Day 35

Wednesday practice, not running for last 2 days and hectic weekend showed. Was really tired. I was hoping that I could do the tempo runs for 20 min today, but even the first 2 strides were hard!! I think to make some serious progress, need to take lot of rest over the weekend, and also eat properly, not at random times. I hate that the practice just seems to take away all weekends. From next time its going to be hills, that will be some fun, but I am really looking forward to improving my uphill run, its what I am weakest at.

Day 34

Did not run on monday, was too tired from the hectic weekend. So ran today before the weights class, it was quite hard, could not run at all, so finally walked on that new treadmill, hopefully practiced uphill run/walk.

Day 33 Week 12

Ran 10 miles today, woo hoo!!
Went to the lake early, around 7:00, ran around the lake once, 1/2 inside and 1/2 outside. Was back by 7:38, must have taken 33-35 min to run 3 miles. After that there was 10 min break as I talked to other people etc. Then started on a 7 mile course with Rishi, somehow I was full of confidence that I can do it. The first half was quite easy, 2 miles near the lake, the same flat course, after that another mile or so was mostly downhill, so that was easy. The next 2 miles were flat, but in sun, and that is where most of my energy was drained, if I was alone, that would have been the point to stop, but thanks to Rishi I kept going. We got some unintentional breaks stopping for signal, figuring out the route and that was great help. The good thing about this route was that Ravenna came suddenly and we joined it pretty close to the lake, so the last 1/2 mile of so I was just running thinking that we are almost there.

Day 32

Friday run was getting too tiring, so I decided to run today after weights class. It was easier and harder, strength class was a warm up, and also tiring. Still managed to run 20 min @ 5.5, approx 2 miles. Every minute I was telling myself, you can do it, 2 miles is nothing, and then tomorrow you won't have to run :) A surprising improvement, I think I am going to stick to Thursday evening run and free up friday mornings for Yoga relaxation.

Day 31

Wednesday trainings are becoming easier, running to the fields does not kill me anymore and I can run more than 4-5 rounds on the track. Doing strides and tempo runs now and dreading the hills. Running strides reminds me so much of the time back in school during PT exam, when we were suppose to run some 400m and get points on our speed, I would run with all my strength and pray to God, please don't let me be the slowest person, and amazingly though I was probably one of the fatest in class, someone always managed to take few seconds more than me :) Not much has changed, except that I don't pray anymore and we don't get points on speed but on distance.

St Helens once again

If you ask me for a movie I can watch again and again, I will say DDLJ, and if you ask me for a place I can go again and again, I will say St Helens. Not because its the most beautiful place I have seen, but because I *can* go here again and again :). So this weekend, Srijan, Sree, myself and Subo headed to St Helens once again. This time I suggested Windy Ridge again, because I found it a lot more amazing view than the super crowded Johnson's observatory. Its here that you can go really close to the crater, look right into the spot from where the lava came out, and into the lake where it went, and you can do that that without bumping into 100 people. And it did turn out to be a very nice visit, windy ridge was windy as usual and it was nice sitting in open after a long week. Sometimes I wonder, for us city dwellers, the fresh air is so rare, while growing up, I just too it for granted. 5 years back if you had asked me what I would give to feel fresh, unpolluted wind on my face, I would have said are u crazy, but today, I am ready to drive for hours to get to a place where you can feel that wind, feel the freedom, feel so close to nature, feel away from all the worries that we have surrounded ourselves with.

Day 30

Not a good day for running. Went to the gym thinking that I will run hill, or faster, but was totally tired from the hectic weekend. Ran for like 5 min and then walked on the new machine for 10 min, that was enough exercise for the day!

Day 29 Week 11

Today was suppose to be big running day, I had planned to run around the lake once and then do the Burke Gilman trail. Got late in reaching greenlake, so did not get a chance to run around the full lake, just did a 1.5 mile run, after that the Burke Gilman trail, it was much better than before, and I think I could have pushed myself more, I was exhausted by the end, but not totally, I could have ran some more. Will shoot for 10 miles next time.

Day 28

Did not run, but walked on that new machine for 15 or something min, before the yoga class.

The Lost World - do i have to tell!!

Fianlly managed to get my hands on this book and read it. The book is good, interesting, still did not meet my high expectations, maybe I have read just too many. There are some loop holes in it like an Ihindi movie, but like a hindi movie, its totall interesting and worth the read. Since its such a famous book, there is no point telling what its about, only, its worth a read, so if you are looking for older literature, go ahead, read it up!

Day 27

This week is turning out to be pretty good, ran today also before the weights class on treadmill
15 min - 5.0 mph, 2.0 - 3.0 elevation.
Treadmill is a good place to get over the dreadful hills :)

Day 26

Today started out as one of the not so good days, I was totally tired by the time we reached the tracks. But then I did some strides, tired again, felt like that's it. Then ran another 11 minutes, tempo run and then ran back. By the end it was one of the normal days, getting better, need to keep it up :)

Day 25

Ran for about 40 min near Kirkland waterfront with Aparajita. Its a nice area to run, with lake on one side and mostly flat because of the lake. We ran about 2.8 miles and I was not too tired, talk about building stamina! The only problem on a weekday is too many cars.

Week 10

Did not run today, slept very late because of Indian Ocean concert Friday night. Instead went on a 7 mile rt hike. Hike was easy, but some exercise.

Soy milk

I finally tried Soy milk today after a lot of contemplations, and guess what, it was actually good!!
It has a slight flavour to it, which is much better than the tasteless milk that you get in US. Its of course a good source of protein and much more filling than milk. Need to check if it has enough calcium as that is one of the biggest reason to have milk. I am on my way to a semi-vegan lifestyle :)

Day 24

Today we did time trials on the track. I ran 1 mile in 11:30 minutes, kind of slow, it would be nice to increase the speed to at least 10:00, else I would just be the last person running on tracks. Ran 6 rounds without dying, so that was good.

