Tag Archives: car

Feb 07, 2026: Weekly Notes 2026/06

  • I am getting frustrated with a car mechanic for not fixing my Tata Nano’s gearbox. It has been with him for four months now. Unless I call him, he doesn’t provide any updates. I ended up pinging the person who recommended him who is a genuinely a very warm and nice guy!
    • Apparently (he told me), all car mechanics do this. They never proactively update you unless you ask.
    • He reassured me that the mechanic is very good at what he does and that the car should be fixed in a few more weeks.
    • I felt bad about involving him.
  • My impression of the mechanic is that he’s a good guy and understands what he’s doing, but he doesn’t keep me in the loop.
  • I’ve started migrating away from Notion to other open-source or self-hosted tools. For example, WordPress (this site) is now my platform for blogging. My notes are in Joplin now. I still need to find a good tool for to-do, web clippings, and task management—perhaps Zoho?!
  • Yesterday, we went to Aditya’s place to meet a common friend. The “Hound of Madurai” was in town and feeling extremely lovey-dovey about meeting old friends. Why not? It took only 90 minutes to drive 20 km.
    • Kaalu was so tired after the whole “meeting friends” affair that she slept the entire night in one position. Usually, she keeps changing her sleeping spots throughout the night!

20 km in just 90 minutes. Driving in Bengaluru!
  • I have interviews scheduled for a senior role early next week at Fortanix. I had a manager screening yesterday which I think went well. I felt alive talking about security and the SaaS services built around it. I liked that they started with manager screening for a senior role. So that we both could easily decide if we want to invest further time in the interview process. I had to say no to the HP Enterprise interview because they start with a technical interview first and I am not feeling motivated to prepare for it without knowing what their plans are!
  • I bought this saw for pruning branches. It’s a good saw—very sharp. The pole is quite long and the overall build is fine, but it could be much better. In particular, the grip on the loosening/tightening joints isn’t great. The saw also didn’t come with a safety cover.
  • I used it to cut most of the lantana trees growing in an empty plot next to my house and trimmed some branches from the mango and Jamun trees that were blocking light. My neighbor also enjoyed trimming branches that were blocking his security camera’s view. All in all, a good purchase.

October 4, 2025: Weekly Notes 2025/16

  • In next 3 months, I need to run roughly 340 km to finish 1000 km this year. Doable!
  • I finally bought a used car from Spinny | Buy and Sell Used Cars. The experience was good. Test drives were on time and manager was extremely responsive. The car was delivered on time as promised.
    • I got a Nissan Micra which came with Spinny buyback insurance, i.e. they will buy it back for a fixed amount anytime for next 2 years. This car has a CVT automatic transmission, which is pretty smooth. It’s much better than AMT I am used to. The ride quality is nice, though I have no decent experience in other cars.
    • Yesterday, I went to meet a friend in this car. I got a mileage of 7km/l in Bengaluru traffic with AC on. I am hoping to get a >15km/l mileage on the highway and 10km/l in city (I don’t think it is possible in Bengaluru).
  • I found an excellent channel to learn more about working of cars.

    https://youtu.be/zRsAw5h6Thw?si=IIFKZHON7quOfTpm

  • I did not think much about Softwares this week (or last week). Most bandwidth went into buying this car. I am glad it is over.

September 20, 2025: Weekly Notes 2025/14

  • The automatic gear shift of my car Tata Nano XTA is bricked. My local mechanic at Carz Tec made it worse. Today, I managed to send it to the nearby Tata Service Center Adishakti Cars using TVS Roadside Assistant service.
    • The first person TVS Roadside Assistant assigned the ticket didn’t show up at my place. He would never tell me the time. He supposed to come at 5pm. But at 11:30pm he was still 20 km away but claiming to be at the shared location😠. Finally they arranged someone who can read the map.
    • Install a tow hook in your car and/or find out where it is. Also keep a small cable with you.
    • I still don’t have experience with Adishakti Cars. Let’s see how it goes.
  • I found BBC Radio 4 – In Our Time podcast. So far, I am really enjoying it. I listened to a few old podcasts. Work in 20th century was excellent. I like the soft spoken host and his style. He invites a few experts to the studio and discuss a grand theme with them. The town square of European and American public discourse seem to be so vastly different. While intellectuals seems to be more common in Europian public discussions, no one seems to give a shit about what they think in the USA! By no mean, I mean to suggest that it a bad or a good thing.
  • When you onboard a new member to your team, how long does it take for them to become productive? Especially when they are not familiar with tooling. I suspect the negative compounding effect to be very strong. They will spend a lot of time dealing with papercuts from not knowing tools, frameworks and possessing tribal knowledge of the codebase. Also the story of the codebase is not an easy thing to acquire.