Visit to the eye doctor….

A visit to the eye doctor is due when:
-> eyes feel as heavy as the universe..
-> you stare lachrymosely at the moitor and people around you think that you are reading a really senti e-mail…
-> you get a doubt whether things look 20% or 30% blurred…
-> you tell mom all these symptoms and she orders you to go to the doc immediately…

This happens to me once in 6 months.. And this time it was due to the contents mentioned in the previous post..! Yeah the lack of a good nights sleep due to stink…

Everytime I totally dread going to the eye doctor…
What if the Doctor says that I have power.. :((((
Oh no!!! Then me got to wear glasses and lenses are a burden and pain… No way!!

Me asking myself…
Me(Q):Do things looked blurred??
Me(A): Hmmm… I think so.. :( But no no.. I think its only because of strain…
Me(Q): Mom said that if you develop power you will have headaches along with it… Is my head aching?
Me(A): **Thinking really hard** Hmm.. I think the right side aches a bit… But that’s not too much I guess… But what if its power?? :O :(((( Oh no!! :(

At the docs place…
Doc does the general check with the torch…
Then asks me to read the alphabets on the wall..
The alphabets are generally pretty big… I guess that was to test whether the person is TOTALLY blind or not… ;)

Me: **with a real nervous sad face...** "Doctor… I don’t want to have power… :("
Doc: (she smiles): "Don’t worry.. We'll check it up…"

Then comes the computerized testing for checking power.. Which will DECIDE my fate! This is the worst part… But it brings out my religious best too…

This prayer I carry out every time I sit in front of this equipment…
"God.. Please… I know that I should take care of my eyes properly.. I promise I will eat carrots and papaya… I will surely eat healthy Vitamin rich food.. I will do eye exercises EVERYDAY from here on.. I will not watch too much TV.. Please let this machine spare me this time… I should not have power… :( Please…. Pleaaaaaaaaaaase!! :("

The worst wait is the two minute wait after the test, before the doc calls…
Me: "Doctor, do I have power? :("
Doc: "No you don’t… :) Jus a strain on the eye… Eye drops and rest would do… :)"

Wooooooow!!!!! Yahoooo!!! Celebration!! :D
Me: (YOU ARE THE BEST!!) "Thank you so much.!!!!!!!!! :D"
Doc: (smiles...) "You are welcome… "

Got back home...
Applying eye drops is another experience by itself….
You have the small bottle right on top of your eye… Your eyes forced open….Waiting for that dreaded drop to fall right inside… And your poor eyelids fluttering to save the eye from its attacker.. :D

First time I am scared… I can see the drop standing on the tip and waiting to fall, and my heart almost stops…The second time, when the drop is about to fall, I deliberately close my eyes at THAT moment and think "Hee hee.. See I fooled you" :D
Then deciding that I shudnt be doing this if I want my eyes to get ok.. I apply it fast so that the shock is only for a fraction of a second..
:)

And this time I have decided to follow all that my prayers say.. ;)
Lets c……

Those cursed seats!

I stare at the montior.. Waiting for it to happen….
Waiting for the magical number to appear….

At the end of it, I could have two different kinds of reactions…
1: "I am lucky!!!!!! I made it… Wowww!!! "
2: "Shit man! Why should it happen to me??? Why me??"

No… I am not describing a casino in Las Vegas…
Its much more important than that...

It’s when I wait for the reservation to happen after I try booking my ticket to chennai and back on the Indian Railways Website…. And wait for the seat number to appear.. :)
The most dreaded numbers 1-8 and 65-72

For those who have not yet figured it out..
In every coach, these form the compartments right next to the toilet !!!

If you happen to get an opportunity to take revenge on a big time enemy of yours get him a ticket in one of these seats and you would have done more damage than what you had imagined..

This time while returning from Chennai, I had this dreaded seat of 71.. Side lower berth… The stink started to make its presence felt in sometime… And I readily had something to cover my nose…
I tried to divert my mind to all the nice things in life…Consicously trying to avoid thoughts about the stink…I didnt want to puke.. when I was interrupted by a guy sitting opposite to me, who was this 'namma-ooru-annachi' types

Me: "TTR eppa varuvaar?" (When will the TT come?)
He: "I think he will be coming in half an hour.."

Me: (kind of taken aback by the response in English to my statement in Tamil...)
"Oh..ok.Will he change the seat if there are other cancellations?"
He: "Yeah .. I think yes.."

My hanky goes back to cover my nose… I am suffering….!!
He: "Have you read this book?" ( points to "Who moved my cheese" in his hand )

Me: "Yeah, I have.."
He: "What does this book say? What do you like about it?"

Me: ( thinking.. ) Don’t you think this is heights of cruelty? Me dying because of the fragrance
around and you are asking me to give a book review!!!!!!!!!!
Me: Its about adapting to change… But realize that its not that practical..
See.. You would have got much better berths in the train previously, and now if you get a stinking berth, then how the hell can you adapt to this change????… Not possible…

He: (Has a 'Business World' in his hand… ) "What do you think about the stock market boom now?"
Me: (thinking… ) Oh God...Why cant a bull or a bear pounce on me and devour me right here?
Me: "Sir, I am not able to talk in this stink.. So please excuse…"
He: "Oh.. Ok ok.. Sorry…"

Don’t know whether his nose had special gabbu filtering agents sprayed, that inspite of everyone reacting to it, he didn’t…

Me took out the body freshner spray from my bag.. Sprayed liberally at the back and front side of my palm, on my hanky too… and covered my face with the hanky and my palm.. "Necessity is the mother of invention" I thought... and tried to sleep…
And early morning, say 1 hour before the train reaches its destination, please ensure that you stay nowhere near those seats…. Please… for your good…

So friends...For those who have not been lucky enough to experience it...in case you land up with seats in the above mentioned range don’t bother losing 40-50 bucks and cancelling the ticket.. and booking another one.. Or get a 3rd AC ticket if travel is not so frequent…

Didn’t sleep the whole night… And came back home only to find that my street had Vinayaka procession related celebration…Fully lit with colour bulbs..and with jarring loudspeakers..! Screaming "We will rock you"! Uhuuhuh !?!?!?!?!
ROTFL….

Sans the stink, putting up with loudspeakers,… I had a good sleep for 3 hrs and reached office late…

Women Hurricanes..,

First it was Katrina…
Now it is Rita….
Was wondering as to why the names of hurricanes should be the names of women always….




Asked my friend-
Me: This is not fair.. Isnt it? Why should hurricanes of all things named only after women…
He: May be people have found similarities…Like the how destructive they are…

Me:How the hell are women destructive?
He: Hurricanes are destructive when it comes to land and property… Women generally are destructive to their partner's wallet…. ;)
Didn’t want to give him one of my feminist talks before getting some info on the topic...

Did some googling on it… And found a whole lot of facts about "Naming a Hurricane".. Strange..
It says that "short, distinctive" names are used for easier and quicker communication when compared to the cumbersome "lattitude-longitude" identification methods…
But you could also call it "Adam" or "Fred" or "Charles" right?
Comeon… What are the feminist organizations doing.. I thought? ;)

Then read, that the hurricane list throughout the 19th century and till 1979 had only womens' names… Then due to some protests.. They started using names of men and women alternately… :D
So we have "Boris", "Douglas" and "Simon" too… ;)

And since they ran out of names, they allocate 24 names per year and end up re-using the same name every 12 years..
Like humans, hurricanes also retire… A hurricane name retires and not to be used again if it has caused too much of havoc and the country affected requests the retirement of the name to facilitate historical references and insurance claim activities…

But only the "Women Hurricanes" make it to the news all the time…Reason being???
Are they more sensational? ;)
I know I am going to get interesting brickbats from all the "Men Hurricanes" out there who generally post their comments here… ;)
Well… pheel phree….

