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Christmas and New year is just one month away. The train and bus tickets have already been booked. Even the return trip tickets from their native places are already filled.

I used to celebrate New Year usually at my native home mostly, except  on twice occasions. There would be special programmes on TV. The Chennai beaches used to be crowded like hell and there would be symptoms of an upcoming festival. Promotion offers at various stores and Blasting ads in various hotels would be spread everywhere. There are some people having children n all who plan their Christmas-New Year vacation. For single guys, I am sure, the usual way of celebration would be a gathering of friends in any pub and dancing and drinking down whole night!

This year, RK and I would be getting plenty of holidays during that period. Wondering what to do or where to go or to be at home.

What do you think is the best way to celebrate New Year? Or rather, how are you planning to celebrate the holidays?

Off late, I have been changing the blog theme quite often. Have you noticed that? I guess I have been bitten by the theme bug again. It happens to me sometimes, whenever I see someone’s blog with beautiful theme. The footer of that blog will contain the theme name and if not licensed by the blog owner, will also contain the theme provider details from where they got the theme. Often, such sites will contain numerous other themes too for free or for premium.

I guess its the girly nature to change the theme often. I have seen professional people sticking onto just one theme for months. Mostly they use premium themes, which costs above 50$ for single user license. I never delete my old themes unless I dislike them or they are not compatible with the new version of WordPress.

There are the popular smashing magazines themes for free to start with. But then, every individual has their own taste. And for me, I always go for  right-sided 2 or 3 column sidebar, with more space for blogpost, and options for customization. But there are some other small factors like the font and the base colors and the header image used which also helps me in streamlining the choice. Though can be customized easily, I am too lazy to do that, when I consider that I don’t have a permanent header image of my own and there are so many other codings like managing adsense code and other third party widget codes to be placed with every theme.

As of now, I have plans to change again within few days to Blue Grace theme after sailing through Kepple and Silverlight. Lets see how it goes. And those who have email subscription, please check the site out in between so that you don’t miss the action!!

The photofunia.com site enables you to blend your images on various ready-made photos. A sample one is given below.

All are catchy photos with special effects which will boost your spirits high. The website uses mostly face detection algorithms to cut out your face alone from the image you supply from your computer/pc. It also enables to save to Imageshack for easy usage in internet sites or save as Avatar to use in forums and as thumbnails or to save the entire image to your desktop and that too for free!!!

Diwali time is nearing up. But there are no crackers yet.The markets have been very much down and rains are pouring heavily.

Long back, one week before the Diwali festival itself, children used to crack mini-bombs and rockets. The diya’s were cleaned and were lighted up the front steps, the gate and the walls. There were flower pots and hand-sparklers as symbols everywhere. There were new dresses as diwali gifts.

And now, the ban on noise pollution and the high prices with down markets has dampened the mood.

Lets hope this diwali lightens the spirit and boosts it up, removing all the dark shades and lighting the ray of hope!

Happy Diwali!

I love taking photos. Rather I guess I love admiring nature. The sky, the flowers, the angles, the view points, the animals and wildlife, the colors, the portraits, the macro’s, the photo effects…

Long back, I had bought my first digital camera, canon a400 to feed my hobby called photograpy. There was the web forums where in I could showcase my pictures to obtain comments and feedback from talented amateur photographers and that too in layman terms. In those days, the DeviantArt site was popular for photographers and I didn’t knew about Flickr at all. I could find there are more professional people using Flickr these days.

After my cold deal with Flickr, I have been uploading most of my photos in Picasaweb. I have now almost 4 to 5 public albums in addtion to the DeviantArt. It includes the time pass photo sessions along with the Mysore snaps. So here we go.

Read the rest of this entry »

Another birthday passing by.

Does it really matter to celebrate the birthdays?

I remember calling in the neighbour family to cut the cake n all, and singing “Happy Birthday to You” when I was young. I used to wear new “color dress” in school while others wore their school uniform. They sang the same song again, and I used to distribute the chocolates mostly “Eclairs” or “Lion King” carrying to each desk. I used to get fed up saying “Thank you” to each one of them.

