Trick Or Treat

If some kid were to ask me "Trick or Treat?" just a few years ago, the kid would probably stumble upon my answer. Now I know when this is asked. My first year of stay in the US included some interesting events... Halloween was one of them. I was invited to an interesting Halloween party in the office. It was a lunch party. I had little or no clue on I should expect at the party. It was one of the first parties I attended at work and I neatly dressed myself in one of my best formals. As anyone would guess, I looked very different from the rest of the "Veteran" crowd present at the party. Thankfully I had company in another friend "B" and we decided we would stick with each other the entire party. I remember twisting my eye brows on seeing spider webs at the cornet of the table as I entered the party hall ... I had whispered to myself " How untidy !!!" Now when I think back, I must confess it was one of the best arranged "Theme Parties" that I have attended.
My first Halloween experience at home was rather disappointing. My husband had informed that the kids in the neighborhood would come by for candies. So I neatly arranged our living room and spread a variety of candies and cookies on trays. I was eagerly waiting for the kids to show up .. but that was not to be... I was disappointed that evening I must confess. I later learnt that a pumpkin at the door ensured that the kids would stop by ... The kids took no pumpkins by the door as a sign for no candies. Of course, there were exceptions to this rule as well :)
I have never ever dressed myself for Halloween and I sometimes fail to understand why people dress up in scary attires. But this year, there is a Halloween party at my daughter's school and the teachers want all the toddlers to dress up for Halloween and participate in the potluck lunch. My brain started comtemplating various costumes for my little one from the day I learnt about the party. One thing I was sure was that my daughter would not wear any scary costume. Also, I didn't want to buy the costume.After a little thought / discussion we decided on the butterfly costume.
So this saturday evening was spent in designing / shopping and putting together the "Butterfly costume". I could have very well bought some costume ... but I knew of the emmense satisfaction that comes with making a costume from scratch at home. My husband helped in giving it some final touches as well. I must admit, it has turned out to be a unique costume and I seem to like it.
I now only hope that my toddler daughter does not play spoil sport and not wear it ... I would be disappointed then :(
I have been tuning her of the wonderful colors on the wings of the butterfly and how good she looks with the wings ... hopefully she is keep them on tomorrow for the Halloween party :)

Rain Rain go away, Come again another day

Its just the first week of Oct and its already started raining here and is getting colder by the day ! It had been raining all the way till the last week of April and some showers in May and rain is already here :( Summer felt way too short ! Had so many plans for this summer and now looks like I almost have to wait another 6-7 months ! My plans for this summer included

1. Atleast a couple of visits to the beach ... walking by the cold waves (because its Pacific ocean ... I am not crazy about the cold water, but I am used it now) in the hot sun. This followed by a light snack / lunch (never forget food anywhere I go.... do I ???) and may be beach volleyball or cricket or just sea shell hunting or making sand castle.
2. Visit the farmer's market at Half moon bay and taste their heavenly strawberrys and fresh peas.
3. A get-together with friends and family at a local park where the kids could get busy with slides and swings while the adults could play a game of Antakshari / Dum Cherrads or Bingo.
4. A visit to the local zoo
5. A visit to the water park (I am still not sure about this one, because I do not enjoy a lot of the rides here and the entry fee is way too expensive not to be used)
6. Couple of visits to the temple and if possible prepare some "Prasad" for the devotees.
7. Long drives
8. Ice cream at Ghiradelli square ( need not necessarily be summer ... but it featured in my "To do this summer" list. )

No I did not prepare a list, but in my mind I wanted to do all these things and more. Only a few of these were accomplished and now I have to wait for the next summer :(
Don't get me wrong... I don't detest the rains .... I enjoy them and am already preparing my list for the days ahead ... of course in my mind ! There are quite a few interesting things I prefer doing during the rains like

1. Cozing up with a warm blanket / comforter on my rocking chair and looking outside the patio door and listening to the rain and smelling it. (I just love that smell)
2. Watching an old comedy on TV with complete Bose stereo effect. If the movie happens to be "Makkala Sainya" (kannada movie) or "Andaaz Apna Apna " or "Chashme Baddoor" .. that would be almost perfect.
3. Listening to some soothing Carnatic classical music while rocking on the chair ... simply divine !
4. Then of course, muching on churmuri or hot spicy pakodas ... yum yum !!! (especially if someone prepared it for me)

