Once you stop writing regularly, it becomes increasingly difficult to start up again. You go through your daily life and experience many things that you could convert into a good post. But somehow you end up not writing anything...just procrastinating to the point where you can't recall when you used to write often and extensively.
Anyway, I'm just going to write about a few things that have happened recently. I may not even publish this on the blog...lets see
Kindle your spirit
Increasingly, it is becoming very difficult to buy stuff for myself. I remember the time when I would fixate on, say, a watch, and then go out there and just buy it (we're talking middling watches that I could afford, not ultra-luxury watches - my impulse buying is also restricted by 'the chadar I can spread'). Or a gadget, like the hard drive + media player that I saw at someone's place and went out and got it. Or when I wanted a racing cycle and went one afternoon to just buy it and carry it back home in an autorickshaw.
Nowadays, I am in perpetual analysis-paralysis about any purchase. No, not really analysis-paralysis, just that the final pull-the-trigger to buy stuff has become very stiff. This is doubly weird because the avenues of buying stuff have literally exploded, what with the Flipkarts and Amazons of the world. Now, I am in dire need of a few devices - a dual SIM phone to keep by Bangalore number going, maybe a Chrome Cast...but the pathos is such that I am just not able to buy them.
Circa 2008 (I think), my ex-boss and tennis partner AG had come down from the US and I went to visit him one evening. There he showed me a device that bewitched me. He had a Kindle, one of the early versions, and I had been thoroughly impressed with the e-ink technology and how paper-like the print looked. But somehow, I was comfortable with my paper books and never had that sense of urgency about buying it. Years passed by, and I got into this no-buy zone that I am in and I thought the chances of me actually having a Kindle of my own were pretty thin.
But I kept talking about having a Kindle, and as they started giving ads on Indian TV, I guess I must've started talking about it a LOT because AV upped and got me a Kindle.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I am a proud owner (by gift, if not by buying) of a Kindle 3G...and its beautiful.
I still don't get how they make such real-paper-like displays, but it is a beautiful piece of work and has very quickly become a constant companion.
Start your engines
I am surrounded by people moving into start ups, or starting on their own. People from my current organization have moved to travel start ups, seniors from college have left lucrative jobs and have started their own location services based firms, some friends have got aboard the analytics bandwagon, while other friends have even gone down the path of delivering meats/food. All in all this is a time where everything seems to be saying - look, having something of your own is the exciting thing to do.
I understand that, but I'm not sure I relish it as much. First, because I'm not sure about what gives me real joy. I mean, these guys who have started up think about it 24/7, are always at work (or work related do's), and are so excited about what they can deliver to their clients. It is exciting to hear them, yes, but I'm not sure if it is for me (not that I have people chasing me down to join their pre-start up teams).
One reason could be that the idea has to hit you and take over your thoughts. And once it does, it can become the all consuming focus of your life. Add on an exciting team, probably with people you've known for a while, and it could become one of those joyful events that I think everyone has helped organize in their college. On second thoughts, getting paid to work in that environment could actually be quite interesting...
Domesticity drivers
Another thing on my mind nowadays is the movement from Bangalore to Delhi. I remember when I first moved to Bangalore, it took me a fair amount of time to really 'belong' there. This seems to be happening as I am back in Delhi now. Something or the other keeps popping up and somehow the smooth routine of life (the one that calms and soothes and lulls you) just isn't coming. I'll give you a couple of examples.
We had one cook for nearly the whole of two years while here the cooks seem to enjoy vanishing for 2-3 months and putting in atrocious replacements.
Suddenly, without warning, the temperature has taken such a horrible turn that getting air conditioners became critical over the last weekend. And there you go, my analysis-paralysis plus the urgency of the requirement made for a stressful weekend there
AV travels quite a bit to her workplace (I feel like a chump as she had a much more comfortable life in Bangalore before she decided to throw it away and come to Delhi with me. But that's a whole different guilt trip...), so we got a driver for her. The initial week was painful as he didn't know the directions. And just when he mastered the directions, he fell ill, then his mother fell ill, then something else happened. You get the gist, don't you? Here I thought that one domestic problem had been solved, and then it hit that nothing had been solved.
