Super Bowl XLVII will be the 47th annual edition of the Super Bowl in American football, and the 43rd annual championship game of the modern-era National Football League (NFL). The game, to be played on February 3, 2013, will pit the champions of the AFC, the Baltimore Ravens and the NFC champion, San Francisco 49ers and will be held at Mercedes Benz Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana. This will be the first time in history that two brothers are head coaches of the respective teams. Hence this event has been unofficially nicknamed, the Harbaugh Bowl or the SuperBaugh. The Super Bowl logos underwent a major change a few years ago and some new rules were introduced to standardize the Super Bowl logos. Starting with the 2011 Super Bowl, the theme of the logo will basically remain the same. The only differences from year to year are the stadium backdrop and the Roman numerals for the game. For this Superbowl, it means the logo displays the Superdome in the background with the Vince Lombardi Trophy sitting on top of the Roman numerals for the game. The city hosting the event is at the bottom of the logo. SuperBowl XLVI will be between the AFC Champions - Baltimore Ravens and the NFC Champions - San Francisco 49ers.

I am personally not thrilled with this decision by the NFL. If you look at the Super Bowl logos from the past you can see they each had a unique style that represented various aspects of the region, the country, the game etc. Some logos were really well designed and some were cheesy, but that was the fun of it. Going forward, all the logos are going to the equally standardized (read Boring!!!)

See all the SuperBowl Logos here.

See the SuperBowl XLII Logo and the SuperBowl XLI Logo.

The Pro Bowl is the all-star game of the National Football League (NFL). Since the merger with the rival American Football League (AFL) in 1970, it has been officially called the AFC-NFC Pro Bowl, matching the top players in the American Football Conference (AFC) against those in the National Football Conference (NFC). Currently, players are voted into the Pro Bowl by the coaches, the players themselves, and the fans.The Pro Bowl has been played in Hawaii since 1970 except for 2009 when it was held in Miami. The 2013 game will be held in Hawaii as well and will be played on Jan 27th, 2013, a week before Super Bowl XVII. The Pro Bowl logo, just like the Super Bowl logo has been standarized in 2011 and has taken the same black & white steel feel to it. The logo consists of the following  key elements  The logo is in the shape of the Pro Bowl trophy, which is basically the shape of a football. There are 4 stars on each side representing the 4 conferences in the AFC (AFC North, AFC South, AFC East, AFC West) and the NFC (NFC North, NFC South, NFC East, NFC West) The only non black and white element of the logo is the colorful NFL logo at the bottom of the trophy.

Once again, much like the new Super Bowl logo which is black and white and allows little change, I prefer the more colorful logos which changed every year. It was always exciting looking forward to a new logo which more often than not, hit the mark.

See all the SuperBowl Logos here.

See the SuperBowl XLVII Logo and the SuperBowl XLVI Logo.

The New Orleans Hornets are a professional basketball team based in New Orleans, Louisiana. They play in the Southwest Division of the Western Conference of the National Basketball Association. The franchise began play during the 1988–89 NBA season as the Charlotte Hornets, based in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they were located for fourteen seasons. Following the 2001–02 season, the team relocated to New Orleans, becoming the New Orleans Hornets In January 2013, the Hornets announced that they would change their name to the New Orleans Pelicans from the 2013-14 NBA season. The new name is taken from Louisiana's state bird, the Brown Pelican. With the new name also came a new logo - a menacing pelican holding a basketball in a blue, gold and red color scheme. On closer inspection of the logo, there are a number of distinct elements of the logo and I will discuss the aspects that I have been able to read and pick up on The font of the city "New Orleans" is the same as the font found on the street signs of the French Quarter, a famous part of this great city.  At the top of the logo, is the most notable symbol of the city, the Fluer-De-Lis (which can be see in the city and is also the basis of the New Orleans Saints logo)  The crescent is also an important symbol of the city because the city was called the "Crescent City" back in 1835. The city is located on a semi circle bend of the Mississippi river.  Apparently the pelican is mean bird and that is reflected in the logo, which I hope will bring some toughness to the players in the team (like the Chicago Bulls logo)  The color blue is associated with the state, gold with the city and red just adds a good mix.