I am sure there are many more things I could come up with for the rainy days ... its been just 2 days since it has started raining and I already have somethings planned out ! The only problem is most of these things end up just being planned ... there is something or the other that comes up and I end up not accomplishing most ! As you would notice most of my planing involves me doing "Nothing" and unfortunately with a toddler around in the house, doing nothing is almost close to "Impossible".
But as my husband keeps reminding me even Impossible says I m possible.... I would like to plan out my activities for the rainy days !

Trike a Thon

This friday was a special day for me. It was the first event I attended in school as a PARENT ! I have participated in numerous events in school as a student ... so this was kinda a special to me. There was a fund raising event called "Trike-A-Thon" at school. I vaguely remember something similar that I had participated when I was in 3rd or 4th grade as part of "Girl Guide".
A trike a thon is an event where in the kids are to tri-cycle or bi-cycle certain laps. This is a fund raising event and the kids are expected to collect the money. The amount thus collected is donated to a Cancer research center. I think its a noble idea to donate money to cancer research, but wonder how a 2 year old can raise money ???
Anyways, since I wanted my daughter to participate in the event, we donated some amount. The day before the event, we had to leave the tricycle at the school so that the teachers could decorate it. They also wanted to rehearse the event.
On the day of the event, after constant reminding from us my daughter was ready for the event. As we approached the school ground, to her surprise, instead of finding just her classmates, she found the entire school students peddling to glory. She was intimidated by the crowd to say the least. Her class teacher handed me her driver's license card (kinda cute, I thought), and I put on her helmet and encouraged her to peddle her tricycle. But all in vain ... she was not to move. She felt lost in the crowd. After a few minutes of looking around she started spotting her classmates at one corner of the playground. That put her to ease. I could see the sudden rise in her excitement and all she now wanted to do was peddle with her classmates. It was turn for her class to peddle around the ground and my little was all set by then. She looked adorable with the helmet and a little license hanging around her neck.
I tried to capture the event in all possible angles with my camera :) It was definitely lots of fun for me. Soon it was time to come back to classroom and all the little ones soon formed a train as per the class teacher's instruction. Soon, I waved bye to my little one and got back home.

Unrelated blabberings

• One of my good friends and collegemate moved to the bay area on a long term assignment. She visited us last weekend and I met her husband for the first time. We chatted for a while and recollected some our silly moments in the college. One thing we both haven't forgotten is our regularity in postponing the internals during Engineering days. There was perhaps not a single internal test which we didn't postpone .... still makes me wonder how we managed to achieve that feat !!!
• Daughter of another good friend of mine turned one over the weekend. I still remember the planning for her surprise baby shower we hosted last year ! Time sure flies so fast !
• We finally decided we needed to take a break from work (the last few months have been especially stressful for my husband). We have finally booked our vacation tickets in December ! I have something exciting to look forward to !
• Not making a habit to blog regularly makes to forget blogging altogether ! Hence decided to write ... even if it were unrelated events !

Dumb

I was expecting a call from my personal banker this morning. She had left a message for me that she would call me at a certain time today. So I knew, it was her when my phone rang. I thought she was quite punctual and admired her time keeping. I answered the phone with a low tone, saying "Hello"... she kept repeating "Hello, Hello..." and then hung on me after a few seconds. My low tone was so low, that she hadn't heard me .... I was dumb (pun intended). You see I have a sore throat so bad that I am hardly able to talk audibly. Its been so bad that I am using internal messaging to send across my comments / inputs for the office meetings that I am dialing into.
My daughter has learnt to reply back in the low tone (almost like whispering) as well. I don't want to think she is teasing me ... I will assume she is being patient with me. But I miss my voice when:

• I read Dora books to my daughter. This morning the first thing she wanted to do as soon as she woke up was watch Dora on TV. Since we would not oblige on that demand, she settled for reading. My husband was too sleepy to read a book and so I gave in to her request. I must admit, I almost fell asleep reading the book in the most inaudible voice.
• Attending office conferences
• Talking to my sister over the phone.
• Humming a few songs in my free time.
• Answering my daughter's never ending questions of curiosity.
• Discussing the day spent with my husband.
• etc etc

I have taken some medicine... but it hasn't proved too helpful. I miss my voice ... I hope I am able to talk / sing / chat / discuss / shout soon .....

