I'm hoping to start blogging regularly on this new blog. Do check it out and refer to your friends if you think they will find it useful.

The suitcase story

This is something that happened in 2003. I was in grad school and I was to go home to Pune for a month long break. So I got my suitcases out to start packing. Unfortunately, I forgot the combination on my large Samsonite suitcase. Being the poor graduate student that I was, I didn't have a car to go buy a new one. (And neither did I have a lot of spare cash.) So being frustrated with the whole situation, I finally resorted to using a butter knife to slide the lock off the suitcase. So I did open the suitcase and I was able to push the lock back on safely after packing, but I wasn't able to change the combination.

At the Chicago airport, I handed over my bags to TSA and the security check guy goes, "So what's the combination?". I gulped for a second realizing that now I had to hand over my bags unlocked. I explained to him that I had forgotten the combination, but if he wanted to open it, he could just slide something sharp under the lock and click it open. The TSA guy smiled on hearing this. The paranoid me, hoped he wouldn't think I stole this bag from someone.

A few minutes later, I got my boarding pass and I started walking towards the boarding area. I hear some guy shouting behind me "4224". I was puzzled for a second. It was the same TSA guy, he whispered smiling "It's the combination to your suitcase". I asked, "How did you find it?". He told me that they have a machine for these things. In case some person forgets to unlock his bag, they have to use a device to open the lock. I've changed my combination ever since, but clearly that won't help dissuade the motivated thief.

Bravo Google! : Public transportation to work

One hears frequent complaints (and I am guilty of the crime too) about the lack of good public transportation in the Bay Area. The complaints are usually followed by plaudits showered on the transportation systems in New York. The only person I knew that took the train to work was Atul 3 years ago, who had just started working at my company and didn't get a new car for a few months. He used to take over an hour to cover the 15 minute distance to work, which seemed like a big waste of time.

So today when I went to the http://www.vta.org site I found a search service from Google. It is a feature in Google Maps called "Take Public Transportation". Previously I had taken the VTA Light Rail to downtown Mountain View and to downtown San Jose on different occassions, and found it to be a fairly convenient way to get around South Bay. One could also make a connection to Caltrain, if one were so inclined, and make a trip to San Francisco as well. Anyways the Google search result was very easy to understand. It was in the same format as the usual Google Maps route, clearly showing the travel time, and the bus stops. It didn't find the nearest stop to work but did give me directions for the second nearest bus-stop.

Here is a sample route:


Travel time by car is roughly 15 minutes. Turned out the travel time by light-rail and bus was around 30 minutes. To try out this new adventure I asked Sai to drop me off at the VTA light rail station in the morning today. The train was pulling in just as I got to the station and it left before I could get a ticket. The next train was 15 minutes later. 3 stops (and 5 minutes) later I got off near Great America Parkway. I had missed my connection, the number 60 bus. So I tried calling VTA's customer service line. The automated system told me that the next bus number 60 was 15 minutes later.

The commuters around me were mostly students, and few other Indians. I started chatting with the only other Indian person at the bus-stop. I realized that I rarely did that these days. The person, Sathish was surprised that I had been working here for 3 years and that I was still taking the train. He was here in Santa Clara on a short business trip at Motorola and was an amiable smiling guy. It didn't make sense for him to buy or rent a car for such a short visit, and so his boss bought him a monthly pass for VTA instead.

The next bus arrived and about 10 minutes later, the bus dropped me right next to our campus, although a remote corner of it. 2 minutes later I was at my desk. Total travel time 50 minutes. Total cost $1.75. As the price of a gallon goes up, I think it will start making more sense to use VTA everyday. I loved the idea and I hope to continue... Lowering my carbon footprint a little. One piece of advice, get to the station 5 minutes early.

It's raining engineers!

This is in response to a post on Ashutosh's blog about the sorry state of sciences in India.

Here is how I see it. With the flat world, instead of doing India's IT jobs only, Indians are now doing the whole world's IT jobs. Admittedly these young engineers are making way more money than their parents did, but in the process India loses experts in all other fields.

I agree with Professor Rao about the lack of complexity in most IT jobs and how IT jobs are mundane. I think most people wouldn't do these jobs for as long as they do, because they don't truly enjoy them. This also means that most companies have productivity issues, attrition issues but that is another topic on it's own.

I disagree with Vivek about science only being about long-term projects and work that may not lead to practical benefits.

For instance if the Indian Government invested heavily in photo-voltaic cell research, where India decides to become the leader in high-efficiency photovoltaics, maybe in 10 years we will have a solar-energy industry which doesn't perform back-office operations for the world, but rather becomes the front-office that sends all it's monotonous manufacturing to another country, and keeps a higher fraction of the profits. By keeping the salaries of educators as low as they do in India, we do manage to keep inflation low, but we also manage to churn out millions of uneducated college graduates.

In the longer term economics is a big equalizer and sooner than later, the costs of doing business in India are going to be higher than some other country. The people with an aptitude for science, but training and experience in engineering, may find it hard to adjust in such a scenario. IT engineers made a quick buck for a few years, but no one ever assured them job security. The industry is brutal in that respect. Profit is the keyword, loyalty and charity are rare lapses.

Spam on Yahoo! Mail

One thing I am definitely not very "Yahoo!" about is the amount of spam I get in my Yahoo! Mail account. It is so bad it is not even funny. It doesn't seem like Yahoo! takes any effort in blocking spam. I have been marking the mail as spam for ages now to no avail. Here is what my inbox looks like today:



How hard is blocking based on the keywords like "Medication" and "Nursing" in the subject field? So 20 messages with all possible kind of spam. I think there is just one legit email there.

This is the final straw for me. I am migrating completely to GMail. So long Yahoo! !

Tryst with Destiny: Archives of TIME Magazine!

My father once told me that Winston Churchill was so opposed to the idea of Indian independence that during the debate on the Independence of India Act in the British Parliament, he predicted that the second-generation Indian politicians would be so corrupt that "They will tax even air!". I have to warn the readers of this blog that so far in spite of my best efforts, I haven't been able to confirm the veracity of this quote.

So hoping to ascertain the truth of the matter I tried to look through the archives of the BBC and TIME magazine. Although I didn't find any supporting evidence for the statement, I did learn many other interesting facts about India 60 years ago.

On racial discrimination in the India before independence, this article quotes:

The Bombay Royal Yacht Club, where no Indian could tread even as a member's guest, was about to close; the Government had refused to renew its lease. No more would the pink pukka sahibs and their leathery memsahibs stare glassily over the glassy bay. Gone from most of the smart hotels were the signs "Europeans only." In cool Simla, Indians now jostled along the Mall where 20 years ago no person in Indian dress would have been allowed.

