Now the years are rolling by me,
They are rocking evenly.
I am older than I once was,
Younger than I’ll be,
That’s not unusual.
No, it isn’t strange,
After changes upon changes,
We are more or less the same.
After changes we are more or less the same.

–”The Boxer” (Concert in Central Park Version), Simon and Garfunkel

I am 40 today. It will take some time for me to gather my thoughts. Check back later for a more meaningful entry.

My last non-middle-aged Sunday.

Had good intentions of sleeping in late – didn’t happen.

It appears the dog got hosed today – literally He was troubling the gardner, so Shubha told the gardner to spray Judo with water to make him give up.

Not smart! Judo of course loved it, and had to be tied up, where Shubha finished the job by giving the mutt a bath. If you think that is nothing major, please remember that our little puppy now tilts the scales at 30 KG, has a major sweep of a tail at one end, and some gleaming, pointy teeth at the other. When he lies down and stretches, he is easily 5 feet long!

Shubha explained to me later that the most hilarious/touching thing was that while she was hosing the dog down, he was desperately seeking protection from her – from her. The logic that his “mommy” was also the aggressor was beyond him .

The cat is beginning to slow down – she is now definitely showing her pregnancy, and Anjali says she could feel the first little head moving in there.

Spent the morning cleaning up my “cable spagetti”.

Lunch was mutton biryani. Someone, however, decided that a whole packet of biryani masala was a good idea, when it wasn’t. To get the idea, head for Mount Vesuvius and sample a few spoons of lava….

Sony showed up in the afternoon, and we proceeded to jam a bit. Somewhere along the way, Mrinal joined us, and things soon got out of hand. Cool!

Mrinal agrees that the amp isn’t reproducing the frequencies I need for keyboards and vocals. It shall be returned tomorrow.

Night saw X-Files in a hilarious episode . If you ever get to see it, don’t miss Scully galopping up and down while Mulder is speaking to Shandling in the studio! Of course, all the innuendos were great, too, including Scully’s mentioning to Mulder that “Tea Leoni definitely likes you” (Tea Leoni is David Duchovny’s real life wife

Three more episodes left before we go into Star’s traditional re-reun mode for 6-9 months.

The StarTrek:TNG episode was excellent as well. This episode was later used as the basis for a much expanded TNG book called “The Dyson Sphere”. I hadn’t seen this episode, but I have read the sequel book, which referred a lot to this episode, so it was very exciting to actually see all this stuff happening.

Pre-chewed, pre-digested rubber balls (Soya mealmaker chunks) for dinner. I was less than thrilled.

Sorry, no entry for yesterday. Too much happening again.

The Secret Project got an unexpected jolt today, which I hope to address on Monday morning. Hope it goes well.

Decided to go out and buy myself a birthday gift – a new amplifier for the live music section of the household.

Grabbed Mrinal and trudged off to M.G.Road. Found reasonably priced ones, and had Mrinal listen to a selection so that we could take a decision.

The choice was between an 80 Watt Stranger Cube80 and a 100 Watt Stranger NS100. The former had two way speakers, the latter more power. Pricewise, there was about 1000 bucks difference, which really didn’t mean much in the context.

Decided on the 100 watt amp. Which appears to have been a mistake.

Back home (after an incident a couple of hundred metres from my house – more later), Sony and I checked out the sound. While the amplifier is perfect for a single guitar, the sound is completely dead and flat when it comes to keyboards and vocals. No amount of fiddling with tonal controls on the amp or the mixer could get the sound to life. Also, for some reason, the amp’s internal spring-reverb cannot be turned off completely.

In comparison, I switched back to the old Cube20 that was placed strategically in a corner – crystal clear sound, major presence, though of course not too boomy.

Looks like I’ll have to go and return this amp and pick up the 80 Watt unit instead. Mrinal had commented on the fact that the Cube80 appeared better suited for non-guitar amplification. I just hope the guys in the shop cooperate. The place is run by the guys from Thermal and a Quarter, BTW.

On the way back from the city, and after dropping Mrinal home, I came within a few hundred metres of my house when a dark blue Maruti van came belting out of a side street in reverse, barely missed hitting me and another car in the front, then managed to scrape my front left fender as he straightened out. Needless to say, by the time I stopped the car and got out, he was a quickly disappearing dot on the horizon.

The damage isn’t heavy, but it is a scrape, and on a freshly painted car, that hurts badly. ^%$^%@$^$@^$^%!!!!!!

