How to make Milk-Shakes at Home

I am finally settled at home after four and a half long months of a tough semester, done a lot of things in that time. And a lot of things happening as I come home, too. What with Prabhakaran getting killed and Manmohan Singh on top of the game (Sonia on top him and Laloo, Mayavati, Karunanidi, et. al. behind his, well, behind).

Anyways (My thoughts going stray again), I have "BIG thoughts" one these issues that I want to write about, but currently too lazy to pen them down. For now, I want to share (Yes, for free) some new idea that I have been toying with during my short stay at home in Mumbai.

With a lot of milk, good refrigerator, ice, and ice cream, etc. i have found really cheap ways (as I have made it my life-principle to respect low price over brand issues) of making milk-shakes and cold-coffee. There are two things from where I found inspiration, which I would like to note:

1. The guy who makes "Ice-cream shake" in ANC worth Rs. 15, 200 ml.

2. The guy who sells "Strawberry shake" in CCD worth Rs. 80 + Tax 300 ml.I tasted both, and found no difference.

And I am ready for an argument.

So I drank the Ice-cream shake in ANC too many times that I almost learnt the proper way of making it at home.

After a couple of unsuccessful trials, (which resulted in butter-milk instead of a milk-shake), I came across the perfect combination of necessary elements of the "Ice cream shake" as it is made in ANC, rather, even better, with some more milk in it.So for all those who are as jobless as I am and getting roasted in the heat (that you folks have so innocently increased manifold with all your industrial farts), here is a 2-minute method to make really cool shakes.

Concept:The main concept behind the "froth" that we love so much about the shake comes not from the milk, as it commonly believed, but from the ice/water mixed in the milk. So it is necessary that we understand this before we go ahead because the same kind of treament that the "perfect" mixture of Shake gets, can create buttermilk out of pure milk solution.

For the making of shakes, all you need is

1. ice cubes

2. cold milk

3. ice-cream/coffee powder

4. Sugar (even if you are diabetic, since the ice-cream, will kill you anyways)

5. Mixer with juicer vessel.
ICE-CREAM SHAKE:

Mix these in the mixer vessel, per glass of shake.1. One scoop ice-cream (30% of glass)2. Ice cubes (30%)3. Milk, cold (40%)Make sure you don't put excess milk. And for your first try, put less than 40% of it, compensate with ice.Add sugar to taste. If you are a diabetic and still reading this, well, still go with some sugar, else the shake won't taste worth drinking anyways.Mount the vessel on the Mixer, and put it on for 40-60 seconds. If you have more milk, put for less time.Open the vessel and check the base for undissolved sugar. Shake more time if sugar remains.Once ready, remember me, thank me, and pray for me, and the enjoy.
COLD-COFFEE:

As above, only change to be made, add 50% milk and rest ice cubes, coffee powder, and sugar.Shake well in Mixer for less than 40 seconds. Keep checking after 20 seconnds for any signs of buttermilk. Stop immediately if you see any "knots" at the
surface. Once again, thank me, take my name, and enjoy the cold-coffee. If CCD charges you Rs. 70 for it, this one is worth that much minus the imported Brazilian coffee beans, which won't make a tenth of a difference with the taste as with the money.

Here is all my findings, free of charge, unpatented, unpublished just for you. Any donations will be welcome in cash. :P

Adios.

