I am errr ...hmmm kind of Busy !!!

 

 

I had kept myself engaged on so called ‘ getting a life’ activities

and gave a rest to the creative side on penning words from what I live
through. Believe me – married life is something which makes you wonder
what surprise it hold until you get hitched and it does throw some
surprises at you as you take it along. For folks who were never
contacted / tried to be invited to my marriage, I am really sorry.
After 30 years of wait, I had to do things in hurry and if I missed
you, I am sorry. I know there are not many readers / followers to this
irregular blog but still I am sorry if I missed inviting you to my
marriage with Ms S and now Mrs Shanks ;) on this July 15th . The
engagement followed by the customary steps at both bride’s and groom’s
place, together with lot of shopping and invitation, the last two to
three months was so much engaging. I am slowly getting into pace with
the life ( now It has added mind power associated with it). But to
keep it short, it was fun and I loved all the center stage attraction
and comments ;)



Now back to where I started, things kept crashing down on me on
each day from different direction, if for a given say its relatives
asking me to visit there place with my family, someday its work that
calls me out of bed at umpteen times. Now I realize the word of
balanced life and I feel it’s an oxymoron. You can never predict or
balance life, all you can achieve is best of day option to drill
through the current day. Most of the time, you get things fall in
place at time, the request, the presence, the presents , the
pleasantry etc. But there would be days when nothing gets going but
still every problem stays until you get back in place and they still
stare at you ! that’s life. One thing I can’t understand is the urge
to pen this down came to me on the most un fortunate time – where I
have an exam to clear in next 1 hour where I have hardly read the
contents of the exam, I have a report delivery supposed to go three
hours ago and I am still typing this out as if, this is the best thing
to do. I am not sure on why I take this exam as its crystal clear that
I would fail but still ruining one attempt of available 2 attempts. So
let me take a conscious step here to stop writing and go through the
content at least once before I take the test .



After note:

Yes I flunked the exam royally, where three separate sections required
60% score to score and maximum over all I could get was a mere 29%.
Thanks to the systems which allowed me change the subject and still I
have two more attempts to clear the new exam . Most of the day time
is gone answering phone on giving updates on what is going and what is
not going good. Rest of the time, it’s on doing what I am supposed to do.
Theoretically I can agree that I have grew old to the 30+ category who
always looks busy with two hand held device to check and respond but
believe me it’s fun at times. The toughest part is there is always one
side of the circle around you which is frowning on a given day due to
your negligence in attending them in the way they expected you to
attend. It can be my better half, my mom / dad, sister / cousin,
friend / friends or my team ..or even a remote ping over my messenger
/ FB which I failed to answer and last but not the least – my blog or
by dusted guitar. The only answer to all this is - live along and things will fall in place at the right time .....

RMS on Wheels -1 : Done deal

After riding different four wheelers for about three months and an extended wait of 6 months ( Thanks to Toyota Nippon dealer - kerala : for extended wait time), i got my hands on my first vehicle in India - Toyota Innove. As usual its just another car, but a comfort ride. Still i have that owners pride smile all over my face and not looking at the monthly fuel bills ;)

So if anyone crash lands in tvm and looking for a ride, gimme a call. If i am around, will give a quick tour of tvm on my new car ..... i mean station wagon - to be precise :D

I wonder why ??????????????????

It is a little disheartening to wakeup everyday morning into such level of negatives. I am hearing negativity / judgments / sadness / War everywhere. This is not the first time I am talking about the negatives we are having around us. Each day morning the daily news paper opens with another round of sex scandals involving minors or another set of ministers doing a multi billion scandal. This is not just in India but worldwide. Then again several stories, one furnished with details on how a friend was beheaded and packed into plastic bags and buried, or how much more black money in banks or how corrupt is our current judiciary. Yes, its human nature to get attracted to such sticky news but I hardly find a news / a story or a discussion which leaves a smile of satisfaction to anyone’s face. Only question I have is if such real positive incidents and stories doesn’t happen at our times or the media is not interested in broadcasting / publishing any of those because they are only worried about their TRP and number of readers ???

Salt N Pepper - Movie review - My tag - Don't miss it!!!

The write up ahead is total spoiler if you haven’t watched the movie. Please come back here after you gave it a try ( if you have even remote plans to watch the malayalam movie – Salt nd Pepper.

When exactly we cherish our moments on anything ? its when one can connect it to one or the other part of you. Many folks who love fantasy movies are people who have a fantastic imagination. A written red romantic movie is loved by anyone who has love in their life or romance even in their heart. A cook loves to watch and tries out cookery and cookery shows. A guy who has / who wants some awesome friends will cherish the movie DCH because the primary reason is that you just relive your dreams by putting different faces to different stories you hear. I had that feeling on many occasion and those remains my favorites. The things here I am talking about is timeless classics because you are able to connect to them at any point in your life. The same goes in live with why an individual in puberty loves romantic flicks and a person on mid 55 enjoys a after retirement documentary or a fresh pair of parents loves a family movie involving kids and babies. It is just the ability of the creator of art to make that connection with you. If one is really talented, the circle of people he touches increases and one with very few connectors would just pass on as a average attempt.

I started to write this to tell about the movie Salt n pepper. I love to cook and I’m mostly a loner. I was able to connect to this movie really well – minus the romance. It never happened!The movie trailers itself made me feel that this is something I should not miss this one.I went for the movie on second day show and the long queue proved me rite – this is going to be a good one.