Mrinal promised to drop in on Sunday for a final “pre-40″ jam. I hope he makes it. These days he is busy with his alternate “big group” Cryptic, where he plays the keyboards. I haven’t heard them yet (and this is another group without its own web site , but I hear they are good. They are apparently off to Bombay next weekend for a competition, with Mrinal in tow. This of course means that we will miss him at our birthday/anniversary bash.

The women in the house are watching the Filmfare awards – that annual, pre-decided and self-congratulatory event touted as “The Indian Oscars”. As usual, it is loud, slightly incoherent, and definitely not something I’d sit and watch, so I am going to bed.

Today was the day I was waiting for – major 2 hour “Come Together: A Night for John Lennon’s Words & Music” on Star World. Started at 6:30pm – great stuff.

Then the channel went blank.

No, this time it as not Star TV playing extortion tricks – all other Star Channels were showing. It looked like the decoder for Star World at Siticable just died. We saw them trying all sorts of combinations fo getting it back to life, but no go. So instead of doing the sane thing (yank the decoder from another less popular channel), they just switched it off.

^%$@%^$#$%#!$%^!%&^%&&!!!!!!

Luckily, sense prevailed, and about 2 hours later, the channel came back, allowing us to see the rerun of the concert at 10pm, but my oft-repeated prayer for “Direct To the Home” TV service to bypass these extortionist cable operators rang out once more.

Great concert, though.

Sean Lennon touched a chord there right at the end, dedicating the song to his mother, and then playing “Julia” – the song John wrote in memory of his mother. Nice touch, Sean. And you look uncannily like your dad – especially when you smile.

Hmmm, Anjali lost her expensive lunchbox for the n’th time (along with a collection of sweaters and other things over time). Not good. To top it, expensive shoes weren’t put out of the way either, resulting in dog chewing up one of them.

Is there any place where one buy a sense of responsibility by the kilo?

Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace…

–”Imagine”, John Lennon

OK, Phase 1 of The Secret Project happened. Now battling with Phase 2.

Been spending my days examining wireless networking options – will need that at home, since wiring up the place would be too messy, and IAC I want to be able to sit in the garden and work on my notebook.

BTW – apart from my 40th Birthday on the 20th, the other big event is our 15th wedding anniversary on the 23rd. Planning a minor private bash at home to celebrate both occasions.

Got my car back. Completely repainted, all items fixed, CD player now works, Radio works, all lights work, no squeals, no noise. Sundaram Motors finally came through. Cool.

Fight with Citibank when they happily refused all my credit cards while I was trying to fill petrol. Turns out that the misleading message the petrol pump validator was showing (“CALL ISSUER”) meant “Problem with link, please call Citibank and validate manually”. By that time, the petrol pump guys were beginning to look rather menacing, as if this was my fault. Luckily, the fault cleared and cards previously being rejected were now accepted. Sheepish looks all around. Hollered at Citibank, who promised to send a note to all vendors explaining what the various messages mean.

Otherwise, it has been a slow day. Some TV, some music.

One of those days.

My car, a Fiat Siena, has been in the garage for servicing, painting etc, for close to a week now. As expected, Sundaram Motors did not keep up their promise of delivering on Friday. In that way, they haven’t been very different from the dealer that actually sold the car – Manx Auto – who really know how to wreck someone’s happiness on getting a new car.

Yesterday (Monday) it took Sundaram Motors three hours to figure out how much the bill was, which they then duely told us on the phone – too late to pick up the car yesterday.

IAC, went this morning, paid the bill, only to be told “oops, we forgot to tell you that there is another 3000 tobe paid”. Fuming, I paid that as well, and went to pick up the car.

I couldn’t believe my eyes.

There it stood, bonnet open, cast in a corner, not even in a shed, no battery, grimy as hell. I screamed bloody murder, which motivated them enough to put the battery back in (after a 15 minute search for the key) and put the car through a wash.

Once the car was clean, I could see the results of their “efficient” work – the left side had been de-dented, painted beautifully, good as new.

The right side was dented, scratched, peeled and otherwise mutilated.

Their excuse? “But you never told us to fix both sides!”.

In addition, they hadn’t fixed the streaking wipers, the defective interior lamps, the squealing fan belt and the hanging wires. And they had lost the cable that connected my CD player to the car stereo.

I went and got the manager, and he sheepishly admitted that the service may not have been quite up to standard. Promised to fix it all for another 5000 bucks, and door deliver the car to my office on Wednesday evening.

Seeing is believing.

