Deesh

I missed you

2011-06-01T20:08:00.000-05:00

Digital content at the public library

2011-02-08T20:14:00.005-05:00

One of the advantages I have to reading hard copy books was that I could go to the library, get a bunch of books and read them at leisure at home, for FREE! How could I possibly do this on an e-reader? Well I shouldn't have worried. Because my public library is up with the times, and has a ton of content online. Now I don't know if this is the case with all libraries (though now it does seem so), but my library has a certain amount of good content available for download for free.

My longer commute and 'active toddler' are leaving me with less time to curl up with a book, so I needed to find better ways to do it. On the public library's page, I found the link for e-books and audiobooks, both of which could be transferred to an iPod/hone/ad, a Nook or a Sony reader ( I don't know why not Kindle, but I hope they are working on it).

The process to actually get the books was time consuming- I had to download this app called 'Overdrive Media Console' which apparently many libraries use to loan out their content. Once that was installed on the iPhone, I could go to the library's website through the app, select the book I want, check it out (it's a little tedious, but not too bad) and then download it on the iPhone.

After that I can access it for the checkout period (7 days usually) and also transfer it on up to 6 devices. Which is a VERY good deal, considering that that means I can transfer it on my computer as well, and read it from there, to reduce battery consumption.

So far, I have downloaded one e-book and one audiobook (I had downloaded one the past, but by the time I could figure out the app, the book was overdue). Both are very good quality to read and listen to.

I was very, very impressed with my library and hopefully they keep adding more titles to their digital collection.

I am not sure though, how the checkout system works. Do the overdue files simply stop working, or is it an honor system. I guess I could find out next week.

Sweet Corn Chicken Soup

2011-02-05T16:12:00.003-05:00

Aarti Sequeira is one of the very few people whose recipes I can like and can easily replicate. Other TV food show hosts who claim simple dishes in 30 minutes, seem to just dunk everything in a glob of cheese and call it amazing dinner.

This is the second recipe of Aarti's that I tried (first here). It's not 'her' recipe in that this soup is sold at every single Chinese establishment (cart or upscale restaurant) in India. But corny commentary aside (oh who am I kidding, I love the corniness) the recipe she uses seems so simple that it would be stupid not to make it at home.

Followed the recipe to a T,and yes the result was as yummy as the local Chinese gaadis and stalls around Mumbai. To make the experience closer to home, I cut up green chillies and added them to vinegar and served as a companion to soy sauce. If you know a better way to make that amazing clear stuff, let me know.

How it went

2011-02-01T12:16:00.002-05:00

I survived the first day.

Two days ago, I was all tensed up because I didn't know if would be able to get back on track with the whole 'get ready and out the door by 8am' with Aditya. Since his diet has changed substantially now, there is more food prep involved, as is eating breakfast and getting the whole daycare bag ready.

But it worked out. The fact that I couldn't get much sleep last night worked to my advantage. Here's what happened yesterday and this morning. Notice how things are broken down in 15 minute blocks. That's how tight things get for me to make it.

Mon Jan 31, 2011

5pm - 5:30pm Back home: Baby VERY tired. Grandma feeds baby snack, while parents get their coffee.
5:30pm - 7pm Play time with Baby: Chasing around the house, climbing stairs and reading books.
7pm - 7:15pm Dinner for Baby! Rice and Lentil with Veggies. yumm.
7:15pm - 7:30pm A little play time before bath and bed.
7:30pm - 8pm March upstairs for bath and Bedtime
8pm Baby cozy in crib
8:15pm - 8:45pm Dinner for the adults.
9pm - 10pm Get Baby's stuff ready for tomorrow: Prepare formula, rice and lentil␣mix for lunch. Cheese and cereal for snacks.
10pm - 11pm Upstairs for some Zs!

Tue Feb 1, 2011

6am - 6:30am Wake up! Shower, coffee and reheat Baby's meal.
6:30am - 6:45am Start making baby's breakfast: Mashed bananas with wheat cereal
7am - 7:15am Baby UP! Sponge baby down and dress him up.
7:15am - 7:30am Get downstairs,Grandma feeds breakfast, while I get ready for work.
7:30am - 7:45am Of course we have a poop diaper! Change that. Get trash out the door.
7:45am - 8am Get baby bundled up and OUT THE DOOR!

Now as you can see, things went quite smooth sailing. We had two things working for us: 1) Baby fell asleep with 15 minutes of rocking, and 2)My mom was in charge of preparing dinner for the adults, so we could focus on baby related things until 8pm.

It is going to be a challenge to squeeze cooking and doing the dishes in between 8 pm and 10 pm. When the baby is awake 100% attention has to be given to him, since its only 1.5 hours in a day that we get with him anyway. But if as usual we cook only every other day and get our teamwork approach in full aggression, we should have a schedule by the beginning of next week.

Here's hoping.

Getting my act together

2011-01-30T17:24:00.003-05:00

The past two months have been nothing short of luxury. Mom is visiting. Free miles due to expire at the end of the year, and a grandson who needed a little TLC made my mom take a impromptu trip to the US. During this time, Kolu could stay at home three days of the week and play with his grandma. During this time, all the meticulous planning I had done for the months before pretty much unraveled. Mom took over the kitchen and general care of the baby while we played with him when we came home and before we left.

But now she leaves next week. And that is freaking me out. Not only have I forgotten how things are done, but Kolu is also older now, and has developed a mind of his own. He is at the stage where he squirms away in the middle of a diaper change and refuses to be clothed on many an occasion.

So this week is going to be a practice run. Getting all his bottles ready for daycare, his food ready, meal planning for us AND the baby. And work, in the middle of all this.

This is going to be hard. But do-able.

Stuff worth hanging on to.

2011-01-23T10:36:00.004-05:00

Today is the first time in many many days that I have the opportunity to sit and type out a paragraph or two. In this time, I could be doing many other things that will be more 'productive', such as clear the room, do the laundry or the dishes. etc. Get my home in order. But all that is for later. Now, I type.

They say ( and I agree) that after you have a baby, your life will never ever be the same. But that does not mean letting go of things that were interesting to you before you had the baby, does it? Do you have to be a mother whose only interest in life is fawning over her little one? I mean, how am I to get my kid interested in all kinds of things if all he sees his mom do is laundry and clean and feeding him? (Maybe he should learn those things too, but that's for later)

I have had to completely cut TV out of my life. Completely. In the last one year, I must have watched 5 hours of TV. And one full movie. I have not watched a single movie at home, without being pulled away from it because the little one decided he wants to investigate the cabinets in the kitchen.

But you know what, that's all okay. Because I guess I didn't mind letting those things go. I love TV and movies, but I guess not that much. Thanks to baby, I have had to re-prioritize and the only thing that has stayed constant pre baby and post, is reading. I don't get as many books done as I used to pre-baby ( and well, during the pregnancy I read more books than I had in the two years before that) , but I still do manage to sneak in a book every two weeks. And I am okay with that. The type of books has also changed. From fiction I have now moved to non-fiction and short stories, as those are easier to finish in the short spans of time I have now. I also embraced audiobooks, which give me a chance to catch up on 'reading' in my 30-minute-each-way commute. car. I guess if something matters to you, you find ways around the hectic lifestyle of baby raising. Hopefully as baby grows up, I will be able to go back to longer books, and the more leisurely method of sitting down with a book by the window.

On the subject of books and babies.. mine loves books. But what he loves, is to just keep turning the pages. If I hold a page and try to get him interested on what is on the page, he gets impatient, and turns the book the other way. Crook. But at least the interest is there. Maybe 11 months is too soon to teach a kid to stay on a page. May be a few months down the line..

Baby Food Combinations

2010-12-04T20:19:00.002-05:00

Because calling them recipes is a little bit of a stretch.

Baby Spinach and Sweet Potatoes
Pumpkin and Green beans
Apples and Pumpkin
Apples and yogurt
Blueberries + Apple and Yogurt.

The shopping list for the first two months

2010-09-19T09:49:00.002-05:00

First of all, hand me downs!! Nothing so useful as hand me downs. I had a lot of stuff from my aunts. Some of it about 25 years old, but it looks and feels newer than most new things. (How is that?!)

I also had a long excel list with 95 or 100 items, which frankly, was quite useless.
However, this link is a good guide for what you need. Of course, there will be a few things that you will want to add, but I don't think we needed anything else for the first two months. Besides gripe water (which is more for the parents than the baby anyway).

Break

2010-09-08T18:39:00.003-05:00

I am taking a break right now. A has gone to play this evening, and instead of resenting that and cleaning the house in martyr mode, I decided that I too, needed to get away from all the stuff that bothers me. Not that I mind his going to play-he does it only once a week. It's just that I keep feeling overwhelmed and every single minute of my spare time goes in trying to figure out how I am going to clean the next section of my house or something similar.
But not today.
Today I will not think of those things. Instead, I will sit here and meditate.
Good night.

The Bread Pudding from Aarti's Paarti

2010-09-05T20:12:00.016-05:00

I don’t watch Food Network. I don’t even have cable. And that is why I had to find out about Aarti Sequeira through a friend. She is awesome. And even better, she is a food blogger first.

