| Yet another social network that is not only a pain in the ass but irritating as hell. One can easily spam everyone on their orkut list with stupid annoying invitations and if you are not careful, it can send invitations to your outlook contacts too. Just a product to avoid and warn everyone about.
I signed up just to check out if this really good or just some bullshit. Difficult navigation, irritating ads and popups and practically no value of this site, that is all I could find out.
Thankfully they have the option to terminate one's account and that is what I did. I hope this helps others who are equally pissed at gazzag.
Related article: http://www.oreillynet.com/xml/blog/2006/11/gazzagcom_is_my_new_enemy.html | comments: Leave a comment   |
| | I have been out of LJ since launch of my motorcycle blog more than a year back. Of late I have been needing to write tech posts too, and thought I would separate tech posts from all others. LJ will be my tech blog from now on, hopefully. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| yes, finally. almost one full day of labor to get the motorcycling page and the index page up.
there is one confusion now. i have started using wordpress blog at my own site, and right now i cant synch lj blogs there... so it is gonna be a tough choice... btw i really like the output of ljbook.com, just hope that they make pdf compilation out of wordpress blogs too.
long day... need to sleep. | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
| a couple days back i got my first payment from the wedding photography i did in march. it was a lot of work both digitally and in the darkroom, and the profit of $250 was nothing compared to it. still, everything has a beginning and i have a portfolio to brag at the next assignment.
surprised to find that i finished printing 120 sheets of 8x10 b/w paper and a couple of 11x14, all in less than a month. have ordered another 100-pack 8x10 ilford paper, a couple of b/w films and finally, a red filter to get those stark black skies in a dramatic silver print.
i have bought a personal domain (www.joydutta.com) just today, and hoping to setup a decent website and photo gallery very soon. | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
| Amazing day today. A few "first time"s jammed together in a few hours. And one experience of deja vu.
The venue of the interview was Glastonbury CT, a little bit away from home. A ferry ride Port Jefferson to Bridgeport and then 60 miles by I-95 and I-91 is what it takes to get there. Perfect excuse to ride. First ride out of NY state and first time taking a ferry over atlantic, that too unlike just another passenger.
The day started late. Woke up at 7:50am instead of 5:30am. Interview was at 2pm, so a lot of buffer time was at hand. Hurried to the Port Jefferson and was on time for the 9am ferry. Pretty exciting as I boarded the vessel, it seemed like a huge parking lot that floats. And it moves quite fast too.
Despite the predicted gloomy weather around Bridgeport, to my relief I found it was perfect for the ride on the interstate highway. A short while later, the speed limit of 65mph of CT state made me real happy, as I could just cruise at 70, though barely catching up the traffic.
As I entered Glastonbury I had a mild drizzle and it brought back a lot of nostalgia. The quietness, the cloudy weather, the drizzle and the greens instantly took me back to June 2003, the ride to Munnar and Kodaikanal. The same emotions, the same excitements, it was just overwhelmingly amazing. Only missed the twisties, and the beautiful names of routes like : "munnar-devikulam-pooppara-theni-periyakulam-kodaikanal"... Here it is all about some numbers and directions and exits...
I reached the office without getting lost, and was quite a bit early. Went out to explore the town. Pizza at Giovanni's tasted just like Dosa with Kerala beef fry, as I was still immersed in the old memories. Never felt so much relaxed, so much at ease and my own self, before an important interview.
The interview was like a deja-vu. Interviewer himself was the CTO. Reminded me when I left Cisco to join a small startup Strandgenomics.com in India, and was interviewed by its CTO. Just a few days back I had been at the Morgan Stanley corporate office at Manhattan for a second interview and the comparison was just the same.
Return ride was even better. Never less than 65mph on I-95 and I-91. Smoothest roads I ever rode. Thought about riding back the whole way home that meant 150-odd miles extra. Felt too sleepy by the time I reached Bridgeport and chucked the plan by some logical thinking. Slept off the whole way in the ferry.
A blissful day. Rode home from Port Jefferson into the sunset. Wish I could capture the road ahead...
