hOw tO sAy hi

i shall now cr8 blasphemy.. wait that sentence is like.. all wrong. i shall now.. do blasphemy.. blasphemize?? da**it. anyways i shall now say something which is probably blasphemy to half of you out there.
i don't like FB. i did type out the whole name, but somehow i had this vision of fb cosp braking down the door in the night and carting me off to places unseen.

this is probably the nth post detailing how much i dislike fb. i mean what do you say?
you know the situation? when ur at a party talking to ppl... and suddenly everyone falls silent and is waiting for you to speak. just waiting for you to floor them with ur wit and uproarious hillariousness. speak da**it. say something funny. everyone's looking at u.. aargh the pressure is too much.
that's why i don't go to parties.
FB is something like that. everyone is right there. the most inane "hey how you doing" that you can come up with, is right there. the moment you ping someone, you have this sneaky sensation that ppl are smirking that you cant come up with funny things to say or funny cartoons of cats playing the piano at hogwarts or something slightly less banal. ok ok "I" feel it.
and its not like you can say anything else after 6 months of not loggin in and all you want to do is say hi.

what DO you say?

"hey i was just reminiscing about the good old college days and i remembered you and thought i'd say hi?"

ooooh that's a good one. let me write that down, so i can post it the next time i login. like after 4 months.


ps: i feel like i shud somehow acknowledge the nice folks who leave comments , but you know.. um... i really dunno what to tell u. so i will just walk away. and thanks for reading and not calling me a pinhead?? umm ok bye.

yuMm... sOme mOre pLs

so the cafeteria in my office does these specials.. local folks come by and sell jam, salsa , cookies, on occassion - pot... naah i'm kidding. pot might be legal in dear ol oregon, but no one sells pot at my office... that i know of.

but there was this lady on friday evening, handing out brownie samples.. and i had some. and they were awesome !! awesome and Awesome!

so, ofcourse i bought the pack and i was excited. here i cud go home and have brownies after dinner.. ofcourse i shud pace myself and not have the whole pack all at once. i really shud start that diet .. but man they were soooo goooood and goooey and delish.... and vegetarian to boot!

so i go home and K stopped by. and i showed him the pack. he wasn't very enthusiastic coz he's already started his diet. but ha! i'll start mine after this pack of brownies is o-v-e-r.

and so after dinner i go and open the pack.


wth. whats this powder? this is brownie MIX???!! when did this happen???
oMG was this, what that lady was babbling while i was tasting the brownie in the cafe???? that i had to actually Make em??? she can't talk while i'm eating awesome brownies... thats like.. cheating !!

by god i was so lost in its deliciousness i completely overlooked the fact that i have to MAKE the blasted brownies???? with APPLE sauce and vanilla yoghurt. what the heck is apple sauce and where do i get some stat?? do you think if i shook the bag a couple of times, they would appear????


aaaaw man, i was really looking fwd to a couple of them after the fab dinner.. and that's how we ended the evening. with K rolling on the floor laughing......

i ThOughT yOU sAid goOD neWs!

ugh.. all is lost. Mr T is thinking of getting P into our team!
disaster.

ofCOUrse all hell breaks loose , as soon as the indie folk hear about this.

and ofcourse you can hear all sorts of groaning and sighing from the lowlie tech coolies in the lab. ( i'm not racist..that's ME for crissake! )

what is he THINKING?? is this a test? of some strange how-long-b4-u-breakdown-and-stab-P-in-the-eye-with-ur-lunch-fork kind of test?? if so, then i do NOT want your bonus, or your help or .. or.. ok i don't know if i'll quit.
but good GOD. why HER?? i mean isn't it enough we slave fourteen... even eighteen hours a day ?? her?? HER?? her who looked at the android logo and asked me what kind of bug it was???

i think come monday morning.. you WILL see a lot of weeping , gnashing of teeth and pulling of hair.. and thats only me we're talking about. no idea how V will take it. he might quit! just plain up and leave! aah brave V. the only guy with a marketable skill set. lucky V!! how i envy you.

well folks. stock up on ur spirits. take a heavy swig. barricade the door to ur cubicle and wait for the news.

tHis iS ArT, dArNit!

aaaha! finally finished.

i can't take credit.. this was in the opening credits of miyazaki's cartoon, ponyo. while i discover that netflix is my friend...
i finished this over the weekend.

ps: you'r only allowed to say its awesome.
pps: what can i say? i really like blue?

:)






my left eyelid is still swollen :( but i can't really give that excuse for not blogging. how about this? i was busy earning that darn promotion.. which only means more moolah.. bwuahahahahaha ;P

update: everytime i feel blue, i just look at these paintings.... see what i did there?? blue?? get it? get it??

aM i ReaLly BacK?

if the only thing i get to hear everytime i call home is how "awesome it would be" for me to bloat up to twice my size and spawn a mini-me.. then thats what you too will be forced to read for the next.. oh say i don't know.. xx years.

so i thought my life had got boring.. now that i was hitched , and ppl ( my family ) finally left me in peace... but oh no! its just a short termed break i got. little do i know that folks are just gathering their breath for the next tidal wave of barraging.

so now... where is my escape plan and emergency runaway kit again? oh! here they are! we're all set and the only thing left to do is book the airline tickets to siberia or alaska.
i think i'll take my chances with russians/polar bears rather than listen to more of this right now..

hellooooo...... ppl...... i am not ready.... what part of that is so difficult to understand???
i would rather stick a fork in my eye.....difficult to grasp????... should i stick it and show you????

suRviVaL sKiLLs

going home for a visit is a serious test of your immunity, system, digestion.

with all the well meaning folks who insist you eat the special halwa, peda, khara, jalebi "they" made. it's not like they make normal quantities either. for some twisted reason, they make the same quantity you would have eaten if you lived there and then wait for you to finish it.
ofcourse then you have the offended moms/aunties if your unable to stuff your face full of awesome jamuns.

"omg, how could you not eat it. i spent 3 days making this stuff"
"maa'am you are better off, just giving me curd rice for 10 days, because my system is revolting so hard that its pushing all the stuff back the way it came.. through my easophagus."

i only have one response. "please pack it."

whatever you got. make them non perishable and pack them.

please i cannot eat it. 4 years of cereal and toast has made my system extremely sensitive to sugar and oil and fat.
one jamun is all i can take.
i can think about the jalebi .. the week after.
no no not eat it. i said "think" it.

now it turns out, i was the only one who made it through this trip with just some minor cough. the rest had fever, fever, jetlagged induced cold , vomiting , yada yada yada.
what? am i the only one with the constitution of an ox??

perhaps its all the conditioning trips i've had to india.

actually there is a secret. eat only idlis , dosas. yup for 10 days straight. eat only idlis and sambar.

tHerE's a GoOd reAsOn.. i kNow iT

there's a very good reason i don't call home often. i just KNEW there was.

i thought things were supposed to get BETTER ppl.. not WORSE :-/

sorry about the resolution and the stick figuredness. but i use paint. and you got the point didn't you... just click on the image. you'll be able to read it without having to gouge your eyes out... excuse me! there's no need for that kind of language !

wHy sO mAny S@!%#y dAYs?

everyone seems to be in a foul mood in the office.

everyone lives with their own set of prejudices about what would work, what is easy, what is hard and what they just don't wanna do.

and sometimes even the most amiable of characters turn into complete morons and start snapping back at you when all you do is ask them for a serial to USB cable.

aaah the ides of march.

what DO I do, when P asks me.. "what is that BUG?? is it the symbol for android???"

