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Google asked me to login to my blog today! After (three?) years I had forgotten that blogger uses a login - anyhow, it is awfully convenient that it is the linked to the google login. In this day and age when absolutely everything needs a login and password do you ever find yourself running out of creativity? When the process first started for me over ten years ago, first hotmail accounts and the name choosing thereof - amritaprasad - taken, amritaprasad83 - taken, thisisridiculous!!!- taken... you get the idea! Then comes the task of figuring out passwords that are, for all practical purposes, uncrackable. So the adolescent fourteen year old naively puts in the name of the latest crush or the hottest TV star at the time and can keep it this way until one day, several years later you need someone else to open your email for you and you have to sheepishly reveal said password.
So after the initial enthusiasm and the subsequent realisation that it is impossible to remember all the logins and passwords you decide on a few generic numbers and words and keep it that way! And speaking of logins and google - have you ever noticed how a person's Gtalk status bar can tell you all you need to know about their state of mind that day, or how it can bind you for life! Like the day that Obama won - every status message on my Gtalk side panel had some variation of 'Yeah Obama'! One look and it can give you that warm and fuzzy feeling that someone else is suffering too when the status message says 'I hate work' or 'I need a break'! It can be a conversation starter like when I changed mine to 'Amrita thinks' - people wanted to know what I thought, voluntarily, without me having to hold a gun to their head or anything!
It can also be a conversation killer like when the message says 'Do not disturb busy pretending to work'. It can be full of surprises, pleasant like when a friend says 'Hi' while on invisible or unpleasant when a friend says 'Hi' while on invisible and then compels you to change your status to invisible. Of course there are the quiet days when all it says is 'Away' or 'Not at desk' but then there are interesting times like when it says 'I cannot believe it happened' and then the conversation flows from there!
It is a little window to everyone's lives and really it goes to show how we can really sum up our days into one little sentence.
Apart from analysing Gtalk messages I have also been reading 'My sister's keeper' by Jodi Picoult and for now I am hooked!
Next update on this blog will be a book review.

History

The last week has been full of unforeseen circumstances. Some good, some not so good. It has led to heart-ache, head-ache and a strange pain in my upper ribs leading me to think that I may have cracked one, what with all the coughing and sneezing fits. But that is for a doctor to decide.
Last week also saw America vote in its very first African-American President and I reckon us who are alive and kicking today should be proud to have been a part of history! I was among the millions who watched Obama's victory. I was also one of the millions who watched this non-entity, Sarah Palin, rise to alarming levels of power and for the lack of a better word, stupidity!
Strangely enough I only listened to two of Obama's speeches, the first when he won his party's vote and the second when he was elected to the highest office in the world!
If there is one thing and one thing only to say for the man - he can talk!
I am not interested in current affairs and politics and my knowledge of these does not extend past the day's headlines, however after Bush the Second came into power (twice!) and thoroughly mis-used it causing grief to millions and basically wrecking havoc on the world, my opinion changed. Of course I had no power in voting him out but I could join in harshly disliking him! I am not of the school of thought that thinks the Bush doctrine is correct and I cannot bring myself to agree that thanks to his 'actions' he has thwarted all further attacks on American soil. I just don't like the way he goes about things - but to each his own I guess.
So it came to pass that I took more than a passing interest in the US elections this year and supported Obama whole-heartedly (if only because he seemed like the lesser of two evils!). Another reason this election was entertaining was because of Gov. Palin. Of course the media exploited her greatly, much like they did Bush himself, however there cannot be fire without fuel. There is more than a fine line between inexperience and sheer lack of ability and it was abundantly clear which side of the line Mrs. Palin was on. That said, I did feel sorry for John McCain when I heard his speech accepting defeat but he did not seem up for the daunting task ahead and worse still, in the case of his demise it would be Mrs. Palin who would be the first (and probably the most cerebrally challenged) female President. And it is a genuine concern!
I do not know if Obama will do all the claims to and neither does the rest of the world. What we do know is that he knows what needs to be done and that is a start. While McCain seemed oblivious to the idea of an economic meltdown, Obama realised that it was imminent. And the fact of the matter is that is happened!
For everyone that says that Obama's African-American heritage was an advantage, statistically it was not and even if it made people of this race vote for him, so bloody what? - he had an advantage and a fair one (pun unintended!). His advantage was not that he bribed people, or coerced them, his advantage was that in-spite of physically appearing like a minority he knew his stuff. He knew the problems and he proposed solutions and did so while speaking like a messiah and looking like a, well, Hollywood star! I say kudos to him.
This is for all those that claim that America is a woman unfriendly place which explains why Hillary Clinton was not chosen and Sarah Palin was targeted by media. Go to America and you will see that an African American man is still considered lower than a white female and there are no two ways about it. It was an unfortunate stereo-type - until now!
So I had goosebumps while listening to Obama's victory speech, not because the words were flowery but because he is a born orator. If Bush or even Hillary Clinton had said the same words they could not have accompanied it with what seemed like honesty of spirit.
It remains to be seen what will come out of all this but we cannot dispute that history has been made, we have all been a part of it and we are all the better for it.