Waking Life

Prequel to Sequel to The nature of proofs

2007-07-24T15:47:00.000-07:00

While a proof of some claim A need not be shown in order for it to exist---a "constructive" proof game for A may be inverted to a dual "classical" proof game for not(not(A))---such a game makes sense only if every refutation R₁ of a refutation R₂ of A can convince the adversary that R₂ is indeed invalid. More specifically, the underlying logic cannot be inconsistent; the claim A must be expressed in a logic that does not allow the player to refute not(A) once a correct proof of not(A) is shown by the adversary.

Sequel to The nature of proofs

2006-01-23T14:11:00.000-08:00

A while back, I ranted on when a proof may hope to be correct---the import: only when its construction and verification are essentially devoid of any intuitive understanding; you need intuition only to understand a jump in reasoning, which does not a correct proof make.

However a proof need not be shown in order for it to exist.

Formal theorem provers like me always kind of look down on the lesser mortals who talk about statements and their "proofs" in English. Even when the statements can be formalized, the "proofs" can seldom be interpreted in any coherent logical framework as sound representations of arguments for their truth. I argue that there is in fact an interpretation by doing lesser, that is, by not offering a proof at all.

In intuitionistic logic, all proofs are constructive, that is, a statement is true only if there is a proof that can be shown for it. In classical logic, however, a statement is true also if there is no proof that can be shown for the contrary. A similar idea appears in mathematics under the veil of the Axiom of Choice. Essentially, it can be proved that something exists without actually showing what it is. This is as much a theory as anything else---the Axiom of Choice follows from or breaks a number of mathematical results.

The point of the argument is that classical logic, to be fair, is as good a framework to judge "proofs" as intuitionistic logic. That out of the way, now consider the following (very common) fix:

I say that statement P is true, but obstinately refuse to show you a proof for it. What can you do about it?

So. Normally, if I say that a statement is true, it is my obligation to prove it. In this fix, it is your obligation to disprove it. If the statement is indeed true, you can never disprove it. Hence I "prove" that my statement is true by staying quiet and confident.

A possible fallacy is that there is no way to verify this proof. I could write up a complete strategy to break any argument you might offer to disprove my statement; this might constitute a "proof"---in logical terms, it is a proof of not(not(P)) instead of P; in other words, it is a proof that shows that it is absurd that P is absurd. However, if it is agreed that I am not the defender, that you are the prosecutor, then I should be okay to hide my strategy. Heck, to not even have one, or come up with one on the fly. All I need is to ridicule you whenever you say something that I have already dismissed as ridiculous.

Point made? I'd better not say too much. I probably would have done a better job by not making an argument.

Magnetisms

2006-01-22T16:49:00.000-08:00

My advisor left an office-magnetic-poetry kit in the lab the other day. My labmate had the first go the very same evening:

our.vision.is.to.monkey.with.technology.solution-s

And then last evening I suddenly saw too many fun ways to use some the remaining words. So I squatted on the ground and filled up a section of a drawer with random samplings, rearranging them to sound like English (and on the way, have them seem to dig obscure references to the office couture we're used to, maybe?):

I.come..eat.lunch..take.a.robust.nap
know.when.to.think.serious-ly
please.crash.me.young
I.can.maximize.sound
how.did.this.paradigm.shift.while.you.were.here
let.us.build.a.new.problem.together
we.must.meet.under.the.desk
never.communicate.on.my.machine
time.will.make.the.future
full-y.dress-ed.smart.women.always.get.some.sex.at.my.cubicle

So quietly

2005-12-30T02:10:00.000-08:00

A crowd of friends are sleeping over at my place tonight. The chandelier burns at the faintest dim above darkness. G breathes peacefully on the left; he has taken it upon himself to wake us up at a quarter to seven in the morning. S snores, restlessly tossing over every now and then on the couch; perhaps he dreams of the girl he was for a good part of an hour on the phone with a while ago. I belch up the smooth aftertaste of peppered pesto. And Svo Hljótt whispers down my eardrums.

Delight

2005-12-24T20:43:00.000-08:00

"... forrrty sevenn...forty eight... forrty neine- *big man with pony tail and specs, dressed in jeans, rattles off in a placating grown..*

"... fifffty... fiffty onne... hey, you know who's fifty one? You know? Well Nanny is, Nanny's fifty one!"

"But I don't want to-" *whines a three-year-old girl sitting opposite the coffee table*

"But you have to, dear. We are playing a little game here, aren't we? We are seeing if we can count till hundred, and whether Anne can-"

"But I donnnnnnnnnnn't want to-"

"But it's fun, Anne. Now where was I? Daddy lost count... can you tell me what number we were at? Anne? Okay, let's start over again-
"Onnee... twooo... thurree... foourr... faaaive..."

*some time passes by, as I'm lost in thought... the next time I hear them-*

"You missing Nanny? No-nonono-... you need to hold the drink with both hands, okay? Like theeeesss... there you go! Hey, isn't this brownie yummy? So yummy in the tummy..."

"But I DONNN'T WANT TOOOOO-"

Allergic

2005-12-23T04:55:00.000-08:00

Hidy tidy, Christ Almighty,
Who the Hell are We?
Zimm Zamm! God-damn!
The Mighty Vindies We!

Vindy-Hoo Vindy-Hah!
Vindy-Hoo! Vindy-Hah!!
Vindy-Hoo!! Vindy-Hah!!!
Vindy-Hoo!!! Vindy-Hah!!!!

Nostalgic

2005-12-23T04:25:00.001-08:00

Here.. boys, lets-sing a school song
For the best schoooool of them all..
Cheer.. boys, cheer-for St. Patrick’s,
Cheer-for St.Patrick’s Asansol..

Whatever-the-task, on us, depend,
We’ll-fight-to-the-last, our school to defend,
Whether-at books or games, it’s all the same,
We are always top in the end. [PUM PUM
PUH]-

(So) here.. boys, lets-sing a school song
For the best schoohoooool of them all...
Cheer.. boys, cheer for St. Patrick’s,
For-we-are-the beeesssstttt ooooffff aaalllll!

Touch

2005-12-19T03:24:00.004-08:00

3:15 am. I raid the fridge, stealing another piece of chicken, and munch in thought. I look at the tortilla rounds, think a bit more, then walk back to my bed, get the plate I'd left there after dinner, grab a handful of them chips, dab in a decent amount of salsa, and walk back to my bed with the plate. Thinking, thinking.

3:21 am. New mail. About work finished earlier in the evening. I want to start something fresh in the morning. No worries about lunch tomorrow!...biryani in the fridge, that's the chicken I snicked.

3:43 am. Now.
This, as usual. A new post tonight. I travel from there thence, beyond and back. I've been doing this all week. I love the reads. A couple of mornings back I mentioned this blog to my girlfriend. I can often tell by her voice when she does not like something, and especially when it's me talking about another girl, which she never likes (and don't I adore that!)---the fact that this girl's name is pretty close to hers does not help. What I did want to tell her about this girl is, well, irrelevant. What she said to that, and what I think of it today, are therefore and otherwise, of course, again, irrelevant.

Alright, so this girl is a mystery. I've been reading about her, her grandmothers, suitors, flatterers, a lot of others she points to. Quite unknown to her, she entertains me everytime I type 'm' on the browser URL box, wait for the autofill to do its thing, and enter. It is funny to imagine I'm writing about this, and it is even funnier that I do not want her to know about it. She writes really well. She's funny. I'm sure I couldn't keep up with in real life. Yet safe behind the bush, I love reading her write and can't help but smile.

...

It rained like crazy all weekend. It never stopped raining. No, mister, when I say it never stopped raining, I mean never, never, yes, that is to say, it rained all the time. Pitter-patter-pitttter-patter, howl howl howl. Oh-and-did-I-mention, I went to see the chimp last night, chimp, ape, pot-a-to, pot/a/to, whatever, was a nice watch. Here's the report: tried the "Before Sunset" shave, dressed in black, microwaved the cappuccino from the night before (oh-and-was-that another story! I could not, could NOT for my life let myself drown into sleep that night, so I went out at six in the dark morning to get that coffee---and stupid me, felt really sleepy before I could finish half of it, so)...now-where-was-I?Ah-so, dressed in black, armed with a huge black umbrella, I set out to see the chimp. Was a twenty minute walk, was feeling cheerfully lonely, I'm always cheerfully lonely when I walk briskly and the air is cold. Not many people were out with umbrellas, and believe me, there were many people that evening, out enjoying the rain, and I thought to myself, fuck it, put this huge black thing away that's giving you the aristocratic-buffoon-in-the-age-of-poverty look, so I apologetically went umbrellaless the few more hundreds of steps to le théâtre. It was crowded, it was fun, the chimp was good entertainment. I walked back whistling, stopping for some hot chocolate at a certain cookie place on the way whose hot chocolate SomebodyIknow raves about, nodding in disapproval after taking a couple of sips, which thence added that accidental tune to my whistling.

