Mr. Mady is Mr. Bendy

Life is like that

They planned it for quite a while. In fact I remember BIL discussing with me two years back during Christmas holidays.

On Wednesday, BIL took baptism in Catholic Church with a Christian name of Benedict (the name of the current Pope). Primary purpose is to avoid confusion about the religion of the kid(s) on the way! (If you already didn’t know it is a inter-religious marriage).

They also ratified their marriage – they got married in a register office, not in a church.

It was a family event and an important one for parents and sister – I really don’t care, these are just symbols.

A good weekend

Life is like that

As I anticipated the weekend was good. Better than most of the weekends. Though I had plans for driving around, I didn’t do it.

But I spent quality time with my family. A lot of it. I teased my mother, danced with her, took family for shopping, went for a walk in a park, and watched two old Tamil movies – ‘Agni Natchathrim’ and ‘Mouna Raagam’. Fantastic times.

But as I was winding down, a scary feeling got inside – that I am going to loose these. That is not a happy feeling. I am under a lot of alcohol as I write this; hey I am just trying to get rid of that feeling.

But I can’t.

I am listening to Kenny G.

I might even shed few tears in the late night.

13th Friday; Not so bad afterall!

Life is like that, Nothing official about it

Don’t they say 13th Friday is a bad day? Well, I don’t really believe that (bad things happen to me all the time, is a different thing).

I woke up with nerves weakened by wheezing. Wasn’t a good start of the day!

I assumed it is going to be another bad day and a bad start for the weekend.

Life is an irony and that is what brings a curiosity into life!

Today we had our quarterly review with the EXCOM (executive community). Even before the start of the meeting, the CDO said,

Joseph, thanks to you, iQuest is now very stable and every one has started to use. Good work!

I felt fantastic.

You know, how you feel when you kiss someone for the first time? You feel butterflies in your stomach? Well, I didn’t feel anything like that, but I felt just great. It came out spontaneously from him and that was cool!

And during the evening, my boss (the one who is leaving) and I were having coffee and we started talking about his experience in the firm. Towards the end he said,

You’ve a great potential and a great scope for learning. If you want to join me in the new firm or if you want a reference when looking for a job, just let me know.

Don’t you think it was nice of him? It is.

So I started the week feeling miserable and I end the week feeling appreciated.

Let me see how it goes through the weekend.

Need of the hour: Confidence

Life is like that

In spite of regular medication, wheezing doesn’t seem to go away. It takes me almost an hour in the morning to get back on my feet. This also means, no exercises – with frequent wheezing, my nerves are so weak.

With the addiction to exercise, this means that, I don’t feel good – first because of feeling sick and second of not doing the exercise.

This in turn means that I am starting the day in a wrong note!

At office, I am loaded with work – Handling Finance System, CRM System, Upgrade of Finance System and getting ready for SOX audit. First I wasn’t very particular about the SOX audit, but overtime, as I realized the impact of non-compliance, I am now very scared (if we fail SOX audit the company will be de-listed from NASDAQ and CEO/CFO will end up in jail). Every morning, I ask myself, if I’m doing the right thing and also if I’m doing it right.

So physical and official is no good.

As I said in an earlier post, I took a drive to beat the banality. Well, as much as the trip was fun, the photos that I took were all washed out. I am upset that I screwed up. I wanted some of the shots to be ‘given-my-best’. When I took the photos, I did; but it turned out that I am not a good photographer!

Without a steady and strong friendship (face-to-face; not long distance), I am not getting the miserable feelings out of me. I should accept though I get regular mails from KD & LA. Even Xavier called me and was on phone for about an hour. As much as I appreciate all of this, I still feel a loner!

So to sum up:
Personal: Not good
Physical: Not good
Official: Not good
Emotional: Not good

Which means, my confidence is the lowest in the past 2 years (I’ve hit rock bottom earlier, but the situations were very different then. I managed to get back on my feet 2 years back; but oops, I screwed up!)

But there is one thing that is going good; damn good – spiritual. I’m getting very much a spiritual person: I’m not discriminating any spirits – Vodka, Tequilla, Rum, Brandy or whatever.

What Jesus can’t heal in the day, a peg of Whisky heals in the night!

Treat your taste buds

Life is like that

This is a long pending post. It is never too late and here it goes.

