Bye Bye GrandMa

Give me a reason to believe that you're gone
I see your shadow so I know they're all wrong
Moonlight on the soft brown earth
It leads me to where you lay
They took you away from me but ...

It was a bright Tuesday morning when I stepped out of my train in Salem to board a bus to my native village, Vellur. It’s my Grandmother’s village where major part of my mid-school summer vacations was spent. The first time I went to that village was when I was four and for my grandfathers funeral. Due to some Family infighting, I was never there and I never saw any of them till then. I was told that while performing some ritual of dropping some flowers and rice over the Grandfathers dead body and I was screaming when I was taken around him.

This time I went for my grandmother’s funeral and I am sure this will be my last visit to that village. Definitely I was not screaming nor was I crying outside, yet some sort of sadness taken in to me. I am still in that state.

KMS Rajammal is the most affectionate and sweetest person I have ever seen. There are people who love you and you love some, but she is one person who shows affection to everyone. As far as I can remember, at any point of time, there will always be some outsider sitting and talking to the inmates as if they are one of them. "samii, kannu, vada eppada vende .." is the words I keep hearing from her whenever someone enters the house. She loved every one and all were very close to her. And these words were ringing inside my ears when I was doing my share of rituals over her dead body...

She really meant much more to me. She is the only relative in whose presence I was always absolutely comfort. I am never myself when I am with my relatives except for her. I still remember the days in my childhood when I got chicken pox, the care she and the other elders showed it to me. Will I ever get something like that again? I bet, never.

And she always stood by her grandchildren. I still remember the day when my father beat me for the last time. It was my 9th std winter holidays and I made a grave mistake in his eyes and as usual I felt I was right. I am sure any body in my situation would have done that. After getting exhausted from arguments and beatings from my father, I was crying in my bed, I felt the caring hands of her on my head. She pulled me out of my bed and was consoling me. I was defending myself saying I was right and even others were doing the same and my defense stopped there as I had nothing more to say. After I stopped crying, she looked into my eyes and said softly - “why do you think you are right just because u are doing what others are doing? Why do you think what you really wanted to do was wrong just because you will be the only guy doing that“. I had no answer that time. But these words got locked up in my heart till date, and influence my decisions. I definitely miss her, but she has given me what I needed to live alone.

This is not exactly and Eulogy or an ode to her. I came back to Bangalore this morning hoping that the last two days effect will vanish but it didn't. So in order to lighten up myself before starting my work, I decided to pour out my feelings to the one place I have in the recent past.

Ironically, today is my birthday and I am no mood to celebrate that. When people ring up and greet me, I don't want to show that I am down. Actually I am not exactly sad nor in the mood for celebration but in a vague feeling between them which according to my friend PV is called smashana vairagya!!!

Hope I will get over this soon. Any way…

Bye Bye grandmother. I will definitely miss you
in my good times and my bad times ...

Wondering what’s happening to me ??

Last few days/weeks /months have been really hectic. Loads of work with concrete deliverables is anyone’s nightmare and that’s what exactly I was going thru. Linux release is solely on me and considerable work on windows domain too along with a junk COO work, I clearly lost my work –life balance. Though I was realizing something was missing, only a few hrs back I realized what I was missing. I just stopped having a personal life. ? Believe me. I really stopped having that!

So what happened in my life since my last post?

1. Wanted to write a post on my diwali trip. My experiences in Shadapti first class and how I got the ticket.


2. Wanted to write a post on the first anniversary/birthday (?) of my dear bike. It really deserves a special post for that. I almost opened my blogger on that day, except that my boss sent a mail which required immediate attention. Sorry sweetie, I will surely write about you and put more photos. Wondering how my life would have been without you? Ps: My bike is also a male bike (Unicorn ;) ) and it is still virgin :( whereas some of my friends who bought some not-so-male-looking bikes(Yamaha’s) got Lucky. (He is enjoying in US now) .


3. Missed some of my good friends’ birthday. This is so unlikely of me. What the hell? I used to remind others reg my friend’s birthday and now I forgot some of my close friends birthday. What a shame, I really feel bad. Not just that, I didn’t eve n call some of them still ;( . I missed jrk’s , sivankar’s birthdays. I managed to wish them properly for last 5 years. I missed my elder sister’s birthday. OMG she will never forgive me. Somehow managed to give a belated wishes to my sister-in law. She was considerate enough in not killing me on that. I also missed my friend’s wedding day. Sorry lingu.

4. My brother got a daughter a month back and I am yet to see her. Hopefully I will see her in January. Wondering whether I can call her - my niece or is it only for sister’s daughter?


5. My granny fell sick. She was hospitalized and recovered, yet not in a healthy state. I want to meet her asap, but I can’t go alone to that place as I am not very close to my relatives. Wanted my mom to come there and the sync between our leave is failing.


6. I am hardly mailing in platform9 and never opened Orkut. If anyone has pronounced my death there, it would have been confirmed by now and they will be having my anniversary. Need to start again on that and more importantly, I need to start sending normal mails to p9 other than financial mails!!!


7. Eye on I: This one needs to be told in a separate post and I will definitely put one(how many promises I made till now in this post? Please don’t count). I joined the sai alumini- sevice activities and participating in them. Apart from organizing EyeonI, I even managed to organize the fund collection from our groups and doing them regularly. If it continues, planning to help other batches to do the same. Hopefully it works. At least I can get rid of some guilt that I am not doing anything for the society.

