The shameless fraudsters a.k.a 24 Hour Fitness

A couple of months ago, I was forced to join a gym in spite of not liking gyms much because one of the classes at my beloved community recreation center got canceled and I could not find a suitable replacement for it.

In spite of some initial disputes with them(never ignore warning signs), I wound up signing a month-to-month contract at 24 Hour Fitness as it is conveniently located. Now, being the ever vigilant exerciser, I had read plenty of reviews online for 24 hour Fitness. Almost all of them sounded upset about 24 hour Fitness's cancellation policy. Apparently you would invariable be charged for one extra month after cancellation.

I decided to be extra careful and asked about the cancellation policy during sign up and was told that it would be no problem at all, I would simply have to cancel before my credit card got charged and I would have terminated the membership from then on. That sounded reasonable.

While signing up, I was charged the last month's fee too along with the first month's. I made a reminder for myself to call up to cancel my membership in May first week since I did not want to go to the gym from June and since the last month was already paid for, I would not have to pay for May. So far so good.

So today I called up the 24 Hour Fitness people and the operator there coolly informed me that I would be charged for one more month and since I had already paid for the last month, my membership would be active till July! I explained that since I had already paid the last month's dues, there was no reason to charge me for the month of May - they could use for my last month's paid fees for the month of May.

Then this idiot tells me "Oh, we have a 30 day cancellation policy". Well, if that was the case, I did want to cancel in June only but was giving him a 30 day advance notice by informing him in May! But apparently the prepaid last month's dues were some kind of Gandhi-kanakku* which was in some limbo-world where it could not be included as fees for the 30 day notice period.

I asked him why and he said that the payment request would have already been sent to my credit card company though the billing date is 8 days from now. I found this explanation ridiculous as any idiot knows that credit company's will *very* easily stop payment requests even two days before the due date.

So I asked him if it is was okay that I called up my credit card company to stop the payment if they found it so difficult to do it themselves. He said okay. Now this sounded too easy but since I did not have an option, I just got a cancellation confirmation number and hung up.

Then I called up my credit card company and they tell me that they cannot stop a payment request unless it comes from the requester, in this case, 24 Hour Fitness, itself - however I could dispute the charge once it was processed. Okaaaaaaaaaaay.

Since I wasn't sure what would happen in case of a disputed charge, I did a quick google search for other user cancellation experiences with 24-hour Fitness and was stunned by the number of complaint stories which showed up. The crux of the matter was 24 hour Fitness is well known for ripping off cancelling customers and has also been involved in a resultant class action suit which resulted in settlement with the plaintiffs.

Quite a few people had faced the exact same scenario that I have. And here is the rub, if users disputed the charge, in some case, 24 Hour Fitness came after them with collection agencies!!!! WTH!! Obviously, I don't want that to happen and now I am being initmidated into ponying up for a service I am not going to use. Aarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!

I am so irritated right now. Their cancellation policy is extortionist in the first place - fine! At least, shouldn't they take the time to explain it to new members especially when they specifically ask for it? Or is this the way that 24 Hour Fitness makes money - by duping people? What kind of horrible corporate ethical business practice standards do they have?

I know one thing for sure, from June, I am never going to go back there again. I am also going to actively persuade people I know to consider other gymming options before they choose this big fraud dump.

Now I am seriously worried since there were quite a few people on the web who had stories where 24 Hour Fitness continued to charge them for months after they had cancelled their membership and had collection agencies come after them when they refused to pay it! I really hope I am not one of them and my relationship with this fraud-house ends permanently in June. Good riddance.

*Gandhi kanakku literally translates to Gandhi's account. Essentially it is equivalent to throwing money down a drain.

Fact for the day

Raw celery eaten by itself tastes horrible. Yuckkkk! I am so glad I am not a super model.

Of videos and video stores

Between the ages of 8-11, I spent three years in Calcutta when my banker dad was posted there. Those were the good old days when DD was the only channel that came on TV. In Calcutta, most of the programs on DD were broadcast in Bengali.

My family's knowledge of Bengali extended to saying "I don't know Bengali" in Bengali. Thus, we used to wait with great eagerness for the very few Hindi and English programs which were broadcast: Ramayana (later Mahabharata), World this Week, Giant Robot (o boy, my sis and I used to *love* this show in spite of being able to predict exactly how the story would go - alien monster attacks city, baffled police unable to contain it, police let loose Giant Robot, Giant Robot vanquishes monster, everyone cheers- only the appearance of the monster changed from week to week), He-man cartoons etc. etc.

