FORT RUINS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The pictures are from an outing to the ruins of a fort on the outskirts of our city.

Sadly, the experience wasn’t as exciting or even remotely close to how good the pictures make it look. After driving for over 50 kilometres on a dusty, dry, un-aesthetic and overcrowded highway, we reached this place much hyped about as a weekend get-away.

 

Well, you do feel like getting away.

From the place!!

Especially if you had harboured great expectations based on the hype on websites (what were they all thinking?!!) and are rudely greeted by a ill-maintained, ramshackle fort right in the middle of a crowded but insignificant town!

The clear blue skies, the rustic old countryside and the tiny little town actually looked  more picturesque in our photographs than in reality.

 

The only saving grace was the lovely weather that day, which kind of made up for the rest of the disappointments.

We tried to make the best of the trip - climbed right up to the peaks of those huge rocks, raced down the stone-staircase ruins, chased a herd of goats and munched on the delicious picnic lunched Daddy had prepared.

And made some beautiful pictures.

 

Of course, the reason you don’t see Shadow in the pictures is because we had gone on this trip long before he came to live to us. Early October last year, to be exact.

We know he would love to climb those rocks, but we certainly aren’t ever going back to that disappointing place again. It isn’t worth all the time and energy you spend.

 

After all, there is a whole big, beautiful world out there, waiting  to be explored…

 

Wags,

Ginger and Buddy

 

 

We are linking to ‘SKYWATCH’.

For more skies from around the world, please do click HERE.

 

 

Technorati Tags: Bhongir Fort,Andhra Pradesh,India,Ginger and Buddy,Rock climbing,Weekend get-away

OUR FERAL NEIGHBOURS!!

For almost two years now, there is this jeep lying abandoned beside our backyard gate.
Occasionally it wheezes, coughs, sputters and emits a dark, all suffocating smoke in response to its owner’s (Our eccentric neighbour!) hopeful attempts to bring it back to life!

What purpose it was meant to serve, lying dormant for the last two years, we could never fathom.
Till the other day…

 

 

 

 

 

View Full Album

 
 

View Full Album

 
Maybe everything, however irrelevant or extraneous it may appear, actually does serve a purpose in life.

 

 
We just hope our eccentric and unpredictable neighbour doesn’t decide to drive them out of their home and …err…drive their home away!!
 
 

Paws crossed for our furry neighbours,

Ginger, Buddy n Shadow

We are playing ABC WEDNESDAY with Mrs. Nesbitt and her Fabulous Team.

Our offering for the week : 'F' is for Feral.

Technorati Tags: Ginger,Buddy,Shadow,Neighbours,Home,Photography,Life,India,Feral cats

SOME MUCH NEEDED LAUGHS….:)

 

 

 

 

 

 

(The pictures belong to whoever has the copyright. We just found them on Google!)

 

All we have been doing since last night is read, read and read more about Blogger - woes!!

And unless we mean to write some thesis someday on this woeful topic, we decided we might as well stop!

Well, no amount of installing and uninstalling would bring back the comments tab on Ginger’s Beach post. So, we have given up.

At least the tab shows up in our new posts. Thank Dog!

 

Thanks for all your comments and suggestions. Whether they prove technically helpful or not is never the issue. It is a relief to know our problem is not an uniquely hopeless one!

 

 

Have a Happy Week ahead,

Wagging again,

Buddy, Ginger n Shadow

 

 

Technorati Tags: Ginger,Buddy,Shadow,Jokes,Laugh,Cartoons,Funny Signboards

PLEASE HELP!!!

Dear Friends,
For some reason, our ‘Post Comment’ tab has disappeared from our earlier post!!
Mummy was trying to install ‘Intense Debate Comments’ form and now neither that nor our original blogger form shows up.

We are so very upset.
We wait so eagerly for all your encouraging and delightful comments....
We tried everything but the tab just won't show up. Do you know how to get past this irritating blogger tantrum?

Please do leave your suggestions, if any?
And if you are using 'Intense debate', please let us know what we can do if the comment form doesn't show up inspite of following ALL their instructions.

Maybe we should just stick to our conventional form. Your thoughts are more important than some fancy form anyday.

Thank you in advance, anyways

Woebegone,

Ginger, Buddy n Shadow

Technorati Tags: Ginger,Buddy,Shadow,Blogger woes

A DOG’S LOVE…

 

And together we walk through Life…..

Live, love, laugh…..

 

 

 

 

Ginger

 

 

Technorati Tags: Ginger,Beach,Suryalanka Resort,Love,Life,Photography

D for Durrell and E for Esmeralda

 

‘Dear Mr. Durrell,

I am ten years old and in my opinion you are the best zoologist in the British Isles (except Peter Scott).

Would you please send me your autograph?’

