tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-86568064447995643712009-11-14T23:34:41.739-05:00A rather irreverent blog on random topicsSujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.comBlogger175125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-41777712192339823652009-11-13T08:15:00.006-05:002009-11-13T16:12:14.377-05:00

I had placed an order for some books at Betterworld.com, which resells old library books and recently asked about the order's delayed arrival. The books arrived yesterday, so I shot off a quick email to let them know.First reply :"Hi Sujatha, This is an automated message to let you know that your message has been received. A Better World Books human will be replying to you shortly. Thanks for

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-56467343708102519632009-11-11T16:16:00.005-05:002009-11-11T17:03:16.661-05:00

that will deter the squirrels and the chipmunks that had been monopolizing the new bird feeder.Good old chili powder.After much soul-searching, I mixed up a batch of mixed bird seed with chili powder and shook it around so most of them were well coated, poured it in the bird feeder, went back inside the house and watched the squirrel march right up expectantly to its much-anticipated feast. Two

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-31273450019109150752009-11-07T06:44:00.004-05:002009-11-07T07:06:22.630-05:00

The bird feeder that I bought earlier this year as a guaranteed squirrel-stumper has hung empty for several months. I had no interest in converting the deck into a squirrel spa. Every now and then, a sad sparrow or chickadee would stop by and frantically check the empty bird feeder, flying away in disappointment. The cardinals disdained this feeder, being unable to perch and eat in comfort on the

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-54791168520455623742009-11-03T20:36:00.006-05:002009-11-03T20:47:21.284-05:00

I got mine from Kochuthresiamma (Pareltank), who evidently caught hers from Lekhni, who caught hers from Shefaly... and so on down the line.This is the 'Blogthemitis' virus. I remember looking at all those new themes and thinking my blues were too blue for comfort, my fluffy clouds too bright and decided to try out a new theme. This theme is the blogger theme 'Mr. Moto' ( and yes, I refuse to

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-11946185868069194152009-10-31T06:56:00.010-04:002009-10-31T07:25:40.136-04:00

M: "I want to be a mouse this year. I'll wear the grey sweatpant and sweatshirt from last year's 'animal concert'( She was an elephant, with a small paper mask). I'll make up a hairband with mouse ears and go around as a mouse."She was a black cat with black turtleneck/pants/tail/purchased glittery cat-ear hairband, last year.A butterfly with wings and matching antennae-like headbands the year

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-90646689540263274262009-10-26T17:28:00.004-04:002009-10-26T17:43:44.715-04:00

Not a fear of phyllo pastry, but an excessive fear of leaves. I think my husband has it in severe form. It's the ailment of the month, when our maples and oaks start shedding copiously, even as they look spectacular in their orange pinks, golden yellows and brown orange tones." We need sponsors for the trees, to rake and bag their leaves, otherwise I'm going to look for a tree-service to come and

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-43883167896660364282009-10-17T20:02:00.001-04:002009-10-18T08:43:34.718-04:00

To all desi readers : Happy Diwali!---------------------------------------------Via Remya:1. When you looked at yourself in the mirror today, what was the first thing you thought?Need to dye the front hairs again. 2. How much cash do you have in your wallet right now?$100. 3. What’s a word that rhymes with DOOR?Bore, core, fore, four, gore,hoar, lore, more, pore, roar,sore, snore,spore,store,tore

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-22745798974560709632009-10-15T16:19:00.005-04:002009-10-15T16:38:30.383-04:00

'We're bombing the moon!''Come attend the party', to paraphrase the Nasa blurb inviting the general public to the LCROSS Impact Night festivities. (Free admission, limited tent space, Please bring your own Blankets, Chairs, and Snacks.)And so the crowds gathered to watch what was projected to be a spectacular 6 kilometer high array of plumes at the point of impact, as the NASA LCROSS mission

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-82591780015869369802009-10-13T06:00:00.002-04:002009-10-23T13:28:09.467-04:00

The above web video is an effort to raise public funding for Dr. Sudhir Paul's further research into a promising approach towards a true HIV vaccine. He is the husband of my friend and co-blogger Ruchira Paul ( Accidental Blogger).-----Cut and paste below while passing the Tag ---------------Mission Anti-HIVAs Dr. Paul says in this video, the 'abzyme' approach to attacking the virus at the

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-79378924304542364722009-10-05T17:22:00.007-04:002009-10-11T16:04:00.318-04:00

It was a small volume tossed carelessly in with the rest of the frayed spines on the Public Library bookshelf. "Love of Seven Dolls" by Paul Gallico.He was one of my favorite authors as a teen, and this was one book that intrigued me, with a faded rendition of a full-skirted girl looking at what appeared to be a puppet show on the cover.I borrowed it frequently, whenever I felt the urge, over the

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-64420997659866526442009-09-25T22:18:00.026-04:002009-10-11T16:03:33.782-04:00

We entered the Metro station near Tati and headed towards line 10. No newfangled sleek trains here, unlike line 1. The trains were older, more rattley, without the completely automatic doors.You had to physically push the handles to trigger the opening. It made for a few anxious moments when the door wouldn't respond. Would we be swept away to the next station before we knew it?But the names that

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-40611995792614791442009-09-23T20:44:00.004-04:002009-10-11T16:03:33.783-04:00

It was the last day of our recent stay in Paris. We had climbed the steps to the Sacré-Coeur basilica and back down, started walking back to the metro station, when I spotted a man saunter by, dangling a pink and blue plastic bag in his hand, emblazoned 'Tati'."That's where Amma used to bring me sometimes for shopping!", I exclaimed. My husband stopped and looked at M and S. 'Shall we walk to