To be barred from places in one's own motherland, is probably discrimination of the highest order. Thankfully these practices ended 60 years ago.

On the positives and negatives of British Rule over India:

The Balance Sheet. What after two centuries could be said of British rule in India? Credits & debits were both enormous. About as much land is irrigated in India today as in all the rest of the world. The Empire's biggest iron and steel plant is at Jamshedpur. The British had built up in India an incorruptible judicial system, a good police force, a vast (if substandard) network of roads, and the world's fourth largest railway system.

Yet Indians were still among the world's poorest people. Seventy-five percent hovered perpetually between gnawing hunger and outright starvation. Malaria, bubonic plague and a host of other diseases made an Indian's life expectancy at birth the world's lowest — 27 years.

The city of Rajahmundry would become Rajamahendravaram, which would be harder to spell, but since 87% of Indians could not write that would not matter so much.

Pandit Nehru in the Discovery of India talked about the wholesale looting of India that the British practiced and how the railway system and the roadways were all just a means for the British to steal the riches of my motherland. I think the magnitude of the British "despotism" can be judged best by these two numbers. The average life expectancy was 27 years and 87% of the population was illiterate. I am sure the per capita income would be similarly abysmal.

Much as we Indians revel in bashing our elected governments, and occasionally wax eloquent about quotes from British despots, the truth is India has done exceedingly well since she became free. Reminders like these from our past can serve to show how much better things are for at least a sizable fraction of the population. If we manage to share the benefits of freedom with more people in the next 60 years, it would all have been worthwhile. Whether India would have fared better under the rule of British despots for another 60 years is a question we shall never find a conclusive answer to.

Correction: Although I haven't been able to find a reliable source, this is the quotation from Churchill that my father refers to. There are references to this all over the Indian blogosphere.
"Power will go into the hands of rascals, rogues and freebooters. Not a bottle of water nor a loaf of bread shall escape taxation. Only air will be free and the blood of these hungry millions will be on the head of Mr Atlee. These are men of straw whom no trace will be found after a few years."

Hola Los Angeles!

In typical Bay Area newly-wed fashion, Sai and I decided to make a road-trip down to Las Vegas over Thanksgiving Break. I usually am wary of day-long drives, but on this occasion I was emboldened by the recent acquisition of an extra driver. (Pardon the phrasing Sai! ;)) On a last minute whim, I decided to use up my floating holiday to start the long weekend a day early and beat the peak Thanksgiving traffic. Our first stop was Los Angeles, roughly a 6-hour drive from San Jose.

Frank Lloyd Wright once said, "Tip the world over on its side and everything loose will land in Los Angeles." I am perpetually reminded of this statement when I am in the Los Angeles metro area. Los Angeles is the archetype for the mega-metropolis, bursting at its seams, a sea of humanity without an end in sight, unclean, lacking any unifying theme. Grid-locked highways with 5 lanes in both directions are common, filled with rude drivers who refuse to let others change into their lane, unless held at gun-point. LA is every car driver's worst nightmare, and occasionally every carpool driver's dream (LA carpool lanes are the most elaborate I have ever seen). After visiting LA about 4 times in the last 3 years I have realized there are few sights there worth a visit. One of them is the Getty Center museum close to Santa Monica. No expense has been spared in the design and upkeep of this museum. The well-manicured lawns, the well-designed rock gardens, the supremely well-chosen pieces of art on display, make the Getty Center a must visit for every tourist in LA.



There were a couple of interesting exhibitions in progress at the Getty that day. One was an exhibition of photographs by Edward Weston, a very famous California photographer of the early 20th century. Sai and I had heard about Ansel Adams during our Photography course at Foothill College, and it turned out Edward Weston collaborated with Ansel Adams. Weston was a member of the F64 club. F64 refers to the aperture setting on the camera these guys loved to take pictures with, to get crystal clear sharpness for the entire scene being photographed. Weston's subjects included a wide range of California scenery... Yosemite, Death Valley, Carmel-By-The-Sea, San Francisco. There were many other objects like peppers. Mr Weston also photographed his many lovers in nude. Photographers and their models! :)



The other photography exhibit was that of a more contemporary photographer called Luc Delahaye. The subjects included the Asian Tsunami, Darfur, the Oil crisis and so on. There were more color photographs than the Weston exhibit this time. The picture below captures the scene at an OPEC summit.



After spending a few hours at the Getty Center (and a few more at the Museum gift store ;)), we made our way through the LA rush hour to our hotel in Hollywood. Hollywood, is the complete antithesis of the glamorous version of Hollywood one imagines after watching all those movies. Anyways we did the usual Grauman's Chinese Theater (to see the autographs of the famous stars in clay) and Hollywood Walk of Fame routine and went to bed. I'll write about Las Vegas in the next post.

A Just Cause

This blog has woken up from it's deep slumber to support a just cause. I am referring to the Writer's Strike which is currently in progress, and whose effects are all too apparent to the regular viewers of many nightly shows hosted by Jay Leno, Jon Stewart, Steven Colbert. If you miss Jon Stewart's show as well here is the latest creation from the writers at the Daily Show:



And here is something from the makers of the Colbert Report:


I think the writers are some of the most talented people in the entertainment business. The actors are the looks behind the operations and the writers the brains. It is such a shame that writers are having to resort to a strike to earn what they rightly deserve. This video talks about how the writers currently get about 4c for every $19.99 DVD that is sold. This strike is just about the writers asking for 4c more. To the media moguls and the AMPTP executives out there. Shame on you!

Here is what the strike is all about:

Did you feel it?

We all felt this scary earthquake tonight. It was close to 8:10 here and I was on my bed surfing. Suddenly the bed starts shaking pretty violently and I first tried to duck under the bed. It was too low, so I ran outside and sat under my dining table until the tremors died down. I live on the third floor, so usually the tremors are stronger around here. I found out from the USGS site that this was a 5.6 magnitude earthquake.

I had blogged about Jim Berkland, who made earthquake predictions. I found this prediction on his website at 850pm.

"PREDICTIONS FOR OCTOBER:

As we approach the 18th anniversary of the World Series Quake it is startling to consider that most local graduating high school seniors were not alive to experience the biggest Bay Area quake since 1906. (The extreme tides of the next three months should acquaint them with a seismic experience.)

The Seismic Window of October 23-31, 2007 is based on the Full Moon of October 25, the very close lunar perigee only six hours later, and the 8.3 ft. Golden Gate tides on October 27th, the highest since last June. Considering these factors I am 80% confident in predicting one or more quakes with the following parameters:"

To all you "Microserfs" out there!

