Men!!

I was sitting in the bus last evening, placidly minding my own business, when I suddenly realized that someone was staring daggers at me. I was rather startled at the intensity of the stare and had a quick look at the guy doing so… he was a slim, dark, spiky haired, rather frightening looking individual, so I quickly looked away.

He walked towards me and my heart sank thinking that maybe he thought I had trod on his little toe, or murdered his dog or kidnapped his child or robbed his house and that he was going to enjoy killing me slowly… and then …………. he smiled! Yikes!! The man was hitting on me! If he expected me to smile back or even acknowledge him after scaring me half silly, he had another think coming didn’t he? Men!!!!!!

The Mummy

This weekend I met up with Hyacinth and Janani to see the movie ‘The Mummy – Tomb of the Dragon Emperor’ at the Majestic Cinema. The cinema was packed; I got quite a shock when I got there at around 1.00 p.m. to see the queue winding down from the fourth floor almost to the ground floor! Luckily Hyacinth had got the tickets early.

We enjoyed the movie tremendously… the good company added to the pleasure.

Janani’s comments about mushy mooshy stuff during a couple of screen kisses kept us in hysterics!

A lovely present

Just got a beautiful present…. I LOVE it. It’s a cookery book called ‘Spice It’ and has a whole load of delicious, seemingly easy to make recipes. Isn’t it the strangest thing that a little thing like a good book can give one so much pleasure? I can’t wait to try out a couple of the recipes on the weekend!

Isn't she gorgeous??

Tusha's and Ryan's Engagement

Tusha got engaged to Ryan on the 26^th of July 2008 at her residence in Dehiwela.

Rams has a great idea!

Rams came up with the fabulous idea of having masala thosai for lunch at a place she knew… so Friday afternoon found six of us making our way to Ambaal’s for an Indian lunch. Luckily for us it was a cool afternoon with no sun, so the walk was a pleasant one despite three of us girls teetering in our high heels!

The place was small, packed with office workers, most probably from Commercial Bank located right across from the café, and the food smelt absolutely delicious…. We had a nice meal of masala thosai, wadai and parata. The thosais were served so hot it burnt our fingers to touch them…. Enjoyed every morsel!! Super idea Rams! Unanimously decided to visit the again at least once in two weeks.

Uncle George does it again!

Well for the second time around Uncle George has done a Mr Bean.

On Saturday he goes into the bathroom to have his usual evening bath and comes out carrying a bucket holding his newly washed sarong and vest. As he passed me I got a lovely smell but didn’t think too much of it…. after all the man had just had a shower.

He went out onto the porch, spied the towel horse sitting there, and removed a dress that was on it, threw it onto the floor and proceeds to carefully lay out his sarong and vest.

Meanwhile Sunethra goes into the bathroom to have a wash and what does she see? An expensive new glycerin soap that we sparingly use only on our faces is down to tiny sliver. The idiot has used the entire cake of face soap to wash his blooming sarong… There was a cake of Palmolive soap available in the shower area if he absolutely had to use a bathing soap on his sarong, but no…. I guess he HAD to use the soft face soap left on the wash stand.

I could have killed him!!!

The earlier similar incident was when he insisted that he would clean an old bit of furniture for us.

After work when we got home, there sat the old chair… gleaming. Uncle George alias Mr Bean proudly showed it to us and after our glowing praise, asked us “what do you think made it gleam like that?’ Soap powder? Detergent? Dish-wash? We queried. No…. He says proudly “I used that big green bottle that is in the bathroom”. Oh NO!!!! That was the new bottle of shampoo I had got recently from abroad and he had used nearly half of it to clean that old chair!!!!!

A cooking spree!

Got into a mood on Sunday and went on a cooking ‘spree’. I made mashed potato, roast beef and tomato for lunch along with a side portion of macaroni and cheese. Felt that was not enough cooking for the day and made a love cake as well. Quite a ‘full’ Sunday it turned out to be!

