>Those Two Months

>This blog has existed for about 4 and a half years now, and I have been loyal to some extent to it. Yes, there have been these flirting moments, and those close calls, when I wanted to call it quits, but the overall love towards it kept me going.

Now this is not a girl that I should get so attracted to and keep raving about it(in case of girls, it is more out of compulsion and less due to the inherent want though!). The blog has indeed been a good companion, and has seen me through my ups and lows, and has now become a very integral part of me, my identity, my.. my.. . Okay! no melodrama here.

Sometimes, this makes me wonder, why do I actually blog?

We write to record our thoughts, true! The other reasons that I could convince myself are:

1. Makes me a better thinker (yeah! Socrates in the making!)

2. Makes me a better writer (obviously!)

3. Develops a voice within myself, which is consistent and natural
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Ah bull..! I just write for fun! Coz, I enjoy writing and nothing else.

Do I never get these writer’s block? Obviously I do!

Sure, there were times when I was completely stuck, and did not know what to write, though somewhere deep inside I did want to write. In such times, I just walked out of the house, go to the beach ( in vizag), and start listening and eavesdropping on people. Random arbit people, that you would find in hoardes everywhere. It would then become that person’s story, and the keyboard kept clicking.

Writer’s block is a fancy term made up by whiners so they can have an excuse to drink alcohol.- ~ Steve martin

I realize that I have written atleast one post every single month since I started this blog. Every single month! Except for two months – Dec’06, and Nov’09.

I think I know the reason why this happened. Why these two months got singled out? What exactly happened during these two months?

December 2006

I was in my final year of engineering, and was living life kingsize. I had everything I always wanted, everything that any college goer would wish. CAT was going good, AIESEC was loads of fun, College was exciting and I was doing pretty decently there, I was on the verge of having a girlfriend,etc.. what better could one ask for?

CAT was done in November, and all the Sundays of December were scheduled in my diary with appointments with other exams – IIFT, XAT, SNAP, JMET, and what not!

With so much happening, I think there was little time left for any blogging. There was no time to actually sleep. Nah! I was not studying.

I remember this one exam – JMET. It was on the 10th of December, Sunday. Just two weeks before this, in the last week of november, I was crowned the organising committee president for a local conference of AIESEC, scheduled to happen on 9th and 10th December. Great! How do I manage this?

“Oh! Come on, I am striving to be a manager. This is the real test!. Multitasking”, I tried convincing myself.

All of December first week was spent in getting sponsorships, ensuring all logistical arrangements are in place, everyone is invited properly, etc.. the whole day, starting from 7 something in the morning with a team meet and a smoke at the beach to late midnight, I was caught up organising this.

Saturday, 9th December morning, everything was set, and i was in the hotel (venue of the conference) right at 8AM, to ensure last minute settings are done properly. The show went on all day, and the evening ( well late night!) parties also went on smoothly.

I was awake till 5:30AM in the morning, ensuring everything is going proper in the party, and there were no untoward events. Then also handling disputing couples who were booked in the same room, but now wanted separate rooms after their quarrel ( how would they end up if they get married?), helping puking people to get more comfortable, more so if the puking person is Asthmatic. This went on till 7 in the morning, and then I realize I have an exam at 10AM.

I rush home, asking my team members to take care, and assigning one person the power of attorney to take decisions for the morning.

I reached home with a shabby tattered look on my face, got freshened up, had breakfast and zoomed to the exam center. I looked like I had just woken up from sleep and walked through. I told my friends of the amount of alcohol within my body, that has been urging to vomit out since morning.

I somehow sat through the paper for two hours, and my sense of duty towards the conference ( or call it lack of trust in my team!) was so high, that Immediately after the exam I zoomed to the hotel, and it went on again like the previous night, right up till monday morning.

These two days were an example of the kind of fast paced of life, I was lucky to experience in december’06, and thus my reason for not writing a single post.

Ah! Well, before you start guessing, I got an AIR of 252 in JMET.

November’2009

This is the second such month, which went without a single post. I was in delhi in November having my Sales officer stint.

The last three months had been strenuous and quite eventful. My first actual exposure to the corporate world, to the world of FMCG, to the world of selling. Yes, I was a salesman! Ah! Well, a sales officer handling the central part of Delhi.

November was my review time, and I was badly rogered in my first review that happened on 26th October (yes, I do remember the date!).

Right from then, I was bent on proving a point and prepared hard for nights together trying to memorize everything that could be asked in the review. (it was scheduled to happen in the first week of November).

Ensuring that no stone is left unturned, I actually memorised everything. How many grams is each unit of every sku? what is the case configuration? how many sku’s in each outer?, what is the price of a single piece? of an outer? of a case? What is the retailer margin? distributor margin? the invoicing details, various placement programs, the details of each one of them, how many such outlets exist in delhi, how many in my area, which ones? Everything.

The next thing, I would start memorizing was the actual sku wise sale of each outlets of the 3500 odd outlets in my territory.!

Well, as luck would have it, my review did not happen in november first week. I rather went to jim Corbett national park with the delhi team. After the trip, when I was very much expecting my review to happen, I was instead sentenced off to meerut, UP for a week.

“I want you to butcher the RD there”, were the words directed to me!

I did not have an option, and taking it in the right stride went on. After two days in meerut, I was again called back for the branch review, within two days of my stay there in meerut.

I now expected my review to happen. It was already the second week of November and my next stint details had come. I attended the two day review, then the launch of a new product, and then on the subsequent Monday when I went to office (very hopeful that I would be reviewed today!), I was sentenced back to meerut.

“two days is too less. Go there for one more week!”, I was told.

“Yes Sir”, and I marched directly to meet Nisha in the evening and from there directly to meerut without any luggage whatsoever.

Here I need to thank Nisha for being there during those difficult days, which could have been a lot more depressing if not for her.

Stayed in meerut for the whole week, and started back on Saturday reaching delhi late night.

On Monday, again expecting the review to happen now that the vanvaas ( exile) of meerut is done, I was completely ready. Well, life cannot be all that simple. The review has further been postponed indefinitely, due to some urgencies!

I was free on tue and wed, as the review would now only happen on 26th, Thursday at the earliest. I went back to meerut, having nothing better to do here in Delhi. Met Nisha on Tuesday, and went back to meerut that evening, only to come back on Wednesday afternoon itself. I would rather prefer spending time with Nisha here in Dlehi, than whine there alone in meerut!

26th November, Thursday
I headed out to office, and this time not so hopeful that there would be a review. I spent the morning, again in the waiting room, cribbing about life in general. At about 2:30PM, finally after the long wait, I was called in for the elusive review. It went well, and it had to after all those nights of preparations.

27th morning, I took a flight to Chennai to meet people here in the south branch. Little did I then know, that this is the branch that I would eventually get posted to. I was in Chennai on Friday and Saturday, and then early Sunday morning, took a flight to Mumbai to attend some training program there.

Flew down to Bangalore on Tuesday evening, dec 1st, finally reporting to my next stint. ASM Shadow stint.

There, thus the whole month of November was filled with utmost depression, and despair, and yeah! I forgot to mention this – I even had a small argument with P, which turned out to be a big one leading to eventualities.

Novemeber 2009 was BAD! Now, how could i have blogged?