Palani's ramblings...

Monday, May 31, 2004

My friends blogs...

Like Senthil, let me also give links to my friends blogs so you can get more context when reading each others blogs.


  • Mappy Blogs - A funny, philosophical character, often very confusing

  • Senthil's Blogs - Cud be the next CM of Tamil Nadu or even the PM of India. Now getting more exposure in the U.S. of A.

  • Natty's Blogs - A man of principles. If there is going to be a revolution in Tamil Nadu, it cud be becos of him. Also one among the very few settled ;-)

  • Suri's Blogs - The next Richard Stallman. A hardcore Linux (sorry GNU/Linux) geek. Also a plain talker.

  • Dharma's blogs - A senior of ours, a colleague of mine, and a mind of no equal. Unpredictable.



- Palani

Almost the whole attendance

(T to B (L to R)): dsen, Pravin, chandi, 'saamy' srini, murs

(L to R): bulb manohar, murs, vijay rag, pandu jan, 'manni' shobs, me pal, pravin

(L to R): Chandi, sk, thalai, navkum, bk, manivel, olu (compoletely hidden) and saby baby

This is me. Again taken in our get together. Posted by Hello

Maybe the new five monkeys? Taken during our get together, each one in a different mood.  Posted by Hello

Get together...

College life is always fun. You realize that you cannot get back the good old days of college once you start working. But we proved it wrong last weekend. We relived those memorable days the last couple of days.

First on Saturday, it was the ECR which started things up. DC's new mini lorry (Bolero) is quite some vehicle. Its just cruises even at 100. Though it needed a helping hand in the sands of the ECR beach, it was an enjoyable ride. The beach was so clean, but we didn't dare venture into the water as it seemed a bit steep. Then off we went to catch Ayutha Ezhuthu at Satyam. We just pit stopped to quench the mini lorry's thirst.

The movie was just amazing. This movie is not a stereotype and so some people may not like it. Its a bold initiaive from Mani Ratnam. I am sure the general masses will accept this movie, and this is going to be a super duper hit. The movie made our veins thrust out. It had so much energy. So cool ourselves we hit on to a Italian restraunt, Cornocopia. The food was not bad, quite creamy and sweet. But some dishes were just toooo bland. By the time we finished we were quite tired and full, so we chucked the plan to go to High Look and headed home.

After getting a good, hearty sleep we (Olu, bk and meself) got ready pretty early and were the first ones to arrive at GRT Grand Days (our get together was in the Emeraldo hall there). Then the fun began. As slowly people started trickling in, they waved their hi's to the guys who cudn't make it because they were in a different continent. A big thanks to DC and Reliance to make technology so mobile :-). To list out all the fun we had wud be impossible. So let me just stick to the gists. Olu had prepared a cool questionaire to re-live our college life. Also our pattu mammi and waffer boy, and not to mention bulb lent their talent to get us in tough with the past.

Then came lunch, it was delicious. I almost put on a kg, especially becos of the sweets. It was general banter then for some time to get to know what others were upto. After every one slowly settled back we had a small session were each one gave an account on what they were doing for the past one year. Except bk all others got only one chance ;-).

After GRT the plan was to relax in Besant Nagar beach, the place where we spent many a evening in our last sem. Though I couldn't join others immediately to the beach, DCs pug did join them. When I arrived in the beach, which by the way for 5:00 PM was amazingly cool, everyone was about to leave. We planned to catch a quick movie before we could board our train. As Satyam was out of question we tried to get tics in Devi, which too was astonishingly crowded. Dejected we went to Spencers where all our regret flew away in a second.

Spencers is the most happening place I guess in Chennai right now. Lots of modernly dressed females were moving around. After some shopping, we chilled out in the Fruit Shop in the 3rd Phase. After we have made enough noise we entered Landmark. Boy O Boy, I have been to Spencer's Landmark many a times but today there was literally no place to stand. Since we were in a time cruch, as Thanix (appo eppo dippo?) had to catch a train early, we left around 8 PM.

In the train, as 6 of us were coming back to Bangalore, we were having lots of fun and chatting a bit aloud. The TTE was a short tempered guy who shouted at us asking us to get into our berths. Well then we called it a day. Next thing I know was people trying to wake me up. I thought they were trying to wake me up in the previous station itself, but found out that we were among the last few to get out of the train.

Though Chennai was a bit hot and sultry, it added to the feeling of being back at *home*. Hope I will be back to account the next get together in Bangalore, hopefully coming December.

You must be a very patient reader if you have come till here.
Signing off,

- Palani.

Thursday, May 27, 2004

Bangalore and traffic

Wow I had a very wasteful trip today. I had top get to a place on Hosur Road half way through to Electronic City from the Hosur Road Bridge. My office BTW is in Banneragatha Road, so its just abt 6, 7 kms to that place. My onward journey was so cool, just took a jiffy of 15 mins.

I thought I could be lucky but then it happened. Bumper to bumper traffic till the bridge on the backward journey. On reaching the bridge it was clear of traffic. I thought may be I am gonna be lucky. But as I reached the summit of the bridge the sight of the traffic continuing on and on would have made any eternal optimist sigh. After almost an hour I reached back in office. The only consolation is that some of my colleagues have been caught in worse traffic, stuck at the same place for an hour. Maybe I am lucky.

The time I ventured out is just the beginning of the rush hour. With all the techies from Electronic city heading home towards Bangalore it would be nightmarish traffic. If Blore is to become a real super power in the IT industry, competing with the places in the sillicon valley, this pathetic state has to change.

Any ideas on how we can improve this state??

-Palani

Wednesday, May 26, 2004

Sports and stuff

The last couple of weeks seems to be quite disapointing for me in the sports side. All the players/teams I cheer for have lost.

First it was the New Jersy Nets who got themselves ousted. I was hoping they could pull of a memorable win, but they are almost proving they are chokers. To add insult to injury, as the cliche goes, Lakes are doing really well.

Then poor Agassi lost in the first round of French Open. Now there won't be any more Steffi on the stands :(

And Micheal almost made it 6 in a row in F1. If only Montoya had driven more sensibly. But atleast F1 is getting a lot more interesting after the monotonous Schumacher ritual of winning all the races. I am just hoping the rest of the races will be as exciting, but with better results for Michael.

Note: Not that it wud be required. But the above are purely my personal opinions.

Monday, May 24, 2004

Introducing myself...

Greetings fellow netizens,

I am Palanidaran, a software developer working in Bangalore, India. I work for Trilogy E-Business Software India Pvt Ltd. I am a computer science engineer from Anna University, Chennai. I lived all my life, before getting into this job, in Chennai. My schooling was in Don Bosco, Egmore, Chennai.

Hope you find my blogs interesting.

Back soon,
Palani.