Category: General

Too tired to type. Been reading things most of the day. Pleasant surprise. Found that a paper I read had my name listed in the citations for a paper I had “co-authored”. Was happy. So here’s a bonus (and totally unexpected) picture of the day.

So the deal here is that black wall like thing is not a wall. It’s a foothpath sidewalk. And yes, somewhere behind the camera was me in the cold in some odd position trying to get this.

Woke. Worked for a bit. Had the usual research meet that ran for a lot longer than usual. Worked for a bit. And now I’m feeling done for the day.

No, that wasn’t odd at all. I lied.

And wohoo, apparently my handwriting does not suck. And there shouldn’t be any more pictures of the day for a bit. I ought to get some things “up and running” in my life. Yes, far more important things than photography. Well, ok, just one. And I know I cheated.

Click it to read it in all it’s glory. THE COMIC DOES NOT REFLECT MY VIEWS ON ANYTHING. I just find it insanely funny, and the only reason to pick up the paper each day.

Convinced myself yesterday to complete the necessary paperwork to get an MS. (It took me long enough to convince me it was worth the 20 minutes, or so I thought it would be, of pain.) Did it today. Ran over to the academic services people here just to find out I had waited too long. I wasn’t late, considering today is technically the last offical day this term, but I also had to travel to some relatively far of place to hand it in myself, since they would use mail otherwise, and it wouldn’t get there in time and all that.

So I did that too, in the cold and the rain. Both of which are irritants, but things that I have gotten used to. Either I’ve gotten used to, or these layers of body fat gained over the past year or so are being put to good use. I knew they had to come in handy some time. :) Got back in time for the end term ME Grad Student mixer/party/free food thing. Mostly it’s just a free food thing.

Anyway, when I was out earlier, I saw some people doing it and I just hate it when I see people running in the rain to avoid getting wet. Just what the heck do they think they are doing?

Let’s assume you are a rectangular plate in cross section for simplicity. You need to get from point A to point B, and it’s raining.

              (      )       (   Cloud    )

               . . . . . .. . . . . . .. . . .

               . . 0 You.. . . Rain drops ..

               . . | . --->  . . . ..  .. .

                . .| . . . Running . . . .

              A____^________________________B

(You need to learn to imagine. Yes, you have shortish legs, or a really small skirt, and no hands, or hair (or nose or eyes or..).)

For all practical purposes, as you are moving between A and B, the rain is NOT GOING TO GET ANY LESS OR ANY MORE INTENSE. The flux of the rain is downward, and you are moving towards the right, which gives it a relative velocity with respect to you at an incline. Anyway, number of rain drops that hit you, and hence how wet you get, is directly proportional to your area of cross section, the rain’s flux. IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH HOW FAST YOU RUN. If you walk slowly, you’ll get wet to a certain extent, as the drops hit you with some rate. If you run faster, MORE HIT YOU in a shorter time. Meaning you’ve spent less time in the rain, but YOU AREN’T ANY DRYER WHEN YOU REACH B.

WALK DAMNIT.

I realized the whole flat plate assumption thing was a bit extreme. I didn’t really get into using elementary dot products and areas. Oh my god. I didn’t realize that’s bothered me SO FISHING MUCH over all these years. Either that or it’s people running in general.

WALK DAMNIT.

Took this today. It’s a bit blurred. But in my defense it was cold and I couldn’t really keep my hands steady. But didn’t really take out my camera too much considering it was all wet outside. Not a good idea.

Just saw this cheesily cute movie with Marisa Tomei. (If you’re reading.. “it was a cheesy movie, but the weak one didn’t change the channel cause she’s cute”, you might be right. But I didn’t say it.) It was called, hmm.. happy accidents. Even the use of profanity in it was cute, in a B cheesy sci-fi romantic comedy sort of way.

It was “just” when I started typing this post an hour ago. I had this irresistible urge to take a nap, and I didn’t bother to resist. Irresistible remember? Sleep is good. I think I am catching up on last night. Anyway, did something yesterday/today that’s made me feel all icky and gross for a bit. Lazy and undriven as I may be, I don’t “just do” stuff. Or do stuff that I know is.. substandard. I might not do, but seldom do it not cool. And yes, I like using 17 sentences where 1 would suffice, you word miser you. If you noticed that, that is.

