Sense, Nonsense and Nan-sense

What to say...

2010-06-19T21:16:00.000-07:00

Lots on my mind right now. Never been so dazed and occupied with thoughts that i just want to take my head off my body and put it down on a table like a helmet. "This too shall pass" - is what i can think of these days, Be it Fun, loneliness, disappointment, anxiety or happiness. Well, time has its own way of giving us answers to the questions we seek. Lets wait and watch.

Things happening right now...
Pre-ordered an iPhone 4 and am anxiously waiting to see if it'll be in my hands on the release day or atleast a day later if not on the release day, 24th.
Listening to 'Usure pogudhey' from Raavanan by Karthik - amazing song yet from the album. Other songs still vying for my attention. they are gonna have to try harder. :)
Going to catch 'Raavana' (Tamil, of course) in the neighbourhood Hollywood theaters tomorrow. Should have been today, but had to put it off till tomorrow for other reasons.
Mom and Dad busy packing their stuff, with new things they got from here, though their return isn't until next monday (28th), that's still 8 days away. When they leave, i will return to my lone life, for better or worse.

Ta

2010-05-01T10:58:00.001-07:00

Been a while since i ranted here. Or even blog anything at all. Havent had time and motivation to post anything. Now i found myself with both albeit with only my mobile phone to post with. Its not convenient to type on my mobile phone but this will just do for the moment.Right now I'm at the grapevine mills mall with my parents which is abt 5 miles frm home. I left them to shop on their own and here i am typing this away sitting in the noisy food court. Yeah i hate shopping and esp walking. I get tired pretty quickly if i have to do both and when i'm not particularly interested. Anyways gettin on to twitter made this look lot more laborious than it actually is. ok time to go now - for lunch. will be back in a new post.

Until then,
Ta

2009-12-19T11:01:00.000-08:00

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.

My motivation...

2009-10-31T10:02:00.000-07:00

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

2009-09-17T16:40:00.000-07:00

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

2009-09-17T16:18:00.001-07:00

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. :)

People, wats up ?

2009-09-17T16:09:00.000-07:00

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).

Wiiitis

2009-07-19T21:33:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-13T23:50:00.000-07:00

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 .

2009-07-13T15:11:00.000-07:00

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....................

2009-07-13T15:05:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-13T15:00:00.000-07:00

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 ??

2009-07-11T21:48:00.000-07:00

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)

Unfaithful

2009-07-11T18:19:00.000-07:00

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

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

2009-06-25T07:50:00.000-07:00

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

2009-06-01T19:09:00.000-07:00

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......

2009-05-29T18:25:00.000-07:00

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.

25 amazing Logos

2009-05-20T09:23:00.000-07:00

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

2009-05-08T14:25:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-26T18:06:00.000-07:00

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.,

what fan ? khaitan fan...

2009-04-22T06:45:00.000-07:00

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 ?

2009-04-19T15:13:00.000-07:00

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 ?

WTF

2009-04-15T10:43:00.000-07:00

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 !!

2009-04-14T18:44:00.000-07:00

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....

2009-04-09T08:54:00.001-07:00

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

2009-04-09T08:33:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-08T14:04:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-06T15:26:00.000-07:00

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...

2009-04-04T18:52:00.000-07:00

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.

2009-04-04T17:46:00.000-07:00

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.

What type are you ?

2009-03-25T11:43:00.000-07:00

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.

2009-03-20T18:39:00.000-07:00

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 !!

Taken

2009-03-20T18:23:00.000-07:00

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.

2009-03-20T17:49:00.000-07:00

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.

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

2009-03-14T11:27:00.000-07:00

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 ?

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

2009-03-14T11:07:00.001-07:00

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.

12 angry men

2009-03-02T16:46:00.000-08:00

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.

what dreams are made of....

2009-02-21T22:02:00.000-08:00

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......

2009-02-21T17:23:00.000-08:00

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)..... :-)

This or that ?

2009-02-21T15:28:00.000-08:00

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.

My Valentines

2009-02-14T10:25:00.000-08:00

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.

Villu - a debacle

2009-01-29T17:30:00.000-08:00

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.

2009-01-29T16:33:00.000-08:00

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....

First weekend in the new year and in chennai

2009-01-04T12:59:00.000-08:00

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.

New year in Singara chennai

2008-12-31T15:04:00.000-08:00

After a long journey, here i'm, posting this from my home in chennai, on the new year's day. The clock struck 12, the new year was born in chennai and i landed at the airport at the same time. That was a joyous moment and the whole plane broke into celebrations.

Happy new year to all.

I'm back with my family at chennai now after a year. Another three weeks and i should get back to Dallas. I had two briefcases (almost) full of electronic items that i'd bought for family, friends and relatives, with hardly any space in them for my clothes !! There are so many things that i don't get in chennai or i'm not happy about. Yet with all due respect to the city that i grew up with, no other place on earth can match it. Chennai is my abode....Chennai is heaven....It is THE-HAPPENING-PLACE for me. I Love Chennai...... To be back here is my new year's present to myself. There are so many things in life that we take for granted and do not realize their significance in life until a noted absence of it. Chennai has been conspicuous by its absence in my life. Chennai or the lack of it has played a major role in the transformation of my lifestyle in the last half a dozen years.

How much i missed chennai in the last one year.....

Priorities do shake a bit of some of our lives, whether we like it or not. I'm no exception.

P.S - Will get back more on my escapades in chennai(that i have planned) in the ensuing weeks

Or if i was not able to !!

Vacation ahoy !!

2008-12-25T19:31:00.000-08:00

This week's flying faster than any other in this year. Thanks to the christmas holidays, jus three working days in this week. Come this weekend i'll be ready for what i've been waiting for the whole time since i came here. In a week's time from now, i'll be breathing the dirty polluted chennai air again which as a matter of fact was my regular dose of oxygen for a quarter century before coming to the US. Give this a thought !! Landing at the dawn of the new year in chennai !! How cool is that ! I'm off to chennai for a vacation of 20+ days and have to catch up with a lot. Family, friends, colleagues, relatives, hangouts........... what not!! Feels nice to think about being in chennai albeit for a short time.......might jus be enough !!

No matter what place on earth you go to, returning home is a pleasant experience and worthless. I can hardly wait to be back in chennai.

The one thing i hate about this travel is the packing and having to go through all the immigration procedures. Its a serious pain in your butt !! As if packing was not treacherous enough, having to keep in mind the baggage rules and the allowance limits while packing is the icing on the cake. You always end up packing in more than the allowance weight and you're left making a choice between what you should carry and what you should REALLY carry !! Jesus, save us all !!

Happy new year to you all !!

2008-12-21T23:34:00.000-08:00

I love this. I really love the way i spent this weekend. I didn't have a single moment this weekend that i thought i was not occupied with. I want all my weekends to be this way, but they are not to be. I feel pretty satisfied with this one.

Pretty early saturday morning we (I and a couple of my colleagues) set off for an outlets mall that's about 80 miles from my place and it was a cool hour and half's drive in my car. Spent all day in the mall, at the outlets of GAP, Tommy Hilfiger, Levi's, Aeroposthale, Fossil, Nike, Reebok, Nautica and their likes. I was happy with a couple of T(shirt)s and bought them. Once we were done with all the outlets, we returned home at about 10 and hit the bed rightaway.

Sunday (which is still today at the time of this post taking shape) dawned well, but was freezingly cold. Didn't suck the spirits out of us though. We had our lunch and braved the sub-zero hostile weather to go shopping again at a local mall. And what a way to end the day and the weekend with. A good movie. Rab ne bana di jodi - this is very well made movie and a must recommend wacth. Hope everyone's had a visit to the local theater to watch the movie. If not, please do immediately. This is one movie you wouldn't want to miss. Had nice songs and a really soothing effect, it has on you.

Being single.......

2008-12-18T22:04:00.000-08:00

How tough or easy it is to be a single ? I wonder. Oh and i don't want to walk through the realms of being a single but there are a few aspects of being single (and not being in a relationship) and be the next one in line ready for marriage, that have me occupied. Occupied in my mind, that is. Not visible to others.

Long since the number of people (in my close relatives) that were to get married came down to zero, this has been a problem. Marriages, wedding receptions, birthday parties, other family functions........Wherever you go, however you hide...... some interested-in-your-well-being-relative will find you and load you with all the crap about when yours truly would get into a wedlock !! You are next in line !!

