The open beta for Warcraft ended on the eighteenth. And they release the retail version on the twenty third. A five day gap.

Yikes…

Well, as I wait, I have been trying to find a guild. One that does not ask me to play eight hours a day.

Yup, I have my priorities in the right order.

Meeting a guy from EA tomorrow. Should be fun.

Two new songs. Both really good. Well one is Eim

The pizzas are here. Later people.

That’s it. I return to the World of Warcraft. Level 18 Warlock.

To my loyal audience, I’m apologize. It has been quite some since I last posted.

I haven’t been particularly busy, I have just been particularly lazy. I noticed that my last posting was my rather cryptic set of rules. I was in a bad mood so let it go.

What has happened since then?

Well I went to Philadelphia and Atlantic City. Met a long lost cousin who is no longer long lost. Um..since this was the first time that I was actually meeting her, I don’t think that I can precisely qualify her as long lost. A never met and now newly found cousin, I suppose. She studies at U-Penn, where my fellow travelers and I met up with her and a friend of one of my fellow travelers. Had lunch, saw the university and a bit of the city. Not necessarily in that order.

U Penn has a very pretty campus. Right in the middle of the city. And Wharton is very, very impressive. The nice thing about U Penn, apart from the fact that it is in a real city is that they do not have all those horribly ugly buildings built in a futuristic style that we see here at Penn State.

And then it was off to Atlantic City, that den of iniquity, that city of decadence, that Jewel of New Jersey. Good fun.

We met up with Penwala at the Econolodge and then wended our way to the casinos. I ended up at the Trump Taj Mahal, bright, glittering and so painfully gaudy. So painfully tacky.

People playing at the slots, their eyes glazed over, and I do not think I saw a single person winning at the slots. But they continued to play. And they continued to lose. I followed their excellent example and proceeded to lose thirty bucks in double quick time at a number of the machines. I would have liked to have played blackjack, but being a poor grad student, I could not afford the minimum bet.

And then we ended up at the Casbah after a slight detour at the Hard Rock Café, where great steps were made. The cover charge for the Casbah was twenty dollars and was worth every cent. Enough said.

We draw a discrete curtain over the events at the Casbah, and I shall continue with the rest of the tale. Penwala had for certain reasons decided to cut out early for Hackesack, and I decided that we should go there directly from the casino instead of heading back to the motel room,

Yup. That was a good plan.

We navigated the treacherous back alleys of Atlantic City and managed to find the NJ Transit bus terminal. We got directions from some cops who were busy escorting someone into the back of one of their cars.

We caught the bus to Newark and after getting directions from Penwala we took the train to Secaucus, from where we were supposed to catch a bus to Hackensack. A workable plan. One small hitch. There are no buses to Hackensack on Sunday.

After much begging from FNU, Penwala agreed to pick us up from the station. Unfortunately he lost his way not once, but twice. The first time he ended back in Hackensack after an hour of driving, and the second time, he ended up at an asylum for the criminally insane. He finally managed to pick us up and I finally got to see his apartment.

We then convinced our “driver” in Atlantic City, that it would be a better idea for him to come to my uncle Daya’s house in Summit rather than us going back to where he was.

Hackensack is a nice town. Some quaint areas. Some bad areas. And a pretty reasonable Indian store where I bought thirty five packets of Parathas.

Ah, Daya’s house. My sanctuary in New Jersey. Mooched lunch off of them. But in exchange, I was made to rake the yard.

Painful work.

When I finally do have I house I will ensure that leaves that fall from trees will be shot at sight and dismembered with happy alacrity.

The ride arrived at Summit and we left for Edison, at a restaurant recommended to us by my aunt Priya. I had the best Pav Bhaji there that I have ever had.

The rest of the trip was mundane. The “driver” Arun’s friend was dropped of at a train station so that she could make her way back to Manhattan and Columbia.

And four hours later, we were back in State College.

Finis.

1) I’m number one.

2) Fuck the world.

3) Dont bother being nice, it does not pay off.

4) Remember that the rest of the world thinks that it is number one.

5) The rest of the world is wrong.

6) Alcohol is bad for you.

7) Drink it anyway.

Bad idea to let songs play randomly on Winamp, when you are awake late at night and trying to work. The blues hit you hard at night.

I dislike the taste of defeat.

Well as I shared with one of you, I talked to a shark. It was an interesting conversation. And now I am amused by me. This happened sometime ago. I had forgotten to put it down.

So here’s to shark hunting and shark fin soup.

The weekend has ended. Probably one of the better weekends I’ve had in quite some time.

