Even across generations of quizzers, a subset of common knowledge exists. There also exists some consensus on the question: what is quiz-worthy and what is not.
I find it rather strange when names like Dag Hammarskjold roll off the tips of the tongues of young quizzing neophytes (quizzerlets?). And everybody seems to answer by reflex to questions like "Who killed the man who killed JFK?" !
1) Magazines/Newspapers keep repeating stuff
a. When records get broken, the same lists are published. The same goes for awards, which are annual affairs.
b. They focus on the same set of personalities, embedding their names and activities in the collective subconscious- laying the foundation for "imaginative, brilliant guesses"
c. Events are regularly commemorated with special issues - serving as time-machines with
2) Quiz masters
a. QMs often repeat questions that they like from other quizzes they might have attended in the past. Repeats become part of the quizzer's armoury - the so-called "chestnuts".
3) Books
Quiz Books and GK books can only get you to the banks of the river.
a. There exists a set of quizzer must-reads. And there is always a "current fad book" - examples from the present would be books like Freakonomics, The World Is Flat. If you keep abreast of the fad books, you're sure to get some points in some quiz or the other, sooner or later. You don't need to read the book; sometimes just reading the review suffices! :-)
b. Science-fiction and pseudo-historical fiction ('fact'ion :-)
Wild, interesting and entertaining theories, generally correct, abound in these books making them gold-mines for quizmasters.
So,
* READ (ABOUT :-) THE FAD BOOKS.
* ATTEND AND OBSERVE QUIZZES.
* PUT THE QUIZ-MASTER'S HAT ON.
* IT'S OK EVEN IF YOU DON'T PORE OVER THE NEWSPAPER EVERY SINGLE DAY.... THE IMPORTANT THINGS WILL REPEAT.
Friday, December 23, 2005
Thursday, December 15, 2005
Old Man And The Puppies
Labels:
Anecdote,
Observation
Reflection on the nature of human kindness
Last Saturday, my friend Shimjith and I were returning to our house after buying some eggs and some biscuits to have for breakfast. It was a cloudy, gloomy day and we had gotten up rather late; it must have been 11 o' clock or so.
We were just a couple of buildings from home when a litter of puppies came running towards us. The neighbourhood stray had given birth to four puppies a couple of weeks back. There were only three of them left now though; one had been killed in a road accident. Of the the remaining three, one was tan (cute and chubby), one was black-and-white (the most energetic of the lot) and the other white (the cutest one). The puppies started nibbling at my toes, which stuck out from my slippers.
Till that day though, I'd just admired the puppy-pack from a distance. I had not befriended them or given them food previously, so I was a bit surprised. Why should they have come to me and not to Shimjith? He was the one holding the food-packets. Why should they be nibbling at my toes and not his?
Shimjith hypothesized 'Freud'ulently, later, that it was probably because his feet were covered and because my toes would have seemed like their mother's nipples to them and they were hungry! I scoffed at his wild conjecture and said smugly that it was because "the innocents know goodness and abhor the evil; they just know.". (Though I knew very well that it was probably because of my smelly feet and puppies love yuckiness!)
The puppies dispelled the gloom of the day with their exuberant playfulness and lifted my heart. I was amused, so I decided to give them some biscuits. Now, they were very young and had not yet been weaned and it was unlikely that they would eat it. Even so, I opened a pack of biscuit and crushed three pieces and laid them on the pavement. The trio sniffed at it and playfully licked the biscuit-powder but largely left it as it was. Stranger's Biscuits? Mother's milk better anyday! Thanks, but pooh! They returned to their play.
All of a sudden, I noticed that an old man, a vagrant, was observing this 'extravagant' splurge on thankless puppy brats, with wistful forlornness. I'm hungry too, he seemed to be thinking, but I'm not cute, I'm not young. Who will bother?
I wanted to help. Should I go and offer the pack of biscuits to him? That could be insulting - I would be equating him with dogs. Maybe a new pack? Eggs? I was confused. What if he hadn't been thinking what I'd thought he'd been thinking? Maybe he was just sad because he wanted to feed the puppies too? Too many ifs. I took the easy way out. I decided to turn a blind eye. But just before getting into our compound, I spied that the old man was gathering the biscuits and was, ostensibly, trying to feed the puppies, but the helpless pang of hunger in his manner was unmistakable.
I asked Shimjith what I should have done. He hadn't noticed it seemed, he had been observing the puppies. I explained to him and Jeswin (another friend) what had been said in unspoken glances, and my reasons for doing what I had (not) done. They said that we should go and offer a pack of biscuits to him. I told them that I would be too ashamed to come, that the regret of not having done the same earlier embarassed me greatly - my shame turned my feet to stone.
They went. I stayed back - the same reason why people don't really like to go for funerals - it's kind but very sad.
"Did he take it?", I asked him.
"Yes...but...," Shimjith replied, "He refused it at first. He said no. But when we turned back towards the house and started walking, he called us back and asked for it."
Why did the old man refuse the biscuit initially?
Why didn't I go along?
Why was I unhesitant to feed the puppies (another species!) who didn't want it but so hesitant to feed the old man who desperately needed it?
- Thomas Jay Cubb
Last Saturday, my friend Shimjith and I were returning to our house after buying some eggs and some biscuits to have for breakfast. It was a cloudy, gloomy day and we had gotten up rather late; it must have been 11 o' clock or so.
We were just a couple of buildings from home when a litter of puppies came running towards us. The neighbourhood stray had given birth to four puppies a couple of weeks back. There were only three of them left now though; one had been killed in a road accident. Of the the remaining three, one was tan (cute and chubby), one was black-and-white (the most energetic of the lot) and the other white (the cutest one). The puppies started nibbling at my toes, which stuck out from my slippers.
Till that day though, I'd just admired the puppy-pack from a distance. I had not befriended them or given them food previously, so I was a bit surprised. Why should they have come to me and not to Shimjith? He was the one holding the food-packets. Why should they be nibbling at my toes and not his?
Shimjith hypothesized 'Freud'ulently, later, that it was probably because his feet were covered and because my toes would have seemed like their mother's nipples to them and they were hungry! I scoffed at his wild conjecture and said smugly that it was because "the innocents know goodness and abhor the evil; they just know.". (Though I knew very well that it was probably because of my smelly feet and puppies love yuckiness!)
The puppies dispelled the gloom of the day with their exuberant playfulness and lifted my heart. I was amused, so I decided to give them some biscuits. Now, they were very young and had not yet been weaned and it was unlikely that they would eat it. Even so, I opened a pack of biscuit and crushed three pieces and laid them on the pavement. The trio sniffed at it and playfully licked the biscuit-powder but largely left it as it was. Stranger's Biscuits? Mother's milk better anyday! Thanks, but pooh! They returned to their play.
All of a sudden, I noticed that an old man, a vagrant, was observing this 'extravagant' splurge on thankless puppy brats, with wistful forlornness. I'm hungry too, he seemed to be thinking, but I'm not cute, I'm not young. Who will bother?
I wanted to help. Should I go and offer the pack of biscuits to him? That could be insulting - I would be equating him with dogs. Maybe a new pack? Eggs? I was confused. What if he hadn't been thinking what I'd thought he'd been thinking? Maybe he was just sad because he wanted to feed the puppies too? Too many ifs. I took the easy way out. I decided to turn a blind eye. But just before getting into our compound, I spied that the old man was gathering the biscuits and was, ostensibly, trying to feed the puppies, but the helpless pang of hunger in his manner was unmistakable.
I asked Shimjith what I should have done. He hadn't noticed it seemed, he had been observing the puppies. I explained to him and Jeswin (another friend) what had been said in unspoken glances, and my reasons for doing what I had (not) done. They said that we should go and offer a pack of biscuits to him. I told them that I would be too ashamed to come, that the regret of not having done the same earlier embarassed me greatly - my shame turned my feet to stone.
They went. I stayed back - the same reason why people don't really like to go for funerals - it's kind but very sad.
"Did he take it?", I asked him.
"Yes...but...," Shimjith replied, "He refused it at first. He said no. But when we turned back towards the house and started walking, he called us back and asked for it."
Why did the old man refuse the biscuit initially?
Why didn't I go along?
Why was I unhesitant to feed the puppies (another species!) who didn't want it but so hesitant to feed the old man who desperately needed it?
- Thomas Jay Cubb
Friday, December 09, 2005
Sigh-O-Nara
I bid adieu to my first company Ushustech in June 2005. This was my farewell letter, in verse!
(The annotations were not there in the original)
SIGH-O-NARA
-------------------------
Two years ago
When I joined Ushus
I saw myself becoming
the US in UShUS.
But I saw that
the going was tough and
the tough were going!
I reassured myself that
They were just panickers!
When I joined, the company was having a rough time.
Panicker is also a common surname in Kerala, this led to some confusion! :-)
Might be a long way to the top
but with desire-fuel
lit by the fire in our bellies
We were the 'get-there-surely' s.
I kept my faith
in Ushus
Somehow I knew
that to the top,
Fate would push us
and not crush us.
My hopes were not belied
Business accelerated (!)
and the HP-era dawned.
When the sun rises,
time for the twinkling stars
To take a break.
I see the U
in UshUs!
But if night should again fall
I'll be there
For U again!
- Thomas Jay Cubb
-------------------------------------------
(The annotations were not there in the original)
SIGH-O-NARA
-------------------------
Two years ago
When I joined Ushus
I saw myself becoming
the US in UShUS.
Sayonara means goodbye in Japanese.
The company had a lot of Japanese customers.
Ushus, by the way, means morning.
The company had a lot of Japanese customers.
Ushus, by the way, means morning.
But I saw that
the going was tough and
the tough were going!
I reassured myself that
They were just panickers!
When I joined, the company was having a rough time.
Panicker is also a common surname in Kerala, this led to some confusion! :-)
but with desire-fuel
lit by the fire in our bellies
We were the 'get-there-surely' s.
I kept my faith
in Ushus
Somehow I knew
that to the top,
Fate would push us
and not crush us.
My hopes were not belied
Business accelerated (!)
and the HP-era dawned.
The company was merged with Accel, another company which was owned by a Mr.Panicker. Prior to this, we had landed major deals with Hewlett-Packard and things were sunny again.
When the sun rises,
time for the twinkling stars
To take a break.
A little bit of self-congratulation! :-)
Now as I am leaving,I see the U
in UshUs!
But if night should again fall
I'll be there
For U again!
- Thomas Jay Cubb
-------------------------------------------
Queuriest - V
-------------------------------------------------------
QUEURIEST - V
Keep Guessing - Johnnie Guesser
-------------------------------------------------------
1. You've heard about the Big Bang. But what's the Interrobang?!?
*
2. A very un-Gentile question, possibly un-gentle as well. What is the Bat Mitzvah? (There has been no misspelling.)
*
3. What is iatrophobia the fear of? Cryptic clue: This might make you eat apples!
*
4. If Neil Armstrong was the first man to set foot on the Moon, who was the last?
*
5. Hesperus & Phosphorus. What's the connection? Real beauty this one, if you know the answer . . .
*
6. In 1982, TIME Magazine chose the PC as the Man of The Year. The next time TIME chose a thing rather than a person for the honour, what was chosen?
*
7. Computers. What is a `frugal floppy'?
*
8. In HG Wells's The Invisible Man, what's the invisible man's name?
*
9. The guitarist of this band lost the tips of his right-hand fingers in an industrial accident just before the release of their debut album around 1970. However he readjusted his style & guitar to give this band its characteristic sound. Which band?
*
10. Which ball-game invented by Niko Brokehysen includes (necessarily) both men and women on a team? Cryptic Clue: Expectorate, maybe?
*
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Strange things cease to be strange on repetition...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "SonOfDelphi"
Date: Fri Jan 3, 2003 2:10 pm
Subject: Queuriest - V
hi folks!
here's the fifth edition of Queuriest.
questions are slightly tougher this time around, i think. but the hints should be helpful. . .MAY THE CLUES BE WITH YOU!. . .USE THE CLUES. . .- QM Yoda
a new year's resolution in case you don't have one yet: Say No To Google :-), while answering these quizzes. hey, what's so new about 2003?- i'm still preaching, ur still searching...well? :-) just kidding!
Happy New Year everybody!
luv
thomas
ANSWERS
--------------
From: "SonOfDelphi"
Date: Thu Jan 9, 2003 12:16 pm
Subject: Answers to Queuriest - V
hi there!
am early with the answers. my apologies to those of you who were planning to write in today..
fabulous reponse this time. 31 in all.
thought this was kinda tougher but was surprised. Strange things cease to be strange on repetition...and of course, maybe on googling also! :-( . . .really, lots of you googled which has forced (reluctant) me to reissue the dread(ed/ful) DISCLAIMER, which was in the cupboard for some episodes now...sorry...
when the going gets tough, the tough get googling?
anyway, here are the answers...
luv
thomas
-------------------------------------------------------
QUEURIEST - V
Keep Guessing - Johnnie Guesser
-------------------------------------------------------
1. You've heard about the Big Bang. But what's the Interrobang?!?
* combined symbol of ? and !
It didn't catch on at all. That's why I was surprised it was so popular among all of you...
RK: ?! by martin spector head of ny ad agency
AJ gives you http://www.interrobang-mks.com/ . Honesty appreciated, you get 0.5
Somebody told me that I was getting predictable, incorporating the symbol in the question a la tittle etc.
2. A very un-Gentile question, possibly un-gentle as well. What is the Bat Mitzvah? (There has been no misspelling.)
* It's the coming-of-age ceremony for Jewish girls. Bar Mitzvah is it for the Jewish boys. Bar Mitzvah for girls is good enough. It means daughter of the commandment literally.
a couple of you corrected me that it was __bar__mitzvah in spite my claims of 'no misspelling'...without that, it'd have done in more of you I guess... :-)
3. What is iatrophobia the fear of? Cryptic clue: This might make you eat apples!
* The fear of doctors.
The clue which was not at all cryptic made it pretty obvious, I guess.
SS said it is the fear of doctors induced by circumcision: I don't know about that, perhaps you're pulling my leg here by connecting it to the previous question?? Jews... ;-)
4. If Neil Armstrong was the first man to set foot on the Moon, who was the last?
* Eugene (Gene) Cernan.
He went on the Apollo-17 in 1972.
Most people got it right.