 
 
This very endearing letter was meant for Gerald Durrell, the most enjoyable zoologist we have ever come across.

 

 

(Googled pics)

Born in Jamshedpur in India in 1925, Durrell’s family moved back to Britain after his father’s death.
Gerald Durrell was and still is one of Britain’s most popular and delightful writers, an avid zoologist and a passionate naturalist.
 

‘My Family and Other Animals’ is the most celebrated in the series of books this amazing man went on to write.
 

 

 
By his own admission, he wrote in order to finance his innumerable expeditions to various parts of the world – missions to collect rare specimens for preservation in his zoo.
Thank Dogness he chose to raise funds this way, for otherwise we would never have had the pleasure of knowing this wonderful pawson as we do now.
 
His unique brand of humour, his extraordinary wit, his childlike enthusiasm and his dedication to save the unique wildlife of our planet is an inspiration that is powerful enough to motivate both the old and young alike.
No wonder his work lives on after him and is very efficiently carried on by the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust

 
Mummy came across ‘My Family and Other Animals’ in a seconds-sale book store some years back.
At first she wasn’t very sure.
‘An autobiography you say?’ she enquired of the man who was trying hard to push this book into Mummy’s already stuffed bag.
 
And then Mummy read the prologue.
Well, Gerald Durrell doesn’t call it that. He calls it ‘The Speech for the Defence’.
 
The moment she was through the first 5 lines she had decided, ‘Do you have any more of this author’s works?’
The shopkeeper was afraid he did not.
That didn’t deter her from researching this wonderful writer and over time we have collected many of his works.
 

You might be wondering about the words that were responsible for our instant change of heart about autobiographies.

 

 

The Speech for the Defence

 

‘Why,sometimes I believe in as many as six impossible things before breakfast.’

The White Queen – Alice Through the Looking-Glass

 
This is the story of a five-year sojourn that I and my family made on the Greek island of Corfu. It was originally intended to be a mildly nostalgic account of the natural history of the island, but I made a grave mistake by introducing my family into the book in the first few pages. Having got themselves on paper, they then proceeded to establish themselves and invite various friends to share the chapters.
It was only with the greatest difficulty, and by exercising considerable cunning, that I managed to retain a few pages here and there which I could devote exclusively to animals.

 
Gerald Durrell dedicates this delightful book to his mother.
 
‘I should like to pay special tribute to my mother, to whom this book is dedicated. As my brother Larry rightly points out, we can be proud of the way we have brought her up; she is a credit to us.’

 

(Googled pic)

 

Never have we come across a more engrossing, delightful and amusing autobiography in our entire lives. Not that we read many autobiographies, we don’t. But this particular one is just ‘un –putdownable’!
It is amazing that a single man’s tale about his life with a fleet of animals and birds will prove to be so delightfully bewitching.
 
We can go on and on about Durrell but we chose to quote his brother Larry who has, very succinctly, summarised all that anyone could say about him.

 
 
‘The child is mad, snails in his pockets!’ – Lawrence Durrell, 1931
‘The child is mad, scorpions in matchboxes!’ - Lawrence Durrell, 1935
‘The child is mad, working in a pet shop!’ - Lawrence Durrell, 1939
‘The boy is mad, wanting to be a zoo keeper!’ - Lawrence Durrell, 1945
‘The man is mad, crawling about snake-infested jungles!’ - Lawrence Durrell, 1952
‘The man is mad, wanting to have a zoo!’ - Lawrence Durrell, 1958
‘The man is mad.
Invite him to stay and he puts an eagle in your wine cellar!’ - Lawrence Durrell, 1967

‘The man is mad.’ - Lawrence Durrell, 1972
 
 

Obviously, after getting engrossed in the enthralling ensemble of Gerald Durrell’s books, the only ‘E’ word that emerged is ‘ESMERALDA’.
 
To introduce Esmeralda to you as a pig would be nothing short of sacrilege for Monsieur Clot, to whom she belonged, regarded her with a reverence accorded to a saint!

Gerald Durrell’s encounter with this illustrious Esmeralda is worth a read.
Had it not been for his many sojourns, this specific one in a delectable little French village of Perigord, and for his wish to explore the glorious countryside that particular autumn afternoon, we would never have known of Esmeralda!


 
Presently, I sat down on the sturdy carcase of an elderly oak to enjoy my lunch and just as I had finished there was a rustling in the dead ginger-coloured bracken and an enormous pig appeared. She was as surprised to see me as I was to see her. We gazed at each other with interest.
She had small golden eyes full of wisdom and mischief, her ears drooped down each side of her face like a nun’s habit.
She had about her an aura not, as one would assume, of pig but a delicate fragrant scent that conjured up spring meadows ablaze with flowers.
I had never smelt a pig like her.
 

