Gaurav's Blog

This can usually be found on Twitter.

Haha! It's 7:18pm by my watch now, and in another one hour 10 minutes we leave for Kodaikanal! Yay! So excited! Going to go have as much fun as possible! See all you guys on Monday, cheers, Gaurav

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I have spent most of today chatting with people about how Good life is. Because it is! Okay, the bad stuff first: completely, totally, incredibly behind schedule with my lab stuff :(. Prob won't be able to get it done before Kodaikanal, which means ... ermm ... ermm .. ermm .. not good. On every single possible other front, things are good. I mean ... I can't even begin to put into words how good everything is. You know the changes I've been going through, the last year, the things I've learned, etc? Well, they're all - in their own way - coming to a head now. It's now adding up - all of it - and it's all making sense. Things are happening. Are happening are happening are happening :). Of course, not everything ... is thought through, not just yet. And ... okay, I need to wander off into un-understandable garbage here, so please excuse :). Well, you know how something was bothering me two weeks back? How the whole of the last year was getting all weird? Well, it's stabilizing now. Of course, it's all in Singapore, and it won't be stabilized until well after June 28th, but ... some of the things are making more sense. Things are coming together in ways what can only be described as amazing (okay, fine: which I choose to describe as amazing. But it's not bad, all things considered *grins*). Okay, just some details (just a few, you know, make this post more interesting, etc.) For instance, would you believe one of the major characters in this whole thing is none another than Kaberi? The more I think about things, the more sense it seems to make. I mean ... yeah, you know. I'm here. I'm now. There's nowhere to go but forward. What happened once can happen again. But if it's going to happen again, it's going to happen again, and that's all ther e is ... to it? (As you can see, I still have an awful lot of thinking to do. But that's what Kodi's for, I guess!). But Thank God that the painful, painful last week is behind me now, and a whole new tomorrow is right around the river bend! Yes, so, in summary. There is no Answer. Not yet. How do I feel about her? Not sure. But before I meet her again, I want to get some things straight in my head. What sort of things? I'm not very sure. I need to push the boundaries on this, I'm sure of that. But how? And in what way? I'm not very sure. But the mood of this week is definately up-looking. And June 28th is so far away, so much time for thought! In my more optimistic moods, I could almost imagine that Tomorrow is coming, that Tomorrow is near, but I know I'm (still) much too confused and unsure about that. An abrupt end for an abrupt, *curse like insanity* reason. Oh god. Oh christ. Jesus. My family is insane.

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Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present: probably the most amazing bureaucratic decision *ever*! Okay, the situation: we had a recess week in the middle of the semester. A brilliant idea, all around - a week, so plenty of time to go for a holiday, chill, hang out with friends, whatever. But - for some weird reason, related to SARS if I'm not wrong - this got cancelled last year. They basically took out the week and put it in at the end, so college ended a week early. Bad decision. Everybody hated it. Apart from just "not having a holiday", the slackers in college (myself included) needed it as a wakeup call. It was also very convenient for midterms - we had them all either in the week just before or just after recess. And it was a chance to prepare for the same if it was all just a mystery to you. So the Student's Union goes to the college and complains. A year of negotiations later, profs are coming and asking us about our opinion, so maybe this is getting somewhere! But today (well, actually yesterday), the decision is e-mailed to us all, and here it is: We are to have half a recess week. Half a recess week! Our recess week will consist of the days Monday to Thursday. Friday will be a working day. I very simply don't see the logic at all (well, I'm sleepy, but I still think I have a valid point!) Why half a recess week? I mean, what's their point? We used have a whole week, didn't we? Something tells me this came about as a "Okay, so we want recess week" - "you can't have a week!" - "how about Half a week?" - "hmmm..." dialogue. I wouldn't put it past them ...

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... with due apologies to my friends who had to suffer in the interim :). Well, no significant changes, but trying not to think about stuff. Did a lot of Perl coding today. Getting better and better! It really is a sexy language. Other than that, nothing much happening. Came online in the hope of finding friends to chat with, but somehow dun think I'll be that lucky ... Just surfing around on Princeton Review, college-dreaming, mostly :). Ah, it's all dreams, but dreams are nice sometimes.

