I accept...

Dear Ankita - The crazy trouble some kid who troubles everyone,

I accept that one of my "ex" boyfriends is not an ex-boyfriend, but another "personality" of mine. I admit I suffer from a multi-personality disorder. I admit that I have 7 different personalities. One for each day of the week, and they take over me, in 7*7 ways each day. Well... each day, one of the personalities can take over me in 7 different ways and this will happen for each of the 7 days. To complicate matters, one of my personalities is dilusionary, the other is schizophrenic, the third has two other personalities (one of which is a 3 year kid and the other a sage on the Himalayas), the fourth is possessed, the fifth is a superman - the love of my life, the sixth is a physiatrist, and the seventh is me.

I hope this clarifies matters.

Thanking you,

Yours sincerely,
Sonal

P.S: Now can we please stop bugging my life, since I have made a public announcement which can also double up as an apology.

The seven deadly IT sins!

Since I'm catching up on my reading today... here's another one!

Check the slide show!
I specially like this one! It reads,

Obviously, avoid the office romance. Not so obvious is to avoid the lust for the perfect technology. It doesn't exist

Lol!

What language do you think in?

The other day I was having a casual conversation with my manager when he asked "What language do you think in". As always, the first thought was "English". Many years ago, I did do an exercise to consciously observe/note/understand what language I use to form those thoughts and then translate to the required language. Back then, the answer was "English"... probably because the exposure to Hindi/Marathi was restricted to the classes in school and occasionally with relatives who weren't comfortable with English. This of course, does not mean I wasn’t confortable with Hindi, or that I didn’t appreciate the language. For the record it’s a beautiful language!

Every language for that matter has its own beauty and certain thoughts can only be expressed in that language. The second part of the previous statement is what I learnt in the later years of my life! Some part of spoken language is not like engineering drawing where you can think up plan and elevation views in first angle and translate them to third angle :)

Today, the previous paragraph compels me to think that I now I don't think in only one language, but in a good mix of both Hindi and English... though I'm still sceptical. So I turned to Google Baba for help! It didn't solve the problem at hand, but I stumbled on a rather interesting article, which talks about thinking in terms of a "programming" language! What really intrigued me was, towards the end the write-up says,

So, what language do you think in? Is it the same one that you're currently being paid to use? If not, you are not as efficient as you could be. And your code may be horribly inefficient, too.

I wonder if I can apply that my work and re-word it as "When you analyze code, do you think in terms of RTRT scripting? If not, the scripts you write may not be as efficient as you are paid to write". Sounds scary!

On a not-so-side note, here's another interesting article I came across on the same site. The crux of the article could be summed up by,

In short, he said that it is important for managers (and I would suggest, for all employees and consultants) to reset their opinions about the team members every 6 months or so. Primarily, his point being that people can and do change, but we often latch onto our early impressions and never give them the benefit of a new assessment.

And I'll sign off, wishing you all a very happy 26th January and a happy happy happy holiday ;)

Micro Story#5

Lets Play Pretend.

Diya was this young chirpy girl. One day she attained enlightenment - the world is not worth her. Human beings are sick. Diya was known for being chirpy and friendly and lively. Hence, even though it killed her from inside, she was still chirpy and friendly and bubbly… because she pretended that she liked the world. I'd call her "Pepsi". Playing pretend gave her a high. A high unparalled by either narcotics or sex. Not that she tried either. She was playing pretend on this Railway track with her boyfriend. She'd pretend to be really happy with him. He'd pretend to love her... or maybe he did. Or maybe he didn't. Because he never told her of the train he heard and she didn't. Was it because she was told him "Let's play pretend... I’m deaf, maybe? ". And the train of course wasn't playing pretend.

End of Story.

92 Percentile

RIP, the IIM dream.

2007!!!!!

I'm a tea addict. I love tea. But I'm not your regular addict, as in, I do not suffer from withdrawal symptoms when I know there is no way I can have tea. Although these symptoms very well manifest themselves when I know tea is available and I'm denying myself the wonderful, hot, steaming cup of tea. Then of course Pearl the Crazy Kid calls me a coal miner, because she claims like the miners I'm trying to extract every calorie of heat that the cup would have. Talking about calories, I've got this love-hate relationship with them... though I'll get back to that a little later.

