I got both a bachelor's and a master's degree in English Literature, and for quite a while there I thought I was going to become an English professor, one of those new media and popular culture types combined with a wide swath of 19th century novels and poetry. Then I watched Laura go through her Ph.D. process, and thought, "There have to be less ( Read more... )

On day 2 of TCONA, the first trivia event was scheduled at 8:30am, but it was the Quiz Bowl Seeding Test, which I co-wrote. So I wouldn't be taking it, which was all for the best, since I'd had a late night. I left my sister asleep in our room and toddled on down to the conference room around 9:45, as the test was breaking up ( Read more... )

I said before that I was all out of question-writing advice. That's still true. And I did miss the Basement Bowl, which was a bummer. (Though the trip to Estes Park was very nice.) But the trivia fire is not extinguished! Far from it. I've got my tickets and hotel squared away for TCONA, and I'm midway through my rookie season in the Learned League ( Read more... )

Now, it's true that I've had some trivia experience. However, I wouldn't exactly claim to be an expert on question-writing. Compared to many of the people I know from that world, I'm a raw newbie. Not only that, there are people out there in the world who actually make their living (or at least a side income) from writing questions, like for ( Read more... )

That post about the art of the trivia question is still brewing, but I got sidetracked this week by another event in the trivia world. You may have heard about it. Watson, an IBM supercomputer, played two games of Jeopardy! against that show's most famous champions, and thoroughly trounced the both of them ( Read more... )

This is something I sent out at work, and it got a good enough reception that I decided to post it here as well. We're in the midst of a massive project at CU, replacing the student system and a bunch of peripheral systems with Oracle PeopleSoft products. There is a lot of pressure, a lot of intensity... and a lot of status reporting. Some of that ( Read more... )

Okay, I'm glad that Women's Basketball magazine exists. Really, I am. But man oh man, does it ever have some bad writing. Check out this recent article opener:
As the 2009 NCAA women's basketball campaign gets under way, "change" is in the air ( Read more... )

To top off my fortnight of word-related posts, I am channeling Rob Gordon and making a Top 5 list of my favorite words, either learned or relearned, from my recent trip through a small thesaurus. I love these words either for their sound, or simply for the fact that they exist.

5. niminy-piminy: Affectedly dainty or refined.

4. rejectamenta: ( Read more... )

Welcome to the miscellany bin. This post holds all the words that I've learned from various places, ones whose categories couldn't gather enough critical mass to merit a post of their own.

( Words, words, words )

I don't tend to watch a lot of TV, but the shows I do watch, I tend to cover pretty thoroughly. There must be something in that habit that explains why almost all my TV vocabulary comes from two shows: M*A*S*H and The Simpsons. Turns out you can learn a fair amount from M*A*S*H and The Simpsons!

( Homer Sez: Increase Your Wordiness )