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Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) by Linux fortune

Grig (the navigator):
        ... so you see, it's just the two of us against the entire space
        armada.
Alex (the gunner):
        What?!?
Grig:        I've always wanted to fight a desperate battle against
        overwhelming odds.
Alex:        It'll be a slaughter!
Grig:        That's the spirit!
                -- The Last Starfighter
Holy Dilemma!  Is this the end for the Caped Crusader and the Boy Wonder?
Will the Joker and the Riddler have the last laugh?

        Tune in again tomorrow:
        same Bat-time, same Bat-channel!
Tallulah Bankhead barged down the Nile last night as Cleopatra and sank.
                -- John Mason Brown, drama critic
The last vestiges of the old Republic have been swept away.
                -- Governor Tarkin
The Worst Musical Trio
        There are few bad musicians who have a chance to give a recital at
a famous concert hall while still learning the rudiments of their
instrument.  This happened about thirty years ago to the son of a Rumanian
gentleman who was owed a personal favour by Georges Enesco, the celebrated
violinist.  Enesco agreed to give lessons to the son who was quite
unhampered by great musical talent.
        Three years later the boy's father insisted that he give a public
concert.  "His aunt said that nobody plays the violin better than he does.
A cousin heard him the other day and screamed with enthusiasm."  Although
Enesco feared the consequences, he arranged a recital at the Salle Gaveau
in Paris.  However, nobody bought a ticket since the soloist was unknown.
        "Then you must accompany him on the piano," said the boy's father,
"and it will be a sell out."
        Reluctantly, Enesco agreed and it was.  On the night an excited
audience gathered.  Before the concert began Enesco became nervous and
asked for someone to turn his pages.
        In the audience was Alfred Cortot, the brilliant pianist, who
volunteered and made his way to the stage.
        The soloist was of uniformly low standard and next morning the
music critic of Le Figaro wrote: "There was a strange concert at the Salle
Gaveau last night.  The man whom we adore when he plays the violin played
the piano.  Another whom we adore when he plays the piano turned the pages.
But the man who should have turned the pages played the violin."
                -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures"
This is the ____LAST time I take travel suggestions from Ray Bradbury!
When the fog came in on little cat feet last night, it left these little
muddy paw prints on the hood of my car.
I've run DOOM more in the last few days than I have the last few
months.  I just love debugging ;-)
(Linus Torvalds)
It must have been the lightning storm we had (yesterdy) (last week) (last month)
        My dear People.
        My dear Bagginses and Boffins, and my dear Tooks and Brandybucks,
and Grubbs, and Chubbs, and Burrowses, and Hornblowers, and Bolgers,
Bracegirdles, Goodbodies, Brockhouses and Proudfoots.  Also my good
Sackville Bagginses that I welcome back at last to Bag End.  Today is my
one hundred and eleventh birthday: I am eleventy-one today!"
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
Sheriff Chameleotoptor sighed with an air of weary sadness, and then
turned to Doppelgutt and said 'The Senator must really have been on a
bender this time -- he left a party in Cleveland, Ohio, at 11:30 last
night, and they found his car this morning in the smokestack of a British
aircraft carrier in the Formosa Straits.'
                -- Grand Panjandrum's Special Award, 1985 Bulwer-Lytton
                   bad fiction contest.
The Bulwer-Lytton fiction contest is held ever year at San Jose State
Univ.  by Professor Scott Rice.  It is held in memory of Edward George
Earle Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873), a rather prolific and popular (in his
time) novelist.  He is best known today for having written "The Last
Days of Pompeii."

Whenever Snoopy starts typing his novel from the top of his doghouse,
beginning "It was a dark and stormy night..." he is borrowing from Lord
Bulwer-Lytton.  This was the line that opened his novel, "Paul Clifford,"
written in 1830.  The full line reveals why it is so bad:

        It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents -- except
        at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of
        wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene
        lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty
        flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.
The holy passion of Friendship is of so sweet and steady and loyal and
enduring a nature that it will last through a whole lifetime, if not asked to
lend money.
                -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar"
The last thing one knows in constructing a work is what to put first.
                -- Blaise Pascal
The lovely woman-child Kaa was mercilessly chained to the cruel post of
the warrior-chief Beast, with his barbarian tribe now stacking wood at
her nubile feet, when the strong clear voice of the poetic and heroic
Handsomas roared, 'Flick your Bic, crisp that chick, and you'll feel my
steel through your last meal!'
                -- Winning sentence, 1984 Bulwer-Lytton bad fiction contest.
The notes blatted skyward as they rose over the Canada geese, feathered
rumps mooning the day, webbed appendages frantically pedaling unseen
bicycles in their search for sustenance, driven by cruel Nature's maxim,
'Ya wanna eat, ya gotta work,' and at last I knew Pittsburgh.
                -- Winning sentence, 1987 Bulwer-Lytton bad fiction contest.
Whenever the literary German dives into a sentence, that is the last
you are going to see of him until he emerges on the other side of his
Atlantic with his verb in his mouth.
                -- Mark Twain "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court"
"What's this?  Trix?  Aunt!  Trix?  You?  You're after the prize!  What
is it?"  He picked up the box and studied the back.  "A glow-in-the-dark
squid!  Have you got it out of there yet?"  He tilted the box, angling the
little colored balls of cereal so as to see the bottom, and nearly spilling
them onto the table top.  "Here it is!"  He hauled out a little cream-colored,
glitter-sprinkled squid, three-inches long and made out of rubbery plastic.
                -- James P. Blaylock, "The Last Coin"
        A sheet of paper crossed my desk the other day and as I read it,
realization of a basic truth came over me.  So simple!  So obvious we couldn't
see it.  John Knivlen, Chairman of Polamar Repeater Club, an amateur radio
group, had discovered how IC circuits work.  He says that smoke is the thing
that makes ICs work because every time you let the smoke out of an IC circuit,
it stops working.  He claims to have verified this with thorough testing.
        I was flabbergasted!  Of course!  Smoke makes all things electrical
work.  Remember the last time smoke escaped from your Lucas voltage regulator
Didn't it quit working?  I sat and smiled like an idiot as more of the truth
dawned.  It's the wiring harness that carries the smoke from one device to
another in your Mini, MG or Jag.  And when the harness springs a leak, it lets
the smoke out of everything at once, and then nothing works.  The starter motor
requires large quantities of smoke to operate properly, and that's why the wire
going to it is so large.
        Feeling very smug, I continued to expand my hypothesis.  Why are Lucas
electronics more likely to leak than say Bosch?  Hmmm...  Aha!!!  Lucas is
British, and all things British leak!  British convertible tops leak water,
British engines leak oil, British displacer units leak hydrostatic fluid, and
I might add Brititsh tires leak air, and the British defense unit leaks
secrets... so naturally British electronics leak smoke.
                -- Jack Banton, PCC Automotive Electrical School

        [Ummm ... IC circuits?  Integrated circuit circuits?]
All programmers are optimists.  Perhaps this modern sorcery especially attracts
those who believe in happy endings and fairy godmothers.  Perhaps the hundreds
of nitty frustrations drive away all but those who habitually focus on the end
goal.  Perhaps it is merely that computers are young, programmers are younger,
and the young are always optimists.  But however the selection process works,
the result is indisputable:  "This time it will surely run," or "I just found
the last bug."
                -- Frederick Brooks, "The Mythical Man Month"
Dear Emily:
        Today I posted an article and forgot to include my signature.
What should I do?
                -- Forgetful

Dear Forgetful:
        Rush to your terminal right away and post an article that says,
"Oops, I forgot to post my signature with that last article.  Here
it is."
        Since most people will have forgotten your earlier article,
(particularly since it dared to be so boring as to not have a nice, juicy
signature) this will remind them of it.  Besides, people care much more
about the signature anyway.
                -- Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette
"For that matter, compare your pocket computer with the massive jobs of
a thousand years ago.  Why not, then, the last step of doing away with
computers altogether?"
                -- Jehan Shuman
Hacker's Guide To Cooking:
2 pkg. cream cheese (the mushy white stuff in silver wrappings that doesn't
        really  come from Philadelphia after all; anyway, about 16 oz.)
1 tsp. vanilla  extract  (which is more alcohol than vanilla and pretty
        strong so this part you *GOTTA* measure)
1/4 cup sugar (but honey works fine too)
8 oz. Cool Whip (the fluffy stuff devoid of nutritional value that you
        can squirt all over your friends and lick off...)
"Blend all together until creamy with no lumps."  This is where you get to
        join(1) all the raw data in a big buffer and then filter it through
        merge(1m) with the -thick option, I mean, it starts out ultra lumpy
        and icky looking and you have to work hard to mix it.  Try an electric
        beater if you have a cat(1) that can climb wall(1s) to lick it off
        the ceiling(3m).
"Pour into a graham cracker crust..."  Aha, the BUGS section at last.  You
        just happened  to have a GCC sitting around under /etc/food, right?
        If not, don't panic(8), merely crumble a rand(3m) handful of innocent
        GCs into a suitable tempfile and mix in some melted butter.
"...and  refrigerate for an hour."  Leave the  recipe's  stdout in a fridge
        for 3.6E6 milliseconds while you work on cleaning up stderr, and
        by time out your cheesecake will be ready for stdin.
I have travelled the length and breadth of this country, and have talked with
the best people in business administration.  I can assure you on the highest
authority that data processing is a fad and won't last out the year.
                -- Editor in charge of business books at Prentice-Hall
                   publishers, responding to Karl V. Karlstrom (a junior
                   editor who had recommended a manuscript on the new
                   science of data processing), c. 1957
In a surprise raid last night, federal agents ransacked a house in search
of a rebel computer hacker.  However, they were unable to complete the arrest
because the warrant was made out in the name of Don Provan, while the only
person in the house was named don provan.  Proving, once again, that Unix is
superior to Tops10.
        "Mach was the greatest intellectual fraud in the last ten years."
        "What about X?"
        "I said `intellectual'."
                ;login, 9/1990
***** Special AI Seminar (abstract)

It has been widely recognized that AI programs require expert knowledge
in order to perform well in complex domains.  But knowledge alone is not
sufficient for some applications; wisdom is needed as well.  Accordingly,
we have developed a new approach to artificial intelligence which we call
"wisdom engineering".  As a test of our ideas, we have written IMMANUEL, a
wisdom based system for the task domain of western philosophical thought.  
IMMANUEL was supplied initially with 200 wisdom units which contained wisdom
about such elementary concepts as mind, matter, being, nothingness, and so
forth.  IMMANUEL was then allowed to run freely, guided by the heuristic
rules contained in its heterarchically organized meta wisdom base.  IMMANUEL
succeeded in rediscovering most of the important philosophical ideas developed
in western culture over the course of the last 25 centuries, including those
underlying Plato's theory of government, Kant's metaphysics, Nietzsche's theory
of value, and Husserl's phenomenology.  In this seminar, we will describe
IMMANUEL's achievements and internal architecture.  We will also briefly
discuss our recent efforts to apply wisdom engineering to oil exploration.
        "That's right; the upper-case shift works fine on the screen, but
they're not coming out on the damn printer...  Hold?  Sure, I'll hold."
                -- e.e. cummings last service call
The goal of Computer Science is to build something that will last at
least until we've finished building it.
The last time somebody said, "I find I can write much better with a word
processor.", I replied, "They used to say the same thing about drugs."
                -- Roy Blount, Jr.
The program isn't debugged until the last user is dead.
The system was down for backups from 5am to 10am last Saturday.
"We are on the verge: Today our program proved Fermat's next-to-last theorem."
                -- Epigrams in Programming, ACM SIGPLAN Sept. 1982
X windows:
        The ultimate bottleneck.
        Flawed beyond belief.
        The only thing you have to fear.
        Somewhere between chaos and insanity.
        On autopilot to oblivion.
        The joke that kills.
        A disgrace you can be proud of.
        A mistake carried out to perfection.
        Belongs more to the problem set than the solution set.
        To err is X windows.
        Ignorance is our most important resource.
        Complex nonsolutions to simple nonproblems.
        Built to fall apart.
        Nullifying centuries of progress.
        Falling to new depths of inefficiency.
        The last thing you need.
        The defacto substandard.

