The Grass is Green on the Other Side!

I'm back! or so it feels. I thought of a better come back line because this one was a particularly long hiatus from this chirpy world of small talk and polarized opinions, but couldn't do better. A come back line is more of an irony at this juncture as I would not summarize my current state of affairs as anything like the one of Earl of Emsworth after the Shropshire race for instance. It's placement season here after all. Nevertheless, I am back to writing and it feels good.Similar emotions with the title of this post as I was wondering what to name it. Cliched as it sounds, a truer word was never spoken.

The "grass" is greener on the other side. Is there a better time for the avid blogger to make a comeback than placement time at b-school? Probably not. But I ain't going to whine here as one would expect from a lesser soul than mine. It's a matter of time before the curtains would roll down on this one year roller coaster ride called b-school and I have mixed feelings about it. Sucking blood is an amusing hobby by any standards. Vampires used to do that notoriously as they say in many a folktale. But this one called b school is adept at sucking blood even more than the vampires. This bubble reminds me of that carnivorous island in the movie "Life of Pi". One makes merry now and one is left gaping for breath the next moment. It's an amusing place to say the least.

Talking of greenery and grass (as I rightly should after naming it so), though they could mean one and the same thing in some sense of the words, they are two entirely different concoctions when looked at from the "other side". The "other side" is an amusing place to be or so I understand from people who tell me to look at it from thither. Think about grades. There is the other side called learning. Think about a job shortlist, there is the other side called long term prospects. Think about money. There is the other side called true happiness. What I fail to understand in these analogies is how people flip the coin to see it from the so called other side.

I remember this day when I was in school, vividly, for various reasons. The girl I used to have a thing for during that time was moving out of town. I guess her father was in the army or something and at that time call of duty came from an "other side" of the country. So they were moving to Mizoram or some such place which I failed to place on the map during that time, thanks to me being geographically challenged. I would deceive one if I said I am any better now. But for one thing, it was far away from Bangalore, where I was picking shells at that point in life. The incredible thing about this girl under scrutiny was that she was the most beautiful thing on earth back in the day and many eyeballs rolled at her sight. I use the word incredible carefully here because, among all the eligible boys in class, she chose to do combined studies with me. Stressing upon the wise usage of the term incredible in this particular context, I would like to bring to the reader's notice here that I had a head in the shape of a full onion at that time and my brains were slightly better than that of a cauliflower by any standards. Incredible, when I come to think why she chose me! But all's not fair in this world of jerks and morons and so be it. The point here is that her last day in school was a melancholic one of sorts for many a soul. I was sobbing when I thought of the next term after summer break and the dark clouds seemed to close in faster than I could imagine. Then an interesting thing happened. It involved my best pal from school, who I hang out with solely for image pepping purposes. If my head was the shape of an onion, his was more like a soda bottle, if you get my drift. He told me many things at length, but I don't recollect much of it since it was more nonsensical than one would imagine. But one thing that he said made sense to me. He told me to look at the neighbor's lawn, the other girl from section b who was better looking, healthier and overall greener in order to forget the loss of this one.

There is always scope for some free advice to say things like there's other stuff on the other side and all that sort of gibberish. But the problem here is that it is frigging easy to say things like these (happens often in the b school classroom too, especially with these strategy professors) and bloody difficult to make anything of it.

So the story, for the curious, ended on a sad note and as I grew up, the onion on top of me grew into more of the beetroot kind and I lost chances if any to hold on to a beautiful girl since then.

The point is that this other side argument is complete bull crap and I wouldn't buy it for as cheap as dirt. But the thing about "grass" and the greenery has amused me to some extent. The other day I was reading a Wodehouse since I was completely demoralized due to a sequence of events here at b school and I came across this thing about greenery. Most of Britain according to Wodehouse tales is covered by lush green lawns with a lake here and there and beautiful couples strolling with their Pomeranian.

The part that is amusing is that they always have an air around them, these people from those country side castles. They seem to own excessively large chunks of property and sit on filthy piles of cash that their daily schedules look like this:

Wake up for the breakfast gong,
Eat till the chicken yells from inside the stomach,
Look at the blue sky and pass a comment or two about the weather,
go to the library and pick up a book like "How to fool the princess at the castle" or some such piece of literature,
Wait for the lunch gong,
Repeat step 2,
Go for an afternoon siesta,
Wake up for an evening stroll with some gorgeous girl who also sits on a pile of cash,
Wait for the dinner gong,
Double up the efforts and perform step 2 even better,
Sleep,
Repeat step 1.

