This is going to hurt a little bit ....

After deliberating on it for a very very long time, i finally managed to get the braces on. As i sat in the dentist chair, the following song was ringing in my ears.

This is just going to hurt a little bit

One thing I like less than most things is sitting in a dentist chair with
my mouth wide open.
And that I will never have to do it again is a hope that I am against hope hopen.

Because some tortures are physical and some are mental,
But the one that is both is dental.
It is hard to be self-possessed
With your jaw digging into your chest.

So hard to retain your calm
When your fingernails are making serious alterations in your life line
or love line or some other important line in your palm;

So hard to give your usual effect of cheery benignity
When you know your position is one of the two or three in life
most lacking in dignity.

And your mouth is like a section of road that is being worked on.
And it is all cluttered up with stone crushers and concrete mixers and
drills and steam rollers and there isn't a nerve in your head that
you aren't being irked on.

Oh, some people are unfortunate enough to be strung up by thumbs.
And others have things done to their gums,
And your teeth are supposed to be being polished,
But you have reason to believe they are being demolished.
And the circumstance that adds most to your terror
Is that it's all done with a mirror,
Because the dentist may be a bear, or as the Romans used to say, only
they were referring to a feminine bear when they said it, an ursa,
But all the same how can you be sure when he takes his crowbar in one
hand and mirror in the other he won't get mixed up, the way you
do when you try to tie a bow tie with the aid of a mirror, and forget
that left is right and vice versa?

And then at last he says That will be all; but it isn't because he then
coats your mouth from cellar to roof
With something that I suspect is generally used to put a shine on a
horse's hoof.

And you totter to your feet and think. Well it's all over now and after
all it was only this once.
And he says come back in three monce.
And this, O Fate, is I think the most vicious circle that thou ever sentest, That Man has to go continually to the dentist to keep his teeth in good
condition when the chief reason he wants his teeth in good condition
is so that he won't have to go to the dentist.

- Ogden Nash

Books to read

Hindu view of life by S Radhakrishnan
Man's Search for Meaning
Fooled by Randomness
What they don't teach you at Harvard


I came across these books when i was browsing the net or through few of my friends. But i have not been able to find time to read them yet, whenever i am pressed with work, i think about them and i get this feeling in my head that i need to read them in a single sitting, which i understand that is not possible, well one does not have much control over their feelings. Everything said and done, these books are haunting me for a fortnight now, dunno when i will get into the grove to start reading them. As i type now, i feel i will be able to do that once i get back home. Well, i have not talked about the new place that i have shifted to. Will talk about that in a little while.

Given the baddy and dinner and the usual bakar, i am not sure i will be able to do it. But lets see how i will be able to manage these things. :)

"My Precious" diary

It is always a pain to find time to blog. Not that you are too busy or something, whatever free time one gets, they do not want to spend time in front of the laptop. I prefer reading to blogging. I hang out with friends, watch some movie or something. But sometimes i feel, there are lots of things happening in my life and my memory is not able to keep pace with my life. So there should be some way i would like to revisit the experiences i have had. One sure way to do it is to catch up with those people with whom you shared those experiences. A simpler way and a personal way to do is to keep a diary or blog. I am not that determined or disciplined to keep a diary of my own.

During my childhood days i felt that i have to keep a diary. It might be more because of more of what i had heard than the actual need for it. That diary will be 'My Precious', it will have all those thoughts i have in mind. I will pen down each and every experience i will have. I will be truly honest with my diary and it will be my best pal. The euphoria around the diary or the mere thought of having a diary and to be honest with it was a big thing to me in those days.

Well, i thought more about it than actually starting one. I got one of those big diaries my dad had and filled up the contact page with the beautiful handwriting i had then :). Then my siblings, as curious as they are, started peeking into what i am doing with a diary. Well, whoever has siblings understand this. Whenever you need your siblings they are not around or they dony comply. When you dont need them, they are always around and they poke their nosed in everything. Well, this brought me back to the real world. I started to feel that if these people get hold of my diary with my thoughts and experiences in them, they are going to make fun of them and it would be just a matter of time when my friends will be laughing at me. Well i think the fear was bigger than the enthu or i was not matured enough to handle that, my diary started and ended on the same day and i couldn't muster enough courage to revive the enthu back.

