Some Ambitious (and Possibly Eccentric) Goals for Next Year

1. Study - The Art of Computer Programming - By Donald E. Knuth
2. Study books on Machine Learning, Algorithms, Data Structures, Operating Systems, Computer Networks, Database Systems and Computer Architecture.
3. Learn to type on the keyboard properly, and then increase my typing speed drastically.
4. Win a Programming Contest again.
5. Develop a (very) small operating system of my own, demonstrating as many capabilities as possible (Maybe starting off with a small instructional operating system like Pintos).
6. Develop a Facebook/Twitter web application.
7. Learn the Piano and compose one worthy song on Reason/Ableton/FL Studio using the piano.
8. End the ended.

Some are odd, I know. And I doubt whether i'll be able to do even one properly. But there's always hope.

The "Robot"

I may talk all technical, but I still have a heart.
Think twice, maybe thrice, before you call me a robot!

You know, it does hurt sometimes... but it's not that I don't get the joke, I do! And therefore, I don't bother.

The Rise and Fall of Blogging

Did you know blog is actually a short form of Web Log? Maybe yes, but most of you probably don't. That's where it's origins were, simply as a form of logging what you were doing, were thinking.

Like most technologies, it changed depending on how the users used it. The Geeks started blogging off, and then the masses took over. Blogging was a phenomenon back in 2006. By 2007-08 it was well established, and arguably, saturated. And for all that I know, it's finally in drastic decline.

I really don't find blogs which I would like to read anymore. Moreover, I don't find any of my close friends blogging. It's close to the end, and I can feel it. So why do I keep blogging? It's because I never started out using blogging as a way to connect with friends. I used it to share my thoughts with the friends I was already well connected with. I had my own voice that was disconnected from the rest of the world and I never felt the urge to build a readership for my blog. That made all the difference.

I still blog, knowing it's only a matter of time before I too make the shift to more contemporary technologies like Google Wave. I don't think i'll ever stop writing, though. :-)

Flashes

Why did I do all that I did? Why?

Why did I start like that? Why did I not understand? Why was I the person that I was? Why did I go up there? Why did I try to change? Why did I never excel? Why always so moderate? Why did that day happen? Why did I fall? Why did I write that? Why did I stop studying? Why did everything change? Why did 'I' change so much? Why am I so messed up due to the current stillness? Why do I find myself at crossroads when there is no intersection? Why am I so frustrated with myself? Why is contentment so elusive? Why?

It all flashes by, and I wish I could have done it all over. There are some things I would've done better, much better, and skipped some of them altogether.

Rendezvous, A Year Later

There's a reason I remember last year's Rendezvous with such zeal, even when this year's Rendezvous is here.

Yes, on the face of it, it's bigger than last year already. In fact, it shows much more promise than any other Rendezvous I have been a part of, till date. Kudos to the Marketing guys, who seem to be getting it right this year around. So the question really boils down to this... "Is it going to be better?" I sure hope so.

Staying outside the organizing team has become a very alien concept. I was sure I was going to stay out this time, but yes, it does suck... and to top it off, people have become so used to thinking of me as a source of passes, that they don't realize I have no way of getting even one, this time around. I don't want a pass, by the way... so I am not complaining.

Coming to something that's closest to me.... Creative Designing for Rendezvous.
I'll be giving a compliment to the Rendezvous 09 posters and Website, if I just say that "they suck". I remember last year, with all the hate mail coming in about the Website, saying it was too dark n all. Well, have a look at this site, and you'll figure out what a gem of a site the last year's one was.
I was criticized for my posters being too similar, when I was actually trying to get them to have a uniform feel and follow our theme - Magic. This time around, the posters seem to have taken a cue from last year and actually ARE the same. It's terrible to see that the entire work seems to be a crude copy of both ideas and design from last year. I stare at the posters in disbelief, noticing that the bar was raised last year, only to be lowered to abysmal depths this time around.