After moving from Charlotte and being displaced for a while, the team may have lost its identify. In order to give the team its identity back, the new logo and name change is warranted and I feel is a good change for the team. The logo is nice and colorful, identifies well with the state and city and certainly a step up from the currently boring white and teal colors of the Hornets. The team has a future superstar in Anthony Davis, who may be a long term player for them. Having his era start with a new branding is a step in the right direction and may be the dawn of a championship winning team.

The New England Patriots, commonly called the "Pats", are a professional American football team based in the Greater Boston area, playing their home games in the town of Foxborough, Massachusetts. The team is part of the East Division of the American Football Conference (AFC) in the National Football League (NFL). The team changed its name from the original Boston Patriots after relocating the team to Foxborough in 1971, although Foxborough is a suburb of Boston, 22 miles (35 km) away. For the greater part of the 2000 decade, they have been quite the dominant team led by coach Bill Belichick and quarter-back Tom Brady. The team was named the Patriots because of the area’s heritage as the birthplace of the American Revolution.

The Patriots introduced their current logo in the 1993 season when the team underwent a major change in the uniform, colors and logo. The logo is a silhouette of a patriot with the primary colors of the US flag (Red, White and Blue) and a star on the hat. The Patriots logo is also known as the "Flying Elvis" to some because of its slight resemblance to Elvis Presley's long sideburns.

The Green Bay Packers are an American football team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin. They are members of the North Division and are the second-oldest franchise in the NFL. The Packers were founded in 1919 by Earl "Curly" Lambeau (hence the name Lambeau Field on which the team plays) and George Whitney Calhoun. The Green Bay Packers have won thirteen league championships (more than any other team in the NFL) including nine NFL Championships prior to the Super Bowl era and four Super Bowl victories in 1967, 1968, 1996 and 2011. The Packers are America's first pro football dynasty and also the first franchise to utilize corporate sponsorship. In 1919, the Indian Packing Company gave the team $500 for uniforms and equipment, hence the name "Packers". The Packers are an anomaly in American sports as they are from a very small town in Wisconsin but have a huge national following and huge success as well. The Packers are pretty much taking over from the Dallas Cowboys as "America's Team".

The oval "G" logo was created in 1961 by Packers equipment manager George "Dad" Braisher. To most people's minds, the "G" stands for "Green Bay". However, when the logo was designed and adopted, it was determined the "G" would stand for "Greatness". The team actually used a number of different logos prior to 1961, but the "G" is the only logo that has ever appeared on the helmet. Although the Packers have granted limited permission to other organizations to utilize a similar logo, notably the University of Georgia and Grambling State University, the Packers hold the trademark for it.

In the 1930s and 1940s, Green Bay used Blue and Gold as their primary colors but by the 1950's changed it to Green and Gold. The color scheme yields the common Packer nickname, "The Green and Gold" which they have maintained until this date.

We were not done with our New Year's wishes, when we were confronted with the news that my 14 year old cousin had died from head injuries resulting from a bike accident in India. 14 years old, alive and bubbly one day and gone the next. Could a helmet have saved his life? Probably yes. One of my pet peeves is around the use of seat belts and helmets. There are so many people I come across every day who are so callous about their use (or non-use) of seat belts and helmets, its quite shameful. One of my earliest memories was the death of a friend, who died from head injuries at 18. The image of a dead body covered in a white cloth with blood stains on the head is an image that still gives me the goodbumps. The bottom line is that seat belts and helmets save lives and I was fortunate enough to have first-hand experience where a seat belt saved my father's life. In 1990, there was a plane crash of an Airbus A320 in Bangalore, when an Indian Airlines flight crashed into a swamp just as it approached the runway. The plane caught fire and roughly 100 of the 130 people on board died. My father was on that flight and survived that crash. Yes, he was able to live only because of this little thing called the Seat Belt. The seat belt saved his life and he only got bruised because he hit hit face and legs with the seat in-front. He went on to live a normal life for another 8 years before he passed away. 8 years that made a huge difference to our family and 8 years that I am very thankful for.   I really find it strange when people refuse to wear seat belts especially for situations belows This is such a common trend in India where many people remove their seat belts seconds after the plane touches the ground. This is one of the most dangerous times because if the plane hits the brakes, you will get tossed. Also, where are you going? Can you not wait till the plane stops? Is the seat belt so uncomfortable? Another trend is to remove the seat belt the moment the "Wear Seat Belts" sign is taken off. There are cases where the plane can hit air pockets and drop several meters if if you are not wearing your belts, you can get tossed up and hit your head among other things.

