Dissolving Shadows

A couple of days ago, in spite of the availability of my car, I decided to walk to my lab. With only the usual fleece, I reached my lab. Four hours later, I decided to stop any more lab work and started going to my home. Two thirds into my walk, my gaze shifted to my shadow, dynamically growing and shrinking with the passing sodium lights. Through the mist of my breath I saw its shadow; the shadow of my mist dissolving and disappearing slowly into the pavement. This is the same shadow, I see everyday in winter. But today, it was quite different. It was much more dark and intense. Some rambling thoughts made me think of dragons throughout the rest of the trip. As soon as I entered my apartment, I went straight to my laptop and typed ‘www.weather.com’ The custom Lex Vegas settings, gave me a page with the words ‘Right now for Lexington. Cloudy. 14 F. Feels like 12 F’
I just opened my fleece zipper and checked if by chance I had a thermal or anything inside me and found none of that sort. One fleece jacket, not even my usual skull cap, and I didn’t even feel the negative 9 degree Celsius. In two years my body has accustomed to the extreme weathers. Guess next year, I would just walk with a T shirt.

Caffeine Alert

Two days (err, two nights actually), of database update with new research papers made me go all day yawn. Before I continue any more, let me say that, am 60% in my senses and 40% in sleep. So... (forgot why I wanted to say that). Insomnia is alwasy linked to extreme hunger and with the wallet childlocked for the weekends big trip, I had no other option but to try a parfait from the cafetaria. Sitting on my usual window chair, I chewed the pastic spoon void of any more parfait for nearly a minute (I was completely lost in sleep, but I have a seminar to attend). The alpha state was broken by the cry (not tears, but shrill sound of wtf) of this old lady (it was the medical center cafetaria), and with drooping eyes, I looked at her. Blah Blah Blah (no mood for description today)

Getting back to my journal (was pathetically reading yet another microdevice paper, still clinching to my germy spoon), my mind went magnetic and I started eavesdropping on the lady's talk with the old guy (husband/bro/any one. I don't remember). Finally the conversation came to, 'So what did they say?'

Instant adrenaline, pupils dilated, chills vanished, muscles tightened, forefinger scratched my head and my forehead frowned: 'Caffeine intoxication. What's that?' Threw the microdevice paper into my back pack (screw this microdevices into micro dust was the attitude then), shoved the two colored markers into the trash of my old sweatshirt (Wah! I have a ton of bills and check receipts in the left locker), and walked back to lab fast (the only part of the walk I remember, is that there was this mid 30s lady who walked as fast I was) and went direct to wiki.

DONT READ THE NEXT PARA - THAT'S FOR SELF ESTIMATION

Me and my chemistry with chemistry, ended up typing caffeine and there came a page longer than I expected. Before I post the link to the page, lemme see how active I am with just a parfait. From my 5 minute ago memory, I loved the structure of trimethylxanthine (forgot the methyl locations, guess its 1,3,5), french term, alkaloid, arabica and robusta, theophylline, theobromine, colored tea is not true, used in shampoo, red bull's got 80 mg per serving (damn bison), chocolate has caffeine coz of cocoa (never knew that), some emperor in China found it first, analysis by Kaldi the sheperd (guess all old legends were sheperds), called as arabian wine, something called as xocoat (has vanilla), damn the metabolism (couldn't remember any of the vital detail), mechanism is clear cut (seriously this one's for group discussion with the nerds), an awesome pic showing the spider web, A table with the per serving caffeine (guess after brewed coffee, its the expresso which has the highest serving), effect on the human body, when overused (the real reason to enter wikipedia. Seesh!), extraction methods (remember the chemical and water extraction. What was the other one?), Naked Scientists Online: why plants make caffeine (hehehehe, memory is related to language sometimes), and nothing else strikes my mind. (Now am gonna look back at the page, to see what other good things, I've forgotten)

Why did I write this post (errr. Brain to Mr. Alex in Wonderland, Brain to Mr. Alex in Wonderland. Hello). Sorry. No idea why I mentioned this post in the first place. Guess, I need caffeine to keep myself awake. Anyway today's memory collected incident;

Today my advisor, to break the icing of an intent 1:20 hrs of discussion, said, 'I know we are married to ATRP' (my reaction mechanism in research). 'But we can affairs too. Try checking with RAFT and other radical polymerization methods' (Sleep deprived, I smile with a 'huh?' look) 'And still we can't go for a divorce, unless she (ATRP) proves us wrong' Have no clue what else to say. Guess I've lost all my energy for the day. Am gonna sleep in the grad lounge. Crap! %&((%^&$&$&^*))%&&$^%^*^&*!**#$#*@*

