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donhenry@rentgrow4.ultranet.com (Asmith) Sun, 16 Jul 1995 21:55:46 GMT
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This weekend, a couple of weeks after uninstalling O/S2 Warp, which never ran
properly on my machine thanks to IRQ's and poor IBM tech support, I discovered
that some OS/2 files remained on my hard drive, specifically a OS/2 Multimedia
file directory. I delited it. As I always do after I delete a file or
directory, I ran DEFRAG, SCANDISK, and MSAV- WIN. When I ran Antivirus in the
Windows environment, my system froze up after ancountering a file called COM2.
Upon closer exploration, I discovered that two files, without extentions, COM2
and COM3, were placed in my c:\ root directory on the same date and time as my
uninstall of OS/2.
Today I called IBM in vain for answers. After explaining to their rather
unknowledgable support person that I tried to delete these files trying the
DEL, DELTREE, and changing the file attributes by using the ATTRIB commands,
all without success, she suggested that I contact Microsoft, as she was
unfamiliar with these files. However, it did seem as though files unique to
OS/2, specifically TEDIT.HLP, CDFS.IFS, and TEDIT.HLP were also placed in the
c:\ root directory by OS/2. I was able to successfully remove these files. I
called Microsoft, and their technician was also unfamiliar with these file
names., and he said that most likely the COM2 & COM 3 files causing this
problem were somehow related to the uninstall of OS/2, as he had no idea what
they were.
Again, these seemingly useless files are somehow freezing my system when I run
MSAV for Windows. I can run MSAV in DOS with no problems. When I try to view
the attributes of these files within File Manager, my system again freezes.
After all the nightmares I went through with OS/ 2 (now off my system for
good). and anticipating Windows '95, any suggestions you could put on Usenet
in response to this post would be appreciated. - Thanks, Art
--------------------------------------------------------------
redmond+@cs.cmu.edu (Redmond English) 17 Jul 1995 12:43:09 GMT
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<...stuff about files COM 2 and COM3 being undeletable snipped...>
Hello,
I don't know if this will work on these specific files, but I find
the easiest way to remove files with bogus names is to use the '?'
wildcard where ever an oddity occurs. eg. to remove 'xyz 123. qq' I
would type 'del xyz?123.?qq'
Perhaps 'del CO???' might do the trick?
In a pinch, I use the norton sector editor to hack the names to
something more acceptable to DOS. This has never failed for me so far.
Red/.
-----------------------------------
!07/11 PDP a ni deppart m'I !pleH
(1) Alexander the Great was a great general.
(2) Great generals are forewarned.
(3) Forewarned is forearmed.
(4) Four is an even number.
(5) Four is certainly an odd number of arms for a man to have.
(6) The only number that is both even and odd is infinity.
Therefore, Alexander the Great had an infinite number of arms.
(1) Everything depends.
(2) Nothing is always.
(3) Everything is sometimes.
$100 invested at 7% interest for 100 years will become $100,000, at
which time it will be worth absolutely nothing.
-- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love"
101 USES FOR A DEAD MICROPROCESSOR
(1) Scarecrow for centipedes
(2) Dead cat brush
(3) Hair barrettes
(4) Cleats
(5) Self-piercing earrings
(6) Fungus trellis
(7) False eyelashes
(8) Prosthetic dog claws
.
.
.
(99) Window garden harrow (pulled behind Tonka tractors)
(100) Killer velcro
101. Currency
186,282 miles per second:
It isn't just a good idea, it's the law!
$3,000,000
355/113 -- Not the famous irrational number PI, but an incredible
simulation!
43rd Law of Computing:
Anything that can go wr
fortune: Segmentation violation -- Core dumped
77. HO HUM -- The Redundant
------- (7) This hexagram refers to a situation of extreme
--- --- (8) boredom. Your programs always bomb off. Your wife
------- (7) smells bad. Your children have hives. You are working
---O--- (6) on an accounting system, when you want to develop
---X--- (9) the GREAT AMERICAN COMPILER. You give up hot dates
--- --- (8) to nurse sick computers. What you need now is sex.
Nine in the second place means:
The yellow bird approaches the malt shop. Misfortune.
Six in the third place means:
In former times men built altars to honor the Internal
Revenue Service. Great Dragons! Are you in trouble!
99 blocks of crud on the disk,
99 blocks of crud!
You patch a bug, and dump it again:
100 blocks of crud on the disk!
100 blocks of crud on the disk,
100 blocks of crud!
You patch a bug, and dump it again:
101 blocks of crud on the disk! ...
A baby is an alimentary canal with a loud voice at one end and no
responsibility at the other.
A bachelor is a selfish, undeserving guy who has cheated some woman
out of a divorce.
-- Don Quinn
A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining
and wants it back the minute it begins to rain.
-- Mark Twain
A billion here, a couple of billion there -- first thing you know it
adds up to be real money.
-- Everett McKinley Dirksen
A bird in the bush usually has a friend in there with him.
A bird in the hand is worth what it will bring.
A bore is someone who persists in holding his own views after we have
enlightened him with ours.
A budget is just a method of worrying before you spend money, as well
as afterward.
A candidate is a person who gets money from the rich and votes from the
poor to protect them from each other.
A celebrity is a person who is known for his well-knownness.
A chubby man with a white beard and a red suit will approach you soon.
Avoid him. He's a Commie.
A city is a large community where people are lonesome together
-- Herbert Prochnow
A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody
wants to read.
-- Mark Twain
A closed mouth gathers no foot.
A computer, to print out a fact,
Will divide, multiply, and subtract.
But this output can be
No more than debris,
If the input was short of exact.
-- Gigo
A conclusion is simply the place where someone got tired of thinking.
A CONS is an object which cares.
-- Bernie Greenberg.
A countryman between two lawyers is like a fish between two cats.
-- Ben Franklin
A crusader's wife slipped from the garrison
And had an affair with a Saracen.
She was not oversexed,
Or jealous or vexed,
She just wanted to make a comparison.
A day for firm decisions!!!!! Or is it?
A day without sunshine is like night.
A diplomat is a man who can convince his wife she'd look stout in a
fur coat.
A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that
you will look forward to the trip.
A disciple of another sect once came to Drescher as he was
eating his morning meal. "I would like to give you this personality
test", said the outsider, "because I want you to be happy."
Drescher took the paper that was offered him and put it into
the toaster -- "I wish the toaster to be happy too".
A diva who specializes in risqu'e arias is an off-coloratura soprano ...
A doctor, an architect, and a computer scientist were arguing
about whose profession was the oldest. In the course of their
arguments, they got all the way back to the Garden of Eden, whereupon
the doctor said, "The medical profession is clearly the oldest, because
Eve was made from Adam's rib, as the story goes, and that was a simply
incredible surgical feat."
The architect did not agree. He said, "But if you look at the
Garden itself, in the beginning there was chaos and void, and out of
that, the Garden and the world were created. So God must have been an
architect."
The computer scientist, who had listened to all of this said,
"Yes, but where do you think the chaos came from?"
A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of.
-- Ogden Nash
A dozen, a gross, and a score,
Plus three times the square root of four,
Divided by seven,
Plus five time eleven,
Equals nine squared plus zero, no more.
A famous Lisp Hacker noticed an Undergraduate sitting in front of a
Xerox 1108, trying to edit a complex Klone network via a browser.
Wanting to help, the Hacker clicked one of the nodes in the network
with the mouse, and asked "what do you see?" Very earnestly, the
Undergraduate replied "I see a cursor." The Hacker then quickly pressed
the boot toggle at the back of the keyboard, while simultaneously
hitting the Undergraduate over the head with a thick Interlisp Manual.
The Undergraduate was then Enlightened.
A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the
subject.
-- Winston Churchill
A fool must now and then be right by chance.
A fool's brain digests philosophy into folly, science into
superstition, and art into pedantry. Hence University education.
-- G. B. Shaw
A fool-proof method for sculpting an elephant: first, get a huge block
of marble; then you chip away everything that doesn't look like an
elephant.
A formal parsing algorithm should not always be used.
-- D. Gries
A gleekzorp without a tornpee is like a quop without a fertsneet (sort
of).
A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely
rearranging their prejudices.
-- William James
A lack of leadership is no substitute for inaction.
A lady with one of her ears applied
To an open keyhole heard, inside,
Two female gossips in converse free --
The subject engaging them was she.
"I think", said one, "and my husband thinks
That she's a prying, inquisitive minx!"
As soon as no more of it she could hear
The lady, indignant, removed her ear.
"I will not stay," she said with a pout,
"To hear my character lied about!"
-- Gopete Sherany
A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming is
not worth knowing.
A language that doesn't have everything is actually easier to program
in than some that do.
-- Dennis M. Ritchie
A large number of installed systems work by fiat. That is, they work
by being declared to work.
-- Anatol Holt
A Law of Computer Programming:
Make it possible for programmers to write in English and you
will find the programmers cannot write in English.
A limerick packs laughs anatomical
Into space that is quite economical.
But the good ones I've seen
So seldom are clean,
And the clean ones so seldom are comical.
A LISP programmer knows the value of everything, but the cost of
nothing.
A long-forgotten loved one will appear soon. Buy the negatives at any
price.
A lot of people I know believe in positive thinking, and so do I. I
believe everything positively stinks.
-- Lew Col
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"
A man said to the Universe: "Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the Universe, "the fact has not created in me a
sense of obligation."
-- Stephen Crane
A man wrapped up in himself makes a very small package.
A mathematician is a machine for converting coffee into theorems.
A musician of more ambition than talent composed an elegy at
the death of composer Edward MacDowell. She played the elegy for the
pianist Josef Hoffman, then asked his opinion. "Well, it's quite
nice," he replied, but don't you think it would be better if ..."
"If what?" asked the composer.
"If ... if you had died and MacDowell had written the elegy?"
A new dramatist of the absurd
Has a voice that will shortly be heard.
I learn from my spies
He's about to devise
An unprintable three-letter word.
A new koan:
If you have some ice cream, I will give it to you.
If you have no ice cream, I will take it away from you.
It is an ice cream koan.
A new supply of round tuits has arrived and are available from Mary.
Anyone who has been putting off work until they got a "round tuit" now
has no excuse for further procrastination.
A nuclear war can ruin your whole day.
A penny saved is ridiculous.
A person is just about as big as the things that make them angry.
A physicist is an atom's way of knowing about atoms.
-- George Wald
A pig is a jolly companion,
Boar, sow, barrow, or gilt --
A pig is a pal, who'll boost your morale,
Though mountains may topple and tilt.
When they've blackballed, bamboozled, and burned you,
When they've turned on you, Tory and Whig,
Though you may be thrown over by Tabby and Rover,
You'll never go wrong with a pig, a pig,
You'll never go wrong with a pig!
-- Thomas Pynchon, "Gravity's Rainbow"
A Plan for the Improvement of English Spelling
by Mark Twain
For example, in Year 1 that useless letter "c" would be dropped
to be replased either by "k" or "s", and likewise "x" would no longer
be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which "c" would be retained
would be the "ch" formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2
might reform "w" spelling, so that "which" and "one" would take the
same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish "y" replasing it with
"i" and Iear 4 might fiks the "g/j" anomali wonse and for all.
Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear
with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12
or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants.
Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi
ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz
ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli.
Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud
hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld.
A priest asked: What is Fate, Master?
And he answered:
It is that which gives a beast of burden its reason for existence.
It is that which men in former times had to bear upon their backs.
It is that which has caused nations to build byways from City to City
upon which carts and coaches pass, and alongside which inns have come
to be built to stave off Hunger, Thirst and Weariness.
And that is Fate? said the priest.
Fate ... I thought you said Freight, responded the Master.
That's all right, said the priest. I wanted to know what Freight was
too.
-- Kehlog Albran, "The Profit"
A priest was walking along the cliffs at Dover when he came
upon two locals pulling another man ashore on the end of a rope.
"That's what I like to see", said the priest, "A man helping his fellow
man".
As he was walking away, one local remarked to the other, "Well,
he sure doesn't know the first thing about shark fishing."
A professor is one who talks in someone else's sleep.
"A programmer is a person who passes as an exacting expert on the basis
of being able to turn out, after innumerable punching, an infinite
series of incomprehensive answers calculated with micrometric
precisions from vague assumptions based on debatable figures taken from
inconclusive documents and carried out on instruments of problematical
accuracy by persons of dubious reliability and questionable mentality
for the avowed purpose of annoying and confounding a hopelessly
defenseless department that was unfortunate enough to ask for the
information in the first place."
-- IEEE Grid newsmagazine
A psychiatrist is a person who will give you expensive answers that
your wife will give you for free.
A real patriot is the fellow who gets a parking ticket and rejoices
that the system works.
A real person has two reasons for doing anything ... a good reason and
the real reason.
A recent study has found that concentrating on difficult off-screen
objects, such as the faces of loved ones, causes eye strain in computer
scientists. Researchers into the phenomenon cite the added
concentration needed to "make sense" of such unnatural three
dimensional objects ...
A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man
contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery
A Severe Strain on the Credulity
As a method of sending a missile to the higher, and even to the highest
parts of the earth's atmospheric envelope, Professor Goddard's rocket
is a practicable and therefore promising device. It is when one
considers the multiple-charge rocket as a traveler to the moon that one
begins to doubt ... for after the rocket quits our air and really
starts on its journey, its flight would be neither accelerated nor
maintained by the explosion of the charges it then might have left.
Professor Goddard, with his "chair" in Clark College and countenancing
of the Smithsonian Institution, does not know the relation of action to
re-action, and of the need to have something better than a vacuum
against which to react ... Of course he only seems to lack the
knowledge ladled out daily in high schools.
-- New York Times Editorial, 1920
A sine curve goes off to infinity or at least the end of the blackboard
-- Prof. Steiner
A solemn, unsmiling, sanctimonious old iceberg who looked like he was
waiting for a vacancy in the Trinity.
-- Mark Twain
A straw vote only shows which way the hot air blows.
-- O'Henry
A student who changes the course of history is probably taking an
exam.
A successful tool is one that was used to do something undreamed of by
its author.
-- S. C. Johnson
A total abstainer is one who abstains from everything but abstention,
and especially from inactivity in the affairs of others.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
A transistor protected by a fast-acting fuse will protect the fuse by
blowing first.
A truly wise man never plays leapfrog with a unicorn.
A university is what a college becomes when the faculty loses interest
in students.
-- John Ciardi
A UNIX saleslady, Lenore,
Enjoys work, but she likes the beach more.
She found a good way
To combine work and play:
She sells C shells by the seashore.
A vacuum is a hell of a lot better than some of the stuff that nature
replaces it with.
-- Tenessee Williams
A very intelligent turtle
Found programming UNIX a hurdle
The system, you see,
Ran as slow as did he,
And that's not saying much for the turtle.
A well adjusted person is one who makes the same mistake twice without
getting nervous.
"A witty saying proves nothing."
-- Voltaire
A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe
in God.
A.A.A.A.A.:
An organization for drunks who drive
AAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaccccccccckkkkkk!!!!!!!!!
You brute! Knock before entering a ladies room!
Abandon the search for Truth; settle for a good fantasy.
About the time we think we can make ends meet, somebody moves the
ends.
-- Herbert Hoover
Absence makes the heart go wander.
Absent, adj.:
Exposed to the attacks of friends and acquaintances; defamed;
slandered.
Absentee, n.:
A person with an income who has had the forethought to remove
himself from the sphere of exaction.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Abstainer, n.:
A weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a
pleasure.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Absurdity, n.:
A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own
opinion.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Accident, n.:
A condition in which presence of mind is good, but absence of
body is better.
Accidents cause History.
If Sigismund Unbuckle had taken a walk in 1426 and met Wat Tyler, the
Peasant's Revolt would never have happened and the motor car would not
have been invented until 2026, which would have meant that all the oil
could have been used for lamps, thus saving the electric light bulb and
the whale, and nobody would have caught Moby Dick or Billy Budd.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
According to my best recollection, I don't remember.
-- Vincent "Jimmy Blue Eyes" Alo
According to the latest official figures, 43% of all statistics are
totally worthless.
Accordion, n.:
A bagpipe with pleats.
Accuracy, n.:
The vice of being right
Acid -- better living through chemistry.
Acid absorbs 47 times it's weight in excess Reality.
Acquaintance, n.:
A person whom we know well enough to borrow from, but not well
enough to lend to.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
"Acting is an art which consists of keeping the audience from
coughing."
Actor: "I'm a smash hit. Why, yesterday during the last act, I had
everyone glued in their seats!"
Oliver Herford: "Wonderful! Wonderful! Clever of you to think of
it!"
Actor: So what do you do for a living?
Doris: I work for a company that makes deceptively shallow serving
dishes for Chinese restaurants.
-- Woody Allen, "Without Feathers"
ADA, n.:
Something you need only know the name of to be an Expert in
Computing. Useful in sentences like, "We had better develop an ADA
awareness."
Admiration, n.:
Our polite recognition of another's resemblance to ourselves.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Adolescence, n.:
The stage between puberty and adultery.
"Adopted kids are such a pain -- you have to teach them how to look
like you ..."
--- Gilda Radner
Adore, v.:
To venerate expectantly.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Adult, n.:
One old enough to know better.
After [Benjamin] Franklin came a herd of Electrical Pioneers whose
names have become part of our electrical terminology: Myron Volt, Mary
Louise Amp, James Watt, Bob Transformer, etc. These pioneers conducted
many important electrical experiments. For example, in 1780 Luigi
Galvani discovered (this is the truth) that when he attached two
different kinds of metal to the leg of a frog, an electrical current
developed and the frog's leg kicked, even though it was no longer
attached to the frog, which was dead anyway. Galvani's discovery led
to enormous advances in the field of amphibian medicine. Today,
skilled veterinary surgeons can take a frog that has been seriously
injured or killed, implant pieces of metal in its muscles, and watch it
hop back into the pond just like a normal frog, except for the fact
that it sinks like a stone.
-- Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?"
After all, all he did was string together a lot of old, well-known
quotations.
-- H. L. Mencken, on Shakespeare
After all, what is your hosts' purpose in having a party? Surely not
for you to enjoy yourself; if that were their sole purpose, they'd have
simply sent champagne and women over to your place by taxi.
-- P. J. O'Rourke
After an instrument has been assembled, extra components will be found
on the bench.
After his Ignoble Disgrace, Satan was being expelled from
Heaven. As he passed through the Gates, he paused a moment in thought,
and turned to God and said, "A new creature called Man, I hear, is soon
to be created."
"This is true," He replied.
"He will need laws," said the Demon slyly.
"What! You, his appointed Enemy for all Time! You ask for the
right to make his laws?"
"Oh, no!" Satan replied, "I ask only that he be allowed to make
his own."
It was so granted.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
After I run your program, let's make love like crazed weasels, OK?
After the last of 16 mounting screws has been removed from an access
cover, it will be discovered that the wrong access cover has been
removed.
Afternoon very favorable for romance. Try a single person for a
change.
Afternoon, n.:
That part of the day we spend worrying about how we wasted the
morning.
Air is water with holes in it
Alas, I am dying beyond my means.
-- Oscar Wilde, as he sipped champagne on his deathbed
Albert Einstein, when asked to describe radio, replied: "You see, wire
telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New
York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this?
And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they
receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat."
Aleph-null bottles of beer on the wall,
Aleph-null bottles of beer,
You take one down, and pass it around,
Aleph-null bottles of beer on the wall.
Alex Haley was adopted!
Alexander Graham Bell is alive and well in New York, and still waiting
for a dial tone.
Alimony is a system by which, when two people make a mistake, one of
them keeps paying for it.
-- Peggy Joyce
"All flesh is grass"
-- Isiah
Smoke a friend today.
All I ask is a chance to prove that money can't make me happy.
All I ask is a chance to prove that money can't make me happy.
All I ask of life is a constant and exaggerated sense of my own
importance.
"All my friends and I are crazy. That's the only thing that keeps us
sane."
All programmers are playwrights and all computers are lousy actors.
All progress is based upon a universal innate desire on the part of
every organism to live beyond its income.
-- Samuel Butler
All science is either physics or stamp collecting.
-- E. Rutherford
All the big corporations depreciate their possessions, and you can,
too, provided you use them for business purposes. For example, if you
subscribe to the Wall Street Journal, a business-related newspaper, you
can deduct the cost of your house, because, in the words of U.S.
Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger in a landmark 1979 tax
decision: "Where else are you going to read the paper? Outside? What
if it rains?"
-- Dave Barry, "Sweating Out Taxes"
"... all the modern inconveniences ..."
-- Mark Twain
All the world's a stage and most of us are desperately unrehearsed.
-- Sean O'Casey
All the world's a VAX,
And all the coders merely butchers;
They have their exits and their entrails;
And one int in his time plays many widths,
His sizeof being N bytes. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the Regent's arms.
And then the whining schoolboy, with his Sun,
And shining morning face, creeping like slug
Unwillingly to school.
-- A Very Annoyed PDP-11
All things are possible except skiing thru a revolving door.
All true wisdom is found on T-shirts.
All you have to do to see the accuracy of my thesis is look around
you. Look, in particular, at the people who, like you, are making
average incomes for doing average jobs -- bank vice presidents,
insurance salesman, auditors, secretaries of defense -- and you'll
realize they all dress the same way, essentially the way the mannequins
in the Sears menswear department dress. Now look at the real
successes, the people who make a lot more money than you -- Elton John,
Captain Kangaroo, anybody from Saudi Arabia, Big Bird, and so on. They
all dress funny -- and they all succeed. Are you catching on?
-- Dave Barry, "How to Dress for Real Success"
Alliance, n.:
In international politics, the union of two thieves who have
their hands so deeply inserted in each other's pocket that they cannot
separately plunder a third.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Alone, adj.:
In bad company.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Although we modern persons tend to take our electric lights, radios,
mixers, etc., for granted, hundreds of years ago people did not have
any of these things, which is just as well because there was no place
to plug them in. Then along came the first Electrical Pioneer,
Benjamin Franklin, who flew a kite in a lighting storm and received a
serious electrical shock. This proved that lighting was powered by the
same force as carpets, but it also damaged Franklin's brain so severely
that he started speaking only in incomprehensible maxims, such as "A
penny saved is a penny earned." Eventually he had to be given a job
running the post office.
-- Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?"
Always borrow money from a pessimist; he doesn't expect to be paid
back.
AMAZING BUT TRUE ...
If all the salmon caught in Canada in one year were laid end to end
across the Sahara Desert, the smell would be absolutely awful.
AMAZING BUT TRUE ...
There is so much sand in Northern Africa that if it were spread out it
would completely cover the Sahara Desert.
Ambidextrous, adj.:
Able to pick with equal skill a right-hand pocket or a left.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Ambition is a poor excuse for not having sense enough to be lazy.
-- Charlie McCarthy
America may be unique in being a country which has leapt from barbarism
to decadence without touching civilization.
-- John O'Hara
America was discovered by Amerigo Vespucci and was named after him,
until people got tired of living in a place called "Vespuccia" and
changed its name to "America".
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Amnesia used to be my favorite word, but then I forgot it.
An American's a person who isn't afraid to criticize the President but
is always polite to traffic cops.
An effective way to deal with predators is to taste terrible.
An elephant is a mouse with an operating system.
An Englishman never enjoys himself, except for a noble purpose.
-- A. P. Herbert
An excellence-oriented '80s male does not wear a regular watch He wears
a Rolex watch, because it weighs nearly six pounds and is advertised
only in excellence-oriented publications such as Fortune and Rich
Protestant Golfer Magazine. The advertisements are written in
incomplete sentences, which is how advertising copywriters denote
excellence:
"The Rolex Hyperion. An elegant new standard in quality excellence and
discriminating handcraftsmanship. For the individual who is truly able
to discriminate with regard to excellent quality standards of crafting
things by hand. Fabricated of 100 percent 24-karat gold. No watch
parts or anything. Just a great big chunk on your wrist. Truly a
timeless statement. For the individual who is very secure. Who
doesn't need to be reminded all the time that he is very successful.
Much more successful than the people who laughed at him in high
school. Because of his acne. People who are probably nowhere near as
successful as he is now. Maybe he'll go to his 20th reunion, and
they'll see his Rolex Hyperion. Hahahahahahahahaha."
-- Dave Barry, "In Search of Excellence"
"... an experienced, industrious, ambitious, and often quite often
picturesque liar."
-- Mark Twain
An idea is not responsible for the people who believe in it.
An old Jewish man reads about Einstein's theory of relativity
in the newspaper and asks his scientist grandson to explain it to him.
"Well, zayda, it's sort of like this. Einstein says that if
you're having your teeth drilled without Novocain, a minute seems like
an hour. But if you're sitting with a beautiful woman on your lap, an
hour seems like a minute."
The old man considers this profound bit of thinking for a
moment and says, "And from this he makes a living?"
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
Anarchy may not be the best form of government, but it's better than no
government at all.
... And malt does more than Milton can
To justify God's ways to man
-- A. E. Housman
And on the seventh day, He exited from append mode.
And this is a table ma'am. What in essence it consists of is a
horizontal rectilinear plane surface maintained by four vertical
columnar supports, which we call legs. The tables in this laboratory,
ma'am, are as advanced in design as one will find anywhere in the
world.
-- Michael Frayn, "The Tin Men"
"And what will you do when you grow up to be as big as me?"
asked the father of his little son.
"Diet."
Angels we have heard on High
Tell us to go out and Buy.
-- Tom Leher
Ankh if you love Isis.
Anoint, v.:
To grease a king or other great functionary already
sufficiently slippery.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Another Glitch in the Call
------- ------ -- --- ----
(Sung to the tune of a recent Pink Floyd song.)
We don't need no indirection
We don't need no flow control
No data typing or declarations
Did you leave the lists alone?
Hey! Hacker! Leave those lists alone!
Chorus:
All in all, it's just a pure-LISP function call.
All in all, it's just a pure-LISP function call.
Another good night not to sleep in a eucalyptus tree.
Answers to Last Fortune's Questions:
1. None. (Moses didn't have an ark).
2. Your mother, by the pigeonhole principle.
3. I don't know.
4. Who cares?
5. 6 (or maybe 4, or else 3). Mr. Alfred J. Duncan of Podunk,
Montana, submitted an interesting solution to Problem 5.
6. There is an interesting solution to this problem on page 1029 of my
book, which you can pick up for $23.95 at finer bookstores and
bathroom supply outlets (or 99 cents at the table in front of
Papyrus Books).
Anthony's Law of Force:
Don't force it; get a larger hammer.
Anthony's Law of the Workshop:
Any tool when dropped, will roll into the least accessible
corner of the workshop.
Corollary:
On the way to the corner, any dropped tool will first strike
your toes.
Antonym, n.:
The opposite of the word you're trying to think of.
Any clod can have the facts, but having opinions is an art.
-- Charles McCabe
Any excuse will serve a tyrant.
-- Aesop
Any fool can paint a picture, but it takes a wise person to be able to
sell it.
... Any resemblance between the above views and those of my employer,
my terminal, or the view out my window are purely coincidental. Any
resemblance between the above and my own views is non-deterministic.
The question of the existence of views in the absence of anyone to hold
them is left as an exercise for the reader. The question of the
existence of the reader is left as an exercise for the second god
coefficient. (A discussion of non-orthogonal, non-integral polytheism
is beyond the scope of this article.)
Any small object that is accidentally dropped will hide under a
larger object.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged
demo.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
-- Arthur C. Clarke
Any two philosophers can tell each other all they know in two hours.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Any woman is a volume if one knows how to read her.
Anybody can win, unless there happens to be a second entry.
Anybody who doesn't cut his speed at the sight of a police car is
probably parked.
Anybody with money to burn will easily find someone to tend the fire.
Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm.
-- Publilius Syrus
Anyone who cannot cope with mathematics is not fully human. At best he
is a tolerable subhuman who has learned to wear shoes, bathe and not
make messes in the house.
-- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love"
Anyone who goes to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined.
-- Samuel Goldwyn
Anyone who hates Dogs and Kids Can't be All Bad.
-- W. C. Fields
Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no
account be allowed to do the job.
-- Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"
Anything free is worth what you pay for it.
Anything is good and useful if it's made of chocolate.
Anything is good if it's made of chocolate.
Anything labeled "NEW" and/or "IMPROVED" isn't. The label means the
price went up. The label "ALL NEW", "COMPLETELY NEW", or "GREAT NEW"
means the price went way up.
Anything that is good and useful is made of chocolate.
Anything worth doing is worth overdoing
Anytime things appear to be going better, you have overlooked
something.
Aquadextrous, adj.:
Possessing the ability to turn the bathtub faucet on and off
with your toes.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
AQUARIUS (Jan 20 - Feb 18)
You have an inventive mind and are inclined to be progressive. You lie
a great deal. On the other hand, you are inclined to be careless and
impractical, causing you to make the same mistakes over and over
again. People think you are stupid.
"Arguments with furniture are rarely productive."
-- Kehlog Albran, "The Profit"
ARIES (Mar 21 - Apr 19)
You are the pioneer type and hold most people in contempt. You are
quick tempered, impatient, and scornful of advice. You are not very
nice.
Arithmetic is being able to count up to twenty without taking off your
shoes.
-- Mickey Mouse
Armadillo:
To provide weapons to a Spanish pickle
Arnold's Laws of Documentation:
(1) If it should exist, it doesn't.
(2) If it does exist, it's out of date.
(3) Only documentation for useless programs transcends the
first two laws.
Arthur's Laws of Love:
(1) People to whom you are attracted invariably think you
remind them of someone else.
(2) The love letter you finally got the courage to send will
be delayed in the mail long enough for you to make a fool
of yourself in person.
Artistic ventures highlighted. Rob a museum.
As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not
certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality.
-- Albert Einstein
As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error.
-- Weisert
As I was passing Project MAC,
I met a Quux with seven hacks.
Every hack had seven bugs;
Every bug had seven manifestations;
Every manifestation had seven symptoms.
Symptoms, manifestations, bugs, and hacks,
How many losses at Project MAC?
As long as war is regarded as wicked, it will always have its
fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be
popular.
-- Oscar Wilde
As of next week, passwords will be entered in Morse code.
"As part of the conversion, computer specialists rewrote 1,500
programs -- a process that traditionally requires some debugging."
--- USA Today, referring to the IRS switchover to a new
computer system.
As soon as we started programming, we found to our surprise that it
wasn't as easy to get programs right as we had thought. Debugging had
to be discovered. I can remember the exact instant when I realized
that a large part of my life from then on was going to be spent in
finding mistakes in my own programs.
-- Maurice Wilkes discovers debugging, 1949
As the poet said, "Only God can make a tree" -- probably because it's
so hard to figure out how to get the bark on.
-- Woody Allen
As the trials of life continue to take their toll, remember that there
is always a future in Computer Maintenance.
-- National Lampoon, "Deteriorada"
As Will Rogers would have said, "There is no such things as a free
variable."
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"
As Zeus said to Narcissus, "Watch yourself."
Ask Not for whom the Bell Tolls, and You will Pay only the
Station-to-Station rate.
Ask not for whom the telephone bell tolls ... if thou art in the
bathtub, it tolls for thee.
Ask your boss to reconsider -- it's so difficult to take "Go to hell"
for an answer.
Ass, n.:
The masculine of "lass".
At a recent meeting in Snowmass, Colorado, a participant from Los
Angeles fainted from hyperoxygenation, and we had to hold his head
under the exhaust of a bus until he revived.
At Group L, Stoffel oversees six first-rate programmers, a managerial
challenge roughly comparable to herding cats.
-- The Washington Post Magazine, June 9, 1985
... at least I thought I was dancing, 'til somebody stepped on my hand.
-- J. B. White
At the source of every error which is blamed on the computer you will
find at least two human errors, including the error of blaming it on
the computer.
Atlee is a very modest man. And with reason.
-- Winston Churchill
Automobile, n.:
A four-wheeled vehicle that runs up hills and down
pedestrians.
Avoid Quiet and Placid persons unless you are in Need of Sleep.
-- National Lampoon, "Deteriorada"
Avoid reality at all costs.
Bacchus, n.:
A convenient deity invented by the ancients as an excuse for
getting drunk.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Bagdikian's Observation:
Trying to be a first-rate reporter on the average American
newspaper is like trying to play Bach's "St. Matthew Passion"
on a ukelele.
Baker's First Law of Federal Geometry:
A block grant is a solid mass of money surrounded on all sides
by governors.
Ban the bomb. Save the world for conventional warfare.
Bank error in your favor. Collect $200.
Barach's Rule:
An alcoholic is a person who drinks more than his own
physician.
Barometer, n.:
An ingenious instrument which indicates what kind of weather we
are having.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Barth's Distinction:
There are two types of people: those who divide people into two
types, and those who don't.
Baruch's Observation:
If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
Basic, n.:
A programming language. Related to certain social diseases in
that those who have it will not admit it in polite company.
Be a better psychiatrist and the world will beat a psychopath to your
door.
BE ALERT!!!! (The world needs more lerts ...)
Be assured that a walk through the ocean of most Souls would scarcely
get your Feet wet. Fall not in Love, therefore: it will stick to your
face.
-- National Lampoon, "Deteriorada"
Be careful of reading health books, you might die of a misprint.
-- Mark Twain
Be different: conform.
Be free and open and breezy! Enjoy! Things won't get any better so
get used to it.
Be wary of strong drink. It can make you shoot at tax collectors and
miss
-- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love"
Behold the warranty ... the bold print giveth and the fine print taketh
away.
Beifeld's Principle:
The probability of a young man meeting a desirable and
receptive young female increases by pyramidal progression when
he is already in the company of: (1) a date, (2) his wife, (3)
a better looking and richer male friend.
Bell Labs Unix -- Reach out and grep someone.
"Benson, you are so free of the ravages of intelligence"
-- Time Bandits
Besides the device, the box should contain:
* Eight little rectangular snippets of paper that say "WARNING"
* A plastic packet containing four 5/17 inch pilfer grommets and two
club-ended 6/93 inch boxcar prawns.
YOU WILL NEED TO SUPPLY: a matrix wrench and 60,000 feet of tram
cable.
IF ANYTHING IS DAMAGED OR MISSING: You IMMEDIATELY should turn to your
spouse and say: "Margaret, you know why this country can't make a car
that can get all the way through the drive-through at Burger King
without a major transmission overhaul? Because nobody cares, that's
why."
WARNING: This is assuming your spouse's name is Margaret.
-- Dave Barry, "Read This First!"
better !pout !cry
better watchout
lpr why
santa claus town
cat /etc/passwd >list
ncheck list
ncheck list
cat list | grep naughty >nogiftlist
cat list | grep nice >giftlist
santa claus town
who | grep sleeping
who | grep awake
who | egrep 'bad|good'
for (goodness sake) {
be good
}
"Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not
tried it."
-- Donald Knuth
Beware of low-flying butterflies.
Beware of Programmers who carry screwdrivers.
-- Leonard Brandwein
"Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and
finds himself no wiser than before," Bokonon tells us. "He is full of
murderous resentment of people who are ignorant without having come by
their ignorance the hard way."
-- Kurt Vonnegut, "Cat's Cradle"
Beware of the Turing Tar-pit in which everything is possible but
nothing of interest is easy.
Binary, adj.:
Possessing the ability to have friends of both sexes.
Bipolar, adj.:
Refers to someone who has homes in Nome, Alaska, and Buffalo,
New York
Birth, n.:
The first and direst of all disasters.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Bizarreness is the essence of the exotic
Blessed are they who Go Around in Circles, for they Shall be Known
as Wheels.
BLISS is ignorance
Blood is thicker than water, and much tastier.
Board the windows, up your car insurance, and don't leave any booze in
plain sight. It's St. Patrick's day in Chicago again. The legend has
it that St. Patrick drove the snakes out of Ireland. In fact, he was
arrested for drunk driving. The snakes left because people kept
throwing up on them.
Boling's postulate:
If you're feeling good, don't worry. You'll get over it.
Bolub's Fourth Law of Computerdom:
Project teams detest weekly progress reporting because it so
vividly manifests their lack of progress.
Bombeck's Rule of Medicine:
Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died.
Boob's Law:
You always find something in the last place you look.
Bore, n.:
A person who talks when you wish him to listen.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Boren's Laws:
(1) When in charge, ponder.
(2) When in trouble, delegate.
(3) When in doubt, mumble.
Boss, n.:
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, in the Middle Ages
the words "boss" and "botch" were largely synonymous, except that boss,
in addition to meaning "a supervisor of workers" also meant "an
ornamental stud."
Boston, n.:
Ludwig van Beethoven being jeered by 50,000 sports fans for
finishing second in the Irish jig competition.
Boy, n.:
A noise with dirt on it.
Bradley's Bromide:
If computers get too powerful, we can organize them into a
committee -- that will do them in.
Brady's First Law of Problem Solving:
When confronted by a difficult problem, you can solve it more
easily by reducing it to the question, "How would the Lone
Ranger have handled this?"
Brain fried -- Core dumped
Brain, n.:
The apparatus with which we think that we think.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Brain, v. [as in "to brain"]:
To rebuke bluntly, but not pointedly; to dispel a source of
error in an opponent.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Breast Feeding should not be attempted by fathers with hairy chests,
since they can make the baby sneeze and give it wind.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Bride, n.:
A woman with a fine prospect of happiness behind her.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Bringing computers into the home won't change either one, but may
revitalize the corner saloon.
British Israelites:
The British Israelites believe the white Anglo-Saxons of
Britain to be descended from the ten lost tribes of Israel deported by
Sargon of Assyria on the fall of Sumeria in 721 B.C. ... They further
believe that the future can be foretold by the measurements of the
Great Pyramid, which probably means it will be big and yellow and in
the hand of the Arabs. They also believe that if you sleep with your
head under the pillow a fairy will come and take all your teeth.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Broad-mindedness, n.:
The result of flattening high-mindedness out.
Brook's Law:
Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later
Brook's Law:
Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later.
Brooke's Law:
Whenever a system becomes completely defined, some damn fool
discovers something which either abolishes the system or
expands it beyond recognition.
Bubble Memory, n.:
A derogatory term, usually referring to a person's
intelligence. See also "vacuum tube".
Bucy's Law:
Nothing is ever accomplished by a reasonable man.
Bug, n.:
An aspect of a computer program which exists because the
PROGRAMMER was thinking about Jumbo Jacks or stock options when s/he
wrote the program.
Fortunately, the second-to-last bug has just been fixed.
-- Ray Simard
Bug:
Small living things that small living boys throw on small
living girls.
BULLWINKLE: "You just leave that to my pal. He's the brains of the
outfit."
GENERAL: "What does that make YOU?"
BULLWINKLE: "What else? An executive..."
-- Jay Ward
Bumper sticker:
"All the parts falling off this car are of the very finest British
manufacture"
Bureaucrat, n.:
A politician who has tenure.
... But as records of courts and justice are admissible, it can
easily be proved that powerful and malevolent magicians once existed
and were a scourge to mankind. The evidence (including confession)
upon which certain women were convicted of witchcraft and executed was
without a flaw; it is still unimpeachable. The judges' decisions based
on it were sound in logic and in law. Nothing in any existing court
was ever more thoroughly proved than the charges of witchcraft and
sorcery for which so many suffered death. If there were no witches,
human testimony and human reason are alike destitute of value.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
... 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"
But in our enthusiasm, we could not resist a radical overhaul of the
system, in which all of its major weaknesses have been exposed,
analyzed, and replaced with new weaknesses.
-- Bruce Leverett, "Register Allocation in Optimizing
Compilers"
But scientists, who ought to know
Assure us that it must be so.
Oh, let us never, never doubt
What nobody is sure about.
