Ride Free…

Hmm… not a lot of work today so was browsing the net to fend off boredom, and came across these.

Ok ok I was drooling over them. *sigh*.

Check out the links for more…

Enjoy

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අද වැඩ අඩු දවසක් නිසා කම්මැලිකම යන්නත් එක්ක අන්තර්ජාලයෙ පොඩ්ඩක් සැරිසරන කොට මේ ටික හම්බවුනෙ.

ආතල් යතුරුපැදි ටික. අනේ ලන්කවෙත් මෙවා තිබ්බනම්


Harley Davidson – All hail the kings…

MGS Custom Bikes

Custom Bikes of Lauderdale

Thunderstuck Custom Bikes







Images from MGS Custom Bikes and Harley Davidson

සින්හලෙන් බිදක්

දිනෙන් දිනම සින්හල භෂාව බ්ලොග් ලෝකය ජයගන්නව, එනිසා මටත් හිතුනා සින්හලෙන් බ්ලොග් ලිපියක් ලියන්න ඔනෙ කියල මේක ටික දවසක ඉදන් තිබ්බ අදහසක්, හබැයි වැඩෙ කල් ගියේ, සින්හල යතුරුලියනය කරන්න තිබ්බ කම්මැලිකමයි. හැබැයි දැන් ඉතින් වැඩ ලේසි කරන මෘදුකාන්ග තියන නිසා හොදයි

අපේ සමහර අයගෙ මතයක් තියනවනේ ඉන්ග්‍රිසි විතරයි, සින්හල ඔනෙ නැහැ කියලා. ඒ අදහස හොද අදහසක් නෙමේ, මොකද සින්හල කියන්නෙ අපේ මවු භෂාවනෙ. ඒකහින්දා අපි ඒක රැකගන්න ඔනෙ මුලු ලෝකෙම සින්හල කථා පමන. ඒකියන්නෙ මුලු ලොක ජනගහනයෙන් ඉතා සුලු ප්‍රමනයක්. හැබැයි ඉන්ග්‍රිසි කතා කරන අය නම් ගොඩක් ඉන්නවනේ. ඉතින් අපි අපේ භෂාව රැකගත්තෙ නැත්තම්, ටික කලයක් යද්දි සින්හල කියල භාෂාවක් නතිවෙලා යයි.

ඒ අතරම තවත් කට්ටියක් ඉන්නව ඉන්ග්‍රිසි ඔනෙ නෑ සින්හල විතරයි කියාගෙන. ඒකත් හොද වැඩක් නෙමේ. තමාගේ මවු භාෂාවට වඩා තව භාෂාවන් දැනගෙන ඉන්න එක ඇගට ගුනයි , විෂෙශයෙන්ම ඉන්ග්‍රිසි. මීට හෙතුව, මේ ගොලීකරනයවූ ලොකයේ, ඉන්ග්‍රිසි තමයි වියාපාරයේ භෂාව වෙලා තියෙන්නෙ. ඉන්ග්‍රිසි නොදැන හිටිය කියල දියුනු වෙන්න බැරි කමක් නැ, හබැයි දන්නවනම් වැඩෙ ලේසි වෙනවා.

සින්හලෙන් යතුරුලියනය කරන එක තාම හුරු නෑ, එනිසා අදට මේ අති.

ඔබ සැමට ජයවේවා!!!

If you are seeing gibberish on your screen, don’t worry, this post is in Sinhala and requires Sinhala fonts. Thought I’d also join the bandwagon to promote Sinhala blogging :D

I do apologize for all mistakes, still getting the hang of typing in Sinhala :(

Coincidently, this is also my 100th post so it’s a good thing to mark a milestone he he…

Odd Stories for the day

It’s no secret that there are many individuals in this wonderful world of ours, who does not possess a full set of marbles in their upstairs region. Fortunately, they provide a bit of comic relief to us, the depressed and stressed out lot, to bring a smile and give hope to get on with our miserable lives.

A man in Zion Illinois, wants to legally change his name to “In God We Trust”. The future Mr. I G W Trust says that this will be a symbol of the help that god gave him during tough times.

Link

Another man in South Chicago Heights Illinois loved his beer so much that he made a custom made casket resembling a beer can. He hasn’t kicked the bucket yet, so he’s using it as a giant keg.

Link

A politician in Germany is thinking about donating his beard for charity.

Link

In Virginia, a woman taking her driving test, crashed into the DMV building instead of parking next to it, as instructed. Guess she was in a bit of a hurry to get that license.

The Manitoba Bar Association had to forego filing a brief because it lacked necessary funds to hire a lawyer. If the lawyers won’t take their own association pro bono, would they even bother to take other people’s cases?