Later in life whenever i felt the need for a diary, i had to rationalise it with my bad writing skills and i would rely on my memory. By then, people had started complementing me on the photographic memory i had. Other's belief was my belief and i had decided that i could rely on my memory than a diary and it was an easy and a safer way out.

But very late in my life i realised the importance of penning down thoughts or revisiting the experiences while writing about it. In doing so, one will think more and deeper about it. One will come across different perspectives of looking at the same thing. One will know more about oneself that way, some sort of realization of the self sets in. There will lots of lessons to be learnt all along the way !!!

Well, the boy was 8 yrs then and he is 26 yrs now !!!

Travel this week !!!

I have been travelling a bit off late. I always loved to travel but the last week's travel got to me.

My travel schedule was Bangalore - Delhi - Ahmedabad - Delhi in 3 days. All of them were early morning flights (5 am to 6:30 am) and one has to reach atleast 1 hr before the departure and had to wakeup nearly 2 hrs to departure, and all these days i had to wake-up at 3-4 am.

Smart thing to do is to sleep early and wake up early, but my engagements used to keep me awake till 1 or 2 in the morning.I am a person who doesn't get sleep in the flight, most of the time i read or listen to music, if i am not engaged in a conversation with my co-passenger. All in all i got to sleep only for 8 hrs those three days !!! not that it is too less or something, but coupled with the tiresome travel and the work committments it becomes a bit more demanding.

I reachned a stage where i couldn't keep my eyes open, then i realised its time for me to hit bed. I left office at 5 pm, bumping into the client, the vice chairman of the company and all those people whom i didnt want to while i was leavin the office that early. There were raised eyebrows but i couldnt even raise my eyelids. It was one of those moments when Murphy scores a point.

I reached home at 5:30 and hit bed. I got a call from the CEO of the company at around 7:30 and i couldnt figure out what was happening. Apparently he wanted to know my views on something and based on the other people who were on the call i did speak some sense, what exactly i do not have a clue. :)

All in all, it was an exciting and a demanding week. There were few lessons learnt on the personal front.

Pending items

There a few things that i wanted to write about and i haven't got the time(rather enthu) yet.. .but will do so very soon ...

1. Status Update
2. Mind of a group
3. Proof Reading
4. Attention span/interest

Whats in Web 2.0

Blogs (short for Web logs) are online journals or diaries hosted on a Web site and often distributed to other sites or readers using RSS (see below).

Collective intelligence refers to any system that attempts to tap the expertise of a group rather than an individual to make decisions. Technologies that contribute to collective intelligence include collaborative publishing and common databases for sharing knowledge.

Mash-ups are aggregations of content from different online sources to create a new service. An example would be a program that pulls apartment listings from one site and displays them on a Google map to show where the apartments are located.

Peer-to-peer networking (sometimes called P2P) is a technique for efficiently sharing files (music, videos, or text) either over the Internet or within a closed set of users. Unlike the traditional method of storing a file on one machine—which can become a bottleneck if many people try to access it at once—P2P distributes files across many machines, often those of the users themselves. Some systems retrieve files by gathering and assembling pieces of them from many machines.

Podcasts are audio or video recordings—a multimedia form of a blog or other content. They are often distributed through an aggregator, such as iTunes.

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) allows people to subscribe to online distributions of news, blogs, podcasts, or other information.

Social networking refers to systems that allow members of a specific site to learn about other members’ skills, talents, knowledge, or preferences. Commercial examples include Facebook and LinkedIn. Some companies use these systems internally to help identify experts.

