Yellow flowers, vertebrates and invertebrates

Rushing to catch the bus as usual this morning, I crossed the throng of parents waiting to get their kids on to the school buses. Snippets of conversation struck my ear but most of it never made it past my in-built noise filter. The only phrase that made it through was "vertebrates and invertebrates" and my ears tuned in to hear a mom complain about some project that she had to complete in a day on the said topic for her kid. Made me wonder how much of the syllabus would be new for the parents - a chance to renew their own learning.

That brings me back to the weather. I hate being the weatherman but with the comet coming into view from today, it is quite disappointing that it has been cloudy since yesterday. On the bright side, because of the rain yesterday, things look bright and clean this morning and there is again a nip in the air streaming in the bus window.

I decided to stop and take a photograph of the yellow flowers I see everywhere these days. Perhaps someone there will recognize what they are.

Blogging from a bus is quite different from doing it from the house. Though I realize that some of the posts might be rather inane, I enjoy it - which is at least half the point in writing here.

Life is on autopilot these days. When is it not? Well more than usual in that case. It is a bit like Zen. When life throws stuff at you, you try to process it and respond. Life throws more at you and you figure how to be more efficient in your processing. But then the deluge keeps on increasing and at some point you realize that you cannot optimize further and you cannot process all of it. And so, you let it all flow by letting the autopilot take over. Selectively picking a few things to delve into but for the most part, just being.

That description sounds quite peaceful. That is not strictly correct. It is a bit like ice age 3(?). The surface is calm but there could be large many toothed beasts lurking in the depths.

Only time will tell ... Whether they exist ... And if they do, whether they are vertebrates or invertebrates.

In the meanwhile, we have partly cloudy skies and unknown yellow flowers.

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Another slice of life

As another day comes to an end, I sit in the tempo traveler with the sun streaming in from the rear window and a breeze blowing in from the side windows. The sky is blue with wispy clouds.

Almost all the other transports have left. Ours is waiting because the driver was on the phone and it is not quite time yet. And finally we start off even as I thumb it into the BB.

It is good not to be driving at the end of the day while going home. The maddening traffic and the deafening horns just become more TV and you can chose to ignore it. Sit back and listen to music and perhaps even browse when the network allows it.

It is already starting to get quite warm here. I am not sure that I like that. Not that one can do much about it.

This week we should be able to see a comet. That is something I am quite looking forward to. Might even post some photographs if I can see it clearly.

The road's a mess with some work going on for a new flyover. The dust is everywhere. Makes the sunsets more colorful I suppose.

More honking than usual today. Traffic is lighter though. All the swaying makes the thumbing that much more difficult.

It must be spring ... I see a lot of yellow blooms by the roadside. We don't really have seasons here so maybe I just notice them now because I have nothing better to do.
I see a lot of kites flying about. Possibly beacons marking particularly dirty areas of the city with more rodents for them to feed on. They look quite majestic gliding in the sunset. The yellow light shining off the brown wings every now and then.

There is construction going on everywhere. Can't complain. A growing economy sure as hell beats the alternative. And growth cannot happen without infrastructure to support it. Some planning would have helped though. Respect for building bylaws as well. Things will work out eventually though.

Time to sit back and relax. Should be home in another 10 minutes or so.

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Monday morning

Eagles blaring on my ear buds, trying desperately to drown out the squeaky RJ of the local FM station that my bus driver favors in the mornings. As I open the window a crack, shut my eyes and lean back in the cramped seat as best I can, the fresh breeze hits my face and I feel alive.

It is not often that one can claim to be heading to office on a monday morning really fresh and I thought I'd make a note of it.

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Going green, going green ... Going blue!

Early in the morning, I am so confounded that I don't know what to do next.

I have been trying to book a gas cylinder for over a month now with no success because the distributor never answers the phone.

Today, I finally get through and I am told that my connection has been suspended because I haven't booked a new cylinder in 6 months.

So, I ask the gentleman at the other end of the line, why has this rule been introduced. Well, apparently, it has been introduced to curb the fraudulent use of domestic gas for commercial purposes.

I always thought that businesses use more fuel than homes and it would make sense for the authorities to check if someone was using too many cylinders rather than too few. But the man one the line insisted that he had not come up with the law that he was enforcing... So that is that.

Who can argue against the medusa that comes up with such weird rules? Where do you get started and whom do you fight?

I guess I'll just go ahead and un-learn every good habit regarding stove usage that I ever learned so that I can avoid having to go to the distributor with a photograph and address proof every time I need a cylinder.

Hah! And all the talk about going green. I am almost choking on my own tongue and going blue here.