A 15 year old student in Connecticut is preparing to sue his school officials for an ear injury. Apparently his teacher had rapped on the desk too hard to wake him while he was sleeping in class.

Some people in Hawaii have built a self sufficient community on burnt out lava rock just a mile away from Mount Kilauea, a still active volcano. One of the residents says that he’s more afraid of people than the volcano, which is unfortunately true these days.

A would be criminal with loose nerves had spent a little too much time trying to build up the courage, but when he finally got the guts to do it, he couldn’t go in. The bank had closed for the day.

Another smart criminal decided to call ahead at the store which he planned to rob to tell them to keep a lot of money in hand. Of course when he went to rob the place, he found himself wearing a nice pair of handcuffs.

On similar theme, a man gave his number to a store employee, and told the employee to call him when the manger, who has access to the safe, comes. And another pair was arrested after they gave detailed description of how they were going to rob a man, to that man. I just can’t understand what was going through their minds. That the victim will nicely wait for them to rob them and give all the money up?

A guy already serving 8 years for fraud has filed over 1000 lawsuits amounting to several trillion dollars against a list of people President Bush, Martha Stewart, Steve Jobs, Britney Spears, Tiger Woods (luggage theft), Barry Bonds (illegal moonshine production).

Ok that’s enough for the day.

For more weird news visit www.newsoftheweird.com


Cheers

And now once more, Twisted Rhymes…

Haven’t come up with one of these in a while, so here goes…

Wee Willie Winkie
Runs through the town,
Upstairs and downstairs
In his nightgown
Rapping at the windows,
Crying through the lock,
"Are the children all in bed?
For it's now eight o'clock.

The neighbors were unhappy
At the thought of Wee Willie
Running about the hood,
In nothing but his jammys
Peeping into their homes
Like little perv,
Scaring the little kids
Out of their little wits

The people in the hood
Finally had enough,
They called on the police
To make a complaint,
“Please lock up Wee Willie
And throw away the keys,
We're tired of his antics
And want them to cease”


The sun went down
And out came Willie,
Running around merrily
Only in his jammys,
Rapping at windows
Like he always does,
What a shock he got
On that fateful night,

A big bunch of cops
Came out of nowhere,
Jumped on poor Willie
And took him down,
They roughed him,
Cuffed him,
Read him his rights,
And bundled him off to jail

The law came down hard
On poor Wee Willie
Off he went to the county jail
For a very long time indeed
He now raps on iron bars
In a brand new striped suit,
Amusing other prisoners
With all sorts of tricks

Thus goes the life
Of Wee Willie Winkie
Who couldn’t keep his nose
Out of other people’s business
He got into mischief
And burnt his tail
Now spends his time
Singing jailhouse blues

Of Road Races and Canned Pol Sambol

Along with Kavum and Kokis, another undying avurudu tradition is the marathons and the cycle races. Frankly I can’t understand how they became an Avurudu tradition in the first place, but it’s there so we have to live with it. Come to think of it, I think this year there are less of those as well. Maybe they couldn’t find any big wigs to do the start off. Anywhoo, came across two cycle races this Saturday, which is quite irritating when you are trying to get somewhere in a hurry.

My gripe is not with the cyclists, after all they are sportsmen and participating in a sporting event. I’m annoyed with all those other idiots who ride along the cyclists on motorcycles. For every one, there are about ten of these freaking idiots riding around the cyclists, like a guard of honor. They go weaving through traffic, shouting at other motorists like they own the road, trying to clear a path for their charge. Reminds one of those dreaded ministerial motorcades. What’s up with that? These posse riders should be banned from doing this.

Then there’s the other set of people who lineup along the way, eagerly waiting to throw a bucket of water at the cyclists. Why does a cycle race turn normal, sane citizens into water throwing maniacs? Another mystery of life yet to be answered. I wonder if the racers actually like this. I mean I would get pissed off if someone threw a bucket of water at me while I’m trying to win a race, but then again different people have different tastes. What a whacky and weird world we live in.

Source nedgallagher.com

As for the other part of the title, has anyone else out there seen Canned Pol Sambol made by MD? I’m not sure for how long this has been in the market, but I only came across it couple of days ago. Has it come to a point in time that people are too busy to make even a simple pol sambol? It is sad. I don’t even want to know what it tastes like. Call me old fashioned, but I still prefer fresh homemade pol sambol any day over canned stuff.



On a more serious note, today, the 22nd of April is Earth Day. I Did a post last year also on it, ranting about the things happening. You can get more information at the official Earth Day site and as well as Wikipedia.

We only have one planet to live on people, let’s try not to blow it up, coz we got no place else to go!!!

Cheers!!!

