Holidays is a time for annual celebrations and inevitably some travel. I love digging into old favorites and opportunities to explore new cuisines. This season’s tastiest culinary treat award belongs to the excellent Italian fare (especially the black truffle Pizza Mushroom) we partook at Forma in Santa Monica. I do admit that I may be suffering with recency bias and also the year is not done yet (3 days to go), so there could be (hopefully 🤤) a change in the rankings?...

Caveat emptor: This post is a compilation of highly abstract half thoughts… Premise Humans (we) are at the top of the food chain on planet Earth, and are fascinated with ourselves. Our capabilities are orders of magnitude superior to our nearest surviving species: apes. The secret sauce for this system seems to be (and most probably is) the organ between our ears, our brain. With the invention of internet, and maybe even before?...

For all its popularity today, cloud computing wasn’t considered as a viable option by established and large enterprises for a long time. The reason is surprisingly straightforward: how can customers of cloud computing trust that the cloud provider is not tampering or getting unauthorized access to their private and secure data? To this date, there exists no technical limitation that stops a malicious internal actor (can be a cloud provider employee or contractor or an external agent breaching into the provider organization) to get access, copy, and sell customer information....

For 2023, I am setting new year resolutions in a different way. I will build a list of outcomes and have incremental progress indicators, much like how I track outcomes in work projects. Nidhi felt supported and loved in 2023. I was a patient husband, an active listener, and a doting husband. We had healthy debates when we made important decisions, and spent quality time together on many activities. How many times did Nidhi thank me?...

My favorite moment of the year was when we stopped mandating wearing masks. Though the pandemic hasn’t been declared as over there is light at the end of the tunnel! We kicked off 2022 aboard a sunset cruise in Maui. What was supposed to be a romantic seven course meal on sunset cruise turned into a lurching, reeling, and sea sick adventure. Still, it remains hard not to have a fabulous time in Hawaii!...

A trip down memory lane: the year was 1998, and it was my first ever exciting फ़ौरन trip! The destinations were right out of a romantic Bollywood movie: France, Switzerland and Italy. It was an official trip, and I was without Nidhi. Vanya wasn’t even born yet! I had a blast visiting various french towns near the quaint town of Saint Genis Pouilly, my company’s office. Paris’s siren song called to me, and on a weekend, all alone, I decided to visit the romantic city....

Beaches in winter have a charm that is hidden away by crowds that throng them in the Summer. You get to experience the vastness of natures bounty, and feel as if everything is on display exclusively for you. There are forensic remnants of a jostling summer with lots of cramped footprints, lonely beach facilities with scary warnings of riptides, secured lifeguard cabins, nearly empty beach cafes and cheerful shops hunting for patrons....

Vacations are a change from routine, and are a great time for reflection. With current medical progress and innovation, we have access to effective medicines for fatal and debilitating diseases. Our health span is also largely under our control based on our lifestyle. An exception to this control is genetic influence and unfortunate accidents. I realized that on average: \( yearsWithoutParents = ourLifespan - ageOfParentsWhenWeAreBorn \) \( ourLifespan \thickapprox 100 \)...

There is an advantage when you vacation where you’ve already visited: a marked absence of hurry. The goal of our second day in LA: spend a long sunny day hiking along gorgeous Malibu beaches. For brunch, we decided on a plant only Cafe Gratitude. Their cleverly named menu of dishes like “I am Motivated”, puts one in a good mood! I chose I am enthusiastic sandwich, a concoction made with oyster mushroom, tomato, pickles, romaine, buffalo sauce, ranch dressing on a vegan brioche bun....

How to Meditate by Pema Chodron is slightly verbose. The author reminds me of a caring grandma doling out life advice. Why meditate? First, the purpose of meditation is not to feel good and comfortable. With regular meditation all we can hope for is a slow transformation: Develop loyalty and steadfastness to yourself. When we meditate, we can have a hard time. Our minds going over a hundred miles an hour, and constantly feeling distracted....