Inflation! Autorickshaw guys to add to the misery!

It's true that the economy world over is in doldrums, thanks to the fuel crisis.
To add to this frustration, are the absolutely insolent autorickshaw fellows in chennai.
Since we moved out of our apartment last weekend, I have been staying with my In-laws in t-nagar, which is supposedly the most crowded and congested suburb of the city, as it is infested with shops .So everyday I need to leave home half an hour early for work, as this is the amount of time spent in haggling with the absolutely RUDE auto guys.
They demand almost twice, thrice the normal fare and most of them even refuse to take you to your destination.
These guys ought to learn something from the autorickshaw fellows in Bombay, who never refuse you a ride and charge you exactly to the meter and even return change back, however small and insignificant it might be.( even 25 ps or 50 ps).
Well I guess it is not only the autorickshaw guys who are to be blamed ,but the TN Govt. too.
Chennai is the only metro city in India where auto guys just do'nt put on the meters.(Although they do carry the most fancy and latest electronic meters! what a waste!)

I miss my home

Well, finally, we finished packing off all our stuff, and moved out of our apartment in Chennai on 15th.Packing and moving is truly a pain in the &@*#. But am I glad that part 1 of packing is over.Now a two week respite until we unpack and move into our new apartment in Bangalore.
I miss the house that we were staying in.It was such a nice spacious cosy and well planned house , in a posh and decent area and everyone who visited our house loved it.
It was so convenient and centrally located.
It's true indeed, "HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS"

Kudos to Mommy ( U r the best!)

So when I realized that I had lost my gold ring which was made for my mom during her wedding and she gave it to me for my wedding, I had to immediately convey the news to my mom, who is away in U.S., visiting my bro.
Now any other mother would have felt miserable about loss of gold, and would have chided the daughter for being so careless.But you know wht my mom said" She said it's ok, after all it is just an object, and that she had no attachment towards any materialistic possessions."
All she said was, you will find it... and that if she were me, she would rather spend her time reading a book than waste time searching for the ring!
Can you believe that? and true to my mommy's words ,I found it next day in office!

MOMMY DARLING, U R THE COOLEST , THE BEST!
VIKS N I R TRULY BLESSED TO HAVE YOU AS OUR MOMMY!
WE LOVE U & I MISS U!

A week of highs and lows!

Well this was quite a tedious week , We got the news that there might be some delay in getting our new apt in blr ( which was due on 1st sept).So we were actually thinkin of lookin out for another apt on rent.
This was very stressful especially for my hubby.And in the middle of all this, on wednesday noon in office i realize that my gold finger ring was missing. It was a family heirloom! Searched for it in office and at home that nite.But cld not find it.As if all the tension that we were goin thru was not enough! But then as the saying goes "after dark, there is light."
I did some reiki on wednesday nite , in which I have tremendous faith,(by the way I am certified reiki 2nd degree).
Thursday morning, came in early to work and found my ring below my desk.
Friday morning, we got the news that the apt would also be ready by 1st sept.
So after a tumultous week , am glad that the week has ended on a happy note!
( And my venky will also be here tomm... ca'nt wait to see him!)

Busy bee!

My blogs have seem to become a weekly feature these days.
Well for starters, work has been crazy busy, as I am working on completing my final assignment in my current job.( I am quitting this job by the end of the month, as we are moving to Bangalore.) I intend to finish off this bIT of work by end of the week well before the deadline of the month end.
So once, I am through with that I can disembark on the next task of looking out for a job in Bangalore.
Thankfully, last weekend was relaxed and peaceful during Venky's visit to Chennai.(Managed to get cpl of hours of sleep too during the noon both on saturday and sunday , which I have not done in a long time).
Will have to slowly start packing this week as we are gonna be moving out of our apartment by next weekend.
And am takin off a lil early from work today to go buy some clothes for my birthday! YIPEE!

Weekend blast at Bangalore(Literally!)

So just a couple of hours before I was getting ready to leave from work last Friday to board the Shatabdi to Bangalore,I get the news about the blasts in Bangalore.
Amidst all that, I leave for the station and luckily the train also departs on time!
So I reach Bangalore and the weekend as usual hectic, marked by dinner and booze party at a friends' house on Saturday night and on Sunday a quiet dinner at the Golf club with some other friends!

A day of disasters!

Last evening, I got home from work...and was watching tv eating some snacks.After a little while I went to the the kitchen to drink some milk.I took the milk which was in a vessel and kept it on the gas on high flame to heat it.
Normally, when I heat or boil milk, I stay in the vicinity.
Yesterday, I thot while the milk is heating let me just go and watch tv for a few seconds.
I started surfing channels, finding nothing suitable to watch, I settled down to watching TOM & JERRY.I saw abt 10 mins of it and then I could get some burning smell.I rushed out of the room and I could see the dining area which leads to our kitchen all smoky, and only then it occurred to me that I had conveniently forgotten about the milk.
The entire kitchen was engulfed in smoke and the milk pot was empty(all the milk having overflown) and it had turned completely black like soot.Immediately turned off the gas and opened all the windows.It took almost an hour for the smoke to settle down.
Soon after that, my maid came home to make dinner, and while I was removing eggs from the fridge to give her, SPLOT.. fell two eggs one after another.. in quick succession!
(My mom had aptly nicknamed me butterfingers!)
Well this was just one of those days you wish that never was!

