To Movies or To Shopping!

True Story. Absolutely original email chain.

Disclosure: All characters appearing in this email chain are NOT fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is NOT coincidental but intentional.
So here it goes......

A very good friend of mine emailed all the men in the group (and CCed the women) asking to see if we wanted to see the movie over the weekend.

(This is him)
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Guys -

Had a thought if everybody is up for it -

How about we go to the awsome movie (which came out today) (Lowes - next to our house) - Prince of Persia and the women can all get together and bitch about us during that time......

I am assuming that since this is a game/historical movie - they are not intrested (atleast I know my wife would peacefully sleep during such a movie)

Lazy Sunday afternoon is what I am thinking - any preferences/thoughts?

Thanks.
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PRINCE OF PERSIA !!! Of course i wanna go... Is that even a question? But I had already told my wife we will go baby shopping....So now what. Let me tell you that there is no subtle way to tell a pregnant women you don’t want to go baby shopping with her and you want to go to the movies instead.

But here is what I replied..........

(This is me)
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Hey buddy,

Nice idea. Here are my thoughts to it.

Read the lines 1 thru 9.

1. I love going to
2. Babies r us and Buy Buy Baby.
3. Movies
4. suck
5. and I would hate
6. to no end , not going to
7. to visit
8. baby shopping
9. at Ikea

Now just read alternate lines (1-3-5-7-9) and (2-4-6-8)

1. I love going to
2. Babies r us and Buy Buy Baby.
3. Movies
4. suck
5. and I would hate
6. to no end , not going to
7. to visit
8. baby shopping
9. at Ikea

You get the idea ...Dont you?

--Regards
Niral Jhaveri

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Alas, I score some brownie points for creativity . She replies to me

"Lolzzz!!! Good One Daddy-To-Be!! "

Ugly Duckling (revisited) by Software Geeks

My search story- The Pregnant Dad

So these days i have been "googling" different stuff....Not the usual google search on Java code or iPhone apps or Megan Fox....

These days its everything is about the baby......how-to's and what-if's

Anyways, So I thought why not use the same tool, which Google used to make their Super Bowl AD and make a video out of it.

Hopefully my humor will come across. Njoi.

Taste of India

Dont we Indians love our food. Check out the fav food distribution in India
(Thanks Jigs for the pic)

Consulting and perspectives

Being in consulting has taught me some very valuable lessons. It has made me realize the importance of the 3 C's in consulting...Customer, Customer, Customer and Customer (Oh, so that’s 4 C's ..Damn it I should have paid attention in the math class). The age old mantra "Customer is always right" is tweaked and remixed in consulting. It goes something like "Customer is always right, when they exactly do as I say"

Being in consulting you get to experience the good, bad and ugly of every business . Not only the perspectives are different within an organization but sometimes they are two ends of a spectrum. My favorite part of consulting is not the challenges i face while solving an issue but trying to bridge the gap between the members of the same organization a.k.a "My Customers"


A CFO's perspective almost reminds of me the McDonald's commercial.



"What can i get for a dollar". Its almost seems to be their favorite Q (and I don't blame them).

The response to that is very different, depending on who is giving the answer. If you'd ask the sales guy...He would say "we can get it way under your budget; for $0.99* instead of the whole dollar."
(* of course that means we will off shore the project and get it done for $0.10)
If the CFO asked me the same Q, I would say that "we can further save $0.01 by using cost saving methodologies*.
(*which means, my team cant expense their lunch and I will work from home)

A CTO's perspective is varied from other management heads. He goes mainly like, "how can we get the cutting edge technology out there, improve efficiency, and build software that should be intuitive for any user". By that he really means get me something which is newer than a super computer technology, build software that will solve all my business needs and something my agonizingly painful users can use w/0 asking too many Q's.

