Monday!

So I spent the long weekend (and unfortunately the new years one for us) taking more than 10 hours worth of escalation calls. Thankfully though, the world (read North America) doesn't work on weekends and so I was off the hook for a good part of Sunday, and we spent it making Pani Puris at home and eating it. How yumm is that, I ask ya? Totally needed after that draining weekend.

So needless to say I was so not g forward to Monday. Especially considering I am off Wednesday onwards this week. I asked the director of engineering very nervously if I can still take my much needed vacation and he said it shouldn't be an issue. So I thanked my stars (and my director) profusely. But now is the problem. I have to carry L all the way to Hyd. And considering that it is a monstrous 4 KG, I hate it. Every time I try to leave it back when going out of town, but somehow I end up taking it (rather having to take it) always :( Now I have to make sure I check emails regularly, take calls if needed etc etc.

But heck, I am going to Hyd, so shut up and work :)

So again, after the digression, I was not looking forward to Monday at all, since I knew I had only 2 days in the week to do as much as possible to avoid ruining the vacation later on in the week. But for all that dreading-Monday syndrome, my Monday was really nice. Morning started off with a nice brainstorming session with all the tech leads here, I love it when I am in a room full of engineers discussing issues and speculating possibilities, it automatically brings so much energy, I don't feel like leaving the room ever. But we had to pull ourselves into another bigger meeting from there and the rest of the day was spent, talking to people, running up to the lab, talking to more people, providing status, running up to the lab, lunching, running up to the lab, helping my group engineers sort out some issues, talking to more people and so on. You get the drift. But all in all, if all my days were this busy and productive, I'd have no complaints about work ;)

The only thing I missed is the evening "T" session with pals @ work and also completely forgot that we were due at the ARO office to get photographed for the EPIC. I don't think I can make it today, but today is the last day. So I am just hoping, EPIC or not, our names somehow get into that voters' list.

Hoping!

I dont have a title for this..

One of my colleagues was wondering why my posts are getting irregular. The only defense I have is (a) being too overloaded on all fronts and (b) as a result of (a) I tend to slack off whenever I get the chance.

But the real reason would be that I do not have anything "nice" or "interesting" or "funny" to write about. The same messy politics on TV. Nothing new to make fun of or provide interesting insights on.

@ work, I've had a really bad day this week (which I think is probably more in my mind than on others' minds (hopefully!)), and normally I don't like to post when I am not in a "good" mood.

I am on a critical customer escalation right now and my really bad day @ work this week was unfortunately related to this, I didn't handle a certain internal discussion well, and I felt like kicking myself for it :( Now I feel everyone is looking at me with a disapproving eye although my guru @ work here asked me to not sweat it out too much. Now on a call, without knowing when it would even go on till! I am just hoping it will end soon, this mess.

So summary is, I didn't post because either I was not in a good "post-worthy" mood, or even when I was I didn't have anything significant to say ;) Now that I have cribbed enough, let me get back to waiting for an analysis of some data I gave :)

Happy Ugadi to all of you folks !!

4 and 1

Yesterday I finished four years in Cisco :) Its been a good ride. So far. Lets see how it goes moving forward. New roles, new challenges. Will I be able to spend 16 hours a day when needed at a stretch going forward too? Not sure at all. Will I need to? Most certainly yes, given the recession and what not. Well, I don't want to speculate too much. So I'll take it as it comes.

This weekend last year, was our last in the United States, we were done being "resident aliens" to move back to being normal citizens again. Lot of things inspired the move. More than anything, it was the desire to be back in the homeland. Back where we can hope to make some difference to whats going on around us instead of being mute spectators at the mercy of some alien land who thought us "aliens" :)

Its been an extremely eventful one year. We've seen it all. Parents being hospitalized one after another, looking to buy a house in Bangalore, getting extremely frustrated at the sky-rocketing prices, finally settling on one, then re-vamping it completely, a house-warming that went like a charm just like I had imagined it to be all those 7 pining years in the US, parents being able to regularly visit, being able to eat chat at just about every nook and corner, without having to make that trip to the "Indian" grocery store, a role change at work that I've been looking forward to for quite sometime, another milestone in our marriage and so on and so forth, the list is endless. Some of our Bay Area friends rightly said, we did things in such a hurry in just one year! Some of it was in our control, most of it completely took us by surprise, we got swamped over, we just got taken in by the flow :)

Well, anyways, just as well, I think I can say, I am "jittery" right now. How things will work out in the near future. Hoping that everything falls into place well enough. Hoping the recession will not kill us. Hoping we can vote and make a difference this time. Hoping all the plumbing problems in the house are fixed. Hoping we won't have a serious water crisis in summer. Lots of things I am praying for to fall neatly in place.