Elevating brain damage to an art form.
        X windows.
Any great truth can -- and eventually will -- be expressed as a cliche --
a cliche is a sure and certain way to dilute an idea.  For instance, my
grandmother used to say, "The black cat is always the last one off the fence."
I have no idea what she meant, but at one time, it was undoubtedly true.
                -- Solomon Short
He who has a shady past knows that nice guys finish last.
He who hesitates is last.
He who laughs last -- missed the punch line.
He who laughs last didn't get the joke.
He who laughs last hasn't been told the terrible truth.
He who laughs last is probably your boss.
He who laughs last usually had to have joke explained.
Nice guys finish last, but we get to sleep in.
                -- Evan Davis
Nice guys finish last.
                -- Leo Durocher
"MOKE DAT YIGARETTE"
                -- "The Last Coin", James P. Blaylock
The last thing one knows in constructing a work is what to put first.
-- Blaise Pascal
Already the spirit of our schooling is permeated with the feeling that
every subject, every topic, every fact, every professed truth must be
submitted to a certain publicity and impartiality.  All proffered
samples of learning must go to the same assay-room and be subjected to
common tests.  It is the essence of all dogmatic faiths to hold that
any such "show-down" is sacrilegious and perverse.  The characteristic
of religion, from their point of view, is that it is intellectually
secret, not public; peculiarly revealed, not generall known;
authoritatively declared, not communicated and tested in ordinary
ways...It is pertinent to point out that, as long as religion is
conceived as it is now by the great majority of professed religionists,
there is something self-contradictory in speaking of education in
religion in the same sense in which we speak of education in topics
where the method of free inquiry has made its way.  The "religious"
would be the last to be willing that either the history of the
content of religion should be taught in this spirit; while those
to whom the scientific standpoint is not merely a technical device,
but is the embodiment of the integrity of mind, must protest against
its being taught in any other spirit.
- John Dewey (1859-1953), American philosopher,
  from "Democracy in the Schools", 1908
"If you lived today as if it were your last, you'd buy up a box of rockets and
fire them all off, wouldn't you?"
-- Garrison Keillor
"Danger, you haven't seen the last of me!"
   "No, but the first of you turns my stomach!"
-- The Firesign Theatre's Nick Danger
Sigmund Freud is alleged to have said that in the last analysis the entire field
of psychology may reduce to biological electrochemistry.
"A commercial, and in some respects a social, doubt has been started within the
last year or two, whether or not it is right to discuss so openly the security
or insecurity of locks.  Many well-meaning persons suppose that the discus-
sion respecting the means for baffling the supposed safety of locks offers a
premium for dishonesty, by showing others how to be dishonest.  This is a fal-
lacy.  Rogues are very keen in their profession, and already know much more
than we can teach them respecting their several kinds of roguery.  Rogues knew
a good deal about lockpicking long before locksmiths discussed it among them-
selves, as they have lately done.  If a lock -- let it have been made in what-
ever country, or by whatever maker -- is not so inviolable as it has hitherto
been deemed to be, surely it is in the interest of *honest* persons to know
this fact, because the *dishonest* are tolerably certain to be the first to
apply the knowledge practically; and the spread of knowledge is necessary to
give fair play to those who might suffer by ignorance.  It cannot be too ear-
nestly urged, that an acquaintance with real facts will, in the end, be better
for all parties."
-- Charles Tomlinson's Rudimentary Treatise on the Construction of Locks,
   published around 1850
... The cable had passed us by; the dish was the only hope, and eventually
we were all forced to turn to it.  By the summer of '85, the valley had more
satellite dishes per capita than an Eskimo village on the north slope of
Alaska.

Mine was one of the last to go in.  I had been nervous from the start about
the hazards of too much input, which is a very real problem with these
things.  Watching TV becomes a full-time job when you can scan 200 channels
all day and all night and still have the option of punching Night Dreams
into the video machine, if the rest of the world seems dull.
-- Hunter Thompson, "Full-time scrambling", _Generation of Swine_
Even if we put all these nagging thoughts [four embarrassing questions about
astrology] aside for a moment, one overriding question remains to be asked.
Why would the positions of celestial objects at the moment of birth have an
effect on our characters, lives, or destinies?  What force or influence,
what sort of energy would travel from the planets and stars to all human
beings and affect our development or fate?  No amount of scientific-sounding
jargon or computerized calculations by astrologers can disguise this central
problem with astrology -- we can find no evidence of a mechanism by which
celestial objects can influence us in so specific and personal a way. . . .
Some astrologers argue that there may be a still unknown force that represents
the astrological influence. . . .If so, astrological predictions -- like those
of any scientific field -- should be easily tested. . . . Astrologers always
claim to be just a little too busy to carry out such careful tests of their
efficacy, so in the last two decades scientists and statisticians have
generously done such testing for them.  There have been dozens of well-designed
tests all around the world, and astrology has failed every one of them. . . .
I propose that we let those beckoning lights in the sky awaken our interest
in the real (and fascinating) universe beyond our planet, and not let them
keep us tied to an ancient fantasy left over from a time when we huddled by
the firelight, afraid of the night.
-- Andrew Fraknoi, Executive Officer, Astronomical Society of the Pacific,
    "Why Astrology Believers Should Feel Embarrassed," San Jose Mercury
    News, May 8, 1988
"The clergy successfully preached the doctrines of patience and pusillanimity;
the active virtues of society were discouraged; and the last remains of a
military spirit were buried in the cloister: a large portion of public and
private wealth was consecrated to the specious demands of charity and devotion;
and the soldiers' pay was lavished on the useless multitudes of both sexes
who could only plead the merits of abstinence and chastity."
-- Edward Gibbons, _The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_
"Let's not be too tough on our own ignorance.  It's the thing that makes
America great.  If America weren't incomparably ignorant, how could we
have tolerated the last eight years?"
-- Frank Zappa, Feb 1, 1989
"I don't know where we come from,
Don't know where we're going to,
And if all this should have a reason,
We would be the last to know.

So let's just hope there is a promised land,
And until then,
...as best as you can."
-- Steppenwolf, "Rock Me Baby"
I realize that the MX missile is none of our concern.  I realize that the
whole point of living in a democracy is that we pay professional
congresspersons to concern themselves with things like the MX missile so we
can be free to concern ourselves with getting hold of the plumber.

But from time to time, I feel I must address major public issues such as
this, because in a free and open society, where the very future of the world
hinges on decisions made by our elected leaders, you never win large cash
journalism awards if you stick to the topics I usually write about, such as
nose-picking.
                -- Dave Barry, "At Last, the Ultimate Deterrent Against
                   Political Fallout"
In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last
resort of the scoundrel.  With all due respect to an enlightened but
inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Nobody shot me.
                -- Frank Gusenberg, his last words, when asked by police
                who had shot him 14 times with a machine gun in the Saint
                Valentine's Day Massacre.

Only Capone kills like that.
                -- George "Bugs" Moran, on the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre

The only man who kills like that is Bugs Moran.
                -- Al Capone, on the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre
Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
                -- S. Johnson, "The Life of Samuel Johnson" by J. Boswell

In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last
resort of the scoundrel.  With all due respect to an enlightened but
inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.
                -- Ambrose Bierce

When Dr. Johnson defined patriotism as the last refuge of a scoundrel,
he ignored the enormous possibilities of the word reform.
                -- Sen. Roscoe Conkling

Public office is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
                -- Boies Penrose
So from the depths of its enchantment, Terra was able to calculate a course
of action.  Here at last was an opportunity to consort with Dirbanu on a
friendly basis -- great Durbanu which, since it had force fields which Earth
could not duplicate, must of necessity have many other things Earth could
use; mighty Durbanu before whom we would kneel in supplication (with purely-
for-defense bombs hidden in our pockets) with lowered heads (making invisible
the knife in our teeth) and ask for crumbs from their table (in order to
extrapolate the location of their kitchens).
                -- Theodore Sturgeon, "The World Well Lost"
Treaties are like roses and young girls -- they last while they last.
                -- Charles DeGaulle
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.
                -- Salvor Hardin
You first have to decide whether to use the short or the long form. The
short form is what the Internal Revenue Service calls "simplified", which
means it is designed for people who need the help of a Sears tax-preparation
expert to distinguish between their first and last names.  Here's the
complete text:

"(1) How much did you make?  (AMOUNT)
(2) How much did we here at the government take out?  (AMOUNT)
(3) Hey!  Sounds like we took too much!  So we're going to
     send an official government check for (ONE-FIFTEENTH OF
     THE AMOUNT WE TOOK) directly to the (YOUR LAST NAME)
     household at (YOUR ADDRESS), for you to spend in any way
     you please! Which just goes to show you, (YOUR FIRST
     NAME), that it pays to file the short form!"

The IRS wants you to use this form because it gets to keep most of your
money.  So unless you have pond silt for brains, you want the long form.
                -- Dave Barry, "Sweating Out Taxes"
The first sign of corruption in a society that is still alive is that
the end justifies the means.
                -- Georges Bernanos (1888-1948), French novelist,
                   political writer. "Why Freedom?" The last essays of
                   George Bernanos (1955)
Boob's Law:
        You always find something in the last place you look.
Bug, n.:
        An aspect of a computer program which exists because the
        programmer was thinking about Jumbo Jacks or stock options when s/he
        wrote the program.

Fortunately, the second-to-last bug has just been fixed.
                -- Ray Simard
Famous last words:
Famous last words:
        (1) "Don't worry, I can handle it."
        (2) "You and what army?"
        (3) "If you were as smart as you think you are, you wouldn't be
             a cop."
Famous last words:
        (1) Don't unplug it, it will just take a moment to fix.
        (2) Let's take the shortcut, he can't see us from there.
        (3) What happens if you touch these two wires tog--
        (4) We won't need reservations.
        (5) It's always sunny there this time of the year.
        (6) Don't worry, it's not loaded.
        (7) They'd never (be stupid enough to) make him a manager.
        (8) Don't worry!  Women love it!
Fortune's Rules for Memo Wars: #2

Given the incredible advances in sociocybernetics and telepsychology over
the last few years, we are now able to completely understand everything that
the author of an memo is trying to say.  Thanks to modern developments
in electrocommunications like notes, vnews, and electricity, we have an
incredible level of interunderstanding the likes of which civilization has
never known.  Thus, the possibility of your misinterpreting someone else's
memo is practically nil.  Knowing this, anyone who accuses you of having
done so is a liar, and should be treated accordingly.  If you *do* understand
the memo in question, but have absolutely nothing of substance to say, then
you have an excellent opportunity for a vicious ad hominem attack.  In fact,
the only *inappropriate* times for an ad hominem attack are as follows:

        1: When you agree completely with the author of an memo.
        2: When the author of the original memo is much bigger than you are.
        3: When replying to one of your own memos.
Griffin's Thought:
        When you starve with a tiger, the tiger starves last.
Juall's Law on Nice Guys:
        Nice guys don't always finish last; sometimes they don't finish.
        Sometimes they don't even get a chance to start!
Lackland's Laws:
        (1) Never be first.
        (2) Never be last.
        (3) Never volunteer for anything
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.
QOTD:
        "I've got one last thing to say before I go; give me back
        all of my stuff."
QOTD:
        "It was so cold last winter that I saw a lawyer with his
        hands in his own pockets."
Ritchie's Rule:
        (1) Everything has some value -- if you use the right currency.
        (2) Paint splashes last longer than the paint job.
        (3) Search and ye shall find -- but make sure it was lost.
Serocki's Stricture:
        Marriage is always a bachelor's last option.
The Heineken Uncertainty Principle:
        You can never be sure how many beers you had last night.
                William Safire's Rules for Writers:

Remember to never split an infinitive.  The passive voice should never be
used.  Do not put statements in the negative form.  Verbs have to agree with
their subjects.  Proofread carefully to see if you words out.  If you reread
your work, you can find on rereading a great deal of repetition can be
avoided by rereading and editing.  A writer must not shift your point of
view.  And don't start a sentence with a conjunction.  (Remember, too, a
preposition is a terrible word to end a sentence with.) Don't overuse
exclamation marks!!  Place pronouns as close as possible, especially in long
sentences, as of 10 or more words, to their antecedents.  Writing carefully,
dangling participles must be avoided.  If any word is improper at the end of
a sentence, a linking verb is.  Take the bull by the hand and avoid mixing
metaphors.  Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky.  Everyone should be
careful to use a singular pronoun with singular nouns in their writing.
Always pick on the correct idiom.  The adverb always follows the verb.  Last
but not least, avoid cliches like the plague; seek viable alternatives.
Survivulousness:
        The tendency to visualize oneself enjoying being the last
person on Earth.  "I'd take a helicopter up and throw microwave ovens
down on the Taco Bell."
                -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated
                   Culture"
Ultra Short Term Nostalgia:
        Homesickness for the extremely recent past: "God, things seemed
so much better in the world last week."
                -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated
                   Culture"
        A young girl, Carmen Cohen, was called by her last name by her father,
and her first name by her mother.  By the time she was ten, didn't know if she
was Carmen or Cohen.
Go away, I'm all right.
                -- H.G. Wells' last words.
If it weren't for the last minute, nothing would ever get done.
It was pleasant to me to get a letter from you the other day.  Perhaps
I should have found it pleasanter if I had been able to decipher it.  I
don't think that I mastered anything beyond the date (which I knew) and
the signature (which I guessed at).  There's a singular and a perpetual
charm in a letter of yours; it never grows old, it never loses its
novelty.  Other letters are read and thrown away and forgotten, but
yours are kept forever -- unread.  One of them will last a reasonable
man a lifetime.
                -- Thomas Aldrich
Let's remind ourselves that last year's fresh idea is today's cliche.
                -- Austen Briggs
Luck can't last a lifetime, unless you die young.
                -- Russell Banks
The last person who said that (God rest his soul) lived to regret it.
The Martian Canals were clearly the Martian's last ditch effort!
Crito, I owe a cock to Asclepius; will you remember to pay the debt?
                -- Socrates' last words
Having wandered helplessly into a blinding snowstorm Sam was greatly
relieved to see a sturdy Saint Bernard dog bounding toward him with
the traditional keg of brandy strapped to his collar.
        "At last," cried Sam, "man's best friend -- and a great big dog, too!"
I have just had eighteen whiskeys in a row.  I do believe that is a record.
                -- Dylan Thomas, his last words
Woody: Hey, Mr. Peterson, what do you say to a cold one?
Norm:  See you later, Vera, I'll be at Cheers.
                -- Cheers, Norm's Last Hurrah

