Radioactive Android's Blah Blah

Labor day weekend trip

2010-09-16T19:02:00.000-07:00

It's been long since I got a chance to write something, work's been keeping me real busy but I took a couple of days off and went on a trip to Bryce Canyon, Zion and Las Vegas.

My husband and I have been wanting to visit the national parks in Utah for a while now, this September we decided we'll make a trip to Bryce Canyon and Zion National park. Although, we could have flown into the airport at St.George, we figured we'll fly into Las Vegas, NV (primarily due to the cheaper tix). We reached Las Vegas on Saturday night (one of our friends joined us there), and we had booked our stay in a small town named Mesquite, 70 miles north of Vegas. Since it was night time and Vegas seemed busy we decided we'll first spend some time in Vegas and then head out to our destination. We spent some time in a couple of Casinos and eventually headed out to Mesquite.

We had booked a condo in Mesquite and it turned out to be a really nice place to stay, we made day trips from Mesquite to Bryce Canyon and Zion. On our first day in Mesquite, we made a trip to Bryce Canyon, it was a really long drive and there really wasn't that much scenery on the way (until you reached red canyon, which is about 10-20 mins from Bryce). The lack of scenery, hectic work from past week and staying late and playing slots at Vegas all caught up to me and I fell asleep. When we reached red canyon, I was woken up. The place looked fantastic, I haven't seen red color rocks before, so it was all the more exciting. It was different rock formations but it looked brilliant. Checkout the photos of red canyon below:

From bryce-zion-kolob-vegas

After taking a few pics there, we were back on our way to Bryce Canyon, we reached bryce within the next half hour and we decided we'll cover all the points from last to first as recommended so that we can be at the sunset point during sunset. Bryce Canyon overall was a very photographer friendly place, I think we would have gotten wonderful pics if we had been there in the morning, it was already afternoon by the time we reached. The good thing was that the sun wasn't facing us therefore we were still able to take pics (except that the lighting wasn't as awesome as it could have been). We moved from one point to the other taking pictures of the landscape and unique rock formations that we could find in the spot we were in. We eventually got to the Bryce point, at which point things got really interesting, we loved the sight of the amphitheater, it was huge and so unique, I've never seen anything like that before, it did look like an arena full of people, which in this case were the hoodoos!! We eventually went to the sunset point, where you look right down at the maze of these hoodoos. We spent a lot of time there. I didn't take a tripod with me so I had to just sit and watch my husband and our friend taking pics of the canyon. Not having a tripod with me was sad but I was really happy to just be there and breathe in the air :).

From bryce-zion-kolob-vegas

Apparently Bryce canyon is also famous for star gazing, too bad we couldn't stay the night there. We headed back to Mesquite after sunset. On our way back we decided to stop somewhere and have dinner, we were in a town named Panguitch and there was this restaurant which was named the "Flying M Restaurant". We were so famished, we were delighted to see a restaurant in that small town. We went in and the lady at the counter told us to wait for a few mins so that they could get a table ready for us (this lady vanished in a few mins), we stood there for more than 20 mins, desperate to just sit down and have food!! Finally another lady who was serving a few tables walked towards us, we were so happy thinking that our turn has come! She looks at us and says "we are CLOSED and have been for 10 minutes", when we told her what happened, the best excuse she could come up with was "the cook threw away everything". We wouldn't have been so disappointed if they had simply told us upfront that they were closed (despite having the open light on), instead they made us wait and this lady had stared at us so many times until she finally made up her mind to come and tell us that they were really closed!!!! Even without having to taste their food, this restaurant qualifies for a 1/5 stars!! Luckily there was a subway right across the street and it happened to be really good one too (long live that subway).

The next day morning, we headed out to Zion, it was a really hot day in Utah with temperatures over a 100F, we ate at a small cafe before boarding the shuttle, the food was expensive on top of that we were charged an $8 service fee. I forgot the name of the place but will update the post with the name sometime soon. The food really took too long to come out, finally we had our lunch and went to Zion. Zion also has points of interest and it roughly has about 8-9 points of which most of them had nothing interesting. we skipped a few and finally came to the weeping rock, I was told that it was one of the largest hanging gardens, all I got to see was a lot of moss!! we started hiking to see the hidden canyon, I went half way, the others went a lot further but we couldn't find any signs which indicated where the trail would fork for us to get to hidden canyon, with really hot weather, it was turning out to be an exercise in futility! we all headed back down. We then went to the big bend, where there is absolutely nothing, except that you get to see the same set of rocks!! In the end we got to the "temple of sinawava" which I think is Zion's saving grace (still not as awesome as it sounds, I was picturing it to be something like the stuff I saw in LOST)!! We walked alongside virgin river and got to the narrows!! It was nice walk. We didn't hike the virgin river (hiking the narrows). I was already disappointed with Zion and the weather, I decided to stop and take rest. Others headed further down the river, took a bunch of pics and returned. I was happy to board the shuttle and head back. It was really dark, close to 9 pm and on our way back, we saw a fox. We also saw a bunch of deers just hanging out. After a tiresome day, there was some excitement, when my co-travelers decided to photograph the stars and the cliffs.

We boarded the springdale shuttle at 10 pm and got off were we parked our car. Most restaurants were closed, we finally found Oscar's Cafe, where they were willing to give us a table. They were very nice and the food was really nice too, they gave generous portions and they didn't charge us any extra service fee. That was the best meal we had in our first two days of the trip.

The next day morning, there were thunderstorms and we weren't sure if we could visit the hoover dam, instead we decided to visit the Kolob Canyon, which happens to be the sister of Zion Canyon (part of Zion that has separate access). It's a 5 mile drive but what we wanted to experience in Zion, we experienced here. The huge rock formations, the gorge, etc...were wonderful. There was about 5 -8 spots and all of them happened to have unique views and made up for excellent photography. The cloud covers resulting from thunderstorms made up for even better photos :)

From bryce-zion-kolob-vegas

we were very happy with Kolob Canyon, we headed back to Vegas slightly before sunset. Vegas wasn't as busy as it was on Saturday night, we were able to walk the streets pretty freely. We took a bunch of pictures of the Bellagio, Eiffel tower, Statue of Liberty, etc...at the beginning it was really interesting, but the fact that everything was fake started sinking in slowly and after sometime I totally lost interest, we went to the casino at Mirage and played a game of blackjack and left. We stayed at the MGM Grand and we chose to eat at the lunch buffet there. I am a vegetarian and didn't have high expectations to begin with, I thought the buffet would be decent, but I was wrong. The buffet was abysmal!! Poor choice of food offerings coupled with really cold food was terrible. Dessert buffet was decent but not great. I have been to better dessert buffets!!
We played some more games at the slot machines and then left :)

Despite Zion being a disappointment, we had a great trip overall, we were so happy to have visited Kolob Canyon which we didn't even know existed until we saw a road sign on our way to Bryce!! This was my first trip with a DSLR camera and for the first time I had the power of polarizer, which made a real difference in the kind of pics I was able to capture :). The trip made for very good learning experience when it came to using DSLR. My advise is if you're planning a trip to Bryce and Zion, set aside at least half a day to visit Kolob :). Review of the vacation rental is Mesquite would be coming soon!!!

A Pendant from Diamond Shark

2010-03-01T23:08:00.000-08:00

Well it's been long since I wrote anything, I have been too busy with work. All the office work, cooking and cleaning caught up with me and I ended up falling sick!! I'm still recovering. Hopefully will better by the end of the week.

Well, anyways I decided that I would write about diamondshark. I needed fancy jewels and didn't like the ones I found at the major chains. I didn't need anything that would be as expensive as the gems listed on bluenile but I needed something that I can wear casually. My husband suggested that I checkout Diamond Shark. Everyday this site offers a deal on one item. The prices are really reduced compared to other stores and websites.

I finally decided to give it a try, I was skeptical and also wasn't sure how good their service would be. I ordered a pendant from this site and I got shipping info within 24 hours and the pendant arrived in 3-4 days. It had come all the way from NY to CA. Unlike some other sites which put magnified pics, the pendant appeared as per the description and was as expected. The stone was more brighter and radiant than I thought it'll be. I've seen similar pendants at other stores which sometimes have price tags nearly two or three times more than what I paid :).

I wish I had known about this site earlier, it would be a good place to consider if you want to add items to your casual jewelery collection.

Diwali

2009-10-15T23:14:00.000-07:00

Happy Diwali everyone. It's Diwali this saturday and I figured no matter how busy I am I had to write about Diwali. Diwali aka festival of lights is one of the most important festivals in India. It's my most favorite festival, it's kinda sad that I won't be home to celebrate Diwali so I guess the next best thing to do is celebrate it here and reminisce those good old days.

I went to a christian school, so we still had to go to school the day before diwali but then the school would close early :). For the most part, I remember celebrating diwali with my cousins :). I don't have any siblings and it was always great when my cousins showed up. After I get home, I normally start firing crackers with all my friends and my mom and granny would be making sweets. Now that I look back, I cannot believe that they managed to make that much sweets and savories at home. My mom's an excellent cook and its needless to say how much we kids devoured the food :). Badhushah was my favorite, I've never seen anyone else make such wonderful badhushahs. Later in the evening my cousin and aunt would show up, then we all would show each other the clothes we got for Diwali :). Then it was my job to take all our new clothes and keep them in the pooja room.

My cousin and I really loved firing crackers and he taught me how to hold the cracker in my hand and let it off in the air at the right moment so that it would burst in the air :). Once it gets dark, we usually start the rangoli. I guess everyone wants their rangoli to be bigger and better than all the others in the neighborhood. I kinda too a liking towards rangoli and my granny had left huge books in which she had meticulously drawn all these. I always picked one of her nice designs. I am poor with coloring so my mom usually helped pick the right combination.

I remember staying thru the night for some diwali's but even if we went to sleep, we all woke up around 4 am, got ready said our prayers and wore new clothes. My cousin and I would go for some more fire crackers before everyone else gets ready. Once the morning prayers are over, we were allowed to have all the sweets and savories...it was just amazing (food everywhere). Then we have a breakfast (pongal, idli, etc...). It was usually my job to distribute the sweets to all our neighbors. Each house had a kid like me who would bring sweets from their home to ours.

We kinda rest up a little bit after a really lavish lunch, there would be tons of TV programs to watch, the elders usually are watching TV or wishing other relatives on the phone. My cousin and I would normally play chess around this time. We thought we were so good at it and we played it so often :). Usually around this time my maternal cousins would also show up, and around evening we'll start firing the mathappu, flower pot and rocket. The rocket was the coolest. No one knew where it was going to go :). Normally there's one trip to the temple as well. We usually fire crackers till late night and then save some for kaarthigai :).

When all the kids in the neighborhood decide to stop, we usually put all the remaining crackers in a big pile and set 'em on fire. It's really dangerous and I don't know why we did that. The last time I saw these three cousins of mine was at my wedding and that was a year ago. I'm sure none of us can forget how much fun we had. Later on the diwali night or the next day morning my cousin's would leave and we all had to go back to school :(. To me Diwali means getting together with friends and family and having a great time. My cousins and I would usually share stories about our schools, kadi jokes :). I really love my cousins and my parents loved them too and thats what really made it special and memorable :). I guess all festivals are about sharing, loving, giving and there was plenty of that :).

It's always during Diwali that I get maximum number of clothes, I remember once I got 10 different dresses :). Mom was always generous when it came to me. Dad always got me nice crackers, I used to go through the list with him and pick out what I want :). No matter what age I was, Diwali was always fun one way or another :).

I wish everyone a very happy diwali :)

Vaigai Restaurant Review

2009-06-03T18:35:00.000-07:00

I had been to this South Indian restaurant Vaigai in Sunnyvale recently and would like to share my thoughts. Last weekend was not the first time I have been to this restaurant, I have had food here once before when they had just opened the restaurant.

The menu here is more or less similar to the menu in every other South Indian restaurant here in the bay area. My husband and I didn't like the restaurant that much after our first visit and that was primarily because of the high price (every dish on the menu is atleast a $1 more) coupled with low quantity of the dish that we ate. We decided to give this restaurant a second chance last weekend.

From our previous visit, we remembered liking the curd vada and ordered that along with fried idly and a couple of combo meals. My husband wanted to order channa batura and the waiter told us that it wasn't available only for us to see another waiter walk past us and serve someone else the same dish just a few moments later.

The curd vada was brought in first and the vada tasted old and whole dish was terrible, it was nowhere close to what it used to be. It costs about $6 for two relatively small old vadas dipped in plain yogurt. Instead of bringing the fried idly next the waiter ended up bringing my main course alone. After a few minutes the mini idly fry was brought in and they had no distinct flavor and once again stuff tasted old and despite being coated with red chilli powder they were not even slightly spicy and the coconut chutney ended up being watery. The fried idli was $6 and it came with very little sambar and coconut chutney and this is by far one of the worst dishes I've ever had.

We were already quite disappointed at this point and my main course was there getting cold and they still hadn't brought my husband's main course. After reminding the waiter his food was finally made it to our table. The combo which costs nearly $10 had 1 plain dosa, 1 vada, 1 small idly and a little pongal with coconut chutney and sambar looked more like rationed prison meal rather than something that you would expect to be served at a restaurant. My husband managed to get onion+tomato chutney but I didn't even though we ordered the exact same dish on the menu. The idly was okay and some parts weren't cooked that well, same was the case with dosa and it was pretty small as well compared to what you get in the other restaurants. The vada was fine and the pongal was very average. It was worse than the pongal that I normally make at home!!

At the end of it all, my husband and I were more disappointed with this restaurant compared to the previous time we dined here and we still wonder how they manage to give low quantities of not so great tasting food and charge more than the other restaurants?? Well, whatever it is we won't be going to this place ever again.

