Life So Far..Random Ramblings

Every day I am so full of thoughts I just wish I had Siri to note them down for me.

*Siri. What an ingenious beauty Steve has left us with. An intelligent voice response system with which you can send message, do dictation, pick calls, check restaurants, get directions, make to-do lists, set up alarm so on and on. Its endless capabilities are mind numbing. Of course the directions and restaurants thingy is only in US of A. I spent some considerable amount of time pouring through the great things that this is capable of doing and the praise for it is universal. Period. Chitti was telling me the other day when we met that speech recognition softwares usually get almost 50% of them right but Siri stands at 75 percent. That's astonishing. I just want to own the darn thing. Last checked - 16 GB unlocked stands at 31K. Not bad at all.

*When has  the browsers stopped becoming news? Just checked today Firefox has newest version with 7.x, Chrome - 15.x, Opera - 11.3. I am surprised no tech blog is covering it be it Mashable, GigaOm, AllthingsD. Maybe the news of browsers have lost the fizz and people don't care about it anymore. As far as my personal favorite goes its Chrome,  through and  through. I do miss the nifty little feature of Firefox CoolPreview plug-in though.

* I am becoming a terrible sleeper. The last four days I have been sleeping around 3,4, or 5 sometimes and getting up as early as 7 or 9. I am sure some bits of such pattern is responsible for my laziness and lethargic feeling I get every now and then.

* These late nights have first started off with watching 'LOST' or 'Heroes'. Last week though I haven't been seeing them at all. Strangely though I haven't been able to watch the movies that I have downloaded and kept. I have around 10 movies 'yet to see' and the one that tops the list is 'I saw the Devil' a thriller from Korea that's supposed to chill your spine quite literally.

* With lot of gusto I started my morning walks last week. I got up around 6:30, dressed my self and set out to walk up till Hitech city. It took me just 15 minutes of brisk walk one way. Felt refreshed and powered. But then Diwali came up, adding to a holiday and then pattern broke up. I hope to continue from tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

* Of late I have been talking some things that I shouldn't be talking about in the first place. Talking about people on their back feels so terribly wrong and upsetting. I need to make sure I keep my mouth shut and not to crib about people. Its just not worth a conversation. Everyone has something positive to take.

* I got caught lying other day when I told someone that I have checked their website but I didn't. The other person found out as I told what I assumed would be on the site.  That's the first time it struck me small inconsequential things like that, there is no point in lying. Just tell the truth, that you didn't and be done with that.

* Saw this wonderful thing the other day in bus. As the bus arrived, all the people at the stop got in and there were two girls left standing. Within few minutes, two guys got up and offered their seats. They then got down the next stop to take the next company bus. Women are wonderful beings and they need to be respected. It felt  so great seeing that not all have forgotten about manners.

* Talking about bus, every time I start to get down the steps of the bus once it reaches the office, at last step in the foot board I hear this resound thump with every foot stepping on it as people leave. Thup. Thup. Thup. It reminds me of scene in 'August Rush' where the kid hears every single sound that is made naturally or unnaturally. Love that feeling.

* Did kichdi today after a long time after facing many ill omens as if nature is acting against my will to let me cook. I got up today around 9, saw that there ain't potatoes or peas to do my version of green kichdi.
So got my purse and wen to IDBI to draw the money. Says no cash. Then I crossed the road, went to the ICICI, said wrong pin. Deja Vu. I already lost my pin twice, didn't want to screw up again and wait another 15 days for new one. I put my card in again, punched each number carefully one by one. It worked. So got the money, went to Shilpa market and bought peas. There wan't alu. Just as I came up I saw that rice in the packet was minimal. Went down again to super market brought the rice. I cleaned the rice, got the mixture and just as I was about to light up the stove, the matchsticks didn't respond! One strike,two strike, matchbox out. I was in no mood to go down and buy matchsticks. Just as I though there is some mystical being watching me and having fun in seeing to it that I can't stick to my game plan, there it was hidden in some corner of the racks a small matchbox full of sticks.

