Those of you following me on Twitter would have seen a status message that read:

Room 103 is the first room in college to get placed.

Akshat and me were place by November 25 and late last Thursday night, we got the good news that Aditya too was placed. In fact he’s got an excellent job with one of the highest salaries in campus

And, we are a hungry group.

So, we booked a cab on Friday night and headed out to Stone Water Grill in Koregoan Park. This was recommended to us by a friend and it was a first visit to the place. Turned out to be a really good location with great service and a good ambience.

We ate and drank and they danced and we brought up a bill that justified Aditya’s high salary.

I’ve still to get the remaining photos. I’ll upload them to my Flickr album when I do so.

Anyway, we reached college at 2.30am, which excluding New Year’s last year is one of the latest I’ve returned.

The last few days have been as lazy as it has been. One extremely irritating thing is the lack of a proper internet connection because our excellent network folks (I shudder to use the word admin) are busy experimenting with the wifi adapters. I plan on writing a really dirty post about this so called “wifi connectivity” that is promised students out here.

Made a 30 mark worth presentation yesterday for World Class Manufacturing. A day’s work that completes one half of the valuation for that subject. This week is a little tight with lectures (well comparatively)!

August is always a high-activity month with a huge number of birthdays and other occasions.

Freshers’ Party

After being postponed several times, the Fresher’s Party finally took place on August 6.

Dance parties aren’t really my favorite and this is usually no exception, especially when the DJ should pay for playing the trash he dished out!

Without doubt, I spent a good portion of my time outside the venue, which was the SIU poolside.

Food however, was better this time, with chicken added to the menu. Needless to say I ensured I ate well.

Below is a photo of me with my date and below that is a photo of five of us in our group.

The Birthday

On 12th, was Sumukhi’s birthday. She threw the party on Tamana rooftop for about 40 of us. Food for me was primarily chicken. (Did I tell you that I avoid vegetarian food?)

Another thing I avoid is dancing free style. I prefer ballroom, the little that I know! Here’s Sumukhi with the three of us roommates.

Anyway, Suchi was the DJ for a good portion of the time until yours truly took over the laptop. Spent the next 45 minutes making people dance! For serious wanna-be deejays out there, Virtual DJ is an amazing software. The demo version works very well for a 21 day period.

Among other stuff

Our area has been facing major power cuts. We had no power this weekend and a good portion of the time the generator was also switched off.

We decided to go off to the city. We had to shop for Sumukhi and also had good time to kill. Went over to Pune Central to shop for the same. IMO, the place is very badly designed and it was horribly crowded being a weekend.

After some shopping, we dropped into Little Italy next door. Little Italy is a completely vegetarian restaurant, but they specialize in pizzas and pastas, so I could survive! The food was decent, service was bad and bill was high

We tramped back into Pune Central after dinner and landed up in Food Bazaar at the top floor. Did some heavy grocery shopping, picking up apples, biscuits, corn flakes and juices. We’re realized it makes more sense to go out there once a week and pickup food instead of regularly visiting Sweety stores in campus.

Ohh, btw, I’m in Mumbai for the next few days

And, have you visited Techtites lately? There’s a new look and regular updates.

Have you ever watched kids
On a merry-go-round?
Or listened to the rain
Slapping on the ground?
Ever followed a butterfly’s erratic flight?
Or gazed at the sun into the fading night?
You better slow down.
Don’t dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won’t last.

Do you run through each day
On the fly?
When you ask How are you?
Do you hear the reply?
When the day is done
Do you lie in your bed

With the next hundred chores
Running through your head?
You’d better slow down
Don’t dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won’t last.

Ever told your child,
We’ll do it tomorrow?
And in your haste,
Not see his sorrow?
Ever lost touch,
Let a good friendship die
Cause you never had ! time
To call and say,”Hi”
You’d better slow down.
Don’t dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won’t last.
When you run so fast to get somewhere
You miss half the fun of getting there.
When you worry and hurry through your day,
It is like an unopened gift….
Thrown away.
Life is not a race.
Do take it slower
Hear the music
Before the song is over.

