Quotes

I have this habit of collecting quotes I find interesting. Here's a dump:

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National anthems can be learnt, but can't be felt. - Figo
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Forget Ram Temple, let's build a temple for Laxman.
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Its not like they know what I am bowling, its like they don't care what I am bowling. - Brad Hogg's thoughts on the Indians' mastery over spin on one of his tours to India
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Anna (Annadurai) wanted to gain power to bring about reforms. However, in his own time he saw the decadence of power. He saw how power corrupts. So he was a disillusioned man at the end.
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Only people who have lived under Riots, bombings and ethnic murder will realise Prabhakaran's role. Good or Bad .. he will be in memory and remembered.
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The bureaucracy is strong in this country (USA), and unlike other countries, hard to bribe.
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When one woman asked whether it was safe to leave (during the 2008 Mumbai attacks at Taj), the commando replied: "Don't worry, you have nothing to fear. The first bullets have to go through me."
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Perhaps it is possible to create more net evil by poorly chosen efforts to keep evil in check.
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The more I see him, the more I want to see him. - Azhar on Sachin
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His life seems to be stillness in a frantic world... [When he goes out to bat], it is beyond chaos, it is a frantic appeal by a nation to one man. - Matt Hayden on Sachin
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Sachin, the man we all want to be. - Andrew Symonds
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Nobody does solos better than Sachin Tendulkar, nor, perhaps, has anyone endured as much heartbreak during those solos.
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CEO Eric Schmidt told: while he assumed that "Google would be an important company; the founders always assumed that Google would be a defining company."
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A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine. - Thomas Jefferson
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Sachin didn't sleep well for 15 days leading up to the match against Pakistan in the 2003 World Cup. He would stay awake planning how to handle each bowler. He admits that he played the entire innings in his head way before it happened on the field. - Akash Chopra in his cricinfo article
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If to be alive is to be remembered by others, Rajeev will always live amongst all of us. - Tribute to Rajeev Motwani
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20,000 people die from novel 2009-H1N1 and everybody wants to wear a mask. 9 million people die from AIDS and no one wants to wear a condom.
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What I'm saying is - and this is not a come-on in any way, shape or form - is that men and women can't be friends because the sex part always gets in the way.” - Harry Burns in When Harry Met Sally
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Well innovation is how America works. The characteristic of America that is different from other countries is that we have more jobs lost and more jobs created per year than anybody else. Literally the creative destruction, this constant process of layoffs and new jobs and new companies and so forth is key to America's competitiveness. We don't want to lose that. - Eric Schmidt
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Once you’ve found the global optimal, why waste time looking for something else? - Rajeev Motwani
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My own theory of attitude of intellectuals is that the market is too big to control, so massive that it can't be understood in conventional frames of thought too caught up with the overt symptoms to delve into the underlying framework. If it can't be easily controlled, or easily understood, it evokes fear. This fear prompts calls for regulation and state intervention. I wish it prompted a fresh look at the frames of thought. Alas...
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The Beautiful Game

"Football is for people who play with cunning...so to put technology like a chip in the ball to see if it went in...I think you take away the cunning and then football ends for the great players...it takes away what football is about, Football is for the cunning, not for technology." - Sergio Romero (Argentinian keeper)

Argentinian goal keeper suggests that you have to be cunning to play football, and might be hinting that introducing technology might take that away from the game. I have to admit that I agree with him. I think for a contact sport like football, pushing, shoving, handballs etc. are integral to the game. I played a little bit of high-school soccer to understand the inevitability of leg-kicks, shoulder-pushes in these tight spaces, and the necessity of these things to win games. Lesson 101: say you are in position to meet and head-in a corner kick, how do you get elevation? You put your hands on the defenders' shoulders and help yourself up as you push him down.

If you have played a totally non-contact sport like cricket, the goalkeepers' view might not make sense. Essentially, in cricket, you play in isolation in your own personal space. Now in Soccer, if we introduce camera reviews of certain incidents, it becomes so much harder...what with every kick, shove, shirt-grab being reviewed and judgements passed. It could lead to situation where players are compelled to give each other space and that isn't soccer anymore. Worse, if these reviews are done during live matches it disrupts the very flow that makes the game so beautiful to watch.

One might object saying that we *start* with simple things like goal line technology, offside calls etc. But question is, what other incidents will you include as we go on, and more importantly will you stop there?

I feel that a few 'Hand of God' incidents make soccer unpredictable while being delightful and we don't need an all seeing 'Eye of God'.

Late Night Wars

Having been a fan of Late night talk shows, I have been religiously following Letterman, Leno and Conan 'o Brien all these years. Being a comedy geek, I was particularly excited when Conan took over the coveted 'Tonight Show' last year and was looking forward to some innovative comedy moments from one of the genuinely brilliant comedic minds of this generation.

