The War in Orkut

One day, my cell buzzed:
me : "Yeah, dude"
R : "Beat ya, 148 to 138"
me : "shit"

Three months ago, when R told me about Orkut, and meeting old friends that you had in your school / college/ previous offices, i brushed it aside. "what cyber crap" was what my mind told me.
And then one day in one of my relative's house, i saw Orky's face, and i fell in. Yep. I got myself invited to orkut, and then it all began.

The number displayed within the evil bracket triggered a turf war, and amazingly the people involved took it up with religious frenzy. Who had the most number of friends? Whose network was the biggest?

It is a show off world, i agree, but then... this was stretching it a little bit too much.

Me was new to orkut, and dint know the loopholes, but hours of R&D into it has made me smarter than the creater of orkut.

It became a daily phenomena. The first thing when we reach office is:
" Yeah , i know. Wait for tonight. I have 20 people lined up to accept my invite"

or

"Oui. Do you really know that guy. How? thats foul, you cant do it"

or

"Okay, lets race to 170"

It was fun, but after sometime, it kind of became a cult.

Our battle turned out into a full fledged war. People joined in. Support poured in. "Hey, i know this guy. will add him in to you"

As it stormed on, the edge of competitiveness began to be tested. Integrity was questioned. Speed was appreciated. Support was rewarded.

and i thought...

Welcome to the real marketplace....

Alive and kicking....

Alive and kicking...

After an eventful quarter, i am back onto blogging.Had somethings to set right, and had to do that without wasting it.
Have you all been good kids when i was not there?
That i get to see in my fave blogs..
Pretty good attritions in my absence.. medocuk has migrated to word press and so have others who have been close to me in this blog world.
But some have stayed by the keel as the ship sunk... rishi, sammy (soumyadeep) etc... all of them sticking with the good old blogspot...
Anyways, this blog entry is to tell you all that i am back and i am back to rock..
Will be visiting your site soon, i mean in a matter of hours.
WAIT... for the apocalypse has begun
:))))

Appu's Brahmasutras - A Collection

• The journey of a thousand miles begins with a broken fan belt and a flat tyre.
• 
  The darkest hours come just before dawn. So if you are going to steal your neighbors milk and paper, thats the time to do it.
• 
  Sex is like air. It only becomes important if you are not getting any.
• 
  Dont aspire to be irreplaceable. If you are cant be replaced, you cant be promoted.
• 
  Remember, no one is listening till you fart.
• 
  Never forget that you are unique, like everyone else.
• 
  Never test the depth of water with both feet.
• 
  If you think nobody cares whether you are dead or alive, try missing a couple of card payments.
  If at first you dont succeed, avoid skydiving.
• 
  Give a man a fish, he will eat for one day. Teach him how to fish and he will sit all day long in his boat and drink Beer.
• 
  Have you lent anyone 20 bucks, and havent seen him after that? Probably its worth it.
• 
  If you are telling the truth, you dont have to remember anything.
• 
  Somedays we are the flies, somedays we are the windscreens.
• 
  Dont worry, it only seems kinky for the first time.
• 
  Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
• 
  The quickest way to double your money is to fold it into half and put it back into your pocket.
• 
  A closed mouth gathers no feet.
• 
  There are two theories about how to win an argument with a woman, neither one works.
• 
  Generally speaking, you arent speaking much if your lipsare moving.
• 
  Never miss a good chance to shut up.
• 
  Experience is something you dont get until just after you get it.
• 
  When we are born, we are naked, wet, hungry and we get smacked on the arse. from there on, life gets worse.
• 
  The most wasted day of all is one in which we have not laughed.

Here I am....

Okay ladies and gents. My brief vanvaas has come to the end. And for all those who were wondering why I had vanished into thin air, i am obliged to give concrete reasons, and as you read on, you will understand and appreciate the circumstances underwhich i had to disappear.

They sent boss on a training session on "How to improve productivity and Employee motivation". Sounded like a very good idea, and the fact that he would not be around for a good half a month was an overjoying event. We celebrated. Liqour flowed. Alas! all good things must come to an end. The 15 days passed like the blink of the eye, and then what. Voila! there he stood in the corridor, and beckoned for me. Okay, so i go over to his cabin. He flips open his laptop with the elan and confidence that comes with being armed with cosmic gyaan. I braced myself for a lecture. It dint come. He smiles, i smile back, and give a general shit of how were things. He then comes to the point. "Appu, i think there is a lot more potential to you than what you are doing here". Wow! Would have handed him the Nobel Prize right then for that discovery. But the felicitations apart, there came the news. "What about a change in the role".... "Whats it going to be" I ask.
He turns around in an Al Pacino 'The Recruit' style, and says "I am putting you in charge of a bigger area of responsibility". Had seen this coming for some time, what with the attrition, i was sure he would start shovelling most of the work into my basket. "Need time to think". His motivation training took over, and after about half an hour of trying to get me to think about the larger picture, the organisational demands and the potential match between me and the role, i come out exhausted to take a smoke break. I come back, and say, "Heck, ok", i took it up. In the next week i travelled non stop everynight between two states getting myself introduced to the new crowd as the man in charge.

