Laziness: The Mother of Innovation

What is Innovation? Well, to me, it's the product of laziness, plain and simple. Innovations usually stem from the desire of a person or a group of people to sit back and relax, and watch as their work did itself. Take the example of the spell-checker - use existing online dictionaries to automatically scan what you're typing and tell you if you're wrong. How about Google Goggles? Too lazy to ask someone about your surroundings? Just whip out your cell-phone, and you have all the info you want.

A week ago, I had to wake up at 4 AM to get some work done, and yes, I innovated. I may seem a little too proud of it, but the fact remains that I proved my own long-standing hypothesis. There are some of us in the world today, who may go to extraordinary lengths to get work done, but only if it pleases us to do so. Anyway, back to my 4 AM story.

Well, I had a math test the following day, and I'd had my fill of revision for the night. I just couldn't stare at any more θ values or sine ratios, and it was already 9 PM. What would any sane person have done? I don't know, maybe study their heads off until midnight. What did I do? Ah. I innovated. :)

You see, my mom had just left to Cochin (on one of her weekly visits to the motherland), and I had noone to wake me up in the morning. As you all probably know, I'm an amazingly sound sleeper. What did I do?

Well, here's what. I flipped open the laptop, scheduled a task on Windows to play "The Catalyst" by Linkin Park at precisely 4 AM the next morning. If you've listened to the song, you'll know that it starts off with a bang, literally. It's a jolt of sound that can make a thunderstorm seem like the purr of a Toyota Prius, and if it doesn't wake you up, you're either in a coma or you're Balaji Subramanian. Needless to say, I knew who I was, and so I took further steps to ensure my awakening at the appointed hour. A phone alarm and two alarm clocks later, I was Go For Mission.

The next evening, my mom was shocked to hear that I had woken up at 4, so much so that she actually googled erratic sleep patterns to find out if they were an advanced symptom of some violent form of brain fever. I, on the other hand, prepared for my math test as if there was no tomorrow, and entered the exam hall brimming with confidence. This confidence did not extend to when I left the hall, nor when I went up to see my score, but these are trivial nothings, not at all germane to the issue at hand.

What I'm trying to say is, laziness is one of the main prerequisites to be an innovator. An innovation is a device or method that adapts existing technology in a way that reduces workload. And what do you call a person who's obsessed with reducing workload? That's right, you call him downright lazy.

As you can see, there exists a region where Lazy Pigs meet Out-of-the-Box Geniuses, and that region needs to be large enough to accommodate both species.

It is that region that I call home, though I know not whether I'm merely a Lazy Pig, or something more else.

bala

Chronicling Doom as it comes

Yes, I know. 4 months is a long time. Then again, these last four look like they've flown past like a comet blazing across the night sky. There are a number of reasons for my internet silence. There was school, for one. That energy-sapping, zombie-creating asylum would have been reason enough to not write a single word for the many decades of life I (hopefully) have in front of me. However, there's more than that. I've suffered a range of disappointments in these last 4 months, ranging in magnitude from Chelsea's slight dip in form to things which are best not mentioned in the public forum of the blogosphere. And even as I write this, my earphones are echoing what my mind is telling me - "What I've Done". And yet, it hasn't all been bad. I've taken up my first job, and like all great men, I start off working without pay. However, I've (successfully, I hope) morphed from the guy who just blabs on the internet between increasingly long intervals, into a guy who encourages other people to do the same, and then criticizes them gleefully.

And then there's...oh wait, there's nothing more. That's the only positive in the last three months, so I shall now proceed to list out the negatives. If Blogger doesn't have a word-limit, that is.

Where do I begin? Well, in August, I went on my usual pilgrimage of Chowdiah Memorial Hall, only to see Giri Balasubramaniam hand out those two coveted laptops, not to Anoop Gopalam and self, but to a couple of bums from Jain College. That wasn't the worst part though, not by a long shot. The real stab was how close we were to taking those notebooks home. Anyway, that was just the first of my series of unfortunate events.

