It's the third year...

Hmm.. I don't know what'd make a guy for sure a weirdo.. Can YOU tell?? lets try.. a guy who doesn't use a cell phone may be?? Oh no!! That's be me then!!! Plus this'd be the third year since I am one!!!

This puts me in a curious light some times; makes me a butt of jokes at other times. aaaand.... insensitive if the ones who love me are right. well then, why would I do it? i wouldn't want to get arguing that not having a cell phone's better than having one since i get to do that often enough. instead, i'd say not having a cell phone is exactly what suits me.

i happen to like it when i'm not available when i don't want to be.. especially when even not answering the phone's a message. would like to make and keep appointments over calling up enroute. would like to wait for and hug the loved one in relief rather than check on her when she's late. i like keeping the distraction away when i work or study. when there're bombs going out in the cities; i would rather breathe anxious inside until i know someone i love is safe than be paranoid until i an actually hear the voice. a million other things actually .. funny that not having a phone is not actually a problem at all. definitely not a tenth as much to me as it is to the person who's trying to reach me. in short; i just refuse to be rushed through life; and refuse to pay the cost of someone else being in a hurry.

but this situation does have its amusing momemts. imagine running into after 3 years, that junior from college who could make you go weak in the knees and not having a number to exchange. and the turn in your stomach when she asks back if its because you don't want her to call you!! imagine having to deal with an airticket booking portal that is dumb enough to mark a cell phone field as mandatory. the credit card support sweet voice that calls up on your home number every other month to make sure if her records are right in missing the number. and every other moment when you have to make a tiny little effort to straighten your back when the other guy pulls out his phone, and asks - "so what's the number?"

i am not sure how long i can be assertive enough with my life.. in dealing with all the men and women who think they HAVE to reach me when want to. but i do hope i could have as much of this unhurried sail as i can..

coming to an argument if i have to; the other day this friend thought i was so out of times when i pointed if there was no life before cell phones that he shot back - what's your point?? wasn't there life before men wore any clothes?

but then, i actually think it would not be that bad of an idea if this were the third year

since when fig leaves were back in fashion!!

 

Charging, do not disconnect...

the city's been colder this week compared to several weeks before. its darker until later, and the days are wetter. i've been trying to wake up at a respectable 6am for the past one week but without success. but call it a day; i was showered, shaved and in my work shoes at 0530 today. so lets make it a fine day.

if not the grander plan coming in the way of the day's tasks its just has to be the exact opposite. but with the early bird getting the worm, today just had give me a wonderful lead i've been looking for over myself. and the day begins..

genuiness is the most deficient quality in one-on-ones. but with a lot pushed out; some does rub on the people around. if a fine malt tastes great on its way in, trust me, it smells just as heavenly on the breath's way out.

lunch was unsually bright. i ended up being the only man at the table with six occupants.. this happening all too often, must find more about it :-). what ticked my brain is a witty comment - "humor is common sense rolling". take your time. think. taste and smell. its... simply... profound!!!!

and if such a fine mid-day break can't open your mind, Jehangir Pocha in the BW editorial wrote what sums it all up about it when one had all doors of the mind closed - "When what you have is a hammer, everything seems like a nail". Man!!! is the world suddenly on a roll or what!?!

getting back home early; i decided that it just has to be the day i take the Gallup's test. not sure how far i am on the "responsibility, strategic, futuristic, significance, input" package running one lifetime, but the beginning's sure very exciting :-).

hmm.. reading was just too slow an activity to hold my wander lusty mind in place; so a movie seemed just like what should be played before i retire this day. only; i ended up choosing a movie with a dialog that left me ever more lusty - "only pigs sweat; men perspire".

there are days when you relish the feeling of being unplugged. and then there are days your very existence throbs with a feeling of being firmly plugged.

and for crying out loud; its all in a day!!!.

The red plastic skittle

You see; me and my brother; when of 8 and 12; had a fight over who gets the best of the three cabinets we got in our new room. I must say this was only one of the many fights we always had over bowls with bigger helpings of the dessert and over window seats on buses. But this time; we also had this red plastic skittle. Something that was made in three pieces that you set one over another; and then it tumbled in whole or just lose its top depending on how you shot at it with a rubber arrow gun. The gun; we'd broken in no time. And now we didn't know what we could do with the skittle. And tired as we were, of our fighting; we drew up this little peace pact. We put all our stuff which we deemed precious; our best pencils, drawing books, draw-out-and-pull-string story books and so on. Together, Undivided, into a common pool we could both draw out of. And we set the skittle in the living room corner. Whenever either one of us were mad at the other; all we had to do was unsettle the skittle. This was to act as a clarion call; to huddle up under the tree in the backyard and... negotiate. The run-away clause was that we'd have to divided back our stuff if the negotiations were to fail.

