Monday, February 23, 2009

Yawnnnnn

Just signed off on a marathon all-night call. One of India's leading ISPs and our router decides to misbehave time and again. Some part of it is abuse from their end too but whatever. Ended up spending all night on a con-call. Time to catch some two hours of sleep now. Reminds me of the last time I did this. All night @ work with managers and tech-leads and all that, that was a much more serious issue of course. My manager actually used to come in just to keep company and he used to bring in snacks etc so we could keep awake ;) This time I was @ home on my couch, so it wasn't easy to keep awake too :(

Lets hope I dont have to do many more of these ;)

Sunday, February 15, 2009

The guy's friends

One of my engineering friends dropped by this evening at home quite unexpectedly. He was visiting with his wife from Chennai and called me in the afternoon and dropped by in the evening. Our last social interaction @ home was probably three weeks ago so it was a good change. Plus this was a good friend and he was visiting Bangalore to check out apartments since he is moving here! Hopefully we will see more of them soon.

I've always noticed how we all go out with Subhash's friends so often and hardly ever catch up with my friends. If we do, then its solo mostly when I am visiting another town. Unless its my extremely close girl friends (who happen to live miles away, so such meeting are yearly anyways), we rarely meet any other friends together. And this, given that Subhash knows most of my friends, at least by name, from engineering since they were his juniors!

Not just us, I've noticed it with most other people. Most socializing happens in the guys' circle. All my friends' (guys) from engineering socialize together with their wives quite a bit too. Its just rare that the girls along with their spouses get involved. I've been wondering why for many a year now. I thought initially that it was because all of Subhash's friends were well-known to me (my seniors) so it was easy for me to mix with them vs the other way around, but we also meet his IIM friends pretty often, none of whom I knew earlier. So, I think its funny, really.

Is this the case with you too? 

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Up early and..

Every Saturday when my maid walks in at 5 in the morning, I don't know what else to do so I login and finish any unfinished work leftover from Friday. Normal days, I spend the time getting ready for work so it works out, but Saturday?! No idea what to do at 5 AM:( I think I should really stop working but most of the times I don't know what else to do so I work. Its bad, yeah. I need to find a pastime. Painting, maybe?

Now I am on a customer issue yet again and this time its been bad. I resisted getting put on this but I had to take it anyways. So I got started on it this week and still have no clue how to get it to a proper conclusion. Hoping 5 AM would help in throwing out some great ideas, I got started. Lets see.

In general the mood is low. Very low. There is some shadow of impending bad times looming and I can feel it. Never before seen frictions at work, the need to take on some very nasty people, well, at least earlier, I've never done this. Ditto for Subhash except he's probably done it before and will definitely handle it better than me. But still, we both are going through a very rough ride at our respective work places and it makes the evening discussions gloomy and angry most times :( Sometimes we vent out at those Pakistani guys who appear on Times Now debates mouthing crap.

I hope it passes soon. I think I've seen too many people say how wonderfully its working out for us and how lucky we are and all that. I think some of them might've meant it too seriously and sourly :(

Monday, February 09, 2009

L in rehab again

First it was the LCD.

Then it was a bad fan which used to make a noise like a flour mill so much so I was embarassed to take it to the meetings. A slight pause in conversation and L could be heard till miles. I endured all that till I noticed the fan was failing it, it was getting heated too quick for my comfort level and I took it to the IT guys and got the fan replaced.

Now its the Hard Drive :(( I shut it down before I left and it apparently didn't shut down. While I was walking back home, I felt it since it was hot on my back. As is my usual practice, I reset it on coming home and then it simply refused to re-start :( To the IT guys again.

Do I abuse L or does it abuse me? I am very careful at that with this one. I keep it docked while at work, very rarely carry it to meetings and all that. Still, it dies on me so often, waaa:((

Weird weird

--I got an email last week from a girl who wanted some advice on buying property in Bangalore. Her husband had bought some stuff from us when we were moving back to India and somehow she chanced on my blog and she tracked me! I was so surprised to see her email, I cannot tell you. What are the odds of that, I ask ya?!

--One of my colleagues's son asked her if there was a certain someone in her office. And he included my name along with my initials and middle name and all. I was totally stumped. Apparently he was asking because his friend asked about me and his friend even knew that I moved back from the US and all. How might a seventh grader know me?! That too my whole name, including my geographic progressions?! Considering that none of my friends are old enough to have kids in the seventh grade, I am really curious to know how this little guy knows me. I've asked my colleague to ask her son to ask his friend how he knows me ;) (Too many asks) Lets see!

--Another colleague mentioned to my sister @ work that this certain someone who is their common friend is someone whom I also knew very well. Again stumped. The name didnt even ring a bell and I was supposed to know this guy very well, ooh. Maybe my memory is completely failing me?!

So many "hey do you know this person" events surrounding me this past couple days. Its too much, I feel like my whole life is out there for people to read?! Maybe I should stop blogging now ;)

Sunday, February 01, 2009

Bah!

I think Federer has gotten into him some sort of psychological block against Nadal now. How many unforced errors man? His aces and winners were brilliant and in the overall stats, the only reason Nadal won was because of Federer's unforced errors. Of course Federer could have had a lot more winners had not Nadal prevented them from becoming winners in every possible way.

Very reluctantly, go Nadal! He deserved this win in more ways than one, what after that 5h 40m semi-final less than 48hrs back!

I really wish Federer manages 15 grand slams for the legend that he has been over the past few years.