All that you feel is, Oh thank you for the timely reminder. what would i have done without you. Holy s*&# !! If this keeps happening to me, i'll not think twice before saying you are next in line, when i see you in a funeral.

All right, may be i'm taking this a bit too far. With all due respect to marriage as a holy institution and these constant naggings being a part of your life till you are finished in the name of marriage[Marriage completes a man, some one said], i began to think about the kind of person that i would like to marry and spend the rest of my life with. My parents asked me this simple question, for which i hadn't an answer. Not that i didn't have a silhouette of the woman/girl that i would want to marry, just that it was not something that i could tell my parents about. For long (read since i was in high school) i've been impressed by 'Iyer aathu Ponn's and Mallu girls. There were a few desperate occasions when i vowed to marry a mallu girl or an Iyer aathu girl, when its time !! As a matter of fact, most of the girls that i've liked so far in my life have either been a mallu or a typical iyer girl [I dont want to get into any caste discretions here, just trying to keep it simple] . who is to worry about me not being a mallu guy or an iyer boy ? I wouldn't. Is this a problem even in today's age ? C'mon people, why do these things still have to be part of bride/groom searches ? It'll be amazing to see 'caste no bar, religion no bar' on every matrimonial listing. That'll make things easy for lesser blessed souls like me !! he hee hehe

Enough for today i guess, will return with this topic another day. Time will have the answer to all my questions. Hopefully.

Love is god.... (Contd)

2008-12-13T09:15:00.000-08:00

Something that i wanted to say in my previous post, but forgot. Its something i've heard someone say..can't remember who or where.....Goes like this...

If someone hits you, you must not hit them back.

If someone hates you, you must not hate them back.

If someone does something wrong to you, you must not do the same to them.

But if someone loves you, you MUST love them back.

Was quiet heartening. I kinda started practicing it since the day i heard this.

Love is god, God is love

2008-12-12T20:41:00.000-08:00

He walked across the room and stood near him. His friend didn't look up. His friend looked worried. It was like all the joy was sucked out of his friend. He sat next to him and looked at him. Nothing again from his friend. Not even a pause in what he was doing. Looks like his friend is deeply focused on his work. Why wouldn't he look up ? why wouldn't his friend speak to him anymore ? Was it something he said ? It must be something he said. He regretted being indifferent to his friend earlier. He thought he should have treated his friend with due respect.

For all he had been and for all that he had not, he wanted to apologize to his friend, he wanted to erase everything from the face of his life like they never happened and wanted to start afresh.

Would his friend forgive him ? He knew he must take the step forward. He touched his friend's hand. His hand just melted like mist while the friend's hand remained intact. He didn't know what was happening. He couldn't touch his friend. If he tried to do so, his hand just went through his friend's body. Was this a dream ? No it wasn't. It looked like he was not for real.

There was a newspaper lying besides his friend. He noticed a photo on it. He immediately recognized it. It was his. When he went close to it and read the lines above the photo - "Boy loses life in a freak accident", he was stunned. It all came to him now. He did not live any more. He was a ghost !! A spirit or a soul !! He now had not a life where he can shower love and receive love. All the love and affection that he got from his family & friends, he ought to have returned them. He hadn't. He'd missed a life time. He cried out loud, no one would hear him.

Love your near and dear ones. You'll not get to do so when you are no more near them.

2008-12-04T21:35:00.000-08:00

I was driving my car to Subway for lunch and i switched on the music on my iPod like i always do. I always have the songs on it played at random (or 'shuffle' as it would have it) and it opened with the song 'Manmadhane' from the movie of the same name. Somehow it felt nice today to hear that song..... I had rediscovered the song.....it rejuvenated me today. Nice melody, nice rhythm, neat lyrics and a wonderful voice to top it off. Often music directors/singers talk of their hit songs having everything falling into place and this is definitely one of them. This has been one of my favourite songs, but today truly was a revelation.

At that moment i realized how driving in solitude could help relish the music on my car...... To think that i've been feeling lonely when i drive to office alone in the car, it really looks stupid now. Never thought travelling in a car alone would have its own advantages. There were so many instances when i would drive my car to/back from office, with music on and other people in the car would have something to talk about, unmindful of the music. Rather than putting up with it, i would turn the music down or increase the volume. Inspite of increasing the volume, people would talk on top of that making it all the more cacaphonic. Most of the time i would find myself playing a mute audience.

Too much of listening to radio turned me into a 'Random/shuffle' fan. I prefer songs playing in random fashion from various movies, to songs playing from the same album. Okay, Looks like i'm babbling a little over my quota today !! Just can't help this pleasant feeling today.....Hope it stays a little longer, though it may not extend onto eternity.

Oh yeah and so many questions pop up in my mind right now, before i end this mini scrap.

why am i still single ? No i don't want to get married yet. But i could do with some company.

Pretty looking girls.....hmmm......

where am i ? (like, in life) . Should i be doing what i'm doing in life now ? Or should i look for a change ? Yeah, strange questions before sleep engulfs me !! That's all for today...

Thanksgiving is done !!

2008-11-30T21:39:00.000-08:00

On the 7th day after my last post i have managed to squeeze some time to blog. I've been busy for the thanksgiving holidays, looking out for deals on electronic stuff and buying them. I can't believe the four holidays have passed by like a bullet train. Whatever i wanted to buy, deal or no deal, i bought them. I haven't had time to open some of them yet. Of course, the stores and the online shops are were brimming with deals, for Thanksgiving day, then the day after i.e, Black friday.

Then yesterday it was a holiday blow out sale for one day and it kinda continued today. Tomorrow has been rechristened as cyber monday - what the heck is that !! These greedy merchants just need another reason to sell their products.

Quite a handful weekend this was. Watched Transporter 3 on wednesday and found it to be entertaining. Absolutely aimless but entertaining.

Now my next count down is gonna be my vacation travel to india which is exactly 30 days from now. Also my next worry is on getting all these electronic stuff into suitcases and get them past the immigration in chennai. And talking of immigration and travel, this week also completes a year of my (first ever) stay in the US.

The holiday season starts here with the thanksgiving, you'd mostly have people going on vacations and in terms of work, should see less of it is my guess. Yes, we do live in perpetual hope of evading work and this season will make us less evil.

About the new cupboard from IKEA and Madagascar 2 at IMAX

2008-11-23T19:36:00.000-08:00

Ok, another weekend's done without much to write about. But it felt better than the previ0us ones in some ways. It felt so nice to have done some clean up work that i have been putting off for aeons now. I got a new small cupboard from IKEA, for storing some of my items that didn't have a place to go into and moved them all into it. Now my place is lot less like a mess. The cupboard was a DIY[Do-It-Yourself] item that you have to assemble with the wooden planks, out of the box, with all the screws and instructions. Building that cupboard was immensely satisfying and i thought it was time and effort well spent.

The other half of the day went in watching Madagascar : Escape 2 Africa, in IMAX. This is my first ever movie at an IMAX theater and i wasn't too excited about it at the end. Anyways, the movie was ok, had me laughing for a couple of scenes. Somehow i can't just help compare it to Ice age or Monsters Inc or some other animation movies that i have loved and thought this movie didn't shine well in comparison.

And today, i had nothing else better to do than eat and sleep all day. Wish i had better things to do. On the brighter side, for keeping it peaceful, i thank the gods above [gods above, huh ?..... makes me think of the two single women living above my apartment ;> ] .

QoS and Dostana

2008-11-21T09:42:00.000-08:00

Last saturday i saw Quantum of Solace, the new bond movie at the local theater. Another of the initial stories of Bond, another dark one just like Casino Royale. It takes off where Casino royale left. A nice action movie but doesn't excel Bourne ultimatum yet. Think bourne was the last movie that i enjoyed for its amazing action sequences.
And in the middle of the week, one night i went to Dostana just for the sake of passing some time. Based on my previous hindi-movie-watching i was expecting this to be nothing short of a disaster. Considering i don't speak hindi, it was not bad. Thanks to the subtitles, i could understand what was going on. Had good fun watching the movie nonetheless. Priyanka was awesome in the movie. Had me thinking....
Don't bollywood movies have any place in india to shoot ? Why are most of the movies based in some place in the US ? And where do they get all the money from ?

Couple of days to thanksgiving !! Can't wait !!

