This weekend was devoted to some musicals. I saw wizard of Oz play at the international rose garden, the kids performing were awesome. Then I saw the movie Hairspray, you will love it if you like musicals.
I also happened to visit the hillsboro country fair. I saw swines, goats, lamas, horses, cows, sheeps. Yeah believe me I was in now way interested in seeing all this, but people with whom I went had not seen them before. It was a large fair, listened to some live music and had some fun rides, so was overall fun.
Looks like more than 1 month has passed since we left for summer. Still struggling to get some work done towards my major area. Yeah I got the euclid's elements, it was written in 300 BC or something. This book is the basis of modern day geometry.
Next weekend planning to do the Crater lake trip, that should be fun.
Monday, July 30, 2007
A weekend in marymoor park
Hello gentlemen,
It was an unusual weekend.. Beautiful weather at seattle (ok ok, thats not the only unusual part of this story), was out in this scenic park called Marymoor most of this week and weekend. Its a huge park by the lake Sammamish, was spent the weekend soaking up the gorgeous sun, in the company of a handsome man... Well, well, before Mohit's creative juices start flowing, let me clarify we were working :). Trying hard to make two laptops communicate when they weren't willing to. But the surprise came on Sat eve.. When we happened to be present for the FSA Grand Prix. It turns out to be a huge racing event, where scores of bikers race on a velodrome. The closest I had come to see a bike race is the Tour de.. on TV. Trust me, its really exciting! You can actually see in action all the strategies bikers are known to use.
Little updates from the North west otherwise. Quiet week ahead.
Saturday, July 28, 2007
Power down google!
"Recent commentary at Nature Climate Change describes an on-going debate about the energy savings associated with the background colors used by high-traffic websites such as Google and the NYTimes. A back of the envelope calculation has suggested energy savings of 750 Megawatt hours per year if Google switched their background from white to black. In response, a new version of Google called Blackle was created. However, other calculations by the Wall Street Journal suggest minimal energy savings."
Friday, July 27, 2007
el mosquitoes and their interesting affairs...
Once a feeding mosquito is full, a chemical signal shuts down the intake. When that signal is disabled in the lab, mosquitoes suck until they explode.
9 It is hard to get upset about that.
10 According to a University of Bristol study, male mosquito “ears” are packed with about as many sensory cells as human ears, helping amorous mosquito males identify and pursue passing females.
11 When a mosquito detects the whine of the opposite sex, it begins to synchronize its own pitch to match that of the potential mate. Randy males can “relate” to girl frequencies in a second or two. Females take several times longer to synchronize. This is the same with humans in a bar.
12 Mosquitoes can mate in midair, often in as little as 15 seconds from approach to fare-thee-well. There are no known instances of prior cocktails and dinner.
13 Male mosquitoes are actually sensitive vegetarians, living on nectar and plant juices. Only females drink blood, for protein to make eggs.
14 Millions of years ago, mosquitoes were three times as large as they are today.
15 Eyes occupy most of the surface of a mosquito’s head. Not eyes into which one might wish lovingly to peer, these compound-lensed organs deliver infrared images of heat patterns emanating from a body. Like the alien in Predator.
16 Mosquitoes also use your exhaled breath to track you down, especially when you sleep or have been exercising. Fortunately, they clock out at only 1.5 mph—so you can’t hide, but you can run. Unless you’re on a treadmill. Then they’ll get you.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
36 hours in NY
Heylo Buddiej,
I just got back from a whirlwind tour of NewYork with a friend here, Uncle Shaitan. As we had swore on the bones of our ancestors, I made it my life's mission to have Majjaaa. Real, undiluted, unstoppable, non-stop Majjaaaaa. We stopped by another friend Nair's for a really quick and utilitarian breakfast of dosas and stew that his mom turned out. She of course never makes dosas without idlis, so we had to, just because she insisted and not because I have a personal stake in Idlis Inc., have some of that too.
A quick run through the Museum of Natural history...(who cares if they have the T-Rex's teeth and the oryx's skin...mere paas maa hai!) ...a run-through sandwich at the Famous Fast and Fresh Sandwiches... and we were at the open-air Shakespeare theater...Since it was the sad man's only comedy, all was well and it ended well. Thereafter we traipsed through the streets and avenues of Lower Manhattan and headed to the Strand bookstore. If they really have 18 miles worth of books hidden in there...they sure look the part. I, finally, managed to lay my hands on the ones I wanted and on some that I did not really want but I did once I went through their backsides (the books', I mean), so I ended up with a bigger haul than I went out to catch.
As we came out, or maye it was before the Strandventure (please beat up this guy from Sportstar. He showed my how every single word could be excruciatingly punny), we hung around the Times Square for a little bit. I couldn't believe how many nationalities you could pack into every square inch of a square. And some really cool toy shops too. With a super fresh smoothie under my belt and giving but a nod to picasso and monet, I fell in love with the work of some unknown guy who painted ladies you could totally fall in love with at this art gallery that specialized in 3-D art. Sad that those paintings weren't in that category. :-)
Btw, I think I have found the best free-concert hall in the country. Just as you are heading out of the Times Square Underground (or subway) if you choose not to and listen to some of the musicians that strut their stuff down there, you will be amazed at what you could end up being a part of. I walked smack into the middle of this Afro-American band with drums and a center-piece of a guy going wild on a bunch of cans...Amazing doesn't even begin to cut it!! They had CDs of their stuff in the front and a collection box by the side...Buddy, if you can imagine your waste-basket a couple of days after you've emptied it, just fill it with cash and you'll get the picture. Only, I didn't have cash on me!!! Damn the crazies, you'd think a subway band would have a credit card reader!!!
