Several Things

From a journal entry:

Driving on the empty road late at night, rain. A friend was driving. As we approached a large intersection, reflections of lighted signs stained the wet road with wide bands of lavender red green. My friend swerved, braked, the screech co-incident with impact, a large heavy object rolling up on the hood, against the windshield, then onto the road, tumbling, coming to a stop a little way ahead. I heard my own voice – “Oh!… God!… What was it?” A black cow with white markings. The car came to a stop, we looked, saw it struggle onto its stomach, raise its head and attempt to straighten its forelegs, hindlegs remaining collapsed under its body. After another minute it scrambled up and walked to the side of the road. We continued on, I panting short harsh breaths with shock.

Anyone who has had a close encounter with a cow or a black buffalo while driving at night on Chennai's underlit roads -- that is, anyone who drives at night -- would have been happy to read about the Municipal Corporation's drive to round up stray cattle and auction them off. But sadly, in its first attempt, Corporation's cattle auction comes a cropper: no one stepped forward to buy the impounded cattle.

An article about the perils of Indian roads from The Week, Driving India Crazy (via Adventures With YardBoy).

I don't think I'm going to be eating anytime soon at Saravana Bhavan, a popular chain of vegetarian restaurants here. The story has been going on for awhile now -- this is just the latest installment:

Hotel owner held for bid to abduct widow

NAGAPATTINAM: Rajagopal, the owner of Saravana Bhavan chain of hotels in Chennai, is back in prison. He was out on bail after being arrested in connection with a murder. Rajagopal's arrest this time is for the alleged attempt to abduct Jeevajyothi, the widow of the man whom he is charged with murdering.

It is alleged that Rajagopal wanted to marry Jeevajothi, wife of Shanthakumar and a daughter of one of his employees. According to the prosecution, Shanthakumar was murdered in Kodaikanal and his body was thrown down a precipice. Police recovered the body following a confession by one of Rajagopal's accomplices...

Now you can buy Eastern Philosophy lunchboxes (via Incoming Signals)

I was looking for some recipes for ekadasi, the eleventh day after the new and full moons, when observant Hindus eat special, restricted diets. I found some links, which I'll post separately. But here are two ekadasi jokes, from this elaborate page, which contains a lot of information about ekadasi. I'm going to look into it further, after I recover:

Some go right over the top, no japa on the beach because of the Grains of sand, no swimming 'coz the sea has grains of salt in it, and sand too, and even cannibals don't eat beans on ekadasi, only humanbeans.

That new bhakta is so thick, it turns out that when he was preparing to take birth and Lord Brahma was going through his check-list Lord Brahma said "Brains" but our new bhakta thought he said "grains" and seeing it was ekadasi, he said ".....no thanks I'm fasting".