Snaps: http://www.ic.sunysb.edu/Stu/jdutta/pics/topride-29mar05/HTML/topride-29mar05/
(Thanks to my friend Vishal, for lending his coolpix camera) | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
| 2am in the night. Still not feeling sleepy. Been a busy day, started with helping out priti with some programming related to her research. Did some other work during the day. Ate nothing but some boring sandwiches.
Badly needed to ride. The heart craved while the head refused.
Hit the road at 2:30. No destinations in mind. Almost zero degree C outside. A beautiful moon in almost a clear sky. Suddenly a lot of memories came rushing back, like flicks from an old film. The Goa trip, especially the attempt to ride all through the night without sleeping felt fresh like yesterday. Took the nicolls road south, just to hit the end of it at Sayville. Wide open road. Held the throttle at a constant 55mph. The whizzing dashed lines on the asphault reminded of the weekend return rides in south india along the mysore road, from Maddur to Ramanagaram, then Bidadi and finally Bangalore.
A heady but short ride later I reached Sayville, a small town that seemed a ghost town at around 3 in the night. I could see what I should be expecting in my future long rides through this country. Unlike India, all gas stations are usable 24 hours, a relief for me. Stopped by a parking lot where I had been before, and turned back.
Reached home at 3:15, tired but satisfied. 30 miles in 45 minutes, at the dead of night, not bad. It reminds me why I ride, despite the questions and frowns from all others. There is no pleasure quite as pure as this for a motorcyclist, and only a motorcyclist will understand. | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
| there never seems to be a definition of happiness. except that it comes to be felt at the most unprepared of times...
today evening was something i still find difficult to believe.
a friend whose portfolio i promised to do finally had some time for it after a few months of procrastinations. it was a gloomy day and a cloudy late afternoon, and at the last moment i decided to ride to long beach in the hope of some good natural light.
what a ride it was and what a barrage of feelings came rushing back ! after a long time i felt like having my gf priti behind me, riding into the sunset. there i was, with a beautiful russian lady, on my trusty 600cc honda, along the narrow country roads, with a bag of classic nikon cameras and a canon digital slr, heading for a beautiful beach. is there anything quite close to such a moment for a passionate motorcyclist and photographer ?
the beach was yet another surprise. the whole parking lot was empty. not a single soul on the beach, the water still like a pond, it was more like a computer graphics than reality. the horizon seemed to be on fire, but there was no harsh light. a superb, perfect studio light offered by nature. all these, after the long wait, countless postponing and emails.
every click of shutter made me go "wow". never had such a thrill of shooting a gorgeoous lady. perfect skin tones, perfect backgrounds, and her natural expression put a permanent smile on me. not to mention both the canon rebel with 85/1.8 and my nikon fm3a with 100/2.8 and TriX400 were a sensual delight to use.
we sat on the rocks by the ocean, watching the sunset and talking about life and psychology.
told her how i missed my rides in india, how i missed priti and seeing her face on the rear view mirror and made sure if she was not dozing off. she went off with a gale of laughter.
it was a lot of mind work and both of us were hungry at the end. a dish of chicken lo-mein and dumplings at a chinese takeout felt like heaven. just like after a long ride and heading back home...
update: the pics are now available at: http://www.pbase.com/jdutta78/suzanna | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
| Google delivered yet another awe-inspiring product - Google MAPS.
just one word to describe - it is GOD. a few days back I fell in love with KeyHole and even ended up purchasing an year of subscription for $30, but now google map software beats it left and right.
never seen such fast map retrieval over the net, it is almost like having the entire north american roadmap to the narrowest lanes as static data dumped on the hard disk.
mapquest, yahoomaps, and even randmcnally seems dinosaur now.
god knows how many more surprises are yet to come from this extraordinary gem of a company. | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
| A few days back I tried to write a vigorous protest article at the campus statesman. It was too short and was not published, so I am putting it here along with some follow-ups:
------------------------------------------------------------------
The parking situation in the campus is anything but a mess.
Not even mentioning the lack of space in peak school hours, of late
it seems that the officers issuing parking tickets need a little more
common sense.
For example, my motorcycle, which has a valid permit,
got ticketed at a Faculty/Staff parking lot today with a mention
that a permit is not visible. Do we expect a normal car permit to
be hung on the handle bar of a motorcycle ? The clear piece of permit
sticker on the front fork is really difficult to miss, unless just assuming
it is absent or, maybe for the fun of writing a $15 fine.
In another recent instance, only two days back, I parked behind a car
in the middle row in a F/S lot. The salt spray all over the ground
made the slot lines not legible at all. Not realizing I was just out
of a proper parking slot, with a car in front and the whole parking lot
otherwise full, I could not have a chance to doubt. I got a ticket
for parking "on the roadway" but not for "missing F/S permit" like today.
Can we see something called consistency here ?
------------------------------------------------------------------
I appealed for both the tickets immediately. No response for a week.
Just now got a mail from them saying both appeals have been denied. Nothing can piss me off more than this rude response from a university parking service. Finally it seems that the parking permit office confused me by
giving me a resident parking permit while saying that I can also park in the
F/S parking lots. Need to talk with them again. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Yeah, a formal suit for the first time after 27 years on this earth. And the tie, too. The Morgan Stanley interview for the summer was just too important to not wear a formal business attire.
Today I had a demo too, for an important project. Came to my apt last night back from working at friend's apt at 3am. And then remembered that the blazer and pant set was never opened since I came to USA. Just had to make sure the pant fits, and with a little fight, it seemed ok for the 20 minute interview. Didnt seem to need a belt though. And the new belt I got from India, refused to show up in a frantic search.
Interview was at 1:15pm. Got up at 10am and still had to do some project work, so started to get ready right away. The shirt was inside the blazer, and was crinkled all over. No time to iron, and no more shirts in that pristine condition. What the heck, the blazer will be over it, so I just went ahead. Forgot how to tie the tie, so my roomie did it for me. Didnt have a formal file to carry the resume, so took the laptop shoulder bag instead. Too bogged down with the project than the interview. Hardly made any preparations.
I had so little time to be tensed about this important interview that ultimately it went well as I was at ease and could converse with the interviewer just like I would do with my project partner. Learnt an important lesson - to get busy before anything important to give as little time to worry as possible. The project that we are doing is all in Java and I was asked mostly java stuff, so there was nothing much to prepare for.
A good day. But the blizzard made me mad. Could not ride the bike after the interview, and even worse, two photography assignments from statesman got cancelled... | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Today was THE day !!! my very own darkroom experience finally happened. I am still stunned at the excitement of the whole process. It literally completed my photographic pursuit. Now I can really visualize the print even before pressing the shutter button. It is a really really beautiful feeling.
The first print I wanted to do as a band-test. Exposed 4 parts of the picture (8x10, Ilford multigrade IV, RC pearl) in increment of 5 seconds. Then chose the region with 10 seconds exposure as my favorite. Oh yeah, the very first print I did on the wrong side of the paper...
What followed the first proper print was an absolute euphoria. Got addicted to seeing the print come out in the developer. For some prints I tried to dodge and burn and understood how that works. Realized how much physical labor is involved to make a single beautiful print. Did 13 prints in a couple of hours.
The whole photographic process is now composed of so many factors to control the contrast... first the exposure of film then development of film, each of which can be adjusted (exposure compensation and push/pull) and then the final step which itself is a quagmire of choices. Paper, filters, timing and what not...
I am still not confident to develop my own film for fear of ruining a whole 36-exp roll, but that hardly matters now. It is the final print that puts a smile in my face. It lets me comfortably forget that there are wonderful tools like digital slrs and inkjet printers in the world I currently live in.
Thanks a million to Henry and Partho of the JJMehta forum for always reminding me how lovely conventional photography is. It is personal, rewarding, and a sheer bliss.
Long live silver prints... | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Today was supposed to be an exciting day. At the end of the day I would have been riding around 100 miles to break in the new tires I bought online a few days back. Instead what happened is total disaster, waste of time, money and endless headache.
I researched very carefully about brands and models of tires. I saved $90 by buying online instead of a retailer or dealership. When I bought the Pirelli MT66 cruiser tires, there was no choice between a tubeless and tubetype tires. Then just sent me tubeless. My bike manual doesnt say anything other than size. So I never had a clue.
