Why I am not drawing

A small comic I made a LONG while ago!

30 before 30

I was chatting with my younger brother and he said, "I never imagined life after 22-23. Somehow that seemed to be the end." I agreed, because I used to be the same way. I never thought I would become any older than 25.

But here's the harsh truth. I turn 30 in February 2014. It's a milestone birthday, and I suppose I could be all unhappy about it. But, instead, I have decided to look forward to becoming thirty. It is sad to leave my 20s behind, and realise that I will not be the target audience for a lot of marketing & advertisers. But on the other hand, a lot of my burning life questions seem to be behind me. I am older, somewhat wiser and have as yet, no white hairs.

I still suffer from existential angst, and self-esteem issues, and yes, acne. I guess these things are not going  away anytime soon.

However, enough rambling! Before I exit my 20s, I decided to make a list of things I wanted to do. It wasn't easy to come up with thirty, but I did it!

1. Run a marathon
2. Throw a party
3. Learn to blow dry my hair REALLY straight
4. Complete the “Artist’s Way”
5. Save an X amount of money every month
6. Learn how to drape a sari really well
7. Find and wear the right makeup
8. Celebrate Diwali the right way
9. Make pickles
10. Keep a photoblog (on posterous)
11. Travel to
• Coorg,
• Pondicherry,
• Hampi &
• Ooty
12. Participate in NaNoWriMo(November)
13. Stitch a garment I can wear outside the house
14. Make a painting or a series of small paintings
15. Design a calendar for 2014
16. Go hang-gliding
17. Travel to another country
18. Learn to do my taxes
19. Go on a road trip
20. "Finish" drawing in all my gifted journals/notebooks
21. Attend a rock concert
22. Take a jewelry making class/Make some jewelry
23. Go vegan for a month
24. Learn to sing a song perfectly
25. Don't shop for a month
26. Write reviews of books & films you watch
27. Participate in hourly comics (1^st FEB!!!)
28. Celebrate Valentine's day
29. Start the 'other' blog (that's a hush-hush project)
30. Be at peace with myself

I am going to try and document this as I go on. Wish me luck!

Story of Curly

I was born with springy, twisted curly hair. As a kid, I longed to have the Rasna girl hair cut with neat bangs on my forehead and a bob-cut. That, I felt, would complete my life.

My hair is stubbornly curly and refuses to be tamed by hair gel, shampoo, hair-dryers, or flat-irons. It has a mind and life of its own.

Around two years ago, I had an epiphany. It was around the time that everyone was going through the re-bonding process. Poker straight hair was in vogue. I remember a girl in my office with dry, frizzy, curly hair who came in one day with her hair looking smooth, and silky. I was so tempted to re-bond my hair. I would get my Rasna girl haircut! I would finally have smooth manageable hair!

I had just brought myself a flat iron and was straightening my hair. It wasn’t working so well for me. My hair was a disaster, it had stopped growing, it was limp and dull, and falling out. I had to wash it nearly every day to keep it from being lank. I was sick of it.

And so came my epiphany. I decided that I didn’t care if my hair was straight or curly; all I wanted was healthy hair.

Whenever faced with any problem, I do a lot of reading. I read on the internet, books, articles, magazines, whatever came my way. And I began working on it.

Getting healthier hair wasn’t easy, it has taken over two-three years. But the more difficult thing is accepting my hair. I have curly hair, and it is crazy on some days. But that’s okay. On the days it behaves, it looks pretty. On the days it doesn’t, well, that’s what buns and scrunchies are for!

A fish shaped building

This is based on a true story.



A bit fishy



This is what happens when you tell jokes to software developers.

And for reference, this is the afore-mentioned fish-shaped building. It's the National Fisheries office in Hyderabad.

And here's another photo for the curious.

( Also, joke credits: Sudarshan )

Thought for today

A scribble from my journal.

A semi-tragic tale with a happy ending

I completed a year as a wedded women recently, and to celebrate this triumph, I decided to bake a cake. I have baked a total number of once before. I made gingerbread. Which was okay.And which I ended up eating mostly by myself.

So I wanted to be careful this time. I decided to bake a simple chocolate cake.

At the beginning of this year, I was browsing Kroma and acquired myself an OTG(Oven-Toaster-Grill). It took me a day to discover that this despicable machine is neither a good oven, nor a decent toaster nor is it a respectable grill. It is a beautiful, curved, chrome and steel contraption which can do nothing well. But since I have brought it, I insist on using it.

So I did bake the cake. It was doing well for itself, rising beautifully till I decided to open the oven and have a better look. The cake could not take this behavior and it collapsed into itself. So now I had a depression in the middle of my cake, like a moon crater.

When I finally took it out, I discovered it had a dark burnt layer at the top as well as the bottom. the reason, I had used normal sugar instead of powdered, which sunk to the bottom of the cake and made a caramel base to my cake. The top layer? Well, I can't explain that.

Despite of this, my cake tasted alright actually. And we all ate it with ice-cream and milk. After all what can go wrong if there is chocolate in it?

lazy sunday

I had a good weekend and am all ready for the Monday blues. I am in an experimental mood today, so I made pancakes.

They were nice, but the next time I make some, I have improvements.

But they were still delicious.

I also lazed on the sofa and made a little drawing and painted it

Drawing and pancakes, that's a recipe for a satisfying weekend.