These days

I am not getting too bored to blog already. It is not yet a been-there-done-that thing for me. I've been running short on time since the last 2 weeks. When I started blogging a lil while back I had absolutely nothing to do in the evenings after I got home from work. Even an hour's time would suffice to write a post and I was easily finding fodder for posts, almost at will. Nowadays although I find fodder, I dont get enough time. My folks are here and week 1 was spent on their orientation with tiny details in daily life. Every other day we have been out at Von's in the evenings because I just cannot manage to get a grip on how much groceries are needed when it comes to full-fledged cooking 2 times a day; as opposed to kaam-chalau cooking once a week =)) By the time my folks were getting comfortable around the house we left for a short trip last Friday to come back late Tuesday night. Yesterday was spent half awake at work. And here I am today, still reeling from the after effects of the 1200 mile roadtrip, feeling a-miss having not updated my blog in ages - hence posting a quickie from work;)

Post Title : Bardot - These Days

11 from last week

Random snippets of potentially useless information from last week which I felt like jotting down.

1. Saturday was Operation Clean House. Took quite a while to get everything done and at the end of the day the apartment looked like it was worth spending all that time on it. Simultaneous chores continued throughout the day, laundry, grocery shopping etc as every weekend and roomie and I were hungry by 6pm. Dined at Piatti on La Jolla shores, recommended by Chris, and got robbed of 3 hours and $60 for a dinner for two. Food was well worth the money spent, though one thing is fo' sho' - no more visits there without reservations.
2. Spent all of Sunday in and out of flights getting to Orlando. I was tired getting from one coast to the other and was worried how mom amd dad would hold up in their 1st ever transcontinental journey. Had a fabulous dinner topped up with a tiramisu on the second consecutive night wondering how I was ever going to succeed shedding those pounds off.
3. Monday was fun day. After a full breakfast and registration done at the conference, we headed over to Universal studios. Lunch at Hard Rock Cafe was followed by lots of rides in both parks. The Incredible Hulk and Dueling Dragons were awesome roller coaster rides; the Revenge of the Mummy on the other hand, could definitely use better seat restraints. I also got a caricature done there :D We headed back to the hotel @ 7:30 and I skipped the welcome event that was scheduled for the night and ordered room service ever so again.
4. Watched a lot of playoff games in the last week. Saw Ginobili go down with a black eye, Nash with Horry, Okur being pulled down by Jason Richardson. Playoff season and emotions run really high and you can definitely expect dramatic games, although this year an unusual lot of blood's been drawn in the Suns-Spurs series.
5. Was woken up by a false fire alarm at 1:30 am on Monday and had to sleepwalk through 11 floors down. Argh!!
6. Was surprised to find that the food quality even in top notch resorts is not consistent on all days. I ordered the penne chicken and tiramisu on 2 different days and every time both of them were served looking and tasting entirely different.
7. Sat through some enlightening sessions at the conference. Like most conferences this one had its share of duds too and I was unlucky to get caught in some of those. Met up with old friends from previous workplaces and got a fillin on who's doing what.
8. The dev server went down once again. Thankfully we could restore normalcy within 10 minutes but this particular problem continues to haunt us without any tracable clues and needs to get sorted quickly.
9. Wednesday evening drove back to Universal for the special event. After sifting through a quick dinner and a never ending lineup of desserts, rode the Hulk once again an innumerable amount of times.
10. Managed to get some value out of the last session of the conference on Thursday and then scurried to the airport. Lunched on awesome linguine with shrimp at one of the eateries in the airport lobby.
11. Reached San Diego after a 15 minute delayed arrival, picked up mom and dad from the airport and took the cab home.
    :End Thursday:

I'll be blogging less frequently now with my folks here for the next 2 months. I'll still aim for atleast once a week, we'll see how it works :)

Bulletin board fun

I love the email bulletin boards at work. People having no work always post something absolutely useless over there and it makes for an interesting read when you're looking for some amusement, sucked out of life by the daily madness at work. Ofcourse BB's in places I've worked before are nowhere as nearly hilarious as some of the desi service based IT companies but recently there's been lot of action on the BB at my current workplace.

