Vacation week 2 of 3 (old draft--2010!)

(Continued: Dec 2010 - Jan 2011)

...turns me into a bleddy housfrau--no offense to anyone--just not what a vacation is supposed to be.

Monday:

1. Walked the dogs and fed them.
2. Prepared breakfast and cleaned up afterwards.
3. Apartment-complex-related activities:
   1. Called up auditor and gave inputs about previous fiscal year's transactions.
   2. Visited the bank for updating the passbook and inquiring about fixed deposit renewal.
   3. Informed members about ongoing and pending tasks.
4. Bought oranges on the way back from the bank--special note because we never remember to buy and consume fruits regularly--ate one and left the peels to dry so that I can powder them to use as flavoring or body scrub.
5. Walked the dogs.
6. Washed and dried bedsheets.
7. Washed utensils.
8. Cooked dinner and cleaned up afterwards.
9. Prepared a home-remedy for cold / cough / fever, which the ungrateful husband refused to drink because it might not taste good.
10. Warmed water and stored in a flask to drink during the night--otherwise our jaws go into shock thanks to the cold that seeps into the water.

Tuesday:

1. Prepared breakfast and cleaned up afterwards.
2. Walked the dogs and fed them.
3. Washed utensils.
4. Washed the oily dog-food container.
5. Washed and dried doormats.
6. Apartment-complex-related activities:
   1. Visited the bank to apply for a new cheque book and give instructions about fixed deposit renewal.
   2. Looked through documents for further information about previous fiscal year's transactions, and informed the auditor.
   3. Informed members about the status of tasks.
7. Refueled the car for use until it's taken away for servicing.
8. Called up mom to fix a date and time for taking her to a place about 30 kms out of town that she wants to visit. Called up other aunts who might want to tag along. Called up hubs to ask about his birthday plans--obviously, he has none, he isn't even sure whether he wants the day off.
9. Walked the dogs.
10. Cooked dinner and cleaned up afterwards.
11. Warmed up aforementioned home remedy. Yet, no sign of hubs' readiness to consume it.
12. Warmed water and stored in a flask to drink during the night.

Wednesday:

1. Cleaned up after breakfast.
2. Fed the dogs.
3. Washed utensils.
4. Cleaned veggies to be cooked for dinner.
5. Checked work-related emails and responded to important ones. (This one turned out to be a source of much happiness. You shoulda seen me skipping away for the next activity.)
6. Walked the dogs.
7. Investment activities for hubs and self:
   
   1. Researched existing documents about investments, called up concerned customer care representatives, planned to submit necessary documents tomorrow.
   2. Called up dad to find out about available investment options and planned to submit the necessary amount and documents tomorrow.
8. Walked the dogs.
9. Cooked dinner and cleaned up afterwards.
10. Warmed water and stored in a flask to drink during the night.

Thursday:

1. Prepared sev-puri (a chaat variant) for hubs (with some ready-to-use ingredients, of course) as a birthday breakfast treat. Yes, we have no concept of appropriate food for any meal.
2. Cleaned up after breakfast.
3. Walked and fed the dogs--this includes waiting on them until they gobble up most of it and leave the rest on a whim, then add more meat for flavoring, so that they find it interesting enough to finish, then pat them and appreciate them for being kind enough to eat what was served.
4. Washed clothes used for cleaning / dusting in the kitchen.
5. Spent 4 hours preparing investments-related documents for submission at various offices.
6. Checked work-related emails and responded to important ones.
7. Walked the dogs.
8. Prepared paav-bhaaji for hubs as a birthday dinner treat (called a cousin over to help and also enjoy the feast--it's rare that I'm in a mood to cook something special). Also presented to him with flourish the chocolate cake I bought in the afternoon. Don't accuse me of being boring, people. I wanted to buy a nice, colorful fruit-cake, but they didn't have any at Monginis. Besides, the husband's a girl when it comes to chocolates. So I thought I'd keep him happy. It's his birthday after all.
9. Cleaned up after dinner.
10. Walked the dogs.
11. Warmed water and stored in a flask to drink during the night.