(I would like to admit here and now that I cannot whistle anything, that I pretend to whistle but all I can do is the Oh Baby one or that Wow Baby one, both tools of the average streetside Romeo that I never was, and that nodding vigorously is the only way I can get the semblance of a wave riding on the monotonous drone.)

It was then that it happened.

The nature of proofs

2005-12-10T00:27:00.000-08:00

A proof may hope to be correct only when it can be verified independent of intuition. The prover and the verifier may agree on a common language to write and analyse the proof, but that language must be bred outside the domain of the proof itself (and I assume that a proof subsumes the theorem it seeks to prove). To analyse a written proof is then to mechanically establish that it has a valid structure.

This necessity, however, abstracts away some burdens off the proof, viz. the denotational meaning of the terms of writing and analysis. One might, of course, prefer to call a proof a proof only when it answers the denotation as well; I would be a bit skeptical, in that case, on what decides the denotation of the in-the-limit denotation language itself. At some point, one would need to rely on intuition to write a theorem to be proved, and write the proof-writing-and-analysis structure, without analysing the soundness of these "translations" formally; it would be futile to seek to avoid this leap.

One now needs to focus on getting the proof right, after such other burdens are hidden. A good principle: strip the proof of any essential intuition. An intuition would reflect a denotation of structure to some in-the-limit informal domain. There is no guarantee that the translation preserves structures, because the structure itself is not formalized in the domain speaking the intuition.

It can thus be thought prudent to delegate writing and analysing proofs to a mind that has never seen the denotational translations as well.

(Note added on 12/16/2005: Maybe I'm repeating an idea that Dijkstra talked about in 1988.)

Camaradereverie

2005-12-08T20:03:00.000-08:00

Friendships
evolve much like
partitioning algorithms---friends
are much like
inhabitants
of intermediate partitions;

Unrelated beings
are not associated
a priori---they
are the only ones
that may
collude their partitions---
on
collusion, friendship begins;

Detachment
happens when
differences arise
due to association---association
is necessary
for detachment;

Detachment may evolve
to indifference---a
partition broken
may opt out
of
further evolution---
it may then rejoin
unrelated partitions.

[ ]

One
should
be careful
when building
un-
de-
ta-
cha-
ble ties
before knowing
the fixpoint---the
only undeniable fixpoint
is solitude, which
precludes the existence of ties.

2005-11-30T19:55:00.000-08:00

This page. "Write, write, left to right, till there's nothing...left to write". I begin this page with that statement. What is left to write?

My answer, I cannot write. In these few months, there have been many times I felt I needed to write; that, I would put under natural instinct. The need to talk is often the most when it is about a complaint. However I have come to appreciate that there is a certain futility in self-pity, and a certain stupidity too, and certainly a lack of manliness. Make no mistake---I dig "Boys don't cry, men do!"---yet for me, if only recently, the act of complaining reflects a weakness persistent, a weakness that any amount of "crying" would not imply, but which certainly comes forth when catharsis fails to rebuild---that weakness I reject.

We often come across the irony in the clichéd winner-lampoons-loser-then-loser-spanks-winner plot. (Did I write about that too?) We typically find such incidents amusing...but is it just that? Perhaps (and I am being plain polite here) we also like the idea of a loser spanking a winner---the so called "last laugh", the idea that everything has to even out eventually, and hope and wait for such a climax, certainly support it, and influence its precipitation whenever possible. That hope is inexplicable: it is a Camus absurdity. Again, make no mistake---I root for absurd hope. Yet, this entails that I understand futility when I can, and I prepare myself for it; I know the line, and when I cross it, I armour up for the consequences. There is a certain lack of care that precedes my hope, thus hope does not enslave me. The climax that never comes does not shock me by its absence. I do not complain.

I am getting ahead of myself, though. I do not understand this well enough. I can elucidate this in my mind; yet I cannot write too much down, since that gives it a finality that it may not claim. I must fear that there might be a Heisenbergian interference of clarity caused by the very act of writing; I must remember Wittgenstein's last line.

What is left to right?

Uh oh.

2005-06-18T10:56:00.000-07:00

Benaud calls for ban on minnows (May 29 2005)
Warne and Hughes call for Bangladesh dumping (May 31 2005)
...
Bangladesh shock Australia (Jun 18 2005)

Lucid ?

2005-06-18T10:17:00.001-07:00

I had a dream last night.

There was some kind of party at our new apartment. Too many people. Slug desis, Delhi-ki junta, Burnpur-er kaku-kakimara. My roomie was sleeping with two pillows on his head to keep out the noise. People were sitting on the floor, eating out of green leaves. Too many people. I remember seeing the usual people running around worried about things. Nobody was drinking. There was a lot of noise, though.

I was following Dimma, she was running frantically, looking for somebody. I don't know for how long. Then she stopped. I saw Dadu sitting somewhere ahead, wet with perspiration, desperate look on his face. His face lit up when he saw Dimma. They said something about looking for each other for an hour, and that it was getting late. They decided to go without eating.

I think Baba and Ma were fighting again. Ma was crying a bit.

I don't remember much else. Except the last part.

I woke up from my dream. I was so tired, I could not move. I tried to get up. I could not. I tried turning on my side, I thought I managed that, but I couldn't get up. I could see my new room, and I could tell that I was turning because the view of the room shifted as I turned. Yet I tried and tried for minutes without being able to get up. I was feeling so heavy. The familiar feel of my muscles stretching, all parts moving as they should to lead up to my getting up, everything was there - yet I couldn't finish the act - I tried and tried - no use - I was *stuck* to the bed, forever...

Then I woke up from my dream a second time. I tried to get up, and could.

Earth

2005-06-14T10:45:00.000-07:00

"I cannot believe that . . . this man could sleep in the same bedroom (with a child) for 365 straight days and not do something more than just watch television and eat popcorn.
"I mean, that doesn't make sense to me." - Juror, MJ trial (male, 62)

!?

An incomplete illusion of inertia

2005-06-07T12:35:00.000-07:00

It's a bright day and the sun feels hot on the skin. Maybe it felt hotter yesterday, at the beach, lying down on K's "hoodie", as she likes to call it. But there was a cool breeze then, every second or two, brushing the sands off my face, soothing the births of baby tans on my cheeks. I looked like a God after my shower this morning. My fiancée loves the colour of my shoulders, she says she does not like the idea of me getting a tan before I show up late summer. I wouldn't like a tan either - but the sun is hot, and it tempts.

I've been thinking of catching up on writing. It's been a lazy spring. I should have written more. I had time. A couple of weeks back, on my way back from somewhere, on the bus, looking out from the window, I had had a glimpse of a thought. I do not remember what it was - all I do remember is that I had decided to name the piece : Illusion, inertia, ... and something else. The third word, if I'd remembered it, might have helped me trace the connection between the first two. But I don't remember anything else about it now. Not even that, that had triggered the thought. Something, seemingly precious, has been lost.

What was the connection? What did I intend to write? I cannot get it out of my head. The sun is hot. Had I discovered that I'd wrapped myself in a state of inertia, and intended to break that illusion in some way? Or had I hit upon inertia as a means to end some illusion I'd discovered I was in? And what was the other, missing word? I remember it began with an "i" - I was excited about the three "i"s in the title.

There's a cool breeze now. I had almost decided to leave, and lie down in the shade for some time. The breeze, the cunning breeze, is making me stay back. I should leave, though. I would not like a tan.

Put in, get out

2005-05-11T12:08:00.000-07:00

(Disclaimer: The title means only what it says; in particular, there is no intended political pun, as might be encouraged by merging words, reading aloud, etc.)

A surprisingly strong duality has recurrently visited me in various guises over the past month. The duality is one between in and out. This deceptively simple pair of opposites, from what it seems, contrive to create quite a stir. I distinguish between a stir and a pact - angels and demons cause a stir, a couple in heat causes a pact. A stir leads to a cancelling effect, destructive to both parties - a pact, on the other hand, leads to a balancing effect, constructive to both parties.

