Of Rocket Science and Shampoo

Catch phrases and cliches seem to be thrown around in the air in the IT industry, very much like confetti at parades in most Australian cities, once in four years, everytime those guys win the World Cup and come back riding on a tableau.

I think we should have a World Cup without the Australians, so that they understand that they need to lose a few games to be part of the whole cricketing circuit. With no downs, the bunch of people from down under will get complacent. India is so well balanced that way, losing to Bangladesh, Kenya, Scotland, Botswana, Mexico, Mongolia, Maldives, Surinam, Monaco and Luxembourg. (Time machines rock!!!) 'Team India' surely keeps the spirit of the game alive.

Nevertheless, going back to this whole catch-phrase thing, my latest pet peeve to rant on about seems to be the term 'rocket science'. I've been at the same company for almost three years, despite appearing for eighty interviews in various other tech firms and being unanimously rejected on grounds of lack of relevant skills (even when I applied as watchman for some leading tech firm on one occasion), and as a result of being at the same place, I am unsure but mostly certain about the fact that this trend might just be possibly extrapolated to other honourable companies as well.

On the rejection front, for all the odds and ends jobs that I applied to as well, none of those sorry fools ever told me that I was over-qualified. Maybe they were under-qualified to take my interview. Despicable dimwits!

Back to 'rocket science', its probably a phrase some top management guy saw in a Dale Carnegie/Shiv Khera/Paulo Cohelo level book and chose to use it with his subordinates, and this whole catch phrase usage has subsequently percolated down to the lower people on the tech totem-pole.

Now you have every other random donkey, wanting to impress people with his lack of knowledge in 'rocket science' throwing that phrase around with gay abandon as a standard format expression.

"We're asking you to write a simple program, its not rocket science!" is how it all starts off. Next you have the rookie techie scolding an auto-driver in broken English with "I aksed you to take auto to Jayanagar 4th block, its not rocket science!" or "I am getting engaged, its a simple family affair, its not rocket science!"

Imagine what people at NASA would use, to bring about such contrasts instead. Space agencies, presumably don't have people spewing managerial bullshit would be oblivious to such statements. However, just for pure kicks, assuming such a thing were possible, their motivational talks would be somwehat similar to the ones us mere lowly mortals would have to undergo.

The only difference would be the fact that 'rocket science' would be cheap and upper end comparisions would be something super complex, such as psychohistory or something to that effect. The poor rocket scientists would hear motivational speeches - "Its not something as complex as psychohistory, by Galaxy!! Its only rocket science!"

One man's C-program is another man's rocket science. Horseshit unplugged.

As if life weren't complicated enough with all this unnecessary bullshit and arbit analogies, there had to be this added dimension that had to go hand in hand with something as simple as growing hair, and resisting the urge to tear it out, while reading the crap seen above.

One wonders how people managed to grow and maintain their hair, as seen in Ramanand Sagar's Ramayana and other epic TV series, with their flowing long hair and perfect teeth and flawless skin. Tyler Durden's nightmares come true, that would be.

Until a few years back, even shampoo was not something used frequently for my hair, but now, with increasing hair length, Goldilocks-like, and being bombarded from all corners by the damages that pollution and stress cause to one's hair, through various adverts, paranoia has set in, and how!

There's so many hundreds of haircare products out there, that soon we'd have a specialization purely dedicated to this part of our person, very similar to dentistry, but with a substantially lower incubation period for potential trichologists to hit the market.

Trichology is your word for the day, you weasel. Go knock yourself out!

Lastly, you know you're growing old when you end up toasting with your pals over a drink of beer, not to visiting the Playboy Mansion in summer, but to stuff like not growing a paunch or having a receeding hairline. Father Time makes his presence felt, with a big bang.

May you stay forever young. Very Dylan-esque, but true. May you also pick a good bottle of shampoo.

PS - Ad sense. Click. Please! Dabboo wanted. There isn't enough of it, no matter what.