Johny Learns To Blog » personal

Brief bio about me

Johny Cage — Wed, 19 May 2010 06:16:45 +0000

In filling some form I was asked to write a brief bio about me… I really liked what I’d written there. So I am sharing it here. I never wrote seriously about me anyways so here it goes….

Pranav juggles many roles at a time. He is engineer by profession and has setup a bootstrap startup engineering firm with his friends. While staying at village, believing in decentralisation philosophy, he looks after his retiring father’s fabrication workshop and agricultural farm.
He’s webmaster by hobby and blogs about GMAT and general stuff occasionally. His interest lies in social enterprises, government schemes/initiatives for social change, ^going green^, magazines and internet (& yes! web 2.0). In past time he designs/makes useful articles by re-using useless trash. follow him on twitter @johnycage

Man! am I getting self-obsessed? or have already become one?

Twitter added colour in my life

Johny Cage — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 09:40:41 +0000

I’ve been living my life like a zombie; twitter came and added colour in my life. Believe me, not that I mentioned about my life earlier, Twitter changed all my schedule and working activities.

Yes, I am talking about my pet- dog, the puppy is merely 4-5 months old. Can you believe that after watching this video? We are teaching him few commands, apparently not in English, unlike most of the dogs out there who only understand English, our Twitter listens to Marathi instructions. Oh yeah!

Well, I”m also talking about twitter.com the website. (in fact that’s the reason I named my puppy twitter) I’m so greatful to the founders of twitter who build such a nice application & all twitter coders who used its API to make it more popular.
Twitter helps you discover so many interesting people from around the world. And best part is it gives you the opportunity to successfully interact with them. Seriously no other communication medium, website or tool had such accessibility. Imagine emailing/IM big corporate guy or any celebrity & expecting reply!! Now you got my point, right?
So if you still are not on twitter, what are you waiting for? Join now! & Follow me there! I promise I may not answer your phone calls but I’ll reply you on twitter. // //

For starters, here’s an introduction to the twitter from horse’s mouth, the founder of twitter & blogspot Evan Williams

starting social tourism

Johny Cage — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:04:57 +0000

Tomorrow I’m going on trip to attend Agricultural Expo by Kisan.in at Pune with my father. By its advertising and marketing efforts I’m sure that it’s going to be India’s largest agri-show. It’s a 5-day expo with lots of programs and agro-products promotion. We’ll be visiting the venue on 17th, the 2nd last day of the exhibition.
The reason I’m writing this post and mentioning my travel details is we’re doing something interesting here. No, no, we dont have any stalls there… And I’ve no big interest in such exhibitions anyways. But we’re going to visit few more places nearby.

We are planning to visit आधुनिक उर्जा ग्राम Adhunik Urja Gram (The Mordern Energy Park) by Mr. Chandrakant Pathak. It’s located on Bombay-Bangalore Highway NH-4 between Lonavala & Pune. I’m looking forward visiting the place and meeting him in person. I’ll be travelling and meeting such people who’re involved in rural development, social services, alternative technology, environmental issues much in coming year. Yeah! didnt I tell you in my last post, coming year is going to be exciting! You may call it “social tourism” in Marathi I call it Samajik Paryatan सामाजिक पर्यटन!

I think I’d have more to write once I personally visit it, mean time dont forget to check my biking routes and other details… I have made special post for that using Google Map

biking 300

Johny Cage — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:01:00 +0000

I’m going to drive more than 300 km tomorrow on motorbike. Well! it’s not that I am doing it for the first time. I’m sure my last scooter journey was longer than tomorrow’s. But this time it’s gonna be different. Firstuff: I’m blogging about it; I’m on motorbike CD-100 & not on my scooter; I’m not alone, yes I’m going with my Dad.
Following map has our journey details and remarks.

View My trip to Pune, Kisan exhibition. in a larger map

what’s going on in my mind?

Johny Cage — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 18:38:11 +0000

Current status? long time no see! yeah! I’ve made lots of ‘status update’ kind of posts after hibernating for months. But I guess it’s better than not posting at all, right?
So What’s going on in my mind? What’s up?
Well nothing much, I am kind of celebrating vacation/break. I was out for my cousin’s wedding & was at his place before the wedding for ~10 days after wedding there was a family get-together for 3 days at my native place. Therefore I was offline (without internet) for more than two weeks, although I was checking my mails on my mobile .

I have some business in New Delhi in coming weeks & I am planning to go for skiing at Himachal Pradesh & I’m (kind of) researching about it… so if you’re familiar with HP or been there-done skiing, ping me or feel free to comment below. While more thinking of it, I though why not take a 7-14 day full-fledge skiing course! I dont know whether I can afford that option or not (time wise & money wise… will see) but I’d at least do skiing this time for sure. I’ve been cancelling delaying it forever & now I dont think I’d let it go.