There's this woman who posts almost everyday with lot of stuff to sell. She includes a long list of DVD's, CD's, books, knickknacks etc and sells them all for a buck each. At the coffee station the other day I overheard some guys talking,"Dude you should see her cubicle. It's all stacked with boxes and sh!t and all day people are walking in and out of her cubicle like its a frikking dollar store!" As if all the unwarranted attention she was getting wasnt enough, she started putting up 'Clothes for Sale' ads too. Everyday she'd put up a new dress/coat/jeans for sale with pictures attached. So now her dollar store was being taken over by a thrift store :) )

The icing on the cake still remained. When she was done selling regular clothes she started putting up wedding gowns for sale! And not one, not two, she put up close to half a dozen exquisite wedding gowns. More gossip followed, the woman in question being genuinely hot good looking. "Dude, why the hell does she have so many wedding gowns and why is she selling them off? Does that mean she's called off her wedding so many times already?!" "Yeah. I dunno why she's trying to sell them man. If she didn't like them why did she buy them in the first place? You think she brought them off the bulletin board from her old company? Hahahaha" "No. Maybe she bought them off craigslist. 'Hmm ... let's see who's selling a wedding gown today. Maybe I can make some money by selling it on the company BB'," (more manic laughter)

Looks like she finally caught in on the coffee station gossip. She's still trying to sell those wedding gowns but now the emails carry a little note in bold: "No, my wedding wasn't cancelled. I'm trying to find the right dress. Wedding gowns are not returnable (even with tags/receipt). "

Oh c'est la vie! I'm loving it :)

Eat sum dim sum!

Last night a colleague of mine sent out an email inviting everyone to join in for some dim sum at lunch today. I wasnt sure what dim sum was so I decided to wait and find out before tagging along. All I knew was it would probably be some Asian food since he was Asian and hello! dim sum - sounds asian! So this morning while I was talking to people around updating my knowledge on dim sum, I found out that it was Chinese food which is served in a unique way. There are servers who haul carts along the dining hall with multiple food plates on them and you have to pick and choose from what's available.

I'm not big on Chinese cuisine and time stands testimony to the fact that the only edible Chinese food is served in PF Chang's. Jokes apart, I really cannot eat Chinese anywhere else and that is mainly because the smell of food in most authentic Chinese restaurants is really over-powering for my olfactory senses. So much so that my eyes become smaller and I start squinting LOL Now it would be interesting to find if sushi would push me into Turning Japanese ;) Anyways, so I was assured by my colleagues that the place where we were going to served good food and that I should try it once if I've never done it before. No harm in trying I thought. I was just about to find out how wrong I was.

As I walked in to the restaurant I was engulfed by the smell of dumplings which once again reminded me why I hate to eat in a Chinese restaurant so much. But no hurried judgement, I told myself, I had been assured that the food here is really good. So we sat down and promptly an Asian female rushed to our table and served us tea. Well, almost. It was actually a greenish brown concoction which I was told was tea. Before I could think whether I wanted to drink it or not one server, and a couple others after her, hauled a big cart each next to our table. D who was our dim sum expert for the day ordered a few dishes. Being desi I was limited to eating seafood and chicken and apparently the best dishes these guys served were pork based. I was informed that the seafood wasnt bad either so I decided to go for the shrimp dishes.

No authentic Chinese restuarant has silverware on the table and this one was no different. Luckily I did not have to display my inefficient use of chopsticks as M quickly asked one server to get some forks. She too was not so good with, "juggling food on two sticks before quickly throwing it in your mouth." I'd rather not go on to describe how each dish tasted. To me they all looked the same and tasted the same because they all really were the same seafood dumplings or chicken dumplings albeit in various shapes. A few dumplings later I was really full, though not happy with my first dim sum experience. My happiness was further dented when the cheque split up to $15 per head.

