Late Nights at work...

Well, its nearing 10.20 PM and I am still at my desk, talking to the "Idiot Box" (I call my comp like that.. dont ask me why) and desperately trying to get done with my tasks. Sadly I noticed that I am out of cancer sticks as well.. darn !! This makes me sit back and think (while my script is running in the background.. and oh btw, one run takes 20 mins.. gosh !! can you believe that), what's with late nights and IT professionals.. ?
Time and again, when I used to work in Tidel Park, and was obsessed with doing late nights, everytime I used to come out for a break, I would see the entire smoker's arena, buzzling with activity ! Well, night shifts could be one of the reasons, but the other reason that frequently comes to my mind is.... tight deadlines... ! Which makes me sit and think, do we always run behind impossible deadlines to get deliveries "Delivered" ?? I dont know about you, but personally I have always felt, its the never ending urge to never say "No" when work is assigned to you, for something that has "That is totally impossible given the short time" phrase written all over it !!
A question to introspect, how many times have you wanted to say, Nah.. thats totally not possible, but still felt yourself jumping out of your seats and saying "Oh yes, that can be done" and then walking out of the meeting room with this utmost deepest and most wanting urge to kick yourself for having said that... ! I have always been a workaholic, apart from being addicted to a whole bunch of other things (which I wouldnt want to confess in a blog that is.. lol !), but even otherwise, I must admit I have made this blunder many a times. Dunno if this is the case with us Indian folks in general or if this just one of those wildest perceptions of mine, but I have always noticed that even before we do our ground work which in general terms is called as "Feasibility" we jump to a task and commit our utmost dedication to it.. maybe its the question of "Ego" or maybe its the question of "Reputation" or even sheer bragging, but the point is, we dont seem to be doing our due diligience !
On the other hand, I have watched a lot of Americans work in a different way... In one such situation, we had an emergency at work at we needed a system admin to show up immediately to fix an issue, but it was a weekend and when we did manage to reach out to the person, he politely and in a very politically correct manner expressed his inability to show up at work, because he was busy taking his weekend time off.. !! That made me wonder, had I been in such a situation would I have said No.. I guess not...
That makes me come to the most important question, why do we slog like this ? Why do we always race against tough deadlines... Well the answer is pretty simple. When tasks get assigned to people, and deadlines fixed against them, the people doing the allocation work, always take away atleast 10% of the allotted time and give us only 90% of the time to wrap it up. This in a way is very good, because we are planning for untoward emergencies. But sometimes this backfires when the person doing the estimation and the person who is actually running around trying to get the job done are two completely different set of people, who in no way interact with each other.. ! Ouch. !! that sounds scary doesnt it.. imagine a situation wherein I am giving an estimate of 10 weeks as the time required to build a "NASA space rocket" when I have no clue about rocket building nor have I spoken to people involved in rocket building and gotten their opinions.. Its a tough decision to be honest.. How much of time is required to wrap up something is always apart from being a "Hot question thrown at an interview" also something which requires a lot of experience, a lot of common sense and not to leave out, a lot of discussions between all the folks working on a task...
We all know there is a problem, but its the same thing again "Who will tie the bell to a cat".. I have now begun to sit up and think, why I do I make blunders when telling someone as to how much of time do I require to get done with a task.. and then end up slogging just to ensure that I keep up my word.. Well reality check.. I think I have found my answer... In my case it has always been the sheer ego... "What will people think about my abilities if I say I require more time to get done with a task" that sort of an attitude.. Its very bad to be honest, because to be honest, in a professional world, no one actually cares for others abilities in such minutest details... I have been living in a fool's paradise.. and what adds fuel to this fire ?? Guess what, everytime when someone says, "Oh Krish, well I know he can get this done in a couple of hours".. that's what makes me do the same blunder.. I seem to be getting carried away.. which I have now decided to fix...

All that said and done, as I decide to wrap up this post as well as my day at work.. ask yourself.. "Why do you slog at office" ??

My New Year Love

     Well, new year to a lot of people am sure would have begun in whole lot of different ways... To me this new year beginning was totally different and unique as well I must say.. This new year I experienced what all the movie makers so profoundly portray as "Love at First Sight"... Yup... it was Friday morning on Jan 1st, and as always I was browsing through some portals looking for something... you know.. the kind of a casual net surfing thing... that was when I stumbled into her in a portal... Her pic was so gorgeous.. the write up on the profile got me interested... I read through and almost instantly fell in love with her... after that, it was what all the love smitten people describe as "The painful wait in love"... after three days finally I got to meet her... she was even more gorgeous than how she looked in the pic.. she was neatly wrapped... and she came with a 2 year warranty... yippie.. just as they had promised on the portal on her profile... I even named her instantly.. I called her "Kung-fu Panda"...
Am sure you must be in a shemozzle now... and wondering.. what the heck does this guy mean by "She came with a 2 year warranty".. and are the gals actually putting up warranty periods as well on the matrimonial sites even.. sheesh !! (I can see that surprised look on your face even)! Relax.., let me explain.. well I was as I said, doing some casual browsing, when I stumbled into this beautiful mp3 player from transcend, Transcend MP650.. a sexy 8GB ivory colored piece, which works as a mp3 player, has a built in FM Radio, can store data just as pen drive, can do recordings for you, and comes bundled with software that lets you even lock your desktop or laptop... kind of a personalised key for your own lappie.. now aint that cool... I fell in love with this thing almost instantaneously.. the minute I laid my eyes on it.. just something that I guess I was wanting to have, but never bothered to look around.. priced at Rs. 2,750 this is a pretty cool mp3 player... I was sitting on my laptop from morning 6 AM trying to put all the songs into it, so that I can sway to the beats of my favorite songs, which I tussled with my scripts and got them to work.. and by around 9 I was almost completely done.. It comes with a USB cable which you use it to charge it (yup it runs on a rechargeable lithion battery).. you can also on an alternative, buy a AC charger for USB devices and then plug this into an AC power supply directly...

    I was feeling a bit low, off late, but my dear "Kung-Fu Panda" surely got me all excited and enthusiastic... and oh by the way, just incase you were wondering, what's with the name "Kung-Fu Panda" being given to this player.. well, couple of reasons... first being, I loved that movie.. and second was because, I loved the core concept of the movie.. which was "There is no special ingredient".. its the belief that makes something special.. on a quick glance this mp3 player is no big deal, and am sure there are better ones available in the market, but to me this one is.. which now explains why I feel this as the special ingredient, which cheered me up on the first week of a brand new year.. !!

So there you have it... Krish.. finally found.. "yet" another true love.. ! Lol.. !!!