Sivaji (twice)

as of now, we have watched Sivaji twice ;) what more can I say about this movie. just type sivaji in google and figure out for yourself. I am busy with music program rehearsals. I am also busy with work. I am also busy with planning for a national park tour that we are undertaking next week. Looking forward to it :)

canon rebate

my rebate came in today! finally. I had mailed my stuff on March 14th I think. one can't be too careful these days. I took so many precautions, yet the mail was almost lost and the rebate was almost denied. I really had to earn my money back.

funeral

Today was a heart breaking day for me. I attended the funeral of a friend/aquaintance that I met during one of the tamil sangam's events. Death is the ultimate reality for all of us and it is something that we all understand the exact same way. The funeral was rather quiet, for an Indian one, but I am tempted to think everyone must have wept uncontrollably in the last week. The person passed away last week. It is very hard to come to terms with the fact that the body & soul don't exist anymore. Cancer could be very traumatizing, both for the person and for the family. His wife was one of the bravest in the hall, I guess she must have been through enough. I pray that he rests in peace and his family finds peace.

I sometimes wonder what kind of a life this is and why we all need to go through this, to ultimately end in death. What's the purpose? Why should we all be subjected to this? I guess I won't know.

Bad times.

My day didn't go very well on Monday. It was pretty bad. Though I have now, some additional knowledge of how the brain works, I couldn't help but feel disturbed on that day. My Canon rebate ($620) was about to be declined because of some stupid error "purchase made outside qualifying period". I kept calling them, but got absolutely no response. Timewarner charged us more than what we are supposed to pay for the monthly bill. Their reps started yelling at me for calling, as if they're the one who are pissed. We purchased paneer cheese from a neighboring store that turned out to be stale and we met with a pretty strong attitude when we tried to return it. The guy didn't take it back and suspected us for being careless and let the paneer rot away. I wonder how to deal with such people and what's happening to all the customer satisfaction and service in this country. Work didn't go too well either, can't elaborate on it here. Ultimately, at the end of the day, I thought I'd watch some DVD and go to sleep, but the DVD got stuck in the player. That was the end of the day...I just crashed after that.

Further developments in the last couple of days would be, my canon rebate problem seems to have been fixed and being processed now. The cable company accepted their fault (subtly though) and said they'll waive the downgrade charge and refund the money. The paneer story remains the same, I haven't tried to contact the store again.

Movies that I've been watching

I have been watching some really good movies lately. Movies that even challenge my dream to become a director ;) don't worry, it's only a dream yet. Pursuit of Happyness, Blood Diamond, Mozhi, Last Kiss, Happy Feet and so forth.

Pursuit of Happyness: I don't know how better acting can get! Will Smith has done a terrific job in this one. Very touching, real life inspired story. Highly recommend. I am looking out to buy the DVD sometime.

Blood Diamond: I have become a fan of Dicaprio and he definitely doesn't disappoint in this one. I like movies made in Africa in general, so I did like this one too. Their life seem so different to us, to the extent that it is a different world out there. People kill each other for stuff that people buy outside Africa. Jennifer Connelly was also great in the movie. Lot of violence and good acting.

Mozhi: This was a surprise winner. I really loved the movie and all of its cast and the direction. Prakash Raj has chosen a really nice movie to produce. Highly recommend this one. The beauty of the movie is that they've interspersed comedy throughout to make a heavy subject appear light. Kudos to the director for coming up with a theme like this one.

Happy Feet: I liked it overall, but it wasn't like finding nemo or Monsters Inc. I guess you can't replicate the ingenuity of these two movies anyway.

Last Kiss: Based on Will Smith's recommendation, I picked up another movie directed by the director of Pursuit of Happyness. He is actually an Italian director and directed this movie a few years ago. Last kiss is a fast paced comedy that deals with the intense emotions of men that want to avoid growing up. The movie ends on a high note.

