Home again, home again

This is just kind of a placeholder post, to say that I'm back in the US (alas) and am going to start blogging about things here as soon as I sort myself out (and finish unpacking). (I am, for better or worse, a very slow unpacker.)

I have just a few things to say about being back:

• It is cold.

• The cats are glad to see me (and vice versa).

• I am grateful for the large size of my hot water heater (see first point).

That's mostly it. I remain delighted that my red bag is fixed. That 20 rupee repair is just about my favorite purchase, along with a gorgeous mulberry-colored scarf/stole I found at Cottage Industries and snatched up instantly. I've decided that I may just keep it around my neck until April. (Although Alex wanted to wear it at dinner the other night, and I let him, and he looked quite dashing in it, with his blueberry-colored sweater and blue eyes, like an elegant aviator, if aviators wore long mulberry colored scarves tossed over their shoulders.) (Now that I write this, I also have to admit that I did carry back with me 4 kgs of tea (not all for me), which I have been happily drinking, and my very first tiffin carrier, which I haven't used yet but plan to soon.)

This post also gives me an excuse to post some random India photos, like the dog Andy and I saw comfortably settled into a heap of trash near the water buffalo ghat.


And a dog who might like to explore a trash heap but will never have to:

That's Choti Fatoh, Sunil's newest puppy. He took her, sight unseen, at 7 weeks old because she had been abandoned by her original person upon learning that she wasn't purebred. (She's half beagle and half lab, though she looks quite a bit like Lisa's lovely Dorrie, who's half beagle and half coonhound.) It was 2 days after the first Fatoh had died, and the little one really has some of the first Fatoh's sunny spirit. She is now 8 months old, and the other three dogs (Zulfi, Sufi and Badal) are 8 years old, so while they putter around in their stately, middle-aged sort of way (except when they're chasing the wild pigs near Sunil's house), Fatoh leaps and jumps and wriggles with excitement over everything. She's the only one with enough spring to jump over the fence, and one afternoon, we sat outside and watched her go over again and again. Cows, bicycles, pedestrians, one little white pony--none were safe from her enthusiasm. When no one is out there with her, she has to stay on the roof, which she likes less:

Sunil said she fell off once, but luckily the trees and shrubs below broke her fall. (And it's a one story house as well.)

And because I can't resist, I'm going to close with one final water buffalo shot. This one Andy took, on that afternoon we spent with the water buffalo, and it still makes me laugh when I see it.

More soon. I'm hoping to embark on an Indian cooking project, which will be one of the things I'm going to write about. Just let me finish unpacking first!