Insecure micromanaging megalomaniac freaks

There is a post on the Inside Higher Ed. board on bio breaks during lectures. In it, Terry Caesar has ranted on for well over 5000 words on how student taking bio breaks “disrupt” the class room. He even has the audacity to say “What makes going to the bathroom so distinctive and uncomfortable is that, while still disruptive, it partakes of some necessity that is socially if not pedagogically acceptable. In most other cases, the professor can understandably lift a cry to the heavens, bemoaning how university life used to be, before hordes of student barbarians broke through the gates, with their plastic slurppies, their taco chips, their baggy clothes and their baggy values.” All I have to say to him is FUCK YOU you ELITIST BASTARD. How dare you talk about students in such a condescending manner? It is the students who pay for those Versace suits of yours.
Not only is he an elitist, he is also a major control freak.He writes, “Some provocations we professors acknowledge. Some we do not. Let the bathroom represent one we do not because it has to do with our authority over the student body.” I repeat, “AUTHORITY OVER THE STUDENT BODY”. Who the fuck made you the supreme commander of all that you see?

I understand this two cent piece of crap writing shit like this to sell his article to a board. What I do not understand is how can academics support this view? Take a look at the comments on Little professor’s blog on this.

Is it not adequate that professors control every square inch of our professionals lives, that they now want a say in our very being too? Either these people have some major insecurity issues, or have egos the size of Jupiter. Either way its screwed up.

Never in my wildest nightmares have I imagined such jackasses being professors who are actually incharge of our lives. These are the neo-conservative republicans of academia.

Is there A primary purpose for our existence?

Weasley and I have been arguing if there is indeed A primary purpose that forms the core of our existence. She think there is, and I strongly disagree.
Let us first define the word purpose. I googled on this, and found 6 different definitions for this word. When I summarize all these, it boils down to “satisfying a need”.
Lets all think about this on a personal level. What is our purpose in life? Ok. Most of us have an answer to it. Now ask yourself, what was my purpose in life an year ago? 5 years ago? 10 years ago? If you are anything like me, you will have 4 distinct answers to “What is our purpose in life?” based on time and situation.
Weasely feels that self-realization is life’s ultimate purpose. Hmm. There is a thought. Most of our religions tell us that self-realization is our goal in life. Buddhism is entirely based on this (atleast what I understand of it). So is Hinduism. I have to respectfully disagree to this too. I present Maslow’s Hierarchy. This studies the needs on humans. Since we defined purpose of an action as satisfying a need, I think I am logical in using Maslow’s theories. First and foremost, all our actions are targeted at the purpose of providing the basic physiological needs such as food and shelter. Then our purpose in life is to provide security. Then it is to find love or belonging. Then it is to garner esteem. Then it is to have self-awareness. At minimum, we have 5 core puposes. Each one equally important.
Many think there are atleast 2 more. Self-actualization would logically lead to self-realization, which Weasley points out as the core of our existence. However, once we achieve self-realization, wouldn’t we want others to achieve it too? So wouldn’t our purpose be then to help others achieve it or, Transcedence?
Who knows what lies after that? As far as I know no has even achieved purpose 5.
So in summary, there are multiple purposes to our existence. Not just one.
Defense rests.

Graduate Illnesses

There was an article in today’s edition of “The Chronicle of Higher Education” titled “Advanced Symptoms of Advanced Degrees“. Pretty hillarious. A must read.

Make or Break Meeting

I was just about to call it a day and leave my office in a good mood for a change. QoH caught me on the way out, and asked me to join him in his office for a talk. We talked for an hour and half. I am not going to write on what exactly transpired right now, for I am not really sure about it. I was either offered a major break in research or was asked to play second fiddle to another grad student in the lab. I am thinking the second for QoH repeatedly mentioned the one project I failed at. So he was either trying to say, “You are not good enough to handle a project on your own”, or “Inspite of it I trust you enough to challenge you again”. All I am sure at this point is that this meeting just made my career, or just broke it. I wish I knew which way it went.

