I hate posting again in so short a while but this had to be said.
I joined Insen, Whiplash, and Stewie, as stand-in vocals in Rock Band on Stewie's new Xbox 360... When Stewie was out bonding with his bro, Whiplash stepped into Stewie's role as drummer, leaving me to do the vocals....I did a fair job on about half my songs and sucked on the rest....I was thrust straight into medium difficulty, in my defense, without any idea of the tone or lyrics of the songs.
I agree that the drums are really hard, I could'nt get a beat going until my second song, but the guitar was ok....I look forward to my next jam session with them, and hope that we can find a second guitar somewhere to play bass with (the only position left open for poor me).
A happy side-effect from the jamming session was that I got a whole new bunch of awesome rock music to listen to, courtesy ye ol' bittorent...
I highly recommend the following songs from RB:
Queens of the Stone Age - Go with the Flow
The Killers - When you were young
Radiohead - Creep
Soundgarden - Black hole sun
Foo fighters - Learn to fly
Iron Maiden - Run to the hills
Weezer - Say it aint so
Cheerio.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Break a leg, por favor...
Well, yeah, its been a long hiatus from writing in general....my life's shifted into a different gear with work and stuff...I live in California now....need to work only about 10 hours a day ( a great drop from the heydays of graduate school )... I own a car, live by myself in a fancy little studio in a posh area, can actually afford to buy random electronic junk...Random sleep times, random lifestyle, and even more random friends, all ensconced in a happy secluded life living alone....ah!
Like all good things, all that blissful randomness came to screeching halt during a rather tumultuous [past] two months.... a rather weird accident to fracture the fibula on my left leg into two rather uncool pieces...Living alone then proved to be an arduous mental and physical task... with concerned parents calling all the time to make sure I was fine, and me having to limp around to do everything from throwing trash to driving myself to work [ oh, by the way, my claim to fame has changed to the rather insane masochistic act of driving yourself to the hospital with a broken leg... autographs available on Plaster of Paris material only].
I promised myself I would not let myself fall to gloom due to the pain, and did everything from climb stairs without crutches three days after the accident, go to a birthday party, watch about a dozen movies, jaywalk across an expressway, get five strikes bowling with a single shoe, lift foosball tables, survived an earthquake, play table tennis...I probably did more stuff than when I had two full legs to walk on!
Like all good things, all that blissful randomness came to screeching halt during a rather tumultuous [past] two months.... a rather weird accident to fracture the fibula on my left leg into two rather uncool pieces...Living alone then proved to be an arduous mental and physical task... with concerned parents calling all the time to make sure I was fine, and me having to limp around to do everything from throwing trash to driving myself to work [ oh, by the way, my claim to fame has changed to the rather insane masochistic act of driving yourself to the hospital with a broken leg... autographs available on Plaster of Paris material only].
I promised myself I would not let myself fall to gloom due to the pain, and did everything from climb stairs without crutches three days after the accident, go to a birthday party, watch about a dozen movies, jaywalk across an expressway, get five strikes bowling with a single shoe, lift foosball tables, survived an earthquake, play table tennis...I probably did more stuff than when I had two full legs to walk on!
Saturday, May 05, 2007
Bacchus normal form
Awesome....I actually remember everything I said about 1 hour ago to a bunch of people who I knew well...It is rather weird that I actually had to outwardly pretend that I was totally 'out of it' to get to know some people better...lime juice and water has that effect on me! No one realized that it was lime and water all the time, and thought I was 'out as light' [ note all comments reporting otherwise shall be despatched to the trash can expeditiously ]...took my abuse and refused to give anything back to me...poor Raghu had to tolerate me asking him to ask him to keep his mouth open. I don't think he opened it though > (did he ?)
A few had to tolerate my verbal tirades, being tightly lipped about what cannot be said, and bunch of other friends allowed me to know what I wanted to know. Unfortunately, it was necessary ;-) Weird eh, that acting inebriated gets you people's compassion instantly, though I still could not get all the answers one often looks for. Damn it, that no one was 'knocked'....would have been a 'good will hunting' time, had people been less tight lipped...as a good friend Vizwaz acting such is definitely more fun :-)
Some people actually knew what state I was in ...I was surprised that the poor little Long Island Ice Teas had lost their effect on me, and were reduced, as Sumeet put it, to regular Ice Tea. From where I picked up this surprising tolerance, to get home, and then play counter-strike for an hour, call everyone to confirm that they got home just fine due to the time of the night, is just underscored by a 'lol'!
Always wanted to name something Bacchus Normal Form ( since I heard of the whole BNF thing), and this moment in time is suitable enough. Reminds me of Kurt Cobain's death for some reason... the whole choking-on-puke thing is rather weird eh ? Especially after lime juice and water???
