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Thursday, July 21, 2011

Amazing Facts About Wine

1. Women who drink two glasses of wine a day are more active in bed. In simple words, they enjoy sex better as compared to women who do not drink wine.

2. The flavour of young wine is known as “aroma” while a mature wine’s flavour is like a “bouquet”.

3. A person who constantly talks about wine that she/he will open but never does, is popularly known as a “cork-tease”.

4. In ancient Greece, a person hosting the party would drink the wine first just to make sure it was healthy to drink and not poisoned. It was here that the popular phrase “drinking to one’s health” arose. It was in ancient Rome that Toasting started when the Romans continue to follow the Greek tradition. However, they were the people to drop a toasted bread in their wine glasses to moderate excessive acidity and undesirable tastes.

5. Except for the Book of Jonah, rest of the entire Biblical Old Testament talks about the wine.

6. You will be astonished to know that early Roman women were not allowed to drink wine. If their husbands found about their wine drinking, they had the liberty to kill them. In 194 B.C.,a divorce also happened due the same reason

7. Since wine tasting is all about wine smelling, women of reproductive ages are better wine testers because they have better smell sense than men.

8. Speyer, a town in Germany is popular as the place where the oldest wine bottle was discovered in A.D. 325, inside one of the two Roman sarcophaguses. The bottle can be seen at the Germany’s Historisches Museum der Pfalz .

9. Highest wine consumption was recorded in the cities of California, Florida and New York of United States of America. France, Italy and Spain are three largest wine producers in the world followed by California.

10. In their endeavour to dissipate the aroma of wine, wine testers twirl their wine glasses, often filling them up to only one third, in order to avoid splitting of wine during a twirl.

11. Drinking wine regularly helps you stay fit and healthy. It has also been found that drinking wine reduces the risk of gum diseases, Alzheimer’s disease, stroke and heart diseases. So, the next time you drink wine, remember it’s health benefits as well.

12. Make sure you never store wine in the kitchen because it is warm, and thus not an ideal place to store it. Moreover, refrigerators are also not the right place to store wines because even at the warm settings, they are very cold.

13. While tasting wine, leave the wine in your mouth for a second or two. Then, you can either spit it out in a spittoon or swallow it. A high quality wine not only tastes good but also has a long after-taste. On the other hand, a low quality wine would have a short after-taste.

14. Ripe and rich dark shades of wine such as the most golden whites, deepest & blackest reds are produced at places that have warmer climate, whereas less lush and lighter shades of wine like white wines are produced at cooler climates. Not many people know that with time white wine becomes golden and brown yellow while red wines lose their colour and turns into a brick red colour.

15. The European Union has decided that any sparkling wine produced outside France cannot be labelled as
“champagne”.

16. Wine when combined with food offers a third flavour or “synergy”. This makes your dining experience, a memorable one. When you plan lighter foods in meal, make sure you have light wines to serve and when you prepare heavy and rich food items, opt for heavier wines. In addition, always remember that serving sweet wine with desserts, white wine with fish and red wine with red meat, compliments your meal.

17. Women who drink excessive wine are at an increased risk of suffering from side effects of wine because the lining of the stomach needed to metabolise alcohol is less in them as compared to men.

18. In the early part of the twentieth century, the “drys” or the prohibitionists protested to eliminate the word “wine” from the college and school texts, including Roman and Greek literature. They also attempted to prove that praises of wine mentioned in Biblical Old Testament are no more than un-fermented grape juice and expressed their views to eliminate medicinal wines from the United States Pharmacopoeia.

Interesting and information about Liquid Nitrogen (LN2)

Liquid nitrogen is what most cryogenic processing companies use to cool the parts in their machines. Here are some facts about liquid nitrogen that may be useful.

The use of liquid nitrogen does not pollute the air. The atmosphere is about 78% nitrogen anyway. Liquid nitrogen is produced by cooling air down until it liquefies. So using liquid nitrogen just puts the nitrogen back where it came from.

The boiling point of LN2 is -320.4oF at 1 atm. (195.8oC, 77.4oK, and 139.3oR)

The heat of vaporization is 38.8 K Cal/Liter or 579 BTU/Gallon

1 Liter of LN2 makes 22.8 ft3 of gas at Standard Temperature and Pressure (STP)

LN2 weighs 6.745 pounds/gallon

LN2 should be used in a ventilated area. Too much used in a closed area will dilute the oxygen in the room and can cause asphyxiation.

Never touch LN2, it is extremely cold and can cause extreme frostbite.

Get training on the use of LN2 and always wear protective gear when using it.