And the weekend is already here !! No hooray for that...Never been able to do anything quite enjoyable over the last few weekends. I may not Thank God Its Friday, After all.

Ta

Vaaranam aayiram

2008-11-19T11:56:00.000-08:00

If you came looking here for a review of this movie, stop reading and look elsewhere. This is a first hand account of my movie watching experience and i've not held back anything to myself.
Vaaranam aayiram is the recent Surya starrer directed by Gautam vasudev menon (that's how his latest movies carry his name), that saw the light of the day at last, when it released last weekend, after a long wait.The movie has three gorgeous-looking women in Simran, Sameera reddy & Divya, playing surya's opposites and surya has donned a father-son dual role in the movie. The movie, in short, talks of the bond between every father and his son. It is no guess that, before the end credits, Gautam lays this movie as a tribute to his father.
This movie had a lot of hype associated with it and i was no less excited about watching it. In addition to that, the music album of the movie had gone on to become a great hit, leaving no room for second thoughts about going for the movie on the first day.
Movie is a slow staright forward narration and it slowly unfolds with no cinematic knot or twist to it. Movies of this kind will have a tough time appealing to the masses and the front benchers.
For instance, this movie had more english dialogues than Quantum of Solace itself !! How about that ! I will be least surprised if this movie is dubbed in tamil and released again !!

I didn't know before watching this movie, that you'd be granted a US visa if you told the visa officer that you want to look for the girl that you love. Since when did the US embassy relax their visa rules ? As if that wasn't enough, the visa officer (an american) breaks down emotionally and wishes surya luck. Welcome to Indian cinema !!

And i almost forgot about the female leads in the movie. Sameera reddy dazzles in her tamil debut. Hopefully should see her around more. Simran and Divya too have shared the screenspace with Surya quite gracefully. Of course, they are saved of the attrocious dance sequences with 30+ insignificant mortals, a rarity in a Gautam movie. That's a Solace !! The scenes that had Sameera were quite clearly the rosier part of the movie, and the sole reason if one should see the movie again. And about Simran & Divya, think its 'Nuff said.

It is definitely laudable that Surya has worked on his physique and cut a great six pack to awe-inspire the audience. His acting too has achieved significant levels of greatness compared to his previous outings. May be its Gautam that brings the magic out of Surya !!
I personally expected much more from Gautam as a Director and to say the least i'm mighty disappointed. This movie didn't touch my heart or kindle my senses [at times made me sleep].
I came out of the hall exhausted and disappointed.

Ta

2008-11-09T21:42:00.001-08:00

Jus two more weeks to Thanksgiving, the fever is in the air already. I can't wait to grab a couple of things that i've waited for so far (And that's a big list) and i'm really excited about that. Last year i missed thanksgiving by a whisker - i landed here just after thanksgiving for my first ever time in the US. Have been waiting for thanksgiving since then..... a year long is a wait enough.

What are the things that i wish for ? Hmmm...lets say a Tera byte external hard disk under $100...... And Oh, i need a handycam, a projector, a digital piture frame, portable DVD player, a Digital SLR camera and some more stuff....... Not just these, i'm gonna acquire anything that's a steal., doesn't matter if i need it or not...he hee hee.... i'm gonna change myself to need it.... ;) I really can't seem to find enough words in the language to describe how excited i am.

Burn the days down !! Bring thanksgiving closer !! May there be greed !! May there be abundance of gadgets and deals !! May there be enough cash in the bank !!

2008-11-07T22:06:00.000-08:00

Another weekend has arrived and i welcome it with the same plans that i had for the last one. None. I have spent most of my recent weekends at home. How pathetic is that ? The weather's been good, i have no problems with the transportation and yet i have not found the ideal company to hang out. That's where the problem is. So many people around, yet i feel lonely. This is not the first time this is happening. There have been innumerable times in the last two and half decades where i've had to go through these rough patches. Not once have i liked it. May be i should stop whining, i don't feel better doing that. Looking at what best i can take from every second in my present and the future seems like the perfect thing to do now. Easier said.

Of course, i'm trying to keep myself occupied and shoo away the devil from working on my mind. But i don't seem to be enjoying the moments that i live through. I feel like i'm so under-living every moment that i want a second chance to do it right. I deserve better. I really think so. I'm going to seize every moment from now on and make sure it ends right and makes me feel good about it. I give a damn to any one or any thing that might stand between me and my happiness. For all the people who might drive me crazy, Screw You !!

Up Yours !!. I could, sooooooo, go on and on...... But i think its 'Nuff said !!

Of Daylight saving time, Friends and a birthday party

2008-11-02T20:16:00.000-08:00

Today daylight saving time ends in the US and Canada, which means we get an additional hour today to sleep. Woo hoo !! I woke up today looking at my watch showing 8:30 and realized it was 7:30 instead due to the end of DST. Did that felt nice.... you feel like you go back in time, by an hour and it seems you lived an hour that didn't officially exist anymore. That is cool !! Had some postive energy flowing all day. Apart from personal benefits, on the nature perspective, it turns out that the DST was being adopted to save energy during the summer. Cool again.

BTW, Friends is amazing. This sitcom was a favourite of mine, but never had the opportunity or the luxury of getting my hands on all the ten seasons. Now i do ! Through Netflix, i've rented all the 10 seasons of the Friends and i'm through with 4 seasons already, sequentially, in ascending order, should i say. It is amazing, can't wait to watch the rest of it.

Yesterday night we went to a colleague's birthday treat, at the Main event - to enjoy the night, bowling. Actually, i and a room mate of mine didn't know it was a birthday party. We just thought we were going for a bowling game like we usually do on the weekends. Once we were there, we were waiting to start the game and order a pizza as we were hungry. But earllier we'd been told by some colleagues of ours that they were planning to go to Main event for bowling and asked us we'd like to join. We thought it was gonna be the five of us. Little did we know that these guys were bringing more people and eventually the total was 12. It wasn't a problem to us. What was a problem is that we were now made to wait for the birthday boy to arrive and then its gonna be his treat. Since everyone else knew it was gonna be late before everyone reaches there, they all had something to eat before they came there. We guys having come to know of all this only after we reached there, were now left with no choice but to wait for the birthday boy, with all the hunger (which was adding fuel to the raging anger). If only we had been communicated in advance we would have been less frustrated. Boy, are these poor communicators of all..... What on earth was it gonna cost them, if they jus told us about this whole thing when they first asked us to come. I and my room mate just mumbled to ourselves and let the celebration get to us and we enjoyed the game. We didn't want to make a scene there, so just kept it to ourselves but swore to ask every single detail the next time we hang out (esp with these guys). Being single can drive you nuts too !!

Boring office days

2008-10-29T11:38:00.000-07:00

Its a boring afternoon at work now. Just finished my lunch and came to my seat about 30 minutes back. Feeling very sleepy and i might doze off any moment now. This is not the first time that i feel this way. It doesn't really mean that i'm work-less now. But its just that i've seen busier days. Got a few bugs to fix (what a bugger i am). Won't it get any better ?
Of course, i feel better than what i did a couple of weeks ago (some stress that i had). So, I thought my wish came true. May be i got used to it. Weekends are much better. Would prefer spending most of the weekends outside, but hardly get a chance to. But atleast i'm happy that they are not bad.

Ta

Tring... tring......Hello ?

2008-10-17T11:29:00.000-07:00

I hate ringtones. Not all of them. Just loud and jarring ringtones of some mobile phones. I hate it when people have these really loud ringtones which also sound crazy and annoying.They don't have to put them in silent/vibrating mode, but they can atleast keep it low, unless they want everyone to know that they are getting calls. I'm having to deal with some at the moment. Either these guys are partially deaf or they are going to end up making one out of myself.

Ta

New apartment & Garage, No cable connection and a new headset

2008-10-11T17:23:00.000-07:00

We (I and my room mates) are all pissed off. Because we were told we can't have the dish installed for DirectTv near our apartment owing to space issues and the unavailability of angle from our side of the apartment. Not even on the roof. The technician checked all the possibilities to install, but the attempts were in vain. WTF !@&#, we can't watch vijay TV now. DirecTV was the only one carrying it.

We moved to a new 2 bed apartment last month and we were planning to have DirecTV installed at the new place just for watching Vijay TV, we liked a few programs on Vijay TV. We were really excited about that. All that was flushed down the drain when we were told that we can't possibly have the dish installed.