5. Hesperus & Phosphorus. What's the connection? Real beauty this one, if you know the answer . . .
* Venus. That's why that was a real beauty! :-) Goddess of beauty-Venus...ZZZZ...
Hesperus= Morning Star and Phosphorus=Evening Star, both of which refer to planet Venus
SS adds Gottlob Frege used them as examples for his theory on usage of words
TU: Hesperus = Phosphorus...the object model used by Gottlob Frege in his work 'Of Sense and Nominatum'.
Full points only if you have mentioned Venus. A bit controversial this, but then, `the real beauty' part of the question should've guided you...
6. In 1982, TIME Magazine chose the PC as the Man of The Year. The next time TIME chose a thing rather than a person for the honour, what was chosen?
* The Endangered Earth in 1988
Possibly the sitter of the quiz
7. Computers. What is a `frugal floppy'?
* Frugal floppy is an 8" floppy drive/disk.
Anybody seen one? Biggest I've seen is the 5.25". Lots of you must have, judging from the number of correct answers...well...:-)
8. In HG Wells's The Invisible Man, what's the invisible man's name?
* Griffin gets you credit. The first name is not mentioned in the book though SC said Hawley Griffin and some others Jack and yet others James. I think the first names came only with the movies
9. The guitarist of this band lost the tips of his right-hand fingers in an industrial accident just before the release of their debut album around 1970. However he readjusted his style & guitar to give this band its characteristic sound. Which band?
* Band: Black Sabbath.
Guitarist: Tony Iommi
+I is that He was left-handed.
+I: Def Leppard's drummer lost a hand in an accident.
10. Which ball-game invented by Niko Brokehysen includes (necessarily) both men and women on a team? Cryptic Clue: Expectorate, maybe?
* Korfball is the answer. There was a major tournament in India some time last year, that's when I first heard about it. Easily gettable from the clue, ehhem ahhem.....
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Strange things cease to be strange on repetition...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The scores (in chronological order):
1. Mamatha Balasubramaniam - 2 (early bird gets 2 worms! ;-)
2. Shiraz - 9 (great show boss)
3. Sylvia - 1 (and...,u thought right!)
4. Sukhamaya - 6.5 (kemp is the doctor)
5. R.Krishna - 8.5 (no venus=0.5)
6. Shash Shekar - 8.5 (thanx for the +Info)
7. Syam Prasad - 7 ( am a lithomaniac though)
8. Satyajit Chetri - 5 ( advice:better vague than incorrect)
9. Biswabijoy Sen - 3 (pentapploformula=gastric trouble?)
10. Venkateshwar KR - 2 (enjoyed ur effort as always)
11. Sujith Vijay - 6 (Superb effort, nice tries)
12. Debashree Mitra - 6 (think you got venus q mixed up but it's all right)
13. Ankur Jain - 6.5 (ray of light in a net of darkness)
14. Anish - 4.5 (not specific enough on q1)
15. Mahesh M Nair - 7 (bat mitzvah answer not good enough)
16. Venu Gopal - 6 (good going)
17. Pauline Daniel - 5 (run-a-ball effort)
18. Bharat Jayakumar - 2 (pretty cool)
19. Thejaswi Udupa - 6.5 (thanx for the comps)
20. Usha Ramaswamy - 1 (keep the posts coming in)
21. Rajiv Rai - 5 (nice guessing,appreciate that)
22. Vimal Vikrant Vardhan M - 1 (more tries please!!!)
23. Rahul Jayanthi - 8 (keep it up)
24. Ajay Sahoo - (blank mail was what i got)
25. Kunal Malhotra - 4 (nothing about girls in Bat Mitzvah)
26. B. Sreeram - 5 (getting too predictable, huh?)
27. Shrijit Plapally - 1 (enjoyed the answers)
28. Kewl_Kittein - 2 (0.5 each for 1 & 2)
29. Vilayannur Viswanathan - 4 (who comes of age in q2?)
30. Stephen Mathew - 3 (enjoyed ur guessing)
31. Satish K - 5.5 (solid effort boss)
--------STATS ----------------------------------------------
Funnest!-
Mr.Glass on Invisible Man
Floppy which refuses to give information! on Frugal Floppy
Mouse on TIME's MoY
Interrupted net connections on Interrobang
Batman's Birthday on Bat Mitzvah
Ridiqulest!-
E.T on TIME's MoY
Paper Clip on TIME's MoY
The day Waugh learnt to bat (Bat meetsWaugh) on Bat Mitzvah
Guessest!- nice guessing
Spitball on Korfball
New key on Apple keyboards on Interrobang
Mixed Doubles on Korfball
Bar Mitzvah party where women are present on Bat Mitz
Internet on TIME's MoY
First ever floppy on Frugal floppy
Fear of diseases picked up in hospital on iatrophobia
Circumcision etc on Bat Mizvah
* Most popular wrong answer: Invisible Man has no name
* All questions were answered
* Shiraz tops the quiz with 9 points
* Average score : 4.5
-----------------------------------------------------------------
DISCLAIMER - Not applicable where void
The QM's congratulatory remarks regarding the maintenance of the state of elevation* conditional to the respondent's abstinence from the use of deprecated extraneous assistance - automated or otherwise. All responses accepted as accurate transcriptions of the respondent's cranial contents. Reponses not matching aforementioned description, if any, constitute breach of trust and are deplored.
*=keep it up etc
Any inconvenience/distress to genuine respondents as a result of this disclaimer is regretted.
QUEURIEST - V
Keep Guessing - Johnnie Guesser
-------------------------------------------------------
1. You've heard about the Big Bang. But what's the Interrobang?!?
*
2. A very un-Gentile question, possibly un-gentle as well. What is the Bat Mitzvah? (There has been no misspelling.)
*
3. What is iatrophobia the fear of? Cryptic clue: This might make you eat apples!
*
4. If Neil Armstrong was the first man to set foot on the Moon, who was the last?
*
5. Hesperus & Phosphorus. What's the connection? Real beauty this one, if you know the answer . . .
*
6. In 1982, TIME Magazine chose the PC as the Man of The Year. The next time TIME chose a thing rather than a person for the honour, what was chosen?
*
7. Computers. What is a `frugal floppy'?
*
8. In HG Wells's The Invisible Man, what's the invisible man's name?
*
9. The guitarist of this band lost the tips of his right-hand fingers in an industrial accident just before the release of their debut album around 1970. However he readjusted his style & guitar to give this band its characteristic sound. Which band?
*
10. Which ball-game invented by Niko Brokehysen includes (necessarily) both men and women on a team? Cryptic Clue: Expectorate, maybe?
*
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Strange things cease to be strange on repetition...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "SonOfDelphi"
Date: Fri Jan 3, 2003 2:10 pm
Subject: Queuriest - V
hi folks!
here's the fifth edition of Queuriest.
questions are slightly tougher this time around, i think. but the hints should be helpful. . .MAY THE CLUES BE WITH YOU!. . .USE THE CLUES. . .- QM Yoda
a new year's resolution in case you don't have one yet: Say No To Google :-), while answering these quizzes. hey, what's so new about 2003?- i'm still preaching, ur still searching...well? :-) just kidding!
Happy New Year everybody!
luv
thomas
ANSWERS
--------------
From: "SonOfDelphi"
Date: Thu Jan 9, 2003 12:16 pm
Subject: Answers to Queuriest - V
hi there!
am early with the answers. my apologies to those of you who were planning to write in today..
fabulous reponse this time. 31 in all.
thought this was kinda tougher but was surprised. Strange things cease to be strange on repetition...and of course, maybe on googling also! :-( . . .really, lots of you googled which has forced (reluctant) me to reissue the dread(ed/ful) DISCLAIMER, which was in the cupboard for some episodes now...sorry...
when the going gets tough, the tough get googling?
anyway, here are the answers...
luv
thomas
-------------------------------------------------------
QUEURIEST - V
Keep Guessing - Johnnie Guesser
-------------------------------------------------------
1. You've heard about the Big Bang. But what's the Interrobang?!?
* combined symbol of ? and !
It didn't catch on at all. That's why I was surprised it was so popular among all of you...
RK: ?! by martin spector head of ny ad agency
AJ gives you http://www.interrobang-mks.com/ . Honesty appreciated, you get 0.5
Somebody told me that I was getting predictable, incorporating the symbol in the question a la tittle etc.
2. A very un-Gentile question, possibly un-gentle as well. What is the Bat Mitzvah? (There has been no misspelling.)
* It's the coming-of-age ceremony for Jewish girls. Bar Mitzvah is it for the Jewish boys. Bar Mitzvah for girls is good enough. It means daughter of the commandment literally.
a couple of you corrected me that it was __bar__mitzvah in spite my claims of 'no misspelling'...without that, it'd have done in more of you I guess... :-)
3. What is iatrophobia the fear of? Cryptic clue: This might make you eat apples!
* The fear of doctors.
The clue which was not at all cryptic made it pretty obvious, I guess.
SS said it is the fear of doctors induced by circumcision: I don't know about that, perhaps you're pulling my leg here by connecting it to the previous question?? Jews... ;-)
4. If Neil Armstrong was the first man to set foot on the Moon, who was the last?
* Eugene (Gene) Cernan.
He went on the Apollo-17 in 1972.
Most people got it right.
5. Hesperus & Phosphorus. What's the connection? Real beauty this one, if you know the answer . . .
* Venus. That's why that was a real beauty! :-) Goddess of beauty-Venus...ZZZZ...
Hesperus= Morning Star and Phosphorus=Evening Star, both of which refer to planet Venus
SS adds Gottlob Frege used them as examples for his theory on usage of words
TU: Hesperus = Phosphorus...the object model used by Gottlob Frege in his work 'Of Sense and Nominatum'.
Full points only if you have mentioned Venus. A bit controversial this, but then, `the real beauty' part of the question should've guided you...
6. In 1982, TIME Magazine chose the PC as the Man of The Year. The next time TIME chose a thing rather than a person for the honour, what was chosen?
* The Endangered Earth in 1988
Possibly the sitter of the quiz
7. Computers. What is a `frugal floppy'?
* Frugal floppy is an 8" floppy drive/disk.
Anybody seen one? Biggest I've seen is the 5.25". Lots of you must have, judging from the number of correct answers...well...:-)
8. In HG Wells's The Invisible Man, what's the invisible man's name?
* Griffin gets you credit. The first name is not mentioned in the book though SC said Hawley Griffin and some others Jack and yet others James. I think the first names came only with the movies
9. The guitarist of this band lost the tips of his right-hand fingers in an industrial accident just before the release of their debut album around 1970. However he readjusted his style & guitar to give this band its characteristic sound. Which band?
* Band: Black Sabbath.
Guitarist: Tony Iommi
+I is that He was left-handed.
+I: Def Leppard's drummer lost a hand in an accident.
10. Which ball-game invented by Niko Brokehysen includes (necessarily) both men and women on a team? Cryptic Clue: Expectorate, maybe?
* Korfball is the answer. There was a major tournament in India some time last year, that's when I first heard about it. Easily gettable from the clue, ehhem ahhem.....
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Strange things cease to be strange on repetition...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The scores (in chronological order):
1. Mamatha Balasubramaniam - 2 (early bird gets 2 worms! ;-)
2. Shiraz - 9 (great show boss)
3. Sylvia - 1 (and...,u thought right!)
4. Sukhamaya - 6.5 (kemp is the doctor)
5. R.Krishna - 8.5 (no venus=0.5)
6. Shash Shekar - 8.5 (thanx for the +Info)
7. Syam Prasad - 7 ( am a lithomaniac though)
8. Satyajit Chetri - 5 ( advice:better vague than incorrect)
9. Biswabijoy Sen - 3 (pentapploformula=gastric trouble?)
10. Venkateshwar KR - 2 (enjoyed ur effort as always)
11. Sujith Vijay - 6 (Superb effort, nice tries)
12. Debashree Mitra - 6 (think you got venus q mixed up but it's all right)
13. Ankur Jain - 6.5 (ray of light in a net of darkness)
14. Anish - 4.5 (not specific enough on q1)
15. Mahesh M Nair - 7 (bat mitzvah answer not good enough)
16. Venu Gopal - 6 (good going)
17. Pauline Daniel - 5 (run-a-ball effort)
18. Bharat Jayakumar - 2 (pretty cool)
19. Thejaswi Udupa - 6.5 (thanx for the comps)
20. Usha Ramaswamy - 1 (keep the posts coming in)
21. Rajiv Rai - 5 (nice guessing,appreciate that)
22. Vimal Vikrant Vardhan M - 1 (more tries please!!!)
23. Rahul Jayanthi - 8 (keep it up)
24. Ajay Sahoo - (blank mail was what i got)
25. Kunal Malhotra - 4 (nothing about girls in Bat Mitzvah)
26. B. Sreeram - 5 (getting too predictable, huh?)
27. Shrijit Plapally - 1 (enjoyed the answers)
28. Kewl_Kittein - 2 (0.5 each for 1 & 2)
29. Vilayannur Viswanathan - 4 (who comes of age in q2?)
30. Stephen Mathew - 3 (enjoyed ur guessing)
31. Satish K - 5.5 (solid effort boss)
--------STATS ----------------------------------------------
Funnest!-
Mr.Glass on Invisible Man
Floppy which refuses to give information! on Frugal Floppy
Mouse on TIME's MoY
Interrupted net connections on Interrobang
Batman's Birthday on Bat Mitzvah
Ridiqulest!-
E.T on TIME's MoY
Paper Clip on TIME's MoY
The day Waugh learnt to bat (Bat meetsWaugh) on Bat Mitzvah
Guessest!- nice guessing
Spitball on Korfball
New key on Apple keyboards on Interrobang
Mixed Doubles on Korfball
Bar Mitzvah party where women are present on Bat Mitz
Internet on TIME's MoY
First ever floppy on Frugal floppy
Fear of diseases picked up in hospital on iatrophobia
Circumcision etc on Bat Mizvah
* Most popular wrong answer: Invisible Man has no name
* All questions were answered
* Shiraz tops the quiz with 9 points
* Average score : 4.5
-----------------------------------------------------------------
DISCLAIMER - Not applicable where void
The QM's congratulatory remarks regarding the maintenance of the state of elevation* conditional to the respondent's abstinence from the use of deprecated extraneous assistance - automated or otherwise. All responses accepted as accurate transcriptions of the respondent's cranial contents. Reponses not matching aforementioned description, if any, constitute breach of trust and are deplored.
