I know I’m not blogging enough on Critical Thoughts. I wondered why. I didn’t get the answers. I absolutely want to keep this blog going. I had to break this bloggers’ block. All that I could do was to seek the advice of a professional consultant to solve this problem for me. The professional consultant Vijayakrishna is a very renowned man in this field and has a history of problem solving, especially that of others. Now, Critical Thoughts becomes his latest project. After a couple of days of study, scrutiny and review of the case, he has come up with the below report.

Project Critical Thoughts

Problem definition: Of late, the client has not been blogging much on Critical Thoughts. What started with many blogs a week had to be reduced one blog a week upon feedback and now the last blog was about a month back. This results in an onslaught from the millions of regular readers and they demand more frequent blogging. Client needs a practical, scalable solution that would put the blog back on track.

Goal statement: To create solutions that would help me blog much more frequently – at least weekly.

Possible causes: (List down all those possible causes that would result in similar situations. This may or may not apply for the stated condition.)

a) Lack of time: The time that’s available for blogging has considerably come down since the client’s daughter started going to school. This may not have to mean that he’s putting in an awful lot of efforts to send her to school everyday. Client’s mid-night awakening behaviour is also undergoing a change which leaves time only during the weekends.

b) Domestic activities: Client does have multiple interests and is pretty active in all his interests such as blogging, gaming, reading, television, socialising and shopping (not of self). Clients has very little control of some of the activities that take bulk of the time. There are too many domestic activities which leaves more sophisticated activities such as blogging down the list.

c) Multiple blogs: Client does have two blogs including this one, the other blog being the more dominant one. Because the other blog is the flagship blog of the client, whatever time is available for blogging acitivity is being spent on that blog.

Possible solutions: (List down all solutions and recommendations that address the causes or help the goal)

a) Short posts: The client himself is a strong proponent of short posts. He can post short blogs with a couple of paragraphs or so. What’s important is the stance of the blogger which would trigger the debate and discussion in the comments area. Short posts are a viable solution.

b) Multimedia posts: The time factor is key when the posts have to be text-based. It is market practice to post blogs with images and vidoes that contain the message that the blogger wants to send across. As we know, a picture speaks a thousand words.

c) Mobile blogging: If the time in front of the computer is a rarity, the client can use his mobile. With a no-limit internet connection and high tech mobile, moblogging is a very practical solution. This would be especially useful during long shopping sessions or prolonged family events.

d) Reclaim time: Client must find ways to reclaim his time so that they can be spent on blogging. For instance, if he appoints a driver for his car, he could reclaim about 2 hours a day that he can spend on blogging while in the car. This would also help him given his driving skills.

Final recommendation: We suggest the client that while he must attempt to reclaim his time by eliminating wastage, he must attempt to write short posts or multimedia posts, and use the mobile phone much more effectively.

This is exactly why we need consultants. They come up with entirely new ideas which we were always aware but were lazy to implement. They help us with these ground breaking solutions that are picked up from our own past history and renew our interest in these ways of resolving the problems.

Critical Thoughts now stands revived.

The last time I went to a ration shop was about 15 years back or so. That’s one of the places I really hate to go. There is not even a single reason to be enthusiastic about going to a ration shop. Anyway, we don’t use the ration shop so much.

On a nice Saturday morning, when made myself comfortable on the couch while booting up the footie in the xbox, my mom tells me that I have to go to the ration shop today. I was like ’sorry, come again?’. I was very sure that it was not for buying anything from the ration shop because they know that I’d buy it at a premium from outside than visiting a ration shop. I realised that it was something administrative and since I’m the head of the family as per the ration card, I had to go. I finished my coffee and wore the most unatractive, unflashy of all clothes as we set out for the adventure.

We took an auto as we knew it was about 2 kms or something and I would not take my car for such short distances. While inside the auto, I just checked with my mom on why exactly are we going to the ration shop. She told me that the bills are going to be computerised soon and our ration card number and other details have to be captured in a register by the staff and signed off by the head of the family. I didn’t get it because the ration card I have is a computer generated one and that should normally mean they would all the data in their systems somewhere. I parked my logic aside and got on with the work.

We reached the ration shop. It didn’t have a big neon board but it did have something that characterises a ration shop. It had long queues. I said ‘queues’ because there were these primary queues for men and women separately and there were these secondary queues which may not be long enough to be called queues but serve the same purpose. I stood in the men’s queue and told my mom to wait in the shadows of the minimalist temple that was opposite to the shop.