Had a bad day .... what bad day ???

Kink Kink ..... The alarm rang at exactly 5:15am this morning. I promptly put it off to catch the last few minutes of sleep. (There is something satisfactory about getting the last minutes of sleep after the alarm has gone) I woke up at around 5:30am ... had double thoughts, if I had to work from home or drive to work. There is an important meeting to attend said one part of my mind followed by well, you can always call into the meeting remotely said the other part.... but you have already packed your lunch, laptop etc and are all set to go to office came another thought ... oh well, can always eat the same for lunch when working from home as well said the other.... all in all, I was too confused to decide eitherways ... the bed looked so comforting, yet I told myself, its friday and I could take a longer sleep tonight. So, half asleep I got out of bed and got ready to work by 6:15am. Prepared Dhokla for tea and breakfast (never compromise on food you see... especially when Dhokla is my daughter's favourite, I had to prepare it .... alas I could not see her enjoy her breakfast). Stepped out of house at 6:15am ... still wasn't sure I needed to drive to office.
It was still dark and I drove listening to the music on STAR 101.3 on FM radio. The song by Daniel Powter, "Had a bad day ,You’re taking one down You sing a sad song just to turn it around " seemed very situational. My day had just started, and you ask already had a bad day ? Oh well, I just felt bad for having missed on sleep ... I was not very sad or anything.
I was driving through the curves of the freeway. I had climbed up a hill and as the curve turned downhill, an orange landscape greeted me. The entire surrounding was covered by the tender rays of the rising sun an the whole place was just "ORANGE". It was an amazing experience ... I no longer felt sleepy, sad ... I was in the best of my spirits and I felt like singing "Ruk Jana Nahin... " The beautiful setting just made my day. Reached office at 7:30am and am all set to tackle the day.
Hopefully I will not be singing the Daniel Powter song when I drive back home :) Of well if I do, I will just remember the rising sun experience and my mood will brighten for sure.

Home improvement

Last weekend was 3 days long weekend on account of Labor day. We initially thought of driving to a resort less than 100miles away ... but lack of proper sleep and a hectic week before ensured we did not venture out. We decided to stay home and complete some of the pending home improvement tasks.
It all started with us buying a good bed frame for a guest bed and re-organising the furniture in the guest room. The entire exercise robbed us of our saturday day time. As we were sipping our evening tea, R my spouse suggested we plant some garden vegetables in our patio. I wasn't sure we could maintain the plants and was not very keen about it. But I saw the enthusiam in him and just wanted to support. We headed out to OSH. I was surprised to see the variety of plants available there. After some discussion, we decided to have one flowering bed, a tomato plant, and bought seeds for eggplant, beans, peas, bell pepper, cilantro and Dhil. That also required us to buy the same number of pots. What surprised me the most was the price of the soil .... its so expensive. Never did it once occur to me that we would be paying so much for a good quality soil. It took us a while to figure out the right soil. R could not wait to get started on the gardening project.
He put on his gardening gloves, cleaned the patio and mixed up the different soil we had bought and started his planting. He started with the flower beds. It was almost dinner time by then, so it was decided that the project would be continued the next day. The next day, sunday, saw us rising early from bed and even the morning tea was the last thing on our mind ... we headed straight to the patio. There were some more pots needed and realised that we were short of the soil as well. Also, we needed to buy a stand to place all the pots. We marched towards Home Depot and soon found all the items and the project continued. By around lunch time sunday, the gardening project was complete.
Our kitchen door looks straight into the patio. It feels so good to see the pots neatly arranged there. Everytime I look outside, it brightens my spirit... I never thought I would get attached to them so fast... but I have. I can't wait for the seeds to germinate and grow into lovely plants and fill our otherwise empty patio with fragrance of fresh flowers and a lovely view of garden vegetables.

