Month: March 2006

I am right here, alive and well. I’ve just been remarkably unmotivated to write (or do anything else, for that matter). Over the past week, I received my new computer. It was very cool, but I managed to find things about it that annoy(ed) me, so I shipped it back to them to have it sorted out.

If I am still displeased, I will be sending it back to them, permanently.

When I first began to realise that this little incident was a microcosm of my existence, I laughed.

Now I cry. Alone, of course.

When did I get so picky?

Today’s post might seem totally random, but it’s a question that has been irking me for a while. I am going to make up fictitious names in my articulation, because it’s easier for me to express myself this way; and besides, it’s no fun getting sued.

Meet Jack. As it turns out, people around him tend to regard him as a good, patient, non-judgmental, supportive listener, and a soothing, steady shoulder to lean on. This in itself is not a problem, and is in fact quite wonderful, as Jack is a calm and caring person who enjoys “being there” for people. Apart from serving as a willing crutch however, Jack is an intelligent, creative person who happily goes about his own interests, but doesn’t find himself emotionally-evolved or socially-skilled enough to build anything of substance with the people he cares about.

Let’s now turn our attention to Jill. For the most part, Jill is an independent, smart young woman who leads a rich life. But, like everyone else’s, Jill’s life is not nearly perfect, and she finds herself confiding in and leaning on Jack when she’s down, because he’s approachable and his supportive presence soothes her.

And finally, we have Phil. I don’t have too much to say about Phil, except that it’s his presence that’s going to add a twist to this tale. As it so happens, Jill and Phil are “an item”, and they’ve been together for a long time. It’s just, Phil doesn’t really treat Jill all that well anymore; and this is the cause of much concern for Jill, in her otherwise wonderful life.

As you may have guessed, this is also a topic of conversation she brings up often when with Jack, because of the nature of their relationship.

The problem for Jack, as time marches, is a (misplaced?) sense of guilt that’s steadily growing within him. Jill is getting more and more cosy with Jack, and slowly getting more revealing—and he’s unsure if this constitutes some weird form of cheating. Even if it were, he isn’t the one attached, and it’s Jill who ought to feel her insides being eaten at, right? After all, isn’t she the one who’s (emotionally) straying from Phil? It’s not like Jack did anything special to get her to open up to him; he’s this way with everyone. Why isn’t she just talking to Phil instead?

None of these facts seem to matter to Jack. He’s feeling sick, like a witting enabler… like he’s the callous “other woman”—without the pleasure of any of the naughty bits.

The question, really, is whose fault is the confusing scene described above? Why should Jack—who’s doing nothing more than being the sensitive support—end up being the one with the sick feeling in his tummy? It’s not like he’s trying to ensnare Jill, or even particularly drawn to her in the first place.

You might know that I spend a good chunk of my life in coffee shops—kinda like an episode of FRIENDS, except that I don’t look like Jennifer Aniston, and actually manage to get real work done. It’s a sanctuary; a place where I can get away from it all, and yet not feel entirely alone. It’s part of my happy-place, where I feel safe and secure, right at home.

At least I did, until today.

I just got back home reeking of nutty-mocha after an annoyingly long time spent talking to this crazy woman. She’d invaded my sanctuary, and what began as a pleasant-enough conversation soon devolved into an extremely unpleasant question-answer session; where I was the one under the gun, and almost had to keep defending my life choices: “why I am where I am” and “how I’ve gotten here” and …

At the outset, let me say that she was no one to be questioning me. Yet she did, almost demanding responses, and I—the fool—tried to appease her. It’s never happened before, but I actually felt insecure and helpless, grasping at straws in a place I usually feel so secure.

Long story short—I know that this might come as a shock to the crazies in the audience—but hasn’t it ever occurred to you that someone might be single because they haven’t come across another person who truly excites, inspires, connects with… completes them? Is it so wrong to be picky, or patient? Why does it always have to be psychoanalysed from the point of view of being a character flaw? Don’t you get that I might just not be into the people you seem to deem as perfect?

