Dictionary De - En
De - Es
De - Pt| Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) | by Linux fortune |
| Around the turn of this century, a composer named Camille Saint-Saens wrote a satirical zoological-fantasy called "Le Carnaval des Animaux." Aside from one movement of this piece, "The Swan", Saint-Saens didn't allow this work to be published or even performed until a year had elapsed after his death. (He died in 1921.) Most of us know the "Swan" movement rather well, with its smooth, flowing cello melody against a calm background; but I've been having this fantasy... What if he had written this piece with lyrics, as a song to be sung? And, further, what if he had accompanied this song with a musical saw? (This instrument really does exist, often played by percussionists!) Then the piece would be better known as: SAINT-SAENS' SAW SONG "SWAN"! | |
| I can't understand why a person will take a year or two to write a novel when he can easily buy one for a few dollars. -- Fred Allen | |
| Jim, it's Jack. I'm at the airport. I'm going to Tokyo and wanna pay you the five-hundred I owe you. Catch you next year when I get back! -- "The Rockford Files" | |
| Leslie West heads for the sticks, to Providence, Rhode Island and tries to hide behind a beard. No good. There are still too many people and too many stares, always taunting, always smirking. He moves to the outskirts of town. He finds a place to live -- huge mansion, dirt cheap, caretaker included. He plugs in his guitar and plays as loud as he wants, day and night, and there's no one to laugh or boo or even look bored. Nobody's cut the grass in months. What's happened to that caretaker? What neighborhood people there are start to talk, and what kids there are start to get curious. A 13 year-old blond with an angelic face misses supper. Before the summer's end, four more teenagers have disappeared. The senior class president, Barnard-bound come autumn, tells Mom she's going out to a movie one night and stays out. The town's up in arms, but just before the police take action, the kids turn up. They've found a purpose. They go home for their stuff and tell the folks not to worry but they'll be going now. They're in a band. -- Ira Kaplan | |
| Like ya know? Rock 'N Roll is an esoteric language that unlocks the creativity chambers in people's brains, and like totally activates their essential hipness, which of course is like totally necessary for saving the earth, like because the first thing in saving this world, is getting rid of stupid and square attitudes and having fun. -- Senior Year Quote | |
| My band career ended late in my senior year when John Cooper and I threw my amplifier out the dormitory window. We did not act in haste. First we checked to make sure the amplifier would fit through the frame, using the belt from my bathrobe to measure, then we picked up the amplifier and backed up to my bedroom door. Then we rushed forward, shouting "The WHO! The WHO!" and we launched my amplifier perfectly, as though we had been doing it all our lives, clean through the window and down onto the sidewalk, where a small but appreciative crowd had gathered. I would like to be able to say that this was a symbolic act, an effort on my part to break cleanly away from one state in my life and move on to another, but the truth is, Cooper and I really just wanted to find out what it would sound like. It sounded OK. -- Dave Barry, "The Snake" | |
| The Great Movie Posters: She's got the biggest six-shooters in the West! -- The Beautiful Blonde from Bashful Bend (1949) CAST OF 3,000! 4 WRITERS, 2 DIRECTORS, 3 CAMERAMEN, 3 PRODUCERS! 1 YEAR TO MAKE THIS FILM -- 24 YEARS TO REHEARSE -- 20 YEARS TO DISTRIBUTE! BEAUTIFUL BEYOND WORDS! AWE-INSPIRING! VITAL! THE PRINCE OF PEACE PROVIDES THE ANSWER TO EVERY PROBLEM! Be Brave--bring your troubles and your family to: HISTORY'S MOST SUBLIME EVENT! YOU'LL FIND GOD RIGHT IN THERE! -- The Prince of Peace (1948). Starring members of the Wichita Mountain Pageant featuring Millard Coody as Jesus. | |
| The old complaint that mass culture is designed for eleven-year-olds is of course a shameful canard. The key age has traditionally been more like fourteen. -- Robert Christgau, "Esquire" | |
| Year Name James Bond Book ---- -------------------------------- -------------- ---- 50's James Bond TV Series Barry Nelson 1962 Dr. No Sean Connery 1958 1963 From Russia With Love Sean Connery 1957 1964 Goldfinger Sean Connery 1959 1965 Thunderball Sean Connery 1961 1967* Casino Royale David Niven 1954 1967 You Only Live Twice Sean Connery 1964 1969 On Her Majesty's Secret Service George Lazenby 1963 1971 Diamonds Are Forever Sean Connery 1956 1973 Live And Let Die Roger Moore 1955 1974 The Man With The Golden Gun Roger Moore 1965 1977 The Spy Who Loved Me Roger Moore 1962 (novelette) 1979 Moonraker Roger Moore 1955 1981 For Your Eyes Only Roger Moore 1960 (novelette) 1983 Octopussy Roger Moore 1965 1983* Never Say Never Again Sean Connery 1985 A View To A Kill Roger Moore 1960 (novelette) 1987 The Living Daylights Timothy Dalton 1965 (novelette) * -- Not a Broccoli production. | |