*=keep it up etc
Any inconvenience/distress to genuine respondents as a result of this disclaimer is regretted.
Monday, December 05, 2005
To The Book Borrower - II
Again because nobody ever returns books they borrow...
You can read Part I by clicking on the following link - TTBB-I.
In the beginning, ownership is remembered. Then, slowly, it becomes an illusion. Finally, it comes to rest with the borrower!
---------------------------------------------
TO THE BOOK BORROWER - II
---------------------------------------------
This is Tom’s tome.
Used to be Tom’s tome?
Hey you, are you Tom’s tome’s tomb?
-Thomas Jay Cubb
Notes
-------
1. A Cryptic Explanation
L1 - Statement of possession
L2 - Statement post-prehension
L3 - Statement of new position (and possession)
2. Line three used to be Hey you, you's to be...? but changed it later on, because it made it too cryptic, defeating my intent behind writing it on the book!!
3. TTBB-I was more efficacious - with this, the reason was sometimes lost in the rime!
------------------------------------------
JUST-IN-CASE LEXICON
------------------------------------------
Tom - me, the owner of the book
Tome - a book
Tomb - the final resting place
----------------------------------------
You can read Part I by clicking on the following link - TTBB-I.
In the beginning, ownership is remembered. Then, slowly, it becomes an illusion. Finally, it comes to rest with the borrower!
---------------------------------------------
TO THE BOOK BORROWER - II
---------------------------------------------
This is Tom’s tome.
Used to be Tom’s tome?
Hey you, are you Tom’s tome’s tomb?
-Thomas Jay Cubb
Notes
-------
1. A Cryptic Explanation
L1 - Statement of possession
L2 - Statement post-prehension
L3 - Statement of new position (and possession)
2. Line three used to be Hey you, you's to be...? but changed it later on, because it made it too cryptic, defeating my intent behind writing it on the book!!
3. TTBB-I was more efficacious - with this, the reason was sometimes lost in the rime!
------------------------------------------
JUST-IN-CASE LEXICON
------------------------------------------
Tom - me, the owner of the book
Tome - a book
Tomb - the final resting place
----------------------------------------
Thursday, November 24, 2005
A Scheme For Numbering Bus Routes
Labels:
Observation,
Rant,
Tips
A SCHEME TO EMBED ROUTE-INFORMATION
IN BUS-ROUTE NUMBERS
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone,
"it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less."
- Lewis Carroll, Through The Looking Glass
"But what about,” I asked him, “bus-route numbers?”.
- TJC
Abstract
The need for a more meaningful scheme for numbering bus-routes in cities is explained and a scheme suitable for this purpose is detailed in this paper. The proposed scheme entails the assignment of numbers to the station and the utilization of the multiplicative properties of the numbers to embed route-information in the route numbers in an efficient manner.
1 - INTRODUCTION
-----------------------------------
A numbering scheme for public buses is essential if a city has a lot of people of different origin, who speak different languages natively. The numbering of buses according to the routes that they service helps a great deal when you don't know how to read the favoured local language.
Democracy, the preferred ideology of this age, is about suiting the majority. If the majority of the local population can read the language, writing the names of the places enroute in that language will be very useful indeed. But the minority of the non-readers should not be neglected either; the route number should still be present, the number being their only cue. Democracy is also about the right of the minority to equality. The situation should be win-win-for-all, where possible.
1.1 Limitations of present schemes
The route numbers for buses, however, seem to be chosen arbitrarily or through an arcane and abstruse scheme. It is biased to suit the operators' convenience more than the passengers'. Ease of administration and maintenance seems to be the driving (excuse the pun) force behind the numbering of the routes.
For example, all that may be common to Buses 361, 362 and 363 may be that they start from the same location. This would not be very helpful for a person standing at that location, clueless as to how to choose from one of the buses at the station!
Very little conclusively useful information can be obtained from a route number. Numbers are used almost like names, meaningless. Such a scheme may be termed a number-as-name scheme.
1.2 Socio-economic impact
Any numbering scheme can be easily implemented by the bus-service operators or company. That being the case, the numbering scheme chosen must be as advantageous to the passenger as possible. A bus-service is, after all, intended as a service to the passengers.
Now, even if the chosen scheme is complex, the operators will eventually adapt to its complexity. A bus-service is, after all, a business too. And in a business, the customer is king. But this scenario will not arise: a scheme easily understood by the passengers will, necessarily, be easy for the operators as well.
A simple, intuitive numbering scheme would be helpful not only for the local-language-ignorant passengers but also for other linguistically challenged people like dyslexics and illiterates (they might be good with numbers). It would also encourage the use of the public transport mechanism; many a time, it is for want of a bus number that we take a cab. We can also eliminate the need for the names of the enroute stations to be written on the bus, as the scheme would be easily usable for the natives also.
2 - PRIME-MULTIPLICATIVE ROUTE NUMBERING
----------------------------------------------------------------------
2.1 Requirement:
A passenger, may not be familiar with the local language, has to be able to correctly decide whether a bus goes where he wants to go.
2.2 Assumption:
A passenger has basic knowledge of mathematics and numbers .
2.3 Base Scheme:
1. Assign each station a prime number. 2, 3 , 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29, 31, 37...
2. Enumerate the stations on the bus-route.
3. The product of the prime numbers denoting the stations enroute, is used as the route number.
2.4 Sufficiency:
Since each station is assigned a prime number, a route number will be unique. The passenger who knows the number of his destination can determine whether a given bus will go to his destination by checking whether the bus-number is divisible by the number of his destination.
3 - CRITIQUE
------------------------
3.1 Learning Curve
A question regarding the ease of learnability of the destination-numbers can be raised. The number can be displayed at all bus-stops, the passenger can make a note of it when he gets down if he thinks he will need to go there frequently.
A passenger will find it easier to remember the set of numbers representing his possible destinations than the numbers of all the buses going there. The number of numbers that a passenger will need to remember in this scheme is less by a multiplicative factor than in number-as-name schemes.
3.2 Length Of Route Numbers
The readily observable and noticed space on a bus is limited; the number of characters required for route-representation is an important criterion. The route numbers must be displayed prominently and they should also be easily analyzable.
Some of the route numbers if we use a purely prime-multiplicative scheme will be very long and too complex for an average individual to quickly analyze with his destination-key.
3.2.1 An alternative:
Let us consider a linear scheme in which we could assign numbers (needn't be prime) to the stations and we string together the numbers for the stations as the route number. On the face of it, this seem to be simpler than the prime-multiplicative scheme. But there could be problems interpreting a linear route number. For example, 123 could be interpreted as
3.2.2 Adapting the prime-multiplicative scheme:
Through judicious and intelligent choices, the length of the route number can be minimized. Some approaches are mentioned below -
a) Use of smaller numbers for stations that are on busier routes. In fact, if all of the buses pass a station, that needn't have a number at all!
b) In the case that all buses passing through a station A come from another station B, the square of B's code can be used for A and so on. This would mean just multiplication with B's code instead of with another prime number which would have been larger.
c) A hybrid combination of the linear and multiplicative schemes may be essential for very large cities. In case the resulting route number is too big, and only then, it can be decomposed into two smaller, more manageable numbers. The passenger can decide whether the bus goes to a destination if either is divisible by the destination-key.
In the opinion of this author, upto a pair of four digit numbers would be quickly analyzable. In most cases, it should be possible to manage with smaller pairs.
d) Colour-coding of the buses and division of cities into sub-areas are also possibilities. But this should be done only if absolutely necessary, as it destroys the uniformity and simplicity of the scheme and creates confusion.
4 - CONCLUSION
----------------------------
A bus-route numbering scheme based on prime-multiplicative encoding can be used, after suitable modifications and adaptation to location-specific peculiarities, for embedding route-information into bus-route numbers in an efficient manner.
A limitation of this scheme is that some of the route-numbers could be unmanageably long - some of the possible workarounds have been explained - but there should be no problem implementing the scheme for at least the most important locations of a city.
The implementation of this or a similar route-information-encoding scheme for bus-numbering would be beneficial.
-Thomas Jay Cubb
Monday, November 21, 2005
Queuriest - IV
------------------------------------------------------------------
QUEURIEST - IV
Keep Guessing! --- Johnnie Guesser
------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Merry X-mas folks (belated) ! But tell me, why is it X in X-mas? C-mas would've been better abbreviations for Christmas, right? What's the story? ------ The question, in short, is : Y X?
*
2.If it is Dr. Watson for Sherlock Holmes, who is it for Hercule Poirot?
*
3.George Orwell's 1984 gave us the terms Big Brother, doublespeak etc. What was 'the ultimate' torture room in the novel called?
*
4.Absolute sitter this one. Which fabric literally means `cloth of the king'? Work it out!
*
5.Eminently guessable one. Which rock star named himself (or/and his band) after a 17th century witch? Maybe you gotta be eighteen to answer this one. . .
*
6. How would most of us better know a virgule as?
*
7. What is the claim to fame of two people called Dismas and Gestas? For Christ's sake, don't google on this one...
*
8. Elementary question! Name the only elements that exist as liquids at 0C (zero degree celsius). Clue: There are words derived from them in the English language. Calling Mr.Webster?....
*
9. It's all Greek to me! Who was killed by Zeus after Pluto complained to him that Hades was getting underpopulated?
*
10.Which four-letter word did Dr. Seuss coin in his 1950 book "If I Ran the Zoo"? Do not search excessively, you just might become one! ;-p
*
-----------------------------------------------------------------
********* Bonus Q for no points:*********
**Gimme a word with the sequence `uqu' in it.
------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "SonOfDelphi"
Date: Fri Dec 27, 2002 9:05 pm
Subject: Queuriest - IV
hi everybody!
Here's the fourth edition of Queuriest.
Hope this edition gets more responses than the previous one (if that is possible!). Get the answers straight from the heart (or wherever it is that you keep ur facts ;-) No WYSWIG (=what you search is what i get) please. Gimme what you got. Make me happy...flood me with replies!
answers in a week's time. get cracking!!!
luv
thomas
ANSWERS
--------------
hi folks!
pretty good response to the quiz. there were 25 responses in all. was expecting more though...(never get enuff of you!) :-) what with more responses to the previous edition.
were the clues too obvious? that's what put some of u off? don't want no more clues? questions too easy? tell me when u answer to Queuriest-V.
the answers follow...
luv
thomas
------------------------------------------------------------------
QUEURIEST - IV
Keep Guessing! --- Johnnie Guesser
------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Merry X-mas folks (belated) ! But tell me, why is it X in X-mas? C-mas would've been better abbreviations for Christmas, right? What's the story? ------ The question, in short, is : Y X?
*X looks similar to the greek alphabet chi,which in greek is the first letter in the name Christ, Chi was used to represent the name Christ ,so christmas=chimas or Xmas
2.If it is Dr. Watson for Sherlock Holmes, who is it for Hercule Poirot?
*Captain Arthur Hastings
I think the Poirot short-stories were almost knocking-copies of the SH stories...personal opinion. everything corresponds
to the Advs of SH&W. Novels pretty good though.
3.George Orwell's 1984 gave us the terms Big Brother, doublespeak etc. What was 'the ultimate' torture room in the novel called?
* Room 101 is what the torture room was called.
When Winston Smith was taken there, he got rats. It contained ur worst fears, whatever that was. His was rats.
GB: Room 101. Where your ultimate personal nightmare is given shape?
4.Absolute sitter this one. Which fabric literally means `cloth of the king'? Work it out!
*Corduroy was what I was expecting. CORD DU ROI
But many of you came up with rexine, working the rex part superbly. Good work but points only for corduroy as rexine is not cloth, just a leather-substitute.
5.Eminently guessable one. Which rock star named himself (or/and his band) after a 17th century witch? Maybe you gotta be eighteen to answer this one. . .
Alice Cooper. the clue had something to do with AC's song Eighteen. among the world's first shock-rockers...white makeup, lipstick etc onstage
6. How would most of us better know a virgule as?
* Slash, the "/", forward slash more precisely.
AV said: comma. in French. FYI puan is a fullstop, and Puan-Virgule, a semicolon.
QM:what would a backslash be called, i wonder . . .
7. What is the claim to fame of two people called Dismas and Gestas? For Christ's sake, don't google on this one...
* These are the people (thieves) who were crucified along with Jesus Christ. The clue was a dead giveaway I guess.
Most of you got it right.Assignment for u: who was on the left and who was on the right?
8. Elementary question! Name the only elements that exist as liquids at 0C (zero degree celsius). Clue: There are words derived from them in the English language. Calling Mr.Webster?....
* Bromine & Mercury
Not too many got both right.
9. It's all Greek to me! Who was killed by Zeus after Pluto complained to him that Hades was getting underpopulated?
* Aesculapius, who was bringing people back to life. Zeus afraid that it would violate the exclusivity of the Gods' immortality, strikes him down with thunderbolt as some versions have it.
BJ complained:MAJOR MISTAKES IN THE QUESTION #1 Zeus- Greek (=Jupiter in Roman) and Pluto- Roman #2 Hades-God of the underworld in Greek mythology (NOT greek for hell!!)
QM:well, Hades IS the name for the Greek underworld as well as the god, as you mentioned. It was named so after the god, I think.And...Pluto, as you mentioned, is Roman but Hade's (the god's) equivalent. I used Pluto just to avoid the confusion between the god and the place. And one more thing,Hades(the place) is not hell: it is the abode of the dead, not a place of punishment like Hell.. . .well, maybe the question would've been better framed as ...Hades complained that the Underworld was...? anyways...
10.Which four-letter word did Dr. Seuss coin in his 1950 book "If I Ran the Zoo"? Do not search excessively, you just might become one! ;-p
*Nerd
Many of you came up with geek which was pretty good work i thought. A lot of other 4-letter words also did come up. . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------
********* Bonus Q for no points:*********
**Gimme a word with the sequence `uqu' in it.
Not too many attempted this, bouquet was the only one that turned up. i guess that's the only word. my anagrammer dug out these obscure words from my comp dictionary:albuquerque,bouquet, chautauqua,chibouque,dubuque,duque,duquesne, ololiuqui, ololiuquis, ottauquechee,tuque. But none of these seem to be 'normal' words. Strange, considering that words with 'uq' would also be the same, since q is always followed by u! Is bouquet the only real word?
