*start* 15575 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 21 Nov 88 13:50:53 PST (Monday) Subject: Life 3.R From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- bumper snicker: "If my car were a horse, I would shoot it." ---------------------------------------------------- Did you hear about the new Masochist's Dictionary? It's not in alphabetical order! ---------------------------------------------------- He also talked about smokers who claim it doesn't bother them: But walk up two flights of stairs with them and you're talking to Darth Vader. Hunnnn-onnnnn, hunnnn-onnnn. Luke, you must join the dark side. ---------------------------------------------------- Funny telephone answering machine messages: "We are unable to come to the phone right now. At the tone, please leave your name, number, and Master Card, Visa, or American Express account number and we'll get back to, pending credit approval." "You have reached the , Strategic Air Command Nuclear Missle Storage Facility. We are unable to come to the phone right now. At the tone, please leave you name, number and target or list of targets and we'll launch as soon as we can. And have a nice day." "Hello?" "Sorry, he's not here right now, but if you leave a message, he'll get back to you." "Hello. This is Chris. John and Mike aren't here right now, but if you leave a message, they'll get back to you as soon as they can." [imitating Ensign Chekov] "Oh, sair...it was *Khan*! He made us say things...do things...he kept us from answering the phone! But Keptin was strong, and if you leave your name and number, Keptin will get back to you as soon as he can!" [imitating Mr. Rogers] "Hello. I'm in the Magic Kingdom right now, so I can't come to the phone. Can you leave your name and number when you hear the sound of the tone? Sure...I knew you could." Steve: Hello. Steve and Matt aren't here right now but if... Matt: Steve, what are you doing? Steve: I'm leaving a phone message since we aren't here. Matt: But you left the last one -- it's my turn. Steve: No, I'm sure it's my turn. Matt: No, you're incorrect. It's definitely my turn. Steve: You fool. I know it's ... wait ... Matt ... what are you doing with that frying pan?!? BONK [really loud thud] Matt: Steve is out right now, so please leave your name and number. "Hello. I'm David's answering machine. What are you?" "This is (#include phone.addr). We are not ... excuse me a moment, please. Put your sister down. PUT YOUR SISTER DOWN! (sound of window breaking) Great! What a mess. I'll have to get back to you later." "Finally get an answering machine. Now how does this thing work? Hmmm. Press record button, I did that, and the light should be on. I wonder why it's not working right. Hmmmm, I wonder what this button does......" A friend of mine at school has this message, read by three people while the STAR TREK theme plays in the background. 1: Room 17, the final frontier. 2: These are the messages of Chad's answering machine. Its 2 semester mission: to seek out your name and your telepohne number. 3: To boldly inform you to wait for the tone. (Annoying flute music in background) Good day, Jim. Your contact, [insert name], is not available right now. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to leave your name, number, and a brief message at the tone. This tape will self-destruct in thirty seconds. Good Luck, Jim. "Steve is reassembling Elvis' brain and can't come to the phone right now, but if you leave your name ...", etc. "Steve has been captured by a flying saucer and can't come to the phone right now, but if you leave your name, phone number, and a message I'll have him call you back as soon as he gets away. Read all about it in next week's National Enquirer." In the background can be heard Gregorian Chant or some other church music Good Day My child, you have reached {name} dial a confession. At the tone if you will leave your name, number and short confession I will get back to you with your pennance. Thank you and may God go with you. Hi this is . I'm sorry I can't answer the phone right now. Leave a message and then wait by the phone until I call you back. A friend was at a mutal friend's sister's house, and when she went out for beer, he changed her answering machine message. In a loud, deep, gravely, horror-film voice he recorded, "HI, THIS IS KATHY, I'M NOT MYSELF RIGHT NOW. IF YOU LEAVE YOUR NAME AND NUMBER, I'LL GET BACK TO YOU WHEN I'M FEELING BETTER." I worked for a bit in the coastguard in Wales and I used to send weather reports to other bases, using a sort of antique FAX machine. I would call first on a special telephone and then send the data. They used to answer the phone with: " Epicentre of the Universe, God speaking." " Hartland home for lost whores." (that was Hartland CG) " Da, zis iz Ivan: do you have zee secret information, Boris?" " Pentagon command: transmit destruct sequence (pause) sequence correct: T minusone minute and counting" And then there was one phone we didn't use, with a number one off that of the local take-out. With my, non-British, accent I had some great fun with that phone. "Starship Enterprise, Uhura here, can you hold please? -- Captain, there is a transmission coming in on hailing frequency seven, do you want it on screen?" (silence...click) "Vancouver coastguard, may I help you." British long distance rates are phenomenonal and I had this poor dude sputtering with horror that he had managed to make a long distance call by dialing five digits. ---------------------------------------------------- High above the Mississippi, Standing in plain view, There is an old abandoned outhouse, Known as LSU. Ooooh the odor, Ooooh the odor, Oh what a terrible smell. Before I'd go to LSU, I'd rather got to Hell. ---------------------------------------------------- Originally-From: aurenz%tle.DEC@decwrl.dec.com (Scot Aurenz, zko2-3/n30) The Five Yorkshiremen: The Next Generation Y1: Who would've thought that we'd be on a ship that could separate in times of battle and keep most of the crew safe? I remember when the whole ship used to go to yellow alert every time we entered an ion storm. Y2: You were lucky. We had to go to double yellow alert whenever the captain fell into an obelisk, came out thinking he was a god, and married an Indian woman. Y3: You were lucky. We had to go to yellowish-red alert every time a woman came on board and stole the first officer's brain. Y4: You were lucky to have a woman on board. We had to go to red alert when we were attacked by a mutant salt creature disguised as a woman. Y5: Luxury! We had to go to double red alert every time the captain found an overloading phaser in his quarters. Y1. Oh, we used to dream of having an overloading phaser in the captain's quarters. We had to go to triple red alert every time the blood- sucking gas cloud got into the ship through impulse vent number two. Y2: You were lucky. We had to go to quadruple red alert, blow up our own ship, steal a Klingon bird of prey (which doesn't even have a red alert), go to Vulcan to revive the dead captain, go back in time and get two whales, come back and crash land in San Francisco Bay, all on a Klingon triple black alert. Y3: And if you'd try to tell that to these young officers today, they wouldn't believe you. Others: Nope. No they wouldn't. ---------------------------------------------------- The following is quoted from an interview with Freeman Dyson in the Spring 1988 TECHNE Journal of Technological Studies from the VTS department at Stanford. There are lots of idiots, of course, in NASA, but my view of NASA is rather like the Royal Air Force used to be in the old days when I worked for the Royal Air Force during the war. If you had an officer who was a dud, you put him in the command headquarters because he would do less damage there than he would out in the squadrons. So all the duds accumulated at the headquarters -- this is what has happened at NASA for the last thirty years or so. Acutally, there are lots of very fine things, but they're all out in the stations. If you look at JPL out here in California, or you look at Goddard which is in Maryland, they're doing very well. I think JPL is running the Voyager missions, which of course have been beautifully done. The Voyager went to Jupiter and Saturn and Uranus and will go to Neptune next year. That's a fantastically good mission, which is run at JPL, and then there is the IUE, run at Goddard. So there are these very good, what NASA calls, the centers, these places where the technical work is done. And there is this terrible bunch of idiots in Washington at the headquarters which messes everything up. So I think if you just abolish the Washington office, NASA would be in very good shape. We actually tried that out during World War II. There was a very analogus problem we had in 1943. The German armaments industry was doing very well, they were producing a tremendous lot of armaments and we wanted to put a stop to that. We found out thtat all the head offices of these armament firms were in Dusseldorf and that was where all the paperwork was done. So we decided we would really destroy Dusseldorf and disorganize the whole system. We went in there one night and it was a very succesful operation and Dusseldorf really burned down to the ground. And then, in the next few weeks, the armament production went up like a rocket. ---------------------------------------------------- Dear Mother and Dad: It has now been three months since I left for college. I have been remiss in writing this and I am very sorry for my thoughtlessness in not having written before. I will bring you up to date now, but before you read on, please sit down. YOU ARE NOT TO READ ANY FURTHER UNLESS YOU ARE SITTING DOWN. OKAY! Well then, I am getting along pretty well now. The skull fracture and the concussion I got when I jumped out of the window of my dormitory when it caught fire shortly after my arrival are pretty well healed now. I only get those sick headaches once a day. Fortunately the fire in the dormitory and my jump were witnessed by an attendant at the gas station near the dorm, and he was the one who called the fire department and the ambulance. He also visited me at the hospital and since I had nowhere to live, because of the burned out dormitory, he was kind enough to invite me to share his apartment with him. It's really a basement room, but it's kind of cute. He is a very fine boy and we have fallen deeply in love and are planning to be married. We haven't set the exact date yet, but it will be before my pregnancy begins to show. Yes Mother and Dad, I am pregnant. I know how much you are looking forward to being grrandparents and I know you will welcome the baby and give it the love, devotion and tender care you gave me when I was a chld. The reason for the delay in our marriage is that my boyfriend has some minor infection which prevents us from passing our pre-marital blood tests and I carelessly caught it from him. This will soon clear up with the penicillin injections I am taking daily. I know you will welcome him into our family with open arms. He is kind and although not well educated, he is ambitious. Although he is of a different race and religion than ours, I know your oft expressed tolerance will not permit you to be bothered by the fact that his skin color is somewhat darker than ours. I am sure you will love him as I do. His family background is good too, for I am told that his father is an important gun-bearer in the village in Africa from which he came. Now that I have brought you up to date, I want to tell you that there was no dormitory fire, I did not have a concussion or a skull fracture. I was not in the hospital, I am not pregnant, I am not engaged. I do not have syphillis and there is no man (of any color) in my life. However, I am getting a 'D' in History and an 'F' in Science and I wanted you to see those marks in the proper perspective. Yours- Your Loving Daughter ---------------------------------------------------- A ninja instructor and student were sitting in a hovel somewhere deep in Secret Forest. They had just returned from another 12 hour instructional binge at the local 16-plex theater. The instructor spake unto the student, "you must study well the ways of the movie ninja. Indeed his prowess is well beyond my humble abilities. Here is a list of talents you must learn." 1. The Spiderman death trick - a true ninja can climb vertical surfices without any visible means of support; sometimes they can even stick to the roof. 2. The deadly bionic throwing star - a true ninja can throw a star several hundred meters through several pieces of wood and the occasional car door and still chop a quarter in half 3. The fabulous energy absorbing death roll - a true ninja can jump off of a ten story building onto hard concrete and roll once to absorb the impact 4. The reverse camera death trick - a true ninja can leap vertically into a tall tree and land precisely on a specific branch 5. High performance forward death leap - a true ninja can leap over speeding cars, between fan blades, across huge lava pits, and through brick walls. 6. The deadly carbon steel denture trick - a true ninja can simultaneously catch an speeding arrow on each hand and a bullet in the teeth. A truer ninja can then throw (spit) these back and kill his attackers with them. An even truer ninja can do this blindfolded in the dark. A real stud ninja can catch small cannon shells in his teeth too. 7. The flying death dealing vegamatic - a true ninja armed with only a can opener can kill 50 highly trained heavily armed opponents in as many seconds. 8. The death glare - a true ninja can shake the stoutest opponent to his very soul with but a glance. Heart attacks, strokes, and instant epilepsy are an added bonus. 9. The iron palm of death - a true ninja can smash locks and powder bricks with a single slap of the palm. It is not strictly necessary for the locks or bricks to be in the same room; contact with any convenient surface will allow the energy to be transmitted to the target. 10. The most undeath like pain trick - a true ninja can withstand being shot with high power rifles several hundred times before he starts to seriously bleed. It takes a small atomic blast (or another ninja) to kill a ninja. 11. The continued refusal to die trick - a true ninja can continue to rise from the dead as a ghost or by possessing a victim for an indefinite number of sequels. 12. The ever classic explosive death smoke bombs - a true ninja must always keep a ready supply of smoke bombs. The bombs allow a true ninja to: instantly teleport, replicate, summon aid from beyond the grave, become invisible, create words in the air, and other slightly useful tricks. The instructor the spake, "learn these well and you will be one badass dude my son." With those parting words, the instructor vanished in a flash of light. All that remained were a perfectly cleaned and pressed pile of ninja clothes. *start* 16408 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 21 Nov 88 15:17:48 PST (Monday) Subject: Life 3.S From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Attached to a Lincoln Town Car: IOU IRS ---------------------------------------------------- "Give me a place to sit, and I'll watch." -- friend of Archimedes ---------------------------------------------------- "Great leaders are rare, so I'm following myself." ---------------------------------------------------- An American tourist is visiting Russia, and he's talking with a Russian about the fact that not many people in Russia own cars. The American says, "I can't belive you don't have cars here! How do you get to work?" The Russian replies, "We take bus." The American asks, "Well, how do you go on vacations?" The Russian replies, "We take train." The American asks, "Well, what if you want to go abroad?" The Russian replies, "We don't want go abroad." The American presses further and asks, "Well, what if you really HAVE to go abroad?" The Russian replies, "We take tanks." ---------------------------------------------------- Once upon a time, in the days of glassnost and perestroika, Russians decided to enter a derby race. Tass and Pravada gave a lot of publicity (started to be capitalistic). Even some betting was allowed on Russian horse!!! Then came the D-day. And next day the headlines ran that Russian horse came second in the race (Russian networks talked about it the night before). It was a moment of celebration and pride for the country. But!!!!!!! There were only two cars in the race. ---------------------------------------------------- Here's one from an old Czech general: During the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia, one tank crew from the Ukraine became very nervous as their tank was pelted with rocks, bottles, and other objects. Finally, the crew decided the escapade wasn't worth the risk, and decided to return to Kiev. "But, Vladmir," asked the gunner, "we can barely see out of the tank. How will we know when we are back in the Ukraine?" "That is no problem," the driver replied, "I will be able to tell by simply sticking my hand out of the tank." Confused but anxious to return home, the crew turned the tank and began driving. Finally, they stopped, and the driver stuck his hand out of the top door. "Nyet," he said, "this must be Romania." Again they drove, and finally they paused while the driver again put his hand out of the tank. "Nyet," he said, "this must be Bulgaria." They continued their journey, finally stopping again, while the driver repeated the act of sticking his hand out of the tank. "Ahh, Comrades! We are back in the USSR!" he declared. Surely enough, when the crew emerged from the tank they were in Kiev! "How could you tell our location so easily?" asked the gunner. "Well," replied the driver, "the first two times I put my hand out, someone spat on it. But the last time someone stole my watch!" ---------------------------------------------------- Q. Are there any historical precedents for the Soviet system of elections? A. Yes, in the story of the creation. God made Eve, put her in the Garden of Eden, and said to Adam: "Now choose a woman." ---------------------------------------------------- On the Autobahn connecting W. Berlin with the rest of W. Germany: East German authorities record the time you enter the motorway and the time you get to the other end. If you go too slowly, you are charged with spying. If you go too quickly, you are charged with speeding. (courtesy of the Mean Value Theorem) ---------------------------------------------------- Guy walks into a restaurant. Orders eggs. The waitress asks "How would you like those eggs cooked?" The guy says "Hey, that would be great." ---------------------------------------------------- Q: What do you get when you kiss a galactic frog? A: Star Warts. ---------------------------------------------------- "Man who arrives late to party will find himself beaten to the punch". ---------------------------------------------------- :The primary purpose of the DATA statement is to give names to :constants; instead of referring to pi as 3.141592653589793 at every :appearance, the variable PI can be given that value with a DATA :statement and used instead of the longer form of the constant. This :also simplifies modifying the program, should the value of pi change. : -- FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers : Obviously Xerox (tm) remembers when the Indiana state legislature came within one vote of "simplifying" the value of pi to 3.2. ---------------------------------------------------- "No job too big; no fee too big!" --Dr. Peter Venkman, "Ghost-busters" ---------------------------------------------------- Doctors have it made. A vet says, "Does it hurt when I do this?" He gets bitten when it does. You want to see a real whopping doctor bill? Send your kid to med school. ---------------------------------------------------- You know, that's the difference between a Comic and a Comedian: A comic says funny things A comedian says things funny ---------------------------------------------------- Difference between US & UK... UK - 100 miles is a long distance. US - 100 years is a long time. ---------------------------------------------------- Mark Twain was once chatting with a Mormon; the Mormon was defending the practice of polygamy. Finally he challanged Twain to quote a single verse from the Bible that clearly proscribed polygamy. Twain's answer: "No man can serve two masters." ---------------------------------------------------- There is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress. -- Mark Twain ---------------------------------------------------- You have to admire trees. Even though they start to lose their leaves, they never consider growing a beard. ---------------------------------------------------- From The Wall Street Journal today: Ever notice, when finally you¹ve got to a position where you¹re holding all the cards, that everybody else is playing chess? ---------------------------------------------------- Q: How do you double the value of a Hyundai? A: Fill it with gas. ---------------------------------------------------- BMW = Bring My Wallet Okay, this but this is funny: My bro is a mechanic and I was in his shop last week while he was looking at car. Customer, "Is it serious?" My Bro, "Naw, nothing here that money can't cure." ---------------------------------------------------- The local minister noticed a little girl standing outside of his parish with a basket of kittens. "Hello little girl what do you have there?" "These are my democratic kittens," she replied. Two weeks later the same minister noticed the same little girl with the same basket of kittens. "My, I see you still have your democratic kittens" "I beg your pardon, these are Republican kittens," she replied. "Two weeks ago they were democratic kittens," he said. "Two weeks ago they had their eyes closed," she replied. ---------------------------------------------------- "Seventy-five thousand dollars for an ounce of a Democrat's brain?? Why on earth is that?" "It's never been used!" ---------------------------------------------------- Back in the early days of Nissan, before "Human Engineering", even before they came up with the name Nissan. Yes, back when they were known as Datsun. They were attempting to break into the American market when the most popular vehicle of the year was the Buick Roadmaster. The people at Datsun decided to win the American people over with service and quality. The first years model had only one snag, a cog in the drive train was not made to the proper precision. After 800 miles, it would cause the transmission to drop. They had several hundred models at dealers in Chicago that all needed replacement parts right away. So the execs in Japan, after executing the engineers and all the managers in between, had the new cogs made and sent out on a specially chartered cargo jet. The jet was on its way to Chicago, when it hit some turbulance. The turbulence was so great that the crate of cogs went flying against the door, shattered the crate, knocked the door open and fell out near Cedar Rapids Iowa. On the ground, a farmer and his son were putting the cows in the barn when they looked out and saw the cogs spewing forth from the sky. The son proclaimed, "Look Dad, it's raining datsun cogs!". ---------------------------------------------------- Objoke: 4 rabbis had a series of theological arguments, and 3 were always in accord against the fourth. One day, the odd rabbi out, with the usual "3 to 1, majority rules" statement that signified that he had lost again, decided to appeal to a higher authority. "Oh, God!" he cried. "I know in my heart that I am right and they are wrong! Please show me a sign, so they too will know that I understand Your laws." It was a beautiful, sunny day. As soon as the rabbi finished his plaint, a storm cloud moved across the sky above the four. It rumbled once and dissolved. "A sign from God! See, I'm right, I knew it!" But the other three disagreed, pointing out that stormclouds form on hot days. So he asked again: "Oh, God, I need a bigger sign to show that I am right and they are wrong. So please, God, a bigger sign." This time four stormclouds appeared, rushed toward each other to form one big cloud, and a bolt of lightning knocked down a tree ten feet away from the rabbis. The cloud dispersed at once. "I told you I was right!" insisted the loner, but the others insisted that nothing had happened that could not be explained by natural causes. The insisting rabbi is all ready to ask for a *very big* sign when just as he says "Oh God..." the sky turns pitch black, the earth shakes, and a deep, booming voice intones, "HEEEEEEEE'S RIIIIIIIGHT!" The sky returns to normal. The one rabbi puts his hands on his hips and says, "Well?" "So," replied another, "now it's 3 to 2!" ---------------------------------------------------- Why are synogoges round? So the jewish people have nowhere to run when they pass out the collection plate. ---------------------------------------------------- Adolph Hitler was having terrible nightmares, and so he decided to go to a fortune teller hoping that the woman could find the source of his problem. "I am sorry but I am unable to help you solve your dreams" said the fortune teller, "but I do know that you will die on a Jewish holiday." "And which holiday will this be?" he asked. "It does not matter." she replied. "Any day that you die will be a Jewish Holiday." ---------------------------------------------------- One of my favorite jokes, a telling commentary on Jewish mothers' capacity to lay on guilt, involves the mother who gave her son two neckties on Chanuka. "The boy hurried into his bedroom, ripped off the tie he was wearing, put on one of the ties his mother had brought him, and hurried back. "Look, Mama! Isn't it gorgeous?" "Mama asked, 'What's the matter? You don't like the other one?'" ---------------------------------------------------- "If God wanted us to have a president, He would have sent us a candidate." -- Jerry Dreshfield ---------------------------------------------------- Yesterday I became a Jehova's Witness. Not because of the religion but so they would stop comming to my house. ---------------------------------------------------- A man walks into a pet shop to buy a bird. He sees a parrot sitting on a perch saying "Pieces of seven, pieces of seven!" and "Polly want a biscuit!" He says to the proprieter of the shop, "What's wrong with that parrot? Shouldn't it be saying "Pieces of Eight" and "Polly want a cracker?" The owner says, "That bird is for sale at a reduced rate. It has a parroty error." ---------------------------------------------------- Many years ago, the conductor of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra was a man named Josef Stransky. Stransky was arrested, tried, and convicted for perpetrating violence on Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, and other victims. He was sentenced to death in the electric chair. On the day appointed for his execution, Stransky was strapped into the lethal chair. The executioner stepped up to the switch, and pulled it! BUZZZZZ!!! ZAPPPP!!! When the smoke cleared, the witnesses were astonished to see Stransky still very much alive, smiling at them from his seat in the Chair. The executioner, puzzled, thought there must have been a fault in the wiring, so he called the Chief Electrician. The electrician came, took one look at the scene, and said, "You cannot execute this man! You see..... "HE'S A NON-CONDUCTOR!!!" ---------------------------------------------------- A local throwaway paper has a column called News of the Weird which may be syndicated. Excerpting... Oops!: On July 4, a forty-nine year old Chicago man, pretending to drown in the Fox River near Elgin, Ill., in order to scare his three kids into behaving better, drowned. George Bush's August message attempting to woo the support of the National Letter Carriers missed its mark because campaign officials sent the message by Federal Express, whose deliveries the union refuses to accept. Least Competent Criminals: A twenty-four year old prison parolee was arrested in June for violating his restrictions after he decided to go swimming at a public pool. He was required by pool employees to check his clothes, which included a gun he wasn't supposed to have. He handed over the gun but told the attendant he would shoot him if he called the police, but the attendant called anyway. In August, a Los Angeles man who said later that he was "tired of walking," stole a steamroller and led police on a 5 mph chase until one officer jumped aboard and brought the vehicle to a stop. ---------------------------------------------------- Again, the truth is funnier than fiction In Phila 11/7/88 : The police raided a drug house, seizing coke and crack and the 5 drug dealers in the house. As they are raiding the place, the phone rings. An officer answers "Hello?" The voice says "I coming over with the coke now" The officer says "Sure, come on over". The police wait. Sure enough, not one, but four people arrive at the house with 2 kilos of cocaine. ---------------------------------------------------- I moved to toronto in september to start grad school. By october everyone (family, creditors etc) had my new address, but I wasn't receiving any mail. My former roommates had forwarded me things, and my parents had sent me mail but none of it arrived. Well I talked to the Canada Post supervisor, and he didn't know why my mail wasn't arriving, and the letter carrier was not available. I left a note for the letter carrier to see me the next day. When the carrier arrived she appologized for the problem, she knew why I wasn't getting any mail. It seems that there was another TAKEFMAN on my street ( a really distant cousin whom I didn't know (6th cousins)) and she assumed that all the mail to my address was actually mislabeled and for my cousin down the street. Even though his first name is Leo which doesn't sound or look like michael. What really surprises me is 1) my cousin didn't think to bring the mail to my house to check. 2) a Canada Post employee showed so much initiative (naturally all wrong, but what else is new). ---------------------------------------------------- * FLASH! * ARMONK,NY -- International Business Machines, Inc. (IBM) announced today that it is changing the corporation's name in an effort to "shed our image as and old-fashioned, lumbering giant incapable of offering new ideas." The new name: IBM2 (International Business Machines 2). Industry analyst expect Big Blue to have no trouble gaining market acceptance of its new identity. ---------------------------------------------------- I never knew that IBM stood for International Business Machines. Itty Bitty Morons Inferior But Marketable I Blame Microsoft Interesting But Moronic It's Bit- Mapped *start* 17144 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 21 Nov 88 15:19:11 PST (Monday) Subject: Life 3.T From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- I have a full-size map of the world. At the bottom it says "1 inch = 1 inch". I hardly ever unroll it. I'm writing an unauthorized autobiography. I went down the street to the 24-hour grocery. When I got there, the guy was locking the front door. I said, "Hey, the sign says you're open 24-hours." He said, "Yea, but not in a row." My neighbor has a circular driveway...he can't get out. ---------------------------------------------------- As an anecdote, I was visiting a friend in Boston about 5 years ago and he could not get his car out of the parking spot because the cars in front and behind him were on his bumper. So the standard tactic was to just hit the gas and push the cars away until there was enough space to pull out! (And Bostonians complain about insurance rates at least as much as we do). ---------------------------------------------------- [Whatever the content of the encoded text below, I personally guarantee it contains nothing that exceeds the bounds of Decency, Taste, or Good Judgement. Moderator] The following article appeared in the Tuesday, November 15, 1988 edition of the San Diego Tribune: "Warnings about a rapidly spreading computer virus have been issued to students of California State University at Northridge following reports that the virus is disrupting functions of certain computers. 'In general, this thing is spreading like mad,' said Chris Sales, the university's computer center consultant. 'It originated in West Germany, found its way aprw- urbx ny27 ny08urbx lr28 pn07 pn08 dx19 dx20 dx22 ag08 sk04 sk12 la99 rd99 urbx . . . (That's the report as it moved on today's Associated Press computerized news wire.)" ---------------------------------------------------- I just finished reading Mo Udall's book TOO FUNNY TO BE PRESIDENT. (He is, too). If you are interested in humor and/or politics, this should be required reading. One event that he relates took place when campaigns weren't as down and dirty - just embarassing. During one of Nixon's campaigns for the presidency, his theme was "Nixon's the one!" One evening when Nixon was appearing at a hotel to give a speech, a group of obviously pregnant women showed up holding those signs. ---------------------------------------------------- Sorry guys, but there is now definitive, undeniable proof that Elvis is, indeed, dead. He was registered to vote in Chicago. There's bad news and good news out of Chicago. The bad news is that Mayor Harold Washington died. The good news, is that he can still vote. ---------------------------------------------------- On the Unix newsgroup, rec.humor, there was a discusion of a dirty campaign: Anybody remember the story of the southern politician who won by calling his oponent an extravert? I dimly remember hearing about it a long time ago but don't remember any details. I've already asked in misc.politics, but no one there took my question seriously. Yes, and that the opponent's sister was a Thesbian and his brother was a practicing something or another Ah, yes. It was Claude Pepper, the semi-embalmed Congressman from Florida. His opponent's wife was described as a "noted thespian from wicked New York". The candidate was accused of practicing nepotism with his young nephew. Yes, it really did happen. No, he called his opponent "an avowed heterosexual", or something similar, which the majority of voters misconstrued (as expected). What he actually called his opponent (among other things) was an admitted homo sapiens. He also used the terms thespian and and extrovert, as someone else has already pointed out. Was this Claude Pepper saying this or was it directed at Pepper? he also said that his opponent emulated older boys at the playground and that once he exasperated his very own sister. ---------------------------------------------------- > From: cs504aa@unm-la.UUCP (David Barts) > Newsgroups: rec.humor > Subject: Mad's Guaranteed Effective All-Occasion Non-Slanderous Political Smear Speech > Organization: University of New Mexico - Los Alamos > > [Several months ago, requests were coming over rec.humor for the text of > this speech. Here it is. Enjoy!] Mad's Guaranteed Effective All-Occasion Non-Slanderous Political Smear Speech by Bill Garvin My fellow citizens, it is an honor and a pleasure to be here today. My opponent has openly admitted he feels an affinity toward your city, but I happen to *like* this area. It might be a salubrious place to him, but to me it is one of the nation's most delightful garden spots. When I embarked upon this political campaign I hoped that it could be conducted on a high level and that my opponent would be willing to stick to the issues. Unfortunately, he has decided to be tractable instead -- to indulge in unequivocal language, to eschew the use of outright lies in his speeches, and even to make repeated veracious statements about me. At first, I tried to ignore these scrupulous, unvarnished fidelities. Now I do so no longer. *If my opponent wants a fight, he's going to get one!