Come on guys, you did have the resources for Creative Design! All it takes is effort. And that's what seems sorely lacking this time around. It took me 2 months to end up with last year's effort. It seems you didn't even put in a Night-Out! Sucks!

You know, yes, I feel quietly happy that the Design part is bad this time. I had this intention of creating something impeccable, unmatchable... so in a way, I succeeded. But my dismay is much more. I would've loved for it to be better, grander. Wish it was actually so.

The Disconnect

It's been more than 4 years since I stepped into this institution, and more than 2 years since I began this blog. But never, never did I mention where I am, where I belonged.

Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi. Yea, that's where I really am. Or was. I am still wondering... why I never got around to mentioning the name, and why I never came close to mentioning my life here. The fact that it's going to be a part of my identity for my entire life gels in well with me. In fact, I love that it will be so.

However, it's plain irony that I write this, when I feel a disconnect towards a place that's a home away from home. I feel this repulsion to be here, knowing that an entire year of my stay might simply be a farce. This year is a year that I wish, would pass by in a jiffy. There's little left here, that would quench my thirst.

Still Wanting to Change

The best, and worst part about me, is that I am never satisfied with who I am. I fervently search for aspects of myself I can change for the better. Yesterday provided me with 2 of them. I state them here, because the first part of change is to acknowledge what's wrong.

1. I think too much - Thinking is an important part of who I am. It's my job to think, think what others can't, or won't. I am about to go into a profession which demands a lot of my gray matter. The problem doesn't lie in the fact that I think a lot about my projects, work etc, but in the fact that I employ an umbrella approach, thinking a lot about almost everything. Sometimes the best is to blink... to make decisions at the spur of the moment, to not have second thoughts about things. There's one counter-intuitive statement I still need to learn...

"Usually, things are more simple than they seem. It's just that we want to see the world as complicated so that we don't feel bad about not being able to cope up with it."

2. I say too much - I do, I know. But that's mostly on chat. On chat, I go as far as to speak out my mind without bothering about consequences - not the best thing to do. In fact, it's a dangerous trend.

"There's a reason why there is no loudspeaker on our thoughts. It's because we are supposed to be careful about which thoughts we should actually blurt out."

In Memoriam

In the end, I never really found myself.
Instead, I lost myself somewhere, sometime, in the clouds of goodness.

Perhaps, it was the best that could ever have happened, and I am glad it did happen that way...The Long Story formally ends today, marking the 100th post of this blog. Acknowledging it's end is the only thing left to do, and I do it today.

It will lie alone, waiting to be remembered, recollected... for that one last time, and that's going to be it. Period.

A Thousand Beginnings, A Single End

I usually know how to end something, even before I begin with it. It's not something that I figure out in the middle of the process... rather, it so happens that I try to figure out the process by which I can reach the very end I desire. With that, there are a thousand different ways I can begin, and still have the same end.

I know the end, but I am trying to find the right way to begin...

Those Little Pieces

"It's funny how a person can break your heart, and you can still love them with all the little pieces"

-Adya on Facebook

Tunnels to Nowhere

Cement, childhood. Those two words, in one place suddenly made me remember of one of the most enjoyable activity I have indulged in. Building tunnels in a pile of cement. I remember the network we used to construct, me and my friends. It was extensive and well-connected, and we used to spend hours to create our city among the tunnels. Tunnels, that eventually led to nowhere.

Where is that innocence, where we didn't know why we are building something, but still enjoyed building it? I mean, if I look now, my decisions on doing something are based on what I can get out of it. I don't do anything just for the heck of it. Those days are long gone.

But that brings me to a more philosophical question. Is the world really a place where each person has to have a purpose, a goal? Or is the world a place where we're supposed to live as we wish, without bothering about our purpose of living? That's something worth arguing about and I have sat in a heated argument which shed a lot of light on aspects of the question. It's too difficult to answer, according to me.