Finally seemsed to be settled

Finally seems to be settled in the new place, arranged my closet on Sunday, opened some boxes, was nice use of time.

Day 23

Ran on Kirkland waterfront again with Marilyse. Its good to find a running partner, keeps me motivated and pushes me to run when I was to just call it quits like today :)

Day 22 Week 9

Ran another 6 miles today, it was easier than last time I ran the bruke-gilman trail. Next time need to try 8 miles.

Day 21

Great week!!
Went running at Kirkland waterfront again with Marilyse from office. Its was a enjoyable run, we also went down to a beach park. Getting ready for long run tomorrow.

Day 20

Decided to run Kirkland waterfront with Aparajita, she could not make, so I ran by myself. This is a better area to run, lesser hills. Ran mostly on weavy way, a small street away from traffic and lined with lake facing million dollar homes :)
20+ min at slow pace.

Day 19

Ran near the new place, its all uphill downhill, killing trail to run on. Managed to run like 20 min, after that was very frustrated by the lack of flat grounds. I think I will need to go back to treadmill, this area is hopless for running more than a mile.

Week 8

Had to move, so did not go for practice today.

Day 18

went for the Wednesday training, could finally run to the field easier. Started on the strides today, now it feels like training :) Strides seemed simple, but are hard, not sure if I got the technique though, I was trying my best. Looking forward to Saturday run. This week ran only for 2 days, so may again go for 2 outer loops around the lake, or if found company, then on bruke-gilman trail.

Day 17

Ran in the Grasslawns park with new shoes for 20 - 15 min. The run was ok, but I was very tired, either because of lack of sleep or because the new shoes are not good!

Day 16 Week 7

Saturdya carpool with Palani and Aparajita. We started running around the greenlake, I was undecided if I should go for 2 rounds, 6 miles or not, basically was trying to give myself reasons why and why I should not. Luckily first time I missed the meeting point and started on the second round without noticing :), that was some motivation, finally finished 2 rounds, last mile was as usual hard, but I could do it without collapsing !!

Sammamish Ridge nightmare

I cannot believe this is happening, or maybe I can, this apartment has been a problem for last one year. I think I had found out quite early that the management is very rude and not at all helpful. But they are also mean and expert in cheating you out of money. Now suddenly I have to pay $1200 rent for August month because I did not send a piece of paper. Does not matter you talk to them, let them know but before they will not say anything. Right after your deadline is passed, they will happily inform you that you were suppose to give a written notice, and now you have to pay some huge rent. I guess that is how these big corporates make their huge profits.

Day 15

Ran for 2 miles (25min) @ 5:0, no breaks required this time, and could have gone on, but was bored. I think I am getting better.

Day 14

Wednesday, finally I went to a wednesday practice. I did not do much, just ran to the track, ran twice rounds on the track and then back from the track, but it was a start. It was good workout. There were even more people from Asha, some new, some veterans. It was fun and relaxing to go out there, was feeling much better after the workout.

Day 13 Week 6

Saturday training, a lot of Asha junta showed up today, it was great. I planned to run 6 miles. After running 4 last saturday and 6 (with breaks) couple of weeks before, I thought I can make it, but guess what, its hard!! The weekday practices are a must to keep you in shape. Our route was really good, nice shaded trails going through the university, it did not seem very difficult also. But running 6 miles at one go was really hard, I think I gave up somewhere little over 4 miles, then it was all walking, running, stumbling, crawling.....
Will try the same next time.

Day 12

Ran for some 20 minutes on the treadmill at 5:00. It was easier than before, but lack of time.

Apartment hunting again

I cannot believe that I am back to apartment hunting. It was such a pain last time that I had decided not to move, but now again I have to move and to a much smaller place. This apartment, Sammamish Ridge, is totally not worth living at such high rates. But I am going to miss the space, open air, especially since I am moving into a basement. I cannot imagine how I am going to pack up everything again. But its probably for the good, I will get rid of lot of stuff and then moving will become easy again. At least I am slowly getting rid of all the furniture.

Day 11 Week 5

Finally after recovering from long weekend trip, apartment hunting spree, I decided to run at the washington lake by myself. I start the trail at 1&1/2 mile marker and then run to start of the trail and back, then I run another 1/2 or 1 mile to the next mile post and then of course back. This running back and forth is helpful, then I am back from the first leg, its a feeling of achievement that 3 miles is done, and then I can run further along.

The mid-week practices have totally stopped since I started apartment hunting, what a tension!
Hope to get back on track starting next week.

The grand Jupiter

Yesterday was a telescope day again, Rahul and I went to Phantom lake to have a look at Saturn. It was so scary in the beginning, all sunsaan, dark. It was a no moon night. First we set up our telescope in the parking lot itself. There were a bunch of bright stars, none of which though really looked like Saturn. The first thing we pointed to turned out to be Mars. Then to a bunch of other bright stars. Now that we were accustomed to the dark, the place was looking less scary. We moved a little into the Park, and there it was really bright planet. Once we pointed the telescope to it, it turned out to be Jupiter with all its glory and its moons. We could clearly see at least 7 of the moons, and with some patience, some colour was also visible on the planet. It was just a amazing site, seeing Jupiter after such long time! Finally we failed to locate Saturn though, guess it was already set.

Day 10 Week 4 amazing Rahul

6 miles, yes! I ran almost 6 miles today, and all the credit goes to Rahul. He was there in sun all the time, running or just waiting for me to get back. We ran on the Sammamish River trail again, it was of course very hard, and I had to take a couple of walk breaks.

moving time again!