:O

< crickets chirping >

< appalled silence >

"uhh, sorry? what did you say? sorry the voices in my head were too busy laughing out loud in derision at your s****** for me to hear what you said"

finally sent off the h/w guy.. poor slob was crying that the s/w was too complex. and it was just too messed up. well welcome to our world buddy.

btw the word up there could be smelly.. well it COULD!

bAttLE cOnTiNUes

what ! you dare enter my lair??? [ ok my cube ]

why P, you have grown more bold and daring in the last few hours since i have declared war!!

this deed shall not go unanswered.

you enter my cubicle, i curse you with rotten tomatoes. < where all your tomatoes will rot 2x faster than normal in your fridge.. yes i'm devious >

grrrr....

coming in to my cube and saying i'm watching a movie! when all i'm doing is listening to some songs.

and you! YOU! you who were snoring in the meeting yesterday. i had the good grace not to poke you in the face while you were sitting next to me and snoring away to glory.

you.. YOU who was constantly harping about cookies and coffee when all you had to do was walk to the vending machine , put a dollar in and buy your own darn cookies!

grrrr ... how i hate thee , my arch nemesis and the curses of a thousand locusts on you.

fiGHtiNg tHe gOoD bAtTLe

aaaaaha! P! i am hereforth and henceforth declaring you as my arch nemesis of the workplace.

you have shown urself to be worthy of this title , through your dastardly deeds and twisting of basic facts of life and physics.

evil madam!! we are now at war! you are advised to stay to your side of the darkest abyss which is the second floor of our office and i shall defend my side of this hellish abyss.

ha! better beware P... i am fully cognizant of your manipulations and trickery. and also pure stupidity which is by far the most dangerous of the dark arts you practice.
but behold! i hold the axe of truth and physics and laws of nature with which i shall cleave your wicked arguments into a million pieces and render them useless!!

now begone! flee from the bright light of logic and reasonableness, run away and hide in your hidey hole...

au revoir
until our next battle.

< bows and exits meeting room >

[ wish i could suddenly stand up in the middle of a meeting, say this and leave in a hurry. expressions would be priceless ]

gOdS gEt aNGry , sO doN't diSs tHEm

ha ha it was funny yesterday.

i had to walk this dude through some s/w setup.

so now , Dude .. and i mean literally a hippie looking kind of dude, walks up to me and says he needs my help to install this s/w right..
since he was gonna help me fix my problems somehow, i was like "sure man, no prob. lets get started", and i grab by SD card.

now he spends atleast a good 15 minutes ranting about how linux is so messed up, and you have to do everything so manually. omg formatting the drive... so hard. < ofcourse i learnt how to do it, just a week ago. so now i can act all high and superior in front of the ignorant h/w folks >

so he says he's a h/w genius and a s/w idiot. hmmm well ur some kind of idiot.
and he rants about how they're team thought they would save a feq bucks by outsourcing to india, and its been such a waste, coz they didnt get any good results of moving part of the team there.
and how everybody is so effed up and no work is getting done.. and blah and blah and blah.

so i was briefly flummoxed about how to move an 8GB OS to a 4GB card, when he declared everything was useless. he had this awesome s/w on windows to copy/write any GB OS to any GB filesystem as long as the actual data was within the limits of the smaller filesystem. and lo and behold! he produced the s/w. installed it. and tada! did his magic.

unfortunately, it didn't work.

unfortunately due to some incorrect settings , he formatted his office laptop and lost his entire HDD.


ouch!

well that shows you should never anger the linux s/w gods. retribution is swift!!!

aVoiD cAtChiNg sTuPidiTy

have you every really pondered the big questions in life?? i mean like the serious one's ??

like

"dude ... why are my hands so red today??"

or

"am i allergic to soy sauce and stupidity??"

i think i'm allergic to soy sauce. just ate some soy sauce soaked veggies last night and today i was like half an ounce bloated. < are you crazy if you notice half an ounce of bloating in your overly reddish hands?? >
i'm definitely allergic to stupidity.

have i said that before???

some ppl are stupid. and the rest are just plain messed up. but its the stupid you gotta look out for..

they're dangerous man.

its like they have some radar in their brains man.. that... that kind of forces them to go headlong into every pothole in their way. and if your not careful they'll just drag you along with them man....

how do you tell if your allergic to stupidity ??? you start sneezing when infected ppl come near?? hey! i sneezed just now, and A just walked by.. hmmm... must monitor A for more signs of infection.

no? how about if they come up to you and speak complete random c**** ??
and your face turns an interesting shade of purple that isn't found in nature??

whatever it is, we better figure it out. fast. coz pssst, they're increasing in numbers man.. and soon they're gonna be everywhere..

shhhh.... P just walked by.

quick.

hide under the desk before she sees you.

iT's toO bRiGhT anD i MiSs mY bEsT fRiENd

ack.

its snowing.

heavily.

means i'm not going to office. also means i'm brewing myself a cup of hot hot tea.. maybe some pakodas... some music... and sleep in.

did you SEE , how many posts i have on the weather??? it's not natural i tell you.. just not natural.


**********

life is tough without my TV. i think i miss it more than...anything :P
how did my brain get stimulated before? without the constant influx of flashing images on the electronic tube ?? < i'm sure some smartass is gonna point out how incredible inaccurate i am... the tv is not an electronic tube.. its a cuboid !! ok ok i get it jeez >

Sigh… I miss my HGFNHC and ABHDC

Its interesting to be in a room full of people , trying to have an all day or couple of days meeting.
You have the constantly-tell-you-how-much-they-work ppl, the doing-anything-is-pointless ppl, the oh-just-relax ppl, the clueless ppl < these are like locusts and termites. They are everywhere > , the omg-sky-is-falling ppl and the how-do-I-get-credit-for-doing-nothing ppl.. Just to name a few.

I'm sure I can think of more categories if I put my mind to it, but I got too much to do and the sky is falling. My boss is clueless and my partner tells me to oh, just relax coz doing anything is pointless anyways…

aLl dAy LoNg

working in I****, teaches you two things.

how to multi-multi-infy-multi-task.. which is listen to some BS on the side, keep blogging, spy on P playing some local office politics, working, chatting, etc etc

how to .. ok, i forgot...

man these day long meetings are boring.. almost brain deadening.

and man some folks play a lot of stupid local politics in the office. including have multiple meetings on the side with individual folks ...

*****

ok perhaps this is beyond boring if we are discussing the egg yolk color between Europe and US chickens.

people over here are so not listening to this meeting...

******

ok nothing else of interest to report. except for the fact that P is acting weird again.. what is Wrong with THAT woman??? neither do i understand your random jokes and nor do i care that your going to india for only 2 days. first of all, i don't understand what it is that you do ... and second of all this hopping between continents is not really working for us.... perhaps you can stay in one.. the one far away from me. far far faaaar away from where i live.

thanks

now shooo go away.


oh my god! i just found out, P the crazy lady has ordered glasses exactly like my new one's. :O that's bad.. that's very very bad. dude, she's nuts and she's like ... FORTY.

ugh ...

hOw diFfiCuLt iS it tO saY No?

its takes a lot of kahunas (kahonas?) to ditch it all and walk away.

a friend of mine finally sent a lengthy goodbye email. R's gonna work her way through S. America volunteering and working in remote villages. its gonna take her 4 months and she'll land in india much the wiser.

kudos!! i think thats simply awesome !

ofcourse i wish i was going too.. ofcourse ... for sure..

but when i read her email, i remember the bygone days when i really really was even considering that. and researching/figuring out how i could do that.

turned out i was too much of a cheapo to pay my way across latin america. and then i heard the kidnapping stories. someone in our company sent out an email about being kidnapped and held hostage for money to be wired from the US.
:O

ooookaaaay...

ofcourse another thing about the virtuous is the de-facto superiority they(we?) feel on being so virtous. by god was i ever that pompous and deluded with the sense of my grandiosity?? ha! must have been nice....


aaah peru, machu pichu and argentina.. when will i ever live amid your awesome mountains and think to myself how blessed i am??

neEd.....sLeeEeeeP

some ppl would probably call me a terrible host.

just.. so... tired last night.

