Life Updates

Since, some of you might be wondering what I am up to, I endeavor to satisfy your queries by one good answer.

I am up to no good.

For now.

I finished my GRE, TOEFL quite a while ago. Did my applications to nine univs and got into only four – Now that’s a slap in the face – Some univs of really low rank have turned me down and some univs of really high rank have taken me in. Laws of life are topsy turvy. Or maybe this does prove murphy’s law – Anyway in this case, its all good – I’d rather have admits from better univs and rejects from mediocre univs than the other way round.

To settle my scores, meaning for those of you who don’t know me – Here is a great way to know - a direct link to my Résumé. Please check it out. If you are in charge of a company, please feel free in offering me a job – preferably online work. It would be nice to earn on the side, when I’m studying.

For those who think my GRE score is 1460/1600 – its not – my scores were first erroneously reported. It is 1450/1600. The last report that came home had it right. You may ask what the heck is there in a difference of 10 points. Trust me – there is a world of difference. And my TOEFL CBT score is 300/300. (Allright – I’m openly boasting here – feel free to pelt me with potatoes next time you see me – preferably fried).

My good offers of admission were from Texas A & M University, North Carolina State University and Iowa State University. My MS is to be in Computer Engineering which is different from Computer Science (One is hardware and the other is software – for those who are not in this field).

I have chosen North Carolina State University for now. My cousin did the same course there, seven years ago, and he says the faculty are still there and they’re good. He’s now in a great position in INTEL. So he must be right. Viva la NC State.

Waiting for the Visa appointment date. Fingers crossed.

Just watched Spiderman – 3 and saw that it was a very normal masala film of the Bollywood type. I didn’t like it when Harry died. He didn’t say any good last liners. I am a person who loves a good last line for a guy who’s dying. People out there – think of a good last liner right now – better to be prepared for it.

A gangster’s line : “Who put this violin in my violin case ?”

Or in different ‘lines’ : “Who put this guitar in my guitar case ?”

(The second one is for guys who don’t like violins – If you don’t like both violins and guitars, then a gangster cant be possibly made to carry a piano case.)

Think of great last lines for james bond villains, like :-

"OK, I shall tell you my evil plan, because you'll be dead anyway..."
"No, I'll take him out myself."
"Yes, I will engage you in hand to hand combat, Mr. Bond..."

How about the villain’s henchmen :-

"He's only one guy; how much trouble can he be?"
"We have him cornered, there's no way he'll escape this!"
"He's out of bullets, we got him now Bob! Uh, Bob..."

Or just plain last lines :-

"No officer YOU put Your gun down!"
"Cut the red wire, not the green one."
“I hate you and your entire family, Mr.Corleone.”
“AAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaggggggggghhhhhhhh.”

Think out a last line for yourself. I invite all you guys to put in any good last lines as comments.

My eight member gang. I'm the third guy from the left - with only my rotund face peeking out.

[Updates on my life]

- Abhishek Ranganathan

{Why pay a dollar for a bookmark? Why not use the dollar for a bookmark? – Steven Spielberg}

Blogging is booming. So, the blogger is back.

Its been a long time. A very long time. Almost one year. I apologize to all my loyal readers out there who have been yearning for my blog.Hence, by public demand, I have once again entered the blog zone.

A lot of stuff has happened in the past year. I see my last entry was when I went to Mayajaal. A million little, yet significant things have happened since then. I should have been spending more time on blogging rather than fritter my time away on orkut, google talk, etc. I have now officially re-entered the blog scene.

Blogs are becoming a large part of the modern day world. Yet, the word blog is still not particularly appealing to me. I know its the abbreviated form of 'Web Log'. But every time I hear it, It sounds like something that involves stomach upheaval and projectile vomiting. Try saying it out loud - its like blech : the word you say when you dont like the food you have tasted. Or more like blah : which is closer to home, because blah is what most of the bloggers are doing. Blogs are 90% blah. You have to agree that what you are reading right now is not exactly Shakespeare.

"To be, or not to be : That is the question" - Now that IS Shakespeare. So that makes my blog less blah.

