At various junctions in life, you feel like you've stopped and you want to turn back and look at where you are.

How far you've come. And where you will be in the next couple of years. When you are lonely you have all the moments with yourself to think about Yourself. Yes, however involuntary as it is, i feel lonely these days and not sure how to go about it. Should i just let it pass ? should i have a perspective about it and start working towards a certain objective in life using this idle and solitary time ? Have to figure it out. 

One thing i know for certain - i could use a companion right now.

Thanksgiving this year was the best (of the two) i've had so far. Didn't go out and stand in the overnight queue braving the unforgiving winter cold on the eve of thanksgivng for door busters in the stores here. Instead checked  the deals available online and ordered most of the stuff from there, including the laptop that i'm typing this post on. We(me and my friend) went sleepless for 36 hours straight. Sitting on your couch and ordering something online that you get for a deal is way better than fighting the crowd. It was a wonderful experience nevertheless.

Its getting colder by the day here as winter is inching towards its peak. It even snowed here one morning on my way to work, a couple days ago. That wasn't a familiar sight. Not in dallas.

Really sad, we are going to have a new state, Telangana. Are we in some kind of competition here with the US for the number of states ? Cant figure where this one's headed.

Like Sean Connery was born to play James Bond on screen, it appears to me that Matt Damon was born to do Jason bourne. Seriously. His best ever. 

I dont know why my paragraphs above look like they are short enough to be tweeted. Maybe the effect of Twitter on me i guess.

Ta

My motivation...

You know what keeps me going when i'm a bit down sometimes ? these videos. They are really motivational. Watch them (completely), you'll agree. :)














Ta

New york

After a long wait and some meticulous planning, the trip to New york city materialized. We(I, my colleague, his wife and kid) had three days with us and i think we made the most of it in New york, last month. Times square was wonderful - full of colours, bright lighting (in the night) and exuberant. We simply travelled by all means of transport in Manhattan for our places to visit - by foot, subway train, bus and even a rickshaw.
Things we did in New york -

1. Climbed to the top of the Empire state building
2. Went on a water taxi to Liberty statue
3. Walked on the Brooklyn bridge
4. Visited the Top of the rock
5. World famous Apple store at 5th Avenue
6. 'See it All' Tour around New york
7. 'See The lights' Tour around New york
8. Madame Tussauds wax museum
9. Sumptuous meal at Saravana bhavan (trip not complete without it :) )
10. Visited Ground zero where WTC once majestically stood and its memorial under construction.

This was quite a satisfying trip and one more check on my places-to-visit list.

Nondhasamy

Since a zillion articles on the web/print have already thuppified the movie , Kandhasamy, i'll restrain from writing a review on it. But i still have to tell you how it made me a 'Nondhasamy', by the time the end credits rolled. Vikram, as an actor, might have put in a lot of effort but is simply nullified by the lack of it from the director as a story teller.

Whenever the CBI director (played by telugu actor Krishna) starts talking,

i was searching the screen for subtitles, I was in splits when i realised he was talking in Tamil. A sleazy role is all a desperate shriya got paid for or was that the only avenue she could pursue to make an impression ? Vadivelu is becoming the most serious comedian these days, few people find his jokes funny. Vikram more than made for it by putting on display some hilarious stuff, the 'kozhi' dance and sound, whenever he was supposed to play an act of god. This no doubt made an already missing-in-the-film vadivelu redundant. Seriously. :)

The camera work was slick i thought, how much of it was relevant though is a different subject. One thing that eludes me is "Why directors are hell bent on making cameo

appearances" in their movies these days, when they should actually be focusing on the script and screenplay. It only makes things worse in this case. I hoped to see the first super-hero movie in tamil, guess i'll have to wait for some more time or settle for the tamil-dubbed hollywood flicks for the time being. I think this still ended up close to a mini-review. :)

Ta

People, wats up ?

After precisely 60 days, i return to blog. Think its my biggest sabbatical since i started to blog. Thanks to work and a little bit of touring, haven't had a chance to write. Wouldn't have had much to write though.

Its been raining here non stop since last friday, welcome in a largely rain-free and sweltered Texas. But its flip side - no sunshine, kinda leaves your day dull and lifeless. Its been close to a week now, it needs to stop, 

so much so that someone would start dancing (and sing "Rain rain go away, come again another day") 

to make it go away. Dancing to stop a rain, ironic ?

Visited Niagara falls over last weekend. Quite a sight. A couple of fun activities in and around Niagara falls made the trip eventful. Buffalo, NY (where niagara falls is) is a beautiful place in itself and had a pleasant weather over the weekend. The boat ride - called 'Maid of the mist', which takes you close to the Horse shoe falls to feel the mist and the force of the water blasted on your face is one of a kind. The walk on the wooden stairs of "Cave of the winds" into the Bridal veil falls is like getting drenched under our own Koutraalam falls but only this has 10 times more volume and height. We also went on a speed boat tour on the river niagara,

called Whirlpool Jet tour. It wasn't out of the world, but worth trying for the white fresh water splashing on you when the boat rides into rough waters. Since the Niagara river acts as an international border between the US and Canada, it was kinda weird driving along the banks of river niagara and couldn't help feel how close  you were to entering canada (punishable offense though, when you dont have a canadian visa).

Ta

Wiiitis

I just learnt that i could be suffering from Wiiitis, after playing Tennis for (maybe 5) hours on Wii yesterday. I had earlier mentioned that i went to sleep with a slight pain in my shoulder and arm last weekend. Turns out its a newly found injury found in people playing Wii (esp tennis).

http://www.webmd.com/news/20070606/nintendo-game-sparks-acute-wiitis

http://www.betadaily.com/2008/04/07/wii-players-suffer-new-injury-named-wiitis/

I'm not too worried about it though, because its really not that painful and i'm getting better at Tennis. Moreover playing more tennis on wii will make it go away i guess :).