bro and sis came to the room to check it out, and what do i do? i fall asleep in the middle of a sentence.

i vaguely remember getting up to lock the door. but more than that i remember nothing.

i don't think i had dinner at all.

wHat wAs i sAyiNg? i fOrGet..

staying at the leela, its good. pretty good. well i wouldn't break out the awesome yet.
after couple of keycards not working, lift keys not working, random service engineers entering my room in the middle of the night to fix a lightblb...having tough time with external cabs entering the place and getting notice about it.
i think i'd say its pretty good. mebe not awesome.

i guess this projects making me worse absent minded than before. well what would you say if i told you i accidently locked myself out of the room in my bathrobe and slippers?? or that i forgot my entire hand purse in the cafe and didn't realize until i had to book a cab???

luckily i got my purse back with all contents intact.

and i only had to stand in the corridor for 5 min before the guy came running with a keycard... u know.. the guy with the turban who stands at the doorway.

maybe that's why they have phones outside every door linked to the front desk. perhaps i'm not the first... ha! i can only hope.

dOn'T tALk To stRAnGerS

i met this funny old man on the flight yest. well he wasn't old old, just about my dad's age.
we struck up a conversation while waiting for the customs in a snake like queue and i was as usual getting a lil bored and so having a conversation with myself..
i think the funniest thing he said was, "are you born between dec 23rd and jan 23rd."
and smack, out of nowhere, everything i was saying or about to say flew straight out of my head.

this is FASCINATING. someone who can tell your b'day month just by looking at you?? now THAT's interesting. but apparently he only guessed that coz he was asking me a lot of questions and i asked him back a few questions coz u know.. didn't want to seem rude there. and he thought "aaha! someone who is as curious as me.. must be a capricorn.."

and apparenlty he tells me, if you google curiosity and capricorn, you'll get quite a few google hits. now that's fun-Nn-ni-er coz now i'm imaginging this lil old man sitting and typing away all sorts of characterisitics along with the workd capricorn into the google search box and poring over the results.

maye someone should tell him that just coz its on the internet, it aint necessarily true. but then as one of the few guys who actually helped build the internet back in those days.. i guess he probably knows more about that.

apparently he works for siemens, in seattle. and i never caught his name. though he did ask mine, and he found out where i was from, and how old i was. ( yes i have finally fallen into the trap of admitting to be few yrs younger than i actually am, but when someone says "now.. lets see... you say you have 2 years of experience, so you must be 25." i'm not gonna counter that with , "oh no, actually i'm almost hitting 30, coz... ". helloooo ofcourse not.

he did mention another thing that was interesting. i asked him where he was from in Andhra, and his wife asked "why", which is when i mumbled , " umm nothing. just curious" < hey i thought i was being polite and asking questions was the thing. heck they asked me where i stayed and how many roomies i had >
which is when he jumped in to tell me, "curiousity is good, never let anyone tell you it isn't" and its peculiar that he would say that, at that moment.
coz you know.. always been yelled at, for asking too many questions when i was a kid. and then intel tells me to always start and end at a question. and then here comes another guy to reinforce that message. funny. huh.

anyways. he was an interesting kind of eccentric man. and his wife had this half smile , sort of like.. "thank you for humoring my eccentric husband, but i really needed the break." and even though we ended up talking about gaming theory and how it was related to the swimming patterns of fish or the disaster area evacuation patterns of cockroaches, i'd say it was a not-unpleasant 15 minutes. and i wouldn't mind going through that again.

high compliment indeed sir. high indeed.


****
the flights were ok. not so impressed with cathay pacific. food was .. uhhh at best.
did watch 3 movies and god, i think i even watched 20 min of dabang by mistake. why salman khan decides to stop and do his pelvic thrusting dance in the middle of chasing a goon , i will never understand. but apparently that's the appeal.

aaah back in blore. and this time i'm in the nicer-er part of town! 04-05: i always wondered if i'd ever stay here every time i passed this way on my way to office. glad to see that it only took a mere 5-6 years to get to it.
i can't wait to go eat in a dhaba !!

^_^

fLyiNg oN a bRoOm

the hong kong airport, not so great actually. just another blatant imitation of the west. there's a McD and there, right round the corner is guess, or is it coach. all these handbags are beginning to look alike now.
and there's the perfume section.. aah big brands, and then they gotta hire a couple of pretty folk to wear suites and just stand around making sure no one steals them.
that must be a little stupid. just stand around all day chatting and making sure 12 handbags artfully placed in lil cubby holes are not stolen.
i mean you could atleast make it a lil challenging. maybe some fiery arrow shooting in the passages, giant swinging axes or a bed os sharp spike ala indiana jones.
but 12 bags? come ON.

the fight so far was uneventful. i got kicked, well actually my seat got kicked by the brat sitting behind me for half the duration of the flight. the other half i was dead to the world.
why does it seem, i always have bratty kids near me in these things?

saw 3 movies. the next segment is not so bad. only 6 hours. i can handle that.

as we get closer to blore, my hearing can pick out more and more ppl around me speaking in kannad. i have mixed feelings about that. while i'm really glad to hear some kannad, most of these folks are fugly man. i mean count me the last person to prejudice against you... but then man ..... i forgot how fugly most of us are.

ok gtg now. this has got to be an interesting two weeks.

rEd mOrNinGs

we have one of our usual staff meetings today.

i saunter in all happy as you please since i missed the last one due to a flat tire..

and i see that only our dear dragon lady is in the room. well... looks like i'm early, but that's ok. so i enter the room after a brief second of hesitation and i sit down.

immediately J the dragon lady smiles at me, and i smile back warily.

J: morning
me: morning!

J: i'm in a really bad mood this week. i feel like screaming or crying.
me: < uh oh >

J: i really am in a funk, i could bite someone's head off.
me: < oh god i don't want to be alone with the dragon lady. please someone enter. pls pls pls. i'm too young to die!! >

< Oh boy am i glad you walked in Ken. Ken my friend!! do come in and give me company!! >

sUd oFf

you think you know how to work a stupid dishwasher.
you think all you gotta do , is put in a lil dihwashing powder, ok so you don't have the powder, maybe you can use some of the dishwashing liquid. its the same innit?
soap is soap.
and you switch it on, to the light wash.

and


whoa, why is the dishwasher foaming and spewing out soap spuds and foam!!!


make it stop.. make it STOP!!

aaargh... its spreading across the kitchen. just ... too ... much... foam.

aAaaHa nOw i GeT it

that's it! i figured it out.

my writing is fuelled by me being pissed off at you.

oh jeez , and if i'm not royally pissed at some douchebag like the one 2 posts ago... i got nothing to write.

uh oh bad news. i really shudn't have got married. it's just too non-anger inducing!

probably the best compliment i can give K or maybe the worst.

"happy anniversary, it's been a very non-angry calm 10 years"

"happy b'day. you never piss me off"

"happy new year, here's to another year not getting mad at the world"

quick. anonymous. say something stupid and pointless.
i'm sure i'll rant about it.

sO wHAt?

oh thanks.

for pointing out how glaringly boring my life has become. between 12-14 hour workdays and sleep, the only excitement i have is .. opening a new box of cereal.

the only exciting ppl i meet is , at office.

a new taiwanese tech who cracks random jokes i don't understand, a chinese s/w developer who'd like some red robin food parceled from the US, an indian in blore who's happy that he got my boss to send me there for 2 weeks, a lab tech who actually did a jiggy when he heard i'd be gone for 2 weeks ( oh well, i'll bug him even more when i get back ), a pregnant lady who complains of nothing but food and her stomach and finally my boss. the ultimate clueless one. i think thats a good name for him.

yes i have nothing to write about.

well the ultimate clueless one is a good topic.

but then he's away in europe for a couple of weeks and won't bug me. yaay!

