The big vacation begins

My current state is hard to define. And because I am not able to find the words, taking a cue from Wittgenstein, I pass it in silence.

(non-obvious) Moon and Venus

Here.

In praise of manual labour

I washed half-a-rin-bar worth of clothes today. Now that is nothing unusual in itself, I have a been a hostelite for close to 13 years now, and I am not noted for my punctuality. But before today (and maybe yesterday, when also I washed half-a-rin-bar worth of clothes) I always looked at these chores as a pain in the behind. This was a tax to be paid, in order to live a life. I had read before about manual labour of this kind being held in high esteem by many great thinkers (names of Gandhiji and Tolstoy immediately come to mind), I think I saw the point this weekend. I tried to think why this should be so and give pleasure, here is what it seems to be

a. It gives a sense of new beginning, of washing away the old crud that has accumulated, and starting afresh. 

b. The flow from chaos to order, the apparent expansion in space as you collect and put scattered things in their place has symbolic value for the unconscious mind.

c. Doing these small thing manually gives a sense of accomplishment (that might seem absurd).

I don't think I will be switching to doing everything manually right away, but I will certainly try to consciously preserve an element of manual labor in my life.

Samay

Have you watched Samay? It's a really good investigative thriller. If I remember correctly, the lead role of the cop was written with a male protagonist in mind, but Sushmita Sen took on a role not written for her and delivered superbly. I had watched and loved this movie sometime during the college years, today I somehow stumbled upon it on Youtube. Recommended.

Shubh Arambh

What makes Oblivion the best movie of the year so far is the balance between narrative and world building. It is science fiction, so maybe I am biased towards it, but many movies lose themselves in just one or the other. Or if they somehow manage to balance it, they fail to make you think. Oblivion has achieved that delicate balance. Good story, well done special effects which support the narrative, and some thought provoking material. 2013 is going to see the release of a number of promising sci-fi movies (Into Darkness, After Earth, Now you see me and of course this one) which had made it exciting at the end of 2012. Oblivion is the first one delivered, and is indeed a Shubh Arambh.

It seems my question has been answered

In the affirmative.

Here is the question I asked a while ago.

And here is the answer. [Here's where I first heard it (search for "second news item")]

Unfortunately, much as I would like it, I won't be able to read the answer right away. Rest assured to get an update when I do. Or feel free to send your update this way.

Demons of old

In our modern, cozy lifestyles it is easy to forget the troubles our predecessors had to put up with. Some did not have cooked food, others lacked clothing, still others had to huddle under trees when rains came pouring down (which was not a wise thing to do anyway). I had to live through one such horror recently. Namely, the lack of autocompletion in a command shell. A remote access tool that I am currently living "inside" of, uses "tab" to switch context and I had to feed carefully prepared command lines to this ancient demon all the time. I cannot be too grateful that I was not born 30 years ago.

My version history

The name of my upcoming autobiography.

[But apparently I am 19 hours too late].