On our way out, we scheduled a screening of the Lion King for August 14th for ourselves, just so we could celebrate our Independence day in style. :-) Nothing like an African jungle tale to soothe frayed post-colonial nerves...
The thing to take away from this presentation would be
- Times Square is a must visit. (Wait for applause)
@Rajesh: how was the dragon boat race?
And there's still no comment on whether or not I'm getting a beat-up old ipod..:-)
Ciao ragazzi.
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Gadgetry...
I suddenly find myself the owner of two gadgets that I never intended to posses, thanks to Microsoft. One is a black Zune and the other is a cingular 8525 windows mobile smartphone. Notice how one is being sucked into the Microsoft clan. On the first glance, they both look like something that came out of Marvin's rearside (Marvin, the ingenious and depressed robot of Douglas Adams creation). But they are pretty good on functionality. The zune has a color screen, can play videos and has wi-fi and 30gb of memory, all of which my faithful ipod lacked. But it beats me how at the time when ipod is getting miniscule by the day, the zune ends up the size of a Lifebouy bar. Makes me believe Apple works on UI and form factor first and MS, the opposite. This comment comes from the fact that the iphone lacks 3g. That brings the discussion to the phone. It has everything that the iphone has and also everything it lacks, except of course, the sexy looks.. As a side note, yes, I did switch to Cingular and the no. continues to be the same. The aspiration is to posses an iphone at some point of time in the future..maybe v2? I havent gotten around to configuring these on the Mac yet.
As for updates on the weekend, has been dull and raining a lot all week. In an attempt to celebrate the occasion of the first woman president of India, Aruna and I hit the nightclub last night :). Aruna is a phd candidate at UMass and is interning in my group. We had a fun time discussing all the cute MSR guys.
Rajesh, any updates on the love story? Mohit, I agree. Harsha is unusually silent.. In fact, these days I hear he has dinner at the computer.. no wikipedia jokes, no education on the on the origin and propagation of Islam, nothing.. I suspect he has stopped consuming non-alcoholic drinks also.. Tch, tch.. who will speak for the suffering?
As for updates on the weekend, has been dull and raining a lot all week. In an attempt to celebrate the occasion of the first woman president of India, Aruna and I hit the nightclub last night :). Aruna is a phd candidate at UMass and is interning in my group. We had a fun time discussing all the cute MSR guys.
Rajesh, any updates on the love story? Mohit, I agree. Harsha is unusually silent.. In fact, these days I hear he has dinner at the computer.. no wikipedia jokes, no education on the on the origin and propagation of Islam, nothing.. I suspect he has stopped consuming non-alcoholic drinks also.. Tch, tch.. who will speak for the suffering?
Great Updates!
Really nice! Looks like there's a ton of action going on around the house. It's pretty cool that Sush could meet up with his undergrad buddies in the Bay area. Especially during the summer the place is flush with interns and graduates... it seems almost impossible to shake a leg in a dance bar and not end up hitting a bosom friend of yore. It's a funny feeling though...you aren't in a faded tshirt...not with flipflops which have outlived generations of college grads...and you aren't speaking a tongue that is cuss-words-of-every-language-you-know-plus-a-bonus-dose... except that it is still the same...you're with the same people, laughing over the same old jokes, fighting over the same old food and dancing the same old steps...it's like straddling two worlds at once. I'm glad you had a spot of flash-back-fun there. Plus it looks like Harsha's treating everyone to grand parties in the Bay...I want to aim for one too. :-)
On the other side, why am I not surprised that Rajesh was the only one laughing at the stand-up's joke? If he can laugh at _every_ single one of Harsha's Jokesbeta he's sure to give a comedian the boost of his life..:-). And great pics from the hike. I always wonder why the sky in India never came out so good. Why does it come out so crystal clear and beautiful blue every single time. (See how smoothly I took away all credit from the ace photographer :-))..but seriously, is there something to it?
I've just come back from a relaxing weekend in the Big Apple...where my weekend's highlight were these thin wavy dosas the way the Keralites make it..:-). Other details, I'll come to in a later post...
@Ramya: The Indian Ocean's a great band to hear relaxing in a room...the poor guys felt really let down when they played contemplative melodies for a charged-up college audience a couple of years back. (Ghy doesn't really tolerate the subtler elements of life :-D.) It's great that you had a fun time! Did you go on that microsoft sponsored hike?
On the other side, why am I not surprised that Rajesh was the only one laughing at the stand-up's joke? If he can laugh at _every_ single one of Harsha's Jokesbeta he's sure to give a comedian the boost of his life..:-). And great pics from the hike. I always wonder why the sky in India never came out so good. Why does it come out so crystal clear and beautiful blue every single time. (See how smoothly I took away all credit from the ace photographer :-))..but seriously, is there something to it?
I've just come back from a relaxing weekend in the Big Apple...where my weekend's highlight were these thin wavy dosas the way the Keralites make it..:-). Other details, I'll come to in a later post...
