My Little Helper

Changed 6 Pillowcases in one go

The Perfect Murder

Penguin classics have launched 4 books in the Inspector Ghote Series. The honest police detective from Mumbai, created by HRF Keating.
The Perfect Murder is the first mystery story in the series and has incidentally also been made into a movie - Ghote's character enacted by Naseruddin Shah.
Lala Varde, the hard nosed businessman is shattered- his secretary Mr Perfect has been hit on his head- the very same head that holds all teh numbers, his business secrets and the very core of his business.
Around the same time as this, there has been a serious case of theft- a Re 1 note from the Minister Mr Kamath's office drawer has been stolen.
As luck would have it, Inspector Ghote is assigned both and both are top priority- along with being the key resource for a Swedish scholar who is researching on Police methods in India.
While he seems to be a nuisance or a distraction in Ghote's work, he will eventually become his strong ally in detection.

We are taken through the delightful train of detection in this simple story. No suspense or thrill but a simple case of intelligent detection ad putting the facts together.
There are false trails, missed moments and then in a flash the case is solved.

Read on. You are going to enjoy it if you like books in tehe lines of No 1 Ladies detective Agency.

Baby Nursery Room

For parents who would like to have ideas for their nursery - here is a lovely site. Maybe it has come a little late in the day for me still, since R who handles the site asked me so nicely, I am glad to oblige. and after all it is a lovely site. I liked the safety section and also there is a section on baby showers- since we play doulas so often, it would be nice to have a resource which pumps in fresh ideas for us!

Check out the nursery themes also.
Now if only there was an Indian connect also!

Finally Got the 15 Puzzle

After raising such a halla at not finding the 15 puzzle, I found it at Mera toy shop. The makers are Toysbox from Mumbai and they even have picture puzzles based on this- classified as Mind Puzzle.
Here Tejas solves this with lots of directions from me.

And I am stuck - but I learn today this series is unsolveable.

This is an online version of the game where the levels keep going up.

This one is just like the manual puzzle and it also scrambles and solves itself

An explanation on the way to solve. And another detailed one.

Here is the 8 puzzle solved

Below are some more challenges- I think the second one is unsolveable as per many sites.

Pic courtsey

Hiding

R Mami gave the kids a Zoop watch each which is given great respect because it has a moveable circular fitting on the watch which has the figures for the minutes imprinted. They feel it is something like Ben 10 omnitrix with a moveable part.

I usually lock the watches in the cupboard and give it to them under my strict supervision.
Every night I confiscate the watches and put them in their boxes and put them in the cupboard much to the twins' frustration.
So Ojas hit upon the perfect place to hide their watch away from my direct view.
He removed the watches from the boxes, closed the lid and hid the watches in the laundry bag.
And here I was thinking the watches are safely inside the boxes!

Smell

Smell and Taste are transportive. A whiff of a remembered odour, a flavor of forgotten food have the power to transport one to faraway lands or to many years before the present time.

My work in these industries have facilitated me to appreciate this fact even better.

But never have I encountered this sort power to transport before.

A couple of days ago, when I came home in the evening, Tejas hugged me and exclaimed- "Wagonr smell".
I work in place where there is a distinctive chemical odour which sticks to the clothes.
During my first stint with this company, I used to drive the wagonr to work and therefore Tejas would have associated the odour with Wagonr odour.
Shortly after I left, I bought the Swift.
I didn't think much of Tejas' comment and attributed it to transportive memory, until last morning when realisation came to me in a flash.
I used to drive the wagonr in 2006 from the time Tejas was 6 months to 1 year old and that too not regularly.
Does smell has a power so strong that a child can be transported to the time when he was as little as 6 months to as much as 1 year old?
If you go back to my posts, I left this place just before the kids turned 1 and the smell in the Wagonr would have lingered till Jan 2007 when I sold it.
Tejas has this style of smelling us and telling which car we drove- he always associates the husband with the Honda city or the Innova. Such is the power or uniqueness of association!

n-Puzzle

I am looking for the n-puzzle. Pretty please. Someone tell me where I may get them.

This and the alphabet version used to be so popular during my time.

I was addicted to it. Would carry them around with me and would furiously work my fingers to slide them into place. These pieces came with patterns printed backside. And we would religiously solve them. Some were highly insolveable. Wonder if I can solve even the simplest one now.

Wonder if the archives of my home still have them or are they broken long ago or given away?

The Secret Keeper

Firstly, I love the cover. Both the front and the back. Depicts Asha the protagonist in totality.