Furtively Funny

First of all, to make things clear, remember that I am no stalker and I don’t accept stalking. Now getting on to the incident. After braining out on downloading about 50 papers and subsequently reading a couple of them I was all left hungry and tired. With the New Year scratching me out of any food money, I had no other option but to go to the medical cafeteria for cheap food. As I listened to Dave Mathews Band and turned around the robotics building corner, I saw my good friend and lab mate walking a couple of meters from me. My mind raced me to say, ‘N. Kidhar?’, but somehow my tongue pushed the words back and swallowed ‘em. I started walking just behind me just to give him the creepy moment of surprise. But I guess I’ve lost all that childhood prankness in me, and decided to walk behind him. In the next 10 minutes of walk we had to the medical center, neither he noticed my presence (though my earphones were blaring into the ambience of awesome weather and I being just 2 meter behind him all the time), nor I tried to call him. With every passing parked car, I analyzed the angle of mirror reflections and moved sideways just to avoid his glance. Even while crossing roads, he had to turn his neck on both ways to check for vehicles and he didn’t notice me. I had two statements running through my excited head. 1. I am right here. Can’t you see me? And 2. I am making sure that you don’t notice me and I shall try to get as close as possible. It was all a different kind of experience. I am waiting for his arrival in the lab so that I can say him what I did yesterday.

The return journey was all intense. I said, ‘What up dawg?’ to a ummmmm a dog near the patient transport spot, and it barked at me. Gave the dog a cruel look and threw a piece of crumpled paper (I guess it was the ATM receipt) I found from my coat pocket, at which the dog smelled for possibilities of a free meal and then grrrred back at me. Though I am a dog lover, and had good experiences with dogs all my life, I checked every now and then behind me, if the dog was furtively following me like I did it to my lab mate. (Guess I need to take the last statement. Makes me feel that I was a dog then) As Joey says in French “Pooh” “Toute et le fruit”

Swiper Viper

After all the New Year fun in Navy Pier we decided to get back on road back to Lexington. Once I reached our car parked a couple of blocks away from my roommate’s cousin’s place, I was blank when I saw our red car covered entirely in inches of white snow (duh… have I ever seen snow of different color?). I started my engine, and switched the viper on. The loose snow broke into a mini avalanche sliding off the windshield. But the condensed ice on the windshield remained resilient. Turned on the viper wash, and to my confusion, the pores were all blocked with more ice. Instead of panicking in the -18 degree C cold, I just looked inside the car for a scrapper. As I expected, being a rental car, that too from a Toyota showroom, I wasn’t provided with one.

No water to wash the windshield too (don’t give me the crap of, ‘you can’t use water on ice coated windshield.’ Remember I’m a Chemical Engg). As my eyes gazed out for a possible source of ice remover, it focused on a tetra pack of strawberry banana juice. Hehehe. The evil in me just made me use it to wash my windshield. Moments later, after removing 40% of the thick ice, I was stranded for any more cool ideas to scrape the remainder of the ice. With no sharp objects except my glasses and the car keys in sight, I was a little puzzled over the issue.

A little thought of how Dreufus used his tie as a fanning belt, made me look for options. My pupils dilated in the eyes piercing ice weather as I came up with an idea. I took my wallet out, took my over-dued maxed out visa card from Citibank and smiled at its edge. I started scraping the windshield with the credit card and it gave an immaculate finish on the glass. A few more strokes and we were all set to pick my roomies for the drive back home.

Being a researcher let me put it in journal words. To conclude, we have carried out swiping experiments using a novel plastic slab, sharp enough to slit a throat, on scraping condensed ice and from the glass water condensation crystal deposit studies, we have shown that credit cards can be used as vital tools for the potential removal of harmful and hindering condensed solid water crystals off the surface of hardened near optical wavelength filtered silicon dioxide. (Blitzkrieg – am losing it). Wow! I just googled for a credit card and look at it 'Drivers Edge'

Red Phoenix Harley

Lost in translation, I waited patiently outside the door searching for the lost spark. And there, at the distance I see, flanked at both sides with a Nissan Altima and a Mushtang was an old man on a red Harley. He looks inside the hood of both the cars and smirked, as if he’d just looked inside their normal skulls instead of their hoods. As the Mushtang revved up at first gear, once the driver saw, red hitting on the perpendicular light, the ‘Nam veteran just waited patiently. Whilst the mind war was going cold at that instant of 2 seconds, the Nissan guy being smart rather than a coward, gave up without a fight just to save his dignity. Green it was, and a lion’s roar scored loud from the Harley and the veteran’s head scarf just flew of momentum like the sword of the closed Samurai. The Mushtang just couldn’t keep up with the Harley and lost all self respect of its V6.

Seconds later, I dreamt of owning a Harley in the future, and of course I was wearing the usual formals going to the Univ as the ‘Harley Proff’. ‘Dream on’ I told to myself and soon got back to my day dreaming. I don’t know how long I was dreaming, but several minutes later, the Harley veteran came to the door step. I noticed that he had one leg shorter than his other, from his padded right shoe. A friendly tweak of self appreciation was all I had to use and there he was narrating his experience in ‘Nam. With all the interesting stories of valor in sparkling English, turning out to be the spark, temptation crept to my tongue and I asked, ‘What’s the price of ur Harley?’ and even before I can shut my mouth, I blurted, ‘Can I try it?’ The next second seemed like eons to me.

