The Matchbox Value

Ramesh said, “I’ve this movie running in my mind. It just runs again and again and it depresses me!”
“What kind of movie is this?”, asked the Psychologist
“Its an incident that happened in the past, an embarrassing moment”
‘Negative Self talk’, the psychologist scribbled in a piece of paper.
The Psychologist smiled, “Run that movie for me”
“I was walking around with my plates in hand, it’s a party hosted by my company. I suddenly slipped and fell into a heap of used plates, my clothes got soiled, I hear laughter, I decide to not to see anyone. I slowly.. carefully got up .. and…. my foot slipped again and I fell for the second time... this time onto the adjoining lawn. A group of ladies standing nearby burst into laughter and others joined the fun.
“People thought that I was drunk and from then on time and again I am accused of being drunk and out of control. Even in office people just wait for me to fumble and then mock at me.”
The Psychologist was still scribbling something in his paper, he looked at Ramesh empathetically
Ramesh exclaimed, “I am actually a teetotaller!”
The Psychologist asked, “When this incident happened?”
“Many years ago!”
“Do people still mock at you?”
“No no that teasing died after some months and many of my colleagues have moved on. But another problem came..”
“The movie!”
“Yes! It just keeps on playing and my embarrassment, my fear that it might happen again just increases each time its played. Please tell me, what should I do in this condition?”, asked Ramesh
“Lets say that I ask you to buy me a Matchbox from the nearby shopkeeper and he sells it for Rs 10. What would you do?”
“I will not buy. The Matchbox is much cheaper. I will look out for shops which sells the Matchbox for the correct price”, replied Ramesh
The Psychologist laughed, “We are good in determining the value for even mundane things like Matchbox, but when it comes to real incident, are we really rational enough to give it the correct value”
Ramesh’s eyes became wide open and his jaws dropped. The Psychologist continued, “If anybody taunts or hurts you…any incident happens to you, just ask yourself how much value you are going to give it, how long are you going to brood over it. Once decided give it only that much. When the negative self talk runs again just remember that its not worth it. You are overpaying for a matchbox!”
From that day on Ramesh started carrying a matchbox. Whenever he felt the negative self talk movie running in his head, he took the matchbox from his pocket and gave it a stern look. Sometimes in an air of excitement, he would burn a matchstick. He calls it, “The Matchstick Value”

Fragile Things - Review

Just finished reading “Fragile Things” by Neil Gaiman. Neil Gaiman’s narration is different and it takes some time to get used to it. His usual focus is on Vampiers, Ghosts and the stories have a lot of adult contents.
If you are reading “Fragile Things” and have decided to put it down then here is my favorite which I think should definitely read :
1. October in the Chair
2. Bitter Grounds
3. Other People
4. Good Boys Deserve Favors
5. How Do you Think It feels
6. Feeders and Eaters
7. Goliath
8. Sunbird
9. The Monarch of the Glen

Mobile Caller Tunes

I once read somewhere that the Mobile Caller Tunes is becoming the #1 market for Digital music. I’ve a very rudimentary mobile phone that serves my purpose. I’m not against smart phones with camera and apps they serve the purpose.
What makes me feel pity to all those innumerable ppl who use caller tunes and different incoming tunes for different callers.
First lets focus on Caller Tunes:
Whenever ppl call you, they will here your caller tunes, you’ll pay a little money offcourse. This is a very beautiful concept for the college goers, but its depressing to see ppl using this technique even if they are in office.
You call a colleague to discuss some important project issue and you hear the caller tune, it just disturbs your focus. Imagine what will happen when the boss calls and hears the tune, he will say to himself, “not very professional guy”
Next lets come to Ringtones, its considered another million dollar business. Whenever some one calls you, you can create a separate ring tone for them.
So if its your Boss, you can put, “Valvae Mayam” etc
The basic idea is that you will be ready when you hear the tone. The fact is you will be ready when you see the number/contact name. And another disturbing fact is your colleagues will know who is calling you!
Why are many ppl not thinking about privacy? Why are they not thinking about the inconvenience to others by their ring tones? Why can’t they make their life simple? Why complicate life?
Once you are into setting ringtones/caller tunes you’ve to change the songs every month to let ppl know that you are trendy. Just an other unnecessary waste of time and money.