Web services are software systems that make it easier for different systems to communicate with one another automatically in order to pass information or conduct transactions. For example, a retailer and supplier might use Web services to communicate over the Internet and automatically update each other’s inventory systems.

Wikis, such as Wikipedia, are systems for collaborative publishing. They allow many authors to contribute to an online document or discussion.

Work Matrix ...

why, mr. Vijay, why? why, why do you do it? why, why get up? why keep meeting? do you believe you're meeting for something, for more than your appraisal? can you tell me what it is, do you even know? is it higher pay or promotion, perhaps learning - could it be for impression? illusions, mr. Vijay , vagaries of perception. temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an execution that is without meaning or purpose. and all of them as artificial as consulting itself. although, only the super boss could get something as stupid as this project. you must be able to see it, mr. Vijay you must know it by now! you can't win, it's pointless to keep meeting! why, mr. Vijay, why, why do you persist?

-agent Ramu

this is one of the mails a frustrated Ramu sent to his immediate boss. It has been inspired from the movie Matrix Revolutions

Existence ...

I found this interesting dialogue from the movie 'Dead Poets Society' .....

We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, "O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless... of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?" Answer. That you are here - that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. That the powerful play *goes on* and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?

What will your verse be ...
What will your verse be ...
the dialogue has so much of passion built in the words... even the ppl who havnt seen the movie nor the clip can get the feel of it ... amazingly well composed ...

Collections ...

I am not sure since when i got interested in quotes... i had my share of likings for cool quotes, motivational quotes, inspirational ones and so on ...

i started searchin for books on quotes in bookstores, on google... i wuld be subjected to plenty of them... few of them appealing ... but the problem was i couldnt remember quite a lot of them
and i culdnt go back and have a look at them too.. since i wuld hav forgotten the source too... i wuld just know the jist of it or what it related to ... but not the quote

then... i started collecting qu0tes so that i culd go back and look at them and try memorizing them... i have collected a good no. since my MBA days .... but the usage has been limited as of now... the collections are not just quotes... any sentence or a statement which i feel is appealing at that point of time ....

with time i guess will keep posting few of them...

Ships ....

Ships are safe at the harbour... but thats not what they are built for

Marathon

After i posted my 'Om Shanti Om' post... i realised that i havent updated my Marathon post....
i did run the marathon on Oct 28th in Delhi .... takin my marathon tally to 3 in 3 diff indian cities...

i managed to finish the 21.092 km run in 2h 16min ...

managed becoz.. had sprained my leg on friday, 2 days before the marathon, durin a practise run...
yes .. u can call me a psycho... since i ran...things were fine ... till i hit the seventeen km mark... then the leg gave away... the last 4 km was more than a walk and less than a jog ... and finally i was able to clear the finish line ....

Om Shanti Om

Saw the movie just an hour back in one of the very old theaters of Delhi... the movie is pretty decent ...
movie is watchable once
but Deepika any no. of times....
she looks absolutely gorgeous in the movie ...
SRK is still giving fabulous performances year after year, movie after movie...

the movie spoofs few of the old actors in the first half...
second half has most of the new actors .....

the story line is a bit let down...
but given the powerful performances of the actors, one is always captivated to whtevr tht is happening on the screen....

if u havnt watched it yet... its time for u to go thru the experience ....

A city life ...

As some people know, i have moved from one small city to another big city. In the small city i used to be an hitech engineer for a large organization, travelling 22 km daily. In the big city i am a consultant for a small organization, travelling for 22 min daily. Both distances are one - way.

What makes me wonder is in both places, i get frustrated during the journey. Vehicles are everywhere, too much of smoke, everyone keeps honking, no one cares for the rules, the list goes on and on... but by the time u reach ur office or home, u will be completely drained.


What i fail to understand is, why do we have to put up with all that, the kind of work what i was doing before and now, are different but they have one thing in common. Given the telecommunication network we have, 80% of the work can be done from any location. If thats the case, why do we have to put up with all this. Why cant we work in a place where we have some peace, where the mere thought of going to the office or home, doesnt make the hair raise, where the decibel and pollution levels are low.