I can't believe that its moving time again, and I just hate it, it was only yesterday that I opened all boxes and put up all posters. But well, you cannot control circumstances. Thinking about selling / giving away all my stuff and go back to the nomadic light weight life. Its obviously very economical. I wonder if that is the best way to live, all those people buying houses, buying all stuff for their houses, are simply ignorant of what's coming.

Day 9

Had planned to run at least 3 miles at 5 today. But ran little under 2 miles at 5 though, no walk breaks.
why - lack of motivation, it gets boring to run on treadmill all alone
todo - get a interesting book, run outside, sammamish river trail?

Day 8 Week 3

Today I was thinking of running around the green lake again, but that was not suppose to be. 520 bridge was closed, and going over I90 was too much effort. So Rukmani and I decided to run on the Washington River trail. Its a nice trail, running along a stream, best thing is that the trail has mile markers. We ran for about 5 miles, and it was a stretch.

2001 A space Odysse - Arthur C. Clark

As ironic as it sounds, the vision of 2001 is good :). I have mostly read Isaac Asimov's books in SciFi and his main theme about space travel is hyperspace etc. This book introduces another concept and its quite interesting, though its still very limiting and does not allow intra-galactic travel. I enjoyed reading the book, it starts out quite slow. You know something is coming, but you turn pages after pages waiting for it, and then there it is with a bang! One thing I found annoying with the book was that it just alludes over the mystery, secret, adventure, without really getting into depths of the mystery. The last few pages are quite action filled though.

Day 7

Wednesday training day. Went to Everyday Athlete for training (great neighbourhood BTW). Unfortunately there were no beginners to give me company, and I did not want to hold rest if the group, so I just ran little uphill by myself, 1.8 miles only. It was good weather and 30min. just passed without even realizing. Could have ran a little more with more persistance or company. Route map -

Day 6

Regular treadmill day, ran 30 min @ 5.0 with 2 min walk bread @3.5, covered 2.5 miles. Seems to be getting better at it :)

Day 5 Week 2

Today we met at the Spiritridge Elementary School in Bellevue at 7:30. It was easier to get up and go today. Thanks to Tarun, Yogita and Rukmani's company, I managed to run 4.6 miles. The last 0.6 mile felt like another 4 miles! But it was a good run. Took me a little more than an hour. It will get better :) Here is the route we took today -

Day 4

Today's treadmill run was a total disaster. Ran for 5 min and that was it. Just lazy I guess and also tomorrow's long run was a excuse, maybe I should start going to Thursdays instead of Fridays.

Day 3

Today I decided to go and give the treadmill a shot. I was suppose to go for up the hill practice, but that was just too much work. Ran for -
2 miles @ 4.5 miles, last .3 @ 5.0, 2 walk breaks in between @ 3.5
totally exhausting!

Marathon

I can't believe it, but I have actually started training for Half-Marathon. If I can finish it, it will be one more personal achievement for me after the Inca Trail in April. I started a new blog for the training -
http://tulika-run.blogspot.com/

Day 2

Sunday was a break day, and I totally enjoyed it. Today morning I decided to go for a 1/2 hr run in the nearby park. It started out well, I got up early, went out, no rain. But I got really tired in only 20 min, and since I was running all by myself, it got boring and I abandoned last 10 min and came back home. Not feeling very good about it, but its just the second day anyway.

A series of unfortunate events

I don't know why I read this book. Everywhere in the book it says that its not a happy book, no happy ending, no happy beginning and nothing happy in between. But that was ok, its a story and tured out to be somewhat interesting. But the writing style us just awful, with each word there is a detour to explain the meaning of the word, real annoying, made me wonder if I am reading a story book or taking a english lesson. The style of writing really makes you feel that its a adult writing for children, making the assumption that they are dumb and do not know anything. I can see that author wants to use difficult words, and then also give the meaning in case dumb children did not understand what the word means, but then why use the word in first place, just use the simpler word instead. That would be a art for writing children's books which the author clearly lacks. I have read other children's books (Harry Potter for instance) and have really enjoyed them, but this one was just awful.

Day 1 Week 1

Today was day 1 of the training, surprisingly good weather on the Green Lake. The goal was to run 1 mile, maybe 2, but I ended up running 3 miles, thanks to the company of Meghana and Reema. It was fun, I have never been able to run more than 2 miles on the treadmill, but running outside 3 miles gave me real confidence, maybe I can do it afterall!

Morning, noon and night - Sidney Sheldon

This is a average novel by Sidney Sheldon, or maybe now that I have read so many, he has become predictable. Its kind of a thriller, takes twists and turns Sheldon style, there are surprises in every chapter. If you decide to spend time to read this book, it will not disappoint you.
Like most Sheldon's novels, its the story of a very rich businessman, his childen, out of wedlock (fancy word!) children, story of rich people's greed for money, betrayal and contented lives of not so wealthy.

Surprise Creek - what a surprise!

So after coming back from Inca Trail adventure, I had decided that I was done for the hiking this season. But on Friday after Srijan's mail about going to this wonderful Surprise Creek hike, and Rahul's convincing, I decided to go.
http://www.wta.org/~wta/cgi-bin/wtaweb.pl?3+tg+fetch+english+1112
The hike was such a disaster for me. Only after 1/2 a mile of walking we started seeing snow on the path which got deeper and deeper. I was totally scared that either we are going to get lost in the snow or I am going to fall in one of the holes in snow and become a Discovery Channel story. We somehow reached covered a couple of miles, crossing perilious creeks, falling, getting up. Had our lunch at a some point. After lunch we started to climb higher and snow got deeper, that's when I wanted to call it a day, I knew I could not go all the way to the creek, path and time were both against us, and there did not seem much point in climbing any higher. If only we had read this story before, it would have saved lot of trouble.
http://www.wta.org/~wta/cgi-bin/wtaweb.pl?7+reports+displayM+2006050400

BITS, Pilani Video

Found this great nostalgic video of BITS, Pilani in 2005. Really cool, amazing work!

