Why do people say 'Bless you', when you sneeze?

Have heard a lot of reasons. Here are a few of my favorite ones -

1. When you sneeze, you heart temporally stops. . . It's an insignificant amount of time that your heart stops, but most consider when your heart stops that you've temporarily died. Therefore, it is polite to "Bless" someone when they have died.

2. Out of compassion for the sneezer and to wish him / her not to be infected with any illness

3. The phrase is used when someone sneezes, since in many cultures it is believed that the soul leaves the body during a sneeze, and God is called on to protect the sneezer from evil spirits at such a vulnerable time.

4. A sneeze is one of the devil's many evil deeds. His goal is to make us sneeze and spread disease or to sneeze while our neck is turned so we break our heads off. I've broken 2 ribs sneezing before. So yea, GOD BLESS YOU the devil is poking you!!

5. There is also a theory that during the Dark and Middle Ages, a violent sneeze was often a precursor of dreaded diseases such as the plague. Whenever someone sneezed, those closest to him or her issued an immediate "Bless you" to ward off the evil forces which led to disease and suffering.

New prepaid phone

Shuchi has her own cell phone now! And what's more, she was supposed to get 450 minutes for her plan, but somehow their system messed up (in other words did a wonderful job) and gave her 870 minutes and a validity of more than 14 months :-). TracFone guys...you are the best :-)

Going to NY again this weekend. traveling to NY always seems so hectic... probably because its so close yet it takes so much time to get there. Well at least on the maps its very close!

Both Noida and Jaipur are getting houses renovated, whitewashed and cleaned up. Preparing for their darling Shuchi to land?

Does this qualify as a conspiracy?

Bush promised to push India's case at the Nuclear Committee and India promised to take delayed steps to control Rupee depreciation.
You scratch my back...i scratch yours.

Oil is falling below $100 per barrel not because Ike did not do the damage as expected, but because speculators at investment banks like Bear Sterns and Lehman are either going bankrupt or have no spare money to play with anymore!

250GB hosting free for life!

So here's a great deal - Get 250 GB of online hosting free for life! Click on this link filesavr.com to get the offer.

If you've been following the Hurricanes in US, this site will be of interest to you - StormPulse.com. It tracks all current and past Hurricanes, their trajectories and intensities over time. Really cool.

Life going fine.
Most recent excitement - Akshia's apartment fire! Yeah, a certain portion of his apartment caught fire, and I got to make my 2nd 911 call (yippee!). The firemen were there in a jiffy, even in the highly crowded NewPort area...that was amazing. Thanks to our neighbors (who had a fire extinguisher) we were able to put off the fire before it did any major harm! Although, the pasta inside the oven that caught fire...did not survive :p

Working hard for another attempt at the elusive MBA. I think, inside my head I have my goals sorted out. Just need to write it all down and fit into 400 words now!

Shuchi has started volunteering. She might join the board of directors of the Shoreline Lliteracy Volunteers committee!

Internet Internet everywhere

In flight browsing available from American Airlines (link).

Now this is progress! Before today you could catch the internet practically everywhere where you could get a public satellite signal except while you were flying. You will no longer be cutoff from the world even when you are aboard an airplane!

$12.95 would get you in-flight email checking. Lets see what else you get -
1. loose the habit of catching up on your sleep on business flight since your boss will be emailing you to respond asap
2. use VOIP to make phone calls, and see staring eyes of co-passengers for you to shut-up
3. lookup wikipedia for cool details of the airplane you just boarded
4. email you pickup that you have been taxing since the last 2 hours as the airport is ever so busy
5. your wife will not know you runaway from home since you will always be online on IM and replying to her emails

Seems that this facility will soon become a necessary evil in the next few months...

As for me...I'm not going to pay $12.95 on 15 hour flight to India simply because my laptop battery will only last 2 hours :-)

Only a few month into our new life...we have settle down. Moved into a new apartment. Bought boatloads of furniture (alright alright, i'm exaggerating...but that's because a bachelor home like mine never had lots of furniture!). Got lots of clothes for me (yay!) and for Shuchi too. She denies it but i think she'll go wild over shopping once she goes to India in Nov. Had mom-dad, Akshia-bhabhi over to stay with us. Akshia graduated and has joined his new job etc etc.

Shuchi and I have been having a great time (link1 link2 link3). We've learn a lot about each other other the past few days and have loved each other even more for that. (to be honest, any given day, Shuchi would recall more about me than i would about her...she has a great memory and because she 'da best). We've had our little fights too. But never could really not talk with each other for more than an hour or so -- that would be cruel.