***

i've been watching too many stalker movies recently.
have you ever come home and found a red balloon tied to your door ? what would you do , if you did ? well first i thought it could be K, but then i think naaah it couldn't be K. he doesnt do balloons.
ofcourse i looked around before i opened the door, and ofcourse i checked the whole house to make sure no one was inside waiting for me. i'm glad i live in a 1 bhk appt. imagine if i lived in a huge house.. i'd be forever doing security rounds of the house.

ok now i'm tired. so buzz off. i want to sleep.

ps: my bro won a couple of awards last week. so hey bro! congrats !! great job shutting up the losers who ever doubted you!

reTurN oF tHe miNionS

its hard to return to office after a prolonged break. its harder to watch everyone stumbling around blinking their eyes at the neon light.
and its even MORE harder ( yes i make it a word ) when you have a FLAT TIRE.
aaargh. stupid tire. like i didn't have enough problems today.

well , happy new yr to me.

cheers

**************

looking back i think i have a wonderful relationship with all my tires. i've had 4-5 flats so far including both my trusty scooter and then the car. its complicated this relationship. i think the one i love the most is the spare tire. so humble, so lowly , so handicapped and yet my unsung hero, the knight in shining armor. and then there's the tire i hate the most... the one around my midsection. it's like some ugly and unwanted relative who just won't leave. ( ok now that's a bit harsh and my midsection tire is just feeling hurt by that )

cAn iT geT aNY bETtEr

when someone tells you they are just thinking aloud, and then it turns out that ahem, you'd rather they had thought silently instead.

had an 8AM meeting today.



..

..

mute.. mute... Muuuuuuuuuuuuuuuute. gosh dangit!!

bRead aT yoUr weDdiNg

i'm trying to make bread tonight.

mostly coz i'm curious, and the rest coz i'm bored.

bread always is such a huge mental block aint it? i mean if i could make bread, then i can probably make any of the other dozen things listed in an enid blyton book breakfast for the famous five. remember the famous five??

here u can read about the process here - bread making for dummies

sorry trifle distracted this week. what with being a lil anemic, and A getting hitched, , < hey! congrats A!! > and us deciding to make another whirlwind trip back to the south-east coast < i really hope i remember to get my paws fridge magnet > and it being a year since i got hitched < aak a year already , and its been SO quiet !! i have not even written a hundred, nay not even 50 posts !! so very quiet, so mysteriously and eerily quiet, what has marriage done to me quiet??!! aaak and i have no turned to baking bread! i mean good lord, aliens have finally mind transplanted a bread baking alien in my place and someone save me ! >

ok ahem, calm down QoD.
its only a wedding, like 4 months away and its not even yours, though just the severely repressed memories of the last trip would make anyone a bit hysterical, and you might feel completely justified in throwing a hissy diva fit when you recollect the shade of lipstick you'll be forced to wear, and then you might recollect Stockholm syndrome and mouthing tiny lil "help me" into the very very bright flash lights the very helpful photographer would be shining onto your sweaty face and all the while when your very very hungry and feel like punching the next person who comes up to you and insists its the best day of your life.
well AREN'T I GLAD I DON'T HAVE TO GO THROUGH THAT AGAIN!

yes lucky i'm not the lucky bride this time. and lucky that i'll actually get breakfast and lucky that i won't be weighed down by 5 pounds of headgear and 5 pounds of .. things around my neck that i won't even be able to sit straight and won't K be lucky coz i won't have the uncontrollably urge to jab him in the ribs everytime he turns to me and tells me to smile more coz its such a happy day and it only comes once. hey i know it only comes once oy, but your the one standing around in a flimsy cotton wrap-around and a toga, while i'm buried under 15 pounds of some freakishly hot silk cloth thing thats baking you inside out.

well yes, things will be decidedly better this time round.
:D
aah yes i will.

update:
omg the bread came out perfect!!
i can't believe i can bake my own bread in 30 min. i am SO never buying artisan bread again !!




update update: hmm a lil less salt, but its AWESOME !!

jUsT anOThEr dAy

it started out normal,

7:45 wake up bleary eyed
7:47 stumble to the bathroom
7:53 switch on the shower and let it run to get hot water
8:10 fire alarm starts beeping.
8:11 i run out and start batting away like crazy at the fire alarm.

wait whaT?

yeah.. its been a normal day.

well atleast office might be peaceful right? but i have to move my desk, to another cubicle a few aisles away. and ofcourse my monitor is locked to the cubicle and i've lost the keys.
ofcourse now they've got to cut the cable, and then they've gotta have a witness < me > and i have to say "aye i give you permission to cut the gosh darn cable"

oh yeah... its just another day.

leaving in a few hours. AND i'm hungry. AND i'ts raining.

hELLiSh pLeAsUReS

note to self: nelly, just a dream

yoohooo
anyone there?

ofcourse it feels like i'm all by myself , gently floating in space.
especially that its 11:01:04 and i'm in the office.
why?

oh coz i'm having an affair with a chinese device driver developer.

is what i want to say. and seriously it would be better than the sad truth.

which is that i'm not even having an affair with a chinese device driver developer.

what i AM having. is a BIG HEADACHE. trying to duplicate stuff done , 13.5 hours away < on a good delta flight > and having to sync up with folks everyday... and having an a*hole yelling at u and making u cry in the office.

oh well.

that's the price we pay for SELLING OUR SOULS TO THE CORPORATE DEVILS.

ok mebe i shud lay off the sugar.. just thinking....

ooh i DID go to the LAME-O < now how do i do strike through? > , i mean .. ahem.. awesome diwali celebration thing we had. actually a couple of dances were good. but the singing.. umm and the oldies dancing.... oh well never mind.
far more than what i did, innit?

11:25:34 and i'm still stuck here. situation has gone from bad to worse.
the sd card had a file system corruption and i had to repartition and reformat. and it still doesnt work.

my life is officially hell.

LazY rOoMies iS to tRAsh

it's easier to take out the trash, when you're fueled by the righteous anger of the fully justified.
don't know what i mean?

have you ever had that annoying roommate who always made a mess, and who never cleaned up after themselves and lets the trash bags just pile up in the middle of the room?

and do you remember huffing to yourself on the simple laziness of your roommate and flouncing to the nearest trash disposal unit in ur appt complex carrying 2-3 trash bags and each step a step in protest of your roommates deficiencies and a symbol of ur self-martyrdom in putting up with the possibly worst roommate in the whole wide world!

and yet,

when ur living by yourself, it's so easy to justify that

it's too cold today.
there's just one bag, thats not efficient. let me wait for a couple of bags.
the bag isn't even full yet! < not even enough trash ! >
its raining
just don't feel like it

i say, lazy roommates help you throw out trash.

fiNd oF tHe dAy

look what i found stumbling.
ladies , gents and all those folks in between, here's pogo, an australian DJ.

ahhh sunday morn.. cereal, cartoons - a match made in heaven.

good tidings on the way, will tell u all about it later.

you should stumble, if you aren't already. something interesting to read on a rainy sunday afternoon -
Photo of the day

and meanwhile you can listen to this on a rainy sunday afternoon -
8 track - stay in bed

update: for those who are confused about the video, tis guy who takes movie clips and makes music out of them. pretyy clever don't u think? don't forget to check out other videos too!

pUNcH in YouR'e tiMe cARdS

would you believe if i said i have seen the calendar of my boss and calculated the number of hours he is in a meeting?

here is the stats:
me : 20 hours in a week spent in meetings which is 50% of the time if you consider a 40 hour workweek. if you think in terms of how many hours i actually work, its more like 44.4%.
my boss : 30 hours in meetings which is 75% of the week but if u consider the actual number of hours that he probably works, more like 50%.

so it looks like the time spent in meetings just increases the total number of hours u spend at office coz we try to maintain a 50% cutoff and compensate by working more.
ok i don't want that promotion. thank you very much.

