Moving fast

Life is moving pretty fast and things seem out of control. Both have the same meaning. I have a bunch of things to plan for the colorado trip. In the meantime, I have got the lens adapter for my canon g3. now I can use my polarizing filter over my digital camera as well. It is something that I should have done 3 years back! How many good snaps have I wasted so far. Oh my god. Ignorance is bliss. I feel like I should have the graduated neutral density filter all my life. I will have to go to antelope canyon again to shoot some nice pictures with the neutral density filter now. How can this be? I was reading some Murphy's laws today and they seemed so funny that I started laughing hard. My favorite one was this: "you don't experience until just after you have needed it" ;) These are really laws!

So, I am probably a good multi tasker at this point. It feels good on one sense, but on the other hand, I feel like I have somewhat moved away from my routine activities. I don't even know how normal life feels like now. It has been like this for quite sometime.

My wife always offers me soy milk in the night. I refuse invariably. and she questions me. what can I do?

General Stuff

I have been trying to do many things. Today has been reasonably productive. I booked rafting in Colorado and also the Cog railway in pikes peak. I settled a violation with San diego superior court by going to the police station in mira mesa and getting it signed off ( address correction citation). I got some real work done, did some minor innovation there. I also booked Rahman's concert on July 16th. I got a few more friends in orkut. But still there is a lot more to do. I have to remember to get camera battery. I thought I just changed it recently and it seems to be dying already. Photography is becoming very expensive that it is really warranting the purchase of a DSLR. I have to try that thing. It is so convenient and I can do without many filters and what not. Well when is the time?

Things to do tomorrow

This weekend is going to be busy, if I end up doing all that I write here:

1. Visit somebody tomorrow at 9am
2. Visit Calumet, Nelson's Photo to find out if they have filters, etc
3. Book rafting and cog railway in Colorado
4. Plan for the trip and finalize the details
5. Work
6. Boogie Boarding
7. Mail out some insurance forms
8. Buy stuff for the trip - slippers, swimming shorts, etc if needed (film rolls too)

I'll update this if I can think of more.

What and Why?

I read somewhere that one should figure out what they like to do and more importantly why they like to do that. I thought it was very profound. I would like to see what comes out of this experiment. Supposedly, you'll notice a trend if you list out all the things that you like to do. I noticed a trend in the stuff that I liked to do - it all involves some form of art. But I am not fully convinced. I'll have to dig deeper and figure out for myself. This is the toughest job one can have. Let me finish this particular blog here and start from the next one.

Summer Solstice

Today is June 21st, considered as the day of Summer Solstice. That basically means that today we have the longest day and hence the shortest night. Today also happens to be the Winter Solstice for people in the Southern Hemisphere. That's quite something. I can't imagine any part of the world experiencing winter now. Summer vacation would mean an entirely different thing for them ;) They would be celebrating Christmas during Summer as opposed to the whole bunch of people in the Northern Hemisphere. It would be nice to spend summer here in the northern hemisphere and travel to a country/place like Australia and continue to experience summer there ;)

I am hooked to Filters

Well I am a filter designer myself. But the filters that I am talking about are those that you attach in front of the lens to moderate exposure levels and bring more detail to the shot. I did some study and found that there is an entire industry out there making thousands of filters for various effects. Even after the advent of digital photography, people find it indispensable to have nice filters. After all, you can't do any postprocessing of digital images if you don't have good data to begin with. That's where the filters come in handy. Take the neutral density filter for example. It is a must for landscape photography. If you are shooting a landscape against a well lit up sky, you'll either overexpose the sky and lose detail there or underexpose the landscape and lose detail there. Neutral density filters darken the sky and correspondingly bring out more detail there, so you can get a really good exposure. I was hooked to a photograph of Moraine Lake in Canada for the last couple of days. That photograph was too perfect (found it on www.photo.net). I was wondering how the photographer managed to capture such detail and found that he used a graduated neutral density filter (cokin) and just a regular digital camera with 8M pixels. The result was amazing and of course now I am determined to replicate that result. So I have somewhat narrowed down to buying a colkin kit, with the adapter ring, filter holder and the filter itself because this brand is cheap. People say that colkin has some color problems and is not scratch resistant. But Tiffen, Schneider and other filters cost a whole lot and spending that much on filter accessories is not currently justified although I can afford them. I really would like to make money out of photography. Ideally the hobby should pay for itself. It is all just a matter of doing it. and too many people are doing it after the advent of digital photography!

