Last Blog for 2008

So when 2007 ended finally, I thought that 2008 will become better for me. Somehow it feels that there is this line that if we cross at 12.00am into Jan 1st every year, things will suddenly become better. But trust me, life is not so clear cut with boundaries. One thing flows into another easily. And I carried all the not-so-fun times from 2007 into 2008.

Here is my diary of things that happened in the wonderful and totally memorable 2008 (being sarcastic). This will remain as one of the years that I will always remember for the rest of my life, for all the bad things and the few good things :)

January

• G, myself and S are alone for the second time, but this time for a long long time to come.
• S turns three months old.
• S has her first ever ear infection.

February

• G leaves me for the first time ever on an official tour for a week.
• S has her first ever eye infection.
• She also gets a mild cough.
  

March

• G gets flu
• I get flu
• S gets flu, in short we are all flu-ed
• G leaves me for the second time ever on an official tour for four days when I am still sick...
• S gets her second ear infection.
  

April

• After almost 5 ear infections and 6-7 antibiotics dosages we get S her tubes on her 6 month birthday! Great gift.

May

• S gets Urinary tract infection, thanks to all the antibiotics!
  
• S gets slapped cheek syndrome.

June

• G is admitted in a hospital for the first ever time in his entire life for five days and four nights. What an adventure. All of us are freaked out. The kind doctor tells us that he has never ever seen anyone in his condition alive before. I freak out more!
  
• G goes again to the hospital but this time for just one night.
• G goes once more but just for a few hours.
  

July

• We go for our first ever three day vacation to NC, my bro's house for the 4th.
• G's mom joins us

August

• G gets hand foot and mouth disease from someone at work.
• S gets that from daddy.

September

• We do our first ever drive from Dallas to Houston with S and G's mom. G has problems sitting and driving the car but we manage and have fun.

October

• S turns one.
• My parents also join us and stay with us for a week.
• G's parents go to Houston. Once again just the three of us for a month...
• S gets ear infection again.
• G undergoes a small procedure.

November

• G starts feeling better finally.

December

• G's parents leave. Once again all alone, just like we were when the year started.
  
• Going to our second ever flight trip to CA, lets see how that goes...then it will be 2009 by the time I can pen back!

Cheers, and wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a bright and prosperous new year 2009.

Da Frand...Dosth dosth na raha....

I recently saw pics of an old friend. A friend who went to college with me, a senior in my undergrad days. Things those days was very simple, take the morning college bus to college, get ragged and come back home cranky and then bitch about seniors over the phone with classmates for hours.

This girl in particular was considered to be scary because she actually ragged. But then she was also a city dweller like myself and we in fact lived in the same neighborhood. Ergo same bus. She was nice to me. She always let me sit next to her and also lent her shoulder a couple of times to me when I dozed off. And without a doubt we hit it off.

We had the same taste in food, clothes, men, fun, etc. Often times she would pick me up and we would hang out just the two of us, shopping, and watching movies. Lets call my friend, M...

Like everyone else, we promptly lost touch with each other right after we graduated from college. I moved to US and she to "I-don't-know-where." So I recently looked at her photo in one of my other senior's photo album and memories came back flooding to me.

One incident that I clearly remember is us going for a drive to Besant Nagar Beach at 8 in the night to meet her then boyfriend (now husband). The weather was ready for a down pour and I was not sure I wanted to go 25kms with her. But she desperately needed my company as the two of them were having some issues and meeting him might solve it. She pleaded me. I knew mom will say a NO...so I told her partial truth and went with friend on the pretext of doing some college work. We were struck by a thunderstrom and I really cannot imagine how we made it back home at 12 in the night with waters raising every minute on the roads and my mom waiting at the verandah concerned. The minute I saw amma, I could see that her expression changed from relief to anger, and this was pre-cell phone days...

Anyways, the other incident was when we were working on her thesis submission and our own design submission during my third year second semester. M and I sat in her house wondering how bored we were. So I reminded her that it would be fun if V was with us then. This was at 1.30am. She quickly jumped up and told me that we should just go and pick V up and that would be a swell idea.

We got out of the house and to our dismay we saw that her car was sandwiched between her house and her tenants car. It was the middle of the night but M being M decided to wake up her tenants at 1.30am. The door was opened by this cute guy, whom I knew as acquaintance****. He was stunned, shocked, angry, but quickly changed his demeanor to that of friendly when he saw me and obliged to move his car out of the way. We told him that the only way he can do it without waking her parents would be to push his car out. With the help of M's housekeeper we pushed his car out and then pushed ours out, all in an attempt not to wakeup M's sleeping family and then drove off 20 kms to pick V up.

When we got back home it was 3.30am. V still confused with the usual how, why, when, what and was wide awake. tired and done with all the exitement both M and I promptly crashed leaving V to ponder if we were crazy!!!

Whenever I was with M, I have always done something crazy, until one day she acted wierd with me when I was talking to her boyfriend. As if I was flirting with him or something. I was hurt and after that I lost touch with her and we moved apart...there ended a good friendship because of one silly act.