@Ramya: The Indian Ocean's a great band to hear relaxing in a room...the poor guys felt really let down when they played contemplative melodies for a charged-up college audience a couple of years back. (Ghy doesn't really tolerate the subtler elements of life :-D.) It's great that you had a fun time! Did you go on that microsoft sponsored hike?
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Standup Comedy by Pete Johansson
This friday, for first time in life I saw live stand up comedy. Pete Johansson is from vancouver and was hilarious. Luckily/ Unluckily our seat was in front and I was also ridiculed for clapping alone at one time :D. Guy was really good and we talked after the show was over. he was mentioning about Russell, apparently Russell is more popular.
This weekend I am watching this dragon boat race at Vancouver, the twin city of Portland. Also we discovered an awesome desi buffet at Vancouver.
Yeah I found something interesting thing before the comedy show. Three of the intel guys have started a club/pub in downtown here called Pi Rem. Its in basement and not obvious from the entrance(one of the places which become famous by word of mouth). And yeah one of the guys who started is a desi. He was saying its just for fun. So yeah I really appreciate these guys on starting a fun business while working. I also discovered the belgian beer there, you should try Red Chimay, its good.
Yeah also did a hike to Hagg Lake this week.
Indian Ocean in concert
Indian Ocean performed in Seattle on Wednesday. I must say they are pretty good. They have really strong instrumentals, although the vocals tend to fall a tad flat.. The tabla player (Aseem) is really good. They pulled off cool hits like kandisa and bandhe and they had the crowd grooving.. Aseem does this neat trick of playing percussion on the bass guitar.. You guys should check the video out on youtube.
They are apparently touring the US and playing in 16 more cities. So if anyone is interested, check their schedule.
They are apparently touring the US and playing in 16 more cities. So if anyone is interested, check their schedule.
Langda tyagi..Bahubali
Bas langda hi reh gaya, ban na paya main bahubali...
@Mohit, I am not able to go to gym. I had got knee injury while returning from Tequepis hike. The stupid doctor in health center did not find any problem. She just asked me to take rest for a month. However, it is not healing at all. I have been going to lab after 5PM to save TAP hours. The worst part is that I am missing out the dance clubs in downtown.
Last weekend I had gone to bay area. It was a reunion of undergrad friends. On Saturday, we rented a car from Budget (not a single car was left in any Enterprise within a radius of 8 miles!) and drove to Point Reyes. It was a wonderful drive through CA-1. It became more enjoyable because Matka (Varun) started making witty pranks on another friend. We started pretty late, and when we reached there, we were damn hungry. Pizza tasted like the best thing in life. We did a very small hike in Bear Valley Trail and then headed back towards home. Harsha had reserved place in a dance club and organized a reunion of UCSB friends, Harsha, Rakhi, Swaroop, Sumanth, Gargi, Tushar, Tidda and me. It was "desi night" and presence of so many desis made it India.
Next day I met Harsha in his apartment which has a view of swimming pool. It is a pretty nice place. Dharamraj, you should share some pics here. After lunch I went to meet Shilpa n gang. We left for Santa Barbara in the evening. Overall, it was a pretty nice trip. Check out the pics here.
@Mohit, invite Karma too in the blog. We are missing out our Best Cook Awardee. :-)
@Mohit, I am not able to go to gym. I had got knee injury while returning from Tequepis hike. The stupid doctor in health center did not find any problem. She just asked me to take rest for a month. However, it is not healing at all. I have been going to lab after 5PM to save TAP hours. The worst part is that I am missing out the dance clubs in downtown.
Last weekend I had gone to bay area. It was a reunion of undergrad friends. On Saturday, we rented a car from Budget (not a single car was left in any Enterprise within a radius of 8 miles!) and drove to Point Reyes. It was a wonderful drive through CA-1. It became more enjoyable because Matka (Varun) started making witty pranks on another friend. We started pretty late, and when we reached there, we were damn hungry. Pizza tasted like the best thing in life. We did a very small hike in Bear Valley Trail and then headed back towards home. Harsha had reserved place in a dance club and organized a reunion of UCSB friends, Harsha, Rakhi, Swaroop, Sumanth, Gargi, Tushar, Tidda and me. It was "desi night" and presence of so many desis made it India.
Next day I met Harsha in his apartment which has a view of swimming pool. It is a pretty nice place. Dharamraj, you should share some pics here. After lunch I went to meet Shilpa n gang. We left for Santa Barbara in the evening. Overall, it was a pretty nice trip. Check out the pics here.
@Mohit, invite Karma too in the blog. We are missing out our Best Cook Awardee. :-)
Friday, July 20, 2007
Wallll, What's the update?
Hello bhaiyon and lady,
What's the update? Our man Anindya is heading out on a cross country tour after submitting a paper, and is scheduled to meet, guess who...ah well, me next week on Thursday. That should be one really fun dinner. :-)
There has been no news of our Dharamraaj. With the muslim world in blazes and reports everyday of Uncle Osama squaring off with little Sam, it is very uncharacteristic of him to not comment. Surprising, bhery surprising...what's yahoo doing to you, Dharamraaj?
