Null Bit Me

Did a major cleanup of feeds from my feed reader. Some feeds had their last posts way back in 2005! I’m a little better ain’t I?

One thing I noticed.. and have noticed over the 5+ years of blog reading is that people stop updating their blogs after getting married. Women especially. …. …. well, either that , or I had more women bloggers on my feed list than men. ….. …. Or maybe the men on my feed list can’t seem o get married..

Anyways… it does prove that married life is stressful. If there was less stress, why on earth would they have stopped blogging? Some of these were popular blogs… their last posts having gathered over a 100 comments!!

I hate to see some of them go. They were wonderful writers. Witty. Fun. .. and perhaps more importantly… more my age I don’t seem to connect that well with the youngsters nowadays. They seem too business-minded, or disoriented, or downright nonsensical (I of all people should not be complaining about this, I guess!).

Oh well.. what is will be..

Girls/womens college. An all girls school. An all boys school. Boys/Mens college (Do these exist ?)… Anyway, what I was wondering was, how many of these had faculty from the opposite sex? I just came to know of a womens college who have a post vacant in a particular department. So they advertised in the newspaper for applications. Of all the candidates shortlisted, there was a guy in the list too. After some discussion among the (oldie) teachers, they chose to throw him out of the list (even though he seems to be the most qualified on paper!). The guy will never get to know that he never made it to the interview list for all the wrong reasons!

I believe this could be happening in other places also. What I am trying to figure out is whether this is correct. It is unethical.. at least that is what I think. What I am wondering is what was going on in the minds of these teachers that made them shortlist only the women. What are their objections? Have they faced any issues previously? Why is it that we have to face so much discrimination in life on the basis of sex, caste, even whether we are in the general/reserved quota, age etc. etc.

We’ve come to expect discrimination, because it is too tiring to fight. Especially when the fight is usually alone. We keep putting up barriers amongst us. And then we complain about the degradation of society. We complain that we don’t know anyone in the neighbourhood. Our closests friends are in other countries, and we cling on to them using IM’s, emails etc.

We need to get out. Open up. Take more risks. Keep an open mind. Live through some undesirable things. After all, isn’t that life? Take some bad, but take in more good? Live life. Not run away from it.

It’s been long… I almost forgot that this blog existed. It is not as difficult to put down your thoughts than to keep them alive in you for more than a few moments. Life happens, with force. It is cruel. It doesn’t let you rest. Relax. Just got a phone call.. and whatever I was thinking went out of that non-existent window.

Don’t worry. I’ll be back soon.

I wonder how do people make commitments to develop a particular technology in 3 years or 5 years. This would be new stuff, right? You cannot plan it in a MS Project sheet, right? A lot of it is unknown, right? Then how does someone make a commitment that their technology will be ready in so and so time.

I presume, as the time approaches nearer, competitors arrive and ensure that timelines are met more or less. Also, I guess the actual developers start putting in insane hours at work… nothing that affects the guy who actually made the commitment, right?

I love being the first one at the STOP sign. For two reasons.

1. I am usually the one who made a lot of people stop. In the NCR region, it’s very rare that people stop at a red light. So when I stop, I piss off a lot of people, but make them follow the rules.
2. When the red light turns green, I get a chance to zoooomm.. away, leaving everyone behind far far away.

Now what does this say about me?

I tend to blog when I can see too much work coming my way.

I want to run… but there’s no place to hide. The next few weeks are going to be hell

Yep… “Fighting for Chairs” is another name of the game that people usually call “Food Courts”. I suddenly see too many of them nowadays. In malls, in big restaurants like Haldiram’s and small road-side restaurants. When road-side temporary establishments do this, I’m fine with it. But when these moneyed chains do it, it sickens me. They charge the same as everyone else or more. And they let in as many people as can enter in their obscenely huge shops with very few chairs and tables. It’s totally up to the people to fight for them or eat while balancing their food on one hand. Perhaps the only differentiating factor from the road-side vendors are that they give you air-conditioning. But then the road-side food tastes better

Lots of events seem to give me the impression that I am a little too weird. And when I see so many people happily jostling for standing space in a super over-crowded Haldiram’s, I get a little more sure that there might be something wrong with me. But I will be what I am. When it comes to dining out, it is restaurants that direct me to a proper table, or a road-side vendor. Fighting for food and tables and chairs are not for me.

Though my gut feeling says that food courts are the future… with the amount of profit these guys must make while having almost no costs in managing customers. Once you set up a food court kind of joint, it just raking in the moolah all the time I gotta learn how to cook.

[UPDATE: The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!]

If God created women… I wonder who created men. Because if God had created both of us, we’d all be brothers and sisters! I don’t like that!!