Anyway, unable to explain any of this, I spent an entire afternoon fending-off one line of questions after the next, just waiting to get out of there and retreat to my last-standing castle; my bed where I write this.

Postscript: Come to think of it, she probably wasn’t all that crazy. Maybe I was just not ready to deal with the sorts of things she was grilling me about. But this is my journal, and “she was crazy” is the story I’m sticking with.

For the longest time (the past few years anyway), the range of my reactions to the news that my friends were getting married spanned anywhere from sitting in the corner of a dark room with a sick feeling in my stomach—moping—to feeling elated and joyous while I excitedly supported the union; showering the couple with kind words and thoughtful gifts.

My exact reaction to the situation was a function of my actual relationship with the guy or girl in question. You know I’d definitely be moping if the woman getting hitched was someone I deemed attractive. The same reaction was sure to ensue if I felt that the guy I knew was undeserving (unintelligent, immature, unattractive …), and remarkably fortunate to “land such a gig”. (In actuality, predicting “how much happiness he deserved”, extrapolating from what I knew of him as a child, and sulking when he exceeded my expectations; especially since he got there before me. Jealous, in other words.)

Of course, there were other situations—like not finding her particularly attractive in the first place—which resulted in a more mellow response. But, after a few years of artificially induced(?) emotions, I just realised that I am too old for this. I needed to come up with a more standard response, something that worked for all such situations; and not have to go through the ordeal of carefully evaluating each circumstance before determining how I felt about the matter. Apart from taking too much time, I was occasionally unprepared to stomach the starkly enlightening realisations that popped up while I pondered.

So, I’ve finally decided to go with a one-size-fits-all approach that basically involves the perfunctory show of support (the wishes, the presents, the smiling presence at the wedding …) while moping when no one else is looking.

That’s it.

You don’t need my blessings. You don’t really care (or need to) about what I feel about the sequence of events, so why would you even want my support?

So I won’t. Of course, I’ll look like I am, but on the inside, I’m not. And you can’t make me. This works for both of us; whoever the other person in question is.

Addendum: This same treatment will be extended to any readers of this journal who may be getting married (unless it’s to me). I’m sorry, but rules are rules.

You and I know that I have a penchant for dropping expensive electronics. But usually (always?), it’s something I own so it isn’t a problem. Broke a 3000$ sensor? Pfft, no biggie, it’s mines and I’ll breaks it if I wants to.

A short while ago, we ordered these workstations for the lab. They were these ultrasnazzy multi-core Xeon many-GHz processor things with oodles of RAM.

It is clear where I’m going with this story. So there isn’t much point continuing.

Update: But hey, at least we don’t have to worry about any woman who witnessed the sequence of events harbouring any hopes of being whisked away in my arms into the sunset; not without carefully weighing the possibility of a broken rib or seven, anyway.

The following is a clip of an e-mail I received earlier in the day. Oh the delicious joy of bending rules.

Relevant details obscured for obvious reasons. But plenty of superfluous information here!

People seem to underestimate (misunderestimate?) how introspective I am. One of the perks of living alone, apart from getting to freely shave in weird places, is that I have plenty of time to sit around and quietly ponder. What about? The answer to life, the universe, and everything. Me, my life, how it all fits in, where it’s all going. Anything and everything. I can literally spend days just sitting and thinking hard. It’s given me a great sense of inner peace, and a degree of self-knowledge that I doubt that few possess.

All was as it should be, until recently when it dawned on me that my degree of disconnection from the world—in a social, hermitey sense—was intimately tied to my degree of contentment with my self. The more content I was and the less attached I needed to be (to feel “whole”), the less attached I was getting. And the less attached I was getting, the more opportunity it provided for me to spend time just by myself; ending up more comfortable and content with myself!

