Love Letter..

Little more than a decade ago, sometimes this month, you did something dumb..may be you smiled at me or may be laughed at my silly jokes and I ended up giving you a piece of me, thereafter my life was never mine anymore. All my WBC's that had successfully fought against all kind of viruses had no clue what do with this new intruder named Lov(irus). You know what, this virus ripped apart my heart, took over my nervous system and made me go weak on my knees and that was the beginning of the end. My best friends became acquaintances whom I met once in a while, my choice of music, movies, clothes, shoes and food changed for no reason. Life changed forever, take this as a sample - Other day when i was going to Shoppers Stop to pick up something, you asked me to get a nail paint of the same shade that you wore on our 6th date ! I always thought God gave me all the strength to handle any difficult situation, but on such days I know even God would empathize with me

Jokes apart, it has been a joy ride right from the day I heard that "unique loud" laughter in our college, those initial nervous conversations, those promises, our first job, blowing away thousands on STD calls, the long long wait to get married, the fun times in India, the long drives and good times in north America and UK, supporting each other during horrific times, our baby in my arms, our new car, our first home, helping each other in our failures, celebrating our minor professional accomplishments, our road trips, your kitchen experiments, etc etc they all make my life special. This month we complete another year together, still a long way to go and i am sure it will be an interesting journey together

By the way, kitchen experiments reminds me of our deal - "I need to take care of your heart and you got to do the same for my hungry stomach". So with this letter I have done my part, now its your turn..give me a surprise when i wake up :-)

With Love..

It was Friday afternoon and the IT consultants had decided to support Anna on his crusade against corruption. Quite a few banners printed, hundreds of candles ordered and the whole team was all set to go to the freedom Park. As they were ready to leave, Rohit suddenly realized he forgot something and was getting restless. When Shweta (Rohit's best friend) inquired if there was a problem? He blurted out that they are short of banners, and asked Shweta to take some more Xerox (Very few Indians take a photocopy, they all take a Xerox. That is the power of Brand, it becomes a synonym. The new brand in the making is brand Anna; the country has already seen millions of followers of this new brand). The Xerox machine on 8th floor was not working so Shweta went to the 7th floor printer room and was taking her photocopies when she noticed an orphan printout lying there. Orphan print outs like bank statement, salary slips, offer letter are very attractive and you tend to take a peek at the contents. This printout was unique, it read "I am responsible for my death; I am taking this extreme step as I am not happy with my life. Friends and Family please forgive me. "

Shweta looked around; the support guy was busy on his phone. She ordered him to get off the phone and find out who fired the print out. Support staff played around with the history on the printer to get the details and accidentally deleted all history. Shweta's heart was pounding in horror, somebody is getting ready to end her/his life and she probably has an opportunity to save this person but had no clue how to go about. Shweta rushed out of the printer room, the whole office was deserted as most had left for Freedom Park. She scanned the office with suspicion; she looked at Santosh, Raj and Mani who were among the few still working on the floor. Santosh has recently got a new job, so it can't be him. Raj has received hell lot of appreciation for his good work and is anyway a happy personality so there is no way he can take this step. Mani was sitting with a grumpy expression on his face, could it be him thought Shweta? Mani was also Shweta's HR Manager; she was skeptical but still decided to talk to him and that is when she saw Rohit going towards the printer room. Shweta immediately rushed to tell Rohit what she found. When she entered the printer room, Rohit was shocked to see Shweta. He asked her what she was doing on 7th floor when she was suppose to take some Xerox ? Shweta was not listening; she immediately gave Rohit the print out or rather the suicide note and asked him what they should do. Rohit was trembling; he was not expecting his “suicide note” to be found by Shweta. Rohit's eyes said it all; he did not speak a word and started to move towards the exit.

Shweta pleaded Rohit to not do anything rash. Rohit hissed back and asked her to stay away from this. Shweta managed to stop him and insisted on knowing the reason; after all they were best friends. Rohit held Shweta's hand and said - Shweta I am in Love with you and I can’t think of a life without you but .....forget it ! Shweta burst into laughter; though Shweta was recently engaged to a family friend, she had the same feeling for Rohit but never told him as she thought this handsome dude never thought of her as anyone more than a friend. They hugged each other (lovers don’t care about locations!), tears flowed and then they both burst into laughter.