Shopping in Chennai!!

2009-05-26T12:09:00.000-07:00

I have been wanting to write about shopping in Chennai for a long time but never really found the time. Last year when I was in India I happened to a lot of shopping before and after my marriage. Normally, I like to buy most of my clothes and accessories here in the USA but then this time my husband insisted that he take me out to some of the malls in chennai and see if I like something.

Most of the shopping that was done prior to the marriage was for stuff that I had to wear during the ceremony itself. I had a tough time when I was trying to pick a silk saree for my engagement as there were too many people trying to convince me to get what they liked. So, this time I took my parents alone and it made a real difference as I really could pick anything that I wanted. It was a lot of fun to actually go shopping for silk sarees. I went to different stores and found lots of varieties in different price ranges...even though it was a saree that I would wear for my wedding I didn't want to spend too much on it considering the fact that I won't be wearing them that frequently. I finally ended up picking two sarees around Rs.7,000 each from Kumaran silks and chennai silks. Pothy's was really terrible for my taste!!! And the sarees from some of the other stores looked too modern!!! (apparently thats the trend). Silk saree shopping wasn't over with that, I still had a 9 yards saree that I had to get and I ended up getting that at Nalli for about Rs. 12,000. My husband and I picked the 9 yards saree together :). There were sarees that were upto Rs. 30K - 40K but I stuck to moderate range as I won't be wearing these sarees frequently.

After all the silk saree purchase, I then had to buy mysore silk, I should confess that on any day I would prefer mysore silk over silk. As its a lot easier to wear and manage :). There was a specific brand called girija silks that my mother-in-law suggested that I get. I found good mysore silk sarees in Kumaran, Nalli and another store in Mount Rd (I forgot the store name).

My mom saved me some time by getting a few silk sarees ahead of time and since I happened to like them, things just got a lot more easier. Since, everyone told me that my sarees looked great I'm gonna assume that my mom and I did a great job in selecting them. I had to buy some churidars as well and I picked them out from some stores in T.Nagar (It's very important to have good casual clothes when you get married, cos my aunt still tells me how her DIL didnt have any good clothes to wear). I wore new clothes almost every other day :) :). In addition I did some salwar material shopping as well and by far I liked Chennai silks the most.

Now comes the fun part, shopping after marriage. My husband did tell me that I could get brand named apparel in India for a lot less than what I pay here in USA. Even before we got married my MIL did some searching to find out where I can get Ralph Lauren jeans and apparently you can only find them in Delhi. So, jeans was ruled out right there. Now the shopping was more for tops, footwear, etc...

Before going to India, some of my friends recommended that I go to Fab India for buying salwars and kurtis. But I didn't have any time to visit that place before marriage. But, luckily my MIL who was also keen on taking me for shopping had seen their ad on newspaper and showed it to me and asked if I was interested. I was excited and we all went shopping together. My MIL picked up salwar for herself and that one was very good. I got kurti tops and I really love to wear them here and a lot of ladies at work tell me they look very good. They even sell Men's shirts there and my hubby and FIL got them and they told me that they liked the stuff there. I thought Fab India was cool, because they had so much stuff and none of the tops shrunk that badly or faded. If you have the patience to go through their collection you can easily find a lot of tops in Rs. 300- 400 range. That's a pretty good price for good quality cotton tops.

When it came to Tshirt shopping, I totally liked shopper's stop and there the T-shirt variety was good and price ranged from Rs.300-400, sometimes even lesser. I think we should buy a larger size than our correct size as most of these tops ended up shrinking. Nevertheless some of them were good and again I got compliments.

I didn't like lifestyle (store at the city center) that much the first time I went there, I didn't like the clothes there at all, and I really wanted to get out of the store asap but my hubby convinced me to take a look at the sandals, which I did so that he wouldn't be disappointed. I bought one sandal and I totally loved it once I started using it. These sandals were exactly the way I wanted them, moderate heels and very light weight. I think I got a few pairs of sandals there.

In addition there was some fashion jewellery shopping that I did, I got some sets done at Narayana Pearls but most of these look more or less traditional. If you really want some fashion jewellery then you have to shop elsewhere. I found good stuff at Landmark (that was the only piece of fashion jewellery I got). But my husband's aunt had gotten me stuff from a store called Damini in Kotturpuram and we later went there to check that store out and found out that the stuff there is in high demand and that they sell out very fast once the new stock arrives!!! Other than there was a diamond pendant gifted to me and I found out that it was bought at Lifestyle. I never really got time to look around for similar stuff in Lifestyle store.

Thanks to my loving husband who had enough patience to drive me around town and get me all this stuff ;). Next time I go to India, I really know what's good there and what stuff should be got there and what stuff I should get here in USA!!! If you do have the time, then do checkout these stores. Happy shopping!!

Perfume shopping at Designer Fragrances

2009-04-01T12:04:00.000-07:00

I was about to run out of perfume and so I decided I would do some perfume shopping over the weekend. I normally buy perfumes from one the following, Scented Monkey, Amazon, Perfumania or Designer Fragrances & Cosmetic Co.

This weekend I decided I would either go to Designer Fragrances or Perfumania at the Great Mall. I personally like the designer fragrances a lot as they happen to carry my favorite brand Ralph Lauren and they always have better pricing than perfumania. This store works out better for both men and women as they also carry brands like Armani, Lancome, etc... but if you want to try out different perfumes and pick one then you need to go to Perfumania.

There I was at the Designer Fragrances store and this time there was more crowd than usual. well, I guess more people have started buying stuff at outlets :). The store usually has perfumes on sale for as low as $10 or $20. Well, my husband and I picked three perfumes totally (Armani Diamonds for women, Diesel Fuel for life for women and Polo Explorer). We basically got all three for less than Armani or Polo's retail price at Macy's or Nordstrom :).

I'll write a separate review for each of these perfumes sometime soon. If you ever need to get good perfumes for a lower price I suggest that you first look at Designer Fragrances.

Follow-up on the rice scenario in the bay area

2009-03-24T23:18:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I had to buy rice and wasn't sure if I should get the long grain rice from any of the American stores or first see if the Indian store has some rice in stock. I happened to be at a store in Sunnyvale and I found that they had lots of sona masoori rice bags and even price seems to have dropped by $10, to $24.95 for a 20lb bag.
Yaay, so I got a bag of rice this time without feeling very guilty :)

When was nonbu really?

2009-03-19T21:35:00.000-07:00

Most of us Indians that live here have this practice of celebrating Indian festivals right on the same date as it is celebrated in India. In reality, the actual date of the festival is determined based on the position of the moon and it varies every year. It never occurred to me until my husband's cousin told us that. Now, that I think of it, when you are in a different geographic location the position of moon does differ and that would mean the auspicious time to celebrate a certain festival might not be the same date and time as it is in India.

This year karadaiyan nonbu happened to fall on Friday for us in USA but most people observed it on Saturday. I don't know if I'm very pious but I do like to observe the religious stuff at the right time, so at the beginning of this year, I went ahead and purchased the calender from the Livermore temple and use it to determine when to celebrate or perform all the religious rituals.

As I'm writing this I just realized that my mother-in-law had actually looked up the right day for the nonbu here and told me the correct date right at the first go :). That's really awesome that she made sure she gave me the right date.

Anyways, if you do care about doing things at the right time it might just be a good idea to either refer to the temple's calendar or purchase a calendar.

Poori

2009-03-02T12:22:00.000-08:00

Yaay...my husband and I had plans of having channa batura at Dosa place this weekend but had to compromise that plan. In the end we decided to make poori at home. I had made poori once before, and that was 3 or 4 years ago. I wasn't 100% sure but still decided to make it as we still had some lasagna that we baked as back up.

Even though I knew the basics I was looking up for poori recipes online but the fancy ones were really fancy therefore I just stuck to the recipe I knew. Here's the basic recipe:

1. 2.5 cups of wheat flour (I used 160ml cups)
2. 1/2 tsp baking powder
3. oil (for mixing and then frying)
4. salt (0.5 - 1 tsp)
5. Warm water (3/4 - 1 cup)

I kinda like poori simply because the chances of screwing up is very less. Anyways, here's the directions

First mix wheat flour, salt and baking powder in a large mixing bowl. I typically use 2 tbsp of oil when mixing the dough. First add 1 tbsp oil and some warm water and start mixing, continue adding water as required, once the dough starts to get pliable add the remaining 1 tbsp of oil and mix well. Add water sparingly during the mixing procedure as the dough shouldn't have excess water. Once the dough is pliable and doesn't stick to your fingers it's time for you to set it aside. Just cover it and leave it alone for 20-30 mins (you could continue to make poori's without leaving the dough aside as well).

Now knead the dough once more and start making small 1.5 inch rounds with the dough mixture. Now start rolling the dough rounds that you made. Typically roll them out to have 4 or 5 inch diameter. The key to making nice poori is to have uniform thickness. First roll the center nicely and then roll around the corners so that the whole thing has uniform thickness. Even when you lift it to drop in the frying pan, the shape shouldn't change. If the dough is rolled out thin, there'll be elongations where you touch 'em.

Now heat generous amount of oil in a pan, drop the rolled out poori's gently, once the dough on the side on top rises, its time to turn the poori around to cook the other side. Poori's done once both sides are cooked. If you notice that the poori's turn to deep brown instead of golden then its time to turn down the heat. I use a gas stove so I have more precise heat control, but with electric stoves, it might just be better to have the heat set at med or med-hi.

Note: You can substitute half of wheat flour with maida if you want the poori's to be more softer.

We had a really great meal last night and I still think poori is one of the easiest dishes to make.

Orkut and Facebook predicament

2009-02-27T13:25:00.000-08:00

Ever had to approve friend requests simply because you don't want to seem rude? Orkut and facebook as awesome as they are for staying in touch and finding old friends they pose this problem of unwanted people finding us.

I've had to approve friend requests from certain people who I know do nothing but criticize my actions or fabricate stories about me. In reality, if not for these sites I could simply get away from these people by simply not staying in touch. In all honesty, approving such friend requests never leads to anything useful, the other person probably just wants to be friend to pry.

There were times I used to feel guilty about not staying in touch with certain old acquaintances, relatives, etc..., every time I think of it, I remember this conversation I had with a friend of mine who never responded to any mails from another friend of mine. When I asked her, "don't you think you'll be hurting her feelings?" she simply told me it would be even worse if I acted like I respect and like her when I really don't. Well, she had a point.

Sometimes, I feel the same way too. Having said all this, I seriously think facebook is a little better as I can find the people that I don't want to get request from and block them completely. It's really useful simply because you'll never receive the friend request you always dread and they would never know. This way no one feels hurt probably ;)

But then, most of the time the kind of feeling (like or hate) between two people is very mutual, it might just be better for some people to not add me as friend, cos except for the initial Hi, I practically am not gonna have a conversation with them and they do the same too. I always wonder if these people ever feel bad about adding someone and then not even having the common decency to say hi to them. It's more like basic manners 101. Sometimes, I say hi and ask them how they do (so that I don't feel guilty of having ignored them or being rude) and they would simply reply saying "ya fine", I sort of find that rude, neither do they thank you for asking nor do they ask you how you are doing. Yea, they pry on me but this is what I really worry about.

I might be the only one that feels this way, as I have seen several others that bad mouth each other to others going about greeting and wishing each other. Every time I see this, I go "what a phony". I don't know how people still feel good about themselves when they don't like someone and still woo them. Well, their business is their business.

As for me, I felt like writing this and I wrote it...

Demetri Martin Game on Comedy Central

2009-02-25T09:52:00.000-08:00

Last night since there was nothing interesting on TV to watch during primetime hours, I went to comedycentral.com to catch up on Colber Report and I got completely sidetracked and found this game.

This game put together by Demetri Martin that appears in Jon Stewart's show is basically trying to identify the anagrams using a given clue. I played a couple of levels yesterday and i completely loved the game.

I'm mostly into crosswords or any other game that has to do with english language, vocab, etc... I'm sure you get the idea. If you love such stuff this game is brilliant as there are 20 levels and it does seem to get complex with every new level :)

give it a try, I hope you like it...

Blueberry Muffins

2009-02-24T11:56:00.000-08:00

My husband and I try a new dish every week and we had tried making muffins a couple of weeks ago they turned out great, so this time I changed the quantity of ingredients a little bit and now the muffins taste even better.

I prefer homemade muffins to store bought muffins simply because the ones that are sold in stores are a bit big for one person to finish.

I got the base muffin recipe from allrecipes.com, I prefer using recipes from this site simply because they have user rating and you also read the suggested changes that could be made to make the dish more tasty. My cousin also tried this recipe and she said it came out great...so, I here I write my improvised recipe:

Servings: 12

Ingredients:

1.75 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
2.5 teaspoons of baking powder
1/2 cup unsalted butter (oil can be used instead)
3/4 cup milk
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons of vanilla
1 cup fresh blueberries

Directions:

1. In a large bowl add the flour, sugar, salt and baking powder and mix them nicely.
2. Take butter and cut into small pea sized cubes and measure 1/2 cup and add it to the flour mixture. Make sure the butter is mixed well with the flour that no large pieces of butter is seen.
3. Break two eggs and mix them well, and then add milk to the beaten eggs, add 2 teaspoons of vanilla to this mixture.
4. Now pour the entire egg and milk mixture in the flour and mix until the flour is fully moistened. It's okay to have lumps, as overworking the batter might end up ruining the end result.
5. Add blueberries to the mixture.
6. Grease the muffin pan with oil and fill each muffin cup to almost full. Fill the empty ones with water.
7. Bake at 400 degrees F for 20-25 minutes, you can either insert a toothpick to see if the muffin is done or just press it lightly to see if the top springs back.

