My Dad DOESNT understand vacations!!!!

"Here I am,
This is me,
There's nowhere else on earth i did rather be.."

Incase you are all thinking that, yet again I have been hit in the head repeatedly, with an unassorted collection of Bryan Adams CD's, for stocking away a lot more than what one might call a fair share of free-coffee, well, you are partially right... I have been filling up my stomach, and now, even certain areas of the liver and pancreas as a NON- VIOLENT mark of protest against the so called "Limited Stock of Free Soft Drinks" (We the protesters even have our very own community now)... But that was about a week ago... This week... I am at home, happily hoggin away at tons and tons of free scrumptious food.

P.S. : If you guessed that I am a mallu from the repeated use of the word Free... No prizes bro... We are a universally stingy brethren. Oh!!! And if you guessed that this blog is going to be about home and all the characters present there, give yourself three brownie points. Collect twenty and you could just win a date. I am not appending 'with me' to that sentence, coz it could and probably would scare off a lot (all two of them) of the readers.

So here it is... A small glimpse into this little abode i call as 'Veedu'

Character Sketch One: Bajh
Real Name: Babu Mathews Profession: Fathering and Fatherism's
Head of the house. Idealist, perfectionist, charming, hard working, perserverant, dynamism and intelligence is a short list of genes that were not passed down from his genes set to me. The list while lengthy enough I should warn you is by no means complete. He has just come down from Bahrain for vacation and as expected is already busy shaping up the place. While, to the naked eye the room might be spic and span, his eyes well... they could pick up a dust particle from a mile. Of the one month that he is here, he gets to gyaan (pass down his knowledge) me only fer one week... Lucky me... 22 years and you did think all the gyaan-ing has been done. Not quite is what i wud say.
We do spend our bits of time together... You kno manly types... The father son thing... For example, yesterday, we had a father son outing, which, brings me to


Character Sketch Two: Bavish
Real Name: Revon Mathews Profession: Being a sibling of variant . type cast-Very sweet to Very . very very very dangerous
Unless you guys/gals suffer frm very very (plz add 3 more very's) short term memory loss, you will remember about the father-son periodic manly outing that i mentioned some time bk... Well, these outings in the context of Home Ministry are classified as Errands... Like, yesterday, when we both drove all the way to the city to get Lakhme 651. Now, all the while during this manly outing, i could wonder only one thing.... 651??? As in, 3 digit number??? Are there like a 1000 varieties of colours girls use to impress guys??? I took a hand count then...13... thats all i cud name... I took a quick survey... the list was topped at 18 by a nearby cousin... dats it... dats all v males can do...??? 18... so y pay that extra hundred for something that, hard as we may try, cant physically distinguish??
Oh and here's what tops it... Ven i finally got to the lipstick, the shopkeeper told me, that it was a colorless variety... Hmmm... 1000 different varities of colorless lipstick??? Just when we thought, women couldnt get any more complicated.

Character Sketch Three: Hamish
Real Name: Elizabeth Mathews Profession:House wife part timing as mum
Now, mum here, well, more than anything else, she is known for Arachnophobia (fear of spiders)... How am i so well acquainted with that term?? Well, you wouldnt forget it either, if you witnessed mums sense ofsenseless reflex to these creatures... For one, I am sure dad wouldnt forget todays experience, when we went out for a drive to one of the busiest cities of Kerala (Ernakulam). Quite drive. Dad took over the wheels after a while, while I moved towards my second favorite activity - sleeping. Screeeeecccch!!!
Now, at first, I was not sure whether what transpired in the next few minutes was a dream or a bad dream*. I watched as my mum continued in probably a near successful attempt at bursting her lungs, while at the same time, jumping up and down, in only what i can guess was a random experiment to measure the spring constant of the seat.
*(It sure din seem real)

In the following scene, I gaze in horror as mum pops open the door at a traffic signal and tries in vain to beat atleast Michael Johnson's record of 100m in 10.12 seconds. I had barely recovered from this, when I see my dad being pulled out of the car by the traffic policeman for "attempting to harm a lady". I would just have gone back to sleep then if another cop didnt continue banging on my window. I noticed a spider on the roof, and, luckily enuf( being more than familiar with this kind of fiasco) guess wat had transpired in the last couple of minutes. I explained the same to the cop, while dad, trying to hide a cocktail of emotions, gently nodded along. It took a further 10 minutes to locate mum. But I am guessing that, it is short duration compared to the period of time DAD's gonna remember this incident.

