Author: Pradeep

  • From the Archives: High School Poetry

    Going through the huge archives collected from time immemorial comes the fact that some of the poetry from high school seems to have survived my burning ritual. I laughed out loud at it and wondered how I was stupid about writing these things at all. Everything looks stupid in hindsight. At the time I wrote it, I probably gave it the attention that an engineer gives his space crafts with multiple last minute checks.

    The book which I am penning now has a full outline ready. It needs flesh and blood and that will probably start tomorrow.

  • High School Reunion

    After about 6 years out of high school, we had our first high school reunion yesterday. I was waiting in anticipation of this event and like in so many previous events, I was totally mum when I actually went there. I think it’s been proved enough times to give a name to it like “Pradeep’s Syndrome” and then actually put it all in a notebook and maybe even apply to patent that name. I’m famous, at last! Every human being’s secret dream!

    Pradeep’s Syndrome can be characterised by extreme preparation for a particular event and then staying so silent at the event that everyone thinks that I lost my capacity to speak.

    Some of the reunion photos are up on Facebook. Me being not so rich enough to afford even a camera phone am happy seeing these second hand records of history. Well, if any of my school mates are reading this: It was nice to have met you and hope we can be silent together when we meet again. Enjoy and all the best.

  • The Shiva Crater

    I just discovered that I live quite close to a crater which can be termed as a KT extinction crater. Translated in lay speak as a mass extinction crater. It’s not everyday that you discover you live close to a crater that possibly was cause of the extinction of life (of any sort) all across the globe. Or maybe I didn’t understand the implications possibly.

    Discovered in Wikipedia. The Shiva Crater.

  • Walk along Marine Drive

    I went to an art gallery on the day before yesterday. It was a showcase of an artiste’s (I forgot her name!) three years of work on the paintings on the development of Bombay from right around the 1780s (around the American Civil War).  This TIFR page has a good history of Bombay. So, catch all the history bit there.

    I then went on a walk along the famous (?) Marine Drive. It’s got a promenade and all that now. I don’t remember how it was earlier. I walked around with markings that said 100 m, 200 m…500 m. Eerie. I looked straight ahead from there on. After sometime, temptation kicked in. 1100 m. Sick!

    I saw all these penthouses and I really wondered at all the Mercedes prowling on the streets. This is a whole different part of town. It was a surreal experience. And, my short term memory being that bad. I have forgotten most of the things. I have scribbled them down on a piece of paper. I’ll recollect, recoup and put a more detailed post tomorrow.

    I walked all the way to Chowpatty beach. I then got lost in some of the myriad bylanes of Mumbai which took me to Gandhi’s Mani Bhavan, Lamington Road and finally to Grant Road after which I took a bus to Sion on the way back home.

    I am thoroughly enjoying my vaccations. I’ll add maps later on. Currently, prowling for a new passport application. Also, today I went to visit the Planetarium with my 11 year old brother. More on all of that in a later post.

  • Map of the Walk Along Marine Drive

    I had earlier thought of writing in my thoughts along the whole walk along with the map, probably numbering them for brevity. But, I am too lazy to type in all my thoughts, edit them and post them here. So, I’ll let them be in my notebook.

    [The original post had a walk-along-marine-drive.kml file attached. I cannot locate it now. This is a placeholder.]

  • Blog Move

    Just for anyone who didn’t catch this earlier. I have moved to a domain of my own. More trouble for me, I know.

    Here are the RSS feeds for posts and comments  –

    Posts – http://www.pradx.org/feed/

    Feeds – http://www.pradx.org/comments/feed/

    Hope to see you there!

  • I’m on WordPress.org

    It seems my life changes almost every second for either the best or the worst.

    I’m now on my own domain name – pradx.org – thanks to Anbarasan, a guy I’ve known for about a year or so now!

    1. Pradeep’s Blog – link – RSS feed

    2. Wiki – link

  • From WordPress to Blogger

    I’m moving over to Blogger – http://pradx.blogspot.com

    You have to change the RSS feeds to – http://pradx.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default

    To the WordPress community: It’s been a great 3 years blogging here and I’m not going away anywhere. Once I have the time and resources to setup my own website, I will definitely opt for a WordPress blog.  Now, I just need to have access to more features than WordPress allows me and I want lesser passwords/user ids to remember.

    Goodbye!This blog and related accounts will be deleted in1 year!!

  • Orhan Pamuk’s Snow

    (I’m a bit late on posting this)

    These are a few things the book made me think about –

    1. Technology and East-West interactions have only deepened the “East-West Divide”. Both reflects the other negatively.
    2. It is really difficult for a guy to understand a girl even if she spells out everything for him. They probably synergise at the level of the heart. O, and it’s probably time for looking for a girl for me too.
    3. Being an atheist in the East is probably difficult. Everyone finds their God, even atheists. Western definitions don’t apply.

    Besides that, I thought the book was really well written and was well expressed. Reading about Orhan Pamuk on Wikipedia and later on his website, probably made it more meaningful.

  • A visit to my grandma’s friend and 60 year old mechanical texts

    I went to meet my grandparents after a long week this Sunday (16/03). My grandma told me about her friend, whose husband died recently after being afflicted with Alzheimers. He was a draftsman and a mechanical engineer from the late 1940s- early 1950s. He had some books that the wife wanted to pass on to other students if it was useful to them or give it away as scrap. Was I interested in taking a look at the books? Sure!

    When we got there she was still in the process of handling the legal formalities of her husband’s death. The legal death of a person takes longer, perhaps than the physical death of a person.

    She brought out the books from a shelf and laid it on the table for me to look. I fished out these books that I mention below and also a set of study materials from the International Home Studies and various society booklets.

    1. Machinery’s Hand Book (for Machine Shop and Drafting Room), The Industrial Press, New York(sole distributors for the British Empire) – 1944 (cost mentioned – Rs. 33)
    2. Theoretical Mechanics – S. Targ – Foriegn Languages Publishing House, Moscow – Rs. 4.25
    3. Applied Mechanics for Engineers – J. Duncan – MacMillan & Co., London – 1949
    4. Applied Mechanics – David Allan Low – Longmans Green & Co., London – 1913 (there was no other date – I’m not sure if it was the co establishment date or the publication date)
    5. Machine Design Construction and Drawing (Book Production War Economy Standards) – Henry J Spooner – Longmans Green & Co, London – 1944
    6. Workshop Technology I (Book Production War Economy Standards) – W A J Chapman – Edward Arnold & Co. – 1945

    It is at times like these that I kick myself mentally for not having a digital camera or a phone camera. The books mentioned above despite the years were well maintained. It’s more probably because of better publication practises than because of better maintainence methods. She also showed me a tyre her husband had designed for Firestone Tyres, the company her husband had worked for. She also showed me the table top calendar that she had made for her husband with day, date, month and year.

    Also, for 60 year old textbooks, most of the content there could be as well used for my own course today with very little change.