One night at the Comedy Club

Hello folks! Good to see a good turn out today.. Always a pleasure to do a gig at the local Comedy Club.. Actually today I will not be doing this alone.. A buddy of mine, a .. partner in crime.. if you will, will be joining me shortly. Till then I will try to hold the fort!

The car ride. It is always such a pleasant experience. In this rapid-fire world, just how often do you get to stare at fellow human beings going about their daily lives with utter nonchalance and freedom? Just how often do we get to smell the fresh open air with its below-harmful-contaminants-level ? Just how often do we get to stare at the intricate graffiti on the bumper of a car before you? And to imagine that I get to do all this every single day of the year for an hour in the morning and in the evening... am I not truly blessed? *HORN HORN* Sorry, the traffic has moved forward by 3 and a quarter inches and I must oblige that by moving my car at least one and a quarter inch forward.

* murmuring groans* 

Hoping that you all got wind of my sarcasm, you might then ask, 'What about traffic jams? Everybody gets stuck in traffic! How does that make you special?' Well, my dear friend, all I want to tell you is, the traffic jam is the finest part of my day!

*sniggers*

Office. My old man once said, if an office does make you want to kill yourself within an hour inside, then stay there your own life. And that's what I did...
*awaits*
I hope you are all done laughing at that joke by now, coz its such a winner on pub-nights!. No? Not even a chuckle? Tough room...

The Boss. I am not gonna complain about my boss here.. I know, I know... I told you that bit about traffic jams being the blah blah of my day ... but did I say my Boss was a prick? I mean, occasionally he likes to sodomize me in front of my team and watch me grin with displeasure, but coming from  a well-groomed family, I would say that's part of the job! Both his and mine!  So how does that make him a prick? Alright, alright ... you could say that public humiliation is not the best tool to motivate but, my dear naive MBA friends, for doing your job, motivation counts for as much as the fresh load my dog Lucy pops each morning!
Let me break it to you! It is all about fear and money and fear of not having enough money and fear of not having enough money to fund your panic attacks treatment!! As my old man once said, if you ain't panicking then you ain't doing it right!

*expectation*

Oh cmon! That was a killer! Did you forget to take your 'acting like humans' pill this morning?!!

Jetsons. My favorite cartoon. Always been my favorite cartoon. I just love their houses. Huge palatial mansions standing on those flimsy pillars! How cool is that?! And the cars? Woah!! Literally blow my mind every single time! What did you say, you blue shirt over there? Oh science fiction? Who the f**k is talking about science fiction? Do I liiike science fiction? Are you telling me I look like a nerdy f**k who likes sci-f**king-fi ? No-no-no, what you telling me I am a 'D**k who watches star wars and talks in Klingon all day to himself' plastered on my forehead? Shut the f**k up! Shut the f**k up!
....Shut the f**k up. Bloody nerds in the house today, folks. No wonder nobody laughed at my old-man jokes. I am sure if I translate that into Klingon and wore a golden bikini, I would be George f**king Carlin tonight..

*pants*

Okay.. okay.. lets get back a little. What was I talking about before this prick called me a nerd ... oh ya, the Jetsons. The thing about that show is that .... screw it... still got a bad taste in my mouth..

What is it sweetheart? Am I a what? A racist? No I am not! I mean I have strong views on people and dogs and blacks and browns and yellows but .. but I am not racist! I like to think of myself as a strong willed human being who cherishes his inner personality and marvels at how he can be a role model to other whites. Whaat? Did I mean 'be a role model to other people' ? Yes, that's what I said, right? Looks like some-body needs my mom's old hearing aid!

*slight chuckle in the house*

FINALLY! Now we are talking! So my dad struck zero while my mama scores!  *more laughter*
Alright.. where were we..

House-work. You know, I am a typical guy. I love my women, my beer, my guns, my dog and my hand-works. *slight laughter* When something breaks around my place, I don't call no f**king handy-man. I am my own handy-man.

*Laughter grows*

Hey! Why are you laughing? Something I said funny? Something about me taking my things into my own hands is funny? Would you prefer if I took your things into my hands then?

*Roaring laughter*

CUT THE F**KING LAUGHTER! All you white-collared pricks are the same I tell ya. Hands that are soft as velvet, never lifted a hammer in your lives, never cleaned out horse muck from a barn. Anything breaks? Oh thats fine, I will just call the handy-man and continue sitting on my own ass and drink coke and eat fries. What if I die of a heart attack? That's okay, my cardiologist is number 1 on my speed dial!

