Bluetooth basics

Some talk about Bluetooth Tecnology

Bluetooth is a standard developed by a group of electronics manufacturers that allows any sort of electronic equipment -- from computers and cell phones to keyboards and headphones -- to make its own connections, without wires, cables or any direct action from a user. Bluetooth is intended to be a standard that works at two levels:

- It provides agreement at the physical level -- Bluetooth is a radio-frequency standard.
- It also provides agreement at the next level up, where products have to agree on when bits are sent, how many will be sent at a time and how the parties in a conversation can be sure that the message received is the same as the message sent.

The companies belonging to the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, and there are more than 1,000 of them, want to let Bluetooth's radio communications take the place of wires for connecting peripherals, telephones and computers.

My Train journey to Amritsar

After a long time I got some time out. Last time, 4 years back, I had been to Chardham yatra that included Gangotri, Kedarnath and Badrinath. It was a great adventurous journey reaching these places.

This time too, alongwith adventurous it was more of a wonderful one, as I was accompanied by 60 odd people of our community. It was like travelling with a big family where everybody were somehow related to each other. This kind of tours allows you to enjoy the benefits of a large group (cost-wise) while enjoying a full privacy with your family.

We started on the night of 1st Oct. 2004 by Golden Temple Express. Most of us boarded from Borivali station, though some of our group members boarded it from Dadar station. Our Dadar passengers had to face some harassment at the hands of our Indian Railways TC. They were not carrying their train tickets as tickets were with us. We were boarding the train at a very next station i.e. Borivali. Anyways, when Borivali arrived my father who had the tickets instantly solved the problem. This tour was arranged and managed by him with full support from my mother on a no profit - no loss basis.

It was going to take us some 30 odd hours before we reach Amritsar. Thus, all had made a good provision for food and were carrying lots of spicy and tasty eatables along with variety of sweets. I don't remember me eating anything that my Mom had packed for us. As we roamed around inside the compartment our kind and gracious members kept offering different delicacies. Breakfast, brunches and luncheons got fussed into continuous munches. Our mouth was constantly churning things way, throughout the journey as something new always kept pouring in. We never said no.

The group comprised of - 50% more than 60 years of age, 40% - middle-aged and 10% - youngsters, including me. In train we played various card games viz., Challenge or 420, as some people call it. Housie and Antakshari also formed a good time-pass and yes, not to be left out, with lots of laughing. Of these playing Housie proved to be a great fun. At a time we used to be around 15-20 playing around 8-9 games in one session. One of the fellow passenger, who was having a quite afternoon nap, felt disturbed at the noises we were making and warned us. But, after sometime got up and desired to be part of the game. He took the role of announcing numbers. He did that with total dedication. He had a good sense of humor, which showed up while announcing numbers. This added to the fun.

You could now imagine the amount of fun we had for all 30 hrs. We reached Amritsar at 0600 hrs on Sunday, 3rd Oct. 2004. We never realised how time went. This was earlier thought to be a great boredom journey. But, it proved to be opposite. I would remember this journey forever.

Russell Beattie ideas on Bush Administration

When chatting with Pro Bush supporters, remind them of Abu Ghraib. The torture at the prison wasn't the case of "some bad apples," but rather a direct result of George Bush's policies which allowed the U.S. military to ignore and suspend the Geneva Convention and basic human rights. It's quite possible that Bush himself sanctioned the extreme measures taken at the prison, or if not, he at least did everything he could to ignore the abuses and do nothing to correct the mistakes in the military. What do you think is going to happen to American prisoners of war from now on?

Look at what Amnesty International thinks of the Human Rights Abuses at Guantánamo Bay. And look at the fact that *hundreds* of prisoners - the supposedly most dangerous criminals and terrorists in the world - have been released and are free after years of detention with out charges.

But it's not just foreigners our government is imprisoning, Jose Padilla - a U.S. Citizen - was taken away in 2002 and imprisoned without charges, directly violating the fifth amendment of the U.S. Constitution. This could happen to you.