A Blog, or something like it

Today morning

2009-12-07T10:56:00.000-08:00

It was a dark night, the sun had given up and bid adeiu much earlier that day. No one dared venture outside the cosy confines of a (n artificially) warm home or car because, lets face it, we aren't all that brave.
I went to sleep nursing the last vestiges of cold, fervently hoping that it would by history by the break of dawn. After a very promising night of no jarring sounds emnating from my vocal chords, I woke up to a dim shaft of light peering in through the blinds. There was a gentle pitter patter going on, and in my befuddled state, I couldn't comprehend why someone would leave their bathroom tap on. Once the cobwebs of sleep gave way to consciousness, I realized it was the rain against the glass pane.

Got up, took shower, started.

I look to the left into the mountains, and I see http://www.google.com/search?q=snow+bay+area&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&client=firefox-a&rlz=1R1GGGL_en___US356 !!!!!!

Salt, Pepper and a little extra

2009-07-20T16:16:00.000-07:00

http://nandoocancook.blogspot.com/

Circa Jan 2009 - July 12 2009

2009-07-14T11:27:00.000-07:00

... The calm that preceded it and the madness that ensued!
New Year 2009 started with me, my phlegm :| (Yes, I had a bad cold throughout that week), the couch, the TV and umpteen cans of soup. After an uneventful 2008 (well, not really.. I lost a car, gained one and ran 13 miles in a go between one car to another :P), and after the eager countdown to 2009 from my side as well as D's, had an interesting trip to florida just before the curtains closed on 2008. Spent a bomb during the entire trip, but came back recharged and refreshed until the lords of cold finally caught up with me :|
Two weeks went by with one trip to the airport and out of nowhere there was a sudden renewal of frayed threads, almost forgotten contacts, and finally a long overdue pilgrimage to the dish.
A rendezvous for coffee became more than just that and fast-forward another week, and "Hey, so what do you think? Do you want to come help with dialogues for this musical?". A meeting, and yet another meeting later, I was IN !! .. fleshing out these 6 entities, thinking like them, talking like them, getting into and out of their shoes to know EXACTLY how they'd react, so much so that the discussions would often degenerate to "no no, why the hell would Preeti say that!!??!! Rahul would NEVER do such a thing" .. and so on...
Things just sped by in a haze.. Professionally, personally there was so much going on that I can hardly separate one from another now :)))
The pace slowed down a little, and then I was like "Ohhh, why dont I get involved here too, and that, and thaat? yeah sure why not!" and it just kept adding up.
And then there was this woman who calls me Nan's (do I look like a paratha? I thought I was more of the cushion!) and believes in "racing to the TOP" .. and this other woman who keeps bugging me for 5 bucks so that she can go get a life and dances in 24 hr dance marathons... it just kept getting more and more interesting !!
Before I knew it , it was the July 4th long weekend, and 35 people had everything from butterflies to huuuge dragons in their stomachs about July 12th !
Now, one week and two days later.. I realized I was aware of the hills yet again and that going to work is probably THE main activity I'll be doing for some time to come, and that weekends are actually going to be less busy and more relaxed than weekdays :))
The roller coaster is on smoother rails now.. but what a ride it was!! ;)

The lesson to take home ?

UNAMAS \\m//

Buggy code and windy roads!

2009-06-03T22:02:00.000-07:00

The inception for this post was waaaaay back in Jan, sometime when I was trying to merge on to the right most lane on Montague Expressway to get to work, and I got this incredible urge, bordering on an extreme craving to run away to skyline boulevard. Well, that never happened, but heck, this post was born. And remained still born.
And got lost somewhere in the prosaic reality of the semi-monthly deposit to my checking account and the pursuit of that ephemeral thing called happiness.

Noor

2009-01-29T00:09:00.000-08:00

BEAUTIFUL dialogue from Dilli6.

Zarre Zarre mein usii kaa Noor hai,
jhank khud mein, woh na tujhse door hai..
Ishq hai usse toh sabse ishq kar,
Ishq hai usse toh sabse ishq kar,
Iss ibaadat kaa yahi dastoor hai.

Ismey usmey, aur usmey hai wohi,
Ismey usmey, aur usmey hai wohi,
Yaar mera har taraf bharpoor hai...

Amitabh's dialogue.. and obviously very movingly delivered!

I find his light/divinity in every particle,
just look into yourself, he's right there,
Love everyone just as you would love him,
This is the essence of the universe..
He's here and there, and there too,
My friend, he's everywhere and in abundance!

Wisdom

2009-01-28T23:07:00.000-08:00

The smartest people in the universe are probably kids.. Untouched by anything even remotely negative, bundles of innocence, joy, laughter and curiosity. It is only later that curiosity becomes desire, innocence gets misclassified as "that guy who'll get nowhere" and the horizon always ends up being what you're looking for.
And one fine day you realize, to be is just to "be", which is why today is called the present.

Naya Saal.. Nyquil Ke Saath!!

2009-01-05T10:03:00.000-08:00

:-)

Deepa's thoughts

2009-01-04T20:37:00.000-08:00

I checked her post just now.. can't really say if it is true or not.. May be it is just a way to assure your ego, or maybe it is actually true? something might have meant a lot of joy once upon a time, so much that you can never imagine it being otherwise, but can end up meaning nothing later..

1. I realized an icky thing. Acceptance of a loss comes easily when you are convinced (or you convince yourself) that you actually gained something by losing it. You know, when it doesn’t cross your mind that what you lost also had some significance. When you refuse to think of what good might have happened had you not lost it. Possibly the thing you lost eventually caused you so much pain that you believe firmly that you’re better off without it, and it really doesn’t occur to you that it did bring you immense joy once upon a time.

To 4VHJ069, With Love -- Contd.

2008-12-22T09:48:00.002-08:00

The Sequel began on August 15 2008 when I signed the documents for my brand new red Mini Cooper S :D

... and what can I say, every day with it has been a thrill ride so far!! :-)

To 4VHJ069, With Love

2008-12-22T09:48:00.001-08:00

Part 1 : April 17 2007 - April 19 2008

A Tribute to the car that got away :)

It was a great evening, the air was crisp with anticipation, but I was not very interested, I was going to test-drive a used car, yet again. The owner was nice enough to come to my place and pick me up for the test drive, and commute post Sep 19 2005 was never the same again. The owner turned out to be one of those people who own a house in Palo Alto, and was selling the car only because 5 cars in a 3 car household was too much to take!
the car turned out to be a well tended one, and I was given lots of warnings and advice on maintenance by the lady of the house, who'd owned it and loved it for the last 5 odd years..
I prolly listened to that with half an ear closed, or open , which ever way you see it ;-).
Loan details completed, I finally owned a ride and spent the next month traversing the main road - Stop Signs, traffic lights et. al. for the pure pleasure of it.

An year, and 12000 miles sped past by, with a lot more memories, accidents, spills and scrapes associated with it :-) .. Life was moving on with my 105 HP friend, and I had no complaints whatsoever -- well, except perhaps that one time I had to replace some A/C valves, send it in for maintenence, fill up gas ;-) .....

Part 2 : The getting away :
It was April 19/20 th, 2008. Coincidentally - the first anniversary of its insurance :D, I got back home after dinner on April 19th, the next day there was a barbecue at another friend's place.. I'd gotten into the habit of leaving my purse in the car.. but since I had to renew insurance, I needed my credit card details, so , what turned out to be the silver lining here, I took my purse from the car as well..
The next day, I had no reason to go down to my garage till about 7:30 in the evening.
What do you do if you see that something that has been a fixture suddenly just disappears, vanishes ?? For about 5 seconds I couldn't believe it -- interesting things like huge objects being stolen only happened to other people, not me.. but incredibly, or so I thought, this did happen..
What was more extraordinary was I'd just heard from D that she'd gotten into an accident, and that her car had been totalled, this must definitely be some curious coincidence.
Well, thoughts apart, I had to inform practically everybody connected to the car about its theft -- the insurance, the bank, the police, the DMV, (did I miss someone here?) and every one I talked to... and also state specifically that the car was locked and that I had its keys :-(.