Existence is almost always a form of co-existence, in the sense that there is a context that meddles, and co-exists with the primary focus. Thus existence requires some notion of interface, that allows the focus and context to talk. In a real world, interfaces are never perfect - they are exploited as approximations. Expectations or assumptions in the interface are fuzzed to swallow discrepancies between the focus and the context. On the other hand, such approximations can be allowed only as much as they do not mess up the very rules of existence. In brief, one can take no less than one needs to exist - one can give no more than one can afford.

However, this is still a simplification. The meddling nature of (co)existence is seldom purely passive - it does not necessarily entail taking before giving - that would be much too like calculators and washing machines. Active existence - as one that would be discovered after realizing that isolation from the context is futile, and consequently applying economic sense in getting something out of the context in the bargain - would imply giving to take, feeding and then milking the context in the same way as the context might hope to feed and milk the focus.

Herein lies the problem. Yin and yang do not balance, instead create turmoil - they do not damp, instead resonate. The economic strategy of functioning both as the cow and the dairy annihilates possibilities of approximation - interfaces need to be perfect, for nobody, not the focus, not the context, can take less, or give more - universal laws, with economics, enforce a perfect selfish world.

(And with some thought, one might come up with more interesting aspects of this fundamental dichotomy - here's one. What makes more (economic) sense, introversion? extraversion? ambiversion, then? One might assume some level of information hiding all the time. Beyond that, encapsulation (as expressed as shyness, hypocrisy, indifference) may be good or bad - introverts are terribly hard to use, or in analogy to the discussion above, feed and milk. Prudent contexts would find introverts easy to prune away, by Occam's razor. On the other hand, introverts can coexist, mingle, hence glean more from the context. Being either introvertive or extravertive might have socio-economic implications, yet there exist dynamic possibilities in those choices - whilst being ambivertive leads to a perfect harmonious null, devoid of the spice of approximation, key jammed in lock for ever.)

What do we do, then? Let economics lead us to harmony and perfection? Make pacts, make peace? Or let yin and yang fight it out, and endure the pain of excitement, and let hair go wild in the storm?

There's yin, there's yang. People with either one don't have a choice. Then there's yin and yang, and people with both have choices - suppress yin? suppress yang? freely merge yin and yang? or separate yin and yang? Suppression doesn't make intuitive sense, on counts of imbalance and unconditional bias. A free merge implies Economic Nadir. Almost blindly, we are led to the only choice that makes sense - separation.

...

The separation construct is embarrassingly simple once you hit on it. Forget economics (I've been giving it more attention than it deserves - statistics and economics are arguably the biggest farces when used as proof techniques - one only needs to pick the right angle to view the picture any way one wants). Harmony can be simulated by viewing the focus as a world in itself - with a dynamic pair of secondary focus and secondary context; the yin and the yang of the focus can be separated into dynamic roles within this pair. Approximations can be simulated by letting one of the components of this pair grow and collude to serve a primary role - thus the dynamic secondary focus fights against a dynamic alliance of secondary and primary contexts. The secondary focus can dynamically choose yin or yang, as long as the secondary context acts in (separate) opposition.

The key intuition is that the secondary context serves as a mirror to "remind" the focus when it crosses over from yin to yang, or back. Cancellation is dynamically avoided. One gets the desired effect - Resonating Harmony.

Good morning

2005-04-24T17:24:00.000-07:00

Sweetheart,

I went to church with K this morning. I can't seem to remember the last time I was in church.*
(There was this one time three years ago when I was sitting there for a couple of hours staring and whispering at Him because I badly wanted something. After praying for some time, the serenity got to me, I started feeling bad about wanting anything, and so I just sat there trying to flush my mind instead. I tried to feel threads untangling, water flowing in. It took time, but it worked bit by bit. At the end of it all, I could feel Him, His tilted head, His slanted gaze rushing into me in bursts, and I could feel myself feeling sleepy, clean and fresh. What was amazing was that when I tried doing the same thing on a couple of subsequent visits, I couldn't recreate the flow. There was a strange sense of untruth that guarded the gates the whole time.)

I set up this visit with K a couple of nights back. R and I went out to have some Thai, then thought of hanging out at the beach for some time. Then on the bus R got a call from S, saying M and he were going for The Interpreter, so we detoured. At the Metro we found G and K, so they came along too. After the show, I asked K if I could join her for church this Sunday.

(There was this other time I went with N, before we started having fights. It was a short five-minute stay, and when I closed my eyes I didn't for once think of Him, my mind was full of N, or the idea that I was with her, and what was going to follow. Everything was such a sham.)

Then last night I drunk till 6. At around 10, somebody called somebody, the phone was right beside me because I'd used it before sleeping, in any case I woke up, blabbered something about somebody being in the shower, and got up. K had mailed asking if I was coming. I almost said no, but wrote that I think I'm coming, although I'm feeling really drowsy and I don't know what I'm writing. She said she'll pass by in five minutes. I tried calling her, but got her answering machine. I brushed my teeth, got dressed and came out just in time.

(V would take me to a church every Sunday night in Sydney a couple of years back. The whole place would be lit by candles, the ones inside round glass cups, and I could close my eyes and feel Him flowing with ease. I'd fallen in love with the place. It would make me so quiet; we would come out into the chill, silently looking ahead. I would then walk back, hands deep in my jacket, head down, eyes on the asphalt running back through my legs.)

K started talking. I told her that if she finds herself talking for some time without me responding, she should excuse me. She said she was groggy too. We walked to the base of campus. I started taking the wrong crossing, but she was more alert than I was. We sat waiting for the bus and talked. The bus came, passed a lot of churches till we got to the one we were going to.

She kept asking me if I was feeling cold, I kept saying that it was the excitement. Then we got inside, and the mass started soon after. I was feeling a bit sick the first few minutes. Then some angels began singing. It felt so nice. They sang and I sang inside. There were two with guitars, one at the piano, four females singing at one scale and a male singing at another. A brook deep inside a forest. And sometimes waves building up one after the other, except that I could never see them break.

There was a couple infront, sitting so close. Their shoulders almost overlapped, so close. I missed you so much. I wished you would hear the carols, and smile that smile you smile when you love something so much that you can't say how much, yet the twinkle in your eyes and the flush of your cheeks say how much. I promised I would bring you here every Sunday.

There were so many old people. I got blessed by a very old woman. And then there were so many small children carrying the cross, the wine, hurrying around the altar, and coming back with proud, smiling faces.

The Lord has made this day, let us recite and be glad.

When we came out, K took me to a chapel and we spent another minute or two there. It was even more beautiful. Then she took me to an old stone building. She said it was a brick building, but I did not want to tell her otherwise. She asked why I was grinning constantly. How could I tell her how good I felt. There was a park, we came across a fireplace, some other signs of fire been lit, and lots of wooden tree trunk stubs to sit on, and fairly long dark green grass. K said we should have a barbeque here sometime. I agreed. She showed me a place on the top of a small hill, from where you could see most of the downtown area. She said she loved Santa Cruz. She said one of the things she loved was that one could explore so many places on foot. She kept looking for some stairs that would lead us down, saying she knew they were here somewhere. I didn't want her to find them, but she did eventually. Even the stairs were cute.

We had lunch at Asian Rose. K said she's found out this morning that I'm non-vegetarian, that I like eggplant and that kids make me smile. We talked for some more time. Sometime in between I told her she was a lot like J, except that I did not mention J. Before that, we reached Peach Terrace. It was around 1:30. It wasn't morning anymore.

Humpies,
A.

* I remember now, a couple of days later.

Devil's business

2005-03-15T18:31:00.000-08:00

One
Here's the deal. I have fifteen minutes before the train comes and leaves, with or without me. I have fifteen minutes for all I have to say. Fourteen minutes is all I have.

I made a startling discovery. No, I don't want to be Fermaty. I want to spell out what I discovered. But I need time. I do not have time. Yet I don't want to be Fermaty.

I was wrong. There is nothing that cannot be overdone. There is nothing that is invariant to infinite stochastication. I was wrong. I was wrong.

I'm a fool. To not know is one thing. To know and yet be blind is another. To know and yet to hope is the worst.