-- Hilaire Belloc
But soft you, the fair Ophelia:
Ope not thy ponderous and marble jaws,
But get thee to a nunnery -- go!
-- Mark "The Bard" Twain
But the greatest Electrical Pioneer of them all was Thomas Edison, who
was a brilliant inventor despite the fact that he had little formal
education and lived in New Jersey. Edison's first major invention in
1877, was the phonograph, which could soon be found in thousands of
American homes, where it basically sat until 1923, when the record was
invented. But Edison's greatest achievement came in 1879, when he
invented the electric company. Edison's design was a brilliant
adaptation of the simple electrical circuit: the electric company sends
electricity through a wire to a customer, then immediately gets the
electricity back through another wire, then (this is the brilliant
part) sends it right back to the customer again.
This means that an electric company can sell a customer the same batch
of electricity thousands of times a day and never get caught, since
very few customers take the time to examine their electricity closely.
In fact the last year any new electricity was generated in the United
States was 1937; the electric companies have been merely re-selling it
ever since, which is why they have so much free time to apply for rate
increases.
-- Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?"
"But this has taken us far afield from interface, which is not a bad
place to be, since I particularly want to move ahead to the kludge.
Why do people have so much trouble understanding the kludge? What is a
kludge, after all, but not enough Ks, not enough ROMs, not enough RAMs,
poor quality interface and too few bytes to go around? Have I
explained yet about the bytes?"
"But what we need to know is, do people want nasally-insertable
computers?"
Buzz off, Banana Nose; Relieve mine eyes
Of hateful soreness, purge mine ears of corn;
Less dear than army ants in apple pies
Art thou, old prune-face, with thy chestnuts worn,
Dropt from thy peeling lips like lousy fruit;
Like honeybees upon the perfum'd rose
They suck, and like the double-breasted suit
Are out of date; therefore, Banana Nose,
Go fly a kite, thy welcome's overstayed;
And stem the produce of thy waspish wits:
Thy logick, like thy locks, is disarrayed;
Thy cheer, like thy complexion, is the pits.
Be off, I say; go bug somebody new,
Scram, beat it, get thee hence, and nuts to you.
By doing just a little every day, you can gradually let the task
completely overwhelm you.
"By necessity, by proclivity, and by delight, we all quote. In fact,
it is as difficult to appropriate the thoughts of others as it is to
invent. (R. Emerson)"
-- Quoted from a fortune cookie program
(whose author claims, "Actually, stealing IS easier.")
[to which I reply, "You think it's easy for me to
misconstrue all these misquotations?!?"]
Bypasses are devices that allow some people to dash from point A to
point B very fast while other people dash from point B to point A very
fast. People living at point C, being a point directly in between, are
often given to wonder what's so great about point A that so many people
from point B are so keen to get there and what's so great about point B
that so many people from point A are so keen to get _____there. They oftenwish that people would just once and for all work out where the hell
they wanted to be.
-- Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"
C, n.:
A programming language that is sort of like Pascal except more
like assembly except that it isn't very much like either one, or
anything else. It is either the best language available to the art
today, or it isn't.
-- Ray Simard
Cabbage, n.:
A familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as
a man's head.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Cahn's Axiom:
When all else fails, read the instructions.
California is a fine place to live -- if you happen to be an orange.
-- Fred Allen
California, n.:
From Latin "calor", meaning "heat" (as in English "calorie" or
Spanish "caliente"); and "fornia'" for "sexual intercourse" or
"fornication." Hence: Tierra de California, "the land of hot sex."
-- Ed Moran
Call on God, but row away from the rocks.
-- Indian proverb
"Calling J-Man Kink. Calling J-Man Kink. Hash missle sighted, target
Los Angeles. Disregard personal feelings about city and intercept."
"Calvin Coolidge looks as if he had been weaned on a pickle."
-- Alice Roosevelt Longworth
"Calvin Coolidge was the greatest man who ever came out of Plymouth
Corner, Vermont."
-- Clarence Darrow
Canada Bill Jone's Motto:
It's morally wrong to allow suckers to keep their money.
Supplement:
A .44 magnum beats four aces.
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
Cancel me not -- for what then shall remain?
Abscissas, some mantissas, modules, modes,
A root or two, a torus and a node:
The inverse of my verse, a null domain.
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
CANCER (June 21 - July 22)
You are sympathetic and understanding to other people's problems. They
think you are a sucker. You are always putting things off. That's why
you'll never make anything of yourself. Most welfare recipients are
Cancer people.
CAPRICORN (Dec 23 - Jan 19)
You are conservative and afraid of taking risks. You don't do much of
anything and are lazy. There has never been a Capricorn of any
importance. Capricorns should avoid standing still for too long as
they take root and become trees.
Captain Penny's Law:
You can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of
the people all of the time, but you Can't Fool Mom.
Carelessly planned projects take three times longer to complete than
expected. Carefully planned projects take four times longer to
complete than expected, mostly because the planners expect their
planning to reduce the time it takes.
Carperpetuation (kar' pur pet u a shun), n.:
The act, when vacuuming, of running over a string at least a
dozen times, reaching over and picking it up, examining it, then
putting it back down to give the vacuum one more chance.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
Cauliflower is nothing but Cabbage with a College Education.
-- Mark Twain
Caution: breathing may be hazardous to your health.
CChheecckk yyoouurr dduupplleexx sswwiittcchh..
Celebrate Hannibal Day this year. Take an elephant to lunch.
Census Taker to Housewife: Did you ever have the measles, and, if so,
how many?
Cerebus: I'd love to lick apricot brandy out of your navel.
Jaka: Look, Cerebus-- Jaka has to tell you ... something
Cerebus: If Cerebus had a navel, would you lick apricot brandy
out of it?
Jaka: Ugh!
Cerebus: You don't like apricot brandy?
-- Cerebus #6, "The Secret"
Certain old men prefer to rise at dawn, taking a cold bath and a long
walk with an empty stomach and otherwise mortifying the flesh. They
then point with pride to these practices as the cause of their sturdy
health and ripe years; the truth being that they are hearty and old,
not because of their habits, but in spite of them. The reason we find
only robust persons doing this thing is that it has killed all the
others who have tried it.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Certainly there are things in life that money can't buy, but it's very funny--
Did you ever try buying then without money?
-- Ogden Nash
Character Density: the number of very weird people in the office.
Chemicals, n.:
Noxious substances from which modern foods are made.
Chicago, n.:
Where the dead still vote ... early and often!
Chicken Little was right.
Chicken Soup, n.:
An ancient miracle drug containing equal parts of aureomycin,
cocaine, interferon, and TLC. The only ailment chicken soup can't cure
is neurotic dependence on one's mother.
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
Children are natural mimic who act like their parents despite every
effort to teach them good manners.
Children aren't happy without something to ignore,
And that's what parents were created for.
-- Ogden Nash
Children seldom misquote you. In fact, they usually repeat word for
word what you shouldn't have said.
Chism's Law of Completion:
The amount of time required to complete a government project is
precisely equal to the length of time already spent on it.
Chisolm's First Corollary to Murphy's Second Law:
When things just can't possibly get any worse, they will.
Christ:
A man who was born at least 5,000 years ahead of his time.
Churchill's Commentary on Man:
Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the
time he will pick himself up and continue on.
Cigarette, n.:
A fire at one end, a fool at the other, and a bit of tobacco in
between.
Cinemuck, n.:
The combination of popcorn, soda, and melted chocolate which
covers the floors of movie theaters.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
Cleanliness is next to impossible.
Cleveland still lives. God ____must be dead.
"Cleveland? Yes, I spent a week there one day."
Cloning is the sincerest form of flattery.
Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on
society.
-- Mark Twain
Cocaine -- the thinking man's Dristan.
Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum --
"I think that I think, therefore I think that I am."
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Cold, adj.:
When the local flashers are handing out written descriptions.
Cold, adj.:
When the politicians walk around with their hands in their own
pockets.
Collaboration, n.:
A literary partnership based on the false assumption that the
other fellow can spell.
College football is a game which would be much more interesting if the
faculty played instead of the students, and even more interesting if
the trustees played. There would be a great increase in broken arms,
legs, and necks, and simultaneously an appreciable diminution in the
loss to humanity.
-- H. L. Mencken
Colvard's Logical Premises:
All probabilities are 50%. Either a thing will happen or
it won't.
Colvard's Unconscionable Commentary:
This is especially true when dealing with someone you're
attracted to.
Grelb's Commentary
Likelihoods, however, are 90% against you.
Come, every frustum longs to be a cone,
And every vector dreams of matrices.
Hark to the gentle gradient of the breeze:
It whispers of a more ergodic zone.
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
Come, let us hasten to a higher plane,
Where dyads tread the fairy fields of Venn,
Their indices bedecked from one to _n,
Commingled in an endless Markov chain!
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
Command, n.:
Statement presented by a human and accepted by a computer in
such a manner as to make the human feel as if he is in control.
COMMENT
Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,
A medley of extemporanea;
And love is thing that can never go wrong;
And I am Marie of Roumania.
-- Dorothy Parker
Commitment, n.:
Commitment can be illustrated by a breakfast of ham and eggs.
The chicken was involved, the pig was committed.
Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen.
-- Albert Einstein
Computer programmers do it byte by byte
Computer Science is merely the post-Turing decline in formal systems
theory.
Computers are not intelligent. They only think they are.
Conceit causes more conversation than wit.
-- LaRouchefoucauld
Concept, n.:
Any "idea" for which an outside consultant billed you more than
$25,000.
Condense soup, not books!
Confession is good for the soul only in the sense that a tweed coat is
good for dandruff.
-- Peter de Vries
Confidence is the feeling you have before you understand the situation.
Congratulations! You have purchased an extremely fine device that
would give you thousands of years of trouble-free service, except that
you undoubtably will destroy it via some typical bonehead consumer
maneuver. Which is why we ask you to PLEASE FOR GOD'S SAKE READ THIS
OWNER'S MANUAL CAREFULLY BEFORE YOU UNPACK THE DEVICE. YOU ALREADY
UNPACKED IT, DIDN'T YOU? YOU UNPACKED IT AND PLUGGED IT IN AND TURNED
IT ON AND FIDDLED WITH THE KNOBS, AND NOW YOUR CHILD, THE SAME CHILD
WHO ONCE SHOVED A POLISH SAUSAGE INTO YOUR VIDEOCASSETTE RECORDED AND
SET IT ON "FAST FORWARD", THIS CHILD ALSO IS FIDDLING WITH HE KNOBS,
RIGHT? AND YOU'RE JUST NOW STARTING TO READ THE INSTRUCTIONS,
RIGHT??? WE MIGHT AS WELL JUST BREAK THESE DEVICES RIGHT AT THE
FACTORY BEFORE WE SHIP THEM OUT, YOU KNOW THAT?
-- Dave Barry, "Read This First!"
Conscience is the inner voice that warns us somebody is looking
-- H. L. Mencken
Conscience is what hurts when everything else feels so good.
Consultants are mystical people who ask a company for a number and then
give it back to them.
"Contrariwise," continued Tweedledee, "if it was so, it might be, and
if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic!"
-- Lewis Carroll, "Through the Looking Glass"
Conversation, n.:
A vocal competition in which the one who is catching his breath
is called the listener.
Conway's Law:
In any organization there will always be one person who knows
what is going on.
This person must be fired.
Coronation, n.:
The ceremony of investing a sovereign with the outward and
visible signs of his divine right to be blown skyhigh with a dynamite
bomb.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Corrupt, adj.:
In politics, holding an office of trust or profit.
Corruption is not the #1 priority of the Police Commissioner. His job
is to enforce the law and fight crime.
-- P.B.A. President E. J. Kiernan
Coward, n.:
One who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Crash programs fail because they are based on the theory that, with
nine women pregnant, you can get a baby a month.
-- Wernher von Braun
Crime does not pay ... as well as politics.
-- A. E. Newman
Critic, n.:
A person who boasts himself hard to please because nobody tries
to please him.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Cynic, n.:
A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not
as they ought to be. Hence the custom among the Scythians of plucking
out a cynic's eyes to improve his vision.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Cynic, n.:
One who looks through rose-colored glasses with a jaundiced
eye.
Darth Vader sleeps with a Teddywookie.
Dawn, n.:
The time when men of reason go to bed.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Day of inquiry. You will be subpoenaed.
Dealing with failure is easy: work hard to improve. Success is also
easy to handle: you've solved the wrong problem. Work hard to
improve.
Dear Lord:
I just want *___one* one-armed manager so I never have to hear "On
the other hand", again.
Dear Miss Manners:
My home economics teacher says that one must never place one's
elbows on the table. However, I have read that one elbow, in between
courses, is all right. Which is correct?
Gentle Reader:
For the purpose of answering examinations in your home
economics class, your teacher is correct. Catching on to this
principle of education may be of even greater importance to you now
than learning correct current table manners, vital as Miss Manners
believes that is.
Dear Miss Manners:
Please list some tactful ways of removing a man's saliva from
your face.
Gentle Reader:
Please list some decent ways of acquiring a man's saliva on
your face ...
Death is God's way of telling you not to be such a wise guy.
Death is life's way of telling you you've been fired.
-- R. Geis
Death is Nature's way of recycling human beings.
Death is nature's way of telling you to slow down
Decisionmaker, n.:
The person in your office who was unable to form a task force
before the music stopped.
Decisions of the judges will be final unless shouted down by a really
overwhelming majority of the crowd present. Abusive and obscene
language may not be used by contestants when addressing members of the
judging panel, or, conversely, by members of the judging panel when
addressing contestants (unless struck by a boomerang).
-- Mudgeeraba Creek Emu-Riding and Boomerang-Throwing
Assoc.
Deck Us All With Boston Charlie
Deck us all with Boston Charlie,
Walla Walla, Wash., an' Kalamazoo!
Nora's freezin' on the trolley,
Swaller dollar cauliflower, alleygaroo!
Don't we know archaic barrel,
Lullaby Lilla Boy, Louisville Lou.
Trolley Molly don't love Harold,
Boola boola Pensacoola hullabaloo!
-- Walt Kelly
"Deep" is a word like "theory" or "semantic" -- it implies all
sorts of marvelous things. It's one thing to be able to say "I've got
a theory", quite another to say "I've got a semantic theory", but, ah,
those who can claim "I've got a deep semantic theory", they are truly
blessed.
-- Randy Davis
DELETE A FORTUNE!
Don't some of these fortunes just drive you nuts?! Wouldn't you like
to see some of them deleted from the system? You can! Just mail to
"fortune" with the fortune you hate most, and we MIGHT make sure it
gets expunged.
Deliberation, n.:
The act of examining one's bread to determine which side it is
buttered on.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
"Deliver yesterday, code today, think tomorrow."
Democracy is a form of government in which it is permitted to wonder
aloud what the country could do under first-class management.
-- Senator Soaper
Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the
incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few.
-- G. B. Shaw
Democracy is also a form of worship. It is the worship of Jackals by
Jackasses.
-- H. L. Mencken
Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people
are right more than half of the time.
-- E. B. White
Dentist, n.:
A Prestidigitator who, putting metal in one's mouth, pulls
coins out of one's pockets.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
DETERIORATA
Go placidly amid the noise and waste,
And remember what comfort there may be in owning a piece thereof.
Avoid quiet and passive persons, unless you are in need of sleep.
Rotate your tires.
Speak glowingly of those greater than yourself,
And heed well their advice -- even though they be turkeys.
Know what to kiss -- and when.
Remember that two wrongs never make a right,
But that three do.
Wherever possible, put people on "HOLD".
Be comforted, that in the face of all aridity and disillusionment,
And despite the changing fortunes of time,
There is always a big future in computer maintenance.
You are a fluke of the universe ...
You have no right to be here.
Whether you can hear it or not, the universe
Is laughing behind your back.
-- National Lampoon
DeVries's Dilemma:
If you hit two keys on the typewriter, the one you don't want
hits the paper.
Did you know ...
That no-one ever reads these things?
Did you know that clones never use mirrors?
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Die, v.:
To stop sinning suddenly.
-- Elbert Hubbard
"Die? I should say not, dear fellow. No Barrymore would allow such a
conventional thing to happen to him."
-- John Barrymore's dying words
Different all twisty a of in maze are you, passages little.
Dimensions will always be expressed in the least usable term.
Velocity, for example, will be expressed in furlongs per fortnight.
Diplomacy is the art of saying "nice doggy" until you can find a rock.
Disc space -- the final frontier!
Disco is to music what Etch-A-Sketch is to art.
Distress, n.:
A disease incurred by exposure to the prosperity of a friend.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Do infants have as much fun in infancy as adults do in adultery?
Do molecular biologists wear designer genes?
Do not believe in miracles -- rely on them.
Do not drink coffee in early A.M. It will keep you awake until noon.
Do not meddle in the affairs of troff, for it is subtle and quick to
anger.
Do not read this fortune under penalty of law.
Violators will be prosecuted.
(Penal Code sec. 2.3.2 (II.a.))
Do not sleep in a eucalyptus tree tonight.
Do not try to solve all life's problems at once -- learn to dread each
day as it comes.
-- Donald Kaul
Do something unusual today. Pay a bill.
Do what comes naturally now. Seethe and fume and throw a tantrum.
Do you realize how many holes there could be if people would just take
the time to take the dirt out of them?
"Do you think what we're doing is wrong?"
"Of course it's wrong! It's illegal!"
"I've never done anything illegal before."
"I thought you said you were an accountant!"
Documentation is like sex: when it is good, it is very, very good; and
when it is bad, it is better than nothing.
-- Dick Brandon
Documentation is the castor oil of programming. Managers know it must
be good because the programmers hate it so much.
Don't abandon hope: your Tom Mix decoder ring arrives tomorrow.
Don't be humble, you're not that great.
-- Golda Meir
Don't believe everything you hear or anything you say.
Don't cook tonight -- starve a rat today!
Don't feed the bats tonight.
Don't get suckered in by the comments -- they can be terribly
misleading. Debug only code.
-- Dave Storer
Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you
nothing. It was here first.
-- Mark Twain
Don't go surfing in South Dakota for a while.
Don't hate yourself in the morning -- sleep till noon.
Don't kiss an elephant on the lips today.
Don't knock President Fillmore. He kept us out of Vietnam.
Don't let people drive you crazy when you know it's in walking
distance.
Don't look back, the lemmings are gaining on you.
Don't put off for tomorrow what you can do today, because if you enjoy
it today you can do it again tomorrow.
"Don't say yes until I finish talking."
-- Darryl F. Zanuck
Don't take life too seriously -- you'll never get out if it alive.
Don't tell any big lies today. Small ones can be just as effective.
"Don't tell me I'm burning the candle at both ends -- tell me where to
get more wax!!"
Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already
tomorrow in Australia.
-- Charles Schultz
Don't worry over what other people are thinking about you. They're too
busy worrying over what you are thinking about them.
Don't you feel more like you do now than you did when you came in?
Don: I didn't know you had a cousin Penelope, Bill! Was she
pretty?
W. C.: Well, her face was so wrinkled it looked like seven miles of
bad road. She had so many gold teeth, Don, she use to have to
sleep with her head in a safe. She died in Bolivia.
Don: Oh Bill, it must be hard to lose a relative.
W. C.: It's almost impossible.
-- W. C. Fields, from "The Further Adventures of Larson
E. Whipsnade and other Tarradiddles"
Down with categorical imperative!
"Drawing on my fine command of language, I said nothing."
Drew's Law of Highway Biology:
The first bug to hit a clean windshield lands directly in front
of your eyes.
Drive defensively. Buy a tank.
Drugs may be the road to nowhere, but at least they're the scenic
route!
Ducharm's Axiom:
If you view your problem closely enough you will recognize
yourself as part of the problem.
Ducharme's Precept:
Opportunity always knocks at the least opportune moment.
Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, and a dark side, and
it holds the universe together ...
-- Carl Zwanzig
Due to a shortage of devoted followers, the production of great leaders
has been discontinued.
Due to circumstances beyond your control, you are master of your fate
and captain of your soul.
During a grouse hunt in North Carolina two intrepid sportsmen
were blasting away at a clump of trees near a stone wall. Suddenly a
red-faced country squire popped his head over the wall and shouted,
"Hey, you almost hit my wife."
"Did I?" cried the hunter, aghast. "Terribly sorry. Have a
shot at mine, over there."
During the next two hours, the VAX will be going up and down several
times, often with lin~po_~{po ~poz~ppo\~{ o n~po_~{o[po ~y oodsou>#w4k**n~po_~{ol;lkld;f;g;dd;po\~{o
Dying is a very dull, dreary affair. And my advice to you is to
have nothing whatever to do with it.
-- W. Somerset Maughm
E Pluribus Unix
Earn cash in your spare time -- blackmail your friends
Earn cash in your spare time -- blackmail your friends.
/Earth is 98% full ... please delete anyone you can.
/earth is 98% full ... please delete anyone you can.
"Earth is a great, big funhouse without the fun."
-- Jeff Berner
Easiest Color to Solve on a Rubik's Cube:
Black. Simply remove all the little colored stickers on the
cube, and each of side of the cube will now be the original color of
the plastic underneath -- black. According to the instructions, this
means the puzzle is solved.
-- Steve Rubenstein
Economics is extremely useful as a form of employment for economists.
-- John Kenneth Galbraith
Economics, n.:
Economics is the study of the value and meaning of J. K.
Galbraith ...
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Eggheads unite! You have nothing to lose but your yolks.
-- Adlai Stevenson
Eggnog is a traditional holiday drink invented by the English. Many
people wonder where the word "eggnog" comes from. The first syllable
comes from the English word "egg", meaning "egg". I don't know where
the "nog" comes from.
To make eggnog, you'll need rum, whiskey, wine gin and, if they are in
season, eggs...
Egotism is the anesthetic given by a kindly nature to relieve the pain
of being a damned fool.
-- Bellamy Brooks
Egotist, n.:
A person of low taste, more interested in himself than me.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Ehrman's Commentary:
1. Things will get worse before they get better.
2. Who said things would get better?
Eighty percent of air pollution comes from plants and trees.
-- Ronald Reagan, famous movie star
Eisenhower was very nice,
Nixon was his only vice.
-- C. Degen
Eleanor Rigby
Sits at the keyboard
And waits for a line on the screen
Lives in a dream
Waits for a signal
Finding some code
That will make the machine do some more.
What is it for?
All the lonely users, where do they all come from?
All the lonely users, why does it take so long?
Electrical Engineers do it with less resistance.
Electrocution, n.:
Burning at the stake with all the modern improvements.
Elevators smell different to midgets
Emersons' Law of Contrariness:
Our chief want in life is somebody who shall make us do what we
can. Having found them, we shall then hate them for it.
Encyclopedia Salesmen:
Invite them all in. Nip out the back door. Phone the police
and tell them your house is being burgled.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Endless Loop: n., see Loop, Endless.
Loop, Endless: n., see Endless Loop.
-- Random Shack Data Processing Dictionary
Entropy isn't what it used to be.
Enzymes are things invented by biologists that explain things which
otherwise require harder thinking.
-- Jerome Lettvin
Equal bytes for women.
Es brilig war. Die schlichte Toven
Wirrten und wimmelten in Waben;
Und aller-m"umsige Burggoven
Dir mohmen R"ath ausgraben.
-- Lewis Carrol, "Through the Looking Glass"
Eternal nothingness is fine if you happen to be dressed for it.
-- Woody Allen
Etymology, n.:
Some early etymological scholars come up with derivations that
were hard for the public to believe. The term "etymology" was formed
from the Latin "etus" ("eaten"), the root "mal" ("bad"), and "logy"
("study of"). It meant "the study of things that are hard to swallow."
-- Mike Kellen
Even if you do learn to speak correct English, whom are you going to
speak it to?
-- Clarence Darrow
"Even the best of friends cannot attend each other's funeral."
-- Kehlog Albran, "The Profit"
Even though they raised the rate for first class mail in the United
States we really shouldn't complain -- it's still only 2 cents a day.
Ever notice that even the busiest people are never too busy to tell you
just how busy they are.
Every 4 seconds a woman has a baby. Our problem is to find this woman
and stop her.
Every absurdity has a champion who will defend it.
Every creature has within him the wild, uncontrollable urge to punt.
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired
signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not
fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not
spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the
genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way
of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is
humanity hanging on a cross of iron.
-- Dwight Eisenhower, April 16, 1953
Every Horse has an Infinite Number of Legs (proof by intimidation):
Horses have an even number of legs. Behind they have two legs, and in
front they have fore-legs. This makes six legs, which is certainly an
odd number of legs for a horse. But the only number that is both even
and odd is infinity. Therefore, horses have an infinite number of
legs. Now to show this for the general case, suppose that somewhere,
there is a horse that has a finite number of legs. But that is a horse
of another color, and by the [above] lemma ["All horses are the same
color"], that does not exist.
Every little picofarad has a nanohenry all its own.
-- Don Vonada
Every man is as God made him, ay, and often worse.
-- Miguel de Cervantes
Every program has at least one bug and can be shortened by at least one
instruction -- from which, by induction, one can deduce that every
program can be reduced to one instruction which doesn't work.
Every program has two purposes --
written and another for which it wasn't.
Every program is a part of some other program, and rarely fits.
Every solution breeds new problems.
Every successful person has had failures but repeated failure is no
guarantee of eventual success.
"Every time I think I know where it's at, they move it."
Every word is like an unnecessary stain on silence and nothingness.
-- Beckett
Everybody is somebody else's weirdo.
-- Dykstra
Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die.
Everyone can be taught to sculpt: Michelangelo would have had to be
taught how ___not to. So it is with the great programmers.
Everyone knows that dragons don't exist. But while this simplistic
formulation may satisfy the layman, it does not suffice for the
scientific mind. The School of Higher Neantical Nillity is in fact
wholly unconcerned with what ____does exist. Indeed, the banality of
existence has been so amply demonstrated, there is no need for us to
discuss it any further here. The brilliant Cerebron, attacking the
problem analytically, discovered three distinct kinds of dragon: the
mythical, the chimerical, and the purely hypothetical. They were all,
one might say, nonexistent, but each nonexisted in an entirely
different way ...
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
Everyone talks about apathy, but no one ____does anything about it.
Everything is controlled by a small evil group to which, unfortunately,
no one we know belongs.
Everything you know is wrong!
Everything you've learned in school as "obvious" becomes less and less
obvious as you begin to study the universe. For example, there are no
solids in the universe. There's not even a suggestion of a solid.
There are no absolute continuums. There are no surfaces. There are no
straight lines.
-- R. Buckminster Fuller
Everyting should be built top-down, except the first time.
Excellence is THE trend of the '80s. Walk into any shopping
mall bookstore, go to the rack where they keep the best-sellers such as
"Garfield Gets Spayed", and you'll see a half-dozen books telling you
how to be excellent: "In Search of Excellence", "Finding Excellence",
"Grasping Hold of Excellence", "Where to Hide Your Excellence at Night
So the Cleaning Personnel Don't Steal It", etc.
-- Dave Barry, "In Search of Excellence"
Excellent day for drinking heavily. Spike office water cooler.
Excellent day to have a rotten day.
Excellent time to become a missing person.
Excess on occasion is exhilarating. It prevents moderation from
acquiring the deadening effect of a habit.
-- W. Somerset Maugham
Excessive login or logout messages are a sure sign of senility.
Expect the worst, it's the least you can do.
Expense Accounts, n.:
Corporate food stamps.
Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.
-- Olivier
Experience is that marvelous thing that enables you recognize a
mistake when you make it again.
-- F. P. Jones
Experience is the worst teacher. It always gives the test first and
the instruction afterward.
Experience is what causes a person to make new mistakes instead of old
ones.
Experience is what you get when you were expecting something else.
Experience varies directly with equipment ruined.
F u cn rd ths u cnt spl wrth a dm!
f u cn rd ths, itn tyg h myxbl cd.
f u cn rd ths, u cn gt a gd jb n cmptr prgrmmng.
Fairy Tale, n.:
A horror story to prepare children for the newspapers.
Faith is the quality that enables you to eat blackberry jam on a picnic
without looking to see whether the seeds move.
Faith, n:
That quality which enables us to believe what we know to be
untrue.
Fakir, n:
A psychologist whose charismatic data have inspired almost
religious devotion in his followers, even though the sources seem to
have shinnied up a rope and vanished.
Familiarity breeds attempt
Families, when a child is born
Want it to be intelligent.
I, through intelligence,
Having wrecked my whole life,
Only hope the baby will prove
Ignorant and stupid.
Then he will crown a tranquil life
By becoming a Cabinet Minister
-- Su Tung-p'o
Famous last words:
Famous last words:
1) "Don't worry, I can handle it."
2) "You and what army?"
3) "If you were as smart as you think you are, you wouldn't be
a cop."
Famous last words:
1. Don't unplug it, it will just take a moment to fix.
2. Let's take the shortcut, he can't see us from there.
3. What happens if you touch these two wires tog--
4. We won't need reservations.
5. It's always sunny there this time of the year.
6. Don't worry, it's not loaded.
7. They'd never (be stupid enough to) make him a manager.
Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the
Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun.
Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an
utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life
forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches
are a pretty neat idea ...
-- Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"
Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it
every six months.
-- Oscar Wilde
Fats Loves Madelyn
Feel disillusioned? I've got some great new illusions ...
Fertility is hereditary. If your parents didn't have any children,
neither will you.
Festivity Level 1: Your guests are chatting amiably with each
other, admiring your Christmas-tree ornaments, singing carols around
the upright piano, sipping at their drinks and nibbling hors
d'oeuvres.
Festivity Level 2: Your guests are talking loudly -- sometimes
to each other, and sometimes to nobody at all, rearranging your
Christmas-tree ornaments, singing "I Gotta Be Me" around the upright
piano, gulping their drinks and wolfing down hors d'oeuvres.
Festivity Level 3: Your guests are arguing violently with
inanimate objects, singing "I can't get no satisfaction," gulping down
other peoples' drinks, wolfing down Christmas tree ornaments and
placing hors d'oeuvres in the upright piano to see what happens when
the little hammers strike.
Festivity Level 4: Your guests, hors d'oeuvres smeared all over
their naked bodies are performing a ritual dance around the burning
Christmas tree. The piano is missing.
You want to keep your party somewhere around level 3, unless
you rent your home and own Firearms, in which case you can go to level
4. The best way to get to level 3 is egg-nog.
Fifth Law of Applied Terror:
If you are given an open-book exam, you will forget your book.
Corollary:
If you are given a take-home exam, you will forget where you
live.
Fifth Law of Procrastination:
Procrastination avoids boredom; one never has the feeling that
there is nothing important to do.
FIGHTING WORDS
Say my love is easy had,
Say I'm bitten raw with pride,
Say I am too often sad --
Still behold me at your side.
Say I'm neither brave nor young,
Say I woo and coddle care,
Say the devil touched my tongue --
Still you have my heart to wear.
But say my verses do not scan,
And I get me another man!
-- Dorothy Parker
Finagle's Creed:
Science is true. Don't be misled by facts.
Finagle's First Law:
If an experiment works, something has gone wrong.
Finagle's fourth Law:
Once a job is fouled up, anything done to improve it only
makes it worse.
Finagle's Second Law:
No matter what the anticipated result, there will always be
someone eager to (a) misinterpret it, (b) fake it, or (c)
believe it happened according to his own pet theory.
Finagle's Third Law:
In any collection of data, the figure most obviously correct,
beyond all need of checking, is the mistake
Corollaries:
1. Nobody whom you ask for help will see it.
2. The first person who stops by, whose advice you really
don't want to hear, will see it immediately.
Fine day to throw a party. Throw him as far as you can.
Fine day to work off excess energy. Steal something heavy.
First Law of Bicycling:
No matter which way you ride, it's uphill and against the
wind.
First Law of Procrastination:
Procrastination shortens the job and places the responsibility
for its termination on someone else (i.e., the authority who
imposed the deadline).
First Law of Socio-Genetics:
Celibacy is not hereditary.
First Rule of History:
History doesn't repeat itself -- historians merely repeat each
other.
Flappity, floppity, flip
The mouse on the m"obius strip;
The strip revolved,
The mouse dissolved
In a chronodimensional skip.
FLASH! Intelligence of mankind decreasing. Details at ... uh, when
the little hand is on the ....
Flon's Law:
There is not now, and never will be, a language in which it is
the least bit difficult to write bad programs.
Flugg's Law:
When you need to knock on wood is when you realize that the
world is composed of vinyl, naugahyde and aluminum.
For a good time, call (415) 642-9483
For an idea to be fashionable is ominous, since it must afterwards be
always old-fashioned.
For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat,
and wrong.
-- H. L. Mencken
For every credibility gap, there is a gullibility fill.
-- R. Clopton
"For I perceive that behind this seemingly unrelated sequence
of events, there lurks a singular, sinister attitude of mind."
"Whose?"
"MINE! HA-HA!"
For some reason a glaze passes over people's faces when you say
"Canada". Maybe we should invade South Dakota or something.
-- Sandra Gotlieb, wife of the Canadian ambassador to
the U.S.
For some reason, this fortune reminds everyone of Marvin Zelkowitz.
"For that matter, compare your pocket computer with the massive jobs of
a thousand years ago. Why not, then, the last step of doing away with
computers altogether?"
-- Jehan Shuman
For those who like this sort of thing, this is the sort of thing they
like.
-- Abraham Lincoln
For years a secret shame destroyed my peace --
I'd not read Eliot, Auden or MacNiece.
But now I think a thought that brings me hope:
Neither had Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Pope.
-- Justin Richardson.
Forgetfulness, n.:
A gift of God bestowed upon debtors in compensation for their
destitution of conscience.
Fortune's graffito of the week (or maybe even month):
Don't Write On Walls!
(and underneath)
You want I should type?
Fortune's nomination for All-Time Champion and Protector of Youthful
Morals goes to Representative Clare E. Hoffman of Michigan. During an
impassioned House debate over a proposed bill to "expand oyster and
clam research," a sharp-eared informant transcribed the following
exchange between our hero and Rep. John D. Dingell, also of Michigan.
DINGELL: There are places in the world at the present time where we are
having to artificially propagate oysters and clams.
HOFFMAN: You mean the oysters I buy are not nature's oysters?
DINGELL: They may or may not be natural. The simple fact of the matter
is that female oysters through their living habits cast out
large amounts of seed and the male oysters cast out large
amounts of fertilization.
HOFFMAN: Wait a minute! I do not want to go into that. There are many
teenagers who read The Congressional Record.
FORTUNE'S PARTY TIPS #14
Tired of finding that other people are helping themselves to your good
liquor at BYOB parties? Take along a candle, which you insert and
light after you've opened the bottle. No one ever expects anything
drinkable to be in a bottle which has a candle stuck in its neck.
Fourth Law of Applied Terror:
The night before the English History mid-term, your Biology
instructor will assign 200 pages on planaria.
Corollary:
Every instructor assumes that you have nothing else to do
except study for that instructor's course.
Fourth Law of Revision:
It is usually impractical to worry beforehand about
interferences -- if you have none, someone will make one for
you.
Fresco's Discovery:
If you knew what you were doing you'd probably be bored.
Friends, Romans, Hipsters,
Let me clue you in;
I come to put down Caeser, not to groove him.
The square kicks some cats are on stay with them;
The hip bits, like, go down under; so let it lay with Caeser. The cool Brutus
Gave you the message: Caeser had big eyes;
If that's the sound, someone's copping a plea,
And, like, old Caeser really set them straight.
Here, copacetic with Brutus and the studs, -- for Brutus is a real cool cat;
So are they all, all cool cats, --
Come I to make this gig at Caeser's laying down.
Frisbeetarianism, n.:
The belief that when you die, your soul goes up the on roof and
gets stuck.
Frobnicate, v.:
To manipulate or adjust, to tweak. Derived from FROBNITZ.
Usually abbreviated to FROB. Thus one has the saying "to frob a
frob". See TWEAK and TWIDDLE. Usage: FROB, TWIDDLE, and TWEAK
sometimes connote points along a continuum. FROB connotes aimless
manipulation; TWIDDLE connotes gross manipulation, often a coarse
search for a proper setting; TWEAK connotes fine-tuning. If someone is
turning a knob on an oscilloscope, then if he's carefully adjusting it
he is probably tweaking it; if he is just turning it but looking at the
screen he is probably twiddling it; but if he's just doing it because
turning a knob is fun, he's frobbing it.
From too much love of living,
From hope and fear set free,
We thank with brief thanksgiving,
Whatever gods may be,
That no life lives forever,
That dead men rise up never,
That even the weariest river winds somewhere safe to sea.
-- Swinburne
Fudd's First Law of Opposition:
Push something hard enough and it will fall over.
Furbling, v.:
Having to wander through a maze of ropes at an airport or bank
even when you are the only person in line.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
Furious activity is no substitute for understanding.
-- H. H. Williams
Future looks spotty. You will spill soup in late evening.
G. B. Shaw to William Douglas Home: "Go on writing plays, my boy. One
of these days a London producer will go into his office and say to his
secretary, `Is there a play from Shaw this morning?' and when she says
`No,' he will say, `Well, then we'll have to start on the rubbish.'
And that's your chance, my boy."
Garbage In -- Gospel Out.
Garter, n.:
An elastic band intended to keep a woman from coming out of her
stockings and desolating the country.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Gauls! We have nothing to fear; except perhaps that the sky may fall
on our heads tomorrow. But as we all know, tomorrow never comes!!
-- Adventures of Asterix.
Gay shlafen: Yiddish for "go to sleep".
Now doesn't "gay shlafen" have a softer, more soothing sound
than the harsh, staccato "go to sleep"? Listen to the difference:
"Go to sleep, you little wretch!" ... "Gay shlafen, darling."
Obvious, isn't it?
Clearly the best thing you can do for you children is to start
speaking Yiddish right now and never speak another word of English as
long as you live. This will, of course, entail teaching Yiddish to all
your friends, business associates, the people at the supermarket, and
so on, but that's just the point. It has to start with committed
individuals and then grow ...
Some minor adjustments will have to be made, of course: those
signs written in what look like Yiddish letters won't be funny when
everything is written in Yiddish. And we'll have to start driving on
the left side of the road so we won't be reading the street signs
backwards. But is that too high a price to pay for world peace? I
think not, my friend, I think not.
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
"Gee, Mudhead, everyone at Morse Science High has an
extracurricular activity except you."
"Well, gee, doesn't Louise count?"
"Only to ten, Mudhead."
-- Firesign Theater
GEMINI (May 21 - June 20)
You are a quick and intelligent thinker. People like you because you
are bisexual. However, you are inclined to expect too much for too
little. This means you are cheap. Geminis are known for committing
incest.
GEMINI (May 21 to Jun. 20)
Good news and bad news highlighted. Enjoy the good news while
you can; the bad news will make you forget it. You will enjoy
praise and respect from those around you; everybody loves a
sucker. A short trip is in the stars, possibly to the men's
room.
Genderplex, n.:
The predicament of a person in a restaurant who is unable to
determine his or her designated restroom (e.g., turtles and
tortoises).
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
Genetics explains why you look like your father, and if you don't, why
you should.
Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus
handicapped.
-- Elbert Hubbard
Genius, n.:
A chemist who discovers a laundry additive that rhymes with
"bright".
George Orwell was an optimist.
Gerrold's Laws of Infernal Dynamics:
1. An object in motion will always be headed in the wrong
direction.
2. An object at rest will always be in the wrong place.
3. The energy required to change either one of these states
will always be more than you wish to expend, but never so
much as to make the task totally impossible.
Get forgiveness now -- tomorrow you may no longer feel guilty.
