Ganesh and Ganesh

Sunday early morning: Saurav arrived here from Carbondale with couple of his friends. Saurav and Akhilesh spent the night at my place. Two of his other friends stayed at Sahu’s place. We were having a weekend party at that time. Damu, Nikhil, Manish, Kabra and Mama were here. Three 12-packs, all different brands and all lite :). Seems everybody is becoming health conscious these days. Saurav and I talked about old times. It was nostalgic. But he had to leave pretty soon as one of his friends had a meeting the same day (Sunday) at 1 PM. I also checked out his new Canon camcorder. Party ended and it was followed by heavy discussions. I could hear Nikhil’s voice a lot – maybe because of his high voice, maybe because of the “words” he was using 😉 !
Sunday was Ganesh Chaturthi. I woke up very late. Manish, Nikhil, Kabra and Damu went to Sitar and I was really sleepy at that time. So, I told them I would not come. Later I regretted it. I was feeling pretty bored at home. DSL was down from 4 AM in the morning and the GR internet lab was also not working. Had chips and pepsi for lunch because I am too lazy to cook!
Called up home, Cheche Naobi and Cheche Bheman. Today, I called up a bit earlier and so I was able to talk with Dada. DSL finally came up at around 4:30 PM. I know the approx time because I was checking the browser every 20 minutes! Downloaded some music videos and sorted them out.
Studied 580 a bit. Manish went to gym today and he came back pretty late. Completed last 2 months accounts with Manish. This time, KUB bill was higher and my personal phone bill too. I had made a lot of India calls from the landline in the last two months. Manish bought some parathas from Apna Bazaar. He also brought a DVD and I heard Damu brought some videos.
At night, we watched 3 Deewarein on DVD. I don’t know how popular it will be in India (btw, it’s rank 9 in this week’s top 10 on Rediff) but personally I liked the movie. It is nicely scripted and the actors have performed well. I won’t spoil the fun but the ending is really interesting and not the ending that you would have expected 10 minutes before the end of the movie! Nagesh Kukunoor has done a good job in this. Jackie Shroff and Naseeruddin Shah have always been great actors. And Juhi Chawla looked simple and beautiful and acted just great. There is another review from IndiaFM here.
This blog entry is named “Ganesh and Ganesh”. Wondered why? The first ‘Ganesh’ is Saurav Biswas. We used to call him Ganesh in school because of his tummy! And the second ‘Ganesh’ is for Ganesh Chaturthi. This entry was previously called “Saurav Biswas, Ganesh Chaturthi, 3 Deewarein”. But I thought, the current title sounded much better and shorter! 😉

Game Day, S.W.A.T.

Coming back to the blog after a long time. I am writing this blog Monday morning and so I don’t really remember (not right now), what happened on Saturday morning. Anyway, I will touch the main points.
Saturday was Game Day. Today was the first football game of the season. UT vs. Fresno State. I did not get the tickets 🙁 because I came to know of it late. Next time I should go early and get my tickets. Manish, Pady and many other guys went to the game. This was Manish’s first game that he actually watched after coming to US. Last time, I had watched around 3 to 4 games. This time, the excitement is a bit less for me. Needless to say, UT won! – 24-6 (Of course!!!). Here is a news item from KnoxNews.
Watched S.W.A.T. today at 4:10 PM at West Town Mall, Theatre 1. I am watching a movie in a theatre after a pretty long time. I know reviews of the film have not been that great (C on Yahoo movies and 2.67/5 on Movies.com). This week it was 2 in US top 10. This movie is definitely not for non-action-movie viewers and they may feel that the action is too much. Personally, I liked the movie a lot – all the high-tech action was just great!. Definitely MY type of movie. It did become a bit slow in the middle but picked up really well at the end. You can read the movies.com review and the yahoo movies review.
Kabra came over in the evening and Saurav called me and told me that are in Nashville and would be reaching Knoxville towards midnight.

Sunday early morning

Coming back to my blog after a long time. The last week has been sort of hectic. Classes started on Wednesday (08/20). Have not decided on the final list of subjects. Have to decide by next week. Database class on Thursday was sort of a new experience because it was a class using video-conferencing. It was sort of funny talking to a screen and I guess it will take a little time getting used to.
Uploaded independence day and potluck photos on Manthan website. Also put up some new annoucements on cs website and pulled down the old stuff from the cs100 website.
I also fixed the computers in Pady’s office and set up the D-Link 704P router with print server. Everything seems to be working fine now. Did not attend the 580 review session on Friday. I was sleeping at that time.
Saturday (08/23), had Maggi for lunch. For dinner, had chicken at Sampy’s place. Pai had made the chicken and it was really hot (spicy). Had some ice-cream after that and so it is fine now. Manish and Nikhil went out to see K-town nightlife. Nikhil drove down to Nashville today morning. Pady also came in the afternoon. Resized some photos for bS. Have not called home yet.

maisnam.com

Registered maisnam.com on Monday (08/18) with GoDaddy.com. The domain got activated in 24 hours. Then shifted the nameservers to zoneedit.com. Pointed the A-records to my existing maisnam.net webspace for the time being. maisnam.com had been registered previously but recently (June 2003), it expired and the previous owner did not renew it. I had been waiting for a long time for the domain to become available for re-registration.
Monday, I also got my TA assignment. I am still 10 hours webmaster and 10 hours TA for CS100.
Transferred 1 computer from SERF to Pady’s office on Monday and another 2 yesterday (08/19). Pady bought a ‘D-Link 704P Broadband router with print server’ from BestBuy. Installed the network in Pady’s office. It’s working fine now.
Met Dr. Berry Tuesday morning. Also met Mahesh Doraiswamy in the afternoon and again later in the evening. Made some updates to jntucekcs.org in a somewhat round-about way. Today morning it was working again even though yesterday night I had to access it remotely through Netscape on cetus@cs.
I LOST MY KEYS YESTERDAY!!! :(. I am still searching for them.
There were lots of virus attacks today. I got more than 200 virus emails today!
There was a dance party at I-House yesterday evening. It was ok, not so much fun.
CLASSES STARTED TODAY. Have 580 in the evening.

Login required in GR internet lab.

The Golf Range computers now need a Net ID and password to login. I had come earlier yesterday evening but at that time they were still upgrading the computers. The software also seems to be upto-date. The entire office suite, photoshop, ssh, exceed etc are neatly arranged in categories. The speed also seems to be faster. The machine names have also changed. The one that I am using right now is – gaz10.labs.utk.edu [160.36.79.110], Machine number 1533. Before, the names used to be of the format vikingxx.utk.edu
Played carrom at Anuj’s place. Me and Pai vs. Nick and Manish. We won 31-23 :). Me, Nick and Manish are planning to go to Cincinnati tomorrow.

Denver Airport

Am at Denver airport now, near Gate A34. My next flight is at 11:45 AM local time. There was wi-fi access at Atlanta airport but I could not log on. The one at Denver airport cost me $9.99 for 24 hours – Wi-Fi access by AT&T. But well, I really needed it. It’s 8:48 AM local time now. Have some more time to play around with the internet here. Am currently transferring a couple of files from Manish’s computer. The transfer is a bit slow but at least it works.