*laughter subsides*

You people disgust me. You are all going to die a painful death and I really hope it is with a bunch of french fries in your mouths as you gag.

*pin-drop silence*

Ya.. that's better.. No laughing when I talk serious alright? That's how it goes around here.

So, you are all here in this comedy club on a Friday night... So that makes you all suckers in my eyes. Unable to get laid so .. what the hell.. might as well have a few laughs out of it!

*mild laughter* 

But TODAY... today my friends is not your typical Friday night.. today is a special night... Why you ask? Coz I am taking you all on a wonderful trip.

'To where?' shouts a member for the audience.

Where you ask? To ... Hell.

*Laughter grows*

Laugh away you f**ks. Laugh away.. I hope this is what you paid for.. and after you are done, say hello to my buddy here, I call her Sandy. She doesnt like her own name much.. I mean who the f**k will wanna be called 'AR 15' eh?

*incessant firing begins that drowns out all the noise from the shrieks and blood-curling gasps. Bodies fall limply as the mad man progresses from first row onward*

30 minutes later

"From the latest sketchy details that are emerging, it appears like gun violence has struck again! This time in a Comedy Club at Winterfell, California where more than 50 appeared to have been gunned down by a gun-man who was the volunteer comedian for the night. The police are telling us that the gun man also gunned himself. More than 60 people have been critically wounded and have been rushed to the local hospital. The Mayor fears that the toll may rise.. Back to you Robert! "

Thank you Cindy. That was Cindy there, our reporter at the scene. Now moving on to the Spokesperson of 'WE WANT GUNS'  lobbying group for his first reactions to this incident.

"Our opinion is very clear from the beginning. If the comedy club had made it mandatory for all visitors to bear firearms for self-protection, this tragedy would not have occurred. The question now is.. how are we going to pressurize Congress to make that come about"
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Photo credits : houseofgaia.org

Analog telephone to the Galaxy Nexus.

I belong to a generation that has constantly been in a state of flux. We have been at the vanguard of a technological revolution in India, the likes of which will probably never be seen again. Born around 1990, my generation has seen and experienced a little bit of both Indias. The first India with its monumental bureaucracies, telephone waiting-lists and single-screen theaters and the second India with its glamorous malls and 3G internet connectivity.

One of my earliest memories of technology revolves around the analog telephone. I come from a big family with over 10 cousins. Around the early 90s when the telephone rules started to ease, each of my Uncles started applying for the BSNL telephone connection. We did as well. A few months later, one day after school when my sister and I were alone at home, the technicians came to install a gleaming, green colored telephone, which was the size of a small football. I was stunned! Even though I had seen telephones before and had even used one in my grandfather's house, it was still a great thrill to actually own one! Three days later when the line finally got through, I made my first call to my father at work. When I replaced the receiver after a short call, it was an intensely gratifying experience. I miss that feeling today when I make hundreds of calls each day on my Google Galaxy Nexus.

Television was another major fad in my early years. Even though it had already existed in a small way for many years in India, the early 90s saw the TV finally making its way into the living rooms of the middle class. The first TV we bought was an AKAI color TV. The exquisite colors that that tiny device spewed out seemed almost magical to me as I had only seen B&W TVs till then at my relatives'. Henceforth, every afternoon after school, I would get a quota of two hours to enjoy this awesome gadget.
The TV became the center piece of the house. My sister with her MTV, VTV, me with my Cartoon Network and WWF, my father with his nightly news shows and my grandmother and mother with their soaps. And all of us used to interleave all our requirements together so that the whole family managed to enjoy the TV. From 8pm to 8 30pm, I would sit with my father and watch the news after which my father and I would join my grandmother in watching a TV serial. Finally before hitting the bed, I would get a chance to watch Cartoon Network's final show of the night before transitioning to TNT. Today, I am spoiled for choices when it comes to content or mode of delivery. Each member of the family can watch any show or channel at any time of convenience. People now spend their evenings in their own rooms surfing the net or watching stuff on the laptop. Technology which managed to bring together families in its early years seems to be doing the opposite today. That worries me greatly.