Washed cleaning / dusting cloth used in the kitchen.

Vacation week 1 of 3 (old draft--2010!)

(Started: Dec 17)

...began with me coming home at 3:20 am on Friday, Dec 17. Couldn't help it--I had work to put in order for others to continue while I am away. Rather, it helped me stay calm--I was bound to have insomnia that night because we were supposed to make a road trip to Vadodara the next day. I would have been much too excited / suffered from HPD (Hyperactive Packing Disorder--one among my various personalized pshychological conditions). Returning home that late kept my disorder at bay and I tried to finish my packing, but felt tired enough to sleep. The alarm woke me up at 7:00 am, which meant I was really sleeping and not wondering whether I slept through the sounds of the alarm.

I was up and packing in no time. Hubs had left clothes and other material out along with the traveling bags--the bugger knows I will not let him pack shabbily and keep repacking until everything is fit into optimal space. A little elf also paid us a visit and did other chores like cleaning the dishes, etc. I excused his laziness to get out of the bed the next morning only thanks to the elf.

The house seemed very quiet and empty because we'd dropped off Mojo and Phoebe at the pet resort the previous day itself. To our surprise and huge relief, they hadn't whined and cried their heads off during the night. The past couple of times that we left them behind, they gave the caretakers much trouble. Mojo would keep yelping for us and Phoebe would join him throwing in barks for good measure. This time I thought of putting them on medication (Anxocare) for calming their nerves, but they surprised us by doing so well without it. We thought of meeting them for a bit before we began the journey and so went to the resort, but the caretaker did not allow us to disturb them.

We were on our way by 9:00 am instead of 7:00 am as initially planned. But that was ok with me. I was the picture of coolness. There was no panic, no hurry, only an adequate sense of urgency to get on the road so as to reach our destination before it became too dark. We took NH-4 to Mumbai, and I drove until we reached NH-8 via Thane. A loo and inform-the-parents-and-remote-road-trip-advisor break later, hubs took over. Bless his soul, he took us through the most boring part of the drive as I caught up on last night's sleep. On a large stretch of NH-8 in Gujarat, bridges connecting smaller roads to villages and towns on either side were being constructed. On the 6-lane road, there were diversions every couple of kilometers, which merged into one lane, so the traffic was considerably slow. Besides, trucks were probably being driven by snakes, because they seemed to be zigzagging all over the place, possibly unaware of something known as a lane system.

Peas-and-cashew fried rice with spicy tomato soup--from a girl who hates to cook!

Saturday evening. After spending a really nice morning catching up with my gal pals for breakfast at Linger On, and then spending the next few hours getting long overdue chores at home done, I thought I should make up a treat for the dear hubs. The initial plan was to make mushroom fried rice, but the mushrooms weren't available, so I made do with what I had at home. And here's what I did...

1. Cleaned and boiled the tomatoes in a pressure cooker.
2. Boiled Basmati rice in a microwave oven--used less water and add a little oil so that it didn't turn out sticky and the grains separated easily. Followed it up by boiling frozen peas.
3. Chopped onions into thin, long slices, and finely chopped garlic cloves, ginger, and some dehydrated coriander (keep a bunch wrapped in tissue paper in a fridge for a few days, and it dries up but stays green).
4. Peeled the tomatoes and crushed them in a juicer with some black salt and rock salt. The peels were added to Mojo and Phoebe's boiled rice-lentils-veggies mix. Hardly anything goes to waste in our kitchen.
5. Spread the rice on a tray to cool off, while I gathered all the spices.
6. Heated oil in a soup pan and let some mustard seeds splutter in it to confirm that the temperature was right. Stirred the chopped coriander, garlic, ginger, some bay leaves, and cinnamon in until they changed color. Added the tomato pulp and a little sugar. Cleaned the juicer with some water and added it too. Set it aside after boiling for couple of minutes.
7. Heated oil in a kadhaai and let a few cumin and white sesame seeds splutter in it. Added cashew nuts and fried them until they changed color. Stirred a little green chilly-ginger-garlic paste and some grated dry coconut in. Added some turmeric and Biryaani masaala and stirred the whole mixture for a minute. Added the boiled peas and stirred for another minute. Added the cooled rice and mixed everything together and kept it covered for a minute before turning the heat off.
8. Boiled oil in a mini-kadhaai and fried the onion slices until they turned brown. Spread them on some tissues to cool and get some of the oil off. Then, mixed them into the rice preparation.

