D will turn 6 in a couple of weeks. She is like nothing I could have ever predicted when I imagined having a baby girl.
Things that make me wonder how in the world this little old-soul thinks the way she does:
a) She is wise beyond her age (yesterday she said to me, "I think if Ani and I were not around, mamma, you would have been crying all the time after your Appa and Mummy died". I could only blink at her)
b) She is super-observant (she told RK, "how come when you fake-laugh, you look down a bit?")
c) She remembers everything about everything (I have resorted to showing her any jewelry or silver or previous stuff in the house and where I keep them, because honestly, I don't remember this stuff but she not only does, she will also recall who gifted what to whom and when)
d) She is crazy, crazy, crazy about makeup and clothes and fashion. Recently she pulled out some cucumbers from the fridge, cut out big pieces, lay down on the bed with the cucumber pieces on her eyes since she saw someone getting a spa on TV. She loves painting her nails and lips, she is a menace with the eye liner and getting her to stop putting powder on is an hour-long ordeal. Ani is the only one who can get her to stop by telling her she looks like a clownish raccoon, whereupon she will first sob and then go scrub her face out (with anti-acne scrubbing soap only)
e) What she wants for her birthday: a cycle (expected), and an animal farm where she can take care of cows, cats, dogs and elephants (huh!)
How in the world did I, a fashion unconscious, not-particularly-perceptive, half-blind (literally and figuratively), utter nerd end up with a little girl like her?
She makes me question my worldview a thousand times. She makes me laugh even while she maddens me with her incessant questions, her story-telling, her insistence on being stylish and her whininess when she doesn't get her way.
She truly is a mystery. I hope, wherever my parents are, they keep a good eye out for her. I need her to be happy, healthy and utterly unpredictable always.
Saturday, February 23, 2019
Wednesday, February 13, 2019
Black.
Tomorrow I turn 37. It will be my first birthday without my parents to wish me.
I've invited myself and the kids to a couple of aunts' places tomorrow- first to one of my aunt's, and then to one of RK's.
I wish there was a pill for heartache.
I've invited myself and the kids to a couple of aunts' places tomorrow- first to one of my aunt's, and then to one of RK's.
I wish there was a pill for heartache.
Wednesday, February 6, 2019
Insomniacs, Inc
After a rousing discussion about work with the man, I was inspired to action and sent out a flurry of messages at 12:45am, not wanting to wait for the sun and fully expecting not to receive replies till later in the day Much to my surprise, 3 out of 4 people replied within 15 minutes.
Huh. I've found my community of insomniacs.
Huh. I've found my community of insomniacs.
Monday, February 4, 2019
General ineptness
Who makes government websites?
Bangalore, the city with the largest density of software engineers, has been touting its BBMP online services for years now.
You know what, BBMP? Half your websites don't work. Bloody hell, which of these fabled software engineers have you been using to create your dumbass websites?
Take the example of the Death Certificate online request form. I either have to take half a day to go in person to the office in Shivajinagar (by the way, I have to go to different offices for each parent... apparently the offices are ward specific and while requesting for a DC for one parent I cannot ask for the other one.... again, internet age? Hello? Isn't the whole effing point of putting things online so you don't have this nonsensical geographical restriction? Imagine if one of my parents had died in Whitefield... or Timbucktoo... I would have had to keep going there to pick up DCs every few months. Because you know what else? You can't order more than 5 at a time. Just shoot me somebody. Right now.)
So the online DC request: You enter your details... and you know while doing so, that there's going to be a problem because you cannot enter any spaces. So I have to type VarshaShridhar or my father's name without any spaces and hope to God that the thing figures out what has been entered.
Then, ok. You enter all the details and click submit. There's an interminable wheel that goes round and round and then abruptly stop... no loading of new page, no error message, nothing. So what is going on? God knows. The Page. Doesn't. Change. Ever.
The state run or the central govt websites are no better. In the GoI website, for example, you are supposed to somehow be born figuring out that a grant application website that doesn't open in Google Chrome might magically do so in Firefox. Many grant applications through BIRAC, for example, do not allow you to change the data in a form without resetting a bunch of other pages. So imagine you are putting in a budget for a grant. As you change your budget, all your milestones and timelines change as well. So instead of a change of a single line, you now have to spend the next 45 minutes retyping (or copy-pasting) the previous 4 pages of content.
Government guys, I know my company website isn't the greatest. But for all the flak it's gotten, at least it works. And I did on a near-zero budget. Tell me, how many crores of rupees of taxpayer money did you spend on these crappy websites?
Bangalore, the city with the largest density of software engineers, has been touting its BBMP online services for years now.
You know what, BBMP? Half your websites don't work. Bloody hell, which of these fabled software engineers have you been using to create your dumbass websites?
Take the example of the Death Certificate online request form. I either have to take half a day to go in person to the office in Shivajinagar (by the way, I have to go to different offices for each parent... apparently the offices are ward specific and while requesting for a DC for one parent I cannot ask for the other one.... again, internet age? Hello? Isn't the whole effing point of putting things online so you don't have this nonsensical geographical restriction? Imagine if one of my parents had died in Whitefield... or Timbucktoo... I would have had to keep going there to pick up DCs every few months. Because you know what else? You can't order more than 5 at a time. Just shoot me somebody. Right now.)
So the online DC request: You enter your details... and you know while doing so, that there's going to be a problem because you cannot enter any spaces. So I have to type VarshaShridhar or my father's name without any spaces and hope to God that the thing figures out what has been entered.
Then, ok. You enter all the details and click submit. There's an interminable wheel that goes round and round and then abruptly stop... no loading of new page, no error message, nothing. So what is going on? God knows. The Page. Doesn't. Change. Ever.
The state run or the central govt websites are no better. In the GoI website, for example, you are supposed to somehow be born figuring out that a grant application website that doesn't open in Google Chrome might magically do so in Firefox. Many grant applications through BIRAC, for example, do not allow you to change the data in a form without resetting a bunch of other pages. So imagine you are putting in a budget for a grant. As you change your budget, all your milestones and timelines change as well. So instead of a change of a single line, you now have to spend the next 45 minutes retyping (or copy-pasting) the previous 4 pages of content.
Government guys, I know my company website isn't the greatest. But for all the flak it's gotten, at least it works. And I did on a near-zero budget. Tell me, how many crores of rupees of taxpayer money did you spend on these crappy websites?
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