Diwali is a great time of the year in any Indian home. Apart from the festivities, the crackers and the sweets, Diwali is also the yearly shopping period for household appliances. Unlike today, when discounts are a dime a dozen, in the early nineties, Diwali discounts were the only option for bringing high-end electronics into the price-range of the many. Needless to say, the responsibility of researching on what to buy, fell on my sister with able, albeit, enthusiastic disturbances from me. On one year, we had been told that nothing major would be bought. Despite the disappointment, I did not let this announcement dampen the holiday mood and continued with my Diwali celebrations. Suddenly in the evening, my father surprised us with news that we will be leaving for Vasanth & Co, a local electronics chain, in an hour to buy a 'walkman'. My sister explained to me that a walkman was a portable music tape-player and it does not need an electricity connection to work. I did not see the charm of the device, truth be told. We already had a 'grandfather' tape-player that was a three-foot long monster which managed to play tapes and the radio pretty well. But electronics-outings were rare and I managed to get myself pretty excited by the time we reached the store.
After two hours of haggling, selecting, billing and dining at the nearby Saravana Bhavan, we reached home, bursting with curiosity. After keeping the new device in the Puja room for a few minutes and praying for its longevity, I was allowed to rip it open!! Inside was this sleek, black-grey, Walkman  that was just about the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I started to put a tape of a recent Tamil movie inside, but my mother forbid me. She said the first thing it plays should be a devotional tape. After some discussion, the elders passed to me, a tape of MS singing the classic 'Bhaja Govindam'. I took the tape and tried inserting it, but it just won't go! Under the watchful, glaring eyes of the elders, I started getting tense! What if I had broken the costly device? Even though that seemed impossible, what if we had been sold a defective device and the shopkeeper puts the blame on me when confronted? Nobody listens to a 7 year old's side of the story! My father, notorious for his short temper, snatched the tape from me and asked me whether I had broken it already. Eyes welling with tears, I put the walkman back in the box and stormed to my grandmother's bosom. After a few tense, heavy minutes at home where everyone was silently praying for the device to work, my smart sister noticed that there was a small piece of cushion inside the walkman that was preventing the tape from going in. Once that was removed, the SONY sprung to life with MS's soulful croonings. My spirits as well soared to her notes and in no time I was playing around with the walkman. Many evenings after that were spent with me and my sister sharing the walkman, an earphone each.

My generation is probably the last to have experienced technology as a 'romantic' passion before it started becoming utilitarian. Today, I see my nephews and nieces being at complete ease with an iPad and a Blackberry and it strikes me that the way they view LCDs, tablets and superphones is completely different from the way I viewed the analog telephone, the color TV and the walkman. While I held these gadgets out to be symbolic totems of family progress, they hold their gadgets to be just sophisticated toys. I envy their self-confidence around such advanced, intelligent devices, but I also pity them a little.
Before I explain why, let me clarify, I am not a tech-hater! Au contraire, I LOVE technology! I own pretty much every gadget a guy needs and then some more. I spend my whole day involved with technology. That's probably why I hold my earliest memories of technology, so close to my heart. Technology, even its crude, earthy, analog ancestors seemed more than just parts and wires buzzing together. It seemed something magical and alien. It made our days seem more worthwhile by making us feel a part of a grander design, a grander course of life. When promised diligent and respectful looking-after, the gadgets promised to make us feel special. It was a no-brainer deal. Today, technology controls our lives but it does not command the same respect and adoration. I change my phones faster than I throw away old underwear. I crib when my smartphone lags for 1 sec when loading my tenth webpage.  I cringe when I hear my Bose headphones starts jarring at max volumes.

Today, technology works for me and I feel normal. Back then, I worked for technology and ended the day feeling unique. I don't know what I prefer more.

Taking stock of the world of tech!

It is that time of the year again!!

If you are a tech-lover (aka geek) then CES is almost like Christmas. Over the next few days, we will get a chance to witness some of the latest innovations from the ever-growing consumer electronics industry. Even though many of the big-guns such as Apple, Google and Microsoft now present their cutting-edge innovations at their own events, CES still makes the entire tech industry sit up and take notice of the undercurrents of innovation from different quarters.

As excited as I am about CES, this post is actually not about CES itself. I want to talk about what CES represents, namely the semiconductor and consumer electronics industry. In times of cut-to-the-bone recession, this industry has grown from strength to strength to emerge as the most vibrant, colorful and happening confluence of people and ideas in the world. The finance guys caused the economic woes, the marketing guys are becoming feeders rather than players and traditional fat guys such as iron and steel are bleeding money. In a depressing world with Euro Crises and American stagnancy, the electronics dudes periodically outshine themselves!

How did that happen? How did a company of self-appreciating geeks become the most valued company in the world? How did a smartphone redefine the social underpinnings of our life and times?

The answer is absurdly simple. Innovation. Competition. Simplicity.

