Maria Daniel Deepak

Category: Random/Personal

  • Essential Farm Makeover

    A couple of friends who run their farms, always advise me to be judicious with the money spent on the farm. Truth be told, farming is not the best business to invest and expect returns.

    However, there are essential makeovers that needs to be done on the farm. This includes fixing the existing fencing stone pillars that are out of place, the barbed wires that are not lined up, painting the fencing stone pillars and removing the weeds that encroached along the entire fence.

    Though spending money on these makeovers seem unnecessary yet fixing the farm boundary is absolutely crucial to avoid conflicts down the road. So I decided to spend on these farm makeovers.

    We hired local resources to get the job done. The work began soon after we purchased the land.

    I could’ve used goats to de-weed along the fence. This would’ve cut down the money spent. But for the time-being, I cannot accommodate goats in the farm.

  • A Piece Of Nature For Me & My Family

    It’s been more than a decade since I got my first paycheck. I never dreamt of buying a farm. The adulteration in the food industry, the effect on health because of adulteration, the lack of traditional knowledge, being passed down to the upcoming generations and the desire to grow my own food made me re-think my choice of purchasing a farm.

    Since the last two years, I began attending sessions to learn to grow food without the use of chemicals, the downsides of globalization, the significance of local economy and most importantly understanding how to work with Nature (abiding the law of Nature) and not against.

    Rather than contributing to the unsustainable economy, I wanted to lead a sustainable life supporting local economy and inspire my family along the way.

    Today, with the Almighty’s blessings, I purchased a piece of Nature for me and for my family. I intend to grow fruits, vegetables, millets and greens without the use of pesticides or chemicals.

    Though everything seems to be a dream come true yet purchasing a farm comes with its own share of hardships starting from finance to running the farm. With the Almighty to guide, the learning, the willingness to put in the effort and the delicious farm produce free of pesticides as an outcome keeps me going amidst the hardships.

    Privacy stops me from sharing the location and the size of the farm for now. I’ll share more details when I’m ready.

    Today, I’m grateful to parents for supporting my decision and for the motivation.

  • Spayed A Stray — Made A Positive Impact

    Spayed A Stray — Made A Positive Impact

    Today, RAIN (Rescuing Animals In Need), a non-profit organization conducted a sterilization drive (at no cost) for the community animals of Salem.

    Bruno, a female stray, was the one who crossed my mind when I read about the sterilization drive. I took the responsibility of spaying her.

    Mrs. Vidhya was my point of contact in RAIN and she was helpful throughout the spaying process.

    I lured Bruno using a store-bought Yogurt and rented an auto for transportation. The surgery took about 20 – 30 minutes and I transported her back to her usual location after the surgery.

    Before the surgery
    After the surgery

    Though I understand that the process is against Nature, I don’t regret spaying her. I could only think of the painful incidents that she would undergo when left unspayed.

    Listening to my story, the auto driver who transported us volunteered to discount on the auto fare. However, I thanked for his generosity and requested him to charge me the fare in entirety.

    I was happy that my deed inspired a person to join hands in making the world a better place. I know someday, somewhere, he would help someone inspiring another person along the way.

    Today, I’m grateful to the RAIN organization for making the world a better place. I sincerely thank the entire team for helping animals lead a better life.

  • Indian Tumblers Vs. Coffee Cups — The Science Behind Tumblers

    I used to hate Indian tumblers for the look. Indeed, many including me would cherish and prefer the feeling of holding a coffee cup to an Indian tumbler. In the recent times, I came across an interesting science fact about Indian tumblers and that made me love the Indian tumblers even more.

    In short, the theory is that surface tension cannot go against gravity making the liquid fall down and NOT run along the surface as is the case with coffee cups.

  • Thirty Three

    I turned 33 today. This post is essentially a thank you note.

    Thank you so much for thinking of me on my birthday. It means so much to me and I thank the dear Lord for letting us cross paths with each other.

    I intend to share a few things that I benefited out of in the past couple of months. I’m sure you could be benefited as well.

    1. Consider buying a term (life) insurance and a health insurance. Both are mandatory if you’re the sole breadwinner. Insurance premium increases with your age. Lock-in the premium at a lower price by opting-in early.
    2. Consider eating locally grown food that are free of pesticides. The more your food travels to reach your plate, the more the loss of nutrients in your food.
    3. Robin Sharma says, “Be a creator, not a consumer”. This is easier said than done. Been a consumer til now? You can become a creator. Start small and start today. If you’re already a creator, feel free to share a link to your blog, videos, etc. in the comments below. Shameless plug — I run a YouTube channel and a blog for dog parents.
    4. Consider being close to Mother Nature. No one can heal the way like Nature does.
    5. Consider having your own measure of success rather than following the society. Arjun Bahree portrays this concept very well.

    Thank you for taking time to read my thoughts. How can I let you go before flashing a few clicks from my camera!

    Enjoyed feeding the birds
    Evin loves animals
    The look after his walk being denied
    The lazy queen
    A beautiful inter-species relationship
    Trek to an abandoned Tiger cave with my big belly
    Munar — Nature’s bliss
    “No” to no-selfie on wife’s birthday

    Today, I’m grateful to the Almighty for granting another year to my life.

  • What’s The Worst Gonna Happen?

    Most times life wouldn’t go as expected. Some would move on. However, most would feel disturbed and shattered.

    During those times, we seek support from friends and family. You should feel fortunate when you have someone to lean on. Despite friends and family, the unexpected events may bother you in ways you cannot imagine. I’ve been there many times.

    When I feel shattered, when I feel weakness, I ask myself, “what’s the worst gonna happen?” Most times the answer to this question would be “I may lose the money”, or “I may lose the job”, or “I may lose a possession”.