| SANTA IS BRINGING GOOD WISHES FROM ALL THE MICRO ARTISTS GANG! MAY 1988 BE A HAPPY YEAR! \__\_ :. ___/ ..\ /-- :.______ : .:* : . _ .: :.. . : . . : ()_ .: (( \. :./(__ :._O_)________:______,____:____/ *\_o ====(( \: (****) (***) :. ...: .. . ()_______/\\ __-' \____(( \ ()oo()_/ /.: : ..________/_____ll -/.: .. ( (( \(())))__/ . .. \\.: ..( ) ll ( l_.: ( / (( \__*__)___:___ : : )) .) /--------\ \ \ ( / ((_____________) .. // . / / /..:: . )_)_\ (____/_____________________\__// : /_/_/ :.. :/_/ \_\ /_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ /_/_/ | |
| +#if defined(__alpha__) && defined(CONFIG_PCI) + /* + * The meaning of life, the universe, and everything. Plus + * this makes the year come out right. + */ + year -= 42; +#endif (From the patch for 1.3.2: (kernel/time.c), submitted by Marcus Meissner) | |
| Operators killed by year 2000 bug bite. | |
| I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me that I may sponge away the writing on this stone! -- Charles Dickens | |
| The Bulwer-Lytton fiction contest is held ever year at San Jose State Univ. by Professor Scott Rice. It is held in memory of Edward George Earle Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873), a rather prolific and popular (in his time) novelist. He is best known today for having written "The Last Days of Pompeii." Whenever Snoopy starts typing his novel from the top of his doghouse, beginning "It was a dark and stormy night..." he is borrowing from Lord Bulwer-Lytton. This was the line that opened his novel, "Paul Clifford," written in 1830. The full line reveals why it is so bad: It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents -- except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness. | |
| A manager went to the master programmer and showed him the requirements document for a new application. The manager asked the master: "How long will it take to design this system if I assign five programmers to it?" "It will take one year," said the master promptly. "But we need this system immediately or even sooner! How long will it take it I assign ten programmers to it?" The master programmer frowned. "In that case, it will take two years." "And what if I assign a hundred programmers to it?" The master programmer shrugged. "Then the design will never be completed," he said. -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" | |
| A novice asked the master: "In the east there is a great tree-structure that men call 'Corporate Headquarters'. It is bloated out of shape with vice-presidents and accountants. It issues a multitude of memos, each saying 'Go, Hence!' or 'Go, Hither!' and nobody knows what is meant. Every year new names are put onto the branches, but all to no avail. How can such an unnatural entity exist?" The master replies: "You perceive this immense structure and are disturbed that it has no rational purpose. Can you not take amusement from its endless gyrations? Do you not enjoy the untroubled ease of programming beneath its sheltering branches? Why are you bothered by its uselessness?" -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" | |
| A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in God. | |
| Ever wondered about the origins of the term "bugs" as applied to computer technology? U.S. Navy Capt. Grace Murray Hopper has firsthand explanation. The 74-year-old captain, who is still on active duty, was a pioneer in computer technology during World War II. At the C.W. Post Center of Long Island University, Hopper told a group of Long Island public school adminis- trators that the first computer "bug" was a real bug--a moth. At Harvard one August night in 1945, Hopper and her associates were working on the "granddaddy" of modern computers, the Mark I. "Things were going badly; there was something wrong in one of the circuits of the long glass-enclosed computer," she said. "Finally, someone located the trouble spot and, using ordinary tweezers, removed the problem, a two-inch moth. From then on, when anything went wrong with a computer, we said it had bugs in it." Hopper said that when the veracity of her story was questioned recently, "I referred them to my 1945 log book, now in the collection of the Naval Surface Weapons Center, and they found the remains of that moth taped to the page in question." [actually, the term "bug" had even earlier usage in regard to problems with radio hardware. Ed.] | |
| How many seconds are there in a year? If I tell you there are 3.155 x 10^7, you won't even try to remember it. On the other hand, who could forget that, to within half a percent, pi seconds is a nanocentury. -- Tom Duff, Bell Labs | |
| I have travelled the length and breadth of this country, and have talked with the best people in business administration. I can assure you on the highest authority that data processing is a fad and won't last out the year. -- Editor in charge of business books at Prentice-Hall publishers, responding to Karl V. Karlstrom (a junior editor who had recommended a manuscript on the new science of data processing), c. 1957 | |
| If the automobile had followed the same development as the computer, a Rolls-Royce would today cost $100, get a million miles per per gallon, and explode once a year killing everyone inside. -- Robert Cringely, InfoWorld | |
| In a five year period we can get one superb programming language. Only we can't control when the five year period will begin. | |