Blogging is done by almost everybody on earth who has access to 24-hours-a-day internet. The best part is that Corporate Executives and Managers are getting in on the action too. But it isnt the way that you think it is. They get their secretaries or corporate tech writers to womp up a really witty blog. If it aint witty enough, they'll ask it to be full of witty quotes from really famous people who are wittier that the manager; thus the manager is able to establish a certain level of wittiness close to the wittiness level of the famous guys. (I guess I used the word witty too many times - that wasnt very witty of me.) I pity the people who work for managers. (Is that more than half the population on earth ?) Maybe the unemployed have it good. They are not bothered by managers, nor will they be able to tick me off (through comments on my blog) when I say that they cant blog, because they cant afford to have access to the internet. And they cant tick me off because I said those words as they dont have access to the internet. For people who didnt understand the babble that was my last two sentences, feel free to read it again. Dont read it a third time - I'll charge you for it. Now back to my topic - what was it - hmmmm - got sidetracked ... wait a minute. I'm unemployed - I have access to the internet. That totally screws up my own theory. I apologize to myself for trying to insult myself.

Here's an example of Corporate Blogging - through my favorite comic hero Dilbert, By Scott Adams.

Please dont sue me for putting these strips up without your permission, Scott Adams. I love your comic. (See above the pictures - I gave credit to the author - I hope thats enough - Great fan !!!) - This is if Scott Adams or someone from Dilbert reads my blog.

Updates on my life soon.

[Blogging on blogging - now there's a blog]

- Abhishek Ranganathan

{I have strong feelings about gun control. If there's a gun around, I want to be controlling it. - Clint Eastwood}

The Rich, The Poor and The Filthy

I recently had a golden opportunity to visit the famous capital of West Bengal. We got there by airplane and were shipped off by taxi from the airport which rocketed past the bad traffic and even though we got sidetracked from our destination, we got back on track and reached the house of my dad’s friend, whose son was getting married (Whew – that’s a long sentence and now I notice that even though I traveled only by plane and taxi, I have used five modes of transportation to describe my experience – no, sorry, no prizes for listing out the five)

One thing I noticed – Calcutta is 98% dirty.

Not just dirty, its filthy. I went to the most famous temple there – The Kali temple, and that was so filthy that I couldn’t stand to stand there. Most of my concentration was on refraining from stepping on something gooey rather than focusing my prayers on the deity. Not more than 10 seconds of praying has passed, before I’m rudely pushed around by the public and I step on a fresh piece of spittle. YUCK.

One clean place I found :-

The adult Calcuttans are very, very nice people. Adults, meaning those who have crossed atleast 35 or 40 years in age. The youngsters, or people who are my age are the most colossal pieces of waste I have ever seen in my lifetime. They have intelligence, money (through parents), Good education, everything – but they are as bad as the hippies described in South Park – maybe even worse. All they do is smoke like all the cigarettes are gonna run out today and drink as if their livers are already shot, so why not another round.

Now, usually, people who drink and smoke are fine with me. I have been to umpteen number of parties where I’m the only guy who doesn’t smoke or drink and most of the people, though drunk, still have really interesting stuff to talk about. But how do you like it when 12 other people (8 men and 4 women, yes – women) are smoking 10 packs each, right in front of you and drinking like there’s no tomorrow, and the worst part is the conversation.

Their entire bloody conversation was about cigarettes and alcohol. ‘Which are the best cigarettes and which type of drink gets you inebriated in no time’, (or drunk, if you haven’t read the GRE word list) etc, etc. The whole experience sucked so bad that I was, for once in my entire life, at a loss for words. I know that a few of you will feel that it is quite a pity that I’m a strict non-smoker and non-drinker, etc, so that I could have joined the fun. But, since I am a teetotaler, I was demoted to the job of sitting there and twiddling my thumbs. The good part was that I discovered I had quite large thumbs, so twiddling was a better experience.

But around two hours later, when they were all drunk, the fun started.

Two guys started arguing about the best beer in the world. One got really angry and said “shut up before I slap your face”. The guys froze and the girls were giggling. Suddenly, a third gets up and says “I shall tell you how to give the best slap in the world”.

