A year later

I always wanted to get back to this blog but the sheer fact that my last blog was in 2010 made me procrastinate a bit longer. I was afraid to see the date on my last post. So much has happened in so little time. Life has seen some important changes while still has remained more or less the same - although I must say, it's wonderful to have someone in it.

I am almost more than a month into my marriage, forgot the one-month anniversary (ya! you need to set up that reminder on phone - if you tend to forget a lot like me). It was one of the happiest moments of my life, my parents' lives and everyone around me had so much fun. Although my ancestral customs forbid the bride and groom to have a lot of fun by making us fast till the end - by the time we get to eat, all our apetite is gone and we wish we could sleep. But that one day, you wish it never ends. Sukhada looked awesome. Needless to say, her reception pics at Mumbai were the best I have seen to date. Photographers in Mumbai are 100% better than what we had at our place.

Rewinding a little bit, it is now two and half years in Bloomberg. Going strong and going good. I hope I can keep going some more. Things around me has changed. People are gone. New ones in. Subhendu & Chhavi still around in US :). I have spared very little thoughts about my office life in the last year. Mostly, it has been like keeping myself alive and awake.

I met Sukhada, fell in love, proposed, waited, felt the world slip away under my feet when she said yes, told near and dear ones and everything in between. There were multiple American Airlines and US Airways tickets made without the miles# before we realized - we need to make sure we have an account with every airline. Travel between New York and St. Louis was a bi-weekly thing (It still is, though sometimes monthly). The biggest fear was when our parents met and everything was sorted out without our presence. We were kept in dark for 2 days when all this was decided and we wondered what might be happenning. As it happened in December, I was given a 6 months deadline. I had given a 3 Year project estimate. Of course, I should have known - neither it was realistic, nor it would have been approved. Marriage date (after panditji made some mistakes citing the bengali calendar vs the oriya calendar) was fixed.

Every thing related to marriage - www.sukhada.in

I did not have so much fun in years. So much so that - now I want to go to India every year. I don't know what happened to me. I did not go for 3 straight years since coming to US. But it felt the best this time around. May be I was given the VVIP treatment. But it was great I could meet so many near & dear ones. Both sides.

Since December, days passed by like minutes. With Sukhada on top of my head with the trigger - I am usually lazy at doing things (Please consider my 3 Years Estimate). We managed to do a lot of things. Skipped some. Forgot a lot too. All in all - it was a total celebration. A momentous one.

Marriage ofcourse did not change anything except that Sukhada's surname is yet to change officially to Mishra. If it has changed anything - it makes me feel rich when I see the gold ring on my left hand :P. Sukhada is lovely more than ever before.

Now, that the jinx and fear has been taken off of my shoulders, I should come back here more frequently. Recently got a git username and plan to start participatng in stackoverflow. Picked up Code Complete to brush up my coding skills but returned it in 2 days - it has too much words & lot less actual stuff.

This has been typed while I am waiting for my food to be delivered. Sukhada just completed driving 100 miles to St Louis Airport and is going to board the flight in next 30 minutes. I am going to pick her up at the airport. She is coming to NY tonight.

Undoing Some Mistakes

Have you got that realization that you have been unjust to so many things in life? That moment kills you.

I have been suppressing this feeling for quite some time now. As always; there have been excuses to kneel on. Life has been hanging between mundane and painful actions. Nothing enjoyable. Why?

Perhaps it is because I am still looking for the right moment. I still cannot define what it is? When I joined MS, we asked our seniors a question: How do you secure an on-campus job?

The answer was simple: "You have to be at the right time, at the right place".

I never did an on-campus job. Reasons many. Excuses galore. I still wish I had done one. Perhaps I never could grasp what it meant in the first place.

I watched luck by chance movie today. An Akhtar trend special, simply put, it should be on your next weekend movie list. It is that simple supper with all the right mix of palatable items with nothing overwhelming the other and exactly filling your stomach, leaving you satisfied and content. Give a listen to song the song "Yeh Zindagi Bhi" by Loy Mendonsa & Shekhar Ravjiani. The overall soundtrack is remarkably light & relaxed.

Diving deep, I found subtle nuances which ask questions so bold that even my soul fell silent and had no answers. I felt alone (and hence writing this blog).