Aarti's recipes seem to be the kind of recipes I have been looking for. Easy and more importantly, variations on stuff I have already eaten.

Which why I decided to give huggy buggy bread pudding a try. Now, husband has been making bread pudding for years, and considers it to be one of his 'signature dishes'. And while I love what he makes ( a base of caramel, chocolate syrup added in), Aarti's recipe seemed to have some interesting ingredients, such as the coconut milk and the ginger.

(And of course the catchy song. How can you not like the catchy song.)

Days went by, and I bought one ingredient at a time.. First we bought the bread. Then there was no ginger. In the time we went to buy the ginger, we ate the bread. So we bought more bread. And waited for it to get old. Until came a day I realized that I am not going to make this pudding unless I make it out of stuff lying around the house.

So of course, I put some variations on Aarti's dish, and here it is! Refer to Aarti's dish on her website to compare to the original. And of course, if you can, make the original.

Ingredients

6 dried dates in hot water ( I did not have whisky, I did not have figs. What I did have was dates. And hot water. So that's improv #1)
1 can coconut milk. (full fat she says..I found a lite variety sitting around. Was not going to buy the full fat one also. Had to use this can up).
2.5 cups whole milk. (Seriously, this was killing me. Whole milk has not entered my house in three years, and it was not going to today. 1 % it had to be.)
3 eggs
1 cup sugar.
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cardamom
1 tbsp ginger grated (I went all out with this ingredient. I grated enough ginger to feed an army, and then used it all in the recipe. No idea how much it was. probably 2/3 of a 2 inch ginger root.)
salt
cashews (had bought them, but ended up eating them before I started the recipe, so cashew-less pudding it was. Though I can see how they would have made the dish super awesome.)
3 tbsp butter.( I saw how much a tbsp is. It scared me. So I used 1/6th of a butter stick. I think that's around1 tbsp)

All the other ingredients were not found in the house and therefore not used.

Now the how-to:

Cut the bread into 1" pieces
Preheat the oven to 350 F.
2 dishes are needed- 1 large roasting pan and one 9"x13" baking dish.

I did not have either. What I did have is a big glass dish by pyrex, and theHefty EZ foil baking pans (8x4). Used two of those instead, and greased them.

Whisked coconut and regular milk, soaked the bread in that.
In another bowl, whisked eggs, sugar, spices, ginger and salt.
Added the slices dates.
Poured this mix into the soaking bread, and tossed together.

To bake this, I had to improvise. So instead of using the roasting pan, I filled the EZ foil pans with the bread mix and placed them in the 9x13" Pyrex pan. I then added hot water into the pan, such that the water was half way at the level of the pans. (True to the original recipe).

Threw in the oven for 35 minutes.
Did not forget the shut door step.

In 35 minutes, delicious looking Huggy Buggy Pudding was ready. And the husband wandered into the kitchen. He suggested-hey- we have craisins lying around-want to throw those in too? So on top of the pudding they went. Everyone sat in the oven till we gave our baby a bath, dried him, fed him and put him in his crib.

The result was amazing. If I hadn't stopped to write this down, I probably would have finished the whole thing, and gained 15 kilos. But I did not. One little bowl (okay, two) was enough to put a huge grin on my face.

So thanks, Aarti, for your recipes. Will be trying out a lot of them for sure!

Meal planning

2010-09-04T22:05:00.004-05:00

These days we actually plan out our meals. The full week's menu. This from a couple that used to eat out almost every other day. We still haven't gone to the fresh home-cooked meals everyday, but at least we eat at home most of the time. More importantly, the trips to the grocery store have significantly reduced. Sunday morning routine is now 'make list, pack baby and stroll in the grocery store'.

What was very useful in all this planning was the 'couple's calendar' I picked up from BN probably two years ago. It has a his, hers and his and hers section, and does not have any dates on it. That's why I love it so much. I could buy it in 2008 and use it in 2010. Of course, the his section is now the dinner section, and the his and hers section is now the baby food section, but it still works.

As you can see, there is a lot of planning, and scheduling involved here (very organized..;). Also, the baby gets to eat healthy homemade ( and freezer stored) food every day. And mom isn't running around trying to make something for him because hey! she knows exactly what he is supposed to eat that day.

Hopefully this is still available at BN once I run out of pages on this one.

And why I'm thinking about starting again

2010-09-04T21:03:00.004-05:00

This post

I love change

2010-09-04T20:50:00.004-05:00

I logged on to blogger after a really long time, and was surprised to see so many options in their backgrounds and templates. Before, I had a flowery template, but that just looked pretty- didn't say anything about me.
However this new one seems to really reflect the way I blog. Relaxed. I do find blogging relaxing, and keep posting sporadically.
My posts do tend to be very self-centered, but I guess that is the way I am. Right now, I cannot find the time to do anything else except shape my career and take care of my family. And maybe, at some point, I will care to blog about things other than that. But not right now. (well, never say never, right).
I recently had a baby. A very cute one, may I add. So chances are, this thing is going to morph into a mommy blog.
I also have a snazzy new phone (ok, who am I kidding, its an iPhone 3G. But hey, it's snazzier than anything I had before).
So the result of that is I may be able to blog pictures! Bloody directly! Oh the possibilities. Need to learn taking close-up shots of everything around me.
Oh well, lets see how this thing goes.

The garden

2010-07-27T21:26:00.003-05:00

I have a little container garden going on, mainly flowers, since Kolu likes their bright colors. I also have 4 little pepper plants going, which are really not producing much by the way of peppers. So may need to fertilize them a little. Since I am going to eat them, I think I might just fertilize them with some organic fertilizer, and hope for some harvest.

The eyebrows

2010-07-24T20:37:00.003-05:00

Why don't I ever shape my eyebrows. Why do I let the mustache grow? Why don't I get mani-pedis? Why don't I buy better clothes? Why don't I earn more money so I can spend it?

Weighty issues

2010-07-24T20:10:00.004-05:00

I have let myself go.
That is an understatement. I was actually never captured really.. I have steadily grown in size ever since birth. I was told it would stop. Well, my height stopped, but my weight never did. I went from a thin school girl, to a weirdly flabby one in college. I probably went from 120 lbs to 140 lbs in those two years. And I know exactly what brought it on. Sleeping. Lots of it. I love to sleep. And the odd hours of the junior college, and the lack of any rules of attendance let me rush back home and nap like crazy.And eat fried fish at 6pm. With rice. And curds. No wonder I gained all that flab.

Then I went to college, which was a 1.5hour commute one way. In the first year, I lost all that weight, and came back to 125 lbs. However, by then, that was not my happy weight. I started to become tired, cry a lot and in general became depressed. Slowly, I came out of that, started eating at home instead of outside, and therefore healthier. My weight quickly went back up to 143, but this time, I was happy. I felt good, I felt like I had a lot of energy.
Then I came to the US. Mom made food and strict regimens no more ( strict regimens=meals at predetermined times). Living with roommates meant eating a lot of home made junk. One of my roommates would pour oil in the pan for 15 seconds. Think about it. A lot of oil can flow in 15 seconds. She would never make rice, always jeera rice. She loved to cook- she made all kinds of things-rasagullas- biryani, you name it, she would love to make it. And we loved her for that.
Surprisingly, I did not gain all that much over those two years. That's probably because us roommates used to hang out at the gym. My roommates' idea of a good time was a good aerobics class, or a good swim or even a good long brisk walk-followed by lots of eating.
Followed by lots of eating- but still- I was still at my happy weight.
Then I joined the PhD program. Things were good-but the weight had started inching forward. I was gaining about a pound a month or so. I was 147 when I came in. By my second year, I was 156. In spite of going to the gym, and having a nice roommate who cooked healthy meals as well.
Then the steroids came. I had an illness, which involved me taking steroids for 3 full months. And that took a toll on my body. I peaked at 186. I probably gained a full 20 lbs that summer. And then that weight never went back. I had also lost stamina, i did not go to the gym anymore- neither did I walk, or run.
I used slimfast and lost a good 12 lbs before I got pregnant- I was 170lbs during my first checkup. I gained 25lbs during the pregnancy, and lost 23 of those in the first 6 weeks postpartum . Mom, I tell you. She came in, put me on a very healthy diet, made sure I eat at specified times. Also, my little one took to breastfeeding very well, and that I am sure helped me lose weight too.
After my mom left, I was still breastfeeding, but I gained some weight. Thanks to the fact that I was now eating rice as well. That is my poison- I eat rice, I gain weight. I am now 176lbs.
I have now also started running a little. Have to also move on to the exercises to gain muscle tone to run. The fact that I have co-workers who are health freaks has helped me a lot. And I think, as he was saying, everyone is more active this year. This may be a good time to get active, and stay active.
I am happy again.

Wish List

2010-07-22T21:42:00.003-05:00

If there is something constant in my life, it is the wishlist. Things I wish to do. And often, there are many things that are constant on that list.
Top of the list: Declutter the house- I have managed to donate and convince A to donate a LOT of things in the house. So yay! we are moving on that one.