Now, this was the same guy who started talking about the best beer in the world, the best vodka in the world, the best cigarettes in the world, you get the picture. So, I take a wild guess that this guy is either working in BEST, Bombay or he is the best person to ask about the best thing in the world for a category. (Although his knowledge of the superlative is usually on things that are truly harmful to your body – So if you want a piece of advice on a good topic, like weight loss; he wouldn’t ask you to do exercises or diets, but he’ll give you the best method to lose 10 kgs in a month, hey, even in a minute – Cut your arm or leg off.)

(Legal Warning : Cutting off arms or legs are done by experts. Please do not try them at home or anywhere else.)

(Some bike ads have the weirdest sense of humor – they give you unbelievable stunts on the ad and they say “Please don’t try this at home” – I mean, where would anyone have enough space inside their home to do a bike stunt – It would most probably be on a road or something.)

Back to the topic. This guy says “I’ll tell you how to give the best slap in the world”. Now this is the third guy. The second guy says – how ? The first guy is interested too – since slapping was his idea.

The third guy smacks the first guy in the forehead.

Now the first guy is pissed – he wanted TO slap, not BE slapped. (Although a smack with your open palm on the forehead is not a slap – it’s a well, err, a smack.) Yet, he uses the same smacking technique to smack the second guy who was intended to be slapped in the first place. (Did you get that last sentence, if not – read it again – you’ll get it.) Now the second guy is in pain, but coolly says to the third guy that the slap is not bad, its quite painful. Meaning, he is so drunk that he is agreeing with the third guy that that’s kind of a good slap. Now I’m not a guy who likes to see something wrong happening and just sits there and watches. I speak out.

So I said “That wasn’t a slap at all. It was a smack. A slap is delivered on the cheeks of the face”.

i.e., I didn’t see anything wrong with the fisticuffs, but I disliked their use of English. So, I tried to put things into place from a scientific point of view.

I realized that that was a mistake when the attention of the three slappers, or smackers in my case, turned to me. Now, I understand that when you’re drunk, nothing matters, but when you’re completely sober and you try to argue with three drunks, you ARE going to lose.

But the third guy comes to the rescue – he says – “I see what you mean” and slaps guy one and guy two at the same time. Then, the fight started. I wont go into details, but the end result was that they poured most of the alcohol on the cigarette packs during the fight that they ran out of both and I was smiling like the gods had made a miracle.

The wedding went well and the food was bad. Calcutta boasts of having a lot of good sweets, but I don’t see how their ‘Mishti-Dohi’ is any different from a good cup of yogurt. I can get more sweets at Adyar than in a shop in Calcutta. Their sweets really are over-rated.

Now, Calcutta has a lot of rich folk, whose children are mostly colossal cesspools. It also has the hard working poor folk who toil away and get a meager earning. Then the last part of the population is the filthy folk, whom I have seen in thousands but would never like to meet particularly, because, well …., they’re filthy.

All in all, I take back my first words of this blog. The opportunity wasn’t golden at all. It was much less than bronze – I could get an aluminium opportunity and have more fun.

A pic of a spider in the hotel room.

[The Calcutta trip - quite not what I expected]

- Abhishek Ranganathan

{If the facts don't fit the theory, change the facts. - Albert Einstein}

A Big Mission Accomplished

Have you ever felt as if life is flying away with no time to do what you want ... that an hour of your life is under-rated ? I now think time has a special meaning in life, that each minute is precious. Dear God! - Do I feel old already? I'm hardly 20.

The above photo is just a panoramic photo of a small portion of my Sathyabama University. This was taken a few days before our holidays. After that I had to start preparing for my GRE, TOEFL exams.Just finished my GRE a few days ago. And my toefl two weeks ago. I first thought these two exams were going to be real headaches. But, interestingly, I found myself being deeply engrossed in the new words that I had started to learn. I liked the fact that I was able to implement dificult looking words in everyday english. Dont worry - I wont bore anybody by using unnecessary words, but it was a pleasant experience on the whole.

By the way, I got a 1460/1600 on my GRE. My TOEFL score hasnt come yet ... All I got was the Toefl range 243-300. I just hope I get an admission in a good University in the United States. Got my fingers crossed. After all the hectic studying for the two tests, I've just got the time for this blog. I'm gonna make it a habit to update my blog every week.