But this still precluded watching any show in Tamil but for the odd Tamil song or two which used to pop up in the national integration song show (forgot the name) and the odd Tamil movie (usually from the period immediately after the silent movie era) which showed up once in a blue moon as the DD Sunday movie.

Enter the VCR. In Calcutta we stayed in the Lake Market area. This area had quite a sizable Tamilian population and hence it was fairly easy to locate Tamil magazines, vegetables, you name it. The area also had a video store which rented out the latest Tamil movies. I even remember the name of the store - Balaji Videos. Most weekends, we rented Tamil movies/ song shows/ dramas etc. to watch during the time we were at home.

We also rented Hindi and English movies to watch. We watched almost all the Shammi Kapoor movies as everyone in my family liked him. We also watched a lot of old English movies as my dad was fond of them and both dad and mom has fond memories of watching them as newly weds. Oftentimes, Dad would remember the name of a good English movie and it would be on the rental list for the next weekend.

Sometimes, we managed to exhaust our weekend supply of movies rather fast. Then, my sister and I would make the 15 minute trip (by walk) to the video store to pick up some movie. Usually other than our desire to watch a movie trumping our desire to crib about the walk, these trips passed off uneventfully.

Once, my dad told the name of a movie about a shipwreck which had a rather unique name. Sis and I carefully memorized it and set off. On the way we got engrossed in other conversation and when we reached the store and went up to the counter to request the movie, we realized that neither of us could recall the movie's name other than the fact that it started with a P. Uh-oh, now what!

So we both racked our brains and finally concluded that the movie we were looking for was "Pobsbion Journey". Now this did sound like a funny name for a movie but then, hey, we did remember it was a weird name. So we both confidentally strode up to the counter and asked for "Pobsbion Journey". The video store guy had never heard of such a movie and asked us if that was indeed the movie name. Not the ones to lose face, we both said, "Yes, it is!" Seeing that the conversation was going nowhere, we asked if we could use the store phone to call our dad to confirm the movie name.

Mercifully, the store guy said okay. We called up home and asked my surprised dad, "What movie did you say you wanted, daddy?"

Dad said, "Poseidon Adventure*. Why, did you forget?"

"Oh no, no, just confirming".

With that we shamefacedly went back to the video store guy and asked for the movie "Poseidon Adventure", which turned out to be very readily available!

You would think this incident would have made us more careful in the future about writing down the movie name before heading out. No way! We were way too smart for that. That's how I once wound up asking for the movie "Kelavan" (meaning old man in Tamil) when my dad had asked for the Hindi movie "Caravan". Sigh, I never learn, do I?

There are a few other movie-name mistakes too, but I think this will do now!

* Obviously, not the 2006 version of the movie.

Technology ki jai ho

Have you folks seen this video clip from Britain's Got Talent show, yet? If not, please, please, please do:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY

Isn't it amazing? I actually got goosebumps on my skin when I heard her sing the first bar!

I saw the video for the first time about a bunch of days back when it was linked on the popular India Uncut blog. Since then everywhere I turn, I seem to be seeing news about this lady. First, it was all over the internet news sites and blogs. Then, this morning, while at the gym (yup, no cable so no TV watching at home), I saw a news clip on CNN in the morning news about the sensation Susan Boyle has caused!

I have obviously never met her, but Susan Boyle comes across as a very optimistic, upbeat and sweet person. Since the time I saw the video I am rooting for her. Everytime I hear or read something positive about her, the voice inside my head goes "yaaay"!

When I saw the news on CNN this morning, it struck me all over again as to just how much technology has helped us in shrinking our world. Ten years ago I am very sure I would have never heard about Susan Boyle and quite probably neither would have any person living outside of Britain. Now all it takes for me is a few clicks to find out not only who the person is but also what the sang and how they sang it! Wow!

Really - information overload is sometimes sweeeeeeeet!

Mahabharata's hidden cast

So the other day I was getting my monthly Hollywood entertainment news fix. As a rule, this is done when getting my monthly indulgence pedicure (mmmmmhhhh). However, this time round, I found myself in a waiting lounge with more than an hour to kill and a fairly recent issue of People magazine nestling in the waiting room literature.

