*start* 16441 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 19 Apr 91 11:11:11 PDT (Friday) Subject: Life 7.7 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Years ago, I saw a show put on by Red Skelton, who asked: "Did you ever wonder where poeple in hell tell people to go?" And from way in the back of the auditorium, there came a shout: "Detroit!" ---------------------------------------------------- Speaking of religion and cricket in the same breath : Apparently the French have a saying that since the English have never been particularly religious, they invented cricket to give themselves some idea of the notion of Eternity. ---------------------------------------------------- There are big signs in Myer at the moment proclaiming "Daylight Savings". Knowing their usual pricing, I reckon they should read "Daylight Robbery". ---------------------------------------------------- I found this warning on a small utility knife in MIT's lab supply: Caution. Blade is sharp. Keep out of children. ---------------------------------------------------- Take time to deliberate; but when the time for action arrives, stop thinking and go on. --Andrew Jackson ---------------------------------------------------- Chris Biagini: In the category of governmentese, this is from an EPA report. "The carcinogenic response observed in humans has a biological basis, although the precise mechanisms are only vaguely understood." My translation: We haven't the foggiest notion of what's going on. ---------------------------------------------------- From: cth@hpfcso.HP.COM (CT Hart) Many years ago, my father borrowed my car for a trip to Denver. He returned, sheepishly explaining that while it was parked in a public lot, someone had smashed out the back window with a 2x4 and stolen everything in the back seat... You guessed it - the thieves got two boxes of trash and a dead battery. And I got a perfectly good 2x4. ---------------------------------------------------- I was watching TV a couple of nights ago, there was a reasonably interesting talkshow going on. They were interviewing someone who believed he was immoratal. The interview went something like this: Q: So you believe you're immortal? A: Yes, I do, I cannot die. Q: You mean you'll reincarnate? A: No, I mean it as I say it, I will not die. Q: Are there other immortal people? A: Yes, there used to be. Q: You mean they're dead now? A: Yeah, they all died. ---------------------------------------------------- The police recently busted a man selling tablets he said gave eternal youth. When going through their files they noticed it was the fourth time he was caught for doing this. He had earlier been arrested in 1794, 1856 and 1928. ---------------------------------------------------- Do you know why God asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac at age 12? Because at 13 it would no longer be a sacrifice. ---------------------------------------------------- Chess-playing has been prohibited in South Africa. The government doesn't like black kings. ---------------------------------------------------- Dr. Odell fell down a well And broke his collar bone. But Doctors should attend the sick, and leave the well alone. ---------------------------------------------------- While you're on mythical bank robbery stories: I heard of a bank robber who wrote the message: Give me all your money, I have a bom (yes, bomb was misspelled) ...ON the back of one of his MOTHER'S CHECKS Also, my girlfriend works in a bank, occasionally they get hold up notes, bacause kids write things on the backs of deposit slips (and their parents don't always notice.) ---------------------------------------------------- WHAT DO YOU CALL A SKODA WITH A SUN ROOF A SKIP (Thats what we use to pick up rubbish in). _______________ WHY DO SKODAS HAVE REAR HEATED WINDOWS? KEEPS YOUR HANDS WARM WHILE YOU'RE PUSHING IT. _______________ A GUY WENT INTO A GARAGE AND SAID "HAVE YOU GOT A FAN BELT FOR A SKODA?" THE GARAGE ATTNDANT SAID "THAT'S A FAIR SWAP". ___________ HOW DO YOU DOUBLE THE PRICE OF A SKODA PUT GAS IN IT ---------------------------------------------------- An MD (Manta Driver) comes into a hotel, books himself a room and then goes with his keys and bag to the lift. He waits a while and then the lift arrives and the door opens. The MD walks in and stands there waiting. He waits. And he waits. Eventually a porter comes along and asks him, "What are you waiting for for so long?", The MD replies, "For the others, ey.", Porter says, "The others ... ?" MD replies, "Yer, it says here 'Lift authorised only for 8 people'" ---------------------------------------------------- An MD wants to sell his Manta and so puts an advert in the paper: Opel Manta GTE 200,000 km DM 4500 One week later ... nothing happens. Two weeks later ... still nothing. In the third week a friend phones up and says, "Ey, are you daft? If you say the car has done 200,000 km nobody will be interested. Take a screwdriver and turn the mileometer back to 50,000 km, then try selling it again." One week later the advertisment is no longer in the paper. The friend rings up again and asks, "Hey, what's up with your Manta?" The MD replies, "Ey, man, do you think I'm going to sell a Manta that's only done 50,000 km?" ---------------------------------------------------- A Manta and a Porsche are driving along side by side on the autobahn. The Porsche speeds up to 120 (kmph remember) ... the Manta is still there. The Porsche reaches 160 ... still the Manta is alongside. The Porsche reaches 200 ... the Manta Driver winds down his window and shouts across to the Porsche driver, "Ey, do you know Mantas, ey?" The Porsche driver replies "Yes, why?" The MD says, "Ey, man, can you tell me how to get into second gear?" ---------------------------------------------------- There are two MD friends who have exactly the same Mantas: same spoilers, same fox-tail on the aerial, same keys - everything. So naturally they have trouble telling which car belongs to who. The first MD comes up with an idea. "Ey, man, ey, this is no good!", he says and makes a little scratch on the bonnet of his car to make the two cars distinguishable. This is fine for a time, and the two friends are able to tell which is their car. A few days later though the second friend comes back with the same scratch on the bonnet! "Ey shit, ey, that's no good!" says the first MD, and makes a dent in the wing of his Manta. Again everything is ok for a few days, but then the second MD comes back with exactly the same dent in exactly the same place on his Manta! This time the second MD comes up with an idea: "Ey, you know what ey? You take the blue Manta and I'll take the red one!" ---------------------------------------------------- There is this MD (Manta-Driver) who goes into his local toy shop and buys a child's puzzle. Exactly one year later to the day he returns to the same show looking very pleased with himself. He goes up to the assistant brandishing the puzzle, MD: Ey, man, ey, I got this puzzle here 1 year ago and I just finished it! Assistant: Yes, so what? (she isn't very polite) MD: Ey, that's not bad ey? It says on the box 3-5 years! ---------------------------------------------------- MD's son: Dad can I have a drive in your Manta? MD : And what's the magic word son? MD's son: Ey, dad, ey, can I have a drive in your Manta? ---------------------------------------------------- Q. What do you call a Lada at the topof a hill? A. A Miracle. ---------------------------------------------------- (Sung to the tune of "The Impossible Dream" from MAN OF LA MANCHA) To code the impossible code, To bring up a virgin machine, To pop out of endless recursion, To grok what appears on the screen, To right the unrightable bug, To endlessly twiddle and thrash, To mount the unmountable magtape, To stop the unstoppable crash! ---------------------------------------------------- All this talk about stupid computer users reminds me of a few stories that was reported in a magazine a while back over here in the uk. One guy wanted his Atari 800 to play space invaders faster so he bypassed the power pack and plugged in right into the mains. 240V instead of 12V smoke one Atari. Another lady was concerned that there wasn't a mouse in her new computers box, always quick to improvise she went down the pet shop and brought one!!!!. A while ago(~1983) is was a fad amoung some computer mags to include a flexible record on the cover, this would contain some computer programs which could be copied onto tape using a normal Hi-Fi. This magazine (What Computer I think) had a phone call from a concerned man stating that he could only get it in his disk drive if he folded it in half! ---------------------------------------------------- FYI, have a good weekend, Henry III. Mike. November 8, 1990 YOU CAN'T FOOL 'EM DOWN ON THE FARM! Real Americans talk About Why They Chose the Sun SPARCstation 2000 (tm) "Wow - with a workstation that powerful, I could get twice as much milking done." - Mrs. Elaine Noose, Scumwater, Oklahoma "Out here on the farm, you really learn to appreciate the value of good graphics resolution." - Ted Lumplin, Brat's Head, Nebraska "After we lost most of our cattle stock to pellegra, our barn burned down. After that, Joe got himself caught in the thresher and lost most of his body hair. Then the banks foreclosed. It sure was a comfort to know that we had 28 MIPs of power to see us through hard times." - Darrell LaQuench, Pine Agony, Maine "I believe that Virtual Quilting, using high-speed networking services, will be the wave of the future." - Mrs. Jane Dobrynin, Fleughh, Utah "Last week we had a fella from Digital come out and look at the soybean crop. After 20 minutes, Ma chased him off and threw his keyboard out the window. We`re from old Norwegian stock, and we know a thing or two about bus controllers." - Buck Flange, Arkansas, Texas Why has the SPARCstation 2000 caught the imagination of the Amer- ican working man and working woman like no other computer in its class? Maybe it's the extra features, like the padded Corinthean leather screen, or the safety air bag that inflates when the typing buffer gets too full. Maybe it's the tradition of honest service and free doughnuts. Then again, maybe not. Sun Microsystems. A Step Ahead of Your Cows. ---------------------------------------------------- This is too good not to send out. From Datamation 15-Jan-91 p.17: Maintaining a Hardware Mindset Huntsville, Ala. -- Although a number of Wall Street analysts question the wisdom of any compnay below a certain size remaining the the hardware business, the alternative isn't all that appealing to Intergraph Corp. Atop its own Clipper reduced instruction set computing processors, the company builds UNIX systems that are bundled with software and sold to users for computer-aided design, among other applications. Why not just focus on software? "There are only four or five software companies whose annual revenues meet or exceed $500 million," observes Eliott D. James, president of Intergraph, whose sales last year were expected to top $1 billion. "It's difficult to sustain a large software company -- due, in part, to the quirky nature of software programmers." ---------------------------------------------------- Everybody is somebody else's weirdo. -- Dykstra Expense Accounts, n.: Corporate food stamps. Every man is as God made him, ay, and often worse. -- Miguel de Cervantes And on the seventh day, He exited from append mode. Talking much about oneself can also be a means to conceal oneself. -- Friedrich Nietzsche As of next week, passwords will be entered in Morse code. Organic chemistry is the chemistry of carbon compounds. Biochemistry is the study of carbon compounds that crawl. -- Mike Adams Never worry about theory as long as the machinery does what it's supposed to do. -- R. A. Heinlein I'm in Pittsburgh. Why am I here? -- Harold Urey, Nobel Laureate Stult's Report: Our problems are mostly behind us. What we have to do now is fight the solutions. Underlying Principle of Socio-Genetics: Superiority is recessive. Anything that is good and useful is made of chocolate. The Army has carried the American ... ideal to its logical conclusion. Not only do they prohibit discrimination on the grounds of race, creed and color, but also on ability. -- T. Lehrer Waiter: "Tea or coffee, gentlemen?" 1st customer: "I'll have tea." 2nd customer: "Me, too -- and be sure the glass is clean!" (Waiter exits, returns) Waiter: "Two teas. Which one asked for the clean glass?" Whenever the literary German dives into a sentence, that is the last you are going to see of him until he emerges on the other side of his Atlantic with his verb in his mouth. -- Mark Twain "Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" ---------------------------------------------------- ,,, But if we laugh with derision, we will never understand. Human intellectual capacity has not altered for thousands of years so far as we can tell. If intelligent people invested intense energy in issues that now seem foolish to us, then the failure lies in our understanding of their world, not in their distorted perceptions. Even the standard example of ancient nonsense -- the debate about angels on pinheads -- makes sense once you realize that theologians were not discussing whether five or eighteen would fit, but whether a pin could house a finite or an infinite number. -- S. J. Gould, "Wide Hats and Narrow Minds" ---------------------------------------------------- A man goes to a tailor to try on a new custom-made suit. The first thing he notices is that the arms are too long. "No problem," says the tailor. "Just bend them at the elbow and hold them out in front of you. See, now it's fine." "But the collar is up around my ears!" "It's nothing. Just hunch your back up a little ... no, a little more ... that's it." "But I'm stepping on my cuffs!" the man cries in desperation. "Nu, bend you knees a little to take up the slack. There you go. Look in the mirror -- the suit fits perfectly." So, twisted like a pretzel, the man lurches out onto the street. Reba and Florence see him go by. "Oh, look," says Reba, "that poor man!" "Yes," says Florence, "but what a beautiful suit." -- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish" ---------------------------------------------------- During the reign of Alexander the Great, a special dye was discovered which, when put on a piece of cloth, would change its shade depending on the intensity of the sun. This enabled the people to tell the time of day. One of these dye-soaked materials was presented to the king. He wore it proudly, tied around his head. And that is origin of Alexander's ragtime band. The famous Oriental detective Charlie Chan was wounded by an opponent. Hurriedly bandaged, he was rushed to a hospital. While waiting in the emergency ward, he peered under the bandage and was heard to mutter, "Ah so! The clot thickens!" When mites from the pigeon pen infested the backyard grass, it was little comfort to reflect that the pen was mite-ier than the sward. A newcomer to the penitentiary was tipped off by his cellmate that if he made romantic advances to the warden's wife, she could get his jail term shortened. However, he decided that it wasn't right to end his sentence