Random Walk of Life

Opening Mood: It’s a new day of a new week
Opening Song: Standing in Motion - Yanni

Change is inevitable.
The Proactive bring about it;
The Reactive adapt to it and further stabilize it;
And the Inactive try to resist, only in vain.

The inactive idiots sleep soundly, wrapped in their quilts of security and stability when the first winds of change start blowing over their heads. But they are so engrossed in the lazy music their own snores that they hardly catch these first winds. With time, these light winds grow stronger metamorphizing into a storm. The inactive idiots wake up in the middle of this storm and think that they are in the middle of a “Revolution”.

Remember, o fame seeker, it’s these idiots who stay back to write the history books!

Closing Song: Santorini - Yanni.
Closing Mood: Munir Lands the Plane - Yanni.

Opening Mood: Just returned back from home.
Opening Song: None.

There are thousands and thousands of quotations on love. There are millions of songs and Zillions of stories and Gazzillions of movies on love.

And I am not sure which one of them to believe, because of so many reasons, one of them being the lack of experience. So I better keep my mouth shut about this kind of slippery stuff, but I feel like barking today. For no particular reason [probably theg's post has triggered something, which I am not able to concretely identify] I want to talk of one quote on Love.

Ages ago, I read this very powerful book “The Fountainhead” which had a great line about love -

“To say ‘I love you’ one must know first how to say the ‘I’.”

When I first read it, I was like “Wowie! What a statement” without even half realizing how might it feel to be in love. I don’t think I understand that now either!

I have been wondering, I have been thinking. I don’t have an answer, but, you bet, I do have a question.

All’s fine if you treat Rand’s statement like a photograph. Look at it, appreciate it, turn the page and look at the next photograph in the album. But when you start thinking of Dynamic quality, you start wondering, is this statement always true?! I mean, will this statement hold good once both “I” and “You” have acknowledged the “I Love You”? Will knowing to say the “I” help, once “I” and “You” have combined to become a “We”? Shouldn’t “Love” be the guiding light for “I” and “You” then onwards?

Arrrgh @$#!@#!! What am I even thinking?! Something about which I know absolutely nothing.
Where is the Mop, where is the Broom???
Let me shove this thought outta my Room…

Whoooosh!! Mop Mop Mop!!!

There - Swept away. Back to a clean state of mind again

Closing Song: None.
Closing Mood: In a hurry. Another trek. Charmadi Ghats this time!

Opening Mood: Weekend blues again…
Opening Song : None…

Fixed a stupid bug which had been creating a lotta noise recently. The fix was accepted in the -mm tree!!

Anyway, I was listening to John Lennon’s “Imagine” the other day. Imagine (not the song, but the verb)
how Lennon would have written the song if he lived in the present day. He probably would have written an anthem for open source.

Something like,

Imagine a world so open,
Without any gates or windows
Where people love to share and care
Where knowledge freely flows.

Imagine all the people,
Living with the source.

You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one..
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will live as one

One more of my stoopid imaginations!!!

Closing Song: None.
Closing Mood: Running home for the weekend!

Opening Mood: New version is out… Gotta start porting everything soon.
Opening Song: Piano Man - Billy Joel.

Have you noticed that when you want something *very* badly, it’s always out of stock.

Like yesterday, I went to Planet M, hoping to buy Switch by INXS. Searched the whole shop and finally found INXS. But no Switch. There was every other album of their’s except Switch. Now my usual response is to walk out of the shop with a dejected face. But not this time!

Right next to INXS was James Blunt’s “Back to Bedlam“. Something that I had not planned on buying. But I wanted it the moment I saw it. For the past two days, the song “You’re Beautiful” has stuck like some worm in my head. I simply cannot seem to get rid of it.

And then after a bit of browsing I also found “Piano Man - The best of Billy Joel“. If you like Billy Joel, you gotta have this one. This has all my favourite songs including - “She’s always a woman“, “Piano Man“, “We didn’t start the fire“, “River of Dreams” and many more.