I don't use baking soda simply because it reacts quickly and causes the muffin tops to crack and makes the muffins look ugly. By replacing baking soda with baking powder we get a much better moist and smooth muffins, that look elegant.

My husband and I loved it and we use these as our evening snack and it's wonderful :)

Klipsch Image X5 IEMs

2009-02-17T12:23:00.000-08:00

This post has been long due and every single time I start writing, something or the other comes up :(. Hoping to make some progress today...

First let me make it clear that I prefer IEM over the full-size headphones. I got the Klipsch Image X5 IEM as a gift from my husband immediately after our wedding (what better occassion!!). First of all I loved it when I saw five ear tips instead of the usual three. I finally found one that fits my tiny ears really well :)

I have pretty much listened to most of Porcupine Tree, Opeth, Dave Matthews Band, Nirvana, Steely Dan, White Stripes, Pink Floyd, etc...and I can confidently say that these are the best IEMs I've ever used. They produce excellent sound isolation. Noise filtering is just terrific, once I have these on all that I could listen is just the music and nothing else, no more distractions and outside noise when listening to music. In terms of sound quality, the X5s are truly brilliant, the highs and lows are crisp and clear, all frequencies sound just about perfect. Using these I can actually see the kind of detail at the low frequencies that the other IEMs miss out. It was quite a thrill to discover the sounds that I missed out in certain songs when I used my old IEMs.

The design of the IEMs are unique and really nice. They fit nicely in the ears without causing any ear ache and aid comfortable listening for longer durations. The housing is a little bigger than the other IEMs but then others cannot hold a candle against the X5s sound quality besides, being bigger doesn't make them uglier, they look good and unique. The cable does seem very delicate but it seems to hold up well, so I am not complaining about it.

The X5s also come with a cleaning kit and small leather box to store them when not in use. This box is one of the best storage boxes I've seen for an IEM, its elegant and nice and has enough room to store the whole thing without having to wind the cable too much.

I don't really have anything negative to say about these IEMs, its built well, looks great, comfortable to use and above all listening to music in this just blows me away. Listening to music has never been so pleasurable. Before I got this one, wanting to listen to a specific band was why I would listen to music, but this IEM has totally changed it. Even when I am not that crazy about listening to a specific band, I would like to listen to music old or new simply because this IEM sounds awesome. Image X5s have become a motivation to listen to music everyday :) (The previous sentence might not have made much sense to everyone, but I'm sure you get the point ;)).

Long live Klipsch Image X5s.

So early?

2009-02-10T10:47:00.000-08:00

I had to wake early today morning because I had a meeting at 7 am. I wasn't very enthusiastic about this meeting, as I'm used to waking up late. I used to wake up early and used to be at work around 8:30 am and for no apparent reason I drifted and started waking up late to a point where I consider 7 am still a part of midnight.

Living closer to work might have made that difference, because my commute is no longer affected by Bus, train delay, traffic, etc... The only factors are the speed at which I walk and one signal that I need to cross.

But I would really love to wake up early especially now, simply because I needn't spend the time in commute instead I could actually water my plants, make nice coffee, catch up with the morning news and ease into my day slowly...
When I was walking to work I notice that there's more cars at 8:30 than at 9:30 and it actually feels nice to walk during that time as the warmth of the sun is still mild and there's still some cool air.

Well anyways, I would be happy if I'm even able to do the same tomorrow ;)

My new TV Panasonic Viera TH42PZ80U

2009-01-28T12:28:00.000-08:00

My husband and I decided to buy a new HDTV for our new apartment. After looking at our Cousin's 32" TV we felt that it might be right size for our apartment too, besides we also felt we could push the big TV purchase for later. We found the Sharp Aquous 32" LC3234U at costco for $499 and bought it. We brought it home and watched TV programs and they all looked great and later that night we watche Surf's Up and both of us felt the TV was smaller.
We decided we'll get a 37" or a 40" TV and were searching for deals. We were eyeing the 40" Samsung A550 model and a Sharp Aquos 37" model. We went to Fry's that friday night and looked at all the models they had we still liked the Samsung, Sharp and 40" Sony Bravia sets. The Sony model wasn't sleek which was a big bummer. We felt Samsung 450 looked better
than the 550 so we were unsure about buying that. We decided to look the Plasma TVs and we liked the Panasonic 42" models 42PX80U and the 42PZ80U models. The latter being the 1080p version. We were unsure if 1080p would actually make a difference at a distance of 6ft or slightly more. After walking up and down the aisles and struggling to pick between LCD vs Plasma we finally got the TH-42PZ80U model home. The reasoning behind picking this TV was that it was a 480hz tv with no motion blur or pixelation issues. Besides the these days plasma TVs come with an anti reflective coating so reflections in bright rooms isn't that big of a deal. In addition all plasmas have better contrast ratio and superior black levels than their lcd counterparts.

The Panasonic Viera TH-42PZ80U has a recommended minium viewing distance of 5.5 ft and has a resolution of 1080p. We were thankful we got the 1080p because it was fairly easy to tell the difference between a 1080p image and a 720p image. Other than that the TV has a native contrast ratio of 20,000:1 and a dynamic contrast ratio of 1000000:1 which is quite higher than most LCD Tvs at the same price range or even significantly more. The Tv doesn't have PC input but supports svideo so it's really not a big deal.

We got the TV home set it up and watched Harry potter for a while, we didn't like the movie but the picture quality was brilliant, the cinema mode was fantastic. Later on we watched Transformers and Spiderman movies and they all looked brilliant, we also played the orange box and Assasin's creed games and we noticed that the blacks pretty much appear fully black. Overall the image quality looked amazing and we thorougly enjoyed the whole experience. I was worried that the TV might be big for watching regular TV shows but I must admit that all the HD shows like House, 24 and American Idol just look fantastic. Bones in Fox looks the best and CBS looks the best compared to FOX and NBC. Even the SD shows like Friends and Frasier look very good. Seinfeld is the only show that doesn't look great.

This TV tuner is one of the fastest tuners I've seen and the menu is so user friendly compared to the menu in Samsung TVs. The remote buttons are nice, big and respond well when you use them. The picture quality of this TV has been compared to the Pioneer Kuro in some regards and that really makes my husband and I happy about having picked this TV. It's a delightful bonus to have a TV that you enjoy watching and notice that several other rever this TV.

We also tested the TV with Planet Earth HD DVDs and they just looked awesome, I'm lost for words to describe how cool it was to be able to watch such stuff at home. I should also note
that we got a good deal for this TV when its selling for $999 else where (yaaaay!!!!).
Finally, I would just like to conclude by saying that my husband and I are so delighted and so extremely happy about the Panasonic Viera TH42PZ80U.

Recipes to dainty dishes :)

2009-01-13T16:59:00.000-08:00

When I left India after marriage, my husband's granny showed me some recipe booklets that got published with the Aval Vikatan tamil magazine and asked me if I like them, I told her I'd definitely like to try them sometime. Basically, each small booklet contains 30 different recipes that would help you to cook 30 variations of the same basic dish (more like specializing it).

I went through the one for Rasam and tried some stuff and I really like it. I like the fact that 30 different recipes for one dish are provided and I could just pick one and make it instead of having to search the internet. Besides I really love to read the traditional south indian recipes in tamil. I guess its just a cheap satisfaction that I get :)

I've had the "samaithu paar" culinary book by meenakshi ammal which is pretty much what most south indian brahmins/vegans follow. I'd like to think of the aval vikatan recipes as a nice extension to that samaithu paar book that I have.

I was trying to find out what other recipe booklets had gotten published and during my pursuit I found all the booklets being shared on esnips. Here's the link to the page http://www.esnips.com/web/SamaithuPaar , it has all the booklets listed in nice PDF. If you are interested, you could just download these and try them out. The only catch is that they are all in tamil.

For those who know tamil and in the mood to try this out "Good luck"

Buying inexpensive petite clothing

2009-01-09T16:01:00.000-08:00

I have a few lady friends at work and they also happen to be petites and sometimes we ask each other where they usually buy their clothes. Being petite and finding nice casual clothing is a big challenge. I have no clue why most of the Petite clothing looks like its been designed for middle aged women, in addition a lot of them look formal as well. Living here in the silicon valley I've found a few stores and brands that I like and I've found that people notice and do compliment me on my clothes.

Kohls, JcPenney and Macy's are some of the big departmental stores that everyone knows that sell petite stores. In Macy's their home brand charter club and style & co aren't that expensive and they usually fit okay. The only catch with Charter club is that most of the tops also look like they are made for older women. I love the Jeans by Ralph Lauren, its quite a steal if you manage to find it on sale.

Kohls and JcPenney have a decent Petite collection, but I personally feel that anything more than 6P is usually easy to find. I like Croft&Barrow, Briggs and Jones Signature.

Now onto the other stores, for some reason everyone thinks that the Petite Sophisticate in great mall has been closed forever, but that's untrue. The store re-opened last year and petite sophisticate now has more causual clothes as opposed to the usual formal wear they used to carry before. Since its an outlet store its really easy to find good clothes for relatively less price.

But the best price value is usually at discount stores like Ross or Burlington, I personally like Ross when it comes to stuff other than coats or Jackets. Even at Ross smaller sizes are tough to find but still you can find most of the brands you usually find at Macy's in addtion they have certain other brands that I've never heard of but they fit so well. I like the brand Rafaella a lot. I regularly shop at Macy's and under numerous occassions I've noticed that most tops from Macy's end up somewhere in Ross for prices that are under $10. Lot of people aren't comfortable shopping at Ross as they think its cheap, but in reality if you get the same branded clothing for prices that are a lot lesser what's there to feel bad about.

With the recent downturn in economy, discount stores are doing extremely well but even otherwise what's wrong with buying the same thing for a lower price???

Shortage of rice in Indian stores in the bay area

2009-01-08T13:25:00.000-08:00

If you've been living in the silicon valley you'd be well aware that most Indian stores have run out of the tamil ponni and sona masoori rice varieties which are widely used by most Indians. With the elections approaching soon in India, the government has no plans to lift the ban on rice export. Last month my husband and I had to make trips to 4 different stores before we could get a 20lbs bag of Sona Masoori for $35, in the end we got the last bag that was remaining at one of the stores.

A week back when I went to the store I didn't find any non-basmati rice at all, I was even okay with buying parboiloed rice but even those seem to have gone. I did ask the store owner if they do have sona masoori and she said that she had but rice is no longer kept in any of regular isles anymore :(. I got lucky this second time also as I could still buy rice for the same $35 and not having to eat the long grain rice.

Even some people have switched to eating long grain rice due to the increasing rice shortage I always wonder how it would taste with the traditional south indian dishes. I'm not sure if I should transition and start eating long grain rice instead of hunting for a rice bag everytime. or should I make the transition only when there's no sona masoori available?

Opeth's Watershed review

2009-01-06T16:21:00.000-08:00

I have been wanting to write this review for a long long time now...This album was released when fans were quite concerned about the departure of both their drummer and guitarist from the band. Fredrik Akesson and Martin Axenrot are the newbies (new only to the band, they were previously associated with bloodbath and witchery respectively) that worked on this album. I think I've listened to Watershed a whole lotta times that its about time I wrote a review.

I'm musically challenged quite a bit so the rest of the review wouldn't be filled with any of the technical stuff. It's solely wat i think about the album and how I feel when listening to it. First of all I can't help but notice that blabbermouth has given this album a 9.5 which pretty much means its an excellent album.

There are a total of 7 tracks in this album, the first song is titled Coil and its a swedish folk song, the song has Axe's girlfriend Nathalie Lorichs rendering vocals as well. Both Akerfeldt and Lorichs sound excellent and I like this song, but I've listened to it too many times to a point where it gets boring...as good as it sounds it does get a bit boring after a while.

The next song is "Heir Apparent" I consider this the best song in the album, the speed at which Axe ends up drumming is just stellar. It gets quite intersting towards the middle, you would know what I'm talking about when you listen to this song...I watched Opeth play this song and I have to say Axe did drum so perfectly it was just amazing :). My husband and I definitely consider ourselves privileged :)

The third song is the "Lotus Eater" it has the sound of Opeth but its nothing like the other songs that Opeth has ever done. It's really progressive and I absolutely love it, I love it so much that I don't even want to judge it. The bouts of silence followed by intense drumming is amazing. Listening to Lotus Eater just elevates my sense especially when the music gets real intense.

The 4th and 5th songs are Burden and Porcelain Heart and I'm not a big fan of both and I don't really have much to say. I find them both to be simple and lacking creativity. I have a problem with just trying to get to like the basic tunes of these songs. Others might very well like 'em, I don't like it simply because its not my kinda songs.

The 6th song is the Hessian Peel, I still remember, when I watched the DVD and heard Akerfeldt play I really couldn't believe the first verse was real. Its such a sadly pleasant bitterly sweet tune. I love the rest of the song as well...but the solo blows me away. Every time I listen to the solo I feel like I'm not here anymore.

The 7th song is Hex Omega its yet another brilliant song.

So, overall I love 5 out of 7 tracks the remaining two aren't bad but they are simply not as good as the other ones. I personally feel that Ghost Reveries is still the best album by Opeth and with this album is definitely not as great as Ghost Reveries but it's definitely close. Opeth with this album has taken a new direction and inclusion of Axe has definitely contributed to the change. This album is certainly great in terms of musicality but the quality of lyrics has certainly dropped. Most other bands run out of ideas when they get this old but Opeth seems to have the conviction to really make good music. In all I understand why blabbermouth gave this album a 9.5 and I certainly feel that the band deserves every single point.

Making a good bed

2009-01-06T10:50:00.000-08:00

My husband and I like a lot other Indians were just sleeping on a plain bed with few regular pillows. We normally like to sit on the bed and watch Frasier before we fall asleep and we've had a tough time sitting on the bed for longer time. We decided we'll make our beds nicely and see if that makes any difference.

There are so many blogs and other sites that talk about how to make a bed for a good night's sleep. We read through some of them and found out that we were missing the euro pillows and the other small square pillows. We went on a shopping trip to Bed Bath and Beyond and picked a couple of 26x26 euro pillows and we also picked out a 300 thread count sheet set by Croscill. I've used Croscill sheets before and they are really soft and they were the first fitted sheets on which I could sleep properly. Since we already had the accent pillows and comforters we skipped those.

We have a memory foam mattress topper on our mattress which makes it nice and soft when we lie down. We aligned the mattress and the topper nicely and put the fitted sheet on it. The croscill sheet pockets are deep enough to fit our almost 13 inch mattress. Then we laid the flat sheet on top the fitted sheet and tucked it in on all sides except the top. We are still learning on how to make hospital corners but other than that we did a good job. We arranged the euro pillows, regular pillows and the accent pillows and neck roller respectively starting from the headboard. We laid the comforter on top like it should be.

After making the bed, when we used it for the first time we discovered that a properly arraged bed really does make a lot of difference. We were able to sit very comfortably with enough support for the back and the quality of our night sleep has improved considerably. Not only that when we are tired enough to fall asleep there's nothing thats more pleasing and inviting than a well made bed :). More importantly this really wasn't a very costly solution, it was very affordable considering the fact that I won't suffer from poor sleep or back ache due to my bed :)

Point Lobos State Reserve

2008-12-29T13:09:00.000-08:00

This weekend my family and I visited the Point Lobos reserve. I've been there 4 times before and I'm never bored. It was a great desire of my husband and I to take my parents-in-law to visit Point Lobos. It's called as the one of the most beautiful places in the world for a reason. It would be impossible for me to write down about all the trails, vista points and the different animal and plant species that are there in addition to the remarkable rock formations and the pacific ocean.

Point Lobos offers something for everyone..I've seen people of all ages hiking the point lobos state reserve. I've gone there both in a big group and just with my husband and I loved it both times. My husband and I have hiked the entire park and we wouldn't be wrong if we told that this place is just so unique and vivid. You don't really get to see beauty of this kind when you are going on the 17 mile drive or just around hwy 1 upto big sur. It's unique because of the abundance of plant and birds and rock formations...It's quite breathtaking to see how the plant species and the terrain changes as you hike from one point to another. People really have to visit Point Lobos to understand and appreciate.

My only motivation behind hiking is that I would like to see something beautiful at the end of the hike and I find Point Lobos to be truly rewarding in that regard..each view point different than the previous one yet so beautiful...As you continue your hike you notice that the beauty only increases.

I'll post pics soon...

Are all parents-in-law MONSTERS??

2008-12-19T13:09:00.000-08:00

I just got back from a meeting where one of my colleagues was pretty surprised to know that my parents-in-law are still here with me? They are here in the US for about 3 months now. He asked me "If I was really enjoying it?" well, we all know what he meant!! and I replied "Honestly, I really do enjoy it". He simply couldn't believe it until I told him that my parents-in-law are really nice and I had to explain why I think they are nice.

I'm writing about this not because I had this conversation with my colleague but I had a similar conversation with another newly married friend of mine. First of all the idea of getting into a fight with your parents-in-law only when you spend a few hours with them is quite appalling and I would imagine that it requires a lot of effort from both sides to brood over everything.

These days a lot of the parents-in-laws are educated and do realize their limits and bounds and yet at the same time can provide the newly weds with enough insights on what could be done to ensure that there's long lasting harmony. The educated ones usually try to treat everyone as equals and try and sort things out in a civilized manner.

Here's my take, I wake up late on weekends and my mother-in-law doesn't complain about that (a lot of others do), she cooks once she confirms with me what needs to be cooked and I help out with chopping vegetables and cleaning dishes. I cook the friday dinner for everyone and even though she happens to be the resident expert in cooking none of my family members make a big fuss when what I cooked for them doesn't taste all that great. That's really all I could ask for and more. Not everyone can eat a meal without making a remark(good or bad) no matter how ludicrous it is. In all the 3 months they've adjusted with whatever we had, they had to be in the living room as we hadn't planned for their visit ahead of time. They did understand our situation and never complained at all.

Best of all is when no one would ever come around trying to prove who's superior. Mothers-in-law or daughters-in-law trying to establish authority never works well in a family. That family is bound to be ruined (or atleast laughed at) sooner or later, unless ofcourse one has the virtue of being able to ignore the authoritative person.

I've always wondered what makes the mother and daughter in laws polar opposites to a point where they are uncomfortable they cannot talk among themselves and instead feel more comfortable complaining about each other to everybody else. The basic problem solving method would be to talk to your husband and see if he empathizes you or if you just had a wrong notion...
well then if he agrees he could do the talking for you...but if you have a spine you could talk things out yourself without actually fighting.

Ultimately for any relationship to be fruitful both parties have to work at it sincerely and employ better problem solving techniques where both parties have something to gain rather than just fight over things to prove a very silly point. This reminds me of an incident that happened when I was in India, my mom deep fried some crispy stuff for me to eat, now this stuff was originally prepared by my aunt who was visiting me at the time. My aunt didn't agree with the way my mom had prepared them...well, it was a simple matter of using less oil vs more oil. My mom was the lesser oil side. My mom simply let it go and didn't care to respond much...but when I went to visit my aunt my aunt made sure she deep fried with the same stuff with more oil and made it a point to show my mom how it ought to look. Frankly, my mom and I couldn't care less and we let it go. But I'm fairly certain everyone else in the room lost respect for my aunt...she just proved to everyone there that maturity doesn't always come with age. She did prove her point but at what expense...was it worthy? Maybe to her it was.

To conclude, I'm sure I wouldn't regret if I said not all parents-in-laws are monsters and for any relationship to be successful both parties should work on it and establish trust and be able to disagree with each other without any sense of fear whatsoever and more importantly you treat the other person like an equal and not like your sub-ordinate. Always remember that vain glory blossoms but never bears fruits. I'd rather give up on a few things and live happy than prove my point all the time and make enemies out of everyone.

Weekend getaway!!

2008-12-02T16:38:00.001-08:00

My husband and I decided to spend the thanksgiving weekend at Napa as we had no intentions of travelling long distance to entertain ourselves. Visiting Napa was a very unique experience. Please note that Napa is the wine country and every restaurant/Inn that you go to offer wide varieties of wines for you to pick from.

We decided to stay at the Hennessy House Bed and Breakfast Inn at Napa. Initially we were a little skeptical about staying in a privately owned B&B as opposed to just staying in a reputed hotel. Nevertheless we decided to try the B&B as it would be a new experience. Napa has lots and lots of B&Bs to choose from, the choices are just overwhelming. After going through almost every single B&B, my husband and I picked the Duck Nook room at the Hennessy House. This B&B was a stone building that had beautiful antiques and each room had a theme which made it interesting.

We reached the Inn around 6 pm and there really wasn't much to do as it had already gotten dark. There was Sherry for us in the room and it did taste really good too. No sooner than we entered the room and closed the door, there was a pet cat that showed up at the entrance. I'm really scared of cats and wasn't sure about opening the door in order to get to the car and bring our stuff back. It was quite amazing to see how my husband could interpret the cat signals and how he made friends with it so quickly. The cat pretty much obeyed whatever he told it to do and it always came running to him once it saw my husband (I just hope I could love the animals the way my husband does!!!). Since it was the thanksgiving day lot of restaurants were either closed or were already full and couldn't take any more reservations. Hennessy House's website had a list of recommended restaurants and it made it easier for us to decide where we wanted to go for dinner.

We managed to get reservation at Ristorante Allegria which was located on the First Street. That was pretty much the only restaurant that we could get a reservation. We managed to get to the restaurant by 7:30pm. The restaurant was nicely decorated for thanksgiving and had lots of room and the seating wasn't cramped. They were serving Thanksgiving special dinner as well, but since I was a vegetarian we picked Bruschetta Al Pomodoro for Appetizer and Capellini Pomodoro as the main course. Upon ordering they served bread with dipping oil, the bread with dipping oil tasted wonderful. Then we got our appetizer, we have always loved the Bruschetta and it was excellent here at this restaurant as well. Then came my Capellini Pomodoro which was excellent as well. It didn't have too much cheese and it wasn't bland for a change. I had nothing to complain about and I was pleased with my main course. For desserts we had Classic Tiramisu, which was great too. We pretty much had a complete dinner with appetizer, main course and desserst and were really happy with the meal and the service at the restaurant.

We got back to the Inn and watched TV, our room had a 42" LCD TV and that was really nice as some of the Inns don't have TV or internet connection. It was really nice to have TV and internet so that we didn't have to invent other ways of entertaining ourselves when at the room. That was our first night stay at this Inn. The room had a nice fire place which was pretty efficient in keeping our room warm. The bedding was amazing, it was truly one of the most comfortable beds that I have slept in. My husband and I managed to sleep well that night.

The next morning we had to get to the dining room that was at the main house at the Inn. They served us our morning fruits, followed by Frech toast and muffin. The Peach Cinnamon french toast was excellent and the muffins were really good too. They had a lot of berries in them and tasted wonderful. They did have the usual granola and yogurt as well but we decided to have the gourmet breakfast. There was tea, coffee and orange juice for beverages. Overall it was a sumptuous breakfast.

After sometime we decided to go for a nice bath in the Jaccuzi tub. We unwound and soaked ourselves. The bath soak liquid was provided as well and it was great too. It was greatly relaxing. Since it was the black friday we spent the rest of the day shopping at the Westfield mall in Fairfield and then shopping at the Napa premium outlets. I bought a PCTV tuner the review of which would follow sometime soon. Having used to shopping at the West Field Valley Fair in San Jose and the Gilroy premium outlets I don't have much to talk about the malls in Fairfield and Napa.

We got back to the Inn past 6:30pm which means we had missed the evening wine and snack. We weren't interested in it so we decided to skip it and just hang out at the mall. Finally we picked up Pizza at Pizza hut in Napa and went back to the inn. Finally it was saturday morning and time for breakfast again, we were served watermelon soup instead of fresh cut fruits. The watermelon soup tasted divine. As for the main breakfast this time it was baked eggs with dill sauce, I didn't like it as much as I liked the french toast. The muffins were different too, my husband picked the sundried tomato muffin and he didn't like it and I had the Banana bran muffin and it was good.

On both days that I stayed at the Inn, our rooms were cleaned nicely and bed was made nicely as well. Everything was back in its place and as good as it was when we got there. When I went to return the keys I met Lorri who happens to be the owner of this Inn. She was very nice and friendly and gave us a lot of information about which places to see, which wineries we could go to and where we could possibly eat lunch. She was nice enough to get us a wine tour reservation at the Rober Mondavi winery and gave us a free wine tasting coupon for V.Sattui and another coupon for the Sterling winery. She gave us a booklet that had map of all the wineries.

We went to the Robert Mondavi winery and took the tour, the tour guy was great he wasn't too fast or rushing us out. He gave us enough time to ask questions, take photos, etc... We were given a brief history about the winery and then the tour began. From whatever he told it was clear that the most important wines were Cabernet Sauvignon, Sauvignon Blanc. Robert Mondavi does make a lot of other wines too...but the grapes aren't always grown at the Robert Mondavi vineyard. We were given the Cabernet Sauvignon grapes to taste. The grape in itself had a strong taste and the skin was way too bitter. Proceeding further we were shown how the oak containers are used and we then got to see the wine aging in the oak barrels. He explained the whole process of wine making and all these intermediary stages from harvesting the grape to bottling the wine.

At the end of it we were given 3 different wines to taste. He offered us the unoaked chardonnay first, I was told that they only made 200 cases of this Chardonnay and that it could be aged upto 8 years easily. The unoaked chardonnay basically bypassed the aging process in the oak barrels and gets bottled right away. Everyone like this Chardonnay as it merely tasted like grape juice only fuller. The next wine that was offered was the 22005 Merlot, this had quite a bit of alcohol and I couldn't take it. Then came the 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon which everyone was waiting for. We were given a small appetizer that was made using olive bread and mushroom when tasting the Cabernet Sauvignon. The winery tour guy told us that Cabernet was the biggest wine they make and it needs to be paired with big foods to be enjoyed. We were also told that Cabernets can be easily aged for about 15-20 years. Finally as a surprise we were given muskato this was an outright winner, it tasted like a stronger 7up and every single person that was there in the tour with us bought atleast 2-3 bottles of this wine.

There were people from other states of USA and certain other countries too that had come to visit these wineries. All the other wineries seemed crowded so we went to Beringer more to see its architecture than for the wine. We didn't go on the tour or wine tasting there. The Beringer vineyard was just beautiful. We walked down the St. Helena Downtown and picked up some chocolates at the Woodhouse chocolate store. Those chocolates tasted divine. My husband and I totally loved these chocolates, each chocolate melted in our mouth. It got dark pretty quickly so we were on our way back. Every winery was uniquely decorated with christmas lights. It was quite a sight.

It struck me on my way back home, how the weekend was a real getaway. The two days we spent at Napa were really relaxing and we never thought about work or daily routine or anything else for that matter. We pretty much lived by the moment. Anyways it was time for us to get back home and we did.

In all honesty, I would definitely recommend a weekend visit to Napa and I whole heartedly recommend a stay at the Hennesy House as well. I would love to visit Napa sometime during summer or early fall and I would definitely love to stay at the Hennessy house or maybe try a different B&B just for the sake of variety.

Point Reyes

2008-11-20T12:27:00.000-08:00

I visited Point Reyes last saturday and had been wanting to write a post about the place. I have already gone there a couple of times only to see the place completely covered in fog. This time it was different and I really got to see how beautiful Point Reyes really is. Even before I start I want to make it clear that no amount of words can truly describe the beauty of Point Reyes.

My parents-in-law are here and we've been wanting to take them to Point Reyes for a while now. This saturday since weather seemed fine I looked at the Point Reyes Cam to make sure that the weather and visibility were good in Point Reyes. Most of the times weather and visibility are great until the visitor center but the Point Reyes light house would be covered with fog. It really helps to see the cam before you leave your home.

Ideally early morning trips should be made to Point Reyes its mainly because the place lies to the west it might be more pleasant in the morning and would have correct amount of light for photography. Photos that are taken in the light house close to evening tend to get overexposed. The other reason is that if you are travelling from San Jose then you need to travel via SFO and as the day progresses the traffic near SFO gets worse.

Anyways if you are lucky with traffic then it takes about a couple of hours to get there. On your way you get to see the Golden Gate Bridge and the drive gets pretty scenic from that point onwards. Further down from the Golden Gate is the Muir Woods National Monument and Park which is where most of the traffic is usually headed. Further down is the Muir beach overlook which is a very beautiful spot where you can see some base-end stations that were used during World War II. Once you cross Muir beach overlook its some more windy roads and you get to Stinson Beach. As you drive further down you get to flat lands lined with backwaters on one side. You just continue on Hwy1 and you finally reach Bear Valley in Point Reyes.

Muir Beach Overlook - View towards San Francisco

Muir Beach Overlook - view of the opposite side.

At the visitor center you pick up the map and head wherever you feel like going. Right when you step out of your car you realize that you are in a secluded place thats far far away from the daily commotion. There's a sense of peace that embraces you. Next to the visitor center is the Earthquake Trail. Its a fairly short trail that takes you through the San Andreas Fault Zone. On your hike you get to see the fence that moved 20 ft apart during the earthquake.

Beach as seen on our way to Light House

The map pretty much has all the beaches and trails listed. But most people usually end up at the historic light house. On your way to the Lighthouse you see Ranches and other beaches, various rock formations and different species of trees. Once you cross Ranches M to A you get closer to the light house. Winds are a lot stronger near the lighthouse and the hike to the lighthouse is 300ft downhill. The view of the lighthouse is spectacular. It was constructed in 1870 and is no longer functional. But the original structure is being preserved and maintined in mint condition. The path that leads to the lighthouse is a flight of stairs that have support rails on either side. You get to see the ocean on either side. You could see the small rocks and different types of birds resting on them on your hike to the light house. The ranger gives a small explanation about the light house mainly about its construction and how it was used.

The Light house

Another View of Light House

Ship and the deer as seen.

Sunset

In addition there are several beaches some offer a calm shoreline and others are usually rough mainly due to the rock formations. Apart from the beaches and light house the whole landscape of Point Reyes is just breathtaking. The valleys, small water bodies, rocks, dense forests with deers running around. The different colors of the ocean at different points is just so wonderful to see.

Because of the early sunset we had to start heading back home earlier than on a typical summer day. But overall I enjoyed every minute I was there in Point Reyes. If you really need a weekend getaway or a quiet day in the wilderness to just zone out then Point Reyes might be the place to go. Even thought its just 1 hr drive from the city you almost feel like you are in some place far far away.

Caress Body Wash, Tahitian Renewal Review

2008-11-18T15:39:00.000-08:00

When I was shopping at Target this weekend I came across a deal on Caress body wash products. They had two of the Caress Tahitian Renewal Body wash and one Caress Brazilian body wash combo for $9. I had been using Caress Moroccan body wash for a while now and I decided to try the Tahitian body wash.

I was mainly tempted to try this product solely because of its pomegranate content. Its cool that this body wash is both moisturizing and exfoliating as well.

Now my take on this body wash: Despite being an exfoliating body wash it does lather well and doesn't seem to strip the moisture from the skin completely. It does exfoliate the skin mildly but that wouldn't be enough to completely ignore your regular exfoliation procedure. It did make my skin softer and my skin felt great all day. Overall my skin definitely felt soft and supple. Infact, I really liked it better than the Caress Moroccan body wash. This one did really smell great, it was a very refreshing smell and it smelt mostly that of pomegranate.

If you are looking at a mostly balanced body wash this might work for you, but if you are keen on deep exfoliation and stuff then this is not the one, some microdermabrasion creams might be the way to go. Also to note, if your skin tends to be dry then this body wash might not work for you.

I'm not going to list out all the ingredients here, but all I would say is that the pomegranate and coconut fragrance seem the most dominant and you can feel the ground pomegranate seeds. As a finishing note, I should say that this body wash does do what it promises to do and that is exfoliate and moisturize at the same time (ofcourse the extent of moisturizing or exfoliation is just not good enough to replace your existing exfoliant or moisturizer).

Sun Puts Tech Layoffs Over 20,000 So Far This Month (Oodle and Rearden Also Join Our Tracker)

2008-11-14T15:34:00.001-08:00

I just came across this article and decided to post it.

Sun Puts Tech Layoffs Over 20,000 So Far This Month (Oodle and Rearden Also Join Our Tracker)

Posted using ShareThis

Marriage

2008-11-10T15:09:00.000-08:00

I read this artcile "Sooner Vs. Later: Is there an ideal age for first marriage", it was quite interesting to see how people prefer to get married later as opposed to getting married in their teens or in their 20s. This article talks about Americans and at what age do they prefer to get married.

During the course of reading this article I was reminded of my dinner with my husband at Amici's in Mountain View, CA. We both love the place and have gone there before our marriage. Last friday we happened to be there and it was quite amazing that both of us told the other person how free we felt despite getting married. I was delighted to know that the feeling was mutual.

I come from India and I know that people there give a lot more importance to marriage. It's not very uncommon to see girls getting married when they are still in college. Not only that a lot of the marriages tend to be arranged marriages as well. Essentially you get married at an early age and start living with a stranger and then try to get to know him and his family. To be honest, I personally feel that it's a bit too much to take when you are in your late teens or just barely 20.

I personally feel that youngsters should be given 2 to 3 years upon completion of their studies to figure out who they really are and what they really want. In my case, the two years after my graduation helped me understand myself a lot better. When you are still in school, you mainly tend to worry about your career and you hardly ever think about marriage. But once you settle down in a job it gives you a lot of time to really think about what you really want. In fact its during that time of life that you really discover who you are as a person.

I'm not against arranged marriage but I totally dislike when there's more than 3-4 years of difference in ages of the bride and groom. In my opinion the closer the ages are it becomes easier to accept the other person as an equal. I can't imagine being in early 20s and marrying someone 8-10 years older than myself. I know women who are in such marriages and say they are super happy but I have my own doubts as its one thing to be truly happy and its totally different to convince yourself that you can't be any happier.

The whole idea of making a long term commitment with an unknown person seems pretty outdated. I'd rather stay single and wake up unhappy a few mornings rather than get married to a wrong person and be unhappy the whole time. Even when you are having an arranged marriage, I think its more important to have a long enough courtship period. The courtship period really helps the bride and the groom to get to know each other really well. In addition, if things don't go well you're better off with breaking that engagement than breaking your marriage.

I had 1 year between my engagement and marriage and time went by so quickly and during that period not only did i get to know my spouse better but his family also. By the time I got married I didn't feel like a total stranger and the transition was easier. There were people who were cynical and were trying to convince me to get married within the next 2-3 months. In fact, one person even suggested that I get married secretively in US (When I'm publicly engaged why should I secretly get married!!!). According to them once engaged its tough to control your urges, in all honesty any disciplined child would know about self-control.

Well, anyways I personally feel that a person should get married only when they feel they are ready (be it teenage or late 20s) and are confident that this relationship with the other person will take them somewhere(not to the courts!!). This is one decision that you need to make for yourself disregarding the pressure from others. We all want to get married just once in life and there's really nothing wrong in taking time to make that decision.

Wax Museum

2008-11-10T11:12:00.000-08:00

I visited the Wax Museum in San Francisco yesterday. I went with my family to San Francisco mainly to see the Golden gate bridge. It was a wonderful evening in SFO with clear skies and the golden gate looked so beautiful. Anyways, since we had some time we decided we'll go to the Wax Museum.

Right at the beginning we saw Tiger Woods, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt and none of them looked real :(, already disappointed we went in to see if there was anything better. As we walked down the stairs to see the other exhibits we first came across Leonardo Di Caprio and Kate Winslet's Titanic exhibit. That's easily the worst replica of Kate Winslet that you can see...It looked nothing like her.

As we kept walking there were lots and lots of exhibits. The exhibits were mostly of presidents, world leaders, dictators, actors, scientists, artists, poets and religious figures.

My favorite wax figure was that of Adolf Hitler, it looked so real and scary. The other nice ones were that of Yasser Arafat that again looked pretty real. Benjamin Franklin and Einstein looked good too. Vladimir Putin was good as well. Cleopatra looked great but then I don't know how that compares to the real one. Eddie Murphy and John Travolta looked nice and realistic. In all honesty nothing looked better than Hitler.

Now the really bad ones were their depiction of hindusim, the religious figures didn't have names and their jewellery and clothing didn't do any justice as well. With regard to christianity Jesus preaching everyone was subaverage but the last supper was okay. With regard to other religion there was nothing breathtaking about them and I cannot critic them as I don't know anything about them.

Then we walked down to the section were egyptian mummy exhibits were kept. It was nice to see the details of the tomb and amount of work that must have been put into making these exhibits. They were good but not my favorite.

Then came the horror section that I completely skipped...but it was so awesome to see the floor with pools of blood (red colored wax really), it sort of looks real until to see it really close.

Now I got to see the sports figures Barry bonds, lance armstrong and stuff...it was okie. After this was the hollywood stars, IMO nicole kidman and marilyn monroe were good but everything else was subaverage. The worst was that of Britney Spears again it looked nothing like her. Now for the hollywood men, Keanu Reeves from Matrix looked okay from distance. The real good exhibits were that of Travolta and Eddie Murphy. The really bad exhibits were that of Governator and Clint Eastwood.

Once this section was over there was a bunch of exhibits for western actors and stuff...and then there were some exhibits for some of the famous paintings like the mona lisa. These were interesting to see but I'm sure I won't remember seeing them.

Overall I would say it was an interesting time pass. It was a lot of fun especially since I visited in a group and not just by myself. I'll post the pics sometime soon.

Crickler

2008-11-07T11:37:00.000-08:00

I play the Crickler puzzle on the Washington Post every single day. I've always liked games that test your word power. The game is sort of interesting in the way that its really not a crossword puzzle but is as interesting as one. I really like the way "y" in included in set of vowels just to add a little complexity.

For those of you who are interested in trying out this game you can start by playing the demo game that gets you oriented on how the game is to be played.

I like to play only the Vocabulary, Crossword and the daily news puzzles but there are a few more for the ones that couldn't get enough Crickler.

I hope you guys like it as much as I do...happy crickler solving :)

I got tagged...

2008-08-04T12:19:00.000-07:00

Yaaay, Uncle Che has tagged me.

So, here are the rules:

List these rules on your blog.
Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog.
Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.

7 facts about Radioactive Android:

1. Work: Engineer that mostly works like a maniac but tries to enjoy other aspects of life as well.

2. Education: Yaaay, not a student at school anymore..I did top in college, blah blah...but they mean nothing!! To me it's all about being able to do things at my own free will...and school isn't the right place for it ;)

3. Friendship: True to saying!! I deserve all my enemies and not my friends. I have very few friends but wonderful friends!!

4. Relationship: Woohoo...I struck gold the very first time :) and I'm just about tie the knot.

5. WWW: Maybe in the 1990's I don't remember the exact year

6. Fitness: What?? Can you repeat the question????

7. Dreams: Well, I only get nightmares :P

Now, I don't know who reads my blog...I started this blog just to post my thoughts and then read it myself...lemme just pass this on to

Suganthi
Tsunami

Waste of time...

2008-07-28T10:36:00.000-07:00

I was reading someone's post in which they were trying to define love, or telling you how to treat others, sometimes more like how to have a better attitude or how to love your family...for some reason everytime I read such stuff I am annoyed.
I always get annoyed when people use most of those old quotes to define love. I mean come on, love is a feeling towards another person and I always find it worrisome when people try to define human emotion and classify them. If Keats or Shakespeare wrote/portrayed it in a certain way it needn't be the same for everyone else and you should also consider the fact that times have changed.
Every time when some tells us to practice tolerance, how to love others, how to sacrifice and what not, I could for the most part clearly hear the tone of a hyprocrite. Well, I guess I feel this way because in case of the posts I read I do know the real person who's writing such posts.
Well I understand that everyone wants to look good in the eyes of others but the way to do it would be to practice it yourself, in most cases the genuinely nice people never tell others what to do. They mostly take people as they are and just deal with them.
Another important thing to understand is that you can't treat a patient when you don't even know what their illness is. You should also understand that people have been writing out such posts forever so you don't really have to go ahead copy and paste those...instead just practice what you preach. If you analyze yourself and post about it that would atleast encourage the reader to look at themselves.
Well, honestly its good to think nicely of ourselves but in reality when most people think you are a fool, I think you are better off trying to see if there really is something wrong with you than simply walking around thinking that you are the greatest.
I really wish people's education taught them how not to be shallow and go around writing such stuff and instead just be good and do their part.

Origins White Tea Skin Care Guardian Review

2008-07-23T20:56:00.001-07:00

I tried out the Origins White Tea Skin Care Guardian, this product falls in the "A Perfect World" category. Now about the product, this product is one of the most mild products I've tried. It felt a little greasy and had a very very mild fragrance. Upon application, I could clearly feel that it was very mild on the skin and helped plump up the skin and created a more smoother look without much shine. I have a few scars on my face and the very first time I used this product I really saw a difference. Since I'm used to applying this kind of serum and applying a moisturizer on top, I certainly didn't have any trouble with the routine.
If you have sensitive skin and are looking for a nicer product that won't harm the skin, this might be a perfect candidate. Skin definitely felt very nice, soft, supple and on top all that it did make my scars less visible :)
Right now I am using Modern Fusion and I'm just waiting for it to get over so that I can go ahead and start using the Skin Guardian cream.

Oakland zoo

2008-07-22T21:46:00.000-07:00

I happened to visit Oakland zoo last weekend and I really liked it a lot. I honestly felt it was better than the San Francisco Zoo. The entire layout of the zoo was very kid friendly and the exhibits were pretty nice that the animals were clearly visible. The bug and reptile display was also very nice. I loved the fact the zoo had nice meadows where families can have nice picnics. It took me about 3-4 hours to cover the entire zoo, I did a lot of walking but wasn't completely exhausted. Here are some of the pictures that I happened to take at the zoo.

My new laptop!!!

2008-07-17T21:40:00.000-07:00

Aw!! I wanted to write this review for a while now but couldn't get to compose it for a while. So, here's the story. I bought a new Compaq laptop from Best Buy for $500 and it came to $538 after taxes.

The laptop has the following components: I'm only listing selective components

1) AMD Turion 64 X2
2) 2GB DDR2 Memory
3) 250 GB Hard Disk
4) Nvidia GeForce 7000M
5) 5-in-1 Memory card reader
6) Double Layer DVD burner

and the laptop runs Windows Vista Home Premium. (For detailed spec, use the link above).
My fiance suggested that I buy this laptop as he was convinced that this is a wonderful configuration for $500. The other laptops with similar configuration were clearly at least a $100 more. Anything that had Intel Core 2 Duo was even more expensive.
First of all I had a Sony VAIO with a Core duo processor, it was an elegant looking laptop even though I found Core duo processor's performance to be average. I loved the screen and also the fact that it never got hot despite using it for longer hours but it had lousy speakers and was super heavy. Anyways, I decided to give the Sony laptop to my parents as a replacement for our older PC as I thought it'll fulfill all their needs.
Now about the new laptop I think it justifies every penny that I spent on it. It looks nice and has a black chassis unlike my Sony that was white. I love the fact that it has Nvidia GeForce video card which kinda makes the display look better. The laptop performs really well but then I don't really use it for playing games and stuff...I use it to work from home for the most part. Initially I was skeptical about buying this laptop as I was unsure about having the Turion processor and also wasn't sure about the build quality of the laptop.
I still decided to buy this laptop as I felt that it would be impossible to get any other branded laptop for the price that I paid. My old Sony costed me $700, which made me think that this laptop was quite a steal.
The most interesting stuff that really made me love the laptop was that when we were looking at the performance score using Vista OS, we found out that Vista gave AMD Turion X2 processor 0.1 more than Intel's C2D and the DDR2 RAM also is comparatively faster than a similar Dell Vostro laptop. So, basically better processor with comparatively better memory really sold the laptop for me and the clean sounding Altec Lansing speakers are a plus. I should also mention the fact that this laptop doesn't get hot despite using it for long durations. I left it on for more than 24 hours and it didn't get hot one bit :). I also love the keypad as its really flat. The charger for the laptop is really small and the length of the cord is pretty generous :) This laptop's wireless connectivity is way better than my old Sony.
I guess I'll end this post here as its getting pretty long, so overall in all fairness i'll give this laptop a 5/5 and yes, I'm extremely excited and happy about this purchase.

SYTYCD does Bollywood dance

2008-07-10T18:57:00.000-07:00

I was pleasantly surprised to see a bollywood dance on So you think you can dance. I thought it was cool and funny. In case if you missed yesterday's episode, here's the video.

Zoooooooooooo

2008-07-08T20:30:00.001-07:00

I happened to go to the zoo last weekend, I really love going to Zoos ever since I was child. I've had a wonderful time every time I visited a zoo and this was no different. Here are some pictures that I took using my new camera (Shall review it sometime soon).

Keeping Busy: Part II

2008-07-02T22:27:00.000-07:00

This is in conjunction with my previous post "Keeping yourself busy". I came across this article today that talks about the how stay at home women can work from home and make a handsome amount of money.
If you need ideas on "How to make money at home" this article might be of help.

Choosing the right sunscreen

2008-07-01T14:15:00.001-07:00

If you had watched the news today you would have seen them reporting about how effective sunscreen creams and lotions are.
Here's the ABC News' version of this story.
As you can see most of the commercial products have performed very poorly in the study done by the EWG. Well, don't lose heart yet, they did recommend some 140 products in the market that could serve as effective sunscreen. Here's the EWG's webpage that describes what to look for in a sunscreen and how to use it.
The bottom line is that you need to use a sunscreen that has zinc or titanium dioxide. Therefore remember to look at the ingredients to see if the sunscreen really has something that counts.
Do exercise caution especially during summer time, remember that you need to use atleast 1 oz of sunscreen to cover your body. If you have small children try to keep them away from the sun as much as you can. If you would like to take your children outdoors then remember to apply a lot of sunscreen on them as well.

Nature's Plus Spirutein Chocolate Shake review

2008-06-28T17:58:00.001-07:00

I have been consuming Nature's Plus Spirutein Chocolate Shake for a couple of years now. It's a great product without doubt and you could see for yourself that all the reviews on the web suggest the same.

I never like eating cereals for breakfast, I'll always start feeling hungry in about an hour and would have to run to the vending machine or drink something. Not only was it not filling enough, but it was also not giving me enough nutrients that my body required. My doctor had always recommended me to have a high protein diet. Once when this topic of breakfast came up, a colleague of mine recommended me to Kashi's protein shake that she was using as her breakfast.

So, I did my own research on finding a good protein shake that would fit my needs and I settled for Nature's plus' Spriutein. Not only does this supply enough protein, it supplies all the other vitamins and minerals that our body requires, which kinda makes it a one big solution for all my problems.

I should admit that I don't feel hungry for a solid 3-4 hours after consuming this protein shake irrespective of whether I have it with Milk or Orange juice,in addition to that this satisfies the golden rule of starting your day with a high protein breakfast to promote healthy metabolism. It's also low on calories.

I should also mention that this product is not one of those muscle building protein shakes, this is for everyday use for normal people with a normal amount of activity. Most people choose to have it either for breakfast or before/after their workout.

The protein powder comes in a variety of flavors, I've tried the vanilla,chocolate and cappucino flavors. I loved the vanilla and chocolate flavors. Cappucino wasn't great but was still very much edible. One important thing to note is that these powders don't have the chalky smell that other protein powders have.

Now talking about the ease of use, I feel this powder mixes well with the liquids more than any other protein powders I've tried. I've tried making my protein shakes using both Hand shakers and Blenders. The powders blend well in both cases (Blender is a little better, in terms of cleaning). It usually takes me about 2 mins to make the shake and drink it, that's a lot less time compared to eating cereals in the morning. You can also use your imagination and add berries and other stuff to the shake if you'd like.

Stores like GNC and Vitamin Shoppe sell this product. I usually buy it from "The Vitamin Shoppe's" website. That's usually the lowest price I could find and they have the free super saver shipping which is about $2.99 compared to the $5 shipping from other vendors.

Overall, I've been very happy to drink this shake every morning :)

Barack Obama's church search - Stephen Colbert Show

2008-06-25T23:34:00.000-07:00

I watched this video yesterday on the Stephen Colbert's show, I really really loved it. So, I decided to post it on my blog. If you are Hindu and can have a laugh...you should watch this...

Coldplay on the Jon Stewart's Tonight Show

2008-06-25T23:19:00.000-07:00

Oh! boy...why did I choose to watch Jon Stewart's tonight show especially when I was almost ready to go fall asleep?? I used to like Coldplay initially but then I realized that they were a bunch of Radiohead wannabes, and it was so apparent that I stopped listening to Coldplay.
They played their new single (I didn't bother to know what the title was) on the show, and it wasn't annoying as I was able to continue doing my office work through it. Since their music isn't really harsh, most people won't mind listening to coldplay. But, my only problem is that they really didn't have anything new.
Even though the song picked up tempo, it still wasn't anything innovative.
I'm kinda saddened by the fact that this is the no.1 selling record everywhere :(
ah! as I'm watching they are playing another song...both of them sound so mainstream!!!
If you are a real rock-music junkie, you would really know what I'm talking about...

Mande Lular Sensuous Body souffle review

2008-06-24T20:39:00.000-07:00

I've been using Mande Lular Sensuous Body souffle for about 6-8 months now. I've been a fan of this product since the first day I started using it.

I've been searching for a good moisturizer for years, none of them really worked for me on a consistent basis. I've tried almost every other moisturizer out in the market to a point that someone that visited my apartment thought that I was spending a lot on cosmetics but the reality was that I bought these moisturizers and they didn't work for me and I really couldn't return them.

Once I was shopping at Target and noticed this Sanctuary Spa's Mande Lular Sensuous Body Souffle. I kinda smelt it a little bit and read the description and noticed that the tub that I was looking at was the only one left so I decided to take it

Needless to say that this stuff smells exceptionally good. The Souffle as such is a little thick but I have no problems with it. In just two applications, my skin became super smooth and soft and it definitely made the skin look more brighter. The best part of this Souffle is that I can use this on my face as well and see the same kind of results. In fact I used this Soffule everyday for a few days and then stopped using it for a week, just so to see how my skin did and my skin didn't dry out for a considerable number of days.

I usually apply this Souffle before I go to bed. I don't use the Souffle every day instead I use it once every 2-3 days. But, I do religiously use it everyday on my face and many people have complimented me for my skin (I've always had good skin, but this product has made people notice it more). I should also note that the mositurizer works so well that skin doesn't dry out after taking a shower or washing my face.

This is my second Mande Lular tub in the past 6 months as very little Souffle goes a really long way. Unlike the really small boxes of body butters, this box is generously sized and only little Souffle is needed to get adequate moisturizing.

I paid about $15 for this but I honestly feel that this was very much worth the price by all means. I had spent a whole lot on other mass produced moisturizers like Nivea, Suave, St. Ives, Neutrogena!!! None of them stand a chance against Mande Lular.

I've seen it for myself that this Souffle works well on normal and dry-skinned people and I'm not sure about how it works on oily skin. But the bottom line is if you think other spa mositurizers and high end moisturizers are too expensive, Mande Lular might be worth trying. I'm so happy with this souffle that I never bought another moisturizer to even try it out :).

Origins Modern Friction and Modern Fusion review!!

2008-06-22T23:00:00.001-07:00

Sometime back I realized that my skin is no longer smooth and soft, and I ended up searching for a product that'll even out my skin tone and make it softer.
I've always used my same body wash on my face as well or I've used Olay facial cleanser, both of which weren't enough to do any good to my face! So, I decided to go searching for some facial product that would do some good to my face.
Basically I have pretty good skin for the most part so I didn't really need something that was very intensive. All I needed was something that would make my skin more clear and nice :). Some of my friends use the 100% organic products but I ruled them out because I couldn't justify spending $60 for a beauty product, besides that I didn't really like it when I tried the sample.
So now having said all that I've tried many of the mass products but none of them really worked consistently. I went to the Westfield Valley Fair Mall that's near Santana Row and I wanted to just see the different beauty boutiques that are there and finally pick something.
Once I was in the mall, I got real curious about the Origins brand, the lady there talked me into buying this Modern Friction buffing paste for the face and the Modern Fusion serum. I tried this stuff on the back of my palm in their boutique and I should agree that I've never seen a better scrub.
I got charged about $75 for both of these and I really wasn't sure if it was all worth it, nevertheless I decided to try the product and if it really doesn't work then I could always return it.
Now that I've been using this product for more than a month, my skin shows very clear improvement. It's quite amazing as to how such really small quantity of the serum and buffing paste work so well.
About the buffing paste, it's not as coarse as the other scrubs in the market and very little quantity stretches all the way and I really like the fact that it lathers with water. I also like the way I'm able to massage this all over my face. The scrub has very clean rice and lemon fragrance which is quite refreshing and nice. I could clearly feel the skin to be soft every time I use the scrub and the result is immediate. I was advised to use the scrub about 2-3 times a week, but since my skin is really sensitive I only use it twice a week sometimes less. I could clearly say that my skin has improved with every use.
Now, to the Modern Fusion serum, I was told to apply this serum after cleansing my face. This serum is supposed to be worn under the moisturizer. Just a couple of drops of the serum helps cover my entire face and it gives a uniform matte finish to the skin and it seems to keep the face clear and nice pretty much through the day. I don't use separate make up or face-powder, it's pretty much the serum and moisturizer and the results are quite amazing. This serum also smells of rice and lemon and is very pleasant and its not as strong smelling as some of the other serums and moisturizers.
I can clearly see that my face has become more brighter and the skin tone has gotten better. I really love these two products. Despite the seemingly high price, I'm fairly certain the buffing paste would last me another 3-4 months and the serum might last atleat another 2 months. So, that makes the cost come down to roughly about $10/month, which is worth it for the kind of results I've seen using these products.
If you are really searching for skincare products that show results, Origins might be really good place to start.

Flowers

2008-06-21T11:13:00.001-07:00

I decided to take pictures of the flowers on account of celebrating my birthday last week. It was a great delight for the eyes to see such colorful flowers. Every single one looked so pretty and so different from the others :).

I am posting some of the pictures in the blog...

Keeping yourself busy to fight boredom!

2008-06-20T11:24:00.001-07:00

A lot of my friends have gotten married and have brought their wives to USA. A lot of these women don't work in US and hence have to find other ways to keep themselves busy.
It's no surprise that they'll lose interest for cooking three times a day within very few days after they land here. If they have previously worked then obviously they'll get bored with just doing the house chores and watching TV. To be honest, I'd rather be at work than stay at home and not know what to do!!!

In fact, I'm very happy that most of my friends were very open to the idea of their wives continuing their education here. In fact, some guys even went to the extent of searching for good schools and learning about the courses they offer that would interest their wives, I found it very fascinating. One person, prepared lunch for his wife and took it to her college :) (Could it get any better than that?).

Yea, now the point is that these women are lucky because they get to do what they want and they have enough support. But, not everyone has that kind of support and not all guys are open to the idea of educating their wives. It might totally depend on the guy's mindset and financial situation.

For the most part, you don't necessarily have to do an MS or MBA as a part of your continuing education, you could still find affordable courses online and some universities offer distance education program (UCSC offers courses right in bay area) or attend some of these pottery classes and other art related classes. Some of them even go to dance classes and give stage performances every now and then. But, if you really have some goodwill towards society (not like donating stuff for tax-benefit), you can even take to doing some social work.
These are just some things to think about.

Maybe you can ask yourself, will it be okay for me to say that my activities are "Surfing the internet" or to say "professional dancing, painting, etc...". I always wonder what kind of a person says "chatting" as their activity, but after seeing so many people, I am no longer surprised.

It'll always be good to keep in mind, that you cannot always expect your husbands to keep you entertained. If only one person goes to work, obviously that person tends to think that they are more stressed (they obviously will be) and will not be able to attend to the needs of others.

In the end, if you really want to fight boredom its you who should find out what is it that'll keep you busy and help you get by rather than just surfing the internet and watching Sun TV or putting together some stuff from Michaels!!!

Dasavathaaram: A big let down

2008-06-17T10:00:00.001-07:00

Last weekend was kind of disappointing for me for a variety of reasons and one of them was having to sit through Dasavathaaram.
First of all, I am not a big fan of Kamal Hassan but I still decided to watch this movie because of all the hype. Even though my gut told me that this movie would be bad, I still gave in to the curiosity. Finally, there I was on Friday watching this movie.
I won't be going over the plot, I am only going to discuss the most atrocious aspects of the movie. After watching the movie, I can confidently say that Kamal played the ten different characters only for the sake of setting a record that no one else cares about. I understand that most of the money was spent on makeup, that looked terrible. I honestly cannot understand how Kamal or K.S.Ravi Kumar watched this movie and decided to release it.
Like the makeup wasn't enough to screw the movie, every single stunt was copied over from some other Hollywood movie. I could give them the benefit of doubt if it was just one stunt or two that resembled a hollywood movie but instead every single one was copied.
Considering the fact that Terminator is one of my favorite movies, I can never forgive Kamal Hassan trying to look like Arnold Schwarzenegger!!! (I should admit that it's not too bad when compared to Vijayakanth trying to look like Keanu Reeves in Arasangam)!!
Out of the 10 characters, about 8 of them ranged from below average to annoying and unnecessary. The Avtar singh character was a total waste of time and fact that he gets cured in the end reminded me of an old Muthuraman movie in which the doctor dies after saving Muthuraman (Which is total BS).
The 95 year old granny was the most disturbing and I am fairly certain that watching this character might just be a reason enough to have nightmares. This was by far the worst makeup I've ever seen in my life.
By now, you could see that I've already endured quite a bit of stuff here and on top that they have this Asin's character and every time she spoke my only visceral reaction was that I wanted to slap her so she would never speak.
I still don't understand why they made a big deal with referring to the common salt as NaCl and how no one calls it common salt. If they really thought that it would be a suspense until Kamal reveals it at the end it really wasn't. There was no suspense, everything was so predictable except for K.S.Ravi Kumars' dancing at the end! I was lost for words when I saw him dance at the end. Did he really have to put us through that??
Amidst all this annoyance, it was the Balram Naidu's character that shined. It was probably the only character that was worth watching in the entire movie. The interrogation scene was the only piece of the movie that's worth watching.
So finally was it satisfactory? No way.
was it gruesome? Completely so.
What did I get out of watching the movie: Migraine headache.

Here's your Macy's 20% off coupon...but you just can't use it!!!

2008-06-11T12:06:00.000-07:00

I have been shopping regularly at Macy's ever since I have moved to California (for about 2.5 years), I personally find it easier to shop at Macy's as its a lot easier to find the smaller sizes there.
Last weekend, I was at Macy's shopping for some apparel and watches and I wanted to use the 20% off coupon that I had received by mail. I was fairly certain that coupon wasn't valid on Watches but I was fairly certain that I could use it on the apparel. So, when I offered the coupon, the cashier told me that I would not be able to use it. I found that quite ironic because, I tend to buy the same brand and I remember using a similar coupon only a few months back. Not only that, I specifically went over the "Excludes:" list to make sure that the brand I was buying wasn't listed in it. I found it interesting and odd that the cashier didn't even have to look at the clothes or the brand name to tell me that I just cannot use the coupon, especially when the coupon says use it for apparel and accessories.
I was unhappy not because I had to spend more but because I really felt cheated. If I literally cannot use a coupon on any merchandise I buy, I really don't see the point in them sending this coupon, it almost seems like Macy's has just stuck to this strategy to ripoff customers. Well, most people like me that have taken the pain to go to the Macy's store would not just return home once we find the coupon to be invalid instead we would still go ahead and buy the merchandise to avoid the hassle of going shopping a second time or finding a better deal somewhere else.
From what I remember, it never used to be this way until a few months back. In fact, in most stores people are nice enough to give you the discount as long as you have your Macy's card. But this time it was awful and I've almost decided to search for another more straight forward and no-frill store to do my shopping rather than deal with such crookedness.

Something's cooking!

2008-06-04T16:43:00.000-07:00

I'm a South-Indian vegetarian that only knows how to cook south indian food. I don't know much about north indian cuisine. But, anyways I wanted to make some curry that I can have with roti and I was searching for recipes online and I found this Potato in Yogurt gravy recipe video. I was just wondering who in the world had all the time to make a video and post it.
Anyways, I decided to try the recipe.

When I was in the process of trying the recipe (actually watching the video), I realized how very nice it was for someone to upload the video. Watching the video eliminates any doubt regarding the actual quantity of the ingredients used. When they mention table spoon or cup you really get to see what kind of spoon or other utensil that they use for measuring. I know that a cup signifies 240ml or 8oz but I've noticed that in most Indian recipes people somehow have it wrong. I once read a recipe in which the cook had specified 1 cup of chillies for making rasam (south indian dish), I couldn't even bring myself to imagine eating a dish that has 1 cup of chillies!!! It's plainly brutal!

So, anyway the video was pretty good because unlike some other recipe blogs the person clearly tells at what heat you're supposed to cook and how long, most others miss this info and they let us use our judgment to decide. The video was about 8 mins long and the making the dish took me about 10 minutes in all. I was very happy the way it turned out (the most important reason, why I even thought of writing one such post).

So, I guess it is a lot more helpful when the person posts the recipe or the procedure to make a certain dish in the video format as opposed to just writing a few lines and just posting a pic of the end product. I'm in no way suggesting that everyone that posts their recipe online should do this, instead I'm just suggesting that it might be better to do it this way.

Here's the video for Potato Curry with Yogurt Gravy

Yellowstone National Park

2008-06-02T13:57:00.000-07:00

Hooray!! after nearly a year of busy schedule at work, I am finally free (well partly atleast). I was wondering how to best spend the lean time and decided to kick-off by going on a group trip to Yellowstone National Park. This was one of those trips that was a lot of fun from the day we left home till I got back home.

Old Faithful Geyser

I'm usually scared of animals and when I agreed to go on this trip, I really wasn't sure as to what I had gotten myself into as YNP is filled with wildlife. We didn't see much of Wildlife on the first day. It was more of Old faithful Geyser and other smaller geysers near it. Despite stinking so badly they all looked very colorful and no two geysers looked alike. Rain did play some spoil-sport in the morning...but I guess our prayers were answered with nice sunshine later in the afternoon. We walked up and down the trail to see all the smaller geysers near Old faithful.

Trail near Old Faithful

Since the temperature was close to freezing temp there was a lot of steam near the geysers, which I thought was pretty cool. We also saw some waterfalls, I personally liked the Gibbon falls more than the other waterfalls I had seen that day.

Gibbon Waterfalls

On our way back to the cabin, we got to see Bison herds walking all over the roads not caring about traffic. Bisons looked more like the cousins of Buffaloes (I guess everybody knows this already).

Bison Grazing

More Bison

Next day began with Norris Geyser basin on our way we saw some Elks just hanging around, well this was more of geysers and bacteria growing near them and stuff. These bacteria are called Thermophiles (every time I hear this, the word pedophile comes to my mind, which is pretty weird!!) and they thrive well near these hot springs and geysers.

Bacteria

We kept going and we came across more waterfalls and snow. As we proceeded north, the elevation increased and the whole place was filled with snow. It completely reminded me of Tahoe. In the afternoon, we got to see some Moose grazing, it felt so good to see something other than Bison and Elks :P.

Moose grazing

Then we drove for a while until we saw lots of people waiting with their telescopes and binoculars. We were curious too and so we stopped by to see what was going on near Tower falls. On our way to Tower falls, we got to see Black bear at a distance. We always had to maintain atleast a 100 meters distance from the bears...so, we could never get to see it like we would in a zoo. I somehow think Tower falls was more picture perfect than the other falls that we saw.

Tower Falls

After watching the bear, we drove around and finally ended up at the Grand Canyon of the yellowstone.

Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone

It was quite amazing although I was a little scared on the insides. It really, truly gives you a sound sense of proportions even if you aren't good at math. I felt so small staring at the breathtaking canyon, the waterfalls in the canyon was beautiful too. The canyon was the highlight for the first two days.

On the third day we had no real agenda in place, in order to cover the areas left out we decided to leave more than an hour earlier than our usual time. In fact all of us got ready and we were so happy that we have more time than usual and wanted to make the most of it, only to get stuck in bison traffic for more than hour. I was quite frustrated during the wait, but on seeing the bisons, I forgot it all. We went to see the yellowstone lake, it was completely frozen. I've never seen such a huge water body completely frozen before.

Frozen Yellowstone Lake

It was really beautiful. On our way, we even saw a wolf. I have to mention that despite being smaller than all the other animals that I got to see, the wolf looked the most cunning and ferocious. I guess I'll remember it for my entire lifetime as to what its really like to stare at a wolf and have it stare back at you. It was a really dull day and we went on see Mammoth springs and also visited more geysers before returning to the Cabin.
In order to keep the size of the post from being too large and lengthy, I haven't added quite a bit of beautiful photos that we took at YNP. I'll have another post exclusively for the interesting photos taken at Yellowstone.
For some reason, I felt that we weren't lucky with much of wildlife viewing, but after talking to people at work, I realized that I was a lot luckier than most people as most of them weren't even lucky enough to see the bison close by. That made me feel lot more happier ;).
Over all, this was one of the most joyful and satisfying trip I've gone on and the memories of it I'm sure will definitely linger for a long long time.

My new camera :)

2008-04-26T00:25:00.000-07:00

I'm really really bored today...I'm still working tonight while watching Jay Leno's show (no, I don't think that affects the quality of my work!!)...I am going to spend the weekend working...so, I decided to write this blog just to distract myself!!
Sometime back I got a new digital camera (I finally got one for myself) and I'm experimenting with it these days.
I was really skeptical about buying a compact point and shoot camera all along mostly because I was under the impression that the quality of the picture taken was questionable in a number of ways. A lot of the pictures that people (people I know...) have taken ends up with poor lighting, and the object being out of focus and often times does no justice to the person that's being photographed. It really gets me upset to see a picture of myself in which I'm darker and fatter (part of the reason why I wasn't going to invest in the camera)...
My fiance (who loves photography..) convinced me to buy this Sony Cybershot W80, I kinda reluctantly bought it and we went to Santa Cruz light house beach to just test out the camera. We took some nice pictures but I still wasn't sure if it was worth it. So, the second trip was to boardwalk and I was convinced that the camera was decent if not great. But, the third time was really the charm...the pictures were really good, that it kindled an interest in me to actually go on trips just to be able to take pictures. Here are some of the pictures that I like that were taken using my camera.

So, basically I've used this camera both indoors and outdoors and I'm pretty impressed with the camera (and myself :P). Considering the fact that a novice like me can take some decent photos I guess the bad looking photos might not be the camera's fault after all.

Piano Lessons..my new obsession!!

2008-03-12T10:32:00.000-07:00

I agree that I've become a Porcupine Tree Evangelical!! until a year back I had no idea that this band even existed...but now I listen to PT every single day!! Usually I tend to listen to a particular band for a certain amount of time and tend to move on...but I find it almost impossible to stop listening to Porcupine Tree eve for a day.
I started listening to Porcupine Tree sometime before Fear of a Blank Planet was released because my fiance wanted to go to their concert. I remember listening to Synesthesia first and I wasn't sure how the whole concert experience would be (which turned out to be nothing short of a great and memorable day)!! But, I totally fell in love with PT once I started listening to Lightbulb Sun, In Absentia and Deadwing...
So, with PT I heard their newer albums first and then tried listening to some of their older albums...I by chance ended up listening to Piano Lessons from Stupid Dream and I totally fell in love with this song...I know that this song ain't metal sounding by any stretch of the imagination and it's kinda quite simple...still I just totally adore this song...
I pretty much start my day listening to Piano Lessons and sometimes I listen to this song multiple times before I move on to the next one!!! Maybe, I love this song...because I could connect..Connect with its meaning in a variety of ways...
This song is about a kid that kinda sucks at learning piano but in the end manages to learn it just fine...Life as a kid is extremely painful when you don't happen to be one of the teacher's favorite students. The little mistakes that you make gets magnified out of proportion. Even if you can do the damn thing right a second time you try...you are made to believe that you'd never be good at this task for the rest of your life.
Well, sometimes it doesn't stop with the teacher either...Even though it was 3 or 4 years since I wrote my Engineering entrance exams...I had one of my aunts wanting to compare my score with someone else's (it's noteworthy to mention that the syllabus was totally changed since I wrote the exams)!! Well, I had nothing to lose cos my score was still better :P..Nevertheless, I certainly thought the whole exercise was unnecessary!!
Every time I hear this song it kinda reminds me of my own desperation to get some credit whatsoever for being better than someone at something!!
Even though none of their remarks had any impact on my progress and I made it through just fine...I still sometimes wish that things were different!!! Yea, maybe a little credit wouldn't hurt :P

Being Wrong!!

2008-02-22T10:35:00.000-08:00

Most of us make mistakes or have made mistakes and ended up learning from them. I know that some people feel so bad about being wrong and try to make amends or sometimes it's just the other way, wherein they try to justify what they did.

Personally, in my case when I do something that I shouldn't have done, I acknowledge I was wrong and kinda try not to do it a second time. I've tried to justify my deeds before, but as I grew older and mature I just realized that I wasn't getting anywhere with that attitude of mine. Besides I don't lose anything by accepting I was wrong, than walk around proudly with my foolish dogmas and expecting people to like me!!

But I do come across people that don't want to be wrong, being cautious is one thing but trying to cover up is a totally different thing. I came across someone that had the urge to prove me wrong and ended up leaving a comment on my page so I take the time to explain why I did what I did and I notice this person just deletes his/her comment leaving my comment appear out of context. I was quite surprised to actually see someone take things so seriously to a point where they delete the comment on someone else's page. I realize the comment didn't make much sense but taking it out once I provide an explanation is just silly or atleast I feel that way. This act just makes me wonder to what lengths this person would go to cover up something? What's the worst that could've happened if the comment had just stayed? Really, nothing would've happened. I don't think anybody will jump to a conclusion or judge you because you said something that didn't make sense or was just totally wrong in such trivial scenarios. If people ever did that I think they are really shallow!!!

As for me, I just left my comment to stay because I don't really care about the few that are going to pass judgments about me by just looking at this one comment.

Did you say MCP???

2008-02-14T11:06:00.000-08:00

I was holding off from writing this blog but I saw this question on TV 'Are we ready for a woman president yet?' or some news about 'Women's Rights' and I was thinking about it and in the end I thought I'd just go ahead and write this blog.

I don't know how many of you have frequently dealt with Male chauvinists in your lives, I feel lucky because I didn't have to deal with male chauvinists for the majority of my life. Ever since I was a child I have always enjoyed a level playing ground. In fact, in high school I studied in a class where the first 5 to 10 rank holders were all girl kids and even engineering college was quite good there were no signs of chauvinism anywhere...and same was the story with grad school.

So, pretty much until the completion of grad school I had never witnessed male chauvinism or even seen men who thought they were superior or had an edge over women. I did witness something weird upon graduating from grad school and when I was searching for my first job. It took me a little over two months to find a job so, during that time I was generally getting advice from others (both solicited and unsolicited).

I happened to talk to this man and some of the stuff that he mentioned really did strike me as odd. Here's some stuff that I still happen to remember: 'mostly employers don't prefer women because they need to provide them maternity leave', 'Why do you need a really good job? if you happen to get a really good one then you wouldn't want to quit it even if you get married to someone in a different city', 'If you get married to someone in a different city, what will you tell your employer that you'll telecommute?', When I mentioned that interviews went well he was like 'yea, probably the manager just flirted with you'.

I do understand some (actually just one) of the stuff mentioned above like having to take maternity leave but I fail to comprehend the need to settle for a mediocre job so that I wouldn't feel bad when I have to quit!! I still don't get it!! Wouldn't you rather have a good job to work on irrespective of what happens in the future. I do understand that some decisions need to be future proof like buying electronics, appliances, retirement investments, etc...but doing a mediocre job so that you won't feel bad when quitting is just beyond me!! The closest analogy I can think of is "Fall sick totally don't treat your illness that way others won't feel bad when you die because there's the comforting thought that you were a sick person and you would have died anyway" On any day I would opt for a good job that way if I need to quit, I would at least have had job satisfaction and would have pocketed more money.

I understand maybe I can get lucky with one job interview because some flirted with me, but can you really get lucky with 3 out of 4 job interviews especially when you are interviewed by people of either gender???

Well, I did hear the advice and I did what I do best with such obnoxious advices just ignored it and took a job which I thought was something that I liked...I like it still...so, I guess I made the right call after all.

So, after all this ranting of mine here's the inside scoop I'm really thankful for the kind of men that I have in my life be it my father or my soon to be husband or friends they have all been great. I know what I dealt with isn't the most vulgar exhibition of chauvinism but I do feel bad for the women who happen to be a part of the lives of such men. I really don't envy them. I guess it's my time to feel content for all the goodwill that has been shown towards me by the people of the opposite gender in my life :)

All alone and by myself ...

2008-02-12T15:35:00.000-08:00

Over the weekend my roomie had asked me to join her for going to this movie Cloverfield, I was having a horrible migraine and had taken a pain killer only then so, I told her that I'm not sure and asked her when she was planning to leave and she replied saying she wud be going to the 10pm show. I thought maybe I can go if my migraine gets any better but in the end I just chose not to go and went back to my room around 8:00 pm and started listening to some music just to distract myself.

At about 9:30pm I heard a loud door bang and I concluded that it was my roomie who was just leaving to go watch the movie. I was quite sedated because of the medicine but I still continued listening to music.

Then a little past 10:15 pm or so I heard a laugh from my roomie's room. I was quite terrified, to be sure that the laughter infact came from her room I immediately turned off the music and I was just still. And at this point I was just thinking of the spirits and what would I do if there was one in the other room?? I've seen people acting like they were possessed by God or ghosts and every time I witnessed one such lunatic act in the past I was never alone and I usually run away to some other room or I'll just distance myself as much as I could, so that I can just run away when the spirit comes chasing me!!

But this time I was all by myself not knowing what to do. So, I tried to stay as quiet as possible and listen if there was any noise coming from the other room. I heard the laugh again, I realised it sounded more like my roomie, so I was terrified even more. I was wondering who could possibly be there and laugh just like her?? In the minutes that followed I heard the laugh multiple times and felt that it would be impossible for anyone to just laugh like her that many times.

After a while I heard some noises from the other room and I finally mustered some courage and went out of my room and checked near the apartment door and looking at our shoes, I realized that after all my roomie might not have gone to watch the movie. That thought did comfort me a little bit but then I was still a little afraid to go to her room and check...so, I had a glass of water and went back to my room, since I was quite sedated I ended up sleeping through the night.

The next day I got to know that my roomie indeed had stayed at home the previous night. So, finally my fear was put to rest and we all went and watched Cloverfield that evening. Watching Cloverfield was quite an unforgettable experience...maybe I can write another blog about the aftermath of watching Cloverfield :P

Where we would be...

2008-02-11T14:22:00.001-08:00

I was listening to Porcupine Tree's 'Where we would be' track from the album Lightbulb Sun. This isn't the best song in the album or for that matter even one of the top 5 songs but I still like it because of the mellow tone and beautiful lyrics. The song is basically about how we don't become the person that we dreamt of becoming when we were young. Every time I listen to this song I have this bittersweet longing to go back in time and continue to dream of how I thought my life would shape up when I grew up.

I'm sure most of us have envisioned ourselves of becoming something like either our favorite celebrity or athlete or musician or a bunch of other things!! For me it was becoming a lawyer, being the 10-13 yr old that I was at that time, I thought it was a lot cooler to be a lawyer. My dad went to law school as a part time student at that time because he was passionate about studying law. I was interested right from the time he started preparing for the entrance exam to get into a law school until the day he graduated out of law school.

The things that interested me the most about studying law and practicing it was the subtlety, the requirement for logical reasoning and a whole lot of emotional detachment. It's quite fascinating to zero-in on some extremely vital information that others couldn't find or ignored. Your skills of reasoning get tested every single day with every single case you see or deal with. I shall NOT go into detail about the reasoning skills as that tends to annoy most people. But, I like the emotional detachment aspect, wherein you really truly need to be disinterested and hold no bias no matter what. It's human nature to look back in time and make decision based on our own personal experience or from what we've heard and seen but it's really a unique ability to be under control and not let your own bias interfere with your judgment. The ability to be strong enough and just interpret the book and not throw your 2 cents in, is something I always wanted to do.

Though, as I grew up I did become something or someone different from what I wanted to be...but the things that I mentioned as interesting do interest me until today which kinda makes me want to go back in time whenever I listen to this song and just build on that dream every now and then :)

Who gave them jobs??

2008-02-07T11:48:00.000-08:00

I always wonder how some people managed to get into hi-tech sector with their sub par knowledge. Even though I have nothing against them, I sometimes find it annoying when they ask me really stupid questions like why don't you use notepad instead of emacs? or ask me if I have a digital camera when I say I'm interested in photography!!! or asking how to switch on an mp3 player, or asking for an example for using every single Tcl command, or sometimes just by saying 'I just want a workaround' when they don't even know what the actual problem is!!! Sometimes not even knowing how to calculate log values even with a scientific calculator!!!

I agree I'm not the smartest person that ever lived but I can clearly see why I'm not dumb. One thing that I think of most of the times is how others deal with these people? Do they get as annoyed as I do? How do they react when asked lame questions? Do they laugh at the question and make the other person get the message that the question isn't worth replying at all? or do they just answer it one time and then just stay away from this person???

I do understand that not everyone knows everything but it's beyond me to see how they cannot understand the obvious!!! How could someone not be ashamed of being an illiterati? How can they not bring themselves to know things that they were already supposed to know but which they don't know yet??

But as much as I get annoyed, I really do admire their ability to actually get the job or survive in hi-tech sector only because they have to for a variety of reasons and not because they actually want to do this. IMO most people would be equally happy and far more satisfied doing some other not to tech job. But still it makes me wonder if they really like doing what they do?? Wouldn't you actually lose interest when you are made to work on something that you don't care about?????? I sure do wish I could be them for just a day and really see for myself as to what goes on in their minds!!!!

Body Image!!

2008-02-05T11:54:00.000-08:00

I constantly bump into women(non-obese ones) that have this desperation to look like someone else more than themselves and I'm quite amazed to see the great lengths to which they go in their desperation to look good. Most people starve themselves or change their diet and get all label conscious and try to get Salt that doesn't say Sodium in the list of ingredients!!! Sometimes its even worse when they think size 2 is bigger and want to reduce to Size '0' or even size '00'.
As much as I support the need to stay fit and wanting to look your best, I don't understand this senseless ruining of your health to look like something or someone that you are not. If you have a naturally big frame you'll never get smaller to a point where you can squeeze yourself into a size 0 clothing and the irony is most women know this, this in turn makes me wonder if they just ignore this fact or if their desperation just prevails over logic!!!
In addition to this wanting to look like someone else ailment most of these women have such poor self-esteem to a point where they have to call normal women fat and ugly just to make themselves feel better. Some women in their 30's pick clothes from the Juniors and girls section and then there's the other kind that would devour the designer outlets to look young and hep without actually understanding that your apparel can only enhance your looks but will not give you a totally new look that you don't have(substitute for a plastic surgery)!!
Majority of these women seek attention and have this need to be noticed and what I don't understand is why do you have to go through so much to be noticed or to even make your presence felt. I constantly wonder how could anyone expect to be noticed or want to be accepted when they themselves cannot accept who they are or how they look!! If you are not comfortable with your own self how could others be comfortable with you??

AdSense or NonSense

2008-02-01T17:20:00.000-08:00

I noticed that most people have a whole bunch of ads that appear on their blog page at first I wondered if they really got someone to sponsor their web page but the realization came quickly when I looked at my own blog page and noticed that I can have ads displayed too.
Now, I'm facing this question of whether or not use AdSense in my blog page, as much as I'd like to get some free money I really think I shouldn't be using it on my blog page.
Now, why do I think I shouldn't use it on my blog page, well part of the reason is that I find them to be annoying and distracting. In some blogs these ads are all over the place that I feel like I literally have to scroll down several miles to read the blog and I certainly don't like doing it. The other perspective that I often think of is how as humans we have the ability to tune out certain things, like the ads in our email home page, tuning out noise, etc...so, eventually most people will tune out the parts of the blog page with these ads and what are the chances that they are going to click on these ads and generate revenue for you?

Why?

2008-02-01T14:42:00.000-08:00

Seriously..I was frustrated no, actually the right word would be annoyed...to see some others blog or rather copy and paste stuff from various websites and call it their "Blog"...if it's that simple then I just thought why not try it!!
No actually, that's not the reason why I started this blog or why I'm going to abandon it either...I just started it to post some mediocre stuff that most others would like to call as thoughts, opinions, experience or whatever they choose to call it...
Even though I have nothing against people expressing their views or quoting someone or referring to some link..I would like to see some originality to the content that's being posted. Well, what is the point in copying and pasting stuff!! Often times I see people copying some news items on to their blog and expecting people to leave comments and that makes me wonder what kind of comments does this person expect...

Oh! wait, I'm still wondering...