Here are some pictures to give you an idea...

I added salt multiple times to various ingredients as per my liking, but you could add it only once to the rice and the soup. I did not mention any portions and avoided mentioning the duration required for each task, because I generally make those up as I go. I am not really a metrics-driven person in this regard. It's got to feel right to me :P

It turned out yummy and the hubs gobbled it up. So did I. Totally worth the effort.

And now, maybe I should change my stance from "I hate cooking" to "I love cooking, at leisure, as hobby to be indulged in, once a month".

Goodbye, Gerry!

Dear Gerard,

You were a very special boy--the only liver-spotted male in the two litters birthed by Mojo and Phoebe so far. You had the handsome looks of your pa and his playful attitude; the color of your eyes and your spots--a gift from your paternal grandma. The look in your eyes, your voice, your multicolored nails, your confidence (bordering on arrogance), and the goofy way in which you sat sometimes was a direct inheritance from your ma. We enjoyed watching all those qualities trickle down into you from your parents, while still being your own person.

You were with us for just a few days over four months, but you brought joy into our lives that would last us a lifetime. Each moment spent with you was special--you made it thus by just being yourself--lively and playful all the time. We could spend hours just watching you--you were so strikingly handsome. Your human ma Geeta tells a story wherein a girl even offered to marry you!

It was only a week back that we came to see you last, and we spent over an hour with you instead of the intended 10 minutes--you were that charming! Then, only a week later, you ate one of your toys (or something else that we will probably never identify) and it got stuck in your system. You started puking the next day and lost a lot of blood over the next few days. Not eating didn't help your cause either. One evening we got Mojo and Phoebe's blood samples to check whether they could help you. We were glad they were a match so that both could donate if needed. We were just getting ready to come over and donate blood for you before your surgery when Geeta called us with the unfortunate news.

She's been hit the hardest by your departure, dear Gerry. Both, your grandpa and I felt very sad a losing you, but we can't imagine what she's going through because we still have Mojo and Phoebe to love and to hold. She's been apologizing to me for losing you, and I keep telling her to let it go. I know she's thinking about the past few days in her mind over and over again--what more could she have done? should she have taken a second opinion? should she have insisted on getting you operated sooner? should she have called me sooner?--I would have done the same. Now, however, you have gone, and no amount of brooding will bring you back. Of course, identifying what could have saved you might help in the future if we run into such a problem with another puppy. For that, however, she needs to feel better about herself. She needs to let you go, and let go of her guilt too. She needs to know that she deserves to be loved. She should get another puppy and love her/him the way she loved you. I know you'd want that. I know you loved her very much and you would want her to feel loved again. Would you stay around for a while longer and tell her that? Maybe pay a visit to her in her dreams?

When we first saw you this morning, you were pronounced dead for about an hour. I could, however, still see the light in your eyes, and both, Geeta and I were waiting for you jump up any moment. Every once in a while it felt like we could see you breathing lightly, or that you blinked... we were hoping foolishly for a miracle. In the next few hours, though, as we waited for the Animal Farm folks to come take you away, I noticed that your gaze became lifeless. I could especially feel it when we left you at the cremation site. It was as if your soul stayed back at Geeta's home, waiting for her and her family to return. I hope it is so. I hope you linger on for a little while more... stay with her and comfort her the way only you can. Remember how you just went to her when she came to visit the first time? You were destined to be together. You were made for each other. Please tell her to remember that, and remind her that nothing lasts forever. It won't be a fitting testimony to your life if she's sad every time she thinks of you. Remind her of the fun times you had and encourage her to remember you fondly without feeling burdened with regret.