So when NBC decided to move Leno to 11:35Pm, pushing Conan to past mid-night, everyone looked up at Conan to see how he would respond, and respond he did -- with a mind-blowing press release statement that was a lesson in class, dignity and self-respect. The ingenuity in the release started with the way it was addressed: "People of the earth". (I have reprinted his statement at the end of this blog). His response/press-release was so amazing that people have called for it to be encased in glass to be studied at graduate programs.

I have always liked Conan O'Brien. He is goofy, funny and insightful in a way that doesn't appeal to everyone. But my respect for him grew exponentially with his stand, and what 'Tonight Show' meant to him. Conan's monologue bits, since then, has followed it up with scathing bits ripping NBC and it's execs, and does not even spare Leno.

Ironically, his particular monologue bit where he said "NBC put him and Jay Leno in a pit and told them to fight it out with sharpened weapons, the winner gets to leave NBC", might actually be in his best interest.
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Conan's statement on the Tonight Show fiasco:

"People of Earth:

In the last few days, I've been getting a lot of sympathy calls, and I want to start by making it clear that no one should waste a second feeling sorry for me. For 17 years, I've been getting paid to do what I love most and, in a world with real problems, I've been absurdly lucky. That said, I've been suddenly put in a very public predicament and my bosses are demanding an immediate decision.

Six years ago, I signed a contract with NBC to take over The Tonight Show in June of 2009. Like a lot of us, I grew up watching Johnny Carson every night and the chance to one day sit in that chair has meant everything to me. I worked long and hard to get that opportunity, passed up far more lucrative offers, and since 2004 I have spent literally hundreds of hours thinking of ways to extend the franchise long into the future. It was my mistaken belief that, like my predecessor, I would have the benefit of some time and, just as important, some degree of ratings support from the prime-time schedule. Building a lasting audience at 11:30 is impossible without both.

But sadly, we were never given that chance. After only seven months, with my Tonight Show in its infancy, NBC has decided to react to their terrible difficulties in prime-time by making a change in their long-established late night schedule.

Last Thursday, NBC executives told me they intended to move the Tonight Show to 12:05 to accommodate the Jay Leno Show at 11:35. For 60 years the Tonight Show has aired immediately following the late local news. I sincerely believe that delaying the Tonight Show into the next day to accommodate another comedy program will seriously damage what I consider to be the greatest franchise in the history of broadcasting. The Tonight Show at 12:05 simply isn't the Tonight Show. Also, if I accept this move I will be knocking the Late Night show, which I inherited from David Letterman and passed on to Jimmy Fallon, out of its long-held time slot. That would hurt the other NBC franchise that I love, and it would be unfair to Jimmy.

So it has come to this: I cannot express in words how much I enjoy hosting this program and what an enormous personal disappointment it is for me to consider losing it. My staff and I have worked unbelievably hard and we are very proud of our contribution to the legacy of The Tonight Show. But I cannot participate in what I honestly believe is its destruction. Some people will make the argument that with DVRs and the Internet a time slot doesn't matter. But with the Tonight Show, I believe nothing could matter more.

There has been speculation about my going to another network but, to set the record straight, I currently have no other offer and honestly have no idea what happens next. My hope is that NBC and I can resolve this quickly so that my staff, crew, and I can do a show we can be proud of, for a company that values our work.

Have a great day and, for the record, I am truly sorry about my hair; it's always been that way."

Bike Trails

Here are some bike trails I have rode this summer.

View Big Basin in a larger map
This was probably a intermediate level dirt trail with quite a bit of elevation gain,
more suited for mountain bikes. We started at about 1600 ft, went down to around
800 ft and then had to climb to 1900 ft to finish off. Damn tiring!

View Halfmoon Bay in a larger map

This is an easy one, with the trail going along the beautiful halfmoon bay coast. More of a fun family ride.

View Arastradero Park in a larger map

This park is located in the Palo Alto hills, a barren trail with no tree cover, we were roasted in the hot sun!

View SFPier41-GoldenGate-Sausolito-Tiburon-SF in a larger map

This is a beautiful route that starts off
from one of the famous SF piers, takes you across the Golden Gate bridge to the
town of Sausolito, then a ride in the country side into Tiburon. We took the
ferry back to SF.