It began a normal weekend, a weekend when we had plans to go to New Jersey, which got shelved on Friday afternoon. This naturally pissed off Penwala, since I’ve been telling him that I’d be coming down to his place for the last four weekends. So at fourish I tell him that we aren’t coming. And he calls back fifteen minutes later saying that he is coming down to State College.

He reaches here at eleven and we head out to Mad Mex in Chinmays rented car. Seeing the long line at the establishment we decide to head off to the G-man. I wish to point out that I opposed going to the G-man because the line at Mad Mex was extremely attractive (I love women in short black skirts). So we headed out to the G-man, which was had a line of equal attractiveness and greater length outside it. At this point we decided to head back to Mad Mex.

A brief summary of the events at Mad Mex:

Siddharth claimed that he was neither getting drunk nor high.

Siddharth got drunk.

I did not get drunk.

I muffed up a chance with a really, really hot blonde in a really really short skirt.

The car got towed away.

End of Friday night.

Saturday. We ended up at Mad Mex again. I did not get drunk, but Jaegarmeister shots rock. Certain other people got totally drunk. However, I shall not name any names.

End of Saturday night

Sunday dawned, and ended rather tamely. We all overslept. Penwala returned to New Jersey.

I will never understand people. When I am the emperor of the universe, and trust me, that will happen one day, I will order that all people give ten valid reasons for anything they do.

Treated my feckless roommates at Bombay Grill (formerly Shaalimar) today. The food was nothing extraordinary, except for the Gulab Jamoons. They were incredible. Truly they were.

I was supposed to be working today, and I actually got a little done, before I got sidetracked into reading the Warriors’ Apprentice. Lois McMaster Bujold is an excellent writer of space operas. Her world building skills are pretty good and the plot lines are reasonably taut and well written. But where she truly excels is in character development. I find myself really caring about the characters and what happens to them. And not just the main characters, even the bit players are very well written, so well written that I wish she’d spin them off into their own novels.

That’s it. I apologize for not reading something incredibly intellectual like “The Great Gatsby”, or “Ulysses”, or “The Fountainhead”. But I am just a simple man of simple tastes who prefers a simple entertaining page turner over those pieces of pseudo-intellectual trash.

I’m done venting.

Programming in Java is fun. (That line was just for you Chilli).

The devil is unwell today. I shall take some time out and humor him.

The following is a transcript of our chat. I am blogging it as we chat. It has been edited for content and secrecy.

Nah… I changed my mind.

I have a feeling that my blogging frequency shall increase over the next few days.

Catch up time. I am attending this TA training course. And last week was my presentation, when I got up and did a little pretend lecture for the other Teaching Assistants for fifteen minutes. I was a tad nervous, but the wise ass in me won over, and at the end of class the instructor said I had used my sense of humor to connect well with class. Ah, being a wiseass paid off.

The devil suggested a few drinks, and since he is an expert I shall take his suggestions. They are, in no particular order, Tequilla, Sembuca, Creme De Menthe, Kalua, Tia Maria, Smirnoff Black Ice, Cutty Sarks and Irish Bitters. I’ll ask him for more after I try all this.

The posting ends here. I return to my work now.

Alcohol has the effect of making me spill the beans. It happened two weeks ago and it happened again on Friday. Note that I do not regret spilling the beans. I was glad to get the beans off my chest. And since the beans were already known by some, I don’t suppose that it was a big deal.

I could ramble on now, I feel the need to ramble on because I think I sighted a shark, and nary a spear-gun on me.

I do not like sharks. Other people seem to enjoy the company of sharks, but I’d rather they stay far, far away.

Some things cannot be fixed once they are broken. I seem to have this knack of driving people away. I also have this knack of driving people on the wrong side of the road. (A weak sally gentle reader, but please bear with me)

(Remember RII? The first caravan has started out from City one to City four. A train, ten kilometers long and ten stories high.)

Time seems to speed up during the semester. I’m running out of it. Too many mistakes, too many blunders, too much alcohol.

Sheesh, that does sound pathetic.

I grow weary of this Rajneesh. He has therefore been discarded.

I think…No I’m sure, that the driver on the R bus was drunk today. And trust me, I can recognize a person when they are drunk. Spoke to Norfolk today. Those guys sure know how to have fun.

I’m still playing Doom3, the demo, cannot afford the retail version of the game. Yup, I do have an exciting life. I find that I do not like the game as much as I thought I would. The weapon handling does not seem very crisp, but I think that that is my computer beginning to show its age. The rig has served me loyally for a year and a half but age has caught up with it. Time to get a new machine, or maybe just upgrade this one.