Furthermore, I found this lens adapter to add to my Canon G3 so that I may use the polarizing filter along with it. I have always wanted to do that and finally found out today that there is this adapter which will enable me to do it. But I don't have another polarizing filter. I would have to keep changing the filter between the two cameras I have. I do slide shots these days and have pretty much forgotten about color negatives. I think they will become extinct soon.

Saturday at the Beach

I did boogie boarding with a bunch of friends at La Jolla Shores Beach this saturday - probably for about 2.5 hours! The waves were really great and everyone had a lot of fun. I caught some double and triple waves. I finally bought a boogie board so that I don't have to worry about renting it everytime.

Trying to get some work done now. Did I mention that my best time solving a 'hard' sudoku puzzle is 4 minutes and 1 second? That's supposed to be in the top 1%.

I still have to figure out what ticks me. And I have to figure out why. There's a lot of work there ;)

48 things about dream

I had to write this here - I found this in this website: No. 32 did give me goosbumps - I couldn't believe it ;)

48 Things to Remember About Living Your Dream

Copyright 2006 Cari Vollmer

You have one, don’t you? A dream? Of course you do. We all do. Whether your dream is big or small here’s some advice on Living Your Dream.

1. You can be sure it’s a dream and not a fantasy if your dream involves serving others in some way.

2. You’re never too old to start living your dream.

3. Living your dream will allow you to be the best you can be and use your natural gifts, passions and talents to the fullest.

4. Living your dream will give you energy, even if your dream requires you to work harder than ever before.

5. Dreams are never too big, even if they start out feeling that way. You will grow into your dream!

6. Your dream is your dream for a reason. Therefore, if you don’t live your dream, you’re not living up to your purpose in life or your full potential.

7. Sometimes dreams have a way of bringing up the pain of our past. That’s because just on the flip side of your dream is all your “stuff”.

8. Living your dream will help you heal your “stuff”.

9. You already possess all the talents and passions needed to bring your dream to light.

10. Your dream expects only one thing from you - to give it away.

11. Living your dream requires courage. You won’t be able to live your dream if you can’t find your courage.

12. Living your dream will inspire many others to live their dream. Can you imagine a world of people living out their dreams?

13. Your Dream = Love

14. Dreams DO come true.

15. Dreams can and will change over time. Therefore, keep asking yourself, “What’s my dream today?”

16. If you have a dream, you’re lucky. All the more reason to start living yours!

17. Living your dream may require you to make changes in your life; some big, some small, but all worth it.

18. Living your dream may make others uneasy. That’s O.K. That just means they’ve been ignoring their dreams for far too long and by seeing you live yours they’re reminded they have something more to do in their life too.

19. People will try to discourage you from living your dream. Live your dream anyway.

20. Encourage every kid you meet to discover and live their dream.

21. Be a Dream Maker. Help other people make their dreams come true.

22. BELIEVE in your dream.

23. Some dreams don’t make sense at first. Stick with them, they will soon enough.

24. Fight for your dream.

25. Do whatever it takes to make your dream a reality.

26. Dreams come from many different places within you. You may feel your dream in your gut, your heart, your head, your soul. It doesn’t matter where it comes from along as it’s your dream and not someone else’s.

27. Some dreams come true over night and others take t-i-m-e. That’s O.K. The longer the wait, the more appreciative you’ll be when your dream comes true!

28. Dream BIG!!

29. Dream every day.

30. Dream the impossible.

31. Dream for others who can’t dream for themselves.

32. Dream of what it will be like when you’re living out your dream. Gives you goosebumps, doesn’t it?

33. Allow your dream to unfold in its own natural timing. Never push a dream. They don’t like to be pushed.

34. Do one thing today to make your dream come true.

35. Enjoy living your dream. Your dream really enjoys you!

36. Don’t be scared of your dream. Dreams aren’t scary, unless you make them so.

37. Forgive your dream. It may require a lot from you, more than you can give sometimes.

38. TRUST there’s a purpose to your dream. Keep trying to discover the purpose to yours.

39. Don’t hide your dream. Dreams like to romp around, play and be in the company of other dreams.

40. Your dream wants you to be a little bit crazy on occasion. In other words, dreams really don’t thrive from playing it safe. Get it?

41. Your dream wants you to know that it will come true if you do your part. Your dream promises it will do its part.

42. Never stop dreaming. If you’re a person who likes to dream and fulfill your dreams, more and more dreams will make their way to you. Dreams like people who listen to them.