Hire cleaning lady- Did that too. Charges $50 per visit (biweekly) but gets the job done very well. So happy about that.

Solid Food update

2010-07-22T21:21:00.000-05:00

Mangoes.

Next up: Apples

Chicken Liver Recipe

2010-07-21T20:13:00.002-05:00

Chicken liver recipe for @patrix

1.5 lbs chicken liver- cut to size.
3 big red onions
4 garlic cloves
one bunch coriander
methi seed powder
jeera powder
(roast the mixture beforehand)
ginger garlic paste
yogurt
Chillies

To marinate the liver:
Rub yogurt, ginger garlic, tumeric and chopped coriander on the liver pieces- let stand for 2 hours.

In a wide bottomed pan, add oil, followed by finely chopped garlic and chillies, then the masala, followed by onions and then finally the livers. Cook.

Questions? Leave them in the comments.

2010-07-20T21:10:00.005-05:00

Oh Hello There, Blog!
How have you been? I have been neglecting you, like everyone else has been neglecting their own blogs, for something thats more suitable for us ADD types. Twitter.

But now, since I have been doing things in real life, I can actually blog about something. Also, blogger's got this new design thing, so you won't look so boring anymore.

So let me bring you up-to-date on what's happened so far

As you know, I got pregnant, and I got stretch marks. I also went to baby classes, got all excited about baby delivery and such, and then delivered a beautiful baby boy in the middle of the winter. Things went very beautifully, and my mother helped us out a lot for the first 8 weeks, followed by her and dad together for another 5. Then they left and along came my in-laws. They have been here for 2 months now, and leave in another month.

So I am guessing that after a month is when the real fun will begin. And you will no doubt, turn into a mommy blog. Face it. I changed, so you will have to too.

Thanks to the fact that I am now a mom, I also have to sleep when the baby sleeps. So abrupt signing off it is.

Grrr

2010-02-07T22:55:00.001-05:00

Faaaak. Stretch marks. Stupid stretch marks. Should have been more generous with that cream. Now I'll never be able to wear a below the navel saree again. Then again, as A pointed out ' maybe first we'll think about the regular saree.'
woe is me.

2010-02-03T18:44:00.003-05:00

Being pregnant exposes you to a lot of propaganda. My first experience, thanks to my dumb decision of taking these pregnancy classes so late, was at the end of the term. And it was about breast feeding. The class was supposed to be about videos on technique, what to do, what not to do, when to panic and when not to. And that's all fine. The reasons I signed up for. What I was not expecting was the filler information on how BPA bottles are horrible. How breast-fed babies are smarter than formula babies (By like 2 points. Seriously. Advertising this clearly tells me you are forumla fed. kthxbai).

After that I dozed off. And I was so tired, I couldn't even go to work today (after sleepwalking through it yesterday, I decided I needed a day to recharge, and worked from home.

Buying books

2010-01-31T19:51:00.003-05:00

I realized that I havent really bought a book in the past 9 months. They have been all bout the becoming a mom phenomenon. Trips to babies r us. Buying what to expect when you are expecting and devouring all kinds of parenting magazines. Add to that finishing the thesis and starting a new job.

Of course, I did read quite a few good books in the time. But they were ALL from the public library. Which is not a bad thing of course, but I think now I need to go back to buying a book. It's almost like if I don't buy now, my habit of buying books will stop.

So now the question is, what books to buy:

Mary Roach's Bonk and Stiff are already on the list, and perhaps the checklist book by Atul Gawande.

Hopefully I actually go through with the order and buy them.

I will. I will. I will.

Update: I bought them I bought them!!The first two that is.. And then some baby mittens and socks to bump the order up to $25.
Cannot wait for the books to show up!

My weekend so far

2010-01-23T13:39:00.004-05:00

Part of the series of 'weekends' :P

Fri even: Played Mario. Watched a short Hindi movie.. in all, not bad.

Sat morning: woke up early-ish to low back pain. Got scared that it maybe contractions. Figured no.. but must look to see what they really feel like.

Played MORE mario. went to get brunch. Ate more sugar than I though there was in the world. Chatted with mom, these days, since we talk during the daytime, talks have become more interesting..

Back home, some blog surfing, some twitter. Nap time.

Wake up. Off to the mall to shop! Try trousers for A. No good ones.. so come back. Get the Ugly Truth from the store.. hope that its atleast ok.. since I suggested it and A grumbled 'It better be good'. :|:|

Wait for the chicken curry for dinner.

A good Saturday so far. Hopefully Sunday's equally good.

Will not let the Rag-of-a-movie Ugly Truth ruin my weekend. Will. Not.

Ideal Weekend

2010-01-21T20:36:00.003-05:00

So now that I've cribbed about my currently boring weekends, lets see what an ideal weekend would look like.

1) Friday evening: Take care of all the calling that needs to be done. That includes family members who care about me, but haven't had an 'eventful' week. This gives me more time in the weekend to myself. Sleep early. Buy the local newspaper and leave it to be read on Saturday morning.

2) Saturday morning: Up at 8am. Breakfast by 9. Do not settle into the couch, but sit and read the newspaper. Spare a couple of hours to clean the house. That includes throwing out junk that hasn't been used in a long time.

Sat evening: Be 'creatively productive' in some way. This includes blogging (don't know why) or some sort of 'crafty' thing.

GO OUT! and not to Babies R Us. The problem is it is too cold to walk around here right now. So maybe going and sitting at a coffee shop isn't a bad idea. Take something to read along.

Sat Night: Nice dinner. And sleep by 11pm.

Sunday night: Wake up by 8 am. Brkfst by 9am. Go through all the blogs that I normally do.

That's all I can think of to do right now..Damn, atleast I have one 'ideal' day.

Typical Weekend

2010-01-21T20:26:00.002-05:00

I think I have been sleepwalking through weekends for the past few weeks. So I need to write down what exactly my ideal weekend would be.

But first, what does my weekend look like now?

Saturday: Wake up at 10am. There goes half the day. Sit around and watch TV. By the time 1pm rolls around, go for a nap. 'Nap' for 4 hours.. wake up when its dark. Go out to Babies R Us for some shopping. Come back. Dinner. Some TV and then zzz.

Sunday: Wake up NOT before 11am. Go through a ton of blogs. Sometimes catch We the People on NDTV..(watch more of that since we cut the cable). Obsess over the fact that the house isnt clean. Try to clean it. Fail. Give up and nap. Sunday evening. DO nothing. I am not sure what I do on Sunday evenings. But try to sleep ASAP.

Monday rolls by and I can crib about the workweek.

Thought I had posted this before but..

2010-01-17T19:02:00.001-05:00

While looking at the window display at Destination Maternity, I wondered aloud why the model looked like she was fake pregnant.. without a second’s lapse, A said ‘Oh, because she doesn’t have pregnancy boobs’.

Very observant indeed.

(and now some perv is going to come here from google using that word. Shoo! there's nothing interesting here.)

2010-01-17T18:39:00.002-05:00

Discovered a new pick me up..just go read my blog archives!
But since this is such a good pick me up, maybe I should write one post or two everyday. That might become too much, but atleast that will give me something to look back on. And also maybe unashamedly blog about my baby.

its scary that the due date is just over a month away, and I become 'full term' in less than two weeks. Right now, every second thought in my head is 'Am I hurting the baby?' Need to stop this now, because later on, it may end up making me a super paranoid mother and we dont want me to become the type of mother that keeps calling her kid every 2 hours to find out where they are..

In other updates, there is this fun phenomenon called fetal hiccups.. where the fetus starts hiccuping for about 20 minutes, and you can feel every single one of the hiccups. Mine somehow gets them only after I eat a clementine. :| Acc to my doc, thats them trying to practice swallowing.. and so I take that as baby loves clementines.

Easily Depressed

2010-01-17T18:14:00.002-05:00

Went through half the book 'The Joy Luck Club' By Amy Tan, and am now a little depressed. Need a pick me up. Perhaps Super Mario Bros Wii might help.

Last name bijness

2009-12-27T13:11:00.001-05:00

This holiday season is proving to be hilarious. I just started working in this organization in Sept. Everyone knows me by my last name. Which is my maiden last name since I decided change it once my passport is up for renewal.

Of course, no one at work knows that, though they know I am married. So imagine when cards come to our home address addressed to 'Mr. and Mrs. T'. It just is too funny and certainly not what I expected to happen. I mean I don't really care about my last name, and had always planned to change it, but never got around to it...

telling my co-workers that they sent cards to my parents is going to be a good conversation topic for a couple of hours. :)

Cleaning out

2009-12-27T13:09:00.001-05:00

The impending arrival is making me nervous by the minute. there is no place in the house! There is so much junk everywhere ( I found my Crest whitestrips from my wedding time, hiding in a box) I have to get everything out. The hardest part is trying to decide what is needed and ehat is not, and right now I have decided that, nothing is needed. Everything except the husband and be bought again if needed.

So that's it. The garbage can is going to be brimming this week.