8. I am becoming fatter and getting balder. And the rate in which its happening is really high. Esp the hairfall. Actually till now I was having broad forehead, but now I am officially bald L. God save the world and my hair.


9. I bought a new mobile .Nokia N72. Not so great, yet manageable. Actually I was eyeing motorolla v3i , but I was told it needs to be handled delicately. Not my area.

That’s it I guess. Not able to think further. I need to post one today as I got a mail from a friend to update my blog. So did it.

Godavari

Godavari - It’s a beautiful feeling. After a long period, I saw a good movie, a movie which makes you happy for watching it, and after watching it. I just sat there and I really lost myself to it.

The story, the screenplay, the music, the dialogs, the actors, the camera, the boat, the river - everything is beautiful and sweet. Everything.

I am not going to tell the story. This is not a spoiler as, personally, I hate to listen to a story before I watch a movie. All I want to say is it is a great movie and every one who like good movies should watch it and it deserves a special recognition and a separate post from me ;)

Few things I liked in the movie (not in the order of my liking)

1. Location and Camera - the Cinematographer must be a highly talented guy to show a normal boat and plain river to look that good.

2. Animated characters: Amazing. Just too good. They come only for short period, yet in right places and make your life lighter. I especially liked the dialogs of the dog. Heard that it was voiced by the director. In a scene, a boy (whom the dog calls master) feeds a dosa and the dog says, “u r not a human, master - a Dog ,err sorry, a God!”. “I will be with you always, at the time of needy, (+ something)” Then to itself: “did I promise extra?? Hey leave it, lets see when time comes (something like that)”. The original telugu dialog is really fun to hear. I also liked the conversation between our dog and another well – breed Dog. And the exchanges between parrot and our dog. Really cool ones.

3. Dialogs (of humans ;) ). :: Short n sweet.

4. The expressions of the heroin (Kamalinee Mukherjee,) - cute

Apart from this, the movie has neither vulgar language or A-rated jokes nor obscene scenes. Not that I don't like them ;), yet nice to see a movie without them. Till now, this directer -Sekhar Kammula's previous movie ANAND was my all time favorite. My opinion is set to change.

Overall a good, decent, sweet and a must movie.

Thinnama, padukunama, thelarinda

I spent my weekend keeping the above line as motto. This line is from Pokiri, a telugu movie where a police officer comments on the general attitude of public. In fact, I can add to say Thinnama, chusama, padukunama, thelarinda - to be more apt.

Thinnama

Friday night:: 10.45 PM. After a busy meeting reg an upcoming program(some serious stuff), me and sriram are busy eating onion dosa, chitrannam, and one more type of dosa(does name matter?) + some juices in the kana bazaar somewhere in lalbagh area. We came to know such a road existed in Bangalore only that night as the rest of so-called decent hotels refused to allow us ‘that’ late in the night. The food was great compared to any good hotel except that u need to stand and eat which is definitely not an issue for me ;)

(Chusama ) Padukunama:

Reached home at 12.30 night and bhasa was wide awake surprisingly. So we decided to watch a movie, name of which I am unable to recollect! But I ended up sleeping around 3.30 ;)

Thelarinda:

So Saturday begin before even I slept for Friday!. Got up at 9.00 with a slight headache. Started my day with the only comforting fact that I got up before Bhasa. After breakfast, incidentally which was a version of Upma, experimented by myself, which includes successful convincing of bhasa to eat that, I settled for a movie. The movie is Godavari(telugu). Ha, one sweet movie. It deserves a separate post, so nothing here ;). mm .Then the gang(Sri, pv, chax, me , bhasa , kv, and babai) met at Bhagini for lunch, which was followed by some discussions on ‘Eye on I’.

Thinnama

Jaya joined us at out home at 6.00 and after some veti -veti talks, we decided to go for dinner at Golkonda chimney (treat from babai). Filled my stomach with some proteins ;) and tried hookah for the first time and returned home at 11.30 after a brief 45 minutes stop at corner house for a light dessert ;) .

(Chusama ) Padukunama:

I was desperate to watch OMKARA as I missed it in theater. Actually I was not very much interested when the movie was released, but later, after the feedback from my colleague was so good that I borrowed a original DVD(slight correction here- it is Piriginal) . So again a bit of convincing worked to get the majority to watch this movie. Yahoo!! , Movie show started at 12.00 and after regular breaks (thanks to sagar) , slept around 3.00.

Thelarinda.

Sunday morning. Sunday usual breakfast of bun+ butter + puff with tea satisfied my stomach. Thanks to kv, who forced me to go out for shopping to marathahalli. Few purchases and back home, so that we can cook before the match will start.

Thinnama :

Sorry, the ‘we’ includes only KV as he is the chef and the others in ‘we’s – PV and bhasa helped him and the last of ‘we’- myself, just coordinated the event ;)

Chusama – watched the match till the end(till mandira said bye) . The day ended when I slept at 10.30 after a simple dinner at near by Bengali mess.

I am sure god won’t be this gracious on me ever. The point is I decided to stay at home this weekend as my computer at office witnessed me working late in the nights last week and I decided to give myself a much deserved rest. Yet, in spite of staying most part of the time at home, I was tired on Monday morning.