Standing in a queue is never fun. In some places, they understand the psyche of the people in the queue and do something about it. But here though, the queue is practically on the road and it was about 11am in the morning which did not improve on the experience. There were some really really nasty arguments and quarrels from the women’s queue. That was the only piece of entertainment. The experience can be better if the wait is worth it. I know standing here is not the same as waiting in the queue for an Apple ipod on the launch day.

While it was about 25 minutes in the queue, I heard someone say that the process of ‘entry in the register’ as they call it, would happen only for the card numbers upto 1500 and the others should come ’some other time’. I quickly checked my card, mine was way above 3000. I did not want to waste single minute there if I’m not going to be serviced. I tried to look for some announcements or some stuff around where it gives these details. I wasn’t surprised, there was none. There is no way I could check with the staff in the shop because from where I was I couldn’t even see whether there is anyone inside and if yes, how many. My best chance was to ask the gentleman was ahead of me in the queue. He confirmed so confidently that they would do for all card numbers. That eased me a bit. From then on, I tried to peep into every serviced customer to see if their card number is beyond 1500. But I failed.

The queue experience is never going to be complete without an infiltration. When I was nearing the final third, this 50-something man was suddenly standing so very closely to me. And he was talking as if he is the uncle of the man before me and the father of the boy behind me. I knew that before I could realise he could take my place and he is not someone I would like to reason. That’s when I had to be very tactical, in terms of my movements, my gestures, my turns and man, it was so subtle that it is probably an art as much as queue infiltration.

I got really closer to the service desk that I can ask the staff if they service cards beyond 1500 that day. As I got closer to the desk, I could see the kind of customer service and client focus that was in display. That kind of made me think ‘what’s the point in asking him now. anyway i’ve stood in the queue for an hour. it’s just a few minutes more’. I waited for my chance. The staff were very cold in their approach and had only one thing in their mind – to get rid of these bastards in the queue so they can go home. Some of the interactions would make you wonder who is the customer here? Customer is king? Then that staff must be the queen.

Finally, it was my turn. The staff looked at my card and turned the register towards me. It was a manually pre-numbered accounts register. They had pre-numbered the register only upto 2295. I thought, don’t ever think of telling me to go back for this bloody reason. He was in a thinking mode. No, don’t even reject me. I’ve stood this fuckin queue for about an hour in hot sun among the people I’d not share my life boat with. I think he got a brilliant idea then. He struck the card number on my ration card and wrote 2295 instead. He’s a fuckin genius! He got my mobile number and then updated the details in the register in the 2295 column and asked me to sign. Despite being a chartered accountant, I didn’t quite know why I was signing. Anyway, if that was to signal the end of the gruelling process, I’d even sign once more.

That was it. I really wish I don’t have to go the ration shop again until and unless they put aircons, make the staff more courteous, provide more clarity of the process, reduce the queue time by 90%, introduce e-ration shop etc. In other words, I’m not going again.

I like my name. I wouldn’t swap my name for any other name. I think one needs like his/her name. More often than not, you’re stuck with it so you better like your name. I don’t know if I can generalise that people like their names. For those who don’t like their names, it’s such a sad life, isn’t it? Have you ever thought ‘wish i had this name’?

Back in school, it’s a sick advantage if you’re name starts with the last few alphabet. Mine being ‘V’, I always had this leeway being a bit late to the class and still getting my attendance marked. I pity that guys Aakash. On the other hand, when it comes to announcing the test results and handing over the test papers, I always had to go through the suspense and thrill as I see names fall one by one.

Vijayakrishna is not a difficult name to remember, read or pronounce. But it’s not a very common name. The thing with uncommon names is always that people would call you with the nearest common name without even caring how annoying it is for the one addressed. All through my school and college, very frequently I’m called ‘Vijaykumar’ because that’s easy and lazy. Everytime I introduce myself I make it a point to say ‘Vijayakrishna’. While I’d love to be called Vijayakrishna, I can say almost no one calls me so. From family to friends to colleagues, I’m just Vijay. The name Vijay is a bit boring. It’s a name of million others. But I’ve made this compromise long back.

I hate when people call me anything other than Vijayakrishna or Vijay. I get wild when people call me Vijaykrishnan or anything like that. It’s even worse when it’s written. People always take the liberty of chopping and chewing your name because they think it’s insignificant. They think, as long as they look at you and speak to you, it doesn’t matter if they get your name wrong. It’s plain negligence and lethargy. Why don’t you call me Mr.President when you’re looking into my eyes?