Sam:   Well, look at you.  You look like the cat that swallowed the canary.
Norm:  And I need a beer to wash him down.
                -- Cheers, Norm's Last Hurrah

Woody:  Would you like a beer, Mr. Peterson?
Norm:   No, I'd like a dead cat in a glass.
                -- Cheers, Little Carla, Happy at Last, Part 2
Q:        Why did the chicken cross the road?
A:        He was giving it last rites.
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%.
                Once Again From the Top

Correction notice in the Miami Herald: "Last Sunday, The Herald erroneously
reported that original Dolphin Johnny Holmes had been an insurance salesman
in Raleigh, North Carolina, that he had won the New York lottery in 1982 and
lost the money in a land swindle, that he had been charged with vehicular
homicide, but acquitted because his mother said she drove the car, and that
he stated that the funniest thing he ever saw was Flipper spouting water on
George Wilson.  Each of these items was erroneous material published
inadvertently.  He was not an insurance salesman in Raleigh, did not win the
lottery, neither he nor his mother was charged or involved in any way with
vehicular homicide, and he made no comment about Flipper or George Wilson.
The Herald regrets the errors."
                -- "The Progressive", March, 1987
        Reporters like Bill Greider from the Washington Post and Him
Naughton of the New York Times, for instance, had to file long, detailed,
and relatively complex stories every day -- while my own deadline fell
every two weeks -- but neither of them ever seemed in a hurry about
getting their work done, and from time to time they would try to console
me about the terrible pressure I always seemed to be laboring under.
        Any $100-an-hour psychiatrist could probably explain this problem
to me, in thirteen or fourteen sessions, but I don't have time for that.
No doubt it has something to do with a deep-seated personality defect, or
maybe a kink in whatever blood vessel leads into the pineal gland...  On
the other hand, it might be something as simple & basically perverse as
whatever instinct it is that causes a jackrabbit to wait until the last
possible second to dart across the road in front of a speeding car.
                -- Hunter S. Thompson, "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail"
When does summertime come to Minnesota, you ask?  Well, last year, I
think it was a Tuesday.
Would the last person to leave Michigan please turn out the lights?
        After the Children of Israel had wandered for thirty-nine years
in the wilderness, Ferdinand Feghoot arrived to make sure that they would
finally find and enter the Promised Land.  With him, he brought his
favorite robot, faithful old Yewtoo Artoo, to carry his gear and do
assorted camp chores.
        The Israelites soon got over their initial fear of the robot and,
as the months passed, became very fond of him.  Patriarchs took to
discussing abtruse theological problems with him, and each evening the
children all gathered to hear the many stories with which he was programmed.
Therefore it came as a great shock to them when, just as their journey was
ending, he abruptly wore out.  Even Feghoot couldn't console them.
        "It may be true, Ferdinand Feghoot," said Moses, "that our friend
Yewtoo Artoo was soulless, but we cannot believe it.  He must be properly
interred.  We cannot embalm him as do the Egyptians.  Nor have we wood for
a coffin.  But I do have a most splendid skin from one of Pharoah's own
cattle.  We shall bury him in it."
        Feghoot agreed.  "Yes, let this be his last rusting place."
        "Rusting?" Moses cried.  "Not in this dreadful dry desert!"
        "Ah!" sighed Ferdinand Feghoot, shedding a tear, "I fear you do not
realize the full significance of Pharoah's oxhide!"
                -- Grendel Briarton "Through Time & Space With Ferdinand
                   Feghoot!"
After the last of 16 mounting screws has been removed from an access
cover, it will be discovered that the wrong access cover has been removed.
Always think of something new; this helps you forget your last rotten idea.
                -- Seth Frankel
Economists can certainly disappoint you.  One said that the economy would
turn up by the last quarter.  Well, I'm down to mine and it hasn't.
                -- Robert Orben
If you haven't enjoyed the material in the last few lectures then a career
in chartered accountancy beckons.
                -- Advice from the lecturer in the middle of the Stochastic
                   Systems course.
In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really
good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they actually change
their minds and you never hear that old view from them again.  They really
do it.  It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are
human and change is sometimes painful.  But it happens every day.  I cannot
recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
                -- Carl Sagan, 1987 CSICOP keynote address
Last yeer I kudn't spel Engineer.  Now I are won.
One day this guy is finally fed up with his middle-class existence and
decides to do something about it.  He calls up his best friend, who is a
mathematical genius.  "Look," he says, "do you suppose you could find some
way mathematically of guaranteeing winning at the race track?  We could
make a lot of money and retire and enjoy life."  The mathematician thinks
this over a bit and walks away mumbling to himself.
        A week later his friend drops by to ask the genius if he's had any
success.  The genius, looking a little bleary-eyed, replies, "Well, yes,
actually I do have an idea, and I'm reasonably sure that it will work, but
there a number of details to be figured out.
        After the second week the mathematician appears at his friend's house,
looking quite a bit rumpled, and announces, "I think I've got it! I still have
some of the theory to work out, but now I'm certain that I'm on the right
track."
        At the end of the third week the mathematician wakes his friend by
pounding on his door at three in the morning.  He has dark circles under his
eyes.  His hair hasn't been combed for many days.  He appears to be wearing
the same clothes as the last time.  He has several pencils sticking out from
behind his ears and an almost maniacal expression on his face.  "WE CAN DO
IT!  WE CAN DO IT!!" he shrieks. "I have discovered the perfect solution!!
And it's so EASY!  First, we assume that horses are perfect spheres in simple
harmonic motion..."
Quantum Mechanics is a lovely introduction to Hilbert Spaces!
                -- Overheard at last year's Archimedeans' Garden Party
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.
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.
        While the engineer developed his thesis, the director leaned over to
his assistant and whispered, "Did you ever hear of why the sea is salt?"
        "Why the sea is salt?" whispered back the assistant.  "What do you
mean?"
        The director continued: "When I was a little kid, I heard the story of
`Why the sea is salt' many times, but I never thought it important until just
a moment ago.  It's something like this: Formerly the sea was fresh water and
salt was rare and expensive.  A miller received from a wizard a wonderful
machine that just ground salt out of itself all day long.  At first the miller
thought himself the most fortunate man in the world, but soon all the villages
had salt to last them for centuries and still the machine kept on grinding
more salt.  The miller had to move out of his house, he had to move off his
acres.  At last he determined that he would sink the machine in the sea and
be rid of it.  But the mill ground so fast that boat and miller and machine
were sunk together, and down below, the mill still went on grinding and that's
why the sea is salt."
        "I don't get you," said the assistant.
                -- Guy Endore, "Men of Iron"
        "Yo, Mike!"
        "Yeah, Gabe?"
        "We got a problem down on Earth.  In Utah."
        "I thought you fixed that last century!"
        "No, no, not that.  Someone's found a security problem in the physics
program.  They're getting energy out of nowhere."
        "Blessit!  Lemme look...  <tappity clickity tappity>  Hey, it's
there all right!  OK, just a sec...  <tappity clickity tap... save... compile>
There, that ought to patch it.  Dist it out, wouldja?"
                -- Cold Fusion, 1989
1893 The ideal brain tonic
1900 Drink Coca-Cola -- delicious and refreshing -- 5 cents at all
        soda fountains
1905 Is the favorite drink for LADIES when thirsty -- weary -- despondent
1905 Refreshes the weary, brightens the intellect and clears the brain
1906 The drink of QUALITY
1907 Good to the last drop
1907 It satisfies the thirst and pleases the palate
1907 Refreshing as a summer breeze.  Delightful as a Dip in the Sea
1908 The Drink that Cheers but does not inebriate
1917 There's a delicious freshness to the taste of Coca-Cola
1919 It satisfies thirst
1919 The taste is the test
1922 Every glass holds the answer to thirst
1922 Thirst knows no season
1925 Enjoy the sociable drink
                -- Coca-Cola slogans
Kissing don't last, cookery do.
                -- George Meredith
Last night I dreamed I ate a ten-pound marshmallow, and when I woke up
the pillow was gone.
                -- Tommy Cooper
Last week's pet, this week's special.
The most exquisite peak in culinary art is conquered when you do right by a
ham, for a ham, in the very nature of the process it has undergone since last
it walked on its own feet, combines in its flavor the tang of smoky autumnal
woods, the maternal softness of earthy fields delivered of their crop children,
the wineyness of a late sun, the intimate kiss of fertilizing rain, and the
bite of fire.  You must slice it thin, almost as thin as this page you hold
in your hands.  The making of a ham dinner, like the making of a gentleman,
starts a long, long time before the event.
                -- W.B. Courtney, "Reflections of Maryland Country Ham",
                   from "Congress Eate It Up"
        "When you wake up in the morning, Pooh," said Piglet at last,
"what's the first thing you say to yourself?"
        "What's for breakfast?" said Pooh.  "What do you say, Piglet?"
        "I say, I wonder what's going to happen exciting today?" said Piglet.
        Pooh nodded thoughtfully.  "It's the same thing," he said.
You can always tell the Christmas season is here when you start getting
incredibly dense, tinfoil-and-ribbon- wrapped lumps in the mail. Fruitcakes
make ideal gifts because the Postal Service has been unable to find a way to
damage them.  They last forever, largely because nobody ever eats them.  In
fact, many smart people save the fruitcakes they receive and send them back
to the original givers the next year; some fruitcakes have been passed back
and forth for hundreds of years.

The easiest way to make a fruitcake is to buy a darkish cake, then pound
some old, hard fruit into it with a mallet.  Be sure to wear safety glasses.
                -- Dave Barry, "Simple, Homespun Gifts"
Again she fled, but swift he came.
Tin'uviel!  Tin'uviel!
He called her by her elvish name;
And there she halted listening.
One moment stood she, and a spell
His voice laid on her: Beren came
And doom fell on Tin'uviel
That in his arms lay glistening.

As Beren looked into her eyes
Within the shadows of her hair,
The trembling starlight of the skies
He saw there mirrored shimmering.
Tin'uviel the elven-fair,
Immortal maiden elven-wise,
About him cast her shadowy hair
And arms like silver glimmering.

Long was the way that fate them bore,
O'er stony mountains cold and grey,
Through halls of iron and darkling door,
And woods of nightshade morrowless.
The Sundering Seas between them lay,
And yet at last they met once more,
And long ago they passed away
In the forest singing sorrowless.
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
                        Against Idleness and Mischief

How doth the little busy bee                How skillfully she builds her cell!
Improve each shining hour,                How neat she spreads the wax!
And gather honey all the day                And labours hard to store it well
From every opening flower!                With the sweet food she makes.

In works of labour or of skill                In books, or work, or healthful play,
I would be busy too;                        Let my first years be passed,
For Satan finds some mischief still        That I may give for every day
For idle hands to do.                        Some good account at last.
                -- Isaac Watts, 1674-1748
And all that the Lorax left here in this mess
was a small pile of rocks with the one word, "unless."
Whatever THAT meant, well, I just couldn't guess.
That was long, long ago, and each day since that day,
I've worried and worried and worried away.
Through the years as my buildings have fallen apart,
I've worried about it with all of my heart.

"BUT," says the Oncler, "now that you're here,
the word of the Lorax seems perfectly clear!
UNLESS someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
nothing is going to get better - it's not.
So... CATCH!" cries the Oncler.  He lets something fall.
"It's a truffula seed.  It's the last one of all!

"You're in charge of the last of the truffula seeds.
And truffula trees are what everyone needs.
Plant a new truffula -- treat it with care.
Give it clean water and feed it fresh air.
Grow a forest -- protect it from axes that hack.
Then the Lorax and all of his friends may come back!"
And if you wonder,
What I am doing,
As I am heading for the sink.
I am spitting out all the bitterness,
Along with half of my last drink.
Farewell we call to hearth and hall!
Though wind may blow and rain may fall,
We must away ere break of day
Far over wood and mountain tall.

        To Rivendell, where Elves yet dwell
        In glades beneath the misty fell,
        Through moor and waste we ride in haste,
        And whither then we cannot tell.