Working out is painful. You do have to have a streak of masochism to do it for any extended period of time.

Kerry won the debate. I’m happy about that. Will it affect the outcome? I don’t know, since most of the people who watch the debates have already made up their minds one way or the other.

That was my feeble attempt to write about a topic other than me in this blog. Do not get me wrong. I find myself endlessly fascinating. It is out of concern for you, gentle reader, that I veer off the topic of Rajneesh and descend into the cruel world.

Weird I am. Agree I do. (That’s me doing my Yoda impression).

Late night TV is freaky, truly it is. Weird advertisements for weirder products. Lots of “Girls Gone Wild” advertisements. That’s always good. Lots of freaky infomercials for products that no one would ever buy. (That observation was a rip of a Seinfeld bit).

Back to Friday. We were ar café 210 and a halfway decent band was playing. The only song I remember though is that infernally infectious song by Lisa Loeb. I do suppose I should list out what I had. The drinks, in the order in which I had them were a Rum and Coke (always a reliable choice), a Vodka Manhattan(Yuk), one and a half Yuenglings (beer beer beer), a Mikes Hard Lemonade(yum) and finally a Rum shot(Was too far gone by then to comment about it).

As you might guess I was a tad tipsy. Just a wee bit. I do not remember much, but I do remember asking some blonde for her phone number and getting shot down. Ended up at Taco Bell, where I ended up repeating what I had done at Bangalore’s Pizza hut, when Aja had come down. Well we finally caught the bus home and in it I ran into a junior, a friend of my roommates’. She informed them Saturday morning that I was quite drunk.

We did have a long serious conversation after getting off the bus. And we did talk a bit about the beans. At least I think we did. Or we talked about maize and the chief agricultural products of Bavaria. I do not remember anymore.

The night ended. I managed to let myself into the apartment without falling flat on my face even once. A major achievement I assure you, gentle reader. I even chatted briefly with my mom, and sent off a message to Bangalore letting them know that I was sloshed.

I then slept.

The sleep of the innocent, the blameless and the drunk. The sleep of an innocent, blameless drunk.

I woke.

I had a hangover.

I have been called caustic and it has been claimed that I have been acting weird. I will now respond to these scurrilous allegations.

Um…

Fine, I have a caustic sense of humor, but in my defense, I am caustic only with those who know that I am never serious. But since it seems that this is being construed as meanness, I shall cease to be caustic towards those who want me to cease and desist.

I shall be all polite and respectful and boringly bland.

Sadly, this seems to make people believe that I am acting weird.

Vicious circle, what?

Incidentally, I do not ACT weird.

I AM weird. There is a not so unsubtle difference between the two.

Back to the vicious circle.

Hmmmm…

That’s no fun.

So if I’m trapped I might as well go down with all guns blazing

.

On that hopefully ominous note, I shall change the topic.

Semester drags on, and by and large it is far less fun than summer.

I have started programming in Java again. Three cheers. I had forgotten how much fun that is. I’m hunting for that elusive job, which will help me get out of Nowhere, Pa. As I said before, lots of money and very little actual work.

While on the subject of jobs, congratulations Ameya on Intel. Back to Bangalore after all this time away. Now by my calculations, Kaushik and I will be the only ones away from the gang, and since our resident plutocrat is in Madras, which is three hops four skips and half a jump away from Bangalore, I am the only one away. On the subject of people being away, Inder, have a great time in Germany. However, since Inder refuses to read my blog, he will never read that.

On the subject of congratulations, congratulations Chinmay , on the candidacy. May we get drunk again, and have another serious conversation.

I think I’ll rewrite the infamous “Manifesto” , one of these days and for a change, I will try to follow it.

No, Really I will. Trust me. I will. No kidding.

Disappointment. I might not be able to make it to India in December.

To those who know, I’m looking for a spear gun to hunt all those pesky sharks. Preferably a weapon that will inflict upon them a long and painful death. Or like the crossbow from Halflife.

Heh. That would be fun. I’m sure Kaushik remembers me potting him from across the warehouse/storage area in the Stalkyard. Incidentally, I lost that map only twice, out of all the times that we played. Here’s to the wastelands, with Kwai and Inder screaming for someone, anyone to defend the flag and Kaushik coming up with inspired defense strategies.

An extract from the removed post, the unposted post from that memorable early morning blogging session.

“

Running on fumes.

Ran out of fumes.

Stranded in the middle of nowhere.

Objects in the rear view mirror may be the cops.

”

On that note.

The Rajneesh vanishes in a puff of smoke.