American Idol 2008

What a show it was this year!!! David Archuleta was my favourite right from the start, so I was quite disappointed when David Cook won. I’m not too much of a fan of his type of Music …. Cook’s I mean. Absolutely loved little David’s crooning. I thought he had the total package… super voice, lovely music, sweet personality and cute too. Sayesha was also one of my favourites … what a melodious voice!

Strictly Come Dancing 2007

Borrowed the collection of videos from a friend and kind of binged on the long Wesak weekend watching the entire lot.

Loved every minute and was happy with the winner Aleysha and her partner Cutler cos’ she is the one we picked right from the start. I really like Bruce the presenter and his partner Tess. They are both so very sweet and full of smart repartee and humour.... no malice whatsoever either.

No news from me for ages?

Jay had sent me an email today reminding me that I have not updated my blogs in a long, long while. I logged on and had a look …….and Yes I have not written anything for absolutely ages. I’ve no excuses this year since I am no longer on the SLAAPS Committee. So thanks Jay, I’ve made a note to myself to write something at least every now and then.

A nice day with a horrid meal at the Intercontinental Hotel

Today was such a nice day. For starters I managed to get quite a bit of work done, and then around 10.00 in the morning Jehan called inviting me out to lunch. We met at the Galadari but decided to go to the Intercon instead since from past experience the Cafe Emerald the food has been pretty good.

It was lovely to see Jehan again. He had lost of bit of weight and quite proud of it too. He’d brought me presents from Kenya….. I can hardly wait to go home and open them up. I snuck a peek and there’s a gorgeous package of perfume though! The rest will HAVE to wait till later.

I must say I was deeply disappointed in the menu that was on for today’s lunch at the Emmerald Café. The spread was minimal, a couple of cheap salads, veges that I don’t normally eat ……there were no cold cuts, the soup was pumpkin and another of noodle… not as good as it looked unfortunately. EVERYTHING tasted so darned bland…. How disappointing! The meal for me was redeemed by the mashed potatoe and the cuttlefish.

The deserts on the other hand were as good as usual. There was a decent array of sweets including the hated bread pudding.

It was nice because we met up after such a long time, but the meal didn’t add anything at all to the occasion, though I suppose it DID give us something to grumble about. I certainly won’t be going back there anytime soon.

The Daily News Cookery Book

The Ceylon Daily News Cookery Book was a book I’ve seen and heard about from the time I was a child. All the great cooks I knew (all my aunts were absolutely fabulous cooks) seemed to have a copy of it. I, for some unknown reason, attributed their cooking skills to the recipes in the book. So at the beginning of this year I thought I too should get hold of this marvelous book. When Jehan wanted to know what I wanted for my birthday, I promptly remembered the book and asked him to get it for me.

Having gotten hold of it, I eagerly scanned its pages for ‘makable’ recipes. Imagine my disappointment when quite a few of the instructions seemed to be vague or missing or left instructions to experience or imagination I guess. I tried the ‘Chocolate Cookies’ and what I got was a horrible looking mess which I fed to the dogs… seriously.

I tried several more of the recipes in them….. and what I figured out is, that the book is either

a) HORRIBLE

b) Is meant for more experienced cooks (then why would they need this book pray tell?)

c) Leaves a lot to the imagination (what about those who lack imagination then?)

d) Written by people who don’t want you to actually succeed (???) doesn’t sound right does it?

e) I certainly can’t make any of those recipes (that sounds more like it – I thought)

Well, on my recent visit to see cousin Emma, who by the way is another great cook (and her husband is a well renowned chef to boot), we got talking about this particular book… and guess what???? She told me precisely the same thing..…. So maybe I was not too far wrong in my thinking then!

Ruani of Professionally Yours Magazine

Something made me smile today. I was walking along the Cargills corridor when an older gentleman stopped me and said… ‘excuse me… but are you Ruani….. of the Professionally Yours Magazine? I have been reading the past few issues from Beryl and recognized you and thought I must say hello”. We chatted a minute and parted, but he quite made my day …. Ruani of the Professionally Yours Magazine! Wow!!!

