Coffee Shop Revolution

When I walked into my apartment yesterday around midnight, it was like a sauna. Today — I guess it’s going to be the same! This is my 3rd summer in Bay Area and I don’t remember any day this hot…crazy!

Ok so I know this is hardly a “revolution,” but Coffee Shop Revolution is back in business, and that is at least worth one cliché title, no? You see, I have a lot of thoughts — and not only that, this is a kind of a crazy time in my life! — so I wanted to start blogging about some of those thoughts again.

There have been a few notable changes in my life recently, and many of those will surely serve as material for my posts. They are (in no specific order):

• I quit my (wonderful) job at Yahoo! a few weeks ago (actually exactly a month ago).
• I bought a MacBook Pro (who would’a thought?)
• I bought an iPhone a couple months ago (yeah yeah, this is not exactly “new” but still…)
• This blog was converted to using WordPress from Movable Type. I feel guilty about doing this — sorry Movable Type, you served me well over the years.
• I created a couple mildly popular Facebook & Bebo apps (see here). They have kept me somewhat busy and also help to pay my rent (that’s always nice).

Anyways — so that is that, see you around!

This post is your opportunity to make a pledge towards taking your life one step forward.

Take a couple minutes to think about what you have really been wanting to do, but haven’t done it. Do something GOOD for the world (or yourself). Examples: do your dishes, go to the gym, finish your paper, looking for a new job, or calling your mother.

Unfinished tasks poison our subconscious and keep our minds from functioning to their potential. Leave your excuses behind for 5 mins, get up, and do what is necessary.

Let this post be your inspiration to take one step forward. Make your effort count, Digg this post. Your vote will inspire others. One post can change our world forever.

Did you hear the news? Well you probably didn’t, but VVS Laxman and Saurav Ganguly are back on India’s Test Cricet team. Our team has taken a full circle and is back to its beginnings. The batting will be led by VVS Laxman, Tendulkar, Dravid, Ganguly and Sehwag. I’m excited to follow the first test to see how they perform, my hopes are high!

In other news, after so many months of being cold-free I once again have a cold. Yes the whole deal, sore throat, coughing, sneezing, etc, etc. Last time I had a cold it lasted 10 days–this one better not! This morning I woke up with a really hurting throat. Hopefully I’ll see the worst of it tomorrow and then be on my way to recovery.

Also, Hack Day is coming up–excited about that!

Ok, you guys take care. Enjoy the holiday season, and if you’re unlucky, the cold weather also.

The first annual Google vs Yahoo! Tennis Tournament (Battle of the Net) took place this morning. Unfortunately I could not play because I injured my back while practicing for it. While this was really annoying, I had a lot of fun helping out and watching everyone play.

Yahoo! won 163-157!

It was a very close match up, and I am excited for the next one where I will definitely play. You can check out the pictures from the tournament to see more!

As Mr. Matt drives his SULEV (Super Ultra Low Emissions Vehicle..aka Hybrid) slowly through the Labor Day traffic, I see the opportunity to finally write a post on my blog. We are making our way back to the Bay Area from LA on this fine Monday afternoon. My stay in LA wasn’t too long, we were here for Vineet’s wedding last night. Vineet is one of my Yahoo Travel co-workers.

The wedding itself was conducted beautifully. It was performed in accordance to Indian tradition, although Vineet’s wife is Chinese. Because the wedding was multi-cultural, there were many attendees who may not have been familiar with how an Indian wedding is performed. A family friend of Vineet’s played the role of the “priest” and commentator during the wedding. He explained lucidly each stage of the wedding and kept the entire crowd (of maybe around 200) interested and engaged throughout. Aside from a few hiccups, the entire ceremony went very smoothly.

Some things of note were that Jennifer (Vineet’s wife) and her parents were all dressed in Indian clothing. They looked very natural and beautiful. The appetizers in between the wedding and reception were also very good. I was glad to see a large vegetarian selection, though I guess I should not have been surprised as it was an Indian wedding. They had Samosas, Paneer Tikka and basic vegetable Bhajia. I wasn’t used to having alcohol at weddings, as I guess the only Indian weddings I have been to recently have been of family, but it didn’t get out of hand.