Part 3: The return of the Civic :
It took me astonishingly little time to get used to the fact that it wasn't getting back, and now my focus was on what next ;-) . There was this book at work - "What cars to buy - The car buying guide 2008" . Being a complete complete neophyte at buying anything "automotively inclined", I started reading up that book , and like an Achcha Bachcha, and taking into consideration gas prices that were going way beyond my modest income level , decided on buying a hybrid Prius. I ask D for her opinions on things (not that I take it anyways ;-) ) and she firmly disliked the hatchback model. Not really caring too much for her opinion, I went ahead and took an appointment for a test-drive -- and -- also checked out the new BMW 128i -- it looks really sexy! so went ahead and took an appointment to test drive that as well! There was a mini showroom right next to the BMW showroom, didn't think it would harm taking a look at the weirdly shaped Mini Cooper, so added that to my options list as well :-).
The (un) expected happened, I totally fell in love with the mini, loved the way it was compact so perenially bad "parkers" like me wouldn't have issues, loved the way it would respond to the lightest touch -- basically fell for it big time :D.
Went for a test drive that day, the day after that, and then another day after that :-), I was pretty much decided and one fine wednesday evening ( May 7 2k8 to be more precise) went to the showroom again armed with the specifications I wanted, and almost booked a car.. the only thing that held me back then was the 1000 dollar deposit needed and that was something I didn't have right at that time due to various financial transactions that I had the privilege of doing at that exact time ;-) ..
Told him I'd be back the next day, and announced in my break room about the new car -- got a mixed response all over, by then it had become a standing joke at work about how I didn't want the old car back at any cost.

May 10 , 2008 : I was in the middle of debugging something, and I receive a call from some unknown number, thinking it was one of the many car dealers I'd been talking to, I say hello, and the person says "Hi Ma'am, I'm from the sunnyvale police department ... " and I went (in my head ofcourse ) -- ayya!!! :-( , it was the inevitable call saying my car was found in some godforsaken place in South Dakota..
California se gira, aur jaa jaa ke Dakota mein atkaa!!

I took the easiest way out, and handed over the towing responsibility to the insurance guys. It finally came back to the area sometime last week.

Current Status : In the body shop, insurance adjuster on vacation till monday, so can fight with him about the resale value/damages only on monday, and yes, the cooper is still on !

I thought this car episode would be a case of quick death, but has turned out to be a classic Ekta Soap! I even know the title!
"Kyunki Civic ka Khwaab Kabhi 'K'ooper bhi thaa"

--To be continued

Evening breeze, masala chai and melodies...

2008-12-21T17:39:00.001-08:00

Coming soon :-)

Kickboxing !!

2008-12-20T17:03:00.000-08:00

Maybe it is growing old(errrr) or something, or maybe it's just me :) , I took a membership at the nearest 24hr fitness and the "josh" carried me on to check out the group class schedule.
Kickboxing(really don't know why it is called kickboxing -- should have had a more capoieraesqe name! It can be a really graceful set of movements PROVIDED the person is a master at it :D ) was on the schedule, for friday 12:00 noon to 1:00 pm. "Pehla Nasha" and all considered, I decided to go for it :)

Completely digressing from the post though, last friday at work was a dream day! 8:30-11:45 : code (or sit in front of my desk :) )
12:00-1:30 : kickboxing :D
1:30-2:00 : go to fry's
2:00-3:00 : play puzzle Bobble :)
3:00-7:00 : back to the desk!

Anyways, I go to this class and I see all this superfit people stretching and warming up.. now no one who knows me on any level can categorize me anywhere close, so the preview itself wasn't looking too good, and just when I finish stretching and bringing myself back to any level of confidence to face the class, the instructor walks in, and immediately starts the "warmup routine" ! I don't have to tell you how that went!!

There was this lady in front of me, green gym clothes and matching socks (amazing considering it was such a weird shade of green!) doing all steps perfectly. With all my natural (and justified) reticence, I'd taken a place right in the last row, and with lady green in front, I didn't really miss any visual instructions.. aah, if only I was as nimble as her and could move a mile in a second :(.

So I'm all drenched in sweat... it seemed like an eternity and the morning spent staring at digg/gmail/cnn/vnc seemed but a distant echo from the past, when the instructor (who still looked like she just stepped out of her car btw.) says : great job guys!! well done!!
Now this was the most cruel part :( history had taught me that well done/ good job signified the end of something, and then she coolly said - "Okay, so it's HALF TIME!"
I have NO clue how I got through the next half an hour.. but there was this uncle next to me, who was really enthusiastic and jumping away to glory.. and suddenly he's clutching his heart a little and then walked away to get some water and a well needed/deserved break. I mean come on!! you shouldn't be setting a not-good example to people half scared right??

I don't really know what category the following piece of info falls into, but it was really chilly outside that day (abt 44F) and there was no heating in the group exercise room, but all the glass walls (Oh Yeah! So that we/ I could see ourselves tripping over when trying to extend that leg beyond it's natural reach!) were really misty from all the people .. $%#%^#%^$^$&%@$#%$%^%^*&^#@#%$^%^&*%$%#%#@$^&%

The session went on for some more time, and then she was again like Okay guys! great job! ... And I was deceived... all over again :(. That was merely a call to get yoga mats so that we could strech a bit more for the 10 minutes or so that were still (!!!!) left...

I can't really describe the feeling when I got out of the room.. Just imagine all exams getting over at the same time and you winning a lottery, and you might come close ;)

The really unbelievable part is that I actually felt super good after it (I can't say my tissues agree with me though, it is 31 hours after the first class and a lot of 'em are still sore at the fact that they were twisted around for no reason at all...) and the ones that aren't, are now going to be sore at the use of the word "first" ;)

SNIST , the movie!

2008-10-28T13:03:00.000-07:00

The video says all :-)

punctuality ke side effects

2008-10-23T10:45:00.000-07:00

My friends all agree on one thing about me, my WORST habit is being on time (in some cases, even being early!), and worser, expecting everyone else to do the same :P . I don't really know when this started, but I guess it should be sometime when I was a kid and had this urge to make sure I didn't miss out on anything, and somewhere down the line it translated to being in a place at 8:55 if the meeting was at 9:00. (Mostly, it never started till 9:30!)

I started school early, mostly because my bro was going to school and I hated the thought of missing something that he was already upto! That was probably sibling rivalry at its peak, when I didn't even know what the term meant. So we ended up going to L.K.G together, and managed a solitary class pic where we're both there. (I love that pic though! :-) ) . Madan skipped U.K.G, and I stayed on and then went on to be the youngest in my class. I was 15 days short of being underage for the class (something I'm still proud about :D )

I remember sometime in 8th class, when my poetry recitation skills were at their peak, I started bugging teachers for poems that I could recite for the hindi , english, sanskrit recitation competition about a month in advance, when the normal time between announcement-practice-competition was about 5 days :-) . (I did win prizes for all of them though :-) )

The same thing happened in Engineering... in my hurry to make sure "what after B-Tech" was good, I ended up going for coaching much much before people normally go, made a few friends join as well :D and all that we ended up doing was sleeping in class when some sir was teaching something...

