All things red

Happy Valentine's day people! I hope everyone survived the snow storm. I was so bored the whole day. I tried everything from playing Flappy bird (sad about the murder case), watching Winter Olympics, news, SRK movies, cooking good lunch and I was  still not able to kill time. I think it was because, I did not feel constructive in any of these activities. It was a dull and boring day. I did one good thing today. I joined Pinterest, just to learn more about it. Quiet impressed by the product. Not sure if I have the time to use it. For people like me, who don't like to read, Pinterest is our answer. It's a pictorial of different categories of interest, like cooking, home, fashion etc. I am looking forward to the release of the movie Gunday.  Hence the Song of the day is "tune mari entriyan". Enjoy!

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I am a romantic person by nature. So, this should be MY day right? Wrong!!! While I do believe in love, I do not believe in celebrating it on a particular day. When 2 people have decided to be together, everyday is a celebration. I like the color red, don't you.? I am posting a few things red that I like.

 

 

 

 All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful:
The Lord God made them all.

I want to change the look of this blog to red today. Hope you like the new look.

What makes Maya happy?

Hello dosts. Good weekend. The weather was not so great, but then again, I can't remember when was the last time we had some great weather. I see no difference between living here and in Alaska. When w were freezing, the drama of Kejriwal was continuing in Delhi. Dharana's after dharana's by him is making him responsible for his own downfall. Now he is threatening to quit if the Lokpal bill is not passed. Isn't that what Congress wants? What started out as a great idea for the future, is now reduced to mockery by the same people who once supported him. By doing so, he is letting down the people who trust him. So sad. I see the hope of Indians dying down rapidly. Salman Khan has refused to host Bigg Boss 8. The show must go on. Who is going to replace him? If the rumor mills are to be believed, it's Ajay Devgan. Salman Khan also visited the Siddhivinayak temple to pray for his movie Jai Ho. I guess these visits have now become more of a publicity gimmick. There was a time when Amitabh used to genuinely go to the temple and the then Bombay would come to a standstill. Nevermind, whatever works best for everyone. And what's up with Vidya Balan wearing maxi dresses to the promotions of her new movie Shadi ka side effects? Is she pregnant?
It was ghazal Sunday for me. Coincidentally, it was the ghazal king's b'day on 08 February. Song of the day is "Muskurakar mila karo humse" by the King. Soul stirring isn't it?  Misery needs company. If you have no friend to listen to you when you are lonely and sad, there is always Jagjit Singh. In a nice way.

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I am the type of person, who will go to 10 stores first, do a through comparison shopping, then buy the item I wish to buy, even if it means saving only a few dollars. 

 

A bargain ain't a bargain unless it's something you need.
- Sidney Carroll

 

My husband can't understand this as he does not believe is wasting time and effort in shopping. For him time is money. I understand fully that in order to save, one has to spend. We HAVE to buy items we "need".  That's were my focus is in this post. Now "wants" are a different story. I had gone grocery shopping to the local grocery store this afternoon. I have this belief that the savings will come off of the list only if we present the savings card when all the items have been scanned by the cashier. I refuse to give the card in the middle of the scanning. Today, when the cashier scanned the card, the savings kept scrolling for a while. It resembled the slot machines at the casino. I couldn't help thinking to myself, is this going to stop at some time? I was overjoyed to see how much came off the total. Must have been a lucky day, when most of the items we normally buy were on sale. There was a time when I used to cut coupons out of a newspaper and take it to the grocery store. I have given that up now. I feel sad to see a coupon being thrown away. But I have learnt to live with that. There are many things that make a person happy and I am no different. But my day is especially made when I save money. Even if it is a few cents. I can sleep well when I know that we have saved some money for a rainy day. I think my Indian upbringing is responsible for this kind of thinking.  We were always taught the value of hard earned money.

 

A simple fact that is hard to learn is that the time to save money is when you have some.
- Joe Moore  

A visit to a fish market

Namaskar friends. Patha nahi kyon, but remembering SRK a lot today. I saw him attend Ahana Deol's wedding reception with a leg injury. He still looked so adorable. Aww. Today's song of the day is from his movie Koyla. Looks like money can buy handsome Son-in-laws. Hema Malini did a fantastic job finding rich, good looking, first hand hubby's for her daughters. What a grand, star studded wedding it was. Everyone was dressed so well for once. Loved Deepika's and Diya Mirza's sarees. Kushal-Gauhar and Arman-Tanisha are milking their cheap stunt at stardom. They are seen everywhere these days. Gau-shal are participating in a reality show now. What??! As long as they have the audience, they win.

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Every year I go to India, a visit to the fish market is a must. My parents call me a cat. I love the smell of fresh fish. Sorry vegetarians this post is definitely NOT for you. For your information, it is just like visiting the farmers market, to buy locally fresh, locally grown produce.  This year too, I fulfilled the tradition. My brother and his son, who also have the same intensity of love for fish and a high tolerance for the smell, took me to this brand new, quintessential fish market, that has now opened in Udupi. It was like taking a kid to a toy store. It was almost closing time for the market. The fish mongers were quoting the lowest prices, I had ever heard off. OMG! the variety of fish that was on display was amazing. The fish comes from the nearby harbor of Malpe. The baskets of fresh, silver fish, looked so inviting. I could eat it all up, that too raw! I bought mackerel, Shrimp, Pomfret, sardines and crab. Rs. 2000/- worth of fish. I did not care if I had paid more. I did not bother to do any comparison shopping. My mind was doing the conversion from rupees to dollars. So cheap! Had to buy them all. I was on a roll. My brother had to stop me. See pics below. Sorry for the poor quality. I was concentrating on the fish. :)

 

 

 

Fish Market 

 

It took my nephew and I, 3 hours to clean that much fish. We could have got it cleaned at the fish market, but I wanted to have the pleasure of cleaning it myself. Since my Mom is a vegetarian, we sat in the backyard of our house to clean the fish. mosquitoes had a field trip sucking our blood. My brother came up with the idea of lighting a mini bonfire next to us, to keep the evil mosquitoes away. It worked temporarily. In the meantime, my brother and Mom were the preparation team they had prepped all he vegetables and masalas for the cleaned fish. 

 

 

 

Marinated fish

 

It took us another 2 hours to finish cooking the fish. Sorry I don't have the pics of the final product. I was too tired to take pics, for that matter even eat. All of us had lost appetite by the time we finished cooking. It was too late at night to eat. We did try to eat a little. The next day we had to travel. So guess what? all that wish had to be given to the maid and her family to enjoy. How sad. It was fun, but never again will I go overboard in buying fish, however tempting it might be. (I do wish, I had bought some clams :)). As they say, too much of anything is bad.