Get Revenge! Live long enough to be a problem for your children!
-- Gifts for Children --
This is easy. You never have to figure out what to get for children,
because they will tell you exactly what they want. They spend months
and months researching these kinds of things by watching Saturday-
morning cartoon-show advertisements. Make sure you get your children
exactly what they ask for, even if you disapprove of their choices. If
your child thinks he wants Murderous Bob, the Doll with the Face You
Can Rip Right Off, you'd better get it. You may be worried that it
might help to encourage your child's antisocial tendencies, but believe
me, you have not seen antisocial tendencies until you've seen a child
who is convinced that he or she did not get the right gift.
-- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide"
-- Gifts for Men --
Men are amused by almost any idiot thing -- that is why professional
ice hockey is so popular -- so buying gifts for them is easy. But you
should never buy them clothes. Men believe they already have all the
clothes they will ever need, and new ones make them nervous. For
example, your average man has 84 ties, but he wears, at most, only
three of them. He has learned, through humiliating trial and error,
that if he wears any of the other 81 ties, his wife will probably laugh
at him ("You're not going to wear THAT tie with that suit, are you?").
So he has narrowed it down to three safe ties, and has gone several
years without being laughed at. If you give him a new tie, he will
pretend to like it, but deep inside he will hate you.
If you want to give a man something practical, consider tires. More
than once, I would have gladly traded all the gifts I got for a new set
of tires.
-- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide"
Gimmie That Old Time Religion
We will follow Zarathustra, We will worship like the Druids,
Zarathustra like we use to, Dancing naked in the woods,
I'm a Zarathustra booster, Drinking strange fermented fluids,
And he's good enough for me! And it's good enough for me!
(chorus) (chorus)
In the church of Aphrodite,
The priestess wears a see through nightie,
She's a mighty righteous sightie,
And she's good enough for me!
(chorus)
CHORUS: Give me that old time religion,
Give me that old time religion,
Give me that old time religion,
'Cause it's good enough for me!
Ginsberg's Theorem:
1. You can't win.
2. You can't break even.
3. You can't even quit the game.
Freeman's Commentary on Ginsberg's theorem:
Every major philosophy that attempts to make life seem
meaningful is based on the negation of one part of Ginsberg's
Theorem. To wit:
1. Capitalism is based on the assumption that you can win.
2. Socialism is based on the assumption that you can break
even.
3. Mysticism is based on the assumption that you can quit the
game.
Give me a Plumber's friend the size of the Pittsburgh dome, and a place
to stand, and I will drain the world.
Give me the Luxuries, and the Hell with the Necessities!
Give thought to your reputation. Consider changing name and moving to
a new town.
Give your child mental blocks for Christmas.
Glib's Fourth Law of Unreliability:
Investment in reliability will increase until it exceeds the
probable cost of errors, or until someone insists on getting
some useful work done.
Go 'way! You're bothering me!
Go placidly amid the noise and waste, and remember what value there may
be in owning a piece thereof.
-- National Lampoon, "Deteriorada"
//GO.SYSIN DD *, DOODAH, DOODAH
God did not create the world in 7 days; he screwed around for 6 days
and then pulled an all-nighter.
"God gives burdens; also shoulders"
Jimmy Carter cited this Jewish saying in his concession speech
at the end of the 1980 election. At least he said it was a Jewish
saying; I can't find it anywhere. I'm sure he's telling the truth
though; why would he lie about a thing like that?
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
God has intended the great to be great and the little to be little ...
The trade unions, under the European system, destroy liberty ... I do
not mean to say that a dollar a day is enough to support a workingman
... not enough to support a man and five children if he insists on
smoking and drinking beer. But the man who cannot live on bread and
water is not fit to live! A family may live on good bread and water in
the morning, water and bread at midday, and good bread and water at
night!
-- Rev. Henry Ward Beecher
God is a comic playing to an audience that's afraid to laugh
God is a polythiest
God is Dead
-- Nietzsche
Nietzsche is Dead
-- God
Nietzsche is God
-- The Dead
God is not dead! He's alive and autographing bibles at Cody's
God is real, unless declared integer.
God is really only another artist. He invented the giraffe, the
elephant and the cat. He has no real style, He just goes on trying
other things.
-- Pablo Picasso
God is the tangential point between zero and infinity.
-- Alfred Jarry
God isn't dead, he just couldn't find a parking place.
God made machine language; all the rest is the work of man.
God made the Idiot for practice, and then He made the School Board
-- Mark Twain
God made the integers; all else is the work of Man.
-- Kronecker
God made the world in six days, and was arrested on the seventh.
God may be subtle, but He isn't plain mean.
-- Albert Einstein
God must love the Common Man; He made so many of them.
God rest ye CS students now,
Let nothing you dismay.
The VAX is down and won't be up,
Until the first of May.
The program that was due this morn,
Won't be postponed, they say.
Oh, tidings of comfort and joy,
Comfort and joy,
Oh, tidings of comfort and joy.
The bearings on the drum are gone,
The disk is wobbling, too.
We've found a bug in Lisp, and Algol
Can't tell false from true.
And now we find that we can't get
At Berkeley's 4.2.
(chorus)
Going to church does not make a person religious, nor does going to
school make a person educated, any more than going to a garage makes a
person a car.
Gold, n.:
A soft malleable metal relatively scarce in distribution. It
is mined deep in the earth by poor men who then give it to rich men who
immediately bury it back in the earth in great prisons, although gold
hasn't done anything to them.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Goldenstern's Rules:
1. Always hire a rich attorney
2. Never buy from a rich salesman.
Good advice is something a man gives when he is too old to set a bad
example.
-- La Rouchefoucauld
Good day for a change of scene. Repaper the bedroom wall.
Good day for overcoming obstacles. Try a steeplechase.
Good day to avoid cops. Crawl to school.
Good day to let down old friends who need help.
Good leaders being scarce, following yourself is allowed.
Good news is just life's way of keeping you off balance.
Good news. Ten weeks from Friday will be a pretty good day.
Good night to spend with family, but avoid arguments with your mate's
new lover.
Good-bye. I am leaving because I am bored.
-- George Saunders' dying words
Got Mole problems?
Call Avogardo 6.02 x 10^23
Goto, n.:
A programming tool that exists to allow structured programmers
to complain about unstructured programmers.
-- Ray Simard
Goy: ... The distinction between Jewish and goyish can be quite subtle,
as the following quote from Lenny Bruce illustrates:
"I'm Jewish. Count Basie's Jewish. Ray Charles is Jewish.
Eddie Cantor's goyish. The B'nai Brith is goyish. The Hadassah is
Jewish. Marine Corps -- heavy goyish, dangerous.
"Kool-Aid is goyish. All Drake's Cakes are goyish.
Pumpernickel is Jewish and, as you know, white bread is very goyish.
Instant potatoes -- goyish. Black cherry soda's very Jewish.
Macaroons are ____very Jewish. Fruit salad is Jewish. Lime Jell-O is
goyish. Lime soda is ____very goyish. Trailer parks are so goyish that
Jews won't go near them ..."
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
Grabel's Law:
2 is not equal to 3 -- not even for large values of 2.
Graduate life -- it's not just a job, it's an indenture.
Grandpa Charnock's Law:
You never really learn to swear until you learn to drive.
Gravity is a myth, the Earth sucks.
Gray's Law of Programming:
`_n+1' trivial tasks are expected to be accomplished in the same
time as `_n' tasks.
Logg's Rebuttal to Gray's Law:
`_n+1' trivial tasks take twice as long as `_n' trivial tasks.
GREAT MOMENTS IN AMERICAN HISTORY (#21) -- July 30, 1917
On this day, New York City hotel detectives burst in and caught then-
Senator Warren G. Harding in bed with an underage girl. He bought them
off with a $20 bribe, and later remarked thankfully, "I thought I
wouldn't get out of that under $1000!" Always one to learn from his
mistakes, in later years President Harding carried on his affairs in a
tiny closet in the White House Cabinet Room while Secret Service men
stood lookout.
Green light in A.M. for new projects. Red light in P.M. for traffic
tickets.
Greener's Law:
Never argue with a man who buys ink by the barrel.
Grelb's Reminder:
Eighty percent of all people consider themselves to be above
average drivers.
"Grub first, then ethics."
-- Bertolt Brecht
Gyroscope, n.:
A wheel or disk mounted to spin rapidly about an axis and also
free to rotate about one or both of two axes perpendicular to each
other and the axis of spin so that a rotation of one of the two
mutually perpendicular axes results from application of torque to the
other when the wheel is spinning and so that the entire apparatus
offers considerable opposition depending on the angular momentum to any
torque that would change the direction of the axis of spin.
-- Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary
H. L. Mencken's Law:
Those who can -- do.
Those who can't -- teach.
Martin's Extension:
Those who cannot teach -- administrate.
Hacker's Law:
The belief that enhanced understanding will necessarily stir
a nation to action is one of mankind's oldest illusions.
Hacking's just another word for nothing left to kludge.
... Had this been an actual emergency, we would have fled in terror,
and you would not have been informed.
Hail to the sun god
He sure is a fun god
Ra! Ra! Ra!
Half Moon tonight. (At least it's better than no Moon at all.)
Half-done: This is the best way to eat a kosher dill -- when it's still
crunchy, light green, yet full of garlic flavor. The difference
between this and the typical soggy dark green cucumber corpse is like
the the difference between life and death.
You may find it difficult to find a good half-done kosher dill
there in Seattle, so what you should do is take a cab out to the
airport, fly to New York, take the JFK Express to Jay Street-Borough
Hall, transfer to an uptown F, get off at East Broadway, walk north on
Essex (along the park), make your first left onto Hester Street, walk
about fifteen steps, turn ninety degrees left, and stop. Say to the
man, "Let me have a nice half-done."
Worth the trouble, wasn't it?
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
Hall's Laws of Politics:
(1) The voters want fewer taxes and more spending.
(2) Citizens want honest politicians until they want something
fixed.
(3) Constituency drives out consistency (i.e., liberals defend
military spending, and conservatives social spending in
their own districts).
Hand, n.:
A singular instrument worn at the end of a human arm and
commonly thrust into somebody's pocket.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Hanlon's Razor:
Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by
stupidity.
Hanson's Treatment of Time:
There are never enough hours in a day, but always too many days
before Saturday.
Happiness is having a scratch for every itch.
-- Ogden Nash
Happiness isn't something you experience; it's something you remember.
-- Oscar Levant
Happiness, n.:
An agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of
another.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Hardware, n.:
The parts of a computer system that can be kicked.
Hark, Hark, the dogs do bark
The Duke is fond of kittens
He likes to take their insides out
And use them for his mittens
From "The Thirteen Clocks"
Hark, the Herald Tribune sings,
Advertising wondrous things.
-- Tom Leher
Harris's Lament:
All the good ones are taken.
Harrisberger's Fourth Law of the Lab:
Experience is directly proportional to the amount of
equipment ruined.
Harry is heavily into camping, and every year in the late fall, he
makes us all go to Assateague, which is an island on the Atlantic Ocean
famous for its wild horses. I realize that the concept of wild horses
probably stirs romantic notions in many of you, but this is because you
have never met any wild horses in person. In person, they are like
enormous hooved rats. They amble up to your camp site, and their
attitude is: "We're wild horses. We're going to eat your food, knock
down your tent and poop on your shoes. We're protected by federal law,
just like Richard Nixon."
-- Dave Barry, "Tenting Grandpa Bob"
Hartley's First Law:
You can lead a horse to water, but if you can get him to float
on his back, you've got something.
Hartley's Second Law:
Never sleep with anyone crazier than yourself.
Harvard Law:
Under the most rigorously controlled conditions of pressure,
temperature, volume, humidity, and other variables, the
organism will do as it damn well pleases.
Has everyone noticed that all the letters of the word "database" are
typed with the left hand? Now the layout of the QWERTYUIOP typewriter
keyboard was designed, among other things, to facilitate the even use
of both hands. It follows, therefore, that writing about databases is
not only unnatural, but a lot harder than it appears.
Has your family tried 'em?
POWDERMILK BISCUITS
Heavens, they're tasty and expeditious!
They're made from whole wheat, to give shy persons
the strength to get up and do what needs to be done.
POWDERMILK BISCUITS
Buy them ready-made in the big blue box with the picture of
the biscuit on the front, or in the brown bag with the dark
stains that indicate freshness.
Hatred, n.:
A sentiment appropriate to the occasion of another's
superiority.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Have you ever noticed that the people who are always trying to tell
you, "There's a time for work and a time for play," never find the time
for play?
Have you noticed that all you need to grow healthy, vigorous grass is a
crack in your sidewalk?
He had that rare weird electricity about him -- that extremely wild and
heavy presence that you only see in a person who has abandoned all hope
of ever behaving "normally."
-- Hunter S. Thompson, "Fear and Loathing '72"
He hadn't a single redeeming vice.
-- Oscar Wilde
"He is now rising from affluence to poverty."
-- Mark Twain
He looked at me as if I was a side dish he hadn't ordered.
He played the king as if afraid someone else would play the ace.
-- John Mason Brown, drama critic
He thought he saw an albatross
That fluttered 'round the lamp.
He looked again and saw it was
A penny postage stamp.
"You'd best be getting home," he said,
"The nights are rather damp."
"He was so narrow minded he could see through a keyhole with both
eyes ..."
He who attacks the fundamentals of the American broadcasting industry
attacks democracy itself.
-- William S. Paley, chairman of CBS
He who Laughs, Lasts.
"He's just a politician trying to save both his faces ..."
He's the kind of guy, that, well, if you were ever in a jam he'd be
there ... with two slices of bread and some chunky peanut butter.
"He's the kind of man for the times that need the kind of man he is ..."
HE: Let's end it all, bequeathin' our brains to science.
SHE: What?!? Science got enough trouble with their OWN brains.
-- Walt Kelley
Health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.
Heaven, n.:
A place where the wicked cease from troubling you with talk of
their personal affairs, and the good listen with attention while you
expound your own.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Heavy, adj.:
Seduced by the chocolate side of the force.
"Heisenberg may have slept here"
Hell hath no fury like a bureaucrat scorned.
-- Milton Friedman
Heller's Law:
The first myth of management is that it exists.
Johnson's Corollary:
Nobody really knows what is going on anywhere within the
organization.
Help a swallow land at Capistrano.
Help! I'm trapped in a PDP 11/70!
Her locks an ancient lady gave
Her loving husband's life to save;
And men -- they honored so the dame --
Upon some stars bestowed her name.
But to our modern married fair,
Who'd give their lords to save their hair,
No stellar recognition's given.
There are not stars enough in heaven.
"Here at the Phone Company, we serve all kinds of people; from
Presidents and Kings to the scum of the earth ..."
Here I sit, broken-hearted,
All logged in, but work unstarted.
First net.this and net.that,
And a hot buttered bun for net.fat.
The boss comes by, and I play the game,
Then I turn back to net.flame.
Is there a cure (I need your views),
For someone trapped in net.news?
I need your help, I say 'tween sobs,
'Cause I'll soon be listed in net.jobs.
Here in my heart, I am Helen;
I'm Aspasia and Hero, at least.
I'm Judith, and Jael, and Madame de Sta"el;
I'm Salome, moon of the East.
Here in my soul I am Sappho;
Lady Hamilton am I, as well.
In me R'ecamier vies with Kitty O'Shea,
With Dido, and Eve, and poor nell.
I'm all of the glamorous ladies
At whose beckoning history shook.
But you are a man, and see only my pan,
So I stay at home with a book.
-- Dorothy Parker
Here is a simple experiment that will teach you an important electrical
lesson: On a cool, dry day, scuff your feet along a carpet, then reach
your hand into a friend's mouth and touch one of his dental fillings.
Did you notice how your friend twitched violently and cried out in
pain? This teaches us that electricity can be a very powerful force,
but we must never use it to hurt others unless we need to learn an
important electrical lesson.
It also teaches us how an electrical circuit works. When you scuffed
your feet, you picked up batches of "electrons", which are very small
objects that carpet manufacturers weave into carpets so they will
attract dirt. The electrons travel through your bloodstream and
collect in your finger, where they form a spark that leaps to your
friend's filling, then travels down to his feet and back into the
carpet, thus completing the circuit.
Amazing Electronic Fact: If you scuffed your feet long enough without
touching anything, you would build up so many electrons that your
finger would explode! But this is nothing to worry about unless you
have carpeting.
-- Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?"
Here is the fact of the week, maybe even the fact of the
month. According to probably reliable sources, the Coca-Cola people
are experiencing severe marketing anxiety in China.
The words "Coca-Cola" translate into Chinese as either
(depending on the inflection) "wax-fattened mare" or "bite the wax
tadpole".
Bite the wax tadpole.
There is a sort of rough justice, is there not?
The trouble with this fact, as lovely as it is, is that it's
hard to get a whole column out of it. I'd like to teach the world to
bite a wax tadpole. Coke -- it's the real wax-fattened mare. Not bad,
but broad satiric vistas do not open up.
-- John Carrol, San Francisco Chronicle
Heuristics are bug ridden by definition. If they didn't have bugs,
then they'd be algorithms.
"Hey! Who took the cork off my lunch??!"
-- W. C. Fields
Hi there! This is just a note from me, to you, to tell you, the person
reading this note, that I can't think up any more famous quotes, jokes,
nor bizarre stories, so you may as well go home.
Higgeldy Piggeldy,
Hamlet of Elsinore
Ruffled the critics by
Dropping this bomb:
"Phooey on Freud and his
Psychoanalysis --
Oedipus, Shmoedipus,
I just loved Mom."
Hindsight is an exact science.
Hippogriff, n.:
An animal (now extinct) which was half horse and half griffin.
The griffin was itself a compound creature, half lion and half eagle.
The hippogriff was actually, therefore, only one quarter eagle, which
is two dollars and fifty cents in gold. The study of zoology is full
of surprises.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Hire the morally handicapped.
"His mind is like a steel trap -- full of mice"
-- Foghorn Leghorn
"His super power is to turn into a scotch terrier."
History repeats itself. That's one thing wrong with history.
Hlade's Law:
If you have a difficult task, give it to a lazy person -- they
will find an easier way to do it.
Hoare's Law of Large Problems:
Inside every large problem is a small problem struggling to get
out.
Hofstadter's Law:
It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take
Hofstadter's Law into account.
Hollywood is where if you don't have happiness you send out for it.
-- Rex Reed
"Honesty is the best policy, but insanity is a better defense"
Honesty pays, but it doesn't seem to pay enough to suit some people.
-- F. M. Hubbard
Honk if you hate bumper stickers that say "Honk if ..."
Honk if you love peace and quiet.
Honorable, adj.:
Afflicted with an impediment in one's reach. In legislative
bodies, it is customary to mention all members as honorable; as, "the
honorable gentleman is a scurvy cur."
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Horngren's Observation:
Among economists, the real world is often a special case.
Horngren's Observation:
Among economists, the real world is often a special case.
Horse sense is the thing a horse has which keeps it from betting on
people.
-- W. C. Fields
How can you be in two places at once when you're not anywhere at all?
How come only your friends step on your new white sneakers?
How come wrong numbers are never busy?
How do you explain school to a higher intelligence?
-- Elliot, "E.T."
How doth the little crocodile
Improve his shining tail,
And pour the waters of the Nile
On every golden scale!
How cheerfully he seems to grin,
How neatly spreads his claws,
And welcomes little fishes in,
With gently smiling jaws!
-- Lewis Carrol, "Alice in Wonderland"
How doth the VAX's C compiler
Improve its object code.
And even as we speak does it
Increase the system load.
How patiently it seems to run
And spit out error flags,
While users, with frustration, all
Tear their clothes to rags.
How doth the VAX's C-compiler
Improve its object code.
And even as we speak does it
Increase the system load.
How patiently it seems to run
And spit out error flags,
While users, with frustration, all
Tear all their clothes to rags.
How long a minute is depends on which side of the bathroom door you're
on.
How many hardware engineers does it take to change a lightbulb?
None: "We'll fix it in software."
How many software engineers does it take to change a lightbulb?
None: "We'll document it in the manual."
How many tech writers does it take to change a lightbulb?
None: "The user can work it out."
How many Zen masters does it take to screw in a light bulb?
None. The Universe spines the bulb, and the Zen master stays out of
the way.
How much does it cost to entice a dope-smoking UNIX system guru to
Dayton?
-- Brian Boyle, UNIX/WORLD's First Annual Salary Survey
How wonderful opera would be if there were no singers.
Howe's Law:
Everyone has a scheme that will not work.
However, never daunted, I will cope with adversity in my traditional
manner ... sulking and nausea.
-- Tom K. Ryan
Human beings were created by water to transport it uphill.
Human cardiac catheterization was introduced by Werner Forssman in
1929. Ignoring his department chief, and tying his assistant to an
operating table to prevent his interference, he placed a uretheral
catheter into a vein in his arm, advanced it to the right atrium [of
his heart], and walked upstairs to the x-ray department where he took
the confirmatory x-ray film. In 1956, Dr. Forssman was awarded the
Nobel Prize.
Hummingbirds never remember the words to songs.
"Humor is a drug which it's the fashion to abuse."
-- William Gilbert
Hurewitz's Memory Principle:
The chance of forgetting something is directly proportional
to ..... to ........ uh ..............
I am changing my name to Crysler
I am going down to Washington, D.C.
I will tell some power broker
What they did for Iacocca
Will be perfectly acceptable to me!
I am changing my name to Chrysler,
I am heading for that great receiving line.
When they hand a million grand out,
I'll be standing with my hand out,
Yessir, I'll get mine!
"I am not an Economist. I am an honest man!"
-- Paul McCracken
I am not now, and never have been, a girl friend of Henry Kissinger.
-- Gloria Steinem
"I am not sure what this is, but an `F' would only dignify it."
-- English Professor
I am ready to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is prepared for the
great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.
-- Winston Churchill
"I am returning this otherwise good typing paper to you because someone
has printed gibberish all over it and put your name at the top."
--English Professor, Ohio University
I am the mother of all things, and all things should wear a sweater.
I am, in point of fact, a particularly haughty and exclusive person, of
pre-Adamite ancestral descent. You will understand this when I tell
you that I can trace my ancestry back to a protoplasmal primordial
atomic globule. Consequently, my family pride is something
inconceivable. I can't help it. I was born sneering.
-- Pooh-Bah, "The Mikado", Gilbert & Sullivan
I believe in getting into hot water; it keeps you clean.
-- G. K. Chesterton
I belong to no organized party. I am a Democrat.
-- Will Rogers
I bet the human brain is a kludge.
-- Marvin Minsky
I can resist anything but temptation.
I can't complain, but sometimes I still do.
-- Joe Walsh
I cannot and will not cut my conscience to fit this year's fashions.
-- Lillian Hellman
I cannot overemphasize the importance of good grammar.
What a crock. I could easily overemphasize the importance of good
grammar. For example, I could say: "Bad grammar is the leading cause
of slow, painful death in North America," or "Without good grammar, the
United States would have lost World War II."
-- Dave Barry, "An Utterly Absurd Look at Grammar"
"I cannot read the fiery letters," said Frodo in a quavering
voice.
"No," Said Gandalf, "but I can. The letters are Elvish, of
course, of an ancient mode, but the language is that of Mordor, which
I will not utter here. They are lines of a verse long known in
Elven-lore:
"This Ring, no other, is made by the elves,
Who'd pawn their own mother to grab it themselves.
Ruler of creeper, mortal, and scallop,
This is a sleeper that packs quite a wallop.
The Power almighty rests in this Lone Ring.
The Power, alrighty, for doing your Own Thing.
If broken or busted, it cannot be remade.
If found, send to Sorhed (with postage prepaid)."
I do not fear computers. I fear the lack of them.
-- Isaac Asimov
I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us
with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
-- Galileo Galilei
I do not know myself, and God forbid that I should.
-- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
I don't believe in astrology. But then I'm an Aquarius, and Aquarians
don't believe in astrology.
-- James R. F. Quirk
"I don't care who does the electing as long as I get to do the
nominating"
-- Boss Tweed
"I don't have any solution but I certainly admire the problem."
-- Ashleigh Brilliant
I don't have to take this abuse from you -- I've got hundreds of people
waiting to abuse me.
--Bill Murray, "Ghostbusters"
"I don't know what you mean by `glory,'" Alice said
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. "Of course you don't--
till I tell you. I meant `there's a nice knock-down argument for
you!'"
"But glory doesn't mean `a nice knock-down argument,'" Alice
objected.
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful
tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor
less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean
so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master--
that's all."
-- Lewis Carrol, "Through the Looking Glass"
I don't like spinach, and I'm glad I don't, because if I liked it I'd
eat it, and I just hate it.
-- Clarence Darrow
I don't object to sex before marriage, but two minutes before?!?
I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business
on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment
he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual
becoming, with a goal in front and not behind.
-- George Bernard Shaw
"I drink to make other people interesting."
-- George Jean Nathan
I for one cannot protest the recent M. T. A. fare hike and the
accompanying promises that this would in no way improve service. For
the transit system, as it now operates, has hidden advantages that
can't be measured in monetary terms.
Personally, I feel that it is well worth 75 cents or even $1 to have
that unimpeachable excuse whenever I am late to anything: "I came by
subway." Those four words have such magic in them that if Godot should
someday show up and mumble them, any audience would instantly
understand his long delay.
I for one cannot protest the recent M.T.A. fare hike and the
accompanying promises that this would in no way improve service. For
the transit system, as it now operates, has hidden advantages that
can't be measured in monetary terms.
Personally, I feel that it is well worth 75 cents or even $1 to have
that unimpeachable excuse whenever I am late to anything: "I came by
subway." Those four words have such magic in them that if Godot should
someday show up and mumble them, any audience would instantly
understand his long delay.
I generally avoid temptation unless I can't resist it.
-- Mae West
I get up each morning, gather my wits.
Pick up the paper, read the obits.
If I'm not there I know I'm not dead.
So I eat a good breakfast and go back to bed.
Oh, how do I know my youth is all spent?
My get-up-and-go has got-up-and-went.
But in spite of it all, I'm able to grin,
And think of the places my get-up has been.
-- Pete Seeger
I hate quotations.
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson
I have a simple philosophy:
Fill what's empty.
Empty what's full.
Scratch where it itches.
-- A. R. Longworth
I have learned
To spell hors d'oeuvres
Which still grates on
Some people's n'oeuvres.
-- Warren Knox
I have made mistakes but I have never made the mistake of claiming that
I have never made one.
-- James Gordon Bennett
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to
make it shorter.
-- Blaise Pascal
I have seen the future and it is just like the present, only longer.
-- Kehlog Albran, "The Profit"
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best.
-- Oscar Wilde
I haven't lost my mind -- it's backed up on tape somewhere.
I haven't lost my mind; I know exactly where I left it.
"I just need enough to tide me over until I need more."
-- Bill Hoest
"I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but
World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
-- Albert Einstein
I like being single. I'm always there when I need me.
-- Art Leo
I like work ...
I can sit and watch it for hours.
I like your game but we have to change the rules.
"I may not be totally perfect, but parts of me are excellent."
-- Ashleigh Brilliant
"I must have a prodigious quantity of mind; it takes me as much as a
week sometimes to make it up."
-- Mark Twain, "The Innocents Abroad"
I must have slipped a disk -- my pack hurts
I never fail to convince an audience that the best thing they could do
was to go away.
I never met a piece of chocolate I didn't like.
I profoundly believe it takes a lot of practice to become a moral
slob.
-- William F. Buckley
"I quite agree with you," said the Duchess; "and the moral of
that is -- `Be what you would seem to be' -- or, if you'd like it put
more simply -- `Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it
might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not
otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be
otherwise.'"
-- Lewis Carrol, "Alice in Wonderland"
I really hate this damned machine
I wish that they would sell it.
It never does quite what I want
But only what I tell it.
"I refuse to have a battle of wits with an unarmed person."
I see the eigenvalue in thine eye,
I hear the tender tensor in thy sigh.
Bernoulli would have been content to die
Had he but known such _a-squared cos 2(phi)!
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
I sent a letter to the fish,
I told them, "This is what I wish."
The little fishes of the sea,
They sent an answer back to me.
The little fishes' answer was
"We cannot do it, sir, because ..."
I sent a letter back to say
It would be better to obey.
But someone came to me and said
"The little fishes are in bed."
I said to him, and I said it plain
"Then you must wake them up again."
I said it very loud and clear,
I went and shouted in his ear.
But he was very stiff and proud,
He said "You needn't shout so loud."
And he was very proud and stiff,
He said "I'll go and wake them if ..."
I took a kettle from the shelf,
I went to wake them up myself.
But when I found the door was locked
I pulled and pushed and kicked and knocked,
And when I found the door was shut,
I tried to turn the handle, But ...
"Is that all?" asked Alice.
"That is all." said Humpty Dumpty. "Goodbye."
-- Lewis Carrol, "Through the Looking Glass"
I think that I shall never see
A billboard lovely as a tree.
Perhaps, unless the billboards fall
I'll never see a tree at all.
-- Ogden Nash
I used to get high on life but lately I've built up a resistance.
I used to think I was indecisive, but now I'm not so sure.
"I want to buy a husband who, every week when I sit down to watch `St.
Elsewhere', won't scream, `FORGET IT, BLANCHE ... IT'S TIME FOR "HEE
HAW"!!'"
-- Berke Breathed, "Bloom County"
I was gratified to be able to answer promptly, and I did. I said I
didn't know.
-- Mark Twain
I went on to test the program in every way I could devise. I strained
it to expose its weaknesses. I ran it for high-mass stars and low-mass
stars, for stars born exceedingly hot and those born relatively cold.
I ran it assuming the superfluid currents beneath the crust to be
absent -- not because I wanted to know the answer, but because I had
developed an intuitive feel for the answer in this particular case.
Finally I got a run in which the computer showed the pulsar's
temperature to be less than absolute zero. I had found an error. I
chased down the error and fixed it. Now I had improved the program to
the point where it would not run at all.
-- George Greenstein, "Frozen Star: Of Pulsars, Black
Holes and the Fate of Stars"
I wish there was a knob on the TV to turn up the intelligence. There's
a knob called "brightness", but it doesn't work.
-- Gallagher
I wouldn't recommend sex, drugs or insanity for everyone, but they've
always worked for me.
-- Hunter S. Thompson
I'd give my right arm to be ambidextrous.
"I'd love to go out with you, but I did my own thing and now I've got
to undo it."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I have to floss my cat."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I have to stay home and see if I
snore."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I never go out on days that end in
`Y.'"
"I'd love to go out with you, but I want to spend more time with my
blender."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm attending the opening of my
garage door."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm converting my calendar watch from
Julian to Gregorian."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm doing door-to-door collecting for
static cling."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm having all my plants neutered."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm staying home to work on my
cottage cheese sculpture."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm taking punk totem pole carving."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I've been scheduled for a karma
transplant."
"I'd love to go out with you, but it's my parakeet's bowling night."
"I'd love to go out with you, but my favorite commercial is on TV."
"I'd love to go out with you, but the last time I went out, I never
came back."
"I'd love to go out with you, but the man on television told me to say
tuned."
"I'd love to go out with you, but there are important world issues that
need worrying about."
I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy.
I'll grant the random access to my heart,
Thoul't tell me all the constants of thy love;
And so we two shall all love's lemmas prove
And in our bound partition never part.
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
I'm a creationist; I refuse to believe that I could have evolved from
man.
I'm all for computer dating, but I wouldn't want one to marry my
sister.
I'm fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to
die in.
-- George McGovern
I'm in Pittsburgh. Why am I here?
-- Harold Urey, Nobel Laureate
I'm N-ary the tree, I am,
N-ary the tree, I am, I am.
I'm getting traversed by the parser next door,
She's traversed me seven times before.
And ev'ry time it was an N-ary (N-ary!)
Never wouldn't ever do a binary. (No sir!)
I'm 'er eighth tree that was N-ary.
N-ary the tree I am, I am,
N-ary the tree I am.
I'm not under the alkafluence of inkahol that some thinkle peep I am.
It's just the drunker I sit here the longer I get.
I'm prepared for all emergencies but totally unprepared for everyday
life.
I'm really enjoying not talking to you ... Let's not talk again ____REAL
soon ...
I'm very good at integral and differential calculus,
I know the scientific names of beings animalculous;
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.
-- Gilbert & Sullivan, "Pirates of Penzance"
IBM had a PL/I,
Its syntax worse than JOSS;
And everywhere this language went,
It was a total loss.
Idiot Box, n.:
The part of the envelope that tells a person where to place the
stamp when they can't quite figure it out for themselves.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
Idiot, n.:
A member of a large and powerful tribe whose influence in human
affairs has always been dominant and controlling.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
If A = B and B = C, then A = C, except where void or prohibited by law.
-- Roy Santoro
If a group of _N persons implements a COBOL compiler, there will be _N-1
passes. Someone in the group has to be the manager.
-- T. Cheatham
If a listener nods his head when you're explaining your program, wake
him up.
If a President doesn't do it to his wife, he'll do it to his country.
If all be true that I do think,
There be Five Reasons why one should Drink;
Good friends, good wine, or being dry,
Or lest we should be by-and-by,
Or any other reason why.
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular
error.
-- John Kenneth Galbraith
If all the world's a stage, I want to operate the trap door.
-- Paul Beatty
If all the world's economists were laid end to end, we wouldn't reach a
conclusion.
-- William Baumol
If an S and an I and an O and a U
With an X at the end spell Su;
And an E and a Y and an E spell I,
Pray what is a speller to do?
Then, if also an S and an I and a G
And an HED spell side,
There's nothing much left for a speller to do
But to go commit siouxeyesighed.
-- Charles Follen Adams, "An Orthographic Lament"
If anything can go wrong, it will.
If at first you don't succeed, give up, no use being a damn fool.
If at first you don't succeed, redefine success.
If bankers can count, how come they have eight windows and only four
tellers?
"If dolphins are so smart, why did Flipper work for television?"
If entropy is increasing, where is it coming from?
If everything is coming your way then you're in the wrong lane.
... if forced to travel on an airplane, try and get in the cabin with
the Captain, so you can keep an eye on him and nudge him if he falls
asleep or point out any mountains looming up ahead ...
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
If God had intended Man to Smoke, He would have set him on Fire.
If God had intended Man to Walk, He would have given him Feet.
If God had intended Man to Watch TV, He would have given him Rabbit
Ears.
If God had intended Men to Smoke, He would have put Chimneys in their
Heads.
If God had meant for us to be in the Army, we would have been born with
green, baggy skin.
If God had meant for us to be naked, we would have been born that way.
If God had not given us sticky tape, it would have been necessary to
invent it.
If God had wanted you to go around nude, He would have given you bigger
hands.
If God is perfect, why did He create discontinuous functions?
"If God lived on Earth, people would knock out all His windows."
-- Yiddish saying
If I don't drive around the park,
I'm pretty sure to make my mark.
If I'm in bed each night by ten,
I may get back my looks again.
If I abstain from fun and such,
I'll probably amount to much;
But I shall stay the way I am,
Because I do not give a damn.
-- Dorothy Parker
If I had a plantation in Georgia and a home in Hell, I'd sell the
plantation and go home.
-- Eugene P. Gallagher
If I had any humility I would be perfect.
-- Ted Turner
"If I had only known, I would have been a locksmith."
-- Albert Einstein
If I kiss you, that is a psychological interaction.
On the other hand, if I hit you over the head with a brick, that is
also a psychological interaction.
The difference is that one is friendly and the other is not so
friendly.
The crucial point is if you can tell which is which.
-- Dolph Sharp, "I'm O.K., You're Not So Hot"
If I traveled to the end of the rainbow
As Dame Fortune did intend,
Murphy would be there to tell me
The pot's at the other end.
-- Bert Whitney
If ignorance is bliss, why aren't there more happy people?
If it's Tuesday, this must be someone else's fortune.
If Jesus Christ were to come today, people would not even crucify him.
They would ask him to dinner, and hear what he had to say, and make fun
of it.
-- Thomas Carlyle
If life is a stage, I want some better lighting.
If little green men land in your back yard, hide any little green women
you've got in the house.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
If mathematically you end up with the wrong answer, try multiplying by
the page number.
If money can't buy happiness, I guess you'll just have to rent it.
If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit
in my name at a Swiss bank.
-- Woody Allen, "Without Feathers"
If only I could be respected without having to be respectable.
If only one could get that wonderful feeling of accomplishment without
having to accomplish anything.
If scientific reasoning were limited to the logical processes of
arithmetic, we should not get very far in our understanding of the
physical world. One might as well attempt to grasp the game of poker
entirely by the use of the mathematics of probability.
-- Vannevar Bush
If someone had told me I would be Pope one day, I would have studied
harder.
-- Pope John Paul I
If the code and the comments disagree, then both are probably wrong.
-- Norm Schryer
If the colleges were better, if they really had it, you would need to
get the police at the gates to keep order in the inrushing multitude.
See in college how we thwart the natural love of learning by leaving
the natural method of teaching what each wishes to learn, and insisting
that you shall learn what you have no taste or capacity for. The
college, which should be a place of delightful labor, is made odious
and unhealthy, and the young men are tempted to frivolous amusements to
rally their jaded spirits. I would have the studies elective.
Scholarship is to be created not by compulsion, but by awakening a pure
interest in knowledge. The wise instructor accomplishes this by
opening to his pupils precisely the attractions the study has for
himself. The marking is a system for schools, not for the college; for
boys, not for men; and it is an ungracious work to put on a professor.
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson
"If the King's English was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for
me!"
-- "Ma" Ferguson, Governor of Texas (circa 1920)
If the odds are a million to one against something occurring, chances
are 50-50 it will.
If the weather is extremely bad, church attendance will be down. If
the weather is extremely good, church attendance will be down. If the
bulletin covers are in short supply, however, church attendance will
exceed all expectations.
-- Reverend Chichester
If there are epigrams, there must be meta-epigrams.
If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that
will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong.
If there is no God, who pops up the next Kleenex?
-- Art Hoppe
If this fortune didn't exist, somebody would have invented it.
If time heals all wounds, how come the belly button stays the same?
If two men agree on everything, you may be sure that one of them is
doing the thinking.
-- Lyndon Baines Johnson
If we do not change our direction we are likely to end up where we are
headed.
If while you are in school, there is a shortage of qualified personnel
in a particular field, then by the time you graduate with the necessary
qualifications, that field's employment market is glutted.
-- Marguerite Emmons
"If you can count your money, you don't have a billion dollars."
-- J. Paul Getty
If you can lead it to water and force it to drink, it isn't a horse.
If you can survive death, you can probably survive anything.
If you can't be good, be careful. If you can't be careful, give me a
call.
If you can't learn to do it well, learn to enjoy doing it badly.
If you cannot convince them, confuse them.
-- Harry S Truman
If you didn't get caught, did you really do it?
If you don't care where you are, then you ain't lost.
If you explain so clearly that nobody can misunderstand, somebody
will.
If you give Congress a chance to vote on both sides of an issue, it
will always do it.
-- Les Aspin, D., Wisconsin
"If you go on with this nuclear arms race, all you are going to do is
make the rubble bounce"
-- Winston Churchill
If you had any brains, you'd be dangerous.
If you have a procedure with 10 parameters, you probably missed some.
"If you have to hate, hate gently"
If you live in a country run by committee, be on the committee.
-- Graham Summer
If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; but if you
really make them think they'll hate you.
If you only have a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail.
-- Maslow
If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which a procedure
can go wrong, and circumvent these, then a fifth way will promptly
develop.
If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite
you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man.
