Last week of December was the Winter break, and now after a week of sleeping, and eating when I please, my circadian rhythms are all over the place, and I am feeling enormously tired and jet lagged although I went no further than Chennai (about 300 km east of where I live) to my parents’ place.
As you might have guessed from my blog title and first sentence, I spent the break alternating between being a couch potato, and being a lazy hippo wallowing in the water, and felt thoroughly relaxed in the process.
All my RSI-related aches and pains, and Vitamin D deficiency-related pains faded away taking me to a mellow place. And yes, the multiple bottles of beer helped too 😀 .
Here’s a quick rundown of all the happenings.
Got hooked on to Netflix
When Netflix was introduced earlier last year, I was bemused over the hysteria it generated among my friends and colleagues. Every one I knew was signing up for it. At the time, I did a quick scan of the offering, and to me it seemed quite a hefty monthly subscription, especially when I have so little time to watch TV. Also, there was no Game of Thrones listed on it, and so I just patted myself on the back for saving me some money.
But I spoke too soon, I guess. I spent the winter break at my parents’ home in Chennai, and was amazed to see my mom, dad, and my 93-year old grandma, all glued to their respective devices watching their favorite shows and movies on Netflix.
Hmm, I need to get up to the times (or at least to my granny), and so signed up for a free monthly trial. And that’s it, I was hooked. After the kids slept, every night, I borrowed my brother’s iPad Pro (awesome display just perfect for watching videos), and rapidly binge-watched the first two seasons of The Tudors (review coming soon), and The Lincoln Lawyer – fantastic movie, which does full justice to the book, and I just loved Mathew McConnaughey in it. He’s such a charismatic leading man, I am always surprised why he’s not more successful than he is.
Now that I am back at work, and my days start early and end late, I highly doubt I’ll keep up the subscription. I do want to catch the remaining seasons of The Tudors though, and maybe catch up with Sherlock, and the movie Carol starring Cate Blanchett – (one of my favorite actresses) looks very interesting too.
All right! I am addicted. I admit it.
Harry Potter Revisited
I’ve urged Snubnose to try Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone for the past year now, and she’s been stubbornly resisting. She’s at this stage now, where it is no longer cool to like the things mom likes.
Anyway,something changed during the Winter break (probably her friends talking about it maybe?), and she started Harry Potter, and just like that we have another Potterhead in the house.
While zipping through the first two books in the series, she peppered me with questions on the plot, why x happened, why z happened, that I knew I just had to reread the series again to answer her questions properly. And now more than a decade later, thanks to Snubnose, I’ve fallen in love with Harry Potter and J.K. Rowling all over again.
Sun, Sea, and Sand
While Snubnose and I were immersed in our Harry Potter books, Piglet remained co-operative through most of the days – content to play with his Duplo blocks, read his own favorite books, and was generally just overall low-maintenance.
But come evenings, it was time to cool down in the beach nearby. If not the nearby beach, then it was chilling at the pool in a nearby resort, or visiting the crocodiles, or boating (all documented here).
And tons of food
What’s a vacation without an endless supply of food and drink? K stocked up the mini-fridge with bottles of beer, and dozens of ice-cream sticks. My mom’s home cooking was simply delicious – tons of fried potato, and sambar, and fried yams, and bajjis – you get the picture.
In addition to home cooking, we gave my mom a couple of nights off, ordering in food from the delicious Little Italy next door, New Year’s Eve dinner was from the Chinese place – Cascade two blocks down the road. All in all, making sure that I didn’t have to burn one little calorie to gorge on massive amounts of food.
The impact can now be seen in the new year where I am struggling to get my pants above my hips, and desperate to get rid of the beer bloat. Time for some health and fitness resolutions!
So that was how 2016 ended, people! I had originally planned to do a long-ish look back on 2016, but I was surprised to find I have very little to say about 2016. It was mostly a year of working myself to the bone in all respects – work, family, blog, it seemed that everything took top priority this year, and I find that while 2016 wasn’t a bad year personally, the general 2016 trends – Syria, Brexit, Trump, demonetization, so many deaths, all this makes me very apprehensive about 2017. I really do have my fingers crossed that 2017 works out better than 2016.
How did you end 2016? What are you looking forward to in 2017? Any resolutions, goals, plans, you’d like to share? I’m still thinking daydreaming on what I want to get done in 2017.
Awwwww, I am so delighted that you and Snubnose are revisiting Harry Potter. My own mother pushed those books on me not tremendously long after they first came up, and I was too cool for them as well — I thought the titles were silly and the covers were sillier, and then when I finally read them I was of course entranced. I feel very heartwarmed that this same experience is now transmitting to the next generation. 😀
@readingtheend:disqus I agree, the titles and covers sound and look ridiculous. I was drooling over the illustrated versions of the books that are now in the shops. They look so beautiful. But quite impractical for reading – overlarge and very heavy.
good for you that you got time to chill out…. this time of the year is usually so manic
@disqus_gmoXW9BOB2:disqus We have an annual shutdown at work, so Christmas is generally relaxing, but the weeks leading up to that shutdown though? Manic.