The Fungle.

This is a fun website for kids. Ashu and I explored the beta version of The Fungle together a couple of days back and as expected, the kid is hooked. As a beginner reader, Ashu was nt able to read everything on her own and needed my help to navigate in the beginning. Then I left her alone with it and came back 10 minutes later to see her dressing up her avatar, listening to a story and then playing a game! But being the scaredy cat that she is, she asked me to help because she was afraid of the snake that appeared in the game! Its nice that the stories and books are read alongs since she can listen to them. And I like the fact that theres an option of switching off the read along for kids who can read.

And like I wrote to Narayanan, the CEO, the Bee Mail idea is pure genius. Ashu went to bed asking if she got a bee mail! :) We cant wait for the Fungle to go live.

Please check it out if you are interested.

Heres Utbt's review of The Fungle and a short interview with the CEO.

ps.

Cross posted at http://indianmommies.blogspot.com/2011/02/fungle.html

Malaysia Vasudevan, MMKR and my Mom.

A couple of days back, I was listening to "Vachaalum Vaikaama Ponaalum" song form Michael Madana Kama Rajan (MMKR) in my car and was giggling like crazy thinking about the picturization of this song. Ashu asked why I was laughing and I told her its a funny song and that I will show the song to her later. ( But soon forgot. ) I can never listen to this song without at least a smile in my face. God, what a movie! I cant event think about MMKR without going "bheem boy bheem boy" in my mind! And then yesterday when I learnt that Malaysia Vasudevan has passed away, it brought a lump in my throat. The same person who put a smile in my face every time I listened to his voice is no more. RIP, MV.

Im sure I have a screw loose up there somewhere to mention this song as one of my favorites when people all around me are going "Kodai kaala kaatre" and "Poongaatru thurumbumaa" but let me redeem myself by saying that "Vetti veru vaasam" is my epic favorite too.

This made me wonder what are the other Tamil songs which are really funnily picturized. And the first one which came to my mind was the one from Bale Paandiyaa - "Neeye unakku"! God, MR Radha's body language is hilarious! And the whole suspense of what will Sivaji do when he sees MR Radha is just edge of the seat funny. (on another note - how the hell did Sivaji lip sync with such perfection for this extremely difficult song? The mind boggles!) And the "Jambulingame" song from Kasethaan Kadavuladaa. Thengaai is just too good in this one.

And talking about funny songs, I have to mention that Nithyashree song from Jeans - "Kannodu". I know that its not really hilarious or anything but then you dont know my mom. So my mom. You know how we type "ROTFLOL" for everything these days. But are we actually Rolling On the Floor Laughing Out Loud? Most often, we are nt even smiling while typing it, are we? Lets just say that who ever coined ROTFLOL got the idea after seeing my mom go ROTFLOL for the Kannodu song. In the cinema theatre that too! One second my mom was sitting right next to me and the next, she was on the floor and I thought she had a heart attack or something! It was 1998. Sis was in the USA and my dad had better things to do so it was just my mom and me. And then I heard her laughing with tears in her eyes and everyone was looking and I was so embarrassed. Then she managed to get up and sit in her seat. But she laughed so loudly the entire duration of the song, slapped and pinched my thigh so hard when the skeleton dances at the end that I had tears in my eyes too. From the pain! God, it was all so embarrassing that I pretended I was not with her when the lights came on. I should have known better though. She has a history. All my cousins and uncles and aunts run a mile from my mom whenever any scene from MMKR comes on TV. "Ava pakkathula ukkaandhamo, sethom" (we will die in her hands if we sit near her!) can be heard from various parts of the household and Im not exaggerating here! So imagine watching MMKR the first time with her in the theatre. Sis, Dad and I kept switching seats because our legs were getting sore!! "anga joke varudho illayo, unga amma kai namba kaal kitta varudha varudhaa nnu paakardhuke time sariyaa irundhadhu! padatha yaaru paatha?" - this was my dad after the movie!! (who had the time to see the movie when I had to watch out for your mom?) Play any of the Thiruppu-Kameshwaran scene to my mom if you want proof. But if theres Delhi Ganesh or Thiruttu Paati in that scene too, then watch it with her at your own risk!