A few had to tolerate my verbal tirades, being tightly lipped about what cannot be said, and bunch of other friends allowed me to know what I wanted to know. Unfortunately, it was necessary ;-) Weird eh, that acting inebriated gets you people's compassion instantly, though I still could not get all the answers one often looks for. Damn it, that no one was 'knocked'....would have been a 'good will hunting' time, had people been less tight lipped...as a good friend Vizwaz acting such is definitely more fun :-)
Some people actually knew what state I was in ...I was surprised that the poor little Long Island Ice Teas had lost their effect on me, and were reduced, as Sumeet put it, to regular Ice Tea. From where I picked up this surprising tolerance, to get home, and then play counter-strike for an hour, call everyone to confirm that they got home just fine due to the time of the night, is just underscored by a 'lol'!
Always wanted to name something Bacchus Normal Form ( since I heard of the whole BNF thing), and this moment in time is suitable enough. Reminds me of Kurt Cobain's death for some reason... the whole choking-on-puke thing is rather weird eh ? Especially after lime juice and water???
Monday, April 30, 2007
Keerti's bday
Amidst all the post H1-B trauma, we managed to do some stuff for Keerti's birthday, friday and saturday nights. Yes, its the first time I went to more than one 'party' for a birthday.
The first one just had the usual butt-kicking and cake...the second one had a huge assortment of junta from the CS dept.......you could have called it the good ol' motley crew....
For the first time , I was at a party with people from Pakistan, Mexico and Burma...not exactly 'international' , but its a big leap forward from the usual hum-ho stuff. Sumeet actually got some champagne, to celebrate the silver jubilee of Keerti's existence as an individual...
I on the other hand, am much younger, and never fail to remind elderly people (>=25yrs) of that fact ;-)
And yeah, listen to the awesome OST "I'm Shipping up to Boston" by Dropkick Murphys, from 'The Departed'...(this btw plays on top of this page, if you havent disabled plugins @!#!@$$!! ).
You can also listen to it on imeem
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
A ruse for sloth
One of my undergrad friends described this as the hedonist phase...where all the body seeks is overweighed by the need for the mind to cocoon itself in a shroud of sloth...Maybe a sea-change is in the offing, but who knows, what this leads to.
I have gone to the brink of total lethargy. All the vibrant energy I associated with myself, has been diminishing over the past month. Is this, as someone put it, the 'dog days' of graduation, where one goes panting to the finish line, out of breath, out of space and and out of one's mind?
I still somehow get assignments in on time, but do nothing else at all. No sports whatsoever. No social interaction.
Like Sourabh puts it, I am no longer 16... Alas, age does catch up, I guess...but this seems almost scary...It sure ain't depression...just something weird.
T'is described as 'la vie'...the ups go with the downs, but why ought there be downs at all? And is this a down at all? I suddenly prefer waking up at 1pm, barely missing my 930a Probability class all the time (The downer's that the mid-term's in a week, and desires my presence). Perhaps, I need a challenge...my thesis has been rather smooth, with just ALL the writing left to be done in about 20 days ( no biggie ).
The interiors of my living room's all I have seen in about 24 hours...with the only break to go get some milk, coz I ran out of it.
Some shit, huh ?
I have gone to the brink of total lethargy. All the vibrant energy I associated with myself, has been diminishing over the past month. Is this, as someone put it, the 'dog days' of graduation, where one goes panting to the finish line, out of breath, out of space and and out of one's mind?
I still somehow get assignments in on time, but do nothing else at all. No sports whatsoever. No social interaction.
Like Sourabh puts it, I am no longer 16... Alas, age does catch up, I guess...but this seems almost scary...It sure ain't depression...just something weird.
T'is described as 'la vie'...the ups go with the downs, but why ought there be downs at all? And is this a down at all? I suddenly prefer waking up at 1pm, barely missing my 930a Probability class all the time (The downer's that the mid-term's in a week, and desires my presence). Perhaps, I need a challenge...my thesis has been rather smooth, with just ALL the writing left to be done in about 20 days ( no biggie ).
The interiors of my living room's all I have seen in about 24 hours...with the only break to go get some milk, coz I ran out of it.
Some shit, huh ?
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
T Rajendar (TR)'s movie Veerasamy
Awesome fun! the best part is that TR actually thinks he's funny...wow...Thanks to the tamil cultural association, a bunch of us got to watch this movie...his dialogues are world famous, and his general great humor is evident throughout the movie...though no one had a clue what was the story....some weird stuff about his daughter running away with his sworn enemy's son, whereas our hero , TR , is himself in love with his servant-maid... Lots of corpulant dancing, weird brylcreem-ed hair-don'ts and allround fun...a must watch for every tamilian out there!
Sunday, March 18, 2007
My all time favorite!
Enable download plugins in your browser, and reload this page, in case you have'nt already. You should see a song playing on top of this page.
Also, if interested, look this up :
Uyirin Uyire Live Mix
Its a score remix.