Well, those are the characters that live closest to me at home. I would love to detail about the characters (i.e., three families of cousins which live next to me - each one with their unique trademarks- and each equally, if not more interesting) but, There are miles to go before I sleep and not to mention a DAD to coax b4 I sleep. I am not sure whether this mite b the best of incidents for him so far. I am sure he's got lot more interesting tales. Let me c, if i can get him to elicit a few more ;).

Of Cat and Mice and a percentage of a billion random thoughts in my head

Ever had a brief point in your life where you wished you could be invisible. Maybe run away so that no one could see you. Hide. Hide from responsibilites, ghosts of past mistakes, and, while at it avoid a few meteors that are being hurled at you by an imaginary being. Yup!!! Deny it as much as you want, but, deep down, we all know that we have been there... Something that we cannot avoid, or rather should not miss... These moments define us... And how one handles such situations defines the integrity of his/her charachter.

Ah well... A lot of big words to describe the cat and mouse games that have been going around in the office fer the last couple of weeks.

DISCLAIMER:This is gonna be one long post. So all you insomaniacs out there, come down here and lets see how much of a help Dr Ro can be. The rest of you, well, read at your own risk.

The story starts almost a couple of weeks ago when the company hires a bunch of software consultants. It was a scary day that one. Long story short, innocent little fresher was asked to interview a bunch of candidates, each 4+ years exp. minimum. And when we say innocent little fresher, we mean the kind you see on the NIIT ads, where any doofus who can spell C-O-M-P-U-T-E-R properly (without hiccupping more than two times b/w consecutive alphabets)* gets kidnapped from the doorstep of his college, is put in a chair and assigned a fancy name like 'Assistant Principal Stress Analyst cum Rejeuvanation Engineer' (which basically means, bring coffee to the boss when he looks drowsy) and is promised a rewarding career with an incentive of taking away a moderately bigger box of peanuts than the neighbourhood sabji-waali, at the end of each month for his contribution to the pockets of google and Orkut Bayyukotten. Hmmmmm!!! Could that sentence be entered in the Guiness Book of World Records for longest sentence ever? You let me know.

Each of these "engineers" can probably remember the day, when their respective companies came to their campus, enticed them with photos of FTV models in their PPT's, saying, "At HiBeeHem, we try to encourage the recruitment of more female engineers, which we believe is necessary for the progress of this country". Man. Those pseudo-messiah's. It would be another 2 months b4 any of these engineers learnt that these companies had lesser females than, Shahid Kapoor - facial hair. And the rare good ones that he would spot, would already have been tagged - Sati Saavitri Pati Vrata Bhaarathiya Naari, which essentially means, "Someone's already bagged this prize bro - go knock at some other door"

Back to story: 5 software consultants, get hired to do a job that a single LKG student, with half the IQ of a retarded mouse could do in 5 days. The team is assigned 45 days and our hero is assigned the task of guiding them in this epic mission. Easy he thought. He he. Looks like the mistress of fate, would not be letting him go that easy. 3 days into work and he soon realizes why these people get paid so much. Simply put, they were excellent naggers who had the uncanny nack of sittin rite under your nose 24 7, till YOU got their job done for them. Apt Managerial candidates these. They even knew how to make something as trivial as a spelling mismatch sound as big as an Earth quake in Timbucktoo that could bring about Tsunami's all over India.

5 minutes of time at his desk is something that would be a hard fought luxury. Rest of the day would have to be spent feeding cerelac to the boss, these consultants referred to as "THE TEAM LEAD" (To achieve the IQ level of a dead DODO was perhaps a distant reality for this chap). U gu gu gu ga... Wat did you say? You dont know the spelling of 'variable' and want me to come to your desk and fix it... Ok duddu baby... I ll jus be there... Dont cry

A cat and mouse game he would have to play. A spot did he find at the far end of the company where he could put his comp and do a remote session to his computer to work. Life would now be an adventure. New routes would he have to adopt to escape the CDB's (Cerelac Duddu Babies). A coffee break would mean sending spies ahead to monitor the premises.

