Rockmelt browser language change

Hahaha, the funniest thing happened to me just now... I guess I can call it funny now and laugh about it, but I struggled with this problem for a good half an hour.

I use the rockmelt browser and it has so many cool features. Today my laptop hanged and I had to restart it. When I opened my browser after the restart, rockmelt had changed completely into a Hindi language browser... I was surprised... decided I had clicked too many stuff when my system hanged, so figured some settings must have changed around that time.

Tried initially to go through all the menu options (which unfortunately were in Hindi), and tried to understand them clearly (fortunately for me, I can relate to the language). Found an option to change language for spell check - thats it. Then tried to go search in google about how to change back my browser language and the sort, but was unsuccessful... meanwhile I had opened my "System Settings" for changing some other settings on my Mac. (Yes, I own a Mac !!!)

Suddenly discovered a language tab there, which showed a list of languages in the order that I prefer them to appear (What ??? Apparently I have chosen konkani as the first one, n then hindi, then kannada and 4th was English... srsly ??) Couldn't really remember when I had done that.... but it hadn't posed a problem until now... or maybe when I clicked on several stuff, it had just gotten replaced... then moved English to 2nd place... Lo and Behold !! My browser was back to English...

I guess it wouldn't be a problem if rockmelt or maybe any other browser didn't have language versions. I figured this because most of my other applications were still in English language mode, so I assumed it was a browser problem !!

Anyways, all is well that ends well... back to work now !!

- So

Job #2 complete

YAY !! Just finished my 2nd job on odesk although this one was a bit complicated as compared to the previous one.

I had a tough time figuring out the solution due to lack of clear instructions, but finally was able to crack it and corrected it. I should know in a few hours what the outcome was, but I am happy about my work.

Luckily or fortunately for me, both jobs were writing small algorithms for implementation of AI concepts. So hopefully should help me in the long run.

- So

Looking for work

I know, I know, I stopped putting up health tips after just a few good ones. That's because, I am always like that :) start all big stuff and then abandon them mid-way.

Moreover I am trying to find a job and believe me it is ONE HECTIC JOB to find a job !! I just don't find time in between house work and studying for interviews and job applications. And to top it off, I wanted to at-least start some work from home things, so I went to this website www.odesk.com and applied to a few jobs, which again I had to abandon because of too much work.

But then yesterday after a whole lot of determination to not give up, I took up a small piece of programming work and finished it in record time (2 hrs), which I think is amazing because of my current mind set and also the fact that I haven't done even a small bit of programming since last year.

After I finished the job and submitted it, the client was very happy with my work and I was so proud of myself. At-least I managed to finish it without any hurdles. So all the confidence I lost in the past few months of not finding a job, I managed to retrieve it back.

Just wanted to note it down !!

- So

Yoga tip of the day - Surya Namaskara

Do you know that in some cultures including Hindu culture, the Sun is considered a deity or a God ? So wouldn't it be good if we had a sort of praying procedure for the Sun God too ? And yes, we do have one. Its called Surya Namaskara.

Ayurveda Tip of the day

I am here with today's Ayurvedic tip... would you like to know what it is ? So yesterday we saw that waking up early is good for health. Lets see what we need to do right after waking up. How much are you willing to do to get rid of those nasty dark circles ? How much would you love ridding your face of wrinkles and having healthier younger looking - not to mention - glowing skin ?

Yoga Tip of the day

Just for emphasis, I am going to add a yoga tip of the day for today :) One of my friends is super stressed nowadays due to various reasons. Just to help her and the rest of the stressed out individuals out there in this age of super strenuousness.

Ayurveda Tip of the Day

Ayurveda, they say is the art of protecting or preventing your body from diseases so that you can live a longer healthier life. Ayurveda means आयुष्य वेद - the art of living longer.