Now the tech sales guy would promise a Intel neon quad core i7 processor with 23 Total Compute Nodes (14,336 Total Cores) with 28,672GB Ram and a never ending disk space with RAID and a 27x7 availability. Also free license of Linux loaded on top of Vista which runs on Solaris.(
I on the other hand would have to say the same above things (since the sales guy already promised that and that's how we got the contract). But would have also added that "we can build a bug free, highly scalable enterprise software solution from some in house reusable software assets which are very user friendly and improve efficiency in business."

(By that i mean we are going to use open source software which is in pre-alpha-beta-theta version and while we are fixing your bugs we will also solve world hunger)

I usually find the business stake holders' perspective the most interesting. They usually begin the conversation by letting us know when they would like the project to end. So they go mainly like, "we would like to end the project this summer so what kind of functionally can push to the users by that time-frame?" Now that's a trick Q. Why? The reason this is a trick Q, coz they will follow the Q by an answer of itself. "Oh don't forget the 1,735 page requirement document we sent you. It is extremely imperative we have all the 160,489 use case in the live system."

Now this usually has a predictable and consistent response from sales and a consultant like me. WTF!!!

In consulting different terms mean differently, depending on who's perspective you looking at. Its kinda like when you tell your wife, you are going to out drinking on sat night with a bunch of guys and she says "Go ahead, do it"....
Woman's perspective: "I dare you to do it" (don't do it bro..)
Mans perspective...YEAHHHH!!!

The same way in consulting terms mean different for a customer and consultants. I tried to get a few which I could think of.

	Customer perspective	Consultant/Consulting perspective
Bug free system	Bug free system Something the sales promised to the CTO who promised to CFO who promised to CEO who promised to stake holders …you get the idea	Imaginary system. Kinda like santa clause ...doesn't exists.
Onsite	Need someone to whine to and blame for our problems	A guy you keep in front of customer so that they can kick his a$$
Offshore	The best cost-reducing strategy known to man.	Mid night calls. (I am not allowed to write more on this)
Open source software	The second best cost-reducing strategy known t.	Usually used when there is no budget for software No documentation.No support. Plenty of bugs.
Project status = Green	All's well and project on track	All's well and project on track (but we don’t know when is dooms day
Project status = Yellow	There is a small issue and we need to resolve it	There is a major problem we have no idea but we cant tell the customer right away.
Project status = Red	Dude, we are doomed	Dude, we are doomed. Doom's day milestone achieved a day early
Priority 1 bug	Need it fix ASAP. The color of blue should be changed to Red	Need it fix ASAP. Solve it before the bug report is sent to PM or call it a “new feature”
Change Request	Nothings a CR. Everything is in scope	Running behind schedule then all bugs are tagged as CR
Quick response is appreciated	I need the answer right away	Please delay as much as possible so that I can lurk around in the cafeteria a little longer
Loyal employee	Can’t get a job anywhere.	No such thing.
Teamwork	Lot of people doing what I say	A Team that does all the work
Appreciation	John is an invaluable "ass"et to the project, could he start working week ends also	Something which looks good on paper and has no influence or value on appraisal
Appraisal	Does not exist.	I concur. Does not exist

I just wanted to reflect on some thoughts i have had during consulting. There are way more dimensions and perspectives to consulting then i could simplify here. And there are plenty of things you will agree/disagree/laugh or curse me for. I just tried to scrub the surface of this versatile industry as i understand.....But then ....what do I know

Comedy of errors

Over the past few years, i have had a series of mishaps. My wife tags it as disasters, I call them comedy of errors. Now be it the microwave burning while talking to a chick in the hallway or using a fire extinguisher to make Maggie noodles (dont even ask how) or how i lost 4 phones in a span of 3 months.

