N00 Year Res0luti0nzZzZ

Ignoring the fruitlessness of every 1 in 1.5 people (or 2 in 3, whichever way you want to have it) making a list of n00 year res0luti0ns, here's mine :

Get in shape - Lose fat and gain muscle

Take coursework seriously and make a conscious effort to learn something from it (afterall, if it were as useless as some 'enlightened' minds proclaim it to be, they wouldn't be teaching those courses. There must be SOME benefit that should accrue to you at some point thanks to that course.. so)

Get better grades

Become a better musician, practice more guitar, listen to more music, start learning theory

Coax my parents to get me a private internet connection at college

Travel and explore more of Goa/Maharashtra/K'taka

Try out new kinds of food and cuisines

Start playing Cricket again

Drink more often

Watch more movies and documentaries

Be a better momma's boy

Resurrection time - Mood Indigo & Ensiferum

The customary back-at-home-enjoying-good-net-speed post. Good internet feels awesome. You can check mail, write blog posts and...err... do a lot more.

Yes, I got back home today, a little late, courtesy Mood Indigo at IIT Bombay, which featured a performance by finnish \m/etchul legends Ensiferum. Kudos to IITB for getting them down here.

Brilliant performance it was, but I can't believe why the crowd was SO retarded. What's the point of going in to watch a 'prograam' if you don't have a fucking clue about what's in store for you? Practically the whole of Bombay's college junta was there. These should be ticketed shows to keep the unwanted junta out. There were people doing bhangra, shaadi dance and what not to Ensiferum. Its metal, not indipop you morons. On many occasions, the band expected some of the most popular passages of their songs to be chanted by the crowd... needless to say, they were disappointed and more than amused to see the crowd clueslessly jumping as if they were a part of the audience for Voice of India, Indian Idol or any other one of those similar 555.5 shows. The pinnacle was yet to come. 

Ensiferum announced that they were playing the 'so called last song of the evening' - "Treacherous Gods" next (one of their most popular songs). It was almost understood that there was going to be an encore after that song. Guess what happened. The band went backstage after playing "Treacherous Gods", expecting the crowd to chant 'once more'.... but the crowd DISPERSED, leading to the end of the show, inspite of the last sound being announced as the 'so called' last song. I stayed back for a bit after the show to try getting snaps with the band. All of them looked really pissed and stormed outside the venue. Needless to say, this was probably the worst audience they could have got.

Another glitch - We were pretty much among the first 200 people in the queue, but the thoroughly mismanaged queue and entry system made sure that we had to wait for a good FOUR AND A HALF HOURS in queue. God knows where the ocean of people appeared in front of us. We entered after more than half the show got over. There was an elaborate system of U turns and what not to get in. There were very few entry/frisking points for that big a crowd, I hope the organizers take a lesson or two from this (simply increasing the number of people handling the frisking and 2 more entry points would have made a great difference). Thankfully, we didn't miss Ensiferum.

Of stereotypical retarded pretentious wannabe urban Indian youth

Do you abhor the average urban young Indian who can't stop showing off his knowledge about the latest cell phones? Do you find superficial taste in music & movies cultivated by peer pressure nauseating? Do you detest people who try to portray themselves as somebody they are not (and fail miserably at that)? How many times have you felt like taping somebody's mouth, kicking them HARD in the nuts, and follow it by writing "I AM A PRETENTIOUS RETARD" on their forehead? If your answer is affirmative to any of the above questions, read on....

I've been living in my colony for 5 years. I'm accustomed to the sight of this one guy, who has never worn anything except baggy jeans (or maybe its pure luck that had him wear super low baggy jeans every time he caught my eye). New hairstyles (which were considered to be the 'in' thing, at that point of time) stupid earrings, new cellphones every month and other forms of pretentious vanity have always been synonymous with him, atleast to me.

Don't get me wrong. I don't have any prejudice against fancy hairstyles, baggy jeans, cell phones, football jerseys or vanity. I have a condescending viewpoint of the pretentiousness associated with it. When people who don't have a clue about Nirvana or Metallica wear Cobain/Nirvana/Metallica T shirts, it is quite irritating. I have a condescending view of people who are responsive to adolescent or teenage 'trends', damning their own choices, opinions and interests.