There is a new thing that I want to start from today onwards: Either I will post an Ayurveda tip of the day or a Yoga tip of the day. This would be my small contribution to promoting these arts. Lets not waste any more time. Lets start the first tip from the start of the day :)

Yoga Classes - 1

I just recently started attending these yoga classes conducted by Patanjali yogapeeth, for which I have to wake up at 5 am. Classes start at 5.30 am. Its hard as it is to wake up at 8 am and now I have to lose 3 more hours of sleep :( I just love my morning sleep. Its so hard to come out of :)

I used to go to yoga classes when I was a kid. After the classes got over, I practiced it for a while and then gradually descending into lesser and lesser practice and then stopped altogether. Result of which, my sleeping patterns changed, my eating became more erratic and hence gained weight - atleast thats what I assume happened to me. Believe me, I was never this fat !!

Cooked again...

... after a long time !!! Yes, just got a chance to cook something new and special once again. I made Palak Paneer - not one of my favorite dishes... in fact I never order it in the restaurant for some reason. But everyone at home asked for this dish and I made it for the first time ever today. It turned out pretty well and I must say, better than I imagined. I was just happy that it wasn't a total disaster :)

Well, here's the recipe of Palak Paneer for you all.

Off to bed now !!
- So.

Dull Saddening Days

Its been a dull few months for me the past few months and I am just not able to start something new. I have just gotten stuck in a boring routine life, which mainly involves housework, resting for a while, tuitions for my nephew, housework again, surfing the net for a while in the night looking for jobs and applying - watching TV at the same time, and then going to sleep. The only exciting thing that I probably do during the entire day is 1 hr of watching Masterchef Australia on TV.

Few things I have been thinking about and which I need to start following soon -

1. Have been planning to start my craft work. I have all the wool, needles, designs etc., ready, but have been either too lazy to start it or just uninterested - dont really know.
2. Have been thinking of taking up some free courses online, but I feel that I just dont find enough time. Maybe I am not very good at time management, because I started some courses before and every time I started them, I left them halfway through and never completed a single course.
3. Been thinking about my future a lot and that is the part which depresses me a lot, mainly because I am tired and frustrated of looking for a suitable job w.r.t my profile and its not seeming to be an easy job.
4. Wanting to join some language classes - maybe French or German. I had taken basic level of French before and would wanna either continue that or take up German. Basically I love learning new languages - not sure when thats gonna happen.
5. Want to get a job asap, at-least to be able to get some free time (not sure if thats gonna happen once I start working), but definitely wanna get settled into some sort of job routine. I feel the main problem to me not getting any interview calls is because the cell phone signal in my house is totally NIL :(, so I have to rely mainly on emails, which is not the preferred primary method of communication in India as of yet.

Hoping for things to start going well soon. Oh !! wanna start blogging more often too, but I just dont have anything to blog about currently - duh - sort of understandable from my situation right ?

Anyways, hopefully everything changes soon and I stop feeling miserable soon.

- So

Back to Cooking !!

The weekend went by in a breeze, but I was still bored to hell, since I was alone at home... Hence thought of doing some cooking and pampering myself. Yes... I cook when I am bored !! STOP LAUGHING !!! Its what I do !!! It makes me happy and keeps me busy :)

Anyways, this was the menu for the weekend.

Jeera-Pepper Tambli (jeer-meerya tambuli), Horsegram Rasam (huraLikaaLu saaru), Bhindi Fry (bendekayi palya) and ginger-garlic buttermilk (shunti-beLLuLLi majjige).... Who has the final laugh now ?? HAHAHA !!!

It all turned out to be finger-licking yummy... and I ate too much !!! Follow the links to find the recipes :)

Meanwhile I am trying out some courses online and I find this one - "Applied Cryptography" - particularly interesting.... the math / computer science geeks out there might wanna try it out. I felt so alive after cooking and eating all this yummy food, that I was able to complete my course homeworks in a jiffy !! :)

Will soon be back with more adventures.

So long....
- So

Awesome Weekend !!