I particularly hate when people put a space in my name. For decades, they have been falling into the same pitfall. It’s a single word Vijayakrishna. It’s got no spaces in between. It should have an A between Vijay and Krishna. It does not end with a N. It’s really simple. I know that the pronounciation may differ from person to person but it’s certainly not hard to look at how I write my name and make an attempt to read it the way it is. It could be really annoying if your name is spelt the wrong way and that’s how it appears in all your records. I simply cannot stand it. The only variation to my name that I accept and like is ‘vjkrishna’.

I know some people who don’t really like their names. May be its not very strange. Names are just like faces, bodies and such stuff. Some may like to have a sharper nose or green eyes. At least, you can change your name as you want, if you’re willing to go through the administrative difficulties. I’m certainly not talking about nameology or numerology. I don’t want to write my name Vyjaiacrrichna because it adds up to something. Names do have character. Names are also personal. One might love his/her name, take pride in his/her name and be very particular about his/her name. People who are not mindful of this don’t impress me much.

What started as a post has ended as a rant. Anyway, rant is over.

I can’t believe I have not posted for a month now. I can go on about why I haven’t written but that hardly matters. I just want to write something today. Not that today is an auspicious day for re-starting things. You know that right? There is an auspicious day to resume things that have once been abandoned. As far as I can think, I never cared too much about auspicious days and all that. You know that I’m a believer when it comes to astrology but auspicious day . . erm . . no.

Sometimes people follow certain things not because they believe in it. May be they follow just because they are superstitious about it. Well, there are two terms – belief and superstition – which go very close to each other and can be misunderstood for each other based on from which side you’re looking from. Let me clarify like this. You can truly believe that certain days are auspicious and certain days are not. If you wanted to do certain things only on auspicious days just because it has worked everytime for you, may be you can call it superstition. The thin line here is, you might want to do certain things only on a Friday because you think it has always worked for you. Then again, it might be called supersitition.

They way I define it, belief should have rationale – for instance one might believe in auspicious days because he believes that the daily movements of planets have an impact on the earth and its inhibitants. Whereas superstition is just blind and irrational. Even preferences and choices can be blind and irrational, or just subjective to put it gently. I can wear my white shirt for every important occasion because I like it or because that would look good on me. That’s choice or preference. But if I wear that white shirt because it brings me good luck, that is supersitition. The dangerous thing with superstitions is that it sometimes borders on obsessive compulsive disorders (OCD). But I’m talking here only about the lighter ones.

I have beliefs as well as superstitions. I can talk to you very proudly about my beliefs because they are backed by rationale. The superstitions can be a bit embarrassing because they are stupid and baseless. The funny thing is, I very well know that they are stupid and baseless but I just do them. May be, that best explains superstitions. It’s also embarrasing because we think we are very rational, objective and thoughtful and then come up with some nonsense as supersititions. I have a superstition that full moon day is always the best day of the month for me.

We love to hear the superstitions of each other because they can be unique and they can be funny. I’m not planning to give you the exhaustive list of my superstitions but I can give you one. Ever since I heard (15 years back) that Sachin Tendulkar wears his left side of his kits first, I’ve just been following it. Sachin always wears his left shoe before wearing his right one and same with socks, gloves and everything. Strangely, even I’ve been wearing my left shoe or sandal first before wearing my right ones. That’s harmless anyway because you would wear them in a gap of few seconds so it does not really catch anyone’s eyes or look ridiculous. In other words, it’s not the same as not changing your posture on the chair because keep scoring.

What kind of superstitions do you have? Do you always wear your watch on the right hand so you can get the movie ticket? Or do you watch cricket standing because your team is on a rampage and you don’t want that to stop? Or you always carry your lucky handbag so you can get a job? We might even find out that some of the superstitions are not, after all, unique. Tell us more.

I’m toying with the idea of buying a MacBook. But I have no valid reason to buy a MacBook. I currently own a nice widescreen Sony Vaio notebook which is in perfect working condition but I’m still ’seeing’ a Mac. If you ask me why, I’d say I love the style and elegance of a Mac. It’s so sophisticated that I can’t stop loving it. Above all, I just want to own a Mac. So there’s the reason why I want to buy a Mac. By now, you’d have got a fair idea of what kind of buyer I am.

I’ve always been like that. If I want something I just buy that. But the good thing is I don’t want so many things. And I never buy anything beyond my means. If something that’s very very affordable for me, all that it matter is if I want that. I need no reason, rationale or any such thing to make a purchase. Many a times, it looks completely arrogant and stupid but I just buy if I want to.

