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Abby lost her grandmother this week. This is her eulogy to her. She was Aunty Matty to other people, mummy to her children and countless other fond names to who knew her. But she was my Nana. I have memories of her cradling me, and taking care of me as a baby. Vacations at Nana’s were the highlight of my childhood years. She was a tireless, hard working woman who raised her large family to the best of her abilities. And not just her family, but also (to me it seemed) the whole neighbourhood. She was loved and appreciated, just by about everyone whose life she touched. ...

Busy with exams this month, so leaving you with this Austin Kleon post with tonnes of quotes on reading. Here’s a few of my favourite ones … “You can’t be a good writer without being a devoted reader.” —J.K. Rowling “Read, read, read everything — trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read!” —William Faulkner ...

A young friend of mine had this to say a while back, when I suggested he use gender neutral pronouns in his writing. the gender thing. I thought a lot about it and came to the conclusion that it is okay to be biased in your writing. Me being a male, it is only natural for me to use ‘he’ more often than ‘she’. But the idea of flipping the roles1 seems interesting :) I’d keep that in mind. ...

These weekly posts will slow down until the end af April. Hard at work, studying for exams. Link for this week is the Safal Niveshak Wall of Ideas. Vishal’s little scribbles have been as influential in shaping my ideas and views of the world around (and within) me, as Shane’s Mental Models page. Each doodle is deceptively simple to read, yet will profoundly affect your life, should you choose to apply its teaching. ...

Then be willing to look like an idiot. (Claude) Shannon had courage. Who else but a man with almost infinite courage would ever think of averaging over all random codes and expect the average code would be good? He knew what he was doing was important and pursued it intensely. Courage, or confidence, is a property to develop in yourself. Look at your successes, and pay less attention to failures than you are usually advised to do in the expression, “Learn from your mistakes”. While playing chess Shannon would often advance his queen boldly into the fray and say, “I ain’t scaird of nothing”. I learned to repeat it to myself when stuck, and at times it has enabled me to go on to a success. I deliberately copied a part of the style of a great scientist. The courage to continue is essential since great research often has long periods with no success and many discouragements. ...

Tim Cook’s entire commencement address to the MIT class of 2017 is lovely (with enough fluff), but this is the part that struck a nerve: Technology is capable of doing great things. But it doesn’t want to do great things. It doesn’t want anything. That part takes all of us. It takes our values and our commitment to our families and our neighbors and our communities. Our love of beauty and belief that all of our faiths are interconnected. Our decency. Our kindness. ...