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Oh god, if you existed, I must be boring you to hell. But then I'm convinced nobody checks my blog anyway :). So that's alright then. Actually, atleast partially, I'm trying to hit *it*. This will be my 89th blog entry. Just another 11 and I reach 100! An important number for any blogger. I wish I could do like a friend of mine and write entirely obfuscated blogs which don't seem to make any sense at all! Sometimes I really dread either myself or others reading my blog and trying to put together the fragments of my mind (Can't be done. Like Humpty Dumpty. Much too many). More than that, I think that friend actually feels better by taking her problems and generalising it, expanding it until it becomes a subset of the universe's problem. I think my problem is pretty universal too, but I can't feel it. Just can't feel it. It seems to be coiling around my neck, choking, choking, choking (or maybe it's just my sore throat?) This seems to be a week for in-betweens. In-between crush and friend. In-between family and self. In-between care and uncare. In-between interest and need. In-between sickness and health. In-between sleep and unsleep. And now, in-between wanting to go back to Singapore (forced adulthood; become who I must because I have no choice) or wanting to stay here (want to regress; to re-enjoy childhood a little more, but knowing that door is forever shut now, maybe). p.s. Yes, I do actually know what I'm talking about. People who read my blog, be warned - you will not understand *any* of the above stuff. It's not covered in my blog, in any way, anywhere. Ask me personally if you want to know, but be warned some stuff is the kinda stuff that I'll only be comfortable talking about face-to-face. But maybe you'll get lucky ;)

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Bored? Look at some nice photos taken when I left Singapore (to come back home for hols). You can also see some of my bestest friends! Comments cheered me up a bit.

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(-) Too much smoking. I mean, that's okay - sort of - but I can't *stand* it with my throat feeling like hell. (+) Amazing dialogue. This female character just found out that she doesn't have AIDS (yay!) and this male character is about to tell his mom that he's gay (yay!). And now Winona Ryder is in love with Ben Stiller (yay!) and she's about to get her scripts on TV (yay!). Except ... if you've seen the movie ... you'll see she doesn't end up with Stiller (aww!) and her script is going to be ruined (aww!) and it's all going to get bad before it gets good in the end. I wonder if lives are like that. If they get bad before they get better. I just feel so completely down right now. And I'm feeling so weak. I'm telling myself it's the darkness before the light, the ugly before the good, the tunnel before tomorrow. But it's not helping!!! I know it's probably just me being in a depressed, sick mood. But. It's. All. Wrong. And. I. Don't. Know. What. To. Do. :( p.s. That !@#!% squid running on Sify servers is preventing me from looking at my blog. I'd say ugh, but I'd feel sick. Me going sleepy sleepy now. Bye bye.

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God, I think, now officially has something against me. 1. Got sick today. No specific handicap of any sort, just a general feeling of ... sickness ... throat-and-stomach, that sort of thing. Just sitting around now with a super-hot computer on my lap feeling *sick*. 2. Got no work - of any sort - done today. At. All. 3. Blogger.com refuses to open. 4. I need to sleep. "Reality bites" is coming on television. Oh. God. 5. I feel so sick. So sick so sick so sick so sick! 6. Things in my life not so good at the moment. Don't want to talk about it. On the whole, - oh good, Blogger is back! - life is getting very sucky. And not just sucky. Bad. God, I need a break. if i was back in singapore, i would have taken the day *off*. Lie around in my room all day. Go down to PGP canteen at 4pm. Eat a burger and fries - crap for my throat, complete hell for my body, not even so tasty, but ... well ... reassuring. a Bit of stability in a mad, mad world. Then i would go for a walk. No, a talk - I'd call someone. I'd call someone and chat for a while. Or drop in on someone and waste a bit of time. Then walk. Walk down the tree-covered paths of KE. Go to the lab, and (try to) blank out everything but work (hard) and reindeer (easy). And ... "Reality Bites" was playing, but on my stomach, just watching all those cigerettes are driving me nuts, so I just turned it off. I suppose I should log off, turn off the light, and go to sleep now? Ugh. Why can't life taste sweeter? Why must it be so sour? (Turns on TV again)

