Incommunicado

Between getting my paper ready for submission and planning my upcoming trip, I won't be around for the next few days.

Az's Day

Took Az out today for lunch and dinner - he's graduating, so we probably won't see as much of each other.

Today's Things:

• Rebels declare victory in east Ukraine [link]
• Indian economy bottoms out [link]

Spring, where art thou?

A cloudy day, but with an absolutely perfect range of temperatures. Had an interesting discussion about sexism, which gave me a lot to think about (well, first I need data).

Also had cake left to me by a student, thanking me for a great semester. I suppose it speaks to my cynicism that I felt happiness and wariness in equal measure until I looked up his grades and made sure he'd done well - or perhaps it's only because I myself might or might not have used laxatives in similar situations in the past :p

I'm quite angry with the Indian National Congress - more so than usual after seeing this video [link]. See 25s to 41s. This is why I won't vote for the INC. How can a senior member of a political party - which happens to be ruling India - say this??!! This kind of party-backed sycophantic nepotism is disgusting. We talk often about caste based stuff - this, to me, is WAY worse. I don't want a family ruling my country, no matter what their pedigree. You can choose a dog based on pedigree - not the prime minister of India. Also, as far as pedigree goes, I'm fairly convinced that Jawarharlal Nehru had Shyamaprasad murdered. And then you have Indira. And Rajiv.

The BJP aren't exactly my ideal party. Frankly, most of the political entities in India are pretty despicable. But, let me just put it this way - I'd rather staple my tongue to a wall than vote for the INC (as it is today.

Also watched Arnab Goswami interview Narendra Modi. Nice.

Today's Things:

• Apple might buy beats [link]
• Putin in Crimea [link]

Saudis, Audis, and alcoholics

Spent a long time drooling at this Audi [link]. Also spent some time reading about how the country (!) of Saudi Arabia has just sentenced a blogger to 10 years imprisonment, 1000 lashes, and a $266,000 fine for insulting islam and setting up a "liberal" network [link]. It's an utter travesty.

Today's Things

• Putin plays a crafty hand [link]
• British spy agencies say they have "noble intentions" [link]

Same old same old

Long day - worked a bit, forgot to deposit my insurance cheque again, and had an absolutely absurd amount of food.

Today's Things

• Ukraine near war [link]

Bachelor Party

Was away for the last couple of days for Andrew's bachelor party on Fire Island.

Back.

Whoever is in a hurry shows that the thing he is about is too big for him.

A very nice day in New Haven. Had final project demonstrations for CS 437 (Databases) - most of the demos were really, really, really good. I'll see if I can put them up on the course website. People made everything from advanced pokedex to location-based social networks to data analysis software. Very, very impressive.

Also had a very nice lunch at Soul De Cuba, followed by froyo, and a nice walk through the gently sunlit campus. Made some more arrangements for Andrew's bachelor party, bought pizza and cheese fries for (probably) the last Computer Science social this semester (I highly recommend Costa Pizza [link]). Read an interesting opinion piece about the sanctions on Russia [link]. Not sure I agree, but it's still interesting.

Today's Things:

• The Ukrainian govt. is faring badly against pro-Russian secessionists [link]. Also, it appears that there is massive support from ordinary citizens - who are willing to fight (see video).
• More Apple-Samsung [link]
• First case of the deadly MERS virus in the US [link]

2 Blasts in Chennai Railway Station

2 low-intensity bombs went off at 7:15am IST on the Bangalore-Guwahati express as it stopped at the Chennai Railway Station for a 10-minute stop. [link]

Cash

Had a wonderful time watching films made by students for a film studies class/workshop here at Yale. The class was TA'd by a friend of mine, Andrey Tolstoy, who was kind enough to invite me to the showing. Said showing was excellent - I especially loved a 30 minute documentary about a funeral home that was closing down; it was called Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye, and featured Ella Fitzgerald's rendition of the song [link].

Speaking of songs, I've been listening to Johnny Cash lately. Class.

> When the man comes around [link]
> Ain't no Grave [link]
> I won't back down [link]

The Man Who Couldn't Cry

Today's Things:

• Oprah might buy the clippers [link]
• James Ujaama on training jihadists in Oregon [link]
• IMF - $17 billion bailout for Ukraine [link]
• Gerry Adams arrested for murder [link]

ISI - building a better world.

The ISI has started a PR campaign in Pakistan: [link]

Really? What is basically a govt. funded terrorist organization - not that I blame the Pakistani government; they have zero control over the ISI - is running a publicity drive.

Wow.

Zaz

Listening to this..
(and also [this])

Mango mango

Spent a long time hating on random people. Did some work using sharemind [link], an excellent secure multi-party computation system.

John Oliver on the(:p) elections:

The full episode can be found here: [link]

Today's Things:

• EU decides to ban a bunch of exports from India, including mangoes [link]
• Ukraine: Separatists seize another provincial capital [link]
• More Apple vs. Samsung [link]
• Botched execution in Oklahoma [link]

Batshorik

Hm. 4pm and I'm already knackered. The HGS dining hall had no real vegetarian food today (they had vegetables, which is not the same thing; something they need to learn).

It's my grandfather's batshorik today - Mahes Kumar Gupta, 1918-2001.

Today's things:

• NetFlix cable tv [link]
• More "sanctions" against Russia [link]

A day to tie for

Had a long day yesterday, searching for ties in NYC. The target tie being very specific in colour, texture, etc., we didn't find an exact match, but after six hours, Andrew settled for whatever we had in front of us. It was quite a nice day - MTA to New York, talking about bad research and people with political opinions based on the 9 O' Clock News and Wikipedia (hatorade: the best drink around); cab to Soho, where we ate at the restaurant of the French Culinary Institute (L'Ecole [link]); trip to Rothman's to pick up his wedding suit; then we got tied up looking for ties.

In other news, I wrote a couple of stupendously long facebook comments, which I shall try to massage into post form for this blog. Also, Spring Fling happened. My precis: mud, mediocre music, mud, and did I mention mud?

Today's Things:

• South Korean PM resigns over ferry [link]
• Hungarians march against anti-Semitism [link]
• Pope. Saint. Pope. Saint. [link]

Yes, Heartbleed happened

Yes. Yes it did. Do you know how much money OpenSSL receives per year for upkeep? Oh, about $2000. There's one (yes, ONE) full time employee working on the code - which is used by everyone from Google to IBM to Cisco; said companies, along with some others, have finally noticed this, thanks to the revelation of the heartbleed bug, and have agreed (via the Linux Foundation) to increase the amount of money going into OpenSSL [link].

I read an interesting article on net neutrality today [link]. While it talks about a lot of other stuff, I find it's explanation of why net neutrality is a good thing refreshingly simple.

Today's Things:

• Ukraine situation - you guessed it. Worse [link]
• The price of gold is currently 411,898 USD/Kg [link]