Creative baby toys

2009-12-09T20:40:00.001-05:00

Apparently some babies play with their poop. Once they poop they put their hand down their diaper and play with the deposit.. while I can see how that may be fun, I hope I don’t have to deal with a baby who is fascinated by poop…

2009-11-29T20:24:00.001-05:00

I miss Gratisgab. She had the most funniest blog ever. And now she doesnt post anymore. I'm sad.

Brothers and Sisters.

2009-11-29T19:50:00.000-05:00

A is VERY close to his brother. My dad and his brother are not on talking terms. I know another set who used to hang out together in the same bunch of friends, but never really seemed to talk to each other. And now that they have their own lives, I really doubt they talk to each other, not because they hate each other, but because they have nothing to talk about..

On the other hand, I don;t know any sisters who are indifferent or not on talking terms. Is this a brother thing? Not sure.

How I spend my weekend

2009-11-22T11:05:00.004-05:00

Dozing.
Saving $150. adding cushions to my old $5 rocking chair, and testing it out as a rocker/glider.
Going to maternity clothing stores to buy clothes, and burning those aforementioned $150.
Signing up for a free back massage (nothing is ever free, but they haven't met me yet.)
Going to Pottery Barn Kids and hitting up on an idea. Tell parents to get high quality sheets from India. And have mom-in-law make quilts from high quality fabric. Also buy a nice Singer machine here, and set up a sweatshop and make the moms make all kinds of cute things for the baby. They will have to show me results at the end of the day. And if they are not what I had in mind, off goes the heating..(maybe it should be called a freezeshop)
Going through one mom blog after the other.. this is probably the most wasteful activity of the weekend. Even more than dozing.

what to do now.

2009-11-03T21:15:00.002-05:00

When I defended my thesis, I took an oath: Never to bring work home again. Ever. There are a lot of things I could do at home, and frankly, life is much easier if the two are separate.
However, right now, I don't have much to do at home. Of course there's the dishes and the cleaning of the entire freaking house. But the dishes are A's job for now, and the house will be cleaned over the weekend.
So what do I do now?

Ooh. How about a little bit of thought organizing. I used to use OneNote quite extensively during my phd,but stopped using it since the writing started. So maybe get back to doing that.
And of course, fill the blog with yapyap and more yap.

kicker

2009-11-03T19:15:00.002-05:00

Watched some seriously creepy vids on youtube about baby movements at week 24. seriously. why would people record their bellies and then post the videos on youtube? anyway, did that because i was concerned that I wasn't feeling anything much, and the fact that i don't really look preggers. and then last night, i got kicked in the belly. For a change not by A, but by A's future offspring. aww.:) went from a 'shit. what was that'. to 'omg.now i have to act all mommy', to finally patting my belly at an attempt at being maternal.. frankly, last night was the first night I felt something 'emotionally' for the baby, and not just omg am i killing it by eating this shrimp or taking this vaccine.

hopefully i get more maternal as days pass.

To get shot or not?

2009-10-24T17:16:00.002-05:00

Approaching a serious catch-22 situation, and unless I take a stand now, this thing is going to get out of control.

It's about deciding to take the H1N1 vaccine. For a while I was sure I wasn't going to take it, but then since I am flying across the country in what will be close quarters with people I don't really know, I decided that I will.

I am not sure what my thought process is, but basically, if I don't take the shot, and get the flu and die, then all the arguments about what will happen to the baby are really moot, aren't they?

Somehow, right now I am more willing to take the risk of unknown effects than the known effect that pregnant women are very susceptible to the harmful effects of the flu.

Now only if the vaccine was in fact available..

2009-10-23T15:23:00.002-05:00

Sitting at work, waiting for a to come pick me up..

I need something to do . Today wasn't an altogether waste but still. My fat fingers haven't yet adapted to the but butt keys of the iPhone but hey, I am managingbto type whole sentences out . Lunch was bad today ,.. Split pea soup which wa s essentially tasteless dal. Buy atleast the baby's wiggling keeps me amused..

Reflections on day two

2009-10-18T11:32:00.004-05:00

Love This.

Oddly, one of my mom's first reactions when I told her I was finally done..'so tell me now, how much longer did it REALLY take'..(she lost patience at year 4.. so for the past two years its been 'get it done with already')

Dad's first reaction when I told him I'll be staying back where I am and take up a lower paying job..'one must learn to dream a little bigger'..thanks..:| ..I can never ever dare to tell my parents that sometimes I feel like becoming a housewife. They will personally come here and kick my ass. Even though I am a 'grownup'.

But at least their expectations are intact. Never once did they even sneakily suggest I reproduce..Love my parents for the back-handed 'encouragement' they have been providing most of the time.. and the times when they really do come out and say that they are proud of me for what I've been doing..

It's Day Two

2009-10-18T11:18:00.002-05:00

of NOT being a PhD student.. and I am going to go to the lab already. But its going to be to clear my desk out. Otherwise all I am going to do is

Go to buy a houseplant- the clover looks a little lonely..

Plant the bulbs I bought - indoor ones.. I work small scale.

It is VERY wierd, not having something to obsess about..I mean no more am I going to have to think about if the experiment I set up yesterday will or will not work. I am thinking of keeping plain 8-5 hours in my current job..and then come home and take care of ME. I may get a laptop from work, but I think now priorities have shifted. I me myself and family will come first and second depending on the situation, and work will come third, atleast for a while now.

In the long term, I need to get back into gardening mode. Recruit someone I know to teach me gardening in the ground.

What next?

2009-10-17T07:42:00.003-05:00

After 6 looooong years, I am finally done. Done with being a PhD student. Finally everyone can rest easy. My parents who were seriously worried about my mental health have now let a sigh of relief. Hopefully there wont be anymore crazies anymore.

They were hard. The past 6 years. At least twice everyday for the past 4 years, I felt like giving the whole thing up. And at least twice in the past 4 years I had seriously considered it. Now that its over, all those things seem so tiny. And getting through just seems so worthwhile. As if all that drama would have gone to waste had I given up midway through. At least now I have a degree to show for it. And a few publications.

I still don't know what I am going to do next. Right now, I am in a setting which lets me get an idea of how life would be if I were to join the industry.. but at the same time, some forces are making me consider the idea of teaching. And it isn't seeming so bad. I like to teach, and the people who teach me the teaching course certainly seem really excited about the profession. But would I want to go through the whole 6 years all over again, when I try to get tenure? I don't think so..

I do have a year to figure out what I want to do, and then another year to prepare my CV accordingly..

But as of now, as it is sinking in that I can;t say 'Sqrlnt, PhD student' anymore, i am confused about what my new identity will be. Oh well, at least for the next 4 months or so, it could be 'sqrlnt, mommy to be'. Unfortunately, I almost threw up from an overdose of maternity advice yesterday..so I might just be over that...

It's my birthday

2009-10-11T08:50:00.002-05:00

Unsually cheery and energetic today. Won't ask why, but capitalize on it.

Plan today:

1) Go over slides for presentation

2) Go to lab and printout copy of thesis

3) Sandwiches for lunch

4) Go to the library and return books, maybe get a new one.

5) Rehearse slides.

6) Anything else that may be required.

Note that there is no opening of gifts, going out for lunch etc. involved. That is all left for the next weekend..

Hello again

2009-10-10T12:37:00.003-05:00

Just thought I should blog again. The last day in my twenties today. Don't know why it is such a landmark, except because now I can't taunt A about being a 30-something and me being only a 20-something.

But I guess they do deserve a look back. My twenties that is. My 'life plan' was derailed for 2 years, so my plans of having a PhD by the time I was thirty were down in the drain. But since that was only because of scheduling conflicts, I don't feel so bad. Atleast I am defending in the first week of my thirties, which is actually a good thing. All the drama in the 20s, and the finale in the 30s.

I also started a new job. It is the dhobi ka kutta type of a job, but hey it does pay me more, and I get to stay in the place I want. Not altogether a bad deal.

Other fun stuff happened in the 20s. More on that later.

If by any chance some people who know me happen to come by this post, I am REALLY very sorry I haven't kept in touch. Was quite the depressed little pup for the past 8 months or so. Will elaborate later, and call as well.

The mystery of the running girl

2008-10-15T17:55:00.000-05:00

For almost two years now, we see a girl running on the road. Every morning and sometimes in the evening. Be it bitterly cold or extremely hot, this girl is always dressed in the same red pants and sweatshirt, and a jacket if there's a snowstorm. I have seen her in so many places around campus and recently even on campus. She doesn’t run like a runner (the types who compete/run to work out). She runs more like someone who is for a lecture. Hands all over the place, odds and ends hanging from her shoulders, flying about her as she runs. But her pace is exactly the same every time I see her.

But today, she ran right next to me.. In fact almost collided into me . I had half a mind of calling out to her and asking her where she runs to and from everyday, but then I thought I'd let her go. Getting the answer would ruin the mystery and the 2 minutes of speculation me and my husband do everyday when we see her.

Losing touch

2008-09-21T14:57:00.002-05:00

There are some people in your life that you can always count on. The ones who you know, no matter how many years go by without talking to, when you do, its like you were never out of touch. And they are usually the same ones you can count on to help you at all times, no matter what.

