New Google Toolbar

New version of Google Toolbar is released and it's even more cooler. It now has Popup blocker plus blogging support. I just blogged this straight from the toolbar!

Yahoo! Launch Getting Better

My favorite online music service Rhapsody is not working for me these days. They removed entire Linkin Park collection, few albums from Kid Rock and God knows what more. So I'm back to my old favorite Yahoo! Launch. They have gotten better with more selection, many more videos and more features. The best thing is, ofcourse, you can tell it what you liked and it will select more your kinda music rather then purely random songs. And it's totally free! You can listen to my own customized radio station which I'm listening to right now.

Jersey Starquest and other star parties

Star parties are event with all night deep sky observations and chance to meet other fellow amateur astronomers. The first one of the year at East Coast is happening this weekend at Hope, NJ. There's usually crowd of 20-30 people with all level of skills. You can try all sorts of telescopes (some as large as 17") and instruments for deep sky CCD observations and so on. There are going to be day time events, talks and presentations and sun spot watching! If you missed this, there is 3 more popular star parties coming up this year. Check the event calander at S&T site. You can see some photographs I took of last year's star parties.

To empty people, brighter nights and shorter days

[Now Listening: Tom Petty - You don't know how it feels]

Can't beat this clock... can't stop staring this screen... can't sleep these nights... can't leave this place... can't think... can't do better things... can't stop thinking... can't stop blood in these veins... can't see world less beautiful... can't find that piece of heart... can't contain in to self... can't hold her hand... can't breath out... can't fall in to comma... can't get closer to my sky... can't steal colors... can't get bigger space... can't stop meaningless talk... can't get bored with blahs... can't keep aweful silense... can't stop reaching out... can't stay alone... can't stop cursing... can't survive people... can't be bad... can't become one...

Bolly Flicks On TCM

Turner's classic movie channel will be showing three Bollywood movies in a row on every Thursday starting 8 PM. This is on experimental bases for the month of June. The bollywood movies have an average opinion of being stupid, mostly same, colorful, frequent with dance sequences with no reason and something that makes most females burst out of tears all the time. But the movies that TCM was showing since past few weeks were some of the very best, including my rare personal favorites, that's far away from this average opinion. So I guess it would be worth to check out their schedule.

Virtual Worlds With POV-Ray

POV-Ray is the 3D graphic software which allows you to create 3D world with lightings, reflections, shadows, color gradients, materials, textures and so on. I'd read about it about 5 years ago and almost ignored it - until just few days back I decided to gave it a whirl one more time (I think it was a sudden urge to create some 3D graphics). Just after a quick simple installation and spending 15 minutes on beginner's tutorial, I was totally in to it. Just a couple of hours more and I'd my very first 3D image which is cool enough to show off. By the time night fall, I already had an AVI movie with a virtual walkthrough in my 3D world (by making camera move along a specified trajectory). This thing is addictive and it rocks. I can now calculate 3D coordinates and linear transformations in my head! The scripting language it uses is C like and very intuitive. Sure there were many other ray tracing programs including 3D Studio but this open source free program is much more "programmer oriented" rather then "artist oriented". Don't forget to check out Internet Ray Tracing Competition for some truly mind blowing virtual images.

PhysLink store

It's nice store. Here are the things I just bought...

 
• Thermodynamic Drinking Bird


• Hyperactive Yoyo


• 75W Black Colored Light Bulb


• Mini Compass


• Whistling Saucer


• Boomerang


• Ceramic Horseshoe Magnet

New Version Of This Site Comming Soon

The new look[s] and content is soon comming to replace my current web site. This new version will feature something called themed site - i.e. I can make my site look like anything I want in minutes! This concept is not new but as I wanted to take care of all small details, it took me 30 hours of heavy duty ASP.Net programming and couple of missed meals last weekend to accomplish this - in most ideal way I could think of. Thanks to all rain and cool air coming from my window - which kept me working long long hours. There will be change in content too. I'm planning to delete some of them. So just in case, you'd liked it, save it in your own machine before it dissapears! Apart from that, I'll be moving my blogs to my own blogging tool. These blogs are currently hosted on blogger.com and that thing SUCKS! They charge for their crappy blogging software and still 50% of the features I want are missing. I'm just tired of looking around for another blogging service and so I got to write my own - my next mission.

High Point State Park

This place is becoming my luxury hike place on lazy drizzly spring days. It's the highest point in state of New Jersey. You can see all neighboring states Pennsylvania, Connecticut and New York on clear day and you don't even have to hike to get on the top - just take 5 min easy drive and you are there! It has even little beach on the lake. You can view Mohonk, Catskills, Camelback, Pocono's, Bear mountains - all from same place! It's even better on drizzly days because there's no one there and clouds are kissing the land :). Also, by far it's the only perfect sunset view spot I've found in NJ. To get there, all you have to do is to be on Rt 23N. Just after few miles Rt 23 suddenly becomes all green and gorgeous. The country roads after the town of Franklin are cool enough to get lost for a while. I have a took some pics - check it out! I'll be adding few more soon.

Central Park Summerstage and 311

Central Park summer stage schedule is out. Mark your dates from their official home page.

On 311, this is a new number you can dial in New York and ask any question or make any complaints - literally! This is due to effort of new mayor Bloomberg to combine several agency to one spot through one number! Want to know how to dispose refrigerator? or complain about that loud car alarm? Dial 311.

Jewel Moments

On one fine spring morning, a beautiful lady with the sweetest voice decided to walk in a gorgeous park and sing for whoever cared. It was Saturday morning, one of the least busy time of the week when rest of the world prefers to sleep after long Friday night. It was one of the most invisibly promoted concert - even a professional certified guide at Central Park just 200 feet away from the stage didn't knew about it! But still many of us did knew and hassled through early Saturday morning to be there. There were even fans who literally set up their front line spaces before sun came up. Then there was a "Jewel stalker" who tried a stunt to reach her with roses. Jewel being inherently very shy and sensitive, you don't expect lots of fun fair on the stage. It goes smoothly with occasional emotional bursts until she feels comfortable with the whole thing. And then she can tell jokes and attempt to be funny. She doesn't try to create exact replica of her album versions, instead almost always she would change tempo, tones and add twists. One often discussed disappointment was new hair style (change from the one with long beautiful hair). She is sure my #1 favorite female artists and I been envy of people who heard her live when she still a coffee house singer. Her open air concert in the world's greatest city and gorgeous park on that fine spring morning just looked like falling from the heaven. Catch her few glimpse in my photo albums section. Her new album 0304 is already in the stores and I guess she might have more upcoming events in case you are interested.