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4980019485488318714&q=pilani

... and Google Earth presents...
BITS Pilani

... and even more pictures. Beware - there are 200+ photos here, and it will take more than 30min, and you can't stop once you started.
http://camelinthedesert.blogspot.com/2005/04/photos-from-bits-april-2005.html

Freakonomics

Prey - Michael Crichton

Wiki- different from blog??

Found a good wiki -
http://www.pbwiki.com/?ref=Tour7

easy password protection, upload file / photos, easy to edit.

Saturn in our backyard ...

.... ok, in the telescope in our balcony.
After months of clouds, it was finally clear sky today. We had kept the telescope outside to get it cool down and were thinking about going out to see Saturn, actually thinking about not going because it was so cold. Then I went out, thinking that the direction is right, Saturn should be in the direction of our balcony and there were a couple of bright things showing. So then as the telescope was anyway outside, I just pointed it to the most Saturn-like thing and that was it!! And we could clearly see the rings from 10mm lense, though not the colours. And there were 2 bright things near it, donno if any of them was its moon. Need more studying to figure out.

Whiteout - Ken Follet

Another master piece by Ken Follet. I think he is my another favourite author. This book is full of adventure, series of unexpected things, enough to keep you hooked and turning pages. A total no-nonsense book.
Must read.
Other similar fiction by Ken Follet - Third Twin

cool new remix album

ok, it may not be really new, but i heard it for the first time. Kajra Nite by Sonu Nigam, lots of cool remixes. My favourites -
Kajra Mohabbat Wala
Hoton pe Aisi Baat

though Pal Pal Dil Ke Paas is totally messed up!!

Check it out at
http://www.raaga.com/channels/hindi/movie/V000548.html

and let me know if u get hold of it.

Winter Has Arrived in Redmond

So, winter finally arrived in Redmond with all its troubles. Today morning when I got up, the grass was all white, road was slippery and there was a thick layer of ice on my car. It took 15 min, lot of pain in fingers and the ice scratcher to get rid of it all. 10 min drive and 15 min of ice scraping!! And this is going to being a every day routine for next 3 months. Time to take out all those sweaters, coats, gloves, caps etc. etc. and layer up. Its also time to move back to California. Oh sunny San Diego !! Even windy San Francisco does not look that bad now.

Birthday Surprise

Telescope..........
This birthday was indeed a BIG surprise. I got a telescope!! A 6inch Orion XT6 beauty :) Spent one whole day assembling it, reading manuals and stuff. It reminds me so much of those wonderful nights star gazing in BITS. That telescope was of course 4 times size of this one. But excitement is still the same. And the way Urvashi and I used to bike back at full speed at 11:00 hoping the MB gates would still be open when we reach. But now I can look past that curfew :). Its a totally different story that we get 9 months of rain and extra looooooooong day light in dry season, still I am all over again excited about looking at rings of Saturn, craters of moon and galaxies.

Other highlight of the day was the mazing Chocolate cake with Chocolate icing and chocolate chips! yummiest!! Thanks to all the friends. And I ended the day with dinner at Thai Tom, which was ok, I think I am getting over its greatness now. Ethiopian next time.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Saw the movie on Friday in the theatre outside office, thinking that will see it again on a bigger screen. But the movie was somewhat of a disappointment for someone who as read, reread and heard the book. It not only deviated from the content of the book but also tried to introduce un-Hogwardly elements to make it, I donno what, more masala movie. Most disgusting was the "Rock'n'Roll" at the ball!! I could not believe it, Rock'n'Roll in Hogwards!! And the 10 minute long overly dramatized scene with the Dragon egg task, what was all that about. And they totally messed up the World Cup scene, Harry watching that man create the dark mark!! I do not remember that happen. The movie was running like a express train, fast fast and faster, but that I can understand given that the book was long and had too much content.

But of course, if you have not read the book, it would probably be enjoyable.

Harry Potter once again

there are some books and movies you cannot get enough of. So it was time for Harry Potter and Goblet of Fire once again, the movie this time. It released yesterday midnight, and I so much wanted to be there first day first show. But alas.... responsibilities of life do not allow me to be out untill 4 on a weeknight. So not first show, but I will sure be there first day. IMO, this book was a lot more action filled as the kids are growing now. Will see.....

State of Fear - Michael Chrichton

After a long time I read a book which presents concepts, ideas, which can actually be discussed and I am dying to discuss it!!
Spent the whole weekend reading "State of Fear" by Michael Chrichton, whole day, nothing else. Its quite a interesting book, it started with about being some environmental issues, and huge scale conspiracies and now is drifting towards influence of media on public opinions and stuff, and ended with random ideas by author about how we should 'manage' nature. Of course I have huge problems with the 'manage' concept.
The theme of this book is global warming and other effects of industrialization on global climate. Its a typical thriller by author, measuring up to Jurassic Park. There is also a element of suspense, very well written. Story line is great and proceeds at the exact pace to keep you involved in the book.