17th of April

Well I haven’t been assigned any work for the day, yippee. So it’s going to be a lazy day. Oh well might as well put up a post :D

And in headlines today:

The Olympic torch has reached New Delhi India

At least 44 people have been killed after a bus plunged into a river in the western Indian state of Gujarat

At least 22 people, including 5 Palestinian children, have died in Gaza's worst day of fighting since Israeli incursions in early March.

A Yemeni court has annulled an eight-year-old girl's marriage to a man in his 20s, after she filed for divorce.

Cleveland zoo researchers find rare giant turtle in Vietnam

Three days after stealing a rare collection of coins, a thief in Germany took them to the bank for safe keeping - and delivered them into the hands of the man he had robbed.

Let’s see what interesting things have happened in the past on this day.

1861 - American Civil War: Virginia secedes from the Union.

1864 - American Civil War: Battle of Plymouth begins – Confederate forces attack Plymouth, North Carolina.

1865 - Mary Surratt is arrested as a conspirator in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

1924 - Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios is formed from a merger of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures, and the Louis B. Mayer Company.

1941 - World War II: The Kingdom of Yugoslavia surrenders to Germany.

1949- At midnight 26 counties officially leave the British Commonwealth. A 21-gun salute on O'Connell Bridge, Dublin, ushers in the Republic of Ireland

1961 - Bay of Pigs Invasion: A group of CIA financed and trained Cuban refugees lands at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba with the aim of ousting Fidel Castro.

1964 - The Ford Motor Company unveils the Ford Mustang at the New York World's Fair.

1969 - Sirhan Sirhan is convicted of assassinating Robert F. Kennedy.

1971 - People's Republic of Bangladesh forms, under Sheikh Mujibur Rahman at Mujibnagor.

1973 - Federal Express delivers its first package.

1975 - Cambodian Civil War ends: The Khmer Rouge captures the capital Phnom Penh and Cambodian government forces surrender.



On the same note let us wish our very own spin wizard Muthiah Muralidaran a very happy birthday, who was born on a day like today back in 1972. He shares his birthday with the following famous people:

1734 - Taksin, King of Thailand (d. 1782)

1837 - J.P. Morgan, American financier (d. 1913)

1894 - Nikita Khrushchev, Premier of the Soviet Union (d. 1971)

1929 - James Last, German band leader

1954 - Rowdy Roddy Piper, Canadian professional wrestler

1968 - Prince Maurits of the Netherlands

1972 - Jennifer Garner, American actress

1974 - Victoria Beckham, English singer

Today is also World Hemophilia Day.

Source is as usual Wikipedia. You can find the complete list here.

Cheers y’all

Hanging out in Nuwara Eliya

As mentioned in my last post, the gang of usual suspects and I went gallivanting during the Awurudu weekend. As usual the destination was good old Nuwara Eliya. This was our fourth trip for this year, so the place is becoming like a second home to us now 

Since Friday was a half day, we started off around 3 pm, but unfortunately a lot of people have had the same idea it seems. The traffic was awful, and took us about 1.5 hours just get from Dehiwela to Kelaniya. It was very slow going all along the Kandy road, especially near the major towns. Add to that the heavy rain, and it took us till 9pm to pass Peradeniya. After that of course it was smooth sailing. Reached NE around 11.30 after spending some time to lift up our spirits along the way ;)

Since it is the season time, NE was crowded, but after the weekend I expect more people would come. The town itself was richly decorated – with advertisements. Every few steps along the pavements, there was a pole stuck to the ground with a banner on it. Not only within the city, but up to maybe 5km’s along the access roads, all light posts had a banner attached to it. There must have been hundreds of banners and millions spent on it. Is it just me or does anyone else think that this is a waste of money that could have been used in more productive manner?

Things were happening up there in them hills. There is a small carnival set in the race course grounds and horse races will be held all throughout the season. There is also a dirt track racing event taking place. Unfortunately, the trial which were supposed to be held on Sunday got pushed back to Monday, so we only got to see the riders practicing. The downside to all of the fun stuff happening is that prices of things are nearly double their normal prices.

Started back home Sunday around 3pm via Hatton. Since it was the “Nonagathaya” time there weren’t many people on the road, which is something rarely seen. It was like travelling when the whole country has been declared a curfew. We were on the road when the new year dawned, so I guess we’ll be doing a lot of travelling during this year he he.

Talking about the dawning of the new year, what’s it with these idiotic people who light crackers and throw them on to the main roads. F***ing retards. They should be shot and hung.

Well after a relaxing weekend, now back in office earning the daily bread. Oh well, life goes on…

Cheers y’all!!!

Go horsey Go!!!

Oi, wait for meee...

Woohoo...
Pint size class

A Lone sentinel


"dam paata..."

"Kaha paata..."

"Rathu pata...pata pata mal"
The hills are alive...



A poor giant must be missing a tea cup...