Cheers, and enjoy the rest of spring.
Also, if interested, look this up :
Uyirin Uyire Live Mix
Its a score remix.
Cheers, and enjoy the rest of spring.
Reservation in India : The real source of brain-drain
For those not in the know, the recent announcements from the Ministry of
HRD,India have re-instated the provisions of the Mandal Commission
recommendations of 1980 of reserving 27% of all seats in institutes of
higher education being centrally funded for OBC's. In effect, this
alongwith the quota already administered for SC's and ST's ricochets
the quota to a staggering 49.5 %
This act will come into being in institutions such as Delhi
University, IIT's, IIM's and other prominent institutes on which India
prides itself. To create reservations for 49.% of the total seats
completely undermines every notion of the so called "equality" it
seeks to bring about.
Wikipedia tells me the following:
Affirmative action, by the way, is followed in the USA, particularly for Black and Hispanic minorities. In India, on the other hand, the whole system is lop-sided against the 'un-reserved' people...
Woefully, reservation was introduced to counter generations of partiality and prejudice adjudged to be due to the caste-system being in vogue, and, instead persecutes people of the un-reserved classes, which still account for 30-50% of the masses.
Under this pathetic system, the 'general quota' positions, are filled according to merit, and the people of the 'reserved classes' under those allocations, do not account towards the reserved vacancies.
Following is a view from an middle-class student from a high school in Chennai:
Nice to see school kids knowing and acknowledging such things.
I, for one, felt an instant sense of alienation, due to extenuating differences in how my classmates and I, whom I had grown up with, were segregated, and differentially 'admitted' into institutions, based on accommodation into respective quotas (In case you are wondering, I fell into the general quota sometime back, which was filled up first, and hence, the consequent cribbing ;-) ).
I felt, personally, that there was no role, that I should play, to accede to this system further, and decided, that further education was only possible at a place there was no such prejudice on where you were born into. Sure, I could afford traveling abroad to study, and sure, my parent's were'nt the poorest of the poor, but it shames me to see, other very smart people, being left in the dirt, simply because, they were'nt of the right class. One of my cousins, for example, cleared well over 99 percentile on both engineering and medical entrance exams after high school, and still could not get into the top three medical colleges in the state, simply because he was'nt of the right birth.
Super-smart, ( or super-rich) people do not feel this pinch, among the un-reserved classes, but the poor, and insufficiently educated lot, are certainly decimated by the system. People like me, who could afford to get out of the system, do so... And considering the opportunities vis-a-vis money and potential elsewhere, why is it then at all surprising, that there is so much brain drain?
Something must be done to rectify the situation, before the politicians in India accuse the smart people of bailing out.
HRD,India have re-instated the provisions of the Mandal Commission
recommendations of 1980 of reserving 27% of all seats in institutes of
higher education being centrally funded for OBC's. In effect, this
alongwith the quota already administered for SC's and ST's ricochets
the quota to a staggering 49.5 %
This act will come into being in institutions such as Delhi
University, IIT's, IIM's and other prominent institutes on which India
prides itself. To create reservations for 49.% of the total seats
completely undermines every notion of the so called "equality" it
seeks to bring about.
Wikipedia tells me the following:
Reservation is a phenomenon unique to India and is different from affirmative action which is practiced in many other countries. The main difference between the two is that in affirmative action the amount of concessions to be made in order to increase representation in an underrepresented group is at the discretion of individual organizations, whereas the reservation system in India is based on statutory quota that must be met.
Affirmative action, by the way, is followed in the USA, particularly for Black and Hispanic minorities. In India, on the other hand, the whole system is lop-sided against the 'un-reserved' people...
Woefully, reservation was introduced to counter generations of partiality and prejudice adjudged to be due to the caste-system being in vogue, and, instead persecutes people of the un-reserved classes, which still account for 30-50% of the masses.
Under this pathetic system, the 'general quota' positions, are filled according to merit, and the people of the 'reserved classes' under those allocations, do not account towards the reserved vacancies.
Following is a view from an middle-class student from a high school in Chennai:
The concept of reservations in India has not worked for 50 years, and this guideline too is a more populist measure aimed at the "aam aadmi's" vote, while cutting away from the real reasons that foster an ever increasing urban-rural divide. Instead of focusing on increased infrastructure creation, strengthening the rural school systems and quality of education, creating trained manpower, cutting corruption and so on, the administration has instead played the reservation card yet again, screwing a sizeable section of the population.
Nice to see school kids knowing and acknowledging such things.
I, for one, felt an instant sense of alienation, due to extenuating differences in how my classmates and I, whom I had grown up with, were segregated, and differentially 'admitted' into institutions, based on accommodation into respective quotas (In case you are wondering, I fell into the general quota sometime back, which was filled up first, and hence, the consequent cribbing ;-) ).
