August 18, 2002

Welcome to Blogger

OK. So, as you guys all know, sometimes I get mad at society, life, WHATEVER you want to call it. And when I'm mad, I tend to get rather politically incorrect. However, given recent experiences, where many people instant messaged me to tell me that I should do more posts like my now infamous poetry profile, I thought, well, I can't really get any more politically incorrect than the quotes page on my website, so might as well just openly harass, criticize, ridicule, and belittle people on my so-called weblog.

January 13, 2003

Snowboarding Adventures

I have triumphantly returned from my mountain adventure, having fallen on my ass more times than need mentioning. My ass & hands are incredibly sore, as is probably the rest of my body, if I could feel it. However, my trip to Lake Tahoe all in all went very well. There were no serious problems or mishaps, I returned in one piece, and it was very relaxing being away from everything for a couple of days. Thus, fun was had both on and off the mountain slopes.

March 24, 2003

Ain't No Place Like Home, Right?

Coming home has become a somewhat bittersweet event these days. While I do enjoy the time off, sleeping in my queen size bed (versus the twin in my apartment from which my feet hang out), watching episodes from the first season of The X-Files, and generally doing nothing but eating and chilling, I'm also growing somewhat bored already, and it's only been 2 days. I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that many of my friends are not home at the same time as me, so thus I haven't really been hanging out that much. Also, I feel kind of guilty, because when I'm bored and have absolutely nothing to do, I haven't been doing homework like I should be because I have a ton of crap right after break. But it's still early. I'll probably get around to doing my homework soon enough, considering the rate that my boredom is increasing.

October 31, 2003

Trendy Since 2001

Tonight, Halloween Night 2003, marks the second anniversary of rohitsrealm.com. Two years ago, I uploaded the first version, a version so different that most people would not even recognize it. All it had was a brief biography, picture gallery made from HTML, and a quotes section. In honor of this momentous occasion, I decided to make some major changes to the site, in my ever persistent desire to remain in congruity with current online trends.

October 02, 2005

Icing on the Cake

I was just thinking today how anyone who doesn't know me in real life, and only through my online persona of rohitsrealm.com blogger, might actually believe I really am as cynical, bitter, depressed, and elitist as I come off through my writing. Okay, so maybe it's true, but those who know me outside of the Internet will have to agree that while my blog does seem to weigh heavily towards the aforementioned topics, I am not incapable of other emotions. To at least partially address this issue, and perhaps even rectify some misguided perceptions people may hold, I will now present a uncharacteristically positive entry.

March 29, 2006

Condescending to the (Techno-Illiterate) Masses

Hi, my name is Rohit, and I am a closet elitist. There—I said it. Man, it feels so great to finally let that out. I know it might be hard for some of you to believe, especially since I spend so much of my time trying to conceal that fact, but it is true. And I am not just one of your garden variety I'm probably smarter than you elitists, either; oh no, I am something even worse. I am a techno-elitist.

July 20, 2006

Le Roi est mort. Vive le Roi!

Popularity. The quality of being well-liked or admired. A nearly universal human impulse, if you ask me. I mean, even hipsters, scenesters, Goths, and all kinds of other counterculture assholes rely on popularity to define their internal social structures. The only difference between them and the yuppie assholes is their delusional belief that they are in fact different from the rest of society. But that's a different discussion altogether.

September 03, 2006

Coming Full Circle (or 270° At Least)

Some of you may have noticed that over this weekend, heretofore private albums in my photo gallery suddenly became public—sort of. This was not a mistake, nor did my site get hacked. After all the fanfare only nine months ago, why did I suddenly reverse my position regarding privacy of photographs?

February 06, 2007

Rohit's Realm, Redux

More than two years after writing a road map to clean up my web presence and more than a year after claiming to accomplish these goals, I have finally come through on my promise. Rohit's Realm is dead! Long live Rohit's Realm!