One mistake – I went there with a half filled stomach – the title song and visuals left me really hungry·
The radio – from the old car was a charming scene – a feel shifter every time it kicks in.·
The whole movie is out of Trivandrum – any one from ‘ Thirondoram would agree with me’ – but no slangs used! [Thirondoram -Trivandrum in proper Trivandrum Malayalam slang]·

Baburaj’s introduction sets his character – ‘Randu Radhas’ [ Two Radhas – a beauty soap usually used by girls]·

Asif ali proved to be a very good actor – as a proper ’vayi nokki’ – a cute one for girls – I guess [ Mouth looker – a flirt]·

The girl proved to be an eye candy - nice song visuals with a smooch sprinkled in!·

The song and drunken dance @ shanghumugham beach is as close to as you can have from reality and the write up in next scene also fits in·

The opening scene after that – a proper hang over morning·

The title song – it’s the best as it sounds from an old movie and the lyrics and the music is catchy.·

The dialogue – ‘ koothara rum alle , ennighenhum venda – is a typical 20 -25ish answer – courtesy – my drunkard friends [ that’s cheap rum, I don’t need it]·

The ‘Kutti’ dosa left me with memories of Kutti dosa made my mom and Grandmma long time back·

The scene where the cook ( Baburaj) elopes with the hero – Lal – nicely done·

The romance is happening through conversation and not with a lavish song in Switzerland – as it would happen ( I hope, no experience yet : ) )·

The climax is done with a wonderful comedy and a new way to unravel the story·

The scene where Lal asks – if salt was added after boiling the curry or not – Some conversation I had with my fellow roomies in US, any one who loves cooking know what I meant!·

The single fight sequence – Lal delivers that kick on the guys chest – awesome and icing from Babu raj – Enthada panni [ Whats up PIG] I left the cinema hall with a broad smile all over my face – the movie is all about cooking, food, romance, loneliness, inferiority complex and a lot of incidents that every one runs into in everyday life – with a tint of humor. This is the second movie after Pranjiyettan which left me feeling, I should be watching this movie again !

- Pic courtesy -kerals.com

Process initiated - RMS on Wheels -1

Ok Folks, I am looking for wheels in Trivandrum and my journey began with SX4. I was quiet impressed with the commercials which says folks will keep everything waiting if you are driving an SX4. I was looking for a diesel on the high end. For the test drive, I managed to get 5 folks inside the car just to get the worst case scenario for my drive in city. The car has got awesome ground clearance and great leg space both to front and rear passengers. The person sitting on rear seat on the middle will not enjoy the ride if it’s a long ride as the removable hand rest is a pain on your back. Second thing I noticed was that the car does not have many features that cars of the same segment will provide like a cup holder( I don’t think I will drink while I drive in India, but still!), sun glass holder, tinted rear view mirrors and electronic adjustable seats . The dash finish also did not impress me as the plastic finish / wood like finish looked cheap. One would definitely require an assisted camera to have an idea of what’s in the rear, forget about looking back and parking in a new place. Only the rear view mirror inside the car is tinted and the side mirrors are just normal glass. Also there is no auto close feature available on two out side rear view mirrors. The car has only one trip meter. The most disappointing fact was that with 5 folks in the car on 3rd gear, the car did not perform as I would like it to have. It might be because I had been using an old diesel Xeana for a while and the engine varies from 1.6 to 1.2 in case of two cars. But still a 10 year old engine giving a better response was something I didn’t expect. Also the car has engine noise on slow speeds from 30 to 50 KMPH but didn’t go beyond 80 or so to see how it sounds. But on slow speeds, even a month old car has noise. All in all, after looking at the limited feature list and a normal performance and looking at the price tag, I would rate it a 6.5 out of 10.

I am yet to drive any other car, I have Toyota Altiz and Verna Fluidic in my list for this Saturday. Hope one of it to do better to be continued

Trip de Switzerland !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am on marathon call for next 5 days and I think this would a good time to do some updates to my out dated blog :)
Mind you, I am updating this when the call get stalled due to ‘Technical issue’ :)

Now, one lady is looking for the latest version of docs she has to walk through in the meeting – I think folks are well prepared for this discussion – ok no something I will be interested to update in my blog.
So were was I ? I was here last time when I set my foot back to my home land and I was saying I like – Life @ TVM.

I had been busy with so many thing happening around me – work wise and personal wise. Three of my good friends got hitched in one or other way in last three months – one still left for the hunt for the better half just like me. Got into a umpteen project which had been written un doable and I took it up as it had the silver line of working from my home town written all over it. I took up the challenge and had been in office 9 to 9 every day including Saturdays …all I got was kind of 12 Sundays in 3 months but I think it was worth the effort. Finally signed off the stuff and got a – more than average sign off for the assignment. Enjoyed a lot with a very fresh and committed team. One thing I learned here was the folks in my team – most of them in the age group 23 to 25 was much more matured than what I was doing at the same age. I think the generation gap is now shrinking to a gap of 4 years. These folks are already having plans of when to quit, when to get hitched and what they want to go after – after being in hardly one or two years in the industry these folks are pretty good at what they are doing and what they want to do! I hardly knew where I was headed when I had two years of experience under my belt. Leaving the work part, I was lucky enough to travel to one of the most expensive and most beautiful places on the world – Switzerland!!! More of a business trip but had fun @ Switzerland

Travel de Switzerland :

Stayed for 14 days, had only three days to spare as the business meeting were tightly scheduled. I had my flight Via Dubai to Switzerland. I had a three hour stop over in Dubai which I happily slept , the flight was good other than the vegetarian meals I got. I never ordered this and later I got to know that the meals was misplaced for me and the one who ordered was my friend who was two rows ahead of me, and this left him to be happy with some fruits for an 8 hour flight. The Zurich airport was smaller than I had in my mind for being such a tourist location and same with the Zurich city. We had been put up in a business suite in a hotel in Zurich city.

