1k and raga of the week!

Blog stats tells me there have been 1001(my paati will be happy) visitors to my blog so far! It might not be a big number for a blog that is about 4 months old now. But frankly I wasn’t expecting to get that many eyeballs, as I rarely leave comments in blogs and almost never as Dandilsa. And it’s not like I write brilliant stuff for the url to spread by word of mouth. So thanks Subbu and Sid. Glad you guys kept the promise and opened my webpage 10 times a day…Lol! Kidding..People, even if you came here looking for “puliotharai dishes” and went back disappointed: thanks! If not anything else, it is but motivation for me to write more sensibly and frequently! I have only 30-odd comments but I won’t be a hypocrite and ask people to de-lurk (hint hint)

My friend Uts and I are doing a raga a week exercise where we listen to one raga all week-RTPs, all possible krithis and almost everything that pops up on searching for the raga on sangeethapriya. This will hopefully make me “the maami with the discerning ear” I soooo long to be! I have been maintaining a notebook to record the songs and ragas I’m covering. But I realised might as well put it down here-good for the environment and the blog :P. I did a whole week of Kalyani last week. By the end of the week I could recognise a Kalyani from miles away (Wishful thinking!). This week’s Bhairavi- a raga that both my favorite singers - Sanjay and TMK, sing with superb elan! Will keep you posted (pun intended)!

Delurking and Dandilsa

First things first - This is my third attempt at something close to a blog. The previous 2 suffered horrible deaths. While one was gobbled at the hit of a delete button, the other barely saw daylight post registering! However my obsessive compulsive blog reading is getting closer to kilpauk (for non chennai residents -tats were the hospital treating mental disorders is located) with my google reader bursting at its seams. Yet there is the need to talk about somethings to someone - without coming off as arrogant, stupid, insipid, bloated or plain obnoxious..what better way..start a blog! (again!) That’s why I am delurking in the blogworld!

Dandilsa is a word in my family, synonymous with a hog. The story goes that on being nagged by an aunt for more food my grandmother exclaimed asking if there was a dandilsa in her stomach - it being a monster that gobbles up the food leaving you perpetually hungry! To me, the word means family jokes, rib tickling-nicknaming humour that runs in my dad’s side of the family, familiar smells and family gatherings and every other beautiful thing that nostalgia is about. And funnily enough the nom de plume fits perfectly with my OCDesque blog devouring habits. So there - Dandilsa Delurking!