I happened to get a new garage right below our apartment after we moved into the new apartment. This one proves advantageous, esp. in the winter coz you can drive your car into the garage and walk up to your apartment from within without exposing yourself to the outside freezing cold. I had a garage earlier too when we stayed in the older apartment, but it happened to be in another building and i had to walk a few yards to my building. Even walking a few yards when its terribly cold in the winter, is excruciatingly painful. The winter is approaching already, hope its not as cold as last year.

Had been quite a while since i fed my spending instincts and now it couldn't hold on any longer. I was looking out for the Aliph jawbone 2, a bluetooth headset that has the best ratings all around, expensive though. Last week i managed to snap one for a good price and the sweet thing arrived yesterday by mail. Came in a neat pacakaging with a good smart design. The headset itself is a thing of beauty and feels nice when worn. A good headset altogether.

As i keep myself busy in more things that i can buy, shall post more about them.

Will this change ?

2008-10-01T21:45:00.001-07:00

Off late i have a bad hangover(No ! i don't drink!!) and i don't know why. Maybe its a bit of frustration at work or a little of friction here and there with a few fellow mates. I don't seem to take any thing in the right sense, and the attitude of the people that i rub shoulders with everyday don't help the cause either. I wake up wanting to do so many things. When i sleep, i really don't look back at things that i did or didn't. So definitely its not a sense of dissatisfaction. So what is it ? Will this change ?

Good times have come and gone in my life before i have realized that they have passed by. This is not one of them. I've seen better times. Wish i can go back to those.

We always live in eternal hope wishing for good times and i'm in such a state now. I've begun to sincerely believe that life comes a full circle and that i would see light at the end of the tunnel i'm in right now. [Hopefully i wouldn't have to pen down such a blog then]. Anyways, to those that are reading this, may happy times be with you.

Leaving las vegas II

2008-10-01T20:42:00.000-07:00

Contd....

So at about 2 AM, it was time for the stratosphere to be closed and we were asked to leave the terrace. we came down and we realized we hardly any juice in us to walk back to the parking lot. With a mammoth-ean effort we reached the car and headed home, a busy day its been.

Oh, i forgot to mention about the Ka show that we went to on the first day, before we set off for Grand canyon. This was a show in the MGM grand and it was a spectacular show (like a musical play with stunts et all sans dialogues). With the stages moving like magic carpets leaving the artists floating in the air and backed up by a brilliant and thunderous musical score, this show simply captured the imagination. Nothing short of a visual and an aural treat, all the five senses were kept occupied throughout the show. The show is around 110 USD per head, but thanks to the friend who came with us, with his student id card, we all got a 30 dollar discount each on the ticket. Money well spent, we thought at the end of the show.

On our way back from the grand canyon, we happened to pass over the Hoover dam built across the colorado river. For the uninitiated, this is the dam that features in the recent movie 'Transformers' and some more movies like the Golden eye, and one other Harrison Ford movie i'm told. We had saved the photo session on the dam for our return back to las vegas from grand canyon. And now was the time, took a few minutes and spent a couple of clicks before we set off to vegas.

Cut back to the day after our return to vegas, we woke up pretty late in the morning after around 10 am (which is close to noon really) , we strode off to the remaining casinos in the sin city. we visited Caesar's palace, Venetian, Wynn - all casinos that also had other attractions built inside them. We rounded off the day with two shows, one at the Wynn which was a aquatic acrobatics show and another at the MGM grand - David copperfield's magic show.

We were immersed with the acrobatics show at Wynn - it was called the Le Reve - this again had amazing music and wonderful acrobatics stunts on water - the best i've ever seen.

To talk of the David copperfield show, we were simply spell bound (No pun intended).

We couldn't believe our eyes when a car appeared on the stage from thin air. There were a couple of other tricks that he performed that looked like less than ordinary but kept us entertained no doubt. At the end of the day, our pockets were lighter, so were our hearts.

There were atleast half a dozen shows at other casinos that we couldn't cram into our holiday schedule, managing just three of the best shows in vegas (that i talked of above) . If you are not the kind that wants to spend the night life at vegas boozing and gambling, these shows are a safe bet. I would recommend not missing the shows at vegas for a wonderful holiday, couples and singles alike. Having spent enough money and time on the best-holiday-of-life at vegas, we woke up on the fourth day to catch our morning flight back to Dallas, reaching home after about 2 in the afternoon. We retired for a good rest and there ended our holiday to vegas.

Leaving las vegas.....

2008-09-23T19:12:00.000-07:00

That was my second vacation trip inside a month...... This time to america's playgound, las vegas..... What a vacation this has been !! I was in awe with the city's grandeur and the effervescence that it shone with. No doubt las vegas is THE happening place in the US of A. Loved the ambience and the lively streets of vegas, especially the strip (Las vegas boulevard is called the strip. It has all the famous casinos of vegas and is simply the one stretch that lights up las vegas).

We spent the first day entirely on some of the casinos and lost some money (my friends did !! I held it back a little :-) ) All the casinos have lodging within themselves for guests who wish to spend time and money at leisure. They consist of attractions like malls and shows apart from housing casinos which are pretty much the ubiquitous beings in the city. Every inhabitable corner of vegas has atleast a score of slot machines (read money-eaters) which have great appetite for the green dollars. That i happened to wrest out 132 USD (i had put in $10) from one of these, is a fact that could easily feature in a Ripley's Believe it or Not !!

When we returned from the las vegas blvd, we set off to the grand canyon on a rental car, at 11 pm, hoping to beat the sun rise. But by the time we got the car and left vegas, it was 1 am. This was a 4+ hr drive from vegas till the grand canyon national park. We reached the South rim at about 5:35 am, just a dozen minutes or so before the sun rise. It was pretty cold out there in a stark contrast to warmer evenings in nearby vegas. The view of the gorge of the grand canyon was breathtaking and to think that a river has carved such deep incisions into an elevated plateau made it even more amazing. After finishing with the grand canyon, we returned to las vagas in the rental car at about 5 PM, with a lunch break in between. All tired, took some rest and only woke up at about 9 PM and set off for the saturday night life in las vegas. The streets were buzzing with tourist crowd and growing more active with the night. We had our dinner at about 2 AM after coming down from a 115-storeyed tower(only the top floor is a hotel) called the Stratosphere. The view of the sleepless city was awesome from there.

To be cont.....

Whose problem is it anyway ?

2008-09-11T18:22:00.000-07:00

I got shouted at. I got shouted at, in front of all my friends(we also work at the same place).

Who shouted ? Another friend. [Let's call him X]

Yeah..... it was pretty embarrassing alright. I didn't know what to do, i just ducked away sheepishly waiting for the heat to come down. We were midway into day one of our LA trip when we were deliberating on the next ride at Disneyland and most of them were fun and excitement. X comes in and asks us if there are any 'Soft' rides and i, in the fun mood that i was in at that moment, wanting to take a dig, said 'that ship is a softride and ......blah blah blah'. X got really angry and yelled at me for making fun. He went on saying i would know how he felt if i had brought my father along to the trip. Well that's what he did.

X's wife and his father also came along with us for the trip and X was having a difficult time seeing his father feeling weak and tired and not being able to cope with the rest of us or enjoy anything out there. Anger justified. But i didn't realize that X being a tough nut to crack was feeling the heat and getting cracked up. It was a catastrophe waiting to happen and i pulled the trigger. I was in my own fun cocoon and honestly, i didn't see what was coming. I didn't apologize. But that's just me... I was being myself taking a dig like i usually do. I didn't do anything wrong.... on a given day this would have passed up as another lighter moment. I take things light and that way, wish to overcome any difficult second i might be in.

But i began to think that i may have hurt someone (without intending to do so) who's not having a good time and should have apologized. I felt sorry for X, later.

All that's (hopefully) forgotten, X and I speak well now, but god knows if its over yet.

Whatever.......Gone's gone, marching forward burying all the little bitter moments and cherishing the larger sweeter moments is what I intend to do.

P.S - Just because i called him X doesn't mean i started hating him or i despised him after that. No names, that's all.

The City of Angels

2008-09-03T18:39:00.000-07:00

Just returned back from a long weekend trip to LA. 4 days of whirlwind touring around the Disneyland parks and Universal studios had me and all of my friends exhausted. Had a
FUN-tastic time after years - turned a kid, freaked out like the world was going to end tomorrow. One amazing city Los Angeles is. Wish i were working & living there. Didn't go much around the downtown, but whatever i could goto was amazing. [May be one more post later about all we did in LA, when i come back to my normal senses.] Disneyland and Universal were absolute amusement and worth all the money spent and distance travelled.

We wanted to holiday for the long weekend (Sep 1st - labor day in the US) and took a day off on the Friday leading into the weekend. We had planned this trip roughly 2 months ago and had booked air tickets then. Everything else, like the Hotel reservation, Car rental etc., kept happening in the run up to the trip. I pretty much thought this would be the last trip to anywhere in the US this year, before my india visit and was hell bent on making this trip a memorable one. I should say it turned out as expected. And this won't be my last visit to LA, but the first of many more to come. I missed the beaches this time, will ensure i don't, the next time around. It'll be some more days before the spell binding memories of the city and the magic of its angels leave me.

Ta

Once upon a time in kotturpuram......

2008-08-14T19:37:00.000-07:00

I've said before that i was caught speeding and fined once. Here's what happened.

It was a Friday. Dressed in a non-business outfit, i set off to office on my bike pretty late in the morning and sped across the traffic. It was close to 11:30 AM when i reached the AMM school signal on the kotturpuram road. I was one of the first to dart off the signal when it turned green and was flanked by two bikers. All of us at nothing less than 65 Km/hr.

Trying to inch ahead of them, i revved a little and in the process failed to notice the two men in the distance. By the time i realized that the men were really cops waiting to intercept speeding vehicles and fine them, it was too late. One of them, a constable, pointed his lathi stick at me and gestured me to stop by the side of the road. To this day, i'm surprised how the two bodyguards that were besides me managed to escape the constable's vision, though they were travelling as fast as i was and were also committing a violation as much as i was. Whoever they are, they were one hell of a lucky baskars !! (Yes, i did mean b#%&*). And i was not.

I stopped and parked the bike on the side of the road as i was asked to. There was a Sergeant standing by his bike and ready with a fine book, in a generous mood to dish out fines.

Though it looked very obvious why i was stopped for, with a hope that it wasn't for speeding I questioned the constable the reason for being stopped. He didn't beat around the bush - was spot on.

Cons - where are you working ?

Me - Software engr in XYZ company.

Cons - where is your licence ?

I promptly show my licence to him and he takes it into his possession and proceeds to ask.

Cons - Why were you travelling at that speed ? Should have been close to 70 !

Me - who me ? No i didn't (amazing.... i can lie). i can barely touch 50 on this... (Oh, i can lie without batting an eyelid !!)

Sergeant jumps in...

Sergeant - What non-sense? Shall i ride it at 70 and show it to you ?

I smiled sheepishly. I know it was a bad start to say my 125cc bike wouldn't cross 50 kph.

I didn't wanna give up. I remembered one of my friends telling me that cops usually will have their speed guns to track speedsters and show the speed on it as an evidence. These guys didn't seem to have one. I questioned.....

Me - You don't seem to have a speed gun. how do you say that i was going at 70 kph ?

Sergeant - We don't need speed guns to figure out your speed. We have enough experience to do that with our naked eye. Can you do that ? Now look ! there is a guy in white in the distance, on his bike. Tell me his speed.

Me - No, i don't see him (Trying to be non co-operative)

Sergeant - You can't see him ?! Then you must be blind, ha ha ha !. You are not even fit to drive then...... ha ha.

That's very funny Mr A**H*** !! What does this guy want with me ? why am i being f#&*^ up like this ?

Me - Tell me what the fine is ?

Sergeant - That's more like it. Spot fine is Rs 400.

Me - What ? 400 ? I don't have that much !! Look at my purse..... [i open my purse and show him. It has a few 10 rupee notes]

Sergeant - Then go get it. Don't bother trying to fool me again.

I could only think of an ATM near the signal that i crossed.

Me - I need to go to the ATM and bring the money.

The Cons is reluctant to let me off, but the Sergeant agrees.

Sergeant - You better get back quickly, remember.... we have your licence !

Having no choice, i U-turn at the signal ahead (opp Cancer Institute) and i head for the ATM, wondering how bad the day could be than this one. Unwillingly i collect the 400 bucks from my savings account and returned back to the spot i was caught. There were more people by now that have fallen prey. Nothing short of a feast for the policemen!!

The constable was standing alone and i approach him and tell him that i have the fine amount. He tells me to go to the sergeant and pay it to him. The sergeant is busy chiding someone who was caught speeding. When he's done with it, i just moved closer and stood before him. He filled up the receipt for the spot fine and asked me to sign at its bottom. I signed and waited for him to ask for the money.

He didn't. He took the licence from his bike bag and gave it to me and cautioned me to avoid this in the future. Duh ? Who's gonna take this money ? Doesn't anybody want this ? Maybe he thought i would have given the fine amount to the constable or may be he forgot that he's yet to take it from me !! Whatever, who cares !! With a wicked smile, i just turned around and literally did a houdini, with a disappearing act.....Off i go on my bike, naughtily giggling all the way to office. Couldn't help feel for the poor soul that's gonna be torn to pieces by the sergeant, when he realizes how he's been fooled and looks for a insect that he can shed all this anger on.

Mukundha mukundha

2008-08-10T08:33:00.000-07:00

My colleague's 7 month old kid prithvi is a born music lover. Atleast that's what it looks like so far. He seemed to like the song "Pehli nazar mein" from the hindi film Race, when he was just 4 months or so and no matter what he does, he will quit doing it and listen to the song. No other song captivates him like this. His parents exploit this weakness of his to feed him, make him sleep or to keep him quite. Its so funny that the song keeps playing on an endless loop all day long, in their apartment.

Prithvi's recent addiction has been the Mukundha Mukundha song from the movie Dasavatharam. His room is now transformed into a music room, that houses a music player and speakers and they have this song played endlessly. The song plays when he is eating, sleeping, not sleeping - whatever he does. Surprisingly, this ambience is required to keep prithvi sleeping. This will keep playing until prithvi shifts his liking to another song.This will do Himesh reshammiya proud for sure !!

Ta

A business day in my life

2008-08-04T18:05:00.000-07:00

Any week day....

6:30 AM - The alarm on the mobile goes off - its a song....whatever it is - my fingers dwiddle with the buttons to switch the alarm off. And then back to sleep......Zzzzzzzzz....

7:45 AM - The last guy leaves the bathroom and its free now. Time for action !! Get my bag of bones to get under the shower and out in a jiffy...

8:15 AM - Not out of the bathroom yet...... getting my contacts on (into my eyes). Bah....this lens is gonna get from me. Mr lens you better get in ! Or else you're gonna have the worst time of your life, I promise !!

8:20 AM - A billion dollar question.... What to wear for office today ? Formal ? Infomal ? partly formal ? which pair of trousers don't look bad with which shirt ? .....i always fear one day i'm gonna wear a green shirt, with a blue pant to match with white shoes....I have absolutely no dressing sense and i have to put up with this ordeal every single day in my life !! Why don't they have uniforms for office ?

8:45 AM - Pressed and dressed in whatever felt pleasing.....Oh my god this takes a lot of time everyday, before i leave home for office.......will deal with this later.....Now for breakfast......

9:10 AM - As i check my gmail and deals2buy, An omlette and a cold coffee (courtesy starbucks) are delivered to the digestive system.......

9: 15 AM - Pick up my car keys , Lock the house and leave for the garage which is miles away, actually a couple of steps' walk.

9: 17 AM - Head to office, with some nice music from the ipod through my car's music system......
9:28 AM - Reached office. Now find a shade and park the car, its too hot these days.....You dont want to sit in a furnace when you come back after a few hours !! Finding a suitable shade is quite a task. Need to figure out which way the shade of the tree is gonna be when the sun moves as the day progresses.....what the heck.....

Oh yeah, i forgot to tell you - i'm supposed to be at office by 8 AM everyday and i end up being around a couple of mins late (90 to be precise), EVERY SINGLE DAY !!

9:32 AM - After a few mins of walk, reach the desk and sit down. Open up the laptop and start looking at the official mails......Everybody around looks to be busy.......Me too joining the club !!

10:00 AM - Looking busy.

10:15 AM - Still looking busy.

10:45 AM - Yes.