A gentle smirk, as if he was thinking, “U Desi’s……” and then he replied, ‘No you can’t try it….’ Well, though the answer was obvious, I felt a li’l depressed of the lost opportunity, and he continued, ‘It’s 35 grand. But I’ll sell it for 70 grand coz I built it with my own hands. That’s my job. And again, No you can’t try it’. The denial repeated, felt like a slap. Anger reddened in my face and my mind spat ‘Why the hell didn’t he fight in Hamburg Hill and die?’ Guess I reddened so immense, that this guy with his limping short feet backed off, both hands waving as if pushing the air between us and said, ‘WOHH son! Don’t give me that face. Here, if you insist on it, here’s the key. Just make sure you don’t end up dropping it’ and he offered me his keys. Hell Dumbstruck was I. What else would you do? I was awed by his guts in giving his 35 grand self built, baby, into the hands of a total stranger, half his age, zero experience on Harleys and who moments ago thought he was dead.

Took me moments to realize that I wasn’t dreaming and I did in fact have an opportunity to try a Harley. Gone were the days of Bullet and Rajdhoot. A face filled with a child’s happiness, I took the keys, and then with the broadest smile of gratitude, I asked, ‘U sure?’ He just nodded just making the situation much more affable instead of speaking the affirmation. As I walked to the Red and Fiery Harley, I was in a situation where a million questions started running into my mind. The most important was, ‘Man, this is no OCC on TV. This is real. Can I balance, the wide front shocks? What if I drop it?’ But the body had its own mind and I managed to lift my right leg, and throw it overboard the leather cushion and the perspective I got from that seat is simply engraving. A full scan of the handsome beast, and finally confirming its glory, I managed to kick start Mr. Ableson and ‘Ah!!! What a feeling’, as I revved up the engine. All my 24 years of glorious self confidence felt like dirt in front of its thunder.

A feel of the clutch and the click of first gear (more of the gun sound you get in movies), and a slow start, made me believe that I was actually driving a Harley. Slowly I lifted both my feet off the ground and shifted to second gear and with full admiration of the vehicle, I roared 10 feet. It is not even close to difficulty level 1 in balancing the bike. It wasn’t heavy, and it was immensely satisfying. With at most respect for the veteran who offered me a try on his baby, I slowed the beast to a stop and slanted it to its parking stand. He never asked me, ‘why I stopped so soon or was I feeling scared?’ He just smiled as if he understood me, and came towards me. He patted my back with his shaky leather cut-gloved hands, smiled again, and as I got down it with full gratitude, he just heaved his heavy left foot over it from the other side and then wore his cap. From its looks, it was as if he was a pilot rather than a private. But it ain’t time to be judgmental about his position in war. Once more, he revved, looked at me and smiled and roared back on the road. His scarf once again looked like the sword of the closed Samurai. I asked for a spark and he gave me fire. I thought heroes are only in movies. But it wasn’t the case today. I did feel like meeting a true hero. Like a kid I say, ‘He was my hero’. As I watched him leave, I noticed his number plate and it had the words ‘PHOENIX’ as the city name. “A RED Harley from PHOENIX”. What else can I say????? (The next time I see him and get a ride. I'll definitely take a pic of me on teh phoenix and shall upload it. And the Harley in the pic was exactly how it looked)

Sensitive Running

It was 4:15 in the morning, when my roommate found out that the Walmart in Sir Barton Way had sensors which activated lights in the shelves kept on the frozen food aisle. I just looked at him, and thought 'If not now, then when?' As the ESP always worked between me and my shorty friend, we both looked around, confirmed that we were the only people inside the store and smiled at each other. 'In 3. 3 2 1....' and chap chap chap chap..... panting for air, we were standing on the other end of the frozen food section. As Forrest Gump does, we had no reason to run. Actually we did - the reason was to make the sensors work and light up our path. We ran in an instant, without any prior committment or notification, that the act freaked out our other funny roomie. We laughed at his shaken up comments and then went to chill him out. As any other shopping day, we ended up spending too much time having fun and ended up buying stuff for $10. We owned the whole store yesterday night.

Ten seconds before sunrise

Words can't describe what I felt when I listened to Ten Seconds Before Sunrise moments ago. I am not a big time fan of DJ music, but this one, ignited bliss in me as I walked by towards my lab. It is impossible for a person to listen to every microsecond and detail of music, when he walks in traffic, especially a 'people watcher' like me. This one, WOW!!! made me raise my hands as I reached the department stairs hoping for the sun to really rise. Please listen to this bit using your earphones at the near loud level. The best music to forget everything happening in your brain.