The impromptu bus picnic!!

So today was an okay sort of day  ...the weather was cold , windy and sunny .....nothing to complain about.... It was my turn to spring for refreshments for a graduate seminar which was at 4 in the evening.[Yes any graduate event is all about the food.... grad student meetings = free food.... today I found out where the free food comes from.] So I skipped along [well not really ... but I would've skipped if I had been a couple of years younger] to trader Joe's aka the gateway to the most wonderful produce and every conceivable snack ! [except the ones you get from street corners in india and bangkok =( ] . They have everything from potato chips dipped in chocolate and popcorn in every flavour to cookies and crackers .... you name it, they have it!! Anyway what I spotted, and eventually ended up getting, was mini - blueberry muffins < How can anyone resist those bite- sized morsels?> , everything crackers < flavored with everything - onions, sesame, blah blah blah> and chunky olive hummus. So I bought these yummy things and went to the seminar, proud of my wise purchases , absolutely sure that my snacks were going to be the best ever and that the rest were going to suck... when I found that another girl , who was to give the evening's presentation had also signed up to bring refreshments..... and what refreshments!!!..... She brought a home- made pumpkin cake she'd made from scratch using , here's the kicker, home grown pumpkins!!! Not only that ... she also brought pink lemonade and other fruit juices, mixed pretzels and a cheese dip!!!!!!!!!!! Now what was I to do??!!! So much for my plans of world domination using mini - blueberry muffins!!!! I still held my head high and opened up the stuff I had bought after so much careful deliberation!! END OF SEMINAR..... I walk back to the table to collect the remains at the table...< I also tasted the opposition's dishes and found to my absolute disgust that it was horribly horribly goooood!!! The cake was moist , yet light .... not dense!! It was seasoned perfectly, with just the right levels of cinnamon and nutmeg . It was perfect !> Which of course meant that people hardly sniffed at my poor, beautiful, shop - bought , mini - blueberry muffins!!! Surprisingly , it was the olive hummus which was almost empty...... who knew  soil scientists had a thing for olive hummus and not blueberry muffins?!! Anyway I collected my almost completely full box of mini- muffins, my half -empty packet of crackers and my almost empty container of olive hummus......and resentfully walked back back to the bus stop( not before I had another small helping of the abominably wonderful pumpkin cake , of course.) How dare this girl steal my thunder by baking that fabulous cake!! So I was waiting out in the cold for the bus..... and a double decker bus < yes, its true... Davis is really cool like that .. they run old- fashioned red double decker buses which they imported from London .> which takes a slightly different route but makes a stop at my drop point , turns up !!!! So I climb onto it and go straight up ..... and find myself all alone on top of the bus with mini blueberry muffins!!! The wind in my hair , the ambience of the bus , holiday spirit ....call it what you will , but it just seemed perfectly appropriate at that point to help myself to one of my hence so far ignored blueberry muffins which were literally begging me to eat them ..... and eat them I did !!! It takes me 10 minutes to get to my stop and it was 10 uninterrupted minutes of munching on the heavenly mini - blueberry muffins!   It was a wonderful feeling!!! It was the shortest picnic ever!! Didn't make it any less fun though!! It almost ,but not quite, changed my life!!! =P  What did change my life was my discovery of  the animal testing- free cosmetic products ..... but that's another story!!!

PS: I found this sweaty guy singing about blueberry hills . His name is Fats Domino http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dl5hknXqXps Its a nice song if you're into R & B.

Saara Paambu polla nenju satham poduthey!!

Wheeee!! My first ever post on my first ever blog!!! Today is indeed a special day!! Oct 20th !! Intha naal unoda calendar le kurichi vechiko!!> So since its the first time I'm officially blogging , some thought ( not a lot though) went into what it should be about! Since yesterday was one of my better days, ( A good day for a soil microbial ecologist is when he/she gets good data all neatly organized.) I thought I should write about it. Also I managed to be productive while watching a movie on you tube ( which is a first) , and that made me feel like patting myself on the back!Don't you just love multi-tasking!!! Looks like yesterday and today are the days of a lot firsts in my life!! I also ran 3 miles yesterday . Now to understand why that is a huge accomplishment in my life you need to know that I was no athlete ( Forget athletic , I was not even active) in school. I loved food and liked nothing better than to curl up in a corner with a good book. ( Do the math!) So its still hard for me to believe that I have it in me and am actually capable of doing things like going running, and running 3 whole miles at that! And the songs that kept me company while being engaged in the above said activity were, " Gurl you're my chammak challoo.... ooh ooh oh!!" from < need I say it> Ra one, and "Sara sara saara kaathu veesum pothu , saara paarthu pesum pothu , saara paambu polla nenju satham poduthey." from Vaagai sooda vaa !! Chamaku challo is of course all flash and sparkle and amazingly catchy beats. It is definitely the song to party to ....... but the other song is so sweet,so soft, as refreshing and unassumingly wonderful as the "saara kaathu" it speaks of .........the complete antithesis to chamaku challo. Right now , they both compete equally for my attention , but the song which will become a part of me and makes me heart sound like the " saara paambu" is without a doubt the latter song!! I sometimes wonder if the same parallel can be drawn with the way we interact and eventually bond with people. In my case , I certainly can. Its bye for now till I feel the urge to write again . I'll let this song keep you company till then...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxjvz-WGhaE&feature=related