High Fives...

Thanks CB for tagging me, here it goes..

Five movies which I like the most

1. The Matrix (not the entire trilogy)- for its sheer brilliance ! While at college, this movie was the default afternoon/evening movie, when no other movie was available in Hostel. Ended up watching this for over 100 times :)
2. Forrest Gump- absolutely entertaining. Tom Hanks rocks !
3. The Godfather- (This reminds me of famous Meg Ryan dialogue in "You've got mail"- "What is it about men and Godfather?"). Also, this was one of the rare movies which was as good as the book on which it was based.
4. The Shawshank Redemption- awesome prison drama, Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins at their best !
5. Citizen Kane- This is one movie which made my jaws drop. How can Orson Welles ever think of such story telling and Cinematography techniques, that too in 1941? Aviator, which was a shameless copy of Citizen Kane(concept wise) comes nowhere close.

Five things I can never live without

1. Food- for obvious reasons
2. Music- my life, keeps loneliness away
3. Internet- main means of communication with all my friends
4. Cell Phone- extension of my arm
5. Excel- infact I am typing this out in excel and then cut-paste to editor :)

Five most favourite celebrities

1. Salman Rushdie
2. Eric S.Raymond
3. Bono
4. Kalanidhi Maran
5. Lance Armstrong

Five things I miss now

1. Someone's best (wont make sense to anyone else except one)
2. College Days- Almost everyday I utter about my college life to someone,it taught me a lot about Life, Universe and everything else
3. Home food :(
4. Fun time with College Wingies- Life would have been more fun if we were all together. But due to various commitments we are scattered all over the globe.
5. Physical Activity- Hate to say "No time" for this ! I used to go for swimming…

Five things I plan to do in near future

1. Buy a Laptop
2. Do something more technical( if you know my work, you will understand this better)
3. Be more organized, I have an action plan for this :)
4. December trip with my friends (yet to plan)
5. Learn something new, outside office

Last movie I borrowed to watch & still not given back

Gajini- To add to this, one of my colleagues has borrowed this CD from me and he hasn't returned it to me yet !

Five books I love

1. Midnights Children- Rushdie's masterpiece, though Woodworm thinks "Ground Beneath her feet" to be the best
2. Lord of the Rings- Once I started reading this book, I never put it down! Finished the entire trilogy in about 10 days( which is a personal best for me ;) )
3. Three Men in a boat- British comedy, loved reading it !
4. Harry Potter series- Gripping !
5. The Dilbert Principle- Must read for everyone spending 1/3rd of their day in Office Cubicle :)

Five people I pass this HIGH FIVES to

1. Hapi
2. Sundi
3. Subbu
4. Balaji
5. Dileepan

Five Point someone..

First, the good news: I have come out of my reader's block ! I finished reading two books in the last 5 days !! My first dream date was with "Three Men in a Boat", a british comedy which narrates the adventure of a boat ride along the Rives Thames (@Woodworm: I did find a mention of Reading in this :) )

The second book that i read was "Five point someone" by Chetan Bhagat. Though i wont say it is a literary masterpiece and stuff like that, i would recommend this book to anyone who has done their Bachelors/Masters degree in a residential School. I drowned into my college days as i read this book, i can faintly correlate Ryan,Alok and Hari to some of my collegemates, this also brought back some of the sweet memories, the fun we had...Well, its all like a dream ! Those are the best days of my life ..

One specific incident which came to my mind and which i want to share is the day when me and Woodworm decided to bunk General Biology class for the first time, that was perhaps the first time we even thought of bunking a session, Woodworm was so hungry and he wanted to help himself with a cup of tea and few sams@Nagarji's, but i felt so guilty of bunking a class. Finally, Woodworm's will power prevailed and we bunked the class, with a heavy heart !! That was the beginning of it and now i realize that we hardly attended any classes after the first test series. Now i guess Woodworm has no option, LOL :))

This is how my day looks like when i am in chennai..

Wake up at around 7 AM, read Newspaper/magazines till 9 AM, take bath,gobble food by 10 AM, then sleep for abt an hour, then browse/chat/fiddle with computer, lazy afternoon nap with Pink Floyd, Dire straits, Led Zep, kenny G in the background, nice Dosas and coffee at abt 3 PM, go out somewhere and come back home by 7 PM, talk with my parents, siblings, watch TV, then dinner and off to sleep by 10 PM :)

Holiday Update

I am taking off for a week, will be back to Bangalore on Nov 7 :)

Wish u all a very Happy Diwali and Ramzan.

Its raining men..Hallelujah !