* Shocker of all the things - I have just finished seeing back to back two awful movies - Beastly and Blue Valentine. Beastly - a modern retake of the the classic 'Beauty and the Beast' with a modern twist. It dragged on midway and then it got predictable. Had some nice intimate moments though. Blue Valentine was outright pathetic. It's such a crappy film about two people's lives alternating between their current constant fights and irritations with each other to the initial romance when they hit upon. Neither of them was appealing and it had hellava skin show which wasn't appealing either. Just when I want to get back to the days of enjoying some really nice off beat movies I end up with this duds. Next on the list are - Cedar Rapids, and 'I saw the Devil'. Hell yeah!

*Have been stuck with the book 'Tigers wife' for what seems like eternity. Need to get over it and get to 'The Glass House'. The book is terrible but again I hate leaving books unfinished.

Started off the posts with points 1,2,3 but then things started popping random. Stuck with stars. 

A Random Recurring Thought put into practise

3'0 clock in the night. That should be enough to learn about my desperation to blog. Nikmo starts blogging, Pavi fires on blogging and then I come across Zohra's blog along with present-not-present Nikhil's blog. That's the limit, do I need any other bigger kick than that?.As I keep subscribing to bloggers and rearranging my Google Reader Settings, I am just forgetting the basic objective - bringing back my true self. Why the hell can't I just blog?

First I wanted to blog on the unbridgeable age gap between parents and the GenY (or is it Z now?). I had such a tough time going through so many multitudes of emotions in trying to convince both the parties my bro and my parents what is cool and what is uncool! Every time it inevitably landed with heated arguments spoiling the whole day. The whole marriage shopping experience is an exercise I wish to forget but am glad I faced it. It just upped my biological senses to handle unreasonable arguments.

Then the whole marriage saga- never ending adventurous bus journey before the marriage , the euphoric family dances (reminiscent of Arvi's Sangeet Marriage), my dazzling Sherwani, the sumptuous dinner. THE marriage can just take up at least 2 full posts.

What was next to be followed was a post on my promotion to SSE (Senior Software Engineer). Its been a highly rewarding 9 months journey into Accenture so far with equal shares of ups and downs. The entire culture, the atmosphere, the people around are so different and the feeling get to back to Bangalore among known people again, does linger time to time. I think that's how life is.

After all these, a post about why for the life of me am I getting addicted to watching movies day in and day out? Laptop has just become sort of a T.V. with my hard disk as the remote! Do the movies have power to suck your mind out of books, blogs, and recreational activities? Jeez..

So, here I am surmising all the posts that should really have been POSTS. The only non stop activity that goes round the clock in my blog though, which in no way am happy about, is a deluge of Spam comments flooding my mail box for two posts namely -

• Bad Timing for Snap Taking
• Unforgettable, Utterly Unbelievable

Folks, could you please help me how can I control the spam and disable only for these two posts of mine? I would remain eternally greatful. I strongly believe its because of the title themselves. So, apart from the absolute genious replies like 'change the titles', do let me know what to do? :)

Regaining my senses - I

Taking off from where I started off, I have successfully been able to steer clear from my distractions for one whole week without

• Watching movies
• Transferring movies
• Downloading movies (I confess I dettered a little by downloading 'Kerala Cafe' for Nikmo. I still achieved my major objective though of not spending enormous amount of time digging for the next movie to download.)
• All of the above intermixed.

It hasn't given me satisfaction yet, as my objective of spending quality time with books or blogs hasn't been truly realized. My work at office too was partly the reason as of late I have been coming back home late in the night. That also explains the 'Part I' of this post.

Watch out for part -II.

Vrooming on the wrong roads

Right from the time I have come to Hyderabad I have had a very bad feeling about so many aspects - the job, the room, the cafeteria, the Axis bank and ego clashes with my peers. It took over a month to get over it and my focus on weight loss contributed significantly in shifting my forgivings.

