‘BRIC’, the building block

One of my favorite pastimes in TV watching is watching Jeopardy. Everyday, like clockwork, if I am at home or at the gym in front of TV running, would be to switch to the program at 7.30PM EST. It seems to be built-in into my brain to switch over automatically. Many, who know me, know of this ritual as well. Even though I don’t get all the questions answered, I can get at least get 30-40% right. Some have derided at me that I watch the program even though I cant get them all answered and that the questions that are answerable are some subjects that we know of. But is it not the fact? We can answer a question, only if we know them or are exposed to that subject and are refreshed by the fact that someone is asking questions on that subject.

Programs like Jeopardy, Cash cab, Weakest Link, (to name a few) ask questions on general knowledge and also in depth on certain subjects like History and Current affairs. When a question is asked, you have a few seconds to answer them and the sooner you answer the better it is or someone else grabs your chance. In that few seconds, you have to run your mind to seek the answer in your collection in your brain if you know it. Compound this task with the adrenaline rush that you get being nervous in front of the audience and that you want to bag as many questions as you can to get the most out of the game in terms of fame and dollars. This really makes the game interesting for the participants.

Last night, while watching Jeopardy, the final question was on BRIC – an acronym that was used by Forbes magazine to talk about the economically developing countries in this globally attacked recession period. To those of you who don’t know what BRIC stands for – Brazil, Russia, India and China – the four countries that are growing economically and Yes, I answered that question correctly. While the US stock market is struggling to reclaim its footing, BRIC countries are doing well and have a gain of more than 30%. India and China are developing in terms of infrastructure and technology. No wonder all the jobs are sent overseas and many large companies here in the US have their development done mostly in India and China and have branches opened in these countries.

Labour is cheaper compared to the US and developers there (whether it is information technology or medical billing/Tran scripting) are far better than those here. Education there (in India and China) is advanced when compared to education level offered here in the US. Compare the level offered in any grade in the public schools versus private schools here and you will see that the private school standards are much advanced than the public schools. The private school standard is what is offered in the public schools in those countries and that is why I say that the standard is higher than here. One out of three people you would see at work would be Asian for the same reason of standards (yes, their accent is hard to follow – pun intended, from the one who has accent herself) and every other item you pick up while shopping has ‘Made in China’ printed on it.

These countries are developing in terms of technology, education and job markets, resulting in stock market growth and are contributing enormously to the global economic power. That is the reason why most of the US I.O.Us belong to China and I won’t be surprised to see ‘Property of the People’s Republic of China’ on the statue of Liberty, soon enough. No matter how much Obama stresses on in terms of bringing back those jobs from India and China back to the US, BRIC are the building block of global economy.

Cycle of air travel

Whenever vacation is planned, I get very excited. It is not because of the destination that I am going to but the packing and the travel that excites me. I take time to put down a list of things needed for the trip and pack every single item in the travel bag in an orderly manner, so that later on, when I needed to get something, I could do it by just putting in my hand inside the bag at the exact location that it is placed. To add to this excitement is the part where you stand in line at the airport security with your shoes off, trying to get your travel bag through the scanner with all other belongings like jewelry, shoes and belt buckles in the tray.

Recent news mentioned that airports are seen less crowded and air travel seems to be slow this time of the year. Is it even surprising? With the recession and soaring fuel prices, people tend to spend less and in turn travel less. Even though the airplane industry is cutting down prices for various destinations to attract customers, people want to hold on to their dollars to use them wisely during this economic crunch time. Folks are losing their jobs like nobody’s business. With economy making a nose-dive, people are figuring out ways to pay their mortgage, to prevent applying for bankruptcy, to pay their bills and to get a decent living.

I know friends who are either selling their townhouse or not being able to pay their mortgage and hence foreclosing their property. In this situation, one would think twice before thinking of spending money on a trip, going on a vacation. But that is my thinking and I know that some people would beg to differ. Reports are also mentioning that recession will end this year and economical growth is just on the horizon. Soon you will see that the airport is crowded once again, with people complaining about how long the check-in takes, how tedious the process of going through the security is and how long you had to wait in the plane seated before the plane actually takes off. I guess that this is the cycle of air travel in general.

