Three tantrums, Five outbursts, Hours of toil and a great meal later.......

Vakratunda Mahaakaaya Suryakotee Sama Prabha

Nirvighnam kuru mey Deva

Sarva kaaryeshu Sarvadaa

Which translates into

O lord with the twisted trunk, with the effulgence of a billion suns,
always remove the obstacles when I am on an auspicious undertaking.

A hopeful start to an optimistic and cheery blog. With the advent of Ganesh Chaturthi…….I have set aside my rampantly-procrastinating spirit and decide to dutifully maintain a regular, uplifting and light-hearted blogette!

A traditional part of this festival is the ruckus that takes place in our household on the first auspicious day. We rise with the birds and spend the better half of the day churning out dishes for the mega afternoon meal. A spread of five different vegetarian dishes, mounds of rice and a bucketful of Payasam is no easy feat!!

Sweating in a hot kitchen over the proverbial hot stove…..cutting, chopping, dicing, stringing, shelling, churning and doing Lord knows what else……is enough to send the festive fervour right out of the nearest window!!

When I try, nonchalantly, to escape the confines of the steaming kitchen…my dear mum (who can spot a slacker a mile away!!) issues some dire warnings and well-placed threats. And like the meek lamb (!?!) that I am, I trudge back into the melting pot.

Everyone pitches it…not only with assistance but also some well-meaning advice. Needless to say, tempers are frayed…..faces are marred with angry scowls….and daggers are well and truly drawn!!

After the mammoth cooking session is over, we perform the main Puja. It is pretty understated by normal standards. A simple fare, with minimal prayers and straight-on devotion, we are quickly done with it and head off to the main attraction of the day…..LUNCH!!!

A lovely spread on plantain leaves; it is a delectable feast for the senses. All the hard work, aching muscles, and the cricks in unheard-of-places seem worth while. We tuck in with vigour….no-hold barred!! Rules of etiquette and concerns of calories are firmly tucked under the table.

Well-fed, content and bursting to the seams, we head off for a long lazy siesta and spend the rest of the day like a family of beached sea-lions. The calm after the storm…..truly blissful and occasionally peppered with a hastily-camouflaged belch!!

I try not to venture out in the evenings, because I inevitably end up admiring the moon….something, which is best avoided on Ganesh Chaturthi!!

Legend has it that during one of his birthdays, Ganesha’s mother, Parvati, cooked (like all doting mothers are prone to!!) twenty-one types of delicious food and a lot of sweet porridge. Ganesha ate so much that even his big belly could not contain it. Mounting his little mouse, he embarked on his nightly rounds. His mouse suddenly stumbled upon seeing a huge snake. To adjust His belly, Ganesha put the snake on as a belt around his stomach. All of a sudden, he heard laughter emanating from the sky.
He looked up and saw the moon mocking him. Ganesha infuriated, broke off one of his tusks and hurled it at the moon. Parvati, seeing this, immediately cursed the moon that whoever looks at it on Ganesh Chaturthi will be accused of a wrong doing.

Though I get tossed the blame bucket pretty frequently, I prefer not to tempt fate on festive occasions!!! Stay in, avoid the moon and tuck into leftovers…..not asking for much, h-uh??

I make it to Satan's List!!

Today was the first day of the Mount Mary Novena. In the Catholic Church, a Novena is basically a devotion consisting of prayers on nine consecutive days. It is usually done to obtain special graces. For me, it’s one of the rare moments in my depraved life where I get to chance to spend some quality time with God. This yearly tryst leaves me with a good feeling inside and more at peace with the demons in my head!!

To return to the lighter side of things…..masses are great places to observe people. It’s an explosion of clashing colours and conflicting perfumes!! I have my yearly favourites…..people I enjoy observing….seeing the changes in them over the years and generally going nuts with my imagination!!!

