Much of what happened during last seven days, barring research related stuff, is worth forgetting - why you ask? Starting with sports for a change, we (Team Fiziks) dropped our last regular season game against ITS. It’s not the loss itself that hurts me (and everyone else on the team) but the manner in which we lost - it was one of those rare days where both offense and defense failed, making us look like first-timers on the field. Our pathetic performance does not mean that I am taking anything away from ITS - they batted well, played smart, and deserved to win. Run differential made sure that we got #3 seed - something that we haven’t experienced since the Summer of 2003.

As if that weren’t sufficient, we dropped a game in the Church League too - against the same team that had beaten us in the regular season. Though we had no clue as to how we lost our previous two encounters, reasons for this loss were pretty clear - we scored well but they did too. They just were a better team in pretty much every aspect of the game and deserved to win. As is well-known, injuries resulting in a loss hurt much more; in a win, even the worst pain feels like pleasure. Couple of blows I took have left me still in pain and so are few others from our team.

Hopefully, we will get ready and recoupe well enough to have better results and end the season on a positive note, in both leagues…

About things to remember, quite a few people have been asking me - Are you excited about the upcoming trip to India? How will the weather be, compared to that in Houghton?? Would you get enough time to spend with family and friends??? I would be cheating myself if I said I wasn’t excited. But excitement isn’t any more than I would have before any other trip I have taken before. After being Yooperized (remember, I did the Polar Bear Dive in January?) through one severe & 3 not-so-severe winters, weather in India might feel a lot warmer but shouldn’t take too long to get used to. As far as the last question is concerned, I am planning to spend most of my time with friends, in travelling and photography, quite a bit of time with my teachers (from elementary to MS) and probably some time with relatives (not sure about the last one though). Packing (myself, my backpack with laptop, camera, few lenses, iPod, one set of clothes) and planning from my side is pretty much complete - here’s the tentative plan - just hoping that I can stick to it…