March 06, 2007

A Tale of Two Feeds

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Though Dickens may have been writing about the French Revolution when he opened his much-exalted A Tale of Two Cities, his proverbial words could just as easily apply to a very different revolution: the RSS revolution, and its still nascent descendant, Atom.

March 09, 2007

One Thousand Words

As the old aphorism goes, a picture is worth a thousand words, and that is particularly true when talking about rohitsrealm.com. Unfortunately, due to my recent battle with existential angst and a bout of all-around somnolence, no photos have made it to my web site in almost four months to complement my mostly irrelevant writings. Today, I remedied that, so those of you tired of reading my mindless verbosity can revel instead in good, old-fashioned drinking and debauchery that is almost synonymous with the Realm..

April 29, 2007

You Are Probably Not a Person

For those foolishly misguided few out there who may have attempted to leave a comment on rohitsrealm.com since the fateful upgrade to v2, the following cryptic error message might look familiar: Sorry, you are probably not a person. In fact, it is not just an attempt on my part to be elitist, or even ironic, as Audrey suggested today, but actually a failed attempt at devising a Turing test to keep out asshole spammers selling V1/\gr4 and other pharmaceutical alternatives to leading a sexually fulfilling life. (Perhaps they target this site because they know its readers cannot be leading such lives by the virtue of the fact that they are regular visitors here? Never mind.)

July 03, 2007

OpenID, Gallery, and the Big Three

Besides the withering battles with existential angst and the woeful failures with women, the biggest problems in my life in recent years have revolved around my photo gallery. Specifically, I have struggled with achieving a proper balance between the diametrically opposed goals of providing access to friends and family, and simultaneously, limiting access to the general public. (My political career may well be ruined, but that does not mean I should actively try to ruin that of others.) A quick historical survey of the archive should demonstrate just how much of a problem this has been.

July 24, 2007

Even Though I Sell Rocks

As the venerable Realm has gained increasing fame and notoriety amongst friends, family, and the odd disaffected, suicide-prone, emo high school student, I have frequently been asked questions in real life about the specifics of my web site. The most common series of questions is as follows:

1. What the heck/hell/fuck is wrong with you?
2. What do you use to host your site? and
3. Why don't you put advertising on your site?

As the first question is difficult to answer (and indeed, may have no singular answer at all), I will oblige loyal readers by answering the latter two.

August 27, 2007

The First Five Year Plan

August 18, 2007 marked the five year anniversary of this blog, formerly known as Rohit's Rants and Other Enlightening Thoughts (2002–2004). In a fine display of characteristic arrogance (and megalomania), I decided that instead of doing a simple tribute to commemorate this historic occasion, I would take it one (or several) steps further: I published a book, or more specifically, an anthology. Entitled The First Five Year Plan: The Best of Rohit's Realm, 2002–2007, this self-published book is a critical selection of the top ten articles in the past five years, along with my thoughts/comments about each selection often many years after the fact. The Preface and the Afterword are both original, written specifically for this publication. It is available on my personal site in both PDF and PS formats.

November 25, 2007

FeedBurner and Related Minutiae

It is astonishing how much I can accomplish with respect to this website when I have much to do in my so-called real life. And with first quarter finals less than two weeks away, the trend continues unabated. [...]

December 18, 2007

Year in Review, 2007

As yet another (meaningless, necessarily futile) year comes to a close—and as we once again stand in long lines so that we may purchase overpriced presents for overrated friends—I thought I might spread some requisite seasonal joy (or misery, as the case may be) through release of my third annual holiday card. Friends and family (at least those for whom I have a valid e-mail address) should have already received a message from me. For those who did not, the following is a non-inclusive list of reasons why you might not have received an e-mail, in no particular order:

February 13, 2008

A Programmer's Achilles' Heel

With all this recent talk about politics and social welfare, complacent readers may have been lulled into believing that the sun had (finally) set on mind-numbingly arcane entries laden with techno-babble that only my equally geeky homies from my days at Cal could enjoy (or understand)—and which pervaded this blog in its earlier years. Yet, nothing could be further from the truth: I am, first and foremost, a colossal computer nerd. And consistent with this blog's theme of highlighting its author's soul-crushing failures (both with women, and in life in general), today I will discuss my greatest failing as a programmer, or in other words, my proverbial Achilles' heel.