I don't read a lot of fiction. The reason is that most of the so-called classics that I have read, fail to keep my interest alive for very long. A prime example of this is Ayn Rand. I probably took many months to finish "The Fountainhead" and have tried in vain to read "Atlas Shrugged" for the last couple of weeks. Ms Rand's style is so long-winded, and although she does have some good philosophical lessons to expound, you could skip many pages and not really miss much. ("Anthem" is an exception. That is one of her works I really liked.) I've tried reading the finest works of Carson McCullers, Virginia Woolf and Tolkien unsuccessfully too (I hated LOTR). So now I read more non-fiction. The reader isn't required to read all the way through, and he still learns something no matter where the book stops being interesting. My point is that if I have to force myself to finish a book like it is homework, it stops being fun. Also stating the obvious, I do like to learn interesting things along the way... Someday I hope to be a contestant on Jeopardy!

Douglas Coupland's "Microserfs" was a very pleasant surprise, given that it is a piece of fiction. I haven't made too many good friends through my blog but Priyanka is one exception to that rule. While some of my failed attempts at reading good fiction came through her recommendations, "Microserfs" is one I will wholeheartedly recommend further. There is obviously a lot I can relate to in this particular work. The title characters are all techies working at Microsoft in the 1990s. They share the very same lives... the seemingly never-ending years of test-writing, bug-fixing, new products, stock options, career anxieties and so on... Coupland also makes a statement about impossible deadlines set by management. This probably rings true to many employees in the tech world. What was even more uncanny was the love for Lego, Star Trek and Jeopardy espoused by many of the characters in the story. I don't know a lot of geeks who care for all or even some of those.

I loved Douglas Coupland's style. Jeopardy! categories in bulleted lists!! For instance, the narrator Dan introduces himself like so:

"I am danielu@microsoft.com If my life was a game of Jeopardy! my seven dream categories would be:
- Tandy products
- Trash TV of the late 70s and 80s
- The history of Apple
- Career anxieties
- Tabloids
- Plant life of the Pacific Northwest
- Jell-O-1-2-3"

The story revolves around the lives of 6 occupants of a Redmond home, Microsoft employees. Dan, Abe, Todd, Susan, Bug, Michael and Dan's love-interest Karla. Most nerd archetypes are represented. Todd is the fitness freak, who only eats healthy and spends a lot of time sculpting a great body. Abe is a rich millionaire, who still maintains a normal techie lifestyle. Susan is the activist, organizing protest marches and the like. Michael, is the genius, who writes beautiful code, "the Mozart to all our Salieri's" as Dan describes him. Dan, the narrator, keeps writing random stuff trying to make sense out of his sub-conscious thoughts. On a more conscious level, the whole book is written like a journal kept on a computer, mostly one entry for every day of the work week. There are tonnes of interesting tidbits throughout the book. One of my favourites so far was about area codes:

""Did you know you can figure out how important your state was circa 1961 by adding up the code's three digits? Zero equals 10."
"No"
"It's because zeros used to take forever to go around the little rotary dial-while ones zipped along the quickest. The lowest possible code 212, went to the busiest place, New York City. Los Angeles got 213. Alaska got 907. See my point?" "

So far I have read the first 110 pages with few interruptions. Thanks Priyanka all the same, for an excellent recommendation. Fiction, afterall isn't all bad!

Saving the World, one step at a time

To a great extent I have tried to reduce my carbon foot-print by putting some thought into daily activities and energy consumption.

- I always use a plate and real silverware for lunch and dinner. People around me, all really smart folks, insist on using to-go boxes for lunch everyday. Thankfully my employer is now only using bio-degradable boxes, so the trash will decompose eventually but will release a lot of methane into the air. Also manufacturing, transporting the boxes and junk will cause more energy consumption. Some hot water and soap to clean the dishes and forks is definitely better.

- I am biking to work sometimes. I don't see more than one or two other people who do that on any given day. Why? I think it's almost a no-brainer that biking is a good alternative. In the Bay Area there are bike-lanes all over. I take 15 mins to drive to work and 30 mins to bike. The numbers might be similar for a lot of people.

- Using CFLs. Okay CFL adoption is probably much higher than other energy-saving measures. Switching off lamps during the day and using sunlight, switching off lamps in empty rooms... I am trying to do this whenever I can.

- Taking shorter baths. I tended to just take a hot shower for 30 mins+ before. Keeping it short, 5-10 mins saves a lot of energy and water.

- I am also working on making computer chips consume less power at work. I also use only one LCD screen, to save some more power.

- Taking a bag along when I go shopping for groceries. When I forget I use paper.

A family in New York actually took this theme all the way and drastically changed their life for a year. No-Impact Man.

What's happening in my neck of the woods?

It's been a while since I posted anything on this blog, so I thought this seems like as good a time as any. I haven't been able to post anything recently for most parts because I have been much busier than usual.

The latest from my end is that I have moved. I now live in Sunnyvale. I only moved a couple of miles away from my Santa Clara home and I love the new 3rd floor 1-bedroom apartment. It is sunny, a characteristic endowed in the name of the city where it is located.

I have been out of the gym for sometime. This week I finally went a couple of times, I have put on a couple of pounds, but it should be easy to shed those hopefully. As long as more pounds don't burden my body I should be fine.

I am taking a course at Stanford this semester through my employer. MS&E 237 Progress in WorldWide Communications. For the course term-paper I decided to analyze the teardowns of various cellphones and figure out what components are in there, who makes them, what the prices are of these devices, the profit margins and so on. I read about 15 teardowns this weekend. Every week we have two speakers, some of the top executives of their respective organizations. The course requires a homework write-up every week as well, analyzing one of the issues covered in the talks the previous week. For instance, I wrote about Broadband Access Issues in India, the Telecom Regulatory Environment in China, and wrote about the Cellphone-Cancer connection. So I am learning something to say the least.

Sai moved here about a month ago. So everything acquired a rosy hue. :) Anyways more in my next post.

iPhone Vs myPhone

Cost:
iPhone costs $499 or $599 after you've signed a 2 year contract with Cingular.

myPhone costs $18 and no contract with Cingular. In fact when you buy this pay-as-you-go Phone, you get $10 worth of talk time free. In effect myPhone costs $8.

Features:
iPhone: is a phone, a camera, a music player and an internet browser.

myPhone: is barely even a phone. Some days it wakes me up doubling as an alarm. It triples as a girl repellant. Ideal function for married men.

If I lost it:
iPhone: I'd turn suicidal, because it is almost as valuable as my life. The person who finds it will almost certainly not return it back.

myPhone: I just fast for one meal and buy me a new one for free. If someone finds it, they are certain to return it... or throw it into a dumpster.

If you are seen using one:
iPhone: People think you are a cool, rich person with good taste. Maybe even a spendthrift who will turn suicidal when he loses his phone.

myPhone: People run away from you, and then you can call them to ask why?

