The new year greeting dilemma

It's that time of the year again, the time when cellphone companies overcharge you for sending that 160 characters new years message to every friend, acquaintance and nemesis on your address book. But now since we are all working people the price is not the dilemma i am talking about, The dilemma is choosing the right message.

There are some unwritten rules that i like to follow when it comes to forwarding greetings, the most important one being - A person must not receive the same message from 2 or more friends belonging the same friend circle, it is acceptable only if the 2 friends sending the same message are from different friend circles. I know it might be a little difficult to accomplish but i have a plan of action. A technique which i like to call "message recycling"

The process is pretty simple, the first step is to identify the different "friend circles" that exists within your friends. This helps because if you receive a message from person A, you can quickly identify based on the friend circle which other friends person A must have send the message to, and you can avoid forwarding the same message to them. Instead, you have a fresh new message to forward to other friends who do not know person A. And if you get a message from person B, who is not in the same group as person A, you can forward that message to person A and his group. Sounds simple doesn't it? It will get even more simpler if everyone starts following the same process, we will have a lot more unique messages to choose from.

Anyway, i found myself in a similar situation today so it was time to scan the inbox for potential good new year greetings to send to people, unfortunately all of them were pretty lame so i had to improvise. I thought of sending just a "happy new year!" but it was too short of a message. A couple of minutes later heres what i came up with - "Happy new year! since everyone else is saying it". You know your new years greeting was a success when you get a reply saying "That is the funniest newyears greeting ever! not! stop being such a wise ass all the time"

Christmas? is it?

Its 12:00am , 25th December. They say its Christmas, but something just doesn't feel right. For some strange reason it just doesn't feel like Christmas this year. I spent a good hour pondering but i still have no clue why. Sure, the streets are lit up, there's a Christmas tree set up in one corner of the room, there's a star shining bright outside the window, the SMS greetings are pouring in, but it still feels as if something is missing, the festive mood has not yet set in. It feels just like any other ordinary day, like Mr. Grinch came out of the story books and stole christmas for real.

What makes it worse is that people who you hardly ever speak to normally will want to wish you a merry christmas. Once you're done with the text book response of "wish you the same", you are burdened with the task of keeping the conversation alive, even though both of you know theres nothing much left to say and you have nothing in common to talk about. It can get really ackward and uncomfortable at times. Thats one of the reasons I don't like festivals much, you have to wish everyone, even those you hardly speak to, just because of this abstract little thing called courtesy. Anyway, I will stop here for fear of taking away whatever christmas spirit the readers may have left.

PS: for what its worth, heres wishing you a merry christmas!

The zinger and me

I finally gave into the temptation, the advertisements were too much for me to handle. I just had to try it at any cost. After 2 weeks of trying to convince different sets of friends, success finally came my way when my college friends agreed. Fate would finally find it in its heart to let my taste buds meet the much awaited zinger burger. The date - 21st December 2008, the place - KFC bandra. Getting there was not easy, despite it being December and winter being the expected season, it was drizzling. Being me, i decided to go by bike and eventually learnt it was a bad idea, the roads were so slippery that it was like riding on ice. But there was no way i was going to let that stop me from getting to the delicious fried chicken, i had waited long enough. After 1 1/2 hour of riding through traffic jams and roads which were so slippery that they could give banana peels an inferiority complex, I finally reached my destination. Without much hesitation we stood in line to place our order. I tried convincing the guys to order a bucket of chicken along with the burgers but they all said they weren't hungry. What kind of guys aren't hungry for a bucket of fried chicken anyway? After failing to convince them I ordered for the zinger meal which consists of a zinger burger, a piece of fried chicken and a glass of coke.

True to their tag line, the chicken was finger lickin' good. It was mouth watering, juicy, delicious and totally worth the 135 bucks by which it made my wallet lighter. I left the place a happy man, and a little heavier than i was when i got in. Having chicken without a chilled beer to drown it in is a sin, so we hopped across the street to Mumbai times cafe and ordered for a pitcher of beer to accompany the fried chicken that must have been getting lonely in our stomachs by now. The ambience of the place is really nice. It was a treat to the taste buds and the retro-reggae-rock genre of music that they kept switching between was a treat to the ears, albeit a little too loud to hold a conversation. Despite having the word cafe in its name, we were not allowed to sit for long as there were people waiting so we headed out to spend the next few hours at carter road discussing the weekend getaway plans. A couple of hours later we were done with our usual "intellectual" discussions and we decided to go on a bike trip the next weekend. But keeping in mind our groups fondness of canceling plans, the chances of it materializing are slimmer than an anorexic supermodel. That being done, I rode on home, this time on dry roads and reached home at 12:30am.

I feel like blogging - Things that annoy me - part III

All this while i have been blogging about my short trips, its been a long time since my last ranting session so here i go. There are so many things to complain about that its hard to decide where to begin.

