Amusing Musings

Trip to Peoria was like opening a pandora's box of memories... My friendship with Shailu dates back to Dec 1999. I saw her through my class window, few days after the First year engineering classes commenced. Since it was the first year, we did not have separate classes for each branch yet. We had same course work for all branches hence were randomly allotted sections. Vani, my first friend of Engg days, and I looked through the window and saw this new enrollee waiting outside to get in to the First year Mechanical Engg. class. She is Fair, tall, thin, silky straight hair looking so naïve, cute and all. We wished she joined our section, just coz... and she did. And then we introduced ourselves and to our surprise found she isn’t that naïve, soft as she looked after all... infact, was a pataka ... hehe! A bold and beautiful girl who was very demanding yet giving and caring all the same time. We had already met on the first day @ college, Hima – a pretty, posh, pleasant, very girly g...

I went to Peoria, IL this weekend to Amogh’s 2nd Birthday party. I missed his First birthday last year and didn’t want miss it this year for anything on the earth! He is as cute as a button and a very smart and sharp little boy, one of my dearest friends, Shailu’s son. I haven’t met her in like 5 years except for a few min meet up in the Minneapolis airport during one of my flight transits some 2 years ago. It was a total hit. The 3 days trip just flew by. The night I landed, Friday, I had a blast cooking guthi vankaya, veg biryani and other mouthwatering dishes on menu for the party for 40 people. I was amazed by my ability to cook Guthi Vankaya Koora, so much quantity, so delicious. We cooked and decorated and talked and talked and mused over good old college days The next morning on Saturday, Shailu, I and her other friends did some more cooking (chana masala, jeera rice, egg masala) and decorating of all the living room with (blue, white and yellow) balloons. Shailu saw the movie “...

Ever felt this way… that you have been waiting for things to happen. Something, anything... Something big to happen, something you have waited for so long all this while to kick off and then unexpectedly everything starts to happen, all the same time, so much so little time so sudden that u actually choke. It is good that things are finally falling in place but all at the same time!!! I panic when I cannot handle so many things at the same time, when it is way overwhelming for MY multi-tasking ability! Yuppie I consider myself a khatarnak multi-tasker ;) It takes lot of work... hard work… physical, mental and of course paper work! You can share the physical work, which automatically alleviates the mental work but you canNOT avoid the paper work involved in present day system. I have been working my a$$ off since the day 1 I landed in the US. It is not easy to have lived all your life a mom’s, teachers’, aunt’s, uncle’s, cousins’ darling in a Golden cage like abode and then all of a sud...

I was going to visit my friend Ammu who is soon to be Mommy. Excitement, anticipation and joy is everywhere when someone is expecting a baby, for the parents and all the near and dear! I hardly get time to visit or have visitors over for formal lunch/dinner invitations with my hectic workweekday routine. I try to squeeze in as many social activities as possible during the weekends. This weekend our sunnyvalites-buddies called for a potluck dinner @ Ammu's. I wanted to get some fresh flowers, beautiful and pleasant, so she would enjoy looking at them. keep the mommy as happy and she(and the baby) is as healthy. :) Giving flowers, for whatever the occasion, I think signifies your feelings and your feelings towards the person you are giving the flowers to. I researched on the internet about flowers, their significance, appeal etc. I came across this very interesting and Exotic flower "Iris". The first time I read about the Iris is when I read the book "The Da Vinci Code...

Sarvadhari Nama Noothana Samvatsara Subhakankshalu... The festival Ugadi marks the new year day for people who follow the southern Indian lunar calendar . And to kick off the new year in a new style, got up at 6.15 am, which is the earliest ever i got up to work! made aloo-onion curry and roties for vj for breakfast, usually brunch is all we have in the morning most days attended a meeting at 7 AM, which is the most horrendous time to have a meeting and drove to work. It was such a crazy day at work.. i hope not, my rest of the year goes by this way. As the saying goes, the experiences and feel of the first day of a new year symbolizes the overall year's balance... though morning was boring, lunch was delicious, scrumptious, lip smacking!... garelu, boorelu, mirchi bajji, guthi vankaya, pongal, bhendakaya fry, dum biryani... Ugadi Pachadi, vankaya pachadi, beerakaya pachadi, paneer masala, gobi manchuriya... ras malai, ...slurp, gulp! are just few of the may items off of the Ugadi...

now how about a mobile phone with a built in credit card, (swipe-able, readable) Photo ID (swipe-able, readable) and a key chain all i need is one object the multifunctional device which lets me communicate, shop, identify myself and lets me into my house. All i need to carry with myself while going out jogging, walking or just out is this multifunctional device. I wonder if this concept/idea was discovered by anyone else before me.. if not hey! ALL RIGHTS RESERVED! ;) :)

It was a beautiful sunny Sunday afternoon. It was about 4.30PM but the sun shone warm and bright almost overhead. We were taking our usual walk around the block when we decided to break the routine and walk towards the downtown. We cut through Murphy, the Caltrain station, Taeffe street and then into Murphy again, the downtown street. To our surprise, we found the place rather deserted. Most of the Shops closed; no people out, hardly any traffic. The construction of the new mall is going at full pace. It is supposed to be as good as the Santana Row. Wow! I am waiting eagerly to see it open. The Caltrain station brought back some fond memories of my engineering final year days when I commuted daily from Home to college and back home in trains about 280 km. The parking of my kinetic Honda in the long term parking, season tickets, boarding the train that is always late - East Coast or the train that takes forever to reach the destination – Push pull or Krishna express, Aurora Engg College...