How Can

How can it be you're asking me to feel
the things you never show

Usually I won’t hear unknown / not previously heard songs when I am down or bothered.

Last Couple of days, I was bothered inside. It is usual for me to get troubled from inside, and during this time, I will go alone (literally) and do some analysis and introspection and eventually will try to change myself. This is a casual style of mine which was annoying my friends during my college days and they used to ask me reasons for my sudden silence or disappearance. But as months passed, they got used to it, I believe, for they stopped bothering me in such times, even though they recognize I am going thru something.

Currently I am in one such mood. It is kinda complex and a closer to heart situation involving people who matter in my life. But for the first time in my life, I am convinced that its not my fault and I should continue as I am. It is a great improvement in my life, for I always convince myself that it must be my fault. I always try to adjust to situations where all are comfortable. If I am in an argument, I always go an extra mile to see other person’s point of view and go extra extra mile to understand why the other person is making a mistake and try to justify his/her stand. But Now-a-days, I am changing. And I know it for sure.

One more aspect is my anger management. I usually won’t get angry or upset with someone as easily as I get with myself ;) But I do get angry at times and usually I get tongue-tied when angry and I will still be angry till the other person calms down. Also I usually try to reason out with the other person and convince him or her that the whole thing was just his or her mistake, if I believe that’s the case. But this fully exercise would have zapped me out and I will be mentally totally disturbed and my work-life balance would have gone for a task, that I will end of spending sometime alone to get composed. Also my first instinct will be to sever ties or maintain distance with someone when I am upset with them. I am improving in this aspect too. I stopped being emotional when angry and trying hard to be insensitive if a person makes mistake knowingly. But looks like this is a quality of Sagittarians and I need to live with it. :(

Oh, why this post? I wanted to tell this. Usually I won’t hear unknown / not previously heard songs when I am down or bothered. This is one aspect of mine where I need to change. There are few songs which I love to hear when I am down. BackStreetBoy’s ‘Show me the meaning’ is one such. This time after hearing the song B2B 8 times, I went crazy enough to hear this particular line repeatedly. With concise wordings, it meant more than what it was intended. So thought of posting /pasting them :)

G-Sheets

Past couple of days, all I am doing is maintaining spreadsheets.

In my office, the Linux work which I was doing went to QE and they found enough bugs. It’s a buggy life after all! My manger, before going on his vacation, told me to coordinate the fixes and delivering the fixed build to QE. From then on, I am coordinating with excel, :) with lot of color schemes, remarks, corrections, blah blah blah ..

On the other hand, p9 too needed some attention from me. Sri was telling me his idea about collective fund rising. But his initial idea of asking people to fill in exact-committed amount and getting them regularly didn't appeal to me much. So I proposed an alternative where a GSheet will be sent to the group every month and every one will fill in their contributions for that month. Since I proposed, I did that GSheet work.

GSheet is Google spreadsheet. Its pretty cool and very useful if you want to share among friends or groups so that multiple people can update simultaneously. Whereas an attached excel sheet fails if the group needs to update them simultaneously.

Also the sharing options are good. We can allow some people to edit and some people to read only. We can always pull back the options.

I kinda like the GSheets . Guess it is pretty useful if you want to keep some accounting information online.

Ofcourse it is Google ;)

Yahoo Beta!!!

I had heard about this from my friend. I wanted to get one but heard that it is only thru invitation. ! I was curious to know how yahoo is going to improvise its mail in order to beat gmail. There is no doubt that yahoo is the leader in that space, yet google is google;) . So I was desperately waiting to try yahoo beta. Then I saw it in techspot.


So do the following if you want to upgrade your yahoo!!! It worked for me and it may work for you too, though I saw some comments that it doesn't work for few. :(

1. Log in to your yahoo mail account
2. on the top left, besides "mail" button, there is one down arrow, click there..
3. Go to "option"
4. on the left panel, click on account information...
5. Click on "edit" under membership information
6. In the first panel, u will find "Preferred Content", click on it.
7. Select "English-United Kingdom"
8. Save changes
9. Go back to your mail window...
10., Now keep this window open, and in a new window, open www.mail.yahoo.com, and login...u'll get an invitation to join "yahoo mail beta version"!!!!

Looks good n cool. Similar to local web client (what we use in office) with scrollable inbox and other stuffs.
I am finding it bit slow when it loads (unlike yahoo!!!) but it is fine after sometime (ajaxified??)
Yet to use it properly, but first impression is good, though not that exiting!!!

Also not sure how many know abt this.
Click on ! of Yahoo! [www.yahoo.com] top left corner :)
Don't forget to keep your speakers on!!!

Yahoo Rocks!!!

Getting COO -ed

Not sure what coo-ed means (is there a word like that?) Too drained to google for that.
Past one week, I am doing a junk, boring and important work. On the day, when I joined back my office after a week's fever, my manager greets me with the info that there is a boring job waiting for me :). I knew it was coming, but didn't really want it.
Basically the work is this. The release for which I was working (Linux release) needs the Certificate Of Originality (COO). Guess every s/w produced will have this. So what is this COO ? COO tells that that particular software is our own original product and we list all the borrowed and bought codes and their licenses. That means, I need to sit and find out what are the third party softwares we are using, names of the individuals whose copyrighted files we are using, open source files, blah blah blah ....
Believe me, it is painful, pitiful, unrewarding, dangerous and an important work. Dangerous and imp because incase I make a mistake in finding out the complete info , say I miss out the info that we are using another company’s library or code and if found later, it will cost my job. Also the probability of that company suing mine is also there. So I need to find these info and we need to put these copyright info in the license doc or copyright info. That’s legal dept's headache. My job is reporting those company info and where we are using in our code and why???


