What matters and what doesn't !

So often we say things we don't really mean. Or, in the very least we end up giving the impression that we don't really mean them. Sample:

It's not that it doesn't matter but... [But I won't give it a nanosecond of my brain's processing time].

You know, that thing doesn't really matter but ... [But I will slit your throat for it].

People might say them because often they have to say something and there is nothing better to say. After all, the truth about most people is not tasteful enough to be told to them.

Sometimes, when people who are more important to me than, the earth's gravity, pull such a trick on me, it leaves me with an acute loss of words. Unsurprisingly, the impressions that are left are not very flattering. Yenna Raskalaa, Mind it!

There is a very interesting saying - When you are negotiating with someone, the deal is worth only as much as your BATNA - Best Alternative To Negotiated Agreement. Upholding the best traditions of an engineer, I propose a corollary - The value of something is only as much as what you are willing to sacrifice for it. If there is something you won't give up at all to have something else, well, no use having something else!

A dear chub from engineering days sent across his research paper on something related to our B Tech Thesis. The title - Complete Constant Random Solution to Computing Non-Antagonistic Multi-player Dynamic Resource Allocation Problems in n-dimensional Momentum-restricted Space. Okay I was kidding. But I swear the actual title was something as scary as that. It took me a fifth of a nanosecond to figure out I won't understand a word of the abstract, leave alone the whole paper. And I lived up to my own expectations. Meanwhile, this stud-in-theory friend seems to have done a good job having teamed up with a fellow whose name sounds Russian.

I have started reading the collection of storied by Manto, translated into English. Very entertaining. Serious enough to touch the brains, but not so heavy as to burden it. A quick-fun read. Next in queue is Fooled by Randomness. Hope to complete it off soon.