That also means that I do very less background work before I end up making a purchase. Sometimes I just google around too much to convince myself that I’m taking a very well informed decision but the fact that they matter only if I’m undecided. Or basically all I want to do is to find supportive arguments and positive vibrations. If I’ve pretty much decided to buy anything, I don’t care how many negative reviews the product has got nd why people run miles away from this product. I know looks are deceptive and all that. What clicks for me is not the looks, but also the X-factor that makes me think that I should buy it.

Many have called me an impulsive buyer. But I think I’m an intuitive buyer. I make instant judgments which always come correct. You can say that I have the eye for such things or simply say that I’m either incredibly lucky or I have psychic powers. As I look around my drawing room, I see that every damn thing that I’ve bought have been bought with ‘let me buy it’ style of shopping. May be that’s one reason I just don’t spend too much time for shopping. I just come, I see and I purchase.

If that looks like too much financial freedom for a married man, I must tell you that it doesn’t come that easily. You should know how to get your way around. I’m sure you know it all – repetitive references, building up the need, display of desparation, offer of sacrifices so on and so forth. As I said, I never try to go beyond my means, which prevents a lot of convincing around.

In a way, I can say that I pamper myself. I don’t deny myself anything that I want and I can get. Everyone has this little boy or girl in them, who makes them wish, desire, adore and long for little things and big things. And there is also this responsible and cautious (boring) old man or woman in us who keeps reminding us how expensive it is or why we can certainly live without it. I’d say I let the little boy rule over the old man every single time.

Why do you need a new laptop? What’s wrong with this? Didn’t you buy this Sony Vaio for 70k and said that this is all you needed? Don’t go around wasting money if you don’t know what to do with it. Invest money, buy jewellery, buy assets or at least save money for a rainy day. What does a Mac give you now? All that you do is browsing right. You’ve got your DVD player and TataSky plus for movies, you’ve got XBOX 360 for gaming and you don’t work at home and all that you’ve gonna do with your comp is just browse the net and this Sony Vaio is more than enough for that.

Er . . I want that, so I’m buying that.

Here I go again. Another visit to a shopping mall and I’m returning with a bag of toys. The range and variety of toys to choose from keeps improving with time. As a girl of three and a half years, my daughter can do many things that she could not do a year back. She is now more interested about certain things than she was a year back. More dexterity, more immunity, more intellect, more curiosity mean lots of choices when it comes to toys. The toys that are just eye catchy or just make some stupid sound are just simply not good enough. Now I need to look for those toys that will also improve her intellect, memory and knowledge but satisfies the most important need: fun.

Buying toys for a three-and-a-half year old can be quite difficult. Today, I went to this mall with an intention of ‘let’s buy her some new toys’. As I entered the floor the first thing I saw was loads and loads of board games. Anything that comes with a ‘rules of play’ is not going to be of any use for her. Rules mean nothing to her. We are only talking about this thing called discipline. I think it will take some time to introduce the word ‘rules’. There were train sets. She is absolutely fascinated by trains. But she already has train sets of various sizes and shapes.

And then there were cars. She has cars, trucks – manually operated, battery operated, remote controlled etc. Almost everything except the ones that run on petrol and diesel. There were kitchen sets. Least interested. I’m talking about myself. Not sure about her. Guns? Same kitchen set feeling here too. How about soft toys? Well the whole of Disney family is at home. There are also their underwater friends and technology cousins. Block building? I won’t be forgiven if I buy another one of that kind. I was not planning to return empy handed anyways.

I was trying to recollect what kind of toys I used to play with. My brain said ‘your search returned 0 results’. Yup, Did I have a lot of toys? No. Was there any favourite toy of mine? No, because I cannot recollect having played with any toys or games when I was a kid. We were a struggling family back then. We had to look after our survival and needs primarily before thinking about comforts and luxuries. I guess toys would have come under the luxuries category back then. So how exactly did I spend my childhood? I think much of our time as a kid was spent in the outdoors, with the other kids, doing stuff and exploring stuff. We had probably lots of freedom which led to adventure. May be, we didn’t need toys as much as kids of these days do (that’s one sign of me growing old).