Susmit, to form, is quiet and brooding...no doubt bulking up on the benchpress and beautying up with the protective tanning lotion...send in a pic if you have one, so we recognize you when we get back. (aur haan main hisaab is weekend karne ka plan kar raha hoon...:-) ).
Loverboy Tushar seems to be on track (hehe..i almost said on Rails) to become a full-scale upstart. Do you guys get together downtown at all?
Hopefully, after Friday tonight, Raju baby will fill us in on the latest and the greatest moments in his l'affaire de Hillsboro. And I'm banking on Ramya to post some more ahem, thought-provoking pics this weekend. As for me, I'm heading out to NY tomorrow for the usual music. Let's see, maybe I'll have a story to chip in with too...So long buddies, keep smiling (optional) and post fun stuff that you come across :-)....
What's the update? Our man Anindya is heading out on a cross country tour after submitting a paper, and is scheduled to meet, guess who...ah well, me next week on Thursday. That should be one really fun dinner. :-)
There has been no news of our Dharamraaj. With the muslim world in blazes and reports everyday of Uncle Osama squaring off with little Sam, it is very uncharacteristic of him to not comment. Surprising, bhery surprising...what's yahoo doing to you, Dharamraaj?
Susmit, to form, is quiet and brooding...no doubt bulking up on the benchpress and beautying up with the protective tanning lotion...send in a pic if you have one, so we recognize you when we get back. (aur haan main hisaab is weekend karne ka plan kar raha hoon...:-) ).
Loverboy Tushar seems to be on track (hehe..i almost said on Rails) to become a full-scale upstart. Do you guys get together downtown at all?
Hopefully, after Friday tonight, Raju baby will fill us in on the latest and the greatest moments in his l'affaire de Hillsboro. And I'm banking on Ramya to post some more ahem, thought-provoking pics this weekend. As for me, I'm heading out to NY tomorrow for the usual music. Let's see, maybe I'll have a story to chip in with too...So long buddies, keep smiling (optional) and post fun stuff that you come across :-)....
Monday, July 16, 2007
World's funniest joke, straight from NJ
A couple of New Jersey hunters are out in the woods when one of them falls to the ground. He doesn't seem to be breathing, his eyes are rolled back in his head.
The other guy whips out his cell phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps to the operator: "My friend is dead! What can I do?"
The operator, in a calm soothing voice says: "Just take it easy. I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead."
There is a silence, then a shot is heard.
The guy's voice comes back on the line. He says: "OK, now what?"
The other guy whips out his cell phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps to the operator: "My friend is dead! What can I do?"
The operator, in a calm soothing voice says: "Just take it easy. I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead."
There is a silence, then a shot is heard.
The guy's voice comes back on the line. He says: "OK, now what?"
Falling in and out of love
It all happened very fast. It started on friday ....
There was one intern event at a local pub when I met her. she was so cool and original. We chatted and drank together. And then turned out that it was the same girl with who was in the bunch of people going downtown to party. So we again met in night in downtown and partied till 4. I know why I liked her. She is sweet and innocent. She sings nicely, both in english and chinese (she is a taiwanese). We danced and had fun together. Everything was going on as a dream, then it turned out that she lived in same appartment complex as mine, what a coincidence. I dropped her at her appartment at night ... that time I wanted to ask her out, but decided otherwise thinking that it might just be drinks and she may be not expecting it. Again next day we went out with movie and then for dinner, my friend mayank was with me that time. I did not want to make it uncomfortable for both of us. Then on sunday we went on a day long hiking and again had a potluck dinner at her place. So practically I spent my full weekend with her. I like her, but I think she is much younger than me (5 years). And looks like she is nice but I dont think she is looking for any romantic relationship for now. So for now i have decided to be a friend and let it happen automatically and not force things. It better not to be emotional and take things as they happen, thats what I am thinking now.
Anyways, the above picture is from the our hike. Its a rock slide area in the Gorge trail in columbia river gorge. Here are other pictures
http://picasaweb.google.com/rajesh.tripathi/ElowahWahclellaFalls
Sunday, July 15, 2007
Work hard party harder
Has been the motto of the week! After crazy amounts of work and having practically a 14 day week, finally it was time to partieeeeeee! Thursday we visited (yes, Im keeping up the santa barbara tradition by starting weekend on a thurs) Kirkland downtown. Kirkland is this town on the bank of lake Washington. With the downtown set around the waterfront, it has a very plush and beautiful feel to it. Three cocktails later, I got back to work and did manage to run some experiments although I ended up making bad jokes about R. I hope he's not mad at me :)
MSR has a Friday evening social where all the interns (and some mentors) get together with some beer. Its a great way to meet other interns and plan what to do over the weekend. I ended up making a deal to subject myself to Harry Potter(sorry Mohit), in return for which I would get company for dancing later in the night. HP is pretty ok, I cant understand why it is hyped so much.
As luck would have it, I ended up meeting R again at the nightclub! I was too high to worry, although he ends up being inhibited with me around and quietly drinks beer in a corner. I havent had any success with him, although his best friend was too easy.. U know what I mean ;-).