| It appears that after his death, Albert Einstein found himself working as the doorkeeper at the Pearly Gates. One slow day, he found that he had time to chat with the new entrants. To the first one he asked, "What's your IQ?" The new arrival replied, "190". They discussed Einstein's theory of relativity for hours. When the second new arrival came, Einstein once again inquired as to the newcomer's IQ. The answer this time came "120". To which Einstein replied, "Tell me, how did the Cubs do this year?" and they proceeded to talk for half an hour or so. To the final arrival, Einstein once again posed the question, "What's your IQ?". Upon receiving the answer "70", Einstein smiled and replied, "Got a minute to tell me about VMS 4.0?" | |
| It is a very humbling experience to make a multimillion-dollar mistake, but it is also very memorable. I vividly recall the night we decided how to organize the actual writing of external specifications for OS/360. The manager of architecture, the manager of control program implementation, and I were threshing out the plan, schedule, and division of responsibilities. The architecture manager had 10 good men. He asserted that they could write the specifications and do it right. It would take ten months, three more than the schedule allowed. The control program manager had 150 men. He asserted that they could prepare the specifications, with the architecture team coordinating; it would be well-done and practical, and he could do it on schedule. Furthermore, if the architecture team did it, his 150 men would sit twiddling their thumbs for ten months. To this the architecture manager responded that if I gave the control program team the responsibility, the result would not in fact be on time, but would also be three months late, and of much lower quality. I did, and it was. He was right on both counts. Moreover, the lack of conceptual integrity made the system far more costly to build and change, and I would estimate that it added a year to debugging time. -- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month" | |
| It isn't easy being the parent of a six-year-old. However, it's a pretty small price to pay for having somebody around the house who understands computers. | |
| `Lasu' Releases SAG 0.3 -- Freeware Book Takes Paves For New World Order by staff writers Helsinki, Finland, August 6, 1995 -- In a surprise movement, Lars ``Lasu'' Wirzenius today released the 0.3 edition of the ``Linux System Administrators' Guide''. Already an industry non-classic, the new version sports such overwhelming features as an overview of a Linux system, a completely new climbing session in a tree, and a list of acknowledgements in the introduction. The SAG, as the book is affectionately called, is one of the corner stones of the Linux Documentation Project. ``We at the LDP feel that we wouldn't be able to produce anything at all, that all our work would be futile, if it weren't for the SAG,'' says Matt Welsh, director of LDP, Inc. The new version is still distributed freely, now even with a copyright that allows modification. ``More dough,'' explains the author. Despite insistent rumors about blatant commercialization, the SAG will probably remain free. ``Even more dough,'' promises the author. The author refuses to comment on Windows NT and Windows 96 versions, claiming not to understand what the question is about. Industry gossip, however, tells that Bill Gates, co-founder and CEO of Microsoft, producer of the Windows series of video games, has visited Helsinki several times this year. Despite of this, Linus Torvalds, author of the word processor Linux with which the SAG was written, is not worried. ``We'll have world domination real soon now, anyway,'' he explains, ``for 1.4 at the lastest.'' ... -- Lars Wirzenius <wirzeniu@cs.helsinki.fi> [comp.os.linux.announce] | |
| Our documentation manager was showing her 2 year old son around the office. He was introduced to me, at which time he pointed out that we were both holding bags of popcorn. We were both holding bottles of juice. But only *__he* had a lollipop. He asked his mother, "Why doesn't HE have a lollipop?" Her reply: "He can have a lollipop any time he wants to. That's what it means to be a programmer." | |
| The personal computer market is about the same size as the total potato chip market. Next year it will be about half the size of the pet food market and is fast approaching the total worldwide sales of pantyhose" -- James Finke, Commodore Int'l Ltd., 1982 | |
| An apple a day makes 365 apples a year. | |
| The man who sees, on New Year's day, Mount Fuji, a hawk, and an eggplant is forever blessed. -- Old Japanese proverb | |
| It is a very humbling experience to make a multimillion-dollar mistake, but it is also very memorable. I vividly recall the night we decided how to organize the actual writing of external specifications for OS/360. The manager of architecture, the manager of control program implementation, and I were threshing out the plan, schedule, and division of responsibilities. The architecture manager had 10 good men. He asserted that they could write the specifications and do it right. It would take ten months, three more than the schedule allowed. The control program manager had 150 men. He asserted that they could prepare the specifications, with the architecture team coordinating; it would be well-done and practical, and he could do it on schedule. Futhermore, if the architecture team did it, his 150 men would sit twiddling their thumbs for ten months. To this the architecture manager responded that if I gave the control program team the responsibility, the result would not in fact be on time, but would also be three months late, and of much lower quality. I did, and it was. He was right on both counts. Moreover, the lack of conceptual integrity made the system far more costly to build and change, and I would estimate that it added a year to debugging time. - Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month" | |