Lets begin by referring to my last post about blocked ears, my ears still show no sign of giving up their strike and are adamant on remaining blocked. At least the right one is. It gets irritating when you are forced to hear every word that you speak, every bite that you take while eating, the bristles of the toothbrush rubbing against your teeth every morning, its just annoying. All this because of a cold. I wonder why our doctors haven't managed to find a cure for the common cold, is it because they are all too busy working on cancer? or is it one huge conspiracy between the pharmacies and doctors since the common cold is a major source of their income? But they say every cloud has a silver lining. My silver lining is i get to pretend that i can't hear people, especially the annoying ones.

Now that i got that out of my system, lets move on to the next thing that bothers me - work. I have to wake up early tomorrow to attend a training session on six sigma. Six sigma has been made mandatory for us and we have innumerable training sessions to attend where we eventually end up learning how to throw coins into a waste bin. At the end of it, we need to do a project to get six sigma certified. My idea was to do a project which measures the amount of time that can be saved if we quit learning six sigma, but i have a feeling that it will be frowned upon.

Another new development at the work place is this 2-3 week program, A new way of improving employee fitness. Its really simple, they just shut down the washrooms and water cooler room on our floor under the pretense of renovating it. This forces us to run downstairs to the 4th floor every time we need to get a glass of water or need to use the washroom and then run back upstairs. It must be amusing to the person sitting on the 4th floor between the staircase and the washroom doors to watch people walk in through one door and enter the washroom and then again walk back out of that door and then out through the main door and back to their floor. They can even maintain a log on how often each person goes to kill their boredom, if any.

The one drawback of being in the IT industry

We have all heard of the good things about IT, how it has created job opportunities for many, how it has changed many lives, and so on. But there's one side effect when you have the label of "IT" on you. Some time around last month, while i was at home minding my own business, My dad comes to me with the phone and tells me that one of his friend wants to speak to me. I was wondering why a person who I had never met before wanted to speak to me. Turns out, he had computer trouble and wanted me to fix it. Since he was a friend of my parents they couldn't say no to him, and since they were my parents, i couldn't say no to them. So i had to get off my lazy butt late on a Saturday afternoon and go check what was wrong with his computer. On the bright side, he did have a good looking daughter who was roaming around the house in an extremely short pant, but that still didn't make up for the fact that i had to leave my place on a Saturday afternoon. Wait, may be it did.

That was incident #1, Incident #2 begins when i was leaving my house at 3:10 for a 3:30 movie at inorbit. I was already running late and then while going downstairs, i meet a neighbor who asked me if i was working at a call center. I don't know what it is that makes them assume that any all youngsters whose work timings are not 9 to 5 work at a call center. I promptly said that i work at TCS, not a call center. Then he says he just got a new computer and wanted to know if i can check it out. I was trying to cut the conversation short and had no intention of checking out his new computer. I tried the "walk away while you talk" tactic and ended the conversation and was off to inorbit. In case you're wondering, I didn't make it in time for the movie and had to wait for the 6:30 show.

The reason i am posting this today is that the same guy#1 called up today saying he couldn't log into any sites and i was force to go check it out again. The reason was his net was not working. When will this end? Do i have to mess up their comps for them to stop calling me?

How to write a letter

This weekend was one of those where there are no plans at all, the type that’s spent wasting away at home. I stumbled upon a link to this Google group we had during our college days. We used to have a lot of fun posting messages to that group during our exams, everyone used to stay online for hours, replying to each others posts, fighting, and having a battle of wits. Among those posts I found one with an apology letter that we wrote to our profs. We were caught for not writing notes, throwing paper balls when the profs back was turned, and making a lot of noise. The dean barred us for giving the exams unless we wrote a letter apologizing to the prof. So there we were, around 20 of us, sitting on the stairs of the auditorium, writing our first apology letter. There were another 2 letters we wrote later in the year, but this was the first. All of us chipped in with the best words from our vocabulary, and the result was - One really professionally written apology letter, I am not even sure that the profs understood it completely. Click on the picture below to read it.

There were times where we had around 200+ posts every week, with people ripping on each other for any stupid reason. To give you and idea of the stuff that was usually going on in the group, heres one incident. There was this one time I was pissed off with a "Mr. X" and thought he was being really self centered and had a little of the "I am better than you" attitude, so I made a couple of stupid jokes on Mr. X. Here is a sample of the jokes.

Q: Why did Mr X cross the road?

A: He wanted to proove he was better than the chicken

A duck and Mr X walk into a bar

Duck: quack

Mr X: quack quack i can quack more

Q: What did Mr X say to the apple and the banana?

A: I can talk and u cant.. im better

Ps: Mr X isnt a bad person, we are still friends and meet up on weekends.

