"... It's all about having a reason to get up in the morning"...

... the title of the page is courtesy borrowed from Ms. GarryZ ...

... i wasn't sure Lady Gaga was good in meaningful songs! :-P

so here it is ... Born This Way ... i guess some of the ladies of 'younger' generation need to listen this!!...

and just in case u need to understand it better here are the lyrics:

It doesn't matter if you love him or capital H-I-M
Just put your paws up
'Cause you were born this way, baby
My mama told me when I was young
We are all born superstars
She rolled my hair and put my lipstick on
In the glass of her boudoir

There's nothin' wrong with lovin' who you are
She said, 'cause He made you perfect, babe
So hold your head up, girl and you you'll go far
Listen to me when I say

I'm beautiful in my way
'Cause God makes no mistakes
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born this way

Don't hide yourself in regret
Just love yourself and you're set
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born this way, born this way

Ooh, there ain't no other way, baby, I was born this way
Baby, I was born this way
Ooh, there ain't no other way, baby, I was born this way
I'm on the right track, baby, I was born this way

Don't be a drag, just be a queen
Don't be

Give yourself prudence and love your friends
Subway kid, rejoice of truth
In the religion of the insecure
I must be myself, respect my youth

A different lover is not a sin
Believe capital H-I-M
I love my life, I love this record and
Mi amore vole fe yah

I'm beautiful in my way,
'Cause God makes no mistakes
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born this way

Don't hide yourself in regret,
Just love yourself and you're set
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born this way

Ooh, there ain't no other way, baby, I was born this way
Baby, I was born this way
Ooh, there ain't no other way, baby, I was born this way
I'm on the right track, baby, I was born this way

Don't be drag, just be a queen
Whether you're broke or evergreen
You're black, white, beige, chola descent
You're Lebanese, you're orient

Whether life's disabilities
Left you outcast, bullied or teased
Rejoice and love yourself today
'Cause baby, you were born this way

No matter gay, straight or bi
Lesbian, transgendered life
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born to survive

No matter black, white or beige
Chola or orient made
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born to be brave

I'm beautiful in my way
'Cause God makes no mistakes
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born this way

Don't hide yourself in regret,
Just love yourself and you're set
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born this way, yeah

Ooh, there ain't no other way, baby, I was born this way
Baby, I was born this way
Ooh, there ain't no other way, baby, I was born this way
I'm on the right track, baby, I was born this way
I was born this way, hey
I was born this way, hey
I'm on the right track, baby, I was born this way, hey

I was born this way, hey
I was born this way, hey
I'm on the right track, baby, I was born this way, hey

... ‎"if you havent lived my life, dont criticize my choices."...

" Religion has convinced ppl that there’s an invisible man…living in the sky. Who watches everything u do every min of every day. he has a list of 10 things he doesn’t want u to do. And if u do any of these, he will send u to a special place, of burning and fire and torture and anguish for u to live forever, and suffer, and burn, and scream, until the end of time. But he loves u.He loves u and he needs money!!!"...

... saw this on a friend's FB profile... i guess this is pretty much valid! :-D

..."if you can't be there, do the next best thing - send flowers"...

... well... i was able to reach there AND brought flowers... it was 5th April and it was MG's birthday... after dropping-off dad and sis at the railway station i went off to office... and during the mildly relaxed hour of lunch time decided to checkout the FB... and was reminded about the birthday... called her... wished her... and the mind wandered off to work again...

... and then AC called me in the evening and 'invited' me to join-in for the... well... watever... so we landed in the same hotel NikkiZ stayed over however this time i got to visit the BBQ-nation at the terrace or watever it is called... the food was okay the cake was yummy and the service was admirable... (they had to make it 'a-table-for-three' from 'a-table-for-two'... apparently AC 'forgot' to inform them for the added guest ... (note to self: check the reservation before u jump!)...