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-71777220926010858362009-09-19T07:55:00.011-04:002009-10-11T16:03:33.785-04:00

Inspired by punarjanman's list (Via Blogpourri):I most definitely remember, not the Chalet School stories, but the Maids of La Rochelle books. There is something very appealing about leaving your hot, humid country, as I subconsciously imagined myself doing, and going off to live on a windswept craggy island with an exotic name like Guernsey, where people speak a variant of English that bears

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-26270231389817135582009-09-12T08:00:00.007-04:002009-10-10T16:41:48.496-04:00

We sit idling in the traffic. The intersection is jammed, and it is definitely going to take more than 10 minutes to clear. The lurid mix of diesel and petrol fumes outside leaves us unaffected, no more than a faint dribble through the air-conditioned air of the car.Outside, a woman in a black cotton veil picked over with tiny embroidered mirrors in red makes her way past the cars. She is

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-40230912586963108702009-08-31T17:10:00.012-04:002009-10-10T16:42:01.878-04:00

The taxi winds around the narrow maze of roads leading up to the fort. It's a very democratic cross-section of the population that lines up to enter the grounds: at Rs.10 per ticket, this is a poor man's park, not just the haunt of the well-heeled. The lawns near the entrance are surprisingly green, well-watered even as an extended dry spell has been hovering over the city and suburbs. But

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-3159734540770195392009-08-22T14:22:00.007-04:002009-10-10T16:37:33.680-04:00

From the New York Times a few weeks ago:"Spending an idle morning watching people look at art is hardly a scientific experiment, but it rekindles a perennial question: What exactly are we looking for when we roam as tourists around museums? As with so many things right in front of us, the answer may be no less useful for being familiar."Why indeed do we wander around museums? Is it the age-old

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-90740161097569268252009-08-21T05:47:00.004-04:002009-10-10T16:42:21.868-04:00

Apologies for the infrequent posting over the last few weeks. I just got back yesterday from a long trip to India, with a brief halt in Paris, as you may have noticed.I will be back soon with little snippets and vignettes from the trip.

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-46942852294826018062009-08-03T05:57:00.007-04:002009-10-10T16:37:50.313-04:00

The first thought that struck me as I wheeled the cabin luggage off the escalator in the Paris airport, was : "They probably know we are Americans from our horrendous sneakers."All the Parisiennes were mincing around delicately in shoes that would make Jimmy Choo green with envy. Up the stairs, down the escalators, triptrapping down the Champs-Elysées, clickclacking over the marbled floors of

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-51179445358742926742009-07-31T06:45:00.003-04:002009-10-10T13:41:37.766-04:00

Kaavya stared dully at the laptop screen, her eyes bleary from the lack of sleep. “Don’t forget to finish your 50 pages of novel. It’s due tomorrow”, rang her mother’s admonition. The page had two lines on it, paused for the last 15 minutes on “…and Opal”. “I hate Opal, hate this novel writing gimmick, hate Amma, hate Appa…” She closed the laptop, dropped it unceremoniously on her table and

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-29216161595497834442009-07-21T06:35:00.001-04:002009-10-10T13:42:09.981-04:00

(originally published April 2006 on the now-defunct Desijournal.com)I have more than a dozen UFOs from the constellation Craftia hiding in my closet, wondering when I will finally let them see the light of day. These UnFinished Objects are in various stages of completion- I’m hoping that highlighting some of them in this article will jog me into going back and finishing them.First came Herkimer

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-36521303820115421032009-07-12T14:55:00.010-04:002009-10-10T13:42:35.469-04:00

Considering that the previous bird feeder was ripped to shreds by the friendly neighborhood squirrel, I marched off to the store, determined to find something that would withstand the depredations.The shelf was lined with several contraptions, but the one that caught my eye as a good candidate in terms of price vs. sturdiness was this one.'Squirrel stumper', as it was called, I thought that it

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-352856638952965292009-07-06T21:56:00.007-04:002009-10-10T13:18:47.614-04:00

There's nothing like reading lists handed out at the end of the school year to send the kids screaming for the hills, apparently.Mine have definitely decided to go off the beaten track, this year, even as NY Times columnist Nicholas Kristof strikes a familiar chord in his column on his Best Childrens' Books of all time, and scores over 2000 reader responses on his blog asking for reader's

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-26168287211215365532009-06-29T15:59:00.006-04:002009-10-10T13:43:12.994-04:00

The world mourns Michael Jackson, but in our household, we mourn the passing of Billy Mays. We were the unofficial Billy Mays fan club, rushing to the TV whenever we heard his stentorian voice booming over the speakers.No more of that, sadly. Who will sell us the next must-have thingamabob, persuade us to try the amazing Fix-it (not bad for minor scratches on a car's finish- I know, I tried it.),

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-10394654016546947022009-06-26T17:23:00.010-04:002009-10-11T16:03:33.786-04:00

It was another of those evenings when I was bored with the blogs, that I typed in the name of the guru who taught me Carnatic music when I was in high school and college. The initial word search pulled up miscellaneous references to the Vechoor cow, apparently the world's smallest, and highly efficient at yielding copious amounts of milk, even on a smaller diet than the more common breeds.

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8656806444799564371.post-53384574682187440102009-06-13T07:12:00.008-04:002009-10-10T13:45:45.855-04:00

The other day, a largish squirrel with a black nose stopped by my brand new bird feeder. The old one had a hole that you could drive a truck through, courtesy of said squirrel, who had managed to pry off one of the perching-post assemblies.This one didn't last 2 hours. Blacknose stopped by, took in a few whiffs, put out her front paws and leaned all her weight on the nearest perch-post.I opened

Sujathahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16602206543960349999noreply@blogger.com2