You need to save for a rainy day that was the realization which dawned on me when my sis gave me an earful yesterday night after knowing about the bad state of my finances.As a software professional I am earning a good pay, however what use is it, when I don't save a substantial amount of my salary.

I have made it a point from today to start spending sensibly and impose a certain financial discipline without compromising on my entertainment and other critical expenses. I neither smoke nor drink or indulge in partying however when I looked @ the state of my finances, it gave me a shock. Reality bites and it bites hard :)

The past few days has been kind of hectic and I expect some work to flow in. Today we had the birthday celebrations organized by our fun group for those whose birthday(s) occurred in the month of May. It was good fun, with the anchor (who is from Kerala) striking an instant rapport with the newcomers from his homestate. Whenever he asked the new team members whether they're from kerala, people from the audience broke into laughter :) The cake was really yummy and I withstood the temptation to grab one more bite :)

One of the newcomers sang a kannada song. She had a beautiful voice and everyone keenly listened to her. It's good to know that techies have a talent for something other than staring into the PC's :)

I watched the movie "Shoot-out at Lokhwandwala" @ Innovative Multiplex with Agni and his friends on Saturday night. I fully agree with the review of the movie by the critic "Nikhat Kazmi" in "Times of India" who has awarded it a 4 1/2 star rating.

The movie opens with blood stained stair-cases, walls riddled with bullets, and couple of bodies lying on the ground. A sweeper uses the broom to clear the empty bullet shells lying on the ground. A T.V journalist played by Diya Mirza narrates what happened the day before. Over 3000 rounds of ammunition was fired and more than 120 police personnel (if I am correct) were deployed to smoke out 5 hardened underworld gangsters holed up in the residential building @ Lokhandwala.

Heading the police operations is the top cop Khan (Sanjay Dutt) ably assisted by his two trusted lieutantants Kaviraj Patil (Suniel Shetty) and Jawed Sheikh (Arbaaz Khan). Khan is the chief of ATS (Anti-Terrorist Squad) which is modelled on the lines of the elite U.S police force S.W.A.T (Special Weapons and Tactics). The movie is based on a true incident which happened @ Lokhandwala in the 90's when underworld gangsters had a free run. Bollywood films are getting slicker by the day. The relentless action is thankfully punctuated only by a couple of songs. Credit goes to the Director "Apoorva Lakhia" for the way he has made the film and handled the big star cast.

Abhishek leaves his mark in a small cameo. Amitabh Bachchan, Vivek Oberoi, Amrita Singh, Tushar Kapoor, Ronit Roy, Shabbir Ahluwalia and others play their roles well. Aarti Chabbria as the bar dancer provides the glamour quotient.

In the light of the recent stage-managed encounters of Sohrabuddin and his wife Kauserbi by the Gujarat Police and the encounters in Kashmir by the security forces, the movie does raise a lot of disturbing questions. How do you bring the hardened criminals to justice without taking recourse to encounters to them bump off when the judicial system is slow and corrupt notwithstanding the nexus between cops, criminals and politicians.

Sunday morning I took off along with one of my friend to Barachukki water falls which is about 160 kms from Bangalore. Unfortunately the place which was supposed to be scenic with water streaming down the hills had a barren look and you could see just rocks all over the place.

Ostensibly I got the timing wrong by visiting it during the wrong season :) Driving down the 4 lane Bangalore - Mysore highway was a experience to cherish, however much to my surprise there was not even a single restaurant on the highway except the one where I stopped for my breakfast on the outskirts of Bangalore. We had no other option than to go hungry during the lunch time. The road was also in a bad shape for around 30 kms.

I had purchased a new digital camera Sony Cyber Shot (7.2 mega pixels resolution) on Saturday and got a few snaps clicked. On my way back home, it rained quite heavily but thanfully I managed to reach home safely.

Monday morning it's back to work, however I am not expecting much work coz our U.S counterparts have a holiday today.

Yesterday after winding up for the day, I was waiting for my office shuttle. It was raining non-stop, thankfully I had my umbrella :) It was slow moving traffic on the roads. I came to know from one of my colleagues that our office shuttle is stuck @ quite a distance.

I was feeling drowsy and instead of waiting for the shuttle, I hired a auto-rickshaw even though I knew it was going to be expensive. As anticipated the auto-driver agreed to take me to my destination for 1 1/2 times the normal fare. I had no other options as the public transport buses were crammed.

