Open your eyes, open your mind, proud like a god but dont act as if your blind!
Quizzing for me has been more than a hobby. It would be fair enough to say that in some sense it has given me a strong sense of identity and no doubt, the numerous quizzing victories have given me a great sense of belief in my abilities. Time and time again though, I have received numerous jibes from people who have never indulged in this mindsport ( yes thats the term i like to use for it ..mindsport!) ..."ohh man! quizzing is for those who dont have a life...just mug up some facts and vomit it out....whats the difference between quizzing and a university exams....ohh him!! I am sure he has no personality.After all he's a QUIZZER!" Obviously, being the person that I am I have rarely ever bothered to return those jibes, those fools obviosuly dont know what they are talking about. I guess those who speak like that, haven't obviously experienced the sheer ecstasy of cracking connect! Or recalling so many little bits of inane information that you might have just observed in your day to day life and putting them all together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle to come up with a deductive answer which would have done good old sherlock holmes proud! For me quizzing has been nothing more than just observing the world around me a little more keenly, understanding and absorbing before cramming, calculating and taking a minute to think rather leaping to a conclusion.
Was pointed to this really good post on a blog
here and it continues
here. Really well written articles. They really give a great perspective on quizzing.
One thing however that this quy has missed pointing out is the role that bad quizmasters and the so called "Business " quizzes play in giving this erroneous notion about quizzing. One classic example is Mr Pig-Fucking -Brain Giri Balasubramaniam. Man, I do not know how anyone can tolerate his quizzes. They are nothing but arbit collections of useless trivia and the questions are framed so badly that it does not give anybody the least chance of actually working out the question. And his quizzes follow such a predictable pattern. One question on some business "gurus" book, one question showing some management mugshot and the question would be identify. As if Edward de Bono is my fucking neighbour that i'll know what he looks like. Hell, what has he done, won the Noble Prize? Sorry boss, he aint even a good looking girl that i might spend some time looking on the web for his pics. Attend an Arul Mani quiz, which is nothing put sheer entertainment for both the spectators as well as the participants. Its like watching a match, hell you ARE watching competing teams battling out for just pride more often than not. So spare me the money, would rather go for Arul's quiz then get a freakin headache at the Pig Brain Circus. Frankly, I have no respect for those guys who win these so called Business Quizzes. They aren't the real thing for me.
Current Music: - AudioSlave - Show me how to live
All i've got ....all i've got is insane!
Shitty freakin week at office. Been languishing under the ever piling load of work. Schedules, deadlines, meetings....uggh!
When I was in college, everyone around me told me that I was cut out for management. And i truly believed it, always thinking that management is all about managing resources. I mean, how tough could it be, juggle with your numbers, cut a few things here, add a few things there and voila....it should be done. However, work has been an eye opener. The word resources has been so misleading, never really thought that managing resources in a company like mine actually meant that i was managing "people" and not some inanimate object like a pencil or a printer or some such thing. Resources for us are a bunch of people who have their own constraints, who have to leave office early to attend to their families, who have to go and search for a house while you're discussing life and death situations with them... and more importantly people screw up !! Thats reality and you have to learn to live with that....come to think of it managing things boils down to managing your screw ups. Optimize your screw ups and you have the perfect project accomplished. Whoa!! Thats enough learning in 1.6 years of work!
Current Music: Stone Sour - Inhale
Sights far from the concrete jungle
Peek a boo
Can you believe that this is just 5 mins away from my office. As RKP calls it, its quite a "happy place" :-)
Sights far from the concrete jungle II
Sienna
Sights far from the concrete jungle III
Sights from the concrete jungle
There's something wrong with the world today, I dont know what it is, something wrong with our eyes..
Update on life. I am back doing what i love the most, quizzing with a vengence. The last few weeks have been quite productive I must admit. The 15k(woo hoo!!) that i won at the ACE Corporate Quiz, came in very handy at this "taxing" time of the year. As always, quizzing helping me cut some slack in life.