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Why am I here? I shouldn't be here - now, on this comp, I mean. No (meaningless) philosophilising about life tonight, guys. Oh, just as a matter of record: my MSN nickname has had the phrase "What comes next?" in it for a while now. Tonight, somebody claimed that *they* came next. It'll be very interesting to see if that prediction - offhand, for-a-laugh - comes true. For better - or for worse - it looks like I'll have the Asilidae dataset by Monday latest, and probably sometime this weekend. Yips. Not good. Means I have to get more done tomorrow in the realm of Perl if I don't want this to end up as yet another monumental copy-and-paste session. Other news: The play. Going well. Paro and Devdas have nice chemistry going. Karan still rocks. Everybody else is atleast decent. The final scene is coming together in a haphazard way, but it is coming together, which is real nice. Looking forward to tomorrow: should probably have Sunil and Pradeep there as well. Oh - the cockroach I saw about a week back, which hid in the World Book shelf? Finally killed it. Wow, that was freaky. I mean, okay, it's big and all, but the way that tiny thing made my heart pound by the end of it - man, it made my heart pound. To tell you the truth. Correction: it was big. Cheesy I-bagged-him grin. My heads - thoughts - are in a bit of a muddle, really. Not very sure what everything's about all of a sudden (if nothing else, 16 sets of randomizations ought to cure that). I mean ... well, I'm not very sure what I mean. I feel like I've given up - on the whole "improve myself" thing? Yeah, I guess I have. Given up. Regressed. It doesn't feel so bad, but it wouldn't, I guess. But not very sure how to ... attack the problem again. Improve, how to. I'm re-reading Rushdie (Midnight's Children) again, and that's fun. But Jesus, I wish I could just figure it out! I mean, it can't be all that hard, can it? Arrrrrgh ...

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After fooling around with my templates, etc. have decided to "release" my blog unto (the poor, innocent) world. I mean, I'm putting it out. Have just put it up on my family blog, whose address I have e-mailed to my dad. Hope there isn't anything controversial on this blog ;). In other news, the play is coming along nicely. My life, not so good. I mean, it's really really really nice (after today, how can I say otherwise??). But it's ... well, nothing much is happening if you know what I mean. I need excitement. I need new. Instead, I spend all my time either wandering around my house (late at night!) and thinking, or sleeping, or walking through life deadlinessish. Ugh! This is bugging! And not coding much anymore, so ... that's a bit down. And my friends are having problems. Ugh. I don't want to have to deal with other people's problems right now!!! Then again, maybe that is the answer. Maybe I should be trying to get more involved in people's lives. Then again, I don't think that is. But I don't really know what is, right now. I need some time alone, something regular in Singapore, but so very hard in Bangalore! Anyways, me off to read a bit (think too much), then sleep. Hopefully not in that order, but strongly suspect it's going to be yet another insomniac, thinking night. p.s. Just to clarify, I am *not* depressed. This is just me being very tired and confused with life. The bane of everybody these days, it seems :). Bane of hols in particular. I need to code!

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A very well-written article on writing your own search engine. Give it a read!

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Been sitting around and fiddling with my WorldzUnlimited template. Quite nice, if I do say so myself! I like, anyways. Tell me what you think.

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Already back to the old profile. What can I say, I've gotten used to the dear thing! What do you guys think of my new blog look?? Send me a comment! (Ok, fine, I get excited easily. Just spent about an hour, maybe more, making this page look beautiful. Can you blame me?)

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... almost :). Sorry if you don't like the hi-funda graphics; this is (I think) the best looking blog option in Blogger. The new, improved Blogger, that is. Will be trying out features in future blogs. But right now, just putting up a short note. Well, right now, things with me are good. No, really. Things with Pradeep are getting better, things with the play are getting better, Blogger is looking cooler, Gmail is working great, Slashdot just gave me 5 moderator points (yes, today!), and ... yeah. All in all, life is nice. Just a little worried (yes, I know - I just can't handle being happy!) that things are ... going to change? Nah, I know they'll do that. What I'm worried about is that they'll go bad. Or that there's something I've forgotten. That's going to jump out of the grass and bite me real soon. Jesus, now I'm actually getting worried. I'm really no good at paranoia! Okay, one thing - getting a lot more laid back. For sure. Getting a lot more happy and satisfied with myself - which means more unlikely to make the kind of changes I need to make myself better. Less enthusiasm, less force, less life. All of this is strictly not good. So, now: going to go write the play. Then sleep. Then work like a dog tomorrow. No, seriously. Like a dog. I don't have a choice. I must. I must I must I must. p.s. been re-reading God of Small Things. It's still as gut-wrenchingly depressive, but somehow I don't think of it as Great, or not as much as I used to. I suppose in my present state of mind, just can't think about anyone that depressive as "great" :). Seriously, being happy is good. But changing is more fun, more interesting, and more exciting in every way. Must keep changing! Must keep changing! (Must adopt that as new mantra. Write that down, brain). p.p.s. Look, comments! Post me some! Post me some!

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Earlier this year, a friend of mine said that people thought was "naive". And today I think I know what she means. And yet, and yet. Has the world really done anything yet to really disillusion me? Is it nicer to live in a nice world of make-believe than a real world of anger and hate? Okay, i'm not making any sense, so just ignore me. Will get back and write some more about this later.