It’s been a while since it has come down to this, but after mucking around most of last night (and day, getting nowhere) with some relatively complicated stuff trying to get something working, I sort of broke around 7 am. I crashed, missed class. Woke later and decided to turn in whatever I did do. Not really bothering about general correctness or coolness, which was as a serious lapse in quality control. Like I said, I feel icky. One more of these normal human days. They suck, and breaking is not fun. It makes you feel all lack of persistency, and uncool.

Things have been pretty messed up at work. I mean literally, not just this breach in quality control. The network people are overhauling connectivity related cabling. Which is good and all, except that it is taking a lot longer than one might imagine it might take. And it’s not just cabling, other infrastructural modifications related to it are being added too. The whole place is quite topsy turvy. Don’t they realize we, read I, have productivity issues even without these added irritants? And sustaining power and connections has been a joke with people randomly moving things around trying to find the nearest working sockets. Sigh.

Got home early to catch up on some shut eye and paperwork. it’s obvious which of those I haven’t bothered to get into. I have amassed like a billion bills to sort out with roommates over time. For a long time, I guess it was me who owed other people, so they’d eventually calculate and ask me, so I didn’t bother. Now I realize they owe me a ton of cash. And I’m too lazy to even calculate how much and ask them. I hate being the responsible one, paying all the bills and things. Finally decided to fill up this form to request for an MS. It should take 10 minutes, and I hope I do it. I am sure it’s not a bad thing to have a degree. You know, just as a piece of paper that reminds other people you’re evolving intellectually.

Ahh yes. That felt good. Literally sleep typing. Just a whole lot of unnecessary verbosity, not worrying about the picture. But, it’s not like it was forgotten. Oh no. So here it is. Forest type places need leaves. Unleafy forest places are quite plainly unforesty.

I am a weak weak human being. I’m so much more than weak, it’s pathetic.

My beef with “reality tv” has been pretty well documented. But damn it, there is something about this Joe show that made me furious. That’s a bad thing, definitely bad. You have to be smart enough to realize it’s JUST A FISHING SHOW and get on with your daily life. Not getting attached means not caring, not not liking. I’ve seen a grand total of 3 episodes, including today’s final, and yet it’s resulted in so much more reaction than all the other “trust us, we are real, un scripted shows in which one person gets to pick their perfect partner from 30 or so others in front of the entire world”.

Anyway, I’m assuming everybody is familiar with the concept. Pick 20-30 random geeks, and mock them while they are made to believe they have a shot at this arbitrary, yet attractive, ex-cheerleader? Now what’s interesting is I’ve seen people use words like “over qualified” with these guys. THERE IS NO SUCH THING PEOPLE. THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH KNOWING STUFF. JEEZ, GO READ OR SOMETHING.

I shouldn’t scream so much. So that’s the plan anyway, generally tune in each week to watch people who are so out of their element screw up. Ok, I had a problem with that, but I was consoled when I figured finally one of them would be able to show this person who they are and all that. Well, that’s not it either, somewhere in the middle, I missed the episode, but caught my second one just a bit after, they introduced these model type men to the mix. Not model type, models. So now the poor average folk try even harder.

THEY’RE FISHING FUNNY AND SPONTANEOUS AND CARING ENOUGH DAMN IT.

Ahem. Anyway, they do, and at the end, the woman, as usual, is “inspired” by them all, but picks a model and rides into the sunset. And the geek who lost was totally totally graceful and all nice about it.

Aww, just like we all wanted and hoped for all along.

And so here’s where I’m so much more pathetic losery than most. I know these things irk me. I know I have 10 more hours work left on things I will be turning in tomorrow. (And I still do, but that’s a different story.) But yet, I magically come home in time. I turn the stupid tv on. And try out this lame movie on comedy central mocking? jews. It was so unfunny, I ended up here. And watching it. And screaming like I am now.

God damn it, it’s just a show.

Been extremely busy all day. Didn’t get too much done, but worked. The comman man in me tells me that’s what counts. Common man. Sheesh. I wonder how they do it.

Saw the prettiest thing today. Oh yes, and this too.

Got to run again, well not literally, but I am a tad hungry. Haven’t made the time for anything or anyone, sigh, and food just wasn’t too high up on the list of priorities.

Guilty enough wasting most of the day so far. Caught up on a small bit of pending emails. Hacked away on the disclaimer and dropped it down from over 12KB to just over 6KB. It doesn’t sound right at points as a result, but contains all that I want it to have, I think.

