my head that i have gone through a lot of changes - yet i know that i am so much more like the me i think i left behind. This was very surprising to me and i suspect in the case of most people. I just moved to Pittsburgh on work and guess what, its almost as if i never left Rochester.

Folks who leave their native lands to live elsewhere can test out this theory. No matter where you go, you carry not just your luggage, there is a whole lot of baggage that travels with you that make you the person you were. If you want to know what i am talking about, imagine this situation - you go to a new country, state or city to study/work/live and once you are past the initial excitement of changing and adapting and growth and wanderlust, most people settle down and begin a life of predictable comfort. Before you know it, everything you are nostalgic about comes back or you go back to it. And I think it explains the birth of Little Indias and Little Italys and Chinatowns all over the planet.

I am convinced that the 'circle of life' is no stretch of the imagination - literally and otherwise you end up where you begin.

Blackout - 2003

On Thursday, August 14th around 4pm large parts of Northeast USA and Ontario, Canada were without electric power. We in Rochester, NY lost power for a little over 12 hours. Other parts in Rochester were without power for as little as 2 hours. It is widely believed at this point that an overload of the grid system somewhere in Ohio caused a cascading domino effect and took out power in the North-east. We spent the night at S & C's home(the lucky few who had power) and enjoyed their wonderful hospitality.

Why such a big deal over a power blackout ? Frankly i felt a little silly telling my dad in India about this event & trying to get his attention. To most people on the outside, it appears to have been nothing more than an inconvenience - something to be prepared for always. To understand its economic and nuisance impact in the US, is to know how dependent people here are on electricity in the daily lives. Can you really blame us? When a failure such as this happens at the rate of once in decade, people do tend to take electricity for granted.

For me, it was an opportunity for a little reflection while in the darkness, so to speak. And i felt strangely at home. No noise from the TV, no computers to stay connected, no flickering LED's from a zillion gadgets, no steady ho-hum from heaven-knows-what that slowly lulls me to sleep. Did i miss electricity ? Yes. Did i enjoy the blackout? Yes. Yeah i'd recommend a blackout once-in-a-while for everyone.

Lost :)

"I am lost...I have gone to look for myself. If I should return before I get back, please ask me to wait. Thank You" ---Writing on the wall in the infamous Tunnel, 2000. Tranceou - Senior Member on digitally imported ( www.di.fm )

reproduced unabashedly from Tranceou's signature. This was the only thing that made sense to me today. thank You.

Family

i read this gem in someone's blogs(i tried hard to find that "someone" to give credits here, no success so far) :
"Family is not always blood relations - its who you choose to love, care for and make your responsibility."

Pretty simple yet so deep.

I have been adopted as family by many people beside my biological parents and i am grateful beyond words to all those kind people. But when i think about it, the truth is that these great folks really had no business doing what they did - they are mostly friends and extended family for example. For a long time i had no real explanation for it until i read this quote. I was by no means special in any way, in fact, i am pretty sure i was a liability to most folks close to me (as childhood friends and kinfolk would attest ;)). As i grew up, i doubted the usual suspects - like treating people with respect and being kind and all that. But then you come across relationships going down the dumps for no explicable reason whatsoever. So it wasn't just about being nice to people or vice versa that made them special.

This quote tied it all together for me - its about choosing and making a special few among the many people you know, your own responsibility. Being a blood relation is as good a reason as any other. In this "family", you have acceptance for who you are, caring and you are their responsibility.

I run these words in my head everytime i have a disagreement with a loved one. And i did get answers to some perplexing problems this way. If the relationship was a choice i made, then i also have the responsibility to make it work. What follows is simple. I work at it instead of giving up on it.