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Log into my Gmail account today, and what do I see? The "Invite other people to use Gmail" link isn't around anymore. It's been replaced by an "Give Mom a Gmail account". Clicking on it gives you a pink pop-up window with the following text:

This Mother's day, give something a little different--a Gmail account to try out! It won't smell as nice as flowers, but it'll last a lot longer. Thanks for helping us spread the love to more trusted early testers.

Are these guys cool, or what?

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Hello! Okay, my comp is acting up a bit, so lemme be quick about this. Just to reassure you all that just because I'm not posting doesn't mean I'm not having fun. Some of the stuff I've been up to: 1. Staying up until 3am (yeah, okay, so I did that in Singapore too, but there I just got used to it ... this is Home, that sort of thing is just not Done. Plus, in Sing. there was an enormous alarm clock to wake me up, which for weight reasons I've left behind. So over here, all I have - pretty much - are my parents and my sis, and they are *bad* at getting someone like me up. But enough of this bracketed thing). 2. I'm going for Aerobics. Which was hell (body-wise, it was still fun!) when I started a week or so back. But now it's just Fun! I don't know most of the steps and exercises and stuff yet, and I still need to stop a few times (but so do most of the other people, and I am *Really* unfit). But now, less than a week later, I can *feel* that I'm much better than I was before. Sure, I still stop, but I stop for shorter periods now, I don't feel faint, and my muscles hurt less. I've never felt so fit! 3. Programming. I'm writing what should be a very simple, easy program - a Java viewer for FASTA files. So far, have rewritten almost everything (ground-up!) twice, and probably will do that a third time. Do I mind? NO! I love this kind of stuff. What I'm doing is, working on it until I get it Right (aka Working). Then rewrite it so it's easier and faster to writer, maintain and understand. That way, I improve myself, while enjoying myself too! 4. Tomorrow-obsessions. Lately (for most of the time I've been here) I've been obsessing about "Tomorrow" - that mythical time that is past the now, past Today. That time when all of Today's mistakes have been rectified, when Today's wrongs have been writed. Pretty prose aside, for me, when I've gotten over the last one and half years, one way or another. Note that: one way or another. By getting over them I don't mean getting over Her, or even getting over my memories and feelings of that time. I mean ... well, I suppose, I meant having the uncertainty settled one way or another: is it to be, or not to be? Obviously (well, obvious to anyone but me, until two days back) I'm thinking waaay too far ahead. The real tests will only come later. And while I'm waiting for tomorrow (and trust me, I was waiting - lying around, racked in doubt, the whole deal), that doesn't mean I can't enjoy today! Which is what I've been trying to do, and rather enjoying myself at it too. To sum it up: have decided not to think about the long term (more accurately, that I can't think about the long term - that it's close to impossible for me to "get over her", not while I'm here and she's .. well .. nevermind). Yeah, just go on feeling what I'm feeling (and I *am* feeling) and to not let that interfere - for worse; it's fine to interfere for better :) - in my life at the moment. This is supposed to be, for me, a time to sit back and think about things, to look at life and figure out what I want. And to develop my skills - to get brilliant at that which I am good, and decent at that which I am bad. So. Enough on that subject. 5. Shopping. And lots of it! Mostly clothes (my mom must be surprised; the first time I've shown an interest in shopping for clothes since ... well, ever). Got all kinds of cool trousers, three-quarter pants, trackpants, and shoes so far (well, singular for most, but it's a start!). On my second day back, bought a deo spray - only to find, on getting home, that my dad and my cousin sis in America have already got me one each in the last year! Ah well. I like the smell of mine tho :). okay, fine, so not *that* much shopping. But more than usual, and more involving me than usual. That's good, isn't it? 6. Swimming. Ah. Not so good. Had a terrible cold for the last four days. Now it's passed (completely!). Suspect it wasn't to do with my swimming, but with the sudden drop in temperature recently. In any case, maybe the pool is an option again? Have to master the art of underwater breathing, if for my own reasons. 7. Driving. Hopefully will start on Monday. Spoke to my mom about it, and nobody seems particularly freaked that I'm 20 and still license-less. Like my mom said, this is India - you can get it whenever, no problem. The trick is actually Knowing how to drive, hopefully will work on that next week onwords :). (Pause. My cat just turned his head around in his sleep and breathed out deeply. Into my elbow. I love cats :) 8. Traveling. Not really going to happen, but maybe next holiday? But going to Bombay in early June, wonder how much of a "travel" I can make out of it. Trying to convince my parents to send me by train - 2nd class sleeper! But only half-heartedly, I'm a little spooked, to admit the truth. 9. People. YES! The Important one, and the one I really haven't been working on. Also the one i really NEED to work on, or rather Should - I had enough incentive last time, when I had been coached by the Best, but this time I've gotten to know (atleast a bit) *two* really amazing awesome talk-with-anyone-and-everyone kind of people. That would be a really sexy talent to have I think. Anything else? Well, not actively. Not interacting with people half as much as I should, but otherwise great. but I'm not going to push myself. Lemme be a bit antisocial for a while, and see how it goes. If I'm not wrong, I should be forced to interact with people eventually, out of sheer desperation. But then again ... well ... let's see! p.s. Definately over my depression of the last few days, and life is looking good - perhaps too good. Perhaps I'll fall, and break a leg. But as my sis's journal says, "You can't learn to ride a bike if you worry too much about falling". So let's see? :) Been getting lots of 42's lately, but a few 43s as well, so not too sure what to make of it. Haha! It's 3:42am RIGHT NOW! With lots and lots of love, Gaurav.