I thought I had it all planned, finish Masters, save up money, and then repay loans in one year.. I ended up doing the same and the result was that once I got done with paying my loans (August 2008 was the last, when exchange rates were hovering around 42 Rs to a dollar), the markets started going C.R.A.Z.Y and now it is Rs 50 to a dollar!!

Moral of the story: don't be on time :-( (I'm sure it'll make D's day if she reads this :-( )

Confessions of an economic hitman

2008-10-15T21:01:00.000-07:00

Just finished the book.. Makes an interesting read.. I liked the first half of the book where the author John Perkins gives an honest unbiased opinion of things happening. The second half seemed like a drag.. he was more interested in justifying himself and felt like he just wanted the reader to sympathise with him..

Liked the last words in the book though, looks like he put in a lot of thought in making the ending nice.

The hour is ours. It is now time for each and every one of us to step up to the battle line, to ask the important questions, to search our souls for our own answers and to take action.
The coincidences of your life, and the choices you have made in response to them, have brought you to this point...

The Silver Jubilee Surprise :-)

2008-10-14T14:20:00.001-07:00

Copyrights :

Sleepy Monkey (SM -- Divya)
Perpetual Organizer (PO -- SP)
Dosed on Coffee(DC -- Chaitu)
Dozing on the (steering) Wheel (DW -- Nandakishore)
Early Awakening (EA -- Nandhini)
The Target (TT -- Bhavana)

Venue -- Bloomington, IL + Milwaukee, WI + Atlanta, GA + Allentown, PA + San Jose, CA ==> Chicago, IL ------- Cincinnati, OH . (==> converging at, --------- all the way to).

Warning : the post may sound more boring than the trip, music to be added shortly ;-)

TT was turning 25 on October 9 2008, SM was getting back from India after a 4 month Bangalore Holiday, PO was bored of Atlanta, EA was tired of San Jose, DW was always ready for anything and DC was hoping for a trip to Hocking hills ;-( .
We all decided to meet sometime in october, and since the timing was right, we decided to meet for TT's birthday .. after all, how often does the youngest looking girl in the group grow old ????!!!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I actually tried making this post very wordy, but I don't think that would do justice to the priceless expression on TT's face.. Chutku, it was worth the trip just to see that look on your face :-)

video coming soon..

The second achievement was DW and EA going on this thing called the slingshot, it is basically like a catapult, and throws you 260 ft above the ground :D.. It was actually an awesome experience.. EA loved it and can't wait to do it again.. but DW's face was worth watching, his last words before getting on the slingshot were "Nandhini, I'm donating these two minutes of my life to you... please take care of them." :-). The expression on his face was priceless as well.. he looked like someone just going to get executed!

video coming soon..

SM can describe where the video is right now :)

finally let TT get back to her homework after another long day and a long dinner, and started the long drive back to Chicago, watched the downtown go by at around 3:00 AM, got dropped at the airport at 5:30, slept till 8:10 AM and finally boarded the flight after the alarm woke me up at 8:10 sharp.

more to come soon...

more places to visit in my lifetime!

2008-10-14T13:55:00.001-07:00

The most incredible lakes on earth..
http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/featured/25-most-colorful-lakes-on-earth/1795/2

and the best underground ones!!
http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/featured/underground-lakes-river/2190

Pav Bhaji

2008-09-26T13:43:00.001-07:00

Came across this recipe recently, seems promising..

Pav Bhaji

Ingredients:
1 small head of cauliflower, cut into florets (about 3-4 cups)
3 medium potatoes, peeled and cut into large chunks
2 tbsp oil
1 green bell pepper, minced
1/2 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp chili powder or red chili paste
1 tsp ginger-garlic paste
salt to taste
2-3 cups tomato puree
1/2 cup peas (fresh or frozen)...optional
1 tbsp Everest pav-bhaji masala (or more to taste)
1 tbsp butter
Method:
1. Boil the cauliflower and potatoes till tender and set aside. I usually do this in a pressure cooker.
2. Heat oil in a deep saucepan and saute the pepper. Add ginger-garlic paste and saute some more.
3. Add turmeric powder, chili powder to taste and salt to taste. Saute for a few seconds.
4. Add tomato puree, peas, boiled potatoes and cauliflower, pav-bhaji masala and butter.
5. Keep sauteeing and mashing it together till it is a smooth mixture, adding water as required (you can use a potato masher to help you along). Be aware that the mixture can spurt up as it boils, so keep a lid on it while you are not actively stirring it. Simmer for 20-25 minutes to really get the flavors to meld together.
You have to keep tasting and adjusting salt, masala and tomato till you like the balance between the tomato-ey tang and the heat of the masala.

Serve with:
1. More pats of butter (as much as you can dare really, don't be chicken now),
2. Finely sliced/ chopped onions, minced cilantro and wedges of lemon.

Source - http://onehotstove.blogspot.com/2005/04/bombay-street-food-pav-bhaji.html

Of journeys and meetings and second chances...

2008-09-15T10:28:00.000-07:00

.... so I get a call at 8:52 pm saying "hey Nandhini, I'm going to watch rock on, interested ?" .. I was like, yeah sure! I want to watch the movie as well.. and then pat comes the reply, cool , can you please get ready in 5 min ? The show starts at 9:05!
A blast of noise greeted us as we walked into the theater, which, we found out later was the ending chords of the song socha hai , and we were like maan, we missed the beginning, and almost immediately afterwards came the title "Rock On" .
What followed was a very well depicted tale of the journey that every person takes in his or her own unique way, the choices they make, the choices they could have made, the struggle with the imp in your head that keeps saying "What if?" ; but ultimately of redemption and of relationships that just have no way of going wrong, however deep the gash may be (or maybe because what was perceived as a gash was just a superficial wound?? you never know!)
Farhan Akhtar is A.W.E.S.O.M.E ! He starts off as the insensitive guy, seemingly oblivious to how empty his life is (despite the great house he lives in!) , who just wants to get on with life kyunki "Compromise kaun nahi kartaa" ? He smiles, and it is more like a grimace, his life is his work, and his wife is just a part of the scheme of things, a convenient addition, with any emotions towards her safely swept under the "compromise package" .
Farhan Akhtar can sing! He's made sure his directorial debut was unforgettable, leading the way to a separate genre of movies -- and every movie made about friends (including the one being written about by yours truly!) has been labeled as a movie "with a DCH hangover" . And what an acting debut! One of those acts where you don't feel separated by time, space and a movie screen, and he manages to sing five out of a total of seven songs, and sound good!! Never seen that before!
As acting went, one could see the desperation in Joe(well played by Arjun Rampal)'s eyes, as they flare up and die down alternately with any tiny wisp of hope and with the wisp never really becoming anything substantial. You see KD, whose face always has that dazed look of someone in shock, and who seems to be eternally asking himself "What if? "
..And then there is the quiet wife who just cannot see whats (not) happening and sets things in motion once she "accidentally" discovers that her husband was infact alive once upon a time.
What seemed the most shaky part of the story was how the friends part, how sudden fame causes dormant egos to waken and reminds everyone that they're individuals first, and a part of a team next. Interestingly (defininitely not originally.. remember seeing something like this before as well, ... may be in DCH :) ) alternating between the present and the past, the viewer is made cognizant of how deep/wide the divide is.
One awkward surprise birthday party and two different conversations later, the four meet, not before Rob says what was the movie's most unforgettable dialogue "Zindagi sabko doosra mauka nahi detii" ..
Next is more or less formula, throw in an old rival, an old love, and an old rivalry, and the good old brain tumour.
My friend and I were "wow" once the closing titles came up (something else comes up too "Please buy a CD, don't download the music" !!! touche! )

It all started with a group of friends who said "Yeh dosti hum nahi todenge, todenge dum magar tera saath na chodenge" , it ends with the same group of friends who still maintain "Yeh dosti hum nahi todenge", but one of them actually manages not to "live" upto it, and what happens in between is just a second chance, carefully camouflaged in a small box, lying somewhere forgotten , unrecognizable and waiting to be picked up by someone who realizes its worth and makes the effort to join the dots.

