A Day in the Life of Nikhil K

[Nothing is fiction, except the truth. All these events took place across the past week, though not sequentially nor on the same day . But hey, who ever said that the human mind works chronologically?]

Nikhil has a habit of sleeping at ridiculously late hours, which he is trying to break. So, after a mug of hot Nestle Cocoa, he has slept early. Little does he know that today is going to be a long exciting day and an equally long sleepless night. Poor Nikhil! The mug is a enameled one with a picture of a jolly family of snowmen drawn on it. Papa snowman, mama snowman and Little snowman grin furiously at the falling snowflakes. It looks as if they are grinning at Nikhil, giving him a Poltergeisty smile. A reminder that this is Minnesota and the temperature outside the window is 80F below that inside, the Weather.com taskbar confirms that it is indeed -28F with gusty winds of 20 mph. Goodmorning Nikhil! Wake up to another arctic day in Minneapolis.

Nikhil wakes up groggily. He is feeling cold. Maybe, he thinks, the heating system is acting cranky again.Or maybe, it is just that the mercury is off the scale and no heater in the world can cope with that. Maybe. No big deal, he makes a mental note to send a email to the landlord asking him to send a man over to check the heating system. Now to brighter things, he keeps two eggs to boil on the stove and dissapears into the restroom. The restroom window is jammed as usual, with thick icicles in the gap between it and the wire grill. Damn, someone has not replaced the roll of toiletpaper. And why on earth do Americans love their toilets without a single drainhole?

Now to brighter things. He nods his Dell Inspiron out of hibernation. Time for the daily news. The Star Tribune says today is the coldest morning of the year. Frost bite in ten minutes. Sports Illustrated has a excellent photo story on Indianapolis Colts and Peyton Manning storming the Superbowl. Nikhil thinks back to last night, when he had seen his first superbowl on TV, a quintessential American experience.It took place in balmy Miami. He ponders for a minute a whirlwind weekend trip to Miami, then laughs to himself and opens the Times of India website. Nothing important from India except that The Sakal reports that India has won this year's world cup held in Panvel. The Kho Kho world cup. Big surprise that one.

Time for class. Its 9 am. He has fried eggs for breakfast, packs his bag, and prepares a ham, salad and cheese sandwich with a liberal dollop of mayo and mustard and packs it in a ZipLock(TM) bag. Dress in layers, thats what everyone says.A T shirt, a sweat shirt and a down jacket stuffed with feathers. A thermal pant, and a pair of jeans, gloves, a skull cap. And snow shoes. Class begins. But, every desk has a desktop on it. So, most people are busy checking their morning mails. After class, he picks up a copy of the campus newspaper and the Onion and searches for a comfortable lounge chair in the Commons. The EE commons is a huge indoors area sprinkled with cozy seating. After some time, Nikhil dozes off. An hour later, he wakes up, yawning, he gets a coffee and sits down to look over the Computer Vision homework. Homework is the most irritating aspect of grad life. It is always there, he reflects, nagging you at the back of your mind. You submit one, and there is a fresh one waiting on the class website. No wonder this place is called school. But this one is really interesting, he sobers up fast. Hmm, reconstruct a 3D model of Einstein's face from shading patterns using MATLAB. Wow, that seems fun, he almost rubs his hands in anticipation of this one.

1 15 PM. Nikhil looks at his watch and panics. Piano class in 10 minutes. No time to catch the bus, he realizes and speed walks across the mile long bridge on the Mississippi. A bevy of punters are practising in the river, boat races take place in spring, but they have to keep their body in shape through the winter. But no time no stand and stare. Fergusson Hall and the School of Music. An hour of serene piano follows, guided by Ms Tatiana, a Ukranian emigre, who is also a PhD in Piano. After Piano, he weighs whether to stay in school and loiter or go back home and do the laundry. The laundry wins. Washing clothes here is just a matter of tossing the whole bunch into a machine, waiting for an hour, transferring the bundle to another machine, the drier and then hey presto, the clothes jump out all warm and almost ironed. Nikhil daydreams about describing this process in intricate detail to XYZ Bai back home in India. In the meantime, he tests the limits of the new Altec Lansing speaker system, putting it through a heavenly rendition of the Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. He looks outside the window, still cold but no fresh snow. He wishes there would be some, then at least he can go sledding on the Witches' Hat Tower hillock a few blocks away. He turns on the TV and catches a rerun of Seinfeld on FOX.

Its evening. 5 PM and sunset. He hasn't forgotten his homework. He cannot, it IS due tomorrow at 8 15 AM. But, Nikhil just doesn't feel like starting it right now and even though he knows that this procrastination is gonna come back to haunt him soon, he decides to do some timepass. Phone calls to a group of friends, free, after all they all have Cingular phones and intra network calls are free, he manages to convince three of them into a game of badminton. He packs his shorts and takes the bus to the Sports Complex. 4 indoors badminton courts, heated of course. After two hours, exhausted but freshly showered, Nikhil is ready for homework. He goes to the Walter Science library and starts off. An hour and a half later, he gets a phone call, “Come to Starbucks”, say a few friends just back from a Honeywell recruitment session. Seeing that the situation vis a vis Estimation and Detection is well in control, Nikhil whizzes off to Starbucks, no second invitation needed.
Caffe Mocha or Latte?
Size Tall or Grande?
No wait, Gimme the Coffee of the Day!
After an hour's bull session, its dinner time. Off to the Big Ten just across the street. After a tuna sub, a plate of Chicken wings and the Houston Rockets thrashing the Minnesota Timberwolves, it is time to go back home. Phone calls, instant messaging and gossiping with roomies. It is 11 PM. Now its celebration time. HW is a hard taskmaster. Four hours. Its done. Hurrah! Now Nikhil writes this recap of a day well spent. So thats the news from Lake Wobegon, where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average. And, everyine is blonde :)