I have heard (and seen) that some westerners feel that any vague information they know related to India makes them a minor authority on exotic/spiritual a.k.a Indian stuff. With such folks, it usually becomes fairly obvious that this exotic knowledge extends to hearing of the name Gandhi or attending yoga classes or seeing *one* made-for-an-international-audience Indian movie. Usually I just smile indulgently when I come across such examples.

But this comment from Jonathan Rhys-Meyers (no, I don't know him from Adam and frankly, I don't care either - I just memorized his name so I could make fun of him *evil grin*) I read in the magazine made me giggle uncontrollably. Basically various celebrities were asked about books they had liked. Our hero had to be different and make this thoroughly enlightened remark:

"The Mahabharata. It's pretty extraordinary. It includes the ultimate symbols of romance, like Emperor Shah Jahan building the Taj Mahal for his wife."

Dude, while I do agree that the Mahabharata is filled with countless main characters, side characters and sides for the side characters, to the best of my belief and knowledge, Emperor Shah Jahan, his wife and the Taj Mahal very definitely do not feature in the cast. Thank you.

Status update

I know there are at least two people who *will* read this blog irrespective of what I write in it: 1. Mommy dearest 2. SK. At least they have promised so. So I shall assume they do and keep up my word of trying to post at least once a week.

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So, what have I been upto?

- I have officially gotten green tea mania. All efforts by parents/friends to make me drink green tea the past few years have resulted in me going, "Yuck, this so tastes like boiled green leaves" except when I am downing it with Chinese or Japanese food. But a few weeks ago I got sudden inspiration (I read plenty of great things about green tea, which I have read before too - but the stars aligned that day) to inculcate green tea into my daily diet. The first few days were torture - I had to mask the taste of the tea with other condiments and had to force myself to gulp it down while scrunching up my face in a very unladylike manner. But soon the tasted started to grow on me. Believe it or not folks, I have now given up on my morning and noon-time coffee and replaced it with green tea and drink at least three cups a day - yaay! Now whether this change is actually having any effect on my health is completely debatable. At any rate, I feel highly virtuous when I thumb my nose at the coffee pot while passing it in the kitchen!

- This crazy California weather is driving me crazy. Some nights start out warm only to turn extremely cold by day break. Other nights start out cold and become all warm and cozy by day break. Since I am too intent upon sleeping to either pull on another comforter or take one off the huge pile on top of me, I wind either shivering or sweating on most mornings. Aaaaaargh!

- Adjusting to the day light savings time change this year was a breeze. I had a class to go to on the morning of the DST change and hence could not sleep in and had to get up per the adjusted time. Thus I did not have to experience the shock of finding the time ahead of what I had expected it to be all day. After 7 years of going through DST change, I finally realize that all I had needed to not feel grumpy when DST began was to get up by the adjusted DST clock as soon as it changed. Oh well, better late than never!

- Never buy that big bag of spinach from Costco unless you have to feed a family of 10 adults. Seriously, that bag is like an akshaya-patram - never ending. I have eaten enough spinach in the past one week to turn me into a green-hued human being. Yet I still have more than one third of the bag left to finish. I think I am going to take the advice of my colleagues and boil and freeze the rest of it for future use to avoid automatic gag-reflex at the sight of spinach.

- Everyone should invest some money in the stock-market and/or join some kind of fitness program just so they have something to talk about at the office lunch hour. These topics provide an inexhaustible source of conversation and also help tremendously in redirecting conversation when it starts heading towards details of how little Munna/Chutki/Poppins celebrated their birthday or starts a "my kid is smarter/is naugtier/eats worse than yours" contest.

- I really ought to come up with better topics for a blog post. I think I have caught a particularly virulent strain of writer's block. Get well soon to me!

Rain

It has been raining and pouring in California for the past few weeks. Not continuously but often enough. However news reports continue to insist that California is still not out of the drought danger red-zone. So I am stoically bearing all the rain instead of whining about it (so noble, I know!).

Surprisingly enough, the weather is no longer that cold. No need to turn on the heater or bury myself under 3 comforters at night. I can even make short trips outside with just a t-shirt and sweats on - cool or what?

One complaint about the otherwise glorious bay area weather for me is the lack of warmth when it rains. I originally come from a place (Chennai, India) where, when the monsoon rains come, it is hot too. So, there, it is perfect to go out prancing in the rain, come back indoors, dry oneself and be as good as new again. A similar scenario in the bay area would be: go out prancing in the rain, come back indoors, dry oneself and most probably land up with a severe case of cold and/or pneumonia. Sigh.

