Hindi Movie: Sikander

My brother called me last week and told me particularily to watch this movie. He called me right after watching the movie and said he was moved watching it. He gave no further info, so I was very curious to watch the film. I finally saw it today - a powerful movie, though not impressively taken. It revolves around the life of kids in Kashmir, how they are effected by the terror that is going on during the fights in Kashmir. As soon as I realized the movie is around this theme, I was very tensed, because I was not prepared to see the children suffer or to see any kind of atrocities happen to the kids. I was tensed through out and had a terrible headache because of that. It was emotionally draining tho the movie did not involve any violent or abusive scenes. Overall, it is a good movie..should not be watched for purely entertainment for sure...thought provoking and brings realities to vision.

Hindi Movie: New York

I watched New York last night and was very impressed. I did not hear about the movie until last month. And once I heard that it was a Yash's movie, I postponed watching it thinking it is another comedy or musical. I was thoroughly amazed to see that the movie content it revolved around post-9/11 dealings with the suspects of the attack. Even though it is a very sensitive subject, that too for a foreigner(non-US) to handle it, the story, screenplay, direction were all meticulously crafted and very well handled. Also to my surprise, Katrina is not just another 'model' in the movie...she actually acted well and carried her character efficiently. Thanks to Kabir Khan, Sandeep Srivatsava and the Yash's..we do have a good movie to watch after a long time. Whats interesting is (to the best I know) there have been no other movies on post-9/11 related to Gitmo detention center made so far and I am glad the first one is indeed good, non-controversial and perfectly presented.

Learning words

I was playing Text Twist on Yahoo games..and...learned couple of words interesting new words...
Ell: old European term for of cubits- arms length

Burr : Has may references..fruit/seed, deformed wood growth on a tree, scrientific theory and many more. I never knew it was a word and it had a meaning, I was surprised to see so many meanings of the word in different contexts. Whats most interesting on these is that the burr seed: it was inspiration for Velcro!

Ebb:
1 : the reflux of the tide toward the sea
2 : a point or condition of decline

Ode: Greek Lyrical verse

No perseids

A whole night without sleep, still no perseids :(
I read that even the night of 12th is good to watch the meteors this year. I went to bed by 10, but couldnt sleep well anyway...woke up at 1.30 in the night and spent 2 hours looking at the sky.....no luck! I was quite disappointed..
watching the dark blue blanket of sky and gazing at the sparkling stars, after long, was a very good experience though!!

After I woke up the next day and searched online again. I read that the night of August 11th and early morning of 12th, before 3pm...that was guaranteed to see some showers in almost all places in US, North America actually. The night of 12th had a chance, not a strong one may be. There will be a chance again sometime in December..there will be Geminids. Can try to watch then, provided we can dare to stand the cold!

Perseids

Last chance to watch the meteor shower today! We wanted to watch it yesterday, but couldnt. I hope I can wake up before 5am tomorrow or stay awake until after midnight today and see the shower. It is suppose to be a very good view this year somehow..with an abundant chance.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090812-perseids-perseid-meteor-shower.html

Some enjoyed the show yesterday already and I saw some videos online today..looks like they had good fun!
A good guide to get more general insight:
http://www.earthsky.org/article/earthskys-meteor-shower-guide

Cash For Clunkers

Commonly seen as "$ for clunkers' on TV or online it is essentially the Govt CARS program - Car Allowance Rebate System.
Working in the Automotive industry I should have caught up with the news and 'terms' well in advance I guess, but did not hear about the CARS until yesterday. In our regular weekly meeting in the office, one of my team members was sad that he missed the eligibility by few points or something and that he cannot take advantage of the program. Intrigued, I looked up the subject online.

There is tons of info already available online and the official website is http://www.cars.gov/
Few of the things the program says:
- Your vehicle must be less than 25 years old on the trade-in date
- Only purchase or lease of new vehicles qualify
- Generally, trade-in vehicles must get 18 or less MPG (some very large pick-up trucks and cargo vans have different requirements)

I thought it was a pretty neat idea of the Govt to get rid of old cars and encourage purchase of new ones. This:
- improves new car sales
- initiates flow of money
- one way forces fuel economy
- helps making the Earth green.

These were the immediate positive effects that I could think of, which are all really healthy both to economy and environment . I heard our Director comment that he had a friend who owns a dealership, who actually said that he ran out of new cars last weekend because he had a lot of customers come for the trader-in. Surely 3,500 or 4,500 dollars in not a small amount!