Go Fish!

I was a little apprehensive for a couple of days as my two little goldfish(btw, have named them goldie and blondie!) seemed a lil scared and intimidated by the three larger ones (Huey,Duey & Louis).And whenever i used to drop fishfood in the bowl, Huey, duey and Louis would immediately scurry up and eat off almost all The fish pellet food.
But now that it's been 4 days for goldie and blondie in their new home, all of them seem to co-exist peacefully!(U GO FISH!)

The Dark Knight

Can't wait for "The Dark Knight" to release in theatres in India.
All my friends in the U.S. have been raving about the movie all over facebook.
Incidentally I came to know of demise of Heath Ledger who was supposed to play Joker in the movie only last week, when I was reading an article in the TOI.
(and he died early this year in January).It makes me feel pathetic that i am six months behind all the news.
I used to be on top of all the news, happenings and current affairs once upon a time.
But I guess married life has got me so involved in scurrying to work after doing mundane chores around the house, that I just about skim thro the headlines in the newspaper and watch tv very rarely.
But oflate, Ihave been spending more time catching up on news!

Baby boom time yet again!

Well more baby boomers!
This time it is my first cousin Bhavana( 2nd one for her) and my friend sapna who went to Engineering college and grad school with me.

And we got 2 new itsy bitsy goldfish too WOWIEE!

So I come back home Monday evening from work, and I see my fishbowl ( the new one) strangely crowded! On taking a closer look, I find that there were 2 more teeny weeny goldfish in the bowl( Balaji must've got them when he went to get the fish bowl)
It was a really sweet surprise for me!( So now will have to figure out names for them!)
Any suggestions?

Yipee, we found an apartment !

So on sunday evening, we saw and finalised this apartment in Bangalore , which is a nice cosy 3 bedroom apartment in Fraser town area.The apartment actually belongs to one of my second cousins, Shyam anna who is in Chicago.And the best part of it all, it is literally a stone's throw away to Venky's office.(I mean he can actually hop, skip and jump to work!)
So with the accommodation getting arranged, the next big task is I need to find myself a job in Bangalore(Any employers reading this?)

Another weekend has come and gone!

I often wonder about the irony of weekends. All through the week, we eagerly look forward to the weekend and when it actually comes, in a batting of an eyelid it has come and gone by, poof!
I keep fantasising about having relaxed weekends at home, but the weekends are the ones which are always so hectic and action packed.
This saturday, we had guests home for lunch, later in the evening we had to pack Venky, my hubby's clothes as he was moving to Bangalore, then he got down to cleaning our fish bowl, anwhich has 3 goldfish, huey, duey & Louis.When he was cleaning it, it cracked and broke, and it was too late in the night to go fetch a new fishbowl. So the poor goldfish had to spend the night in a tub.
Earlynext morning we had to drive down to Bangalore to see an apartment.
So there goes my weekend again!(I hope my dream of a relaxed weekend comes true some day(weekend!))
Incase u guys are wondering about how we took off to Bangalore leaving the goldfish in a tub, our good friend Balaji was kind enough to buy a new fishbowl the next day for our fish and he put them back in the bowl and even fed them!

Meet the Goombal!

Last evening was such fun at our place when our extended family goombal( tamil for crowd) came over for dinner.It felt really nice to have met Brinda akka ( my second cousin ) and Hashim uncle after almost 2 years. Sahaj & Atij, have gown up so much and are boys in the true sense of the word!
My dear maid Sumathi churned up the best of dishes parthas, Veg Kurma,Tomato Rice,Raita & Egg & Paneer salad & my sweetie pie hubby, venky played a good host serving people beer and taking really good care of them(which according to him, I was supposed to do..), but then people who know me well, know I love yapping and away I was yapping with the almost dozen people around the house.

I love you all my family, and here is to many more such get togethers in the future!
P.S. Bhamini Mami, thanks for all the loads of ice cream you got us.I am actually gonna go and dig into one of those right now!

It's baby boom time!

Well it seems to be that time when most of my close friends and cousins seem to be on their family way, with a couple of them having had babies in the recent past.Sudha and Vinuta's babies turned one recently.While Shefu, had a baby abt 2 months back and Shruti is due early August.On the cousin's front,Ayshwarya and Leena are preggy too.
God bless all of them and their offsprings!

A good beginning to the weekend( thankfully!)

Thank god it's Friday!
Well the day started off well, although late(Woke up only at 8:30 a.m.)
Venks and i watched "the general's daughter" on dvd last nite.
So no sooner than i gt up, got a sweet surprise call from mommy darling!(who is now in new jersey)
Felt really thrilled talking to mommy almost after a week.
(Lookin forward to the weekend, shopping and relatives visiting us! yipeeeee!)

Madras sucks! Bombay Rocks!

Yipee... I am so excited to begin writing my first ever blog citing Bomay in it.
Another hot lousy day spent at office in Chennai without power(Imagine we do'nt have a decent generator for power back up).Power outages are such a frequent occurrence in Chennai( Heard in Bangalore and Delhi it's worse!) Two thumbs up for Bombay in this respect.Bombay is such a resilient city, inspite of torrential incessant rains for nearly 3 months every year, power outages in Bombay are such a rare feature! Bombay ...I miss ..home...!