Killing Expedition....

My friend who is known to be affected by this 'excessive-indulgence-in-cleanliness' syndrome one day saw two tiny cockroaches running out of one of the cupboards, in our two bedroom house.. She gets frenzy and comes and complains..


She:"You know what??? I saw SO MANY cockroaches in the house… they were running here and there… everywhere…. I saw them come out of the cupboard too…Its high time we do something About this yaar.. "
And I go "Ah! There goes Anshul again.. :)"



Me: "I don’t think there are SO MANY cockroaches Anshul… I have not seen any of them.. Probably one.. That too a small one.."
She: "No yaar.. There are lots...There may be SO MANY more, you know… What will happen if there are SO MANY GENERATIONS of them??"
Me(thinking..): … They will establish their kingdom here and encroach our place….and throw us out…. :D

Me: "Ok…If there are many, as you think, then the next time we go to food world, we'll pick up a bottle of 'HIT' okie??"
She: "Okie…."
Then we get a BIG Mortein Spray which will kill cockroaches, spiders and all kinds of nauseating insects… ;)

Its saturday morning….
Both of us are ready for the mission….
She: "We'll take everything out of all the cupboards.. Keep it inside our rooms… And then spray… 'coz you may never know...those creatures might be hiding in the crevices…"
Me: "You mean take EVERYTHING OUT OF EVERY CUPBOARD??"
She: "Yeah..!"
Me: "Hmmm… ogay.. " ((thinking..) we might have to set the WHOLE damn house right after that…! )

We remove all the cupboard contents…Put them in our respective rooms…
She: "Shall we seal the space beween the door and the floor with papers so that the ENTIRE cockroach khandan will not come running into the rooms??"
Me(thinking...) .. Wait and watch whether we run or they run… :D
Deciding that the idea was too too much of precaution, we drop it…. ;)

Me: "I didn’t even see a single one when we emptied the cupboard..!"
She: "I know.. They are hiding.. They are running inside the gaps which may be there... "
Me: "Hmm.. Ok.."

We tie our scarves as masks and continue alternately spraying Mortein in the cupboards…She sprayed real EXCESSIVE quatity of Mortein in evey square cm of the cupboard, that at one point of time, I thought that the wooden cupboard and shelves by themselves would scream, detatch themselves and run out of the house!! :D

We finally happened to spot one small cockroach, and she went behind that poor thing spraying with HIGH PRESSURE and didn’t leave it till it died!!!

Me: "Hey, I guess we need to spray and leave it.. The cockroaches will automatically come out and die on their own… Its not like we have to go around as if we a re shooting them down with guns..."
She: "Is it?? Ok.. But when will they die..."
Me: "They will.. Eventually… Wait and watch.."

Unable to bear the stink of the house because of the spray, we were tieing our masks tighter and tighter….And after she finished almost the ENTIRE BOTTLE of Mortein… We decide to go out of the house for sometime, till it works…We got out and went to the terrace…

Me: (laughing) "You know what.. Even for a proper household with a lot of area, one bottle lasts for almost 2-3 months… and we managed to empty the whole thing in our chota house in one hour!! "
She: "Oh..ok.."

Me: " We shall SUE Mortein if we find anything less than 30 cockroaches… okies?? :) "
(**there better be lots, atleast for your good...** ;) the ENTIRE cupboard has to be set again!! Aaarrrrggghhh ")

She: "See.. We saw 2 small ones right..? There should have been 2 BIG ones which have produced these.. So we'll try to kill them also... :D"
Me: "Aaarrrrrrrrrrrrggggggggghhhhhhh" :)
She: "Ok… ok.. ;) "

We come down after half an hour and enter the house… We see JUST FIVE very small dead ones…!!!!!!!!!!!! Looked at her, giving a 'where-are-the generations' ?? 'wheres-the-kingdom' ?? Kind of looks… :D She became kind of guilty… Then..

Me: "Ok.. Now that there are not many, If we see one hereafter, we'll kill it with the broom..instead of emptying cupboards..Ok? :)"
She: "Okies :)"

Thus ended our expedition… And we had to light agarbathis everywhere in the house to take the stink away… :D

My buddy provides good blog material.. Doesn’t she... ;)

Happy Birthday Sush….

My sis celebrates her Birthday today… :) This post is dedicated to her...

I consider her as almost a kid sister as shes almost 6 years younger than me… and hence am always very protective about her, hence telling her whats good and whats not.. what to do and what not to do.. (whether she listens to me is a different story.. ;))

Before everything, let me tell you, I was the one who named her… :D **sounding victorious **

If you see us from a distance, conversing with each other, then it SURELY it means we are fighting… She is the only person who can irritate me in the whole world and make me shout and get angry… :D

We two are two of totally different kinds.. We are poles apart..

I am this studious kind who would go to any extent to work hard and perform... Shes this total bindaas kind who has to be lectured and grounded by parents, to study….



I dread to even enter the sports ground.. Shes an amazing athlete and wins the championship in almost every sport she participates in….

I am this one who likes to snuggle in bed with a book, in a quiet peaceful atmosphere…. Shes the one who loves to hear jarring music in unimaginably loud volume…

I am the one who is the height of obedience and never say anything other than "Yes, I will" to my parents… And shes the one who says -"Why the hell should I??" in the same situation…

I am the one who'll constantly look at the speedometer and conciously slow down if I happen to cross 30kmph.... Shes the one who can never go below 50kmph…

Sometimes I used to think that life would have been a bit more fun, if I could break the rules like her..

Shes is the fan of so many people, those whom I cant stand! Example.. Simbu… She and her friends were even seen with half a 'blade' tied as a pendant to their chain…! He is supposed to have set a 'trend' they say…Simply incorrigible…! :p

All the fights we've had for the remote when she will never budge from her POGO or nickelodeon.. I am this patient kind and she has a real bad temper! (like my dad sometimes..) How many times, I've pulled her leg saying -"Sush, I have ALL the good genes from dad and mom and you have ALL the bad ones.. ;) "

She'll wantedly do everything to irritate me, and say -"You know, I love to irritate you.. :D" She'll drive me to the border of insanity, the poor otherwise silent me…

For the last few months, since I have become an 'earning sis' , she considers me nothing less than a world bank to fund her.. :) I keep hearing "So you have your card with you right? :D" statement way too often... Though I want to buy much more stuff for her than what i've done till now...

When I was a kid, before sush was born, There was a boy by the name Arun, as my neighbour, who was my age.. He was such a pain and used to fight with me big time.. So I still remember that day when I stood in the pooja place and sincerely prayed to god that if I have a sibling, I want a sister and not an unruly brother… But always tell her that i should have asked for a vampire instead.. ;) or I should have declared all the conditions leaving no loopholes for God… ;)

Every part of it, even when we were fighting, has been real good fun.. Dont know what I would have done without her company.... shes amazingly sweet in a LOT of ways… :)

She doesn’t 'love' chocolates, chocolates which she gets during any of her friend's birthday, she'll directly bring it home to me, coz she knows I love them :)

When teachers in school used to the start the 'sibling comparison' saying that "Your sister was that good, and how come you have this totally non-serious attitude?" She used to come back home and tell that to me very proudly.. "You know, in front of the whole class, my teacher said that my sister was really good.." :) I used to smile back and say-"Sush, good that you feel this way, but the bottom line is you need to work harder… ok?"

Shall always remember every minute spent with sush, whether during war or peace… Not able to believe that she has entered the first year of engineering… Shes still a kid sister to me.. Though I have never told her openly as to how much I care for her and love her, I know that I always do.. And today, on her birthday, i wish she gets the best of everything year after year...

Sent her a gift , to reach her today… waiting for her response… :)

Adventures of the missing phone....

Scene 1:
One fine morning, a group of us go to one of the usual 'Sagar's in Bangalore to have breakfast…
I get a call, and after attending it, place my cellphone on the table, next to my plate…Then I am engrossed in thinking about my plans for the evening..We all leave together for office, and I leave my cell phone behind…

After 15 minutes, realization dawns that my phone is missing… I ask my friend to call my number from his mobile.. Some person picks up the phone and starts talking in kannada.. We don’t understand what he says…We give it to our driver, and he speaks to him… He finds out that the person is a milkman and he happened to get hold of the phone lying in the hotel, and he took it with him, so that he didn’t want anyone to steal it… He said he was standing near Wipro e-city gate.. And can be identified with a milk can in his cycle.. Highly relieved, we rushed to the spot, and there he was, the phone saving 'paalkaaran'.. :) Thanked him again and again profusely for his help…

My phone was given a second life….

Scene 2: ( 6 months later)
Boarded an auto.. Made him stop at the Citibank and the ICICI ATMs for few minutes… heavy traffic on the road.. Inspite of all this, the autowallah, quite an old man, never cribbed.. Everyminute of the journey, I was waiting for it to happen.. "Now hez gonna start cribbing :( now… now…" But it never happened… I was feeling guilty as to why he did not crib.. Had a peaceful trip to office.. So while getting down, I gave him five rupees more, as I felt like…

Reached office.. And after half hour, my friend calls at my desk phone…
He: "Wheres your phone?"
Me: "In my bag!"(I open my bag and search hurriedly...)
"Oh no! not there!"
He: "Yeah.. Knew that.. Some guy picked up the phone and started talking something in kannada…Hey, ask one of your colleagues, who know kannada to speak to him and find out what hez saying…"
Me: "Ohk.."

My colleague speaks to him.. The guy happens to be the owner of a beeda shop.. He says that the auto driver, who belongs to the auto stand near his shop gave it to him as he did not know how to operate, and inform the person who calls the mobile first…He gave the address of the shop…
We rush to the place…

Shop guy: "The auto driver asked me to keep this safe and as he wanted only the rightful owner to take it, He said that the phone had to be handed over only after he has seen the person.."
We were moved by the extent to which he ensured safety…
Shop Guy: "He has gone for a trip now… Will be back during lunch time.. I will call you and tell you then.. As it is not right on my part to hand it over, sir.."

So we left my colleagues number with him and left.. We get a call around noon, saying that he has come… We went there…The auto driver smiled giving a 'here-is-the-rightful-owner' kind of look... Showered thanks to the autowallah and the shop guy...
We also handed over a fifty rupee note as a small gratitude for his help...

Came back only to hear from other colleagues that they have hardly heard such a case of getting the phone back after it was misplaced…!

Hmmm... Nice people in this world still exist…. :) Feels good…
Got lucky twice…. Don’t want to have a third adventure and hence will be extra careful….

Yipppeee! TV at home....

Finally, a goodbye to boredom! Have been waiting for this day for quite a long time..
How many days can you go freak out with friends, after a tired day, squandering your money? How many days can you spend without listening to the news on NDTV? How many days can you spend without seeing Agassi or Schumi on TV? How long can you keep missing all our India matches and Formula1.... And how can you stay without making a mockery of the atrociously hosted shows with their themes on TV... The wait is over! Got an LG Flatron Golden eye at home yesterday... ! :)
The process of checking out various models and deciding, that by itself will provide content for one full post But coming back to my TV...



I simply love it! Amazing clarity..Go it delivered yesterday, hoping to see the agassi match.. But it turned out to be a total fiasco as I ended up watching our very own Doordashan! No prizes for guessing.. the cable connection which was there was not activated and the cablewalla is supposed to come today....
Well.. till yesterday, never ever had the patience to even stop by Doordarshan for more than a span of 30 seconds... But new TV... :( Nothing else to watch.. :( So ensured and convinced myself that the programmes WILL be interesting... Comeon..things gotta be interesting..Doordarshan could have improved itself..

Settled in front of the TV.. with my cushions, packets of haldirams and maaza.. to get a 'Gold Class' PVR cinema hall effect... :D
The first one was a tele film.. Expected atleast SOMETHING which will keep me entertained... Sat through the one full hour tele film with a lot of patience.. It was nothing short of ABSOLUTE TORTURE! Not even a SINGLE SOUL in it, could act! Especially the lady who played the main role.. Even if someone went and told her in real life that her husband was in real danger, they cant bring out ONE BIT of emotion from her !!! Then imagine how she would have fared in all the scenes in reel life!
She was suppposed to be a dancer in this, but she would weigh something more than a hundred kilograms easily.. Why the hell do they not pick people for the roles which suit them,i thought... And during all her 'supposed to be' dance programs, they cleverly focussed on just the feet of the dancer.. Obviously, they cannot make her dance..! ATROCIOUS acting.. And am sure that they would have flicked some classical dance clip from some National Integration programme of theirs... :D <>

And her father in law in the film, who was supposed to be a musician, acted as if he was playing he chords in the harmonium.. That was even more atrocious, as during a real slow tune being played in the backround, he hits the chords with whole lot of pace and vigour!
And they even kept focussing this unpardonable thing for almost 5 whole minutes, He was supposed to be really disturbed and was focussing on his music to get back to normal state... But God knows how many people got a stroke on seeing this nonsense...
Finally sailed through successfully and there came the names of the people in the crew.. And 'that' lady, turned out to be the director of the telefilm! NO WONDER! ;)

The channel has not changed a bit, leave alone a byte... Before i even settled down to watch the next programme which was titled 'Cinema Dil Se' which had a three people on a talk show, the anchor, a social activist and a psychatrist discussing about how alcohol is portrayed in Indian Cinema and its evil effects... It defied the borders of boredom i should say...