Taa naa, nah nah naa Taa naa nah nah naa

Interesting poem

2008-09-09T14:12:00.000-07:00

The second coming -- William Butler Yeats

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out

When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi

Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert

A shape with lion body and the head of a man,

A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,

Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it

Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.

The darkness drops again; but now I know

That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

A Life lived...

2008-07-29T11:09:00.000-07:00

Coming soon...

Rancho San Antonio Open Space Preserve

2008-06-19T09:05:00.000-07:00

Imagine every shade of green laid out in front of you, stretching away till the eye can behold.. That in short is Rancho San Antonio Open Space Preserve :-).
We had our morning "short run" there (don't really know how these people call 4 miles short!! ) .. The entry to the park is a labyrinth in itself, and navingating that is no mean feat for any one with a good/bad sense of direction.
So I found myself in its parking lot some time at 6:00 AM on a super fine day -- Sun shining mildly, but not managing to penetrate through the maze of branches and shrubs, birds chirping, a small stream steadily gushing away, trying to drown the birdy cacophony but inadvertantly complementing it to create a lovely white noise pattern really soothing to the ears, and other equally drowsy fellow runners similarly entranced.
Just when we thought the park was all lovely, we see a small yellow sign - instructing us what to do if you happen to come across a mountain lion -- it actually has instructions to fight back! I always thought that if you met a member of the feline species other than a cat, all you could do was stand still, or well, try to break the world record in running!
We were all really cold, we'd underestimated the place, so to keep the cold away rather than actually train, we started running.
We crossed a wooden bridge, and immediately came across this place called Deer Hollow Farm, which has enclosures for goats, pigs and what not! Guess most of them end up at McD or Burger King ? :-( . A little further on, you can see a rabbit, mindful of the multitudes of pattering feet, yet sufficiently secure in its own territory and the fact that no one (one == human) is going to cause harm. Deer cross your path non-chalantly and it seems so normal that the only time you actually stop is to stare at the cat that crossed your path.
Running never seemed so effortless and beautiful :-), trust me.

The longest morning ever

2008-06-17T10:34:00.000-07:00

June 17 2008

6:40 AM : Get up.
7:30 AM : Actually wake up.
7:44 AM: Decide to take a shower.
7:44 - 7:48 AM : Decide against biking since car is supposed to be back today, and decide to take lightrail + caltrain.
8:15 AM : Leave for lightrail station.
8:20 AM : Miss the train by 30 seconds, and wait for the next train,
8:35 AM : Board the lightrail and leave for mountain view.
9:07 AM : Reach mountain view and miss Caltrain by 30 seconds. Next train in half an hour.
9:10-9:20 AM : Decide to try out Turkish coffee, which turns out to be a no milk coffee, throw it away and again wait for the train.
9:42 AM : Board Catrain finally.
10:00 AM : Reach work. Find out that I'm unable to login to my desk comp.
10:24 AM : problem finally fixed (really fast! ) and the day starts.

Distance from home to work : 5.1 miles.
Time taken
-- by car : 10 min.
-- bike : 20 min.
-- public transport : 1 hr 40 min.

11 Rules of life -- Bill Gates

2008-06-09T11:08:00.001-07:00

Bill Gates recently gave a speech at a High School about 11 things they did not and will not learn in school. He talks about how feel-good, politically correct teachings created a generation of kids with no concept of reality and how this concept set them up for failure in the real world.

Rule 1 : Life is not fair - get used to it!

Rule 2: The world won't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3: You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won't be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for burger flipping: they called it opportunity.

Rule 6: If you mess up, it's not your parents' fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

Rule 10: Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Rule 11: Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one.

Little drops...

2008-05-11T21:20:00.000-07:00

So training for the (half) marathon is underway, and I got this interesting, though un-original idea to document the cumulative distance that I've travelled during training alone..
I decided to mark the distance against Palm Drive to 101 South, and lets see how far it goes :)

The story so far..

my wishlist :)

2008-04-02T10:28:00.001-07:00

http://www.thetravelerszone.com/travel-information/25-wonderful-places-to-visit-in-your-lifetime/

Weepy books, movies and more

2008-01-24T10:48:00.001-08:00

The earliest memory I have of crying for some onscreen avatar is for some oooold telugu movie -- the hero (shoban babu - all the gult readers should know him :) ) marries the heroine much against her parents' wishes, and apparently it is her ghost he marries, cos when they go over to her parents' place ; the camera zooms over to the lifeless prostrate form of the heroine, and suddenly the heroine vanishes!
I know this is pretty vague, but that was all my 6/7 year old brain could process, I'm sure I did not understand the concept of love or loss then, but nothing could stop tears from trickling down and I had to run to the bedroom to control them!
The next distinct memory is watching Kuch Kuch Hota Hai for the first time :) (yes, I've watched it may be 10-15 times till now). It was almost an year since the movie released, so I did know the story and how Shah Rukh does end up with Kajol by snatching her away from Salman Khan in the Shaadi Ka Mandap (which was soon to become his trademark style of wooing his heroines :p ) . I did know what was going to happen, but nothing would stop the flow of tears in the theatre ! I've never been comfortable weeping out for everyone to see, and I really don't know how I managed to dam the multitude of tears just streaming away!
I again cried after watching the movie a second, and a third time, and it was only at take 4 that the tears finally stopped :). (wow! never knew I was such a cry baby! )

If you're a girl, and if you like reading, it is almost a given that you must've read Love Story . I was first introduced to the book in B-Tech. Bhavana and I read the first sentence together " What can you say about a twenty-five year old girl who died ? " . Bhavana's eyes immediately welled up. I was influenced for sure, but no tears really came out. When I eventually read the book (then) too, it was sad for sure , but again nothing more.
I bought a copy sometime in December '06 in India, and on my way back (to Stan) got it for some light reading on the plane. I had to board a plane at Portland to eventually reach SF, and I decided to read the book then. I had the window seat, so I just leaned my head against the window, and began reading.
Read the first statement , 'twas okay. Sad, but okay. And then I (re)read the sentence - "Love means never having to say you're sorry " . And that was It. I used up the tissues handed out just in trying to stem the flow. This was really weird cos I'd read the story earlier. The timing was such I guess ? well, atleast I'd like to think so!

And recently I read A Thousand Splendid Suns : the reason for this post. One thing you notice about most authors is their signature. Every author has probably one (in some cases a few, and in others , quite a few) piece(s) of work that really stands out , that becomes his/her hallmark, and all other written work merely becomes an extension or in some cases just a shadow of 'the' work. I read the Kite Runner, it was a really good piece of writing, it had the power to pull your thought towards Afghanistan in all its turbulence.
Frankly , I'd bought A Thousand Splendid Suns purely on an impulse , even the cover looked similar to the Kite Runner, and from a disillusioning experience with Paulo Coelho's other books (apart from the alchemist ofcourse), I was sort of sure that this would pretty much endorse the same things as the Kite Runner. One similarity I found was the frivolity of the titles :). They are probably the weakest link in both books. A more in-depth (or even a second sitting) study of both books might make the same signature very obvious, but one thing that really stood out in this book was the female protagonists. The Kite Runner had male protagonists, and that in itself probably makes both books fundamentally different.
Protagonist #2 Laila comes across as a feisty, intelligent person. She dares, and also shows a LOT of spunk when it is demanded of her. The treatment of females is extremely crummy ( no other description fit it so well) and the spirit she shows is really remarkable. That she has the guts to escape her husband with another ally (husband's biwi no:1 Mariam : protagonist #1 ) is really great. The planning, the saving and the lying that goes into it is truly awesome. Any normal person's mental process would have just blocked by then.
Whats more - they are caught in their attempt, she is brutally beaten, is almost strangled, but her courage is intact.
As most books go, this does have a happy ending, but at the cost of Mariam's life, and Laila's health, and her children's happiness. To cut a long story short, any one would be compelled to feel extremely bad at the collosal waste of precious lives. quite a few people also seem to have endorsed this!

