Happy New Year

Sundar's Travelling family

Wishes you all a

VERY HAPPY and PROSPEROUS

2007 !!!

Here's to 2007 ...

Lake Cachuma

Lake Cachuma is around 6-8 miles from Solvang. A very short drive with two or three spots on the way.

First you pass an Ostrich farm on your right,



then you pass the Mission at Santa Ynes and after you make a right to go towards the lake you cross the Bradbury Dam View point.

The lake itself is just your run of the mill State Park Lake. But we got to see some blue Heron's fly back and forth from their nest. But I spent the time taking pictures of the local ducks.

Here is one.


Here is another one..


Yet another variety (although I am not sure if this is a duck!)


You get the PICTURE right ?

Note : It was a tragedy that my 4 year old Canon S30 could not zoom enough or had enough Mega Pixels to catch the Heron's which were just a few hundred feet away!! If only I had Digital EOS at hand...

I still love my S30 .. look at these shots..(you have to click on the panorama shot to see the larger version).


or this shot of Jr.


And here is Bradbury dam. The vista point entrance hyped up the place. It was scenic, but to the extent of the hype..


Here is the panaromic view from the Vista point..


There is a grill right at the Lake Marina..The most interesting thing (at the grill) was that the girl at the counter was downright flirting with me inspite of me having one kid on my shoulder and another one holding my hand. I was pondering the "Why?" for a full 30 minutes after I finished eating my lunch!

Now, that leaves only two more posts on this trip..

Mission at Santa Ynes
The stops on the way back (Morro Bay, Limekiln State park and sunset at Carmel)!

Solvang et. al.

This is a continuation of the photoblog series..

Solvang is really beautiful. Cute shops that look like they are frozen in time. It is almost like visiting Denmark, with the addition of pedal carts, horse drawn carriages, no tto mention the cute shops..

It was a treat to take pictures of the kids in the Solvang park, which is right next to the Hans Christian Anderson Museum..



The statue in the park ..


The cutesy pedal carts in Solvang..



Window displays outside stores that are a treat to watch..


We came to Solvang pretty late, after spending the day at Lake Cachuma and the Mission at Santa Ynez. (I will post on those two places separately). So before we knew it, the town shut down and all the shops closed and it was just us and the lights..



The main street and two other streets were well lit (beyond that it was residential areas, just like any other city). Here is one of the side streets.



The Main street in Solvang, nicely lit.


The courtyard of a small mall with a fountain that had four horses in the four sides..



Statues at one end of the mall



After spending time in the few blocks of well lit Solvang, we realized that there was no place to eat!! The place where we stayed (the famous Pea Soup Andersons) closed down at 7:15 for Christmas eve. It was a pity that we stayed here but never drank the Pea Soup..


We were left scampering to find food. Thankfully, there were two options. A mexican place and a Chinese place. We choose Chinese. The Mandarin Touch restaurant, which I will never forget. Probably only place open in Solvang till 11:00 on X-mas eve !! We thanked Jesus for this restaurant ...


The fried rice was yum yum yummy delicious! It was either this or go cook Maggi noodles in the microwave in the Hotel room..

Will have two more posts on this local travel series. One on Lake Cachuma and one on the Mission at Santa Ynes, over the next two days..

Scenic Route 1

This is part of a series of photoblogs on our recent trip along the California Coast..

The first part was Sisters at Play.

Route 1, is by far the most scenic highway I have driven on. The only thing that comes close is the Great Ocean Road Drive on the south Australian Coast (which we visited in 2004).

Just after Crossing Carmel, we came to Rocky Creek and Bixby Bridges.. They are truly spectacular. Would have got better shots of the bridge if we could make it down the mountainside.. but the wife was worried about safety, so we let that one pass..


The two bridges ..


The coast from Rocky creek..



The coast farther along in Big Sur..


The coast from a vista point along the Big Sur section..


It is always a pleasure to keep driving when the road keeps opening up and you dont see any car in sight.. just a windy highway that seems to lead straight into the ocean.. This photo was taken by San through the windshield..


Baby discovered what it means to jump into puddles at the Pfiffer Burns State park..


Watching the kids among the backdrop of the giant trees was a new experience. Somehow they seemed to brighten the hues from the colors of the falling leaves..


Jr. walking on a fallen log. She doesnt get to spend time in wooded areas as much as I did when I was growing up. We need to do these outdoor trips more often!


The amazing beauty of McWay falls where the creek goes straight into the ocean. Breathtaking!!


The view from the trailhead of McWay falls. The park bench was inviting, but there was a Poison Oak warning that scared me...


The sea gulls on the way to Pismo beach..


