daily dump

I just realized that this blog thing is more rewarding when I'm updating regularly. The idea being that the more I write, the more I will have to say. Even if I don't have anything to say.

Speaking of which (not really, but it was a convenient segue), Google now lets you blog in हिंदी। If the Hindi text does not render properly on your machine, you may need to turn on multilingual support, as described here. For some reason, the default rendering messes up the little ई मात्रा, and does strange things with compound letters. If you cannot read Hindi, then just admire the roundy-ness of the letters.

Speaking of which - and this time we actually have a sequitur - I have this weird recurring nightmare where I find myself having to take a Hindi test the next day (or sometimes a Gujarati test, in a variant of the same dream) and I cannot seem to remember anything other than a few basic words. My life somehow depends on this test, but I can never find the right words for anything. I've actually been having this dream for years now, and is the closest thing I have to a recurring nightmare. And yes, my hindi has probably deteriorated to the point where I have a pretty hard time not reverting to English semi-regularly. For example, I cannot remember the word for "baby". Looks like someone will be joining Satya in her Sunday Hindi school lessons. Gads - then I might actually have to take a Hindi test. Noooooo .....

no cat no cradle

When the last living thing

has died on account of us,

how poetical it would be

if Earth could say,

in a voice floating up

perhaps

from the floor

of the Grand Canyon,

“It is done.”

People did not like it here.

Kurt Vonnegut - you will be missed. Dearly missed.

Flashback

Six months ago I was in Austin, TX. I rented a little red Chevy Aveo, which pretty much screams cheap-o economy rental. I peeled out of the parking lot and drove down the drag, windows rolled down, volume cranked up to 11, with the radio blasting: "You are tuned into Fresh Air with Terry Gross on NPR".

Stephen Elliott

I read this little piece in last month's Believer and it made me cry. And it made me happy to think that beauty is alive and well.

http://www.believermag.com/issues/200703/?read=article_elliott

My Friend

My friend is very nice. He comes over and does the dishes for us sometimes. He has brown hair. My friend has two cars that don't run. I am glad that my friend is not a brain surgeon. My friend is very good at many things like bicycles and dogs. My friend has a very nice girlfriend. He writes songs about his girlfriend. He also writes songs about me, like the Shrey Doggie song and the N. Shrey Dawg song. I like my friend very much. My friend is 34 years old.

Written by Shreyas D., age 30

cell division

At the risk of turning this into a running baby blog, which has never been my intention, I have to say this - we reached a significant milestone yesterday. Satya outgrew her newborn diapers. This means that she is probably growing.

Alive

Satya just slept through the night for the first time. That was my first contiguous 6 hour block of sleep in 37 days. Yippee!

If I had one of those tardoid mood icons, a la livejournal, it would say: "Current Mood: Awake"!!

Food, Sex or Cars

Ok - not really, but the old SNL skit, did some pretty funny stuff with Hobson-esque choice, where each alternative is equally attractive (or unattractive). My version from last night:
- Guinness, Gordon Biersch Pilsner or low-fat organic yogurt.

We also used to play this idiotic game in college that went along the same lines, but with a "who would you rather bang?" bent. It was mad fun. For example, who would you rather bang: Arnold Schwarzenegger or Jesse Ventura?

I'll occasionally bring this feature back, as I think of better examples.

TV Funhouse

One of the perks of early babyhood (the catch-all term for the baby experience from the perspective of all concerned parties) is the amount of unstructured free time you must spend at home. Don't get me wrong - there is a lot of work involved (diaper changes, feedings, keeping everything else in the household at least minimally functional), but there is also a lot of down time, given that babies tend to sleep for around 16 hours a day. This is the perfect excuse to catch up on all the useless pop culture that you've missed out on in the past several years since you've sworn off television. And Netflix makes this available to you in convenient, easy-to-digest chunks. In glorious Technicolor*. Commercial free. Without the annoying inter-episode cliffhangers that leave you irritated and unsatisfied for weeks, possibly months. TV on DVD, here I come! Now watching:

• Lost - Season 1
  
• Dr. Who (The new BBC series) - Season 1
  
• The L-Word - Season 3
  
• City of Men
  
• The Office - Season 2
  
• The Office (BBC) - Series 2
  

*Why do people still use the term "Technicolor"? What does it even mean?**
**Yes - I could look it up in Wikipedia, but that's not the point, is it?

your moment of zen

demographics

In about 4 hours, I will be 30 years old. Approximately 68 hours ago, I became a dadzorz. Somehow I don't feel old or anything. The hype around 30 is overrated. In my mind, 34 is a far more significant milestone. That is when I will no longer be a part of that crucial 18-34 demographic, that the media and marketing folks adore. Four years from now is when I'm going to be truly freaking out.

satya marjane

we'll be uploading more pics on flickr

thanks to everyone for the wishes. we're all doing fantastic!