I felt, personally, that there was no role, that I should play, to accede to this system further, and decided, that further education was only possible at a place there was no such prejudice on where you were born into. Sure, I could afford traveling abroad to study, and sure, my parent's were'nt the poorest of the poor, but it shames me to see, other very smart people, being left in the dirt, simply because, they were'nt of the right class. One of my cousins, for example, cleared well over 99 percentile on both engineering and medical entrance exams after high school, and still could not get into the top three medical colleges in the state, simply because he was'nt of the right birth.
Super-smart, ( or super-rich) people do not feel this pinch, among the un-reserved classes, but the poor, and insufficiently educated lot, are certainly decimated by the system. People like me, who could afford to get out of the system, do so... And considering the opportunities vis-a-vis money and potential elsewhere, why is it then at all surprising, that there is so much brain drain?
Something must be done to rectify the situation, before the politicians in India accuse the smart people of bailing out.
India V Bangladesh, WC '07
India won!! Not!
For the first time in history, I feel like giving up on cricket...Losing, is all too common for India, but losing to B'desh, and that too in such a wimpy fashion, deserves a blog entry, nay, a whack-in-the-butt...The high and mighty attitude Team India carries is all too evident...They lost to Zimbabwe similarly in the 1999 World Cup, sealing their fate then ( though Zim were a better team then, and that result had a probability of say 20% ).
There seems to be a deep-rooted mentality amongst general cricket-watchers and cricketers alike to over-rate or under-rate India, based on current performance...Think of it this way, of the 30-odd matches India played against B'desh, India never lost...Probability finally caught up with it...lol.
For the first time in history, I feel like giving up on cricket...Losing, is all too common for India, but losing to B'desh, and that too in such a wimpy fashion, deserves a blog entry, nay, a whack-in-the-butt...The high and mighty attitude Team India carries is all too evident...They lost to Zimbabwe similarly in the 1999 World Cup, sealing their fate then ( though Zim were a better team then, and that result had a probability of say 20% ).
There seems to be a deep-rooted mentality amongst general cricket-watchers and cricketers alike to over-rate or under-rate India, based on current performance...Think of it this way, of the 30-odd matches India played against B'desh, India never lost...Probability finally caught up with it...lol.
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Totally unremarkable spring break
Hi,
After much deliberation, me and a bunch of friends decided to go someplace. Well, in our rather extreme stupor, we decided to head to Dallas. Almost immediately, thanks mainly to Google, we discovered that there was practically nothing to see for a tourist at Dallas. But considering group politics and our total lethargy in planning anything else we settled for Dallas.
An early morning ( at about 1PM ) trip to Enterprise gave us a car, and the trip there was rather easy. We stayed at the DaysInn Plano, and went the next day to the Dallas Arboretum. That gave us a rather neat view of Dallas downtown, with its picturesque highrises and so on. Nothing out of the ordinary, except for seeing about a million flowers, all of whose genetic classification I have forgotten by now.
A rather uneventful trip to the Natural Science Exhibits ensued at Fairpark. Saw some really weird dead bodies enbalmed, preserved, and internal organs dyed and displayed in totally unorthodox positions. The term 'rigor mortis' kept popping into my head, as for some reason, the relative positions of the different 'specimens' was rather strange. We also saw a bunch of other things there, but nothing remarkable. Apparently one can donate one's body to this rather irreverant exhibition, though I have no clue why anyone would do that.
Sure, there were a number of other things to do, but we decided not to do them, for inexplicable reasons. Our drive back was far more eventful and lively, thanks to the torrential rainfall that accompanied us all the way from Waco(enroute) to Austin.
After much deliberation, me and a bunch of friends decided to go someplace. Well, in our rather extreme stupor, we decided to head to Dallas. Almost immediately, thanks mainly to Google, we discovered that there was practically nothing to see for a tourist at Dallas. But considering group politics and our total lethargy in planning anything else we settled for Dallas.
An early morning ( at about 1PM ) trip to Enterprise gave us a car, and the trip there was rather easy. We stayed at the DaysInn Plano, and went the next day to the Dallas Arboretum. That gave us a rather neat view of Dallas downtown, with its picturesque highrises and so on. Nothing out of the ordinary, except for seeing about a million flowers, all of whose genetic classification I have forgotten by now.
A rather uneventful trip to the Natural Science Exhibits ensued at Fairpark. Saw some really weird dead bodies enbalmed, preserved, and internal organs dyed and displayed in totally unorthodox positions. The term 'rigor mortis' kept popping into my head, as for some reason, the relative positions of the different 'specimens' was rather strange. We also saw a bunch of other things there, but nothing remarkable. Apparently one can donate one's body to this rather irreverant exhibition, though I have no clue why anyone would do that.