December 22, 2008

Year in Review, 2008

Another year has come and gone, and no doubt neither you nor I have anything to show for it. Such is always the case in this necessarily futile enterprise we sometimes call life. And with the economy in the tank, the blind materialism that usually serves us so well cannot even be of much solace. At a time like this, holiday cheer is hardly called for, and that is precisely why I have issued another holiday card—my fourth.

Those for whom I have a valid e-mail address should have already received a link. Those who did not may find a non-exclusive list of possibly reasons why not here. In any case, see the card here. I hope the new year for you is one of less failure and misery than the one that has past. Happy holidays!

June 28, 2009

Did Law School Kill the Realm?

It is hard to know what has suffered more in the (school) year just past, my personal life or this blog. Needless to say, however, both have suffered dramatically. And while my personal life was never much to write home about—and therefore its faltering nothing to lament—the same cannot be said of the (formerly) illustrious Realm. Once a glimmering bastion of douchebaggery and misanthropy, all that remains today is a fetid cesspool of occasional despair and compulsory self-loathing. It is, in short, a shadow of its former self.

What villainous scoundrel vanquished this most worthless of Internet havens that so poignantly failed to display the utter pointlessness of human existence? Certainly law school would be a worthy contender for this dishonor. Between soul-crushing journal work and lunatic decisions to take four to five substantive courses per quarter, the past year rarely left me with time to pontificate on the meaninglessness of existence. There just was not enough time to appreciate my own material worthlessness. But, I submit to you dear readers, a most dreadful proposition—one that is far worse than the aforementioned. It is with a heavy heart that I must admit that, at least in part, I have failed to write this past year not only for a mere lack of time but also for a loss of inspiration.

Read more.

August 17, 2009

Seven Years and Counting

Despite my dereliction in updating this past year, I hope the recent flurry of activity convinces you, dear readers, that I have indeed resurrected this site from the ashes of unmet expectations. Two posts in as many days, however, is unusual, even by what used to be normal standards; I have two reasons for breaking these prevailing norms.

First, in addition to returning to the web, I have also posted pictures from my time in the UK this summer (working in London). Albums from Edinburgh and Bath are now online.

Second, today marks the seventh anniversary of this blog (though not the Realm, which is almost a year older). My first post appeared on this site on August 18, 2002. Please do not judge me too harshly.

In any case, I am off to Japan tomorrow (or later today, I suppose) for a little more than a week. Expect at least a couple updates from there, as I will be carrying a computer and will need to be online (for asinine reasons, as it were) rather regularly.

December 22, 2009

Year in Review, 2009

And just like that, dear readers, another decade comes to a close. What have you accomplished in the ten years that have passed since the prospect of computer-induced annihilation reined supreme? What have I? The answer to the latter question is as simple as it is dismal: nothing. I imagine the answer to the former question is similarly dour, but I shall dwell on that not.

In the spirit of the Y2K catastrophe that never elapsed, however, I have again issued a holiday card—my fifth to date—to commemorate the singular misfortune of my continued existence that the world yet again had to bear in the year just passed.

Those for whom I have a valid e-mail address should have received a link earlier tonight. For all the rest, the card is available here. May you experience no more failure or futility in the year that follows than the year that has passed. Happy holidays.

November 22, 2010

Slowly, But Surely

A couple months back, I penned an incredibly dense, technical, and abusive post about my travails with writing a compiler, which, I hope, most of you promptly ignored. The obscurity of that subject matter notwithstanding, however, there was a takeaway there for even the most hapless of the loathsome unwashed among my (nonexistent) readership, namely: I have finally returned to coding. And it's about time, too: things around here have totally been falling apart since I went merrily off to law school some three years back.