The weekend that just went by was a time for relaxing and cleaning... since the much awaited festival of Ugadi is just around the corner (23rd March). The relaxing after the cleaning was what was long due... because generally everyone is at home (since I live in a joint family), and there is no end to the cooking and cleaning up after and washing dishes and the like, not to mention - add to that the extra work of cleaning every nook and corner of the house !! However this weekend was totally different. My in-laws had gone to their village for some festival over the week. The guys in the house followed them over the weekend and the ladies in the house had the house to themselves. Then there were the kids. But there was more relaxing time comparatively, because kids generally dont care much for rice n sambar and all the elaborate cooking. So, I got to do some experimenting around the house.

Trip to LA - Second Day

So, we had a great first day trip and went to the hotel room assigned by our tour guide and just fell off to sleep. I wanted to go for a swim, but the hotel staff said it had already closed around 6 pm. So we just watched a movie n slept. We were super excited about the next day - we had an option to go either to Disneyland or for a San Diego city tour... Like all other people on the bus (sans a few), we decided to go to Disneyland because we felt that the city tour would be super boring with all the war memorials and some other museum stuff they were gonna show us. If they were taking us to the national park instead, maybe we would have changed our mind. Anyways, we were really excited about going to Disneyland and taking pictures with all the Disney characters like Mickey, Winnie the Pooh and what not !! But we had something else waiting for us there... little did we know !! LOL !!

So, we left early morning for the theme park and since it was not more than a 20-min drive from the hotel, it felt like we reached it before we could blink our eyes. We got out at the parking lot until where our trip bus was allowed, and were supposed to take a train to the actual entrance of the park. We all got into the train all the while taking photos and embarked on our journey to all kids' favorite dream of all times. At the entrance, the guide informed us that for the first half of the day, he would take us around to popular attractions and for the rest of the afternoon, we were allowed to go ahead and explore on our own. We decided to stay with him at-least for a couple of hrs to see if we liked the places he would show us. We were then asked to go through a security check at the entrance and then get into the theme park. The entrance sports a large signboard "Let The Memories Begin". We were super excited by looking at all the awesome advertisements, thinking to ourselves "Its indeed gonna be a memorable day".

The first thing you see when you enter Disneyland is the Main Street... I will not describe here everything that we saw - because, you know, I dont want to spoil your fun or give away all the details. You just have to be there to experience it and everyone's experiences are different :) Anyways, since Christmas was already nearing, we saw a huge and I mean HUGE christmas tree in the center of the main street and so many street cars - the old style :) - they were beautiful... we meant to ride them sometime during the day, but we never got the chance and we did not even know they were free or paid. Then there were many shops which we did not even turn to look. We just wanted to go straight to the rides and to find our favorite characters. Anyways, one reason is we were running behind the guide, who was going pretty fast to take us to our first ride of the day - Indiana Jones Adventure. It was fun. We were expecting something very different, but we really liked it nevertheless. There was such a huge line for the adventure that we were waiting in line for nearly an hr or more I guess. And when we came out, what do we expect to see - our guide - but we did not see him there at all. Neither did we see any of the tour people who came with us.

We waited for quite some time and then dejected, decided to set out on our own. We both took out our maps of Disneyland and started to decide where we wanted to go next. The rides were all very very long and by lunch time we had not even covered 1/4 of the place even though we had skipped so many rides and attractions !! We were seriously disappointed about the fact that we were not going to be able to see the whole place. Moreover after lunch and after a couple more rides, we were so exhausted walking around and standing in line, that we started to feel more and more disappointed about the whole trip :( I guess the crowd and long lines were due to the fact that we had been there on a long weekend. Then we got so tired that we just decided to go to some shows at the California Adventure, because we heard someone saying that the same ticket would work for both the theme parks. However, the tickets that the guide had got us, was valid for just one theme park and we were disappointed even about that fact.