My MT2 Viva

My MT viva:
Vivas have since long been a source of humour for many aspiring engineers, and well, here lies the paradox. Good engineering education is that wherein the ability of the student to deal with
practical engineering situations is tested and strengthened. Now this is the prime motivation behind having a practical course with a viva component. Big thoughts aside, the point is my MT2 viva was one incident that creates humour out of my shamelessness about my ignorance.
Here is how it goes:
Me: Hello Madam.
Madam: Hmm.. What is the significance of Change Point?
Me: Madam, change point is a station where you CHANGE, the umm..
Madam: Change what?
Me: Change the theodilite position?
Madam: OK.
Me: (OK? WOH! :O )
Madam: But I want to know why you change the position at all? What is the purpose?
Me: Well, Madam, you actually have a BS, then IS then a FS where you finish your round to change to another position. (In utter desperation, attempting to take the instructor for a ride)
Madam: Do you really know WHY we use the change point?
Me: (Blushing) umm.. No madam, Sorry :)
Madam: OK. (Expressin of pitty) What is the Least Count of Theodilite?
Me: You mean least count of the angle measured?
Madam: Well that is the only thing that the theodilite measures isn't it?
Me: (Is it?)
umm.. (Pause, uncomfortable, not wanting to say no, AGAIN, waiting for the instructor to write that zero against question 2... Suddenly:
20 seconds?
Madam: YES. OK.
Me: OK? (Yippee!)
Madam: (Stares at me) What is Chainage and offset?
Me: umm.. Can I have paper so I can explain perfectly?
(Generally, a piece of paper is an escape, where one can jot down loads of equations and other jargon, which is a desperate, final attempt to impress the instructor, or even confuse her)
Me: Well, ahem.. you have this square, like, all those ranging rods you have humped, I mean, punched the ground with, around the object. So you draw this line down from the point to the chain, and this length is chainage and this is offset.
Madam: What line are you dropping?
Me: What? umm.. I think its a perpendicular...
Madam: OK.
Me: (OK?????)
Madam: So you did the Bernoulli's theorem experiment, right?
Me: Yes Madam.
Madam: OK, so what is Bernoulli's theorem?
Me: (I know this one!!) well, ahem.. Well, its that P plus Ro V square by 2 is constant. :)
Madam: What? Where is gamma?
Me: umm.. What gamma is it Madam?
Madam: Its P by gamma right?
Me: umm.. (DUmb for 30 seconds, then something strikes me, yet again) Well Madam, I you divide the equation by Ro into g, and then Ro into g is gamma so you get gamma, I told you the equation in the most FUNDAMENTAL form... =|
Madam: (Looking cross) OK. (Looks into the labsheet) You have not done this well, the experiment.
Me: Uh.. well I haven't madam, sorry!
Madam: (Looks up, again cross, looks down, writes down 6.5 for viva, amazingly high, for the things I did, gives away the sheet) Please sign. You can leave. Thank you.
Me: Thank YOU Madam! :)
End.

An early morning in the campus

Its been a long time I have been wanting to do this. For the heck of it, I wanted to go for a jog in the campus before 5 am in the morning. So this post is to validate that achievement.

This is how it went. I am in the middle of a BITSian night out. (A BITSian night out last from night time = 1 am to morning time = 9 am) Its 4.30 am I have just finished watching the movie Peaceful Warrior (primarily the reason that I got so adventurous later) And now I have nothing to do. I don't want to sleep now, so put on my shoes and take a walk around campus at 5 am in the morning. Now it wouldn't have been amazing had it been some other place. But 5 am in BITS, is like mid-night.
I wonder how lazy the system has made us BITSians. The funny part is there is an occasional sight of people out jogging by 5.30, but there is not a single student in sight. And it has to be the faculty! Those 40 year old professors know the importance of discipline and good health. Its weird, that a profoundly ambitious BITSian population doesn't get a clue of this. I really wonder sometimes how much discipline, health, or more generally the "quality" of life mean to us in face of the over-flowing challenges and opposrtunities that we come across, and more often than not, mistake them to be stress-generators. Is it that our negligence towards the quality of life makes us fighters or is it that this self-induced thirst for challenges and opportunites converting into stress-disorders is the primary effect of that cause, that we don't emphasize on quality?
Never-the-less coming back to how beautiful the morning was, I got to see an emptier Patel Chowk, where I could sit in peace for a long time, and more peaceful institute building, and the fact that 99 percent of my fellow-mates were asleep at this time gave me a high.
One thing more is that you can actually see how noisy and ugly chirping birds can get in the morning. It isn't all that poetic to see birds chirping till their throats go sore, and for no obvious reason they fight in the trees. All you can see is the rattling of the branches and aleaf falling off here and there. You, see there is something more that can be taken out of this. That poetry also about making ugly things look beautiful sometimes. Or is it that in their intense moments of happiness, poets fail to see truth?