At the end of the day, every pawn needs to know that he is part of a game. And to know that he can be sacrificed. Yet it can only take a step forward. It cannot go back. It can be blocked and forgotten. Everything is part of a plan. Entropy never decreases. Laws do not have exceptions. Nothing is nothing but nothing.

I was a fool to know and yet to hope.

I have eleven minutes. I do not want to use them up. For they are going to be used hence, not used hence. Never again. I shall go underground. I shall be dead.

I shall be dead. I shall be gone. I shall be myself.

I hate business. I do not like businessmen. I do not like to do business. I can, however, mind my own business. I can deny businessmen business. I can affect things by not being affected.

I have nine minutes. Nine minutes. A cat has nine lives.

I am going to be reborn. I am going to fucking get reborn. I am going to be dead. What rhymed with eight in that nursery rhyme again?

I have to go now. I have to go now. I shall be gone.

Two
I have been thinking. Running makes me dizzy. But it makes me breathe more oxygen into my brain. It makes me think. It makes me think wild.

I have been thinking faster than I can remember.

I remembered that I should beware the Ides. Quinze. Fifteen. Is one less sixteen. Therefore nothing. Facts are facts. They are nothing. They are too many, so nobody cares about them. Fifteen is one less sixteen, but sixteen is four cross four. Seventeen is a prime. Eighteen is double a perfect square. Nineteen is another prime. So what. Therefore nothing.

So many facts, and hence forgotten. That is the key. The Book was right. I was wrong. There is nothing that cannot be overdone. Facts are useless.

A pawn is useless.

A pawn knows that it is useless. This is getting funny. It does not rebel. It is not blinded from the truth, yet it hopes. This is getting funny. It needs to rebel.

Fifteen needs to stand up and refuse to be one less sixteen. Then sixteen cannot be four cross four. Four and four and four may be twelve, but twelve and four cannot be sixteen. Fifteen has stood up and refused to be one less sixteen.

Then three can no longer be one less four. One can no longer be one less two. Zero can no longer be one less one. Zero can no longer identify. Identity crashes.

Every fucking thing comes down. The king does not know himself. The queen does not know herself. Nobody trusts nobody. Nobody uses nobody. The game halts.

This is funny. One fact of so fucking many, one forgotten fact can jeopardize business by not caring anymore. Yet no fact rebels.

Three
The mirror is a weird object. Who invented the mirror?

It is amazing what a pair of scissors can do. It is even more amazing what one can do with a pair of scissors. I have had enough of this hair. I am going to get creative. I am going to vent.

Snip, snip, snip. Snip. Snip, snip. Snip, snip, snip.

Fingers can be deceptively strong. They can force teeth to bleed. I see my mouth, filled with blood. My teeth red. I look good. I look like I've eaten someone alive. I feel good.

Four
To be, or not to be, that is the question.

Five
I missed banging my head so bad. I sometimes forget what I miss. This is bad. Metal is good. I'm loving this. I'm so fucking sorry I did not do this earlier. Where was I lost, forgetting you? You are too good to me. I like this so much. I was missing this so much.

I like the wooden look. I like to be indifferent. I feel good. I feel detached. If someone would prick me with a rapier, if someone would set my hand on fire, if someone would beat me with a hammer, if someone would shoot me in the head, I would still feel good. And detached. This is difficult to do. I cannot do this at other times. It feels silly. Then. Now, this is the best thing that could have happened to me. I can look at that Thai chili stain forever, head tilted at 29 degrees 17 minutes 3 seconds, without a blink. I can stop breathing. I can hear the blood pumping from my heart, into my ears and back. I can lift my hand and point to that stain with my right index finger, and I can see it pointing to everything but the stain, going round and round, never staying on the stain for more than half a second, and I can still not care. I can feel myself going to sleep. I can feel everything grinding to a halt. I can feel void. I can feel the thing that is nothing.

Six
The Devil has been born.

Six
Hot pangs of stinging water on my scalp, bulleting my neck, consecrate me. I morph into myself. I shed my scales. I hatch. I am free.

Six
I cry my first cry.

Forbidden fruit

2005-02-26T15:35:00.000-08:00

Sometime very early in my childhood, I learnt that one has a right to have opinions, and soon after, I learnt to hate the Apple. Every morning, Mumma filled a Golden ratio of my tiffin with neatly cut Apples to school, and I returned, smug, Apples untouched. She proceeded to give me some very curt words of advice and made me eat the Unedible, now almost brown and frightfully smelly. I felt like throwing up.

When I got old enough to have "insights", my favourite conjecture, which I liberally shared with whoever I met, was that the worst way to begin a child's introduction to English is to make it chant "A for Apple". I also decided that Mrs. Ambrose, my Std IA class teacher, was a most horrible liar, when she taught me an idiom on apples and doctors I found Absurd.

Ironically, I learnt to fear and worship that same idiom sometime around the turn of the century. You see, I fell in love with a doctor, and that changed the whole dynamics of the situation. An Apple a Day Keeps the Doctor Away? But I Do Not, Do NOT Want My Doctor Away! Apple, Apple, Go Away! The Rebel declared, bravely, every once in a while - NO amount of Apples can keep you away from her, O Foolish One, or her from you! Grow Up! Yet an irrational fear of the unknown made me shrink at the very image of an Apple finding its way into my mouth. The Apple, already Unforgiven, now became the Forbidden Fruit.

So I diligently avoided the Apple. Come what may, I avoided it for dear life. When I visited Aunt M, she gave me Apples for breakfast; when I went to the Puja at R, I got a leaf bowl of prasad, and sure enough, Apples smiled back at me; God taunted and taunted Eve. But Eve, did not succumb. Sweating in terror, she did not succumb.

---

Then, one day, I, Prodigal Sonofa, saw an Apple, a Gorgeous, Angelic Apple, and I Lusted for it. It was but a foreign Apple, not quite an Apple, yet still an Apple; I burnt with desire, and I burnt with superstitious paranoia, and desire, and paranoia.
I fought and I fought. Eve fought and fought. And Eve lost.

I tasted the Forbidden Fruit. I was tried, and acquitted. For it was but a foreign Apple, not quite an Apple.

Yet still an Apple?

Riddles, entropy, regression and Valentine

2005-02-13T11:05:00.000-08:00

You pick up riddles along the way. You do not understand them, not yet, yet they awe you so, bind you in mystery and hope. You cannot leave them behind, forget, ignore - so you pick them up and take them with you. Your bag, your history is a set of partially solved riddles, most of them opaque, some translucent, a few clear. The clear, transparent ones you hold dear, for they are the evidence of your persistence, of hope not unfounded, of mysteries answered. Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards. (Søren Kierkegaard)

You may hope for the day when nothing surprises you anymore. You may hope for the day when entropy tends to nothingness. Equivalently, you may hope for the day when life is ready to slap you dead. When your bag is empty of riddles, when things are clear as they stand, in point and past tragectory , but with no spice of mystery for tomorrow, you have but two options. To find new riddles by noon, or freeze the game by midnight. For then, you would know that life is ready to slap you dead.

But while you have riddles, you are a busy, murmuring, humming human. You wonder the whys, you sigh the is-it-this-is-it-that-think-think-thinks, you whisper the ah-of-courses, you wink the twinkles in your eye. You are constantly trying regression on seemingly random riddles. You are constantly discovering curves to connect your seemingly random history. You are constantly unraveling the proof, backwards.

You have choices, which you exploit. You look to fit your hypotheses by tampering with the course of your life, so that tomorrow, you may whisper the ah-of-course you think you've been close to for quite some time now. Oh fool, fool you, but so human, you. Tomorrow, you find that something has gone quite wrong - something unexpected has happened. Your choices have spawned new riddles, your hypotheses are not quite there yet. Disappointed? But no! You have, oh fortunate one, stumbled upon the very means to keep you busy! You have stumbled upon a perfect plan to deny life slapping you dead.

Epilogue. And one day, after a taunting, exciting fight with your existence for a good many years lived well, Riddle No. 313* answers itself, suddenly, with a flash of genius insight into the phenomenon Hypermetropia. And you read -
"Riddle No. 313, oh elusive one, you have tormented me day and night, given me reason to scream and cry, wreaked my mind with countless euphoric orgasms of thought eurekas, seen me grow from boy to man. Today, you lie vanquished, and I sigh, with a nostalgic calmness, forever indebted."

* Find j.

