Sonnet Walk

I wanna take part in a "Sonnet Walk."

You walk through London and people --ranging from a guy on crutches to a philanderer on her cell-phone -- seemingly immersed in their daily routine stop and recite sonnets.

As we shambled down the Victoria Embankment, a bum on a bench started to harangue us for money. Suddenly, his requests for spare change segued into Sonnet 91, "Some glory in their birth, some in their skill/ … Thy love is better than high birth to me/ Richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost." The transformation was incredible—menacing to captivating in two lines. We carried on—a more cohesive group by now—and as we picked our way through the tourists in Whitehall Gardens, a blind man stumbled and fell. Naturally, we ran over to pick him up, only for him to launch into a sonnet. And so it went, through winding little roads, past ancient pubs and Middle Temple Hall, all the while being surprised by 12 stealth sonneteers posing as: a needy guy on crutches (Sonnet 89, "Speak of my lameness, and I straight will halt");more street people; a woman talking to a cheating lover on her cell phone; workmen; lost tourists seeking directions; and, as we grew increasingly suspicious of everyone we saw, a guy in a chicken suit. After two hours, we found ourselves at the Globe, where we placed our roses on the stage in a hokey sign of respect to the bard.

Thank-you Google!

..for this new toy.

Google trends "aims to provide insights into broad search patterns."

By the Power of Grayskull!! I have the Power!!

There comes a tide in the affairs of men [or women] when one has to 'fess up to the questionable tastes of one's childhood. In my case that would be looking you straight in the eye and admitting to being -- oh so briefly, my 20-something self hastens to add --mesmerized by the tales of "He-man and the masters of the universe." [Yuk, could I have really liked such an overtly sexist cartoon with its not-so-bright dialogue?]. But, I did. I was 7 years-old. Do I hear calls for a public beheadment?

But Sam Anderson has a similar mea culpa in Slate.

Sadly, I can no longer watch He-Man through 6-year-old eyes. The show, it turns out, is not quite the singular artistic triumph I once thought it was. Its creators seem to have spared every expense. It's a badly animated, low-budget scramble of every sci-fi and fantasy franchise that preceded it—Conan the Barbarian, Star Wars, Star Trek, Superman, even The Jetsons. ... Plots usually adhere to the Bond formula: Villains take short breaks from marathon sessions of maniacal laughter to hatch the most transparent evil schemes, which He-Man foils while tossing off bons mots like a drunk uncle ("I guess they just don't make energy bows like they used to," he quips to a flustered Trap-Jaw; "Boy, the things people leave lying around," he says wryly while tossing two stunned Fishmen off-screen). The dialogue is tediously expository, written apparently for viewers who have slept through most of the episode: "Sorceress, you used the space portal to bring us here. Thanks!" or "Hurray! The power of Grayskull brought your memory back!"

But, as Anderson notes, He-man wasn't designed to be a great cartoon (like The Family Guy, The Simpsons, South Park, or Bugs Bunny). It was designed to get us (little kiddies) to harangue our parents into buying us poorly manufactured plastic toys. I remember getting Castle Grayskull on my Navjote and being taken to Asiatic and allowed to choose a toy (under 50 Rupees or about one US Dollar) on another occasion.

I could criticize He-Man all day for its aesthetic shortcomings, but there's really no point. It wasn't designed to be a good show, just to trigger the collecting impulses of young kids without blatantly offending their parents. It was basically a long-form, serialized Mattel commercial, the first cartoon ever to be conceived and produced only for the purpose of selling an action figure—a mythology preceded by its own icons (plastic ones, with swiveling torsos and "power punch action"). In retrospect, it's pretty clear that my love for the show—my quasi-religious immersion—was just a Pavlovian response to aggressive cross-marketing.

Economist Tim Harford on why your colleagues are stupid and why you can't buy a decent used car.

First the cars...

His [Nobel laureate Akerlof's] basic insight was simple: If somebody who has plenty of experience driving a particular car is keen to sell it to you, why should you be so keen to buy it?

A person with a good car would hold onto it because he couldn't prove it was good and so wouldn't expect an attractive offer for it. And if the good cars aren't put up for sale, the lemons will be what is left. This is a problem not just for buyers, but for sellers, too, who wish they could be trusted.

Your co-workers...

