Feline Musings

Random Notes on the Role of the Modern Woman

felinemusings — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 16:21:17 +0000

A confusing scenario; a messy state of affairs – women are supposed to be well-bred, educated and enlightened but at the same time their individual choices and career preferences have to be compromised in the face of pushy social norms. While men have always required women to work side-by-side with them – be it in farmlands, or orchards, or managing entire households and the finances while the men were at war or away on voyage – it is the modern trend of equal financial contributors that has added to the role of the women. In most families today, the burden of loans, lifestyle and spiraling expenses is forcing reliance on double-income and when this trend started more than a decade back, there emerged the concept of DINK – Double Income No Kids. But as women developed work-family life balance, social and familial demands on compliance to traditional child bearing and rearing roles were reasserted.

Creativity Redirected

felinemusings — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 15:21:54 +0000

What I realized from this experience was that Creativity in any form definitely feeds on your life force, it imbibes, and emerges from something deep within you and you have to give it all that you possibly can. Whether it is fanning the fires within with passion for a Muse, or having a mind at rest from all other cares of the world, Creativity is a jealous child – an all-demanding, all-consuming force that compels and commands single-minded devotion, dedication and energy. Whether you feed it with intense pain or pleasure, with dominant passion or intense absorption, your enthrallment with your creative side has to be complete and undivided. No wonder, many bright and creative individuals over time and centuries have been known as eccentric, withdrawn, silent, moody and even autistic. With all things worldly, there are exceptions and many may not agree with the concept that I explore in this blog, but I would love to hear about real-life experiences that say that creativity demands single-minded dedication and most importantly, a mind a rest from most things materialistic.

From the Mind’s Eye

felinemusings — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 12:44:54 +0000

The smell of the first showers intoxicated me. A gust of wind sprayed my face with icy rain drops, as I reached to close the window. I took a deep breath. The showers were heavy and had caught unaware many passers-by. A tiny puddle was created and a small child splashed in the water gleefully. I could almost feel the pleasure of the child, and in my mind I protested more vehemently than him when his mother pulled him away with a slap on the bottom. The child in me wanted to enjoy the rain and the mud. I felt light-hearted and child-like.

Fahrenheit 451 – Relevance in the Age of New Media

felinemusings — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 11:43:04 +0000

The book is a wonderful parody on state-run monopoly, and manipulation, foolishly covered and relayed by the media, and the modern man’s quest for fun and entertainment at the expense of other people’s pain and folly. It is the ultimate reflection of a material world where lack of knowledge and pursuit of entertainment leads to subservience to the vile and the irrational. Like Huxley’s Brave New World, Ray Bradbury has imagined a world were gratification reigns supreme and human beings live in self-assured indulgence.

When the Dew Drop and the Bubble fell in Love

felinemusings — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 05:45:28 +0000

Dew Drop was impressed by the brave stance of the Bubble. She looked at him admiringly. Bubble caught the glint in her eye and saw the tint on her countenance, “She is so beautiful, and she reflects the virtue of my mother, Innocence!”

The R Factor of Modern Indian Entertainment

felinemusings — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 09:28:08 +0000

Hence, each bat of the eyelid and every trickle of a tear, the smudge of the sindoor and the sweat drop on the forehead, the teeth-gnashing and the shock, the breaking of the bangles and the flutter of the curtains, the shuffle of footsteps and the boiling of the milk, every single shot was shown three consecutive times in a swift replay, accompanied by music to suit the scene. Each replay – dhish-dhish-dhish – emphasized the severity of the situation, the seriousness of the matter, the wasting of the time of the jaw-dropping viewers.

Social Media: A sociological perspective on a technological phenomenon

felinemusings — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 07:08:45 +0000

Social media is a powerhouse of ever flowing information, tinged with experiences and opinions of many users, across diverse stages of learning, maturity and understanding. A decade ago, when technical writing was struggling to find a stronghold in the Indian IT industry, the greatest impetus came from the use of online groups and mailing lists. Islands of information and individual aspirants conjoined at an online abode, where they shared details of jobs, tools, technical trainings, and challenges. In the absence of established courses and training institutes, most technical writers were learning the intricacies of the usage of authoring tools through chats, forums, and blogs. The online availability of industry-wide authoring standards and trends has helped technical writers to think and write from the perspective of global users, and also come of age, in terms of international competition.

Words and words are all I have – to win this race one day

felinemusings — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 12:39:28 +0000

When I came across NovelRace, the occurrence was aptly complimented by the fact that I had three stories running parallel in my mind, but had not yet penned them down. This made the search for a theme for my novel a cakewalk, as I decided to thread the three stories together with a common event and/or a series of event and then just go with the flow.

The Red House on the Hill Top

felinemusings — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:47:32 +0000

The first light of dawn woke up Manas, and he peered out of the window to witness the sky was clear, and the sun was rising from the embrace of the emerald mountains. The tree outside the window was crystal studded with the last drops of last night’s downpour hanging in blissful union with the jade leaves. Manas stretched his arms wide, took a full-breath of the air, and reached for the bedroom door, with shuffled steps. As he opened the door, his heart skipped a beat, and a cry rose up his throat.

Weekend Travelogue: Renuka Lake, Nahan in Himachal Pradesh

felinemusings — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 06:19:28 +0000

The banks of the lake are dotted with temples and ashrams and colorful shops selling beads and essential articles. Fish feeding has emerged as a thriving business and recreation, and local vendors sell dough to lure the fish, which display ample gluttony to allow everyone to feed them to their hearts content. Monkeys thrive in this area, competing with the fish for their share of food, but are less aggressive than the ones we encountered in Pushkar, on our way to the Savitri temple. Strangely, for a place with so much vegetation, and greenery, it is disappointment for the ardent bird-watcher, except for the Raven that is spotted in the lush trees.

Google Wave can create ripples in Technical Publications

felinemusings — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 06:22:10 +0000

Google Wave is a new tool for communication and collaboration on the web, coming later this year. Google Wave introduces a new platform built around hosted conversations called wave. With the Google Wave APIs, developers can take advantage of this collaborative system by building on the Google Wave platform, and allowing people to communicate and [...]

Move over Wiz-ee-Wig, Wiz-ee-Op is here!

felinemusings — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 08:11:36 +0000

While WYSIWYG became one of the most commonly used phrases in Technical Publications, it also became a misnomer, for developers and technical writers working with various HATs, and word processors realized that many times what they actually saw in the editor didn't usually match the results. WYSIWYG was becoming a fallacy and the reality was closer to the description of WYSIOP (What You See is One Possibility).

Nanofiction – the art of minimalism

felinemusings — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 02:48:13 +0000

So, when I decided to dabble with 55-fiction, I expected it be cakewalk. It wasn’t. It’s very difficult to contain thoughts in as little as 55-words, while maintaining a plot, characters, conflict, resolution and the shock element. I had storylines but after I jotted them out, I spent a lot of time editing and redoing the sentences to reach the magic number. I finally have five stories in place that I am sharing here.

In Vogue – From Blogs to Books

felinemusings — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 07:15:33 +0000

Books by bloggers are becoming a cultural phenomenon and a trend, and so is populist writing. Any blogger with a blog that will entertain and amuse the public has a chance to get a book deal. The appeal of a blogger’s personality and the passion for a subject becomes an attractive force for publishing houses looking for long-term commitments and sustained zeal. Aspiring authors are even coming out with e-books that can be downloaded from their websites and blogs. (I am reminded of Paulo Coelho’s web-based marketing wherein he releases some chapters of his forthcoming publications on his website, and regularly contributes small pieces of writing on the online newsletter – Warrior of the Light.) Today, such marketing concepts are being well-utilized by the tech-savvy, young and ambitious Indian writers!

The Origin and Emergence of Technical Documentation

felinemusings — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 06:41:02 +0000

The 20th century is the age of structured authoring and optimizing information reuse. Interactive media, content and learning management systems, authoring tools, and the need for diverse and multi-output documentation to support the upsurge in application development, as well in consumer-focused mechanizations, have given end-user based technical documentation a professional status.

The Better Man by Anita Nair

felinemusings — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 07:47:09 +0000

Anita Nair has a knack for crisp and complete characterization and is also an accomplished prose writer with liberal rendering of the scenic and daily life of a small (and fictional) village in Kerala. She has touched on many controversial and sensitive subjects, but all with extreme grace and subtlety. She talks about untouchability, casteism, cultural and religious bias, adultery, exploitation and disregard of women, dominance of power and money, bureaucratic red tapism, and even homosexuality.

Quest for the Best

felinemusings — Sun, 24 May 2009 15:02:42 +0000

Selective breeding has also been a well-practiced science in both zoological and botanical worlds. We get to know of genetically engineered better, bigger, stronger species of animals and plants. In fact, when we think of it, Hitler's call for a predominantly Aryan society and the genealogical extermination that followed was close to the Spartan concept of society. Charles Darwin's "Survival of the Fittest" is an assertion of the fact that the genetically "better, bigger and stronger" will ultimately rule the Earth, or for that matter the Galaxies.

Love at first sight – with a ZooZoo

felinemusings — Fri, 15 May 2009 03:17:23 +0000

I have favorites in each one, for example, in the Beauty Tips ad, I love the way the little ZooZoo is peeping in from the threshold when the mummy ZooZoo struts in to see what's scaring the kids, or in Recharge Anywhere ad, the way the girlfriend ZooZoo has a hand on her boyfriend's shoulder as he is happily driving away, or the wringing of the hands in the Fashion Tips ad.... there are so many more details to observe and enjoy and each one can find their favorites.

Dark Chocolate Almond Cake

felinemusings — Tue, 12 May 2009 03:07:39 +0000

I, however, have continued to experiment with baking and I decided that the best way to get back to blogging was share this approved recipe ...

“Making a Mark” as a Technical Editor/Reviewer

felinemusings — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 14:44:18 +0000

The planning, collaborating and analyzing responsibilities provide on-the-job training for a documentation manager's role. It opens one's perspective to challenges of good documentation, the need and pressure of working with various stakeholders within specified deadlines, collating and analyzing data to generate appropriate metrics, and most importantly, accountability for the quality of a deliverable.