Never a dull moment

Internet is a wonder tool which has revolutionised the landscape on sharing information storage, transfer and communication in the last decade and a half. A lot of other things have changed as well and some of them for good- like payment of telephone bills, electricity bills, booking of air and train tickets and bank transactions which can be done at a touch of a button. Standing in a queue for long after travelling from one's place of work or residence was a energy sapping and time consuming exercise especially if one is trying to book tickets for holiday season or during holiday season. Everybody who matter has an email address and this has resulted in the near death of snail mail amongst contacts in major cities and big towns who have everyday access to internet. It has been long time since people have written letters as it is internet, mobile verbal telephony or sms is the medium of communication these days. Internet revolution has made English the prime language around the wor...

World Cup Football championship is going on in South Africa. Football is the most popular game in the world and has the highest viewership and along with Olympics is the sport with the highest viewership in the world. Football is a simple game in terms of rules of the game and has following all over the world unlike other games like basketball, volley ball and cricket which are of interest to some cluster of countries or the other. Liek Olympics, the build up for World Cup football event in South Africa commenced a month before the event in Indian newspapers. There were write ups about each of the 32 teams participating and there were several articles about how South African administrators were working hard to make it a perfect event. The first set of 48 league matches are over and 16 teams are now battling it out in the knock out stage. From this stage each match has to produce a result and the winning teams advance to quarter finals followed by semi final and final.At each stage the ...

19th June. It is my birthday today and it is Golden Jubilee birthday too. I am passing through one of the worst phases in my career. It has been tough and unnerving days in the office for a couple of months now. The wee hours when the golden jubilee day dawned saw me going sleepless and attending to an explosive situation involving our staff at a leading government hospital with a large police force surrounding them. Eminently avoidable start for a birthday. Naturally I could not sleep after getting home around 2 am. Golden jubilee is a landmark when some people look back upon the milestones passedd on the way. Not much luck on this score for me. Looking back, I can not see anything but a vast expanse of nothingness with a tinge of colour on shapeless objects here and there. I can see some colours and object with shapes before after the halfway mark towards the starting line. What could those objects be ? I raked my brain. Yes, I can remember them now. The good academic achievement wh...

The first jitter I got on the eve of my golden jubilee was that the expiry of driving licence. Indian driving licence is issued with validity till 50th birthday or for twenty years which ever comes earlier. Since I took driving licence in late thirties, mine was valid till the official 50th birthday ( which precedes my actual date of birth by 19 days ). I said "jitters" with a specific reason. The driving licence I held was issued in Chennai. There is no way I can get it renewed in Chennai as I am not travelling to Chennai in the near future.The more important reason is that I can not produce any proof of residency there. This is the problem of being on jobs which keeps one moving from one city to another without a permanent address. I decided to apply for renewal of driving licence at Jaipur itself as I have some "influence" in government circles here. I am staying in a rented accommodation but without a lease agreement. My landlord is abroad and there is no way I ...

I have been looking out for opportunities on job front. The present assignment has been like a heavy weight boxing championship series and the current bout is fizzling out this month. I have an option to take part in the next bout as head of another state. I am getting tired of this boxing bout and would seek to engage myself in some other sport. In this pursuit , I have been widening my contact base. One such attempt was joining Linkedin group of IIMA Alumni few days ago. My request for membership was accepted and the first news digest I received from this group was that HP was firing 3000 people ! I shook my head in disbelief. Though HP has nothing to do with my profession, it was an ironic message considering the main motivation for joining this group. Rajasthan has been reeling under severe heat wave conditions last month. Several black bucks had died due to water scarcity in Jaisalmer and Jodhpur districts. There has been water scarcity all over Rajasthan this summer as last rainy...

I have an easy way of talking even with total strangers. There have been several occassions when the participants in such ocnversation were women. This has happened in several fora like wedding reception, birthday parties and social get togethers. On some occassions, my better half felt insecure and even asked me whether I would leave for somebody else. My response to this query reassured and comforted her. I told her that I was not foolish to commit a grave mistake twice in my life knowingly.Of course, this is my Golden jubilee year and the progressively her insecurity has diminished what with bulging waste line and rapidly receding hairline further reducing my attractiveness. I read somewhere that Al Gore and "Tipper" Gore are parting ways after 40 years of marital bliss. It sounds so foolish and idiotic to go for a divorce when the couple are in 60s age group. As years roll by, I notice that the greatest enemy is loneliness and boredom. This increases as one heads past fi...