Monday, October 28, 2013

Priya 6th Month Pictures

This is Priya baby when she wakes up.  She is such a morning person and is super happy.  She likes to girly scream for an hour, we call it her morning singing.


 Here is a picture of Priya in Orange


Picture of Priya in Orange 2


Priya Chillin and Watching Football with Daddy


Priya Showing a little leg to distract Dallas when they were playing the Lions.  It worked, we won!!


Sunday, October 27, 2013

Priya Lady Bug Pictures



Here is Priya as a Ladybug:

She has multiple Halloween costumes, let us see what she finally wears.






Priya was crying and Neeta put her in the laundry basket and she stopped right away.



Saturday, October 26, 2013

5 Year Plan

In my last 5 year plan, so far almost nothing I have envisioned has happened.  So now with my daughter added to the mix, I thought that we needed a new 5 year plan.

Year 1 - Keep building the business and merge with a strategic partner. 

We are pretty much stuck on the same profit level we were 2 years ago.  The IT market has been very slow, and I am not sure when it will rebound again.  I thought that I would expand but I obviously chose the wrong time to do it, so we will scale back, keep a tight reign on expenses and build cash for a the next 1-2 years.

Year 2 - Watch for a rebound in the IT market

Year 3 - I would expect by now that the cyclical slowdown should have ended by now and we should get ready for expansion.  We should be flush with a few million in cash by this point and should have the flexibility to expand.

Year 4-5 - I am waiting to get $4,000,000 cash in my investment account.  I am expecting that I would reach this amount by then.  Once I get this amount in Vanguard Admiral Shares of the S&P 500, then I will officially retire.  If I need to sell off some of the businesses to reach the $4,000,000 million cash, I will do so in year 4-5.

At least that is the goal, I would guess that I have a 50-50 chance of reaching these goals.

During retirement we will move to somewhere warm.  I am unsure where, but so far I have these destination in mind:

Key West FL
Charleston SC
Austin TX
Monterrey CA
San Diego CA

Of course it would all depend on finding great schools for Priya since she is the number 1 priority. 

The Profit

For those of you that have a business or want to open a business, really need to watch a TV show called The Profit.

He characterizes all business as nothing more than:

Product
Process
People

That is it.  You need to have product that is in demand, processes in place so that everything runs smoothly and the right people that understand your vision and can help you build the business.

I love the show.

Akki Roti's

I was looking at pictures of Spandana and she was taking about missing Akki roti.  I was thinking damn it, I miss them too.

Spandana was a friend of mine that use to come over to the house all the time.  Now she is a big movie star and an Member of Parliament (MP). 

She was here 2 years ago and she called me everyday to come to Las Vegas and hang out and I did not go.  She is a sweet girl.  When I knew her she was just a college girl and when I left India, she was acting in her first movie.  The first day of shooting, Srinu and I even dropped her off on the set.

Shoulder Pain

I have been having shoulder pain for about 1 year now.  My wife insists that I go to the doctor.  I know exactly what the issue is, but I just do not speak out.

I am terrible at controlling my diabetes.  I currently have almost 120 units of Levemir and about 100 units of Humalog.  If I take this on time and as need, my Diabetes is controlled.  But most of the time what happens is that I forgot to take my evening dose.

So the day before I had to wake up at 3am to go the bathroom.  Basically what happens is very simple, your blood sugar gets too high and this osmotic pull of having too much sugar in your blood will pull in proteins into the urine.  The urine will get sticky (Too much sugar) and foamy.  I think the foam is do to the proteins.  So my wife comes to me and says to me, she was walking on the bathroom floor and it was sticky.  She wanted to know if she wanted me to book an appointment with the Diabetes doctor.

The funny thing is that I know exactly what is going on, but I feel helpless to stop it.

I know that in my current state controlling diet and exercise are the two most important things for me.  But I do neither.  I mention that I make a lot of money and with that money comes a great deal of power in a household.  I pretty much get away with my bad behavior (eating wise), because I make all the money.

So coming back to the shoulder pain.  Why do I have shoulder pain?

Like I said I am an uncontrolled diabetic, and what happens in this condition is that over time you will start losing muscle.  The first muscle that I lost was the Butt Muscle.  I use to have a nice big butt, that is gone now.  After this the next muscles that are disappearing are the shoulder and biceps muscles.  The pain is a direct result of the loss of these muscles and the fragility of the left over muscles.

I was throwing a football last summer and when I threw it, I heard tearing in my muscles and I was in massive pain.  Currently the muscles that are disappearing are my shoulder and bicep muscles.  They seem to be getting fragile and thinning out.

I figured out that there was no other option, I suck at taking care of myself, so I have booked an appointment at the Bariatric Clinic and Providence Hospital.  Seems like there is solid demand, because the next available date I could get was Dec 17th.  So after years of failure, it seems like this is the only choice and before I lose more muscle I am going to go ahead and have the Baraitric procedure done.  I hoping that it will stop the diabetes right away, and will allow my body to heal.  I understand that for a lot of people the diabetes stops right away and there is no need of Insulin anymore.