And finally i told myself.."Well.. you better not mind the trouble of getting your cushions back to your room...Guess thats a better option than watching ultimate crap just because you have bought a new TV... The wait is only till tomorrow evening.." :) Saying thus, I hit the bed...
Well.. now.. jus a few more hours to go... :D

The '7' tag

Well i have been tagged by Jaggu
And here are my answers

7 things I want to do before I die

Create wealth
Write a book
Become a journalist for NDTV
Go on a French cruise
Visit Hawaiian islands and stand amidst the volcanoes
Sing for an entire day to a person who loves to hear me!
Be a tourist guide to the people from the west, touring India, and tell them the greatness of this country and make them realize their non existent culture! (Feel very strongly about this one... :) )


7 things I can do

Get up early everyday (Well.. I cud try)
Start full fledged cooking
Call my friend and bug the person to the core! ( tempted..)
Try to be less sensitive… (I said 'try' ;) )
Go out and get completely drenched in the rain…( and ofcourse catch cold and fever.. :D)
Spend till my bank balance is Zilch
Shut down my comp now, and munch potato wedges at McDonalds


7 things I cant do

Go on a roller coaster
Eat non veg food
Have a pet (lotsa animal phobia.. :( )
Back bite
Not being scared of crows :D
Take failure easily…
Stay without talking to my mom everyday


7 things that attract you to the opposite sex!!

Trustworthy character
Being Mr Nice
Very good sense of humor and wit
Intelligence
Interesting conversationalist
A bit of chauvanism and attitude
Being very very caring and dependable!

7 things you say the most

Amazing!!
Too much!!!!!
Poda.....
Well....
Chance e illa ! :D
Thaanga mudila......
Aaaarrrrrgggghhh !!
Yean… Yean.. Why…. ?!?!?!?!?!?! ;)


7 celebrity crushes

Shahid Afridi
Prannoy Roy
Schumi
Pierce Brosnan
Zaheer Khan
Derek O Brien
Siddharth Basu

Well.. thats me! :)

Time to take tests!!

Happened to come across this particular website which offers 'accessories' for blogs…
Real funny experience I should say.. In case you find it funny, you could even add some of
these scripts in your blog… but me giving disclaimer for introducing this to you.. ;)

These 1 minute quizzes are stricly for timepass.. I saw the list of quizzes and first decided to
go for the 'What does the letters in your name indicate' test….


Entered my name 'Sudha' this is what it gave...
Sappy Unique Delicate Hardworking Artistic

Basically a set of adjectives which were selected at random and displayed…
When I kept refreshing it with the same name.. It even threw words like Slippery for the 'S'
and Deadly for the 'D'… ;)
Since I am really attached to my name 'Sudha Narayanan' and being parama vetti, I tried
it out with that too… The program ran short of adjectives starting wid 'A' and it displayed
'Amazing' 'Amazing' for most of the A's in my name.. :D
Made me grin at the monitor and decided to take more such silly tests…

The next one which looked interesting was the 'Who were you in your past life' test…
You enter your profession and you get to know some random stuff.. This is what I got..

You were: A ditzy cannibal :-O
Where you lived: Quebec
How you died: Consumption ( Did I consume someone and die or did it get eaten up by fellow cannibals??!?!!?!?!?! )
Strange!!

There was one test by name 'Who is your daddy'.. ;) Total wierdo!!!
Enter your dad's name: …. I enter….
Your Daddy is Arnold Schwarzenegger!!!!
You call him : Papi
You love him because: His your muck dad!
And I go.. What the HELL!!!!!!!!!!!

Unable to control my laughter at the craziness of things happening… I go on…

Then comes the 'Wacky Fortune cookie generator'
Only one question asked "Are you feeling lucky Y/N"
I say yes… and the fortune generated is "Man who jump off cliff, jump to conclusion"
Hmm… feeling very lucky and motivated… thank you!..

For my name, the result of the "French name generator" was Cyprien Fleury
and the "Hawaiian name generator" which sounded more interesting, produced
Kalika Lokelani
Wow!!! :D

Other crazy tests include
"Whats your seduction style"
"Outrageous name generator"
"What rejected crayon are you"
"Were you naughty or nice this year"

And if you still remain sane after taking these tests and find them impressive, you could go ahead and add them in your blogs.. Have seen a few blogs with the "Seduction Style" link though… ;)

Cookery shows...

Please! I HAVE to write about this.. Dont stop me..
The smalll amount of television i see is when i am at home in chennai... Most of the stuff nowadays in TV makes me look at it from a hilarious angle, as i dont understand as to how artifical things can get....

Well, talking about cookery shows... One day, I was flipping channels, not able to stay in one for more than a minute, when my mom wanted to watch a particular cookery show...
These shows are pretty funny...

This is the place where you will get to see 'hand care' at its best!! ... be it well manicured, highly nail-polished hands or a whole bunch of designer hand ornaments.. its all there for the viewers... They know that their hands are going to be 'the focus of attention' throughout the show ......but i still wonder as to who would like to knead a sticky dough with 4 finger rings and 2 coats of nail polish on.... ;)

In these shows, you can clearly observe that the statement "Idhu panradhukku romba easy and odambukku nalladhu kooda..." ( Its easy to make and very healthy too...) will be repeated atleast a hundred times in the course of the show...
Even if they fry it in deep oil or add a liberal layer of cheese on top of what they are making, they will still pinpoint the 20mg of DAL which happens to be present in the content, and say that it has a LOT of protein it... or the stem of the vegetable which they have added will provide an lifelong supply of Vitamins .. or the milk which they have mixed will keep your bones strong even after you die...!!! :D well.. exaggerating...

One more thing which has to seriously BANNED from being said on these shows is "Kozhandhainga school lendhu vandha virumbi saaptuduvaanga... avangalukku romba pidikkum" ( When children return from school, they will really like to eat this stuff) For GOD's sake... its not only children who have to eat, in this world... even grown ups DO EAT..!!
They keep repeating that children will love it, and mention that they are adding every ingredient keeping in mind what children like...
And i really wonder if these people make this for their children when the kids get back home...

Last but definetely not the least, the 'garnishing/decoration' which they do, after they finishing cooking... Half a kilogram of whatever they make will be accompanied by another half a kilo or corriander, cashew, sliced cucumber,carrot,tomato and all such stuff on top of it... and at the end of it, you see a colourful end product, when it is focussed, and by the end of it, you end up forgetting what she had actually cooked... as it will be hidden, under the covers..err.. colours... And i bet all those 'extra' stuff will be treated as untochables after the show...

Theres one incorrigible show on one of our channels, wherein a team from the company which has sponsored the show comes on air, and they are served all the stuff which has been prepared and they taste it then and there.. The cameraman simply refuses to take them out of focus till they FINISH whatever is there in their plate/cup... !!
THE LIMIT I TELL YOU!! :)
Even as i am typing this i am ROTFL.... and hoping that situations would change, but still wonder as to how people put up with such consistent crap! :)

Well.. feel free to comment...i hope you will empathize.. :)

A tribute to Mukesh…

The days when I would go to sleep hearing old hindi numbers humming in low volume on Radio(on "Aap ki Farmaish") with the dim night lamp on, is still vivid in my mind. Thanks to my dad, I got to hear so much of it.



This time when I went home, my dad and me happened to see this particular programme on Doordarshan, about Mukesh, on his death anniversary.. Though I am a die-hard fan of Mohammed Rafi, nothing can stop me from penning down the songs of this legend, which has left deep impressions in the hearts of millions of people worldwide… including me...


In the old hindi music industry, which was dominated by Rafi, Kishore and Mukesh in the male voice segment, Mukesh has probably sung the lowest number of songs…(around 1200 songs…comparitively) in a span of 30 years… but the singer has carved a niche for himself very nicely..