Running hard on the treadmill, just to stay at the same place...
Anyway, I'm just going to write about a few things that have happened recently. I may not even publish this on the blog...lets see
Kindle your spirit
Increasingly, it is becoming very difficult to buy stuff for myself. I remember the time when I would fixate on, say, a watch, and then go out there and just buy it (we're talking middling watches that I could afford, not ultra-luxury watches - my impulse buying is also restricted by 'the chadar I can spread'). Or a gadget, like the hard drive + media player that I saw at someone's place and went out and got it. Or when I wanted a racing cycle and went one afternoon to just buy it and carry it back home in an autorickshaw.
Nowadays, I am in perpetual analysis-paralysis about any purchase. No, not really analysis-paralysis, just that the final pull-the-trigger to buy stuff has become very stiff. This is doubly weird because the avenues of buying stuff have literally exploded, what with the Flipkarts and Amazons of the world. Now, I am in dire need of a few devices - a dual SIM phone to keep by Bangalore number going, maybe a Chrome Cast...but the pathos is such that I am just not able to buy them.
Circa 2008 (I think), my ex-boss and tennis partner AG had come down from the US and I went to visit him one evening. There he showed me a device that bewitched me. He had a Kindle, one of the early versions, and I had been thoroughly impressed with the e-ink technology and how paper-like the print looked. But somehow, I was comfortable with my paper books and never had that sense of urgency about buying it. Years passed by, and I got into this no-buy zone that I am in and I thought the chances of me actually having a Kindle of my own were pretty thin.
But I kept talking about having a Kindle, and as they started giving ads on Indian TV, I guess I must've started talking about it a LOT because AV upped and got me a Kindle.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I am a proud owner (by gift, if not by buying) of a Kindle 3G...and its beautiful.
I still don't get how they make such real-paper-like displays, but it is a beautiful piece of work and has very quickly become a constant companion.
Start your engines
I am surrounded by people moving into start ups, or starting on their own. People from my current organization have moved to travel start ups, seniors from college have left lucrative jobs and have started their own location services based firms, some friends have got aboard the analytics bandwagon, while other friends have even gone down the path of delivering meats/food. All in all this is a time where everything seems to be saying - look, having something of your own is the exciting thing to do.
I understand that, but I'm not sure I relish it as much. First, because I'm not sure about what gives me real joy. I mean, these guys who have started up think about it 24/7, are always at work (or work related do's), and are so excited about what they can deliver to their clients. It is exciting to hear them, yes, but I'm not sure if it is for me (not that I have people chasing me down to join their pre-start up teams).
One reason could be that the idea has to hit you and take over your thoughts. And once it does, it can become the all consuming focus of your life. Add on an exciting team, probably with people you've known for a while, and it could become one of those joyful events that I think everyone has helped organize in their college. On second thoughts, getting paid to work in that environment could actually be quite interesting...
Domesticity drivers
Another thing on my mind nowadays is the movement from Bangalore to Delhi. I remember when I first moved to Bangalore, it took me a fair amount of time to really 'belong' there. This seems to be happening as I am back in Delhi now. Something or the other keeps popping up and somehow the smooth routine of life (the one that calms and soothes and lulls you) just isn't coming. I'll give you a couple of examples.
We had one cook for nearly the whole of two years while here the cooks seem to enjoy vanishing for 2-3 months and putting in atrocious replacements.
Suddenly, without warning, the temperature has taken such a horrible turn that getting air conditioners became critical over the last weekend. And there you go, my analysis-paralysis plus the urgency of the requirement made for a stressful weekend there
AV travels quite a bit to her workplace (I feel like a chump as she had a much more comfortable life in Bangalore before she decided to throw it away and come to Delhi with me. But that's a whole different guilt trip...), so we got a driver for her. The initial week was painful as he didn't know the directions. And just when he mastered the directions, he fell ill, then his mother fell ill, then something else happened. You get the gist, don't you? Here I thought that one domestic problem had been solved, and then it hit that nothing had been solved.
Running hard on the treadmill, just to stay at the same place...