We finally decided we would come back and watch the Christmas parade at 5 pm. That part was sure fun. We watched as we saw many disney characters coming alive. And believe me, we had seen only Winnie the Pooh until that time in the whole time we were there !!! And we could not take a picture with Winnie, because we were standing in line for some ride at the time and after we got back from the ride, Winnie had disappeared !! Can you believe it... going to a disney theme park and not getting a picture with any of the disney characters :( We were getting more n more dejected by the minute with all these sad things happening to us. Not sure if it was just us, or all of them were facing the same problem. We got some good pics of the parade though and then there was supposed to be a fireworks show at 8.45 pm. So we had to kill 3+ hours and we had no intention of going on any other rides. We were super tired by this time and just wanted to relax. We decided to go out to Disney downtown street and shop around for a while. That is where we saw the "funnel cake" stall. YAY !! I was jumping with joy just looking at it. I had had funnel cake once before when I went to Six Flags with my friends - oh that was a fun day too :)

I explained to my friend what a funnel cake was and after the aebleskiver experience the previous day, she was eager to try it. But we still decided to buy just one and had it - and it was super super yummy !! Again it was time for the fireworks show by then - because of all the window shopping and we regretted not buying one more. We promised ourselves that we would buy one more before we leave for the day and went in to wait for the fireworks show. We wanted to get good seats to watch the fireworks and at the same time, we wanted to be near the entrance too - because our guide was going to meet us at 9 - right after the show ended outside the entrance to take us back to the trip bus.

Finally we got a good place to view the fireworks right in front of the castle where they were going to burst the crackers. We waited for at-least 45 mins for the show to start - yes, we had to get there early to get good spots. We got so bored that we started counting down minutes and seconds for the show to start. Finally it was time !! The show started. It was superb - simply awesome !!!! We thought all the wait and pain and tiredness was worth it - we took a video of the same. It was absolutely amazing... IT WAS WORTH IT ALL !! Believe me... I have seen many fireworks shows, but this was something different altogether. Anyways, then suddenly it was time to go. We ran for the gate - there was not enough time. We thought we would miss the guide and end up going back alone. So we dashed for it. Somebody showed us a shortcut to the entrance. We took it and reached there in no time. We found the guide. All was well again. We however could not keep up our promise of getting another funnel cake. We had so less time and we waited for the train to take us back to the parking lot.

By the time the train arrived, we were so exhausted that, all we wanted was to get into the bus, get to the hotel and throw our shoes somewhere and just crash !! Anyways, all in all - I guess it was a fun day - even though we were disappointed. Oh - did I mention that when we running around to find spots for the fireworks show, we saw Goofy and took a photo with him... Did I tell that the photo did not come out that great :( What a tragedy for us !! Finally we decided that we were sooo tired that we wanted to skip the Universal Studios adventure the next day, because we just could not walk anymore. We informed the tour guide of our decision and he tried to persuade us, but we stuck with our decision. We told him that we were just not interested anymore and we told him we will decide the next day whether we wanted to go or not and went to bed.

Wait for the 3rd and final day story....
- So

Sick to hale-n-hearty in no time !!

I would have continued on my previous post about my LA trip with my friend, but I have been sick since the past 10 days. Its been horrible. I think I got the flu "with the works" - cold, cough, excessive sweating, the shivers, sore throat, eye infection, sinus, migraine, swollen eyes - anything you name and I have it.

I get the flu at-least once every year without fail. I dread having the flu, and try to avoid it as much as possible. I generally dont fall sick, but if I do, then its pretty intense. It goes to the extent that I lose my voice and end up talking in funny tones LOL. I try to sleep as much as possible when sick, but the funny thing is sleep evades me even when I take medicines which are supposed to make you drowsy.

Trip to LA - First Day

Wow !! What a weekend it was... both fun and tiresome at the same time -- is that even possible ?

What am I talking about ? The long weekend trip to Los Angeles (LA) with my close friend A. We went on a guided tour to Solvang, Disneyland and Universal Studios over the Thanksgiving weekend on a Chinese bus with a Chinese bus driver and a Chinese tour guide. I guess we might have picked up a few Mandarin Chinese words here and there, since we had a bi-lingual guide who explained everything in English first and then in Mandarin.