------------------------------------------------------------------
The scores (in chronological order):
1. Ravikiran Rao - 3.5 ( not 205 sorry, .5 for Hg)
2. Aishwariya V - 4 (the French connection!)
3. Debashree Mitra - 6.5 (good going)
4. Vaidyanathan - 7 (great show boss)
5. Dinesh Krothivasan - 6.5 (thanx for the comps)
6. Mamatha Baloo - 3 (roll the dice sometimes)
7. Ramkumar Shankar - 3 (geek was good)
8. Venkateshwar - (but having major fun though!)
9. Abhinandan LN - 7 (100%hit rate!)
10.Ananya Deb - 5.5 (.5 for Greek god part tho Aeschylus was somebody else)
11. R.Krishna - 7 (nice work)
12. B.Sreeram - 5 (cafe-panic-amnesia? :-)
13. Bharat Jayakumar - 2 (xQ = 0.5! )
14. Pauline Daniel - 4 (guess more!)
15. Vimal Vikran Vardhan M - 2.5 ( V3M :-)
16. Bhaskar Singh - 2 (hi nerd pal?? ;-)
17. Rajaram Sethuraman - 1 (enjoyed ur effort)
18. Sourabh Issar - 1.5 (Bromine, not Iodine)
19. Girish Bhat - 3 ( u nu no uqu in sequence didn't u? ;-)
20. Syam Prasad - 4 (It's Winston Smith in '84)
21. Ryan Michigan - 8.5 (ref my expl on Q9. )
22. Husain Poonawala - .5 (BS named after a movie)
23. Partha Sengupta - 1 (Dude! ;-)
24. Debanjan Ghosh - 5 (solid show)
25. Mahesh M Nair - 5.5 (back in tvm?)
----- STATS --------------------------------------------------------------
Funnest!-
Classroom/School on Room 101!
X stands for the cross, rotated by 45 degrees on Xmas
People who became words: Dismal & Gestapo! on Dismas/Gestas
Most of us know it as an unknown word! on Virgule
Guessest!- good guessing
Rexin,Shahtoosh on Corduroy
Geek on Nerd
Rat Trap on Room 101
Alice In Chains on Alice Cooper (QM: same Alice I wonder?)
* Ryan Michigan tops with 8.5 points
* Average score : 4
* All the questions were answered.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
QUEURIEST - IV
Keep Guessing! --- Johnnie Guesser
------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Merry X-mas folks (belated) ! But tell me, why is it X in X-mas? C-mas would've been better abbreviations for Christmas, right? What's the story? ------ The question, in short, is : Y X?
*
2.If it is Dr. Watson for Sherlock Holmes, who is it for Hercule Poirot?
*
3.George Orwell's 1984 gave us the terms Big Brother, doublespeak etc. What was 'the ultimate' torture room in the novel called?
*
4.Absolute sitter this one. Which fabric literally means `cloth of the king'? Work it out!
*
5.Eminently guessable one. Which rock star named himself (or/and his band) after a 17th century witch? Maybe you gotta be eighteen to answer this one. . .
*
6. How would most of us better know a virgule as?
*
7. What is the claim to fame of two people called Dismas and Gestas? For Christ's sake, don't google on this one...
*
8. Elementary question! Name the only elements that exist as liquids at 0C (zero degree celsius). Clue: There are words derived from them in the English language. Calling Mr.Webster?....
*
9. It's all Greek to me! Who was killed by Zeus after Pluto complained to him that Hades was getting underpopulated?
*
10.Which four-letter word did Dr. Seuss coin in his 1950 book "If I Ran the Zoo"? Do not search excessively, you just might become one! ;-p
*
-----------------------------------------------------------------
********* Bonus Q for no points:*********
**Gimme a word with the sequence `uqu' in it.
------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "SonOfDelphi"
Date: Fri Dec 27, 2002 9:05 pm
Subject: Queuriest - IV
hi everybody!
Here's the fourth edition of Queuriest.
Hope this edition gets more responses than the previous one (if that is possible!). Get the answers straight from the heart (or wherever it is that you keep ur facts ;-) No WYSWIG (=what you search is what i get) please. Gimme what you got. Make me happy...flood me with replies!
answers in a week's time. get cracking!!!
luv
thomas
ANSWERS
--------------
hi folks!
pretty good response to the quiz. there were 25 responses in all. was expecting more though...(never get enuff of you!) :-) what with more responses to the previous edition.
were the clues too obvious? that's what put some of u off? don't want no more clues? questions too easy? tell me when u answer to Queuriest-V.
the answers follow...
luv
thomas
------------------------------------------------------------------
QUEURIEST - IV
Keep Guessing! --- Johnnie Guesser
------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Merry X-mas folks (belated) ! But tell me, why is it X in X-mas? C-mas would've been better abbreviations for Christmas, right? What's the story? ------ The question, in short, is : Y X?
*X looks similar to the greek alphabet chi,which in greek is the first letter in the name Christ, Chi was used to represent the name Christ ,so christmas=chimas or Xmas
2.If it is Dr. Watson for Sherlock Holmes, who is it for Hercule Poirot?
*Captain Arthur Hastings
I think the Poirot short-stories were almost knocking-copies of the SH stories...personal opinion. everything corresponds
to the Advs of SH&W. Novels pretty good though.
3.George Orwell's 1984 gave us the terms Big Brother, doublespeak etc. What was 'the ultimate' torture room in the novel called?
* Room 101 is what the torture room was called.
When Winston Smith was taken there, he got rats. It contained ur worst fears, whatever that was. His was rats.
GB: Room 101. Where your ultimate personal nightmare is given shape?
4.Absolute sitter this one. Which fabric literally means `cloth of the king'? Work it out!
*Corduroy was what I was expecting. CORD DU ROI
But many of you came up with rexine, working the rex part superbly. Good work but points only for corduroy as rexine is not cloth, just a leather-substitute.
5.Eminently guessable one. Which rock star named himself (or/and his band) after a 17th century witch? Maybe you gotta be eighteen to answer this one. . .
Alice Cooper. the clue had something to do with AC's song Eighteen. among the world's first shock-rockers...white makeup, lipstick etc onstage
6. How would most of us better know a virgule as?
* Slash, the "/", forward slash more precisely.
AV said: comma. in French. FYI puan is a fullstop, and Puan-Virgule, a semicolon.
QM:what would a backslash be called, i wonder . . .
7. What is the claim to fame of two people called Dismas and Gestas? For Christ's sake, don't google on this one...
* These are the people (thieves) who were crucified along with Jesus Christ. The clue was a dead giveaway I guess.
Most of you got it right.Assignment for u: who was on the left and who was on the right?
8. Elementary question! Name the only elements that exist as liquids at 0C (zero degree celsius). Clue: There are words derived from them in the English language. Calling Mr.Webster?....
* Bromine & Mercury
Not too many got both right.
9. It's all Greek to me! Who was killed by Zeus after Pluto complained to him that Hades was getting underpopulated?
* Aesculapius, who was bringing people back to life. Zeus afraid that it would violate the exclusivity of the Gods' immortality, strikes him down with thunderbolt as some versions have it.
BJ complained:MAJOR MISTAKES IN THE QUESTION #1 Zeus- Greek (=Jupiter in Roman) and Pluto- Roman #2 Hades-God of the underworld in Greek mythology (NOT greek for hell!!)
QM:well, Hades IS the name for the Greek underworld as well as the god, as you mentioned. It was named so after the god, I think.And...Pluto, as you mentioned, is Roman but Hade's (the god's) equivalent. I used Pluto just to avoid the confusion between the god and the place. And one more thing,Hades(the place) is not hell: it is the abode of the dead, not a place of punishment like Hell.. . .well, maybe the question would've been better framed as ...Hades complained that the Underworld was...? anyways...
10.Which four-letter word did Dr. Seuss coin in his 1950 book "If I Ran the Zoo"? Do not search excessively, you just might become one! ;-p
*Nerd
Many of you came up with geek which was pretty good work i thought. A lot of other 4-letter words also did come up. . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------
********* Bonus Q for no points:*********
**Gimme a word with the sequence `uqu' in it.
Not too many attempted this, bouquet was the only one that turned up. i guess that's the only word. my anagrammer dug out these obscure words from my comp dictionary:albuquerque,bouquet, chautauqua,chibouque,dubuque,duque,duquesne, ololiuqui, ololiuquis, ottauquechee,tuque. But none of these seem to be 'normal' words. Strange, considering that words with 'uq' would also be the same, since q is always followed by u! Is bouquet the only real word?
------------------------------------------------------------------
The scores (in chronological order):
1. Ravikiran Rao - 3.5 ( not 205 sorry, .5 for Hg)
2. Aishwariya V - 4 (the French connection!)
3. Debashree Mitra - 6.5 (good going)
4. Vaidyanathan - 7 (great show boss)
5. Dinesh Krothivasan - 6.5 (thanx for the comps)
6. Mamatha Baloo - 3 (roll the dice sometimes)
7. Ramkumar Shankar - 3 (geek was good)
8. Venkateshwar - (but having major fun though!)
9. Abhinandan LN - 7 (100%hit rate!)
10.Ananya Deb - 5.5 (.5 for Greek god part tho Aeschylus was somebody else)
11. R.Krishna - 7 (nice work)
12. B.Sreeram - 5 (cafe-panic-amnesia? :-)
13. Bharat Jayakumar - 2 (xQ = 0.5! )
14. Pauline Daniel - 4 (guess more!)
15. Vimal Vikran Vardhan M - 2.5 ( V3M :-)
16. Bhaskar Singh - 2 (hi nerd pal?? ;-)
17. Rajaram Sethuraman - 1 (enjoyed ur effort)
18. Sourabh Issar - 1.5 (Bromine, not Iodine)
19. Girish Bhat - 3 ( u nu no uqu in sequence didn't u? ;-)
20. Syam Prasad - 4 (It's Winston Smith in '84)
21. Ryan Michigan - 8.5 (ref my expl on Q9. )
22. Husain Poonawala - .5 (BS named after a movie)
23. Partha Sengupta - 1 (Dude! ;-)
24. Debanjan Ghosh - 5 (solid show)
25. Mahesh M Nair - 5.5 (back in tvm?)
----- STATS --------------------------------------------------------------
Funnest!-
Classroom/School on Room 101!
X stands for the cross, rotated by 45 degrees on Xmas
People who became words: Dismal & Gestapo! on Dismas/Gestas
Most of us know it as an unknown word! on Virgule
Guessest!- good guessing
Rexin,Shahtoosh on Corduroy
Geek on Nerd
Rat Trap on Room 101
Alice In Chains on Alice Cooper (QM: same Alice I wonder?)
* Ryan Michigan tops with 8.5 points
* Average score : 4
* All the questions were answered.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
Dumbbells Under The Bed *
Ever heard the one about the guy who learnt body-building through a correspondence course? He didn't become much brawnier, but the postman is now the strongest man in town!
"This is what Zeno said, what about you?"*
It's not enough that you read and come to know of great men's thoughts; what's important is that you think about these, form an opinion of your own and know what they really mean. Think, what if. Think, what more. Only then can you assimilate greatness and become better for having read/heard it. Think, Why. Think, Why Not. Like the Eagles sang in their song Already Gone, you can see the stars and still not see the light.**
This is the path to discovery and, often, invention- small deviations may result in totally different though possibly equally great, if not greater, destinations. The pleasures are in the journey on the thought-train; even if the terminals are the same, the route makes a difference.
What say you?
- Thomas Jay Cubb
NOTES
---------
* This piece was inspired by a few lines mentioned in Tibor Fischer's The Thought Gang. The comparison in the title is from a passage in it. Ever since I read it, this particular thought has influenced me a lot. Other listings included -
Stupidity, that's me. - about the value of humility.
Live according to nature. - no greed path to happiness.
** In the case of good books, the point is not how many of them you can get through, but rather how many can get through to you. -Mortimer J. Adler,
philosopher, educator and author (1902-2001)
"This is what Zeno said, what about you?"*
It's not enough that you read and come to know of great men's thoughts; what's important is that you think about these, form an opinion of your own and know what they really mean. Think, what if. Think, what more. Only then can you assimilate greatness and become better for having read/heard it. Think, Why. Think, Why Not. Like the Eagles sang in their song Already Gone, you can see the stars and still not see the light.**
This is the path to discovery and, often, invention- small deviations may result in totally different though possibly equally great, if not greater, destinations. The pleasures are in the journey on the thought-train; even if the terminals are the same, the route makes a difference.
What say you?
- Thomas Jay Cubb
NOTES
---------
* This piece was inspired by a few lines mentioned in Tibor Fischer's The Thought Gang. The comparison in the title is from a passage in it. Ever since I read it, this particular thought has influenced me a lot. Other listings included -
Stupidity, that's me. - about the value of humility.
Live according to nature. - no greed path to happiness.
** In the case of good books, the point is not how many of them you can get through, but rather how many can get through to you. -Mortimer J. Adler,
philosopher, educator and author (1902-2001)
Monday, November 14, 2005
Doubled
Labels:
Verse
This was written to report the occasion of a colleague getting married.
---------------------------------
DOUBLED!
---------------------------------
From a lion to a cub,
Welcome to the Club.
-Thomas Jay Cubb
---------------------------------
Meaning plane 1
You have just gotten married; we have been married for many years. Come and start enjoying the joy of matrimony.
Meaning plane 2
You were a lion (with free will) once, now you'll become a cub again! We share your misery!
---------------------------------
DOUBLED!
---------------------------------
From a lion to a cub,
Welcome to the Club.
-Thomas Jay Cubb
---------------------------------
Meaning plane 1
You have just gotten married; we have been married for many years. Come and start enjoying the joy of matrimony.
Meaning plane 2
You were a lion (with free will) once, now you'll become a cub again! We share your misery!
Friday, November 11, 2005
Surprisingly SBI
Labels:
Kicks
There are a lot of ads doing the round asking different questions, all of them with the same answer: Surprisingly SBI.
Which bank has the most ATMS?
Which bank gives you ......... ... the best X?
...
...
Surprisingly SBI.
Why should it be surprising? Why do they have such low self-esteem? Didn't the ad agency think about that?
Does SBI expand to Surprising Bank of India? :-)
Which bank has the most ATMS?
Which bank gives you .....
...
...
Surprisingly SBI.
Why should it be surprising? Why do they have such low self-esteem? Didn't the ad agency think about that?