Why focus the Flaw?

I love stamps, they are a thing of beauty. The Miniature sheets are much more beautiful and could be literally framed in the walls. I’ve been collecting Indian Stamps, b’coz, its easy to collect since I’m an Indian (living in India) and want to know more about India.
What I find very strange as I browse through sites dedicated to Indian Stamps, the focus is more towards finding defect in a stamp! These collectors take all the pains to identify a defect and say, “Hey! I found this flaw. I’ve these flaw stamps. Wanna buy?”
Why these ppl are focusing on defects and why they want to keep the price of a defect piece more than a correct piece!
I dono if I will trade my stamps but if at all I do I will say, “I’ve this beautiful stamps and they are absolutely perfect. Do you want them?”

Trump: Think Like a Billionaire - Review

I heard this Audio book. This is not a "How to" book, its like a Journal.. not a very interesting journal.
Donald Trump is a very confident guy, but too much confidence is not really good. He dint spent much time for this book, he just gave his daily Journal as publication.
This book gives insights of the typical day of Donald Trump, how he interacts with his employees and contractors. How well he takes care of his estates and buildings.
Also gives more details about The Apprentice, talking in detail about the Apprentice is a waste of time. How will ppl reading the book in another 20 years will feel about the Apprentice. They will not know and will not care about the Apprentice program.
All these things could've been placed as articles in a magazine, but any book should strive to be timeless. This book failed in that regard.
My verdict.. not worth your time.

I am a collector

I know it …I know it all these years of living that I’m a collector. .i love collecting. It started with bus tickets train tickets then I settled to stamp collecting during my school days. At that time I dint know about Indian commemorative stamps, so I used to go to book stores and buy only foreign stamps. I loved the colors and arts in stamps, I had no thematic collection(even now I dint have any thematic collection, I collect whatever I like). After some years the stamp collecting season got lost and so I left it.
Also I saw the proliferations of telecommunication, with emails, chat, web cam and very cheap calling rates there was a severe decline in snail mails. Couple of years ago I went for a Japan stamp exhibition in Chennai where I came across a Philately President in Chennai, who gave me some details of the Philatelic wing of Indian Post. Then I went to the Anna Salai Head Post Office and was the Commemorative stamps, they were all very beautiful and informative. I immediately subscribed for the mailing services. Also I fell in love with Miniature Sheets.
I believe this is a good investment of my time and money. Philately.. here I come!

Flipkart

How beautiful it will be if India has an online bookstore like Amazon. When you live in a suburbs of Chennai and it's a pain to commute to place where good bookstore is present. There are basically 2 mindsets when you visit a bookstore.

1. You know what you want to buy
   
2. You just want to browse around with an open mind and find a book
   

If you are in #1 category then how good it will be if you've an online bookstore! It should be ok even if we spent some rupees extra, if it saves our time and energy. There are a number of big chain of bootstores who've online presence like Landmark, there is a Hindu's online bookstore. There are also a few exclusive online bookstores, but none impressed me. Finally I bumped into Flipkart and I am pleasantly surprised. The search was good, almost all the books I was looking for was in there! They had a small discount and they ship it within 3 days…..no shipping charge. These ppl have no offline bookstore, read here their interview

When I browsed for reviews on Flipkart I found many positive and some negative reviews, but the best thing is most of the ppl who gave negative review said that they are happy now since Flipkart ppl had corrected the issue! This is really good, we cannot be perfect but if someone says something is wrong then if you are able to correct it, you are bound to succeed. I ordered a couple of books and it was in my doorstep in exactly 3 days!

I am very happy that I've discovered Flipkart.