I had jokingly told my wife on a weekday in the middle of the never ending confusion at work that I would cook over the weekend.. I never expected her to take me so seriously and she promptly reminded me on Saturday that it was my turn to take over the kitchen on Sunday morning.. I readily accepted the challenge.. laughing inside that she did not know what she was going to eat :-) I finally decided that I will prepare vegetable pulao..

I got up tired and weary after watching TV late on Saturday night..and suddenly realised that I did not have the recipe for it..I then hurriedly logged onto the internet and asked my trustworthy online buddy google for some results and lo! there it was..I hurriedly wrote down the recipe and went about preparing the dish..finally after two hours of "reasonable" turmoil and sweat in the kitchen, I completed my first ever dish..and yes, it did not taste bad at all.. well am not saying it because I did it but it was WCVP - Wife Certified Vegetable Pulao :-)..

We finally sat down and had the meal together..and it finally felt good..from being branded as a person who would never step foot into the kitchen to preparing vegetable pulao..well..I have finally arrived :-)

Cheers
~N~

I used to be an avid reader of books..infact at one point of time it almost became like a disease as however tired I was, I would come home and make it a point to read a book atleast for about half an hour to forty five minutes and then go to sleep..

Some of the books that I read with great vigor recently would include, Kalki's "Ponniyin Selvan", which is according to me on of the greatest epics I have read after probably Rajaji's "Ramayan" or R.K.Narayan's "Mahabharatha". The way the story has been woven, the characters have been chosen, the intricate details are simply stupendous and there is no way a reader would want to keep down the book because, there are many authors that have written great books but this book of Kalki will go down in time as one of the greatest epics..well I read the english translation as my tamil is not all that strong..though whoever I recommend this book, I ask them if they know tamil and if they do, I ask them to read the tamil version as its the original..whatever said and done.. anything original is best enjoyed in that form..In terms of keeping the reading audience spell bound, Kalki did a Dan Brown long back..and I mean very long ago..about 30 years back..

Currently Iam reading "Malgudi Landscapes", a collection of all the stories of R.K.Narayan and it is with out a doubt one of the books that I will always be proud to own. I literally felt Iam being transported into the imaginary town of Malgudi..more updates on how the reading session went..when I get a chance to finish it :-)

Till then..

Adios
~N~

WOW..amazing..fantastic..mind blowing are just a few words that can be considered an understatement of India's performance in the last one day international at Karachi..The last one day international and what a way to finish off the series at 4-1.

It has been the 13th one-day match that India has chased a total and so convincingly won it. Of all these 13 matches, this one stands on top. At an asking run rate of more than 8 runs an over and a Pakistan bowling attack that surprisingly was tight for a few spells..I was thinking that the Paks might want to finish off this one day series with a win and save some disgrace..but eventually as the match progressed what the current Indian team showed was that the fate of the match did not rest on a "rested" Tendulkar's shoulders nor did the wall of confidence break when Rahul "The wall" Dravid fell after a fine half century.

The youngsters, Yuvraj and Dhoni showed that this team is made of enourmous grit, courage and consistency and has shown that nothing is impossible. Even at that daunting asking rate they did not seem to be deterred one bit and continued making runs, slowly but consistently. I was getting impatient at one point thinking what these guys had in mind by taking singles and the two runs and whether they had any idea of the rising required run rate but when they finished the match with three overs to spare, I realised that these guys and the current team means serious business and they will go a long way.

The credit goes to quite a few people for this tremendous victory. First of all to Rahul Dravid for captaining the side not just as a captain passing on orders to his "boys" but letting them do what they are best at and leading from the front with some impressive performances of his own. Coach Greg Chapell who has changed the mind set of the entire team and last but not the least the boys themselves..well am justified when I say the boys themselves because, all of us go through rough patches at various times in our lives, but to come out of that rough patch, nobody can help us but ourselves and that is what these guys have done and proved..

Iam eagerly looking forward to the series with England which Iam sure will be exciting. I sincerely hope Mike Vaughn has something seriously effective in store for this Indian squad or Iam sure he is going to be the first one to be called for the presentation ceremony as the loosing captain. As far as Inzy is concerned, his team has a long way to go, interms of bowling, fielding and most importantly confidence and consistency.

England, welcome home and have a pleasant stay.... hopefully :-)

Cheers
~N~

Second post

Hey its my second posting today.. Iam totally enthusiastic about the blogging world now..with encouragement from my good friend, colleague and active blogger Jammy I decided that by hook or crook, I will definitely make an attempt to "just blog it" every day..

Well I know work kills and will continue to but yes this would definitely be my much needed daily relaxation break..today at home it was good as my son seemed to be getting more used to me..well its good in a way as the only time he actually sees me is for a few hours everyday..sad but true but am glad am finally getting to play father :-) when I look at him a stark reality strikes me and am sure all dads will agree and dads to be and who are planning will also agree with me sooner or later that its the only period of our lives that we actually live without a care in this world..how good it would remain this way..the daily tensions, the thrills and frills, the pressures..no sweat.. the reality is also that only when we see kids to we sense this reality as we have long forgotten that we used to be like this someday..well lets not speak more about this as I know its not possible..but atleast let us aim to make our daily lives as enjoyable as possible with whatever we are doing..be it work, taking a little tea break, having a chat or even blogging :-)

I will be visiting a lot of blogs henceforth to get some good tips on the art of survival in the blogging world, but from the little of what I have seen..the plain simple truth is..just dont get too worked up by it.."just blog it"

Till next time..which is very soon..

Adios

~N~

The Blog World..Here I come :-)

OK, I have decided finally to start off on my blog..just felt like it..as I suddenly felt a bit boring and probably a bit kind of writing types..usually dont cause the interest wears out pretty fast..well I cannot blog like my friends Ari or Jammy do but sure will try to improve over a period of time..its like am just beginning to crawl in to blog world :-)

I watched the Oprah winfrey show after a long time today and today was a really touching show..it was about child abuse and the damn pedophiles.. spoke about a little orphaned girl from Russia who was adopted by a jerk in the US who said he had lost his daughter..imagine the jerk went all the way to Russia and got her to the US.. he then treated the girl like his sex slave for nearly five years and traded her pictures all over the internet for money..well later turned out that he had metted out the same treatment to his biological daughter as well..the damn SOB..pardon me for the bad language..the little russian girl was only five years old..the guy was tracked down by a police officer who had posed as a guy interested in the pics..the jerk is behind bars.. the police officer, the biological daughter and the little russian girl (shes grown up a bit now) met today on the Oprah winfrey show for the first time today.. It was good to watch the three of them together, especially the police officer who had taken so much of pains..imagine entering a chat room which has thousands of pedophiles..yeeks..the thought of it is so grose..but finally the satisfaction you get when you have helped somebody is unexplainable isnt it? As a viewer I was happy the jerk was behind bars..his sentence is nothing less than 45 years in prison..well If I were the judge, instantaneous death sentence..

As responsible users of the Internet, we need to make best use of it..well am saying that porn is something that cannot be erased from the face of this goddamn cyberspace..whatever said and done its business for many but that business presents opportunities to a race of jerks..
All said and done..this was my first blog entry..I know its kind of a serious topic to start off but this kinda stayed in mind the whole day..so wanted to share it.. will come back very soon..

BTW, Happy Valentine's to all of ya :-)

Cheers
Naarayan