Sunday!!

Hi,

Am in office on this Sunday. Thought I would finish off some pending work but as luck would have it, the application is not launching :-( Trying to make the best use of time here. Its my first Sunday at Cognizant and I was hoping for a better outing. Hmm on the brighter side of things, India managed to scrape through for a victory against the Aussies yesterday, and more importantly take a 2-1 lead. It was a decent performance from the Indian team and would definitely boost their chances for a series win. Bought a new book by David Baldacci which I plan to use to kill time. Post the exams, I seem to have a lot of free and boring time. Hmm, I do miss the exams sometimes ;-)

I am back

Wellll, I had almost forgotten about my blog in the frantic rush which modern life brings about. Lot of things have been happening in the past few months, the most notable among them being my jump to Cognizant from Ramco. This was long due and am happy it has happened at last. Just about getting settled with my new position and it kind of suits my style. Am working independently and work involves more of code analysis and tuning. On the academic side of things, I have entered the last phase of my M.S at BITS and only the project now remains to be done. Looking forward to it. India Australia series has started and series has shaped up nicely at 1-1. India look to be having the upper hand but series should boil down to be a thriller.

Back Home!!

The short trip has come to an end and I am back in hot and humid Chennai. Not that it was very cool out there in Kerala ;-) The trip went well. Reached Calicut by 7 pm on friday night and took a cab to Guruvayoor. After lot of arguments and opinions, we decided to check into a pretty normal looking decent hotel (much to Mom's agitation!!) nearby to the temple. The next day morning around 8 am we left for the darshan and the crowd at that time was quite large. After nearly 90 minutes in the queue we got the darshan of the lord(he seemed to be smiling more than before!) and after buying the traditional prasadam, made our way out. It was high time we had our breakfast and thats what we did before doing some light shopping. Once back in the room, we packed our bags and soon were on the way back to Calicut in a Sumo Granade. Lunch was at a hotel called Vazhiyoram and it was the first time we tasted non veg dring the trip. Soon afterwards, at around 4 pm, we reached Calicut via the NH-17 and not before long, we found my dad's uncle's house, where we were supposed to halt for the night. The house was a villa type and it looked very colorful and attractive. The rest of the day passed peacefully and I went to bed quite early, unlike the usual me. The next day, we bid goodbye and left for the airport by 9 am. Our flight to Chennai was scheduled to take off at 10.45 am and they pretty much did it on time. Our CM's daughter Kanimozhi was also present in the flight and I wondered what she was upto in Kerala. Anyways spent the next 1 hour journey reading newspapers and catching up on all the news and events over the last 2 days. Yet again they served only tea and biscuits and I was totally dissapointed. Guess they have cut down on the food items to tackle the economic recession. By 12.30 or so, we were back in the comforts of our home and I tried to get some sleep before leaving for office. I did mange to get a few winks but not much and by 4.30 pm I was up again to find out that we were having some guests. After briefly playing with my niece and chatting with my cousin sis Simi, I made my way to office at around 6 pm. When the clock ticked 11.30 pm, I was back home and watched the dying moments of Om Shanti Om. The coming week looks to be a really intense and hectic one and I hope that things go smoothly and according to plan. South Africa just dont seem to give up and the match against Australia heads to be a really sensational one, if South Africa get close to the target in their bid for another record chase. West Indies has yet again displayed a steely resolve to come back after conceding 600 runs in the first innings to England. The fact that they have been allowed to take the lead shows the lack of penetration of the English bowlers. Maybe Flintoff's absence has dented their sprits somewhat, but special credit must go to Sarwan for his fantastic 291. March has started and its just a month away before my main exams start. Time to get down to business!!

Pressure builds !!

Work pressure has been building steadily over the past 2 days. The coming days doesnt look like its going to be good either. Visiting Guruvayoor temple is on the cards this weekend and it should provide a good break for me. Should be nice seeing Lord Krishna again :-) The world champs have lost :-( It was obvious the way India batted that they were trying to blast New Zealand out of the game but this strategy proved to be a total failure. After losing 2-3 wickets, they should have stayed on at the grease and done the big hitting at the end. The problem was that everyone tried playing the huge shots with the small ground really too tempting for our guys. Lets hope for a turnaround in the next match as a loss in the T20 series will be a huge dissapointment for the world champs and their fans.

Jai Ho India!!

ARR has done the unthinkable. When people were doubting if he would win an Oscar, he has gone one step ahead and got 2!! Such is the greatness of ARR. I knew it was just a matter of time before this would happen, my heartfelt congrats to him. The surprise element was Resul Pookutty and I am more happy as he is from Kerala !! Great going man, keep up the good show. Overall it was a complete sweep for Slumdog Millionaire and this should put India on the world cinema map. Hope we see a Brad Pitt or a Kate Winslet shooting at a Spencers plaza or a Maayajal sometime soon!! At least from now on we should be able see more high quality movies from all the regional languages. Coming to my personal life, nothing much to cheer about. Work is getting heavier by the day and more and more responsibilities creeping up. Errors just dont stop coming, do they? The issues which were supposed to have been fixed long back show their ugly face just at this crucial time and its really a big pain in the ass! Wonder how I am going to manage them :-( They are such a headache and will drive you nuts. I am spending longer hours at office including weekends and this is really affecting my other activities. Ayo kadavule.. Nee thaan kaapathanum.... Tommorow the India NZ series starts off with a T20 and I hope the Indians would bring some smiles to my sagging face..

Oscar fever!

The oscar fever has started and its little less than 7 hours bedore the mega event is to unfold. Lot of expectations on ARR and hope he wins. Should be great for the country and especially, for Madras! Going by the hype and the awards it has already bagged, I guess its going to be a coup for Slumdog Millionaire. On the personal front, its been a pretty ordinary weekend; went to office on Saturday but didnt do much. Today spent some considerable time studying and then slept in the evening. Had a late bath and went for a walk at 9pm. Back to my studies now and hope to rise early to catch the academy awards. Jai Ho!

Loooooong walk!

Record of sorts!! Walked all the way home from Eldams Road!! Not sure if it was as long as the walk from Kathipara to K K Nagar, still it was an good effort for me personally. Would make up for the missed morning walks in the past few days. An interesting day in office, starting with the utter failure of the audit :-( Was more or less expecting this. Ram celebrated his last day in RBDG team and he is ready to enter the bliss world of Swiss. Weekend has come but not too many plans for it. Office is in the iternary and hope to go through a few chapters for my course too. An outstanding effort by the West Indies(especially the last pair) saw them draw the match(with some help from the sun who chose to leave the premises early!!) and this in itself is a huge victory for the team. Guess England are not in the good books of Lady Luck :-)