No more dim sums for me, I promised, as we drove back to work. As we trudged back in from lunch, another colleague of mine who had wisely chosen to stay away asked the other people,"So did you pop Amit's dim sum cherry?" Everyone burst out laughing as I told him, "Yes. And it hurt really bad."

Chaha Pohe # 1

Its been a while now that this happened but I had to write about my experience. Maybe I'll get some tips from been-there-done-that people on do's and dont's. Alternately I could just end up wasting some more time writing random useless stuff :))

This dates back to my last trip back home in Dec 06. After a few days of fun, the obvious topic of marriage came up during one of our casual talks. My parents quickly convinced me that it was not all hunkydory when an arranged marriage was concerned. Gullible that I am (yeah, right!) I succumbed and agreed to .. how do I say this .. well, put myself out there LOL Task 1 accomplished, my parents got to the next step - spreading the word. In a few days time, I was setup for my first official chaha pohe program. Thankfully, that was the only one during that trip.

It so happened that one of the families that lived a few blocks over from where I live happened to know someone else who were also looking to get their daughter married. Stage set! A convenient date was blocked and we decided to meet over at our few-blocks-over-neighbours place. This soon became the butt of all jokes as soon as the neighbours son found out what was going on. That he was at our place everyday did not help! My brother, cousin and he ganged up against me to cash in on this opportunity to pull my leg to all of their hearts content. I tried to take it all in stride, shamelessly :P

In more ways than one, calling for an arranged marriage is like putting your weapons down while fighting and accepting defeat. Bright readers please note that the weapons I mention here are metaphorical. I don't know what signals we are sending to our parents when we do this. Is it:
a> Yea, you're gonna hafta take care of this thing too. Might as well get started.
b> Alright, I give up. Nothing happened for the last X years, do you expect miracles overnight?
c> You can tell I'm not much of a ladies man. But that doesnt mean I'm gay!
d> I'm sooo obedient and moral-debt stricken and I value my culture and traditions. I'll get married to whomsoever you want me to.
e> All of the above
f> None of the above

Whatever option you choose, truth be told, your parents have a job cut out for them.

Interestingly enough, the other day I had a conversation with my manager and when I explained the concept of how arranged marriages are set up, he went "Huh, so thats more like an assisted marriage." I voiced over as strong a protest as I possibly could against calling it assisted. At the same time I couldnt help but wonder whether arranged marriage was a euphemism for the singles' sake.

Anywho, getting back on track, on D-day around 5-ish we headed over to our neighbours place when we were informed that ladkiwaale aa gaye hai. I walked in to see a bunch of unfamiliar uncles and aunties and two girls who looked of marriageable age. As I sat down I was thinking, doesnt really matter who's who I gotta get out of here quick! Then the families were introduced to each other and I found out that the not-so-prettier of the two was who was out to get married and the slightly better looking one was her sister. With introductions also came first round of refreshments. Traditionally, I think this used to be limbu sarbat/panha or some such. We were served Coke. I usually stay away from pop and so I had to get me a glass of water. Not very surprisingly, it illicited comments about how these days people are more health conscious and yada yada yada.

After that it was time to play 'oh I know this guy, we went to school together' between the 2 dads. So they managed to play catchup on old times and found out that they did have quite a few common friends. In the meantime, I was pestering mom to get me out of that place. While this was going on, aunty served us pohe. Now first of all I'm not at all a pohe guy, I like upma better and second, I had long given up the good ole' habit of high tea that the British had passed down onto us desis and had caught up with breakfast over the last 5 years. My point being, I was not hungry and I was being served a non-favorite dish. So, much to chef aunty's chagrin, I managed to clip a lot of pohe off my plate and took my own sweet time to get through them so no one would bother to serve me a second helping.