with a proposition. ---------------------------------------------------- *start* 15413 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 29 Apr 91 11:57:02 PDT (Monday) Subject: Life 7.8 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- FOR SALE: Special deal on tens of thousands of Iraqi rifles. Never been fired - only dropped once... ---------------------------------------------------- In recent times, there has been much discussion of the shortcomings of US education. Americans' poor knowledge of geography is one of the areas often criticized. A. Whitney Brown, in his commentary about the war, had this to say on Saturday Night Live (Feb. 9, 1991): "But you have to admit, our bombs are incredibly smart. In fact, our bombs are better-educated than the average high-school graduate. I mean, at least they can *find* Kuwait." ---------------------------------------------------- QUESTION: Know how many Iraqees it takes to fire a SCUD? ANSWER: Three. One to load it, one to fire it, and one to check CNN to see where it landed. ---------------------------------------------------- Q: What's the difference between Saddam Hussein and Northwest Airlines? A: Northwest has more kills. ---------------------------------------------------- Reported on NPR's Morning Edition regarding surrender of Iraqi troops: One guy was encountered alone in the desert wearing Bermuda shorts and a Hawaiian shirt, and looking generally ready to party down. When he was challenged, he replied in a Chicago accent, "Where you guys been? I've been waiting forever!" Turns out he was an Iraqi-American, who had been in Iraq visiting his grandparents when hostilities broke out, and he was drafted into the Iraqi army. ---------------------------------------------------- A bunch of US soldiers in Saudi Arabia are getting ready to board an airliner. One of them looks very nervous, so his sergeant claps him on the shoulder and says, "Relax, son, you're going _home_!" The soldier replies, "I know... but I'm from New York City." ---------------------------------------------------- We are now landing at Kuwait internation airport. Please put your seats in a fully upright position and set your watches back 2,000 years. ---------------------------------------------------- Two divisions of the Iraqi army have withdrawn from the Turkish border. The explanation given on TV is that they are heading for Baghdad, in an attempt to help keep Saddam Hussein in power. Personally, I think that a Turkish border guard stepped out of his sentry box and yelled "We're coming to get you!" ---------------------------------------------------- On Tuesday, Paul Harvey cited a rumor (since denied) that Saddam Hussein's son had been killed in rioting. He noted that they still hadn't managed to Baghdad.... ---------------------------------------------------- Saddam was right about one thing. This was not going to be like Panama or Granada. They put up a much better fight. ---------------------------------------------------- I heard the other day they were dividing Iraq into two sections--smoking and non-smoking. ---------------------------------------------------- In the 15 March 91 Wall Street Journal: Before the Gulf War started, the Iraqi Army was the the fourth largest in the world. Now, its the second largest army in Iraq. ---------------------------------------------------- Heard this one at the office. "Why are there no WalMarts in Baghdad? Because there is a Target on every corner!" ---------------------------------------------------- The Americans have reportedly said that they are still worried about the Iraqi's but the threat is on a different front.ie the next olympics! Why? You cry despondantly! Well this is why I whisper: They are simply afraid that the Iraq armed forces will get to enter. The Americans have discovered that the Iraqi Tank men can run faster than Ben Johnson and none of them take steroids!!!! ---------------------------------------------------- Top 10 reasons Saddam is leaving Kuwait: 10) Sears 2 for 1 sale on Scuds is over. 9) American troops capturing Air Force generals before he can shoot them. 8) Only way to get those damn CNN crews out of the country. 7) No more Kuwaiti VCR's to steal. 6) Special war reports keep pre-empting "Alf." 5) War not as fun when other side shoots back. 4) Top Secret "play dead and whine' defense not working. 3) Economy hurting; hard to pump oil form burning wells. 2) Albert Goldman and Bob Woodward threatening to write books about him. 1) Siskel and Ebert gave the war a "thumbs down." ---------------------------------------------------- (A Johnny Carson line, contributed by Dorothy Lustig at Tandem:) Have you heard the latest rumor going around about Hussein? This is allegedly true. Some people are saying that he had plastic surgery so that he could escape from Iraq unseen. But I don't think the doctor who did it liked him very much. He made him look exactly like Salman Rushdie. ---------------------------------------------------- Resourceful Resorts is now offering a fabulous golf vacation the the Middle East. TRIP INCLUDES: *Round trip airfare on a U.S. Air Force C-141 Transport. *7 Days and 6 Nights at Iraq's sole remaining Hotel. *Unlimited admission to Iraq's newly constructed 270,000 hole golf Course. Featuring: 1) A beginner's course with holes up to 30 feet in diameter. 2) An 83,000 sq. mile sand trap (largest in the world)! 3) A never ending challenge with new holes on course being constructed hourly. *NIGHTTIME CAMEL RIDES FOR TWO, PAST ROMANTIC ARABIAN OIL FIRES AVAILABLE AT DISCOUNTED PRICES! FROM $2150.00 (Dbl. Occ.) ---------------------------------------------------- Saddam Hussien calls up George Bush. "Mr. President," he says, "I must discuss peace with you." "To what do I owe this sudden change of heart?" asks Bush. "You see," explains Hussein, "Last night I had a dream. And in this dream I was in your capitol, and I looked up upon the tallest building, and I saw a flag which read "Allah is Great", and I knew that Allah wanted me to make peace." "Well, that's just great," said Bush, "You know, I had a dream last night as well. I dreamt that I was in YOUR capitol, and I too saw such a flag." "Really?!" said Hussein, very surprised, "And what did this flag say?" "I couldn't tell you," replied Bush, "I can't read hebrew." ---------------------------------------------------- From: bhuntley@contact.UUCP (Brian Huntley) Number 7 on the list of proposed peace terms in the Soviet-Iraq agreement is that the withdrawal be monitored by countries not directly involved in the anti-Iraq coalition. When that was read on the CBC news last night, a friend sitting next to me said: "Oh, good. Israel qualifies!". ---------------------------------------------------- (original: Rob Ullmann, ariel@relay.prime.com) ------- Anonymous note, dropped down a bunker ventilation shaft somewhere near Baghdad: Dear Saddam, We have your Army. If you ever want to see it again, put $200 billion in small bills in a truck (several trucks, actually) and send them on the road to Basra. We will find them. ---------------------------------------------------- From: kjp@ecn.purdue.edu (Kevin J Podsiadlik) Subject: How to scare Saddam Hussein One sure-fire way to put sheer terror into the heart of Saddam Hussein: Have George Bush make the following statement in his next State of the Union address: "Read my lips, no nuclear weapons against Iraq." Kevin Podsiadlik = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = Subject: Iraq vs. Canada I heard today that Iraq has developed a special weapon for use against the Canadian Navy. It's called a rust-seeking missile. -- a1040%mindlink@van-bc.uucp = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = From: flak@mcgp1.UUCP (Dan Flak) Subject: Saddam Hussein holding back According to the news services, Saddam Hussein stated that he has committed "only a fraction of his forces". (In other words, he's committing only those forces that are still operational). Not mine, my 17 year old son's. -- Dan Flak - McCaw Cellular Communications Inc., 201 Elliot Ave W., = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = From: donnam@palomar.sandiego.ncr.com (Donna Mitchell) Subject: Mrs. Saddam >From Tom Blair in the San Diego Union, January 20, 1991: What is Saddam Hussein's wife telling neighbors who ask why she's leaving the country? a) "We're having some remodeling done." b) "The exterminators are coming." c) "We're getting the carpets bombed." d) All of the above. = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = Subject: standard Iraqi bidding From: scott%ferrari.labs.tek.com@relay.cs.net An original: At my last bridge tournament most pairs played the standard American system. But one pair caused quite a stir with a new bidding system, standard Iraqi: whenever the opponents opened the bidding, they threw rocks at the next table. -- Scott Huddleston = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = From: dkrause@orion.oac.uci.edu (Doug Krause) Subject: Iraqi Career Moves Q: What is the best Iraqi job? A: Foreign Ambassador Douglas Krause University of California, Irvine Internet: dkrause@orion.oac.uci.edu = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = From: bhhardy@copper.ucs.indiana.edu (Barbara Helen Hardy) Subject: funny gulf quotes from CNN folks I SWEAR I heard these: "You can never tell who you are going to run into in a bomb shelter." "We've been told to stay inside...there are a few courageous people out there, or maybe some journalists...." Taking censorship too far: "According to the military, the weather has cleared...." Source: CNN, various days, various correspondants. = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = From: mcb@hpgrla.gr.hp.com (Michael Berry) Subject: Training Iraqui Pilots is Easier... Did you hear that it is twice as easy to train Iraqui fighter pilots? ...you only have to teach them to take off. = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = From: evans@decvax.dec.com Subject: Super Bowl Joke [ source unknown ] U.S. Intelligence sources have confirmed that as early as last October, Saddam Hussein planned to launch a SCUD missile attack on the Super Bowl. He knew it was the one site guaranteed NOT to have Patriots. ---------------------------------------------------- This political joke is from the book "From Beirut to Jerusalem," by Thomas Friedman. ----------------- A minister goes to the Syrian dictator Hafez Assad after a national election. Minister: I have excellent news, Mr. President! You won 98.6% of the vote in the election! Less than 2 percent of the people dissented! What more could you possibly want? Assad: Their names. ---------------------------------------------------- Brought back from the Sudan when it was a one-party dictatorship. A young man, going to "vote" for the first time in a national election, got nervous in the voting booth and mistakenly voted against the ruling party. When he told his father, the old man ran to the polling place to try to correct the error that would probably spell doom for the whole family. "Please, you must save us," he told the election officials in a panic, "can the error be changed?" "Don't worry," they replied, "it's already been taken care of." ---------------------------------------------------- (From the April 15, 1991 edition of Newsweek Magazine:) "I can say that anyone who, like me, has been educated in English public schools and served in the ranks of the British Army is quite at home in a Third World prison." British businessman ROGER COOPER, on being released last week after five years in an Iranian prison. ---------------------------------------------------- From: mitchell@MDI.COM (Bill Mitchell) Reminds me of something I overheard on a tactical radio in Vietnam: Voice #1: "We're taking enemy fire from the treeline!" Voice #2: "Those are friendlies in the treeline!" Voice #1: "Roger that. We're taking friendly fire from the treeline!" ---------------------------------------------------- French Army tanks have five gears: four in reverse, and one forwards - in case the enemy attacks from the rear. ---------------------------------------------------- The current shortages in Cuba do produce jokes: At the University of Havanna, some students and professors refer to the course on Marxism as science fiction. Others point out that Castro's tough it out slogan, "Socialism or Death" is a redundancy. ---------------------------------------------------- From: tomas@inmic.se (Tomas Lundstrom) I just got hold of a bunch of Eastern Europe jokes. For a while (i.e last year) it looked like these kind of jokes (mostly about the regime, KGB, the system etc...) were going out of date, but thanks (?) to the recent development in the USSR, they are quite fashionable again: - What can you get for a Dollar in Moscow ? - five years. - Intourist (USSR travel agency) advertisement: "Visit USSR before they visit you" - An elder estonian walks the streets of Tallinn when he sees a big crowd. It appears that a roof brick has fallen down and killed a man. The estonian sighs: - Woe, woe... we are so few estonians and now it's one less... - But sir, it was actually a russian ! says a spectator. - Damn it ! There are so many russians here in Estonia nowadays that there isn't even room for a brick to fall down ! The contest "Best political joke in the USSR" has been held. The winner, a factory worker from Minsk, got 25 years. The Czechoslovakian proof that the earth is round: 1945 the fascists were kicked out to the west. 1968 they came back from the east. A jew wants to leave the USSR. The clerk asks: - Why do you want to leave ? - I have two reasons. I'm afraid that if the Communism system is overthrown, there will be anti-semitism again... - But our system is so strong it'll never be overthrown !, says the clerk. - That's my second reason ... ---------------------------------------------------- phone jokes from Russia: Dial a number. "Hello, this is your local telephone station speaking. We are sorry to tell you but we are having a terrible fire here at the station. The fire cannot be controlled, it is spreading over telephone cables and will reach your house in 5 minutes. So, if you don't want to burn down your house, hurry up and take your telephone receiver and throw it into a bucket of cold water!" Sometimes it works, and people do throw their receivers into water. It is especially amusing to play this joke on the people whom you intend to visit later in the day. That way you can come and inspect the damage. ___________________________ "Hello, this is your local Zoo speaking. Do you like animals? We are experiencing severe problems with hot water. Would you be so kind as to allow us to bring our elephants over to your bathroom for a shower?" The most common response: "Well, sure, but my neighbour's bathroom is bigger and better equipped to handle elephants." *start* 17241 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 4 May 91 14:30:16 PDT (Saturday) Subject: Life 7.9 From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Reality is for people who can't handle Star Trek. ---------------------------------------------------- All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible. T. E. Lawrence _The Seven Pillars of Wisdom_ ---------------------------------------------------- While