Happy Tears !! This should definitely be The Alchemist :) . I just love the book, and I've 'forced' a LOT of people into reading it. Santiago's courage is really awesome. It is like the time when we were children, and wanted to change the entire world. We moderate it more and more, and by the time we reach adulthood, our dreams usually end up becoming as insignificant as us :) . Santiago on the other hand dreams, and dreams big, and does not let go of his dream (though he does come perilously close to it a couple of times).
The last few pages are really gripping, when he realizes that the treasure he was seeking was in his own backyard, and it was for this treasure that he had to travel halfway across the world. That is what it is mostly about, your destination/ destiny is so near you that you can't see it and yet when all paths converge to it and you realize you've journeyed a long way just to reach some place so close, the journey itself would have been worth it :) .

An idea @ day

2008-01-15T11:41:00.001-08:00

Behind every great idea,
every significant achievement,
every important accomplishment
is a full wastebasket,
or a cluttered blackboard,
or a doodled up legal pad..

Is scribbling all it takes ?

Are you just a cramped writing hand away from changing the world?

probably not.

But no one ever led a revolution with his hands in his pockets.

Source -- A hyundai Ad.

Of Rats and Races

2008-01-10T15:08:00.000-08:00

I don't like competition -- never did . Well, the latter part of the statement is probably not completely accurate, may be I did like competing against scores of other similarly placed school kids in recitation, or the race where you have to run to the other end about 100 m away, eat a banana, and then run and come back, or even the normal 'running race' where I was inevitably second if it was a race between two people.

So does not liking competition indirectly suggest a lack of ambition ? ambition is defined as having a strong desire to achieve something, and I do have that - I do want to have a full life, utilize my abilities, and have no regrets when I move on. Trying to one up someone is something I really don't understand -- it is more about being better than the person next to you than doing your best and being the best if you are the best.

For a large majority, this starts from the time you are a kid - lots of mommies tell their kids, pinku!! look at rinku's scores in Maths, and look at yours!! Dinku was first in the athletic meet, I didn't make you participate for you to come third! This might be one extreme case, but google parental violence, and you come across umpteen cases of parents carrying it too far, but there have been instances of coaches being mauled to death by parents! All in the name of competition ?? Not really - one upmanship is more apposite here I guess. Strains of such memories probably get carried over to adulthood, and you again have instances of doping, doping programs, or plain vanilla aggression :).

One can also think about the current US Presidential elections (the primaries/ caucuses) or any elections that matter - the amount of mudslinging that goes on- both inadvertant and intentional is stupendous!

Well, it would have been utopia if everyone just went by their business, did the best they could do, and honestly rejoiced in others' success :) :) .
Yeah, life is probably all about making decisions, and making sure they are the right ones ;-) -- the most complicated decision I had to make today was to decide between cauliflower and cabbage curry :) :) -- no , my life is definitely more complicated and worthwhile than that :) :).

The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat.

Rendezvous with Highway 1

2007-10-01T15:12:00.000-07:00

If you live in the bay area, it's a given that most of your outings are going to be water-related, and concerning the pacific, and along highway 1. Extending from Legget in the North to San Juan Capistrano in the south, this 548.59 mile long stretch is a breathtaking composition of the best part of the pacific coastline along California.
A drive through the perennially foggy Big Sur alone suffices the reputation of Route 1.
My first brush with Hway 1 was sometime last summer, when (only) one of us had a driving permit, so we took a rental car and drove all the way upto Santa Cruz. Actually this first experience was more of disillusionment and frustration - Santa Cruz is/was a particularly smelly beach, add to it the dogs-allowed policy, and dog-fearing people, hmmm, not something I'd care to remember beyond now :)).
The second tryst was much more enjoyable - the seventeen mile drive - A really scenic stretch of Seventeen miles, dotted with millionaire homes, 'splurgy' golf courses, and cypress trees shaped more by the passage of wind than any thing else :). At the right view point (Seal Rock) , you'll get a really good view of Sea Lions, and you can't help but envy their all-you-can-eat-then-sleep lifestyle as you watch them sluggishly move forth, contemplate the issue of world peace, then take a 3 hr nap, and then finally make the intended plunge into the icy cold waters of the pacific.
A little further down is the famous 'lone cypress ' (or did I get the name wrong??). A protective enclave manages to keep the roots from getting mangled with the sea weeds, but other than that, it stands alone (and not tall :( ) jutting just a little into the sea.
'D' came over for an interview to the area, and apart from the interview 'preparation' (believe me, I didn't keep her from studying!! Ask her!!) she had about 14 hrs, 5 pm - 7 am the next morning. So D, Rahul n I went to SF - I made her walk almost 1+ miles to show her Fisherman's wharf :), and all she could say later was that the walk had done her good, and that this was the only way she'd have been able to really see the skyline :).
When we got back to campus at about 1:30 am plus a triple chocolate something cake (anyways, it has chocolate, and Divya can't see anything except chocolate, and chocolate cakes in grocery stores) ; Ravi got the crazy idea to go to half-moon bay and then have cake. What was initially half moon bay then became midway to Santa Cruz, and we ended up having cake somewhere near the point-something lighthouse, and sometime near 4:30 am. But truly, that was one of the best cake locations I've ever had :D.
Graduation time : My parents came over for graduation, and my Mom is a confirmed water-lover. All I had to do to keep her happy and smiling was to drive down to any water body, and lead them to the water-front :))). En Route to LA, we made a stop-over at Big Sur: well - just at Pfeiffer State beach, a scenic out-of-the-way beach. It's got all these 'cavey' rocks, which have these hollows through which water gushes through, and makes a very miniature version of the movie scenes where the heroine learns that she is going to have a kid, and that the villain has (apparently) killed the hero, and all the waves in the world race madly towards the biggest rocks in the world and ... well, you got the point.
The next rendezvous with Pfeiffer State Beach had much more interesting consequences, it was windy as ever, and sand poured in, and my photographic equipment unintentionally became exposed to the vagaries of nature, and what was left out of it was my warranty covered camera, and a couple of kindergarten kids :).
San Simeon is yet another picturesque place along the coast, 'tis the location of the largest known congregation for elephant seals, and the best part is you get to watch them from really close quarters, and then you notice that June (or probably the entire solar cycle) is a time when the seals shed their old scales, which look very similar to the bark of trees, and that seals and sea lions are different (one of them has ears and one of them hasn't; I forget which is which though), and that they're actually a lil more active that sea lions, but we're probably talking in terms of single digit percentages here ;-).
Go even further south, and there's Solvang and Santa Barbara, more 'man-made' that the above places, and equally famous too, but that is another weekend :)

A Surfeit of Bad Movies

2007-08-30T12:43:00.001-07:00

Well, I graduated! Big deal, everyone does .. it's not like I made it thru school with a 4.3! , anyways, who cares, I was done with 'studying', with the homework, the telephone crying sessions - 'OMG!! Why do I have so much to do??, why the heck did I take the course?? I'm not learning anything :((( , and after the grades are out

if ( grade == A)
{
stmt = " I know this was a great course!! I really learnt a lot from this!! bla - bla blu " ;
}
else {
stmt = " It must've been the height of randomness when I signed up for that!! What the hell was I thinking??? It's neither my depth nor breadth!! why why why!! The course is so poorly structured!! It is so arbitrary! bla bla blue .. " ;
}

trasmit_to_every_one_unfortunate_to_hear_you(stmt) ;

About summarizes 6 quarters of existence at one of the most beautiful campuses in the world (well, not exactly, but you get the point ;) )

Anyways, we're getting away from where we were, which was that I was DONE.
Also got a car sometime before leaving school, and then the cup of joy runneth over! I must've covered about 1k miles in a month, just traversing El Camino Real! Looks petty?? Well, try asking the people who still make trips to the shopping center in shopping express, and wait for some kind friend/ car friend to take them to the Indian Stores!

