Mkan's A Series of Depressing Events or Help Me God, I am Die(t)ing!!

It all started about 12 years back.
Those were the times i never had to bother about eating stuff and putting on weight.
Those were the times, when the instructor in the gym used to set me as an example on how to maintain fitness.
Those were the times, when i could fit perfectly into any kind of dress.
Those were the times, when i could skip for 20 minutes and do 120 push ups.

Times have changed now.
Apart from getting old i have also added lots of mass over the past 12 years.
One of the reasons being not keeping up my strict exercise routine.
I watched myself as the waist size of my trousers kept on increasing but didn't do much to keep it under control.

The past two years were the worst as i grew out of all the available sizes in all the brands. The only brand that i can get myself into is "ALL" (A Little Larger).

It has come to the point where i started avoiding shopping malls because the whole experience of looking at all the stuff there and realizing that i can't fit into them depressed me to the core. It's like all your favourite food is available but you can't eat them, you just have to watch and go on.

It is not just with clothes, there were lots of other things that i would like to do but cannot do. These lead to more depression. I have tried to get back into my exercise routine but never could continue it for long thanks to my lifestyle and laziness.

All these depressing events called for desperate measures and i had to go consult a doctor. Now the doctor put me on a strict diet and exercise routine which i have to follow if i really want to get back into shape and he will be monitoring my progress every week. Since all my other attempts failed and burdened by my weight and the resultant depression i agreed to it.

Third week into the routine......

I still don't fit into the clothes at the shopping malls which is depressing (of course i can't expect to), now i can't even eat my favourite food.

So now its not just the shopping malls that depress me, going to a super market, the sight of my favourite restaurants or even the ads that advertise food depress me. All these depressions are frustrating.

All that i am allowed to eat leaves my mouth tasteless and the quantities i eat leave me hungry. I did not give in to temptation yet. The other day i was offered a samosa and a sweet and my brain waged a war with my conscience, finally my conscience won, it was the most difficult thing.

Did you ever experience words biting you back? Well that always happens to me.

When i was asked to diet earlier, my reply used to be "If one cannot even eat what one wants to eat, there is no point in living ".

When i was asked why i never touch green salad or even vegetables, my reply used to be "just because a lion is hungry, it does not mean that it will eat grass ".

Now all i am allowed to eat is green salad and vegetables.

OK, come bite me and bite me hard.

Amongst all these the only comfort i have is the subway food that i am allowed to eat, that too without the mayo.

Slowly i hope to get out of each depression and be myself again.

Misty Mystique

All captured with my Nokia N72 (which is now resting in mobile phone heaven) while on a road trip.

You Will Regret

I was trying to pay my electricity bill online the other day. Now i belong to IT industry and being a lazy person, I take advantage of anything that will not result in moving myself physically. So pretty much everything that can be done sitting at my desk, I do. That includes transferring money, paying credit card bills, paying utility bills etc etc.
The government of A.P. has thankfully launched a website where you could register and pay your utility bills including electricity bills, telephone bills, water bills, property taxes. Earlier it used to be standing for hours together (although realistically it used to take about half an hour) at the respective department offices in long queues waiting for your turn to pay the bill only to be asked by the jerk at the counter to go and get exact denomination. So i have been taking advantage of this facility for a couple of years.
Last time when i logged in to pay my electricity bill something came up and usually i would be pissed off but the error message they displayed made my day. Please click on the image for a larger view and read the circled message and if you did not laugh you will regret.

Points to ponder

I had the privilege of talking to a learned gentleman couple of days ago and he gave me something to ponder and pass on to others like they were passed on to him.


1. Everybody is selfish on one level or another

I contemplated a lot and tried to argue
I thought it is a more generalized statement and there always have been exceptions to that. My conscience argued, nobody is an exception. There are people who are known for their selfless acts but were they always selfless to the core, I don't think so. Although at some degree the selfishness is not visible or it is so negligible that it does not affect anyone in a negative way. I could give a lot of explanations but that is not the point of posting it. It is up to each and every individual to derive a conclusion for themselves.


2. Love descends, it does not ascend

This is something that i failed to understand until the context was explained. What the gentleman meant was that the amount of love and affection one shows to his/her parents is negligible when compared to the love and affection showered on his/her children. The simple point he stated is that when things go wrong you would always count how much you have done to make your parents happy but you would never do that to your kids. I had nothing to argue against it. It is a universal fact and if somebody is in a mood to debate against it i am game for it.

Happiness

Happiness is, your four year old niece calling from US and telling that she saw you in her sleep.

Office Humour

Read this before going further.
More excerpts from the mails of the people I tolerate on a daily basis. I swear i did not change a single letter.

1.

Dear Colleagues,

The following people were attending the Tele Conference from X and K is going to moderate the total Discussion.

If you did not get the glitch in that statement please leave your contact details, i will make it a point to make fun of you personally.

2.
Please go ahead and place the order for 4 chairs. Give two chairs for the Dev. team and the other two will take care the new joinee’s

I am appalled

3.
General leave should be availed for not more than 3 consecutive working days. Any 3 consecutive leaves shall be availed either before or after the vacation or weekend but not on both the ends.