The author mentions really interesting facts about effect of media on people in developed worlds. He introduced PLM syndrome (or something) - Politics, Legal and Media. He said that these three things combined create a State of Fear in which most people of developed countries live. The media can create a picture of catastrophe from any smallest of events, and it paints such scary pictures, urging people to be prepared, to be careful, to be scared!! He also mentions the role of legal and politics in continuing that state. I totally agree with that, I can clearly see the difference while watching local news, every news story is amazing, everything is something to be scared of, something to be prepared for. Its these type of stories that keep people's attention and keeps the media profiting.

Towards the end he also throws in lots interesting ideas about what we should do for environment, the ideas I do not agree with. He does not seem to believe in conservation of nature, but in managing the nature. He says that natural balance is all non-sense, and you cannot just leave nature alone and let it recover from any damage that we have done. Though in the beginning he also presented examples on how human beings end up destroying nature by trying to manage it. But later he proposes to create a 'test environemnt', where we can experiment and learn what is the best way to manage nature, something that I totally do not understand.

Its a must must read.

quoting Michael Chrichton cont...

well, I thought that I would get the time to share what Michael Chrichton had to day in the book, but nope, I had to return the book and anyway I don't know if copying anything from the book would be copyright violation. I guess its not, but in this country, you can never be sure !@!

So anyway, I will just write the book summary at http://bookreviewsbyus.blogspot.com

One concept that he talked about, which I found so true was PLM syndrome (or something) - Politics, Legal and Media. He said that these three things combined create a State of Fear in which most people of developed countries live. The media can create a picture of catastropy from any smallest of events, and it paints such scary pictures, urging people to be prepared, to be careful, to be scared!! He also mentions the role of legal and politics in continuing that state, which I have sort of forgotten already.
And he also presents some interesting ideas about what we should do for environment, the ideas I do not agree with. He does not seem to believe in conservation of nature, but in managing the nature, though in the same book earlier he has presented lot of arguments about how we cannot manage nature, as we cannot fully understand it. But later he proposes to create a 'test environemnt', where we can experiment and learn what is the best way to manage nature!! Talk about million year plan :o

More later ........

quoting Michael Chrichton

This is one of the best and IMO most accurate paragraph I found in his book State of Fear. Unfortunately as the book is not online, I will have to type the whole thing out.....
coming up......

aaiye, aapka intzaar tha!!

That is how you can greet people on yahoo! messenger now and in a sexy voice and look too.
During our saturday monopoly session I discovered that Yahoo! has come up with a bunch of funny audibles in Hindi. The standard messenger audibles have some of them, when you go to more audibles - international - India, ( or something like that). To get all of them, you have to install the messenger from www.yahoo.co.in, its a pain with yahoo trying to change all your settings, but its definately worth the trouble.

Year 2084

A friend sent me this sometime back

http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2005/10/10/opinion/1010opart.html

pretty impressive, humm!!

Monopoly

Yesterday was another night of monopoly.

b'day surprises

So how do u surprise a person on her/his b'day when the person knows what is the usual thing you do and you are intent on doing the usual thing. In our case, b'day cake at mid-night and dinner party next day. And what is this thing about cutting cake at mid-night!! Not everyone is born at mid-night, and cutting cake at 12 is same as cutting it at any other time. If you want to cut it at exact time a person become 1 year older (or should we say more experienced as we no more want to get older), should we not be cutting the cake at exact time the person was born?
And now the surprises, well, lets say efforts to give surprises... Are they worth all the effort of hush-hush, breaking into homes etc. etc. So yesterday we almost decided not to even attempt any surprises, as Ravi puts it -
"<"ravi">"
In order to uncomplicate the ubiquitous philosophical uncertainties that a birthday boy/girl goes thru about old age, married/unmarried life, prospective career moves, bosses and advisors and team leads, allgorhythms, saturday nite dandiya, nirvana, the universe and everything...it was en masse believed that one less uncertainty (read surprise) in life would be healthy! Opponents to the above-mentioned theory please stand up!
"<"/ravi">"

PS: I donno how to escape html tags

Angels and Deamons - Dan Brown

Another of the typical Dan Brown novels. A thrilling adventure in middle of unknown facts about christanity. The story line is good, there is not a mystery per say as Da Vinci Code, but unknown adventures in each page. It starts somewhat slow as usual, when the professor is explaining same things again and again about the long lost cult Illuminati. But it gets faster once we have past the beginning and things start moving at great speed. Its hard to put down the book when we reach the core of the plot. I spent the whole sunday just sitting and reading, convincing myself that I am too sick to do anything else. The real thrilling story actually ends 100 pages before end of the book. The last 100 pages were a great disappointment to me, its just a endless drag of same statements repeated infinite number of times, some small things happening in vatican after everything is over. Though author has not failed to hide still more surprises in those pages, but the content around those small surprises gets too boring. I would say a must read, but if you are short of time, you will not miss by skipping though the last 100 pages.

Horrors of Diet Coke

Today I was in my office, happily drinking away cold diet coke after lunch, keeping the sleep away and concentrating hard on work. It was at that moment that it struck me that diet coke is a artificial thing. Its artificially made, artificially sweetened and then filled with CO2!! So, I went to the net to find out what's up. And there it was the truth about diet coke and most of the artificially sweetened products - Aspartame. Yup, that's your culprit. Its the sweetner of diet coke and it works my stimulating your brain to think that what you are drinking is sweet!! Can you believe it, stimuating the brain directly!! Its like taking drugs, its not sweet, you just 'think' that its sweet. No wonder it makes you feel good about everything else too. Talk about artificial life. So that's the end of diet coke for me.