So thats what has been with me, but I shall not let anything interfere with my nefarious blogging activities. No, I shall not, so help me God.

What been happening around when i was busy with the Penetration percentages, the market share and the volume increments.

~ A US weapons lab has trained Bees (yeah, the honey ones) to sniff out bombs. I mean, WOW. So the next time i swat a bee, i turn around to see if there are any feds panickingly radioing in to their base camp "Officer Down, repeat Office down". This they say is very critical to their homeland security. So when an american kid runs into his house with a bee sting what will he say, "See Ma, Aint this police brutality?" But that also makes me think, whats next, a camera on the cockroach? not a bad idea, considering its accesibility. Or bombing dragonflies

~ Hey, did you know that ahead of the Cricket World cup, all the teams have signed up for free match practices. Yes, you guessed it right. They have signed up for series with India. The latest one is South Africa, and the Indians are giving them pretty good practice. It goes by a match to match agenda. The last match was a practice session to enable Justin Kemp to hone up and perfect his Sixer hitting pull and hook shots. It was also a practical session to teach the South Africans how not to ball.

~ Did you guys check out todays front page of Econimic Times (Yeah, i started reading it after the motivation gyaan). It shows the head honcho of some company and the Rajastan cheif minister greeting each other, and well, with a peck on the lips. Wonder what the fundamentalists are going to say to that...

~ We are going to sell chicken to the Aliens. Yeps. KFC has invested bones and meats of money to get their brand visible from space, its the only one to be seen from space. The only thing that bothers me is if the guy who owns the Saravana Bhavan chain of restaurants in Chennai reads about this. He might just open a branch serving idli dosa on the moon.

So thats it from me for sometime. You guys have fun. :))

Too Much Work

BUT WILL BE BACK IN 3-4 DAYS

Of Sarees and Acts

Ok, after the trainlag kinda died out, i started thinking what to write on next. There seems to be a problem of the plenty (a title that i lifted from Artnavy, you should check that post out)

~ These days there seem to be an unprecedented flurry activity around saree making. Seems like product innovation is the mantra. Now, just to give u a perspective, there is this road in T Nagar - Chennai which is the hub of all saree sales in India. There are like about 10 major multi storeyed stores selling about every type of garments and vying for the same customer who walks down the road. The saree business is to these guys what F1 is to the motorracers. What makes it more unique is how these guys try to catch the attention of the unvary customers. Some examples:

- Reversible saree: Okay, this is one saree but when worn in four different ways can be four different sarees. Okay figure:

Mami 1 : Ayyo, wat a luvly pattu (Silk) saree.

Mami 2 : Mmm, lovely illa? 30 thoujand rupeez.

Mami 1 : That day you wearing the maganta one. That was also nice.

Mami 2 : Aama, my sun-in-laa, irrukkane Varadharajan, gifted it me.Four silk sarees he bought for me.

Mami 1 : (Going green) Lucky you. My son magesh does not even bother.

Mami 3 : Enna, Kousalya Mami, this is the four side reversible saree from RmKV dhaane. I wanted to buy one, aana did not like the design.

Mami 1 : *gulp*

Mami 2 : Oho... this is the matter aaaa....

- Pocket Saree: (Warning: Ladies, Will sound your typical MCP, pls continue reading if you can control your BP, if not skip this for some great news for the Indian Woman)

These are the latest one to do the rounds. Sarees with pockets. Originally desgined for housing mobiles, the ladies have staretd adapting to this latest innovation. Now they carry their entire makeup kit in that pocket, and since the pallu kinda hides it, the better for them. Well, as a member of the masculinity, i was proud of such a thing. They werent happy with picking up the jeans and t shirts and shirts and suits from us. They werent happy with waxing, they got a razor made for them. Now that they cant go any further without starting to grow a beard, they started copying our stuff onto theirs, and the pocket saree is just the beginning. So, whats next? A pant type saree: the frills of a saree sewed on to a pair of trousers, so that they can wear it like a pant, but will look like a saree....phew...

- The Saree of the Ring : Apparently this saree is so soft and thin that it can pass through a ring. And when folded they can fit into a match box. So , atleast now, husbands can be spared the burden of carrying suitcase after suitcase of heavy Kancheepuram saree. Imagine.

She : Honey, Have you taken my luggage?

He : Ya sweetheart, your pink and red sarees are in my right pocket, and your green and blue sarees are in my left pockets.