Of all things that sucked the most was the time when I had to pay my HSBC bills. It so happens all of a sudden all top banks or maybe all banks in general have decided to remove the service of paying credit card bills online excepting their own. Finding a guy with HSBC savings account would be like finding fish in air. I know comparison sucks big time, so was my experience. I phoned at least 10 of the people I know to find some way, even if it involves extra 100 bucks payment. Tough luck.

With 1 day left for payment, I set off from work all the way from Hi-Tech city to Raj Bhavan road. That's almost 45 minutes journey in the hot scorching sun bearing the chaotic traffic. This has been the case for the last 3 months. Thats a productive loss of 4 and a half man hours for the company. ( not that I care so much to the detail) but the exhaustion, tiredness, helplessness and most importantly the frustration of not being able to doing things really hit me hard.

Of course, there are better ways of handling things-through cheques, friends or your own. For me though that was like giving up my way of life and moving on to entirely new territory. It might sound silly but its true. I hate change or adapting to change. Life had been so much simple for almost three years with ICICI or Citi and suddenly its just been snatched. Sadly the option of opting for Axis bank card necissitates a wait of 1 year. Screw Axis!

This is the 4th month running and I am quite comfortably placed to pay the bill. I have about 12 days in hand to implement one of the most easieset payment options of door to door cheque delivery (a service provided to few niche cities, Hyerabad being one such.) I am all gung ho for it and literally waiting to write my cheque off.

Well that was about my lousy journey to pay the lousy bill. What did prompt me though to write this up was my today's unneccesary adventure to Prasads for selling the unncessarily booked tickets for unnecassarily hasty oversite of my decision that anything would be possible. Its a long story, ain't got all night to write that. To cut it short, I wasted another 3 hours in my painful journeying ordeal.

In conclusion-
Total time wasted - 7 1/2 hours
Total Unnecessary Distance Covered- 110 Kms
Total Fuel - 2 Lts
Amount of frustration endured - Priceless.

There are definitely somethings money can't buy and no mastercard is not there every time either! I fervently hope better sense prevail and get me vroooming on the right roads.

Nexxt is whattt - Cricket is Hott??

Just yesterday surfing through the channels I came across this bizarre ad ever. No...not the LG..Don't be misled by the title..they suck anyway. 'welcome to the touch generation' - oh yeah?? in comparision to the killer i-Phone (don't even get started with me on features, price, blah blah blah..i-Phone rocks..Hands down...)  even with so much Aamir doing various acrobatic dances, nothing comes closer to the pure beauty of touch that i-Phone offers...

Anyways it's the latest Pepsi's "First Ball ka Captain" commercial featuring Dhoni and the same guy from Aircel commercial, you know the one who fears his chances and Dhoni magically assures him after few clicks of button logs on to cricinfo and all that. Talking of which what the heck was that whole ad about? - Hello?? 3-G ain't there boss.. it's still raining GPRS here..Whom are they trying to fool - music downloads, ticket booking, net browsing..all this with only Aircel?? I just don't get the funda behind this campaign..

Again..coming back to the Pepsiiiiiiiiiiiii.. well..as the name implies you drink drink drink Pepsi, see the lid, nothing written? ..no prob..drink drink drink, something written? ..Hurrah!!!!! You just won yourself tickets to ICC T-20 world cup at England.. This, in the words of Punita Lal, Executive Director - Marketing, Pepsi Co India, " which we are introducing to spice up this year’s tournament to add even more excitement to the matches and give our cricket crazy consumers the cricket experience of a lifetime." That set me into thinking for what might be next just to set already mindless craziest and well ..let's just stick to those two.. fans..