One is the dapper old couple that comes unfailingly every year. Elegantly clad, they ooze old-world charm and grace. I am a sucker for an ol’fashioned love story. More often than not, the gentleman makes some whispered comment and the lady smiles impishly. They must have been like this, twenty years back….and you can still the traces of age-old beauty etched into their softly wrinkled faces. All I need is Louis Armstrong’s What A Wonderful World playing softly in the background…..and I would be honking noisily into my wad of tissues!!!

A regular fixture is the pack of teeny-boppers (mostly girls!), giggling uncontrollably. Clichés be damned…..you put two or more girls together and more often than not, they’ll be whispering, checking out the newest recruits and cackling wickedly……it’s a wonderfully awkward age…..and brings back so many sweet memories for me!!!

And last but not the least…(***drum roll please!!!***)…….Mr. Cool-Pilot-Dude!! He looks like a pilot…dresses like a pilot…….ergo…….the highly unimaginative nickname!! I have been seeing him for the past five years or so and envy his cool, confident style. He is totally devout and oblivious to all the flirty glances thrown his way. He has that indefinable quality……'Presence'. Somehow, like Moses and the Red Sea…the crowds part willingly for him. The seniors nod jovially….the guys look on in reluctant admiration and the girls sneak quick peeks at regular intervals.

When I feel the prongs of Satan’s trident poke my ribs……I snap out of my daze and switch back to devout mode. Somewhere, the angels are shaking their heads in despair and praying for the redemption of my rotting soul!!

Embarrassing moments 'n' more.....

Parents have the uncanny ability to embarrass us at the most inopportune moments. My folks are pretty decent, but I have had my share of “will-the-ground-open-up-and-swallow-me” incidents. A lifetime of evil-eyes, hasty nudges and eye-rolling has tempered my folks down to a slow simmer. But every now and then, I come across such delightful faux-pas in others!!

The other day, at the grocer’s….I witnessed an interesting mother-daughter duo. Uber-cool pre-teen sauntering around lazily, dumping items into an already overloaded cart…paying scant attention to her bling-laden mum’s constant yammering.

Then came the glorious moment at the check-out counter (where mumsy-dear had managed to reach the head of the line, by rudely nudging aside all the other customers). Here’s what the conversation between the two went like:
Mum: Pick up some bananas, sweety.
Snotty chicklet: Ugh!...No way, mom!!
Mum (in a LOUD-DD, carrying voice): But sweety, you have to eat some bananas. You haven’t been to the Loo for the past three days!!!

Like a pricked balloon, Miss.Irregular Bowels lost all her uppity-ness in a flash and shot her mom a truly nasty glare. If looks could kill, dear concerned mama would be lying petrified on the floor, that very instant.

A polite society that we are, everyone tried to appear like they were suddenly overcome by a sudden onslaught of deafness, but it’s wasn’t hard to miss the quickly-concealed smirks. Nothing like a sonorous mama to knock the stuffing outta you, I say!

Blistering Bowls of Pasta!!

My Pièce de résistance…if I say so myself.A rainy day coupled with a lovely warm bowl of pasta in tomato and mushroom sauce smothered with oodles of fragrant cheese!!.....Utter bliss!

I try to stay true to the original recipe, but when you belong to a true-blue South Indian family with a fiery palate….things kinda change beyond recognition. My family likes it hot…’n’ I mean dragon fire-breathing hotttt!”. If you’re eyes haven’t watered or you ain’t got a runny nose…then u might as well relegate the dish to the back of the fridge already!!

So like a mad-scientist on a pay-rise…..I cackled evilly over my tomato sauce….throwing in chilli flakes, red chilli sauce, freshly-ground pepper and more than a generous dash of chilli powder! (yep, I don’t believe in moderation). Needless to say…it was scary-a** Hot! But my crazy family tucked in merrily and managed to give me an approving nod beween the sniffles and leaky eyes.

I fear for their sanity….but since this blog session is interspersed with me stuffing my face with the said pasta…..it’s basically a situation of “Hello kettle, said the inky pot….Lordy Lord, ain’t u black!!!”

"I am a WARRIOR!!!.........hear me whine!"