11:15 AM - "Shall we ?". "Huh, what ? so early for lunch ?", i ask. "Its late, actually" is the reply.
Well, their faces said it. "Alright, fine. Give me 5 mins"

11:35 AM - Let's save petrol, lets do car-pooling. Pick up one of the cars and leave for home for lunch.

11:45 AM - Reach home and ponder over what to have for lunch !! Hastily cook something and fill your stomach with it.

12:50 PM - Time to get back to office

1:15 PM - Reach office for the rest of the day at work. Immediately get into looking busy !!

2:30 PM - Witness people leaving office already.

3:30 PM - Most of the day's work is done. Rest is for tomorrow !!

4:30 PM - Drive the car out to return home, but the car drives itself to KFC or Chick-fil-a.

5:15 PM - Reach home and start to tinker on my laptop. Go through tech websites, mobile phone reviews, browse through gadget gyan, scan film news, what's happening back in india ? all that stuff.......

8:45 PM - Time for dinner. Lets meet together to arrive at a critical decision......What to cook ?

9:15 PM - Start cooking.....well, something.

9:45 PM - Dinner's ready..........

10:30 PM - Stomach is filled........now for some movie or something interesting to watch on techsatish or tubetamil, until sleep takes over.....

1:30 AM - Sleep appears on the horizon and i'm taken over. Good nite.
I'm older by another day !

Ta

Greener grass

2008-08-04T17:27:00.000-07:00

Another day goes by. Feel like all the juice in me is being sucked up..... Not just this place, but my life too is going dry. Days are adding up to my life, with hardly any life added to the days. My job is not helping the situation either. It was better at offshore. Lot better. Miss those days. Had a plan for every weekend, rain or shine. Be it the sathyam cinemas for a new release, Freaking out at Mahabs, a cup of coffee at the Ashvita/Coffee day or a fun filled evening at Mayajaal or even hanging out at the office - never had a dearth of hangouts. We even spent time at office and never felt bored. Lot less time, yet more joy.
I will keep going on.....this will never stop. Of course, never felt i would be in a dry phase like this, talking about my greener minutes in life. Could have stayed in chennai forever !! The grass was greener on this side.

Subramaniyapuram

2008-07-28T21:03:00.000-07:00

This movie is all about betrayal, love and murder staged in the rustic madurai of the 80s. The fulcrum of the film is a couple of youngsters that get guiled into becoming rogues, eventually end up committing cold blooded murders for which they themselves fall prey to and lose their lives. The major part of the movie takes place in 1980, shuttling between present day and back, for a few minutes. What forms the end of the film is something you'll not be prepared for.

A bold theme and a clear screenplay walks us through the entire length of the movie with awe striking reality. Since all (or atleast most of them) are new actors, its a breath of fresh air that fills up the entire characterization. The director himself debuts in an important lead role which incidentally marks his debut directorial venture as well [He has also produced it]. The 80s madurai has been wonderfully portrayed, especially the songs played on the radio and the release of super star's hit film "Murattu kaalai". Other little nuances that are visibly explicit like the costume of the male characters, the lambrada scooter, the TV model and the video of the old songs playing on it are well thought out. The director definitely deserves appreciation here.

Laudable performances form the movie's forte. Stunning revelations are Samuthirakani who plays the antagonist and Ganja karuppu who has acted in a supporting role that has more than humour in it. Jai (of chennai 28 fame -rockers raghu) who plays the lead shines but only in certain scenes. One instance when he cries out loud that he is instilled with the fear of death and another in the climax when he learns (in his dying moments) that he is turned in by none other than his own love are notable observations. The female lead played by a new face swathi too deserves a praise here when she wails out loud realizing the mistake that she has done. [what happens to her in the end is not told]. Otherwise she walks in and out of every frame like a doll.

James vasanthan (who we all know as a tamil tv comperer) scores music for this film and has come out with bright colours in his debut. The song "Kangal irandal" bears testimony to that and james has done a commendable job in the background score too.

Overall this is a gripping story that binds us to the movie. Worth a watch for its bold approach and refreshing story line. Simply put, this is a no nonsense movie and will be ranked among the good movies. 4 stars out of five.

Ta

Once upon a time, when i drove a car.......

2008-07-24T07:49:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine read my post on my passion for driving. We caught up with each other in a chat online and he reminded me of an embarassing experience. This post is the result of that. Though i had forgotten about this incident, he apparently didn't seem to have. You'll know why, when you are done reading this post.

My office was in perungudi at that time and it was a make-shift arrangement before we permanently would move to a new building further down the old mahabalipuram road.My driving was still in its nascence and I wasn't quite comfortable yet driving a car at that time, though i was looking forward to every chance that i could bargain. This is one of them.One of my colleagues(lets call him Mr M) drove to office everyday in his santro and i asked him if i could drive his car once. Refusing at first, unable to put up with my persistent nagging he gave in. Conditionally.
Mr M agreed to let me drive, with him besides me and certain conditions.....i should drive slow and not try anything silly on the road....and blah blah blah blah....... The industrial estate roads around the office were a perfect fit for 'child' drivers like me, with not much traffic on it. I started driving the car with a lot of pride and care (very slowly), like an astronaut driving a shuttle to the Mars. The car rolled on pretty smoothly and i was getting comfortable with it. After a couple of lefts and rights we hit a dead end. The road wasn't wide enough to make a turn around, so M asked me to back up so that we can turn left and then return back to office(he must have had enough of baby-sitting my driving). Now reversing a car isn't my cup of tea, but i put the car in reverse (gear) and very reluctantly stepped on the pedal, looking behind. The car started moving back and as i was beginning to think if i have backed up too much, THUD -- there was a sound as if to say 'Yes' !! and one side of the car was buried into the road. There was a ditch on the side of the road and one of the rear wheels went into the ditch causing the car to precariously hang in balance on the side (Driver's side !!) .
Mr M was so mad at me for driving the car into a ditch and was shouting at me to get off the car. He tried to drive it back up from the ditch, but the engine power wasn't enough to bring the wheel of the car out of the ditch. We tried to push the car out from the ditch, but failed miserably. Eventually we had to seek the help of a passer-by to move the car and the wheel out of the ditch. With the assistance of me and the passer by pushing the car from behind, M was at the steering wheel giving all the throttle. After a few frantic moments, the car climbed out of the ditch, much to our relief. M vowed to never ever let me drive his car again. Though there was no public embarrasment as there was no one else on the road, in an effort to prevent any damage to my reputation, i begged M to keep this from everyone at office. Somehow he agreed.

To this day this has remained a secret. It has seen the daylight now, thanks to this post and my friend's reminder. He'll be a happy soul now, laughing at the dent on my image, whatever little i have.

Ta

A baby's learning power

2008-07-19T15:44:00.000-07:00

Today i was playing with Vijay's 6 months old kid Prithvi,[Vijay is my colleague and neighbour] and i was watching him try really hard to grab the pepsi can that i was holding. He's not on his 4 feet yet, and just about manages to crawl to whatever he wants. I learnt that it'll be another month or so before he can move on all fours......he makes sounds like he is talking to us and wants to tell us something......it made me wonder what must be going through the brain inside that little head......Does he really know that whatever he wants to say is not understandable by any adult ? Well... the vice versa is something we'll never know, i'm sure.
He's not going to grow up and say "Look, you told me this one day when i was a 6 month old baby and this is what i understood" right ?
When he learns to speak from the people around him, his glossary would have built up and the accent his speech would take, would be that he hears most.......Its really surprising to see the capability of the human brain to learn so much in a short time. He's definitely learnt a lot and does a lot of things that he didn't 4 months ago......I've always had this thought whenever i play with babies like these.

Ta

Eeemineee.....Eeemineee

2008-07-18T18:17:00.000-07:00

Got to listen to this new song from the movie 'Sakkarakatti', sung by chinmayi, 'I miss u da' and it starts with the words "Eeemineee.....Eeemineee" - An alluringly crazy humming that made me like this song. Like all ARR songs, this too is slowly growing on me and is increasingly becoming difficult to take it off my mind.......Oh yeah, this film has music by AR Rahman.

I'm stumped with the way chinmayi goes about rendering the song with all the oomph.... makes me wonder if she is under such an emotional travail in reality. Hard to believe that its her singing, with all the husky tone to the song.

Way to go, chinmayi !! One more inch closer to the pinnacle !!