Kudos Indane, IOC and whoever else thought up this rule... Good one!

Maybe I'll even light some sort of eternal flame honoring your stupidity on my front yard so I can meet this ridiculous requirement on minimum cooking gas consumption.
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Priorities

Somehow, in life, we always seem to prioritize the things that we shouldn't. No matter how many times you read the 7-habits and how many workshops you attend, are you always stuck in quadrant 1?

I am. Which is why, despite my best intentions, I always fail to post to my blog regularly. It is why the photographs never get uploaded. It is why the cookbook I am writing hasn't moved past the 4th recipe in a year.

There was a time when accessing the internet meant setting aside time (which I had plenty of) and money (which was always in short supply) to go to an internet cafe. Now, when I can access it on my phone lying in bed, I seem to have lost interest.

I am thinking of closing this blog. Shutting shop as it were. In its lieu perhaps I will start 2 or 3 more - each focused on a specific area that I am passionate about. But then, what are the chances that I'll update multiple blogs when I fail to update one?

So, I'll continue with this one.

Life is too short. And there is so much that I want to do before I hang up my boots - not that one really gets to decide on that. I can only hope that I will be more productive in the years to come than the years that have gone by.

Buck up and buckle up ... For this IS as good as it gets.
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Quotable perhaps... But is it true?

I was thinking, perhaps the ability to ask the right questions is overrated:
Life is more about finding the right answers than it is about asking the right questions. And, it is most about the ability to go on when you have neither the right questions nor the right answers and only the dimmest of ideas on how to evaluate whatever little information you have.

Yes. That is what I wanted to share today.
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Oops!

Guess what? Decided to take it easy this weekend and almost forgot to write my post for the week.

Upgraded my 9700 to OS 6.0 as soon as I found out that an official version was out there. It looks pretty nice and I am really liking it. Will have to use it for a while though before I can be certain that I like it. I doubt if I will roll back though unless there is some critical flaw.

Enough about the phone though. I don't have too many readers to begin with and among the few that I do have, there aren't too many technophiles.

Though I am still writing my posts pretty close to the deadlines, slowly it is starting to become a habit again. Sometimes, in the middle of a busy day, I catch myself thinking - "Hey, I could write about this!"
The next step would be to actually make a note of it to follow up later.

This week, one intent was to come up with a list of books that I have read and really love and then another list of books that I want to read. Why not use the Shelfari account for that you may well ask. Which is one of the reasons why that finally did not make it to the post.

Then there is the Egypt thing going. Pretty much all of middle east really. Looks like our generation is luckier than most to be witnessing so many events that will probably go down in history as major turning points. While I can go on about it for quite a while, I think for now, I will let my wife have the last word on this one:
Yesterday she messaged me saying "From now on, walking like an Egyptian will have a whole new meaning. Isn't it?"
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Post 4, An obvious observation

As another week comes to an end, I find myself thumbing away at the keypad of my blackberry, late in the night once again.

The other night, I was thinking how my blog seems to be more of an escape rather than the real me. My daily life deals with things such as dealing with my father's cancer, handling a million minor tasks at home and not finding the time to take care of a zillion more, my work and so on. Somehow, I seem to get away from all that when I begin my writing. Here, I can dwell on Quality, the Universe and whatever else I choose to.

So my blog is a lot about what I think and how I feel about things. It is however not quintessentially me or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that it does not really represent me as a whole. More often than not, my posts are far removed from my current situation in life.

But that would make this blog a diary - something that I never intended this to be in the first place. So, it being disconnected from my daily life should not be of any concern.

Interestingly enough, while I understand this of my own blog, in retrospect I realize that I have sometimes ignored this when reading other blogs. Extremely naïve of me one may say... and quite obvious one may condescend. But that is how it is (with me) often.

I wonder whether this is a common mistake that a lot of readers make or I am more of an exception. I also can't help wondering whether there are blogs out there that quite accurately paint a picture of the author as a whole without just opening a small window to just some of their facets.

Hmmm...

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Post 3: The Universe

I don't know why I always do things in the last minute - but here I am again writing a post in the wee hours of the morning on the last day of the week to meet my self imposed deadline. On the brighter side, given my hectic and erratic schedule, I am glad that so far, I have managed to maintain this commitment to myself.

Well, getting down to the post itself, have you ever thought about the universe? How big is it anyway? Does it have an end? If so, what lies beyond it?

I still remember the feeling I had that morning in class 3 when I bumped into these questions for the first time. If you've ever tried riding the superman at six flags on a full stomach, you should know.