Shakira! I don’t know what’s there in her music except the fact that it make me go “oo-la-la” everytime I listen to it. Bought off “Hips Don’t Lie“. Trust me, they don’t!!

But the top buy of the evening was “Let’s folk again” - A planet M Exclusive. It has some of the best folk songs by stalwarts like Dylan, Baez, Simon and Garfunkel, Chris De Burgh and others. It’s a two CD Album and also comes with the lyrics book. Nice package.

Also bought off “Anand” DVD. I’ve been wanting to *own* this one for quite sometime now. It’s one of my all time favorites.

I know I’ve spent a fortune on all these. But the knowledge that the music you are listening to is one hundred percent legal, is simply priceless!!

Closing Song: Kya mujhe pyaar hai - Woh Lamhe.
Closing Mood: Fresh!

Opening Mood: Weekend Blues!
Opening Song: Piano Man - Billy Joel.

I walked to office today. It was pretty early in the morning and there wasn’t much of traffic. And had Radio Indigo to keep me company. The usual soundtracks played on the airwaves. One of them stood apart.So much that I made a conscious attempt to remember the refrains inorder to google it and find out more about that song.

It turns out to be this awesome song called “Afterglow” by the aussie band INXS ( Pronounced In Excess).

When I first heard this song, I thought it was some remix version of Bryan Adams’ “Here I am”. But it wasn’t. It was something much more special. The percussion in the background reminds you of bollywood. But boy, the lyrics … They are simply too good…

“Touch me and I will follow in your afterglow
Heal me from all this sorrow
As I let you go I will find my way, I will sacrifice
Now I’m living in your afterglow

Bathed in blue, the walls of my memory divide the thorns from the roses
It’s you who is closest “

Buy of the week is their album - The Switch.

Closing Song: Speed of Sound - Coldplay.
Closing Mood: Running home.. Weekend’s here!!

Opening Mood: Accomplished - Patches posted.
Opening Song: Lucy in the Sky - The Beatles.

Ok, I am not quite sure what to write about. Haven’t thought of anything. But I *know*, I will write something and in a matter of minutes the amount of junk here is going to increase exponentially.

Yup, found my topic. Or rather topics. Bangalore night life, Diwali celebrations, and Bridge on troubled waters. Dunno which one to expand on. I feel like a third grader who has been given a set of topics to write a full page essay on, but has no clue how to begin or end. Just a few bones here and there but the full skeleton is not yet known. Archealogy. Yeah, that’s what those idiots probably do. Dig out a bunch of bones and try to fit them together and give it some weird name like pithecanthropus, whatever that means.

See! I have already filled up more than ten lines without actually writing about anything concrete. It aint all that difficult to fill pages.

Ok, Bangalore night life it is….

Just a few months back, one of my collegues got mugged when she was going back home from work.The time was somewhere around 10pm at night. Which makes me ask the obvious question, what was the Bangalore Night Patrol ( I think they call it Hoysala) doing?!

Now I know. They were all on MG road and Brigade road, waiting outside the pubs to ensure that there were no “drunken brawls” or “drunken drivers” on the road.

Hmmm, that’s a nice way of showing your authority. Just catch hold of some damn guy and test his breath. The probability that he will test positive for alcohol would be extremely high. Fine him a coupla thousand bucks and thy job’s done!! Thou hast done thy duty. And how!

If you are thinking that I am going to talk about Mr.Adam Biddappa’s innocence, stop right there.

On then contrary, I feel today’s kids are given too much freedom including the freedom to shy away from the responsibility that comes along with it. Don’t you think that the reason why the police does night patrolling near the pubs might be because of the past experiences of “irresponsible” behaviour by these children of freedom??

I come from a society where one is expected to “earn” freedom by proving that you are capable of handling responsibilities. But I don’t like this model. Because freedom is a fundamental right, and the “guardians” of freedom can always end up being the guards thereby screwing your happiness. That’s definitely not the way to go.