I could relate to few, I got lost in others. Mistakes have been made. Undoing them would take a lifetime now. The question is: Have I realized it yet completely? Perhaps not.

It is today that perhaps I get a feeling what is the right moment. But still it is vague. And believe me I feel the pain.

Thanks to everyone who has been around for so long time with me. I am here now; 25, at the cross-roads - whatever I have achieved it is because of you. So you must know this and I have to speak it aloud - You are the Best!

Inactivity around

I need to order some fizzy drinks I guess.... something really fizzy!

For the past 3 days, since my internship has ended, suddenly I see myself sucked into a land of inactivity. All I do is sit in the Joe's chair (remember the one they had in Friends') and ponder on what should I do next and which one should I do first!! Of course, as you have guessed by now, its not that I can't figure out what to do next, but the list is so damn long and vast - I just can't come to a consensus on what to begin with. So the past 3 days, I have been just day dreaming. At nights, I sleep for 12 hours putting the blame on jet lag "I came from California last week, you know".

Semester just began. I can't still get used to the fact that their is no office to attend. I am a "office" person I guess, while I hate discipline. I can never go to office at 9, technically I can - I would be just half asleep. But if thats not there, there is a big void. To fill it in I come with these strange ideas to fill in my mind and the the rest of the day goes by dreaming and creating castles in air.

I have a long list of software upgrades lined up which include FF3. I am still not sure if I should reformat my laptop to run Ubuntu instead of Vista. I perhaps should do it sooner but I want to know how good Eclipse + Java 1.6 runs on Ubuntu - if you have tried it out, please leave a comment.

I am looking for doing something more this semester. Will probably look forward to build something on python, try my hands on web development and write some big chunk of server code in c++. While all of these targets towards getting myself noticed for a job interview, I sincerely think this is a long term fruit. And throwing away vista would be perhaps the first gear to kick in. But the only difference is that I am running out of time and I can feel it. I feel it really hard now.

Its high time I get high ... aghh .. I mean I dream big ... I mean .... you know what I mean.

[Give me some fizzy drinks]

Stop and Stare

An ideal morning for me would be an extended version of a Sunday Morning. Waking up at 10, making a hot cup of coffee with just the right amount of sugar and creamer with VH1 playing the Top 20 countdown. Wow! Perfect start to a perfect day.

Tonight, when the college breaks in mid of spring semester, I try to recollect how fast the days have gone by in recent weeks. I have been more or less able to cope up with facts and figures which would give a normal guy a heart attack. Of course, when you try to juggle more than 3 balls, it's likely you goof up somewhere. I am no professional neither a genius. So trying to play just an average guy - which indicates that my acads are not going too well, but yeh in an amortized sense ; everything is just all fine.

The visit to NYC was awesome. We stayed at Broadway Millennium which is at Times Square (I mean AT Times Square, of course, you can't be "at" per se, but it was 10 steps from there). I had the 46th floor with nice view of - yeh - The Times Square :). NYC was freezing. The hotel was too much comfortable. We had lots of coffee, thanks to the Coffee Maker provided in the room. I guess it tops the list of first-to-be-bought-items when I visit NYC in summer. Roaming around the city reminds me of Bombay. But it is way more than that. It's a real cosmo world. And I mean world.

I have been watching the Top20 Countdown on VH1. Everyday when I wake up, its perhaps the best thing to make my eyes at least open and start peeping, even if it is the Idiot Box. There are two songs which are currently in the Top 10 and are awesome. You can listen to them online.

"Falling Slowly" from the band "The Frames" won the Academy Award this year.

"Stop and Stare" from the band "RepublicOne" is a debut, still a good debut.

So, next time you get a chance, hook on to rhapsody or youtube and watch them!

Few lines from "Stop and Stare"

Stop and stare
I think I'm moving but I go nowhere
Yeah I know that everyone gets scared
But I've become what I can't be, oh
Stop and stare
You start to wonder why you're 'here' not there
And you'd give anything to get what's fair
But fair ain't what you really need
Oh, can u see what I see

Adios and Happy Spring Break!