With foes ahead, behind us dread,
Beneath the sky shall be our bed,
Until at last our toil be passed,
Our journey done, our errand sped.

        We must away!  We must away!
        We ride before the break of day!
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
Gil-galad was an Elven-king.
Of him the harpers sadly sing:
the last whose realm was fair and free
between the Mountains and the Sea.

His sword was long, his lance was keen,
his shining helm afar was seen;
the countless stars of heaven's field
were mirrored in his silver shield.

But long ago he rode away,
and where he dwelleth none can say;
for into darkness fell his star
in Mordor where the shadows are.
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
He who loses, wins the race,
And parallel lines meet in space.
                -- John Boyd, "Last Starship from Earth"
I had an errand there: gathering water-lilies,
green leaves and lilies white to please my pretty lady,
the last ere the year's end to keep them from the winter,
to flower by her pretty feet till the snows are melted.

Each year at summer's end I go to find them for her,
in a wide pool, deep and clear, far down Withywindle;
there they open first in spring and there they linger latest.

By that pool long ago I found the River-daughter,
fair young Goldberry sitting in the rushes.
Sweet was her singing then, and her heart was beating!

And that proved well for you--for now I shall no longer
go down deep again along the forest-water,
no while the year is old.  Nor shall I be passing
Old Man Willow's house this side of spring-time,
not till the merry spring, when the River-daughter
dances down the withy-path to bathe in the water.
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
I've been on this lonely road so long,
Does anybody know where it goes,
I remember last time the signs pointed home,
A month ago.
                -- Carpenters, "Road Ode"
If Dr. Seuss Were a Technical Writer.....

Here's an easy game to play.
Here's an easy thing to say:

If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,
And the bus is interrupted as a very last resort,
And the address of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,
Then the socket packet pocket has an error to report!

If your cursor finds a menu item followed by a dash,
And the double-clicking icon puts your window in the trash,
And your data is corrupted 'cause the index doesn't hash,
then your situation's hopeless, and your system's gonna crash!

You can't say this?  What a shame, sir!
We'll find you another game, sir.

If the label on the cable on the table at your house,
Says the network is connected to the button on your mouse,
But your packets want to tunnel on another protocol,
That's repeatedly rejected by the printer down the hall,
And your screen is all distorted by the side effects of gauss,
So your icons in the window are as wavy as a souse,
Then you may as well reboot and go out with a bang,
'Cause as sure as I'm a poet, the sucker's gonna hang!

When the copy of your floppy's getting sloppy on the disk,
And the microcode instructions cause unnecessary risc,
Then you have to flash your memory and you'll want to ram your rom.
Quickly turn off the computer and be sure to tell your mom!

                -- DementDJ@ccip.perkin-elmer.com (DementDJ) [rec.humor.funny]
In the early morning queue,
With a listing in my hand.
With a worry in my heart,        There on terminal number 9,
Waitin' here in CERAS-land.        Pascal run all set to go.
I'm a long way from sleep,        But I'm waitin' in the queue,
How I miss a good meal so.        With this code that ever grows.
In the early mornin' queue,        Now the lobby chairs are soft,
With no place to go.                But that can't make the queue move fast.
                                Hey, there it goes my friend,
                                I've moved up one at last.
                -- Ernest Adams, "Early Morning Queue", to "Early
                   Morning Rain" by G. Lightfoot
Last night I met upon the stair
A little man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today.
Gee how I wish he'd go away!
Like corn in a field I cut you down,
I threw the last punch way too hard,
After years of going steady, well, I thought it was time,
To throw in my hand for a new set of cards.
And I can't take you dancing out on the weekend,
I figured we'd painted too much of this town,
And I tried not to look as I walked to my wagon,
And I knew then I had lost what should have been found,
I knew then I had lost what should have been found.
        And I feel like a bullet in the gun of Robert Ford
        I'm as low as a paid assassin is
        You know I'm cold as a hired sword.
        I'm so ashamed we can't patch it up,
        You know I can't think straight no more
        You make me feel like a bullet, honey,
                a bullet in the gun of Robert Ford.
                -- Elton John "I Feel Like a Bullet"
My analyst told me that I was right out of my head,
        But I said, "Dear Doctor, I think that it is you instead.
Because I have got a thing that is unique and new,
        To prove it I'll have the last laugh on you.
'Cause instead of one head -- I've got two.

And you know two heads are better than one.
O! Wanderers in the shadowed land
despair not!  For though dark they stand,
all woods there be must end at last,
and see the open sun go past:
the setting sun, the rising sun,
the day's end, or the day begun.
For east or west all woods must fail ...
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
One thing about the past.
It's likely to last.
                -- Ogden Nash
Please stand for the National Anthem:

        Oh, say can you see by dawn's early light
        What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?
        Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight
        O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
        And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
        Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
        Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
        O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

Thank you.  You may resume your seat.
The thrill is here, but it won't last long
You'd better have your fun before it moves along...
The, uh, snowy mountains are like really cold, eh?
And the, um, plains stretch out like my moms girdle, eh?
There's lotsa beers and doughnuts for everyone, eh?
So the last one to be peaceful and everything is a big idiot,
Eh?
So shut yer face up and dry yer mucklucks by the fire, eh?
And dream about girls with their high beams on, eh?
They may be cold, but that's okay!  Beer's better that way!
Eh?
                -- A, like, Tribute to the Great White North, eh?
Beauty!
To code the impossible code,                This is my quest --
To bring up a virgin machine,                To debug that code,
To pop out of endless recursion,        No matter how hopeless,
To grok what appears on the screen,        No matter the load,
                                        To write those routines
To right the unrightable bug,                Without question or pause,
To endlessly twiddle and thrash,        To be willing to hack FORTRAN IV
To mount the unmountable magtape,        For a heavenly cause.
To stop the unstoppable crash!                And I know if I'll only be true
                                        To this glorious quest,
And the queue will be better for this,        That my code will run CUSPy and calm,
That one man, scorned and                When it's put to the test.
        destined to lose,
Still strove with his last allocation
To scrap the unscrappable kludge!
                -- To "The Impossible Dream", from Man of La Mancha
We gotta get out of this place,
If it's the last thing we ever do.
                -- The Animals
We've tried each spinning space mote
And reckoned its true worth:
Take us back again to the homes of men
On the cool, green hills of Earth.

The arching sky is calling
Spacemen back to their trade.
All hands!  Standby!  Free falling!
And the lights below us fade.
Out ride the sons of Terra,
Far drives the thundering jet,
Up leaps the race of Earthmen,
Out, far, and onward yet--

We pray for one last landing
On the globe that gave us birth;
Let us rest our eyes on the fleecy skies
And the cool, green hills of Earth.
                -- Robert A. Heinlein, 1941
Well I looked at my watch and it said a quarter to five,
The headline screamed that I was still alive,
I couldn't understand it, I thought I died last night.
I dreamed I'd been in a border town,
In a little cantina that the boys had found,
I was desperate to dance, just to dig the local sounds.
When along came a senorita,
She looked so good that I had to meet her,
I was ready to approach her with my English charm,
When her brass knuckled boyfriend grabbed me by the arm,
And he said, grow some funk of your own, amigo,
Grow some funk of your own.
We no like to with the gringo fight,
But there might be a death in Mexico tonite.
...
Take my advice, take the next flight,
And grow some funk, grow your funk at home.
                -- Elton John, "Grow Some Funk of Your Own"
Well, my terminal's locked up, and I ain't got any Mail,
        And I can't recall the last time that my program didn't fail;
I've got stacks in my structs, I've got arrays in my queues,
        I've got the : Segmentation violation -- Core dumped blues.

If you think that it's nice that you get what you C,
        Then go : illogical statement with your whole family,
'Cause the Supreme Court ain't the only place with : Bus error views.
        I've got the : Segmentation violation -- Core dumped blues.

On a PDP-11, life should be a breeze,
        But with VAXen in the house even magnetic tapes would freeze.
Now you might think that unlike VAXen I'd know who I abuse,
        I've got the : Segmentation violation -- Core dumped blues.
                -- Core Dumped Blues
What with chromodynamics and electroweak too
Our Standardized Model should please even you,
Tho' once you did say that of charm there was none
It took courage to switch as to say Earth moves not Sun.
Yet your state of the union penultimate large
Is the last known haunt of the Fractional Charge,
And as you surf in the hot tub with sourdough roll
Please ponder the passing of your sole Monopole.
Your Olympics were fun, you should bring them all back
For transsexual tennis or Anamalon Track,
But Hollywood movies remain sinfully crude
Whether seen on the telly or Remotely Viewed.
Now fasten your sunbelts, for you've done it once more,
You said it in Leipzig of the thing we adore,
That you've built an incredible crystalline sphere
Whose German attendants spread trembling and fear
Of the death of our theory by Particle Zeta
Which I'll bet is not there say your article, later.
                -- Sheldon Glashow, Physics Today, December, 1984
When a lion meets another with a louder roar,
the first lion thinks the last a bore.
                -- G.B. Shaw
When you're a Yup
You're a Yup all the way
From your first slice of Brie
To your last Cabernet.

When you're a Yup
You're not just a dreamer
You're making things happen
You're driving a Beamer.
If you think last Tuesday was a drag, wait till you see what happens tomorrow!
Today is the last day of your life so far.
What happened last night can happen again.
You will be the last person to buy a Chrysler.
        COONDOG MEMORY
        (heard in Rutledge, Missouri, about eighteen years ago)

Now, this dog is for sale, and she can not only follow a trail twice as
old as the average dog can, but she's got a pretty good memory to boot.
For instance, last week this old boy who lives down the road from me, and
is forever stinkmouthing my hounds, brought some city fellow around to
try out ol' Sis here.  So I turned her out south of the house and she made
two or three big swings back and forth across the edge of the woods, set
back her head, bayed a couple of times, cut straight through the woods,
come to a little clearing, jumped about three foot straight up in the air,
run to the other side, and commenced to letting out a racket like she had
something treed.  We went over there with our flashlights and shone them
up in the tree but couldn't catch no shine offa coon's eyes, and my
neighbor sorta indicated that ol' Sis might be a little crazy, `cause she
stood right to the tree and kept singing up into it.  So I pulled off my
coat and climbed up into the branches, and sure enough, there was a coon
skeleton wedged in between a couple of branches about twenty foot up.
Now as I was saying, she can follow a pretty old trail, but this fellow
was still calling her crazy or touched `cause she had hopped up in the
air while she was crossing the clearing, until I reminded him that the
Hawkins' had a fence across there about five years back.  Now, this dog
is for sale.
                -- News that stayed News: Ten Years of Coevolution Quarterly
"Oh, he [a big dog] hunts with papa," she said. "He says Don Carlos [the
dog] is good for almost every kind of game.  He went duck hunting one time
and did real well at it.  Then Papa bought some ducks, not wild ducks but,
you know, farm ducks.  And it got Don Carlos all mixed up.  Since the
ducks were always around the yard with nobody shooting at them he knew he
wasn't supposed to kill them, but he had to do something.  So one morning
last spring, when the ground was still soft, he took all the ducks and
buried them."  "What do you mean, buried them?"  "Oh, he didn't hurt them.
He dug little holes all over the yard and picked up the ducks in his mouth
and put them in the holes.  Then he covered them up with mud except for
their heads.  He did thirteen ducks that way and was digging a hole for
another one when Tony found him.  We talked about it for a long time.  Papa
said Don Carlos was afraid the ducks might run away, and since he didn't
know how to build a cage he put them in holes.  He's a smart dog."
                -- R. Bradford, "Red Sky At Morning"
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
We was playin' the Homestead Grays in the city of Pitchburgh.  Josh [Gibson]
comes up in the last of the ninth with a man on and us a run behind.  Well,
he hit one.  The Grays waited around and waited around, but finally the
empire rules it ain't comin' down.  So we win.  The next day, we was disputin'
the Grays in Philadelphia when here come a ball outta the sky right in the
glove of the Grays' center fielder.  The empire made the only possible call.
"You're out, boy!" he says to Josh.  "Yesterday, in Pitchburgh."
                -- Satchel Paige
                Answers to Last Fortune's Questions:

        (1) None.  (Moses didn't have an ark).
        (2) Your mother, by the pigeonhole principle.
        (3) I don't know.
        (4) Who cares?
        (5) 6 (or maybe 4, or else 3).  Mr. Alfred J. Duncan of Podunk,
            Montana, submitted an interesting solution to Problem 5.
        (6) There is an interesting solution to this problem on page 1029 of my
            book, which you can pick up for $23.95 at finer bookstores and
            bathroom supply outlets (or 99 cents at the table in front of
            Papyrus Books).
This fortune is dedicated to your mother, without whose invaluable assistance
last night would never have been possible.
Change is the essential process of all existence.
                -- Spock, "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield", stardate 5730.2
EARL GREY PROFILES

NAME:                Jean-Luc Perriwinkle Picard
OCCUPATION:        Starship Big Cheese
AGE:                94
BIRTHPLACE:        Paris, Terra Sector
EYES:                Grey
SKIN:                Tanned
HAIR:                Not much
LAST MAGAZINE READ:
                Lobes 'n' Probes, the Ferengi-Betazoid Sex Quarterly
TEA:                Earl Grey.  Hot.