But that doesn’t mean that we start assuming freedom comes for free either.

Yeah, I know, I know. You are thinking, WTF is this guy talking about? Neither this nor that, can’t he just stick to any one thing ?

My answer would be - NO. I cannot. Because I believe that life is all about striking the right balance between conflicting goals.

So now you would wanna ask, Ok Mr.Smarty Pants, how am I supposed to strike the right balance? Hmmm, you know what, if I knew the answer to that question, I would have just coded the whole thing up, compiled it, executed it and rested in peace. I mean WHAT is the point of living if you knew the answer to that? It would be like playing Age of Empires with god mode on. What’s the fun? Satisfying your stooopid ego probably!

Yeah, so my take on night life at bangalore - It won’t improve unless we are ready to behave as responsible citizens.

And having said that it would be of great help if we could have more policemen patrolling on ring road. I wouldn’t want to get mugged like my collegue!

PS: Its so much fun to dump your mind’s snapshot

Closing Song: Free as a Bird - The Beatles.
Closing Mood: I am hungry. It’s dinner time!

Opening Mood : Attentive.. Running stress tests
Opening Song : None.

This is what the Benevolent Dictator for Life ( read Linus Torvalds ) had to say about Evolution vs Revolution.

“Only stupid people think they should throw away old proven concepts. What happens quite often in academia in particular is that you find a problem you want to fix, and you re-design the whole system around your fix. This is how we get crap like microkernels. They have ‘an agenda’, and that’s the _worst_ thing you can have when designing software. You fixate on some perceived problem, and the end result is that yes, maybe you fixed _that_ problem, but in the meantime you also generated a whole new of issues - usually things that were solved by the original approach. The UNIX/Linux approach is a very pragmatic thing - leave the things that work well alone. There’s no point in re-inventing the whole system just because of some small perceived flaws… And many things _can_ be done without throwing out old designs. Implementation improvements are quite possible without trying to make something totally new to the outside. That’s how things like the dcache come about, for example - keeping the standard old boring UNIX filesystem approach, while internally caching it in new ways, improving performance tremendously. Not throwing out the baby with the bath-water doesn’t mean that you cannot improve the system. I’m only arguing against stupid people who think they need a revolution to improve - most real improvements are evolutionary.”

Now I know why I love this field so much. Just love the idea - to evolve, to grow, to change, to adapt. Dynamic, eh? You bet it is

Who made the statement “Have your head in the clouds and your feet firmly rooted to the earth“ ? I can’t remember.
But, if you can’t imagine how to do that, think of climbing a mountain, and you’ll know how.

Closing Song: None
Closing Mood: My tests need me. Something not going according to the plan. Need some Change!

Opening Mood: Normal da.
Opening Song: Some peppy thing on Radio Indigo

What is your world view ? Are you a Postmodernist, an Idealist, a Romantic, a Fundamentalist??
Find out at http://quizfarm.com/test.php?q_id=23320

Looks like I am a Postmodernist! This is what the site said:

Well, from the looks of it, I am more of a materialist as compared to a Romantic! Well, I always thought it was the other way around!!

I don’t know, and I don’t care!

Closing Song: Belly Dancer by Akon
Closing Mood: Didn’t you read properly?! I don’t know and I don’t Care.

Opening Mood: Nice  The patch has come out good.Opening Song: El Condor Pasa by Simon and Garfunkel.

It's been a long time since I blogged. That doesn't mean nothing happened.Infact lot has happened since I last posted. My first patch got published,It fetched some good reviews, and some *not* so good ones.

I also went for my first trek. It was fun, the trek. We walkedfrom M.M Hills to Nagamale, and from there to Palar. 24 kilometersaltogether. Details can be found here.

Other than that, I also visited my hometown twice more.And did the obvious - Sleep!


