This is an actual conversation I had with someone they told me was a "Tech Support" person at Cingular, which is my cellphone service provider. And this was after I'd spent around 30 minutes on the phone with "Customer Care" and they decided they'd transfer me to someone who was "more equipped" to help me.

Support: Hi, and how may I help you today?
Me: Well, I'm calling because as of last Thursday, I've stopped receiving text messages from India.
S: You've started receiving text messages?
Me: No, I've stopped receiving text messages from India.
S: Okay, you've stopped receiving messages.
Me: Yes. People send me messages, but they never reach me. (Just in case she thought I was calling to complain that no one messages me anymore)
S: Okay. And what would you like to do today?
Me: (Speechless for a few seconds) I'd... like to know why I'm not getting messages from India anymore.

No, seriously. This is not a joke. That's one person who'd fail the Turing test. Or maybe she had a two-minute memory.

It turned out, by the way - another 30 minutes later - that I wasn't actually speaking to Tech Support, since Customer Care had forwarded me back to Customer Care.

Yes, I know the holiday season isn't exactly here yet, and Christmas is a long time away. But Santa dropped by this afternoon. No, really!

Remember that book-store I wrote about recently?

Well Santa just gave me two $50 gift cards to the store! $100 of books! I suddenly feel like a kid in a candy store. With mommy paying the bills!

Long live Santa!

As of this week, there is a brand new Borders bookstore on the ground floor of the building I work in. And along with a very large collection of books, they've got at least 40 shelves full of science fiction and fantasy. While they don't have every Discworld novel ever written (but then that's ok, since I do), they do have difficult to get Terry Pratchett titles like Nanny Ogg's Cookbook and Where's My Cow?.

And they've got offers like "Buy 2 books and get the 3rd free" and "20% off".

I'm so screwed.

Update: It's worse than I thought. Their SFF section is not just 40 shelves. It's 139 (yes, I counted). And that's not counting the 30 shelves filled with extra copies of the bestsellers. And the store occupies at least two floors.

I'm so so screwed.

I just found out from the The Unknown Indian's blog that Vasantahabba has been cancelled for the second year in a row. Vasantahabba, is a festival of dance and music that runs from sunset to sunrise on the first weekend of February, on the outskirts of Bangalore. It is usually held at Nrityagram, the dance school founded by the late Protima Bedi. 2005 saw the organizers canceling it to pay respect to the memory of the victims of the December 2004 Tsunami. This year though, the festival was cancelled due to lack of funds.

I attended Vasantahabba on a visit to Bangalore in 2001 and have been aching to go back ever since. It was definitely one of the best experiences I've had, ever. To find out how to make sure there is a Vasantahabba 2007, check this post.

I'm in Bombay for the weekend on some personal work and have been seeing huge billboards all over the place advertising the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival. From coverage at the official blog it seems to be an event that no art lover in Bombay should miss. Now I don't consider myself to be one of those artsy/intellectual types, but I'm still not happy that I'm probably not going to be able to take advantage of my trip to Bombay to see some of the events, like for example "Prayog" - An experiment in Bharatnatyam at Rampart Row.

But if you can, do check out the schedule and take advantage of this once-a-year amalgam of art. There's an HTML-only version of the schedule here if you have any trouble with the PDF link.

Update: Do check out the contests hosted at Caferati as part of the fest. The deadline for the Flash Fiction contest is gone (unless there's another extension) but the SMS Poetry contest is still on. So get your entries in quick!

There's a concierge service in the office. Which means that you can book movie tickets, train tickets, bus tickets, and pay your bills, all without leaving the office.

Yes. The management is really smart.

Well, I approached the concierge desk today, as I was planning to spend new year's eve with friends in Bangalore.

"Hi," I said. "I want to book tickets for Bangalore this weekend. To Bangalore Friday night, and back Sunday morning."

"Are tickets available?"

For a second, I wondered why my voice sounded different. And then I realized that the guy at the desk was asking me.