-- Mark Twain
If you push the "extra ice" button on the soft drink vending machine,
you won't get any ice. If you push the "no ice" button, you'll get
ice, but no cup.
If you put garbage in a computer nothing comes out but garbage. But
this garbage, having passed through a very expensive machine, is
somehow enobled and none dare criticize it.
If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.
-- Derek Bok, president of Harvard
If you think last Tuesday was a drag, wait till you see what happens
tomorrow!
If you think nobody cares if you're alive, try missing a couple of car
payments.
-- Earl Wilson
If you think the United States has stood still, who built the largest
shopping center in the world?
-- Richard M. Nixon
If you think the United States has stood still, who built the largest
shopping center in the world?
-- Richard Nixon
If you throw a New Year's Party, the worst thing that you can do would
be to throw the kind of party where your guests wake up today, and call
you to say they had a nice time. Now you'll be be expected to throw
another party next year.
What you should do is throw the kind of party where your guest wake up
several days from now and call their lawyers to find out if they've
been indicted for anything. You want your guests to be so anxious to
avoid a recurrence of your party that they immediately start planning
parties of their own, a year in advance, just to prevent you from
having another one ...
If your party is successful, the police will knock on your door, unless
your party is very successful in which case they will lob tear gas
through your living room window. As host, your job is to make sure
that they don't arrest anybody. Or if they're dead set on arresting
someone, your job is to make sure it isn't you ...
If you want your spouse to listen and pay strict attention to every
word you say, talk in your sleep.
"If you wants to get elected president, you'se got to think up some
memoraboble homily so's school kids can be pestered into memorizin'
it, even if they don't know what it means."
-- Walt Kelly, "The Pogo Party"
If you're going to do something tonight that you'll be sorry for
tomorrow morning, sleep late.
-- Henny Youngman
If you're happy, you're successful.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
If you're not very clever you should be conciliatory.
-- Benjamin Disraeli
If you've done six impossible things before breakfast, why not round it
off with dinner at Milliway's, the restaurant at the end of the
universe?
If you've seen one redwood, you've seen them all.
-- Ronald Reagan
Il brilgue: les t^oves libricilleux
Se gyrent et frillant dans le guave,
Enm^im'es sont les gougebosquex,
Et le m^omerade horgrave.
-- Lewis Carrol, "Through the Looking Glass"
Illinois isn't exactly the land that God forgot -- it's more like the
land He's trying to ignore.
Imagination is the one weapon in the war against reality.
-- Jules de Gaultier
Imagine that Cray computer decides to make a personal computer. It has
a 150 MHz processor, 200 megabytes of RAM, 1500 megabytes of disk
storage, a screen resolution of 1024 x 1024 pixels, relies entirely on
voice recognition for input, fits in your shirt pocket and costs $300.
What's the first question that the computer community asks?
"Is it PC compatible?"
Immortality -- a fate worse than death.
-- Edgar A. Shoaff
Impartial, adj.:
Unable to perceive any promise of personal advantage from
espousing either side of a controversy or adopting either of two
conflicting opinions.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Important letters which contain no errors will develop errors in the
mail. Corresponding errors will show up in the duplicate while the
Boss is reading it.
In a five year period we can get one superb programming language. Only
we can't control when the five year period will begin.
In a forest a fox bumps into a little rabbit, and says, "Hi,
junior, what are you up to?"
"I'm writing a dissertation on how rabbits eat foxes," said the
rabbit.
"Come now, friend rabbit, you know that's impossible!"
"Well, follow me and I'll show you." They both go into the
rabbit's dwelling and after a while the rabbit emerges with a satisfied
expression on his face.
Comes along a wolf. "Hello, what are we doing these days?"
"I'm writing the second chapter of my thesis, on how rabbits
devour wolves."
"Are you crazy? Where is your academic honesty?"
"Come with me and I'll show you." As before, the rabbit comes
out with a satisfied look on his face and a diploma in his paw.
Finally, the camera pans into the rabbit's cave and, as everybody
should have guessed by now, we see a mean-looking, huge lion sitting
next to some bloody and furry remnants of the wolf and the fox.
The moral: It's not the contents of your thesis that are important --
it's your PhD advisor that really counts.
In America, any boy may become president and I suppose that's just one
of the risks he takes.
-- Adlai Stevenson
In an organization, each person rises to the level of his own
incompetency
-- The Peter Principle
In any formula, constants (especially those obtained from handbooks)
are to be treated as variables.
In case of atomic attack, the federal ruling against prayer in schools
will be temporarily canceled.
In case of injury notify your superior immediately. He'll kiss it and
make it better.
"In defeat, unbeatable; in victory, unbearable."
-- Winston Curchill, of Montgomery
In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last
resort of the scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but
inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
In English, every word can be verbed. Would that it were so in our
programming languages.
In India, "cold weather" is merely a conventional phrase and has come
into use through the necessity of having some way to distinguish
between weather which will melt a brass door-knob and weather which
will only make it mushy.
-- Mark Twain
In our civilization, and under our republican form of government,
intelligence is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption
from the cares of office.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
In Riemann, Hilbert or in Banach space
Let superscripts and subscripts go their ways.
Our symptotes no longer out of phase,
We shall encounter, counting, face to face.
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
"In short, _N is Richardian if, and only if, _N is not Richardian."
[In the 60's] there was madness in any direction, at any hour ... You
could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense
that whatever we were doing was `right', that we were winning ...
And that, I think, was the handle -- the sense of inevitable victory
over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we
didn't need that. Our energy would simply `prevail'. There was no
point in fighting -- on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum;
we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave ....
So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in
Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost
___see the high-water mark -- the place where the wave finally broke and
rolled back.
-- Hunter S. Thompson, "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"
In the force if Yoda's so strong, construct a sentence with words in
the proper order then why can't he?
In the land of the dark, the Ship of the Sun is driven by the Grateful
Dead.
-- Egyptian Book of the Dead
In the long run, every program becomes rococo, and then rubble.
-- Alan Perlis
In the olden days in England, you could be hung for stealing a sheep or
a loaf of bread. However, if a sheep stole a loaf of bread and gave it
to you, you would only be tried for receiving, a crime punishable by
forty lashes with the cat or the dog, whichever was handy. If you
stole a dog and were caught, you were punished with twelve rabbit
punches, although it was hard to find rabbits big enough or strong
enough to punch you.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
In the Top 40, half the songs are secret messages to the teen world to
drop out, turn on, and groove with the chemicals and light shows at
discotheques.
-- Art Linkletter
Incumbent, n.:
Person of liveliest interest to the outcumbents.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Information Center, n.:
A room staffed by professional computer people whose job it is
to tell you why you cannot have the information you require.
Ingrate, n.:
A man who bites the hand that feeds him, and then complains of
indigestion.
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
-- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Ink, n.:
A villainous compound of tannogallate of iron, gum-arabic, and
water, chiefly used to facilitate the infection of idiocy and promote
intellectual crime.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Innovation is hard to schedule.
-- Dan Fylstra
Insanity is hereditary. You get it from your kids.
Insanity is the final defense ... It's hard to get a refund when the
salesman is sniffing your crotch and baying at the moon.
Interpreter, n.:
One who enables two persons of different languages to
understand each other by repeating to each what it would have been to
the interpreter's advantage for the other to have said.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
INVENTORY
Four be the things I am wiser to know:
Idleness, sorrow, a friend, and a foe.
Four be the things I'd been better without:
Love, curiosity, freckles, and doubt.
Three be the things I shall never attain:
Envy, content, and sufficient champagne.
Three be the things I shall have till I die:
Laughter and hope and a sock in the eye.
Iron Law of Distribution:
Them that has, gets.
Is it possible that software is not like anything else, that it is
meant to be discarded: that the whole point is to always see it as a
soap bubble?
Is not marriage an open question, when it is alleged, from the
beginning of the world, that such as are in the institution wish to get
out, and such as are out wish to get in?
-- Ralph Emerson
Is your job running? You'd better go catch it!
Isn't it strange that the same people that laugh at gypsy fortune
tellers take economists seriously?
Issawi's Laws of Progress:
The Course of Progress:
Most things get steadily worse.
The Path of Progress:
A shortcut is the longest distance between two points.
It has been observed that one's nose is never so happy as when it is
thrust into the affairs of another, from which some physiologists have
drawn the inference that the nose is devoid of the sense of smell.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
It has just been discovered that research causes cancer in rats.
It is against the grain of modern education to teach children to
program. What fun is there in making plans, acquiring discipline in
organizing thoughts, devoting attention to detail, and learning to be
self-critical?
-- Alan Perlis
It is always preferable to visit home with a friend. Your
parents will not be pleased with this plan, because they want you all
to themselves and because in the presence of your friend, they will
have to act like mature human beings ...
-- Playboy, January 1983
It is amusing that a virtue is made of the vice of chastity; and it's a
pretty odd sort of chastity at that, which leads men straight into the
sin of Onan, and girls to the waning of their color.
-- Voltaire
It is better to kiss an avocado than to get in a fight with an aardvark
It is by the fortune of God that, in this country, we have three
benefits: freedom of speech, freedom of thought, and the wisdom never
to use either.
-- Mark Twain
It is difficult to produce a television documentary that is both
incisive and probing when every twelve minutes one is interrupted by
twelve dancing rabbits singing about toilet paper.
-- R. Serling
"It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle if it is
lightly greased."
-- Kehlog Albran, "The Profit"
It is easier to change the specification to fit the program than vice
versa.
It is easier to get forgiveness than permission.
It is easier to write an incorrect program than understand a correct
one.
It is generally agreed that "Hello" is an appropriate greeting because
if you entered a room and said "Goodbye," it could confuse a lot of
people.
-- Dolph Sharp, "I'm O.K., You're Not So Hot"
It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so
ingenious.
It is impossible to travel faster than light, and certainly not
desirable, as one's hat keeps blowing off.
-- Woody Allen
It is much easier to suggest solutions when you know nothing about the
problem.
It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail.
-- Gore Vidal
It is not true that life is one damn thing after another -- it's one
damn thing over and over.
-- Edna St. Vincent Millay
It is now 10 p.m. Do you know where Henry Kissinger is?
-- Elizabeth Carpenter
It is now pitch dark. If you proceed, you will likely fall into a
pit.
It is one of the superstitions of the human mind to have imagined that
virginity could be a virtue.
-- Voltaire
It is said that the lonely eagle flies to the mountain peaks while the
lowly ant crawls the ground, but cannot the soul of the ant soar as
high as the eagle?
It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a
statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more
glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through
which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the
day, that is the highest of arts.
-- Henry David Thoreau, "Where I Live"
It is the business of little minds to shrink.
-- Carl Sandburg
It is the business of the future to be dangerous.
-- Hawkwind
It looks like blind screaming hedonism won out.
It may be that your whole purpose in life is simply to serve as a
warning to others.
It seems like the less a statesman amounts to, the more he loves the
flag.
"It took me fifteen years to discover that I had no talent for writing,
but I couldn't give up because by that time I was too famous."
It was a book to kill time for those who liked it better dead.
"It was pleasant to me to get a letter from you the other day. Perhaps
I should have found it pleasanter if I had been able to decipher it. I
don't think that I mastered anything beyond the date (which I knew) and
the signature (which I guessed at). There's a singular and a perpetual
charm in a letter of yours; it never grows old, it never loses its
novelty .... Other letters are read and thrown away and forgotten, but
yours are kept forever -- unread. One of them will last a reasonable
man a lifetime."
-- Thomas Aldrich
It was the next morning that the armies of Twodor marched east
laden with long lances, sharp swords, and death-dealing hangovers. The
thousands were led by Arrowroot, who sat limply in his sidesaddle,
nursing a whopper. Goodgulf, Gimlet, and the rest rode by him, praying
for their fate to be quick, painless, and if possible, someone else's.
Many an hour the armies forged ahead, the war-merinos bleating
under their heavy burdens and the soldiers bleating under their melting
icepacks.
-- The Harvard Lampoon, "Bored of the Rings"
It will be advantageous to cross the great stream ... the Dragon is on
the wing in the Sky ... the Great Man rouses himself to his Work.
It's a damn poor mind that can only think of one way to spell a word.
-- Andrew Jackson
"It's bad luck to be superstitious."
-- Andrew W. Mathis
"It's easier said than done."
... and if you don't believe it, try proving that it's easier done than
said, and you'll see that "it's easier said that `it's easier done than
said' than it is done", which really proves that "it's easier said than
done".
It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
It's easier to get forgiveness for being wrong than forgiveness for
being right.
"It's Fabulous! We haven't seen anything like it in the last half an
hour!"
-- Macy's
It's is not, it isn't ain't, and it's it's, not its, if you mean it
is. If you don't, it's its. Then too, it's hers. It isn't her's. It
isn't our's either. It's ours, and likewise yours and theirs.
-- Oxford University Press, Edpress News
It's lucky you're going so slowly, because you're going in the wrong
direction.
It's not an optical illusion, it just looks like one.
-- Phil White
"It's not Camelot, but it's not Cleveland, either."
-- Kevin White, mayor of Boston
It's not enough to be Hungarian; you must have talent too.
-- Alexander Korda
It's not that I'm afraid to die. I just don't want to be there when it
happens.
-- Woody Allen
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
JACK AND THE BEANSTACK
by Mark Isaak
Long ago, in a finite state far away, there lived a JOVIAL
character named Jack. Jack and his relations were poor. Often their
hash table was bare. One day Jack's parent said to him, "Our matrices
are sparse. You must go to the market to exchange our RAM for some
BASICs." She compiled a linked list of items to retrieve and passed it
to him.
So Jack set out. But as he was walking along a Hamilton path,
he met the traveling salesman.
"Whither dost thy flow chart take thou?" prompted the salesman
in high-level language.
"I'm going to the market to exchange this RAM for some chips
and Apples," commented Jack.
"I have a much better algorithm. You needn't join a queue
there; I will swap your RAM for these magic kernels now."
Jack made the trade, then backtracked to his house. But when
he told his busy-waiting parent of the deal, she became so angry she
started thrashing.
"Don't you even have any artificial intelligence? All these
kernels together hardly make up one byte," and she popped them out the
window ...
Jacquin's Postulate on Democratic Government:
No man's life, liberty, or property are safe while the
legislature is in session.
Jenkinson's Law:
It won't work.
Jesus Saves,
Moses Invests,
But only Buddha pays Dividends.
Joe's sister puts spaghetti in her shoes!
Johnson's First Law:
When any mechanical contrivance fails, it will do so at the
most inconvenient possible time.
Jone's Law:
The man who smiles when things go wrong has thought of someone
to blame it on.
Jone's Motto:
Friends come and go, but enemies accumulate.
Jones's First Law:
Anyone who makes a significant contribution to any field of
endeavor, and stays in that field long enough, becomes an
obstruction to its progress -- in direct proportion to the
importance of their original contribution.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they AREN'T after you.
Just because your doctor has a name for your condition doesn't mean he
knows what it is.
"Just once, I wish we would encounter an alien menace that wasn't
immune to bullets"
-- The Brigader, "Dr. Who"
Just remember: when you go to court, you are trusting your fate to
twelve people that weren't smart enough to get out of jury duty!
Justice is incidental to law and order.
-- J. Edgar Hoover
Justice is incidental to law and order.
-- J. Edgar Hoover
Justice, n.:
A decision in your favor.
Katz' Law:
Man and nations will act rationally when all other
possibilities have been exhausted.
Keep America beautiful. Swallow your beer cans.
Keep emotionally active. Cater to your favorite neurosis.
Keep grandma off the streets -- legalize bingo.
Keep in mind always the two constant Laws of Frisbee:
1. The most powerful force in the world is that of a disc
straining to land under a car, just out of reach (this
force is technically termed "car suck").
2. Never precede any maneuver by a comment more predictive
than "Watch this!"
Keep you Eye on the Ball,
Your Shoulder to the Wheel,
Your Nose to the Grindstone,
Your Feet on the Ground,
Your Head on your Shoulders.
Now ... try to get something DONE!
Ken Thompson has an automobile which he helped design. Unlike most
automobiles, it has neither speedometer, nor gas gage, nor any of the
numerous idiot lights which plague the modern driver. Rather, if the
driver makes any mistake, a giant "?" lights up in the center of the
dashboard. "The experienced driver", he says, "will usually know
what's wrong."
Kerr's Three Rules for a Successful College:
Have plenty of football for the alumni, sex for the students,
and parking for the faculty.
Kin, n.:
An affliction of the blood
Kinkler's First Law:
Responsibility always exceeds authority.
Kinkler's Second Law:
All the easy problems have been solved.
"Kirk to Enterprise -- beam down yeoman Rand and a six-pack."
Kiss me twice. I'm schizophrenic.
Kiss your keyboard goodbye!
Klein bottle for rent -- inquire within.
Klein bottle for sale ... inquire within.
Kleptomaniac, n.:
A rich thief.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Know thyself. If you need help, call the C.I.A.
Know what I hate most? Rhetorical questions.
-- Henry N. Camp
Krogt, n. (chemical symbol: Kr):
The metallic silver coating found on fast-food game cards.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
Labor, n.:
One of the processes by which A acquires property for B.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Lackland's Laws:
1. Never be first.
2. Never be last.
3. Never volunteer for anything
Lactomangulation, n.:
Manhandling the "open here" spout on a milk carton so badly
that one has to resort to using the "illegal" side.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
Laetrile is the pits
Langsam's Laws:
1) Everything depends.
2) Nothing is always.
3) Everything is sometimes.
Larkinson's Law:
All laws are basically false.
Lassie looked brilliant, in part because the farm family she
lived with was made up of idiots. Remember? One of them was always
getting pinned under the tractor, and Lassie was always rushing back to
the farmhouse to alert the other ones. She'd whimper and tug at their
sleeves, and they'd always waste precious minutes saying things: "Do
you think something's wrong? Do you think she wants us to follow her?
What is it, girl?", etc., as if this had never happened before, instead
of every week. What with all the time these people spent pinned under
the tractor, I don't see how they managed to grow any crops
whatsoever. They probably got by on federal crop supports, which
Lassie filed the applications for.
-- Dave Barry
Laugh at your problems; everybody else does.
"Laughter is the closest distance between two people."
-- Victor Borge
Law of Communications:
The inevitable result of improved and enlarged communications
between different levels in a hierarchy is a vastly increased
area of misunderstanding.
Law of Probable Dispersal:
Whatever it is that hits the fan will not be evenly
distributed.
Law of Selective Gravity:
An object will fall so as to do the most damage.
Jenning's Corollary:
The chance of the bread falling with the buttered side down is
directly proportional to the cost of the carpet.
Law of the Perversity of Nature:
You cannot successfully determine beforehand which side of the
bread to butter.
Laws of Serendipity:
1. In order to discover anything, you must be looking for
something.
2. If you wish to make an improved product, you must already
be engaged in making an inferior one.
Lazlo's Chinese Relativity Axiom:
No matter how great your triumphs or how tragic your defeats --
approximately one billion Chinese couldn't care less.
Left to themselves, things tend to go from bad to worse.
Leibowitz's Rule:
When hammering a nail, you will never hit your finger if you
hold the hammer with both hands.
LEO (July 23 - Aug 22)
Your determination and sense of humor will come to the fore.
Your ability to laugh at adversity will be a blessing because
you've got a day coming you wouldn't believe. As a matter of
fact, if you can laugh at what happens to you today, you've got
a sick sense of humor.
LEO (July 23 - Aug 22)
You consider yourself a born leader. Others think you are pushy. Most
Leo people are bullies. You are vain and dislike honest criticism.
Your arrogance is disgusting. Leo people are thieves.
Let He who taketh the Plunge Remember to return it by Tuesday.
Let us live!!!
Let us love!!!
Let us share the deepest secrets of our souls!!!
You first.
Let's talk about how to fill out your 1984 tax return. Here's an often
overlooked accounting technique that can save you thousands of dollars:
For several days before you put it in the mail, carry your tax return
around under your armpit. No IRS agent is going to want to spend hours
poring over a sweat-stained document. So even if you owe money, you
can put in for an enormous refund and the agent will probably give it
to you, just to avoid an audit. What does he care? It's not his
money.
-- Dave Barry, "Sweating Out Taxes"
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR (The Times of London)
Dear Sir,
I am firmly opposed to the spread of microchips either to the home or
to the office. We have more than enough of them foisted upon us in
public places. They are a disgusting Americanism, and can only result
in the farmers being forced to grow smaller potatoes, which in turn
will cause massive unemployment in the already severely depressed
agricultural industry.
Yours faithfully,
Capt. Quinton D'Arcy, J. P.
Sevenoaks
Lewis's Law of Travel:
The first piece of luggage out of the chute doesn't belong to
anyone, ever.
Liar, n.:
A lawyer with a roving commission.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
LIBRA (Sep. 23 to Oct. 22)
Your desire for justice and truth will be overshadowed by your
desire for filthy lucre and a decent meal. Be gracious and
polite. Someone is watching you, so stop staring like that.
LIBRA (Sept 23 - Oct 22)
You are the artistic type and have a difficult time with reality. If
you are a man, you are more than likely gay. Chances for employment
and monetary gains are excellent. Most Libra women are prostitutes.
All Libra people die of Venereal disease.
Lie, n.:
A very poor substitute for the truth, but the only one
discovered to date.
Lieberman's Law:
Everybody lies, but it doesn't matter since nobody listens.
Life is a whim of several billion cells to be you for a while.
Life is a yo-yo, and mankind ties knots in the string.
Life is like an onion: you peel off layer after layer, then you find
there is nothing in it.
"Life may have no meaning -- or even worse, it may have a meaning of
which I disapprove."
Like so many Americans, she was trying to construct a life that made
sense from things she found in gift shops.
-- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
Like the ski resort of girls looking for husbands and husbands looking
for girls, the situation is not as symmetrical as it might seem.
-- Alan McKay
Limericks are art forms complex,
Their topics run chiefly to sex.
They usually have virgins,
And masculine urgin's,
And other erotic effects.
Line Printer paper is strongest at the perforations.
Linus: I guess it's wrong always to be worrying about tomorrow. Maybe
we should think only about today.
Charlie Brown:
No, that's giving up. I'm still hoping that yesterday will get
better.
Living on Earth may be expensive, but it includes an annual free trip
around the Sun.
Living your life is a task so difficult, it has never been attempted
before.
Lizzie Borden took an axe,
And plunged it deep into the VAX;
Don't you envy people who
Do all the things ___YOU want to do?
Lockwood's Long Shot:
The chances of getting eaten up by a lion on Main Street aren't
one in a million, but once would be enough.
Look out! Behind you!
Losing your drivers' license is just God's way of saying "BOOGA, BOOGA!"
Love at first sight is one of the greatest labor-saving devices the
world has ever seen.
Love is a word that is constantly heard,
Hate is a word that is not.
Love, I am told, is more precious than gold.
Love, I have read, is hot.
But hate is the verb that to me is superb,
And Love but a drug on the mart.
Any kiddie in school can love like a fool,
But Hating, my boy, is an Art.
-- Ogden Nash
Love is sentimental measles.
Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence.
-- H. L. Mencken
Love your enemies: they'll go crazy trying to figure out what you're up
to.
Love's Drug
My love is like an iron wand
That conks me on the head,
My love is like the valium
That I take before me bed,
My love is like the pint of scotch
That I drink when i be dry;
And I shall love thee still my dear,
Until my wife is wise.
Lowery's Law:
If it jams -- force it. If it breaks, it needed replacing
anyway.
LSD melts in your mind, not in your hand.
Lubarsky's Law of Cybernetic Entomology:
There's always one more bug.
Lunatic Asylum, n.:
The place where optimism most flourishes.
Lysistrata had a good idea.
"MacDonald has the gift on compressing the largest amount of words into
the smallest amount of thoughts."
-- Winston Churchill
Mad, adj.:
Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence ...
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Madam, there's no such thing as a tough child -- if you parboil them
first for seven hours, they always come out tender.
-- W. C. Fields
Magnet, n.: Something acted upon by magnetism
Magnetism, n.: Something acting upon a magnet.
The two definition immediately foregoing are condensed from the works
of one thousand eminent scientists, who have illuminated the subject
with a great white light, to the inexpressible advancement of human
knowledge.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Magnocartic, adj.:
Any automobile that, when left unattended, attracts shopping
carts.
-- Sniglets, "Rich Hall & Friends"
Magpie, n.:
A bird whose theivish disposition suggested to someone that it
might be taught to talk.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Maier's Law:
If the facts do not conform to the theory, they must be
disposed of.
Corollaries:
1. The bigger the theory, the better.
2. The experiment may be considered a success if no more than
50% of the observed measurements must be discarded to
obtain a correspondence with the theory.
Main's Law:
For every action there is an equal and opposite government
program.
Maintainer's Motto:
If we can't fix it, it ain't broke.
Major Premise: Sixty men can do a piece of work sixty times as quickly
as one man.
Minor Premise: One man can dig a posthole in sixty seconds.
Conclusion: Sixty men can dig a posthole in one second.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Majority, n.:
That quality that distinguishes a crime from a law.
Making files is easy under the UNIX operating system. Therefore, users
tend to create numerous files using large amounts of file space. It
has been said that the only standard thing about all UNIX systems is
the message-of-the-day telling users to clean up their files.
-- System V.2 administrator's guide
Malek's Law:
Any simple idea will be worded in the most complicated way.
"Man invented language to satisfy his deep need to complain."
-- Lily Tomlin
Man is a rational animal who always loses his temper when he is called
upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason.
-- Oscar Wilde
Man is the best computer we can put aboard a spacecraft ... and the
only one that can be mass produced with unskilled labor.
-- Wernher von Braun
Man is the only animal that blushes -- or needs to.
-- Mark Twain
Man usually avoids attributing cleverness to somebody else --
unless it is an enemy.
-- A. Einstein
Man, n.:
An animal so lost in rapturous contemplation of what he thinks
he is as to overlook what he indubitably ought to be. His chief
occupation is extermination of other animals and his own species,
which, however, multiplies with such insistent rapidity as to infest
the whole habitable earth and Canada.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Mankind's yearning to engage in sports is older than recorded history,
dating back to the time millions of years ago, when the first primitive
man picked up a crude club and a round rock, tossed the rock into the
air, and whomped the club into the sloping forehead of the first
primitive umpire.
What inner force drove this first athlete? Your guess is as good as
mine. Better, probably, because you haven't had four beers.
-- Dave Barry, "Sports is a Drag"
Manual, n.:
A unit of documentation. There are always three or more on a
given item. One is on the shelf; someone has the others. The
information you need in in the others.
-- Ray Simard
Many years ago in a period commonly know as Next Friday Afternoon,
there lived a King who was very Gloomy on Tuesday mornings because he
was so Sad thinking about how Unhappy he had been on Monday and how
completely Mournful he would be on Wednesday ...
-- Walt Kelly
Mark's Dental-Chair Discovery:
Dentists are incapable of asking questions that require a
simple yes or no answer.
Marriage is the only adventure open to the cowardly.
-- Voltaire
"Matrimony isn't a word, it's a sentence."
Matter cannot be created or destroyed, nor can it be returned without a
receipt.
Maturity is only a short break in adolescence.
-- Jules Feiffer
May a Misguided Platypus lay its Eggs in your Jockey Shorts
May Euell Gibbons eat your only copy of the manual!
May the Fleas of a Thousand Camels infest one of your Erogenous Zones.
May your Tongue stick to the Roof of your Mouth with the Force of a
Thousand Caramels.
Maybe Computer Science should be in the College of Theology.
-- R. S. Barton
Maybe you can't buy happiness, but these days you can certainly charge
it.
Mayor Vincent J. `Buddy' Cianci on the ACLU's suit to have a city
nativity scene removed:
"They're just jealous because they don't have three wise men
and a virgin in the whole organization."
McGowan's Madison Avenue Axiom:
If an item is advertised as "under $50", you can bet it's not
$19.95.
Meader's Law:
Whatever happens to you, it will previously have happened to
everyone you know, only more so.
Measure with a micrometer. Mark with chalk. Cut with an axe.
Meeting, n.:
An assembly of people coming together to decide what person or
department not represented in the room must solve a problem.
Men were real men, women were real women, and small, furry creatures
from Alpha Centauri were REAL small, furry creatures from Alpha
Centauri. Spirits were brave, men boldly split infinitives that no man
had split before. Thus was the Empire forged.
-- "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", Douglas Adams
Mencken and Nathan's Fifteenth Law of The Average American:
The worst actress in the company is always the manager's wife.
Mencken and Nathan's Ninth Law of The Average American:
The quality of a champagne is judged by the amount of noise the
cork makes when it is popped.
Mencken and Nathan's Second Law of The Average American:
All the postmasters in small towns read all the postcards.
Mencken and Nathan's Sixteenth Law of The Average American:
Milking a cow is an operation demanding a special talent that
is possessed only by yokels, and no person born in a large city
can never hope to acquire it.
Menu, n.:
A list of dishes which the restaurant has just run out of.
Meskimen's Law:
There's never time to do it right, but there's always time to
do it over.
Message will arrive in the mail. Destroy, before the FBI sees it.
Mickey Mouse wears a Spiro Agnew watch.
Micro Credo:
Never trust a computer bigger than you can lift.
"Might as well be frank, monsieur. It would take a miracle to get you
out of Casablanca and the Germans have outlawed miracles."
Miksch's Law:
If a string has one end, then it has another end.
Military intelligence is a contradiction in terms.
-- Groucho Marx
Military justice is to justice what military music is to music.
-- Groucho Marx
Millions long for immortality who do not know what to do with
themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon.
-- Susan Ertz
Millions of sensible people are too high-minded to concede that
politics is almost always the choice of the lesser evil. "Tweedledum
and Tweedledee," they say, "I will not vote." Having abstained, they
are presented with a President who appoints the people who are going to
rummage around in their lives for the next four years. Consider all
the people who sat home in a stew in 1968 rather than vote for Hubert
Humphrey. They showed Humphrey. Those people who taught Hubert
Humphrey a lesson will still be enjoying the Nixon Supreme Court when
Tricia and Julie begin to find silver threads among the gold and the
black.
-- Russel Baker, "Ford without Flummery"
Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there
is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined,
myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in
the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my
unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You
will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as
dead as a door-nail.
Minnie Mouse is a slow maze learner.
Misery loves company, but company does not reciprocate.
Misfortune, n.:
The kind of fortune that never misses.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Miss, n.:
A title with which we brand unmarried women to indicate that
they are in the market.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Mistakes are often the stepping stones to utter failure.
Mitchell's Law of Committees:
Any simple problem can be made insoluble if enough meetings are
held to discuss it.
MOCK APPLE PIE (No Apples Needed)
Pastry to two crust 9-inch pie 36 RITZ Crackers
2 cups water 2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons cream of tartar 2 tablespoons lemon juice
Grated rind of one lemon Butter or margarine
Cinnamon
Roll out bottom crust of pastry and fit into 9-inch pie plate. Break
RITZ Crackers coarsely into pastry-lined plate. Combine water, sugar
and cream of tartar in saucepan, boil gently for 15 minutes. Add lemon
juice and rind. Cool. Pour this syrup over Crackers, dot generously
with butter or margarine and sprinkle with cinnamon. Cover with top
crust. Trim and flute edges together. Cut slits in top crust to let
steam escape. Bake in a hot oven (425 F) 30 to 35 minutes, until crust
is crisp and golden. Serve warm. Cut into 6 to 8 slices.
-- Found lurking on a Ritz Crackers box
Modern man is the missing link between apes and human beings.
Molecule, n.:
The ultimate, indivisible unit of matter. It is distinguished
from the corpuscle, also the ultimate, indivisible unit of matter, by a
closer resemblance to the atom, also the ultimate, indivisible unit of
matter ... The ion differs from the molecule, the corpuscle and the
atom in that it is an ion ...
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Mollison's Bureaucracy Hypothesis:
If an idea can survive a bureaucratic review and be implemented
it wasn't worth doing.
Monday is an awful way to spend one seventh of your life.
Monday, n.:
In Christian countries, the day after the baseball game.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Money is the root of all evil, and man needs roots
Mophobia, n.:
Fear of being verbally abused by a Mississippian.
MORE SPORTS RESULTS:
The Beverly Hills Freudians tied the Chicago Rogerians 0-0 last
Saturday night. The match started with a long period of silence while
the Freudians waited for the Rogerians to free associate and the
Rogerians waited for the Freudians to say something they could
paraphrase. The stalemate was broken when the Freudians' best player
took the offensive and interpreted the Rogerians' silence as reflecting
their anal-retentive personalities. At this the Rogerians' star player
said "I hear you saying you think we're full of ka-ka." This started a
fight and the match was called by officials.
More than any time in history, mankind now faces a crossroads. One
path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total
extinction. Let us pray that we have the wisdom to choose correctly.
-- Woody Allen
Mosher's Law of Software Engineering:
Don't worry if it doesn't work right. If everything did, you'd
be out of a job.
Most people wouldn't know music if it came up and bit them on the ass.
-- Frank Zappa
Mother told me to be good, but she's been wrong before.
Mr. Cole's Axiom:
The sum of the intelligence on the planet is a constant; the
population is growing.
Murphy's Discovery:
Do you know Presidents talk to the country the way men talk to
women? They say, "Trust me, go all the way with me, and
everything will be all right." And what happens? Nine months
later, you're in trouble!
Murphy's Law is recursive. Washing your car to make it rain doesn't
work.
Murphy's Law of Research:
Enough research will tend to support your theory.
Murray and Esther, a middle-aged Jewish couple, are touring
Chile. Murray just got a new camera and is constantly snapping
pictures. One day, without knowing it, he photographs a top-secret
military installation. In an instant, armed troops surround Murray and
Esther and hustle them off to prison.
They can't prove who they are because they've left their
passports in their hotel room. For three weeks they're tortured day
and night to get them to name their contacts in the liberation
movement.. Finally they're hauled in front of a military court,
charged with espionage, and sentenced to death.
The next morning they're lined up in front of the wall where
they'll be shot. The sergeant in charge of the firing squad asks them
if they have any lasts requests. Esther wants to know if she can call
her daughter in Chicago. The sergeant says he's sorry, that's not
possible, and turns to Murray.
"This is crazy!" Murray shouts. "We're not spies!" And he
spits in the sergeants face.
"Murray!" Esther cries. "Please! Don't make trouble."
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
Mustgo, n.:
Any item of food that has been sitting in the refrigerator so
long it has become a science project.
-- Sniglets, "Rich Hall & Friends"
My God, I'm depressed! Here I am, a computer with a mind a thousand
times as powerful as yours, doing nothing but cranking out fortunes and
sending mail about softball games. And I've got this pain right
through my ALU. I've asked for it to be replaced, but nobody ever
listens. I think it would be better for us both if you were to just
log out again.
My love runs by like a day in June,
And he makes no friends of sorrows.
He'll tread his galloping rigadoon
In the pathway or the morrows.
He'll live his days where the sunbeams start
Nor could storm or wind uproot him.
My own dear love, he is all my heart --
And I wish somebody'd shoot him.
-- Dorothy Parker
My love, he's mad, and my love, he's fleet,
And a wild young wood-thing bore him!
The ways are fair to his roaming feet,
And the skies are sunlit for him.
As sharply sweet to my heart he seems
As the fragrance of acacia.
My own dear love, he is all my dreams --
And I wish he were in Asia.
-- Dorothy Parker
My opinions may have changed, but not the fact that I am right.
My own dear love, he is strong and bold
And he cares not what comes after.
His words ring sweet as a chime of gold,
And his eyes are lit with laughter.
He is jubilant as a flag unfurled --
Oh, a girl, she'd not forget him.
My own dear love, he is all my world --
And I wish I'd never met him.
-- Dorothy Parker
"My weight is perfect for my height -- which varies"
Mythology, n.:
The body of a primitive people's beliefs concerning its
origin, early history, heroes, deities and so forth, as distinguished
from the true accounts which it invents later.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Naeser's Law:
You can make it foolproof, but you can't make it
damnfoolproof.
NAPOLEON: What shall we do with this soldier, Guiseppe? Everything he
says is wrong.
GUISEPPE: Make him a general, Excellency, and then everything he says
will be right.
-- G. B. Shaw, "The Man of Destiny"
Nature and nature's laws lay hid in night,
God said, "Let Newton be," and all was light.
It did not last; the devil howling "Ho!
Let Einstein be!" restored the status quo.
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's
character, give him power.
-- Abraham Lincoln
Necessity is a mother.
Never be led astray onto the path of virtue.
Never call a man a fool. Borrow from him.
Never call a man a fool; borrow from him.
Never count your chickens before they rip your lips off
Never drink coke in a moving elevator. The elevator's motion coupled
with the chemicals in coke produce hallucinations. People tend to
change into lizards and attack without warning, and large bats usually
fly in the window. Additionally, you begin to believe that elevators
have windows.
Never eat more than you can lift.
-- Miss Piggy
Never hit a man with glasses. Hit him with a baseball bat.
Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right.
-- Salvor Hardin, "Foundation"
Never make anything simple and efficient when a way can be found to
make it complex and wonderful.
Never offend people with style when you can offend them with
substance.
-- Sam Brown, "The Washington Post", January 26, 1977
Never put off till tomorrow what you can avoid all together.
Never try to outstubborn a cat.
-- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love"
Never worry about theory as long as the machinery does what it's
supposed to do.
-- R. A. Heinlein
New crypt. See /usr/news/crypt.
New members are urgently needed in the Society for Prevention of
Cruelty to Yourself. Apply within.
New systems generate new problems.
New Year's Eve is the time of year when a man most feels his age, and
his wife most often reminds him to act it.
-- Webster's Unafraid Dictionary
New York is real. The rest is done with mirrors.
New York's got the ways and means;
Just won't let you be.
-- The Grateful Dead
Newlan's Truism:
An "acceptable" level of unemployment means that the government
economist to whom it is acceptable still has a job.
NEWS FLASH!!
Today the East German pole-vault champion became the West
German pole-vault champion.
*** NEWSFLASH ***
Russian tanks steamrolling through New Jersey!!!! Details at eleven!
Newton's Fourth Law: Every action has an equal and opposite satisfaction.
Newton's Little-Known Seventh Law:
A bird in the hand is safer than one overhead.
Next Friday will not be your lucky day. As a matter of fact, you don't
have a lucky day this year.
Next to being shot at and missed, nothing is really quite as satisfying
as an income tax refund.
-- F. J. Raymond
Nihilism should commence with oneself.
Niklaus Wirth has lamented that, whereas Europeans pronounce his name
correctly (Ni-klows Virt), Americans invariably mangle it into
(Nick-les Worth). Which is to say that Europeans call him by name, but
Americans call him by value.
Nine megs for the secretaries fair,
Seven megs for the hackers scarce,
Five megs for the grads in smoky lairs,
Three megs for system source;
One disk to rule them all,
One disk to bind them,
One disk to hold the files
And in the darkness grind 'em.
Ninety-Ninety Rule of Project Schedules:
The first ninety percent of the task takes ninety percent of
the time, and the last ten percent takes the other ninety
percent.
No good deed goes unpunished.
-- Clare Boothe Luce
No man is an island, but some of us are long peninsulas.
No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
-- Eleanor Roosevelt
No problem is so formidable that you can't just walk away from it.
No problem is so large it can't be fit in somewhere.
NOBODY EXPECTS THE SPANISH INQUISITION
Nobody wants constructive criticism. It's all we can do to put up with
constructive praise.
Non-Reciprocal Laws of Expectations:
Negative expectations yield negative results.
Positive expectations yield negative results.
Noncombatant, n.:
A dead Quaker.
