ers 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