God bless keyboards! For, if I had to write a single word with my poor crab-like hand right now…..you would sense the sheer agony coursing through my veins. And no, it’s nothing as dramatic as my writer’s soul crying out in pain or other such high-falutin’ crap!

This is the outcome of the deceptively simple “Warrior Moves- Cardio Workout” by Patricia Moreno (courtesy Nikewoman.com). The instructor describes it in the following glowing terms : This cardio workout transforms you into a fit, lean warrior. A warrior is someone who loves her body and her life, and is dedicated to being all she can be. If you stick with Warrior Moves, you’ll achieve a higher level of cardiovascular endurance, fit and toned arms and legs, and a higher level of energy, passion and enthusiasm for your body and your life.

It appealed to my fanciful imagination. I suffer from vague delusions where I imagine myself to be some sort of “Elle Driver meets Xena meets Fa-Mulan” warrior princess. This was the perfect workout for the “warrior-in-waiting.”

I was lulled into a false sense of security by the instructor’s calm and decisive voice. The fact that Patricia Moreno heads a fitness company should have rung a warning bell, but as usual I was driven by my eternal optimism and pig-headedness! The workout sounded easy…..piece of cake actually. Reality ofcourse….was like a swift kick in a not-so-warrior like zone!!

Half-an-hour of shadow-boxing, lunges and pilates is not as easy as it sounds. I twisted and twirled liked a sozzled butterfly……clumsily balanced on the tips of my toes….high-kicked and scared the living-daylights out of a pigeon roosting on my window!! I sweated out a week's worth of chocolate tarts and lemon rolls......By the end of it, I crumpled into a pathetic heap on the floor.

Muscles I didn’t even know existed are aching, my shoulders feel like I am in the middle of my transformation into the Incredible Hulk and I am gingerly walking around like I have the mother of all wedgies!!!

It’s a good thing that the workout has to be done every three days. It’s an even better thing that I don’t belong to some elite finishing school for warriors!!!..if I had to go through this sublime form of torture everyday, besides being the laughing stock of the entire school, I would most probably have “BIG-FAT-LOSER” tattooed on my forehead and relegated to the back of the class!!!

Unleashing the Monster…….

I decided to introduce my dear mum to the big, beautiful world of blogging. Thoroughly sick of my constant hounding, she deigned to spare an hour or so to see what I was getting so worked up about. Considering myself to be a smart chicky (ah....the delusions we labour under!!!), I promptly led her straight to the food-blogs. After all, my mum's grande passion is collecting recipes, reading food-related articles and treating lucky mortals like me to delectable dishes!!

Under my bossy supervision, my mum fumbled along at first…..and then slowly but surely began moving around like a pro! She clicked on links effortlessly, scrolled up ‘n’ down the screen like a bunny on steroids, enlarged and shrunk images like an ace and basically started treating the whole thing like she had been doing it for years!!

She was like a big kid let loose in a candy store. So many interesting sites.....exploding with so much information. It was like she had received all her Christmas presents at once!! I doubt she was this ecstatic, when I popped into this world!!! (jus’ joshin’ mum!)

Needless to say, getting my mum OFF the chair has become a Herculean task. Like an irritating fruit-fly, I buzz around her….begging and pleading to get my comp back. She gives me the ol’ line of “just five minutes more” and smiles gleefully!! I am the devil's spawn after all!!!

Now I Know what Frankenstein felt like. Lock up your doors people…..the chambers have been opened!!

"Mischief Managed!!!"

Ton Tongue Toffees, Canary Creams, Skiving Snack Boxes, Puking Pastilles, Nosebleed Nougats, Fainting Fancies, Portable Swamps, Stink Pellets….sounds like an utter load of gibberish?!?..or wickedly familiar??

Yep, am talking about the diabolic inventions of the Weasley twins....the Supreme Troublemakers…the Grand Poobahs of chaos and disorder…the ultimate pranksters!! Life would be so much more duller at Hogwarts without the twins’ quick wit, evil intentions, razor sharp brains, unholy capers and smart business sense.