one of the main things that worry me, is that i see ppl who joined a yr before me, 2 yrs before me and they give a very good indication of where i'll be in mebe 2-3 yrs from now. < ok mebe i can drag my feet and move along a lil more slowly, but i still gotta move > and then i see the kind of lives they lead. one guy has become just plain 'chubby' and the girl looks like a walking zombie and lives on cereal.

oh well. i can always wear bamboo clothes and go back to raising chickens in some remote village forest near my house back home.
oh but i'd miss "House" so much.

pAPpaRAZzi sHOts

when folks , ur friends or families send you pics of their vacations.
and u feel that mild twinge of envy < or indigestion .. oh whatever..... u took ur pick > when u wish you were on that vacation instead.

but sometimes u get a situation where ur faced with 300 pics of ppl. patel snaps we call it, and its just pic after pic of ur friend posing in front of some of the most amazing scenery and essentially blocking ur view. < hey!! i wasn't lucky enough to go there myself and mebe u cud let me live vicariously through u, u douchey << ok now i'm just making up words >> >
but what if they are not only standing in front of plain ol awesomeness, but standing with their awesome dolce gabana glasses. i mean its bad enough that u block my view, then on reams and reams of pics, u force my eye to be drawn to ur crazy sunglasses that after the 145th pic , just make u look blind.

have u looked at ppl wearing sunglasses?? have you looked at 300+ pics of the same 2/4/6/x ppl with sunglasses? do they or do they not look like blind ppl ?? and slightly ________. < i'm too polite to fill it >

why do ppl assume it makes them look cool?
ok ok i'm guilty of doing that too. i too have a couple of pics somewhere in which i'm wearing my sunglasses and i think i look awesome. but i have 2.
not THREE HUNDRED.
are u frikin kidding me??
ur singlehandedly ruining my favorite vacation spots.


i did not mean to spell out 'ho' out there.

sLeeP oF iNnoCenSe

if you can't sleep

click here to fall asleep :P

LaTe reSpOnsE

big oooops

i had a meeting at 8 today.

a staff meeting where everyone meets and you need to be present in person.

and i woke up at 8.

i didn't even remember the meeting till i came to my desk and switched on my laptop.

i'd put a sad smiley out there if i wasn't so busy laughing at the comedy of it.

can u imagine telling grownups that you missed the meeting coz u slept in ?

it's hillarious!!!!! and sad!!! i don't know if i shud be :( or hahahaha

oh god. < groan >

****************************

now the reason i wasn't able to get up, is coz i was dreaming of a revolution in personal transportation. the whole city to be connected by these tubes, and u get into one and say the gate number and just get whisked away to ur location.

also before that, i dreamt i was caught in a burning building.
not very pleasant, except for the fact that i think there was a ghost and i was ghost hunting after the building burnt down.


****************************

aDviCe oN tHE inTErNeT

just a dream, Nelly

the other day i was searching some old forums .. for shucks i dunno.. something and then i happened on someone describing this brand new thing. buy a tiny "webcam" and hook it up to your computer and then u can actually see the person ur chatting with using this new brand new s/w like yahoo chat!!
ok thats when i checked the date, and saw it was 2002.


ha!
well that explains it. poor fools who didn't know how far the world would come in just a decade. but wait .. weren't we some of those poor fools? and wait didn't ppl in every decade say it of their predecessors?
still its pretty ridiculous to read those old posts.

then i was looking at some other posts and came upon this religious lady's site.. wait let me try to remember it...
had some junk about .. oh ya. she was advising this other dame, that she shouldn't get a job even though her husband lost his job and things were getting tough at home. "oh no! don't get a job dearie, u'd hurt ur husband's self esteem. it's his job to provide for the family and u getting a job might suggest that u think he's not upto snuff. < so what if ur kids don't have ice cream o sunday? > a good wife knows how to make do with less and the only way u shud help him is to provide a better life at home with the meager things you have around < like home grown cabbage and potatoes?? >. and that's the best you can support your husband through these trying times. by being kind and doing ur job !! < that is taking care of the house.. > and the good lord will take care of you. the end."

oh good lord! i swear i cudn't make this stuff up. this is exactly what was written on the site. i still have a bitter taste in my mouth from throwing up after reading that.... pile of cow.. no wait horse dung. < ok that's the kindest thing i can say >.

i swear i think i found the place where stupid came to die.

aLL CAPS dAmmiT

recently i had to make a presentation to my boss.
did i tell u this story already? perhaps i did ...

so you know, me trying to be clever made this clever presentation where i had the title of each slide was in all small letters. and kind of started with a small letter.
now I THOUGHT it looked cool, ok?

but my boss takes one look at it, gives me this wierd look and says, yeah the presentation is fine, but pls make all the title start with CAPS. and now i'm grimacing coz how do i tell him, dude u need to be buried before we can bring back cool. but then he reads my face < i have been told my face gives my thoughts away awfully easily > and then says , yes i know you kids think its very casual and cool nowadays , but it won't work here. we are professionals. we need to make professional slides.

$%@#!! oh ya? i don't see what CAPS has anything to do with professional.
uh uh but i DO NOT.

today he mails me his leadership feedback form. muahahahahahahaha.... < very resident evil laughter fading into the background >

tReaSuRe huNt & oThErS

its unbelievably hard to find a song when you don't know the singer, the lyrics, the album, the title...
ultimately the only way is to comb through the billboard charts and listen to the top 100 songs one song at a time ... not a bad way to pass time though :P



note to self : OneRepublic - secrets

:D

*******************************

spoke to A the other day. her wedding's fixed!! well then congrats A!! ofcourse A's a lil ahead of the times and i can just imagine everyone in the remote town of Trichi when she walks in wearing a houte couture designer gown.. a really slinky one and then i can imaging some poor grandma with her eyes almost popping out of her sockets at the audacity. hehehehehehe < semi-evil laughter > :D
good fun! shocking the establishment. i say u go for it A. and if possible carry a tiny live webcam so that the rest of us can roll of the sofa laughing our heads off.

*******************************

now, as you all might know, a close friend has been taken hostage by a tiny lil alien living inside her and the day when its gonna rip her < ouch > and get out is getting closer and closer. as you know, i am terrified of these tiny delicate looking creatures who have the power to bring fully grown adults to the edge of sanity. but i am steeling myself to the possibility of looking the tiny alien in the eye and not running; screaming like a lil girl < puh-lease lil girls have nothing on me, when i encounter the strange mystic aliens >

another colleague is considering voluntarily giving up her job so she can move to NY next yr and host another one of these < how many more will you take darn it! > and that's truly sad, coz she's my only lunch buddy right now. and if she goes away to gah! > be an incubation machine, then who will i have lunch with ? < hey... come ON!! look at the big picture !! >

:D

********************************

god knows where my head is at, nowadays. i right slept through a 7 AM meeting. infact i had this really wierd dream, where i had gone into a shoe shop and another senior lady colleague was there trying to buy boots and i thought to myself "aaha! my nemesis. i too should buy a shoe to defeat her" and then next thing i know its 7:44 and i wake up to open my laptop < yes i open my laptop as soon as i can open my eyelids every morning > and then i am kindly informed by my helpful outlook i am 44 minutes overdue to a meeting. < gaaaaaaaaaaah! darn you my arch nemesis. ur the reason i was late!! trying to outdo ur shoe selection!! >

i demand satisfaction madam.

ok calm down and listen to this song instead



note to self: OneRepublic - apologize

sAYiNg iT tHe riGHt wAY

OOOOOOOOOOOooops

i really shud back off a bit.

u know the last post, i was raving a bit ? mostly becoz i was having a really bad day at the office??

well my.. ahem friend caught be red handed or u cud say red-lettered.
yeah !! oops!! u cud say THAT again!!

now while he was gracious enough to laugh it off.. umm haha... others who have caught me red-lettered might not find it so funny.

well... i shud really start getting more and more vague-r if i plan to take 'inspiration' from life.

