Archive for Hobbies

March 26th 2011

Some Of My Best Read Novels

by Anwin in Books, Hobbies     tags:       3 Comments

Wow, I read a totally different set of books. Strange…hmm…

My all time favorite author of recent times is Lee Child. The Jack Reacher series has been exceptionally brilliant and seat gripping. (Since Mr. Ludlum can’t write from beyond the grave). If as a reader one would like to try out Lee Child, I suggest reading Die Trying to start with. Amazing action with vivid explanations about the 1 mile shot. Yes, how to take a shot across a mile with varying wind conditions, trajectories and with a good sniper rifle. YUM!!!

My favorites are below (all fiction):

Horror: Stephen King’s The Dark Tower Series (there are 7 books out of which all of them are amazing. You just cannot wait until one book is over so you can start on the next)

Thriller: Alistair McLean’s Force 10 from Navarone and Puppet on a Chain

Spy thriller: Robert Ludlum’s The Bourne Series (I tell you, the movies are awesome, but still incomparable to the three original books)

Science Fiction: Isaac Asimov’s The Foundation Series (A trilogy + 2, an amazing story of human endurance and ingenuity and the future of mankind set somewhere far far away in the future. Simply amazing, and marvelous the images that come into your mind when you get involved with Asimov’s books).

Classics: A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens and The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas.

Pulp Fiction: James Hadley Chase and Nick Carter Series.

Latest authors I am reading: Matthew Reilly, Andy McNab and Vince Flynn. And I really hope I find more similar authors once I exhaust the books written by these guys :-( .

And I read every day, at all costs and no matter what. At least 10 pages a day.

March 9th 2011

Renie’s Jewel Fishes With Nest

by Anwin in Fish, Hobbies, Pics     tags: ,       5 Comments

Renie sent a picture of his Jewel fishes with their nest. Saw the pic today and I wanted to write a post immediately. Talk about inspiration!

I remember going to his house in nagercoil and always finding cichlids, be it bandit cichlids or aurotex cichlids (not sure if I got the name right – they are the ones with yellow and black horizontal bars on the body), breeding and with innumerable babies and juveniles in one of his cemented tanks.

The secret to his style of breeding is to give a large tank, no special care given, lots of hiding places, and not disturbing the fishes.

Blogged using wordpress app from Nokia on my E71.

September 23rd 2010

Bannerghatta National Park Big Cats In Trouble

by Anwin in Animals, Bangalore, Cats, Flickr, Hobbies, Pics, Snakes, Trip     tags: , , , , , , , , ,       7 Comments

Poor guys, they seem to have got some bug or something. It has been a sad week with 5 big cats dying in the past week at Bangalore’s Bannerghatta National Park or Biological Park. Two of them were old Bengal tigers and a White Tiger who, officials say, has died of an almost 3 months battle with kidney disease. And another, a cub which probably died of salmonella and E.coli. Really really sad.

Read more here and here.

Anyway, I feel someone has supplied real bad chicken meat there. Hmm…

Some of my old friends (who I hope are still running around):

He was quite majestic looking and not at all bothered about people around.

This guy was a bit uneasy around us. He was lying under the shades when we came and proceeded to get into the man made pool for a quick dip.

This guy was totally cool. All pictures were taken this April – on the 24th to be precise.

Some other pictures I liked:

One of the truly free guys. He was on the rampage and fighting turf wars all around us on the footpaths and on the trees.

Mother and two baby monkeys (Rhesus monkeys) watching out for the big guy in the previous picture.

And two butterflies ‘going at it’ at the butterfly park adjacent to BBP ;-) .

Please do check out my flickr set too.

August 8th 2010

Wide N Straight Handlebars For My Enfield Bullet Standard

by Anwin in Bikes, Hobbies, Personal, Pics     tags: ,       5 Comments

Got a chance to change the handlebars on my 1986 Enfield Standard. I was very nervous after buying the handle at JC Road. It was big and wide and I had no visualization of how it would look on the bike.

Anyway, all my fears turned out to be groundless since the bike handles beautifully well.

New look:

Previous mod:

February 17th 2010

A Red Dragon Hmpk Betta Picture

by Anwin in Betta, Fish, Hobbies, Pics     tags: , ,       2 Comments

No, that’s not latin :)

It just means – a betta plakat (PK) fish (siamese fighting gish) with a pattern on its body called ‘red dragon’ and with finnage of a halfmoon (HM) (a circle cut in half?).

I am bad at explaining, so here’s a handy link to the Wikipedia page on bettas and their fin types – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siamese_fighting_fish#Tail_shapes.

That’s a ‘Red Dragon’ pattern – a visible layer of white on the body with red fins.

In the above picture the betta shows his tail fin which has straight edges and a 180 degree spread. Hence the name, halfmoon – HM.

And the below picture, just to show the betta’s body in detail.

The above pictures are all of the bugger who is the star of my lot of fishes.