About the city Zurich: it is not as neat as I expected, there was lot of construction going on which might be one reason for the dust. The streets were mostly empty on week days by 7 or 8 pm and night life also was dull. One more thing I learned was Swedish German is a different language from German and some one who speaks German cannot talk Swedish German. Also every one doesn’t understand English :) . So if you are headed to Switzerland, get used with words like ‘ Danke’, Mercy and Good Morningk – with the German accent. The total population of the country is well under the total population of my state ‘ Kerala’. People are good but not ‘ smiley’ people like folks from US. They are more of folks from France / UK where they don’t smile until there is a reason. Public smoking is not an issue here and every other guy / women smoke here- may be the climate is the excuse these smokers cling on to! Cycle is one of the most common transportation used here and we have folks cycling to our customer location on suits. The trams here are too good and it looks to be the affordable transportation to everywhere. We had our chuck cut out for cabs but even with a fat allowance, money was not enough to pay cab charges . For any one who is still tied to Indian food, there are lot of Indian and Srilankan restaurants in Zurich. I was amazed to find out that there was a restaurant named – Kerala restaurant and one conversation when we were about to leave convinced me that it’s a restaurant owned by a malayale

Owner : (phone) : Hello
From the other : ….
Owner : Elaam kazhinju, njan iceum vellavum ready aaki vachelkam, inghu ethiyal mathi ( everything is over, I will be ready with Ice and water)
From the other end : ….
Owner : urappalle

I guess this was conversation regarding a drinking get together the same evening. Malayale never changes – even in Switzerland and falls back to the tag line ‘ inetha parypady’ ( Whats today program?)

I heard that when a new building has to be build, there has to be a approval plan from the locals on the building appearance which will fall in place to the neighboring buildings and that’s why the streets look so much similar. Also they have some amazing building all over. The spider sculpture is really big when you go near to it. The climate ( it was summer) was around 25 to 30 degree Celsius. It was raining almost once in three days but it was never so cold not much hot. I think it justifies why we didn’t find a bigger went in our room for our air conditioner. Out of 26 channels we had in our hotel only one was English and rest was German / Swedish. Also it was a little surprise to find out that our hotel and another one near by doesn’t have a complimentary breakfast even after charging quiet expensively for a two bed suite. This was more of a normal thing in any inns in US! We were lucky to find that lady Gaga performed on the ground right in front of our hotel. We were roaming around and the song sounded familiar. A peak over the fence, we were surprised to see lady Gaga right across the fence performing for a group of half drunk crowd! As I didn’t had any pop song fans with me, we didn’t bother to venture in!- Lady gag looked very small when compared to the pictures I saw from her albums. We experimented with our dinner and played safe with our lunch as there was a online order delivery available with Best curry – 10 franks lunch – Indian vegetarian lunch :)

We had couple of Mexican diner, one Italian, three Sri Lankan and rest was either Pizzas at hotel or Indian restaurants around. I gained almost 4 KGs in two weeks – blame it on eating out completely for two weeks.

Ok, Left it about our weekend on my last update
The weekend, we had it planned quiet good and thankfully it was a long weekend. For Saturday we roamed around Zurich city, Zurich lake and some local mall. One thing I found every where was Swiss army knife and lots of cheap – really good wine. We took a local Zurich lake – boat trip for around one hour and had a good site of many buildings. It was curios that the boat restricts, food, smoke and ice cream. I didn’t understand the difference between food and ice cream :)
On second day we headed to the Alps – Junfrau ‘Top of Europe’. It was more of a 6 hour journey one way and spend almost 2 and half hour on the top. The journey had two hour of bus ride, a on hour stop over at Interlaken and another 3 hours on a Cog wheel train to the top of Europe. More updates and pics on next update :)................

Finally landed.....

The status screen say 90% and 10% more to go. It is almost 9:50 pm and I am still in office making sure that today’s update reach my client in time. First things first! It had been a while before I had updated this blog and I have the usual excuse of ‘I was too busy with my life’ to pen down a few words. The thing is I had so much to write every time that random thought goes through my mind or when I see some thing which sparks of a series of thought but never got a breather to sit down and jaunt down some. Now I have a 10% upload window of a huge application which leaves me with out much option to use internet ( as it slows down my upload, a disconnected mobile phone connection which makes sure that I don’t call up a random friend and say some thing stupid …. )
A few updates, after a stint of around 40 months in US, I’m back in my motherland. It feels good to be here. Last time I was here for a vacation, the humidity and the dust killed me (the usual NRI dialogues) but it was rather because of the cold weather of East coast which I got so much used to in say last 3 years!
So this time I made sure that I take step by step crash down to my home place so that I have interim places to shed off the cold weather or say snow. I had been in Hyderabad for around two months before I finally got to my hometown. This time I am here to stay for a while and not for a brisk vacation which usually leaves an impression to my friends that ‘did he come’ or we just felt ‘he came’!
Staying at home and working like a day scholar is something I always wanted to do but my profession never allowed me to do so. Now I got a golden chance and I seriously enjoying the same. My friends back in US had warned me of the stringent time lines now my company has stipulated at my offshore locations and the kind of work we get to change my mind set to stay longer in US. It has been close to two months and I am glad that I stuck on to my decision to travel back. Yes it means to come back from a lot of comfort to a lot of discomfort but this discomfort does come with a sweet thing called ‘family’ around me! I am enjoying every bit of food I get at home as well as at my desi canteen!
A few things that really irked me for a while and now getting back to the desi skin which makes the saga ‘Everything works’
Every one I met in this last two months were in a hurry
No one cares for anyone else until and unless the ‘other one’ is a friend / relative / any of group-one belong to – either be cast / religion / language or even age! My understanding of culture is basically ‘concern for others’ and I haven’t seen much anywhere!
The long queue in front of a Mc’dee in a mall at Hyderabad left me in splits and my friend who was with me didn’t believe that Mc’dee is kind of a fast food eatery and not considered as a restaurant of any class!
No one cares for rules and everything works no matter how bad it is