Johnny Johnny… Yes papa

Terror plans? No papa! (waterboarded) Tell me the truth. Yes papa, I will tell the plans!

Recent news showed that Nancy Pelosi knew about the waterboarding that was done on al-Qaeda prisoners by CIA to get the truth out. Washington Post had mentioned that they researched on the news and confirmed that she knew about the CIA’s “enhanced interrogation techniques - EIT”, harsh interrogation tactics against al-Qaeda prisoners. Whether she knew about it or not, whether she didn’t agree that she knew about it when she was asked is debatable. Nobody in power would just answer a question on internal security or techniques, just because they were asked. CIA is using EIT on al-Qaeda prisoners, for Pete sake, a group responsible for 9/11.

Isn’t that what CIA characters – Jack Ryan of Tom Clancy, John Carr of David Baldacci or Jason Bourne of Robert Ludlum or the most famous James Bond 007 of Ian Fleming (and the list goes on) do or undergo when a truth has to be brought to light? The spy or the intelligence finds a person who might know the truth (and in most cases they do, otherwise the Spy’s are not doing their job right), CIA captures them or gets their custody as POW, do their bit of drill on them to get the truth out that would serve their country. Even Sayid in ‘Lost’ does the same. The so-called torture is done to get the truth or plans they might have to attack on their country and by all means the CIA wants to get the truth out to take preventive actions.

If a person from al-Qaeda was caught before 9/11 or after the fact, do you think our people will just let it go. Wouldn’t they, not want treatments like waterboarding done to get the truth out? Tell it to the people who have lost families and friends of 9/11 and see what their reaction is. President Obama might not want to perform EIT on any prisoners to get the truth and might have other alternatives to get the truth out, but it is the person who is in charge who has to deal with the prisoners. If he is not able to get the information out from the prisoners to take preventive actions, then the public would say that the Government is not doing anything in terms of protecting their nation.

If you know that a prisoner has information on attacks or is a national security threat, then by all means do what you have to do, to get the information out. I come from the land of Gandhi, where he said that if someone slaps you on one cheek of the face, then show the other cheek but he didn’t say what to do if that someone slaps the other cheek as well. Smart man! You need to do what you need to, to protect yourself.

Born in the USA

No. I am not talking about myself. I was born in India and grew up there. I came to the US about 15 years back but I am an US citizen. Though I cannot become the president, I have every right as people here claim it. My friend Kristens’ Birthday was yesterday, May 18th and her husband, Marc, Surprised her by taking her to a music concert last night. The band is famous for the song that is same as the title of today’s blog. Yes, you guessed it right – The E street Band, led by Bruce Springsteen.

My friends are from NJ, settled here in VA and they are die hard fans of Bruce as he is from NJ as well. So when this concert came into planning, he booked a room in the Lexus Suite in Verizon Center and had called his and her family and friends to surprise her on her birthday which is the same day as the concert. The concert was scheduled to begin at 7.30pm, so people arrived at 7pm to grab a quick bite of dinner that was served in the suite. People were trickling in the Verizon center general seating area and they were also standing before the stage.

When the tickets for this concert were opened for sale, all tickets were sold out in fifteen minutes. The big tickets selling names like ticket master and other business had monopolized in buying the tickets in bulk and hence the tickets were gone in a few minutes after being opened for public sale. Then these big companies would turn around and sell those tickets to the public for a higher price. Yet, people bought those tickets to see Bruce in action. The entire auditorium was packed and it looked like ant hill with ant crawling all over the auditorium.

Artists pick their own time of arrival depending on how famous and wanted they are. Don’t believe me – Go to any concert of your choice and you will see when the actual program starts depending on the artists. In this case, Bruce is an old-timer. He is a rock song artist from the 70’s and the 80’s and had been awarded many awards for his albums. He is also called ‘The Boss’. So his program scheduled to start at 7.30pm, started at 8.30pm. He opened the night by singing ‘Badlands’, followed by many popular songs like ‘She's The One’, ‘Little Latin Lupe Lu’, ‘Blinded By The Light’, and ‘Born To Run’.