The driver wanted to chart his own way to the destination however I insisted that I'll provide him the directions. As is usual with the auto-drivers he broke a signal, tried overtaking a bus through a narrow opening beside the road. I counselled him not to break the signals and let the bus go first. It doesn't matter if I am a bit late. Life is more precious. I don't know about the first 2 points however he did agree to my last point. I reached home by 10 p.m and thankfully the fare came upto 100 bucks which was okay :) After dropping me, the auto-driver smiled and waved @ me :)

Agni had called up yesterday and today morning. Unfortunately we haven't got the tickets for the movie as all the shows are houseful. The other option left is Innovative Multiplex @ HSR layout. Today morning, it was quite hectic. I started off with cleaning my car, preparing my breakfast and mopping the floor. The last task was to iron my clothes for the working week ahead :) I am quite @ peace now after going through the grind :)

Today morning after finishing my morning chores when I was washing the utensils in the kitchen, the cup which I was washing fell into the sink and the handle broke into pieces. Seeing that even my heart broke and tears welled up in my eyes.

The cup was one of my coveted possessions and was there with me for the past 2 years. It all happened due to my negligence as I was deep in thought when washing the cup. Even as I am writing, I am almost on the verge of tears thinking of the incident. The cup was an inanimate object however I had developed a deep emotional bonding with it. I still made my Bournavita and had it in the same cup minus the handle. I offer my apologies to the beautiful cup for breaking it's handle.

As if that wasn't enough I almost ended up tripping on the powercord extension of my washing machine. I wasn't sure whether I should believe in superstition or the fact that I was just having a bad day.

On the work front, things are still a bit slow. The weather continues to be pleasant and it was a sexy breeze which was blowing across in the evening. It's almost the end of the day. I am planning to go for a movie tomorrow @ PVR Cinemas, Forum mall along with my friend Agni who has just returned from a vacation in Hyderabad. The only thing which I am still not sure is the availability of tickets :)

Imagine talking to a friend on your cell, the only difference is you're standing on the highest peaks in the world with temperatures @ -30 degrees celsius and a beautiful panoramic view of the adjoining peaks. You guessed it right, it's the Mount Everest.

When I read the experience of Rod Baber a british citizen who achieved this feat backed by Motorola in today's "Times of India" edition, I couldn't help but put myself in his shoes. We all suffer from network problems in a closed room, entering tunnels, or entering an area with low or no network coverage. Mount Everest is the last place you did imagine making a call.:) But technology has made it possible.

The weather was again quite pleasant today after a spell of heavy showers and it continues to drizzle as I write this article. I am all excited about tomorrow as Friday is here and of course with it, the weekend is not far away :)

How many of us are conscious of our ecological footprint? Take for example, when we visit our neighbourhood Grocer, do we think twice before taking the plastic bags which the shopkeeper offers to stuff our groceries. How about reusing the old plastic bags? Not only are we contributing our bit in saving our environment from further pollution but also by consuming less plastic reducing the chances of the sewers / drains get choked.

There was an interesting article I read today about minimising the usage of cars and using public transport / metro trains, bicycling or walking to work. I personally follow this when it comes to commuting to work. Even though I can afford to spend on fuel, I prefer taking the bus or the office shuttle to work. I know I am in a minority however I am doing my bit to reduce environmental pollution, reduce congestion on the road (there will be 1 less car on the road :)) and also it's not bad for my pocket either :) I take my car out only on the weekends. The good thing when travelling by bus/office shuttle is that it allows me to grab that few extra winks of sleep :)

Most of my colleagues are into share trading and so I wasn't surprised when there was an absorbing discussion during our evening snacks about who sold which shares, whether there was any profits made or losses incurred (thankfully none) etc. There was some lighter moments as well. It rained quite heavily in the evening and some portions of our rooftop cafeteria was flooded with water. From a hot afternoon to a cold & chilly weather it was quite a remarkable change :)

Parker gets darker..is the theme for the recent movie Spiderman-3. You expect a super-hero to be flawless however when your hero comes across as someone who is equally vulnerable like most of us and has a darker shade it's not something which is palatable for most of his fans.

I am narrating this coz I too feel that I have a darker side to my personality. It's a dilemma I have been grappling with. Last night, I had a nightmare in which I could sense something evil lurking within me which comes out and destroys whatever good deeds I had done so far. My eyes were wide open and I realized that it was a dream. What I did know was that the dream was just mirroring a reality of my daily life.

It goes without mention that I don't reveal everything in my blog as there are some personal issues which can't be discussed here.

Progress on the work front has slowed down considerably as I am awaiting inputs from the on-site team which is not expected atleast till the end of this week.

