I am trying to continue the trend started by me when 2006 was ending. To summarize the things in the way that you can recall them later, more easily than ever.

Here is the first series of that kind (you can also find same list for last year) -

1. What did you do in 2007 that you’d never done before?
   1. Continued my job for 2 years (of course that is an achievement when it is for first in 3 years of career)
   2. Completed NetAmp application - an app to play music over network
   3. Found my love
   4. Traveled abroad / US (Writing from there only)
   5. Visited Disneyland and Universal Studios
   6. Watched lot and lot of movies (I still can’t believe that I managed to watch 50 movies in 2 months!)
   7. Visited Historical Monuments in Capital nearby
   8. Met with old time mate (Happy)
2. Did you keep your New Years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

   Oh yes I kept it. I don’t have habit of leaving impossible things like that. If it couldn’t be done in 2006, it was kept in 2007. Hey Krishna, are you listening? Of course, making another one for year 2008 and this time, again it is next to impossible for a person like me!

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

   Luckily NO.

4. Did anyone close to you die?

   No.

5. What countries did you visit?

   US

6. What would you like to have in 2008 that you lacked in 2007?

   Remembrance (I think it isn’t about resolution)

7. What date from 2007 will remain etched upon your memory?

   27/07/2007, 04/12/2007 and 13/12/2007 (all sum up to mah lucky number as I have realized just now)

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

   Discovered Love

9. What was your biggest failure?

   Umm…None.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

    Yes. Cough and Cold for quite long time during Cricket World Cup

11. What was the best thing you bought?

    I never buy things rather I present them to myself - 2 GFs / Laptops (dv9502 and dv6500t CTO NB) and 2 External HDDs (160 GB LACIE and 1 TB Western Digital)

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
    1. Jo
    2. Ritu
    3. Puneet’s laughs
    4. Pankaj’s company during celebrations
    5. Nitesh Gupta for wonderful rides
    6. My Brother
    7. Archana for wonderful compliment
    8. Happy
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

    Three of mah colleagues

14. Where did most of your money go?
    1. Laptops
    2. External HDDs
    3. Clothes
    4. Movies
    5. Coffee
    6. Food
    7. Discotheques
    8. Shelter
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
    1. Love

I was just going through some random thought process and was finding the friends who are going through changes  in early new year 2007 and I landed up with few very good observations. After all, this blog is the place where I don’t write about technology all the time. My musings are also a part of it. So here are my observations -

Pankaj Bhardwaj - my college mate, roomy and very dear friend from Hoshiarpur but shifted to Jalandhar who is one of his kinds happened to be a big email resource who used to send about 4-5 emails regularly on daily basis in year 2005 and early 2006. After about first quarter of 2006, he got dead busy in his project (don’t ask me details because no one else except his team knows about the tools they used in project -  Frankly, they never impressed me at least). Then he went to onsite at Siemens, Germany and returned in last quarter of the year. We, his room-mates, here at Gurgaon, missed him (and of course his mails) a lot in that time and more than us, he missed all of us as well as India - yes Chunks, I know that although we used to get angry with you when you used to call us after weeks.

So why I am writing about this great personality here??? We all, who were in his mailing list, missed his mails a lot in last 3 quarters of 2006, received only about 3-4 mails. That’s it. So his average came down to about 2 mails per month from 80 mails per month in first quarter. And now, he is Back with a bang. I am so happy that he has started mailing in bulk. He is one of 2 really good friends whom I used to rely for emails everyday. He sends really cute mails and they can make anyone’s day. I just wanted to thank and congratulate him here for coming back - in fact, it happens to be his new year resolution after I myself and Puneet used to tease him for not sending the emails.

I am feeling the relive you feel for regular voyages to hometown…and the excitement in life brought by them.

I was at home on this weekend and I enjoyed it the most…For once you feel like you aren’t having anything to do rest of the world except your dear ones around you.