So lets call this guy Mr X. My younger brother interacts with Mr X and his younger brother, so let me present to you some anecdotes by Mr X (courtesy - my brother) -
"I change my girlfriends faster than my cellphone" - Yeah right. I'm sure you found this on the "HoW tO Be CoOL" community on orkut.
"Honda civic is too boring, it reaches 60 km/h in 10 seconds." - Ok, Auto freak, I know you've tested the Bugatti Veyron. Plus the fact is unwarranted - I've had a ride in my cousin's Civic which speeds upto more than 60 km/h in 10 seconds. I'm sure about that.


I happened to have the misfortune of speaking to Mr X a week back. His interests - collecting mobile phones, bragging and bluffing about inane stuff. Ofcourse, he didn't mention the latter two. The only good thing about him seems to be the fact that he is manipulative, and makes money out of it (cell phone trade!) (on second thoughts, he could be bluffing about that too). That was the first time I spoke to him in the 5 years of my stay here.

Today, I ventured out of my house, and I wasn't wearing my spectacles. I saw this face glued to a cellphone looking towards me. He waved at me. I waved back, out of sheer courtesy. I didn't realise it was Mr X until I had finished waving. The moment I recognised him, my mind started to sulk.

As I prepared for an inane conversation driven by a double digit IQ, I walked towards him. We shook hands.

He continued talking to Miss Y. Meanwhile, he desperately tried to make faces and convey the fact that a girl was 'after' him, since she was talking to him and wasn't letting go of him. The reality was that he wasn't exactly saying anything which would prompt her to disconnect. Obviously, facial expressions weren't being transmitted. The moment he disconnected, he said, in quintessential Dilli Ingliss, "Arre yaar, this girl toh doesn't leave me only! Just because I don't ignore her, she gives me missed calls! (Read : BHAAV)" Yeah, retard, I'm supposed to believe that. You're pretending to be too cool to talk to her, while the fact is that you're the motherfucker who returned her missed call. You're the motherfucker who's giving her bhaav by calling her. And then you try to eyewash others, by pretending to not ignore her (while you're pretending to want to)... bah!

Phase one wasn't bad enough. Out came the famed device, which has revolutionized India, the cellphone! (in my opinion, it was an old ugly Nokia Phone)

My opinion notwithstanding, pat came out showoff attempt # 2, "You see this SEXXXY phone? I love collecting phones. It was a revolutionary (now now, he didn't use that word) phone 2 years back, blah blah blah".

I said, "OK. What else?".

I had made a mistake, apparently.

"You know I went to Atta market today, I saw this SEXXXXXYYYY chinese phone. It looked like a Marlboro packet from one side. The other side was a phone! Turn it around, and you have a keyboard. You can also store your fags in there (I hope he meant cigarettes by that). It also had a hidden camera, you can take pics of anything/anybody without them knowing. How cool is that?"

I suppose India TV could do with new sting operation personnel. But seriously, are these people sick or what? His statement reeked of tendencies to invade personal privacy and voyeurism. If you want to see good looking women, you have plenty of options online, which are free of cost and consented by those women. These kind of guys click stupid pics all over the place and then log on to 'desi masala' forums and post inane pictures of normal people, clicked without consent with thread titles like "HOT AUNTY WITH BIG BOOBS SPOTTED IN XYZ MALL".... You should check out any desi masala forum to get my drift.

I had a query on the Nokia E series phones. I asked him. His reply - "Ah. You know I never really liked Nokia E series phones, their design was not SEXXXXY." I can understand him not finding Nokia E series 'SEXXY', but don't fucking pretend to know all there is to cell phones. The E70 is a great model, which maybe doesn't get him a hard on, but it does have great features and functionality.

X: "I have 3 sim cards. 1 Rajasthan, 2 Delhi. Whenever I applied for an internship, I put my 9810xxxxxx Delhi number in there, it impresses the corporate people. 9810 is 10 years old, I was one of the first people in Delhi to get a mobile connection...."