Sorry to stop it abruptly but the upload is compete and I have to get home atleast by 10:30 and heard that the by-pass road is too dangerous to drive after 10:00pm …god save me :!

Random thoughts

Eyes are really burning and still don't feel like sleeping. My dear friend Susu is sitting next to me with a half finished wine thinking about which movie to play now... So closing my eyes, it black - Pitch black. Nope looking a little close now. Its not pitch black but a collection of dots. So its not black, its more of a collection which looks like black. Yes it has got black, a little gray dots! So if you analyse black very closely you will realise black is not completely black. If you take anything and analyse closely, its not complete. Take anything, love, hatred, air, water, nothing is complete when you look at the smallest unit of it symbolises an incompleteness. So the next question arises , why to analyse anything this close? Not actual a good thing to analyse but best thing is to embrace it. The random stream of thoughts never stop but it just flows in.

Chicken Drum sticks ...easy way ;)

I call it Chicken Drum sticks but not exactly drum sticks ;)

Ingredients:

Chicken leg piece : (Skinless– 8 Nos)
Ginger garlic paste : 1 tsp
Red chilly powder : 1 1/2tsp
Chicken masala : 1 tbsp
Coriander powder : 1 tsp
Salt : as required
Pepper powder : 1 tsp
Vegetable oil : 3 tbsp
Curry leaves : 5 to 6


For garnishing
Onion (sliced) : 1 (big)
Tomato (Sliced : 1
Lemon : one half

Recipe:
Gently spread the 1 tsp ginger garlic paste evenly to chicken pieces and keep aside. Heat a copper bottom frying pan and sauté red chilly powder, chicken masala, coriander powder, pepper powder and salt. Heat it only up to maximum 2 minutes on medium flames and mix well. Keep the fried masala mix to a flat ceramic plate and gently spread over the chicken pieces. Keep aside the left over masala mix. One slight cover up should do it. Once all the pieces are covered with one thin layer of masala, leave the chicken pieces for 45 to 50 minutes. After 50 minutes, microwave for 3 minutes each (4 pieces at a time). [ this is to make sure that the chicken piece gets cooked)
Heat a flat frying pan with 3 tbs of oil (Medium hot). Add curry leaves to the hot oil. Keep chicken pieces on the hot oil and roll them up with skewers every three to four minutes. Each time, sprinkle a little masala over the freshly fried chicken part so that the mix glues to the meat. 9 to 14 minutes frying should be enough. Move the fried chicken to a ceramic plate with tissue paper to remove the extra oil over chicken

Sprinkle lemon juice over arranged chicken pieces over sliced onions and tomato. Serve hot for best taste.

Life's Colors, It is gray!

It is easy to live in a black & white world where you can live with straight lines and defined shapes. As in the moral stories we heard in our childhood where the villain is full of evil and the hero is the living idol of good! Now when we see the world with a thin load of 20 to 30 years behind us, the picture we could draw about the world is never black or white. It is somewhere in the middle. Even when judgmental is the one thing we try to remove from our mind every moment of our life, we circle back to the same level next moment judging each of things or humans around us. The final outcome is never a black or white result; it just draws another undefined shape with the color ‘Gray’. Be it a relative, a friend a stranger, no one is of one color, they change color with time and circumstances and they fill a little of black and white each time they change sides! Some are of a lighter shade with less guilt and more are of a darker shade with a symbol of pride over their achievement. At the end of the journey, does it even matter if what our color is while we exit the world or does it change the true course of cycles of life as in re incarnation?

Camping - Vermont - Emerald lake

Ater a long wait, planning, re planning, scheduling and re scheduling finally we went for our first camping trip to Vermont – Emerald lake. Sunil took care of the reservations and checklist for shopping and we were on the way to Emerald by 12:00 pm from Abhishek’s house. (Plan was to leave there by 10 …just fell over by 2 hours). 5 guys on a small compatible car with truck load of stuff. A tent for 8 ppl, 4 pounds of chicken and pack fo 24 chicken sausage in an ice box, case of beer, vegetables and paneer for grill and couple of cameras. It was 3 hour drive from our place, reached the camp site by 4:00 – just in time so that the park office was open.

Took an hour to set up the tent and set the basic things. We head for the walk trail which looked so small in the map but a long trail with two (foot ball injured guys) in the group. The terrains where not so challenging but injuries take tolls :), have to appreciate my brave friends to go walking on such terrains with nurtured ligament tare and twisted ankles… Folks once on track are all in one aim to finish the trail.


We found one amazing lake bank idle for swimming but we missed our bath towels. After spending a while we realized we are falling short on time to get back to our tent and do the grilling part.
On the way around, we found a nice playing area where the foot ball players showed of their skills, a little time running behind the Frisbee and a lot of walking.