 
Durrell proceeded to lure her into his station wagon, drove down to the village inn he was staying in and found the redoubtable owner, Jean.

 
‘Oh!la la!’ said Jean. ‘It is Esmeralda. Oh, Monsieur Clot will be out of his mind. You must take her back to him at once, Monsieur. Monsieur Clot thinks the world of that pig. You must take her back immediately.’
‘Monsieur Clot lives in “Les Arbousier ’s”, he said.
‘And where is that?’ I asked.
‘You know, his land joins on to Monsieur Mermod’s.’
‘I don’t know Monsieur Mermod.’
‘Oh, but you must know him, he’s our carpenter. He lives down in the valley by the river.
Well, you drive through the village.’
‘Which way?’
‘That way,’ he said, and pointed.
‘And then?’
‘You turn left at Mademoiselle Hubert’s house and…’
‘I don’t know Mademoiselle Hubert or her house. What does it look like?’
‘It is brown.’
‘All the houses in the village are brown. How can I recognise it?’
He thought deeply.
‘Ah’, he said at last, ‘today is Thursday. So she will be cleaning. So, elfin, she will hang her little red mat out of the bedroom window.’
‘Today is Tuesday.’
‘Ah, you are right. If it is Tuesday, she will be watering her plants.’
‘So I turn left at the brown house where the lady is watering her plants. What then?’
‘You drive past the war-memorial, past Monsieur Pelligot’s house and then, when you come to the tree, you turn left.’
‘What tree?’
‘The tree at the turning where you turn left.’
‘The whole of Perigord is filled with trees. The roads are lined with trees. How can I distinguish this tree from the others?’
Jean looked at me in astonishment.
‘Because it is the tree against which Monsieur Herolte killed himself,’ he said, ‘and it is where his widow goes and lays a wreath in his memory on the anniversary of his death. You can tell by the wreath.’
‘When did he die?’
‘It was in June1950,sixth or seventh, I can’t be sure. But certainly June.’
‘We are now in September – will the wreath still be there?’
‘Oh, no, they clear it away when it fades.’
‘So is there any other way of identifying that tree?’
‘It is an oak,’ he said.
‘The countryside is full of oaks – how will I know this particular one?’
‘It has a dent in it.’
‘So there I turn left. Where is Monsieur Clot’s house?’
‘Oh,you can’t miss it. It is a long, low,white building, a real oldstyle farmhouse.’
‘So I just look for a white farmhouse.’
‘Yes, but you can’t see it from the road.’
‘Then how will I know when I am there?’
He thought about it carefully.
‘There is a little wooden bridge with one plank missing,’
He said. ‘That is Monsieur Clot’s drive.’
 
 
Whether Durrell manages to find Monsieur Clot's farmhouse and bring back  Esmeralda to him is for you to find out!


We envisage that our efforts at reviewing Gerald Durrell’s books have left you duly enamoured by this enchanting man and that you are sufficiently enticed to go explore his enthralling world yourself.

Well, buy, beg, borrow or steal one if you have to, but please just go read Durrell.
 
As for ‘Esmeralda’, her story is the first in the collection published as ‘Marrying off Mother and Other Stories.’

 

Enchant e',

Ginger

 

 

 

This is our entry for this week’s ABC wednesday with Denise Nesbitt and her encouraging team. Because we missed posting last week, we have encumbered you with both ‘D’ and ‘E’ this week.

Technorati Tags: Ginger,Buddy,Shadow,ABC Wednesday,Gerald Durrell,My Family and Other Animals,Zoologist,Autobiography,Humour,Book Review

DEAREST FRIENDS…

 

We are just so very thankful.

We definitely have the BEST friends in all of blogdom. For that matter, the Best Friends one can ever wish for.

 

We have been so, so behind in blog visits and commenting and stuff, of late.

But in spite of that, you have all been with us and have always taken the time to come visit us.

Not only do you visit us, you actually patiently trounce the all prevailing blogger owes and leave us the most wonderful, kindest and the most touching comments.

 

Thank you so very much from the bottom of our hearts. We cherish all the friendships we have found here. Sometimes, we feel they are more real than the real ones, if you know what we mean.

 

We want so much to be able to go visit each and every one of you. But things have been pretty crazy around here, what with our shifting plans and Mummy’s work.

We tried hard to squeeze in our Valentine Day post- yes, a very special post too in honour of our little brother Shadow – and raced against time to make it on D-Day, but Time outraced us!

If you noticed it, our V-Day post was on the 15^th of Feb!!

We were a little upset. But then we decided it was alright.

After all it is not the day that matters as much as the thought behind celebrating it.

V-Day is actually just a reminder for us to spread a little love, friendship and joy. So what if we do it a day later.

