Softman and the Manager

10 comments
The softman strikes again!
He's lying on his chair, half dead, fully depressed. His half yearly feedback is out and all his tactics have paid no returns. All those days of reassigning tasks at the last moments, all those nights of kissing the manager's ass, nothing came to his rescue.

Is he going to give up? What else has the softman got up his sleeve? After all, playing normal tricks is just meeting expectations in his mental feedback, doing something extraordinary and so quiet that the next person doesn't know the carpet is being pulled off from underneath him is what softman needs to do in times of such dire crisis. That's how he can exceed expectations.

Suddenly, his manager calls him into the office for a feedback discussion. Softman's brain is working at the speed of his best friend, the stupid computer he works on everyday.
He goes in

Manager: "Good Morning S.M, take you seat, How's work going on these days?"

SM: "Awesome GK, I have taken an initiative to make the task tracker better. That is taking up some of my productive hours but no worries, I'm quite good at managing both" (Lol! God knows I haven't even tried to write 10 lines of code for that )

Manager: Have you gone through your feedback?

SM: Yes I have

Manager: What do you think? Is it fair enough?

SM: According to me blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah

This goes on for one hour......

Finally the Manager, snapping out of his mid morning siesta, interrupts him.

 Manager: I think all these things that you have mentioned are all taken into account while giving feedback.  
                Please perform better in the next cycle you'll get better ratings. You can please leave. Thank you

Our Softman is tongue-tied. He doesn't know what to say. He just walks out dazedly. It is just not his day!!

Meanwhile inside the Manager's office.

He has a wicked smile on his face which seems to say "Been there done that!"

Lets not forget, the manager himself was a softman once... :)



Read more about Softman here: Chronicles of Softman








Bryan Adams- A musical discovery

11 comments
Okay, firstly you should have the overconfidence that "Yes, I'm a Bryan Adams fan, I know all his songs. I love him even if he's as old as my granduncle", then you should have 1500 bucks to spare and then randomly decide to throw it off. most importantly, you should be me.This is the recipe for a perfect evening to realise that you are a musical misfit.

I have always wanted to go to a concert, but since I never had that kinda money to throw on 2 hrs (yes, it was only for 2 hrs! ), I had never been to one. Obviously, like any other foolish first-timer, I was so excited. I told my friends, all sailing in the same boat, that we'll book a cab to drop us home at midnight (OMG!I am such a dreamer) Anyway, after an hourlong walk from the gate to the venue, where they promptly disposed our water bottles only to be selling them at black rates inside (India!). The lights went on, I could see minute moving figures on the stage one km away!! Thankfully, there was a lifesize screen next to us. Bryan walked in, hair combed like a school boy, we ooooooohed and aaaaaahed and tried out all the calls we learnt for 4 yrs in college.

Before the concert, My friend was apprehensive that she didn't know any of his songs, a show-off that I am, I laughed at her secretly thinking "Barreily se bhag ke aayi hai". Then with music in my heart and passion in my eyes, waited for him to sing. Yes, I'm a drama queen, student of Vipul, from Barriely whose philosophy in life is "Real life is inspired by movies and advertisements."

He started crooning. I forced an intensity into my eyes like the one I get when I'm constipated. I opened my mouth to sing along, but alas! I didn't know the song. Okay, I'll try the next one. Then to pass the time, We started dancing like robots (I mean, I can only do that for an english song). Anyway, by this time, the whole crowd which looked strangely similar to the one at shokhsabhas were getting irritated with the our extraordinary behavior (I have to do something, I paid 1500!!). One song over, second one started, I knew one line, Could I sing along?..No! Anyway, I tolerated it. The cycle continued till Summer of '69 started, the whole crowd went crazy. Then, at this moment I realised, this is it. This is the reason everybody's here! 90% of them were like me!
LOL!
I was not alone! At least, I'm not as lame as the ones like me who took 8000 bucks tickets to sing one song!