Fiat makes great cars, but the dealers ****SUCK***! They may know something about cars, but they sure don’t know anything about the value of their customers’ time.

Went back to the office. We have a tradition in the office – for a whole month, someone in the office is the one whom we point a finger at saying “it’s all his fault”. Last month, it was Shanu. Problem is, this month it is Jessie’s turn, and since she is new at Exocore, I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Luckily, Biju manfully stood in for her – so it was all Biju’s fault.

There, I felt much better. Dunno about Biju….

Phase One of The Secret Project experienced starting problems today as I failed to get all the main actors to one place at the same time. Trying again in tomorrow.

Got home, watched some TV. Snuck into basement and sang a bit to cool off. Simon and Garfunkel, some Beatles, some Denver, some Pink Floyd. I suspect I had an audience, but I could have been wrong.

BTW – some people have been complaining about the lack of a comment mechanism for my diary. Well, I can only say – use email (you know my address) and read this.

Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
You fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way.
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way.

–”Time”, Pink Floyd

Didn’t I tell you guys that the family would (try to) drag me out of bed at an ungodly hour?

Fabmart finally delivered a CD I had ordered a long time ago – Eric Clapton’s Time Pieces. I have had this album as a cassette for ages, and the tape was wearing kinda thin. So I tried (so far unsuccessfully, until now) to order a replacement, this time as a CD. For some reason, FabMart’s supply chain hates me – it took three attempts to order it before I finally got it!

Hallelujah!

Gopi and I started work today on The Secret Project. I could tell you what it is, but then I would have to kill you.

9 days left before I tumble over the middle-age barrier. I wonder what it will feel like.

Trivia: Did you know that my birthday this year is a perfect palindrome? 20th February 2002 is written as “20/02/2002″, or “20022002″, in most parts of the world, except in that land of non-standards (the USA), where it would be written as “02202002″.

Not much more for today. It has been a regular Monday. Exciting part of the day consisted of eating bun-omelette at the IISc canteen and some more solo-jamming in the basement.

Time is gettin’ shorter
And there’s much for you to do,
Only ask and you will get what you are needin’
The rest is up to you
Plant your love and let it grow

–”Let it grow”, Eric Clapton

If yesterday was a lazy Saturday, today was a lazy Sunday.

First of all I slept in very late. Somewhere during that time, the maid came in, fed dog and cat, cleaned house, made breakfast for me, and disappeared.

Kewl!

Did a lot of email, watched some TV, then snuck into the basement and switched on every piece of music equipment I had

Ahhhh, I love singing. Since I am still in a Pink Floyd state of mind, I ripped through bunches of their songs. “On the turning away”, “Coming back to life”, “Wish you were here”, “The thin ice”, “Learning to fly”, “Money”….

Found a “magic setting” on my old analog echo/reverb unit which made it much easier to control from the mixer, while also reducing the noise being injected. Actually dead simple – just turn up all settings to full, the attenuate using the mixer’s effect send/receive. Much more control, and much deeper effect when needed. If you listen to “On the turning away” and “Coming back to life”, you will realise that there is no such thing as too much echo

I still can’t record what I am doing – the deck I thought was still functional has major issues with speed variations.

And in any case – recording analog sucks in this day and age. I really need to get hard disk recording going. But that needs Anjali’s machine in the basement (my old notebook won’t cut it) and a new sound card.

Evening brought the Exocore gang into the house to watch “Galaxy Quest”. Man, I love a good ripoff, and this one was a classic – StarTrek fans will never be the same. Brilliant!

Traded insults with Vinod over SMS during commercials – he is never going to learn who is the master!

Dinner was Chinese order-in. Major bungling during the shipping of the order resulted in meal that felt strangely like Windows – looked good, but slightly unstable. No sauce with the Wontons – almost as bad as 22 KHz MP3 recording!

Crashed early, since family was coming back in the morning, and I just know they are going to haul me out at some ungodly hour.

Never Give Up, Never Surrender! Full Speed Ahead!
– Commander Peter Quincy Taggart in Galaxy Quest

Hmmm, apart from the dog (who just chewed up either Anjali’s or Shubha’s slippers) and the cat (who has been sleeping all night and day – I need to check if she is alive at all), I am all alone at home.

Spent the morning answering mail and doing some office work (from home, of course), now getting ready to decend into the basement and jam.

Before I do – several people wrote in saying they cant find the article I mentioned last night. That is because I have not yet put it up! I did say that I need to get clearance first!

I will add more here later today. There is a StarTrek movie (Generations) on HBO in a while, but I have seen it, so I guess I should just jam.