They decided to freshen up (yes lovers discuss and take decisions on even such trivial things). Rohit rushed to "His" and Shweta to "Her", it took Shweta good 15 minutes to apply all that can be applied on her face (after all tears had destroyed her make-up). When Shweta was about to come out of the restroom, her phone rang, the phone display said "Rohit's Mom". Shweta and Rohit's Mom had known each other, and they used to speak to each other once in a while. Shweta had a smile on her face and was feeling a bit shy; it was not her friend’s mom calling but her possible future Mother-in-law, Shweta picked up the call after the 4th ring. On the other end, Rohit's Mom was crying but still not mincing any words she came straight to the point and said Rohit was found dead in his bedroom the last night. Rohit's Mom kept talking, Rohit had told his Mom that he was planning to go to the freedom park the next day, etc etc etc but Shweta was not listening to anything neither she could make out anything. Tears started flowing down her cheeks in long streams, her heart was pounding at a rate that could break the ribs !

Head(ache?)lines Today

SRCC sets the cutoff marks for admission at 100%
There is lot of noise on this, even the education minister finds 100% cutoff marks irrational. Well students should stop worrying and look at alternatives, they can join the school or institute where these Baba's (Ramdev or other swami's) study. Before it is too late the students should start applying, as you never know admissions into these schools will also be difficult in coming years. Mind you this is a very good career option, we all know Baba Ramdev runs a empire worth 11000 Million INR and we know how much Satya Sai Baba left behind, how many IIM/Harvard pass out can boast such a thing ? Forgot to mention, students can join the 3 day crash course from Sri Sri Money Shankar to get a feel of what the course ahead would be like !

Anna to fast again on 16-Aug in Jantar Mantar
It’s true that as we grow old, we again become kids and there is enough proof around. My Son Rahul and Anna's behavioral pattern match. Even Rahul refuses to have food whenever I or his mother ignore Rahul's stubborn demands. But you know what ? it works, Rahul ensures I and his mom succumb to all his demands before he gets back to dinner or lunch. Anyways, hope the Lokpal bill sticks to the objective and does not create a parallel government to govern the government. It is easy for the opposition to use this bill as a weapon to destabilize the government for their own selfish needs.

Another arrest in 2G Scam
Ever wondered if the spectrum was not given at the so called throw away prices then will our cell phone bills still be the same ? Would the operators still manage to set less than 0.02 USD per minute call rates ? I believe the common man has benefited from this. 2G Scam has also helped Amma, the one who was dethroned because about a decade ago the state was convinced that Amma is a very very corrupt leader and now Amma has managed to showcase Karuna as even more corrupt and is back as the Chief Minister. It’s the case of sometimes prey sometimes predator

The RBI on Thursday hiked key policy rates for the 10th time since March, 2010 to control inflation
ok fine so will the petrol prices come down now ? any commodity prices coming down ?

Bhaag Bhaag D.K.Bose D.K.Bose D.K.Bose D.K.Bose
chalo sab Bhaago !! Ramlila se Haridwar :-) was the song written for them ?

Tip of the day: Never trust a woman to follow instructions, even Sita did that ages ago, remember Lakshman rekha ???

nappy main zyaada happy ..

Cricket is in air, the same old game which I learnt on my Apartment ka terrace. We bunch of boys in our chaddis would play cricket every single evening, exam ho ya na ho. It used to be fun impersonating the cricketers of that era, we copied their stance or their bowling style and being a tamilian i had to copy Kris Srikanth, and i was as inconsistent as him, unpredicatable bowling, erratic batting and "pakda-tho-pakda" type fielder but used to be lots of fun. An occasional Viv Richards shot would take the ball down the building, and we had to coax some bhole-bhalle kaka to throw the ball up..."Kaka, ball dya na pleaaseee" (yes i can speak Tendulkar's Mother tongue). After few attempts, the ball would manage to reach the terrace which was on the 5th floor of our 4 floor building and we would cheer "Kaka" for his extraordinary effort. Kaka would stroke his godrej-dyed hair congratulating himself for a great job done. As we grew older the venue shifted to smaller grounds in our town, we lost most of our matches and yet had good fun. But gaye woh din, nappy main zyaada happy the yaar !! Now-a-days I get to play occasionally with the new chaddi gang (my son and his chillar pillar friends).

Apart from playing the game the best part was to watch a cricket match and the enthusiasm hasn't gone anywhere. Earlier it used to be Rasna, Bhajji's at home while watching these matches and these days we rest our bum in some swanky sports bar with liquor and Manchurians. All Indians are experts of this game, it is common to hear intelligent comments like Dhoni's backlift is not high enough and that is affecting his stroke play, Zaheer should bowl the 34th over considering that the there is 73% moisture, so that is the over when the ball will start reverse swinging. It is weird but so what ?? even the ICC chief Sharad pawar has never played professional cricket tho hum bhi kissi se kam nahin hai.

Last one month has been great fun, Indian cricket team is doing wonderful and 1 billion Indians are waiting for Dhoni and his boys to lift the world cup on 2nd April. I will be wearing the same jeans that I wore when India won against the Aussies and then Pakistan, I also plan to visit the same sports bar with the same group of 15 odd colleagues screaming and dancing with every wicket, every boundary, etc etc. You never know my jeans might be the real match winner ;-)

I was 4 years old when India won the world cup in 1983, my son is 4 yrs now ....I have heard many times that history repeats

boo !!

