What to Do when you are taken to Pondy on yet another weekend

1. for starters- insist that you should be back the same night. So that your Sunday is not disturbed
2. Go unprepared so that you don't have to stay there in case of emergency. Also get just enough clothes for the kids to last for that day only
3. Take a book to read on the way and in Pondy and then don't read it
4. Stop at your prawn farm if you have one or else stop at any prawn farm on the way and take a lot of pictures for blogging purpose (that can be posted as a separate post)
5. Insist that you have lunch (prawns) outside and not get cornered into making dosa yet again.
6. Take an auto and go shopping with the kids and MIL and end up getting frustrated at the way the kids are pulling down bales of cloth and stepping on them. Buy common stuff like rubbersheets and white cloth for redoing your dirty (pee, puke, drool stained) pillows - that way your need for retail therapy gets cured without hitting you really badly
7. Finally bargain with the dholak wallah that you see on every trip to Pondy- he will start with 300 plus for the smallest dholak and you start with 50 bucks and continue shopping. After coming out of the shop- scan the surroundings for the aforementioned dholak wallah and deliberately go in his direction if he hasn't already appeared in front of you apparently out of nowhere. Just before getting into the auto to go home, agree for Rs 100 a piece and pick up two- Now this strategy serves many purposes- you get a good bargain, you don't have to carry it all around while shopping and the kids finally stop troubling you.
8. Prepare for going back- get packed and ready and plan to eat in a restaurant on the way back.
9. When hubby informs that he needs to return next morning for an hour long early morning meeting, make a big fuss and then work out the mathematics and agree to stay back on one condition that he buys your night dress and clothes for next day and dinner and promises to leave for Chennai next morning by 10 am. (Actually it would have been cheaper if he just went back and returned next day by bus)
10. Put the kids to sleep (using the newly bought rubber cloth) and go for a drive by the beach and a midnight dinner at GRT and finally get your hubby to yourself.
11. When all plans of leaving by 10 am goes kaput because the hour long meeting converts into just a long meeting, manage to stay as long as it takes for the chicken to get cooked (by MIL), grab the hubby for a shopping trip as soon as he is free and go for the Pudhumai exhibition (Pondy Handicraft) oppostie Gandhi statue on the beach (the empty tents were seen courtsey the midnight drive on the beach and a clever guess was made that there might be an exhibition going on).
12. Spend lots of money on buying almost all the wooden puzzles that you were rooting for since the past few months (and post the pics in another post). Also manage to collect their business card so that in case of emergency they may be contacted for buying puzzles (this the husband failed to do when he bought the puzzles last time and I had been looking allover Pondy just in case I spotted the shop somewhere).
13. Go back in generally high spirits which will leave the husband wondering whether the fuss last night was just to get him to buy you new clothes.
Optional: One could also buy mosambi from the fruit stall located right next to the building (conveniently) and make lots of mosambi juice which the kids will decide for once not to look at and therefore will be gulped down by self (because hubby is in a meeting)