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(From Slashdot) With that, here's a crash course in CS: 1. Loops are most of (time, operations) the program. Try not to use them. 2. To avoid loops, structure your data. Giving structure means assumptions, and assumptions means you can skip irrelevant sections of data. 3. Determine your dataset, minimize worst-case occurences. Find out what order of data or instructions will make your n*log2(n) algorithm become n^2. Then find away around it. 4. and optimize for average case. That is, if you never sort more than 6 numbers at a time, an n^2 will beat a n*log_2 (n) algorithm. 5. If your data structure introduces overhead (most will) find yuor most common or costly operation. Optimize your datastructure for that (searching, sorting, etc) If you do a combination determine the ratio and optimize for that. The cost of overhead is usually small compared to the reason why your using a datastructure to speed up your common operation. 6. The most obvious and easiest to code algorithm is the slowest. (Bubble sort vs. Radix or quick-sort) 7. Mastery of the above is the difference between a $50k programmer and a $90K programmer. To learn more, take a datastructures class at your local university. Please review Calculus II before doing that though. (Click here for the actual post)

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I MISS MY FRIENDS FROM SINGAPORE!!!! I LOVE YOU GUYS! SEE YOU REAL SOOOOOON ... *gets dragged away from computer*

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On the good side, went to aerobics class today. Unbelieavably exhausting (i have zilch stamina!) but intend pursuing this atleast as far as I can. Argh! Still gotta go running for car driving too! Atleast this Java thing is working on rather nicely, so that's good ... hopefully will have a Java fastablaster ready by tomorrow. But yeah, there's just so much to do! And it's very bugging, I'm not getting out and interacting much, which really sucks. It's just that every night I tell myself that I will tomorrow, and then tomorrow never turns up. And, well, I'm just such a boring person that I don't know what to talk with anybody else about. There, I've said it. I don't know, I guess partially I can't wait to get back to Singapore. But then .. things will be different, and Naef would have gone away, and ... ugh. Ugh ugh ugh ugh ugh. I need something good - not just aerobics good, or java good, but REALLY, REALLY **GOOD** - happen in my life, and quickly. Or I'm just going to go nuts.

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Hey everybody, Sorry about this post, but I'm just in a very "ugh" mood. Before anybody makes any assumptions, it's not because of any particular chat or e-mail or anything. Today's just been a very jobless, pointless kind of day, the one where your head slowly fries under (depending on the day) overwork or underuse. In my case, strictly the latter. On the whole, it's been a bad weekend; I'm basically starting to suffer from "holiday stress" now. Just this general sense of time-wasting permeates the air. And, in less than two days, I seem to have suddenly set myself up on bad terms with a friend, my family, *and* my sister. I'm just worried now about how much worse things might get ... I mean ... argh, I don't know. I hate holidays. Even with all the crap that's always happening to me at college, it's just never quite as bad as home, cos college you've got friends. Here, I ... see, mostly, it's just that I don't have the strength to go on. I'm this close and *so* tempted to just throw it all down and give up ... except I'm not even very sure what "giving up" means. I mean, I don't know what happens if I "give up", what I'm supposed to do and stuff, I mean. I wish I could say that this was my darkest hour, but I suspect things are going to get worse before they get any better ... I'm serious. I'm just going to sit around now and let everything just go over me and over my head and not know what to do or anything. Okay, me off to work now. Wish me luck! Found a nice joke page, though: http://www.workjoke.com/projoke.htm.

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