watching Channel 4 news last night (with the sound off, of course) I noticed they were displaying a graphic entitled "STATE ASSEMBLY PLAN" over a very patriotic picture of our state capitol building. The graphic read: -------------------------- | STATE ASSEMBLY PLAN | | | | - Do nothing | | until May | | | | - Tax the rich | -------------------------- This is the best thing I've seen come out of government in a long time... ---------------------------------------------------- Two American tourists are looking at the Niagara falls, one of them is from New York and the other one from Texas. The NY-guy says: "I bet not even you, in Texas, have something similar to that." "Well, no,", the Texas-guy says, "but we do have a man that could fix this leak in five minutes." ---------------------------------------------------- An American expedition is getting ready for going to Africa. The boss gathers his men, and tells them how to behave: "We have to be carefull of how we behave with those natives. Most important is, that we don't argue too much with them if it's not really necessary. For instance, if someone there tells you that Africa is bigger than Texas, don't bother enlightening him." ---------------------------------------------------- It seems that, in a fit of international awareness, some southern states were trying to make foreign language a high school requirement. One of the opposition, a depressingly stupid lady, stood up in a school board meeting and said "If English was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for me!" ---------------------------------------------------- A Muscovite asks her butcher for beef and is told there is none. She asks for chicken. None. Lamb? None. Pork? None. Veal? None. The shopper leaves and the butcher exclaims to his assistant, "What a terrific memory!" ---------------------------------------------------- Maybe not last words, but close: When Thoreau was dying someone (his aunt?) asked "Have you made your peace with God?" Thoreau answered "I am not aware that we have ever quarreled." ---------------------------------------------------- o What do you say to the banjo player in the three piece suit? Will the defendant please rise. o Why do some people take an instant aversion to banjo players? it saves time in the long run. ---------------------------------------------------- "Cathy! what do you want to be when you grow up?" "I want to be a nurse, sister." "Good, good. And you, Maggie?" "I want to be a teacher, sister." "Right on. How'bout you, Mary?" "I want to be a nun, sister." "Very good. Marie?" "I want to be a prostitute, sister." "A WHAT?" "A prostitute." "Good heavens! I thought you said - a protestant!!" ---------------------------------------------------- Last night I saw some Japanese tourists trying to locate the Southern Cross using a night-sky map. When they found it, all 3 of them whipped out their cameras and took a flash-illuminated photo of it. ---------------------------------------------------- Roberto had immigrated to New York from southern Italy late in the previous spring. Now, on the threshold of winter, he was experiencing his first really cold morning as he waited for his friend Giuseppi. Giuseppi was a second-generation American (subspecies: New Yorker), accustomed to the chill and humidity of the weather in the Northeast. Arriving, he and Roberto set off down the sidewalk to their respective jobs, each striding along with his hands buried in his pockets. Both men were usually talkative, but this particular morning, Giuseppi chatted alone. Other than an occasional grunt, Roberto declined to speak. Finally, feeling very uncomfortable, Giuseppi asked, "What is this that's with you, my friend Roberto? You aren't looking unhappy, you aren't drunk, but you won't even make friendly talk. Whattsa problem?" Replied Roberto: "It's-a cold! You want me freeze-a my hands?" ---------------------------------------------------- We tried to get rid of a very dead washing machine one time. It sat on the curb with a "free" sign on it for several days. When we put a "$50" sign on it, it disappeared that night! ---------------------------------------------------- Q: What the only thing wrong with Australia A: It's above sea level ---------------------------------------------------- In shock news today, Derryn Hinch was reported as having been shot, run over by a car, thrown out of a high building, and finally blown up with 3 kg of TNT. "This is obviously a job by someone with an extremely strong and deep-seated dislike of Derryn Hinch," said a police spokesman. "We are choosing our suspects with this fact in mind, and we will be talking to these people as soon as we can." Latest reports have indicated that police are seeking to interview the entire population of Australia. ---------------------------------------------------- The following story differs from the above in that it did actually happen. Three weeks ago $300,000 worth of damage was done to the ACTU's Trades Hall in Adelaide by a fire bomb thrown into an upper story window. Three days ago $5,000,000 worth of damage was done to the same building by an incendiary device thrown into the ground floor boardroom. When interviewed, ACTU local secretary Mr John Lesees muttered darkly "This is the work of someone with a grudge against the ACTU." Such an astonishing genius for the obvious is rare, nowadays. ---------------------------------------------------- Heard on '60 Minutes' 31 March: (from a National Party Senator in Queensland whose name escapes me now) The definition of recession is when your neighbour loses his job. The definition of depression is when you lose your job. The definition of recovery is when Paul Keating loses his job. ---------------------------------------------------- Saddam wakes up and looks up to the mirror above his bed: Saddam : Mirror Mirror who's the biggest SOB off all? Mirror : You are Saddam. Saddam then walks out to his office where all the offices are shivering with fear but when they see his smile they relax. The next morning the same. The next saddam walks out with a stunned look on his face the gaurds are terrified, one walks up to him scared he may be shot. Gaurd: Ssss addam whats wrong.... Saddam looks up with a puzzled look and asks who the hell is Paul Keating. [ask an Australian] ---------------------------------------------------- Paul Keating and his chauffeur were driving past a pig farm on a typical pollies' tour. Suddenly a pig ran in front of the car and was struck and killed by Keating's car. Keating told the chauffeur he had better inform the farmer that he had killed the pig. After about half an hour the chauffeur emerged from the farmstead looking quite bemused. Keating : "What took you so long?" Chauffeur : "Well I told the farmer about his pig and he shook my hand, the wife gave me a beer and cried for joy and the daughter was showering me with hugs and kisses!" Keating : "What did you say?" Chauffeur : "All I said was that I'm Paul Keating's chauffeur and I've just killed the PIG!" ---------------------------------------------------- I was in the post office today when a fellow walked in asking to post a letter to England. What transpired was funny enough to warrant writing down and follows as best I remember it. Man: I'd like to post a letter to England. Clerk: That'll be $1.20 M: $1.20? I thought it was $1.10! C: I'm afraid the prices have gone up. M: When did they go up? C: Oh, it must have been around December last year (it's now April). M: No, I'm sure it's only $1.10, they only charge me $1.10 at Dapto. C: Well, I'm afraid it's $1.20 M: Hrmph, I'm going to post this at Dapto (marches out the door in a huff) At this point I think to myself how on earth he's going to get to Dapto (15 km away) for 10 cents. Now this conversation was more than audible by everyone in the post office (me, three clerks and the man in question). The clerks now discuss amongst themselves the possibility that Dapto post office is undercharging and ring them to check. The Dapto post office charges $1.20 for mail to England! Well, it was funny at the time. ---------------------------------------------------- From Gary's collection: I use not only all the brains I have, but all I can borrow. --Woodrow Wilson Two men look out through the same bars; one sees mud, and one the stars. --Oscar Wilde A crisis is when you can't say, "Let's just forget the whole thing"--Ferguson Flying is the second greatest experience known to man. Landing is the first. If this saying did not exist, somebody would have invented it. Life is fraught with opportunities to keep your mouth shut. Predestination was doomed from the start. The death rate on Earth is: One per person. The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax--Einstein The zebra is chiefly used to illustrate the letter Z. There is nothing wrong with abstinence, in moderation. You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out, and in which your alarm clock goes off by going on. Football combines the two worst features of American life. It is violence punctuated by committee meetings--George Will The Best of Leaps--Scott Bakula You won't strain your eyes if you look at the bright side of things--Winston Churchill It is much easier to repent of sins that we have committed than to repent of those we intend to commit. Josh Billings I enjoyed the wax tadpole story. Do you think they package "bite the wax tadpole FREE" or "DIET bite the wax tadpole"? ---------------------------------------------------- The rest of this stuff is from postings sent out by Victor Schwartz SCHWARTZ_VICTOR@tandem.com ------------------------ What's orange, and sounds like a parrot? A carrot! ------------------------ All those who believe in telekinesis, raise my hand. (Thanx again to Ken Dorfman.) ------------------------ Think positive. Remember... Negative expectations yield negative results! Positive expectations yield negative results! ------------------------ "Pepper" the parrot, hired last fall for a TV commercial for Alascom, the long- distance telephone carrier for Alaska, actually only lip-synced his line because the sponsor thought Pepper sounded too human. The company wound up hiring a human actor who imitated a parrot's voice. (From "News of the Weird") ------------------------ The Oklahoma Supreme Court in December upheld the landslide victory by incumbent Frank Ogden III (91 percent) over Josh Evans. Evans had run on a campaign of being an "able lawyer and a living person," which he thought gave him an advantage over Ogden, who had died three months before the election. - From "News of the Weird" in a recent San Jose newspaper ------------------------ Delightful marketing! I saw a product on the market which is: "100 percent liquid cow manure, chemical-free, all natural, organic." Product name: "Wholly Cow" ------------------------ (Another Johnny Carson line, contributed by Dorothy Lustig:) Now here's something real odd that happened to me over the weekend. This was genuinely creepy. I wanted to get that new Time-Life book series. You know the one on "Strange, Unexplained Phenomena". I received my first book five minutes before I called in to order it. ------------------------ (A Johnny Carson joke, contributed by Dorothy Lustig at Tandem:) Last Thursday was the 112th anniversary of Albert Einstein's birth. It's kind of sad that a lot of the young people today don't know as much about Einstein as they should. They asked several hundred young people to finish the equation "E = MC ____ " Three out of four answered: "E = MC Hammer"! ------------------------ (A Jay Leno line, supplied by Dorothy Lustig at Tandem:) Despite the recent rains, the drought in California is so bad that crooks have been breaking into people's homes and draining the waterbeds! ------------------------ (Contributed by Tom Belligan at Tandem:) "I'll always remember this as the night that Michael Jordan and I combined to score 70 points." -- Chicago Bulls forward Stacey King after scoring 1 point in a game in which Jordan scored 69. ------------------------ (Contributed by Tom Belligan at Tandem:) "You're damn right I know where I am. I'm in Madison Square Garden getting beat up." -- Boxer Willie Pastrano to a concerned referee from the mat. ------------------------ (You say you feel like a cross between a teepee and a wigwam? Well, you're just two tents! Read the following item submitted by Tim Hutchinson. It might help you to relax!) As heard on Capital Radio driving to work the other day. This spring a camping equipment manufacturer in Cincinnati, Ohio who wanted to get rid of his surplus stock decided to run an ad campaign in the local newspaper. Drawing on that great man of English letters William Shakespeare the ad read: "Now is the discount of our winter tents." ------------------------ (Contributed by Jim Ellingsen:) There is so much sand in Northern Africa that if it were spread out it would completely cover the Sahara Desert. ------------------------ American Airlines recently introduced non-stop DC-10 service from San Jose Airport to Tokyo, Japan. (For those of you not from the local area, San Jose Airport is MUCH more convenient to most people in Silicon Valley, but long-haul non-stop flights normally require departure from San Francisco Airport.) Well many of the passengers on these recent American Airlines flights, including those who paid premium prices to be on the inaugural flight, were more than a little irritated when the plane stopped for almost an hour at the Oakland Airport. (To go from San Jose to Oakland on a DC-10, you barely have enough time to get your wheels off the ground!!!) It turns out that on WINDY DAYS, with a full load of passengers, the runway at San Jose Airport is not long enough to allow a DC-10 to take off with a full load of fuel. So the plane has to stop in Oakland to fill the tanks! ------------------------ (Remember the classic Woody Allen variant of the classic story? He related that when he was a little boy, someone very dear to him gave him a BULLET as a present. This bullet always served as a reminder of his love for this person, and he kept the bullet in his inside jacket pocket, next to his heart. One day, while walking down the street, he was suddenly STRUCK IN THE CHEST by a flying BIBLE! And if it hadn't been for that BULLET, he wouldn't be alive today! Well ... here's a recent variation on this story, straight from the San Jose News about a week ago:) "Calculator lets shooting victim count blessings" Knight-Ridder News Service DETROIT - Ice cream deliverer Kenneth McCarroll's pocket calculator was always handy for figuring customers' bill, but he never knew it was bulletproof. The calculator added years to his life on Tuesday afternoon, when McCarroll, an employee of a local dairy distributor, stopped his truck at a Detroit store. As he entered the truck's freezer to get $200 worth of drumsticks, popsicles and ice cream for the store, McCarroll saw a man lying halfway inside the freezer. The man, who may have fallen, fired a shot without saying a word. "I felt it hit," McCarroll, 40, said at his Dearborn, Mich., home Wednesday. "It knocked the heck out of me. ... I grabbed my stomach, ran into the store ..." Marine duty in Vietnam taught him to