(For the control systems junkies in the audience, imagine a very positively fed-back, closed loop system. And for the rest of us, imagine the situation where the retard on stage keeps insisting on taking his uncovered mike close to the annoyingly-loud speakers.)

This is getting dangerous, because one day I’m sure it will result in me losing my ability entirely to interact in pleasant company (or has that threshold already been crossed?). I know I want to break myself out of this loop. I want to change. Unfortunately, though I see that I ‘want’ to, I don’t clearly see ‘why’ I need to. And I’m afraid change won’t happen if I don’t reason it out for myself.

Which requires me to answer questions like, “Why do I need to talk to other people”? Definitely not a pleasant line of thought.

On a vaguely related note, during much of this introspection, I think I’m finally ready to articulate something that I’ve been trying to for a very long time. Here it goes:

I am a natural philosopher.

I am not an engineer, I’m not an applied mathematician, I am not a physicist, I am not a computational scientist … I am a natural philosopher, damn it.

It feels good to actually be able to put this in words. Now I don’t have to get shifty when I get asked in an academic setting, “So, just what is it that you do”? I can proudly say, “Why, I’m a natural philosopher, thank you for asking. I describe and ponder over the natural phenomena I observe”.

And, if you’re into this sort of thing, you might fancy this related article.

The following is a “trackback” to a post on another journal. This is my first trackback ever to anywhere, so I am not entirely sure as to whether this is the right way of going about it. Either way, here goes.

I didn’t realise kids could be so mean; especially over something so trivial. I’ve obviously been to school in a different system, and I don’t think there was this clear a separation between the “cool kids” and the “uncool kids” in my case. In any event, there wasn’t an undue amount of pressure to be a part of the cooler kids. Either that or I was inadvertently a part of the cooler kids, or just was too stupid to notice.

I’d like to think I would have shrugged something like this off. I’ve spent all my life totally outside the system—in terms of not forming an opinion because it’s “the cool thing” to do—and for the most part have ended up independent, original, and fully capable of making up my own mind regardless of what the mob does.

People seem to respect/admire this aspect of my life. But I am not so sure at times; it really is an oddly double-edged sword. (I tried to think of another reference considering what you just said, but my brain seemed to blank-out on me. Sorry.)

After an entire life of building an identity totally independent of what other people have to say about it, I sometimes yearn for just a few minutes of normalcy with a crowd where I just go ahead and do something, “just because everyone else is doing it”. I don’t care if it’s the stupid thing to do. I don’t want to be alone and cool—respected or otherwise—I just want to be accepted.

But I can’t. I’ll immediately declare it the irrational thing to do—and appear smart, or aloof, but definitely alone.

One of the problems with the intarweb is that whatever grand ideas you may have in the shower, by the time you actually sit down at a computer and try to write it up, you’ve turned into this weird sort of mindless, incapacitated consumer person. For instance, here are some of the glorious things I’ve waded through instead of coming up with something funny.

• Alice’s adventures in wonderland — When you’ve settled on being illiterate, the possibilities are limitless!
• Ha Ha Ha America — An extremely eye-opening look at why China is so awesome.
• Jake the Nazi: A memoir — Freakin’ hilarious. But not for the squeamish.
• Gay genes from moms — This is the kind of extreme research that distracts scientists while China heads toward world domination.
• Not an episode of the OC: My coke addiction — Sometimes, it perks me up to know how much worse life can be. Definitely not for the squeamish.
• Why Merom is so much cooler than Yonah — Or why one can never really be happy with a laptop purchase.

I also spent some time fetching the new Ubuntu live CD, Dapper Drake, and trying it out (my first or second time at giving it a spin, ever). While it’s quite polished, it’s very orange, and the fonts are fucked up. Only Red Hat/Fedora gets beautiful font rendering and selection right out of the box.

So, what were you browsing instead of working today? I really am curious.

