“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single home in possession of a good snowfall, must be in want of peanut butter and toilet paper.”
- Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (Not)

It’s December. This is New England. And there is a snowstorm expected. This can mean only one thing: The local department and convenience stores will run out of peanut butter and toilet paper.

Why is that, you ask? Well, the answer to that takes us back several thousands of years to a time when humans lived (and made markings) in caves. Recently discovered cave-drawings show us that this tendency to stock up on these two specific items is not surprising, after all, but might indeed be genetically imbibed in each of us.

Behold:

The purport of this decidedly anachronistic fresco is clear: “When you are hunting, if it ever snows, then you go right out and get some peanut butter and toilet paper”. All that was needed was for someone to actually invent the damn things so others could buy them, but now we are just talking technicalities here.

And so it has been for centuries. Irrespective of what activity humans are involved in at any given time, if they should ever hear that there is an impending snowstorm, they just drop everything they are doing and rush out to the nearest store to grab as many jars of PB and as many rolls of TP as they can lay their hands on.

All this makes me wonder, exactly what the heck are people doing in their homes when it’s snowing outside? I don’t know about you, but all I do is lay back in the couch with a cup of tea and write about others rushing around helter-skelter as if this was their last opportunity to get anything at all and as if civilization as we know it is going to come to a screeching halt as soon as the first snow flakes hit the ground.

I have heard of people laying out detailed emergency procedures, locking themselves in the basement with crank-operated radios and not venturing out for two days until the “event” passes. They will periodically call their friends to enquire about how bad it is “out there” and of course the usual response will be something along the lines of “Huh? What do you mean?” because said friend had simply cleared out his driveway and headed out to work as usual.

But the paranoid are not easily convinced and so hunker down they will. Then once they do come out they discover that … nothing at all happened. The world went on as usual and the only real “event” is that they have missed of a couple of days of work cooped up in the basement for no reason at all.

And what do you think they do during all the time they spend in the basement? Why, eat all the peanut butter and …. use up all the toilet paper, of course!

First of all every sink now has a Purel hand-sanitizing solution beside it, which is weird if you come to think about it because the door leading out the restroom has had a Purel wall-dispenser next to it for years. So what was already a complicated process of washing your hands, wiping your hands, opening the door and quickly sanitizing your hands before jumping out to avoid the closing door … just got even more ridiculous.

You see, the new office has touchless sinks, touchless soap-dispensers and to top it off … touchless paper-towel dispensers as well. This means only thing: parents who want to teach their kids the Elmo song usually visit our company restrooms first: You put your left hand in, You put your left hand out, You put your left hand in and You shake it all about (but no – you won’t get any soap even after all the hand-wringing in front of the minuscule sensor). Of course, once you finally decide to give up and start to wash your hands without soap, the dispenser will be happy to squirt some soap all over your shirt-sleeve. At this points, most parents are advised to close their kids’ ears while certain choice words are yelled out in frustration. Then the drying process begins and it’s no different: same Elmo song and even more vigorous movements but no paper. The good news is that all the hand-wringing has dried your hands already and you don’t really need the paper anyway. Infact, I think the company already knows this and has stopped refilling the paper-roll for weeks now.

In swine flu panic mode, however, the process involves using the Purel by the sink as well and we are still trying to figure out if that is before the hand washing, or if it’s after the hand-washing but before the hand-drying, or if it’s after the hand-drying but before using the other Purel by the door. One employee, unable to take this decision-making promptly threw the sink-side Purel into the trash. Problem solved.