Soorya Mangalaya

April is the year when all Sri Lankans get together and get ready to celebrate in grand style. Yes, it is the time, when people say goodbye to the old and welcomes a brand new year. The Sinhala and Tamil New Year is based on the movement of the sun in the celestial sphere, when it moves from the Meena Rashiya (House of Pisces) to the Mesha Rashiya (House of Aries). It also marks the end of the Harvesting season, when farmers have stored their grains and relax themselves.

Ok, I’m not going to go into lengthy descriptions here. People interested can read more about the festival by checking out the links

Wikipedia

Info.lk

In reality however, this time the celebrations will be low key I guess. I don’t need to elaborate on things happening here do I? Even two days before the New Year, I haven’t seen much of hoopla like previous years. I’m talking only about Colombo, which is understandable considering the security situation. I’m sure things are different outside of the city limits. After all most people would be leaving for their home towns during these days, to spend the days with their families and loved ones. Hopefully celebrations are going on in other parts of the country as usual.

Talking about changing times, even the Koha’s have left the area. Seriously, I haven’t heard a Koha singing till today. I think they got wise to that fact that they can be happy and safe out of the city, so packed their bags and left. Good decision I say. Who else would want to live in these concrete jungles except us humans?



Image source and details image lanka

Luckily I will also be heading out to the greener pastures of Nuwara Eliya with the usual suspects for the weekend. We usually never go during season time, but thought we’d try it this time and see. Of course it’s zero hassle when one of them owns a hotel up there :) . I’m pretty sure things are happening in the hills. Also looking forward to stuffing myself with Kevili and other goodies in the coming days he he. Can’t wait for those mouth watering kevums, kokis and other yummy yummy goodies…Mmmmm…

So, to all my fellow bloggers and all Sri Lankans, I’d like to wish you all a happy new year.

Odds and Ends

How crummy can the weather be? It was sunny in the morning. I go out and it starts to pour. I'm on me two wheeler and there's not even a place to get some shelter either. I am soaked. Finally finds a place, by which time I look like I've been dipped in a pool, wait for about half an hour till rains stops. Get’s pissed and drops what I’ve been planning to do and heads back to office. School is out, gets stuck in traffic. Now that I'm back in office, it's bloody sunny again. I'm sitting under a AC vent in wet clothes and hoping that'll get pneumonia so that this day can get better. A nice shower when I'm going home can make this a great day indeed. Yippee…

So might as well do something productive like putting up a blog post eh?



She'll be comming round the mountain when she comes...



so far far away...



Look at me, I'm soooo pretty...



Abode of the gods...



EARTHQUAKE!!!!



Watcha looking at punk? You wanna peice of me?



ROOOOOOAAARRRRR!!!



Put em up punk. I ma gonna rearrange your face for you!

Morphing Phones

This is for all those mobile phone nuts out there. Getting tired of that same old solid phone designs? Well how about a phone that can be stretched, shrunk, twisted or whatever your little heart desires. This new concept phone called the Morph by Nokia might just be the thing for you.

The secret behind this stretchable, flexible gadget is nanotechnology. This is a branch of science which focuses on controlling matter on an atomic level. It is a highly multidisciplinary field and can be seen as extending existing science into the nanoscale.

More information here…

One aspect of nanotechnology is that it allows to create materials and components that are flexible, stretchable, transparent and remarkably strong. Hence the Morph phone made out of these materials can be stretched and bent as you please.

Of course this is only concept models. Whether it'll go to production is a question only time will answer.

Check out Nokia.com for more details on this.

Read Nokia Article

Read Nokia Press Release

Images thanks to Nokia

Lazy Long Weekends

Ayi caramba…been a while since I made a post on ze blog. 32 days to be exact. The joys of work, both official and private have been keeping me busy all this time. Now back after a four day long weekend, so thought I’d hack something out.

Most of the people I know packed up the disappeared to various parts of the country, to take advantage of the long break. Unfortunately, many of usual suspects are religious (at least their families are) so were not very keen to go anywhere during Easter. We had been to Nuwara Eliya and back just two weeks before and thought we take a good rest this time. Wednesday night had a small party with the office guys and got hammered, so that was a good start for the weekend. Unfortunately that was about it :(. Rest was spent lazing around the house doing nothing much. Anyways this was the time to be in Colombo, since everybody else was out of it he he.

