Coffee and my tryst with it

Lingering over a cup chatting with friends. Sitting near a window staring out and contemplating over life in general. Gulping one cup down quickly before sitting down for loads of work. Sitting down with one before a long night of studying. And of course the large steaming cup to help reduce the headache. I am sure that most of us use our cup of joe for the above mentioned reasons and a whole load more.

I stumbled upon coffee when I was 19 at a kalyana mandapam where they served nothing but coffee and tea.(ie no milk!!!) and fell in love with it. The sights and smells of coffee give me a high (of the non alcholic kind). To me coffee is not an addiction.. As in, I dont need it to survive or start my day. But I do have an extremely hilarious addiction. I need coffee at weddings. Maybe it has something to do with my inception to this drink. As most are aware Telugu Weddings are at absurd times of the night and the only thing that will keep me going is coffee. 2 30 muhurtam..no problem, if i start drinking coffee by 11 by the end of 5 cups it will be 2 30. Dont look at me like that.The cups at the kalyana mandapam are usually really little. My wedding was at 10:11 in the morning. But I dint want to break the tradition (bad karma et al) . So I had my shots of coffee. 5 minutes before muhurtam with the sheet between TTG and me when he couldn't see me I had my coffee.

Back in my Wipro sojourn 16 hour days usually meant coffee at the end of 8 hours. And another one at the end of 10 hours. By which time they would shut the coffee machine. And I am not a big fan of the instant variety that the Lipton vending machine dispenses. Half of its water anyway!!! I need my black coffee with milk. More black than milk. The best coffee I have had is a a huge giant tumbler that an aunt made for me in Bangalore, when I was interning there.

I do get a lot of the caffeine thing and back when I was in India and un-married I used to get the coffee makes you darker thing. I also get the coffee can be addictive thing and the general coffee is not good for your health thing. But what the heck. I am not addicted to it. Just need it like a bit of adrenaline now and then to get me through activities. That is not wrong is it? (Gawd, I am sounding bad even to myself)

However here comes the problem, I dont make good coffee. Well, atleast I dont like my coffee(that is the coffee I make). I make great tea. However, I dont like tea!!! Recent solution that I have hit upon. TTG (though he doesnt drink it) makes a really good cup of coffee. I also discovered a StarBucks within walking distance from home (heck, I wouldnt go if it was further, I would just loose the urge for it)
I am a strong liker ( big fan) of small bistros or the friendly coffee shops where you can sit with ur cuppa and chat and eat a whole lot of cookies or biscuits. There is something about the ambience and the smell which gives me the "feel good" feeling. But till I discover that, TTG I am depending on you to tide me through the migranes or if we do attend any weddings around here.

A little mokke that I thought of.. If you dont get coffee, eat tiramisu.. haar haar haar..

Another mile stone - Big Dreams

You know when you are really little -people who went to college were big people.And you couldnt wait to go to college. And then when you come to college - married people are uncles and auntys and only friends of your parents are married. And when you graduate and start working you are sort of stuck with this awkwardness of whether to call ppl aunty and kids call u aunty.(what is the fixation with aunty!!!!!!!!!!!) Well, I have graduated so I am a big person and I am married so I am an aunty. And I am gonna turn a year older in less than a week!!!

In the last one year I have seen loads of things and grown up ages. I gave up a gothram and took up a new gothram, I got a whole new family along with my own, I moved to a new country and started a certification in management (Wait all that happened in the last 6 months) In the 6 months prior to that, I changed hair colours, I worked maniacal hours, I wrote my TOEFL and forgot my glasses at the test center, ate out of cartons (to avoid washing dishes) and worked 14 hour days. Phew isnt that a lot to be doing over a year. Gone from one extreme of the spectrum to another. I would definitely say that I have grown a lot in the last one year. I think I have done justice to the whole year and made the most of it.