Moment of Inertia [ Hiran ]

An important week ahead

Next week is very important, to me and to INXS. All the hard work put into by me, by entire INXS for the last 8-10 weeks is going to see some light. It is not the end of the tunnel. But a small break in the tunnel to expose what the team has done till now.

Keeping fingers crosses, as someone said, being `cautiously optimistic'.

All the best to INXS.

Beginning the year with mixed events

Before, I mention, how 2009 has begun for me, I will list down something about my eventful 2008.

• my sister as well as myself fell for chicken pox, one after the other.
• 4 of my very close relatives, committing suicide.
• one of my cousin sisters getting married
• one of my best friends, escaping a not so fatal accident
• one of my best friends, effected by recession
• one of my best friends, going the family way
• some of my colleagues, including my CEO, going the family way
• INXS tying up with TD Ameritrade, and stamping on our vision for Unified Brokerage Access Channel
• launching our Mobile application for trading with TD Ameritrade.
• one of my cousins getting into PhD Sanskrit, following in the footsteps of my grandpa.
• Amma, succumbing to office politics and resigning, later coming to stay with me.

I know the list is endless.

After all this, I thought, may be this year I will see more good news than bad news. But, I was in for a surprise.

• expanded our device coverage for the trading application.
• in talk with some more big brokers, for expansion of business
• one of my cousin's marriage getting fixed
• one of my cousins, getting a divorce notice (shockingly), after 1.5 years of marriage

It has been a month in 2009, with full of mixed emotions. A prayer for giving courage and peace of mind, for things beyond our control, and a constructive attitude towards things that are is in our control, is what I am looking forward to.

I have been selfish, in mentioning events, only having direct relation to me. Those are things, which I feel, everyone is effected and does not need to be explicit.

Still, positive for the year ahead.

Rockstar Developer

Govi and I are ROCKSTAR developers at INXS.

Well, this happened last week, amidst too many things. TD Ameritrade, made it public, about our Blackberry Application for Ameritrade users. See the details for their `pr' release here. I was responsible for integrating our platform's back-end with TD Ameritrade, and Govi was responsible for the Blackberry client application.

Remains of a chair

I had earlier posted about, how I am responsible for breaking chairs in my office. Well, few days back, I was again bang on target. Well the chair was already broken, which I realized, when I sat on it. When Kumaresan, sat on it, it broke into pieces, making a loud noise. Well, since I was sitting on it earlier, I became the culprit.

the chair broke in an unrepairable condition. Look at these.

May the chair rest in peace.

Putting on weight

People usually do not associate `putting on weight` with people on the heavier side. After seeing a person more than 6 feet tall, and weighing more than 100kg's, it is embarrassing to say he has put on weight.

Same is the case with me. I have been a bit consistent in maintaining my weight for the last 5-6 years, between 100 and 110. So even an increase of 5 kilos, say from 103 to 108, people don't see a significant change, and even if they see, they don't mention it.

Now that Amma is in Chennai, I am enjoying life, in having proper food. From morning tea to dinner, everything is addressed, even if I don't have to move my ass from my seat. I am that relaxed. If someone says that, your mental health effects your physical health also, it is true. It has been only 5 days, since Amma came to Chennai, and I have already started feeling the extra kilos.

Will it be a different story for me, as far as putting on weight is concerned? Will have to wait and see.

Furnishing your place

Furnishing your place of stay is one of the things that you ponder over and over again before taking a decision. Well that all comes after you round off your place of stay after several days of searching and negotiating.

I had allocated a part of my savings to furnish my new rented house. Starting from a sofa set for your living room to your cot in the bedroom, the story is same. Thoughts like, what kind of, from where, how much, is it reasonable cross your mind quite often and one can get confused with these. Solving one by one may help if you have surplus money, but if you have to budget your expenses month by month, then finding a reasonable solution to your problem set sometimes becomes difficult.