Sure, there were a number of other things to do, but we decided not to do them, for inexplicable reasons. Our drive back was far more eventful and lively, thanks to the torrential rainfall that accompanied us all the way from Waco(enroute) to Austin.
Saturday, February 10, 2007
J.S. - B.E.; M.A.;
Yes...Its official.
" Jayesh Seshadri, of the University of Texas at Austin, shall end up with a M.A., courtesy his professional adventurism in attempting the impossible... trying to get a thesis done as part of his Master's. "
( And yes, its spelt Master's and not Masters you dope... And don't hate me for my punctilliousness :-))
Its remarkable that from a Bachelor of Engineering, in an Engineering school, I end up getting an (aaargh!) Arts degree from the College of Natural Sciences.
Personally I have nothing against the Natural Sciences bit, but getting an Arts degree, as Patton put it, is simply, a bridge too far.
My friends ( the 'Scientists' amongst us ) jokingly allude to the ludicrity with which it shall be viewed in my (possible, probably improbable) marriage invitations ( another bridge; perhaps too far! ).
p.s. No offence - I have nothing against Art-'ists' , but just my upbringing in a developing world, where traditionally the lowest ten percent end up going to schools of arts puts me in a weird mood... I understand completely that this could be read as bigotry, prejudice, etc...But I shall whole heartedly disclaim any version of this attributed to me in the future...I'll just claim this is a consequence of a MySpace attack ;-)
" Jayesh Seshadri, of the University of Texas at Austin, shall end up with a M.A., courtesy his professional adventurism in attempting the impossible... trying to get a thesis done as part of his Master's. "
( And yes, its spelt Master's and not Masters you dope... And don't hate me for my punctilliousness :-))
Its remarkable that from a Bachelor of Engineering, in an Engineering school, I end up getting an (aaargh!) Arts degree from the College of Natural Sciences.
Personally I have nothing against the Natural Sciences bit, but getting an Arts degree, as Patton put it, is simply, a bridge too far.
My friends ( the 'Scientists' amongst us ) jokingly allude to the ludicrity with which it shall be viewed in my (possible, probably improbable) marriage invitations ( another bridge; perhaps too far! ).
p.s. No offence - I have nothing against Art-'ists' , but just my upbringing in a developing world, where traditionally the lowest ten percent end up going to schools of arts puts me in a weird mood... I understand completely that this could be read as bigotry, prejudice, etc...But I shall whole heartedly disclaim any version of this attributed to me in the future...I'll just claim this is a consequence of a MySpace attack ;-)
Thursday, January 25, 2007
A Nomad's life
Aargh....damn these pesky bedbugs....Unfortunately, I have recently found out that bedbugs can exist without there being any beds too...On the stubborn refusal of my roommate to throw away his bed-linen, we have ended up with a rather sticky problem...I am unable to stay home past 10p.m. thanks to these nocturnal pests squiggling around to suck my blood...my roommate, however sees nothing wrong in "giving" away some of his blood...
As a consequence, I have been restricted to a nomad's life...roaming from location to location in seek of shelter. Lucky am I, to have some friends....
As a consequence, I have been restricted to a nomad's life...roaming from location to location in seek of shelter. Lucky am I, to have some friends....
Sunday, November 26, 2006
Pencil chewers, Duos, Trios and Austin Entities in action :-p
Just thought I would show off my collections of roommates/best friends/couples etc I captured slyly over the past 5 months of action in Austin....Vetti is me, I know ;-)
>> Kaarthic(MK) in action......Tasting pencil,of course...accompanying him is Suresh Talore...another rather famous Avalonite (Avaloner? Avalonian?)... 
<< Image 2...The deadly trio of MK, Anand (Madurai Veeran), and Arvind (Chella) ...Anand is upto his usual histrionics, roaring around, making noise ;-)..He has a strange fascination for velakennai, btw ( future brides beware :-))
>> Image 3: Sarath and Arun....This comedy pair was also part of the refugee camp at Avalon 211 around end of May 2006...these two switch between brief fights and gelling together on road trips. Currently roommates-at-large somewhere at the Raleigh...
<< Image4... Krishnan and Tinny(Amit)...were the guys I used to go to Intern with...
They are quite a fun duo...
Tinny, like any hard-working IT specialist, loves to sleep when given the chance(Image 5 )....>>>
>>Sumeet and Keerti,(Image 6) are on the other hand, made for each other,
though are quite non-gay...Sumeet loves to cook and also to raid filled refrigerators(see Image 7 below) and Keerti loves to contemplate the meaning of life, when he finds time away from jogging around or doing compilers assignment... I should'nt crib about them too much they have put up with a lot of my antics of late :-)
>>(Images 8 and 9) Any blog entry on Austin entities would be incomplete without our dude Srivatsan, the oft misunderstood, misquoted, but much loved stud of Austin.