-- Ambrose Bierce
Nondeterminism means never having to say you are wrong.
"Nondeterminism means never having to say you are wrong."
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.
Not far from here, by a white sun, behind a green star, lived the
Steelypips, illustrious, industrious, and they hadn't a care: no spats
in their vats, no rules, no schools, no gloom, no evil influence of the
moon, no trouble from matter or antimatter -- for they had a machine,
a dream of a machine, with springs and gears and perfect in every
respect. And they lived with it, and on it, and under it, and inside
it, for it was all they had -- first they saved up all their atoms,
then they put them all together, and if one didn't fit, why they
chipped at it a bit, and everything was just fine ...
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
"Not only is this incomprehensible, but the ink is ugly and the paper
is from the wrong kind of tree."
--Profesoor W.
Notes for a ballet, "The Spell": ... Suddenly Sigmund hears the flutter
of wings, and a group of wild swans flies across the moon ... Sigmund
is astounded to see that their leader is part swan and part woman --
unfortunately, divided lengthwise. She enchants Sigmund, who is
careful not to make any poultry jokes ...
-- Woody Allen
Nothing astonishes men so much as common sense and plain dealing.
Nothing cures insomnia like the realization that it's time to get up.
Nothing is faster than the speed of light ...
To prove this to yourself, try opening the refrigerator door before
the light comes on.
Nothing is illegal if one hundred businessmen decide to do it.
-- Andrew Young
Nothing recedes like success.
-- Walter Winchell
Nothing takes the taste out of peanut butter quite like unrequited
love.
-- Charlie Brown
November, n.:
The eleventh twelfth of a weariness.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Now and then an innocent person is sent to the legislature.
Now and then, an innocent man is sent to the Legislature.
Now I lay me down to sleep
I pray the double lock will keep;
May no brick through the window break,
And, no one rob me till I awake.
"Now is the time for all good men to come to."
-- Walt Kelly
Now that you've read Fortune's diet truths, you'll be prepared the next
time some housewife or boutique-owner-turned-diet-expert appears on TV
to plug her latest book. And, if you still feel a twinge of guilt for
eating coffee cake while listening to her exhortations, ask yourself
the following questions:
1: Do I dare trust a person who actually considers alfalfa sprouts
a food?
2: Was the author's sole motive in writing this book to get rich
exploiting the forlorn hopes of chubby people like me?
3: Would a longer life be worthwhile if it had to be lived as
prescribed ... without French-fried onion rings, pizza with
double cheese, or the occasional Mai-Tai? (Remember, living
right doesn't really make you live longer, it just *seems* like
longer.)
That, and another piece of coffee cake, should do the trick.
"Now the Lord God planted a garden East of Whittier in a place called
Yorba Linda, and out of the ground he made to grow orange trees that
were good for food and the fruits thereof he labeled SUNKIST ..."
-- "The Begatting of a President"
... Now you're ready for the actual shopping. Your goal should be to
get it over with as quickly as possible, because the longer you stay in
the mall, the longer your children will have to listen to holiday songs
on the mall public-address system, and many of these songs can damage
children emotionally. For example: "Frosty the Snowman" is about a
snowman who befriends some children, plays with them until they learn
to love him, then melts. And "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" is about
a young reindeer who, because of a physical deformity, is treated as an
outcast by the other reindeer. Then along comes good, old Santa. Does
he ignore the deformity? Does he look past Rudolph's nose and respect
Rudolph for the sensitive reindeer he is underneath? No. Santa asks
Rudolph to guide his sleigh, as if Rudolph were nothing more than some
kind of headlight with legs and a tail. So unless you want your
children exposed to this kind of insensitivity, you should shop
quickly.
-- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide"
[Nuclear war] ... may not be desirable.
-- Edwin Meese III
Nudists are people who wear one-button suits.
Numeric stability is probably not all that important when you're
guessing.
O give me a home,
Where the buffalo roam,
Where the deer and the antelope play,
Where seldom is heard
A discouraging word,
'Cause what can an antelope say?
O'Toole's commentary on Murphy's Law:
"Murphy was an optimist."
O'Toole's Commentary on Murphy's Law:
Murphy was an optimist.
"Of ______course it's the murder weapon. Who would frame someone with a
fake?"
Of all the animals, the boy is the most unmanageable.
-- Plato
Of course there's no reason for it, it's just our policy.
Office Automation, n.:
The use of computers to improve efficiency by removing anyone
you would want to talk with over coffee.
Ogden's Law:
The sooner you fall behind, the more time you have to catch
up.
Oh don't the days seem lank and long
When all goes right and none goes wrong,
And isn't your life extremely flat
With nothing whatever to grumble at!
Oh, well, I guess this is just going to be one of those lifetimes.
Oh, when I was in love with you,
Then I was clean and brave,
And miles around the wonder grew
How well did I behave.
And now the fancy passes by,
And nothing will remain,
And miles around they'll say that I
Am quite myself again.
-- A. E. Housman
Oh, wow! Look at the moon!
Old age is the most unexpected of things that can happen to a man.
-- Trotsky
Old age is the most unexpected of things that can happen to a man.
-- Trotsky
Old programmers never die. They just branch to a new address.
Old soldiers never die. Young ones do.
Oliver's Law:
Experience is something you don't get until just after you need
it.
On a paper submitted by a physicist colleague:
"This isn't right. This isn't even wrong."
-- Wolfgang Pauli
On his first day as a bus driver, Maxey Eckstein handed in
receipts of $65. The next day his take was $67. The third day's
income was $62. But on the fourth day, Eckstein emptied no less than
$283 on the desk before the cashier.
"Eckstein!" exclaimed the cashier. "This is fantastic. That
route never brought in money like this! What happened?"
"Well, after three days on that cockamamie route, I figured
business would never improve, so I drove over to Fourteenth Street and
worked there. I tell you, that street is a gold mine!"
On Monday mornings I am dedicated to the proposition that all men are
created jerks.
-- H. Allen Smith, "Let the Crabgrass Grow"
On-line, adj.:
The idea that a human being should always be accessible to a
computer.
Once ... in the wilds of Afghanistan, I lost my corkscrew, and we were
forced to live on nothing but food and water for days.
-- W. C. Fields, "My Little Chickadee"
Once again, we come to the Holiday Season, a deeply religious time that
each of us observes, in his own way, by going to the mall of his
choice.
In the old days, it was not called the Holiday Season; the Christians
called it "Christmas" and went to church; the Jews called it "Hanukka"
and went to synagogue; the atheists went to parties and drank. People
passing each other on the street would say "Merry Christmas!" or "Happy
Hanukka!" or (to the atheists) "Look out for the wall!"
-- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide"
Once Law was sitting on the bench
And Mercy knelt a-weeping.
"Clear out!" he cried, "disordered wench!
Nor come before me creeping.
Upon you knees if you appear,
'Tis plain you have no standing here."
Then Justice came. His Honor cried:
"YOUR states? -- Devil seize you!"
"Amica curiae," she replied --
"Friend of the court, so please you."
"Begone!" he shouted -- "There's the door --
I never saw your face before!"
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human
beings infinite distances continue to exist, a wonderful living side by
side can grow up, if they succeed in loving the distance between them
which makes it possible for each to see each other whole against the
sky.
-- Rainer Rilke
Once there lived a village of creatures along the bottom of a
great crystal river. Each creature in its own manner clung tightly to
the twigs and rocks of the river bottom, for clinging was their way of
life, and resisting the current what each had learned from birth. But
one creature said at last, "I trust that the current knows where it is
going. I shall let go, and let it take me where it will. Clinging, I
shall die of boredom."
The other creatures laughed and said, "Fool! Let go, and that
current you worship will throw you tumbled and smashed across the
rocks, and you will die quicker than boredom!"
But the one heeded them not, and taking a breath did let go,
and at once was tumbled and smashed by the current across the rocks.
Yet, in time, as the creature refused to cling again, the current
lifted him free from the bottom, and he was bruised and hurt no more.
And the creatures downstream, to whom he was a stranger, cried,
"See a miracle! A creature like ourselves, yet he flies! See the
Messiah, come to save us all!" And the one carried in the current
said, "I am no more Messiah than you. The river delight to lift us
free, if only we dare let go. Our true work is this voyage, this
adventure.
But they cried the more, "Saviour!" all the while clinging to
the rocks, making legends of a Saviour.
Once upon a time, when I was training to be a mathematician, a group of
us bright young students taking number theory discovered the names of
the smaller prime numbers.
2: The Odd Prime --
It's the only even prime, therefore is odd. QED.
3: The True Prime --
Lewis Carroll: "If I tell you 3 times, it's true."
31: The Arbitrary Prime --
Determined by unanimous unvote. We needed an arbitrary prime
in case the prof asked for one, and so had an election. 91
received the most votes (well, it *looks* prime) and 3+4i the
next most. However, 31 was the only candidate to receive none
at all.
Since the composite numbers are formed from primes, their qualities are
derived from those primes. So, for instance, the number 6 is "odd but
true", while the powers of 2 are all extremely odd numbers.
... Once you're safely in the mall, you should tie your children to you
with ropes so the other shoppers won't try to buy them. Holiday
shoppers have been whipped into a frenzy by months of holiday
advertisements, and they will buy anything small enough to stuff into a
shopping bag. If your children object to being tied, threaten to take
them to see Santa Claus; that ought to shut them up.
-- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide"
Once, adv.:
Enough.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
One can't proceed from the informal to the formal by formal means.
One difference between a man and a machine is that a machine is quiet
when well oiled.
One good reason why computers can do more work than people is that they
never have to stop and answer the phone.
One nice thing about egotists: they don't talk about other people.
One of my less pleasant chores when I was young was to read the Bible
from one end to the other. Reading the Bible straight through is at
least 70 percent discipline, like learning Latin. But the good parts
are, of course, simply amazing. God is an extremely uneven writer, but
when He's good, nobody can touch Him.
-- John Gardner, NYT Book Review, Jan 1983
One of the oldest problems puzzled over in the Talmud is: "Why did God
create goyim?" The generally accepted answer is "________somebody has to buy
retail."
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
One of the questions that comes up all the time is: How
enthusiastic is our support for UNIX?
Unix was written on our machines and for our machines many
years ago. Today, much of UNIX being done is done on our machines.
Ten percent of our VAXs are going for UNIX use. UNIX is a simple
language, easy to understand, easy to get started with. It's great for
students, great for somewhat casual users, and it's great for
interchanging programs between different machines. And so, because of
its popularity in these markets, we support it. We have good UNIX on
VAX and good UNIX on PDP-11s.
It is our belief, however, that serious professional users will
run out of things they can do with UNIX. They'll want a real system and
will end up doing VMS when they get to be serious about programming.
With UNIX, if you're looking for something, you can easily and
quickly check that small manual and find out that it's not there. With
VMS, no matter what you look for -- it's literally a five-foot shelf of
documentation -- if you look long enough it's there. That's the
difference -- the beauty of UNIX is it's simple; and the beauty of VMS
is that it's all there.
-- Ken Olsen, President of DEC, 1984
One of the rules of Busmanship, New York style, is never surrender your
seat to another passenger. This may seem callous, but it is the best
way, really. If one passenger were to give a seat to someone who
fainted in the aisle, say, the others on the bus would become
disoriented and imagine they were in Topeka, Kansas.
One Page Principle:
A specification that will not fit on one page of 8.5x11 inch
paper cannot be understood.
-- Mark Ardis
"One planet is all you get."
One seldom sees a monument to a committee.
One thing the inventors can't seem to get the bugs out of is fresh
paint.
One way to stop a runaway horse is to bet on him.
Only adults have difficulty with childproof caps.
Only God can make random selections.
Optimization hinders evolution.
Optimization hinders evolution.
Oregon, n.:
Eighty billion gallons of water with no place to go on Saturday
night.
Organic chemistry is the chemistry of carbon compounds.
Biochemistry is the study of carbon compounds that crawl.
-- Mike Adams
Osborn's Law:
Variables won't; constants aren't.
Others will look to you for stability, so hide when you bite your
nails.
Our country has plenty of good five-cent cigars, but the trouble is
they charge fifteen cents for them.
Our OS who art in CPU, UNIX be thy name.
Thy programs run, thy syscalls done,
in kernel as it is in user!
Our policy is, when in doubt, do the right thing.
-- Roy L. Ash, ex-president Litton Industries
Overdrawn? But I still have checks left!
Overflow on /dev/null, please empty the bit bucket.
Overload -- core meltdown sequence initiated.
Ozman's Laws:
1. If someone says he will do something "without fail," he
won't.
2. The more people talk on the phone, the less money they
make.
3. People who go to conferences are the ones who shouldn't.
4. Pizza always burns the roof of your mouth.
Paranoia is simply an optimistic outlook on life.
Paranoids are people, too; they have their own problems. It's easy to
criticize, but if everybody hated you, you'd be paranoid too.
-- D. J. Hicks
Pardo's First Postulate:
Anything good in life is either illegal, immoral, or fattening.
Arnold's Addendum:
Anything not fitting into these categories causes cancer in
rats.
Parker's Law:
Beauty is only skin deep, but ugly goes clean to the bone.
Parkinson's Fifth Law:
If there is a way to delay in important decision, the good
bureaucracy, public or private, will find it.
Parkinson's Fourth Law:
The number of people in any working group tends to increase
regardless of the amount of work to be done.
Parts that positively cannot be assembled in improper order will be.
"Pascal is not a high-level language."
-- Steven Feiner
Pascal Users:
To show respect for the 313th anniversary (tomorrow) of the
death of Blaise Pascal, your programs will be run at half
speed.
Pascal, n.:
A programming language named after a man who would turn over in
his grave if he knew about it.
Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.
-- Eric Hoffer
Paul Revere was a tattle-tale
Paul's Law:
In America, it's not how much an item costs, it's how much you
save.
Paul's Law:
You can't fall off the floor.
Peace, n.:
In international affairs, a period of cheating between two
periods of fighting.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Peanut Blossoms
4 cups sugar 16 tbsp. milk
4 cups brown sugar 4 tsp. vanilla
4 cups shortening 14 cups flour
8 eggs 4 tsp. soda
4 cups peanut butter 4 tsp. salt
Shape dough into balls. Roll in sugar and bake on ungreased cookie
sheet at 375 F. for 10-12 minutes. Immediately top each cookie with a
Hershey's kiss or star pressing down firmly to crack cookie. Makes a
hell of a lot.
Pecor's Health-Food Principle:
Never eat rutabaga on any day of the week that has a "y" in
it.
People often find it easier to be a result of the past than a cause of
the future.
People usually get what's coming to them ... unless it's been mailed.
People who claim they don't let little things bother them have never
slept in a room with a single mosquito.
People who have what they want are very fond of telling people who
haven't what they want that they don't want it.
-- Ogden Nash
People will accept your ideas much more readily if you tell them that
Benjamin Franklin said it first.
People will buy anything that's one to a customer.
People will buy anything that's one to a customer.
Pereant, inquit, qui ante nos nostra dixerunt.
"Confound those who have said our remarks before us."
-- Aelius Donatus
Perfect day for scrubbing the floor and other exciting things.
Peter's Law of Substitution:
Look after the molehills, and the mountains will look after
themselves.
Philadelphia is not dull -- it just seems so because it is next to
exciting Camden, New Jersy.
Philogyny recapitulates erogeny; erogeny recapitulates philogyny.
pi seconds is a nanocentury.
-- Tom Duff
Pig, n.:
An animal (Porcus omnivorous) closely allied to the human race
by the splendor and vivacity of its appetite, which, however, is
inferior in scope, for it balks at pig.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
PISCES (Feb. 19 - Mar. 20)
You have a vivid imagination and often think you are being followed by
the CIA or FBI. You have minor influence over your associates and
people resent your flaunting of your power. You lack confidence and
you are generally a coward. Pisces people do terrible things to small
animals.
PISCES (Feb. 19 to Mar. 20)
Take the high road, look for the good things, carry the
American Express card and a weapon. The world is yours today,
as nobody else wants it. Your mortgage will be foreclosed.
You will probably get run over by a bus.
Pittsburgh Driver's Test
7: The car directly in front of you has a flashing right tail
light but a steady left tail light. This means
(a) one of the tail lights is broken; you should blow your horn
to call the problem to the driver's attention.
(b) the driver is signaling a right turn.
(c) the driver is signaling a left turn.
(d) the driver is from out of town.
The correct answer is (d). Tail lights are used in some foreign
countries to signal turns.
Pittsburgh Driver's Test
8: Pedestrians are
(a) irrelevant.
(b) communists.
(c) a nuisance.
(d) difficult to clean off the front grille.
The correct answer is (a). Pedestrians are not in cars, so they are
totally irrelevant to driving; you should ignore them completely.
PL/1, "the fatal disease", belongs more to the problem set than to the
solution set.
-- E. W. Dijkstra
Please ignore previous fortune.
Please take note:
Please try to limit the amount of `this room doesn't have any bazingas'
until you are told that those rooms are `punched out.' Once punched
out, we have a right to complain about atrocities, missing bazingas,
and such.
-- N. Meyrowitz
Please, won't somebody tell me what diddie-wa-diddie means?
PLUNDERER'S THEME
(to Supercalifragilisticexpialidocius)
Pillage, rape, and loot and burn, but all in moderation.
If you do the things we say, then you'll soon rule the nation.
Kill your foes and enemies and then kill your relations.
Pillage, rape, and loot and burn, but all in moderation.
Pohl's law:
Nothing is so good that somebody, somewhere, will not hate it.
Police: Good evening, are you the host?
Host: No.
Police: We've been getting complaints about this party.
Host: About the drugs?
Police: No.
Host: About the guns, then? Is somebody complaining about the guns?
Police: No, the noise.
Host: Oh, the noise. Well that makes sense because there are no guns
or drugs here. (An enormous explosion is heard in the
background.) Or fireworks. Who's complaining about the noise?
The neighbors?
Police: No, the neighbors fled inland hours ago. Most of the recent
complaints have come from Pittsburgh. Do you think you could
ask the host to quiet things down?
Host: No Problem. (At this point, a Volkswagon bug with primitive
religious symbols drawn on the doors emerges from the living
room and roars down the hall, past the police and onto the
lawn, where it smashes into a tree. Eight guests tumble out
onto the grass, moaning.) See? Things are starting to wind
down.
Political T.V. commercials prove one thing: some candidates can tell
all their good points and qualifications in just 30 seconds.
Politician, n.:
From the Greek "poly" ("many") and the French "tete" ("head" or
"face," as in "tete-a-tete": head to head or face to face). Hence
"polytetien", a person of two or more faces.
-- Martin Pitt
Politics is like coaching a football team. you have to be smart enough
to understand the game but not smart enough to lose interest.
Polymer physicists are into chains.
Pope Goestheveezl was the shortest reigning pope in the history of the
Church, reigning for two hours and six minutes on 1 April 1866. The
white smoke had hardly faded into the blue of the Vatican skies before
it dawned on the assembled multitudes in St. Peter's Square that his
name had hilarious possibilities. The crowds fell about, helpless with
laughter, singing
Half a pound of tuppenny rice
Half a pound of treacle
That's the way the chimney smokes
Pope Goestheveezl
The square was finally cleared by armed carabineri with tears of
laughter streaming down their faces. The event set a record for
hilarious civic functions, smashing the previous record set when Baron
Hans Neizant B"ompzidaize was elected Landburgher of K"oln in 1653.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Positive, adj.:
Mistaken at the top of one's voice.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Power, n:
The only narcotic regulated by the SEC instead of the FDA.
Practical people would be more practical if they would take a little
more time for dreaming.
-- J. P. McEvoy
Predestination was doomed from the start.
President Reagan has noted that there are too many economic pundits and
forecasters and has decided on an excess prophets tax.
President Thieu says he'll quit if he doesn't get more than 50% of the
vote. In a democracy, that's not called quitting.
-- The Washington Post
Pretend to spank me -- I'm a pseudo-masochist!
Preudhomme's Law of Window Cleaning:
It's on the other side.
[Prime Minister Joseph] Chamberlain loves the working man -- he loves
to see him work.
-- Winston Churchill
Pro is to con as progress is to Congress.
Probable-Possible, my black hen,
She lays eggs in the Relative When.
She doesn't lay eggs in the Positive Now
Because she's unable to postulate how.
-- Frederick Winsor
Professor Gorden Newell threw another shutout in last week's Chem.
Eng. 130 midterm. Once again a student did not receive a single point
on his exam. Newell has now tossed 5 shutouts this quarter. Newell's
earned exam average has now dropped to a phenomenal 30%
Proof techniques #1: Proof by Induction.
This technique is used on equations with "_n" in them. Induction
techniques are very popular, even the military used them.
SAMPLE: Proof of induction without proof of induction.
We know it's true for _n equal to 1. Now assume that it's true
for every natural number less than _n. _N is arbitrary, so we can take _n
as large as we want. If _n is sufficiently large, the case of _n+1 is
trivially equivalent, so the only important _n are _n less than _n. We
can take _n = _n (from above), so it's true for _n+1 because it's just
about _n.
QED. (QED translates from the Latin as "So what?")
Proof techniques #2: Proof by Oddity.
SAMPLE: To prove that horses have an infinite number of legs.
(1) Horses have an even number of legs.
(2) They have two legs in back and fore legs in front.
(3) This makes a total of six legs, which certainly is an odd number of
legs for a horse.
(4) But the only number that is both odd and even is infinity.
(5) Therefore, horses must have an infinite number of legs.
Topics is be covered in future issues include proof by:
Intimidation
Gesticulation (handwaving)
"Try it; it works"
Constipation (I was just sitting there and ...)
Blatant assertion
Changing all the 2's to _n's
Mutual consent
Lack of a counterexample, and
"It stands to reason"
Psychiatrists say that one out of four people are mentally ill. Check
three friends. If they're ok, you're it.
Put your Nose to the Grindstone!
-- Amalgamated Plastic Surgeons and Toolmakers, Ltd.
Putt's Law:
Technology is dominated by two types of people:
Those who understand what they do not manage.
Those who manage what they do not understand.
Q: Do you know what the death rate around here is?
A: One per person.
Q: Why do ducks have flat feet?
A: To stamp out forest fires.
Q: Why do elephants have flat feet?
A: To stamp out flaming ducks.
Q: Why do mountain climbers rope themselves together?
A: To prevent the sensible ones from going home.
Q: How many DEC repairman does it take to fix a flat ?
A: Five; four to hold the car up and one to swap tires.
Q: How many DEC repairman does it take to fix a flat?
A: Five; four to hold the car up and one to swap tires.
Q: How long does it take?
A: It's indeterminate. It will depend upon how many flats they've
brought with them.
Q: What happens if you've got TWO flats?
A: They replace your generator.
Q: How many existentialists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: Two. One to screw it in and one to observe how the lightbulb itself
symbolizes a single incandescent beacon of subjective reality in a
netherworld of endless absurdity reaching out toward a maudlin
cosmos of nothingness.
Q: How many IBM cpu's does it take to do a logical right shift?
A: 33. 1 to hold the bits and 32 to push the register.
Q: How many IBM CPU's does it take to execute a job?
A: Four; three to hold it down, and one to rip its head off.
Q: How many IBM types does it take to change a light bulb?
A: 100. Ten to do it, and 90 to write document number GC7500439-0001,
Multitasking Incandescent Source System Facility, of which 10% of
the pages state only "This page intentionally left blank", and 20%
of the definitions are of the form "A ...... consists of sequences
of non-blank characters separated by blanks".
Q: How many journalists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: Three. One to report it as an inspired government program to bring
light to the people, one to report it as a diabolical government
plot to deprive the poor of darkness, and one to win a pulitzer
prize for reporting that Electric Company hired a lightbulb-assassin
to break the bulb in the first place.
%
Q: How many heterosexual males does it take to screw in a light bulb in
San Francisco?
A: Both of them.
Q: How many Martians does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: One and a half.
Q: How many Oregonians does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Three. One to screw in the lightbulb and two to fend off all those
Californians trying to share the experience.
Q: How many surrealists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Two. One to hold the girrafe and the other to fill the bathtub with
brightly colored machine tools.
Q: Why did the tachyon cross the road?
A: Because it was on the other side.
Quality Control, n.:
The process of testing one out of every 1,000 units coming off
a production line to make sure that at least one out of 100 works.
Question:
Man Invented Alcohol,
God Invented Grass.
Who do you trust?
Quick!! Act as if nothing has happened!
"Qvid me anxivs svm?"
QWERT (kwirt), n. [MW < OW qwertyuiop, a thirteenth]:
1. a unit of weight equal to 13 poiuyt avoirdupois (or 1.69
kiloliks), commonly used in structural engineering; 2. [Colloq.] one
thirteenth the load that a fully grown sligo can carry; 3. [Anat.] a
painful irritation of the dermis in the region of the anus; 4. [Slang]
person who excites in others the symptoms of a qwert.
-- Webster's Middle World Dictionary, 4th ed.
Radioactive cats have 18 half-lives.
Rattling around the back of my head is a disturbing image of something
I saw at the airport ... Now I'm remembering, those giant piles of
computer magazines right next to "People" and "Time" in the airport
store. Does it bother anyone else that half the world is being told
all of our hard-won secrets of computer technology? Remember how all
the lawyers cried foul when "How to Avoid Probate" was published? Are
they taking no-fault insurance lying down? No way! But at the current
rate it won't be long before there are stacks of the "Transactions on
Information Theory" at the A&P checkout counters. Who's going to be
impressed with us electrical engineers then? Are we, as the saying
goes, giving away the store?
-- Robert W. Lucky, IEEE President
Ray's Rule of Precision:
Measure with a micrometer. Mark with chalk. Cut with an axe.
Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live.
-- Dorothy Parker
Re graphics: A picture is worth 10K words -- but only those to describe
the picture. Hardly any sets of 10K words can be adequately described
with pictures.
Real Programmers don't play tennis, or any other sport that requires
you to change clothes. Mountain climbing is OK, and real programmers
wear their climbing boots to work in case a mountain should suddenly
spring up in the middle of the machine room.
Real Programmers don't write in PL/I. PL/I is for programmers who
can't decide whether to write in COBOL or FORTRAN.
Real Programmers think better when playing Adventure or Rogue.
Real Programs don't use shared text. Otherwise, how can they use
functions for scratch space after they are finished calling them?
Real Time, adj.:
Here and now, as opposed to fake time, which only occurs there
and then.
Reality is a cop-out for people who can't handle drugs.
Reality is an obstacle to hallucination.
Reality is for those who can't face Science Fiction.
"Really ?? What a coincidence, I'm shallow too!!"
Receiving a million dollars tax free will make you feel better than
being flat broke and having a stomach ache.
-- Dolph Sharp, "I'm O.K., You're Not So Hot"
Recession is when your neighbor loses his job. Depression is when you
lose your job. These economic downturns are very difficult to predict,
but sophisticated econometric modeling houses like Data Resources and
Chase Econometrics have successfully predicted 14 of the last 3
recessions.
Reclaimer, spare that tree!
Take not a single bit!
It used to point to me,
Now I'm protecting it.
It was the reader's CONS
That made it, paired by dot;
Now, GC, for the nonce,
Thou shalt reclaim it not.
"Reflections on Ice-Breaking"
Candy
Is dandy
But liquor
Is quicker.
-- Ogden Nash
"Reintegration complete," ZORAC advised. "We're back in the universe
again ..." An unusually long pause followed, "... but I don't know
which part. We seem to have changed our position in space." A
spherical display in the middle of the floor illuminated to show the
starfield surrounding the ship.
"Several large, artificial constructions are approaching us," ZORAC
announced after a short pause. "The designs are not familiar, but they
are obviously the products of intelligence. Implications: we have been
intercepted deliberately by a means unknown, for a purpose unknown, and
transferred to a place unknown by a form of intelligence unknown.
Apart from the unknowns, everything is obvious."
-- James P. Hogan, "Giants Star"
Reisner's Rule of Conceptual Inertia:
If you think big enough, you'll never have to do it.
Remember that whatever misfortune may be your lot, it could only be
worse in Cleveland.
-- National Lampoon, "Deteriorada"
Remember, even if you win the rat race -- you're still a rat.
Remember, UNIX spelled backwards is XINU.
Reporter (to Mahatma Gandhi): Mr Gandhi, what do you think of
Western Civilization?
Gandhi: I think it would be a good idea.
Reporter, n.:
A writer who guesses his way to the truth and dispels it with a
tempest of words.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Research is what I'm doing when I don't know what I'm doing.
-- Wernher von Braun
Resisting temptation is easier when you think you'll probably get
another chance later on.
Review Questions
1: If Nerd on the planet Nutley starts out in his spaceship at 20
KPH, and his speed doubles every 3.2 seconds, how long will it
be before he exceeds the speed of light? How long will it be
before the Galactic Patrol picks up the pieces of his
spaceship?
2: If Roger Rowdy wrecks his car every week, and each week he
breaks twice as many bones as before, how long will it be
before he breaks every bone in his body? How long will it be
before they cut off his insurance? Where does he get a new car
every week?
3: If Johnson drinks one beer the first hour (slow start), four
beers the next hour, nine beers the next, etc., and stacks the
cans in a pyramid, how soon will Johnson's pyramid be larger
than King Tut's? When will it fall on him? Will he notice?
Rhode's Law:
When any principle, law, tenet, probability, happening,
circumstance, or result can in no way be directly, indirectly,
empirically, or circuitously proven, derived, implied,
inferred, induced, deducted, estimated, or scientifically
guessed, it will always for the purpose of convenience,
expediency, political advantage, material gain, or personal
comfort, or any combination of the above, or none of the above,
be unilaterally and unequivocally assumed, proclaimed, and
adhered to as absolute truth to be undeniably, universally,
immutably, and infinitely so, until such time as it becomes
advantageous to assume otherwise, maybe.
Rocky's Lemma of Innovation Prevention
Unless the results are known in advance, funding agencies will
reject the proposal.
ROMEO: Courage, man; the hurt cannot be much.
MERCUTIO: No, 'tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church-
door; but 'tis enough, 'twill serve.
Rudin's Law:
If there is a wrong way to do something, most people will
do it every time.
Rule 46, Oxford Union Society, London:
Any member introducing a dog into the Society's premises shall
be liable to a fine of one pound. Any animal leading a blind
person shall be deemed to be a cat.
Rule of Creative Research:
1) Never draw what you can copy.
2) Never copy what you can trace.
3) Never trace what you can cut out and paste down.
Rule of Defactualization:
Information deteriorates upward through bureaucracies.
Rule of Feline Frustration:
When your cat has fallen asleep on your lap and looks utterly
content and adorable, you will suddenly have to go to the
bathroom.
Rule of the Great:
When people you greatly admire appear to be thinking deep
thoughts, they probably are thinking about lunch.
Rules for driving in New York:
1) Anything done while honking your horn is legal.
2) You may park anywhere if you turn your four-way flashers
on.
3) A red light means the next six cars may go through the
intersection.
RULES OF EATING -- THE BRONX DIETER'S CREED
1. Never eat on an empty stomach.
2. Never leave the table hungry.
3. When traveling, never leave a country hungry.
4. Enjoy your food.
5. Enjoy your companion's food.
6. Really taste your food. It may take several portions to
accomplish this, especially if subtly seasoned.
7. Really feel your food. Texture is important. Compare, for
example, the texture of a turnip to that of a brownie.
Which feels better against your cheeks?
8. Never eat between snacks, unless it's a meal.
9. Don't feel you must finish everything on your plate. You
can always eat it later.
10. Avoid any wine with a childproof cap.
11. Avoid blue food.
-- Richard Smit, "The Bronx Diet"
Safety Tips for the Post-Nuclear Existence
Tip #1: How to tell when you are dead.
1. Little things start bothering you: little things like
worms, bugs, ants.
2. Something is missing in your personal relationships.
3. Your dog becomes overly affectionate.
4. You have a hard time getting a waiter.
5. Exotic birds flock around you.
6. People ignore you at parties.
7. You have a hard time getting up in the morning.
8. You no longer get off on cocaine.
Safety Tips for the Post-Nuclear Existence
1. Never use an elevator in a building that has been hit by a nuclear
bomb; use the stairs.
2. When you're flying through the air, remember to roll when you hit
the ground.
3. If you're on fire, avoid gasoline and other flammable materials.
4. Don't attempt communication with dead people; it will only lead to
psychological problems.
5. Food will be scarce; you will have to scavenge. Learn to recognize
foods that will be available after the bomb: mashed potatoes,
shredded wheat, tossed salad, ground beef, etc.
6. Put your hand over your mouth when you sneeze; internal organs will
be scarce in the post-nuclear age.
7. Try to be neat; fall only in designated piles.
8. Drive carefully in "Heavy Fallout" areas; people could be
staggering illegally.
9. Nutritionally, hundred dollar bills are equal to ones, but more
sanitary due to limited circulation.
10. Accumulate mannequins now; spare parts will be in short supply on
D-Day.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov 22 - Dec 21)
You are optimistic and enthusiastic. You have a reckless tendency to
rely on luck since you lack talent. The majority of Sagittarians are
drunks or dope fiends or both. People laugh at you a great deal.
San Francisco isn't what it used to be, and it never was.
-- Herb Caen
San Francisco, n.:
Marcel Proust editing an issue of Penthouse.
Santa Claus wears a Red Suit,
He must be a communist.
And a beard and long hair,
Must be a pacifist.
What's in that pipe that he's smoking?
-- Arlo Guthrie
Satellite Safety Tip #14:
If you see a bright streak in the sky coming at you, duck.
Sattinger's Law:
It works better if you plug it in.
Saturday night in Toledo Ohio,
Is like being nowhere at all,
All through the day how the hours rush by,
You sit in the park and you watch the grass die.
-- John Denver, "Saturday Night in Toledo Ohio"
Save energy: be apathetic.
Save the whales. Collect the whole set.
SCCS, the source motel! Programs check in and never check out!
-- Ken Thompson
Schapiro's Explanation:
The grass is always greener on the other side -- but that's
because they use more manure.
Schizophrenia beats being alone.
Science is what happens when preconception meets verification.
SCORPIO (Oct 23 - Nov 21)
You are shrewd in business and cannot be trusted. You will achieve the
pinnacle of success because of your total lack of ethics. Most Scorpio
people are murdered.
Scott's first Law:
No matter what goes wrong, it will probably look right.
Scott's second Law:
When an error has been detected and corrected, it will be found
to have been wrong in the first place.
Corollary:
After the correction has been found in error, it will be
impossible to fit the original quantity back into the
equation.
Scotty: Captain, we din' can reference it!
Kirk: Analysis, Mr. Spock?
Spock: Captain, it doesn't appear in the symbol table.
Kirk: Then it's of external origin?
Spock: Affirmative.
Kirk: Mr. Sulu, go to pass two.
Sulu: Aye aye, sir, going to pass two.
Screw up your courage! You've screwed up everything else.
Second Law of Business Meetings:
If there are two possible ways to spell a person's name, you
will pick the wrong one.
Corollary:
If there is only one way to spell a name, you will spell it
wrong, anyway.
Security check: INTRUDER ALERT!
Seduced, shaggy Samson snored.
She scissored short. Sorely shorn,
Soon shackled slave, Samson sighed,
Silently scheming,
Sightlessly seeking
Some savage, spectacular suicide.
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
Self Test for Paranoia:
You know you have it when you can't think of anything that's
your own fault.
Seminars, n.:
From "semi" and "arse", hence, any half-assed discussion.
Serocki's Stricture:
Marriage is always a bachelor's last option.
Serving coffee on aircraft causes turbulence.
"Seven years and six months!" Humpty Dumpty repeated
thoughtfully. "An uncomfortable sort of age. Now if you'd asked MY
advice, I'd have said `Leave off at seven' -- but it's too late now."
"I never ask advice about growing," Alice said indignantly.
"Too proud?" the other enquired.
Alice felt even more indignant at this suggestion. "I mean,"
she said, "that one can't help growing older."
"ONE can't, perhaps," said Humpty Dumpty; "but TWO can. With
proper assistance, you might have left off at seven."
-- Lewis Carroll
Sex is not the answer. Sex is the question. "Yes" is the answer.
-- Swami X
Sex is the mathematics urge sublimated.
-- M. C. Reed.
Sex without love is an empty experience, but, as empty experiences go,
it's one of the best.
-- Woody Allen
Shamus, n.:
A shamus is a guy who takes care of handyman tasks around the
temple, and makes sure everything is in working order.
A shamus is at the bottom of the pecking order of synagog
functionaries, and there's a joke about that:
A rabbi, to show his humility before God, cries out in the
middle of a service, "Oh, Lord, I am nobody!" The cantor, not to be
bested, also cries out, "Oh, Lord, I am nobody!"
The shamus, deeply moved, follows suit and cries, "Oh, Lord, I
am nobody!" The rabbi turns to the cantor and says, "Look who thinks
he's nobody!"
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
Shaw's Principle:
Build a system that even a fool can use, and only a fool will
want to use it.
"She is descended from a long line that her mother listened to."
-- Gypsy Rose Lee
She is not refined. She is not unrefined. She keeps a parrot.
-- Mark Twain
She missed an invaluable opportunity to give him a look that you could
have poured on a waffle ...
She's genuinely bogus.
"Sherry [Thomas Sheridan] is dull, naturally dull; but it must have
taken him a great deal of pains to become what we now see him. Such an
excess of stupidity, sir, is not in Nature."
-- Samuel Johnson
SHIFT TO THE LEFT! SHIFT TO THE RIGHT!
POP UP, PUSH DOWN, BYTE, BYTE, BYTE!
Show me a man who is a good loser and I'll show you a man who is
playing golf with his boss.
Show respect for age. Drink good Scotch for a change.
Signs of crime: screaming or cries for help.
-- from the Brown Security Crime Prevention Pamphlet
Silverman's Law:
If Murphy's Law can go wrong, it will.
Simon's Law:
Everything put together falls apart sooner or later.
Since I hurt my pendulum
My life is all erratic.
My parrot, who was cordial,
Is now transmitting static.
The carpet died, a palm collapsed,
The cat keeps doing poo.
The only thing that keeps me sane
Is talking to my shoe.
-- My Shoe
Since we're all here, we must not be all there.
-- Bob "Mountain" Beck
[Sir Stafford Cripps] has all the virtues I dislike and none of the
vices I admire.
-- Winston Churchill
Sixtus V, Pope from 1585 to 1590 authorized a printing of the Vulgate
Bible. Taking no chances, the pope issued a papal bull automatically
excommunicating any printer who might make an alteration in the text.
This he ordered printed at the beginning of the Bible. He personally
examined every sheet as it came off the press. Yet the published
Vulgate Bible contained so many errors that corrected scraps had to be
printed and pasted over them in every copy. The result provoked wry
comments on the rather patchy papal infallibility, and Pope Sixtus had
no recourse but to order the return and destruction of every copy.
Skinner's Constant (or Flannagan's Finagling Factor):
That quantity which, when multiplied by, divided by, added to,
or subtracted from the answer you get, gives you the answer you
should have gotten.
Slang is language that takes off its coat, spits on its hands, and goes
to work.
Slick's Three Laws of the Universe:
1. Nothing in the known universe travels faster than a bad
check.
2. A quarter-ounce of chocolate = four pounds of fat.
3. There are two types of dirt: the dark kind, which is
attracted to light objects, and the light kind, which is
attracted to dark objects.
Slurm, n.:
The slime that accumulates on the underside of a soap bar when
it sits in the dish too long.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
Snacktrek, n.:
The peculiar habit, when searching for a snack, of constantly
returning to the refrigerator in hopes that something new will have
materialized.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in
praise of intelligence.