The GRE was a unique experience. I went in with the locker key provided. Sat down and wrote their confidentiality statement. Then started the test. With my issue essay being the first thing i had to attend, I started jotting down the required points on the rough paper provided. I finished with the points, stretched my arms and legs and blinked at the suddenly blank black computer
screen.

I looked down and saw what had happened.

I had switched off the computer when I stretched my leg.

I found new meaning to the word 'panic'.

I had always read about feelings of panic by characters in a book or seen it in a movie, but I always felt it to be artificial. I thought panic never occurs like that. However, It was clear in my mind that I was experiencing the perfect state of panic. I guess that was the only clear thing in my mind at that time. The entire welter of thoughts in my brain started sending out smoke signals. I raised my hand and furiously called the test center administrator. She came, She saw and She understood. I stuttered what had happened. She gave me a benign smile and switched it on again. It took around a minute, but the program came up again after I had switched it off with the same essay topics I had been given. The first true feelings of relief started to creep in after that. Though I had lost a couple of crucial minutes, I was glad I didnt have to pay $140 again for another exam. Everything else like the Argument essay, the Verbal section went smoothly. The Quantitative section was a tad tougher than usually expected, but still manageable.

TOEFL was a much easier ball game. It was really quite easy and I'm just waiting for my actual scores to come. Its been a long while since I saw any new movies or looked at any new game releases. Got to get back to all that.Now begins the process of applying to a few universities and hoping I get selected in one of them.

Life is blazing by me without me taking any notice. I need to slow down, see where this train is going and possibly check if this is the station I want to get down on. Too psychological, huh ? I dont know - my brain's still addled from all the thought processes filling it up. I need ways to relax - I mean mentally. I always relax physically - Its a natural state. I never do anything physical in my life, except maybe an hour or two of table tennis. I've found a few more outlets of mental relaxing. I've started my first mystery novel,which'll be done in a few months. I hope its good material.

I think I dropped my humor nerve somewhere in this blog, and I'm frantically searching for it. This has been a more thought provoking entry. Maybe the seriousness will fade out in a few days. Well ... See you till next week.

[A thought provoking attempt after the two biggest exams of my life]

- Abhishek Ranganathan

{ "There are only 10 types of people in the world: Those who understand binary, and those who don't." - Unknown }

It was good fun

How do you define fun ? Do you actually dole out a definition or give experiences to explain it ? Our main aim in life is to have fun, right ? So I had it.

The bench (please refer to the 'Managing to Study' blog for explanations on my bench) had assembled at my house for an outing ... in other words ... it was for a treat for my birthday today. We had two scooters and there were four of us. It was really hot. Yet we went out to have fun.

Our destination ? We thought of Mayajaal on ECR, for those who arent acquainted with the place, its a big building built for entertainment. Its got 6 cinema halls, bowling alleys, pool table, arcade gaming, a restaurent, a shopping area, yada yada.

We started out on the ECR ... the East Coast Road. Soon we forgot all about the heat ... We found the ECR to be a pleasant road, with almost no traffic. With the wind in our faces and a song in our hearts ... we journeyed to our destination. When actually singing on the back of a scooter and the wind in my face, I forgot the fact that I was wearing a cap. When we were doing around 40 km/hr, It flew off.

I yelled "Stop. I lost my cap" to Rama. So he did. I ran down to the side of the road near my cap. It was in the middle of the road. Cars, jeeps, lorries, trucks were whizzing past my cap at 80 km/hr and the bridge scene from M:I-3 came to mind, and I looked up to see if there was any hint of an aerial assault. Just before looking for any copters, I saw a truck go almost over my cap. I then looked up to see if there were any imminent missiles and then looked down. My cap wasnt there.

I then saw it was stuck on the truck wheel and was being given a rag doll ride. So I formulated a plan. I ran to the scooter, asked Rama to step on it and we caught up with the truck. When we were close to the back wheel, I stretched out my hand, leaned to one side and with an action-hero style, I ripped the cap from the wheel. But, then I fell off from the bike and rolled to a stop on the ECR.

Foreseeing all this in Final Destination style, I never ran to the scooter. I walked. (and after a few days, bought another cap for for 50 rupees). 'Better safe than sorry or under a lorry' is my kinda motto.