The last week has just flown by with most of my time was spent not studying.

Wednesday – Party 1

On Wednesday, we were singing for a Silver Wedding mass. The mass was held at Atma Darshan and the reception was at Le Royal Meridien, for which the entire choir was invited.

Had just dorned my normal formals for the mass, so went home to pickup my blazer as well as drop off the bike (Never drink and drive my mama said )

U. Conrad picked me up and we were among the first to reach the reception. Ate, drank, danced and feasted on food and desert.

Got dropped home a little after 1.30am and came home and crashed into bed.

Thursday – Dinner 1

Spent the entire day at Melody‘s house working on her blog. Convinced her to add adsense (which is performing really bad overall for me currently). Also added some internal pages and top CSS navigation bar (I’m getting good at this).

We went out for dinner to 5 which is near Yoko’s in Santacruz. The place is posh and the food is good, however the service is simply pathetic. It took us 10 minutes to find someone to take our order and then it took another half hour to get served. In addition he messed up the bill, by not informing us for an extra charge. At the end of it we were pissed off.
Expensive places!

Friday – Party

Saakshi threw a “Welcome Home” party for Melody and invited a good amount of the junta from the Indian Bloggers’ scene and their friends. Met a few of them for the first time, while others for the second… well I’m not a regular.

My phone came handy to click a few photos, though the quality wasn’t too great. Anyway, here are a few: Knocked off on request.

Saturday – Lunch and Dinner 2

Met up with Krupa, my ex-office colleague for lunch and a movie. We went off to watch Life in a Metro which tells the tale of several people in Mumbai. The movie was rather slow. Can’t say it was great, can’t say it was bad.

Watched the movie at Chandan in Juhu. It has been several years since I have been to Chandan. The theatre remains the same, but the area surrounding it has developed a lot!
We went to Pizza Hut in Juhu for the late lunch and got a drink free because the guy forgot to put it on the bill.

Lil white mouse came over after work and she stayed for mass. After mass, the two of us went to Lucky’s for dinner. It has been a while since I visited Lucky’s. Tried some different dishes this time which were yummy.

And then there was Sunday

Lil white mouse came over today for lunch. Mom seemed to outdo herself today. Lil white mouse left in the evening and I got down to getting some work done.
Tomorrow I study.

I’m so tied down with things it’s surprising how a person sitting at home all day long can be so busy!

Last Friday, I made it for choir practice after a while. Saturday was James‘ brother’s wedding. The nuptials were at our church, while the reception was at St. Andrew’s, Bandra.

Danced a decent amount. I still wonder about my two left feet two years back!

Music has to be shut off at 10.00pm as the wedding was in open air and it’s really sad that you have to do so after spending so much money.

Was home before 11pm as a result, which was good considering the big FMS exam was on Sunday. Center was St. Xavier’s as usual. And as usual the exam isn’t worth talking about
Will await the result patiently.

Went for choir practice on Monday as well. But in the morning I went to give the Mock CET at TIME, which I had missed on Sunday. The paper went well, results not out yet. I’m really hoping the CET goes great.
I also paid a visit to Wellingkar’s to enquire about their MBA courses.

Tuesday was spent at Melody‘s place working on the upcoming redesign of WebberZone. Still a lot of work remains.

Spend a good portion of yesterday afternoon reading Robert Ludlum’s The Lazarus Vendetta. Still haven’t complete it, but highly recommended read.

Today was a busy day as well with me paying a visit to one of my clients and then meeting my grandmother.

The week so far has been rather exhausting. I don’t see it easing up though.

Christmas and Internet has been kind of responsible for no posts for quite a while on this blog. Christmas is over, but the internet continues to remain bad.

So I’m gonna make a post while I have the chance to do so.

I ended the week before Christmas with a wedding mass that we were singing for. As usual, we trooped out to eat after the mass. We chose Domino’s because of its proximity. My opinion that Domino’s is not an eatin was re-enforced.

