He curled his fingers into the closest thing to a fist he could manage, and then he punched the wall. Many times.

But it was a wall, so the wall didn’t move. His hands hurt, though unless he hit the wall at the correct angle. Even then, after it hurt after a while.

So, he thought to himself, this is a waste of time. I shouldn’t trouble myself hitting walls. The wall doesn’t seem to trouble itself too much.

And so came the day he stopped punching walls.

It was the care,That was the problem.
Before I found a solution,
The problem went away.

Oops. There was one more that I had to get out of the way.

I had started off November extremely excited about the National Novel Writing Month (www.nanowrimo.org), sure that I would follow all their tips and get 50000 words written by the end of November. The idea was ready, so I was already in a better place than a lot of people. Or so the e-mail said. I told all my friends, and even made them a part of my story, just so I would have even more motivation to get it done.

I decided I would not edit the novel. I wouldn’t re-read it. I would just keep writing. That was what all the motivational e-mails said. Save the editing for December. Write today like there’s no tomorrow.

I have no idea where I slipped and decided to rethink a few bits. I changed the point of view in the second chapter and I was immediately lost. I couldn’t decide whether to rewrite the first chapter or whether to edit it in December, though the latter was obviously the right thing to do. Three days went by with me lost in thinking about the story and I was 6000 words behind schedule. Two more and I knew I would have to give up. This November, unfortunately had been destined to be a busy month the day it began. So, the novel is going to stay in my thoughts for a few more weeks now. The new deadline is the end of January, so watch this space. New ideas are forming as we speak :)

Here’s the thing: I’ve always loved sports. I think I loved to swim once. Then I got bored, or I hated the coach, depending on whether you talk to me or my mother. I loved Table Tennis. I still love Table Tennis. I can’t wait to get to a TT table, but:

a) I’m scared that my hand will shake. That’s happened for the last few years. My right hand shakes sometimes. It doesn’t some other times. It’s distracting and worrying. But then, I think I’ll be okay now.
b) I’m lazy. There’s a TT club, but I have to join it.
c) I’m shy. New people and all.
d) Joining the TT club costs money.

I always loved football. Still do. But for very similar reasons as above, I’m not getting any. Though I have tried to fight my natural instincts and gone and asked a few times. Persistence is the key, I guess. I really like squash too. It reminds me of TT in some ways, and doesn’t in some other ways. I like it that there are games where I do things I didn’t know I could.

Tennis and volleyball are a lot of fun. Badminton is okay, though I don’t play it much. Rock climbing is awesome. But it costs money.

Running. Running deserves a post by itself, because of the love-hate relationship I have with it. Either way, I don’t really consider it a sport when I do it because mostly I’m competing with myself. The post about running might or might not come up one day. We’ll see.

He pauses, and thinks. Wait 3 seconds before proceeding. Really.

This post wasn’t meant to be about the individual sports. It was meant to be about the fact that through my life, I’ve constantly scolded myself for quitting swimming. It’s true. I was a year away from nationals, and I quit. Whether I was bored or it was the coach, it sounds stupid today, doesn’t it? I thought when I started playing TT, I would stick with it, but my academic performance got in the way. But, today, I realized – very completely – that I’m happy doing a PhD, that I like my research and that I would rather do this than be a sportsman. Though I still do want to play football :-|. And TT. And squash.

Whatever it is that I want to play,
I can confidently say (today)
That I’m happier,
With Matlab open and
me lost in a problem
I only half understand.

What if the moment of reckoning does not come for him?
What if it does,
and you were the one who was wrong?
All along?

What then?
Will you still be happy about the road you didn’t take?

-Daft

It’s not often that I get annoyed with code. But circumstances are such, and though others may derive different causes from them, I have contemplated long enough to know the cause has been work. Anyone who knows me will tell you: I’m not one to complain much. And yet, for the last few months, that is what I have been doing. Working, not working, working – always complaining, to an extent where I believed that I had changed. Like Laundry :P

First I blamed it on a lack of money. Then on love. Then on not playing football. Then to various degrees – on things that randomly came up in the spur of the moment: lack of exercise, a dirty kitchen, waking up late, waking up early, not drinking coffee, drinking coffee….For a while, I even settled uncomfortably on the conclusion that this PhD is not for me. During all this, I screwed up while playing drums on stage. This is something I consistently do, just as consistently as I believe that the next time will be different. I lost in a squash match to an opponent, when I had had myself believe that I was number 4.5 in the university.

I didn’t mind that some people didn’t listen to me. I did mind that some others didn’t.

Of course it was work. Of course I didn’t accept it – even though I never stopped saying it – because:

a) I was lazy
b) It would mean I had to work. Refer (a) above.

These last few days, I have been at war with Matlab and my adviser (even though really, we were on the same side), and today I won. So for now,

I’m happy.
That my code works.
That my plane soars.
That I can sleep and dream.
(Which really, I was doing anyway).

That I can use big words,
like research,
and Passion
and Truth
and
(an a different, though sort of tangential note)
Good.
and not punish myself.

Life is like laundry.
Change is necessary.

-Daft

I ate one and a half vegetarian burgers. One at Merry Ann’s Diner and half at Guidos – or Two East Main, as I like to call it. The latter was crispier, and tasted better. The former was cheaper, tasted okay, but I like the place better. The former was a "harvest burger" and the latter blackbean. While I was eating them, I remember thinking that I should write reviews of every veggie burger that I eat. And so I started this post. But now that I’m here and writing it, I find that I can’t write exciting stuff about food after I’ve eaten it. Next time, if I have a laptop around when I’m eating a delicious burger with sauce dipping from the sides of my mouth, I should be able to write something more interesting.

I saw A Serious Man. Attached to this movie is the name of the Coen Brothers, something that means something to people who are familiar with them. I’m not, since I haven’t seen No Country for Old Men or Burn After Reading or The Big Lebowski. Though, I know the names of these and other movies that they have made and know that they are slow, weird and very good or some combination of these three depending on who you talk to. A Serious Man is slow, though in a very good way. I understand why some people could call it weird, but I didn’t think it was. It is a very good movie, however and it made me think about the ending after the movie was over, something I don’t do often. It helped that I had very good company, of course. The movie seems to revolve around the premise that even when you think it’s all over, it isn’t.

These games are fun,
Real fun.
But I would
rather not play them.

Very, very, very bad metaphor: The kernel has changed. A reboot is necessary.

* Pause *

Reboot done.