Read from February to March 2007.

This self-help book on relationships is interesting, but many of the things discussed have proliferated into common society now.  There still are techniques mentioned that I found somewhat helpful.  As an engagement present this is a good book to read.  It is a good skimming book because Gray repeats himself over and over again - something common in self-help books.  At times I felt the entire book could be condensed into a 30 page pamphlet.

But the wisdom is useful, especially if you are in a relationship and going through a difficult period.

I would recommend this book if you have not read any other books in the last 15 years on relationships - I am assuming that most of the book cover the same material.

Read more about it and purchase it from here.

There are those orphan pictures that need to be on the website, but do not belong in any particular album. I have a couple from recent months that I need to upload. Thanks to the convenience of Live Writer (blog), I am throwing them into this post and calling it a day.

Dinner with friends before watching “Casino: Royale”

Taken on November 18, 2006.

In the picture, from left to right: Matt, Gina, Brian, Stephanie, Shaina, Kevin, Shanna (Derek was out of town), Vaishail, Achint, Rajat.

This was the first time time I had seen many of these folks in several months. Tony and Jessica were missed, but I am still getting used to the idea of them getting a sitter and such in order to come out during the evenings.

Sachin’s Bachelor Party

There are a few more pictures, but this is the one I like the most (and is best for public consumption). The party was on December 2, 2006.

Note: Clicking on each will bring the picture in its full size in a new window. Save this picture to your computer and use a service like Shutterfly or Snapfish (what Costco uses) to get prints made.

I have recently been using Orkut more and more. Turns out most of my Indian friends are on Orkut far before any other social networking site. When using it today I noticed that they offer a Google Talk connection so you can chat with your friends. This is the link that most social networking sites are lacking (one of the things they are lacking). Figures that Google would solve this. It has been very interesting to watch how Google has created more and more integrated products (or properties if you wish) in the last six months.

I went through the steps of hooking up my Google Account to a Google Talk account. This was painless. Then I decided I didn’t want another IM client running on my machine, so I wanted to get my newly created Orkut Google Talk working in Gaim (my IM client of choice).

In the effort of brute force attempts, I stumbled upon what appears to be the correct configuration for getting your Orkut Google Talk account working in Gaim. It seems these steps are very similar to setting up Gaim with someone using Google Apps, see the references section below for those instructions.

(Note: These dialogs are described from Gaim 2.0 Beta 6 - the same content has existed since the latest released version Gaim 1.5 but the order/location of the info might be changed. So just read the content here and scour the Gaim settings area for the appropriate field to fill in.)

Setting up an Orkut Google Talk account in Gaim:

1. Create an Google Talk screen name, this is linked to the Google Account associated with the Orkut user.
2. In Gaim, create a new account (Ctrl+A)
3. Fill in the following settings:

   Basic Tab
       Protocol: Jabber
       Screen name: (Fill in Google Talk Screen Name
                    created in Step 1)
       Server: gmail.com
       Resource: Orkut
   
   Advanced Tab
       Connect Server: talk.google.com

4. Click Save

To Add Orkut Friends to your Gaim friend list: 

1. Add Buddy (Ctrl+B)
2. Screen name: Google Talk Screen name (in your friend’s profile page, it is after the Google Talk:) @gmail.com - for example if your Google Talk Screen name is bob then the Screen name here is: bob)
3. Pick your newly created Jabber account from the list, and click Add

References:

• How do I configure Gaim to connect to Google Talk for my domain
• How do I configure Gaim for Google Talk?

Give it a try, let me know if my steps are confusing.