When we came back and started to sort out things in the tent, we realized we are short of drinks, missed chilly power, the grill needs a bad wash and we didn’t had the rite tools. So we head out again in search of a general store in a remote place relying on GPS and iphone searches. Meanwhile Deepak, Bobby and Abhi set the grill to fire. After tenuous effort for about 45 minutes, they got a clean grill with steady flames – hats off to you guys.



After a 30 mile drive and couple of bad search results, we found a super market and got everything we required and started driving back. One the way back the weather took a wild turn. The 30 % rain chance showed up that the 70% fell on the day time and rain gods blessed us with heavy down pour. By the time we reached back, the chicken was marinated, Paneer already grilled and tent was filled with two petromax and rest searching for battery for our big lamp.



The chicken sausages where already grilled and it tasted so good (we had a long day on trail, games and shopping and all we ate was that sausage which tasted the best sausage I ever ate(hunger and taste are definitely inversely proportional to glorify the taste) After a tough search for about one hour, we confirmed that the battery pack is missing and we need to spend our night with two LED lamps and moon light under on a heavy rainy day. But our spirits where high, drinks where on and so do the grill! Grilling and card game went on late until 1:00 PM! We had to keep strict silence as the camp had rules that after 10 it is strict silence …. Also our camping neighbors looked like its mid night for them at 10:00! So we relied on sign symbols and LED lights ….and here is a glimpse of what we ate for night :)



It was an experience on what all we can do in limited lights which included fire display, guess whose drink is where and keeping track of who left what and where.



By 1:00 we had three heavy down pour of rain and it looked like rain is going to stay. It was dream come true for me to sleep under tent with rain sound just over our head, a little warmth of tent inside woods … felt a serene feeling once you close your eyes and listen to the rhythm of rain over your tent.

We woke up next morning around 8:00. We had to cook our breakfast, clean the camp site and leave by 11:00. Bobby again showed his master skills by putting back the grill on in 45 minutes which took a heavy toll from rain last night and some close to wet firewood. The rest of food was finished in no time! We noticed a young boy going to each neighboring camp site picking up the left over firewood (an arm load cost you 4 $s and felt even Americans do this ;)) A fellow camper came around and asked if they can take the rest of our firewood and we felt that these folks take this very seriously – to pay and get firewood. We left the site by 11:30 and were back in home on my bed by 4:00…

It is so refreshing to be close to nature, listening rain, eating from a grill with a shade of charcoal flavor in your food. Learned that getting the tent back to the packing back is a tedious task and all you need is one night to get attached to a place. Until the next camp, I am signing off …..

Shanks

World cup 2010 .......

What next ?

The question is what to do next. There are no more interesting videos in youtube. Most of the recent movies in available free websites are over. Read most of blog friends post or they are no more updating (busy with more important things in life). Not hungry, so can avoid cooking for today. Yesterday was not a big problem as the last thing I remember is folks dropping from the conference call making that ‘Beep’ noise which woke me up from sleep. I kept the phone away and closed my eyes, which was like 4:30 in the evening and I opened my eyes on 6 O’clock today morning, one of the best days …

The spring showers and a tornado kept the summer heat away and water in our pool is freezing, so cannot swim L. Tried 64 channels in our cable subscription, but not a single interesting movie and those on ‘On demand’ I can actually write up the script from heart. It was really a rainy evening today and I partially got drenched when ran into my apartment form the car. A nice tea + bread omelet made my evening ….(my roomie was pissed off as his omelet had a little too much salt (my bad))

But what to do next ? I have so many things to write up and post it here but most of the things are blocked due to one or the other reason. May be because some one told me not to write all those or I am afraid that they will read it here and I will get thrashed! It agains another empty passing phase I guess
.

Filters.....

It’s been almost a month now since I came from my vacation and just couple of weeks after my trip to my cousin’s place. A dry afternoon on a boring Monday with lots of pending work but I am seriously tired and sleepy! My right eye is twitching and I am unable to concentrate on anything now. To beat the sleep I walked up stairs, almost 8 floors up in 2 minutes and met my roomie / colleague and talked for 10 minutes ( that much to kill my afternoon nap).

To stretch it out, I did Google the reason for ‘Twitching in right eye’ lead to answers like “Causes of myokymia include, nervous system disorders, Staring at the computer or television screen for a long time, stress, fatigue, lack of proper sleep, consumption of too much caffeine and irritation in the cornea or in the conjunctiva of the eye”

From what I remember I slept from 12:00 pm to 6 AM yesterday night, had only one cup of coffee, did not stare more than the usual 12 hours at my computer screen and two hours at the television screen, so I have to blame it on stress and fatigue due to travel (read it as three hours of sleep in New Jersey transit train and Metro North Train). Now back to the heading of my post, yes Filters….As I mentioned earlier, I went to my cousins’ place and I had to watch my vocabulary, jokes and the kind of talks initiated in a family environment and on the way back, I came back to more of me ( bachelor vocabulary’ once I was back at my house). It started a series of thoughts about the kind of filters we use while talking and on conversation depending on whom we talk to and the place where we are.

An ideal scenario would be answering about a simple question ‘How was your weekend?’If it’s my client manager, it goes like

‘Good, went out played tennis, had an eat out, did some driving’

If it’s my cousin, ‘It went well, had a good play with my in law, made him pay for an expensive restaurant, ate and slept well’

If it’s my friend (just a friend), “it was great, had a good time with family and it went very fast’

If it’s my jigidi dosth (read it as one who stays in the circle) “Had a good time, made my in law sweat a lot over tennis, had some good fights with my nephew, had great food at cousin’s place ….