Once I get closer to the procedure date and I get it done, I will write updates.

Impulsive

I am little bit impulsive.  My Escalade's transmission started acting funny so instead of fixing it I went ahead and decided to buy a new car.  I bought a new Lexus LX570.

I have had it for 2 weeks now.  I took it for a trip to Wash DC and I have been driving it around here town.  I know that GM is back, because I miss my old Escalade. The Lexus costs $90,000 and the Escalade with the employe discount comes to around $70,000.

I hate the Lexus.

Here are all the problems with the Lexus LX570:

Drink Cups Holder to Shallow - In the Escalade the drink cup holders are deep and nice and there is no chance of the cup falling over.

Drink Cup Holder Made of Hard Plastic - In the Escalade the drink cup holders have a soft rubber coating and hold the cup where it is.

Seats are too small - The Escalade seats are much more comfortable than the Lexus seats

No Room in the third row when the seats are folded up. - In the Escalade if I take out the third row, there is plenty of room to haul around stuff.

Too Much Useless Stuff - All that off road nonsense is a waste.  How many people are going to take a Lexus off road.  Nobody.  Just get rid of all the off road nonsense, normal drivers will never use it.

Going fast the car does not feel stable - When you are going fast, the Escalade handles much better than the Lexus.  The Lexus is much quicker from a start, but on the Highway, the Escalade feels much safer.  The Lexus almost feels like you could tip over with a sharp maneuver. 

The rear seat entertainment system TV's are way too small.  I would rather have a big center TV, then those tiny TV's on the backseat of each car.   The Escalade's TV's are way better.

To watch the TV's in the back you have to put the DVD in the front and then the front people cannot listen to something else.  On the drive to DC, my mom was watching a movie and our choice was to listen to the audio or turn down the sound and the people in back could use their headphones.   - Oh my God, really.  This is advancement.  Ridiculous. 

My Ipod keeps freezing when I am playing it.  Then I have to disconnect it and connect it back and it works.  Not sure whose fault this is, but my Ipod never freezes when I use it normally.

The Front Command screen always comes back to the Map screen.  When I click on Audio screen after a while it comes back to the Map screen again.  I do not want to watch the stuid map all the time or any other screen.  I should be able to pick what screen I want the command screen to stay on.

Terrible gas mileage.  I know that I should not complain about gas mileage for a $90,000 car, but boy it sucks down gas on the highway.  The Escalade gets better gas mileage than this car.

I was so bugged by this car after just 2 weeks I went to the local Mercedes dealership and bought the 2014 S550.   It was a little bit more at $118,000, but I just had to get rid of the stupid LX570.  My new S550 will be coming in about 30 days.  It is currently in Germany.

Now I need to sell a new Lexus LX570.  Anybody want to buy a 2013 LX570 with 1600 miles.  I paid $85,000 plus tax for a total of $90,000.

I can sell it for $80,000 if anybody wants it.  The car is in new condition.  For a family member I can sell it for $75,000.  If you cannot get financing I can keep it in my name and you can pay the monthly payment.

I hate the car, but almost everybody else that drove it, loved it.  I likes things to be perfect, and I feel it does not come close to the comfort of an Escalade.

GM is back, if a buyer like me says that the Lexus LX570 sucks and he would rather have an Escalade, I think it is safe to say that GM is back and building great cars again.  I could pretty much get any car I want and it is safe to say that the only cars I will every drive again will be:

Mercedes S - Class
Cadillac Escalade

I have had both and both are by far the best cars I have ever driven my whole life.  They drive beautifully, and are very comfortable.

Cars I have hated, that I have owned:

Lexus LX570 - I hate this SUV - Compared to the Escalade it is total junk.

Mercedes E - Class - After you drive the S Class, you realize what a piece of junk the E class is.  There is simply no comparison. 

Forgiveness and Coping

I think I tend to forgive almost anyone given enough time. 

Then the thought came to that, if I had forgiven now, then what if I was never got upset with her and simply walked away and forgiven her then.  How would this have changed the course of events.

Obviously there would be no lawsuit.

I guess what if's are fun in retrospect, but when you are playing your part, it is so hard to do something else.  It does not feel like that is an option.

There has been a bit of a brouhaha about money that I had left to family member.  I never asked for it back nor did I ever bring it up.  I think my wife said something to my parents who mentioned it to the family member.

The family member was upset and said that all he owed me was $500 and sent that back to me via Chase Quick Pay.

Like I said I could careless about the money and I would have never asked them back for anything.  But I am pretty good with money and remembering who owed me what or for that matter if I owe money to someone.

I myself owe $10,000 to Murli and I told him that I would pay it as soon the 2 new houses I bought closed and I had a chance to fix them both up and get them ready for rental or resale.  I closed on one house in DC and fixed it up and the second house closing got delayed and we will be closing on it on Nov 4th.  I made a promise to pay it back the second I finish all my expenses with the houses and I will. It bugs me everyday that I owe money to somebody, but I promised to pay it back the second I finish with the house and I will.