A coupla years back on one of my assignments with IBM, i was on a conference call with about 30 folks (u all know how those calls are). I had a VP of Sales, Mr.Timbuktu. He was on a mad rampage and would not let anyone speak on the call. This fiesta went on for about 20-25 mins of the 30 min call we had...ARGHH. So I decided to vent out some of my anger by IMing my associate Captain GoGo (..of course i am not going to list out the real names)

me: Dude...when will Timbuktu stop. Hes driving me nuts. I wish he'd stop right now..my brains are fried
(brief pause)
Timbuktu : oh, i will stop right now.
(oh gosh!! i had IMed my VP instead of my associate, telling him hes an idiot. How can i do that. People who know me said "Only you can do that")
me: Sign out

The next day we had a awkward moment, but then we laughed over it.

I have had a few comedy of errors in my life in things I have done or said or even heard. I went to a school in Mumbai PCT college of Engg..(almost as famous or infamuous as MIT ...lol who am i kidding). Apart from valuable lessons on Engg I also learned Pinglish (PCT-English) . Some of the moments we still revlive ...

A professor in a telecomm branch catches 3 students copying in class. He asks them to stand up and...

Prof: You both all 3 get out .......(both..all 3 huh)
Prof: Also i want you to get all your fathers
(all your fathers ..are you kidding me)

Prof: oh wait ...u get your mother ur father and both ur parents

I was in the Computer Engg and file submission is the most critical time in the 4 year of college and no matter how much i tried i never got my file submitted on time...So i reach to college very early (the next day of submission) and the prof has just come in.... My prof is this guy who's english is kinda like minglish (marathi + english). So i go in the lab

me: Sir, may i come in

Prof: kashala (why)

me: Sir, file submission

Prof: aree....सकल सकल डोका नाकू फिराव (sakal sakal dok nako phirav)

me :excuse me what???? (now i am desi guju guy, me no speak marathi)

Prof: Morning Morning dont rotate my head ...(Rotate...huh...oh wait he translated it literally) .

Prof : Go open the doors of the windows and let the atmosphere come in. (!!! atmosphere!! ..at that point i had to leave)

I love giving exams (ya rite!) specially the surprise tests. They are best not because they are taken unannounced and you are shocked but its the surprise you get after the tests...

Aree dude, aaj mera surprise test tha. Waise to maine pura paper attempt kiya but I think mera ek answer to surely right hai. (pure paper mein ek answer...waah mere einstein).

The surprise comes when you get the tests back you realize you get 0/100. If the profs could negative i am sure they would. Speaking of surprise tests i remember something which happened in a Telecomm class

Prof: Students i am going to take a surprise test

students: ahhhhh

Prof: Yes, surprise test ....any Thursday of next week. OK.

Really, so much for the surprise.

I am sure my class mates have much more to add on to this, i hope i can reach out to some of them and add thier Pinglish here.

The first one

So i wake up from a deep tech hibernation to find out world is all ahead of me with Facebook, Twitter ...Suddenly having a iPhone or a blackberry or an equivalent toy is a must.

So i had to rattle some gray matter and think of rejoining the new mad surge. So the obvious thing to ride this surge was to begin blogging (which means i am now only 10 years behind the tech revolution). I also got myself a new twitter account



So since this is the #1 blog i thought i will introduce "me" on my own blog (sounds like a new Paradox)...



So "me"....



...is also called as "topi"
....is a huge a huge fan of NY Giants, Spurs and Yankees
...is a Software Geek who works @ Consulting firm in NY

...is a couch potoato who loves to watch movies and sports all day
...is absolutely not a morning person
...loves desi food to the core
...does not follow politics (but does know all the possible political scandals)
...does not believe in astrology or numerology (and hard work either but wudnt admit it) but believes strongly in destiny
...is hugely unpredictable, very disciplined, passionate about career and can gossip all day
...is big time faatoo a.k.a scared of sky diving, deep sea cruises, bungee jumping
...is a lucky SOB to have a loving and supportive wife, great gang of friends and a sweet family for whom he would die for (surprisingly they'd do the same for him)

Thats what i think about "me"......but then what do I know ........