Marketing:
Apple spends millions of dollars to produce snazzy ads for the iPhone.

Motorola spends millions of dollars, so that people won't find out that they made myPhone.

Steve Jobs advertizes the iPhone = iJobs

I advertize myPhone = iJobless

A Laid Back Weekend!

Peter Gibbons: What would you do if you had a million dollars?
Lawrence: I'll tell you what I'd do, man: two chicks at the same time, man.
Peter Gibbons: That's it? If you had a million dollars, you'd do two chicks at the same time?
Lawrence: Damn straight. I always wanted to do that, man. And I think if I were a millionaire I could hook that up, too; 'cause chicks dig dudes with money.
Peter Gibbons: Well, not all chicks.
Lawrence: Well, the type of chicks that'd double up on a dude like me do.
Peter Gibbons: Good point.
Lawrence: Well, what about you now? what would you do?
Peter Gibbons: Besides two chicks at the same time?
Lawrence: Well, yeah.
Peter Gibbons: Nothing.

So guess what I did this weekend? I pretended to be a millionaire for the weekend and did nothing! :) It feels so good to do nothing productive, nothing useful.

On Friday night I went out with Sai's cousin Varun to Banana Leaf for dinner. If you have never had Malaysian food, it is an interesting experience. It is very closely related to Indian and Thai food. My favourite appetizer has always been roti prata (so close to Roti Paratha), which comes with fluffy crispy roti and a curry style dip. The next day I helped him move into his apartment in Mountain View.

Saturday afternoon I slept and then went to Borders in the night to read random books. I picked up the New York Times Almanac. It was an interesting read. I loved the compressed history of India that they have in it, listing all the major historical events. Even the recent past does seem like a violent time if you go by that description... Babri masjid demolition, Bombay riots, Kargil War, Attack on the parliament and so on. Then of course most news-worthy stories are such events. The final paragraph talking about the great strides that India made with Green Revolution to feed all it's people, the IT revolution also feels nice for a change. There have been positive developments. I also looked for a John Mayer CD, but I didn't want to spend $20 on it. So I backed out. Sorry John, your music is really great but please go easy on the pricing!

I tried hunting for apartments from time to time but I couldn't find a great deal. Most one bedroom houses in the area have shot up to $1600+ thanks to a new school across the street and the influx of recent graduates from various universities. I remember the good old days when I used to split a two bedroom apartment and pay $700 in rent. Went for a bike ride around the area in the evening. And finally watched parts of Office Space. I love it... Every time you watch it, you have gained more experience and you start relating even more to all the problems in the movie. I hope I don't have to see a round of layoffs like those guys. There are always pessimists out there... many predictions of slowing growth in the semiconductor industry. Don't know what to make of it.

Postcards from California

Another one from the Land of Cubes

I have noticed one very odd thing about living in the land of cubes. You go to the restroom in the morning and you bump into a person, say your customary "Hey X!" and then move on. Few hours later, nature calls and it's deja vu "Heeeyyy XX!?"! You bump into the same person again after another few hours, a third time in the same day. This seems to point to some natural law of restroom breaks. There is some default periodicity that we are all set to. I know you're going, "Too much Information!" at this point, so I shall stop right here. I just wanted to be the first one to propound some natural law.

A new phenomenon at work these days is the attrition. For the last few months, one person I know is leaving the company every month. Some send very poetic farewell messages. One of the most recent had the subject line "So long and thanks for the fish!", alluding to the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy! Some leave for Motorola in Illinois, some leave for start-ups close by. Some invite everyone to the Indian buffet close by called Mayuri for lunch. Today my immediate next-door neighbour (Buttons' master Philip if you read one of my posts about canines in the Cubeland) left the company after working for 5 years. Somehow I feel sad even though I didn't really talk to Philip a whole lot in the 2.5 years that I have been here. Are all these smart people the mice on the sinking Titanic? (the last two people were graduates of MIT and the one before of the U of I) I know there are some big unknowns in the future outlook of the company a few years down the line, but I don't know if it warrants a move right now.

At dinner at the cafeteria today, it felt nice to talk to my co-worker friends. The conversation as usual drifts from one thing to another. Today the highlight was the discussion about "The Bay 2 Breakers". It is a race in San Francisco, where people run from the Bay to the Breakers, a distance of roughly 7 miles. R and P went to the race in the City over the weekend. Apparently there were a lot of drunk people, dressed in various costumes, or not dressed at all. There were tonnes of anecdotes they shared. The most interesting ones were about the deluge of blonde Paris Hilton look-a-likes, dressed in prison jumpsuits. And then there were some people who ran the race upstream, calling themselves (and presumably dressed like) salmons because they ran in the wrong direction.

The way back on the bike was slightly chilly but I found a less busy albeit longer route to get home. And when I came back a beautiful sunset welcomed me home. Park rangers they say are paid in sunsets. I defintely got a bonus today:

Booyah Oil Money!

About a year and a half ago I saw the price of gas rise by a huge amount during the record hurricane season of 2005, the season that included Hurricane Katrina, the season the weatherman ran out of letters to name his storms. I wagered that as global warming would only get worse, the hurricane season in 2006 would be just as bad and so it is as good as a cinch that oil stocks would rise. After some elementary research and falling prey to Jim Kramer's stupid advice, I bought some shares of Valero (Stock Ticker : VLO)

Luckily for the Gulf states, 2006 was a very mild hurricane season. Unfortunately for me with all the talk of litigation against oil companies for their huge profits, Dubya's speech of America "Addicted to Oil", Valero had a very bad run in 2006. So the stock tanked and went way lower than the value I bought it at. I was kicking myself for making my dumb prediction, but I decided to weather the storm and hold on to VLO. While my personal stock market storm was in full fury, I always filled gas at a Valero station close by. I probably owned one small part of some gas station anyways... I mentally decided it would be the pump at the station close to 101 in Santa Clara.

This summer though Valero has done very well. The stock went from $50 to roughly $75. So out of my winnings I bought a new bike from a bike shop close by called "Off Ramp". It is a 20 inch tall mountain bike from a company called Giant. I have decided that I am going to commute with a bike from now on. It will save money on gas, give me regular exercise, and help reduce my personal carbon footprint as well, 3 birds with one stone... Work is just a 20 min ride from home. I even did a dry run of the same today and loved it. It sure does feel great to create some renewable energy out of gas. Here is a picture of my bike:

Coaster-Phobia

This weekend was fun. R organized a trip to Six Flags with his friends from Intel, Sacramento. So A S R and I went to Vallejo to spin on some rollercoasters. My last trip to Six Flags was in 2003, when a bunch of us UW grad-students went to the Six Flags in Gurney, close to Chicago. I had an awesome time back then and I enjoyed nearly all the rollercoasters. The Vertical Velocity coaster freaked me out initially, but I finally mustered some courage and even sat through that one.

