DEEn Dictionary De - En
DeEs De - Es
DePt De - Pt
 Vocabulary trainer

Spec. subjects Grammar Abbreviations Random search Preferences
Search in Sprachauswahl
give
Search for:
Mini search box
 
Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) by Linux fortune

A Hollywood producer calls a friend, another producer on the phone.
        "Hello?" his friend answers.
        "Hi!" says the man.  "This is Bob, how are you doing?"
        "Oh," says the friend, "I'm doing great!  I just sold a screenplay
for two hundred thousand dollars.  I've started a novel adaptation and the
studio advanced me fifty thousand dollars on it.  I also have a television
series coming on next week, and everyone says it's going to be a big hit!
I'm doing *great*!  How are you?"
        "Okay," says the producer, "give me a call when he leaves."
        A shy teenage boy finally worked up the nerve to give a gift to
Madonna, a young puppy.  It hitched its waggin' to a star.
A young man wrote to Mozart and said:

Q: "Herr Mozart, I am thinking of writing symphonies. Can you give me any
   suggestions as to how to get started?"
A: "A symphony is a very complex musical form, perhaps you should begin with
   some simple lieder and work your way up to a symphony."
Q: "But Herr Mozart, you were writing symphonies when you were 8 years old."
A: "But I never asked anybody how."
It proves what they say, give the public what they want to see and
they'll come out for it.
                -- Red Skelton, surveying the funeral of Hollywood mogul
                   Harry Cohn
It took me fifteen years to discover that I had no talent for writing,
but I couldn't give it up because by that time I was too famous.
                -- Robert Benchley
Potahto' Pictures Productions Presents:

        THE TATERNATOR: Cyborg spud returns from the future to present-day
McDonald's restaurant to kill the potatoess (girl 'tater) who will give birth
to the world's largest french fry (The Dark Powers of Burger King are clearly
behind this).  Most quotable line: "Ah'll be baked..."

        A FISTFUL OF FRIES: Western in which our hero, The Spud with No Name,
rides into a town that's deprived of carbohydrates thanks to the evil takeover
of the low-cal Scallopinni Brothers.  Plenty of smokeouts, fry-em-ups, and
general butter-melting by all.

        FOR A FEW FRIES MORE: Takes up where AFOF left off!  Cameo by Walter
Cronkite, as every man's common 'tater!
The Great Movie Posters:

SCENES THAT WILL STAGGER YOUR SIGHT!
-- DANCING CALLED GO-GO
-- MUSIC CALLED JU-JU
-- NARCOTICS CALLED BANGI!
-- FIRES OF PUBERTY!
        SEE the burning of a virgin!
        SEE power of witch doctor over women!
        SEE pygmies with fantastic Physical Endowments!!!
                -- Kwaheri (1965)

The Big Comedy of Nineteen-Sexty-Sex!
                -- Boeing-Boeing (1965)

AN ASTRONAUT WENT UP-
A "GUESS WHAT" CAME DOWN!
        The picture that comes complete with a 10-foot tall monster to
give you the wim-wams!
                -- Monster a Go-Go (1965)
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"
If you have received a letter inviting you to speak at the dedication of a
new cat hospital, and you hate cats, your reply, declining the invitation,
does not necessarily have to cover the full range of your emotions.  You must
make it clear that you will not attend, but you do not have to let fly at cats.
The writer of the letter asked a civil question; attack cats, then, only if
you can do so with good humor, good taste, and in such a way that your answer
will be courteous as well as responsive.  Since you are out of sympathy with
cats, you may quite properly give this as a reason for not appearing at the
dedication ceremonies of a cat hospital.  But bear in mind that your opinion
of cats was not sought, only your services as a speaker.  Try to keep things
straight.
                -- Strunk and White, "The Elements of Style"
Just pick up the phone and give modem connect sounds. "Well you said we should get more lines so we don't have voice lines."
"Speak, thou vast and venerable head," muttered Ahab, "which, though
ungarnished with a beard, yet here and there lookest hoary with mosses; speak,
mighty head, and tell us the secret thing that is in thee.  Of all divers,
thou has dived the deepest.  That head upon which the upper sun now gleams has
moved amid the world's foundations.  Where unrecorded names and navies rust,
and untold hopes and anchors rot; where in her murderous hold this frigate
earth is ballasted with bones of millions of the drowned; there, in that awful
water-land, there was thy most familiar home.  Thou hast been where bell or
diver never went; has slept by many a sailer's side, where sleepless mothers
would give their lives to lay them down.  Thou saw'st the locked lovers when
leaping from their flaming ship; heart to heart they sank beneath the exulting
wave; true to each other, when heaven seemed false to them.  Thou saw'st the
murdered mate when tossed by pirates from the midnight deck; for hours he fell
into the deeper midnight of the insatiate maw; and his murderers still sailed
on unharmed -- while swift lightnings shivered the neighboring ship that would
have borne a righteous husband to outstretched, longing arms.  O head! thou has
seen enough to split the planets and make an infidel of Abraham, and not one
syllable is thine!"
                -- H. Melville, "Moby Dick"
The Least Perceptive Literary Critic
        The most important critic in our field of study is Lord Halifax.  A
most individual judge of poetry, he once invited Alexander Pope round to
give a public reading of his latest poem.
        Pope, the leading poet of his day, was greatly surprised when Lord
Halifax stopped him four or five times and said, "I beg your pardon, Mr.
Pope, but there is something in that passage that does not quite please me."
        Pope was rendered speechless, as this fine critic suggested sizeable
and unwise emendations to his latest masterpiece.  "Be so good as to mark
the place and consider at your leisure.  I'm sure you can give it a better
turn."
        After the reading, a good friend of Lord Halifax, a certain Dr.
Garth, took the stunned Pope to one side.  "There is no need to touch the
lines," he said.  "All you need do is leave them just as they are, call on
Lord Halifax two or three months hence, thank him for his kind observation
on those passages, and then read them to him as altered.  I have known him
much longer than you have, and will be answerable for the event."
        Pope took his advice, called on Lord Halifax and read the poem
exactly as it was before.  His unique critical faculties had lost none of
their edge.  "Ay", he commented, "now they are perfectly right.  Nothing can
be better."
                -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures"
A computer salesman visits a company president for the purpose of selling
the president one of the latest talking computers.
Salesman:        "This machine knows everything. I can ask it any question
                and it'll give the correct answer.  Computer, what is the
                speed of light?"
Computer:        186,282 miles per second.
Salesman:        "Who was the first president of the United States?"
Computer:        George Washington.
President:        "I'm still not convinced. Let me ask a question.
                Where is my father?"
Computer:        Your father is fishing in Georgia.
President:        "Hah!! The computer is wrong. My father died over twenty
                years ago!"
Computer:        Your mother's husband died 22 years ago. Your father just
                landed a twelve pound bass.
        A disciple of another sect once came to Drescher as he was eating
his morning meal.  "I would like to give you this personality test", said
the outsider, "because I want you to be happy."
        Drescher took the paper that was offered him and put it into the
toaster -- "I wish the toaster to be happy too".
        A manager was about to be fired, but a programmer who worked for him
invented a new program that became popular and sold well.  As a result, the
manager retained his job.
        The manager tried to give the programmer a bonus, but the programmer
refused it, saying, "I wrote the program because I though it was an interesting
concept, and thus I expect no reward."
        The manager, upon hearing this, remarked, "This programmer, though he
holds a position of small esteem, understands well the proper duty of an
employee.  Lets promote him to the exalted position of management consultant!"
        But when told this, the programmer once more refused, saying, "I exist
so that I can program.  If I were promoted, I would do nothing but waste
everyone's time.  Can I go now?  I have a program that I'm working on."
                -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"
===  ALL USERS PLEASE NOTE  ========================

Compiler optimizations have been made to macro expand LET into a WITHOUT-
INTERRUPTS special form so that it can PUSH things into a stack in the
LET-OPTIMIZATION area, SETQ the variables and then POP them back when it's
done.  Don't worry about this unless you use multiprocessing.
Note that LET *could* have been defined by:

        (LET ((LET '`(LET ((LET ',LET))
                        ,LET)))
        `(LET ((LET ',LET))
                ,LET))

This is believed to speed up execution by as much as a factor of 1.01 or
3.50 depending on whether you believe our friendly marketing representatives.
This code was written by a new programmer here (we snatched him away from
Itty Bitti Machines where he was writing COUGHBOL code) so to give him
confidence we trusted his vows of "it works pretty well" and installed it.
===  ALL USERS PLEASE NOTE  ========================

The garbage collector now works.  In addition a new, experimental garbage
collection algorithm has been installed.  With SI:%DSK-GC-QLX-BITS set to 17,
(NOT the default) the old garbage collection algorithm remains in force; when
virtual storage is filled, the machine cold boots itself.  With SI:%DSK-GC-
QLX-BITS set to 23, the new garbage collector is enabled.  Unlike most garbage
collectors, the new gc starts its mark phase from the mind of the user, rather
than from the obarray.  This allows the garbage collection of significantly
more Qs.  As the garbage collector runs, it may ask you something like "Do you
remember what SI:RDTBL-TRANS does?", and if you can't give a reasonable answer
in thirty seconds, the symbol becomes a candidate for GCing.  The variable
SI:%GC-QLX-LUSER-TM governs how long the GC waits before timing out the user.
Computers are useless.  They can only give you answers.
                -- Pablo Picasso
Dear Emily:
        How can I choose what groups to post in?
                -- Confused

Dear Confused:
        Pick as many as you can, so that you get the widest audience.  After
all, the net exists to give you an audience.  Ignore those who suggest you
should only use groups where you think the article is highly appropriate.
Pick all groups where anybody might even be slightly interested.
        Always make sure followups go to all the groups.  In the rare event
that you post a followup which contains something original, make sure you
expand the list of groups.  Never include a "Followup-to:" line in the
header, since some people might miss part of the valuable discussion in
the fringe groups.
                -- Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette
GIVE:        Support the helpless victims of computer error.
If this is timesharing, give me my share right now.
The bugs you have to avoid are the ones that give the user not only
the inclination to get on a plane, but also the time.
                -- Kay Bostic
The primary purpose of the DATA statement is to give names to constants;
instead of referring to pi as 3.141592653589793 at every appearance, the
variable PI can be given that value with a DATA statement and used instead
of the longer form of the constant.  This also simplifies modifying the
program, should the value of pi change.
                -- FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers
Unix Express:
All passenger bring a piece of the aeroplane and a box of tools with them to
the airport. They gather on the tarmac, arguing constantly about what kind
of plane they want to build and how to put it together. Eventually, the
passengers split into groups and build several different aircraft, but give
them all the same name. Some passengers actually reach their destinations.
All passengers believe they got there.
                                UNIX Trix

