070723

CRACKPOT

introduction

i am sure you know what is a crackpot; but do you know what is crakblok?

well, crakblok is a facility provided by an indian isp as a security measure to their dial up net work customers. if you activate this facility your internet account will be tied up with the particular telephone number of your choice. suppose i steal your username and password for tata indicoms dial up connection and try to access the net from my telephone or for that matter any other telephone other than the one you have choosen on the crakblok i will not be allowed to log on to the net.

well; i do have a dial up net work account with tata indicom's vsnl.net. it is not free; i pay them eight rupees for every hour i spend on the net over and above the telephone charges. and i will tell you what happens when i try to use the crakblok facility. we will start, not with presenting compalints but, with past history and it is indeed a more logical way of approaching a problem - that is if it is not a dire emergency!

past history

i stay in a rented house and have to shift house frequently. every time i shift house i have to shift my telephone connection as well and it invariably has a new number at the new place.

when i shifted house in 2006 also i had a telephone with a new number at the new house. before i moved out i forgot to deactivate the crakblok of my internet account. that means that the crakblok will prevent me from accessing the net from my present telephone. all the same i tried just for the heck of it. surprise! i got logged in! how come?

i telephoned the help number of the isp. the gentleman said that the crack block was in place and accepted that there is a snag some where and assured me that they will take up the matter with the telephone company. - that was the last i heard of the incident. in short, my faith in the isp was rather misplaced.

it was by sheer accident that i came to know that the crakblok in my case was for name sake only. there was no way i could have checked it up for i have no human contact over here; and checking up invaribly means using some one else's computer and telephone to try it out.

if i complain to the isp they will pass the blame on to the telephone company and the telephone company will give the information to g. sujathan as evidence of my insanity. so, better keep mum!

the present

the present is not history as yet. after the above incident i was not using the crakblok; what is the point? and in this house also i was not using it. but just like all mad men do, a couple of days back i also heard a voice (auditory hallucination ?) telling me - activate the crakblok!

i obeyed the command; at least i tried to and tried activating the crakblok. well i was not able to. when i try to open the page i could not find the page where the facility is there to enter the telephone number and without a telephone number how can you activate the service ? my conclusion was that the gestapo is not interested in my using the crakblok.

may be i needed help and help came in the form of another voice from the helpline of the isp. the voice tried from the other side and activated the crakblok on my behalf

good, eh? No; bad. from that moment onwards i could not access the net any more though i was dialing from the telephone which was entered by the help desk in the crakblok. how come?

if you ask me, i would say that it is because my telephone is being tampered with and when i use my dial up connection and it reaches the server the telephone number is different from or at least the criteria set by the server to accept it as coming from 2357704 are not satisfied. and i am not allowed to log in. i have told you time and again about the gestapo's proxy server and the net nanny and all.

after a couple of days of not being able to use that net connection, the voice came back to me again. and the voice this time on told me to deactivate the crakblok and try again to connect to the net.

as usual i obeyed the voice. i accessed the net through my bb ( pronounced beeevi) and tried deactivating the crakblok - NO problem. it got deactivated damn fast inspite of my intellectual impairment.

i logged out from bb and tried connecting from the dial up net work with the crakblok deactivated. NO problem at all ! i could log on to the net and that too from the same dial up networking connection through the very same telephone line that was not allowing me to log on till the previous moment.

how come - aisa kyom? i would say that this is almost definite proof that the telephone line is being tampered with. with the crakbok on the indian gestapo cannot make me go through his proxy server and have complete control over my net connection.

oh, dont bother yaaar; it is all the gibberings of a raving lunatic! oh, yes;

I'm MaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaD

viceman
070723

* * *

related links

home
Rome
movies
more movies
picasa
flickr
diary land
youTube
address

070716

I'm MaaaaaaaaaaD

breeding

"would you like to sit down sir?" that was a young man, must be in his late teens, offering me a seat that became vacant in a public transport bus in which we both were standing passengers. i profusely thanked the youngster and made him take the seat.

some other time, while i was walking back to the bus stop, a paper flew off from my files. a girl (she was in a sari and must have crossed her teens) ran after it and fetched it and gave it to me.

both the above incidents occurred in ernakulam and happened a couple of years back. then why do i bring it up now?

for one thing, if some one does me a good turn i never forget it ( same in case of a bad turn as well ). but the real reason why i brought it up right now is to provide contrast; i was painting the board white - if you write on a white board with black ink it stands out sharp.

last monday, that is exactly one week back i had been to tirumala town looking for some place where i could get my old transistor radio repaired.