Gowri- Ganesha habba

The Ganesha-Gowri habba at house was celebrated with much enthusiam and love this year. It was actually fun and it felt (after a long time) very close to the celebrations we had back home in India. I sure missed my parents and their way of celebrations, but sure, tried to make it as close to tradition and fun as possible.
The preparation for the festival ran almost week long. If I were to account for the planning part then it must have been 2 weeks prep work. it was decided that Gowri habba (festival) lunch would be at my place and the Ganesha habba lunch at my sisters'. But there was one hitch though, both of us were keen to have a Ganapathy mangalarathy (customary to invite friends in the evening and share prasad / gooddies) as is the tradition in Karnataka at our places. We both had separate set of invitees as well. So it was decided that after lunch at my sister's place we would rush back home and get ready for the evening gathering of friends and family.
Deciding on the food list for the mangalarathy and not trying to duplicate the items at both my sister's and my place was tasking and fun :) Finally it was decided that I'd make Mango rice, Mosaranna (curd rice / Bakala bhath), Usli (seasoned garbanzo beans), Benne bisuit(baked creamy cookie) and jelebi was to be bought from the stores.
I wanted to make this festival real special for my daughter as well, as she had shown real liking towards the traditional pooja. I wanted to take advantage of her keen interest and pass on some of the traditions my parents had passed on to me. We started the Gowri pooja at around 8:40am (our plan was to start at 8:00am but thanks to my sister, we got delayed). After the pooja, we had a delicious breakfast of Sorekayi Idli / Chutney. Then the men left for some last minute shopping for the next day after helping us with some lunch prep work. Cooking did not feel exhausting at all. (Perhaps because I was done with most of the veggie chopping and stuff the previous night). We had a scrumptious lunch and loads of fun discussing about our festival experiences back home.
The Ganesha pooja was a smooth sail as well. We performed the pooja on time and headed to my sister's place for lunch. The evening was fun with a lot of people visiting us. My daughter was more than excited to share her toys with her friends and play with them. It was amazing to see her come down the stairs every time one of her friends came by and lead them to her room upstairs. The only sad part was that I had prepared all the food items in excess. There was so much left at the end of the day.
All in all, it was an amazing experience and I thoroughly re-lived some of my moments in India.

ps: Its been a week since the festival and I have been lazy to blog these days ... but wanted to vent out all my excitement before it was gone :)

Ganesha Chaturthi

Have not been able to blog for sometime now ...
Just want to wish everyone

HAPPY GOWRI - GANESHA CHATURTHI !!

Happy Independance Day

India celebrates her 59th Independance day and here is wishing every Indian a very Happy Independance day.
August 15th always occupied special place for me. I remember even now, the Independance day celebrations at school. When I was in primary school, I commanded the pledge "India is my country and all Indians are my brothers and sisters .... every day and it meant even more on the Independance day. Then there would be an inter school gathering where chosen few from each school would display their marching ability. Dignitaries from the colony we stayed in were invited as chief guests ... there would be sweet distribution followed by sports day activities. (for me sweet distribution was the culmination of the event. I never really took part in sports)
Middle school days involved me leading a pack of students in patriotic song rendition. There would also be some cultural dance... oh yes, I was a part of the school band (flute was my instrument of choice) and hence got to wear lovely band dress and a cap :) I simply loved the outfit and thought I looked "smart" in it.
My participation in high school involved in me giving either the welcome speech or a small speech reminding everyone of the sacrifices made for Independance by our fellow countrymen. I was also a part of the school orchestra and we sang lovely patriotic songs. Then again, there was attendance (no attendance in primary and middle school) followed by sweet distribution. Usually it was followed by sports day ... again of which I was never a part of :(
I remember attending Independance day in Engineering college only twice. The tricolor Indian flag was hoisted by the principal, followed by the National Anthem. What surprised me most was the mere 30-40 crowd. It was disappointing...
Anyways, there has and will always be a spirit in my heart riding high on the Independance day and I will continue to feel proud for being an INDIAN !!!
Before I conclude, I'd like to recollect some of the patriotic songs I have learnt:

• Saare jahan se achcha (my all time favourite)
• Hind Desh ke Nivasi
• Jai Jan Bharat, janamana abhimata
• Aakash ganga
• Ye mere watan ke logon
• Sara haddina bahu doorada varegu
• Vishwa vinuthana vidhya chetana

many many more.......