You see that truck in the distance on the photo ... Its not the truck that has my cap ... But its a truck on the ECR and thats close enough.

We then arrived at mayajaal, with a stupid looking half lion in front. We all wondered if it was broken or was it just a bad sculpture? Whats the point of a lion having a face, a mane, two legs and then after two to three feet it has its two rear legs ... we kept searching for a body that connects the two ... but i guess the sculptor had not attended his biology classes or must have slept through them, like I do, most of the time. Poor lion. If it ever wants to go some place, all it can do is hop around with two legs and wonder "why is my behind always getting left behind ?".

After parking at the back of the place under some shady trees, we looked at a vast expanse of grass and few nice buildings and it slowly dawned on me that this was Mayajaal's new sports club venture and the fact that there was'nt a soul in sight showed that the place was far from doing well. We walked back to the front entrance, and on the way, took a gander at the movies that were currently being shown. 'Fanaa' was one of them and two of us were interested. So I inquired the price of a ticket.

"Rs. 150, saar." was the flabbergasting reply.

No other dialogue was required within 'the bench'. Everything was understood. We somberly walked past the ticket counter to the entrance were they gave us entry tickets. The price for entry was Rs.50 and we had to pay Rs.200 which we could use through a magnetic card, inside the complex. Fun had its price.

We went to the bolwing alley. I had played bowling just once before. That time, it was with my brother and my friend, Rithesh. I saw that I had completely lost touch. Deepak started getting a few good shots in, and beginner's luck was starting to win. After five to six throws, I started getting my game back and got a score with four first time ten-splits on my game and even though I lost to Deepak, I was happy with my ten-splits and to the fact that the scores were far off at all.

We then started a game of pool. Rama and I teamed up against Deepak and Arravindh. After a single shot, Rama confessed he had never played before, and so w all started teaching him and soon, he started to connect easily. We then played four games and Rama & I massacred the other two guys. We almost lost the first game when Deepak had the winning chance to pot the black. Only the black was left on the table. He did pot the black, and the two guys started shouting and celebrating the fact that they had won. But our eyes were still on the green where the white slowly followed the black into the hole. That was a big funny moment. Arravindh started shouting at Deepak and Rama and I started shouting in victorious glee. After that, we played three more games and it was smooth sailing to complete victory. 4-0.

We came down to eat and some guy started saying "I'll give you two meals for two ... Its actually a meal for one, but I'll make the same thing a meal for two and you can have the unlimited stuff from the buffet". So we thought this might be an interesting offer and looked over the items on the buffet menu. It was standard Tandoori fare. He then suddenly said "Please, sir. Take the offer, please". Now I wondered what was wrong with this sentence ? Yah - right - he had said 'please' twice. Now you dont often hear a waiter saying - "Oh. Please eat our food. Its cheap on your wallets". On second thought, Its not often, its never. This struck a bad note.So, we then looked at the buffet itself and found that it looked OLD. Then we understood. But, he had seen the mild eagerness on our faces when we saw the fare and earlier, we had no doubts, as this was 'Mayajaal'.

But we had to take evasive action at that point, or it might have lead to our stomachs being tortured for a day or so. We slowly started to walk away and the guy started pleading us to take the offer and eat the buffet ... I started to feel sorry for the guy, but I wasnt about to just run my stomach through a possible rollercoaster ride for pity's sake. We politely told him "Dont worry. We'll be back after a few games". Needless to say, we didnt go back.

We then went to Marrybrown, had a few burgers, later ordered some chinese items and, in the end, headed for the arcade room.

There was this counter game where we had to press a big pink button at the point when the counter reaches 1000. It starts from zero, goes up really fast and we have to have lightning fast reflexes to get it right. We all tried it once and didnt win. It then dawned on me that it could be easily programmed to make sure that nobody ever 'won'. Still the guys wanted to try again and we stupidly did, only to be dissapointed again, but it was real fun shouting all the time the counter went up, trying to distract the guy's concentration on pressing a big pink button. We played a few more games, collected a few tickets and finally we won a .... wait for it ... a 10-piece CRAYON SET.

