Thinking constitutes such a small part of our daily lives that we start thinking we can get away with anything without it. It's to be ingrained in every walking moment.

Obviously, it won't happen overnight. Sitting under the Banyan tree and waiting for the enlightenment to happen is hilarious. One needs to make conscious efforts for that.

I am mercenary. Money is no end in itself, just a means, and yet an important one. I have seen so many good things stopping 'coz monetary sources backed out.

If it would have been in my hands, I would have poured those lifeless wads into such projects to revive them again. If...that's the key word!

And this!!!

It can't get more realistic than this!!!

I work on behavioural ecology of wasps but nobody should think that I am a greenhorn novice when it comes to human behaviour. To succeed and thrive in this era, only merit is not adequate…PR is imperative, self-promotion, image management and media manipulation are must, and narcissism is not only a sufficient but a necessary pre-requisite. Recognition feeds to more recognition, success brings in more success. Not only that. The whole ball-game seems to have turned upside down…the awarders need a reasonably famous and celebrated person to promote their own award, their own ceremonies and in the end, themselves.

This post should not be mistaken for acrimony, bitterness or a high-collar attitude. It was never there. These are all rules of the game and the reason why I think so casually about all this is I have seen too many people doing this. However, there is definitely a slight contempt towards those who play these games.

I want to be famous, successful and may be one day the allure to play the game to the hilt will be tremendous. Will I do that? Who knows, may be I will, may be I would have found an argument to justify my actions by then.

Right now, however, it seems pathetic and disgusting to actually beg for recognition. No value judgements...I am not making universal statements here, it's just not a right thing for ME. Like a true idealist, I feel it's better to lead an unsuccessful, unrecognized life than stoop to such a level...

The exact time when t = 0 is highly tricky to gauge, highly contested, and hence, highly indeterminate amongst the cosmologists but I think a general consensus of 13.7 billion years as the age of the universe has been reached. This post, however, does not need an exact date of creation of universe (creationists hold the word ‘creation’ close to their hearts, but I obviously don’t mean that), and can do with the phrase ‘indeterminably long back in the past’.

It's quite funny when you come across people having varied queries about evolution, which is, or at least should be an integral part of education. What's not funny is the way these chaotic queries turn into views and theories that are passionately vouched for. Coming to the biped evolution, it’s really not amusing to hear people saying that all this seems to be planned, was planned (meaning man was predestined to evolve somehow)…of all the places in an institute which pledges by science and technology research…this is as ridiculous as vouching for creationists’ theory. It’s been noted in painstaking and meticulous details how the evolution progressed. The palaeo-records may not give species by species account as to what happened in the past. Instead it gives us a set of clues and evidences, which a logical, rational and commonsensical mind can use, and assemble the chain of events a la monsieur Poirot. This gives a lucid idea as to what happened and what existed in a particular geological time period.

I always say that there’s nothing like luck, right? Well, life on earth may just be an example of luck! Nothing but a stroke of luck! So many complex, mind-boggling phenomena have happened before we arrived, it can make anyone’s eyeballs go white. There has been so much of chance in whatever happened that if evolution were allowed to happen again, it would probably take a new route…a path in which many of the existing and well-established species won’t exist anymore, including us!

Philosophically speaking, the more I read about origin of universe, formation of earth, origin of life on earth and the process of evolution, the more polite and humble I feel. It’s a true exercise in remaining grounded. We are so, so diminutive and miniature in these whole astronomically vast dimensions of space and time that it borders on the verge of insignificance!

The lost cycle...

And while she was busy planning the best way to harass her students, I was left in agony over the weekend...I lost my beautiful DEVIL! Read on for further clarifications:

To all the guys who own a HERO DEVIL cycle,

One of you have taken my silver-coloured HERO DEVIL cycle!!! And I have YOURS!!!

Our keys seem to be Exact Replica of each other, where each key fits in both the cycles.

In a fit of hurry, you seem to have taken my cycle (leaving me with no choice but to take yours).

I am sure you’re quite attached to your cycle (as I’m to mine) and you want it back ASAP!!!

If you’re that person, please call me on 98809 99*** OR 23605*** (ask for A***). You can also mail me at a***@***.iisc.ernet.in

After all this advertising, got the cycle back in mere 2 days!!!

Pedagogy

A conversation with a friend who has recently entered the teaching profession:

“So…how does it feel to be on the other side of the table (finally)?”

“Yeah, good…gr8 actually…No exams, but I get to set up the paper…no assignments, and homework, but I get to decide on the topics and themes of what my students gonna do…but, y’know, more than anything else, it’s the joy of shaping a life…”

blah blah blah....>>> Fast fwd...

(I will die laughing man…Will decode the language for you…The idea of shaping lives means endless opportunities of haranguing and harassing and ribbing and ragging!)

"Don't be nasty to them as some of your professors have been to you...give easy questions...be generous in assessing them...and most importantly, if you spot someone sleeping in the class, please don't call that person to the blackboard and tell him/her to explain things to the whole class. That would be the worst kind of humiliation. One's in a total zombie and disoriented state."


I'm sure I've given her several ideas...a sly grin appears on that face...her eyes twinkle...am sure she is regretting the long weekend...and thinking whether she can actually call people for an extra class on the 2nd!

A New Ant Species reported from our Research Group!!!

shit, shit, SHIT...I lost out on an opportunity coz the big bosses in tow thought I am too arrogant and stuck-up. Some dufus-head attributed a remark to me which I'dn't said. And the bosses believed it without checking the facts. This is really too deliberate for any coincidence. I'm sick, plain SICK of these DAMN RUMOURS!!!

Schaller's talk reinforced my idea that conservation and ecology should never happen without taking into consideration the destitutes of that area...that conservation practice which doesn't consider the local people is always going to fail one way or the other.

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If anyone has to convert my growls to purrs, here's a clue. Tea and breakfast in bed, lunch in an outdoor restaurent, a candlelight dinner. Movies and Concerts. Being waited on. And the usual dose of adulation. That's all...

I keep misplacing things...practically everything. Stationary, clothes, mobiles, money, books and many other inanimate and animate things. It's as if there's a clandestine door to another world and when I'm sleeping, someone sneaks around and just picks up the stuff!

I shouldn't be waiting for the new year to come. Should work on my temper tantrums...Soon enough!

It's fun to spend money on your date by taking her to the best diners and theatres. It's good to see the radiance on someone's face by making them feel special.

Even if your salary doesn't allow you sometimes. But you can always buy 1 shirt less.

I loved Pluto as a planet, for its weird oblong orbit, expecting for it to create a cosmic chaos one day by colliding with Neptune. But now they have ruled it out as a planet...what a shame! Hrrrmphh, damned definitions and outcasts...

Wayanad

Tushar Giri Falls

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