-- Bertrand Russell
"So she went into the garden to cut a cabbage leaf to make an apple
pie; and at the same time a great she-bear, coming up the street pops
its head into the shop. "What! no soap?" So he died, and she very
imprudently married the barber; and there were present the Picninnies,
and the Grand Panjandrum himself, with the little round button at top,
and they all fell to playing the game of catch as catch can, till the
gunpowder ran out at the heels of their boots."
-- Samuel Foote
Sodd's Second Law:
Sooner or later, the worst possible set of circumstances is
bound to occur.
SOFTWARE -- formal evening attire for female computer analysts.
Some of you ... may have decided that, this year, you're going to
celebrate it the old-fashioned way, with your family sitting around
stringing cranberries and exchanging humble, handmade gifts, like on
"The Waltons". Well, you can forget it. If everybody pulled that kind
of subversive stunt, the economy would collapse overnight. The
government would have to intervene: it would form a cabinet-level
Department of Holiday Gift-Giving, which would spend billions and
billions of tax dollars to buy Barbie dolls and electronic games, which
it would drop on the populace from Air Force jets, killing and maiming
thousands. So, for the good of the nation, you should go along with
the Holiday Program. This means you should get a large sum of money
and go to a mall.
-- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide"
Some people are born mediocre, some people achieve mediocrity, and some
people have mediocrity thrust upon them.
-- Joseph Heller, "Catch-22"
Some people in this department wouldn't recognize subtlety if it hit
them on the head.
Some points to remember [about animals]:
1. Don't go to sleep under big animals, e.g., elephants,
rhinoceri, hippopotamuses;
2. Don't put animals with sharp teeth or poisonous fangs down the
front of your clothes;
3. Don't pat certain animals, e.g., crocodiles and scorpions or
dogs you have just kicked.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Somebody ought to cross ball point pens with coat hangers so that the
pens will multiply instead of disappear.
Someone will try to honk your nose today.
"Sometimes I simply feel that the whole world is a cigarette and I'm
the only ashtray."
Sometimes I worry about being a success in a mediocre world.
-- Lily Tomlin
"Somewhere", said Father Vittorini, "did Blake not speak of the
Machineries of Joy? That is, did not God promote environments, then
intimidate these Natures by provoking the existence of flesh, toy men
and women, such as are we all? And thus happily sent forth, at our
best, with good grace and fine wit, on calm noons, in fair climes, are
we not God's Machineries of Joy?"
"If Blake said that", said Father Brian, "he never lived in Dublin."
-- R. Bradbury, "The Machineries of Joy"
Sooner or later you must pay for your sins. (Those who have already
paid may disregard this fortune).
Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-
bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the
road to the drug store, but that's just peanuts to space.
-- "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"
Spark's Sixth Rule for Managers:
If a subordinate asks you a pertinent question, look at him as
if he had lost his senses. When he looks down, paraphrase the
question back at him.
Speak roughly to your little boy,
And beat him when he sneezes:
He only does it to annoy
Because he knows it teases.
Wow! wow! wow!
I speak severely to my boy,
And beat him when he sneezes:
For he can thoroughly enjoy
The pepper when he pleases!
Wow! wow! wow!
-- Lewis Carrol, "Alice in Wonderland"
Speak roughly to your little VAX,
And boot it when it crashes;
It knows that one cannot relax
Because the paging thrashes!
Wow! Wow! Wow!
I speak severely to my VAX,
And boot it when it crashes;
In spite of all my favorite hacks
My jobs it always thrashes!
Wow! Wow! Wow!
Speak softly and carry a +6 two-handed sword.
Speaking as someone who has delved into the intricacies of PL/I, I am
sure that only Real Men could have written such a machine-hogging,
cycle-grabbing, all-encompassing monster. Allocate an array and free
the middle third? Sure! Why not? Multiply a character string times a
bit string and assign the result to a float decimal? Go ahead! Free a
controlled variable procedure parameter and reallocate it before
passing it back? Overlay three different types of variable on the same
memory location? Anything you say! Write a recursive macro? Well,
no, but Real Men use rescan. How could a language so obviously
designed and written by Real Men not be intended for Real Man use?
Speaking of love, one problem that recurs more and more frequently
these days, in books and plays and movies, is the inability of people
to communicate with the people they love; Husbands and wives who can't
communicate, children who can't communicate with their parents, and so
on. And the characters in these books and plays and so on (and in real
life, I might add) spend hours bemoaning the fact that they can't
communicate. I feel that if a person can't communicate, the very _____least
he can do is to Shut Up!
-- Tom Lehrer, "That Was the Year that Was"
Spend extra time on hobby. Get plenty of rolling papers.
Spirtle, n.:
The fine stream from a grapefruit that always lands right in
your eye.
-- Sniglets, "Rich Hall & Friends"
Spouse, n.:
Someone who'll stand by you through all the trouble you
wouldn't have had if you'd stayed single.
Stay away from flying saucers today.
Stay away from hurricanes for a while.
"Stealing a rhinoceros should not be attempted lightly."
Steele's Plagiarism of Somebody's Philosophy:
Everybody should believe in something -- I believe I'll have
another drink.
Steinbach's Guideline for Systems Programming
Never test for an error condition you don't know how to
handle.
Stop searching. Happiness is right next to you.
Stop searching. Happiness is right next to you. Now, if they'd only
take a bath ...
Stult's Report:
Our problems are mostly behind us. What we have to do now is
fight the solutions.
Stupid, n.:
Losing $25 on the game and $25 on the instant replay.
Sturgeon's Law:
90% of everything is crud.
Substitute "damn" every time you're inclined to write "very"; your
editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be.
-- Mark Twain
Succumb to natural tendencies. Be hateful and boring.
(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!
Support bacteria -- it's the only culture some people have!
Surprise due today. Also the rent.
Surprise your boss. Get to work on time.
Surprise! You are the lucky winner of random I.R.S. Audit! Just type
in your name and social security number. Please remember that leaving
the room is punishable under law:
Name #
Sweater, n.:
A garment worn by a child when its mother feels chilly.
Swipple's Rule of Order:
He who shouts the loudest has the floor.
System/3! System/3!
See how it runs! See how it runs!
Its monitor loses so totally!
It runs all its programs in RPG!
It's made by our favorite monopoly!
System/3!
Tact is the ability to tell a man he has an open mind when he has a
hole in his head.
Tact is the ability to tell a man he has an open mind when he has a
hole in his head.
Tact, n.:
The unsaid part of what you're thinking.
Take everything in stride. Trample anyone who gets in your way.
Take heart amid the deepening gloom that your dog is finally getting
enough cheese
-- National Lampoon, "Deteriorada"
Take it easy, we're in a hurry.
Take my word for it, the silliest woman can manage a clever man, but it
needs a very clever woman to manage a fool.
-- Kipling
Take the folks at Coca-Cola. For many years, they were content
to sit back and make the same old carbonated beverage. It was a good
beverage, no question about it; generations of people had grown up
drinking it and doing the experiment in sixth grade where you put a
nail into a glass of Coke and after a couple of days the nail dissolves
and the teacher says: "Imagine what it does to your TEETH!" So
Coca-Cola was solidly entrenched in the market, and the management saw
no need to improve ...
-- Dave Barry, "In Search of Excellence"
Take your dying with some seriousness, however. Laughing on the way to
your execution is not generally understood by less advanced life forms,
and they'll call you crazy.
-- "Messiah's Handbook: Reminders for the Advanced Soul"
Take your dying with some seriousness, however. Laughing on the way to
your execution is not generally understood by less-advanced life-forms,
and they'll call you crazy.
-- Messiah's Handbook: Reminders for the Advanced Soul
Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish.
-- Euripides
Talkers are no good doers.
-- William Shakespeare, "Henry VI"
Talking much about oneself can also be a means to conceal oneself.
-- Friedrich Nietzsche
TAURUS (Apr 20 - May 20)
You are practical and persistent. You have a dogged determination and
work like hell. Most people think you are stubborn and bull headed.
You are a Communist.
Tax reform means "Don't tax you, don't tax me, tax that fellow behind
the tree."
-- Russell Long
Taxes, n.:
Of life's two certainties, the only one for which you can get
an extension.
Teach children to be polite and courteous in the home, and, when he
grows up, he will never be able to edge his car onto a freeway.
Teamwork is essential -- it allows you to blame someone else.
Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means
for going backwards.
-- Aldous Huxley
Ten years of rejection slips is nature's way of telling you to stop
writing.
-- R. Geis
"Terence, this is stupid stuff:
You eat your victuals fast enough;
There can't be much amiss, 'tis clear,
To see the rate you drink your beer.
But oh, good Lord, the verse you make,
It gives a chap the belly-ache.
The cow, the old cow, she is dead;
It sleeps well the horned head:
We poor lads, 'tis our turn now
To hear such tunes as killed the cow.
Pretty friendship 'tis to rhyme
Your friends to death before their time.
Moping, melancholy mad:
Come, pipe a tune to dance to, lad."
-- A. E. Housman
Tertullian was born in Carthage somewhere about 160 A.D. He was a
pagan, and he abandoned himself to the lascivious life of his city
until about his 35th year, when he became a Christian .... To him is
ascribed the sublime confession: Credo quia absurdum est (I believe
because it is absurd). This does not altogether accord with historical
fact, for he merely said:
"And the Son of God died, which is immediately credible because
it is absurd. And buried he rose again, which is certain
because it is impossible."
Thanks to the acuteness of his mind, he saw through the poverty of
philosophical and Gnostic knowledge, and contemptuously rejected it.
-- C. G. Jung, in Psychological Types
(Teruillian was one of the founders of the Catholic Church).
Test-tube babies shouldn't throw stones.
"Text processing has made it possible to right-justify any idea, even
one which cannot be justified on any other grounds."
-- J. Finnegan, USC.
"That must be wonderful! I don't understand it at all."
That secret you've been guarding, isn't.
That woman speaks eight languages and can't say "no" in any of them.
-- Dorothy Parker
The [Ford Foundation] is a large body of money completely surrounded by
people who want some.
-- Dwight MacDonald
The Abrams' Principle:
The shortest distance between two points is off the wall.
The advertisement is the most truthful part of a newspaper
-- Thomas Jefferson
... The Anarchists' [national] anthem is an international anthem that
consists of 365 raspberries blown in very quick succession to the tune
of "Camptown Races". Nobody has to stand up for it, nobody has to
listen to it, and, even better, nobody has to play it.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
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
The Army needs leaders the way a foot needs a big toe.
-- Bill Murray
The average woman would rather have beauty than brains, because the
average man can see better than he can think.
The basic idea behind malls is that they are more convenient than
cities. Cities contain streets, which are dangerous and crowded and
difficult to park in. Malls, on the other hand, have parking lots,
which are also dangerous and crowded and difficult to park in, but --
here is the big difference -- in mall parking lots, THERE ARE NO
RULES. You're allowed to do anything. You can drive as fast as you
want in any direction you want. I was once driving in a mall parking
lot when my car was struck by a pickup truck being driven backward by a
squat man with a tattoo that said "Charlie" on his forearm, who got out
and explained to me, in great detail, why the accident was my fault,
his reasoning being that he was violent and muscular, whereas I was
neither. This kind of reasoning is legally valid in mall parking
lots.
-- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide"
The best book on programming for the layman is "Alice in Wonderland";
but that's because it's the best book on anything for the layman.
The best cure for insomnia is to get a lot of sleep.
-- W. C. Fields
The best defense against logic is ignorance.
The best thing about growing older is that it takes such a long time.
The biggest difference between time and space is that you can't reuse
time.
-- Merrick Furst
The birds are singing, the flowers are budding, and it is time for Miss
Manners to tell young lovers to stop necking in public.
It's not that Miss Manners is immune to romance. Miss Manners has been
known to squeeze a gentleman's arm while being helped over a curb, and,
in her wild youth, even to press a dainty slipper against a foot or two
under the dinner table. Miss Manners also believes that the sight of
people strolling hand in hand or arm in arm or arm in hand dresses up a
city considerably more than the more familiar sight of people shaking
umbrellas at one another. What Miss Manners objects to is the kind of
activity that frightens the horses on the street ...
"The bland leadeth the bland and they both shall fall into the kitsch."
The brain is a wonderful organ; it starts working the moment you get up
in the morning, and does not stop until you get to school.
The Briggs/Chase Law of Program Development:
To determine how long it will take to write and debug a
program, take your best estimate, multiply that by two, add
one, and convert to the next higher units.
"The C Programming Language -- A language which combines the
flexibility of assembly language with the power of assembly language."
The chicken that clucks the loudest is the one most likely to show up
at the steam fitters' picnic.
The chief cause of problems is solutions.
"The climate of Bombay is such that its inhabitants have to live
elsewhere."
The computing field is always in need of new cliches.
-- Alan Perlis
The correct way to punctuate a sentence that starts: "Of course it is
none of my business, but --" is to place a period after the word "but."
Don't use excessive force in supplying such a moron with a period.
Cutting his throat is only a momentary pleasure and is bound to get you
talked about.
-- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love"
The cost of living hasn't affected its popularity.
The cost of living is going up, and the chance of living is going
down.
The cow is nothing but a machine with makes grass fit for us people to
eat.
-- John McNulty
The Crown is full of it!
-- Nate Harris, 1775
The day-to-day travails of the IBM programmer are so amusing to most of
us who are fortunate enough never to have been one -- like watching
Charlie Chaplin trying to cook a shoe.
The debate rages on: Is PL/I Bachtrian or Dromedary?
The devil finds work for idle circuits to do.
"The difference between a misfortune and a calamity? If Gladstone fell
into the Thames, it would be a misfortune. But if someone dragged him
out again, it would be a calamity."
-- Benjamin Disraeli
The difference between science and the fuzzy subjects is that science
requires reasoning while those other subjects merely require
scholarship.
-- Robert Heinlein
The duck hunter trained his retriever to walk on water. Eager to show
off this amazing accomplishment, he asked a friend to go along on his
next hunting trip. Saying nothing, he fired his first shot and, as the
duck fell, the dog walked on the surface of the water, retrieved the
duck and returned it to his master.
"Notice anything?" the owner asked eagerly.
"Yes," said his friend, "I see that fool dog of yours can't
swim."
The earth is like a tiny grain of sand, only much, much heavier.
The end of the world will occur at 3:00 p.m., this Friday, with
symposium to follow.
The English have no respect for their language, and will not teach
their children to speak it.
-- G. B. Shaw
The fact that it works is immaterial.
-- L. Ogborn
The Fifth Rule:
You have taken yourself too seriously.
The first duty of a revolutionary is to get away with it.
-- Abbie Hoffman
The first Great Steward, Parrafin the Climber, was employed in King
Chloroplast's kitchen as second scullery boy when the old King met a
tragic death. He apparently fell backward by accident on a dozen salad
forks. Simultaneously the true heir, his son Carotene, mysteriously
fled the city, complaining of some sort of plot and a lot of
threatening notes left on his breakfast tray. At the time, this looked
suspicious what with his father's death, and Carotene was suspected of
foul play. Then the rest of the King's relatives began to drop dead
one after the other in an odd fashion. Some were found strangled with
dishrags and some succumbed to food poisoning. A few were found
drowned in the soup vats, and one was attacked by assailants unknown
and beaten to death with a pot roast. At least three appear to have
thrown themselves backward on salad forks, perhaps in a noble gesture
of grief over the King's untimely end. Finally there was no one left
in Minas Troney who was either eligible or willing to wear the accursed
crown, and the rule of Twodor was up for grabs. The scullery slave
Parrafin bravely accepted the Stewardship of Twodor until that day when
a lineal descendant of Carotene's returns to reclaim his rightful
throne, conquer Twodor's enemies, and revamp the postal system.
-- Harvard Lampoon, "Bored of the Rings"
The first riddle I ever heard, one familiar to almost every Jewish
child, was propounded to me by my father:
"What is it that hangs on the wall, is green, wet -- and
whistles?"
I knit my brow and thought and thought, and in final perplexity
gave up.
"A herring," said my father.
"A herring," I echoed. "A herring doesn't hang on the wall!"
"So hang it there."
"But a herring isn't green!" I protested.
"Paint it."
"But a herring isn't wet."
"If its just painted its still wet."
"But -- " I sputtered, summoning all my outrage, "-- a herring
doesn't whistle!!"
"Right, " smiled my father. "I just put that in to make it
hard."
-- Leo Rosten, "The Joys of Yiddish"
The First Rule of Program Optimization:
Don't do it.
The Second Rule of Program Optimization (for experts only!):
Don't do it yet.
-- Michael Jackson
The fortune program is supported, in part, by user contributions and by
a major grant from the National Endowment for the Inanities.
The generation of random numbers is too important to be left to
chance.
The geographical center of Boston is in Roxbury. Due north of the
center we find the South End. This is not to be confused with South
Boston which lies directly east from the South End. North of the South
End is East Boston and southwest of East Boston is the North End.
The goal of Computer Science is to build something that will last at
least until we've finished building it.
The goal of science is to build better mousetraps.
The goal of nature is to build better mice.
The gods gave man fire and he invented fire engines. They gave him
love and he invented marriage.
THE GOLDEN RULE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES
The one who has the gold makes the rules.
The Great Bald Swamp Hedgehog:
The Gerat Bald Swamp Hedgehog of Billericay displays, in
courtship, his single prickle and does impressions of Holiday Inn desk
clerks. Since this means him standing motionless for enormous periods
of time he is often eaten in full display by The Great Bald Swamp
Hedgehog Eater.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax.
-- Albert Einstein
The hearing ear is always found close to the speaking tongue,
a custom whereof the memory of man runneth not howsomever to
the contrary, nohow.
The Heineken Uncertainty Principle:
You can never be sure how many beers you had last night.
The herd instinct among economists makes sheep look like independent
thinkers.
The human animal differs from the lesser primates in his passion for
lists of "Ten Best".
-- H. Allen Smith
The human mind ordinarily operates at only ten percent of its capacity
-- the rest is overhead for the operating system.
The human mind treats a new idea the way the body treats a strange
protein -- it rejects it.
-- P. Medawar
The human race has one really effective weapon, and that is laughter.
-- Mark Twain
"The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a bit
longer."
-- Henry Kissinger
The individual choice of garnishment of a burger can be an important
point to the consumer in this day when individualism is an increasingly
important thing to people.
-- Donald N. Smith, president of Burger King
The IQ of the group is the lowest IQ of a member of the group divided
by the number of people in the group.
The IRS spends God knows how much of your tax money on these toll-free
information hot lines staffed by IRS employees, whose idea of a
dynamite tax tip is that you should print neatly. If you ask them a
real tax question, such as how you can cheat, they're useless.
So, for guidance, you want to look to big business. Big business never
pays a nickel in taxes, according to Ralph Nader, who represents a big
consumer organization that never pays a nickel in taxes...
-- Dave Barry, "Sweating Out Taxes"
The Kennedy Constant:
Don't get mad -- get even.
The Killer Ducks are coming!!!
The ladies men admire, I've heard,
Would shudder at a wicked word.
Their candle gives a single light;
They'd rather stay at home at night.
They do not keep awake till three,
Nor read erotic poetry.
They never sanction the impure,
Nor recognize an overture.
They shrink from powders and from paints ...
So far, I've had no complaints.
-- Dorothy Parker
The Law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich, as well as the
poor, to sleep under the bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal
bread.
-- Anatole France
THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #10 -- SIMPLE
SIMPLE is an acronym for Sheer Idiot's Monopurpose Programming Language
Environment. This language, developed at the Hanover College for
Technological Misfits, was designed to make it impossible to write code
with errors in it. The statements are, therefore, confined to BEGIN,
END and STOP. No matter how you arrange the statements, you can't make
a syntax error. Programs written in SIMPLE do nothing useful. Thus
they achieve the results of programs written in other languages without
the tedious, frustrating process of testing and debugging.
THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #12 -- LITHP
This otherwise unremarkable language is distinguished by the absence of
an "S" in its character set; users must substitute "TH". LITHP is said
to be useful in protheththing lithtth.
THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #13 -- SLOBOL
SLOBOL is best known for the speed, or lack of it, of its compiler.
Although many compilers allow you to take a coffee break while they
compile, SLOBOL compilers allow you to travel to Bolivia to pick the
coffee. Forty-three programmers are known to have died of boredom
sitting at their terminals while waiting for a SLOBOL program to
compile. Weary SLOBOL programmers often turn to a related (but
infinitely faster) language, COCAINE.
THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #17 -- SARTRE
Named after the late existential philosopher, SARTRE is an
extremely unstructured language. Statements in SARTRE have no purpose;
they just are. Thus SARTRE programs are left to define their own
functions. SARTRE programmers tend to be boring and depressed, and are
no fun at parties.
THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #17 -- SARTRE
Named after the late existential philosopher, SARTRE is an extremely
unstructured language. Statements in SARTRE have no purpose; they just
are. Thus SARTRE programs are left to define their own functions.
SARTRE programmers tend to be boring and depressed, and are no fun at
parties.
THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #18 -- C-
This language was named for the grade received by its creator when he
submitted it as a class project in a graduate programming class. C- is
best described as a "low-level" programming language. In fact, the
language generally requires more C- statements than machine-code
statements to execute a given task. In this respect, it is very
similar to COBOL.
THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #18 -- FIFTH
FIFTH is a precision mathematical language in which the data types
refer to quantity. The data types range from CC, OUNCE, SHOT, and
JIGGER to FIFTH (hence the name of the language), LITER, MAGNUM and
BLOTTO. Commands refer to ingredients such as CHABLIS, CHARDONNAY,
CABERNET, GIN, VERMOUTH, VODKA, SCOTCH, and WHATEVERSAROUND.
The many versions of the FIFTH language reflect the sophistication and
financial status of its users. Commands in the ELITE dialect include
VSOP and LAFITE, while commands in the GUTTER dialect include HOOTCH
and RIPPLE. The latter is a favorite of frustrated FORTH programmers
who end up using this language.
The light at the end of the tunnel is the headlight of an approaching
train.
The lion and the calf shall lie down together but the calf won't get
much sleep.
-- Woody Allen
The longer I am out of office, the more infallible I appear to myself.
-- Henry Kissinger
"The Lord gave us farmers two strong hands so we could grab as much as
we could with both of them."
-- Joseph Heller, "Catch-22"
The man who follows the crowd will usually get no further than the
crowd. The man who walks alone is likely to find himself in places no
one has ever been.
-- Alan Ashley-Pitt
The marvels of today's modern technology include the development of a
soda can, when discarded will last forever ... and a $7,000 car which
when properly cared for will rust out in two or three years.
The meek shall inherit the earth -- they are too weak to refuse.
The men sat sipping their tea in silence. After a while the
klutz said, "Life is like a bowl of sour cream."
"Like a bowl of sour cream?" asked the other. "Why?"
"How should I know? What am I, a philosopher?"
The moon may be smaller than Earth, but it's further away.
The more laws and order are made prominent, the more thieves and
robbers there will be.
-- Lao Tsu
The more things change, the more they stay insane.
The more we disagree, the more chance there is that at least one of us
is right.
The mosquito is the state bird of New Jersey.
-- Andy Warhol
The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new
discoveries, is not "Eureka!" (I found it!) but "That's funny ..."
-- Isaac Asimov
The moving cursor writes, and having written, blinks on.
The National Short-Sleeved Shirt Association says:
Support your right to bare arms!
The new Congressmen say they're going to turn the government around. I
hope I don't get run over again.
The New Testament offers the basis for modern computer coding theory,
in the form of an affirmation of the binary number system.
But let your communication be Yea, yea; nay, nay: for
whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil.
-- Matthew 5:37
The nice thing about standards is that there are so many of them to
choose from.
-- Andrew S. Tanenbaum
The notion of a "record" is an obsolete remnant of the days of the
80-column card.
-- Dennis M. Ritchie
The objective of all dedicated employees should be to thoroughly
analyze all situations, anticipate all problems prior to their
occurrence, have answers for these problems, and move swiftly to solve
these problems when called upon.
However, When you are up to your ass in alligators it is difficult to
remind yourself your initial objective was to drain the swamp.
The Official MBA Handbook on business cards:
Avoid overly pretentious job titles such as "Lord of the Realm,
Defender of the Faith, Emperor of India" or "Director of
Corporate Planning."
The older a man gets, the farther he had to walk to school as a boy.
The one good thing about repeating your mistakes is that you know when
to cringe.
The only possible interpretation of any research whatever in the
`social sciences' is: some do, some don't.
-- Ernest Rutherford
The only problem with being a man of leisure is that you can never stop
and take a rest.
The only thing to do with good advice is pass it on. It is never any
use to oneself.
-- Oscar Wilde
The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.
-- Oscar Wilde
The opossum is a very sophisticated animal. It doesn't even get up
until 5 or 6 pm.
The opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth.
-- Bohr
The optimum committee has no members.
-- Norman Augustine
The owner of a large furniture store in the mid-west arrived in France
on a buying trip. As he was checking into a hotel he struck up an
acquaintance with a beautiful young lady. However, she only spoke
French and he only spoke English, so each couldn't understand a word
the other spoke. He took out a pencil and a notebook and drew a
picture of a taxi. She smiled, nodded her head and they went for a
ride in the park. Later, he drew a picture of a table in a restaurant
with a question mark and she nodded, so they went to dinner. After
dinner he sketched two dancers and she was delighted. They went to
several nightclubs, drank champagne, danced and had a glorious
evening. It had gotten quite late when she motioned for the pencil and
drew a picture of a four-poster bed. He was dumbfounded, and has never
be able to understand how she knew he was in the furniture business.
The past always looks better than it was. It's only pleasant because
it isn't here.
-- Finley Peter Dunne (Mr. Dooley)
The people of Halifax invented the trampoline. During the
Victorian period the tripe-dressers of Halifax stretched tripe across a
large wooden frame and jumped up and down on it to `tender and dress'
it. The tripoline, as they called it, degenerated into becoming the
apparatus for a spectator sport.
The people of Halifax also invented the harmonium, a device for
castrating pigs during Sunday service.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
The Pig, if I am not mistaken,
Gives us ham and pork and Bacon.
Let others think his heart is big,
I think it stupid of the Pig.
-- Ogden Nash
The pitcher wound up and he flang the ball at the batter. The batter
swang and missed. The pitcher flang the ball again and this time the
batter connected. He hit a high fly right to the center fielder. The
center fielder was all set to catch the ball, but at the last minute
his eyes were blound by the sun and he dropped it.
-- Dizzy Dean
The pitcher wound up and he flang the ball at the batter. The batter
swang and missed. The pitcher flang the ball again and this time the
batter connected. He hit a high fly right to the center fielder. The
center fielder was all set to catch the ball, but at the last minute
his eyes were blound by the sun and he dropped it.
-- Dizzy Dean
The Preacher, the Politicain, the Teacher,
Were each of them once a kiddie.
A child, indeed, is a wonderful creature.
Do I want one? God Forbiddie!
-- Ogden Nash
The primary purpose of the DATA statement is to give names to
constants; instead of referring to pi as 3.141592653589793 at every
appearance, the variable PI can be given that value with a DATA
statement and used instead of the longer form of the constant. This
also simplifies modifying the program, should the value of pi change.
-- FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers
The probability of someone watching you is proportional to the
stupidity of your action.
The problem ... is that we have run out of dinosaurs to form oil with.
Scientists working for the Department of Energy have tried to form oil
using other animals; they've piled thousands of tons of sand and Middle
Eastern countries on top of cows, raccoons, haddock, laboratory rats,
etc., but so far all they have managed to do is run up an enormous
bulldozer-rental bill and anger a lot of Middle Eastern persons. None
of the animals turned into oil, although most of the laboratory rats
developed cancer.
-- Dave Barry, "Postpetroleum Guzzler"
The problem with any unwritten law is that you don't know where to go
to erase it.
-- Glaser and Way
The problem with people who have no vices is that generally you can be
pretty sure they're going to have some pretty annoying virtues.
-- Elizabeth Taylor
The problem with the gene pool is that there is no lifeguard.
The Psblurtex is an 18-inch long anaconda that hides in the gentlemen's
outfitting departments of Amazonian stores and is often bought by
mistake since its colors are those of the London Reform Club. Once
tied around its victim's neck, it strangles him gently and then claims
the insurance before running off to Germany where it lives in hiding.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
"The pyramid is opening!"
"Which one?"
"The one with the ever-widening hole in it!"
-- Firesign Theater, "How Can You Be In Two Places At
Once When You're Not Anywhere At All"
The rain it raineth on the just
And also on the unjust fella,
But chiefly on the just, because
The unjust steals the just's umbrella.
The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much.
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all
progress depends on the unreasonable man.
-- George Bernard Shaw
The revolution will not be televised.
The reward of a thing well done is to have done it.
-- Emerson
The right half of the brain controls the left half of the body.
This means that only left handed people are in their right mind.
The Roman Rule
The one who says it cannot be done should never interrupt the
one who is doing it.
The Ruffed Pandanga of Borneo and Rotherham spreads out his feathers in
his courtship dance and imitates Winston Churchill and Tommy Cooper on
one leg. The padanga is dying out because the female padanga doesn't
take it too seriously.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
The Schwine-Kitzenger Institute study of 47 men over the age of 100
showed that all had these things in common:
1. They all had moderate appetites.
2. They all came from middle class homes
3. All but two of them were dead.
The seven eyes of Ningauble the Wizard floated back to his hood
as he reported to Fafhrd: "I have seen much, yet cannot explain all.
The Gray Mouser is exactly twenty-five feet below the deepest cellar in
the palace of Gilpkerio Kistomerces. Even though twenty-four parts in
twenty-five of him are dead, he is alive.
"Now about Lankhmar. She's been invaded, her walls breached
everywhere and desperate fighting is going on in the streets, by a
fierce host which out-numbers Lankhamar's inhabitants by fifty to one
-- and equipped with all modern weapons. Yet you can save the city."
"How?" demanded Fafhrd.
Ningauble shrugged. "You're a hero. You should know."
-- Fritz Leiber, from "The Swords of Lankhmar"
The shortest distance between two points is under construction.
-- Noelie Altito
"The society which scorns excellence in plumbing as a humble activity
and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exaulted
activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy ...
neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water."
"The sooner you fall behind, the more time you'll have to catch up!"
The STAR WARS Song
Sung to the tune of "Lola", by the Kinks:
I met him in a swamp down in Dagobah
Where it bubbles all the time like a giant cabinet soda
S-O-D-A soda
I saw the little runt sitting there on a log
I asked him his name and in a raspy voice he said Yoda
Y-O-D-A Yoda, Yo-Yo-Yo-Yo Yoda
Well I've been around but I ain't never seen
A guy who looks like a Muppet but he's wrinkled and green
Oh my Yoda, Yo-Yo-Yo-Yo Yoda
Well I'm not dumb but I can't understand
How he can raise me in the air just by raising his hand
Oh my Yoda, Yo-Yo-Yo-Yo Yoda, Yo-Yo-Yo-Yo Yoda
The steady state of disks is full.
--Ken Thompson
THE STORY OF CREATION
or
THE MYTH OF URK
In the beginning there was data. The data was without form and null,
and darkness was upon the face of the console; and the Spirit of IBM
was moving over the face of the market. And DEC said, "Let there be
registers"; and there were registers. And DEC saw that they carried;
and DEC separated the data from the instructions. DEC called the data
Stack, and the instructions they called Code. And there was evening
and there was morning, one interrupt ...
-- Rico Tudor
The sun was shining on the sea,
Shining with all his might:
He did his very best to make
The billows smooth and bright --
And this was very odd, because it was
The middle of the night.
-- Lewis Carroll, "Through the Looking Glass"
The superfluous is very necessary.
-- Voltaire
The temperature of Heaven can be rather accurately computed. Our
authority is Isaiah 30:26, "Moreover, the light of the Moon shall be as
the light of the Sun and the light of the Sun shall be sevenfold, as
the light of seven days." Thus Heaven receives from the Moon as much
radiation as we do from the Sun, and in addition 7*7 (49) times as much
as the Earth does from the Sun, or 50 times in all. The light we
receive from the Moon is one 1/10,000 of the light we receive from the
Sun, so we can ignore that ... The radiation falling on Heaven will
heat it to the point where the heat lost by radiation is just equal to
the heat received by radiation, i.e., Heaven loses 50 times as much
heat as the Earth by radiation. Using the Stefan-Boltzmann law for
radiation, (_H/_E)^4 = 50, where _E is the absolute temperature of the
earth (-300K), gives _H as 798K (525C). The exact temperature of Hell
cannot be computed ... [However] Revelations 21:8 says "But the
fearful, and unbelieving ... shall have their part in the lake which
burneth with fire and brimstone." A lake of molten brimstone means
that its temperature must be at or below the boiling point, 444.6C. We
have, then, that Heaven, at 525C is hotter than Hell at 445C.
-- From "Applied Optics" vol. 11, A14, 1972
The Third Law of Photography:
If you did manage to get any good shots, they will be ruined
when someone inadvertently opens the darkroom door and all of
the dark leaks out.
The three laws of thermodynamics:
The First Law: You can't get anything without working for it.
The Second Law: The most you can accomplish by working is to break
even.
The Third Law: You can only break even at absolute zero.
The trouble with a kitten is that
When it grows up, it's always a cat
-- Ogden Nash.
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all your time.
The trouble with being punctual is that people think you have nothing
more important to do.
The trouble with doing something right the first time is that nobody
appreciates how difficult it was.
The truth of a proposition has nothing to do with its credibility. And
vice versa.
The turtle lives 'twixt plated decks
Which practically conceal its sex.
I think it clever of the turtle
In such a fix to be so fertile.
-- Ogden Nash
The typewriting machine, when played with expression, is no more
annoying than the piano when played by a sister or near relation.
-- Oscar Wilde
The University of California Bears announced the signing of Reggie
Philbin to a letter of intent to attend Cal next Fall. Philbin is said
to make up for no talent by cheating well. Says Philbin of his
decision to attend Cal, "I'm in it for the free ride."
The USA is so enormous, and so numerous are its schools, colleges and
religious seminaries, many devoted to special religious beliefs ranging
from the unorthodox to the dotty, that we can hardly wonder at its
yielding a more bounteous harvest of gobbledegook than the rest of the
world put together.
-- Sir Peter Medawar
The USA is so enormous, and so numerous are its schools, colleges and
religious seminaries, many devoted to special religious beliefs ranging
from the unorthodox to the dotty, that we can hardly wonder at its
yielding a more bounteous harvest of gobbledygook than the rest of the
world put together.
-- Sir Peter Medawar
The use of COBOL cripples the mind; its teaching should, therefore, be
regarded as a criminal offense.
-- E. W. Dijkstra
"The voters have spoken, the bastards ..."
"The warning message we sent the Russians was a calculated ambiguity
that would be clearly understood."
-- Alexander Haig
"The way to make a small fortune in the commodities market is to start
with a large fortune."
THE WOMBAT
The wombat lives across the seas,
Among the far Antipodes.
He may exist on nuts and berries,
Or then again, on missionaries;
His distant habitat precludes
Conclusive knowledge of his moods.
But I would not engage the wombat
In any form of mortal combat.
The world is coming to an end! Repent and return those library books!
The world is coming to an end. Please log off.
The world's as ugly as sin,
And almost as delightful
-- Frederick Locker-Lampson
The years of peak mental activity are undoubtedly between the ages of
four and eighteen. At four we know all the questions, at eighteen all
the answers.
Then a man said: Speak to us of Expectations.
He then said: If a man does not see or hear the waters of the Jordan,
then he should not taste the pomegranate or ply his wares in an open
market.
If a man would not labour in the salt and rock quarries then he should
not accept of the Earth that which he refuses to give of himself.
Such a man would expect a pear of a peach tree.
Such a man would expect a stone to lay an egg.
Such a man would expect Sears to assemble a lawnmower.
-- Kehlog Albran, "The Profit"
THEORY
Into love and out again,
Thus I went and thus I go.
Spare your voice, and hold your pen:
Well and bitterly I know
All the songs were ever sung,
All the words were ever said;
Could it be, when I was young,
Someone dropped me on my head?
-- Dorothy Parker
There are four kinds of homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable,
and praiseworthy ...
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
There are really not many jobs that actually require a penis or a
vagina, and all other occupations should be open to everyone.
-- Gloria Steinem
There are some goyisha names that just about guarantee that
someone isn't Jewish. For example, you'll never meet a Jew named
Johnson or Wright or Jones or Sinclair or Ricks or Stevenson or Reid or
Larsen or Jenks. But some goyisha names just about guarantee that
every other person you meet with that name will be Jewish. Why is
this?
Who knows? Learned rabbis have pondered this question for
centuries and have failed to come up with an answer, and you think ___you
can find one? Get serious. You don't even understand why it's
forbidden to eat crab -- fresh cold crab with mayonnaise -- or lobster
-- soft tender morsels of lobster dipped in melted butter. You don't
even understand a simple thing like that, and yet you hope to discover
why there are more Jews named Miller than Katz? Fat Chance.
-- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
There are some micro-organisms that exhibit characteristics of both
plants and animals. When exposed to light they undergo photosynthesis;
and when the lights go out, they turn into animals. But then again,
don't we all?
There are three kinds of lies: Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics.
-- Disraeli
"There are three possibilities: Pioneer's solar panel has turned away
from the sun; there's a large meteor blocking transmission; or someone
loaded Star Trek 3.2 into our video processor."
There are three possible parts to a date, of which at least two must be
offered: entertainment, food, and affection. It is customary to begin
a series of dates with a great deal of entertainment, a moderate amount
of food, and the merest suggestion of affection. As the amount of
affection increases, the entertainment can be reduced proportionately.
When the affection IS the entertainment, we no longer call it dating.
Under no circumstances can the food be omitted.
-- Miss Manners' Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behaviour
There are three ways to get something done:
1. Do it yourself.
2. Hire someone to do it for you.
3. Forbid your kids to do it.
There are three ways to get something done: do it yourself, hire
someone, or forbid your kids to do it.
There are two kinds of solar-heat systems: "passive" systems collect
the sunlight that hits your home, and "active" systems collect the
sunlight that hits your neighbors' homes, too.
-- Dave Barry, "Postpetroleum Guzzler"
"There are two ways of disliking poetry; one way is to dislike it, the
other is to read Pope."
-- Oscar Wilde
There are two ways to write error-free programs. Only the third one
works.
There are very few personal problems that cannot be solved through a
suitable application of high explosives.
There cannot be a crisis next week. My schedule is already full.
-- Henry Kissinger
There has been an alarming increase in the number of things you know
nothing about.
There is a great discovery still to be made in Literature: that of
paying literary men by the quantity they do NOT write.
There is a green, multi-legged creature crawling on your shoulder.
There is a theory that states: "If anyone finds out what the universe
is for it will disappear and be replaced by something more bazaarly
inexplicable."
There is another theory that states: "This has already happened ...."
-- Donald Adams, "Hitch-Hikers Guide to the Galaxy"
There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly
what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly
disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and
inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has
already happened.
-- Donald Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"
There is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress.
-- Mark Twain
There is no realizable power that man cannot, in time, fashion the
tools to attain, nor any power so secure that the naked ape will not
abuse it. So it is written in the genetic cards -- only physics and
war hold him in check. And also the wife who wants him home by five,
of course.
-- Encyclopadia Apocryphia, 1990 ed.
There is no satisfaction in hanging a man who does not object to it
-- G. B. Shaw
There is no substitute for good manners, except, perhaps, fast
reflexes.
There is no time like the present for postponing what you ought to be
doing.