Last Sunday, I happened to visit some furniture marts looking for cot, dining table set, TV stand, sofa set. Problem with me is, I cannot fit in a regular 6.6 ft x 3 ft single cot. I need the extra length to stretch my legs, and for that I needed a customized cot with a customized mattress. Well, some of them told that they cannot customize because everything come as `industry standards' and work is basically machine cutting and not manual work. One of the showrooms did tell that they will customize but take 1 month for delivery. When I got the estimate (30000/-) from them, only for the customized cot and mattress, I got the shock of my life. Suddenly, all sorts of numbers started crossing my mind, the same questions started creeping in. I even thought of getting things done in Kerala and transporting them to Chennai. I had reached a point where, I was multi-processing different solutions taking into account two cases of a fixed as well as flexible budget.

It was then, my friend told me that there is a mart which makes household furnitures and is pretty reasonable too. 2 days later, i.e. on Tuesday, we went to the mart, told our requirements and asked him to put an estimate. It was damn reasonable and he promised delivery in 10 days. 2 single cots and mattress (customized), a 4 seater dining table, a tv stand, a small stool, a living room set (3 + 2 seater + 1 tea poy) all came to 40000. Cot will be of teak wood, as well as the chairs for the dining table. Very reasonable and will even beat the cost of making them in kerala and transporting it to chennai.

What else, I can now concentrate on getting other things like a TV, a fridge, washing machine, gas connection, etc.

Shifting Place

I am shifting my place of stay from Triplicane to Kotturpuram. Two and a half years in mansion is something no one would like to go through. A 70 sqft area for 2 people to sleep and a 18 sqft area as an attached bathroom. There is literally no place to move, forget stretching your arms after a nap.

I was searching for a house for a long long time, which I finally got at Kotturpuram, in a very nice residential area. The owners are very nice people. They handed over the keys today only. Tomorrow, I will officially start living there. Feeling so happy to have finally come out of Triplicane.

For those who are thinking, whether I am going to get married, `NO' will be my answer. Amma wants to spend Onam with me in Chennai.

All the best to me for a new beginning.

Breaking a chair

Couple of days back, I was embarrassed in office with breaking one of the wheels of a chair. I was sitting on that chair and having an intense discussion with one of my colleagues, when there was a big noise followed with something moving right on the floor. It moved to almost 10 feet from my chair until it came to rest. It was the caster wheel which broke along with the portion of its pivot. A moment of scare for some, a surprised look for others, but I was laughing within myself. I thought of ignoring what had happened. But couldn't manage for long. Venkat came around to see what happened and I had to pick up the caster wheel and show it to him as if `what can i do? the chair is off poor quality`.

I was fine until that point, when people started commenting on what I should do, what Venkat should do etc. The best part was, when one suggested that the new corporate policy will be to deduct cost of such wear and tear from the salary.

In the 26 months that I have spent here, I have broken 8 chairs, the last one being the biggest, since the chair is in irreparable condition.

 

Social Crime

You are walking down a street in the night, and you want to cross the road, when a motor bike without headlight switched on, races down across you. Escaped by inches.

You are trying to board a bus, for which you keep your hands on the support rods. You take your hand off it and realize that something is sticking on to your hand, and it just extends as you move away your hand from the rod. You realize that you had kept your hand on chewing gum stuck by someone on the rod.

It is ten in the night and the bus does not stop at the bus stop. You take an auto.

You are in a hotel, and waiter brings a glass of water for you. He puts his fingers in the water as soon as he realizes that you are watching his hands. You automatically order for a bottle of water.

These are some crimes that people commit in the so called civilized society. I have started to believe that no one is true to self in this world. I have learnt from `Bhagvad Gita` that realization of self is the best one can do in his or her life on earth. But is that possible in Kaliyug?

2 @ INXS, 26 overall

Ever wondered, why time moves so fast and does not wait for anyone? Infact a unit of time, i.e. a second, is just enough for, 9,192,631,770 cycles of the radiation corresponding to the transition between two electron spin energy levels of the ground state of the Caesium atom. Yeah, it's really fast.

Yesterday Amma was advising me on enjoying bachelorhood, as these days will never come back. The statement template sounds similar. Try out, removing `bachelorhood', with `childhood'.

Well, Amma had a point. Looking at all my married friends and relatives, I realize, Amma has a point. So now the big question, how do I enjoy bachelorhood? Ideas requested from readers.

Apart from completing 26 years of my life, I completed 2 years at INXS Technologies last week. It has been fantastic so far, primarily because I am living life at INXS.