Sheer happiness I thought! I was driving to office one day and I looked up… Right in front of me was the most beautiful and amazing rainbow I had ever seen. I smiled. I kept looking at it so much that I would have almost hit the guy in front of me. Every time I recall that rainbow, I feel so happy. I wanted to show it to my daughter but never saw anything close after that day.

Last week, I was browsing and I saw that there was a Cricket match between India and England. There was a free live stream. I just clicked the link and in a few minutes, I was watching Cricket! Almost after a decade and half! I thought it would not interest me much, but there I was hooked to the screen to see India score 387! And after that I watched another match last night. Now I am addicted again to the good old game called Cricket! Can’t wait for the next one to see Yuvraj hit another century.

And today, my good old friend writes to me that she got her ear pierced. Now that was more than the first good one done when we were kids! And I am excited again like a teenager to get my ears pierced. Will do it this weekend. The joy of little things!

I have always respected customer service folks and telemarketing callers for all the crap that they have to put up with. They all do it as part of their job. It may not be in their personal interest to annoy anyone with products. But a few are terrible at this job and they should consider a career change.

For one, if you are calling to sell a product, listen to the other party too. Do they really want it? Would they even consider it? Don’t go on with your story as soon as someone says a “hello”. Yesterday evening a lady called me regarding a calling card. She was an Indian and she knew I am one too. So she started off as soon a I picked the phone. Here is how it goes:

She: Is this P?
Me : Yes
She : We want you to switch to our calling card service since blah blah blah (for 3 minutes, as I watched the clock)
Me : I am sorry, I am not interested (with 2 kids crying at the background)
She : You will certainly like this, since you call India.
Me : Really? I don’t call India at all
She : This is good for UK too
Me : I don’t call UK either. This is not a good time to call and can you please delete my number from your list.
She : OK! Then where do you call?
Me : I don’t call anywhere (I was annoyed by now)
She : Really? You don’t have any relatives anywhere?
At this point I was done! I just said “Its none of your business where my relatives are, just delete my number!” and I hung up!

Airtel calling card telemarketers should follow the US do not call registry when they call people in the US!

Once in a lifetime someone comes along and they leave a mark like nobody ever has or ever will. You may not remember that person everyday but you remember them whenever there is a problem to solve. For me, one such person was my Theory of Computation/Graph Theory Professor Dr B N S Murthy. I have seen him since my childhood. A single lonely man, with nothing much as part of his personal life. But his brain worked better than most of the people I have met along my way. He could recite the algorithms in Graph Theory like no person ever has. He talked and breathed Theory of Computation. I did not understand the importance of this man or the subject he taught during those days. I only wanted to get done with his course. But during the recent years, as I got more involved in solving real computer science problems in Information Retrieval, I realized the importance of what he taught. He was my hero and he still is. He knew how to solve all the problems I am looking at today, about a decade back. I wanted to call him and tell him ‘Thanks, I have realized your importance now’, but I procrastinated. I called home this morning and my mom said ‘I have a bad news’ and even before I heard it, she had told me he was gone. I wish I had called him just once and said ‘I truly respect you’ but I never did and I know I will regret this whenever I solve yet another graph problem.

Though the reality shows in Indian TV is mostly copied from American TV, Indian ads are getting better and better. They beat the world hands down and yeah! I strongly think ads will be outsourced to India soon, if they aren’t already. I am not particularly fond of Indian TV copying American reality shows like “Fear Factor” or “Are you smarter than a 5th grader?”. I am sure there is a lot of creativity out there and then can do better reality shows. On that note, here is a Vodafone ad and I absolutely love it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lB1UPJ4leqs

If you are employed full time are are paying SDI out of every paycheck:

1. You can get 4 weeks of SDI during pregnancy (4 weeks before due date or more as the doctor suggests).This pays 55% of the paycheck to a max of 800+ $ per week (I am not sure of the right number but that’s close)

2. You can get 6 weeks of SDI for normal delivery or 8 weeks for C-Section; again at 55% of pay (max applies).

3. Following the 10 weeks (or 12) above, you can get 6 weeks of Paid Family Leave (PFL) in California. Again 55% of the paycheck (max applies).

So you can get up to 16 weeks of pay (55%) for normal delivery and more for C-section. If you start using the SDI during pregnancy, then they will automatically kick-in SDI after delivery and PFL forms will also be sent accordingly. But there is a time limit to claim these things, upto 12 weeks I believe.

You can see more info here:

http://www.edd.ca.gov/fleclaimdi.htm (SDI)

http://www.edd.ca.gov/fleclaimpfl.htm (PFL)

Call the 1800 number listed here to see if you qualify.

I do not claim to be an expert in this, but this is from my own experience.

My parents are leaving in a week’s time. My mom has been with us for 7 months now and my dad, for over 2 months. I have never seen time fly by so fast. It just feels like I picked them up from the airport yesterday and now they are all set to leave. We went on short and long trips, almost every weekend. While I will certainly miss them, its my kids that will miss them the most. From patiently listening to my kids woes to bed time stories and calm feeding sessions, they have been with the kids all through the day and night. I have never once felt like a mother of 2 kids with my parents around. I have always felt like a kid myself. Maybe thats what parents do to you, bring out the child in you. I went out yesterday and made my dad buy me the entire Harry Potter collection. I am not sure if I will have time to read them soon, but walking to a book store and making dad buy me books, is entirely a different kind of fun. We spent 2 hours at B&N and bought a whole lot of books. This is one of the many things I enjoy doing, make my dad buy me books

I am sure life will not be the same from next week. I will terribly miss them, but I know that they are going back after a wonderful trip. Its reassuring to know I have done the best I can.