As cliched as that word has come to be, Innovation is still the one thing that this industry does better than most others. But the funny thing is, the question of 'what to innovate on' itself keeps going through cycles of innovation! Hence, we have a rich spectrum of work being carried out at different strata and different boundaries of this industry. This lends to an amazing realm of products, ideas and services that literally cater to every aspect of the consumer's life! Being a part of one of the most innovative companies in the world, I must agree, its a sheer thrill to be part of this never-ending cycle of attempting crazier and crazier ideas!

Competition is the fire upon which the finest steel and success are wrought. In the tech world, competition has become (largely) synonymous with being identified by and with YOU! Unlike the big-wig banks who stole your money and then filed for bankruptcy only to be saved by YOUR money again, the tech industry is solely at the whims and moods of the consumer. Gone are the mid-90s when Microsoft ruled the roost and treated the rest of the industry as its serfdom. Today, the power-plays change in matters of months if not weeks. One bad product, one deficient design or one uninspiring idea and you are sent to the guillotine by both the critics and the end-users. Just consider the much-publicized and widely expected Windows 8 OS from Microsoft. Quite possibly the biggest gamble the company has made in a long time, Windows 8 represents a tectonic shift in the thinking process of the big firm. One that unequivocally reaffirms the orientation of the industry towards mobile computing. Despite a fluid, new touch-based interface and beautifully minimalist designs, Windows 8 did not receive great reviews from picky critics and has seen insipid response from the market. Even before the platform has been given time to establish itself, Windows 8 is being spoken in the same sentence as failure. That's how cut-throat this industry has become!

Despite the ugliness of constant law-suits and over-powerful reviewers, competition spells good-news for the consumers. With a constant overhaul of what's new and trendy every few months, the industry as a whole re-invents itself periodically. Compare this with other areas such as heavy industry or finance where change is so much harder if not impossible to bring about.

Simplicity is the greatest ideal in the world of technology. Anything that can be made simpler, MUST be made simpler. When an industry is driven by such a goal, superior products and designs are inevitable. Being a B2C industry(largely), intuitiveness becomes a paramount factor in designs. Gone are the dumbfounded days when we were forced to click a button called 'Start' and then click a button called 'Shut Down' to switch off the desktop. That was just not intuitive. Touch-based UIs have become the norm and have brought about a sense of interaction with technology that has drastically brought down the learning curve, which lends to greater participation and market. The mobile space in particular has been the trailblazer in the quest for simpler, superior experiences. Android, iOS and Windows Phone all represent different visions for simple and effective man-machine interaction. Projects such as Google Glass and Smart watches may take this intuitive interaction to whole new levels in a very short time. One can only wonder what is in stock after that!

To cut a long story short, the tech-world has a lot to offer both through amazing products and services as well as through ideals and practices. Innovation, competition, simplicity - we could do with more of these in every sphere of life. Let's take stock of this fact @ CES 2013.

[UPDATE] Nvidia announces GeForce Experience, Nvidia Grid, Tegra 4, Icera Software Defined Radio and Project Shield. wOOt wOOt! :)

Selling Stereotypes

Stereotypes are everywhere. From the first day at primary school depending on what you wear to first day of college, depending on where you sit, people judge you. They judge you for the color of your skin, the accent of your voice, the color combination of your dressing and the place you call home. It is natural. It is life.

I have been prey to my fair share of stereotypes. Tam Brahm, nerd, geek, Madrasi, ass-hole, etc. To be honest, stereotypes hurt. Each person prides on being so many things. I believe that each human being is so much more than the some of his/her parts but stereotypes do not allow for that. Stereotypes insist on reducing a person to a few crass terms. But as I said before, stereotypes are not going to go away because to judge is a primal instinct of our species.

In some ways, stereotypes can also be fun! Among friends, stereotypes often become affectionate terms of endearment! They stand for the exclusive bond we share with that person. For example, in college we used to call one of our friends as 'Thambi' (the derogatory term in NIT Trichy for a Tamilian). This was appalling because many of us who were calling him that were also Thambis, but we never used that term in a hurtful manner! Yes, if that person did something outrageously Tamil, then we will pass a remark or two but as I said before, he knew it and we knew it, it was in good humor and respect.

But when stereotypes are passed and accepted between people who don't know one another, then they become recipes for disaster.