These profound questions were introduced by an innocuous diagram on the right hand side of the page in black and white that had an Alfred Neuman look alike (coincidental no doubt) peering over an edge of some sort and asking: "If this is the end of the universe, what lies outside?".

So what are the options really? There is a lot of literature out there but frankly, since there is no way of knowing at least in this life time which of these (if any) are correct, my theories are as good as any.

The simplest is that the universe has no end. Which is sort of difficult to reconcile with the big bang theory - which you would tend to believe given that there is plenty of evidence for it - such as the cosmic background radiation, evidence of an ever expanding universe and such. Though you may be inclined to wait another couple of millenia for an alternative theory that throws some light on dark matter, dark energy, why the expansion appears to be accelerating and so on.

The other option is that our universe - and perhaps a zillion other like it are contained within a bigger universe... Which in turn is contained in another in another in another ad infinitum. And what created it? Let us not even get there ...

The fact that neither makes much sense is something you will eventually reconcile with once you realize that no matter how long we survive as a race and how advanced our technology gets, we may never really be able to answer these simple questions.

Why try to answer these questions at all you may well ask. And really, there is no reason why you should or shouldn't just as there is no apparent reason why this universe should exist or shouldn't ...

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Magic: full moon and a smudged lens!

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Post 2, Week 2 - The Night Sky

Having lived in rather remote places for most of my childhood, I have always loved watching the night sky. In the evenings, my parents would settle down on the veranda for a cup of tea and my brother and I would continue playing till it got too dark. Then we would sit on the stairs and invariably my gaze would turn to the stars above.

I remember one evening when we were walking over to the EACs house for a dinner party. I had the torch in my hands and much to my parents disapproval, I insisted on flashing it at the sky every now and then. I thought, if everyone is there on those stars looking down at us they could see the flashes. Then again, I thought if earth looks as bright from out there as those stars do from here, then this must be a futile exercise. But then again, I reasoned, since it is night here, this side cannot be shining. So, if anyone happens to be looking, they might still see the flashes. Naïve.

Growing up at Shillong, when I was in class 1, I remember almost every other evening, we'd go over to my Mama's house. On our way back, I'd be skipping and hopping down the steep road with mom holding on to my hand to keep me from stumbling as I tried to spot the little bear between the swaying pines.

High school brought me to Delhi. A landscape so different from the hills and pines I was so used to that I might as well have gone to Mars. Between voracious reading, rehearsing for the school play, some reluctant studying, bunking out to watch movies, falling in and out of love and a million other things, I still found the time to look up to the skies. I missed the zillion stars that light up the skies over Shillong and the other small hill towns but realized that this made it much easier to pick out Orion, the big dipper and most of the other constellations. I watched them move with the seasons. I noted where they stood in the middle of the dusty summer and where they shone as I felt the first dew drops of september on the grass under my feet.

Even to this day, almost invariably, I spend some time out on the balcony before I sleep, watching the stars. For the last fortnight or so, the skies over bangalore have been clear enough for me to clearly see the little bear again. It reminds me of Shillong, the swaying pines and my Nani.

Watching the night sky fills me with a peace that I find hard to explain. As I look up to the stars, I feel a connection with all my ancestors and with all future generations to come. I don't know how many of them looked up at the stars but these were there then too... And will be there long after I am dead and gone. I may not have gone to Egypt but when I see the belt of the Orion, I know that the architects of the great pyramids must have looked at them too.

Standing on my balcony, sheltered, I bask in the star light from thousands of years ago from distances so great that I cannot even begin to comprehend them. I am filled with wonder at the universe. I am filled with joy at having been given this opportunity to experience this ... and humbled ... so truly humbled by it.

Try it some time. Take some time out to just stand and stare at the heavens.
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Post 1, Week 1 - The resolution

Here we are, in the New Year and in the blink of an eye, we are almost at the end of the first week as well.

My blog has been languishing for quite a while now and it is time perhaps to get it up and running again. Previous attempts to resuscitate have failed over the years, leading me to adopt a somewhat cautious approach this time:
The plan is to ensure that I publish at least one post every week.

Who am I kidding?

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Blame it on inception – I guess

It is raining. In the dark, I do not see the rain falling – but I can hear it as it falls on the leaves. I can hear the water gurgling through the gutter and the distant hiss at the outlet towards the back of the house where it gushes out into the drain. In the darkness ahead of me, every now and then I catch a glint as a blade of grass bounces in the rain to catch the light from some distant street lamp. The air feels moist and cold.

A clap of thunder breaks the silence. In the light I see the towering columns of clouds threatening to continue the deluge for an eternity. The cane chair I am sitting on creaks in protest as I settle down more comfortably, lean back and try to catch a glimpse of the ceiling.