College days were fun. After reading for around 2 hours, i still have a lot more to complete. Reading the posts brought back all the memories of the last 2 years.

just another day in my mindset at the office

Its becoming harder to come up with topics to write about these days, and i blame that on my work place for making my life routine. Today was even more boring than the other work days for quiete a few reasons 

1) We had no meetings at all, so that meant spending 8 hours staring at the computer screen 

2) I usually equip myself with a well thought playlist for such occasions, but thanks to a cheap memory card, all my songs were wiped off and i had no music.

3) Being diwali, half of the people were on leave and there are not many people left to talk to.

But then i resorted to plan B to make the day a little more interesting. Plan B meant chatting with people over the office messenger. In the midst of all this, out of nowhere i remembered my school days where we had one very effective way of tackling situations like these. It used to start off with just a few guys, then spread accross the entire class room, and pretty soon the entire building would be doing it. It was so effective that the principal had no option but to give in to our demands. By now you must be curious as to what i am talking about. What we used to do was , Start hitting the benches and yell "HALF DAY!". It spread like an infection and every student used to start hitting the benches in unison and yell at the top of their lungs. More often than not, we got that announcement over the intercom where the principal uttered the words we were waiting to hear, we got our half day. I wondered if these tactics would work in the office. Just the thought of all of us banging the desks yelling "half day" is funny enough to put a smile on your face during the otherwise dull day. Maybe the seniors would start acting like our teachers used to, and retort by writing down our employee id's on the board? What if they made us kneel down outside the cubicle as a punishment for making a noise in the office? I was so bored that i had these thoughts running through my mind. But if theres one thing that the work place can borrow from schools and colleges, it would be "the bell". It would be nice if there was a bell that rung at 5pm where everyone would have to get off their seats and take a break for snacks and tea, and then one at 11pm forcing everyone to leave at the dot of 11 ensuring that we work only 8 hours a day. But then again, wouldn't this make the day more routine than it already is?

When i grow up?

Theres this new song they keep playing on VH1. I hate it, I have to switch channels everytime it plays. It ruins my daily morning doze of VH1. The song sucks, I would rather listen to himesh than this crappy song. Its a song called "when i grow up" by the pussy cat dolls. How did they manage to get songs like this on TV? Even the nursery rhymes we learnt as kids make more sense than its lyrics. Theres one annoying line they keep repeating, It goes "ha ha ha ha". Here are the lyrics, meaningless, absurd, utter crap! If anyone of you happened to like this song, you need to see a shrink now!

Boys call you sexy (What's up, sexy)
And you don’t care what they say
See, every time you turn around
They screamin' your name

[Verse 1]
Now I've got a confession
When I was young I wanted attention
And I promised myself that I’d do anything
Anything at all for the boys to notice me

[Bridge]
But I ain't complaining
We all wanna be famous
So go ahead and say what you wanna say
You know what it's like to be nameless
Want them to know what your name is
'Cause see when I was younger I would say

[Chorus]
When I grow up
I wanna be famous
I wanna be a star
I wanna be in movies

When I grow up
I wanna see the world
Drive nice cars
I wanna have Groupies

When I grow up
Be on TV
People know me
Be on magazines

When I grow up
Fresh and clean
Number one chick when I step out on the scene

[Hook x2]
But be careful what you wish for
'Cause you just might get it
But you just might get it
But You just might get it

[Verse 2]
They used to tell me I was silly
Until I popped up on the TV
I always wanted to be a superstar
And knew that singing songs would get me this far

[Bridge]
But I ain't complaining
We all wanna be famous
So go ahead and say what you wanna say
You know what it's like to be nameless
Want them to know what your name is
'Cause see, when I was younger I would say



[Hook x2]
Be careful what you wish for
'Cause you just might get it
You just might get it
You just might get it

[Verse]
I see them staring at me
Oh I'm a trendsetter
Yes this is true 'cause what I do, no one can do it better
You can talk about me
'Cause I'm a hot topic
I see you watching me, watching me, and I know you want it

[Chorus]
When I grow up
I wanna be famous
I wanna be a star
I wanna be in movies

[Chorus]
When I grow up
I wanna be famous
I wanna be a star
I wanna be in movies

When I grow up
I wanna see the world
Drive nice cars
I wanna have Groupies

When I grow up
Be on TV
People know me
Be on magazines

When I grow up
Fresh and clean
Number one chick when I step out on the scene

[Hook x2]
Be careful what you wish for
'Cause you just might get it
You just might get it
You just might get it

[Hook x2]
Be careful what you wish for
'Cause you just might get it
You just might get it
You just might get it

When will they grow up???

The different views on photography

As i was walking out side my office, i looked up to the sky and noticed a clear blue sky, a streak of clouds, and with the sun below the horizon, the clouds lit up with a bright orange colour. It was a beautiful sight. I stopped to take a picture while the others walked ahead. When i showed them the picture, they asked "What can you do with this picture? How many times will you look at it?"

