Sunday, August 23, 2009

Museum of Natural history, one more!

This is one of the other pictures, I shot during my visit to Museum of Natural history, New York. Being one of the photos I posted onto Flickr with least expectations, I was pleasantly suprised this morning when I found out that this one made it to Explore.

Explore is a Flickr feature with the intent of showing people "some of the so-called most awesome photos on Flickr." Photos seem to be automatically selected by computer according to a secret algorithm called Interestingness! Explore includes a small sampling of all of the photos on Flickr (currently at 500 per day or about 0.005% of the daily upload volume).

Guess I got lucky! :)

View the above photo on Black and my other Explore photos here.

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Kavitha- still afloat and flippant

Hello everyone and a special thanks to Alan Smithee for (uncharacteristically) noticing my prolonged absence. In unimportant updates, my parents left a couple of weeks ago. I suffered from severe trauma and denial at being suddenly deprived of my mother's delicious rasam, the heavenly aromas of which tickled my nostrils awake every morning. I never thought I will see light again. But I survived the cold turkey. And I figured it was high time this blog saw a post with more than two lines of writing. Especially given that it is beginning to look like an evil twin of Arun's flickr page.

With still no job in the offing, no mom, dad or grandfather to humor my dysfunctional rants and no stash of green to support my customary decadence, I am constantly at a loss for things to do. I must tell you, twenty four hours is a long time! I have renewed respect for homemakers. So I've been going on at least one hike every week (well, almost). I also run everyday. I bought dumbbells yesterday to put to test an ambitious weight training regime I've planned. All in
anticipation of that dashing young man who is bound to walk into my life. He has to sooner or later, don't you think? I just hope he's not flabby.

These days I read for nearly 4-6 hours a day- news,
blogs, economics, books... It feels like my college days when I used to skip classes to finish a book. Since I didn't want to taint this lovely travel blog with my hackneyed world view, I've been putting my pen to work at http://thembasaga.blogspot.com. Grace me with a visit or even a comment when you are in the mood for some banality.

In between all these delightful activities that do not put food on the table, I manage to squeeze in a couple of hours to apply for jobs which hopefully will put food on the table and give me back my decadence. I also spend an hour or two offering a shoulder and an ear to my unemployed brethren. And of course I talk to Arun 14 times a day.

So that's how life unfolds on the West Coast. More soon...

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Yosemite National Park, at its driest!


This was one of the photographs taken in March'09 at Yosemite National park, California during ourcross country road trip. We did not have enough time for a hike to the falls then, but nevertheless I thought this was a great view of both the falls (upper and lower falls) from this point.
I would have certainly been happier to see this place in the colors of Fall or the beauty of Spring, but this dry side of Yosemite was a charm in itself!

From Flickr.

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Ostrich - Museum of Natural History, New York!


The scene re-created here takes place in the Kidong Valley, about fifty miles west of Nairobi, Kenya. The male ostrich, protective of its family, reacts with alarm, its neck outstretched, its mouth open because the family is threatened by warthogs.

The best feature of Museum of Natural history, New York is the way they recreate real scenes from natural forests, in just a small indoor exhibit. The reality of the scene is simply astonishing! It gives one a feeling of being there in the scene in person. Fascinating I should say!