Now I see her in the photo, married to the same guy with a little son and I wonder why she behaved like that towards me, especially when I was a part of all her fun times and I did not do anything to make her think that I would snatch her BF away...

Anways...hopefully next time I am in Bengalooru I will get back in touch with her. Can't loose sleep over useless things from the past...I have the future to live and friends to make and keep :)


PS: **** indicated that this cute guy (CG1) was a friend of another cute guy 2 (CG2) from SVCE. I had gone there for intra college culturals and won prize for Dumbcharades and Rangoli. On our way back home we were sitting in the, the above mentioned cute guys behind me and CG2 could not stop talking to me. After a few months they came to our college for some Engineering Symposium and CG2 came hunting me down. Unfortunately I was MIA that day :(. There ended something that could have been...because we were so into each other then in just that one plus hours of flirting.
CG2...engirundhalum Vazhga... (live happily wherever you are).

If I had the choice

of meeting an Indian actor, then it would be...


Surya!


I always loved Rajnikanth. Grew up watching his movies, his stunts, and watching my friends imitate everything about him. He was a star, today an icon and will be a legend tomorrow. And of course I would like to meet him.

But if you asked me now, I think it is Surya. He is not overtly handsome, can act, is totally cool, can match Aamir, Sallu and Hrithik on Physique, can match SRK on screen presence and yet is so South Indian.

I always tell G, that there is a thing about South Indian men. They might not be hugely tall, or fair or anything like what Sallu or Hrithik are but they definitely do not border on looking like women either. Surya does not need a mustache to make him look like a man. He is the perfect representation we can ask for.

Ajith too fair to represent the pamara (aam) South Indian and Vijay too average looking, but Surya has the combination cut out for him.

Ya, it is him. No two ways about it!

I think I am a...

CLOSET SHAH RUKH KHAN fan!

Totally. I think I like him. I like his movies. Other than K3G and Veer Zara. The rest of mostly tolerable and his presence in a movie actually makes me want to watch it (like most of India does).

But. But, I don't think I will ever accept in the open like my friend RJ or SJ do. I wont go gaga for him in public. I am very diplomatic when people ask me. I tell them, that I do not hate him and do not mind him.

Which is why G reasoned with me two nights ago on our drive back home from Sams Club that he thinks I am a closet SRK fan. I am not aware that I like him.

Then I reasoned with him why I don't really feel bad about it (I would have cried myself to death if anyone had told me that I was a closet AB or AB Jr. fan).

• I like the way he dances. You should try to imitate the steps he does in the song "mahi ve" from KHNH. The grace he has is so difficult to get to. I know this because six-eight of us tried to imitate him while we were rehearsing for a friend's engagement party and all of us sucked! I would like think that I did not, but...
  
• He is self made...I really do not want to know how he got where he is now and his relationship to Mr. K. JO and so on...but he, like my other favorite Rajnikanth, came into the industry without having a star backing and are shining bright now.
• He has stage presence. He is not immensely handsome but he is superbly charismatic.
• He loves his wife.
• A good businessman.
• He is into chick-flicks and so am I.
• He has a sense of humor.

I might have more to add, but you can help me too...

Tera Time Paisa, Aur Mera Time Waisa?

I hate going to doctors. The reasons are multi-fold:

• Dentists plain and simple hurt you.
• Eye doctors ask you to judge your vision.
• General Physicians want to draw blood.
• Gynaec's want to smear you.
• And if you go to any other doctor then you are in some trouble!

All doctors as much as they save lives, are trouble and inconvenience. I wish I did not have to say that but it is so true. How many times have you been pleasantly shocked when a doctor walks into the room when you are only two minutes into the second article on Parenting book?

I wonder why they all have Parenting Books, there are non-parents too you know, and parents who don't want to read a bunch of commercials, get Reader's Digest or US Weekly for the love of God.

I digress. Most of my experiences are doctor's office has been spent staring at the wall with a cheap photo or a mass produced art work sitting smug on a cheap frame. My Gynaec during my pregnancy was the worst. Her name was Dr. Kathleen F. Varadi and she works near Plano Med Center in Texas. She absolutely sucks. She has made me wait for two hours once without an apology. She walks in and kicks me out in two small minutes with terse replies and annoying attitude. She was one of my wrong decisions.

I had just delivered S and she was stitching me up with a tech asked her if it was a 3rd degree or 2nd degree episiotomy, when she cooly turned and said, make it 2nd, I got cited for too many 3rds...I sat there wondering WTF!

Now the general physician that I just found is not bad. She is talkative and spends time talking to me and understanding my problems, but then I just don't like the place. It is not like what you call patient friendly. I hate the nurse there and the others who seem to give me the impression that they are doing me a favor.

Anyhoo, the point is:

• All (99%) the doctors take their patient's time for granted.
• They overbook themselves so that if anyone cancels out last minute they can still mint money to pay towards their student loans and their $3 million mansions and oh don't forget the Lexus.
• They make you wait and feel that you should not complain.
• Their waiting rooms suck.
• They can cancel out on you and give you no excuse but you get slapped with $45 if you cancel out last minute on them.
• They can make you wait for 2 hours but you cannot be late by 10 minutes.
  