... last month was a lot about travelling... some of them familiar places... others were first time experience and rest were were 'rejig' for memory... just for the record we traveled to Kopargaon, Shirdi, Shani-Shingnapur and Mumbai... max speed achieved was 140kmph... had three close encounters with accident including one very very close! ... had to stop afterwards to gather my breath... (note to self: if u r accompanied by family pay more attention to road AND drive slow!)...

... "keeping the fingers crossed"...

--> the good thing is: i still want to keep writing my blog

--> the better thing is: i have couple of 'topics' to ponder over and 'pen down'

--> (however) the bad thing is: i am STILL feeling lazy after the month long 'home treatment'

..."I believed in myself. I never imagined myself as just an ordinary player." ... ~ Imran Khan

... i am way too engrossed with so many things that are happening around me to sit tight and write... so here's an email forward to ponder::

By - HARSHA BHOGLE

Remember when you failed an examination. How many people recall that, your class, friends, relatives? You failed to make it to the IITs or IIMs. Who remembers. How many times have you had the feeling of being the best in your class, school , university, state….., you failed to get a visa stamped this quarter…, you missed a promotion this year…, how did it feel when you dad told you in your early twenties that you are good for nothing…..and now your boss tell you the same...

You keep introspecting and go into a shell when people most of whom don’t matter a dime in your life criticize you, back bite you, make fun of you. You are left sad and shattered and you cry when your own kin scoffs at you. You say I am feeling low today. It takes a lot from us to come out of these everyday situations and move on. A lot??? really?

Now here’s a man standing on the third man boundary in the last over of a world cup match. The bowler just has to bowl sensibly to win this game. What the man at the boundary sees is 4 rank bad bowls bowled without any sense of focus, planning or regret. India loses, yet again in those circumstances when he has done just about everything right.
He does not cry. Does not show any emotion. Just keeps his head down and leaves the field. He has seen these failures for 22 years now. And not just his class, relatives, friends but the whole world has seen these failures. We are too immature to even imagine what goes on in that mind and heart of his. That’s why I would never want to be Sachin.

True, he has single handedly lifted to moods of this entire nation umpteen number of times. He has been an inspiration to rise above our mediocrity. Nobody who has ever lifted the willow even comes close to this man’s genius. His dedication and mental strength is unparallel. This is specially for those people who would have made fun of him again last night when India lost. saying that "JAB SACHIN KHELTA HAIN INDIA MATCH HAARTA HAIN". They are people who are mediocre in their own lives. Who just scoff at others to create cheap fun. Who have lived in a small hole throughout their lives and thought they have seen the oceans.

Think about the man himself. He is 37 years of age. He has been playing almost non stop for 22 years. The way he was running and diving around the field last night would have put 22 year olds to shame. The way he played the best opening quickies in the world was breathtaking. He just keeps getting better which is by the way humanly impossible. Its not for nothing that people call him GOD.
But still I don’t want to be in those shoes. We struggle in keeping our monotonous lives straight, lives which affect a limited number of people. Imagine what would be the magnitude of the inner struggle for him, pain both mental and physical, tears that have frozen with time, knees and ankles and every other joint in the body that is either bandaged or needs to be attended to every night, eyes that don’t sleep before a big game, bats that have scored 99 international tons and still see expectations from a billion people.

And he just converts those expectations into reality. We watch in awe, feel privileged.
Well I think its time that his team realizes that enough is enough. They have an obligation, not towards their country alone but towards sachin. They need to win this one for him. Stay assured that he himself will still deliver and leave no stone unturned to make sure India wins this cup.
This is not just a game, and he is not just a sportsman. Its much more than this. Words fail here.....

“The art of patience is not about how long one wait but its about how one behaves while waiting…”

... “Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not; a sense of humor to console him for what he is” ...

returned from SPP's place... had a delicious dinner of scrambled eggs with Paav-Bhaaji... was spending the day watching the Indo-Irish face-off... and after defeating the English team the Irish men looked serious to upset the Injians as well ... however our 'boys' won the 'important' match and i am all impressed with the Irish team...

