Cordless Internet Phone

I just came across an ad in the newspaper for this Linksys cordless Internet phone. The great thing about this product is that it provides the functionality of Skype software to make your Internet calls without having to sit infront of a PC. In addition to the convenience of a cordless phone, it even displays the contact list to make your calls. A small USB device which connects to your PC acts as the base station for the phone. The base station supports upto four handsets and they can behave as an intercomm. DECT(Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunication) standard is used for communication between the phone and base station.

Days of our Lives

Here is an example of an extremely unproductive day at office. Do not assume this timeline as an accurate representation of this blogger's daily life.

900am: Slow and easy breakfast at the office cafeteria comprising of bee-hoon, egg and Peelfresh mango.
930am: A sneaky late entry into the office where eye contact is avoided.
935am: Boot up the laptop. With all the setup scripts running, this process takes approximately 5-10 minutes and nothing much can be done during this time.
940am: Time to fill up the tea cup and have a quick chat with co-workers present in the pantry.
950am: Take a quick round trip around the office to get an update from colleagues whom you normally wouldn't talk to.
10am: Laptop should be ready for work now. Time to check up your emails. Reply to urgent work related mails first and then get to the pending ones when the excuses have been figured out.
1030am: This is the news hour. Tune into BBC, CNN, TOI, ST, CNA until you manage to encounter a website which has been blocked by your local proxy administrator. Next, view blogs of people whom you usually don't meet.
11am: Time to start work. Integrate, compile, debug and test until the stuff gets working. Errors are good, because they give you a chance to think into the problem. If everything worked at the first shot, there wouldnt be our jobs in the first place.
12noon: Start planning for lunch and send quick SMSs to your lunch mates.
1230pm: SMS replies would have been received by now and lunch location confirmed.
1245pm: A satisfactory lunch hour at the cafeteria, foodcourt or hawker center.
145pm: Time for a short 15min post-lunch nap.
2pm: Coffee break in order to wake up.
215pm: Back the seat for some real work.
4pm: Visit the boss to clarify issues and make sure that your presence in known in office.
530pm. Quick exit from from office. The colleagues who do not know you, assume that you are doing a part-time masters.

A life no less than ordinary

Of late, upon some restrospection, I realised that everything in my life has become a well-set routine, almost like its being run of some script. This includes the lesser known people whom I encounter on a daily basis. The familiar faces are the security guards at home and office, the people who commute by train and bus at the same time, the colleagues who enter office before me and those who leave office after me, people who frequent the gym and the nearby shop owners. This also goes to the extent of the people who serve food/drinks at the foodcourts/hawker centres which I frequent, who happen to know my typical orders.

I think its time to move on.. There is a fear of remaining stuck behind.. Time for more introspection and need to make some changes..

Memorable quotes

Well.. I’ve got nothing much to say.. I’ve got nothing much to write.. I’ve been keeping myself busy and occupied.. Need a little time to wake up..

Filling up this empty space now with movie quotes:

Trainspotting
Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching luggage. Choose a three-piece suite on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on a Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pishing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourself. Choose your future. Choose life... But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin' else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you've got heroin?

Pulp Fiction
The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.

Shawshank Redemption
In 1966, Andy Dufresne escaped from Shawshank prison. All they found of him was a muddy set of prison clothes, a bar of soap, and an old rock hammer, damn near worn down to the nub. I used to think it would take six-hundred years to tunnel under the wall with it. Old Andy did it in less than twenty. Oh, Andy loved Geology, I guess it appealed to his meticulous nature. An ice age here, million years of mountain building there. Geology is the study of pressure and time. That's all it takes really, pressure, and time. That, and a big god-damned poster. Like I said, in prison a man will do anything to keep his mind occupied. It turns out Andy's favourite hobby was totin' his wall through the exercise yard, a handful at a time. I guess after Tommy was killed, he decided he had been here just about long enough. Andy did like he was told, buffed those shoes to a high mirror shine. The guard simply didn't notice, neither did I... I mean, seriously, how often do you really look at a mans shoes? Andy crawled to freedom through five-hundred yards of shit smelling foulness I can't even imagine, or maybe I just don't want too. Five-Hundred yards... that's the length of five football fields, just shy of half a mile.

Future of the DVD

Any form of storage media never remained permanent in this world due to rapid technological advancement. It has been a long time since gramophone discs were widely used for music, and then it was the audio tapes and VHS video tapes. For data storage there were floppy disks and then the hard disk drive. Digital media became immense popular with the advent of the CD (compact disc) and most recently the DVD (digital versatile disc). Today, we have portable hard disks and thumb drives which utilize the convenience and benefits of USB data transfer.

The future of the DVD is now heading in two directions – Blu Ray and HD-DVD. Blu Ray is a format developed by Sony where as HD-DVD is a format developed by Toshiba. Seldom have we seen such a situation in the past, where the media and entertainment industry fails to agree and adopt a common standard. HD-DVD claims to have a big advantage in terms of the manufacturing process. The major Hollywood studios Warner Brothers and Paramount have announced the availability of movies in both formats. In recent times Microsoft and Intel have declared their loyalty to HD-DVD where as HP has been rooting for certain changes in the Blu Ray standard. Both discs are capable of storing about 40-50GB of data. The key issue to decide on the popularity of the formats will be the price at which their hardware and software products are launched by the end of this year.