Mad about Money

I won't write anything here because this is my second time. The saying goes that to err is human. But I think all this is done so well, that I don't blame myself falling into the trap twice. I just hope to be smart enough to evade it a third time.

I would point you to a webpage - Go READ here.

And then http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_scheme.

If you don't have time, just watch the video (thats enough). Be educated and start to think logically. And then suddenly you realize the days of one-dimensional rabbit holes are long gone. There are meshes and meshes surrounding you. Ideas and philosophies which blind you for the very wrong desire which you always loathed.

Vagaries of mind multiplicity

One of my friend used the following signature for his email footnote:

Every man is a hero is his dreams

- Sigmund Freud.

Today, is a saturday night. This week has been more than just a week. I saw couple of night outs - which have faded out since college days. Of course, sometime back in my working days - I used to stay late and finish work. But, things did not last this long - because I never felt that compulsive responsibility. As this is academics, you feel bad when you screw up due to mis-management. So, perhaps let the oil burn a little more - it just reminds of those days when things used to shine bright till the morning dawn.

Next week is going to be still more hectic. Oh! did I say hectic - thats an understatement. I would make my first trip out of Gainesville - a paid one of course. So, I am all excited to go to New York where I am supposed to give an interview and perhaps as friends plan - stay a while and enjoy the place. I can feel jitters in my stomach every time I think about the trip - but I convince myself saying that this is just a beginning. Many more are yet to come. This mind is not just waste matter - some gray cells are worth the price.

So, would an interview make it hectic. Nope! Nada! I have given so many of them that the questions often don't surprise me - if they save those "Out of the Box" ones. For those types - I have an honest answer - given time I can produce equally worthy results to your satisfaction ; but at this moment my best answer may not average well with your expectations. I may digress with things which are way beyond imagination while coming out with suggestions which may seem dumb to incorporate. I am not saying I lack creativity - all I am is a lazy thinker.

Next, to add to the interview - I have a quiz, two assignments, two projects and a midterm lined up in ten days. Is it not a red carpet for me - a bloodshed in waiting!

So, why the title reads multiplicity - many of times when you are alone, you feel like talking to yourself. When you are with your self for some more time - you start retrospection. You go back in time, recollect fond memories, shed some tears, laugh off key moments and wish you had more of them. You then digress more and ask what is WRONG in the present moment. Why are you unhappy? Your mind gets divided into two halves. You start judging yourself with the popular yardstick of successful and unsuccessful people around you. You start assuming things on their part as how they have made their lives lively or miserable and what is common between them and you. Somewhere in the middle of retrospection, you start contemplating about your future. And you dig down deep into the rabbit hole for hours - tumbling like Alice, whatever happened to the wonderland!

I hear this song - "Numbered Days" by Eels/Shootenanny often. The song makes me feel to long more. Like every passing day is taking something away from me and I have very few moments left to cherish. I hear it when I am alone ; in a mood to complain for something or the other.

I thought I would quote some lines here : but I could not pick which ones I should show up here. So here's the link. Do listen to the song if you get a chance (It belongs to soft rock genre and available in rhapsody).

So, its a saturday night. I missed out on my weekly badminton practice due to the schedule I have. But, if I see people around me - I am still having a lot of time to myself. If I can write this huge a blog, I won't lie that I spend time in useless stuffs too. But perhaps everybody is not built in the same type. We need different catalysts to keep our lives going. To say that one's catalyst is bad is putting a wrong argument.

So - fixed in all the mind battles, what is Joyesh going to do? Breathe in and start fighting the lonely battle or ruin everything and let life take its course? Is it the time to say "Thats it, Its all over, I'm through .... Counting Numbered Days".

<yawn>
<more yawn followed by a deep sleep>
<I have been watching MATRIX a lot these days than medically prescribed>

Potpourri

We are always living in times when things are happening - even when they seem to be still and quiet. In case you are like me - you must know this, that you are missing out the celebration somewhere.

In the winter break I watched so many movies that I stopped watching any more this semester. With that I meant I stopped watching movies on television. I watched Halla Bol recently - but would not recommend as a must watch. The theme lacked a force - may be few strong dialogs from the main actor Ajay Devgan. And yes, before that I watched Juno. Nice movie - simple story : good watch. And I always knew the guys in SuperBad would be seen in many more to come.