It was almost 2 am as Samir walked across to the mens room, his hands full with print out of the reports to be presented to the Senior management the following day. The office was deserted, save a couple of consultants and support staff who sauntered around majestically. After-office hours Support Staff turn into tigers in a national reserve. A lady dressed in spotless white churidhar stopped Samir and asked if she can talk to him. They decided to discuss at Samir's cabin in 5 minutes time
Samir was back at his desk in 2 minutes and was packing up to leave for the day when the lady appeared again with 2 mugs of steaming hot coffee
hey come in ! So how can I help you ? Asked Samir (he wanted to add that he hates coffee..but did not)
I am Chandni - She responded (that explains your white dress thought Samir and almost smiled )
I used to work as a interior designer for this building. I spent a lot of effort in getting it to this state – she added
Samir interrupted her - You have done a great job Chandni (what else does a Manager do anyway right, they say great or use some similar adjective or talk about improvement)
Chandni was not interested in any appreciation, she continued and said - See you are the first one I am telling this, I need your help to get me out of this building
You are not on "office-arrest" or something right, take the elevator and get out of this place. Who is stopping you ? was Samir's immediate reaction
Well its complicated, you need to go to the XX000 conference room on the 6th floor, to the left of the door there is a wall, exactly 4 feet from the far most left corner go break the wall, you will find my dead body. My parents are still searching for me and for some reason they can neither see me or hear me, i want them to know I am dead ... get me out please ..she pleaded
Soaked in fear and sweat, Samir fell off his bed and that woke him up, his heart was beating like jungle drums, the clock ticked to 7.00 AM and a little tweety came out to announce the same....woooosh..thank god, that was a dream, the heart beat slowed down and was getting back to its normal pace. Samir stole a kiss from his wife and kid who were deep asleep and without disturbing them he started with his daily chores and in the process forgot about his dream. Samir got ready to office and for a change the drive to office was wonderful, hardly any traffic and was hoping to have a "issue-less" day at office. He opened his cabin door and almost froze to death ...Two Coffee Mugs at his desk !
Not to be continued ...

Late Latif !

been a long time since I wrote anything other than emails so i am taking this short break ..

Said good bye to 2010 with a really lousy Kamal Hassan starrer Tamil movie, and started the year with some new year resolutions

Quality Reading - I realized I was spending more time reading junk like Bangalore Mirror or Bangalore times. What is the use of reading about some female actor who is least interested in me but still manages to draw my attention by giving the best possible horny expression. Male Actors are no less these days, apart from showing off their bums god knows what is up with hair styles ? what do they use ? Gel or Tar ? All spiked, the sideburns are extra sharp..Well the mind has got to be sharp the sideburns don't matter but its a different issue that neither my sideburn nor my brain is sharp :-(

Vacations - Been a year since I have had a good vacation time. Also need to have more picnics, it is time i get into my shorts, wear my shikari shambu cap and have some fun. I need to live my life and not just be alive.

Career - A rocking chair keeps moving but does not take you anywhere, i have a feeling that i am now in a rocking chair. What am i doing about it? i have got some plans and i better act on it before it is too late. (planning your career does not mean job change..). Also better to not get wooed by fancy job titles. I guess managers in a IT company are nothing more than a Head clerk in traditional companies. Organizations give you a ego massage by calling you Managers, then Senior Manager then Group manager ..and when all adjectives are done with, start a new series, director, senior director, etc etc. Got to be careful with these titles !

Learn to play Keyboard - Will either ask Rahul's instructor to help me out or might just learn on my own with Rahul's help. With the keyboard already at home I got to make the best use of it

Watch selective movies only - Tees Maar Khan was yuck and so were Akshay's other movies last year! On a side note, forget the politicians even bollywood movies have started ignoring the common man, we have had movies on Quadriplegia, Progeria, Autism, Dyslexia, Leukemia, HIV, Alzheimer, Amnesia and what not. Can someone make a movie on common man's common cold ? Well you can't pass it off as an easy subject, don't forget that common cold has no cure and so are the worries of a common man

Exercise regularly: I have had this resolution every single year but kuch kiya nahin...may be this year for sure. Another decade to go and I will be in my 40s. I surely don't wish to have too many defective organs in my body at that point in time and it won't be any fun driving a BMW (wish!) if your back hurts. Moreover I have to stop blaming the fabric or the brand for not being able to get into a 32 inch trouser and breasts don't look good on men.

and finally got to do things on time and not like this post, a post on new year resolutions after 22 days into the new year. Next time on time...pakka teri kasam