Above me, I can barely make out the wooden paneling of the verandah ceiling painted white. The roof above slopes down low – to keep the incessant rains from spattering on to the verandah. My feet feel cold on the dark red cement floor and I prop them up on the wooden railings, polished by age, as I reach out for a cup of tea that I know to be there on the table.

The warmth is comforting. Instead of taking a sip, I hold it in my palms for a while, soaking in the heat. The aroma of the tea wraps around my head – it is almost a physical presence – warm comforting. I take a sip and let myself sink deeper into a state of emptiness. No thoughts. No feelings. No desire move – blink even. Only breathing. Just sitting. Just being. Comfortably numb.

Blame it on inception. I dreamed last night of such peace. I could almost smell pine in the air.
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Moon and Venus

A photograph taken from my cell phone yesterday evening showing the Moon and Venus. Saturn wasn't bright enough to show up with this camera so didn't try to include it either!
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World Cup 2010 - last take

It takes some getting used to - no football on TV to rush home to at breakneck speed during the crazy evening rush hour.

But life goes on. And whether you are Paul the Octopus, Iniesta the golden goal scorer or just the plebeian TV viewer from a country that never makes it past the qualifiers, sooner or later the euphoria passes.

The final this year shall be remembered for a long time to come. I personally intend to acquire a recording of this game so that I can teach my children (when I have them), what football is NOT supposed to be and how football should NOT be played.

Thanks to Spain, I should be able to give them some pointers as to what football is and how it should be played ... as well using the same example.

This game is a must for value education classes as well. Values like sportsmanship, decency and honor are so much a part of most games that you don't even realize what part they play in making a great game - till of course you watch a team playing that is totally bereft of each of those qualities.

To be fair to them, the techniques that the dutch used are definitely not unheard of. But to see them being employed at a world cup game - and that too the final - was a little too much to stomach. I tremble to think what football would transform in thousands of school grounds around the world had they won. Despite them having lost, I shall not be surprised if a lot of kids come home complaining of chest pain from school because someone on the field played a "dutch tackle" on them and kicked them on the chest.

I guess it is easy to forget in this age that the ends don't necessarily justify the means. Footballers are almost worshiped around the world by kids because they are perhaps the closest you get to super-heroes in real life. Sadly for a lot of kids, the line between the super-heroes and super-villains might just be a little blurred thanks to the Dutch.

Well, for now, we can thank God that Spain won and we can pray and hope that the world cup will be better in the years to come - a true showcase of football magic instead of mere hooliganism.
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Witches on beaches?

Or in deserts perhaps. An interesting sign I came across while at Mangalore:

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An idea regarding malaria eradication

All of a sudden, we have been invaded by mosquitoes and that gave me an idea about malaria eradication:

There isn't much that I know about this. However, whatever little bits I pick up form here and there appears to indicate that a lot of effort is focused on trying to eradicate the breeding grounds of the mosquitoes. Now, mosquitoes being mosquitoes do not get the bigger picture and continue to breed - in places that are difficult for us to reach and clean - such as city sewers etc.

I am sure that there is something fundamentally flawed with my idea - which is why it has not been tried before. Or perhaps it has and I simply don't know about it. My fear is that it may have been overlooked because it is too simple.

The idea is that in addition to the conventional method of trying to remove breeding grounds, we should perhaps create breeding grounds that can be controlled. I don't know whether mosquitoes look for some characteristics ... Such as stagnant water, a water body with sufficient water that won't dry up before the eggs/larvae mature, a water body small enough to limit the number of natural predators and so on. The controlled breeding grounds can then be created to these specifications in places that no self respecting mosquito would miss. The water can then be filtered at regular intervals to clear it of eggs/larvae etc.

Does this make sense?
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Hmmm this could be fun

Till the novelty of it wears out that is.

I am hoping that will take some time though ... And in the meanwhile, I can keep posting pearls of wisdom, pics and what not to my blog.

After twitter, this seems to be a lot of typing though!
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Test Post

This is a test post from my mobile device. Hoping that this will help me get started again!

another year

And before I know it, it is a new year.

As usual, I am caught out in the cold looking over my shoulder and bidding farewell to the receding year... just a wee bit too long ... long enough for the new year to come rumbling by and bawl me over. So, here I am, just getting up and dusting the earth off... getting used to the feeling of the new year as it picks up speed and starts to whiz along.

Wish you all a very Happy New Year. May this year be better than the best that you have had so far. Let this year bring peace and prosperity into your lives. May all the good things that you wish for this year be granted...

Peace.