I'm sorry. WHAT? Not only did he have the knowledge of cellphone number prefixes designated to Delhi, he also knew how old they were.(and the nobel prize for inane joblessness goes to...)

Firstly, it would be ridiculous if normal people knew mobile number prefixes designated to particular cities. Secondly, even if they knew it, it would be incredibly stupid for them
to judge a prospective employee on that basis. There's something called the 'Home Address' which indicates your location, not your cellphone number prefix. And I doubt if Home Address is any proof of your skills for the job, let alone your cellphone number. Maybe it was the prospective employee in this case.


Phase three. Inane education talk. "I'm going to start a Mashter (sic) course in Fashion Business somecrap at NIFT Kolkata. You know NIFT, this that.. Its like an MBA in Fashion" Ok Cool. I didn't expect you to get into NIFT. But still, I know many dimwitted dumbfucks at BITS, so there's no reason why you can't get into NIFT. Then came the bomb.

"You know I never wanted to study. I wanted to be a bass vocalist." (i think Steve DiGorgio or Bruce Dickinson also wouldnt know what a bass vocalist is. Maybe Himmesh does, though). "We were about to perform, but we had to disband. My band members failed a year, and their parents called them back to Delhi." Thank God for that, I say.

Now, I do play (try to, rather, hey I'm modest :P) guitar myself and know a fair bit about music, especially rock/metal. So I decided to ask him a few 'innocent' queries.

Most probably, my looks gave away the fact that I was into 'ingliss' rock/metal. Or maybe, my brother told him that I liked music. That would aptly explain this tactic of his to impress me. Also my brother told me that this chap usually speaks in Saadi Dilli Hindi. I don't know why he was making desperate attempts to talk to me in English, despite me speaking in Hindi. I don't have anything against people who are not proficient with the English language (I myself am far from proficient). I have a problem with pretentious bitches. Why don't people understand that speaking in Hindi, as opposed to broken English will form a much better impression? English interspersed with 'yaar' 'sexxxy' doesn't make you any 'kEwLeR', kewl d00d.

X : "We were about to make it big you know. Our guitarist was god you know. He had a sexy black curved ELECTRONIC Geetar. He used to sound so awesome with distortion and all. He was a SEXXXY guitarist. He used to play Linkin Park. The DRUMMIST also.. he purchased his own drumkit!"

Me : "But err... Linkin Park hardly has any god guitar work, you know, anybody who has been playing for 2-3 months would easily rip through all Linkin Park songs" (I tried my best to abstain from expressing my opinion on Linkin park. After all, I'm trying to expose the fake person that he was trying to be, not indulge in anti LP rhetoric)

Me : "So what did you guys play? Where did you play?" (to be honest, I was expecting Jal/Strings)

X : "You know we did the usual 2 Linkin Park songs, 1 Parikrama song. We were going to play at our college fest."

Music talk not extending beyond Linkin Park/Eminem/Evaneshuns is one thing , and is OK, if you ask me. Claiming to be a rock band member/god in a similar scenario is another.

The bubble burst. This asshole was talking as if his 'band' was on the brink of exploding onto the music scene and earning millions. I'll cut the crap about what kind of success a rock band can achieve in India. On one hand, established american bands with record deals & financial backing like Machine Head have day jobs, and here, you have this typical wannabe kewl d00d, ready to quit his education in pursuit of his 'music' dreams and career, pretending to be a Rock God in broken English, while the only band he has heard of is Linkin Park. I forgot to mention the lack of any musical skills or training whatsoever. Buying equipment doesn't make you a rock god. Atleast Amul voice of India/Indian Idol participants make sure that they can sing before aiming to win these contests, even if their optimism is highly unrealistic. Also the bit about their college fest. It's a local college in Alwar, Rajasthan. No prizes for guessing what sort of a launch an obscure college's fest can give to a 'rock' band's career. No issues with the college, but this guy sure as hell is hallucinating if he thinks that playing on stage in a college fest is going to make him famous and wealthy.