How about you” Basically, the message is, I had a good time, but depending on whom we talk the intensity, the things we share, the way we project it, details …everything around it changes. This is implemented by everyone, applying filters on what we talk, leaving some details and making it sound totally different. The best part is when you get to listen to the things as it happens which will be shared to very few (friends and family)Every moment we open our mouth to talk something in a group, there is a filter in place. These filters, they come in different intensity levels according best possibility on the moment! The best part of it is when you are around someone and then goes with them when they meet their friends, family relative and colleagues and they talk about something that happened where you also were the part of the crowd watching. This is the time when you can seriously watch a filter in work from a third person perspective.

Is this because we can’t be ourselves to everyone? To make an image or just to follow the ‘Social rule’ to be followed as it is painted on everyone? It works well as well defined and well in control filter becomes a part on ones personality ( either imposed or natural filters ) where one decide what to say, what not to say and how to say it.I am just talking about conversation filter here, but the thing is every one of us live behind a mask. The mask which filters out what your mind really want and what one can really express. Some go with the way it comes to their mind but still when they are around their loved ones / influential people, they watch their thoughts or actions.

Back to the topic, as a child I was not aware of having any filter in my mind, as my niece who will ask anything as it comes to her mind and she doesn’t care. As we grow up we tend to pretend or molded to something or someone, sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally. As we grow up, we keep on adding too many filters into our life and we lose track of it as we grow old were we just blurt outs things because our filter process is not in place anymore. I think I am carrying a lot of mask / filter lately, I guess that’s the way it works until I lose track and end up blurting out ‘me’ to many as it is!

Dude, where is my car ????????????

Dude , Where is my Vasu ?

Vasu is the short name for my car ‘Vasumathy’. We named my car so after naming D’s car as Kalyani kutti and A’s car as Meenukutti. (note: these are names of characters from two super hit Malayalam movies of Mohanlal, and when we discussed about naming my car, it was more like Vasumathy, ….athumathy, another movie dialogue, but not from Mohanlal’s movie)

This is happened on a very cold morning in November. The temperature outside my apartment was 26 degree f. (Close to -3 Degree Celsius). Time was around 6: 30 in the morning and I was rushing through my morning routine. I had packed up my lunch (whatever was left behind from the experiment in kitchen the day before), polished my shoes and headed out to the drive way. Then realized that I forgot my company ID card and came back to find that I left my wallet as well! So I had to remove my shoes again and get into the bed room to get all the possessions!
Phew!!!!! what a way to start the day. Doing all this, time was around 6:43. Every day or most of the days I have an in-person meeting with my team at 7:00. So my trip to office is a 20 minutes drive to cover around 17 miles and a 6 minutes’ walk ( others usually takes 12 to 15 minutes ) I have long legs and I always walk like someone is eating my lunch at the other end of the building, so I cut it down to 6 minutes.

So I had all this running in my mind that I am going to be late for today’s meeting as I am already late. To cover a 17 miles drive and a 6 minute superfast stride in 17 minutes, not a chance. I didn’t count the time to start up my vehicle, clean the ice off and warm it up so that it will actually run! Imagining all those, I walked to my drive way and alas!!!!!!!!!! I am looking at a different car in the place I had parked my car yesterday. I had lot of things going on my mind …..

Where did I park my car?
When did I park it?
Do I have my car key?
Where is the insurance paper?
Where is the title?

Do you know the moment your throat just go dry even if it is freezing cold and you were not even close to thirsty? Then the stream of thoughts went something like this ….
Ohh I lost a lot of things with my car ….was it stolen? How will I commute until I get the car / new car …. Lots and lots of questions! Then the thought came to call Thimmashan ( Mr D, who is the car guru in our group. He is a wonderful Business analyst but he love cars) so tapped his number and woke him up on a cold first light ….so the tête-à-tête went like this

D: Halla
Me: My car is missing

D: What???
Me: Eda, My car is not where I had parked it yesterday!

D: Look again, where did you park it yesterday?
Me: In the open parking lot next to our building

D: Are you sure you parked it here, or it was in a marked parking lot
Me: I am pretty sure, I parked it here ….(or if was one lot on the right side thinking in my mind ), So what to do now

D:What else, call up 911 and tell them your care is being stolen!
Me: WHAT ?
Me: Yes , go ahead and call them

So here I go tapping 911 …

Me: Hi
Officer: Hi, please state your emergency

Me: it looks like my car is stolen , I had parked in my parking lot and it is gone today morning
Officer: Can you please give the license plate number and the location

Me: It is XCP …. And location
Officer: your car was towed yesterday night at 12:30 as it was parked on someone else parking lot. Please contact the tow vendor at (address& phone number) to get your car.

Me: let me write it down and thanks for the info

I went back to house with D, and sat on sofa thinking ‘Did I park there ???’ Then called up the towing company and they said I have to pay 75 $s to get my car back. This is towing and handling charge …. So I bought my car again from the towing company for 75 $s…. I remember the incident where my mom bought me from a police man when he caught me for driving a scooter without a license ….That day I still remember the conversation with my mom and the police man.

Policeman: You shouldn’t allow your kid to drive the scooter at such young age
Mom: how much

Police man: 500
Mom: OK, I will make sure he doesn’t drive out again ….

And she came back home saying … Look what I bought today for 500 ….. Me.....