I looked around a little to ensure that I wasn't talking to the wrong person.

Nope. The board on his desk said "Concierge Desk". Right Desk at least.

"You work for the concierge service, right?" I asked, wanting to be sure.

"Yes, of course," he said, pointing to the board.

"So," I tried again. "About those tickets..."

"Are they available?" he repeated.

"Umm... err.."

"If you can find out if tickets are available, that would be helpful," he continued. "How much do the tickets cost?"

I didn't know what to say. I still don't.

I'm not very good with remembering faces. In fact, I'm not very good with names either. And to be frank, I'm even less good at putting names and faces together.

It's not that I have a memory problem, as such. Not at all. I still remember climbing up and down the staircase in my uncle's house in London when I was two. I also remember befriending a priest on the flight back home. I remember things I did in the US when I was nine. I even remember conversations I've had when I was ten.

But when it comes to faces and names, I think the associated part of my brain is probably missing some nervous tissue. (Yes, I know. The whole of my brain is probably missing some nervous tissue. But can we not get into that now?)

To give you an example, every time I return to Chennai after a trip to the US, I bump into people who I'm supposed to know, but I just cannot place. I may be casually walking towards the cafeteria, when someone vaguely familiar will come up and say "Hi!"

Now, I may not be a master of tact, but I do try my best (yes, I know it isn't good enough, but that's another story) not to be rude. So instead of saying "Who are you?" I say "Hi", ask some random questions like "So which project are you working for now?" and "How are you doing?" and move on, wondering where I know this person from. Attempts at looking at their ID card to get their name, are not always successful. After all I don't want it to be obvious.

There are some people who I know quite well, and remember exactly how I know them, but their names will always elude me. Then there are people whose names I remember very clearly, but I would have trouble recognizing exactly which of the four people sitting in that room is, say, "Mahesh".

A friend once introduced me to his girlfriend, who seemed to know me, though I didn't recognize her at all. "We played carrom together earlier this year," she said. "Oh yes!" was my reply. I still don't know what she was talking about.

A couple of weeks ago, I was passing someone in the corridor who looked familiar, and immediately said "Hi!" Now it would have been fine, except that she seemed a little taken aback at this, even though she did respond. In the sixty seconds that I spent talking to her, I realized she was probably just someone I'd seen around the office and had never actually spoken to, and that she was just too polite to point that out. I still don't know what her name is.

And yesterday, I ran into someone who (1) did not look familiar and (2) whose name I did not recognize either. That, of course, didn't stop us from having a conversation that lasted at least two minutes. I even answered his question of "So how long has it been since we met last?", correctly. I was pretty proud of myself at that. I have this sneaky suspicion though, that I really don't know him and that he actually mistook me for someone else.

But the most interesting example of this fault of mine is from a while back.

(Note: Names have been altered)

I'd joined a new project at work, and was told I'd be working with Bhavna, though we wouldn't be sitting together initially. Bhavna was someone I'd seen around the office and whose name I definitely recognized, though I may have only spoken to her once.

She'd come over to my seat, we'd discussed something, and I'd then proceeded to work in it. At some point, I decided I wasn't clear about something and that I needed to discuss it further. I'd forgotten to take her extension, so I decided I'd just go over to her seat and talk to her. She only sat a couple of cubicles away anyway.

[For the benefit of the non-technically inclined out there, and also due to non-disclosure agreements with our clients, I'm going to replace all the technical words in the following conversation with completely irrelevant non-technical ones. It won't make any sense either way.]

Me: Hey Bhavna, I have a question about the {evolutionary tendencies of tadpoles}...

She: [turning to me, and realizing that I'm speaking to her] Oh, I'm sorry, I wasn't listening. Can you please start again?