For those of you in the reseller business, here is a helpful tip that will
save your support staff a few hours of precious time.  Before you send your
next machine out to an untrained client, change the permissions on /etc/passwd
to 666 and make sure there is a copy somewhere on the disk.  Now when they
forget the root password, you can easily login as an ordinary user and correct
the damage.  Having a bootable tape (for larger machines) is not a bad idea
either.  If you need some help, give us a call.
                -- CommUNIXque 1:1, ASCAR Business Systems
We don't really understand it, so we'll give it to the programmers.
When someone says "I want a programming language in which I need only
say what I wish done," give him a lollipop.
You know you've been sitting in front of your Lisp machine too long
when you go out to the junk food machine and start wondering how to
make it give you the CADR of Item H so you can get that yummie
chocolate cupcake that's stuck behind the disgusting vanilla one.
Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day.
Teach a man to fish, and he'll invite himself over for dinner.
- Calvin Keegan
The computer can't tell you the emotional story.  It can give you the exact
mathematical design, but what's missing is the eyebrows.
- Frank Zappa
Obviously, a man's judgement cannot be better than the information on which he
has based it.  Give him the truth and he may still go wrong when he has
the chance to be right, but give him no news or present him only with distorted
and incomplete data, with ignorant, sloppy or biased reporting, with propaganda
and deliberate falsehoods, and you destroy his whole reasoning processes, and
make him something less than a man.
-- Arthur Hays Sulzberger
By one count there are some 700 scientists with respectable academic credentials
(out of a total of 480,000 U.S. earth and life scientists) who give credence
to creation-science, the general theory that complex life forms did not evolve
but appeared "abruptly."
- Newsweek, June 29, 1987, pg. 23
I'm often asked the question, "Do you think there is extraterrestrial intelli-
gence?"  I give the standard arguments -- there are a lot of places out there,
and use the word *billions*, and so on.  And then I say it would be astonishing
to me if there weren't extraterrestrial intelligence, but of course there is as
yet no compelling evidence for it.  And then I'm asked, "Yeah, but what do you
really think?"  I say, "I just told you what I really think."  "Yeah, but
what's your gut feeling?"  But I try not to think with my gut.  Really, it's
okay to reserve judgment until the evidence is in.
- Carl Sagan, The Burden Of Skepticism, The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 12, Fall 87
"Largely because it is so tangible and exciting a program and as such will
serve to keep alive the interest and enthusiasm of the whole spectrum of
society...It is justified because...the program can give a sense of shared
adventure and achievement to the society at large."
- Dr. Colin S. Pittendrigh, in "The History of Manned Space Flight"
The idea of man leaving this earth and flying to another celestial body and
landing there and stepping out and walking over that body has a fascination
and a driving force that can get the country to a level of energy, ambition,
and will that I do not see in any other undertaking.  I think if we are
honest with ourselves, we must admit that we needed that impetus extremely
strongly.  I sincerely believe that the space program, with its manned
landing on the moon, if wisely executed, will become the spearhead for a
broad front of courageous and energetic activities in all the fields of
endeavour of the human mind - activities which could not be carried out
except in a mental climate of ambition and confidence which such a spearhead
can give.
- Dr. Martin Schwarzschild, 1962, in "The History of Manned Space Flight"
If only God would give me some clear sign!  Like making a large deposit
in my name at a Swiss Bank.
- Woody Allen
The Bible is not my Book and Christianity is not my religion.  I could
never give assent to the long complicated statements of Christian dogma.
- Abraham Lincoln
The notion that science does not concern itself with first causes -- that it
leaves the field to theology or metaphysics, and confines itself to mere
effects -- this notion has no support in the plain facts.  If it could,
science would explain the origin of life on earth at once--and there is
every reason to believe that it will do so on some not too remote tomorrow.
To argue that gaps in knowledge which will confront the seeker must be filled,
not by patient inquiry, but by intuition or revelation, is simply to give
ignorance a gratuitous and preposterous dignity....
- H. L. Mencken, 1930
We're here to give you a computer, not a religion.
- attributed to Bob Pariseau, at the introduction of the Amiga
...It is sad to find him belaboring the science community for its united
opposition to ignorant creationists who want teachers and textbooks to
give equal time to crank arguments that have advanced not a step beyond
the flyblown rhetoric of Bishop Wilberforce and William Jennings Bryan.
- Martin Gardner, "Irving Kristol and the Facts of Life",
   The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 128-131
The more a man is imbued with the ordered regularity of all events, the firmer
becomes his conviction that there is no room left by the side of this ordered
regularity for causes of a different nature.  For him neither the rule of
human nor the rule of divine will exists as an independent cause of natural
events.  To be sure, the doctrine of a personal God interfering with natural
events could never be refuted, in the real sense, by science, for this
doctrine can always take refuge in those domains in which scientific knowledge
has not yet been able to set foot.

But I am persuaded that such behavior on the part of the representatives
of religion would not only be unworthy but also fatal.  For a doctrine which
is able to maintain itself not in clear light, but only in the dark, will
of necessity lose its effect on mankind, with incalculable harm to human
progress.  In their struggle for the ethical good, teachers of religion
must have the stature to give up the doctrine of a personal God, that is,
give up that source of fear and hope which in the past placed such vast
powers in the hands of priests.  In their labors they will have to avail
themselves of those forces which are capable of cultivating the Good, the
True, and the Beautiful in humanity itself.  This is, to be sure, a more
difficult but an incomparably more worthy task.
- Albert Einstein
We may not be able to persuade Hindus that Jesus and not Vishnu should
govern their spiritual horizon, nor Moslems that Lord Buddha is at the
center of their spiritual universe, nor Hebrews that Mohammed is a major
prohpet, nor Christians that Shinto best expresses their spiritual
concerns, to say nothing of the fact that we may not be able to get
Christians to agree among themselves about their relationship to God.
But all will agree on a proposition that they possess profound spiritual
resources.  If, in addition, we can get them to accept the further
proposition that whatever form the Deity may have in their own theology,
the Deity is not only external, but internal and acts through them, and
they themselves give proof or disproof of the Deity in what they do and
think; if this further proposition can be accepted, then we come that
much closer to a truly religious situation on earth.
- Norman Cousins, from his book "Human Options"
The rule on staying alive as a program manager is to give 'em a number or
give 'em a date, but never give 'em both at once.
"A child is a person who can't understand why someone would give away a
perfectly good kitten."
-- Doug Larson
"And kids... learn something from Susie and Eddie.
If you think there's a maniacal psycho-geek in the
basement:
    1)        Don't give him a chance to hit you on the
        head with an axe!
    2)        Flee the premises... even if you're in your
        underwear.
    3)        Warn the neighbors and call the police.
But whatever else you do... DON'T GO DOWN IN THE DAMN BASEMENT!"
-- Saturday Night Live meets Friday the 13th
"He didn't run for reelection.        `Politics brings you into contact with all the
people you'd give anything to avoid,' he said. `I'm staying home.'"
-- Garrison Keillor, _Lake_Wobegone_Days_
David Letterman's "Things we can be proud of as Americans":
        * Greatest number of citizens who have actually boarded a UFO
        * Many newspapers feature "JUMBLE"
        * Hourly motel rates
        * Vast majority of Elvis movies made here
        * Didn't just give up right away during World War II like some
            countries we could mention
        * Goatees & Van Dykes thought to be worn only by weenies
        * Our well-behaved golf professionals
        * Fabulous babes coast to coast
"I'll rob that rich person and give it to some poor deserving slob.
That will *prove* I'm Robin Hood."
-- Daffy Duck, Looney Tunes, _Robin Hood Daffy_
"This knowledge I pursure is the finest pleasure I have ever known.  I could
no sooner give it up that I could the very air that I breath."
-- Paolo Uccello, Renaissance artist, discoverer of the laws of perspective
"I have a friend who just got back from the Soviet Union, and told me the people
there are hungry for information about the West.  He was asked about many
things, but I will give you two examples that are very revealing about life in
the Soviet Union.  The first question he was asked was if we had exploding
television sets.  You see, they have a problem with the picture tubes on color
television sets, and many are exploding.  They assumed we must be having
problems with them too.  The other question he was asked often was why the
CIA had killed Samantha Smith, the little girl who visited the Soviet Union a
few years ago; their propaganda is very effective.
-- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
   "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 100
HP had a unique policy of allowing its engineers to take parts from stock as
long as they built something.  "They figured that with every design, they were
getting a better engineer.  It's a policy I urge all companies to adopt."
-- Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, "Will Wozniak's class give Apple to teacher?"
   EE Times, June 6, 1988, pg 45
"The stars are made of the same atoms as the earth."  I usually pick one small
topic like this to give a lecture on.  Poets say science takes away from the
beauty of the stars -- mere gobs of gas atoms.  Nothing is "mere."  I too can
see the stars on a desert night, and feel them.  But do I see less or more?
The vastness of the heavens stretches my imagination -- stuck on this carousel
my little eye can catch one-million-year-old light.  A vast pattern -- of which
I am a part -- perhaps my stuff was belched from some forgotten star, as one
is belching there.  Or see them with the greater eye of Palomar, rushing all
apart from some common starting point when they were perhaps all together.
What is the pattern, or the meaning, or the *why?*  It does not do harm to the
mystery to know a little about it.  For far more marvelous is the truth than
any artists of the past imagined!  Why do the poets of the present not speak
of it?  What men are poets who can speak of Jupiter if he were like a man, but
if he is an immense spinning sphere of methane and ammonia must be silent?
-- Richard P. Feynman (1918-1988)
An Animal that knows who it is, one that has a sense of his own identity, is
a discontented creature, doomed to create new problems for himself for the
duration of his stay on this planet.  Since neither the mouse nor the chimp
knows what is, he is spared all the vexing problems that follow this
discovery.  But as soon as the human animal who asked himself this question
emerged, he plunged himself and his descendants into an eternity of doubt
and brooding, speculation and truth-seeking that has goaded him through the
centures as reelentlessly as hunger or sexual longing.  The chimp that does
not know that he exists is not driven to discover his origins and is spared
the tragic necessity of contemplating his own end.  And even if the animal
experimenters succeed in teaching a chimp to count one hundred bananas or
to play chess, the chimp will develop no science and he will exhibit no
appreciation of beauty, for the greatest part of man's wisdom may be traced
back to the eternal questions of beginnings and endings, the quest to give
meaning to his existence, to life itself.
-- Selma Fraiberg, _The Magic Years_, pg. 193
"I dislike companies that have a we-are-the-high-priests-of-hardware-so-you'll-
like-what-we-give-you attitude.  I like commodity markets in which iron-and-
silicon hawkers know that they exist to provide fast toys for software types
like me to play with..."
-- Eric S. Raymond
"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
"They know your name, address, telephone number, credit card numbers, who ELSE
is driving the car "for insurance", ...  your driver's license number. In the
state of Massachusetts, this is the same number as that used for Social
Security, unless you object to such use. In THAT case, you are ASSIGNED a
number and you reside forever more on the list of "weird people who don't give
out their Social Security Number in Massachusetts."
-- Arthur Miller
A serious public debate about the validity of astrology?  A serious believer
in the White House?  Two of them?  Give me a break.  What stifled my laughter
is that the image fits.  Reagan has always exhibited a fey indifference toward
science.  Facts, like numbers, roll off his back.  And we've all come to
accept it.  This time it was stargazing that became a serious issue....Not
that long ago, it was Reagan's support of Creationism....Creationists actually
got equal time with evolutionists.  The public was supposed to be open-minded
to the claims of paleontologists and fundamentalists, as if the two were
scientific colleagues....It has been clear for a long time that the president
is averse to science...In general, these attitudes fall onto friendly American
turf....But at the outer edges, this skepticism about science easily turns
into a kind of naive acceptance of nonscience, or even nonsense.  The same
people who doubt experts can also believe any quackery, from the benefits of
laetrile to eye of newt to the movment of planets.  We lose the capacity to
make rational -- scientific -- judgments.  It's all the same.
-- Ellen Goodman, The Boston Globe Newspaper Company-Washington Post Writers
    Group
"Never give in.  Never give in.  Never. Never. Never."
-- Winston Churchill
"Oh what wouldn't I give to be spat at in the face..."
-- a prisoner in "Life of Brian"
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-- Benjamin Franklin, 1759
I made it a rule to forbear all direct contradictions to the sentiments of
others, and all positive assertion of my own.  I even forbade myself the use
of every word or expression in the language that imported a fixed opinion,
such as "certainly", "undoubtedly", etc.   I adopted instead of them "I
conceive", "I apprehend", or "I imagine" a thing to be so or so; or "so it
appears to me at present".

When another asserted something that I thought an error, I denied myself the
pleasure of contradicting him abruptly, and of showing him immediately some
absurdity in his proposition.  In answering I began by observing that in
certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right, but in the present
case there appeared or semed to me some difference, etc.