Only after opening the rear tire today the shop guy told me I got wrong tire. He showed me the tube and clearly mentioned he would not fix tube in a tubeless tire. (Later I learnt that one can very well fix a new tube in a new tubeless tire without a problem, and tubetype tires for certain brands and sizes are getting unavilable these days. I now feel those guyz were either stupid or morons). It felt like being thrown into water from a pleasing daydream. It felt like hell. But I was calm. I was practising the teachings of Pema Chodron to control my rage about my own sheer stupidity.
The store didnt have the same tires and needed to order. Two tires and two tubes went up to $300 that I promptly refused and told them to put the old tire back on. And holy cow, with the saturday working hours almost coming to an end, I found that the old tire now had a leak, obviously at some fault of the mechanic. I had no way to ride back 10 miles at this condition. I tried hardest to not starting to pull my hairs in desperation. My friend back at my apt complex could not be reached, so I started walking. Tried to get a ride, stood by the road with stretched thumbs, but almost every driver looked at me with doubt, and I realised how unwelcome bikers are among common people. Suddenly there was a bus stop and I could get a ride upto a friend's house close by and hopefully she was there. A good home style meal later we picked up my new tires and she dropped me home. Bike stayed back, to be had on tuesday with the leak repaired. Dont know how two bikeless days will be...
What a day... reminded me of the most important lesson from the Pema Chodron's book "When Things Fall Apart", that never to expect things, never to assume a day will be good.
Just got a reply from the online tire shop, and they said I can put tubes in tubeless tires without any problem. Tubeless tires are thicker than tubed, so from a logical point of view, I too agree to this. Now I have to see if I can buy tubes from them and convince them to put them in the tubeless tires.
Just hoping I can still take my roadtest on thursday... | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Finally a long cherished dream became a reality. The other day, my photo editor friend showed me how to print a bw photo. My first experience to see thepicture coming out in developer tray in the red safelight was simply out of this world.
Holding a 11x14 print that he did was far superior an excitement than seeing high res, super sharp, super clean dslr images on the monitor. Even on an apple system. While for newspaper work digital is essential, I am not feeling absolutely any attraction towards using digital gear for personal use. I am really glad I didnt invest on a dslr. It is far more easier to have a decent print to be happy with than I thought. Ofcourse it needs a lot of work towards mastery of prints, but it is the fun I was really looking forward to.
All these days I felt something was incomplete in the whole photographic process. I cribbed about quality of local one hour labs, cribbed abt the time it takes for the prints to come from snapfish, cribbed abt the costs of manual bw prints made by a lab (which I never got made here). Everything is solved the moment I realized I can make my own 8x10 prints myself. Cheap. Classic. Archival quality. Exactly the satisfactions I took up photography for but never realized before.
Guess it is time to shoot much more bw than any other film. Already dreaming to have my own darkroom sometime in future. Just told my friend to pick up a 100-pack ilford multigrade pearl-finish 8x10 box of paper. Tomorrow am going to print some of my negs myself... can't really wait. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| 100 miles. -5 to -1 deg C whole day. All for the pre-licensing certificate.
Some things in a particular order give a priceless amount of satisfaction.
It was a rather bad start of day yesterday with a huge amount of pending project works. Two failed attempts to locate the classroom for the pre-licensing course in the previous weeks added to the frustration. Riding season is approaching fast and I just cant afford to be without a full license to ride anywhere I wish.
I decided to work as much as possible the whole of yesterday. In the afternoon, after a little fight with my project partner, we finally hanged on with the project and without knowing it was almost dawn of today, with the work looking good and almost finished.
Needed to ride. I finally found the classroom location after repeated e-mails to the auto school. Such a stupid business that nowhere on their website did they list their location. Woke up in the morning after a very short nap but was mad to find the temps well below zero. It was a perfect clear and dry day, so I decided to ride at all cost. Could not really afford another week of lost time to schedule the roadtest. I put on my windshield as the last resort of keeping warm on the long ride.