There is one thing that’s bothered me ever since I came to this country, but I decided it’s best to shut up about it. After something I saw on TV yesterday, I realised how much it irked me, and I can’t keep quiet anymore. Before I begin, standard disclaimers apply. If you feel your pretty little feathers are going to be ruffled by reading this post, don’t. Stroll down over to the beach or something.

After a long time, I actually watched some TV last evening. I happened to catch the finale of one of the funnest reality shows around, and also got to see the season premier of another—featuring black/white people disguised as white/black people and experiencing life on the other side. While this premise is all nice and dandy, and it makes for good TV, there is something I don’t understand. Why do black people seem to define their identity around being black? Why is everything that happens to them (or doesn’t) have to do with their colour? Why is there so much hurt and repressed anger against a society that’s scheming to “put them down”? Why does every facet—from music to clothes to vernacular to mannerism to…—revolve around being black?

I understand that there were evil things done to your ancestors by the ancestors of another dominating culture. I understand that your great-great-grand-pappy was probably hauled on a boat from the dark continent and forced to work for pittance while having his rights trampled on by the dominating race. While I get why you’re angry, what I don’t see is why it’s so intense, and so pervasive.

Compare a generic black suburban family here,

with one in, let’s say, Uganda (it doesn’t really matter where).

Are you—you latte-sipping, SUV-driving, fubu- and bling-wearing denizen—seriously telling me your current generation doesn’t have it orders of magnitude better-off than that woman who has to walk 10 Km to fetch drinking water for her family? Even if it’s true that you’re not treated fairly and with a bias to this day?

Why so much resentment?

I am not excusing the actions of the ancestors of the white man. I am just wondering how you could possibly not realise how much worse it could have been. I am not taking sides because this is in no way my fight; I didn’t oppress you nor was I oppressed like you. I am just a curious fly on the wall.

In closing, I’d like to point out that this is just one man’s uninformed opinion. Opining accurately after carefully researching all the facts is just not how this journal operates. But you knew that already.

When they say, “Shake well before use” on a bottle of juice, what they really mean is, “Make sure the cap is tightly closed, then shake well before use”.

My poor carpet.

Maybe I should sue someone, because, you know, when in Rome…

I’m proud to announce some recent life changes; as proof that you don’t always need a shiny new computer to effect said changes.

o I’ve become rather conscientious about avoiding processed foods when the options present themselves. This basically means that anything overly prepared and packed with artificial goodness—as yummy as it may be—is a no-no.

o Barring minor lapses (usually unknowingly), I’ve managed to stay vegan for the order of weeks. This is replete with such joyous events as “cookies and milk” now implying (yucky, oil-for-fat based) vegan cookies and (equally repulsive, lactose free) soy milk.

o I’ve made it a point to be aware of and concentrate on my breathing, forcing myself to inhale and exhale slow, steadily, and deeply; each half of a breath now lasting 7–8 seconds. The interesting side effect of doing this, is that once I start concentrating hard on things like breathing—which are otherwise involuntary—it seems to leave my brain calmer as it’s less attentive to so much of the crap that’s out there.

o And finally, returning to the theme of food, I’ve also been trying to make sure I masticate (no, not what you just thought) well. As in real well. As in 30 chews for a bite of food well. Nothing I’ve eaten so far has stayed solid for so long, but the point again here is to concentrate on something which you would have otherwise taken for granted; to the same end as above.

Now if I just go entirely barefoot and get into marijuana, I can pick up my free-spirited-hippie license at the street corner.

I don’t often get into political affairs, not because I’m apolitical, but because I’m apathetic in general. But bear with me as I emerge from my shell and chime in with my ignorant remarks this evening.

All of today—every time I’ve browsed past a news channel—there has been something or the other about Bush’s talks with Dr. Singh on nuclear issues. I even saw some related clips on the BBC, and have surprisingly read up a bit on matters from the intarweb.

A couple of things that came up over and over in these reports pissed me off to no end.