After partying till 5 in the morning, its unbelievable how I got up at 9 and started for the hike. It is the MS sponsored annual hike to Mt. Rainier. Basically, we can go hiking to Mt. Rainier and MS will cover all expenses. Its about 100 miles towards Portland from here and 5 of us drove there and started on a 7 mile hike. It was a nice hike, moderately strenuous, where we gained over 1000 feet elevation. We got some spectacular views of Rainier. I was super excited to get my hands on the snow, ice rather. We threw snow balls at each other, it was fun! :)
The pics are here http://picasaweb.google.com/ramya05/MtRainier
To end it perfectly, I got back to read some good news. My paper to IMC got accepted :)
A well spent weekend, to say the least.
Saturday, July 14, 2007
Malgoody days
Hey all,
I have been managing to beat the heat here by hiding, or ahem...working, inside NEC. The evenings are pretty cool, and with my newly discovered AC in my room, I guess I've my plan in place to only hear about the summer heat second hand.
I like it that there are a bunch of intern events at Intel where you can meet people and even hit on them assuming, w/o loss of generality, that all the beautiful girls must by definition be single. (You know how hard it is to approach the good ones and so on...). Here, I've to work up ruses to get the fun rolling, but now that we've dug out ping-pong and foosball tables, the scene's looking up. (Official disclaimer: My hit counter is, and will stay, at zero :-) )
I tried my hand at baseball at my company picnic the other day, and am convinced that it is exactly what it looks like. You take a gourmet's dream, cricket, with all its sophisticated artistry and subtleties of strategy and turn it into a ready-to-eat dish and you'd land up with baseball. I do not mean to be disrespectful, for you can set the simplest of tasks and before you blink it will have turned into a monster with thousands busting their balls to do it better than the rest. Think 'hit this this big ball into that net'. Or 'just throw it into that hoop'. Or just run past that line...and so on.
You still need the eye of a hawk and the coordination of a fill-in-a-well-coordinated-animal-here to make it good in baseball. And the pitcher does make the ball swing in the air and vary its pace. But for a batsman to not think about the movement off the pitch or the gaps in the fielders' positions or a spinner to not have the loop, turn and zip or the captain to not fret about rotating his bowlers and fielders every six pitches and discounting the team composition and such affairs as a problem for the flannelled fools that huff-n-puff for five days and then drink to the draw, I feel that there's a lot more depth to cricket. In a way, there are so many simultaneous battles going on that even a bowler marking his run up is imbued with more than a touch of drama.
Anyways, that was my two cents on the sports. I'll head to a Yankees game sometime soon and give you a heads up on how it looks like at the top level :-). For now though, it's back to inheriting losses...Hope you guys are having fun,
I tried my hand at baseball at my company picnic the other day, and am convinced that it is exactly what it looks like. You take a gourmet's dream, cricket, with all its sophisticated artistry and subtleties of strategy and turn it into a ready-to-eat dish and you'd land up with baseball. I do not mean to be disrespectful, for you can set the simplest of tasks and before you blink it will have turned into a monster with thousands busting their balls to do it better than the rest. Think 'hit this this big ball into that net'. Or 'just throw it into that hoop'. Or just run past that line...and so on.
You still need the eye of a hawk and the coordination of a fill-in-a-well-coordinated-animal-here to make it good in baseball. And the pitcher does make the ball swing in the air and vary its pace. But for a batsman to not think about the movement off the pitch or the gaps in the fielders' positions or a spinner to not have the loop, turn and zip or the captain to not fret about rotating his bowlers and fielders every six pitches and discounting the team composition and such affairs as a problem for the flannelled fools that huff-n-puff for five days and then drink to the draw, I feel that there's a lot more depth to cricket. In a way, there are so many simultaneous battles going on that even a bowler marking his run up is imbued with more than a touch of drama.
Anyways, that was my two cents on the sports. I'll head to a Yankees game sometime soon and give you a heads up on how it looks like at the top level :-). For now though, it's back to inheriting losses...Hope you guys are having fun,
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Summer heat in North West
Its getting really hot in hillsboro here. On Tuesday the temperature was over 100 F. Interestingly we dont have the AC, so we went out looking for AC last sunday and guess what .... all the portable ACs was sold out. So I biked back home on that hot day. I thought the temperature is only 37 C, not much by indian standards. Biking back was not an issue and it was ok. The problem was when we came back home. It was hot and humid and fan was not helping. So at 7:45 we decided to go to a movie to beat the heat. SO finally we were able to catch the 8 PM show of Ratatouille. Oh it felt so nice and movie was awesome! It appeals to children and grown ups a like. The message in the movie is "You can do anything if you want to." Its a well made movie. I also liked the chinese chick in the movie (Man .. whats happening to me, now I am liking the animated chicks!!)
Today there was a intern career fair at I-nte-l (yeah I am paranoid :D )which was a good overview of different groups in intel. Intel is really BIG! with so many versatile businesses. The question I was thinking was does it really make sense for it to involve itself in so many things?? And yeah today I got to see all the interns here (abt 300). And surprisingly there are some hot chicks around. And interestingly one of them works in my building (our building is really small and not many here know abt this). And she told me that she has been feeling a lonely intern all while, so .... I said "dont worry" (Mai hoo na ;)). I am going by that famous rule "A girl is single, unless proved otherwise " :D
But still worse is that I did not ask her for her number yet ... thinking I am going to meet her anyway. But I was kind of flirting with one desi girl around and also got her number :) , though I know that I might not call her. (actually I was asking if she is interested in clubbing and all, but looks like she does not go to "such" places). Anyway ....... So guys as you see I have been really trying hard :D, sometimes I also feel that I should not have tried that hard, but I cannot help it ;), sometimes it comes spontaneously and you cannot help it.