Kirkwood Ski Resort Opening Dates

2012/13 - 11/16 (Opened with Chair 5 and a storm moved in too; Early start to season as it typically is in the pattern of a weak El Nino forecast; Some late october/early-november storms led to snow on the mountains, couple of feet at some places, maybe more on the sierra crest; Cold temperatures and Vail's deep pockets mean good snow making opportunities)

2011/12 - 11/25 (Opened on Nov 25 with Chair 5 spinning, but resort operated only on weekends after a few days with no snow and warm temperatures, then reopened for 7 days a week on 12/17 with Chairs 5, 11, 1 spinning, thanks to snow guns; Bad snow year overall)

2010/11 - 11/24 (Bluebird opening on Nov 24th, after an "Epic" November storm with 5-7 ft of snow in 4 days; Chairs 5, 6, 11 and 1 were turning)

2009/10 - 12/04 (opened with chair 5)

2008/09 - 12/15

2007/08 - 11/25

2006/07 - 11/25

Biking

Summer dawned and I began to suffer from Skiing withdrawal symptoms (symptoms include frequent countdowns to the next ski season - around 180 days for the curious, lurking in the epicski community among other things). So, I took up biking with some friends.

I bought this classy new bike - Trek 7.2 Fx, and was happy riding it all over the place. And then Shit happened! As we drove across the golden gate bridge on our way to some bike trails, with our bikes tied on the back of our vehicle, believe it or not, my bike comes off the rack, flies close to the car behind us, misses it and bounces off the road before crashing. We then treaded along the dangerous narrow freeway shoulder to retrieve my bike. And man was it screwed up, fork twisted out of shape, wheels bent, headset scratched and bent, saddle torn, seat post bent and unusable, front brakes broken. Only the frame held up along with the gear system, so technically not salvage material yet. Later I learnt that this is a common problem with bike racks (WTF?#@!&). I just blame it on my star alignment.

I also got a chance to try out some of Google's Android applications. One application called "MyTracks" deserves special mention. This app uses the gps device available on the G1 to record geo coordinates and store them. Later, when I get net connectivity, I can upload it to docs/spreadsheets, maps etc. That was very cool. Heres my trip around shoreline.


View Travel in a larger map

Bunny to Black

The Mooney we flew on a company offsite(on the way to Truckee-Squaw)

Inside the 4-seater Mooney

Beautiful Sierras

Me doing parallel turns

Our cabin on one of our trips to Tahoe

The title describes my journey as I began to ski for the first time since 2007. What a season! Here I am - a strong intermediate skier, a confidence acquired after 15 days of skiing this year at 6 different resorts ranging from Northstar, Homewood and Squaw in the North Lake Tahoe area to Kirkwood, Sierra-At-Tahoe and Heavenly in the South Lake region.

It has been a great learning experience. One might think that Skiing involves just sliding down a hill, but as I studied more about skiing, I began to understand the limitless expanse of skiing -- the varied skiing techniques, the differing terrain, weather conditions, difficulty levels, degree of gradient, or different surface conditions such as moguls, powder, icy, corn snow, slushy etc.

After graduating the green slopes, it was an absolute delight to tear into the long broad intermediate/blue slopes. These cruisers are an absolute favourite of mine, as they are long, steep and broad that enables me to turn at ease. Some of my favourite runs have been: West Bowl at Sierra, Shirley Lake at Squaw, Bonanza and High Grade at Homewood, Bark Shanty/Juniper/Whiskey area in Kirkwood and Meteor and Comet runs at Heavenly.

Having been comfortable on intermediate slopes, I began to venture into some of the tougher black diamond slopes. Some of the blacks that I tried were the Siberia Bowl at Squaw and Upper Zachary at Kirkwood. Skiing blacks can be tough. They tend to be really steep and it takes some courage to shake off the initial chills and jump in. The presence of bumps along the slopes makes it much harder. These ventures really exposed my shortcomings in technique as a skier, but made me determined to really "learn" skiing. I have now begun to work on the art of carved turns, an elusive technique for most intermediates. The more natural way to ski would seem like using the flat skis on snow, but carved turns requires us to tip the skis on their edges and achieve a certain degree of edge control. With sufficient angulation of the body, the skis tips on their edge, and the body's weight pushes the centre of the ski down, so these parabolic shaped skiis carve their way into the turn. Sounds simple, but has been a difficult skill to acquire.

Many experts suggest that beginners should be taught parallel/carved turns right away as that will prevent them from learning such bad techniques as wedge turns. But I felt that wedge and stem-christie turns, bad as they might be, provided me with a defensive platform and kept me interested in skiing. As I learn to use parallel/carved turns and graduate into tougher terrain, it is comforting to know that I have a stem christie to fall back on for tougher terrain.

Although this has been a great skiing season, I am sad that it is coming to an end with the advent of summer. I am already looking forward to the 2010 season (some 7-8 months away) as I aim to take my skiing to the next level.