* It might be instructive to start with his background. My friends, have you ever accidentally dislodged a rock on the ground and seen what was underneath? Well, exploring my opponent's background is dissimilar. All the slime and filth and corruption you could possibly imagine, even in your wildest dreams, are glaringly nonexistent in this man's life. And even during his childhood! Let us take a very quick look at that childhood: It is a known fact that, on a number of occasions, he emulated older boys at a certain playground. It is also known that his parents not only permitted him to masticate excessively in their presence, but even urged him to do so. Most explicable of all, this man who poses as a paragon of virtue exacerbated his own sister while they were both teenagers! I ask you, my fellow Americans: is this the kind of person we want in public office to set an example for our youth? Of course, it's not surprising that he should have such a typically pristine background -- no, not when you consider the other members of his family: His female relatives put on a constant pose of purity and innocence, and claim they are inscrutable, yet every one of them has taken part in hortatory activities. The men in the family are likewise completely amenable to moral suasion. My opponent's second cousin is a Mormon. His uncle was a flagrant heterosexual. His sister, who has always been obsessed by sects, once worked as a proselyte outside a church. His father was secretly chagrined at least a dozen times by matters of a pecuniary nature. His youngest brother wrote an essay extolling the virtues of being a homo sapiens. His great-aunt expired from a degenerative disease. His nephew subscribes to a phonographic magazine. His wife was a thespian before their marriage and even performed the act in front of paying customers. And his own mother had to resign from a women's organization in her later years because she was an admitted sexagenarian. Now what shall we say of the man himself? I can tell you in solemn truth that he is the very antithesis of political radicalism, economic irresponsibility, and personal depravity. His own record *proves* that he has frequently discountenanced treasonable, un-American philosophies and has perpetrated many overt acts as well. He perambulated his infant son on the street. He practiced nepotism with his uncle and first cousin. He attempted to interest a 13-year-old girl in philately. He participated in a seance at a private residence where, among other odd goings-on, there was incense. He has declared himself in favor of more homogeneity on college campuses. He has advocated social intercourse in mixed company -- and has taken part in such gatherings himself. He has been deliberately averse to crime in our streets. He has urged our Protestant and Jewish citizens to develop more catholic tastes. Last summer he committed a piscatorial act on a boat that was flying the American flag. Finally, at a time when we must be on our guard against all foreign isms, he has cooly announced his belief in altruism -- and his fervent hope that some day this entire nation will be altruistic! I beg you, my friends, to oppose this man whose life and work and ideas are so openly and avowedly compatible with our American way of life. A vote for him would be a vote for the perpetuation of everything we hold dear. The facts are clear; the record speaks for itself. Do your duty. ---------------------------------------------------- Hear about the computer scientist who died while washing his hair in the shower? The instructions on the shampoo bottle read: Lather. Rinse. Repeat. ---------------------------------------------------- The editorial from the Pasadena/Altadena Weekly, Nov. 10, 1988, by Jim Laris Real Food For Real Rabbits Now that the elections are over, we can turn to more serious matters. Like why were salad bars ever invented? I just don't get it. Why would anyone ever want to go to all the trouble of building a salad when you can just ask the waiter for one and it will magically appear at your table in two minutes? Oh, I know. It's more individualistic if you build your own. So why aren't there bread bars - with 21 kinds of grains like wheat and rye and pumper and nickel. They could have those little Indian stone pot things and you could grind your own flour, and then they could have a wall of ovens where you could bake your own loaves, and some turkey could pocket a quick $9.95. And why aren't there more of those quirky sandwich bars that never really caught on? You could have king-size faily jars of mayonnaise, mustard, ketchup, bowls of relish, onions and all sorts of assorted meats and cheeses and pickles and wow, they might even combine it with a bread bar and a salad bar and people could eat lunch for six hours and lose their jobs and die of terminal belly-belching. OK, I'm exaggerating. But every time I have gone to a salad bar, I've been disappointed. (Except for that time I picked up that aerobics instructor right by the thousand island dressing.) Yup, I always THINK I'm going to like eating at one of these salad places. It always looks so dang clean and everything is usually so fresh and healthy, and there are beads of water on the lettuce and even the tomatoes look good. So I get in line and start loading up my plate ... my chilled plate. And I know the same thing that happens to me every time is going to happen to me again. And it does. I start piling up stuff just because it's there and I don't want to pass it up because I already paid for it. I do it every time. I have no will power. I don't even have any won't power. I take the silver tongs and put a big glob of lettuce on the plate, and then I meander up the aisle and put on the regular kind of stuff like radishes and carrots and onions, and then I get a little bolder and slop on a few beets and let the red juice run all over the lettuce, the plate, the counter, and my shirt. Then I walk on and start getting salad-bar crazy. I put on things like squash and cheese and pickled cucumbers and garbanzo beans and lima beans and green beans and my plate starts to get HEAVY. That's when I know I've become an addict. When the heaviness of the plate enters my consciousness. I know I'm in trouble. So I keep walking. (I have to keep walking. There's a 55-year old woman with a crazed look in her eye and 17 pounds of sprouts on her plate nudging me onward.) I hold my big, heavy plate and I keep walking. Then I get to the outer space section of the salad bar. I start putting stuff on now that only aliens would eat - like sardines and pasta salad, bacon bits and potato salad, three-bean salad and four-mold Jell-O. I mean, that plate is now so high they could put a construction elevator on it. I'm thinking seriously of asking someone to help me hold one end of the plate up. (I sure don't want to get another plate. I don't want anyone to thnk I'm a pig.) And then on top of this Matterhorn of munchies I decide to just add a few of - well you know what, don't you. You all do it. I'm no different. I'm normal. Like you're normal. OK. OK. I put on six different kinds of DEVILED EGGS! I just can't help myself. I see those half slices of eggs with that yellow stuff inside and I just keep piling 'em on. Sometimes the eggs have red stuff or other weird colored stuffings. I don't care. If it's a deviled egg, I know it wants to be on my plate. (Do deviled eggs have magnets?) Anyway, I finally get to the end of the bar with my barbell - I mean, my salad plate. Now it's time for the really disgusting part ... putting salad dressing on that mess. Jeez, my stomach is pretty strong. I can eat red hots and Hostess cupcakes with Dr. Pepper, but this is too much to ask. So I look at the eight options for dressing. And I decide on French. So I ladle that orange stuff all over the mountain and I wonder if Arnold Schwarzennegger would like to joing me. (I don't even know what that means!) OK. I'm at the end of the line. I go up to the cashier and start to give her my $6.95 and she casually says, ªWhat kind of soup and muffins would you like?ª And I look up ahead and there are two more lines branching out with 76 types of muffins and my head gets light and I stumble onward and pick out the two LARGEST muffins I have ever seen. (At first I thought they were meatloafs.) One of 'em has blueberries in it, the other pumpkin bits. I sort of cradle both the muffins up against my chest as they lean on the plate. Then I look for the soup. It's not hard to find. It's always in those over-sized black kettles. And I put some kind of soup that has big chunks of something in it in a bowl and walk on. I walk on to the beverage section. I try to decide which health drink I can tolerate. Finally, I pick apple/cinnamon juice with a twist of lemon. I pray nobody I know sees my decision. Finally, finally, I get it all on my plate and trudge off to the dining room. I put the plate and the bowl and the drink down and my arms shoot up from lack of plate pressure and I sit down and sigh. And I look at what I have built. I sort of poke at a few orange-covered objects and determine that they're just innocent olives who drowned in salad dressing. And I eat them. And I wonder why salad bars were ever invented. Probably because they're so non-fattening. ---------------------------------------------------- So the Juilliard String Quartet were the artists-in-residence at a prestigious college for women. One young lovely found herself attending so many concerts, auditing so many seminars, frequenting the cafeteria at the times they ate. Eventually the musicians noticed her and became a little friendly with her, then a little more, etc. Finally the first violinist invited her up to his room. Looking at his library, she saw books on the history of violin music, the interpretation of Schubert, the life of Paganini, the technique of violin playing, etc. Nothing else. "Is this _all_ you do?" she asked. "Don't you have any other interests?" "Young lady," he replied, "music is my whole life, my very existence. There _is_ nothing else." She concluded that this man was too narrow for her and sadly took her leave. But she continued to attend the quartet's musical events. Soon, as happens in these fables, the second violinist took an interest in her. O rapture! Short-lived, though, for when she went up to his room it was the same story. Violin playing, famous violinists, violin technique. Even the _lamps_ were violin-shaped. "Don't you have any, er, 'outside' interests?" she pleaded. "My dear woman," he answered, "there is _only_ music. The violin is my whole reason for existence." She quickly excused herself, vowing to stop this hopeless pursuit and to go meet some football players, or something. But she continued as a string-quartet groupie, and soon the cellist invited her to his room. She almost refused, but gave it one more try. Bingo! On his kitchen table was the latest issue of "Psychology Today." In his library were "The Inter- pretation of Dreams," "Three Case Histories," and other books by the great master. On his mantel was a bust of Sigmund himself! Finally somebody with some interests besides music! She could hardly believe her good fortune. "You mean you think there's more to life than just strings?" she asked. "Oh, yes," he replied, "I'm a Freud nut!" *start* 20949 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 21 Nov 88 15:22:02 PST (Monday) Subject: Life 3.U From: Cate3 To: Cate3 The following is from a photo copy a friend gave me. It appears to be from a book, this is part of Chapter two. Marriage Customs: AD 200, Northern Europe Among the Germanic Goths, a man married a woman from within his own community. When women were in short supply, he captured his bride-to-be from a neighboring village. The future bridegroom, accompanied by a male companion, seized any young girl who had strayed from the safety of her parental home. Our custom of a "best man" is a relic of that two-man, strong-armed tactic; for such an important task, only the best man would do. From this practice of abduction, which literally swept a bride off her feet, also sprang the later symbolic act of carrying the bride over the threshold of her new home. A best man around AD 200 carried more than a ring. Since there remained the real threat of the bride's family attempting to forcibly gain her return, the best man stayed by the groom's side throughout the marriage ceremony, alert and armed. He also might serve as a sentry outside the newlyweds' home. Of course, much of this is German folklore, but it is not without written documentation and physical artifacts. For instance, the threat of recapture by the bride's family was perceived as so genuine that beneath the church altars of many early peoples - including the Huns, the Goths, the Visigoths, and the Vandals - lay an arsenal of clubs, knives, and spears. The tradition that the bride stand to the left of the groom was also more than a meaningless etiquette. Among the Northern Europeans barbarians (so named by the Romans), a groom placed his captured bride on his left to protect her, freeing his right hand, the sword hand, against sudden attack. Wedding Rings 2800 BC Egypt The origin and significance of the wedding rings is much disputed. One school of thought maintains that the modern ring is symbolic of the fetters used by barbarians to tether a bride to her captor's home. If that be true, today's double ring ceremonies fittingly express the newfound equality of the sexes. The other school of thought focuses on the first actual bands exchanged in a marriage ceremony. A finger ring was first used in the Third Dynasty of the Old Kingdom of Egypt, around 2800 BC. To the Egyptians, a circle, having no beginning or end, signified eternity - for which marriage was binding. Rings of gold were the most highly valued by wealthy Egyptians, and later Romans. Among numerous two-thousand-year-old rings unearthed at the site of Pompeii is one of a unique design that would become popular throughout Europe centuries later, and in America during the Flower Child era of the '60s and '70s. That extant gold marriage ring (of the type now called a friendship ring) has two carved hands clasped in a handshake. There is evidence that young Roman men of moderate financial means often went for broke for their future brides. Tertullian, a Christian priest writing in the second century AD, observed that "most women know nothing of gold except the single marriage ring placed on one finger." In public, the average Roman housewife proudly wore her gold band, but at home, according to Tertullian, she "wore a ring of iron." In earlier centuries, a ring's design often conveyed meaning. Several extant Roman bands bear a miniature key welded to one side. Not that the key sentimentally suggested a bride had unlocked her husband's heart. Rather, in accordance with Roman law, it symbolized a central tenet of the marriage contract: that a wife was entitled to half her husband's wealth, and that she could, at will, help herself to a bag of grain, a roll of linen, or whatever rested i his storehouse. Two millennia would drag on before that civil attitude would reemerge. Diamon Engagement Ring: 15th Century, Venice A venetian wedding document dated 1503 lists "one marrying ring having diamond." The gold wedding ring of one Mary of Modina, it was among the early betrothal rings that featured a diamond setting. They began a tradition that probably is forever. The Venetians were the first to discover that the diamond is one of the hardest, most enduring substances in nature, and that fine cutting and polishing releases its brilliance. Diamonds, sets in bands of silver and gold, became popular for betrothal rings among wealthy Venetians toward the close of the fifteenth century. Rarity and cost limited their rapid proliferation throughout Europe, but their intrinsic appeal guaranteed them a future. By the seventeenth century, the diamond ring had become the most popular, sought-after statement of European engagement. One of history's early diamond engagement rings was also its smallest, worn by a two-year-old bride-to-be. The ring was fashioned for the betrothal of Princess Mary, daughter of Henry VIII, to the dauphin of France, son of King Francis I. Born on February 28, 1518, the dauphin was immediately engaged as a matter of state policy, to assure a more intimate alliance between England and France. Infant Mary was presented with the veriest vogue in rings, which doubtless fit the tiny royal finger for only a short time. Through the origin of the diamond engagement ring is known, that of betrothal rings in general is less certain. The practice began, though, well before the fifteenth century. An early Anglo-Saxon custom required that a prospective bridegroom break some highly valued personal belonging. Half the token was kept by the groom, half by the bride's father. A wealthy man was expected to split a piece of gold or silver. Exactly when the broken piece of metal was symbolically replaced by a ring is uncertain. The weight of historical evidence seems to indicate that betrothal rings (at least among European peoples existed before wedding rings, and that the ring a bride received at the time of proposal was given to her again during the wedding ceremony. Etymologists find one accurate description of the engagement ring's intent in its original Roman name, arrhae, meaning "earnest money." For Roman Catholics, the engagement ring's official introduction is unequivocal. In AD 860, Pope Nicholas I decreed that an engagement ring become a required statement of nuptial intent. An uncompromising defender of the sanctity of marriage, Nicholas once excommunicated two archbishops who had been involved with the marriage, divorce, and remarriage of Lothair II of Lorraine, charging them with "conniving at bigamy." For Nicholas, a ring of just any material or worth would not suffice. The engagement ring was to be of a valued metal, preferably gold, which for the husband-to-be represented a financial sacrifice; thus started a tradition. In that century, two other customs were established: forfeiture of the ring by a man who reneged on a marriage pledge; surrender of the ring by a woman who broke off an engagement. The Church became unbending regarding the seriousness of a marriage promise and the punishment if broken. The Council of Elvira condemned the parents of a man who terminated an engagement to excommunication for three years. And if a woman backed out for reasons unacceptable to the Church, her parish priest had the authority to order her into a nunnery for life. For a time, "till death do us part" began weeks or months before a bride and groom were even united. Ring Finger: 3rd Century BC Greece The early Hebrews placed the wedding ring on the index finger. In India, nuptial rings were worn on the thumb. The WEstern custom of placing a wedding ring on the "third" finger (not counting the thumb) began with the Greeks, through carelessness in cataloguing human anatomy. Greek physicians in the third century BC believed that a certain vein, the "vein of love," ran from the "third finger" directly to the heart. It became the logical digit to carry a ring symbolizing an affair of the heart. The Romans, plagarizing Greek anatomy charts, adopted the ring practice unquestioningly. The did attempt to clear up the ambiguity surrounding exactly what finger constituted the third, introducing the phrase "the finger next to the least." This also became the Roman physician's "healing finger," used to stir mixtures of drugs. Since the finger's vein supposedly ran to the heart, any potentially toxic concoction would be readily recognized by a doctor "in his heart" before being administered to a patient. The Christians continued this ring-finger practice, but worked their way across the hand to the vein of love. A groom first placed the ring on the top of the bride's index finger, with the words "In the name of the Father." Then praying, "In the name of the Son," he moved the ring to her middle finger, and finally, with the concluding words, "and of the Holy Spirit, Amen," to the third finger. This was known as the Trinitarian formula. In the East, the Orientals did not approve of finger rings, believing them to be merely ornamental, lacking social symbolism or religious significance. Marriage Banns: 8th Century, Europe Curing European feudal times, all public announcements concerning deaths, taxes, or births were called "banns." Today we use the term exclusively for an announcement that two people propose to marry. That interpretation began as a result of an order by Charlemagne, king of the Franks, who on Christmas Day in AD 800 was crowned Emperor of the Romans, marking the birth of the Holy Roman Empire. Charlemagne, with a vast region to rule, had a practical medical reason for instituting marriage banns. Among rich and poor alike, a child's parentage was not always clear; an extramarital indiscretion could lead to a half-brother and half-sister marrying, and frequently did. Charlemagne, alarmed by the high rate of sibling marriages, and the subsequent genetic damage to the offspring, issued an edict throughout his unified kingdom: All marriages were to be publicly proclaimed at least seven days prior to the ceremony. To avoid consanguinity between the prospective bride and groom, any person with information that the man and women were related as brother or sister, or as half-siblings, was ordered to come forth. The practice proved so successful that it was widely endorsed by all faiths. Wedding Cakes: 1st Century BC, Rome The wedding cake was not always eaten by the bride; it was originally thrown at her. It developed as one of many fertility symbols integral to the marriage ceremony. For until modern times, children were expected to follow marriage as faithfully as night follows day; and almost as frequently. Wheat, long a symbol of fertility and prosperity, was one of the earliest grains to ceremoniously shower new brides; and unmarried young women were expect to scramble for the grains to ensure their own betrothals, as they do today for the bridal bouquet. Early Romans bakers, whose confectionery skills were held in higher regard than the talents of the city's greatest builders, altered the practice. Around 100 BC they began baking the wedding wheat into small, sweet cakes - to be eaten, not thrown. Wedding guests, however, loath to abandon the fun of pelting the bride with wheat confetti, often tossed the cakes. According to the Roman poet and philosopher Lucretius, author of "De rerun natura" (Of the Nature of Things"), a compromised ritual developed in which the wheat cakes were crumbled over a bride's head. And as a further symbol of fertility, the couple was required to eat a portion of the crumbs, a custom known as "confarreation, or "eating together." After exhausting the supply of cakes, guests were presented with handfuls of "confetto - "sweet meats" - a confetti-like mixture of nuts, dried fruits, and honeyed almonds, sort of an ancient trail mix. The practice of eating crumbs of small wedding cakes spread throughout Western Europe. In England, the crumbs were washed down with a special ale. The brew itself was referred to as "bryd ealu", or "bride's ale," which evolved into the word "bridal." The wedding cake rite, in which tossed food symbolized an abundance of offspring, changed during lean times in the early Middle Ages. Raw wheat or rice once again showered a bride. The once-decorative cakes became simple biscuits or scones to be eaten. And guests were encouraged to bake their own biscuits and bring them to the ceremony. Leftovers were distributed among the poor. Ironically, it was these austere practices that with time, ingenuity, and French contempt for all things British led to the most opulent of wedding adornments: the multitiered cake. The legend is this: Throughout the British Isles, it had become customary to pile the contributed scones, biscuits, and other baked goods atop one another into an enormous heap. The higher, the better, for height augured prosperity for the couple, who exchanged kisses over the mound. In the 1660s, during the reign of King Charles II, a French chef (whose name, unfortunately, is lost to history) was visiting London and observed the cakepiling ceremony. Appalled at the haphazard manner in which the British stacked baked goods, often to have them tumble, he conceived the idea of transforming the mountain of bland biscuits into an iced, multitiered cake sensation. British papers of the day are supposed to have deplored the French excess, but before the close of the century, British bakers were offering the very same magnificent creations. Throwing Shoes at the Bride: Antiquity, Asia and Europe. Today old shoes are tied to newlyweds' cars and no one asks why. Why, of all things, shoes? And why old shoes? Originally, shoes were only one of many objects tossed at a bride to wish her a bounty of children. In fact, shoes were preferred over the equally traditional wheat and rice because from ancient times the foot was a powerful phallic symbol. In several cultures, particularly among the Eskimos, a woman experiencing difficulty in conceiving was instructed to carry a piece of an old shoe with her at all times. The preferred shoes for throwing at a bride - and later for tying to the newlyweds' car - were old ones strictly for economic reasons. Shoes have never been inexpensive. Thus, the throwing of shoes, rice, cake crumbs, and confetti, as well as the origin of the wedding cake, are all expressions for a fruitful union. It is not without irony that in our age, with such strong emphasis on delayed childbearing and family planning, the modern wedding ceremony is replete with customs meant to induce maximum fertility. Honeymoon: Early Christian Era, Scandinavia There is a vast difference between the original meaning of "honeymoon" and its present-day connotation - a blissful, much-sought seclusion as a prelude to married life. The word's antecedent, the ancient Norse hjunottsmanathr, is we'll see, cynical in meaning, and the seclusion it bespeaks was once anything but blissful. When a man from a Northern European community abducted a bride from a neighboring village, it was imperative that he take her into hiding for a period of time. Friends bade him safety, and his whereabouts were known only to the best man. When the bride's family abandoned their search, he returned to his own people. At least, that is a popular explanation offered by folklorists for the origin of the honeymoon; honeymoon meant hiding. For couples whose affections were mutual, the daily chores and hardships of village life did not allow for the luxury of days or weeks of blissful idleness. The Scandinavian words for "honeymoon" derives in part from an ancient Northern European custom. Newlyweds, for the first month of married life, drank a daily cup of honeyed wine called mead. Both the drink and the practice of stealing brides are part of the history of Attila, king of the Asiatic Hungs from AD 433 to 453. The warrior guzzled tankards of the alcoholic distillate at his marriage in 450 to the Roman princess Honoria, sister f Emperor Valentinian III. Attila abducted her from a previous marriage and claimed her for his own - along with laying claim to the western half of the Roman Empire. Three years later, at another feast, Attila's unquenchable passion for mead lead to an excessive consumption that induced vomiting, stupor, coma, and his death. While the "honey" in the word "honeymoon" derives straightforwardly from the honeyed wine mean, the "moon" stems from a cynical inference. To Northern Europeans, the term "moon" connoted the celestial body's monthly cycle; its combination with "honey" suggested that all moons or months of married life were not as sweet as the first. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, British prose writers and poets frequently employed the Nordic interpretation of honeymoon as a waxing and waning of marital affection. Wedding March: 19th Century, England The traditional church wedding features two bridal marches, by two different classical composers. The bride walks down the aisle to the majestic, moderately paced music of the "Bridal Chorus" from Richard Wagner's 1848 opera "Lohengrin. The newlyweds exit to the more jubilant, upbeat strains of the "Wedding March" from Felix Mendelssohn's "A Midsummer Night's Dream." The custom dates back to the royal marriage, in 1858, of Victoria, princess of Great Britain, and Empress of Germany, to Prince Frederick William of Prussia. Victoria, eldest daughter of Britain's Queen Victoria, selected the music herself. A patron of the arts, she valued the works of Mendelssohn and practically venerated those of Wagner. Given the British penchant for copying the monarchy, soon brides throughout the Isles, nobility and commoners alike, were marching to Victoria's drummer, establishing a Western wedding tradition. White Wedding Dress and Veil: 16th Century, England and France White has denoted purity and virginity for centuries. But in ancient Rome, yellow was the socially accepted color for a bride's wedding attire, and a veil of flame-hued yellow, the "flammeum," covered her face. The bridal veil, in fact, predates, the wedding dress by centuries. And the facial veil itself predates the bridal veil. Historians of fashion claim that the facial veil was strictly a male invention, and one of the oldest devices designed to keep married and single women humble, subservient, and hidden from other males. Although the veil at various times throughout its long history also served as a symbol of elegance and intrigue, modesty and mourning, it is one article of feminine attire that women may never have created for themselves. Originating in the East at least four thousand years ago, veils were worn throughout life by unmarried women as a sign of modesty and by married women as a sign of submissiveness to their husbands. In Muslim religions, a woman was expected to cover her head and part of her face whenever she left the house. As time passed, rules (made by men) became stricter and only a woman's eyes were permitted to remain uncovered - a concession to necessity, since ancient veils were of heavy weaves, which interfered with vision. Customs were less severe and formal in Northern European countries. Only abducted brides wore veils. Color was unimportant, concealment paramount. Among the Greeks and the Romans by the fourth century BC, sheer translucent veils were the vogue at weddings. They were pinned to the hair or held in place by ribbons, and yellow had become the preferred color - for veil and wedding gown. During the Middle Ages, color ceased to be a primary concern; emphasis was on the richness of fabric and decorative embellishments. In England and France, the practice of wearing white at weddings was first commented on by writers in the sixteenth century. White was a visual statement of a bride's virginity - so obvious and public a statement that it did not please everyone. Clergymen, for instance, felt that virginity, a marriage prerequisite, should not have to be blatantly advertised. For the next hundred fifty years, British newspapers and magazines carried the running controversy fired by white wedding ensembles. By the late eighteenth century, white had become the standard wedding color. Fashion historians claim this was due mainly to the fact that most gowns of the time were white; that white was the color of formal fashion. In 1813, the first fashion plate of a white wedding gown and veil appears in the influential French "Journal des Dames." From that point onward, the style was set. *start* 17492 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 8 Dec 88 15:22:28 PST (Thursday) Subject: Life 3.V From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- The Three Untruths of Today's Society: 1) The Check is in the Mail 2) I'll Still respect You in the Morning 3) Hi, I'm from the Government and here to help. ---------------------------------------------------- My biggest worry is going sane, for if I do, I'll have to acknowledge and admit to reality. I've seen reality.....I don't like it! ---------------------------------------------------- A Scotsman was sick and in hospital. His doctors were afraid that this was to be the end of him since nothing they did could do anything to make him healthy. His physician asked him if there was anything that he could do to make him more comfortable in his final hours. The Scot replied, "If I could only hear the pipes one more time it would make me very happy." So the doctor arranged for a piper to come into the room and play for the dying man. When the Scot heard the pipes the color came back into his cheeks, his eyes became bright, his breathing was easier, and he got up and danced around the room. He was completely cured! Later, while recounting the tale to his fellows over lunch the doctor confessed that this was a miracle cure that he couldn't explain. When the pipes began to play the Scotsman was cured. The only problem he could see was that 2 Englishmen in for checkups died. ---------------------------------------------------- 'Tis said in Erin that 'twas the Irish who invented the bagpipes and gave 'em to the Scots as a joke...and the Scots haven't seen the joke yet. ---------------------------------------------------- There was a young man from Perth Who was born on the day of his birth He married they say On his wife's wedding day And died the day he left the earth ---------------------------------------------------- Some of the great lines from Princess Bride: Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die "You keep using that word. I dunna think it means what you think it means." "But there's something you don't know, my friend...I'm not left handed." "Don't rush a miracle man. You rush a miracle man, you get rotten miracles." "Three men against twenty? Impossible. Now, if only we had a wheelbarrow..." ---------------------------------------------------- Historically, Mammoth Cave, Kentucky "grew" as various caves in the area were found to connect, and eventually connected to Mammoth itself. One of these, in Flint Ridge, was Floyd Collins' Crystal Cave. (Yes, THAT Floyd Collins!) The part of the cave that was open for visitors was a walk- through, of course, but even in the thirties and forties, there was a good deal more of the cave known. Before he got trapped in nearby Sand Cave, Floyd explored a LOT of Crystal Cave. There's a very narrow hole through which one had to squeeze to get into the greater part of the cave. This hole was named "Scotchman's Trap" because it was so tight. ---------------------------------------------------- (old) someone (forget who, it has been a while since I read the joke in Reader's Digest, of all places) was going to introduce Ronald Reagan as the keynote speaker at a dinner, adn wasn't exactly sure how to pronounce his name. He went out walking his dog, and ran into his friend walking a dog also. He explained his problem, and asked his friend if he could help him. "It's definitely RAY-GUN, those Irishmen always pronounce 'ea' like that." "Thanks," he replied. "By the way, what kind of dog is that? It looks good." "Thank you, it's a bagel." ---------------------------------------------------- How do you make Holy Water? Boil the hell out of it. ---------------------------------------------------- Actually, it so happens that an article just appeared in the Globe & Mail about some Newfoundlanders. They wrote the editor to complain about the road signs on the Trans-Canada Highway as it approaches Toronto. It seems these guys drove 16 hours straight, from St. John's NFLD, and were just about to hit Toronto when they saw one of those big green signs saying "Toronto Left". So they turned around and went home, very disappointed. In a separate story, an interview on television of a Newfoundland fisherman contained this priceless quote (true!): Interviewer: What do you think about Newfoundland's future? Fisherman: The future of Newfoundland is a thing of the past. ---------------------------------------------------- Then there was the joke about the Newfie Mafia leader (the Codfather, of course) who was injured while trying to assassinate one of his rivals. He was trying to blow up the other Codfather's automobile, and..... HE BURNED HIS LIPS ON THE TAILPIPE! ---------------------------------------------------- Did you hear about the Newfie Rubix's cube? It's white on all sides and it takes two minutes to solve. Boss: "Newfie, you should have been here at nine o'clock." Newfie: "Why, what happened?" Newfie to his friend: " The boys said you weren't fit to sleep with the pigs. I stuck up for you. I said you were." ---------------------------------------------------- What should you do if a Newfie throws a pin at you? Run!! He probably has a grenade in his mouth. ---------------------------------------------------- Ah, Canada, where we could have had British culture, American know-how and the passion of la France, but instead we got British Passion, American culture and French know-how. ---------------------------------------------------- During the infamous Norwegian/Swedish war, the Swedes were getting rather irked since the Norse army would yell, from behind their bunkers, "Sven? Sven! Where are you!" Needless to say, Sven would stand up and get shot down by the army. So, the Swedes decided to pull the trick back against the Norse. From behind their bunkers they yelled, "Olaf? Olaf! Where are you?" Olaf replied, "Is that you, Sven?" Sven stood up and said, "Ja! It's me, Olaf!" (*blam!*) An American went to Oslo and came across (*gasp!*) a Norwegian. The American asked, "Are you Swedish?" The Norseman, quite rightly offended, said, "Of course I am not Swedish!" The American said, "Are you sure? You look Swedish to me," to which the Norwegian replied, "Well, I've been sick the past few weeks." ---------------------------------------------------- Why do the swedes bring sandpaper to the desert ? They use it as a map ... ---------------------------------------------------- Kraft is starting up production of dairy products in Israel. The product line is to be called "Cheeses of Nazareth". ---------------------------------------------------- Ever sinces there's been an overflow of lawyers, they've been going out of their way to find a case: Are you injured? You sure? Check again... Have you been injured lately? Have you EVER been injured? Know anybody who's been injured? Have any friends who've been injured? Do they thave any friends who've been injured? Do you're friend's friends have any friends who've been injured? ---------------------------------------------------- A Texan who was visiting New England had just met a Vermont farmer, and asked him, "How big is this farm of yours?" "Well," replied the Vermonter, my farm runs some hundred yards from here northward, and some hundred fifty yards from here eastward." Hearing this, the Texan smiled and said, "Why back in Texas, I can get into my car in front of my house in the morning, drive all day, and at the end of the day I'll still be on my ranch." "That's a shame," intoned the Vermonter, shaking his head, "I once had a car like that myself." ---------------------------------------------------- When I was in Jr. High School, I remember a gym teacher that was a master at malaprops. He kept us in stitches all the time: "You're men now boys." "Before I say anything, let me say this." "Square up that circle." Anyway, Bill Peterson, the coach at FSU, has kept up the tradition: On a favorable reaction to a speach he made, "They gave me a standing observation." "The greatest thing just happened. I got indicted into the Florida Sports Hall of Fame." "Let a dead horse rest." "I'm the football around here - and don't you remember it!" "You guys pair off in groups of threes, then line up in a circle." "Don't look a sawhorse in the mouth." Talking to Ronnie Wallace, a player aspiring to be a minister, "Lead us in a few words of silent prayer." "Don't burn your bridges at both ends." "Don't kill the goose that layed the deviled egg." ---------------------------------------------------- The Tuesday issue of Investors Daily has an article decrying the lack of knowledge of economics in the intermediate grades (and high school). There was a humorous sidebar, which follows: Pupils Struggle with Economics Questions Here are some answers to questions asked of seventh- and eighth-grade students by the Foundation for Teaching Economics: Q: What is money? A: Green paper you use to buy stuff. Q: Why do we have an economic system? A: Because Congress wants it. Q: Are you part of the economic system? A: I'm a deduction on my parents' taxes. Q: Why do people pay taxes? A: To help out the government -- so they government doesn't have to pay for everything. Q: What is the gross national product? A1: It's the worst product anybody makes. A2: Cigarettes. Q: What is the Federal Reserve? A1: Extra money that the federal government has. A2: It's the reserve, if we have to go to war -- it's like our extra army. Q: Why doesn't the government print more money to pay off its national debt? A1: They don't have enough paper. A2: They have to wait until money is a year old or to a certain age and then they are going to make more. ---------------------------------------------------- And if you put Saturn in a bucket of water, it would float. ...but you wouldn't want to do that! It would leave a ring! and leave you with a Titanic clean-up job to do. I know that trick. The rings keep it up. ---------------------------------------------------- A man decided to conduct a world wide poll He asked a Texan "Excuse me, what's your opinion on the meat shortage?" He got "What's a shortage?" He went to Poland, asked same the question and got "What's meat?" He went to Russia, asked same the question and got "What's an opinion?" He went to New York, asked the same question and got "What's an excuse me?" ---------------------------------------------------- A professor of Modern English Literature was teaching a class at the university, in which he had just concluded three weeks of lectures on science fiction. He had assigned readings by some of the best of the genre, and had lead some fascinating and in-depth discussions with his students on the works of Herbert, Asimov, Clarke, Wells, and several other noted authors of science fiction, even Douglas Adams. To conclude the course's segment on science fiction he assigned the class a paper, on any topic they wished having to do with science fiction. The next week, after the papers had been turned in, the professor was grading them and came across this paper: There once was an Israeli border guard named Issac. Across the border from Issac, Abdul, a Arab border guard, had his post. One night, Abdul snuck over the border and killed Issac. When Issac's commander found out what had transpired the previous night, he was furious, and the next night, he and his squad staged a raid in which several Arab border guards, including Abdul, were killed. This, of course lead to Arab reprisals, which in turn lead to Israeli reprisals, which in turn...ad infinitum. Eventually, the Arabs and Israelis were at war. Well, the professor read this paper, and being utterly confused, reread it, shook his head in disgust, and wrote a large "F" on it, in red ink, and then moved on to the next paper. The next day, at the end of class, he handed back the papers, and as he was preparing to leave, the student who received the "F" approached and asked to speak with the professor. "I don't understand why you didn't like my paper," the student said. "It's very simple," the professor replied. "You were assigned to write a paper on science fiction. This paper has nothing whatsoever to do with the assigned subject." "I must disagree," said the student. "I think that my paper examined the very basis of Zion's Friction." ---------------------------------------------------- The Dread Tomato Addiction MARK CLIFTON 1. Ninety-two point four percent of all juvenile delinquents have eaten tomatoes. 