| Two things are certain about science. It does not stand still for long, and it is never boring. Oh, among some poor souls, including even intellectuals in fields of high scholarship, science is frequently misperceived. Many see it as only a body of facts, promulgated from on high in must, unintelligible textbooks, a collection of unchanging precepts defended with authoritarian vigor. Others view it as nothing but a cold, dry narrow, plodding, rule-bound process -- the scientific method: hidebound, linear, and left brained. These people are the victims of their own stereotypes. They are destined to view the world of science with a set of blinders. They know nothing of the tumult, cacophony, rambunctiousness, and tendentiousness of the actual scientific process, let alone the creativity, passion, and joy of discovery. And they are likely to know little of the continual procession of new insights and discoveries that every day, in some way, change our view (if not theirs) of the natural world. -- Kendrick Frazier, "The Year in Science: An Overview," in 1988 Yearbook of Science and the Future, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc. | |
| "Consistency requires you to be as ignorant today as you were a year ago." -- Bernard Berenson | |
| "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) | |
| A comment on schedules: Ok, how long will it take? For each manager involved in initial meetings add one month. For each manager who says "data flow analysis" add another month. For each unique end-user type add one month. For each unknown software package to be employed add two months. For each unknown hardware device add two months. For each 100 miles between developer and installation add one month. For each type of communication channel add one month. If an IBM mainframe shop is involved and you are working on a non-IBM system add 6 months. If an IBM mainframe shop is involved and you are working on an IBM system add 9 months. Round up to the nearest half-year. --Brad Sherman By the way, ALL software projects are done by iterative prototyping. Some companies call their prototypes "releases", that's all. | |
| "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 | |
| Demographic polls show that you have lost credibility across the board. Especially with those 14 year-old Valley girls. | |
| If you make any money, the government shoves you in the creek once a year with it in your pockets, and all that don't get wet you can keep. -- The Best of Will Rogers | |
| Our congratulations go to a Burlington Vermont civilian employee of the local Army National Guard base. He recently received a substational cash award from our government for inventing a device for optical scanning. His device reportedly will save the government more than $6 million a year by replacing a more expensive helicopter maintenance tool with his own, home-made, hand-held model. Not suprisingly, we also have a couple of money-saving ideas that we submit to the Pentagon free of charge: (a) Don't kill anybody. (b) Don't build things that do. (c) And don't pay other people to kill anybody. We expect annual savings to be in the billions. -- Sojourners | |
| Politics is the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn't happen. -- Winston Churchill | |
| The Minnesota Board of Education voted to consider requiring all students to do some "volunteer work" as a prerequisite to high school graduation. Senator Orrin Hatch said that "capital punishment is our society's recognition of the sanctity of human life." According to the tax bill signed by President Reagan on December 22, 1987, Don Tyson and his sister-in-law Barbara run a "family farm." Their "farm" has 25,000 employees and grosses $1.7 billion a year. But as a "family farm" they get tax breaks that save them $135 million a year. Scott L. Pickard, spokesperson for the Massachusetts Department of Public Works, calls them "ground-mounted confirmatory route markers." You probably call them road signs, but then you don't work in a government agency. It's not "elderly" or "senior citizens" anymore. Now it's "chrono- logically experienced citizens." According to the FAA, the propeller blade didn't break off, it was just a case of "uncontained blade liberation." -- Quarterly Review of Doublespeak (NCTE) | |
| Will Rogers, having paid too much income tax one year, tried in vain to claim a rebate. His numerous letters and queries remained unanswered. Eventually the form for the next year's return arrived. In the section marked "DEDUCTIONS," Rogers listed: "Bad debt, US Government -- $40,000." | |
| checkuary, n: The thirteenth month of the year. Begins New Year's Day and ends when a person stops absentmindedly writing the old year on his checks. | |