Rebate status

My rebates almost got lost in the 'mail'. I had sent it via certified first class USPS mail with delivery confirmation. I thought I did a pretty good job of it, with the usual paranoia. Only, the paranoia came true in the unexpected channel. The mail was never delivered. I kept calling USPS to figure out what's going on until one angry representative yelled at me on friday saying that it might have been lost in transit and I'll have to file a claim. I was so pissed off. I decided to handle things directly with Canon and called them and made them escalate my rebate matter. I don't know what they have exactly done 'cause I still haven't received the "within 72 hour call" from them. Regardless, I have faxed them my documents. This morning I receive an email from USPS saying that they have delivered it. Funnily, yesterday I had filed a complaint with them. Now, the battle is between myself and Canon's rebate center. Let's see what happens.

Canon Rebate

I am supposed to get back $620 in Canon rebates. And Canon has been very notorious in giving the rebates back to the customers. So, I have been very paranoid and sent in all the materials to canon. I mail everything on wednesday by priority mail (or first class) and have requested a delivery confirmation. Let's see how long it takes for the rebates to come.

5D owner!

I recently bought a Canon EOS 5D, I think I got it on Feb 22nd to be precise. I got a 75-300mm lens with it as well and that's not performing up to my expectations. But the camera is great, with 12.8Mpixels and all those fancy stuff. I hope to seriously take some great pictures and possibly go pro on the side. I have always wanted to be a pro photographer. The definition being one that generates money out of photography. If I can generate enough to buy more and more fancy equipment, that itself would be great. Let's see. There are too many things related to photography. The lens buying experience is one of them. Too many lenses, too many expensive and good ones out there. Too many flash options and too expensive again. I'm trying to get a good external flash, as the camera doesn't come with an internal one. The 580EX is supposed to be a great flash with lots of power. I hope to get it new or used. Then I would need the 50mm f/1.4 EF lens. This lens is really sharp and I love its performance! Lots to learn.

Boring stuff

I don't know if it is just me or everyone else. I think life is generally boring these days. I feel the need to be more creative. I also know that it is somehow possible to be creative in my field. But my interests don't seem to lie there. Or should I take it up as a challenge and go on? There are too many people in the world doing the same thing. I feel the need to be unique, though I am not, in many ways. Most people that I talk to, want to do something great, possibly much sooner than it is practical. I am not different there. Sometimes I think it is easier to just give up and move on in life rather than trying to force things. I also wonder sometimes whether I am good enough for what I aspire to be. That is a doubt that probably many will have. How do you work under such circumstances. I need to reflect on myself more everyday. I have actually progressed at a much faster rate by reading several self improvement books and taking a lot of free courses and self evaluation, personality tests, etc. When people give me suggestions, they don't tell me anything that I don't know.

Also, I feel like I have become a recluse of some sort, having lost some tolerance in dealing with people who can't offer me more insight than I already have. This may sound arrogant, but that is not my intention. I have long struggled with a sense of guilt that I wrap around most of my actions but recently, I have realized that I shouldn't be feeling guilty for what I am. After all, I have not really meant any harm to anybody. I shout and yell occasionally. I feel like I am in a rut. I did a whole lot of research on business schools, other careers, etc. Time is passing by too. I feel like I want to be in many places at the same time. Why does my mind wander like this, I don't know. There is some deep unfulfilled desire, I am sure. It has probably something to do with not contributing enough to the arts. I am interested in music. I have progressed quite a bit since I started playing keyboard. But it is not enough for me somehow. I want to be at a much greater level, but I am not there yet and that kind of demotivates me and puts me on a downward spiral of depression.

I wish to say that I am not usually like this nor do I want to be. I want to be able to create funny sit-coms and so forth. I should lighten up ;)

b'day yesterday

I found out that four other people share the same b'day as me! One of them in fact, has born on the same day as I was and shares the same star! My friends surprised me last night by bringing in cake and some card. that was nice....

The rest of the day went off normally.