We were lucky this felt like a game for the first few days; and we had fun even fighting and making up :-). And by the time we had bigger fights; we'd already built on our common treasure and every addition meant furthering the complication that dividing our stuff amongst us was to be. And this kept us going at the "game". Over time; ganging up under the tree already meant part success. I could do it without facing my brother; without yelling and being yelled at; without feeling helpless and multiplying my madness for feeling so.

I didn't particularly like Susan Scott's "Fierce Conversations" (ISBN 0 7499 2381 4) for its repetitiveness; but I presume this is what she meant by "Emotional Wake". Or close. I've always seen that there's a better chance of dealing with people; when we are conscious of ourselves and of the whole exchange. I have always had difficulty discussing my life with my dad; but then he is always another person when I speak to him in his home office. And so am I. It was like we have secretly and unconciously agreed on being fair with each other around his swivel chair.

These days, when I have problems at work in keeping my patience; or I rage up in traffic and yell; I shall have to try more to see that skittle unsettled. I am hoping to "wake" myself up :-). And for waking some else up in a conversation; I guess its not without a reason that I was always amazed by that little play...

Knock knock
Who's there?
Red Skittle.
Red Skittle who?
Red Skittle who wakes you.

The Hammock..

Imagine a beach with sand reminding you of snow; and the water blue, clear & coral-set to remind you of an aquarium.

Now imagine the sun at his sunniest best, a chilled beer in your hand and the cool breeze.

Now let’s throw in those beautiful bodies in tooth-floss wide bikinis.. going about not further from you than how far you can pee.. Mind you, they are there, but just a handful; spread wide about to not make a crowd but a picture from a glossy magazine.

Now... the hammock. It's in the shade, under a fine coconut tree, swayed by the cool breeze. Any guess who's lying on it? It is the one who by now wants to the most... You.

Kind of like a time share commercial, huh? Yes, and this did happen to me one Sunday afternoon at Sai Ree, at the secluded Koh Tao island in Thailand.

And do you know what I was thinking about? Literally the pain in my ass!! What with the rope from the hammock that was cutting into my butt cheeks... Such can be reality when it happens.

Missing that coveted school admission by a few hours; not cracking the Jee over two attempts; and missing those management schools by the water on a swan's back. I've regretted on each of these occasions; but only for a while. They are big; and shall remain so in my life. But then I fear no more when I feel so good in spite of it all and when I am proud of being me; because I know I am not letting these or anything else make me settle for any less. They are going to be my reminders. That not everything imagined, is just not the same in real.

Kind of like the rope knit hammock; which I am sure... is no fox's sour grape...

 

It's Alive..

Yeah.. it’s the title of that book by Meyer and Davis. It's the second book in all of my life, that I didn't read till the end..and the worst part of it, it kept me up in the nights over the first few chapters..

"The coming convergence of information, biology, and business" shouts the title. Ask me, and I'd rather prefer a "The coming convergence of information, biology and manufacturing".

There are only these things that when trying to see far enough I can see.. - The role that biology is going to play in information technology as far as providing previously unimagined hardware. - The role that biology is going to play in manufacturing.

To apply evolution into business decision making systems.. uh..huh... for now I'd say only eccentric professors and consultants can afford to get away with such a thing.

Any system capable of all that is claimed, needs to be creative.. needs to learn.. and...needs to be... as error prone as a human mind. I mean.. all of this is already available.. as a human brain of course. Anyone giving me that crap of computers being more accurate, in this case; may think of what application of processes to knowledge industry is doing to it.. I'm not even saying this isn't possible.. Only saying that this better be done by the already available wares..

The book provides a beautiful counter example to its own theories; but by accident of course.. that the US marines is winning in Afghanistan. If one still wants to believe in the convergence of evolutionary biology and decision making; she may as well read the book and bore herself to sleep.

I wouldn't bet my money on it, not just yet; not ever.

It's Alive - Christopher Meyer & Stan Davis, Crown Business (www.randomhouse.com), ISBN 1-4000-4641-6.