As I mentioned, went to Nuwara Eliya about two weeks back coz one of my friends opened a hotel up there, called the Chesterfield Hotel. So we went there for the official opening. It’s out of Nuwara Eliya city limits, closer to Hakgala, around 5 km’s along the Badulla road, so the surroundings are great. The Nuwara Eliya town itself has become too saturated with buildings for my taste. I don’t think any of the hotels in town can boast of a good view. The only view they have is the backyard of another hotel. This place on the other hand has a great view of the Hakgala mountain ranges and the forest reserve, and the surrounding areas are not crowded like the town. Unfortunately the long reaching arms of development are rapidly spreading its way towards this area as well. I hope that it won’t destroy the beauty of the area. We had a great time though, and even managed to do a photo-shoot to get pictures for the website, brochures and ads during the rare sober periods. The web site is still going through its final phases, so will put up a links ones the site goes live.



On other stuff happening around the world, the death toll of US soldiers reached around 4000, while marking the 5th anniversary of the war. Heck we’ve been having one for more than two decades and we are carrying on merrily aren’t we? Don’t worry GW, another few more years of war and the people will take it as part of their daily lives and forget you’re the one who caused all the mess.

In good old England there was a cash machine giving out double the money out to customers. If you asked for 500 pounds the machine gave you 1000. The machine must’ve been feeling charitable I guess. Damn, why can something like that happen to me???

Two genius criminalsfrom Toronto decided to rob a store and call a cab to make their getaway. Of course the Police came in the cab and arrested the two dumbos. Lesson to be learned; always bring your own getaway car, preferably a stolen one.

A Dutch shoplifter managed to make a quick getaway with the goods but left an important piece of evidence. His son. The police contacted the idiot through the son but he refused to come get him and told them to contact the mother. Well at least he doesn’t do dumb things twice in the same day. He later gave himself up, probably out of fear the mother of the child would kill him.

Ok that’s enough for the day…Get back to work.

Cheers y’all

Evil Dudes and Blood Floods

Read an interesting book sometime back titled “The World’s Most Evil People” by an author called Rodney Castleden. It profiled 90 people who have done evil deeds, mainly destruction of human life, spanning through the ages, from the ancient times to the present day.



Amazon

What is evil? According to the Oxford dictionary, evil is defined as morally bad, harmful or very unpleasant.

This basically means that evil depends on the level of morality of the people, in other words us.

Moral: concerned with right and wrong; virtuous

What a person will perceive as evil will depend on what they think as right and wrong. The problem is that different people has different ideas on what is right and wrong. What someone might consider as wrong might not be considered the same by someone else. Blame the way our brains are wired.

So evil appears and disappears according to the person’s viewpoint. The author of the book notes this as a moral paradox. A classic example of this is the decision by America to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. There are 3 viewpoints on this event. One is that it is a good thing, because it brought a quick end to the second world war, a necessary evil, because it stopped the war, but killed a large number of people in the process, or as an unequivocal evil, because the people killed were civilians, slaughtered in cold blood, and they should never have been considered as military targets.

Another point made in the book is that evil depends on the zeitgeist, or the spirit of the age. Taking a look back at history, there have been more evil people about in certain time periods than in others. The 20th century is one of them and so far the worst one. Worst because of the large number of human lives destroyed, thanks to technology and the industrialization of warfare.

The 20th century saw a blood-letting on a scale never seen before in human history. There were 20 wars (events) during the 20th century that involved more than 1 million deaths, some of them closely linked to each other. Collectively these events formed a single complex upheaval described as a Haemoclysm, or a blood flood, in which 155 million human lives were destroyed. Keep in mind that this was just these 20 events. Add to that the other skirmishes around the world and the death toll is much higher.

The list is as follows, ordered by the death tolls:

1. Second World War (Late 1930s – September 2, 1945 )– 50 million

2. Mao Zedong’s regime in China (In office 1945 – 1976 )– 48 million

3. Stalins regime in the Soviet Union (In Office April 3, 1922 – March 5, 1953 )– 20 million

4. The First world war, including the Armenian massacres (July 28, 1914 – November 11, 1918 ) – 15 million

5. Russian Civil War (1917-1923 ) – 8.8 million

6. Warlord and Nationalist era in China – 4 million

7. Congo under King Leopold of Belgium (17 December 1865 – 17 December 1909 ) – 3 million

8. Korean War (June 25, 1950 - present. Full-scale fighting until an armistice on July 27, 1953 )– 2.8 million

9. Second Indo China War – 2.7 million

10. Chinese Civil war (Full scale fighting lasted from April 1927 to December 1936, and clashes from January 1941 resuming full conflict from August 1945 to May 1950; war declared over by the ROC in 1991; [1] no legal document has been signed to end the war, technically continuing from 1927 until today )– 2.5 million