Herein, I present two rather contrasting sides of Srivatsan...the pic on right shows him reading his gospel (Sundaraghandam) and on the left, he's deep-frying some good old fashioned ground-nuts... Being his roommate has been quite a roller-coaster ride.
>> Kaarthic(MK) in action......Tasting pencil,of course...accompanying him is Suresh Talore...another rather famous Avalonite (Avaloner? Avalonian?)... 
<< Image 2...The deadly trio of MK, Anand (Madurai Veeran), and Arvind (Chella) ...Anand is upto his usual histrionics, roaring around, making noise ;-)..He has a strange fascination for velakennai, btw ( future brides beware :-))
>> Image 3: Sarath and Arun....This comedy pair was also part of the refugee camp at Avalon 211 around end of May 2006...these two switch between brief fights and gelling together on road trips. Currently roommates-at-large somewhere at the Raleigh...
<< Image4... Krishnan and Tinny(Amit)...were the guys I used to go to Intern with...
They are quite a fun duo...Tinny, like any hard-working IT specialist, loves to sleep when given the chance(Image 5 )....>>>
>>Sumeet and Keerti,(Image 6) are on the other hand, made for each other,
though are quite non-gay...Sumeet loves to cook and also to raid filled refrigerators(see Image 7 below) and Keerti loves to contemplate the meaning of life, when he finds time away from jogging around or doing compilers assignment... I should'nt crib about them too much they have put up with a lot of my antics of late :-)
>>(Images 8 and 9) Any blog entry on Austin entities would be incomplete without our dude Srivatsan, the oft misunderstood, misquoted, but much loved stud of Austin.
Herein, I present two rather contrasting sides of Srivatsan...the pic on right shows him reading his gospel (Sundaraghandam) and on the left, he's deep-frying some good old fashioned ground-nuts... Being his roommate has been quite a roller-coaster ride.
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Where's the party tonight?
My recent 'break a leg' incident left me literally identifying myself with the 'differentially enabled', and yearning for days to rush by so that I could walk normally again!
Look for the long compression-stalkings on the guy on the left...Sumeet Rao cannot contain his laughter for some reason... Btw, this was at Chinmayi's Bday party the other night. Keerti, has a rather funny take on this photo...
Look for the long compression-stalkings on the guy on the left
Friday, October 20, 2006
Tanha Dil, Tanha Safar...
The more I listen to this sing, the more I see the correlation with my present rather masochistic life...Tanha Dil, Tanha Safar indeed...
For those ignorant few: This was a song brought into this world by Shaan, in his album Tanha Dil...(2000). Awesome, if I do say so myself! Thanks Keerti L (brought into this world, a few years earlier, in 1982) for reminding me of it!
Some lines, for those who can appreciate good lyrics ;-) :
Aankhon mein sapne liye
Ghar se hum chal to diye
Jaane yeh raahein ab le jaayengi kahan
Mitti ki khushboo aaye
Palkon pe aansu laaye
Palkon pe reh jaayega yaadon ke jahan
Manzil nayi hai anjaana hai kaarvaan
Chalna akele hai yahan
Tanha dil, tanha safar
Dhoonde tujhe phir kyoon nazar
Tanha dil....
Dilkash nazaarein dekhe
Jhilmil sitaarein dekhe
Aankhon mein phir bhi tera chehra hai jawaan
Kitni barsaatein aayi, kitni saugaatein laayi
Kaanon mein phir bhi goonje teri hi sada
Maane kiye the apna hoga aashiyaan
Vaadon ka jaane hoga kya
Tanha dil, tanha safar
Dhoonde tujhe phir kyoon nazar
Cheers...Happy Diwali everyone!
(btw -- This is Keerti L's real identity..Not quite Jason Bourne, eh;-))
For those ignorant few: This was a song brought into this world by Shaan, in his album Tanha Dil...(2000). Awesome, if I do say so myself! Thanks Keerti L (brought into this world, a few years earlier, in 1982) for reminding me of it!
Some lines, for those who can appreciate good lyrics ;-) :
Aankhon mein sapne liye
Ghar se hum chal to diye
Jaane yeh raahein ab le jaayengi kahan
Mitti ki khushboo aaye
Palkon pe aansu laaye
Palkon pe reh jaayega yaadon ke jahan
Manzil nayi hai anjaana hai kaarvaan
Chalna akele hai yahan
Tanha dil, tanha safar
Dhoonde tujhe phir kyoon nazar
Tanha dil....
Dilkash nazaarein dekhe
Jhilmil sitaarein dekhe
Aankhon mein phir bhi tera chehra hai jawaan
Kitni barsaatein aayi, kitni saugaatein laayi
Kaanon mein phir bhi goonje teri hi sada
Maane kiye the apna hoga aashiyaan
Vaadon ka jaane hoga kya
Tanha dil, tanha safar
Dhoonde tujhe phir kyoon nazar
Cheers...Happy Diwali everyone!
