A Place to Show your photos to the world

In my opinion the biggest success factor of internet is its visual appeal and worldwide reach. If internet as a media had not offered users an opportunity of free photo sharing with their family, friends and people across the world it may not have become so popular. The most popular sites on the world wide web are photo sharing websites. There are hundreds, perhaps thousands of websites which enable users to upload and share their pictures with the world. I have signed up in couple of these sites and share my pictures online with my friends and family.
I recently came across a brand new photo sharing website. Like all other image, picture and photo sharing sites this has a unique and peculiar name, Picuna. What I particularly liked about Picuna is its simplicity in design without any fancy graphics, animations or jarring colors and its offering. Users have access to unlimited photo sharing for free. These pictures can be mapped as per latitude and longitude, thus giving a geospatial appeal to your pictures.
I particularly liked the fact that one can use these pictures as postcards to create online greetings. One need not own the picture to do that. This gives me access to millions of potentially award-winning photographs. Being a avid traveler I like to look at a place before I visit and these kind of websites provides me the right opportunity to take in a location and get familiar with it before getting there.
The fact that within just a short time Picuna has become so popular is proof that this site has some great offerings, both in terms of pictures and benefits for those who register now. If you were fed up of old picture sharing websites where there are hundreds of restrictions about what you can do and what you can't, just get into Picuna and experience a world of difference.

Vistas of Collin County

Last weekend I had gone driving to explore the rural areas of Collin County and what I saw flabbergasted me completely. There are roads which seemed as if they had not seen asphalt for decades, lined by trash on either sides, these roads had only gravel on the surface. Then of course there were several modern style village roads with good signage, smooth surface and wide enough for two large vehicles pass each other. But overall the road signs in rural Collin County needs improvement. Here are some images.

Concrete can be decorative and artistic!!!

One of the fantastic inventions of the modern world is concrete, which has a multitude of applications in construction of pretty much everything. Homes, offices, roads, sidewalks, etc are all either built or strengthened with concrete. But I have seen that few companies have innovated and gone further from plain concrete to creating attractive and decorative works with concrete. These companies use vivid colors and myriad patterns to create Decorative Concrete acid staining concepts which give an additional allure to the building.

When I visited California last year I saw that San Diego area has some fantastically designed concrete structures. It made me wonder whether concrete has become the new medium for artists in San Diego. It seemed that everything built of concrete in San Diego had an artistic touch to it. I now understand that there are different applications to concrete. It can be structural giving strength to buildings, roads, walls, etc; concrete can be used in streets for paving, landscaping and other purposes too. Then there is of course the new concept of concrete design San Diego which includes reactive coloration, micro toppings, grinding, polishing and other treatments to make buildings, walls and other structures look beautiful and pleasing to the eye.

One thing becoming aware of the possibilities in concrete changed my opinion about concrete.

Grand Canyon Monuments

Grand Canyon 068, originally uploaded by srinidhilv.

This is another recreated monument in the South Rim of Grand Canyon. Like all other monuments here this also represents what Native American architecture is all about. The material used to construct this monument was found here and the design was adapted from some research about Native American architecture.
This monument like all others serves the dual purpose of serving as a tourist attraction and also to portray to the world the "European White colonial-settlers" care and consideration to preserve the culture of Native populations. While conveniently ignoring the fact that the ancestors of these very "Colonial-settlers" massacred and decimated large native populations in order to create the empire.

Grand Canyon View Points!

Grand Canyon 042, originally uploaded by srinidhilv.

All along the South Rim of the Grand Canyon are these tiny metal contraptions which help one focus on a particular spot. This not a telescope or lens, but just an empty metal tube installed on a sturdy stand. The tube helps focus on a particular point of interest. There are natural rock formations which look like objects we are familiar with, but without these tubes it would be almost impossible to discern them in the vast canyon area.
The tubes pretty much act like blinders on horses and help focus in the right direction.