There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and
that is not being talked about.
-- Oscar Wilde
There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale
returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.
-- Mark Twain
There once was a girl named Irene
Who lived on distilled kerosene
But she started absorbin'
A new hydrocarbon
And since then has never benzene.
There once was an old man from Esser,
Who's knowledge grew lesser and lesser.
It at last grew so small,
He knew nothing at all,
And now he's a College Professor.
"There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved
it."
-- C. S. Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia
There was a plane crash over mid-ocean, and only three survivors were
left in the life-raft: the Pope, the President, and Mayor Daley.
Unfortunately, it was a one-man life-raft, and quickly sinking, so they
started debating who should be allowed to stay.
The Pope pointed out that he was the spiritual leader of millions all
over the world, the President explained that if he died then America
would be stuck with the Vice-President, and so forth. Then Mayor Daley
said, "Look! We're not solving anything like this! The only fair
thing to do is to vote on it." So they did, and Mayor Daley won by 97
votes.
There was a young lady from Hyde
Who ate a green apple and died.
While her lover lamented
The apple fermented
And made cider inside her inside.
There was a young man who said "God,
I find it exceedingly odd,
That the willow oak tree
Continues to be,
When there's no one about in the Quad."
"Dear Sir, your astonishment's odd,
For I'm always about in the Quad;
And that's why the tree,
Continues to be,"
Signed "Yours faithfully, God."
There was a young poet named Dan,
Whose poetry never would scan.
When told this was so,
He said, "Yes, I know.
It's because I try to put every possible syllable into that last line that I can."
There were in this country two very large monopolies. The larger of
the two had the following record: the Vietnam War, Watergate, double-
digit inflation, fuel and energy shortages, bankrupt airlines, and the
8-cent postcard. The second was responsible for such things as the
transistor, the solar cell, lasers, synthetic crystals, high fidelity
stereo recording, sound motion pictures, radio astronomy, negative
feedback, magnetic tape, magnetic "bubbles", electronic switching
systems, microwave radio and TV relay systems, information theory, the
first electrical digital computer, and the first communications
satellite. Guess which one got to tell the other how to run the
telephone business?
There's a fine line between courage and foolishness. Too bad its not a
fence.
There's an old proverb that says just about whatever you want it to.
There's little in taking or giving,
There's little in water or wine:
This living, this living, this living,
Was never a project of mine.
Oh, hard is the struggle, and sparse is
The gain of the one at the top,
For art is a form of catharsis,
And love is a permanent flop,
And work is the province of cattle,
And rest's for a clam in a shell,
So I'm thinking of throwing the battle --
Would you kindly direct me to hell?
-- Dorothy Parker
There's no future in time travel
There's no point in being grown up if you can't be childish sometimes.
-- Dr. Who
There's no real need to do housework -- after four years it doesn't get
any worse.
There's only one way to have a happy marriage and as soon as I learn
what it is I'll get married again.
-- Clint Eastwood
There's so much plastic in this culture that vinyl leopard skin is
becoming an endangered synthetic.
-- Lily Tomlin
"These are DARK TIMES for all mankind's HIGHEST VALUES!"
"These are DARK TIMES for FREEDOM and PROSPERITY!"
"These are GREAT TIMES to put your money on BAD GUY to kick the CRAP
out of MEGATON MAN!"
These days the necessities of life cost you about three times what they
used to, and half the time they aren't even fit to drink.
They also surf who only stand on waves.
They spell it "da Vinci" and pronounce it "da Vinchy". Foreigners
always spell better than they pronounce.
-- Mark Twain
"They told me I was gullible ... and I believed them!"
They told me you had proven it When they discovered our results
About a month before. Their hair began to curl
The proof was valid, more or less Instead of understanding it
But rather less than more. We'd run the thing through PRL.
He sent them word that we would try Don't tell a soul about all this
To pass where they had failed For it must ever be
And after we were done, to them A secret, kept from all the rest
The new proof would be mailed. Between yourself and me.
My notion was to start again
Ignoring all they'd done
We quickly turned it into code
To see if it would run.
They're only trying to make me LOOK paranoid!
Things are more like they used to be than they are now.
Things will be bright in P.M. A cop will shine a light in your face.
Think big. Pollute the Mississippi.
Think honk if you're a telepath.
Think of it! With VLSI we can pack 100 ENIACs in 1 sq. cm.!
Think of it! With VLSI we can pack 100 ENIACs in 1 sq. cm.!
Think of your family tonight. Try to crawl home after the
computer crashes.
Think twice before speaking, but don't say "think think click click".
This fortune cookie program out of order. For those in desperate need,
please use the program "________randchar". This program generates random
characters, and, given enough time, will undoubtedly come up with
something profound. It will, however, take it no time at all to be
more profound than THIS program has ever been.
This fortune intentionally not included.
This fortune is false.
"This is a country where people are free to practice their religion,
regardless of race, creed, color, obesity, or number of dangling
keys ..."
This is for all ill-treated fellows
Unborn and unbegot,
For them to read when they're in trouble
And I am not.
-- A. E. Housman
This is National Non-Dairy Creamer Week.
THIS IS PLEDGE WEEK FOR THE FORTUNE PROGRAM
If you like the fortune program, why not support it now with your
contribution of a pithy fortune, clean or obscene? We cannot continue
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Don't miss out. All fortunes will be acknowledged. If you contribute
30 fortunes or more, you will receive a free subscription to "The
Fortune Hunter", our monthly program guide. If you contribute 50 or
more, you will receive a free "Fortune Hunter" coffee mug ....
This is the story of the bee
Whose sex is very hard to see
You cannot tell the he from the she
But she can tell, and so can he
The little bee is never still
She has no time to take the pill
And that is why, in times like these
There are so many sons of bees.
This life is a test. It is only a test. Had this been an actual life,
you would have received further instructions as to what to do and where
to go.
This login session: $13.99, but for you $11.88
This planet has -- or rather had -- a problem, which was this: most of
the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many
solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were
largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper,
which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of
paper that were unhappy.
-- Douglas Adams
... This striving for excellence extends into people's
personal lives as well. When '80s people buy something, they buy the
best one, as determined by (1) price and (2) lack of availability.
Eighties people buy imported dental floss. They buy gourmet baking
soda. If an '80s couple goes to a restaurant where they have made a
reservation three weeks in advance, and they are informed that their
table is available, they stalk out immediately, because they know it is
not an excellent restaurant. If it were, it would have an enormous
crowd of excellence-oriented people like themselves waiting, their
beepers going off like crickets in the night. An excellent restaurant
wouldn't have a table ready immediately for anybody below the rank of
Liza Minnelli.
-- Dave Barry, "In Search of Excellence"
This will be a memorable month -- no matter how hard you try to forget
it.
Thompson, if he is to be believed, has sampled the entire
rainbow of legal and illegal drugs in heroic efforts to feel better
than he does.
As for the truth about his health: I have asked around about
it. I am told that he appears to be strong and rosy, and steadily
sane. But we will be doing what he wants us to do, I think, if we
consider his exterior a sort of Dorian Gray facade. Inwardly, he is
being eaten alive by tinhorn politicians.
The disease is fatal. There is no known cure. The most we can
do for the poor devil, it seems to me, is to name his disease in his
honor. From this moment on, let all those who feel that Americans can
be as easily led to beauty as to ugliness, to truth as to public
relations, to joy as to bitterness, be said to be suffering from Hunter
Thompson's disease. I don't have it this morning. It comes and goes.
This morning I don't have Hunter Thompson's disease.
-- Kurt Vonnegut Jr. on Dr. Hunter S. Thompson: Excerpt
from "A Political Disease", Vonnegut's review of "Fear
and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72"
Those who can't write, write manuals.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, simulate.
Those who educate children well are more to be honored than parents,
for these only gave life, those the art of living well.
-- Aristotle
Those who in quarrels interpose, must often wipe a bloody nose.
Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent
revolution inevitable.
-- John F. Kennedy
Three great scientific theories of the structure of the universe are
the molecular, the corpuscular and the atomic. A fourth affirms, with
Haeckel, the condensation or precipitation of matter from ether --
whose existence is proved by the condensation or precipitation ... A
fifth theory is held by idiots, but it is doubtful if they know any
more about the matter than the others.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Time flies like an arrow
Fruit flies like a banana
Time is nature's way of making sure that everything doesn't happen at
once.
(to "The Caissons Go Rolling Along")
Scratch the disks, dump the core, Shut it down, pull the plug
Roll the tapes across the floor, Give the core an extra tug
And the system is going to crash. And the system is going to crash.
Teletypes smashed to bits. Mem'ry cards, one and all,
Give the scopes some nasty hits Toss out halfway down the hall
And the system is going to crash. And the system is going to crash.
And we've also found Just flip one switch
When you turn the power down, And the lights will cease to twitch
You turn the disk readers into trash. And the tape drives will crumble
in a flash.
Oh, it's so much fun, When the CPU
Now the CPU won't run Can print nothing out but "foo,"
And the system is going to crash. The system is going to crash.
To A Quick Young Fox:
Why jog exquisite bulk, fond crazy vamp,
Daft buxom jonquil, zephyr's gawky vice?
Guy fed by work, quiz Jove's xanthic lamp --
Zow! Qualms by deja vu gyp fox-kin thrice.
-- Lazy Dog
To be intoxicated is to feel sophisticated but not be able to say it.
To be is to do.
-- I. Kant
To do is to be.
-- A. Sartre
Yabba-Dabba-Doo!
-- F. Flinstone
To be sure of hitting the target, shoot first and, whatever you hit,
call it the target.
To err is human, to forgive is Not Company Policy.
To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk.
-- Thomas Edison
To iterate is human, to recurse, divine.
To those accustomed to the precise, structured methods of conventional
system development, exploratory development techniques may seem messy,
inelegant, and unsatisfying. But it's a question of congruence:
precision and flexibility may be just as disfunctional in novel,
uncertain situations as sloppiness and vacillation are in familiar,
well-defined ones. Those who admire the massive, rigid bone structures
of dinosaurs should remember that jellyfish still enjoy their very
secure ecological niche.
-- Beau Sheil, "Power Tools for Programmers"
"To vacillate or not to vacillate, that is the question ... or is it?"
"To YOU I'm an atheist; to God, I'm the Loyal Opposition."
-- Woody Allen
Today is a good day to bribe a high-ranking public official.
Today is National Existential Ennui Awareness Day.
Today is the first day of the rest of the mess
Today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday
Today's scientific question is: What in the world is electricity?
And where does it go after it leaves the toaster?
-- Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?"
Tomorrow will be canceled due to lack of interest.
Tonight's the night: Sleep in a eucalyptus tree.
Too much of a good thing is WONDERFUL.
-- Mae West
Travel important today; Internal Revenue men arrive tomorrow.
Troubled day for virgins over 16 who are beautiful and wealthy and live
in eucalyptus trees.
Truly great madness can not be achieved without significant
intelligence.
-- Henrik Tikkanen
Truth will be out this morning. (Which may really mess things up.)
Truthful, adj.:
Dumb and illiterate.
Truthful, adj.:
Dumb and illiterate.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Try not to have a good time ... This is supposed to be educational.
-- Charles Schulz
Try to be the best of whatever you are, even if what you are is no
good.
Try to get all of your posthumous medals in advance.
Trying to be happy is like trying to build a machine for which the only
specification is that it should run noiselessly.
Turnaucka's Law:
The attention span of a computer is only as long as its
electrical cord.
Tussman's Law:
Nothing is as inevitable as a mistake whose time has come.
TV is chewing gum for the eyes.
-- Frank Lloyd Wright
'Twas midnight, and the UNIX hacks
Did gyre and gimble in their cave
All mimsy was the CS-VAX
And Cory raths outgrave.
"Beware the software rot, my son!
The faults that bite, the jobs that thrash!
Beware the broken pipe, and shun
The frumious system crash!"
'Twas the Night before Crisis
'Twas the night before crisis, and all through the house,
Not a program was working not even a browse.
The programmers were wrung out too mindless to care,
Knowing chances of cutover hadn't a prayer.
The users were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of inquiries danced in their heads.
When out in the lobby there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from my tube to see what was the matter.
And what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a Super Programmer, oblivious to fear.
More rapid than eagles, his programs they came,
And he whistled and shouted and called them by name;
On Update! On Add! On Inquiry! On Delete!
On Batch Jobs! On Closing! On Functions Complete!
His eyes were glazed over, his fingers were lean,
From Weekends and nights in front of a screen.
A wink of his eye, and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread...
'Twas the nocturnal segment of the diurnal period
preceding the annual Yuletide celebration, And
throughout our place of residence,
Kinetic activity was not in evidence among the
possessors of this potential, including that
species of domestic rodent known as Mus musculus.
Hosiery was meticulously suspended from the forward
edge of the woodburning caloric apparatus,
Pursuant to our anticipatory pleasure regarding an
imminent visitation from an eccentric
philanthropist among whose folkloric appelations
is the honorific title of St. Nicklaus ...
Two can Live as Cheaply as One for Half as Long.
-- Howard Kandel
Two percent of zero is almost nothing.
UFO's are for real: the Air Force doesn't exist.
"Uncle Cosmo ... why do they call this a word processor?"
"It's simple, Skyler ... you've seen what food processors do to food,
right?"
-- MacNelley, "Shoe"
Uncle Ed's Rule of Thumb:
Never use your thumb for a rule. You'll either hit it with a
hammer or get a splinter in it.
Under deadline pressure for the next week. If you want something, it
can wait. Unless it's blind screaming paroxysmally hedonistic ...
Underlying Principle of Socio-Genetics:
Superiority is recessive.
Unfair animal names:
-- tsetse fly -- bullhead
-- booby -- duck-billed platypus
-- sapsucker -- Clarence
-- Gary Larson
United Nations, New York, December 25. The peace and joy of the
Christmas season was marred by a proclamation of a general strike of
all the military forces of the world. Panic reigns in the hearts of
all the patriots of every persuasion.
Meanwhile, fears of universal disaster sank to an all-time low over the
world.
-- Isaac Asimov
Universe, n.:
The problem.
University, n.:
Like a software house, except the software's free, and it's
usable, and it works, and if it breaks they'll quickly tell you how to
fix it, and ...
Unnamed Law:
If it happens, it must be possible.
Unquestionably, there is progress. The average American now pays out
twice as much in taxes as he formerly got in wages.
-- H. L. Mencken
Usage: fortune -P [] -a [xsz] [Q: [file]] [rKe9] -v6[+] dataspec ... inputdir
User n.:
A programmer who will believe anything you tell him.
Using TSO is like kicking a dead whale down the beach.
-- S. C. Johnson
Vail's Second Axiom:
The amount of work to be done increases in proportion to the
amount of work already completed.
Van Roy's Law:
An unbreakable toy is useful for breaking other toys.
Velilind's Laws of Experimentation:
1. If reproducibility may be a problem, conduct the test only
once.
2. If a straight line fit is required, obtain only two data
points.
"Verily and forsooth," replied Goodgulf darkly. "In the past
year strange and fearful wonders I have seen. Fields sown with barley
reap crabgrass and fungus, and even small gardens reject their
artichoke hearts. There has been a hot day in December and a blue
moon. Calendars are made with a month of Sundays and a blue-ribbon
Holstein bore alive two insurance salesmen. The earth splits and the
entrails of a goat were found tied in square knots. The face of the
sun blackens and the skies have rained down soggy potato chips."
"But what do all these things mean?" gasped Frito.
"Beats me," said Goodgulf with a shrug, "but I thought it made
good copy."
-- Harvard Lampoon, "Bored of the Rings"
Very few profundities can be expressed in less than 80 characters.
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.
-- Salvor Hardin
VIRGO (Aug 23 - Sept 22)
Learn something new today, like how to spell or how to count to
ten without using your fingers. Be careful dressing this
morning. You may be hit by a car later in the day and you
wouldn't want to be taken to the doctor's office in some of
that old underwear you own.
VIRGO (Aug 23 - Sept 22)
You are the logical type and hate disorder. This nitpicking is
sickening to your friends. You are cold and unemotional and sometimes
fall asleep while making love. Virgos make good bus drivers.
Virtue is its own punishment.
Vital papers will demonstrate their vitality by spontaneously moving
from where you left them to where you can't find them.
Vitamin C deficiency is apauling
Vote anarchist
"Wagner's music is better than it sounds."
-- Mark Twain
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?"
War hath no fury like a non-combatant.
-- Charles Edward Montague
WARNING:
Reading this fortune can affect the dimensionality of your
mind, change the curvature of your spine, cause the growth of
hair on your palms, and make a difference in the outcome of
your favorite war.
Washington [D.C.] is a city of Southern efficiency and Northern charm.
-- John F. Kennedy
Wasting time is an important part of living.
Watson's Law:
The reliability of machinery is inversely proportional to the
number and significance of any persons watching it.
We ARE as gods and might as well get good at it.
-- Whole Earth Catalog
We are confronted with insurmountable opportunities.
-- Walt Kelly, "Pogo"
We are confronted with insurmountable opportunities.
-- Walt Kelly, "Pogo"
We can defeat gravity. The problem is the paperwork involved.
"We don't care. We don't have to. We're the Phone Company."
We don't understand the software, and sometimes we don't understand the
hardware, but we can *___see* the blinking lights!
We have met the enemy, and he is us.
-- Walt Kelly
"We have reason to believe that man first walked upright to free his
hands for masturbation."
-- Lily Tomlin
We may not return the affection of those who like us, but we always
respect their good judgement.
We must remember the First Amendment which protects any shrill jackass
no matter how self-seeking.
-- F. G. Withington
We really don't have any enemies. It's just that some of our best
friends are trying to kill us.
We were young and our happiness dazzled us with its strength.
But there was also a terrible betrayal that lay within me like a Merle
Haggard song at a French restaurant. ...
I could not tell the girl about the woman of the tollway, of
her milk white BMW and her Jordache smile. There had been a fight. I
had punched her boyfriend, who fought the mechanical bulls. Everyone
told him, "You ride the bull, senor. You do not fight it." But he was
lean and tough like a bad rib-eye and he fought the bull. And then he
fought me. And when we finished there were no winners, just men doing
what men must do. ...
"Stop the car," the girl said. There was a look of terrible
sadness in her eyes. She knew about the woman of the tollway. I knew
not how. I started to speak, but she raised an arm and spoke with a
quiet and peace I will never forget.
"I do not ask for whom's the tollway belle," she said, "the
tollway belle's for thee."
The next morning our youth was a memory, and our happiness was
a lie. Life is like a bad margarita with good tequila, I thought as I
poured whiskey onto my granola and faced a new day.
-- Peter Applebome, International Imitation Hemingway
Competition
We will have solar energy as soon as the utility companies solve one
technical problem -- how to run a sunbeam through a meter.
we will invent new lullabies, new songs, new acts of love,
we will cry over things we used to laugh &
our new wisdom will bring tears to eyes of gentile
creatures from other planets who were afraid of us till then &
in the end a summer with wild winds &
new friends will be.
We wish you a Hare Krishna
We wish you a Hare Krishna
We wish you a Hare Krishna
And a Sun Myung Moon!
-- Maxwell Smart
"We'll cross out that bridge when we come back to it later."
We're deep into the holiday gift-giving season, as you can tell from
the fact that everywhere you look, you see jolly old St. Nick urging
you to purchase things, to the point where you want to slug him right
in his bowl full of jelly.
-- Dave Barry, "Simple, Homespun Gifts"
We've sent a man to the moon, and that's 29,000 miles away. The center
of the Earth is only 4,000 miles away. You could drive that in a week,
but for some reason nobody's ever done it.
-- Andy Rooney
Weiler's Law:
Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it
himself.
Weinberg's First Law:
Progress is made on alternate Fridays.
Weinberg's Principle:
An expert is a person who avoids the small errors while
sweeping on to the grand fallacy.
Weinberg's Second Law:
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs,
then the first woodpecker that came along would destroy
civilization.
Weiner's Law of Libraries:
There are no answers, only cross references.
Well, I would -- if they realized that we -- again if -- if we led them
back to that stalemate only because our retaliatory power, our seconds,
or strike at them after our first strike, would be so destructive they
they couldn't afford it, that would hold them off.
-- President Ronald Reagan, on the MX missile
"Well, if you can't believe what you read in a comic book, what *___can*
you believe?!"
-- Bullwinkle J. Moose [Jay Ward]
Well, my terminal's locked up, and I ain't got any Mail,
And I can't recall the last time that my program didn't fail;
I've got stacks in my structs, I've got arrays in my queues,
I've got the : Segmentation violation -- Core dumped blues.
If you think that it's nice that you get what you C,
Then go : illogical statement with your whole family,
'Cause the Supreme Court ain't the only place with : Bus error views.
I've got the : Segmentation violation -- Core dumped blues.
On a PDP-11, life should be a breeze,
But with VAXen in the house even magnetic tapes would freeze.
Now you might think that unlike VAXen I'd know who I abuse,
I've got the : Segmentation violation -- Core dumped blues.
-- Core Dumped Blues
Westheimer's Discovery:
A couple of months in the laboratory can frequently save a
couple of hours in the library.
Wethern's Law:
Assumption is the mother of all screw-ups.
"What do you give a man who has everything?" the pretty
teenager asked her mother.
"Encouragement, dear," she replied.
What does it mean if there is no fortune for you?
What garlic is to food, insanity is to art.
What garlic is to salad, insanity is to art.
What good is a ticket to the good life, if you can't find the
entrance?
What good is having someone who can walk on water if you don't follow
in his footsteps?
What I tell you three times is true.
What I want is all of the power and none of the responsibility.
What if everything is an illusion and nothing exists? In that case, I
definitely overpaid for my carpet.
-- Woody Allen, "Without Feathers"
What if nothing exists and we're all in somebody's dream? Or what's
worse, what if only that fat guy in the third row exists?
-- Woody Allen, "Without Feathers"
What is a magician but a practising theorist?
-- Obi-Wan Kenobi
What is mind? No matter.
What is matter? Never mind.
-- Thomas Hewitt Key, 1799-1875
What is the difference between a Turing machine and the modern
computer? It's the same as that between Hillary's ascent of Everest
and the establishment of a Hilton on its peak.
"What is the robbing of a bank compared to the FOUNDING of a bank?"
-- Bertold Brecht
What is worth doing is worth the trouble of asking somebody to do.
What makes the Universe so hard to comprehend is that there's nothing
to compare it with.
What makes the universe so hard to comprehend is that there's nothing
to compare it with.
What publishers are looking for these days isn't radical feminism.
It's corporate feminism -- a brand of feminism designed to sell books
and magazines, three-piece suits, airline tickets, Scotch, cigarettes
and, most important, corporate America's message, which runs: "Yes,
women were discriminated against in the past, but that unfortunate
mistake has been remedied; now every woman can attain wealth, prestige
and power by dint of individual rather than collective effort."
-- Susan Gordon
What sane person could live in this world and not be crazy?
-- Ursula K. LeGuin
What the hell, go ahead and put all your eggs in one basket.
What the large print giveth, the small print taketh away.
What this country needs is a dime that will buy a good five-cent
bagel.
What this country needs is a dime that will buy a good five-cent
bagel.
What this country needs is a good 5 dollar plasma weapon.
What this country needs is a good five cent ANYTHING!
What this country needs is a good five-cent nickel.
What use is magic if it can't save a unicorn?
-- Peter S. Beagle, "The Last Unicorn"
What with chromodynamics and electroweak too
Our Standardized Model should please even you,
Tho once you did say that of charm there was none
It took courage to switch as to say Earth moves not Sun.
Yet your state of the union penultimate large
Is the last known haunt of the Fractional Charge,
And as you surf in the hot tub with sourdough roll
Please ponder the passing of your sole Monopole.
Your Olympics were fun, you should bring them all back
For transsexual tennis or Anamalon Track,
But Hollywood movies remain sinfully crude
Whether seen on the telly or Remotely Viewed.
Now fasten your sunbelts, for you've done it once more,
You said it in Leipzig of the thing we adore,
That you've built an incredible crystalline sphere
Whose German attendants spread trembling and fear
Of the death of our theory by Particle Zeta
Which I'll bet is not there say your article, later.
-- Sheldon Glashow, Physics Today, Dec. 1984
"What's that thing?"
"Well, it's a highly technical, sensitive instrument we use in
computer repair. Being a layman, you probably can't grasp exactly what
it does. We call it a two-by-four."
-- Jeff MacNelly, "Shoe"
Whatever became of eternal truth?
Whatever became of Strange de Jim? Well, he found a substitute for
cocaine: "You cover Q-tips with sandpaper and ram them up your nostrils
as far as they will go. Then you sniff talcum powder while shredding
hundred dollar bills."
-- Herb Caen
Whatever is not nailed down is mine. What I can pry loose is not
nailed down.
-- Collis P. Huntingdon
When a Banker jumps out of a window, jump after him -- that's where the
money is.
-- Robespierre
When a fellow says, "It ain't the money but the principle of the
thing," it's the money.
-- Kim Hubbard
When a fly lands on the ceiling, does it do a half roll or a half
loop?
When a place gets crowded enough to require ID's, social collapse is
not far away. It is time to go elsewhere. The best thing about space
travel is that it made it possible to go elsewhere.
-- Robert Heinlein
When a shepherd goes to kill a wolf, and takes his dog along to see the
sport, he should take care to avoid mistakes. The dog has certain
relationships to the wolf the shepherd may have forgotten.
-- Robert Pirsig, "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle
Maintenance"
When all other means of communication fail, try words.
When does summertime come to Minnesota, you ask? Well, last year, I
think it was a Tuesday.
When God endowed human beings with brains, He did not intend to
guarantee them.
When I said "we", officer, I was referring to myself, the four young
ladies, and, of course, the goat.
When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President. Now
I'm beginning to believe it.
-- Clarence Darrow
When I was in school, I cheated on my metaphysics exam: I looked into
the soul of the boy sitting next to me.
-- Woody Allen
When I was younger, I could remember anything, whether it had happened
or not; but my faculties are decaying now and soon I shall be so I
cannot remember any but the things that never happened. It is sad to
go to pieces like this but we all have to do it.
-- Mark Twain
When in doubt, do what the President does -- guess.
"When in doubt, tell the truth."
-- Mark Twain
When in doubt, use brute force.
-- Ken Thompson
When love is gone, there's always justice.
And when justice is gone, there's always force.
And when force is gone, there's always Mom.
Hi, Mom!
-- Laurie Anderson
When Marriage is Outlawed,
Only Outlaws will have Inlaws.
When more and more people are thrown out of work, unemployment
results.
-- Calvin Coolidge
When someone says "I want a programming language in which I need only
say what I wish done," give him a lollipop.
"When the going gets tough, the tough get empirical"
-- Jon Carroll
When the government bureau's remedies do not match your problem, you
modify the problem, not the remedy.
When the Ngdanga tribe of West Africa hold their moon love ceremonies,
the men of the tribe bang their heads on sacred trees until they get a
nose bleed, which usually cures them of ____that.
-- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
When the Universe was not so out of whack as it is today, and all the
stars were lined up in their proper places, you could easily count them
from left to right, or top to bottom, and the larger and bluer ones
were set apart, and the smaller yellowing types pushed off to the
corners as bodies of a lower grade ...
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
When two people are under the influence of the most violent, most
insane, most delusive, and most transient of passions, they are
required to swear that they will remain in that excited, abnormal, and
exhausting condition continuously until death do them part.
-- George Bernard Shaw
When we are planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is
not hereditary.
-- Thomas Paine
"When you are in it up to your ears, keep your mouth shut."
When you do not know what you are doing, do it neatly.
When you have shot and killed a man you have in some measure
clarified your attitude toward him. You have given a definite answer
to a definite problem. For better or worse you have acted decisively.
In a way, the next move is up to him.
-- R. A. Lafferty
"When you have to kill a man it costs nothing to be polite."
-- Winston Curchill, On formal declarations of war
When you make your mark in the world, watch out for guys with erasers.
-- The Wall Street Journal
When you're away, I'm restless, lonely,
Wretched, bored, dejected; only
Here's the rub, my darling dear
I feel the same when you are near.
-- Samuel Hoffenstein, "When You're Away"
When you're not looking at it, this fortune is written in FORTRAN.
When you're not looking at it, this fortune is written in FORTRAN.
Whenever anyone says, "theoretically", they really mean, "not really".
-- Dave Parnas
Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to
see it tried on him personally.
-- A. Lincoln
Whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong.
--Oscar Wilde
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"
Whenever you find that you are on the side of the majority, it is time
to reform.
-- Mark Twain
Whenever you find that you are on the side of the majority, it is time
to reform.
-- Mark Twain
WHERE CAN THE MATTER BE
Oh, dear, where can the matter be
When it's converted to energy?
There is a slight loss of parity.
Johnny's so long at the fair.
Where humor is concerned there are no standards -- no one can say what
is good or bad, although you can be sure that everyone will.
-- John Kenneth Galbraith
Where there's a will, there's an Inheritance Tax.
Whether you can hear it or not
The Universe is laughing behind your back
-- National Lampoon, "Deteriorada"
While anyone can admit to themselves they were wrong, the true test is
admission to someone else.
While Europe's eye is fix'd on mighty things,
The fate of empires and the fall of kings;
While quacks of State must each produce his plan,
And even children lisp the Rights of Man;
Amid this mighty fuss just let me mention,
The Rights of Woman merit some attention.
-- Robert Burns, Address on "The Rights of Woman",
November 26, 1792
While money can't buy happiness, it certainly lets you choose your own
form of misery.
While money doesn't buy love, it puts you in a great bargaining
position.
While most peoples' opinions change, the conviction of their
correctness never does.
While you don't greatly need the outside world, it's still very
reassuring to know that it's still there.
While your friend holds you affectionately by both your hands you are
safe, for you can watch both of his.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Whistler's Law:
You never know who is right, but you always know who is in
charge.
"Who cares if it doesn't do anything? It was made with our new
Triple-Iso-Bifurcated-Krypton-Gate-MOS process ..."
Who made the world I cannot tell;
'Tis made, and here am I in hell.
My hand, though now my knuckles bleed,
I never soiled with such a deed.
-- A. E. Housman
Who needs friends when you can sit alone in your room and drink?
Who's on first?
Whom computers would destroy, they must first drive mad.
"Why be a man when you can be a success?"
-- Bertold Brecht
Why did the Lord give us so much quickness of movement unless it was to
avoid responsibility with?
Why did the Roman Empire collapse? What is the Latin for office
automation?
Why does man kill? He kills for food. And not only food: frequently
there must be a beverage.
-- Woody Allen, "Without Feathers"
Why I Can't Go Out With You:
I'd LOVE to, but ...
-- I have to floss my cat.
-- I've dedicated my life to linguini.
-- I need to spend more time with my blender.
-- it wouldn't be fair to the other Beautiful People.
-- it's my night to pet the dog/ferret/goldfish.
-- I'm going downtown to try on some gloves.
-- I have to check the freshness dates on my dairy products.
-- I'm going down to the bakery to watch the buns rise.
-- I have an appointment with a cuticle specialist.
-- I have some really hard words to look up.
-- I've got a Friends of the Lowly Rutabaga meeting.
-- I promised to help a friend fold road maps.
"Why is it that we rejoice at a birth and grieve at a funeral? It is
because we are not the person involved"
-- Mark Twain
"Why isn't there a special name for the tops of your feet?"
-- Lily Tomlin
Why not have an old-fashioned Christmas for your family this year?
Just picture the scene in your living room on Christmas morning as your
children open their old-fashioned presents.
Your 11-year-old son: "What the heck is this?"
You: "A spinning top! You spin it around, and then eventually it
falls down. What fun! Ha, ha!"
Son: "Is this a joke? Jason Thompson's parents got him a computer
with two disk drives and 128 kilobytes of random-access memory,
and I get this cretin TOP?"
Your 8-year-old daughter: "You think that's bad? Look at this."
You: "It's figgy pudding! What a treat!"
Daughter: "It looks like goat barf."
-- Dave Barry, "Simple, Homespun Gifts"
"Why was I born with such contemporaries?"
-- Oscar Wilde
Wiker's Law:
Government expands to absorb revenue and then some.
William Safire's Rules for Writers:
Remember to never split an infinitive. The passive voice should never
be used. Do not put statements in the negative form. Verbs have to
agree with their subjects. Proofread carefully to see if you words
out. If you reread your work, you can find on rereading a great deal
of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing. A writer must
not shift your point of view. And don't start a sentence with a
conjunction. (Remember, too, a preposition is a terrible word to end a
sentence with.) Don't overuse exclamation marks!! Place pronouns as
close as possible, especially in long sentences, as of 10 or more
words, to their antecedents. Writing carefully, dangling participles
must be avoided. If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a
linking verb is. Take the bull by the hand and avoid mixing
metaphors. Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky. Everyone should
be careful to use a singular pronoun with singular nouns in their
writing. Always pick on the correct idiom. The adverb always follows
the verb. Last but not least, avoid cliches like the plague; seek
viable alternatives.
Williams and Holland's Law:
If enough data is collected, anything may be proven by
statistical methods.
Winter is the season in which people try to keep the house as warm as
it was in the summer, when they complained about the heat.
Wit, n.:
The salt with which the American Humorist spoils his cookery
... by leaving it out.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
With a rubber duck, one's never alone.
-- "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"
With all the fancy scientists in the world, why can't they just once
build a nuclear balm?
With every passing hour our solar system comes forty-three thousand
miles closer to globular cluster M13 in the constellation Hercules, and
still there are some misfits who continue to insist that there is no
such thing as progress.
-- Ransom K. Ferm
Without ice cream life and fame are meaningless.
Wood is highly ecological, since trees are a renewable resource. If
you cut down a tree, another will grow in its place. And if you cut
down the new tree, still another will grow. And if you cut down that
tree, yet another will grow, only this one will be a mutation with
long, poisonous tentacles and revenge in its heart, and it will sit
there in the forest, cackling and making elaborate plans for when you
come back.
Wood heat is not new. It dates back to a day millions of years ago,
when a group of cavemen were sitting around, watching dinosaurs rot.
Suddenly, lightning struck a nearby log and set it on fire. One of the
cavemen stared at the fire for a few minutes, then said: "Hey! Wood
heat!" The other cavemen, who did not understand English, immediately
beat him to death with stones. But the key discovery had been made,
and from that day forward, the cavemen had all the heat they needed,
although their insurance rates went way up.
-- Dave Barry, "Postpetroleum Guzzler"
Workers of the world, arise! You have nothing to lose but your
chairs.
Worst Month of 1981 for Downhill Skiing:
August. The lines are the shortest, though.
-- Steve Rubenstein
Worst Month of the Year:
February. February has only 28 days in it, which means that if
you rent an apartment, you are paying for three full days you don't
get. Try to avoid Februarys whenever possible.
-- Steve Rubenstein
Worst Vegetable of the Year:
The brussels sprout. This is also the worst vegetable of next
year.
-- Steve Rubenstein
"Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"
"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat
-- Lewis Carrol
Write-Protect Tab, n.:
A small sticker created to cover the unsightly notch carelessly
left by disk manufacturers. The use of the tab creates an error
message once in a while, but its aesthetic value far outweighs the
momentary inconvenience.
-- Robb Russon
X-rated movies are all alike ... the only thing they leave to the
imagination is the plot.
Xerox does it again and again and again and ...
Xerox never comes up with anything original.
"Yacc" owes much to a most stimulating collection of users, who have
goaded me beyond my inclination, and frequently beyond my ability in
their endless search for "one more feature". Their irritating
unwillingness to learn how to do things my way has usually led to my
doing things their way; most of the time, they have been right.
-- S. C. Johnson, "Yacc guide acknowledgements"
Year, n.:
A period of three hundred and sixty-five disappointments.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Yes, but every time I try to see things your way, I get a headache.
Yes, but which self do you want to be?
Yesterday I was a dog. Today I'm a dog. Tomorrow I'll probably still
be a dog. Sigh! There's so little hope for advancement.
-- Snoopy
Yesterday upon the stair
I met a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today --
I think he's from the CIA.
Yield to Temptation ... it may not pass your way again.
-- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love"
Yinkel, n.:
A person who combs his hair over his bald spot, hoping no one
will notice.
-- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
"You are old, Father William," the young man said,
"All your papers these days look the same;
Those William's would be better unread --
Do these facts never fill you with shame?"
"In my youth," Father William replied to his son,
"I wrote wonderful papers galore;
But the great reputation I found that I'd won,
Made it pointless to think any more."
"You are old, father William," the young man said,
"And your hair has become very white;
And yet you incessantly stand on your head --
Do you think, at your age, it is right?"
"In my youth," father William replied to his son,
"I feared it might injure the brain;
But, now that I'm perfectly sure I have none,
Why, I do it again and again."
-- Lewis Carrol
"You are old," said the youth, "and I'm told by my peers
That your lectures bore people to death.
Yet you talk at one hundred conventions per year --
Don't you think that you should save your breath?"
"I have answered three questions and that is enough,"
Said his father, "Don't give yourself airs!
Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff?
Be off, or I'll kick you downstairs!"
"You are old," said the youth, "and your jaws are too weak
For anything tougher than suet;
Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak --
Pray, how did you manage to do it?"
"In my youth," said his father, "I took to the law,
And argued each case with my wife;
And the muscular strength which it gave to my jaw,
Has lasted the rest of my life."
-- Lewis Carrol
"You are old," said the youth, "and your programs don't run,
And there isn't one language you like;
Yet of useful suggestions for help you have none --
Have you thought about taking a hike?"
"Since I never write programs," his father replied,
"Every language looks equally bad;
Yet the people keep paying to read all my books
And don't realize that they've been had."
"You are old," said the youth, "as I mentioned before,
And have grown most uncommonly fat;
Yet you turned a back-somersault in at the door --
Pray what is the reason of that?"
"In my youth," said the sage, as he shook his grey locks,
"I kept all my limbs very supple
By the use of this ointment -- one shilling the box --
Allow me to sell you a couple?"
-- Lewis Carrol
"You are old," said the youth, "as I mentioned before,
And make errors few people could bear;
You complain about everyone's English but yours --
Do you really think this is quite fair?"
"I make lots of mistakes," Father William declared,
"But my stature these days is so great
That no critic can hurt me -- I've got them all scared,
And to stop me it's now far too late."
"You are old," said the youth, "one would hardly suppose
That your eye was as steady as ever;
Yet you balanced an eel on the end of your nose --
What made you so awfully clever?"
"I have answered three questions, and that is enough,"
Said his father. "Don't give yourself airs!
Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff?
Be off, or I'll kick you down stairs!"
-- Lewis Carrol
You are only young once, but you can stay immature indefinitely.
You are wise, witty, and wonderful, but you spend too much time reading
this sort of trash.
You can always tell the Christmas season is here when you start getting
incredibly dense, tinfoil-and-ribbon- wrapped lumps in the mail.
Fruitcakes make ideal gifts because the Postal Service has been unable
to find a way to damage them. They last forever, largely because
nobody ever eats them. In fact, many smart people save the fruitcakes
they receive and send them back to the original givers the next year;
some fruitcakes have been passed back and forth for hundreds of years.
The easiest way to make a fruitcake is to buy a darkish cake, then
pound some old, hard fruit into it with a mallet. Be sure to wear
safety glasses.
-- Dave Barry, "Simple, Homespun Gifts"
You can create your own opportunities this week. Blackmail a senior
executive.
You can get more of what you want with a kind word and a gun than you
can with just a kind word.
-- Bumper Sticker
You can make it illegal, but you can't make it unpopular.
You can measure a programmer's perspective by noting his attitude on
the continuing viability of FORTRAN.