She : Cho Chweet, what about my maroon crepe one and my light cream chiffon.

He : No worry, sweetie, on in my shirt pocket and the other is in my wallet. S

he : You are the best. What about the rest of my stuff. He : Oh, I have put them in three suitcases.
Ladies : Are you reaching down for your chappals, or out for any object that can be treated as a weapon, I told you not read it. Read on for the good news.

~ The first arrest under the Domestic Violence Act has happened in Chennai. A guy has been arrested for beating his wife. Ok, did you know of this act. Nopes, i dint. But i did some research, and well, my heart kinda skipped a beat. Now we all know that the authorities are a tad soft towards the fairer sex (though in Chennai the term fairer would not hold any value, every girl here is as dark as the winter nights...Okay Okay...exagerration, but cant play down the fact too, can i?). DV has become the perfect household weapon.

He : Sorry re, office mein kaam hai, i will have to come late.

She : Okay, see you in Jail then.

He : Awww shit...

He : sweetheart, get me a coffee. I am very

She : Why dont you go wash the vessels, then the clothes. Ya, the kid needs a diaper change. He : What are you gonna do?

She : None of your business.

He : Okay, guess i will go to the hotel and have dinner

She : Ok, there is a short cut to the police station from the hotel, take that, i will be waiting there.Dont be long, heard the inspector is pretty short tempered

He : Awww Shit....

So, the perfect weapon for them. I want to meet all those males who signed off on this bill.

A day In the Indian Train

An urgent trip to Bangalore landed me in the second class seater and also an opportunity to meet the average indian train traveller. That the three seater was comfortable only for two people was coupled with the fact that for a collossal rearside like mine required half of the seat did not help my seat mates. Well, that was their problem i reckoned, and pushed myself farther in.
And when the magazine supply ran out, I did what i always do. Nothing but staring, and i started to notice the various types of people. And with my tremendous experience in psychological profiling, here are the kinds of travellers.

The first of the kind are the Flaunters, the guys who were supposed to be in showbiz but couldnt make it.These are the things that they showoff:

Mobiles : Come on, camera mobiles are dime a dozen nowadays, but these gentlemen would take their mobiles out with a flourish and keep peddling and pressing. And if the group is two or more, then it is an exchange mela.

"Hey,do you have any good tones, send them thru bluetooth"

And if the other guy doesnt have that, then he is given a look reserved for the vermins.

Highend reading material : Imagine, one guy in front of me was reading Stephen Hawkings " A Brief History of Time", and i thought ok. I noticed after sometime that the number of pages read have come down. Oh! sir did u start reading the book from the middle. Who are you trying to impress?

IPods : Walkmen seem to have taken a complete makeover with the new Ipods, and there were this gang of young folk who moved back and forth with that flat thing hanging from their "dilly dallying to the music" neck.

The second are the Consumers: They buy everything that comes in the way. Its like the guys in the pantry car have been subcontracted to this person. Any point of time, there is atleast one vendor standing along with this guy.

And this is the count i had of one of the gentlemen:

6 Teas

2 Tomato Soups

3 Soft drinks

5 rounds of vadas and Bajjis

1 round Masala Dosa

1 round bread omlette

1 packet of Lays

1 Packet orange

1 Childrens Joke Book

1 Famous facts of the world book

1 Easy to learn science book

1 Automatic reacharge torch

1 Set of 10 pens

The third of the Kind are the Rebels. They bend the rules, and go by the out of ordinary. I classified them as three types

- I dont need the bloody seat. No matter they have reserved seats, they keep tanding at the door.

- Frequent trips to the loo for a smoke. Smoking on a train is punishable, but hell, the train loos are not on the train, are they?

- The Hopping Robins: They need to get on and off at every station, and they just do it for the heck of it.

The fourth : The Dalals : These are the guys who curse when the mobile network is not in reach, and each time the train slows down, or is coming to a station, their cellfones are glues to their ears.

Mobile fone with camera : Rs 5000

Train Ticket to Bangalore : Rs 200

Irritation when the darned network is not available : Priceless

The fifth are the Frequent Travellers : Their suitcase contains everything for their daily survival. They change into a lungi the minute the train leaves the station. They then eat, brush, and pull out a quilt kind of thing and put it on the berth for them to sleep on. Then they pull out an air pillow blow into it. They then take a pillow cover, insert the blown pillow into it, and place it in the corner. The next item to come out is a bed sheet. They then remove their shirts and in a banian slip under the bed sheet. It would just be a matter of seconds they are snoring away to glory. Morning would find them dutifully next to the wash, brushing and shaving. I wanted to find out whether they bathe on train, but the bathroom doors are opaque. :))

Well that about it I think. Pls feel free to add more.