Then there's the market for jobs. How many of your colleagues are lemons? If you're competent but can't prove it to your boss, you may prefer to be a freelancer. If other competent workers think that way, it may explain why you think your colleagues are idiots and they think the same about you.

These problems can be solved, but at a cost.

And an explanation of the signalling value of higher education (Yes, MBAs included).

Employees spend years acquiring qualifications with little value other than proving that they're smart and work hard.

And used-car buyers will look for trusted sellers, even if that raises the cost of doing business. I bought my Volvo from my brother-in-law because I thought that would lower the risk of being sold a lemon.

And that ladies and gentleman is an answer to the "Why MBA, Why now" question that you should NEVER share with the Admission Committee.

Things I will never understand... (Part 1 of many)

TiVo is going to let viewers search for and watch TV ads.

Yes Virginia, TiVO subscribers can select ads to watch...of their own volition. What's next? People will want to buy bottled water?

Incidentally, my Google quote of the day was: "Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half." - John Wanamaker

And yes, practice does make perfect (Tips for the GMAT and for life...)

Steve Levitt writes in the NYT that practise and determination has more of an impact on performance than does genes and hereditary factors.

This success, coupled with later research showing that memory itself is not genetically determined, led Ericsson to conclude that the act of memorizing is more of a cognitive exercise than an intuitive one. In other words, whatever innate differences two people may exhibit in their abilities to memorize, those differences are swamped by how well each person "encodes" the information. And the best way to learn how to encode information meaningfully, Ericsson determined, was a process known as deliberate practice.

Deliberate practice entails more than simply repeating a task — playing a C-minor scale 100 times, for instance, or hitting tennis serves until your shoulder pops out of its socket. Rather, it involves setting specific goals, obtaining immediate feedback and concentrating as much on technique as on outcome.

This reinforces the advice given to me by one of my mentors -- a former deputy attorney-general turned law professor -- that practice and discipline are the keys to success. Professor M had never lost a case in his entire career as a trial attorney and prosecutor, and he attributed his winning streak to "always researching and studying the case more than the opposing council."

And for those of you studying for the GMAT, remember to set specific goals, evaluate your weaknesses and to then work on fixing those weaknesses.

Their work, compiled in the "Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance," a 900-page academic book that will be published next month, makes a rather startling assertion: the trait we commonly call talent is highly overrated. Or, put another way, expert performers — whether in memory or surgery, ballet or computer programming — are nearly always made, not born. And yes, practice does make perfect. These may be the sort of clichés that parents are fond of whispering to their children. But these particular clichés just happen to be true.

I see this everyday in the dojang -- my students who practise at home -- are much better than the students who come in once or twice a week and just go thru the motions.

Condensed milk goodness.

I just finished dipping my fingers into a tin of sickly sweet condensed milk...and...it was divine!!

Strange how much joy I get from the foods of my childhood. Now, if only I could find a way to get fresh Lychees, Alphonso mangoes (Apoos), and --I don't know the English word -- Targollas in Southern Indiana.

And a place serving the Parsi staples of Dhansak, Patra ni Machi (Fish in Banana leaves) and Saahs ni manchi would be nice too. Oh, for Jimmy Boy to open shop here.

I can't wait for my trip home in December, though everyone is going to take the mick out of me for taking pictures of everything I eat and see.

Even an MBA can do it!

Economics is extremely useful as a form of employment for economists." - J. K. Galbraith

JKG was one of the most eloquent economists of all times. He did not hesitate to call a spade a spade and made some truly prescient observations and he was years ahead of his time.

From the NYT Obit:

He argued that America had become so obsessed with overproducing consumer goods that it had increased the perils of both inflation and recession by creating an artificial demand for frivolous or useless products, by encouraging overextension of consumer credit and by emphasizing the private sector at the expense of the public sector.

Incidentally, he was also; ambassador to India; served as an informal advisor to the newly-formed Indian government; got on splendidly with Nehru (no surprises here); and was an avid collector of Indian Art.

More JKG Quotes:
In the choice between changing ones mind and proving there's no need to do so, most people get busy on the proof.

The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.

One of my greatest pleasures in my writing has come from the thought that perhaps my work might annoy someone of comfortably pretentious position. Then comes the realization that such people rarely read.

All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership.