Guests

Here is the picture of one of the snakes, which lived by the steps in front of my house.  They seem to have moved away, as the gardener put mulch around their hideout last week.  I miss them now! :-)

Wide Screens

I guess the computer makers wanted to ensure that computers can be used to watch movies more effectively, and hence converted to a 16:9 aspect ratio a few years back.  But I feel it has not really been a good move.  I am sure there are people that use laptops primarily to watch movies.  But I think there are a lot more users who use computers for other purposes, especially browsing the internet.  Most of the web content is still designed for lower resolution screens.  It really makes a good portion of the wide screen redundant.  My laptop has an HD screen with 1920x1200 resolution.  And attached is a scaled down version of the screenshot of a Rediff page on it.   I think well over 50% of my screen is not used, when browsing general internet content.  Duh! What were they thinking?!  I guess the only gain for me is that the keyboards are a little more comfortable to use, given the wider dimensions.  But when I see some of the pages, I wish I could swivel the screen to switch length and width!

It hurts...

I played the first official game of the 20/20 Cricket season on Sunday.  The weather was nice, but cloudy.  We were playing the team full of Caribbean folks.  They won the toss and elected to bat first.  10 minutes before the game, I found out that I was keeping.  Not a problem, I thought.  Except that it had been almost 13 years since I kept wickets at that level.  I padded up and enthusiastically ran in.  I did much better than I expected - did not concede any byes and did not drop any catches.  But I ended up blocking some balls which I would have gathered cleanly, 13 years ago!  They scored 125 in 20 overs, and it was drizzling pretty much all through their inning.  But when we started, the rain started coming down heavily.  I was padded up to go in at #3, but the game was called off after 3 overs in our inning.

While I had not had any issues keeping the wickets, I realized late in the evening that my legs hadn't liked my wicketkeeping stint!  I had to get to the crouching position about 150 times during the game.  I have been biking a bit and running a little this spring, I was in no shape to do that many sit-ups.  It's been really painful the last two days, especially climbing down the stairs!!!  I have the next game on Saturday.  I am hoping that the pain would have subsided by then, so that I can keep the wickets again.

Snakes

My wife saw a snake the other day near the front footsteps of our house.  Knowing that venomous snakes are extremely rare in the Northeast, we were not too alarmed.  We researched and found out that it was an Eastern Ribbon Snake, which is harmless.  When she saw that snake again within the next couple of days, she was a little worried.  Then she showed me that there were two of them, sunbathing right next to the front steps.  We did not want to kill them.  I thought of using the shovel to move them away from the steps and closer to the woods/stream that runs through our property.  But I realized that they move really fast and that I might not be able to keep them on the shovel until I get to the stream.  So, they continue to live in a hole next to the steps.  I read that snakes of this species mate in spring, and give birth to about 10-12 babies in July/August.  I am worried now, and am trying to think of ways to move them away from the front entrance, without harming them.

For now, I see them sunbathing every morning.  I try to say "Good Morning"!  But they do not seem to like me much, as they run away as soon as they see me :-)

Butterfly, Butterfly, Fly Fly Away...

I lived in a town called Tarikere in the district of Chikmagalur in India, between the years of 1979 and 1982.  We had a GREAT front yard.  There were lots of flowering plants and my Mom also planted vegetables there.  My siblings and I used to play all the time in the yard.  There were countless butterflies and dragonflies that were attracted to our yard.  We used to chase them, catch them and play with them.  Looking back, I am sure we were cruel to them in many cases.

Fast forward to 2009.  We took my son to a butterfly conservatory (http://www.magicwings.com/) about three weekends back.  The entry fee was $32 for the three of us.  They did have a ton of butterflies and it was a nice visit.  We ended up buying a small box that had eight caterpillars (for $40).  I was remembering all those hundreds of butterflies that flew in our garden in Tarikere.  I could appreciate my childhood experiences a lot more, given how much we had to travel and spend to get my son to see the butterflies.

We brought the caterpillars home, waited anxiously for them to gain weight and transform to chrysalis.  Two of them died within a week.  The other six managed to climb up to the roof of the box and hang upside down.  Of those six, two fell down within a day.  We took them out and put them on a plant, upside down.  The other four are still going strong and are expected to come out as butterflies anytime.  My wife, son and I have been following this metamorphosis very closely.  When I saw that the two chrysalis had fallen off the roof, I felt really bad.  And I started thinking about all the butterflies I had been cruel to, when I was a kid.  I added one more item to the list of things I should not have done.  That list is getting longer :-)