Does SBI expand to Surprising Bank of India? :-)
Thursday, November 10, 2005
Living To Fight Another Day
After writing the elimination round of any quiz competition, there is always this doubt in one's mind - Have we scored enough? Will we get through to the final round?
In my experience, I have found that around 50% does it. Of course, the more points you get, the surer you are to get through. But if one is sure about around half the questions, the odds are that you will make it. We might not qualify as the toppers, but we will most probably scrape through - living to fight another day and that's what counts.
On a couple of occasions, I have been eliminated even after touching this magic figure. Each time, there were more than a couple of teams on the same score, we were shot out after a tiebreaker or a coin-toss and apology. It's fair and square, I've been on the benefiting side as well.
Now, suppose you are sure about 60% and you still don't get through.
Chances are that -
a) you were wrong on a few (QM googlies). Oh.......#@*#.....That! How could I have not spotted that! The QM knows better than you.
b) you know better than the QM. He uses an old edition of that book. But there's no point in arguing, remember the cardinal rule : the QM is always, always, no matter what, right.
c) it was not a good set of questions- hugely loaded with current affairs or some niche topic - favouring some teams with specific backgrounds. Was Rembrandt really that good? So many questions... Or is today that important a day?
d) The other teams were fantabulously great. They make it every time, why don't I?
In all four scenarios, it's probably best that you didn't make it. But no matter what, stay to watch the final round. Don't leave the venue disappointed.
On the other hand, if you didn't score around half and the cut off was round about there, it's time for some serious book- or web-crawling!
What say you?
This 50% rule is also the criterion by which I make out who google on my online quizzes and who don't. Generally, I'm right! Or, it was a bad set of questions....More thoughts on what makes a good set of prelims questions, later.
In my experience, I have found that around 50% does it. Of course, the more points you get, the surer you are to get through. But if one is sure about around half the questions, the odds are that you will make it. We might not qualify as the toppers, but we will most probably scrape through - living to fight another day and that's what counts.
On a couple of occasions, I have been eliminated even after touching this magic figure. Each time, there were more than a couple of teams on the same score, we were shot out after a tiebreaker or a coin-toss and apology. It's fair and square, I've been on the benefiting side as well.
Now, suppose you are sure about 60% and you still don't get through.
Chances are that -
a) you were wrong on a few (QM googlies). Oh.......#@*#.....That! How could I have not spotted that! The QM knows better than you.
b) you know better than the QM. He uses an old edition of that book. But there's no point in arguing, remember the cardinal rule : the QM is always, always, no matter what, right.
c) it was not a good set of questions- hugely loaded with current affairs or some niche topic - favouring some teams with specific backgrounds. Was Rembrandt really that good? So many questions... Or is today that important a day?
d) The other teams were fantabulously great. They make it every time, why don't I?
In all four scenarios, it's probably best that you didn't make it. But no matter what, stay to watch the final round. Don't leave the venue disappointed.
On the other hand, if you didn't score around half and the cut off was round about there, it's time for some serious book- or web-crawling!
What say you?
This 50% rule is also the criterion by which I make out who google on my online quizzes and who don't. Generally, I'm right! Or, it was a bad set of questions....More thoughts on what makes a good set of prelims questions, later.
To The Book Borrower - I
Because nobody ever returns books they borrow... After some time it becomes the borrower's - why return it now, he has read it anyway! I used to write this in every book I bought.
-------------------------------------
TO THE BOOK BORROWER - I
-------------------------------------
This book is dearly mine,
And if you, my darling, borrow
Mind to return within weeks nine
For that is the mine-thine fine line.
Beyond which is bereavement, sorrow.
- Thomas Jay Cubb
-------------------------------------
TO THE BOOK BORROWER - I
-------------------------------------
This book is dearly mine,
And if you, my darling, borrow
Mind to return within weeks nine
For that is the mine-thine fine line.
Beyond which is bereavement, sorrow.
- Thomas Jay Cubb
Friday, October 28, 2005
Queuriest - III
----------------------------------
QUEURIEST - III
Keep Guessing - Johnnie Guesser
----------------------------------
1. What is a tittle? Clue: There are six of them in this question!
*
2. Connect the seed-drill and scuba. Maybe you should be sitting on a park-bench while thinking this one out!
*
3. Real sitter. Who stays at Apartment 3D, 344, ClintonStreet?
*
4. Which modern-day term was originally used to refer to the high-flying flags on ships in the 18th century?
*
5. Who, according to Don Bradman, "scored goals like runs"?
*
6. "Woods are lovely,dark and deep..." All of us are familiar with these words by Robert Frost. But tell me which poem?
*
7. Who were the signatories of the Treaty Of Park Avenue?
*
8. Pete Sampras currently holds the record for maximum number of Grand Slam titles among me. Whose record did he break?
*
9. If a philanthropist makes charitable donations to increase human well-being, what does a psilanthropist do?
*
10. What kind of people did Gulliver encounter in Glubbdubdrib?
*
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Great men are only agents of a great cause. - Nietschze
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
hello everybody!
hope this edition gets more responses than the previous one.
questions are fairly straightforward this time around. gimme what u got! No What-You-Search-Is-What-I-Get please! rediscover the joy of guessing!
answers in 7 days time. get cracking!
luv
thomas
hi folks!
thanks for the fantabulous response. there were 44 responses in all.
had a lot of fun compiling the stats, scoring the responses etc...and thanks a lot for 'rediscovering the joy of guessing'.
luv
thomas
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ANSWERS
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. What is a tittle? Clue: There are six of them in this question!
*the dot over the i . Almost universally cracked. Did EVERYBODY really know this one?. . . I guess the clue gave it away!!! ...or was it ...? ;-)
AJ adds: - however i think there are eight in ur question...since ur question mark as well as ur exclamation mark have one each (below them) they too are called tittles .....e.g. spanish has an inverted question mark before the question and an inverted exclamation mark before an exclamation (and of course a straight question mark and straight exclamation mark after a question and exclamation respectively) so they too are called tittles.
MM says: A title is a small mark or point added to a letter like the German Umlaut, I'm not sure whether the dot over the i qualifies as a tittle.
QM: tittle literally = A tiny or scarcely detectable amount, Related word: diacritic, check it out.
2. Connect the seed-drill and scuba. Maybe you should be sitting on a park-bench while thinking this one out!
*The seed-drill was invented by a person called Jethro Tull. And Aqualung is another name for the scuba gear which is an album/song by Ian Anderson's Jethro Tull.
Really,you should be specific and clear while answering connection Qs. 1 point only if both JT and AL mentioned.only 0.5 if just one mentioned.
about the clue:'Sitting on a park-bench' is how the song starts...
Not too many takers on this one.
3. Real sitter. Who stays at Apartment 3D, 344, ClintonStreet?
* Clark Kent aka Superman
No controversy on this one. Most of you got it.
4. Which modern-day term was originally used to refer to the high-flying flags on ships in the 18th century?
*Skyscraper.
Only Shash Shekar got this one.
5. Who, according to Don Bradman, "scored goals like runs"?
* Indian hockey team/Dhyan Chand
I'd been thinking that it was about the hockey team alone, but so many of u `remembered' it as being about Dhyan Chand also...maybe it was about Dhyan Chand's Indian hockey team! Points for either.
6. "Woods are lovely,dark and deep..." All of us are familiar with these words by Robert Frost. But tell me which poem?
*Stopping by the woods on a snowy evening.
Had many variants like Walking, winter evening, winter morning..but I've been very generous!
7. Who were the signatories of the Treaty Of Park Avenue?
*Arthur C. Clarke and Isaac Asimov. The treaty was that whenever asked who the best science-fiction writer was, Asimov would say Clarke, and Clarke would name Asimov.
Shiraz adds: its basically while in the taxi cab on Park Ave that they made a pact
8. Pete Sampras currently holds the record for maximum number of Grand Slam singles titles among men. Whose record did he break?
*Roy Emerson's record of 12 Grand Slam singles titles (A6,F2,W2,U2). He still has the maximum number of Grand Slam titles overall (including doubles, 28).
Rod Laver and Bjorn Borg have 11 each.
9. If a philanthropist makes charitable donations to increase human well-being, what does a psilanthropist do?
* A psilanthropist is a person who believes that Jesus Christ was a mere mortal.
(Perhaps this was the most referred answer. Hail Webster?)
10. What kind of people did Gulliver encounter in Glubbdubdrib?
*Sorcers and Magicians.
Glubbdubdrib was ruled by a sorcerer, who entertains his guests by calling forth the spirits of the ancient world.
QM: Many of you answered Yahoos for this one. Well, Gulliver met them in the land of the Houyhnhnms, a race of intelligent horses. The Yahoos were the human savages there...and Gulliver met the Struldbrugs, a race of immortals, in Luggnagg.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The scores (in chronological order)
1. Pauline Daniel - 2 (that was such a quick response!)
2. Gautham Ravichander - 2 (Great work on Jethro Tull )
3. Husain Poonawala - 4 (cool show)
4. Shiraz - 7 (superb show man! hope u enjoyed the rediscovery process! :-)
5. Shobhana Balakrishnan - 2 (stopping by, not walking thru,but I'm generous!)
6. Krishna T - 1.5 (First to get hockey team as such!)
7. Aishwariya V - 3 (had planned 2 put ur lace tidbit as a Q in fact. but now NO!!!)
8. Vaidyanathan - 5 (why duplicates? confused me.)
9. Mohit Sud - 6.5 (y didn't u mention Aqualung?)
10. Naveed Mohammed - 7 (right on Laver/Borg but Emerson has 12. )
11. Abhishek Hariharan - 2 (nice try)
12. Sourabh Issar - 1 (GlubbDubbians was a cheeky one! ;-)
13. Rajesh Malviya - 3.5 (It's not Doug Adams)
14. Syam Prasad - 4.5 (way to go man! it was not too much after all, eh?)
15. Madhu M - 2 (a tittle of a doubt! but dot over i good enough to get points here)
16. Biswabijoy Sen - 5 (Aqualung could not have been answered in a better way!)
17. Ranganathan Sairam - 4 (y didn't u answer prev quiz if u liked it? anyway,thanx for the compliment.)
18. Samir Bora - 4.5 (Superman/(Superman+Mask) = 0.5 )
19. Debashree Mitra - 6 (solid!)
20. Quizgeek - 6 (who's the man behind the mask?)
21. Anshuman Mishra - 5 (OK!OK! I wish you luck ;-P )
22. B.Sreeram - 6 (How old are you anyway, huh?)
23. Sameer Baxi - 7 (Check out RAMA series by ACC)
24. Ramsu - 7 (It's not Pele! Go head! Kick urself :-)
25. Ramkey - 3 (100% hit rate! u should've made more attempts!)
26. Soumyadipta B - 5 (glad to know u appreciate the Qs)
27. Harish J Prabhu - 6 (Bradman's grandkids LOL!!!)
28. Satish K - 5 (no points for meaning of tittle sorry. u should have used the clue!)
29. Kasthuri - 6.5 (glad to know u used the clue. and...is ur heart content now? ;-p)
30. Raghavendra Achar - 1 (Good guesses but hard luck :-(
31. Thejaswi Udupa - 8.5 (about history textbook-people. he met only their ghosts thru way of necromancy.)
32. Dhiraj Ramakrishnan - 2 (nice try)
33. Aseem - 4 (solid)
34. Udayan Chakrabarti - 2.5 (y didn't u mention Jethro Tull)
35. Shrijit Plapally - 2 (enjoyed ur answers ;-)
36. Dhananjay Shettigar - 3.5 (good work on hockey team)
37. Amit De - 5 (willie renshaw was that guy who kept winning Wimbledon right? he ever win anything else?)
38. R.Krishna - 7 ( is the middle name really jerome? please confirm)
39. Ankur Jain - 7 (Holmes Jain!!!)
40. Bhaskar Singh - 2 (William Renshaw won a few Wimbledons.But that was it, I guess)
41. Venkateswar - 2 (there were some queery answers after all hey?)
42. Shash Shekar - 6 (congrats on skyscraper)
43. Bharat Jayakumar - 4 (hi there. mudblood? :-)
44. Siddharth K - 2.5 ( No AL on JT = 0.5)
--------------------STATS--------------------------------------
*Honestest! -
SP who said `He believes that Christ was only a man. (Do not give me marks for this. I consulted my Dictionary.) '
Queuriest! -
Response to q2 seed-drill & scuba
UC: Aqualung yes but no Jethro Tull !
MS & DS: Jethro Tull, yes but no Aqualung !
Cryptickest!-
SB who said IS IS POINTS to What is a tittle?
and QM deciphered as is I's points! yay!!!
Funnest!-
Monica Lewinsky on Clintonstreet
Raymonds on Treaty Of Park Avenue
Snot nosed- drippy nosed people on Glubbdubbdrib
Misspell Philanthropist on Psilanthropist
Himself playing football with his grandchildren on Don's comment
...and now the cricketers score runs like goals! on Don's comment
(thought it gooddest not to reveal authors.)
* Thejaswi Udupa tops the quiz with 8.5 points
* Average score: 4.5
* Everybody scored!
* All the questions were answered.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Great men are only agents of a great cause. - Nietschze
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
QUEURIEST - III
Keep Guessing - Johnnie Guesser
----------------------------------
1. What is a tittle? Clue: There are six of them in this question!
*
2. Connect the seed-drill and scuba. Maybe you should be sitting on a park-bench while thinking this one out!
*
3. Real sitter. Who stays at Apartment 3D, 344, ClintonStreet?
*
4. Which modern-day term was originally used to refer to the high-flying flags on ships in the 18th century?
*
5. Who, according to Don Bradman, "scored goals like runs"?
*
6. "Woods are lovely,dark and deep..." All of us are familiar with these words by Robert Frost. But tell me which poem?
*
7. Who were the signatories of the Treaty Of Park Avenue?
*
8. Pete Sampras currently holds the record for maximum number of Grand Slam titles among me. Whose record did he break?
*
9. If a philanthropist makes charitable donations to increase human well-being, what does a psilanthropist do?
*
10. What kind of people did Gulliver encounter in Glubbdubdrib?
*
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Great men are only agents of a great cause. - Nietschze
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
hello everybody!
hope this edition gets more responses than the previous one.
questions are fairly straightforward this time around. gimme what u got! No What-You-Search-Is-What-I-Get please! rediscover the joy of guessing!
answers in 7 days time. get cracking!
luv
thomas
hi folks!
thanks for the fantabulous response. there were 44 responses in all.
had a lot of fun compiling the stats, scoring the responses etc...and thanks a lot for 'rediscovering the joy of guessing'.
luv
thomas
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ANSWERS
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. What is a tittle? Clue: There are six of them in this question!
