God brain-washes devotees in to death

Fatalities in India temple crush http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7643373.stm

Well, we have another story from Northern India that shows how idiotic these f***ing god-washed devotees are. Personally, I do n't have any sympathy for these god-nuts but would have felt sad if they had died due to stampede inside a Cricket stadium instead of damn Temple. Going to temple is a sign of decayed mind and dying in a stampede inside a temple... omg...is being brain-dead :-)

Well, I certainly blame God for brain-washing these idiots in to grave

Corrupt curiosity Citi, Wells Fargo and Wachovia

Point 1)
Citigroup and Wells Fargo were locked in a bidding war on Sunday over a possible emergency takeover of the Wachovia Corporation, people involved in the talks said.

Point 2)
The government, led by the Federal Reserve and Treasury Department, has been involved in the talks as well, these people said. But so far, the government is resisting pressure to help bidders by guaranteeing a part of Wachovia’s assets the way it did for Bear Stearns when it was sold to JPMorgan Chase in March.

Point 3)
Either way, Citigroup and Wells Fargo are unlikely to bid more than a few dollars a share for Wachovia, substantially less than the $10 at which its shares were trading Friday.
Source:-http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/29/business/29bank.html?ref=business

Question:- Both Citibank and Wells Fargo must have connections to trigger a panic regarding Wachovia prospects; they may even have access to Credit rating agencies, and will Citi&Fargo, use these to drive down Wachovia shares? And we also know that FBI is investigating the banks http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7632790.stm , and by now we are well aware of wall-street's credibility :-)

Just a corrupt curiosity....

Using AGL

Fluid Acrylic + AGL+++ stays wet for longer than Heavybody Acrylic + AGL

Praportions

1) AGL + Napthol Red Medium (Fluid Acrylic)

2) AGL + Burnt Sienna (Heavybody Acrylic)

Transperancy

1) AGL + Napthol Red Medium (Fluid Acrylic)
2) AGL + Burnt Sienna(Heavybody Acrylic)

Seems AGL affects transparency least

Blending AGL mix

1) AGL + Napthol Red Medium (Fluid Acrylic)

2) AGL + Burnt Sienna (Heavybody Acrylic)

Drying of AGL mix after 30minutes

1) AGL + Burnt Sienna (Heavybody Acrylic)

Pre-election wedding?

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article4837644.ece

McCain camp prays for Palin wedding
In an election campaign notable for its surprises, Sarah Palin, the Republican vice- presidential candidate, may be about to spring a new one — the wedding of her pregnant teenage daughter to her ice-hockey-playing fiancé before the November 4 election.

Is this an election? I am confused

Golden AGL as Retarder?

It seems Golden Acrylic Glazin Liquid (AGL) can be used as Retarder without the fear of losing binding because AGL is contains Binder. This is what Golden says "Don't be fooled by the "glaze" part of the name, blends of 1:1 with most colors can still be very opaque. Adding AGL will increase working time proportionately. Don't worry about adding too much or sticking to an exact ratio, blend as needed."

Paraphrased from http://www.goldenpaints.com/justpaint/jp8article2.php

Golden Pastes

-Hard Molding Paste has self-leveling qualities not found in other Molding Pastes. High peaks formed in application will settle out before it is completely dry.

Paraphrased from http://www.goldenpaints.com/justpaint/jp6article2.php

Acrylic Glazing

GLAZE and Refractive index
Acrylic Color = Pigment + Binder
Refractive index of the Binder is 1.4 for every Acrylic color but that of Pigment varies from pigment to pigment, and closer the Refractive Index of Pigment to that of Binder(i,e. 1.7) , more is the transparency/transculency. Example: Refractive Index of TW is 2.7 so it is opaque and that of Utramarine blue is 1.7.
What light manages to pass through or between the particles is ultimately absorbed or reflected by the lighter, underlying ground, gaining a second opportunity to interact with the pigment particles before making its way towards the viewer. This complex interplay of light within the paint film creates the particular sense of glow and luminosity that is one of the prized attributes of glazes.

Why use GEL instead of WATER?
Binder 's refractive index plays a critical role in limiting the scattering of light, and having the particles well bound in a paint film becomes crucial for creating a luminous translucent glaze. For this reason a glaze needs to be made with plenty of medium to insure the pigment is fully suspended. A 10:1 ratio of binder to color is a good place to start your mixtures. A very common mistake is to simply thin the paint with water, which only leaves the pigments more exposed to the air, where the scattering of light is greatest. Rather than a smooth translucent film, the paint will also tend to create a rougher, matte surface that further dissipates the light and leaves the color feeling washed out.

Loss of Light
Lastly, it is important to remember that glazes will always lower the value of the underlying color. Less light, not more, is ultimately reflected back from a glazed surface, so it is important to keep the underpainting or ground at a higher value then you anticipate for the final result.

Mix or GLAZE?
Glazes allow for a unique development of color that cannot be achieved by any other means. A bright yellow, glazed with a transparent red, will result in an orange completely different than if they were mixed together on the palette. There is a sense of luminosity and greater saturation of color caused by the light traveling through one or more translucent films before reaching the viewer.

Paraphrased from http://www.goldenpaints.com/justpaint/jp12article2.php

Golden Fluid Acrylics

-Fuild Acrylics are produced with the same pigments at the same load as the Heavy Body paints, yielding similar tinting strength. However, many artists believe they are actually stronger than the Heavy Body colors due to their greater leveling. Formulating the Fluid Acrylics is a more difficult process, as there is a tendency for highly loaded paints at a low viscosity to thicken over time.

-Different colors can have different Gloss; one way to tackle this is to mix with appropriate Gel which would reduce the color load and other way is to apply varnish.

-Max Water to Paint ration is 1:1

-Brush strokes get evened out. Fluid colors fills the brush in an uniform way.

-Fluid colors are good for making Gel based Glaze mixtures because foaming can be avoided.
Fluid colors are strong so 2% may be enough for Glaze mixture.

Full article
http://www.goldenpaints.com/justpaint/jp4article3.php

McCain's random antics

This is an interesting observation on random punchs thrown by John McCain

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/09/tactics-v-strat.html
...that the McCain campaign is obsessed with tactics -- not strategy. The campaign is focused on winning the news cycle -- not having a larger consistent message....

Drying of Acrylic paints

About drying of Acrylic Colors.

Types of Drying
1) Surface drying: This is the first stage of drying, where a skin gets formed over the surface because the moisture, stored in underlying layer, are no longer able to keep the film/surface wet. This is also called as "dry-to-touch". Thin layers attain this stage in seconds while think layers would have to wait little longer.

2) Internal drying: This is the time required for every layer to dry and is more important than Surface drying. Time for this varies and could take hours. I have observed that color mixed with Gels or Pastes takes lot longer to dry, and show different color when dry.

Temperature:-
-Does not dry well at temperatures below 48F
-While using Hair-dryer, keep the heat low.

Substrate and drying:-
Substrate is the painting surface and its nature affects the time taken by paint to dry. An unsealed the surface/substrate like paper or canvas could accelarate drying of Acrylic color. By sealing the substrate -with Golden Soft Gel etc...- one can reduce the drying time.

Full article:
http://www.goldenpaints.com/justpaint/jp3article1.php

Why Palins did this to herself?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/26/us/politics/26watch.html?em
I saw Palin interview with Katie Koric, yes that Russian question?
Palin's asnwer was not polished; see I was not expecting a the truth but just a confident presentation. She stumbled, sorry I should not be that judgmental(being bad talker myself) , but a VP needs to be confident; does not matter whether the individual brain-dead(like Mr Bush :-)).

Sarah went speechless while describing how media made fun of her by saying 'Palin's foriegn policy experience comes from being next to Russia', and Palin could not get the word 'caricature' to describe the way media treated her, and then Katie helped her with word 'mock'. I do not understand why Palin is putting herself to this kind of humiliation, media is going to be beat it to death; and bloggers are slaughtering it already. Sorry Sarah even I mocked at you :-), try to listening to BBC World service, every day, for few years :-)

"Clear Tar Gel" by Golden

Golden has several kinds of Gels: Hard, Soft, Clear Tar. And out of all these Clear Tar Gel has unique characteristic of settling in a way so that the surface is flat. And in addition this Clear Tar Gel does not create could, instead it creates a transparent layer that looks like Glass.
Among all, Clear Tar Gel is my favorite and have used it create glassy layers. The method that used is to mix apply a layer a hard molding paste mixed with some color and then it is still somewhat wet, pour Clear Tar Gel.
'Rheology' is a new term that I recently came across, it is refers to ability of the viscous liquid to settledown in such a way that surface bceomes flat.