Summarizing: graduated, got car.
And then work started! Work is actually really exciting, the people I work with are really great (no no , I dont think there is a chance of them coming across this piece of chick-lit, so I really mean it ) and it makes sure you have a full week, and then comes friday, when ; as always, you decide to go watch a movie , and here's the story/stories (finally!!!!!)

Aduvari Matalaku Ardhaale Verule (AMAV) ( The words of women have various meanings) This was in the pre-grad days, but still deserves a mention for the sheer randomness that was baptized as a movie by the director (Some Doss, murugadoss/ramadoss, well -- what the heck!!)
The title is actually from a hit song in a hit earlier movie, and definitely suggested possibilities -- yeah, if a computer illiterate learns so much in his first few days at a software firm that he single handedly recovers all data after the entire system crashes -- well -- it would have been better if the inane rhapsody was named director script ki ardhaalu levu le :)))))))

Ta ra rum pum - Again a pre-grad movie, it resembled those K-serials a lot, except that there were no 'bad' ppl , but the array of good looking characters, exquisitely dressed despite poverty, everything converging to one place where all the worlds problems have to be shouldered by the lead lookers (actors would be too strong a word for this movie) and the only way out is to achieve the impossible - which obviously the hero (One of my favorites - Saif, but at the risk of being two-faced, he DOES look great !! ) does :) )

Harry Potter and the order of the phoenix -- It pains me to place this movie in this list; well it was not that bad actually, just that it was not that great, may be that is the reason why one shouldn't have expectations, the fall; however softened; hurts real bad. Add the fact that we got bad seats, not exactly a great experience!

Salaam-e-ishq : great songs, bad movie, bad stories, too many stories, bad characters, too many characters, bad acting, too many actors, bad script, too many writers. need I say more? ohh, and yes L.O.N.G.

Dubai Seenu (Seenu from Dubai) , Yamagola ( ~ yamaleela) - Two of the most horrendous movies I've seen in recent times, the saving grace of AMAV was that it wasn't loud, but these pulled out all stops!! Add to it a dance hall converted to a theater - so zero acoustics, the perfect recipe for temporary deafness. Things happen for no rhyme or reason, people meet, people die, people kill other people, should I actually mention more??
And mind you, both movies were actually given great ratings!! and by reputed sites!!

Conclusion : There are three choices

a) Watch bad movies.
b) watch good ones.
c) dont watch any.

For a looooooong time to come, I'm picking (C).

And then this quarter ends too.

2007-05-27T11:41:00.000-07:00

Well, happens every quarter, has to come to a close, but this is probably the last time a quarter actually ends for me, in all possibility the last few days I'm going to be a student, don't really remember having been anything else for quite some time now..
You know, everytime, it used to be like okay - this is the 'big jump' could've been from Kindergarten to primary school, or to high school, or to college, I guess this phase could really be called a transition, finally finding your bliss after 2+10+2+4+2 years of being led, somewhere.
Frankly, I really dont think life is gonna be any different, its just the tag associated with me that will change.
Not that I've done great work this quarter ;) but it will probably be nice to wake up at 6:30, have a nice cup of coffee, put in your eight hours, come back home, hang out, do masti over the weekends, and the whole brouhaha associated with 'working'. Yeah, it sure is going to be nice, atleast until the next jump anyways, whatever/whenever that may be.

What is it with Nanditha's birthday??

2007-03-16T01:44:00.000-07:00

Nanditha and I share a common superstition, that my 'life' undergoes a complete change after her birthday - which is on March 14th. So it goes like this - until march 14th, some things happen, and then, after that, something happens, and happens abruptly, which changes a lot of things - for better I mean :D
Well - the 'logical' reason would definitely be that march happens to be the end of a financial year, and that most things end/begin in march; but I'd like to believe otherwise.
Well, looking forward with greater trepidation to next winter!!!

Phir Milenge / Till we meet again

2007-02-13T17:51:00.000-08:00

I always found this concept really interesting, with slight exaggeration, it kind of reaffirms the human faith in hope, the hope of meeting again, the hope of catching up on things that were left behind, it could be the other way round too.
Concisely, its a promise of tomorrow's existence.

(gtg, TA hours shortly :) )

Self gift (???)

2007-02-01T21:48:00.000-08:00

The original intent was to name this post 'Man's gift to man' (again - a strident reminder of the leaps and bounds by which my language has gone down the drain - but thats branching out again ;) ) ; okay, coming back to the original topic- it totally smacked of gaygiri , and I was like it could definitely do better, and from the look on your face, I'm dead sure it didn't succeed :)) .

Btw, did you know that, under ideal conditions - a sound that has been created, will never die down!! The reason being that it will keep resonating along the walls, eventually the refelctions will permeate the entire room (I know this is putting it really badly, but a good reference should help) : bottomline being that the density of sound actually increases with time, so when some old aunty says, there is so much more noise these days even when it's really quite, there is some significance to it :).

Coming back to the gifts part -
some of the best creations by man are ( a concept is a creation too!! )

Google (hence the 'concept' mantra).
Bicycle.
Coffee.
The 'printf' statement.

Wotsay??

Happy New Year!!!!

2007-01-16T13:38:00.000-08:00

Better late than never - I'm sure you'll agree..

The interesting thing was, I was pondering on this year's (breakable) new year resolution, and found that there was nothing!!

interesting :) (or not?? )

anyways, who cares!!

Honey! I'm Home!!!

2006-12-08T09:27:00.000-08:00

I agree that Fred Flintstone's dialogue is not very apposite here, but replace honey with mamma, and you're bang on target :-). It's been one year, three months, and 5 days (and counting) since I left hyderabad, and I can still hardly believe I'm going back in another one week!!
There will be a lot of catching up to be done, will finally be able to have a conversation with my parents across a table - without 8405 kilometers separating us, and reliance india call, and two phone lines making the effort to keep us connected :-).
No, I'm not complaining, its something I volunteered to do. It is just that this unnatural yearning for home is a transient response, a spike, which does not really exist. Eventually it is a stable, harmonious equilibrium you look for, and for someone in their quarter life crisis, every goal seems to have a horizon at eternity, which is again not true, time takes its time :-), but it's frightening none-the-less ......
Again, there is a lot of catching up to be done with siblings, friends, cousins, and other non-friends-non-acquaintances, we've been connected all along, but the 'personal' interaction is something that has been sorely missed, we all parted as young adults at the threshold of something exciting, a new stage of life, something that would finally represent the fact that we were grown ups - we meet now as adults, with some goals, aspirations, likes, dislikes, passion which might be more toned down than the high-flown ones we had before, but one can take solace in the fact that it is now more real (and boring? :-) ).
Again, there will now be the inevitable question of what next, parents are going to broach the question of marriage, a 'new' life, whatever :-) , there will be some ribbing for friends who've 'found' someone, and hope and expectations for those who haven't :-))) .
An year is a long time, but as it inches closer to the inevitable end (after which parting should follow again, but that is another post :-) )

Well, we'll all meet again, a bunch of confused grown ups, to part again perhaps, but its a 'full life' that counts, and not a 'long life' :-)

An Ode to The Red Indians

2006-11-23T16:22:00.000-08:00

OOOOOOh!!!! Its the fourth thursday of nov,
and its the bay area, so no wind, no snow!!!
and we all meet
to sing and eat
and say thank you
thank you thank you
O you good native amru ,
where would have we been, but for you!!