... it was quite hectic last week... three-fourth of my family was in Poona and apart from the mild set back of not making in the first cut of the admissions, the overall trend was upping... for the first time 'after' i made a 'resolution' for the flight path correction, i came face to face with a counselor!! and i feel good! ...

... and since i woke up wayyy too early (and though got a chance to catchup on the sleep!) and watched the entire Indo-Irish face-off i am feeling li'l sleepy rite now! ... not to mention i drove very dangerously on the Mum-Pun highway... near the Nashik phata to be precise! :-(

... shall be keeping this in mind for time to come! ...

..." i know you are bootylicious!, but why show off?" ...

... "just because i am not making sense doesn't mean i am all nonsense!" ...

... ‎"A diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman's birthday but never remembers her age "...

..."Wise men don't need advice. Fools won't take it."...

One good thing about my grey matter is that it is holding up pretty neatly awl together… now that is not something I should brag about on my blog… especially when I have followers who have somehow mastered the art of keeping the billion neuron strong network together and electrified… and why only blog followers? I’ve been fortunate enough to have rubbed my online identity with zillion other people… and ironic it may sound these very grey cells have left me wondering and exasperated as well and on more than one occasion… but then… that is different story…

… I was pretty excited about the ninth day of this month … and you can read the trailing posts to know more about it… however the fire event @ Bombay House threatened to turn the mood towards the gloomier side but then the subsequent chit-chat left me in better sense of general well-being… which meant I was in a better position to concentrate on the travel bookings for my mom…

… February fourteenth usually puts me in a confused state … and my experience is that this topic is more philosophical than most people think, so I would stay away from it… and while a sizeable population was wandering here and there for some opportunistic moments, some of my family members were on their way to meet me in Poona… and this is a good thing… nothing beats the pampering by mom… and since my sis was also joining-in I knew I will be having some honest exchange of ideas on some mortal aspects I’ve been left wondering lately upon…

… so while I am spending time arguing debating defending fighting laughing and (sometimes) doing nothing … you enjoy the blog and don’t forget to leave your trail in the comment section… J

... "If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker that came along would destroy civilization." ...

... there was a fire that broke out in the "Bombay House" in Mumbai yesterday ... till the last news came 3 people (out of 4 who were trapped) had died inside and one person was hospitalised... the fire strated in the basement canteen due to a short circuit in the airconditioner while the complete picture may emerge after the investigations, the prima-facie it appears to be the outcome of another careless attitude of the humans towards the work/living environment...

... usually at such moments it is easier to take the 'i am holier than thou' approach ... but then, it wud be better & better for all of us to take cognizance of our behavior and attitude towards ourselves and humans surrounding us and then work upon it to make this world a safer place to inhabit...

... it was a usual work day... and i had returned from the lunch, opened the web browser to catchup on the day and with Google news in fornt of me i saw "Fire in a Mumbai Building" ... and just when this news was on my screen i saw few colleagues whispering around "...Bombay House mein?..." ... and my fear was bang-on... the fire was in our corporate office...

... and in next few seconds i could think of at least one colleague who probably works there... and apart from the Knome and couple of emails we haven't interacted much... "...the building was evacuated by 11:30..." said the news and i knew she should be all right and still i couldn't just let go... i found her contact information in our corporate email... dropped her a message immediately... and positive reply came in after few moments...

... i guess there are nasty surprises all around the corners of this long winding road of life, wouldn't it be a better thing to continue with the positive outcomes?...

..."Success in marriage isn't in marrying the right person, it's being the right person"...

best thing today: my parents' wedding aniv AND so is A-MG's as well!! |-D

good thing today: i reached the office forty minutes before the scheduled time |-)

bad thing today: it was 5:50 AM then! |-(

..."It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt."...

... it was not the usual monday morning today... as per our, recently introduced, shift schedule i was in the first shift... which translates to 0630 hrs swipe-in time... it sounds way too early, but trust me... in winters AND in monsoon it IS way too early! :-) ... but as i said saat farvari was not the usual morning... and then i forgot wat was so special ...