The reception was also quite normal. The part I always love in the reception is the time for toasts. In a way, toasts strengthen the bond between the bride and groom and their guests. We get to know them from the perspective of their closest friends and family. Toasts are fun, joyful and occasionally embarrassing too . Indian receptions don’t have this tradition of toasts at receptions; receptions in India end up having 4x the number of people as the wedding (around a 1000) and nothing is personal anymore. But I’d like to start having them at our weddings too.

After the reception was the dancing! Vineet is Punjabi, so they don’t really do raas/dandia so they just had Bhangra. Dandia/raas would have been a lotta fun too, but of course bhangra is fun also. Matt was a great sport with the dancing, and we all had a lot of fun. Jason also danced for some time. It was tiring and fun! After we were thoroughly sweaty and tired, we all went up to our hotel room (we had gotten a room in the same hotel as his wedding, so that was very convenient) and showered and relaxed.

I then found my dvd of The Office season 2, so we decided to watch some of those shows. That was funny and relaxing We all fell asleep while watching the show and woke up 10 hrs or so later–tired, but satisfied from our wedding, labor day road trip.

In the spirit of titling posts with names of songs, today we have “Mohe Panghat Pe,” a song from the classic (and my all time favorite hindi movie album) Mughal-E-Azam. The tabla in this song just dances all over my mind. When I am really into it…I can’t even type straight while it is playing, my fingers just lift up in rhythm.

The woman sings: Mohe panghat pe nand laal chedde gayo re…. (which means something to the effect of “Krishna was flirting with me at the riverbank…” One of those “Krishna-was-a-playa” kind of tune’s that just plays on my mind. Naushad (the composer) was a genius.

Anyway, so in other news–My work day is rolling down. I have been working hard on the “new” travel site. I don’t think I can tell you more without having to kill you. Sorry

I also bought a new DVD player yesterday (perhaps I’ll post a review of it on here, but probably I won’t). Which I LOVE. I am hoping to sell my old one for $35 or so, and then I’ll have this new upgraded player for around a net price of $40. Not bad huh? Yeah.

The last few days have been a sort of warm breeze passing on my life. Everything has been kind of fuzzy but in all this mess there are some greater truth’s that are becoming clearer, and I guess stress is a small price to pay for truth. Ok. I better go now…I’m hungry. (And anyway, I couldn’t tell you more without having to kill you)…so sorry, and you have a wonderful evening

It is about 2:20am, I am really really tired so and I am about to go to sleep. My mind is not spinning in the correct direction…so let me tell you about my day.

For the first time in a LONG time (2 months almost) I had Taco Bell. Yes, it was still good. Dave and I were driving around in San Carlos looking for a place to eat at around 10:15 pm or so. And in the Bay area, most of the eating places close by 9. So we couldn’t find anything but a pizzeria on some inside street. Turns out they were only open for take out and so we thought lets go get some Taco Bell. So I phoned Ben and he gave me the location to the nearest Taco Bell which was only about half mile away =) Them wuz some goooood Chalupas!

Dave and I had ended up in San Carlos after spending our afternoon in Stanford participating in a study of pair programming for a professor there (for which we got paid $250 each). The study took a decently long time, but it was a lot of fun. We had to solve a pretty involved problem that took around 4 hrs or so. It was great getting that college machine problem assignment feeling again. The study took place in a lab at Stanford where there was a computer in the center with cameras all around. We also had to wear a microphone so they could record our interactions. Funn stuff =)

I had done some studying earlier for this study to get back into the Java frame of mind. I didn’t get as much time to work on it as I would have liked, as I spent most of my morning working on my Top Music Charts script which is first stab at trying to evaluate all this music listening data I have been collecting about myself over the last 9 months or so. Hopefully I’ll be able to make the app cooler in the future

I didn’t do much before that, as I only ended up waking up at 11am today. Speaking of which, it is now around 3am and I would rather not repeat the waking up performance of yesterday tomorrow morning as I need to get to work. So–take care, and good night!