The guy is 60 years old but the energy he showed in his singing and playing the harmonica was that of 40-45 years old. The concert started off with the words of his songs perceptible to ones ears but then as time went by, the energy in his songs were so high, that the music was all one big congregate of instrumental note. The words were not that clear which made the songs showier of the tunes. But I am sure that many of the folks who were present at the concert enjoyed Bruce despite the loud music. I am old fashioned in that regard when it comes to music. The words of the song have to be audible and pleasant to the ears even in a rock song. Even in heavy metal music, there has to be harmony. But that is just me! The concert ended with an Encore - Rosalita (request sign: "Obama called and wants Rosie") which I think is funny. But I was told that he never played the song that he is famous for – ‘Born in the USA’ which was wretched performing in the Nations’ Capital.

Every dollar is worth it

With soaring fuel prices, one has to wonder how much mileage you get on a car. People are resorting to ride share or using the metro, to cut down the fuel expenses. Take the fuel prices and compound it with the growing recession and bad economy, and one gets to think twice before making any road trip. This has lead to the growth of scooters and motorcycle usage. Scooters costs about $1000 to $10,000 and motorcycles cost about $3000 to more than $10,000, depending on the model and they can use fuel or electric charge and can give up to 35 miles per charge or fuel tank.

One thing that I miss here in the US versus in India, is the freedom to take my bike (I don’t mean the bicycle and we, Indians call the motorcycles as bike) around to get the shopping done. Maybe it be going to school or college, or a trip to the bookstore or picking up a few items that mom needed at the groceries, I would take my Kinetic Honda (similar to scooters here) or my brothers Hero Honda (motorcycle). Helmet there is for safety but not many wears them and I did not wear it for my short local trips. Now-a-days, it is a law even in India, to wear the helmet when you are on main roads.

Using the scooter or motorcycle is convenient and quick and you can get return on every dollar on fuel. I now see a few bikes around here in the US where high school or college students use it around the campus or make short trips to the library or groceries. My routine or trips, apart from going to work from Centreville to Ashburn, revolves around my home. I take Yash to school, which is about a mile from home and then to his classes like Kumon, Tae-kwon-do, Chess club, and Soccer in and around 5 mile radius near the house. My library, groceries, gym and other shops is within the same range.

Even if I use my car to go to work (if I go on the bike with helmet, I would end up with a bad hairdo day), I could still use the bike to run my local errands for myself or for Yash. I would have to buy an extra helmet for the passenger and figure out a place to store them within the bike when the bike is parked. This would cut down on fuel expenses tremendously, in this ever rising fuel prices and growing recession. Parking becomes easier, and traffic grids can be avoided as well. If you have a motorcycle that is well-built, you can even take it to work to and from, as far as D.C. Bikes can be used from early spring to late fall but not a good choice in terms of safety, in winter and during rainy days. Seeing how much of a snow we get in our area, we can use bikes more often for convenience and inexpensive means of transportation.

Rock the Red

Go Caps…

I am not a big fan of NHL but this season, I have started watching a few playoffs and I am hooked on it... groovy… Tonight is the big night for Caps – Game 7 and I wanted to wish them luck (na… they don’t need any, they are GOOD! They ROCK!). They are playing against the Penguins and is an important game to get to the Stanley cup.

Everything flying

Man is a curious animal and in that he wants to conquer the land that he lives on. Conquering is not just in terms of ruling but understanding the mysteries of nature. Look for instance, he saw the fish in the ocean and he prepped himself to triumph over the waters and sail away to the far, far land. He saw the birds fly in the sky and he invented airplanes more than a century ago. (Pardon me, aviation buffs, for not providing the exact dates. I will leave the honors to you). He has pretty much left no stone unturned to master the natures’ workings. But as Spiderman was told, "With great power comes great responsibility…”

We certainly have made a breakthrough in aviation. Different types of planes with immense technology to get anyone across the world in the minimum amount of time possible. With every step forward, we also see that many accidents take place in the flights. A couple of months back, two incidents in flight accidents grabbed our attention. One good and one bad… The good kind of accident (are accidents ever good? Yes, if you walk out of it scratch less!) was when the pilot had the presence of mind to land the US Airways plane with 155 people on board into the Hudson River in New York, when a bird struck the engine during takeoff from New York's LaGuardia Airport. This incident happened on January 15th of this year, when everybody on board that plane was saved by the quick-thinking of the pilot of that plane.