Allright I should stop now. Guys have fun!!
Today there was a intern career fair at I-nte-l (yeah I am paranoid :D )which was a good overview of different groups in intel. Intel is really BIG! with so many versatile businesses. The question I was thinking was does it really make sense for it to involve itself in so many things?? And yeah today I got to see all the interns here (abt 300). And surprisingly there are some hot chicks around. And interestingly one of them works in my building (our building is really small and not many here know abt this). And she told me that she has been feeling a lonely intern all while, so .... I said "dont worry" (Mai hoo na ;)). I am going by that famous rule "A girl is single, unless proved otherwise " :D
But still worse is that I did not ask her for her number yet ... thinking I am going to meet her anyway. But I was kind of flirting with one desi girl around and also got her number :) , though I know that I might not call her. (actually I was asking if she is interested in clubbing and all, but looks like she does not go to "such" places). Anyway ....... So guys as you see I have been really trying hard :D, sometimes I also feel that I should not have tried that hard, but I cannot help it ;), sometimes it comes spontaneously and you cannot help it.
Allright I should stop now. Guys have fun!!
Mid week crisis?
Anyone else having a mid week crisis too? Have the feeling that its been an incredibly long week and it has to get over soon...? Adding to it is the the killing summer heat..It was 102 here y'day! Anyone has some interesting updates to post? Harsha...u'v been unusually quiet dude...
Sunday, July 8, 2007
My Summer Days ...
Well, if I wanted to finish in one sentence, I would have said another summer in Santa Barbara... Nothing very interesting till now, but things are going pretty smooth. I went to our 'unfinished hike', the 'take-a-piss' trail with Sharadh and Anindya. Surprisingly no one contributed to the stream there. In fact, there was not a single stream there ! May be those streams origin is linked to the name of the hike ...
Anyways, we still could not reach the top because it is not maintained and there are only bushes near the top. We tried to go through the bushes, but had to stop after some time... we got pretty good views though. The pics are uploaded in here.
Time to talk little bit about new house... only KP and I am staying there because Badri seldom stays here. I don't know anything more, so don't expect any gossip :-)
Almost everyday KP and I am making food together... but I miss those dinner at our old apartment and primarily the conversations !
I am trying to learn playing guitar in summer. I have started taking lessons from a dude in downtown (Las Positas). Lets see how long my interest stays alive...
What else ... hmmmmm... I am going to downtown (read pubs) on tuesday after I am done with my MAE, and to Bay Area on friday to meet my friends. I think thats all from me till now...
Enjoy madi !
Anyways, we still could not reach the top because it is not maintained and there are only bushes near the top. We tried to go through the bushes, but had to stop after some time... we got pretty good views though. The pics are uploaded in here.
Time to talk little bit about new house... only KP and I am staying there because Badri seldom stays here. I don't know anything more, so don't expect any gossip :-)
Almost everyday KP and I am making food together... but I miss those dinner at our old apartment and primarily the conversations !
I am trying to learn playing guitar in summer. I have started taking lessons from a dude in downtown (Las Positas). Lets see how long my interest stays alive...
What else ... hmmmmm... I am going to downtown (read pubs) on tuesday after I am done with my MAE, and to Bay Area on friday to meet my friends. I think thats all from me till now...
Enjoy madi !
Fun on the lawn
A JIT ping to tell you that Wimbledon this year's really enticingly poised.
Apart from the final being a matchup between the top two players in the last couple of years, Federer's looking to make it five-in-a-row to become the only second person in histroy to do so. And he's up against Nadal, who is the French open champion three years running. With one guy beating the other in last year's Wimbledon and the other responding in kind this year in Paris, it looks like a classic match up between the Ghost who Walks and T4.
So ladies and gentlemen, if ever there was a time you wished you had sopcast, this time is that time. :-) And just when I thought I'd seen all there is to see in tennis, I get this.
Enjoy.
Apart from the final being a matchup between the top two players in the last couple of years, Federer's looking to make it five-in-a-row to become the only second person in histroy to do so. And he's up against Nadal, who is the French open champion three years running. With one guy beating the other in last year's Wimbledon and the other responding in kind this year in Paris, it looks like a classic match up between the Ghost who Walks and T4.
So ladies and gentlemen, if ever there was a time you wished you had sopcast, this time is that time. :-) And just when I thought I'd seen all there is to see in tennis, I get this.
Enjoy.
Saturday, July 7, 2007
Updates from Hillsboro
I like this idea of blogging, thats cool !! Allright ... so there are a lot of things I want to talk about. Let us take it one by one.