Its raining cats and dogs in the Silicon Valley of India ! Most of them are stuck in their offices, with so much of flooding and traffic on roads. Most part of the city is under water, i guess this is very similar to the recent Bombay rains. Already email forwards depicting the flood situation is bombarding most mail servers(what else will S/W engineers stranded in office do at this time?). At the moment, All i can say is that i have never seen such a rainfall in my life time !

Reader's block..


I am going through a Reader's block, which appears to be quite severe this time. I wont call myself a voracious reader, when compared to chaps like Woodworm(in his former prime perhaps ;) ), who eats, sleeps and drinks any written material. I used to finish a book in 30-45 days. Depending on that book, I decide whether to read another one or lay low for a while. If I have a block, I stop reading for say 10-15 days and then start with another book. But this time, my reader's block is spanning months ! During this period, I have started a lot of new books and left them halfway through. Here is the list of books that I started (but never really completed):



1. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Suggested by my friend Mathi, I started reading this last October. Then came a series of US trips and I could never really complete it. But so far what i have read, it was pretty good.

2. Cloud Atlas
Woodworm's parting gift to me, yet to turn the first page ;)

3. Focault's pendulum- Umberto Eco
Recommended by Ditch long back, did not start !

4. The Art of Unix Programming - Eric Raymond
Purchased last year in one of the Book fairs that happened at Office, it is supposed to explain the "Zen Principles" behind Unix. I made fairly good progress, but something struck me hard in my head and I had to throw it in bin !

5. Three Men in a Boat - Jerome K Jerome
Started this after my Hampi trip, if I were in a good mood, I would have completed this 100 odd pages book in 2 days. Somewhere I lost the enthu and thats the end of story for that read. Anyway, I plan to read it during my Chennai trip next weekend.

6. The Mythical man month
S/W engineering book, what else can I say? I was so glad to read the first few pages of the book, especially when the author(a Project Manager at IBM) pin pointed that the main problem with S/W engineering is Estimation. Will probably read it sometime next year..

7. Godel Escher Bach..
Recommended by Woodworm, crossed the 75 page mark recently ! I would say it is a good progress, considering the content of the book. I heard that freeingmind is also reading this ...

I started Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, I hope I complete it successfully and come out of my block!


Wishlist :
Life of Pi - RSAS guys, lemme have the book, I know it is either Zygote or Freeing mind
Shalimar the clown- Rushdie rocks, always !
Works of Ayn Rand- I reserved this for post retirement life, but due to mounting pressure from Ayn rand fans, i am starting this earlier, probably by Jan 2006 :)


Now Playing : "Jeremiah Blues" - Sting

A quizmaster named Parnab..

For all those who have been in the quizzing circuit of BITS, the name Parnab Mukherjee would bring roars of laughter. I still remember the quiz where Venky walked out of the quiz, as he couldn't bear the rude comments made on him by Parnab. Also, i guess that was the quiz where he demonstrated the "Fart of the year", giving a new funda for the Indian Rock band "Thermal and a Quarter" ( picture Ditch's sad face here)

I just had a chance to read his exploits in Pune and other Indian cities here . That bloke definetely has a huge fan following ...

Tamil Cinema and Modern Women
I was watching this tamil movie in one of the zillion channels available on Cable, it was about some 21st Century tamil woman, narrating what interests her the most. I was just thinking that she will have Bharathiyar Poetry in her list and hey Presto ! She did say that she liked Bharathiyar Poetry. Now guys, gimme a break, why does any typical "Modern Women" like Bharathiyar poetry? It sounds too banal, why can't they change this trend for good? Why not Vairamuthu poetry or Karunanidhi's Prison diaries? Dont they find any other interesting thing, which is somewhat different from another Modern Woman? This kinda bothers me so much, huh !

On Brand Ambassadors...

I got a chance to watch this show called "I-to-I" on NDTV, where the celebrities play a dual role of interviewer and the interviewee. The episode that i watched featured Vijay Mallya, where he kinda proved why he is considered as Richard Branson of India :) . One valid point he made is that he doesn't need any movie star / celebrity to be his brand ambassador, as he himself plays that role for the UB group. That was a valid claim. I just tried to think about other Indian Big shots, who double up as the brand ambassadors for their own companies. Some non-IT Indian names that came up to my mind are Vasanth Kumar (Vasanth & CO), Selvarathnam (Saravana stores), Balu(Balu Jewellers)... strange, all Chennai big shots! Help me build up this list...

Quote of the day

"I wouldn't call this a sport. It would take a lot for the England cricket team to make a movie. Footballers are great actors anyway – all you have to do is touch them on the ankle and they roll over screaming for a penalty."

- Kevin Pieterson, while attending the premiere of football film "Goal"