Dad was telling me that mukesh is famous for what is called 'straight singing' where there is not many variations(brugas u call them..).. The songs are all plain and simple.. But what makes it so tough is that even a slight deviation from the tune/pitch will be clearly heard and 97 out of 100 people CANT maitain that even for a stanza, leave alone one complete song…

Even a person who has hardly listened to Mukesh, would have surely appreciated some of the following evergreen melodies at some point in their lives…

Chandan sa badan...
Amazingly melodious number… sung with a voice with very very less expressions… but will make you drool over the song, and make you listen to it a million times..By the time he sings 'Ho jaoon agar meinn deewana' I would have already become one…

Kabhi Kabhi mere dil mein…
Starts of with an elegant flute piece, and followed by the simple singing of Mukesh… Singing a romantic song WITHOUT added expressions and getting away with it and the song creating a fan following for him is somehting which is not done often…Seriously!
The song leaves an unimaginable impression… :) One of my all time favourites...

Awara hoon.. & Dil ki nazar se...
I am already running short of adjectives… These two songs beautifully bring out the base voice of the maestro.. Rendered in a highly simple style, He is simply unparallelled in such numbers…

Dil tadap tadap .. & Woh chand khila...
These two duets with Lata Mangeshkar are too cute and out of the world..contains equal parts sung by both… It’s a must listen folks…
Very very sweet to listen to…. :)

Kisi ke muskurahaton pe... & Mera Joota hai japani...
The song with no nonsense lyrics… And a nice foot tapping ,peppy number with nice pace… Gives a real nice feeling at the end of it…

Jis desh mein ganga behti hai..
Nice patriotic number… Have to listen to it to experience the proud feeling which surfaces from within...

The popular Ramaiyya Vastavaiyya... & Dum dum diga diga…
Nice ones which you can never ever get bored of….

Ek pyar ka nagma hai…
Must listen… a romantic duet with lata of the 70s… Very tough for anyone to even compose such a melodious tune...

And lots more…

I am actually listening to these songs as I am typing this…
At the end of it I wonder…. Man! this guy sings very very plain and simple! He projects emotions in such a raw and unpolished manner... How the hell did I fall… Hmmm…

I realize...
Its a magical voice.. which has got a mysterious mellifluous sweetness associated with it..
Cant think of ANY other possible explanations… Probably these are what you call 'mystic melodies' ;)

A tribute in my small way... :)


Ps: Even if you cant listen to all of them, I request you to listen to atleast the first two in the list from one of the online music sites… Really worth the time spent, and you will end up appreciating simplicity which is in its best form...

They take you places...dont they!

As I was reading the blog of one of my friend(Sudheer), who had written about the "Economics of transaction with an autowala…" There are a lot of thought provoking issues which one comes up with, when they realize the common patterns in most autowalas in the country.. Be it madras or bangalore…or wherever…



1. He decides the destination…
Not difficult to see such kind of auto drivers…
We: Nungambakkam?
Autodriver: I am going to Tnagar…
( as if we asked him his plans for the day..!!!! )

2. They demand both the to and fro fare, for you to travel one way….
We: (at Koramangala...) Electronics city….?
AutoDriver: Electronics city… very far away madam… I have to return back home all the way madam… double meter….
( We argue and finally settle for 1.5 times the meter rate, as we also feel that it is in the outskirts.. )

Some other day..
We: ( at Electronics city…) Koramangala…
AutoDriver: 1.5 rate madam…
We: Why the hell? You are going to the main city area only right…?
AutoDriver: No madam, we are this area autodrivers… Have to come back all the way…
( Too much!!!!!!!!)

3. Even a small news item in the newspaper about a 'possible' oil price rise in Saudi, could result
in he demanding atleast 5 bucks more per kilometer, and even if you try to argue a little, your
day will be made miserable with his groanings and complaints…

4. In bangalore, the auto meters are set to run at 1.5 rate before 7:30 am and after 9:00 pm… If you happen to get into the auto at 8:45 pm for a half hour ride, then the driver will demand that you pay 1.5 times the rate as by the time you reach the destination, the time would cross 9 o clock!!
After so much of argument, you get into the auto, and after 2 minutes, you wonder as to whether the autowala had put the meter after you got in.. Or it was already running… anyways for the first few minutes you will see that it will show a standard "10 rupees" only… so one cant differentiate… Mental tension all the way...

5. Travelling that last mile…
Not actually a mile :), but the last 100-200m ...
The worst part of the journey, I would say… Obviously we don’t tell the autowalas everything from the door number of our house, to take us there… Suppose we say "17th main" and your house happens to be in the middle or end of 17th main, you are done!! From the time he sees the board reading '17th main' till he takes you to your house, he will ensure that he drives at a mere 2 kmph and keeps cribbing that you are exploiting him and making him cover more distance than what he had expected… You have to console him everytime, and say that we are almost there.. we are almost there....

Pheww!! All this for you paying your hard earned money…. But whatever... they've become our lifeline.. :)

Do you need reasons to send e-cards?

When I logged on to this 123india.com site, to send a card to my friend, I had the most hilarious experience of scannning through
the "events" calendar which had almost everyday of the year, with a special(crappy) event attached to it..


To be noted that they have cards for each and every occasioon they have mentioned in the calendar…
I was literally ROFTL when I read them…

A selected few abmormal events, from the entire list...

jan 17th - ditch your new year resolution day (wow! Even before jan ends??)
jan 24th - beer can appreciation day
jan 29 - bugglegum sculpture day (heights of creativity!!)


feb 4th - homemade soup day
feb 11th - grandmother achievement day
feb 19th - temporary insanity day (too much….)
feb 27th - polar bear day


march 1st - pig day
march 3rd - i want you to be happy day (Oh no...)
march 12th - departmental store day


april 3rd - chocolate mousse day
april 4th - "tell a lie" day (right royally?? )
april 5th - bell bottom day
april 15th - rubber eraser day
april 17th - nosy neighbour appreciation day (I like this one a lot.. Don’t now why.. ;) )

may 13th - frog jumping day
may 15th - flip your mattress day

june 15th - a friend in need is a friend indeed day
june 15th - sneak a kiss day
june 29th - remote control day

july 14th - cow appreciation day
july 31st - jump for jelly beans day


august 7th- lighthouse day
august 11th - grab some nuts day
august 19th - soft icecream day
august 25th - kiss and make up day
august 26th - toilet paper day
(Aaaaaarrrrggggghhhhhhhhh…. The limit!!! )

Apart from these, you have other days like
Get it over day
Turn up the heat day
Step in a puddle and splash your friend day
Eat something raw day
Penguin awareness day
Rubber band veteran day


k people... Tomorrow (August 23rd ) is "hug your sweetheart" day... so enjoy..
but please dont fail to visit this site incase of any clarification for celebration...

Speaking of insurance…..

There was this presentation on Medical Insurance at office by some guy from a top insurance company with which our insurances have been taken…
The guy was was really good at what he wanted to say.. and this is what happened...

Insurance guy(Agent): We are from blah blah insurance commpany.. We are glad that we got an opportunity to present in front of you people.. Blah blah….