11. German expulsions after WWII – 2.1 million

12. Second Sudanese Civil War (1983 - 2005) – 1.9 million

13. Congolese Civil War (June 1997–December 1999)– 1.7 million

14. Cambodia Khmer Rouge Regime (1975 – 1979) – 1.7 million

15. Afghanistan Civil War (1978–conflict still ongoing )– 1.4 million

16. Ethiopian Civil War (1974-1991 )– 1.4 million

17. Mexican Revolution (1910)– 1.3 million

18. East Pakistan Massacres – 1.2 million

19. Iran – Iraq war (22 September 1980–20 August 1988 ) – 1 million

20. Nigeria Biafran War (1967–1970 )– 1 million

The total of all this: 155 million

Since the book was written sometime back the details maybe a bit outdated. Another dark event that can be added to the list is the Rwandan Civil War in the 1990’s, where the Rwandan genocide estimates 800,000 to 1 million deaths. The most recent and ongoing conflict is the war in Darfur , in Sudan, raging on since 2003. The estimated death toll is 200,000 to 400,000, with over 2.5 million displaced. However since there seems to be no end in sight, we can probably expect the death toll to rise as time goes by.

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

John Lennon 1940-1980

…And what a Bloody Valentine it was

A malevolent little spirit
Known to all as Cupid
Lies atop an alter of stone
Life slowly draining away
A tiny little heart
Cut out from his chest
A river of Red
Seeping into holy ground…

And where did it all end up? At the most rocking valentine event, which went by the name My Bloody valentine? For the clueless, MBV was held yesterday (Sunday) night @ the Zetter with 3 awesome Sri Lankan metal bands rocking the heads off local metal heads. The bands were Swords of the Spirit, Paranoid Earthling and the great Stigmata.

SOS did the first set followed by PE, with mostly their originals with some covers thrown in. however the night was ruled by Stigmata. They had the crowd head banging like there’s no tomorrow.

Anyways it was a superb show. I mean if your ears are still ringing the next morning, it had to be good eh? A big shout out to all the bands, for some excellent performances. Hopefully there will be more events like this in the future.

Cheers!

Sword of the Spirit

Paranoid Earthling

Stigmata

February 14th

Before you bang your head against a wall, let me tell you that this is NOT another dreaded Valentine’s Day post. The blogosphere is already inundated with more than enough lovers prattling on about the great V-Day. Instead I’m going to share some other things that happened on February 14th, sourced from the great online Oracle, Wikipedia :D

1849 - In New York City, James Knox Polk becomes the first serving President of the United States to have his photograph taken. (...and the first paparazzi was born)

1855 - Texas linked by telegraph with the rest of the United States, with the completion of a connection between New Orleans and Marshall, Texas. (...a time before the mobile phone)

1859 - Oregon admitted as the 33rd U.S. state.

1876 - Alexander Graham Bell applies for a patent for the telephone, as does Elisha Gray. (...can anyone imagine a world without the telephone today.)

1886 - First trainload of oranges left Los Angeles via the transcontinental railroad. (Oranges??? didn't they have anything better to send?)

1899 - Voting machines are approved by the U.S. Congress for use in federal elections.

1900 - Second Boer War: In South Africa, 20,000 British troops invade the Orange Free State. (Does the Brits have something against Free Oranges?)

1912 - Arizona admitted as the 48th U.S. state.

1912 - In Groton, Connecticut, the first diesel-powered submarine is commissioned.

1919 - The Polish-Soviet War begins.

1920 - The League of Women Voters is founded in Chicago, Illinois.

1924 - The International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) is founded. ( Me thinks we should have IBM day instead…)

1929 - St. Valentine's Day Massacre: Seven people, six of them gangster rivals of Al Capone's gang, are murdered in Chicago, Illinois. (Must have been fun :P)

1942 - Battle of Pasir Panjang contributes to the fall of Singapore.

1949 - The Knesset (Israeli parliament) first convenes.

1961 - Discovery of the chemical elements: Element 103, Lawrencium, is first synthesized at the University of California.

1979 - In Kabul, Muslims kidnap the American ambassador to Afghanistan, Adolph Dubs who is later killed during a gunfight between his kidnappers and police.

1990 - 92 people are killed aboard Indian Airlines Flight 605 at Bangalore, India.

2005 - Lebanon's former Prime Minister, Rafik Hariri, is assassinated, prompting the country to fall into chaos and devisions.

2005 - Seven people were killed and 151 wounded in a series of bombings by suspected Al-Qaeda-linked militants that hit the Philippines' Makati financial district in Metro Manila, Davao City, and General Santos City.

The most obvious one of course is the death of St. Valentine around 270 AD


Shocker aint it. The world doesn’t stop on Valentine’s day :P

This is just a selection of events. For the complete list visit here.

All are welcome to add any interesting events that happened on the 14th, in Sri Lanka or anywhere around the world.

If you are looking for a Valentines on the dark side, this might just be it. “My Bloody Valentine” on the 17th of February, Sunday from 5pm to 9pm @ the Zetter, featuring three superbly excellent local metal bands, Stigmata, Paranoid Earthling and Swords of the Spirit.