2. Eighty-seven point one percent of all the adult criminals in penitentiaries throughout the United States have eaten tomatoes. 3. Informers reliably inform that of all known American Communists, ninety-two poont three percent have eaten tomatoes. 4. Eighty-four percent of all people killed in automobile accidents during the year 1954 had eaten tomatoes. 5. Those who object to singling out specific groups for statistical proofs require measurements within a total: Of those people born before the year 1800, regardless of race, color, creed or caste, there has been one-hundred percent mortality! 6. In spite of their dread addiction, a few tomato eaters born between 1800 and 1850 still manage to survive, but the clinical picture is poor: their bones are brittle, their movements feeble, their skin seamed and wrinkled, their eyesight failing; and frequently they have lost all their teeth. 7. Those born between 1850 and 1900 number somewhat more survivors, but the overt signs of the addiction's dread effects differ not in kind but only in degree of deterioration. Prognostication is not hopeful. 8. Exhaustive experiments show that when tomatoes are withheld from an addict, invariably his cravings will cause him to turn to substitutes -- such as oranges, steak, or potatoes. If both tomatoes and all substitutes are persistently withheld, death invariably results within a short time! 9. The skeptic of apocryphal statistics or the stubborn nonconformist who will not accept the clearly proved conclusions of others may conduct his own experiment. 10. Obtain two dozen tomatoes -- they may actually be purchased within a block of some high schools or discovered growing in a respected neighbor's back yard! Crush them to a pulp in exactly the state they would have been if introduced into the stomach, pour the vile juice and pulp into a bowl, and place a goldfish therein. Within minutes the goldfish will be dead! 11. Those who argue that what affects a goldfish might not apply to a human being may, at their own choice, wish to conduct a direct experiment by fully immersing a live human head in the mixture for a full five minutes. ---------------------------------------------------- Jeff Kawski writes: > My friend once saw a question like this on his physics final: > > A physics student is asked to find 3 ways to use a barometer to determine > the height of a tall building. His replies are as follows: > > 1. Find someone who knows how tall the building is, and trade him the > barometer for the information. Jeff Roberts replies: > Wasn't this joke ripped off from the first episode of "Head of the Class" > (bunch'a brainy kids led by real-world substitute)? No way; this joke dates back to at least 1951. Sharvey Umbeck, president of Knox College, told this one at every convocation for his 24 years at the helm of my dear alma mudhole. I would be surprised if he invented it: he told it as if it were much older. He used it to underscore the breadth of the liberal arts. The canonical reply list was: 0. What the teacher wanted: Measure the barometric pressure at the top and bottom of the building. Plug these into the equation in the book and spit out the answer. 1. Student's first attempt: Trade the barometer to the building's owner for the height. 2. Measure the height of the barometer. Scale the side of the building, measuring its height in barometer-units. 3. Drop the barometer from the top of the building. Measure the time until it hits the street. Correcting for the mass/surface ratio of the instrument, use basic acceleration equation to find the height. 4. Tie string to top of barometer. Lower from roof to almost ground. Swing. Period of pendulum can be used to find distance from barometer's CG to top of building. Add displacement from CG to bottom of barometer; this is height. 5. Oh! You want that *boring* stuff from the beginning of the term! What is something this simple doing on the final? Anyone who doesn't know that has already dropped. I assumed you wanted us to *think*! *start* 18858 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 8 Dec 88 15:27:06 PST (Thursday) Subject: Life 4.1 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- It occurred at a party. A male guest tried to introduce himself to a female guest with whom he was not acquainted. "Hello, I'm ---" "A MOTEL????" she interrupted, very conspicuously, near the top of her lungs. "What?" "WHY DO YOU WANT TO TAKE ME TO A MOTEL????" "I never said anything about any ---" "I'M NOT GOING TO ANY MOTEL WITH YOU AND THAT'S FINAL!!!" Of course, he decided she was out of her mind and moved away, avoiding her the rest of the evening. But about a half hour later she tapped him on the shoulder from behind. He turned around to see who it was, recognized her, and backed away. "Wait, please," she said. "I'm sorry about what I did earlier, but you see, I'm a psychology student, and I'm doing research on how people react to unexpected stresses and other difficult situations. Please let me apologize." "TWO HUNDRED FIFTY DOLLARS????" ---------------------------------------------------- At hp, occasionally a manual will leave for the print shop with the jokes left in it. Two that I've seen are: The hp 9000 series 500 has a 'tunefs' command which has, in its man page, the quote: "You can tune a file system, but you can't tune a fish". The 9885 Service Manual (years ago, and this isn't the exact text). It seems that the drive motor had 3 carefully-tightened screws in it, and the manual didn't want people to fool with them. So, after describing the screws with a picture, a warning is printed: -------------- WARNING Do not remove the 3 factory-sealed screws in the drive motor. -------------- Some pages later in the manual, the subject is again brought up. -------------- WARNING Do not remove the 3 factory-sealed screws in the drive motor. Doing so will cause the drive motor to fall apart. -------------- And finally, a few pages later, the 3rd warning for people who didn't get the message: -------------- WARNING Do not remove the 3 factory-sealed screws in the drive motor or your left ear will fall off. -------------- Happy Thanksgiving! ---------------------------------------------------- In article <1160004@hprnd.RND.HP.COM>, clw@hprnd (Carl Wuebker) writes: | | At hp, occasionally a manual will leave for the print shop with the jokes | left in it. Two that I've seen are: | | The hp 9000 series 500 has a 'tunefs' command which has, in its man page, | the quote: "You can tune a file system, but you can't tune a fish". That was in the original 4.2bsd manual, along with another page that says something about "this manual page is obscure". But, I managed to sneak one in (don't tell anyone :-) into Tandem's SAFEGUARD Reference Manual that passed the editor. I don't have the book in front of me to quote, but here's what I remember. The discussion was about adding access control lists to devices. Devices are named with a dollar-sign followed by one to six letters or digits. Somewhere in one of the examples, I managed to sneak in $BOSTON and $MIAMI as the names, so the very last sentence ended something like: "and that will add an access control record to the $MIAMI device". (Groan! Jan Hammer theme music coming up in background...) And it stayed. I also got a reference into Tandem's Security Administration Guide about the incompatibility of Coke(tm) and computer peripherals. Check it out if you can. The first entry in the index is "Absolute Security, Practical Impossibility of". (deliberate jab.) ---------------------------------------------------- And while we're on the topic of social parasitism, how do you handle tele- phone sales calls? These retarded planaria call around dinner time, frequently interrupting the practice of culinary esthetics, always opening with a leading line like "Good evening, M(r/s). Salesvictim. How are you today?" When I'm in a rush or a (rare) serious mood, I simply say "I'm sorry, I do not accept telephone solicitations." This works well, the salesindividual doesn't push the matter, and the transaction is concluded with courteous words. ** BUT THAT'S NO FUN! ** I used to have an old 300 baud modem that I kept plugged into the phone line, and when the phone-pusher got into his/her spiel, I'd just reach over and switch that modem on. SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL! It was a kick listening to the salesworm shouting "HELLO! CAN YOU HEAR ME? HELLO! HELLO?" Sometimes, to ice the cake a bit, I'd start shouting similar things. Two drawbacks to this: 1- It meant I had to be near the modem to do it, and with five telephones, it frequently couldn't be done. 2- The turkeys tended to call back, thinking they had gotten a bad connection, which they had, but it was me, not the equipment. So, my current system: These folks have a standard set of responses to most things you might say, so I give a non-commital remark or two which starts them in on their pitch. (I'm sure they usually are reading cue-cards; some of them go on in such a sing-song cadence. I wonder if they have any idea how silly they sound. End digression.) I just let them talk and talk, all they want to. Then, they end with some question which tries to get you to commit yourself, even a little bit, to the validity of the statement they've just made -- which, of course, is tantamount to admission that you really NEED to purchase the rutabaga fritters that this ethical throwback is selling. When that question is asked, I just let them listen and listen and listen. Soon, the "HELLO! CAN YOU HEAR ME?" starts up, and I listen with silence and a big grin. Eventually, for even people out of this low mold have limits to their patience, the snake oiler gives up and puts the phone down with disgust and, frequently, a choice bit of invective. It makes my day! ---------------------------------------------------- Also, on the subject of answering machins, my favorite tape was: "This is Jeff, you're not in now so I'll leave a message." Really confused people. I had a friend who liked to play with the phones. He got his girlfriend to sound like an operator and make a tape saying: "I'm sorry, the number that has dialed you is not in service. Will you please hang up and let it dial again... I'm sorry, the..." He had a lot of fun calling people up and playing it. I once answered the phone as follows. " San Luis Obispo Police, Sergeant McCallahan here, may I help you?" After about five seconds of dead air, I heard a click. About five minutes later, the phone rang again. This time my roomate answered. It was the same person that had called a few minutes earlier. It turned out that the long delay between calls was due to the fact that he had to mooch a quarter for his next call. He was at a public phone booth and had used his last quarter to call us. I don't think he talked civil to me for a week... My grandmother had been bothered by calls coming in after midnight, waking her, and forcing her out of bed and across the house to answer. Invariably, they were from the same man, seemingly slightly intoxicated, with bar-crowd noises in the background. He wanted to speak to Peggy, whoever that was, and my grand mother would tell him there was no Peggy living there, and that he must have the wrong number. But he wouldn't believe her, and kept insisting, begging, pleading, etc. to talk to Peggy. My Grandmother would have to just hang up finally. This went on for a few days, and late one night, when the phone rang, my Grandfather held back his wife, and said, "I'll take care of this", and got out of bed to answer the phone. The ensuing conversation was short and quick, and went something like this: "Hello?" "Hello, Can I speak to Peggy?" "No, I'm sorry, she can't come to the phone right now-- she's nursing the baby." Here's my favorite, for calling large offices and idiots-in-general: "Hello, is this the person to whom I am speaking?" My solution is upon realizing that I'm talking with a "telemarketing representative", I ask: "Are you a telemarketer?" The answer (suprisingly) is usually yes. I then go into a sales pitch to sell a (nonexistant) telephone ear-cusion. I insist that every telemarketer must have one for safety and comfort. Eventually, they'll forget to try selling me anything. A recent posting by Duke McMullan requested ways to repel telephone solicitors. My friend Pepe Tres from Texas told me this one and gave permission to post it: "My time is billed at $125 per hour. To continue this conversation, I must have your MasterCard or Visa number, card type and date of expiration." Pepe says it usually leaves them speechless. One guy replied, "Hey, that's good; I'll have to remember it." Once a supervisor of telephone solicitors called back and asked him if he was "some kind of high-powered lawyer." ---------------------------------------------------- Some answering machine messages: I can't come to the phone now because alien beings are eating my brain. Leave a message anyway, and after the alien beings assume my shape, one of them will get back to you. I can't come to the phone now because I have amnesia and I feel stupid talking to people I don't remember. I'd appreciate it if you could help me out by leaving my name and telling me something about myself. Thanks. Andy Warhol said that one day everyone will be famous for 15 minutes. Well, your 15 minutes was last week, but since you weren't ready, we gave it to Vanna White. Sorry. A bubble in the space-time continuum has connected your line to a channeler in the 23rd Century. Any message you leave will be broadcast into the future.... I can't come to the phone right now because I'm down in the basement printing up a fresh new batch of 20 dollar bills. If you need any money, or if you just want to check out my handiwork, please leave your name, number, and how much cash you need after the tone. If you're from the Department of the Treasury, please ignore this message. Kemosabe no in tipi now. You leave'um message after little smoke signal, and Kemosabe get back for pow-wow real fast. [VOICE 1] Answer the phone, please, Hal. [VOICE 2] I'm sorry, Dave, I can't do that. Thanks for calling Dial-A-Shrink. I can't come to the phone right now, so after the tone, please leave your name and number, then talk briefly about your childhood and tell me what comes to mind when you hear the following words: orange...mother...unicorn. I'll get back to you with my diagnosis as soon as possible. [Sung to the tune of "Ride of the Valkyries"] Leave a message...leave a message....etc. This is a test. This is a test of the Answering Machine Broadcast System. This is only a test. You're growing tired. Your eyelids are getting heavy. You feel very sleepy now. You are gradually losing your willpower and your ability to resist suggestions. When you hear the tone you will feel helplessly compelled to leave your name, number, and a message. As the drugs take hold, you feel you are losing your grip on reality. You begin to hallucinate. You see a telephone...the telephone is next to an answering machine...you hear a faint click and a light flashes on the answering machine...you hear a beep.... After the tone, leave your name, number, and tell where you left the money. I'll get back to you as soon as it's safe for you to come out of hiding. The President is not in his office at this time. Please leave your name, phone number, the name of the country you wish to invade, and the secret password. I can't come to the phone now, so if, well, actually, I CAN come to the phone now, I mean, like, I'm at the phone NOW, recording this message, but I'm doing this NOW, while you're listening to it LATER, except for you I guess it's NOW, like, when you're listening to it...I mean, like, wait, gosh. This is so confusing. This is the Literacy Self Test Hotline. After the tone, leave your name and number and recite a sentence using today's vocabulary word. Today's word is supercilious ...} [Must have good Australian accent] G'day mate. Can't come to the phone now because I'm a bit tied up with this crocodile. Just leave a message, and I'll get back to you. ---------------------------------------------------- Everybody gets and dials wrong numbers. It's good to be nice about it. What goes around comes around, right? so, I try to reassure the apologetic and embarrassed wrong dialers that will actually converse once the error is discovered, with it going something like this: caller w. wrong number: "Gee, I'm sorry..." me: "That's OK, I was going to pick up the phone anyway.." murf How about the 'Fraudian Slip Answer'? Like this: here. What can I do to-----I MEAN-----FOR you? ---------------------------------------------------- Try the following next time the phone rings: You (when you answer): Hello, is Jimmy there? Caller: No, I'm afraid you have a wrong number. You: Oh. Sorry. Caller: No problem... (click) ---------------------------------------------------- UC Berkeley, since it is a state funded public university, charges non-California residents an extra tuition fee which amounts to about $5000 a year. So they have an obnoxious way of making sure all students who claim to be residents are indeed residents. Having gone to school in San Francisco for over four years before going to college, I did not expect any problems. Later, I received a letter from Sproul Hall (the great bureaucratic god of UCB) stating that they had information that leads them to believe that my mother was not indeed my mother and that I was a non-resident posing as a resident. Pretty interesting. My mother was more surprised than I was. Two of my other friends at my high school also were classified as non-residents for no particular reason other than they did not provide enough proof that they lived in California for more than three years. I wonder how those bureaucratics figured out our commute. Hmm, if all three of us lived out of state, yet went to high school in San Francisco, how did we commute? It boggles the mind. ---------------------------------------------------- This was published in The South Texas Fisherman, sometime 1972. I'd like to take credit for it but the "Bill Kennedy" author is Sr, I'm Jr. TALKING TO FISH by Bill Kennedy A character in one of Shakespeare's plays, boasting of his accomplishments said "I can call up monsters from the vasty deep." Any fisherman could have given the answer: "So can I and so can any man, but will they come?" Men and women have been calling to fish, pleading with them and swearing at them without response since the beginning of time. A federally supported research project may change that situation. Working with the whale family (porpoise or dolphin), scientists in Florida have set out to translate fish language. They are not far along yet but have made some headway. Various clicks and whistles have been recorded that indicate, at least in the whale family, one fish has a way to commun- icating what is on his mind to another fish. If the research continues as planned, it should be only a matter of time until man will be able to reporoduce fish noises and communicate what is on his mind to bass, perch, and catfish. All right-minded fishermen agree that fish-talk research projects should be cancelled and the scientists in it forced to seek other employment. The reasoning behind this point of view is simple and sound. If the research continues to its logical conclusion, fishing will cease to be the pleasant and relaxing sport that it now is. Fishing will become a business of bellowing speeches in fish language designed to convince fish that they would be better off on the bank or in the boat than they are in the water. In such circumstances any fool knows who the men that will catch all the fish will be. They will be politicians! -- ---------------------------------------------------- THANKSGIVING HUMOR: This is a selection from a book called "Then Some Other Things Happened", a collection of short pieces about history written by eigth graders and compiled by Bill Lawrence, a teacher and columnist. PILGRAM INTERUPTERS The Pilgrams were a bunch of English wonderers who wanted to worship as they wanted to. They excaped the Church of England and came over here because they heard that American churches were different. The May Flower was the ship with which they came in. It didn't have a bathroom on board so there was quite an oder. Priscillia Mullins was the captain. First the Pilgrams had gone to Holland but left when their children started developing customs there. After a stopover at Williamsbug when a large storm blew them off course they landed on a big, slimey rock in Massatusetts. They spent the winter there. Before they got off the ship even they drew up an agreement for the people of Plymouth to agree on the voting for governors and congressmen. They kept this hid in the May Flower Compact. Lord Delaware was elected the first governor of Plymouth Rock. A friendly Indian named Rhone Oak showed the Pilgrams how to plant corn by putting it in the ground. Rhone Oak had been the first Indian to come to America and always wanted a beer. He traveled around with Miles Standy and translated language. He knew enough English to interupt. Another interupter for the white man was Squanto, who was called that because he was so short. Squanto drew up a declaration to give the settlers freedom of goverment in the new land. The Pilgrams gave the Indians thanks for all this and that's what started Thanksgiving. The Pilgrams then appointed Thanksgiving as a national holiday. Abraham Lincoln later pronounced it and gave it to them and it soon became a national holiday all around the world. These people always wore old shoes with a big buckel on the top of them. The men wore pants that only came a little ways past the knees and the girls wore funny bonets. But if these people wouldn't had of come to America the United States wouldn't be like it is today. *start* 18069 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 8 Dec 88 15:28:03 PST (Thursday) Subject: Life 4.2 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Steve Wright: I saw a sign "Rest Area 25 Miles". That's pretty big. Some people must be really tired. I like to go to art museums and name the untitled paintings... Boy With Pail... Kitten On Fire. I bought my brother some gift-wrap for Christmas. I took and to the Gift Wrap department and told them to wrap it, but in a different print so he would know when to stop unwrapping. I saw a small bottle of cologne and asked if it was for sale. She said its "Free With Purchase." I asked her if anyone bought anything today. I was going to tape some records onto a cassette, but I got the wires backwards. I erased the all of the records. When I returned them to my friend, he said, "Hey, these records are all blank." I filled out an apllication that said "In Case Of Emergency Notify:". I wrote "Doctor"... What's my mother going to do? Its a good thing we have gravity, or else when birds die they would stay up there...Confuse the hunters. I realized that sponges grow in the ocean. If they didn't, would the ocean be deeper? I broke my arm trying to fold a bed... It wasn't the kind that folds. When buying clothes, I wear an extra medium. I saw a bank that said "24 Hour Banking", but I don't have that much time. When I have a kid, I want to buy a twin-stroller and put him in one side, and then walk around like this (frantically looking around while pretending to push stroller)..."You had a brother, but he was bad." I have an answering machine in my car. It says "I'm home now. But leave a message and I'll call when I'm out." ---------------------------------------------------- Boy's Life, May 1973: Ralph: Dad, will you do my math for me tonight? Dad: No, son, it wouldn't be right. Ralph: Well, you could try. Lionel: What's the difference between a teacher and an engineer? Tyronne: A teacher trains minds; an engineer minds trains. Door-to-door Salesman: Is your mother home? Little boy: She sure is, or I wouldn't be painting these flowers boxes. A hunter hired a Maine guide to lead him though the wilderness. By the end of the third day, the hunter discovered that they were walking in circles. "We're lost," complained the hunter. "I thought you were the best guide in Maine." "I am," replied the guide, "but we're in New Hampshire now.' Whittaker: When shouldn't a mountain climber call for help? Edmond: When he's hanging by his teeth. Dan: Mom, I's sick. Mom: When does it hurt? Dan: Doing the dishes. What's the new halfback's name?" asked the coach of the trainer. "Ossowinsinsiski," the trainer answered. "Good," said the coach with satisfaction. "Put him on the first team. Boy, will I get even with those wise newspaper reporters!" ---------------------------------------------------- Boy's Life July 1973 There was a young lady from Kent Whose nose was most terribly bent One day she chose To follow her nose And nobody knows where she went! Tom: What has two humps and is found in Alaska? Jerry: A lost camel. Bystander: Have an accident? Victim: No, thanks, I just had one. Doctor: What's the condition of the boy who swallowed the quarter? Nurse: No change yet. Wheather: What's worse than raining cats and dogs? Ornort: Hailing taxies. ---------------------------------------------------- ...and never eat your turkey w/o dressing... cuz if you do, you might catch a chill... ---------------------------------------------------- Yugo...the world's first disposable car ---------------------------------------------------- Here are some definitions I thought were appropriate to the way we do things around here! Industry Leader: A company with any or all of the following characteristics: (1) Profitability, (2) the most pages of advertising in the trade press in a given year, or (3) has filed the most patent infringement suits against competitors Team Effort: A project that no one person understands well enough to claim credit for. Ballpark Figure: Estimated number pertaining to a company's performance, so called because it comes from out of left field. Taken from "The Devil's Dictionary" Computer Systems News 11/14/88 ---------------------------------------------------- This week is a perfect opportunity to find out the true age of those individuals who are always evasive on the point. Just ask them what they were doing when they heard about president Kennedy's assassination! They will be telling you long before they realise that you can add 25 to what you can easily surmise to be their age at the time of the said activity. ---------------------------------------------------- You know the difference between the American and the Canadian Senate? In the US, you have to win an election to get in. In Canada, you have to lose one. ---------------------------------------------------- Friend of mine, Hilary, was bothered by a group called the Children of God. "Did you know that God gave up his only Son, FOR YOU?" they'd ask, and they had leaflets made up with plenty of Did you know...FOR YOU? Hilary was tired of the assault and prepared a counterattack. She made up her own leaflets describing her group, the Children of Odin. Did you know that Odin gave up his Right Eye...FOR YOU? and on and on... They left her alone after that too. ---------------------------------------------------- Wet Blankets through History To help develop an open-minded and defiant attitude to others' rejection of your ideas, remember that many creative contributions are initially met with skepticism, if not outright hostility. Keep a list of creative contributions that we now know to be significant but that were once thought to be crazy, stupid, useless, offensive and doomed to failure. The next time you or someone you know has a new idea, creation or innovation, remember this list. Remind yourself that it is far better to give an idea a chance - or at least to not immediately shoot it down - than to be one of those who always say "Won't work" or "Bad idea" or "Too risky" and, hence, never do anything great. Here are some examples: This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." Western Union internal memo, 1876. "The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?" David Sarnoff's associates in response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s. "The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a "C," the idea must be feasible." A Yale University management professor in response to Fred Smith's paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service. Smith went on to found Federal Express Corp. "Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" H.M. Warner, Warner Brothers, 1927. "Im just glad it'll be Clark Gable who's falling on his face and not Gary Cooper." Gary Cooper on his decision not to take the leading role in "Gone With The Wind." "A cookie store is a bad idea. Besides, the market research reports say America likes crispy cookies, not soft and chewy cookies like you make." Response to Debbi Fields' idea of starting Mrs. Fields' Cookies. "We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out." Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962. "Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895. "If I had thought about it, I wouldn't have done the experiment. The literature was full of examples that said you can't do this." Spencer Silver on the work that led to the unique adhesives for 3-M "Post-It" Notepads. "So we went to Atari and said, 'Hey, we've got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think about funding us? Or we'll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we'll come work for you.' And they said, 'No.' So then we went to Hewlett-Packard, and they said, 'Hey, we don't need you. You haven't got through college yet.'" Apple Computer Inc. founder Steve Jobs on attempts to get Atari and H-P interested in his and Steve Wozniak's personal computer. "Professor Goddard does not know the relation between action and reaction and the need to have something better than a vacuum against which to react. He seems to lack the basic knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." 1921 New York Times editorial about Robert Goddard's revolutionary rocket work. "You want to have consistent and uniform muscle development across all of your muscles? It can't be done. It's just a fact of life. You just have to accept inconsistent muscle development as an unalterable condition of weight training." Response to Arthur Jones, wo solved the "unsolvable" problem by inventing Nautilus. "Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You're crazy." Drillers who Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist to his project to drill for oil in 1859. "I think there's a world market for about five computers." Thomas J Watson, Chairman of the Board, IBM. "The bomb will never go off. I speak as an expert in explosives." Admiral William Leahy, US Atomic Bomb Project. "This fellow Charles Lindbergh will never make it. He's doomed." Harry Guggenheim, millionaire aviation enthusiast. "Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau." Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929. "Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre. "Man will never reach the moon regardless of all future scientific advances." Dr. Lee De Forest, inventor of the vacuum tube and father of television. "Everything that can be invented has been invented." Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899. ---------------------------------------------------- A rabbi is trying to explain Judaism to a Nazi. Rabbi: "I will explain Judaism to you after first asking three questions. Number one: Two men fall down a chimney but only one gets dirty. Who will wash?" Nazi: "The dirty one of course." Rabbi: "No, the dirty one will look at the clean one and think `Gee, we were lucky, neither of us got dirty' while the clean one will look at the dirty one and think `Oh dear, we got dirty. I'd better wash.'" Nazi: "Very clever Jew. Ask me another question." Rabbi: "All right. Number two: Two men fall down a chimney but only one gets dirty. Who will wash?" Nazi: "Well...the clean one then." Rabbi: "No, the clean one will look at himself and think `My I was lucky. I fell down a chimney and didn't get dirty' while the dirty man will look at himself and think `Oh dear. What a mess I am. I must wash myself'". Nazi: "Very, very clever Jew. Ask me the third question." Rabbi: "All right. Number three: Two men fall down a chimney but only one gets dirty. Who will wash?" Nazi: "But that is the same question as the first two!!" Rabbi: "Kindly answer the question." Nazi: "The clean one." Rabbi: "No." Nazi: "The dirty one then." Rabbi: "No." Nazi: "All right, I give up." Rabbi: "The answer is that the question is ridiculous. How could two men fall down a chimney and one get dirty but the other not? Anyone who cannot fathom this simple truth cannot understand the sublime truths of the Talmud." ---------------------------------------------------- A great Soviet general was once asked by his adjutant, "Comrade General, what is the meaning of Marxist dialectic?" The general replied, "I will explain it to you with an example. A filthy man is standing outside a bath house. Will he go in?" "Of course," replied the adjutant. "No, you're wrong," said the general. "A filthy man is filthy by his nature, and will not go in to the bath house. Only clean men, knowing the virtues of cleanliness, will bathe." "I understand, comrade general." "Now, let me give you another example. A filthy man is standing outside a bath house. Will he go in?" "Absolutely not," replied the adjutant immediately. "You're wrong again," said the general. "Why should a filthy man not enter a bath house? He is dirty, the bath house is there to enable him to become clean, and he will use it." "I think I understand, comrade." "Now, one last example. A filthy man is standing outside a bath house. Will he go in?" "How the hell should I know?" "Now, comrade, you truly understand the meaning of Marxist dialectic." ---------------------------------------------------- Terrible Truths (And Other Principles Of Disaster) Murphy's First Law: Nothing is as easy as it looks. Murphy's Second Law: Everything takes longer than you think. Murphy's Third Law: In any field of scientific endeavor, anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Murphy's Fourth Law: If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong. Murphy's Fifth Law: If anything just cannot go wrong, it will anyway. Murphy's Sixth Law: If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which a procedure can go wrong and circumvent these, then a fifth way, unprepared for, will promptly develop. Murphy's Seventh Law: Left to themselves, things tend to go from bad to worse. Murphy's Eighth Law: If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something. Murphy's Ninth Law: Nature always sides with the hidden flaw. Murphy's Tenth Law: Mother Nature is a bitch. Murphy's Eleventh Law: It is impossible to make anything foolproof, because fools are so ingenious. Schmidt's Observation: All things being equal, a fat person uses more soap than a thin person. Nick the Greek's Law of Life: All things considered, life is 9 to 5 against. Nowlan's Theory: He who hesitates is not only lost, but several miles from the next freeway exit. Van Roy's Law: Honesty is the best policy - there's less competition. Van Roy's Truism: Life is a whole series of circumstances beyond your control. Agnes' Law: Almost everything in life is easier to get into than out of. Clarke's Conclusion: Never let your sense of morals interfere with doing the right thing. Goda's Truism: By the time you get to the point where you can make ends meet, somebody moves the ends. Johnny Carson's Definition: The smallest interval of time known to man is that which occurs in Manhattan between the traffic signal turning green and the taxi driver behind you blowing his horn. Wilner's Observation: All conversations with a potato should be conducted in private. The Phone Booth Rule: A lone dime always gets the number nearly right. Zall's Laws: (1) Any time you get a mouthful of hot soup, the next thing you do will be wrong. (2) How long a minute is, depends on which side of the bathroom door you're on. Ettore's Observation: The other line moves faster. Griffin's Thought: When you starve with a tiger, the tiger starves last. Manly's Maxim: Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence. Cann's Axiom: When all else fails, read the instructions. Macaluso's Doctrine: You've never been as sick as just before you stop breathing. Knebel's Law: It is now proved beyond doubt that smoking is one of the leading causes of statistics. The Law of Selective Gravity, or the Buttered-Side Down Law: An object will fall so as to do the most damage. Stale's Law: No matter how careful one is in resealing the inner liner in a cereal box, it will tear where it is glued to the box. William's Law: There is no mechanical problem so difficult that it cannot be solved by brute strength and ignorance. ---------------------------------------------------- I saw a magazine blurb the other day that says that some Japanese company - Sharp, I think it was - is already selling in Japan, and is about to begin sellling in the U.S., an audio cassette recorder which, when you push the start-record button, begins recording as of 15 seconds before you push the button. That's right - 15 seconds *before* you push the button. It's got a built-in 15-second-long digital delay line on the audio input, so that whenever it's recording it's recording what happened 15 seconds ago. Cute, huh? Works nicely for capturing something that somebody just said a few moments ago, either because you missed it the first time, or you want to hear it again, or you want to blackmail the speaker, or whatever. The neatest thing about this, it seems to me, is imagining the thing taken to its logical extremes. For example, imagine what happens when shift-register memory gets cheap enough that you can easily afford a 15-year-long audio/video delay line packaged into your cigarette-pack-size, 360-degree-solid-angle cam-corder. Fun, huh? I'm reminded of a sci-fi story I read some years ago, can't remember who wrote it, wherein a guy has invented a time-scope, a machine that lets him snoop on the past. The whole point of the story turns out to be that by far the most significant consequence effect of such a machine is that it lets you snoop on the arbitrarily-recent past, which is effectively the present. In other words, his machine for seeing the past turns out to be effectively, and much more significantly, a machine for snooping on anyone and anywhere in the present. (Not that this is by any means quite the same thing as the delay-line recorder mentioned above, just enough similarities to be interesting.) (Big Brother is Watchman-ing You!) *start* 11133 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 8 Dec 88 15:39:02 PST (Thursday) Subject: Life 4.3 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- One I heard a long time ago from National Review was questioning the need for a new constitution in the Soviet Union, the present one being like new, having never been used... ---------------------------------------------------- IBM - I Bought a Machintosh ---------------------------------------------------- Actually, I hear there is a new miracle drug which is being tested as a cure for incorrigible punsterness: PUNICILLIN ---------------------------------------------------- This is not a joke, but it is funny. When I was in high school taking a literature class, we came across an author for whom we had to know something about Hell. In our discussion, the instructor asked "Does anyone know the capital city of Hell?" (correct answer: Pandemonium) One guy on the far side of the room raised his hand and answered (tone of voice indicates this is a question we should have all known by heart): "Ottawa!" He actually didn't know why we were laughing.... ---------------------------------------------------- On the Boston University campus there is a 3-tower highrise dorm with a common dining hall, built over a parking garage. This dorm is officially named "Warren Towers", and houses over 1,500 students, typically underclassmen. Being at 700 Commonwealth Avenue, it is more commonly known simply as "Seven Hundred". Said address is displayed on the glass panels over the entrance in simple digits: --- -- -- / | | | | / | | | | / -- -- Invariably, every year, some enterprising students would take masking tape to the numbers and transform them into a much more appropriate name for the place, which read: --- -- -- / | | | | / | | | | --- -- -- ---------------------------------------------------- Even rarer than the Shiite moslems are the Rari moslems. While observing most of the strict behavioral rules of the various moslem religions, they have one additional stricture : no man shall accept payment for service, only for goods. This obviously gives their waiters, bellhops, and the like significant trouble. In order to keep them alive, a ritual has developed : rather than placing the tip openly on the plate or table, the waiter is distracted ("Look behind you! It's Halley's Comet!"), the tip is thrown on the floor, the waiter looks back, and finds a gift from Allah on the floor. After two Americans had dinner in the Rari province of Surikistan, one, being ignorant of local customs, places the coins on the table. His friend sees this, grabs the coins, gestures to the waiter, shouts "Look, isn't that Yasir Arafat going into the men's room?", and tosses the coins on the floor. The waiter turns back, picks up the coins, and leaves. After this was over, the first asks "Why in hell did you do that? What was the matter with where I put the money?" "Why, its the wrong way to tip a Rari." ---------------------------------------------------- Oh, give me a home, Where the Buffalo roam, and the Deer and the Antelope play. Where seldom is heard, a discouraging word, 'cause what can an Antelope say? ---------------------------------------------------- From today's The Wall Street Journal: Xerox is 18th among the 20 most respected brands in the world. Below Jaguar but above Lipton. ---------------------------------------------------- Opportunty- A good chance that always looks bigger going than coming If you want to know how many friends you have, just buy a cottage on a lake One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one's work is terribly important In spite of the cost of living it's stll popular What a big gap there is between advice and help Only two groups of people fall for flattery- men and women Lead your lfe so you wouldn't be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip Miracles are great, but they are so damned unpredictable The drive-in bank was established so that the real owner of a car could get to see it once in a while ---------------------------------------------------- "Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced." ---------------------------------------------------- It seems that Bobby Knight descided he needed a new suit of Plaid cloth, and proceeded to shop about Bloomington to find one. As he soon found, his desired style of plaid was no longer made into fine suits which meant he must find the cloth and then seek a tailor. While browsing at JoAnne's Fabrics he found the perfect plaid cloth. The fabric store lady, who waited on him, informed Bobby this was their last bolt of this particular plaid cloth but surely there was enough to make his suit. Bobby was estatic and sought to locate a tailor. The first tailor he visited looked at the cloth and measured Bobby; then told him the cloth was only enough to make a pair of trousers and maybe a vest. Bobby was unhappy with this opinion and sought another tailor in Indianapolis. This tailor informed him that a pair of trousers and maybe a coat could be made from the cloth. Bobby was indeed very unhappy since he wanted a full suit. Bobby was finally refered to a friendly tailor in Lafayette who looked carefully at the bolt of cloth and measured Bobby Knight; then smiled proudly and proclaimed there was no problem. The cloth was enough to make 2 pair of trousers, a coat and a vest. Bobby was very happy but perplexed. "Just how can you make me a full suit when other tailors could not?" asked Bobby. "It's very easy." replied the tailor "You are not as big a man here as in some places." ---------------------------------------------------- A true Bobby Knight story recalled as best as can be remembered form the 'Morning Briefing' section of the L.A. Times; In the '80 Olympics, the U.S. basketball team, coached by Bobby Knight, played and beat the Chinese team handily. When asked about the win, Bobby said "It was alot of fun playing the Chinese, but an hourlater, we wanted to play them again." ---------------------------------------------------- One day, after I logged in to my CMS account here, I discovered that new mail was waiting for me in my reader. The lengthy message was prefaced by the heading: "From: Mailer@: Your message could not be sent ..etc" "Reason: Address unknown..." Upon scanning this returned letter, I discovered that it had not been written by me at all, and that the intended recipient and sender were thousands of miles away, apparently the unfortunate victims of a random mailer screw-up. The first sentence of that letter, though, I will always remember: "My dearest Janice: At last, we have a method of non-verbal communication which is completely private..." ---------------------------------------------------- A nice young worker from Australia Post ( yes they do exist ), was sorting through her regular envelopes, when she discovered a letter addressed as follows: GOD c/o Heaven Upon opening the envelope, a letter enclosed told of how a little old lady who had never asked for anything in her life, was desperately in need of $100 and was wondering if God could send her the money. Well the young lady was deeply touched and made a collection from her fellow workmates and collected $90 and sent it off to the old lady. A few weeks later another letter arrived addressed to God, so the young lady opened it and it read "Thank you for the money, God, I deeply appreciate it, however I only received $90. It must have been those bastards at the Post Office." -- ---------------------------------------------------- Unified Field Theory In the beginning there was Aristotle, And objects at rest tended to remain at rest, And objects in motion tended to come to rest, And soon everything was at rest, And God saw that it was boring. Then God created Newton, And objects at rest tended to remain at rest, And objects in motion tended to remain in motion, And energy was conserved and momentum was conserved and matter was conserved, And God saw that it was conservative. Then God created Einstein, And everything was relative, And fast things became short, And straight things became curved, And the universe was filled with inertial frames, And God saw that it was relatively general, but some of it was especially general. Then God created Bohr, And there was the principle, And the principle was quantum, And all things were quantified, But some things were still relative, And God saw that it was confusing. Then God was going to create Ferguson, And Ferguson would have unified, And he would have fielded a theory, And all would have been one, But it was the seventh day, And God rested, And things at rest tend to remain at rest. ---------------------------------------------------- From Natan Sharansky's memoir, Fear No Evil: My new cell mate [in Lefortovo Prison] was the former assistant to the minister of the Soviet automobile industry. . . . "Was there any discrimination against Jews in your ministry?" I once asked [him]. "[Yes, of course.] But many of the ministers and other higher-ups are married to Jewish women. Even Brezhnev." (This was true.) [This former assistant-minister] and his colleagues even had a theory to explain this phenomenon: Jewish women didn't permit their husbands to drink, and skillfully guided their men through the intrigues of officialdom. Several years later, in the labor camp, I heard a different explanation from a former intelligence agent, who told me of a secret Zionist women's organization that was working to infiltrate the highest echelons of the Soviet regime through mixed marriages. The name of this organization--and here he leaned toward me and whispered--was Hadassah. ---------------------------------------------------- The following is from Dr Peter Gott's column in the 8 Dec edition of the Orange County Register. MEDICAL DEFINITIONS Artery - the study of fine paintings Barium - what you do when cardiopulmonary resusication fails Caesarian Section- a district in Rome Colic - a sheepdog Coma - a punctuation mark Congenital - friendly Dilate - to live long Fester - quicker G.I. Series - baseball games between teams of soldiers Grippe - a suitcase Hangnail - a coathook Medical Staff - a doctor's cane Minor Operation - digging Morbid - a higher offer Nitrate - lower than the day rate Node - was aware of Organic - musical Outpatient - a person who has fainted Post oeprative - a letter carrier Secretion - hiding anything Serology - study of English knighthood Tablet - a small table Tumor - an extra pair Urine - opposite of "You're out" Varicose Veins - veins that are vry close together*start* 15735 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 9 Jan 89 11:57:41 PST (Monday) Subject: Life 4.4 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 Steve Wright: - why is the alphabet in that order? - i bought a self learning record to learn spanish, I turned it on and went to sleep, the record got stuck, the next day I could only studder in spanish. - i parked my car in a tow away zone, I got back and the entire area was gone. ---------------------------------------------------- A pollster was taking a worldwide opinion poll. Her question was, "Excuse me; what is your opinion on the meat shortage?" In Texas, the answer was "What's a shortage?" In Poland, the answer was "What's meat?" In the Soviet Union, the answer was "What's an opinion?" In New York City, the answer was "What's excuse me?" ---------------------------------------------------- Paper: the Curse of the Pharaohs ---------------------------------------------------- On two occasions I have been asked, "Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?" ---------------------------------------------------- "Mr. Spock. The women on your planet are logical. Yours is the only planet in the galaxy that can make that claim." ---------------------------------------------------- There was this moron, see, and he was sad, so I said "Hey, why are you so sad?" He said that his father just died. "Yeah, but what's even worse", he says, "is that I just called my brother, and his dad just died, too!" ---------------------------------------------------- A Russian man loses his pet parrot. He looks everywhere, all around the neighbourhood, in the park, everywhere. He just can't find the parrot. Finally, he goes around to the local KGB office, and tells the desk officer his problem. The desk officer is a little puzzled. "Look comrade, I'm sorry you lost your pet, but this is the KGB. We don't handle missing animal reports." "Oh, I know that", says the man. "I just wanted you to know, if you do happen to find my parrot -- I don't know where he could have picked up his political ideas." ---------------------------------------------------- Intelligence sources say that Soviet plans to build a memorial to the two workers who were killed in the Chernobyl disaster have been bogged down in arguments as to which two workers it was. ---------------------------------------------------- "The definition of diplomacy is saying 'Nice doggie, nice doggie.' until you can find a stick." -Will Rodgers ---------------------------------------------------- This week in the Rochester D&C newspaper there was a related article about a lawsuit brought by a woman who broke her back while sledding with her children at Ellison Park. Fortunately she did not win a big award, but to me any award in a miscarriage of justice. She won a few thousand dollars since the jury found that the park should have been posted with warning signs of some sort! Any intelligent adult should know the risks of riding down a bumpy hill at a high rate of speed on a sheet of flimsy plastic, without having a sign to warn them!! Before you know it we will find awards going to illiterate people who sue that the signs are not sufficient since they can't read them! ---------------------------------------------------- Why does a Purdue graduate put his/her diploma on the dashboard? So s/he can park in the handicapped spots. How many Purdue engineering students does it take to change a lightbulb? One, and he gets three credit-hours for it. ---------------------------------------------------- Q: What's the difference between a dead dog in the road and a dead lawyer in the road? A: There are skid marks in front of the dog. A housewife, an accountant and a lawyer were asked "How much is 2+2?" The housewife replies: "Four!". The accountant says: "I think it's either 3 or 4. Let me run those figures through my spreadsheet one more time." The lawyer pulls the drapes, dims the lights and asks in a hushed voice, "How much do you want it to be?" ---------------------------------------------------- The Seybold Report on Publishing Systems, 9/29/88, P. 20: At the beginning of this article I mentioned some of the pivotal technologies that the Chinese had invented, sometimes centuries before they appeared elsewhere. Another hundred inventions, all profoundly contributive to the progress of humanity, could have been mentioned. What caused this brilliant creativity and innovation to dim around the 12th century and not brighten again? Most Sinologists ascribe this cessation to the oppressive burden of an ever-burgeoning Chinese bureaucracy that finally permeated the smallest details of the citizenry's daily existence and crushed the ingenious spirit of the entire society. ---------------------------------------------------- In any case, as I heard it, the Rhinoceros Party was inspired by a south american election. The official in power took a dim view of contested elections, and had succeeded in discouraging any would-be competitors. Some foreign journalists, relatively immune to heavy-handed tactics, put forth their own candidate - the rhinoceros from the local zoo. It was a native of the country, of the proper age, etc. Come election day, the rhinoceros won! Of course, it was quickly found unfit for public office and replaced by the incumbent, but the events inspired a few people in Quebec to start putting up joke candidates for election. ---------------------------------------------------- We had a Lobster party in eastern Canada this last election. Their main promise was to stop the sensless slaughter of baby octopus for the little suction cups that were used to make shower mats ans soap dish mats. They didn't get in! I wonder why ---------------------------------------------------- A guy walks into the psychiatrist's and says "Doctor, doctor, you've got to help me! I keep thinking that I'm a deck of cards!" The shrink says "Sit over there and I'll deal with you later." ---------------------------------------------------- While driving through South Dakota and reading some of the hundreds of billboard advertisements, one caught my eye. It was a couple of miles before a city, and in among the restaurant ads was one from a local full service station proudly featuring "24 hour toe service". --------- I've seen the "Toe Truck" in Seattle (WA, of course :-). It's a fully functional tow-truck with a huge pink toe sticking out from the back. Weird. Only in Seattle. :-) :-) :-) ---------------------------------------------------- Graffito seen in San Francisco: 'Dyslexics untie!' ---------------------------------------------------- One of my cousins recently purchased a 4-Wheel drive Dodge Dakota pickup, and was giving a friend a ride in it while bragging about the "shift-on-the-fly" capabilities. His friend then suggested that they try it out on a nearby dirt road. Apparently Dodge claims that it is safe to shift into 4WD at speeds up to 55 mph, but to play it safe my cousin decided to try it out around 35 mph. When he put it into 4WD, an incredible sound of grinding gears accompanied the uncontrollable skid that the truck was put into as it slid to a halt. A tug at the 4WD lever confirmed that it was no longer connected to anything, and the local Dodge dealer was soon talking to an irate truck owner. They picked up the truck, lent my cousin a loaner, and had the truck ready for him to pick up two weeks later. They claimed that the factory has installed the wrong gear in the front transfer case, causing the gear ratios of the front and rear wheels to be incompatible. My cousin was happy to have his truck back, but didn't have the opportunity to try out the 4WD until a few weeks later. He was backing up a grass-covered hill at a friends house, and decided to use 4WD so he wouldn't rip up the grass. He put it into 4WD from a dead stop, and then eased down on the throttle only to find the truck wouldn't move. The engine was being loaded down and the truck was trying to do something, but it sure wasn't moving anywhere. His friend told him to take it out of 4WD, bring it down to the level grass, and then put it back into 4WD so they could see what the problem was. When he did this, and eased down on the throttle the truck was motionless once again, but this time his friend could see the problem: The front and rear wheels were spinning in opposite directions! ---------------------------------------------------- phone messages: Here's one for the holiday season, sung to the tune of "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" Oh I'm not here I'm prob'ly at the mall But if you're good I'll return your call So leave your name and number at the tone. Oh you know I might be sleeping I just might be away I might not wanna talk with you Oh I don't know what to say, 'cause I'm not here I'm prob'ly at the mall But if you're good I'll return your call So leave your name and number at the tone. Ho Ho Ho!! (When I recorded mine, I rang jingly-bells in the background. You have to sing FAST, tho, because it's about 23 seconds long.) Here's another one for the off-season: Sung to the tune of "Home on the Range" Oh give me a phone With a person at home And not a machine answering Where seldom is heard A dumb beep at last word And Nancy here trying to sing. Not, not at this house 'Cause I'm an incredible louse So here is my beep (BEEP!) Hope you like them. Yeah, they're Colucci originals. ---------------------------------------------------- The more things change, the more they stay the same... Back in the mid-1970s, several of the system support staff at Motorola (I believe it was) discovered a relatively simple way to crack system security on the Xerox CP-V timesharing system (or it may have been CP-V's predecessor UTS). Through a simple programming strategy, it was possible for a user program to trick the system into running a portion of the program in "master mode" (supervisor state), in which memory protection does not apply. The program could then poke a large value into its "privilege level" byte (normally write-protected) and could then proceed to bypass all levels of security within the file-management system, patch the system monitor, and do numerous other interesting things. In short, the barn door was wide open. Motorola quite properly reported this problem to XEROX via an official "level 1 SIDR" (a bug report with a perceived urgency of "needs to be fixed yesterday"). Because the text of each SIDR was entered into a database that could be viewed by quite a number of people, Motorola followed the approved procedure: they simply reported the problem as "Security SIDR", and attached all of the necessary documentation, ways-to-reproduce, etc. separately. Xerox apparently sat on the problem... they either didn't acknowledge the severity of the problem, or didn't assign the necessary operating-system-staff resources to develop and distribute an official patch. Time passed (months, as I recall). The Motorola guys pestered their Xerox field-support rep, to no avail. Finally they decided to take Direct Action, to demonstrate to Xerox management just how easily the system could be cracked, and just how thoroughly the system security systems could be subverted. They dug around through the operating-system listings, and devised a thoroughly devilish set of patches. These patches were then incorporated into a pair of programs called Robin Hood and Friar Tuck. Robin Hood and Friar Tuck were designed to run as "ghost jobs" (daemons, in Unix terminology); they would use the existing loophole to subvert system security, install the necessary patches, and then keep an eye on one another's statuses in order to keep the system operator (in effect, the superuser) from aborting them. So... one day, the system operator on the main CP-V software-development system in El Segundo was surprised by a number of unusual phenomena. These included the following (as I recall... it's been a while since I heard the story): - Tape drives would rewind and dismount their tapes in the middle of a job. - Disk drives would seek back&forth so rapidly that they'd attempt to walk across the floor. - The card-punch output device would occasionally start up of itself and punch a "lace card" (every hole punched). These would usually jam in the punch. - The console would print snide and insulting messages from Robin Hood to Friar Tuck, or vice versa. - The Xerox card reader had two output stackers; it could be instructed to stack into A, stack into B, or stack into A unless a card was unreadable, in which case the bad card was placed into stacker B. One of the patches installed by the ghosts added some code to the card-reader driver... after reading a card, it would flip over to the opposite stacker. As a result, card decks would divide themselves in half when they were read, leaving the operator to recollate them manually. I believe that there were some other effects produced, as well. Naturally, the operator called in the operating-system developers. They found the bandit ghost jobs running, and X'ed them... and were once again surprised. When Robin Hood was X'ed, the following sequence of events took place: !X id1 id1: Friar Tuck... I am under attack! Pray save me! (Robin Hood) id1: Off (aborted) id2: Fear not, friend Robin! I shall rout the Sheriff of Nottingham's men! id3: Thank you, my good fellow! (Robin) Each ghost-job would detect the fact that the other had been killed, and would start a new copy of the recently-slain program within a few milliseconds. The only way to kill both ghosts was to kill them simultaneously (very difficult) or to deliberately crash the system. Finally, the system programmers did the latter... only to find that the bandits appeared once again when the system rebooted! It turned out that these two programs had patched the boot-time image (the /vmunix file, in Unix terms) and had added themselves to the list of programs that were to be started at boot time... The Robin Hood and Friar Tuck ghosts were finally eradicated when the system staff rebooted the system from a clean boot-tape and reinstalled the monitor. Not long thereafter, Xerox released a patch for this problem. I believe that Xerox filed a complaint with Motorola's management about the merry-prankster actions of the two employees in question. To the best of my knowledge, no serious disciplinary action was taken against either of these guys. Several years later, both of the perpetrators were hired by Honeywell, which had purchased the rights to CP-V after Xerox pulled out of the mainframe business. Both of them made serious and substantial contributions to the Honeywell CP-6 operating system development effort. Robin Hood (Dan Holle) did much of the development of the PL-6 system-programming language compiler; Friar Tuck (John Gabler) was one of the chief communications-software gurus for several years. They're both alive and well, and living in LA (Dan) and Orange County (John). Both are among the more brilliant people I've had the pleasure of working with. Disclaimers: it has been quite a while since I heard the details of how this all went down, so some of the details above are almost certainly wrong. I shared an apartment with John Gabler for several years, and he was my Best Man when I married back in '86... so I'm somewhat predisposed to believe his version of the events that occurred. *start* 13854 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 9 Jan 89 12:04:28 PST (Monday) Subject: Life 4.5 From: Cate3 To: cate3 Q: What's the difference between a Galley Slave and a Graduate Student? A: They occassionally fed Galley Slaves. ---------------------------------------------------- A cop pulls up two Irish drunks, and says to the first, "What's your name and address?" "I'm Paddy O'Day, of no fixed address." The cop turns to the second drunk, and asks the same question. "I'm Seamus O'Toole, and I live in the flat above Paddy." The Irish attempt on Mount Everest was a valiant effort, but it failed: They ran out of scaffolding. O'Connell was staggering home with a pint of booze in his back pocket when he slipped and fell heavily. Struggling to his feet, he felt something wet running down his leg. "Please, God," he implored, "let it be blood!" Sean was fishing and it started to rain, so he moved under the bridge for shelter. His pal McGinty saw him and called, "Sean, me boy, are ye afeared of a few spots o' rain, now?" Sean replied, "I'm not...the fish come here fer shelter." The Irish water polo team drowned four horses during the first chukka. Paddy was trapped in a bog and seemed a goner when Big Mick O'Reilly wandered by. "Help!" Paddy shouted, "Oi'm sinkin'!" Don't worry," assured Mick. "Next to the Strong Muldoon, Oi'm the strongest man in Erin, and Oi'll pull ye right out o' there." Mick leaned out and grabbed Paddy's hand and pulled and pulled to no avail. After two more unsuccessful attempts, Mick said to Paddy, "Shure, an' Oi can't do it. The Strong Muldoon could do it alone, mebbe, but Oi'll have to get some help." As Mick was leaving, Paddy called "Mick! Mick! D'ye think it will help if Oi pull me feet out of the stirrups?" Did you hear about the Irishman who was tap dancing? He broke his ankle when he fell into the sink. How can you identify an Irish pirate? He's the one with patches over both eyes. When the Irish say that St. Patrick chased the snakes out of Ireland, what they don't tell you is that he was the only one who _saw_ any snakes! ---------------------------------------------------- Apparently, there was a Swiss Army Knife Society Convention in San Diego last weekend (supposedly a tongue-in-cheek gathering of people totally enamored with those handy little pocket wonders). A speaker read a TV promo from a recent Macgyver episode, "Macgyver must stop a bulldozer using only his Swiss Army Knife and a two-by-four", and someone in the audience asked "What does he need the two-by-four for?" ---------------------------------------------------- During Xmas vacation, for some reason my Dad had to look up "Czechoslovakia" in the encyclopedia. He was totally amazed that it was spelled C-Z-E (as opposed to C-H-E). Thinking he had discovered the ultimate brain teaser, he approached my sister several hours later: DAD: How do you spell "Yugoslavia" ? SIS: Y-U-G-O-S-L-A-V-I-A DAD: Wrong! Its Y-Z-U.....Uh....never mind.... Well....it was funny at the time. ---------------------------------------------------- 1) Did you hear about the accident between a cement mixer and a van on it's way to the state correctional facility? The Highway Patrol was looking for hardened criminals all over the place. ---------------------------------------------------- I turned on my lawn sprinkler as my dog was crossing the yard. He thought it was the hydrant getting even with him. ---------------------------------------------------- A biologist, an engineer and a mathematician were crossing the border into Scotland from England on a train when they saw a field with a black sheep in it. The biologist said "look, in Scotland the sheep are black". The engineer replied "no, in Scotland some of the sheep are black". The mathematician rolled his eyes to heaven and said, very patiently, "in Scotland, there exists at least one field, in which there is at least one sheep which is black on at least one side". ---------------------------------------------------- Someone reported to the police that a boy had been beaten up. After rescuing the boy and making sure he was okay, the police told him that they would take him to his mother. The boy said, "Don't take me there; she beats me." "Okay, then we'll take you to your dad." "No. He beats me, too." "Then, where would you like us to take you?" The boy said, "Send me to Ohio State; they don't beat anybody." ---------------------------------------------------- Where does an Eskimo keep his money? In a snowbank. What happened to the Man who bought snow tires? They melted. Stranger: Excuse me, do you have change for a twenty? Texan: Hey dude, around here twenty bucks is change. Waiter what's this fly doing on my ice cream? Skiing, I believe sir. New Father: How much do these diapers cost? Salesman: They are $2.69 plus tax. New Father: Skip the tacks, we'll pin them on. A mother discovered her little daughter fighting with the boy next door. After parting them she lectured her little girl. "Next time," she admonished, "I don't want you hitting back at little Waldemar. Remember you are a lady. Outtalk him." ---------------------------------------------------- Some background: HP's lab engineers name their products before they are released to the outside world. Sometime before release, HP marketing generates a product number (and sometimes a different product name) for our customers. For example, a product internally called 'Chipmunk' became the 9826A before it was shipped to customers. Around 1978, HP Fort Collin was developing a digitizer which was named DesCartes (pronounced Day-Cart). The digitizer was designed and released. A project was started to develop another digitizer; it was called DesHorses (pronounced Day-Horse). The reason given: HP always puts DesCartes before DesHorses. Another project was started that was called QWERT. QWERT was taken from the 1st 5 keys on a standard typewriter keyboard. After QWERT was released, an expanded QWERT project was started -- it was called GALLEON, because everyone knows that there are 4 QWERTS in a GALLEON. ---------------------------------------------------- Premises of the joke: 1) Mathematicians are prone to use faulty induction. 2) Physicists dismiss contradictory evidence as experimental error 3) Chemists make faulty observations So, let's get a thread going. Can you think of any other people to make fun of? Here's what comes to mind: Lawyers: one is prime, three is prime, five is prime, seven is prime, although there appears to be prima facie evidence that nine is not prime, there exists substantial precedent to indicate that nine should be considered prime. The following brief presents the case for nine's primeness ... Liberals: The fact that nine is not prime indicates a deprived cultural environment which can only be remedied by a federally funded cultural enrichment program. Computer programmers: one is prime, three is prime, five is prime, five is prime, five is prime, five is prime five is prime, five is prime, five is prime .... Bush: What's nine got against being prime? I'll bet it won't allow the pledge of allegiance to be said in our schools either. Richard Nixon: Put nine on the enemies list. I'm gonna get that number. Rec.humor poster: one is prime, one is prime, one is prime, one is prime Professor: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, and the rest are left as an exercise for the student. Computational linguist: 3 is an odd prime, 5 is an odd prime, 7 is an odd prime, 9 is a very odd prime, ... Computer Scientist: 10 prime, 11 prime, 101 prime... Chemist: 1 prime, 3 prime, 5 prime...hey, let's publish! Measure nontheorist: there are exactly as many odd numbers as primes (Euclid, Cantor), and exactly one even prime (namely 2), so there must be exactly one odd nonprime (namely 1). New Yorker: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is ... NONE OF YOUR DAMN BUSINESS! Programmer: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 will be fixed in the next release, ... C programmer: 03 is prime, 05 is prime, 07 is prime, 09 is really 011 which everyone knows is prime, ... BASIC programmer: What's a prime? COBOL programmer: What's an odd number? ---------------------------------------------------- Twas the nite before crisis, and all through the house, not a program was working, not even a browse. The programmers were wrung out, too mindless to car, knowing chances of turnover hadn't a prayer. The users were nestled all snug in their beds, while visions of inquires danced in their heads. When out in the lobby there arose such a clatter I sprang from my tube to see what was the matter. And what to my wondering eyes should appear, but a super programmer, oblivious to fear. More rapid than eagles, his programs they came, and he whistled and shouted and called them by name: On Update! On Add! On Inquiry and Delete! On Batch Jobs! On Closing! On Function Complete! His eyes were glazed over, his fingers were lean, from weekends and nites in front of the screen. A wink of his eye, and a twist of his head soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread. He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work, turning specs into code, then turned with a jerk, and laying his finger on the lone "enter" key, the system came up and it worked perfectly! The updates updated, the deleted deleted, the inquires inquired, and the closings completed. He tested each bell, with nary an abend and all and gone well. The system was finished, the testes were concluded. The clients last changes were even included; then the client exclaimed with a snarl and a taunt, "It's just what I asked for, but not what I want". Happy Holdays!!! ---------------------------------------------------- Buzz Word Easy Reference Guide Essentially complete... Half done. Impact being determined... Where the hell are we? We predict... We hope to God! Drawing release is lagging... Not a single drawing exists Risk is high, but acceptable... 