Agent NOT NOT Shaven: Report your status. Is the coast clear for Mamma Mia?
Spy Chai(That means you Pichai): All seems clear. No sign of the CDB's.
Mamma Mia a.k.a. Cerelac Feeder: Are we a go spy-chai?
Spy Chai: We are a go Miss...uh sorry...Mr Mia.

The team quietly baby steps to the pantry. Long jumps across passages would minimize the probability of being spotted. And finally.

Mama Mia: Here we are boyz... The pantry... Job well done.

Spoken too soon... Here come the CDB's... Execute Plan B:Freeze.. Agent NOT NOT Shaven, Spy Chai and Soukara form a barrier round the Mama.
Mama Mia: You know the plan boys... Light rays... Block all light rays trying to reach the contours of my body. You carry this out well, and, we represent india in the Synchronized Swimming competition next year.30 seconds of suspense later, our valiant heroes are a happy bunch. A close call that was to say the least.

The next week was spent in developing more escape strategies. Better and more efficient algorithms. Maps were drawn out. Shortest routes to the nearest loo from any random point 'x' in the company as a function of distance, time and hazards encountered en route were calculated in the unlikely event that there was a fundamental flaw(S1 P1 bug) in perhaps the most robust algorithm that had been penned down by a bunch of lazy engineers.

In the last one year in the company I had never spent lesser time at the pantry or more in the loo. Toilet paper rolls had turned out to be our heroes best friend in these testing times. He would crib endlessly to them.

In the coming days, our hero wud become one with this tribe - TATA (The Available Toilet Accessories). He would share their pains, whether they be torturous songs by fellow McAloreans with the singing capacity of a feverish Himesh Reshammiya or encounters of the fourth kind with amnesiatic McAlorens who had not been taught the purpose of THE FLUSH.

Its been two weeks now since that uneventful day (the day of the hiring).The toilet GODs were not merciful ones he had learnt. They didnt answer prayers. Probably not so soon. Our hero still evades the CDB as Laloo Prasad Yadav his tooth brush.

This journey would not be an easy one, nor would it be a short one. Will our hero get through this alive? Will he be able to visit his parents who have come down to India for their once in a year trip? Or will the toilet GODS continue to heave their wrath on this poor engineer?

I am pretty much sure that right now you think I am escaped journalist from CNN-IBN. "Hi, I am Rajdeep Sardesai and the question we are asking tonight is : Should Sachin Tendulkar be endorsing VIP Frenchie or EURO underwears? To know what India thinks, log onto to www.ibnlive.com As of now 10% are in support of VIP and 8 in support of EURO. The rest have polled for our new category... "i dont give a %$&^$% beep beep beep @#%!@#$%"."

Thank you and do tune into www.yetanotherachievement.blogspot.com for more updates on this story. Join us as we track the story of our hero RGM all week only on, C-Annan-RGM. Gnite and tc yo all :). (Atleast the two of you who do read my posts)

Of Murphy and his WiCkEd wIcKeD lawZ!!!

"If there's more than one possible outcome of a job or task, and one of those outcomes will result in disaster or an undesirable consequence, then somebody will do it that way." It is most often cited as "Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong" (or, alternately, "Whatever can go wrong will go wrong, and at the worst possible time," or, "Anything that can go wrong, will," or even, "If anything can go wrong, it will, and usually at the most inopportune moment")

Pre Requisite:Murphy's LAW

Saturday evening 8:45 pm: He had been working continously for the past 10 hours for now, without any breaks save his not-so-brief twenty minute ordeal with the contents of the Noodle Packet. Whoever gave the caption, "Maggi two minute noodles", thought he, had conveniently forgotten to mention the HAZARDS OF MAKING NOODLES or atleast the DO NOT's. He was confident about one thing though. His next noodle session would be a grand success. In whatever way it was possible to screw up the art: "noodle-making" he had already done that evening. Next time he wouldnt forget to add the water before putting it into the microwave atleast. Not unless he wanted to he wanted to hear the sweet chants of the fire alarm and the rhythmic grace with which foreign guards uttered obscenties ...once again!!!

Yup... The signs were already there... This was going to be ONEofTHOSEdayz.

Nothing had been going right that day. He repeatedly exchanged quick glances between the circuit diagram and the bread board. Why wasnt it working? He wished he had just chosen to be a software engineer. If all else failed, there wud always be the Ctrl-C Ctrl-V.

