1. Do at least 10 tactics puzzles on chesstempo.com every day. When you get a problem wrong, go through it SLOWLY and figure out what you missed.
2. Stop playing all forms of blitz
3. Study GM games
4. Establish an opening repertoire, understand the themes and main plans
5. Study your own games carefully, and if possible with stronger players
6. Study all “fundamental” end games.

All wonderful suggestions. I am going to work on them now. Here’s my current situation/progress against each point:

1. This is something I need to start.
2. I need to stop blitz immediately.
3. Past month or two, been watching a lot of GM games. Helped a lot.
4. Due to the T49 at Team League, I’ve studied a few more openings now. Need to work more.
5. Thanks to spendius and sirpicha on FICS, I’ve studied my games on a regular basis.
6. Thanks to tjradd again, I’ll now get started with his endgame primer.

Do you have any other tips?

I feel sad at times to look back on things to realize what all we could do before and cannot now.

1. We could bunk classes, we can’t bunk office.
2. We could hang out with friends, we can’t any longer.
3. We could chat with friends on the phone almost daily, now once a week feels frequent.
4. We could get the bikes and hit the road, pick buddies from their homes and go on trips. Now we need to plan months in advance.
5. We could say/do dumb things all day, now we better get our act together (we are professionals).
6. We could blow up all pocket money on food/drinks in one shot, now we better save to ensure sustenance till end of month.
7. We could go on college fests, take part in contests. But now, we just have meetings to attend in office.
8. We could go to movies (even if 1 hour later than the start) any time, any day we wanted to. Now we have to wait for the weekends, and might still not have company of enough good friends.

Life has become more serious than ever before. 2.5 years into the professional life, I feel things are going to get further downhill from now. The fun days are behind us. Period.

At the beginning of the year, I had the company of various people. Some were assholes, some were really good friends and some were colleagues to draw inspiration from. I end this year with absolutely nothing to do with them anymore. By the grace of God, circumstances have forced some leachers out of my life, and I couldn’t have done any better at that wilfully! Hence, the positives far outweigh the negatives, trust me. So, expecting 2012 to be a step forward in life. Welcome 2012, I’ll value each day carefully towards a happy fulfilling life ahead.

Manas fell ill, had to resort to medical care back in Allahabad.. Why so? Despite running continuous high fever for a few days, a Hyderabad hospital prescribed him “crocin” to run the fever down! And, not just Manas.. I fell ill, got admitted into CMH for a couple of days. And these are just a few highlights of the tip of an iceberg.

Anyway, will try to keep writing again, soon.

Ikiri mikiri cham chikiri,
Chamé kaata mojumdar,
Dé élo damodar,
Damodarér handi kudi,
Taité boshé chaal kudi,
Chaal kudithé holo béla,
Bhaat khabiaai jamaai shaala,
Bhaaté podlo maachi,
Kodal diyé chanchi,
Kodal holo bonta,
Kankshiyalér maata!

How to:
The kids sit in a circle and place their hands in the centre with fingers spread out. The song is sung with great gusto and one kid touches every finger in turn, progressing in a clockwise direction. The finger that gets touched when the last word of the song is sung is tucked under the hand it belongs to and the game goes on, with the song being sung anew. A kid who “loses” all his fingers is out of the game. The last kid standing (sitting, rather) wins!

Yesterday, had fruitful “business” discussions with Mitali, Pavanesh and Vivek. It seems the plans seem fit and ready to be proceeded with. Yes, “business” stuff!

After a year of disappearance from normal life, I have changed and been rendered unfit to be described in one or two words — words like “techie”, “nerd”, “geek”, etc. Pretty much the opposite. I’ve started taking travel more seriously, writing micro/macro blog posts more often, reading “non-tech” stuff with more passion, and of course, utilizing my intellect more on the lines of entrepreneurship.

Recent trips to Mysore, Mekedatu and Kalyani was part of a series of one big eye-opener: travel is fun. Playing around with a GPS is even more interesting! Looking forward to taking up more trips, more GPS traces, more fun and less (but productive) work. Hoping to bring this blog and my fellow bloggers back to life (Anshul, Akriti, Mitali, Anshima ma’m: are you reading?)

[Note: I never got to complete this blog post. I am leaving this one be as a "contd...", but if you know me, you'd understand that I never complete "contd..." tasks ]