30 April 2017

One good turn deserved another…

I ran a 5K race after a long time this morning. To make sure that I did not wait for that long a time for the next one, I went ahead and ran a second one this evening. Morning one was on a flat surface and I was able to post 8:13 min/mile. The evening one was on punishing hills and I had to slow down to 8:41 min/mile. But there was wine at the end of it 🙂

Nikita and our dog Jay Jay came to cheer me up. (Sharmila is visiting Natasha in New York).

Your probably remember some of the inspiring pictures of kids running in the morning. The evening one was no different. The evening run was to raise money for differently abled kids who are financially disadvantaged. There was one kid who clearly was differently abled who showed up (for the shorter version of the race) to raise money for his brethren.

I was touched by him enough to hang around till he showed up at the finishing line. I was completely humbled by the fact that somebody who can barely walk properly would show up for a race just to raise money for kids like him but in a different financial situation.

What blew my mind was the sight of his mom walking step for step with him all the way. What sacrifices must she have made to raise her son all her life!

Every time the next hill in my run threatened to take my breath away, all I had to do was remind myself of what I had just seen. The world was very even after that.

Let the records indicate that for all the divisiveness we have pushed ourselves to in the garb of so called knowledge and intelligence, our basic instinct of just being humane is often still intact!!!

7 August 2016

Teasing Jay Jay

As much as Jay Jay kept screaming at the deer, the deer just did more antics to make Jay Jay mad!! This is inside our property and part of the property was fenced in specifically for this purpose – the keep the dog in and the deer out.

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19 June 2016

Sunday morning Chalupa run

I had to drag myself out of bed today. I have not had a full night’s sleep for the last five days and have already posted some 30 miles for the week. I was very tempted to sleep in – but went out for a run anyways since I will be losing the miles when I am in India next week. And I am glad I went. In our Chalupa group, finally we were able to get some gender balance – as many men as women. Admittedly, we had to throw in Jay Jay (our male dog) into the count to get that parity 🙂

We had Samaresh, Joyjit, Ayan, Ashok, Gita, Malobika and Sharmila. And among the youngsters, we had Nikita, Anannya, Raya, Puja and Abheek.
Did I mention Jay Jay? 🙂

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12 April 2015

If you had any doubt that the youngest ones are always the most pampered ones…

Our first dog, Princess was never allowed to get up on chairs or sofas or any other furniture. She got trained very quickly to not climb up any of those stuff. For thirteen years, we have had no challenges whatsoever.

Now we get a new puppy Jay Jay and guess what happens? Not only is he being allowed to climb up chairs and sofas, evidently he is sleeping in our beds too! With full encouragement from the family members!!! Princess can’t believe what she is seeing!!!

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9 March 2015

I am getting smarter!!

Some of you may remember my handwritten notes for the girls that I had put up on the fridge before I left for India. The ones with sharper memory might even recollect that one of my instructions was to keep the shoes in the shoe closet and leave the floor for the purpose of walking. Well, that has been a struggle for a long time.

At home I am the one who likes keeping everything back in their proper places and the girls like to just infuriate me. By not putting everything back in their proper places. Especially shoes. Given that we live in the forest, we do get some occasional bugs here and there in our house. No problem!!! There is at least a couple of shoes within spitting distance regardless of where you find the bug.

At one point, I got even some elaborate shelves built in our garage with a lot of space for every family member to entice them to keep shoes back in their places. Want to guess which shelves have more shoes out and around them than inside?

Then again, sometimes, problems have a way of sorting themselves out.

On that note, please meet our new family member – Jay Jay – a mix of cocker spaniel and a terrier. He is the one closer to you in the picture. The other one is Princess – our thirteen year old Maltese. You will be amazed how a three month old puppy’s unyielding energy to chew anything and everything in its eyesight can quickly bring shoe discipline at your home.

Evidently, all these days, I was simply “barking” up the wrong tree!

Enough said!!

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