Now the bad kind of accident is the one when the repercussions are not good. This can be loss of lives, damaged goods or reputations, or whatsoever. On February 12th, 2009, exactly 3 months from today, Continental connection flight 3407 crashed into a house in Buffalo, killing 50 people, 49 on board and one person living in that house on which the plane crashed. The plane was flown on a wintery day and ice was formed on the windshield and wings and it began to stall. The pilot Captain Renslow was caught in shock of the stall and he jerked the plane upward and caused it to spin out of control. If he had lowered the nose of the aircraft, increased power and leveled the turboprop’s wings, the plane would have stabilized. As a result of the pilots’ actions, the plane crashed, taking the lives of 50 people.

Hind sight is always 20/20. We can take any situation after the fact and analyze it in slow motion and can come up with alternate results or theory of that action. The NTSB is doing investigations on this accident and has mentioned that the pilot didn’t have enough experience to fly this kind of commuter plane nor did he have any training for stall-recovery. Authorities are putting in hours to investigate this mess-up. If the board had put in these same hours before the fact in selecting a well-trained pilot, maybe they could have avoided this incident perhaps?

I am not pointing fingers at anyone nor am I concluding that the pilot made a mistake. I am sure he did his best in that situation, because it was just not others lives but his own was in danger. He just was caught with the problem like the deer-in-the-headlights because he was not paying attention to the situation but instead of chatting with his co-pilot. This just added to the inability to take proper actions along with his lack of training and experience on the situation at hand. If the flight management team took the time to select a proper pilot for the flight and if the pilot had the quick-thinking needed to take action in situations like these, maybe the 50 people who lost their lives would be breaking bread with their families tonight.

Healthy Street talks

When Mr. Obama is working to improve the Wall Street, Mrs. Obama made an appearance on the Sesame Street in New York this past week. Her mission was to inform the oblivious group about the importance of exercise and good healthy eating habits. She used Elmo as the media, asking him to exercise unless he wanted to turn himself into a fat, hairy alcoholic like Snuffeluffagus. She also insisted that parents should be the role models for their children to cultivate healthy eating habits and exercise routines. To be honest, I have not watched Sesame Street episodes like the kids do here in the US. I am glad that Mrs. Obama made this appearance to cultivate good eating habits and importance of exercise in the show that is most watched by growing kids these days.

I can reword the saying – ‘Good manners start at home’ to ‘Anything good starts at home’. It is true that kids learn from watching what the elders do. If the parents feed their kids from the beginning, with fruits and veggies, kids learn to make it a part of their meal. If the elders stack their kitchen with healthy snacks, that is what the kids get to eat, unless they see otherwise. Let us run the logic through – a kid comes to see what is there to eat in the pantry. He sees a bag of Oreos and a bag of Triscuits – what do you think he will pick up? Splurging once in a while on treats is good but not always.

Mrs. O (new nickname that I bestowed on her) also stressed on exercising habits. Seeing how Mr. President himself works out 6 times a week, plays basketball and sets himself up as a roll model to stay fit and Mrs. O works out 3-4 times a week (one health conscious First family), it is apparent that she would talk about exercising to keep one self healthy. I would not call myself a gym freak but I would end up at the gym at least 3 or 4 times a week for about an hour at the minimum. The days I am hooked onto the right music on my iPod or on the music channel at the gym, I would be on treadmill or elliptical for about an hour and then do weights for another half hour. But that still does not put me in the fit category. The day I would wear my swimsuit and not be evasive about it, I would consider myself fit.

Exercise is for everyone, both for men and women. I do see men workout to build their abs, biceps and triceps but I do think that they need to work on their chest to get rid of their man-boobs. Not all have them, but when they do, it looks ugly. I have seen some have that, and would still wear a tight fitting top without banyan (undershirt). They think that they are showing off their chest while it is actually making the people who see it, sick to their stomach. Maybe they should consider wearing a sports bra, like Homer wears it in ‘The Simpsons’ or try the Mansierre as shown in ‘Seinfeld’. Whether it is wearing tight fitting garments underneath or eating fat burning pills, they are all means to cover-up the parts of our body that are not right. Oldest method is till the best method we have so far – proper eating habits and working out to burn what was put inside our body.