Me: Oh. Okay. Well, it's about the {tadpoles} see? I mean I know we're supposed to {get them to give birth to monkeys} but don't you think that {was exactly what my mother warned me about} ? See, on the one hand you have {tadpoles} and on the other hand you have {orangutans} and somehow I think they just don't seem to go together. I mean even if we could get that to happen, {who would feed the little apes}? There'll always be the risk of {the babies swallowing their moms}...

[She'd looked quite blank when I'd started speaking, and she continued to look just as blank as I rambled on. And then I realized that that wasn't Bhavna. I knew her, and had spoken to her before - spoken to her more than I'd spoken to Bhavna at least - but she definitely was not Bhavna. And she'd probably not heard me call her that either.]

Me: Well, anyway, so I was a little confused about that. By the way, do you know where Bhavna sits?

She: [probably thinking I was a little nuts (okay, extremely nuts)] Oh, I think over in that cubicle.

Me: Thanks.

[At this point, I sort of slinked away.]

Imagine talking to two different people over a period of time - people who don't even look alike - and believing they are the same person. At least Jaggu had an excuse in Chaalbaaz (1989).

So, now that you know my little secret, the next time you run into me, and go "Hi! Where have you been?!", if I look a little blank, please don't mind, okay?

Warning: This is a pointless post. As in, it's more pointless than my usual posts. So if you are interested in reading the usual comparatively less-pointless stuff that I irregularly churn out, come back in a couple of days. I'll try to make sure you're not disappointed.

It's been a hectic two weeks selling my car, TV, Foosball table, and other assorted stuff, wrapping up work, and packing everything I own into two suitcases. There's been no time to blog, and even lesser time to respond to comments. And now I'm finally back in Aamchi Mumbai for a couple of weeks of vacation time before I get back to the grind in Chennai.

I've observed a few things in the last few days, though.

Air India isn't that bad

No, really. They're not as rude as, say, Air France, not as off-schedule as, say, North-West, and not as uncomfortable as Biman Air. They get you from one spot to the other, and they do it fairly well considering that they have a plane full of Indians to deal with at the same time.

I'd forgotten how warm Bombay can be in October

It's raining in Chennai these days, and even that city has lower temperature than aamchi Mumbai. Thank goodness for air-conditioning.

I hate Zee TV more than I thought I did

I mean, really. My mother insists on watching every episode of every Ekta Kapoor show on TV, and I can't bring myself to be in the same room when one of them is running, for more than five minutes at a time.

Broadband in India is expensive

I mean MTNL wants me to pay Rs 1199 (a month!) for a 256 kbps connection with a 1.25 GB download limit. And my brother's 64 kbps/unlimited download cable connection doesn't allow me to set up my router so I can hook my laptop into the connection. Well, at least they say I can't. To he** with them.

I may call it writer's block, but I'm just too darned lazy

Really. I've been sitting on at least five blog ideas for a couple of months now. And instead of putting pen to paper (or to be more accurate, finger to keyboard), I've been spending my time reading Schlock Mercenary, Real Life Comics, and Down To Earth. I'll tell you, Web Comics can be extremely addictive. Specially if you decide you want to read through all the archives.

Enough rambling, I think. I intend to be back to more-frequent-than-regular blogging in the next couple of days.

No. It's not this blog's birthday.

First of all, I prefer the term blog-anniversary. So if anything, it is one day past the first anniversary of this blog. Not a blog birthday. Not a blog anniversary. Okay?

So now you're going to say that that's not true. The earliest post on this blog seems to be posted on the 17th of April, last year. Well see, that was just to throw you off. *evil grin*

I did start blogging on the 17th of April in 2004. But that was on Sulekha. That "blog" if you want to call it that, can be found here. The first post on this blog was posted on the 5th of June, 2004. Once I started blogging here a little more regularly, I just copied my first ever blog post to this site, with the original date. Why? Oh, it felt like the right thing to do at the time.

Anyway. So, what else is special today?

Let's see. It's the 6th of June in the year 2005. That's 6/6/5. So one year from now, the date will be 6/6/6. The year of the Devil is just a year away.