Back to Monday morning. I had a very sound sleep so I didn't have any complaints on getting up on a Monday morning however when you know that you have a whole week to go for the next weekend to come, things do get a bit depressing.

The reality is we all (most of us) need to work to earn our bread and butter. It was a nice weekend though. The pleasant climate early in the morning and later in the evening made my day.:) I did my usual shopping for fruits and also bought a couple of kitchen cloths as that was something missing in my kitchen. Shopping @ Big Bazaar was quite cool however walking in the hot sun to the shopping centre around @ 2 p.m was definitely not the coolest thing to do and I realized it the hard way :)

On the work front today, I continued with my learning sessions.

You never feel the same on Friday's, maybe it's the weekend fever which gives you a new high :) Everyone seems to be much relaxed, the roads have lesser amount of traffic and there's a spring in everyone's step.

I got up today morning to a lovely weather. The weather was just perfect. It reminded me the other day when I read in the newspaper that the temperature in Delhi which was hovering around 43 degrees came down by a couple of degrees caused due to a spell of shower. So one should count their blessings in a city like Bangalore which is having a gentle weather in the cruellest month of May.

Yesterday I came to office in the general shift, as in the evening I had to catch up with a friend of mine whom I was meeting for the first time. It was a pleasant experience meeting her over a cup of coffee. I was completely lost gazing into her eyes :) It was a refreshing sight for my sore eyes after a long day @ work.:) I have never been able to understand the equation of how someone falls in love..I mean is it just physical attraction or some instant chemistry between 2 individuals or a combination of both. Anyways I had a good time :)

For the past couple of days, there has been a nagging pain in my knees which has restricted my mobility a bit. It may be that I am overstressing my knees or due to vitamin deficiency. I am feeling slightly better today, as I have started taking Vitamin C tablets.

It's the last day of the week and for today I have learnt some new stuff on the job. I hope to have a great weekend apart from the usual chores of doing my laundry and house cleaning :)

Now-a-days I am feeling a bit more tired and jaded by the end of the day. I am getting the extra bucks, however staying late till 9 p.m does have it's downside. My main worry is that having a late dinner can have a disastrous effect on your health.

After the end of the day, all I look forward to is having my grub and then hitting the sack. For the past few days I having my dinner by 8:30 p.m, though that means I need to take an extra break during office-hours. However I believe that "Health comes before everything else"..:)

I have requested my Project Manager to arrange dinner facilities for those who are staying late. He said he'll look into it. On the work front, after a few hectic days the pace has slowed down and I am looking forward to further inputs.

I had a good time last weekend. My brother was back along with his friend, and I took them out for a movie. Initially we went to PVR cinemas @ the Forum mall, koramangala to watch "Life in a Metro" there, however all the shows turned out to be housefull.

Then we went to the Innovative Multiplex @ HSR Layout closer to the airport and I was sure that we will be getting a ticket there. That's because it's quite a distance and people prefer something which is within reach. We comfortably got 3 tickets for the show.

For the first time, I watched a movie without going through the review and so had an unbiased mind. Luckily, the movie was worth watching :) The movie is a reflection more of the times we live in especially in a city like "Mumbai"

Shilpa Shetty comes up with a creditable performance, however the real star of the show is the Konkona Sen & Irffan Khan track. Kay Kay Menon comes up with another brilliant performance as the male chauvinist husband of Shilpa Shetty. The portrayal of his character is such that you invariably end up detesting his very sight. Sharman Joshi, Kangna Ranaut, Shiney Ahuja, all play their parts well. Watching the movie brought back memories of my stay in Mumbai :)

Here, Dharmendra & Nafisa Ali's romance needs a special mention. Their last scene together has been handled quite sensitively and aesthetically by the director "Anurag Basu". It shows that age doesn't matter when it comes to love.

Pritam's music fills up the void, if you do feel any :) On a humourous note, pritam and his band keep popping up throughout the movie sending the audience into peals of laughter :)

My brother left in the 7 p.m bus on Saturday night. Sunday, it was pretty much the same for me with laundry, cleaning and cooking taking up most of my time. In the evening, I went to the commercial street and had dinner with one of my friends.

It's back to Monday and so far I have been keeping busy. I was feeling very drowsy in the afternoon, thankfully a cup of tea saved me from dozing off :)

Thank God it's a Friday :) It was back to my favourite dress code i.e casuals :) I am hoping to catch up on some movies this weekend. Let me see how things go :)

Phew..another hectic day has gone by. Today, I had to rush to office coz I had to pickup my younger brother who arrived in Bangalore after a tiring journey.