The view from "shitrock" as I call it.. the favorite vista point for the gulls..


Pismo beach! Next time, I am staying at the Best Western with the ocean view. You should see their lobby! They have a huge glass window overlooking the ocean.


The sunset, rather after the sunset.. Went to feed baby in the lobby for a minute and came out, only to find that the sun had just set! Well, better luck next time.


Next up will be Solvang in Pictures......

Sisters at play !

This is a photoblog of Jr. and her cousin during our recent trip to Solvang, California..
At Bixby bridge..





The tunnel at McWay falls that goes directly under Route 1..





At the Ostrich farm in Solvang..





Seriously observing Morro Bay near the Morro Rock.. They were trying to find out why the water near the boats was so filthy ?





Wandering into the wilderness, at Limekiln state park..





Many more samples, but these were definitely the best. Brought back so many memories of my own childhood and the fun I had with my brother and sister when we were little.

Stay tuned for more photoblogs of the trip..

Christmas travels

As is customary when we do not have a few month old baby at home during Christmas, we went on a long trip.

In our hurry, forgot to wish one and all a very merry Christmas, happy Hannukah.. So, would like to wish you all a belated Christmas and Hannukah. Would also like to wish you all a happy holiday season and a great 2007!!

Our original plan was to go to a quiet place where there is not much to see except a quiet rustic life, not too far from home, without stressing out the kids..

As our partners in crime Cousin family put it, "Solvang" fits the bill on all counts!!

Except, there were two things that were overlooked. First, Guys by definition, just do not believe in this "lets have a quiet time in a hotel" kind of vacation.. They need to be moving, taking photographs in the middle of highways because they have a moral obligation to JPEG some scenery!! Second, Solvang pretty much shuts down at sunset, Christmas eve or otherwise. So you have extremely well decorated streets with closed shops and restaurants which leaves you scrambling for something to do or a place to eat on Christmas eve. Two years ago we were in a similar situation in Zion National park (we didn't even know a Tsunami had hit till we came back to civilization a day later!).

We had a wonderful trip as we(the men) changed the focus of the trip from the "quiet hotel stay" to the "great coastal ride" ! We practically stopped at every major state park on the scenic coastal highway #1, did some hiking, not to mention the photography..

So much was covered in the last three days that it would take a few posts to describe it..

I am going to split it up into a few posts.

1. Sisters at play: Jr. loves spending time with her cousin. This is her first road trip with her cousin and it was a treat to watch them together. I was secretly taking pictures of them (secret photos/videos are becoming my speciality now) and have a small collection..

2. Coastal highway from here to Pismo Beach (in pictures)

3. Solvang by night (replace "night" with Christmas eve at 11:00 PM with no one else on the street except me and Balaji standing in the middle of first street with a tripod!)

4. Things to see around Solvang (Cute places to spend a "quiet day" and take pictures)

5. Limekiln State Park and sunset in Big Sur(a place that deserves a post all by itself).

Stay tuned for the series of posts..

Beta Beta...

I am not singing the Bhagyaraj song..

Beta beta
oh my beta
en aanandham onnodu dhaan..

(son son
oh my son
my happiness is only with you!) for those who care..

I am referring to Beta Blogger.

This harmless screen that said, great things await me when I switch to the beta version by just signing up with my gmail account, turned out to be a mixed blessing.

Beta is not different from the standard version. Except the obvious "republish blog" button is not to be found..

The minute I switched to beta

1. my sidebar went nuts
2. I lost all the original buttons I made (luckily I was able to hold on to my old template and was saved, but I almost got a heart attack!)
3. Worse, my Tamizh blog became )_&)(*^R^(*#^(*^$^(*#^@8 or something to that effect.
All the fonts, the profile everything , gone.. at the click of a button..

Took me an hour last night to put back everything, that too by playing with html (because you dont know what )*)&)(^(*&%&*(^*&%$ was and )_*)(&(*^*&^$%$ was originally!!

Finally, there is some order in my blogs again. My fellow bloggers, before you switch to beta, make sure you copy old template files, especially if they are in a foreign language..

other than that, enjoy beta blogger..

BARR - Chaat Paradise

Had a reader recommend Chaat Paradise! So we decided to go for our evening tiffin last weekend. The place is located at the corner of Grant Road and El Camino Real in Mountain View. It is in the complex next to the 24 hour Walgreens Pharmacy. It is tucked away in a corner of the complex and not visible from the street.

The restaurant is very spacious and has a very nice ambience and is busling with people.