I wonder if it was peer pressure the last time. This trip to Six Flags I didn't really enjoy the rollercoasters as much. I don't like that sinking feeling you get in your stomach when you fall fast. I did try out all but a couple of the rollercoasters. I loved the coaster called Boomerang though. It consists of two parallel rails interconnected with some twists and the train goes from one rail to the other and back. You are completely disoriented midway through the ride and falling in reverse is an interesting experience. One of these green coaster with a huge drop at the start, just scared me a little too much. There was also some of that "Final Destination" effect. I am alluding to the rollercoaster accident in the movie, in which a lot of people are saved from death due to girl's premonition and then the Grim Reaper hunts them down all the same in some sequence. That movie must be the least favourite movie for the owners of Six Flags I bet.

The prices for various victuals at Six Flags are just atrocious. A bottle of water for instance was for $3.60. Hot chocolate was cheaper at $2.00. I think it is just inhuman to charge so much for water. They are just waiting for some people to die of dehydration. Well I almost did, but then finally got myself some hot chocolate when I was almost on the brink.

To conclude, I think I am out of the coaster-crazy phase of my life. Yeah I am a senile 27-year old I guess. I just don't see the point of paying someone to torture me, first with the sinking feeling in my stomach and then with overpriced food. I enjoyed making new friends and hanging out with some of my older friends. That's something I ought to do more often.

Referring to an article from BBC News posted here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6640147.stm

Quote:

Few of those flying today, though, know what all this will mean in terms of pollution and carbon emissions. "I'm not thinking about all that right now," said Anita Gupta as she arrived to catch her flight to Mumbai. "How it impacts the environment is difficult to grasp," added Anjali, as she queued at the security gate.

Danesh, a businessman, was the only person we found who was concerned. "All these additional planes being added to the system,
and the fuel being emitted, causing more warming is very hazardous," he said, "but I am still flying because I have to for my job."

For now, India's priority is a massive programme of building: half a dozen new international airport terminals, new runways, new infrastructure. Worrying about the environmental cost will come later.

I have never seen this question asked to anyone in the US. On an average day there are probably 100 times more planes flying to various places within the US. I admit air travel has a huge effect on carbon emissions, but has anyone ever asked America to reduce aviation because it isn't good for the environment. Heck why doesn't America just stop using planes altogether because airplanes were invented here and they have had a hyperactive aviation business for the last century.

An Attempted Environment-Friendly Weekend

The weekend reports here are inspired by Hob, who writes similar weekend updates. Friday night was fairly ordinary. I realized that very frequently I tend to not do things in ways that I know best. So for starters I decided to become very environment-friendly and reduce my personal carbon footprint. Friday night I went grocery shopping with a cloth bag and walked to the store about a half mile away rather than driving. I shopped for really healthy things, such as whole wheat pitas, hummus, organic milk, sundried tomatoes, walnuts and olive oil/balsamic vinegar. Unfortunately at the checkout line I forgot to hand my cloth bag to the person packing the bags, so I ended up using some plastic bags inside my cloth bag. Lessson learned and now I know another way "a bulb cannot be made" (Quoting Edison on optimism). And I came back home and enjoyed all the healthy goodies. I highly recommend the Athenos Hummus, if you are in the market for some Mediterranean food.

On Saturday morning I went to watch Spiderman 3 with Alok, Mani, Atul, Sathish and Raj. The movie was decent, but lacked a cohesive storyline. (It seems to have broken records of the highest opening weekend numbers.)We went for Indian food at Spice Hut in Sunnyvale thereafter. I turned vegetarian two weeks ago and I was feeling pretty happy about it. Also given the news that chicken feed containing the melamine (that killed many pets) has entered the food-chain, it seems like a good move already.

The other big way to reduce my carbon footprint would be to start biking to work. So I decided to shop for bikes at Walmart. I got completely confused by all the options and eventually ended up not getting one. But I bought an energy-efficient bulb for about $2 from GE. The lamp is subsidized by PG&E and also uses 13 watts to emit the same amount of light as a 60 watt bulb. (1/4th the electricity consumption is quite something!) Usually I hate the light from these substitutes because it tends to be ugly white, but surprisingly these ee-bulbs give out light with the warm yellow hue that I love. It seems pretty ironic to me that things that we usually assume as signs of progress are actually very short-sighted. For instance, cars, bulbs, electricity, medicine. All things that define progress of technology, but all things that actually cause more serious problems such as global warming, overpopulation... Frankensteins that were conceived many years ago and now taking birth. A lot of organizations have started demanding manufacturers to do a life-cycle analysis of their products, which is a step in the right direction.

I had read a review for Mohammed Yunus's "Banker to the Poor" by Hirak on Friday, so I picked up the book at Borders on the way back home. I couldn't let go off the book for the remainder of the night. I was already impressed with Yunus's micro-lending concept when I heard about it a few years ago. Reading about the other challenges Grameen Bank faced and how they solved them, inspired me even further. All in all a weekend that made me happy! :)

Que Sera Sera

I wish Conan O'Brien had telecast today's show back when I was younger in India. Conan has been in San Francisco this week, and on today's show he visits Intel in Santa Clara. (As a matter of fact the very building he visits is about a mile from my home.) He wades through a sea of grey, grey as far as the eye can see and cubes completely indistinguishable from one another. The people who are guiding him through the place keep quiet for most parts, while he cracks lots of jokes about the place and how every cube is the same and nobody has any individuality.

While the company I work with is pretty nice, it is similar to Intel in many respects. I sit in a sea of cubes surrounded by identical green-brown walls. Everyday I spend 8 hours or more in a cube staring at a couple of monitors, writing emails, looking at waves and Verilog and C code. Is this what life is all about? Spending the years until you retire, making one chip after another work? There are a lot of advantages to it of course. It pays pretty well, you get to live in a beautiful warm place like Santa Clara, you get to drive a nice car, live in a nice apartment and have super weekends. Some of the chips I worked on are out in the market as well, and the bits I worked on could help you watch a HD-DVD or Blue Ray Disc on your computer. My manager is a really kind person and I own my company's quick moving stock. You do feel happy about being a productive member of society and paying taxes. (Okay actually taxes don't make me happy. ;)) I guess we are very privileged in some sense. There are people who are much worse off, who have no running water or food or a shelter. But somehow after doing this for 2 years, there is a certain hollowness I feel about this. Will I be doing this for the rest of my life?