I worked even on weekend and from Sunday, I am working late till 12.00 in the night.
Finally it is over and has to answer few more questions to the manager in US.
Phew......
For few days I forgot that I am a s/w engg :)

Wondering I can ever do a manager’s job. I mean non - technical work and which involves a lot of paper work!!!.

--saka

ADding Sense or ADding nonSense ?

Finally I too added nonsense to my blog. Nope, I am not talking abt my posts...

I am talking about AdSense. Google’s premier innovation, which is fast catching up among bloggers, caught me too. So I enrolled for it and added adSense code into my blog .

Two things I managed to do.

1. Google search bar, which is not aligned properly and not working at least on my firefox.

2. Advertisements at the end of the blog . From the time I added, only bharat matrimony ad is getting displayed. !! Is god sending me some msgs (or rather atleast google is doing)...

Ok. Lemme see how much I will earn ;) . My dear folks,do visit bharat matrimony or whatever is getting displayed, whenever u remember saka!!

Hail Google!! Hail AdSense...

My Life :: Post 9/3

Sunday 03/09 : 13:15 ::::: 98.6
Sunday 03/09 : 17:15 ::::: 99.6
Sunday 03/09 : 19:15 ::::: 103
Monday 04/09 : 09:30 ::::: 104
Monday 04/09 : 12:30 ::::: 104
Monday 04/09 : 17:30 ::::: 102
Monday 04/09 : 20:30 ::::: 103
Tuesday 05/09 : 09:30 ::::: 102
Tuesday 05/09 : 12:30 ::::: 100
Tuesday 05/09 : 15:30 ::::: 100
Tuesday 05/09 : 19:30 ::::: 100

These are not bus numbers or chart of a market value of a share.
These are my temperatures when I feel sick.
Yep, this week, my body temp touched 52 week high, (all time high, I guess, at least as far as I remember). Sunday afternoon, after having lunch in sagar's new home, I started experiencing wrist pain. I had plans of roaming in Indranagar that evening to buy a gift for my sis birthday, but all I managed to do was sleep on my bed and the fever caught me. Treated for chikun gunya in the local hospital and I was hardly recovering. Even on Wednesday, my stomach refused to accept anything solid, and promptly throws up even horlicks. That’s it. I decided to go to Chennai at any cost. And I did pay a heavy price, for the taxi to majestic ;) and a tatkal c/c ticket (which is usual).

The rest of the week, all I did was resting, resting and resting. And this resting process was broken occasionally to have juices, soups and idles... Wow. I really enjoyed. If not for my manager, I would have extended my 8 days leave, but, u know... I am always duty conscious!!!

Now I am back to take up my responsibilities in Bangalore, yet feeling home sick ;)

Got to gear up....

Ganesh Chathurthi

It is a big festival for all of us. But this year vinayaka chathurthi (as called in TN) is more special for me, for I am attending one after 10 years. Last time I was in home for this festival when I was in my 11th std ;) . So this time I was all geared up. With some escalations which popped up at last minute showed signs of my trip getting cancelled, I still managed to go, in spite of reaching the bus stand 15 late !!!. The festival was more filling than in one way. Three or four types of chundals, a lot of fruits, pori, kollukattai's... O my god... I never ate like that in the recent past. Suddenly I started longing to be in Chennai. Truely. All of a sudden I feel that being with family is also good, I mean.. Feels good. Took Monday off, spent some time with my sis, saw some movies , gave some serious gyan to parents to take care of their health. And had some real good quality sleep ;)

Basically, had a good time at home :)

--saka

Sudden Dullness.

Suddenly the world looked dull today.
All the people around me looked dull, hazy, as if they are unsure about something.
The vehicles in the road were going in a chaotic manner and the drivers are surprised with the sudden appearance of the vehicle. In office, the manager looked strangely as if someone didn’t reciprocate a smile when he expected. The monitor looks dull, the program crashes dumbly. The same chapathai kurma looks different, even though it tastes the same junk. I can keep going on like that …


How many times have you experienced this?
I do every two months.
Whenever I break my specs.

Going colorful..

The Blogger .com is in the process of upgradation. This morning I logged in to report the happenings of the last weekend and hardly knew I was in for surprise.

A beta version of the blogger is ready and I was asked the option of moving ahead.
For which of course, I will always be ready!!!.

Any case, here I am, typing my post, after successfully migrating to the beta version.

Lot of good things is in store. The look and feel has improved evidently, as the Dashboard looks different and definitely betterJ. Font color options, new and better layouts make it kinda cool. Best thing is u can upgrade ur existing theme without any hassle. Label is a new option provided by default, apart couple of other new things to put it on ur blog page. Another good thing is improved access control to have private blogs!!! . I definitely need one.

You need a gmail account to port urself to this beta version and eventually to the new blogger (I believe) and hereon ur gmail account will be ur login.
As such really happy about it and it really looks cool and atleast some change in my life ;). So decided to put a small post on that...