| Christmas: A day set apart by some as a time for turkey, presents, cranberry salads, family get-togethers; for others, noted as having the best response time of the entire year. | |
| Famous last words: (1) Don't unplug it, it will just take a moment to fix. (2) Let's take the shortcut, he can't see us from there. (3) What happens if you touch these two wires tog-- (4) We won't need reservations. (5) It's always sunny there this time of the year. (6) Don't worry, it's not loaded. (7) They'd never (be stupid enough to) make him a manager. (8) Don't worry! Women love it! | |
| FORTUNE EXPLAINS WHAT JOB REVIEW CATCH PHRASES MEAN: #4 consistent: Reviewee hasn't gotten anything right yet, and it is anticipated that this pattern will continue throughout the coming year. an excellent sounding board: Present reviewee with any number of alternatives, and implement them in the order precisely opposite of his/her specification. a planner and organizer: Usually manages to put on socks before shoes. Can match the animal tags on his clothing. | |
| Pickle's Law: If Congress must do a painful thing, the thing must be done in an odd-number year. | |
| Second Law of Final Exams: In your toughest final -- for the first time all year -- the most distractingly attractive student in the class will sit next to you. | |
| Worst Month of the Year: February. February has only 28 days in it, which means that if you rent an apartment, you are paying for three full days you don't get. Try to avoid Februarys whenever possible. -- Steve Rubenstein | |
| Worst Vegetable of the Year: The brussels sprout. This is also the worst vegetable of next year. -- Steve Rubenstein | |
| XIIdigitation, n.: The practice of trying to determine the year a movie was made by deciphering the Roman numerals at the end of the credits. -- Rich Hall, "Sniglets" | |
| Year, n.: A period of three hundred and sixty-five disappointments. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" | |
| Anti-Sabbatical: A job taken with the sole intention of staying only for a limited period of time (often one year). The intention is usually to raise enough funds to partake in another, more meaningful activity such as watercolor sketching in Crete, or designing computer knit sweaters in Hong Kong. Employers are rarely informed of intentions. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" | |
| AMAZING BUT TRUE ... If all the salmon caught in Canada in one year were laid end to end across the Sahara Desert, the smell would be absolutely awful. | |
| Congratulations are in order for Tom Reid. He says he just found out he is the winner of the 2021 Psychic of the Year award. | |
| Let's remind ourselves that last year's fresh idea is today's cliche. -- Austen Briggs | |
| When I heated my home with oil, I used an average of 800 gallons a year. I have found that I can keep comfortably warm for an entire winter with slightly over half that quantity of beer. -- Dave Barry, "Postpetroleum Guzzler" | |
| Q: How many members of the U.S.S. Enterprise does it take to change a light bulb? A: Seven. Scotty has to report to Captain Kirk that the light bulb in the Engineering Section is getting dim, at which point Kirk will send Bones to pronounce the bulb dead (although he'll immediately claim that he's a doctor, not an electrician). Scotty, after checking around, realizes that they have no more new light bulbs, and complains that he "canna" see in the dark. Kirk will make an emergency stop at the next uncharted planet, Alpha Regula IV, to procure a light bulb from the natives, who, are friendly, but seem to be hiding something. Kirk, Spock, Bones, Yeoman Rand and two red shirt security officers beam down to the planet, where the two security officers are promply killed by the natives, and the rest of the landing party is captured. As something begins to develop between the Captain and Yeoman Rand, Scotty, back in orbit, is attacked by a Klingon destroyer and must warp out of orbit. Although badly outgunned, he cripples the Klingon and races back to the planet in order to rescue Kirk et. al. who have just saved the natives' from an awful fate and, as a reward, been given all light bulbs they can carry. The new bulb is then inserted and the Enterprise continues on its five year mission. | |
| Q: What's a light-year? A: One-third less calories than a regular year. | |
| A Plan for the Improvement of English Spelling by Mark Twain For example, in Year 1 that useless letter "c" would be dropped to be replased either by "k" or "s", and likewise "x" would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which "c" would be retained would be the "ch" formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform "w" spelling, so that "which" and "one" would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish "y" replasing it with "i" and Iear 4 might fiks the "g/j" anomali wonse and for all. Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli. Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld. | |
| Not only is this incomprehensible, but the ink is ugly and the paper is from the wrong kind of tree. -- Professor, EECS, George Washington University I'm looking forward to working with you on this next year. -- Professor, Harvard, on a senior thesis. | |
