Strange thing, memory. (Here I go again!).

I was thinking of the good old days when I used to watch Cartoon Network in English, and not in Hindi.

I have nothing against Hindi as a language, but I just can’t stand Bugs Bunny mouthing “ehhh .. kya baat hai, dost?” – which is the rotten Hindi translation of the classic “Eh.. (munch munch munch) What’s up, Doc”, complete with carrot munching noises in Hindi as well. I watch CN / Pogo with the sound turned off, these days – there’s no saying what I might do when I listen to Bugs talk in Hindi. I just might do to the cable guy what Bugs often does to Elmer and Daffy. Wishful thinking, actually.

I digress.

I was thinking of the good old days when I used to watch Cartoon Network in English, and not in Hindi. Time was when Dexter’s Lab came out as a beta release on the What a Cartoon Show. It was an instant hit, and a few weeks later, became a CN regular. This was a worthy example which was soon followed by the Powerpuff Girls. Another “popular” show in those days was the 70’s (I think) Japanese cartoon, Speed Racer. This show was famous for its funny English. The Dexter’s Lab guys (I think it was mostly Genndy Tartakovsky), never the ones to miss an opportunity to stick an elbow into someone’s ribs, did a spoof on Speed Racer. I forget the name of the episode, but one line from it is stuck in my mind permanently:

Mysteriously unknown to Dexter, a Mysterious stranger is Mysteriously watching.

Speed Racer was full of gems like this one. I never missed it – just so that I could listen to more stuff like this. Crazily enough, I don’t remember a damn thing from the original – it’s the spoof that’s stuck in my mind.

Oh, those were the days.

Away for a week!

Argh.

It’s 12.45 and I’m not asleep yet.

Tomorrow evening I fly to Bangalore, for Deepavali. Six days of peace, hopefully. I plan to hack on at least four of those six days, but this is mostly wishful thinking.  OTOH, I definitely will emit sounds that go hack. Benadril should help me out with that.

I need to wake up early, put fingernail to plastic and clack out some stuff. Then clean up the house, pay the maintenance to the secretary who lives below, and arrive late at work. Dispose of the day’s quota of ugly emails (how I hate emails – then again, I shouldn’t really be complaining, I’m not a manager yet, thank goodness.).

Must remember to empty fridge and do dishes.  Also need to pack. Couple of clothes and couple of books. Uh, make that one book. No room for the other. Plus, will be buying books at Bangalore. Not to forget laptop – most important :). Laptop is much abused ancient compaq from work. Am getting attached to the damn thing. Dump everything into one bag. Just one damn bag. No checking in, cabin baggage only. Nothing beats travelling light. I can’t say the same of the return trip, though :(.

Damn bronchial infection hasn’t waved me bye-bye yet. Hopefully fireworks do not aggravate my condition.  I don’t believe in fireworks, but I can’t say the same for everybody else around me.

Will be back in a week’s time.

Sack, here I come.

Renaming a mountpoint

A friend at work noticed something interesting. On his Solaris box, he tried the following:

$ mkdir /mnt1; rm -fR /mnt2
$ mount /dev/dsk/somedisk /mnt1
$ mv /mnt1 /mnt2
$ mkdir /mnt1

Down, not out yet :)

Down with a bad case of whatever the heck it is. Okay, “it” is an infection of unknown origin that has attacked my upper respiratory tract. It looked pretty bad yesterday morning, and seemed to get better by late afternoon. Cousin It struck back with a vengeance yesterday evening, however. Post dinner, I’ve just been a lump of lard lying on the bed.

Woke up a little while ago (today afternoon) and ordered some stuff to eat. Bless the guy who dreamed up the concept of food delivered to the doorstep :) I’ve been on an antibiotic diet since yesterday, am throwing up gobs of bright green slimy stuff that is reminiscent of radioactive waste. The damn antibiotics make me feel woozy and tired all day. Crap. Entropy has waved its magic wand again, and the flat looks like it’s been hit by a cyclone. With me in no shape to clean up, things are only going to get messier.

I would love to be back to normal by tomorrow morning. Wishful thinking.

Sea Fever

I must go down to the seas again,
to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship
and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song
and the white sail’s shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea’s face
and a grey dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again,
for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call
that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day
with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume,
and the sea-gulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again
to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way
where the wind’s like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn
from a laughing fellow rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream
when the long trick’s over

John Masefield

Interesting thing, memory. I was thinking back to the time when I was clothed for the better part of the day in light blue terry shirt and navy blue cotton shorts, with white socks and polished black leather shoes. Usually when my brain throws up dirt from that long ago, it is unpleasant stuff – like memories of being caned for arriving a few minutes late for the first class of the day. Or for forgetting to do homework. Not this time! My mind’s eye pictured a slim volume with a bright green cover, which was the recommended text to learn English poetry from. Notice that we had to learn things, not enjoy them. I never did pay much attention to what I had to learn, though. Poetry least of all. Funny thing then, that I should remember Sea Fever, and that it had been written by a Poet Laureate. Now when I look at it, the poem appeals to me, immensely.

I also remember that I once scored full marks on a mathematics test, being the only kid in class to write the square root of two as an example for an irrational number. Never mind that I did not know what the heck an irrational number was. I was learning; I still am.

Stochastic Effluvium

I’ve heard often that your eyes see what your mind wants you to see. I tried to kill time at a bookstore today, and discovered an example to support that statement. As I sauntered idly past the aisle, I glanced at a title and quickly did a double take.

What a normal person should/would have seen: Chicken Soup for the Soul

What I saw: Chicken Shit on My Sole

I now declare myself a certified, grade-A cynic of the first order. Tantantantantaraaaa! Roll of drums and blasts of trumpets!

Many well meaning people have told me that I should seriously consider writing. The trouble is that my writing is anything but serious. Like my good friend Asuph, I too believe that the moment I take up writing (or anything else that I enjoy seriously) in a serious way, I will cease to enjoy it. This time around though, I am sorely tempted. I would love to write Chicken Shit for the Engineer’s Sole, and many other such similar sounding titles, full of similar crap. And make a pile of money out of it, while I’m at it. This amazing four-letter phenomenon called life is making a cynic out of me, and I’d love to spread some good cheer around.

The Tao of Programming

A recent conversation I had with someone at work centered around recommended reading for beginning programmers, as well as programmers who are aspiring managers. The recommendations for reading were mostly non-technical in nature; the technical reading list is the subject of a forthcoming post.