Agent: We cover illness, accident and maternity stuff…. And by accident, I mean anything and everything which is mentioned under the oxford dictionary as the meaning of accident… (Wow!!) For eg. Even if you slip and fall in the bathroom, it is an accident…
** Wow.. If u jus slip and fall and produce some fake bills, they cover you ? **


Agent: But remember these ground rules.. We cover you only under 2 conditions Number1: You should necessarily be hospitalized for 24 hours .... Number 2: The doctor should diagonize some illness/disease or major complication….
**Ooooh .. Ok ok.. **

Agent: And see.. You cant fool us… If you walk into any hospital and tell them you want to do some tests and hence and you want to get admitted, they will be too glad to admit you, as all they want is money.. You get admitted… and they make all tests and your bill comes to around 15,000 bucks.. And then the doc looks at the report and says that you are completely fit and fine…. Then in that fit and fine condition, you need to bear the entire bill.. We wont pay it for you…
**Huh… all plans spoiled! **

Agent: The eligibility for the employees of this company is Airconditioned/Non airconditioned room…. There are two hospitals in the city which have special suites which is almost half the size of this hall… In case you want to take that up, then we pay part of the cost and you bear the remaining…
**One guy is very interested about this suite thingie… so he asks..**
"How much percent will you bear.." and a lot other questions related to it…

Agent: Sir, you generally don’t go to a hospital for vacation… You want to get out of that place as quickly as possible, so generally the suite doesn’t make a difference.. (everyone laughs) Anyways, we bear 80% of the charges…
But the ground rules are.. should be hospitalized for 24 hrs… and diagonized for illness/disease...blah blah…
**we know we know…**

Agent: One more thing… you are free to drink and drive, but we wont cover u if you meet an accident in the process…. (giggles..) or atleast get a report from the doc saying that there was no alcohol in the blood… :)

**the ppt now displays a long list**
Agent: these are the conditions we cover… ( goes on reading every type of diesase/illness ) **ugghh..**
But again , the ground rules…
**aaarrgh...ok…ok… these rules are kinda becoming our anthem...**

Agent: And these are the things we don’t cover…
**another list comes up… felt sick**

Agent: Incase of accidents, for loss of limbs, we have different rates… If you lose a hand, you get back the insurance amount, ...Even in case of a finger, different lengths of finger amputated will have different amounts… the doc has to say that -"the person is amputated to x%" and accordingly we will reimburse…
**Please continue the cannibal talk! Feels great when I listen to cutting limbs...** ugh..

After the presesntation got over, we were walking back, when my HR smiles and asks me -"How was the presesntation?"
Me: "Uggh… kinda feeling sick already… will they reimburse me something for a sick feeling?.. Oh no… How can I forget the ground rules.. !"
;)

About school days....

Well.. Decided to blog about my school memories.. Certain interesting ones here and there right from the age of 3, which have left unerasable trails in my memory… Most incidents pretty funny, but nostalgic…
Year-wise if I start narrating all that I remember about me at school…

Lower Kinder Garden …
We had these small cute colourful chairs and tables of various shapes.. The whole class was filled and decorated with fun stuff! How I wish it stayed that way till the end of our schooldays…

In this particular class, I was known for not keeping my bag on the floor.. Till date, I don’t like to do it… I was told that inspite of my teacher asking me to keep it down, everyday, I never did it, and always had it on my lap… :D
When my grandma used to come and pick me up after school, Ms Yasmine(my teacher) used to tell her -"She safeguards her bag as if she's got lots of gold inside! "
This was LKG…

In UKG, I remember this incident when, half way through the year, our teacher didn’t turn up to school for almost a weeks' time… In school assembly, they announced that Ms Bella, my teacher, was to undergo an operation…
I got so disturbed on hearing that, that immediately after I reached home, I went and sat in the corner of the room with God's photo in front of me, and cried so much and prayed really hard that god should save Ms Bella and she should be back in school..
My grandma kept asking me as to why I was crying but I didn’t tell her a thing... Infact she was a terror as she was known for beating children, with a wooden scale on their knuckles, if they talk in class… She came back in two weeks time…
Was so glad to see her...

Class 1, we had an interesting dance for our School annual day, called the 'Angel Dance'.. I was one of the 10 tiny ones selected for it.. We had a full and flowing dress, in different colours, and they gave us netted wings too… The wings were pretty heavy for me to carry, and it was bigger than me, at that time… Even when I look at that photo of mine, now, I cant stop smiling as to how sweet/comical it was…
I used to fall sick very often, and my teacher Ms Regina Louis name me 'Delicate Darling' at that time… the name failed to leave me till the time I left school…
My absence record in my diary used to overflow with "Cold and Fever" and nothing else…

Class 2, we had Ms Girija, who taught us hindi also… She used to write the letters of the hindi alphabet in such a big font size on the board that I used to be scared of sitting in the first row and even look at them…. But she knew how to manage an unruly bunch of kids…
This was the year when I developed my 'crow phobia' … One day, when I was with my friends during lunch time, a crow flew towards me and took away my lunch… I was terrified by that incident, that TILL DATE, I am extremely scared of crows!!!!!!!! :(

Class 3 and 4, there was Ms Tereza Fernandez, who was an angel in disguise… They way she carried herself, the patience with which she taught us, and her polite and affectionate nature etc etc was more than enough to make her our favourite teacher…
She gave me the "Best Behaviour" award for that academic year… :D I don’t call her an angel, because of that.. ;) Jus tha only one angel can identify another… :p

Class 5 was Ms Joyce, who was not my favourite… She was the kind who was partial and totally biased towards a particular community…
One incident which affected me a lot - We generally sit in the order of our grades/rank , in our class , while receiving the report card from our principal… I used to be in the top 5, and once after the half yearly exam results were announced, and we were waiting for the princi, she pointed to one particular girl sitting in the row at the back, and told her, "You could have performed better than her! Try to do it the next time" It really hurt…but I resolved to do better... And when I finished school and after class 10 and 12, bagged awards, and I went to her and showed them all, as we generally do it to all the teachers who have taught us… She
was in all praises, and said that she was proud that I was her student.. I was happy to hear that from my teacher… :)

Class 6, was fun, as we had a new class teacher every week… Every teacher left after a weeks' time.. Don’t know why, but it we had different versions of geography and biology everytime,,, ;)

We were this unfortunate lot who had their classrooms immediately adjacent the Teachers' staff room…. Thus even a small amount of noise (read: having fun) is enough to bring a teacher to our class… we were branded as the "Unruly class"

The first half of school life was lot of fun… It was the age of crayons and sketch pens…Age when you sit with dad and help him cover all your new notebooks and books with laminated sheets and write names on labels… enjoy the smell of fresh paper from notebooks.. gape at the pictures in the new text books..

Age when we used to go gaga over pencil boxes with pianos and buttons (press buttons to open every segment of the box, which contains erasers, sharpeners etc)…
It was the age of School bags with Clocks and squeezy water bottles…
Age when you graduate from pencils to pens…

Hmmm… Memorable days.. Weren't they?? :)

From mehndi to body painting….

The 'Annual/Family day' of my company was held at Club Cabana, a chill away place in the outskirts of Bangalore! The whole day was filled with fun and frolic, and I got to try some out of the ordinary stuff…

Mehndi…
Mehndi (or Marudhaani, it is called in tamil) is one of my all time favourites.. My perima(aunt) has a huge marudhaani plant in their house, and she makes sure that she picks fresh leaves from there, grinds it and gives it to me whenever I go to their place..