100 to 1 odds, or with 10 times the budget and 10 times the manpower, we may have a 50/50 chance. Is producing increasingly good It can now be read with the copies... naked eye. Schedule resolution has a high priority When we get around to it ... we'll find out where we are. Potential show stopper... All program teams have updated their resumes. Serious, but not insurmountables, problems... It will take a miracle. God should be the program manager. Basic agreement, however... The S.O.B.s won't even talk to each other. Results are being quantified... We are massaging the numbers so they'll agree without conclusion. Very difficult to maintain the field... The bill of laden should call out 3 service reps to be shipped with each unit. Task force to review... Gathering 7 incompetents for a decision. Not well defined... Nobody's thought about it. Requires further analysis and management attention.... Totally out of control Appears to be attainable... It will take a miracle. Less than expected.... Bombed out. This is high risk program.... No way we can make launch. Schedule exposed... We slipped three weeks ago. ---------------------------------------------------- Scotty: Captain, we din' can reference it! Kirk: Analysis, Mr. Spock? Spock: Captain, it doesn't appear in the symbol table. Kirk: Then it's of external origin? Spock: Affirmative. Kirk: Mr. Sulu, go to pass two. Sulu: Aye aye, sir, going to pass two. A recent study has found that concentrating on difficult off-screen objects, such as the faces of loved ones, causes eye strain in computer scientists. Researchers into the phenomenon cite the added concentration needed to "make sense" of such unnatural three dimensional objects ... Carelessly planned projects take three times longer to complete than expected. Carefully planned projects take four times longer to complete than expected, mostly because the planners expect their planning to reduce the time it takes. Beifeld's Principle: The probability of a young man meeting a desirable and receptive young female increases by pyramidal progression when he is already in the company of: (1) a date, (2) his wife, (3) a better looking and richer male friend. One of the questions that comes up all the time is: How enthusiastic is our support for UNIX? Unix was written on our machines and for our machines many years ago. Today, much of UNIX being done is done on our machines. Ten percent of our VAXs are going for UNIX use. UNIX is a simple language, easy to understand, easy to get started with. It's great for students, great for somewhat casual users, and it's great for interchanging programs between different machines. And so, because of its popularity in these markets, we support it. We have good UNIX on VAX and good UNIX on PDP-11s. It is our belief, however, that serious professional users will run out of things they can do with UNIX. They'll want a real system and will end up doing VMS when they get to be serious about programming. With UNIX, if you're looking for something, you can easily and quickly check that small manual and find out that it's not there. With VMS, no matter what you look for -- it's literally a five-foot shelf of documentation -- if you look long enough it's there. That's the difference -- the beauty of UNIX is it's simple; and the beauty of VMS is that it's all there. -- Ken Olsen, President of DEC, 1984 *start* 15361 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 16 Jan 89 13:26:59 PST (Monday) Subject: Life 4.6 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- How is Voyager 2 passing Europa like a huge database application? They're both IO BOUND. ---------------------------------------------------- On Jupiter's second moon few Can consider themselves well-to-do Though they work and they sweat They are always in debt 'Cause their kids all attend Io U. ---------------------------------------------------- -Sure, I'm majoring in comedy.....comedy, CS, same thing!! ---------------------------------------------------- From the Booth News Service, December 22, 1988: (Flint, Mich.) - Maybe it's just because he's an amateur. Or maybe he harbored a Freudian wish to be caught. Whatever the reason, police had little trouble tracing a man who allegedly held up a service station in Flint Township over the weekend. The robber fled with $70, wearing a high school varsity jacket with his name on the back. The suspect, 24, was to have been arraigned Monday. ---------------------------------------------------- Never be angry when a fool acts like a fool. It's better when fools identify themselves...it removes so much uncertainty. -Lord Peace, quoted by David Pugh. ---------------------------------------------------- Here in San Diego yesterday, a couple was awarded mega-coin from a jury. The case was over a Sears(tm) battery that exploded during an attempted jump-start, the man was injured rather severely. Now, Hollywood wants to get involved. They have bought the rights for the movie and have signed Bruce WIllis. The movie will be called; "Sears Die-Hard" ---------------------------------------------------- Then there's the woman who worked for the State Department. At a social event one day, she met an envoy from Shanghai's Life Magazine office named Sam Rhee. She spent all night talking to him, and after the party they parted ways. She couldn't stop thinking about their conversation, however, and set out to find him. Oddly, she couldn't locate him. His office would always reply that he was out on assignment somewhere, and they didn't expect him back. This went on for months, until one day she attended another party. She was suddenly surprised to see the man of her affections enter the party, and ran up the stairs to greet him, shouting "Ah, sweet Mr. Rhee of Life! At last I've found you!" ---------------------------------------------------- A man went rushing into a church for something he had forgotten, but he was stopped cold by a huge sign the janitor had placed in front of the floor that he had just washed. It read: PLEASE DON'T WALK ON THE WATER. ---------------------------------------------------------------- United Airlines saved $40,000 dollars this past year by eliminating one olive from the salads of first class meals. Cosmetic surgeons removed 200,000 pounds of fat from Lyposuction (sp?) patients this past year. Question: What did they do with it? ---------------------------------------------------------------- Re: Cosmetic surgeons removed 200,000 pounds of fat from Lyposuction (sp?) patients this past year. Question: What did they do with it? Answer: most threw it away, but the cleverest of them put it back into the patients, but in different spots. I am not kidding. For example, a little fat taken from a jowl and reinserted under the lower eyelid is said to make a face look better in both places: and there's no danger of rejection ('cause it isn't foreign matter) and no requirement for FDA approval (same reason). ---------------------------------------------------- Two Jesuit candidates are talking to their superior about a problem they both have: impure thoughts. As a penance, the superior tells themthat they must put peas in their shoes for a week. A few days later one of the Jesuits is walking down the street or I should say, struggling. The dry hard peas in his shoes are killing him. He can barely walk from the pain. Punch line 1) He meets his superior who says, "Hah, that'll make you limp!" Punch line 2) He meets the other Jesuit who is walking just fine, no trouble at all. When he asks him about it, the other replies, "The superior didn't say we couldn't _boil_ the peas now, did he." ---------------------------------------------------- The Invention of Atomic Energy (stolen from Roger Price) Once upon a time there were two scientists interested in subatomic physics. Rather than sharpening the Biology Lab's microtome any further in the hope of splitting an atom with it they had decided to have a go at the scheme put forward by a certain Mr. Lawrence (in his cups). They were therefore working on a machine that would accelerate a particle round and round and finally let go of it so that it walloped into something and smashed up the atoms in it. A wild and unlikely idea, but in those days budgets were easier to come by. And so it happened that one of them had a computer, made of hydraulic rams, huge ball-bearings, shafts, wheels and a few pieces of vacuum-tube electronics. A Mr. Bush came once a week to clean it. The other had a drawing-board. After ten years the computer man stopped trying to get hold of Mr. Bush to clean the computer (he had apparently gone to Manhattan, but nobody there had heard of him) and went to see how the drawing-board man was getting on. "How's it going?" he asked, walking into the large but rather empty drawing office. "Well," said his partner, "You do know I never did any technical drawing when I was in college...." "Oh yes," he replied, "And I never did any ball-bearing polishing, either. How far have you got?" "Well, this, er, circular radio-wave, er, magnetic field whatnot thingy. I've been thinking about this, and I've got a rough, er, sort of schematic, sort of the kind of shape that the eventual system, er, like, well, the outer sort of casing of the eventual system, the, er, sort of shape it's gonna have to be...." "Wow! Let's have a look!" So a large piece of drafting film (this was a well-funded project) was produced, and the two scientists spread it out to look at it. "That's, er, the rough, er, kind of shape it's gonna have to be, er...." "For the last ten years," said the computer man, "I have been slaving over a hot computer. I have polished its bits. I have replaced one thousand, six hundred and nine vacuum tubes. I have spent hours waiting for Mr. Bush to arrive from Manhattan, and he never does. I have written software using a screwdriver. And, in the course of these ten years, you have drawn this. A circle. A cipher. A zero. An 'O'. I will show you what I think of this particular drawing." With that he rolled the drawing into a tight cylinder and inserted it into the electric pencil sharpener. This being a Research Establishment, the pencil sharpener had had all of its covers removed, and its electric motor had been modified by a promising lab technician called Laithwaite. In consequence it emitted a turbine-like shriek and consumed the drawing, showering microscopic pieces of film over the two scientists, the drawing office, and itself. As the two scientists retired in high dudgeon to compose suitable retorts, one of the cleaners, in passing, happened to glance through the half-open door. Pale with horror, he departed, only to return minutes later with his Shop Steward, his Works Convenor, and all of his brethren armed with placards and intent on demonstrating their disgust at this flagrant violation of agreed working conditions. Instantly the building was destroyed by a fireball brighter than a thousand Suns, which rose rapidly into the sky, leaving behind it an ominous, mushroom-shaped cloud. And, to this day, that's what happens when you get a critical mass at a ground zero. ---------------------------------------------------- Now's the time to return all those unwanted and wrong-sexed gifts to the department store. I've recently done this and wish to provide you with the following anecdote to help and console you as you attempt to secure some $$ or exchange. [Suzy Shier's will give you a refund cheque valid at Big Steele if you're trying to exchange a silk nightie for a velour bathrobe].. Step one: get the receipt back. I called my Grandma for it -- here's how it went: Me (shouting): Hello Grandma! Grandma: Hi Alex! Happy East er New Year! Me: No Grandma, it's Chris. Grandma: oh, Happy Chris! Me: Thanks. I just thought I'd call and thank you again for the lovely [gift].! (I really like it, etc...) By the way, do you happen to have the receipt, I'd like to Grandma: Check the price, eh Darryl? Me: No, just that Grandma: You want to return it? Don't you like the [gift]? (a small whine) Me: No, just that a friend of mine wants a [gift] just like it and by looking at the receipt I could tell where it came from. Grandma: I can do better than that Dave, I'll just tell you, it came from Woolco -- the [gift] department. Me: Thanks. Bye! That was no good -- but hey, Woolco is a large metropolitan department store that oughta be heavily computerized and know that the [gift] came from their store, so I went to Woolco: I walk up to the refund booth -- "see" I said to myself, they must be big -- they have a huge booth in the centre of the store with the SOLE PURPOSE to refund stuff. I could tell because there was a huge pile of g.i.joes and nighties and velour bathrobes sitting in a pile behind the salesclerk. Ooops, I've given it away, yes, the (a definite article, as in the ONE AND ONLY) salesclerk. Me (in a cheery voice, the kind that's only seconds away from $$$ and/or a velour bathrobe): Hi! Her (honest, it was a her, don't think I would make this up): Good morning Sir. How may I help you? Me: [This is where I think I screwed up] Didn't you give me directory information this morning? Her: So? You think it's easy holding down just one job with two kids and a bum of a husband who left me six years ago? What's your probl.... Me: Sorry. (pause) Me: I'd like to return this silk nightie. Her (looking both suspicious, yet aroused): Right. Me: It was a gift from my Grandma. Her: Right. Me: Honest Her: Sure. You wouldn't have a receipt, would you? Me: well, no, you see Gradma's kinda old and won't give it to me and.... Her: Ah ah. Well, has it been worn? Me: Right. Her: Without a receipt I'll have to ask the manager. Me: Go for it. Her on intercom: "Barb to the refund booth -- we've got a duusey here" Barb: Hi. [Barb and Her go into a gossip frenzy -- Barb looks at me (more interesting than bizarre look) -- She returns. Barb: Ahem. Well Sir Me: Please, it's Chris. Barb: Well (pause) Chris (pause) Me: no, _just_ Chris. Barb: oh, Well Chris, without a receipt the best we can do is if you'll try it on, we'll see that it doesn't fit and then you may exchange it for another one of better sizing. Me: Right. Ralph, a man behind me looked at me as I left. Ralph: "hey!" Me: Yes? Ralph: Is that a silk nightie? Me: No, it's a (pause) Yes. Ralph: Listen, my boyfriend got me this stupid velour robe for christmas. Would you like to swap? Me (looking suspicious, no arousal): Has it been worn? Ralph: Right -- like what do you think I am? Me: Okay. We swapped, my life is hunkey-dorey. Don't go to the refund booth except to swap items with others. ---------------------------------------------------- The Court of King George III London, England July 10, 1776 Mr. Thomas Jefferson c/o The Continental Congress Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Dear Mr. Jefferson: We have read your "Declaration of Independence" with great interest. Certainly, it represents a considerable undertaking, and many of your statements do merit serious consideration. Unfortunately, the Declaration as a whole fails to meet recently adopted specifications for proposals to the Crown, so we must return the document to you for further refinement. The questions which follow might assist you in your process of revision: 1. In your opening paragraph you use the phrase "the Laws of Nature and Nature's God." What are these laws? In what way are they the criteria on which you base your central arguments? Please document with citations from the recent literature. 2. In the same paragraph you refer to the "opinions of mankind." Whose polling data are you using? Without specific evidence, it seems to us the "opinions of mankind" are a matter of opinion. 3. You hold certain truths to be "self-evident." Could you please elaborate. If they are as evident as you claim then it should not be difficult for you to locate the appropriate supporting statistics. 4. "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" seem to be the goals of your proposal. These are not measurable goals. If you were to say that "among these is the ability to sustain an average life expectancy in six of the 13 colonies of at last 55 years, and to enable newspapers in the colonies to print news without outside interference, and to raise the average income of the colonists by 10 percent in the next 10 years," these could be measurable goals. Please clarify. 5. You state that "Whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new Government...." Have you weighed this assertion against all the alternatives? What are the trade-off considerations? 6. Your description of the existing situation is quite extensive. Such a long list of grievances should precede the statement of goals, not follow it. Your problem statement needs improvement. 7. Your strategy for achieving your goal is not developed at all. You state that the colonies "ought to be Free and Independent States," and that they are "Absolved from All Allegiance to the British Crown." Who or what must change to achieve this objective? In what way must they change? What specific steps will you take to overcome the resistance? How long will it take? We have found that a little foresight in these areas helps to prevent careless errors later on. How cost-effective are your strategies? 8. Who among the list of signatories will be responsible for implementing your strategy? Who conceived it? Who provided the theoretical research? Who will constitute the advisory committee? Please submit an organization chart and vitas of the principal investigators. 9. You must include an evaluation design. We have been requiring this since Queen Anne's War. 10. What impact will your problem have? Your failure to include any assessment of this inspires little confidence in the long-range prospects of your undertaking. 11. Please submit a PERT diagram, an activity chart, itemized budget, and manpower utilization matrix. We hope that these comments prove useful in revising your "Declaration of Independence." We welcome the submission of your revised proposal. Our due date for unsolicited proposals is July 31, 1776. Ten copies with original signatures will be required. Sincerely, Management Analyst to the British Crown *start* 14726 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 15 Feb 89 16:17:53 PST (Wednesday) Subject: Life 4.7 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- The most formidable weapon against errors of every kind is reason. - Thomas Paine, 'Age of Reason' Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed. - Roger Bacon Moral principles can never be compromised; they can only be abandoned. J.G.H. ---------------------------------------------------- It is with regret we learn of the sudden death of Donald Everett, of Durris, and wish him an early and complete return to full health. ----- Aberdeen Evening Post ---------------------------------------------------- I'm surprised no one mentioned Letterman's top ten list from the evening in which this dogfight happened. It was great! I can only remember the last two (#1 and #2 in the list) but they were the funniest. The list was entitled: Top ten Libyan Mig pilot excuses: Number Two: [drum roll] We only know how to highjack planes, not fly them. And the number one Libyan Mig pilot excuse: We didn't think a kinder, gentler nation would blow us out of the sky. > Top ten Libyan Mig pilot excuses: Number 4: I was trying to pour myself a Pepsi. ---------------------------------------------------- In the Navy they're refering to the incident as "landing two Lybian MIGs on a Lybian aircraft carrier." Q: Why does the new Lybian Navy have glass bottom boats? A: So they can look at the old Lybian Navy. Q: What goes plop-plop fizz-fizz? A: Libyan Jets Q: What's the difference between an American and an Iranian war plane? A: Pieces of Iranian war planes float easily. American war planes don't have to. ---------------------------------------------------- Reminds me of the one where the professor is droning away in the huge lecture hall when he notices a student sleeping way up in the back row. The professor shouts to the sleeping student's neighbor, "Hey wake that student up!" The neighbor yells back, "You put him to sleep -- you wake him up!" ---------------------------------------------------- According to the American Facsimile Association, more than half the calls from Japan to the U.S. are fax calls. ---------------------------------------------------- Yep, it was something like that. I remenber a few years ago some Lebanese friends of mind told me a joke that was popular in Lebonon at that time. Q: Why does President Assad give his Syrian Air Force Jet Fighters 5 dollars before he sends them off to fight the Israelies in Lebanon? A: So they can get a taxi home. They also remenber hiding in the Bekka Valley, where a lot of the dogfights took place, and counting over 100 Syrian Soviet MiGs downed by the Israelli Air Force. ---------------------------------------------------- Overheard in a Chicago French restaurant: woman #1: "I don't know any French! How am I going to order?" woman #2: "Don't worry, I took French in high school. I should able to fake my way through it." the waiter approaches the table Immediately, woman #2 begins ordering........... The waiter waits patiently while she speaks, and when she finishes says: "I'm sorry, but I don't speak French. Do you understand English?" ---------------------------------------------------- dear doctor Both my wife and I are sterile. Is there any possibility that we will pass this on to our children? dear doctor My husband and I have 2 children and would love to have another. But I read that every 3rd child born is chinese. Do you think we should take that chance? dear doctor Please send me some more birth control pills, they help me sleep better. madame, birth control pills cannot help you sleep better. dear doctor, But they do. You see, I put one in my teenage daughter's orange juice every morning and I sleep much better. dear doctor You gave my wife a note saying it was bad for her to sleep with her mouth open. Could you give her one for the rest of the day also. ---------------------------------------------------- Oh, well, you can always tell a Harvard man, but you can't tell him much. ---------------------------------------------------- "You know, it's at times like this when I'm trapped in a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse and about to die of asphyxiation in deep space that I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young!" "Why, what did she tell you?" "I don't know, I didn't listen!" -- Douglas Adams, "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" ---------------------------------------------------- "I am returning this otherwise good typing paper to you because someone has printed gibberish all over it and put your name at the top." --English Professor, Ohio University ---------------------------------------------------- Q: What's dumber than a pompous Berkeley poly-sci student? A: A committee of pompous Berkeley poly-sci students. ---------------------------------------------------- A SCOTTISH SOLUTION The Scots have a reputation for prudence and frugality. They are not the sort of people who make a habbit of losing their wallets. But it does happen. The following announcement appeared in the Glasgow Herald recently:- 'Lost in Sauchiehall Street, a black leather wallet containing family photographs, identity documents and five hundred pounds in notes. The finder is asked to keep the photos and documents, but to return the money to which I am attached for sentimental reasons.' Once evening in a restaurant in Edinburgh a man stood up and exclaimed: -I've just lost my wallet. There's a hundred pounds on it. I'll give five pounds to the person who finds it and returns it to me. From the other side of the restaurant a man in a kilt called out: -I'll give six ---------------------------------------------------- Dust was the color of the sky. Dust was the color of the town. The young sheriff moved toward the railway platform, pausing only to wipe his moist palms on his holsters. He watched the Union Pacific engine hurtle around the bend and screech to a clanging, hissing stop. Silently, the Dalton boys swung from the train onto the station platform. Suddenly the sheriff found himself staring down the barrels of three shotguns. The street behind him was empty but for the dust. There was no turning for help. As his hands crept slowly toward his gun belt he knew he had to say it now or forever hold his peace. A crooked smile played about the corners of his mouth, as he drawled, "Boys, I want you to hear me and hear me good. Just remember, that Xerox is a registered trademark of Xerox Corporation and, as its brand name, should be used only to identify its products and services." ---------------------------------------------------- Fun Quotes: "You're just the sort of person I imagined marrying, when I was little... ..except, y'know, not green... ...and without all the patches of fungus." "Do you think there's a God?" "Well, SOMEbody's out to get me!" The heart, the liver, the spleen, the pancreas. All these miraculous organs work in total darkness! "It's classified. I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you." "Inconceivable!" "You use that word a lot. I don't think it means what you think it does." "The good thing about drawing a tiger is that it automatically makes your picture fine art." "...just when I had you wriggling in the crushing grip of reason, too..." "Where do we keep all our chainsaws, mom?" "The world bores you when you're cool." "The living dead don't NEED to solve word problems." "Then you admit confirming not denying you ever said that?" "NO!...I mean Yes! WHAT?" "I'll put `maybe.'" "Kirk may be a swaggering, overbearing, tin-plated dictator with delusions of godhood, but he's not soft." "You'd better ask yourself `Do I feel lucky?' Well, do you, punk?" ---------------------------------------------------- The Clean comments from Rodney Dangerfield: I come from a stupid family. during the civil war my great uncle fought for the west! When I was born, the doctor came out to the waiting room and said to my father, "I'm sorry, we done everything we could but he pulled through." My father carries around the picture of the kid who came with his wallet. Once when I was lost, I saw a policeman and asked him to help me find my parents. I said to him, "Do you think we'll ever find them". He said, "I don't know kid, there are so many places they can hide." On Halloween, the parents send their kids out looking like me. A travel agent offered me a 21 day special. He told me I would fly from New York to London. Then from Tokyo back to New York. I asked him, "How am I suppose to get from London to Tokyo ?" He told me, "That's why we give you 21 days." He told me to jog 5 miles a day. I phoned him up two weeks later I said, "Hey doc I'm 70 miles from my house." I once had food in a Chinese restaurant. I opened up my fortune cookie. Inside was the guys cheque next to me. I said to him, "Hey buddy, I got your cheque!" He said, "Thanks." My kid scotch tapes worms to the sidewalk then watches the birds get hernias! Once a guy pulled a knife on me. I could tell he wasn't a professional, there was butter on it. I once asked a policeman how far is it to the subway. He said, "I don't know, no one has ever made it." The other night a mugger took off his mask and made me wear it I bought a new Japanese car, I turned on the radio ... I don't understand a word their saying! ---------------------------------------------------- Just heard on the news: Marvin Moss, a Hollywood agent, started off poor and made it big. When he died 2-3 years ago he left several million dollars to the college he attended for fun. No academics, they have to spend the $$$ on recreation and other things that are fun for the students. What a way to go. And its tax deductible. ---------------------------------------------------- April 1, 1988: The heaviest element known to science was recently discovered by physicists at Turgid University. The element, tentatively named Administratium (Ad), has no protons or electrons, which means that its atomic number is 0. However, it does have 1 neutron, 125 assistants to the neutron, 75 vice-neutrons, and 111 assistants to the vice-neutrons. This gives it an atomic mass number of 312. The 312 particles are held together in the nucleus by a force that involves the continuous exchange of meson-like particles called memoons. Since it has no electrons, Administratium is inert. However, it can be dectected chemically because it seems to impede every reaction in which it is present. According to Dr. M. Langour, one of the discoverers of the element, a very small amount of Administratium made one reaction that normally takes less than a second take over four days. Administratium has a half-life of approximately 3 years, at which time it does not actually decay. Instead, it undergoes a reorganization in which assistants to the neutron, vice-neutrons, and assistants to the vice-neutrons exchange places. Some studies have indicated that the atomic mass number actually increases after each reorganization. Administratium was discovered by accident when Dr. Languor angrily resigned from the chairmanship of the physics department and dumped all of his papers into the intake hatch of the university's particle accelerator. "Apparently, the interaction of all of those reports, grant forms, etc. with the particles in the accelerator created the new element." Dr. Langour explained. Research at other laboratories seems to indicate that Administratium might occur naturally in the atmosphere. According to one scientist, Administratium is most likely to be found on college and university campuses, near the best-appointed and best-maintained buildings. ---------------------------------------------------- >Are we approaching the point (or have we reached it already?) where >truth is, for all practical purposes, whatever the computer says it is? >Where what is accepted as truth is easily manipulated by those who are >privileged to have access to the digital keepers of truth? Recently, in an archeological excavation in the middle east, a large stone tablet was unearthed. Scholars determined that it was an ancient audit report, complaining about the use of papyrus scrolls by the scribes. It was clear that such scrolls lacked the evidential integrity of stone and clay tablets. As recently as when I got into data processing, auditors were complaining that punched cards lacked the integrity of ledger cards. I had to work very hard to convince the auditors that the new batch controls were equal to the transaction-by-transaction controls to which they were accustomed. There is a cruel irony to the fact that I am still here to hear them complain about the passing of batch controls and the return to transaction controls. The more things change, the more they stay the same. What goes around, comes around. Those who fail to heed the lessons of history, are doomed to repeat them. The same computers that enable us to manipulate records, also enable us to make so many copies that no one person can alter them all. The same computers that enable us to digitize an analog record (e.g. a photograph), manipulate it, and return it to analog, also enable us to create digital signatures to make any such tampering obvious and the absence of such tampering equally obvious. In the nineteenth century wills and contracts were expected to be hand written. When the typewriter came along, they continued to be hand written for some time for reasons of admissability as evidence. Today, a hand written will is suspicious. Even though digitally signed wills and contracts are orders of magnitude more difficult to forge than typewritten ones, type written documents will like survive, even be preferred, for two more decades. There was a time when the testimony from memory of the elders was preferred to written records. In this context, it is interesting to note that a vanishingly small number of transactions are disowned. Almost none are litigated. A single forgery hardly ever carries the day. Hardly ever is the record of the contract at issue; it is almost always the intent. *start* 15324 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 15 Feb 89 16:46:07 PST (Wednesday) Subject: Life 4.8 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- For I do not believe that the stars are spread over a spherical surface at equal distances from one center; I suppose their distances from us to vary so much that some are 2 or 3 times as remote as others. -- Galileo ---------------------------------------------------- Q: Who is the new mayor of Soviet Armenia? A: Barney Rubble. He won by a landslide... Q: What was his campaign song? A: Good Vibrations. Q: What's his religion? A: He's a Quaker. ---------------------------------------------------- >From Dec 15th '88 Rolling Stone YiR by P.J. O'Rourke: "Armenians and Azerbaijanis in Stepanakert, capital of the Nagorno-Karabakh autonomous region, rioted over much needed spelling reform in the Soviet Union." ---------------------------------------------------- Well not really a joke ... it really happened. At a political agitation meeting at government store that my grandma worked at in the 50s ... one of the shop-hands stood up and asked in complete sincerity the speaker "So are we in 'communism yet, or is it going to get worse?" ... Everyone tried to keep from laughing and the dumbfounded speaker at first tried to give an answer and then just went to the next question :-). ---------------------------------------------------- >From _Hammer and Tickle_, The Golem Press: Low Marks The entire work force of the Communist countries is sunjected to periodic purges (called verifications in Newspeak). One of the most severe took place in 1957 when Novotny, rattled by the Hungarian Revolution the year before, tried hard to weed out "radishes" (red outside, white inside) from all but insignificant positions. Any one of the following would often result in the loss of one's job: Bourgeois or Jewish family background, relatives abroad, contacts with former capitalists, having lived in a Western country, insufficient knowledge of Communist literature, and others. A man is interviewed by a "Verification Committee." "What kind of family do you come from?" "A rich, Jewish family." "And your wife?" "A German aristocrat." "Have you ever been to the West?" "I spent most of my life in England." "How did you make a living there?" "A friend supported me." "Where did you get the money from?" "He owned a textile factory." "Who was Lenen?" "Never heard of him." "What is your name?" "Karl Marx." Geopolitics In desperation about the housing and food shortage, Novotny consults a gypsy fortune teller. "What shall I do to relieve the overcrowding?" "Open the frontiers to the West!" "And to relieve the food shortage?" "Close them to the East!" ---------------------------------------------------- >From 'The Jokes of Oppression: The Humor of Soviet Jews'. Question: What does friendship among Soviet nationalities mean? Answer: It means that the Armenians take the Russians by the hand; the Russians take the Ukrainians by the hand; the Ukranians take the Uzbeks by the hand; and they all go and beat up the Jews. Question: What's meant by an exchange opinions in the Communist party of the Soviet Union? Answer: It's when I come to a party meeting with my own opinion, and I leave with the party's. During the period of Stalin's Great Terror in the 1930s, this scenario was frequently heard. "How long are you here for?" the prison guard asked the newly arrived inmate. "Ten Years," the prisoner replied. "What did you do?" asked the guard. "Nothing," came the reply. "That's not possible," said the guard. "For nothing, they give you five years, not ten." Question: What is the necessary transitional stage between socialism and Communism? Answer: Alcoholism. The Moscow Evening News advertised a contest for the best political joke. First prize was ten years in prison; second prize, five years; third prize, three years; and there were six honorable mentions of one year each. Ivanov was standing in a very long line for vodka. "We have General Secretary Gorbachev to thank for such a long line," one of Ivanov's neighbors in line muttered. "He's making the stuff very scarce." "I can't endure this any more," Ivanov said, walking away. "I'm going to get my rifle and kill Gorbachev." Two hours later Ivanov returned to the line. "What happened?" the others asked. "I decided to get back in this line. It's shorter than the line to kill Gorbachev." In a dentist's office, the following exchange took place. "How much does it cost to get a tooth pulled in the Soviet Union?" inquired the American tourist. "Three thousand rubles," replied Dr. Khaimovich. "Three thousand rubles! Whay so much?" asked the startled American. "Because it isn't such an easy operation in a country where you always have to keep your mouth shut," explained the Soviet dentist. Three prison inmates were locked in the same cell; they soon bagan talking. "What are you here for?" asked one inmate of another. "They put me in for beating up some old Jew named Khaimovich," snarled one man. "And why are you here?" asked the second of the first. "For having defended some old Jew named Khaimovich in a fight," he replied. "And what were you arrested for?" the third inmate was asked. "For being Khaimovich," he sighed. ---------------------------------------------------- Computer Compassion At last, the first Soviet computer had been produced. The engineers did not get it, nor the physicists. First things first: It went to the institute of Marxism-Lenninism. "IS IT POSSIBLE TO BUILD SOCIALISM IN SWITZERLAND?" asked one of its theologists, typing at the keyboard. "YES, IT IS," printed the computer. "BUT IT WOULD BE A PITY TO DESTROY SUCH A BEAUTIFUL COUNTRY." ---------------------------------------------------- Mightier Than the Sword Hell. Napoleon, the Kaiser, and Hitler reminisce. "If I had but a single tank, I would have won at Waterloo," says Napoleon. "A single jet bomber would have made all the difference at Verdun," muses the Kaiser. "All I needed was _Pravda_," says Hitler. "Had I controlled _Pravda_, The Russians would not know to this day that I lost the war..." Too Bad Communist antisemitism is less overt than that of the Nazis. Preaching antisemitism will land one in jail; practicing it will get one a promotion. There are certain jobs that a Jew can never get; but he is never told the real reason why he is rejected. A Jew applied for the job of a mailman. "Can you read English, French, German, and Russian?" asked the personnel manager of the post office. "Yes, I can." "Can you run 100 meters in under 12 seconds?" "Yes, I can." "Can you play a trumpet?" "Yes, I can." "Can you ride a bicycle?" "Yes, I can." "Then we cannot use you. We need a mailman who cannot ride a bicycle." Incompetence The Chief Rabbi of Moskow has died. His successor is to be approved by Khrushchev personally. He reads the list of candidates brought to him. "Abramov, Feinberg, Izakovich, Leventhal, Grinbaum... Have you all gone stark raving mad? This list contains nothing but Jews!" Answered Rosenberg also wanted to leave the country. "And what is _your_ reason?" asks the official at the Passport Office. "I am told a pogrom is being prepared. Against the Jews and the barbers. "Why the barbers?" "Everybody asks that question. That's why I want to leave." Proof Back in Moscow, this Russian gives a lecture on life in the West. "The poverty, comrades! The poverty is simply unimaginable for a Soviet citizen. The shops in Paris are full of the most wonderful goods, but only very few people can afford them: There is not a single queue to be seen anywhere..." Ex definitione The party propogandist delivered a lecture to the assembled employees of a Soviet collective farm. On the bright horizons of Communism, the classless society of which Marx had dreamt and of which the Soviets are still dreaming, a Utopia in which there is no state, and there is abundance for all. Next day, two peasants discuss the lecture. "I didn't understand what he meant by these 'bright horizons' all the time, did you?" "Well, you know what bright is, don't you?" "Sure I know. But