Both the ends? This could have been one of those What The Duck moments if i was not laughing my "posterior" off, when i read that mail. For those who did not get it they don't want us to take 3 consecutive leaves such that there is a holiday or weekend in between like Thursday, Friday and Monday with the weekend in between. Now go laugh your "posterior" off.

4.
All the Security Staff,
On a random check it was observed that there are some items identified to be as CD’s/DVD’s, USB’s are been commuted in and out of the office.

It was strictly prohibited and you are requested to monitor them continuously. To protect and safe guard the Information you have to make thorough checks and the prime responsibility lies on you in protecting them. I too was no exception to do your Job.


Dear Colleagues: To keep and maintain the highest standards of Information Security and integrity, I request all of you to cooperate with the security in discharging their duties. This is an effort not to humiliate or under privilege any body but to make strong security practices and protect the Organizations interests and integrity.

I hope all of you will take the message in the right spirit.

P: Make sure the message gets communicated to all the Security Staff.

Forget the usage of words, forget the grammar the Security Staff don't have an Email ID. It is evident in the last line where "P" is asked to convey the message to the security staff.

The next point worth noting is maintaining "Highest Standards of Information Security" by checking bags, pockets and lunch boxes.

If you did not laugh yet and wondering "now whats wrong with that!!" then maybe you should consider becoming a Director of a software company.

Again if found that I posted these, I could be fired. Since there are only a handful that visit my blog, I am safe.

What Dreams May Come

I love to sleep a lot and usually I don't dream, or rather I don't remember what I dream.
However there are these two dreams that keep repeating so many times in my life till now that i remember even the minute details about those dreams.

1. There is this train and i keep missing it every single time, although i never missed a bus or a train or a flight.

Every time the situation is different, a different station, a different location, at times i am alone and at times i am accompanied by friends or family members. There were times when the stations and locations were not imaginary. With all these differences the dream was always the same, missing the train.

At times i am late , at times i am in the train but got down for something or someone and at times i jump off the train as someone with me could not get into the train, there was this time when we i was on one platform but the train arrived on a different platform. The final result is the same every time, i miss the train. There were times when i even chased the train

I still remember the one time that i caught the train, I climbed the engine. I dreamt that i missed my flight couple of times. Train or flight the outcome is the same, i miss my transportation. It has been a long time since that dream repeated, I miss my Dream Train.

2. Exams, i was never afraid of exams, being more or less in the top five of the class and with the sincerity and dedication that i used to attend all the classes, i was always prepared for exams.

There is this exam, i have not prepared and it is already the day of the exam. This dream repeated itself with such intensity and reality quotient that once i woke up startled all covered in sweat, i switched on the light and checked the date only to realize that i finished my exams couple of days back.

It was a different exam every time, i still remember some English, Hindi, Statistics. At times i was prepared for a different exam and it used be a different one, at times it was already the time for exam, my mom was waking me up, i wake up and realize i didn't prepare for it. This dream repeated even a couple of months back.

When it comes to nightmares i seldom have nightmares, there are these two nightmares that i remember. Both the times it was as if somebody was holding me down although i could not see anyone, i was unable to move and i couldn't even shout. Both the times i got up and realized that i was still unable to move and when i tried to shout all that came out was air. Next moment everything was back to normal. Weird I know.

Some random moments of my life

Congratulations to everybody who survived 2008 and All the Best to you all as you step into 2009. Ok, i am being cynic... Happy New Year Everybody

I am feeling nostalgic these days so why don't we go back into my memory lane and pickup some excerpts.

I was born in the beginning of the last quarter of 20th century, that makes me..... OLD

I would have been lost forever when a girl in my kindergarten class took me to her house for playing, if not for my mom who threatened the gatekeeper of my school that she would kill him if he did not find me before it got dark.Thankfully the gatekeeper saw me going with the girl and he also knew the house of that girl.

I was a shy kid and girls used to boss over me and made me play house with them although i wanted to go out and play with other guy kids.

I have changed 7 schools in 12 years of my education. The maximum time i stayed in a school was 3 years. That might be one of the reasons i did not make some long lasting friendships during that time. I even studied my Intermediate (plus 2), graduation, and post graduation in two different colleges each. I think that is a record.

My first crush was when I was 16 years old, it would have worked out well only if i had the guts to go to the girl and talk.

I was crazy about playing cricket and that is the reason i could not get a rank in the Common Entrance Test to become an Engineer that my parents always wanted me to become. I could not become a cricketer either because i stopped playing cricket after that. However I have become a Software Engineer which more or less satisfied my parents.

When i was in my school me and couple of my friends went to this place where they sold the applications for "National Talent Search Examination". Not that i had any talent, but because it gave an opportunity to go somewhere i have never been before. It was a huge house which was partially converted into a school. After 6 years during graduation one of my close friends took me to his house and DejaVu. I have been visiting that house for the past 14 years.

I lost my best friend to cancer during my post graduation. I will write about her some other time.

The reason i landed in my current job is due to my addiction towards computer games.

I have been working in the same company for the past five and half years. I think this compensates for all the school shifting i did.