But what if you feel that knowing this, you both have made lesser efforts than you should have, to get in touch with each other, and keep in touch? to put things another way, the closer you are to a person, the more you take them for granted?

These days I feel like I am losing someone who is very close to me, just because I have been having a little too many 'I'll call you back's..

SBaB updates

2008-09-17T17:04:00.000-05:00

The SBaB program worked really well. I finally got one experiment to work. But now as I explained to my husband (who is so tired of listening to me and my 'experiments') I just mixed the right colours, now I have the whole sky to paint with that colour.

Ever get a premonition? Like today, right as I walked in to the room to view my results, I thought, today this thing has to work. Was it premonition, or was it that I had known that I had finally eliminated all the kinks in the experiment and knew that now, nothing could go wrong?

How the step back and breathe program's going so far

2008-09-16T15:24:00.003-05:00

As I decided in my previous post, I decided to just step back and breathe. And relax. First, I thought I would just take the morning off, but as morning turned into evening, I decide that well, some more vacay time wont hurt, and it ended up that I did not go to the lab for the whole 'business hours' day.

And its been more or less fabulous. I woke up at 10 am, and made myself a nice hot coffee and watched some Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Grifford push pull on TV. I had a nice shower in some Crabtree and Evelyn bath products we picked up from our hotel room in Hilton because as Ross says , 'They're built into the price'. Then came back and turned the TV to watch 2 minutes of 'The View' , because frankly, that's all I can take of that show. Went online , blurked and twlurked. Made some comments.

Peeled some onions and vacuumed the peels off, scaring myself in the process.

Was reminded of so many blogs that I used to visit, but don't these days. Not sure what the reason was, but that's okay I don't have to read everything that everyone says, all the time. That's like wanting to watch all the TV channels there are.

But then yet, visited a couple. Neutralized the bad taste in my mouth from watching the View.

You know which other sucky morning show I used to watch? Live with Regis and Kelly.No no, it wasn't voluntary, but that show was always on during my wait for my early morning doctor's appointments. In fact, thanks to that I have a nice association with the show. Bless the doctor.

Wrote a long winded nonsensical autobiographical post on my day. Stopped feeling guilty about adding crap to the internet . (Yes, I have that fear..I liked to think that I should conserve the space blogger's alloted me by posting something sensible. But screw that. If Regis and Kelly can have their show, I can have my blog.

Step back and breathe

2008-09-15T14:13:00.001-05:00

It is one of those days, where I keep doing an experiment and suddenly lose track of why I am doing it in the first place. It turns into a war. I HAVE to make it work, I HAVE to make it work, and finally I am not even sure why I started the experiment out in the first place. This time, now that I have realised it, I hope I approach things more rationally. And step back and breathe when needed. I am doing the same exact experiment, tweaking it here and there for the past five days, the last time this happened, tweaking went on for a year after which one day, everything just miraculously fell into place. I hope this time I don't have to go on for one year before I hit pay dirt. and oh yeah, that one year, was just 'method optimization' I still needed another month to analyze samples after that. Oh well such is science. It's true what TGFI says about science.

2008-08-28T14:04:00.000-05:00

So boss gave me some tips on how to select a journal..here they are..

How to select a journal for your publication, besides a decent impact factor that is.

It should be freely accessible to people in the University. If it is, then it is probably available in other universities as well.

look through the references in your manuscript and then narrow your choice down to the top 3 journals you have been citing from, and then select one of them, depending on the impact factor. ie, they aren't too big for you and not too small either.

Check which journals the lab has been publishing in before and if they are suitable for your current one.

My tip: make sure the journal's formatting style is included in endnote or else it is a heck of a pain to format things.

Slightly unrelated. sometimes I wonder it would be fun to have a lab blog and a blogroll for 'labs we like'.

Lessons from Dreams

2008-08-26T09:10:00.000-05:00

I know most people are not interested in other people's dreams, I apologize, this is actually a 'note to self'.

Last night I had a dream which that actually had a moral science lesson. This wasn't the fun dream I used to have as a child, where there was a well in our living room and skulls used to emerge from the well and have conversations with us. This was more human. A guy, I don't know who, was being tortured by some other people. ( not bad torture, just walk the plank types) and the final step was making the guy jump off a building from the terrace. The guy was made to stand at the ledge and the torturers were going to push him over at an 'unspecified time'. So the guy is thinking, screw all this, if I jump right now I will be spared of any other bad things these guys have planned for me. But just as he is about to jump, one of the sidekick torturers runs in and informs the main dude that this guy who's being tortured is actually the son of his 'really scary aunt'; a piece of information that makes the torturer all weak-kneed and allows for a hurried rescue of our tortured guy.

Seriously, torture and waiting to fall off an edge and then being suddenly let go..it's too creepy to try to make sense of, but somewhere, I got a 'moral of the story' from all this. Don't given up on your own, you never know when a sudden twist of fate may improve your prospects.

Resolutions

2008-08-25T08:03:00.001-05:00

Its a new semester. New beginnings. Its one of the advantages of being in a university, you get to 'start over' three times a year, make three new semester resolutions, instead of once a year new year resolutions.

So this semester I have a couple of work related resolutions.

1) Finish all the lab work that's related to my thesis.
2) Finish all the manuscripts.
3) Dress more professionally.

Only three things. Of which one is fluff. So that;s not so hard.

Baby names

2008-08-23T13:11:00.002-05:00

These days there is a baby boom around me. And with each baby coming in, there is a controversy over the last name. Do we want to keep it as the father's family name? Or hyphen a mother's name to it? Or just have one long last name. One creative couple even named their kids as 'kid's first name, father's first name-mother's last name, father's last name' . While I love that concept, as I was watching a Freind's episode last night, I was reminded of 'Princess Consuela Banana hammock' , the name Phoebe changes to after she marries Mike. And in that , the officer tells her her name can be 'anything she wants' .SO I have decided. My future kid is going to have numeric last name. And it will immortalize the number of the house me and my husband conceived her/him in. He/she may then add to his/her kids last name, the number of the house the kids were conceived in. This will literally keep all the gharanas alive. Oh now I want to have a baby just so I can have her hate me for her unfortunate last name.
PS: I predict, 15 yrs from now, the world's going to have a lot of those kind of kids.

2008-08-19T17:05:00.000-05:00

So mom wants to know whats going on in my life. Not much actually, but anything and everything is good for her. However, there is a problem.I have a verh short term memory. Especially when it comes to good gossip or fun things that happened. Additionally, mom is maha social and therefore almost never at home. So IM'ing her is not really an option. But she still wants to know. ( and I want to tell, if only I remembered)

So what's the answer? Twitter of course. I thought of that when I opened my account on Twitter and opened an account for her too. But she really isn;t using it. Which makes sense. I mean if she is online, she might as well use skype and call me, instead of reading 140 charac filled bakwaas from me.

But mataG is maha texter. As is everyone in Mumbai I guess. So what if I configure her a/c for receiving texts? How would that work? I'm guessing incomings are free, so it wont cost her but how do you turn SMSes off at night?

So many things to figure out, but on paper, it does seem like a good idea..any suggestions/input?

I'd vote for her, if I could.

2008-08-05T18:44:00.004-05:00

Paris Hilton Responds to McCain Adfunny videosFunnyOrDie.com

See more funny videos at Funny or Die

In other things, is it just me, or is that actually Kareena Kapoor?

What's my style? (Not that it matters.)

2008-08-05T17:35:00.004-05:00

I've been watching 'What not to Wear' for a while now. I used to like it for a while, but now it just seems like they take people with individuality and and transform them into people with 'admin style'..you know, the style of those nice admin assistants you see in offices, who all look like they went to jcpenny on the same day?

Personally I don't have a 'style' but at the same time, I know what I like. I don't like to dress in solids too much. I don't like to have a 'signature style'. Also, department stores make me claustrophobic. I'm better off shopping at New York & Co. or Ann Taylor than Macy's or JCPenny, just because there I don't feel like all the clothes are out to eat me. Surprisingly, Walmart is not as claustrophobic..not even the supercenter.

I love prints. And I try to stick to the 'regulation' of one solid piece + one print at a time. And I am not scared of experimenting with prints.

So there. To use a term I've recently learnt, bite me.

OH btw, endless surfing @ bluefly.com, endless.com, zappos.com and etsy.com

In other things, I am thinking of starting a 'swear blog' in which I will use ALL the swear words I wanted to use in the day but couldn't. EFF EFF EFF. EFF you RIA.

And why the EFF is David Beckham endorsing EFFING Sharpies. oh wait, I actually could use the 'real words' in that sentence, so that stays on this blog. :)

Unfinished thoughts

2008-08-02T07:34:00.003-05:00

Saturday Mornings, a cup of coffee and a book. I am reading the chapter in which one of the protagonists mulls over books bought but never read. Which sit on the shelf, staring at you, sometimes angrily and sometimes pleading. I have many books of that kind. But I hope that one day, I will have given them away to someone who may turn their pages, slowly.

