Monday, October 24, 2005

SNAFU

I wrote a post by the same title yesterday also,but some error occured while publishing and I lost it.So,let me start all over again.

The title is inspired by Siddharth's post.Actually, last night,I was feeling a lot better thinking that I have pulled myself out of the SNAFU condition.But today I am feeling worse than before.

Well,where do I start from?Let it be OS first.This important subject is now completely screwed up,with only a very faint chance of getting anything above a C. Mid sems were a disaster, and as if that was not enough,I chucked the assignment evaluation for a useless movie,'Se7en' and I have been begging the tutor for the past 2 days to evaluate it, with no avail.To top it off,some dumbass sent a 'threatening' mail to the tutors.Now even they are not ready to help us and the prof has revised the grading criteria,making it absolutely impossible for me to get a decent grade.Then there is the labtest and the next assignment due day after.

Then there are loads of other assignments,Signals,Maths,ITWS and the project.That reminds me that I have to meet the prof tomorrow to show the progress of the project. Needeless to say,the progress has been infinitesimal.

I'll wrap up this post with the only positive development of the week gone by.The movie club portal is up and working.I had to break my head over the php code for the whole of yesterday to get it right.But now it is working fine.Haven't had any error reports till now.

That is all for now.If you are still reading this,then please pray for me.

Friday, October 21, 2005

All play and no work !

Last 4-5 days I have been doing little except playing NFS Underground 2.I have become a complete addict.

I could have done so many things,I could have read "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich",I could have watched the movies I had on my computer and downloaded few more.I could have done my assignments,I could have worked on the project,I could have had the movie club portal working by today,.....

But all I have done is play NFS till 3 o'clock every night(except lsat night).This post is just to vent my frustration.I haven't been able to get the movie portal up for voting for almost a month now.I better get working.

The ITWS project is also going nowhere.Had Dhruvan not completed the Java applet,we would have had nothing to show for this deadline.I struggled with the PGN to XML conversion for 3 days before getting it to work.

Lets hope this weekend I finish some major work on all the fronts.

If you are still reading this,thanks for standing this crap post.

Sunday, October 09, 2005

First Blog from 172.17.9.85

I just discovered that my new pc's new ip address is 172.17.9.85.Actually yesterday I had a pretty cool ip address:172.17.8.8.But it proved to be absolutely useless as I was getting miserable LAN speeds(<30 kb/sec).So I tried and tried and poor Anand (who did not go home,because he had to help me get my pc from Park Lane to IIIT and then get it working) tried and ultimately I went to bed with some 40 items on the download queue in DC++.

Today morning I woke up and found 10 items still there.I thought,"What the hell? 6 hours and this shit (I just noticed that these two words are anagrams) cannot download a few MBs?"
Then finally today evening I put Anand's old LAN card and it worked perfectly fine.Download rates are now of the order of 10^2kb/sec.That is when i got the ip address 172.17.9.85.

I missing home today.Many guys have gone home.I have stayed back.I don't know why.I was actually planning to get my PC in these holidays and then do some work with the project.Let's see how much I actually do.

Dusshera used to be fun at home.I would help my grandmom make garlands to be put on the doors,I would watch my mom make shrikhand,watch my father do the puja of all our vehicles,books etc.Then I would enjoy a wonderful meal,make a Ravan effigy with my friends in the afternoon,invite everyone for the Ravan Dahan,watch the fireworks and feel proud of the effigy we had made.

Now I can't even go home.All these festivals were much more fun when I was young.Now I don't know what to do.I'm too old for all the fireworks,or am I?But,that is where all the fun of these festivals lies.

I think I just don't want to grow up.I want to stay a kid forever.

Tuesday, October 04, 2005

Exams and Slogging

It has been a very long time since the last post.Even the last post was a copy-paste matter.

Second mid sem exams started today and the ordeal will be over by day after.Right now I feel quite satisfied.I realise that when time comes, I can slog too.I spent more then 6 hours in the library yesterday,without dozing off.Slogging isn't that bad if you have to do it for just a day or two.I dont know how regular sloggers maintain their mental balance.

Over the years, I have completely lost faith in the examination system.I think nothing can test anyone's knowledge at a particular subject.Getting marks and being actually good seem to be two completely different things.The world would be so much better without exams.

But a stereotype like me should not be talking about exams and their futility.After all,I have not done anything too revolutionary. I have accepted the system,though faulty.I have been tackling exams all my life.The very reason for my being here in IIIT is that I had a better day than someone else on the entrance exam day.