I wanted to become an astrophysicist as a child. I grew up thinking science is the most wonderful thing we have, and how making a small contribution of my own would be a worthwhile way to spend life, and yet will be fun. When one is younger, in the age of ambition and dreaming, you want to make a difference to the world. You want your life to have some meaning... you have faith in the fact that you can do great things. You do well in school and are encouraged by your teachers into thinking you're a reasonably smart kid. But somehow this life now seems like an anticlimax. Your teachers didn't tell you that there are soo many smart people in the world. After arriving here, the road ahead really doesn't have milestones or signs. As a kid you have exams to prepare for, classes to try to ace, degrees to get, professions to choose and there is a huge realm of possibility ahead. What I find sorely missing in my life now is passion and a sense of higher purpose! Maybe one cannot have one's cake and eat it too afterall!

Conan Live in San Francisco: What's inside those coffee mugs on the show?

I've been a fan of Conan O'Brien's Late Night show for sometime. It used to be my regular before-bed ritual back when I was on the Central Timezone, when I went to Graduate School in Madison, WI. Lately though staying up until 1230-1 am before work everyday on the Pacific Time Zone is just no doable. I do catch every other show on Friday night, and it brings back fond memories. Conan is a pretty gifted comedian. I am sure he saw it coming... from Harvard lampoon, to Simpsons to Saturday Night Live, Conan has contributed to a wide range of classic comedy. (Okay I admit I know nothing about the Harvard Lampoon)

Today though was an interesting day to get to see a show taped live in front of you. So what were the things that struck me most? A) The stage/set is soo small. One imagines it to be much larger than it is. The band is playing along one wall of the stage using as little area as possible. Seven people cramped against one wall while the rest of the show proceeds in the middle. In the smallness regard, the set shares this feature with the White House. The real White House is sooo tiny when compared to the impression of it that you get from TV pictures. B) They pour water into those coffee mugs. Yeah they do! I saw them do it. C) Conan is a pretty sweet guy overall... if some kid is waving like crazy during the commercials, he waves back nicely acknowledging the wave. D) The Orpheum Theater was pretty grand and seats a lot of people too. All the more challenging for Conan because it is hard to get a show on, with so many excited fans all shouting from various corners of the theater, trying to get heard on national television. Yeah I know it's pretty lame to do that. E) The Max Weinberg 7 is technically around to entertain the people during the breaks and to play the opening and closing music on the show. But seems like their major role was for the breaks. F) Various parts of the set are rolled in and rolled out onto the stage during the show. For instance, the couch and desk for the interviews are brought in this way. The band that plays it's own music, gets their instruments dragged in similarly.

It took some amount of time to stand in the lines, get tickets etc. You do feel slightly special that you got tickets in the beginning, until you realize there are a zillion other people who got tickets too. Randy Jackson was one of the guests on the show tonight. Overall though Thursday night shows are generally alright, nothing noteworthy. So you get a few laughs, you get to hear some decent music and before you know it the show is over and you are back home writing a blog post about it. :)

An ode to Jon Stewart

A minor flop at the box office last year, "Man of the Year" was a movie starring Robin Williams about a TV show host who runs for the presidency and wins. If had to pick one TV personality to become the leader of the Free World (quoting Obama), it would be Jon Stewart. Exceptional comic timing, great facial expressions, and a remarkable wit already make him the best in the business even if he had no other notable quality. I truly wonder if the person who wrote the script for "Man of the Year" had Jon Stewart in mind. Jon's talents though don't end there.

Fearless and outspoken, he doesn't steer clear of controversial topics but takes them head on, asking some of his more political guests all the tough questions, that the rest of the shows tiptoe around. The Daily show relishes in poking fun at the various contradictions of the Bush government. One of the best examples of such satire was a piece from last week entitled "Bush vs Bush", where Daily Show pitches GW Bush of the second term against GW Bush from the first term in the White House. My favourite line was the one following both Bushes warning America of deadly consequences if America doesn't invade Iraq before and recently if America leaves Iraq now.

"So let me get this straight, first term President Bush went in to remove Saddam Hussein, and second term President Bush you are there to battle the threat created by the LACK of Saddam Hussein."

Juxtaposing statements from the same person about similar issues shows the hypocrisy of the administration.

It is said that a vast majority of young America gets their news from the Daily show, and it definitely doesn't seem like a responsibility that Jon takes lightly. I cannot think of any other show that has a discussion about a book. It seems like a conscious decision to put the sex appeal back into books. Mr Stewart seems to use his fame to good use too. Attacking Tucker Carlson about the quality of television journalism was just one such example. My vote (if I had one) to President Stewart!

Question: What is the biggest sign that America hates George W Bush?
Answer: The frontrunners in the Presidential race today are a woman and a black male Democrat.

Carpe Diem Reloaded

After having a complete blast last weekend, by going to Mission Peak in Fremont and then to the Rosicrucian Egyptian museum in San Jose, I decided to do the Carpe Diem theme again this weekend, although may be not quite as successfully.

Friday

On Friday night, I went for an excellent movie, Fracture starring Anthony Hopkins and Ryan Gosling. This one is a suspense drama with an excellent storyline. I was pleasantly surprised that this turned out to be such a good movie. The process of measurement spoils the quantity being measured though... the Heisenberg principle as applied to movies... my contention is that since I have told you that this was an excellent movie, you visit the theaters with greater gusto and then realize that it wasn't so great afterall. Not a lot of movies are theater-worthy but I did have a good time with this one. Anthony Hopkins did what he does best... act as a smart rich villian. Ryan Gosling's role as the protagonist made me realize something very significant. I realized that success cannot be measured by money, by possessions, by your achievements, by other people's judgement of your worth... personally I think a true measure of success is self-respect. Real success I think is living up to one's own standards in pursuing one's goals and earning one's own respect.

Saturday

I dabbled in photography again. I learnt how to use Sai's Nikon D200 and then took a few pictures in the lawns outside within Mansion Grove. Here is one of the pictures testing D200's depth of field.



A friend A is moving to London in a few months from now and her brother S organized a party in Palo Alto. It was at this swanky place called "The Mantra Lounge", which is probably the most sophisticated place with an Indian theme I had ever been to. They had paintings by MF Hussain on the walls, a very fancy decor and some very fine Riesling.

Sunday

Today some friends A & M, invited me to lunch and then we went checking out condominiums in the area. Milpitas had some for around 300,000 dollars but these were 30 years old and right next to 680. Then I found some brand new condos close to home for around 500,000 dollars with a brand new primary school in the area. I don't think I really am in the market for a place yet, but it was good fun checking out prices. Half a million dollars is a lot of money!

Looking forward to seeing Conan Live in San Francisco this week. I got tickets for the recording. :)

Carpe` Diem - Postcards from San Jose

The man, the machine... Street Hawk!