The first thing I want to tell all of you about is, filling gas in Oregon. Believe me its not as mundane as it sounds. Ramya! Do you remember when we first filled up the gas in Oregon, I do. We did it at the Newport when we were to take a right turn to OR-20 to come to Portland. I remember an employee type looking guy was staring me, when I was filling the gas myself, as if I was doing something illegal. And as it turns out, I was doing illegal activity for which I could be fined 500$ !! Yes !! So the point is in Oregon you cannot fill your gas yourself, actually you are supposed to sit in your car and wait for the employee to do it for you. Supposedly the gas is a dangerous substance for untrained people (Read you and me ) to handle :D
As I had heard, oregon is green and beautiful. I have joined the oregon hiking club of Intel and we go on hikes on most of the wednesdays and saturdays. I was able to make into 2 of them till now. Larch mountain and Eagle Creek . I really enjoyed these hikes. One interesting point is that somehow there are more people hiking here than in california. One reason can be that its summer time in Oregon and only time in the year for doing outdoor activities.
Other interesting fact I came to know about portland is that it has highest number of gentle mens' clubs per person in United states. I did not get a chance till now but will certainly be paying my visit to some (??) of them ;).
Portland downtown has nice pubs, we went once to irish pub. They had there traditional music live that day and people were doing line dancing, one like in the Titanic movie, we also tried a few steps. One other thing I tried is pedalling a dragon boat with Mayank (my friend from bhu and Talisma) and his team. Its fun but is really tiring. May be will do it again.
I have told the sad story of my vehicle registration problem to most of you. For the sake of completeness will mention it here again. The roads specially the back roads on mountains are very pretty here and are many. I wanted to buy a motorcycle but figured out here that I cannot register that in oregon because I am california resident. There can be ways around still trying to figure that out. I dont want to take any risk with insurance and stuff. Specially the cops here are very strict about traffic rules and are too many. Also here the cops sometimes ride normal looking cars and thats good way of catching violators. Therefor people here are very careful of speed limits and stuff.
That said, my office is a good 3.4 miles from place where I live. So I bought a very normal bike (read cheap) . It takes me 20 minutes to get to office, so I get 40 minutes of exercise for free daily, am saving the environment from being polluted , tress from being cut ......
About Intel .. the work is good. I cannot talk about that here ... There are some 300 interns here in oregon area and as usual people keep organising something or other. But I miss those free lunches and events like yahoo, there are only few intern events. And I also miss the game room of yahoo. playing pool and foosball was so much fun last year.
There are other things .. which i will tell you guys in my next post.
Unexpected twists in the tale..
Hi all,
Multicast anyday is quicker than unicast, thanks Mohit :)
So, thanks to Rajesh, I reached Seattle from the safe confines of santa barbara. No toofan, no gunde, no aag, sorry we have no masaledaar stories to say. But the roadtrip was absolute fun.
Rajesh has posted pics. Will have him post it..
Completing the last leg of journey from portland to seattle was non eventful. Here are some observations about this place:
- People drive slow, like real slow. The leftmost lane is for people at the speed limit, right most lane is always under speed..
- Lotsa people....yeaaaaah. There's all the trappings of a big city, traffic, parking problems..reminds me of b'lore :-D
- Young crowd.. Welcome change from last summer :-D
And then, the first day at work, I met the man himself..Bill G! That was an exciting start. No pics, sadly. We had to leave everything behind for security reasons. Im surprised they didnt blindfold us and take! Anyways, it was great to talk to the man up close..
Ok.. and for anyone who hasnt heard it from me already...mucchad is married (since this is a public blog!).. The proverbial twist in the tale..Now, I know you all are very sad for me and want to lend me a shoulder to cry..Thanks guys, I really appreciate! Yes, Im still pretty shocked and depressed. I know, I should try to move on and all. Its very hard though...saccha pyar.. :-D
That apart, its been loads of fun. MS has 1200 interns!! So there is a mad mad splurge of activity going on all the time..
Have posted some pics on facebook. We went to the alki (its called as al-kai, we kept saying al-kai-duh) :-D beach and did a bbq and watched fireworks. The place was filled with thousands of people bbqing, drinking, playing volleyball.. It was a very lively time..Here's the link.. Notice how im trying to move on :-)
http://ucsb.facebook.com/album.php?aid=34340&l=984ee&id=891220552
More stories coming..
Hows the biker dude? And whats mr karma up to?
Su, good luck reading papers
Cheerios
Ramya
Multicast anyday is quicker than unicast, thanks Mohit :)
So, thanks to Rajesh, I reached Seattle from the safe confines of santa barbara. No toofan, no gunde, no aag, sorry we have no masaledaar stories to say. But the roadtrip was absolute fun.
Rajesh has posted pics. Will have him post it..
Completing the last leg of journey from portland to seattle was non eventful. Here are some observations about this place:
- People drive slow, like real slow. The leftmost lane is for people at the speed limit, right most lane is always under speed..
- Lotsa people....yeaaaaah. There's all the trappings of a big city, traffic, parking problems..reminds me of b'lore :-D
- Young crowd.. Welcome change from last summer :-D
And then, the first day at work, I met the man himself..Bill G! That was an exciting start. No pics, sadly. We had to leave everything behind for security reasons. Im surprised they didnt blindfold us and take! Anyways, it was great to talk to the man up close..
Ok.. and for anyone who hasnt heard it from me already...mucchad is married (since this is a public blog!).. The proverbial twist in the tale..Now, I know you all are very sad for me and want to lend me a shoulder to cry..Thanks guys, I really appreciate! Yes, Im still pretty shocked and depressed. I know, I should try to move on and all. Its very hard though...saccha pyar.. :-D
That apart, its been loads of fun. MS has 1200 interns!! So there is a mad mad splurge of activity going on all the time..