Its a pity that some people dont have an eye for photography. I like to think i do. This is not the first time i got comments like these. It's happened many times before whenever i send pictures to friends. The first question they ask is "where are the people?"

Some people may ask others to come closer together so that they fit in the picture, but i ask others to move out of the frame if i like the scenary better. Some people ask me "why do you take picture of trees and other objects?" while some others ask me "what camera did you use to take this picture?". Its the latter kind whose opinion matters. I feel proud when i tell them that i used my ordinary 2mp sony ericsson phone camera.

Landscape/Nature photohrapy is one of my favourite hobbies, along with biking and listening to music. The only time when i can do all of it at the same time is when i am on a bike trip to some place away from the city life, while i listenin to music and cruise the highways with stops for photograpy wherever the scenary makes me stop. It leaves you with a fresh feeling for the entire month and an eagerness to go on another such trip again. 

I am still stuck on a hangover of sorts from the previous 5 day ride. When i am at home, everything is a routine. wake up at the same time, go to office, sit at the same desk, next to the same people, take some cafeteria breaks with the same people, go home, sleep , repeat. It gets really boring. When you are on a bike ride, everything is different. You sleep at different hotels every night, wake up early, hit the highway, stop at a new place for breakfast, a new highway dhaba for lunch/dinner and visit places you haent been to before. Thats the good life, a good break from the daily routine, everyone must try it atleast once. If you do, you will thank me later

More on telemarketers

The following is an exceprt from a real conversation which happens atleast once every week.

It is translated to english so that others can understand and to hide the fact that my hindi sucks and my hindi spellings suck even more.

Telemarketer: Hello sir,  Can i speak to angelo?

Me: yes, speaking.

Telemarketer: Sir you have been making your bike payments on time and you are a very loyal customer, So we are willing to offer you a personal loan of Rs 50,000.

Me: Not interested.

Telemarketer: But sir, you are a loyal customer and the intrest rate is also low sir. Why aren't you interested

Me: May be because.... I am not in need of a loan??

Telemarketer: Ok (Hungup)

I don't get these telemarketers. They need to change their stratergy. Perhaps  if they call someone who is having difficulty in paying their existing loans, their offer would be more appreciated. But if they still insist that i am as loyal a customer as they perceive and wish to reward me for that, I'd be glat to accept the Rs 50,000 for free. Are you reading this Mr Telemarketer?

An update on the post The goverment totally sucks

I got the extra 650 that was deducted from my account.

The bank had a bunch of  printed forms which state that "my account was debited twice".

I guess the problem is not that uncommon to them after all. It really makes you confident the next time you wanna pay by your SBI card, dosen't it?

The goverment totally sucks

Todays title is from a song by tenacious D. Listen to it incase you havent. Let me explain why the goverment totally sucks. It all started out after watching snakes on a plane. I had gone out for dinner that night, we were a little short on cash so i payed the bill of Rs650 with my "goverment bank" (SBI) debit card. All went well untill i checked my account balance the next day only to relize they had deducted the bill amount twice. Went back to the hotel which was in santacruz, they checked their records and showed me that the card was swiped only once and it was a bank mistake.

Being a sunday, the bank was closed so i went today morning to the bank to get things cleared out. The bank guys say its the fault of the hotel. I had a talk with the service manager and he made me fill out a form saying that the money has been deducted twice from my account and he said that they will "look into it", i hope they really do. I was slightly relieved that i might get my 650bucks back. Time to head home, but there was a surprise waiting for me as soon as i stepped out of the bank. Since i am using song titles and movie titles a lot in my posts, lets say I was like "Dude wheres my bike?" Damn those towing people. I had not parked in a no parking area either, there were many other vehicles parked there but since mine was at the extreme left, they decided to tow my bike. They are corrupt to the core. I got a reciept saying "payment towards the goverment". I hate the goverment, the people working for the goverment must all die and rot in hell.