My work is going fine. Met with the governor a few days back...and had my pics taken too by a professional photographer... link 4.
Still hoping to learn photography using my SLR soon! For now...my N95 camera is working out great for me! Checkout these panoramic pics from my phone - BBQ Burgers, Pittsburg downtown, Akshia convocation.

Yet another attempt in *starting to being a regular blogger*

:-)

Hiiii

Hi blog! How you doin'?

Here's what I've been up to in the past 3 months! -

Getting married -











Annaprasaan at house








Visiting New-York











Skiing


Playing Holi

HIIIIII!

A big hi from the x-bachelor :-)

Been a while since i posted any updates here...it will be soon, keep watching!

Meanwhile here's a much recent update - new furniture in the house! just delivered today -
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ankushbhargava/sets/72157603826622689/show/

loop

WSJ: Stocks slid Monday morning, extending the previous week's selloff, as investors continued to worry about the economic outlook amid rising inflationary pressures and slower growth prospects.

Because they worry, they take their money out of the US markets and invest it in other world markets. Meanwhile, in other world markets - since the US investors are so worried, the stocks slide too! Because of this global slide, the US investors get good bargains on global stocks and make good money. Which makes them happy. When thy are happy, the stocks price back to normal, and every books profits.

...until, the US investors start becoming worried again.

To buy or not to buy!!

Ooma is coming pretty cheap now. Can get a box for only $350.

Its the free phone service for life endorsed by Ashton Kutcher!

good things!

So, my previous post a little too cynical...!

You can never undo what you've already done. You can only make the best of what you have. So, here's my attempt to better it - some good things that happened this past week - !
1. No one got hurt in the car-based-ice-skating incident
2. My car got damaged when I was *not* in it
3. Got some nice thanksgiving deals
4. Had thanksgiving lunch with Richard's family. Turkey mmm...
5. Had dinner with Ruchi moti
6. Done with the new dashboard for my company

this one requires a special mention since it means much to me :-)
-- My new Nokia N95 is in the mail --

Well, this post certainly outweighs my previous post. I am at peace.

You finally got me.

update 11/24 11:30am: The fire alarm went off in my building, and the fire engine was here. Fortunately there was nothing for concern. Still half of Saturday and Sunday to go before the week ends!

update 11/23 7:30pm: ICICI just called. They said, I'm a NRI so am not allowed to hold the resident savings a/c or transact my DMAT as per RBI regulations. I need to close down my accounts in India.

original post --
God, if you are reading this, are you happy now?

The past week has been eventful, but not for happy reasons.

This past Tuesday it was the first snow of the season. The roads were slippery again. And while Richard and me were driving through the West Lake Dr, I recalled the bad memory of that traffic light. When i allegedly touched (not even sure if i touched!) the car of this Russian female who sued me for $450 later. Snowy days in CT has spelled trouble for me, and history was soon to repeat itself. 10 minutes later, at a speed of about 70+mph, our car skid on the snow and took a 450 degree turn (yes 1 full round and more) and finally stopped after hitting the side barrier. Thankfully there was no car behind us or on our sides, otherwise things would have become bad.
As you could have guessed from the size of this post, things didn't end there (wink!). After making sure that we were alright and the car was drivable, we decided to drive the same car to office. As soon as we reached a speed of about 50mph, the car spun again. This time about 180 degrees and we end up facing incoming traffic behind us. Richard, quickly drove us off road before things got uglier.

Those that drive in US know how embarrassing it is when you get honked. Nobody honked on us on Tuesday since there was no one behind us when we skid. Come Thursday, I was forced to honk not once but twice, on two different occasions, and that too on the freeway driving at 70mph. Why? Because the drivers on my right lane decided to overtake the car in front of them by shifting to the left side. And yes, I was right next to them on their left lane. I am sure they didn't mean to push me off road, but God, twice in a single day?? They changed lanes half-way and then when i honked loud and hard they realized they were on collission course. At such high speeds, a slight touch can spell disaster.

Hmm...a cat has 9 lives, I figured I only have 4. This morning, i was all upbeat and ready to shop for thanksgiving! I was in Circuit city, where I found this really cool 22" widescreen LCD monitor for only $160. Great! Its bigger and better than my T.V ;-)
But, when i came out of Circuit City I finally gave up. God - you win.
My car was hit by someone in the parking lot, and they did not even leave a note (I prolly got one of those junkies that America is full of). They just ran away. Circuit City has no video cameras in the parking lot, so we can't catch them now.










Hmm....Shuchi's camera got stolen and was later found broken in not-working condition - it was my first gift to her. I skipped MIT and Tuck application deadlines, as I haven't been able to cope up with office and the applications.

I don't want to know what else can go wrong. I just hope they don't happen.