( yes, i still listen to the radio; i am almost addicted to the bbc news bulletins and for once there is an india govt. owned set up doing a magnificent job - vividh bharathi .

also, i wonder why people listen to the doordarshan news where there absolutely are no visuals. what is the fun in watching balakrishnan's bearded face? you listen to the pradeshika varthakal which is as good if not better!

well, DD news do have visuals just for the heck of it. if there is a news item on a happening in andhra pradesh you might be able to see a map of andhra with a dot showing hyderabad! does it help you in any way?)

coming back to my trip to tirumala, it looks no one uses the radio hereabouts; at least there was no one in thirumala who would repair my radio. and i was standing by the side of the road, looking up the neighbouring shops in case there is some radio repairer around. and then it happened.

the despicable wretch

some one started hooting the horn from close by. i thought it could be of no concern to me, for i was far away from the motorable part of the road, and so i went on with my business. when the hooting persisted i looked around and lo, there was this great man sitting on his bike standing behind me.

the fellow indicated to me to move off. i hesitated initially but thought better of it and moved off for i did not want to get into an argument and may be an ensuing scuffle.

rather than bothering with the hooting, he could have tilted the handle of his two wheeler by a couple of degrees and gone his way; but not our great man - he owns a motor bike, where as i am on foot! this is the type of behaviour typical of the gentry here in thiruvananthapuram - ill-mannered, ill-bred.

i am not saying that every one in trivandrum is like that; of course, there are exceptions.

"nooorru suputhranmar undavatte"

while walking back to my house on that monday, i was wondering - are the parents of the youngsters, like the ones i met in ernakulam, doing the right thing by their children - teaching them manners and being good and all that?

with the ideas of right and wrong, which many a time the very parents do not practise, drilled into their young mind, i am afraid, it is a no-win situation.

if you follow those principles life is going to be difficult. like, if you dont occupy the seat immediately it becomes vacant, some one else will take it and you will keep standing not only in the bus but all through your life.

what did the young girl gain by being nice to me? do you think the good wishes of an ordinary mortal like me will help her in any way? suppose i bless her that she be the mother of even one fine son, leave alone the one hundred good sons of yonder years ( i am sure she wold'nt want all that one hundred !) will it work out ?

on the contrary, if you go against those principles, again, life is going to be miserable - prick ( no, not that one), of conscience!

who is the one fit for survival ?
those fine youngsters i met a couple of years back or the wretch whom i met last week?

all bloody f*&^ing rot?
dont worry;
" I'm MaaaaaaaaaaaaaaD "

viceman
070716

* * *

related links

Rome
movies
more movies
picasa
flickr
diary land
youTube
home
address

you cannot keep a jyothi down

i am sure some of you must have you been wondering why i am taking pains to have a home page of my own on my hard disk!

well, the fact is that many of the things you can do on your computer are not allowed on mine. i cannot make bookmarks nor can i add pages to favourites and store pages for offline viewing. you can see all the urls you have recently visited appearing in the drop down from your address column on your browser. none of such things are available on my computer. in short every time i hit my back button the page has to come from the gestapo's server; there is nothing saved in my cache. so the way out is what you see as the so called launch pad in one of my blogs.

i am not allowed to take advantage of the facilities available with a net connection of my own. like last night i tried to make a telephone call from my puter. initially i tried my dial up net connection with tata indicom. i logged on to the net and then started my net telephony connection. as i started dialing the program came up with an error report. actually what happened was that the dial up connection was cut off. could be an accident; possible but not probable. all the same i logged on to the net again and as i started dialing from the net telephony account the net connection was again cut off. this process was repeated four times.