Total losses over this weekend

Debit card     = 650rs

Travelling back to the hotel  = 50rs

Towing charges                      = 200rs

Its been an expensive weekend. The goverment really does suck

A must watch movie

I was spending my Saturday afternoon just like most other people - flipping through channels. Found a movie that was just starting on HBO, so i decided to watch it. The movie was about this boy who witnesses a murder and is being escorted on a plane by an FBI agent to testify against the murderer. As Hollywood would have it, the bad guys are after him. There’s just one problem. He is on a plane. How do you kill a person on a plane? you crash the plane. (Give yourself 10 points if you guessed that right). There are many ways to crash a plane, Hollywood’s favorite being planting a bomb on the plane. But not these guys, they sneak in a payload of poisonous snakes and set up some timer that releases the snakes on the plane. Result, people panicking, screaming, running around, being chased by snakes. These snakes crawl around the plane biting on the electrical wires, with sparks flying everywhere damaging the planes electricals. Any ordinary snake would die or at least be stunned by the shock, but not these snakes. They are movie snakes, they are immune to electric shock. This describes 70% of the movie already. The next question on the directors mind would have been "how do I make a movie like this more interesting?" the answer was simple - kill pilot #1 and let pilot #2 be the hero who saves the day. So they go on to kill pilot #1 and after careful thought, they decide a snake bite will do the trick. Pilot #2 is still alive to fly the plane. But wait, they thought to themselves, The audience needs more excitement in this movie, why not kill pilot #2 as well? sounds like a good idea, doesn’t it? So there goes pilot #2, foolishly into the under carriage which he knows is full of snakes now, and surprise! Snake bite! The job of being the hero is now transferred to our FBI agent. He uses this innovative weapon made of a stick and a broken glass bottle at the end and stabs all the snakes that get in his way. By now the passengers realize that the plane can't fly itself and our FBI hero tries his best but he can’t fly the plane either. Then there’s a miracle, pilot #2 was no ordinary pilot either. He was a movie pilot too and was not dead after all, it was just a swollen arm that kept him unconscious for a while. The concerned stewardess asks him if he can still fly the plane and he grins at the stewardess as he says "A man can do many things with just one hand". Now it looks like the situation is under control, the snakes are locked up at the other end of the plane, passengers safe on the opposite side, so they decide to check on pilot #2. FBI guy heads to the cockpit door, knocks, no answer. He breaks the lock and pilot #2 is dead, again! They took away his "movie pilot" powers. Now the job of being the hero is transferred to this one kid who had over 2000 hours of flying experience, that is on a ps2 flight simulator game. But things are not so simple. The cockpit is still filled with snakes. Our FBI guy thinks to him self, how do I get snakes off the plane that is in mid air? The answer is simple - shoot out a window. Bang!  a hole in the window, All snakes get sucked out of it, they come flying from all over the plane. FBI guy saves the day. PS2 kid lands the plane which seemed similar to driving a car. When they land, anti venom is ready, everyone lives happily ever after. 

The directors had to give this movie a really good title so that it sells. After a lot of brain storming, they come up with the perfect name. The name is so perfect it tells the entire story of the movie in its 4 words. The title was 

- SNAKES ON A PLANE

(Creative indeed)

I hope my Saturday evening is spent doing something better

The week that wasn't

I may have copied the title of this post from the popular TV show, so what? sue me. Its been 1 week since my last post, and the fact that i haven’t posted a thing this week should be enough to get the message across that its been a really dull week. It was filled with work, some more work, and even more work. I even did a 15 hour shift on Thursday, was sick on Friday, recovered on Saturday and Sunday was.. well.. typical to say the least. made plans canceled plans, made more plans, canceled them too.. you get the drift. If you are still reading this you must be more bored than i was this week. 

Alright, lets get on with our lesson for this week. What’s the topic? you ask? I have used the word "week" 5 times already and that is exactly what i will be the teaching you'l today.

We will be studying the state of mind of an average middle class working  person through out the days of the week. I will give you 2 minutes to go get your notepad and pencils out, take notes, this information is priceless

Monday: Mondays are always coupled with the word "blues" for a reason. Getting back to the office after a relaxing and fun filled weekend is the culprit here. It's a drastic and sudden change from a fun filled day to a day filled with new pending issues to take care of at work. No one except the die hard workaholic can handle that change without falling victim to "Monday blues". Symptoms are a strong feeling of de-motivation and repeatedly asking your self "what am i doing here? "

Tuesday: One might think on a Tuesday you are better off than Mondays. But on the contrary, Tuesdays are worse. Reason you ask? You had that little bit of weekend energy left in you that helped get you through the Monday. Unfortunately that’s not the case with Tuesdays. And to make matters worse, the next weekend is still too far away. Do not forget that you are still recovering from Monday blues. It is similar to recovering from any sickness. You can't do anything fun, you must not exert yourself, In short, you have to just wait it through and pretty soon you will be humming to the tune of 'Tuesdays gone' (Its a song by metallica incase you are musically challenged).

Wednesday: Wednesday is where things start getting better. You are almost half way through the week. You can now see the light at the end of the tunnel. It may be a mere dot but it’s a light none the less. The trick is to be focused on the light and not look anywhere else. Now is the time to start planning out your next weekend, It will help in making the time go by faster.

Thursday: The light at the end of the tunnel just got bigger, It is the perfect time to officially "look forward" to the weekend. Imagine a bunch of cheer leaders standing besides you, telling you one more day to go! Just one day! you can do it!. I don’t want to ruin the image I just painted in your mind so let’s leave it at that and move on to the next day

Friday: The day we all wait for. The feeling on a Friday is the same as running the last lap of a marathon. As the day draws to an end, you make the final sprint towards the finish line, the crowd cheers, the anxiety can reach levels where it’s difficult to get work done during the last few hours of your shift. You finally reach the proverbial "light at the end of the tunnel" and like an Olympic runner, you run past the finish line , fall flat on the ground , heave a sigh of relief marking the end of the week long torturous race.