Ta

I just imagined using different browsers on my laptop as if it were the same as going out with a different girl every night. Or having many girlfriends at the same time in life. True story - dont have any. Why m i thnking like this. Pathetic it is. I'm so high right now. Nope i'm not drunk. Its just the way i feel now. sleepy. so sleepy i feel its a lot of effort to get up from this seat and goto bed. Yes, music is also playing on one side of the room, it seems to be struggling to come on top (what, again...i can't help this) over the ultra low frequency rumble of the AC. All of them conspiring to add to my drowsiness and usher me far into the deepest of i dont know where. Oh, BTW Neha bhasin sounds gr8 in Pesugiren.... (Now playing...). But for the music and the rumble of the AC, the night (at 1:30 AM - dawn already ?) seems to be serene.
who invented movies ? who invented/discovered music ? and how did anyone come up with the idea of bringing music and movies together. music for movies. And they have been doing this for hundreds of years (??). i just remembered something i goofed up today. When in walmart, i was checking an automatic tooth brush (sort of) and the third one that i checked had a button on it, for switching it on. I pressed it and it started with a vibrating noise too loud to be heard across a couple of aisles. Slighlty embarrasssed, fiddled the button to switch it off, it simply wouldn't. With each excruciating second, the noise seemed to be growing agonisingly
louder. Eventually, gave up and threw it deep into the aisle, where the noise wasn't a bother anymore. Quickly cleared the scene like i was never there.
as i m seeing objects like they are suspended in mid air and different colours on my off-white wall, guess i got to sign off for now.

Ta
PS : i had to type, stop and see if there is a mistake, correct it and then proceed. has taken a lot of crazy energy to do this than usual .

Hmm....what is it with women and driving ? Irrespective of their age and the country they come from, driving & women seem to be an odd combination on the road. You find a slow car ahead of you., you pass the car and look who it is, its a "cautious" woman driving. You have a left indicator blinking and you see the car taking a right turn, its a woman. You have a car veering side to side in a lane, guess who's driving - a woman talking on a mobile phone. Some i know, TEXT while driving, with no hands on the wheels. God save people on the road.
I've seen women driving their car for miles without realizing they had their hand-brake on. With due respect to some (ok, make it "a few") women who are astonishing at the wheel, rest of them on this planet simply lack road sense and the application of mind when it comes to driving. Be it talking on the phone & driving or parking in a slot, they just can't do it. Parking without (taking the car out in reverse and back in) multiple attempts is not possible, even after a couple of months of driving. God help them. I feel sorry for them, though i'm bashing at 'em mercilessly. Off the wheels, i have a special respect for them. :)

Ta

Wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii....................

Yesterday i strained my right shoulder after playing on Wii for about a couple of hours straight. It started with the afternoon, and then the rest of the evening till i had dinner and went to bed with my shoulder and my right arm aching. This was the first time i was playing on a Wii and it was quite good. Should get it for myself some day. Sigh ! my birthday is not around anytime soon to wish for the Wii as a birthday present. Talking about playing games, its been a while since i played any video games lately. Used to play on my PSP for days endlessly.
Don't play on it anymore, lost the interest in those kind of games. Wii has somewhat kindled that passion for video games in me. Feels like a rebirth of sorts. May it live long !!

Ta

When i went to the salon (my usual) this weekend to have an haircut, it was a sweltering hot saturday afternoon and i was praying there wouldn't be too many people waiting to have theirs done. Luckily it was empty and i was the only one. When the barber started working on my hair, she (yet to see a male barber here) was taking her own sweet time cutting it. And usually it doesn't take too long to cut mine - may be 10 mins or so. But it had been over thirty minutes and she was still "working" on it. As if on cue, since about 5 mins after she started cutting my hair, people started pouring in. It had been over 45 mins and this lady seemed unfazed by the crowd, obviously with more barbers (all of them women) from the back (inside) of the salon coming out to attend to customers, yet weren't just enough as some customers still had to wait. I couldn't help feeling surprised at two things. One, the sudden inflow of the customers and two, the barber that was attending to me who didn't bat an eyelid. I would have expected her to hurry up things with me so that she could move onto the next customer. She has cut my hair before and never has she been so cool. And she did a pretty good job with my hair too. Usually, having an hair cut is not my cup of tea. I'd want something and tell the barber that, but would end up having a not-so-proud-to-have funny haircut making me look awfully sheepish.Communication totally lost somewhere. Didn't bother. Gonna grow back anyways.

Though i had a new haircut that i was happy with, it was lost for a moment when my friend's wife looked through their door's peep hole and mistook me for her neighbour from downstairs and freaked out. Well, almost freaked out.
They were watching Vijay TV and there were some promos of its other shows that were playing in the ad interval of the program. They were getting annoyingly repeated due to the lack of the regular ads (because this was the edited version to be telecast in the US or something like that). As it turned out that i was incapable of tolerance towards such nuisance i had to switch channels or mute the volume everytime the ad break came up.
I can't fathom how people put up with such idiocracy all day.

Ta

Benny lava ??

A friend dropped the link in my msg basket.

It was funny. Have a look. Didn't have an idea something like this was going on !!

http://hawkeyeview.blogspot.com/2009/03/benny-lava-phenomenon.html

(Courtesy: Hawkeye's blog)

Ta

Unfaithful

A couple of days ago i learnt that the song "Unakkena naan" from the movie kadhalil vizhundhen was actually a tamil version (copied?!?! inspired?!?!? whatever.) of an english song titled "Unfaithful" by Rihanna. When i happened to chance on the actual video of the song on youtube, kinda got hooked to it. what followed were the infinite loops of the song played (on youtube). I'm not a big fan of english songs, there'll be hardly a couple of them on my iPod. This is gonna be one of 'em.

When i happened to tell this to my cousin, he told me about another song sung(& featured in the video) by Rihanna. Umbrella. This too had me listening to it in loops and had quickly become one of my favourites.

Talking about youtube videos that i'm hooked to these days, stumbled on another smart piece of work as far as the way the song had been pictured and the dance put together. Its the video of the song Aathichoodi from TN 07 AL 4777.

"Aatichoodi" was actually the adapted version of Dinesh kanagarathnam's "Surangani surangani". So credit goes to Dinesh, not Vijay Anthony.

Dinesh's another rap song that's quite nice, IMO.

Happy listening

Ta

PS : I couldn't embed the first two videos (Rihanna) on this post, as they were restricted from being embedded.

Pretty hectic is what i'll call the last couple of weeks. My swimming classes and the supplementary practice sessions have kept me busy in the evenings on work days. Talking about swimming, i guess i can now do better than aimlessly kicking the feet and hands in the water, which in my opinion is decent enough. Decent, considering i've not been in water that's more than knee deep, in a quarter century.