But back to the point.  I know for a fact that I lent $2000 and the family member insists that it is $500.  Before that $2000, I remember that I had lent $15,000, but the family member says I gave nothing.  I guess I could be wrong, but either way, I never asked for it back, so how does it matter.

Then it got me thinking about coping mechanisms and how people tend to forget or change the nature of an event to cope with it.

The family member forgetting about the loan or thinking that it is smaller, is nothing more than a coping mechanism.  I just found it interesting.

Or someone characterizing their bad behavior as nothing more than blaming circumstances.  To me, you are presented with choices every day.  You either are good and will choose the right decision or you are bad and make the bad decision.  But the fascinating part of brain is that someone that makes a bad decision make mask it or make it more palatable by having their brain characterizing it differently.

I will give an example.

A wife will sleep with someone that is not her husband.  Her brain will characterize that she did nothing wrong.  She will actually blame her husband or someone for her moral failure.  Her brain eventually will convince her that what she did was correct and that she did not have a choice and not put a moral character flaw on her.

I just find the whole thing very interesting.

Tuesday, October 22, 2013

Priya and Pumpkins

Here is Priya with Pumpkins:







Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Teddy's Birthday

It was Teddy's Birthday yesterday.  Happy birthday Teddy. Here are a few pictures of Teddy when he was younger.


These were the two that we took home, Teddy and Kumo.  Kumo is on the right.  Everyone scared us that two boy Akita's would fight all the time so we actually gave Kumo away to the head of the SPCA in El Paso.


This is a picture of Teddy on the first day that we met him.  He was close to 2 Months old here.


This was when he was less than one year old.  We left him home alone for the first time, and he ripped apart the sofa that he is lying on.


I always loved this picture of Teddy.  I wanted to enlarge it and hang it in the house.  His left ear still droopy, but still looking so Majestic.


This is Teddy lying in his favorite spot in the El Paso Apartment.  Front Door Tile.


Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Pictures

Daddy and Priya hanging out after dinner.  We went to the Goan fish restaurant called, Indofusion that I love.



 They have a coconut tree in the restaurant and here is Grandma and Priya under the tree.


I came to DC for business, so Priya is getting ready for ride to Cleveland to stay with her Pedma.  Here she is all bundled up and ready to go for her 2 1/2 car ride.


Neeta took a picture of Priya was an empty beer bottle and you can see Neeta's mother in the background super pissed.  She wanted Neeta to not take the picture and to delete it immediately.  This picture may have to be taken down, based on the flack I get over it.  So here is Priya was an empty beer bottle.


Wednesday, October 9, 2013

Priya Pictures


Priya baby finally tired and sleeping:


Here is Priya playing in her play center:



Priya Chilling on Kumo:



I am sure Kumo is thinking, why is she lying on me.  I am just trying to take a nap.  He did not move a muscle while she was lying on him:




Saturday, October 5, 2013

Pictures of Priya and Annaprashana and Videos

This is Priya during her Annaprashana, (first feeding).  After the feeding they have a game in which the baby chooses an item and this is supposed to be what the go towards in life.  My Daughter choose flowers during this Annaprashana.  (This is actually her second Annaprashana, the first one was done at the temple on Wednesday and this was on Sunday following the Wednesday)

This is a family friend Bhavani, who is a family friend and one of the sweetest people on earth.  She always helped my students with their Dental issues (She is a Dentist) for free or at cost.

She has a matching saree with Priya dress and they looked like mother and daughter.



This is Siva and Bhavani with Priya.  Siva is my cousin brothers wife and they came over to Detroit from DC and surprised us for Priyas function.  Their daughter got accepted into Univ of VA and it was parents weekend, but they skipped it so they could hang out with Priya in Detroit.  Sorry Sravya.


It was my moms birthday 2 days later and we had a cake for her and as you can see the cake we had a question candle for her, since no one knows how old she is, or acts I can add.


This is a video of Priya and her uncle Sampath, who plays with her for at least 10 hours a day.



This is the actual video of Priya during her annaprashana picking out something.  She actually touches the Bhagavad Gita first, but that was right next her right hand, but in my view she actually grabbed the flowers first.



This was my mom feeding Pirya during Annaprashana.  Priya loves payasam and as much as the gang gives her she is gobbling up.



Priya finally learns to roll over.



More Priya rolling her.



This was in the evening of the day that she learned to roll over and apparently in India, they have the baby roll over Bobbatlu (Indian Sweet).  If you look closely you can see the Bobbatlu's below her.  They put wax paper over the Bobbatlu and then had her roll over.  No clue on this tradition or what meaning it has, but Priya was pooped from rolling over all day and she did cooperate in their game at all.



I know what the title say, but this was the evening of when she was rolling over all day and this was another video of Priya trying to rollover on Bobbatlu.



Mom feeding dad with her birthday cake