a promise kept.

Way back when ... I promised that I would put up a picture of the perm that shall go down in history on my blog.

Well readers, Happy Freakin New Year.



Oh, the horror. The horror! Look at the perm! Look at the laser background. Look at MY SLEEVES THAT MATCH THE LASER BACKGROUND! How did I make it out of fifth grade without uppers? Mother, seriously, I love you. But this may qualify as child abuse. Or at least child endangerment. Fashion endangerment, that is.

I would like to balance out this picture with evidence of cuteness at some point in my childhood.



Oh the cuteness. The no-front-toothed, chotli sporting cuteness.

Chotlis! Hee! Chotlis mean braids, by the way, my lovely culturally-sensitive non-North Indian readers. And check out those hairy arms. Man oh man, imagine the teasing. No wonder my skin is thicker than a cut of meat at a steakhouse in Nebraska.

Happy Christmas to All, and to All a Good Night!

Sophia and Guddi (my cousin) on Santa's Lap, circa 1982ish.

Also, please note the rockin' thermal underwear *with flowers* that I'm sportin.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Love,
Sophia

happy holidays ... from wal-mart.

I secretly love the Wal-Mart holiday commercials. You know, the ones with Beyonce and her family, and also with Queen Latifah and her mom ... and that blonde kid who looks like a mini-Backstreet Boy. Yeah. I kinda like them. They make me want to put on a chenille robe and sip egg nog by the hearth.

We don't celebrate Christmas or give gifts in my family. Actually, I'm not a big gift person all around. I dislike birthday gifts. I know it sounds weird but it bothers me that someone went out of their way to buy me something. I get the spirit of giving, etc. etc ... but then I always feel bad that I don't have a present for the gift-giver.

The real secret to my heart? Handwritten cards. They hit me RIGHT THERE. Just like the Wal-Mart commercials. I will be your best friend forever if you write me a card that actually contains thoughts and full sentences.

On that note, Happy Holidays everyone! I hope you all have safe, wonderful holidays and a happy new year.

*~*~

It has been pointed out to me by several people that I'm way behind the times on the Curry-N-Rice video thing. By like 4 or 5 months. Well so-ree! I don't hunt around for these video things. If someone sends me something funny, I pass it along for everyone's amusement. So in reality, it's my friends who are behind the times. Because nobody clued me in.

i will be the eccentric old lady.

I'm on a path of self-enrichment and improvement. To the untrained eye, it may seem slightly silly and and somewhat cheesy. The trained eye, however, will recognize that it's actually very silly and significantly cheesy.

With my med school interviews winding down, I found myself with more free time than normal. I love meeting new people and trying new things. However, much of this remains simply a rhetorical goal and I often end up lounging in front of the television when I could be doing more productive things. Slightly shy of the new year, I've decided to implement some early resolutions.

1) I started taking beginner Salsa classes. My instructor is the finest human being on the planet. And he can shake his booty like it's his job. Oh, wait. I guess it is his job. Yesterday I got to class early and he used me as a guinea pig for a routine he was inventing. It was a very advanced routine. Given that I can barely get the basic step down, I just let myself be spun and dipped and flipped like a Raggedy Ann doll. The $15 for the class was worth it for that little experience alone.

FYI: Guys, if you are having trouble getting the attention of the ladies, learn how to salsa. It's so damn sexy, and so few guys can do it.

2) I've joined a book club. Yes, a book club. With real people. Not like the Scholastic Book Club from back in the day in elementary school. Remember that? Every month we'd get a paper catalogue of the new Scholastic books, and you would fill in an order form and have your parents write you a check? And then you'd cut out the little order slip and give it to your teacher? The day the books arrived in school was so exciting! Uh-oh. Do other people remember this or am I giving too much of a glimpse into my lame childhood? Still, I loved that Scholastic thing. I grin like a kid high on Fun Dip when I think of it.

But the book club. It's awesome. A friend of a friend started it, and I went. I met some amazing women and had a really meaningful and intellectual discussion with them. We have another book club tonight! We read Shopgirl by Steve Martin. It's a novella - a trifle of a book, purposely chosen for its length given our pre-holiday hectic schedules. It was quite good, I recommend it for anyone looking for a quick and fun read.

3) Last but not least. I may start taking Tae Kwon Do lessons. Yes, I'm serious. No, for real. Stop laughing! I went for an intro lesson last week at a studio near my house (which I found through Google. I HEART GOOGLE.) Kicking is a great way to exercise I think. And Tae Kwon Do is all about the kicks. My instructor was this awesome woman who was really energetic. At some point she told me to kick her though, and I couldn't. I mean, she didn't do anything to me. Why should I kick her? There's gotta be an easier way to get to know each other. So I invited her to the book club, of course! (I keed, but maybe I should...)