June hasn't started well for people around me at work and it scares me too. People are being sent back to india in the name of workforce reduction at onsite and thereby cutting on costs. Mera number kab aayega ?!?!? (but with a lot of anxiety and sadness though).
No matter how much you like chennai and want to go back, you still wouldn't want to give up the life that you got used to here. Living in foreign land has its own problems (those when you miss india). No one likes change - especially when it disrupts their otherwise happy life. Everyone is willing to put up with the problems living here rather than having to return back to India. Too bad the situation isn't good and choices have dried up. Land of opportunity - not anymore.

Something unfortunate happened two weeks back and took us all by shock.
Arun's(my roommate) father passed away in a freak accident in india and Arun had to return to india in a hurry. The flight journey was going to be an agonising 24 hrs, the longest 24 hrs of his life. Coincidentally, he was originally scheduled to return back to India once for all, a week later but destiny was something else. May his father rest in peace, Deepest of our sympathies be with him.

Dont want to signoff on a sad note. "How I met your mother" is an american sitcom (situation comedy) series that i've recently dived into (:-) influence of swimming classes) and i must admit i'm addicted to it (Courtesy : my cousin back in Bangalore, India.). Its more on the lines of "Friends", another popular sitcom. Grab a cd/dvd if you can and have a good laugh.

Ta

P.S - My cousin did everything except paying in cash to get me into referring his blog in my posts. :P

Swimming lessons

Just back from my first swimming lessons - first ever in my life. I've avoided learning it all this time and somehow i've been a little restless lately about learning something new and quite keen to learn some of the things that i've miss in life so far. Coming back to the swimming lessons, i'm sure i didn't pickup things too well, but the instructor kept saying we are doing good. Guess i should make it a point to practice a little bit tomorrow to catch up before the next class on wednesday. On the lighter side, it was funny to see myself kicking the legs and arms in the water and not being able to keep myself afloat. Whatever i did i kept sinking. Long way to go......

Ta

As the weekend dawns, i gather some motivation to write this post. Went on a 5 day trip to LA and San diego last weekend which happened to be a long one thanks to the memorial day and the two additional days i took off, on either side of the weekend. Was a pleasure to be at Disneyland again - really is the happiest place on earth. Second time at Universal studios as well. I could goto these places again and again and never feel bored. Then we drove to the beautiful San diego along the awesome coast line and hit the Wild animal park, which was so-so. Far too less animals for you to watch. The San diego zoo would have been a better bet i thought. Thought we could goto a zoo anywhere else, but the wild animal park was to be found only here at San diego. Obviously the idea bombed. Rounded off the trip with a walk on the san diego beaches and a couple of shows at Seaworld. 

 On both my flight journeys to LA and back from San diego, i was to travel alone and would have a stranger sitting next to me for 3 hours. Was wondering if i should strike a conversation to avoid boredom and it never happened. I saw a young girl (cute and bubbly, round about the same age as i am) reading a novel when i was waiting at my gate before boarding the LA flight and was hoping she would sit next to me on the flight. My prayers were nearly answered. She had an aisle seat in my row and i was in the window seat, with a guy in the middle - shattering all my hopes to pieces. This close !! Cursing my luck, looked at the guy in the middle to see if i can atleast converse with him. He didn't wait a second to plug his earphones into his ears straightaway and dozed off. Ok, see you in hell !!

                  It didn't look that bad on my return trip though. This time a girl sat right next to me, but the pessimistic side of mine reminded me of the previous trip and kept me from attempting anything. Not that i had the opportunity for long. Within minutes of take off she laid her head on the food tray and went into a dream mode i guess. After a couple of minutes, drinks was being served and i asked for and got a coke can. When i tried to open the can, there was this mini-burst sound and this female woke up startled, literally screaming. I couldn't control my laughter when i heard her say she had this dream and there was an explosion in it that woke her up(referring to the bursting sound of the can's opening), even as i was apologizing for disturbing her sleep. Looking least bothered she went back to sleep. That's all. That's all the talk we had.

Ta

25 amazing Logos

Roaming through the Wild wild web, i stumbled across an amazing article that spoke about some famous logos and the meaning/symbols hidden inside them. To think that i've been blind to the symbols inside most of the logos that we quite often see is overwhelming and weird.

http://www.graphicdesignblog.org/hidden-logos-in-graphic-designing/


Ta

lady luck

Sometimes it looks like i'm not lucky enough. There are things i end up a loser, when others don't have to sweat a muscle. Some people get a few things while i'm made to wait for or denied completely. what is it with my luck ? Am i the chosen one or what ?

Funny my father should mention that i'm enjoying the best time of my life (sukkira dhisai in Tamil astrology) as per my horoscope :). Either its ironical or this is the best i can get in my life. Then i wonder what will be the worst ?

Ta

Last two weeks have been ok-ish. 

I can't believe i watched 3 madhavan movies in a row a week ago, as if i was a madhavan fan. Fact is i'm not. It just happened. More of a coincidence. I've not watched them before, had too much time to kill and i chose to kill it this way. I would personally rate them in the below order. 

1. Kannathil muthamittal

     Moved me. A drop of tear escaped my eyes in a scene or two.

2. Dum dum dum

     Can't help the feeling Madhavan & Jothika looked totally out of place.

3. Rendu

         You get an impression that the first half of the movie ran untethered from the movie itself.

Talking of Rendu, can' t help observing something about Sundar C's movies. The choice of leading ladies. Man he's got good taste !! You could watch his movies just for that. He'll not disappoint you ;-)

That also brings to my mind another Madhavan movie that i watched a couple of days ago - Yaavarum nalam. Good attempt.  

We had an office team get-together, last week. Again ? This was confined to a smaller team. Yet had about 16 of them.  Reason ? Someone reminded us that it had been a long time since we had a team get-together (the smaller team) and suggested we all have a team outing. Also we had a couple of team members from offshore for a brief period, making the group huge. Went to an entertainment center (Dave & Buster's). Had fun for a couple of hours and then left for an indian restaurant to have a get-together dinner. I darted off like a bullet, ended up missing an exit on the freeway [actually didn't realise that for a long time :-) ], only to drive a few miles too long - in the opposite direction. Took a U-turn, found my way back and drove to the restaurant while hungry team members were waiting for me without ordering. Thanks for waiting and Sorry for making you guys wait..... ;-). 