After 3 hours of fun and complete satisfaction, we went to a beach on the ECR and sat on the sands for a while and talked about strikes, college, lives and all stuff. 'The bench' is a strict non-smoking, non-alcoholic, purely vegetarian group and Arravindh mentioned these attributes. I told him that i did have some alcohol once, when I was less than two years old and I was on board a ship, a few crew members gave me a few thumbs dipped in alcohol, and after that, according to my parents, I danced all night, was completely drunk and I guess I had a great time, and you have to remember that I was less than two.

After a great many laughs, a few wrong turns, we reached the ECR, came back home to a nice evening and a day well spent. It wasnt bad for a birthday of fun. Wasnt bad at all.

[Description of a fun day]
- Abhishek Ranganathan

{ "First, there were some amoebas. Deviant amoebas adapted better to the environment, thus becoming monkeys. Then came Total Quality Management." - Scott Adams on 'The Theory of Evolution' }

No weddings, one funeral and almost another

It was a dark and stormy night.

Well, it was actually a hot and sunny afternoon but i've known Snoopy to start most of his stories this way, so I just gave it a try.

My mother and I were just returning from a funeral and we were coming home in a tourist taxi. On our way back, we were passing through Indira Nagar (a place close to home) and suddenly a guy with some Gym equipment ran past our car. The driver, with good reflexes, had the instinct to apply brakes, and only after this did we notice who the guy was.

It was this guy in the photo.

I didnt realize this until our driver had slowed down and I was about to shout out something at the guy. But if our driver hadnt slowed down, We could have killed him. Atleast ten producers would have cursed us for bankrupting them. A million fans would have mourned for their star. He gave us a frightened glance and ran off to the 'Maverick' gym on the opposite side of the road.

I still think what would have happened if our car had hit this guy. Maybe we would be saving ourselves from a bit of his over-acting - just a thought.

[A near collision experience with Vikram]
- Abhishek Ranganathan

{ "I'm a skilled professional actor. Whether or not I've any talent is beside the point." - Michael Caine }

When Animals Attack - It happened to me

It was before dawn. I opened the back door of my house. I stepped onto the concrete backyard and looked on at the plants there. I moved towards the backyard water sump. There was a small cabinet that housed the water pump. I walked towards the back wall and the electric pump cabinet was to the right of me. There were a few odds and ends on top of the cabinet. I noticed a white cloth through the corner of my eyes. I walked along, not giving anything any attention.

It moved. With speed.

I abruptly turned to see my attacker. But it was already on me.

Those moments will be etched in my memory till I draw my last breath.

Then it moved past me. Dashed over the fence and made its escape, possibly fearing that I would have returned the attack.

Something was wrong ... it hadnt attacked me. And then realization and stupidity dawned on me. It hadnt been a close encounter with an attacking animal, it had been a brush on the leg with a white cat.

My dreams of reporting my encounter on TV with viewers all over the world, awed at my survival instincts, went up in white smoke. White - a color i'll always hate.

I cursed myself for an hour. And then one more hour ... I would have done it for a whole day .. but I had an exam coming up. So with the all the cursing pushed into the subconscious, I moved to the bathroom for a certain missed call, that i had to attend.

I had my second encounter.But this time, a role reversal had taken place. I opened the bathroom by clutching the door knob and turning it ninety degrees for the door to open.

Something slithered under my hand.

I lifted my hand from the knob to find that i had fully squeezed a lizard that was coolly sitting on the doorknob. In revulsion - I darted back and so did it. I guess it scurried away into the murky depths of the bathroom, thinking it wasnt a cool idea anymore to sit on a doorknob and expecting something fun or appetising to happen - what was the point of sitting on a doorknob - was it trying to do a MI-2 stunt by dangling from the edge of a cliff-like doorknob or was it waiting for the door to spout out some knock-knock jokes ?

A question that will not be answered for eternity. Two encounters - And i was the predator the second time.

I now hate the color white and my right hand. The first i could easily ignore, but how does one ignore a hand - it's really really been tough typing this entire blog up with my left hand.

[Television narrator deep threatening voice] : What do you do when animals attack ?

[Eerie pipe organ ending music]

[A description of close encounters with other species]
- Abhishek Ranganathan

{I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.- Winston Churchill}