I soon found the advantage of this change in my manner; the conversations I
engaged in went on more pleasantly.  The modest way in which I proposed my
opinions procured them a readier reception and less contradiction.  I had
less mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily
prevailed with others to give up their mistakes and join with me when I
happened to be in the right.
-- Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough
to take it all away.
                -- Barry Goldwater
Democracy is the name we give the people whenever we need them.
                -- Arman de Caillavet, 1913
Give all orders verbally.  Never write anything down that might go into a
"Pearl Harbor File".
"Give me enough medals, and I'll win any war."
                -- Napoleon
He didn't run for reelection.  "Politics brings you into contact with all
the people you'd give anything to avoid," he said. "I'm staying home."
                -- Garrison Keillor, "Lake Wobegone Days"
I don't care how poor and inefficient a little country is; they like to
run their own business.  I know men that would make my wife a better
husband than I am; but, darn it, I'm not going to give her to 'em.
                -- The Best of Will Rogers
"I'll rob that rich person and give it to some poor deserving slob.
That will *prove* I'm Robin Hood."
                -- Daffy Duck, "Robin Hood Daffy", [1958, Chuck Jones]
If you give Congress a chance to vote on both sides of an issue, it
will always do it.
                -- Les Aspin, D., Wisconsin
Love America -- or give it back.
Our sires' age was worse that our grandsires'.
We their sons are more worthless than they:
so in our turn we shall give the world a progeny yet more corrupt.
                -- Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Horace)
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
                -- Benjamin Franklin, 1759
With reasonable men I will reason;
with humane men I will plead;
but to tyrants I will give no quarter.
                -- William Lloyd Garrison
A new koan:
        If you have some ice cream, I will give it to you.
        If you have no ice cream, I will take it away from you.
It is an ice cream koan.
Carperpetuation (kar' pur pet u a shun), n.:
        The act, when vacuuming, of running over a string at least a
        dozen times, reaching over and picking it up, examining it, then
        putting it back down to give the vacuum one more chance.
                -- Rich Hall, "Sniglets"
Gold, n.:
        A soft malleable metal relatively scarce in distribution.  It
        is mined deep in the earth by poor men who then give it to rich
        men who immediately bury it back in the earth in great prisons,
        although gold hasn't done anything to them.
                -- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Hlade's Law:
        If you have a difficult task, give it to a lazy person --
        they will find an easier way to do it.
momentum, n.:
        What you give a person when they are going away.
My father taught me three things:
        (1) Never mix whiskey with anything but water.
        (2) Never try to draw to an inside straight.
        (3) Never discuss business with anyone who refuses to give his name.
QOTD:
        "I've got one last thing to say before I go; give me back
        all of my stuff."
share, n.:
        To give in, endure humiliation.
The Consultant's Curse:
        When the customer has beaten upon you long enough, give him
        what he asks for, instead of what he needs.  This is very strong
        medicine, and is normally only required once.
The Modelski Chain Rule:
(1)        Look intently at the problem for several minutes.  Scratch your
        head at 20-30 second intervals.  Try solving the problem on your
        Hewlett-Packard.
(2)        Failing this, look around at the class.  Select a particularly
        bright-looking individual.
(3)        Procure a large chain.
(4)        Walk over to the selected student and threaten to beat him severely
        with the chain unless he gives you the answer to the problem.
        Generally, he will.  It may also be a good idea to give him a sound
        thrashing anyway, just to show you mean business.
The three biggest software lies:
        (1) *Of course* we'll give you a copy of the source.
        (2) *Of course* the third party vendor we bought that from
            will fix the microcode.
        (3) Beta test site?  No, *of course* you're not a beta test site.
Give me a Plumber's friend the size of the Pittsburgh dome, and a place
to stand, and I will drain the world.
GIVE UP!!!!
I'd give my right arm to be ambidextrous.
Just give Alice some pencils and she will stay busy for hours.
When you're ready to give up the struggle, who can you surrender to?
One dusty July afternoon, somewhere around the turn of the century, Patrick
Malone was in Mulcahey's Bar, bending an elbow with the other street car
conductors from the Brooklyn Traction Company.  While they were discussing the
merits of a local ring hero, the bar goes silent.  Malone turns around to see
his wife, with a face grim as death, stalking to the bar.
        Slapping a four-bit piece down on the bar, she draws herself up to her
full five feet five inches and says to Mulcahey, "Give me what himself has
been havin' all these years."
        Mulcahey looks at Malone, who shrugs, and then back at Margaret Mary
Malone.  He sets out a glass and pours her a triple shot of Rye.  The bar is
totally silent as they watch the woman pick up the glass and knock back the
drink.  She slams the glass down on the bar, gasps, shudders slightly, and
passes out; falling straight back, stiff as a board, saved from sudden contact
with the barroom floor by the ample belly of Seamus Fogerty.
        Sometime later, she comes to on the pool table, a jacket under her
head.  Her bloodshot eyes fell upon her husband, who says, "And all these
years you've been thinkin' I've been enjoying meself."
Sam:  What's going on, Normie?
Norm: My birthday, Sammy.  Give me a beer, stick a candle in
      it, and I'll blow out my liver.
                -- Cheers, Where Have All the Floorboards Gone

Woody: Hey, Mr. P.  How goes the search for Mr. Clavin?
Norm:  Not as well as the search for Mr. Donut.
       Found him every couple of blocks.
                -- Cheers, Head Over Hill
Symptom:                Drinking fails to give taste and satisfaction, beer is
                        unusually pale and clear.
Problem:                Glass empty.
Action Required:        Find someone who will buy you another beer.

Symptom:                Drinking fails to give taste and satisfaction,
                        and the front of your shirt is wet.
Fault:                        Mouth not open when drinking or glass applied to
                        wrong part of face.
Action Required:        Buy another beer and practice in front of mirror.
                        Drink as many as needed to perfect drinking technique.
                -- Bar Troubleshooting
There be sober men a'plenty, and drunkards barely twenty; there are men
of over ninety who have never yet kissed a girl.  But give me the rambling
rover, from Orkney down to Dover, we will roam the whole world over, and
together we'll face the world.
                -- Andy Stewart, "After the Hush"
Q:        How many gradual (sorry, that's supposed to be "graduate") students
        does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A:        "I'm afraid we don't know, but make my stipend tax-free, give my
        advisor a $30,000 grant of the taxpayer's money, and I'm sure he
        can tell me how to do the shit work for him so he can take the
        credit for answering this incredibly vital question."
Q:        Why should you always serve a Southern Carolina football man
        soup in a plate?
A:        'Cause if you give him a bowl, he'll throw it away.
                        It's grad exam time...
COMPUTER SCIENCE
        Inside your desk you'll find a listing of the DEC/VMS operating
system in IBM 1710 machine code. Show what changes are necessary to convert
this code into a UNIX Berkeley 7 operating system.  Prove that these fixes are
bug free and run correctly. You should gain at least 150% efficiency in the
new system.  (You should take no more than 10 minutes on this question.)

MATHEMATICS
        If X equals PI times R^2, construct a formula showing how long
it would take a fire ant to drill a hole through a dill pickle, if the
length-girth ratio of the ant to the pickle were 98.17:1.

GENERAL KNOWLEDGE
Describe the Universe.  Give three examples.
David Letterman's "Things we can be proud of as Americans":

        * Greatest number of citizens who have actually boarded a UFO
        * Many newspapers feature "JUMBLE"
        * Hourly motel rates
        * Vast majority of Elvis movies made here
        * Didn't just give up right away during World War II
                like some countries we could mention
        * Goatees & Van Dykes thought to be worn only by weenies
        * Our well-behaved golf professionals
        * Fabulous babes coast to coast
One of the rules of Busmanship, New York style, is never surrender your
seat to another passenger.  This may seem callous, but it is the best
way, really.  If one passenger were to give a seat to someone who fainted
in the aisle, say, the others on the bus would become disoriented and
imagine they were in Topeka Kansas.
There was this New Yorker that had a lifelong ambition to be an Texan.
Fortunately, he had an Texan friend and went to him for advice.  "Mike,
you know I've always wanted to be a Texan.  You're a *____real* Texan, what
should I do?"
        "Well," answered Mike, "The first thing you've got to do is look
like a Texan.  That means you have to dress right.  The second thing
you've got to do is speak in a southern drawl."
        "Thanks, Mike, I'll give it a try," replied the New Yorker.
        A few weeks passed and the New Yorker saunters into a store dressed
in a ten-gallon hat, cowboy boots, Levi jeans and a bandanna.  "Hey, there,
pardner, I'd like some beef, not too rare, and some of them fresh biscuits,"
he tells the counterman.
        The guy behind the counter takes a long look at him and then says,
"You must be from New York."
        The New Yorker blushes, and says, "Well, yes, I am.  How did
you know?"
        "Because this is a hardware store."
Congratulations!  You have purchased an extremely fine device that would
give you thousands of years of trouble-free service, except that you
undoubtably will destroy it via some typical bonehead consumer maneuver.
Which is why we ask you to PLEASE FOR GOD'S SAKE READ THIS OWNER'S MANUAL
CAREFULLY BEFORE YOU UNPACK THE DEVICE.  YOU ALREADY UNPACKED IT, DIDN'T
YOU?  YOU UNPACKED IT AND PLUGGED IT IN AND TURNED IT ON AND FIDDLED WITH
THE KNOBS, AND NOW YOUR CHILD, THE SAME CHILD WHO ONCE SHOVED A POLISH
SAUSAGE INTO YOUR VIDEOCASSETTE RECORDER AND SET IT ON "FAST FORWARD", THIS
CHILD ALSO IS FIDDLING WITH THE KNOBS, RIGHT?  AND YOU'RE JUST NOW STARTING
TO READ THE INSTRUCTIONS, RIGHT???  WE MIGHT AS WELL JUST BREAK THESE
DEVICES RIGHT AT THE FACTORY BEFORE WE SHIP THEM OUT, YOU KNOW THAT?
                -- Dave Barry, "Read This First!"
I myself have dreamed up a structure intermediate between Dyson spheres
and planets.  Build a ring 93 million miles in radius -- one Earth orbit
-- around the sun.  If we have the mass of Jupiter to work with, and if
we make it a thousand miles wide, we get a thickness of about a thousand
feet for the base.

And it has advantages.  The Ringworld will be much sturdier than a Dyson
sphere.  We can spin it on its axis for gravity.  A rotation speed of 770
m/s will give us a gravity of one Earth normal.  We wouldn't even need to
roof it over.  Place walls one thousand miles high at each edge, facing the
sun.  Very little air will leak over the edges.

Lord knows the thing is roomy enough.  With three million times the surface
area of the Earth, it will be some time before anyone complains of the
crowding.
                -- Larry Niven, "Ringworld"
I'm often asked the question, "Do you think there is extraterrestrial intelli-
gence?"  I give the standard arguments -- there are a lot of places out there,
and use the word *billions*, and so on.  And then I say it would be astonishing
to me if there weren't extraterrestrial intelligence, but of course there is as
yet no compelling evidence for it.  And then I'm asked, "Yeah, but what do you
really think?"  I say, "I just told you what I really think."  "Yeah, but
what's your gut feeling?"  But I try not to think with my gut.  Really, it's
okay to reserve judgment until the evidence is in.
                -- Carl Sagan
        "In this replacement Earth we're building they've given me Africa
to do and of course I'm doing it with all fjords again because I happen to
like them, and I'm old-fashioned enough to think that they give a lovely
baroque feel to a continent.  And they tell me it's not equatorial enough.
Equatorial!"  He gave a hollow laugh.  "What does it matter?  Science has
achieved some wonderful things, of course, but I'd far rather be happy than
right any day."
        "And are you?"
        "No.  That's where it all falls down, of course."
        "Pity," said Arthur with sympathy.  "It sounded like quite a good
life-style otherwise."
                -- Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"
The Greatest Mathematical Error
        The Mariner I space probe was launched from Cape Canaveral on 28
July 1962 towards Venus.  After 13 minutes' flight a booster engine would
give acceleration up to 25,820 mph; after 44 minutes 9,800 solar cells
would unfold; after 80 days a computer would calculate the final course
corrections and after 100 days the craft would cirlce the unknown planet,
scanning the mysterious cloud in which it is bathed.  
        However, with an efficiency that is truly heartening, Mariner I
plunged into the Atlantic Ocean only four minutes after takeoff.
        Inquiries later revealed that a minus sign had been omitted from
the instructions fed into the computer.  "It was human error", a launch
spokesman said.
        This minus sign cost L4,280,000.
                -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures"
The rule on staying alive as a forecaster is to give 'em a number or
give 'em a date, but never give 'em both at once.
                -- Jane Bryant Quinn
They don't know how the world is shaped.  And so they give it a shape, and
try to make everything fit it.  They separate the right from the left, the
man from the woman, the plant from the animal, the sun from the moon. They
only want to count to two.
                -- Emma Bull, "Bone Dance"
Top scientists agree that with the present rate of consumption, the earth's
supply of gravity will be exhausted before the 24th century. As man
struggles to discover cheaper alternatives, we need your help. Please...