Yes, I know. Very funny.

So, I've been blogging here for more than a year now. What next?

Well, I have a couple of things on my mind. First, hopefully, I'll start blogging everyday again. (Of course, that's probably just wishful thinking).

The other thing I've been thinking about, is starting a blog version of a soap opera. Why? Oh, just like that. It's something to do. In general of course, I've always been afraid of sharing a half-finished story with the world. But I'vevjust begun writing a story for which I don't have a specific end in mind, and I think I'll have to watch it evolve over an extended period of time, to see where it goes. And now I've experimented with episodic blogging in the Celestial Conversations, so I'm just a little more comfortable with the idea of publishing an incomplete story.

I've read stories split over multiple parts on blogs before. One of my favourite bloggers who does this, calls herself Fizo_Al on Sulekha. She now also blogs on blogger sometimes. Of course, I haven't read any of her latest stories, but they used to be quite interesting to follow.

What I'm going to attempt, though, isn't supposed to have a specific end. At least not yet. So writing something, and then not being able to go back and change it, is a little scary.
Still, let's see.

So does that mean that there will be no more Celestial Conversations? Naah. My God's not going anywhere yet. *smile*

I've also had this idea for a blog sit-com for a few months. I haven't been able to write one complete paragraph about that yet, though. Hopefully the new year of blogging will bring me some new words.

There's also that play-type comedy that I've been unable to complete for almost two years now. And the long pending blog-template update.

Lots of blogging to do. So little time.

(Alright. I can't resist it. Happy Belated Birthday Bloggy!)

Blogger with a capital "B" of course.

Yesterday I couldn't post anything because I couldn't even log in to my blog maintenance screens. And today I can't post comments on anyone else's Blogger blog. People can only comment on their own Blogger blogs. Quite boring. Interestingly, Blogger's spell-check tool doesn't recognize the following words in this post -

1. Blogger
2. blog
   

Pretty smart, eh?

So what's my excuse for not posting for the two weeks before that happened?

*sheepish grin*

A new post will be put up on this blog in less than 24 hours - unless Blogger dies on me again.

Don't go away! We'll be right back after the messages (or lack thereof).

(In case you didn't get that , it means "Love is in the air")

Valentine's fever is in the air. People are either thinking about what to get their sweethearts, or talking about how Valentine's Day sucks. Usually, the former have sweethearts (or at least have specific people in mind they want to make their sweethearts), and the latter don't. Disclaimer: This is not a rule.

Me? I try my hand at fiction.

However, writer's block has recently been a bit of a problem in the recent past. So no new stories.

That being said, I do have some stuff I wrote around a year ago, that I never published for various reasons. So over the next few days, to celebrate Valentine's week (why just one day?) I'll be putting these stories up along with any new stories I can manage to pen down.

Hope you like them :)

Yikes!

A whole month without blogging!

And I've got at least two posts that are nearing completion, and three more ideas that are currently just fledgling posts - started long ago, but ignored ever since.

This "Save As Draft" feature on Blogger is actually a deterrent to blogging. Feeds the tendency towards procrastination. Allows the blogger to loll his time away writing partial blogs never completing any, always coming up with new but incomplete ideas, leading to the slow death of the blog, the child that needs to be constantly fed slowly being deprived of nutrition, wasting away quietly, shrivelling up until it is almost a skeleton, drying up to the bones, crumbling to dust...

From ashes to ashes...

Well. Here's to the New Year and a resolution to never using the "Save As Draft" feature ever. Ever. (Except in case of emergency, of course)

---

The above blog was written in 12 minutes. (Yes, it took that long. One more would have been unlucky)

I visited my colleague's house again on Friday. Her daughter (she's 23, not 20, by the way) was quite glad to see me, again. She kept talking to me in gibberish from the minute she saw me, and jumping around the room on her matchbox-sized feet. The word sweet doesn't do justice to her.

