While most would regard the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything else as the greatest unsolved mystery plaguing mankind, it's vagueness causes me to differ. What about "P=NP?" ? Surely, it's exceptional brevity would earn it the top spot? Alas, the associated pre-condition of sitting through a mightily rigorous one-semester course just to gain enough knowledge to be able to comprehend the problem goes against it. Let's try something simple. What say thee to the deceptively simple, infinitely profound problem of 'classifying human actions as right or wrong'? A large chunk of the human population has given up on this and an even larger chunk is lost to reason and logic (they being the followers of extremely dogmatic schools of thought called 'religion'). The remaining are those that study the science of Ethics.
Now 'Ethics' interested many of the 'Wise', and a multitude of approaches were devised, but none withstood the test of time, when it came to distinguishing between virtue and vice. (Poetry caught you by surprise? You just witnessed the birth, of a new literary device!).
Then came the wisest of them all, and he said something, which made them gall:
That, which gives you pleasure, is right
That, which takes it away, is shite (as the British pronounce it)
(It is a common affliction. You compose a couplet, you become Wordsworth's equal. You write CRAP poetry. You realise that in the next couplet. No two sentences you ever utter/pen/think of in the rest of your life have any semblance of a rhyme. Congratulations, you have successfully (and thankfully) murdered the (mediocre to the core) poet within you).
And thus was born Hedonism.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Thursday, May 21, 2009
How-Good-My-Intern-Is
I don't want to sound like an ungrateful brat, but the barrage of comments (which, rather surprisingly included a few compliments as well) the first post received has put me under immense pressure. So don't blame me for the delay in putting up the second post, blame yourself! - I was just trying to live up to expectations :P
As I write this, I am relishing my first office 'bunk'. The endless water-polo games in the swimming pool (was an awesome experience, more about that later) and the continuously running split-AC's have claimed their first victim, and my tonsils are under siege. In this state, I can't think of a more suitable topic than the simple and traditional "how-good-my-intern-is" post. (After they have officially rejected me for the PPO, I will start such a tirade against Microsoft's tyranny that even Bill Gates, sitting in Redmond, won't escape a spine-tingling shudder). [Clarification: A few readers interpreted the previous sentence as meaning that our hopes have already been squashed. I assure you that's not the case, but I also assure you that it very soon will be]
Q - Briefly list the salient features which make your intern totally 'awesome' (Pun intended :P). [5 marks]
A - My intern is good because:
a. The guest house provided by Microsoft, (for free of course) is grand. My room has a split AC (which my tonsils absolutely hate), refrigerator (which my tonsils hate with even more fervour), cable TV (With some steamy entra channels, good for my **** ), attached bath (with a tub, highly useful for Mandela, totally useless for most of us), (magically reappearing) bottles of Sprite and Coke, (magically reappearing) packets of various Lays flavors and a (magically disappearing) Wi-fi internet connection.
b. Free room service - we don't have to make our beds (good for Mandela again)
c. Free Bed-tea and Breakfast (we are getting used to it, and that's bad for our wives in the future)
c. Snooker, Foosball, TT and Carrom table in the lobby. (Bad for other interns, getting continuously raped by me in Foosball does nothing for their morale).
d. The icing on the cake - brace yourselves, because you are bound to have trouble believing this - we are sharing our flats with chicks!
[Disclaimer: The author recognizes the fact that every other chick in the world pales in comparison to Chhavi Kapoor, and hence he shall not be liable to charges of excessive flirting/cheating/sleeping around. The author also expects comments on the lines of "How sweet of you..", "You are the best boyfriend in the world" etc. from the aforesaid person as an indirect consequence of stating this fact publicly].
e. Avenger. No, they are not providing us with cruiser bikes. Or, maybe they are - the chain of thought goes something like this:
I've already told you about the free breakfast, but did I mention free lunch, free snacks and free dinner? (they are rather plain with items like butter chicken, chicken roganjosh and chicken masala :P).
But wait, I surely must have mentioned the free cabs we get for pick-up and drop? I didn't? How very evil of me.
And since I am getting so forgetful these days, I guess telling you about the pool parties we get would've skipped my mind. (I really am dying to write a post about water-polo, the only game which can give cricket a run for it's money).
In a nutshell, big daddy MS gives us pocket money, but doesn't let us spend it ;). Now, with most of you being IITians, and almost as intelligent as me, do I need to elaborate where will that Avenger come from?
With this mandatory topic out of the way, I can concentrate on the more juicy stuff the next time around (read Mandela ;)). Stay tuned, adios!