(btw -- This is Keerti L's real identity..Not quite Jason Bourne, eh;-))
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
In Suspended Animation
I have been inundating myself in tonnes of anime, over the past month or so...Four serieses and almost 200 episodes down the lane, I find the thirst unquenched...a subtle knock inside my brain tells me that I am reneging on the vow to self that I shall dither from spending all my time watching pointless, meaningless, purposeless, listless, endless waste of time, via Manga-turned animation series, a la Japanese anime; english subtitled, but nevertheless far more interesting than tame american cartoons [ 'cartoons' here are meant purely in a derogatory fashion! ].
Perhaps all this TWT can be attributed to the heights of boredom that one tends to fall into when interning...Excellent bandwidth and YouTube are primary reasons for the fall of anime-addicted men!!
Perhaps all this TWT can be attributed to the heights of boredom that one tends to fall into when interning...Excellent bandwidth and YouTube are primary reasons for the fall of anime-addicted men!!
Friday, June 30, 2006
[LP] Linkin Park
I have been listening to nu metal and rap for quite a while now, and thought the least I could do for LP ( other than buy their CDs of course ;-)) is to put this link up ( and increase their Google PageRank™ by a notch!!
In the End, is however, their highest grossing single ever, and continues to be played on nu metal/rap radios across the US...
Listen to the music on Amazon.com
 | Check out "In the End" by Linkin Park launched in 2001 under their 6x Platinum release: Hybrid Theory... |
| This was followed promptly by Meteora and Reanimation Remix, going over 8x Platinum (over 8 million copies sold!!) with songs like Pts.of.Athrty, Numb and Somewhere I Belong...bringing Linkin Park to #1 on the Billboard US charts in 2001,2002,and 2003. They also sneaked in multiple Grammy Awards for Numb and Numb/Encore with Jay-Z in 2004 and 2005. |  |
The band was touring most of 2004 and 2005, peforming internationally, and most importantly in Texas [ see Linkin Park-Live in Texas!! ] |  |
| I have quite an antiquated Singingfool link for some of my favorite songs. The official website has most of the record videos and audio streams at high bit rates. I can't compete with Wikipedia on info on Linkin Park, so go there if you wanna know more! |
In the End, is however, their highest grossing single ever, and continues to be played on nu metal/rap radios across the US...
Listen to the music on Amazon.com
Sunday, June 11, 2006
Interning to glory!
Aloha!
Being an intern at National Instruments is certainly quite a lot different from what I imagined it would be.... I have pretty much a free hand in deciding the course of my project, and I am being challenged to the limits of (my very limited) knowledge and programming skills...Scarcely would I have imagined that I would have so little to do with electronics at NI....
That said and done, internships are supposed to be fun, and I end up having so much time on hand at the end of the day and on weekends, that I find myself questioning myself as to why I have this much time on hand....Scarcely over the past 5 years have I felt so little weight on the top of my mind, ( could be because my brain has gone to the dogs...but who knows...)...Its actually fun to be in an internship which limits you -- quite strictly- to 40 hours per week, and gives you plenty of relaxation time...
I now know why people who work find it so difficult to come back to academia or to study in specific....its simply awesome to be feel so liberated, and voluntarily going back to the shackles of student, let alone the poverty-stricken graduate student, life is going to be soooo difficult!
This duality, of being an corporate employee and a grad student has its perks though...I get to watch all the FIFA World Cup matches in the relative comfort of my Grad Lounge, as opposed to being forced to run to the nearest pub/bar, as my work colleagues have to do.. (You guessed right...My department's loaded...)
I can't wait for next summer! Who knows where I will be then!!
Being an intern at National Instruments is certainly quite a lot different from what I imagined it would be.... I have pretty much a free hand in deciding the course of my project, and I am being challenged to the limits of (my very limited) knowledge and programming skills...Scarcely would I have imagined that I would have so little to do with electronics at NI....
That said and done, internships are supposed to be fun, and I end up having so much time on hand at the end of the day and on weekends, that I find myself questioning myself as to why I have this much time on hand....Scarcely over the past 5 years have I felt so little weight on the top of my mind, ( could be because my brain has gone to the dogs...but who knows...)...Its actually fun to be in an internship which limits you -- quite strictly- to 40 hours per week, and gives you plenty of relaxation time...
I now know why people who work find it so difficult to come back to academia or to study in specific....its simply awesome to be feel so liberated, and voluntarily going back to the shackles of student, let alone the poverty-stricken graduate student, life is going to be soooo difficult!
This duality, of being an corporate employee and a grad student has its perks though...I get to watch all the FIFA World Cup matches in the relative comfort of my Grad Lounge, as opposed to being forced to run to the nearest pub/bar, as my work colleagues have to do.. (You guessed right...My department's loaded...)
I can't wait for next summer! Who knows where I will be then!!