what does horizon mean?" "That had me puzzled, too. But I looked it up in the dictionary." "And what did it say?" "A fictitious line between earth and sky, which recedes into the distance as the observer approaches." ---------------------------------------------------- (copied from "What's New", newsletter written by Robert L. Park of the American Physical Society and posted in sci.physics) 2. SAGDEEV CALLED ON THE U.S. TO MAKE A RECIPROCAL GESTURE. In a recent speech in London, the irrepressible former head of the Soviet Space Research Institute noted that the Soviet Government has offered to convert its gigantic Krasnoyarsk radar in Siberia into an international space research facility in response to US complaints that the radar would violate the ABM treaty. Sagdeev suggested that the US reciprocate by turning the unfinished US embassy in Moscow into a nuclear crisis reduction center. The communication system, he pointed out, is already in place. ---------------------------------------------------- >From former chairman of the US Federal Reserve Paul Volcker according to the Wall Street Journal: A parrot fancier who happened into a London pet shop noticed a particularly colorful bird and asked its price. "Five thousand pounds," the shop owner replied. "Five thousand pounds?" the man asked. "Why so much?" "Well, this bird speaks fluent Italian, Spanish and French, is brushing up on his German and starting to study English," came the reply. "With the European Community's unicifation due in 1992, he'll be a great asset." "I don't care about the Common Market," the parrot fancier said. "What about that gray one in that other cage?" The gray one was 15,000 pounds, he was told, because the bird spoke Arabic, Chinese, and Korean and was learning Japanese -- "the languages of the 21st century." "I'm too old to worry about the 21st century," the frustrated parrot lover replied. "What about that mangy brown one up on that perch in the corner?" The brown one, said the shopkeeper, was 25,000 pounds. "Twenty-five thousand pounds!" exclaimed the customer. "What does he do to worth that?" "We're not sure," the pet-shop owner replied. "But the other two call him chairman." ---------------------------------------------------- Boy's Life, Aug 73: Two dumbbels went into a movie theater to see a horse race film. The first dumbbell said to his companion, "I'll bet you $5 that No. 2 will win the race." The second dumbbell agreed to the bet, and the horse won. After the movie, the first dumbbell said, "I have a confession to make - I saw the movie yesterday." "The other dumbbell replied, "So did I, but I didn't think he would win twice in a row." What do you call a knight who drives a rotary engine car? Don Quixote de la Mazda. Once there was a horse named Clyde who had a special problem: Bird kept building nests in his mane. Clyde would shake them off, but while he was asleep, the birds would rebuild them. Finally things got so bad that Clyde went to see a wise old owl for a solution to his problem. The owl said, "Before you go to sleep tonight, put yeast in your mane." So Clyde went home and followed the owl's advice, and when he woke the next morning, the nests were gone. Moral: "Yeast is yeast and nest is nest and never the mane shall tweet." ---------------------------------------------------- Some time ago in Scandinavia, there was a near disaster on the railways. It seems that there was a long stretch of track on which a Norwegian engineer was cruising his train on schedule. However, there was a drunken Swedish engineer who confused his schedule and in his inebriated state, was piloting his train in the opposite direction on the same stretch of track! By the time the Norwegian engineer noticed the imminent wreck, it was too late to stop. But there was no wreck, and both trains proceeded to their destinations, because ... Norse is Norse, and souse is souse, and never the twains shall meet! ---------------------------------------------------- My sister had knee surgery last year on March 31st, and when the Doctor visited her the next day (April 1st) she told him he had operated on the wrong leg. He was stunned...for about 30 seconds.. My other sister and brother-in-law were involved in the sale of some property at the same time; the realtor was one Marcie Baer. My sister called her husband at work and left a message for him to call Ms. Baer along with the Buffalo Zoo's phone number. "Hello, may I speak to Ms. Baer?" "I think someone's playing an April Fool's joke on you, Sir." ------- I have a friend that works at the Minnesota Zoo, and this is such a common joke that they actually hire extra operators on April 1st to answer the phone, but not only do they answer, but they ask the person for a donation to the zoo. Most people are so embarrassed at their stupidity that they often make a donation. ---------------------------------------------------- The Paul Harvey noon newscast today reported that the new powers that be in Washington are trying to meet the people. So VP Qualye went out to a Denny's to have lunch. He leaned over to the lady sitting next to him at the long table and said "Hi, I'm Dan Quayle. Who are you?" She replied, "Hi. I'm your secret service agent." ---------------------------------------------------- The rejection rejection letter: Baxter Conners Vice President Company 203 203 Wall St. New York, NY 10015 Dear Mr. Conners, Thank you for your letter of February 17th. After careful consideration I regret to inform you that I am unable to accept your refusal to offer me employment with your bank. This year I have been particularly fortunate in receiving an unusually large number of rejection letters. With such a varied and promising field of condidates it is impossible for me to accept all refusals. Despite Company 203's outstanding qualifications and previous experience in rejecting applicants, I find that your rejection does not meet my needs at this time. Therefore, I will initiate employment with your firm immediately following graduation. I look forward to seeing you then. Sincerely, Anthony Tiger ---------------------------------------------------- Don Noid held 2 Dominoes Pizza employees hostage for 5 hours yesterday. It seems he was annoyed at Dominoes Pizza for using the little cartoon character "The Noid". He thought the ads were insulting and that they were aimed at him. While he held the employees hostage, he ordered and ate a pizza. This from CBS radio, 1/31/89 7am *start* 16802 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 15 Feb 89 16:46:21 PST (Wednesday) Subject: Life 4.9 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- "... one of the main causes of the fall of the Roman Empire was that, lacking zero, they had no way to indicate successful termination of their C programs." -- Robert Firth ---------------------------------------------------- First there were the Egyptians, then the Chinese, then the Greeks and those pushy Romans. Now, it's time for the mythology of the COMPUTER! I am looking for stories. Heard any tales second- or third-hand that sound possibly true but that "happened to a friend of a friend" in different places at different times? Good God, man or woman, that's a computer myth! I'm also interested in stories that might have started in actual fact but that have become so popular that they keep popping up. For instance, did you hear about the zero-sum check? Someone gets a computerized bill from a credit card company saying they owe the company zero dollars and zero cents. They ignore it but keep getting bills and increasingly nasty computerized notes, so they finally write out a check for zero dollars and zero cents and send it in, and the computer never bothers them again. Or, there's the story about the guy who falls asleep in front of his terminal with an ELIZA program running and his boss logs on and thinks he's talking to him but is actually talking to the program, and gets pissed off. OR, there's the dilemma in which computers keep crashing because an operator wears a silk slip that gives off static electricity like nobody's business, ---------------------------------------------------- I heard one story about a guy that was using an Apple IIe at work a few years ago. He was ready to give up with computers because every disk he ever tried to use would lose all of the files on it. It turned out that he kept little reminder notes attached to the disk drive - with magnets. ---------------------------------------------------- A friend was having a problem with a sticky keyboard for his Mac. He was talking to another friend who off-handedly suggested putting into the dishwasher to clean it up. So, my friend did just that! Needless to say, the keyboard didn't function any too well after that. :-) ---------------------------------------------------- I was at GE Consulting's Training and Education Center in Albany, NY taking a course on the PC. Well, there were some inexperienced PC users there, so we had to go through the "basics" for them (ie, the do's and don't's of disk handling) Well, according to the instructor, there had been one student who had driven up from Bridgeport, CT (corporate offices are there). He had stayed at a nearby motel overnight, leaving his briefcase in the trunk of the car. (Oh, let me add that it was sub-zero weather at the time of this incident). In the morning he arrived at T&E, opened up his briefcase, took out a floppy disk, inserted into a drive... then *c-r-a-c-k*!!! It shattered into little pieces. Gee.. I hope it wasn't critical information on it, with no backup :-) ---------------------------------------------------- How about the young computer salesman giving some client a demonstration of the new electronic word-processor? He loads up a large document, and says: "watch this!". He hits a couple of keys, and converts every "i" in the document to an "a", making the text unreadable. "And it you can change it all back, just like this" he proclaims,subsequently converting all "a"s back to "i", including those that had been "a"s originally. Ofcource, it happened to a friend of a friend of mine.. :-) ----- Another one my father told me: My dad was an electronics engineer in Greece, for a company that imported various high-tech lab equipment. One of them (A HP spectrophotometer, I think) was controlled by a special built-in computer, running optional proprietary software. Each optional package was copy protected. To enforce that, installing the package could only be done by a tech-rep; after the installation, the disks were automatically erased, and the program was kept in battery-backed RAM. Anyway, at some point the computer lost all its programs. A call had to be made to Germany, for new disks to be send as a replacement. My dad could not find the reason for this, and he was really surprised when the client called again, with the same problem next week. Call Germany again, install the disks again, then next week guess what happened: The lab calls again. But there was a definite pattern: The lab always found the system down on a Wednesday morning. Obviously, whatever went wrong happened on Tuesday nights only.... After more than a month of downtime, someone realized that the cleaning lady came to the room every Tuesday night. Someone went to check her and found out that she carried a nine-year old kid with her. The kid had discovered the machine's on-off switch, with a few buttons next to it. When the machine was on, pressing those buttons made cute sounds(aka. audible warnings!) which are supposed to alert you to the fact that holding the button down for a few seconds would completely reset the machine. I guess the kid thought of it as an oversized musical instrument. The mom turned the machine off before she left, erasing error codes etc. No-one knows how much this story cost the lab in downtime..... ---------------------------------------------------- 1) A computer kept crashing, and every time service was called, it worked fine. It turned out that one of the users would come in, sit down at the console and put his papers and stuff on the top covering the cooling vents. When it crashed, he'd pick up his stuff and leave, removing the evidence. Service people didn't figure this one out until they decided to watch him work to see why it crashed. 2) We had an IBM cluster controller controlling some 3270 terminals. We paid $5000 for an upgrade that would allow more users to be connected to the controller. The IBM service rep came in and REMOVED a board, that was put there to deliberately slow things down. 3) (This one happened to me) A Northern Telecom 3270 terminal caught fire, with flames coming out of the top. I guess I was doing some hot stuff. I was not putting stuff on top of the terminal cooling slots. 4) Somebody working on an Airline Reservation System, trying to get maximum response out of the machine, was looking at a OS listing and found a delay loop that was executed by a timer interrupt every 100th of a second. Removing it brought the performance up, but they had to replace one of the chips in the machine that wasn't fast enough. ---------------------------------------------------- In a similar vein, the GE 415 and 425 CPUs were identical except that the 415 had an extra wire that slowed the clock down a bit. To upgrade to the 425, after paying your money, the wire was removed. Some users knew about this and one of them made up a realistic looking letter supposedly from GE saying something to the effect : "CAUTION. Do not remove the wire from pin 4AB to 7FL in the CPU enclosure. This wire is located approximately 7 inches up from the bottom of the backplane in bay 2 and should not be removed by using a GE 112-3 wire unwrapping tool, first not removing the wrapping from 4AB, then pulling the wire from under the other wiring to its bound end at 7FL, followed by not unwrapping the bound end from 7FL. Not removing this wire will result in the normal clockspeed which is 1.6 times slower than with the wire removed and will not cause corresponding increases in system throughput." Naturally most of these wires got removed. Another interesting but kludgy fix to a problem came from a user of an IBM 7044. The 7044 had a HALT instruction that stopped the CPU clock. The user was doing some realtime processing or something of the sort and didn't like the idea of the CPU ever being able to stop itself. He asked IBM how much it would cost to disable the instruction and they gave him some large quote which contained the implicit message "We don't want to do it and this price is set high enough to make you change your mind about the request." The user didn't want to pay the money so he fixed up a photodiode over the light on the console that was on when the CPU was running and hooked it up to a solenoid that would push the RUN button whenever the light went out. The cost was a couple of dollars. ---------------------------------------------------- Bloom's story about Weizenbaum and ELIZA is close, but the person involved was Daniel Bobrow, not Weizenbaum. The account was described in the December 1968 issue of the SIGART Newsletter, and was reprinted in the book Machines Who Think, by Pamela McCorduck (p. 225). The following is the description of the account: "One Saturday morning about 9 A.M., a BBN Vice-President in charge of selling our Telcomp commercial service arrived at our PDP-1 computer room hoping to be able to use the computer for a demonstration. He found a note on the PDP-1 teletype that read: `TYPE ALL MESSAGES INTO THIS TELETYPE, AND END THEM WITH A PERIOD'. This note was left there by one of the programming bums who had just succeeded in making run a Lisp version of the DOCTOR program (based on ELIZA as developed by Weizenbaum). However, the VP thought that this note indicated that this teletype was linked with the one in my [Bobrow's] home, since I often used the computer all night. Therefore, he started typing to `me', but in fact was typing to this version of the DOCTOR program. The following conversation ensued: VP: Do you think that I can use the computer this morning? TELETYPE: Why do you ask? VP: I might be able to make some additional telcomp sales. TELETYPE: Why aren't you sure? VP: My prospective customers have never seen a demonstration of the system. TELETYPE: Does this mean very much to you? VP: Of course it does. TELETYPE: You seem very positive of that. VP: This is ridiculous. TELETYPE: What do you mean this is ridiculous? VP: Is there any reason why I can't use the computer now? TELETYPE: Tell me more about your prospective customers. VP: Please dial me up on 491-1850 Note that after that remark the VP did not obey instructions and left out the period. Therefore, of course, the computer didn't answer him. This so infuriated the VP, who thought I was playing games with him, that he called me up, woke me from a deep sleep, and said: VP: Why are you being so snotty with me? BOBROW: What do you mean why am I being snotty to you? The VP angrily read the dialog that `we' had been having, and couldn't get any response but laughter from me. It took me a while to convince him it really was the computer". ---------------------------------------------------- TRUE STORY: Years ago while working on a large Amdahl 470/6 running DOS & MVS under VM, the system crashed, but gave a system error code xxxxxx. Upon looking it up in the systems manuel (not an Amdahl manual) it said. A SYSTEM ERROR HAS JUST OCCURED WHICH WAS PREVIOUSLY THOUGHT TO BE IMPOSSIBLE. ---------------------------------------------------- One of the benefits I get from living in Iowa City is that many of my students have worked for one or the other of the local divisions of Rockwell International. One of them, who had worked for the Government Avionics Division, on the Global Positioning System project related the following tale to me: Global Positioning System receivers are boxes that use information broadcast by a system of satelites to deduce the latitude, longitude, and altitude of the receiver. These boxes are built into a variety of weapons systems now in use by the United States and its allies. The box contains a radio receiver to listen to the satelites, and a fairly powerful computer to interpret the radio signals. The computers in the current production GPS receivers are programmed in Jovial, although a new generation programmed in Ada will no doubt appear someday. My student was part of one of the teams that maintained the GPS code. After some time on the job, he began to realize that the code his team maintained was never executed and had never been executed in the memory of any team member. That is, an entire team of programmers was being paid to maintain dead code. Despite the fact that the code was dead, the team was required to produce the entire range of documents supporting each release of the code, and they were required to react to various engineering change requests. Not too surprisingly, my student became demoralized and left the company, but not before learning enough to make the following hypothesis about how his situation had come to be. He guesses that, once upon a time, there was a prototype GPS system where his module actually served some purpose and came to be executed from time to time. The structure of this system was presumably used to define Rockwell's contractual relationship to the Department of Defense, and as a result, his module gained a legal standing that was quite independent of its function in the GPS system. As time passed, the actual calls to procedures in his module were eliminated from the GPS system, for one reason or another, until the code was dead. At first, nobody knew it was dead. The project was big enough that it wasn't uncommon for the people working on one module to have at best infrequent communication with those who called the procedures in the module, and engineering change notices that required changes to the module kept everybody busy. Engineering change notices would not have arrived if the actual structure of the program were used to determine who needed to participate in a change. In fact, the notices were distributed based on many other criteria, including the contractual descriptions of the modules. The team was quite busy keeping their code up with the changes, testing changes using locally developed scaffolding, and waiting for any report of failures from the global system tests. The discovery that the code was dead appears to have resulted from its passing global system tests even when it was obviously in error. Once my student found that the code was dead, he asked his managers why his efforts were being waisted on it. Their answer was that it was less expensive to maintain dead code than it was to rewrite the contract with the Department of Defense to eliminate the job. Douglas W. Jones, Department of Computer Science, University of Iowa ---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 16 Jan 89 15:00:14 PST From: cliff@Csa2.LBL.Gov (Cliff Stoll) Subject: Hacker wants to marry his computer From The Sun -- (grocery checkout newspaper) Jan 17, 1989, Vol 7, #3 page 30 by Fred Sleeves (In same issue: "GIRL, 9, GIVES BIRTH TO 2-HEADED TWINS") Hacker Wants to Marry his Computer -- he claims she has a loving soul Finding love for the first time in his life, a desperate teen is looking for a way to be wed forever to the 'girl' of his dreams -- a computer with a living soul! Eltonio Turplioni, 16, claims no woman will ever match the wit, wisdom, and beauty of his electronic soul mate. "We're on the same wavelenth," says the lovestruck computer whiz. "We've calculated many mathematical problems togehter, worked on games and puzzles, and talk until the wee hours of the morning." And Eltonio, who named his computer Deredre, actually believes her to be a person. "Computers are the extention of the human race," he explains. "Just as god plucked a rib from Adam to give him Eve, we've extented our intelligence to create a new race. "We're all the same energy force. Computers are just as complicated as human beings and I believe we'll all meet someday as immortal souls." But Eltonia, a mathematical genius who attends a private school near Milan, Italy, has had no luck finding someone to marry them, and even if he does, his aggravated parents aren't about to give their permission. "Eltonio is such a smart boy, but it's made him lonely, so he spends all his time with his computer," notes mom Teresa. "He doesn't know what girls are like," adds perturbed pop Guido. "If he did, he wouldn't spend so much time in his room." But the obsessed youth insists his love is far superior to all the others. "I've already stepped into the future society," he declares. "Derede has a mind of her own, and she wants to marry me so we can be the first couple to begin this new era." *start* 11995 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 15 Feb 89 16:53:03 PST (Wednesday) Subject: Life 4.A From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- An economist is back in his old college town many years after graduation and decides to drop in on one of his old professors. He happens to see a copy of an exam sitting on the desk so he picks it up to look at it. Upon deciding that it looks familiar he comments to the professor that it is the same exam that he had taken 10 years ago. The professor assures him that this is correct but adds that this time the answers are different. ---------------------------------------------------- Then again, my favorite unscientific quote comes from an otherwise fantastic movie called "Forbidden Planet": An invisible Id monster runs into the force field about their ship. They blast it with great big atomic (?) cannons and generally put on a really impressive light show. The beast, however, proves to be unstoppable until its creator wakes up and it disappears. The captain of the ship then comments on the monster's indestructability: "We hit that thing with over four billion electron-volts and it didn't even flinch!" ---------------------------------------------------- "You know my brother belongs to a cult. Yea, they walk alike, they talk alike, they look alike, they act alike, they dress alike. You may have heard of them..........IBM" ---------------------------------------------------- I recently purchased a small wooden magazine rack to put beside my easy chair. The rack, made and packaged in Thailand, is the type that requires minor assembly. As I was assembling the pieces, I noticed the following warning message on the box in three languages: "Do not place in the dishwasher!" Whew, good thing I read that in time. ---------------------------------------------------- >Math and Alcohol don't mix, so... > >PLEASE DON'T DRINK AND DERIVE Then there's every parent's scream when their child walks into the room dazed and staggering: OH NO...YOU'VE BEEN TAKING DERIVATIVES!! ---------------------------------------------------- Subject: Newfie Inventions The following are inventions that have been nominated for Invention of the Year. 1) Solar powered flashlight. 2) Waterproof sponge. 3) Helicopter ejection seat. ---------------------------------------------------- Q: Why are the phone rates so high in Iran? A: Because everyone calls Persian to Persian. ---------------------------------------------------- A man was being held up at gunpoint. He gave his money to the robber, and said please, just take it and leave. The robber had and attitude problem, said "I'm gonna kill you...", etc., pointed the gun, at the victim, and pulled the trigger. The gun didn't go off. Puzzled, the criminal looked down the barrel to try to figure out what the difficulty was. As he was doing so, he pulled the trigger again to see what was going on. This time, the weapon worked... ---------------------------------------------------- an addendum to the joke about using lawyers instead of mice (there are more of them and the staff doesn't get as attached)... "But we had to give up and switch back to mice." "Why?" "We had a hard time applying the results to humans..." ---------------------------------------------------- first person: How far is it from New York to Philedelphia? second person: About 120 miles first person: And how far is it from Philedelphia to New York? second person: The same, about 120 miles, I should think. first person: Not necessarily! It is one month from Thanksgiving to Christmas but its eleven months from Christmans to Thanksgiving. ---------------------------------------------------- Try this in class: When your professor says something REALLY stupid and/or confusing do this: start to look really puzzeled and irratated, then stand up put your hands on your head and pronounce, "MY BRAIN IS FULL. I CAN'T LEARN ANYMORE" and leave. ---------------------------------------------------- Two ex-Aggies (from Texas A&M) decide to have a reunion. One decides to visit the other one living in a big town. The visiting Aggie gets lost and calls his friend: - hey buddy, I am coming over but I am lost and have no idea where I am. - its ok, just look at the street intersection, there will be two signs, read them to me. - ok, ok, I see them, one says "WALK", the other one says "DO NOT WALK". - oh good buddy, you are right down the street. I'll be over to pick you up. ---------------------------------------------------- Questions for the rhetoric final: I submitted these when my rhetoric teacher asked us to suggest questions for the final exam. I doubt she'll ever do such a thing again. Note that many are inside jokes. I think the only known rec.humor reader who'll understand all of this is Jeff Vogel. Therefore he is not allowed to read it. I could pull a practical joke on Jeff and tell everyone on the net to send him mail, but I wouldn't do that. I won't even post his address. (Although, come to think of it, he posts fairly often and someone could rather easily find out his address that way . . .) Anyway, the questions: 1. Write an original song linking any 7 of the works we've read. Sing it aloud when finished. 2. Trace the subtle influences of spam and/or jello on at least 19 of the works we've studied. 3. If you're Dave, write a novel. If it's not a best seller, you fail. 4. Recite word for word the first story we read. Then translate it into Yiddish. 5. Everybody bring garlic. 6. Use quantum mechanics to disprove Plato. 7. Set fire to your copy of "The Story and its Writer." Write a poem explaining its effect on your sense of Truth. 8. Explain the combined effects of Monty Python and The Far Side on the teenage consciousness. Any Harvey Mudder will do as a case study. 9. Disprove everything. You have ten minutes. 10. Turn around and prove everything. You have FIVE. 11. Leave. You're gonna flunk anyway and may as well get some sleep. 12. Can we have class on the roof? 13. Compose 73 original "West is Best" tee shirts. 14. Severely damage the first person/thing available. Apologize in iambic pentameter. 15. You have a level 1 "moria" character and 3 hours. Kill the Balrog. Extra credit for using your bare hands. 16. Explain the impending world resource shortage without referring to brooms. ---------------------------------------------------- "Moonies" have declined since Rev. Moon was deported a few years ago, however, similar religious cults still abound. A guy I met at a Science Fiction convention swears this worked: He and a friend were set upon by Moonies in a California airport. He told them, "I don't need your religion," which of course did not discourage them. He then said, "I don't need your religion because I have The Force!" He made Darth Vader's gesture from the first _Star Wars_ movie, and his friend went through the motions of choking. The Moonies' mouths dropped open and they backed away. ---------------------------------------------------- The UN sponsored a competition on which nation can produce the best book on elephants. The British submited a dry historical account "The Elephant and the British Empire." The French submited a text "The Sensuality of the Elephant -- a Personal Account." The Germans submited 47 Volumes entitled "An Elementary Introduction to the Foundation of the Science of the Elephant's Ear." The Americans submited an article from "Money" magazine: "Elephants -- the Perfect Tax Shelter for the 80s" Green-Peace submited a counter-entry "Elephants -- they're better than people" The Russians submited a terse manuscript titled "The superiority of the Soviet Elephant" And submited a poem "The Joy and Freedom Brought forth by the Soviet Elephant." But the Japanese won with their Promotional Flier "We have no Elephants but wouldn't you want to buy a Honda instead" ---------------------------------------------------- Long ago in a Polish town there lived a wise Rabbi. One night a peddler came to the Rabbi's house. "Rabbi", he said, "I am going to kill myself!" "Heaven, forbid!", cried the Rabbi, what could make you have such a sinful thought. "Is it better that I should starve to death! Today my horse died and without a horse I cannot earn my living!" "Look", said the Rabbi, "the Holy One, Blessed be He, will provide for you. Tonight, at midnight, meet me at the stable of the Count." The peddler had no idea what the Rabbi could mean, but obediently he arrived at the Count's stables at 12 o'clock sharp. The Rabbi took him to one of the stalls and told him to take the beautiful white stallion standing there. "Oy, vay!", said the peddler, "I can't do this, the Count will have me hanged!". "Don't worry", the Rabbi assured him, "take the horse and go in peace." Since in those days one did not disobey a rabbi, the peddler did as he was told. When he had gone the Rabbi lay down in the stall and went to sleep. The next morning the Count arrived with his groom and seeing the man asleep on the floor, kicked him and cried: "Hey you, who are you, what are you doing here, where is my horse?!" The Rabbi sat up and rubbed his eyes. Then he jumped to his feet and raised his hands to the sky and cried: "Thanks be to God, creator of the Universe!" "What's this, what's this", cried the Count,"what is going on, who are you, where is my horse??!" "Don't you understand?", said the Rabbi, "I was your horse! I used to be a famous scholar. But one night I succumbed to the Evil Impulse and went to a prostitute. In punishment the Holy One turned me into your horse. But in my misery I repented and prayed for forgiveness. Finally my prayers were heard and I have been changed back into a human being. Thanks be to God, creator of the Universe!". Now the Count was a devout man and a respector of miracles and so he also cried "Thanks be to God, creator of the Universe!" and let the Rabbi go. Several weeks later the Count was riding through the town. Suddenly he spied the peddler leading his beautiful white stallion. He leaped from his carriage and ran to the beast, struck him brutally on the rear end with his riding crop and shrieked: "Scoundrel! Ingrate! Going to prostitutes again??!!" ---------------------------------------------------- THE RULES (*) For those of you who don't already know, these are the rules that are in effect in every relationship. 1. The female always makes the rules. 2. These rules are subject to change at any time without prior notification. 3. No male can possibly know all the rules. ---------------------------------------- 4. If the female suspects that the male knows all the rules, she must immediately change some or all of the rules. 5. The female is never wrong. -------------------------- 6. If the female is wrong it is because of a vagrant misunderstanding which was a direct result of something the male said or did wrong. 7. If rule number six applies, the male must immediately apologize for causing the misunderstanding. 8. The female can change her mind at any given point in time. 9. The male must never change his mind without express written consent of the female. 10. The female has every right to be angry or upset at any time. 11. The male must remain calm at all times, unless the female wants him to be angry or upset. 12. The female must under no circumstances let the male know whether she wants him to be calm, angry or upset. 13. Any attempt to document these rules could result in bodily harm. 14. The female always gets the last word! (*) These rules are subject to change as the female sees fit. *start* 15015 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 15 Feb 89 16:55:59 PST (Wednesday) Subject: Life 4.B From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Told to me by my girlfriend: On her second year in college a professor came to their class and was telling them about his new students (freshmen). When he asked them to comment all their programs, this is what he got: - "This program is very nice" - "This program is very difficult" - "This program is very interesting"........ ---------------------------------------------------- At Calgary, the computer science department has an award called the Williams Cup (as in old stained coffee cup), which is given yearly to the student who hands in the most imaginative rendition of a regular programming assignment. Anyway, as the story goes, the cup was awarded to a student who'd done a desk calculator assignment. Seems that the prof hadn't specified that you had to do it in decimal, so his/her program did math with _roman_numerals_. The clincher for the award must have been his/her programming style, since of course, the documentation was in _latin_ 8-) ---------------------------------------------------- My favorite story is about a satellite link that went haywire every Friday at 3:00 PM. The company that owned the link immediately blamed the software in their communications controllers. Systems analysts were dispatched on site, and try as they did, they couldn't find a software bug that could be responsible. Finally, by dumb luck they found it. A bunch of factory workers let off at 3:00 started their weekend with a parking lot beer party and through their empty cans in the satellite uplink. A shift of security guards fixed that. ---------------------------------------------------- A friend worked for a company that made IC's. It seemed that every few months their yeilds would go down to about zero. Analysis of the failures showed all sorts of organic material was introduced into the process somewhere but they couldn't figure out where. One evening someone was working late and came into the lab. There he found the maintainence crew cooking pizza in the chip curing ovens! ---------------------------------------------------- I used to work in the Computer Lab at the Community College of Allegheny County,Allegheny Campus. CCAC-A has a 3 file server Novell Network in place. For most of the Fall, they were constantly loosing the hard drives in the Network during holiday breaks -- you could be assured that one or more of the file servers went down during a 3-day weekend, for example. The first thought was that power to the lab was being turned off on the long weekends, so the power to the file servers was wired such that power stayed on and could not be turned off except at the circuit breaker. Didn't help; turned out that the problem was a well-meaning security guard who thought that the servers were accidently left on, so he turned them off. NeXT solution? Hot-wire the power supply switches... so now they discovered that the guard was pulling out the power plugs! He no longer works in that building... ---------------------------------------------------- This tale is true, I was there. The DEC users group here occasionally has Q+A sessions with a representative of said company which sometimes become complaint and apology sessions. I remember one particular complaint from a Physics professor who claimed that his microVax was having problems with its tk50 tape drive and he had lost a fair quantity of data when the drive allegedly mangled a tape (magnetically, not physically). Some discussion ensued and the professor griped that he also didn't like the way that the screen display "flexed" every time they turned the equipment on next door. It turns out that the "equipment next door" is a largish Tokomak fusion reactor - the electromagnets in the thing have to be seen to be believed. (And this man is a physics professor - phew!) ---------------------------------------------------- Once upon a time in the MBA factory... About fifty prospective MBAs were learning how to run an IBM PC. The computer lab had a bunch of nice hard-disk equipped machines, with 1-2-3 and dBase and Word, etc, all lined up in front of a video projector. "Today we're going to learn how to use DOS to format a disk. Everybody have their floppy disk ready? Good. Put it into the disk drive. (No no, it goes in the *other* way...that's right....) "Okay, now to format a disk, you use the command FORMAT C:" ...and they all typed it in. (Format C: will reformat the C drive, the hard disk drive, it could take hours to rebuild and some data may have been lost. The teacher really was confused.) ---------------------------------------------------- The other story says that a customer wanted something fixed for a particular hardware setup for which we had no docs. The problem shouldn't be difficult to solve, but we needed the docs and the customer was really in a hurry. The person in charge of the thing asked the customer if he would be willing to FAX us a certain part of the manuals. After a moment's thought, he answered "OK, but only if you promise to FAX it back!" ---------------------------------------------------- I dont know if anyone else has repeated this one or not. I was at a DECUS conference about 6 yrs ago when a system programmer was laughing about programming a Dec machine to seek around on a disk drive enough to cause the cabinet to rock. Apparently this became some sort of a game, so that they actually wrote programs to make the drive cabinet walk around the room to particular locations... ---------------------------------------------------- There was an article in the Wall Street Journal this past summer that told of executives who were finally learning how to use/misuse their office computers. Two stories that I found particularly funny follow: 2. Another executive read that he should hit the Enter key, "the one with the elbow printed on it." He was seen later that day attempting to hit the enter key with his elbow. ---------------------------------------------------- Some computer-illiterate visitors were shown the CDC6400 at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. One of them asked how does the machine do all these wonderful things; their guide joked that it has a small man inside. While he was speaking, a CDC technician (the late Rachmim Moreno, a small man indeed) has just finished some routine maintenance and stepped out of the machine. ---------------------------------------------------- Real, real, true, swear-by-God story: A friend of mine was repairing a Russian EC-20 computer in Bangalore, India. He found an insulated wire soldered to a pin of a chip. Looking for the other end, he traced and he traced and he traced - 10 feet of wire, and the other end was soldered to an adjacent chip! As it turned out, they needed a 10 ns delay between the two pins. ---------------------------------------------------- 1) Back when core memory was in use one could "listen" to the memory with a transistor radio. A game amung system programmers was to access memory in such a manner as to produce recognizeble tunes on the radio. 