While in Chennai, along with the warmth, the rainy season brought a lot of inconvenience with it. The roads used to get routinely flooded and the usually unpredictable bus schedules became even more erratic. Plodding through ankle deep water in the rains to get to and from school was routine and wading in knee-deep water was not at all uncommon.

However, in spite of everything, with all the exuberance of youth (waah, I am actually beginning to reflect upon youth), I used to look forward to the rainy season. For one, when it rained, it was quite exciting and suspenseful to see if our schools would be closed or not. Usually, one of these two things used to happen: 1). The government would declare a holiday the day *after* a storm/cyclone had passed - so all school kids had the joy of sitting comfortably at home on a perfectly dry and sunny day 2) All kids would already have battled the rain and the floods and reached school only to be told that the school was
closed thus necessitating them to repeat the same arduous journey in the reverse direction immediately.

On the days we went to school and were surprised by an unexpectedly heavy downpour later in the day, getting back home was an adventure in itself. Only a few kids, if any, would have brought an umbrella as a precautionary measure for the rainy season. As a result, sometimes as many as four of us would try to squeeze under one small umbrella as we tried to keep dry (obviously unsuccessfully). Once we made it to the bus stop, the vigilant gaze for the arrival of the bus would begin. Our Pallavan buses were sometimes so state-of-the-art that it would rain right *inside* the bus too and we used to wonder if we should open our umbrellas inside also!

When I was small, for the longest time I used to think that wearing a rain-coat as opposed to carrying an umbrella was the uber-coolest thing ever. I begged and pleaded with my parents to buy me a rain coat and promised to diligently take care of it. Eventually my whining got on their nerves (hehe, I whine well) and they bought me a pale pink raincoat with dark pink flowers on it. I could barely wait for the next rain.

The next rain came and I proudly wore my rain-coat to school. On the way I felt hot and sweaty. When I reached school and took off my rain coat, I felt like I had just walked out of a slow cooking oven. I discovered for myself what my parents had known all along - rain coats are simply too warm for the hot and humid Indian weather! Of course, considering all the fuss I had made, there was no way I could complain and I resourcefully came up with plausible excuses to avoid wearing the rain-coat! Unlike umbrellas which used to disappear, never to be seen again, into some nether zone with metronome-like regularity, this rain-coat stuck around for the longest time and never got lost. I don't remember what eventually happened to it.

Another thing which I used to covet was colorful patterned umbrellas. The standard issue umbrellas were plain black. While they did their job just fine, my heart longed for colors. Given that my sister and I lost umbrellas like we were being given a special badge of honor to do so, my parents weren't too keen on investing in the more expensive colorful umbrellas. Finally, they succumbed and my sister got a checkered pink and patterned umbrella while I got a light blue flowered umbrella with a dark blue border. Surprise, surprise - we somehow never lost them (though we still *did* manage to lose black umbrellas occassionally) and eventually threw the colorful umbrellas away only when they broke.

In spite of the raincoats and umbrellas, sometimes the rain was so heavy that it was impossible to stay dry. At those times, I would come home to find hot water waiting for me. After a nice hot bath, mom would dry my hair as I sipped on the hot tea and munched on the hot snacks she would have made. Bliss!

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Those are some vignettes from my Indian rainy reminiscences. This post has become longer than I intended it to be - so I will save rainy reminiscences in the USA for another day!

Alcatraz

Last weekend being a long weekend and all due to President's day, I had friends coming over visiting. I enticed them to California citing the warm, glorious spring-like weather. So of course, the day they landed, it poured like I haven't seen in months. Driving to the airport, I could barely make out the tail-lights of the vehicle ahead of me through the blinding rain. O boy - so much for spring-like weather!

By now the "San Francisco tourist circuit" is a well known route for me. Of the two visiting friends, S has been to the bay area before while it was the first time for V. So, though we had planned other things to do on two of the days, there was no avoiding the "let's go to SF and do touristy things" cry. It then struck me, instead of going on the bay cruise ferry yet again which had a very likely chance of me jumping into the Pacific if I heard Captain Nemo's voice (ya that is the name for the guy who gives the voice over on those tours) once more, why not do the Alcatraz tour instead?

For, you see, in spite of being in Pier 39 a zillion times before, I have never been to Alcatraz since those tours are *always* sold out. This time around, I was smart and booked tickets 3 weeks in advance.

