Questionnaire Feedback

A while ago I had sent mails containing a set of questions to my colleagues and superiors at work asking about my performance, my behaviour and my contributions to the organizations.

While the feedback has been generally positive (Very gracious of the folks here ;) ) the weakness/criticism was sort of common across all the feedback replies. I tend to rush things ;)

I guess I do that sometimes, not putting in enough thought or maybe just try to meet the deadline. But that is mainly due to my laying a greater emphasis on meeting deadlines than anything else. But I am now realizing that I have to lay more emphasis on thoroughness and completeness rather than speed.

Well, the best thing this questionnaire has done is given me stuff to improve myself on and other “qualities” which are appreciated by others :)

Me got one too

Inspired by Kuksie, I went out and got myself one of these (It’s a logitech gamepad with force feedback) too!
Looks and feels awesome.. And it’s cordless too.. Will start cracking out the games now ;)

Finally I can put my relatively decent grafix card to some strain :D

Admitting Failure

When should one admit failure and decide that yes, this is not possible and give up on it? Should it be till one is blue in the face trying every possible idea and tread all know/unknown paths, then finally give up in disgust or should one save time and effort acknowledging that it is beyond one’s capacity. Both have merits and demerits..

Sigh..

Goodbye Schumi

The legend, the greatest driver in Formula 1 history finally retires.

After a fantastic win in Italy, Michael Schumacher announced his retirement from the sport where he has reached a position no other driver can reach. It is a sad day to see my favorite driver retire. He will be missed. :(

To make the news of Michael’s retirement slightly less painful, Kimi Raikkonen has signed up for Ferrari. Kimi who was my favorite driver after Michael will continue my support for Ferrari. I am glad he decided to join the Prancing horse team :)

Long time

Yes, it’s been quite long since I’ve posted. Work, a project I have recently taken up and my MBA applications have all contributed to my hardly having any spare time or for that matter, even a social life..

We have a release this month so it should be slightly easier after that.

MBA applications are killer. There is so much to do and with so little time, they are suffering the most. I have to write, on an average ~4.5 essays per University application. But one of the best things about these essays are that they force me to think about myself, my past and what I have done and what I seek to do in the future. They have required quite a bit on introspection (which I have done, sometimes into the wee hours of the night) :)

I have recently sent out questionnaires to people I work with so that I can get feedback about myself and how I am viewed by them.. This should be interesting ;)
Sleep is a precious commodity which I am losing out on big time. I feel I am perpetually in the land of tiredness :(

In other news, I received my Toefl Score which I must say I’m quite surprised with. I got a 114 out of a possible 120 which is on the higher side of my expectations. And I’m not complaining :D

Nadia Ali – iiO

Remember the runaway hit in 2001 titled Rapture by the band iiO. It is one of my favorite songs and I had loved the video due to the model featured in the video. I just found out that the model was none other than the singer of the song, also the lyricist Nadia Ali. She is one of the two member of the band. And man she is hot and pretty too ;) . I loved the video due to her but never knew her name or any other information about her.

Oh and did I mention she is a very good singer? I love her voice and singing style with the slow drag she gives to the songs..

Check out Rapture the rapture video.

Toefl – End result

Toefl went well. It is much more easy than I expected. But it’s not like I aced it and will max it.

Reading section was pretty easy although I was a bit nervous at first because I had heard or rather read on the Toefl forums that sometimes instead of the regular 3, 5 essays are given in this section for the same amount of time. Well I got only 3 so I was relieved when the section started.

Listening was a breeze although I might have gotten a couple of inference questions incorrect.

Speaking! This is the section I did the worst on. In one of the questions, I got a bit flustered and so forgot what I wanted to say. In another, I could not finish what I had to say in the allotted time so it was kinda incomplete.

Essay writing was pretty easy. The summarizing section was easy enough. The opinion essay was a cracker. The topic was such a trivial one that I initially did not know what to write. However I managed to wrangle something out and write a decent enough essay (Due to the NDA, I cannot disclose what the topic was)

Ps. Received my GMAT essay score. Scored a 5 on 6. Much better than I expected

Toefl

I have my toefl tomorrow. Finally ;)

Unfortunately, it starts at 4 pm and with it being a 4 hour test, I might have to be in the test center till 8 pm :(
Whew.. That is a looong time and it will be late!

Anyway, I’m not quite as nervous as I was for GMAT since Toefl seems relatively easier. Buuuut, being as prepared I was for GMAT and yet I screwed it up, I hope I don’t do the same for Toefl :(

OT: Went out of my house for the first time in 6 days. Had to get my bike fixed before the test and did not want to take a chance tomorrow. Realized what an awesome weather the city is experiencing and was pissed of at having to miss all that due to these bleeding exams :(