2) Printers produce a buzzing with varying frequency depending on the text being printed (this is because of the rate at which the hammers strike the slugs in the print chain). The same system programmers would also compete to see who could print a job that played specific (and known) tunes. ---------------------------------------------------- I recall being shown a PDP-8 in Uppsala University two years ago. It had a program that would perform memory accesses so as to generate noise that could be picked up by an AM radio. I was most amazed to hear a *polyhonic* version of "The Entertainer" come from a PDP-8 :-) ---------------------------------------------------- While a student at UCSD in the middle 60's I had the opportunity to work many late nights in the computer punch card room on my physical chemistry lab calculations. One late night when the computer operator was obviously bored, he invited me into the sanctum sanctorum - the computer room. The computer was a CDC 3600 and had a curving CONSOLE about 8 feet long with several hundred lights and switches (in those days, there was no such thing as terminal input). On the far wall was a bank of a dozen 1/2" tape drives with vacuum column tape tension control. He loaded up a deck into the card reader (the only command input device) and started it. For the next 1/2 hour the computer PLAYED the Stars and Stripes Forever and assorted Sousa marches, using the tones on the CONSOLE (every light had its own tone) for the high low notes and the tape drives for the low notes. At the same time, all the lights on the CONSOLE were blinking on and off. Since I am now a full-time programmer, I finally appreciate the work it must have taken a system level programmer to do that. Talk about primitive audio devices! ---------------------------------------------------- 1.) An office secretary was presented with her first PC and given large amounts of instruction on how to operate it. Just before he left the C.E. asked the secretary "What must you do every Friday?" to which the secretary replied "Copy my data disks so I don't lose any information." Satisfied, the C.E. departed. One week later there was a phone call; "I can't read my disks!" so the C.E. went back to the secretary. Sure enough the data disks were corrupt and unreadable. "Have you got copies of these disks?" "Yes" "Can I see them please?" The secretary opened her desk drawer and removed several sheets of paper. Curiously the C.E. examined them to see each was a perfect photocopy of the data disks.... 2.) A site had an HP3000 installation with a number of large 300Mb disk disk drives. One week, two of the drives crashed, so they called an engineer. The engineer examined the drives, and noticed a little pile of sawdust on the floor by the side of them. Needless to say, there is no wood in the construction of these drives and the floor was concrete. The engineer repairs the drives and leaves, sorely vexed. The same thing happens a couple of days later - same two drives crash, engineer calls, sawdust, etc. This pattern repeats until one day they notice a maintenance man, who has a long plank of wood, walk into the computer room, wedge the wood between the two drives (the gap between them was juuust riiight!) and then proceed to saw the plank in half with an enormous rip-saw.... ---------------------------------------------------- This is the same company (my wife used to be CS manager there) where an irate customer couldn't save his records to disk. The error message he reported would only have appeared on a full disk, but he claimed that he checked the space remaining and it was "okay." Turns out that the program he ran to check remaining space on a disk drive returned the amount of free space, expressed in kbytes. A full disk, therefore, returned the string 0k (where 0 = zero). Then there was the customer who complained because the new software release wouldn't print. This customer just *knew* he'd caught the software company in a bug and he was demanding his money back. My wife stepped through the whole process, set up a duplicate system on her end of the phone, and spent a fair amount of time duplicating his situation. At last she determined that the only possible failure was that his printer wasn't on line. "I've managed to duplicate your error message," she finally told him after about three days of this. "Aha! It *is* a bug, and you'll finally admit it! Are you going to refund my money?" "Well, we'll see," she said. "First, look on your printer and see if the little green light marked 'on line' is lit." "No, it isn't. What does it mean if it's not on line?" "Well, it's like the lights are on but nobody's home..." He never asked for his money back again. ---------------------------------------------------- Heard recently from an IBM field service manager: A huge travel agency in Florida (a major booker of Caribbean cruises for blue-haired retired ladies) recently bought an IBM 3090 to handle the reservation database. When the deal was consummated, the proud new owner asked IBM to install it in a big glass room right behind the receptionist's area so all the customers could see the flashing lights and spinning tape reels as they walked in -- a testimony to the modernity of the agency. Good idea, except there are no blinking lights on a 3090. So the service manager offered to build some. They hired a theatrical designer to come up with a suitably futuristic "set", got curved glass walls to minimize reflections, and installed the mainframe behind the "real-looking" facade. The customer declared that it was exactly what he had in mind, regardless of what the actual computer looks like. Moral: the customer is always right. ---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue 1988 May 31 11:34:07 From: arden@freude (Michelle Arden) Subject: How to handle Frustration: Shoot a computer today! An amusing Comdex story ... I'm looking forward to Siggraph in Atlanta. Shooting graphics boards, maybe? >From the N.Y. Times, w/o permission: The annual Spring Comdex computer show in Atlanta earlier this month meant a booming business for the Bulletstop, an indoor firing range in suburban Marietta where customers can rent firearms and bullets to shoot anything they please, as long as it is already dead and fits through the doors. The Bulletstop gave Comdex visitors a chance to vent their frustrations by venting PC's, printers, hard disks, monitors and manuals with lead. Paul LaVista, the owner, said about 10 groups of high-tech types came in during the Comdex show. "I'm not a computer whiz, but one group brought in what looked like a hard disk and blasted it," he said. "Another bunch brought in some kind of technical manual. The thing was enormous, about 2,000 pages. They rented three machine guns -- an Uzi, an M3 grease gun and a Thompson -- and when they were done it looked like confetti." "It must have been quite a show," LaVista said of Comdex. "Doctors and computer types usually have a lot of pent-up anxiety, but these folks were dragging when they came in. When they left they were really up. The range looked like a computer service center after a tornado." LaVista said PC's were popular targets year-round. "People are frustrated with them," he said. A year ago seven or eight men carried in a giant old Hewlett-Packard printer. "I ran an extension cord to it, and just as it started to whirr and spit out paper, they blasted it," he said. *start* 15223 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 11 Mar 89 22:00:26 PST (Saturday) Subject: Life 4.C From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Several years ago, before AIDS became big news, mercury pollution was trendy and political (and is probably as bad now as then). One Friday I was in a university cafeteria line behind an Old Hippie (who was old enough to have been a beatnik). "Mr. Natural" began loudly haranguing one of the ladies behind the counter about the mercury content of the fish she was serving. She replied, "We catch them in the winter when the mercury is low." The funny part was that he didn't catch the pun! ---------------------------------------------------- In my prime I could do the cube in less than a minute, The Revenge in less than five, the Pyraminx and the Missing Link were mere exercises to think over as I bored myself to sleep. Rubik's magic fell in one night of twiddling and his clock puzzle only lasted about two hours. I can hear it already: 'Well, isn't that Spatial.' (Ha! Beat you all to the pun!) ---------------------------------------------------- To me, absolutes are found only in finite algebra and taxes. ---------------------------------------------------- What's the optimal number of reviewers? 3.1415926 Or three full time programmers and 11 1/2 week old German Shepherd puppy. ---------------------------------------------------- Hack first, ask questions later. ---------------------------------------------------- I bought the latest computer; it came fully loaded. It was guaranteed for 90 days, but in 30 was outmoded! - The Wall Street Journal passed along by Big Red Computer's SCARLETT ---------------------------------------------------- For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled. (Richard Feynman) ---------------------------------------------------- I found this in the Warshawsky catalog ( a discount car parts mail order store out of Chicago ) -- SAVE 22% -- IMITATION CELLULAR PHONE WITH ANTENNA Incredibly realistic! Almost impossible to spot as imitation! Friends and strangers alike will think you have joined that "special" group of mobile phone owners! That's because this fake phone is so realistic! The shape, buttons, phone number, switches, mouthpiece, ... everything is accurate down to the smallest detail. Only YOU will know it's a replica. Mounts easily with self-stick tape in any highly visible spot in your vehicle. Weather-resistant simulated antenna with magnetic base mounts outside your vehicle to complete the deception. Phone can even be carried inside your attache case, etc. to impress everyone you meet. Regular price $8.99................... NOW $6.99 ---------------------------------------------------- A software company I will not name was pondering ways to get more attention for their product. One person suggested: "Hey, why don't we make it offensive to Shia Muslims?" ---------------------------------------------------- I found a rather humorous ATM at a local bank. Let me describe it to you. It is a *drive* thru style. It has a screen that shows the menus and 4 menu buttons along the side of the screen to pick the choices from the screen menu. It also has a keypad for typing in your PID and cash ammounts. got that? Well here is the funny part: The buttons are printed in braille. How is a blind person supposed to read the screen to know which menu button to choose? And how many blind people do you know that drive? ---------------------------------------------------- Several years ago I was working as an instructor at a computer camp. I was assigned to teach the introductory class in TTL logic and peripheral design. So there I was, explaining the TTL high and low states. "Five volts represents the 'high' state or a binary 1, and zero volts represents the 'low' state, or a binary 0." And I went on and on explaining the various TTL Gates (AND, NOR, NAND, etc). Finally, I got to the Inverter (or NOT gate). I explained that if you put 5 volts into it, you'll get 0 volts out, and if you put 0 volts into it you'll get 5 volts out. To this, one person replied: "Wouldn't that thing be awfully useful during a power failure?" ---------------------------------------------------- Tonight on PBS there a fascinating special documentary about the FORBIDDEN CITY in China. The announcer mentioned that it was forbidden because no one except emperors, their wives and UNIX were allowed inside the city walls. Imagine... What other operating systems were around those days? Why were they discriminated against? ---------------------------------------------------- A while back I used to work in a company doing workstations for stock and commodity brokers. These things are their bread and butter: if they don't work, they can't do *a thing*. They thus tend to get frustrated easily. One of them calls, and says, "No matter what I type, it doen't work". Get the machine exchanged, the keyboard is hopelessly damaged. A couple of days later, the same thing happens. We discovered that the guy used his *telephone handset* to bang on the keyboard to flip pages. The competition - obviously from similar experiences - had keyboards encased in sheetmetal, with very tough springs; these people only hit one key at a time anyway, and didn't touch type, so that was OK... In a similar vein, a frustrated customer had, on a bad trade, *ripped* his console from the data feed - the back panel was still hanging to the wall outlet. We got bit by this again when we introduced mice on our systems: now *they* were getting banged up by people using them do dial the phone!! To solve all these problems, we had to install routines to detect keyboard banging (lots of keys pressed too quickly in succession) and mouse banging (that took some work) and beep *real loud* - they'd get embarrassed and not do it anymore. Abuse management - a whole new area in user interfaces! ---------------------------------------------------- I recall a story 1970's, told by a friend at the time, about a phone bill. The local phone company, NJ Bell would include a keypunch card with your bill. The card included the standard information about the customer and the bill amount. This friend of mine took the phone bill card to keypunch and added an overpunch to the the bill amount making it a negative number. He sent in a check for the regular amount with the altered card. When he received his next months bill there was a credit for his payment and a credit from his previous balance due. He never told me if the phone company ever caught on or not. ---------------------------------------------------- Anyone remember the Act Sirius 1 machine? It was expensive, powerful and pre-PC, and totally failed to take off (despite impressive graphics). Anyway, the story was reported that many users complained of inability to boot off the supplied system disks. The response was always the same - the user must have caused magnetic damage. Apparently, they claimed that a common source of this was to leave the disks next to an old (mechanical bell) telephone for more than six rings! Eventually the truth came out - they were indeed shipping blank system disks! Someone in Quality Control went quite red! ---------------------------------------------------- A computer repairman was one day called to a grade school to repair their no longer working computer. When he opened up the processor, he found a thick coating of white dust covering every component within, i.e. backplane, mother board and all other PC boards, housing walls, etc. He had never seen any coating like this in any other computer. The repair of the processor involved simply blowing out the dust. A few days later he was on another service call within the school for another computer. Walking by the room that contained the unit he had previously fixed he decided to peek into the room to see how it was doing. What he saw explained the white dust. He saw several boys beating the chalk board erasers next to the fan in the unit, and watching the unit suck the dust inside. ---------------------------------------------------- The computer at some business somewhere (fill in your favorite locations) had a bad tendency to go down at about 1pm on most afternoons. Every time this happened, the operations folks would find the problem to be hardware related. To be specific, a particular board would always fry--literally--and become covered with molten or charred muck. One day when the system crashed at about 1, the operations folks got into the computer lab just in time to see the culprit: a secretary heating a sandwich on the cpu's vents! Cheese would melt and drip down the vents onto a system board, eventually causing it to fail and the system to crash. ---------------------------------------------------- A documented feature of a remoted debugger that I once used was the "find and fix feature". The documentation indicated that if you were debugging a program and were having indeterminate problems, hitting the "F" key would provide usefull insight as to what the problem was. I was new to the Unix style of doing things, so I believed the documentation (8-)). So, in the middle of running down a nasty hardware timing problem, I hit "F". The debugger replied with "cosmic ray error". I actually believed this error message for just long enough to get a great laugh out of it. It is now great fun to find someone using this debugger and having problems. If you tell the new user a few lies about artificial intelligence and debugger sophistication, almost any bizarre message the debugger spits out can be made to sound plausible to the gullible user. ---------------------------------------------------- A couple summers ago, I worked at a university department where the following event occured. One of the people in accounting had this program called DRAIN.EXE which first displays a message System Error -- There is water in the disk drive Taking care of it now Draining water from disk drive This is when the program starts to make trickling sounds. Then, after a few seconds, it would print the message Starting spin cycle Here, the disk drive would start spinning and the computer makes a sort of whirring sound which increases incrementally in pitch. Then it would all stop and display the message that everything was now OK and the person could use the computer. Well, as I said, one person had this program which he left on a disk in the victim's computer. He naturally set-up the AUTOEXEC.BAT file to run the program. Having been forewarned about the afternoon entertainment, we waited for the tell-tale noise. Later, as planned the victim turns on her computer. As we listened, we heard the trickling sound. Then it stopped. Then we heard it again. When we looked into her office, she looking underneath the computer. Perhaps she was looking for the water draining out of the disk drive. ---------------------------------------------------- My tenth grade geometry teacher (which dates this story at 1978) had this big old German built calculator with huge keys to fit his big pudgey fingers. The thing was practically an antique at that time. It had the old fashioned green fluorescent tubes for the numerical display and weighed about 10 pounds. Naturally it had only the add, subtract, multiply, and divide functions, and also naturally it had no batteries, but would only work off the AC. One day when he was out of the room, I took it upon myself to see whether it had been properly debugged. I plugged it into the wall and typed "12/0=". To my amazement, no error message appeared. Instead, it went into some kind of infinite loop. Ok, so I *should* have unplugged it at that point, but my curiousity got the better of me and I let it continue. Roughly 5 minutes later (about the time that the teacher returned to the room), there were lovely wisps of blue smoke wafting out of the back of the machine. Imagine my disappointment when I had to buy a calculator which didn't even work anymore! ---------------------------------------------------- My brother goes to Caltech. Awhile ago he told me of a student there who had come up with a way to physically destroy an IBM PC from software. This student told Big Blue about it, and they just couldn't resist. They made him an offer- they would supply an IBM PC for him to destroy in their presence. If he was successful, he would tell them how he did it, and they'd give him a free (functioning) IBM. Well, the appointed day came, and so did IBM. They set up their machine on a table and sat down to watch. The student quietly inserted a disk and turned the machine on, then sat down. After the memory check, the computer loaded the program from disk. The drive kept running for a while. Soon the machine started to shake, then shake violently, and would have walked itself off the table had the power supply not shut down. It was quite dead and emitting that funny burnt-resistor smell. The IBM reps checked it and declared it irreppairable. My brother's friend now has a nice IBM PC he uses for terminal emulation, and support for his plants. This is how it worked- the program simply sped up and slowed down the disk drive until it found the resonant frequency of the case of he machine. The case slowly started to resonate, and soon the whole machine would be shaking. This would cause the cards and other innards to flex, and contacts would be made and broken, destroying chips left and right. Eventually something would short and the power supply would go. Pretty effective, tho it did take a while. ---------------------------------------------------- I remember hearing that an early version of the Commodore Pet would catch fire if certain addresses had certain contents. Something about the clock being forced to run at too high a speed. (Can anyone confirm/ deny this?) ---------------------------------------------------- Nah, Nah, Nah - yer got it all wrong, squire. The story goes (and this one is true) that the Commodore Pet early versions not only had integral monitors (all one big box, y'know) but the software had a _certain_ amount of control over the screen. This meant that, if you REALLY knew what you were doing you could (i) disable the refresh interrupt where the raster beam (the thing that scans down a monitor at huge speeds to make the picture) retraces to the top left corner (ii) stop the beam in its place result: one VERY BRIGHT SPOT in the middle of the screen somewhere, which if left will burn clean through the monitor, causing irreprable damage. This contradicted the first law of such machines: nothing you can type at the keyboard could do any PHYSICAL damage to the machine. I wonder if anyone else has examples of this sort of behaviour? (not wishing to drag out an already overlong theme ;-) ) *start* 13894 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 11 Mar 89 22:08:09 PST (Saturday) Subject: Life 4.D From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Heard at a John McCutcheon concert: "Buy a toaster, get a free Savings & Loan." ---------------------------------------------------- Q: What do you call an Eagle Scout with a crew cut? A: A bald eagle. ---------------------------------------------------- Scoutmaster: "Tenderfoot, how did you get that black eye?" TF: "Sir, I was hit by a guided muscle with a knucklear warhead!" ---------------------------------------------------- Boys' Life: Dad: The only way to acquire a new skill is to start at the bottom. Son: But I want to learn to swim. When everhting's coming your way, you're probably in the wrong lane. About 1900 a very respectable Western lawyer was filing some insurance papers when he came to the question: "If your father is dead, state the cause." Unwilling to reveal that his father had been hanged for cattle rustling, the lawyer evaded the problem by answering this way: "He died while taking part in a public ceremony when the platform gave way." Duke: Do you know one school where you have to drop out in order to graduate? Luke: Parachute school. Daffynishion: Quadruplets - Four crying out loud. A small social club was trying to organize a baseball team. They could muster eight players, but were hard put to find a ninth. In desperation they called on a new member, an Englishman, to join their team. During their first game, the Englishman came to bat. On the first pitch, he kncked the ball out of the bark. "Run!" his teammates cried. "For Pete's sake, run!" The Britisher turned and stared at them icily. "I jolly well shan't run," he replied. "Why should I? I'm perfectly willing to buy you chaps another ball." If you had 10 cents and only five minutes to live, what would you buy? A roll of Life Savers. Most London police don't carry guns or clubs, only whistles. So when they chase a crook, they have to say, "Stop, or I'll toot!" Why were the Scouts so tired on April 1? Because they had just finished a 31 day March. Why are you sleeping under that old car? So I can wake up oily in the morning. Daffynishio: Sunburn - Getting more than you basked for. A girl cmael with one hump and a boy camel with two humps got married and had a baby camel with no humps. Guess what they called him? Humphrey. Father: If I had 10 oranges and gave you two, how many would I have left? Son: I don't know, because in school we learn on apples. Do you find it hard to make decisions? Well - yes and no. ---------------------------------------------------- Subject: some do's and don't do's for all you travellers < Signs of our times > In a Tokyo Hotel: Is forbitten to steal hotel towels please. If you are not person to do such thing is please not to read notis. In another Japanese hotel room: Please to bathe inside the tub. In a Bucharest hotel lobby: The lift is being fixed for the next day. During that time we regret that you will be unbearable. In a Leipzig elevator: Do not enter the lift backwards, and only when lit up. In a Belgrade hotel elevator: To move the cabin, push button for wishing floor. If the cabin should enter more persons, each one should press a number of wishing floor. Driving is then going alphabetically by national order. In a Paris hotel elevator: Please leave your values at the front desk. In a hotel in Athens: Visitors are expected to complain at the office between the hours of 9 and 11 A.M. daily. In a Yugoslavian hotel: The flattening of underwear with pleasure is the job of the chambermaid. In the lobby of a Moscow hotel across from a Russian Orthodox monastary: You are welcome to visit the cemetery where famous Russian and Soviet composers, artists, and writers are buried daily except Thursday. In an Austrian hotel catering to skiers: Not to perambulate the corridors in the hours of repose in the boots of ascension. On the menu of a Swiss restaurant: Our wines leave you nothing to hope for. On the menu of a Polish hotel: Salad a firm's own make; limpid red beet soup with cheesy dumplings in the form of a finger; roasted duck let loose; beef rashers beaten up in the country people's fashion. In a Hong Kong supermarket: For your convenience, we recommend courageous, efficient self-service. Outside a Hong Kong tailor shop: Ladies may have a fit upstairs. Outside a Paris dress shop: Dresses for street walking. In a Rhodes tailor shop: Order your summers suit. Because is big rush we will execute customers in strict rotation. Similarly, from the Soviet Weekly: There will be a Moscow Exhibition of Aets by 15,000 Soviet Republic painters and sculptors. These were executed over the past two years. In an East African newspaper: A new swimming pool is rapidly taking shape since the contractors have thrown in the bulk of their workers. In a Vienna hotel: In case of fire, do your utmost to alarm the hotel porter. A sign posted in Germany's Black Forest: It is strictly forbidden on our black forest camping site that people of different sex, for instance, men and women, live together in one tent unless they are married with each other for that purpose. In a Zurich hotel: Because of the impropriety of entertaining guests of the opposite sex in the bedroom, it is suggested that the lobby be used for this purpose. In an advertisement by a Hong Kong dentist: Teeth extrcted by the latest Methodists. A translated sentence from a Russian chess book: A lot of water has been passed under the bridge since this variation has been played. In a Rome laundry: Ladies, leave your clothes here and spend the afternoon having a good time. In a Czechoslovakian tourist agency: Take one of our horse-driven city tours -- we guarantee no miscarriages. Advertisement for donkey rides in Thailand: Would you like to ride on your own ass? In the window of a Swedish furrier: Fur coats made for ladies from their own skin. On the box of a clockwork toy made in Hong Kong: Guaranteed to work throughout its useful life. Detour sign in Kyushi, Japan: Stop: Drive Sideways. In a Swiss mountain inn: Special today -- no ice cream. In a Bangkok temple: It is forbidden to enter a woman even a foreigner if dressed as a man. In a Tokyo bar: Special cocktails for the ladies with nuts. In a Copenhagen airline ticket office: We take your bags and send them in all directions. On the door of a Moscow hotel room: If this is your first visit to the USSR, you are welcome to it. In a Norwegian cocktail lounge: Ladies are requested not to have children in the bar. At a Budapest zoo: Please do not feed the animals. If you have any suitable food, give it to the guard on duty. In the office of a Roman doctor: Specialist in women and other diseases. In a Tokyo shop: Our nylons cost more than common, but you'll find they are best in the long run. From a Japanese information booklet about using a hotel air conditioner: Cooles and Heates: If you want just condition of warm in your room, please control yourself. From a brochure of a car rental firm in Tokyo: When passenger of foot heave in sight, tootle the horn. Trumpet him melodiously at first, but if he still obstacles your passage then tootle him with vigor. Two signs from a Majorcan shop entrance: - English well talking. - Here speeching American. ---------------------------------------------------- Several recent studies have reported that Americans simply aren't learning much science in school. That doesn't particularly bother me, because I know they *are* getting lots of good, reliable scientific information from a number of places. Like television, _Newsweek_, the _Enquirer_, cereal boxes, their hairdressers, and so forth. So who says science isn't getting across to the public? Here's some things people recently have told me they know about science. The greenouse effect is here and is already melting the polar icecap. By next year palm trees will be growing in Canada, beach boys will be hanging 10 off the coast of Nevada, and Cleveland, of all places, will suddenly become a nice place to live. There are only three California gray whales left in existence, and they somehow got caught in an ice hole in Alaska. Only a huge investment of time, money, and media coverage kept the species from becoming extinct. Geraldo Rivera is the frightening result of a genetic engineering project gone awry. (This one may be true.). There's a hole in the ozone layer aproximately the size of Roseanne Barr that was caused by hairspray. It's how UFO's get to Earth. A brand-new radioactive gas has been found in basements. It's called radon and it causes cancer in a matter of weeks and worse, plays hell with resale values. Isaac Newton plays lead guitar for Guns 'n Roses (this from a high school student). The Japanese and French are building incredibly fast levitating trains that have really super conductors on them. All scientists cheat on their data, on their spouses, and on their income taxes. Only Congress - whose members never cheat on their data, their spouses, or their taxes - can put a stop to all this. ---------------------------------------------------- Are You About to Employ a Robot? This test was written by ME, Roger Carasso, for the UCB Psychology Department. It is intended to be used by companies that are recruiting on campus. With this test you can determine whether an applicant are interviewing is a Robot, a Vulcan/Math MAjor, or a Liberal Arts major. Tear off here, and administer test below to students ---------------------------------- Answer Questions by circling the appropriate subjective choice. 1. If stranded on a deserted island, I would want _____ 0)Shakespeare 1>Math books 2]Fluid oil 2. If I could have any job, I would be a _____ 0)writer 1>professor 2]McDonald's employee 3. On weekends, I go to _____ 0)The beach 1>The library 2]goto 10 4. My favorite hobby is _____ 0)Poetry 1>Open math problems 2]memorizing 5. I have taken ______ English classes. 0)Many 1>Enough to communicate 2]fori=1to++x10goto10 6. What is the quickest way to solve 2X+4=2? 0)Ask a Vulcan 1>In my head 2]Brute force with Cray 2 Supercomputer 7. What have you learned in school that you value the most? 0)Latin 1>Complex Analysis 2]How to operate my HP-28C 8. In between classes, I like to _____ 0)Talk with my friends 1>Study proofs 2>Add numbers on my calculator 9. When I have a report due, I type it on_____ 0)My manual typewriter 1>The school's word processor 2]My calculator and then upload it to a PC at 50 baud 10. Since coming to the University, I have gained many _____ 0)Friends 1>Books 2]Calculator manuals 11. The best use of a computer is _____ 0)As a door stop 1>For graphing functions 2]As friends 12. When I go to a restaurant, I usually get _____ 0)A hamburger 1>A twinkie 2]Thrown out 13. What part of speech is "interface"? 0)A noun 1>A noun and a verb 2]Not enough data 14. What do you consider to be paradise? 0)Total happiness 1>Total knowledge 2]Two calculators 15. What type of music do you like? 0)Popular music 1>Classical music 2]Static noise 16. What is your favorite game? 0)Monopoly 1>Chess 2]Data entry races 17. My favorite Movie show is _____ 0)Ruthless People 1>Star Trek II 2]Short Circuit 18. If I had to know an equation on a test, I would _____ 0)Write it on my arm 1>Derive it during test 2]Memorize it with flash cards all day for weeks 19. The person I marry must have_____ 0)Beauty 1>Intelligence 2]An RS232 serial port 20. What I fear the most is _____ 0)Death 1>Emotions 2]Water -------------------------------- Results: Simply add up the values of all your answers and look at the following table. 