Ta

With your two eyes

2008-07-17T22:46:00.000-07:00

No i wasn't trying to hit bull's eye with an attractive title here, just a bit too lazy to think of a title for this post. Translation of the two words the song starts with...... Thought it was apt for the song i'm gonna talk about.

Kangal irandal - a new song from the movie Subramaniyapuram, has been on a loop on my system for the last couple of days since last week. Its a brilliantly composed song and well sung, all credits to the male and the female voices (supposedly their debut). James vasanthan, the only anchor on tamil TV channels that i know of, who speaks unblemished tamil, is the composer.

The song had me mesmerized since the first time that i listened to it. Such captivating orchestration and amazingly soothing lyrics that blend together, melts your heart like creamy ice cream.....No points for guessing what i'm listening to at this moment, as this post is taking life........

P.S. : Learnt that this song is on a raaga called reethigowla (carnatic purists, beg your pardon if i didn't spell that right :) ), there have been songs before composed using this raaga. here's the list....

1. Chinna kannan azhaikkiran - kavikkuyil by Ilayaraja
2. Thalayai kuniyum thamaraiye - By ilayaraja
3. Azhagana ratchasiye - Mudhalvan by AR Rahman
4. Meetadha oru veenai - Poonthottam by Ilayaraja

Ta

Driving cars & bikes

2008-07-14T20:58:00.000-07:00

I like driving. Driving cars, driving bikes.......For the same reason, i like racing games.
Driving pleasures me unlike anything. The sense of satisfaction and the instant gratification is unparalleled to anything on earth. I can't remember since when i took to driving with such passion. I didn't ride a cycle till i was 15. Amidst a lot of embarrasment, I was pushed to learn cycling in the vaction that followed my 10th board exams. Within a year i could drive a geared motorcycle sans help and there's no looking back since then. Bought myself a Discover 125 Cc after i started to goto work. Office was 25 kms from home and hitting 100 kph on a regular basis on my bike, on the way to office and back was never going to be surprise. God smiled at me when the IT corridor was extended and relaid with more lanes to make it a speedway. I had to travel back home pretty late in the night most of the time and i preferred it too. That way i got to keep trafffic and house chores away. Made sure there is just enough time for me to sneak in , eat something and hit bed, for a good night's sleep !!

I would wade through all the traffic from Anna arch to choolaimedu through nelson manikam road and then hit tnagar via mahalingapuram. Out of tnagar onto mount road through venkatnarayana road and then it is chamiers road headed to kotturpuram. One straight road till the cancer institute[where you hit 80 comfortably] where its a dead end and then skid onto madhya kailash, where the whole city is waiting for you, or..... well.. for the traffic to clear, of course. From then on its another 10 kms of IT highway to office, bliss as i would call it.
Would take me anywhere between 45 to 90 mins for the entire journey.
Its a lot less on the way back home - same route though. One night, I reached home in 22 mins flat.

Well, you may wonder if i was never caught speeding. I was, once. Its another story what happened at that time, but its, proportionately, way too less for 10 years of driving in the fast lane.

I miss it a lot now....Driving back home at such a high speed....with headphones tucked in my ears, inside my helmet. With the radio on, listening to all the good(new) songs and the RJ that somehow keeps me awake. (Thanks to the RJ, i was still on the road)

Later on, I began to goto office by the new santro that dad bought. [he seldom went to office by car]. I enjoyed driving a car to office too, but never as much as i enjoyed a bike. Now i own a civic, but then rules of the game have changed here.

Ta

Date

2008-07-14T17:57:00.000-07:00

Me : Excuse me !!
She : Huhm...ya ?!
Me : Hi, i need to talk to you for a moment. Will you have the time ?
She : You want to talk to me ? What about ?
Me : I'm afraid i can't say that here, in public.
She : (Rises slowly from her chair smiling mischievously and gestures to her friends on the table that she'd be back)

At the Far east desolate corner, we stand facing each other.

Me : I wanted to ask you out. Out for a date......
She : what ?.... Are you a jerk ? (surprise).......you don't even know me.....i don't know you.....And...
Me : [Isn't that reason enough to go out on a date ?] That's precisely one of the reasons we have to go on a date. I need to know more about you and you about me.
She : is this some kind of a joke ?
Me : No its not. Let me explain. I know that your father works in this(un-name-able) institute and you also stay in the same campus. I found out your mobile number and your landline. I learnt that you wrote the [DOG ?!?!] exam, made it to the shortlist of this-famous-business-school, but didn't get through.
She : Don't be a freak ! Tell me why you are doing all this.....
Me : I like you. I think you are pretty. You have captured my imagination like anything.
She : what made you think i'll go out with you.....
Me : Actually, nothing. We all live in perpetual hope and its the same hope that pushed me to do this today.
She : What hope ?!?!? i don't want to go out with you, esp. on a date !!
Me : why not ?
She : I dont want to answer questions like that !! I dont have to !! I can't believe i'm talking to you !! nonsense you are......

Turns her back and walks away from me quickly to her table.

So the dream ends.........This too isn't real, but i'm awake.

Yes, madam

2008-07-09T23:11:00.000-07:00

Have you had a woman boss at work ? I have. Almost every alternate project that i worked on were led by managers who were women ....Incl my current assignment.....
what's with these woman bosses ? The ones that i have met so far were all aspiring, career oriented and dominating.....they would have the last word, any day. No matter how irrelevant they talk.....They've had, and will have, men nodding in silence, thanks to the organizational hierarchy, inspite of completely knowing that these eves dont make any sense at all.
My previous project manager got promoted thrice in three years.... This rarely happens in our company....Its even harder to believe that coz she hardly works....never seen her interested in any kind of work....She never had the knowledge or the ability to learn and work.......she never fails to delegate most of our managerial tasks to her subordinates and stays at home half the time, with a "Working from home" notice.......she's wastes her time (and everybody else's)in meetings to discuss or learn about what happened or is happening in projects. For all the above reasons, she's despised by everyone in the account. Constantly in pursuit of any kind of feather that she can add to her hat.......you tend to hate such people and wish you never see them again, but you don't have a choice.....
Another manager of mine was as dominating and arrogant as this one, but atleast not as bad. This one was technically sound, but was a bit too pushy........Women bosses are pushy......Climbing the ladder in one's career is what everyone would wish for.....but hey, not at the cost of other people, especially those that work hard and go unrewarded just because you took the credit away from them for your selfish ulterior motives.

Women bosses, listen !! be open minded......don't just cut people off with your self righteous attitude and arrogance.. Its time you appreciated people working under you and and their work, and respect them. Allow people to grow with you !!

I wish i never have to work under women bosses again, atleast not such dominating ones......

Ta

Sweet sweat

2008-07-01T09:51:00.001-07:00

I don't know if that title makes sense or not, but it kinda gists what i have been appreciating for the last 10 mins or so. This is what happened.

Today is yet another hot day, I was just driving back home for lunch when i was listening to my ipod in the car and like a cold breeze, the lyrics .....

Female voice : Un vizhigalin veyilil yen viervai inikkudhe..
Male : Un punnagai ninaivil yen thookkam tholaindhadey.....

Wow, I couldn't help appreciating these lines !! The meaning and the affection that it brings about.....I never gave attention to these lines all this long..... I liked some other lines of this song when i heard them the first time......

Male : Yennai pola yevarum unnai kaadhalikka mudiyaadhu
Female : Mudiyum yendraal kooda avanai kaadhalikka mudiyaadhu

And this has been a favourite song of mine, for various reasons..... It only got better.......
Nice.......

Ta

Strike

2008-06-29T22:16:00.000-07:00

I jus returned from bowling in which i spent today's evening. No, not in cricket, The snow bowling....
When i was in college, my friends used to go for bowling almost every weekend. I considered it an expensive timepass then and was never game for it (pun unintended). Moreover i was never given pocket money and if i told my parents that i wished to go for snowbowling they'd never allow me to....they mostly don't allow me to do things that they might not understand.......i don't blame them, any body else would do the same.........Now things have changed. I'm on my own and with time, my interest in the game has grown. Now, i and a few like-minded colleagues go for bowling in the weekends. Never thought i could take to this game with this kind of an affinity.......At the end of the bowling session, the wallet feels lighter, so does my heart......

Ta

Dasavatharam

2008-06-29T16:30:00.000-07:00

Its been two weeks since i saw this movie in the theatre and here i narrate my account of the experience watching the movie.