St Anthony’s Feast

Now it just seems to be part of our family tradition to go to St Anthony’s Kochchikade each 13^th of June and make an occasion out of it.

We were sorry that Uncle George had to go to Kandy for a funeral and missed it – I don’t think he’s ever joined us. So it was just us and as usual we met up for lunch and then made our way to the Church before the roads closed.

The Church was teeming with people. We made our way through to the pews and knelt to pray and then to sat back to absorb the powerful atmosphere that is so prevalent at St Anthony’s. My eyes roamed over the Alter and sanctuary beautifully decorated in white flowers and greenery while the rest of the church was brightened up with tinsel and streamers of red and gold. Thousands of people waited patiently in long, long queues to kiss the relics and statues while others made their way on their knees down the isle of the church making their petitions. I never cease to be moved by the simple faith of our people along with the utter desperation and even tears that could be seen on many a face. It makes me feel grateful for everything that God has given us.

After sitting there for as long as we desired, we made our way around the church, lit our candles, got our blessings from the Priest there, collected some holy water and squeezed out of the church.

The streets were lined with ammes with lots of sweetmeats which looked so tempting – Sunethra always wants to buy some, and I always manage to persuade her otherwise – those flies !!!

The roads take on a carnival atmosphere, and we walked through just looking at the people and things laid out. There were little clay playthings bringing back memories of my childhood, there were handbags, fruit, wadai, earrings and chains and soft toys a whole lot of everything spilled out on the pavements with voices competing with each other to sell their wares. I just love the hustle and bustle and the good natured revelry that takes place on those roads.

We had our look and even managed to get onto a bus before the roads closed for the evening procession which takes place so late in the evening that we had to give it a miss this time.

Golden Gleam 2007

Wow!!! Lucky Me! I was invited to the dance of St Peter’s College. My favourite band, Misty was playing and the theme looked Hawaain. I fished out my black and gold dress to go with the theme Golden Gleam and off we went to the Colombo Hilton.

We were greeted at the entrance by girls dressed in keeping with the theme and the ladies were welcomed with a fragrant garland of araliya flowers. I thought that added a lovely touch. The hall was decorated with huge palm trees while on each table stood half a kurumba made into a candle which burned steadily throughout the night.

There was a HUGE crowd. The old boys of St Peters had turned up in full force in support of their college. One choice table was reserved for Priests from the college I presumed. How sweet and thoughtful.

The large floor was always filled with dancers and unlike the last dance at the Galadari, the floor didn’t open up. And the food was amazing. Hilton had a good spread to tempt the palates of anyone, whether their fancy was continental, Sri Lankan, vegetarian or whatever. I noticed that the prawn counter was kept continuously busy, as was the hopper stall. The breakfast buffet was good too.

I enjoyed the dance very much. Misty as always played excellently. The second band Cosmic Rays was not too bad, though they did seem to favour a lot of baila even after an exhausted bunch dancers staggered off the floor huffing and puffing after their exertions on the dance floor! Clifford Richards was the compere again as always (in my opinion) talking too much.

They had a fabulous array of prizes for both the entrance draw and the raffle ticket draw. And 10 bottles of liquor for table draws. The raffle tickets had to be bought by the book though… no buying a couple of tickets priced at 100/- each. One sweet gent next to me was rather high, and told the girls who came around with the ticket books, that the college was smart in getting beautiful girls to sell the tickets, but that he couldn’t spend a whole 1000/- cos he had never ever won a single thing in his entire life!

The entrance ticket draw had two air tickets while the raffle draw had four air tickets and guess what?? Dorian won a prize (8^th? I think) AND the fourth prize – an air ticket to Madras. Wasn’t he the happy lucky one!

My Experience with Abans

Just over a month ago our TV decided to konk off on us right at the most ‘crucial time’ of American Idol and Survivor, two of our favourite programmes. Many a discussion took place as to whether to give it to our neighbourhood TV repairman or whether we should haul it off to Abans Repairs located all the way in Wellawatte.