                        CONSERVE GRAVITY

Follow these simple suggestions:

(1)  Walk with a light step.  Carry helium balloons if possible.
(2)  Use tape, magnets, or glue instead of paperweights.
(3)  Give up skiing and skydiving for more horizontal sports like curling.
(4)  Avoid showers .. take baths instead.
(5)  Don't hang all your clothes in the closet ... Keep them in one big pile.
(6)  Stop flipping pancakes
                        Has your family tried 'em?

                           POWDERMILK BISCUITS

                 Heavens, they're tasty and expeditious!

            They're made from whole wheat, to give shy persons
           the strength to get up and do what needs to be done.

                           POWDERMILK BISCUITS

        Buy them ready-made in the big blue box with the picture of
        the biscuit on the front, or in the brown bag with the dark
                     stains that indicate freshness.
IT MAKES ME MAD when I go to all the trouble of having Marta cook up about
a hundred drumsticks, then the guy at Marineland says, "You can't throw
that chicken to the dolphins. They eat fish."

Sure they eat fish if that's all you give them!  Man, wise up.
                -- Jack Handley, The New Mexican, 1988.
Prunes give you a run for your money.
To see the butcher slap the steak, before he laid it on the block,
and give his knife a sharpening, was to forget breakfast instantly.  It was
agreeable, too -- it really was -- to see him cut it off, so smooth and juicy.
There was nothing savage in the act, although the knife was large and keen;
it was a piece of art, high art; there was delicacy of touch, clearness of
tone, skilful handling of the subject, fine shading.  It was the triumph of
mind over matter; quite.
                -- Dickens, "Martin Chuzzlewit"
What is important is food, money and opportunities for scoring off one's
enemies.  Give a man these three things and you won't hear much squawking
out of him.
                -- Brian O'Nolan, "The Best of Myles"
                        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
        All that you touch,                And all you create,
        All that you see,                And all you destroy,
        All that you taste,                All that you do,
        All you feel,                        And all you say,
        And all that you love,                All that you eat,
        And all that you hate,                And everyone you meet,
        All you distrust,                All that you slight,
        All you save,                        And everyone you fight,
        And all that you give,                And all that is now,
        And all that you deal,                And all that is gone,
        All that you buy,                And all that's to come,
        Beg, borrow or steal,                And everything under the sun is
                                                in tune,
                                        But the sun is eclipsed
                                        By the moon.

There is no dark side of the moon... really... matter of fact it's all dark.
                -- Pink Floyd, "Dark Side of the Moon"
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!"
Everybody knows that the dice are loaded.  Everybody rolls with their
fingers crossed.  Everybody knows the war is over.  Everybody knows the
good guys lost.  Everybody knows the fight was fixed: the poor stay
poor, the rich get rich.  That's how it goes.  Everybody knows.

Everybody knows that the boat is leaking.  Everybody knows the captain
lied.  Everybody got this broken feeling like their father or their dog
just died.

Everybody talking to their pockets.  Everybody wants a box of chocolates
and long stem rose.  Everybody knows.

Everybody knows that you love me, baby.  Everybody knows that you really
do.  Everybody knows that you've been faithful, give or take a night or
two.  Everybody knows you've been discreet, but there were so many people
you just had to meet without your clothes.  And everybody knows.

And everybody knows it's now or never.  Everybody knows that it's me or you.
And everybody knows that you live forever when you've done a line or two.
Everybody knows the deal is rotten: Old Black Joe's still pickin' cotton
for you ribbons and bows.  And everybody knows.
        -- Leonard Cohen, "Everybody Knows"
Give me the avowed, the erect, the manly foe,
Bold I can meet -- perhaps may turn his blow!
But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can send,
Save me, oh save me from the candid friend.
                -- George Canning
Give me your students, your secretaries,
Your huddled writers yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your Selectric III's.
Give these, the homeless, typist-tossed to me.
I lift my disk beside the processor.
                -- Inscription on a Word Processor
Her locks an ancient lady gave
Her loving husband's life to save;
And men -- they honored so the dame --
Upon some stars bestowed her name.

But to our modern married fair,
Who'd give their lords to save their hair,
No stellar recognition's given.
There are not stars enough in heaven.
I have lots of things in my pockets;
None of them is worth anything.
Sociopolitical whines aside,
Gan you give me, gratis, free,
The price of half a gallon
Of Gallo extra bad
And most of the bus fare home.
"I said, "Preacher, give me strength for round 5."
He said,"What you need is to grow up, son."
I said,"Growin' up leads to growin' old,
And then to dying, and to me that don't sound like much fun."
                -- John Cougar, "The Authority Song"
I stood on the leading edge,
The eastern seaboard at my feet.
"Jump!" said Yoko Ono
I'm too scared and good-looking, I cried.
Go on and give it a try,
Why prolong the agony, all men must die.
                -- Roger Waters, "The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking"
If I don't drive around the park,
I'm pretty sure to make my mark.
If I'm in bed each night by ten,
I may get back my looks again.
If I abstain from fun and such,
I'll probably amount to much;
But I shall stay the way I am,
Because I do not give a damn.
                -- Dorothy Parker
Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp! cries she
With silent lips.  Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me...
                -- Emma Lazarus, "The New Colossus"
Love in your heart wasn't put there to stay.
Love isn't love 'til you give it away.
                -- Oscar Hammerstein II
My My, hey hey
Rock and roll is here to stay        The king is gone but he's not forgotten
It's better to burn out                This is the story of a Johnny Rotten
Than to fade away                It's better to burn out than it is to rust
My my, hey hey                        The king is gone but he's not forgotten

It's out of the blue and into the black                Hey hey, my my
They give you this, but you pay for that        Rock and roll can never die
And once you're gone you can never come back        There's more to the picture
When you're out of the blue                        Than meets the eye
And into the black
                -- Neil Young
                "My My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue), Rust Never Sleeps"
"My name is Sue!  How do you do?!  Now you gonna die!"
Well, I hit him hard right between the eyes,
And he went down, but to my surprise,
Come up with a knife and cut off a piece of my ear.
So I busted a chair right across his teeth,
And we crashed through the walls and into the streets,
Kickin' and a-gougin' in the mud and the blood and beer.
Now I tell you, I've fought tougher men,
But I really can't remember when:
He kicked like a mule and he bit like a crocodile.
But I heard him laugh and then I heard him cuss,
And he went for his gun, but I pulled mine first,
And he sat there lookin' at me, and I saw him smile.
He said: "Son, this world is rough,
And if a man's gonna make it he's gotta be tough,
And I knew I wouldn't be there to help you along.
So I give you that name and I said goodbye,
And I knew you'd have to get tough or die,
And it's that name that's helped to make you strong!
                -- Johnny Cash, "A Boy Named Sue"
No one likes us.
I don't know why.
We may not be perfect,                        We give them money,
But heaven knows we try.                But are they grateful?
But all around,                                No, they're spiteful,
Even our old friends put us down.        And they're hateful.
Let's drop the big one,                        They don't respect us,
And see what happens.                        So let's surprise them
                                        We'll drop the big one,
                                        And pulverize 'em.
Asia's crowded,
Europe's too old,
Africa is far too hot,                        We'll save Australia.
And Canada's too cold.                        Don't wanna hurt no kangaroos.
And South America stole our name        We'll build an All-American amusement
Let's drop the big one,                                park there--
There'll be no one left to blame us.        They got surfin', too!

Boom! goes London,
And Boom! Paree.
More room for you,                        Oh, how peaceful it'll be!
And more room for me,                        We'll set everybody free!
And every city,                                You'll wear a Japanese kimono, babe;
The whole world round,                        There'll be Italian shoes for me!
Will just be another American town.        They all hate us anyhow,
                                        So, let's drop the big one now.
                                        Let's drop the big one now!
                -- Randy Newman, "Drop the Big One"
Now I lay me back to sleep.
The speaker's dull; the subject's deep.
If he should stop before I wake,
Give me a nudge for goodness' sake.
                -- Anonymous
O give me a home,
Where the buffalo roam,
Where the deer and the antelope play,
Where seldom is heard
A discouraging word,
'Cause what can an antelope say?
Oh give me your pity!
I'm on a committee,                        We attend and amend
Which means that from morning                And contend and defend
        to night,                        Without a conclusion in sight.

We confer and concur,
We defer and demur,                        We revise the agenda
And reiterate all of our thoughts.        With frequent addenda
                                        And consider a load of reports.

We compose and propose,
We suppose and oppose,                        But though various notions
And the points of procedure are fun;        Are brought up as motions,
                                        There's terribly little gets done.

We resolve and absolve;
But we never dissolve,
Since it's out of the question for us
To bring our committee
To end like this ditty,
Which stops with a period, thus.
                -- Leslie Lipson, "The Committee"
Oh, give me a home,
Where the buffalo roam,
And I'll show you a house with a really messy kitchen.
Oh, give me a locus where the gravitons focus
        Where the three-body problem is solved,
        Where the microwaves play down at three degrees K,
        And the cold virus never evolved.                        (chorus)
We eat algea pie, our vacuum is high,
        Our ball bearings are perfectly round.
        Our horizon is curved, our warheads are MIRVed,
        And a kilogram weighs half a pound.                        (chorus)
If we run out of space for our burgeoning race
        No more Lebensraum left for the Mensch
        When we're ready to start, we can take Mars apart,
        If we just find a big enough wrench.                        (chorus)
I'm sick of this place, it's just McDonald's in space,
        And living up here is a bore.
        Tell the shiggies, "Don't cry," they can kiss me goodbye
        'Cause I'm moving next week to L4!                        (chorus)

CHORUS:        Home, home on LaGrange,
        Where the space debris always collects,
        We possess, so it seems, two of Man's greatest dreams:
        Solar power and zero-gee sex.
                -- to Home on the Range
On a morning from a Bogart movie, in a country where they turned back time,
You go strolling through the crowd like Peter Lorre contemplating a crime.
She comes out of the sun in a silk dress running like a watercolor in the rain.
Don't bother asking for explanations, she'll just tell you that she came
In the Year of the Cat.

She doesn't give you time for questions, as she locks up your arm in hers,
And you follow 'till your sense of which direction completely disappears.
By the blue-tiled walls near the market stall there's a hidden door she
    leads you to.
These days, she say, I feel my life just like a river running through
The Year of the Cat.

Well, she looks at you so coolly,
And her eyes shine like the moon in the sea.
She comes in incense and patchouli,
So you take her to find what's waiting inside
The Year of the Cat.