• Another common practice is for people sitting in the back seat not to wear seats. I don't understand why? I often get asked "Does that law in your state require you to wear a seat belt at the back?". If there is an accident at 70 miles an hour, everyone is in equal danger whether you are in the front or back. The same with helmets, if you are riding at the back, wear a helmet. 
• Not wearing helmets or seat belts for short distances. Many people think, "Oh, I am just going to the next street...what can happen"? .....well you never know.

Video is copyright by Susses Safer Roads

If reading this article helps you change you mind and wear a seat belt or helmet, I would feel like I made a difference. Please do wear your seat belt and helmets at all times. If not for yourself, do it for the ones who love you. Wearing your seat belt or helmet is one thing you can control while getting into a vehicle.

Internet commerce has been around for over a decade and Thanksgiving sales have been around for many years. So, one would have figured that a technology company like Best Buy would be prepared to handle a little something called a pre-sale for its Silver Rewards member. Wrrrrrrrooooooooonggggggg. On Monday, November 19th, just days before Black Friday in the US, Best Buy had a special pre-sale event for its Silver Rewards members. These are loyal members of Best Buy who spend at least $2000/year. These are your high spending VIP customers who you really wanted to impress with a good experience so they would come back on Black Friday and shop some more. Unfortunately for Best Buy, this pre-sale turned out to be quite a disaster especially for customers like me who may not want to shop on their site or even deal with their phone lines.

Best Buy had been hyping this sale over the past week with a number of emails about the upcoming pre-sale. They even had a preview on Sunday. With all the preview traffic and email, they should have had an idea of the amount of traffic to expect. The sale kicked off exactly at 11 AM EST. Thanks to the preview, I knew that I wanted to get 3 DVD sets of the Big Bang Theory (yes, I am a geek). I quickly found the items and started adding them to my shopping cart. I must have added 2 items reltively quickly but by the time I got to the 3rd item, the site had slowed down to a crawl. This was all within the first 5 minutes of the pre-sale event starting. I tried to Checkout but the system hung for a while and returned back with an empty cart. Within about 10 minutes the site had crashed and I got the "We were expecting Snow but we got a Blizzard" screen. Awwww, so cute, if this were my child's website but this is Best Buy. You should not only be expecting a Blizzard, you should expect Superstorm Sandy and be prepared for that. Bestbuy.com went down faster than any of the the Kardashian sisters.

They had provided a Silver Member hotline so I decided to call that. After navigating through the phone tree, I was put in the queue only to be rudely disconnected. Seems like the Blizzard hit the phone lines too. I tried calling back but never made it. At this point, I checked Twitter and the FB page and realized that there were many irate customers like me. I tried loading the page every few minutes but kept running into the same "Blizzard" message. About an hour later, the site came back up to some extent but I had trouble adding to my cart. Eventually, I was able to add my 3 DVDs and started checking out when it hit another snag with their tax software. Fortunately, it allowed me to make the payment. It took me about 90 minutes to complete something that I should have been able to do in 5 minutes. I am still unsure the DVDs will arrive in the mail in the next two weeks.

Best Buy is one of the few businesses in the US that sells electronics and has a retail front. In the last few years, with Circuit City and Comp USA shutting down, Best Buy probably survives only because consumers do not have too many options to go to a store and purchase electronic items. They are having a hard time making profits and should do anything to avoid a black-eye or turn away loyal customers. In the age of Cloud Computing and Big Data, is it that hard for a technology company to figure out capacity? After all they have trends for the last so many years on their big sale days.

In the age of social media, they should take advantage and do any damage control, but unfortunately that did not happen either. There was no apology on the Best Buy Facebook page, there was no email from Best Buy and neither a tweet. Ironically, they were promoting Rihanna's new album aptly titled Unapologetic. The reality must be that the Marketing team that handles social media, probably reports to another part of the company and have no idea of this disaster.

They have three days to prepare for Black Friday. If they have the same issues, Black Friday may well turn in Red 2012. Now I understand why folks start camping out 4-5 days in advance, they just don't trust bestbuy.com. I still think they are morons but now perhaps give them some benefit of the doubt.