There existed a solitary pleasant thought in his mind then. She was expecting a call from him that evening. Their first since the 3 months they had started chatting. He had precisely calculated the time differences. It should be exactly 7:33 in her watch right now. 8:50(on her watch) was the time they had agreed upon. Precautions had been taken from both sides. He was only too aware of the ordeal of "Rendezvous with beastly DAD of the beauty".

Easy he thought. 15 minutes to wrap up work. Walk home. Buy dinner. (No more fiascos tonite). Eat. Relax. Call at 10. Past reputation had earned him the epithet "the miser". Not tonite. Money didnt matter tonite.

One hour and fifteen minutes later: (10:05 pm local time)
Arrrrghhhhh!!! The generator had been screaming in his ear for the past fifteen minutes. To make things worse, there was this really irritating flashing of light coming from the distant corner of the living room for the past 5 minutes. He moved to the source. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!! Oh no !!! Oh no!!! How could he have been so stupid to keep the mobile in silent mode? What point was a reminder set on the alarm if it didnt have the squeaking capacity of a mouse subjected to two torturous hours of Himesh Reshammiya songs.

Its a good thing there was a phone booth just below his house. He looked into his purse.Oh Oh. Re 10. Maybe he could just say "Hello... Srini-vas here" and cut the phone. Hmmmm!!! Dont think she would be too happy abt that!!! Ah... There was always the ever dependable Shaar... Gr8 roomie this guy... Never short of cash. Only a couple of days ago had he seen Shaar hangin 500 Rs notes to dry.

He should have paid heed to the signs... This was gonna be Murphy's Day.. Shaar had chosen the wrong day to go out shopping. Atleast the wrong time... He looked to his other roomies... The smiles on their faces indicated that he would have better luck trying to squeeze wisdom out of George Bush's speeches.

ICICI bank!!! There was an ICICI atm nearby. If he leapt at lightnin pace, he could get the money just b4 'princess' put him in yetAnotherTardyNut category. Run did he to the atm. Murphy's Law: Corollary 3C: The length of the queue (esp at testing times) is inversely proportional to the amount of time one has to spare. Corollary 3C : Sub Section A: If the time left is a real number less than or equal to zero, ther would be a plus 5-member in the queue. In addition probability of there being a female shopper (the ones that would take out the money, just get out of the ATM and run back in to grab an extra 300 more) would double.

It would be 10 more minutes before he learned that, for reasons beyond paranormal, his HSBC card would not work on this ICICI atm today (the first in the last 38 times he had been to the ATM). Either that or he had picked the perfect day to forget his 6 digit pin number*.

No seconds thoughts... Our hero now made a dash to the nearest HSBC bank... Strange no queue!!!!! Surely, Murphy was trying to outsmart him... somehow. He quicky withdrew the money from the ATM.

"Where is the phone booth?", asked he to the security guard. "I think there should be one right next to Nexus building. Just go left", replied the guard in perfect English. Murphy was definitely trying to set him up here. He would show Murphy who the smarter one of the two was. There would be no indecision. Took two steps did he to the left and then run to the right. He he!!! He would only allow Murphy a teasing sniff of victory before he outwitted him.

There was a reason Murphy had a law named after him. He could not so easily be outwitted. Our hero would have to return to the phone booth right beneath his house, where the Q#%$#$ generator was trying busy trying to prove that he had the noisiest growl of them all.

Apparently, choice was something he was not going to have in plenty today. Valiantly he stepped into "ThePhoneBooth". 00-93-555-55215544. The number would remain engrained in his mind for a long time. No more hassles here.

Hmmmph!!! Was it worth it??? Would a voice somewhere in the distant corner of the world be nearly as sweet as the extreme his imagination would let him percieve?? And to what end?? What fruitful gain could there possibly be from this "conversation"... the little which he could hear, that was not drowned in the monotonous noise of the generator.

"Hey U", said a voice on the other end of the phone. There are few... very few instances in life where one gets to find out that even Imagination had its limits. The voice on the other end. Memories of the days hardships vanished in an instant. He could not have prayed and gotten anything more beautiful.

All of the best things in life are worth fighting for. Only a few of them, would you look back and say. "Hmmmmm.... I wonder if I did enuf to deserve this reward". This could easily top that list. The story has perhaps only begun.