Rabid

2005-02-09T13:38:00.000-08:00

I always know when It gets restless. It takes a step this way, and a couple that, pauses, and thumps Its paw on concrete earth. It imagines that this will shake the traffic off the road, bring down some trees, cause a fire, but nothing happens. It bites Its nails. The tttttraffic, making metallic, shrill, nonchalant hammerings on the eardrums, honks its way past time. The gaussians of the pitch, the slow, sure ascents to deafening heights and the reluctant, inevitable descents back to silence, disturb, irritate and taunt It. It knows that time is going to win this race. It thumps its paw again, pauses, then thumps every one and a half seconds for the next five minutes, salivating, red, shivering, rabid. It throws up a low, rattling growl from Its stomach, clenching Its teeth so hard, wanting something to ttttttttttttear apart into atoms. It bites Its wrist, pushing the teeth into the flesh but not closing them as tight as It would, and so pushing as hard as It can - torn between the urge to vent and the sense to fear. The first pangs of pain shoot through Its nerves, and Its shivering drops a hertz or two. More pangs follow, and It gets calmer. Soon, It brings Its mouth out. Its wrist is red and wet, dented. It tries thumping again, but there is not enough strength this time. It stands still.

I always know, that then, It gets hot. Beads of slimy sweat appear on Its forehead, join into streams of pale colorless yellow and niagarate into Its eyes. Into the red, lightning-shaped veins of Its burning eyes. It stands still. The falls get heavier. A fly buzzes into the steamy halo around Its ear and takes three close peeks at the wax. It stands still. It seems, suddenly, the traffic has gone quiet too. It hears a pig being repeatedly battered in the head, a repetitive train of low thuds miles away. The fly sits on the wax, and It feels itchy. It stands still. A cool waft of breeze blows past. Niagara dries into menthol, the fly glides high into the air, hits a blade hanging from an electric wire, which pierces first its wing, then its body, then its other wing, perfect metosis, both parts fall on the concrete earth, disturbing the rhythm of the head-battering of the pig, and the plasma and the white corpuscles of its one drop of blood coagulate before falling on Its nose.

I always know, that this is when It wags Its tail four and a half times.

Feel free to commit suicide

2005-01-26T14:30:00.000-08:00

"At least 10 killed as California trains derail", and life moves on for you, mister, the one who caused it. Except that you wanted to end your life seconds before you caused it---before you changed your fickle, sick mind. You changed your mind, cried in shame, and then caused some others to die for your lack of commitment. Changing your mind was a good thing, perhaps, for you. But you did not respect atomicity, you allowed yourself to be observed---this disturbed things. Now you shall be tried, because you are responsible. Not, this time, for your choices, but because you failed to commit on a choice, you failed to act.

The most humiliating thing I can imagine is to be pointed fingers at for not finishing what you'd set out to do. Free will, you say, but only as long as your hands keep out of my pants. You cannot affect the free will of your environment by your choices. You've got to clean up after shitting, mister. Feel free to commit suicide, or not, but you are not allowed to make choices for others. You messed up bigtime, mister, and I hope you're going to pay.

Il était une fois ...!

2005-01-24T20:36:00.000-08:00

Too much humour

2005-01-15T15:40:00.000-08:00

I would like to warn the world of the following fact: too much humour can seriously affect the way you speak. And in just a profound way as too much logic affects the way you think, judge and articulate ideas. Words in speech, now more than ever, are critical (once you get used to editing on emacs, for instance) - for there seldom exist 'inverse' phrases that neutralize the effects of ill-chosen words.

But the choice of words is scarcely what I want to talk about. I want to indicate the existence of the principle and practice of redundance. For most, it should be an useful concept to close-eyedly accept and apply in everyday speech, for good - even if one is a logician, and has a natal, guttural urge to complete analyses on all counts, or to rationalize every word exchanged in context. To ignore some words, for one will need the favour from the other side (in time) too. To ignore some cases, for one might not be able to do justice to them once one embarks on the path, not in the least because one is incompetent or handicapped to do so, but simply because no such path exists. Some things cannot, and therefore should not be said, because there isn't enough language to describe them satisfactorially. What is dangerous in speech is that choices are committed; there is seldom the scope for "forfeit", even if caused by eventual enlightenment. Therefore, inviting holes in reason are often better ignored, at the solace of being safe from hidden volcanos and flash-floods.

But I've been talking about logic, while I set out to talk about humour. Humour is, perhaps, even more delicate, because it is by it's very nature based on multifarious interpretations, and derives a kick out of implied contradictions - holes in reason are the saucepans which cook humour best - it is only modest to assume that these holes, these contradictions can thorn out unexpected conclusions. What makes this worse is that humour can be tempting, perhaps even habitually so - the practice of taking a dig at everything imperfect is often a pathological mania with those who nurture it (propelled, no doubt, by frequent buttery chocolaty oohs and wows). Once again, because spoken words are by nature committed, a nonchalant humourous arrow might spawn electric loops of arguments one would, desperately, hope to trade for the mere (im)possibility of backtracking into silence. For oftentimes humour is redundant, it is a spice that might liven up the sauce while carefully used, but might easily burn the tongue when fooled around with, in foolery.

Presidents and assassinations

2005-01-14T20:44:00.000-08:00

Although Scorsese was a class apart in Taxi Driver, Sean Penn, I hesitantly admit, beats Robert de Niro in The Assassination of Richard Nixon. The comparisons are inevitable, and it's difficult to be fair; however Penn is Bicke in the truest possible portrayal of being that pathetic, that desperate, that doomed somebody's "is". Undoubtedly Penn's best performance ever. Pure angst. Heavy see.

Being absurd

2005-01-13T10:49:00.000-08:00

It was intriguing to witness a man's dogged persistence at drawing a distinction - to be, to begin with, one of the accepted good, but soon found to be one with a different mind, stretching the good after dark - till the very distinction becomes a vehement fight for identity. To know one's class is in part to know the mind's mode of thought, then find the quirks in the details that make subtle variations in conclusions - variations that become so critical to point out that they symbolize and safeguard, and otherwise threaten to compromise, the very passion that led to the inspection of such depth. The obviously worthless are first filtered out; to be part of the betters, however, is not a satisfaction for long - there is a persistent urge to filter more, distance more, till friends run out and one is alone to fight for his own genius.
The fine line that Camus draws between existentialist escape and absurdist struggle perhaps finds its most sublime example in Camus' own persistence to separate himself from being classified as an existentialist. Walking on that narrow line, on the strength of a position that makes the final distinction, is what is being and living the absurd. To be aware of that distinction, and to defy escape thereon is what gives birth to an absurdist.

Note 1. Gandhi's satyagraha is typically absurd.
Note 2. RMS's ideas on free software, and his distinction between the terms free and open-source make him an absurd man.

Appendix to Strange loop

2005-01-13T10:14:00.000-08:00

Apparently some notable inventions* by Surds include...
- the waterproof towel,
- the solar powered torch,
- the book on how to read,
- the pedal powered wheel chair.

*somewhat edited from a forward on Surd teasers

The chequered tale

2004-12-03T18:57:00.000-08:00

September 25. ## ######## ### ##### #####. ###### ## ## # ### ##### ##### # ## #### ####### ###. #### ####### #### #### ####### # ## #### ###### ## ## #####.

October 3. ### ## # ##### ## ### ##### #### ##### ### ## ####! ### #### ## ####### # #### ##### ### ### ####. "#### ## ## ####### ###?" ##### # ## ## ###.

October 8. ### ### ###### #### ### ## ###### ### ####### # ## #### #### #### ###### ##.

November 1. ## #### ## #### #### ### ### ##### #### # ## ### ### ##. ## ### #### ### ####### ## ###### # ## ###.

November 29. ### ## # ##### ## ### ##### #### ##### ### ## ####! ### #### ## ####### # #### ##### ### ### ####. "#### ## ## ####### ###?" ##### # ## ## ###.

December 2. ## #### ## #### ## ## ####.

December 3. # ### ## ###### ##. ### ##### ### ##### ###### ## ### ### ####. #### ## ######.

New Year's Eve. # ### ### ### #### ###### ### ###. #### #### ## # ##### ### ### #### ###### ###. ## ## ## ##### ## # ##### ## ## ####. ### #####. "##### # #### ### ### ##### # ## #### #####. ## ### ## ##".

Girls can't even hate honest.