As I write this, I am relishing my first office 'bunk'. The endless water-polo games in the swimming pool (was an awesome experience, more about that later) and the continuously running split-AC's have claimed their first victim, and my tonsils are under siege. In this state, I can't think of a more suitable topic than the simple and traditional "how-good-my-intern-is" post. (After they have officially rejected me for the PPO, I will start such a tirade against Microsoft's tyranny that even Bill Gates, sitting in Redmond, won't escape a spine-tingling shudder). [Clarification: A few readers interpreted the previous sentence as meaning that our hopes have already been squashed. I assure you that's not the case, but I also assure you that it very soon will be]
Q - Briefly list the salient features which make your intern totally 'awesome' (Pun intended :P). [5 marks]
A - My intern is good because:
a. The guest house provided by Microsoft, (for free of course) is grand. My room has a split AC (which my tonsils absolutely hate), refrigerator (which my tonsils hate with even more fervour), cable TV (With some steamy entra channels, good for my **** ), attached bath (with a tub, highly useful for Mandela, totally useless for most of us), (magically reappearing) bottles of Sprite and Coke, (magically reappearing) packets of various Lays flavors and a (magically disappearing) Wi-fi internet connection.
b. Free room service - we don't have to make our beds (good for Mandela again)
c. Free Bed-tea and Breakfast (we are getting used to it, and that's bad for our wives in the future)
c. Snooker, Foosball, TT and Carrom table in the lobby. (Bad for other interns, getting continuously raped by me in Foosball does nothing for their morale).
d. The icing on the cake - brace yourselves, because you are bound to have trouble believing this - we are sharing our flats with chicks!
[Disclaimer: The author recognizes the fact that every other chick in the world pales in comparison to Chhavi Kapoor, and hence he shall not be liable to charges of excessive flirting/cheating/sleeping around. The author also expects comments on the lines of "How sweet of you..", "You are the best boyfriend in the world" etc. from the aforesaid person as an indirect consequence of stating this fact publicly].
e. Avenger. No, they are not providing us with cruiser bikes. Or, maybe they are - the chain of thought goes something like this:
I've already told you about the free breakfast, but did I mention free lunch, free snacks and free dinner? (they are rather plain with items like butter chicken, chicken roganjosh and chicken masala :P).
But wait, I surely must have mentioned the free cabs we get for pick-up and drop? I didn't? How very evil of me.
And since I am getting so forgetful these days, I guess telling you about the pool parties we get would've skipped my mind. (I really am dying to write a post about water-polo, the only game which can give cricket a run for it's money).
In a nutshell, big daddy MS gives us pocket money, but doesn't let us spend it ;). Now, with most of you being IITians, and almost as intelligent as me, do I need to elaborate where will that Avenger come from?
With this mandatory topic out of the way, I can concentrate on the more juicy stuff the next time around (read Mandela ;)). Stay tuned, adios!
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Now I know what you did last summer!
Finally I have a blog. And like all my decisions, this one is backed by solid reasons too. The thing is, my intern is in Hyderabad. At Microsoft, to be precise. Now, on the face of it, I am aiming for a PPO. For the uninitiated, that arcane term stands for a Pre-placement offer - the elixir which makes your last college year slightly more palatable. To be precise (I know I am abusing this phrase , but then I do love to be precise...but I digress), you feel you are watching the IPL decider at the Wanderers, while you are actually watching the Kapili-Dihing Inter-Hostel Hockey Final. (This Blog is *not* like those wonderful books on the Application of Linear Algebra in Computational Fluid Dynamics for Optimization on Parallel Architectures which require absolutely no pre-requisites and are completely tailored towards the layman - it *is* biased towards IIT Guwahati students, so be warned and no lawsuits please). So then, this elixir, with it's wonderful properties and all, is totally desirable, what with a nightmare of a semester that just concluded, but the brutal fact is - it's beyond my reach. Yeah yeah, Nitin Kumar Gupta will have a field day, climbing trees and shouting "Hypocrite! Hypocrite!", but the truth is the truth, and my blog *defines* truth. (Please read that very carefully, because this theme is central to the blog, and will manifest itself in numerous guises. I'll help you - repeat after me "Truth is this Blog, this blog is the Truth, Truth is this blog, This blog is the Truth..."). That being the case, and combined with the fact that I am not going to be getting any lap dances in Amsterdam, or drinking exotic Champagne (with the flavour enhanced by a couple of Ice Cubes :P) in First Class Flights to San Diego, or getting myself snapped below the Effiel Tower with face masks keeping Swine Flu at bay, the summer seems depressingly meaningless. But lo and behold! For I am Gandalf the Gay, and I shall be flirting with Entra Chicks in Hyderabad, and pleading with Indigo airlines Officials to allow me one extra nanogram in check-in luggage, and sharing a room with the great Sanjay "awesome" Ahuja himself. To document my wild adventures, so that I can narrate them to my grand-children, this blog has been born, aptly titled "Now I know what you did Last Summer". (A title which is witty, sardonic and self-deprecatory at the same time..the genius within me keeps springing up surprises). So stay tuned, for the next post (at the thought of which you are already masturbating, I know). Adios!
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