100,000 !

What does the title represent ... can you guess ??? Its not the number of posts on my blog... it isn't lottery amount I won (I wish !!) ... its certainly not my age ... (I know that was a bad one).... well thats the number of miles we have driven our first car !!!
Yep ... last friday our car crossed the 100,000 milestone and yours truly was driving it when the feat was achieved. Of the 100,000 miles, I can certainly claim atleast 50% contribution if not more. My distance to work has certainly been responsible for this amazing achievement. Anyways, our car which my husband fondly calls "Darling", has been a very loyal and great companion. It has been a wonderful ride (pun intended) so far and I have lots of memories like my first drive in the car at 12:30am on the day of landing in the US, our trip to LA, our ride back home from the hospital on the birth of my daughter ... and many many more.
I am certain there are many more in the making !

Peddle, Peddle, Peddle

When I think about my most priciest materialistic possession, my BSA SLR features in the top 5. For the uninitiated, BSA SLR is a brand of bicycles in India.
I learnt cycling during the summer vacation after class 4. We were in Chennai (then called Madras) visiting, my mom's uncle. We were atleast 4 cousins and were undeterred to give up cycling, before we mastered the art. The initial balancing part was slightly hard and the fact that my feet did not touch the ground, when I wanted to bring the cycle to a halt, only made my task a little more harder. Even an occasional scratch on the knee did not bother me. Before I realised, I had learnt to balance and peddle on my own ... but the brakes were still a small concern.
My parents saw my enthusiam and decided to buy me a bicycle. I already knew that I wanted a BSA SLR. That was the "HAPPENING" brand for girls cycles. When we went to the cycle shop, we gave a slight thought if we had to go with the gray color or the marroon ... but all of us were easily convinced that it had to be marroon. My dad offered to peddle it from the cycle shop to the house, but we decided against it soon. Customary pooja was performed and I was rearing to take it for a ride. Thus began my long association with my BSA SLR.
I showcased my peddling talent to my parents the following weekend to get their nod on riding it to the school. My parents did notice my "not so great", braking ability. But had to concede to my request finally. I was just in the 5th std, when I began cycling to school.... and continued doing it till my first year of engineering. I was not very particular on getting a moped / scooter etc even during my engineering ... but my parents felt, I deserved one and bought me a scooty. (thats again very close to me). Anyways, coming back to my cycling days, the initial days saw me enthusiastically going to the grocery store, music/ dance classes, offering "doubles" to cousins and friends all the time. I participated in a lot of extra cirricular activities during my student days ... be it an inter school debate, story telling, singing, science exhihibition etc etc, I cycled my way to the location, participated and rode back home. Mysore not being a very big city, only helped that, I could peddle my way to / from any place within the city.
Now why did I suddenly write about my bicycle ... well last weekend, we were trying to teach my 2year old cycling and she was not very keen on learning. So, we decided that may be if one of her parents set her an example by peddling along with her, she would learn faster ... I volunteered to peddle. Soon, I discovered that my passion for bicycles was intact ... my little one was more than happy to just watch her enthusiactic mother peddle her way in the park :)
I guess some passions stick with you for lifetime !!!