When will I get to engage in such routine? Will I ever get to? As greedy as I sound, that is what one would secretly wish for. Let's face it (as my room mate here would put it). It is so funny to be dreaming of such things when one is fighting to get a shortlist (let alone a job) for a handsome pay package to pay off the huge loans post b school. But nonetheless, I want to live like those characters in Wodehouse (on the "other side" of the ocean :-P)

I said I wouldn't whine, but here I am whining in front of you, but only for two really really sound reasons.
1. There is no brighter other side. period.
2. The greens are a mirage they don't seem to up the mood anyway.

Screw the green, screw the sides, Cheer up! For in times such as these, there is "grass" (a soft pillow from mother nature to sleep on, if you got the message wrong!!!)

P.S: As lame as this post would sound, I request for some concern and pity owing to the long gap in writing. Thou shall only get better.

Of Corporate Worlds, Software dummies and CATs

So yes, once again it is the usual set of chores. I start feeling the need to write after a good few decades and then I realize that I have lost that thing for writing these days, and that leads me to a state of limbo where I wonder what topic to write on, what would make a good blog post..what for the humor bit in it.. et al. and then decide to write something about some shit in football or give some tangential funda to the poor readers who chance upon this blog. Deja Vu. I went through such emotions for a couple of days now and after good amount of deliberation, decided.... better not to write at all....

One may wonder what the hell made me write this shit then....Folks, the answer is "frustration". If the thing has already put you off, please hit the red cross button to your top right...Alternatively, for a detailed description of this thing called frustration...read on.....

Frustration, taken as a wholesome feeling, is definitely one of the frequent visitors in a common college passout's life. I mean...you see a chic on the road and think she is the only woman in this world and start wondering which of her wonderful features strikes you so hard that makes you think she is the apple of your eye and all that sort of thing when you suddenly realize there is this specimen, 6 feet high and 3 feet wide that's acting like her escort more or less, staring at you intently. This gross situation, I would label as one that leads to frustration, anger fear etc. Or to take another instance...you watch a bollywood flick where Sallu bhai unbuttons his T shirt to show his six pack and hottie Katrina's eyes widen and she falls for him and they go to Switzerland for a song sequence..then you start dreaming about the song in general and slowly start substituting you for Salman in the scheme of things when your friend calls you out for a cigarette break....That gives a similar kind of feeling. But the kind of frustration that i was alluding to in my introductory note, cannot be classified under this kind. It is the feeling that creeps into you when you realize that you have written an exam for 3 years in succession and still don't seem to have grasped the knack of getting through. I mean, such problems are not disturbing.... for people whose brains are no different from a rotten cauliflower stored in a refrigerator (borrowing from PGW, if I may). But for sharp ones like mine, which can tell a white cat from a black one, this is certainly a disturbing thingy.Cutting the tangent and coming to matter... For the third time, I have royally screwed up my CAT and wonder what....the third one was the nastiest amongst the three. These, if I may use Bertram Wooster's patented phrases, are deep waters, my friend. One does not know where to go from such faux pas situations...

As I write fervently about the frustration that makes me go crazy at this juncture, I notice on the 'Title' area and realize I have to touch upon 'Software' and 'Corporate'. Real Stinkers...That is what they really are....Why can't we all just be self employed? All of us I mean. It is just getting sicker by the day..this software thing... that's earning the bread, butter and alcohol for us poor twenty somethings....it is a pain in the ass. Listening to the dumbest of customers who blab from across several thousand miles is one thing. But "indeed, sir- ing" and "your are right sir-ing" to such dumb asses makes you go crazy. When are these fools who buy 4000 lines of half-baked software for a few million dollars,going to cut the crap and start thinking rationally?I mean if they don't exist, this industry wouldn't exist and if you get the drift, we software engineers wouldn't exist at large. And we would be forced to do some other shit for the bread, butter and a. One may definitely tend to ask me at this point.."Why can't you quit and do something else you brat???". Yes, valid question. That takes me to the other part of the corporate equation. With software on one side, the corporate equation holds 'money' on the other side. Take a minute to try and look at it from the other side of the court. Isn't it just too difficult to say no to big money that comes for nothing???


Ok.....I am bored of this obfuscating the trivial problem thingy.....Point is....I am not able to get a b-school admit nor am I convinced about quitting a software job that pays...In other words, I am ok with one part of the corporate equation...viz money...but not ok with the other viz..software.... Thoughts????