During this time, aunty suggested that the girl and I could get together to have a small talk without the rest of them bothering us. I managed to fend that awkwardly since I wasn't really interested (what is that they say 'If beauty is on the inside, I'd rather see you inside out'. Yea, it was kinda like that, not so bad, but almost) After finishing off the pohe, the girl's mom once again suggested that the girl and I get together for a chat. Refusing the second time would've been really rude so I walked out onto the patio much against my wishes, knowing not what I was going to talk. If I was genuinely interested I could've bothered to come up with some questions; since I wasn't at all, I decided not to tax my brain. We talked for about 10 minutes, talked as in the girl kept bombarding questions and I kept answering/ducking for cover, and then headed back in. I think I kinda made 'not interested' clear with my lackadaisical attitude during this time.

No chaha pohe program is ever complete without chaha and shortly later, piping hot tea was served. I couldnt refuse tea. Tea, for a lazy instant coffee drinker like me, is luxury; if prepared by someone else and handed over - supreme! More generic discussions on socio-political issues between all parents followed while sipping on tea and I was stuck in awe of how the clock could move really slow at such times. Another half hour later, the saga ended and I merrily trooped back home.

Of celebrity restaurateurs ...

.. heck, of Shilpa Shetty to some extent and allied rants for the other.

So Shilpa Shetty is the latest to hop onto the celebrity restaurateur bandwagon following the likes of the Tendulkars and the Zaheer Khans and some of her more illustrious counterparts from LaLa Land. I can already envision a leopard print theme on all fabric in the restaurant and probably a curry house which serves south indian curries as opposed to the good old CTM that Britain loves. Speaking of CTM, I dont know how good they have it up there in Southall and Bradford, but I have yet to come across *good* CTM in any of the towns I've had it in so far in America. And I've lived in the desi-est of places as Chitown and ATL! I cant really tell the difference in taste of one CTM from the other, its like all the restaurants across the nation go with one standard recipe. Come to think of it, its really not like I can't tell the difference, more like there IS no difference;)

Anyways so we'll wait and watch how Ms Shetty's attempts at cashing in on her newfound popularity in Britain turn out. It is no news that her 'popularity' ( y'know I really wouldnt call it popularity, its really more like familiarity - know what I mean?) in Britain stems from all the wrong reasons lately with the hullabaloo caused by Big Brother. The first curry house opens up in London and then she'll open up more branches. I wonder if Ms Shetty would dare open up a branch in Mumbai. Well she's been 'popular' here too .. thanks to Mr Gere. Yep, that was a classic case of hypocrisy and things blown out of proportion and comments interpreted in whatever-the-hell-way one would want and whatever more idiocy one could imagine. Effigy making could probably soon turn into a million dollar industry looking at the rate at which they are being burnt in India over the slightest of chances, y'know first the usual suspects - the cricket team, then Shilpa Shetty and Richard Gere, then someone else; protesters just dont seem to get enough of effigy burning.

Coming back to restaurants, I dont know what gives celebrities the idea to start a restaurant. Maybe they bank on it as an alternate revenue generating machine - if not the cricketing whites/glossy makeup face-cakes, I can always don an apron! Tendulkar started one and apparently eats there quite often. Zaheer Khan started one, now that was a good one - starting a restaurant in Pune is almost always a foolproof plan. The city has enough restaurants already, yet anytime you walk into a restaurant, you cannot easily get a table without considerable wait time. Ofcourse, owning a restaurant in Pune has its own disadvantages and ZK's recently got trashed by some zealots while India was on the losing track. If anyone were to open up a new restaurant in Pune, it'd have to be Italian. Despite having a truckload of restaurants, I dont think Pune has one restaurant which serves authentic Italian worth it's weight in .. err .. pasta.

Anywho, enough with the rants, imma get back to some work. These pretzels are making me thirsty!