well.. ahem... i'm sorry... errr...

anyhooooo
now on another note, u know how sometimes in life ur forced to deal with the government? like the post office or the driving license folks. and u wish you could rather poke urself in the eye with a fork than deal with those guys. coz really if someone was the living definition of moronic or dodoish then it wud be the beurocracy guys. ok so the DMV in this country is marginally better than the post office, but boy do the PO guys take the cake.
trust me, if u try to get them on the phone, u can't even call ur local PO! u get routed to some random HQ where they ask u for ur zipcode and tell u they cant find the PO next to ur house.
yup.. enough to make u want to pull ur hair out.

sigh.

feeling a it restless tonight. must be the meds.
tell me one thing, how many females in ur office who have .. say 10+ yrs of experience and aren't ... wierd.
ok just say how many are normal and competent.
then think of the rest. i swear my group has only preggers who look like their going crazy coz of the hormones, young females including me < hey i'm young... sort of > who run around like chickens with their heads cut off and then the small elite group of older females who are insane. i mean literally insane.
a couple i suspect are just menopausal but the moment i mentioned that to my colleague, all she said was "eeeew what's wrong with you" to which i replied, "what, its a normal human thing. i really think J's menopausal u know. there can be no other explanation for her behavior."

much as i'd like not to perpetuate negative stereotypes, sometimes it just can't be helped... this female P.. she's crazy man.
the other day she pings me out of the blue and asks me
P: "hey, is the camera working on ur board"
me: "ummm YA?? " < come ON lady its been working for a yr and u've seen it. you CANNOT be serious. >

i mean really?? how would u like it if i came to u and asked u, hey is gcc working.
ugly man. office politics is just plain ugly. luckily i'm not caught up with it. but then turf wars, and ppl blaming the tools for random measurements, taking credit for other ppl's work and just plain ol nastiness... i miss the dolphins. they're highly more civilized.

lot of thrash in the office. as u can see from the sparsity of the posts.. just too much thrash in the office.

hoW tO spELL tMi

you know how on ur chat list, sometimes you have people you kind of know, but don't really know.. i mean, you've spoken to them a couple of times and yet they're vague aquaintances at best bound to you by some random commonality like college classmate or high school classmate or something.

and i know with me atleast its a daily ritual to open my laptop and login to gmail and look at the gmail chat list and then get on with work.
ok these ppl are in today. these are not. its not like i'd chat with 20 ppl on my list everyday, but its like a virtual.... coffeehouse?? and ur just strangely comforted by the thought, that these ppl are accessible within nanoseconds incase a serial killer crept up behind you and tried to strangle you.
"heeeelp, call 911. i'm being stranmgled"

but then all such warm thoughts vanish when u spy this said vague aquaintance with a seemingly incongrous status message but makes u so uncomfortable , that u want to barf.
"i never knew how to pray, until i learnt how to love"

what? i mean here i am mentally strolling through my daily ritual and this brings everything to a screeching halt. before it starts again. just the momentary stall is enough to irk me.
dude what??
i get funny status messages. i LIKE funny. but i don't do ... ugh sends a shiver down my spine...

rEaL LivE chiCkEn

watching some corny movie right now, but the music is pretty good.

anyhoo...have u ever noticed, how deathly afraid we are of making choices. personally i hate making choices, even of what kind of soap or cereal i buy. always imagining me making the worst possible choice and that moment cascading to a minor disaster of nuclear proportions leading to the end of the universe as we know it.

trust me, every little choice i have to make, black or blue, pink or green, buy dress or not, leads to long internal debates carefully weighing the pros and cons till all possible outcomes of the choices are debated and deemed safe for the future of the world, and then i feel i can commit to something.
that's why most times i feel infinitely better if someone else makes the choice for me, or if i dither long enough the universe finally gets fed up of waiting and says, "hey! i'll take care of this one, u get the next."

but i think everyone is a little afraid of making the wrong choice. what if this was the decision that ended up as the turning point in ur life, and everything went downhill after that and then u ended up homeless, living out of a box?
sounds ridiculous doesn't it?? but let me ask you, how many times have u decided you'd rather stay where you are at a deadlock, simply spinning in one spot than go left or right down the path to wherever u cud be heading?

how many times do we chicken out and say no, when we're too afraid of taking the risk to say yes? or vice versa...
how many times would we rather maintain the status quo than ... than take a leap of faith and just go for it.

ugh! too serious a topic for saturday night isn't it?



note to self: song title, love the way u lie

oFfiCe mEsS

gaah ! its terrible.

just look at my track record this year!

just 33 posts !! ok 34 and counting! somehow in my head i had a whole lot more writing done.

i wonder how many posts i can post about my lack of posts.

gaah! never mind.

today i realized that i really do have a pointy haired boss.


gaaah!

tUrTLeS swiMmiNG

note to myself: neon trees, animal

boy have i searched for this song. it's the ad song for bones. you know the tv show. though i don't watch the show myself. i did happen to stumble on this when channel surfing.

ok adding the hawaii pics. just a teeny tiny subset.









lava flowing into the ocean


this house is trapped after lava flowed all around it! but hey! it survived dinnit?

nice pics aren't they?? HEY I TOOK THEM. everyone stop giving credit to K!! just coz he carries a huge camera around !! and he hasn't even posted those pics yet!

oPpoSinG pOLeS oN fAcEboOk

i know that everyone says opposites attract, but have you actually looked around you to observe it? is it true that opposites attract or do we just tune ourselves to oppose everything our.. umm 'better halves' say and do :P

think about it , right?
on the one hand we have K who's easy going, social, friendly, likes ppl, likes coffee, mebe not necessarily in that order; and on the other hand we have me, who's neurotic, paranoid and actively dislikes ppl AND coffee and prefers the company of dolphins instead.
add to all that narcissistic, egoistical and lazy and can we say hello-big-disaster-here?

its the same case, right. with R and her .. ummmm...."better half" < no seriously this has to be in double quotes. its the highest kind of euphemism to call her partner the better half... >
she's uber friendly and extrovertish and outgoing and he's umm... basically a more paranoid freak version of me.

makes one wonder. were we like this before we met our halves or did we just digress to this opposite points on the scale so that things could be in balance??? like some mystical yin yang thing??

K: "here, try some coffee. its amazing"
me: "i'd rather not thanks."
K: "but it's really good"
me: "no i don't want it"
K: "but it's really reaaaeaally good"
me: "i'd rather throw up" < that shud quiet you, you coffee pusher >

K: "you have to call ppl. keep in touch with them. login to facebook once in a while.."
me: "i hate facebook, i hate it. infact i abhor it. no, i actually loathe it. and while ur at it, i hate ppl too" < good, that should be enough to discourage any more talk about facebook. do you think that's enough? mebe i shud throw in a few more adjectives while i'm at it.. >

i find that, often with ppl, it's useful to NOT stop at politely declining a helpful suggestion. one has to smash it beyond all hope and grind it to dust to prevent it from ever being resurrected in the future again. or else you'll just end up saying "no, thank you" over and over and over again, and that too at the same suggestion. ha! as if 10 minutes later i'll find the idea of facebook appealing.