On my trip to India this time, one of my best friends from childhood Priyadarshan took me out to a place called "Mocha" for dinner. I loved the place! One of the few meals which were blog-worthy. The crowd around us mostly comprised of "hep" kids from Symbiosis college, the local place for youngsters with rich parents. We looked like the oldest people in the place, and with my impending wedding, I was soon to enter the age of uncle-hood. It was a much more upscale version of a hookah place in Austin that Suvid once took me to, and with great Indian food to boot. And so the atmosphere was exotic to say the least. One sits on the floor with large cushions. The place is dimly light, some smoke, psychdelic colors, other-worldly music... the only thing missing was a belly-dancer. I felt transported to another country. And then there was the menu... In India people don't care about calories. They just relish their food and leave guilt for Americans. And so I had some amazing coffee, and kheema paav (Mumbai ishtyle) and a few more things I can't recall. The prices were totally not Indian. Priyu spent more than I spend on an average meal in the valley that night in absolute numbers.

Priyu also had a neat phone with a camera and the theme from Street Hawk, a childhood favourite for both of us. It took me back to a much simpler time, when TV stood for Doordarshan and it was pretty sucky. There were usually only a couple of decent shows all week. One used to be "The World this Week" which was a top-class journalism effort hosted by Pranoy Roy. I don't think I've seen a comparable news show, even later, although I have to admit that my outlook on the world was a lot different around age 10.

And then there was Street Hawk. I knew when it would show, and there were no advertisements, just pure fun! It was every kid's dream to become a crime-fighter and ride a cool fast bike. Today I visited this site and it brought back such pleasant memories, of a time long gone, yet a memory worth cherishing. Street Hawk was cancelled in the United States within 13 episodes. Somehow even though I watched some Knight Rider later, it was no match for Street Hawk. If you are someone from my generation who shared this liking for Hyper Thrust and the man with a machine, do visit this place. Priyu actually rides like Mr Mach on his spanking new Karisma. I am happier without riding one though... dont have the guts to even sit as a pillion rider now. :)

The TV Buying Dilemma : My Decision Making Process

TV Buying is a nightmare scenario. The number of options that one has not just for technology, sizes, manufacturers and retailers, make decision making very hard. I got past all the initial technology related understanding LCD, Plasma, CRT, Projection and others. I have talked to a sizable number of people who own TVs and each one recommends getting a kind unlike their own. Joseph says,"I bought an LCD TV from Samsung 2 years ago, and some important component went kaputt. Buy Plasma TV!" Nachiket says "My friend bought a Plasma TV. They don't last very long. Don't get Plasma!" So I decided I am going to get an LCD TV, under $1000 in price.

I worked on video processors for the next generation standards, so I know about the latest high resolution DVDs that have come out. Blue Ray DVDs and HD-DVDs both have a resolution of 1920 x 1088 pixels. This is called 1080p or Full HD resolution I think. Also if you watch NBC Nightly News you would know that their broadcasts switched to Full HD from last week. Comcast HD also broadcasts at that resolution. So it seems like all broadcasters are switching to that resolution. If you spend a $1000 on a TV, you better buy something that plays 1080p.

But that as much as I can tell is an impossible proposition. There are no such TVs in the market currently. The cheapest 1080p TV is the Sharp Aquos 32 inch TV from Buy.com or Circuit City. The trouble is that it is over my budget. It costs around $1400. So I think the smart thing to do is to get the cheapest decent TV money can buy, and wait until 1080p TVs are within my budget. That seems like a 20 inch Tube by Philips from Walmart for around $200. I need a good second opinion that my thinking here makes sense. Any takers?

It's raining cats and dogs

There's been a deluge of dogs at work these days. Within a one cube radius of my cube today, there were three dogs. A neighbour I share the aisle with, gets his really cute but old dog called Buttons to work. Then last week a new neighbourette moved in with her Apso. The third dog, a dachshund, is the one in the cube one aisle away, which I share a wall with. As a dog lover, I couldn't be more pleased. Canines are just too cute, and because at least one member of my family always hates them, some pleasures are best enjoyed vicariously.

Buttons has been coming to work for most of last month. Our workplace has a policy of "welcoming obedient pets" and all of these dogs fit the bill. Very rarely does one hear one of the dogs bark, although you do hear them lapping up water, or squealing from boredom. Poor Buttons keeps staring at passers by and I pet her and smile at her everyday. My neighbour gets a walk every few hours. Sitting in a small cube all day is not good for anyone's health and Buttons ensures that her master gets some exercise.

I've heard that Google takes pet friendliness a step further. They actually buy a pet for employees who sit next to each other and want a dog. The company takes care of it, feeds it and drills a hole in the cube walls so that the cuddly creature can visit everyone. The poor human beings stare at code all day. Well if that's what it takes to become Fortune's top company to work for, I say let all employers buy us pets.

Zodiac : A Review

I was utterly and totally scared as I made my way back home last night after 11 pm. I came back home with a person on the phone for moral support, and then quickly turned on all the lights at home and made a quick inspection of every room. The reason was this: An intelligent serial killer once roamed the same Northern California streets that I tread on today. The murders he committed some of the most ghastly crimes in the area. What's more even after 37 years , no one has yet confirmed with certainty the identity of this monster.

No movie house would have dared to make a movie about the Zodiac killer for many years. An accurate depiction of the killer would most likely have spooked Bay Area residents to the hilt... Paramount allowed David Fincher to make such a movie, and I cannot imagine a higher compliment to the movie-makers than my reaction to the movie last night.

**SPOILER WARNING** **ANALYSIS**

So why was the Zodiac Killer never caught? Here is my take on this based on the facts presented by the movie:

- The lack of a motive. The murderer just killed people to taunt police officers.

- Zodiac probably also understood that every case in a different county gets treated by different police authorities. In a less wired world, information sharing between the cops from various counties wasn't efficient and well-coordinated. Some of the Bay Area counties didn't even have fax machines at the time.

- The creation of ciphers. This was merely a distraction. The police would spend a lot of time and energy on trying to solve the ciphers, and really not gain any useful information. This meant they had less time to actually connect the dots.

- Claiming crimes that he didn't commit. This again I believe was a way to waste the police's time.

- Pretense of attack on bus for school children. Terrorizing San Francisco and forcing the police to spend time on checking all buses instead of solving the crime.

I think Zodiac was smarter than most police officials thought. But that intelligence could have been put to better use in other more useful purposes for humanity.

