NJ Marathon

4:01:54 is what the official time says based on gun time.
The chip time shows 4:00:18.

Results here

Whatever the no, we have wrested the family record for the marathon as well and bested our previous best by about 41 mins!

More when we get some time. Currently on the West Coast and trying to cope with yet another time zone change.

Since this is a lifetime achievement, will write in a detailed post soon.

NJ Marathon - D Day is here

The day we have been waiting for, is here. Tomorrow is the NJ marathon and we shall attempt to record our best ever timing at this distance.

It is being held in, what we think is a sleepy little suburb along the coast of the Atlantic Ocean.

We have some assorted goodies from y'day when we collected our starter kit incl. a T-Shirt (Yes! Yes!) and a pace band for the wrist. Need to run 26 miles at a 9 min pace.

More when we finish the run.

700 Sundays

Have just begun reading "700 Sundays" by Billy Crystal.
Had left behind all books in India except "The Perfect Distance" as I had planned to buy some in the US. Also, the latter was the only one relevant to Running.
However, we are having fun reading the former, which is a lift from bade bhaiyya.
God bless big brothers.

Fire in the backside

Our flight from Madras to JFK took off about half an late. And then the delay increased to an hr at Dubai. While we were transiting between terminals, one of our co-passengers, a cute surd kid (one of two cute surd kids) screamed, "See Momma, Fire in the backside." Considering that the expression means altogether something different for us, we were a little taken aback. All that it took to clear the air on this one was to follow the kid's pointing to the sky. He was pointing at a flight whose lights were the "fire in the backside!"

So much for fires and planes.

We are well and truly in Dhammerica.

Are now in Chicago and waiting to post two blogs on our visit to Broadway and a raunchy play.

Also pending are some pics of the Boardwalk in NJ and some from Chicago.

All in due time.

Like our wise old friend in Portland says, I shouldn't be surfing in the US. There is a lot of time to do that. Back to the city experience now

Voice of Dhammerica

This is to kick start our series of posts on our first ever visit to the US.
Amongst several things that we shall be doing are

The New Jersey Marathon on 29th Apr

Assorted visits to NYC, Chicago, Portland, Seattle, Bay Area, etc.

Hope to post several posts on this theme.

If you had read this you will know why this series will be called Dhammerica.

More later

Flightless bird

Takeoff 8 pm. Land 2 am!

In one of our routine across the country romps, we managed to take off from Bombay at 8:10 pm, feeling all warm and fuzzy about returning to the centre of our universe, otherwise known as Bangalore.

Rain and thunderstorms while making the view from the plane exciting, turned an otherwise dull day into an awful one. First, incessant rain ensured we burnt fuel hovering around the city. Then, expectedly we ran out of fuel for any more hovering. So the pilot informed us that the weather in Madras is better and we would land there!

So we end up in an unused portion of Madras airport. We refuel, but can’t get clearance for takeoff due to congestion in Bangalore! Then, one passenger gets sick. Some foreign tourists want to get off the plane as they can’t take the heat anymore. There is a general unhealthy buzz about the plane and the collective frustration of some hundred sulking people! To add to the merriment, the pilot informed us that there were no step ladders outside and hence we could not step out.

We got some Cookieman cookies to eat, courtesy Jet and then drank 3 bottles of
lemonade. Add to it some 6 bottles of water and we want Loo Bega!
Eventually we do get to Bangalore in the wee hours of the morning. Auto driver wants extra cash. We give him solemn advice. Poor guy’s meter let him down 

We had fun talking to some passengers while walking around the closed plane about what would have been if we had had to hover around Chennai as well!

Literary Guide to the World

If you were wondering," What is the Literary Guide to the World?", click on the link to understand this delightful offering from Salon

Poornachandra Tejaswi RIP

The only Kannada book I have read till date was written by this affable author.
The book in question is Parisarada Kathe (Story of Nature).


Poornachandra Tejaswi was the son of the Kannada literary giant, Kuvempu, who passed away a while ago. Under such a legacy, he managed to carve out a place for himself while writing and working for environmental issues, amongst others.

May his soul rest in peace, if only for the immense pleasure I derived from reading the book.

All Fools Day Run

Long Run with some buddies from RFL happened on this special day at the UAS campus.
About 34 km in about 3 hrs 40 mins with some generous breaks in between for waterstops. Ran at an even pace for the first two laps, but the later laps were under testing heat. Abandoned plans for even 36 km to ensure no injuries happen.

Now we wait for Apr 21st and then 29th