One more update, I’ve left BeatTheGMAT gang, yeah it’s sad thinking that I wont be there on btg with Eric & team but life goes on & we got to move on, right? (I guess I’ll have to edit my “about blog” am not associated with any GMAT study/ preparation forum any more.) I’m currently working on an exciting startup & it’s gonna be real (yeah, you guessed it right it’s not some dotcom!) So stay tuned you’ll soon hear more about it. 2010 is going to be exciting.

Rural rant

Johny Cage — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:22:13 +0000

I’m adding new flavour to my blog. A new category dedicated to my rural rants, life at countryside and philosophy.
I’m born and brought up in rural area of a third world country. And I still live in the same village that my great great grand father migrated and settled to.

People or living beings migrate for good. Most of the times they migrate because they see better prospects and better life than the one they’re currently living in. They say that those who migrate, progress in life. I want to question that belief. I want to try, and I want to prove that you can excel in life even living in rural area. Yes, I know many have proved that & I dont have to prove anything new, but I want to make it even solid. Your location is irrelevant to achieve excellence. & by the way did you read “the world is flat” by Friedman? Anyways I think I’m going off the topic here.

So the point (and purpose) of this post is expect me talking about rural life some times.

see you.

Updates, I’m alive

Johny Cage — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 05:23:34 +0000

I haven’t updated you guys since long, I know. But I want to let you k now that I’m online, active & alive. Just that blogging is too time consuming in this jet-age. so I more often do micro-blogging rather than updating this blog. As you can notice on this site itself you can follow my tweets and connect me via facebook.

That doesn’t mean that end of this blog or website, but I’d add posts here when I have something significant to say. In fact I’m in the process of adding many static pages to blog. Notice resources, & GMAT books recommendation pages? they are in html, I’ll add them in this blog and also, many other resourceful webpages in pipeline.

On personal front: We’ve got new puppy (male dog). He’s cute & looks just like fantya, the dog we had 10-15 years back. I named him twitter. For naming actually I used the social media. Asked this question on Gtalk status, orkut etc & got tons of responses….(Ah now I feels like Chris Pirillo ). My cousin suggested that name & I really liked it. So I’m not acting like a zombie anymore. yep check profile page to know my current hobby/habits/interests

On Amrute’s website front: I’ve just renewed my domain to year 2012. So we dont have to bother much about those issues now. Also I just had shoutout at Amrute orkut community to invite amrute to this website. So I expect some signups as well.

On beat the GMAT front: yes, Eric & David are fine tuning the website & new revamped website will be open by this weekend, 15 Nov. For time being you can check getting started at Beat the GMAT page.

~Enjoy~

Amrutes Amrite? interested in free website & email

Johny Cage — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 20:21:19 +0000

Hello my dear Amrite fellas,

I’ve finally created a form through which you can send the sign up requests.

Click on the Home button from the nav-bar to see the details or directly go to the Submit the form page

Or you can wait for my new post in Marathi, perhaps my first post in Marathi on this blog. (I’ve already created couple of pages in Marathi for Amrute.Me but in this blog I’ve never scribed in Marathi.)

Global warming will eat my home first

Johny Cage — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 05:07:04 +0000

It’s been raining since last three days at my village. (drafted article on 23 July) and I wanted to take video but couldn’t successfully make a good clip, (I told you, I’m not good at this)
So posting my past clipping from Youtube.

Also check the photos I could shoot after rain stopped, I live near sea shore & Arabian sea is eating our compound fence… Check the photos I could shoot after rain stopped (better see slideshow in full-screen F11).

The photos taken from my Skydrive folder below.

beating GMAT & beyond to JLTB

Johny Cage — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 18:06:07 +0000

If you’re a regular visitor or even visited this blog in past at least once/twice, you’d notice that I have changed my blog’s name from Beating GMAT & beyond.

As you might know this blog is inspiration from Beat The GMAT blog & I liked its title too, infact it was the title of that blog that attracted me on the first look! Sigh!! it’s 2005 I am talking about! & when I thought of making a GMAT related blog I want something similar name yet I wanted to address beyond GMAT topics as well. Hence the name

Now you can guess where we’re heading… yeah since I moved this blog from blogger to wordpress (& my personal domain/website.) I’ve made it clear that this blog is not gonna be ‘only GMAT specific’ but I’d add some other stuffs along with my personal updates.

“Johny Learns to Blog” was my signature (yeah MLTR is my fav. you have problem? ) in one of the online forums later I must have changed it as I dont remember now where I’d used that line.

Now I’m in dilemma as should I use my real name? instead of Johny? It’ll be then “Pranav Learns To Blog” hows that sound?

leave a comment & tell me. Is JLTB is OK or should it be PLTB?