Punjabi/remix

I have been listening to more and more Punjabi music in the recent past and this is a bit worrying, as its unusual for me. We all have these times when a certain tune gets stuck in our heads which is normal . When a new AR Rahman's movie is released, its quite normal -atleast in my world- to play it on repeat mode for a few days or a few weeks. But this Punjabi thing has been dragging on for almost 2 months. I think its time I got over it. In case any of you are wondering exactly what kind of music I am talking about, there is Bobby Friction, MacG-Ambersariya, Rishi Rich, etc...Was looking out to buy this but apparently its only available in Amazon UK. If any of you folks there in the UK planning to visit US, you know what to get me :-) !

Online shopping

Just bought a gift for a friend on Amazon. Man, you gotta love online shopping. I really like Amazon's UI and the cool features like storing the list of things you recently looked at, your recent orders, their recommender engine, etc.
I also frequently use their movie database (imdb) too, especially the user comments. Now I am not one of those people who try not to read the storyline or the ending before watching the movie. I usually don't like wasting my time on boring movies (well, except for those lazy weekends when I watch all the gory/absolutely bad/ alien/insect movies on the sc-fi channel where you can predict who is going to die next based on their characterizations). So I usually have to check out the movie reviews on imdb before i watch anything. And this has worked very well so far. Is there anything similar for Tamil movies where it is easier to search and read comments and reviews? Imdb does have non-English movies but the list is quite limited. I occassionally read reviews on teakada.com. Gotta love to their name.

(sidenote: I made some thakkali chutney a few days back and it tasted awesome. The trick, I am guessing, was to blanch the tomatoes ? )

Of Tunics and Kurtas

I went to the outlet mall in Park City, UT and observed the same trend that I had seen in other malls. There are Indian clothes (I dont mean clothes made in India but actual desi clothes) everywhere .... In Express and in Gap -- 2 of my favorite stores. And they are so expensive. Beautiful embroidered short kurtas, Rajasthani prints, zari/chumki work, soft printed cotton tops --all going by the name - tunics. I may be biased but I think the colors, patterns and textures that Indian clothes (especially sarees and salwar kurtas) come in are absolutely fantastic and also unmatched. If I had some money, it seems like a good time to open a store featuring desi clothes. One of my fave stores in Chennai is Surang. They have a good selection of salwar kameezes (Is that the right spelling?) and ghaghra cholis but the prices are a little towards the higher end. There are 2 branches, one in Kasi Arcade (side note: I am surprised that Kasi Arcade is still open. I half expected it to be demolished and see an apartment complex springing up when I went there last summer, considering that most of the stores there have closed) and one on Cathedral road.
I used to get some of my clothes tailored at a store called Aesthetica in Spencer Plaza. It was owned by a lady called Shubha (don't know her last name). Imagine my surprise when I read an article that claimed that she was on her way to the Guiness book of records for producing the most number of films in a year or something like that ! Neat .

Moab

Monday morning, um.., afternoon i mean. After all the fun in past few days, its boring to sit in front of my computer. And for once, I did not get restless without the internet. And I did not feel like the world stopped because I did not check email. Yeah..whats the point..Its not like everyone is sending me offer letters or anything, right ? Coming back to the trip, we went river rafting, went to the Mormon miracle pageant in Manti (very impressive), camped for 2 nights and hung out in SLC downtown (Temple square). I also managed to get pulled over for speeding (I was only a few miles over the 35 mph limit !! ) but got off with a verbal warning. More pictures later on flickr.