I’m hoping it was a guy in a galaxy far far away… maybe we men are all descendants of Darth Vader

May the force be with us

This post by Ideasmith that linked to further posts by other women suddenly made me want to understand why did men want to marry virgins. Let me try to think like different males of different ages and lets see what I can come up with:

1. Damn, she’s done it before me I don’t want to marry her. I’ve lost the race. [This applies to a guy who's not done it yet and is extremely competitive]
2. Aw shucks… what if she starts comparing me to the other guys…. and I am not good enough [This applies to a guy with low self-esteem and would especially apply to a guy who's never done it]
3. What! She’s done it before. She’s got no morals. What if she does it with other men after marriage. I can’t marry her. [This applies a guy who doesn't understand the power of love]
4. If I meet one of her ex’s and he reminds me of their time together, I won’t be able to bear it. Wah! [This applies to insufferable romantics weak-hearted men some men]
5. She must have become “big” down there. I’ll never be able to fill her and satisfy her. [You need to grow up kiddo]
6. She loves to do it too much. What if she can never have enough? She’ll wear me out and still not be happy [Go out jogging every morning...]
7. She might have STD’s. Why take a risk? [The ever cautious idiot]
8. She might find me too small and make fun of me

Ok… that is all I could think of. Please don’t beat me up. I just needed a break from work and something to get me to blog… and sex is usually a good topic to get out all that rust All these came from all the discussions we had when we were in school and later.

Sometimes age is not enough to grow up.

Is it just my account, or is spam hitting everybody like crazy on WordPress.com? I've been getting like over 100 spam comments per day when earlier it used to be like a few per week!

It's funny how a lot of girls blog in poetry… post after post with nothing but poetry!

A language that only their friends understand??

In my younger days… and I mean my school going days, I used to wonder why marks were so important. Especially the marks in sanskrit and history and civics and geography in which I had no interest whatsoever, and I was extremely sure that I would not venture in these fields during higher studies. So I always remained at the bottom of my class… well a little above than that, but you get the drift. Need to pass. Read all night before the exam. My parents, while they kept complaining about my marksheet failed to explain why was it necessary. I was naive. They explained. I never understood.

Here's an explanation that I found interesting. I doubt if I would have understood it if my parents has used it while I was in school… but at least I have finally found a reason that satisfies(?) me… just so that I have reason to bug my own kids to improve their scorecards

Busy not working… It's around 4:00 PM … time for some tea

Tring Tring… Damn… a call from an unknown number … +914039845465 .. who's this idiot calling.

Caller: Sir, I am calling from ICICI Bank regarding some payments that you have made from the website.

Me: (worried… I did make some online payments 2 weeks back which had mysteriously failed) Eh… ok.. what's this about?

Caller: Sir, this is about *&%*&%

Me: Sorry but I didn't get that. Could you repeat it again?

Caller: Sir, this is about &*^&^%%*

Me: (Time to get my ears checked) Right… thanks. Ok.. so?

Caller: Sir, Did you make a payment to …. Hutch… of Rs. 465/-?

Me: No… (Hutch… I never have had a Hutch phone!)

Caller: Sir, your credit card number is xxxx xxxx xxx?

Me: (hmmm… the first 8 digits match) Excuse me… but I thought you said this was regarding online payments..

Caller: Sir, this is regarding &^%*^%*&$

Me: (pissed off) Right… anyway you have given me only 11 digits. A credit card would have 16 digit, right?

Caller: Sir…. could you confirm that your credit card number is xxxx xxxx xxx?

Me: (paitently) And I just told you, unless you give me all the 16 digits I cannot verify if this is my credit card number or not.

Caller: Ok.. just a moment… Sir, could you tell me your credit card number?

Me: (whoa slow down baby) No I cannot. Could you tell me again what this is all about? Is this about failed online payments?

Caller: Err… sir, is your credit card number xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx?

Me: (ok, 16 digits finally. Where did he get them now?) No it is not…

Caller: ok <disconnect>

OK… what was that all about? Was somebody trying to steal my credit card numbers or is it just me with an overactive imagination?

Last night I glimpsed a girl… a super beautiful girl while walking past a restaurant. She was standing at a table near the window talking to her friends, her mobile in her hand.

I'm not going to describe her any further… I will assume that beautiful is a word that everyone – even kids understand
Today, I went to the same restaurant to have breakfast. And as I passed across that same table, the girl came back to mind.  And I began wondering what kind of a life must it be to be absolutely and crazily beautiful. Once in a while there is someone like that in class or at work… someone who takes away almost everyone's breath.

I would have loved to stare at her… but then that is rude so I didn't But I am sure she gets lots of looks every place she goes. And I realised that I would have hated it if I was in her place. And I wondered did she feel the same? And if she did, how did she cope? I guess it would be a heady feeling at first… but after an extended period of time… dunno.

I don't suppose girls stare at guys…. so I guess I can keep wishing I was super handsome without any worries if I did get my wish

It's funny how most people who reach my blog via search engines reach via the search for "manglik". I did write a frustrated post once it once. But people seriously seem to be worried about this thing! And there's nothing out there which says anything with authority, or clears up all this confusion. Pretty hopeless case this