Not sure what Roxie's hourly rate is...

My cat has been very anti-me the past couple of weeks...feel like she's mad
at me because I have been away so much. So I spent some quality time
playing with her last night and now she's all over me. Maybe she knows that
tomorrow she will get spayed and therefore she's being nice...I keep telling
her to watch out with her attitude because she's going to get snip-snipped.
It's probably not nice to say that, but she's a cat.

This is a picture of us working this morning. She's not in the way as long
as she doesn't put her paws on the touchpad...then all heck breaks loose
when you're trying to design and there's an errant paw drawing lines for
you.

It's snowing here again...it's already been the snowiest winter on record in
Philadelphia...I don't mind it, but I do have to go out in this weather for
a massage in a couple of hours. Oh yes...poor me.

The health in the Garimella family is on the mend. Tanuja is her bouncy
self. Spoke to her yesterday and she is a-ok. I went to a GI doctor
yesterday to find out what's going on...and GASP...he's asked me to cut
dairy out of my diet for 6 weeks. Somewhere Wendy is gasping with me. Upon
his recommendation, I'm going for the blitz approach of Nexium (prescription
antacid), overdrive on fiber, cut out dairy, overdrive on yogurt (which
apparently doesn't have lactose), and some blood tests - all in the hopes of
getting me in tip-top shape in a couple of months. He thinks that I could
have developed a TEMPORARY lactose intolerance due to the intestinal
infections from India. You KNOW I walked away emphasizing the word
"temporary" in my head.

So, along with rest of Philadelphia in the pre-snowstorm frenzy, I hit Whole
Foods last night in search of dairy-free products. Cheese-like "cheese",
dairy free ice cream (think water ices), soy milk (which I've always liked),
and cheese-free pizza (think bruschetta). I drew the line at "butter-like
butter". No way. A pat of butter won't kill me. The good thing is that
this is actually a very healthy diet to be on, so I'm looking forward to
that actually.

Anyways, I better go...I'm on work time now...turns out Roxie's marketing
plans are not that solid. Need to find someone else to outsource to.

Last bits of India

Can't believe it's already been a couple of weeks since I got back from India. Just got back yesterday from the Outer Banks, North Carolina - a trip Hasan and I had planned for last August, but couldn't make at the last minute. What a beautiful place. I went this time to visit a new client of mine...awesome group of people that I had a lot of fun with.

I miss my sister and niece. My niece has been intensely sick this past week, hospitalized with typhoid fever. I'm thankful she's now getting better. I have also been sick since my last day in India - some kind of bad intestinal issue. I can tell my sister is concerned for me - so this week I'll need to focus on getting some tests done etc, make sure I too don't have typhoid. It's not something they know how to treat and diagnose that well here in the US, but my doctor is an Indian woman with experience treating typhoid so that makes me feel better. In the meantime, I'm not that interested in food...which is weird for me.

Last week, we started family dinner Sundays with Hasan's family. I like it - these sorts of traditions and gatherings are important, I think. Tomorrow is our turn to host. Hasan wanted to do a fish fry, but my lack of appetite and interest in food is making me not want to cook. So we'll see what we pull together.

Anyways, here's the last set of pictures from India - some cute ones of Tanuja.

View from the living room of the condo I'm staying at on the Outer Banks, North Carolina

Just gorgeous here in Waves, NC