| Periphrasis is the putting of things in a round-about way. "The cost may be upwards of a figure rather below 10m#." is a periphrasis for The cost may be nearly 10m#. "In Paris there reigns a complete absence of really reliable news" is a periphrasis for There is no reliable news in Paris. "Rarely does the 'Little Summer' linger until November, but at times its stay has been prolonged until quite late in the year's penultimate month" contains a periphrasis for November, and another for lingers. "The answer is in the negative" is a periphrasis for No. "Was made the recipient of" is a periphrasis for Was presented with. The periphrasis style is hardly possible on any considerable scale without much use of abstract nouns such as "basis, case, character, connexion, dearth, description, duration, framework, lack, nature, reference, regard, respect". The existence of abstract nouns is a proof that abstract thought has occurred; abstract thought is a mark of civilized man; and so it has come about that periphrasis and civilization are by many held to be inseparable. These good people feel that there is an almost indecent nakedness, a reversion to barbarism, in saying No news is good news instead of "The absence of intelligence is an indication of satisfactory developments." -- Fowler's English Usage | |
| Decemba, n: The 12th month of the year. erra, n: A mistake. faa, n: To, from, or at considerable distance. Linder, n: A female name. memba, n: To recall to the mind; think of again. New Hampsha, n: A state in the northeast United States. New Yaak, n: Another state in the northeast United States. Novemba, n: The 11th month of the year. Octoba, n: The 10th month of the year. ova, n: Location above or across a specified position. What the season is when the Knicks quit playing. -- Massachewsetts Unabridged Dictionary | |
| Minnesota -- home of the blonde hair and blue ears. mosquito supplier to the free world. come fall in love with a loon. where visitors turn blue with envy. one day it's warm, the rest of the year it's cold. land of many cultures -- mostly throat. where the elite meet sleet. glove it or leave it. many are cold, but few are frozen. land of the ski and home of the crazed. land of 10,000 Petersons. | |
| paak, n: A stadium or inclosed playing field. To put or leave (a a vehicle) for a time in a certain location. patato, n: The starchy, edible tuber of a widely cultivated plant. Septemba, n: The 9th month of the year. shua, n: Having no doubt; certain. sista, n: A female having the same mother and father as the speaker. tamato, n: A fleshy, smooth-skinned reddish fruit eaten in salads or as a vegetable. troopa, n: A state policeman. Wista, n: A city in central Masschewsetts. yaad, n: A tract of ground adjacent to a building. -- Massachewsetts Unabridged Dictionary | |
| To know Edina is to reject it. -- Dudley Riggs, "The Year the Grinch Stole the Election" | |
| Visit[1] the beautiful Smoky Mountains! [1] visit, v.: Come for a week, spend too much money and pay lots of hidden taxes, then leave. We'll be happy to see your money again next year. You can save time by simply sending the money, if you're too busy. | |
| When does summertime come to Minnesota, you ask? Well, last year, I think it was a Tuesday. | |
| You know you're in a small town when... You don't use turn signals because everybody knows where you're going. You're born on June 13 and your family receives gifts from the local merchants because you're the first baby of the year. Everyone knows whose credit is good, and whose wife isn't. You speak to each dog you pass, by name... and he wags his tail. You dial the wrong number, and talk for 15 minutes anyway. You write a check on the wrong bank and it covers you anyway. | |
| 1 Billion dollars of budget deficit = 1 Gramm-Rudman 6.023 x 10 to the 23rd power alligator pears = Avocado's number 2 pints = 1 Cavort Basic unit of Laryngitis = The Hoarsepower Shortest distance between two jokes = A straight line 6 Curses = 1 Hexahex 3500 Calories = 1 Food Pound 1 Mole = 007 Secret Agents 1 Mole = 25 Cagey Bees 1 Dog Pound = 16 oz. of Alpo 1000 beers served at a Twins game = 1 Killibrew 2.4 statute miles of surgical tubing at Yale U. = 1 I.V.League 2000 pounds of chinese soup = 1 Won Ton 10 to the minus 6th power mouthwashes = 1 Microscope Speed of a tortoise breaking the sound barrier = 1 Machturtle 8 Catfish = 1 Octo-puss 365 Days of drinking Lo-Cal beer. = 1 Lite-year 16.5 feet in the Twilight Zone = 1 Rod Serling Force needed to accelerate 2.2lbs of cookies = 1 Fig-newton to 1 meter per second One half large intestine = 1 Semicolon 10 to the minus 6th power Movie = 1 Microfilm 1000 pains = 1 Megahertz 1 Word = 1 Millipicture 1 Sagan = Billions & Billions 1 Angstrom: measure of computer anxiety = 1000 nail-bytes 10 to the 12th power microphones = 1 Megaphone 10 to the 6th power Bicycles = 2 megacycles The amount of beauty required launch 1 ship = 1 Millihelen | |
| How many weeks are there in a light year? | |
| "Multiply in your head" (ordered the compassionate Dr. Adams) "365,365,365, 365,365,365 by 365,365,365,365,365,365". He [ten-year-old Truman Henry Safford] flew around the room like a top, pulled his pantaloons over the tops of his boots, bit his hands, rolled his eyes in their sockets, sometimes smiling and talking, and then seeming to be in an agony, until, in not more than one minute, said he, 133,491,850,208,566,925,016,658,299,941,583,225!" An electronic computer might do the job a little faster but it wouldn't be as much fun to watch. -- James R. Newman, "The World of Mathematics" | |