Check Theena’s blog for the poster

Cheers y’all





Source:http://www.derringert-shirts.com
Source: http://images.cafepress.com/

Udurawana Goes Online

That great Sri Lankan citizen Mr. Udurawana has stepped into future by starting his own site. After all this is the virtual age :D. Drop by and give him a shout out.

Udurawana.com

Happy Chinese New Year

February 7, 2008 marks the Chinese New Year, also known as the Spring Festival or the Lunar New Year. It is the most important of all the traditional Chinese holidays.

The start of the Chinese New Year is the first day of the New Year containing a new moon. This means that the day varies in each year of the Gregorian calendar. In 2007 the date was 18th of February, and in 2009, it will fall on the 26th of January. The celebrations last for 14 days and ends with the Lantern Festival.

Read More

Punchi Kale Ape

A collection of children’s songs presented by the talented students of the R A Chandrasena Memorial Music Institute. It was officially launched on Saturday the 19th of January, with a live performance of the songs at the Elphinstone Theater.

Those who are not familiar with R A Chandrasena, he was a highly talented musician who did an invaluable service to Sri Lankan music. This was way back before FM radio stations, CD’s, MP3’s and before hip hop became infused into Sri Lankan music scene. It was the era of Radio Ceylon and vinyl records. If you are reading this, I doubt that you belong to that generation. Check with your grandparents, they were the party animals of that time.

R A Chandrasena was born in 1924 in Kandy, and passed away in 1980, after long years of service to the country. He played many roles during his lifetime. Among them, he was the leader of the musicians at Radio Ceylon. He was the music director for many Sinhalese films of the era. He was a producer of records under his own RAC label. In addition to these, he was teacher who taught and introduced to the world the next generation of Sri Lankan musician. His music academy was established in 1951, 57 years ago, where many great musician like Dharmadasa Walpola and Premasiri Khemadasa passed through its doors.

Today the institute carries out the work and the vision of it’s founder to create talented musicians to the country. Renamed as the R A Chandrasena Memorial Music Institute, the legacy is carried on by his daughter and son-in-law, Darshani Chandrasena and W D Ariyasinghe, prominent musicians of their own right.

This CD is a showcase of the talents of the young students of the academy. Lyrics for the songs were done by some of the leading songwriters of the country, such as Bandula Nanayakkarawasam and Saman Chandranatha Weerasinghe. The music, arrangements and music direction were all done by Darshani Chandrasena.

You will be able buy the CD from stores in near future. Also, you can always contact the institute for purchases. Please drop a mail.

R A Chandrasena Memorial Music Institute
140/ 31 D, Kalapura,
Templers Road,
Mount Lavinia

Email : info@lankamusicacademy.com / harshadewa@gmail.com

If you are outside Sri Lanka, you can always buy the CD through www.lanka.info / www.kapruka.com. Look for children's songs in the site.

Thinner the Better

If we (after we invent the time machine of course) had told the early pioneers of the computer that someday we’ll be carrying computers in our hand, they would’ve laughed so hard till they cried. Then they would’ve committed us to the loony bin for talking such crap. After all, the only computers they know of are the size of a building, and unless someone invents the shrink ray, hand held computers were never going to happen.

Well back in the present aren’t we all glad that things didn’t stay the same eh? The computer luckily has lost its weight and size down to something that we can carry in our hands. It’s like a super model on three different diets at the same time. The newest “thin model” to join these ranks is the Apple Macbook Air, the world’s thinnest notebook.

This newest product from Apple, which was introduced recently, has a thickness of 0.16 inches at the bottom and 0.76 inches at the top, with a 13.3 inch screen. It can support a normal hard drive, but it doesn’t have a CD or DVD drive. It’s designed so that everything needed is taken through wireless connectivity. Its weight is a mere 3 pounds with dimensions of 12.8 X 8.94 inches. It also seems that Apple has worked with Intel to make a smaller version of the Core2Duo Processor.

The Macbook Air is supposed to go on sale within two weeks and all of this can be your for a tidy little sum of US$ 1,799.00. No point in converting to LKR since after all the taxes add up it might be 4/5 times that price :D

Tech Specs:
• .16 to .75-inch thickness on top
• 12.8 x 8.94 inches
• 3 pounds
• 5 hours of battery life with everything running
• Intel Core 2 Duo Processor at 1.6 or 1.8GHz, motherboard the length of a pencil.
• 800MHz frontside bus.
• 2GB RAM 667MHz DDR2 standard.
• 13.3-inch screen, LED backlit.
• 1,280 x 800 pixels
• Micro-DVI adapter (for DVI, VGA, composite and S-Video output)
• Intel GMA X3100 Graphics processor with 144MB RAM shared
• 1.8-inch 80GB HD or 64GB Solid State Drive
• Multitouch trackpad with gestures. Pans, zooms, rotates, etc.
• 802.11n and Bluetooth 2.1.
• Optional external HD for $99, USB-bus powered.
• Full backlit keyboard.
• One USB 2.0, one audio port, one Micro-DVI
Source: Gizmodo