This particular book I have been reading for three weeks now, but have read only 173 pages so far. Not because it is a boring book, but because it is one of the most engaging books I've read in a long time. I am 'savouring' it.

But there is another book on which I might have spent the same amount of time, and read the same number of pages. But never completed the book. The name of that book is 'A Suitable Boy. By Vikram Seth. It is a book I have borrowed from the library many times, kept at my house through the loan period, and once even beyond. But I still cannot get beyond its first few pages. And then I find out the she has tried to read the same book four times, but each time got only as far as page 80.

It is too fat, the book. My hands hurt when I carried it from the library to home, and that took much of the excitement away. After that, I've tried to read it only to be able to keep up in conversations. but I have matured since then. If I cannot finish a book, it is acceptable. Trying to finish it would be like dragging a bad relationship. The sooner we part ways, the better.

noted

2008-07-24T21:00:00.003-05:00

So cliched, but its so easy being mean..

Its easy to ignore people and their moods and carry on life the way you want to

bleach in the pool does not smell the same as bleach in the kitchen.

Almost all Indians who swim, swim incorrectly. And create excessive splashing in the pool. Why is that? Did all the coaches go to one single convention and come back resolving to teach everyone the wrong technique? In case you're wondering, I swim the wrong way too..but trying to correct it.

Sort of keep coming back to the whole 'its easy being mean' funda.

Is the internet bad for science

2008-07-17T21:16:00.002-05:00

Asks a news line in my inbox.
Well I don't know, but all I know is Thank God for the internet and interlibrary express loans. Otherwise I would never have dreamed of graduating in the amount of time I dream to. :)

Of course, I don;t know another way. My researching days started only after the internet became as essential and easily available as air. So its the only way I know.

Returning Decades

2008-07-17T19:01:00.001-05:00

I got my first Glamour magazine in the mail today. It wasn't as fun as I thought it would be..their free tote bag was in fact better. But this issue did give me a useful piece of information.

The 90s are back. That gives me even more reason to wallow in nostalgia...the things I did and the things I missed out on.

Speaking of which, seems to me I missed the biggest trend in the 90s by hating boybands..but sorry thats not something i'm willing to do, even though the 90s are supposedly back.

Random recruiter tales

2008-07-15T08:48:00.000-05:00

A random recruiter probably got my contact information off one of the associations I am registered for. And now he keeps calling me every 4 months, asking me how much I have progressed and if I am getting such and such experience on my resume. I think I was just too kind when I talked to him before and said I will sent him some information, but now he just acts like he's my boss.. he asked me to send him my CV, something I haven't even looked at myself, so he could work on it. Dude! I am not ready. Back off! I just keep telling him I have no idea when I will graduate but he just doesnt get it as a sign to push off. Maybe its time to be more direct.And tell him I have little, if any, respect for people who use their initials as their names in professional settings.

Monkey off my back

2008-07-15T06:13:00.001-05:00

A recently got rid of a 'monkey off his back' when he took an exam he had to for a long time. I need to get two monkeys off my back. I don't understand why I am so incredibly slow when writing. I wonder how long it normally takes for people to write one manuscript. Going by the emails, one of them has been on my back for 3 weeks and the other for bluddy 4 years. The second one is just too much data and something I certainly don't want to do.
But must get both the monkeys off my back.. Have to get the printouts today and send them out to the other authors.

Monkey! Get off my Back!

not a word you hear everday

2008-07-13T20:31:00.001-05:00

Bucolic . So much more interesting than the vanilla 'rural'.

Then why does it remind me of a cow's stomach?

Possible apple tree

2008-07-13T19:45:00.000-05:00

That tree in the backyard? Might be an apple tree.. it had some very pretty blossoms in the fall and now has apple-y fruit. Don't eat those apples though.. the squirrels will get to them anyway.

Puppies or weddings pictures?

2008-07-10T21:59:00.003-05:00

Back in 1992 when I was a 12 yr old my youngest aunt was getting married in much pomp and all. Hours passed, and me and my sister dutifully fulfilled the roles of little flower girls, distributing flowers to one and all and generally having a ball throwing attar on women's silk sarees and akshata on bald men's heads. (of course there was some conflict resolution going on on the side..we had decided that the war between the TN team and the KB team had dragged on too long and a wedding was the perfect time to broker a peace deal).

While all that was real good fun nothing, really nothing, could come even a close second to 6 cuddly newborn puppies. I was 12 and my sister 10. Our maternal uncles ( who by the way were 19 and 22 at the time) convinced us that it would be superfun to go to another relatives house and name the 6 cuddly newborn puppies, and as a bonus, we would also meet Gauri, Shammi and Chikki. (Chikki was the puppies mom, Shammi HER mom and Gauri was the spinster grandaunt of the puppies).

We thought we'd be able to cut across to Bandra from Dadar, name the pups and come right back for the pictures, so we all slunk out. And off we went. But tell me, can a 12 or 10 year old keep track of time when something THIS cute is in her hands?

I blame my uncles for not keeping track of time.. and not taking us back to the wedding hall in time for my aunt's wedding pictures.. but honestly.. take a look at those puppies again.. you think a 22 year old guy can keep track of time surrounded by those cuties? I don't think so.

2008-07-03T07:19:00.000-05:00

Conflict resolution is mentally and emotionall draining, but it is your calling..

2008-06-27T21:00:00.003-05:00

And I thought I was self absorbed.

Decisions decisions decisions...

2008-06-19T13:07:00.001-05:00

So I am thinking about getting a new laptop.

Its a 3.5 yr old laptop and I have replaced the electric cord on it, added ram and some other things. In all, probably spent about $120 extra on those things.

Now frankly, it works just great, but has been hitting a few bumps lately. For but the past 2 days, the audio seems to be coming on and going off on its own.And yes, I've encountered the mysterious blue screen maybe once a year. So I wonder, even though this laptop 'fulfills' my needs, is it time to get a new one.

But somehow I'm hesitant, considering the fact that this one still does everything i need it to, and at a speed i am certainly not complaining about.

Now frankly I wouldn't have wondered about this but for the Macbook+ipod touch' deal. Getting those AND a free printer for 1k does not sound like a bad deal at all. Especially since my lil 700m is hiccuping the way it is.

On the other hand, I could get a free ipod touch in the next three months, so the free ipod touch deal suddenly becomes less lucrative...

I guess it depends on how long does a regular 700m lasts.

decisions decisions decisions..

Masala Turkey Meatloaf

2008-06-17T18:56:00.002-05:00

I'm constantly looking for recipes that can have prep time less than 15 minutes, so when I heard about meatloaf from my labmate, it was something I knew I wanted to add to my regulars menu.

However, we are a decidedly desi household. ( BTW, awesome term for our kind, coined by Inkspillz: DITLAWM (Double Income Two Lazy Asses Without Maid) And so anything we eat has to have a ton of spices in it. Also turkey is a 'healthier option' than beef, so if this had to become a regular, it would have to be a turkey dish.

So I tried the following steps for a killer Masala Turkey Mealloaf ( Hence refered to as MTM)

The basic recipe is hers, which is to combine the meat, stock, breadcrumbs and some spices and bake at 375F.

a) Mix the following ingredients together

1lb ground turkey
1/2 cup chicken stock
1/2 cup breadcrumbs
1tsp ginger garlic paste
1tsp coriander chutney
1tsp salt
1 cup egg beaters (equiv of 2 eggs)
1tsp any chicken gravy masala ( in my case it was a 'Malvani' masala from some shop in Mumbai. Does that mean the meatloaf becomes a Malvani Turkey Meatloaf? hmm)

Mash them together into a homogeneous paste and lay out thickly into a greased baking pan. The one I used was a square metal pan, 8x8x2 inch.

Bake @ 375 for 45 mins

Allow to cool. Enjoy with ketchup or gravy if you have the energy or patience to make it. If you want to make gravy, kindly google a recipe and let me know about it too!

As work proceeds at snail's pace..

2008-06-17T13:43:00.004-05:00

I am at that stage where we finally need to get out that piece of data thats been analyzed and re analyzed to death. So finally I have it written out, and things look okay and now I’ve been told to look for an appropriate journal for the same. Some of the things I was told to look out for were

a) Accessibility to users from our Univ?

b) Look at the articles you’ve been citing frequently, and determine which journals they are coming from. Then narrow it down to one or two from those

c) Impact factor. I wasn’t told to look for it, but still I’m looking at the journals the lab has previously published in, and trying to find a journal that has a+b characteristics as well as an impact factor in the same range as previously published works. Narrowed it down to two journals so far, and sent it to boss. Hopefully the work gets published in the near future.

Additional reading

2008-06-17T07:01:00.001-05:00

Summertime Rocks:

2008-06-15T11:13:00.003-05:00

FYI:

Touristy mom

2008-06-11T07:05:00.001-05:00

Mudder returns from a touristy trip to the UK. I am so damn proud of her. :) I always make plans to go somewhere nice, and then keep putting them off because a) I won't get leave b) It will eat into my India trip (too many of those happening, thanks to siblings and allies getting married).