The Sun is shining, and the birds are chirping

• I slept of whole of 4 hours last night before I had to rush to a teleconference.
• I talked to a senior researcher in the company I am interning in, to get his advice on my project. We got talking and he told me how difficult it was for him too when he started out with his first project. That made me feel good about all the mistakes I had been making. I realized encountering problems and then resolving them is an integral part of research, not a result of my lack of forethoughts.
• To make things better, the power supply I had ordered f0r my server was delivered today. Three days ahead of schedule!!
• MOST importantly, I got the first comment on this blog this evening. Thank you Weasley. You made my day.

What a wonderful day.

OK I Give Up

I have been trying to force me to get atleast some work done for the last 5 hours. I give up. I put up too much fight for my taste. I am going home. Hopefully, tomorrow will be a better day.

Still Depressed

I woke up at 10.00 AM this morning feeling pretty depressed. I figured the rest of the world can wait, and went back to bed. Finally managed to crawl out of the warm embrace of my comforter around 3.00 PM. Made myself a cup of strong coffee and some hot lunch. Cleared emails, watched some TV, and finally hauled my ass to school. I found QoH had dropped off a draft of the book chapter with his comments on it. Fortunately, he had mostly minor comments. Ofcourse, he did strike out an entire subsection as being irrelevant, but it is a major step forward considering during the previous iterations he had rejected the entire text as piece of garbage. That lifted my mood quite a bit. Lets see how the rest of the day goes.

My First Feed Request !!!

I just noticed that someone has requested the feeds from this blog. My first legit unsolicitated reader.
I dont know who you are, but I want to thank you. It kind of feels nice to know that I am not the only one to read this blog.

Creakings of a broken heart

My ex-girlfriend is moving to a different country to pursue to a new career early next week. I got this information from a common friend of ours. My ex was my closest friend for better part of my undergraduation, and for about 2 years after that. She was my one true love, and she loved me even more. We had to split due difference of opinion on what we should do with our lives. It was one painfull long drawn split. We decieded that it would be best for us if we stopped all forms of communications.
I dont know why this news upsets me so much. Its not like there was ever a chance of us getting back together. Its been 2 years since we broke up for god sakes. Yet, it pains. This news brought back a lot of fond memories of the time we spent together. Memories of how we just sat there holding hands for hours. Memories of the never ending phone calls.
Since we both came from conservative backgrounds, we had to meet in secret. We threw elaborate smoke screens and often quitely slipped away to spend quality time with each other. Once, we told our parents we would be at a friends’ place studying and instead went to a fancy restraunt to eat and talk. I still remember the horror on her face when her father walked in with a bunch of his friends.
The most I remember about her was how she made all the problems go away with just reassuring smile on her face and the comforting touch of hers. I still remember the day she proposed to me, and every word she said. God, I was fool to let her go. I miss her so much. Sometimes I think of how different things would have been if he had stayed together. Today, I am a fairly successful graduate student. I command respect of my peers. I know for a fact that I have a pretty bright career ahead. Yet, none of these seem to be worth giving her up. If only I knew what I know now then.
I think I need to go see a therapist about this. I clearly still have unresolved issues. But then going to therapist is for white guys with money to burn, not for immigrant students like me. I like a man just lock my feelings up and throw the keys over a bridge.

“Memories are wonderful things, if you dont have to deal with the past.”

When 24 hours a day just doesnt cut it

Its been a hectic few days for me. I have slept only 3 hours in the last 2 days. I have so much work to catch up on.

• I wrote a considerable chunk for the book chapter. Still a long way to go. I really want to get this thing done.
• On Sunday, QoH asked me to write up a final report for a research project, and have it in by Tuesday 5.00 PM. Its 4.19 AM on Wednesday, and the report is still at best half done.
• I have work to do from my FULL TIME internship. Those guys are not going to go easy on me just because my advisor deceided to make me slog it out.
• I run my own email and http server. It figured today is as good as any to burn up the power supply. Since I didnt have a 600W PS on standby, I had to install a 250W till I get a new one. The temporary one can support only 2 hard disks at maximum. So, I had to prioritize the absolutely essential parts of my websites, and copy them onto two disks. Did I mention reconfiguring all the programs so that the access the new file locations was hell-of-lot of fun?

I am practically a walking zombie right now. I have a meeting to attend in another 6 hours, and I dont have anything prepared for it. Guess I will head home now, sleep for 2 hours, and then start working again.