Guess What? Guess How?

First of all can you guess what you are looking at ( do not worry about the green stuff)? It is some kind of vegetable. I guess you know the answer. The color of the vegetable gives it away. Yes you are right. It is a carrot cut into circles and cored.

Now that you know which vegetable it is, can you guess how I went about doing it? It was quite simple to accomplish that. All it took was a carrot with a very hard core (in other words, a bad carrot). So once I peeled and cut them into circles, all I had to do was push the center core out with my thumb. That created the donut effect.

Cool isn't it?!!!!

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What Were They Thinking?

Today, when my husband got back from work, he casually mentioned that HP was going to acquire PALM for whopping $1.2 Billion. He also mentioned that PALM was in such bad shape financially that they were almost going to close down.

My 9 year old snapped back immediately. She said , "Have you seen the Palm Pre ad? One look at that ad and you will never want to own a Palm Pre." Actually what she said about the ad is so true. It kind of spooks you out a little bit. If a 9 year old could figure that the ad is not working, then why can't the people making these ads. It makes you wonder as to "What were they thinking?!"

That kind of reminded of the Burger King ads. One look at the king and your appetite goes out the window. I guess they were trying to copy the Jack in the Box ads without similar results. Even without any controversy I hated those BK ads. Then there was this King's gone crazy ad, which was considered so controversial, it had to be pulled off the air. That I feel actually worked out in favor of BK. At least we don't see that idiotic king character anymore.

I don't know what they were thinking?

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Earthquakes: 2010

Since I live in California, I suppose, I pay close attention to earthquakes (no matter where on earth they occur). Year 2010 has bee very peculiar in that regard. We are only one quarter of a year into it, and we have already seen eight major earthquakes (magnitude 6 or higher) and ten if we count magnitude 5.5 or higher. That's a lot of earthquakes in such a short time period. They have been all over the world.

Of these the Haiti Earthquake of magnitude 7.0 on Jan 12th was one of the deadliest. The other major one was the 8.8 magnitude earthquake in Chile on February 27th. There was a quake in Mexico on April 4th of magnitude 7.2 followed by 7.6 magnitude quake in Indonesia on April 6th.

I do know there is a lot of earthquake activity that happens on a daily basis. However much of this activity is either not high enough magnitude or in densely populated areas. So they go unnoticed. Hope we don't see too many of these quakes, the rest of the year!

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Happy Earth Day!!!

I want to wish all the earthlings a very happy Earth day. As a living being on the planet Earth, it is our responsibility to take good care of our planet. So this earth day I researched the web to find some useful sites on going Green!!!

1. National Graphics's Green Guide
2. Planet Green , A Discovery Company
3. The Daily Green
4. HGTV Green Home Giveaway

In the meantime we all can make some simple changes to help planet Earth:

1. Use cloth kitchen towels instead of paper towel, wherever possible.
2. Use a permanent coffee filter instead of paper filters.
3. Use filtered water instead of bottled water.
4. Bring your own reusable bag for grocery shopping.
5. Use bamboo products for cutting boards etc.
6. Use pressure cooker for cooking (saves lot of energy)
7. Try carpooling.
8. Use bicycles or walk whenever possible.
9. Minimize the use of water and electricity wherever possible.
10. Replace all the bulbs with energy efficient "CFL bulbs".
11. Use solar powered lamps for landscaping.
12. Use clothesline for drying clothes in summer.

Or maybe some big ones .....

1. Use energy star appliances.
2. Try to harvest rain water if you can.
3. Buy a hybrid car.
4. Try to use solar panels for power generation (if you can afford it).

The list goes on and on . So on this earth day and in the future, Think Green, Act Green and Go Green!

Reduce! Reuse! Recycle! That's the mantra.

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Cock-A-Doodle-Doo

Need I say more ..... You get the picture .....

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Window Shopping

One of the fun things about Disneyland are the colorful window displays. I have always enjoyed looking at them. Of all the windows "Ratatouille" captured my attention. Because they actually had a character moving. The display is so realistic, with all sorts of details. You can see a refrigerator, kitchen utensils, recipe book etc. Here are some pictures and the video of that window display. I only wish I did not see the glass reflection in my pictures and video.

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It's A Small World!

We had been to Disneyland just recently for my daughter's spring break. It was one hectic trip no doubt. No matter how well you plan your trip, there is only so many rides one can cover in a day.

Of all the rides, "It's a small world" is very different, and the message is wonderful - unity in diversity. It promotes the sense of togetherness and peace, which is so much needed in this world, with all that is going on.

Here are some pictures I took of the ride.

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Easter Egg Hunt ....

My hunt for Easter eggs started on Saturday, April 3rd. We are lucky we have a Walgreens close to our home for procrastinators like me. I found these cute Easter baskets, some pastel colored plastic eggs and bite size candy all in one quick stop. It cannot get any easier than this. I filled the eggs with miniature Snickers and Hershey's candy and hid them in our backyard.