THE WEEKEND: Its time to celebrate! The weekend is here again, enjoy all you can while it lasts. It wont be long until you realize the light at the end of the tunnel was another oncoming train. Before you  know it, you are hit by the train and you wake up surrounded by people, in an enclosed box like room with a lot of commotion and chaos around you only to realize that.. Its Monday again and you are in your cubicle with your boss dumping a fresh new load of work on you.

That will be all from me for now, Till next time, have a great week ahead

The ATM hogger

You never know where you ‘ll find inspiration for the next post, it can be anywhere. I was short on cash today so I had to stop by the ATM, there was someone already in so I had to wait outside till that person was done. The waiting never seemed to end, that’s when it struck me. I had just discovered  this new breed of people whom I like to call  – The ATM hoggers. They are relatively easy to spot.  They are your typical middle aged to elderly people. You know you’re standing behind one when they take more than 5 minutes to complete their transaction. You can spot them even before they enter. They will be the ones digging through their purses/wallets/pockets to find the right ATM card. If you’re lucky, you can run and get to the machine before them. I must warn you, it’s a race against time and not everyone makes it. Once in, they have to ponder for at least a minute to remember the PIN code. You’d think it would be faster once they got the pin code, but you couldn’t be more wrong. Thanks to their cautiousness or inexperience in using ATM machines, they have to read EVERY word that’s printed on screen and get the “what does this button do?” expression before pushing any button. Now the next step you or me will take is enter the amount and withdraw the cash, but not these people. They need to check their available balance first. Put on their glasses, check the receipt. Then they finally get to the part where they withdraw the money and you are struck with the ray of hope that they are done. But you’re wrong again. How can they leave the machine without counting the cash first? Lets not forget the fact that it’s a machine and it almost always gives the correct amount , But what would you do if it gave you the wrong sum of money? Assuming the wrong sum is lesser than what you entered, what can you do? Yell at it? Unplug it? Kick it in the groin? There’s no point in counting your cash inside. Anyway, by now you must have been waiting outside for around 4-5 minutes, so what difference does a few more minutes make? They still need some more time to dig into their handbags/wallets/pockets to find the perfect place to keep their carefully counted sum of money and then finally they are out after struggling for a few seconds to find the door release switch. Most of them are conscious about the amount of time they took and try and avoid eye contact while leaving, however some of them are courteous enough to apologize. There are even those that plan the time they need in advance and ask you to go in before them, but they are a minority. 

Monday blues

I hate weekdays. Especially when the weather outside is pleasant and I am forced to sit between those 4 walls in an air-conditioned office building. Being air-conditioned, threes no way we can open the windows. We cant even open the blinds because of the glare on the hundreds of computer screens. And to top that off, they are even sound proof making sure all sounds stay out, except to the loud thunder. However, I do get my doze of fresh air during my regular evening breaks where i go for a short walk around the area. I think I’m complaining more because its been almost a month since my last ride and that voice inside of me has started nagging again that its time for the next ride. I've always wanted to go on a ride to malshej ghat before the monsoon ends, but the plan ends up getting canceled because people always back out. That deadline is getting closer now, I think I might do a solo trip there soon just to experience the greenery and waterfalls. But there’s one small little problem - I suck at directions

 

Things that annoy me - part II

I am back with a fresh new list of things that annoy me. Im sure the first one in my list will be one with which everyone  

will agree are the most annoying. 

They are..... 

(brace yourself)....

1)  The TELEMARKETERS

I don’t know how i missed them in the first post. The reason i remembered them now is because I was woken up pretty early today morning with the voice at the other end of the phone saying "Good morning sir i am calling from ICICI Prudentials". It’s ironic how they have the nerve to wake you up and still call it a GOOD morning. Needless to say, my response was a prompt "not interested" to which the voice at the other end reacted with in a disappointed low tone saying "But sir the other day you showed interest". Well, the other day when they called me, I was busy working and they just wouldn't hang up so i said i was busy and asked them to call back later. These guys actually try each and every extension of our office in a sequential order. I usually make the other guy in my cubicle answer these calls, but the last time he was not there so I had to answer it. I just hope they hate their jobs as much as i hate them.

2) People who use Internet slang while chatting

For simplicity sake, I will be rating these words on a scale of cool - cooler - coolest. It is important to keep the sarcasm factor in mind when using this scale. Lets start off with the first word

DA - This famous 2 letter word is supposed to be the cooler version of "the". If not cooler it is definitly the easier to spell amongst the two. Threes just one situation where it is ok to use the word DA. That is - If you are south Indian (or whichever part of india it is where they use the word da). At best, this word saves you from typing that one extra keystroke.