How to fool people on All Fool's day: part one

You have probably come across this post through a link promising you 101 ways of fooling people.
Now it is ESSENTIAL that you take things step-by-step.
So here goes the first way...




















































































































HEHEHAHAHHEHAHAHAHAHAHEHEHEHEHEHEHEEEHAHAAAAAAAHEEHEEHAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

When you have a GF….

(I have deliberately changed the topic to use the short form GF, since the dumb BITS-server isnt allowing proper access to this page because of the use of the word GIRL)
It has been a while since Pranav and me had sat at Patel statue, I don’t remember why but we had come up with this amazing theory about teenage relationships. :O And the thought of this just comes back to me in this post-Apogee mood, when I am sitting in my room, doing nothing and trying to calculate the rpm of my ceiling fan. That was when I decided to weigh my options on how productively I can spend my time. I can find no other utility currently other than putting this amazing story at the back of my mind on paper.
It all started with me looking around at my friends cuddling up with my other friends for whom I had been not more than the perfect brotherly figure (Yuck!). I have never been so lucky to have had a firsthand understanding of this phenomenon of LOVE (WHAT?), or have I? (Hush….)
Nevertheless, here goes the story of a teenager, one-time footballer, college hunk lost in pigeonated love with that pretty (dumb?) girl who is known for her typical walk when she puts her head into the cell-phone and her fingers into the keypad, almost dead from those innumerable SMS’s. She gives out a vague smile more often than not when she looks at the phone, a mysterious smile, one that speaks more of her happiness for the fact than her guy has shown signs of appreciation for her than of the news of his well-being, sent through the SMS.
The guy, on the other hand is going (typically) through a drastic change in his psyche. At one time he had been walking on the road, care-free, in lose jeans, falling off his buttocks, and pair of smelly socks giving out an odour that would travel a length across half a BITSian wing, shaggy hair, white shirt turned brown from those football marks. Now he walks in a black t-shirt (he can’t change too much, to be able to wash his clothes regularly so soon, so a black one is an escape), with an expensive deodorant all upon him, (a lot of research has gone into that, with trying to get as close to supposed aphrodisiacs with the money that he has) , in tighter jeans, (so that he can feel the vibrations of his universe, the phone, in his left thigh, and long for it), clean shaven, and a typically kiddish haircut.
So here is how it all starts. Guy meets girl, girl and guy talk for a period of a week or two maximum, then exchange phone numbers. Once the phone connection is set up, it all speeds up. Here is a sample series of messages:
Initial stages:
Guy: Hi wassup?
Girl: nm. Just came to my room, had fun with my wing today. Xs Bday treat :) You know Y is a vry nice frnd. U say. Wasup.
Guy:
Failure: nm here, had a great match today, we won 4-2. Screwed em’ ;)
Success: Hey cool. Yeah Y is a very nice girl. :)
Girl: Yes u know …. BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH…..
Guy: Hmm.. nice ;)
Girl: Chalo, gtg to sleep. Gntc.
Guy: Oh sure cya gn :)
Weeks later,
Girl: Wassup?
Guy: nm. Wait I ll call…..
Girl: cool :)
Trring..
Girl: HII!!
…………………..
…………………
……….
2 hours later
……..
Bbye gn!
Cut..