..."You've gone a million miles ; How far d'you get ; To that place where you can't remember ; And you can't forget"...

We Need To Talk:

… if you are hearing this particular sentence in a rom-com/sitcom it will often be followed by giggles or burst of laughter (sometimes as a voice-over as well… for the un-initiated ones!) and if you are hearing this face-to-face there is a good chance that your face will develop reddish hues and difficulty in listening and general loss of concentration…

… communication is not easy… and that is in spite of the spectacular growth in the field of ‘transmission’ be it data or voice or pictures or even humans! … it really doesn’t matter how fast you are able to send your ‘thoughts’ or ‘views’ unless the intended (or even unintended!) recipient is able to ‘get-it’ from your perspective… be it Orkut or FB or ICQ or AIM or Wikipedia or Knome … last of which is an interesting place to be… the riot of colors on the pages was welcome and inviting … an exhaustive FAQ page was another surprising aspect … they don’t bother to ‘create’ it anymore these days…

… Knome what?? … “ a Knowledge Management and a social networking website. It blends cutting edge consumer web collaboration patterns with enterprise KM to provide a platform that is easy, intuitive and adaptable. It is an interactive portal having modules like Q&A, Bytes, Blogs, Wikis, Ideas, Debates, Community and Media which provide a one stop shop to look for and contribute to the generation of knowledge in your organization.” …

… there was a reason why the ‘coffee house’ became so popular… there was an entire generation which turned to these places; not only to drink good coffee and munch the mouth watering and delicious and crunchy hot snacks… be it vada-paav or masala dosa or bread pakoda or medu-vada sambar… but also to sit across and talk and share and debate and laugh and crib and most importantly communicate… ideas, perspectives, feelings, passions… everything was put on the table and dissected among the peers …this helped anyone and everyone who was willing enough to sit for the entire length of the chit-chat … the beauty of such ‘verbal battlefields’ was that they were slugged in the most casual way possible…

… and THAT is what is needed… an informal, casual and light-hearted chit-chat … you can post an open ended query in ‘Q&A’… you can ‘blog’ your doubts and seek answers… and you can definitely ‘byte’ your crib… but if you want to get the answers first-hand… get ready to walk the longer way round … the shortest path between two points is not always a ‘straight’ line… so go ahead and buy a decent pair of spare footwear… tap gently on the shoulder… wear a friendly smile… tell them that you want to help and let them sing… and they will…

(originally posted in the intranet portal: Knome)

‎... "You can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but you can't pick your friends' friends. :-)" ...

... i guess i need more masala in this post, just to makeup for the previous 'short' ones! ... but then this ain't no masala blog! ... somewhere down the line i went slightly, only slightly, off-track ... but then it is easier to pen down your thoughts wen u have accumulated something! ...

... it was very silly of me to stay awake late in nite that Sunday, more so because i was in early shift the following day! ... and to make the matter worse i started browsing Knome from home! ... now usually that wud not have made any difference but wat took my forty winks away was this 'sarcastic' (as said by the author himself!) article on me AND another female colleague, though she sits about more than one hundred miles away from me!! ... now being the ever forgiving and ever forgetting... i thought to sleep over it... but wat made me angry was the fact this article was totally uncalled for! and the damage was done! ... with some toss & turns i was able to spend rest of the night on the bed! ...

... however this dumb fellow needed to face the wrath of the caustic Piscean!! ... just because i am long on warm tolerances doesn't mean i will count till ten and leave it! ... 'duffer' has faced that! ... and many of my colleagues know this!... and so this guy was going to get some of it from me... by the time i was asleep i already had the thought process flowing in my mind... and i executed it in the ever amazing ever evolving word play the following day! ... first thing in the morning!! ...