apply pressure to bullet wounds, so McCarroll clutched his stomach. The gunman escaped while McCarroll waited for police and emergency medical service. "I finally had the nerve to look at it," he said. "When I pulled my shirt up, the bullet fell to the floor. I searched my pocket, and my calculator was just mangled." The bullet - thought to be .32 caliber - ripped through his jacket and plowed through the metal front of the quarter-inch-thick calculator. The slug deflected before bursting through, searing a 1-inch black mark on McCarroll's belly. *start* 16735 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 10 May 91 13:50:07 PDT (Friday) Subject: Life 7.A From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- Q: What's the difference between Bigfoot and intelligent man? A: Bigfoot's been spotted a several times. ---------------------------------------------------- Two women who hadn't seen each other for a while met at the mall. One said to the other, "Agnes, it's been so long. I heard you even got married." "Yes," the second said, "I married a lawyer, and an honest man, too!" "Hmmm," said the first woman, "Isn't that bigamy?" ---------------------------------------------------- I heard this on Dave Broadfoot's monologue on Air Farce today: Q: How amny Canadians does it take to change a lightbulb? A: None. Canadians don't change lightbulbs, we accept them as they are. ---------------------------------------------------- Q: what's the best way to accelerate a Macintosh? A: 9.8 m/(s*s) ---------------------------------------------------- So I'm driving in today, and the INB plug for "let us save you money paying bills" came on the radio. They want to save you the cost of checks, stamps, and envelopes. "At INB we figure that you can pay up to thirty-nine cents or more on each bill. If you pay 20 bills each month, that's over one hundred dollars a year" I'm in a particular hurry to give these math majors my accounting business. Has anyone made use of this service? ---------------------------------------------------- Mechanic to customer : I'm afraid you have more of a problem than I anticipated Your battery needs a new car. Payment Plan : While on a shopping expedition, I mistakenly handed the salesperson my blood-donor card to pay for one of my purchases. He looked at it and then gave it back, saying "That's all right, lady. We still only want money." ---------------------------------------------------- Heard 11 Apr, 91 at 6:57 AM on radio station KKUP, Cupertino, CA: Host: Well, do you have any concluding statements, Marshall? Guest: No, I don't, Larry. Host: Then could you say something to last about three minutes? ---------------------------------------------------- From the Star Tribune, _Letters from readers_, April 9, 1991: (Some background -- a police investigation recently resulted in a bust in which a couple dozen postal employee were arrested for being involved with drugs or drug dealing "on the job". I assume this is original to the author, W. L. Gillies) Regarding the postal workers arrested for drugs in Minneapolis [MN] last week, I hope that the investigating team did not waste any time or money looking for speed or other amphetamines. ---------------------------------------------------- In response to an article from earlier in my collection, Peter Karras responded: there WAS some development into ejection seats for helicopters. they would fetch the pilot SIDEWAYS out of the chopper. ---------------------------------------------------- From: bostic@okeeffe.Berkeley.EDU (Keith Bostic) >From March 6th San Francisco Chronicle: "I've never taken drugs, so that's why I'm probably not a big Doors fan." Spike Lee expressing his deep admiration for Jim Morrison and the Doors, in US magazine. ---------------------------------------------------- Q: How do you spell boss backwards? A: Double S.O.B. ---------------------------------------------------- While out Looking For A Place To Hunt: (supposedly true) A carload of hunters, looking for a place to hunt, pulled into a farmers yard. The driver went up to the farmhouse to ask permission to hunt. The old farmer said, "Sure you can hunt, but would you do me a favor? That old mule standing over there is 20 years old and sick with cancer, but I don't have the heart to kill her. Would you do it for me?" The hunter said, "Sure," and headed for the car. While walking back, however, he decided to pull a trick on his hunting buddies. He got into the car and when they asked if the farmer had said OK, he said "No, we can't hunt here, but I'm going to teach that old cuss a lesson." With that, he rolled down his window, stuck his gun out and blasted the mule. As he exclaimed, "There, that will teach him!" a second shot rang out from the passenger side. And, one of his hunting buddies shouted, "I got the cow!" Copied from the Brownells Gunsmiths Newsletter who credits Larry Ahlman, Ahlman's, Rt. 1, Box 20, Morristown, MN 55052. ---------------------------------------------------- Mike Royko had a rather amusing article in August of 1988 regarding Phone Hucksters. There's this fellow called Robert Bulmash who says that they [the phone huckster] will be billed for any time used when they call him. If they persist, he takes them to small claims court. The article says that he has taken five small companies to court. Royko goes on to say that he's collected $120 here and there, but now and then he nails one. One time when he (Bulmash) was making a case against the Plan-O-Soft Water Conditioning Company, the Judge says, "Yeah! I was called twice during last night's ball game!" and awarded the guy 97 cents and $38 in court costs. Bulmash has started a company called Private Citizens Inc which puts together a mailing list (as of the writing, $15 if you want to join) of people who don't want to be called. If they are called, the telemarketer gets billed for time. I wish I had the date for the article, It's roughly August of 1988 in the Chicago Tribune. ---------------------------------------------------- From: kent@parc.xerox.com The latest in phone scams occurred this week in New York. employees with pagers received phone inquiries from 540 numbers, which are billed the same as 900 numbers. When the number is called, the customer is automatically charged $55.00. Employees from other companies around New York have also been hit by this scam. ---------------------------------------------------- I spotted the following in the New York Times last week: A friend of mine received a phone call. "Who is this?" a woman's voice answered. "Whom do you want to speak to?" my friend asked. "Did you say 'whom'?" the caller inqured after a somewhat startled pause. "Yes" my friend said. "I have the wrong number" the caller said. Then she hung up. ---------------------------------------------------- Answering machine messages: -------------------------- From: ken@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Ken Johnson) Before Louise (daughter, fourteen years) came to stay on Friday evening, my answering machine message said, in my voice: `This is 031-343 xxxx. Thank you for calling. I'm sorry, I can't come to the phone right now, etc. etc.' Now it says, in Michelangelo's voice: Hi, dudes, this is 031 343 xxxx. This is the Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles' secret underground hideaway. I'm afraid we're all out just now on a desperate mission to save the Planet from boring answering machine messages, but if you know what The Shredder has done to April O'Neill, or if you know where he is, or if you can think of a decent pizza recipe, just leave your name and number and we'll ring you right back. But don't say anything yet! Enemy agents may be listening. When the computer has checked they're not eavesdropping, it will make a bleeping noise and you can speak freely.' All in 28 seconds, too. -------------------------- The number you have reached, Seven. Six. Seven. One. Two. Three. Four. [Use your number here.] has not been disconnected and is still in service. Please leave a message at the sound of the tone. ---------------------------------------------------- Reportedly heard over the loudspeakers on airplanes: ==================================================== ``Ladies and gentlemen, the captain is preparing for the final descent. Please return your stewardess to her full, upright position for landing ``Please return your seat-backs and tray-tables to their upright and most uncomfortable positions.'' ``So that you don't embarrass yourself by falling on your face in the aisle, please remain in your seats until the plane comes to a complete stop at the terminal.'' ``On behalf of airline, we'd like to welcome you to Bora-Bora, but instead we'll welcome you to to Los Angeles.'' ``If you are seated next to a small child, or someone who is acting like a child, put on your oxygen mask first '' ``There is no smoking in the aisles or lavatories. If you are caught smoking in the lavatories or the aisle, you will be asked to leave the aircraft once we reach 35,000 feet.'' ``Please check the overhead compartments for any personal belongings or small children you may have brought on board.'' After reading to the safety rules to the passengers after takeoff: ``If you do not follow these rules we will be forced to ask you to leave.'' ``We hope you have enjoyed flying with AirCal today, but if you haven't, this has been PSA flight 99 to San Francisco.'' >From a PSA captain: ``We hear that AirCal and American are going to merge. They're going to call the new airline CalCan.'' ``The captain has located the airport, so we've begun our descent into San Diego.'' ``Welcome to San Diego The Captain is a much better flyer than he is a driver so it would be in your best interests to remain seated until we screech to a full stop at the gate.'' ---------------------------------------------------- Walking down the street I came upon a store front with a sign reading Ole Olsen's Chinese Laundry. Curious, I entered. I asked the old Chinese man behind the counter who Ole Olson was. He said that he was Ole Olsen. He then proceeded to tell me the story how he became Ole Olsen. When he came to this country in the old days, he was in a very long line at the department of immigration. He finally got near the front of the line and heard the immigration officer ask the fellow in front of him, "Name?" Ole Olsen, came the reply. Next was his turn. "Name?" So he told him his name, "Sam Ting." Ever since then he has been known as Ole Olsen. ---------------------------------------------------- From Risks From: jane@stratus.swdc.stratus.com (Jane Beckman) I've been meaning to post this for a while, as it is a perfect illustration of the hazards of a system that gets too dependant on computer programs. In 1989, Mongomery Ward had a sale of "discontinued, one-of-a-kind, and out- of-date merchandise." A fellow I was dating, who was a Wards employee, told me the story of where it had come from. Around 1985, Wards had reprogrammed their master inventory program. Somehow, the entry for the major distribution warehouse in Redding, California, was left out. One day, the trucks simply stopped coming. Nothing was brought into the warehouse, and nothing left. Paychecks for the employees, however, which were on a different system, kept coming. While this was baffling to the employees, they figured it was better not to make waves. (Rumor has it that they were afraid the warehouse had been phased out, and they had "forgotten" to lay them off, and figured it was better to stay employed.) They went to work every day, and moved boxes around the warehouse, and submitted timecards, for three years, until someone doing an audit finally wondered why major amounts of merchandise had simply disappeared. Tracing things back, the missing warehouse was finally re-found. They were then stuck with an entire warehouse full of white elephants--- merchandise that was three years out of date. Thus, Wards stores throughout California ended up with major amounts of discontinued merchandise to sell at deep discounts. Wards, being majorly embarrassed, tried to downplay how the merchandise was "found." Or, more specifically, why it had become lost in the first place. The store employees got a big chuckle over the warehouse employees being afraid to mention this oversight to the higher-ups, for fear of becoming unemployed. Many references to "like jobs with the government." Of course, the question is: is this the only case like this? Are there more places where an operator entry glitch has caused some function to simply disappear? Things like this happen when live people are accidentally classed as "dead," etc. What happens if someone types the wrong thing, and the local branch of your bank, or MacDonalds, or whatever, simply ceases to exist, to the central computer? Jane Beckman [jane@swdc.stratus.com] ---------------------------------------------------- From: marc@skypod.uucp (Marc Fournier) --------------------- The quack was selling a potion which he declared would make one live to a ripe old age. "Look at me," he shouted, "hale and hearty. I'm over three hundred years old." "Is he really as old as that?" asked a listener of the young assistant. "I can't say," replied the assistant, "I've only worked for him a hundred years." ------------------------' One man found the key to safe driving for his wife. He reminded her that if she had an accident, the newspapers would print her age with the police report. ------------------------- Before the plane took off, the flight attendant gave chewing gum to all the passengers. "This will keep your ears from popping when we attain a high altititude," she told them. After the plane landed, a worried-looking man came over to the flight attendant. "This was my first flight," he told her. "It was very nice, but now that it's over, could you tell me how to get this gum out of my ears?" ------------ The maid had just been discharged. Extracting five dollars from her purse, she threw it to Fido, the family dog. When asked why by her former employer, she answered, "I never forget a friend. This was for helping me clean the dishes all this time." ------------ A little boy who had spent a week at a dude ranch told his mother excitedly: "Mom, I even saw a man who makes horses." "Are you sure?" asked his mother. "Yes," he replied. "He had the horse nearly finished when I saw him, and he was just nailing on the feet." ---------------------------------------------------- From cybapunk@tornado.gen.nz (Phil Ross) ------------------------------ A very proud mother phoned up a big Sunday newspaper and reported that she'd given birth to seven children. The girl at the desk didn't quite catch the message and asked: "Would you repeat that?" "Not if I can help it," the woman replied. ------------------------------ Excuse me, sire," said the down and out tramp to the millionaire he accosted in the street. "I've trudged over 100 miles to meet you because I've heard that you are the world's kindest and most generous man." "Indeed," said the millionaire. "And will you be going back the same way?" "I expect so, sir." "Then do me a favour, will you? Just deny that rumor when you get back." ------------------------------ A little girl called Esme Pipple was taken by her father to a seance. When they arrived, the medium asked Esme is there was anybody she would like to contact and speak to. "I'd like to speak to my Granny," said Esme. "Certainly, my dear," said the medium, going into a deep trance. He began to moan and talk in a strange voice, saying "This is your Granny speaking from Heaven... a wonderful place in the skies. Is there anything you'd like to ask me, my child?" "Yes, Granny," said Esme. "What are you doing in Heaven when you're not even dead yet?" ------------------------------ POLICEMAN : Here! Why are you trying to cross the road in this dangerous spot? Can't you see there's a zebra crossing only forty yards away? PEDESTRIAN: Well, I hope the poor beast is having better luck than I am. ------------------------------ The solicitor was reading the late Wilberforce Toeworthy's will, and had just reached the final paragraph. In a deep voice he intoned : "I always said I'd remember my dear wife, Gertrude, and mention her in my will. So - hello there, Gertie!" ------------------------------ 1ST ESKIMO : That's strange. I installed radiators in my kayak and it immediately went up in flames! How do you explain that? 2ND ESKIMO : Simple, my friend. You can't hope to have your kayak and heat it too! (Cake and eat it too) ---------------------------------------------------- *start* 16849 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 17 May 91 11:50:24 PDT (Friday) Subject: Life 7.B From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- God invented mothers because he couln't be every where at once And God invented guilt because mothers could be every where at once. ---------------------------------------------------- Disclaimer: I used to be sane, but I got better. ---------------------------------------------------- One of my American friends commented about soccer: We guys don't play this game much. You have to use your head a lot in this game, you know........ ---------------------------------------------------- "Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it." -- Donald Knuth ---------------------------------------------------- Canada Post doesn't really charge 32 cents for a stamp. It's 2 cents for postage and 30 cents for storage. -- Gerald Regan, Cabinet Minister, 12/31/83 Financial Post ---------------------------------------------------- Rather remeniscent of a line by Tom Lehrer, from the introduction to the song "It Makes a Fellow Proud to be a Soldier," which goes something to the effect of: "All kidding about the army aside, one must admire the way the military has followed the democratic ideal to its logical conclusion, in that they forbid discrimination not only on the basis of race, creed, and color, but on the basis of......ability." ---------------------------------------------------- Overheard in the regimental mess: First soldier: "Pass me the chocolate pudding, would you?" Second soldier: "No way, Jose!" First soldier: "Whyever not?" Second soldier: "It's against regulations to help another soldier to dessert!" ---------------------------------------------------- There are four wheels and eight men on a fire engine. Four and eight makes 12. There are 12 inches in a ruler. Queen Elizabeth is a ruler. The Queen Elizabeth was a ship. Ships sail in the sea. The sea has fish. Fish have fins. The Finns are always fighting the Russians. Russians are known as "red". Fire engines are always rushin', and that's why they're red. ---------------------------------------------------- It's not whether you win or lose It's whether *I* win or lose. ---------------------------------------------------- #A LUCKY MACINTOSH USER had the Talking Moose program (Addison-Wesley Publishing Co.) working on his Macintosh when burglars broke into his home while he was away. Presumably thinking there was someone in the home, the burglars left the room with the Macintosh alone. --Seattle Times 4/30 ---------------------------------------------------- When the husband came home from his job, he found his wife crying. -"Your mother insulted me, very much.", she sobbed. -"My mother ? How could she do that when she's on a vacation on the other side of the world ?" -"I know. But this morning a letter addressed to you arrived. I opened it, because I was curious." -"And ?" -"At the end of the letter it was written: PS. Dear Catherine, when you've read this letter, don't forget to give it to my son." ---------------------------------------------------- -"I dont know how to make my wife stop buying all these gloves." -"Buy her a diamond ring." ---------------------------------------------------- They were married, but since the argument they had a few days earlier, they hadn't been talking to each other. Instead they were giving each other written notes. One evening he gave her a paper where it said: "Wake me up tomorrow morning at 6 am." The next morning he woke up and saw that it was 9 o'clock. Naturally he got very angry, but as he turned around he found a note on his pillow saying: "Wake up, it's 6 o'clock !!!" ---------------------------------------------------- The police arrested 2 tramps, one for drinking battery fluid, the other for eating a firework. What did they do with them? Well, they charged one, and let the other one off. ---------------------------------------------------- Did you hear about the new breakfast special, it's called the LAPD Egg? It's one egg, with the hell beaten out of it. Did you hear about the guy who got caught beating somebody up? He was charged with impersonating an officer. ---------------------------------------------------- In a very small alley two trucks driving in opposite directions meet. As the drivers are equally stubborn, none of them wants to reverse. They angrily look one at the other. Finally, one of them picks up a newspaper and starts reading. The other one says: -"Will you, please, when you've finished the paper, give it to me ?" ---------------------------------------------------- From England: A student starts his summer job at IBM. The manager tells him his first task is to sweep the floor. "But", he protests, "I can't do that, I'm a Coventry Poly Computer Science Student !" "Well in that case" says the manager, "Your first task is to learn how to use the broom" ------------------------- What does the poly graduate say to the university graduate ? "Guilty, M'lud" ------------------------- Q. Did you hear about the Newcastle uni grad student who successfully enrolled on a post grad course at cov poly? A. No,neither has anybody............ ---------------------------------------------------- From: chiyo@tharr.UUCP (Douglas Spencer) I heard this joke on a BBC Radio 4 Documentary on Finland, on 15/4/91. Two Finnish gentlemen decide they are going to do some drinking. They lay on some supplies and shut themselves away in a room. They drink solidly for three days. Then, one of them turns to the other to say "Do you think that perhaps we should *eat* something ?" The other one replies "Did we come here to drink, or to talk ?" ---------------------------------------------------- From: monson@cayman.AMD.COM (Steve Monson) Here's another my father told me many long years ago... A truck driver is hauling a load of new automobiles one night, when his headlights go out. He tries to fix them, but to no avail. He can't afford to spend the night without driving, since the cars must be delivered the next day. It's a lonely country road, so there's no one even coming along whom he can ask for help. Finally he figures out how to solve his problem: he turns on the headlights of the car over the truck cab. The lights shine down on the road, and he proceeds to haul his load. Some time later, a car approaches. As the truck and car get about fifty yards apart, the car suddenly swerves off the road into the ditch. The trucker pulls to a stop and runs back to see what made the car driver do such a thing. He asks the motorist, "Are you all right? What happened? Why did you run off the road so suddenly?" The driver looks at the trucker and says, "I saw these headlights coming at me, and thought, 'If it's that high, how _wide_ is it?!?'" ---------------------------------------------------- A BYU coed was driving on the road from school to home when she saw a man trying to hitch a ride. She picked him up and they got to talking. "What do you do?" "I recently escaped from prison for having killed my wife." "Oh, does that mean you are available?" ---------------------------------------------------- unclear on the concept: The Met Office is now using fax machines to give local authorities early warning of severe weather. The Hampshire emergency planning office said: "Rather than having to rely on telephones, for instance, where lines are at risk in bad weather, we are encouraging the wider use of fax machines." {News courtesy of the Reading Evening Post} ---------------------------------------------------- This came from the "Abort, Retry, Fail" section of PC Magazine. A guy was following a set of instructions to format a floppy diskette. Step 1 : Put diskette in disk drive. The man puts the disk in the drive... Step 2 : Close the door. The man gets up and, with a confused look on his face, walks over to the door to his office and closes it. ---------------------------------------------------- An office technician got a call from a user. The user told the tech that her computer was not working. She described the problem and the tech concluded that the computer needed to be brought in and serviced. He told her to "Unplug the power cord and bring it up here and I will fix it." About fifteen minutes later she shows up at his door with the power cord in her hand. ---------------------------------------------------- Our computer (a Unisys thing) has periodic maintanence done on it once a month. This particular morning the Unisys techies were stumped. The computer was on but nothing happened on the console (Keep in mind that this computer has 150 terminals on it). After three hours, at $96/hour, one of the techs turned up the brightness on the monitor. ---------------------------------------------------- When running QEMM on a 386/MS-DOS machine and the program does a protection violation, it reports: General exception fault #13 at ABCD:1234 (T)erminate Program, (R)eboot, or (T)ry to continue? _Try_ to continue? Hmmm... ---------------------------------------------------- -- A CI (Computer Illiterate) reads in the manual that when you save something, it creates a file. The person saves what he/she is doing, then gets up, walks over to the file cabinet, and flips through the files, trying to find the new one. -- A CI who follows baseball reads that his computer has 640K memory. The CI then spends five or so hours trying to figure out how the computer can pitch a strike-out. -- A CI refuses to use a laser printer because he/she fears it will burn a hole through the paper. -- A CI buys a home computer with a hard disk. He/she unpacks the computer, sets it up, then calls the place he/she bought it from, complaining that there were no disks in the box at all, hard or floppy. ---------------------------------------------------- Another story, I used to work in a PC retail store that specialized in Apples. Apparently, when the Apple III came out, it had a small problem with ventilation and when the chips would overheat, they would pop partway out of their sockets. When people called up to complain that their computer had broke, we would tell them to pick it up about an inch off the desk and drop it. ---------------------------------------------------- A person has just gotten a new printer. She plugs in the printer, walks across the room, tries to print something with no connection to the printer, and then wonders why it doesn't print. Person turns on the computer without a keyboard plugged in. When she turns on the computer, the computer finds out that there is no keyboard attached and it gives a "Keyboard Error" message. She then asks "Why did it give me a keyboard error? There isn't even a keyboard attached? ---------------------------------------------------- While trying to diagnose a problem over the phone I told the user to type out his autoexec.bat file. He said it said "File not found". I told him to do a dir. I asked him if he saw autoexec.bat listed. He said, "Well it says autoexec, then there's some spaces, but no dot, and then it says bat." I said type this in "type autoexec.bat". Again he got "File not found". I asked him to tell me exactly what he typed. He said, "I typed just what you told me: `type autoexecdotbat'. ---------------------------------------------------- from the Wall St Journal 4/26/91... Satirist Argus Hamilton says the U.S. is still trying to drive Saddam Hussein nuts: "Just today, his wife received a dozen roses signed, 'You were wonderful last night. Love, Frank Sinatra.' " ---------------------------------------------------- Taken from the Houston Chronicle Page 2A from Thursday, April 18, 1991 In response to Lenore Skenazy, who asked Advertising Age readers to come up with bumper stickers for Saddam Hussien: "My Army imvaded Kuwait and all I got was this lousy bumper sticker" "Quit honking! I'm retreating as fast as I can" "Dukakis-Bentsen in '92" "If you don't like the way I reign get out of small, neighboring countries" "Lose Kuwait now! Ask me how" "If you're rich and own a uranium refining plant, I'm single" "If you can read this you're probably with the 1st Airborne" "Bomb me, I need the insurance" ---------------------------------------------------- Paraphrased from Sen. Robt. Dole from a recent appearance on "This Week": Q: What's the difference between John Sununu and the Iraqi Air Force? A: John Sununu flies more often. ---------------------------------------------------- Q: What was Saddam's secret weapon against the allied land offensive? A: The thousands of Iraqi military who surrendered and slowed the advance of the allied troops... ---------------------------------------------------- The problem with the Iraqi army is that they were using Russian defense tactics: 1. Engage the enemy. 2. Draw him into your territory. 