Listed below are the twins’ excerpts from the seven books that capture their fiendish essence to perfection!! (This may sound like a lot of gobbledegook to the uninitiated…so it goes without saying that you have to be a fan of "The Boy Who Lived". If you haven’t touched a Potter book in your life (g-asp!!) or belong to the snooty brigade that turns it’s nose up at the Pottermania, just ignore the rest of this passage blithely. For the rest of the giddy bunch...time to tickle the funny bone again!!)

1. "Fred, you next," the plump woman said.
"I'm not Fred, I'm George," said the boy. "Honestly, woman, you call yourself our mother?
Can't you tell I'm George?"
''Sorry, George, dear."
''Only joking, I am Fred." (Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone : Book 1)

2. "Now, you two - Behave yourselves. If I get one word that you've blown up a toilet or - "Blown up a toilet? We've never blown up a toilet."
"Great idea though, thanks, Mum." (Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone : Book 1)


3. Harry is rumoured to be the Heir of Slytherin:
Fred and George, however, found all this very funny.
They went out of their way to march ahead of Harry down the corridors, shouting, "Make way for the heir of Slytherin, seriously evil wizard coming through …

Percy was deeply disapproving of this behaviour."It is not a laughing matter," he said coldly.
"Oh, get out of the way, Percy," said Fred, "Harry's in a hurry."
''Yeah, he's nipping off to the Chamber of Secrets for a cup of tea with his fanged servant," said George, chortling. (Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets : Book 2)


4. "Where is Wood?" said Harry, suddenly realizing he wasn't there.
"Still in the showers,"said Fred. "We think he's trying to drown himself." (Harry Potter and The Prisoner of Azkaban : Book 3)

5. "Come on, Ron, you were always saying how boring Scabbers was," said Fred bracingly.
"And he's been off-colour for ages, he was wasting away. It was probably better for him to snuff it quickly. One swallow – he probably didn't feel a thing.''
"Fred!" said Ginny indignantly.
"All he did was eat and sleep, Ron, you said it yourself," said George.
"He bit Goyle for us once!" Ron said miserably. "Remember Harry?".
''Yeah, that's true," said Harry.
"His finest hour," said Fred, unable to keep a straight face. "Let the scar on Goyle's finger stand as a lasting tribute to his memory…" (Harry Potter and The Prisoner of Azkaban : Book 3)

6. "Yeah, someone might slip dragon dung in it again, eh, Perce?" said Fred.
"That was a sample of fertiliser from Norway!" said Percy, going very red in the face. "It was nothing personal!''
"It was," Fred whispered to Harry, as they got up from the table. "We sent it." (Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire : Book 4)

7. "Don't be a prat, Neville, that's illegal," said George.
"They wouldn't use the Cruciatus curse on the champions. I thought it sounded a bit like Percy singing… maybe you've got to attack him while he's in the shower, Harry." (Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire : Book 4)

8. "I don't believe it! I don't believe it! Oh, Ron, how wonderful! A prefect! That's everyone in the family!"(-Mrs.Weasley)
"What are Fred and I, next-door neighbours?" said George indignantly… (Harry Potter and The Order of The Phoenix : Book 5)

9. "Would you like us to clean out your ears for you?" enquired George, pulling a long and lethal-looking metal instrument from inside one of the Zonko's bags.
"Or any part of your body, really, we're not fussy where we stick this," said Fred. (Harry Potter and The Order of The Phoenix : Book 5)

10. George: [To Fred about both looking like Harry, after drinking the polyjuice potion] Wow - we're identical! (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows : Book 7)

11. [referring to Voldemort on Potterwatch]….but the fact remains he can move faster than Severus Snape confronted with shampoo when he wants to...(Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows : Book 7)


These are just a few of the twins' classic moments. I never get tired of their idiocy and delinquent sense of humour....so am jus' gonna scrounge around for more such debatable gems.

May your soul rest in peace, Fred and am sure that somewhere in the depths of hell, The Grim Reaper is jus' minutes away from flinging himself on his scythe!!! GIVE 'EM HELL, FRED!!!