1. Getting to Bat the first ball..obvious..ain't it? When you start with bowling..then the batting..
2. First Ball wicket-keeping
3. First Ball fielding
4. Or matter of fact just to keep the pulse even more racing why not have it at the last ? Say Last ball captain, Getting to bat the last ball, Getting to field the last ball
5. Still not enough? Hmm..let's say ..commentating for the first 5 minutes..This just doesn't sound that exciting. I know. But hey we are crazy after all..
6. Bringing drinks during the breaks- this was already there if I remember well.
7. Chance to participate in the first five minutes of team discussion. Wow..irresistable..ain't it? The drinks would go sky-rocketing if this comes up..
8. Chance to give the prizes to the winning captain..that might just mess things up..you know in case India lose but conditions always apply..right?
9. Chance to appear the first 1 minute in the ad commercial? hmm..that might be too lonely if this started with Coke--they just got Gambhir now who is desperate to sell friends..
10. Man..how did I miss the most pivotal of ..Umpring?? Woah!!!!!!!!! Umpring for the first ball, first minute..In the ranks of 10 this might be just be 6..But still it's appetising enough..And actually this might turn out to be a advantage.. Just keep saying no-ball, no-ball and you get to be there more and more..I know with so many camera's analysing things it just can't happen that way..but let's say it can..how aweshomeee...

As crazy as those things might sound I still feel at least some of it might become reality. Ok, just to keep the things straight this particular campaign is only to bowl against greats like Dilip Vengserkar, Jonty Rodes etc and not a live match. It wouldn't be surprising at all just to pulp the already crazy cricket fan, they might just do anything . 

The first time I felt something seriously wrong was during the last IPL . Commentators talking to the players while on the dressing room is understandable, but talking directly with the guy who is batting or with a person who is fielding and with the guy who is bowling..You gotta be kidding me..It was annoying and irritating.. What's your strategy? How are you going to bowl now? How are your chances?? - my foot...And then the technology improvement is just fascinating to say the least - hawk eye, aerial view of all the balls with the trajectories, ball-by ball motion within an over, extending the same thing further ..all the balls bowled by the bowler, lbw through third umpire, noice meter to check for an edge, and the most recent to hit the screens - heat analysis..just to see where the ball strikes. 

This isn't all. In one of the articles from Dataquest I read during the last IPL the live images clicked by King Khan through his cell were sent automatically to all the guys who subscribed to it. I don't know how they did it as there was no such publicitiy at all but take it from me it did happen. In either ways these things keep getting more and more --technology and marketing...all for one cause--to cash in on the crazy customers...If you have any more crazy ideas do put it in or if you think I missed any..just put it in your comments...Until then...you youngstupistaaansss... see ya...

Random Thoughts of an Absolute Demented Mind - My Mind -Part II

Here is what is going to happen now. I will try to roll out as much as I can while I watch IPL simultaneously.

There are some general thoughts on mind now about blogging in general. Of late I am running out of titles and coming up with so stupid ones. Is there something like ‘hit the wall’ for bloggers? I guess there must be. No, I am definite there is one - I hit them so vigorously almost at equal intervals of time, it puts me down like a patient suffering from third-degree burns for months sometimes. There was a while back reading certain posts in Lalitha Larking, it hit certain emotional chord in me. Her posts are simple, thoughtful, not much fancy but poignant and heartfelt. I have also decided to focus more on thoughts than on the gloss. How I wish I could turn back the time using time-turner (like the one Hermione had in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban) and pen down all those sweet memories of Engineering days, those unbearable dimwit lecturers, those bunk the college watch the movie and the list goes on and on. But if ever time permits I will with inputs from Laddo herself J . Here are upcoming titles (well at least then I will have an idea what to write about…)

100th Post Celebration
Mom’s Trip To Bangalore
Plays
Quinn’s Quest to Laptop Series - The End

Apart from that I also have to write a mail to Mihir – poor thing, must have been wondering what happened to me and how come a simple question regarding my occupation could put anyone on high alert. Boy, I am going to have a ball writing that. And then there is one blurb of all my current favorites to my mom’s friends…All in short time.