Category: General

It’s like, I finally get it now.

All that time I was cribbing about intellectual hurdles, I wasn’t cribbing about that at all. It was just this lack of.. support. Some form of comfort or anything. I had nothing.

The moment I get through it, I realize I have no one to go joyously screaming to. I have nothing.

Fish.

You’d assume that large research institutes won’t be bothered by a few bolts of lightning hitting power lines.

You assume wrong.

(*#$%(#* @_+@# CONNECTION INTERRUPTED $(@Y($@)(@)))) )@)$

I’ve been meaning to migrate from my aging (and slowly beginning to get too kludgy to maintain) RedHat box to something newer. Spent most of yesterday backing up data, wiping that partition, and installing Fedora. I must say it’s very… slick, and very blue. There were a bunch of kinks which I am slowly beginning to iron out, but for the most part it is beginning to get there.

I will be documenting my progress, the trials and tribulations involved with this sort of change, and the inherent coolness of newer stuff like linux 2.6.x and a nicely customised GNOME 2.6.x. Why? because my opinions matter.

Back in reality, similar revamping has been extrapolated to other things. My apartment for one. Fixed (as in got people to fix) a bunch of things in the apartment. I now have a functioning AC blower again among other things.

That apart, I got the travel paper work done at the international student center. I’ve started making few plans with the few people I know who will be in town around the same time. I returned a bunch of books I borrowed to read for the test (but didn’t have the time).

It’s all slowly getting back to normalcy. Yay.

There is this extremely huge electrical storm? going on outside right now. Muuuusstt sttanndd oouutt anndd obbsseervee preettyy patterrnns innn flaaashhhess ooffff ligggghhtt.

*CRACK!*

OWWW. IT BURNS.. ITT BBURRNSS. AHH.

*Runs around all goofily flailing limbs arbitrarily*

I wouldn’t consider V particularly sensitive or incisive. I don’t even usually give him credit for being able to cut through the fluff and see things for what they are. So anyway, we got to talking and he’s strangely all helpful about what I need to get my mom. I doubt there is something too much funnier than two clueless guys deciding what to get their mom. I mean, it’s not the process itself, it’s the magnitude of the cluelessness that makes it hilarious.

Either it’s been the lack of sleep or generally extremely sidetracked mind of mine, but I was going about justifying to him the gloriousness (and economics) of combined parents’ gifts. He listened, surprisingly patiently and just said “.. yeah, except Amma won’t ever touch it.”

Fancy him catching that. Back to the drawing board.

I rock. It went … very differently from what my nightmares had portrayed.

Fortune favours the brave, and occasionally, the foolhardy. Nothing officially stands in my way now from getting that PhD in Mechanical Engineering and Scientific Computing. (Yes, I like saying it out fully at times like this.)

And I did it my way too, the “wing it and let coolness carry you through” way. People spend months. I spent 2.5 real days.

Did I mention I rock?

Now to catch up on a couple of night’s sleep, and a day’s food. Well, mostly sleep.

Actually, I love you all. I just want to leave before the general narcissism makes you think I’m a bad person.

Will the world love me any less if I screw up tomorrow?

Or on the brink anyhow. This is madness, I just hope I don’t do something weird during the test itself. (Read: Pass out, cry, just fall down and start screaming in pain, get all defensive and start blaming arbitrary things for lack of knowledge, …)

It was so much easier when I was younger. I could be the guy who didn’t know squat, put in the 18 hours of reading, suddenly come out the guy who knew more than most. All that’s gone. I can’t really concentrate for more than a couple of hours (which explains why I am out here typing this), and even that time spent isn’t tremendously productive.

And there used to be this huge support network functioning quietly and efficiently at times like this, primarily my mom. If I looked tired, I needn’t ask for a glass of tea or whatever, it’d just be there. Having to make my own food was never an issue. If I realized the books I had were worthless, I could order someone to buy me better ones. If I was spending 8 hours trying to pass some level in some game on the eve of a test, I would at least be asked if I felt prepared enough to warrant goofing off.