• The minute they walk out of the room you cannot remember any last minute question and ask them. They avoid you like plague and run and hide in their rooms. I know this for a fact because I designed and built two Medical Office Buildings in Dallas and all the doctors we were involved with wanted this convenience where they can go into hiding the minute they leave you in the room.
  

I can go on, but prefer to stop. One last doctor, Steven Peskind, Bab's ENT made me wait for the third time for forty five minutes. Just before he left the room he asked me, "so I will see you in six months?"

I told him, "No you won't."

He stopped in his tracks and looked back and asked me, "Why? Why do you say that?"

I replied, "I hate to loose my job because I spent an hour and half in the doctor's office waiting for him to come in spite of having an appointment."

"Did they do that to you?"

"I am not sure if they did, but you did."

"Sorry, I will make a note of it and make sure that this will never happen to you. Will you come back in six months now?"

"Ok."

I spoke, because I was mad, how many of us do? I should have told off my stupid gynaec Varadi when she made me wait 2 hours or 3 hours when I was pregnant and still working. But I did not then, I am done with taking their crap. If their time is so valuable that they don't have to be accountable for it to us, then I have choices too and I will find myself one who is more relaxed and punctual. Not like I expect immediate attendance, a 10-15 minute wait is ok...not an hour!

Tera khoon khoon, mera khoon pani??!!!! Damn it!

PS: Doc's nowadays rarely spend saving lives, they spend more time saving dollars! !@#@#$@#$@#$@#$

A Story

Not long ago a wise person once told me a story. And I told Shilpa that I will write about it in response to her comment on my blog so here it is...

The story goes like this and it is retold by me so bear with mistakes and inconsistencies.

In England apparently they would remove the grass that grew in front of all important buildings during winter, roll it up, take it to a green house so that they can maintain it from getting destroyed and bring it back the following spring. This made the grass look green and healthy. So one researcher took it upon himself to do a small but long experiment.

He chose a ten acre piece of land and divided it into two halves. On both halves he sowed grass seeds, but he chose to maintain one like what they did to the grass in front of the buildings and the other he decided to let it grow on its own.

After ten years he conducted an experiment to check out what was left in terms of strain in the grass the grew on the two halves.

The first half, the well maintained one, showed that there was only one strain of grass left in it.
The other half, the naturally growing one, showed that there were about ten strains of grass still left in it from the original mix. One strain survived in moisture, while another survived rot, another was strong in winter, while one was strong in summer and so on. There was a diversity here that made the grass always look green.

The first half, well maintained strain would not survive past a spring if it were left to be on its own. All the other dominant strains had died and only one survived.

The moral of the story is that the more diverse we are the more strong our chances of survival is. If we try and force to make all of us to think alike and believe in everything alike, then we will never be able to survive past one summer...I think this story is very apt in the current scenario.

Monday Blues...

This weekend I did quite a bit of cooking. Nothing major, did not invite anyone home or stuff like that, but then it was a pretty much stay at home and chill weekend. So I helped MIL with the housely chores. Now MIL does cooking the traditional way, ie to make masala fresh, to make pickles in the house, to cook at the beck and call of her lazy ass son or her dear hubby, to cook fresh food for Babs every day and so on...and then there is me! The quintessential lazy ass!

Things I realized:

• Had I been born a few decades ago, chances of my survival would have been bad.
• Had I been born a few centuries ago, chances of my survival would be nil.
• I like to cook simple and fast. Even if it making 2 minutes maggi noodles, I will try and look for a shortcut.
• I love cleaning more than cooking.
• I will do anything to avoid cooking.
• I miss those days when I lived alone when an apple pie or maggi noodles made my day!

The reason for the first two points are because of the fact that cooking in the good old days was not simply add garam masala or pav bhaji masala...the first step would have started with doing those darn masalas.

I Imagine myself thinking a day ahead that I would like to eat chole masala. Soak the chole, and then the next morning prepare the masala, and then make the batura. I swear to god, all I see myself doing would be spending the rest of my life in the kitchen...a kitchen where we would have a chulha and not a flat top cooking grill.

Imagine making idli or dosa. This would mean planning two days ahead and then grind the paste and all that big deal. Even making dahi. I remember my mom making dahi every other night. I load the dishes in the dishwasher and forget to turn it on, that is how lazy I am!

Or making Chapathi, we would have to make the powder from the grain. Can you imagine? Ya granted those old lady's of yore did not go to full-time work and kitchen was their work, still, I would rather sit at work than in the kitchen!

Do any of you also feel like I do??!!!

PS: New header!

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I am lost for words. I am not sure what to write either. Whatever I have to say has already been written somewhere on the www or it might sound cliched and untrue. Whatever I want to say might not come out the right way because I am still brimming with anger and words become daggers when you are angry.

But I know this for sure, something has to be done now. I am really hoping that the peaceful protest/demonstration in Bombay and Delhi do mount up to something. Change in our political system is going to be snail slow, but there should be a start. I hope the people don't once again give up and move on with their lives when things don't seem to change.

Anyways, I signed up at www.smallchange.in have you? This is one step that I can take living away from my homeland and hopefully we all can do our bit to the country.