Yes, so who knows how long these newfound interests will last ... but as of right now they are fun. These next few months are for me - it's the last time I will have the freedom to try such activities, because once medical school starts my only high kicks will be made out of sheer frustration from being in the library for too long.

*~*~

Total aside: If you haven't seen the Curry-N-Rice video yet, here's a link to it. I promise, it's hilarious.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4532245984549289375

goop

Ah, to be a monkey all over again. I came in for a 7:00 AM meeting where one of the doctors was supposed to give a presentation that I had prepared over this last week. Not so fun waking up at 5:30 AM then heading into work in the sleet and wind.

Of course, the meeting was canceled.

I decided to warm my insides up by purchasing some oatmeal from the cafe in my building. I've never had oatmeal from there before. I asked for a cup. The woman obliged and gave me a cup. I went to go pay, when I said "Oh, where's the cinnamon and maple syrup?" She looked confused. "Brown sugar, cinnamon ...?" She said "We don't have any." "No toppings for the oatmeal?" She shook her head.

Now, two things: First, I think she was lying and was just too lazy to go and get the toppings from whatever shelf they were on. Second, I felt too embarassed to give her the oatmeal back and say "Well then I don't want it."

So I bought the oatmeal and tried to eat it. Plain oatmeal tastes like sand and elmer's glue. Blech. I tried to eat it, I swear. But the goop is just sitting on my desk, a constant reminder that I am a total wuss. And am in the hole by 95 cents. And 2 hours of additional sleep. Gaah!

baby it's cold outside.

I get cold really easily. Over the past year, I've given up fashion for comfort and have decided to do whatever I need to in order to avoid feeling the chill of winter. I have a really ugly white hat made out of some unnatural hybrid of fur and fleece. Since I have uber-short hair, the hat covers my whole head and I look like a potato. But do I care? Nope. Because I am nice and toasty. And, hopefully, noone will recognize me under all that furleece. Yes, I just made up that word.

But the real secret of dealing with the brutal cold of boston is thermal underwear. Lots and lots of layers. Remember when we were kids (those of you who grew up in the colder climates at least) and we would wear thermal (pronounced "THURRRR-mul", accent on the rolling r, in a desi household)? I am talking the old school, waffle-type thermal. In colors like awful yellow. For girls, they had flowers on them. For boys ... well, I don't know. But I'm guessing He-Man certainly made an appearance.

They don't make waffle type thermal for adults. At least I haven't come across it recently. I have an old pair from many years ago that I have been wearing regularly since the weather turned icy. The headache of rewearing one day, doing the inside-out trick the next, and then finally succumbing and doing laundry was getting on my nerves though. So this past weekend, I grabbed my family and went on a multi-store hunt for some thermal underwear.

Results? No cheap waffle like thermal underwear for adults anywhere. We checked Target, Wal Mart, Marshalls AND Costco. Um, hello? I think there is a market for this stuff! Target did indeed carry Cuddl Duds. These are fancy schmany silky feel long underwear. And not so cheap. $20 per set. I bought some, and have been wearing them daily. I'm so warm! I love it. But I don't love the fact that I still would much rather prefer some cheap cotton waffle thermal. With pictures of She-Ra carrying lots of flowers.

I can't believe I wrote an entire post about thermal. I'm sorry readers.

ethnocentric

I think I am too Indian for my own good.

This afternoon, I saw the following advertisement atop a taxicab for Killian's Irish Red Beer:




At first glance, I didn't understand the advertisement. I said to myself "What's Desi Red? Are they advertising to Indians? Desi Red? Is it an Indian beer? What does Red have to do with Desi?"

My brain was so warped and focused on something saying "Desi" that I did not even register the word "DESIRED." And I didn't get the play on Killian's RED being desiRED.

Desi Red. What has become of me? Excuse me, as I go buy my ticket to go right back on the boat where I belong.

su dok me? su dok you!!

I have become obsessed with su doku. OBSESSED.

Have you heard of it? It's a crossword puzzle for numbers. Be warned. You will become OBSESSED.

Ha, I just like writing obsessed in capital letters. I wish I had ominous music in the background.

Here is a sample Su Doku Grid:

The rules are simple. Enter digits from 1 to 9 into the blank spaces. Every row must contain one of each digit. So must every column, as must every 3x3 square.

Go to http://game.websudoku.com. It drives you mad, I tell you. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!

Speaking of crazy pills ... this morning, my colleague J - a lovely British woman (for those of you keeping tabs, she was the one I initially disliked because she reminded me of Emily from Friends. But I subsequently discovered she's awesome) ... Anyway, J was talking about a building she had visited this weekend, and that it was in pretty bad shape. She used the word "derelict" to describe the building.

I stopped paying attention to her story at that point ... because from then on, all I could think of was ... DERELICTE!!!!!!!!