I am just like her too but a bit more restrained after seeing family members run from her! I am always the one who laughs the loudest in any group. We watched Quick Gun Murugan last week with some friends and man! It was awesome! What a brilliant spoof! It was so wonderfully funny that I was truly ROTFLOL. But then I watched it sitting on the floor, so it did nt look quite as bad as my mom! :)

ps.

Can someone settle this for me once for all? Who sang the "Nila Kaayudhu" song from Sakalakala Vallavan? SPB or Malaysia? The song is credited to SPB but it totally sounds like Malaysia and I ve been thinking it was indeed him until a few years ago when my sis raised this doubt. It has been nagging me ever since. "Kattavandi" is credited to MV, "nethu raathri amma" is credited to SPB. So why not this song to MV? But if it was indeed SPB why did he sing it so different from his own voice? Discuss.

Breaking the break.

Things have been crazy in Boodom. The sick fest began in Jan and I just realized the whole family has been falling sick every January like clock work. I think I ll take some flu shots next year. I mention only me here because its the Universal truth that the whole world and its neighbor can get sick but a MOTHER never ever can fall ill! Its a recipe for disaster especially when she has to drop two kids in school! It all started with Ashu burning with fever one sunday and then bunking school the next 4 days. Antu fell sick somewhere around Day 3 and I caught it on Day 5. One day it was Thursday and the next thing I know, it was Monday morning! I have no idea how the three days in between flew by. It was one of the worst days in my life! Even though I was out of fever on Monday, it took me 5 more days to come back to normal. Phew! Just writing about it is giving me the jitters. Thank God for the husband. I would have killed myself otherwise. February has been kind to us so far. Ashu's school is closed for ski break and we are as usual busier then school days. BFF and I are taking our respective girls for ski lessons through the week and we want to be put in a pedestal and given a medal for this brave endeavor but no one is biting. hmph!

I wanted to write so much and every time I had something interesting to share, I wrote down a few words in a notepad so that I can blog them later. Now I have words like "Pacifier, Ashu- big sis, Eraser(!), Memory, Phone call", etc... but for the life of me, I cant remember what I wanted to say! You guys lucked out, I guess! :)

Talking of phone call - why the hell cant I bring myself to say "Im busy right now. Can I call you later?" to anyone? I just cant! Im taking Kid 1 out of the bath with the phone stuck between my ear and shoulder and in excruciating pain but I cant tell the person, "hold on for a minute!" Its not like I dont try. But I just am not able to find the right pause to say that! It always seems like the wrong time to say, "I ll call you later!" This one time, Antu even fell down from the sofa and bumped her head and was howling and I ran to the other room so that whatever the caller was saying did nt get interrupted!!! (yes, yes. Hd took care of her! But the fact remains that I did nt care!) I can NOT multi task while on my phone. My sister even uses her mixer while talking to me. But I sit on the sofa or lie on the bed or walk here and there at the most. I hate using call waiting and while Im on the cordless, I dont pick up the cellphone if it rings! Even if its from God himself!! If its Hd, I pick up and keep on talking on the other phone, so he hangs up very irritated. I swat the kids away like mosquitoes if they come near me while Im on the phone. As if Im living a secret life and if the caller finds out I have kids, he or she will terminate me from the secret mission or something! While in fact the caller most of the time is a fellow mom! I think I will die of stress if I ever work from home and have to take calls! And in the rare cases that I do initiate to end the call, Im apologetic to the point of embarrassment! argh! Im such a doofus! How hard is it going to be to say, "Im potty training Antu. And she just had an accident and sprayed the whole playroom including her toy laptop, piano, guitar, a picture dictionary book and a coloring book which is totally drenched and which I mostly have to throw in the trash and make sure Ashu never ever finds out. And to make matters worse, she thinks she has to clean the mess and is "mopping" the floor with a facial tissue! Can I call you later? Like once shes in college?"