3. Wait until winter sets in. ---------------------------------------------------- Paraphrased from one of the major news anchors reporting on the Iraqi's having arrived for the cease-fire talks: "Once again, the Iraqi's were well-dressed. It seems they have better tailors than military tactics." ---------------------------------------------------- On the contrary, SCUD jokes are very popular, though mostly silly (I wonder if staying too long in a sealed room affects one's brain?). Some examples: Where does Saddam hide his missiles? In Scudinavia! What kind of car does he drive? A Scudillac! What should one do before crossing a street in Ramat-Gan [the town which had the most hits]? Look to the right, to the left, and upwards! (From a stand-up comic on TV): "They told us the chances of being hit by a SCUD are like winning the big prize in the state lottery. But they forgot to tell us there are going to be three drawings every night!" ---------------------------------------------------- Saw this on a car wash billboard in Indianapolis: IRAQI AIR FORCE MOTTO: I CAME I SAW IRAN ---------------------------------------------------- What does Sadaam Hussein and General Custer have in common? They both want to know where the hell are those Tomahawks are coming from! ---------------------------------------------------- Sign seen on the Marines' first division command center, Saudi Arabia: MARINES: When you care to send the very best. ---------------------------------------------------- The Iraqi verions of the classic army regulations can be summarized as: If it doesn't move, hide behind it. If it does move, surrender to it. ---------------------------------------------------- Safer as Allied troup than US driver (Jan - Feb 1991) Allied KIA's 182 People killed in US traffic accidents during same period of time 4,440 (source: US News and World Report) ---------------------------------------------------- Selections from stuff collected by Dale Fraser ----------------- Q. How many members of the Iraqi Joint Chiefs of Staff does it take to screw in a light bulb? A. Four. One to screw in the light bulb, one to find out the actual results, one to tell Saddam what Saddam wants to hear, and finally one to be shot for it. Q. How many members of the coalition forces does it take to screw in a light bulb? A. We are not prepared to comment on specific numbers at this time. Q: What's the difference between the Iraqi army and a loaf of bread? A: You can make soldiers out of the bread! ----------------- From: okunewck@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu (Phil OKunewick) "Do you surrender?" "I HAVE NOT YET BEGUN TO FIGHT!" "Yeah, we noticed. That's why we asked." ----------------- From: grazier@maxwell.physics.purdue.edu (Kevin R. Grazier) Q: What should Iraq get for its air defense system? A: A refund. ----------------- From: bdh@uchicago (Brian D. Howard) WHat do you call an Iraqui tank that has been painted pink? -Thats a mosque. What do you call the white one with the red crescent? -Thats a hospital. How do you tell the Iraqui Hero? -He's the one that waited 30 seconds before he surrendered. -------------- From: cirby@vaxb.acs.unt.edu (((((C.Irby))))) Q: How many Iraqi soldiers does it take to change a light bulb? A: I give up! -------------- From: jmartin@ntmtv.UUCP (Jeff Martin) This just in from Radio Bagdad: "Help! My army has fallen..... ...and it can't get up" ---------------------------------------------------- *start* 15586 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 8 Jun 91 18:24:43 PDT (Saturday) Subject: Life 7.C From: Cate3 To: Cate3 Selections from Spaf's collection: ---------------------------------------------------- While you're at the shore, take a bucket of paint and a brush, paint the backs of all the boats, and really get the folks annoyed at you as you leave no stern untoned. ---------------------------------------------------- But what if it is true? Lynn Persoff was sentenced for contempt of court in August for violating a court order (on a divorce settlement) not to bad-mouth her ex-husband, Myron. At a black-tie social event in Boca Raton, Fla., a community in which both are well-known socialites, she called him a "moron." ---------------------------------------------------- Where do you want to go to jail In January, Bernard Sexton, 26, of Cambridge, Ill., withdrew his guilty plea to misdemeanor alcohol charges and pleaded instead to a related felony, good for an 18-month sentence. Reason: The county jail where misdemeanants are sent bans smoking, but the state prison permits it. ---------------------------------------------------- One way to take care of the world's population The IRS has reported the "disappearance" of more than 8 million American children during the late 1980s, "caused" by tax reform legislation. That number is the total of all children claimed as dependents of beneficiaries of child care tax credits before 1987 but who were never again claimed once the IRS started requiring proof that such children existed. ---------------------------------------------------- let him die? Brian Kernodle, 21, walked into a Key West hospital emergency room in January with two hand grenades strapped to his body and demanded medical care. After being promised care, he disarmed himself, explaining that he thought his approach was the best way to ensure that he would get attended to in the busy hospital. ---------------------------------------------------- It seems that in Florida, when EMS was just beginning many years ago, there was an ER doctor on the med channels who was talking to paramedics who were trying to restar a guy's heart, to no avail. As the medics kept trying, the MD ordered every drug in the drug box into the patient, in the hopes that *SOMETHING* would work. When his last option was exhausted, in desperation, he asked "Is there a phone book there?" The surprised medics answered affirmatively, and the MD asked "Do you know this guy's name?" The bewildered medics again answered yes. "OK," the doc said, "Look up his name and CROSS IT OUT..." ---------------------------------------------------- From: cj@modernlvr.wpd.sgi.com (C J Silverio) Newsgroups: talk.bizarre durrell@umaxc.weeg.uiowa.edu (Cyberpixie) writes: Remember those Choose Your Own Adventure books you used to see? I want to use that style to write technical manuals for products in development. "If this engineering decision is made, turn to page 40. Otherwise, turn to page 62." ---------------------------------------------------- This story came by way of Ian Smith and Keith Edwards . Date: Sat, 06 Apr 91 13:08:00 -0800 From: "S. Ansell" Hi, My name is Seth, I'm a grad student in color science at RIT in Rochester N.Y., an area in which the national weather bureau states that we receive an average of 62 sunny days per year. One of the many advantages of this, is that, unlike people who live in California, *we don't have to worry about getting skin cancer.* Anyhow, I was cleaning out my mail files and found this... I thought someone out there might appreciate it. HEAVY BOOTS About 6-7 years ago, I was in a philosophy class at the University of Wisconsin, Madison (good science/engineering school) and the teaching assistant was explaining Descartes. He was trying to show how things don't always happen the way we think they will and explained that, while a pen always falls when you drop it on Earth, it would just float away if you let go of it on the Moon. My jaw dropped a little. I blurted "What?!" Looking around the room, I saw that only my friend Mark and one other student looked confused by the TA's statement. The other 17 people just looked at me like "What's your problem?" "But a pen would fall if you dropped it on the Moon, just more slowly." I protested. "No it wouldn't." the TA explained calmly, "because you're too far away from the Earth's gravity." Think. Think. Aha! "You saw the APOLLO astronauts walking around on the Moon, didn't you?" I countered, "why didn't they float away?" "Because they were wearing heavy boots." he responded, as if this made perfect sense (remember, this is a Philosophy TA who's had plenty of logic classes). By then I realized that we were each living in totally different worlds, and did not speak each others language, so I gave up. As we left the room, my friend Mark was raging. "My God! How can all those people be so stupid?" I tried to be understanding. "Mark, they knew this stuff at one time, but it's not part of their basic view of the world, so they've forgotten it. Most people could probably make the same mistake." To prove my point, we went back to our dorm room and began randomly selecting names from the campus phone book. We called about 30 people and asked each this question: 1. If you're standing on the Moon holding a pen, and you let go, will it a) float away, b) float where it is, or c) fall to the ground? About 47 percent got this question correct. Of the ones who got it wrong, we asked the obvious follow-up question: 2. You've seen films of the APOLLO astronauts walking around on the Moon, why didn't they fall off? About 20 percent of the people changed their answer to the first question when they heard this one! But the most amazing part was that about half of them confidently answered, "Because they were wearing heavy boots." ---------------------------------------------------- In article <2550@odin.cs.hw.ac.uk>, sfleming@cs.hw.ac.uk (Stewart T. Fleming) writes: A couple of literature-related topics this month : The Director of one of Britain's radio stations has cancelled the serialization of Tolstoy's epic "War and Peace". Ten weeks of the series had been broadcast before it was realised that at the current rate of progress, it would take approximately 70 years to complete the book. As compensation, the station is now running a competition to win a video commentary on the book. This comes in the form of a 3-video set. In Russian. Without subtitles. It could be worse. One of Japan's daily newspapers has been serialising a novel for the past 20 years. It is expected to be published in a 40-volume hardback set "shortly". Another BBC Radio programme (Radio 4's "Strange Tales") has revealed a mysterious 250-year-old scandal involving the statue commemorating William Shakespeare in Westminster Abbey. Sharp-eyed readers will note that the inscription on the statue appears to be Prospero's famous speech (which I have conveniently forgotten. "...The cloud-cupp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, Shall dissolve and leave not a wreck behind..." ?) from "The Tempest" (generally taken to be W.S.'s last play), but in fact it has been altered quite intentionally. The difference has been noted for some while now, but the significance has only recently become apparent. The chairman of the Baconian Society, Mr Thomas Brockenham, claims that the inscription actually contains a secret code, which when decoded using a cipher published in 1625 (!), reveals the claim that "The Tempest" was actually written by Francis Bacon. More interestingly, the statue was erected by public subscription by several prominent pupils of Bacon, including Alexander Pope. ---------------------------------------------------- Subject: Do you know calculus? From: lvron@earth.lerc.nasa.gov (Ronald E. Graham) The differential of hi over ho is (ho d hi - hi d ho) over ho ho. Subject: Local college offers Star Trek anthropology course Newsgroups: rec.arts.startrek.info An article in the Thursday,February 7 Free Lance-Star (Fredericksburg, VA) by Michael Zitz was about an undergraduate anthropology course examining episodes of Star Trek (TOS) for their anthropological relevance. The instructor, Prof. Margaret Huber, had noticed that students who seemed bored and listless during a review session for physical anthropology perked up when she referred to an old Star Trek episode to make a point. The course Anthropology 472: Anthology of Star Trek analyzes Star Trek as a mirror of contemporary American culture and American attitudes about other cultures. There is no dramatic criticism, film criticism, or literary criticism involved, the focus is to teach the class to look at the episodes with an anthropologist's eye. The 22 episodes chosen for this class all demonstrate how American popular culture has led to a mixture of fact and fiction. One example used is "The Paradise Syndrome", in which Captain Kirk is stranded on an Earth-like planet that has produced a civilization similar to that of Native Americans before the intrusion of the white man. The anthropological point of this episode is that American popular culture portrays all Native Americans as Plains Indians, and that has resulted in a mish-mash of dwellings, dress, rites, and symbols in the Star Trek episode. The instructor cautions that this is not a course for those students looking for an easy A but a real anthropology course that uses material that many of today's college students are already familiar with to examine anthropological theory. ---------------------------------------------------- These are quotes Dan Quayle is suppose to have made: Mars is essentially in the same orbit... somewhat the same distance from the Sun, which is very important. We have seen pictures where there are canals, we believe, and water. If there is water, that means there is oxygen. If oxygen, that means we can breathe. -- Vice President Dan Quayle Hawaii has always been a very pivotal role in the Pacific. It is IN the Pacific. It is a part of the United States that is an island that is right here. -- Vice President Dan Quayle, Hawaii, September 1989 We expect them [Salvadoran officials] to work toward the elimination of human rights. -- Vice President Dan Quayle I believe we are on an irreversible trend toward more freedom and democracy - but that could change. -- Vice President Dan Quayle If we do not succeed, then we run the risk of failure. -- Vice President Dan Quayle, to the Phoenix Republican Forum, March 1990 Target prices? How that works? I know quite a bit about farm policy. I come from Indiana, which is a farm state. Deficiency payments - which are the key - that is what gets money into the farmer's hands. We got loan, uh, rates, we got target, uh, prices, uh, I have worked very closely with my senior colleague, (Indiana Sen.) Richard Lugar, making sure that the farmers of Indiana are taken care of. -- Vice President Dan Quayle on being asked to define the term "target prices." Quayle's press secretary then cut short the press conference, after two minutes and 30 seconds. May our nation continue to be the beakon of hope to the world. -- The Quayle's 1989 Christmas card. [Not a beacon of literacy, though.] Verbosity leads to unclear, inarticulate things. -- Vice President Dan Quayle The real question for 1988 is whether we're going to go forward to tomorrow or past to the -- to the back! -- Vice President Dan Quayle We will invest in our people, quality education, job opportunity, family, neighborhood, and yes, a thing we call America. -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 1988 This election is about who's going to be the next President of the United States! -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 1988 ---------------------------------------------------- Contributed by: mark thompson (mark@megatek.UUCP) True fact (humor in the financial press): A very large government contractor (VLGC) is involved in a proxy fight with a questionable outside investor (QOI). The QOI published the following in a large number of big city newspapers (BCNs). It quotes statements from the VLGC's annual statement and the QOI's translation... quote [VLGC] says Our translation We characterize 1989 as a transitional year which prepared us for strong 1989 was a bad year financial performance in 1990 and beyond. [VLGC]'s sales increased slightly when Sales are down $541 million. adjusted for completion of the But they're up if you count program. business we don't have anymore. A third initiative centers on our efforts to attract commercial aircraft sub- contracting work to our facilities in We still haven't found a Georgia. We are continuing discussions replacement business for the with potential customers and expect to . build this base significantly. The write-offs are expected to cover excess The write-offs will be even costs to completion after estimated pricing higher unless the govern- adjustments and contract changes. ment agrees to rewrite the contracts. Absent the write-off on the