But my daughter certainly does. She needs toys, games, television, movies, music etc. She can get to see a lot of experiences but she would not have the freedom of experiencing them herself. That’s because she is always under our radar. It’s not just because she is a three-and-a-half year old but also because we’re like that. In particular I am like that. I’d buy her whatever toys and games that she wants if it means she won’t have to go out of sight. In a way, I have created this need for toys and such stuff for her. That’s sad but that’s the way it is. Nowadays (that’s another sign of me growing old), kids don’t grow up learning and experiencing by themselves. They are now left with abundance of nicely packaged second hand experiences.

I was still struggling with my choices in the toys section. My daughter was happily playing in the play area of that mall with complete confidence that I’d buy what she’d like. I did finally pick up a jigsaw puzzle, a time teller book and something else. I truly wonder what I’d be buying in the next round of purchases, whenever it comes!

Gosh! That must be about a hundred thousand people watching me now. Where is this? Looks like Camp Nou. This is a fantastic stadium. I have great memories of this stadium. I’ve scored dozens and dozens of goals here. This must be a very important match. Who are we playing by the way? I see that the opponents are wearing yellow. Man, I don’t want to be playing Wigan. Give me something better. Hang on. I see little Messi walking in. That must be Barca then. At Camp Nou stadium and playing in yellow kits. Yes, they are. Am I playing for England or Chelsea? I see Didier around. Ok then, it is Barcelona vs Chelsea at Camp Nou. I think I’m being put in my usual attacking midfield position. What? Me? You know me. Frank Lampard. Still wondering? Googling always better than wondering.

We’re waiting to kick off. It won’t start until that man wants us to. No, that’s not the referee I’m talking about. I’m talking about the gamer that’s controlling us. Who’s playing us today? Ah, that’s vjkrishna. Gentle gamer. Knows his football. And he likes me too. Would always play me and never subs me. I hate to be played by players who don’t know how to use me. Vjkrishna adores me. I think I’m like his idol. He puts me in right areas and makes full use of my capabilities. But you know what, he makes me run and work. He uses me in attack as well as defence. That normally makes me tired by the 75th minute but that’s football.

Why is he not starting the game yet? What’s stopping him? Let me see. Okay, his controllers are out of batteries. He’s gone to check his daughter’s toys to see if he can quickly get a pair of batteries. The funny thing is, we’ll have to be on the pitch, in the positions, waiting for kick off until he resumes the game. That’s the case for all the players including me, Terry, Ballack, Drogba, Messi, Eto and Xavi. We’re all the same. One interesting thing is, we can stand here for ages with no impact to us, it’s only when we play we get fatigue. We’re still waiting for him to back and resume. No idea where he’s gone. The other day we waited for about an hour and suddenly the power went off. Such disappointment.

He’s back. Looks like he’s got the batteries. He is in his couch. Ok boys, we might start any moment. Oh wait, he gets up. For what? Strange. I’ve been played by him more than a thousand times and he’s never done this. If he loads us up, he’s always played the match. What’s wrong today? I see him opening the DVD closet to look for something. Is he going to watch a movie? Probably not. That closet has only games. Goddammit, he’s picking up the tennis game. The bloody new rival. Vjkrishna has always played football, every single time he’s loaded the xbox. I think so. Anyway, if he doesn’t play football on xbox, I don’t exist. I think he’s gonna pull us out of the box and load tennis. God, that must be some insult. He’s still thinking. Ah, he’s leaving the tennis game exactly where it should be – the shelf. Let’s have a kick about.

There he starts the game. I’ll catch you after the first half.

Half time. Great game so far. We’re trailing by a goal but we did dominate the game. Barca are very good but in this match, they are controlled by the AI programme and not by humans. I love to be controlled by humans. They bring the best out in me, especially gamers like vjkrishna. With the way the game’s going, I think we might turn it around in the first half. Vjkrishna has subbed Anelka and he’s bring in on Mikel. Very strange considering that we are a goal behind. Oh, he wants us to play 4-4-2. Because Mikel is in, he’s put me in the left midfield. Not to my liking. Catch you again at full time.

Final whistle. 1-2. We’ve lost. We came back and scored that equaliser early on. But Messi wreaked havoc and finally found the net at the 80th minute. We’ve lost the game. This is such an important game. Playing Barcelona at Camp Nou. We should have won or at least have drawn the match. I might just be the electronic clone of Frank Lampard but I hate to lose these big matches. But there is one big advantage I hold over my flesh-and-blood clone. I get a second chance to get things right, probably, every single time. There you go, vjkrishna is arranging for a re-match. He’s not gonna end the session until we win. We’ve never finished losers. Super Frankie Lampard! I’m sure you envy me on that one!