*the dot over the i . Almost universally cracked. Did EVERYBODY really know this one?. . . I guess the clue gave it away!!! ...or was it ...? ;-)
AJ adds: - however i think there are eight in ur question...since ur question mark as well as ur exclamation mark have one each (below them) they too are called tittles .....e.g. spanish has an inverted question mark before the question and an inverted exclamation mark before an exclamation (and of course a straight question mark and straight exclamation mark after a question and exclamation respectively) so they too are called tittles.
MM says: A title is a small mark or point added to a letter like the German Umlaut, I'm not sure whether the dot over the i qualifies as a tittle.
QM: tittle literally = A tiny or scarcely detectable amount, Related word: diacritic, check it out.
2. Connect the seed-drill and scuba. Maybe you should be sitting on a park-bench while thinking this one out!
*The seed-drill was invented by a person called Jethro Tull. And Aqualung is another name for the scuba gear which is an album/song by Ian Anderson's Jethro Tull.
Really,you should be specific and clear while answering connection Qs. 1 point only if both JT and AL mentioned.only 0.5 if just one mentioned.
about the clue:'Sitting on a park-bench' is how the song starts...
Not too many takers on this one.
3. Real sitter. Who stays at Apartment 3D, 344, ClintonStreet?
* Clark Kent aka Superman
No controversy on this one. Most of you got it.
4. Which modern-day term was originally used to refer to the high-flying flags on ships in the 18th century?
*Skyscraper.
Only Shash Shekar got this one.
5. Who, according to Don Bradman, "scored goals like runs"?
* Indian hockey team/Dhyan Chand
I'd been thinking that it was about the hockey team alone, but so many of u `remembered' it as being about Dhyan Chand also...maybe it was about Dhyan Chand's Indian hockey team! Points for either.
6. "Woods are lovely,dark and deep..." All of us are familiar with these words by Robert Frost. But tell me which poem?
*Stopping by the woods on a snowy evening.
Had many variants like Walking, winter evening, winter morning..but I've been very generous!
7. Who were the signatories of the Treaty Of Park Avenue?
*Arthur C. Clarke and Isaac Asimov. The treaty was that whenever asked who the best science-fiction writer was, Asimov would say Clarke, and Clarke would name Asimov.
Shiraz adds: its basically while in the taxi cab on Park Ave that they made a pact
8. Pete Sampras currently holds the record for maximum number of Grand Slam singles titles among men. Whose record did he break?
*Roy Emerson's record of 12 Grand Slam singles titles (A6,F2,W2,U2). He still has the maximum number of Grand Slam titles overall (including doubles, 28).
Rod Laver and Bjorn Borg have 11 each.
9. If a philanthropist makes charitable donations to increase human well-being, what does a psilanthropist do?
* A psilanthropist is a person who believes that Jesus Christ was a mere mortal.
(Perhaps this was the most referred answer. Hail Webster?)
10. What kind of people did Gulliver encounter in Glubbdubdrib?
*Sorcers and Magicians.
Glubbdubdrib was ruled by a sorcerer, who entertains his guests by calling forth the spirits of the ancient world.
QM: Many of you answered Yahoos for this one. Well, Gulliver met them in the land of the Houyhnhnms, a race of intelligent horses. The Yahoos were the human savages there...and Gulliver met the Struldbrugs, a race of immortals, in Luggnagg.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The scores (in chronological order)
1. Pauline Daniel - 2 (that was such a quick response!)
2. Gautham Ravichander - 2 (Great work on Jethro Tull )
3. Husain Poonawala - 4 (cool show)
4. Shiraz - 7 (superb show man! hope u enjoyed the rediscovery process! :-)
5. Shobhana Balakrishnan - 2 (stopping by, not walking thru,but I'm generous!)
6. Krishna T - 1.5 (First to get hockey team as such!)
7. Aishwariya V - 3 (had planned 2 put ur lace tidbit as a Q in fact. but now NO!!!)
8. Vaidyanathan - 5 (why duplicates? confused me.)
9. Mohit Sud - 6.5 (y didn't u mention Aqualung?)
10. Naveed Mohammed - 7 (right on Laver/Borg but Emerson has 12. )
11. Abhishek Hariharan - 2 (nice try)
12. Sourabh Issar - 1 (GlubbDubbians was a cheeky one! ;-)
13. Rajesh Malviya - 3.5 (It's not Doug Adams)
14. Syam Prasad - 4.5 (way to go man! it was not too much after all, eh?)
15. Madhu M - 2 (a tittle of a doubt! but dot over i good enough to get points here)
16. Biswabijoy Sen - 5 (Aqualung could not have been answered in a better way!)
17. Ranganathan Sairam - 4 (y didn't u answer prev quiz if u liked it? anyway,thanx for the compliment.)
18. Samir Bora - 4.5 (Superman/(Superman+Mask) = 0.5 )
19. Debashree Mitra - 6 (solid!)
20. Quizgeek - 6 (who's the man behind the mask?)
21. Anshuman Mishra - 5 (OK!OK! I wish you luck ;-P )
22. B.Sreeram - 6 (How old are you anyway, huh?)
23. Sameer Baxi - 7 (Check out RAMA series by ACC)
24. Ramsu - 7 (It's not Pele! Go head! Kick urself :-)
25. Ramkey - 3 (100% hit rate! u should've made more attempts!)
26. Soumyadipta B - 5 (glad to know u appreciate the Qs)
27. Harish J Prabhu - 6 (Bradman's grandkids LOL!!!)
28. Satish K - 5 (no points for meaning of tittle sorry. u should have used the clue!)
29. Kasthuri - 6.5 (glad to know u used the clue. and...is ur heart content now? ;-p)
30. Raghavendra Achar - 1 (Good guesses but hard luck :-(
31. Thejaswi Udupa - 8.5 (about history textbook-people. he met only their ghosts thru way of necromancy.)
32. Dhiraj Ramakrishnan - 2 (nice try)
33. Aseem - 4 (solid)
34. Udayan Chakrabarti - 2.5 (y didn't u mention Jethro Tull)
35. Shrijit Plapally - 2 (enjoyed ur answers ;-)
36. Dhananjay Shettigar - 3.5 (good work on hockey team)
37. Amit De - 5 (willie renshaw was that guy who kept winning Wimbledon right? he ever win anything else?)
38. R.Krishna - 7 ( is the middle name really jerome? please confirm)
39. Ankur Jain - 7 (Holmes Jain!!!)
40. Bhaskar Singh - 2 (William Renshaw won a few Wimbledons.But that was it, I guess)
41. Venkateswar - 2 (there were some queery answers after all hey?)
42. Shash Shekar - 6 (congrats on skyscraper)
43. Bharat Jayakumar - 4 (hi there. mudblood? :-)
44. Siddharth K - 2.5 ( No AL on JT = 0.5)
--------------------STATS--------------------------------------
*Honestest! -
SP who said `He believes that Christ was only a man. (Do not give me marks for this. I consulted my Dictionary.) '
Queuriest! -
Response to q2 seed-drill & scuba
UC: Aqualung yes but no Jethro Tull !
MS & DS: Jethro Tull, yes but no Aqualung !
Cryptickest!-
SB who said IS IS POINTS to What is a tittle?
and QM deciphered as is I's points! yay!!!
Funnest!-
Monica Lewinsky on Clintonstreet
Raymonds on Treaty Of Park Avenue
Snot nosed- drippy nosed people on Glubbdubbdrib
Misspell Philanthropist on Psilanthropist
Himself playing football with his grandchildren on Don's comment
...and now the cricketers score runs like goals! on Don's comment
(thought it gooddest not to reveal authors.)
* Thejaswi Udupa tops the quiz with 8.5 points
* Average score: 4.5
* Everybody scored!
* All the questions were answered.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Great men are only agents of a great cause. - Nietschze
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday, October 20, 2005
Answers
Labels:
Dictum,
Philosophy
Will expand on these later. Just a reminder to myself.
Definition of life
Life is a progression from one addiction to the next.
Birth was when the demon awoke/
Life's just steps from yoke to yoke - Excerpt from Sweet Angel, a song I wrote.
Purpose of life
It's to be useful to others - to know that you'll be missed if you are not there. No, it's not money.
Definition of life
Life is a progression from one addiction to the next.
Birth was when the demon awoke/
Life's just steps from yoke to yoke - Excerpt from Sweet Angel, a song I wrote.
Purpose of life
It's to be useful to others - to know that you'll be missed if you are not there. No, it's not money.
Monday, October 17, 2005
Better Incomplete Than Incorrect
While answering a question in a quiz, if you're not sure about the entire answer, omit the parts of the answer that you are not really sure about.
Also, say the parts you are sure about loud and confident (in oral rounds) or conveniently abbreviate. Maybe the QM won't notice or the answer that you say might be unambiguous enough for him.
Let's say the answer to a question is John F Kennedy, but you are not sure about the John part. Just say Kennedy. Never say James (often you will be sure that the name starts with a J) or, god forbid, Robert Kennedy (another person famous in his own right).
Even if the answer is incomplete, the QM might give you half-points but if it is wrong you won't get any. Mask your ignorance in the quiz. But be aware of your ignorance and work towards gaining some knowledge in that area afterwards. Questions do repeat and next time around, you might not be so lucky.
Also, say the parts you are sure about loud and confident (in oral rounds) or conveniently abbreviate. Maybe the QM won't notice or the answer that you say might be unambiguous enough for him.
Let's say the answer to a question is John F Kennedy, but you are not sure about the John part. Just say Kennedy. Never say James (often you will be sure that the name starts with a J) or, god forbid, Robert Kennedy (another person famous in his own right).
Even if the answer is incomplete, the QM might give you half-points but if it is wrong you won't get any. Mask your ignorance in the quiz. But be aware of your ignorance and work towards gaining some knowledge in that area afterwards. Questions do repeat and next time around, you might not be so lucky.
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
Use Refuse
USE REFUSE
--------------
The lizard uses its beloved tail,
To tickle itself, to scratch its head, to many avail.
But when in trouble, trapped by a nail
Coolly sheds it, with not so much as a wail.
- Thomas Jay Cubb
Notes/Commentary
--------------------
1. Alternate titles were Use-And-Throw and Disposable.
2. The spontaneous removal of a body is called autotomy.
3. Refuse is used in the sense of disposed stuff.
4. Moral: Favours done are very easily and quickly forgotten.
Monday, October 10, 2005
Queuriest - II
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
QUEURIEST - II
Keep Guessing! --- Johnnie Guesser
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. A pricky question (piquant?) that could leave you in stitches? Tell me, what you would do with Buffon's needle?
*
2. Name the Sherlock Holmes stories in which Holmes himself is the narrator? Points only if you get all of them.
*
3. Calling all Purpleheads...What was peculiar ( queuerious? ;-) about the way in which Deep Purple's mid-70s lead singer David Coverdale used to sing Deep Purple's all-time classic and possibly their most famous song "Smoke On The Water"? Why? (If you know the lyrics to the song, this is very much workoutable.)
*
4. Chess. Who or what is known as a patzer? (Cryptic clue: A Remus would be a good option for them! )
*
5. Was grass ever for Indian cows? Who was the first Indian to be seeded at Wimbledon?
*
6. Art Spiegelman's Maus won the Pulitzer Prize in 1992 . What's the distinction?
*
7. The absolute sitter of this quiz possibly. You've heard about telegrams and anagrams. But what is a pangram?
*
8. Rama, Shiva, Sugriva. What's the connection? (apart from the fact that they are mythological characters etc). Unleash your imagination! I'm waiting to learn more . . .
*
9. Who is a picaninny? You should never call them this!
*
10. How do we better know Mosi-o-Tunya? Cryptic clue: Smoke that thunders rises when a monarch capitulates?
*
hi folks!
here's the next installment of Queuriest.
the questions are fairly straightforward. there are no deliberate misspellings or hazification of questions in order to prevent you from googling. do justify the trust placed in you. there are lots of clues in the questions! tell me if they helped you work out the answers.
hope u enjoy cracking the Qs as much as I did setting them!
luv
thomas
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
`Curiouser and curiouser!'
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ANSWERS
1. * You could try to find the value of pi.
Sathish: Buffons needle is experimental method used to calculate the value of pi. one of the method is like this, say you got a needle of length 'x',draw parallel lines of distance 's' apart. if you drop the needle 'n' timesand it touche the lines 'y' times then the value of pi can be calculates as app (2*n*x)/(y*s).
Kamal:Buffon's Needle is one of the oldest problems in the field of geometrical probability. It was first stated in 1777. It involves dropping a needle on a lined sheet of paper and determining the probability of the needle crossing one of the lines on the page. The remarkable result is that the probability is directly related to the value of pi.
2. *Only two - The Adventure of The Blanched Soldier and The Adventure Of The Lion's Mane. Only Sreeram gets both.
3. * The song goes `We all came out to Montreux. . .', it was about an fire episode during a Frank Zappa concert that the members attended. Those days Ian Gillan was their lead-singer. After David Coverdale replaced Gillan in the band, at concerts/shows whent the band played the song, DC sang the song with 'We' replaced by `They', since he was not involved in the episode. (`They all came out to Montreux' etc). He sure was a sentimental guy!
4. * A patzer is a poor(moderate to inferior in quality) chess player. Of course, patzers are bound to be poor as well! :-) About the clue - Remus is German for draw, patzers would be very happy if they manage to draw the game?
Sathish: Patzer is a term for novice in chess. the persons elo rating is around 1400.
5. * Dilip Bose was seeded 15 in 1950. He could reach only the 2nd round. He had reached the 4th round in 1948.
6. * First cartoon/graphic book to win the Prize. In fact a whole new category was created for it,it seems.
7. * A sentence or poem which contains all the letters of the alphabet. eg. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
8. *The key word was pithecus.All have hominids named after them, Ramapithecus, Shivapithecus etc.
Cracked only by Sreeram.
Bharat says: RSS. (The party's alternate expansion!!)
Sreeram asks: Are there parts of Niagra which are named after them?
QM: I know there's some such trivia Q about Niagara but forget what exactly it was. Or was it about Colorado? HELP!!!