| Quantum Mechanics is a lovely introduction to Hilbert Spaces! -- Overheard at last year's Archimedeans' Garden Party | |
| Dear Mister Language Person: I am curious about the expression, "Part of this complete breakfast". The way it comes up is, my 5-year-old will be watching TV cartoon shows in the morning, and they'll show a commercial for a children's compressed breakfast compound such as "Froot Loops" or "Lucky Charms", and they always show it sitting on a table next to some actual food such as eggs, and the announcer always says: "Part of this complete breakfast". Don't that really mean, "Adjacent to this complete breakfast", or "On the same table as this complete breakfast"? And couldn't they make essentially the same claim if, instead of Froot Loops, they put a can of shaving cream there, or a dead bat? Answer: Yes. -- Dave Barry, "Tips for Writer's" | |
| The black bear used to be one of the most commonly seen large animals because in Yosemite and Sequoia national parks they lived off of garbage and tourist handouts. This bear has learned to open car doors in Yosemite, where damage to automobiles caused by bears runs into the tens of thousands of dollars a year. Campaigns to bearproof all garbage containers in wild areas have been difficult, because as one biologist put it, "There is a considerable overlap between the intelligence levels of the smartest bears and the dumbest tourists." | |
| The Kosher Dill was invented in 1723 by Joe Kosher and Sam Dill. It is the single most popular pickle variety today, enjoyed throughout the free world by man, woman and child alike. An astounding 350 billion kosher dills are eaten each year, averaging out to almost 1/4 pickle per person per day. New York Times food critic Mimi Sheraton says "The kosher dill really changed my life. I used to enjoy eating McDonald's hamburgers and drinking Iron City Lite, and then I encountered the kosher dill pickle. I realized that there was far more to haute cuisine then I'd ever imagined. And now, just look at me." | |
| You can always tell the Christmas season is here when you start getting incredibly dense, tinfoil-and-ribbon- wrapped lumps in the mail. Fruitcakes make ideal gifts because the Postal Service has been unable to find a way to damage them. They last forever, largely because nobody ever eats them. In fact, many smart people save the fruitcakes they receive and send them back to the original givers the next year; some fruitcakes have been passed back and forth for hundreds of years. The easiest way to make a fruitcake is to buy a darkish cake, then pound some old, hard fruit into it with a mallet. Be sure to wear safety glasses. -- Dave Barry, "Simple, Homespun Gifts" | |
| A salamander scurries into flame to be destroyed. Imaginary creatures are trapped in birth on celluloid. -- Genesis, "The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway" I don't know what it's about. I'm just the drummer. Ask Peter. -- Phil Collins in 1975, when asked about the message behind the previous year's Genesis release, "The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway". | |
| Have you ever felt like a wounded cow halfway between an oven and a pasture? walking in a trance toward a pregnant seventeen-year-old housewife's two-day-old cookbook? -- Richard Brautigan | |
| History is curious stuff You'd think by now we had enough Yet the fact remains I fear They make more of it every year. | |
| I always will remember -- I was in no mood to trifle; 'Twas a year ago November -- I got down my trusty rifle I went out to shoot some deer And went out to stalk my prey -- On a morning bright and clear. What a haul I made that day! I went and shot the maximum I tied them to my bumper and The game laws would allow: I drove them home somehow, Two game wardens, seven hunters, Two game wardens, seven hunters, And a cow. And a cow. The Law was very firm, it People ask me how I do it Took away my permit-- And I say, "There's nothin' to it! The worst punishment I ever endured. You just stand there lookin' cute, It turns out there was a reason: And when something moves, you shoot." Cows were out of season, and And there's ten stuffed heads One of the hunters wasn't insured. In my trophy room right now: Two game wardens, seven hunters, And a pure-bred guernsey cow. -- Tom Lehrer, "The Hunting Song" | |
| I had an errand there: gathering water-lilies, green leaves and lilies white to please my pretty lady, the last ere the year's end to keep them from the winter, to flower by her pretty feet till the snows are melted. Each year at summer's end I go to find them for her, in a wide pool, deep and clear, far down Withywindle; there they open first in spring and there they linger latest. By that pool long ago I found the River-daughter, fair young Goldberry sitting in the rushes. Sweet was her singing then, and her heart was beating! And that proved well for you--for now I shall no longer go down deep again along the forest-water, no while the year is old. Nor shall I be passing Old Man Willow's house this side of spring-time, not till the merry spring, when the River-daughter dances down the withy-path to bathe in the water. -- J. R. R. Tolkien | |