2004-11-30T22:16:00.000-08:00

This to any ex-crush, any ex-girlfriend and any ex-ex-chromosome I've known and decided it prudent to label with an 'ex': I HATE you. Yes, I HATE you because I don't love you, and I can't be indifferent about you. My fiancee loves it when I hate you aloud, and although I find that amusing, I get the same kick out of listening to her damning her misadventures. (Digression. And that's the way it should be. There shouldn't be regrets, questions like 'what if' and 'how could I'. Time has an arrow; the me,context tuple of yesterday had made the me,context tuple today. I am because I was, there's no way I want to defy time; then I will not be what I am. Hating is my defence against my human tendencies to regret.)

I hate you a lot, oh yes, there were times I wanted to kill you. I probably wouldn't have killed you in the end, though; I was fearful of myself. And that was the bend, when I saw the dark yonder of the curve, each time. I was fearful of myself, so why would I destroy Me because of You? And so you became that-one, and love turned into hate, kill-and-let-kill gave way to live-and-let-die. Hate saved me, or maybe I saved myself and HATE saved me from there on; HATE I brood. For there is no cause not to hate, it's done with and all that remains is a muted vengeance and a heart full of filthy wishes. For you.

Sometimes I did flounder, there were days when I thought, why don't I let it go, because there isn't that sting in the HATE anymore, I didn't, like, think filthy of you this morning, maybe I've almost forgotten you, so why not let it go? If I see you next time, I'll just say 'Hello', and then you can slip into the class of people I've never met, who may have been in the world and hence in the context of my me,context tuple of the past, but were never used, and hence why not cut them out, Occam would say. Cut You out? How can I? How could I? For you changed me everytime, every one of those thorns changed me so that if I like what I am, which I do, I have to give you credit. I have to say, look, you WERE used! So Occam yields, and I think, if I can't cut you out, why say Hello? Nothing matters anyway, but to say Hello would be to say, Oh well, it's okay dear, those days were not that important, that madness, that insane urge to murder, destroy and burn was, ah, something I can forget about. Duh!? Who said I can forget about that, dear. Off you go Unhelloed, for I HATE you.

So why can't you hate me the same way?

When there's a cigarette burn in my shirt, I like to tear around the hole till the shirt looks like part of the hole, and not the other way around. I am NOT okay with holes in my shirt. Although you ARE, probably because you've never smoked? Why do you like keeping things 'floating', hoping for a better future with the sun shining inspite of the clouds that would inevitably beget mud? Why are you, what-shall-I-say, so optimistic? And what about? Or is it your curious urge to be likeable, by friend AND foe AND once-upon-a-time-lover-who-I-hope-not-turns-into-a-foe? Oh but I HAVE, I am dormant, yes, but I'm your MOST dangerous foe! Yet why don't you leave me alone? Why do you, N, ask for the coffee date, and you, S, tell me about your adorable H, and why, of all people, you, T, the girl I HATE for eight years now, whose name I'd vowed to give to my first ugly pet-bitch and then poison her, why would you crop back into my life again, as you did today?

Why don't you just leave me alone?

Why Jay Itches

2004-11-17T14:32:00.000-08:00

(Read 'Y', 'J', 'H's)
So I thought pronouncing Jurgen Klinsmann as Yorgen Klinsmaan was bad enough. Then I became a Domino's fan and by-the-way 'jalapeno sauce is actually yalapino sauce', or so I learnt. So I generalized and imbibed the weird-but-true substitution of J with Y every time I heard a foreign word.
Of course, San Jose could't be a foreign word, but it was. The first time I was on Caltrain from Stanford to San Jose, I didn't recognize the eerie rendering of the name on the arrival announcement system. So I asked a really really old woman where I had landed up, and she said 'Suh Hosay'. In a God-triggered flash of incredible brilliance, I decoded the phonetic isomorphism and alighted, ah, to Suh Hosay.
(But then by the same trick, San Francisco should have been Suh Fruhcisco, but instead turned out to be Frisco. Just that? Yup! Be cool, my babies.)
Anyways, by now I realized there was something fundamentally different between German, English and Spanish. I later came across a tin of diced tomatoes and jalapenos, and then my IBABCD roommate (Indian born, American bred) told me they were tomatoes and halapenos. Ah, so Js are really Hs, is it, hmm.
Of course, Taqueria Vallarta is Taqueria Vayarta, just like Versailles was Vehsayee. So French and Spanish agreed on the substitution of LL for Y, so Y suddenly became interesting again. But hey, H substituted R, so now H is clamoring for attention too! (But S goes silent whenever your tongue tires, which makes it a darling. Not surprising, then, that it is universally employed in the word Sssshhh. Now don't ask me what the Hs do at the end, I seriously don't know.)
Now it makes sense to mix close-enough languages together (as much as it makes sense to mix Hindi and Urdu, or Bangla and Bangal). Now what major phoren language have we not considered? Italian! But then, Gucci is really Goochi, which means when there are too many Cs, some of them can conveniently go to Hs. (Js, meanwhile, want attention too, so they mischievously substitute Gs in English. How childish is that!)
Having speculated thus, it seems that H and Y are really important to the language. This is surprising, since they are generally looked down upon as the most irritatingly-conspicuous-and-expensive-but-good-for-nothing letters of the alphabet. What, they don't even have intuitive phonetic names, who would have guessed that 'aich' is used to start holy wars and 'why' is used to say yeah baby.
On the other hand, letters like J really itch, because they are so so expendable. Of course Jay Leno would hardly like to be called Gay Leno, but we could write Gee!Aye! Leno, and he would certainly be happier than he currently is.

So why are you so silent? It's Amerika, my friend, we don't need U to add color to our language.

Strange loop

2004-11-12T14:11:00.000-08:00

This morning, it occured to me that self reference is probably the only intellectually interesting theme for human thought. And not only in pure mathematics, in which over and over again I had come across incomplete theories pointing fingers at self reference; it seemed to me that thinking humans are passionate about using self reference as a tool of awe to create intricately beautiful art and philosophical pursuit. Movies that set up a hypothesis, and then drop the protagonist in the premise of that hypothesis. Books on time travel that loop the (relative) future into the present. Paintings that revolve focus from the borders into the center. Feelings of guilt and self-loathing. Memories (in the past) of hopes (on the future). The struggle to conciously exercise free will, slave to one's own freedom.
It seems to me that the human mind that uses reduction and analysis to dissect and devour problems feels lost the moment it digests the last morsel. Indigestion, on the contrary, is what induces partial satiation and triggers further appetite. Incompleteness ensures we always have work to do, and however lazy humans imagine they are, the true essense of human thought lies in the non-termination of explorative appetite, the seed of which is self reference.

I need to write a blog, too

2004-11-11T16:19:00.000-08:00

To get the context, please read the prequel I need to write a blog.
This conversation is a saga of unmotivated revenge. I start out serious, eager to learn, but very soon I learn that my enthusiasm, triggered by the deep and the doubtful, is meaningless because the quack simply parrots. So I spit giggles, the quack ducks again and again, till finally.. the unthinkable happens.

I am the psychotherapist. Please, describe your problems. Each time you are finished talking, type RET twice.
(Edited: RET once for twice)
I'm missing my girlfriend
Why do you say you are missing your girlfriend?
I didn't expect you to ask a more sensible question
What makes you believe that?
It's because of the silly last conversation we had
Are you sure that is the real reason?
Yes
I see... Well, are you sure that this is so?
Yes vaguemaster
Maybe the silly last conversation you had have something to do with this.
With me missing my girlfriend? No way!
Is it because of your plans that you say with you missing your girlfriend no way?
This sounds familiar
Do you really think this sounds familiar?
Yes
Yes, hmmm... so, what makes you think this is so?
You said the same things modulo context last time around
Is it because of your life that you are going through all this?
Hah
Can you elaborate on that?
Hah
I would appreciate it if you would continue.
Hah
Go on, don't be afraid.
Hah
I need a little more detail please.
Hah
You're being a bit brief, perhaps you could go into detail.
Hah
Can you are more explicit?
Hah
Are you just trying to see what kind of things I have in my vocabulary? Please try to carry on a reasonable conversation!
Okay sorry.
Is it because of the people you hang around with that you say sorry?
Hah
And?
Hah
Please, go into more detail?
Hah
You aren't being very talkative today!
Oh okay. Well as I said, I'm missing my girlfriend
I don't understand.
I mean I miss her duffer, I want to see her again
Why do you say you might want to see her again?
Because I want to be with her, look at her, touch her, love her
Is it because you want to be with her look at her touch her love her that you came to me?
Of course not
How do you reconcile problems at school?
Hah
Is that all there is to it?
Hah
Why must you respond so briefly?
Because you are too predictable. You are a bad, bad program.
Does it bother you that I am too predictable I am a bad bad program?
No you can go rot in hell for all I care
Would you please watch your tongue!
My nose blocks the view
What makes you believe your nose blocks the view?
It's apparent, and quite obvious since light travels in blah blah blah
What happened when light travels in blah blah blah?
The train collided/collides with your ass
Why don't you avoid such unwholesome thoughts.
Okay
Can you elaborate on that?
Okay I will avoid such unwholesome thoughts as trains colliding with
your ass
Could you get your mind out of the gutter.
Only if it is in the gutter
Earlier you said you would like to see her again?
Yes I did
Perhaps this has something to do with any hobbies you have?
Hah
Please, continue.
Hah
Go on, don't be afraid.
Hah
I need a little more detail please.
Hah
You're being a bit brief, I would appreciate it if you would go into detail.
Hah
Can you are more explicit?
Hah
And?
Hah
I give up. You need a lesson in creative writing...
Yoooooooooooooooooooooooooohoooooooooooooooooooooo !!!!
I give up. You need a lesson in creative writing...