Procrastination

I think procrastination leads to a downward spiral of not accomplishing anything. The more you procrasinate, the more you keep thinking about the ones that you've procrastinated and that preoccupies your brain and prevents it from paying attention to other important things, which in turn get delayed. I read this book called Stumbling on Happiness and that says that the brain tends to keep thinking about something that's left unfinished - this can both lead to happiness and sadness. It is upto us to exploit this nature of the brain. It's a great book, BTW.

Me and my ideas

can't believe I've had ideas that other companies have come out with products representing them almost exactly! Firstly, I have had the same cell phone for the last five years (more than five, actually) and I've been looking at all the generations of cell phones without ever getting any interest. Somewhere in the middle, I got an ipod and loved it so much. I have always wanted a device that can combine the ipod and a phone together, with nothing but a display in it, that is touch sensitive. And guess what, Apple has come up with precisely such a thing. I have visited a blog that had all the potential designs of the iphone, based on fans' prediction on how it would look. They all looked great and sweet, but none of them seem to have thought of my idea and much to my disbelief, Apple seems to have made it happen!

The other notable thing - I have always wanted to replicate our house in 3-D model in a software and design the interiors myself and exchange opinions with my family through emails. It has been very difficult to suggest nice interior changes with me living here and my family living in chennai. I come back from my vacation and much to my delight and disbelief, I find this software called "Sketch up" from Google! IT IS A FREE 3-D MODELLING SOFTWARE. Can you believe it? Furthermore, it is just sooo easy to create any 3d design you want using that software. Interior designers have a great tool now.

One more major disappointment - I wanted to shoot a song in just one take, without changing scenes. I really dreamt about this one...but alas, somebody else is doing it before me, in the movie called Auto (Oram Po). I don't know what the hell is happening here.

I've learnt one thing - an idea that's not used today is an idea that's useless tomorrow :)

New Year 2007

I had gone to santa barbara, malibu temple, lake cachuma and solvang on dec 30, 31 with a couple of friends. it was a relaxing trip and we mostly spent time taking pictures and eating unhealthy foods.

My absence

well I was in India from Nov 20th to Dec 16th. That means I left LAX on Nov 18th and reached back on Dec 17th. That was my longest vacation to India/Chennai in quite some time. I wonder why I call it an India trip at all, 'cause frankly I don't know much apart from how Chennai looks. I wanted to go to Bangalore, but that didn't happen. The main mission to accomplish was to prepare for my father's 60th bday celebrations and that went very well. Apart from that we did quite a lot of shopping - mostly clothes for us and the visiting family members and friends. Clothes are expensive. I bought a couple of nice shoes as well. I am back alone 'cause my wife wanted to stay back for some more months. That's about it.

the weekend so far

the weekend will come to an end soon. I had to do many things to prepare for our trip to India soon. I recorded about 28 songs from my keyboard. People back home have been asking me to do so. We watched a couple of movies. Borat is #1 this weekend too! that's amazing. We just came back from a "world of opera" concert held in San Diego Symphony Hall. Didn't know that Irwin Jacobs has pledged to donate $100 million to the Copland Symphony foundation. That's a nice gesture ;)

Got something

got something that's really needed on Nov 7th ;)

Nacho Libre, etc

I watched many movies in the weekend - nacho libre, MI3, Motorcycle Dairies, Borat ;) I liked all of them very much. Borat is definitely one of the funniest movies. It's also easily the grossest one I have seen. You can easily take offense to it and easily laugh too. Nacho Libre was exactly like Napoleon Dynamite, not nearly as funny. I really liked the title music. It was very apt. MI3 was an edge of the seat thriller. Very well done. I really liked Motorcycle Dairies until the 2nd half, where it gets philosophical, etc.

Problems with Air India

AI cancelled the flight from Singapore to Chennai because of bad weather in Chennai. Here's the good part - apparenly, a flight from Chennai is supposed to fly to Singapore first so that it can bring the passengers from there and that's the flight that wasn't able to take off!???? How do you like that?