-satya, elizabeth and shreyas

2cm and counting

2cm this past Thursday. Contractions started coming and going this weekend. And still we wait. I realize that this part is slow, and could last for days. I want to meet our baby, but it is probably best to wait. Allow it to get a little bigger. I promise there will be pictures when the time comes.

now reading

Not that you really wanted to know, but I like keeping these little notes, so that I can look back and nostalgificate.

• The Schematics of Computation - Vincent Manis, James Little. Oddly enough, this seems to be fulfilling my light, recreational reading quota. I'm trying to rediscover Scheme and functional programming, from a more advanced and mature, post-CS degree perspective.
  
• The Shuttered Room - H.P.Lovecraft. This is currently my bathroom reading. It is kinda fun to get all turn of the century spooky, while in the loo.
  
• The Birth Partner - Penny Simpkin. This is what I spend every free moment absorbing, in, what is bound to be, a valiant but essentially impossible attempt to be "prepared" for childbirth.
  

hrrrrrr

Seriously, how has Tuvan throat singing not become the rage among all the indie kids. This stuff is fantastic, bizarre and just plain brilliant. Check out Huun Huur Tu or Chrigilchin if you get a chance [Link]

Eanie Meany

This song has been stuck in my head for over SIX months now. Literally!

Jim Noir - Eanie Meany [Video links at the bottom]

Yes, this is the song from that Adidas World Cup commercial: Jose 10+ ... remember?

Best Records of 2006

I've posted my list on the KALX website. After the jump, we replicate the list here, for your convenience.

1. The Knife - Silent Shout (Rabid/Mute)
2. Boat - Songs That You Might Not Like (Magic Marker)
3. Jose Gonzales - Veneer (Hidden Agenda)
4. Islands - Return to Sea (Equator)
5. Motohiro Nakashima - I Dreamt Constellations Sang (LOAF)
6. Casiotone for the Painfully Alone - Etiquette (Tomlab)
7. Juana Molina - Son (Domino)
8. Two Gallants - What the Toll Tells (Saddle Creek)
9. Daniel Johnston - Welcome to my World (High Wire Music)
10. Barbara Morgenstern - The Grass is Always Greener (Monika)
11. Thom Yorke - The Eraser (XL)
12. Various Artists - CD86: 48 TRACKS FROM THE BIRTH OF INDIE POP (Castle)
13. Herbert - Scale (K7)
14. The Trucks - The Trucks (Clickpop)
15. Dirty on Purpose - Hallelujah Sirens (North Street)
16. DJ Shadow - The Outsider (Universal Motown)
17. Chin Up Chin Up - This Harness Can't Ride Anything (Suicide Squeeze)
18. TV on the Radio - Return to Cookie Mountain (4AD/Interscope)
19. Chirgilchin - Will Teach (Pure Nature Music)
20. soundtrack - STRANGER THAN FICTION (Columbia/Sony Music)

And I'm doing a "Best of 2006" show, which will feature selections from the above list and more. Tune in tonight 9pm pacific. We even have a live mp3 stream these days.

The sum of the internal energy of the system plus the product of its volume multiplied by the pressure exerted on it by its surroundings

We even fight dorky, as is apparent from this recent interchange:

S: Hey Elizabeth, what is the exact definition of the term enthalpy?
E: I really don't want to have this conversation right now, Shreyas.

:)

This Blog is a Mess

The New York Times did a piece on this a couple of weeks ago, but you need to have a paid subscription to view this. Instead, listen to this wonderful segment on NPR, extolling the virtues of clutter and mess. Mess creates a kind of randomness that may lead to forming unexpected connections ... intuitive leaps ... fresh perspectives ... new discoveries ... apophenia ... pattern recognition ... William Gibson ... cyberpunk ... umm, wait, how did I get here anyway?

Anyway, this is your new year's resolution. Embrace your mess. Let it guide you. Do you really want to argue with Einstein? (“If a cluttered desk is a sign of a cluttered mind, of what, then, is an empty desk?”)

twosies

Bloggers are compulsive list makers. Why, some would say, the world wide blogosphere is built on the idea of lists. While there are no definite rules governing the semantic or syntactic structure of lists (other than ye olde <li> tag), a good list generally has at least five elements. This has me in a bit of a tizzy (or perhaps, the kids call it "thizzy" these days, with all the hyphy hype). I'll often think of two or three fabulous list items, but then I'm left scrounging for filler to reach that magic number five. Well, no more! I'm going back to first principles - coredumpin' is all about regurgitating the raw data sitting around in your brain. If the stack trace only has two elements, so be it.

Here we go:

Halloween costume ideas that only Don and Shrey would find funny

• Pliny the Younger (or Don talks in a faux Cockney accent as "Pliny the Younger" - inspired by, but completely unrelated to Greek philosopher, Pliny the Elder. No really! Don thought Pliny was this dead British guy, which makes this whole thing even funnier).
  
• Raider Nation (or Shrey ironically dresses up as Raider fan, complete with psycho regalia)
  

Why 2006 was the year of the d**k meme (NOT SAFE FOR WORK)

• Dick in a Box
• Yo Dick
• Let's Sexy Engrish