As I finished sipping the last sip of my midnight cup of tea (which is something I consume only when I'm up late at night, which is not very often since Mathi Boy is no longer onsite @Powerway.) As I sipped the last sip of tea, (!!) I casually, like a high profile big shot actor in a gigantic budget Karan Johar movie, glanced at the time, and interestingly the clock read 23.59. This made that the last sip of the last cup of tea of 2006 in the last minute of 2006! I wish I could get my name in some record book for that feat! While on Karan Johar, I think his movies are dumb, but definitely better than enduring a Shaadi No.1. And and and I love his choice of heroines, and of Shah Rukh Khan and their dress designers and the dresses these dress designers design... which gives me enough reason to donate my hard earned money for a movie ticket. It saddens me that I still haven't seen KANK as yet. And it’s even got Preity Zinta and my darling Abhishek in it!

So, as I was creating the world record for sipping the last sip of tea from the last cup of tea in the last minute of 2006, my mind started going back on the year that was.

2006 started on a high. If I remember right, I kissed someone happy new year... and before your minds get working, not "that" kind of a kiss. Later I had enough days off from office, as I thought I was sick. Well, I did fall ill, but then I could have gone to office... lol!!! I had an enjoyable January, the ankle sprain from Christmas was killing me, but then one evening I had a lovely coffee with Charlie Boy (sadly it wasn't coffee with Karan)... and we rode over the Marathalli road to this cosy CCD somewhere near the Bangalore airport.

Other highlights were of course the crazy work I did at office, the lovely micro marathon that I won! Besides that, I think 2006 has been the most un-productive year of my 23 years, 1 month and 20 days of existence on planet earth. In fact the productivity of 2006 was negative... for instance, I lost negative kgs of weight (and that explains why I prefer the unit Calorie to Joule which is the SI unit of heat despite the fact that my four years of engineering and 2 years of junior college and a couple of years of school drilled in the importance of the SI system of units.) I also did a lot of negative work, on one special occasion managed a screw up on the eve of the project release. But sadly, I had a backup and I wasted only 10 minutes fixing it. So much for the adrenaline rush! Sigh! And to carry on in the same vein... I did some negative progress on the CAT, the JMET, the IIFT entrance, the SNAP, the NMAT and I'm looking forward to keep up the spirit this year with the XAT and FMS and probably the CET. Still pretty undecided on the CET. Not really sure if an engineer of my "calibre" should bother with anyplace other than the IIMs and XLRI... I'm a narcissist. And I think I'm the best! Which reminds me of this lovely song from a Shah Rukh movie "phir bhi dil hai hindustani" called "I'm the best". I can bet you a couple of million dollars that it was written with me in mind. Of course, I will not be betting them, is an altogether different issue. I'd rather use them to buy myself an exotic island where me and my lover(s) can have sex forever without being disturbed by pesky human beings.

A year that can be summed up in 2 paragraphs (412 words) definitely deserves the world award for the most unproductive year. My post count was also pretty low... and the quality was despicable! Never the less, new year... new resolutions... and not 1024X768, since I'm already using that, and since its a rather old joke. My resolutions for 2007 will be something doable... that by itself excludes getting into IIMA.

1. I added myself onto Y! Messenger years ago. I also added my otherself, i.e. a "profile" of mine on Y! Messenger centuries ago. Now the task for this year would be to set up a conference with me, my added self and my other self! (The idea is courtesy a friend of mine who claims this way I won't have to google search the meaning of my life.)
2. No spraining of ankles this year. Its really simple, all I need to do is to take a deep breath, not think of Abhishek Bacchan, no jumping half a flight of stairs, no monkey-ing, no trying to chase Pearl in the incy-incy little bedroom of ours, no frog jumping without shoes, no skipping more than 4000 counts regardless of whether all my stamina is underutilised, no... damn... this sounds difficult. But then, as Bond says, "if you try, you might, if you don't, you won't"! :)
3. Stop using kiddie pencils that have the 6 and 7 times tables printed on them. (It helps there aren't many of those left...!!!)

Three is a good number of resolutions. It is, in fact a good number. Like one bugger that day was telling me for the XAT essay, it’s a good idea to discuss three important points. In a PI, if you're asked your strengths, don't rattle off a shopping list, but talk of 3 strengths. He should have told me something new...!! But then, not everyone is a genius like me...!! I love myself! And for 2007, another New Year resolution that I will definitely keep up is to fall in love with myself all the more!! To kick start the new year...

... Love you Sona Baby!!!!!!!!!