For my current job, i have to travel a bit, when i have to meet up with clients but in a IT setting u dont have to do that. I am not suggesting u sit at home and work, but we can leave the hustle and bustle of the city and move to quite and peaceful sub urbs and work from there. Since majority of the people working in these kind of companies migrate from different places, relocation should not be a problem as long as basic amenities are present. This way there will be less irritation and frustration among the employees. What a nice thing to happen to all of us.

Why cant the people who take a call on the location see what most of us see.

Demanding Sport

This discussion happnd in the winter of 2006, when we were practicing for the marathon. It was about what was the most grueling sport. After you have run for some 27 km, the first thing that comes to one's mind is the marathon. We moved to Decathlon and Triathlon. We agreed upon triathlon as the most demanding sport. But what we missed out that day was Tour de France. Arguably, the most demanding, most challenging sport in the world today.

Here is an excerpt of an amateur cyclist who cycled only a single stretch of the tour. He has expressed his experience in a wonderful way. After running the marathon, i couldn;t agree with him more.

Marathon time !!

yup...
i am running the marathon again.. but only half this time.... as far as runnin is concerned ... this year has been a fruitful year for me .... starting with StanC mumbai marathon in Jan and Bangalore midnight marathon in May .. it has been a wonderful experience. Going on the same note i am planning to take on the gruelling delhi circuit this time around... the marathon is scheduled on 28th of October and i have barely moved out of my 8 month slumber .... its been 3 days since i have started to wear the running shoes again .... lets c how things go on from here.....

My personal times of the marathon

Stan C full marathon - 42.195 km ... 4h 40min
Blore half marathon - 21.097 km .... 2h 30min

well as u can see there is an aberration in the times here.... for StanC marathon .. i had put in 4 months of practise ... for the blore one .. not even 4 hrs ...

hopefully will improve on my half marathon timing this time around ....

running is one thing that keeps me going ... atleast i found something to pursue in Delhi...

-Raghu

Another Links URL

Sergey Brin's page on Stanford....
http://infolab.stanford.edu/~sergey/

Larry Page's page
http://infolab.stanford.edu/~page/

Technical paper on Google search engine
http://infolab.stanford.edu/pub/papers/google.pdf

Stanford technical reports
http://infolab.stanford.edu/TR/

Elements of Style
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strunk_and_White

Back again !!!

Think there are more posts abt me cumin back than actual posts ...

some update...

did my first international travel last fortnight..
was in 4 different countries in 4 consecutive days .. :) ...

it has brought in some difference in the way is see things in India..
wht exactly i am not sure...

one thing is for sure... w.r.t some countries we are not just 1000 kms far but 1000 yrs far... with the rest we are still behind ...

have a vague idea about certain things... will pen down when the vagueness vanishes but not the idea ...

Coming back after a long time !!!

Not that i was too busy or something ..
not that i didnt have any thoughts to pen...

thoughts were plenty...
time was at hand ...
but what i lacked was the enthu ..

Its been a long time since i hav worked with enthu...
i cant remember when was the last time i had enthu...
may be my TI days... never durin my MBA days...

but yesterday i worked with enthu...
the long lost enthu.... not to the true potential...
but there was passion in what i was doing...

An Irony ....

Our country is driven by monsoons, but when ever monsoons hit the country, everything comes to a standstill.

The economy slows down if there is a slight delay in the monsoons, once the monsoons hit the cities slow down.

Strange are the way things are !!

Dimension

All these while, i have been thinking about lots of stuff to a great deal. All this thought have contributed something to my life. But where it takes a back seat is when it comes to work. I have been thinking specifically about general things and generally about specific things, well when it comes to work a general thought will not do any good. I think its time for me to reduce my indulgence is thinking about things that are way too general and start thinking more about the work i have.
Atleast, it pays.