:)

Nothing is the same after a point in time. It’s like a point in space of a line, where things look so different and after that. For each and everything, all you get is one decision point where you take left or right and then it goes like rail lines … they don’t give many to change lines after you choose one. When you look back, all you can recall is the moment with span of seconds where you thought what to say, how to act and then its done which will never be un done. So think before you go with everyday life, because life is not lived in chunks of time, but day by day – moment by moment. All one need to enjoy is their time with their mind and a little energy to enjoy the same. No matter how bad things go, if you can strain on to the ray of hope, that’s all that take you to the end J smiling …

RT.....

Random thoughts

I guess these days I’m having more of random thoughts rather than any straight thoughts!
In this world of emails and n number of networking website and a hell lot of other ways of communication, I was wondering, if I see some one I know after a long time, will I even cross the street to meet them? I thought about it long enough in my hard race like driving from Hartford to my house. I am not sure what is all about this hurry for every one on the road. Anyway I was not in a hurry following the 65 mph limit and pissing off every one behind me in the traveler line. So back to the thought, In the era of gtalk / yahoo/ strings of emails/ facebook / myspace, we can always choose whom to ignore and whom to attend even without letting them know your choice. Even on your phone you get the choice whom to attend and whom not to. The same with the voice messages, you can always choose without hurting anyone. The technology gives us the luxury of avoiding / meeting people. There are some lucky / unlucky people are flurried with lot of communication and there are some unlucky / lucky people who don’t have much to answer. The technology doesn’t change the attitude of any one in their mind, it just gives you more option to do the same thing and have the same results. What would it take you to make that move and take the pain / pleasure to cross the street and say a Hi / hello and share the email / phone number / email id according to the depth of the friendship strength?

Yes, the major part of it would depend on the last meeting or the status of the person you just saw! No one would want to stir up some one they had avoided in he first place, but yes if it is a charming person who always remind you of the good times you had.!
So I was just thinking through the short list of people who would make me cross that little street form my daily amazing life and take time out to talk to him / her. I realized that there are not many who would make me do that, may be I have not met many charming people yet or they don’t find me charming.

Either way, it was a good thought and it left me with a good smile and some faint memories of some good old faces …..winds of smile and thoughts …it just flows through

Something to smile about

How do you celebrate every day in your life ? Do you celebrate sometimes ? I am talking about enjoying the smallest and sweetest things in the world which is not actually the biggest but which gives one of the best feeling. Because I do get up some days feeling so dejected and lonley and starts thinking ‘ What am I doing here ? ‘
Why exactlly I am here and what I am supposed to do about something, matter of fact about everything. I do have quiet a good job, a little bundle of good friends and family and a lot of other things to wine about. But what actually contributes to my life ? Is it my salary ? Is it the kind of work I do or is it the way I feel every day. Happiness is bound to be what you make out of everything you feel
Following are some of things I enjoy these days a lot. Its not much but these are kind of luxuries I (WE) have in our life which most of us ( I did) take for granted. Now atlest when I am in my good sense, I do really take the time to appreciate it and enjoy it. I had good hard reasons to enjoy it. Some tims mind is too busy to see the details and focus on the big picture. I am going to list down some of them and looking forward to keep that things that way …… Its kind of akward, but it works for ME !
1. When you wake up hald slept in early morning on a weekday and realise that its just 4:30 in the morning and you have another hour to sleep. It is a luxury to have a cosy bed and time to sleep at your will. Not many have it this early in their career because many of them have an angry boss’s face when they close there eyes to catch that ‘ 5 minutes of escasty sleep’
2. A little time in the morning to make a good nescafe coffee for your self and sip it through the rush hour morning wondering what I am going to do today about the hedious production defects I am going to sit through today. Most of the time, the activites of the day steals the coffee effect but there are days where I can sit blank and just sip the coffe and appreciate its taste and aroma. Just a coffee but it is really good when you enjoy it.
3. The morning songs I listen to! Now this is a bigger luxury to have your own choice of music to be played that early in the morning where a nice search would get you any song available in intert in youtube. It is strage that I some how love the song ‘Dil khoom khoon kare’ but my roomie gets sad lsitening this song and requested not to play it. You now know what I meant by luxury
4. A good bath! You might be wondering if ever a bath ia luxury. Belive me, I am now living in a new england winter where the temperature seldom falls above 5 degree celsius. I just get mesmerised standing on a hot shower and let the face skin feel each droplets of hot water. It starts with a sharp knill but it leavs a feeling og hot nails which I love afterwards.
5. To have at least a crush or a face to think about when you actually dress up for the day. Mostly we end up non – noticed but this is something I enjoy. Just wondering about a moment where some one might catches you on a good costume and you get to know that ( seldome got this luck, but yes I do some times)
6. My favorite song being played in shuffle when I drive. Its again a luxury that my co travelers let the song complete as we seldom get people pf same tastes ad same mood at same time
7. A slot of 5 minutes for myself at some or the other time in a day. Now a days, life just rushes through from one tast to another! Its kind of too fast and there is never a moment to ourselvs, just to sit blank and enjoy the moment of glory ( even if its not a gladiator fight) we do win our wars at times
8. To have such a place where I can write such piece of crap and still people do come here, read up to here thinking what is this guy up to but still reads to the end :D ……. Ok this one was far fetched and I am stopping the luxury details here …….