Now, nothing. None of these and other such things exist. It’s only a matter of time before I sink, expecting inherent capabilities and support nets that don’t exist anymore to keep me afloat.

No, I don’t have any delusions of being able to pull these off.

I’ve been afraid and tense. Very. Which in my world seems to be the only time I work so it cannot really be any other way. I hope I don’t pass out during the test itself under the pressure. (Yes, that’s happened too. It’s extremely embarrassing.)

In an attempt to sidetrack my mind a bit, I’ve been reading up on the political fiasco at the homeworld. I am the most apolictical person I know. I just can’t get myself to care about such relatively pointless real life issues. But this recent general elections results back home has gotten me quite worked up. And I don’t see why. Here’s a portion of something I posted in some other forum.

What gives?

Firstly, this is totally independent of me having/not having issues with Congress party’s policies toward the advancement of the country. This is about our inability to find one worthy leader out of a billion or so.

IANAFIRI (I am not a farmer in rural India). Of course I don’t have any real clue how economic policy changes over the past few years affected “the average person in villages”, but I seriously doubt their positions could have gotten any worse. All I saw were my juniors in college finishing up with a lot more options than I had. It seemed to be a very good thing. These options resulted in highly improved purchasing power, and consequently better lifestyles. What seems to be the problem with a middle class that’s moving economically forward? How much can it alienate the poor? I am not an economist either, but don’t earnings growths in some sections trickle down to most other sections of society eventually?

More importantly, how much more could someone from the outside know about the real lives of these people than people from right there. If you felt the current government policies were only helping a few rich people in Bangalore, wouldn’t it be a safer bet to elect someone from around who’s lived your life so will probably work toward your betterment? as opposed to someone from Italy?

No, I was not there to vote myself and consequently have my opinions heard, so I don’t really have any right to complain. But what’s the deal? How important is someone’s name? If I officially called myself Gandhi Gandhi tomorrow will I automatically get to rule all with an iron fist?

Doesn’t this scheme of events bother anyone else?

I don’t feel so good. As in, I don’t really know. I’m pretty sure it’s in my head. My stomach’s all knotted up and I just.. I just wasted all day. I’ve been constantly flip-flopping between cockiness and seemingly justified goofing off, and fear and consequent inability to work. It’s pretty annoying, and very taxing. I just want.. no, I don’t even know what I want. I think.. I want something to be able to comfort me right now. So I can get back to real work and not constantly fight weird demons. I have realized, however, that I can’t ever really be a hermit hermit. Which is some good that’s come out of this. I can’t believe how much I craved some, any form of interaction today.

Unrelated, I bought some more stuff for people. V’s lists apart, I bought a relatively sweet camera and some other electronics goodies for my dad. I’m still quite clueless as to what to get my mom, and I’m too tense right now to make something.. thoughtful. It’s not as much clueless as the need to not make/get something lame and impersonal.

If someone went through this sort of thing few days ago for mother’s day, and came up with something, I’m all ears.

I’ve just spent the past two days with no human contact. And I mean the real deal. No leaving home, no roomies, (obviously) no phone, no email, no im, not even commenting on web logs. The world must have assumed I was studying (or died in my sleep), but I know better. That was broken this morning when the Fedex guy rung my doorbell and had me sign for a decent watch I’d ordered.

Trouble is, it isn’t for me. I still get to use my trusty old one my grandma got me when I aced my tenth boards.

And, not to get overly political or anything, but fuck. I’m from a land with very bright people. I’m so proud right now, I could cry. I guess all that needs to be done now is to change my name to Nehru Gandhi, go home, and rule said bright masses with an iron fist.

I’ve finally been cracked.

Apparently showers are where I get most of my thinking done. I just realized events in the recent (and not so recent) past have finally gotten to me. I no longer see the world through my rose coloured glasses. I no longer believe everything happens for the good. And I definitely don’t see it as a terribly nice place filled with caring folk anymore.

People in general don’t really give a damn about loyalty, honesty, morality (and other such words ending with ‘ty’) and they sure as hell don’t ever really care about you. (Of course, this sort of premise hopefully excludes things like a mother’s feelings toward her child, because otherwise, I am being plain mean right now.) No one’s really going to go too much out of their way to ensure that peace and harmony and so on are ensured. Forget large scale things like that, even to put a smile on someone else.

People do what’s best for themselves, at whatever costs. Sure, that’s why we have laws like “killing other people is wrong” to prevent this from being extrapolated to the extreme, but within these broad limits, people do exactly what’s good for them. Something better comes along, by all means, go ahead and take it. Who cares if you’ve worked at the same company who’ve treated you well for 5 years? You’re getting a better sounding deal somewhere else, just leave. And a few lies here and calculated silences here and there never really hurt anybody right? I used to think criteria involving ethics dictated such decisions, but apparently not. Guess who has more money in the bank? Omarosa or yours truly?

So listen up everyone who believed the world exists to be nice to you and that everything happens for the best. All you have to do is be nice to it in return.

You’ve been lied to. You can be as kind, gentle, caring, generous… as you’d like, just don’t believe in karmic balances. The world will not hesitate to screw you over either way.

Unfortunately for the evil world, it doesn’t realize it doesn’t take too much to push genius to cross that line to evil genius.

Unfortunate indeed.

Damn I hate marathons. No, not the kinds in which people run insane distances just because they can. Well, actually, I’m not particularly fond of those either. I mean these marathons on TV, where they show 192 episodes of the same awesome show back to back realizing there are jokers out there with no self control (*hint hint*) who will sit through the entire thing even when they have far far more important things to do.

When S told me about today’s Simpsons marathon the day before, I was all pfft, I’ve seen them all anyway, I’ll be concentrating on my reading. By which, I obviously meant I’ll be sitting in front of the TV all day without batting an eyelid. What is it with men, the remote and the Simpsons?

Though I’m happy to report that didn’t result in me giving up on my run in one day. In fact, I increased the distance covered by about 50% today. But since parts of my body seem to have enough neurons to make their own decisions, this just means a smaller portion of the actual run involved running. It might not have been the best idea for other reasons as well. I ended up apologizing to this homeless guy for being a non smoker. Good god, after his pestering, I almost wished I smoked. And unrelated, I’ve just been told I’ve got womanly legs. Now I am not entirely sure what that’s supposed to mean, but I’m sure it’s no compliment. Now I can’t even joke about waxing.

First I lost the staple saggy man breast bit (long story), and now this. This has not been a great week for punch lines. God damn it.

Though I don’t usually notice such things, the weather has been extremely weird for the past few days. It’s like 70 degrees in the day, and there are these hail storms with marble sized pellets at night (global warming anyone?). Apparently they dent cars and chip off paint and so on.

I’ve had this on my mind for a while now, but then I hadn’t looked at the specifics too carefully. Today, I’ve started changing that. I’ve been going through different sorts of organizations which exist to help children in need, and I hope to make the right choice sometime soon. For a not-so-large sum every month, I get the glorious feeling of being able to put a smile on a kid’s face. Apparently, you even get to see pictures and write to them. I’m pretty certain I want to do this.

Yes world, you heard right, I am sponsoring a child. Wish me luck.

(Yes, I’m desperately attempting to figure out the deep seated personal gain here too. I will definitely let you know the moment I find it.)

And in a moment of culinary genius, I think I just burnt a bag of microwaveable popcorn. Sheesh. I better go.

I would just like to let the world know I was finally able to force myself to go out and run for forty minutes today. This is huge, because I have finally acknowledged the fact that not everything will necessarily be handed to me, and some things require work. Keeping this up or improving on this is going to be a real challenge, not like doing well on some test. Which is a good thing, since I need something to quell this newly spawning wave of cockiness.

I would by lying if I didn’t clarify that the “run” was more like a fast (by my standards) jog for about ten minutes, a slow (even by my standards) jog for about twelve minutes, a normal walk for about ten minutes, and a literal crawl on all fours for the remaining eight as I struggled to make it back home.

I would be lying if I said my legs don’t feel like jelly and are not killing me now. I would be lying if I said I don’t feel faint and my head’s not throbbing.

I am the most unfit person alive. This will definitely change that.

It’s going to kill me.