After the dinner, came back home with my head aching big time, no idea why. May be it was the noise at Dave & Buster's. 

Just happened to pick up "Jaane tu ya jaane na" and found it good to watch. Another feel-good love story, that'll cool you like a gentle breeze. When the movie was released last year, i never got to know that this movie was so good and would have been worth watching then. No one i knew had seen it, though one or two songs in it were nice - Kabhi kabhi & pappu can't dance. After watching it now, i like more songs from it - Jaane tu mera kya hai, nazrein milaana etc.,

Ta

what fan ? khaitan fan...

Its always funny to see, when people publicly express their devotion to a certain TV star or an actor or a sports person or any other popular human (most likely through television). You could see them talk excitedly when they get an opportunity to do so, as if they're being paid to do it. And if they have a like minded friend or a colleague at work who shares the same enthusiasm for a particular human being - you cannot even tolerate a minute of their company. Their obsession would invariably reach fanatic (and lunatic) levels whenever they talk about this common interest.

My dad is an MGR fan and i've grown up listening to him talk and heap accolades on MGR, his good deeds yada yada... I believed all of them until a certain point in my life, may be till i was in 6th or 7th standard. I wasn't really that intelligent you know. My dad still is an ardent MGR fan and continues to support/favour ADMK - the political party that MGR started. You could see his bias towards anything that's remotely related to MGR and ADMK. Like for instance, Jaya TV. And i believe, for the same reason, he hates Sun TV - and anything that has a link to DMK - that currenly is the ruling party in TN. He is not a fan of Ms. Jayalalitha, but definitely admires her character and authority as a ruler. Anyways Jaya TV is now his favourite channel after Doordarshan and is hell bent on catching the Jaya news whenever there is one, at any time of the day. He hates to watch news on other channels and is always critical about them. Why ? because Jaya tv is the only channel that tells truth on their news and others lie. - Give me a break. I can't bear this already.

Have some guys at work (happen to be friends & roomies as well) who are die-hard actor Vijay fans...Oh did i say Vijay ? Sorry fellas, Dr Vijay it is. They like all the bullshit that Vijay continues to dole out flop-after-flop, no wonder Vijay keeps doing it. Can't blame him really - he's keeping his fans satisfied. whatever. back to our guys - they can never talk enough of this actor and almost always see gems and worth in Vijay's films where others can't. wadda talent, i say. They like all of Vijay's songs - however bad they are. To them, All vijay songs are good and there are other songs that have good music occasionally, they think. Wake up guys, wake up.
At times when i play music on my car, i've seen them squirm like they stepped on shit if they happen to listen to a song that's not from a Vijay film. As if this wasn't enough both find it amusing to unleash abuse on Ajith who's supposed to be Vijay's rival in Kollywood. I've seen this absurdity being taken to alarming levels around the time when the movies of these actors are being released. Not that i'm an Ajith fan or something, yet i find their hatred ridiculous and laughable.

The advent of reality TV shows and their spotlight on the participants spurns an entirely new audience irrespective of the genre they are on - singing, dancing, adventure sports and the likes. When people get hooked on to a particular show, its inevitable that they turn fans of one of the participants and start following that person like the hutch-dog. literally. We had a couple of guys at work that were following a certain show on tv and it soon turned into war of words when they were fighting against each other on their favourites. Eveyone is entitled to their opinions and has the right to express it. In a civilized way, rather. They went to the extent of campaigning for their favourite and propagating their opinion amongst other seemingly hapless guys while degrading others' differential opinions on the same matter. C'mon, stop acting like its your kin that's on the show. After all its only a tv show. On the lighter side, these debates about the shows are nothing short of entertainment and we love it anyways as they provide some comic relief.
And to talk about the reality tv shows that take commercialism to new heights - with all the elements to keep the TRP high up on the charts - will need lot more than words.

Its a funny world.

Ta

Gift card ?

To have to gift someone is one of the most daunting tasks ever in my life. Usually, there is an escape route when someone volunteers to collect money and buy the gift. I'd gleefully give them my share of the money for the gift and forget about the whole thing, while this sad person who volunteered will goto umpteen shops, sift over a thousand probable items - for that ideal gift for the occasion.

These days its so common to find people buy gift cards from big stores, fancy shops etc., and present it to people. It looks like the most ideal solution to the 'Gifting' problem these days, when people hardly have (read do not wish to spend) any time & effort for such things. To be honest, wouldn't blame them. And its always being justified that presenting a gift card would allow the so & so person who needs to be gifted, to decide on what they want or need at that specific time rather than ending up with a gift that can only beautify their showcase and not being able to put it to use. Sounds practical alright - for people that are just acquaintances/colleagues. But for people that are more than just colleagues/family friends, gift cards are too impersonal i think.

 

Recently, one of my close friends who also happens to be my colleague at work (and was thy room mate too once upon a time)  was celebrating his second marriage anniversary. I along with my friends/room-mates decided to gift him and they didn't bother too much about what to gift. Gift card was the unanimous decision - except me of course, i thought we should buy him something rather than a gift card - somehow a gift card didn't feel personal. After some brainstorming - we presented him with a printer. Was absolutely certain it'll not be useless. Donno how the other guys felt - but no one opposed. 

Gift cards or Gift items. What do you think ? 

Ta

WTF

Not because i'm patriotic and all, but calling the entire population of a nation 'slumdogs' isn't right in any way and i think its a little too much. Popular american radio jockey, Rush limbaugh went on air last week calling indians 'slumdogs' when he was answering a caller on his show about the call center jobs outsourced to indians. Read it here.
Unjustifiable that it is, this guy would do well than to call indians 'slumdogs'.
Well, Mr. Limbaugh...Do you see my middle finger ? Its for you...

Work hard, Party harder !!

Yesterday we had an office celebration for getting All green in our customer service levels and our manager had organised it at Main Event on company's expense. Main Event is an entertainment center with bowling, billiards, laser tag, video games and other fun stuff. My manager A reached there first, bought tickets and was waiting with the wrist straps and game cards to hand it over to people - since he was the one organizing this whole thing. We reached there, got our wrist bands and started playing billiards, while A was waiting for the rest of them to join. Though it was free (company's expense) people took all the time in the world and were lazily trickling in one by one.