Anyways, as I as saying, S and V arrived and we were having fun. The day of the Alcatraz tour dawned dull, cloudy and rainy (well, when it had been pouring for the past 48 hours, there was no reason for it to stop on that day either, was there?). I was worried that the tour would be canceled but a quick call to the tour operators confirmed that they kept the tour running come hell or high water. Oh well!

This I have to say for S and V. Where mere mortals (e.g. me) would have balked at the rain and shrunk from the prospect of taking the train to SF and then take public transportation to the pier and then travel on a ferry in the downpour, S and V cheerfully said, "Oh we are from Seattle. We are used to ignoring the rain and going about with our life. Come on, don't be such a wimp."

Who could say no in the face of such enthusiasm?

So off we set out. Mercifully it turned out that the rain was intermittent only and was never very heavy. After lunch, we ran pell-mell to the boarding area for the Alcatraz ferry - as usual we had ill-timed ourselves and were perilously close to missing our ferry. There it turned out that we were not the only crazy souls - the tour was sold out as usual and people in the long queue even stood in the rain cheerfully!

The ferry ride was rougher than usual. The boat rolled about quite a bit. But the incessant drizzle was finally taking a siesta and the sun came out to see the world a bit. S and me were very enthusiastic and clicked pictures from all possible angles. Of course, the Golden Gate bridge was our pet subject.


The ferry soon reached Alcatraz island and found the choppy waves near the dock too rough. After a couple of attempts, the ferry was finally able to dock at Alcatraz.



By this time the drizzle had woken up again and we were thankful that the guided tour of Alcatraz was indoors. We hurried our way to the entrance (quite a climb to get there) and picked up our head-phones and player for the self-guided tour.

As we neared the starting point of the tour, I saw the cells for the first time. Narrow, small rooms with a small bed, a small basin and a tiny toilet at the back. My stomach did a flip - this is how prisoners live?
The self-guided audio tour was an excellent one. But the more time I spent inside the prison, the more closed in I felt. I noticed S and V had become extremely silent as well and none of us were shutter-happy anymore. We were taking pictures more because we *had* to rather than because we wanted to. The unspoken thought was "I don't want too many memories of this place."

I could only imagine how horrible it must be to only see the outside world through bars! How long and similar each day must feel if the one after it only brought more confinement! How does a person keep from going insane under such a circumstance? Perhaps that is why the law tries so hard to make sure that no innocent get punished wrongly.

By then, the intermittent showers of the day had turned into a steady downpour. From inside the prison we could only see bleak and gloomy skies outside. The weather seemed to match our moods. Though we knew we were free to leave when we wanted, the place was still so depressing!


Once the tour was over, S, V and me made the unanimous decision to get back on a ferry to the mainland as quick as possible. One ferry had already docked and we ran all the way in the pouring rain down to the jetty to board it. We so did not want to stay on the island any longer than we had to!
On the way back, we were very silent, absorbed in our thoughts. Finally, I said out loud what all of us were thinking, "So far I have not had any intention of committing any crime - after seeing Alcatraz, I don't think I will get that intention ever!"

Really, prison is a seriously creepy and frightening place!

Bollywood shining

All the hype* around Slumdog Millionaire already had people buzzing about India in the USA. And then A. R. Rahman goes and wins a Golden Globe award - how cool is that?

A couple of days later I was idly browsing through Time magazine (don't you think they publish the mag way too fast? I am barely done with one before I am picking out the next from my mail box) when I thought I had read the word Chandni (Hindi word for moon) in the shortlist section in the last but one page where they usually list out a bunch of notable (according to them) movies/books/music etc. I did a double take and sure enough, the last item in the short list of five was "Chandni Chowk to China" - what!?! A full-fledged Bollywood masala movie actually made it to the review section of a mainstream English magazine published in the US! I was totally thrilled - first AMC, Century theatres et al. start showing Indian movies and now this! Woohoo. Of course, they might have showcased a better movie** - still, bad movie better than no movie, no?

Finally, two days ago, gossip about the Bollywood actress in Slumdog Millionaire, Frieda Pinto, got featured on my local radio show. Yes people, gossip! Bollywood has totally arrived and is here to stay! Yaay!

Yeah, yeah I know I will enjoy Indian movies regardless of whether they arrive or depart or whatever. But cheap thrill is still cheap thrill only. Add also the joy of sitting in comfy AMC seats while doing the above said enjoying ...

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And oh, Joy passed me a tag - this being easy tag and all, I am doing it immediately. Basically I had to take a pic of the front of my fridge and post it (or something to that effect).