The funny thing about my kid brother is whenever I tried calling him on his cell he always hangs up the phone. His reasoning is that the roaming charges are applicable. I appreciate it, that he values money and doesn't want to waste his mobile currency. However this was an emergency and I needed to know where he exactly was. Poor thing, he kept searching for my office location and eventually found it, although it was quite late in the day @ 1 p.m.

Today my kid brother Akshath (Akki) that's how we fondly call him has turned 28. He also happens to be my dentist.:) We have come a long way since we were kids. I used to envy him for all the attention he used to get being the youngest in the family. We ended up fighting most of the time and even though I was the oldest, I was @ the receiving end :)

Now Akki has grown up and is more mature than me. On the occasion of Akki's birthday, I wish him all the best in his career goals and pray for his well-being :)

The usual culprit for my half-awake day was inadequate sleep the previous night. For the past few days work has been keeping me pre-occupied. I was expecting one of my ex-colleagues to come down from Mumbai. As I only have 1 bed to sleep, as an emergency measure I had to get 2 single cotton beds and a pillow. It was not a bad deal for INR 550. Eventually it turned out that my ex-colleague will not be able to make it coz of urgent work @ her office.

I finally received my car from the Concorde showroom, the dent has been fixed and also the bumper has been repainted. The only sore point is the rear bumper which had just a brush-up done. You could easily make out that it has suffered a scratch.The total cost came to INR 6,500. Repair job was only 1400 bucks however painting cost a whopping INR 4,600. The rest was service charges and education cess. Thankfully I had to shell out only 500 bucks from my pocket and the rest was covered by insurance.

Touchwood, my fervent prayer and appeal from now on is to drive even more carefully and hope that nothing untoward happens.

Past couple of days has been quite hectic. Got a bit of relief when we had a lunch party hosted in favour of one of our colleagues who will be leaving this Friday on a year long assignment to Florida, U.S.A. After a long time, I savored chinese cuisine, vegeterian ofcourse :)

My car has now been repaired and I will hopefully be getting the delivery tomorrow. The weather for the past few days has been quite cool and if someone from any other city would visit Bangalore they would be surprised by the lovely weather and remember we are still in the month of May which is supposed to be the hottest :)

Saturday morning's as usual was reserved for my weekly chores like cleaning and mopping the floor. My car is in the garage to undergo repairs due to the dent caused in the accident nearly a week ago. I really miss it :)

Today I made a decision to invest in mutual funds. The funds I picked up was SBI Tax Magnum Scheme, UTI Infrastructure fund and HDFC Mutual Fund. I always had an interest in the share market however was apprehensive of getting directly involved for the fear of burning my fingers as other small investors learnt to their dismay when they got caught in the volatility of the stock market.

By investing in mutual fund(s) on a long term basis through a Systematic Investment Plan (SIP) you're not in it for the short term benefits but for the long haul. Mutual fund investments are still subject to market risks however as the portfolio is diversified and there are professionals who handle the money, there is a lesser amount of risk involved.

In the evening, I went to PVR Cinemas @ Forum mall to get 3 tickets for "Spiderman-3". I have always been a fan of Spiderman series and didn't want to miss the final instalment. However I was disappointed to know that tickets have been sold out till Monday.

On my way back home, I boarded the BMTC bus and what a journey it was..with the engine of the bus groaning and grunting :) Poor thing seemed to have been completely strained. I was praying and hoping that it atleast completes the journey till my bus stop. I agree, I am being selfish here, to be honest who isn't :) We need to be a bit selfish to survive.

The day has finally come to an end and there is only sunday left before my working week begins :)

It's been a long time since I wrote my blog. So it feels good to be back again. Last week, I was on a vacation @ Hyderabad. I drove all the way from Bangalore to Hyderabad. What a trip it was, I logged a distance of 610 kms and 620 kms on my return journey. The roads were a pleasure to drive on the National Highway 7 (NH 7). Onward journey to Hyderabad started @ 6:55 a.m from Bangalore and by the time, I reached Hyderabad it was 11 p.m.

I was totally stretched out having driven 16 hours. Of course I did take my breaks :) I had a good time with my family as I took them around in my new car. We watched a movie, hung out @ the hussainsagar lake and had dinner.

Return journey was less tiresome, thanks to my brother who shared the burden of driving. My work has started in full swing. and finally it's going to be weekend again.

Yesterday i.e. 3rd May was Pramoda's (my mom) 23rd wedding anniversary, I normally tend to forget it, but thankfully remembered it this time and wished her :)