The balls they keep rolling

Sitting here in my lab on a Friday afternoon 30 minutes before our group meeting, I feel so sleepy (nothing new about that) that I thought the best way to do something productive is to try posting something on my blog. It has been 3 weeks since I left the paradise called `Google Internship' and came back to grad school (or what some others call Hell, although I would beg to differ). Looking back I must say that life at Google was pretty luxurious, free food and no hassle of making food or cleaning dishes or cleaning up after yourselves. But the thing is that even though it has just been 3 weeks, I do not miss it at all and have happily gotten into the grove of my usual motions of waking up and putting a bowl of milk in the microwave and a pan on the stove with my eyes still half closed (mind you it does not mean it is really early, generally it is like 10 in the morning). And I finally wake up halfway through my cereal just in time to make sure I do not burn my eggs. And I must say, I do not miss the ease and availability of food there. But what I do miss are the great friends I made there, people with whom I used to have lunches and dinners and then go out for drinks. And I miss playing soccer every monday and wednesday evening and at times on friday afternoons. I made a lot of friends and acquaintances on the field (I hope I made some friends though).

And at soccer I was amazed to see so many people so talented at it. Such great ball control, great passes, great vision. It was really fun playing with them. And then I met people who never gave up, people with broken ankles who would still keep playing for the love of the game. After duct-tapes and wraps and ankle braces, they would jump on to the field and be awesome as usual. Looking at all these people, I felt so inadequate and useless. But I am just glad that I was allowed to play with them. Reminds me of my time in undergrad when I used to play with some other really talented people.

The thing is that I have played football long enough, but I still suck at it. But that is true for swimming for me too. I have been in a swimming pool since I was 5. You would think I would be some amphibian. But alas, I am a slower swimmer than people who have swam for less than a couple of months. I am sure there are a whole bunch of 5 - 6 years old kids out there who are quicker than me, and the only reason I might be able to beat them (if I can that is), is because of my longer stroke length and height. I guess I can never get better at swimming or football ever. Nor can I ever figure out why.

Sorry for digressing. So yeah, as much as I used to enjoy football at Google, I am back to playing water polo here at Tech. And as usual, it is painful as shit for me. But I do enjoy it, I just don't know it yet. And if only I could swim faster, I could have been more useful for our team. So my point being that even though I miss a few things from the summer, I am really glad to be back to my life here in Atlanta.

Now my meeting has started so I might have to get to the point of this post in another post. Later!