At first, I was very apprehensive. But then I remembered who were talking about. This is the lady who went around NYC with a subway map and some cash and went around all the major points in the city and dragged dad along. At one point she decided she wanted to see the world famous Wall Street Bull (seriously, this guy is like the next Niagara Falls, inexplicable attraction point to the desis and Asians). So she just turned around and asked people 'Where is the bull?' To her credit she was in the wall street area, but seriously, what reaction did she expect. She calls me and goes 'hey I just asked a lady where the bull was and she said she didn't know which bull'. How can she be here and not know where the bull is.' ( well, actually it was sort of my fault. I had the total desi mentality and gave her half baked directions over the phone and then added a 'waha jaake kisi ko bhi pooch lena, bataa denge' at the end. )

But in the end, they made it to the Bull, and were very happy indeed.

This experience of hers made her more brave and she decided that this summer she could go to the UK. Dad put his foot down and refused any more adventurous travel, but mommy dearest had a friend who's going for a Europe tour, the friend is a very organized person, and they have common friends scattered all over the UK, who are more than willing to take them around. So she and friend I am told had a wonderful time out there. All I need is photographic evidence

This time when she did London though, my friends mom and dad took her around ( much like an insider's tour..they were visiting their daughter for a month, but live very close to my parents' place in Mumbai) I'm sure that wouldn't have stopped my mom from asking passersby random questions...I wonder though..what might she have asked? where is the queen? in any case, they all probably know the answer to that one.

2008-06-08T21:04:00.001-05:00

I am sick of it. Let me just get over with it already. Its like the ripping of a band-aid..I need to do it now, and fast. Of course, it will hurt when I do it. But after that, there won't be any pain!

Eroding social skills

2008-06-08T12:21:00.002-05:00

I think that's what's happened to me over the past few years. My social skills have gone from an average value, to perhaps downright unacceptable. I think I have lost the filter between my mind and my mouth.

No, there is a filter in place, its just that it gets too clogged up frequently, and then on one occasion just rips open and I end up causing a gigantic embarrassment. These days since I have realized the ripping of the filter, I tend to avoid situations which might cause an embarrassment, which is to say, I think I avoid any and all social interaction, beyond the lab. I should really get over that, and get back into the groove.

Declaration

2008-06-08T10:19:00.001-05:00

I love you,blog.

Dirty Kangaroo

2008-06-04T14:44:00.003-05:00

Recent events that conspired reminded me once again that for some reason, family members consider me to be the 'freak in the family', while sqrl/TA is viewed as the angel/know-it-all/'good one'. Fact is that she just uses a cold front in the face of everyone else and then her evil, silly side seems to surface on the blogs and when with me.

For example, she just explained to me why and how tissues are grinded with mechanical blades for use in the labs. This, in spite of knowing my total fear of blood and blades concerning others. Somehow, that conversation led to the discovery that the infamous Dirty Kangaroo poem we used to sing in school ( and more often to decide who's 'den' it is while playing in a group) is not to be found online.

So I have been assigned the honor of posting this for the benefit of future 'dirty kangaroo' googlers and nostalgic desis. I guess it goes well with my history of horrible animal related posts.

Warning : It is possibly the most disgusting thing I have ever sung. No animals were hurt in the making of this poem - god knows who made it - certainly not the Australian Tourism Board!!!

Dirty Kangaroo

Kangaroo, Kangaroo, Dirty Kangaroo,
Sitting on the railway, doing number two!

Number two is dirrrrtyy, wash it in the sea,
Cut it into pieces and have it with your tea!

Side Note : Why do bollywood songs have "ROO ROO ROO ROOOOOOOO, ROO ROO ROO ROOOOOOO", as background fillers???!!!

Also - interview of Dirty Kangaroo hisself :
My Fav Song : Roo-ba-Roo
Fav Movie : Roo-Dali
What I want in life : Roo-pees, lots of Roo-pees
Where to find kangaroo sarees in Mumbai : Roo-pam
Fav actor : Shah Roo-k
Fav food - Roo-Mali roti

Scene at the Indian restaurant

2008-05-30T19:26:00.007-05:00

The Indian restaurant I've been to a couple of times has this wonderful tapestry hanging from pushpins on the wall. At first glance, it looks like your regular Indian restaurant kitsch, but up on closer inspection, you realise its depth. It is a scene filled with dread and horror....

Allow me to dissect the scene

Its a ~~nice sunny day~~ dark scary night. The king and queen are out on their royal camel, accompanied by by their able guards.

HowEVER!

as seen in area 1: Two guards are making eyes at each other. Not to mention the sneaky hand holding..

As are the guards in area 4..perhaps some sweet nothings are being exchanged..

All the other guards either look stoned or are taking in the gossip to post it on their blogs.

If the guards are making eyes, the king and queen have to , too. (3)

And of course the camel's in looove..with superman?

And of course as the camel's trying to jump and catch up with superman and might just get tripped up by the wonderful pink dangling seat under his foot.

Tragedy, waiting to happen.

The Movie To-Do list.

2008-05-29T21:04:00.002-05:00

Kung Fu Panda

Get Smart

(actually caught a 30 min episode of the 'original' series on TV the other day..odd)

CJ7

Wall E

Sex and the City

(the last one to prove I'm not a 10 yr old)

PhD comics has a webcam in my life..

2008-05-23T12:33:00.002-05:00

This is my idea of a free shopping spree..

Presentation freaking out

2008-05-22T05:01:00.002-05:00

I'm officially nervous. I am supposed to give a tiny presentation at 10 am and I haven't rehearsed for it yet. It is data that I have frankly been around for too long. And the presentation is part of one I gave in February. I have been taking things too lightly, but I sooo soo hope this does not come back to bite me.

Waiting for 10.20 am..

Frustrating Connectivity Issues

2008-05-20T17:23:00.001-05:00

Summer's here and I am trying to spend as much time as possible outside on the deck, writing. I'd like to do that for an extended period of time and it looked like I might be able to do it: I found a little electric outlet on the outside of the house, which would take care of the charging. But, I just cannot get my computer to connect to the internet Its weird, because distance-wise, the laptop is closer to the router than anywhere else in the house (except the same room, in which case you don't really need a router. I get a connection sometimes, but it is so slow and painful and gets dropped in 10 seconds. I wonder if there is something I'm not doing right. The minute I open the patio door and step inside, the connection is wonderful.

Oh well, at least this is a frustrating, but most likely overcome-able problem

Good intentions, bad narcolepsy.

2008-05-19T12:59:00.001-05:00

:)dont have time to elaborate. funny.

2008-05-18T10:12:00.003-05:00

Update: So I finally have time to elaborate. Danny Bhoy and I have similar opinions about Brett Lee.

Oh! And so does the entire nation of Australia, apparently

No one can beat Godzilla

2008-05-07T22:50:00.001-05:00

A picture is worth a 1000 words. But till I get that, here is the explanation :

Some meetings just seem to drag on and on and on and on I tell you. Today I was in this monkey discussion which seemed to be basically about how we could climb banana trees to get to the fruit instead of having a giraffe break them down for us.

Cryptic, cryptic.

Anyway - given how short my attention span is and I always start doodling even if something highly exciting is in the making. I picked up my thermocol glass and drew a flower with a cute little bunny next to it. Aww. I guess I was in a sober mood.

Two minutes later, I look at the glass and to my horror see that there was a shapeless monster about the devour the bunny!

Apparently I was not the only one looking to escape. My colleague, let's call her Lilac ( coz thats her favorite flower), had so deviously drawn said monstah on the cup!

I am not one to let monstahs wreck peaceful bunny lives. Powerpuff girl after all. So, soon we had a giant hairy, wart filled foot about to step on the monstah!!!

Not to be outdone, a fire that was about to burn the giant foot as it was about to step on the monstah that was about to eat the bunny appeared.

Followed by my aluminium watering can that was about to extinguish the fire.

This one took time to appear, but next thing you know, there was a recycling truck with "I <3 to eat Aluminium" written on it, about to get the can.

Call it being competitive or maybe we just ran out of space. I got the last word with Godzilla, saying he loves to eat trucks, about to eat the truck that was about to get the can that was about to water the fire that was about to burn the foot that was about to step on the monstah that was about to eat the bunny. And NO ONE CAN BEAT GODZILLA - GROWRRR!!!

Unresolved meeting issue : was the bunny going to eat the flower?

2008-05-06T16:08:00.001-05:00

This week is commencement. Students all around me a excited about finally graduating and having their moment under the sun after years of hard work. (I imagine..the only real conversation I've had today was with a rat..an imaginary one at that) . At least I was super excited about getting my masters degree and actually bought a $39.99 (whoa!) suit. My aunts flew in for the occasion and they we even had a little party at home. ( All 4 roommates were graduating and so had relatives and such over.) But last year, I had an interesting experience. I was at the home of a relative, a very senior professor. He had to attend the graduating ceremony. And was not happy about it. He was not happy about the fact that he was going to have to sit on the stage, listening to endless 'inspiring' speeches, only to go up to the stage for 1 minute to 'hood' his students.
And thats when it struck me. Imagine, for a student graduating is something that happens 2, maybe 3 times in their lives. Professors have to go through the process over and over again. Is it
inevitable that you become so cynical about the process when you have to show up every year, that too all dressed up in uncomfortabe academic regalia.
I am going to have work extra hard in the lab. Because I'm going to attend my graduation (whenever that it) and I need to make up for putting my advisor through it. :)

feeling down? dig deeper.