All BITS photos are up now

(and they are on yahoo ;))
BITS2005
BITS Library

And here is another blog which has more photos from BITS.
http://www.bitstrip2005.blogspot.com/

The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul - Douglas Adams

Just finished another book by Douglas Adams, something about Dark Tea-Time of the Soul. Its hard to remember the title itself. And as expected the book is as absurd as HHGG, but atleast in the first reading it does not seem to contain the humour that HHGG had. Its more full of absurdity. Dirk, the detective character has wierd habits like not opening his fridge ever!! Its something to do with different Gods and what they do. I did not get the story line at all. Guess will need to read it a second time to understand anything. Skipped the last few pages, it was just too much nonsense.

BBQ at Golden Garden

As summer is drawing to an end we seem to be trying to make the best of it. Yesterday we had another BBQ at Golden Garden Park. This one sponsored by STP cyclists. Had lot of fun. Food was usual BBQ burgers, chips, coke. Then we started playing ultimate frisbee, but the game was interrupted by a injury. After that we just hung out and then started the bon fire. It was nice sitting by the fire. After making an attempt at trying to play the story building game, we settled on Dumb Shreds. I had ofcourse played it after a long long time, I guess after school. And it was fun. Our team of Sree, Ravi, Vaibhav, myself and well, I forgot the name, totally dominated the other team. We came up with movies like 'Bhuvansham'.... or I think that was the name. Though I very much got stuck at 'Hedalgo', not being able to think of 'hide'. But anyway that's game, the experts guessed it anyway.

more dancing

I cannot believe this. This week after all is turning out to be real fun. Yesterday we again went out dancing, me, Vani and Sree and then Ravi, nema and their friends joined us later. It was lot of fun. A band from India MedivalPundits was playing. It was mostly mix of bhangda with techno. Feet just could not stop dancing on the beats. Hope we can find more fridays and saturdays to do the same.

Dancing after loooooooong time

Yesterday, thanks to Ravi's b'day, we went dancing at Pioneer Square. I realized that its the first time I had gone dancing in this year!!! It was wonderful. We first went to Phoenix. It has a really big dance floor. So that was nice. Although some people had apprehensions that their music is not that good, but I liked it. Then we headed to The Last Supper. It looked like a more fancy club, but dance floor was small. Music was initially good, fast and loud. But after sometime I got somewhat bored, there was not much variation in the beats and you just end up repeating the same set of steps. It was a perfect start of the weekend.

Hindi Keyboard!!!

Type in Hindi Devanagri Unicode Keyboard

Found this great Hindi keyboard. And what's better is that you can change your name in gmail to appear in Hindi!!

Gmail instructions:
go to Settings and look for the 'Display Name'. There will be couple of options, business name etc. Use nick name. Then write your name in the keyboard above, copy it from there and paste in the nick name. That's it.

first long weekend in seattle

well, this is the first long weekend that we are staying at home, and not going anywhere. There is ofcourse a lot of pending work at catch up both in office and at home too, which is enough to occupy whole week, still 3 days of finishing pending home work!! That's definately not something like us. Maybe we will end up going and camping at Mt Rainier. (which i refer to as camping in the backyard)

Spoken like a True BITSian...

what is better way to connect to other BITSians than by their blog. Here is one that Rahul found.
http://camelinthedesert.blogspot.com/
I still haven't read it, but looks interesting.

where is indian film music going

For quite some time I have been listening to the latest hindi film songs from raaga.com . There are some nice songs, hit numbers by Sunidhi Chauhan, Soni Nigam and all the new music directors. But usually after listening for an hour or so, it just felt like its getting so noisy and I needed to stop them. Today I started with old golds from 80s and late 70s. There is a unmistakable difference. The older songs are so soft and melodious. Even the voices of singers (mostly Lata Mangeshkar and Kishor Kumar) are so pleasant. I have already listening for more than 2 hrs and its still nice, quiet and happy mood here. This definately brings up the questions where is our film music going. With songs like 'Just Chill!!', are we blindly running after the american pop music (which BTW is horrible), why are we loosing our melodious roots and trying to adopt somthing that does not at all fit in society. Is this the end of evergreen, melodious, soothing songs in Indian cinema?

--
tuls

world's most densely populated countries

according to http://www.aneki.com/densely.html, world's most densely populated country is Monaco? Anyone ever heard of it? incidently its the world's second smallest country with area if 1.95 sq. km. Then come Singapore, which is understandable.
India does not show up in the top 10 at all, which was a little surprise to me. Maybe we are headed there, but not quite there yet.

It also gives me another thought, if we take world as a whole, the population density is < 50 per sq km. Wouldn't it be great if we just forget all boundries and evenly redistribute world's population. I guess it would be really hard for people who get assigned to Siberia say, but we can rule those places out. And we can also rotate people so that everyone can get a feel of what it looks like to live in certain parts of the world.

PS: more research tells me that wikipedia has better data http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_density
I should get back to work now.

why are we here?

well, sometimes when I am stuck at work, doing things that I do not want to do, and wishing all the time that I was somewhere else, doing something else, having a lot more fun. Its at those times I wonder (though I know I should be concentrating on finishing that unpleasant business rather than wondering) why are we here, on this earth? Are we here to devote ourselves to whatever profession we are in, and think about other stuff only in the little time after work. Or are we here to enjoy ourselves, have fun, do things we love, live by the saying that life is short, enjoy it while u can? Of course in the second case there is the question about where are we going to get the money for doing all those stuff.
There are always these people talking about striking a balance between work and personal life and blah blah. But has anyone every really struck that 'balance'. Is it possible to have a balanced life when everything needs to be done NOW. And if you spend your life trying to strike the balance would you not end up in a situation where you neither worked well not enjoyed well?
Then there are always these people whole 'enjoy' their profession and cannot think of doing anything else. How many of those people are there and how many of them are just deceiving themselves, making themselves believe that they do not want to do anything else?
To these questions you would often hear answers like 'prioritize', 'do time management', but if you try to do that stuff, are you simply not adding more stuff to the things that you want to do and creating even a bigger problem?