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Boy!  I still have a thing for Anagrams!


Ok, back to the post, this one is about mushy songs. Doesn'tquite fit in this blog, now does it?! I know, I know, but I seem to havekinda developed a liking for some of these songs lately.

For four years in college, I've just been collectinga lot of music, but listening mostly to the instrumental genre.Even at work, I love my Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner, Mae, Yanni. Probablythe lyrics distract me from coding ;). However, I wanted a change and forthe past two weeks I've been listening to songs with lyrics.And guess what?! The mush songs seem to be the most relaxing ones!With them, you just drift away, where the singer wants you to.Like taking you back in time. Mmmm, nostalgia, smells sweet!Here's the list of my favorites. In no particular order that is.I want to spend my lifetime - Mask of Zorro Soundtrack.I guess this one was sung by Mark Anthony. Vipin recommended it wayback in 2nd year Engg. But I was busy listening to Hindi Music back then.

Lady in Red - Woman in Red Soundtrack.Don't know who the singer is. But it's damn good. One of thefirst english songs I ever listened to.

I'm leaving on a jet plane - John Denver.I had heard the Aerosmith's version of song back in college. Probablyit was the soundtrack of some movie. I remember Steve Tyler screaminghis lungs out towards the end of the song.

Love will keep us alive - Eagles Original.A nice song from the Hotel California gang. The vocals are girlish.I had the video of this song from their 'Hell freezes Over' concert.

That thing you do - The Wonders soundtrack.Would have deleted this song, if Thamie had not made such a fuss outta it.Thanks maccha, it's a nice song.  Also saw the movie "The Wonders".They were truely  The 'One'ders.

Iris - City of Angels Soundtrack.This has been my long time favorite. Though didn't quite knowwho was the singer or the name of the song. It was played onRadio Indigo today morning. Seems that original was by Goo Goo Dolls.The one I have is Ronan Keating's version.

Sealed with a kiss - Bryan Hyland, The Wonder Years Soundtrack.Got this one from the songs I flicked from our seniors. It's the mushiestof them all. But boy, does it have that retro feeling! Awesome!!

Ain't no sunshine when she's gone - Notting Hill Soundtrack.Bill Wither's version, this is one those songs which can put youin a light-blue mood!

When you say nothing at all - Notting Hill SountrackSilence is Golden! Reminds me of the night-walk-in-the-park scenefrom Notting Hill.

Love is All around - Four Weddings and a Funeral Sountrack.I haven't seen this movie, but another *mushy* movie which hasthis same song is Love Actually. Liam Neeson's story in that moviewas a nice one.

Bridge over troubled waters - Simon and Garfunkel.What a song this one. It's certainly one of my all timefavorite. Abhinav Chaturvedi recommended it while we wereinterning at Pune. Thanks dude, else I would not have listenedto this awesome duo.

El-Condor Pasa - Simon and Garfunkel.Another one of their beauties. I am not sure which is the stringinstument they use to create the opening tune of this song. Soundssimillar to santoor. The song has a Mexican feeling, evident from it'stitle.

Good Riddance - Green Day.Reminds me of Lenon strumming on his guitar while we were sippinghot tea. This one is considered to be a famous breakup song.Suitably named :D!

She's always a Woman to me - Billy JoelI had this song since ages. Listened to it only last week. The lyrics arereally good. One of those narrative songs with very little background music.

I just called to say I love you - Stevie Wonder.Those who've seen Omkara, this is the *same* song whichViveik Oberoi teaches Kareena Kapoor.Only that the original version sounds *much much* better  

Something Stupid -Robbie Williams version feat Nicole Kidman.The original version of this song was sung by Nancy Sinatra. Anotherof my latest discoveries. They played this song on Radio Indigothis morning.

By the way, Bangalore has a new international radio station -Radio Indigo 91.9 FM. Finally some good music in the airwaves.A big relief for anyone bored with nasal "over"tones!!!