Here is link specifications http://www.goldenpaints.com/technicaldata/targel.php
And salient features are
0) When poured, drops along a line without breaking.
1) 100% acrylic polymer dispersion
2) Prestinely clear, not sign of fog.
3) Aware of bubbles.

Working with Clear Tar Gel http://www.goldenpaints.com/artist/cltargel.php

Country of 1/2 billion puppets

Some boy does not want to love Her because His mom & dad did not approve; and similarly Some girl did not want to love Him because Her mom & dad refused.

This is not at all news in the nation of India; assuming that 50% living there are parents, rest of the off springs are just puppets; my genuine sympathies to them. It is a society that does not encourage self-determination. It is place where we have to redefine the terms Adult.
Yes, Indira Gandhi, a lady, became prime minister in 60s, is that true example for womens' freedom?, no I do not think so. Being able to choose in personal life is more important than freedom to hold the hightest office of the land. It is a strange country/society, even a CEO, may need mom & dad consent whom to love.

I am writing this because few victims are my close friends, and I can't change status-quo because it is a systemic problem, and it is frustrating to me that I have my friends suffering there.

Cow-boy's economic solution

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2008/09/20080924-10.html

'..is an extraordinary period for America's economy....'
This is how politicians scare their citizens with all superlatives and sometime it works; there are dumb people who believe that ...yes I should agree otherwise, sky is going fall on my family, land is going break... Mr. Bush used similar words to convince dumb Americans about Iraq war too.

'...And it will help send a signal to markets around the world that America's financial system is back on track...'
Observe the words 'system is back on track', Is fixing a systematic crisis as easy as throwing 700bn at thirsty wall-street? I do not think so, Wall-street has wasted lot more money than this, giving them money is like giving drugs to an addict; first we should cure system of its addiction. This statement goes well with Bush's simplistic/shallow view of the World; Guy is not fit for position.

'....And together, we will show the world once again...'
Again, Mr. Bush talks like a Cowboy riding to his glory; everything is a week-end adventure for him. He used similar machostic words when stepped in to Iraq war. This statement also smells like cheap patriotism perfume that every politicains loves.

I would have said that Mr. Bush should get a better speech writer, but it is too late :-)

'Country first' trash

I believe 'patriotism' is one of the misleading and misused emotion. Misuser's of 'patriotism' get addicted to it, and as the time goes by they spew more of it on others, just like an over-dosing addict.

John McCain, is also suffering from that so are many politicians, epitomizes many politicians. John has overused his POW credentials to shield himself from even constructive criticism, postponed meeting(RNC convention) just because there was hurricane 1000 miles away venue, now he wants to postpone seize his campaign for Presidency because the Wall-street is facing time of crisis.

Why can't he behave normally? Like me :-) , as a regular guy?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7634455.stm

our emotional boundaries

Like us, Nature has not made any progress (in human terms), it has as not had any cosmetic surgery; and rock, mud and tree have stayed pretty much the same. We humans may have look at trees with sympathy, pitied their austere landscape for missing on fun and luxury of modern life.
Whenever it got chance, this enormous Nature defeats and humbles human mind. An easy example is Sea whose every aspect is beyond our grip. Also, remember the last time you looked through the window and got stuck by the soaked leaf caught in wind. This way Nature presents us these extreme version and both of these, for few moments, flushes our mind with humble emotion and also takes us to the edge of life, helps to transcend many our self created emotional limitation/boundaries like anger, jealousy etc.

Alternative Super-power?

US is the reigning super power and some are looking for an alternative. How good, sane are these potential candidates? Not that we need anything at all, but I have not yet seen the world without super-power, so I do not know.

In general, sovereign country’s policy could not be dictated by outsiders, this is very much true once the country rises to the throne of superpower because it becomes assertive, in worst case arrogant. So, only the Citizens that makeup the super-power can control the leader, and this makes Democracy a must-have attribute of super-power. And not just any kind of Democracy would do (a good example is Indian democracy), it should be a strong democracy with few of the following.
-A responsible and constructive opposition party that does not block everything blindly for plitical purpose. (India is a good example for not having one.)
-A constitution which is not just on paper but helps the Citizens. A strong judicial system must be present to apply the constitution. This is important because in Democracies like India, constitution is just a piece of paper, hardly rescues its citizens. Constitution should provide tools, by means of rights to dissect the internal and foreign policies of Govt. (Like, right to track Govt. records).