Will get to work, soon. Or so I think. Sheesh, why is it so hard to start?

On the picture front, it’s not always grass that’s covered with frost. Cars too. I could have saved one of these pictures for tomorrow, but hmm, I just HAD to put it up too. Yes, it’s irritatingly cold outside. I just hope there isn’t a stupid blizzard thing to further complicate the 18 degrees Fahrenheit absurdity.

Woke extremely late. Didn’t do too much during most of the day. Which is somehow magically legit cause it’s Saturday. And unrelated, V’s stuff have finally reached. Expectedly, Appa’s not really keen on him playing with any of it before his exams are done. Which is a good thing, he’s not me. ;)

Not that I’m entirely certain he won’t work around it.

Thought about working on newer site hopefuls, but hit quite a few blocks. All relating to me being a lazy slacker. Cycled through a few themes, and while many of them looked a lot better than the current one, they didn’t feel right. This has a grey/dark hackery feel, which all the “happy happy” white and bright coloured ones couldn’t pull off. Going to attempt a first pass at a new site that’s not too different from the existing one (at least on the surface) and then see how things go from there. Currently pressing needs include a newer photo gallery page. As people have noticed, this is clunky and cheap-hacked. Anything else ought to be better. Something.. something more dynamic. Which brings me to my next thought, this site was never intended to be a medium of showcasing pictures. Just arbitrary boring bodies of text I cared to type out from time to time.

And this picture a day thing being a lot harder than I had originally anticipated, requires having to post botched images too, just to have something up. And interestingly, it doesn’t bother me. But something else is. As I’m updating this log, I don’t seem to remember/concentrate on the events of my day (however uneventful it was). It’s becoming more, pictures up (botched or not), I’m done. Hmm. This is NOT A PHOTOLOG. Need to think about separation. Even if it means my grand evil plans relating to people reading the text while they are here for the pictures will be self-foiled.

Here is today’s anyhow. Disembodied Signage. A botched night picture.

Left work kinda early last evening. It was cold. But I needed a long walk to clear my head and generally get some thinking done. It was actually quite good fun. I ended up getting quite lost in the middle. I hadn’t realized it earlier, because I wasn’t paying particular attention to where I was going, and more importantly, I have less sense of direction than a blind pig normal person. Didn’t panic or any such thing. Just walked around in semi darkness (yes, the sun sets at some 4) arbitrarily. Ended up eventually at this auditorium with a piano concert starting. Stayed for a while. It was very good. Then resumed my think-walking in the cold. It really helped. However, after a rather long time of not dropping anything valuable, I dropped my camera during the walk. And I wasn’t even using or planning to use it. Sheesh. It seems ok.

Got back home rather late. Caught quite a bit of Adult Swim before I slept. There is just something about adult cartoons designed to fake being kids’ cartoons when they really are kids’ cartoons in the first place. Complicatedly sweet.

Today was as usual. The sem is nearing to an end and that pile of work still just sits there. Started on a wee bit today morning, just to stop quite soon. There was this student run breakfast thing, and the general activity and chaos in the usual work lounges killed the newly spawning productivity. Lunch was oddly interesting. Spent it with this student who’s finishing and all reminiscent. Rather enlightening.

And yes, the sun beginning to set early is not always a bad thing. Here is this rather symmetric cloud and moon pattern. It totally reminds me of Pacman. Totally

Sigh. Have you ever tried so hard not to fish things up just to end up fishing up the most important things in your life? Why do such sequences of events occur? Is that even remotely normal? I am not too bad a human being. I don’t actively aim to con or hurt anybody. I just want to be.. not hurtey and not unhappy.

It doesn’t seem fair. Being a geek sucks. I want to be expressive and articulate and not have to rely on ESP to make my thoughts heard.

Between feigning working and hurting people, I was not really in the mood to use my camera. Hastily played around with an earlier image to get this, my right eye.

Come to think of it, I am not in a “yay I want to update my log” mood either. You can burn up positively built up karma faster than you know it.

Generally idled most of today. I have such a huge set of things piled up to do, I have no idea where to even begin. So I didn’t. It’s going to kill me, real soon. However, rather than “just idle”, I built most of GNOME 2.5, complete with a new GIMP. Anyway, inspired enough to work on and update the Text Effects page. Cheesy, but fun! While I’m shamelessly plugging stuff, I might as well get it over with and plug the relatively cool redirect page, for people who might have missed it earlier. Yes, that’s a picture of my screen.