Well, morning comes and you're still with her, but the bus and the tourists
    are gone,
And you've thrown away your choice and lost your ticket, so you have to stay on.
But the drum-beat strains of the night remain in the rhythm of the new-born day.
You know some time you're bound to leave her, but for now you're going to stay
In the Year of the Cat.
                -- Al Stewart, "Year of the Cat"
Our sires' age was worse that our grandsires'.
We their sons are more worthless than they:
so in our turn we shall give the world a progeny yet more corrupt.
                -- Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Horace)
Razors pain you;
        Rivers are damp.
        Acids stain you,
And drugs cause cramp.

Guns aren't lawful;
        Nooses give.
        Gas smells awful--
You might as well live!
                -- Dorothy Parker, "Resume", 1926
Scratch the disks, dump the core,        Shut it down, pull the plug
Roll the tapes across the floor,        Give the core an extra tug
And the system is going to crash.        And the system is going to crash.
Teletypes smashed to bits.                Mem'ry cards, one and all,
Give the scopes some nasty hits                Toss out halfway down the hall
And the system is going to crash.        And the system is going to crash.
And we've also found                        Just flip one switch
When you turn the power down,                And the lights will cease to twitch
You turn the disk readers into trash.        And the tape drives will crumble
                                                in a flash.
Oh, it's so much fun,                        When the CPU
Now the CPU won't run                        Can print nothing out but "foo,"
And the system is going to crash.        The system is going to crash.
                -- To the tune of "As the Caissons go Rolling Along"
There's amnesia in a hangknot,
And comfort in the ax,
But the simple way of poison will make your nerves relax.
        There's surcease in a gunshot,
        And sleep that comes from racks,
        But a handy draft of poison avoids the harshest tax.
You find rest on the hot squat,
Or gas can give you pax,
But the closest corner chemist has peace in packaged stacks.
        There's refuge in the church lot
        When you tire of facing facts,
        And the smoothest route is poison prescribed by kindly quacks.
Chorus:        With an *ugh!* and a groan, and a kick of the heels,
        Death comes quiet, or it comes with squeals --
        But the pleasantest place to find your end
        Is a cup of cheer from the hand of a friend.
                -- Jubal Harshaw, "One For The Road"
Well, I don't know where they come from but they sure do come,
I hope they comin' for me!
And I don't know how they do it but they sure do it good,
I hope they doin' it for free!
They give me cat scratch fever... cat scratch fever!
First time that I got it I was just ten years old,
Got it from the kitty next door...
I went to see the doctor and he gave me the cure,
I think I got it some more!
Got a bad scratch fever...
                -- Ted Nugent, "Cat Scratch Fever"
Well, my daddy left home when I was three,
And he didn't leave much for Ma and me,
Just and old guitar an'a empty bottle of booze.
Now I don't blame him 'cause he ran and hid,
But the meanest thing that he ever did,
Was before he left he went and named me Sue.
...
But I made me a vow to the moon and the stars,
I'd search the honkey tonks and the bars,
And kill the man that give me that awful name.
It was Gatlinburg in mid-July,
I'd just hit town and my throat was dry,
Thought I'd stop and have myself a brew,
At an old saloon on a street of mud,
Sitting at a table, dealing stud,
Sat that dirty (bleep) that named me Sue.
...
Now, I knew that snake was my own sweet Dad,
From a wornout picture that my Mother had,
And I knew that scar on his cheek and his evil eye...
                -- Johnny Cash, "A Boy Named Sue"
Well, we're big rock singers, we've got golden fingers,
And we're loved everywhere we go.
We sing about beauty, and we sing about truth,
At ten thousand dollars a show.
We take all kind of pills to give us all kind of thrills,
But the thrill we've never known,
Is the thrill that'll get'cha, when you get your picture,
On the cover of the Rolling Stone.

I got a freaky old lady, name of Cole King Katie,
Who embroiders on my jeans.
I got my poor old gray-haired daddy,
Drivin' my limousine.
Now it's all designed, to blow our minds,
But our minds won't be really be blown;
Like the blow that'll get'cha, when you get your picture,
On the cover of the Rolling Stone.

We got a lot of little, teen-aged, blue-eyed groupies,
Who'll do anything we say.
We got a genuine Indian guru, that's teachin' us a better way.
We got all the friends that money can buy,
So we never have to be alone.
And we keep gettin' richer, but we can't get our picture,
On the cover of the Rolling Stone.
                -- Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show
                [As a note, they eventually DID make the cover of RS. Ed.]
When my fist clenches crack it open,
Before I use it and lose my cool.
When I smile tell me some bad news,
Before I laugh and act like a fool.

And if I swallow anything evil,
Put you finger down my throat.
And if I shiver please give me a blanket,
Keep me warm let me wear your coat

No one knows what it's like to be the bad man,
        to be the sad man.
Behind blue eyes.
No one knows what its like to be hated,
        to be fated,
To telling only lies.
                        -- The Who
"You are old," said the youth, "and I'm told by my peers
        That your lectures bore people to death.
Yet you talk at one hundred conventions per year --
        Don't you think that you should save your breath?"

"I have answered three questions and that is enough,"
        Said his father, "Don't give yourself airs!
Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff?
        Be off, or I'll kick you downstairs!"
"You are old," said the youth, "and your jaws are too weak
        For anything tougher than suet;
Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak --
        Pray, how did you manage to do it?"

"In my youth," said his father, "I took to the law,
        And argued each case with my wife;
And the muscular strength which it gave to my jaw,
        Has lasted the rest of my life."

"You are old," said the youth, "one would hardly suppose
        That your eye was as steady as ever;
Yet you balanced an eel on the end of your nose --
        What made you so awfully clever?"

"I have answered three questions, and that is enough,"
        Said his father.  "Don't give yourself airs!
Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff?
        Be off, or I'll kick you down stairs!"
Give him an evasive answer.
Give thought to your reputation.  Consider changing name and moving to
a new town.
Give your very best today.  Heaven knows it's little enough.
Never give an inch!
You will give someone a piece of your mind, which you can ill afford.
Fortune finishes the great quotations, #15

        "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses."
        And while you're at it, throw in a couple of those Dallas
        Cowboy cheerleaders.
Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day.  Teach a man to fish,
and he'll invite himself over for dinner.
                -- Calvin Keegan
Give me a fish and I will eat today.

Teach me to fish and I will eat forever.
Reporter:   "What would you do if you found a million dollars?"
Yogi Berra: "If the guy was poor, I would give it back."
For 20 dollars, I'll give you a good fortune next time ...
A star captain's most solemn oath is that he will give his life, even
his entire crew, rather than violate the Prime Directive.
                -- Kirk, "The Omega Glory", stardate unknown
Do you know about being with somebody?  Wanting to be?  If I had the
whole universe, I'd give it to you, Janice.  When I see you, I feel
like I'm hungry all over.  Do you know how that feels?
                -- Charlie Evans, "Charlie X", stardate 1535.8
When dreams become more important than reality, you give up travel,
building, creating; you even forget how to repair the machines left
behind by your ancestors.  You just sit living and reliving other lives
left behind in the thought records.
                -- Vina, "The Menagerie" ("The Cage"), stardate unknown
All of the people in my building are insane.  The guy above me designs
synthetic hairballs for ceramic cats.  The lady across the hall tried to
rob a department store... with a pricing gun...  She said, "Give me all
of the money in the vault, or I'm marking down everything in the store."
                -- Steven Wright
"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 box of telephone rings under my bed.  Whenever I get lonely, I
open it up a little bit, and I get a phone call.  One day I dropped the
box all over the floor.  The phone wouldn't stop ringing.  I had to get
it disconnected.  So I got a new phone.  I didn't have much money, so I
had to get an irregular.  It doesn't have a five.  I ran into a friend
of mine on the street the other day.  He said why don't you give me a
call.  I told him I can't call everybody I want to anymore, my phone
doesn't have a five.  He asked how long had it been that way.  I said I
didn't know -- my calendar doesn't have any sevens.
                -- Steven Wright
I'm going to give my psychoanalyst one more year, then I'm going to Lourdes.
                -- Woody Allen
If only God would give me some clear sign!  Like making a large deposit
in my name at a Swiss bank.
                -- Woody Allen, "Without Feathers"
  I'll give you a definite maybe. -Samuel Goldwyn
  I'd give my right arm to be ambidextrous.
Bill Gates is surfing the Internet, collecting the URLs of anti-Micrsoft
websites to send to the legal department for possible libel lawsuits. Suddenly
the devil appears, and says, "Bill, I've got a deal for you. I will turn
Microsoft into a complete software monopoly. Every computer will run Windows.
Every user will be forced to buy Microsoft software. The Justice Department
will look the other way. Everyone will love you. You only have to do one thing:
give me your soul." Bill Gates looks at him and replies, "Ok, sure. But what's
the catch?"
Help Microsoft stamp out piracy. Give Linux to a friend today!

   -- From a Slashdot.org post
Increased Electricity Consumption Blamed on Linux

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The US Department of Energy claims Linux is partially
responsible for the increased demand for electricity during the past year.
Electricity use was up 2.5% from January to September of 1998 compared with
the same period in 1997.  "While some of the increase can be attributed to
higher temperatures over the summer," one Department bureaucrat explained,
"Linux is certainly a contributor to the increased demand for power."  

When asked for clarification, the bureaucrat responded, "In the past, most
PCs have been turned off when not in use.  Linux users, on the other hand,
usually don't turn off their computers.  They leave them on, hoping to
increase their uptime to impress their friends.  And since Linux rarely
crashes the entire system, those computers stay on for weeks, months, even
years at a time.  With Linux use continuing to grow, we expect demand for
electricity to increase steadily over the next several years."

In response to the news, several utility companies have announced plans to
give away free Linux CDs to paying customers who request them.  One anonymous
executive said, "The more people who use Linux, the more power they consume.
The more electricity they use, the more money we make. It's a win-win
combination."  Yesterday Linus Torvalds was nominated as a candidate for the
Assocation of American Utility Companies Person of the Year.
Humorix Holiday Gift Idea #9

Dial-A-Detective
$499.95/year; 1-888-BYE-SPAM

This detective firm is not what you'd expect. Instead of tracking murderers or
unfaithful husbands, this band of rogue private investigators goes after
something just as sinister -- spammers. For a modest annual retainer fee,
these spam detectives will track down the source of every piece of spam you
receive.

Using the latest in forensic technology, they will bring you the virtual scalp
of the spammer -- their name, home address, social-security number, and, more
importantly, credit card numbers. At this point you are free to pursue the
evil spammer as you see fit.

If your friend or relative is sick of receiving wave after wave of "Find Out
Anything About Anyone" spams, give them a subscription to Dial-A-Detective,
and they'll find out anything about any spammer -- for real.
MAKE MONEY FAST FROM SLASHDOT!!!!!!

You are probably familiar with the Slashdot.org "News for Nerds" site.
You've probably heard about the "Slashdot Effect".  Now, we want to
introduce a new term that could change your life: "Slashdot Baiting".

The Slashdot Effect is a significant source of traffic.  Lots of traffic.
Thousands of visitors within hours.  Thousands of eyeballs looking and
clicking at YOUR banner advertisements.  In short, the Slashdot Effect, if
properly utilized, can produce a significant amount of advertising revenue.

That's where we at MoneyDot Lucrative Marketing International Group, Inc.
come in.  We know how to exploit the Slashdot Effect.  We call our strategy
"Slashdot Baiting".  It's quite painless.  We have formulated 101 easy ways
to get your site mentioned on Slashdot.

Interested in pursuing Slashdot Baiting and obtaining financial
independence? Want to make $50,000 (or more!) within 90 days?

Then purchase MLM's "Slashdot Baiting Kit", which will contain everything
you need to know to put this powerful marketing force to work for YOU! We
also throw in a warranty: if your site isn't mentioned on Slashdot within 90
days of using this Kit, we'll give you your money back guaranteed!
Microsoft Mandatory Survey (#8)

Customers who want to upgrade to Windows 98 Second Edition must now fill
out a Microsoft survey online before they can order the bugfix/upgrade.