Miraculous escape

I got up as usual this morning and got ready to head to the office. The second time tea excercise (since the milk split the first time) and awake child delayed my heading out. I reasoned with my little one that I will be back in the evening to pick her up from school and gently patted her back and smoothened her hair. She was satisfied soon but wanted to bid goodbye from the garage. She gave me a warm hug and friendly smile and said bye. I drove the usual route to work ... the traffic was moving at regular freeway speed. Just as I merged from one freeway to another and had driven a mile, I saw a black car hit another car (I don't even remember the other car color now). This was the first time I witnessed an accident and it was just 2 cars ahead of me. I was in the left most lane (3rd lane) of a 3 lanes freeway. The accident had occured in between the first and the second lane. The traffic in the first too lanes immediately came to a halt. I noticed that the cars in my lane were still moving so I just moved on. I could hardly think ... I was too confused and I was still seeing as the events were unfolding. The impact of the accident was so bad that it left the black car spinning and within fraction of second, the black car headed towards the 3rd lane. It must just a hairline of a distance by which I missed and the the black car ended up hitting the car behind me ... there was a loud thud. I was completely shaken. My mind stopped thinking. I looked at my rear mirror and noticed that all 3 lanes were now blocked and mine was the last car to move ahead of the accident scene. The next thing that occured to me was to call 911. I was concerned about the safety of the drivers involved in the accident. But I had never ever called 911 and was apprehensive about it. But I boosted my courage and dialed 911. A heard a "Hello" and I started reporting "I just witnessed an accident on freeway ..." only after a slight pause did I realise, it was an automated recording that was playing on the other end. I was too shocked to even feel stupid. Soon a real person picked the phone on the other end.
Here is what our conversation sounded:
She: Hello California Highway Patrol
Me: M'am, I just escaped an accident on freeway XYZ
She: Which direction
Me: (trying to think hard ... I was shocked to recollect which direction I was headed) : North bound
She: Where ?
Me: Near ABC... Exit PQR
She: Tell me the details
Me: I just escaped the accident and I am concerned about the drivers involved
She: If you don't give me details, we can't dispatch our crew.
Me: I just told you the exit ... I have no more details.
She: What colour were the cars involved?
Me: I am not sure. Pls send someone though
She: OK. Thanks for calling

I am not sure, if it was OK or not for me to call 911... but in any case I did. It took me a few minutes to get back my composure. The traffic updates kept me glued to the radio set the rest of the drive to work. I only hope everyone is safe.

Hot hot weather

Have you heard of many take pride in the Bay area weather ? When there are discussions around the high cost of living in the bay area, it invariably concludes in the fact that, we pay the huge price for the near perfect weather. The past week has made me think, re-think and then think again, if this is what we call a near perfect weather. Its been scorching hot ... near the 90's and upto 100. For one, we just had one fan, which has been rarely used and no AC. Sitting on a comfortable sofa is uncomfortable in this weather ... imagine standing in front of the stove and cooking for a huge gathering.... its been pathetic. Unable to hear my grumble about the weather my husband has bought a powerful fan which has been more than used over the weekend. The interesting part is that, reasonably priced Air conditioners are out of stock in most stores. Various tricks of escaping the heat like, going on long drives (remember, Car has AC :)), window shopping , eating out, dip in the pool has definitely helped. Last night was slightly cool though. As I drove to work this morning, I heard that the weather would continue to be hot for a couple of days more ... I just hope, the evenings are cooler atleast. (you see, when you are in office, you don't realise the heat)