A was reaching the heights of frustration and anger, having to haplessly wait at the entrance to hand over the wrist bands to all our people. His face was morphing into unthinkable shapes and dimensions with a thousand expressions dancing in it, that'll put Jothika to shame. And then the obvious happened, he started calling those that were yet to arrive, on phone and was giving them some piece of his mind. Eventually after nearly an hour everyone had arrived.

 

After some billiards, we started with bowling - 6 continuous lanes for us. Had good fun bowling after a long time. Used to frequent mainevent for bowling once upon a time - thing of the past now. And yes, what's better than to win both the games that we played. I'm not bragging here, but the previous experience of having bowled there helped me win, surely. It was also funny to watch my colleagues in the other lanes bowl or rather learning to bowl. Some were unmindful of the white line, kept stepping on it and didn't even realize that it was a foul inspite of the red light beaming and blaring loud. Then came the cheese pizza, that we helped ourselves with. I LOVE the cheese pizza at mainevent. Oh, and there were people that were showing off like they've been bowling all their life - No no, not me. Of course I didn't know how to bowl until i came to the US, but atleast i wouldn't show off my bowling skills (like i have any) before the others who knew less about it. 

After everyone had played roughly two games of bowling, A suggested that we spin off for laser tag - a kind of laser shooting game in a large dark room. We were split into red and green teams - i was in the red team. We had a helluva fun playing the laser tag running around the room shooting your enemy and their base targets and to top it all, guess what.... red won - By a huge margin (that's the kid in me, kindly excuse !!). We all came out sweating and panting, no less excited. After laser tag, we played a couple of video games for the next two hours or so and then decided to return home. In the middle of it all, some boozed like anything - at company's expense. To sum it up, everyone had fun i guess. Looking forward to more such office parties and celebrations in the future. And god be with you A, for the reimbursement of the entire expense from our company. I can only wish you luck - the best i can do !!

To tweet or not to tweet is the....

Twitter !! Twitter !! Twitter !! everyone's (online) talking about twitter now. Most of the people that proclaim to be social networking have a facebook account, myspace or now a twitter account.
Twitter claims to have over 7 million accounts[incl me as well =) ] and is growing exponentially by day.. at a whopping 1382 % over the past year (says Switched.com). And most of them that have twitter accounts don't even know how to use it [uh..hmm, that doesn't include me].Some of my friends are on twitter too and going heavy on it.

I created a twitter account to understand what the hoopla was all about. you'll not find more than a couple of tweets on my account.. That too i attribute it to my initial enthusiasm. I should admit that i'm one of the millions that either don't effectively use twitter or don't see a use for it in their lives. Not yet. There are also surveys or reports that suggest that most of them that have a twitter account do not know how to use it.

For the uninitiated, Twitter is a social networking service that works on the concept of answering the question "what are you doing ?". you simply update your account with a short message of 140 chars [that's shorter than an sms) answering that question. you could update through your web browser or through a desktop twitter client or through your phone by sending an sms to your twitter account. These updates are called tweets and the process is called tweeting.
Ideal for the people on the move and those that heavily dwell on text messaging. You could follow people to see what they are doing or people can follow you. Depends who you are.

No doubt twitter is hot in the youth circles and catching up fast with every living mortal on this planet. It not just lesser mortals like you and me, but also celebrities, websites, big corporations,
and every other weighted matter on this blue planet wants to follow or wants to be followed - on twitter. Twitter is becoming ubiquitous now (atleast on the internet) - Will twitter become the new world order ? Will it be the end of homo sapien supremacy on Earth ? Time will tell, people...... Time will tell.

Ta

I can't stand some people here. Now. I believe i have my reasons for not being able to tolerate these people, but some of those reasons look unreasonable. Uh..Or so i think. Nevertheless, i'm sick of these people. why can't i just stay happy or atleast be indifferent to these mortals and the stuff they do. Just can't help the feeling.... Just can't help it. God bless all.

These rants are increasing by the day (some live as posts) and i can't seem to find anything else that is soothing or far more pleasant. No focus. Think i need a stronger mind to go through all this - hope i manage to scrape through. More and more questions, lot less answers. Wanna be able to sink myself into something as a reprieve whenever i hit such paranoiac levels. Not all that's in my head is coming out as words now here, writer's block may be. Wish someone was listening though.

Ta

At the end of an almost hectic day !! Hardly a minute to relax ! Glad its coming to end !!

Tomorrow is the last working day of this week, thanks to Good Friday. The long (unplanned) weekend appearing on the horizon, is looming large now. The fear of having nothing to do is the worst of all my fears and its damn boring. Got to plan for something to make this weekend worthwhile. With all the routine people and things that make me go mad, need a release valve for all my stress, so badly. Each day is growing less and less interesting with nothing to look forward to. Not even music is enough to alleviate all this stress and boredom. Feel like going through a dry patch in life !! Some patch this is !!

Songs i'm hooked to right now

I'm hooked to the following songs for the time being. Be it listening to music on my car or in my room, you'd catch me with one of these songs playing. And on loop. Indefinitely.

Except for serialization, this list signifies no order of preference.

1. Adada vaa - Sarvam
2. Neethaane - Sarvam
3. Chinnan sirusuga - Kunguma poovum kojum puravum
4. Choododhu - pokiri (telugu) - i know this isn't a recent song but i happened to watch this movie recently and 've been smitten by this song since.
5. Pada pada vena - Vennila kabadi kuzhu
6. Lesa parakkudhu - Vennila kabadi kuzhu
7. Jaane tu - jaane tu ya jaane na

Ta

One year...

its been since i bought my civic here, though it still has very few miles on it (compared to the average mileage of cars driven in texas).  All my driving mostly consisted of commute to work and back and some to shopping malls, which was negligible however. To put some more miles on my car, i  thought of driving to houston - that would also fulfil my long-drive aspirations. Anyways, i had it planned for next weekend which is a long one owing to a bank holiday on Good friday and it looks like that might not happen. I don't want to spend a long weekend sitting on my ass all day looking at my laptop screen. maybe i should pursue other avenues to kill time rather than this drive-down-houston thing this weekend. Houston - some other time maybe.

