Hey, what happened – just yesterday it was the 11th of May, and now it is the 20th? What happened to all the time?

Ah well, time flies….

The past week has had its ups and downs, but in general it was mostly unremarkable, except for a few items:

Gopi turned 40 today, crossing the barrier to join me on the other side. We decided to make it a big event to make sure that it registered with him, and so we had a pre-40 pot-luck party on last Saturday, the highlight of which was Shubha and Sony baking two cakes – a date and walnut one by Shubha that was heavy enough to sink the Titanic and rich enough to outclass Bill Gates, and a chocolate cake by Sony. The latter had a mysteriously uplifting effect on us all, and we later found out what happened to that bottle of rum….

Shubha also made meatloaf and potato salad. *No one* makes meatloaf and potato salad like Shubha does. The Germans don’t even come close. Period.

Shef and Avi brought in a wine-soaked macaroni dish that helped lift the mood even more, and Shef’s trademarked Pepper Chicken that Anjali completely demolished, leaving only a few bits for us.

The afternoon before that was spent by Sony and me browsing in Habitat – the little hole in the wall shop on Church Street that has the best music collection in town, looking for CDs for Gopi. We finally settled on The Steve Miller band, Booker T. and the complete collection of Bob Dylan, but it took us *hours* to make up our minds!

Over the week, I have also had the misfortune of watching family politics take their toll, with some family members using their standard manipulative tactics, irreparably tearing apart already fragile relationships. The master manipulator wins again.

A major discovery this week was Anjali finding “skins” for her “The Sims” game, allowing her to create and interact with characters such as 7of9, Janeway and Chakotay from Voyager. Interesting possibilities….

Battling with BLUG-related issues, such as meets, management, events, sponsors, agendas….

It is becoming more and more difficult, as people appear to be more interested in taking than giving, being entertained rather than lending a hand. The big event is about 6 months away, and it looks like everyone is again expecting me to do all the pushing and magic. This is so tiring. Why can’t people be more supportive and understand that if they totally depend on one person to make things happen, then they may not happen at all?