And for me, it is always exciting journey to home…specially while travelling back from home to Gurgaon. It has always turned up as a surprise to me…every time, whenever I was returning to Gurgaon. Be it meeting some relatives in train, meeting an old friend who was your college mate…6 years ago. And this time, I met 2 guys - Vinod and Sameer, BHU pass-outs, working in an Agri MNC in Delhi. It was their initiative of taking ___ (as they pronounced … hum to lete hain ) and my prompt-responsiveness (as they told me) which made us familiar with each other at first instance…soon we were sharing more about us…and there turned out to be some relation of a guy - Vinod, with Infy. And then there were more discussions about weather it is a push-back for a guy from non-comp Sc bg when he joined a s/w firm or it is the risk taken by firm to employ such a guy but it turns out to be + - + situation for both ultimately…no one goes in loss. He was concerned about one of his loved one and I was surprised how soon we had opened up to each other. He was happy to discuss all this and know more about our field and I was, as always, happy to share my exp in s/w industry (IT industry as he referred)…so far. Anyway, there was another surprise waiting for me in morning at station when I had just departed from these 2 guys when I heard a soft voice calling my name from back - it was Harprit - she was my college mate in 2000 in HSP and it was pleasant surprise for me to see her there. As we hail from same place, I knew something about her that she is is working with Satyam and these days at Gurgaon working at client’s site. But it was totally unexpected meet and I was wondered. She told me that she had noticed me at Hoshiarpur railway station but got to meet here only. And rest of the journey to Gurgaon was like a dream…didn’t know when reached discussing about our whereabouts and all. She is going to switch next month and has already resigned…will be moving to Noida then but it was a great time to meet her.

So it was my latest astonishment…and that’s why I love travel…specially when you get to meet so many good people about whom you never dream of.

I went to my home-town on this weekend.

And there I bought another gadget. It is Nokia 6630.

I was in search for a PIM which is simple to use, robust, flexible and user-friendly. And this gadget came as recommendation from my younger brother - the tech expert & a true geek. Yes bro, u r an expert He know what are the latest trends, what is hot and what is the next best suitable gadget for oneself.

I was planning to get a PDA or high end cell phone. The PDAs which I liked including Nokia 6708 were mainly operated by Stylus and there was very little operatability/functionality provided using keypad and that was a turn off for me - those kbd geeks can understand what does a keyboard mean to a technophobe who want speed and accuracy plus efficiency Also there were few sets which dint support sis files (kinda 3rd party s/ws for cells). So after going thru’ the features of different high end PDAs (yes I also considered Communicator, N-Series but I would prefer to go for laptop for kinda functionality they promise at the offered price tag), I decided to get 6630 which was strongly backed by bro also and I was convinced by the facts given by him.
It provides a wide list of organizers and doc viewers plus different Symbian apps, Global Roaming, Voice commands/recording, Video/Audio conferencing, high speed data transfer, hot swappable & expandable mem slot with 64 MB RS-MMC, 65k TFT display, 1.3 MP camera plus 1.23 MP for images with 1280×960 dimensions with modes including night-wide etc.
And web browser with improved HTML support (supports background images, frames and JavaScript).

The talk time is up to 3 hrs and stand by time up to 11 hrs. I tested its time, space & pixel limits on very first day after purchasing it.

The package includes phone set, 64 MB DV RS-MMC, Adapter for DV RS-MMC, Stereo Headset HDS-3, Battery BL-5C, Charger ACP-12, USB Data Cable and CD ROM containing PC Suite & Adobe Photo Album 2. Moreover, this is the first Nokia 3G smart phone.

Also purchased additional 512 MB memory card for making sure enuf space for my dear songs and few fav videos.

All needed apps were already there with bro including best media players, image viewers, screen captures, zip, games (included my fav chess), net s/ws, webcam apps, dictionary (it sud be there), explorers (the best ones), office apps including word & spreadsheet etc. etc. (add on their registration also ) and they shaped up my cell into the one for prof use! Then he copied full length, high vol compressed audio n video songs. Those songs which sized 5 MB in PC were compressed to 1.5 MB size and the sound quality was much better - he knows how to do it using few audio editing s/ws and also taught me. Also there were s/ws for videos which compressed 54 MB files to 4-5 MBs!