The sheer joy of seeing that bright maroon thing on your hand is simply unexplainable..


The south indian way of applying mehndi is not like what is done up north.. We have no designs as such.. Theres a big circle, surrounded by smaller ones, and caps(we call it..) at the end of the fingers… Even such a simple design, in its bright colour is an amazing contrast to the hand….

Pattu paavaadai (silk skirts..the kaancheepuram one..) and marudhaani, used to be the rage! And how we to retain it for longer hours than the other person, so that it becomes darker…

Back in college, I won a mehndi competition too… not for applying.. :D The girl who made the design on my hand won a prize too.. But I got it for 'The best hand suited for mehndi' hee hee.. Seriously!! Believe it or not! :)

At Club Cabana, there were professionals.. And I got this arabic design done.. Cute isnt it…





Body Painting...
First experience in this area was when my face was painted by Nithya, at the IIMB culturals.. She did an amazing job and had a superb theme too… Now don’t ask me whether I won 'the best face to be painted' award… The best, we felt was the 'chinki' face, its perfectly flat, and has lot of area on which u can paint without any hassle.. :)

At club cabana, there were funky things being painted on peoples' cheeks and hands.. Grown ups had everything from skulls to scorpions and flowers.. All the kids wanted either a pokemon, spiderman or power puff girls… Almost the entire crowd had something or the other…

And I decided to get my Zodiac painted..
I am too attached to this 'piscean' thing that I asked him to paint two fishes in the opposite direction.. He did it so well, that I couldn’t stop admiring it… Here it is…

I wish the pic showed all the perfect and intricate painting strokes which he made in this particular piece of art… It was really nice that he matched the colours of the fishes with those in my t-shirt.. In short, it was nothing short of being Cute and cool… :)

Didn’t have the heart to wash the paint off… The next day, took care to see that it doesn’t get affected during bath, but inspite of being very careful, a bit of it got scraped off... And hence I took the entire thing off… :(

Waiting to get a tattoo done next time… :D

Early bird gets the worm??

This is one of my favourite calvin strips… :D Had an overdose of Calvin last night, and when I came across this fav one of mine, I resolved to write my next blog about something related to this..



I have become a real sleepy head nowadays… Probably compensating for the lack of sleep in the last 2 years of my post graduation…

The workplace being near the house, is also a major contributing factor for this lazy attitude of mine.. Have seen my friends giving envious glances, as they have to travel for quite a distance, and if they miss their office bus/cab, it takes an Arabian nights 'magic carpet' to take them there, crossing all traffic jams …

Well, this is my rigourous process of waking up... ;)

One thing I religiously do everyday, is to set the alarm at 7 before going to bed.. :D Whether it is of ANY use at all, will be known later in this blog…

Alarm set in the phone, rings….

Me refuse to open my eyes, my hand automatically going to the place where I generally keep it.., make a few attempts to pick it up if it had got displaced from its ideal position… and then with a wicked grin, still with my eyes closed, I think -
"Hee, Hee, I command you to ring everyday at this time.. But do you think I do it becoz I want to get up??.. Not at all !! … sorry.. Its jus to take that guilty feeling off me, and to make myself feel that I atleast 'attempted' to get up… :D, So I shall the put you in the snooze mode, buddy…ring again later.."

The alarm rings for the second time after 10 minutes…

"I know that you are obedient! But pleeeeeeeeeeeease! Let me sleep for some more time….
:( I shall set you to ring at 7:45.. That’s a decent time to get up.. Isnt it?"

Feeling satisified that I wont be disturbed for another half an hour, I doze off again..

Rings after half an hour..
Hmmm.. Now I have no other go! I need to wake up, but still make some brave attempts of convicing myself that I 'could possibly' … err.. Ok ok.. Now I get up…

As soon as I come out of my rug, I get the feeling that the eskimos have conquered my room along with their igloos…!!!!

"Its so damn cold at this hour! How the hell can someone expect me to get up and get ready??? Totally unfair"…

So I snuggle back under my rug..Then I send a 'good morning' message to my friend who is already on the way to office… When I explain this 'unfair' situation, I get a "How-the-hell-do-you-think-I-get-ready?" reply...
Ok.. Ok.. Wrong person to complain to...Then I get mocked as to how lazy I am nowadays… By this time, I am fully awake…

I get ready in around 45 minutes…Only to find my roommate STILL fast asleep, coz she has to leave only at 10:30 for office… So I wake her up.. In a sleepy tone, she says- "Itni jaldi taiyaar ho gayi tu?" Me in a total bragging mood - "Yeah! Of course.. U thought I was like you.?? Never! " ;)

Now, taking advantage of the fact that she doesn’t know a thing about my waking up process, I play this 'active-girl role' and call her names (Aalsi anshul, lazy leo.. Blah blah.. ) Make statements like 'even god cant save u if u are such a lazy goose' … taunt her to the maximum extent possible… ;)
And get totally entertained by the statements which she makes in a 'half asleep' condition! And remember them, add some masala and again pull her leg in the evening about all that she said…

At the end of the day, I am the early bird ! (err.. Atleast in my house….) ;)
and the worm??? Reaching office on time..! "Big Incentive!" huh..
;)

"Of soaps, and all the hype that surrounds…"

"Tulsi is not going to die .. !" screamed the headines on one of the major news websites….
Wow.. What an electrifying news I thought…

Who is this tulsi…

Someone who fought for the rights of tribal population somewhere, went against the law and had been sentenced to death and her supporters are protesting that such a thing shouldn’t be meted out to a noble soul like her?

Or was it someone who has stood up for some noble cause in controlling some epidemic and prevented a catastrophe somewhere in the world, and in the process got infected with some grave disease and is finally cured…


Hmmm…Well… realized that there is no use thinking about such accomplishments in anything related to what our news websites have to say… She is tulsi….




Now u get the picture? Tulsi is a character in KSBKBT … and for those who havent heard this world famous acronym.. It stands for "Kyunkii Saas Bhi Kabhi…. " ok.. Now u know..

The news item, from mumbai, was about this character being diagonised with lung cancer (in one of the episodes), and there was apparently a rumour that she was going to die, and wouldn’t appear hereafter..

The website said- "home viewers were shocked out of their couched stupor" and "viewers went into collective dismay.The major soap minus its protagonist was Inconceivable and unimaginable"

Give me a break! I thought.. Arent there better things to protest about? Why not protest for the poor municipal infrastructure which which came to light due to the heavy rains there? Why not protest against the hard earned tax payers money( 33% of the nations' which comes from mumbai) not being used for the public property and facilities?

Ok.. Even if u don’t want to protest about all this, going into a "collective dismay and anger" n all, for some rumor about a person dying in a soap, is really really tooo much!!!!!!!

More interesting information given in the article, about this character.. Guess, previously, tulsi had been pregnant gone through a lot of crises and lost all her memory and then, she totally revived from all that…
So the actor says that - "when people have seen things like that, accepting this should be a Cakewalk… "
( read: when people have taken extreme amounts of unimaginable crap before, this seems to be lesser crap to me..)

In one more popular soap called "jassi jassi koi nahin" (sumthing like that..) a news item about the special "wedding episode" of Jassi is being aired on someday… the channel has a special designer for the occasion and she says - " the wedding outfit is a pink lehenga choli with an aqua-orange dupatta. It weighs around 5 kgs, comprising exquisite embroidery and
zardozi work, crystals and semi-precious stones." (total extravagance! for nothing at all..)