-A vocal but decent citizens who are not afraid to express their thoughts about Foreign policy, take part in debates and blogs. These citizens should be courageous enough to scrutinize Govt. to the hilt regarding Foreign affairs, and ask what it is doing to World.

I am not a Constitution professor, so whatever I wrote above is based on what I see around. As far as I know, none of the Asians countries have all of the above but there are few western countries that meet these requirements. Obviously US is a mature democracy with all these abilities. Here is an example, Govt wanted to prosecute the chauffer of Bin Laden and there were people in favor of severe sentence and people who advocated that chauffer is no Bin Laden. If the 9/11 had happened in India, it would have been hard to avoid physical threat if one were to advocate in favor of Bin Laden’s chauffer, but in US, citizens debated, blogged to acquit Bin Laden’s chauffer. And in the end, amidst the raging debate, US court awarded a minimum sentence to chauffer.

US off-stream media is full of foreign policy critics and conspiracy theorists; yes, those critics, bloggers may not bring policy change over night but important thing is that Govt. gave them the chance to express their voice; who knows their voice may make some one to really act. After listening to liberal media, I should say that worst critics of US are inside US.

US Govt. is arrogant but its citizens are mature enough to keep it on the leash, and citizens are Russia, China and India are not even anywhere close.

Democracy in Pakistan

I see Pakistan as a failed democracy and to some extent even India is not that far(based on where I stand).
When political system itself is corrupt, honest individuals will not be able to rise to the position of 'Leader' and 'voting' becomes thing like that obligation in a broken marriage, and a tool to legitimize corruption. If the system is so corrupt intellectual act hardly helps, example is the lawyers strike.
Ordinary people are not intellectuals, they just want to live, and it is sad that they are caught in the this, neither voting helps them nor they are Gandhi

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7600917.stm

Interview

These are the things that I have learnt, over the years, about technical interviews.

1) Tech industry has broad divisions like: server side, security, GUI etc. It is would help if the interview knows these so that he could pro-actively inject these in to conversation, so that interviewer could latch on to these.

Ex: Here is piece of conversation
interviewee: I wrote an IMAP client.
interviewer: Was it designed run on Server?
[this gives me a clue that interviewer was interested in knowing whether the person being interviewed had any server-side experience]

2) Interviewer might want to know, how well the candidate, can apply technical knowledge? So they usually ask the candidate to describe the practical scenario where she/he had do apply the XYZ technology.
Example: Describe me a scenario where you had to use 'Synchronization' objects?
In response it is better to use a scripted example so that it sounds compelling. One way to prepare these scripts is thoughfully go through the past experinces, pick a RIGHT one and decribe it as if one is being interviewed.

These are the things that I have learnt, over the years, about technical interviews.

1) Tech industry has broad divisions like: server side, security, GUI etc. It is would help if the interview knows these so that he could pro-actively inject these in to conversation, so that interviewer could latch on to these.
Ex: Here is piece of conversation
interviewee: I wrote an IMAP client.
interviewer: Was it designed run on Server? [this gives me a clue that interviewer was
interested in knowing whether the person
being interviewed had any server-side
experience]

2) Interviewer might want to know, how well the candidate, can apply technical knowledge? So they usually ask the candidate to describe the practical scenario where she/he had do apply the XYZ technology.

Example: Describe me a scenario where you had to use 'Synchronization' objects?

In response it is better to use a scripted example so that it sounds compelling. One way to prepare these scripts is thoughfully go through the past experinces, pick a RIGHT one and decribe it as if one is being interviewed.

http://www.lookupanyone.com

This is a serious stuff, http://www.lookupanyone.com has all the personal details for sale. They will show preview of it without payment and buy full details after paying 40$. This site is held by a company located at

Intelius, Inc.
Attn: CUSTOMER SERVICE
500 - 108th Ave NE #1660
Bellevue, WA 98004

Do they have SSN?
They claim that they have SSN but that seem to be lie because of following reason. When I searched for my name, they showed two results with different postal address, and both address were correct, I have lived at those addresses; my point is if they were to have my SSN, they would have linked those two results in to one. I am almost tempted to buy my personal results and see what they have.