You gave us (???!!!???) land,
shelter and food,
well, its actually just land right(?)
and then 'we' did good!!

Aah! that fateful day when we
finally got off the 'May Flower'
A bunch of disenchanted separatists,
looked on with awe and wonder,
We're not so lazy, so ye idle brains, hark!!
The bird was on the wing, and on the thorn the lark!!
we set to work, and began sowing,
lost our people, but continued mowing,

And lo!! everything we touched became gold!!
We survived!!
and then we looked back, with pride!!

We work hard, we party hard,
just needed an excuse, and found it in our backyard!!
A newly grown fowl, but that wasn't enough quirky,
so, we thought, why not turkey!

And so we have, the thanksgiving repast,
all you can eat, and then depart,

And go, buy a flash drive, it's just a little under $ four,
Such tempting deals, it makes you want more,
but after some time, fry's might be a bore,
so move on with life, there's clothes and more!

You buy and buy and buy till you drop,
and whats in your pocket looks like half the shop!!
ohhh, make a stop at walmart!!! we still need that mop!!
Oh Maaaan!! Thanksgiving sure packs a wallop!!!

Arrived!!! :-)

Looking back/Looking Ahead

2006-11-21T08:47:00.000-08:00

Its funny how some things never really change, whatever happens :-). Yesterday, I was 'doing' an assignment with a 'bachpan ki dost' - Divya, Well, for some reason, I've always known and been reasonably close to people with that name, and I'm not going to say anything about their bullying tendencies :)))) .
Ok, so it was actually a 2 hr conversation, and we were both doing parallel processing, meaning just gappe maarofying and nothing else,

Looking back, undergrad seems a lot of fun, but I guess that is the power of nostalgia - it paints everything done and over with, with a really rosy brush, and makes us sit in a corner, sigh and say - "aah, woh bachpan ki yaadein' .
There was always this urge to use those four years as just a spring board to higher things in life, and not really think/have time for anything else, but as things turned out - the friends I made then, are for life. But, I guess the best things happen to you when you least expect it.

Everyone's constantly hitting 'refresh' button, keep hearing surprising things almost every week (as for me, I use refresh just to see if the number of hits to my blog increased :p), looking forward to many more new developments :))

I miss you all, and all the great times we shared together - notably - sonet room, counting the number of times 'someone' was nodding 'its' head in class over a span of half an hour, baaabitha and daepa time, passing messages (on paper and the calc), laughing out loud at the mention of wanting fruit pieces over juice, getting booked, the tour, getting 'drunk', snow world, the awesome reception at Tennessee, all the lambe conferences, all the impromptu movies, handi, and much much more :)

>:D<

whatever

2006-11-20T17:42:00.000-08:00

Did you know that Solaris sucks??
I do, now.

hmmmm.........................

2006-11-17T10:48:00.000-08:00

When I started the blog, I promised myself that it will not be one stream of self-indulgent non-sense :). but old habits die - hard :))

Have a demo coming up today, and that will be kind of the "end" of one project I was working on, the final version looks pretty cool I should say :).

another thing - had a Strawberry Nutella crepe yesterday - thats the worst possible thing which can happen to you when you are amongst the non-un-employed set of people, the hangover persisted for about 12+ hrs .

Thank you Prashanti!!

2006-11-09T18:45:00.000-08:00

Had my first presentation in almost two years today (not counting a presentation that had for my internship, which was more of a walkthrough of what I did over the summer), thought it was not that great, I distinctly remember saying "so we do this" , "so we do that" when I was actually talking about some third party who was doing stuff,
Divya, its all your fault! I got so used to doing projects with you and then talking about it saying "we did this" and all that.

Anyways, coming back to the title of my blog, Prasanthi, my roomie , also came over to check out my presentation, I thought it was really nice and brave since one usually goes out of the way to listen to presentations :)),
Thanks again!! and I hope I get the opportunity to be present at your PhD defense!!

height of creativity/joblessness!!

2006-11-08T23:30:00.000-08:00

My roomie just asked me something about some calculator(calc) functions, and that brought back long lost memories :), as first year students, our particularly favourite passtime was to write messages in the calculator (starting Fx 911 W , i think A-F and several other keys are present) , and our inventiveness provided for the alphabets that couldn't be , so a pi became an r and so on (try it!!) ..
that was a really cool/creative/jobless thing to do!!
ok, lemme get back to work.

Good Luck SP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2006-11-02T20:05:00.000-08:00

SP(SwethaPriyanka to the uninitiated :) ) has her thesis defense coming up tomorrow, just wished her and told her that I'll start working on my presentation too, but I'm being creative instead :p.

Now the most special thing about SP is her sense of night and day - she is one of the really few people I know who manages to do a nite out for all the right reasons (as far as I can remember - I must've been part of 3 all-nighters - all for 'social' reasons :)) ).
So her USP is the way she takes things heads on when she's under pressure - which is awesome, cos most ppl I know (including me) would just sit and wait and watch :).
Which brings me to the issue of how different people react to different things differently..
Another incident which triggered this thought was a road rage incident that happened today to a postdoc in my lab; I didnt venture to ask the details, but from what I could glean - he (his car) apparently hit/bumped into someones car , and the other person followed him for about 20 minutes, and this person(X) was assuming that Y (stalker)'s workplace was the same. When X pulled into the parking lot - Y suddenly bumps into him from behind.. I dunno too many details, but from what I could see of X - he was totally totally shaken - which was completely different from how he appeared to the world until yesterday - I'm really afraid of him, had a very very angry and rude email from him once, and since then I make sure that my work is much before the deadline.
It was really surprising (or perhaps not) to see him go to pieces today ; had to go to a class, and on the way I saw him sitting in the cafeteria with someone ( presumably the girlfriend) who was trying to console him, and he had a tissue in his hand.
I guess it is these sudden shocks that bring out what you really are, how you react to them is a true measure of what your chromosomes are made of, or probably this is the definition of that enigmatic 4 letter word - life.

Yes or No?

2006-10-25T15:40:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, I wish life was one long series of true or false questions, there must have been no need to turn back, or even look back, cos there's only one way - the right way to do things...

Well, the reason I'm writing this is - I have a mid term + a presentation coming up soon ( a big deal for someone as lazy as me ;-) ), but there is a whole lot to do as part of my RA.

So is it nice that I am being paid to study, or is it not nice that I have to keep that as my top priority, come what may, since that is paying for me to study?

Yeh Dil Maange More??

2006-10-21T12:50:00.000-07:00

Its only human to want more - more money, better grades, better looks, better clothes, a better shelter, better food, and what not.
I received a forward today, one of the typical 'starved african children' forward. Not having done anything towards promoting their well being, it would definitely be hypocritical if I were to criticize everyone about being as selfish as me.
Well, the first step would definitely be not to waste anything - food, clothes,money.