Here are the highlights :





Wait time : 5 minute (resonably crowded for a saturday afternoon).
Food wait time from order : 30 minutes. Real long wait considering our order!
Check time : 2 minutes (Visa Mastercard, didnt check if they take AMEX)
Average price per person : $9
Rating "My wife can cook better".
Service : Below Average


Items sampled : Aaloo Paratha, Samosa, Bhel puri, Vada Pav, Chai.

The paratha was definitely one of the best I have had in the Bay area. These guys have perfected it.

The samosa was also nice. Reminded me of Banaras tea shops. Very tasty but very oily as well.

The Bhel puri and Vada Pav were a Mrs. only exclusive. Her take was that the Bhel puri was good but the Vada Pav was a big disappointment.

Chai was fantastic.

I guess this is one of those places which knows how to make some items extremely well and some other items are a must have in a typical Chaat Menu, but they dont have a handle on these items.

Not once did the people who served us or the ones who took our order or gave our check smiled ! They all looked sad, and reminded me of people working in some sweatshop!

The reasonable tactics for places like this would be to try all the items that other people strongly recommend so you cant go wrong with your order ..

Jr. tasted only the paratha and gave it two "Yummies".

Recommendation : If you know what you are ordering in this place, it is worth it.

One last video...

The trial period on the morphing software ends tonight..

So, one last morph trick before I wrap up. . .





I am glad you liked the previous morph videos.. I got emails that said it looks more like "sun TV opening credits", "Michael Jackson videos" etc..

No one said it looked like the Nijaam Pakku Ad (which I thought was a bad idea to morph faces that have nothing in common..)

Considering my little one is a girl, the resemblence is uncanny.. hope she will take after her mother for her looks as she grows up..

Blockbuster vs. Netflix

As I had posted earlier, we joined Netflix in October. Have been watching 3 DVD's a week, DVD's that came to our door by mail.

Recently found out that blockbuster was giving away a free DVD to Netflix members if they brought our Netflix address label to any blockbuster store(which we throw in the garbage anyway) Blockbuster.

At face value, this sounds nothing but ridiculous ! Last weekend, we got the 24 Season 5 disk 1. San and me watched it and as usual couldnt handle the suspense after the first 4 episodes of 24. So, off I went to the local blockbuster to get the next two disks. At the store there was a long line of people waiting to use the only computer against a wall. I asked the guy at the desk what was going on and he says..

"you get one free DVD if you sign up for blockbuster online". I asked him, does this have to do anything with Netflix and his response confused me.. Then I came home and told San. As usual, she did her detective work and found out that we can get two DVD's free. One for signing up with blockbuster online, and one for bringing over our Netflix address label!!

Now, I thought there was some catch in this whole thing. But when San finally knocked it into my head that this was for real, I realized something profound :

Laziness rules!
Capitalistic Laziness rules better!

A lesson well learnt. Apparently, Blockbuster is upset that they are losing business to Netflix, inspite of their having so many stores. So it appears that they are trying to get business back by using the fact they have stores and an online business compared to Netflix which only has an online business. What is the only weakness in the Netflix setup ? The US Postal service.. If you get a DVD and return it today, it reaches them tomorrow, they ship you a new one tomorrow and you get the day after.. this means you get to watch only on alternate days.. and the USPS does not work Sunday's !!!!

So, Blockbuster, in their infinite wisdom are

1. Trying to increase their online business by making people signup for online accounts (the lure is a free DVD)
2. To make it more lucrative for people who are Loyal to Netflix to defect over (I think loyalty doesnt make any sense in todays capitalistic world.. you are only loyal to your own best interest if you are a customer!), they are giving away another DVD free to netflix people who will try this "total access" idea.

I am allllllllllll for Blockbuster now. They were pricey at almost $4.50 a DVD. But not anymore !

For those who dont know the details here goes.

1. you go and sign up with blockbuster online, same price deals as the Netflix memberships(you get one DVD free at a local blockbuster store).

2. you show them your netflix address label (you get one more free DVD at the store)

3. you get a free trial period (just like Netflix) on the online thing. Somehow these guys at Blockbuster have a online menu with the exact same look and feel as Netflix. I am sure there is some patent violation somewhere, but these are big companies and they can get away with murder! As an inventor, I got pissed with that.. but that is Netflix's problem now to find out how someone else can have the same system of a queue, "add" buttons which look alike etc. etc..

4. you add movies to your queue. And the first movie gets mailed to you the next day.

5. NOW FOR THE BEST PART OF THE DEAL : After you watch the movie, you have two options.

a. Return it by mail and wait for two days to get your replacement (like Netflix.. which means you are without any new DVD for a day!) or

b.just take the DVD with the mailing envelope, return it at the local store, get any available DVD from the store for FREE ! when the online store gets the DVD you returned, your next DVD ships.