< now i better stop before i go on a complete bender and an entire 4 pages worth of facebook-hate-rant. No!! i do NOT wish to know how good your lunch break was. thank you very much my-highschool-classmate. and i absolutely do NOT wish to throw a cow at you. stop sending me requests, it confuses my poor brain as i don't know if i'm supposed to remember you and i've forgotten or if your some random psycho stalker >

dOLphiNs pLayiNG iN bLuE wATeRs

so ... i've been a away for a while ... hmmm well u know.. how it goes.. ummm... its not like i forgot you or anything. i mean.. i swear!! i totally remembered you.. like.. yesterday itself. when i was .. umm... buttering my toast. i mean ... i meant to write, but u know it was work, and then vacation.. and then...
yeah.. i know i know.. excuses excuses :P

so. here's the latest.
just got back from vacation. went to hawaiiii. oh it was awesome. the best part?
mebe its the red glow of the volcano, or the green sand beach or the manta ray. omg the manta RAY!! i snorkelled and came up close to this GIGANTIC MANTA RAY!! and in the pacific ocean!! and in the night!! and next to a japanese guy who kept squealing "manta is coming, manta is coming"!!

oh it was awesome. i loved snorkelling. i plan to do more of it. ok mebe not in portland. but somewhere, some day.
hawaii is pretty neat. everyone shud go there atleast once.

yaawn. i'm jet lagged. K is nice , took care of the whole trip. ok K is not only nice, he deserves a "K is Awesome!!"

will post some pics soon. mebe of the Maaaaaaaanta Raaaaaaay!! woooohooooo
< ok no more mai tais for me >

SpOkeN biTeS

it's hard talking to extended family on the other side.
i thought it was hard to get along old fogeys in my family before..

but after last dec, there are a few concepts i find hard to digest .. oh forget accept.

the notion that there now is my "side" of the family and his "side". really really hate that. i mean i cannot even begin to describe how much i hate that term and that concept. family is family and should be hated/barely tolerated/ignored equally.
:D

its a medieval very colloquial term, that we've heard ppl using all our lives and which seems to express literally what it's supposed to... but it also somehow conveys a division... or a partition if you will. which i really don't want to.
i mean i already was pretty busy, making fun of "my" folks, now if i have to make fun of "his" folks. then i'd like to make fun of all of "them".. toegther.
keeps it simpler for my brain, that way.
:D

( but you know what i mean .. just the idea of having to keep the... ahem.. "relatives" seperate and make fun of them seperately is gonna burn some extra cycles in my brain. which i don't wanna do )

so here's me banishing the sides and mashing them all up together. from now on, i shud refer to all the .. ahem.. relatives in some single group way. yet to be defined.

( i need to find a funny name but yet not too insulting , u know? coz some of them are really computer literate and might be reading this as i type.. ok not as i type.. but you know what i mean. and its really hampering my style < ya right! > )

so. getting back to the list.
what was i saying again ?
oh ya stuff i never get used to.

so you know how they say families are different , and ofcourse they are. but its not really that. all familias are wierd < that's not a typo > and yet we're just used to the eccentricities of our own. it's when we're faced with new eccentricities out of the blue is when we're blinking in a dazed way and wondering "what happened".
it's easier if you're the kind of person, who generally likes ppl .. like K.
but if you happen to be some neurotic, paranoid person like .. ahem.. someone .. then it's really hard not to smack someone sideways in the head, knock them unconcscious and make a run for it.

it looks like i'll not be completing the list today.
but another thing i wanted to mention, that makes me very hesitant to talk to these folks , is that my brain has to constantly kind of censor my thoughts and replace all singular references to K with the plural. now the reason i find it hard, and i only have a 50% success rate, is that brain isn't used to censoring anything. my traditional solution for censoring the brain, was to keem mum.
but now sometime's brain is forced to speak up and then you can watch me fumbling in all my glory.. stumbling over words, tripping until i don't know what's up or what's down anymore.

now it's not so bad when i talk about K , right? coz i can always make sure i never ever directly refer to K at all. < yes my solution, is to just omit the reference and continue with the sentence. ppl make the connection on their own .. the brain can be a powerful friend.. my.. uh.. friend > or the other option is to seamlessly break into english mid-sentence. < its these times that i really appreciate all that the brits have done for us >

but what do you do, when you slip up and refer to Their spouses in the singular.
oooooh now you've really done it.
if X doesn't refer to her own husband by his name, and refer's to him in the plural, how could YOU do it???
uh oh... major blooper. so then i hurry up and move to some topic that will take their mind off , off my foot-in-the-mouth moment.
now to go one step further, its more complicated if you have friends/colleagues with the same names .. which only means that the names come oh-so-easily to you and you just spill them every sentence..

"so how's M.. < ow >. did you and M go to that picnic you were talking about? < ow > i mean the other day K was thinking of calling M < ow , ow stop talking already. >"

ya i shud just shut up. maybe i shud switch languages to swahili. think that would help?

giFtiNg nAtUre

K's bday's coming up.. and while i troll the online world wondering what i can get him... i stumbled across this site... pretty funny!! and the comments are even more hillarious!! some ppl really don't get a joke.

Funny Blog someone else wrote.

it's true!! if i had to count the number of things K's given me on his own.. < that's without me saying i want it.. >

K: "lookout for the post, i've sent u a package."

me: "really!! what did you send???" < secretly thrilled. it's the first time i'm getting something from him in the post. >

package arrives

i open it

it's Alton Brown's "gear for the kitchen"

K: "what? you didn't like it?? it talks about how to pick the right shaped utensils and knives and equipment for the kitchen. and i read it the other day, and it was so technical..."

i reset my expectations of poor K. now i just tell him what i want and he gets it.. which is gr8 coz now i can go all "ooh i love it, you shouldn't have"

bAke mE a biTe

hey !!

i baked !!

and it was edible!!

incredible isn't it??

:D

i mean , i had a bite, and i didn't spontaneously combust or turn sick .. or .. or ANYTHING!

that's awesome.

i made date and cashew nut cake.

you your right, i'm completely awed by myself. ok ok so it didn't have as much sugar.. but it was chewy. and soft. and not like a brick.

that's awesome !

tO reAlLy waLk abOvE thE cLOudS

note to self : shontelle, impossible.


how does it feel to be above the clouds? how does it feel to be weave your hand through a cloud? i think i'll be pushing the limits of language to actually describe it.

the only way to truly experience the olympic national park is to backpack through the country. this time we tried a more sanitized view of the park. staying in the olympic lodge, and then going round to all the spots.
couldn't do the coast or the ferry to victoria.

but mebe next time.








i just heard. today my grandma passed away. may her soul rest in peace. and i don't want to talk about it anymore.

i'd rather just listen to the songs.
and just look at the stars..........

aCroSs bRidGe oF thE gOdS

did you know why Dog mountain is called that?

apparently coz starving pioneers were forced to eat their dogs when they did their pioneering thing through the mountains.

eeeeeeeeeeeEEEEsh!!

oh well. ppl do all sorts of crazy stuff.

like this guy who ran up and down the mountain. TWICE!! :O

lets not kid ourselves, this was a tough hike !! in the first ten minutes i was all .. what the $%##$@!! have i gotten myself into?? already feeling dizzy and nauseous. i felt like throwing up. i think i was mildly dehydrated to start with, and then the weather was a bit hot.

ok back up a little.

me and S, head out to hike. ok it's only the two of us. we can do it. ok here we go.. we're starting now..