Question 8: If you could meet Bill Gates for one minute, what would you
            say to him?

A. "Can you give me a loan for a million or so?"

B. "I just love all the new features in Windows 98!"

C. "Could you autograph this box of Windows 98 for me?"

D. "I really enjoyed reading 'Business @ the Speed of Thought'. It's so
   cool!"

E. "Give the government hell, Bill!"
Jargon Coiner (#1)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* WINCURSE: Loud expletive uttered when a Linux user comes face-to-face
  with a computer containing a WinModem.

  Example: "Eric wincursed when his mother showed him the new computer she
  bought from CompUSSR... which contained a WinModem and a WinSoundCard."

* WIND'OH KEY: Nickname given to the three useless Windows keys that come
  on virtually all new keyboards. These keys are often hit by mistake
  instead of CTRL or ALT, causing the user to shout "D'oh!"

* DE-WIND'OH!ED KEYBOARD: (1) A new keyboard produced without any wind'oh!
  keys or a "Enhanced for Windows 95/98" logo. Extremely rare. (2) A
  keyboard in which the wind'oh! keys have been physically removed.
Jargon Coiner (#2)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* SLASHDUP EFFECT, THE: Accidentally posting two or more duplicate
  comments to Slashdot, usually as the result of hitting ENTER at the
  wrong time or fumbling with the Preview option.

* YOU'VE GOT SLOGAN: The tendency for reporters to parody the stupid
  "You've Got Mail" saying when writing about AOL.

  Example: "You've Got Spam", "You've Got Merger" (the headline for an
  article about the Netscape/AOL Merger From Hell)

* PENGUINIZATION: Ongoing trend to slap a picture of Tux Penguin next to
  anything even remotely related to Linux.

* IDLESURF: Aimless surfing of the Internet; looking for something
  interesting to read while killing time. Often involves reloaded the
  Slashdot homepage every 5 minutes to see if a new article has been
  posted.
Jargon Coiner (#3)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* LILOSPLAININ': Arduous process of explaining why there's now a LILO boot
  prompt on the office computer.

  Example: "John had some lilosplainin' to do after his boss turned on the
  computer and the Windows splash screen didn't appear."

* UPTIME DOWNER: Depression that strikes a Linux sysadmin after his uptime
  is ruined. Can be caused by an extended power outtage, a pet chewing
  through the power cord, a lightning bolt striking the power line, or an
  urgent need to reboot into Windows to read a stupid Word document.

* OSTR (Off-Switch Total Recall): The sudden recollection of something
  terribly important you need to do online that occurs exactly 0.157
  seconds after you've shut down your computer.
Jargon Coiner (#4)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* FREE LECTURE: Attempting to explain the concepts of Linux, Open Source
  software, free software, and gift cultures to someone who is not
  familiar with them. Made extra difficult if the explainee has been
  misled by superficial mainstream news articles about the subject.

  Example: "Eric gave an hour-long free lecture to his mother-in-law after
  she asked him about this Linux thingy she read about in USA Today."

* LEXICON LAZINESS:  Filling a fortune file with a list of fake jargon
  instead of publishing something more substantive (and funny) that would
  take more effort to write.

* FOR(;;)TUNE LOOP: Repeatedly running fortune(6) for cheap entertainment.

  Example: "During a coffee break, Bob became bored and started a
  for(;;)tune loop. His boss had to issue a SIGTERM to get him to resume
  working."
Jargon Coiner (#5)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* DUKE OF URL: A person who publishes their Netscape bookmark file on
  their homepage.

* WWWLIZE (pronounced wuh-wuh-wuh-lize): Habit of unconsciously appending
  www. in front of URLs, even when it's not necessary.

* DUBYA-DUBYA-DUBYA: Common pronounciation of "double-u double-u double-u"
  when orally specifying a wwwlized address.

* ADVOIDANCE: iding a particularly annoying advertising banner by dragging
  another window over it, or by placing your hand on the monitor to cover
  it up.

  Example: "Bob advoided any Microsoft banners he came across."
Jargon Coiner (#6)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* STOP MIRAGE: Trying to click on an imaginary Stop button on a program's
  toolbar after doing something you didn't want to. Usually caused as the
  result of excessive use of Netscape.

* YA-PREFIX: Putting "another" or "yet another" in front of a name or
  tacking "YA" in front of an acronym.

  Example: "We could ya-prefix this fortune by titling it 'Yet Another
  Lame List of Fabricated Jargon'."

* DOMAINEERING: Using a service like Netcraft to determine what operating
  system and webserver a particular domain is running.

* NOT-A-SALTINE EXPLANATION: The canned response given to someone who
  uses the term "hacker" instead of "cracker".
Jargon Coiner (#6)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* TLDography (pronounced till-daw-graffy): The study of top leval domains.

  Example: "I asked my friend, a TLDographer, what country .ca stood for,
  and he responded, 'California, of course'."

* TLDofy (pronounced till-duh-fy): Identifying a country by its top level
  domain.

  Example: "Oh, so you're from .de? Sprechen Sie Deutsch?"

* HTML lapse: A period of time when the brain slips into thinking in HTML.
Jargon Coiner (#7)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* O'REILLY O'WRITING: Going to a bookstore and copying down notes from an
  O'Reilly computer book that you can't afford.

* DEEP WRITE MODE: Similar to "deep hack mode", but applies to people
  writing editorials or (very rarely) Slashdot comments. The author
  of this fortune file sometimes experiences "deep humor mode".

* EDITORIAL WAR: Skirmishes between two or more parties carried out via
  strongly-worded editorials published to sites like Slashdot, Linux
  Today, etc. ESR and RMS are frequently engaged in this.

* THREENYM: Referring to someone by the first letter of their three names.
  Used by some people (RMS and ESR), but not others (has anybody ever
  tried to refer to Linus Torvalds as "LBT"?).
Jargon Coiner (#8)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* STAR SPINOFFS: Applying themes and ideas from "Star Wars" and "Star
  Trek" to contemporary events.

  Examples: "Let the Source be with you!", "Microsoft is the Evil Empire",
  "Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated by Microsoft".

* TRADEMARKIZATION(tm): Giving a phrase special meaning by appending a
  trademark symbol to it.

  Examples: "Think Free Speech, Not Free Beer(tm)", "Real Soon Now(tm)",
  "Blue Screen of Death(tm)"
Jargon Coiner (#9)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* RHYMES WITH CYNICS: The final answer to any debate about how to
  pronounce Linux. Of course, "cynics" might not be the best word to
  associate Linux with...

* WISL? (Will It Support Linux?): The very first thought that springs into
  a Linux user's mind when a cool new piece of software or hardware is
  announced.

* JJMD! (Jar Jar Must Die!): Meaningless reply given to a question or poll
  for which you don't have a good answer.

  Example: Question: "When did you stop beating your wife?"
           Answer: "JJMD!"
Jargon Coiner (#10)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* HOBTOB (Hanging Out By The O'Reilly Books): Seeking free Linux technical
  support at a bookstore by waiting near the computer books for a geek to
  come by and then casually asking them for help.

* MOOLA (Marketing Officially Organizes Linux Adoptance):  A press release
  issued by a Dot Com (or Dot Con?) heralding their "support" for Linux
  (i.e. "BigPortal.com adopts Linux as their official operating system by
  adding five Linux-related links to their BigDirectory"); used to inflate
  their stock price and rake in moola even though none of their employees
  have ever used Linux and don't really care.
  
* KARMA KOLLECTOR: Slashdot user who treats the acquisition of "karma" as
  a game; often has a detailed strategy on how to sucker moderators into
  raising the score of their posts (i.e. posting a comment with a title
  like "Microsoft Sucks!!! (Score 3, Insightful)" or using "Only a fool
  would moderate this down" as a signature). See also "Karma Whore".
Jargon Coiner (#12)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* IPO (I've Patented the Obvious): Acquiring patents on trivial things and
  then hitting other companies over the head with them.

  Example: "Amazon just IPO'd one-click spam and is now ready to sue B&N."

* IPO (I'm Pissed Off): Exclamation given by a Linux user who was unable
  to participate in a highly lucrative Linux IPO due to lack of capital or
  E*Trade problems. Also uttered by Linux hackers who did not receive The
  Letter from Red Hat or VA Linux even though their friends did.
  
* YAKBA (Yet Another Killer Backhoe Attack): The acronym that describes
  network outtages caused by a careless backhoe operator.

  Examples: "Don't blame us, our website was offline after we suffered a
  YAKBA". "Don't worry about Y2K, what we need to think about is
  YAKBA-compliance."
Jargon Coiner (#13)

An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon
that we've just made up.

* NINETY-NINERS: In 1849, a horde of people ("Forty-niners") headed to
  California to pan gold and get rich quick. In 1999, a horde of people
  ("Ninety-niners") headed to California to invest in Linux companies and
  get rich quick. Some things never change.

* ZOO: The ubiquitous shelf of O'Reilly Animal Books that many nerds keep
  next to their computer

* THEY'RE MULTIPLYING LIKE PORTALS: The proliferation of Linux portals
  that have the latest headlines from Slashdot and LinuxToday but offer
  little original content.

* YOU CAN SPELL EVIL WITHOUT vi: A curse uttered by freshman Computer
  Science students struggling with vi's insert mode for the first time.
Programming for money sucks... you have to deal with PHBs, 16 hour days,
and spending the night in your cubicle half of the time to avoid the
Commute From Hell...

I minored in Journalism, so I tried to switch into a job as an IT pundit.
You'd think they'd welcome a geek like me with open arms, but they
didn't.  Ziff-Davis wouldn't even give me an interview. I was "too
qualified" they said. Apparently my technical acumen was too much for
their organization, which employs Jesse Berst and the ilk.

It gets worse. I tried to get an entry-level reporting job for a
local-yokel paper. After the interview they gave me a "skills test": I had
to compose an article using Microsoft Word 97. Since I've never touched a
Windows box, I had no clue how to use it. When I botched the test, the
personnel manager spouted, "Your resume said you were a computer
programmer. Obviously you're a liar. Get out of my office now!"

  -- Excerpt from a horror story about geek discrimination during
     the Geek Grok '99 telethon
Brief History Of Linux (#15)
Too many hyphens: Traf-O-Data and Micro-soft

Bill Gates and Paul Allen attended an exclusive private school in Seattle.
In 1968, after raising $3,000 from a yard sale, they gained access to a
timeshare computer and became addicted. After depleting their money
learning BASIC and playing Solitaire, they convinced a company to give
them free computer time in exchange for reporting bugs -- ironically, an
early form of Open Source development!

The two then founded a small company called Traf-O-Data that collected and
analyzed traffic counts for municipalities using a crude device based on
the Intel "Pretanium" 8008 CPU. They had some success at first, but ran
into problems when they were unable to deliver their much hyped
next-generation device called "TrafficX". An engineer is quoted as saying
that "Traf-O-Data is the local leader in vaporware", the first documented
usage of the term that has come to be synonymous with Bill Gates.

Soon thereafter, the two developed their own BASIC interpreter, and sold
it to MITS for their new Altair computer. April 4, 1975 is the fateful day
that Micro-soft was founded in Albuquerque, NM as a language vendor.
Brief History Of Linux (#24)
Linus Torvalds quotes from his interview in "LinuxNews" (October 1992):

"I doubt Linux will be here to stay, and maybe Hurd is the wave of the
future (and maybe not)..."

"I'm most certainly going to continue to support it, until it either dies
out or merges with something else. That doesn't necessarily mean I'll make
weekly patches for the rest of my life, but hopefully they won't be needed
as much when things stabilize." [If only he knew what he was getting into.]

"World domination? No, I'm not interested in that. Galactic domination, on
the other hand..."