My joy was short-lived, though. She dumped me for Elmo soon after. I guess it's hard for a 26-year-old guy in a suit to compete with a red furry monster with a girl's voice. *sigh*

(Observation for the day: If you have a cup of hot - and I mean scalding hot - soup in your hand, and the cup contains a stirrer that you put in it to keep the instant soup mix from settling to the bottom of the cup, try to remember that the stirrer is not a thin straw, even though it functions pretty well as one. Because that's not why you put it there. And scalding hot liquid rushing through a thin plastic cylinder to the middle of your tongue... I think you get the idea.

Do you think it's okay to put burn ointment on your tongue?

Ppppppppffffffttt. Yuck. I think not.)

Apparently, Samsonite makes Tripods for cameras. I know, coz a close friend recently bought one cheap.

(Yes, that's the only reason I have the word 'Samsonite' in the title of this blog. So sue me. Picking a title for a blog is no easy task. And it's easier to talk about Samsonite, rather than Sam's Son. Ok? So there)

We had our first snow Monday. Was pretty cool. Not for drivers, but we've got a cool view from the office. So was it nice to watch the snow settle on the firs outside.

Went to a colleague's house for dinner too, that day. It's nice to eat desi homemade food when you don't have cook it. But having to watch Sun TV, on the other side of the planet from Chennai, isn't. And I'm not really interested in knowing that some chap who looks like the son of your local paan-ki-dukaan-waala (Indian road-side tobacconist) married Rajnikant's daughter last month. So I guess Rajnikant's daughter now looks like the daughter-in-law of your local paan-ki-dukaan-waala.

And as if Sun TV itself isn't enough, I had to watch this 14-year-old female called Lylah play coy when the 25-something hero of the movie danced around her. I also had to fend off the question "Don't you think she's good looking?" while I was being fed Puris (a deep-fried Indian bread item). Choking on Puris isn't a very nice experience, let me tell you. Of course, being treated to a second glass of Badam Milk (Almond flavoured milk) is. But did they really expect me to believe that this Lylah's married and has two kids?

Speaking of kids, my colleague's got two children too. The younger one is a girl. She's 20. Fell for me instantly. I guess it must be the glasses. She probably couldn't resist a man with metal on his nose. She was all over me, all evening.

Of course, I know it won't last. Women tend to change their opinion about me past the age of 36 months.

*Sigh*

Well, that's life.

But things are definitely getting interesting, with at least one large Indian company starting an internal matrimonial portal for its employees.

I was checking out Dumbs' blog yesterday, and a friend pointed out that the "I'm Chandler" link is actually a test out there created by a guy called stomps that tells you which F.R.I.E.N.D.S. character you are most like, based on your answers to some questions there. So you take the test and then he asks you to put some HTML on your site/blog/homepage that tells the world what he thinks. So here it is.

I'm Chandler Bing from Friends!



Now I've mentioned this before, but I'll say it again - I don't believe in the results of Personality tests. So, I've got my own opinion about which friends character I'm most like. And I came to this conclusion back in April this year.

I, am Ross Geller. Why?

Well, given my track record, it is highly probable that:

1. If I ever do get married my wife will realise that she is a Lesbian.
2. The woman who marries me will only do so if she is completely drunk.

Also, look at some of Ross's personality quirks:

1. Ross is a geek.
So am I.

2. He comforts Rachel when she breaks up with most of her boyfriends, and specially Paulo.
I am often in the position of being "A shoulder to cry on" for women who are having trouble with their boyfriends or ex-boyfriends.

3. Rachel tells Ross that she is off guys after she breaks up with Paulo.
Most single women tend to say that to me.

4. When Joey falls for Rachel, after initially being shocked Ross tells Joey that he should tell Rachel how he feels. And that if Rachel feels the same way then that's up to them, and Ross shouldn't have a say in it.
I have the same "Aa bail mujhe maar" (translates to inviting a bull to come and hit you without the training of a matador) attitude.