*On a somewhat funny and related note, there was a headline today that Best Buy provided Romney technology for his campaign. #Winning

Asian Paints is an Indian chemicals company headquartered in Mumbai, India. It manufactures a wide range of paints for decorative and industrial use. It is India's largest and Asia's third largest paint company, with a turnover of Rs 96.32 billion. It is also one of the largest paint companies in the world and operates in 17 countries. Besides Asian Paints, the group operates around the world through its subsidiaries Berger International Limited, Apco Coatings, SCIB Paints and Taubmans. Asian Paints was founded in 1942 and has over 5200 stores.

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The new school year has just begun in the US and with a few weeks gone by, its time for their first round of evaluations. As a parent of child from the Indian sub-continent, the question that is asked most often by other Desi parents is "How is your kid doing academically?". Its not about how your child is doing overall, its mostly about the academic aspect. I fortunately, have been blessed with a child who demonstrates intelligence at a slightly higher level than most of the students in his school and attends some extra classes called the "Challenge Program". When other parents find that out, their first question is "Will you get him tested and pushed to a higher grade?". My reaction always has been and will continue to be a BIG No!.

As someone from the Indian subcontinent, I have found that a large number of my friends and colleagues have falsified birth certificates just so that they could attend school early. I never made much of it but now I wonder Why? What is the mad rush to get your child into school early? Should education be treated as a race? Is it really about intellectual maturity or is there more we should consider before pushing our child to a higher grade? All the questions spin in my head.

If you are parent, you would have realized that a child will change tremendously over the course of 1 year, especially at younger age. A child at 4 is much more mature than at 3 and even when they hit their teens, the maturity year over year is noticable.  In my opinion, a child's maturity needs to be considered in the following  3 areas.

• Physical Maturity - Physical maturity among young kids changes a lot over the period of 1 year. At age 4 and 5, kids learn to write, kick and throw a ball, swing a bat. Within the period of 1 year, you will see significant improvements in their physical ability. Kids will be bigger and stronger in the space of 1 year. According to the US CDC growth chart, an average boy will grow about 2 inches taller and 4 lbs heavier between the ages of 4 and 5.  Why then would you want to push your child to a higher grade with kids that are physically more mature?
• Emotional Maturity - Similar to physical maturity is emotional maturity. A child will show great improvement in their emotional maturity in the space of 1 year. A child at age 4 is more attached to their parents, tends to cry more for small reasons, has a hard time separating from their parents. As they reach age 5 & 6, the emotional maturity is much higher. Another aspect of emotional maturity is their ability to think before they act. Younger kids are typically more impulsive and do not have an understanding of their actions. Why then would you want to send your child early to school, when its unlikely they can adjust emotionally?
• Intellectual Maturity - Last but not the least, the child must demonstrate intellectual maturity. Your child may be a prodigy in one or more areas, perhaps its reading, mathematics or something else. One needs to evaluate if the child is performing at a level higher than just their peers or performing at a level of the next grade. Keeping in mind that there are other kids in the higher grade that also have above average intelligence, your child could fit in the average group for that class. Would you like your child to be average in a higher grade or above average in his or her grade?

If you child is perhaps above average in their class, they may end up being just average in the next grade. In the long run, this may impact the child negatively. They could have been at the front of the pack in their assigned grade but may end of being in the middle of the pack in the grade above. If your child is showing higher levels of maturity in all the areas above and you truly believe that the child needs to move to a higher grade then you should speak to your school.

I am sure many parents may disagree with my views and thats fine. I do see value in pushing the child and driving that sense of competition. I have seen him push himself harder when he does activities (swimming in his case) with bigger kids but I also see him feel a bit down about it when he is unable to compete. He does go through ups and downs but its only in his swim school. I would much rather he undergoes those emotions in a controlled environment for a limited time during the week than to go through it every day at school. The worst thing I would want to ever hear from him is "I hate going to school".

With every passing year, I see so much growth in all levels of maturity in my child that I would never consider pushing him to a higher grade. While he demonstrates a higher intellectual maturity and could perhaps do well in a higher grade, he is very much on average in his physical and emotional maturity. At the end of the day, he is just a regular 6 year old. This reminds me of something someone said to me that always rings true - Learning is a Journey, Not a Race. My journey was slowing down but now that I have a little partner with me, I am back on that journey. Sometimes its down the same old roads, sometimes its down new roads but the journey still remains gratifying. Hope this journey never ends.