Early that morning at dawn, when I wake up to mom’s call from Kitchen, its not any different. When she see me, she starts singing the wish song loud from the kitchen itself, while I brush my teeth!. As if proclaiming to the world and to the house, that its her daughter’s birthday. And then, in evening, when she comes from office at around 6- 6.30, we cut the cake and share it during the late tea session. If it comes on a holiday, “payasam” would be prepared.

In college, there was no color dress. But there was “new” dress. There was no group singing of “Happy Birthday”. Instead, it shortened to “treat”. Birthday treat. It started as Rs.5/- wala “munch” and “perk ” and went on to become lunch treats as we reached the graduation days. There were festive days combined with, mostly “Diwali” and “ThriKarthika”.

At office, the lunch treats, new dress, wishes continued along with the addition of gifts and birthday bumps. The only time my room mates could lift me up and kick my a** was last year. It was the first and I guess, the last time, I received them. At the end, I felt sorry for the huge effort by the kiddo’s to life the Gulliver’s sister!!! There were balloons, there was “payasam” again, the temple visits, birthday cards, dinners, and lots of gifts.

And now, as I hit the silver jubilee, I am at this home, trying to live the role of a housewife, sitting on the pc, holding in my hand, a plate of piece of cake, bought and cut yesterday night, and blogging with the other, replying to sms messages and attending calls, very few ones, wondering whether to get up and make the “payasam” for myself and being lazy, sitting back and recollecting the old memories…

I guess its a different kind of celebration….ain’t it?

I had resorted to review immediately each and every book that I read, so that I could pen down my views and the emerging thoughts influenced by the writing onto the blog. But off late, the timing was not enough and bad scheduling have chopped off most of the thoughts. So before I lose them all, let me share few lines atleast for some of them.

Brida by Paul Coelho:

I had finished this soon after I did the page123 tag. The effect of Paul Coelho had kinda started to diminish in me one by one. Not that I disliked his theme n all, but I am not that impressed any more. Maybe that’s why I am hesitating to take up the thrid book of his from my bookshelf, “By the river Piedra…”. There had been many instances which I didn’t liked or believed in this book, say for example, the re-birth and the story of Wicca and Witchcraft. I don’t deny or say that re-birth is false, but its just that I have not been convinced yet of those thoughts. The main thing I liked is that, Brida was in search of her soulmate, if it ever existed, just like any young woman and the revelation to her that we can meet more than one soulmate in our lives. The concept of the Dark Forest was also meaningful at times, and I particularly liked the ending (if at all you have the patience to reach there!) , which is almost applicable in the present life.

Ladies Coupe by Anita Nair:

The starting of the book was great, since it spoke of the railway station and train journeys which reminded me of my own travels. There was a fictional part of listening to all the life stories of 5 people in one single night, but nevertheless its a fiction. The stories of all the young ladies strikes a note with present life, but not entirely at some places. Some places it looks exaggerated, but we never know what all happens at urban places or within relationships. The protagonist, Akhila searches for an answer whether is it essential for a woman to get married in life. The unrevealed answer is contained in the open ending, so as to create more depth in the intrigued solutions of the common question. For me, its actually par with the Arranged Marriage, but on the other side, and I feel it portrays unconventional answers, but depicting conventional importance. Read the rest of this entry »

I had watched Kidnap last Sunday. It was unscheduled but still we got tickets. Imran Khan would be really happy that we had seen his both films!!! Nothing much to write about as its pretty much done here. At most places, RK and me were laughing out loud for the stupid scenes, and at the artificiality of Bollywood. Obviously, how can you not laugh when an 18 year old kidnapped victim, instead of making use of the chance and escape, nurses the kidnapper who has been gun-shot!! The glam dresses of both mother and daughter are again unfit to the theme. Minisha is not fit for glam roles. She is cute and able to act, but I guess needs to be choosy. The only part I liked was the tasks set by the kidnapper, the clues, the convincing answers for the actions, and tasks and the ending, which unlike other films doesn’t end up with love story among the kidnapper and the victim!

Does it also points out at the dark side of the law system and the juvenile home treatment and jail which creates more criminals out of young people?