CRUSH

I guess it is a good thing to have a crush going on, in life at any given moment. This is what I read in one of the dailynews recently. Looking back, I could say I had my fair share of crushes from my childhood and most of them are one way crushes starting from Hemamalini( yes she is almost 30 years elder to me ) when I had that thought in my mind. If I recall it correctly, the next one was my music teacher in my 4rth standard (do people have cruses at ages like that or it’s just my evil perverted mind?) I don’t know, I still have a soft corner for the fairer side who are really good singers. It went on with couple of girls in my college life and that was it. Somehow the work life kept me so busy that I never found any face / person interesting enough to catch my attention (may be a pretty smile somewhere). I am not sure if it was more of a realization that crushes doesn’t help much unless you work on it. (In my case even you work on it!)

So it leads to the question what happens if I try to work on a crush to take it to next level? Most of the time I get crushes to the best person around and I end up joining a marathon run rather a short sprint with limited people where I have at least a chance to finish and ends up my heart being crushed! So the million dollar question is why I am talking about crush at this point of time. Yes you are right! I got that long forgotten feeling of having a crush over some one lately. A pretty face which I bumped into in my current workplace! I am not sure if having a crush in mind for someone is ok and if it is good to write about it here! I hope I will be able to keep this in my blog long enough J and no one comes walking to my desk to break my legs / hands

More about the crush lady, I have to come up with some name which cannot be traced back to this girl. So I will go with Crush Lady- CL. I have never tried to work on a crush to see if it would reach somewhere. This time, I sat back and thought, When I had such a thing going when I was in 4rth standard, my thought process went like I am just 4, let me grow up. The same thing came back on my adolescence, again thought I had to grow up a little more. When I got my first job, I tried something and didn’t get the best of results! I think, that is the last time I ever tried until now.

For now, I sat and thought long enough and thought if I don’t do it now, when I would have such an opportunity? Looking at the time gap, last time I found some one interesting was around 4 years back. So I guess my eyes have a specific filter for such faces and it’s not something always available out there. With the backing of such farfetched thoughts, I tried making conversation couple of times over office communicator and ended up getting cold answers. Cannot blame CL as how comfortable any one would be talking to a total stranger over messenger! What I am talking about is not a yahoo messenger or a chat box but office communicator! ( yak what a pervert!!! ;))

Do you know how tough it is to get a lady to talk to you when you really want to her to talk! If the girl already got signals of the possible crush factor, the girl is going to make sure that every window /door and any open communication media are closed out for any kind of inroads (unless she is really interested). I think after the futile chat attempts, the earlier half smile / eye contact (which might be another farfetched thought of mine) was denied. One thing people don’t understand is being friendly to someone doesn’t hurt anyone but as a matter of fact,’ something in demand is always short of supply!’ With my friends who are really good at getting crushes, I always ask them what happens if you just smile and walk past to those who are really behind you and these folks have never given me a good answer on why they keep the straight face.

One thing strange is I always find a little crush feeling only with the best ( at least something which falls best for my eyes ) and I never come in the radar for any of those ….matter of fact I wonder if anyone had a crush feeling anytime towards such a freak (ME)….I don’t think so :D. So I am still thinking about whether to wink at this CL or let her have fun with her life and avoid the elevator she is already in :) you know, next time she might slap me with the laptop she has in her hand!

Yes, I have a ton load of work to finish and an everlasting to-do list but somehow these are the times when the blogger in me pops up and says, it’s time to write up something. It was really busy two to three months with lot of travel, not much of work but lots of catch up. Two of my good friends got married (this time – guys not girls!) and they are still through the period of getting a new person in their life. It often happens that when friends get married, it mostly like throwing in a log into a standstill pond with a lot of friend-ships floating around. The pond and the log will be together and there will be a lot of ripples in the pond until it stabilize. We all know that this log is going to stay in the pond all lifelong and going to tumble some of the friend-’ships’ floating in the pond. The interesting part is the initial time ripples are too big as the log splashes into it washes up a lot of tiny ships around. Many a few who manages to be still and be around just floats! I know this analogy is farfetched and you (whoever is reading) didn’t get a clue of what I am talking about.
Anyways, current 'in-thing' is 'fitness' and somehow six packs suddenly sound nice to me. Yes currently I am a lean figure who looks like I will die of dehydration if I walk fast, but nothing is impossible. (This kind of crazy thoughts is what keeps people going)So I am slowly goanna start jogging to burn off my little 'tortoise on a pillar' like tummy I am having right now and will try at least to get a firm tummy, dreaming about a six – four- two packs :) . The biggest challenges I will face is the random beer fest and the sparkling wines which tempts me at Italian and Irish cuisines which goes so well will steak and freshly well done meat dishes in client meetings/ potlucks. I never used to eat much in such official meeting until recently where I grew confident enough to cut and fang the cooked food with forks and knife. Until recently I was afraid that the chicken piece I am struggling with will end up with my engagement managers' plate or if the noodle string will slip out from my mouth to the plate. Still not 'James bond of forks and knife' but got a good enough confidence to take out the tools and use it when I am really hungry ( still struggling with the chop sticks as it hurts for a days after trying to eat rice soup without slurping sounds)
So as my plans are holding, I tried to get in the path of jogging and abs exercise and now I am left with a wonderful pain over my belly and thighs which is preventing me from smiling as everyone has to be happy with a smirk! A good laugh is hurting as it moves stomach muscles and a stair will just pulls my things apart. One serious questions coming back to me is, does these six pack guys actually laugh at all? If they don’t it’s just because it hurts like hell after the work outs :)
After three days of gym and a lot of pain, I am having serious second thoughts about 6-4-2 packs :D