Meet my Valentine.... :)

The shy li'l girl I happened to fall in love with, less than a year ago, is now in her own words my "new best friend". Isn't she precious! :)

"I am Powerful"

Our daily routine is composed of countless visual assaults: billboards that do nothing for the landscape. As someone said, "advertising's constant mission to creep into every corner of our lives". But every once in a while, and I have to hand it to the Madison Avenue, they come up with something that jolts you into looking beyond your immediate needs. Care.org has been creating some very "powerful" ads and on an issue close to my heart: focus on women's innate power in fighting the global poverty. I decided to put it up here as my final contribution to Project Yellow.

I also wanted to take this opportunity to mention about this friend who's running a 26 miles marathon this June in San Diego to raise funds for cancer research. His mother's a breast cancer survivor of several years and his close cluster of family and friends has unfortunately not been free of cancer-related diseases. Please do have a look at his website here and pass the word around and/or donate if you can. Thank you for listening and have a great week ahead :)

Hanging On!

Before they make the final fall.

Patch of sunlight

A stray patch of sunlight from a dying sun painted this on the canvas of a wall. I am having a lovely weekend and wishing the same for all of you :)

A Moment in Time

Much as I want to share the beauty of Mackinac Island here, I had to share this image shot this Sunday evening in good ol' Florida :) I love the reflections here and the moment warms the cockles of my heart for some strange reason. Hope you all had a great start to the week :)

On a shoe-string budget???

On a shoe-string budget??

Very unlikely. As a Dutch proverb goes, "Don't throw away your old shoes until you have got new ones."......Someone seems to a have a coupla pair too many ;)

Little Miss Sunshine :)

We never got any rains but we did get a lot of breeze and a smattering of clouds. An almost perfect weekend before life gets busier and lesser fun.

A jaunt to Siesta Key in Sarasota a week earlier yielded this shot. Its one of the finest places to visit on this side of Florida. The crystal-white sand is so fine that it feels like satin below feet(they tell moi, the sand here is 99% pure quartz). And the Gulf of Mexico as blue as Blue Curacao.

She was the cynosure of every adoring eye on the beach. People would stop by just to smile at all the fun she was having. I could not contain my enthusiasm while capturing her and ended up with more than a dozen odd shots (as always :D). This one's my favorite. Absolutely adored the way she wants to have fun in water but not brave enough yet to leave her mom's side :) Have a great start to a great week, all :)

Meet my better half......:)

Can you spot the rust lines on the floor where the bench must have been placed in past......:) Leaving footnotes behind??? :)

The Pumpkin Day and Jack-O-Lanterns!

I dig warm colours and orange's one of them...........so tho' i have no real fascination for pumpkins, i somehow always end up clicking them for that bout of colour they add even to the dullest of the surroundings.........

Hope u have a happy and safe Halloween!!! :)

Mom's the wor(l)d! :)

.......That's the second time am using the title......the last time I did was for Mother's Day : http://mykodak.blogspot.com/2006/05/moms-world.html I must have almost forgotten about this pic as it was shot aeons ago when this camera was newly acquired......... The adorable 6-weeks old Tamani (that means "hope" in Swahili) was the town's darling.................Every afternoon he'd come out for a coupla hours to play in the sun and for public-viewing and we'd all go sighhhhh!!! It was such a wad of fun to see him playing in the sand and tho' it had its aunts and uncles around, it wud never leave his mom's side, nor would she move more than a few inches away from him ever!!!! :) I have a coupla more shots of him, which I would put up as soon as I can locate the CD they are on! It was a struggle to get to shoot him coz of the kids thronging up to watch the baby-elephant they all adored, am lucky I managed to get this one ............... Nevertheless, I was mighty thrilled with my brief date with Tamani :)

Cherub................ :)

Guess what! I just discovered that my camera has some of the pics and all this while I thought I'd deleted them all. Here's a li'l Himachali cherub (btw, i love the way that word rolls off my tongue) with that splendid cap of his..........he was extremely shy and wud just not look into the camera........we tried bribing him with the pencil but guess that was a bad move, he got so enchanted with it that he completely refused to acknowledge moi and my dear camera!!!! :( P.S : Please click on the pic : it looks better when seen in its original size!

Postcards from Shimla - II

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.................... The curtain of mist ........a sight I woke up to every morning :) Dint I say earlier....my heart's in mountains.

Postcards from Shimla - I

A week long sojourn in Shimla with my li'l brother...........an orgy of sight-seeing......it's been a splendid vacation and the best part is it's not over yet....... These glorious sunsets were captured on a rare, singular day that we had sunlight........... My heart's in mountains..........I wish to have a home one day nestled among hills, hid behind conifers, pine scent in the air, Himalayas in the backdrop.................. :)

Objets d'art!

This is from the collection that i have from our visit to St. Augustine, Florida. The place was replete with shops selling antique wares: one wud expect that from a place that stakes its claim to be the oldest city in United States . It's a delightful place, if u care for a lazy stroll down the palm-tree lined town dotted with shops housing antiques, curios, souvenir, colourful family-owned eateries and Spanish-influenced architecture, but they burn a neat li'l hole in ur pocket. I love the paper-weights i picked up from there: http://mykodak.blogspot.com/2006/03/two-cents-worth.html PS: Click on the pic to get a better look!

Two cents' worth!

Well, no pretensions! This was a deliberate attempt to create that nostalgic feeling say Raymond's "The Complete Man" ads bring :) Or the Hallmark cards! Got my paperweights, dropped them on a bed of fallen leaves and there I had, my own "two cents' worth" moment! :)

Chicago River!

This was taken from a bridge over the Chicago River in the downtown. So, what do u see there? Concrete jungle or the li'l speck of sun making its way thro' the highrise to the waters of the river?

Wet,Wet,Wet.

On a rainy Friday afternoon :Didn't I tell ya about the lamp-post and the cycle being my fav. muse?

Lone Ranger?

This shot was taken at North Beach, on a cloudy afternoon. Lovely shades! :)