PS: I am in the camp that thinks that we should prioritize :)

flood of old memories

Thanks to Sanjukta again, my mailbox every morning is full of e-mails from old school friends. She created a google group and its been totally successful. I hope we keep the enthu.
Till now only my BITS friends (particularty Prajakta only) used to say that I have changed a lot from my 1st year at BITS, but now even Sanjukta who has just talked to me on net claims that I have changed a really lot and more 'interesting' to talk with :). I totally agree with the last part. And here is another memory of me from Nidhi - "I cant get over ur thin hair choti the front flicks and ur ever eager self to complete all the homework and answer all the Qs shot at us by our dear teachers!!! ;-)".
well, Harry Potter fans, does that ring any bells :)
I would not at all mind to have been like that in school. But yes now things are different. The 'choti' is gone, flicks is still there, but going soon. A pair of spects got added to my face right after school, but I got rid of them now. Homeworks and teachers are no more there and I am no more eager to complete any office assignments. They take their own sweet time.

why do we blog

It was another of the wonderful dinner parties that Srijan place. It started with something new, Chaat. After a long long time I had chaat and it was great. For dinner we had hyderabadi biryani, kofte, daal and something non-veg. It was quite a gathering. Among all the jokes, leg pulling, one questions that came was 'Why do we Blog?' Do people just have lot of time and get bored, so start scribbling here. Or in today's world where communication is ever progressing and its claimed that you can remain 'always connected' with friends and family, we still need something like a public webpage to express our ideas? Or is it that people just do not want to talk to other people and write everything they want to say here for anyone who cares to read it :) Although I have been blogging for quite sometime, but I do not have answer to this question.

Harry Potter series - audio books

There is only one word that I can saw in the review of Harry Potter series. They are simply great, and if you have not read it, then you are missing something great.
The audio books are great if you want to re-read the books.

harry potter audio books

I am reading, correction .. listening to all the Harry Potter all over again. The audio books are great, reader is just amazing at making things interesting by giving sound effects. Although I did not very much like Harry and Hermionie's voices, but overall effect is good. Now that I have read the 6th book and its almost clear what 7th book is going to be about (not ruling out surprises though), I can events in all the books in a new light. The books are totally sequential, and it appears that J. K. Roling really thought about the whole story before starting to write. I can clearly see how there are hints about events in book 6 right in book 4!!

The Tristan Betrayal - Robert Ludlum

The main plot of this book takes place in Moscow during Stalin's rule. The times are when Hitler is advancing in Europe with full force.
One of the best plotted spy ring novels. There are surprises at every corner. Its the story of a genius spy, bound to keep your attention till the very last. I do not want to say anything more about the book as it might give away the small surprises hidden in every page.
A must read.

Murder at Nob Hill

The title of this book attracted me because it was related to San Francisco, lately I have been feeling that I miss living in that windy foggy city. Anyway, so I started listening to this book thinking that if nothing else, it will be like remembering San Francisco again. But I was totally surprised by the story, what a great mystery it turned out to be. Its one great adventurous book, and the reader has done a great job of immitating various characters. The book is fast moving, events after events happening, and its hard to put down after you have overcome the first few pages. Its just in the beginning that it goes on and on about problem a women lawyer faces in getting herself taken seriously in a man's worked of 1800. But once you are past that, it becomes quite interesting. A enjoyable investment of time according to me.

Networking again

I have recently been taken to networking with my old old school friends again, thanks to another old old school friend Sanjukta. Its just overwhelming to find that those people you know as teenagers in school are not all grown up, working at different places, pursuing all sorts of careers. Its just great.

audio books

Audio books are my new found love. They are just a great way of reading (listening) a book which u know u are never going to read on paper as its boring and 1000 pages thick. And its great way to spend time in the gym, it gives a whole new motivation to get on the treadmill. I always find listening to same old songs so boring. And they are great for bed time listening when everyone is fighting over turing light on and off. Good to pass time in moving vehicals without straining eyes. I am sure ears are not really bothered by the motion. So in all, its a great way to know the exact contents of a book :)

I am still alive

yes, I am still alive, just not putting anything on the blog. Things have not being going exactly great lately, and I hate to put bad things in the blog because they are best forgotten, hence no posting for a long time. Well things are still the same though, but I wanted to share some newly found interesting things. Like yesterday I discovered that cars (atleast corolla) have a small little thing on the doors called child lock which do not allow doors to be opened from inside. Recently when we got our car back from the mechanic, for some reason that child lock was turned on on one for the doors. (Now I wonder what the car was doing at mechanics with child lock on) anyway, so that was on and the door would not open. I spent 2 days worrying about it (the whole weekend), cursing the mechanic to do such a bad job as to fix the trunk and break the door, and then drove 10 miles just to discover that all that we had to do was pull that little thing up and release the lock. What a badly designed car!!

what can be more like monsoon back home

Heavy rain in heavy wind followed by a power failure, what can be more monsoon like, only the temperatures are a bit lower, and its not easy to just go out and get wet in the rain, and yes, ofcourse noone but me seems to be excited about the rain. Still I can feel that same excitement that you get from rains in July, same happiness in the air. It just washed away all the blues I was feeling since yesterday!!

