The Official Blog of Ranganathan Sankaralingam (We Have No Branches)

Comments for the post on my blog.

We watched the Namesake yesterday. I had loved the book for its true-to-life depictions of a student-immigrant’s life and thoughts. Everybody was compassionately presented. So I had high hopes for the movie, but the movie fell far short of my expectations.

Instead of telling a story, Mira Nair has hijacked the movie to show off her mastery of visuals. It’s a self-aggrandizing movie in which precious seconds are spend showing snow melting while Ashima’s development from dependence to independence is not explored well. A visit to the Taj, a passing mention in the book, takes up several scenes and is an excuse for Mira Nair to capture the squalor or Calcutta (yes, she shows the hand-drawn rickshaw) and the majesty of the Taj. The centrality of the train accident to the movie is not at all clear in the movie.

I agree with Jhumpa Lahiri’s view that Mira Nair has succeeded in telling a Bengali story in the stereotypical Bengali movie style. Not a mean feat, considering that Nair doesn’t come from that tradition. But what’s the point? Her job is to tell a story and fails miserably at that. This is a huge waste of a good story, in my humble opinion.

This is a good story that deserves to be told better and I would gladly contribute $200 to any amateurs who want to remake this movie. Robert Rodriguez shot El Mariachi for $7,000 or something back in 1992; so I am convinced that amateurs can literally make a better movie than this.

Maybe famous directors shouldn’t direct good stories because they may end up obscuring the story and putting their stamp on. Peter Jackson deserves much praise for having the humility to stay true to the book.

Mystery solved: Windows has some smart algorithms in the mouse driver to make pixel-level control easier.

See my write-up here: Why it’s Easier to Control the Mouse in Windows

Unhappy Meals, by Michael Pollan

via reddit. 

Couple of interesting points:

.. freezing food destroys the fiber that would slow sugar absorption.

From Whole Foods to Refined: “Chemical fertilizers simplify the chemistry of the soil, which in turn appears to simplify the chemistry of the food grown in that soil. Since the widespread adoption of synthetic nitrogen fertilizers in the 1950s, the nutritional quality of produce in America has, according to U.S.D.A. figures, declined significantly.”

From Complexity to Simplicity: For reasons of economics, the food industry prefers to tease its myriad processed offerings from a tiny group of plant species, corn and soybeans chief among them. Today, a mere four crops account for two-thirds of the calories humans eat. When you consider that humankind has historically consumed some 80,000 edible species, and that 3,000 of these have been in widespread use, this represents a radical simplification of the food web. Why should this matter? Because humans are omnivores, requiring somewhere between 50 and 100 different chemical compounds and elements to be healthy. It’s hard to believe that we can get everything we need from a diet consisting largely of processed corn, soybeans, wheat and rice.

From Leaves to Seeds: … these crops are exceptionally efficient at transforming sunlight into macronutrients — carbs, fats and proteins … the fact that grains are durable seeds … means they can function as commodities as well as food, making these plants particularly well suited to the needs of industrial capitalism. Put in the simplest terms, we’re eating a lot more seeds and a lot fewer leaves, a tectonic dietary shift the full implications of which we are just beginning to glimpse.

Omega-3 acids come from plants: Most people associate omega-3 fatty acids with fish, but fish get them from green plants (specifically algae), which is where they all originate. Plant leaves produce these essential fatty acids (“essential” because our bodies can’t produce them on their own) as part of photosynthesis. Seeds contain more of another essential fatty acid: omega-6. Without delving too deeply into the biochemistry, the two fats perform very different functions, in the plant as well as the plant eater … Since the two lipids compete with each other for the attention of important enzymes, the ratio between omega-3s and omega-6s may matter more than the absolute quantity of either fat. Thus too much omega-6 may be just as much a problem as too little omega-3.

And the recommendations?

HERO HERO HERO HERO -> Eat food. Though in our current state of confusion, this is much easier said than done. So try this: Don’t eat anything your great-great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.

I’ve been trying to do this for a long time, but without much success. After reading the first point about frozen veggies, I am giving serious thought to giving up on them. The toughest one is going to be non-dairy creamer. I love it.

Eat mostly plants, especially leaves.

Eat traditional foods.

A life-or-death situation: Family poisoned by mushrooms first to receive experimental treatment

Just look at the number of interacting entities! And the willingness of the bureaucracy
to cut red tape and move fast to the save the lives of some random guys.

I am impressed. via.

The grinch who stole $3.99

If a non-profit sends people to do giftwrapping, Amazon will give the charity 60-75 cents per package. Amazon charges the customer $2.99-$5.99 per giftwrapping.

It sounds borderline unethical to me.

I found this interesting aside in an article linked from reddit:

And there’s the scary, unsexy truth about search, the one you’ll never read about in a search engine’s top-10 list: Most people aren’t really searching. They’re using search engines as navigation, typing website names or even URLs into the search box that automatically pops up in their browser.

I know that many the “search” feature of many websites simply reproduces canned results for popular searches [E.g., "live" on Microsoft]. I would not be surprised if “real” search engines were doing the same.

The Hindu has an article titled “Labour shortage affects industries in Erode” which states that owners of industrial units are finding it difficult to find workers for their blue-collar positions. One owner went 1000 km away to Bihar and Orissa to find workers.

They give two reasons:

1. Workers are not interested in more work for more more pay. Once a worker earns decides he’s earned “enough” in a day, he is not interested in working any more that day.
2. People are becoming more educated, and once educated, they do not want blue-collar jobs.

Or maybe it’s just that the wages being offered are too low.

Today, I bumped into the full-text version of the book “Almost Perfect”, a history of WordPerfect by following random Wikipedia links. I read this book many years ago and found it very interesting. The guy has a plain, straightforward, and engaging style. Highly recommended. [Btw, here is a less-than glowing review].

If you read this book hoping to learn more about running a business, then I hope you noted the parts about teaching correct principles and allowing employees to govern themselves. In spite of the problems I had understanding and implementing this philosophy, I am convinced it is the best way to run a business. In today’s competitive environment, businesses can no longer afford the overhead of one supervisor for every five or six employees. As organizations flatten and supervision decreases, employees will make more decisions on their own and govern themselves much more than they have in the past. If a company is to function effectively, its employees must have a good understanding of what is expected of them. Very small organizations may be able to find success without defining and teaching correct principles, but any business with more than 25 or 30 people must get organized. [emphasis mine]

The guy’s grit, determination, and self-confidence are inspiring. What a comeback! I hope he leads India to victory in the World Cup.