Hi again!

A year long blogging break and I am back! HAPPY NEW YEAR! :-)

An awesome Europe trip was one of the highlights of 2007. But I guess the biggest change in our lives was brought about by our big baby...Romeo, our Great Dane puppy. He just turned 1 and has been our biggest joy since April when we brought him home from Pennsylvania. He is all of 37" tall at the shoulders and weighs 145 lbs.

There's so much to catch up on! Will post again in detail soon.

HAPPY NEW YEAR

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At last...

Hell, yeah! Justice!! Finally! 2 long running cases of murder finally settled almost together! I’m so happy for the Mattoo and Lal families! I can’t imagine fighting for years and years to bring your loved one’s murderer to justice!

But then again, how many people can afford to spend that kind of time and money? And how many people are still out there seeking justice? And how many people have been disappointed with the verdict and suffering just because their case wasn’t so publicized? All said and done, it sure does give the entire nation some hope!! :-)

Ssup?

Hope ya’ll had a great Thanksgiving weekend. I did! I shopped till I dropped and probably for the first time in my life, I’m happy with what I bought and don’t have to return anything! :)

I know I’ve been out of commission for a while now and I guess I’m not the only one...75% of the people on my ‘everyday’ blog list haven’t been writing regularly and it’s disappointing to say the least! I’m sure most of them have the same reason as me…no time! It’s lame I know!! But it’s true! I don’t know if it’s me and I am bad at time management or if 24 hrs is too short for a day! Oh well!

Btw, I watched Dhoom 2...first day, first show! Movie...awesome! Hrithik...coolness! Ash...stunning! Bipasha...hot! Uday...irritating! Abhishek...disappointing! Music...so, so! Hrithik undoubtedly steals the show. Ash needs to enroll herself into an acting school. Abhishek needs to get rid of his ever present beard, tone up and improve his posture. Bipasha needs to understand that her newly toned body isn't the end of the road. Uday Chopra just needs to disappear from Bollywood! But do watch the movie...it rocks! :)

Did I ever tell you that I have a passion for cooking? Well, I do!! I tried my hand at Damrot last night and it came out pretty good. I love South Indian food and I’ll come back with some of my favorite recipes soon.

Scrapwall

I’ve been planning to put this post up for a while now. So here it is!

This is a project S and I did a couple of months ago. See we have a big formal dining room in our new house and this is apart from the big breakfast room we have attached to the kitchen. Since we hardly have any formal dinner parties and since we both eat in the living room in front of the TV, we decided to turn this room into something else. Of course, we toiled with all sorts of ideas. We wanted to convert this into a game room with a pool table. Although we both loved this idea, we weren’t too keen about it as this room is kind of an extension to our living room and it would take away the beauty of our living room we both love so much.

So after many weeks of discussion, we decided to turn this into a lounge area, with pictures, lounge chairs, a small bookshelf…y’know a place we can relax and read a book! We bought some plants and chairs etc. Now we had these huge walls, which were empty, and I wanted to put up lots of pictures on one. I considered just buying a lot of frames, but somehow it didn’t appeal to me a lot. That’s so cliché! I also wanted to get into scrapbooking from a long time and so I thought why not make a ‘Scrapwall’ instead of a ‘Scrapbook’? I thought maybe if I buy a huge roll of cork that can cover the entire wall, we could just randomly pin pictures and captions on it and turn the entire wall into some sort of a collage.

Then began my quest for a cork roll and turns out, it was more expensive and hard to find than I thought. And then this genius idea hit…not me but S! He came up with this brilliant idea of getting plywood boards. As the idea grew, we got more and more excited. So we went to Home Depot and got these 2’x4’ boards. He thought we should paint them different colors and put them up. But then we didn’t want to drill so many holes in our new wall and so he got these long beams which would be nailed to the wall and then we would nail the boards to the beams. Voila!!! We had our scrapwall! It looks beautiful and colorful and we have got huge compliments from everyone who’s seen it. We are yet to put up pictures on it, which is a work in progress. But I think it looks good as it is!! What do you think? :D

Goodbye, Love!

Gloomy days and cloudy skies
How could I not see all your lies?

Your love’s gone and the passion’s dead
It was never there…it’s what I dread

The end is near, it’s time to part
Hold on a bit longer says my mournful heart

Your shadow lurks in the darkness here
Your smile fades and I shed a tear

Upon the meadows touched with dew
I can see our love askew

Beneath the thousand twinkling stars
It’s time to leave with jagged scars

The lonely years must go by
Until I learn, it’s no good to cry

My heart’s broken, I’m clinging to the past
It’s hard to accept, our love didn’t last

Deep inside my heart is where you reside
When I think of you…that’s where I’ll hide

DIL and Studio 60

In the past 3 days, I’ve realized that you need to have a DIL to be a good Daughter-In-Law. Yeah, my Mom-in-law’s here for 6 months. It’s a new role, a new life, and new beginnings. I’m still tense around her, trying my best to leave a good impression and trying to be as dear to her as her daughter. I know it’s an uphill task and it won’t happen overnight…but so far, it’s going great! :) We cooked together, went shopping, watched TV and I enjoyed every moment. Of course, it was a bit tiring to be on my toes all day long, but given my lifestyle until last Thursday, I definitely need this kind of change. I cannot sit on the couch all evening long, watching the same ol’ reruns of King of Queens and Everybody Loves Raymond and order Pizza and not to mention all the pounds I’m happily packing on lately. I have to actually BE a wife to S and do all the typical d-i-l things. It’s all good!! After 6 long years in the US, I feel like I’m in real touch with my roots. While I’m running around, chopping vegetables, rushing to turn the cooker off or to make rice, washing vessels, I think of my Mom who is a dynamo in the house…quick, clean and never tired. While I was growing up, I never did any work around the house! There never was any to do! Collecting the dinner plates and stacking them in the backyard for the maid to clean them the next morning and then wiping the dining table with a damp cloth was my only job. I probably did that twice a month coz before I could drink water after dinner and wash my hands, my Mom would be done with those. Someday, I hope to be as good a homemaker as she is! It feels strange to see S’s Mom in the kitchen and not my own. It’s a different feeling…one I’m yet to get used to. But I belong to their family now and I’m happy to finally be a part of them after waiting for so long…too long! And I've never seen S so happy! His 2 best gals under the same roof AND getting along! Lol! I wonder how it is for him! Whatever it is, it surely must be a huge relief for every man!

On a different note, we bought a 42” Panasonic Plasma HDTV. It will be delivered tomorrow and I can’t wait to watch TV on a big screen and in hi-def!! :) I guess many of you who know me well know by now that I am a chronic TVholic and so for me, this is the best gadget we’ve ever owned. I hope tomorrow comes soon!!

Actually, I wish it'd have come today :( And for a good reason too! Chandler’s back!!! Yeah baby!! Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip premieres tonight at 10 p.m. EST on NBC. It’s definitely the most anticipated series for me! I’ll pray for it to be as huge a success as F.R.I.E.N.D.S and I hope it doesn’t take the Joey route! Matthew Perry looks more handsome than ever and of course I love Amanda Peet too. Wowie! Now all I have to do is make a smooth transition from Chandler Bing to Matt Albie. With his charm and talent, I’m sure it’s a walk in the park! Yeah, I know! I need help! But hey, I’m the biggest Matthew Perry fan on this planet!!! So cut me some slack, watch this trailer and then go watch the series premiere. :D