And then there is Australian Open. All sorts of thing happening this year around. Tsonga beats Nadal as if Nadal was the one who was unseeded. The volleys and techniques just stunned Nadal who tamely lost the game. The courts are said to be slower than US Open, but still Tsonga repeatedly surprised Nadal by coming to the center of the court and taking control of the game rather than letting Nadal to continue his baseline ralleys.

And then the historic upset - I would say this because I respect Roger. When he says he has created a "Monster", we have no idea how high peoples' imaginations soar for him. I watched his game against Blake - James was no match. He was a spectator to almost most of Federer's returns. People often say that this man is 26 and still the fastest around. But....

Someday all this has to end. If not this grand slam, still signs have started coming in. And I hope the best for him to make that 14 as soon as possible. Djokovic was not very good - but he played really sensibly. My analysis (whatever sane my mind could think) is that Roger dig his own grave by making more unforced errors than that is allowed in a grand slam final and come on - its not allowed to him either, he is Roger Federer. Novak never failed trying and the moment he got the opportunity to break games, he took his chances. It was a great game to watch and to see the legend bow down. I am making him a legend - coz I know he is sure to be one pretty soon.

Next comes Fe-male matches. Sadly I watched the finals. My observations were that ladies should not have two serves given to them because 99% times they tend to make mistakes in the first serve. Hardly you see 2-3 aces in the entire match. Anyways, as reported in the news, it must have been a photographers' frenzy to watch Tennis's 2 hottest and best players fight each other - Serbian Ana Ivanovic vs Russian Maria Sharapova. Who then cares what happened to match? Haha, just for the records - Maria won it in straight sets. But I cheered for Ana and I know Maria ain't last long.

What else - I had and have my classes going in full SWING. Unfortunately, rather than going out and playing it, I am in my blanket caught napping for past a month now. Thats {bs}ad.

Next few weeks are going to be interesting. I am hoping that I get some Internship Calls pretty soon - now that its time to convert and secure something for the summer. So, thats in a whole a short diary of what happening these days. And being a lazy bum - I did not celebrate republic day ? Why, because by the time I recollected it was THE day the time in the clock was 6:30 pm. India was already past the day :).

Adios.

Reflections and Reverberations

It's time to look ahead. It's time to look back. It's time.

Nobody knows what 2008 has in store. Will it be different? Will it bring all the bads to an end in your life? Would it make this life a little bit more lively, if not filled with celebrations day in and out. I don't know.

The calenders are turned in and people look at months ahead and make tentative plans. Some people keep them. Most forget and get busy with mundane schedules of life in which this new year's celebration adds nothing but hope. Is it all in vain? I am not sure.

So, should I be celebrating still when all these questions remain unanswered? I thought I had a good appetite for them. I am contemplating now on things. I am nobody.

As I deliberate more, I fall into these loops and I can see that I get swamped into the fake patterns which life shows. The more I try to understand them, the more it intrigues me. Sadness and Happiness over long terms share common proportions. But can I amortize them over any period of my life? I have no answers.

So, how does it matter if it is 2008? This time next year, I may be sipping margaritas somewhere or will be drinking my sorrows away. But both of them would have started well before the new year giving it no due significance. Do we need a new year to drink? Aha! No, Not at all.

2008, 2008, 2008 ...... Reverberating everywhere. Hope it goes on for sometime for the people who dreamed to see this day. Let them have their share of joy. And then, lets get back to where we started. The mundane circles of life awaits our presence.

If you really want to remember it, do something new. Even if it is a small thing not worth of any significance, do it for yourself - probably it may turn out to be a reason for you to remember new years. If not that, perhaps your life may not remain mundane after all. Little works of pleasure build an empire of happiness.

Supreme Beings of Leisure

I am no connoisseur. But the taste is far too difficult to forget because the ecstasy seconds to none. And well for that matter, the pleasure is Never the Same.

For few days the Johnnie Walker Black Label Advertisement was airing and I liked the jingle a lot. Being all ears to good music (what I think is Good Music) I tried to get the source (if any). Needless to say - the names are perhaps aptly given.