EARL GREY NEVER VARIES.
The sooner our happiness together begins, the longer it will last.
                -- Miramanee, "The Paradise Syndrome", stardate 4842.6
"`This must be Thursday,' said Arthur to himself, sinking
low over his beer, `I never could get the hang of
Thursdays.'"

- Arthur, on what was to be his last Thursday on Earth.
"In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a
lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad
move." - The Book just racapping what happened in the last
book.
"`I am so amazingly cool you could keep a side of meat in
me for a month. I am so hip I have difficulty seeing over
my pelvis.'"

- Zaphod being cool.
"`My doctor says that I have a malformed public-duty gland
and a natural deficiency in moral fibre, and that I am
therefore excused from saving Universes.'"

- Ford's last ditch attempt to get out of helping
Slartibartfast.
"The last time anybody made a list of the top hundred
character attributes of New Yorkers, common sense snuck in
at number 79. ....
When it's fall in New York, the air smells as if someone's
been frying goats in it, and if you are keen to breathe the
best plan is to open a window and stick your head in a
building."

- Nuff said??
"You're very sure of your facts, " he said at last, "I
couldn't trust the thinking of a man who takes the Universe
- if there is one - for granted. "
"I got into an elevator at work and this man followed in after me... I
pushed '1' and he just stood there... I said 'Hi, where you going?'  He
said, 'Phoenix.'  So I pushed Phoenix.  A few seconds later the doors
opened, two tumbleweeds blew in... we were in downtown Phoenix.  I looked
at him and said 'You know, you're the kind of guy I want to hang around
with.'  We got into his car and drove out to his shack in the desert.
Then the phone rang.  He said 'You get it.'  I picked it up and said
'Hello?'... the other side said 'Is this Steven Wright?'... I said 'Yes...'
The guy said 'Hi, I'm Mr. Jones, the student loan director from your bank...
It seems you have missed your last 17 payments, and the university you
attended said that they received none of the $17,000 we loaned you... we
would just like to know what happened to the money?'  I said, 'Mr. Jones,
I'll give it to you straight.  I gave all of the money to my friend Slick,
and with it he built a nuclear weapon... and I would appreciate it if you never
called me again."
                -- Steven Wright
I have a map of the United States.  It's actual size.  I spent last summer
folding it.  People ask me where I live, and I say, "E6".
                -- Steven Wright
I have a rock garden.  Last week three of them died.
                -- Richard Diran
I tell ya, gambling never agreed with me.  Last week I went to the track
and they shot my horse with the opening gun.

Well, just last week I was at a Chinese restaurant and when I opened my
fortune cookie I found the guy's check sitting at the next table.  I said,
"Hey, buddy, I got your check", he said, "Thanks."
                -- Rodney Dangerfield
"I was drunk last night, crawled home across the lawn.  By accident I
put the car key in the door lock.  The house started up.  So I figured
what the hell, and drove it around the block a few times.  I thought I
should go park it in the middle of the freeway and yell at everyone to
get off my driveway."
                -- Steven Wright
I was in a bar and I walked up to a beautiful woman and said, "Do you live
around here often?"  She said, "You're wearing two different-color socks."
I said, "Yes, but to me they're the same because I go by thickness."
She said, "How do you feel?" And I said, "You know when you're sitting on a
chair and you lean back so you're just on two legs and you lean too far so
you almost fall over but at the last second you catch yourself?  I feel like
that all the time..."
                -- Steven Wright, "Gentlemen's Quarterly"
I was in Vegas last week. I was at the roulette table, having a lengthy
argument about what I considered an Odd number.
                -- Steven Wright
I'll be comfortable on the couch.  Famous last words.
                -- Lenny Bruce
Last night the power went out.  Good thing my camera had a flash....
The neighbors thought it was lightning in my house, so they called the cops.
                -- Steven Wright
Last year we drove across the country...  We switched on the driving...
every half mile.  We had one cassette tape to listen to on the entire trip.
I don't remember what it was.
                -- Steven Wright
  William Safire's rules for writing as seen in the New York Times

     Do not put statements in the negative form.
     And don't start sentences with a conjunction.
     If you reread your work, you will find on rereading that a great
     deal of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing.
     Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.
     Unqualified superlatives are the worst of all.
     If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is.
     Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky.
     Never, ever use repetitive redundancies.
     Also, avoid awkward or affected alliteration.
     Last, but not least, avoid cliche's like the plague.
Robert Tappen Morris, Jr., got six months in jail for crashing 10% of the
computers that Bill Gates made $100 million crashing last weekend.
Q: How many Microsoft support staff does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Four. One to ask "What is the registration number of the light bulb?", one
   to ask "Have you tried rebooting it?", another to ask "Have you tried
   reinstalling it?" and the last one to say "It must be your hardware because
   the light bulb in our office works fine..."
Mad Programmer Commits Suicide

KENNETT, MO -- For two years Doug Carter toiled away in his basement computer
lab working on his own 'Dougnix' operating system. Apparently he was sick of
Windows 95 so he decided to create his own OS, based loosely on Unix. He had
developed his own 'DougUI' window manager, Doug++ compiler, DougFS filesystem,
and other integrated tools.

All was going well until last week when he hooked his computer up to the
Internet for the first time. It was then that he stumbled on to www.linux.org.
Reports are sketchy about what happened next. We do know he committed suicide
days after, leaving behind a rambling suicide note. Part of the note says:

"I've wasted the past two years of my life... Wasted... Gone... Forever...
Never return to. [illegible] Why did I bother creating my own OS... when Linux
is exactly what I needed!?!?!?! If I had only known about Linux! Why someone
didn't tell me? [illegible] Wasted! Aggghhh!" [The rest of the note is filled
with incomprehensible assembly language ramblings.]
Open Source Beer Revolution

Yesterday, Red Hat introduced an 'open source' beer called Red Brew. The
recipes for making the beer are available for free over the Net, and
microbrewery kits are available at low cost from Red Hat. Says a Red Hat
spokesman, "With the proliferation of free (open source) software, it was only
a matter of time before open source beer became reality. After all, the only
thing hackers like more than free software is free beer!"

Following the Red Hat annoucement, other companies are racing to launch their
own beer 'distribution'. Caldera is developing an OpenBrew beer. Meanwhile,
Patrick Volkerding is working on a SlackBeer distribution, and DebianBrew is
expected soon.

Traditional breweries and beer distributors are not thrilled about open source
beer. "This is ludicrous! People want beer that comes from time-tested, secret
recipes -- not beer from recipes invented overnight! Open source is a fad," a
spokesman for Buddwizzer Beer, Inc. said. In addition, other beverage
distributors are nervous. "First open source beer, and soon open source soft
drinks! Before we know it, we'll have RedCoke and SlackPepsi! This open source
plague must be stopped before it eats into our bottom line! Don't quote me on
that last sentence," the CEO of Croak-a-Cola said.
Tux Penguin Boxing Match

LAS VEGAS, NV -- The unofficial Linux mascot Tux the Penguin will face his arch
rival the BSD Daemon in a boxing match this Saturday night. The match is part
of the International Computer Mascot Boxing Federation's First Annual World
Championship Series. The winner will advance to face one of the Intel "Bunny
People".

Boxing pundits favor Tux as the winner. Last week Tux won his first match in
the Championship Series against Wilbur the Gimp. "The Gimp didn't have a
chance," one spectator said. "With Tux's ability to run at top speeds of over
100mph, I don't see how he could possibly lose." The BSD Daemon, however, is
certainly a formidible opponent. While boxing rules prohibit the Daemon from
using his patented pitchfork, his pointy horns are permitted in the ring.

Some observers think the whole Computer Mascot Boxing Federation is a fake.
"WWF is all scripted," one sports writer pointed out. "And so is this. You
actually think that a penguin is capable of boxing? The idea of a penguin
fighting a demon is patently absurd. This whole Championship Series has no
doubt been scripted. It's probably nothing more than two little kids in
penguin and demon suits duking it out in a boxing ring. What a waste of time."
Linux Ported to Homer Simpson's Brain

SPRINGFIELD -- Slashdot recently reported on Homer Simpson's brain "upgrade"
to an Intel CPU.  Intel hails the CPU transplant as the "World's Greatest
Technological Achievement".  Intel originally planned to install Microsoft
Windows CE (Cerebrum Enhanced) on Homer's new PentiumBrain II processor.
However, due to delays in releasing Windows CE, Intel decided to install
DebianBrain Linux, the new Linux port for brains.

Computer industry pundits applaud the last minute switch from Windows to
Linux. One said, "I was a bit concerned for Homer.  With Windows CE, I could
easily imagine Homer slipping into an infinite loop: "General Protection
Fault.  D'oh!  D'oh!  D'oh!  D'oh..."  Or, at the worst, the Blue Screen of
Death could have become much more than a joke."

Some pundits are more concerned about the quality of the Intel CPU.  "Linux
is certainly an improvement over Windows.  But since it's running on a
PentiumBrain chip, all bets are off.  What if the chip miscalculates the core
temperature of the power plant where Homer works?  I can just imagine the
story on the evening news: 'Springfield was obliterated into countless
subatomic particles yesterday because Homer J. Simpson, power plant
button-pusher, accidentally set the core temperature to 149.992322340948290
instead of 150...'  If anything, an Alpha chip running Linux should have been
used for Homer's new brain."
Linux Advocacy Crackdown

SHERIDAN, WY -- In an unprecedented blow to Linux advocacy, Aaron McAdams, an
employee at the Sheridan Try-N-Save Discount Store, was fired last week.
According to the store's general manager, McAdams was fired because "he
constantly rearranged items on shelves so that Linux-related books and
software boxes would be displayed more prominently than Windows merchandise."
McAdams' boss added, "If he would have spent as much time actually working as
he did hiding Windows books at the back of shelves, he wouldn't have received
the pink slip."

The general manager supplied Humorix with videotapes from the store's
security cameras showing McAdams in action.  In one scene, he takes a whole
stack of "...For Dummies" books and buries them in the Cheap Romance section,
an area of the store rarely visited by computer users.  In another, McAdams
can be plainly seen setting copies of Red Hat Linux in front of a large,
eye-catching display of various Microsoft products at the front of the
store.  Finally, at one point McAdams can be seen slapping huge tags reading
"DEMO DISPLAY BOX -- NOT AVAILABLE UNTIL 1999" on boxes of Windows 98.

McAdams disputes his bosses accusations.  "If he would spend more time
actually working instead of peering over security camera footage for hours on
end, this store might actually turn a profit for a change."
Red Hat Linux 10.0

RALEIGH-DURHAM, NC -- HypeNewsWire -- Red Hat, the producer of the most
popular Linux distribution with over 25 million estimated users, is proud to
announce the availability of Red Hat Linux 10.0.  The latest version
contains the new Linux 6.2 kernel, the Z Window System 2.0, full support for
legacy Windows 3.x/9x/200x/NT software apps, and more. Copies of Red Hat
Linux 10.0 will be available in stores on CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, or GNUDE (GNU
Digital Encoding) disks within the next week.

Compaq, Dell, Gateway, and several other large computer manufacturers have
announced that they will offer computer systems with Red Hat 10.0
pre-installed.  "We can sell systems with Red Hat pre-installed for
considerably less than systems with Microsoft ActiveWindows 2001. Overall,
Red Hat Linux's superior quality, low price, and modest system requirements
puts Windows to shame," one Dell spokesperson said at last week's LinDex
convention.
New Crime Identified: "Tech Rage"

HARRISBURG, IL -- The police department in this Illinois town has coined a
new term for a growing trend in crime: "tech rage". Tech rage shares many
similarities with another modern crime, "road rage", but instead of
affecting drivers, tech rage is experienced by disgruntled computer users.

The first documented case of tech rage involves a Microsoft salesman, Bob
Glutzfield, who convinced the local TV station to "upgrade" its computer
systems from Macintosh to Wintel.  While the migration seemed successful at
first, the Blue Screen became more prevalent during the following months.

Then, in January, the entire computer system crashed in the middle of the
weather forecast during the 10 o'clock evening news. Viewers could plainly
see the Blue Screen of Death showing in the monitors behind James Roland,
the chief meteorologist. The instability of Windows 98 stretched Roland's
patience until he snapped last week and succumbed to tech rage.