PS: We finally registered to vote. The process was not at all as painful as I thought. I filled in and printed forms at Jaagore and we took it and submitted them in person. In fact except for that officer at the ARO office in Jeevan Bima Nagar suddenly creating his own rule and asking for two copies of Form 6 instead of one and we having to scout for a Xerox shop trying to get an extra copy, everything was smooth. But is the ride over yet? I am afraid not. We have to show up next week at the office to get us our EPICs (Electoral Photo Identity Cards) and that will tell us if we are finally through in that list! Keeping fingers crossed. I don't know who I will vote for yet. But at least I want to vote. I haven't voted even once in my lifetime and I feel ashamed about it. Totally! As soon as I got eligible to vote, right before the elections, I flew out to the US and after that I've never been able to :(

PS: I have an EPIC in Hyd now. If our registration here goes through fine, that will/can be safely cancelled, else at least I can vote from some place, if not Bangalore, ha!

PS: The one regret I have from this one year is not being able to visit Hyd as frequently as I would have wished to. We've just gone about 4 times I think :( Most of them in a hurry because of one emergency or another. Then the house happened and we got completely clamped to Bangalore, then Subhash started having 6-day-weeks at work and that totally killed it. Now we are planning a Hyd trip, finally planning, I am actually thinking of taking time off and visiting during the week, not just the weekend, to compensate for at least some part of the pining for that mystic hometown of mine :) :) Lets see!

Wrap it up!

I am about 13 test cases away from wrapping up as an engineer. So long!

But the 13 test case path is not easy I tell ya! 4 of the simplest ones took all day yesterday and still didn't finish although I was at them till 11.45 in the night. Why? Its not even my fault. Some router crashes, some disk goes bad, images simply refuse to copy, how the hell is an engineer supposed to test when the routers and all the forces in this universe refuse to co-operate!?!?!

Anyways, hoping that next week I will be able to finally say "So long!" to the engineer me and don a new role. And hoping that the last 6 years have taught me something to go on for the next 6-7 months which is obviously a "testing" phase. (Too much test in my life, bah!)

Art!!

Subhash's parents are here for a short stay and this is what his Dad has come up with.














So inspired! When I first saw it on Sunday morning, I assumed it was his mom, naturally, she is the one that does such artistic stuff. But I was positively shocked when I heard it was his Dad, I didn't know he had such an artistic bent of mind. Apparently this is the in-thing in hotels now so he's tried to replicate it in our smallish front porch ;) Next he wants to bring a bigger thing to put water and flowers in. Every morning during his morning walk he diligently brings flowers to make a pattern in colours of them. WOW!!

Good stuff

Today I felt touched. By someone's generosity of affection :)

I made this bunch of friends @ work when I moved back last year. We have lunch together, and I surprised my old team-mates from SJ when I told them I go to the cafeteria everyday to have lunch (spotting me in SJ campus cafeteria was a positive shock to those guys back then). I hate missing my lunch sessions and try my best to not avoid it if I can.

Anyways, so I am at the threshold of a change at work and this gang was by far more excited than I was about it. I guess I was a just a little bit excited but a lot more nervous. But these guys were all charged up and excited and wanted to celebrate and I had no words. I was just overwhelmed and felt blessed :)

Here is to a lasting friendship to everyone at my lunch table :)

Sigh!

If I haven't blogged in ages, its because I have a reason (yeah right!)

Too many things happening. Too many major changes. Too many risks. I don't know sometimes, I am confused. Should I be happy? Should I be worried? Should I be upset? Should I be excited? Believe me, its a mixed bag.

Two people. Two careers. Both standing at a threshold of change. Both for the better hopefully. Will this change bring in good? Or will it make everything turn upside down and make it all go wrong? Big questions. No answers. And the financial liability we've taken on adds to my confusion.

I am confused. Did I say that already? Well. Yeah.

In all this I feel happy for one thing. That the two people have each other whether good comes or evil :)

And I feel happy for friends. At work. They are more excited about my developments than I am at every stage :) I feel lucky and blessed that they want to celebrate my threshold of change with more enthusiasm than me :)

Well, lets hope it all works out :)