Nitrogen was discovered by Daniel Rutherford in 1772

Nitrogen has a specific heat of 2.04 kj/kg Ko

Nitrogen is the fifth most abundant element in the universe

Nitrogen freezes at -345.9oF. (-209.9C or 63.2oK)

Liquid Nitrogen is usually sold by the "Standard Cubic Foot". This is the amount of space the gas produced by evaporating the liquid would take up at 1 atmosphere and at 68oF. This is done because a great majority of the users get liquid nitrogen for use as a gas. One liter of LN2 will make 22.8 cubic feet of gas.

LN2 is delivered in two ways. It can be delivered in dewars or in bulk. The picture at the right shows a CP-500vi connected to a portable dewar. When the dewar is empty the supplier comes out and picks it up and leaves another. Note that there are wheels on this dewar, but many dewars just sit on the floor. They are heavy, so for safety you need some means of moving them.

Most LN2 suppliers charge rent for the dewars on a day to day basis. They also charge for delivery. Another charge that will show up is a "Hazardous Materials" charge. This is basically a nonsense charge that makes their profit more.

With bulk deliveries, you have a large dewar permanently located at your facility. A truck with a huge dewar on it comes and pumps your dewar full.

Note that LN2 is stored and delivered in dewars. Dewars are the most efficient means of storing LN2. Dewars still lose a little LN2 over time.

THE INDIAN STOCK MARKET

1.India has the third largest economy in the world measured by purchasing power parity.

2. India has the tenth largest economy in the world in US dollar exchange-rate terms.

3. India is is the second fastest growing major economy in the world [9.5% GDP growth rate].

4. Indian Services make up over 61% of their GDP.

5. The inflation rate in India is 5.3%.

6. India has the fourth-largest reserves in the world of coal.

7. India has the world’s largest reserves of thorium, a slightly radioactive metal which has been considered an alternative nuclear fuel to uranium.

8. Indian oil reserves provide 26% of the country’s demand.

9. India ranks second worldwide in farm output.

10. India ranks fourteenth worldwide in factory output

11. Indian IT industry accounts for only about 1% of the total GDP.

12. In 2005, India liberalised its foreign direct investments policy to allow up to a 100% foreign investment stake in India based ventures.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

FUN FACTS ABOUT HONEY BEES & HONEY

  • 80% of the pollination of the fruits, vegetables and seed crops in the U.S. is accomplished by honeybees.
  • Honey bees have five eyes
  • Bees have been producing honey for at least 150 million years
  • A cave painting depicting an androgynous figure robbing honey out of the hive was found in the Cave of the Spider in Valencia, Spain. It is estimated to be 15,000 years old.
  • Honey stored in air tight containers never spoils. Sealed honey vats found in King Tut's tomb still contained edible honey, despite over 2,000 years beneath the sands.
  • A queen is the largest bee in the hive. She can lay up to 2,000 eggs per day, twice her own body weight per day.
  • Drones have no stinger. They do no real work. Their only purpose is to mate with virgin queens.
  • The area now comprising Israel and the Palestine autonomous region is often referred to as "the land of milk and honey." (Exodus 3:8)
  • German peasants were required to give their feudal lords a payment of honey and beeswax.
  • Europeans brought the European Honeybee to America in 1638. The Native Americans referred to the honeybee as the "White Man's Flies," because wild swarms always preceded the arrival of the white man.
  • Bees must visit approximately 2 million flowers to make 1 lb. of honey.
  • Bees have to fly over 55,000 miles to make 1 lb. of honey.
  • On average a worker bee will make 1/12 teaspoon of honey in her lifetime.
  • Two tablespoons of honey would fuel a honey bee flying once around the world.
Honey bees will visit between 50-100 flowers during one nectar collection trip



Honey stored in air tight containers never spoils. Sealed honey vats found in King Tut's tomb still contained edible honey, despite over 2,000 years beneath the sands.


Monday, June 13, 2011

CCL (CELEBRITY CRICKET LEAGUE) FINAL PHOTOS

ACTOR R.SARATH KUMAR AND ACTOR ABBAS ALI GETTING THE WINNERS TROPHY




KICHA SUDEEP GETTING RUNNER UP TROPHY



ACTOR VIRANTH GETTING HIS MAN OF THE MATCH AWARD




ACTRESS SRIDEVI AT PRESENTATION CEREMONY








CELEBRITY CRICKET LEAGUE CHAMPIONSHIP 2011-FINAL

CELEBRITY CRICKET LEAGUE

CHAMPIONSHIP 2011-FINAL

KARNATAKA BULLDOZERS V/S CHENNAI RHINOS


CHENNAI RHINOS WON BY 24 RUNS


TOSS: KARNATAKA BULLDOZERS (Elect to field)


SCOREBOARD


CHENNAI RHINOS

TOTAL 189-8 20 OVERS

BATTING:

VIKRANTH 66(29)

VISHNU 61(37)

ABBAS 15(8)

BOWLING:

PRADEEP 25-3

DHRUV 29-2

ABHIMANYU 29-1

KARNATAKA BULLDOZERS


TOTAL 165-9 20 OVERS


BATTING:

BASKAR 67(47)

SUDEEP 28(20)

MAHESH 17(13)


BOWLING:

SHANTANU 28-2

JEEVA 24-2

SHIVA 21-1

MAN OF THE MATCH : VIKRANTH (50’S -2)


BEST BASTMEN OF SERIES : VISHNU (50’S-3)


MAN OF THE SERIES : DHRUV (50’S-3)

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

10 Signs It’s Time to Leave Your Job

1. Social networking but not working

Are Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter taking up more of your working day than preparing that PowerPoint presentation? If your company doesn’t allow access to these sites, perhaps your energies are focused on finding proxy sites which allow you to access sites that have been blocked by your company.

Or, do you simply dread coming to office and wait for the day to end quickly?

If this happens some days a week, then maybe you simply need a holiday. “But if one spends more than a month populating Farmville on Facebook, then yes, it’s stagnation and you need to move on,” says Purvi Sheth, chief executive officer of Mumbai management consulting firm Shilpusti Consultants.

2. Been there, done that

If your job has become so routine or monotonous that you can do most of it without thinking much, what are you doing in it? Essentially, you are not learning much or growing in that role, so you won’t be able to stay motivated for long. “Careers are not ponds, they are streams; they have got to be going somewhere from somewhere,” says Dony Kuriakose, director of Delhi-based recruitment firm Edge Executive Search Pvt. Ltd. “If you’re not moving, you’re dead in the water.”

Remember that if you have become too complacent and start taking the company for granted, your employer will soon recognize that, putting your role in jeopardy.

3. Not challenged enough

This is related to the point above. But if you feel that your organization is not giving you the right exposure or a challenging enough position, you could end up becoming very frustrated. “Take the initiative of engaging with (your) employer and…ask for more responsibilities,” says Pankaj Arora, managing director of Protiviti Consulting Pvt. Ltd, a business consulting and audit firm. If that doesn’t work, look for challenges elsewhere within or outside your organization.

4. Unmet goals

You want to become a team leader or a business head but your employer is moving you around into different departments without really promoting you. “It is time for you to move on when you feel your career objectives are not being met or fulfilled by your employer,” says Ms. Sheth.

5. Too big for your shoes

You were good at your first job, so you were promoted to the next level and the next level and so on. But now you have reached a position which is too much for you to handle. This is popularly referred to as the Peter Principle which states that in a hierarchy, employees rise to a level of their incompetence.

Either you need to re-skill and reinvent yourself pretty quickly to survive in that role or you need to move into another position which is a better fit for you.

6. Closed to change

Today’s organizations are nimble on their feet and are often changing their processes or businesses to meet delivery and cost pressures. If you can’t handle that change because you are too set in your ways, you could end up getting left behind. Or, maybe you don’t agree with your organization’s changes at a philosophical or an ethical level. “There are certain reasons why you work at a place and there are certain things that enthuse you,” says Mr. Kuriakose. “If those core issues change and you suddenly find that you’re working for a place that you wouldn’t have joined” it might be time to rethink.

7. Politics over mechanics

Every organization has politics and it’s smart to keep on top of major changes as well as the movers and shakers of your organization. But if your professional relationships at work have become so entangled and complicated that they are keeping you from your work, that’s a problem. Don’t let politics become more important to you than the mechanics of your job.

8. You’ve been overlooked — again

Are your batch mates from school and college more successful than you are? Or is your company promoting people with less experience and fewer achievements above you? Figure out why that is happening. If they’re working harder and are smarter than you, then consider adding to whatever skills are keeping you from that next job. But if your company is overlooking you, then it might be time to go where you get more recognition.

9. Don’t want your boss’s job?

We typically envy our bosses not only for their higher salaries but also for the responsibility and authority they command. But if you don’t aspire to be in your boss’s position at some time in the future, then it’s time to look around and reconsider your career plans. You can’t stay in your current position forever. Not everyone has to be the top dog, but a career path that promises advancement and satisfaction is a good road to be on.

10. Evil thoughts about your boss?

Ok, so all of us have some evil thoughts about our bosses every now and then. That’s normal. If you hate him or her as a person, deal with it. But if your professional relationship is troubled, then you have a problem. “You have to work with all kinds of people,” says Mr. Kuriakose. However, a boss who is always pulling you down, and maybe embarrassing you in front of colleagues, could be harmful for your morale and progress. Time for some introspection and perhaps an exit strategy.