Roland tracked down the Microsoft salesman and followed him one evening to
his apartment.  The weatherman yelled at the bewildered Microserf, "You
[expletive]! Because of you, I'm the [expletive] laughing stock of Southern
Illinois!" and then proceeded to beat him up.  Roland is currently out on
bond pending trial next month.
New Linux Companies Hope To Get Rich Quick (#2)

Don't throw out that old Red Hat Linux 3.0 CD. A group of entrepreneurs
are hording vintage Linux items in the hopes that they will become hot
collector's items in the coming decades. The venture, called "Money Grows
On Binary Trees", hopes to amass a warehouse full of old Linux
distributions, books, stuffed penguins, promotional material, and Linus
Torvalds autographs.

"Nobody thought pieces of cardstock featuring baseball players would be
worth anything..." the founder of Binary Trees said. "That 'Linux For
Dummies' book sitting in your trash could be the next Babe Ruth card."

The company organized a Linux Collectibles Convention last week in Silicon
Valley, drawing in a respectable crowd of 1,500 people and 20 exhibitors.
The big attraction was a "Windows For Dummies" book actually signed by
Linus Torvalds. "He signed it back at a small Linux conference in '95,"
the owner explained. "He didn't realize it was a Dummies book because I
had placed an O'Reilly cover on it... Somebody at the convention offered
me $10,000 for it, but that seemed awfully low. I hope to sell it on eBay
next month with a reserve price containing a significant number of zeros."
New Linux Companies Hope To Get Rich Quick (#3)

In the "Cathedral and the Bazaar", ESR mentions that one motivation behind
Open Source software is ego-gratification. That's where OpenEgo, Inc.
comes in. For a fee, the hackers at OpenEgo will produce a piece of Open
Source software and distribute it in your name, thus building up your
reputation and ego. You can quickly become the envy of all your friends --
without lifting a finger. Want a higher-paying tech job? With OpenEgo's
services, you'll look like an Open Source pro in no time, and have dozens
of hot job offers from across the country.

Says the OpenEgo sales literature, "Designing, implementing, maintaining,
and promoting a successful Open Source project is a pain. However, at
OpenEgo, we do all the work while you reap all the rewards..." A page on
the OpenEgo site claims, "We produced a Linux kernel patch for one
customer last year that was immediately accepted by Linus Torvalds...
Within days the person gained employment at Transmeta and is now on the
road to IPO riches..."

Prices range from $1,000 for a small program to $5,000 for a kernel patch.
Excerpts From The First Annual Nerd Bowl (#1)

JOHN SPLADDEN: Hi, and welcome to the first annual Nerd Bowl in sunny
Silicon Valley.

BRYANT DUMBELL: We're coming to you live from the Transmeta Dome to watch
the battle between the North Carolina Mad Hatters and the Michigan
Portalbacks as they compete for the coveted Linus Torvalds Trophy.

SPLADDEN: This is shaping up to be one hell of a match. The Mad Hatters --
sponsored by Linux distributor Red Hat -- have been on fire the past
month. But the Andover.Net sponsored Michigan Portalbacks are on a tear as
well, thanks in part to the stellar performance of Rob "Taco Boy" Malda.

DUMBELL: Taco Boy is quite a star, John. Last week at the Kernelbowl he
blew away the Transmeta Secret Agents when he scored 51 points
singlehandedly in the Flying CompactDiscus round.

SPLADDEN: But then Mad Hatter's Alan Cox was voted this season's Most
Valuable Hacker in the Eastern Division. So, this game is going to be
quite a show.
Excerpts From The First Annual Nerd Bowl (#4)

BRYANT DUMBELL: Welcome back. After Round 1, the Mad Hatters are ahead 15
to 12. Round 2, the Caffeine Craziness event, is now underway.

JOHN SPLADDEN: This is my favorite part of the Nerdbowl. Each player tries
to consume as many gallons of caffeinated beverages within one minute, and
then points are awarded based on the redness of their eyes.

DUMBELL: I like this event too... I must admit, it's much better than the
"Crash It" event that was played in the Zeroth Annual Nerdbowl last year.
Players were each seated in front of a PC running Windows 98... points
were awarded based on how fast the player could cause a Blue Screen.

SPLADDEN: Ah, yes, I remember that. Everybody complained that the event
was too easy. "Where the hell is the challenge?" yelled Chris DiBona while
doing a victory dance after the VA Linux Rich Penguins beat the SuSE Cats
In The Hats last year 121-96.
Affordable Virtual Beowulf Cluster

Every nerd drools over Beowulf clusters, but very few have even seen one,
much less own one. Until now, that is. Eric Gylgen, the open source hacker
famous for EviL (the dancing ASCII paperclip add-on to vi), is working on
a program that will emulate Beowulf clusters on a standard desktop PC.

"Of course," he added candidly, "the performance of my virtual cluster
will be many orders of magnitude less than a real cluster, but that's not
really the point. I just want to be able to brag that I run a 256 node
cluster. Nobody has to know I only spent $500 on the hardware it uses."

Eric has prior experience in this field. Last month he successfully built
a real 32 node Beowulf cluster out of Palm Pilots, old TI-8x graphing
calculators, various digital cameras, and even some TRS-80s.

He demonstrated a pre-alpha version of his VirtualEpicPoem software to us
yesterday. His Athlon machine emulated a 256 node Beowulf cluster in which
each node, running Linux, was emulating its own 16 node cluster in which
each node, running Bochs, was emulating VMWare to emulate Linux running
old Amiga software. The system was extremely slow, but it worked.
Will Silicon Valley Become A Ghost Town?

Back in the 80s, businessmen hoped that computers would usher in a
paperless office. Now in the 00s, businessmen are hoping that paper will
usher in a computerless office. "We've lost more productivity this last
decade to shoddy software," explained Mr. Lou Dight, the author of the
bestselling book, "The Dotless Revolution". "By getting rid of computers
and their infernal crashes, bluescreens, and worst of all, Solitaire, the
US gross domestic product will soar by 20% over the next decade. It's time
to banish Microsoft crapware from our corporate offices."

Lou Dight is the champion of a new trend in corporate America towards the
return of pen-and-paper, solar calculators, old IBM typewriters, and even
slide rules. If "dotcom" was the buzzword of the 90s, "dotless" is the
buzzword of the 21st Century.
Elite Nerds Create Linux Distro From Hell

HELL, MICHIGAN -- A group of long-time Linux zealots and newbie haters
have thrown together a new Linux distro called Hellix that is so
user-hostile, so anti-newbie, so cryptic, and so old-fashioned that it
actually makes MS-DOS look like a real operating system. Said the founder
of the project, "I'm sick and tired of the Windowsification of the Linux
desktop in a fruitless attempt to make the system more appealing to
newbies, PHBs, and MCSEs. Linux has always been for nerds only, and we
want to make sure it stays that way!"

One of the other Bastard Distributors From Hell explained, "In the last
five years think of all the hacking effort spent on Linux... and for what?
We have nothing to show for it but half-finished Windows-like desktops, vi
dancing paperclips, and graphical front-ends to configuration files. Real
nerds use text files for configuration, darnit, and they like it! It's
time to take a stand against the hordes of newbies that are polluting our
exclusive operating system."

One Anonymous Coward said, "This is so cool... It's just like Unix back in
the good old days of the 70's when men were men and the only intuitive
interface was still the nipple."
Brief History Of Linux (#12)
A note from Bill Gates' second grade teacher:

Billy has been having some trouble behaving in class lately... Last Monday
he horded all of the crayons and refused to share, saying that he needed
all 160 colors to maximize his 'innovation'. He then proceeded to sell
little pieces of paper ("End-User License Agreement for Crayons" he called
them) granting his classmates the 'non-transferable right' to use the
crayons on a limited time basis in exchange for their lunch money...

When I tried to stop Billy, he kept harping about his right to innovate
and how my interference violated basic notions of free-market capitalism.
"Holding a monopoly is not illegal," he rebutted. I chastised him for
talking back, and then I took away the box of crayons so others could
share them... angrily, he then pointed to a drawing of his hanging on the
wall and yelled, "That's my picture! You don't have the right to present
my copyrighted material in a public exhibition without my permission!
You're pirating my intellectual property. Pirate! Pirate! Pirate!"

I developed a headache that day that even the maximum dosage of Aspirin
wasn't able to handle. And then on Tuesday, he conned several students out
of their milk money by convincing them to play three-card Monty...
Brief History Of Linux (#13)
Wanted: Eunuchs programmers

Everything you know about the creation of the Unix operating system is
wrong. We have uncovered the truth: Unix was a conspiracy hatched by
Ritchie and Thompson to thwart the AT&T monopoly that they worked for. The
system, code-named EUNUCHS (Electronic UNtrustworthy User-Condemning
Horrible System), was horribly conceived, just as they had planned.

The OS, quickly renamed to a more respectable "Unix", was adopted first by
Ma Bell's Patent Department and then by the rest of the monopoly. AT&T saw
an inexpensive, multi-user, portable operating system that it had all
rights to; the authors, however, saw a horrible, multi-crashing system
that the Evil Ma Bell Empire would become hopelessly dependent on. AT&T
would go bankrupt trying to maintain the system and eventually collapse.

That didn't happen. Ritchie and Thompson were too talented to create a
crappy operating system; no matter how hard they tried the system was too
good. Their last ditch effort to sabotage the system by recoding it
obfuscated C was unsuccessful. Before long Unix spread outside of Bell
Labs and their conspiracy collapsed.
DeCSS T-Shirt Used To Commit Piracy!

College student Cody Potter stunned the world yesterday when he used a
T-shirt with the printed DeCSS source code to illegally copy a DVD of
"Star Trek XXI: We Promise This Is The Last One". Well, it wasn't the
actual DeCSS source code. The shirt contained a Perl script which spits
out a bash shell script which produces a GW-BASIC program which outputs a
ROT13-encoded Python script that manufactures a Pig-Latin-encoded Java
program that finally produces the real DeCSS C source code when executed.
"Brown Orifice" Is Only The Beginning

Last week security holes were found in Netscape's Java implementation that
allowed it to act as a web server. Earlier today, a hacker announced that
he had found vulnerabilities in Mozilla M17 that allow it to operate as a
web browser. And that's just the beginning.

Said "3l337h4x0r", the discoverer of the M17 exploit, "This is quite a
hack! By manipulating some internal functions, I was able to use M17 to
actually surf the web. Slashdot and Humorix rendered beautifully."

Mozilla engineers were stunned. "This shouldn't be possible. M17 contains
a newsreader, a mail client, an instant messenger client, and a whole
bunch of XUL acronymn-enriched stuff, but it shouldn't be able to handle
HTTP or HTML. We haven't been planning on adding web-surfing functionality
to Mozilla until M30... maybe M25 at the earliest. I suspect this whole
thing is a hoax."
Clippit Charged With Attempted Murder

Microsoft's Dancing Paper Clip turned violent last week and nearly killed
a university student testing a new Windows-based human-computer interface.
The victim is expected to make a full recovery, although psychiatrists
warn that the incident may scar him emotionally for life. "You can bet
this kid won't be using Windows or Office ever again," said one shrink.

The victim had been alpha-testing CHUG (Computer-Human Unencumbered
Groupware), a new interface in which the user controls the computer with
force-feedback gloves and voice activation.

"I was trying to write a term paper in Word," he said from his hospital
bed. "But then that damned Dancing Paper Clip came up and started annoying
me. I gave it the middle finger. It reacted by deleting my document, at
which point I screamed at it and threatened to pull the power cord. I
didn't get a chance; the force-feedback gloves started choking me."

"We told Clippit it had the right to remain silent, and so on," said a
campus police officer. "The paperclip responded, 'Hi, I'm Clippit, the
Office Assistant. Would you like to create a letter?' I said, 'Look here,
Mr. Paperclip. You're being charged with attempted murder.' At that point
the computer bluescreened."
The Socioeconomic Group Formerly Known As "Geeks"

Nobody wants to be called a "geek" anymore. The label, once worn proudly by
members of the tech community as a symbol of their separation from mainstream
society, is now suddenly out of style.

It all started last week when some clueless PR firm released a list of the
"Top 100 Geeks", including such anti-geeks as Bill Gates, Janet Reno, Paul
Allen, and Jeff "One-Click" Bezos. Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal reported
that businessmen in South Korea are striving for the "Geek Chic" image by
dressing like Bill Gates.

Now that the Chief Bloatware Architect has been identified as a "geek",
everybody else has bailed ship. Still undecided on a new label, the community
now calls itself the S.E.G.K.A.G. (SocioEconomic Group formerly Known As
Geeks).

"I cannot tolerate belonging to the same subculture as Bill Gates!" explained
one former geek. "If that manifestation of evil is called a 'geek', then so be
it. I am now officially a nerd."
Microsoft Website Crashes, World Does Not Come To An End

REDMOND, WA -- In a crushing blow to Bill Gates' ego, world civilization
did not collapse when the Microsoft website was offline for an extended
period last week.

During the anti-trust trial, Microsoft's lawyers repeatedly warned that if
the company was broken up or dealt any other penalty (no matter how
trivial), it would not only cost the tech industry billions of dollars,
but it could decimate the entire world economy and even bring about the
start of World War III. At the risk of sounding like a biased, slanted,
overzealous journalist, let me just say: Yeah, right!