It was a great ride. except for numb fingertips, everything was fine and comfortable. Great roads and good traffic.
The 5 hour class was a total bore. A lady did a lot of blah blah blah interspaced with some auto safety videos of which only one I liked. There was no mention of a motorcycle. Heck, I can use this certificate for the car road test as well. I got quite restless thinking of the cold ride home. But to my surprise, the return ride was warmer than I was scared of. It was a pleasant night ride home, non stop 50 miles at 55mph. A good ride with one big headache gone forever.
The satisfaction of good work throughout night, in a well configured linux laptop, followed by a 100 mile ride as one more step towards a full motorcycle license, is something to cherish for a long time to come... | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Another frustrating, hopeless Saturday. Second attempt to find the auto school to attend the 5-hour pre-licensing course for motorcycles. Arrived at the spot shown in mapquest one hour in advance. No sign of the office. Locals were also clueless. Some pointed to north, some to south.
A little drama unfolded here. While checking my map at a gas station I noticed an old woman weeping nervously and looking lost. After an eye contact or two she came to me and told that the guy she came with left her alone. She was from New Jersey and had no money to go back home. It was a shivering, windy day and I felt very sorry for her situation. Her home would not have been very far, but I didnt have the extra helmet, so dropping her home was out of question. I gave her two dollar bills for calling friends and suggested to call 911 and seek help of the police. She was doubtful of what the police would do. I stood by her for a while and talked to calm her down. After a while she went to call. I had to leave.
With 30 minutes left for the pre-licensing class to start and still clueless about the location of the office, I combed all the streets around that spot for one more hour and then gave up the search. To hell with pre-licensing and to hell with this state's insane license rules. In the numbing cold, hunger and thirst pinned me down at the nearby taco bell.
Two chicken soft taco and a glass of lemonade was like a 15-minute full charge for me. Back on the interstate, the return ride seemed much shorter. before long I was on my neighborhood highway 347, and a rider on a Yamaha Royal Star Venture passed me, waving. I accelerated to join him at the next light and requested him to stop at walmart to talk a while.
It turned out he was a fire department guy, an old man in his fifties and from the same place I had been a while back. He gave precise directions how to reach that school next time. We exchanged addresses. I sat on his 1300cc massive, monstrous machine. We chatted like we knew each other for many years. He said I was welcome to knock his door any time I wanted. I told him about my plans to ride long distances, about my summer plan of the Kansas ride. He encouraged me like "Kansas is a good ride, you should do it in 2-3 days" ! wow. I gotta bother him a lot in the coming weekends !
All in all, missing that course today was not that bad. I had a little ride after a long time and had its share of events. Most importantly, I got to know an old, wise biker. | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
| I remember the days of playing with my mechano kit my father brought me from America when I was 8. It was a toy kit of metal pieces with nuts and bolts to make a wide array of constructions. Those days of infantile pleasures came repeating back when last night I assembled the backrest of my bike. I assumed I needed to drill holes on metal on the bike and was disappointed till yesterday night when I took a casual look at the instruction sheet. Found out that it was going to be much easier.
Today morning a few hours of labor finally rewarded me with the backrest in place. Only one problem now is that I cant access the bolt which fastens the seat to the frame. Not a big deal, as the seat attaches through a hook and is pretty stable without bolts. Have to find a way to solve this, though.
Oh yeah, not to mention that I came out of the apt in the morning wearing night pajamas and just a winter jacket, and locked myself out with keys inside. Luckily the weather was warm with 2 deg C and sun. Had to run (it was good anyway, I jogged after a long time) to apt office for the emergency key, leaving all the tools out in the open.
The bike is more or less ready for the long, open road. A set of new tyres, and a routine checkup for the season, and I will be all set. | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
| Needed some essential tools for regular maintenance of my bike, including a 24mm C-spanner for the rear axle nut and ratcheted nut driver.
I tried walmart with not much luck. One biker friend told me to go only to Sears for tools.