Surprise Surprise

Ever heard of the saying – “Jack of all trades and Master of none”? While I was growing up, my dad would insist that I become good at any one particular art but sure do try to know everything else that I could lay my hands on. He would put me in all the classes that I would ask him of. I have taken classes in dancing and instrument playing but I would leave that bragging for a latter time. Most of my gardening skills come from my father. We would spend hours together doing gardening on our terrace. Yes, I meant the terrace of our house as there was no land available around the house in the crowded city of Madras.

Well, this blog is not about gardening either. I wanted to focus on part of the proverb – Jack of all trades. This past weekend, I was reading the papers and I read that the unemployment rate is now at 9%. People are losing jobs like being dropped like a hot potato. Like shown in the picture, one should be surprised to have their job retained on any particular week or for that matter on any given day. Folks go to work and find out whether they still have their job or not. I have seen my friends lose their job after putting in years of service at a company.

There are many sites on the internet that give advice on how to survive a layoff like making sure to have enough savings in the bank to survive at least for three months, build up on the network so you can get referred to a new job when it opens up and such. If you Google the information, you can hear it from the horse’s mouth rather than me. But I am sure that none of those sites will have this advice on the list - "Get yourself a Significant Other." (obviously, if you don’t have one), , followed by having a fun week. I learned about it a few years back.

To survive this economic crisis, one would have the advantage if he or she knows how to perform many jobs. In my case, I can do programming, if needed but I do project management mostly. But, I also can do project costing and analysis and write proposals as well. The more you grow your expertise, the better you get to survive this downtime. I also read an article that mentioned that bar tending schools are on the rise and that this year marked the most enrollments in their schools. People get depressed after losing their jobs or unable to find new ones and go to bars to drink their depression out or to socialize to get jobs contacts (only they know) and can this be considered to improve the economy as they are spending and putting it back into the pot? Experts, this is your chance to speak up. Since I like to make or rather experiment myself in making new exotic mix-drinks, I can enroll in the bar tending program and add a feather in my cap. The more colorful my cap is the better luck for me to outrun this job survival.

Rain rain go away… GO… Gone!

One of the most discussed topics on the news channel apart from Swine Flu is the weather. This past week or so, we have been getting rain showers for most of the day and the weather channels are doing a good job tracking the occurrences. I am not going to be mocking the weather guys of their bad predictions (like snow occurrences this past winter) in this blog. I will leave the honors for some latter time. At least for the moment they are doing their best based on whatever data they have.

Local area people are now pretty much done with the rains and want to see some sunshine, so they can move on with their outdoor activities. But me, I never am done with the rains. I grew up in Chennai (former Madras), India, which is on the East coast and my house there was five minutes walk from the beach (Bay of Bengal). Climate there is humid for most year, hotter during summer and of course there is no winter per say. But we do have monsoon rains. When the rainy season starts, it is refreshing when the warm rain drops touches the skin and is the most wanted season of the year.

During my school days, I used to walk to school up until fifth grade. My mom usually forced me to take an umbrella or raincoat (not Gogol’s raincoat) with me during the rainy days but I always ended up with drenched uniform and schoolbag. So my mom got me a bigger umbrella that gave a bigger coverage and I still ended up drenched. Little did she know (tujhe sab hai pata..haina ma) that I purposely don’t use the umbrella or raincoat on my walk back from school up until I reach the corner of my street. I love the raindrops or shower falling on my face, soaking me completely wet and then the wind blowing to make it even cool. I cannot explain in words as to what the feeling is… You have to experience it for yourself, like Natasha says “Feel the rain on your skin; No one else can feel it for you”. Later, I started using the bus for my school and college but during rainy days, I still got wet on my way to and from the bus stop, sat near the windows in the bus to get the mist on my face.