Finding a great Realtor in Dallas

Nationwide the real estate industry is flagging and going through a severe downturn. Realtors are finding it difficult to close sales like before. There are few cities across the country where the downturn has not been so bad. Dallas, Texas is one such example where the real estate market didn't rise to astronomical heights nor did it plummet. The market has been real steady and realtors are still in business.

Dallas area has thousands of realtors, but how do you find one who is right for you? Finding right Dallas realtors can be quite a challenge due to several reasons. The realtor has to understand your needs, he has to find homes which suit your personality and preferences and ensure that it is also within the price range you are comfortable with.

In my opinion the first step in finding a good realtor is by asking friends who have bought nice homes. Find out how their realtor worked with them and helped them get into their dream home. If you find your friends recommending their realtor, you should have a talk with him to see if he could be your realtor. The next best way to find a good realtor is to find someone who has been in business for long time and who has a good reputation. You don't need to know any of his/ her clients but you need to know that they are happy with their realtor's services.

The final step is to talk to as many realtors as possible before drumming down your choice to the final one who will help you find your dream home.

Grand Canyon - End of Grand South Rim

Grand Canyon 064, originally uploaded by srinidhilv.

This is a picture I shot at the extreme end of South Rim. The difference in scenery and landscape is stark. While Grand Canyon is rugged, craggy and relatively bare of greenery, the exterior is green and relatively plane. Towards the end of the canyon the greenery starts increasing and leads the way towards thick pine forests.

Realistic Toys for Children

Children are fond of toys, boys of cars and girls of babies and dolls. One thing that can be commonly liked by both little boys and little girls is a dollhouse. Boys would like to build and break down these houses while the girls would prefer to pretend living in them with their dolls.

What's interesting is that over the past few decades an entire industry has been created around these dolls, dollhouses and toys for children. Now a child can actually get a complete house with all specifications, the only difference would be that it would be a scaled down. For example I came across this online stores which exclusively retails dollhouses and accessories.

I wanted to buy a nice present for my friends child and hence started browsing. What completely amazed me was the store's vast inventory that included things like dollhouse bathroom accessories. I am pretty sure that kids who play with these toys will grow up to be exceptionally smart and architecturally oriented.

I particularly liked the Contemporary Ranch Dollhouse Kit, which features four bedrooms, skylights, walls, roof, doors and all the things necessary to build your own dollhouse. Looking at the kit and reading the instructions made me wish I was a kid and spend hours with this model kit. The array accessories available for this model and other dollhouses is simply mind-boggling. Things such as miniature hair dryer, bath linens, miniature candles, dining sets, bedroom sets, etc are all available custom built for dollhouses.

My favorite section in this online store however is specials where one can find superb bargains on dollhouse accessories such as miniature pink satin floral sofa, Hansson miniature Americana end table, Hansson Miniature Americana Stool and a host of other exotic products. Like I said before I think today's children are very fortunate to have all these fantastic toys at their disposal.

Watch Tower in Grand Canyon, Az and Carrollton, Tx

Grand Canyon 069, originally uploaded by srinidhilv.

Yesterday I blogged about this unique recent structure built in Historic site of Grand Canyon. Well when I came to Dallas area first I saw a similar structure outside a ranch at the border of Carrollton and Plano cities. But the tower in Texas is not as large or as tall and has a water fall in its center. I wonder why the owner of the property built the tower, but this provides a hint of beauty to the site.

Varieties of Newspaper Bags

When I first came to the US one thing surprised me, the volume of papers in the size of the daily newspaper. It has so many pages that it is impossible to distribute them without placing them in a plastic bag. On Sundays the number of pages in the daily newspaper is so many that often larger sized Newspaper Bags are used to deliver them.

On further inquiry I found that there are large corporations which manufacture newspaper bags of different colors, styles and sizes. These poly bags can be in daily size or weekend size and the film colors are different and some newspaper bags even have advertisement messages printed on it.

One of the newspaper bags I saw impressed me quite a bit. This creatively designed poly bag has a special place to hang it to the door knob. I think this kind of creativity in every little aspect of life is very impressive and necessary to build a great nation.