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.