Back after almost a decade...

Hello dear reader...

It has been almost a decade since I wrote something in this space. As the cliche goes, life is now different (much so) since I wrote last (Jul 3, 2011 apparently - :O)

It has been a wild ride - and I am sure we are all much better for it - if you even remember the existence of this blog. :P

The last time I wrote here... 

India had just won the ICC World Cup. 

I was still struggling through my Masters' degree (I was just in my 2nd semester at that point, so pl. bear with me). 

I was still unemployed - it is funny, now that I think about it - the coincidence of my stopping to write with my starting to be gainfully employed (either part-time or full-time). It is almost as if my job(s) replaced my writing... Geez!

America was still presided over by Mr. Obama, so, for better or for worse, it was different.

I still had a non-smart phone (a bright red flip LG at that) and used to be edgy saying "I am not a big fan of touch-screens) *facepalm* - of course this quickly changed when I was able to buy my first Android (Samsung Galaxy Nexus - untainted by Samsung's bloatware yet)...

And in the meantime, the past 10 years have brought great things into my life, and I am sure all in all of yours too...

COVID-19 has to take the cake for the most influential thing in the past decade - hopefully, the vaccines will tame this beast soon!

He-who-must-not-be-named (or more aptly, Umbridge) being the president for one full term and seeing the horrid news cycles spewing out the craziness.

A stable career and work that I enjoy doing (of course there are ups and downs, but, for the most part it is great fun)

The experiences that are unique to being a first-generation immigrant in the US - especially practically starting from the scratch in a brand new place - One thing I plan to write more about

Getting married - best thing that I chose to do

Getting into photography - just enjoying a hobby the most I can - another thing I would like to write more about

Reading (and more importantly, re-reading) a lot - this is one other thing I plan to write about - sort of book reviews, I guess, especially about things I have learned and understood better from it.

So, here's the lowdown - I just read something excellent about a gentleman's journey through his life from Hyderabad to the USA (spanning some 30 years so far) and this has sparked me to get back onto this pursuit of mine - link in comments.

Not going to make lofty promises of posts everyday, but may be once every few weeks about the things that have shaped me (esp. in the past decade) when I have been mute on this platform..

So, yeah - thanks for coming back to Musings with Munaf! Hope you read along and contribute when/where you can!

 

Confessions of a Blog-a-holic a.k.a. Biopsy of a blog

Another day, another post. Sometimes I wonder why I do this. I could be doing a lot of better (for me) things like preparing for my semester exams or may be for CAT or doing my application processing work (seriously, it's getting no where, please pray for me...). Anyway, it feels a lot guilty doing this (yes, I have a conscience too :P...). I'd like to share my feelings about maintaining a blog, something I've never expressed to most people, I guess.

For knowing why I blog, you might want to refer to my previous post (again, I show the insensitivity of a *whatever* and assume that you have no better job to do... :P). So, if you are planning to start a blog yourself, you'd better read this post first...

So, the first consequence of having a blog (I'd rather list this, makes me feel better...)

• Knowledge: You expect people to know the fact that you have a blog. (This totally got to me at the beginning, but then, one gets used to being ignored...) You stop mentioning your blog to anyone after about a couple of weeks and then forget it yourself too. This is when a blogger needs to be very patient and keep on writing. You know what they say : "Every blog has its day!" (If you didn't get the joke, remember that, "Every dog has its day :P").
• Condescension: Look it up if you don't know what it means. (The purpose of the sentence is to demonstrate the point...). Anyway, it is important to get through this stage, as it may lead to alienation of people and then you start getting depressed and one thing leads to another; it's a vicious circle see, and might lead to bad things.
• Requests: You start asking your friends to read your blog, but then, most of them are either busy or too self-centered and narcissistic to be able to do this and you even give up on them.
• Acceptance: This is when you lose all hope and decide that you are just another good for nothing blogger who cannot do a damn to the world around you. But then, if you are strong at heart, you keep on blogging in some silly hope that someday, someone will go through your blog and praise your effort.
• Doubt: There comes a stage when you wish you had a dollar for every post that never left the scribble pad, you'd be a 100-aire (forming new words shows creativity on your blog :P). And then you realize: what is important is not the number of posts but the the quality of those that matters.
• Guilt: You get addicted to your blog. This is the stage this blog is currently in. You start seeing this as a big waste of time and is interfering with your other works. I am not able to be so articulate when it comes to writing about this thing itself.

Well, I cannot surmise as to the next steps but will try to keep you updated about the changes. :) Anyway, all the best to anyone who's planning on starting a blog!!

Good Night!! :D

Why do I blog??

I've been thinking about it. It might interest you that, that's the only thing I do these days - think about pretty much useless things :). This train of thought began right at the moment I created this blog. I'm pretty sure this is gonna stop now at this little station where it started :P (pardon me for my poor attempt at humor). I ended up having a few strong reasons for blogging... Behold! Here come the reasons :)

• I, being pretty much an introvert, need a place to vent my feelings, thoughts and anger(rarely, I hope..). So, a blog perfectly serves the purpose and keeps me light :).
• I've seen this one on the blog of one my friend's - a delightful person, I might add - the culprit seems to be "peer pressure", and I thought, how true! Indeed, our un-ending thirst to stay ahead of our colleagues, friends, family.. yada, yada... does indeed drive me to do this in spite of all my other interests...(Let's face it guys, I'm very much human. I love to stay ahead of others., be it in having fun or making my "presence" felt on the web. I often gloat about the fact that I have a blog, while most of my friennds don't :)). So, essentially, I don't come from "Planet Loser" see..
• Ahh, here comes the silly one... I need an excuse to listen to music on my comp. I've been using the comp for such a long time that, I become pretty hyper-active while using it. I simply can't listen to music - I mean do only that. This might as well become the case after a few days of blogging though :).
• Then, there's always the classic one - To stay connected to the world through the Internet and share my thoughts (with anyone who cares to go through the blog I might add...).
• A blog, I feel, also helps me improve my creativity and ingenuity :).
• And, I had this certain "whim" to go and blog (Don't mind, but, this was after I read a couple of blogs of my friends').
• I also felt like improving my "writing skills", which are pretty important for some of the tests I intend to take. May be even my vocab, dude...looks good, eh??

So, there goes... I've had enough for today I guess. Enough reasons too, keeping in mind the fact that, I usually do things on instinct :).

Stay Good (Whatever that means? :)).

I've Started Blogging... :) :)... What's it take, huh??

Hi everyone,

This is the first time I've tried to make a blog...And well, I've even lost my patience already, I have thoughts, yes sir, but then, putting them into words is indeed something different...

Actually, the name of the blog does reflect what I feel about this blog, I've asked myself this question everytime I've read someone else's blog, indeed What's it take??

• to create an new blog?
• to maintain it properly?
• to...I've not even framed my questions properly as you can see...

Let's face it, ok... It first takes a lot of patience (which I'm quite short of)

I'm just planning to share my views about things I face and feel... And I have decided, come what may, I'll definitely maintain this blog for long... Just keep reminding me about it... :)