Have started attending K Circle meetings regularly and have come 2nd in both the meetings I attended. Must admit, that the standards of K Circle are not quite there as compared to RV QuizCorp or KQA but still it aint too bad. Keeps me nicely occupied for one evening in the week and also gives me a chance to "unrust" this mind of mine a little. I have been asked by the K Circle guys to do a quiz there, this evening and i guess I am a bit overprepared. 50 dry questions, 10 audios, 10 videos, 15 visuals should suffice for one complete quiz in most places. Its almost like that this kinda hiatus from aggressive quizzing has left me teeming with fundaes. So today will be an unleash after a long time. Hope the KCircle guys are ready( **evil smirk**)!
On the musical front have got the Athiest albums that i had been so dying for thanks to
satej . Though, I am currently tripping on the brilliant, brilliant Cynic album from 1993 called Focus. Those have to some of the best time shifts that have been seen in a long long time. And the transitions are so smooth, with each movement blending seemlessly into the next. Never imagined that the bass licks interspersed between the clean tone guitars could have such a captivating effect. Plus, the vocals which keep shifting between the Chuck Schuldiner/Chuck Billy kinda mature, anguished growls and the Cyborg-on-helium kinda synthesised voice box effects are a real treat. Awesome stuff this !
Other acquisitions include Coldplay's new offering "X&Y", Audioslave's "Out of Exile" and the critically acclaimed "Hot Fuss" by The Killers. Am still chewing on these, so my thoughts on them in sometime.
Going to watch "Batman Begins" also tomorrow. I have been following the progress of this movie since August last year, so i cant wait to watch the final product. The initial reviews have been very positive. I am hoping that Chris Nolan( Memento, Insomnia) has finally given my superhero the treatment/respect that he deserves.
Current Music: Cynic - Sentiment
Watta crack!
Read this on a
blog "RV College of Engineering is more like a quiz club that does engineering for timepass. "LOL. Man somebody finally cracked it!! Thats what we guys used to do while we were in college. Even sems were the time when the Bangalore college circuit was buzzing with activity. There was a fest every 2 weeks...oooof there was hardly any time to attend classes ;-) After all, there was lotsa money to be won. Man, if it hadnt been for those quizzes, i would have rotted away in penury with a miserable jungle life for memory. Thankfully the money that i made was more than enough to finance my "extra-curricular" adventures. Then there was also my bike which i won in a quiz...which thankfully relieved me from the agony of 222A, the godforsaken,rickety 4 wheeled monstrosity that carried the scum of the earth in its belly, from majestic to RV. Sigh...what would i have done without my bike :) . I know a lotta people who would be nodding their heads in quite approval a that statement.
The quizzing season waned around January after which the quizzes were few and far between. However, most of these quizzes were out station and that gave us an opportunity to travel to pretty much all the well-known colleges of south and west india. How were the trips financed?...From the money that we won in the quizzes there of course. So you see, the quizzing was not just about college pride or for the love of it all, it was also a very important means of livelihood.
Jokes apart, the wins in those quizzes were a high that i will never forget. I was fortunate enough to be a part of one of the best college teams in India. Man those were some good days!
Mood - Nostalgic!!
Current Music: A Perfect Circle - The Outsider
Every day is exactly the same..
Cant believe I am hearing this song right now. What a perfectly apt description of life in a cube!
Hmm....havent heard this song before. The artist is Nine Inch Nails btw...guess the song must be from their new album "In Teeth". Have been hearing good things about this album. I think the first single from this album "The Hand that feeds" came out while I was in Las Vegas and it was creating quite a buzz there. Must buy this album when it comes here, which will be god knows when.