And of course, today’s photograph. It is moderately frost covered? grass.

Click me for a larger version of the same picture.

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Hmm. The idiot neighbour people (No, not the squeaky bed ones above – who have resulted in some recent sleep loss btw. Will complain about that when it gets too bad.) had left their dog loose for a bit last evening and the scary thing charged towards me as I was nearing home. I am not an animal person. Mmmmmaybe a cat tolerating person, but an animal person, definitely not. I have to say it scared me a bit. It’s not a small cute dog. But then again, it’s not like it’s menacing or something like that. But it is large and I’m sure it could hurt you if it wanted. Anyway, when the neighbour dude n dudette did notice, they yelled out to it and it just stopped and turned around. And my heart had had its workout for the month, though all it probably wanted was to sniff me or some such.

It’s pretty fished up to have large animal pet things. It’s even more fished up to leave them all unattended and leashless.

Anyway, paid a bunch of bills today. I am sure a good deal of them are a tad late, but it’s stopped bothering me. Bill time is always related to a “feel poor for a bit” feeling that lasts for the day. Hmm, I ought to pay em in the evening. Quite expectedly, housing chaos is beginning to rear its ugly head again. This time I am better mentally prepared to handle things. It’s just, a major annoyance for no real reason. Also, must check out this place. It looks like fun. Probably, just probably, a fun way to meet people of different age, interests, and sexual orientation having broad thoughts, creative ideas, and diverse backgrounds. Though I am pretty sure it will not be without its fair share of nonsense you have to deal with either. Am curious though.

It’s all easy to say things like “I am definitely going to take at least one picture everyday” and all that. It’s insanely hard when you get down to it. And it’s just my third day at it. Large blocks of text that don’t make too much sense and that aren’t terribly exciting are my speciality. You start looking for the weirdest of things to shoot. Like, here is today’s.. wall.

Es ist groß, grau und unpersönlich. Wie ich.
(It’s large, grey and impersonal. Like me.)

For some reason, groß, grau und unpersönlich were among the the first 10 German words I learnt. I wonder what the authors were thinking when they wrote the book.

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Got back to the uni yesterday after a decent break. Actually been moderately productive today. Not great, but much better than in the recent past. Met some mind blowing genius types down at the math department far far away from here. I think I finally have a half decent way of describing the way I differentiate between scientist/mathematician types and engineer engineer types. It’s like the difference between, say an actually talented bunch of music performers, and a manufactured boy band.

It’s not about the big bags of money, or the multi-platinum records. It’s about keeping it real.

And the cutest thing. Ok, not really. The squirrels out here are quite large and ugly. They are as big as small dogs, and quite brave. Not very squirreley. I was a little early for class and decided to chill (literally?) at a park. This squirrel comes up real close, I think expecting some nuts or some such to eat. While it was hanging about near my feet I thought it’d be cool to shoot it. Of course, by the time I got my camera out, it realized it’s not getting any food from me, and ran up a tree. Obviously, that didn’t stop me.

Click it to open another page with the same picture, but a bit larger. If you’re so inclined, of course.

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Saw The Family Man yesterday. It’s not like I have a thing against fantasy movies, but this was just a bit much. It started off funny and soon degraded to “Gah! Pierce my eyes and let me out of this misery”ey. If I had something better to do last night, I’d have gone and done that. Obviously I didn’t, and this is the pain I had to endure.

But I have to admit it dealt with something I’m sure everyone wants. The chance to “just know” what would have happened if things had happened differently. That’d be cool, and you know it. Even our friends at MT make references to it. Actually, being a l33t hardcore gamer type, I think at some point you just hope real life’s like that too. Where you can save at regular intervals, scew up something big time, and restart at those points like nothing happened. Again, that’d be awesome.

Stumbled onto her gallery the other day. Obviously, someone’s insanely talented. Got bit by the inspired bug, and decided to try an “at least one pic a day” thing, so that, you know, I get better.. eventually eventually? I think that’s more of an “at least one pic every relatively free day” thing. Of course, the operative word is relatively. I shot these today.

Yes, I have things to do and am at work. But that doesn’t have to stop me. Pencils are pretty.. enough. They were shot on a manual focus of, IIRC some 6 and 4 cm.