air- Profit margins are down. But craft modification program margins also they are up if you don't improved for the technology services group. count the business we lost money on. The stock buy-back program to recover from the market share equivalent to those issued We stopped buying back shares to the ESOP was suspended in 1989, pending because we were running out clarification of the timing of cash require- of money. ments related to the 1989 write-offs. There are hundreds of ongoing programs Our funded backlog keeps going throughout [VLGC] that form a solid business down: base. Many of the programs extend well into the future. Ordinarily, because of the method 1986 $9.7 billion of funding of government programs, they do 1987 $8.4 billion not appear in the backlog beyond the current 1988 $7.4 billion year. 1989 $7.1 billion Early this year, we agreed with the customer that work on future phases of this program We got fired. will be performed by another supplier. Regarding the , several factors have occasioned design and schedule difficulties in developing the aircraft. Significant among these factors was an expectation of a high We bid on the wrong plane. degree of commonality with the which turned out not to be attainable due to other performance characteristics required by the Navy. *start* 14395 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 17 Jun 91 11:45:30 PDT (Monday) Subject: Life 7.D From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- { 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. Selections from Stuff collected by Gunter Ahrendt : ---------------------------------------------------- From: s65327@ursa.calvin.edu (John A. Bolhuis) Subject: Why did the chicken cross the road? --Famous Peoples Conjectures-- [Why did the chicken cross the road?] Walt Whitman: To cluck the song of itself. Jack Nicholson: 'Cause it (censored) wanted to. That's the (censored) reason. John Paul Jones: It has not yet begun to cross! Ralph Waldo Emerson: It didn't cross the road; it transcended it. Aristotle: To actualize its potential. Roseanne Barr: Urrrrrp. What chicken? Pyrrho the Skeptic: What road? William Shakespeare: I don't know why, but methinks I could rattle off a hundred-line soliloquy without much ado. Thomas Paine: Out of common sense. TS Eliot: Weialala leia / Wallala leialala. Groucho Marx: Chicken? What's all this talk about chicken? Why, I had an uncle who thought he was a chicken. My aunt almost divorced him, but we needed the eggs. Karl Marx: To escape the bourgeois middle-class struggle. Mark Twain: The news of its crossing has been greatly exaggerated. Mr. Scott: 'Cos ma wee transporter beam was na functioning proprely. Ah canna work miracles, captain! Robert Frost: To cross the road less traveled by. Sigmund Freud: The chicken obviously was female and obviously interpreted the pole on which the crosswalk sign was mounted as a phallic symbol of which she was envious, selbstverstaendlich. William Wordsworth: To have something to recollect in tranquility. Caesar: To come, to see, to conquer. Bill the Cat: Oop Ack. Rene Descartes: It had sufficient reason to believe it was dreaming anyway. Leda: Are you sure it wasn't Zeus dressed up as a chicken? He's into that kind of thing, you know. Zsa Zsa Gabor: It probably crossed to get a better look at my legs, which thank goodness are good, dahling. George Bush: To face a kinder, gentler thousand points of headlights. Epicurus: For fun. TS Eliot revisited: Do I dare to cross the road? Zeno of Elea: To prove it could never reach the other side. Emily Dickinson: Because it could not stop for death. Howard Cosell: It may very well have been one of the most astonishing events to grace the annals of history. An historic, unprecedented avian biped with the temerity to attempt such an herculean achievement formerly relegated to homo sapien pedestrians is truly a remarkable occurrence. Gregor Mendel: To get various strains of roads. Sisyphus: Was it pushing a rock, too? Salvador Dali: The Fish. Lee Iacocca: It found a better car, which was on the other side of the road. Henry David Thoreau: To live deliberately ... and suck all the marrow out of life Mae West: I invited it to come up and see me sometime. Joseph Conrad: Mistah Chicken, he dead. Gerald R. Ford: It probably fell from an airplane and couldn't stop its forward momentum. Gottfried Von Leibniz: In this best possible world, the road was made for it to cross. Candide: To cultivate its garden. George Washington: Actually it crossed the Delaware with me back in 1776. But most history books don't reveal that I bunked with a birdie during the duration. Dylan Thomas: To not go (sic) gentle into that good night. David Hume: Out of custom and habit. John Milton: To justify the ways of God to men. James Tiberius Kirk: To boldly go where no chicken has gone before. Ernest Hemingway: To die. In the rain. Gilligan: The traffic started getting rough; the chicken had to cross. If not for the plumage of its peerless tail the chicken would be lost. The chicken would be lost! Thomas Dequincy: Because it ran out of opium. Socrates: To pick up some hemlock at the corner druggist. The Sphinx: You tell me. --- Reprinted with permission from the December, 1989 issue of the Calvin College Dialogue Note regarding original material contained therein: This collection of Chicken Jokes was dreamed up by the staff members of the Calvin College Dialogue last year. Now I was a staff member, and I wrote some of the jokes myself, but the others (Steve Mulder, Heather Gemmen, et.al.) wrote many of them as well. What I am trying to say is that this is original material, but it was created by a group of weirdos, not just one weirdo. -John Bolhuis ---------------------------------------------------- Atheism is a non-prophet organization. Clones are people two. "During the earthquake, Bill's zip code changed three times before he got out of bed. Question on government questionnaire : "Have you ever committed suicide?" If we don't get some money in our bank account soon, we'll be arrested for impersonating the government. Mechanic to customer : I'm afraid you have more of a problem than I anticipated Your battery needs a new car. ---------------------------------------------------- A woman was reporting her car as stolen, and mentioned that there was a car phone in it. The policeman taking the report, called the phone, and told the guy that answered that he had read the ad in the newspaper and wanted to buy the car. They arranged to meet, and the thief was arrested. ---------------------------------------------------- The head doctors in an insane asylum had a meeting and decided that one of their patients was potentially well. So they decide to test him and take him to the movies. When they get to the movie theatre, there are signs of wet paint pointing to the benches. The doctors just sit down, but the patient puts a newspaper down first and then sits down. The doctors get all excited cause they think maybe he's in touch w/ reality now. So they ask him, " Why did you put the newspaper down first?" He answers, "So I'd be higher and have a better view." ---------------------------------------------------- Mum went to pick my (half-) sister up from Kindergarten yesterday, and the kid came out with pieces of sticky-tape on her upper and lower lips. "Look Mum, Lip-stick!" ---------------------------------------------------- -"Do I get a guarantee, if I buy this car ?" -"Oh, yes, we guarantee it's a car." ---------------------------------------------------- The cyclist, passing a pedestran crossing, runs into a man, and they both fall down. -"Geez, are you lucky." The cyclist says. -"What do you mean by lucky ?" The pedestrian angrily asks. "I got hurt really bad." -"Ah, you're lucky because I recently lost my license. I usually drive a bus." ---------------------------------------------------- A Newfoundlander was accused of purse snatching. He decided to represent himself in court rather than hire a lawyer. The first question he asked the lady on the witness stand was "Did you actually SEE my face when I took your purse?" ---------------------------------------------------- The CENSUS TAKER knocked on the door of a backwoods shack. An old timer came out, asking what he wanted "The President has sent us across the country to find out how many people live in the United States," the man replied. "I'm sorry you came all the way out here to ask me," said the hillbilly, "cause I ain't got the faintest idea." ---------------------------------------------------- Payment Plan : While on a shopping expedition, I mistakenly handed the salesperson my blood-donor card to pay for one of my purchases. He looked at it and then gave it back, saying "That's all right, lady. We still only want money." ---------------------------------------------------- I definitely think we're in trouble. I just saw an ad for a new movie sequel called... "The Never-Ending Story 2" ---------------------------------------------------- Sergei Yevshin, a coal miner on strike in the Ukraine was quoted in this weekend's The European [newspaper] as saying: "We watched with envy on television as American soldiers gave out packets of Marlboro cigarettes to Iraqi prisoners of war. Many of us have to work an entire shift underground to afford one packet of Marlboro. I want to surrender to the Americans." ---------------------------------------------------- He was prosecuted. The judge asked him "Don't you need a lawyer ?" "No, I don't need any, I'm going to tell the truth." ---------------------------------------------------- After successfully passing the bar exam, a man opened his own law office. He was sitting idle at his desk when his secretary announced that a Mr. Jones had arrived to see him. "Show him right in!" our lawyer replied. As Mr. Jones was being ushered in our lawyer had an idea. He quickly picks up the phone and shouts into it "..and you tell them that we won't accept less then fifty thousand dollars, and don't even call me until you agree to that amount!" Slamming the phone down he stood up and greeted Mr. Jones; "Good Morning, Mr. Jones, what can I do for you?" "I'm from the phone company" Mr. Jones replied, "I'm here to connect your phone." ---------------------------------------------------- While visiting Iowa State University this week, Dan Quayle observed that the reason for low voter turnout is the difficulty in getting to the poles. Said the Vice President: "Even in this modern age of rapid transit, it can take several days to get to either pole -- North or South." ---------------------------------------------------- So there were these two cows, chatting over the fence between their fields. The first cow said, "I tell you, this mad-cow-disease is really pretty scary. They say it is spreading fast; I heard it hit some cows down on the Johnson Farm." The other cow replies, "Hell, I ain't worried, it don't affect us ducks." ---------------------------------------------------- Three blokes die and go to heaven and queue to meet St. Peter. StP Hi, what's your name? Pete Pete. StP Hi, Pete. Tell me, when you died, how much were you earning? Pete 120K StP Wow! Tell me, Pete, what were you doing to earn that kind of money? Pete I was a lawyer. StP That's great. Come on in. ( To 2nd bloke. ) Hi, what's your name? Rog Rog. StP Hi, Rog. Tell me, when you died, how much were you earning? Rog 60K. StP Hey, that's great! Tell me, Rog, what did you do for a crust? Rog I was an accountant. StP That's very good. Come on in. ( To 3rd bloke. ) Hi, what's your name? John John. StP Hi, John. Tell me, John, how much were you earning when you died? John About $13,000. StP Hey, that's fantastic, John! Tell me, what instrument did you play? ---------------------------------------------------- Real Engineers... Real Engineers consider themselves well dressed if their socks match Real Engineers buy their spouses a set of matched screw- drivers for their birthday. Real Engineers wear moustaches or beards for "efficiency". Not because they're lazy. Real engineers have a non-technial vocbulary of 800 words. Real Engineers think a "biting wit" is their fox terrier. Real Engineers know the second law of thermodynamics - but not their own shirt size. Real Engineers repair their own cameras, telephones, tele- visions, watches, and automatic transmissions. Real Engineers say "It's 70 degrees Farenheit, 25 degrees Celius, and 298 degrees Kelvin" and all you say is "Isn't it a nice day" Real Engineers give you the feeling you're having a con- versation with a dail tone or busy signal. Real Engineers wear badges so they don't forget who they are. Sometimes a note is attached saying "Don't offer me a ride today. I drove my own car". Real Engineers' politics run towards acquiring a parking space with their name on it and an office with a window. Real Engineers know the "ABC's of Infrared" from A to B. Real Engineers rotate their tires for laughs. Real Engineers will make four sets of drawings (with seven revisions) before making a bird bath. Real Engineers' briefcases contain a Philips screwdriver, a copy of "Quantum Physics", and a half of a peanut butter sandwich. Real Engineers don't find the above at all funny. *start* 15545 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 25 Jul 91 17:56:38 PDT (Thursday) Subject: Life 7.E From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- "TV is a medium (pause) because it is neither rare or well done." Ernie Kovacs ---------------------------------------------------- Q: Why don't art students play hide and seek? A: Because nobody wants to look for them. ---------------------------------------------------- I remember one mechanical engineer. When he stopped to think you could practically smell the wood burning ---------------------------------------------------- musician jokes: Q1: What's the difference between a trampoline and a viola? Q2: What is the definition of a minor second? Q3: What are burning oboes good for? Q4: Why are bassoons better than oboes? A1: You take off your shoes before you jump on the trampoline. A2: Two oboes playing in unison. A3: Lighting bassoons on fire. A4: They burn longer. ---------------------------------------------------- Student Bloopers: ---------------- A hamlet is a little pig. A gargoyle is seen on church towers and people's necks. Faith is a quality which enables us to believe what we know to be untrue. Chalk and sand can always be seperated by flirtation The commandment, "Thou shalt not commit adultery," means that you should not put water in milk, or cheat in any way similar. The locusts were the chief plague in Egypt. They ate all the first-born. Joseph was so straight that Pharaoh made a ruler of him. If David had one fault, it was a slight tendency to adultery. The wise men brought gifts of gold and frankfurters. John the Baptist was beheaded with the Ax of the Apostles The three wise men were Winken, Blinken, and Nod. ---------------------------------------------------- MATH AND ALCOHOL DON'T MIX Please, don't drink and derive. Mathematicians Against Drunk Deriving ---------------------------------------------------- Long ago, the Scots devised a fearsome battle tactic. As the Scots neared their enemies, they would take cats, swing them 'round and round above