Moving to a new blog

For this new year, I've gifted myself a new blog - with my own domain name - http://www.manasg.com/

All my future posts will be on the new site. Please update your links and blogrolls :)

Oh - am hosting it on nothing less than mediatemple - yeah baby!

Of Unicorns and Centaurs

Of course it cannot be of either.. None of them exist!

But we do. And there is no mystery about us. We're humans after all!

But don't you think that friends can be more mysterious than strangers?

Loopholes

answer to life, the universe, and everything

"when you really want something to happen, the whole universe conspires so that your wish comes true"
-The Alchemist

Sometimes you get this itch to complete things that have been pending for a very long time. Like for the last couple of days, I've had this killing thirst to finish reading The Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy. I started reading this a couple of years back (well, yeah) but had to abandon for some reason I don't remember.

So there I was sitting in my office on a Friday evening. What better way to mark the end of the weekdays than to get H2G2 from a bookstore and make the best of a weekend?!

I went to Walden book store - pretty nice. Sadly, They were out of stock.

I din't lose heart - No Sir! I went straight to the City Center mall where they have the best book store in town - Crosswords. I made a dash to the fiction section and was amazed to find myself amidst huge racks of sci-fi. It did not take even a minute - I found the Douglas Adams shelf right in front of me. My heart leapt. I could already hear the drumming in my ears. I could easily see The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Life the Universe and Everything, So Long and Thanks for All the Fish and even Mostly Harmless!!

Later, the man at the counter told me that the Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy is not expected to be in stock for the next 10 days.

Alchemist! Are You listening?

Shikhar

Its a movie. You might not have even heard about it - Ajay Devgan and Shahid Kapoor. Ajay Devgan plays a builder - a bad mean dirty fellow. Shahid Kapoor is a nice cute guy who Ajay Devgan makes friends with and spoils. Puts him into the habit of drugs, gambling and the sort.

I don't know what happened after that 'coz I could not bear it anymore.

Update: Managed to finish it. Not that bad afterall - typical Bollywood ishtyle masala with a social message. Don't watch it. You can do without it.

Why don't I blog?

I don't even remember the last time I wrote in this text area! Somehow I've not got that itch I used to get every once in a while to write something down.

I'm missing all my pals in college today. Suddenly.

Speaking with Hari is always a pleasure - even if it is a small chat. He is one the the few guys on the planet who know (well.. almost) everything about me. It was fun doing those night outs in our Lab.

I miss Spider too.

And the recent news I've got about Spider is not all that great - the circumstances in college have become more difficult - Internet access to First year students is a welcome step, but it comes down heavily on the popularity of Intranet sites like Delta and Spider.

Then there was the deplorable decision of the institute authorities to totally disallow any form of interaction among the freshers and the senior students. The C course Spider taught was the *BEST* introduction to programming one can get. There used to be notable difference in the performance of students who used to attend the Spider C course compared to other first time coders.

And finally, all this has affected the enthusiasm of the team.

Bad times come and go, and even this one will. The Matlab course was a sweeping success, and I'm sure Hari and his army have something up their sleeve.

This post was supposed to be an explanation of why haven't I been blogging (see the title :P). Emotion overtook me? Maybe.

I was very attached to Spider. I saw it as my own thing. It was very hard to give up too. After 6 months now, I've tried hard to detach myself - now it is only like a void left inside me, and I do miss its presence in my everyday schedule often.

I should stop. I dont think I'm going to write anything merry tonight.

Donkey and the carrot

I am finally an engineer. Four years of hard (read : hardly any) work have finally got me my degree. I'm not excited.

What I am excited about is my first job. My workplace is awesome, the people are great and you see good work happening around you.

All this put aside, there is something I've always felt. When I was in class X, everyone told me - Manas, do well in your boards and life will be a cakewalk.

I did well in my class X boards.

When I was in classes XI and XII, I was told that getting through a great Engineering Institute would secure my future.

I did.

In college, I was told that be in the first 5 in your class, and everything will be fine.

I did.

In my senior year, I was told that getting a great job would really settle my life.

I did.

Now I'm being told to make sure I perform well at the job as that will make sure that I have a successful career. Another set of people tells me to plan for my higher studies to ensure a great life.

Then I guess it will be about getting a good wife and then being happy in my marriage and then ensuring everything goes well for my kids.

When does it stop?

Spider - my love

(This post will make sense to you only if you were in NIT Trichy during 2006-07 or know me pretty well)

What is it about Spider that I've been trying to prove? Our supremacy? Intellect? Or plain addiction to work?

I don't really know.. Never thought in these terms when we worked. It was a real morale booster to think about changing the 'image' of the group in the minds of the campus junta, and once that had been done, the next idea to motivate ourselves was 'work harder than anyone else' or to be the 'best'.

But all this was only internal. Only to motivate ourselves. Why we do all this is still not clear to me. Maybe we just love working.. and want to create a breed that loves to work too..

Or maybe its the recognition. When people stop us in the middle of the road and say "Hey! you're in spider right? I saw your photo.. you guys have done awesome work for 1st years!" It feels nice.

No. I don't think any of these are real reasons.

Here it is: I feel immensely satisfied with myself when I go to bed late at night dead tired from working in our lab. I feel that the day was worth it.


I've loved working for Spider and I hope I'll never stop.