2nd year - Outdoor Birthday Party

Last weekend, we celebrated my daughter's 2nd year birthday. It did not take a lot of debating for me and my husband to decide on the venue. We had long decided that we would host and outdoor party for our daughter. As most parents know, the child's first year birthday party is for the parent's satisfaction / happiness ... then on, it will be decided based on child's interest. We knew that our daughter would love an outdoor party but what we didn't know was that a beautiful, well landscaped kid's park was in close vicinity to our house. We had seen the soccer ground everytime we drove by the park.. what we didn't know was that a quite little play area was tucked inside as well. That was until little over 2 months ago. We were so glad to have found a play area with swings / slides, sand box etc in such close quarters ... ever since we have tried to take her to the park atleast 3 times a week. It has been her favourite play area since. So, it was not a surprise that we decided to host her birthday in the park. Now there are so many things to do when you decide to host a party .... prepare a guest list, send invites to the guest, decide on the time, food, goodie bags, cake, balloons etc. The problem was we decided to host the party a little too late (we weren't sure we could host one because of prior commitments) ... we just had 6 days to plan, decide and execute. Narrowing the guest list is always tricky ... so was it in this case. After much deliberation, we decided to invite our daughter's day care pals and some of our close friends / relatives. I took the initiative and invited our guests ... thankfully, most of them did not have prior commitments and readily agreed to come. Not wanting to take a chance, I also called up the county park dept and ensure that "Our chosen Venue" was a public park and did not need any reservations. We decided to gift the kids with pail / showel / seeve kit which toddlers love during the summer. My sister volunteered to make cookie and toffee bags ... some puzzles, candies and lollypop and ... lo ... the goddie bags were ready. We ordered a Strawberry Dora cake ... dora being one of my daughter's admired characters. We were to have a snack party. The weather these days has been so hot that the menu had to include loads of fruits and liquids. My sister, BIL, hubby and me ... all of us pitched in prepared the food ourselves. We could have ordered the food to save on the efforts ... but I insisted on cooking, as I really wanted to do something for my little one and it meant a lot to me. The party day arrived ... we franticly worked to get all things right and arrived at the park just on time. The guests started coming slowly. My daughter's excitement on seeing her friends was worth a million dollars. She individually welcomed all her friends ... led them to the play area and ensure they were comfortable. Its surprising how the kids learn to be good hosts :) There were quite a few kids and all of them were busy in their own world ... and for a change, parents were happy to just watch them from a distance and have a good time among themselves. Not one kid wanted parents' involvement ... all of them were just too busy in their world to disturb their parents. Soon they were hungry ... it was just a perfect time to cut the cake. The dora cake turned out to be a perfect choice ... most kids loved Dora and of course the cake. (one thing I am sure is Dora and Barney have huge fan following among my daughter's friends). The kids and adults enjoyed the food alike. It was again play time for the kids. The evening had gotten a lot cooler by now and I decided to conduct an interesting game for the kids. The winnders were beaming with pride when they got their prizes !! Soon it was time to depart for most of the guests. The goodie bags were distributed to the kids ... and they were only too happy to open its contents. The first thing that caught their attention was the lollypop. As the kids reluctantly went back home with their parents licking the lollypops, one thing we knew was that the birthday party was a success and any future party that we would host for the kids would be in parks :)

Lawyer Fee - whats right ?

Once,a law teacher came across a student who was willing to learn but couldnt pay the fees...the student struck a deal saying he will pay his fees as soon as he wins his first case in the court of law..the lawyer agreed and proceeded with the course...after the course was over,the lawyer demanded his fees.but the student kept postponing it.the lawyer got fed up and filed a case against him.each of them decided to fight the case on their own.the lawyer thought if he wins the case,then the student has to pay him his dues.but even if he loses the student would have to pay him becos he had won his first case!!!!the student thought if he wins the case he need not pay the lawyer... and even if he loses the case he need not pay becos he hadnt won his first case!!!!!Whats your say ??

ps: This is not my original thought / puzzle... its picked from internet. But I found it interesting enough to discuss

Email ka kamaal

I had written a few days about my job and that I had to commute 120miles everyday to work. I am losing atleast 3 hrs in driving. Naturally I was not very happy about this. I decided to talk it out with my managers ... but they did not pay any attention to my pleas. So of sheer frustration, I wrote an email to the company CEO. I had little hope that he / she would read it, let alone take any action. I just wanted to get my frustration out .... email was the only means I could think of at the time.
I was thrilled to see a response to my mail from the CEO of my company .... I didn't know what to say. The CEO had forwarded my mail to a senior person in the company and it trickled down to my direct manager in a matter of 3 days. Now my manager along with the HR was wanting to discuss my concern and address it. I explained to them that the work location was too far to commute for me and that I would prefer working from a nearer location. After a bit of discussion, we concluded that the manager would work out a plan for me to work from home for 2 days and commute 3 days to work. I am quite satisfied with this arrangement. (its been just 2 days since ... so I am not complaining :)
Anyways, the whole idea of writing this blog was to express my elevated respect to my company CEO. Thank you Sir / Madam for understanding and addressing my concern.