By now, I was aching to go back home. Fate had it otherwise. His conversation was interspersed with bits from his trips to LUNDONN and DOOBAAII..

X : "I love driving cars. I keep watching YouTube videos on burn outs, wheelies . I practice them on my car too." Then, he pointed to a short 20m strip of road and said, "I can burnout here. I can also do wheelies in such a short distance. I once drove a Honda civic at 208 km/h on the Delhi Noida Expressway."

Guess what retard. I'm not impressed. In all probability, he couldn't pull off any of the tricks he was bragging about. Even if he could, no common sense would explain his out-of-context arbitrary decision to enlighten me about his car stunt capabilities. Also, driving at such high speeds on a highway meant for normal commuters means threat to life and property, which constitutes uncivilized behaviour.

Now came the ultimate stamp on his ignorance.

X : "After I get to kolkata, I'll keep going to Goa and Bangalore for weekend fun. I'll go by train. I mean, trains are so fucking cheap! 1500 bucks only for an overnight journey to Goa/Bombay/Blore! Why spend 5 GRAAAANDS on a flight ticket!" (how yankee is that, GRAANDS in haryanvi accent!)

Ok I know you're a rich spoilt brat. 1500 bucks is nothing for you. But still, why brag about it? Humility and modesty, anybody? Your wealth certainly doesn't reflect mentally. To me, you're just a male Indian wannabe Paris Hilton or Lindsay Lohan. (I hope my mentally hyperactive friends do not take this in any context other than literal)

What? Overnight TRAIN journeys from Kolkata to Goa/Bombay/B'lore? I had to take the pain of enlightening him that such large distances cannot be covered by train in a night, unless it was Japan/Korea/Europe. Also, I told him that he would have to add 24/48 hours to his calculated journey time... and that he conveniently excluded 1 whole day from his journey time.

And, I heaved a sigh of relief. Got back home. Come on, chant with me in chorus, "RETARDS RULE". They provide great entertainment. The planet is overpopulated with them.

This reminds me of an interview of Dr. Atanu Dey (a renowned Indian blogger) where he said - "I pursued Mechanical engineering, but I didn't quite like Machines. Then I pursued Computer Science. I found computers artificially dumb. I decided to do a PhD in Economics since I found the planet abundant with human stupidity, which seemed to be the most intriguing thing."

Also, "There are two infinite things - the universe and human stupidity. The former I'm not sure of." - Albert Einstein.

How to make the most of a day

Step 1 - Don't try sleeping for more than 8 hours, because if you do, you'll end up having a headache and fall asleep again, resulting in you sleeping for over 15-16 hours a day (has happened to me many times). A bad way to waste a day.

Step 2 - Wake up, drink hot milk, and SHIT. Yes. SHIT. Tatti. Potty. Kakka. Provides immense relief and makes you feel a lot fresher (and lighter).

You'll be up and running within no time if you do these two things. Tried and tested. Take my word for it. I know it is hard for some people to believe that I shit daily since my farts are omnipresent (they're smelly, I don't make much noise when I fart, and I take pride in claiming that it was me who farted), but err yeah, thats the way it is.

I woke up 1 hour ago. Its time for me to be the good executioner that I am, and execute step 2!

Fun Became.. Fun Came

Hold on... wait for the next post. Total fun came.

DSL TV = 1500 Channels!

Yes. That's what my family is enjoying in a Gulf Country. This is just goes to illustrate the 'too many options' thing which I have ranted about in my previous post. Don't forget to read all my blog posts below...

India lost *wails*
After such a long time, I decide to follow a cricket match, and India loses :(
But this reminded me the value of ODIs and Tests, as opposed to IPL which made a mockery of most of the skills required to play good ol' cricket.

*yawn* Another day. Revival of old days. So much to do, so little time. 'STOP TALKING, START DOING'

Today was a little different. Instead of waking up at 9 Am, I woke up at 12 Pm (please tell me you give a shit). Had s00per cold milk with chocos, and nothing since (this time it is not because I'm lazy, to know why I'm starving read ahead). I need to go to the ATM because I don't have money to buy food (and I've run out of food).

