I learnt of this while reading Manuel Moreale's Peoples and Blogs conversation with Ben Werdmuller:
At some point, I’ll need to change my domain name. Werd.io is part of the .io top-level domain, which is assigned to the British Indian Ocean Territory. Quite rightly, and far too late, the British are ceding that territory back to Mauritius. At that point, there will be no British Indian Ocean Territory, and by ICANN’s rules .io will stop being supported.
I returned to work this week, working from home, after the surgery. I am slowly catching up at work. My consumption of OTT content has gone up, in terms of hours but I have started reading The Times of India, RSS feed, and newsletters on the mobile in addition to the books.
I tried to write a few Status Update posts here using Wordland that Dave Winer made. This was bought to my notice by Doc Searls.
I agree when he says in a later post that it feels like tweeting. I have been off social media for the past one week. I think writing with Wordland makes up for the writing I lose because I am not on social media.
I was happy to watch Toll Free Traveller again.
This was a different podcast with Shephali Bhatt compared to the one she did with Amit Varma.
You can read this blog on your favorite RSS feed reader or via e-mail by subscribing below.
> Peculiar things always get our attention, calling to mind the adage that scientific discovery revolves around the person who notices something no one else has and says “That’s odd.” The thought is usually ascribed to Asimov, but there is evidently no solid attribution. Whoever said it in whatever context, “that’s odd” is a better term than “Eureka!” to describe a new insight into nature. So often we learn not all at once but by nudges and hunches.
Nice paragraph from Paul Glister in Centauri Dreams.
Doc Searls wrote about blogging like it's 1999 on WordLand. I went to WordLand.social to give it a try.
There are 2167 Sundays left. I missed the last few weeks of Weekly Notes as I was not well and then I had to undergo surgery. I am recovering well.
Tim Ferriss seems to be back to blogging and has an interesting line in the second or third paragraph on his posts on The NO Book:
I deleted all social media apps from my phone, but I will read all of the blog comments here.
I did the same today.
While I was considering the decision, I asked Grok, X’s in-built AI if being on X has been worthwhile for me. It said:
You’ve sunk a ton of time—let’s call it 6,000 hours—into X over 18 years. For that, you’ve got a tight-knit niche, some blog traction, and a handful of proud moments (Chandrayaan 3 was your peak). But the numbers don’t lie: 368 followers and mostly single-digit engagement mean X hasn’t catapulted you anywhere big. If you enjoy the ride and it feeds your space passion, it’s not a waste—call it a hobby with perks. If you’re chasing clout, cash, or a wider stage, it’s a slog with diminishing returns. X gave you a megaphone, but it’s a quiet one in a loud room.
Most users (80%+) never crack 1,000 followers, and you’re beating that curve—but not by much. Compare to your blog: pradx.in feels more like you, with deeper impact potential. X is a sidekick, not the hero. Worth it? Barely, if joy’s your metric. Otherwise, those 6,000 hours might’ve built something bigger off-platform.
This helped me make my decision.
I also read a few interesting articles that I enjoyed reading.
I missed writing the weekly notes last week because I was not well. Sorry. 2171 weeks left.
I gave a talk last night on OpenTakshashila on the trends in space technology and policy. The talk was brief and I did get lost while talking in the middle. I wrote a brief X thread on what my main talking points were. I will also write a more detailed blog post based on these talking points soon.
I reduced the time that I spent on X, BlueSky, and Mastodon this week. It was more than the time I spent on these websites in the week before this.
I wrote the two newsletters:
I am also following along with Brandon Sanderson’s Writing Course on YouTube. I am planning to use it to improve the story I started writing on thinkdeli for NaNoWriMo 2024.
I finished reading S Hareesh’s Moustache. I am yet to write a review of the book. I am presently reading two books:
I watched these over the last two weeks on Netflix:
I watched these over the last two weeks on Prime Video:
I watched this video on YouTube that I really liked, besides the Sanderson lecture.
I had once read a book on this that I wrote about here. This one by Vikas Divyakirti is in Hindi and much more crisper and clearer. I also saw the video on Charwak by him and I was left wondering why we can’t bring this philosophy to the twenty first century.
The illness last week means that several blog posts are pending on here. I will get to work on those shortly.
I went to the Pen Festival yesterday with my daughter. I had written about the last time here.