"Several people have already wondered if Linux should adopt a logo or
mascot. Somebody even suggested a penguin for some strange reason, which I
don't particularly like: how is a flightless bird supposed to represent an
operating system? Well, it might work okay for Microsoft or even Minix..."

"I would give Andy Tanenbaum a big fat 'F'."
Brief History Of Linux (#29)

"The Cathedral and the Bazaar" is credited by many (especially ESR
himself) as the reason Netscape announced January 22, 1998 the release of
the Mozilla source code. In addition, Rob Malda of Slashdot has also
received praise because he had recently published an editorial ("Give us
the damn source code so we can fix Netscape's problems ourselves!")

Of course, historians now know the true reason behind the landmark
decision: Netscape engineers were scared to death that a large
multi-national corporation would acquire them and crush Mozilla. Which
indeed did happen much later, although everybody thought the conqueror
would be Microsoft, not AOL (America's Online Lusers).

The Netscape announcement prompted a strategy session among Linux bigwigs
on February 3rd. They decided a new term to replace 'free software' was
needed; some rejected suggestions included "Free Source", "Ajar Source",
"World Domination Source", "bong-ware" (Bong's Obviously Not GNU), and
"Nude Source". We can thank Chris Peterson for coining "Open Source",
which became the adopted term and later sparked the ugly "Free Software
vs. Open Source", "Raymond vs. Stallman" flame-a-thons.
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.
A friend is a present you give yourself.
                -- Robert Louis Stevenson
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."
Give me a sleeping pill and tell me your troubles.
I can give you my word, but I know what it's worth and you don't.
                -- Nero Wolfe, "Over My Dead Body"
I give you the man who -- the man who -- uh, I forgets the man who?
                -- Beauregard Bugleboy
        I made it a rule to forbear all direct contradictions to the sentiments
of others, and all positive assertion of my own.  I even forbade myself the use
of every word or expression in the language that imported a fixed opinion, such
as "certainly", "undoubtedly", etc.   I adopted instead of them "I conceive",
"I apprehend", or "I imagine" a thing to be so or so; or "so it appears to me
at present".
        When another asserted something that I thought an error, I denied
myself the pleasure of contradicting him abruptly, and of showing him
immediately some absurdity in his proposition.  In answering I began by
observing that in certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right,
but in the present case there appeared or semed to me some difference, etc.
        I soon found the advantage of this change in my manner; the
conversations I engaged in went on more pleasantly.  The modest way in which I
proposed my opinions procured them a readier reception and less contradiction.
I had less mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily
prevailed with others to give up their mistakes and join with me when I
happened to be in the right.
                -- Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
I'll give you my opinion of the human race in a nutshell ... their heart's
in the right place, but their head is a thoroughly inefficient organ.
                -- W. Somerset Maugham, "The Summing Up"
If God wanted us to be brave, why did he give us legs?
                -- Marvin Kitman
If you continually give you will continually have.
It is easy when we are in prosperity to give advice to the afflicted.
                -- Aeschylus
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's
character, give him power.
                -- Abraham Lincoln
Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.
                -- Eric Hoffer
        "Richard, in being so fierce toward my vampire, you were doing
what you wanted to do, even though you thought it was going to hurt
somebody else. He even told you he'd be hurt if..."
        "He was going to suck my blood!"
        "Which is what we do to anyone when we tell them we'll be hurt
if they don't live our way."
...
        "The thing that puzzles you," he said, "is an accepted saying that
happens to be impossible.  The phrase is hurt somebody else.  We choose,
ourselves, to be hurt or not to be hurt, no matter what.  Us who decides.
Nobody else.  My vampire told you he'd be hurt if you didn't let him?  That's
his decision to be hurt, that's his choice.  What you do about it is your
decision, your choice: give him blood; ignore him; tie him up; drive a stake
through his heart.  If he doesn't want the holly stake, he's free to resist,
in whatever way he wants.  It goes on and on, choices, choices."
        "When you look at it that way..."
        "Listen," he said, "it's important.  We are all.  Free.  To do.
Whatever.  We want.  To do."
                -- Richard Bach, "Illusions"
Something better...

13 (sympathetic): Oh, What happened?  Did your parents lose a bet with God?
14 (complimentary): You must love the little birdies to give them this to
        perch on.
15 (scientific): Say, does that thing there influence the tides?
16 (obscure): Oh, I'd hate to see the grindstone.
17 (inquiry): When you stop to smell the flowers, are they afraid?
18 (french): Say, the pigs have refused to find any more truffles until you
        leave.
19 (pornographic): Finally, a man who can satisfy two women at once.
20 (religious): The Lord giveth and He just kept on giving, didn't He.
21 (disgusting): Say, who mows your nose hair?
22 (paranoid): Keep that guy away from my cocaine!
23 (aromatic): It must be wonderful to wake up in the morning and smell the
        coffee ... in Brazil.
24 (appreciative): Oooo, how original.  Most people just have their teeth
        capped.
25 (dirty): Your name wouldn't be Dick, would it?
                -- Steve Martin, "Roxanne"
The best way to keep your friends is not to give them away.
The people sensible enough to give good advice are usually sensible
enough to give none.
The point is, you see, that there is no point in driving yourself mad
trying to stop yourself going mad.  You might just as well give in and
save your sanity for later.
The strong give up and move away, while the weak give up and stay.
The worst thing one can do is not to try, to be aware of what one wants and
not give in to it, to spend years in silent hurt wondering if something could
have materialized -- and never knowing.
                -- David Viscott
Visits always give pleasure: if not on arrival, then on the departure.
                -- Edouard Le Berquier, "Pensees des Autres"
We give advice, but we cannot give the wisdom to profit by it.
                -- La Rochefoucauld
Why did the Lord give us so much quickness of movement unless it was to
avoid responsibility with?
You can't cheat an honest man.  Never give a sucker an even break or
smarten up a chump.
                -- W.C. Fields
You give me space to belong to myself yet without separating me
from your own life.  May it all turn out to your happiness.
                -- Goethe
        Youth is not a time of life, it is a state of mind; it is a temper of
the will, a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions, a predominance
of courage over timidity, of the appetite for adventure over love of ease.
        Nobody grows old by merely living a number of years; people grow
old only by deserting their ideals.  Years wrinkle the skin, but to give up
enthusiasm wrinkles the soul.  Worry, doubt, self-distrust, fear, and despair
-- these are the long, long years that bow the head and turn the growing spirit
back to dust.
        Whether seventy or sixteen, there is in every being's heart the love
of wonder, the sweet amazement at the stars and the starlike things and
thoughts, the undaunted challenge of events, the unfailing childlike appetite
for what next, and the joy and the game of life.
        You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt; as young as your
self-confidence, as old as your fear, as young as your hope, as old as your
despair.
        So long as your heart receives messages of beauty, cheer, courage,
grandeur and power from the earth, from man, and from the Infinite, so long
you are young.
                -- Samuel Ullman
/* strangest things ever said, #6, to alan cox: "...and remember, alan
* - no monkeybusiness.  remember, i sleep nude and we dont want to
* give rachel the shock of her life..." */

        - comment in the Crack 5 source, file src/util/kickdict.c
        /* Sun, you just can't beat me, you just can't.  Stop trying,
         * give up.  I'm serious, I am going to kick the living shit
         * out of you, game over, lights out.
         */

        - comment from arch/sparc/lib/checksum.S
You want brutality and heuristics?  I'll give you brutality and heuristics...

        - Eric S. Raymond on linux-kernel
Drivers are a more complex issue. I'm not opposed to binary only drivers,
providing its easy to tell they are there and dump all bug reports about them.
Freedom generally includes the right to give up freedom. I'll tell people its
a bad idea but once they get caught, well it was their right to do so...

        - Alan Cox on linux-kernel
Oh, and before people start telling me that RCU was successfully used in
AIX/projectX/xxxx/etc, you have to realize that I don't give a rats *ss
about the fact that there are OS's out there that are "more scalable".

        - Linus Torvalds
Chris Rumpf wrote:
> I would like to join this mailing list.

you want all of us to give you a call saying you're welcome ??

        - elko@home.nl on linux-kernel
The highest good is like water.
Water give life to the ten thousand things and does not strive.
It flows in places men reject and so is like the Tao.
In dwelling, be close to the land.
In meditation, go deep in the heart.
In dealing with others, be gentle and kind.
In speech, be true.
In ruling, be just.
In daily life, be competent.
In action, be aware of the time and the season.
No fight:  No blame.
Give up sainthood, renounce wisdom,
And it will be a hundred times better for everyone.

Give up kindness, renounce morality,
And men will rediscover filial piety and love.

Give up ingenuity, renounce profit,
And bandits and thieves will disappear.

These three are outward forms alone; they are not sufficient in themselves.
It is more important
To see the simplicity,
To realize one's true nature,
To cast off selfishness
And temper desire.
Give up learning, and put an end to your troubles.

Is there a difference between yes and no?
Is there a difference between good and evil?
Must I fear what others fear?  What nonsense!
Other people are contented, enjoying the sacrificial feast of the ox.
In spring some go to the park, and climb the terrace,
But I alone am drifting, not knowing where I am.
Like a newborn babe before it learns to smile,
I am alone, without a place to go.
Others have more than they need, but I alone have nothing.
I am a fool.  Oh, yes!  I am confused.
Others are clear and bright,
But I alone am dim and weak.
Others are sharp and clever,
But I alone am dull and stupid.
Oh, I drift like the waves of the sea,
Without direction, like the restless wind.
Everyone else is busy,
But I alone am aimless and depressed.
I am different.
I am nourished by the great mother.
Peace is easily maintained;
Trouble is easily overcome before it starts.
The brittle is easily shattered;
The small is easily scattered.

Deal with it before it happens.
Set things in order before there is confusion.

A tree as great as a man's embrace springs up from a small shoot;
A terrace nine stories high begins with a pile of earth;
A journey of a thousand miles starts under one's feet.

He who acts defeats his own purpose;
He who grasps loses.
The sage does not act, and so is not defeated.
He does not grasp and therefore does not lose.

People usually fail when they are on the verge of success.
So give as much care to the end as to the beginning;
Then there will be no failure.

Therefore the sage seeks freedom from desire.
He does not collect precious things.
He learns not to hold on to ideas.
He brings men back to what they have lost.
He help the ten thousand things find their own nature,
But refrains from action.
The Tao of heaven is like the bending of a bow.
The high is lowered, and the low is raised.
If the string is too long, it is shortened;
If there is not enough, it is made longer.

The Tao of heaven is to take from those who have too much and give to those who do not have enough.
Man's way is different.
He takes from those who do not have enough and give to those who already have too much.
What man has more than enough and gives it to the world?
Only the man of Tao.

Therefore the sage works without recognition.
He achieves what has to be done without dwelling on it.
He does not try to show his knowledge.
Are you a parent?  Do you sometimes find yourself unsure as to what to
say in those awkward situations?  Worry no more...