In September, I attained the distinction of having the lowest ratio of Academic Potential to Marks, with the figure reportedly being so low that China invented a new supercomputer to calculate it.

In October, I was exiled from football, banished by His Royal Highness KM Gopinath, my ortho. Apparently, I had a layer of soft tissue growing around my right big toe, and this tissue thought it would be fun to give me a jolt of sharp, shooting pain every time I touched a football with my right foot.

In November, well, it will be sufficient to say that things have happened. Things that are beyond words. Things that struck me below the belt, and struck me particularly hard.

Well, it's been a good four months, hasn't it? You tell me.

Like they say, so far, so good. Smite me, oh Mighty Smiter!

until next time,

bala

Musing on the pot

Ah, the pot. The seat, the commode, call it what you want - it plays a HUGE role, not only in your life, but the development of humanity. Decidedly, it is the site of most of mankind's most brilliant ideas; the most famous of them all being Archimedes. But we mustn't forget that you and I, too, use the pot for purposes other than hygiene. Most of us, admittedly, make life decisions in the bathroom. Some of our biggest ideas have hit us in the face while we were reaching for the flush knob, while others have waited for us to clean ourselves before dancing in front of us.

Quite frankly, the time I spend in the company of the toilet seat is the only time I actually think. About what, you ask? Well, just about anything. It could be a rational explanation for the existence of extra-terrestrial life, a formation that Chelsea should play in order to dominate their opposition, an excuse for Chelsea's loss the previous night (this happens very rarely, mind you), or random questions about nuclear reactions, cellular technology and the tackling of cross-border terrorism and drug-trafficking. More recently, it was a brave new idea on quelling the high rates of fratricide in the Indian Army and its Paramilitary Forces.

Anyway, you get the point. Do you do the same or am I unique? Do let me know.

What I'm trying to say is, all of us live such mechanical lives that we never stop, sit and think about anything. In the last 3 days, I haven't thought specifically about something unless I was on the pot or in the shower or in the few minutes between the time I hit the bed and my eyes close.

And yes, before you ask, the idea for this post was born today, just as I was stepping out of my bathroom.

bala

What a month it's been...

It's been a month of school. A hectic month and a month full of pressure. Class 10 seems like something out of the works of a particularly sombre Russian author. And CCE is like Kapil Sibal's very own definition of the word 'sadism'. It truly has been an eventful month.
The month of June began with my first week of school. The change was sudden and unpleasant - no more late night movies, no more late breakfasts or anything else that I had come to associate, even remotely, with fun.
It was quite hard on me, when all that I loved was replaced by all that I didn't.
That first week was marked by many assignments, a few learning experiences ("Nobody ever kicks a dead dog") and hardly any fun. You can’t expect anything else; the nearest substantial holidays are a whole year away, the World Cup doesn't start for 3 weeks and the Premier League is completely out of the picture.
I will be deceiving you, my readers, if I tell you now that I breezed through that week. The truth, the ugly, sad, bitter truth is that I barely made it. And I won’t give you some vague explanation about all my struggles being a "valiant battle in the face of defeat". I will come out and tell you that all my struggles were purely in vain.
The second week was nothing of consequence, but a dreary sequel to the first. It sapped my energy and made me a ghost of myself.
From the third week, however, things began looking up. There were football matches to watch, and even the deep, malicious voice of Mr. Jagannath Shenoy couldn't have any impact on me. The tests may have begun, but whoever cared??
And then the bombshell came: England's woeful, miserable, Dickensian performance. should I go as far as to call it a performance?? After all, it seemed like they hadn't turned up in South Africa.
But I shall not dwell on such matters of the past. Let England's misery be a tale to be told some other time.
The fourth week, there were some amazing encounters on the green field. German engineering proved its mettle (again), and two highly overrated teams exited the tournament.
And at the end of the month, what do I have to show for my struggles? Nothing, apart from my very being here to write this blog, nothing at all. and yes, Rs.501 to buy Eco-friendly women's fashion. Now that's something isn't it?

bala

musing on a vacation

If today was your last day...tomorrow was too late, could you say goodbye to yesterday?

 

This was what I am listening to, as I lie in bed typing out what will be my first blog post in a long, long time.  Nickelback's words ring through my kingfisher headphones like Nostradamus' cries, and I get an idea of how sad a song's lyrics can really get. The morbidity is compounded by a power-outage, supposedly the first of the decade. And yes, it just HAD to happen while I was in town...a touch of bad luck? Now that's an understatement.

With all this tragedy in the air, I felt like I was in the middle of the dark ages in the words of a particularly tragedy-happy Russian author.

Then, as the song goes, "it's never too late to shoot for the stars, regardless of who you are"...

In a moment of inspiration, the guys in charge of neyveli's power supply gave us the benefit of modern technology- the electric lighting that gave us the gift of daylight, at night. The power was back on, and I was back in business. Which reminds me of what I was supposed to be doing; writing this post?

I reached neyveli on the morning of Saturday the 8^th of May, having taken the bus the previous night. The 8 hour journey, surprisingly, was quite comfortable. I had a little gum with me, and chewed it at the rate of 2 pieces an hour.

Anyway, my first day was quite uneventful, except for a festive lunch which I enjoyed after a nice little nap.  The second day was the Final Day of the Premier League, and I was devastated, though not surprised, to learn that I would not be able to watch it as sports channels were not being telecast on cable here. I had to make do with reading an SMS every 5 minutes from my father back in Bangalore.  I read fabulous stories of Didier Drogba's exploits as Chelsea thrashed Wigan 8-0 to make history, or rather, prevent Man Utd from making history. That night, I slept with a big smile on my face, thanks to John Terry and Co.

Today, I was awakened by a harsh little shower of good old neyveli water(read Bangalore sewage), and I guess that must explain my day-long vendetta against the toxicity of the so-called drinking water supplied to the residents of this township. The residents, though, stoutly stand by the liquid they call water, with one of them, a high-ranking official of the Neyveli Lignite Corporation, even offering to give me a tour of their "modern" sewage treatment plant, which he said worked 24/7 to keep the water supply here clean and pure. I was also given a sales pitch for the dermatologists of this place, who supposedly charge outrageous fees for what is reported to be the best skin care in the world.  I shall get first hand information on that score, what with an appointment scheduled for Thursday morning at this panacea-man's clinic. I may never survive it and may even end up with skin disease for the rest of my life if I do live at the end of that appointment, but I do it in the interest of knowledge. The lamp of wisdom shall shine on the medical profession in this area with full brightness, and I shall be the one who is remembered to have shone it. Ah, the pride that comes from martyrdom is almost as inexplicable as the human mind itself. Anyway, the uncivilised, primitive inhabitants of this place shall see the light and extricate themselves from the sea of darkness, while I, hopefully, shall be back in Bangalore, among my friends and having a whale of a time. 

Nickelback is still shouting his doomsday prophesies into my ears, and all I can do is be thankful that his tune isn't as horrid as his lyrics. Now my grandfather adds his voice to the commotion, asking me what time it is. He catches me at a disadvantage – if I tell him that it is 10.38pm, he will certainly ask me what I'm doing awake when the clock is past midnight and it's almost dawn. On the other hand, I cannot lie to him, noble soul that I am. So my only option is to shut the laptop, wait for him to go to sleep and continue in my quest to chronicle my adventures in this wasteland called neyveli.

-bala

(at 10.40 on the 12^th of may, 2010 with a grandfather breathing down his neck, ready to move in for the kill)

 

Now, when I re-read this post, I am struck by the realisation that the entire 750 word body could be replaced by just 3 characters, and my message would have got across to my reader. Which 3 characters, you ask?

:'(

Ah, the beauty of emoticons...