I'm feeling like I felt a year back. A year back, I had nothing to do. I would use the internet for 10+ hours at a stretch, listening to some of my favourite music which, at that point of time was Tech/Prog Thrash, especially Annihilator, Nevermore and Savatage. I'm doing the same things now, sitting in the same room, on a new computer though. I'm listening to the same music now. Rediscovering the music you loved is probably one of the best feelings ever, this feeling of deja vu is unmatched!

Random digression #1

You may not agree with me, but I feel that blogging constitutes a good way of 'keeping in touch' with your friends. The number of friends whose blogs you can track (realistically) are obviously
lower in number than the friends you can handle on facebook or orkut. However, the beauty of blogging is that you get to know what your social circle is upto if they choose to blog about it. You don't need to send them messages/scraps/wall posts asking what they're upto. If something significant happens in their lives, they will usually post about it. You read their blogs and stay 'in touch' with them, without actually communicating with them! Obviously, they might not post secret stuff which the whole world is not supposed to know, but by and large, blogs give you a much more comprehensive answer to 'whats up' compared to a response you would receive to that query on a social networking site. And if you want that secret info, you can always ask for it :P.

Random digression #2

The enormity of the world wide web never ceases to amaze or engulf me. I have around 60 tabs open in Firefox now, and each of them is worth bookmarking. Lately, I've started exploring a lot of blogs. It's amazing how blogs cater to everything - be it music album download links, daily accounts of life by journalists in Africa (which really make you feel lucky), a stupid emo chick whining about how she is going to slit her wrists because she got too influenced by My Chemical Romance, a 40 year old woman going through a mid life crisis, tech blogs telling you how to do everything from saving wikipedia on your computer to spying on your boss to downloading entire magazines for free and so on and so forth.

NOW, just have a look at the hierarchy. There are n types of blogs. Blogs account for just a minuscule fraction of the WWW. Just like blogs, there are other there are n other aspects of the web. Then there's wikipedia, which bears testimony of the power of mass-collaboration. And a thousand such things. The internet itself is a shining example of the power of mass collaboration. It belongs to nobody. Everybody contributes to the internet, be it for personal gain or mutual benefit in the WWW. What we have is a marvel of modern civilization and the power of mass collaboration.

If you were to explore everything that was interesting to you on the internet, I'm sure this lifetime would not be enough.

Coming to think of it, the Internet is just one small aspect of our otherwise diverse lives. Think similarly about other aspects of life, and you realize how enormous the answer to what-can-a-human-do is. It belittles individual entities like you, me or any human being.

Let us take education and careers as another example - I'm sure there are a lot of people who are interested in pursuing careers in more than one field, but are constrained by the one lifetime available to them (if you discount people who change careers, I'd say they are exceptions). And there are SO many fields available.

There's so much more that we associate with making the most of life - Food, Travel, Music, Movies, Art, and so on (the list will vary depending on the person's interests)...and each of these entail a lot of subdivisions and categorization. This leads us to one conclusion - You cannot experience and learn it all. There are so many things that the world and civilization offer to us. We cannot experience and learn it all. Out of those offerings, we are interested in some. The sad part is that we cannot experience and learn everything we are interested in, too.

We owe a lot to our ancestors and civilization in general. We possibly can't experience everything life has to offer in one lifetime, or maybe in a thousand lifetimes too. Such is the enormity of what the world has to offer to us, it is belittling.

The collective progress of millions of humans around the planet in a short time span has led to this, to a point, where you begin to think - 'Is having too many options a bad thing?' I have an ambiguous answer to this - Yes and No.

No, because, atleast from my perspective, we have a lot more to do, learn and experience than our ancestors did.

Yes, because after a point you start feeling bad about missing out on so many things in life.

All this just leads me to one inevitable question : How should we live our lives? There's so much to do in such less time!

