Wednesday, July 28, 2004

Twisted

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Currently reading a book of short stories, twisted by Jeffrey Deaver. It contains quite a few stories, all with an eponymous ending. Most of them have to do with crimes related to extra marital affairs - which makes one wonder how much energy people spend in cheating, getting cheated upon in turn, and then getting caught avenging themselves! Like one of my friends was mentioning today, Shaadi ka laddoo - Khayee to pachhtaye, Na khaaye to bhi pacchtaye (Mail me if you want a translation into English).

During the weekend, completed The Last Juror by John Grisham. This is, by far the most mediocre of his books whch have read, one which just kept rambling like an overused chewing gum, devoid of any action. In fact, it would not be wrong to say that the book was boring,e specially from an author who has penned classics like Partner, The Runaway Jury, Rainmaker, The Firm..to name a few.

~-^-_-^-~

Abhinav |

Saturday, July 24, 2004

Weekend movies

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On a nice Friday evening (or, to be more precise, Saturday Morning), I utilized my time in watching two great movies.

The first one, titled The Usual Suspects is about a bunch of gangsters who are forced together in a police lineup, and go on from there. The movie, which started out with sequences that left not an iota of doubt as to where the bollywood flick kaante was inspired from, made me shed all my hypnagogic tendencies and delve deep into the gripping drama. With spectacular performances by Kevin Spacy et. al., teamed with excellent screenplay and a gripping storyline, this is undoubtedly a must watch movie. In fact, the plot is such that it will need more than a single time to realize what actually happens.

The second movie for the night turned out to be another gem. The Shawshank Redemption written by the legendary Stephen King (of the x-files fame). This is a story about a guy who is charged with the murder of his wife and her lover, and his life in prison, where his unconventional attitude in the stark face of atrocities enable him to achieve his desires. This film takes one through a range of emotions from hope to despair, and the suspense is broken only in the fag end of the movie.

All in all, two great movies which should be on the must-watch list of everyone.

Btw, yes, the time for this post is in IST ;)

~-^-_-^-~

Abhinav |

Tuesday, July 20, 2004

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Visit this site for a heart-rending story.

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Abhinav |

Saturday, July 17, 2004

Pulp Fiction

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Watched the Quentin Tarantino Classic Pulp Fiction.

Having seen Kill Bill earlier, there was a strong sense of deja-vu as far as the screenplay was concerned. Feelings of action and suspense were omnipotenet, right till the last scene. Bruce Willis, Uma Thurman, John Travolta, Samuel Jackson - all veterans of hollywood, packed quite a punch.

All in all, a good entertainer. Wonder where I could get the soundtrack from?

~-^-_-^-~

Abhinav |

Friday, July 16, 2004

Perl Tip: Replace across multiple files

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Say you want to replace xxx with yyy across multiple files

perl -pi -e 's/xxx/yyy/g' files

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Abhinav |

Tuesday, July 13, 2004

Great work from MS guys ;)

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Listen to this spoof of American Pie.

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Abhinav |

Wednesday, July 07, 2004

Did you know?

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If you have more than one tab open in mozilla firefox 0.9, you can open more by double-clicking on some free space in the tabs area.

Better than using ctrl-t in some cases :)

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Abhinav |

Friday, July 02, 2004

Are you a geek?

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Take the Geek Test to find out if you are one !

Be forewarned .. it is a bit long.

My score was just enough to certify me as a geek..which is not much, just 1 step above the lowest :(

Like they say, there's miles to go before I sleep .. problem is, the time to sleep come closer day by day ;)

~-^-_-^-~

Abhinav |

How Tax Cuts Work

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You've heard the cry in the past "It's just a tax cut for the rich!",
and it is accepted as fact. But what does that really mean?

The following explanation may help.

Suppose that every day, 10 men go out for dinner. The bill for all 10
comes to $100. They decided to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes,
and it went like this:

* The first four men (the poorest) paid nothing.
* The fifth paid $1.
* The sixth $3.
* The seventh $7.
* The eighth $12.
* The ninth $18.
* The tenth man (the richest) paid $59.

All 10 were quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner
said: "Since you are all such good customers, I'm going to reduce the
cost of your daily meal by $20." So now dinner for the 10 only cost $80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes.

The first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But
how should the other six, the paying customers, divvy up the $20
windfall so that everyone would get his "fair share"?

They realised that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted
that from everybody's share, then the fifth and sixth men would each end
up being paid to eat. The restaurateur suggested reducing each man's
bill by roughly the same percentage, thus:

* The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% saving).
* The sixth paid $2 instead of $3 (33% saving).
* The seventh paid $5 instead of $7 (28% saving).
* The eighth paid $9 instead of $12 (25% saving).
* The ninth paid $14 instead of £18 (22% saving).
* The tenth paid $49 instead of $59 (16% saving).

Each of the six was better off, and the first four continued to eat for
free, but outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their
savings.

"I only got a dollar out of the $20," declared the sixth man. He pointed
to the tenth man "but he got $10!" "That's right," exclaimed the fifth
man. "I only saved a dollar too. It's unfair that he got ten times more
than me!"

"That's true!" shouted the seventh man. "Why should he get $10 back when
I got only $2? The wealthy get all the breaks!

"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison. "We didn't get
anything at all. The system exploits the poor!" The nine men surrounded
the tenth and beat him up.

The next night the tenth man didn't show up for dinner. The nine sat
down and ate without him, but when they came to pay the bill, they
discovered that they didn't have enough money between all of them for
even half of it.

That, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our
tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most
benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being
wealthy, and they just may not show up at the table anymore. There are
lots of good restaurants in Monaco and the Caribbean(tax saving havens)

With thanks to David R. Kamerschen, Professor of Economics, University
of Georgia.

~-^-_-^-~

Abhinav |