I recently traveled from Bangalore to Singapore by Indian Airlines with my 2 year daughter. By the time we reached Singapore, my daughter had several rashes on her legs with some swelling. We were instantly worried if she had developed some allergy over the flight and were terrified. Our next flight was to Hong Kong, which was about 3 hours, and now the carrier was Cathay Pacific. We decided to take the risk and fly, with the thought that we would see a doctor if the rashes increased during this flight. The rashes seemed under control, but our next flight was to San Francisco was about 11 hours and these rashes caused a lot of stress. It was only after we saw her Paediatrician here in the US, that we realized this was caused by bed bugs. And this was in the Indian Airlines flight operating from Bangalore to Singapore. For the $$$ that we all pay, I think we deserve a much cleaner service. I would never fly Indian Airlines after this and would never recommend it to anyone.

I was driving home yesterday evening. Very tired and almost sleepy. The lights turned red and I hit the brakes, cursing my luck, wishing it were green a little longer. I saw a young lady walking with a child and a old man. It seemed to me like they were father, daughter and grand-daughter. Just as they finished crossing the street, the child prompted the lady to pick her up. The lady picked the child and the old man continued to push the stroller, which accidently hit the lady’s feet. She was about to fall but got a good grip and stood back up. She turned, stared at the old man and started shouting at him. Well, I could not hear what she said but from the expression on her face, she seemed clearly upset. The old man patiently apologised and continued to do so for the next few seconds. At this, the light turned green and I saw that they moved on too. But it did leave an effect on me for several hours. Did the old man really deserve to hear so much for a silly mistake? We are so nice to strangers. If another person had done this and apologized, the lady would have said ‘Its OK’ and walked on. Do our parents need to be taken for granted? The first little steps we took, the first time we went swimming, the first time we drove and several such ‘first times’ were with our parents. We have grown up and may not need their support any more but a few kind words and a few good deeds is all they want and any parent deserves it.

As if writing blogs were not sufficient, now I have started blog-lifting too. Well this was a nice article and I had to put it here, I am an engineer, so it makes me appreciate this article and I am a computer Engineer, so the Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V.

For the engineers among us who understand that the obvious is not always the solution, and that the facts, no matter how implausible, are still the facts …

A complaint was received by the Pontiac Division of General Motors:

“This is the second time I have written you, and I don’t blame youfor not answering me, because I kind of sounded crazy, but it is a fact that we have a tradition in our family of ice cream for dessert after dinner each night. But the kind of ice cream varies so, every night, after we’ve eaten, the whole family votes on which kind of ice cream we should have and I drive down to the store to get it. It’s also a fact that I recently purchased a new Pontiac and since then my trips to the store have created a problem. You see, every time I buy vanilla ice cream, when I start back from the store my car won’t start. If I get any other kind of ice cream, the car starts just fine. I want you to know I’m serious about this question, no matter how silly it sounds: ‘What is there about a Pontiac that makes it not start when I get vanilla ice cream, and easy to start whenever I get any other kind?’”

The Pontiac President was understandably sceptical about the letter, but sent an engineer to check it out anyway. The latter was surprised to be greeted by a successful, obviously well-educated man in a fine neighbourhood. He had arranged to meet the man just after dinner time, so the two hopped into the car and drove to the ice cream store. It was vanilla ice cream that night and, sure enough, after they came back to the car, it wouldn’t start.

The engineer returned for three more nights. The first night, the man got chocolate. The car started. The second night, he got strawberry. The car started. The third night he ordered vanilla. The car failed to start.

Now the engineer, being a logical man, refused to believe that this man’s car was allergic to vanilla ice cream. He arranged, therefore, to continue his visits for as long as it took to solve the problem. And toward this end he began to take notes: he jotted down all sorts of data, time of day, type of gas used, time to drive back and forth, etc.

In a short time, he had a clue: the man took less time to buy vanilla than any other flavour. Why? The answer was in the layout of the store.

Vanilla, being the most popular flavour, was in a separate case at the front of the store for quick pickup. All the other flavours were kept in the back of the store at a different counter where it took considerably longer to find the flavour and get checked out.

Now the question for the engineer was why the car wouldn’t start when it took less time. Once time became the problem — not the vanilla ice cream — the engineer quickly came up with the answer: vapour lock. It was happening every night, but the extra time taken to get the other flavours allowed the engine to cool down sufficiently to start. When the man got vanilla, the engine was still too hot for the vapour lock to dissipate.

Moral of the story: even insane-looking problems are sometimes real.

Here is an awesome article about the personality traits of best software engineers.To summarize, the best software engineers are:

• Pessimistic – asking What could possibly go wrong?
• Angered by sloppy code
• Long term life planners – Retirement savings, own a home etc
• Attention to detail

Agreed that this would make the best software engineer, but do any of these traits indicate a good team player? All the traits discussed above make a great individual but how many people with these traits work well in a team. I think to work well in a team, communication is very important, and communication is possible only when you can think on the same wavelength as your other teammates.