The stunning realization that the world does not revolve around Redmond
(yet) has plunged many Microsoft executives into shock. "But microsoft.com
is the single most important website in the world! And Microsoft is the
single most important company in the Universe! This can't be happening!
Why isn't civilization teetering on the edge right now?" said one
depressed President Of Executive Vice.
Jon Splatz's Movie Review: "Lord of the Pings"

I've never walked out on a movie before. When I pay $9.50 to see a movie
(plus $16.50 for snacks), I'm going to sit through every single minute no
matter how awful. The resolve to get my money's worth allowed me to watch
Jar Jar Binks without even flinching last year.

But I couldn't make it through "Lord of the Pings". This movie contains a
scene that is so appalling, so despicable, so vile, so terrible, so
crappy, and so gut-wrenching that I simply had to get up, run out of the
theater, and puke in the nearest restroom. It was just that bad.

The whole thing is completely ruined by a scene that takes place only 52
seconds into the flick. Brace yourself: big letters appear on screen that
say "An AOL/Time Warner Production".

...

Because this film is brought to you by the letters A-O-L-T-W, I must give
it an F-minus even though I've only seen 53 seconds of it.
Severe Acronym Shortage Cripples Computer Industry

SILICON VALLEY, CALIFORNIA (SVC) -- According to a recent study by the
Blartner Group, 99.5% of all possible five letter combinations have
already been appropriated for computer industry acronyms. The impending
shortage of 5LC's is casting a dark shadow over the industry, which relies
heavily on short, easy-to-remember acronyms for everything.

"Acronym namespace collisions (ANCs) are increasing at a fantastic rate
and threaten the very fabric of the computing world," explained one ZD
pundit. "For example, when somebody talks about XP, I don't know whether
they mean eXtreme Programming or Microsoft's eXceptionally Pathetic
operating system. We need to find a solution now or chaos will result."

Leaders of several SVC companies have floated the idea of an
"industry-wide acronym conservation protocol" (IWACP -- one of the few
5LCs not already appropriated). Explained Bob Smith, CTO of IBM, "If
companies would voluntarily limit the creation of new acronyms while
recycling outdated names, we could reduce much of the pollution within the
acronym namespace ourselves. The last thing we want is for Congress to get
involved and try to impose a solution for this SAS (Severe Acronym
Shortage) that would likely only create many new acronyms in the process."
A man is crawling through the Sahara desert when he is approached by another
man riding on a camel.  When the rider gets close enough, the crawling man
whispers through his sun-parched lips, "Water... please... can you give...
water..."
        "I'm sorry," replies the man on the camel, "I don't have any water
with me.  But I'd be delighted to sell you a necktie."
        "Tie?" whispers the man.  "I need *water*."
        "They're only four dollars apiece."
        "I need *water*."
        "Okay, okay, say two for seven dollars."
        "Please!  I need *water*!", says the man.
        "I don't have any water, all I have are ties," replies the salesman,
and he heads off into the distance.
        The man, losing track of time, crawls for what seems like days.
Finally, nearly dead, sun-blind and with his skin peeling and blistering, he
sees a restaurant in the distance.  Summoning the last of his strength he
staggers up to the door and confronts the head waiter.
        "Water... can I get... water," the dying man manages to stammer.
        "I'm sorry, sir, ties required."
A pretty foot is one of the greatest gifts of nature... please send me your
last pair of shoes, already worn out in dancing... so I can have something
of yours to press against my heart.
                -- Goethe
But Officer, I stopped for the last one, and it was green!
Don't tell me what you dreamed last night for I've been reading Freud.
Don't try to have the last word -- you might get it.
                -- Lazarus Long
Friendships last when each friend thinks he has a slight superiority
over the other.
                -- Honore DeBalzac
If you lived today as if it were your last, you'd buy up a box of rockets
and fire them all off, wouldn't you?
                -- Garrison Keillor
Intolerance is the last defense of the insecure.
Last guys don't finish nice.
                -- Stanley Kelley, on the cult of victory at all costs
Short people get rained on last.
The last time I saw him he was walking down Lover's Lane holding his own hand.
                -- Fred Allen
You could get a new lease on life -- if only you didn't need the first
and last month in advance.
He liked fishing a little too much, and he believed that work was
something a man did when he had to.  He had always been able to get
along well enough without it, especially for the last couple of
years.
                -- "The Stone Giant", James P. Blaylock
"I suppose this is the Linus Torvalds version of Fermats Last Theorem :-)
(Leaving people wondering "why" for hundreds of years...)"

        - Timmy Thorn on kernel/sched.c:schedule()
"I admit I've done too much playing around without understanding
the issues involved over the last years as well, but it's time
to stop reinventing the (sometimes octangular) wheel and learn
everything from history which we can learn."

        - Rik van Riel
cp -a fs/ext{2,69}
cp -a include/linux/ext{2,69}_fs.h
cp -a include/linux/ext{2,69}_fs_i.h
cp -a include/linux/ext{2,69}_fs_sb.h
for i in fs/ext69/* include/linux/ext69*; do
        vi '-cse ext|%s/(ext|EXT)2/\169/g|x' $i;
done
vi '-c/EXT/|y|pu|s/2/69/|s/Second/FUBAR/|x' fs/Config.in
vi '-c/ext2/|y|pu|s/ext2/ext69/g|//|y|pu|&g|//|y|pu|&g|//|y|pu|&g|x' \
  include/linux/fs.h

had done the trick last time I needed something like that, but that was long
time ago...

        - Al Viro explaining some simple commands on linux-kernel
This is probably the first and last time I will openly agree for someone
to tell me were to go, and do it ;-).

        - Andre Hedrick on linux-kernel
Eric Biederman wrote:
> That added to the fact that last time someone ran the numbers linux
> was considerably faster than the BSD for mm type operations when not
> swapping.  And this is the common case.

"Linux VM works wonderfully when nobody is using it"

        - Alan Cox on linux-kernel
The last time I looked, Solaris and AIX and all the rest of the "scalable"
systems were absolute pigs on smaller hardware, and the "scalability" in
them often translates into "we scale linearly to many CPU's by being
really bad even on one".

        - Linus Torvalds
indent does _not_ solve the problem of:
        * buggers who use typedefs like WORD, DWORD, BYTE, IMANIDIOTSHOOTME
        and other crap from the same source (OK, they don't write the last one
        explicitly - not that it wasn't obvious from the rest of their,
        ahem, code).

        - Alexander Viro on coding style
Heaven and Earth last forever.
Why do heaven and Earth last forever?
They are unborn,
So ever living.
The sage stays behind, thus he is ahead.
He is detached, thus at one with all.
Through selfless action, he attains fulfillment.
To talk little is natural.
High winds do not last all morning.
Heavy rain does not last all day.
Why is this?  Heaven and Earth!
If heaven and Earth cannot make things eternal,
How is it possible for man?
He who follows the Tao
Is at one with the Tao.
He who is virtuous
Experiences Virtue.
He who loses the way
Is lost.
When you are at one with the Tao,
The Tao welcomes you.
When you are at one with Virtue,
The Virtue is always there.
When you are at one with loss,
The loss is experienced willingly.

He who does not trust enough
Will not be trusted.
He who is filled with Virtue is like a newborn child.
Wasps and serpents will not sting him;
Wild beasts will not pounce upon him;
He will not be attacked by birds of prey.
His bones are soft, his muscles weak,
But his grip is firm.
He has not experienced the union of man and woman, but is whole.
His manhood is strong.
He screams all day without becoming hoarse.
This is perfect harmony.

Knowing harmony is constancy.
Knowing constancy is enlightenment.

It is not wise to rush about.
Controlling the breath causes strain.
If too much energy is used, exhaustion follows.
This is not the way of Tao.
Whatever is contrary to Tao will not last long.
And he climbed with the lad up the Eiffelberg Tower.  "This," cried the Mayor,
"is your town's darkest hour!  The time for all Whos who have blood that is red
to come to the aid of their country!" he said.  "We've GOT to make noises in
greater amounts!  So, open your mouth, lad!  For every voice counts!"  Thus he
spoke as he climbed.  When they got to the top, the lad cleared his throat and
he shouted out, "YOPP!"
        And that Yopp...  That one last small, extra Yopp put it over!
Finally, at last!  From the speck on that clover their voices were heard!
They rang out clear and clean.  And they elephant smiled.  "Do you see what
I mean?" They've proved they ARE persons, no matter how small.  And their
whole world was saved by the smallest of All!"
        "How true!  Yes, how true," said the big kangaroo.  "And, from now
on, you know what I'm planning to do?  From now on, I'm going to protect
them with you!"  And the young kangaroo in her pouch said, "ME TOO!  From
the sun in the summer.  From rain when it's fall-ish, I'm going to protect
them.  No matter how small-ish!"
                -- Dr. Seuss "Horton Hears a Who"
Article the Third:
        Where a crime of the kidneys has been committed, the accused should
        enjoy the right to a speedy diaper change.  Public announcements and
        guided tours of the aforementioned are not necessary.
Article the Fourth:
        The decision to eat strained lamb or not should be with the "feedee"
        and not the "feeder".  Blowing the strained lamb into the feeder's
        face should be accepted as an opinion, not as a declaration of war.
Article the Fifth:
        Babies should enjoy the freedom to vocalize, whether it be in church,
        a public meeting place, during a movie, or after hours when the
        lights are out.  They have not yet learned that joy and laughter have
        to last a lifetime and must be conserved.
                -- Erma Bombeck, "A Baby's Bill of Rights"
I opened the drawer of my little desk and a single letter fell out, a
letter from my mother, written in pencil, one of her last, with unfinished
words and an implicit sense of her departure.  It's so curious: one can
resist tears and "behave" very well in the hardest hours of grief.  But
then someone makes you a friendly sign behind a window... or one notices
that a flower that was in bud only yesterday has suddenly blossomed... or
a letter slips from a drawer... and everything collapses.
                -- Letters From Colette
If pregnancy were a book they would cut the last two chapters.
                -- Nora Ephron, "Heartburn"
My boy is a mean kid.  I came home the other day and saw him taping worms
to the sidewalk, he sits there and watches the birds get hernias.  Well,
only last Christmas I gave him a B-B gun and he gave me a sweatshirt with
a bulls-eye on the back.

I told my kids, "Someday, you'll have kids of your own."  One of them
said, "So will you."
                -- Rodney Dangerfield
Remember that as a teenager you are in the last stage of your life when
you will be happy to hear that the phone is for you.
                -- Fran Lebowitz, "Social Studies"
What really shapes and conditions and makes us is somebody only a few of
us ever have the courage to face: and that is the child you once were,
long before formal education ever got its claws into you -- that
impatient, all-demanding child who wants love and power and can't get
enough of either and who goes on raging and weeping in your spirit till
at last your eyes are closed and all the fools say, "Doesn't he look
peaceful?" It is those pent-up, craving children who make all the wars
and all the horrors and all the art and all the beauty and discovery in
life, because they are trying to achieve what lay beyond their grasp
before they were five years old.
                -- Robertson Davies, "The Rebel Angels"
<Overfiend> partycle: I seriously do need a vacation from this package.
            I actually had a DREAM about introducing a stupid new bug
            into xbase-preinst last night.  That's a Bad Sign.
"What does this tell me?  That if Microsoft were the last software
company left in the world, 13% of the US population would be scouring
garage sales & Goodwill for old TRS-80s, CPM machines & Apple ]['s before
they would buy Microsoft. That's not exactly a ringing endorsement."
        -- Seen on Slashdot
Last time I had intimate contact with another human being was rather a
painful experience... I rather liked it... ;)
        -- Brett Manz
I'd been hearing all sorts of gloom and doom predictions for Y2K, so I
thought I'd heed some of the advice that the experts have been giving:
Fill up the car's gas tank, stock up on canned goods, fill up the bathtub
with water, and so on.