        When are you going to grow up?
        I'm only doing this for your own good.
        Why are you crying?  Stop crying, or I'll give you something to
                cry about.
        What's wrong with you?
        Someday you'll thank me for this.
        You'd lose your head if it weren't attached.
        Don't you have any sense at all?
        If you keep sucking your thumb, it'll fall off.
        Why?  Because I said so.
        I hope you have a kid just like yourself.
Breast Feeding should not be attempted by fathers with hairy chests,
since they can make the baby sneeze and give it wind.
                -- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
Give a small boy a hammer and he will find that everything he encounters
needs pounding.
Give your child mental blocks for Christmas.
One of the disadvantages of having children is that they eventually get old
enough to give you presents they make at school.
                -- Robert Byrne
Gold, n.:
  A soft malleable metal relatively scarce in distribution.  It is mined
  deep in the earth by poor men who then give it to rich men who immediately
  bury it back in the earth in great prisons, although gold hasn't done
  anything to them.
        -- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
"You have the right not to be an asshole.  If you give up that right
everything you say and do in here will be held against you. If you cannot
afford to stop being an asshole then someone will be appointed to kick
yours outta here."
        -- Your rights as an irc addict
* Simunye is so happy she has her mothers gene's
<Dellaran> you better give them back before she misses them!
<netgod> heh thats a lost cause, like the correct pronounciation of
         "jewelry"
<netgod> give it up :-)
<sage> and the correct spelling of "colour" :)
<BenC> heh
<sage> and aluminium
<BenC> or nuclear weapons
<sage> are you threating me yankee ?
<sage> just cause we don't have the bomb...
<BenC> back off ya yellow belly
<kira> is a surgical war where you go give the foreign troops nose jobs?
"As you journey through life take a minute every now and then to give a
thought for the other fellow. He could be plotting something."
        -- Hagar the Horrible
<knghtbrd> Solver_: add users who should be messing with sound to group
           audio..  Make sure the devices are all group audio (ls -l
           /dev/dsp will give you the fastest indication if it's probably
           set right) and build a kernel with sound support for your card
<knghtbrd> OR optionally install alsa source and build modules for that
           with make-kpkg
<knghtbrd> OR (not recommended) get and install evil OSS/Linux evil
           non-free evil binary only evil drivers---but those are evil.
           And did I mention that it's not recommended?
<Deek> "A good programmer can write FORTRAN in any language."
<Deek> knghtbrd has proven that you can write C++ in any language too.
       <grin>
<Mercury> We are currently considdering if we should give him or prize, or
          kill him..
<Mercury> (Of course, by all rights, this means we should give him the
          prize, and then kill him.. <G>)
<|Rain|> Knghtbrd: let me give you access to the zone files
<Knghtbrd> oh gods - you do realize I have never played with bind right?
<|Rain|> uhoh :)
        A man walked into a bar with his alligator and asked the bartender,
"Do you serve lawyers here?".
        "Sure do," replied the bartender.
        "Good," said the man.  "Give me a beer, and I'll have a lawyer for
my 'gator."
Humor in the Court:
Q: Are you qualified to give a urine sample?
A: Yes, I have been since early childhood.
        Idaho state law makes it illegal for a man to give his sweetheart
a box of candy weighing less than fifty pounds.
                        Pittsburgh driver's test

(2) A traffic light at an intersection changes from yellow to red, you should

        (a) stop immediately.
        (b) proceed slowly through the intersection.
        (c) blow the horn.
        (d) floor it.

The correct answer is (d). If you said (c), you were almost right, so
give yourself a half point.
We may not like doctors, but at least they doctor.  Bankers are not ever
popular but at least they bank.  Policeman police and undertakers take
under.  But lawyers do not give us law.  We receive not the gladsome light
of jurisprudence, but rather precedents, objections, appeals, stays,
filings and forms, motions and counter-motions, all at $250 an hour.
                -- Nolo News, summer 1989
        An older student came to Otis and said, "I have been to see a
great number of teachers and I have given up a great number of pleasures.
I have fasted, been celibate and stayed awake nights seeking enlightenment.
I have given up everything I was asked to give up and I have suffered, but
I have not been enlightened.  What should I do?"
        Otis replied, "Give up suffering."
                -- Camden Benares, "Zen Without Zen Masters"
To give happiness is to deserve happiness.
To give of yourself, you must first know yourself.
"You would do well not to imagine profundity," he said.  "Anything that seems
of momentous occasion should be dwelt upon as though it were of slight note.
Conversely, trivialities must be attended to with the greatest of care.
Because death is momentous, give it no thought; because victory is important,
give it no thought; because the method of achievement and discovery is less
momentous than the effect, dwell always upon the method.  You will strengthen
yourself in this way."
                -- Jessica Salmonson, "The Swordswoman"
> I've hacked the Xaw3d library to give you a Win95 like interface and it
> is named Xaw95. You can replace your Xaw3d library.
Oh God, this is so disgusting!
        -- seen on c.o.l.development.apps, about the "Win95 look-alike"
In short, at least give the penguin a fair viewing. If you still don't
like it, that's ok: that's why I'm boss. I simply know better than you do.
        -- Linus "what, me arrogant?" Torvalds, on c.o.l.advocacy
>       Yeah, Linus is in the US.
>
>       His source trees are in Finland.

        OK, someone give him access -fast- ...... ;-)
        -- babydr@nwrain.net, because of problems with the kernel
Computers are useless.  They can only give you answers.
        -- Pablo Picasso
(6)        Men employees will be given time off each week for courting
        purposes, or two evenings a week if they go regularly to church.
(7)        After an employee has spent his thirteen hours of labor in the
        office, he should spend the remaining time reading the Bible
        and other good books.
(8)        Every employee should lay aside from each pay packet a goodly
        sum of his earnings for his benefit during his declining years,
        so that he will not become a burden on society or his betters.
(9)        Any employee who smokes Spanish cigars, uses alcoholic drink
        in any form, frequents pool tables and public halls, or gets
        shaved in a barber's shop, will give me good reason to suspect
        his worth, intentions, integrity and honesty.
(10)        The employee who has performed his labours faithfully and
        without a fault for five years, will be given an increase of
        five cents per day in his pay, providing profits from the
        business permit it.
                -- "Office Worker's Guide", New England Carriage Works, 1872
According to a recent and unscientific national survey, smiling is something
everyone should do at least 6 times a day.  In an effort to increase the
national average  (the US ranks third among the world's superpowers in
smiling), Xerox has instructed all personnel to be happy, effervescent, and
most importantly, to smile.  Xerox employees agree, and even feel strongly
that they can not only meet but surpass the national average...  except for
Tubby Ackerman.  But because Tubby does such a fine job of racing around
parking lots with a large butterfly net retrieving floating IC chips, Xerox
decided to give him a break.  If you see Tubby in a parking lot he may have
a sheepish grin.  This is where the expression, "Service with a slightly
sheepish grin" comes from.
Consultants are mystical people who ask a company for a number and then
give it back to them.
It is better to give than to lend, and it costs about the same.
Promise her anything, but give her Exxon unleaded.
The annual meeting of the "You Have To Listen To Experience" Club is now in
session.  Our Achievement Awards this year are in the fields of publishing,
advertising and industry.  For best consistent contribution in the field of
publishing our award goes to editor, R.L.K., [...] for his unrivalled alle-
giance without variation to the statement: "Personally I'd love to do it,
we'd ALL love to do it.  But we're not going to do it.  It's not the kind of
book our house knows how to handle."  Our superior performance award in the
field of advertising goes to media executive, E.L.M., [...] for the continu-
ally creative use of the old favorite: "I think what you've got here could be
very exciting.  Why not give it one more try based on the approach I've out-
lined and see if you can come up with something fresh."  Our final award for
courageous holding action in the field of industry goes to supervisor, R.S.,
[...] for her unyielding grip on "I don't care if they fire me, I've been
arguing for a new approach for YEARS but are we SURE that this is the right
time--"  I would like to conclude this meeting with a verse written specially
for our prospectus by our founding president fifty years ago -- and now, as
then, fully expressive of the emotion most close to all our hearts --
        Treat freshness as a youthful quirk,
                And dare not stray to ideas new,
        For if t'were tried they might e'en work
                And for a living what woulds't we do?
        Then a man said: Speak to us of Expectations.
        He then said: If a man does not see or hear the waters of the
Jordan, then he should not taste the pomegranate or ply his wares in an
open market.
        If a man would not labour in the salt and rock quarries then he
should not accept of the Earth that which he refuses to give of
himself.

        Such a man would expect a pear of a peach tree.
        Such a man would expect a stone to lay an egg.
        Such a man would expect Sears to assemble a lawnmower.
                -- Kehlog Albran, "The Profit"
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.
Will you loan me $20.00 and only give me ten of it?
That way, you will owe me ten, and I'll owe you ten, and we'll be even!
XXXI:
        The optimum committee has no members.
XXXII:
        Hiring consultants to conduct studies can be an excellent means of
        turning problems into gold -- your problems into their gold.
XXXIII:
        Fools rush in where incumbents fear to tread.
XXXIV:
        The process of competitively selecting contractors to perform work
        is based on a system of rewards and penalties, all distributed
        randomly.
XXXV:
        The weaker the data available upon which to base one's conclusion,
        the greater the precision which should be quoted in order to give
        the data authenticity.
                -- Norman Augustine
Perl is designed to give you several ways to do anything, so
consider picking the most readable one.
             -- Larry Wall in the perl man page
Either approach may give birth to various sorts of monstrosities.
             -- Larry Wall in <199710221950.MAA25210@wall.org>
Finish the sentence below in 25 words or less:

        "Love is what you feel just before you give someone a good ..."

Mail your answer along with the top half of your supervisor to:

        P.O. Box 35
        Baffled Greek, Michigan
Give me chastity and continence, but not just now.
                -- St. Augustine
If you can't be good, be careful.  If you can't be careful, give me a call.
The little pieces of my life I give to you, with love, to make a quilt
to keep away the cold.
First, I'm going to give you all the ANSWERS to today's test ...  So
just plug in your SONY WALKMANS and relax!!
Give them RADAR-GUIDED SKEE-BALL LANES and VELVEETA BURRITOS!!
YOU!!  Give me the CUTEST, PINKEST, most charming little VICTORIAN
DOLLHOUSE you can find!!  An make it SNAPPY!!
        It seems there's this magician working one of the luxury cruise ships
for a few years.  He doesn't have to change his routines much as the audiences
change over fairly often, and he's got a good life.   The only problem is the
ship's parrot, who perches in the hall and watches him night after night, year
after year.  Finally, the parrot figures out how almost every trick works and
starts giving it away for the audience.  For example, when the magician makes
a bouquet of flowers disappear, the parrot squawks "Behind his back!  Behind
his back!"  Well, the magician is really annoyed at this, but there's not much
he can do about it as the parrot is a ship's mascot and very popular with the
passengers.
        One night, the ship strikes some floating debris, and sinks without
a trace.  Almost everyone aboard was lost, except for the magician and the
parrot.  For three days and nights they just drift, with the magician clinging
to one end of a piece of driftwood and the parrot perched on the other end.
As the sun rises on the morning of the fourth day, the parrot walks over to
the magician's end of the log.  With obvious disgust in his voice, he snaps
"OK, you win, I give up.  Where did you hide the ship?"
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."
A woman went into a hospital one day to give birth.  Afterwards, the doctor
came to her and said, "I have some... odd news for you."
        "Is my baby all right?" the woman anxiously asked.
        "Yes, he is," the doctor replied, "but we don't know how.  Your son
(we assume) was born with no body.  He only has a head."
        Well, the doctor was correct.  The Head was alive and well, though no
one knew how.  The Head turned out to be fairly normal, ignoring his lack of
a body, and lived for some time as typical a life as could be expected under
the circumstances.
        One day, about twenty years after the fateful birth, the woman got a
phone call from another doctor.  The doctor said, "I have recently perfected
an operation.  Your son can live a normal life now: we can graft a body onto
his head!"
        The woman, practically weeping with joy, thanked the doctor and hung
up.  She ran up the stairs saying, "Johnny, Johnny, I have a *wonderful*
surprise for you!"
        "Oh no," cried The Head, "not another HAT!"
Stress has been pinpointed as a major cause of illness.  To avoid overload
and burnout, keep stress out of your life.  Give it to others instead.  Learn
the "Gaslight" treatment, the "Are you talking to me?" technique, and the
"Do you feel okay?  You look pale." approach.  Start with negotiation and
implication.  Advance to manipulation and humiliation.  Above all, relax
and have a nice day.
No guarantee of accuracy or completeness!
©TU Chemnitz, 2006-2024
Your feedback:
Ad partners