And as for us? We can only be grateful that you came to us and stayed for as long as you did. You were the embodiment of pure, unbridled joy and beauty. We'll always remember you fondly.

Lots of love.
G'pa and G'ma

I don't understand Monday morning blues

After a nice long weekend wanting-to-do-lots-but-actually-doing-very-little-yet-not-feeling-too-bad-about-it, I woke up as the clock struck 7:00. Except it didn't really strike anything. It didn't even chime. It must have been a sweet time in the past when grandfather clocks announced the hour of the day or when the little sparrow (or cuckoo) peeped out of a fancy clock's window and tweeted the time. Sigh! I digress.

The first thing I felt was happiness at being awake at an early hour. I wanted to walk Mojo and Phoebe before the sun started beating down on us earthlings, and this was just the right time. Then I noticed that I was lying with my head at the wrong end of the bed, my feet propped up on my pillows. I don't remember when that happened! Many a time, even if I am dreaming, I am aware of the fact that I'm dreaming. But last night must have been something. I don't remember how or when I drifted off to sleep (the hubs kindly filled me in with seemingly innocent comments about how the arm he rested on me vibrated each time I snored). Anyhoo.

The day began on a good note. I can't understand people who are 'not morning people'. It's a little strange to me how someone can not feel elated at being able to rise and shine with the sun. What I also fail to understand is why people often complain about Monday morning blues. I love going to work. Maybe I'm one of the few people who enjoy their jobs. But if your job is so much of a pain in your butt, why not do something about it? It's not like I've never felt the blues... I did, at times, when the work pressure was too much and some unreasonable tasks were expected of me... but how can a person feel blue on every Monday morning. How miserable could someone's life be?

If you were looking for a point, I'm sorry, there wasn't any that I was trying to make. Just typing out something that was going through my mind. Succumbing to the silly need to express myself. Just cuz I can. Meh. Get on with your day, folks. I hope you didn't waste your time reading upto this point.

Feeling all grown up (and amused at it!)

When I slept after midnight, I was groaning to myself that I won't be able to work out what I had planned for the next day. Although I don't know how it happened, I woke up at 7:00, and felt like sleeping in only for a few minutes before my brain took over and I sprung on my feet and got cracking. Maybe it was sound sleep that made me feel rested, and maybe it was reading The Hobbit to the hubs that gave me the sound sleep I needed. But I was glad I didn't spend any time complaining to myself and trying to stay in bed.

I freshened up, opened all the windows--an activity I love to do in the mornings--to left the cool, fresh air in, walked the dogs, bathed myself, paid the milkman, cleaned up a bit while boiling milk, and closed all the windows again so that the hot summer doesn't turn the house into an oven. I updated the sleepy hubs on the status so far and gave him instructions about the stuff to do (or not) next. Then it was time for the most important activity of the day: dropping off my new two-wheeler for its first free servicing. I wasn't keen on doing it because I didn't want to walk any distance at all in the sun. But a nice idea hit me when I reached the service station. By the time the attendant looked at other people's bikes, I walked down home and fetch the car. I reached just in time for the attendant to check my bike and hand me the job card.

I zoomed off to work and was happy to reach at my favorite hour... right before breakfast is served. My favorite activity is to set myself up at a nice, cozy corner table, switch on my laptop and get on with my day. During my first few days at the new job, I sometimes used to stay put in the cafeteria until it was lunch time and the smells of various food items pissed me off, or the laptop battery was almost completely drained. In any case, almost half my day would have passed pleasantly. It felt nice to do that again... in the past few weeks, I've had to change my work timings so that I could go play badminton on my way back home. But I've begun to think that maybe working in 2 shifts with a break in between is a good idea, and the drive home and back would be worth it. But I can never seem to stick to any kind of routine.