 

We hope you all had a fabulous day and hugged and kissed everypuppy you love in this world.

And in the process, also got some nice pressies and treats.

 

We had a quiet day at home with Daddy while Mummy worked the ENTIRE day!

(Daddy is done with his notice period and will soon be relieved from work and is, these days enjoying being a full time house-husband! We think Mummy is a tiny-winy bit jealous that he gets to stay home and do whatever he likes, while she has to go to work!)

It being a Monday did not help matters. Like Lola had mentioned, it is certainly not Mummy’s favourite day of the week since it is usually the busiest.

 

But she did fix us a special dinner – Mummy special tomato-chicken and loads of bones.

There wasn’t any cake though.

 

Now, ever since Booker’s Mama told our Mummy how to make a strawberry shortcake, we have been dying to have some.

Ah! For some nice, juicy cake!

Sadly, it is already too hot for fresh strawberries in this part of the world. Or for Blueberries or Raspberries or any other berry for that matter.

 

But berries or no berries, we think Mummy should at least bake us a plain old vanilla cake and top it with whipped cream. We are ready to settle for that.

We will definitely let you know if our luck turns!

 

(Thanks, Google, for this picture. Maybe Mummy will be inspired by it!)

 

And we hope Mummy will manage to help us visit everybody by the time this week ends. That is a good long rope, don’t you think?

 

Wags,

Ginger, Buddy n shadow

 

 

Technorati Tags: Ginger,Buddy,Shadow,Friendship,Love,Life

OUR VALENTINE….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We LOVE YOU Heaps, Shadow Baby.

We think YOU make the CUTEST Valentine in the WHOLE WIDE WORLD!

 

 

 

 

Wags and hugs,

Ginger, Buddy, Mummy and Daddy

 

 

HAPPY HAPPY VALENTINE’s Day, Everypuppy!

 

 

 

Technorati Tags: Ginger,Buddy,Shadow,Valentine's Day,Labrador Retriever,Indian Dog,Photography,Family,Love

LOVE

 

 

 

 ‘ Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage’

- Lao Tzu

 

 

Technorati Tags: Ginger,Buddy,Shadow,Love,Life,Family,Indian Dog,Labrador Retriever,Photography,Monochrome world

IT’S ME, SHADOW

Hiya Everybodys!

I is here to give you a quick pupdate.

Don’ts you worry. I won’t be taking muches of your time like my Big sis Ginger who writes so very very long posts!

Here’s my latest photo- portrait, just in case you’ve forgotten what I looks like!

 

 

Mummy says Gin-gin has taken after one of those great fhi-lo-so-furs like Leo-nerd-o- the-vin-chi or Eris-total, she likes to ponders over life so much.

Once she is done wif her walkie and dinner, she justs like to lie there and go into deeeep thots.

Not that she doesn’t plays wif me, she does. But only if she wants to.

Buts I do love and admire her very, very muches.

I fink she is very, very full of smartnesses and has tot me a lot about the ways of life at home.

 

The 5 Bestest finks she tot me are –

1. Smell the flowers everyday, get mud on your nose but DONOTS dig up Mummy’s pots.
2. A good book is to be read, NOT chewed.
3. Make sures EVERYONE is in bed before you sleep.
4. You sleep Bestest at night when u snuggle closest to Mummy.
5. Greet everyone wif a Good-morning nose-kiss.

 

And she always lets me snuggles up to her and go to sleep.

 

 

 

My big brother Buddy is a REAL fun guy.

He is just forevers ready to play wif me, any time of the days or nights.

He never ever get angry wif me even when I take away his treats right from insides his mouth.

I only does it to make him play chase wif me, and he always understands.

He is so atheletic and gentle too.

He is my role-model and I tries to do everythings just like he does.

I fink I want to be just like hims when I grow up.

 

 

 

Now for my Pupdate.

Does you remember my earlier post where I has told you about my mission to modify Mummy’s slippers?

Well, I am still working on thems and is doing very well.

Look…!

 

Three wooden-balls down and just one mores to go!!

 

Mummy says I has been a very, very GOOD BOY. Somefink to do wif me not chewing the real slippers.

Why would I wants to chew her slippers? I wonders…

 

Anyways, I got to go now.

It is hard work writing a post all by meself. And there are so many finks to be done always.

Right now a Moth is getting away…

 

Wiggles-wag-wag-wag-wag,

Shadow

 

 

Hey Moth, Moth, Moth…get down and play wif me… please get down…

Hello Lizard, will you get down insteads…please please…

 

OH! Why doesn’t somebuddy get downs?

....Huh…Sigh!!…ZZZzzzz…

 

 

Technorati Tags: Ginger,Buddy,Shadow,Labrador Retriever,Indian Dog,Shadow's mission,Photography,Life,Family