Mind of Mark Madhavan

"I am just going to pretend that I don't know anything about work and energy, OK?" The janitor said when we met again today. Not really a difficult job, I thought to myself. "So, we know that energy is the ability to work. And work is..." Both of us did not remember Wikipedia's definition of work. I was about to fire up the browser, but he stopped me. "Let us just go with common sense definition of work, okay?" The janitor said. "What is work according to you?" "If you lift or move something then I would say you have done work," I said. "Great, I like it," The janitor said. "Let us go with that definition." Then he took my notebook, tore a paper and balled it and kept on the table. If a classmate of mine had done it we would be rolling on the ground fighting. But he was twice my size and his dress was little dirty. So I let it slide. "If something can move this ball, then it has energy according to your ...

Today my class teacher asked me to show him a sample of my writing before we left for the farm. Just to make sure that I was up to it.  "Write why plants are important," he said. "Write about oxygen and photosynthesis, but go deeper," he said and winked. In academic circles, 'Going deeper' is a code-word for 'Going to Internet' "Sure! I will go deeper," I said and nodded.  But I never planned to go to Internet. Internet has just information. But I was after knowledge, no! wisdom. I needed to go to the library and talk to the janitor.

"What do you want to hear first - bad news or... worse news?" Our class teacher asked us today. He sounded cheerful, even happy, like the way the teachers sound on Friday evenings when they know they don't have to see us for two whole days.

I am Madhavan. You can call me Mark Madhavan Menon, because, well, that is my name.