And moreover there are celebrities like abhijeet sawant, mandira bedi etc 'blessing' the show with their presence…

** not talking**

As I write this, I can visualize my grandma in front of the tv, watching the 5th or 6th soap for the day, but one thing I know for sure that atleast, she is not the one who goes to the extent of protesting, if some girl tripped and fell down the stairs and is in the hospital…

Hmmm...
Wheres all this leading???? **wondering… **

Annoying yet entertaining ...

Scene 1:
Venue: Citibank ATM, Jaynagar
I am about to enter the ATM place to withdraw some cash..
I see a group of men crowding right at the door..
Me wondering whats wrong.. Thought process wanders from every place right from thinking whether the ATM machine has run out of cash , to, whether some burglary/ security breach has happened there…
Later I realize that they are Citibank agents, marketing credit cards..
I try to get past them and gain entry, when I am stopped…

Agent: Ma'am, we are offering a life time free …. (** I go deaf **)
( I am sick and tired of this "life time free" concept that even if someone actually offers me life time free supply of haldirams or toblerone, I might jus not listen...)


Me: I already have a card, thank you..
A: No ma'am, I don’t think you will be having a life time free … ( I am again irritated...)
Me: I do have a LIFE TIME FREE card Sir, which jus happened to arrive to my address through post, when I hadnt even asked for it..
A: Ma'am but you could try this one.. Its got other advantages like.. Blah.. Blah..
Me: No.. Thanks… Can you please leave way…
Hes kind enough to let me enter the ATM…

After cash withdrawal, I come out, thinkin about how my expenses were growing.. And suddenly I am stopped at the door..
The same agent again..!
A: Ma'am, you could try this life time free…. ( Aaaaaarrrrrrgggggggggghhhhhh )
Me: ( really pissed off, and in a literal pleading mode..) I thought you jus asked me when I entered…
A: ( smiling..) Yes ma'am, I jus gave it a try, incase you had changed your mind..
Me: ** didn’t know how to react ** Please… I have enough number of cards, which I hardly use.. I DON’T NEED ONE MORE..
Guess he took pity on me and let me go…
A: Ok ma'am..


Scene 2:
Venue: My cubicle in office…
I am totally engrossed in fixing a bug which was to go in the next product release…
Some change which I made to the original fix I had given was causing some problem, and I was trying to revert the changes and getting it to work, when the phone rings….

I pick up the phone but continue looking at the code…
Me : Yeah ( asm_t_varp->NLMUnload = TRUE; )

Voice : Ma'am, i am calling from Manhattan..
Me : yeah.. ( asm_t_varp->Quit = TRUE; )

Voice: blah... blah…
Me : what did u say.. ( Shit man! All flags set.. Still this damn thing not working.. Now let me look the other function... )

Voice: blah blah….
Me: yeah….

Voice: ok ma'am then can we send our agent to your office, Today or tomorrow ?
Me: For what??!?!?!??!?!?!?!?! ** all of a sudden becoming alert to what was happening.. **

Voice: You jus said you needed a loan ma'am…
Me: What the hell.. What loan…???!?
Guess she started all over again..

Voice: We have selected you for a pre approved loan…
Me: Wow! I was selected?? Great! And what were the parameters you had, to 'select' me? ( you dial all extension numbers in my floor in sequence and tell them that they are selected? )
Voice: No ma'am, your colleagues have recommended you and your salary certificate, length of stay in the company etc ma'am
Me: Hmm.. Interesting criteria… ( I myself am yet to receive my first pay slip thru mail… been here as an employee for jus a month.. !! )

Voice: So ma'am.. There are a lot of advantages of choosing us.. Blah blah…
I interrupt her in between..
Me: You are more irritating than the bug which is buggin me here!!
Voice: Ma'am?
Me: Nothing… I don’t need it …. Pleaaaase…!

Voice: Thank you ma'am.. Shall call you after a few weeks…
Me: For what?????????? I don’t need it.. I'll get back if I do… please don’t call…please…
Voice: ok..

Phew! Marketing people kill you.. Don’t they !!!! :)

A great cook is born....

She never entered the kitchen all her life… She didn’t find the necessity… And moreover her mom didn’t allow her to… She knew nothing about the specific constituents which went into her food… She couldn’t differentiate the different kind of dals, she found she was better off doing C programming... She was the object of ridicule of her friends, when it came to cooking.., and once when asked by them as to whats required to make something as basic as idlies, she replied - "just soaked rice", only to realize that even most of the guys knew that there was soaked dal which went along with it… :p


After she left home for bangalore, again there was no opportunity for her to cook… Amidst the hectic academic schedule, all that needed to be done was make a trip to the cafeteria for lunch and dinner.. But jus like any other amateur cook, she could boast that she could make maggi…

After quite some time, on her friends' birthday, to make the occasion special, she made payasam(kheer)... but there was nothing great about it, as it was a ready to make one… In the process, she didn’t know when the milk would boil overflow, and slightly burnt her fingers in the process..But it was really worth the effort, as it tasted pretty good and her friend loved it! :)

She was this confident female who thought that nothing was very difficult to achieve… So during one of the trips to chennai, she told her mom that she wants to learn to cook… Her mom was kind of shocked to hear that, but at the same time was glad that she had atleast given a thought to cooking..

She wanted to cook on her own.. She thought she will take her mom's guidance whenever necessary.. She gave a "here-i-come" look as she entered the kitchen, knowing that she would master the art.. And if she had even a small part of her mom's genes, she would do a wonderful job…

Her cousin gave her a call.. He said he would come home to see her, as it was real long time since they met up… She invited him for dinner and said that she would be cooking… He said he was reconsidering his plan of coming home, then… ;)

She commenced...opened the cook boook… scanned it to see as to what she would cook… decided on 'peas pulav' …Methodically cut all the vegetables required, occasionally getting instructions from mom as to how to cut, with which knife etc…Then she followed the instruction from the book perfectly, and started making the dish… Her pre-conceived notion of kitchen work being tiresome and sweaty was proved wrong.. She moved around with sophistication and confidence and did things as if she was an expert..

Towards the end of the process, the aroma of the peas pulav made her feel on top of the world.. Her first creation.. She was desperately waiting to taste it… And as it cooled a bit, she made onion raitha to go along with it… Then she tasted her masterpiece.. Wow! It was amazingly tasty ! :) She thought she could give the peas pulav at 'Gramin' a run for its money.. :D Here it is….




(You cud click on the pic to enlarge... :D)

She couldn’t stop talking about how good it was.. Everyone at home, including her cousin tasted it, and said that it was nothing short of amazing and it had exceeded expectations, and the entire thing was finished off in no time… But they still wonder as to how, this person, who has never entered the kitchen, managed such a good job…! She never failed to take a pic of her maiden attempt.. When her friends, who didn’t get an opportunity to taste it, saw the pic, questions like -"Pic looks nice, but who knows who cooked it? " and "Whats the guarantee that it tasted as good as it looks" kind of questions… But at the end of it all…

A great cook is born… All the Mallika badrinaths and Sanjeev Kapoors… watch out… :D


Psst... The 'she' referred to all this while is none other than ME (if you havent realized...)!! :D