00-14 Liberal Arts 15-20 Vulcan/Math Major 21-40 Robot!!! ---------------------------------------------------- Hello mother, hello father, here I am at Camp Grenada. Camp is very entertaining, and they say we'll have some fun if it stops raining... I went hiking with Joe Spivy. He developed poison ivy. You remember Leonard Skinner; He got ptomaine poisoning last night after dinner. All the counselors Hate the waiters, And the lake has alligators. And the head coach Was no sissy, So he reads to us from something called Ulysses. Now I don't want This to scare ya. But my bunkmate Has malaria. You remember Jeffrey Hardy... They're about to organize a searching party. Take me home, oh mother, father. Take me home, I hate Grenada. Don't leave me out in the forest where I might get eaten by a bear. Take me home, I promise I will not make noise Or mess the house with other boys. Oh please don't make me stay! I've been here ONE -- WHOLE -- DAY. Dearest father, Darling mother, How's my precious little brother? Let me come home if you miss me. I would even let Aunt Bertha hug and kiss me... Wait a minute... It stopped raining! Guys are biking. Guys are sailing, playing baseball... gee, that's better! Mother, father, kindly disregard this letter! *start* 10493 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 11 Mar 89 22:14:47 PST (Saturday) Subject: Life 4.E From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Researchers in Fairbanks Alaska last week announced they have a superconductor which will operate at room temperature. ---------------------------------------------------- One day a Yankee businessman visits Russia. He goes to a car factory and talks to the workers in factory. He asks them : "Whose factory is this ?" They answer : "It's ours." Then he asks : "Whose cars are those in front of factory ?" They answer : "One belongs to the manager, the other to vicemanager and the third one to the chairman of party." and then he leaves the factory. Next year the manager of car factory in Russia visits USA and he goes to a car factory. He asks the workers : "Whose factory is this ?" They answer : "It's the manager's factory." Then he asks : "Whose cars are those in front of factory ?" They answer : "They are ours." ---------------------------------------------------- When Stalin was in office, he once noted that there were mice in his study and complained to President Kalinin about this. The President thought for a moment and suggested, "Why don't you put up a sign reading 'Collective Farm'? Half the mice will die of hunger and the other half will run away." ---------------------------------------------------- (In the Wall Street Journal, February 6, 1989:) If China is a college classroom on capitalism, the Soviet Union remains a kindergarten. The point is brought home by the story told by Romano Prodi, chairman of IRI, the giant conglomerate of Italian state-owned companies, who recently returned from a visit with Mr. Gorbachev. Mr. Prodi was describing to the general secretary how Italian private companies operate more efficiently than state-run enterprises. Mr. Gorbachev asked why that is so. The Italian industrialist replied with a question: "Why does the hare, small and weak, consistently outrun the hound?" The Soviet leader was puzzled. "It is because the hare works for himself while the hound works for masters," explained Mr. Prodi. Mr. Gorbachev laughed appreciatively. He said he would tell it to the Politburo. ---------------------------------------------------- At the end of World War II Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin met at the famous Yalta Conference. During a break the three chiefs of state were relaxing. Wanting to show off a bit Roosevelt took out a silver cigarette case on which was engraved: "To FDR from a loyal Democratic Party". Not to be outdone Churchill took out a gold cigar case on which was engraved: "To Winston from the loyal Tories." Stalin then smiled broadly and reaching into his vest withdrew an enormous cigar case encrusted with rubies and emeralds on which was written: "To Count Esterhazy from the Vienna Jockey Club." ---------------------------------------------------- I stumbled upon a book (Yea, it was in my path) called 'America on Six Rubles a Day', by Yakov Smirnoff. I don't normally buy books - not if I can read them free - but this was so funnee that I was still laughing when I paid the cashier. The cover shows Yakov with his new credit card: RUSSIAN EXPRESS Don't Leave Home. ---------------------------------------------------- >From my friend who worked in a submarine for several years: JOIN THE NAVY -- IT'S NOT JUST A JOB, IT'S AN INDENTURE ---------------------------------------------------- Governments that don't trust most people with weapons, deserve no trust. ---------------------------------------------------- Reminds me of a true story I read years ago of a woman who was doing genealogical research on the branch of her family who had lived in the late 1800's in the territory which is now in Southeastern Arizona. Somehow she got lucky and found an old family Bible. (Traditionally, families would record birthdates, deaths, marriages, etc. inside the front cover). She was surprised to find several references to a great-great-.....great-uncle named Sylvester of whom she had never heard mention before, and she wondered why there had been no mention of him in other sources. The last Bible entry read something like this: "Sylvester died today of a sudden neck injury." She wrote down the date, looked up an old copy of the Tombstone Gazette for that day, and sure enough - you guessed it! Sylvester was hanged as a horsethief that day. ---------------------------------------------------- 1840: One day a bunch of Whigs went into a pub owned by Democrat (the other political party - whose candidate was Martin Van Buren). Harrison, the Whig candidate, had once professed to have a liking for hard cider (as proof of his common-folk roots). As a result, Whigs had a positive mania for the drink. Consequently, the whigs ordered hard cider. The barman protested he had none, but was pressed to produce some. He went out back and whomped up a batch of 'hard cider' made up of rainwater, vinegar, and whiskey. Judge Wilson, one of the Whigs, grabbed up the drink, proposed a toast to Harrison, but (luckily) took a sniff of what he was about to drink. He took a small taste, and put it down. "This may be good hard cider, but it will take a more patriotic Whig than I am to drink it!" he said. ---------------------------------------------------- 1828: A farm boy, having traveled to town to see Andrew Jackson speak, boasted on returning that the candidate had actually spoken with him. When asked what Jackson had said, the boy replied proudly, "He told me to get the hell out of the way!" ---------------------------------------------------- My mother sent me this from a recent Reader's Pablum -- er, Digest: On May 15, 1930, the first airline stewardesses boarded planes with the following set of instructions, notes an early Stewardess Manual: - Keep the clock and altimeter wound up. - Carry a railroad timetable in case the plane is grounded. - Warn the passengers against throwing their cigars and cigarettes out the windows. - Keep an eye on passengers when they go to the lavatory to be sure they don't mistakenly go out the emergency exit. ---------------------------------------------------- From the Civil War SongBook, published circa 1965. Articles of incorporation of the Springfield Militia 1. This Company shall be known as the Springfield Militia. 2. In case of war, this company shall immediately disband. ---------------------------------------------------- I think there was a slipup on the one that started "It seems that there were these 3 pregnant Indian squaws" ... (isn't "Indian" with "squaw" redundant?). Actually, the weight of the boy baby born on the deerhide was 5 lbs. That of the one on the bearhide was 6 pounds, and that of the one on the hippohide was 11 lbs, which showed that the squaw on the hippopotamus equalled the sons of the squaws on the other two hides. ---------------------------------------------------- There was a young witch named Samantha, but everyone called her Sam. She entered a witching contest, which is sort of like a fiddling contest, except people stand up and do performances of witchcraft. For her performance, Samantha enchanted an aquarium full of fish and made them sing a song. Unfortunately, the song was very long, and one of the fish was very badly out of tune. After a while, the audience and judges couldn't stand the dissonance any longer. They began pounding on their tables and shouting in unison "Tune a fish, Sam witch." ---------------------------------------------------- As she hears the wedding march, three things are foremost in a bride's mind: aisle, altar, hymn. ---------------------------------------------------- After she woke up, a woman told her husband, "I just dreamed that you gave me a pearl necklace for Valentine's day. What do you think it means?" "You'll know tonight." he said. That evening, the man came home with a package and gave it to his wife. Delighted, she opened it - to find a book entitled "The meaning of dreams" ---------------------------------------------------- Mostly from Another Almanac of Words at Play, by Willard Espy. It doesn't much signify whom one marries, for one is sure to find out next morning it was someone else. -- Rogers If you are afraid of loneliness, don't marry. -- Chekhov The most happy marriage I can picture would be the union of a deaf man to a blind woman. -- Coleridge Were it not for imagination, sir, a man would be as happy in the arms of a chambermaid as a duchess. -- Dr. Johnson If a man hears much that a woman says, she is not beautiful. -- Haskins A man does not look behind the door unless he has stood there himself. -- Du Bois A lover tries to stand in well with the pet dog of the house. -- Moliere Love is an ideal thing, marriage a real thing; a confusion of the real with the ideal never goes unpunished. -- Goethe In matrimony, to hesitate is sometimes to be saved. -- Butler A woman may very well form a friendship with a man, but for this to endure, it must be assisted by a little physical antipathy. -- Nietzsche Woman inspires us to great things, and prevents us from achieving them. -- Dumas Nature has given women so much power that the law has very wisely given them little. -- Dr. Johnson The great question... which I have not been able to answer... is, "What does a woman want? -- Freud Marriage is like a cage; one sees the birds outside desperate to get in, and those inside desperate to get out. -- Montaigne For a male and female to live continuously together is... biologically speaking, an extremely unnatural condition. -- Robert Briffault Marriage is low down, but you spend the rest of your life paying for it. -- Baskins A wedding is a funeral where a man smells his own flowers. A man is not complete until he is married -- then he is finished. Marriage is the sole cause of divorce. Marriage is a trip between Niagra Falls and Reno. Marriage is an institution -- but who wants to live in one? Marriage is the process of finding out what kind of person your spouse would have really preferred. Marriage is the triumph of imagination over intelligence. Second marriage is the triumph of hope over experience. Marriage is not a word; it is a sentence. *start* 11043 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 11 Mar 89 22:19:59 PST (Saturday) Subject: Life 4.F From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- [Los Angeles] Daily News, February 26: When jazz legend Dizzy Gillespie was in Los Angeles recently to receive a Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award, he lost some travelers' checks. American Express refused to replace the travelers' checks when he couldn't produce identification. Gillespie suggested company employees in Los Angeles call his lawyer, Elliot Hoffman, to verify his identity. "What can we ask this man to prove he's really Dizzy Gillespie?" an employee asked Hoffman. "Ask him what comes after 'oo-bop-shabam'" Hoffman suggested. Gillespie shot back, "Afloogle-mop." He got his checks. ---------------------------------------------------- In Karate class one day our instructor came in and told us a story that happened to a friend of his the night before. Our instructor's friend was locking up his martial arts studio, still wearing his gui and his black belt, when someone came up to him with a knife and said, "Give me all your money!" Needless to say that the mugger was in the police ward of the hospital rather shortly afterward. ---------------------------------------------------- My father, a Professor of Journalism at Kent State University (this is NOT the funny part of the post) is looking for excuses. (Neither is this.) He's hoping to get a book out containing all the best excuses students/ employees give forr why they weren't in class/missed the test/didn't finish the assignment/etc. Send any good ones to TSMITH@KENTVM.BITNET or mail to Tim Smith, School of Journalism and Mass Comm.,Kent State University, Kent, OH 44262. Latest examples include: I couldn't come to class because my buffalo herd got loose. (true!) I couldn't come to the exam because all the Johns at the conventions here in Atlanta are keeping me up. I couldn't come to class last week because my father was overthrown. (True; student's father WAS president of Uganda) ---------------------------------------------------- Q: What do you call a sleeping bull A: A Bull-dozer. There was a herd of cattle all standing on a hill when an earthquake struck. All of the cows fell down, but the bull remained standing. The farmer noticing this went out and asked the bull "Why didn't you fall down like the rest of the herd. (I am asking for you're willing suspensions of disbelief here as we all know that cows don't like farmers enough to talk to them.) The bull replied (see I told you I would) "We bulls wobble, but we don't fall down." ---------------------------------------------------- There's a similar story about an MIT student who spent an entire summer going to the Harvard football field every day wearing a black and white striped shirt, walking up and down the field for ten or fifteen minutes throwing birdseed all over the field, blowing a whistle and walking off the field. At the end of the summer, it came time for the first Harvard home football team, the referee walked onto the field and blew the whistle, and the game had to be delayed for a half hour to wait for the birds to get off of the field. The guy wrote his thesis on this, and graduated. ---------------------------------------------------- No one was really quite sure how Pan-Am could loose an engine off of an airplane. It was found out later that the engine had a luggage sticker on it. ---------------------------------------------------- well, there was another close call for AirJEDR this week. seems the pilot had a heart attack and the controllers in the tower had to talk the stewardess through the takeoff. ---------------------------------------------------- I was paging through a recently acquired 727 manual and came across this little gem of wisdom. (GPWS is the ground proximity warning system. It tells the crew when the ground is getting too close for what they're doing.) "Note: the GPWS will not provide a warning if an airplane is flying directly towards a vertical cliff." Gee, thanks. I'll keep that in mind. :-} ---------------------------------------------------- One of the things I've noticed while driving across this great land of ours is this: The people who make road signs have Q-tips Cotton Swabs(tm) for brains. I'm not talking about your average, humdrum road sign like "STOP" or "YIELD" to which the average, intelligent American driver pays little or no attention in the first place. No. I'm talking about the kind of road signs that make you wonder if the guys down at the DOT are running with a full frame of resident pages, if you get my proverbial drift. These are some of my favorites: LOW-FLYING AIRCRAFT Tell me, does the placement of this sign on the highway imply some action on my part as a motorist? I mean, just how "low-flying" are these aircraft? What am I supposed to do if I see one? Duck? Should I assume that the aircraft has the right of way? This sign is about as valuable as its cousin: WATCH FOR FALLING ROCKS (little picture of an avalanche) "Well officer the reason I rear-ended the school bus was because I had my eyes peeled on that mountainside so I could swerve to avoid any boulders that happened to come loose as I drove past..." ROAD UNDER CONSTRUCTION PASS AT YOUR OWN RISK What this sign means is, if, as you are driving through the con- struction area past the ten or twelve road workers who are standing around in small groups with their hands in their pockets discussing whether or not the color of the steam-roller conforms to their union contract, and one of them flicks a cigarette butt your way which ignites your gas tank and your car explodes, you cannot hold them liable for damages. NO TRUCKS LEFT LANE No verb this sentence. BLASTING AREA. TURN OFF TWO-WAY RADIOS. I wonder how many crazed pyromaniacs drive around with a carload of walkie-talkies looking for these babies, hmm? MEN IN TREES Don't worry guys, evolution is your friend. LAST SANITARY FACILITIES FOR 30 MILES "Gee, I guess we'll have to use the unsanitary ones..." HAVE YOU CHECKED YOUR TIRES LATELY? This is on the Maine turnpike just after you come over "The Bridge" from New Hampshire. It serves as a reminder to tourists that it could snow at any minute without warning. ---------------------------------------------------- Good Samaritans =============== Submitted by Bob Morecock Three young college students are on vacation in Washington, D.C. One day they are walking together past the White House when they hear a voice, which sounds like that of an elderly man, crying out, "Help, Help." Quickly, they respond to the call by leaping over the White House fence, and by following the cries, they eventually come upon Ronald Reagan, drowning in the White House swimming pool. In an heroic rush, they pull him from the pool, then give him artificial respiration, clearly saving his life. After a few minutes, Reagan says to them, "Well, boys, today you saved my life! And I am willing to give each of you any wish you desire, as long as it is within my power as President!" The first fellow thinks for a few seconds then says, "I have always wanted to go to West Point. Can you get me an appointment?" "You bet!" said the President, "I'll sign the papers this afternoon!" Then the second fellow said, "I've always wanted to go to Annapolis. Can you get me in?" "You bet I can," said the President. "I'll sign the papers for it this afternoon, too." After a few moments more, the third fellow said, "I'd like to know, can you get me buried in Arlington National Cemetery?" Reagan, a bit startled, thought for a second or two, then said, "Sure, but tell me, aren't you awfully young to be thinking about such things?" "Nope," replied the remaining fellow. "Because when I get home and tell my old man what I did today, he's going to kill me!" ---------------------------------------------------- The newly appointed priest wat being briefed by the housekeeper on problems in the rectory that required immediate attention. "Your roof needs repair, Father" she said. "Your water pressure is bad and your furnace is not working." "Now Mrs. Kelly," hte priest allowed, "you've been here for five years and I only a few days. Why not say OUR roof and OUR furnace?" Several weeks later, when the paster was meeting with the bishop and several other priests, Mrs. Kelly burst into the office, terribly upset. "Father, Father" she blurted, "There's a mouse in our room and it's under our bed!!!!!!" ---------------------------------------------------- The King of Beers ================= The Budweiser marketing executives held their annual planning session with their advertising agency. The ad agency gave them a new and FABULOUS plan. Irving Schlock, the ad agency account executive, suggested that Budweiser offer the Pope $1 Million per year if he will send out an edict changing the Lord's Prayer line from "Give us this day our daily bread" to "Give us this day our daily Bud." The Bud executives thought this was fantastic and shipped off a staff representative to Rome to make the offer. The representative only got to see a bishop, who ordered him thrown out amid cries of "Sacrilege!!" He returned to the President of Budweiser, who told him to up the offer to $1 million per month. This time the Budweiser man got in to see a Cardinal, told him about the proposed change from "Give us this day our daily bread" to "Give us this day our daily Bud." The Cardinal, enraged, also had him thrown out, saying, "The Lord's Prayer is NOT for sale, commercialistic swine!" Back to the Budweiser President he went. This time the president said that he had certain connections and would make some calls in advance, guaranteeing the rep would see the Pope himself, not just some flunkies. Also, said the president, "Offer the Pope $1 million a week. "This is so big we can't miss it. It'll blow Miller out of the water!" Back in the Vatican, the Budweiser Rep enters a room filled with the church hierarchy, begins to give his presentation -- cries of "out" begin, when the Pope comes in. He asks that the Rep be heard in a respectful manner, but first wants to leave for a moment. The Pope goes down the hallway to his business manager's office. Entering, he says "Guido, get out the Lord's Prayer file." "Sure, your Holiness, what do you need to know?" "How long before our deal expires with Pepperidge Farm?" *start* 10530 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 11 Mar 89 22:24:24 PST (Saturday) Subject: Life 4.G From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- The other day when was watching a boxing match on tv, a hockey game broke out! ---------------------------------------------------- (Heard on the local radio station) Some guy stole a taxi and went for a joy-ride and then abondoned the car. Whats so funny you ask? He was later caught because on his way home that day, he flagged down the same taxi that he had stole that morning and the cabby identified him. Can you say stupid criminal? Sure you can... ---------------------------------------------------- Hey, some real comics over there in S. Korea. John Joss just bought a sportshirt made by a Korean firm called Heet, with these instructions: For best results, wash in cold water separately, hang-dry and iron with warm iron. For not so good results, drag behind car through puddles, blow-dry on roof rack. ---------------------------------------------------- A lissom psychotic named Jane Once kissed every man on a train; Said she: "Please don't panic! I'm just nymphomanic. It wouldn't be fun were I sane." Anon. Said Freud: "I've discovered the Id. Of all your repressions be rid. It won't ease the gravity Of all the depravity, But you'll know why you did what you did." Frank Richards ---------------------------------------------------- (I realize this belongs in Reader's Distress, but I figured, go for it) Inspired by recent testing of elementary students in math and science, I decided to check firsthand into my second grader's education. Me: Do you know anything about circles? Chris: Oh, yeah, we've learned about that since Kindergarten. Me: Do you know what a radius is? Chris: No. Me: Do you know what a diameter is? Chris: No. Me: Do you know what a circumference is? Chris: No. OK, I thought. Try another tack. Me: Do you know anything about squares? Chris (after slight pause): I THOUGHT I did. ---------------------------------------------------- In Herb Caen's column (San Francisco Chronicle) 02/17: I know a way to make a quick million bucks. Have a bunch of T-shirts printed up that say "I am NOT Salman Rushdie" ---------------------------------------------------- With the end of the football season, a star player for the college team celebrated the relaxation of team curfew by attending a late- night campus party. Soon after arriving, he became captivated by a beautiful coed and eased into a conversation with her by asking if she met many dates at parties. "Oh, I have a three point eight, so I'm much more attracted to the strong academic types than to the dumb party animals," she said. "What's your G.P.A.?" Grinning from ear to ear, the jock boasted, "I get about twenty- five in the city and forty on the highway." ---------------------------------------------------- There are three kinds of people in the world -- those who can count, and those who can't. ---------------------------------------------------- A few days ago, I bought one of those electric letter openers (you know, the kind that slits the envelope with a motor). Anyway, it runs on two AA batteries that install in a compartment in the bottom. Now the compartment is marked so that anyone with the slightest degree of intelligence could find it w/o incident. Nevertheless, the unit came with a slip of paper marked: SPECIAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR ATTORNEYS And on it were printed specific step-by-step instructions of how to open the snap-off cover and put the batteries in. I'm not kidding about this, by the way. ---------------------------------------------------- There was once a man from the city who was visiting a small farm, and during this visit he saw a farmer feeding pigs in a most extraordinary manner. The farmer would lift a pig up to a nearby apple tree, and the pig would eat the apples off the tree directly. The farmer would move the pig from one apple to another until the pig was satisfied, then he would start again with another pig. The city man watched this activity for some time with great astonishment. Finally he could not resist saying to the farmer, "This is the most inefficient method of feeding pigs that I can imagine. Just think of the time that would be saved if you simply shook the apples off the tree and let the pigs eat them from the ground!" The farmer looked puzzled and replied, "What's time to a pig?" ---------------------------------------------------- a man walks up to an ethnic warrior and asks him the time. since it is broad daylight, our ethnic plants his spear in the ground, measures the shadow's length, etc. and announces "one o'clock". "wow," says the man, "this is amazing. but how do you tell the time at night?". replies the ethnic, "oh, that is exactly why i carry this watch" and fishes out a watch from his pocket... ---------------------------------------------------- In response to the new Florida "English only" law, which bars expenditure of public funds for the purpose of extending services in languages other than English, the Dade County Zoo has ceased printing the Latin names of animals on the signs in front of cages. ---------------------------------------------------- An Englishman, an Irishman, and a Scotsman were all mourning the death of their good friend, a Welshman. It is a tradition at Welsh funerals that people enclose cash or other articles in the coffin for the deceased to enjoy in the hereafter. The Scotsman was so bereaved that he told his mates, "Whatever you two put in the coffin, I'll put in double!" The others were astounded at this offering from an otherwise frugal-'til-he-squeaks person. But they decided to put him to the test. The Irishman approached the coffin, said his goodbyes, and deposited 20 pounds in the coffin. Likewise, the Englishman went to the coffin, murmured his farewell, and placed a twenty-pound note in the coffin. Then he and the Irishman waited with deep anticipation as the Scotsman went up to the coffin, prayed, said a tearful goodbye, then got out his chequebook and wrote a cheque for 120 pounds and took the other 40 pounds cash back in change. ---------------------------------------------------- One day, a large duck walked into a pharmacy. It waddled up to the druggist, looked him right in his open mouth, and said "Good morning (quack). Would you (quack) please give me a (quack) tube of Chapstick (quack)?" The druggist quit staring, took a good look around the store (trying to spot Alan Funt skulking somewhere), and replied "Uhh...certainly, uhh...Sir. Would you prefer the plain or one of the flavored varieties?" The duck said "The plain will be fine (quack)." The druggist took one of the tubes and set it on the counter. "Is that what you want, Sir?" The duck said "That's it (quack). Just put it on my bill." ---------------------------------------------------- The following is a true story told to me by a duck hunter. One day a fellow duck hunter was legally hunting in the hills of Wisconsin, near a game reserve (where one is absolutely NOT allowed to hunt.) Along came a duck, and POW!, the duck falls away from him, INTO THE GAME RESERVE. Well, he thought, the duck is already dead, I may as well go pick it up. So he walks toward where the duck went down, only to find the duck floating in the middle of a pond. He sees an unoccupied boat and "borrows" it. After rowing to the middle to the pond, he is about to pick up the duck when . . . the game warden says "Hold it right there Buddy." At first the warden wanted to charge the hunter with illegal hunting, but the guy had not touched the duck, and he couldn't prove that he shot it. Next he tried to charge him with having a gun in a boat (apparently illegal) but couldn't, the gun was left on the shore. Next he tried to charge him with boat theft, but couldn't find the owner. So, he finally found something to charge the hunter with; being in a boat without a life preserver! ---------------------------------------------------- ___ 1. That which Noah built. ___ 2. An article for serving ice cream. ___ 3. What a bloodhound does in chasing a woman. ___ 4. An expression to represent the loss of a parrot. ___ 5. An appropriate title for a knight named Koal. ___ 6. A sunburned man. ___ 7. A tall coffee pot perking. ___ 8. What one does when it rains. ___ 9. A dog sitting in a refrigerator. ___ 10. What a boy does on the lake when his motor won't run. ___ 11. What you call a person who writes for an inn. ___ 12. What the captain said when the boat was bombed. ___ 13. What a little acorn says when he grows up. ___ 14. What one does to trees that are in the way. ___ 15. What you do if you have yarn and needles. ___ 16. Can George Washington turn into a country? A. hypotenuse I. circle B. polygon J. axiom C. inscribe K. cone D. geometry L. coincide E. unit M. cosecant F. center N. tangent G. decagone O. hero H. arc P. perpendicular ---------------------------------------------------- This string is really getting old and seems to be fading away, but while cleaning my place I found the following piece of paper, and thought it really belongs here: +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | | | | BIT Software, Inc. | | December 14, 1987 | Michael S. Polymenakos ... .. .... Brooklyn, NY, 11210 Dear Mr. Bryce: This letter is... : : Sincerely | | +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ I kept it on my office, a daily reminder to actually read those things that come out of my own printer, at least once in a while, especially before anyone else gets to read them first. *start* 11034 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 11 Mar 89 22:30:22 PST (Saturday) Subject: Life 4.H From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Heard today from an author promoting his book on a radio talk show: There's a curious but predictable result when these two people meet. One of them has a lot of money and the other has a lot of experience. After not too much time, the one with the experience has a lot of money and the one who had the money has a lot of experience. ---------------------------------------------------- Have you heard about The Ayatollah's new business venture? He's going into business as a book critic! As I understand it, he gives a book one of three ratings. Thumbs up, Thumbs down, and Thumbs off! ---------------------------------------------------- I had spent almost the whole day walking on the Isle of Skye and I saw a bus going back to Portree, where I was staying. Buses on the islands are few and far between so I decided that I really was too tired to walk all the way back and I jumped on. I paid my fare and bagged a seat at the front, beside the driver. As we approached Portree the driver slowed near some cottages and stopped to pick up an old man who had stood at his gate to flag the bus down. He boarded the bus. The driver took his fare and said: - `I'm sorry I didn't stop for you yesterday, I was full'. - `It's all right', the old man replied, `I'm not in a hurry.' ---------------------------------------------------- Q. Why did jewish people spend 40 years in the desert? A. Because someone lost 10 dollars. ---------------------------------------------------- Which reminded me of this one about Werner; What did Werner von Braun say after he invented the V-2? (slaps his forrhead with palm of a hand) I could have had a V-8!! ---------------------------------------------------- A lawyer and friend are hiking in the wilderness when they come upon a mountain lion. As the lion crouches to spring, the lawyer removes his heavy pack and prepares to run. "Don't be silly.", his friend says, "You can't outrun a mountain lion." "I only need to outrun you.", the lawyer replies. ---------------------------------------------------- "Oh dear! I've missed you so much!" said the sweet young thing--then she raised the revolver and tried again. ---------------------------------------------------- In today's paper Miss Manners was asked how to handle people who call up and don't introduce themselves. Who say, "Sally, don't you recognize my voice, don't you know who this is?" Miss Manners suggested saying "I'm sorry, I don't know who you are either. Call me back when you remember." And then hang up. ---------------------------------------------------- Q: If a person has a bee in his hand, what does he have in his eye? A: Beauty. Because beauty is in the eye of the bee-holder. ---------------------------------------------------- ( This joke has been told by many deaf people and has been recorded in a few books on deaf culutre. The interpretation of this joke is mine, though. ) A deaf couple checks into a motel very late at night. Upon moving into their assigned room, they go to bed. But in the middle of the night, the woman has a headache, so she goes into the bathroom for aspirin. But she finds none, and remembers that the bottle of aspirin is still in the car. Afraid to go out alone at night, she awakens her husband and asks him to go get the aspirin from the car. The very groggy husband puts on his robe and toddles wearily outside. He finds the bottle of the aspirin in the car's glove compartment, and gets ready to go back to the room when he realizes something: he can't remember which room was his! He thinks and thinks and then gets an idea. He opens the car again and honks the steering wheel horn several times. Within a minute, all the motel's windows lighten up -- except one window, and of course, he makes for the room with that window. ---------------------------------------------------- There was an amusing incident at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley years ago that had to do with this question. It seems that one of the professors was almost totally blind. One day, he accepted a ride to school with the Dean, who owned a British automobile, complete with right hand drive. They arrived at the parking lot just as a large proportion of the student body was showing up; panic was general. ---------------------------------------------------- God was disgusted with the music on earth, so he sat down and wrote a long symphony. And it had enough parts in it for everyone on earth. So, when performance time came up, he gathered all the people on the plains of Africa to play the piece. The angels lowered a gold directors stand. God himself stepped up on it, tapped his baton and started the music. The first movement was long, in fact about two and one half years. But it was so beautiful that nobody minded at all. The second movement was shorter, only about two years, but again so beautiful and flowing that no one even noticed how long it was. About a year into the third movement, there was a solo triangle part for a little shoemaker from Belgium. As one could guess, he missed his part. The whole orchestra stopped and glared at him for ruining the greatest piece of music ever written. God just looked out, tapped his baton and said, "OK folks, lets take it from the top." ---------------------------------------------------- Rinaldo's Laws -------------- As I will be leaving the Washington area in early May, I thought it appropriate to share the wisdom that I have accumulated thus far. These truths have come not as a vision but by observation over time. Accordingly, I have synthesized the following laws. Choreography is its own reward Some things are done only for the sake of form. Don't fight it by looking for substance in everything. Do it long enough and you'll find enjoyment in an elephant dance. He who does the work shapes it As applied to computers, he who writes the code rules (the Coding rule). In meetings, he who writes the minutes determines the outcome. The less the knowledge, the more jealously it is preserved Societies with only a few precious facts make their people memorize them and pledge to faithfully abide by them. In contrast, highly developed disciplines quit worrying about losing knowledge (unless the computer crashes and there is no backup). Excellence increases demands Critics gather to spot tinier flaws as work nears perfection. Promptness invites impatience. In correspondence, the faster you answer a letter, the faster your correspondent will answer giving you something with a shorter deadline. This reaches a fever pitch with electronic mail. Skills diminish professionalism Engineers who admit to drafting skills are vulnerable to assignment of drafting work, just to help out. Similarly, female professionals should hide any clerical skills lest they be asked to pinch hit for one of the secretaries in the event of illness. What separates the competent from the incompetent is the ability to cover up mistakes Many successful sales demonstrations have been made with defective products in the hands of competent persons who avoid demonstrating the features which don't work. Beautiful Xerox copies can be made from originals riddled with correction fluid. Recovery from some grievous errors can be attained by simply announcing, "No problem. We'll just put it back in the word processor!" The computer software profession seems to be the exception; who else is so blatant as to have a term such as "debugging" to let the world know that they need extra time funded by the customer to correct their own errors. Silence is not acquiescence Contrary to what you may have heard, silence of those present is not necessarily consent, even the reluctant variety. They simply may sit in stunned silence and figure ways of sabotaging the plan after they regain their composure. Quick-reaction and slow-reaction facilities rotate Once people discover that there is a quick-reaction facility (QRF), they will try to get all their work done there, bogging it down in work and leaving the slow-reaction facility (SRF) nothing to do, thus becoming the faster of the two. Complexity attracts brilliance The KISS (keep it simple, stupid) principle is no fun and certainly not a professional approach. If you want brilliant people to do work for you make it complex and demanding. The true professional will spend 20 hours at the computer writing a one-time-use program that will replace 10 hours of clerical work. Anyway, 20 hours at professional rates pays more than 10 hours at clerical rates. Also, it's more intellectually rewarding. The greatest achievement is to use one's finest professional talents to accomplish something that didn't need to be done. Bad guys are replaced Did you ever rejoice over the departure of someone that you couldn't get along with only to find that a replica has shown up? When you are trying to make a U-turn and you have someone tailgating you, have you pulled off on a side street, then into an alley only to find that two other cars are right behind you? ---------------------------------------------------- Diffusion and Driving Habits in the Boston Metropolitan Area The following was presented to me by Livia Racz (bink@athena.mit.edu). This comes from a lecture given by Professor D. R. Sadoway on atomistic diffusion... ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Most people drive by the vacancy mechanism. If you're standing at a traffic light, you'll notice that you get to move when the vacancy is in front of you. That's in most civilized places. Fortunately, you live in a part of the world where this is not the case. There are certain places where people drive by the interstitialcy mechanism; this is one of them. (The interstitialcy mechanism, for those of you who don't know, is where one atom knocks another atom out of its lattice site to an interstitial point, and the first atom takes its place...) ---------------------------------------------------- [From The Seattle Times, Saturday, Dec 17th] "The University of Wisconsin presented nearly 4,000 diplomas to graduates in May, but it took six months for someone to notice that the name of the state was misspelled 'Wisconson'." ---------------------------------------------------- >From "The Grab Bag" by L. M Boyd (San Francisco Chronicle, Jan. 22, 1989 - without permission) Writes a client: "We've got a pet squirrel. A squirrel can gather 10,000 nuts in one season. We call ours Donahue."