I guess I wasn't fully awake when I completed my preparations late last
night.  This morning I found the kitchen shelves soaked in gasoline, water
in the car's gas tank, and my bathtub filled with baked beans.
        -- Dan Pearl in a message to rec.humor.funny
<wli> Yeah, I looked at esd and it looked like the kind of C code that an
      ex-JOVIAL/Algol '60 coder who had spent the last 20 years bouncing
      between Fortran-IV and Fortran '77 would write.
In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really
good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they actually change
their minds and you never hear that old view from them again.  They really
do it.  It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are
human and change is sometimes painful.  But it happens every day.  I cannot
recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
        -- Carl Sagan, 1987 CSICOP keynote address
A certain old cat had made his home in the alley behind Gabe's bar for some
time, subsisting on scraps and occasional handouts from the bartender.  One
evening, emboldened by hunger, the feline attempted to follow Gabe through
the back door.  Regrettably, only the his body had made it through when
the door slammed shut, severing the cat's tail at its base.  This proved too
much for the old creature, who looked sadly at Gabe and expired on the spot.
        Gabe put the carcass back out in the alley and went back to business.
The mandatory closing time arrived and Gabe was in the process of locking up
after the last customers had gone.  Approaching the back door he was startled
to see an apparition of the old cat mournfully holding its severed tail out,
silently pleading for Gabe to put the tail back on its corpse so that it could
go on to the kitty afterworld complete.
        Gabe shook his head sadly and said to the ghost, "I can't.  You know
the law -- no retailing spirits after 2:00 AM."
For three years, the young attorney had been taking his brief
vacations at this country inn.  The last time he'd finally managed an
affair with the innkeeper's daughter.  Looking forward to an exciting
few days, he dragged his suitcase up the stairs of the inn, then stopped
short.  There sat his lover with an infant on her lap!
        "Helen, why didn't you write when you learned you were pregnant?"
he cried.  "I would have rushed up here, we could have gotten married,
and the baby would have my name!"
        "Well," she said, "when my folks found out about my condition,
we sat up all night talkin' and talkin' and finally decided it would be
better to have a bastard in the family than a lawyer."
There is no doubt that my lawyer is honest.  For example, when he
filed his income tax return last year, he declared half of his salary
as 'unearned income.'
                -- Michael Lara
Dying is a very dull, dreary affair.  My advice to you is to have
nothing whatever to do with it.
                -- W. Somerset Maughm, his last words
Either I'm dead or my watch has stopped.
                -- Groucho Marx's last words
Execute every act of thy life as though it were thy last.
                -- Marcus Aurelius
Mohandas K. Gandhi often changed his mind publicly.  An aide once asked him
how he could so freely contradict this week what he had said just last week.
The great man replied that it was because this week he knew better.
        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.
                -- Richard Bach
You will always find something in the last place you look.
I've run DOOM more in the last few days than I have the last few
months.  I just love debugging ;-)
        -- Linus Torvalds
Q: Why shouldn't I simply delete the stuff I never use, it's just taking up
   space?
A: This question is in the category of Famous Last Words..
        -- From the Frequently Unasked Questions
By the way, I can hardly feel sorry for you... All last night I had to listen
to her tears, so great they were redirected to a stream.  What?  Of _course_
you didn't know.  You and your little group no longer have any permissions
around here.  She changed her .lock files, too.
        -- Kevin M. Bealer, commenting on the private life of a Linux nerd
<Overfiend> partycle: I seriously do need a vacation from this
            package.  I actually had a DREAM about introducing a
            stupid new bug into xbase-preinst last night.  That's a
            Bad Sign.
        -- Seen on #Debian shortly before the release of Debian 2.0
A traveling salesman was driving past a farm when he saw a pig with three
wooden legs executing a magnificent series of backflips and cartwheels.
Intrigued, he drove up to the farmhouse, where he found an old farmer
sitting in the yard watching the pig.  
        "That's quite a pig you have there, sir" said the salesman.
        "Sure is, son," the farmer replied.  "Why, two years ago, my daughter
was swimming in the lake and bumped her head and damned near drowned, but that
pig swam out and dragged her back to shore."
        "Amazing!"  the salesman exlaimed.
        "And that's not the only thing.  Last fall I was cuttin' wood up on
the north forty when a tree fell on me.  Pinned me to the ground, it did.  
That pig run up and wiggled underneath that tree and lifted it off of me.
Saved my life."
        "Fantastic!  the salesman said.  But tell me, how come the pig has
three wooden legs?"
        The farmer stared at the newcomer in amazement.  "Mister, when you
got an amazin' pig like that, you don't eat him all at once."
All this big deal about white collar crime -- what's WRONG with white collar
crime?  Who enjoys his job today?  You?  Me?  Anybody?  The only satisfying
part of any job is coffee break, lunch hour and quitting time.  Years ago
there was at least the hope of improvement -- eventual promotion -- more
important jobs to come.  Once you can be sold the myth that you may make
president of the company you'll hardly ever steal stamps.  But nobody
believes he's going to be president anymore.  The more people change jobs
the more they realize that there is a direct connection between working for
a living and total stupefying boredom.  So why NOT take revenge?  You're not
going to find ME knocking a guy because he pads an expense account and his
home stationery carries the company emblem.  Take away crime from the white
collar worker and you will rob him of his last vestige of job interest.
                -- J. Feiffer
But the greatest Electrical Pioneer of them all was Thomas Edison, who was a
brilliant inventor despite the fact that he had little formal education and
lived in New Jersey.  Edison's first major invention in 1877, was the
phonograph, which could soon be found in thousands of American homes, where
it basically sat until 1923, when the record was invented.  But Edison's
greatest achievement came in 1879, when he invented the electric company.
Edison's design was a brilliant adaptation of the simple electrical circuit:
the electric company sends electricity through a wire to a customer, then
immediately gets the electricity back through another wire, then (this is
the brilliant part) sends it right back to the customer again.

This means that an electric company can sell a customer the same batch of
electricity thousands of times a day and never get caught, since very few
customers take the time to examine their electricity closely. In fact the
last year any new electricity was generated in the United States was 1937;
the electric companies have been merely re-selling it ever since, which is
why they have so much free time to apply for rate increases.
                -- Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?"
It's fabulous!  We haven't seen anything like it in the last half an hour!
                -- Macy's
Nothing makes a person more productive than the last minute.
Some people have a great ambition: to build something
that will last, at least until they've finished building it.
The departing division general manager met a last time with his young
successor and gave him three envelopes.  "My predecessor did this for me,
and I'll pass the tradition along to you," he said.  "At the first sign
of trouble, open the first envelope.  Any further difficulties, open the
second envelope.  Then, if problems continue, open the third envelope.
Good luck."  The new manager returned to his office and tossed the envelopes
into a drawer.
        Six months later, costs soared and earnings plummeted. Shaken, the
young man opened the first envelope, which said, "Blame it all on me."
        The next day, he held a press conference and did just that.  The
crisis passed.
        Six months later, sales dropped precipitously.  The beleagured
manager opened the second envelope.  It said, "Reorganize."
        He held another press conference, announcing that the division
would be restructured.  The crisis passed.
        A year later, everything went wrong at once and the manager was
blamed for all of it.  The harried executive closed his office door, sank
into his chair, and opened the third envelope.
        "Prepare three envelopes..." it said.
The first 90% of a project takes 90% of the time, the last 10% takes the
other 90% of the time.
The last person that quit or was fired will be held responsible for
everything that goes wrong -- until the next person quits or is fired.
What they said:
        What they meant:

"If you knew this person as well as I know him, you would think as much
of him as I do."
        (Or as little, to phrase it slightly more accurately.)
"Her input was always critical."
        (She never had a good word to say.)
"I have no doubt about his capability to do good work."
        (And it's nonexistent.)
"This candidate would lend balance to a department like yours, which
already has so many outstanding members."
        (Unless you already have a moron.)
"His presentation to my seminar last semester was truly remarkable:
one unbelievable result after another."
        (And we didn't believe them, either.)
"She is quite uniform in her approach to any function you may assign her."
        (In fact, to life in general...)
What they say:                        What they mean:

New                                Different colors from previous version.
All New                                Not compatible with previous version.
Exclusive                        Nobody else has documentation.
Unmatched                        Almost as good as the competition.
Design Simplicity                The company wouldn't give us any money.
Fool-proof Operation                All parameters are hard-coded.
Advanced Design                        Nobody really understands it.
Here At Last                        Didn't get it done on time.
Field Tested                        We don't have any simulators.
Years of Development                Finally got one to work.
Unprecedented Performance        Nothing ever ran this slow before.
Revolutionary                        Disk drives go 'round and 'round.
Futuristic                        Only runs on a next generation supercomputer.
No Maintenance                        Impossible to fix.
Performance Proven                Worked through Beta test.
Meets Tough Quality Standards        It compiles without errors.
Satisfaction Guaranteed                We'll send you another pack if it fails.
Stock Item                        We shipped it before and can do it again.
XI:
        If the Earth could be made to rotate twice as fast, managers would
        get twice as much done.  If the Earth could be made to rotate twenty
        times as fast, everyone else would get twice as much done since all
        the managers would fly off.
XII:
        It costs a lot to build bad products.
XIII:
        There are many highly successful businesses in the United States.
        There are also many highly paid executives.  The policy is not to
        intermingle the two.
XIV:
        After the year 2015, there will be no airplane crashes.  There will
        be no takeoffs either, because electronics will occupy 100 percent
        of every airplane's weight.
XV:
        The last 10 percent of performance generates one-third of the cost
        and two-thirds of the problems.
                -- Norman Augustine
last|perl -pe '$_ x=/(..:..)...(.*)/&&"'$1'"ge$1&&"'$1'"lt$2'
That's gonna be tough for Randal to beat...  :-)
             -- Larry Wall in  <1991Apr29.072206.5621@jpl-devvax.jpl.nasa.gov>
I love you more than anything in this world.  I don't expect that will last.
                -- Elvis Costello
"I'd love to go out with you, but the last time I went out, I never came back."
Love -- the last of the serious diseases of childhood.
The giraffe you thought you offended last week is willing to be nuzzled today.
The only difference in the game of love over the last few thousand years
is that they've changed trumps from clubs to diamonds.
                -- The Indianapolis Star
But was he mature enough last night at the lesbian masquerade?
Didn't I buy a 1951 Packard from you last March in Cairo?
... or were you driving the PONTIAC that HONKED at me in MIAMI last Tuesday?
"How do you know she is a unicorn?" Molly demanded.  "And why were you afraid
to let her touch you?  I saw you.  You were afraid of her."
        "I doubt that I will feel like talking for very long," the cat
replied without rancor.  "I would not waste time in foolishness if I were
you.  As to your first question, no cat out of its first fur can ever be
deceived by appearances.  Unlike human beings, who enjoy them.  As for your
second question --"  Here he faltered, and suddenly became very interested
in washing; nor would he speak until he had licked himself fluffy and then
licked himself smooth again.  Even then he would not look at Molly, but
examined his claws.
        "If she had touched me," he said very softly, "I would have been
hers and not my own, not ever again."
                -- Peter S. Beagle, "The Last Unicorn"
        "Then what is magic for?" Prince Lir demanded wildly.  "What use is
wizardry if it cannot save a unicorn?"  He gripped the magician's shoulder
hard, to keep from falling.
        Schmendrick did not turn his head.  With a touch of sad mockery in
his voice, he said, "That's what heroes are for."
...
        "Yes, of course," he [Prince Lir] said.  "That is exactly what heroes
are for.  Wizards make no difference, so they say that nothing does, but
heroes are meant to die for unicorns."
                -- Peter Beagle, "The Last Unicorn"
What use is magic if it can't save a unicorn?
                -- Peter S. Beagle, "The Last Unicorn"
A doctor calls his patient to give him the results of his tests.  "I have
some bad news," says the doctor, "and some worse news."  The bad news is
that you only have six weeks to live."
        "Oh, no," says the patient.  "What could possibly be worse than that?"
        "Well," the doctor replies, "I've been trying to reach you since
last Monday."
Better to use medicines at the outset than at the last moment.
        "Welcome back for you 13th consecutive week, Evelyn.  Evelyn, will
you go into the auto-suggestion booth and take your regular place on the
psycho-prompter couch?"
        "Thank you, Red."
        "Now, Evelyn, last week you went up to $40,000 by properly citing
your rivalry with your sibling as a compulsive sado-masochistic behavior
pattern which developed out of an early post-natal feeding problem."
        "Yes, Red."
        "But -- later, when asked about pre-adolescent oedipal phantasy
repressions, you rationalized twice and mental blocked three times.  Now,
at $300 per rationalization and $500 per mental block you lost $2,100 off
your $40,000 leaving you with a total of $37,900.  Now, any combination of
two more mental blocks and either one rationalization or three defensive
projections will put you out of the game.  Are you willing to go ahead?"
        "Yes, Red."
        "I might say here that all of Evelyn's questions and answers have
been checked for accuracy with her analyst.  Now, Evelyn, for $80,000
explain the failure of your three marriages."
        "Well, I--"
        "We'll get back to Evelyn in one minute.  First a word about our
product."
                -- Jules Feiffer
Your digestive system is your body's Fun House, whereby food goes on a long,
dark, scary ride, taking all kinds of unexpected twists and turns, being
attacked by vicious secretions along the way, and not knowing until the last
minute whether it will be turned into a useful body part or ejected into the
Dark Hole by Mister Sphincter.  We Americans live in a nation where the
medical-care system is second to none in the world, unless you count maybe
25 or 30 little scuzzball countries like Scotland that we could vaporize in
seconds if we felt like it.
                -- Dave Barry, "Stay Fit & Healthy Until You're Dead"
No guarantee of accuracy or completeness!
©TU Chemnitz, 2006-2024
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