Monday, April 24, 2006
Dreams for an Insomniac
I watched Macross Zero over the last week , an animation continuation of the popular Japanese Anime mega series Macross ...Watching anime was once a favorite past time. I was hooked onto Robotech in the late nineties...
All the stars seem to be looking down upon me , and having a nice big hearty laugh, with a snicker, they seem to chorus "Loser,loser..."....It is perhaps apt. I am so not in control of anything....Like a troupe of vultures scavenging, perhaps....Maybe those stars are just me seeing stars!! I am sick and tired of not doing anything useful...Maybe it all boils down to the moral paucity one feels in driving oneself to suicidal mania...Or it could be just the caffeine talking...Sleep comes unnaturally, at unghastly hours, these days... Maybe it is all divine direction...Reminds me of the dialogue from Rang de Basanti about youth and usefulness...
The mere thought of the stigma of failure, and the gathering of heavy clouds right over one's head seems all too familiar...especially in context to what comes to mind of Wordsworth and his little gloomy interlude, when he wrote zero works of literature in nearly a year....Being driven into subsuming madness, and amidst repeated defeats at the hands of fate, one does get dark ideas....Amidst extreme self-inflicted pain, and coffee-induced multiple day insomnia...I finally dream of dreaming...Yes...
I can now see why people have breaking points...The mere fact that I am typing this load of BS when I have tonnes of work over the next week, shows the pathetic state of affairs...
It is often difficult to hide happiness, and far easier to hide sorrow, a wise man once said ( Vishwasms , remarkably , concurs ), but for someone who's almost never happy in any situation ( the kind Redford talked about in The Color of Money), my attempts to be cheerful have often lead to drastic drops into spouts of sadness, nay , depression (denial?Me? Naah). Hyprocracy? Never...
Ah well, self analysis will get you no-where...or is it now-here? Space-time curves and figments of warped time-space in singularity, with the altogther wrap of being solo ( prnounced 'so low', maybe 'hollow' as the Phillipine island of the same spelling goes in pronounciation ). Twenty Two was a far cry.... Able was I. Vous cherchez, mais vous ne trouvez pas que vous cherchez......Lost ctrl :-(
Jay
p.s. Coz my keyboard's broken ;-)
All the stars seem to be looking down upon me , and having a nice big hearty laugh, with a snicker, they seem to chorus "Loser,loser..."....It is perhaps apt. I am so not in control of anything....Like a troupe of vultures scavenging, perhaps....Maybe those stars are just me seeing stars!! I am sick and tired of not doing anything useful...Maybe it all boils down to the moral paucity one feels in driving oneself to suicidal mania...Or it could be just the caffeine talking...Sleep comes unnaturally, at unghastly hours, these days... Maybe it is all divine direction...Reminds me of the dialogue from Rang de Basanti about youth and usefulness...
The mere thought of the stigma of failure, and the gathering of heavy clouds right over one's head seems all too familiar...especially in context to what comes to mind of Wordsworth and his little gloomy interlude, when he wrote zero works of literature in nearly a year....Being driven into subsuming madness, and amidst repeated defeats at the hands of fate, one does get dark ideas....Amidst extreme self-inflicted pain, and coffee-induced multiple day insomnia...I finally dream of dreaming...Yes...
I can now see why people have breaking points...The mere fact that I am typing this load of BS when I have tonnes of work over the next week, shows the pathetic state of affairs...
It is often difficult to hide happiness, and far easier to hide sorrow, a wise man once said ( Vishwasms , remarkably , concurs ), but for someone who's almost never happy in any situation ( the kind Redford talked about in The Color of Money), my attempts to be cheerful have often lead to drastic drops into spouts of sadness, nay , depression (denial?Me? Naah). Hyprocracy? Never...
Ah well, self analysis will get you no-where...or is it now-here? Space-time curves and figments of warped time-space in singularity, with the altogther wrap of being solo ( prnounced 'so low', maybe 'hollow' as the Phillipine island of the same spelling goes in pronounciation ). Twenty Two was a far cry.... Able was I. Vous cherchez, mais vous ne trouvez pas que vous cherchez......Lost ctrl :-(
Jay
p.s. Coz my keyboard's broken ;-)
Friday, April 07, 2006
Twenty-two
Twenty-two is where life begins and days turn sprite...
Every dawn, noon or dusk blooms with her sight.
Twenty-two....All's spite...
To glimpse her afar makes us take flight.
Catch 22? Uncaught...Mostly right...
A year too young for her? What?? That can't be right!
Aiming to meet her, don't have to cuss.
Missing to meet her,is to literally miss the bus...
...and class,
Oh! Dont be so non-plussed!
Route Twenty-two...Chicon...Exposition Loop...Ne cruzes delante ou detras de la autobus..."
p.s. This blogger is twenty-one, in age.
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