BTW – remember my mentioning that I was trying to get someone to join Exocore a while back? Well, I am happy to announce that it worked out. Now try and figure out who it was

Later…

Well, I didn’t get to go down to the basement and jam – made the fatal mistake of switching on the TV just as the StarTrek movie started rolling. While this movie is not really exceptional in any way (and what the heck – they destroyed the Enterprise!), I was honourbound to sit it out – if for no other reason than to prove to myself something I have known all along – Troi has nothing on Crusher. The Doc is the real thing to drool over.

Traded insults with Vinod in Delhi over SMS. Naturally I won the battle.

The highlight of the day was something that has become a sort of annual ritual: once a year, my friends Harsha and Samyeer join me in what we call our “sit down” – the three of us sit down and analyse our lives, talk technology, and eventually head out for food.

This year was sort of special for me – on the 20th of Feb, I turn 40. If I am to die at 80, I will be officially middle aged. Of course if I am to die at 60 or 50, I am almost there. In books and movies, they use a phrase for this – “reminds us of our own mortality”.

Ah well, let me not dwell on that – plenty of time for that over the next 11 days.

IAC – the three of us hopped into the car and went hunting for food. We drove across town, but eventually landed back in really the only place we should have considered to begin with – Windsor Pub on Vasanthnagar main road.

Surprisingly, neither Harsha nor Samyeer had been there before, so it was great fun to watch them totally freak out over the fabulous food. Windsor Pub is “different” – compared to the other pubs in Bangalore, you don’t go there to beat your brains to a pulp with loud (and bad) music or to get hoplessly sloshed – this place has great atmosphere, great music (lots of Clapton, CCR, etc.) and FABULOUS food! And very attentive and quick service. Next time you want to go and eat out, check out the Windsor Pub – I cannot recommend it highly enough, both for young people in the need to feel hep, as well as families.

That brings me back here. Family is still out of town, there is nothing good on TV, so I guess I’ll just curl up with a good book. I have a series of Perry Mason novels loaded on my Palm Vx, and the Lord of the Rings books. One of them will do, I guess.

So here I end for the day – my penultimate Saturday as a non-middleaged individual.

For long you live and high you fly
And smiles you’ll give and tears you’ll cry
All you touch and all you see
Is all your life will ever be.

–”Breathe”, Pink Floyd

This is to let you know that the thing that has been bugging me all of these past two weeks is now history.

It is a long and painful story, and it is going to take a while to write, so I will not be putting it here in the diary, but will put it up as a separate article on this site. As this is also destined for publication, it may take a couple of days for me to get clearance for putting it up here, so hold on there. I can guarantee that it will change the way you think of some technology, products, people and companies.

In the meanwhile, I am gearing up to be productive again. But not this weekend – I am currently bachelor, with wife and kid away in Hubli for a family function.

Tomorrow, I stay at home. It has been weeks since I did any decent music, and tomorrow I intend to make up at least partially for this. Mrinal is in the middle of exams, so I won’t bother him – I guess it is just me, my equipment and a sequencer

Mrinal was talking about this fabulous multi-track hard disk recording thingy for Linux that is supposed to put Protools to shame. Problem is that it hates the sound card in my current system at home (an old AWE64), so I guess it is about time to order a new card.

These days, I have been watching Star Trek:Voyager more often than I should. After the sometimes serious look at humanity in Star Trek:TNG, Voyager is a bit of a let down, focussing more on corny, unreal situations (and way too little on Jeri Ryan’s anatomy . The story lines suck ostrich eggs, but what can I say? Hallmark Channel shows ST:VOY twice a day, 5 days a week! And I am a sucker for SciFi!

Fabmart is currently off my recommended list. Despite all good intentions, these guys have screwed up badly with their revamp, and the number of complaints I have been hearing (coupled with my own painful experiences) is not funny. It is clear that this switchover to the new system has not gone well. The new site is behaving seriously weird – searches don’t work, there is still no “One Search to Find Them All” across departments, the customer data management is totally haywire, 90% of their inventory seems to be out of stock, and the ordering system is kaput. Period.

I hate it when good guys with good intentions go and break a good thing. I definitely preferred the old system – at least it worked.

If you should go skating
On the thin ice of modern life
Dragging behind you the silent reproach
Of a million tear-stained eyes
Don’t be surprised when a crack in the ice
Appears under your feet
You slip out of your depth and out of your mind
With your fear flowing out behind you
As you claw the thin ice

–”The Thin Ice”, Pink Floyd