I dream of.....

being a Show-Man!!

Yes, thats true. My most frequent dream (be it a day dream or while I'm asleep) is that I'm performing on stage before a huge audience. In fact if someone has to ask me about my dream profession it will be being a stage performer, no second thoughts to it! I love singing, though my voice doesnt support me much :-) I also love to perform on stage, but there also I'm not that good. But given those hard facts, I've still done both of them with singing restricted till school. Dancing, I started late in school and enjoyed the most in college! After that also I've been dancing a lot at different occasions, but it was more of a group dance on the music played by some DJ at office or some club. I haven't given any performances as such after the college. At college I also participated in a skit (GOTF will always cherish that), debates and anchored shows.

But whatever, my dreams will still allow me to pursue my passion of being a showman - now and forever! And its not only the dreams, I'll keep on singing, dancing and performing on stage whenever I get an opportunity!! So people, are you ready for the torture? :-)

Life is Beautiful

It has been a while that I am able to find some time for myself. Again!! I think this syndrome strikes me now and then. Why? Am I slow or am I bogged up with too many things at the same time. Well, I’m sure and my wife also agrees that I’m not slow. It’s that I take too many things in my plate and try to eat them all and eat them in a well organized and systematic way. So if I see the current situation, my “platter” includes:
1. Family attention and frequent travel
2. Coordinating College Alumni site development
3. Helping Fund collection for College sports event
4. Office projects
5. My transfer status between offices
6. Investing and tracking my portfolio
7. Writing blog as frequently as possible :)

So the two key points are:
1. Lot of things at the same time, and
2. Working systematically

Both these two points add to the lack of time in my life (at least assume for now!). But if I introspect, the good thing is that there is room for everything! I mean I don’t see complaining to myself that I’m unable to do something because I don’t have time. It’s always that I say I don’t have time for myself and not for anything else.

So the next moot point is, am I neglecting myself. Well, I think that’s also not correct because:
1. I make sure that I see my face couple of times in the mirror and apply some day/night cream :-)
2. I make sure that I’m eating good and eating right (though my wife will disagree on this!!)
3. I involve in some physical activity – either some sport or exercising at home
4. I involve in some religious activities
5. I make sure that I call my close ones every now and then – this helps in satiating my hunger to remain connected!
6. I’m almost up-to-date in the Hindi movies arena

So why am I cribbing… I’m doing so much for myself. It’s just the perception. Change it!!
Sorry guys for wasting your time… I’ve no complaints whatsoever :-)

Life is beautiful!

New Roof on the top!

Finally I've moved out of the corporate guest "house" and moved to my new "home"... the feeling is a bit mixed...on one hand i've the pain of leaving the luxury of the guest house wherein I can leave my bed messed up in the morning with my towel lying somewhere and when I come back in the evenig its all spic-n-span!! water bottles filled up, heaters on (a great luxury in such chilly weather), hot water available 24hrs a day... wow... BUT all this cannot belittle the happiness that I've inside for setting up my new place... sooner or later I had to do it and I think this is the right time at the right place... till now I've been out of sync with so many things like getting a gas connection, buying household stuff, maintainig cleanliness etc etc... so many things to do... and believe me I've loving it... I think everyone gets this feeling and its definitely worth experiencing... all those discussions with wife which thing to buy, what color, what size :)) its neat...

There is so much to do.... i better kick start again...... cya...

FEATURE_ERROR_USER_OPEN_NO_ACCESS

Like millions of users all the across the globe, I tried logging into my yahoo mailbox this morning. but hey whats going on, the application is not accepting my user id and password. I quickly did a sanity check for the CAPS lock. Has my account hacked or something? Noooo :-((

Then the next thing i tired was to change my password. But the application gave me the following error: "FEATURE_ERROR_USER_OPEN_NO_ACCESS". Now what is this? I started feeling a bit of shock and tried to google this message. I found lot many people are facing this issue and are worried. But i was now relaxed since i'm not the only one in the apin and i was sure Yahoo will surely look into this soon.

On googling I found that the error "FEATURE_ERROR_USER_OPEN_NO_AC mean:
FEATURE_ERROR - the feature from Yahoo! which you are trying to use for that particular ID is unavailable
USER_OPEN - the user ID which you are trying to reset the password cannot be opened for recovery
NO_ACCESS - currently you are not allowed to access the specified user ID

With so many important information packed in our yahoo (or for that matter any mailbox), have we ever thought what will happen if suddenly all these mailboxes stop working or the services are discontinued??

Keep yourself ready........

pss.... yahoo mailbox services are restored!!! :)) YAHOOOOOOOOO!!

Productivity Improvement through Reuse

This is the poster that I along with Divesh and Vikrant made for the above mentioned theme. Still waiting for the results :-)

Changing gears in Davos

The Annual meeting of World Economic Forum for 2008 is in session at Davos. A lot many distinguised people from finance world, politics, manufacturing, media etc are present there to discuss the issues facing the world right now. In normal circumstances, the meeting would have focused the collaboration that's needed for the peace in Middle East, making use of the latest technologies for fighting against social and environmental issues or to discuss the prospects of Pakistan and Afghanistan. But here comes the thunderball. A lot of energy would now be spent on the US recession and its impact on the economy across the globe.

Till now people have been optimist. Yes, there is a credit crunch due to reckless lending in the subprime mortgage category, and also in property and credit cards - but we will handle it. Another perscpective was that growth is very powerful in India, China and middle east - that will wither the American storm.

But "Decoupling" is not working. The fear has crept in big time. The insatiable desire for cunsumer stuff in US (much of it made in China) is now making the growth charts go southwards. Recession gurus are saying, "we are almost there"!

10 ways to stop those marketing calls

Disclaimer: These are not my ideas, I got it as a forward and I doing what I do best - "copy-paste".

1. After the telemarketer finishes speaking, ask him/her to marry you.
2. Tell the telemarketer you are busy at the moment, and ask him/her if he/she will give you his/her home phone number so you can call him/her back.
3. Ask them to repeat everything they say, several times.
4. Tell them it is dinner time, BUT ask if they would please hold. Put them on your speaker phone while you continue to eat at your leisure. Smack your food loudly and continue with your dinner conversation.
5. Tell them that all business goes through your agent, and hand the phone to your five year old child.
6. Tell them you are hard of hearing and that they need to speak up...louder...louder...louder!
7. Tell them to speak very slowly because you want to write every word down.
8. If they start out with, "How are you today?", say "I'm so glad you asked, because no one these days seems to care, and I have all these problems............"
9. Cry out in surprise, "Helen, is that you? I've been hoping you'd call! How is the family?" When they insist they are not Helen, tell them to stop joking. This works especially well if the telemarketer is really MALE.
10. Tell the HSBC call center guy to call on your office number - and give him the ICICI call center number.

Any additions??