The service was pathetic, they took a great deal of time to serve us (their thirty minute guarantee should apply to those eating in as well!)

I didn’t go for the Christmas midnight mass, as I prefer the morning masses. Did the second reading as well.

We made last minute plans to go for the Christmas Dance at Bandra Gym.
Picked up The Mouse from her place and then the ticket from a friend of hers. Stopped at Pot Pourii in Bandra for some dinner. I guess that either I don’t know what to eat at the place or the food just sucks there!

We reached the gym before 9pm and jived a good deal until 11.30pm with a small break in the middle.

With a little food in our bellies we resumed dancing until they moved the music inside and started playing stuff I hate dancing on.
By 3.30am we were totally bored and decided to just leave instead of waiting for the slow music to start.
Slept a good portion of 26th which is expected when you don’t sleep most of the night

Had choir practice on 26th evening to practice for yet another wedding mass on the 28th at Dominic Savio. Couples really need to prepare for their masses!

27th was the day of the grand Blogger Christmas party organized by Ms. Voice in Her Head.

I reached there in the afternoon itself to help her to get things in order (little wonder I never throw parties).
Her Mom is a real sweetheart and without her I am sure the party wouldn’t have come close to being as good as it was, especially the food aspect.
Read Melody’s mini post. Sakshi has a small writeup with photos of the evening and Vulturo has a detailed post of his experience.

It felt a little weird as a few there, Melody and Sakshi in particular, referred to me as India’s No. 1 Resident blogger. It’s nice to have that title, but I definitely am not that. And more importantly, I never set my sights only on India
Not being too much of the extrovert I chose to keep to myself and the mouse for a better part of the evening.

Today was an unfruitful day in college. However I did get my HDFC account closed, printouts of the transcripts and gave my bike for servicing, which means that I am without wheels for a day.

The weekend ahead is going to be with the books, with two mocks and classes as well.

Went over to Melody‘s place on Sunday morning to complete the work on her new computer.

Bowling

Elvis loves to go bowling whenever he is down and so after lunch me and Melody joined Elvis, Delilah, Clint and Alisha for a round of bowling at Fun Republic in Andheri W. They were already playing when Melody and I reached there.

Fun Republic is one noisy place. Added to the noise of the people there, you also have to bear blasting music. Telling them nicely didn’t help until we fired the guy.

This was one of the longest rounds I’ve played of bowling, since there were six of us. I suck and bowling and I don’t know why the folks think otherwise. Lost once again in the last round when Delilah overtook me by four points
And when I say lost I meant I don’t consider Elvis or Clint who are experts!
The pic on the side shows our final scores.

By the time we finished bowling it was past 6.30pm and then we started off towards Bandra. But…

Bikes

… Flame (my bike) decided to disagree. I need to get the battery changed and the only option now is to kick start the bike. However after several kicks the bike just refused to start. On checking I found that petrol was leaking. I’m not an expert on bikes and so my dilema!
Took it to a mechanic in the area who got it working. And Melody was really click happy as you can see!
But the problem just wouldn’t get solved. While we were stuck in heavy traffic in Juhu, I once again got the smell of petrol, only to find it leaking again. Thankfully turning off petrol via the lock stops this outflow!

To make matters worse, I was on reserve so was hoping I wouldn’t run out of petrol. Filled up two litres at a pump and managed to get the bike started again. Petrol continued to drip! But, atleast I wouldn’t run out of it.

Traffic, bike woes ensured that we reached Bandra only by 7.30pm.

I had plans to meet up with school friends, but had to cancel them

Bingo, Booze and BBQ

Bandra Gym had the 3Bs night running, viz. Bingo, BBQ and Booze?
Didn’t get the Bingo, the BBQ wasn’t tempting enough and I don’t booze. But, I love to dance and so did jive a bit. Melody was in her “irritate Ajay” mood (as usual) and refused to follow!
Alisha says she was new, but followed well enough.
I didn’t have my regular jive partner. Plans on for Wellingdon soon (?).

