Chief Driving Mentor

Got a slight promotion from my driver role. I am elevated to a driving mentor / co-passenger now. That is someone who just sits helplessly in front seat, seeing his life flash right in front of his eyes as his friend wrestles with the controls of a Maruti Suzuki Swift.

Stall , jump and jerk, stall, near miss on a 2 wheeler, pedestrian crossing , brake , brake , brake , BRAAAAKKKKKEEEEEEE ... Sweat pouring off me as if I am running a marathon in 40 deg C heat. Even 30 minutes of intense cardio workout won't push up your heart rate as high as this !!

Why do you do this, did I hear you ask ?

Research is my career, high risk-low return projects are my bread and butter :-))

Read the following excerpt from A few good men, the conversation would not be entirely out of place between me and my friend.

Jessep: Have you ever put your life in another mans hands, and in return, asked him to put his life in yours?
Kaffee: No Sir.
Jessep: We follow orders, we follow orders or people die, it's that simple. Are we clear?
Kaffee: Yes, Sir.
Jessep: Are we clear!
Kaffee: Crystal.

The orders here would of course my commands to stop, turn, brake etc which are almost always ignored. As you can guess, I do not get the responses that Kaffee gives above :-((

According to historical Indian traditions, Indian females never drove Maruti Swifts, maybe there is an opportunity for Sriram Sena to step in and do their bit and save me !!  [ One point troubles me about the entire Sriram Sena episode. Traditionally Indian men too never visited pubs, because there were no pubs back then !! How come no one wants to bash up the pub going men ? I guess that argument is futile. They say never fight with a pig, you will get more and more dirty and pig will just keep loving it ]

Will I survive this shock treatment ? Stay tuned to find out :-)

PV cabs

Reports suggest that a highly rated cab service has been cornering quite a bit of business around the Marathahalli area. Named after the driver's initials, PV cab service has quickly established a name for itself among needy customers. Some of the key benefits of PV cab service includes

• Zero tariff plans, an occasional meal or cup of tea is sufficient. Has been known to operate even without these benefits
• Wide coverage area : Whitefield, AECS layout, Marathahalli, Yemlur , Airport Road and Indiranagar. Extended range of operation on customer request
• High availability factor of almost 24 x 7. Some rivals might accuse that this is because the driver has no other life. PV maintains a dignified silence on these allegations
• Phone/e-mail/SMS/Instant messenger booking facility
• On time arrival in over 99% of cases
• Improved passenger comfort with AC and latest Hindi songs. Any song available on request with just 24 hour notice. Ability to interface customer's MP3 players to car audio system
• Significant improvement in passenger safety after the adoption of conservative driving style

PV cabs would like to welcome suggestions on how to improve service in future

Daughter of the East

The latest book that I read has been Daughter of the East , which is an autobiographical account of Benazir Bhutto. Although the latter part of the book are quite repetitive and boring, I was hooked by the initial portions. Especially the ones involving the trial and execution of her father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

I am always fascinated by these incredible tales of courage, people who refused to back down in spite of clearly knowing that they would lose their lives. One of my friends suggested that it may be a hunger for power which prompts folks like Bhutto to take on such risks. While I do not understand what drives people like these, I am not sure that it can be explained simply as a need for power.

I am quoting some lines from The Autobiography of Malcolm-X as told to Alex Haley . The Malcolm-X autobiography is one of the most extreme biographies I have read. The anger and determination of this man bursts through in this book.

" I am only facing the facts when I know that any moment of any day, or any night, could bring me death

....... it always stayed on my mind that I would die a violent death.

To come right down to it, if I take the kind of things in which I believe, then add to that the kind of temperament that I have, plus the one hundred per cent dedication I have to whatever I believe in-these are ingredients which make it just about impossible for me to die of old age".

That is not something a power hungry man would say.

I would like to think that I would stand up for what I believe in. Would I risk my life for it ? Probably not ...

Channa-Batura

Master chef continues his foray into north Indian dishes with a massively successful attempt on Channa-Batura.

A picture is worth a thousand words, so have a look at my master pieces below !! 

Making of batura is not very tough. I took 1.5 cup maida, 1/2 cup curd, half tea spoon of baking powder , some hot water and kneaded the dough just as for chapathi. Most recipes mentioned using baking soda. Baking soda is sodium bicarbonate and I did not have it in stock. Checked the ingredients of baking powder, it also contained sodium bicarbonate, so figured not much harm can come from using it. In fact I have no idea if baking soda and baking powder are the same !!

I kept aside the dough for close to 2 hours, again most recipes recommend 8 hours. [ I can rarely plan cooking that much in advance :) ] I figured the disadvantage of keeping for a shorter time is that dough would not ferment well. Now what impact that has on taste is unknown to me

I did not make the white channa as that is not something that I cook or stock. So I made black channa curry instead, with a tinge of coconut milk added at the end.

Tasted quite nice. I'll let the admiring world add another feather to my cap :)

Gosh, soon I will have so many feathers that people may mistake me for a bird !!

Marble cake

So after perfecting the regular cake, I thought I should innovate a bit. One of the advantages of being a live-alone cook is that I can pretty much claim whatever I want about my cooking without you ever knowing about the truth :-) I can even claim I am the best cook you will ever meet , which should really tell you a lot about your own cooking ;)

I love the marble cake, so I thought that should be a logical extension to my lab experiment sequence. Since I was almost out of ingredients, did a quick round of shopping to get fresh eggs, maida, vanilla essence , butter and baking powder. Also brought Cocoa powder for the marble part of the cake.