LA has a fantastically laid out blog where she frequently post of her tips on various cuisines. The blog is rightly named, Tasty Palettes.

Now G (her pitiful husband), is not only eating whatever she cooks; he has to photograph them too. LA and G discuss on whether to photograph these food items in the natural light or in the dark. I always thought G is a lucky guy. Now I’ve started to pity him! (I know, LA, you will say – kollupu romba aiydithu).

Joy, you should visit the site so that you could break the record of reading the 10000th tips on cooking, without ever entering the kitchen!

There is also another reason, behind this posting. I realized, very very lately, that I forgot to wish LA on her b’day. Shame on me! This is kind of pleading for a merciful apology. Please forgive me and a belated birthday wishes.

I’m drinking too much

Life is like that

With recent mood swings, I’ve started to drink a lot.

As much as I had a wonderful day, as I drove back home, I was gripped with loneliness and weariness. I went to a near-by bar and I drank until 2 in the morning before coming home.

Because of recent irregular exercise routine, the lost fat is quickly finding its way back.

Unplanned trip; Unusual experience

Life is like that, Travel

I am used to undertake unplanned trips – just take the car and drive and see what comes up. Most of the time, I’ve ended up enjoying. So was this Sunday’s trip.

I’ve been asking around to find a place to drive and see. My boss (one who is leaving), suggested a ‘Danish Dairy Farm’ in Kanakapura Road, near Bangalore. I was thinking of driving there for the past two weeks; but I wasn’t on the mood.

Yesterday I drove to Kanakapura Road. But wait, ‘getting lost is my hobby’. I drove long and long and didn’t locate this farm. I kept driving until I reached kanakapura! Then I saw a sign board with direction to ‘Cauvery Fishing Camp’ at a distance of 50 km. Hmm…wacky thought of driving to there, got into my mind.

Oh! Wait. I need to mention about this incidence before proceeding. I stopped for lunch at a restaurant on the way. The board outside looked so colorful that I couldn’t resist taking a photo. From nowhere this guy comes up and asks in Kannada, ‘why did you take the photo of the board?’ I tried reasoning with him,

‘I am a tourist; I took it because it looked nice’

Slowly 3 other guys from the restaurant joined and I couldn’t bring any sense to them. This bloody idiot repeated the same bloody idiotic question again and again. Finally they let me go, only after I deleted the picture. Of course, one guy told me that there was a documentary in a series called ‘Crime Story’ which covered this restaurant! I have no clue what happened. But I realized it could be a dangerous place. It was a bit scary but thrilling incident.

Other than that incident, there was no other irritating incident – of course I am not considering the crowded traffic or the narrow roads.

The route goes via many villages. There was clay houses on both sides of the roads, reminding of the house were I was born. It is a long journey from one of those houses to where I’m!

Once I reached there, I forgot all the tiredness; in fact I forgot my world. It is an un-spoilt serene nature. There was absolutely no crowd. I remembered the trip I took with KD to Landsberg were we stopped by the river bed and relaxed. It was something similar to that (in most of the sense 😉 ). I did miss her though.

Given a choice, I would’ve stayed there. But I had to come back. 🙁

It was a pleasant time!

A photo blog in development

Programming

I’ve been looking at different options to improve my photography.

One key factor is to know the different parameters of the photos taken. I couldn’t find any easy way of doing that. One way is to have a photo blog.

At the same time, I also wanted to improve my programming skills.

So I decided to develop one on my own. I’m developing one in Django framework. Hopefully in 3 months, I can have it done well.

How the hell he manages to do it?

Books/Movies, Life is like that

It is just amazing that even after crossing 50, Rajini can pull out this much of crowd.

I’m just out of seeing Sivaji, the boss. It is the same old ‘Robin Hood’ storyline. But it is Rajini and that makes a hell of a difference. I didn’t like the movie much except to wonder how he can do this even at this age.

I grew up fascinated by his styles. But after some age, I got fed up of his styles and punch dialogues. I came to appreciate the variety that Kamal brought to the filmdom. Yet, one thing I should appreciate in Rajini – when other heroes like Karthik, Vijayakanth let their body show their age, somehow Rajini has maintained a slim body.

Another sad pattern emerging in the Tamil industry is lack of any story. It is unfortunate that the thinking ‘quantity can substitute quality’ is quickly gripping directors and producers.