This is a perplexing question which one must logically answer. IMO, far too many people do what others like, and not what they would ideally want to do. In such a short life, can you afford to do that? NO! Identify your interests, and pursue them till death, that is the only way you can die a satisfied man (Random digression #2.1 or woman, just in case some female chauvinists are around... maybe I should replace 'mankind' with 'humankind' everywhere, but I'm sure they'd have a problem with why a term like 'huWOmankind' does not exist, anyway I'll leave my opinions of shiv sena/jihadi-esque breeds to another post. Disclaimer : I am not against gender equality)

Lets get back to the point. I'm 19 years old now, and I feel that I've wasted a lot of these 19 years in fruitless pursuits dictated by society (read : Do what parents say, study for school, Disclaimer : I am not one of those angst ridden, anti-social-anti-establishment rebels without a cause, I just put forth my opinions). Given an opportunity, I would love to be reborn again with a to-do-before-i-die list, and live life from day one like the way I want to live it now, do things which I now wish I had done back then.

I think the first part of the post should have been a random digression, not Random Digression #2. I'm too lazy to change it though.

Note to self : Stop wasting time, you're running out of time. Maybe I should really abandon laziness, pull up my socks and do as the IBM advertisement says - 'Stop talking. Start doing.'

Of relocational inflation & high calorific value of alcohol...

Inflation has driven up the prices of almost everything. However, the kind of inflation that has hit me the hardest is - Relocational Inflation - it is a misnomer because it barely has anything to do with what inflation technically is.

I had moved to Goa for a period of four years. Out of which, one has been spent. It has changed the way I live...

Incase you didn't figure it out yet - I'm talking about alcohol.

Alcohol has a very high calorific value, or so we were told. I never really gave a shit (because alcohol based fuels didn't have any effect on my life), until I moved back to Delhi for my vacation.

A bottle of beer costs 40 odd bucks in Goa. It costs 90 bucks here! Alcohol indeed has a high calorific value - it burns a huge fucking hole in my pocket. A relocational inflation of 125%.

Maybe goa's tourism department should adopt a new punchline - 'Shield yourself from relocational inflation - Go Goa!'

"Home alone for 17 days" & life since the vacation began

The first reaction triggered by my facebook status (ie "Home alone for 17 days") was on the lines of "Salla Madarchod", "Lucky bitch" and so on. Initially, I thought it would be fun. I would have the home all to myself, and most importantly the freedom to do whatever I wanted to at any point of time.

Actually, the main reason why I insisted on staying at home while my family went abroad was the possibility of *gasp* daaru parties at home :P.

Ofcourse, the drawbacks would be that I would have to watch over the maidservants (which is a pain the in the ass considering the levels of laziness I have attained) and cook (yes! i cook too! for further details, read ahead). Mommy dearest did her bit by cooking lots and lots of food which is currently lying in the freezer. 1 container contains...guess what.... BUTTER FUCKIN' CHICKEN!

It has been a few days since I've been living alone at home; If you took away the TV, the computer and the telephone, it would feel like solitary confinement. I thank the wonderful people broadcasting the Discovery/Nat Geo/History Channels, and of course, the people producing spectacular shows like 'Modern Marvels', 'Future Weapons', 'Naked Science', 'Is it real?', etc running on those channels for making my life a lot better. Apart from that, I've been downloading a lot of stuff (music and documentaries), listening to lots of \M/etchul, practicing playing guitar (very little though) and playing cricket. All in all life is a lot different from what it was back on campus. However, I'd rather be on campus. Human company is essential for life to have a meaning. (I do write profound philosophical shite at times).

Surprisingly, I've been waking up every morning at 9 am without fail, which is no mean feat considering my past track record.

Cooking involves frying 2-4 eggs in the morning, opening cans of tuna fish, toasting bread, boiling milk, mixing horlicks and putting chocos in it, cooking dal and rice from scratch (at times), heating the awesome food mom has stored in the freezer for me, cooking maggi (very rarely compared to BITS).

