December Drouble

Except for the 10 day company shutdown which happens, nothing about December is cool.


At work, people always talk about what they are going to do for their vacation or bring in something nice to eat (read cake, pies etc. which are really tough to resist with my gym plans. Each slice of cake means extra minutes on the treadmill which is.... not easy :) ). Since makkal here get vacations quite rarely, they make elaborate plans and make you privy to all their nitty gritty details of the trip. Most of the plans of Amru junta revolves around going to some exotic place - Key West, Cancun or something like that. Desi makkal either plan to go to India or visit some relative (mostly in Calif. or some other desi hub). Constant talk about plane fares and some killer deal (I do not know how long the No regrets! plan would stay available.. clicklink fast!) which they got is not cool to listen. And I'm just amazed at how many tambrahm makkal are in the US and I somehow seem to be the only guy with no living family member in this part of the world. But even if there were any family makkal, I really doubt if I'd be naive enough to go and hang out with them when I'm supposed to be having fun. But, I ended up actually having plans for a Florida Yatra with a couple of SVCE makkal - the usual punniya-sthalams like Miami, Key West, Universal -Islands of Adventure and Busch Gardens are on the anvil and I have something to make the small talk with junta at work. (People who know me would vouch for the fact that I make an effort to engage in small talk with general junta - except for NHL, I follow NFL and NBA {for personal reasons} and MLB {primarily for small talk purposes}and all the usual suspects like American Idol, Office, Lost and other stuff by reading up on them online)

Related to what I was talking about pasanga going back to India, many of them are working and closer to 25 (I was admitted earlier in school as folks back home could not put up with my nonsense when I was young) and so are looking out for potential brides in tamilmatrimony and looking to getting engaged or meeting up with prospective ponnus in India when they make it there. A good friend of mine and me came to know one of our SVCE makkal was hunting for girls like aforesaid and so we decided to see what that that person had 'described' about themselves - as usual the physical characteristics like height were fudged - I somehow do not get the logic behind saying stuff like this on online matrimonial sites. The truth is going to be staring at the people's faces when the physical meeting happens and what's the point really? As policy I believe in 'under'promising and over achieving rather than 'over'promising and falling short. Also, I think people would rather love to pleasantly surprised rather than be shocked nasty. Perhaps, I'm weird and all that - but this further gives credence to my opposition to how marriages happen back home. Well, the point was that that profile kept us engaged for quite a bit and made my tuesday morning.

The only positive outlook for december, apart from my month end 'divya-desam' trip inside Fl., is that after a month of dawdling with my gym plans, I have found the motivation to hit the gym with a vengeance.

P.S: If any of the people out there know how long it would take to do the usual touristy thing in Key West, please let me know. I have never been there - largely due to my aversion to crowds - so any information on how to reach there, good places to stay and all the good stuff would be appreciated.

Year of Kobe?

Hope Kobe wins the ring and proves that post Jordan, he is the next best.

Stewie - Part 1

Microsoft ups the ante....

Finally Microsoft seeks to dent Google's stranglehold on Internet based services. Google has already started Google Health . This gets interesting - much like Mortal Kombat. Already Yahoo! has been left to lick its wounds - its virtually Microsoft's Muscle against Google's perceived 'cool' factor.

Simple Genius - No Genius

Last week, I joined the HCPLC - with a view to practice my new found fiscal responsibility and also given the fact that my apartment is fast losing any storage space. The library system is quite cool and I have 2 locations right near my apartment and also my workplace - so my usual somberi-th-thanam in anything useful is almsot ruled out.

Now on to my view about this book by David Baldacci.

I always have a soft corner for books which try to mix fact and fiction. The best book in this category, IMO, is The Three Musketeers by Alexander Dumas. A close second is The Count of Monte Cristo, again by A. Dumas and The Da Vinci Code.

The book has an interesting premise and grows two parallel tracks quite well. But somewhere mid-way the author loses plot and meanders into one of those cheap ஒன்றரை ரூபாய் நாவல் my dad loves to depracate.


Verdict: Avoid. Waste of 5 hours time.