I need to write a blog

2004-11-11T15:37:00.000-08:00

The following is a conversation I had with XEmacs > Apps > Games > Psychoanalyst, ending up with me getting real pissed off. Reminds me of Waiting for Godot. However, some things the quack said and did set me thinking after I re-read the converation.

I am the psychotherapist. Please, describe your problems. Each time you are finished talking, type RET twice.
(Edited: RET once for twice)
I am bored
Why do you say you are bored?
Because I don't have good work to do
Is it because you do not have good work to do that you came to me?
No
Why not?
Because you can't give me work
Does it bother you that I cannot give you work?
Not really
Earlier you said you do not have good work to do?
Yes
I see... Well, what makes you believe this is so?
Because I don't feel like I'm doing good work
When did you first know that you do not feel like you are doing good work?
I don't remember
Maybe your plans have something to do with this.
My plans?
Is it because of your life that you say your plans?
Please ignore what I said just now
You mentioned that I cannot give you work?
Yes
Yes, hmmm... so, are you sure that this is so?
No
Are you annoyed that I ask that?
A bit
Is it because of the people you hang around with that you are going through all this?
No
Why not?
Because this is more related to my mental state than anything else
Is the fact that this is more related to your mental state than anything else the real reason?
Maybe
Can you elaborate on that?
I need to write a blog
Do you really think you might want to write this blog?
Yes
I understand. So what makes you think this is so?
I can pour out some of my creative instincts that way
I would appreciate it if you would continue.
Every morning I think of writing something interesting and then I come
here to work.. and work is not as exciting
Why do you say that?
You are going in loops
What makes you believe you do not have good work to do?
I said so.. I don't feel like it
How do you reconcile problems at school?
What problems?
Tell me about your school.
Why do you care about my school?
Go on, don't be afraid.
I'm not afraid
Are you sure that you are afraid of something?
What??
I need a little more detail please.
I won't give you any
Do you really think you will not give me any?
Yes
Oh. ...And what makes you think this is so?
Because it's my fucking will I'm controlling
Are you sure it's your fucking will you are controlling?
Yes I am SURE!!!
Earlier you said you do not feel like you are doing good work?
No I didn't
Perhaps this has something to do with any hobbies you have?
Man you are imaginative
Is it because of your sex life that you say man I am imaginative?
I need to QUIT!!!
How does it feel to want?
What???
You're being a bit brief, perhaps you could go into detail.
Fuck You!!
Please, watch your tongue!
I can't.. it's difficult and makes my eyes pain
Possibly you should consult a doctor of medicine, I am a psychiatrist.
Yes, thank you
You mentioned that I cannot give you work?
Chuck it man
Maybe hangups you have are related to this.
Ya right
Why do you say I right?
Goddamnit
Can you are more explicit?
Ah so now your English is hotchpotched
What makes you believe this is more related to your mental state than anything else?
Forget I ever came here
Is it because of your inhibitions that you are going through all this?

Back to the future

2004-11-02T15:18:00.000-08:00

The day after tomorrow

2004-10-31T13:42:00.000-08:00

Garba sharba

2004-10-17T17:31:00.000-07:00

Five years in Delhi, and I'd not attended one Navratri... and here I was, yesterday, getting all excited to garba with the desi gang at Santa Cruz!
(It's curious how living in pardes makes you more desi than you were when you were in des. More on that later.)

So the usual CEO (Gaurav) called up sometime after noon, proposing we attend the celebrations at Mountain View. I had loads planned for my fifth Saturday ;-) so I got fire in my pants and finished up my work before six, when we first went to Amin's place to get something appropriate to wear (I was in my Kroger sweatshirt, with red and white stripes, white stars on navy blue, you get the picture... not the ideal desi-cultural-evening-attire). A white kurta made me happy. It was then that I remembered I'd not shaved that morning, but who cared, by then.
So we left, and on the way we remembered that we had to get cells for Amin's camera, and somebody came up with this bright idea letscallSubhashtellhimgetthecellsbe. Subhash was in Campbell at his brother's place, and was due to be picked up on the way.

Meanwhile in another car, the ladies left with poor old Shamboy (kahanfansadiyabe). After seventeen U-turns, we got to Campbell, when Subhash asked Amin didyoubringmykurta to which he wickedly pointed to me. It took Subhash four and a half minutes to understand that this was no joke, he really didn't have a kurta for free, during which time the ladies arrived, and Subhash rushed in to get his brother's shaadi's sherwani. It was no surprise, then, when fifteen minutes into the freeway he sheepishly admitted to have forgotten the eight used cells he had collected during our seventeen U-turns, back at home, in exchange for the sherwani. Anyways.

Sometime later near Mountain View we picked up Malik, and finally got to Vibha auditorium. It was past nine. Some of us, including me, didn't know that admission came in exchange for fourteen dollars, and immediately started looking for ways to get in without the trouble. We soon came to know that a bluestarsonwhiteband was necessary no matter what. (No matter what? What about the back door Shyamboy saw four guys with bands go through? Fifteen minutes into debating whether we should follow suit, Shyamboy checked again but this time the door was locked! So, we reasoned, the blue stars were emitting some authenticating fields to the doorlocks, and such trivia.) Thus we dug into our pockets anyway, but then...

... were bombed with the news that tickets were sold out, so thankyouseeyounextyearbyebye. (And then we spent fifteen more minutes shouting at Shyam for not going in with the four guys and calling us from inside.)

Meanwhile someone remembered how hungry we were, so we packed up and found a Mexican place nearby, where we had nachos and burritos and tartos and doyouexpectmetoremembereverybodysorders. Hence spirited, we went back, gangly, to Vibha, this time resolute to get in come what may. The motivation for our optimism lay in true desi bhailog community feelings, which we were confident we could stir given adequate guineapigs.

We finally (actually our very first hit) found a guy who succumbed, took fifty dollars for the whole gang as donation, and in return gave us The Eight BlueStar Bands. We got inside, it was a noisy, wild party of ABCDs and first generation desis in ghaghra cholis and kurta pajamas clicking and clucking and whirling and thumping full steam. Trust Shyamboy to find 7 sticks under the speaker wires, and nobody remembers what happened in the next half hour.

Happy birthday, Santa Cruz!!

2004-10-04T15:42:00.000-07:00

Local news report

Man, the fireworks by the beach was AWESOME!!

Lost in translation.

2004-09-15T17:38:00.000-07:00

This link was the same as http://www.cse.iitd.ernet.in/~csd99439 is the same as nowhere.

Ooh yes, aye

2004-09-15T17:21:00.000-07:00

New Delhi - Tokyo.
8 hours of miserable piloting, great wine, stretched sleep.

Tokyo.
10 hours of Larry King Live, Iraqi terror and Sumo wrestling.

Tokyo - San Francisco.
9 hours of Chink chatter, chatter and more chatter.

San Francisco.
KS picks me up, also Marwah-with-the-hat-and-the-skates on his rented Nissan, takes us to lunch at Lucky Dhaba @ Sunnyvale, and then leaves for his driving test. I take my first shower at Stanford. It's very, very hot.