Asha, just like the meaning of her name, lives in hope. A hope for her future, a realisation of her dream of being the first bengali Psychologist in India, and above all she is entrusted with the responsibility of taking care of her mom and sister in her father's absence.

Set in the 1970's the secret keeper records the life of Asha. The Secret Keeper (nick named SK) is her personal diary- complete with a lock and key- her outlet where she pours her thoughts, feelings, dreams and hopes- just like our blogs.

Asha's father loses his job. He decides to try his luck in the land of hopes- USA leaving his family behindAsha and Reet along with their mother move from Delhi to Calcutta to bide their time in their uncle's household until their father sends for them.

With great ease, Mitali Perkins tells the story of their settling down with the household. Unsaid responsibilities are taken, friendships are formed, and the two girls become an integral part of the household.

An unexpected tragedy forces them to take tough decisions and optimise resources in the face of this sudden crunch.

The book is a young adult fiction but can be appreciated by others too. The voice definitely is young adult centric- the actions and decisions of the protagonists are to be viewed through the lens of teenagers on the verge of adulthood rather than through an adult's lens. And that too, young adults who lived in the 70's. When feminism was not so much there in India and tradition and culture was still having a strong hold in the mindset despite some people breaking free of the confines when they were not in their childhood homes/ with their ancestral family.

Which is why I had to struggle with the turn of events at one point of time. Asha's hard decision which was her best decision in her words might not have been so if the book was set in current time.

The book left me very sad. It is realistic. It could happen to anyone but somehow I felt very emotionally drained after reading the book.

It had good moments, funny lines but mostly it was full of moments comprising the struggle of survival. Struggle to maintain the family honour and uphold dignity inspite of the situation. From the word go there is a sense of urgency and tension.

So much so that the few times the family went for a shopping round- I found myself asking- why are they wasting money!

I loved the lines- Certain stories could come back to life on the second, third, or even tenth reading if you gave them time until the next encounter.

Out of The Box Thinking

Debating, discussing, weighing options to arrive at a logical solution - we adults pride in our skills. The skills are taught, learned, imbibed, we get trained in decision making. We attend workshops.

But what we forget that we human beings are gifted with decision making skills naturally. We sometimes just forget that logical thinking and jugaad comes naturally to us. After a point we stop questioning the facts handed out to us and accept things as is.
Not my kids.
There was a picture puzzle exercise in one of their activity books.
The picture was that of a striped wild cat and there were 4 spaces given for the solution.

While a striped wild cat means tiger, the 4 spaces prompted us to write Lion.

Picture the twins debating the problem.

I think it looks like a tiger
But there are only 4 boxes.
Does it mean Lion?
But it is not a Lion.
Shall we say cub?
But cub is only 3 letters, and we have four letters here.
I think answer should be Tiger
But there are only 4 boxes, and Tiger has 5 letters.
So what shall we do?
Let us write Tiger.
We will put R outside the box.

Vengeance of Ravana

I thought it was the last book in the series. But lo and behold, there is teh 7th one and one more to come.
Ashok Banker's Ramayana series is highly recommended for those looking at a thrilling rendering of the all familiar story of Ramayana. A perspective of good wins over evil is often the backdrop of most renderings but this one takes a different angle- one in which good co exists with the bad. An angle which is relevant to modern times which is not black or white but grey. The premise is that evil never dies, it is reborn or rather always there as long as the good is there.
The 7th book talks of the time after the Lanka war. Ram returns to Ayodhya and takes over his rightful place as the King.
Peace is imminent as Ramrajya is back, but is it so in reality?
A huge army is at the gates of Ayodhya
Kala Nemi - evil incarnate is back
Valmiki is back to warn Rama about impending doom.
Meanwhile, the Gods want Rama to come back to his heavenly abode and Rama feels his work on earth is not yet accomplished.

The stories traverse time-space- matter dimensions and the concept of parallel universe is explored here.

The 6th book left one matter unresolved- what was the legacy of Ravana that was being left behind.
Read the 7th book to learn that.
This particular aspect is explored in the Thai rendering of Ramayana- a different dimension to the link between Ravana and Sita- the abandoned baby- the cause of the downfall of Ravana.

To me, this is the first of its kind- this aspect fo Ramayana has not been explored in any of the versions that I have read or seen on TV. And it suits this series perfectly because this series has taken the entire concept of Ramayana to a different plane.

My only grouse- too verbose, too much description and a little confusing.

And yes, I love this ravana- lean, mean and less clumsy with the pyramidal rack of heads as against the linear one which has a more unbalanced feel.