Saketh's story

This is at the beginning of his 6th grade.
( first he wrote the same in to 5 rough pages then moved in to word.)


Gochaun was hunting in the forest, he was chasing some Ulies. Ulies are buffalo like creatures with the

ability to camouflage into the background. Gochaun had chased them all morning, and was

going to make his camp when he saw something glint behind a tree. He decided to go check it

out. When he got to the tree he was pretty sure the thing was an egg, but it looked nothing like

any egg he had ever seen. The egg was half a foot in diameter and was a perfect sphere. It was

pure white with thin blue stripes running down. He decided he would probably be able to sell it,

and if that didn’t work he would cook it himself. He went back to his house, his house was on

the outskirts of a small town called Fjod. He was getting ready to go to the store when he heard

something crack. He checked his bag and saw a small crack as small as a thread. The egg

suddenly started shaking and a web of cracks appeared on the egg. The tiny head of a lizard, no

a dragon poked out of a hole in the egg, then the whole body came out of the egg, there were

tiny spikes on the dragon’s back and it had translucent wings. He touched the head of the

dragon and a searing pain ran up his arm. He also heard a voice in his mind “I am Fuun” he

replied telepathically “so it is Fuun?”, but Fuun was already what seemed to be asleep. In the

midst of his shock Gochaun did not notice Tajun approach. “You have one of the last dragons”

said Tajun, Gochaun turned to face Tajun, “what do you know about dragons” asked Gochaun

“very little or very less, dragons do extraordinary things” replied Tajun. Gochaun remembered

the pain in his arm and looked at his arm, he saw a strange tattoo of a limbless dragon running

down his whole arm. “That is the mark of a dracolite” explained Tajun then Tajun lifted his

sleeve and Gochaun saw a similar tattoo but had fire “why is your tattoo different than mine?”

asked Gochaun “my dragon  is fire and your dragon is ice” replied Tajun. During the

conversation neither Gochaun nor Tajun noticed Fuun was freezing Gochaun’s hair. Gochaun

turned to check on Fuun and saw what Fuun was doing, immediately Gochaun turned his bag

upside down and Fuun glided out and landed at Gochaun’s feet “he is hungry” said Tajun and he

handed Gochaun a chicken. Gochaun held a little bit out in his hand and Fuun gobbled it up

hungrily. “More” said Fuun telepathically, soon Gochaun had fed Fuun the whole chicken then

then Fuun was satisfied. Gochaun and Tajun talked some more and Gochaun agreed to have

Tajun as his mentor. Dokun the lord of all evil heard the whole conversation and planned to

kidnap Fuun and use him to take over the world. The next day Gochaun had his first lesson with

Tajun and Fuun had his first lesson with Libai (Tajun’s dragon). The next week Dokun striked,

while Fuun was in the woods exploring Dokun sent his demons from the nether realm to restrain

Fuun’s power and take him to the dragon’s cage the only place that can restrain a dragon. Fuun

knew it was no use to fight back when he had no power. Fuun mentally told Gochaun what

happened and out of his rage Gochaun teleported to Dokun, and started to fight. Gochaun and

Dokun fought for 7 days and 7 nights. When finally Dokun teleported Gochaun to the Madaar

desert and Gochaun realized that he needed to control his rage. Gochaun tried to teleport to

Fuun but he could not lock onto Fuun. He realized he needed to break into the castle by force

and he needed the help of the dwarves who lived on the other side of the desert so he set off.

LOL.. My first saleforce search results error

New generation error page 

A relocation journey from MN to TX

I don’t want to discuss why I made decision to move to TX from MN. (But money was a not factor.)

However I was told that there is no state tax in TX, you will save a lot after relocation etc. 

So in this post, i will starts with finance discussions. ( I have to start with something.)

In MN I used to own a small home (1750 Sq. foot & I used to pay ~2K property taxes.1% of home value)

After moving to TX, I brought a home 3300 Sq. foot & now I am paying 10.5K as taxes on 440K home. (Around 2.5% of home value)

In TX, I am not paying any state tax on my full time pay check. 

On similar salary, I used to pay 6K MN state tax.  

In summary, property tax in TX alone equates property tax in MN + state tax.

For one year, I rented an apartment before buying home here in Austin, TX

Again if are compare renting at MN vs, TX. 

In a good neighborhood, rent is minimum $300 to $400, more on similar size apartment compared to MN. 

On average for 12 months, this is equals MN state tax.

Bottom-line, don’t assume you are going to save a lot by moving to TX if you want to send kids to good schools. (In both approaches i.e. via rent or home.)

Coming to public services, for example, applying to kids’ passport etc., I used to spend 10 minutes at MN post offices. It was very quick. Here in Austin, TX, it is more than 3 hours process. 

Same case with Vehicle registration. For some reason, smaller teams serves larger public. 

Particular if both parents works, it is kind of ½ day forced vacation situation for this kind of simple situation. 

On side note, on average gas is 30 cents cheaper compared to MN. (It all depends on how many miles you drive your car. I don’t drive a lot for work...)

Another amazing about Austin TX is, school kids play lots of competitive games right from primary school. For example, my kids started playing chess and now they compete at many schools. We drive a lot to Dallas, Houston or San Antonio. Not only Chess, there is lots of competition for Tennis, Swimming etc. If you want to expose kids how competitive the worlds is this is very good place.

few Java Util methods used in batch programs

During processing of csv files or mainframe dumps and feeding to oracle/mysql via spring batch etc.


public static  convertStringSetToString(Set inputStrSet, char delimiter) {
    StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
    if (inputStrSet != null) {
      Iterator iters = inputStrSet.iterator();

      while (iters.hasNext()) {
        String stringValue = iters.next();
        sb.append(stringValue);
        sb.append(delimiter);
      }
    }
    return sb.toString();
  }

  public  String convertStringListToString(List inputStrList, char delimiter) {
    StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
    if (inputStrList != null) {
      Iterator iters = inputStrList.iterator();

      while (iters.hasNext()) {
        String stringValue = iters.next();
        sb.append(stringValue);
        sb.append(delimiter);
      }
    }
    return sb.toString();
  }


    public  String arrayToString(T[] array) {
      if (array != null) {
        StringBuilder builder = new StringBuilder();
        for (int i = 0; i < array.length; i++) {
          Object object = (Object) array[i];
          builder.append(String.valueOf(object));
          if (i < array.length - 1) {
            builder.append(", ");
          }
        }
        return builder.toString();
      } ///if null return ""?
  }

LONE STAR OPEN SCHOLASTIC 2015

Following are few pictures from weekend "LONE STAR OPEN SCHOLASTIC 2015" 

Both kids did good.We are kind of stressed out ( Austin to Houston & returned by mid night)
 but final out come is OK.

Casis Elementary Scholastic Chess Tournament

Location:

Casis Elementary

2710 Exposition Blvd

Austin, Texas 78703

It is very long day but Saketh did very good with all his games.

Not only individual first prize trophy, he contributed maximum points to his school trophy 

His rank was increased more than 300 point with this tournament. 

This is the scary part…

Dhanvi did not perform well. (However he has tough lineup)

Few pictures.

Indian Creek Elementary Chess

Following are few pictures from this tournament.

Both did well. In particular Dhanvi won first prize.

(However both can be better based on their performances and past ranks.)