Loopback

2004-07-28T18:40:00.000-07:00

July 29, 1999 - July 29, 2004.
That's how long it takes to loop though this place.

Visa power!

2004-07-24T14:57:00.000-07:00

So you thought 'Go get it' is just about everything you need to do to get an American visa?

The first thing to do is, of course, to get an appointment online. I barely managed a date on July 19. This was after I'd waited for my I-20 for more than a month. Apparently you can't apply for a F1 more than 90 days before your intended departure, so *technically* I wouldn't have use for an I-20 before June. I'm technical too, so I preferred to get a date after I had the I-20 on my desk.

Next step, get your dues cleared from the insti. This, I'd heard, would take the better half of a month to complete. Luckily, a friend and me went around and did all but the department dues in two days. This done, one would have thought, apna department hai, kya tension hai yaar. When you're as sure as that, and assuming you're human, you'd go into hibernation till around a week before your appointment date. I, being sure, and human, did that.

Finally when the blistering alarm went off, I looked at the 5 blanks at the department no-dues form and... whistled. Through the next working week, I was running after lab asses, ill Kuars, grislyhaired HODs and the other mortals in town to burn the signature forest spawned by them innocent-looking 5 blanks. I threw myself a Domino's party the day I finally laid lands on my provisional degree and transcript.

Next, I'd to get a photograph of my face, and lured by the promise of a car-ride, I went to a polaroid place to get that done. In minutes, I got four smiling copies, hair parted on the wrong side (the mirror is *always* right!). Till I noticed that they were far smaller than the 50mm x 50 mm demanded in the application. They wouldn't care, I told myself.

In the meantime, I got a couple of drafts made out for American Embassy, New Delhi and TTS Services, New Delhi. I got back some shady looking handwritten rectangular pieces of thin paper they called banker-cheques. Are they the same as demand-drafts, I asked. Same, I heard. But of course, they wouldn't care, I told myself.

As Monday approached, I got increasingly paranoid about the two things I'd told myself they wouldn't care about. On top of that, I'd chosen not to shave my goatee. Would they care about that too?

I reached the embassy a quarter of an hour before my appointment time, and found a line of 100 odd hopefuls before me. Half an hour into the queue, I found an irritating public video pointing out for the sixth time that probably my photograph was invalid material. I calculated that 1.4 inch squared is less than half of 2 inch squared, so the argument "I almost listened to you Sir" that I'd thought of throwing in the loo that morning fizzed up my ***. I decided to break out of line.

Somebody told me there's a place nearby that takes out instant digitals. I never got to know if he was right. On the way, an autowala promised me to take to a place he knew for 10/-, and I chose him over uncertainty. We rode for some minutes, during which I was told it would be 30/- for the return trip, and I agreed, pleasing the autowala immensely. I was given three large (I mean, 50 x 50) photos, then one stuck back on the application, and then told it would be 200/-. I reached into my wallet and found I had two notes of 100 each. Hah, fate. I asked for a 20/- rebate, and they agreed. The autowala gave a further 10/- rebate, and I rejoined the line half an hour after I had broken it, now confident all would be well.

After that, it was easy. I got to a window, passed my pre-screening in two tries (I had to overwrite N/A with some contact number there, which I dug out from the right side of my brain), went through a line of twenty to submit the courier draft, another line of fifty through a lunch break of half an hour and, an hour each either side of lunch, and... finally faced the windows showing the faces of people who would decide if I was good enough for the power of an American visa. I will spare you the shitpot cravings of my companions in the line who'd heavied my lids for one sixth of a day.

The guy who took my interview looked a killer, with unkempt straight hair, penetrating eyes and no idea where his smiling muscles could be. I chose not to wish him, because I didn't want to sound the bullshiting type. He looked at my application, then my scores, asked me about any other offers I'd received, complemented my choice of school, took fingerprints of both my index fingers, asked me to do something with them when I put them on the red sensor, I did that something, he said *this time audibly* that he wanted me to press the length of the digit on the sensor instead of the tip, I did that now, and then he said, your visa will be ready in a couple of days.

I let out the fart I'd kept inside for a good part of the day. I gave the address of a hostelmate (I've vacated my room) to the courierwalas, and today, after a couple of "Sorry I missed you - BLUEDART"s, I looked at an American visa for the first time in my life.

My American visa.

Je ne parle pas anglais!

2004-06-14T14:17:00.000-07:00

In a stunning finale of overflow mathematics, the scoreline screamed an amazing FRA 2 - 1 ENG. I, and a few comrade comedians, jabbed our fists, made crazy faces and howled and howled in orgasmic ecstacy.

And only moments ago, I was totally pissed. The first half had been exciting, Scholes and Beckham relentlessly pushing the bored black French fesses, and Pires and Zidane bursting shocks in the English arses. Till that amazing header hung blue heads in a zap.. and all I waited desperately for was halftime.

During which I imagined the air at the French camp would be full of curses, temper, water, a quite monologue, rethinking, pumping, breathing. I couldn't have been right, for I didn't see what came out of the break! Post-halftime, I was bored with the same moves, the same formations, and no innovation at all. Henry was a misery without help from the far left, where Lizarazu was a mess. Everyone seemed too edgy to try individually, and it became too easy to predict what Zidane would do when he got back the ball on every third pass. Time jerked on, tension mounted of course, the French got impatient, moved faster, kicked around, elbowed around, frustrating the English and yet assuring them they would try nothing else, but sink in with a lot of splashing. The English laid back full strength behind the halfline, the French attacked this way and this way and that way and this way, and then the occasional quick counter-run would pinch some more holes in the French cheeks. When finally on one of such runs, a desperate challenge saw Beckham smirking on the penalty spot, the French stopped looking altogether, and the English chorus reached deafening levels of melody.

It was then that the first of the unthinkables happened. Beckham blotched, a random predictive judgement by Barthez but one which visually changed the mood of the game. Time never stopped, though, even though many hopeful hearts did. Past fulltime, the match now entered 3 minutes of injury time.

The usual freekick outside the D, Zidane comes up with a stunning curve to the top left corner of the English goal, mouths fall, some look up and smile, some blush and go hoarse on the vocals, some horny guys like me think, what if another one happens now? Half a minute later, Zidane moves to the far left and suddenly rolls a brilliant play which ends with Henry with the ball, defenders running behind, goalie desperate, either Henry finishes past him or he attacks his leg. Fate chooses the latter, Zidane looks at the penalty spot, does a jiggle, effortlessly places it on the left corner of the net, the whites turned white, mouths falling, eyes dropping out, throats dry, while "I, and a few comrade comedians, jab our fists, make crazy faces and howl and howl in orgasmic ecstacy".

Obituary to a bad Shah

2004-05-26T22:48:00.000-07:00

The dead will march on, just us poor bald Asheeshaw will
\begin{verbatim}
devote my entire life ...
to see that the ego and arrogance of people of your department is crushed and the department is brought to its normal wavelength.
\end{verbatim}

Interesting if he really comes up with something crazy, sues some Einsteins[NM] and Gauguins[UBAN] here and there, but I doubt that. This man, lone warrior, will die an insipid death, with the world oblivious of his sad and genuine cause.

I didn't know he did what he did to /bin/dull and Naq Ul Gurgh, but Kaks aka Kaka and me had a hard time too with him around. We infact blame him as one of the biggest reasons why we booted SURA (summer 2001). The fucker used to put up such a cute moustache infront of MB that all our complaints (dudes, we knew when things didn't work, and we didn't bluff) fell on deaf gray haired ears, rebounded, bounced back and forth between the bad Shah's shining black sadistic evil smirking teeth and banged us into nonchalance. He somehow convinced MB that he was in total control of the fucked up INCODE thing, every command worked wonders on every wire, we were a gadha-gaddha duo, "Chod na inko kyon summer barbaad karta hai? Chal chai peete hain, tu Eindhoven jaa, aake PhD de diyo".

May he test in piece. Amen.

Google rules!

2004-05-19T17:38:00.002-07:00

It's curious how close my NEWS pieces came to being called BLOG material. For losers, the pieces I'm referring to are lazy 3-4 month updates on my web page [HEADLINES] with cryptic verses blabbing my ongoings. Anyways, I've created a blog now, so the big question is, what will become of the motley dudey NEWS page? I think that'll continue to be updated, and I'll try to push the more regular happenings on this blog, of course ever trying to be less cryptic than usual. [Official whistle, KICK OFF!!]