could be that it was a dial up connection and so the bandwidth was not enough so i logged on to my ADSL connection with bsnl and tried the net telephony (which comes from the tata indicom - the fact is that i have a lot of free hours pending with them and so net telephony comes handy for other wise the hours are likely to expire after a fixed time.) inspite of the broad band and all it did not work - this time the net telephony software was telling me "you are already logged in". well it was not me who has logged in for i was not able to use the facility. then who was the one who logged in? any idea?

i rang up the tataindicom's help line. and spent almost half an hour on the line.(luckily this time i could carry on the conversation with the person on the help line for the indian gestapo was not muffling my ear piece as was done on an earlier date). ultimately the gentleman told me he will tell their local representative in trivandum to contact me.

after the conversation i tried logging on again and this time there was no one else already logged in! i could dial and get connected to a number but the person at the other end could not hear me. when i tried the tools for adjusting the mic and the speakers i was told that some one else is using the hardware - the reason for no voice going over to the other side was obvious. so i gave up ultimately and went to bed.

today that is 11 july night i tried again. every thing worked fine and i could talk to a newyork telephone number for ten minutes or so for less than half a dollar! it was the same puter, the same hardware, same software, the same broadband and the same net telephony connection! but this time "no problem"!

between you and me there is no secret!

who was the person in new york i was talking to ? i will tell you; but please dont tell any one else.

i had sent a rather (by my standards) costly present to my girl friend in new york by a registered acknowledgement due letter in may 2007. even after one month the acknowledgement card (for which i have paid the indian postal service almost the same amount as i did on the phone call made today ) has not reached me. i do not blame the post man - how many gerries said no to the gestapo before the war! there was no point sending an e-mail or even a letter. and now that i have the broadband connection and tata's net telephony the easiest and cheapest way out was to make a call from the net phone. and the indian gestapo was throwing a spanner in the works!

may his (her as well) tribe increase

there was nothing i could have done about it. the fact that today i was able to make a call and get an assurance from my girl friend's staff that the present has reached her was just an indication that there still are a trickle of sensible human beings over here - ben adam's tribe has not yet been completely annihilated!

the fraternity

there has been a response to my letter copy of which was published on the web last time. NOT a reply - a pBird has been posted to the tree just adjacent to my bed room and thanks to its shrieks, day before yester day i was forced to get up at 0430 hrs.

there is nothing i can do about it - the birdees keep a safe distance till dusk and then there is not much of a point trying my air gun. so for the last two night i have been sleeping in the spare bed room on the first floor which is on the opposite side of the house. and i woke up yesterday at 1200 and today at 1000 hrs respectively; cool.

you cannot keep the viceman down

viceman
070711

* * *

links

Rome
movies
more movies
picasa
flickr
youTube
home
address

text of another letter despatched vide no.833622 dt 29 june 07 of professional couriers statue trivandrum

Cheriyath Jyothi
TC 18/1626(2), paraputta lane
Aramada P.O
Thiruvananthapuram - 695032,
tele - 2357704

no.0706D/mess

29 june 2007

to
the principal, medical college trivandrum,
medical college p.o., trivandrum - 695011.

ISSUE OF NO-LIABILITY/LIABILITY CERTIFICATE
AND RELEASE OF GRATUITY
dr. cheriyath jyothi
retd. Lecturer, medical college, trivandrum

A. this is in the context of the communication received by me vide no.G3-10223/05/DME of the director of medical education kerala dated 23.4.2007.

1. i noticed with "glee" that you want me to pay rs.20,000/- as damages because i did not appear for the pg examination. Your audacity is commendable.

2. why just rupees twenty thousand only ? why not two hundred thousand ? And why not stop my whole pension as such?


B. by the way what happened to your plans to get me certified? You have the "inquiry" report by your esteemed predecessor and famous police surgeon g. Sujathan with you. And you can still get the local police to establish that i am a public nuisance and put me in.

you are a great person; you can still do it.

Be bold! for once, come out into the open; come and get me.

sd.
( C. Jyothi )

enclosure - copy of my letter no. 0705k/PEN/DME/ dated 25 may 2007
addressed to the director of medical education, kerala.

* * * * *

viceman

070703
last updated 070703

top

home