1. STOP COMPARING INDIA AND IRAN. I know all your Iranian friends will keep referring to themselves as Persian (and NOT ARAB) in an attempt to reconnect with a (glorious?) past they aren’t willing to let go, but,

“India is a highly democratic, peaceful, stable state that has not proliferated nuclear weapons. Iran is an autocratic state mistrusted by nearly all countries and that has violated its international commitments.”

— R. Nicholas Burns, the under secretary of state for political affairs.

I couldn’t have said it better myself. My attempts would have resulted in offensive (potentially racist) profanity.

2. INDIA’S NUCLEAR PROGRAM HAS LITTLE TO DO WITH STOCKPILING AMMUNITION AGAINST CHINA/PAKISTAN. We are proud people, and we probably lack resources, but we enjoy highlighting our self-sufficiency. All of our technology is in-house, and NOT SIGNING your stupid nonproliferation treaty and harping about our tests is just a means of rubbing into your face that “We can do it too. Better, cheaper, without your help. We are smart.”

I repeat, we are proud people. It has nothing to do with actually wanting or needing weapons. We “fought” for our own independence through peaceable means for god’s sake. We have the energy needs of a billion+ people to worry about. While you might have your wonderful oil resources (which you (mis)appropriate through wars), we only have a quarter of the world’s thorium. What else do you suggest we use? Herbal petrol?

There, I said it. And I’m certain my choice of words in this post got my journal flagged in some NSA watch-list, forcing some overweight slob to read through it in detail each evening while slobbering over his doughnuts.

Update: Related to what I was trying to say in this TIME article.

“The biggest hurdles to a bright future are the habits of the past. Sensitivity to foreign interference in its internal affairs is high in India, where a history of opposing imperialism has produced one of the proudest nations on earth. No Indian government could accept a relationship with the U.S. in which it was obviously the junior partner.”

From the opening paragraph on their review of the Macbook Pro:

“Remember the famous five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance? If you’re a fan of the Macintosh computer, meet the five stages of switching to Apple’s new laptop: lust, anticipation, delight, dismay and waiting.”

I wish I were as articulate as that when it came to expressing myself.

With those objective differences out of the way, now onto the more touchy-feely issues I had. Some trivial, some not, and in no particular order. (None of which are disputable; I’m not a reasonable person.)

1. After I’d initially ordered the MBP, I spent hours of my days looking at things like this, this and this to augment my purchase. We wouldn’t want our sexual preferences to be that apparent now, would we?
2. The T60p I’ve now picked is higher spec’d in every respect, and cheaper. I disliked the thought of being treated like a “Mac fanboy” who’d happily get shafted by Apple. Getting shafted by IBM however, I can handle.
3. I get to try out the T60p for a month, and return it if I’m unsatisfied for whatever reason—no questions asked. I like the sound of that. Contrast that with Apple’s, “You buy a configured machine from us, you’re stuck with it no matter what problems you may face” policy.
4. The T60p runs much cooler, has a better battery life and the aspect ratio of its dimensions are more standard; not ungodly 17″-like wide like the MBP. I am willing to sacrifice some thickness for the reduced width, besides; it now fits in a cute bag I was eyeing.
5. The T60p doesn’t have a magnetic power cord jack like the MBP. Imagine what that could have done to my credit card, external hard drives or worse. But the real issue is, after I’d accidentally erased my card and went to the bank to replace it, I’ll have to listen to that old lady’s spiel on how women are so more careful with their stuff than men!
6. I am also quite intrigued by the possibility of wireless-broadband-everywhere that the T60p provides. Goodbye even more, social life.
7. I wasn’t ever drawn to OS X in the first place; I just wanted a fast, rugged, sleek x86 laptop to run GNU/Linux. Apple is not really free software friendly; no matter how much you try to convince yourself otherwise.
8. Having to replace a UNIX (Mac OS X) with another UNIX (GNU/Linux), because Apple’s Darwin kernel is less performant than linux ON THEIR OWN HARDWARE, seemed quite retarded. The least they could have done is to not require that distribution makers run through hoops (even if minor) getting their OSs booted on x86 Apple machines.
9. ThinkPads on the other hand are historically GNU/Linux friendly. Even the more esoteric things on the laptop, like the fingerprint reader, already have working linux support. I must say I am impressed.

