Then and now..

On the recent whirlwind India visit, my brother suggested we recreate an old photo.. I was not sure we were on the outside and parents were in the middle.. he was sure we were in the middle sitting on their laps..

Since the original was with me in the US, we could not verify.. 

Still, we present to you.. the four from 1976 (my sister was not born then!)

and now.. 

Next time we will try to get the order right and do one of those morphing GIF pictures.. 

Have a trove of pictures from the past which my brother had saved while moving houses. Given the short time, took iphone pics of those pics. Going to spend Christmas editing those photos and posting them on FB. 

We are going to have a "black and white" Christmas this year.

Rumaging through old photos..

Found this gem..

This was taken when Jr. was 10 months old during her first India visit for her "mottai"..

The photo on the top wall is San when she was almost a year old!

There are 1000's of photos from 2002 August to 2005 that predate the blog.. we are having so much fun watching those photos and videos..

Going to see if we can fix up the old Canon Powershot and hand it over to the kids as their camera. Also planning to teach them Photography lessons every week for 30 mins or so. Today's generation needs photography skills as a default, no?

What with Facebook and Flickr possibly being a big part of their life in a few years?

Another year flies by

The girls turned 7 and 4 respectively and yes, we had a great birthday party at a place called "Color Me Mine" where they got to paint little ceramic plates, cups etc. with their friends.

Next week we get to relax a little bit before Daddy and Mommy have their Joint birthday party!

Dad will turn 37 and Mom will watch Dad turn 37(Mom has remained 29 for a few years now and will maintain the status quo!)

Leaving you with a few pictures that capture the essence of our week..

On the funny side, the little one asked me if it was possible for her to be three again. I said "No. you can only grow older!" and she was very disappointed.

"I don't want to grow bigger and bigger and then die! I just want to say small!" she said. I do not know where this is coming from and will have to understand her reasoning. It did bother me that a three year old (er, four year old) is concerned about growing up and dying.

Told her that only her mom can tell her how to freeze age. "Daddy grows older and older, but mommies don't right?" and she agreed with that!!!!

Mom has no idea that she is going to be quizzed about her methods, on the way to school tomorrow..

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Audio tapes to MP3

An old box full of audiotapes has been dusted out.

They contain precious recordings from 1977 to 1994..

Including the only tape of my childhood voice singing a few lines of "kandar Shasti kavasam", my grandpa reciting Vishnu Sahasranamam for me the day before I first left for the US of A, my grandma singing me my favorite Carnatic songs, audio of a concert where I got to sit on the stage (as Mic boy) and enjoy Lalgudi Jayaraman and his kids perform, etc. etc.

Most of the tapes seem to be deteriorating and I might have one chance to transfer them to digital format before they self destruct!

so the question is..

If any of you who read this blog in the US have converted Audio tapes to MP3, is there a product out there that you would recommend? (some kind of tape recorder that outputs MP3? or connects to your laptop through USB? and then you can import it into itunes?)

Please do let me know.

Life has been busy with work, ice cream, physiotherapy, listening to music, voting, enjoying time with the wife and kids, not particularly in any order..

Lots to write, but it has to wait. Until Friday...

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Remoteless control

Today every TV comes with a remote. It is the default. Our three year old does NOT know that there is a power button on the TV which can be used as err.. "backup"!

Last week she was watching a kids DVD while eating dinner and when she finished her food, I told her to stop watching. She promptly took the remote and ran away. "how will you off it now?!" said the little tease and her face shrank when daddy casually walked past the TV on the wall, pressed a button on the side (she did not even see me press it) and the TV went "blink".. poor thing was devastated that she could not one up daddy.

Now, as usual this post is somehow steering to a remote when it should be going the other way..

The old TV in that photoblog, which seems to have stirred so many memories, has some appendages. A small box with a needle that keeps moving around 220V, called the voltage stablizer and an antenna on the terrace. A three pronged antenna mounted on the little parapet wall two floors above, connected to the TV below by a flat 1/2 inch black vinyl covered umbilical cord.

The TV had a rotary dial that went from 1 to 30 (if I remember right) and why 30 we do not know for there were only two channels! But you got the two channels to alternate in many of the 30 channels by moving the rotary switch in combination with the antenna position. In other words, there were 600 ways to get the two channels!

In those days, monkeys and I-spy playing kids would roam the terraces quite freely and once in a while, pull the cord or rotate the antenna by mistake and that would send the adults cursing.

The men would blame the kids when they saw Sunil Gavaskar launch into what could have been a "glorious cover drive" only to be suddenly replaced by millions of teeming black and white insects on the screen matched by a bzzzzzzzzzzzz sound!

"indha pasangalaaaa..."(these boyyyyys...) would come a menacing scream from the menfolk, only to be nullified by "nethu mandhi korangu mottai maadikku vandudhu nna! adhu dhan antennava thirupi irukkum" (yesterday a big male monkey came to the terrace with his harem. he must have moved the antenna) from the ladies concerned for their kids back!

The elders would quickly quiet down, because in their hearts, they knew!

They knew that getting that picture back in time to see the action replay of that shot and determining if the ball made it to cover or the slip cordon, was a two person job. A kid willing to swing the antenna on the terrace and a person twiddling the dial on the ground. So the little one(usually me) would be dispatched to the top.

Konjam left..

Konjam right..

go back..

and the directions would be relayed through an open window and like a sailor navigating a boat on a rocky sea to 1/2 degree precision, the antenna would be returned to its rightful position. The smarter kids who knew that this nuisance would haunt them for years, what with real monkeys roaming the terrace and all, would leave pencil or chalk marks to align the pole to the parapet wall, only to realize that it really didn't matter.

Gavaskar, was out! and bringing back that picture was as good as bringing in a telegram into the house that read "Gavaskar Dead. Stop. Mourn Immediately. Stop. Gory action replay to follow. Stop."

The antenna saga went on for almost a decade before the now ubiquitous remote even appeared on the scene.

Now, we just take it for granted!

Just for the fun of it, I should send Jr. and the little one to climb on the roof of our house every now and then and adjust a fake antenna.. Just for the fun of it, Gavaskar or otherwise.

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