9. * It's a derogatory term for a Black child.
SK: Dominant racial carricature of Black children. They are described with bulging eyes, unkempt hair and wide mouths. Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin explains better.
10. * Victoria Falls. That's its local name. Literally means 'smoke that thunders'. So, the clue was not so cryptic after all, huh?
-------------------------------------------
hi everybody!
Here are the answers to Queuriest -II.
Why were there only so many responses? Just 5! Was this because of my criticism of googlaholics (ref: DISCLAIMER in the prev Answers post)? Is this the size of the nongooglaholic population within Quiznet? ;-) But really, was expecting more... :-(
anyways. . .
luv
thomas
The scores (in chronological order):
Sathish.K - 6.5 (some answers were not specific enough)
Kamal Rathi - 5 (Computer opponent was a good try)
Sreeram - 4 ( <=4 prediction ---> =4 = 4 ! )
Kunal Malhotra - 4.5 (patzer answer vague)
Bharat Jayakumar - (:-)) Keep ur creativity going though!!!
* The only unanswered question was the one about Smoke On The Water
No disclaimer needed this time around!!!
QUEURIEST - II
Keep Guessing! --- Johnnie Guesser
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. A pricky question (piquant?) that could leave you in stitches? Tell me, what you would do with Buffon's needle?
*
2. Name the Sherlock Holmes stories in which Holmes himself is the narrator? Points only if you get all of them.
*
3. Calling all Purpleheads...What was peculiar ( queuerious? ;-) about the way in which Deep Purple's mid-70s lead singer David Coverdale used to sing Deep Purple's all-time classic and possibly their most famous song "Smoke On The Water"? Why? (If you know the lyrics to the song, this is very much workoutable.)
*
4. Chess. Who or what is known as a patzer? (Cryptic clue: A Remus would be a good option for them! )
*
5. Was grass ever for Indian cows? Who was the first Indian to be seeded at Wimbledon?
*
6. Art Spiegelman's Maus won the Pulitzer Prize in 1992 . What's the distinction?
*
7. The absolute sitter of this quiz possibly. You've heard about telegrams and anagrams. But what is a pangram?
*
8. Rama, Shiva, Sugriva. What's the connection? (apart from the fact that they are mythological characters etc). Unleash your imagination! I'm waiting to learn more . . .
*
9. Who is a picaninny? You should never call them this!
*
10. How do we better know Mosi-o-Tunya? Cryptic clue: Smoke that thunders rises when a monarch capitulates?
*
hi folks!
here's the next installment of Queuriest.
the questions are fairly straightforward. there are no deliberate misspellings or hazification of questions in order to prevent you from googling. do justify the trust placed in you. there are lots of clues in the questions! tell me if they helped you work out the answers.
hope u enjoy cracking the Qs as much as I did setting them!
luv
thomas
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
`Curiouser and curiouser!'
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ANSWERS
1. * You could try to find the value of pi.
Sathish: Buffons needle is experimental method used to calculate the value of pi. one of the method is like this, say you got a needle of length 'x',draw parallel lines of distance 's' apart. if you drop the needle 'n' timesand it touche the lines 'y' times then the value of pi can be calculates as app (2*n*x)/(y*s).
Kamal:Buffon's Needle is one of the oldest problems in the field of geometrical probability. It was first stated in 1777. It involves dropping a needle on a lined sheet of paper and determining the probability of the needle crossing one of the lines on the page. The remarkable result is that the probability is directly related to the value of pi.
2. *Only two - The Adventure of The Blanched Soldier and The Adventure Of The Lion's Mane. Only Sreeram gets both.
3. * The song goes `We all came out to Montreux. . .', it was about an fire episode during a Frank Zappa concert that the members attended. Those days Ian Gillan was their lead-singer. After David Coverdale replaced Gillan in the band, at concerts/shows whent the band played the song, DC sang the song with 'We' replaced by `They', since he was not involved in the episode. (`They all came out to Montreux' etc). He sure was a sentimental guy!
4. * A patzer is a poor(moderate to inferior in quality) chess player. Of course, patzers are bound to be poor as well! :-) About the clue - Remus is German for draw, patzers would be very happy if they manage to draw the game?
Sathish: Patzer is a term for novice in chess. the persons elo rating is around 1400.
5. * Dilip Bose was seeded 15 in 1950. He could reach only the 2nd round. He had reached the 4th round in 1948.
6. * First cartoon/graphic book to win the Prize. In fact a whole new category was created for it,it seems.
7. * A sentence or poem which contains all the letters of the alphabet. eg. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
8. *The key word was pithecus.All have hominids named after them, Ramapithecus, Shivapithecus etc.
Cracked only by Sreeram.
Bharat says: RSS. (The party's alternate expansion!!)
Sreeram asks: Are there parts of Niagra which are named after them?
QM: I know there's some such trivia Q about Niagara but forget what exactly it was. Or was it about Colorado? HELP!!!
9. * It's a derogatory term for a Black child.
SK: Dominant racial carricature of Black children. They are described with bulging eyes, unkempt hair and wide mouths. Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin explains better.
10. * Victoria Falls. That's its local name. Literally means 'smoke that thunders'. So, the clue was not so cryptic after all, huh?
-------------------------------------------
hi everybody!
Here are the answers to Queuriest -II.
Why were there only so many responses? Just 5! Was this because of my criticism of googlaholics (ref: DISCLAIMER in the prev Answers post)? Is this the size of the nongooglaholic population within Quiznet? ;-) But really, was expecting more... :-(
anyways. . .
luv
thomas
The scores (in chronological order):
Sathish.K - 6.5 (some answers were not specific enough)
Kamal Rathi - 5 (Computer opponent was a good try)
Sreeram - 4 ( <=4 prediction ---> =4 = 4 ! )
Kunal Malhotra - 4.5 (patzer answer vague)
Bharat Jayakumar - (:-)) Keep ur creativity going though!!!
* The only unanswered question was the one about Smoke On The Water
No disclaimer needed this time around!!!
Friday, October 07, 2005
Cause And Effect (intro)
------------------------------------
CAUSE AND EFFECT (intro)
------------------------------------
Opulence,
A life of ease.
Corpulence,
You are obese.
-Thomas Jay Cubb
-------------------------------
JUST-IN-CASE LEXICON
opulence = wealth as evidenced by sumptuous living
corpulence = the property of excessive fatness
Definitions sourced from WordWeb dictionary
Commentary
------------
This is an excerpt from my poem "Cause And Effect" which deals with the problem of being overweight and how to get rid of the extra flab. Its philosophical thread is how the cause and the effect are so easily (and so often!) mistaken by the casual observer as the other.
This snippet summarizes the cause-and-effect line of reasoning. The poem is shaped (literally) as a fat man on a diving-board; these four lines form the head of the person and of course the root of the problem!
The surest way to eliminate the effect is to remove the cause from the equation. Rather be fat than poor?
CAUSE AND EFFECT (intro)
------------------------------------
Opulence,
A life of ease.
Corpulence,
You are obese.
-Thomas Jay Cubb
-------------------------------
JUST-IN-CASE LEXICON
opulence = wealth as evidenced by sumptuous living
corpulence = the property of excessive fatness
Definitions sourced from WordWeb dictionary
Commentary
------------
This is an excerpt from my poem "Cause And Effect" which deals with the problem of being overweight and how to get rid of the extra flab. Its philosophical thread is how the cause and the effect are so easily (and so often!) mistaken by the casual observer as the other.
This snippet summarizes the cause-and-effect line of reasoning. The poem is shaped (literally) as a fat man on a diving-board; these four lines form the head of the person and of course the root of the problem!
The surest way to eliminate the effect is to remove the cause from the equation. Rather be fat than poor?
Tuesday, October 04, 2005
FFAT (Four Fingers And A Thumb)
Here's a song I wrote in early 2004. Can be sung to the tune of generic rock and roll songs . This version has been stripped of scene-setter/mood-changer paras which I felt were obstacles to the free flow of the rock'n'roll rhythm.
Literary value? Well, it coins a new(!) proverb and also tells a story!
It is an autobiographical account of a band that never was. Does that make it fiction?
Read (sing) on ....
----------
FFAT
(Cubb)
-----------
Spending my days out on the beach
Dreaming dreams that were outta reach
Gotten tired of counting grains of sand
Why don't I start my rock'n roll band?
Tunes that buzz around in my head
Wonder can they earn me my bread?
Scores of new songs in my hand
But what's the name that I will call my band?
Whoever said that, "What's in a name?"
I tell you he really hasn't played the game
Abbreviations mean less appreciation.
Personal name gives one all the fame (and the blame!)
It's gotta have soul
It's gotta rock'n roll
Yeah, and it's gotta have meaning too.
That's the name of the game...
(chorus)
Don't you know that
Four fingers and a thumb
make the mighty hand
Four fingers and a thumb
make the mighty hand
That's the name that I will call my band
Four fingers and a thumb.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Times were good we could do no wrong.
People they throng just to hear our song.
Though the exec was a slippery eel
Finally managed to land us a deal.
(he said)
Guys you really don't fit the mould
Gotta beat the odds just to break even
(and we said)
We ain't clones of pop stars of old.
Platinum, gold just a question of when.
Songs I sang then in the studio
I hear them all now on the radio
Playing pool, drinking beer, we're having some fun
Rock show here, a concert there, we're out in the sun.
We're on a roll
We've beaten them all.
Beaten the odds and broken the records.
Wonder whether we've won the game?
(chorus)
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Though the years have passed us by
The hand's still mighty and going strong.
Man, you oughta hear us
When we're on song...
...And that's always!
(chorus)
(repeat & fade to end)
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
WASTE
----------
The discarded lines were
Maybe/Babe/You'll be seeing me singing on the shore
Maybe/Babe/You'll be seeing me singing on the show
Maybe/Babe/If you don't see me right on top for sure
at the end of each chorus.
and
[It's a long way/To the top/If you wanna rock'n roll
I got high hopes/But no ropes/to climb upon]
[It was a long way/To the top/We really did rock'n roll.
Gonna stay on/where we've got/ Just know that things will stay the same.]
just before the 'maybe-babe's.
-------------------------------------------------------
Quote
---------
Four fingers and a thumb make the mighty hand. - TJ
Literary value? Well, it coins a new(!) proverb and also tells a story!
It is an autobiographical account of a band that never was. Does that make it fiction?
Read (sing) on ....
----------
FFAT
(Cubb)
-----------
Spending my days out on the beach
Dreaming dreams that were outta reach
Gotten tired of counting grains of sand
Why don't I start my rock'n roll band?
Tunes that buzz around in my head
Wonder can they earn me my bread?
Scores of new songs in my hand
But what's the name that I will call my band?
Whoever said that, "What's in a name?"
I tell you he really hasn't played the game
Abbreviations mean less appreciation.
Personal name gives one all the fame (and the blame!)
It's gotta have soul
It's gotta rock'n roll
Yeah, and it's gotta have meaning too.
That's the name of the game...
(chorus)
Don't you know that
Four fingers and a thumb
make the mighty hand
Four fingers and a thumb
make the mighty hand
That's the name that I will call my band
Four fingers and a thumb.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Times were good we could do no wrong.
People they throng just to hear our song.
Though the exec was a slippery eel
Finally managed to land us a deal.
(he said)
Guys you really don't fit the mould
Gotta beat the odds just to break even
(and we said)
We ain't clones of pop stars of old.
Platinum, gold just a question of when.
Songs I sang then in the studio
I hear them all now on the radio
Playing pool, drinking beer, we're having some fun
Rock show here, a concert there, we're out in the sun.
We're on a roll
We've beaten them all.
Beaten the odds and broken the records.
Wonder whether we've won the game?
(chorus)
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Though the years have passed us by
The hand's still mighty and going strong.
Man, you oughta hear us
When we're on song...
...And that's always!
(chorus)
(repeat & fade to end)
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
WASTE
----------
The discarded lines were
Maybe/Babe/You'll be seeing me singing on the shore
Maybe/Babe/You'll be seeing me singing on the show
Maybe/Babe/If you don't see me right on top for sure
at the end of each chorus.
and
[It's a long way/To the top/If you wanna rock'n roll
I got high hopes/But no ropes/to climb upon]
[It was a long way/To the top/We really did rock'n roll.
Gonna stay on/where we've got/ Just know that things will stay the same.]
just before the 'maybe-babe's.
-------------------------------------------------------
Quote
---------
Four fingers and a thumb make the mighty hand. - TJ
Professor Bhatt
BHATT LIMERICK
-----------------------
There was an old man by the name of Bhatt
Who lectured whilst scratching his butt
His nails were long
So when he taught for long
He ended up with his butt cut.
- TJC 23 Sep,2003
----------------------------------------------------
PCP Bhatt was my professor in iiit-b (where I had a brief stint). He used to teach us Operating Systems and Foundations Of Computing. Professor Bhatt was an excellent teacher, with plenty of wit, but had a strange habit - his hand inevitably crept into his pants when writing on the whiteboard, when his back faced the class...in full view!This limerick was reportedly leaked to Professor Bhatt! I wonder what he thought.
I remember an interesting conversation that I had with him in class when he was explaining schedulers - the component of an OS that decides what should be done when. I detected a chicken-and-egg problem : who or what schedules the scheduler? I decided to be cryptic. The exchange, unforgettable for anyone who was present in that class, went verbatim-
TJC: Professor, but who cuts the barber's hair?
(pause of 5 seconds)
PCP: What if the barber is a Sardarji?
-----------------------
There was an old man by the name of Bhatt
Who lectured whilst scratching his butt
His nails were long
So when he taught for long
He ended up with his butt cut.
- TJC 23 Sep,2003
----------------------------------------------------
PCP Bhatt was my professor in iiit-b (where I had a brief stint). He used to teach us Operating Systems and Foundations Of Computing. Professor Bhatt was an excellent teacher, with plenty of wit, but had a strange habit - his hand inevitably crept into his pants when writing on the whiteboard, when his back faced the class...in full view!This limerick was reportedly leaked to Professor Bhatt! I wonder what he thought.
I remember an interesting conversation that I had with him in class when he was explaining schedulers - the component of an OS that decides what should be done when. I detected a chicken-and-egg problem : who or what schedules the scheduler? I decided to be cryptic. The exchange, unforgettable for anyone who was present in that class, went verbatim-
TJC: Professor, but who cuts the barber's hair?