Anyway, getting so much done simply by springing out of bed early in the morning makes me feel all happy inside. And grown up, if I may add. Yep. I still find it surprising when I act all mature even though it's expected of me now that I'm in my 30s.

PS: It gladdened me to see a fresh bunch of flowers in the little garden patch. Who knew that the simple white bloom of Vinca can be such perfect metaphoric accomplice to the beginning of my bright day?!

Apologies

It's been so long since I posted anything here that it feels a bit weird typing text into this UI. However, the apologies are not for that. Also, for a change, this is not a sarcastic post.

To the girl in the white burqa/hijab with the gray floral print who was driving a black scooter on F C Road yesterday,

I apologize to you yet again for my mistake. I intended to park next to Wadeshwar, and because the most efficient way to parallel-park a car is to do it in reverse, I halted close to other vehicles parked on the right. Being totally focused on getting to the spot before the traffic started flowing again from the signal at my rear, I made a mistake. I reversed the car before thoroughly checking the rear view mirrors. Thankfully, neither you nor I were fast enough, and I stopped the moment I realized that the rear left fender of my car had hit the front bumper of your scooter. It took me a few seconds to make sense of what happened and realize that I had to immediately move forward to help you regain control over your vehicle. I did so, got out of the car, and tried to repair the damage that I had done. It seemed to me like your scooter had not toppled over and that you were standing straight, which meant that you were apparently not seriously injured. I helped pick your bags off the road and placed them on your footboard, and I wanted to do more.

I hope that by now your shock and anger has subsided and you are ready to hear me out. I apologized then too, but you were in mood to pay any heed. Had I been in your situation, I would have felt the same things about you and said the same things to you... "Why do you drive if you can't reverse? You should simply stay off the road, etc" However, you said something to the effect of "An apology is of no use, it doesn't change anything." That got my goat. I totally disagree. I knew what my mistake was, and I had to decency to acknowledge it and apologize for it. In addition, I came over to find out the consequence of my action... Were you hurt? Could I help you get medical attention? Did I break something? Could I get it repaired for you?

Had you given me a chance, I would have done all in my power to undo the wrong that I did. However, you and I were both in a bit shock (you, understandably more than me) and tempers flew high. I have seen people who do not even bother to get out of their effing car and try to find out what their mistake has cost others. I surely didn't give off any such arrogant vibes. Not even remotely. However, when you yelled at me even after I profusely apologized and helped you gather your stuff and offered to do more, I got ticked off too. I did argue that I made a mistake and that it could have happened with you too, but it was more to get you calm down and try to establish a dialog rather than for the sake of arguing. It definitely didn't help, did it?

Then, because you didn't seem to need or want any help from me and because you were putting up a fight even against my apologies, I stormed off and got back into my car. Did you notice that I waited patiently until you moved away (still yelling at me) and I could continue with my task without harming anyone else? I'm sure you didn't.

What's the purpose of writing all this here? Well, I hope that you shared your story with someone and somehow someone you know gets to read this and lets you know about it. I pride myself on my driving skills and feel ashamed at the mistakes I make. I do try to learn from them and not repeat them. However, like everyone else, I am not and will never be perfect. So, I do the best that I can. Apologize for my mistakes and try to undo the wrong that I might have done.

I wish we had met in a better situation. We might even be friends. Inspite of the fact that it was all directed against me, I liked that your were spirited and didn't take things lying down. Also, unlike me, you were feisty without being abusive (at least I don't remember any cuss words being used). You remind me of my dear friend Noor, and not just because your attire indicated that you are a Muslim. I could totally picture her giving a piece of her mind to someone who had wronged her! Anyway. For what it's worth, I hereby record my apology and wish that the incident doesn't linger on in your mind. Also hoping that you weren't hurt, and if you were, you do recover soon.

Regards,
Simply Pallu