I spent a couple of weeks using OS X a lot, and snagged and browsed every OS X (written for UNIX geeks) book I could find. Here are some UI issues I still have with Macs:

• One fucking mouse button.
• I am a very heavy Emacs user, and I need my ctrl and alt buttons where I want them.
• Even on powerful machines, in my limited experience, OS X seems a little laggy.
• There is usually only one “right way” of doing things, and it isn’t always intuitive as to what it is. I hated feeling like an idiot not knowing how to do simple things. I am not in a frame of mind to reset all that I know, well, and have to relearn redundant, even if arguably fun, information.
• It’s not really (a) UNIX (you’re used to). I mean it is, but it’s so warped, it isn’t. I hated feeling like I didn’t know where what goes and such, reiterating the last point. Don’t even get me started on sudo.
• It’s stuffy and lacks configurability. Some effects quickly go from being “Oh, so shiny” to being downright cheesy. But everything that annoys you cannot be turned off, because, well, Apple deems it so.

Mac users (at least the ones that popup in various fora across the intarweb) seem to be a bunch of whiners. I am not sure if their spoilt-bratisms arise out of being so well treated by Apple in the past, or if they’re just a bunch of whiners, period. Since the release of the MBP a couple of weeks ago, less than 1% of the user reviews I’ve read of it have been positive. Here’s a sampling of the delightful things you’re subjected to instead.

• ARRGHH, it’s making this annoying whining noise. It annoys me so much I can’t sit at it and it aggravates my migraines.
• MY SCREEN IS WARPED. I took it out of the box and my aluminium screen was clearly bent, but Apple told me that was a cosmetic defect which they don’t replace.
• I have a GROWING PATCH OF DEAD PIXELS on my screen!!! When I called Apple they said they’d replace it only if it crossed a certain number of dead pixels.
• (And, in case they do send it in for replacement.) I CAN’T BELIEVE THEY PUT ME AT THE BACK OF THE QUEUE. I have to wait for FOUR MORE WEEKS for my computer. ARGGH.
• The resolution is SO LOW FOR THIS SCREEN SIZE. Even my Powerbook had a better resolution. The fonts RENDER FUZZILY.
• The LCD brightness is INCONSISTENT. It is arbitrarily brighter in some regions and darker elsewhere.
• It runs SO HOT. After a short while, my KEYS ARE TOO HOT TO TOUCH.
• The screen ONLY OPENS TO 120^o. I need a 135^o opening angle like my PowerBook!!

You know what you bunch of whiners? STFU. Stop exaggerating. But this is not the response the more seasoned Apple devotees will give them. Instead, they go, “You bought a revision A (first generation) product, what did you expect? Every company has issues with transitions”. Umm, so, it’s OK?

1. I really assumed Mac users are generally a bit more technically aware than your standard windows counterpart. Not so. Even the simplest questions you ask them (“Oh, so where is the menu where I can turn this off?”) will result in a standard response. They will point you to a “freeware/shareware/adware” application that does it for you. Quickly followed by a “I really like it, it’s worth the 50 bucks. Get it!!!”. It’s like they haven’t heard of free software, or just DOING IT YOUR FUCKING SELF.
2. On the other hand, not one of the T60 reviewers was unhappy with their purchase. They were, in fact, ecstatic. I am not saying that makes it a better product, I am just talking about the apparent maturity of the users.
3. The existence of resources like Thinkwiki, and a vibrant GNU/Linux community.