Last night, my friend and I decided to go to Pizza Hut. Unfortunately we were greeted at the door by a board saying - "Sorry. Computer Not Working. No Credit Cards Will Be Accepted." For a fleeting moment, I thought about offering to fix their computer in return for Pizza, but we decided to take the more mundane option of retrieving some cash from an ATM.
It turns out ATMs are not as populous a species as I believed they were, at least not in Iowa City. You will find them at the Malls and near the banks, but not always near major stores like Walmart and K-mart and we happened to encounter a lack of these today. My friend was ravenously hungry, so we decided to explore a better alternative than going elsewhere in search of food or an ATM.
One of the great latent advantages of possessing a debit card is the power it bestows upon you to go to any major store, buy some trinket and take away a huge amount of cash, a system they call "cashback" - something I had never bothered to give serious consideration before. However, 2 years of cashiers politely enquiring "Any cashback, sir ?" with much redundancy had made me aware of its existence. So enter we did K-Mart, in order to acquire the 20 bucks or so that would allow us to have our weekly Pizza.
I am no avid shopper. I hate going out there and spending hours browsing through the stuff on offer before purchasing. I'd much rather go there with a detailed specification of what I want, get it and get out of there. Having said that, I never thought I would walk into a shopping situation like this and be unable to buy or want to buy *anything*.
T-shirts are always welcome, but I have just got a whole new army of those; tennis racquets don't do harm but K-Mart is hardly the place to buy them and there are no books !! I have no idea where the chocolates are and with every second we are getting more and more ravenous for the impending Pizza. Finally I decide, that a 12-pack of Pepsi in the fridge can never hurt, we pick it up and get in the line for checkout. Some woman who evidently has a lot of cash (unlike us) is taking her own merry time at the counter and on more than one occasion I have a good mind to smash the 12-pack on her head.
As we make progress in the line however I begin to wonder about the benefits of having a 12-pack in the fridge when I am going to leave the town in 4 days time. I mean that is still 8 bucks !! What do we do ?? Finally I spy some things nice and cheap and that could never be wasted - a boll-pen !! - that all-time classic, chocolate - oh hell, why don't they put them everywhere ? and some gum. Well any one of these would have sufficed but it just doesn't feel too good to demand a 20$cash back on something priced at 30 cents, so all three went in for 2$. The lady at the counter was told that I didnt really want the 12-pack and I was fairly impressed by the impassivity and lack of surprise shown - these people are real pros - and we finally departed with a lot of relief and hilarity.
Monday, May 16, 2005
Master Of One Trade
Graduated with a Master's Degree in Computer Science Saturday.
Phew ! The Convocation Ceremony is some experience - albeit an exhausting one.
There are so many PhD graduates - and for each there is usually a "Prof. XYZ" who "assists with the hooding." And if that is not elaborate and time-consuming enough, the person on stage repeats the above sentence every single time. I'm sure he must have woken up several times in the middle of the night muttering something about Professors and hoods much to his wife's distress. My - apply a little bit of "common" arithmetic here - by common I mean the method of taking out the common factor - we all know that the person who "will assist with the hooding" is a "Professor" and that he will indeed "assist with the hooding" - take that out of the brackets for goodness sake. Just say the names of the Professor and the student !! And to put the icing on the cake, we need to sit through this for 2 hours wearing not only the graduation gown, a piece of cloth which is undoubtedly an honor and a privilege but also one that generates extreme body heat when adorned, but also a blazer and a tie, on chairs that are placed infinitesimally apart.
But all in all, it is an occasion to remember - with family and friends watching - it feels nice. I dont know whether I will ever be experiencing that feeling again.
Phew ! The Convocation Ceremony is some experience - albeit an exhausting one.
There are so many PhD graduates - and for each there is usually a "Prof. XYZ" who "assists with the hooding." And if that is not elaborate and time-consuming enough, the person on stage repeats the above sentence every single time. I'm sure he must have woken up several times in the middle of the night muttering something about Professors and hoods much to his wife's distress. My - apply a little bit of "common" arithmetic here - by common I mean the method of taking out the common factor - we all know that the person who "will assist with the hooding" is a "Professor" and that he will indeed "assist with the hooding" - take that out of the brackets for goodness sake. Just say the names of the Professor and the student !! And to put the icing on the cake, we need to sit through this for 2 hours wearing not only the graduation gown, a piece of cloth which is undoubtedly an honor and a privilege but also one that generates extreme body heat when adorned, but also a blazer and a tie, on chairs that are placed infinitesimally apart.
But all in all, it is an occasion to remember - with family and friends watching - it feels nice. I dont know whether I will ever be experiencing that feeling again.
Tuesday, May 10, 2005
Lot On The Plate
Apologies for the lack of any interesting or rather *any* posts in recent times. Fact of the matter is there is lot on the plate at the moment. And even excluding what has gone in the past few days, there are still the following upcoming items on the agenda:
May 10 - Parents arriving for graduation; pick them up from airport
May 11 - Exam at the diabolic time of 7.30 in the morning, project report due later
May 12 - Take Home Exam of one of the toughest courses offered due, attend a function in celebration of graduation
May 13 - Grading papers
May 14 - Graduation, throw a party (and help organize it)
May 15 - Travel to and sight-see Chicago
May 16 - Return to Iowa City
May 17, 18, 19 - Prepare for upcoming job interview
May 20 - Fly to Houston to Mama's place
May 21, 22 - Continue Studying for upcoming interview
May 23, 24 - Trip to Las Vegas and Grand Canyon
May 26 - The Interview
And it is not as if it ends there, but I guess you get the picture. So ...
May 10 - Parents arriving for graduation; pick them up from airport
May 11 - Exam at the diabolic time of 7.30 in the morning, project report due later
May 12 - Take Home Exam of one of the toughest courses offered due, attend a function in celebration of graduation
May 13 - Grading papers
May 14 - Graduation, throw a party (and help organize it)
May 15 - Travel to and sight-see Chicago
May 16 - Return to Iowa City
May 17, 18, 19 - Prepare for upcoming job interview
May 20 - Fly to Houston to Mama's place
May 21, 22 - Continue Studying for upcoming interview
May 23, 24 - Trip to Las Vegas and Grand Canyon
May 26 - The Interview
And it is not as if it ends there, but I guess you get the picture. So ...
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