Parents have left

I dropped them off at LAX last night. After quite a few phone calls that were exchanged between Air India and myself, they finally managed to put them on a singapore airlines flight. Time flies - their visit now seems very short. I am not sure if I managed to please them and make their trip entirely pleasant 'cause I was too busy. I did my best though - couldn't have done any better ;) They will reach India on Friday. Another four weeks or so and we'll be gone too.

Stuff I've been thinking about

My mind knows. It knows that I should stop doing a lot of things I do now. I haven't been able to live the moment for quite some time now. There are all these thoughts. I somehow need to create value with all my talents. I just don't know how. I have been thinking very hard about this questions for a very long time now and I have no answer at all. What my mind says is that I am losing my present with this anxiety, but I am unable to take charge now. My mind says that start on something and the fog will clear from there, but I am somehow not able to proceed with full speed now. I need energy. I have to take charge. How can one create value from interest in music, interest in photography, films and a deep knowledge and appreciation for science? Particularly, what will I do with the professional experience that I have gathered? What do people do in general? Do they just go with the flow, complaining all the time? Or do they just go with the flow happily, hoping for the good stuff to happen whenever it is destined to happen? What do the rest of the men do? Seriously.

Education. It is something I truely value. Be it in any field. It is a process in which you learn quite a bit. The life after education is when you seldom use all of your knowledge. That's the sad part. May be I should have become a professor, but let me not go in that direction. I have this constant urge to learn something. Anytime not spent learning is considered a waste. Anytime that is not spent pursuing your passion is also a big waste. I am tempted to think that this phase will pass. I want to be optimistic. But the clock doesn't wait for anyone. It keeps ticking.

I have a lot of ideas. Tons of them. My nature, call it stupid, tells me that I want to execute all my ideas when my mind knows that one of them itself can take a lifetime to accomplish. Who planted all these ideas in me? Is it so that I'll definitely do something about it? Aren't there any clear people in the world? What do they all do and how did they arrive there? I do see a lot of content people, who don't seem to give a damn about their future. I envy them in one sense. I feel like I have come too far from being like that. My thinking and contemplating mind never stops. It just never stops.

I need to start exercising vigorously again. I have been rather dull. All work and no play makes me a dull boy. I realized that I was quite happy and energetic when I had a strict gym schedule - 3 times a week. It was quite amazing. Amazing to the extent that it was not meant to last. I had this thing going on for four years in a row. I somehow had the motivation, regardless of where I lived, to keep going to the gym and do my one hour thing there. How the hell did that end? I can't possibly explain 'cause I don't know.

I am interested in entrepreneurship. I can't take finance or investment banking. Consulting - may be, but I am getting old for that. I can't put in so many hours per week and see my time being spent away from music, photography. I need those two in my life. Can I take music courses in the undergrad/grad level somewhere? I can already tell you that my mind would want to take photography courses as well. How about film school? Do I stand a chance at all? What am I missing here? Is this the so called mid-life crisis. I really hope not, because I can see things getting far worse.

I thought I would vent the steam out a little. I took a career test from www.livecareer.com. You should take it too. It takes about 20 minutes to answer the 100 questions or so they have on the site, for which there are no right or wrong answers. I know about these tests. You need to be completely honest in order to get a fair evaluation of your interests and your skills, talent, etc. Apparently, I am the most interested in Arts, Science and Writing. The former two I can understand, but I don't know where writing came from. It's a means of being creative...so I guess I can include that. I am also not very assertive or persuasive apparently. I remember earlier I had flunked an entrepreneur test that I found in Guy Kawasaki's website. Don't know where I am headed, to be brutally honest.

The only thing right now that can make me totally happy is a reasonably clear short term future, say 2 years. Education is an option or working hard and learning new things is another. In either of these, I don't see music standing much of a chance. Photography is solely restricted to when I am travelling, but I want to do a lot more. God bless.

Laterz.