Two advantages.

1. You are never out of a DVD at home. There are no dead days because of the US postal service delay.
2. If you are watching serials like 24 and you dont want to wait every alternate day for the next disc, this is the best deal. You put disc 1,3,5 in the queue and pick up 2,4,6 from the store!! Works great.

So, go forth and conquer, my fellow capitalists.. The customer always comes first!

My grandma used to tell me when I was a kid "keerikkum paambukkum sandainna, koothadikku dhan kondattam".. which translates to "if there is a real fight between the mongoose and the snake, it is the charmer who gets to benefit"

This is exactly like that.. If Netflix and Blockbuster fight, WE win!

ps. On the first two blockbuster envelopes we got two coupons for full size PapaJohn's pizza's for 99 cents ! Dont know if it is standard for all the new guys who sign up or if it is some luck of the draw thing..

pps. just noticed that you get one pizza for 99 cents if you order another one full price.. sorry I didnt mention that earlier this afternoon.. still not a bad deal.

Yippppeeee!!

More Fun with morphing..

Have been having a lot of fun with the morphing software.

First I used Fantamorph, then I downloaded a free trial version of Morpheus! This thing is even better..

So here is a video of me morphing into the wife..



Why the hell would a guy do a morph video with his wife ? I have no explanation for that one !

Then I found this mixer thingy.. takes two photos and mixes the features..

So Here is Sundeetha or Sandar (whichever way you want to look at it)..



Attention Jr. and baby..(assuming this blog stays around that long)..

YOU MIGHT LOOK LIKE THIS 30 YEARS FROM NOW !!!

Dont tell me I didnt warn you, my darling daughters..

My many faces..

Most of you have seen this post on my changing face..

Well, I found this free software by Abrasoft called Fantamorph.. gave it a try and it works very well.

here is the result ..






Not bad eh ?

Well, I morphed my face with my wifes and have another one of Jr. But they need more work.. will post them next week.. happy weekend!

Worries..

I worry about a lot of things on any given day..What is worse, we have unnecessary things to worry about..

like this email I receive from someone I dont know.




I am hoping this is spam..

Having been tossing and turning about what to do ?

1. email the person and ask who he/she is ?
a. this person could be a nice person who just doesnt know how to comment on my blog, and instead resorts to sending an email like this.. but then why no signature ? no subject ?
b. this is some private stalker who happens to be smart enough to find my gmail address, but wants to stay anon..

2. shut down blog for fear of someone digging info on us..
a. I could be paranoid and be doing this as a knee jerk reaction
b. Then again, maybe I should be careful..

So, I am emailing the person back tonight.. enough with the sleepless nonsense.

And this is a request to all ye commenters out there.. please at least give me your name if you want to post a comment and dont have a blogger account!

Thank you !!

Which comes first ?

Here is a twist on the "Which comes first, the chicken or the egg ?" conundrum ..

Which comes first ? The parent or the child ?

Why should I even bring this up ? Well, my four year old daughter has suddenly grown up after her birthday, now that she is a "big girl" by her own (and her mommy's) declaration. Part of being a "big girl" is to talk to daddy with the same all knowing attitude as mommy, grandma's, great grandma's and aunty's..(note no male relatives are mentioned above).. I guess the big boy vs. big girl debate will have to be postponed to another day! This post is not about the whole boy vs. girl thing.

It is about how I am supposed to listen to her! Every 5 minutes or so, she talks to herself or her toys and then looks at me and goes, "daddy, you are not listening to me!". It is getting on my nerves.

To top things off, I called my mom in India this morning. My average phone conversation to anyone in India is like watching the compressed version of friends that is now circulating on youtube.. it is an emotional rollercoaster ride (except it goes on for nearly 20-30 minutes). I tried to make a point and asked my mom to stop interrupting me and "listen" for once ! My logic was that based on an extrapolation of Jr. becoming a "big girl", I have also become a "big boy" and have earned the right to ask my parents to listen to me ..

I couldnt have been farther from the truth. All I got on the other end was a
"let me talk. you shut up and listen" which was continued by the "Great Grandma memorial lecture", on everyones place in the heirarchy, who knows what, etc. etc.

How come, I got left out of the growing up chain all of a sudden ? What is happening here ? Either my parents start listening to me or I stop listening to Jr.

I will let them fight this one out.

ps. Any tips on helping me grow into a "big boy" will be greatly appreciated.

pps. tips from the big girls will be valued more than the big boys unless the boys can prove that they are ISI approved and certified !