half past nomad

I recently had to hike across campus to attend something. I am not being vague on purpose; I said attend “something” because I didn’t know at the time (nor do I still really know) what the event was about. Actually the conversation which led to even going to this event went like this:

Lab mate: Hey! There’s like a reception or something at Wean Hall, want to go?
Me: Argh…
Lab mate: Uh What?
Me: Sorry I was thinking about being a pirate …

(awkward pause)

Lab mate: Hey, so there’s like a reception or something at Wean Hall, want to go?
Me: Well I have 3 weeks of work to catch up on. I think I’ll just stay here and work.
Lab mate: I think they’re serving dinner-
Me: -Ready!

In my defense I had to yell “Ready” because I was actually outside running and shouting my reply to my labmate over my shoulder. In retrospect repeatedly shouting “I said, ‘I am Ready’!” while running across campus wasn’t probably the best of ideas…

Regardless, as you can see, the place and occasion of such events is unimportant as long as there is dinner involved. For all I know, it could have been the annual Women in Science and Engineering dinner.

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If you hold very very still, then you can slowly freeze your thoughts. The addition of large and immediate quantities of frozen slush will advance this process approximately 73 million times.

My elder brother is one of the greatest role models I have in my life. He has taught me much. When he went off to college, I was left helpless in many many ways; he taught me independence and still does. When I was 19, I remember sitting to his right and he turned to me and said “Listen, I love you. But I cannot always be there for you”. He wasn’t abandoning me, he was teaching me. He taught me about Islam, about respect, about forgiveness. He taught me to be gentle with strength, he taught me to protect those weaker then me and to never abuse my position.

It is strange what you end up remembering. See, bro used to have this old wooden study desk, with built-in shelves and a small tubelight for personal study purposes when the entire room would be dark. It was beautiful. On this desk of his, he would have this sticker that said, very simply

Accidents happen in a wink
So take time to think

It was my mantra for many years. At college, I used that as my email signature but like many things in life, you end up taking such wisdom, such hiqmat for granted. You are immortal.

You have to be very careful about what you do today. Be not afraid of death but of your sins. You cannot change your death, but you can change your sins. Actions today can have consequences for a long time to come. Youth acts rashly, brashly and brutally at times.

Be careful then. Man tears, God repairs.

We once wrote more then enough, we wrote large ridiculous amounts that later akds would always go back and try to change. We wrote so much and so much that we were afraid of what we did. We stared at the screens in marvelous fascination when the comments would come in. One, then another, then the next and they would flow in.

It made us afraid, deadly afraid. Didn’t sisters have kosher kooties? Did they not have germs? And things called el-dar-brat-hers?

You know what folks, there’s no science as to why we don’t post. No one can figure out why akds deletes his post so fast that even Google misses them completely. Why does he only shop between the hours of 3AM and 3:23AM? Why won’t he ever let anyone see him buying salsa? Is he ashamed of his Mexican heritage, courtesty of Taco Bell? We don’t know, he doesn’t know and he refuses to google for it.

I slowed down writing because as I grew older, frankly speaking, I realized that though a thousand words could say so much, there was much more unsaid and unspoken and if you stopped to listen to them, you may eventually understand the mysteries of life. Perhaps, I don’t know and if i don’t know, it’s better not to say anything. Allah knows best.

How do you write the truth? How do you capture something properly? After all, are we not supposed to remind each other of Faith, of Patience, of The Right Path and peform righteous deeds?

It’s the same question that I’ve asked before and you haven’t had answers then and I am not expecting answers now. So you know what we do? We change the topic. We talk about the weather, we talk about the latest Pixar movie (Cars! The Incredibles!) and we remind ourselves of the intricate beauties of the new BMW 5 series that have you so floored that your new wife was subjugated to them in your very first week of marriage. Hey, did I tell you folks about my new camera? And the 1GB 150x speed SD card I bought for it? Oh and then there’s…

Enlightenment comes when God sends it. If you’re willing to get up at 4AM to get in line at the US Consulate for a student visa, then be quiet and wait. This is more important.

I realized today that the *only* French phrase I know is “Parlez-vous français?,” which means “Do you speak French?”

Let me begin by saying that the only purpose of this phrase is to begin a conversation in French. Now don’t get me wrong, that’s just fantastic…

My problem, however, is that I don’t know any French. No, I never took French in school. This is seriously the only conversation I can have:

Me: Excuse me, parlez-vous français?
French person: (Yes)
Me: …

I actually stopped in my tracks when I realized this today. I can’t believe how useless knowing this phrase is. It’s just like when super heroes have useless powers.. Like the ability to sneeze on command or the ability to turn invisible when it’s completely dark. My skill is the subtle knowledge of knowing how to ask a French person in their native tongue, if they speak French..

You have no idea how sad this all makes me..

Previously, I posted my concern that the new design might be too dark. However, after looking at it from several different monitors and browsers (and the two comments) -it seems okay. Apparently, it was.

I also discovered recently that CSS hates me. The CSS file (the file which defines colours and layout) for this website is from a template. I am fairly certain that if CSS were a logical markup language I would understand it at some level. I don’t understand it.

Working with CSS is like the scientific process for determining gene function:

For example, when scientists try to figure out the particular function of a gene in an organism, they often try to either knock it out (delete it) or mutate it. Likewise, when working with CSS, I often have to either mutate some line of code and observe if the result is something expected or in more extreme cases I remove it to see just *what* exactly the purpose of said attribute was.

Alhamdulilah I am a father. My wonderful wife and I are parents.
May Allah swt bless you with a character that He loves, my son. That is a father’s dua for you.