All the excitement !!

YAYYYYYY !!! My friend A is landing tomorrow morning at 10 am in SFO and I am counting hours before I can meet her. I dunno why I am so hyper but I am super excited to be seeing her and spending a few days with her roaming around SFO and all that.

I just did not know what to do with all the excitement, so thought of penning it down. We are planning on a trip to LA and one to Yosemite and then we are planning to go around SFO and also to the beach... Not sure how much of this will work out, but somehow we plan to do it all !!

Lets see how it goes
- So

All set and ready to travel !!

I never knew I was such an impatient person until now. I am waiting to leave for the airport in less than 2 hrs time and I cannot think of anything to do that can help me pass those 2 hrs or less. Now that I think back about it, I guess I have always been very very impatient.

Anyways, I am waiting to travel to SFO for an interview on the 16th Nov. But the more important reason that I am going to SFO is mainly to meet my close friend A. She is arriving to SFO on the 18th for a company project and she is there for 1.5 months. I will be meeting her constantly every weekend for 1 month after which I will be traveling back to Athens, GA.

Its funny how you begin to count days to a particular event and then when the days get lesser and lesser, you begin counting hours and then minutes. The human brain automatically switches, making things go even slower than it already is and making it seem like its gonna take forever. It also makes other things seem so trivial, which is a wonder... And when the moment finally comes and goes, you just cannot believe later that its GONE and is probably not coming back again in your life !!!

Dont wanna be giving out negative vibes to myself right now. For now, I am just WAITING WAITING to meet this friend of mine and cannot think of anything else !!! Nov 18th seems so far far away !!!!!

So long folks
- So  :)

Belated but FUN Deepavali with friends...

Medu Vada and punugulu

Had a fun-filled deepavali with friends in the US this year. Most of us were busy with work / school during Deepavali days, so a bunch of us decided to celebrate it in a simple fashion over the weekend with a famous sweet from Andhra Pradesh, Bellam Gaarelu and an ever-so-awesome snack, Medu Vada from South India.

Making Ghee

Most people I know today do not know how ghee is made from butter. It is a very simple process where large amounts of butter is heated continuously until a clear liquid is obtained and the solids separate out from it.

The process of making ghee takes me back to my childhood days when the aroma of fresh ghee used to fill the house every Friday morning. My mom used to make fresh ghee for the diyas (oil lamps) on Fridays. She used to light ghee lamps on every Friday. She never used the old batch of ghee because it was already used by us for cooking / eating.

DEEPAVALI - THE INDIAN FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS...

Hey u'all

First of all wishing you a very happy and prosperous deepavali and may god shower you with lots of love and wealth throughout your life.

For those of you who dont know Deepavali, it is one of the biggest festivals in India and its the FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS. People adorn their houses with lots and lots of lights, lanterns, oil lamps etc., etc., and it generally lasts for 3 days. It is said that Goddess Lakhsmi walks into the houses which are bright and showers the family with wealth and blessings.

Damn (pardon the word usage), I have been writing pretty long posts nowadays - this is going to be one of them.

There are a lot of stories associated with the 3 days of Deepavali. I will not bore you all with the tons of stories right now. If you wanted to know that, you would have been reading something else - maybe I will put up the stories that I heard from my parents in another post, but for now, I just want to talk about my memories from the Deepavali at my house.

When we were kids, the only excitement during festivals was new clothes, amazing food, yummy sweets to eat and in the case of Deepavali, excitement over the kind of crackers we were going to burn and the quantity of crackers each of us would get. There would always be a fight over that ofcourse.

