Best flowers shop vs best grocery shop

A colleague of mine asked me today if I knew of a good flowers shop near office. I was stumped. Yeah, I recall one in Indiranagar, but what is its name? When did I last purchase/receive flowers from there? So I look the type who buys/receives flowers, but I don't know of any good flowers shop??
Back in college, I could name good flowers shops near my house (on DP road), near college (on JM road/FC road), and even near random places of interest (MG road, Deccan). But nobody asked me such questions back then - obviously because I didn't look the type who would purchase/receive flowers (read didn't look the type who had a boyfriend). And now, I am married to my special someone - and I don't know of ANY good flowers shops, ANYWHERE in Bangalore!
But hey - ask me about the best deals on grocery near office, I know them!!!

I don't know exactly when this transition happened - from subconsciously keeping track of places of interest to people who 'have-a-life', to keeping track of places of interest to someone who needs to 'get-a-life'. It probably happened sometime when I finally did 'get-a-life'.

And though I miss romanticizing (flowers/chocolates and the like), I'm loving the romance in the regular grocery-shopping-outings.

I recently found out that atleast 6 of my classmates from school are into the films and television - from singer, to model, to channel producer, to asst director to anurag kashyap, to asst director to ekta kapoor, to winner of awards for short films in indian film festivals... Wow! Its so awesome to look at their pictures in news and go - I know this girl!!! And its even more awesome to think how well they have done for themselves :)
I always cribbed about the ICSE English paper format - of a 40 marks essay, 20 marks letter-writing, 10 marks precis writing & 30 marks comprehension. HOW on earth can we write 40 marks worth of an essay, no longer than 2 sides of a fullscape sheet? And WHY?? Well, now atleast I know why - to let the creative geniuses amongst us discover their hidden talent, while the rest of us unimaginative ones, instead, invested our energies in calculating the probability of scoring an 85%+ even with the lousiest score in English :)

On becoming fearless - by Arianna Huffington

I read this book on Pradnya's recommendation. And boy, am I glad I did :)

"Fearlessness is not absence of fear" - so damn true. She talks about not conforming to societal cliche's like being 'nice'. She encourages every woman to be a go-getter, to be aggressive, and ofcourse, to be fearless.

Absolutely loved it!

Parle rocks!

Did anyone ever imagine that the same company that gave us Parle G, would ever give us Milano??

The shy, cute little boy of Parle G

Has now grown up into the hunkman Hritik!

Kitchen tips

Almost every blogger worth his/her salt, has a blog that showcases his/her cooking talent. With this entry, my blog is about to become a complete blog! Only, I wont be sharing a recipe, but a fantastic tip, that I bet you have not heard/seen before!!

What do you do when:
- You feel hungry at 10 pm, and realize that you haven't had dinner
- You feel like eating, say, hypothetically, Poha
- You chop up onions, chillis, corriander and soak the poha
- You place the pan on the stove and realize that the gas is OVER!! (ofcourse its over, afterall its been over a year; even if you cook just 4 meals a week, the gas will run out after a year.. Predicting the parameters of the almost-annual change-the-gas-cylinder cycle merits a separate post)

So yes, what do you do now that it is 10.30 pm and it is almost impossible to order anythin, and you dont have any bread at home, no biscuits or other life-saving munchies either, and you are HUNGRY, and hungry for Poha in particular? (I strongly believe in the hungry-for-a-specific-food-item concept, especially since most of my "I am hungry" wails were answered by my mom with a (hatefully tall) glass of milk!)

What you do is, use the roti maker that you got in dahej (which, upon reflection, reflects how much confidence your parents have, not just in your roti-making skills, but also in your ability to predict when to change the gas cylinder)

Yes, for all disbelievers of the roti maker - it works great as a hot plate!
Ofcourse it wastes electricity, and the rotis may never turn out fine after this little experiment, but well, maybe by next year I will have a better solution for this problem.

Epiphany

Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy says that the answer to life, the universe and everything is 42.
It was brought to my attention that I have it - i.e. the answer to life, the universe and everything AND more! Thanks to my hubby :)

Jatin = જતીન (in gujrati)
= 43 (જ = 4 in marathi, and તીન = 3)
= 42 + 1

Yeps, one of those PJs I enjoyed very much :)

Scuba diving at Maldives!

Jatin and I went for a trip to Maldives in Feb 2009. The place is gorgeous - sandy white beaches, beautiful blue water, a gorgeous reef, and so much more.

Some friends asked me to blog about the trip - in particular the diving. So here are some details about the best part of the trip - the scuba diving:

- If you can snorkel, you can most probably dive. So do give the 'beginners lesson for diving' a shot. They teach you some basics of diving for free, and you pay only if you are confident you want to dive.

- We went through Delphi's school of diving, and they charged us USD 75 for one dive. (The cost included equipment - oxygen tank, fins etc, but not the wet suit). PADI school of diving is cheaper, and better, so if your island has a PADI centre, go for it. They even give you a certificate after the dive :)

- You are charged separately for renting a digital camera. Delphi's charged us USD 45. PADI charges approximately USD 30. I would say renting a cam is completely worth it!

- You can dive only 24 hrs after you fly in, and 24 hrs before you fly out of the Maldives. This is to give enough time for your body cells to adjust to the changes in pressure due to flying and diving. Plan your dive accordingly. If you want to try snorkeling for a day before diving, plan accordingly.

- It was freakin cold in the water, especially at greater depths. If you wish, wear a tee to keep you warm, instead of wearing just a wet suit.

Diving is a wonderful experience. We went diving only upto a depth of 8m, but got to see many different types of fish, corals, oysters, and even a sea turtle :)

So, in a nutshell - if you go to the Maldives - definitely go diving!