43. The bigger you get, the bigger your dreams will get.

44. Living your dream may be the road to making more money than you ever have before.

45. But if you don’t (make more money), that’s O.K. because by living your dream you’ll finally understand that it’s not about the money anyway.

46. Your dream is perfect for you.

47. Dream now, dream later, dream all the time.

48. DREAM beautiful dreams.

Leadership class

was good to attend. but sitting in the class for a whole day is kind of intimidating. I guess it has to do with being dependent on the computer and the internet and the coffee breaks in your normal everyday life. I wish I can read some of the books listed in the bibliography of the tutorial. I have read the most important one though - "7 habits of highly effective people" ;)

Don't try to be interesting - Be interested!

This is a quote by Jim Collins, the author of "Good to Great" and few other books. I have read his book for some motivation. At some point of time last year, i was into this motivational stuff. I learnt a lot during that phase. Then work took over and my life got consumed and I have ended up restless as ever. In fact, this directly relates to the quote - if you try to be interested, you do find out a great deal of information and tend to be happier relatively. Which is what I was doing in the second half of last year - I was somehow content with the amount of information I was gathering inspite of the many unanswered questions. My restlessness subsided. Then I became terribly busy all of a sudden and have been heavily distracted from my stream of thoughts since then. In trying to be interesting, now I have ended up as an overworked, stressed and boring-cause-of-lack-of-play individual. I am trying to change that and I have somewhat succeeded. I am of course not where I want to be.

Let's try to apply this to my life now. There are too many unknowns - that's only because I think there is a need to know a lot of things. That's the desire that causes the corresponding suffering of having to deal with ambiguity. In the recent times, I have really learnt to make faster decisions at work, partially because that's what is expected and also because of the fact that it is important to get something done rather than making slow decisions and not having anything perceivable. I can quote that as a good learning in my life inspite of the amount of stress that I had to put up with. How else can I be interested? What should I be interested in? I know that I am having very complicated thoughts and I am not letting it go. I can't quite say that I have tried 100 things and none of them worked. I don't even know what I am trying and what for I am supposed to be trying anything. I am pretty sure there are quite a few people like me in this regard. I am also sure that they don't have the answer to the unknown question. I am watching a lot of Larry David these days in his episodes of "Curb your Enthusiasm". I highly recommend it BTW.

Look at Larry. He seems to be at peace with himself - well, not in those episodes, but overall. He has rightly capitalized on his talent and has had a decent break somewhere. He is 60+ and still pushing strong. He runs pretty fast and writes and directs and produces and what not. He still has the thing with him. Look at so many other sixty year olds around you - how many of them can be considered successful? I guess that would depend on the definition of success. We can keep arguing like that. But coming back to the point, how can I be interested? There are multiple things looming in the horizon. May be looming is not the right word. Let's say that there are multiple responsibilities for me in the future. One thing would be my own family and the other important thing would be the health of my parents and my in laws 'cause they are getting older. Harmony with family seems to be one very important thing for me although I have to admit that I have not been very good at it in the last couple of years. I guess those were the years when I tried to be interesting than be interested. Should I be totally interested in what I am doing right now? Why am I so influenced by successful people and flashy products and achievements? Should I dismiss this whole thing as a fantasy/dream or should I take it positively and do something about it. After all, there are so many others like me, or rather I am like so many others who are very predictable. What do I really have that would make me anymore special than somebody else. There aren't many to quote.

I was reading about this concept called "Space Elevator" today. It's a pretty fascinating concept where the rotation of the earth is exploited in hanging a taut tether between the earth's surface and space, where a counterweight is hung on the other end to counter the effects of gravity with centripetal force. They are testing the comercialization of this thing called "carbon nanotubes" which has the highest tensile strength and a relatively low weight. If they build this thing successfully, it could revolutionalize space travel and launch of rockets. They wouldn't have to burn so much fuel and propel a rocket into space - they can just get there slowly at the rate of 120mph. It's quite incredible! The point is that this thing affected me or rather I showed genuine interest in this.

Well, life is complicated. I will continue later.