Have posted some pics on facebook. We went to the alki (its called as al-kai, we kept saying al-kai-duh) :-D beach and did a bbq and watched fireworks. The place was filled with thousands of people bbqing, drinking, playing volleyball.. It was a very lively time..Here's the link.. Notice how im trying to move on :-)
http://ucsb.facebook.com/album
More stories coming..
Hows the biker dude? And whats mr karma up to?
Su, good luck reading papers
Cheerios
Ramya
Friday, July 6, 2007
Have SummerPostitis?
Hello doston,
Maine socha having a place where we can post (links to) and follow the fun stuff goin' on around the country would be a really cool idea. (I like taking ze credit. Sorry Ramya :-) ). It'd be cool to have a substitute for the dinner-time chatathons, plus we'll have a bunch of stuff by the end of this summer.
To set the ball rolling, a quick update on my trip to NY. I stayed at my friend's home where, Allah be praised, his Mom was visiting from Kerala. It'd been a six year deal that his Mom'll treat me to Idlis the day we meet. She stuck to her word, and Inshaallah, they were worth the wait. We headed out to a Jazz club where a really cool sounding guitarist was strumming away. We shelled out a cover charge, (I'd never pay that much 'cept if I was on a hot date. In the future! :-) ) enjoyed a great performance and headed out through this overflowing party zone to a big park where a million guitarists were sitting out in the open sky-high on the fun stuff and strumming away lustily. Some wandering fellas wanted to know really bad how we were doin' and if we wanted some more fun right there; it took a lot of persuasion to convince them we were there just for the music.
The next day we packed our bags for Long Beach, spent a couple of hours, and established the truth of the matter as to which of the oceans has warmer waters this time of the year. Continuing the musical theme of the trip, we watched the NY Philharmonic perform Summertime classics from the last century. The best part was when the conductor would go through a detailed story and then look for the plot in the following performance. There was a beautiful piece on the Elbe river, where they started with two flutes for two streams that join and part and join again with the sound of raindrops falling in the background, and on it went until it passed out of the country with a flourish...Amazing!
We went back home to find a journalist waiting for us. Turned out he was working on a story on which books people've felt a connection with, so we'd an impromptu interview. Now if you see my pic on Rediff someday, you'll know who to hunt down :-).
My friend, Manish, then took us out to this Gujarati restaurant (a veggie place, Ramya) where they seat you in a really nice setting and bring out three loaded courses for dinner. No menu, no choice, no nothing! Just lean back and wait for the goodies; and eat all you can. Highly recommended! I've put up some photos here.
Apart from that, I like this place. It's thickly wooded and has nice trails to ride around. There's the IV of Princeton univ nearby and as for work, there are a few new projects starting up, so I'm pretty much charting out my own path. सब लोग मस्त मज़े मैं हो, इस आशा से यह ख़त यहीं समाप्त कर्ता हूँ। अलिव्दा ।
Maine socha having a place where we can post (links to) and follow the fun stuff goin' on around the country would be a really cool idea. (I like taking ze credit. Sorry Ramya :-) ). It'd be cool to have a substitute for the dinner-time chatathons, plus we'll have a bunch of stuff by the end of this summer.
To set the ball rolling, a quick update on my trip to NY. I stayed at my friend's home where, Allah be praised, his Mom was visiting from Kerala. It'd been a six year deal that his Mom'll treat me to Idlis the day we meet. She stuck to her word, and Inshaallah, they were worth the wait. We headed out to a Jazz club where a really cool sounding guitarist was strumming away. We shelled out a cover charge, (I'd never pay that much 'cept if I was on a hot date. In the future! :-) ) enjoyed a great performance and headed out through this overflowing party zone to a big park where a million guitarists were sitting out in the open sky-high on the fun stuff and strumming away lustily. Some wandering fellas wanted to know really bad how we were doin' and if we wanted some more fun right there; it took a lot of persuasion to convince them we were there just for the music.
The next day we packed our bags for Long Beach, spent a couple of hours, and established the truth of the matter as to which of the oceans has warmer waters this time of the year. Continuing the musical theme of the trip, we watched the NY Philharmonic perform Summertime classics from the last century. The best part was when the conductor would go through a detailed story and then look for the plot in the following performance. There was a beautiful piece on the Elbe river, where they started with two flutes for two streams that join and part and join again with the sound of raindrops falling in the background, and on it went until it passed out of the country with a flourish...Amazing!
We went back home to find a journalist waiting for us. Turned out he was working on a story on which books people've felt a connection with, so we'd an impromptu interview. Now if you see my pic on Rediff someday, you'll know who to hunt down :-).
My friend, Manish, then took us out to this Gujarati restaurant (a veggie place, Ramya) where they seat you in a really nice setting and bring out three loaded courses for dinner. No menu, no choice, no nothing! Just lean back and wait for the goodies; and eat all you can. Highly recommended! I've put up some photos here.
Apart from that, I like this place. It's thickly wooded and has nice trails to ride around. There's the IV of Princeton univ nearby and as for work, there are a few new projects starting up, so I'm pretty much charting out my own path. सब लोग मस्त मज़े मैं हो, इस आशा से यह ख़त यहीं समाप्त कर्ता हूँ। अलिव्दा ।
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