No matter where I am, when the rain falls, I would walk in the rain to feel it. When the first rain falls and wets the soil, the fragrance that comes as a result of it soothes your mind. This past week was bliss when it rained. For many, they needed the rain to wash down the pollen and to increase the ground water level for the season. For me being a gardening aficionado and a rain craze, I needed the rain so my plants and grass get water and I get my rain walk. I enjoyed walking along the trail near my house with a mist overhead and sometimes just overcast sky. Since it has been raining for almost a week now, people are getting tired of the rain and want to see some sun shine and have been praying for the rain to stop. Now the rains are gone. It is only a matter of time before these very same people will start doing their rain dances to call for more rain when the temperature hits 90+ degrees.

Rest in Peace... Eventually ...

They are making it easy on us, aren’t they? I am talking about the Kindle DX, a new version of Kindle that was unveiled yesterday. I was listening to the news about it on my way home yesterday and how it has added features that make it better than Kindle (or Kindle 2). This device can hold up to 3500 books, has almost 3gb of storage, large screen with auto rotation feature and with no need to zoom or pan out while reading the eBook on it but the cost is almost $500. Is it worth it?

Of course, it is all worth it. It certainly will be cool among college students who usually beg, borrow, (steal?) loads of textbooks for their courses. The same textbooks can be loaded on Kindle and can be read from as if reading an actual book. This will save up on book costs eventually and also be eco-friendly as that many trees will be saved in making these books. Any other book (guilty pleasure of reading?) can be loaded on Kindle via subscription besides newspaper and magazine. As it is, the future of newspaper is at stake. I meant the actual newspaper that you can feel it in your hands and read but at least eNewspaper will still keep the newspaper saga alive via this life support. By getting rid of actual books, students can make room for their most wanted items like video consoles and cases of beer in their room.

Reading that I support Kindle, some who are avid readers would come charging at me with a sword (or rather pen – mightier than a sword) for their defense. They would argue as to how that feeling of holding an actual book and reading will vanish with Kindle. To them I say you still can hold Kindle like you would hold any other book. Yes, it would be staring at another screen apart from TV, computer, or video screen but you also can listen from Kindle like books on tape. But honestly, cutting down so many trees to print books for the pleasure of just feeling it while reading is so contrary to the fact that we are on a band wagon singing about go-green, eco-friendly, and saving the world.

I am an ardent reader too. Any free time I would get, I would be seen reading or going to local libraries back home hunting for my mystery novels (okay, I read all those Nancy Drew, Poirot and Perry Mason mysteries). I also used to collect all these books but after reading it once, you just arrange them in your shelves and that is the end of those books (of course you read it again later if you want to) but then I realized there was no point in buying all these books and hoarding them. Rather a better deal would be to just borrow it from the library – my contribution to saving the trees.

In all aspects of life we go through a cycle of evolution. We invent an item, and then we make that item even better by polishing its features. Take for instance the music player. We started off with vinyl records, 8-track, cassettes tapes, CDs and now mp3 and iPods. There is plethora of devices that we have seen do the same thing – play music. But the medium has changed for the better and we are accustomed to these changes for our own good. This same logic can be applied to books. We started off with papyrus and natural ink from plants that was used for writing using a feather. From there we graduated off to book publication, books on tape and iPod and now Kindle. I am sure that people who now talk about holding the actual book and refusing to accept Kindle will own it soon; it is just a matter of time. It is the medium that is dying, not the reading.

Story of the $64 Tomato

Friends who know me would vouch for the fact that I spend more time in the garden of my house than anywhere else. Of course I do, do the chores around the house like cleaning, cooking, laundry and .. and… (ok, ok, enough already!) But I tend to be more in the garden though. From early Spring to late Fall, I spend most of my time there. What do I do there? Certainly not reading a book and getting lost in the fantasy world. Come on, let us be practical and be down to earth. I do gardening, working on soil beds, weeding and cleaning the flower and vegetable beds, becoming one with the Nature.

I like to read a lot on the different flower varieties that are around. When I see a flowering plant that I am not familiar with, I do research on it to find out more. Whenever I go to Home Depot or Lowes, I end up like a zombie in the garden section looking at the different plants that are on display and reading their little tags trying to find out what type they belong to. I am certainly not a Botanists but I could become one if I took up on the program. I love plants. The different colors, sizes, shapes and texture of the plants (just not flowers) makes me happy – takes me to the la-la land (ok, not going there).