Google rocks!!!!

Tax Return

I successfully filled my tax returns today. :) I know, it will be kind of shocking to u folks that the saka, who does things wrt his to-do list, slipped away from his tax returns date. Sorry folks, No I was on my schedule. Actually my previous employers failed to send my Form16 on time. I got my form 16 only on Monday!!! And managed to file it by today!!!!

Since I have nothing to pay or nothing to get back, I can file anytime before March 31^st and so I am quite on time :) !!!

Identity Crisis

If you really know me well, please don’t read this post. I know people hardly read my blog and I really don’t care about what they feel as they are reading in my space(as advised repeatedly by my friend), but still u may change ur opinion abt me , if u read this post. So please please don’t read this…

If you really know me, then please don’t read any further, but mail me immediately to tell me what u know about me. Yes, tell me what u know abt me, what u thought abt me, what u think abt me, for I want to know what I am. I really want to know what I was, and what I am so that at least now, I will know what I am and can decide what I want to be…..

I am going nuts... I am going thru an Identity crisis. Yep. I thought I underwent one in my teens, when I was in the edge of deciding on something which would have changed my life drastically, but God was there with me and made me choose the right one. Or rather my intense faith and prayer would have made him to pull into his folds for sometime. But now, he is not even informed of what’s happening in my life.

I remember I was fine. I was feeling good with myself, had some good friends, had good fun, had some leadership qualities, had people who admired me, had people whom I admired, had people whom I helped in what they are now, had people whom I looked upon. I was fine.

Then I really don’t know what happened. I never noticed my fall. I never realized that I am going down. I never noticed that I am forgetting myself, Never noticed that I am loosing myself.
Now I am lost and I am lonely.

Broke my Specs :(

Is there anything called good day or bad day ..

Not sure. But definitely better day exists :)

For instance, yesterday was a better day than today 4 me, not figuratively but literally.

Yesterday was cool. Got up 7.15 , cook came on time, had bath by 8.00 had hot dosa and coffee and out of house by 8.40 and in office by 9.00

Record time driving in peak hrs and didn't get caught much in signal.

Found the Linux problem which was eating my head for last two weeks..

Left 4 home early and calculated the pending room expenses..

Watched friends from 8.30 till 12.25 , then football match ...

O my god... what a great day...

today.

My only remaining team out of my four favorites, Germany lost (at 2, midnight)

Morning got up at 8.00 cook came around that and made upma :(

when i was abt to go 4 bath, found that water got over and the motor is not pumping the water up!!!

Struggled with it for 30 mins. All my roomies were sleeping happily and i was struggling (bad day only 4 me).

Later solved the problem and had a quick bath and the time was 9.30.

Had dry upma and no coffee.. While wearing helmet, I kept my specs in my bike. It fell down and I stamped it by mistake!!!!! . What the Hell!! Burnt 2500rs, sorry stamped on it..

In office by 10.15

Then found things r not working..

Had bad lunch.

Having a bad headache...

Now at 7.00pm, i desperately want to run home ....

My only dilemma is whom to support ? France or portu?

I want France to win so at least for first half i will support portu...

Goin Nuts...

saka

New Cook

Now I know what people managers mean when they say, new people in an organization get fresh ideas and bring abt changes ( though not necessarily good ones ) :). Me and my roomies were having a peaceful time. Staying in a Nice three bedroom house, found a dhobi, got gas stove … We used to cook whenever practical, esp in nights, else happily eat outside :)

My friend Sagar joined us from Noida and within two weeks he found a cook in our neighborhood who can cook for us breakfast and dinner. :) The cook is a Orissa guy, Claims to be better at Northi stuffs and ok at south indian items. So we appointed him in one month evaluation mode. Just three days over and food is not so great. It is manageable and not all my roomies have approved him as of now.

But as of now I am happy, not because of food, but I need not cook. Other wise everyday when I leave from office, the very thought of going home and cooking used to pain me. Now just sit and eat .....

:) saka

Blog is the reflection of mind. ???

I am not a blogger. First I am not regular, Second, nobody reads mine. :)

Started off as an anonymous let out for my feelings, during which I used to pour out things straight from my Heart (I mean mind too) without discretion. Later when I came to know that a few of my friends are reading this, I started using some discrimination here n there and that led to irregularity :) (that resulted in a totally anonimous blog getting opened !$!)

ok. The point is not abt my past, the point is me reading another persons blog (mind it, i am not using the word coblogger, -- descrimination effect!!)to know something about that person. What made me think that i will come to know about someone if i read their blog?. I remember, when PV started blogging (when rest of us were busy in our mundane lifes),

He used to advertise blogging in his own inevitable style, Talking only about the same topic continuously in all conversations, blogging blogging blogging.

"Blogging gives me an identity, I am more comfortable with the virtual world, the virtual world is more real, wanna know abt me, read my blog " were his dialogs, which for a change he really meant ;) . And that is true. Blogging really changed him. He grew, become a better person after blogging.

ok. Again I am deviating. The point is I wanted to know abt some one. Let us call the person as A (Guess B will be more appropriate!!!). And I came to know about A's blog. And being a s/w Eng, the curiosity of knowing things got into me and visited the blog and read the recent ones . Of course I found that a lot of commonalties do exist, reg reading habits, movies, and anand -movie music :) . But the i wanna know more about A. I know for sure it is of no use to know about A as our lives will never cross again. Still the innate curiosity made me read A's blog's archives!!!. Sat for 1 hr and read the archives(not all but did a browsing). End of which gave an insight abt blogging and how it really projects a virtual personality of oneself. But all said and done, it is what A decided to project as it was not just a personal blog and thats sums it all.