A story for the inevitable doubt :
There were innumerable starfish lying/slowly dying along the beach of some ocean. A man was systematically picking up them using a hovel and throwing them back to where they belonged - the ocean . A cynic asked - "How in the name of anything are you going to save all of them?? Its just a waste of time!! " .
This person said nothing, just picked up yet another one, made sure it landed in the ocean, and then says - "Made a difference to that one" .

:-)

Of Fountains and Moonbeans

2006-10-18T21:57:00.000-07:00

Moonbeans is your equivalent of the ubiquitous "College Canteen" - the most flamboyant part about it being its location - forming a modest third of the triangle between the Green Library, the fountain hoop and itself .
The coffee haven for people 'studying' (well, some actually do!! ) in meyer/green, or the more unfortunate people breaking their head over some code in sweet hall, it fully lives up to its name.
It's a fine afternoon, and you decide you've had enough of acads, and you just want to grab a cup of coffee, watch life zoom by (or rather, bike past you) ; you invariably end up getting slightly shocked when you perceive the serpentine queue waiting for their own potion/poison. Still, never mind, you wait patiently for tea/coffee, or sometimes samosa (yeah!! they have that too!!) .
The guy behind the counter is a really warm person, and he sometimes asks for your name, tries pronouncing it, usually with a good measure of success, and if the crowd is not too bad, will also say - "Kaise ho" (Apparently, he does know a smattering of several languages! ) .
You smile, conveniently forget politeness, and wait for your coffee.
With the cup of life in hand, you then head to the fountain, the steady drone of water drowning away any directed noise, so the only thing you hear is a steady gush of H2O. Another ideal location to go over that paper which doesn't seem to make sense even though you think you've read it enough.
Things now move speedily towards a happy ending, and that paper is no longer greek and latin.
Peace is restored, and you head back home to search for something else to break your head on.

Looking forward to many more fountains and moonbeans!! :)

Stopping by the woods on a snowy evening

2006-10-16T14:57:00.000-07:00

Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know,
His house is in the village though,
He will not see me stopping here,
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's a sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

lovely poem :-)
My take?
I think sometimes its okay to stop by the woods because life is about the journey, and not just the destination....

2006-10-14T16:11:00.000-07:00

I was coming back from my lab, and happened to notice several sets of people across
Serra Street, apparently it was a reunion, so 'students' from the batch of 1951-61-....1981-1991 (I think) came over..
Coming back to your Alma mater, meeting, catching up with long lost friends/acquaintances, must be pretty exciting!!

I cant wait for my 'reunion' !!
See you in 2017 !!!

cooool!!!!!!!!!!!

2006-10-12T14:49:00.000-07:00

There was this Matlab Program which was (apparently) consuming huge amounts of memory, and wasn't executing right,

my suggestion?? Restart the computer, and guess what?? It worked!!!

What Next

2006-10-10T23:22:00.000-07:00

15 Sep 1984 - 1987 - Ignorance
1987 - 1989 - Kindergarten
1989 - 2001 - KV Bolarum
2001 - 2005 - SNIST
2005 - 2007 - Stanford
2007 - ____ What next?

Went to the career fair today, told everyone how awesome I was, and why I should be considered for the best position in the world!

Lets see what comes up!!

RNA Secondary Structure Prediction

2006-10-09T13:35:00.000-07:00

Paper Reference
Björn Voß (Voss), Structural analysis of aligned RNAs . Nucleic Acids Research (Oxford Journals). October 2006.

Abstract
In this paper, the author describes the need for structural analysis of different classes of RNAs and discusses RNAlishapes, a tool/algorithm which facilitates the prediction of a consensus structure of a class of RNA sequences. The algorithm uses extensions of several techniques from single sequence RNA structure prediction.
The input here is a set of aligned RNA sequences, to which a shape abstraction technique is applied first. The biggest utility of the shape abstraction technique as a first step is that it retains only the nesting and adjacency pattern of helical and unpaired regions, so any exponential growth of the number of sub-optimal regions is curtailed.
Structure prediction (based on an adaptive technique using a grammar describing the search space) is then performed, which accepts user defined inputs too, providing the ability to assign confidence levels to different structures. The grammar used in RNAlishapes describes RNA secondary structures without isolated base pairs and handles dangling bases differently. This branching into grammar and algebras facilitates the application of already existing grammars on individual sequences and then averaging it over the entire alignment sequence.
Unpaired bases and gaps that arise due to alignment of different RNA strands are taken into account by considering the thermodynamic energies of various scenarios. Ultimately the consensus structure predicted has the minimum mean free energy (MmFE).

Discussion:
The author has come up with an algorithm that forms a consensual prediction of the given aligned RNA sequences, which is a significant step ahead of the prediction of the structure of a single RNA sequence that was discussed in class. Different (classes of) non-coding RNAs are characterized not by their sequence similarities, but by their structural properties, and under this light, this study could definitely lead to a more generic algorithm.
In my opinion, one of the best aspects of the algorithm was having shape abstraction as the first approach, and then opting for more specific filtering/prediction schemes. This must have been the prime reason for the asymptotic complexity to be significantly less (O(pN,N3,M) for an alignment of length N holding M sequences, where p depends on the shape abstraction chosen).
Typically, genetic algorithms that work best have a mix of learning/stochastic and deterministic techniques, with a carefully selected feature vectors (for the training sets/learning algorithms). In the “Structure Prediction” section for instance, the author illustrates a base-pairing parameter, where there is a threshold level which would be user defined. ‘Hardwiring’ the threshold is not considered good practice. Also, in calculating the free energy, the parameters selected to determine the MmFE alignment sequence may/may not be functionally complete.
RNAlishapes builds upon existing algorithms for consensual prediction of aligned sequences and manages to keep the asymptotic complexity within bound. It would however be useful to check if self learning schemes could be incorporated into Structure Prediction.

Home

2006-10-08T16:21:00.000-07:00

I sit here, contemplating, of all things about you
Reflecting on every aspect of life, that revolved around you,
Your blissful presence was a presupposed fact,
You were there for me, every scene, every act,
shielding me from the unforgiving sun,
protecting me from rain and hurricane,
being indulgent and letting me have all the fun,
remaining irrevocably benign, while I was raising cain.

Your thoughts come unbidden now,
The dewed mornings when it appeared
as if you were fresh from the laundry,
The mild days when the wind lapped up the waves
playing them softly against your feet,
The delicious evenings, when you stuck out like a pearl
amongst plastic :-)

And yet, when future beckoned,
You let me go with open arms, and an open invite
Isn’t that love at its best, not seeking a return?
I grew wings, flew out of sight,
With the tiniest sliver of doubt,
If you shed tears at the loss, but was I contrite?

And now, when I come back to wintry evenings,
When your care and concern is a thing of the distant past,
My thoughts suddenly fly to you,
and everything about you becomes rosy once again,
So loveable, so pristine in its affection
and so unattainable….

I can’t wait to see you again,
I keep crossing out dates
So I can speed them up and see you sooner,
Aah! If only I was all mighty,
None of these days would intervene,
But that is not meant to be, time takes its time,
And then one day,
I will be with you, and make you the happiest in the world!!
A lesson learnt from the school of life,
never to be forgotten.

And yet, something nags me at the back of my mind,
what is it that I miss the most,
Home, or the idea of one?

:-)
Courtesy: A gtalk chat with "d" :-)

Welcome :)

2006-10-08T15:50:00.000-07:00

Well,

I dont really want to write too much of an intro, I am sure its going to be deja vu :) .
I've always been really interested in creative writing (or the idea of it :p) , and now that I've become reasonably good at managing my time, I've decided to get back to it, and unleash it to the world!

so, welcome to my blogspace :-)