Ta 

Life is just crawling on, so boring and eventless. Not much to write about these days and could not muster enough resolve to post something. Another week (that sucked) passes by.

Last sunday we went to Six flags over texas - an amusement park at Arlington - at about an hour's travel from home. That was fun, took a toll on each one of us- felt so tired the whole day on Monday. Yet i was game for another jolly trip to some place this weekend, but nothing really worked out.  A drive down to Houston (with some office colleagues) almost happened, but somehow that was too short of a notice. Wacthed Ayan (tamil film) - surya,tamannah starrer - last night at a local theater, what a crap movie. Songs were good though - well picturised, but out of place (read context). Every time surya and tamannah meet, you know there'll be a song the next minute. Stop it, Mr Director (K V Anand) - just because Harris jayaraj was paid a hefty sum, you don't have to bombard  us with romantic torpedoes. 

Whenever i goto walmart i pray that i don't bump into the 'consultants'. These are people(mostly indians)  that come to walmart just to find some unsuspecting indian student or an indian that's working here on a work permit, who they can rope in to do some (IT) projects with them. I doubt if that's legal and i do my best to stay away from these people. What irks me the most is the way they try to appear friendly like someone who you happened to meet by chance and then goes on to get more details about you and then try to brainwash you into working with them or quit your current job to shift to their consultancy, while they actually come there looking for people like that. They are usually dressed in complete formals, when its so obvious that people that come to walmart do not dress up like they goto office, rather will be mostly in their night dress or lazy casuals. These guys will hardly have anything in their cart, except for one or two small items - to keep people from suspecting them about their motives.  

And once they 'pick' their target, they come close and stand next to you and then ask odd questions like "is this food item good for health ?", "does this camera work well?",  "is that a bluetooth that you have in you ear?" - and if you bother answering these questions they build a conversation and at some point introduce themselves with the only motive of getting more info about you - mobile number being one of them. The days that follow will have calls from these guys pestering you to quit your current and join their consultancy. I hate this breed, really.

Ta

What type are you ?

I happened to read an article on Switched.com's blog, that talked of a site called Typealyzer.com, that can determine your personality type based on the kind of language used on your blog. It also warns that it isn't 100% accurate yet was interesting. I found the site interesting too and this is what it had to say about this blog. [Though i can't completely admit/deny any of the report]

The analysis indicates that the author of http://vikkypedia.blogspot.com is of the type:
ESFP - The Performers

The entertaining and friendly type. They are especially attuned to pleasure and beauty and like to fill their surroundings with soft fabrics, bright colors and sweet smells. They live in the present moment and don´t like to plan ahead - they are always in risk of exhausting themselves. The enjoy work that makes them able to help other people in a concrete and visible way. They tend to avoid conflicts and rarely initiate confrontation - qualities that can make it hard for them in management positions.

Now, i don't know how much of that is true/false, but i found it amusing. It even had a brain activities mapping.

Ta

Of late, lot of my posts have been about good movies that i happened to watch. This post is no exception. True, i'm watching a lot of movies these days - good ones.

A wednesday - is the latest in that list. I had not heard of this movie until recently, when it was in the news - for plans of remaking it in tamil. Good acting by Naseerudhin shah and Anupam kher. Nothing short of a contest between the two, in terms of acting. Shah comes out top.

Certainly not another run of the mill bollywood story, where you have 30 women dancing in the background with the male and the female lead romancing shamelessly. There are no songs in this movie, for that matter. A bold attempt in these times of negligence, terrorism & immature media. The director deserves credit for opening up on the social issues and thrashing the media which fuels the fire from within.

There is a scene where the police need some professional help in tracing a call, one of them suggests bringing in a hacker. Anupam kher is surprised to see a young college droupout in his teens, in the hall as a hacker and raises his concerns about the boy handling the complicated telecom systems. 

The guy without batting an eye-lid, says that he's completely aware of those systems and calls them out dated. And when anupam kher asks if he knows what he's doing, the guy replies "Sir, i'm a drop-out by choice".    

Would recommend this movie to anyone who likes serious, thought provoking cinema.

Go watch it !!

Ta

Taken

Last weekend my room mate asked if we could go for a movie called Taken, in our neighbourhood theater. I asked who was in it and he said it had Liam Neeson and was a serious kinda story. I checked out the theater's website to get the show times and also found another movie - pink panther 2 listed. I recalled that my room mate had long back asked if we could go for that movie and somehow we couldn't go then due to lack of time, we eventually forgot about it. This time though looked good for watching it and when asked he was happy with that too. 

Though i had suggested pink panther 2, i was unconvinced about not watching Taken. i decided to check which one of them is better, in the IMDB site and found that Taken had done well in the box office and had a good viewer rating as well. Convinced now, i got my room mate to change his mind too and went for Taken. We were glad we did. It turned out be a good movie and was a worthy watch. Slick and taut - were my reactions when i came out thinking about the movie. Well packed with action and (the story) was dealt with a sensible screenplay. 

5/5 from me.

Can't speak for pink panther 2 since i didn't watch it - but i know it had low viewer ratings, on IMDB.

Ta

I moved to a new apartment (single bedroom) at the beginning of this month owing to room mates moving out and some other reasons. I began to update the change of address in the SSN records, Driver's license, local post office, bank account, vehicle loan, insurance, internet etc., And when it came to updating my address in the Driver's license, i've hit a dead end now. Usually, i would be able to change the address online, but this time i couldn't. The website refused to process my change of address request and asked me to goto the license office to get it done. Another friend of mine too had a similar problem and he told me that this was because of the number of months left on the visa being less than 12, he said he could get it when he went to the office with this passport. So i took my passport and went to the license office to get it done.

To my disappointment, they sent me back saying i need to have a proof of employment provided by my employer, as well. It took more than 10 days to get it and when i went to the office this time, they seemed to be ok with changing my address (with the proof of employment) and did it. In the process the top portion of my license with the old address, was cut off, to make it invalid and i was given a temp permit. I was told i'll get the license with the new address in 3-4 weeks. I left the room and was waiting in the hallway for my friend, when i received a call. It was the lady at the license office that said she missed to note something on my visa and asked me if i could come back.