... the good thing is that i prevented the slug-fest ... the bad thing is no one noticed! ;-) ... and while all this was happening in the week me in the first shift... what came as another surprise next week was our departmental meeting ... it was a follow through of the G12 survey result meeting ... and certain very welcome things came out! ... first of all we get to know about this new project... although the background was already known, the presentation was a welcome change! ...

... and my project has been decided to be the next on the projector! ... already received the 'bare-bone' presentation to start my work ... i guess this is going to be one good exercise! ...

... "i may be bad, but i am perfectly good at it..."...

... i guess we humans are more attuned to being plainly opportunistic ...

... and if u looking for the song... then (sigh!) it is here ...

"If you don't understand my silence, you will never understand my words!"

... he was not in his usual mood anyway... the Gallup's result was out and the rumors were rife that a meeting for the results' review will be held anytime... there was an undercurrent of excitement with the poker face plastered over the subtle smile...

... and then the D-day came ... we were asked to gather in the conference room... and with the chuckles and suppressed laughter the mood was quite ... umm... upbeat? ... the thing is... almost awl our team members (rather group mates) gave the lowermost scores in the G12 survey ... and or HOD's Gallup score was @ rock bottom ...

... the meeting started with a simple objective to identify why our group scored low ... and after the 'warm-up' it was getting better and better with more and more people opening up and at least for the duration of the meeting He appeared to be on the back-foot ... defending and sometimes with childish energy countering all the 'attack' by the younger team members...

... the immediate fallout of the meeting was introduction of '3 shifts' ... A, B and G ... in rotation ... now shifts are pain in arse... specially when u r NOT working dedicatedly on CAD ... but then... shifts are good... for once u get to wake-up 5 in the morning and then drive awl the way to the office... and then when the entire company is lazying around after the lunch, your official day is already over ...

... also for once u get to wake-up at your convenience ... do awl the lazy stuff u always wanted to do in the day ... i mean the dishes the laundry the FB updates the emails the chat the phone calls and etc etc... and then u reach the office when everyone is in the pack-up mood... u get some time to catch-up with the rest of the colleagues and just when u r all geared-up for the 'day' the evening takes over the senses... and then... well... the 'day' starts ...

... productivity gayi tel lene! as long as u r coming in shifts u r 'working' ... now whoz going to argue with the balding heads with grey hair?? ... so 'we' decided to follow the shift schedule strictly and it's been fun! ...

... one interesting fall-out was i 'missed' the weekly project review meeting... however... the good thing is, some of those who attended the meeting were very excited about it ... the smile grin on their faces was so... ummm... sheepish? ... now... i am tempted to write in detail but then i will be compromising on the TCoC ... so keeping the excitement with me ... u enjoy some splice of the Imagineering 10-11

... "We are but older children, dear, Who fret to find our bedtime near"...

... it is getting drab ... and for some reasons the new editor i am using in this blog is NOT letting me keep the posts in the order i want them to be in!... sheh! ... this is going to add to the frustration ... and i am not in that magnanimous mood of mine to let it go just like that! ...

... anyway ... who can stop the post whose time has come! ;-) ... it is forty minutes past midnight and i returned from office about an hour ago... and just when i was about to park my vista i noticed a rangoli at the front gate ... and then another interesting figure on my ODO ... now since i still don't own a camera phone (yet!) ... so i have missed some earlier milestones ... but this one was easy to capture ... so all i had to do was click! :-)

..."If u wait for happy moments u will wait forever, but if u start believing that u r happy, u will be happy forever"...

... the excitement was palpable and the air was charged with anticipation... me and sharry decided to leave @ three from the office and decided to book the Candy White Skoda Fabia (Ambiente) with petrol engine...

... his parent were supposed to arrive from their native along with some monetary help... and they did arrive in the afternoon... so i went o this place... took  some tea and then we headed to the showroom... the whole process was more or less... ummm... quiet and .... ummm.... sober (?) :-p

... the money quickly changed hands and left Sharry one lac poorer! ... and then we lingered on in the showroom... going thru the accessories' list and el... and then decided to leave ... and wait for our expected delivery date of January 25 ...