Why the inactivity, you would ask.
1) I am too lazy to go out.
2) When I think of going out, it starts raining. If it is not raining, too much energy from the fusion reactions in the star of our solar system prevents me from going out.
3) Autos in Delhi are too expensive for me (at least while my parents are away).
4) Taking buses to venture out to have 'fun' != fun, since procrastinating at home>>>>>having fun outside, which in turn is due to the work involved in traveling around Delhi/Neeooddda (read : Noida) Laziness prevails!
5) All my friends are not free on the same day for a daaru party. (boy there ARE people on this planet who are lazier than me)

Actually, everything boils down to my immobility, which in turn is due to lack of a vital skill - that of being able to drive confidently on NCR roads. Meri bahut phatti hai (it's hard to get out the hindi pronunciation using the English alphabet at times) Every time I travel in Delhi, I wonder how I will reach my destination alive. I wonder how Delhi drivers manage not to have accidents in each and every journey of theirs (I am not new to the city, I have been living here for 5 years now, if you do not count the 8-9 months in Goa). There has not even been ONE journey in Delhi which lacked a oh-my-fucking-god-i-am-closing-my-eyes-and-cringing-because-i-think
-my-vehicle-will-bang-into-a cow/car/truck/dog/human moment.

Being perpetually broke does not help either!

Surprisingly, I haven't used my 500 Gb hard disk for the intended purpose yet - That of having enough TV series, movies and other assorted material (NO NOT WHAT YOU ARE THINKING :P) for the vacation. I've seen only 3 documentaries and all episodes of a really funny british sitcom - 'The IT crowd' (it has nothing to do with India or Indians) up till now (25 days). I don't know what the issue is - I thought I was indifferent to stuff like studies. Throughout my vacation, I have been indifferent to almost everything I had planned (and liked) - Practicing Guitar, Learning Music Theory, Working Out, Watching lots of movies and TV series, Going out and having fun. Err, so I'll sum it up in one line - I have wasted almost half of my vacation.

And no, learning any programming language wouldn't have changed that opinion. I fancy doing stuff I like, not what the whole world is doing, or what will help me with my 'career'. In any case, I'm not getting Comp Sci, EEE or EnI as a dual, so what's the point in learning programming languages? I'm not so hardcore about my academic interests (if something like that exists)...

I have picked up the habit of reading books. I regret not having inculcated this habit previously. Reading good books is probably the most constructive thing a lazy person can do. Almost no effort required!

I've been indulging in a lot of 'life planning' - a fancy name for long term planning. Identifying interests, pursuing them, compiling to-download/read-lists, to-do-before-you-die lists and stuff like that. I'll share some of that here.

I've always been fascinated by aviation. I want to learn how to fly aircrafts, and own one before I die. The other day, I stumbled upon a website which looked like ebay for aircrafts! You could buy 2 seater cessna's for 100-200K $. That made me happy. If I ever make that much money, I should be able to get one of those :D. Also, there are aircrafts which can be mounted onto road vehicles - they take off from the roof of your car. How metchul is that? I love being airborne.

Other positive short-term realistic outcomes of 'life planning' are - A trip to Himachal Pradesh before I get back to Goa (anybody interested in tagging along should let me know ASAP), a list of places to eat in the NCR before I get back to Goa (if any of you are treating, let me know ASAP), some adventure sports and trips to amusement parks/go karting circuits (i'm already looking at my wallet), shopping for metchul t shirts...

The only problem seems to be that very little of the 'life plan' seems to be implemented, be it academic/'intellectual' stuff or fun stuff like getting drunk.

I've also run out of money. I have 20 bucks left in my wallet, and the ATM is not working... Grr....

Ze beginning!

I've been reading (and WANTING to write) random blogs over the past 4(?) years. On many occasions, I thought to myself, "Damn, this seems good! I should try this too!". However, laziness prevailed. Today, under extreme circumstances (read : extreme joblessness), in want of something interesting, I had to resort to this.

"Senti\m/etchul" - Nice name eh? All credit goes to Shalini Lahiri, who suggested my nickname for the college magazine. I'm a bit sentimental, and I like metal, in case you were wondering what it was all about.