December 24, 2010

Year in Review, 2010

Well, dear readers, another year has come and gone, and I hope each and everyone of you is taking some much deserved time off to reflect upon the utter futility of modern existence. Once again bucking the almost overwhelming existential angst by which I am routinely consumed, I have issued another annual holiday card reviewing the happenings (and inevitably, soul crushing failures) of the year just past.

Those for whom I have a valid e-mail address should have already received a link; for all the rest, the card is available here. Enjoy the holidays, and try not to let the darkness consume you in the New Year; I will try to do the same.

November 28, 2011

Recent Mod Perl Woes

I would imagine that most of you (insofar as there are any of you) who read this most miserable of blogs do so with some kind of feed reader. And as you should: the code running this decrepit site has not been updated in almost five years—an eternity in the Internet era. One problem with running such an old site is that when things break, they break badly. That was precisely what happened this past weekend when what should have been a routine security upgrade of my webserver (Apache) instead took out my whole web presence.

And while I'd like to say I have fixed things, alas it isn't so. I have merely hacked them so that they are again functional; a fix, unfortunately, is still missing. For anyone experiencing issues recently with Apache and mod_perl, I have outlined the issue below. (That past sentence, by the way, should be taken as a sign for most—or all—of you to skip what comes next.)

December 31, 2011

Year in Review, 2011

Well, dear readers, it would appear that both you and I have managed successfully to keep the existential demons at bay for yet another dismal year, undeterred in our never ending pursuit of nothingness. Whether that is an accomplishment or a most miserable development, I leave for you to decide.

Rather than spread holiday cheer this year in an uncharacteristic display of misguided merriment (as I have been want to do in the past), however, I thought I might take a moment to comment on the state of this most dismal site as it charges on (futilely) into its tenth year of existence. Yes, you read that correctly: it's been ten years. Hard to imagine, really.

And while the state of its author has not much changed in that time—I remain as unmoored in a turbulent sea of loneliness, despair, and the like as ever—this site has taken a definite tumble, both in intellectual caliber and technical adequacy. I can't much help the former; tacit failure is largely what this site represents, after all. But I can and do intend to remedy the latter, probably sometime in the first or second quarter of 2012. (It's important to have goals.) So stay tuned for a better platform by which I will deliver my usual enlightenment.

Oh, and Happy New Year. Be sure to enjoy the festivities tonight. If the Mayans were right, it'll be this planet's last.

August 18, 2012

Some Reflections on the Tenth Anniversary of the Realm

Even typing that title is a little disorienting: has it really been that long? Have I really been tending this miserable little spot on the web full of irrational rage and misguided existential angst and random computer shit and really crazy ideas for ten years? Am I really so old that a decade can pass me by with nary a notice? Hardly seems possible.

August 21, 2016

An Update (of Sorts)

Well, hello there, dear readers. It's been a long while, has it not? Nearly three years to be precise and, really, quite a bit longer than that (tepid book reviews hardly count). And while I primarily decided to return to this site after so many years to test that the bug fixes I implemented over the weekend were working, I thought I might as well also put out an update (of sorts) while I'm at it.

September 04, 2018

The Photo Gallery Comes Home to Nest

As should be readily apparent from the lack of activity on this most wretched of sites—the last post was nearly a year ago and about some weird computer shit—very little these days can wake me from the somnolence that set in over me and this site years ago. But asleep shouldn’t necessarily be interpreted as moribund. While this pathetic excuse for a site hasn’t seen a comprehensive update in more than a decade, I have not abandoned all my web properties just yet.

For instance, following the untimely demise of the Gallery Project, I did develop and release a web application for displaying my photos on the web, built on top of the command line software that I had developed in 2006 to facilitate my photo management that has served me well over the years. Over Labor Day weekend, I managed to finalize and release a much needed update to that system. The balance of this post summarizes the changes made, and also briefly (and, very likely, futilely) discusses what is up next.