But nothing could have ever prepared us for the signs, and oh yes, you better believe there are signs … All over the place. “Cover your mouth when you sneeze”, “Wash your hands after you eat”, “Sneeze into your arm-pits” (yeah I don’t get that last one either)…

One particular sign about hand-washing is so useful it would be remiss if I didn’t share it with the entire world (click to enlarge):

For me, especially, this is invaluable information, because this is how I used to wash my hands earlier (it helps to follow along with the steps above to realize how wrong I had been all these years):

1. I always consider the sink to be very sanitary. I have been known to take a couple of licks of the shiny spout now and then.
2. I usually run my hand all over the sink admiring the wonderful workmanship – sometimes I use both hands and give it a good rub-down just because I feel like it.
3. The third point above confuses me because I have always wet my hands and wrists before I turn the water on – probably because of my bad aim but that’s another story (and I can’t use a paper towel anyway because the company hasn’t filled the dispenser in weeks – have you been paying any attention at all?!)
4. Don’t even get me started on the soap.
5. With the new touchless systems, the only vigorous movements I am used to are frantic efforts to get any soap and water at all.
6. Stream? I thought we use the sink – we have a stream now? Is it touchless too??? And my elbows will feel so left out of the washing process if I don’t squat and point my fingers upwards while I wash my hands as I am used to doing (try it – it is almost like doing yoga while you wash your hands).
7. When I am done I usually look for a used, wet paper towel because I am green like that. Looks like the author of this guide wants me to ruin the environment by using a clean, dry paper towel. What a tree-hating whale-killer!

Not a day goes by that I am not thankful for the wonderful ways in which I am educated – even if it to relearn something I was taught when I was 3.

That’s great, except real life is nowhere close to that narration. Sudip Mazumdar, a Newsweek reporter from New Delhi recounts his own experiences living in and out of the slums of Kolkata:

People keep praising the film’s “realistic” depiction of slum life in India. But it’s no such thing. Slum life is a cage. It robs you of confidence in the face of the rich and the advantaged. It steals your pride, deadens your ambition, limits your imagination and psychologically cripples you whenever you step outside the comfort zone of your own neighborhood. Most people in the slums never achieve a fairy-tale ending. [Newsweek]

As he recalls his own life experiences in this reality-check piece, you can see that he is obviously not comparing real life with what is obviously a feel-good fairy tale made into a movie. No; instead what he wants to tell us is that not only do most people never make it out of the slums (he has seen almost no difference in the last 50 years at Tangra, Kolkata’s Dharavi), they are probably not encouraged to either:

[...] slums exist, in large part, because they’re allowed to exist. Slumdogs aren’t the only ones whose minds need to be opened up. [Newsweek]

Yes, I know it’s all about priorities, but hey, how about a bailout for atleast those slumdogs who actually want to make an honest effort at adding to GDP?

Newsweek: Man Bites ‘Slumdog’

Happy Birthday To Me!

Pretty soon the only posts on this blog will be these anniversary reminders … !

You can bring your own domain or even sign up for a dreamhost subdomain for free. While your bandwidth and storage are limited, it is a great deal for beginners who are just experimenting with these applications.

The following applications are currently supported:

1. Blog: Wordpress (is there any other?!)
2. Content management: Drupal
3. Photos: ZenPhoto
4. Bulletin Board / Forum: phpBB
5. Wiki: MediaWiki

DreamHost Apps also supports Google Apps so you can have email, calendar etc. for your domain.

Give it a shot and let me know how you like it! But hurry: only 8500 more allowed as of now and the invites are going fast!

Nadal and Federer: 2009 Australian Open

What a match!

(Image: Getty Images)

Warren Buffett is diving headlong into U.S. equities with a strong warning to cash-hoarders:

Today people who hold cash equivalents feel comfortable. They shouldn’t. They have opted for a terrible long-term asset, one that pays virtually nothing and is certain to depreciate in value. Indeed, the policies that government will follow in its efforts to alleviate the current crisis will probably prove inflationary and therefore accelerate declines in the real value of cash accounts. [New York Times]

“Buy American”, he says. “I am”.

Well that’s good to hear, but the question is “Do I (and you) dare?”

Today, October 15th, is Blog Action Day: a day when thousands of bloggers around the world come together to write about a particular issue. This year, that issue is Poverty and according to site they “aim to raise awareness, initiate action and to shake the web!” I am happy to play a small role in talking about this critical issue.