Almost an insurance claim

I have this unique habit of praying before and after I do a lot of activities. For Eg: Up from bed, Driving, Writing exams, starting my day at work etc etc. Calling weird .... well I don't mind. Praying gives me some mental peace and confidence before I begin my activity and it takes just a few seconds ... of couse, I have to thank god for everything, so the end prayer :)
Anyways, today as usual, after reaching the office parking lot, I parked the car at a convinient spot and started thanking god for the safe trip I had made. When I opened my eyes, my car was not in the spot I had parked. I was puzzled .... I didn't know where I was. The next fraction of my second, my brain asked me to look at the rear mirror. I looked and applied the brakes ... I was almost about to hit the car parked behind mine in the parking lot. It was a very narrow escape. I then realised that, I had not applied the hand break and instead of putting the car in the parking gear, I had put in Reverse gear. (for those uninitiated, the gears are in this order: Parking, Reverse, Neutral, D4,3,2,1) Thankfully I had turned the engine off and so the car was moving very slowly.
I thanked my stars and of course God .... I was this close to getting my insurance money increased ... touch wood, it didn't happen :)

Riddles - Mind ticklers

Here are some riddles I heard on the radio on my way to work. I found them amusing. ... hope you do too.

1. I am heavy forward and not backward.
2. What is better than the best, worse than the worst, the poor have it and the rich need it. And if you eat it, you will die
3. If 2 is company, 3 is crowd, what is 4 and 5 ?

Keep thinking ... :)

Happy Father's Day

Last friday, during my long drive to office, I was listening to this radio station where people were calling in to share the best advise they ever got from their dad. Some of them very hilarious while others were sensitive and cute. One particular advise that I really liked was "If you want to do stupid things, be prepared to be strong" ... isn't that a cool advise. As expected, I drove down my memory lane, reminding myself of all the cool advises I got from my dad and all the precious time spent with him. In our house, mom has been a more strict parent than dad ... but then dad always supported mom when she tried to dicipline us. Those were rare occanions where dad actually had to raise his voice to straighten me. He would say he stored a "Buddhi Kolu" in the attic and that he would not hesitate to use it if required ... those magic words would somehow work and all the tantrums would be given up. Dad also took keen interest in ensuring that I recited my "Bayi Paatha" every day. The bayi paatha included rhythmic recital of 12 months (Hindu calendar and English calendar), 7 days of week(Kannada and English), Lunar days (Padya, Bedige, Tadige etc), 60 samvatsaras and the constellation and stars in Kannada (Ashwini, Bharani... etc and Mesha, Vrishabha, Mithuna etc). This would be followed by a quiz of math tables. Dad would ask 16 * 8 and I had to come up with the answer immediately ... even a slight delay would not be acceptable and I'd have to write the tables backwards from 2 to 20 that day. This backward writing of tables stayed with me through my engineering days. Whenever I got a slate and chalk (rather "balapa") , I would write down the tables. (yes, I used slate and chalk through out my student days .... it was my kinder garden slate and I refused to give it up ) Dad also was very innovative in generating interest in Maths. Atleast 6 hours a week was reserved for maths and it was not just textual. Even today, if I solve a problem / puzzle I owe to my dad. He introduced me to simple puzzles, problems very early and sharpen my ability. I must add that my grandpa who stayed with us, contributed quite a bit in this as well. Being a teacher himself, he knew the type to questions to be posed for a certain age group. As I grew older, I followed my dad / grandpa and would come up with tricky problems for my sister/ cousins. Dad always said that he could never get over the fact that he had scored 97 in maths in 10th and wanted me to complete the century. I am really glad I achieved it ... I can never forgot that day when the 10th results were out .. dad's face was beaming with pride. Through out my student life, I have participated in numerous competitions.... be it mono acting, singing, poem recitation, debate, elocution, story telling etc, Dad had a big role in this again. Initially dad wrote the script for most of the competitions (obviously not singing ... that was amma's department). Dad also introduced me to voice modulation. Being a good dramatist himself, he knew the importance of voice modulation. Slowly, I was asked to come up with a basic structure and dad would contribute to it. Now, my cousins ask me to help them in their competitions ... and I owe this to daddy. Another thing I am proud about my daddy is his memory. Last year, he visited us here in the US and was putting my daughter to bed. I was shocked to see him use his primary school poems as a lullaby for the little one. (for those of you who know, these poems, he remembers, Dharani Mandala Madhyadolage, Tunga teerada balagadeyalli, some quotes from Someshwara shataka etc) I have had many many more amazing learning experiences with dad and to put down all of it in a single blog is beyond my ability. All I want to say is "Thank You Daddy. Hope you had a wonderful father's day !"