We decided in favour of Abans.

On making inquiries I was pleasantly surprised when Abans suggested that I hand over my TV to the nearest Abans showroom in Rajagiriya and that they will send it on for repair. That seemed like a good omen. So on the 15^th of May, we toddled off with our TV and gave it to Rajagiriya. A few days later when I called them, they airily told me they had already delivered it to their repair shop.

Wow! What excellent service I thought… and gave it a couple more days and called the repair shop directly. They asked me for a job number – job number??? I thought blankly – I don’t recall any job number. A panic stricken call to Rajagiriya reveled that the TV MAY not after all gone to the repair center yet.

Of course! I THOUGHT it was too good to be true. Anyway the next day I got the job number and was told the repair would take two weeks.

After my former experience and poor Chandana’s recent experience with them, I resolved to give them a call every single day to see how things are ‘progressing’.

Well, it’s been more than a month already and I’ve spoken probably to everyone who works there. They efficiently take down the job number, call me by name and then say that the repair is not done yet and that they will call me back….. Only one guy ever called back to tell me it would be done on Saturday….. a couple of Saturdays ago… but we are still TV’less.

American Idol was won by Jordon Sparks who we were routing for anyway, and we’ve no idea what happened to Survivor… and still we don’t have our TV back…. Boo hoo.

Just yesterday I tried calling a Director from Abans and was very rudely and successfully barred by his dragon of a secretary.

I did however manage to get through to a manager yesterday, who asked me to call today that he will let me know what the situation is. I’ve been unsuccessful in getting through to him – maybe he’s out? I’ve even gotten hold of his mobile number….. still no response. Why am I not surprised???

Unfortunately, most of our household appliances have been bought from Abans…. What a pity - to my way of thinking… their service stinks!!!!

A Petal Pink Bedroom

The last weekend was a long one since Thursday was Poya. So Sue and I decided to take the Friday off too and paint our bedroom. It was coming to a point where the room was so messy that there was just a pathway from the door to the beds and that’s it.….. if a stranger ventured in and fainted through sheer shock, the person would never be heard of again cos he/she would be buried under a deluge of possessions!

Anyway, we knew we’d need the four days (I exaggerate not).

§ One day to clear the room and mess up the rest of the house with our things,

§ Another day to actually get the room painted. We used our genius in this area and roped in Uncle George to help (well…. Ummm.. I mean to actually do the painting). There was no fear of losing him under anything now since the room was cleared.

§ Finally the last two days to put the stuff back.

At the start, things went better than expected. We cleared the room in record time and by 3.00 p.m. on day one Uncle George was on the ladder painting the ceiling a pure white. Then we hit the snag… ever since we shifted into this place, we’ve always wanted to paint our room a girly pink. The original colour many hundreds of years ago was blue and despite many tries with pinky sounding names they turned out to be white. The last try was Rose White – and yes of course, it was white!

This time we bravely bought Petal Pink. Yes, you probably guessed right! It was very nearly white too! Many long discussions were held whether to sally forth and buy a violent pink (with Uncle George grumbling vociferously about the wasting of time) and finally decided it would be too long a process and batted ….. I mean… painted on.

The room looked marvelous when it was done, especially after the floor was polished too! I almost felt sad to put the things back.

The next two days proved a lot of hard work putting all the things back (hopefully not where we found them).

Was it worth all the effort? Oh yessssss… a definite YES!!!

Looking Ahead

Today’s message from the Daily Bread was on looking ahead - with the footnote

“It’s better to look ahead and prepare,

than to look back and despair”

Good words indeed.

The Master Fiddler – Janet Dailey

The second of Hyacinth’s books – this was a tad better than the other one cos it involved a stunning blond who was a spoiled brat, used to getting her own way by using her beauty and charm. She runs away from home to prove her independence and proceeds to crash into Choya Barnett's car and meet his motherless little son, who like all other males falls in love with her. She then loses all her money and is forced to accept help from Choya who seems to be the only one immune to her charm.