And more than 3 billion people – or half the world’s population – live on less than $2.50 a day.

Apathetic Perspective?

My perspective on poverty is obviously shaped by the environment in which I was raised and when you live and grow up in a country like India where unfortunately you stare poverty in the face every single day. The Atlas Of The Real World which contains maps of the world in which countries are shown not based on actual territorial sizes, but on different criteria like number of immigrants or wealth of its citizens, presents this altogether disheartening map of Poverty:

Map Of The World where each territory shows the number of people living on US$2 a day or less.

It leads to a kind of, for want of a better word, apathy. Seeing something everyday only makes you notice it less. It’s not that you don’t care, it’s that you are overwhelmed and that feeling gradually leads to despair, despondency and finally surrender. You roll down your car windows to drop a coin into the ever-waiting begging bowls at traffic signal after signal until you end up realizing: (1) “It’s too big for me alone to handle” and (2)”There is nothing I can do about it”.

(1) might be true. You “alone” probably cannot “solve” this problem in the standard definition of the word. But, (2) is certainly not true. At least, not anymore.

Think. Then Act Locally and Globally

You have always heard to “Think Globally, Act Locally” but with the Internet on your side you can act Globally at a fraction of the cost of what it would have been just a few years back. Just a few things to consider doing today (and always):

Act Locally:

1. Donate: Old clothes, books, toys.
2. Mentor: Education is a pet panacea of mine and my friends often tease on the extent to which I think it is the “one solution to all problems”. While I could rant endlessly on the various ways a sound education to every child until the age of 18 could reshape our entire planet and create a generation of smart, responsible citizens, I’ll check myself since I am talking about acting locally and just advocate mentoring or tutoring as a simple and effective way to make a positive difference in a child’s life.
3. Raise awareness: See poverty in your neighbourhood? Think you have a solution? Your local Representatives and Congressmen should hear about it. From you. Now.

Act Globally:

1. Visit The Hunger Site: You click on a button, the sponsors of the site give to charity. Simple and effective.
2. Play FreeRice: 20 grains of rice are donated everytime you answer questions on a variety of subjects. (I wrote about this site last Novemeber)
3. Setup a microloan on Kiva: Another concept virtually impossible without the Internet. You give a small loan (even as low as $25) to a needy person across the world and watch as it helps that person fulfill his/her dream of an enterprise. The entrepreneurs are pre-screened and commit to working hard to lift themselves out of poverty and pay back your loan which they indeed do (99.7% of the time!).

These are obviously just a few things you can do but for a lot more ways you can make a difference, check out these resources:

1. 88 Ways to Take Action Against Poverty Right Now
2. Make Poverty History
3. Oxfam International

Spread the word today by blogging or emailing your thoughts. Let’s Unite To Make Poverty History!

In answer to his question “Is it rational to vote?”, Norvig writes:

[...]We can estimate the total monetary value by noting that the current office holder presided over a $3 trillion war and at least a $1 trillion economic meltdown. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) estimated the cost of the Bush presidency at $7.7 trillion. Let’s compromise and call it $6 trillion, and assume that the other candidate would have been revenue neutral, so the net difference of the presidential choice is $6 trillion.

The value of not voting is that you save, say, an hour of your time. If you’re an average American wage-earner, that’s about $20. In contrast, the value of voting is the probability that your vote will decide the election (1 in 6 million) times the cost difference ($6 trillion). That means the expected value of your vote is $1,000,000. What else have you ever done in your life with an expected value of a million dollars per hour? Not even Warren Buffett makes that much.

[Is it rational to vote?]

The assumption behind this calculation stems from your being in a swing state, but if you are a citizen of the United States and if you lived through the tragicomedy that was the 2000 Presidential Election, then this might not be such a far-fetched valuation after all.

Let’s get it started!