The shocking case of Sunanda Sen in NYC chills one's bones. A man whose only fault in life was waiting for the subway train to take him home after a hard day at his copying business. Little did he know, that right behind him, an evil woman had judged him from the color of his skin and assumed him to be a Muslim terrorist. He was simply at the wrong place at the wrong time and had fallen prey to a wrong stereotype! A life was brutally crushed under the weight of stereotypes and train wheels.

Stereotypes are dangerous! They are just a stone's throw away from racism. Especially in a country like India which is a melting pot for every caste, creed, religion, color and language, stereotypes are like ticking time-bombs. As a country, we must realize that stereotypes are not worth the few moments of baseless laughter that they seem to give! Sadly, we seem to be doing the exact opposite of it! Today stereotypes sell films. From Punjab to Tamil Nadu, stereotypes are the staple for 'masala' films.

It is a pity that even the so-called Badshaah of Bollywood seems to need picking on Tamil stereotypes for his movies. No, Mr.SRK, we Tamilians do not eat noodles with curd. And we certainly do not insert ayyos into every line. And, I can't believe I am saying this, but we do not all wear lungis and go bare-chested.

Unfortunately we don't take such stereotypes at face value and often end up judging an entire race of people by such silly antics that you chose to magnify in a distorted manner.

I consider actors to be ambassadors of a country and her people to the whole world. But more importantly, you are bridges that connect people within the country. India is a diverse land with very few common themes connecting us. One of the bridges that joins us as one people is our joint celebration of talent and genius. We never cheered for Sachin as Tamils or Marathis or Bengalis. We cheered as Indians. We did not celebrate KBC for just Big B - the Hindi superstar. We loved the show for its quality and the over-whelming humility of that great man.

Reducing people to a few terms may appeal to the baser sentiments of the masses and sell you more tickets, but remember, you will never be cherished for it. Nobody will remember Rani Mukherji for her revolting Dreamum Wakupum song, instead we will cherish her poignant performance in Black.

We Tamilians love our stereotypes. We bear a man who is the grand capital of stereotypes - Rajnikanth as our mascot and our face. Even when the bulk of the country chooses to club entire races of people, each with cultures stretching backwards to thousands of years, as 'Madrasis', we just choose to shrug it off and move on. Some of us even share with a chuckle.

To conclude, in the words of that lecherous dwarf - "Let me give you some advice, bastard: Never forget what you are. The rest of the world will not. Wear it like armor, and it can never be used to hurt you."

Ayyo, so my Tamil machas-a, let us-a go-a bare bodied-a with-a lungis-a to office-a tomorrow-a.

Okay? Mind it!

2012 - The year the Droids caught up with me

2012 was many things to me. The year that I passed out of college, the year I moved to a new city, the year I started at my first job, the year that I started tweeting and so on. But among many other things, 2012 was also the year I was consumed by Android.

When I was in school and then in college, Apple seemed like the coolest company in the world! I used to love each gadget they brought out and mac-rumors website used to be my top bookmark. But all that changed in 2012. Not that I still do not admire the company for making some amazing gadgets, but rather because my eyes were opened to a whole new paradigm called Android. 

As with most good things, it all started when my bank account started filling. After a few paychecks that were ridiculously disproportionate to the amount of work I do, my bank account seemed indecently obese and I decided to use it to replace my aging, trusted Nokia C3.

Despite many better phones in the market such as S3 and HTC One X, I decided to get the Samsung Galaxy Nexus. To be honest, I did not know much about the whole 'Nexus' program of Google. But being a Google phone, I somehow trusted it to be awesome. Thank you Google for living up to my trust! 

The Galaxy Nexus exploded into my life! For someone who had lived all his life with dumb phones and erratic net connections, Bangalore's amazing net speeds and Android Jelly Bean was a God-send! For the first time in my life, I understood the term 'staying connected'! From instant tweeting to Google readers to weather updates to Google Now, Android consumed every part of my day and very soon, I was proudly adorning the 'Droid' Badge. 

Thanks to Nvidia, within a few months, I managed to get my second Google device - Nexus 7. Powered by Tegra, Nexus 7 was as much about Nvidia loyalty as it was about getting a tablet. 

Android is not just an OS. It is a way of life. And more the points of contact, the greater will be the impact. If Android had made my life smarter after my Galaxy Nexus, after my Nexus 7 I felt like Einstein! With seamless integration across apps, contacts, photos, music and preferences, Android became my window to the world! 