Dasavatharam looks technically brilliant, considering the technical difficulties and the crew deserves a lot of appreciation. The CGI involved in the tsunami scene and glueing together multiple kamals in the same scene (wherever required) is laudable.
Kamal plays 10 roles in this movie, in an attempt that's world cinema first.
Awe inspiring enough, the initial 15 mins of the movie introduces kamal as one ranga rajan nambi in the 12th century who fights the Shaivism-obsessed kulothunga cholan from uprooting the vishnu idols and fails as the king orders to have nambi submerged with the idol in the deep blue. Kothai, wife of nambi kills herself at this sight. The stupendous camera work and the visual grandeur of the sets aid the gripping prelude so far. Then the story walks into the present day and fails to remain as taut as the prelude, till the end.
Govindan, a scientist in an american biotech research centre, discovers a deadly virus which is sought by some people and Govindan's chief is monetarily interested in helping them. How the protagonist protects the virus from getting into their hands and keeps it from spreading is what forms the rest of the story.
Kamal delivers astounding performance in playing the 10 roles, simply overwhelming the rest of the cast. As balram naidu, RAW officer, kamal sets the theatre ablaze with his impeccable comic timing and a humourous accent. One another novel(notable) character is Vincent Poovaraagan, who protests illegal sand quarrying and arrives momentarily to save andal(asin) from those thugs. In an animated bush, kamal tickles the rib again, nevertheless the rest of the kamals barely look convincing to stick to the script. Asin plays dual roles as 12th century Kothai and present day Andal, though ends up annoying us with her frequent ramblings and stupid accusations against the lead male.

Mukunda mukunda sung by sadhana sargam stays on our lips and kallai mattum by hariharan deserves a worthy mention, but the remaining songs fail to impress.

The bottom line is - less impact. The script doesn't require 10 roles, in the first place. Albeit, the technical brilliance, the movie fails to touch your heart. You walk out of the theatre disappointed as it doesn't live up to its expectations and wondering where all the money went.

3 stars for the technical brilliance.

Ta

What landed me in my first job

2008-06-29T00:16:00.000-07:00

Its funny now if i have to recollect how i got into a job that i have now. My job as a Software engineer in the one-of-india's-top-five-IT-companies company.
I had one more exam in the final semester the following week that flagged an end to my engineering course and the weekend before that, the placement center in our college wanted all of the final years to attend a campus interview by this company. We were the first batch to pass out of the college and had really none of the leading companies visit our college to recruit.
I came to know of this interview through a class mate and i wasn't too confident of cracking the interview and wasn't interested in attending it.... But this guy insisted and for fun's sake he asked me to accompany him to the interview. I did. The rest is a comedy.

Saturday, 22 May 2004
8 AM
Reached college to find anxious boys and girls meticulously going through the aptitute test question banks and pondering over analytical & mathematical concepts and puzzles that involved them. It almost looked like a war zone with not one in the vicinity that was indifferent..... indifferent like i was. Beads of sweat sprouted out of my forehead and started their downward journey along my face..... I didn't know if it was the morning sun or because of the mere sight of devoted guys preparing as if this was their last chance of survival before they are to be buried 10000 feet under the earth's crust for eternity.

We were allocated different halls to write the aptitude test and i came out after finishing the test, feeling fairly satisfied about the performance, not worried about the results though. These guys were incredible again. Once again you have all these highly intelligent guys grouping up to discuss the questions and their answers. I felt i shouldn't have overheard them, for i heard them mention the answers, that were the exact opposite of what i had chosen.....with logical derivations to rub the salt in. I began to feel that i was right about not being able to beat these guys, in the first place. All the hope i had, burst like bubbles when they said only the top 10 percent of the total would qualify for the next level, Group discussion. My anguish and disappointment was shortlived......To my surprise and shock, I cleared the aptitude test and even more surprisingly found that the some of the guys who were discussing the answers earlier didn't make it. A shot in the arm indeed for the next level and i felt like shouting out "Bring it on, now".

2 PM - After lunch same day

Walked into a hall that we were asked to goto for the group discussion and there were a couple of students and a lady.This lady who was to coordinate the GD, briefed us what the topic is gonna be. She had barely finished and someone started off in a ziffy in a knee jerk reaction.... well, it was me !! Faces in the hall turned towards me. Not the one to be least bothered about what they thought, i went on talking and then the rest joined in to make it a discussion. After the discussion, when we were all waiting, the results came out. I couldn't believe i had cleared it yet again. This would qualify me and 100 others to attend a final tech/HR interview the next day, at the company premises.

Well i forgot to tell this. The guy who i said insisted that i accompany him for the campus interview, ironically, didn't clear the aptitude.

Sunday 23 may 2004

Went to the company's office and began waiting in the lobby like others were. My fellow college mates. After an hour or so, we were seated in a conference room and we all started talking, playing and having fun, as if we were at an amusement park. Luckily no one did anything attrocious enough to get caught !!
I went into the interview room when i was called in....It was all new to me and i had never been interviewed for a job before(obviously)......A male and a female were the interviewers and what caught my eye was a piece of cake on a small plate that was placed on a desk next to the female. Whatever they asked, i rolled my eyes away from them to think and the eyes kept catching the piece of cake. I was beginning to feel if they would notice this and think that i'm hungry, and might even ask me if its disturbing me. Certainly, it would have been embarassing. Fortunately they never did and i came out with a sense of completion. They'd yet to announce the results, but having completed the interview cooled me down. Then the announcement came. I was in the selected list, didn't know how to react......what started off as a casual saturday outing turned out to be a career-decider for one. It was indeed a great feeling to know that you don't have to worry about looking for a job anymore, neverthless having an exam to go. This feeling didn't sink for sometime and really don't know how i managed to write the last exam and clear it.

Life is not just beautiful, its crazy

Ta

A bizarre dream

2008-06-28T10:14:00.000-07:00

There is this bizarre dream that i wanted to talk about, or rather blog about. Its kinda strange what happened in the dream..but that's what dreams are made of, isn't it ? It goes like this.....

Gowrisankar(gowri as we call him) is holding a wedding invitation of this girl i had a crush on.
Was it just a crush or more than that ? I don't know, but i was deeply depressed at the sight of the invitation. gowri felt sorry for me, i could see it on his face. He knew what this girl meant to me and did realize that it wasn't any where close to comfort in learning that this girl i liked is getting married to some one else soon. Can't this be stopped ? What do i have to do to stop it ? Or should i ?
I knew this girl for quite some time now. The first time i saw her i was dumbstruck and the poor english language has few words (or none) to describe that beauty. Lunch was the time i got to see her in the cafeteria everyday.....boy, was i waiting for that. Each passing day my liking for her grew in stature. All these days, never spoke to her...not even once. I never had to...We had mutual friends, but never thought of using them to strike a silly conversation. Somebody every now and then would tell me that i need to talk to this girl, but i never did.
And today the sight of the wedding invitation with her name on it drove me nuts...
why does it have to end like this ? have i made a mistake in not talking to her, even once ?
Now all of a sudden my heart feels heavy.........feels like its being crushed by a thousand tons of rock....pain is too small a word now compared to what i was going through.

"Oh wait", an excited gowri says...."Look at this !!"

"Oh no i don't want to see that again, its unbearable, gowri....i can't......Please take it away from me, can't take it anymore....."

"No, you should take a look at it, for god's sake !!", he said putting down his finger on the invitation.
Composing myself with all my will, like a child who doesn't want to have an injection i so reluctantly looked at the wedding invitation and barely focused my eyes to the point that gowri had his finger on. The groom's name looked familiar. My focus increased exponentially.
Goodness gracious !! its me !! i couldn't believe my eyes, I'M THE DAMN BRIDE GROOM. My joy knew no bounds and was on cloud nine [10, 11 maybe ;)]. Celebrating i jumped onto the table to do a little dance. And blinded by the rosiness of the moment, without realising what i was doing, in a wrong footing, lost my balance and i could see the marble floor approaching really quick and fast....rather i was going down towards the marble floor, face down....Thud !! Ouch !! it hurts......hurts badly.....

I get up to see that i have just woken up from a dream, falling off the bed as a result.
My face and my shoulder are still hurting from the fall...

To me the dream is strange and what makes it stranger is how a dream could have things that you never thought of, consciously. I happened to read somewhere that your dream mostly consists of what your brain has come across before as a thought or something that your eyes have seen.

Ta