Stage of Love
Guy: You know I have this thing about you, I really like you….
Girl: Oh. :)
Guy: ??
Girl: ntn :) same here.
SUCCESS!
Guy-girl go out every day, now as a couple, initially to SAC or CNOT, every day.
One fine day,
Girl: (7-pointer) Hey I really suck at Physics and test is coming up. I need help!
Guy: (5-pointer) Hey maybe I can help out. Let’s go to the lib.
……
And now they have diversified their love-spots, taken it to the next level. And over there, step-by-step they go from studying (very short time-span), displaying boredom, going to REDI/IC/SKY, cuddling, kissing :O, stray-hands going places :|, etc. etc.
Next, once they have become consciously aware of their requirements, having successfully communicated them, they move on to Shiv-G, T-Lawns (post 9 pm), etc. On Valentine’s Day, they are for once feeling intimidated by the large number of people with similar intentions crowded in these places, male counterparts silently communicating with each other, issues about territory encroachment, that the issue becomes more complicated than UN problems, is a only a slight over-statement.
One additional fact that can be given is the recent “Student Ram-Sena” attacks on couples in Shiv-G this Valentine’s conducted by a group of brave, visionary (or jealous?) first yearites, that brought out the worst in them.
FINAL PHASE: THE BREAK-UP
SMS: Guy to girl (usual check up SMS)
Hi! Wassup.
Girl: NM
Guy: how ws ur day…
Girl: Good.
Guy senses no smileys, no exclamations :O something wrong.
He calls up girl…
Guy: Hi! How are you?
Girl: I am fine. Hey I have to sleep now. I will call you tomorrow. Good night.
CUT
Guy is screwed up. He has a test tomorrow. Girl is BASICALLY bored of the guy and Charles Darwin couldn’t help him much with the Survival of the Fittest theory, since he only discovered it, much to his dislike. He HAS to get the girl hooked within the next 48 hours or she is history…
Guy wonders, and wonders, girl studies for test, after all, she is a girl, and BASICALLY more intelligent than the guy. And this, actually is just one more reason why BITSian CGPAs are at least showing a downward trend if not a constant one. Guy remains at 5, girl remains at 7, but with a lot less pain and suffering and not as much strategy and planning as the guy has put in to maintain this relationship.
One fine day, guy gets pissed off, simply because of the frustration of output not being even to scale of the input. He screams, shouts, abuses, girl takes it in, (as if she has been waiting for this very moment), she weeps, cries, gets a lot of attention and this, finally completes the BREAK UP.
Now, there are two issues.
As deep as I can delve into the female psyche, it is difficult to say why females can bottle up their problems when they aren’t required and why guys are so dumb to keep drooling on them when the worst of things are on their heads. :O
Secondly,
For those who are thinking about jumping into the weeping girl’s life EXACTLY at the time of the break-up, to bank upon the situation ;) they better get their logistics right. Recent study suggests you might just get hooked up as the Big brother if you enter at the wrong time, and the wrong way. :O
Adios,
This is Tekawade signing off.

To blame or not to blame....

I have seen, in the past few days, a LOT of blog-posts condemning the terror attacks in Mumbai. So there are people who basically crib either about the "system" or they crib about the "ignorant mentality" of Indians, and there are some who generally crib about everything there is to crib.
There are however, some who do not do not post and simply smile away at the way things are heating up, knowing how much they will contribute to actually nipping the problem in the bud, knowing very well that on the very same blogs, after a few weeks, there will be posts about some other thing making NEWS. I was talking to a friend at home the other day, and she was naturally psyched-out about the whole terror thing. It seems people want the government to "take action" and they are ready support the government in "whatever way they can".
So my very next question was, what can you do to help the government? And they say, they are ready to help out in every way they can, and that they are ready to volunteer in activites to promote vigilance among the janta. So I asked, "Will you stand for elctions, will you enter into the whole crap and change it from within?". And they answer was the obvious, "(sigh) I have not considered politics as a career option yet. Besides its impossible to change the system that way" And then she knew she had to shut up.
What really agitates me is people talk so much and with such confidence that will blow you over! And when it comes to implementing all the bull-crap that they have talked about, they have their own lives to worry about. In view of this, I feel proud to be the one who shuts his mouth and lets the moment pass away, knowing very well that one does not deserve to comment on such issues over tea sessions. What can the government really do? Do we have that much strength in the system that can stand to such unexpected happening. How do we do deserve to complain when-
1. We do not vote saying no one deserves it, when we, essentially are leaving the vote to someone else.
2. We do not vote, and let petty local politicians win their votes from small-minded communalists, or illiterate folk, who fall for over them because their problems do not go beyond food, water and shelter and of course, job security for their OWN community! (I am refering to the recent "AAMCHI-MUMBAI" issue)
3. If we do vote, we end up voting for those local leaders who will give us our immediate needs of water supply, roads, etc. and expect them to sit down together and resolve global issues like terrorism.