Several memories come into mind, when I sit down to think about it. My pappa (dad) used to get the pre-packaged boxes of variety crackers, one for each of us - me and my sis. The box contained one or more of the following smaller boxes - lakshmi pataki (its a small cracker), bijli pataki (even smaller), atom bombs (not the ones that we know would destroy cities ofcourse) - this kind of bomb would make a loud sound, bidrindlu - which is like a fountain of lights when lit, rockets (very small ones), electric crackers, nelachakras (to light on the ground), vishnu chakras (to light in the hands with a metal stick to hold each of them) - all of them in smaller sizes of course for kids.

Me and my sis used to exchange even among those small boxes, I used to get to light all the vishnu chakras - she was scared to hold that thing in her hand. Anyways, we used to light our own share of crackers, and then pappa would have brought some fancy crackers separately. We used to watch him light those - some of them were whistling fountains, butterfly, bigger rockets etc., - things which were dangerous for kids. After lighting all the crackers, we used to have dinner. We used to gobble up the food so fast on those days that amma (mom) used to tease us about it on other days. This was because another activity was in store for us during Deepavali.

Our house had a nice view of the city from our backyard and terrace, and we could see the crackers and lights all over the city. We used to have fun - lets call it - cracker gazing :P It was so amazing to see the whole city lit up with lights and also bursting various kinds of crackers and we could hear all the sounds from the bombs, the malas (garlands of crackers), whistles. It was a sight when the fancy firecrackers used to burst high up in the sky lighting up most of the neighborhood around it !! It was a heavenly sight. Its one of those things - you have to be there to get the experience. At the end of the day we used to refuse to come inside - because the city never stopped lighting the crackers even though it was well past midnight. BTW, those were the only days we were allowed to stay up late after midnight.

Then comes the awesomest food that my mom used to prepare and the oil massage and oil bath. That used to be a very bothersome time. Getting us kids to stay still while amma applied oil to our hair, face, arms, legs - yes almost to the whole body and then we had to walk it off, so that it seeps into our body, but amma had lot of rules around the house. Dont touch the sofa, sofa cushions, sofa covers, table, walls, blah blah and the list goes on... So basically just walk around the house - or rather stay outside the house if you can, but dont touch anything :P Now we understand how difficult it is to clean oil stains, but then, all we wanted to do was play... It was pretty intense both for us and amma. Finally it would be time to take the most-awaited oil bath. Piping hot water - yes, u heard me right, piping hot water was poured over us - mainly to get rid of most of the oil and we had to apply soap like 3 - 4 times to rid the skin completely from the oil - imagine how much oil that would be !! We would scream with the heat...

BTW, all this oil bath and running around would be early morning around 4 am. The previous night, we would have to fill the boiler (after pooja n all that) for heating the water. Wake up early morning at 3 am and all we wanted to do was burst crackers :P But all in all, I miss it nowadays. We hardly wake up at 6 or 7 on weekdays and even later on weekends. 3 am is just too much if you ask me. We would rather stay awake until 3 am than wake up that early :) And who will go to the extent of doing pooja to the boiler that too in the night, filling it with water etc., We have an easier solution now, geysers :P Nobody will be patient enough to get an oil massage and wait for an hour before taking a shower.

But ofcourse we still have the bursting of the crackers, there are so many kinds of crackers available in the market today that its so difficult to select a particular cracker. In comparison, selecting a good phone would be so much easier. But for those of us living in the US currently, even the firecrackers are mostly a no-no, because of the security measures and mostly that we dont normally find firecrackers in the US at this time of the year. For such of us, every year, we keep regretting that we are not in India to enjoy this wonderful time with friends and family. For others who are fortunate to travel to India at this time, way to go people :) Grab all the memories you can of this special day !!

I could go on with my memories from Deepavali at my grandparent's house but I will stop this now and free you from the boredom :) Go enjoy your deepavali !!! I will let you go with a pic from my childhood of the Deepavali day.

This is me and my sister lighting electric crackers.
BTW we used to try to write our names in the air while twirling the crackers :)
Believe me you should try it once, its beautiful !!

HAPPY DEEPAVALI ONCE AGAIN TO ONE AND ALL
- So