    Once you know the worst thing that might happen, you will find courage to overcome your difficulty.

    Whether you lose or win doesn’t matter. You will eventually grow to greater heights with time.

    I wish your hardship fades away. Let the Almighty help you find the courage within. Remember, you will win and you will never back down.

    Today, I’m grateful to all my mentors who inspired and portrayed a life of contentedness.

  • Unforeseen Bite

    I’ve been reading a lot on Canine psychology and body language since four years. The acquired knowledge helps me bond with any dog. I don’t approach dogs that are not comfortable with my interactions. Dogs communicate all the time using body language.

    Rain or shine, I walk my dogs every day. My eldest dog will turn four this December. We hardly missed a walk during these four years.

    I sometimes pet, talk to a few strays during our walks. I was walking one of my dogs like every other day. A stray came out of no where and bit my leg from behind.

    For a moment, I wanted to hurt that dog in return. But the knowledge I acquired helped me make the right decision. Dog’s don’t escalate to biting unless provoked. The dog appeared to disabled with a broken leg. She would’ve bit me out of pain or could even be because of rabies.

    I shooed the dog away and noticed that I was bleeding. I rushed to the hospital and got my first anti-rabies and TT shots.

    The bite doesn’t affect my love for dogs. However, I would be more cautious with the one that bit me.

    I wish I had a good knowledge on snakes as well. I happened to kill one that visited my house a few months ago.

    Today, I’m grateful to the Internet, a vast library, that made me a better person.

  • Monthly Review: March 2021

    Like most people, I make great plans every new year. However, I lose track of my goals and live an ordinary life every year. I don’t want to let go of another year making meaningless choices. Hence, I wanted to reflect on my progress every month. These monthly reviews keep me accountable.

    Server Administration

    Unfortunately my cloud hosting server crashed this year. This unfortunate event led to a series of events that I’m proud of. You wouldn’t be reading this post otherwise.

    1. Moved to Linode cloud hosting.
    2. Setup backups that are saved on to a different server.
    3. Moved all my domains to Google domains.
    4. I shall soon retire my daniel@danieldeepak.com inbox.

    Pet Project

    I’ve been running Tap That Brain for a couple of years now. This month I decided to steer the course of the project radically. I made my mind to not indulge in in-person training sessions.

    Rather, I wanted to offer online dog training courses. Also, I’ve been wanting to run and manage a members-only forum / platform to discuss anything and everything dog training and dog parenting.

    1. Setup a members-only forum using Vanilla.
    2. Implemented single sign-on for Vanilla using WordPress log-in credentials.
    3. Began writing my first online course.
    4. Had setup newsletter to send out dog training tips for dog parents.

    Blogging

    1. Published 11 posts in my personal blog.
    2. Published 9 posts in Tap That Brain blog.

    Productivity

    Starting March, I’ve been following the deep work philosophy. Using deep work, I was able to get things done faster and better. I’ve been consistently clocking three deep work blocks every work day. Each work block would range between 45 minutes to 90 minutes depending on my energy level that day.

    Family

    Out of the blue, we visited Velankanni. The struggle in finding a stay will make the trip memorable forever.

  • Abundance In Scarcity

    Last Saturday, I took my family to a sports club with the intend to enjoy a swim. On our way back home, we stopped at a street vendor selling baby clothing.

    My wife and I try and support not only street vendors but also street artists when ever we can.

    The street vendor was a woman. We purchased about four items. The old lady encouraged us to try the clothing on, on our baby. We had a little conversation with the woman and we were happy with the purchase. We were preparing to leave.

    The woman looking at our kid pointing fingers at a mask made for kids, offered the mask at no charge. She also offered another clothing that she loved to see our baby put it on.

    We insisted her to take the money but she replied saying that she saw our kid like one of her grandchildren. She also said there’s only so much we can do with money and happiness matters the most beyond money.

    On our way back home, my wife and I realized that the old lady could have made a little more by aceepting the money we offered. But she felt joy and abundance in offering.

    Everyone fights their own battle in life. In the world of constant scarcity, the act of the woman, a street vendor, portrayed abundance.

  • Goodbye Droplet. Hello 👋 Nanode!

    I made the decision to self-host my WordPress blog four years ago. I was reluctant at first. But being a developer, I wanted to expand my server administration skills.

    Digital Ocean was popular in the cloud web hosting territory back then and their documentation and affordability were icing on the cake. I spun up a server with my limited knowledge and things were pretty good.

    Four years later, here I’m sharing my experience with Digital Ocean. In these four years, my servers crashed twice. Because of the way I had set up my files, I lost all my data. I wouldn’t blame Digital Ocean for the loss of data.

    However, I got pretty uncomfortable the second time I lost the data. The urge to move to a different cloud web hosting was stronger than ever. So I started looking for alternatives.

    I remembered using Linode at work a couple of years ago. I never experienced an issue with their reliability. Without second thought, I opted for Linode.

    Making the switch

    I chose to go with Linode’s starter plan — Nanode. Because I know I can expand later. Moving to Linode also meant revisiting my server administration skills. But this time, I had a couple of things in mind —

    1. Setup backs to prevent losing database and files
    2. Tighten up server security

    Setting up a server this time wasn’t as complex as I did four years ago. I matured enough to be able to know a bit more of the server-side stuff. Not only did I set up the server (Nanode) but also attached a block storage to my Nanode for data backups.

    I documented everything that I did while setting up using Obsidian, a cross-platform note taking app. A couple of weeks passed by since I made the switch. The backups make me feel safe allowing me to sleep peacefully.

    Today, I’m grateful for the Almighty for the life I live.