My new music purchases include the amazing Dave Matthews' solo album called "Some Devil". That dude is one talented bugger i must admit. Beautiful album with some really catchy ditties. The ones that stand out are the first 4 songs on the tape. "Dodo" has this really melodious chorus which goes something like "Why would you play by the rules?Who did, you did, you !You say who did, well you did, you" A little intriguing i must admit, but it sounds a whole lot better when Mr Matthews sings it in his smokey voice. The other track that really stands out is "Gravedigger". A very minimal song but one that almost killed me the first time i heard it. Sample these lyrics
Grave digger
When you dig my grave
could you make it shallow
so that I can feel the rain
People nowadays say that poetry is dead. You really think so??
Ahh well....there's my manager calling me for a meeting. Bye bye Dave Matthews :-(
Current Music: King Karma - Breathe
Walking on water...
Ganj gingerly checks out the waters for his plunge....
Was really nice to meet him after ages in Charlotte. This photo was taken when both of us were at Lake Norman. A whole set of interesting pics. Probably will post some more later.
In office at 9 freakin am
Office politics! Hate that shit....nobody notices your work only the amount noise that you generate. Disgusting, grovelling at other people's feet for attention
Current Music: keyboard clicks
Travelling somewhere,could be anywhere!
At the outset, I have a confession to make. I tend to give positive comments even for movies which later, upon contemplation, i realise are quite crappy. Sometimes, upon viewing the movie again, i actually wonder how i could give such a good rating to such a pathetic movie. Now you must wondering, if i have this in mind then how could i continue with it....well out of a sub-conscious habit i guess. Maybe i am just a real nice person who says only good things about people :-)
Ok back to what i originally intended to write about. Saw this nice movie yesterday called "Hazaron Khwaishein Aisi". Well, the movie had a real good storyline( for once in an Indian movie)...however the weak link in the movie seemed to be the insistence of the actors in the movie to converse in English. It seemed a little to contrived and not at all natural. This movie is basically a love story set in the times of the 1970's when Socialist Revolution and Emergency were the hot burning topics and Student Politics was the cool,in thing. Must admit Chitrangada Singh is quite simply STUNNING, but in the league of Smita Patil she aint! A very pronounced American accent, she has. She must lose this asap is she is to stand a chance of succeeding in Indian movies. Hmm...actually come to think of it, the wannabe types might actually be impressed by it, but she'll never rank high in my books if she cant get an accent to suit a role. The fact, that in the movie, she has an American accent even though she hasn't ever visited the US is quite ridiculous. Overall, the acting and editing in the movie leave a little to be desired. Moreover i was a little disappointed by Sudhir Mishra's story telling abilities, the film overall seemed a little confused and ambled from one point to the other. The saving grace of the film though is Shiny Ahuja, who is the "shiny"-est(hehehe) star on the rookie acting horizon, i must admit. Watch him in "Sins" and you'll know why I say this.
On the musical front, i have decided to go back to the basics kinda. I am currently listening to Steely Dan's Grammy winning "2 Against Nature" and "The Best of Joan Baez". I had always wanted to listen to Steely Dan and when i heard them again in a friend's car in Bangalore recently, i decided that I must get some of their music. And its quite trippy! They seem to make very sincere, understated music which is very strong on melody. Must admit, at first i had this impression that their music would be much harder that it actaully turned out to be, not that i mind now. Nice stuff in all. And i am also currently tripping on Joan Baez's "Diamonds & Rust". This songs talks about her failed relationship with Bob Dylan. People have often complimented me on my knowledge of music, but when i "discover" artists like Joan Baez, i realise there's so little that i actually know about music. I mean, here is this prodigious musical talent, with a voice, smooth as silk, with lyrics that will make even the insane wanna understand life, and i haven't heard ANY song by her till now. Man, i have a life full of music to discover.
Coming back to the song, it has some of the most wonderful lyrics, wherein a woman wistfully recalls her failed relationship. Sometimes i wonder, after all the immediate acrimony has been lost in time, do people recall only the joyous moments of their past relationships? If they do, then why cant they do that whilst they are in that relationship...i guess anger is always the instinctive emotion.
Current Music: - Tool - Schism