As you can see, it is filled with magnets of places I have visited in the past 5.5 years or so. The only exceptions to the rule are the magnets from Dubai, China and London and the solitary postcard of NZ - all gifts.

I hit upon this brilliant idea of magnets as a cheap and easily transportable souvenir sometime in 2003 and have since been diligent about collecting them (sometimes friends/relatives have been bugged and begged to buy the needful in case I forget). As much as possible, I have tried to buy different patterns of magnets - that being about the only variety I can add to my standard souvenir. No magnets from India though - guess I have never actually seen souvenir magnets in India, have you?

Anyone who thinks their fridge front needs publicity :-) is welcome to pick up the tag!

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* not yet seen the movie so don't know if there is actual substance to the hype.
** again I haven't seen this movie but the reviews were pretty bad.

Bread

*Bread in this post refers to the western version. Not naan, parathas and the like.*

When I was in the hostel during my undergrad days, Friday mornings used to bring on a flurry of frowns to several faces around me. Friday breakfast provided by the "mess" was bread and kurma and quite a few students strongly objected to bread (hey, that's for prisoners!) being served for breakfast. Me, on the other hand, used to wait eagerly for Friday - I simply *loved* the toasted bread and vegetable kurma combination and it was easily my most favorite breakfast. Even at home, sandwiches for breakfast never evoked the kind of strong negative reaction like upma (gaaah) did. Bread omlette, toast, bread-upma, croutons, shahi tukre - I was up for everything bread.

My fascination for all things bread continued when I landed at grad school. I distinctly remember a period when I had two sandwiches - one each of jam and peanut butter - for lunch for almost *every* single week-day over a duration of three months. One fine day, I was midway through enjoying a peanut butter sandwich when my brain signaled, "Thus far and no more." I had to toss the rest of my sandwich and thus ended my love affair with peanut butter. But I still loved bread.

Anyways, bread has seen me through many a hungry evening when I do not have the time or the patience or the hunger-withstanding capacity to cook an elaborate meal before my stomach decides to digest itself into oblivion. When I casually mention my bread-based dinners to other folks, I always get a pitying "poor you" glance. Little do people know that toasted sour dough bread, olive oil and fresh ground pepper is pretty close to culinary heaven for me.

Anyways, I have tried all sorts of bread from the baked goods section - stone ground, dutch crunch (yummmm), sour dough, focaccia, pugliese and so on. The only bread I met which I didn't like was the multi grain, multi-whatever variety. But in a pinch, even that works.

Now it is obvious that I have an irresistible attraction to bread. Given that I am a fairly decent cook too, it has struck me only recently that I have never tried making bread. This thought has kept striking me on and off for almost a year now and finally in a serendipitous event, I found a link to recipe for focaccia in this blog which had followed the instructions from here.

Ah-ha. The instructions seemed quite straightforward and not too time consuming. Perfect! So last evening, while coming home from work, I stopped at Safeway to buy all the ingredients.

You would think that a person who has baked no kind of bread whatsoever before would be a little bit diffident about buying too much of ingredients which might go unused in case of a breaderly disaster. Not me.

I bought a big five pound bag of all purpose flour (really, is there anything else one can make with it, especially if you are fairly heath conscious?), not one, not two, but *six* packets of yeast, a big tin of sea salt (well, the small tin seemed too small) and jar of dried rosemary. After some prep last night, this morning the actual baking took place.



Contrary to what the original recipe said about pouring the raised dough into a baking tray, my dough was a healthy, firm specimen which had to be bodily lifted and dumped onto the tray for baking.

No smells of baking bread filled the house but after twenty minutes, I had nice looking golden crusted bread sitting in the pan. Whatever you might say, warm bread from the oven, even when it is not as light or spongy or bready as you would like it to be, still tastes heavenly. Of course, you also need to understand that I probably would eat hay too as long as it is topped with rosemary (rosemary has such a wonderful flavor, I tell you).


Now I can finally say that I *can* make my own bread. I probably will try making this bread again with minor variations but if anyone needs all purpose flour, I have got some for you!

p.s. While we are talking food, here is an awesome recipe for Chinese fried rice - I followed the recipe as is (minus soy sauce) and wound up with near-perfect fried rice. In the spirit of "what happiness I got, let the world get too" have been promoting the recipe ever since!

p.s.1. Sea salt does have a different (in a nice way) salty flavor.

p.s.2. Nopes, this blog hasn't changed into a food blog. Regular programming will resume next post.