Independence Cafe

After Bandra Gym, we went over to Independence Cafe on Hill Road for dinner. I haven’t been there before and seems like a nice joint.
Food was good but the Sun Shine Splash was watery!

Ate almost a complete roast chicken. Was helped by Melody, Elvis and Delilah to finish the mashed potato and vegetables surrounding it

Yesterday was “Let’s be Friends” night at Wellingdon. Anjali had invited me for it and since besides her family other common friends were also there and cause my new craze is dancing, I decided to go along.

After a really tiring day at work, where we left only at 6.30 and really really very horrible traffic on the way home resulted in me reaching only past 8.30pm. Got ready and left immediately and made it to Santa Cruz in under 25min in heavy traffic!

Had been informed that it would end by 10pm so wasn’t expecting to get much. However, the program took place in the hall upstairs and so was able to continue well past 12am!

Danced quite a bit as usual and played a few games (many of which were senseless). Met up with Anjali’s cousin Andre who is down from Canada.

Have plans to go out in the evening as well. Let’s see if they materialize.

Was so zonked this morning that I just switched off the alarm and went to bed. Mom woke me up around 7.10am and I had to get ready in 15minutes

There has been a major water problem in my area for the past few days. Got reports of a rasta-roko yesterday resulting in temporary supply. However, people are getting rather irritated by the whole deal. Sometimes, I think our municipality sucks!! But isn’t that the case all over X(

So how was your Christmas?

Mine was fabulous!

Hadn’t gone for midnight mass so began Christmas day with the 9.30am Mass. The church was pretty much empty because I guess most had gone the previous night. Ended up doing the Prayer of the Faithful.
Had planned on wearing my coat but thought I would be overdressed. When I got there saw many in coats. I am sure if I wore the coat, no one else would have done the same?

Spent a good deal of the day at home, but for sometime when I visited the saloon in a desperate quest to look even more handsome than I already am (I know that I am really really vain!)

Dressed up in my new maroon shirt and Anjali and I left together by rick to Bandra. Got stuck in such horrible traffic that it was really very irritating. Thankfully I know all the roads on the way to Bandra and was able to bypass a good section of the traffic.

Reached there way before the others and so just walked up and down the road waiting for them to come!

Finally got in around 9pm and realized we were early!

Took some pictures of us. Am not going to post all, but here is a good one of Anjali and me.

Well we jived a good two hours at a stretch until we were really exhausted and decided to take a break. Well, I’ve improved. Have progressed from a guy with two left feet to one who could dance to one who can dance with the music!
Havilah sure was shocked to see me jiving well (I won’t boast about my dancing skills).

Here’s another pic of the group when we were well exhausted and sleepy!

We partied on till 4am. Anjali and I missed a good part of the slow music because we were busy sipping down some hot coffee. Needed when your throats are in a mess and its early in the morning!

Got the last slow number because they shut off the music. We headed off home. Had some trouble getting a rick in the morning. But we reached home around 4.45am and since all of us were there did some timepass till 5.30am.

Perfect end to a great Christmas night! One of my best Christmas’ so far

There’s 15 days for Christmas and I am sure while many have already decided what they will do, there may be many others who are still deciding!

I’ve fallen perfectly into the latter. Have quite a few options, though I just am not sure which option to follow.

For the past four years I have been spending Christmas and New Year with my choir. It has usually be low key affairs with private parties held at someone’s house. I never had a date nor did I know how to dance hence the rule-out of popular places like Willingdon or Bandra Gym.

Times have changed and now I do know how to dance (a bit). And I thought I had a date, but I don’t think I will be able to spend the days with Madam C. (don’t anyone raise a finger at me!)

So now it will most probably be choir. Though, Melody made me a very tempting offer of Catholic Gym. Though, I am totally clueless of the days.

Another thing to worry about is that I can’t be so zonked that I can’t make it to work!

Anyway, moving away from me, what are you doing this Holiday Season? Do comment and let me know