I got a lazy lounge version of the song - soothing and flowing as slowly as possible. The Details:

Track Name: Never the Same Album: Supreme Beings of Leisure.

Classy, ain't it? Well for that matter, Johnnie Walker is meant for such a coterie. Cheers.

Rendezvous with Life

Today I was not in that great mood. I don't know what happened. Is it something which happened today? Or is it something I have been putting off for long?

I was feeling sick - perhaps a bit homesick. This is not what I am usually. Even I did not buy that myself. But I was down and low.

Couple of hours and I am back. Back to normal. I have a test, an assignment, a presentation as well as a demo lined up in the next 5 days. And I watched "Bend it Like Beckham" for the past two hours. The movie was more than a distraction.

Suddenly I realized something. And it is what will take me through these five days and more.

There is always more to life. I wrote my last post, but at times I fail to believe in it. It is the persistence which I lack. The ability to stand for that extra second. Why did I always fail?

I have my answers to find. If you can, help me - in the right way.

Sweet November

Yes, I know thats a good movie - the inset of fall sets a whole new view of Gainesville. I just wished somebody could lend me a digicam for couple of months.

The temperature has fallen down. I have stayed in Delhi for a year and I know I used to freeze at 4 degrees. The huge fur jackets, probably heavier than me at that time, had to be used to keep you warm. But still it was just four degrees.

The fall in Gainesville is beautiful. Imagine being in a hill station - only thing missing is the mountains and the deep mist. But the serenity and breeze would sweep your minds. At nights, the mist would escape as you start talking. The cool breeze would make you long for warmth. But, it is not all jittery. If you stay for sometime out there, you would start enjoying it. Well, fortunately or unfortunately it never snows in Gainesville. So, I do not know how wonderful it would be. But yes, yesterday the temperature was -1 degree celsius. And the night was worth roaming around.

Well, for that matter my roommate returned home at four o'clock in the night, after watching his first movie in an american movie theatre. And of course, he had dinner at 2 am in a bustling restaurant nearby. Eight dollars for the movie. Seven dollars was the dinner. Roaming around the town in the night with friends in a ca-ar, priceless for a desi "graduate" student.

The day sets in pretty early. I usually take the bus from a nearby bus stand to go to college. The bus stop is around 300 metres from my place. The walk is pretty relaxing. The cool breeze fills you in waking you up for the day. The picture perfect trees and signboards just catch your breath. The best thing out here is the nature. Its all calm and quite - what you would desire when you try to take a break from the city life. No wonder this place has been voted as the best place to live in US for some time.

This is perhaps the best time around the year to be at Gainesville. Its not too cold, but you feel the chill. And the time of the year when you enjoy the sun. Sweet November ain't it?

A thousand thoughts

Codes, thoughts, ideas - those have been the diet on which I survived for so long. And yes, for some time now, the burritos.

So to start with - choosing the name for this blog took me some time. I must confess that it took more than two hours. Well, whats in a name? But sometimes a lot of factors external to you affect you more than you thought they would. And that is exactly what I mean. I was supposed to name it Fork(ing)Threads. But searching for definitions could bring in more clarity to the first word. So, a better vocabulary could have helped. Still, one should always check before letting it out! And I checked it because I am not a novice if not an expert :)

So here we are again - back where we started (Train - Free).

I started writing this blog because when I get my hands full, I just drop everything blindly and tend to do something which is not at all related. Its a distraction for a good cause. Being a master's student, you will have your To-Do lists all filled up and popping in at every glance you take. Deluge of mails reminding of the pending assignments and projects which lack clarity and need substantial effort than they were intended for. Whatever happened to Proof of Concepts, it is very much alive and takes precedence over modeling solutions when it comes to deadlines. Hours of efforts flow in. Who said going back to school was cool?

But thats what we are here for. To apply what we have learned. And to re-learn again, what we use to apply, in a new way. To find better ways to the mistakes we have been doing. To take a break from the mundane codes which had become our only friend. To simplify our thoughts, our designs and the way we visualize. To bring us back when we are long lost in the forest.

So whats next? I want to write on some of the tools which I recently picked up and have been using since. Valgrind, Doxygen and Rational Rose would figure out in next couple of blogs along with other potpourri of rants on life, thoughts and revelations.