Quotes from the Harry Potter Series

Lady Rowling had some pretty impressive thoughts thrown in at regular intervals in the midst of all that witching and warring!! Here are some which I especially liked.......

***It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, just as much to stand up to our friends ~ Prof. Dumbledore (Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone)

***…to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure. ~ Prof. Dumbledore (Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone)

***Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself. ~Prof.Dumbledore (Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone)

***Ah Music.....A Magic beyond all we do here. ~Prof.Dumbledore (Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone)

***“It is our choices, Harry, that show what we are, far more than our abilities.” ~ Prof. Dumbledore (Harry Potter And The Chamber of Secrets)

***That suggests that what you fear most of all is—fear. Very wise, Harry. ~ Remus Lupin (Harry Potter And The Prisoner of Azkaban)

*** Curiosity is not a sin... But we should exercise caution with our curiosity... yes, indeed. ~Prof. Dumbledore (Harry Potter And The Goblet of Fire)

*** You place too much importance... on the so-called purity of blood! You fail to recognize that it matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be! ~Prof. Dumbledore (Harry Potter And The Goblet of Fire)

*** If you want to know what a man's like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals. ~Sirius Black (Harry Potter And The Goblet of Fire)


*** You sort of start thinking anything's possible if you've got enough nerve. ~Ginny (Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix)

*** Dumbledore says people find it far easier to forgive others for being wrong than being right. ~Hermione (Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince)

*** We must try not to sink beneath our anguish, Harry, but battle on. ~Prof.Dumbledore (Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince)

Books to the ceiling,
Books to the sky,
My pile of books is a mile
high.
How I love them!How I need
them!
I'll have a long beard by the time I read
them.

~Arnold Lobel



This snippy l’il piece pretty much sums up my affection for the written word (minus the beard, ofcourse!!!) . So more often than not this blog is going to be splattered with details about my favourite reads, authors who keep me glued for hours on end, quotes, fan-fiction, fan-art, passages, poems, zingy one (two/three) liners that stuck in my head and stayed with me long after the book was back on the shelf. It also includes my feeble attempts at book-reviewing and articles that captured my interest.



It may be though-provoking OR downright gibberish!!! But it’s mine……ALL MINE!!(*insert maniacal laughter here!) So am pretty much goin’ to do a hatchet job on it. Bear with me…and maybe, jus’ maybe..it won’t be so bad after all!

Slow Down Pizza Guy!!!

Decoding the local pizza guy has become an exercise in futility! To a certain extent, I don’t blame him ofcourse. Repeating the same message, day after day to a gazillion clients can make even the most chirpy l’il woodchuck lose his vitality. But for the person at the receiving end, it can be mighty painful!

What I basically get when I dial in for Pizza is “HelloM’amWelcomeTo'******'CanITakeYourOrder?” followed by a stream of other choice openings. When my eye-balls have stopped rattling around in my skull, I am highly tempted to tell the l’il twerp that the best possible way he could help me would be by going in slow-mo and speaking in a language which my species would actually understand!!

Then comes the *fun* part of placing my order. You would think that I would actually get a break and the pizza of my choice would be available. But no…..God Forbid that the one combo I crave would ACTUALLY be on the list!!

Thus begins Round 2 of “drive-customer-batty-with-inane-mumblings’. After listening to 5 minutes of the House-Favourites’ litany, I have managed to grasp a familiar word here and there. I feebly place my order and stoically bear through an additional 5 seconds of ‘toppings, thin-crust, thick-crust, extra cheese, complimentary drinks, offers’ and everything else that the generous Pizza House is willing to fling at me.

By the time I hang up, my brains feel like a bunch of wet and squelchy dishrags! Maybe I am growing old, maybe I am not as lucid and intelligent as I assumed I was, maybe I am just a closet-dumbo who needed an iffy college boy to point out that for things to seep into my thick skull....you need to speak very...very...VERY slowly!!Think the next time I get the hunger-pangs, am jus’ drinking a LA-ARGE glass of water and sitting tight!!