their heads. Then the cats would be sent sailing through the air and land, clawing and biting, among the Scot's foes. This was very effective. Word got out of this fearsome stratagem, and soon just the sound of the cats, howling and screeming as they were whirled over the heads of the Scotsmen, was enough to send even battle-hardened foes into full retreat. But the Scots began to run out of cats. So they invented the Scottish bagpipe as a substitute. And now you know ... the rest of the story. ;-) ---------------------------------------------------- Fortune's graffito of the week (or maybe even month): Don't Write On Walls! (and underneath) You want I should type? ---------------------------------------------------- (Thanx to Jim Ellingsen for providing this quote, and a reminder of this WONDERFUL book ... MUST reading for any chocoholic with a sense of humor.) As with most fine things, chocolate has its season. There is a simple memory aid that you can use to determine whether it is the correct time to order chocolate dishes: any month whose name contains the letter A, E, or U is the proper time for chocolate. -- Sandra Boynton, "Chocolate: The Consuming Passion" ---------------------------------------------------- With more than 12 billion catalogs being mailed annually, it's little wonder that marketers are playing fast and loose with mailing lists. In one particularly cruel move, the proprietors of a chocolate catalog purchased the mailing list of a weight-loss organization. Chocolate sales rose almost immediately, but the weight-loss group wised up and now keeps it clients' names to itself. ---------------------------------------------------- If dreaming you are a muffler causes you to wake up exhausted, does dreaming that you are a wheel rim cause you to awaken still tired? ---------------------------------------------------- (Another item from "News of the Weird":) An Austin, Texas, grand jury indicted Michael Taylor, 25, last May for registering to vote under 37 different names of dead people. Taylor denied bad motives: "I wasn't going to use it for voting. It was just to be doing something. I had some problems in my life." (Indeed, none of the 37 had voted in the March 1990 primary.) ---------------------------------------------------- From: rubin@majorhavoc.apple.com (Owen Rubin) I have to add the following sign to your list: This sign is seen on several freeways around the S.F. Bay Area: Speed Enforced By Aircraft (small picture of a plane) Makes me wonder what the pilot is going to do if I'm caught speeding? Do they use F-16's? I can just imagine the Calif Hiway Patrol saying something like: There is a speeder, lets shoot him down!!!!! From: rubin@majorhavoc.apple.com (Owen Rubin) A while back you posted a few strange traffic signs, to which I replied about "speed enforced by aircraft". Well, I was in Vancouver, Canada this past weekend and saw two more to add to your collection. The signs read: |------------| | PLAYGROUND | | | | X X | | X | | X X | | | | Stop when | | Occupied | |------------| |------------| | SCHOOL | | | | X X | | X | | X X | | | | Stop when | | Occupied | |------------| It was a rather large 'X', obviously meaning crosswalk (its a universal symbol used alot in Canada for crosswalk signs). But to a visitor, the "X" was not at all obvious. It looked like one of our railroad crossing X's, but with no letters. It was also a light grey color on a white sign. SO the sign reads to me that if the school or playground are occupied, you should stop. That could keep you there a LONG time. ---------------------------------------------------- A major corporation bought a Cray to use in R&D. On a tour of the department, a executive remarked that it was a lot of money for such a small machine. The engineer countered that it did calculations 100 times faster than their old machine, allowing them to things they only used to dream of before. Impressed, the executive remarked it probably calculate this huge spreasheet of his in under a second. Sadly, the engineer informed his boss that Lotus didn't make a verious of 1-2-3 for the Cray. At this, the executive remarked: "What do mean, its not PC-compatible?" ---------------------------------------------------- Helmut Kohl and his top ministers are in an important meeting when one of the aides comes in and whispers in Helmut's ear that he is wanted on the phone. Kohl excuses himself, and comes back ten minutes later looking very sad and shocked. - What's wrong Helmut? asks one of the ministers. - It's a bad day for my family, says he, I've just heard that my father died this morning. Naturally everyone is very sympathetic, but Kohl suggest they go on with the meeting anyway. Half an hour later Kohl has go leave for another phone call, and when he comes back again, he manages to look even more upset than before. - What's wrong now Helmut? - This is trully a bad day for my family, he replies, That was my brother on the phone, and HIS father has died too! ---------------------------------------------------- Here is a list of the ways professors here at the American University grade their final exams: DEPT OF STATISTICS: - All grades are plotted along the normal bell curve. DEPT OF PSYCHOLOGY: - Students are asked to blot ink in their exam books, close them and turn them in. The professor opens the books and assigns the first grade that comes to mind. DEPT OF HISTORY: - All students get the same grade they got last year. DEPT OF RELEGION: - Grade is determined by God. DEPT OF PHILOSOPHY: - What is a grade? LAW SCHOOL: - Students are asked to defend their position of why they should receive an A. DEPT OF MATHEMATICS: - Grades are variable. DEPT OF LOGIC: - If and only if the student is present for the final and the student has accumulated a passing grade then the student will receive an A else the student will not receive an A. DEPT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE: - Random number generator determines grade. MUSIC DEPARTMENT: - Each student must figure out his grade by listening to the instructor play the corresponding note (+ and - would be sharp and flat respectively). DEPT OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION: - Everybody gets an A. ---------------------------------------------------- From: f88-som@nada.kth.se (Sead Omerov) -"It's unbeliavable how the number of cars is increasing." A driver sadly says to his friend. -"Yes, really, you could say: As soon as you park you car besides another car and turn your back on them, they've made a baby." A police officer stops a man driving in the opposite direction in a one way street. -"Didn't you see the arrow ?" -"Arrow ?" the driver, obviously all saused, replies,"I didn't even see the indians." On a street, where the speed is limited to 30mph the police stops a driver. -"So then. Not only have you been driving too fast, you've been overtaking where it was not allowed. Your lights don't work, your tyres all completely worn out... This is surely going to cost you a lot. What's your name ?" -"Schtrodzuwskibladssmurtow Vocgelghfstulmfph." -"Hmmmm...eh...well, I'll let you go this time...but don't do it again." A doctor is talking to a car mechanic: -"Your debit several times more per hour then we get paid for medical caring." -"Yea, but you see, doc, you have always the same model, it hasn't changed since Adam; but we have to keep up to date with new models coming every month." ---------------------------------------------------- HAMLET (Condensed to three minutes) by Adam MacNaughton. (as sung by Michael Carthy to the tune Mason's Apron) There was a king nodding in his garden all alone When his brother in his ear poured a little bit of henbane Stole his brother's crown and his money and his widow But the dead king walked and got his son and said "Now listen kiddo, I've been killed and it's your duty to take revenge on Claudius, Kill him quick and clean and tell the nation what a fraud he is." The kid says, "Right, I'll do it but I'll have to play it crafty, So that no one will suspect me I'll kid on that I'm a dafty" So for all except Horatio, and he counts him as a friend, Hamlet, that's the kid, he kids on he's round the bend And because he's not yet willing for obligatory killing He tries to make his uncle think he's tuppence off a shilling. Takes a rise out of Polonius, treats poor Ophelia vile, Tells Rosencranz and Guildenstern that Denmark's blooded bile Till a troupe of travelling actors like seven eighty four Arrive to do a special one night gig in Elsinore. Hamlet, Hamlet, acting balmy Hamlet, Hamlet, loves his mommy Hamlet, Hamlet hesitating He wonders if the ghost's a fake and that is why he's waiting So Hamlet wrote a scene for the players to enact So Horatio and him could watch to see if Claudius cracked The play was called "The Mousetrap," not the one that's running now, And sure enough, the king walked out before the scene was through So Hamlet's got the proof his uncle gave his dad the dose, The only problem being now that Claudius knows he knows, So while Hamlet tells his mother her new husband's not a fit man Uncle Claude takes out a contract with the English king as hit man. Then when Hamlet killed Polonius, the concealed corpus delecti Was the the king's excuse to send for an English hempen necktie With Rosencranz and Guildenstern to make quite sure he got there But Hamlet jumped the boat and put the finger straight on that pair. When Laertes heard his dad was killed in the bedroom of the heiress He came running back to Elsinore tout-suite hot foot from Paris When Ophelia heard her dad's killed by the man she was to marry After saying it with flowers she committed hari-kari. Hamlet, Hamlet no messin' Hamlet, Hamlet learned his lesson Hamlet, Hamlet Yorick's crust Convinced him all men good and bad at last must come to dust. Then Laertes lost his cool and was demanding retribution, The king said keep your head and I'll supply you a solution So the king arranged a swordfight for the interested parties With a blunted sword for Hamlet and a sharp sword for Laertes And to to make double sure (the old belt-and-braces line) He fixed up a poisoned sword-tip and a poisoned cup of wine The poisoned sword got Hamlet but Laertes went and fluffed it Because he got stabbed himself and he confessed before he snuffed it. Then Hamlet's mummy drank the wine and as her face turned blue, Hamlet said, "I think this king's a baddie through and through." "Incestuous murderous damned Dane," he said to be precise Then made up for hesitating once by killing Claudius twice. He stabbed him with his knife and forced the wine between his lips Then he said, "The rest is silence," and he cashed in all his chips. They fired a volley over him that shook the topmost rafter And then Fortinbras, knee-deep in Danes, lived happy ever after. Hamlet, Hamlet, end of story Hamlet, Hamlet, very gory Hamlet, Hamlet, I'm on my way And if you thought that was confusing you should read the bloody play. - David ---------------------------------------------------- From: "Dean Gottehrer" A California couple discovered the wife was pregnant, but the family simply couldn't afford more children. They looked around and found an excellent Hispanic family to adopt the child. Then...they found out she was going to have twins. Fortunately, a family of Arab Americans agreed to adopt the other child. Twin healthy boys were born and passed along to the families, who named them Juan and Amal. The biological parents kept in close touch with the adoptive parents in a very amicable relationships. One day, Juan's family sent a picture of the youth in his baseball uniform. The biological mother was so proud of her son. She said to her husband "He is so handsome! I wish we had a picture like this of our other son, too." He replied "Dear, they are twins. When you've seen Juan you've seen Amal." ---------------------------------------------------- From: cms2839@isc.rit.edu (a.stranger) ------------------------------------------------------------ When it's really cold out I like to stand outside and watch all the smokers pass out because they don't know when they're finished exhaling. ------------------------------------------------------------ "I've been smoking 5 packs a day for 10 years and my lung feels fine!" (singular, not a typo)--------------------------^ ------------------------------------------------------------ Okay, here's one in a Singapore newspaper some time ago: (offending to smokers) When you light up, you are not really the one smoking. The cigarette is smoking .... you are just the sucker at the other end ! ------------------------------------------------------------ "I don't mind you smoking, it's when I'm breathing that it bothers me". *start* 17034 00071 UU @00045 01536 ftffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff @Sender: Henry Cate III:OSBU North:Xerox Date: 6 Aug 91 20:45:57 PDT (Tuesday) Subject: Life 7.F From: Cate3 To: Cate3 ---------------------------------------------------- What's the difference between Canada and the U.S.A.? The U.S.A. has George Bush, Johnny Cash, Bob Hope, and Stevie Wonder. And Canada has Brian Mulroney, No Cash, No Hope... No Wonder! ---------------------------------------------------- Q: You've got Paul Keating, Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussein and 2 bullets. What are you going to do? A: Shoot Keating twice. ---------------------------------------------------- I originally heard it in NZ some years ago during an english tour against the all-blacks(or something like that) I've made it more topical though. And in case anyone wonders about it, I dont like rugby, but live in a house full of rugby fans. The Queenslanders had come down to Sydney to play the second State of Origin rugby game. They had been doing well, so Mal (Meninga) and Wally (Lewis), told the rest of the team they could go down to the pub, and they would play the game out for them. Well, come half-time, the Q`landers are leading 36-0, so Mal says to Wally, "You can go down the pub as well, I'll finish up here and meet you there later". So Wally leaves. After the Match, down at the pub, Wally asks Mal, "How did it go?" "Not good," replied Mal, "We won 40-30." "Why did you let them get so close?", asked Wally. "Well, I didn't have a choice, I was sent off 5 minutes into the second half". ---------------------------------------------------- Blackadder is a TV show, Blackadder quotes: "I wanted to see a war fought SO badly" "Well, you've come to the right place. A war hasn't been fought THIS badly since King Otto the Incredibly Stupid ordered 8000 viking helmets with the horns on the INside." Lord Melchit: Lord Blackadder. Our foremost cartographers have given us a map of the area you'll be traversing. BA: But it's blank! LM: Yes, they'd like you to fill it in as you go. BA: I thought it was common maratime practise to have a crew. Capt Rum: Well, opinion on the matter is divided m'Lord. All the other captains say it is. I say it isn't. ---------------------------------------------------- Another story that does the rounds here - I've no idea how true it is or if it's an UL - this guy was sitting an exam in Trinity College here (old college, bout 400 years old). In the middle of the exam, he called a porter and requested his pint of al