I went Sears this morning. the tools sections just made me dumbstruck, and I felt like a village boy in an science fiction toy store. Tools, tools and tools. Every possible instrument was there, with all kinds of specifications and combination packages. It was a mad, mad place for me. For a while I completely forgot what I came for, and devoured the specs of completely unnecessary tools - especially the power hammers which use miniature bullets to drive nails. They are real bullets and I have seen empty shells of them outside my apt few days back. There are all sorts of power tools - the drills, the stapler/nail guns, the glue guns... I could not just imagine how dearly I needed those tools so many times before even I came to USA. So many household jobs could be tremendously easier if I had them...
Back to the mechanic's tools aisle, it was even crazier for me. One aisle of only spanners. I picked up mine, of the famous American brand "craftsman", which set me back by $17. That was the most important tool to have, so the price was fine. Having some mechanic's knowledge was of tremendous help to me, as in this country everything is mostly do-it-yourself. I picked up the exact tools I need a not much inexpensive. My bike being a honda uses all metric (mm) sized nuts. American autos use mostly SAE (inches). I took a cheap ratchet set with a mix of metric and SAE drivers, for "just in case". Other than that, a hammer and a chisel, very important for miscellaneous drill jobs.
It is some tooling time now. Gotta fit the backrest on the bike. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| I still cant believe I used the top of the line professional Nikon D2H Digital SLR today !!!
It is just another dream-come-true for me, even though I still dont own one.
Had my first assignment from statesman of this semester today. Women's basketball, Seawolves (Stony Brook Univ) vs Huskies (Northeastern Univ).
My friend and statesman photo editor recently traded his whole Canon DSLR setup (EOS 1D and L-series lenses) to get the D2H, a Nikkor 70-200/2.8 AFS VR, Sigma 28-70/2.8 EX HSM, Sigma 15-30 and Nikon SB600 flash on ebay. It is an amazing setup and I simply loved the D2H for its handling and interface alone. The out-of-camera images are far superior than the Canon, and the nikon flash is simply the best. The flash exposures were accurate and always consistent.
I am very tempted for a D70, as I just cant afford a D2H. My friend got the D2H (body only, used) for $1500. A new D70 body can be got for around $700. Still justifying trading my beloved F80 towards funding the digital. In this age, I still wonder how long I would be using film. Cost is not much issue, because film gives no headache about archivability, and I just love projecting slides on the wall. And also, those color slides will still be viewable and scannable after 40-50 years without an issue, if stored properly.
So much for film and digital. Each has got its distinct domain of use, and I am slowly understanding the barrier. Might be shooting both digital and film in near future. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Applied for membership of AMA (American Motorcylist Association, www.ama-cycle.org) and today I got the card. A neat motorcylist identity card to have, and I wanted to have a similar one in our bangalore bullet club, but somehow it was not implemented back then.
It gives me benefits regarding help on legal rights on various motorcyle matters, including insurance and accident policies. I can participate AMA sponsored rides and rallies and get discounts in various events, even for renting some of the big harleys. Will receive the American Motorcyclist magazine thoughout the one year long subcription.
Most importantly AMA has this roadside assistance program called MOTOW that might help some day on the road.
Looking forward to the rides ahead... | | comments: Leave a comment |
| I had my head banging for the last couple of days as my ymessenger in yahoo wont show any online buddies. Someone at IRC told me to get the latest version of gaim - the 1.1.2. I did and it was much better than the version I had seen long back. I particularly liked the following features of gaim:
-can add id like abc@xyz.net
-can chat with someone who is offline/invisible or can chat without adding the id
-doesnt quit when closed - like windows ym, stays in the system tray
-automatically shows few lines from last conversation
And then, one guy caught me and suggested there is an even better IM client - the AYTTM. The best feature of that is fallback messaging, for example one guy has both msn and yahoo id and both his id's are on my list under his contact-name. If we are chatting through msn, and he logs off msn, he will get the messages automatically on his yahoo id, given he is online there. Pretty neat feature, but not too much use for me.
Another neat thing is ability to use webcams. Havent tried though.
But, as of now, gaim still wins, because of the features I listed, some of which AYTTM seems to lack.
But I will be using both for some time alternately to choose one to stick to.
Today we got ethernet in out apt. Time for some serious fun... | | comments: Leave a comment |
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pissed off