5. When Joey's girlfriend Charlie (who Ross likes) tells Ross she thinks she should break up with him since he's not intelligent or a paleontologist (which Ross is), Ross encourages her to stay with him, inspite of his own interests.
See (4)

6. Rachel gets a job in Paris and Ross tries to make sure that she can stay in New York. Even after everything is arranged, when he sees that she wants to go to Paris, he tells her she should go.
See (4) and (5)

So there.

I was watching Baby's Day Out today. Has anyone out there realised that the baby's nanny in the movie is played by Cynthia Nixon, who also plays Miranda Hobbes in Sex and the City?

Now that caught me by surprise.

I mean, yes, Miranda is probably the most likeable of the four (Charlotte is cute, but dumb), but I still can not picture her as a Nanny!

Anyway.

In the movie, the nanny is closer to the baby than the mother. Which is probably natural if taking care of the baby is the nanny's job. I mean if all that the mother does is say Hello to the kid at meal times, or kiss it good night, then of course the kid is going to be attached to the Nanny, with the mother simply being known as the person called "Mom".

I don't think I would be okay with the idea of giving the charge of my children to a nanny. Raising a child is what makes parents, parents. You can't outsource that.

Yes, I know. Wait till it's my turn, and my wife wants to go back to work after having the baby. Then I'll know.
But then maybe I'll quit my job and stay home to take care of my children (of course, if I'm the one who has to stay home, I'll probably stop at one kid). I've been thinking about making writing my profession. Then I could stay home, right? Going by the hit rate this blog invites, I'd probably be able to afford to buy a bottle of milk every month on my earnings. And that's if I'm optimistic. Still, being among the top ten on Sulekha's "Best Authors" list must count for something, no?

I've also been learning to cook over the past few days, so I think I might be gearing myself to be a good housewife... Made good Dal under supervision on Friday, and edible, though a little high on the red chilli Potato-Cabbage curry (don't ask me what that means. I was out of vegetables) today.
And I can make rice too. So I think I can survive.

Oh, who am I kidding? If I cooked regularly, the whole family would end up with food-poisoning.

My personal laptop was giving problems (would not charge even when plugged in, unless I was holding the power adapter's connector in place) and so I had to send it off to California today. Luckily, I'm still covered under the first year warranty. They said they'd return it in 5-7 business days. Which means I don't get to see it for a couple of weekends.

Luckily, I still have my office laptop and so my new broadband connection won't be wasted all that much.

Still, I miss the darn thing. It's got the huge 15.4 inch wide screen giving me a lot more screen space, specially when I've got the sidebar turned on in Firefox (which means, always).
And the larger keyboard is kinder to my poor fingers. I've got to type with practically two fingers on this IBM Thinkpad T21.

I guess what I really want is a desktop...

Four months less two days from the day I submitted my story to Sulekha, and I finally get published. And I'm left wondering if it was even worth the wait...

Will You Marry Me?

I finished moving into my new apartment on Saturday morning, but was travelling on the weekend and so only slept there the first time on Sunday night.
No phone, no internet access, and no movie channels for another week.

I tried latching on to someone's wireless network but the signal was very low, and only connected from one spot in the house.
So, just playing video games on the laptop for now.

This blog will be back. Very soon.

And this is really D-uh!

I'd wondered for a long time what the name of the Times of India cartoon Dubyaman, was supposed to refer to. I'd suspected for quite a long time that Dubya is George Bush, but I had no idea why.

Today, as the result of a brainwave, I decided to ask Google. (Tubelight? I would tend to agree).

Searching Google for "define:dubya" tells you that Dubya is George W. Bush, a.k.a W, a.k.a dubyuh (pronounce W with an American accent), a.k.a Dubya. Simple, eh? Downright ass-brained...

I've had one false start, so don't want to celebrate too soon, but Sulekha told me yesterday (and this is the second time for this particular submission) that they'd love to publish my story. Hopefully they'll give me a date soon. Let's see.