After a cursory scan at some recipes ( remember, I am the expert now, recipes are for beginners !! ), I arrived at the conclusion that there is nothing to this. All you do is follow the exact same procedure as making a regular cake. Right at the end split the batter into two. Into one batter add some cocoa powder and mix well. Now mix this part with the other half of batter, but very lightly.

Everything went smoothly till I reached the very last step of mixing the cocoa batter and regular batter. One twirl of my spoon and the entire batter assumed the color of the cocoa one :( I was somehow expecting the two of them to stand a bit more apart so that I could get the marble like effect after baking. Complete desertion at this crucial juncture by my consultant did not help one bit either !!

Anyway there was nothing I could do at that point, so I went ahead and baked it. Instead of marble cake, it became chocolate cake , was still yummy though. Again was devoured at great speed by my colleagues at office :)

The greatness of a cook is decided by the taste of his dishes. Yet another step towards greatness by the master chef !!

More thoughts on Outliers

Sometimes the initial read lulls you into a false sense of greatness about the book. A quick re-read is often eye opening. Although the books Outliers is quite interesting to read, realistically it did not tell me something that I did not know earlier. Let me summarize the key points in the book for you

• Once your IQ is greater than a certain level, it does not really matter how high it is. What matters more is the amount of hard work you put in and in some cases your ability to interact with people and influence them
• The economic and social status of your parents, does play a role in shaping your personality and hence decides to a certain extent your success level
• Many times success is about being at the right place at right time, not really about how smart you are. e.g:- The relative prosperity of the generation post the Great Depression in US

All this is hidden behind an interesting array of statistics and behavioral studies. But ultimately this is what it amounts to. Thinking back , all of Malcolm Gladwell's books have left me a bit confused. There is no strong conclusion, no clear point established.

When talking about geniuses , why not compare say a Diego Armando Maradona and Richard P Feynman. What is the common thread that binds them, how did they become the way they are ? IQ ? Can't be . I don't know if sporting geniuses have great IQs. So there has to be more to genius than IQ and hard work. Why do so many of them hover so close to self-destruct button ?

Now that would have been an interesting analysis to read. What say thou ? :)

Still recommend reading Outliers though. Pretty decent read !!

Ulcers !!

I have been harassed over the past couple of days with mouth ulcers. Actually not strictly mouth, I have some harsh variant which happens to be near my throat area. Each time I swallow, feels as if someone is hammering nails into my throat. Otherwise I am fine, meaning I still have my normal ( maybe slightly more than normal ) appetite.

But how do I eat now ? All depends on what I want more badly : avoiding pain or eating food. Right now avoiding pain wins hand down. Which also means I am in this permanently irritable mode due to reduced food intake :(

Apparently there is no real treatment apart from taking Vitamin B-complex and hoping for the best. There are several old-wisdom based suggestions "Gargle with hot water", "Use hot water with salt", "Apply salt near the ulcer" and so on. My theory is that most of these are purely for the amusement of the bystander who is laughing at your predicament !! }:-{

In case you are wondering why my co-passenger driving experience blogs are not yet up, it is for the simple reason that I am not getting any experiences !! The driver is out of action with an ankle sprain, chances of recovery for next week also looks bleak :(

Reading has started on the right note. Finished Outliers: The story of success by Malcolm Gladwell. An interesting analysis on why some people are more successful than others, , tying success to lots of social and external factors that are not so apparent. I enjoyed it. Blink was good, Tipping point was poor, this one is very good again.

Baked another version of my cake, this time with raisins added and minor adjustments to my baking temperature and cooking time. Turned out excellent, was very well appreciated by my colleagues. Entire cake vanished in less than 5 minutes :-). Planning to try a marble cake this weekend.

In the meanwhile my struggle with the persistent ulcer continues.

Ulcer , ulcer go away,
Don't come on another day,
Big Pradeep wants to eat,
Ulcer, Ulcer go away

Speed illusions .

6 am in the morning, empty stretch of Mysore road stretching out in front of me as if in invitation of a challenge.

Brake check - ok. Ignition - fired up. Seat belts - locked in. Air bags - None . ABS - none. Floor the pedal, and off I go !!

As the numbers shoot up in the speedometer, sense of thrill also shoots up. 60-80-110-125 .... Man, I am the next best thing to Schumacher. Ha ha ha ha .....

What is the black speck in my rear view mirror ?
Is it a bird ? Is it a plane ?
No, wait ..................

It is a BMW blasting past me as if I am standing still. Before I blink it has gone off into distant horizon ..

The Schumacher bubble bursts well and truly . Good old Pradeep settles back into his seat for a respectable 100 kmph drive

I hate BMWs !!

And here I am

Happy new year to all !!

Holiday season is over and so I am back to Blogger again.

Had a nice Christmas vacation this time. Among other things we went to my Mother's home in Kunnamkulam. We used to go there every summer vacation as kids. I guess I must have gone there after 8-10 years now !! The winds of change are yet to blow across Kunnamkulam so nothing much has changed.

One change though is the old church which had been renovated. I felt it lost a bit of character after the renovation, but then what do I know. Snaps of the church and the old house are below

 

So time for new year resolutions ?? Not really . The only real aim for 2009 is to read more , as usual :)

Saw this quote too today Imagination is more important than knowledge. I am not so sure. Would you feel comfortable if you went to a doctor with an illness and saw this quote on his wall ?? Or say a TV news channel had this as their motto !!! Awful ....

I have some updates on my driving / co-passenger experiences, will write it up soon :)