I obliged and when she looked at the I94( which has the entry date and how long you could stay in the US),  she said its not been issued for a year and hence the address change on the license can't be done because of that.

Oh, brilliant !! And she reversed the request (cancelled it). Now I can't change the address on my license until i get the I94 renewed atleast for ayear. Its mandatory that i update the address on my license and i've just started with the process of extending my I94. It'll take nothing less than 3 months and could be more, in the worst case, to extend the I94. 

Atleast i later came to know that i'll get the license in mail, with the old address(It was torn off, if u've not forgotten). 

                      I'm really pissed off with this kind of rules and people who have to implement them.

I know that my friend too had the same I94 with less than a year on it and he got the license, but i didn't. To top it off, my three visits to the license office have gone waste. Time and effort made insignificant. Couldn't they have clearly specified rules on a website or a common forum ? 

Just wanted to take my rant out and i did.

Ta

Once upon a time there lived an umbrella......

Umbrellas are meant for protection from the rain (and sun, may be) and come in a variety of shapes and sizes, appropriately priced. I found that out or rather re-discovered it when it was raining here a couple of months ago. I decided to get myself one then and immediately went to walmart, only to find myself drowned in a plethora of choices. I settled on one and bought it. Well, what d'you know! It stopped raining the next day!! It did not rain for the next 3 months - my umbrella was happily resting in my car - until last wednesday. It started raining pretty early in the morning and once i reached office i opened the umbrella for the first time (in its professional life). There blew a gust of wind and with it the umbrella folded backwards - breaking one of its spokes. so much for a new umbrella !! The umbrella isn't completely unusable though - its partly crippled but can still serve well. That was the sad story of my umbrella :( ......

Oh and i thought.... why isn't there an umbrella pant/bottom or something like that.... coz an umbrella can only keep you from getting wet on the top. Below the waist, you will become wet [from the rain, that is - i know what you thought :)] no matter what. And if its windy, don't even ask. Wearing a waterproof pant over your pants is not a solution. It should not be wearable and should be like an umbrella - to cover the lower half of your body, if you understand what i mean.

Any ideas ? 

Ta

Yay....Got a new phone, Finally !!

Yes, the to-buy or not-to-buy phase came to an end last week. I got a new nokia 5800 after a lot of pondering. Ordered last weekend and it arrived mid last week. This  baby is a thing of beauty and is doing most of the stuff i'd want it to. [No, it doesn't dance ;)]. Few posts earlier i had sought help from anyone who reads the blog to help me with deciding between nokia 5800 and an HTC touch diamond. Thanks to those who helped. 

There was even a suggestion to buy both of them and use them for a couple of days and see which one lives with me better !! No thanks, not at the time of a global economic recession :) 

[though i should admit i was inclined to execute it, being a gadget freak that i am :-,  and also ran the fear of ending up with keeping both - Definitely not a good sign for my future financial situation]. 

This phone set me back by approx 400 USD, but happy with what i have for that price. 

Here are some pics.

Ta

12 angry men

Was the movie i saw over the weekend. pretty interesting movie, i should say. Its an old movie. 52 years old [Courtesy: IMDB], to be precise. In a hot room, a 12 men jury are left to decide if a 18 yr old boy is guilty or not, after being tried for allegedly murdering his father. If proven guilty, the boy faces a death sentence. All but one, vote guilty - how the only one who differs convinces the 11 other men in the room is a captivating watch. Has gone into my favourites of all time.

Ta

what dreams are made of....

Had a strange dream about two weeks ago. I call it strange because i had to walk through my school days, in a flashback style. Why this dream occurred, i have no idea. For those of you who can't read my mind, i'll put my dream in words 

here ;-). Or rather walk through my life's flashback. Have a tortoise coil ready and we'll start.

I was an average student in school. All through my primary schooling, i never had a pressure/fear worrying

about how good/bad i was with studies. I went to DAV mogappair, for my 4th standard and onwards till Tenth. I never settled there, meaning i felt very home-sick (can i say that ?) with my old school and my friends there. I never made new friends and also lost touch with my old friends, for the simple reason that we couldn't meet more often. I remember very vaguely that it was when i finished my 6th and stepped into the 7th that i began to feel some sense of realization of how good/bad i was in studies. It was also at that time cable television - satellite broadcasting had become a new rage of sorts and i too was sucked into all the glitz, like a moth to the fire. I spent most of (my non-school) time watching cartoons, cricket, other film-based TV programs & all other

 nonsense on the idiot box. what not. I was becoming spoilt. Which meant i was found lagging in studies and reduced to somewhere between below average and poor kind of student. Merely scraping through some exams and not even managing to get a minimum mark (to pass) in some. I also remember not doing an assignment/home work - simply writing answers from the text books for the questions that the teacher gave us in the class. Least bothered about the consequences, i conveniently ignored the home work in favour of TV and got the stick at school, instead. 

I was an outstanding student in this regard. Someone not doing an assignment can be chided once or be punished at the time. But someone who is supposed to have all the notes written in a notebook,and has never really cared to do it, will get punished in every class until he makes up for all the backlog in the notebook. Exactly what happened to me. It appears funny and crazy to me (now) that i never went back home thinking that i should make up for all this. Not one day. So i had to stand outside the class almost every day (that we had that subject on). Guess what, the situation got better with subjects with backlogs increasing. And i was the only one in a class of 38. It was embarrassing enough, but never attempted to correct it.[May be i was not too embarrassed as it was all boys' school]. Quite obviously, this also showed in my exams - lost interest in these subjects. If i come to think of it now, i can't imagine how addicted to the TV i was. I'm glad i got out of it. 

Yes, later on after numerous periods of standing outside the class and a variety of other punishments - i completed the backlog and recovered from the 'defaulter' syndrome. But that didn't help me get back to where i was in studies. That took a couple of years i should say. But thankfully in time, just before my board exams. But of course, i was never comfortable with Mathematics. It painfully got worse with more complex notations and formulaes - wish i had someone to help with it back then. But i could never get it out of my life as it was necessary for me to pursue  science group in my 12th and follow it up with Engineering (Especially computers). 