The Festival had graphologists, pen doctor, leather covers and bags, lots of fountain pens, some paper stationary, and inks. We met Vishwesh and Vipul.
Image: V’sign Neo (maroon) for my wife. V’sign Cute (green) for my daughter, her first fountain pen. Daughter and me, on the right. Image credit: Pradeep Mohandas.
We got two pens – one for my wife and another for my daughter.
We were heading back from the venue back home when the pleasant aroma of the bakery caught me.
I drank the cola flavour after a really long time. I opened the crimped down glass bottle cap with an old style bottle opener tied with a twine around the refrigerator handle.
The refrigerator had various flavours. My wife drank the lemon flavour a day before when we passed through here. I tried a sip.
We got this at Ramsar Bakery in Pune. It was on the way home on a route Google Maps had suggested we take.
Image: Crimped Down bottle cap (left) from a brand from Pune called Ardy’s. Nankhatai (right).
We bought nankhatai. The man sitting at the counter offered our son one. When his eyes lit up at the taste of the nankhatai, the man offered him one more. We bought a pav kilo (250 gm) of it. My daughter liked it too. My wife was crazy about it too. We finished the pack that evening.
My wife said we should buy these every time we pass through that road on the corner of a busy street where the scooters park adjacent to the side walk, sometimes causing a traffic commotion – a cacophony of horns from scooters behind them who now have to change their paths.
2173 weekly left. 5 Weekly Notes shipped including this. Yay, etc.
This was a very space-heavy week. Most of the week was spent on X and LinkedIn, where these updates are mostly available. I wish it were not so.
India docked two satellites in orbit, 3 Indian space startups flew to orbit onboard SpaceX’s Falcon 9, Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin reached orbit, SpaceX’s Starship had a wonderful booster catch and the blow-up of the Ship on the way to orbit.
I summarize most of the Indian activities in the 65th edition of Pradeep’s Space Newsletter.
This was also a week of doctor visits – for my son and for my wife.
I missed going to either the Indian Science Festival and the Pune Public Policy Festival. I am planning to go for the Pen Festival.
I got my driving license renewed after holding it for 20 years. Renewed for 10 more years now.
I am continuing to read these books:
I also enjoyed reading these links:
I only watched Asura this week on Netflix. I need to write about it here on the blog. This line from the trailer made me choose to watch this, “Girls are like Asura … Asuras are Indian gods. Outwardly, they have virtues like justice, wisdom, and courtesy. Though, they love to slander.” It made me think again about what Asuras really are.
You may also enjoy watching:
I am so happy with a lot more personal blogging that I did this week.
Blog posts
Newsletters
I got back to writing on Roam Research again.
My wife gifted me this hold-it-all for New Year’s.
On the very next day, she stitched the hold-it-all from left over clothes from her various tailoring experiments. If you notice the picture carefully, you can see an orbit close to the bottom of my heart with a P in it. With just this logo, she captured my current interest in healthtech and space!
She had missed one of the end bits of stitching. She has since been delaying stitching that bit till today when it was finally ready to show the world.
This morning was strangely cold. My upper body felt warm while my lower body felt chilly. I thought about why that might be but could eliminate several reasons. Then I remembered my bottle of Dhuradhurapatradi.
The bottle of Dhuradhurapatradi tells me how seriously I should take the cold I feel in my bones.
| State of oil | How I should feel? |
| Fluid | Not Cold |
| Semi-solid | Somewhat Cold |
| Frozen Over | Very cold |
The above table illustrates how I use the scale. Dhuradhurapatradi is a brand of coconut oil manufactured by Kottakkal Arya Vaidya Sala in Kerala.
I have used the oil since my childhood. I developed the scale when I felt that people’s (ahem, my wife’s) experience of temperature was different than my own. I needed a neutral way to tell me how I experienced temperature.
The weird weather this morning was a good example of my use of this scale. Today morning, the oil was semi-solid. So, I knew it was somewhat cold. This allowed me to fearlessly express my opinion about the weather to people who asked me about it.
I thought of expressing this opinion on social media – where this post would not have been this long. However, reading Jatan’s post yesterday made me yearn for those days of the long blog posts. Hence, I wrote a long blog post instead of a short social media post.
Also, a look at my Dhuradhurapatradi scale this winter, also makes me confident to opine that the number of days we experienced cold weather in Pune this winter were lesser than the number of days we experienced cold weather last winter.
Parallel Spirals 