2008-04-25T18:36:00.002-05:00

When there are problems in your life, people say it is important to focus on the positive aspects in your life. My experience is focusing on the biggest screw up in your life helps you realize how small or insignificant this current one is.

Name Change

2008-04-18T18:53:00.003-05:00

For so long I've been meaning to officially change my last name after marraige..but never did it. I'm probably going to go the hyphen way, but have always wondered does the maiden name come first or the married. Apparently it doesn't matter. But this linkhelped me decide. By using the married name first, I move from #20 to #1 in the alphabet. Talk about using an unfair advantage.. On the other hand, anecdotal evidence does not support the study mentioned above..results did not come out to be statistically significant.. So may be its just a sample pool thing?

Some thoughts:

2008-04-15T15:57:00.001-05:00

Now is a good time to start clicking..

I am SO behind on my writing that its not even funny anymore.

I am a little behind on my printing, but that'll get done tomorrow.

Need dressy shoes for Thursday. Thursday is a packed day.

twitter?

pikwik sqrl encourages you to

2008-04-12T07:59:00.000-05:00

eet sum mor :)

Overheard

2008-03-13T07:33:00.000-05:00

Labmate introduced me to a website called 'Overheard in New York'.
Fun stuff. Adds to my afternoon addictions of this and this passivaggressivenotes.com and icanhascheezburger.com.

So in the spirit of the newly found website, let me give you a few of my own

Overheard somewhere not so far away, not so long ago:

'How can something so complex be by chance? ' talking about evolution

'DO you believe the end is near?'. talking about what else, the end.

'Its always the non believers that are the problem', talking about moi?

Where's a running train when you need one.

Wierd story in Goa.

2008-03-10T11:36:00.001-05:00

Police men in goa will hide on top of a ghat to catch errant drivers. For example: poor lil biker goes whistling to the top of the ghat only to find policemen waiting there to welcome him. There is no where he can turn. the only way out is down, and that is where the police are waiting. the poor man is caught, and he pays his fines/bribes. But he wants to save others to the same trickery he fell for. So as he;s going down, he starts warning bikers coming up the other side by signalling 'helmet, helmet', to one and all. And guess what, thanks to his warning sign, the bikers unlock the helmet they have hitched on the back of the bike, wear it and move ahead. Ahh such community living. Help each other. I am sure a similar thing happened on the other side of the ghat as well. The police were probably left wondering how come suddenly everyone has a helmet on. The only thing not there was a lil helmet hawker at the base of the ghat. But I am sure one will come along soon.

irobot

2008-03-08T17:07:00.003-05:00

I am stuck in a room with no windows right now, with three machines buzzing around me like crazy. Do they have minds? Maybe they do. For the nth timethe instrument I work with decided to act up. It;s not the instrument's fault really, but once in a while, the computer that manages the instrument is not on talking terms with it, and decides to go on strike. And EVERY single time that happens, I happen to be using it.

When it happened for the millionth time today, I finally gave up and burst into tears. I called up A and sobbed about how the instrument has never ever co-operated with me, and I always have to spend more time than anyone else has to.

I hung up, and decided to give it one last try. And its back on. Its wierd. Did the instrument feel sorry for me? Maybe. I dont know what it is, but something tells me we need to get a new computer around here.

Junk food for the mind

2008-03-08T11:16:00.002-05:00

Over dinner, discussion with Pauser and gang soon disintegrated into the usual trashy topic of who's going out with who in Bollywood, and forecasts on people's careers in Bollywood. Of course, Pauser was highly impressed by my knowledge in all things Hindi movie.

So now Pauser has resolved to keep up with all news Bolly related by reading Mid-Day. OF course, that isnt going to be enough, since DNA and Mumbai Mirror are eating into Mid-day's territory, but you won't get news like OOOH Ranbir is dating Deepika....who at last count had at least 4 boyfriends ( series, not parallel) anywhere else.

And not to mention Manish Malhotra's catty remarks about Vidya Balan being the Paris Hilton of India. ( I dont think Vidya says 'that's hot', but whatever) Now Vidya baby had the guts to call a spade a spade, and Malhotra's ugly designs in Heyy Babyy, well, ugly. Of course she went and out fugged her Hayy Babyy days @ Filmfare decreasing a credility by a huge chunk, but come on Manish, your ICL costumes are a huge dhabba on your credo.

Anyway, this is such a random post.. I am off junk food you see.. no soda, no pizza nothing. So I have to satisfy my junk cravings via Mid-day...Thank you God, for Mid-day.

OF course, for all the details on the lattest gossip on Vidya-Mal snarky snark snark, and Ranbir's declaration of true date, visit www.mid-day.com

New look

2008-03-07T23:12:00.002-05:00

Maybe its the glasses, but this template just makes me want to post something more wicked than ever.

Class report

2008-03-07T22:28:00.002-05:00

Went to my first ever painting class last week. I had registered on a whim, so when the first day of class arrived, i was seriously jittery. what if everyone else knows exactly what they are doing, they discover I don't? As I confessed to my sister, I can't paint shit. (The accomplished artist that she is, she told me its quite easy, just paint a suspicious blob in burnt sienna.. )

So anyway, i went to this class, and for the first time EVER, I felt like I was in another country. In so many years of being in the us, it was probably my first time being the only person in the room with non-American parents. And the first time being the only non white person in a room. It was like I had walked into a weird scene in desperate housewives.. and there was a doctor there too. His name wasn't Rex, so he's probably going to be around for a while. :) Of course, people had trouble pronouncing my name, and of course, I rolled the R more severely than necessary, just for kicks. But finally we settled on sqrl, the way Americans say it. After all, I don't really swallow the Rs in their names, so why should I expect them to roll the one in mine. RRRRRight?

The instructor was the cutest grandma, and grandmas are cute everywhere, even if they are the meanest little grandmas. But this lady was cuter than MY grandma. ( who incidentally was a teacher herself..hmm..) She put the newbies at ease, and gave us a quick run through of what supplies we'll need to get based on what our preferences are ( traditional oils, water mixables, acrylics). I've chosen water mixables, because apparently, they are more forgiving than acrylics, but less messy than traditional oils. And we were also told to look out for coupons in the papers for art supplies. otherwise this is going to be an expensive affair indeed.

And she told us to get a scene we'd like to paint. The first one, for starters has to be a simple one, with some water or sky, some grass and maybe a tree. So I am thinking of taking this one below. Even for future projects, I am thinking of taking my own photographs.

And yeah, she also told us what paints to get. The primaries, a white and a brown. I am thinking of taking burnt sienna to paint a suspicious blob in the grass we're going to paint.

Silly panic beeping in the RAV4

2008-03-05T19:32:00.003-05:00

We bought the RAV4, keeping in mind the snowy weather here, and the fast formation of black ice on the streets. Of course, for the past 1.5 yr, we haven't had any problems, probably thanks to three factors: 'Intelligent four wheel drive' on the RAV4, the city's efficient snow clean up. ( It really is, at least on the main streets and highways.) and EXTREME defensive driving efforts on our part.

BUT in the past week, the car skid twice, once on a left turn and once on a right turn. The bad part wasn't the fact that the car skid. I understand that no matter how 'intelligent' your four wheel drive is, there are some things it just cannot handle.

What annoyed me is the rapid panic beeping sound makes when the car gets out of control. I mean come ON! I know the car is out of control, I am doing my best to get it back in control, I don't need your helpful rapid beeping to send me into panic mode. I'm sure the driver's anxiety level goes 10x higher after hearing the beep. It's like the car telling you 'oops, you're on your own now,buddy.' And the car started beeping for a little skid, making things seem more serious than they actually were.

The wierdest part was looking for a settings button on the car. :) And realising, this isn't a phone. Need to go back to the manual to check how to stop that annoying sound.

Anyway, here's how to control a skidding Rava:

'Toyota says the new RAV has a unique electric power steering system that should help control skids. If you start skidding and turn the wheel the correct way to stop the skid — that is, steer left if the back end is skidding left — the system provides normal power assistance. If you turn the wrong way — which would make the skid worse — you get no power assistance. That's an obvious clue you're doing it wrong, and it slows your ability to exaggerate the skid.'

Get this out of my head, please~

2008-03-03T19:38:00.000-05:00

Did she just say what I thought she said

2008-03-03T19:25:00.001-05:00

Kajol in U Me and ho-hum

maine to manga tha saheli jaisa saiiyan
palle pada paheli jaisa saiiyan.

Not quite a century

2008-03-02T16:02:00.003-05:00

Scared of a century, so I keep deleting my 'what was I thinking' posts to keep the total posts < 100. Come to think of it, this post will be deleted tomorrow.