Like i said, i have no idea why this occurred as a dream to me now. Somehow i have a feeling it could be coz of how strongly these events are etched in my memory, and will stay that way for life. I wish i had a chance to go back in life to correct these and be a good student or atleast be a sensible-average school guy rather. Some of the important years in my life were lost, i guess.

I had no reason to bring these out if i hadn't dreamt of all this. Though i should say i feel better as i'm inching close to the end of this post, having unloaded some really unpleasant memories. 

Catch up with you later in a lighter post......

Ta

Was listening to songs (randomly) in my room and this song from 'Kuthu' played - "Ennai theendi vittai".  I 'just' realized that the female voice in the song was 'Chinmayi' - I never realized all this time. I generally have a liking for this song, for the reason that i liked both the singers' voices in this song (But never really knew who the female voice was). The fact that i could identify chinmayi's voice without a spec of doubt(today) amazes me. 

I've become no less a fan of Chinmayi though this was after seeing her anchor the super singer show two years ago [and definitely the bloopers helped ;-) ].

A random post (at the speed of thought).....   :-)

Ta

This or that ?

Now that i have had my Sony ericsson w810 for a year and a half,  I'm looking to upgrade to a new smartphone [bye bye dumbphones :-)]. In fact i narrowed down my choices to two.

HTC Touch Diamond and a Nokia 5800 Xpressmusic. 

I'm pretty impressed with both and i can't just choose between the two of them.

In the US, the diamond has been around for a while say 6 months or so and the Nokia 5800(US version) is yet to set its foot on the american soil [likely next week]. Its been released in the Europe and India though[two months back]. I've personally compared the specifications of both the phones and like 'em both for some distinct feature of their own.

I want someone to tell me how good/bad the nokia 5800 is. And it'll be of great help if someone can actually tell me which one of the two is better. More smartphone choices are welcome too. 

If you know someone that has already bought any of the above two phones and are willing to share their opinions on them,  please do leave (their opinions as) a comment. 

Ta

My Valentines

Yeah, in plural. Not one, many. These are the valentines of my life. I love them the most. more than anything else in this world and beyond. Thought it fit to post this on Valentine's day :)

 The first and the last (from left) are my sister's kids and the ones in the middle are my brother's.

More of them !!

My brother in law, I call him Maams :)

That's my sister in the middle, of course.

Guess who it is in the back ground [in black jeans] - yours truly, who else.

Ta

Villu - a debacle

I can't possibly jot down how harrowing it was to watch this movie. Right through the entire length of the movie, i was cursing myself for having spent(read wasted) 220 bucks on a crap load. And i slept through the last 15 mins or so and never got to watch the climax. At least i saved myself of 15 minutes of rubbish, i should say. Well what made this worse was the fact that people around me [most of them middle aged] seemed to be laughing their hearts out and i never saw the joke. Not even a 10-min break for the intermission was sufficient to bring the relief that was needed. It looked like this movie was made with the notion that those who watch it had no other work to do and were morons. That was the feeling that grew in me, as every scene rolled on. My intolerance to this nonsense was being fed to no bounds. My first movie in the theater this year is a debacle, to say the least. With that being the case, i no longer have the will (pardon the pun) to re-live the experience once more (in the form of a post). It can make things better for none.

what has become of the film makers and actors these days ? why isn't enough care taken to respect the movie watching public, by giving a sensible product. It's a rarity these days to come across a well made film. They do happen, yet few and far between. May be its the hype and (own) expectations that surrounds the (big stars') movies these days that makes the experience worse.

Ta

Been quite a while since my last post. In fact, the two posts that i wrote at the beginning of my india stay were the only ones during the period. Things kept me busy and out of connectivity for most of my vacation. (As i have returned to the US) Here i return to my usual blogging self to ensure people that read my blog do not stay in peace forever. ;-, 

For a start, let me begin with the dance i was doing on the indian roads, trying to cross the road. Blame it on the year's time that i was away from india, the chennai roads looked so scary brimming with traffic. I hate to say that i got used to being patient and waiting for traffic signals before i walk or when i drive, and to shed all that to become aggressive on the indian roads was a tall order in itself. I had to convince myself into being on the toes to cross the roads and be alert for any possible space that might emerge between the moving traffic. The colors on the traffic lights proved insignificant as vehicles were on the move always and i was reduced to wait for the rare space on the road where i could sqeeze myself in, to cross the road without being hit. It took me about a week to get into this mould and i turned fearless.

Vehicle traffic in chennai has grown since i left the city and its all the more difficult to get parking space in and around the city. Imagine my plight driving around the city, when getting across to the other side of the road by walk was a challenge. I didn't risk driving a car and chose the two-wheeler instead. It proved to be an efficient solution and finding a parking space wasn't tough either. I used to drive 50 kms a day up and down to office and back, with ease. Wasn't that easy any more. [Growing old ?]. Whatever.... 

Ta

First weekend in the new year and in chennai

A weekend's gone by in chennai and i'm having a good time so far. 

Day one dawned with a golden aura and i had hardly slept the night before as i had just landed a few hours ago. Neverthless, i got off my bed, picked up the paper from the lawn and started reading it. It was over 13 months since i had last done that. I literally went through every single word in it and felt completely satisfied when done. In a few minutes my stomach started ringing and i had dosa for my breakfast, another first in 13 months. Thanks to the heavy breakfast coupled with the staying up all night and the incoherent sleeping on the flight, my eye lids were heavy with sleep and i conveniently helped myself to it. Slept all through the afternoon and the evening of new year's day only to wake up for supper. I believe i had lunch too by waking up in the middle of it, which i only vaguely remember. Days two and three followed with some unpacking and setting up of the electronic items that i (bought &) brought from the US. A bit of insomnia (Jet lag, may be) is still lugging around though. One reason for this post taking shape at an odd hour. 

Today i went out and met with friends at a coffee shop and returned home a little late in the evening. Everyone was a little surprised to find me put on weight (technically 6 kgs since the last time i saw them). While having supper i happened to watch the movie 'Apollo 13' and should admit i was overwhelmed by it. Tears rolled out of the corner of my eye when Tom hanks' voice breaks out with "Houston, this is Odyssey" after 4 minutes of black out. [Crew should respond in 3 minutes usually. Considered not alive if they didn't]

And that brings an end to the weekend and this post.

Ta