As of the end of 2012, I just wanted to jot down a few of the things that have radically changed my life in the last year. To be honest, I am not a 'root-it-flash-it' sort of Android guy! I tried flashing a custom ROM on my phone once and it just seemed like too much effort! I just stick to Google stock ROM and it has never failed me! So I look at Android solely for how it can make my life easier, not for how I can modify it. 

Pocket : 
I spend most of my day reading news on the net. I scourge through so many websites, apps and feeds that often I cannot come back to the same page again if I want to read it later. On my PC, I used to have a clunky method of book-marking these 'read-later' pages, but the method was.. well.. clunky. Pocket changed all that! An elegant, simple solution to all your "Read it later" requirements, Pocket lets you add stuff to it through email, shares, and file transfers. Best of all, it organizes what you want to read into appealing formats and animations. Every night, before hitting the bed, I make it a point to clear my Pocket account and sleep feeling a little smarter! 

Springpad  :
Springpad is about notebooks. It allows me to categorize everything into tiny, visually aesthetic notebooks which I can go over later at leisure. Spring pad also has some 'read-later' notebook features, but I prefer Pocket for that. Instead I use Spring pad to jot down all the ideas that I have, the movies I want to see, the books I want to read, the recipes I want to try out etc into different notebooks. Once you 'spring' these entries into the notebooks, this clever little app automatically fetches relevant info about these entries, such as movie reviews, links to recipes, Amazon cook books etc. Hence my little entries automatically collate to become wholesome notebooks with relevant information! Springpad is such a beautiful way to collect information about your future projects! 

Evernote :
Like me, if you keep forgetting important things such as the last date for paying the electricity bill then, trust me, you need Evernote. Possibly the best note app in the market, Evernote offers hassle-free connectivity between my phone, tablet and multiple desktops across OSs. Be it things to do, grocery lists, interesting passages for my blog etc, all of it goes into this tiny green app. An app that I simply cannot do without! 

BBC World News :
As I said before I am a news-junkie. Every morning I get my first shot from this app. A great app that collects the most relevant news from BBC World and presents it in a beautiful design. I have been using the iOS version of this app for years on my iPod Touch but I did not realize its full potential till I got my tablet. Definitely not the fastest news app out there, but the quality of the content pips it to the top of my news-apps list! 

Google Drive, Dropbox :
Cloud storage. Enough said. If you don't use any cloud storage tool, then you are a stupid, stupid person. 

Google Currents/ Google Reader - Again, further dosages for my need for news. While Currents presents everything in a tiled, framed magazine-like format which makes for great reading at leisure, I use Reader for following up on my favorite blogs and instant news breaks. For a long time I used Flipboard and Pulse instead of Currents but after the 2.0 update, Currents just seems faster and more elegant. But its a personal choice. 

Imo :
Even though initially it felt cool to have Messengers in many different websites and services, it quickly became unmanageable and downright irritating! Thats when I moved to Imo. A simple one-stop messenger that integrates all my accounts, Imo just works the way I expect it to. And nobody can complain with that! 

Series Guide :
Following a TV series can be really annoying when they don't release a calender schedule beforehand. Otherwise you will have to follow it through Wikipedia or Google which is such a fuddy way to do it! That's when Series Guide came into the picture. I just subscribed to all my favorite TV shows and now I get instant updates and reminders about each new episode. A light-weight app that works better on my phone than on my tablet. (because the tablet version is just a scaled-up one and looks very unappealing) Hoping that they will release a better tablet version of the app in 2013! 

Notification Weather :
Weather apps are a dime a dozen in the Play Store. But among all of them, the app that works best for me is Notification Weather. The simple reason is that it easily lodges itself into my Notification Bar. Also it follows Jelly Bean's simple black and white design ethos and hence when I pull down my Notification Bar, I am treated to an elegant weather update that seems more like a Google feature than a third-party app! 
Also, putting my weather on the notification bar saves me real estate for other widgets! 

I could probably list twenty-more apps that I use regularly on my phone and tablet but I guess you get the picture. For a really long time, I was a smart-phone sceptic. I thought it was making life obscenely easy and will make you go 'soft-minded'. But I was wrong. A smart-phone does not make the hard things in life any easier. It does not. You still have to worry about paying your bills and making those tough career choices. But my phone and tablet make the less important things in life much easier and more elegant to deal with. Somehow, it makes my life more organized and that helps my life go smoother. When I don't have to worry about last dates for paying bills, sudden outbreak of rainy weather or missing critical emails, I am able to focus better on the things that matter! In that way, it is indeed a smarter way to live. 

Thanks to Android for a great 2012. Looking forward to an even better 2013!