Hot

It has been rather hot here since Mid- February. We are told this is unusual- normally it starts getting hotter in March and April - May are the hot and humid months. We don't like humidity much. We are also told that a festival of about a 10 days back normally marks a point where Bangalore would have had some rain, but no rain so far. Monsoon normally starts about June 1 with sometimes very heavy rains and frequent rains. However, last year was unusual because we had few really heavy rain storms- we thought that "Monsoon" is something people made up!
People seem a little concerned about the hotter days (temps in the 90's F) and the lack of any rain. Hopefully it will be a somewhat normal year.
Ziggy has seemed a bit lethargic, but otherwise healthy. He has gained some weight. Zoe seems fine. Jim took them to the Vet today to have them checked over. We have a vet who seems good and we have heard there are some others who are good too. The vet said they seem generally quite healthy, but Ziggy's weight gain and lethargy may be related to digestive system changes related to his having been neutered. The vet said he is about the right age for that to be showing up. He did not indicate it is a serious problem, but it means we have to control his intake more than he would like or we would like. So, we will have to watch him more. It is difficult with two or more cats to control what they eat when they eat from the same dishes!
Janet is not feeling well today. She had pretty much recovered from whatever she got in Ahmedabad, but then we had some very spicy food for dinner last night and that tends to give her problems more so than Jim, though he has had his share of intestinal problems too!
Janet rested an Jim did some errands and picked up a couple paintings he had framed. We have mentioned before how inexpensive it is to have things framed here. It is cheap enough that you just do it over if you are not happy with your first choice, or if the framer gets it wrong.
The paintings are a reproduction watercolor of one done in the 1800's of the Taj Mahal and 2 "miniatures" Jim bought when we were in Delhi. The style dates from the Mughal Period, from hat we can tell, about 1500 to 1800 and there are many fine examples around of the old ones, but also lots of newer versions- often done on old paper, often on new paper. One wonders about some of the ones on old paper. They might be made to deceive, but we have found that most sellers state that it is new work on old paper, but normally, its pretty obvious anyway.
In any case, many of these are very nice- the details in the faces of the people is remarkable. many of the artists have branched out some and do animals, insects and flowers as well. Many of those are very nice!
We have received most of the items we bought while in the north and had shipped to us. There isn't that much but a couple things were a bit fragile but they arrived in good shaped. The shipping companies appear to have staff who handle parcels rather roughly (as they do in most of the world), but here is seems that they usually try to package the items well enough to survive the trip. The packing materials vary a lot. One item was a small table which came in a box that was badly beaten up, but the table was OK. Inside there was cardboard, corregated cardboard, scraps of leather, paper and cloth and some styrofoam. the last is not used so much here as in the US. Another item was wrapped in bubble wrap, and plastic with a few pieces of styrofoam and then shredded newspaper was packed all around and then it was placed in a specially made wood box.
Shipping costs by "courier" seem to be rather expensive sometimes. We don't know if we pay more because they know we will pay or if it really is that expensive. Compared to US prices, it seems reasonable most of the time.