DISCLAIMER: The paragraph above is not a sponsered Adfor Radio Indigo. It's just a token of gratitude for playinggreat music. Keep up the good work guys!  

Closing Song: It's Probably Me, Lethal Weapon Soundtrack.Closing Mood: Good. Brilliant  infact, to get started with the locks!

Opening Song: Pulp fiction Title track.
Opening Mood: Cool. Infact hangover from ZATAOMM.

The past few days of my life have revolved around only two things.
Locks ( all sorts of them ) and ZATAOMM. I wanted latter to be more of a way to relax so that I wouldn’t dream of the kernel-code.

But, it proved to be much more than that. It was as if you are groping for something in the dark and you find something, which you just keep for the sake that you have found it. But later when you shed light on that find of yours, you realize what wonderful a thing you’ve found.

ZATAOMM is *the* Elixer which has to be sipped slowly inorder to savour it. Gulping it down in one shot might leave you with a dizzy feeling.

Anyway, this post is about Quality. The subject that we’ve been discussing all through our seventh and eight semesters through Software Engineering and Software Quality Assurance. I wish I had read this book back then.

The excerpt below echoes most of my ideas, only that it presents these ideas in a manner that’s way more enjoyable.
So without much ado, I present before thee Phaedrus and his discovery of the qualities of Quality.

The world now, according to Phædrus, was composed of three things: mind, matter, and Quality. The fact that he had established no relationship between them didn’t bother him at first. If the relationship between mind and matter had been fought over for centuries and wasn’t yet resolved, why should he, in a matter of a few weeks, come up with something conclusive about Quality? So he let it go. He put it up on a kind of mental shelf where he put all kinds of questions he had no immediate answers for. He knew the metaphysical trinity of subject, object and Quality would sooner or later have to be interrelated but he was in no hurry about it. It was just so satisfying to be beyond the danger of those horns that he relaxed and enjoyed it as long as he could.

Eventually, however, he examined it more closely. Although there’s no logical objection to a metaphysical trinity, a three-headed reality, such trinities are not common or popular. The metaphysician normally seeks either a monism, such as God, which explains the nature of the world as a manifestation of one single thing, or he seeks a dualism, such as mind-matter, which explains it as two things, or he leaves it as a pluralism, which explains it as a manifestation of an indefinite number of things. But three is an awkward number. Right away you want to know, Why three? What’s the relationship among them? And as the need for relaxation diminished Phædrus became curious about this relationship too.

He noted that although normally you associate Quality with objects, feelings of Quality sometimes occur without any object at all. This is what led him at first to think that maybe Quality is all subjective. But subjective pleasure wasn’t what he meant by Quality either. Quality decreases subjectivity. Quality takes you out of yourself, makes you aware of the world around you. Quality is opposed to subjectivity.

I don’t know how much thought passed before he arrived at this, but eventually he saw that Quality couldn’t be independently related with either the subject or the object but could be found only in the relationship of the two with each other. It is the point at which subject and object meet.

That sounded warm.

Quality is not a thing. It is an event.

Warmer.

It is the event at which the subject becomes aware of the object.

And because without objects there can be no subject…because the objects create the subject’s awareness of himself…Quality is the event at which awareness of both subjects and objects is made possible.

Hot.

Now he knew it was coming.

This means Quality is not just the result of a collision between subject and object. The very existence of subject and object themselves is deduced from the Quality event. The Quality event is the cause of the subjects and objects, which are then mistakenly presumed to be the cause of the Quality!

Now he had that whole damned evil dilemma by the throat. The dilemma all the time had this unseen vile presumption in it, for which there was no logical justification. that Quality was the effect of subjects and objects. It was not! He brought out his knife.

Those of you who are interested to read more, there’s an online version of the book which can be found here.

I am only half way through the book by the way!

Closing Mood: Calm.
Closing Song: IRIS ( Movie OST of City Of Angels).