Its monsoon time

yes, its monsoon time here in Seattle. Its been raining heavily for few days now, and not just Seattle style, but real heavy rain which can drench you in minutes. There are heavy clouds, poor visibility etc. etc. With temperatures being not that low now, its a definate reminder of monsoons :)

My BITS visit 2005

I recently made a visit to BITS campus, one of the advantages of being from near Pilani. I was definitely expecting lot of changes to the campus from the reports going around on different BITS mailing lists, but still the extent of change surprised me. The most visible being conversion of all the guys bhavans into something resembling very close to jails. The corridors in front of the rooms have been closed with impenetrable jalis. Apart from any inconvenience to the guys, it has also made giving gate calls somewhat harder, now you cannot just shout and catch someone from the front wing to run your errand. I did not get a chance to find out what new mechanism the girls have deviced. And as most of know by now, the other major change in the face of hostels is that Mal has been made a girls bhavan now, enclosed in MB like boundry and with its own mess. But I am sure what most people did not hear is that girls from Mal claim that food in their mess is very very good, much better than food at MB. I did not get any chance to verify that statement, but I got that statement from a lot of Malites voluntarily. More news from MB is that MBans has retired and someone else is the warden now, I forgot to get her name. A new guest waiting room has appeared near MB gate, but I guess its not open for the guys waiting for their gate calls to be answered.

Here are some of the selected photos
library
campus-and-insti
bhawans

and here are all of them
(and they are on yahoo ;))
BITS2005
BITS Library

As we are hearing everywhere, there are a lot of new structures coming up on campus. Akshay has been converted into a US style department store, where you can get all the stuff from spices, aata, daal, oil to shampoo, creams, dustbins and even rajai, gadda! Bye bye Nootan. And everything there is cheaper than the regular rates. I did all my US shopping from there this time too. If you get a chance, drop by our apartment and taste some daal from Pilani.

Oasis 2004

http://www.bits-pilani.ac.in:12346/bitsaa/menu_frames/index.htm

there is a oasis 2004 video up there. though its not the video of the
actual oasis fest as I thought, still its quite nostalgic. shows all
the departments at work before oasis and some glimpses of fashp. the
theme was Expressions Unleashed I think.

--
tuls

what an exciting day

It was the height of excitement when I heard from a school friend
Sanjukta. We were in school together and then lost contact for almost
7 years. Today she discovered me on orkut and we synced up on yahoo.
its really really a small world now!
long live orkut!
long live yahoo!! (I mean untill google come up with something even better ;)).

The day started great too when I got my UCSD degree, all safe and
addressed to the correct place and person.
--
tuls

new addition to our home

We have a new teddy bear added to our home, its big life sized and white. According to Rahul, it looks so real that he is scared to touch it, so you can imagine its so great. He was anyway thrilled to get it, me too especially since it came for free, well, almost, its one of the long stories on how :) Will have a picture here as soon as its all washed and dressed and ready for display.

driving to work!

finally I am driving to work, all by myself, parking in the office garage, its just great!! I am still slow, not all that confident to leave my hand off the wheel for even a sec to adjust the sun shade, but still its working.

Library

Yes, we have a big new great fancy impressive library on campus now. Its designed like a big pink jaipur palace, huge.


dear refli and stairs in front, do I have to say more about it, we all have our memories associated. closed now for some fancy structure 


ah, the new library, wait, is that pink, what happened to the yellow paint!! 


BITS Library entrance, phew are we still on campus 


This is where current BITSians study 


pillars pillars, more pillars, what happend to the nice cozy refli 


library stairs 

The campus and Insti

Lets start with the AC lecture/compree rooms everyone has been talking about. They are indeed great, high tech stuff, AC, projector, mic, lot like the lecture rooms in univs in US. No more sweating during comprees because of heat (but i guess students still sweat in comprees).


The AC lecture rooms everyone has been talking about 

Most of the insti is still the same though, I could still see myself walking in those coridors, sitting in the lawns, IC and everything is still there. Though these are a few additions like the fancy BOSM grounds gate.


BOSM grounds, fancy gate now behind ANC 

The D-lawns in front of FDIII are still there. Channel V and (probably nescafe) used to play music there during OASIS, and the nescafe stall, maggie at midnight! Those were fun times.


front of FDIII, this is where lot of oasis music used to happen, nescafe stands 

Sky was also the same, though empty. Not a single group having lachcha. Even pappu was not that busy. Just a couple of senti-semites (girls), hanging around in back sky, looking very bored, and they said that they were very bored. senti-sem is boring!!


sky, the sun clock, and pond behind that 


sky 

The SBBJ has a ATM on campus, plastic money has arrived.


We have a ATM on campus 

so have cell-phones...


Cell phones have arrived, lost also and treat assured 

The OASIS 2004 structure, great as ever, this time it was soemthing like a monstor, I could not find what the theme was.


OASIS 2004 structure, don't know what the theme was 

There were a lot more bike stands near IPC, and some wierd hurdles on the way.


do we have hurdle race in front of IPC, had no idea what these strcutures were for 

the bhawans

This is how the bhawans look now. Guys bhawans all enclosed with jalis, RP made into MB2, I think its still called RP though. It hosts the 5th yearites still, but only girls, and it has its own mess. I talked to some of them and they all said that food is just awesome the new mess. I could not find out where the 5th year guys have been dumped.


jailed gandhi 

Ah, our old wing has a new TV and a big equipment, which I first thought was a water cooler, but is related to the BITS connect thing.


new TV, this was our 3rd year wing 

Cycle stands in MB are still the same but there are a whole lot more cycles. The number of cycles in guys bhawans has also increased considerably. Well, I guess there is no more walking with your girl, holding her bike :). The insti seemed to be a big mess of cycles everywhere.


cycle stand in MB, and we can almost see the gatekeeping leaving after announcing a gate call 


attending the gate calls, MB gate 


RP, gates closed now, this 5th yearite terror bhawan for freshers is converted to girls hostel now, though still for 5th yearites