KEWL - This is supposed to be the coolest way to say cool. However, lets look at it from a more practical point of view. Cool and Kewl both have 4 letters, no advantage there. Cool on the other hand has the letter 'o' repeated twice, which means you don’t have to move your fingers all across the keyboard to type it, kewl isn't it?. It is even easier to spell than kewl. But still people who want to be cool use kewl. The only comprehensible reason one would use it is to make up for the one keystroke they missed while typing "DA". But then again, if that’s the reason, why use these words in the first place?

3) Waiting in line for a haircut.

Yesterday i tried going for a haircut, but the line was too big. which reminded me of the last time i went for a hair cut. It was around 4:30 pm on a Saturday. I thought the saloon would be empty since most people would be sleeping at home instead. But i was wrong, there were 3 old guys, and one college going guy, So i waited. The old guy was the first to finish (may be because of lack of hair in the first place) and it was my turn to go next, Or so i thought. But then the old guy had to get his hair colored too which would take another half n hour. After noticing the grey hair on the other 2 old guys my attention went towards the young guy who i thought would finish first. And finish first he did. But wait, he’s not getting off the chair.. Something must be wrong. Then he asks for some weird stinky hair oil. I figured hair oil wont take that long so i waited 10 minutes and he was done with the hair oil. I was about to get in again but the guy still didn’t get up. What more could he want from the saloon? I asked myself. and there came the answer. Now it was time for some facial... Damn those metrosexuals. Having seen enough i walked out to come back next week. At this rate, it wont be long until men start getting manicures and pedicures too.

Feel-Good Friday

Thanks to my net, this post is a few days late

Fridays have always been good. It is a day when you will notice a smile on everyone’s face in the office. There are many reasons for that, the weekend is few hours away, everyone is in casuals and so is the atmosphere, with people roaming around everywhere having fun. We had a team party too, with lots of cake. Its been a good day for me, mostly because i got rid of half of my workload today . By completing it off course, not by dumping it onto others (I don't have that high a designation yet :) ) . I also made a donation towards the Bihar flood relief fund today. That adds a lot towards the Feel-Good factor of the day. But apparently the day wasn’t so good to this friend of mine who had loads of work, so while leaving she suggested we take the longer route home and stop somewhere for ice-cream. We were off to find a ice cream parlor at 11:30 in the night. Wiped the rain drops off my bike seat, started the engine, hit the road and a little further ahead, there’s an ice cream parlor and a coffee shop right next to each other. We could have gone to the naturals ice-cream parlor. But no, we decide to have coffee at this place called 'Beans and Beyond'. Nice place, good coffee. After finishing my cafe latte with hazel nut flavor, we headed home at around midnight. I always liked coffee but there’s just one minor problem with midnight coffee. Yes you guessed right, you'd be sitting up in the wee hours of the night writing blogs instead of lying in bed where you rightfully should be. To make matters worse, my nets down again so i am writing this post in notepad while listening to pink floyd. With no net, there goes the number 1 way to kill time. If you’re lucky (make that - if I am lucky) you will get to read this first thing in the morning. I think I’ll watch some south park episodes while I wait for the caffeine levels to drop.

Into the wild

NIts been a typical work week with nothing much to write about. But for the last few days I just can't get the songs from the movie "into the wild" out of my head. These songs, written by eddie vedder the vocalist of pearl jam are the type of songs that grow on you everytime you listen to them. The movie is equally good. It's a true story about this student who gives away all his posessions including a 24,000$ savings account to charity and takes off backpacking accross North America to Alaska to live in a secluded place in the wild, meeting different people along the way. Eddie Vedder has done an amazing job in capturing the movie in every song. The lyrics of the songs are much better than the movie in giving you an idea of what was going on in his mind at that time. I'd suggest you watch the movie, and hear the album. It makes for some good late night music, Especially when working late in the office. Makes you wanna take off into the wild.

A few of my favourites are

-Guaranteed

Everyone I come across, in cages they bought
They think of me and my wandering, but I'm never what they thought
I've got my indignation, but I'm pure in all my thoughts
I'm alive...

Wind in my hair, I feel part of everywhere
Underneath my being is a road that disappeared
Late at night I hear the trees, they're singing with the dead
Overhead...

Leave it to me as I find a way to be
Consider me a satellite, forever orbiting
I knew all the rules, but the rules did not know me
Guaranteed

- No Ceiling

Comes the morning
When I can feel
That there's nothing left to be concealed
Moving on a scene surreal
No, my heart will never
Will never be far from here

Sure as I am breathing
Sure as I'm sad
I'll keep this wisdom in my flesh
I leave here believing more than I had
And there's a reason I'll be
A reason I'll be back

As I walk
The Hemisphere
*I've got* my wish
To up and disappear

- Society

Society, you're a crazy breed.
I hope you're not lonely, without me.