(pause of 5 seconds)
PCP: What if the barber is a Sardarji?
Monday, October 03, 2005
Night Flight
Labels:
Anecdote,
Memory,
Observation
Went to Delhi for my cousin's wedding on September 22.
Very nearly a one-liner.
"This is the last and final call. I repeat, this is the last and final call. I repeat..."
- Airport Announcer
Oh, the hypocrisy!
Was Passenger no. 49. Thought it was the name of a Wesley Snipes movie - later, much later realised that its name was actually Passenger 57 - in which the plane gets hijacked or something. There is a John Travolta movie called Ladder 49. Didn't share the tidbit with any of my co-passengers. Spared the blushes.
Seats are very uncomfortable. No leg-space. Got reminded of chickens being taken for slaughter!! On the plus side, no need to wear a seatbelt; so tightly are we packed.
It was my first night flight/
And the moon was on my right/
Clouds right below/
Lit soft and mellow/
Featherbeds or sand dunes?
In the sky or in the desert?
Then in a flash, the sky burst into flame. Lightning flooded the sky. The lady in the window seat tries to impress with lofty philosophical meanderings - How insignificant man is! The power of nature! - with allusions to Katrina thrown in for good measure. I quickly ground her in the middle of her flight of fancy by gently reminding her that we, members of the human race, were in fact flying at that moment- against the will of nature, so who's more powerful.
Silence can be bought with a cheap line.
Very nearly a one-liner.
"This is the last and final call. I repeat, this is the last and final call. I repeat..."
- Airport Announcer
Oh, the hypocrisy!
Was Passenger no. 49. Thought it was the name of a Wesley Snipes movie - later, much later realised that its name was actually Passenger 57 - in which the plane gets hijacked or something. There is a John Travolta movie called Ladder 49. Didn't share the tidbit with any of my co-passengers. Spared the blushes.
Seats are very uncomfortable. No leg-space. Got reminded of chickens being taken for slaughter!! On the plus side, no need to wear a seatbelt; so tightly are we packed.
It was my first night flight/
And the moon was on my right/
Clouds right below/
Lit soft and mellow/
Featherbeds or sand dunes?
In the sky or in the desert?
Then in a flash, the sky burst into flame. Lightning flooded the sky. The lady in the window seat tries to impress with lofty philosophical meanderings - How insignificant man is! The power of nature! - with allusions to Katrina thrown in for good measure. I quickly ground her in the middle of her flight of fancy by gently reminding her that we, members of the human race, were in fact flying at that moment- against the will of nature, so who's more powerful.
Silence can be bought with a cheap line.
Thursday, September 22, 2005
Dullest Headline?
Labels:
Kicks
Came across this while browsing the web.
Claude Cockburn's famous candidate in the competition among Times sub-editors for the year's dullest headline:
"Small Earthquake in Chile: Not Many Dead."
Claude Cockburn's famous candidate in the competition among Times sub-editors for the year's dullest headline:
"Small Earthquake in Chile: Not Many Dead."
Friday, September 16, 2005
About A Word
This is a poem about my favourite word: quinquennium, which means a period of five years. This is fresh from the Incubbator! Track its history there.
Not sure how much literary value it has; there is no theme as such, just some facts in verse. But if you are here for the wordplay, this is it.
-------------------
ABOUT A WORD
-------------------
English words starting with 'Q'
Are, queerly, but a quiescent few.
Query anyone, "Not many in queue".
A quixotic five-year quest (quite untrue),
Cupid's arrow struck me, a random lexicon view;
I had found the one most q-true-blue!
Quinquennium: It's quite my word favourite.
Quin-quenni-yum: Say it aloud and savour it.
Take my cue: over "half a decade", favour it.
Indeed the Queen Of Words. Aye aye, so true!
Not only does it start with a 'Q',
But it has one to spare too: two!
-Thomas Jay Cubb
Not sure how much literary value it has; there is no theme as such, just some facts in verse. But if you are here for the wordplay, this is it.
-------------------
ABOUT A WORD
-------------------
English words starting with 'Q'
Are, queerly, but a quiescent few.
Query anyone, "Not many in queue".
A quixotic five-year quest (quite untrue),
Cupid's arrow struck me, a random lexicon view;
I had found the one most q-true-blue!
Quinquennium: It's quite my word favourite.
Quin-quenni-yum: Say it aloud and savour it.
Take my cue: over "half a decade", favour it.
Indeed the Queen Of Words. Aye aye, so true!
Not only does it start with a 'Q',
But it has one to spare too: two!
-Thomas Jay Cubb
Song For The Quinquennium
I reproduce here my submission to My Favorite Word.
Quinquennium. Not too many words start with a 'q', and this one has two 'q's! Really like the way it sounds too.
-------------------------
SONG FOR THE QUINQUENNIUM
-------------------------
English's list of Q-words:
Not many in queue.
I searched "five years"!
At last found a good one
not just starting with Q
but which in fact had two!
I just love it, won't you too?
Please do take my cue.
-Thomas Jay Cubb
http://incubbator.blogspot.com
I wonder why this word is not more in vogue; a quinquennium is a more practical measure to track your life with than a decade is, come to think of it...
-------------------------------------------
This became, very soon, the first version of "About A Word" (final version at CubbSpace)
This is a poem about the word quiniquennium which means "five years", it is in fact my favourite word. somebody had asked me yesterday, so that's where the inspiration comes from all of a sudden..
it's very very experimental.has its rough edges, so let me know what you think... so that i can finalize... .
luv
thomas
ABOUT A WORD
--------------------------
English words starting with 'Q'
Are, queerly, a quite quiescent few.
Query anyone, "Not many in queue".
A quixotic five-year lexical quest (quite untrue)
And I found the word most q-true-blue!
Half a decade, it's my favourite
(The word's quinquennium)
Say it aloud, savour it
Ain't it cute, sounds so.. yum-yum?
No question, better than all the rest of'em.
For not only does it start with a 'Q',
It has one to spare too: two!
-Thomas Jay Cubb
(September 15, 2005)
Quinquennium. Not too many words start with a 'q', and this one has two 'q's! Really like the way it sounds too.
-------------------------
SONG FOR THE QUINQUENNIUM
-------------------------
English's list of Q-words:
Not many in queue.
I searched "five years"!
At last found a good one
not just starting with Q
but which in fact had two!
I just love it, won't you too?
Please do take my cue.
-Thomas Jay Cubb
http://incubbator.blogspot.com
I wonder why this word is not more in vogue; a quinquennium is a more practical measure to track your life with than a decade is, come to think of it...
-------------------------------------------
This became, very soon, the first version of "About A Word" (final version at CubbSpace)
This is a poem about the word quiniquennium which means "five years", it is in fact my favourite word. somebody had asked me yesterday, so that's where the inspiration comes from all of a sudden..
it's very very experimental.has its rough edges, so let me know what you think... so that i can finalize... .
luv
thomas
ABOUT A WORD
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English words starting with 'Q'
Are, queerly, a quite quiescent few.
Query anyone, "Not many in queue".
A quixotic five-year lexical quest (quite untrue)
And I found the word most q-true-blue!
Half a decade, it's my favourite
(The word's quinquennium)
Say it aloud, savour it
Ain't it cute, sounds so.. yum-yum?
No question, better than all the rest of'em.
For not only does it start with a 'Q',
It has one to spare too: two!
-Thomas Jay Cubb
(September 15, 2005)
Thursday, September 15, 2005
FloccinAUSSIEnihilipilification
Labels:
Kicks
The recently concluded Ashes series saw the floccinaucinihilipilification of the Australian batting order by the English pace bowlers. There! I have used the word! In context!!!
Wonder why nobody else came up with that line... The word was just begging to be used, with even the "Aussie" bit in it!
Ashes 2005: Floccinaussienihilipilification would pretty much describe the series in one word, wouldn't it? For the record... :-)
Floccinaucinihilipilification is the longest non-technical word in the dictionary.
Wonder why nobody else came up with that line... The word was just begging to be used, with even the "Aussie" bit in it!
Ashes 2005: Floccinaussienihilipilification would pretty much describe the series in one word, wouldn't it? For the record... :-)
Floccinaucinihilipilification is the longest non-technical word in the dictionary.
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Cake In The Pantry
The birthday-poem...Dedicated to Thomas by Thomas!!!
Written on February 19, 2004 to invite colleagues to share some cake on the occasion of my birthday.
----------------------------------
CAKE IN THE PANTRY
----------------------------------
Personally, Thomas Jake-
ub invites you to partake
pieces of his birthday-cake!!
It's in the pantry,
but I remind you to hurry
for the problem with cakes
and other such sweet bakes
is that, a few moments is all it TAKES!!!
And hey on-sites
How I wish you could have a few bites!
Alas!
A loss!
- Thomas Jay Cubb
------------------------------------
PS I (as do you of course! :-) wish me a happy birthday!!
Written on February 19, 2004 to invite colleagues to share some cake on the occasion of my birthday.
----------------------------------
CAKE IN THE PANTRY
----------------------------------
Personally, Thomas Jake-
ub invites you to partake
pieces of his birthday-cake!!
It's in the pantry,
but I remind you to hurry
for the problem with cakes
and other such sweet bakes
is that, a few moments is all it TAKES!!!
And hey on-sites
How I wish you could have a few bites!
Alas!
A loss!
- Thomas Jay Cubb
------------------------------------
PS I (as do you of course! :-) wish me a happy birthday!!
Beauty And The Beast Holder
Wise men and philosophers through the ages have disagreed on many things, but most seem to agree on one - "We become what we think about".
A man is what he thinks about all day long. - Ralph Waldo Emerson
A man's life is what his thoughts make of it. - Marcus Aurelius
As a man thinks in his heart, so is he. - The Bible
It is when we fill our minds with negativism that the world becomes evil. (The beast is within.) Everything we experience and everybody we encounter will carry the scent we hold in our mind.
Everything is a matter of perception; everything is relative, to you. You can choose to see a diamond or a rock. You choose the spectacles you wear - choose blue ones and the world is blue, choose green ones and the world is green.
Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder... Cliche! Cliche! ... If you don't have beautiful eyes, everything is ugly!
A man is what he thinks about all day long. - Ralph Waldo Emerson
A man's life is what his thoughts make of it. - Marcus Aurelius
As a man thinks in his heart, so is he. - The Bible
It is when we fill our minds with negativism that the world becomes evil. (The beast is within.) Everything we experience and everybody we encounter will carry the scent we hold in our mind.
Everything is a matter of perception; everything is relative, to you. You can choose to see a diamond or a rock. You choose the spectacles you wear - choose blue ones and the world is blue, choose green ones and the world is green.
Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder... Cliche! Cliche! ... If you don't have beautiful eyes, everything is ugly!
Thursday, September 08, 2005
Sudoku
Sudoku's all the rage nowadays. Have attempted two thus far, completed one.
The word Sudoku means "single number" in Japanese. The first puzzle was created by Howard Garnes, a freelance puzzle constructor, in 1979. It was originally called Number Place.
Should appear in a quiz near you in the near future...
The word Sudoku means "single number" in Japanese. The first puzzle was created by Howard Garnes, a freelance puzzle constructor, in 1979. It was originally called Number Place.
Should appear in a quiz near you in the near future...
Monday, September 05, 2005
Krypto's Last Stand: In Memoriam
Krypto, my dog, died today morning. I am very very sad. There are no mixed emotions, just pure sadness.
Though named after Super-Dog, Krypto would have been just a run-of-the-mill black Labrador Retriever to you but he was very special to me. It's because of him that I can identify with the "Parent's choice situation" - no choice but to accept and love whoever is born and, also, believe whole-heartedly in the perfect illogicality that the he's-mine-so-he-is-special line of reasoning is. Cold logic can shake the foundations of love and emotion. He may not have been extra-special or anything, but whatever, Krypto is irreplaceable for me.
Nine and a half years old, Krypto had haemoglobin deficiency; his blood couldn't retain oxygen. That explained why he used to pant such a lot. We had been thinking it was plain old age or asthma-like shortness of breath. Now it all makes sense but it's too late. The doctor said it could have been a dietary problem.
I think, illogically perhaps, that his deterioration was somehow linked to my leaving for Bangalore for a new job three months back as well. Pets need love, demonstrations of love for well-being. Like they need food. Call that my pet-theory, but I think it holds some water. Three weeks back when I was home on vacation, I had found that he had grown senile, forgetting how to climb steps - you know, there's a certain logic to it: which leg goes first and next and so on.
Krypto lived a simple but full life. Simple because, with him it was always have-energy-will-wag-tail-and-play and forever-greedy-for-treats. Full because he'd seen quite a lot of places, with us through three residence-shifts, seen and loved, without exception, a lot of people as well. The only person he ever bit was a trainer who had been very harsh with him. If the trainer was the one who threw the ball, he could very well go and fetch it for himself. Why should I do it? He never learned to fetch, he used to go and get but would not return the object- cutting short many an hour of play and interaction.
The lasting memory of Krypto that will stay with me forever is the image of him refusing to return the towel being used to dry him after his bath after snatching it from me and then play-fighting with it.Another unforgettable image is his sitting in perfect, mock obedience, with his beautiful brown eyes brimmingwith mischievous innocence, but with unwavering attention fixed on the bone in my hand, waiting for the "Take-It-Krypto" nod of assent from me.
I will try my best to not remember you as I saw you last - lying helpless on the wooden plank as the antithesis of what you had been all your life. However, I also realize the importance of our final meeting and thank you for holding on till I could get home and see you.Krypto had lost the will to live whereas before he was life itself. When I left him on Sunday, I knew that would be the last time I saw him, I sort of knew he did too. From there, I thought jokingly , if he recovered, I would give him a new name - Krysto; the situation was so bad that macabre humour was the only balm.
I hear that just before Krypto died on Monday morning, he tried to stand as best as he could, but failed and then collapsed. That was the real Krypto within, trying to stand up, he did so and left.
I apologize for not having taken you for as many walks as I could have; I did only the regular ones, when I was not "tired". For not taking you for a swim in the sea; I always wished to but never did take you and never made any real effort either. I apologize for not spending enough time with you as I should have (If only you would've returned the things you fetched!). I also regret that I do not have enough snapshots of you; I was never click-happy.
From insignificant excuse to insignificant excuse. Krypto's gone. Nobody to respond to my kri-ptoo whistle now.
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