5 minutes later i'm huffing and puffing like a smoker asked to run the 50k marathon. and i'm wishing i could lie down some place nice and cool and go to sleep forever.
so i ask S to go on without me, and i tell her i'll follow slowly and meet you when your coming down.




she leaves me reluctantly coz really its only the two of us. but i convince her and so she goes.

another 10 min later, i'm eating my protein bar and drinking water trying to hydrate myself. coz its so friggin hot. and i'm sweating buckets. and i'm thinking of going back. i'm taking breaks every 5 min. but everytime i sit down, someone comes up behind me and i start walking a lil coz i don't really want to look like a douche bag in front of them. so i walk a bit. and stop a bit and walk a bit and fall down a bit. my bag now feels like it weighs a TON. and i even try carrying it on my head like an old indian railway station porter. hey! there's a reason why frail ancient looking guys can carry our heavy luggage, right?

so the trail continues through the forest. relentlessly switching back and forth.

now, the overall trail goes like this. its approx 0.7 miles to a fork on the road. the right is more difficult and the left is most difficult. no, really that's how its labelled. and then they converge someplace and then its a common trail about 1.1 miles to the top. the more difficult path adds about 0.4 miles extra to your hike coz its not so steep; you know ( but trust me, you won't know it ) ... and the total gain is about 2800 feet ( ouch! i know!! )

anyways, so i decide not to be a hero; and hence take the more difficult path rather than the most difficult one; and i know that there's a viewpoint in the more difficult path, and i think. ok i can at the very least make the darn viewpoint. and then mebe i'll head back. you know. so i alternate between walking and collapsing sporadically.

after an hour of huffing and reeling about drunkenly i finally reach the first viewpoint. yaaay!! phew. now most of the time the only reason i got up from wherever i was collapsed was coz of a> the mosquitos and b> ppl coming up behind me and i didnt want to be sitting there like some kind of .. well you know.

i collapse on the bench. take a few pics and cast a wary eye over the next section of the trail. after about 10 min, i think. ok mebe not so bad. i dont feel like i'm dying, i could try as much as i could. the prob right now is i'm running out of water. poor S had given me half her water and i still had gone through it like a ... like a... very thirsty person. < grimace. ok so i can't really think of anything right now! >

now i know that this view point is atleast 1.4 miles away. at minimum. so i start trying to do the math and walk. and i meet some ppl coming down and ask them. and she says, its cooler on the top. and you clear the trees. so its nice. but its steeper than the way we came. coz the way we came also included some walks through the forest where i caught my breadth.

now i'm seriously consuidering leaving my bag somewhere so i can pick it up on the way back. and now i'm looking for a convenient hiding spot.
and then i reach this place. the point where the more and most difficult meet. couple of guys sitting there. and i ask them how bad is it. up ahead. he looks at this meter thing. and he says. well its 900 ft elevation. and another mile atleast. but its cooler. you should do it. i look at the trail. its a friggin mountain. i think its at that point i mentally started praying. i mean literally, doing hare ram hare ram. now these guys were sitting there, and i didnt' want to turn back in front of them, so i think ok let me walk to that point and lets see.

so i walk up and i almost come tumbling down, coz i mean its steep man.
but somehow i take breaks and keep walking. i'm down to a single user path and if i sit down, then ppl literally have to jump over my head. also there might be creepy crawly things. but rememeber she said i'd climb over the trees? so i notice that the trees are getting shorter and shorter. and i look for the tallest tree i can find. and i think; ok let me go to the friggin base of that tallest tree and see.
and i go.

so sometimes i look up, sometimes i look down just focusing on the next 10 steps. and sometimes i'm praying.
and then i come up to this path that's literally a very very narrow path through overgrown bushes. and that's where i get the call from S. she's reached the top and asks me where i am. i tell her as best as i can. and she says there's another viewpoint up ahead. pretty close, so mebe we should meet there, coz its even steeper after that. i agree wholeheartedly.

now armed with the info that its close by. i try to do the rolling hikers walk and put some energy into my steps.
when i'm almost ready to give up, i meet some ppl heading down and they tell me. the second viewpoint is right up ahead. at the end of my present climb. and then you got to turn and you climb straight up to the top.
i look around and i notice, i've cleared the trees completely !! yaay!!

so since i'm meeting her at the second viewpoint, i go lumbering on.

man the view is already great out here. i can see the whole columbia river. i can see cascade range. beacon rock looks so tiny. i'm amazed. and then i spot the sign. it says 0.4 miles to the top.
i sigh. man i made it this far. i cant turn back down now.
and anyways you can see the path all the way to the top. atleast you have hope of where it'll end. so i call S and tell her i'll meet her atleast at 0.2 miles. coz every foot i gain will give me a better view. i start climbing.

now the last stretch is all gravel. and slippery rocks. so she was coming down slower than i was climbing. i met her half way. and i was like how far is it from here. i look around, its amazing. she says u know you came so far. you shud go till the end.
ok i have 2 sips of water left and a subway in my bag. its 2:00. its not so bad. so i tell her i'll catch up with her. and i labor on.

but now i can see the end, so its not as bad. and i have a spring in my step. i come to this kind of clearing where ppl are sunbathing and look around confused. where does the trail go? and then i get it.

i reached the top !!!




woohoo!!
:P

well time to plonk down and have a sandwhich. and look at the amazing view !

so i sit there, for a while in the mud and grass. and the sun beating down on me. but the winds were amazing. and i look to my right and i can see st helen through the clouds behind the cascade range. and i look to the left and i see mt hood peeking from behind the cascade range too. and i'm amazed at the height and the river and the wind and everything!!

15 min later i remember S is waiting , and i head back down. full of energy and happy. ofcourse i went down faster. but since the path was soo steep, you literally have to jog down. and the knees kind of take a hit.
but since i knew she was waiting , i went at a brisk pace. only thing was the path just kept on going. it just went on and on and on.
by this time i was sooo thirsty and more than ready to take a dunk in the columbia river.

an hour later we were on hour way home and celebrating with gatorade and a litre of water :P

good times!

tHe sKeW oF thiNgS

if i ever needed proof of my potential for disaster, then i think i got plenty of evidence this month.

oh no, really. things are super fine here. i'm i n beijing and after all the circus to finalize my plans. they cancel the flight to get out of here on the 3rd. and now the brilliant morons, just rebooked one of my flights, without changing the connecting flight!! so basically my connecting flight is 15 hrs before my first flight.
oh brilliant.

and my manager got to know, what i did.
and was like.. aaah thats a no no. booking official trips through external websites.
ok boss.

i think next time, i'd decline the official trip itself.

more and more i feel like there are all these hurdles in my way. "i can hear you plotting you know! darn gollums"

went to this place called pure lotus. some cross over of buddhist and indian and arabian kind of place. pure vegetarian. but in the sense they make everything look and taste like non veg. but made from tofu. actually it was more like, the chinese understanding of indian. there were sculptures of camels around. and diwans and waters and waitresses wearing outlandish salwars. and lot of glitter.
and the serving plates were exotic. hey hang on, i got pics.



and this is a serving dish of tofu that looks and tastes like shark fin.
to be very honest, it was ugh. how could ppl eat this stuff.



in chicago there's a vegan restaraunt that gives you tofu based food that looks and tastes like chicken and beef. this is the chinese version of that place. where food looks and tastes like authentic chinese food. for ppl who hate the smell and taste of non veg food, its a no win sitch. coz who would want to eat veg food that tastes like non veg. ugh.
for ppl who wish they could eat it, but cannot due to some moral upbringing and repressing themselves from doing it. hey! this is awesome.

another place we went to the day before was very upscale and even more awesome. i think i should wait till we get out of the country to post pics. though another thing is i had forgotten to take the camera with me for dinner.
well lesson learnt! now i don't step out of the room without my camera!!

it was al black and white and i had a cushion of purple feathers. and these 8 foot backs to the chairs. and some really fancy and wierd setting. there was this tree that was painted all white. might be fake and it was kind of the center piece of the whole place.

and the whole rest. was just one long table with these chairs around it. the chairs were pretty simple but had 8 foot long backrests... maybe these hotels should be a seperate piece by themselves!!

tHrouGh tHe LoOkiNg gLaSs

beijing is a humongous city. ok its dark out and i can't really see much. 12 AM. the city was bustling. i look out the 17th floor window of the westin, and all i can see are vehicles whizzing by.
4:00 AM and the city slightly calmer. i look out the window and see huge signs on buildings. lettering all of it in chinese. sony erricson says one. gateway says the other.. and unless i see the english translated sign on the other side, i really don't know what they're declaring to the world.

nice roads, short ppl. really short and tiny ppl. or mebe its just coz i'm on the 17th floor.. naah they really are a short race. if you moved from sweden to here, you'd totally get a culture shock.

ok here's the view from my window -
really really early in the morning at 4:00 AM:




and morning 6:00 AM


the lobby :).. aaaaw yes i know i'm being a total tourist!!