So, what does the title have to do with any of this? “The $64 Tomato” is a book by William Alexander and anyone who is in the garden club and also a voracious reader (pick me, pick me) would know about it. The author explains the joy of gardening, fruits (or rather vegetables) of labor doing the garden work in your own backyard, how it relieves stress and foremost what it means to garden in terms of satisfaction. He explains the fact that by the time you end up growing any vegetable after putting in the time, material and labor, you would end up with a tomato that costs $64.

Don’t believe me? Fine. Let me put it this way. To start a garden – flower or vegetable bed in your backyard, you have to prep the soil along the fence or near the back wall of the house. Till the soil, add garden soil, fertilizers, and after the bed is ready you put in the seeds that might cost you $1.50 to $3.00 a packet. When the seed is sown, comes the watering process, cleaning the beds of weeds and worms/insects, putting a fence around the bed so the deer or the squirrel won’t eat your plants, putting support for your plants and such. By the time the plant actually grows and yields anything for that matter, you have already spent enough dollars on your garden that that the one vegetable that fully grows, (bless the fruit that escaped the deer’s craving) in this case for example, a tomato, would cost $64 which is more than what you would pay at the grocery store.

Now that Spring is here, I have started my garden work. I have made my trips to Home Depot and Lowes buying flowering and vegetable plants. I am yet to start planting them and you will hear more of it in my upcoming blogs (so the tooting begins…) Having said this, any true gardener would still agree to grow his or her own tomatoes in their backyard, put in their labor, spend hours watering the garden, weeding and feeding them, caressing and supporting the plants, fencing and applying scram to keep the deer and squirrels away to see that one ripe tomato on their dining table. n'est-ce pas?

There and back again!

I am back. You remember me, don't you? I was quiet for a while for numerous reasons ranging from being busy to what topics must I blog on, with so many news and blog sites that are present around the world (or must I say 'on the internet'). But seeing how many can blog even when they don’t have anything to say other than tooting their horns (really it gets boring after a while), I figured I could contribute some to the noise.

The latest news, if you are flipping radio or TV channels is on Swine Flu. Now, now, I am not going to be blogging about the flu or its new name H1N1 or how it spreads or what its effects are. There are enough news channels that are doing a good job talking about it and how to prevent it from spreading or how to contain it from becoming a pandemic. People are becoming really cautious about this flu because the media has given enough exposure on the flu and WHO has raised the panic level to 5. There are enough school closings to keep the sick children home and to keep all other students from becoming sick. But is this all necessary?

Flu or influenza is a common disease and every year we have this sickness and deaths as a result of this. Any flu needs proper hand-washing and sanitization, covering of mouth while coughing (or now in this case, even while kissing as shown in the picture) to prevent spreading of germs and keeping the sick children and of course adults too, if they are sick, back home to avoid the spreading of infection. But are these not what we should be doing even otherwise? Is it that difficult to follow the same logic for a somewhat catchy named flu? Whether it is a bird flu or avian flu or swine flu or HIN1, they all belong to the same group - FLU.

In 1996, Oprah mentioned about mad cow disease and everyone shunned from eating beef. Couple of years ago, there was bird flu and the next thing that followed the news was that the market for Chicken (poultry) went rock-bottom. Now this! I am sure the market for hot dogs is in the negative. It is ironic to see the TV commercial “Feed the pig” at this time around. It is a piggy bank savings commercial but because of this swine flu pandemic, the namesake will reap the effects because of people who are not aware of this. Even the flight industry will take a nose dive because of what the VP said about not flying as the air in the plane will be contaminated when one person sneezes. Churches had stopped the communion handshakes during their meetings to avoid the spreading of the virus.

I feel sorry for the school board who are working extra hard to sanitize the school grounds so the children can be safe. Is it that difficult to follow the norms on keeping a sick child home and having the schools open as usual? Now that the flu effect is waning out, schools are reopening after 2-3 weeks of closings and the students will have to work extra to catch up on the work that they missed. If we just follow the precautions, would not everything will be in its place? It is just a FLU for gods sake!