Summer 06

I guess the summer has begun officially. It's been a while. There is light till at least 8pm (which is a great source of joy). I got my boogie board finally. I should have got it couple of years ago since I got hooked to it and have been doing it for quite some time. But as usual, I am skeptical as to how many times I would use it to justify the cost. But that's ok. At least I don't have to worry about returning it on time and take my credit card or cash to the rental place everytime. I can now leave pretty much everything in the car and walk to the beach with my stuff and have a nice time. We did boogie boarding today at La Jolla shores beach - my favorite spot for boogie boarding. Not many waves today though. Last weekend was much better. Our friends had also come. Both of them were trying it out for the first time. I am not sure if one of them would come again. I would have to talk to him since he was not really able to catch some good waves today. I think he got the hang of it though.

Then we had our tamil sangam meeting for which I was late. They are trying to hold like an american idol event - three teams with several themes each. they are supposed to sing a suitable song in each theme and will be ranked on their performance, song selection, lyrics, etc. There has been some discussion going on for quite sometime without major decisions being made. I am now for making decisions fast. The point is just to do it without wavering or dilly dallying all the time. There were conflicts as usual. It took a great deal of effort to convince people as to how practical the whole thing is.

I am back home now beginning to work.

Workaholism

I am beginning to think whether I belong in this category. Yesterday I watched parts of "Sweet November" starring Charlize Theron and Keanu Reeves. I think the gist of the story is that she tries to cure a workaholic Keanu Reeves. He seems very detached, too busy to even have a date or have a cup of coffee at her place. She takes him to the beach and just spends time without doing anything worthwhile, like playing with the dogs, etc.

Here's what I pulled up from Wikipedia regarding this topic:

A workaholic is a person addicted to work. This addiction may be pleasurable to the victim or it may be burdensome and troubling.

Workaholism is believed by some to be a disease, akin to obsessive compulsive disorder. The problem is that workaholics believe that if they don't work, their world will collapse. Workaholics do not necessarily love their work or try to excel in their work. If a person thinks he or she is the only person capable of performing their work, he/she is most likely a workaholic. Although most workaholism is associated with a paying job, it can also be associated with people who excessively practice sports, music, art, blogging.

The term is often used inaccurately to describe an energetic person who devotes a lot of time to work despite having good relations with co-workers, taking pleasure in other non-remunerative activities, being well rested, and attending properly to family and social life.

The condition is more accurately described when it becomes recognized by the victim or by others to be detrimental to family life or social relations within or outside of work. This may be due to the victim's fatigue, poor relationships with non-addicted co-workers, or lack of time and energy devoted to family life, friends, hobbies, and other activities.

The word itself is a play on "alcoholism," created via back-formation. The term was first coined in 1971 by Wayne Oats in his book, Confessions of a Workaholic. It gained more widespread use in the 1990s, as the result of a wave of the self-help movement that centered around addiction, analogizing harmful social behaviors such as overwork to drug addiction, including addiction to alcohol.

Japan is often portrayed as having a workaholic culture. Several Japanese workers die each year from overwork. The Japanese term for death by overwork is karoshi. In cases where it can be proven that the cause of death was overwork, the family can seek compensation from the employer for its failure to intervene in the employee's self-destructive behavior.

I am afraid now ;(

Oh My God! I took this quiz at forbes.com and this is what I get - it was a 25 question quiz and the answers were rather easy for me:

Are you a Workaholic?

Your Score is 72 - You are a workaholic. You could be on your way to burn out, and family members may be experiencing emotional repurcussions as well.

Damn!! What have I become?

Desires

There are too many things in my mind. As usual. Nothing new there. But some desirable things are new.

• Booking tickets for Rahman's concert in LA (July 16th)
• I am double booked for a party in LA and a Seinfeld show in SD on July 8th
• I wish to go to Denver for July 4th weekend and see around (may or may not happen)
• I wish I can plan our India trip during Nov-Dec time frame - I am kind of afraid that I may have to pay large prices for the flight 'cause that's the busy season
• I don't know when to bring my parents here and how to go about it
• My father's 60th birthday is completely unplanned as of now. It's on Dec 11th I think and I am totally unsure as to how to go about it now. Don't know how long that will take.
• My bike needs some fix
• I would like to travel to South America, New Zealand, Australia, Africa, Europe, Alaska, Hawaii, Bahamas, Tahiti, Egypt, etc. Obviously I would have to come to terms with the reality here
• I wish I can instantly be a movie director - it somehow seems cool. But knowing myself, I don't think I am going to feel entirely secure doing just that.
• Should I pursue higher studies - MBA, film school? or may be just take a year break and think about what I want to do?
• Taking care of my finances - something that I will never do until I retire I think.
• Taking some nice pictures and buying a DSLR - this will definitely get pushed down to the bottom of the list. Anyways.