Fast forward to Sunday, and here you can see the results of my kids' Easter egg hunt.

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Refrigerator Magnets

There are some things which get noticed lot more than others. I don't know what it is about them. Somehow most of my friends who visit our home, seem to like these refrigerator magnets. I got them years ago at Pier 39 in San Francisco. There is a store in Pier 39 just dedicated to refrigerator magnets. There is tons and tons of variety. I picked out these since they looked very cute.

I know, I know ....... one of the dolls is missing a shoe. I need to glue it back on. One of these days it is going to happen, I promise (myself)!!!

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Melon Baller Magic!

What do you get when you start with some seedless watermelon and a melon baller.

Voila !!!





All I can say is YUM!!!!
Cheers to some easy, healthy deliciousness!!!!

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Choclate Chip Cookies!!!

My kids love CCC (Chocolate Chip Cookies). I guess most kids do. There is always a request for CCC at snack time.

So I usually end up buying the cooking dough and baking them. There are so many choices when it comes to cookie dough these days. They really made it easy to bake cookies with these readily available cookie doughs.

Once my kids tasted these semi homemade cookies, they do not seem to like the store bought ones anymore. The taste is not the same. I'm sure the cookies made from scratch are much more delicious. But for now, I'm happy with the semi homemade version. It saves me a ton of time.

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Happy Ugadi : 2010

Ugadi marks the first day of the Telugu New Year. This year it was on the 16th of March. Every year I try to at least make the ugadi pacchadi (chutney) which includes 5 different flavors. The 5 flavors include, sour, sweet, bitter, spicy and tangy. So we use raw mango for sour, Jaggery (bellam) for sweet, neem flowers for bitter, chili for spicy and tamarind for tangy. This year I managed to get all the ingredients except for the neem flowers, which I usually substitute with neem powder which is easily available in Indian grocery stores. But not this year. This year they sold out all their neem powder, can you believe that?!! I know. So I made mine with four flavors, instead of five.

Anyways the reason I was told we make this special chutney was it represents the different situations we face in real life. Like sweet is supposed to represent happiness, bitter for sadness, spicy for anger. I do not remember what sour and tangy represented. I shall try to find out.

So here's to another fabulous and fun year. Cheers!!!

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The Sun, The Rain And The ....

Today we have seen the weather go from cloudy to sunny to rainy. It was changing all throughout the day. Very unpredictable. But with the unpredictability came a beautiful surprise at the end of the day.See for yourself.

I have been trying to capture the rain for a while on my camera, but didn't know how. Today I finally got the idea, when I saw the rain drops on my french door. It was a perfect shot.

It was a beautiful rainbow. My 2 year was super excited when he saw it. I don't know what it is about the rainbows, but it brings some kind of joy when you spot one, at least for me!! I'm so glad I was able to capture it on my camera.

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Samosas

The other day I had some left over potato curry from lunch. I also happened to have one of those Roti Land roti packs. So I decided to make some samosas.

I took each of those roti land rotis and cut them in half. Then I stuffed it with a few spoonfuls of potato curry and made it into a samosa. I used a fork to seal the edges.

Then I deep fried them all in oil. I just served with the chutney on hand. Samosas seem to go well with ketchup too.

That was one quick and easy way for a home made samosa. Didn't break a sweat.

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Organize: Kitchen

I have been trying to organize my kitchen a little better. So I went looking for some drawer organizers. I finally found the Expandable Bamboo Gadget Tray at Crate and Barrel. It is made of bamboo, looks sleek and it is expandable. It fit my drawer perfectly. What more could I ask for. So I have finally organized my gadget drawer. Here take a look ....

I was told that spices last longer and stay fresher when stored in a refrigerator. I decided to store mine in a refrigerator too. I like the idea of using glass bottles instead of anything plastic for storage. So I ended up using the Starbucks coffee bottles and Classico pasta sauce bottles for storage. It was very easy to peel of the labels off the Starbucks bottles. I just washed all the bottles once in a dishwasher before filling them with my spices. I could fit 4 Classico bottles in the back and 5 Starbucks bottles in the front row perfectly. It looks neat and I didn't have to spend a Penny on these bottles.

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Spring Is In The Air

The colors of spring. Wow what a sight. It's brings so much joy to see the blossoms and bulbs and all the new life that springs from spring. Those beautiful sounds of birds chirping away. Nature at it's finest.

What's not to love about Spring, unless you are an allergy sufferer .......

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Gallery of Birds in Our Backyard

I love birds. So whenever I see any birds in my backyard I try to capture it on my camera. This month I have seen quite a few variety of birds. All the birds were beautiful, but my camera skills do no justice. I need to learn to take better pictures. Also I need to learn to identify the birds.

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Birds In Our Backyard : Videos

Here are some short videos of birds in my backyard. I only wish I could identify the species.

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Food 2009 : A Year End Recap

Just making a simple gallery of all the different food that I made in the year 2009 which was kind of little different from the usual and for which I have pictures taken. A year end recap. Bon Appetit.

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