When you want more than you have, you think you need...
and when you think more then you want, your thoughts begin to bleed.
I think I need to find a bigger place...
cause when you have more than you think, you need more space.

Society, you're a crazy breed.
I hope you're not lonely, without me.
Society, crazy indeed...
I hope you're not lonely, without me.


Look up the lyrics of the others as well

A musical day

Today begin just like any ordinary day, but little did we know that it would turn out to be a real fun day. The day revolved around music. To start of, we made a last minute decision to go watch rock on. A couple of phone calls later and 3 of us (craig, anirban and me) were in for the movie. Come to think of it, its always been just the 3 of us for the last minute plans, may be because we are the only people that have nothing better to do while the others always have some excuse ready on the tip of their toungue. As usual i was the first to reach the theater and not wanting to miss the start, i brought the tickets and took my seat. 15 minutes into the movie the other 2 showed up. The movie was great, not your typical bollywood movie with couples dancing around trees in the rain (this one had men jumping around on the stage instead. and before you think of any wisecrack - No, thats not why i said the movie was  great). To be honest i found some of the lyrics a little bollywood-ish considering its portrayed as part of the rock genre, but the music was good. After the movie, we were off to celebrate another friends (varuns) birthday at SBX. I had suggested this place because i like the ambience there since they play my kind of music. They played tunes of artists like pinkfloyd, aoasis, audioslave, staind, santana, robbie williams and Without much delay we got started to work our way upto that 4 figure bill. Its amazing how given the right amount of alcohol guys can start debating on any given topic like they have been studying it for years. We had a whole lot of topics to discuss, starting from politics, to relegion and god, to how to enjoy life to the fullest, to the all important women. Offcourse sticking to the 'code of conduct' none of those discussions can be revealed to those that were not present at the time. Some of us (read: Anirban) were getting quiet philosophical too. I was more intrested in the music and wasn't listening to most of the conversation there. We called it quits when we were at the quarter mark to a 5 figured bill. I was bent on having coffee from one of those road side cycle guys that roam the streets at night. But since we didnt find any coffee stall we had our midnight coffee at a nearby CCD outlet and then headed home. I reached home at around 12:30 that night. It was a fun night and i must thank Varun for the treat. 

Things that annoy me

My net was down for the past 4 days so these posts are a few days overdue. Anyway, heres a small little list of things that annoy me, take carefull notes so that you dont fall in that category.

The first one would obviously be my ISP who even after repeated calling keep saying the net will work in 1 hour but it doesn't for days.

Off late i realized that people have forgotten how to cross roads. They are just plain ignorant (or stupid) towards the one rule that needs to keep in mind when it comes to crossing roads, and that is the famous "look both sides before crossing". Funny thing is most of the people look only one side - the opposite side from the oncoming traffic. The only way they will ever learn is if they get hit by a bus and survive to pass on the knowledge to their friends. 

There is this new breed of jay walkers that just step onto the middle of the road out of nowhere and give the traffic the half raised palm signaling them to halt. I have half a mind to run them over, but then they did show "THE PALM". how can one ignore the palm?  they expect meto slam on the brakes on the already wet and slippery road and if  lucky, not get hit from behind while i do so. I try my best to scare them into looking both sides, usually by sneaking up to them and hornking lound enough to make them jump. Yes, i am on a mission to rid the world of thier kind, one jaywalker at a time.

Another thing that annoys me is the spitters. Usually rickshaw drivers. They are the types that spit at every signal, without looking if someone is there next to them. sometimes when they spit too close to my bike i usually pretend do an inspection of the bike, making sure they looki, and check if any of it fell on my bike. Unfortunately theres no way to deal with them. I usually try giving them the dirty stare to invoke whatever little humiliation they have within. It's a pity that our political parties are more busy making sure that shops put up certain language signboards instead of looking into the more obvious issues of cleanliness and infrastructure. I havent heard of anyone dying of hunger just because the neighbourhood grocery store didn't have a sign board in their local language.

I will be updating this list very often, so keep checking.

The first post

I have always wanted to start a blog, there were many occasions where i thought of "blog-worthy"content but was too lazy to sign up and write it down. So i decided to take the step by step approach and sign up at blogspot first with hope that the laziness will be dialed down the next time and i might actually end up posting something here. Then came the ordeal of selecting a name for the blog. after half an hour of trying my luck, ending up with the message "sorry the name you have chosen is already taken", here i am with a new blog, using up one of the million possible names, and making it a little more difficult for the next blogger out there to register. Here you can expect to find details about the various weekend out of mumbai trips that i think i am addicted too. And keeping the title of this blog in mind, you may also find occasional random thought that comes to my mind which some may dismiss as being plain stupid but entertaining or amusing none the less.