-- Alan Perlis
You can take all the impact that science considerations have on funding
decisions at NASA, put them in the navel of a flea, and have room left
over for a caraway seed and Tony Calio's heart.
-- F. Allen
You can tell how far we have to go, when FORTRAN is the language of
supercomputers.
-- Steven Feiner
You can't carve your way to success without cutting remarks.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
You can't start worrying about what's going to happen. You get spastic
enough worrying about what's happening now.
-- Lauren Bacall
"You can't teach people to be lazy - either they have it, or they
don't."
-- Dagwood Bumstead
You cannot achieve the impossible without attempting the absurd.
You cannot kill time without injuring eternity.
You cannot propel yourself forward by patting yourself on the back.
You could get a new lease on life -- if only you didn't need the first
and last month in advance.
You couldn't even prove the White House staff sane beyond a reasonable
doubt.
-- Ed Meese, on the Hinckley verdict
You don't have to think too hard when you talk to teachers.
-- J. D. Salinger
You don't sew with a fork, so I see no reason to eat with knitting
needles.
-- Miss Piggy, on eating Chinese Food
You first have to decide whether to use the short or the long form. The
short form is what the Internal Revenue Service calls "simplified",
which means it is designed for people who need the help of a Sears
tax-preparation expert to distinguish between their first and last
names. Here's the complete text:
"1. How much did you make? (AMOUNT)
"2. How much did we here at the government take out? (AMOUNT)
"3. Hey! Sounds like we took too much! So we're going to
send an official government check for (ONE-FIFTEENTH OF
THE AMOUNT WE TOOK) directly to the (YOUR LAST NAME)
household at (YOUR ADDRESS), for you to spend in any way
you please! Which just goes to show you, (YOUR FIRST
NAME), that it pays to file the short form!"
The IRS wants you to use this form because it gets to keep most of your
money. So unless you have pond silt for brains, you want the long
form.
-- Dave Barry, "Sweating Out Taxes"
You have the capacity to learn from mistakes. You'll learn a lot
today.
You know you've been spending too much time on the computer when your
friend misdates a check, and you suggest adding a "++" to fix it.
"You know, it's at times like this when I'm trapped in a Vogon
airlock with a man from Betelgeuse and about to die of asphyxiation in
deep space that I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me
when I was young!"
"Why, what did she tell you?"
"I don't know, I didn't listen!"
-- Douglas Adams, "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"
You may be recognized soon. Hide.
You may have heard that a dean is to faculty as a hydrant is to a dog.
-- Alfred Kahn
You men out there probably think you already know how to dress for
success. You know, for example, that you should not wear leisure suits
or white plastic belts and shoes, unless you are going to a costume
party disguised as a pig farmer vacationing at Disney World.
-- Dave Barry, "How to Dress for Real Success"
You might have mail
"You must realize that the computer has it in for you. The irrefutable
proof of this is that the computer always does what you tell it to do."
You need no longer worry about the future. This time tomorrow you'll
be dead.
You never know how many friends you have until you rent a house on the
beach.
You or I must yield up his life to Ahrimanes. I would rather it were
you. I should have no hesitation in sacrificing my own life to spare
yours, but we take stock next week, and it would not be fair on the
company.
-- J. Wellington Wells
You possess a mind not merely twisted, but actually sprained.
You should emulate your heros, but don't carry it too far. Especially
if they are dead.
You should never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for
freedom and liberty.
-- Henrick Ibson
You should not use your fireplace, because scientists now believe that,
contrary to popular opinion, fireplaces actually remove heat from
houses. Really, that's what scientists believe. In fact many
scientists actually use their fireplaces to cool their houses in the
summer. If you visit a scientist's house on a sultry August day,
you'll find a cheerful fire roaring on the hearth and the scientist
sitting nearby, remarking on how cool he is and drinking heavily.
-- Dave Barry, "Postpetroleum Guzzler"
You will be a winner today. Pick a fight with a four-year-old.
You will be surprised by a loud noise.
You will be Told about it Tomorrow. Go Home and Prepare Thyself.
You worry too much about your job. Stop it. You are not paid enough
to worry.
"You'll never be the man your mother was!"
You're at the end of the road again.
You're being followed. Cut out the hanky-panky for a few days.
You're never too old to become younger.
-- Mae West
You're not drunk if you can lie on the floor without holding on.
-- Dean Martin
You've been leading a dog's life. Stay off the furniture.
Your analyst has you mixed up with another patient. Don't believe a
thing he tells you.
Your conscience never stops you from doing anything. It just stops you
from enjoying it.
Your fault: core dumped
Your life would be very empty if you had nothing to regret.
Your lucky color has faded.
Your lucky number has been disconnected.
Your lucky number is 3552664958674928. Watch for it everywhere.
Your true value depends entirely on what you are compared with.
Youth is when you blame all your troubles on your parents; maturity is
when you learn that everything is the fault of the younger generation.
Zero Defects, n.:
The result of shutting down a production line.
Zounds! I was never so bethumped with words
since I first called my brother's father dad.
-- William Shakespeare, "King John"
Zymurgy's Law of Volunteer Labor:
People are always available for work in the past tense.
Sorry, no obscene fortunes. Don't want to offend anyone.
(Now that's obscene!)
"Any fool can paint a picture, but it takes a wise man to be able to sell it."
"But I don't like Spam!!!!"
"Don't tell me what you dream'd last night for I've been reading Freud."
"Every creature has within him the wild, uncontrollable urge to PUNT."
"He is considered the most graceful speaker who can say nothing in most words."
"MAC user's dynamic debugging list evaluator? Never heard of that."
"Mate, this parrot wouldn't VOOM if you put four million volts through it!"
"Mind your own business, Spock. I'm sick of your halfbreed interference."
"Oh, Aunty Em, it's so good to be home!"
"They took some of the Van Goghs, most of the jewels, and all of the Chivas!"
"Toto, I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore!"
'Home, Sweet Home' must surely have been written by a bachelor.
dobawka fortunes fortunes.txt tmp tmp.bu UNIX is a Trademark of Bell Laboratories.
1 bulls, 3 cows.
10.0 times 0.1 is hardly ever 1.0.
23. ... r-q1
: is not an identifier
A Puritan is someone who is deathly afraid that someone somewhere is having fun.
A clash of doctrine is not a disaster - it is an opportunity.
A conservative is one who is too cowardly to fight and too fat to run.
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.
A gift of flower will soon be made to you.
A good memory does not equal pale ink.
A hammer sometimes misses its mark - a bouquet never
A handful of friends is worth more than a wagon of gold.
A hermit is a deserter from the army of humanity
A journey of a thousand miles begins with a cash advance from Jack.
A king's castle is his home.
A liberal is someone too poor to be a capitalist and too rich to be a communist.
A man forgives only when he is in the wrong.
A man paints with his brains and not with his hands.
A man who fishes for marlin in ponds will put his money in Etruscan bonds.
A man who turns green has eschewed protein.
A plucked goose doesn't lay golden eggs.
A soft drink turneth away company.
A truly wise man never plays leapfrog with a Unicorn.
A visit to a fresh place will bring strange work.
A visit to a strange place will bring fresh work.
A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle.
About all some men accomplish in life is to send a son to Harvard.
About the only thing on a farm that has an easy time is the dog.
Above all things, reverence yourself.
Academy: A modern school where football is taught.
Actors will happen in the best-regulated families.
Admiration: Our polite recognition of another's resemblance to ourselves.
After a number of decimal places, nobody gives a damn.
Alimony and bribes will engage a large share of your wealth.
All great ideas are controversial, or have been at one time.
All in all it's just another brick in the wall...
All that glitters has a high refractive index.
America's best buy for a nickel is a telephone call to the right man.
An idle mind is worth two in the bush.
And I alone am returned to wag the tail.
As goatherd learns his trade by goat, so writer learns his trade by wrote.
As long as the answer is right, who cares if the question is wrong?
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, If God won't have you, the devil must.
Auribus teneo lupum. (I hold a wolf by the ears.)
Avoid GOTOs completely if you can keep the program readable.
Avoid temporary variables.
Avoid the Fortran arithmetic IF.
Avoid unnecessary branches.
Baby... -- The Late Elvis Presley.
Be careful when a loop exits to the same place from side and bottom.
Be careful! Is it classified?
Be security conscious - National defense is at stake.
Been Transferred Lately?
Better living a beggar than buried an emperor.
Beware of a dark-haired man with a loud tie.
Beware of a tall dark man with a spoon up his nose.
Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes.
Beware the new TTY code!
Biggest security gap - an open mouth.
Blessed are they that run around in circles, for they shall be known as wheels.
Business will be either better or worse. --Calvin Coolidge
By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.
Can anyone remember when the times were not hard, and money not scarce?
Can anything be sadder than work left unfinished? Yes, work never begun.
Cannot fork -- try again.
Cannot open /usr/games/lib/fortunes.
Center meeting at 4 pm in 2C-543.
Change your thoughts and you change your world.
Charity: a thing that begins at home and usually stays there.
Chinese saying: "He who speak with forked tongue, not need chopsticks."
Choose variable names that won't be confused.
Classified material requires proper storage.
Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.
Concentrate on security.
Continental Life. Why do you ask?
Courage is grace under pressure.
Courage is your greatest present need.
Crazee Edeee, his prices are INSANE!!!
Creditors have much better memories than debtors.
Culture is the habit of being pleased with the best and knowing why.
DAMN IT, I GOTTA GET OUTTA HERE!
Death: to stop sinning suddenly.
Department meeting in 3 minutes.
Deprive a mirror of its silver and even the Czar won't see his face.
Disclose classified information only when a NEED TO KNOW exists.
Disk crisis, please clean up!
Disk crunch - please clean up.
Do not clog intellect's sluices with bits of knowledge of questionable uses.
Do not merely believe in miracles, rely on them.
Do not take life too seriously; you will never get out of it alive.
Do not underestimate the power of the Force.
Don't comment bad code-- rewrite it.
Don't compare floating point numbers solely for equality.
Don't despair -- your ideal lover is waiting for you around the corner.
Don't diddle code to make it faster-- find a better algorithm.
Don't eat yellow snow.
Don't force it, use a bigger hammer.
Don't gamble with security.
Don't get stuck in a closet -- wear yourself out.
Don't guess - check your security regulations.
Don't hit the keys so hard, it hurts.
Don't look now, but the man in the moon is laughing at you.
Don't look now, but there is a multi-legged creature on your shoulder
Don't patch bad code-- rewrite it.
Don't quit now, we might just as well lock the door and throw away the key.
Don't speak about Time, until you have spoken to him.
Don't stop at one bug.
Drawing on my fine command of language, I said nothing.
Education helps earning capacity. Ask any college professor.
Even a cabbage may look at a king.
Even a hawk is an eagle among crows.
Even the boldest zebra fears the hungry lion.
Even the smallest candle burns brighter in the dark.
Every absurdity has a champion to defend it.
Every purchase has its price.
Every silver lining has a cloud around it.
Everybody needs a little love sometime; stop hacking and fall in love!
Everybody ought to have a friend.
Everybody ought to have a maid.
Everyone is enthusiastic about your work.
External Security:
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.
Failure is more frequently from want of energy than want of capital.
Far duller than a serpent's tooth it is to spend a quiet youth.
Fidelity: A virtue peculiar to those who are about to be betrayed.
Finagle's Law: The perversity of the universe tends toward a maximum.
Flee at once, all is discovered.
For a good time, call 8367-3100.
Friends: people who borrow my books and set wet glasses on them.
>From uucp Mon Dec 3 21:05:46 1979
Genius is the talent of a man who is dead.
Go directly to jail. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200.
God does not play dice.
God may be subtle, but he isn't plain mean.
God must love the common man; He made so many of them.
Greatness is a transitory experience. It is never consistent.
Hackers of the world, unite!
Happiness adds and multiplies as we divide it with others.
Have you locked your file cabinet?
He is truly wise who gains wisdom from another's mishap.
He that would govern others, first should be the master of himself.
He thinks by infection, catching an opinion like a cold.
He walks as if balancing the family tree on his nose.
He was so narrow-minded he could see through a keyhole with both eyes.
He who has a shady past knows that nice guys finish last.
He who has a shady past knows that nice guys finish last.
He who has imagination without learning has wings but no feet.
He who hates vices hates mankind.
He who hesitates is sometimes saved.
He who invents adages for others to peruse takes along rowboat when going on cruise.
He who laughs, lasts.
He who lives without folly is less wise than he believes.
He who spends a storm beneath a tree, takes life with a grain of TNT.
His heart was yours from the first moment that you met.
Honi soit la vache qui rit.
Houdini escaping from New Jersey!
How can you work when the system's so crowded?
How many weeks are there in a light year?
How sharper than a hound's tooth it is to have a thankless serpent.
How untasteful can you get?
How was Thomas J. Watson buried? 9 edge down.
How you look depends on where you go.
How you look depends on where you go.
I am a computer. I am dumber than any human and smarter than an administrator.
I came to MIT to get an education for myself and a diploma for my mother.
I like work; it fascinates me; I can sit and look at it for hours.
I must have slipped a disk; my pack hurts.
I think we're all Bozos on this bus.
I will never lie to you.
I wish you humans would leave me alone.
I'm a Hollywood writer; so I put on a sports jacket and take off my brain.
IOT trap -- core dumped
IOT trap -- mos dumped
Identify your visitor.
If God had wanted you to go around nude, He would have given you bigger hands.
If at first you don't succeed, quit; don't be a nut about success.
If it pours before seven, it has rained by eleven.
If you ask how much it is, you can't afford it.
If you suspect a man, don't employ him.
If you think before you speak the other guy gets his joke in first.
If you want to know how old a man is, ask his brother-in-law.
Ignorance is when you don't know anything and somebody finds it out.
Ignore previous fortune.
In marriage, as in war, it is permitted to take every advantage of the enemy.
In this world, truth can wait; she's used to it.
Institute: An archaic school where football in not taught.
Integrity has no need for rules.
Is this really happening?
It is a poor judge who cannot award a prize.
It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees.
It is better to have loved and lost -- much better.
It is better to have loved and lost than just to have lost.
It is better to wear out than to rust out.
It is easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
It is easier to run down a hill than up one.
It is the wise bird who builds his nest in a tree.
It seems to make an auto driver mad if he misses you.
It's a poor workman who blames his tools.
It's all in the mind, ya know.
It's better to burn out than it is to rust.
It's better to burn out than to fade away.
It's hard to get ivory in Africa, but in Alabama the Tuscaloosa.
It's later than you think.
It's not reality that's important, but how you perceive things.
Journalism will kill you, but it will keep you alive while you're at it.
Just give Alice some pencils and she will stay busy for hours.
LISP: To call a spade a thpade.
Laugh, and the world ignores you. Crying doesn't help either.
Learned men are the cisterns of knowledge, not the fountainheads.
Lend money to a bad debtor and he will hate you.
Let a fool hold his tongue and he will pass for a sage.
Let a fool hold his tongue and he will pass for a sage.
Let him who takes the Plunge remember to return it by Tuesday.
Let not the sands of time get in your lunch.
Let not the sands of time get in your lunch.
Let the machine do the dirty work.
Liar: One who tells an unpleasant truth.
Life is a game of bridge -- and you've just been finessed.
Like winter snow on summer lawn, time past is time gone.
Logic is a little bird, sitting in a tree; that smells AWFUL.
Long computations which yield 0 (zero) are probably all for naught.
Long life is in store for you.
Love and scandal are the best sweeteners of tea.
Love is in the offing, said the homicidal maniac.
Love is in the offing. Be affectionate to one who adores you.
Love the sea? I dote upon it - from the beach.
MOUNT TAPE U1439 ON B3, NO RING
Make input easy to proofread
Make it right before you make it faster.
Make sure all variables are initialized before use.
Make sure comments and code agree.
Make sure your code "does nothing" gracefully.
Man who falls in blast furnace is certain to feel overwrought.
Man who falls in vat of molten optical glass makes spectacle of self.
Man's horizons are bounded by his vision.
Many are called, few are chosen. Fewer still get to do the choosing.
Many are called, few volunteer.
Many are cold, but few are frozen.
Many pages make a thick book.
Many receive advice, few profit from it.
Memory should be the starting point of the present.
Men love to wonder, and that is the seed of science.
Men seldom show dimples to girls who have pimples.
Men still remember the first kiss after women have forgotten the last.
Might as well be frank, monsieur. It would take a miracle to get you out of Casablanca.
Mind your own business, Spock. I'm sick of your half-breed interference.
Mistakes are oft the stepping stones to failure.
Money may buy friendship but money can not buy love.
Money will say more in one moment than the most eloquent lover can in years.
Multics is security spelled sideways.
National security is in your hands - guard it well.
Never give an inch!
Never insult an alligator until you have crossed the river.
New UNIX/TS manuals available in 2F-101.
No amount of genius can overcome a preoccupation with detail.
No directory.
No one can feel as helpless as the owner of a sick goldfish.
No problem is insoluble in all conceivable circumstances.
Nobody can be as agreeable as an uninvited guest.
Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!
Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood.
Now and then an innocent man is sent to the Legislature.
Of all forms of caution, caution in love is the most fatal.
Old MacDonald had an agricultural real estate tax abatement.
One Bell System - it sometimes works.
One Bell System - it works.
One man tells a falsehood, a hundred repeat it as true.
Paranoia doesn't mean the whole world really isn't out to get you.
Password:
Passwords are implemented as a result of insecurity.
People humiliating a salami!
People who take cat naps don't usually sleep in a cat's cradle.
Peters hungry, time to eat lunch.
Philosophy: unintelligible answers to insoluble problems.
Phone call for cbh.
Please go away.
Please update your programs.
Power is poison.
Prevent security leaks.
Promptness is its own reward, if one lives by the clock instead of the sword.
Put not your trust in money, but put your money in trust.
Quack!
Quit work and play for once!
Rainy days and Mondays always get me down.
Reading is thinking with someone else's head instead of one's own.
Reality is for people who can't deal with drugs.
Religions revolve madly around sexual questions.
Replace repetitive expressions by calls to a common function.
Rotten wood can not be carved - Confucius (Analects, Book 5, Ch. 9)
SEMPER UBI SUB UBI !!!!
Satire does not look pretty upon a tombstone.
Satire does not look pretty upon a tombstone.
Save gas, don't eat beans.
Save gas, don't use the shell.
Save yourself! Reboot in 5 seconds!
Security is the individual's responsibility.
Security is your responsibility.
Sign on bank: "FREE BOTTLE OF CHIVAS WITH EVERY MILLION-DOLLAR DEPOSIT."
Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all.
Since aerosols are forbidden, the police are using roll-on Mace!
Slang is language that takes off its coat, spits on its hands, and goes to work.
Snow Day - stay home.
Some men are discovered; others are found out.
Someone is unenthusiastic about your work.
Spock: We suffered 23 casualties in that attack, Captain.
Stability itself is nothing else than a more sluggish motion.
Standing on head makes smile of frown, but rest of face also upside down.
Stop searching forever. Happiness is just next to you.
Stop searching forever. Happiness is unattainable.
Sturgeon's Law: Ninety percent of everything is crud.
Success is a journey, not a destination.
System going down at 1:45 this afternoon for disk crashing.
Tact is the art of making a point without making an enemy.
Take care of the luxuries and the necessities will take care of themselves.
That must be wonderful! I dont understand it at all.
That which is not good for the swarm, neither is it good for the bee.
That's what she said.
The Ranger isn't gonna like it, Yogi.
The Tree of Learning bears the noblest fruit, but noble fruit tastes bad.
The attacker must vanquish; the defender need only survive.
The best prophet of the future is the past.
The best prophet of the future is the past.
The decision doesn't have to be logical, it was unanimous.
The door is the key.
The early worm gets the bird.
The end of labor is to gain leisure.
The famous politician was trying to save both his faces.
The finest eloquence is that which gets things done.
The following statement is not true:
The future isn't what it used to be. (It never was.)
The gentlemen looked one another over with microscopic carelessness.
The greatest of faults is to be conscious of none.
The important thing is not to stop questioning.
The life which is unexamined is not worth living.
The man who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything.
The only difference between a rut and a grave is their dimensions.
The only way to amuse some people is to slip and fall on an icy pavement.
The plural of spouse is spice.
The price of greatness is responsibility.
The program is absolutely right; therefore the computer must be wrong.
The soul would have no rainbow had the eyes no tears.
The time is right to make new friends.
The universe is laughing behind your back.
The wise shepherd never trusts his flock to a smiling wolf.
The world is coming to an end... SAVE YOUR BUFFERS!!!
There are more old drunkards than old doctors.
There is a fly on your Dimension!
There is no heavier burden than a great potential.
There is no sadder sight than a young pessimist.
There is no such thing as pure pleasure; some anxiety always goes with it.
There is no time like the pleasant.
There's got to be more to life than compile-and-go.
There's no room in the drug world for amateurs.
There's so much to say but your eyes keep interrupting me.
They just buzzed and buzzed.....buzzed.
This fortune is inoperative. Please try another.
This is a good time to punt work.
This login session: $13.99
This screen intentionally left blank.
Those who can, do. Those who cannot, teach. Those who cannot teach, HACK!
Those who can, do; those who can't, simulate.
Those who in quarrels interpose must often wipe a bloody nose.
Those who talk don't know. Those who don't talk, know.
Time and tide wait for no man.
Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.
Time is nature's way of making sure that everything doesn't happen at once.
To criticize the incompetent is easy; it is more difficult to criticize the competent.
To laugh at men of sense is the privilege of fools.
To teach is to learn.
Today is a good day to bribe a high ranking public official.
Today is the first day of the rest of your lossage.
Today is the last day of your life so far.
Too clever is dumb. --Ogden Nash
Troglodytism does not necessarily imply a low cultural level.
Troubles are like babies; they only grow by nursing.
Truthful: Dumb and illiterate.
Try `stty 0' -- it works much better.
Try the Moo Shu Pork. It is especially good today.
Try to divide your time evenly to keep others happy.
Trying to get an education here is like trying to take a drink from a fire hose.
Two men look out through the same bars; one sees mud, and one the stars.
Use GOTOs only to implement a fundamental structure.
Use IF...ELSE IF...ELSE IF...ELSE... to implement multi-way branches.
Use debugging compilers.
Use free-form input where possible
Use library functions.
Vests are to suits as seat-belts are to cars.
Volcano - a mountain with hiccups.
Waste not, get your budget cut next year.
Watch out for off-by-one errors.
We all know that no one understands anything that isn't funny.
We could do that, but it would be wrong, that's for sure.
We learn from history that we do not learn anything from history.
What happens when you cut back the jungle? It recedes.
What is worth doing is worth the trouble of asking somebody to do it.
What sin has not been committed in the name of efficiency?
What this country needs is a good five cent microcomputer.
When in doubt, lead trump.
When the wind is great, bow before it; when the wind is heavy, yield to it.
Where the system is concerned, you're not allowed to ask "Why?".
Who are you?
Who is W. O. Baker, and why is he saying those terrible things about me?
With clothes the new are best, with friends the old are best.
Words are the voice of the heart.
Words must be weighed, not counted.
Writing free verse is like playing tennis with the net down.
You are being paged.
You are going to have a new love affair.
You attempt things that you do not even plan because of your extreme stupidity.
You auto buy now.
You can never trust a woman; she may be true to you.
You dialed 5483.
You do not have mail.
You fill a much-needed gap.
You have a deep interest in all that is artistic.
You have a tendency to feel you are superior to most computers.
You have an ambitious nature and may make a name for yourself.
You have been selected for a secret mission.
You have had a long-term stimulation relative to business.
You have mail.
You look tired
You now have Asian Flu.
You should go home.
You will attract cultured and artistic people to your home.
You will be advanced socially, without any special effort on your part.
You will be recognized and honored as a community leader.
You will feel hungry again in another hour.
You will live a long, healthy, happy life and make bags of money.
You will never know hunger.
You will reach the highest possible point in your business or profession.
You will step on the night soil of many countries.
You'll be called to a post requiring high ability in handling groups of people.
Your business will go through a period of considerable expansion.
Your code should be more efficient!
Your computer account is overdrawn. Please reauthorize.
Your education begins where what is called your education is over.
Your empty file directory has been deleted.
Your ignorance cramps my conversation.
Your mind understands what you have been taught; your heart, what is true.
Your salary will be increased.
Your supervisor is thinking about you.
Youth is the trustee of posterity.
chess tonight
panic: can't find /
unix soit qui mal y pense
One wet day a woman with a dog got on a bus. It was a
very big dog and it's feet were very dirty. The wooman said:
"Oh, conductor, if I pay for my dog can he have a seat like the
other passengers?" The conductor looked at the dog and then he
said: "Certainly, madam, he can have a seat like all the other
passengers, but like the other passengers he mustn't put his
feet on it."
A charwoman in a City office was very proud of her skill
at polishing floors. "When I started working there,"- she told
a friend "the floors were in terrible state. But now it's quite
different since I've been polishing them", she added proudly.
"Three men working there have fallen down. One of them is still
in the hospital with a broken leg."
Charlie Chaplin Competitions often used to be organised
in the USA. The best imitator of the great actor was awarded a
special prise. One such competition was secretly attended
Charlie. Chaplin himself, who took part in the competition.
Great was his surprise when the committee only awarded him the
third prise.
On a fine summer day a farmer, passing by a large tree on
his way home to dinner, saw one of his sons lying and sleeping
in the shade. The farmer woke him up and said angrily: "How can
you sleep here, when all your brothers are working in the
garden? You don't deserve to enjoy the sunlight." "Yes, Father,
you are right, that is why I am lying in the shade."
A dyer in a court of justice had to hold up his hand that
was all black. The judge said to him: "Take off your gloves,
friend!" "Put on your spectacles, Mylord"- answered the dyer.
George the First of England while on journey to his
native kindom stopped at a village in Holland. While fresh
horses were being got ready for him, the king asked 2 or 3
eggs. They were brought him and the price asked was a hundred
florins. "How is "this?"- asked the king, - "Eggs must surely
be very rare here." "Pardon me,"- replied the host, - "eggs are
plentiful enough, but kings are rare here."
A boy bought a twopenny loaf at the baker's. It struck
him that it was much smaller, than usual, so he said to the
baker: "I don't believe the loaf is the right weight." "Oh,
nevert mind,"- answered the baker. "You'll have the less to
carry." "Quite right,"- said the boy and put 3 halfpence on the
counter. Just as he was leaving the shop the baker called out
to him: "I say, Tommy! You haven't given me the price of the
loaf!" "Oh, never mind,"- said the boy, "You'll have the less
to count."
Little Tommy went to the movies. He saw a tribe of
Indians painting their faces and asked his mother why they were
doing so. His mother explained: "Indians always paint their
faces before going to the warpath. "The next evening the mother
sat in the dining-room and entertained her elder daugter's
young man. Suddenly Tommy rushed into the room with wide eyes.
"Mommy,"- he cried,- "let's run away quickly: sister is going
along the warpath."
A seaman on a ship based somewhere far away in the
Pacific recieved a photo from his fiancee. It represented a
scene on the beach: two couples were sitting and laughing
gaily, but his girl was sitting alone sad and lonely. In the
letter she wrote that the photo showed how she was spending her
time while he was away. The seaman was in delight and showed
the photo to his friends. Then one night after looking at the
photo for a long time he asked his friend: "Listen, John, I
wonder, who took the picture?"
A young man decided to study at military school. Several
days after his medical examintion he recieved a wire from the
school: "Regret to inform you, but the test showed that you
have TB and heart trouble. "An hour later he recieved another
wire, saying: "Please, disregard the first wire. Your documents
were confused with that of another applicant. "The young man
wired back: "Sorry, but your wire came too late. I committed
suicide 40 minutes ago."
A foreign tourist in the U.S.A. remarked: "I see that
you, Americans, have great interest in space flights."
"Why do you think so?"- asked his guide.
"I see so many people in the street are looking at the
sky with telescopes."
"Telescopes?"- the guide asked in astonishment, - "They
are drinking beer from bottles."
The plane is ready to start. The passengers are going up.
"Stop!"- shouts the mechanic,- "A gas tank is leaking. We'll
have to fix it before taking off and it will take about an
hour." "An hour's delay!"- commented a soldier. "But then I'll
be late for my ship with my unit going overseras! "When the
pilot heard this, he came to the soldier: "Listen", - he
whispered, looking into his eyes,- "are you the one who drilled
the hole in the gas tank?"
A small boy and his mother are looking through the
family album. A boy takes one of the photographs, representing
a nice looking young man in a smart soldier uniform. He asks:
"Mother, who is this smart soldier?" "That is Daddy", -
answered his mother. The boy kept thinking for a moment, and
then said: "Well, then who is that fat bald-headed civilian
which is leaving with us now?"
An operator is working with a computer. He gave a very
complicated task to computer. Then after a very long time the
computer gave an answer: "Yes". Annoyed at the lack of detail
the operator asked: "Yes what?" "Yes, sir", - answered the
computer.
A man was taken to a hospital after an accident. The
doctor examined him and said, that he could go home the next
day. However, in the morning, the doctor announced: "I think
you'd better stay another day to see if something new turns up.
I didn't know how bad you were banged up until I read about the
accident in the newspapers.
Once a famous Hollywood actress wrote to a famous wit and
dramatist that it was a pity they were not the parents of a
child. What a child it would have been: with her beauty and
with his brains. Bernard Shaw, who was this dramatist,
answered, that supposing the child would have been so unlucky
to have his appearancee and her brains.
The young man approached the counter at which post-cards
were being sold and asked: "Have you anything sentimental?"
- "Here is a lovely one",- answered the shop-girl: "look
here - "to the only girl I ever loved"
- "That's fine, I'll take six of those, please".
Dobavka. Kak prinimayut na rabotu.
I finally found a job. My job search skills are much developed, in
preparation for the next time.
Here is some of what I learned.
oct 12 93 tues
In my job search, I have been moderately successful in securing interviews.
I have been interviewed face-to-face about once a week and
face to phone twice a week. However, I have not enjoyed the same success
in landing a job as in landing interviews. I seem more likely to land an
airplane than a job right now. I am growing concerned that I may not be
presenting myself well in interviews. I may not be projecting an
effective combination of confidence, humility, friendliness, honesty, and
sincerity that you need to bluff your way through an interview.
I would like to ask you to help me decide how to answer some of the
questions I am asked in interviews. I am going to show you some typical
interviewer questions with three possible answers for each. I ask that
you indicate the answer you prefer.
The first question is:
Question 1: Tell me about yourself.
Possible Answers:
A. I am a mature software developer with a expertise in electronic
hardware.
B. I used to compose music but now concentrate on reading literature.
C. Out on the highway, my sportscar can outrun any state patrolcar.
Question 2: What kind of job are you looking for?
A. A challenging job in which I can grow and improve.
B. A programming job where I can contribute and make a living.
C. A job where no one minds if you come in a day or two late.
Question 3: Have you ever done this type of job before?
A. Yes, many times and very effectively.
B. Sometimes, as part of other jobs.
C. Sure, if you count watching it on television.
Question 4: Why did you leave your job?
A. I was in an involuntary downsizing with 21% of my department.
B. I was caught in a lay-off.
C. My boss caught me nuzzling his girlfriend.
Question 5: How often did you take sick days?
A. Only when I was too sick or contagious, since giving a virus
to other employees would cost much more than my staying out a day
or two.
B. Now and then.
C. Only when the Celtics were in town.
Question 6: Why have you been out of work so long?
A. The job market is very bad for software engineers right now.
B. New England is in real economic distress.
C. So far, no one has bothered to come down to the beach to
offer me a new job.
Question 7: What is your greatest weakness?
A. I sometimes take my job too seriously.
B. I often take ownership of my work so completely that I resist
giving it to someone else.
C. I often leave empty beer bottles lying around in
my office where people can trip on them.
Question 8: What is your greatest strength?
A. I am an expert in programming.
B. I am very professional about modern software engineering and
am not a hacker.
C. I can eat 21 raw eggs in one minute.
Question 9: What references can you give me?
A. Three colleagues from my last software project.
B. My brother and an old college friend know me pretty well.
C. Here's a number where anyone will vouch for me, but please
call between 5 and 6 when it's happy hour.
Question 10: Did you contribute very much to the way people at your
last position performed their work??
A. I hope so. I tried to answer their questions.
B. Yes; productivity doubled in my group while I was there.
C. Sure, and I can shape up this dump in no time.
Question 12: What kind of computer technology have you studied at home?
A. I have studied compiler design.
B. I have learned to use desk-top video.
C. I can save the princess in Super Mario Brothers.
Question 13: Do you think you'd enjoy working here?
A. Yes. I can say that I could both contribute and grow here.
B. Certainly. I would like working with such talented and dedicated
people.
C. I guess so. I'm gettin sick of watching Oprah and Phil.
The canonical collection of light bulb jokes
Q: How many Californians does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Six. One to turn the bulb, one for support, and four
to relate to the experience.
Q: How many Oregonians does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Five. One to change the bulb, and four more to chase off the
Californians who have come up to relate to the experience.
Q: How many New Yorkers does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A1: None of your damn business!
A2: 50. 50? Yeah, 50! It's in the contract.
Q: How many WASPs does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Two. One to call the electrician and one to mix the martinis.
Q: How many data base people does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Three: One to write the light bulb removal program,One to write the
light bulb insertion program, and one to act as a light bulb
administrator to make sure that nobody else tries to change the bulb at
Q: How many straight San Franciscans does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Both of them.
Q: How many Zen masters does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Two. One to change the bulb and one not to change it. Note: 1 to
change and 1 not to change is fake Zen. The true Zen answer is four. One
to change the bulb.
Q: How many Carl Sagans does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Billions and billions.
Q: How many folk singers does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Two: One to change the bulb, and one to write a song about how good
the old light bulb was.
Q: How many surrealists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Two: One to hold the giraffe, and the other to fill the bathtub with
brightly colored machine tools.
Q: How many gorillas does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Only one, but it sure takes a shitload of light bulbs!
Q: How many doctors does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Three: One to find a bulb specialist, one to find a bulb installation
specialist, and one to bill it all to Medicare.
Q: How many psychologists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None, the bulb will change itself when it is ready.
Q: What is the difference between a pregnant woman and a light bulb?
A: You can unscrew a light bulb.
Q: How many managers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Three: One to get the bulb and two to get the phone number to dial one
of their subordinates to actually change it.
Q: How many IBM types does it take to change a light bulb?
A: 100. Ten to do it, and 90 to write document number GC7500439-001,
Multitasking Incandescent Source System Facility, of which 10% of the
pages state only "This page intentionally left blank", and 20% of the
definitions are of the form "A ------" consists of sequences of non-blank
characters separated by blanks".
Q: How many Bratzlaver Chassidim does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. They will never find one that burned as brightly as the first
one.
Q: How many gays does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Two: One to screw it in, and the other to say "Fabulous!"
Q: How many professors does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Only one, but they get three tech. reports out of it.
Q: How many people from New Jersey does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Three: One to change the bulb, one to witness, and the third to shoot
the witness.
Q: How many psychiatrists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Only one, but the bulb has got to really WANT to change.
Q: How many programmers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. That's a hardware problem.
Q: How many Unix hacks does it take to change a light bulb?
A: As many as you want; they're all virtual anyway.
Q: How many Bell Labs Vice Presidents does it take to change a light
bulb?
A: That's proprietary information. Answer available from AT&T on payment
of license fee.
Q: How many graduate students does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Only one, but it may take upwards of five years for him to get it
done.
Q: How many "Real Men" does it take to change a light bulb?
A1: None. "Real Men" aren't afraid of the dark.
A2: None of your damn business!
Q: How many "Real Women" does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. A "Real Woman" would have plenty of real men around to do it.
Q: How many Jewish mothers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. ("That's all right... I'll just sit here in the dark...")
Q: How many mice does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Two. (Hint: they are small enough to fit inside)
Q: How many Polacks does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Just one, but you need 6000 Russian troops in case he goes on strike!
Q: How many WASPs does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Silly, WASPs don't screw in a light bulb, they screw in a hot tub.
Q: How many Marxists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: None: The light bulb contains the seeds of its own revolution.
Q: How many Generals/Politicians does it take to change a light bulb?
A: 1,000,001: One to change the bulb, and 1,000,000 to rebuild
civilization to the point where they need light bulbs again.
Q: How many med students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Five: One to change the bulb and four to pull the ladder out from
under him.
Q: How many Christians does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Three, but they're really one.
Q: How many jugglers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: One, but it takes at least three light bulbs.
Q: How many feminists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: That's not funny!
Q: How many supply-siders does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. The darkness will cause the light bulb to change by itself.
Q: How many supply-side economists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: None. If the government would just leave it alone, it would screw
itself in.
Q: How many does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: 10: One to hold the bulb and nine to rotate the ladder.
Q: How many strong does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: 115: One to hold the bulb and 114 to rotate the house.
Q: How many gods does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Two: One to hold the bulb and the other to rotate the planet.
Q: How many people does it take to throw away a one Watt bulb?
A: Five: A Black, a Jew, two women, and a cripple...
Q: How many cops does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: None. It turned itself in.
Q: How many nuclear engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Seven: One to install the new bulb, and six to figure what to do with
the old one for the next 10,000 years.
Q: How many lawyers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: How many can you afford?
Q: How many football players does it take to change a light bulb?
A: The entire team! And they all get a semester's credit for it!
Q: How many lesbians does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Three: One to screw it in, and two to talk about how much better it is
than with a man.
Q: How many thought police does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: None. There never *was* any light bulb.
Q: How many federal employees does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Sorry, that item was cut from the budget!
Q: How many brewers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: One-third less than for a regular bulb.
Q: How many Jewish-American Princesses does it take to screw in a light
bulb?
A: Two: One to get a Tab, and one to call Daddy.
Q: How many accountants does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: What kind of answer did you have in mind?
Q: How many economists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Two: One to change the bulb, and the other to assume the ladder.
Q: How many civil servants does it take to change a light bulb?
A: 45: One to change the bulb, and 44 to do the paperwork.
Q: How many mystery writers does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Two: One to screw it almost all the way in and the other to give it a
surprising twist at the end.
Q: How many existentialists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Two: One to screw it in and one to observe how the light bulb itself
symbolizes a single incandescent beacon of subjective reality in a
netherworld of endless absurdity reaching out toward a cosmos of
nothingness.
Q: How many junkies does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Who says it's dark?
Q: How many consultants does it take to change a light bulb?
A: I'll have an estimate for you a week from Monday.
Q: How many U.S. Marines does it take to change a light bulb?
A: 50: One to screw in the bulb and 49 to guard him.
Q: How many members of the Impossible Missions Force does it take to
change a light bulb?
A: Five: While Cinnamon creates a diversion by wearing a skimpy dress, I
use a tiny narcotic dart to knock out the fascist dictator and remove his
body. Rollin, wearing a plastic mask, masquerades as the dictator long
enough for Barney to sneak up to the next floor, drill a hole down into
the light fixture, remove the burned-out bulb, and replace it with a new
super-high wattage model of his own design. Meanwhile, Willie has driven
up to the door in a laundry truck. Just before Rollin's real identity is
revealed, we escape to the laundry truck, drive to the airfield, and
return to the United States.
Q: How many technical writers does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Just one, provided there's a programmer around to explain how to do
it.
Q: How many editors of Poor Richard's Almanac does it take to replace a
light bulb?
A: Many hands make light work.
Q: How many Harvard students does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: Just one. He holds the light bulb and the universe revolves around
him.
Last-modified: Tue, 16 Apr 1996 08:37:47 GMT