Well I really do not expect anyone to answer me on this. Primarily because I do not expect an answer different from rhetoric.
Now, if we sit down to think about why we cannot change the whole system by simply raising our voice, we will realise, it is simply not that easy to change someone's view towards life by use of emotional jargon. There are those illiterate folk or self-proclaimed defenders of culture (I am again refering to Mumbai) who have lived all there life on old, redundant principles, which sadly do not hold in today's world. And when they see such global disturbances, they are baffled, and try to reinforce the same principles that they are following, with the fear that they have been less strict with things in the past. I do believe it would have worked with LOTS more effort for them, but the solution to todays' problem is much shorter by today's methods. And this is where it all boils down to.
We cannot make the old folk change the way they think. What we can only do is change the way we think. Do our part and wait....

Logic with a Base

(I dedicate this post to my new-found interest in computer programming)
Logic, as I would define, is a series of well-reasoned inferences, one leading to another, arriving at the conclusion so sought for. The reasons are based on a set of fundamental axioms. As it all begins from one single statement which needs to have another statement beneath it for it to be an inferred statement, and since it doesn’t have one, it has to be an axiom. Now this set of axioms is what I would call ideology.
From political differences (which lead to constant heated arguments between my father and me) to differences in attitude towards a relationship (a subject I take active interest in, with data collected from my friends and their objects of love) to differences in friendships, to petty differences arising during gang-wars and communal-wars alike, everywhere, everyone on every side of the battle, know too well that they are right, and their opponents or opposing peers are wrong. So what then, is the underlying mechanism that drives people to the so called “right” answer? It is very easy to say that either one of them has to be eternally wrong, but has been prejudiced into believing he or she is right, like when it is a case like terrorism under consideration. But it isn’t so easy always.
It is very difficult to make such conclusions when it is a case of political ideology. We accept as a democracy that there can be different ideologies people follow, and the ideology that wins public acceptance leads the rest. So does that make the other ideology wrong? We cannot be very sure of that. But the thing that we can be sure of is that, to the world, right or wrong is a concept that belies on the concept of public vote.
Now what I consider of interest to me is the way people defend their own ideology and frame a seemingly perfect logic on the basis of this ideology, thus concluding that anyone who differs with them has simply NO logic! Now, the truth is that the other person has similarly framed his own logic on the ideology that he has defended for so long.
There is a reason that I have spotted, that makes people adamant in their views, or as we have been terming it, ideology. The reason is more psychological in nature. Every individual grows up in an environment unique to himself, and thus has his own set of observations, and based on his previous observations, develops his own interpretations of these observations. Thus, he develops views or paradigms based on this set of observations and interpretations. This leads to a personality or in psychological terms, a cognitive framework. It is not just human tendency but even a tendency experienced by a computer program, that if it encounters conflicting or inconsistent results, or it finds a loophole in its own algorithm where it can’t proceed further, the program crashes. (Ever heard of the dangling references error? It occurs when a previously defined reference, in form of a heap variable is destroyed, and a pointer reference is made to it. The compiler confuses itself into finding the reference, but fails to find one). That is exactly what happens when an ideology is proved wrong to the person holding it, through his own logic. He crashes to depths of his own mind. Such a kind of personal tragedy can lead a person to change uncontrollably. So what I have learnt is when I enter a very sensitive debate, it is sometimes a better option to pretend to have lost, rather than fight out and prove the other wrong, simply by finding dangling references, thus causing hurt and system breakdown of the opponent.
Some examples of system breakdown are ‘break-ups’ in teenage relationships. Another example is when an old man, after living more than 95% of his life under specific ideologies is forced to face the reality of “today” where his views do not hold. This is an example of the program failing when it is tried with a test-case that it is not written for. Betrayal is another form the dangling references bug. One person makes it an axiom to trust another and through this logic he is proved wrong.
There is another thought to this essay. What amazes me currently is that man really is not so different from a computer program. It requires simply going further into the depths of the human mind to understand his full potential to be a consistent, accurate, and predictable self-building, computer program.
This way of thinking has led me to follow a different way of life or a religion. A life full of logic, based on certain paradigms, and with the full understanding that my paradigms aren’t always followed by everyone. So I am ready for encountering a dangling references bug or even an extra test case which I haven’t programmed myself for. All I need to do is rewrite my program…