So decided to spend more time in reading others blogs , which i was neway doin when i was in my previous company but totally stopped after joining here.

Anyhow All the best for A to have a happy (blogging) life and the same to other bloggers in this wide www world.

Way to Go Saka :)

Being Lonely...

Show me the meaning of being lonely
Is this the feeling I need to walk with
Tell me why I cant be there where you are
There is something missing in my heart

Not Sure why. But when ever i hear this song, i will hear it back2back atleast 5 times before I proceed further.

Is that because i am currently feeling Lonely ??? I Guess it is because I was, is and will ever be a lonely guy. One of my best friend is known for making just-like-that statements which he popularises and adds meaning after making it (is there a word for such people or such acts !!!) . One of his statements that will ever remain in my heart (sorry in memory) is - I am alone amidst crowds. It never troubled me then .Its not that i have no friends. Most of my best friends are in banglore and this is all i could have wished for during my college days. It is not that i am free or jobless. I am busy, ramping up in my new office and coping with new changes :)
And no financial problem or family problem .

Still .......

Currently hearing it for 8th time in succession. Hope i am not goin any nuts ..

Knock knock.

knock knock ..
who is that ..
this is saka ...
who the hell is that ...
the guy who writes here ..
that was long time ago .. now get the hell out of here...


psss.... thats my state now.. i stopped blogging for a long time now.. No.. its not that there was nothing happening in my life. So much was happening.. but truely i was busy :)
Busy with happenings and changes in my life and in the life of people aroung me.
So what was happening in my life ?? Will try to list out in a chronology ...
1. My brother came back from US and is settling in chennai. Atlast i have some relatives in chennai.
2. Changed my job .. again :-) thats the main reason for my silence
3. One of my best friend got married. So my weekends are pretty much free...
5. Father’s Retirement. So more responsibility ??
6. Orkut fever: This is one thing I had resisted for long. Orkut, Ringo , Namedatabases.. alll these things some one or the other will invite and will be forgotten, 3 months after joining. So I was resisting for long. But too many guys sent me the invitation
so I got into orkutting and bingo... I found that my entire world was already there ...
7. sync with my 360. Now that my blogspot is my primary blog, I was not posting nething there . Now i decided to sync up both. Basically scrap the same thing at both the places . (btb, it is scrap not crap... result of orkutting ....)
8. trying to organize myself again.


will continue ....

TN Assembly Elections 2006

We will do what we have said;
We will say what we have done!

so says the election manifesto of DMK for the 2006 elections. The election heat is on and I was able feel it during my recent Chennai visit. Believe me, the election heat was hotter than the scotching Chennai temperature. With the media wars between Sun and Jaya TV have started, the fun has already begun. Ironically the people can enjoy this fun only till the election. All the dramas to woo the people will end at the day of polling and people will be left uncared irrespective of who comes to power.

Still I wanted to know what is in the game. So I started reading their election manifesto. Oops it’s really good.

• We will waive all the cooperative loans given to small and marginal farmers. • It will urge for declaring ‘Thirukkural’ as National Book • Instead of selling rice at the rate of Rs.3.50 per Kg. for the ration card holders as at present, we will distribute quality rice at the rate of Rs.2 per Kg. and bring cheers to women. • Keeping the recreation of women and their getting general knowledge in mind, during the days of celebration of Arignar Anna’s Birth Day and Thanthai Periyar’s Birth Day, for those homes without a television, a scheme for distribution of free colour TV Sets will be introduced and implemented. • For poor pregnant women, for three months before delivery and three months after delivery, maternity allowance of Rs.1000 per month will be given for six months.
says DMK. Their Manifesto starts with a brief history (stressing on ANNA and no mention of MGR) and hits out ADMK by pointing out ADMK’s 2001 promises which they failed to fulfill. Then moves on to stress on current UPA govt ‘s achievements and the promises for current election.

The Manifesto of AIADMK is really cool, the very first page hits Karunanidhi .Later it tells the achievements of JJ and how she fought back the injustice committed against her  :-)

• After the demise of Peraringnar Anna, the Machiavellian Karunanidhi with cunning, deceit and vengeance made the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam his family property to serve his selfish ends. • Puratchi Thalaivar MGR considered that Puratchi Thalaivi J Jayalalithaa was uniquely endowed, being selfless, and with a high degree of intelligence, having an infinite capacity for hard work, and was ideally suited to carry forward the mantle of the party to lead it after him. • Karunanidhi, heartless like Dhritarashtra of the Mahabharatha epic, was only interested in establishing the dynastic rule of his family in Tamil Nadu as his sole ideal, and thus functioning with a selfish motive. He continues to function in the same way. • At that time when Puratchi Thalaivi demitted her office in September, 2001, as per the verdict of the Supreme Court she had vowed:- • “I will crush the opposition maneuvers, face the false case filed in the Courts again and after establishing my innocence, stand for election again and come to power once again as Chief Minister” • Fulfilling her vow, Puratchi Thalaivi emerged victorious. That is the mettle of the General Secretary of the AIADMK. Circumventing all the hurdles placed in her path, Puratchi Thalaivi proved to Karunanidhi and his coterie of sycophants the truth of the words: Whatever be the conspiracy against righteousness, righteousness will always win.