Amche Pune Revisited

Last month I visited Pune again after two and a half years. It is always super to be back home. I had been forewarned about a slew of changes to my old city. Hard to miss are all the new shopping malls. We live on S B Road, so only a blind person would not notice them. The malls are all very fancy, some even fancier than the ones in the US, with much the same merchandise. Pyramid and Benzer on S B Road were my usual hangouts, when I needed to do most of my wedding-gear shopping. (I also got married on this trip to my classmate from COEP, Sai Hingne! : )) Clearly inflation is a huge problem in India today. Nearly everything at these malls is comparable in absolute amounts to clothes one buys in America. Some positive changes that I saw around me were the humongous flyovers, such as the one on University Road. Some positive changes in the making are causing a lot of Punekars a lot of heartburn nevertheless.

The road/traffic situation is easily the biggest problem. While I never tried to plough my way through rush hour traffic, when I did get stuck in places, I was reminded that gridlocks are common in all major metros... I've driven through some in San Francisco and Chicago as well. But what I disliked the most was the lack of fear of the law among educated people too. At every signal, people habitually break the red light. Without cops to extract fines and with the fines now becoming a measly fraction of the average person's paycheck, people have absolutely no regard for traffic rules. City planning is my other major gripe with the city. City officials just keep extending already clogged roads further up-stream, without caring about the fact that traffic is virtually at a stand-still during every rush-hour down-stream. Plans for new complexes in places like Pirangute should only be approved once many alternate ways of getting from there to the heart of the city are created. Pune desperately needs a subway system atleast from Kothrud to Deccan and Laxmi Road Areas.

One other uniquely Pune-sque feature is the excavation of roads at random. In my 4.5 years in the US and other visits to Bombay, Delhi, and other cities, I have never noticed this problem elsewhere. I don't know why people need to replace these huge cement pipes or lay telephone lines again and again. And it doesn't even seem like anyone is in a particular hurry to get the mess sorted out. The mud is left lying around on the street, without anyone working on clearing it up even after 5 pm. I saw a person on a scooter, running into one such obstruction and suffering a very bad fall.

But here is a list of all the positive things I found on my trip: the inexpensive yet stylish clothes from FabIndia, a night's stay at Le Meridian in Pune, (11 on 10 on all counts. Excellent hotel. Highly recommended! Highly overpriced though) and my flights on Jet Airways to Delhi. The Pune airport was a fairly decent experience and a first class flight on Jet Airways nicer still. There were 7 passengers in the cabin and 3 attendents looking after them. Food is excellent, the attendants polite, and flights were on-schedule. Also there were no blackouts all through my stay. Admitted it was winter and electricity requirements were lower, but it felt nice. While there are huge mounds of mud to conquer, there is hope!

Who killed the Newspaper?

"Video killed the radio star." - The Buggles

For the last few months, someone has been delivering the San Jose Mercury News to my Santa Clara home. I don't know why. I have tried emailing them and asking them to not deliver the newspaper but they insist on continuing their unwanted altruism. I wonder how they reconcile with the fact that I am not a paying. And it's not like I read the newspaper either... someone or the other picks it or drops it into the trash.

Which brings me to the premise of this post... Why has the newspaper become so unwanted these days (so much so that I won't even read it for free)? The Mercury News isn't the best thing on the newspaper stand, but in many respects their coverage of the Silicon Valley's high-tech industry is unrivalled. Newspapers try to inform their consumers about the local news, weather, sports, schools, job market... the keyword here being LOCAL. But for a 26-year old foreign high-tech worker in California, weather is never a concern given the mildness of it. Sports hardly impresses... who cares what the Stanford Cardinals/Oakland Raiders/SF Giants/49ers are upto?? Don't need a new job right now, and even if I do it looks like the headhunters are finding me faster than I need jobs. In a wired world where people are close to their computers nearly all their waking hours, all these things can be checked for free, updated real time and from many competing sources. Craigslist and Ebay stole the classifieds business from the newspapers, and Monster Jobtrak the jobs search market.

The final nail in the coffin was struck by President Bush's war on terror. If you track the most emailed stories on any of the news websites, the Iraq related headlines are never something anyone emails to anyone else. These newspapers executives should learn about Shannon's Information Theory, known to most EE or CS grads, says that the information content of any piece of information is inversely proportional to the probability of it's occurrence. Clearly "50 dead in Baghdad" is a very deplorable incident, but doesn't really add to anyone's knowledge of the world at large... Minus the few people in the White House, everyone knows that Iraq is in a civil war and given the 3000 civilian deaths in the last few years, the last resort of fools is to just contest the definition of a "civil war". Dilys voiced the same opinion recently about news as a pessimistic world view, where bad incidents make the frontpages faster than good ones.

And finally a plug for the New York Times. I love reading it online! The Times gets it... no pop-ups, no weird banners, most emailed/blogged articles, stories that contain fun information... Tonight I read the following excellent news-stories:

San Franciscans hurl their rage at the Parking Patrol

First-Baby Sweepstakes Fuels Immigration Debate

Seeking Big Payoff, Companies Pay Dearly for Tech Trade Show

Job Growth Is Strong, Surprising Economists

Sunny California : Where everyday is Earthquake season!

"The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away"

So presumably goes a line in the Bible. It refers to how someone blessed with plenty, is also hobbled with some negatives. California is no exception. The great weather, the high-tech industry, the vineyards, Hollywood, the movie-star Governator (maybe the Lord was confused on that one) all great things, but the Lord taketh away by putting plenty of faults into our Northern California backyards. My roommate reminded me of those and my own lackadaisical attitude towards them yesterday. He asked me to read this page and it literally scared the living daylights out of me. Try it yourself here.

Joel, my room-mate told me about the Loma-Prieta earthquake, and how the road we walked on in San Francisco on New Year's eve, was built after the 1989 quake. The website above reminds me to do a lot of preventive things to avoid problems during an earthquake, describes what happens during one typically. It talks about how shattered glass is all around and how you ought to sleep every night with shoes tied to the side of your bed. So as I lay in bed last night I realized that my bed was right beneath a window. I wouldn't want to be cut right through by the shattered glass and immediatly I moved my bed to the opposite wall of the room.

Still uneasy from the seismic wake-up call, I started reading the Wikipedia about the Loma-Prieta earthquake as well. It referred to a funny prediction made by a reporter about the Baseball World Series game in the City at the time. (The two big Northern California teams Oakland Athletics and San Francisco Giants were going head to head.) But there was another person who works for the US Geological Survey, Jim Berkland, who also got this prediction right. In fact he even wrote an article about it in the Gilroy Dispatch. Here is his site. Jim seems to be making a small busines out of the quake predictions. You can subscribe to his newsletter about quake predictions. It seems the US government has warned him not to make any more predictions to avoid mass panic (I don't know how he reconciles both the last two claims). I know what site I am going to check every week now.