More Links:
Apple
Gizmodo
Engadget




Pic source: Gizmodo

The Newest Cancer Fighting Drug…Pot

… or better known as Cannabis, Marijuana, Ganja, Mal and many other names. Apart from helping one get high, compounds in Cannabis is known to reduce pain from cancer and other illnesses. The latest research has found out that it may also help in stopping tumor cells from growing and getting out of control.

This study was done by Robert Ramer and Burkhard Hinz from the Institute of Toxicology and Pharmacology, University of Rostock, Rostock, Germany.

I’m not going to go into all the medically technically things, mainly because I don’t understand all of that stuff. Please check the links below if you really want to know more 

Inventor Spot Article
Article from the Journal of the National Cancer Institute
Wikipedia – Cannabis
Wikipedia – Cannabis Sativa
Wikipedia- Cannabis as a Drug

All I know is, with all these medicinal benefits, shouldn’t ‘Mal’ be legalized? Now there’s a thought he he :D

Life-size TV anyone?

Tired of looking at pint-sized figures when watching TV? Want a larger than life experience? Well no fear, the time is here.

Panasonic yesterday unveiled it’s latest product, called the “Life Screen”, during the Consumer Electronics Show, being held these days in Las Vegas. It’s the world’s largest Plasma HDTV. Naming it Life Screen is appropriate considering that this technology displays objects on screen in life size.

This giant of a TV has a diagonal screen width of 150 inches, or 12 feet and 6 inches. The width of it is 11 feet. Now that’s what I call big…Even though it is this big, the marvel of it is that it’s width is only 1 inch (No that is not a printing mistake :P ).

There are no pricing details, but according to experts, HDTV concepts like these sells for about $1000.00 per inch, which would place this in the range of $150,000.00. :(

Unfortunately you won’t be seeing in the stores in the near future. It’s still a concept design and probably won’t go for mass production for at least another 1 or 2 years.



Source: Inventorspot

MMVIII

Ah… a new year has dawned (I know I’m a bit late, but what the heck eh?), with a bang I might say. The good and the bad have already happened, and the year can only get better. (Hopefully :) )

Personally for me, the last few days of 2007 really sucked, but the New Year will hopefully change things. The best thing so far is that I started a new job in a new place. A total change over for the New Year, you might say. The only downside is the increase in travelling :( , knowing how our public transportation system works, it’s a headache.

Dear old 2008, or as the Romans might have said MMVIII. A long awaited leap year for all those unlucky folks born on the 29th of February. Well, you guys better a get ready to party, and I mean party hard, after all you only get to celebrate once every four years.

According to good old Wikipedia, 2008 has been designated as the following:

International Year of Planet Earth
European Year of Intercultural dialog
Australian Year of the Scout
International Year of the Potato
International Year of Sanitation

Chinese Astrology proclaims that 2008 is the year of the Rat. Well actually it’s the period starting from February 07th 2008 to January 25th 2009. According to this system, each year is assigned a zodiac animal out of twelve. The Rat is the first in a cycle, so it makes 2008 the beginning of a new cycle.

The characteristics of the Rat are as follows:
Rat (Yang, 1st Trine, Fixed Element Water): Forthright, disciplined, systematic, meticulous, charismatic, hardworking, industrious, charming, eloquent, sociable, shrewd. Can be manipulative, cruel, dictatorial, rigid, selfish, obstinate, critical, over-ambitious, ruthless, intolerant, scheming.



In addition to the associated animal there is also an associated element, and for 2008 it is ‘Yang Earth’ The Yin or Yang is broken down into Five Elements (Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water) on top of the cycle of animals. These are modifiers and affect the characteristics of each of the 12 animal signs. Thus, each of the 12 animals are governed by an element plus a Yin Yang Direction.

Characteristics of Earth are:
• Center
• Three Enclosures, Change of seasons
• The Yellow Dragon
• The Planet Saturn
• The Color Yellow
• Digestive system, Spleen and stomach
• Patient, Militaristic, Prudent, Stable, Reliable, Hard-working, Ambitious, Stubborn, and very energetic
• Disciplined, Tenacious, Logical, Governed by Service and Duty to Others

Earth Governs Dragon, Rat, and Ox. It is the central balance of the elements and can lend qualities to all 12 animals as well.

Check the links for more details if your interested...

Well here’s wishing y’all a great 2008!!!

Love & Peace

Cheers!!!