The remaining are achievements of govt which are AMMA oriented and can find minimum of one ‘amma’ word in every sentence. There are no big promises and big achievements but on a whole a very highly comprehensible manifesto covering all the topics. Probably the govt issued an order to all secretaries to report the achievement in the last 5 years and just added them in their manifesto.

But the point is who will be in? Till last year, we can blindly say that the DMK alliance will sweep. The first four years saw more stern governance and atrocious activities showing the stubborn and arrogant nature of JJ. The kannagi statue demolition, the Queen Mary’s college incident, taking over the land from Anna university, kicking out the govt employees who went on strike, ‘proper’ usage of ESMA, vaiko and POTO and nothing to beat the dragging incident of KK. O my God. Also the kanchi incident is also rumored to be master minded by JJ due to her interest in kanchi trust and some NRI hospital. Yet there were some good points. The stern governance and keeping the police, secretaries, collectors on their toes, No bending for any type of strikes , be it transport, govt servants.. anything. I really loved it, personally. I believe every govt should take action against those people who work in essential services and go on strike just for the heck of it. Also the free hand for police (with exceptions), trying to remove free electricity to the farmers, anti-conversion law are really the bold steps taken.

So DMK had definitive edge one year back. But amma changed her stand and was very liberal in the last year which softened tamilians mind and forgot about their previous problem and were happy about chandramukhi becoming a hit. Currently most of the tamilians are more vehemently praying that ‘shivaji-theboss’ should be a hit rather than for a good govt. Also the colorful promises of DMK has raised the eyebrows of many people and esp. the reservation to minorities will be a negative factor for DMK to loose out a good number of votes from elite crowd. Yet DMK had the edge and TN is the place where anti-incubancy factor had proved time and again and lets watch our future …

Regarding me?
I vote for anyone who promises to improve the bus quality of SETC and am ready to campaign for the party which promises VOLVO buses between Bangalore and Chennai .

Jai Hind. Jai Elections.

For DMK Election Manifesto(English)
For AIADMK Election Manifesto (English)

ooops suroor

‘How many of you like Himesh?’ Asked my cubicle mate. I voluntarily turned myself away from my system to get into a subject which was going on my mind till recently.
‘Why’asked preth.
Atr is still at me and expecting an answer from me. I gave a smile and told her ‘I liked him till recently’.
‘Why not now ??’
‘It’s a bit too much now-a-days. Its more of forcing to hear his music.’
‘Ya thats the point. I started hearing his voice even my hubby sings.’

‘Don’t crap ! prashu has got a better voice!’ Poked preth.
Atr gave a stern look and turned to wards her monitor.
I wanted the conversation goin.
‘Ya. U r correct. Did u noticethis. For the last three months the morning slot of Mtv has only his songs.Either his album or movie songs and he is every where’
'Ya. Also that irritating fanna fanna song.Infact they alternate' added preth.
‘Correct !. Thats the irritating part.’ Atr back into conversation.
‘Its not just in Mtv , even in V and any damn music channel.And its kinda too much now-a-days. I want to do some thing’exploded Atr and is looking at us for our reaction.

Me and preth spoke in one voice.'Ask prashu to start singing’ and turned towards our system.
Later in the day I got this picture as forward and forwarded to both of them.

knock knock...

His diary read 'I think I lost my mind. I think I stopped thinking.'
And he really meant it. He works for a big MNC. Joined just 6 months back. His company is THE market leader in its space. Has a cool n creative job, tools development on a web application server. New development projects and still not into maintainance. Nice job,Nice sal and happy environment !!!.

Then the problem started. The problem was there was no REAL problem.Not so understanding manager is every one's problem. Yet started getting frustated for every small thing. When his frustration was at its peak, one of his friend called him to have a casual chat.They chatted about everything and one such was life at the friends office.He was mentioning abt the party coming up and all the fun they are having. TO keep the conversation going he asked his friend to forward his resume to his group. After an yes, the conversation turned to another subject. He too lost himself in his world.

In three days he got an interview call.Without thinking about the repurcussions , he attended the interview and got an offer. Though the offer is not great and the work is going to be in maintainance for time being, he was happy that we will be under a more understanding manager.

Now the real problem starts.
His heart asks him to quit and join the new company. His mind advices to adjust and stay,for things will be better here in future. Being a south indian, he too believes that every one has problems and problems are the stepping stone for success. He is one guy who read a lot of self help books. He is one guy who know howw to motivate hinself when things are not in his favour. He is one guy who got things only because of hard work.He thought that he knew when to think from heart and when from mind. So the soln looked simple for him.

Yet he told his boss that he quits.Though he is not convinced of the reason. The Manager is not convinced. Its more than a week they are talking and still no conclusion. He is not telling any strong reason why he is quitting(wonder he has) and the manager is not ready to leave a employee whose productivity in last 6 months is more than most of the senior members of the team. Today the manager escaleted the issue to the director.

Tomorrow he is meeting his director for the first time.

saka@Wonder-la

With the launch of P9, the group became more cohesive and more active. Lot of mails on democracy, expressive signs, gyans, statistics and the creativity n ability to deliver sarcastic replies have increased multifold in most of us. But all the activity stops there. Never the mail chain regarding weekend meet or abt a weekend trip received more than 7 replies of which 3 will be decline mails. But somehow when the idea of wonder-la was revived again, most of us were ready to go for it with few tentative ppl who ultimately turned up. Thus some of the p9 members (totally 9 of us) roared towards wonder-la on our bikes on saturday morning.
The platins (chax terminology) were
me and bhasa -on my bike
rp and sriram - on rp's bike
subbi and kallu - on subbi's bike
jaya - jaya's bike
manoj - manoj's bike
MC - MC's bike


It was really a wonderful trip. We started off with dashing car, where I was the target since I ditched them and went for the previous round with some other people. Then the drop zone which really excited us .So we went twice in that. Then straight to Y Scream - the ultimate one.



Oops at one point of time me and manju (2 will sit together) were hanging upside down and waving at jaya and subbi . It was great . Kallu dropped out of this . Then the next one was maverick. This one was specialized in churning the stomach. We pulled in MC who along with kallu tried to skip this one. It was really a churner and luckily rp was the only victim.

Then we moved on to water rides after our lunch. The water riders were too good and enjoyed a lot. Late in the night at 7.30 we went to the gaint wheel which is on the 13th floor, followed by the musical fountain and laser show...

Over all an enjoyable one. But what I really liked was the spirit of manju , and sriram. Manju because he came in spite of his leg sprain just to make sure that this trip is also not cancelled and sriram who joined us at the expense of something which is more close to him.

Read to live,not live to Read (cont .. )

Keeping up the promise I made in read to live,not live to read post, i am updating with the books i read recently, along with my thoughts on them. Recently finished two of them. One is a novel by Ken Follet, named Whiteout. A decent one from Follet thought not one of his best. This time he ventured into drugs and bio-hazardous chemicals.(In Last twin he tried his hands on DNA replication). A Scottish company does research on/for/using deadly viruses and our heroine (ex-cop) is the chief security officer. The plot is quite steady and quite gripping till the end, though there are no unexpected twists n turns. Of course I am not expecting some deadly ones of Frederick Forsyth, but not having even a mediocre one makes it evident. But as with any Follet’s, there is some masala, this time between two teenaged step-cousins. Over all a decent read.
The Other one is a real beautiful book. Its a non-fiction by Mitch Albom, named Tuesdays with Morrie. Its really a simple, good and a must read book. The book is just all about the conversations between Mitch and his mentor Morrie which takes place during the last few days of bed-ridden Morrie. This one definitely raises the reader’s spirit and gives a new view of the life,one which not many 'worldly aspiring buddies ' will agree. A good read.
Ok, here is the updated list...
So my new list says
Michael Crichton

1. Jurassic Park
2. The Lost World
3. Congo
4. TimeLine
5. Airframe
6. The Andromeda strain
7. Disclosure
8. Sphere
9. The Terminal man
10.The Great Train robbery
11.State of Fear
-----------
John Grisham

1. A Time to Kill
2. The Firm
3. The pelican Brief
4. The Client
5. The Partner
6. The Testament
7. The Brethren
8. The Summons
9. The Last Juror
10.The Broker
11.
-------------

Jeffrey Archer

1. Not a penny more Not a penny less
2. Kane and Abel
3. The prodigal Daughter
4. Shall we tell the President
5. First Among Equals
6. A matter of Honour
7. Honour among Thieves
8. The Eleventh Commandement
9. Sons of fortune
10.

----------
Eric Segal
1. The class
2. Love Story
3. Oliver's Story
4. Doctors
5. Acts of Faith
6.


-----------------

Sidney Shelton
1. If tomorrow Comes
2. Memories of midnight
3. The Other side of the midnight
4. Tell me your Dreams
5. Master of the Game
6. Nothing Lasts for ever
7. Rage of Angels
8. Morning noon and night
9. Dooms day conspiracy
10.

--------------
Ken Follet
1. Jackdaws
2. The Eye of the Needle
3. The Third Twin
4. Codeto Zero
5. Hornet Flight
6. Whiteout
----------------
Dan Brown
The Da Vinci Code
Angels and Demons
Digital Fortress

----------------
Frederick Forsyth

1. The Day of The Jackel
2. The Devils Alternative

-------------------
Robert Ludlum

1. The Bourne Identity
2. The Sigma Protocol

------------------
James Patterson

1. Along came a spider
2.
------------------------

Others:
1. The Rule of Four : Ian Cladwell and Dustin Thomason
2. The touch of a Stranger :
3. Tuesdays with Morrie : mitch Albom

to be continued ..

So what am i currently up to? I am reading a tamil classic called Ponniyen Selvan by Kalki. Currently i am living in Chola Dynasty!!!!

A Spiritual Beginning

I wanted this Newyear Eve to be special.This  gonna be an important year for most of us. So I decided to begin with the LOU (Lord of the Universe.) Had a good, non tiring, pleasent trip to and from parthi.Had  good Darshan, both Morning and Evening. Over all , it was a pleasent experience.  O Lord, Please forgive us all and let us be in sync with you, for ever.