| In high school in Brooklyn I was the baseball manager, proud as I could be I chased baseballs, gathered thrown bats handed out the towels Eventually, I bought my own It was very important work but it was dark blue while for a small spastic kid, the official ones were green but I was a team member Nobody ever said anything When the team got to me about my blue jacket; their warm-up jackets the guys were my friends I didn't get one Yet it hurt me all year Only the regular team to wear that blue jacket got these jackets, and among all those green ones surely not a manager Even now, forty years after, I still recall that jacket and the memory goes on hurting. -- Bart Lanier Safford III, "An Obscured Radiance" | |
| Knock Knock... (who's there?) Ether! (ether who?) Ether Bunny... Yea! [chorus] Yeay! Stay on the Happy side, always on the happy side, Stay on the Happy side of life! Bum bum bum bum bum bum You will feel no pain, as we drive you insane, So Stay on the Happy Side of life! Knock Knock... (who's there?) Anna! (anna who?) An another ether bunny... [chorus] Knock Knock... (who's there?) Stilla! (stilla who?) Still another ether bunny... [chorus] Knock Knock... (who's there?) Yetta! (yetta who?) Yet another ether bunny... [chorus] Knock Knock... (who's there?) Cargo! (cargo who?) Cargo beep beep and run over ether bunny... [chorus] Knock Knock... (who's there?) Boo! (boo who?) Don't Cry! Ether bunny be back next year! [chorus] | |
| "No program is perfect," They said with a shrug. "The customer's happy-- What's one little bug?" But he was determined, Then change two, then three more, The others went home. As year followed year. He dug out the flow chart And strangers would comment, Deserted, alone. "Is that guy still here?" Night passed into morning. He died at the console The room was cluttered Of hunger and thirst With core dumps, source listings. Next day he was buried "I'm close," he muttered. Face down, nine edge first. Chain smoking, cold coffee, And his wife through her tears Logic, deduction. Accepted his fate. "I've got it!" he cried, Said "He's not really gone, "Just change one instruction." He's just working late." -- The Perfect Programmer | |
| 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" | |
| Snow-white! Snow-white! O Lady clear! O Queen beyond the Western Sea! O Light to us that wander here Amid the world of woven trees! Gilthoniel! O Elbereth! Clear are thy eyes and bright thy breath! Snow-white! Snow-white! We sing to thee In a far land beyond the Sea. O stars that in the Sunless Year With shining hand by her were sown, In windy fields now bright and clear We see you silver blossom blown! O Elbereth! Gilthoniel! We still remember, we who dwell In this far land beneath the trees, Thy starlight on the Western Seas. -- J. R. R. Tolkien | |
| Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day Fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way Kicking around on a piece of ground in your hometown Waiting for someone or something to show you the way Tired of lying in the sunshine And then one day you find Staying home to watch the rain Ten years have got behind you You are young and life is long No one told you when to run And there is time to kill today You missed the starting gun And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking And racing around to come up behind you again The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older Shorter of breath and one day closer to death Every year is getting shorter Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way Never seem to find the time The time is gone, the song is over Plans that either come to nought Thought I'd something more to say... Or half a page of scribbled lines -- Pink Floyd, "Time" | |
| Troll sat alone on his seat of stone, And munched and mumbled a bare old bone; For many a year he had gnawed it near, For meat was hard to come by. Done by! Gum by! In a cave in the hills he dwelt alone, And meat was hard to come by. Up came Tom with his big boots on. Said he to Troll: "Pray, what is youn? For it looks like the shin o' my nuncle Tim, As should be a-lyin in graveyard. Caveyard! Paveyard! This many a year has Tim been gone, And I thought he were lyin' in graveyard." "My lad," said Troll, "this bone I stole. But what be bones that lie in a hole? Thy nuncle was dead as a lump o' lead, Afore I found his shinbone. Tinbone! Thinbone! He can spare a share for a poor old troll For he don't need his shinbone." Said Tom: "I don't see why the likes o' thee Without axin' leave should go makin' free With the shank or the shin o' my father's kin; So hand the old bone over! Rover! Trover! Though dead he be, it belongs to he; So hand the old bnone over!" -- J. R. R. Tolkien | |
| "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!" | |
| Celebrate Hannibal Day this year. Take an elephant to lunch. | |
| If you learn one useless thing every day, in a single year you'll learn 365 useless things. | |
| Next Friday will not be your lucky day. As a matter of fact, you don't have a lucky day this year. | |
| You have the body of a 19 year old. Please return it before it gets wrinkled. | |
| You learn to write as if to someone else because NEXT YEAR YOU WILL BE "SOMEONE ELSE." | |
| You will be a winner today. Pick a fight with a four-year-old. | |
| You will be divorced within a year. | |
| You will be married within a year, and divorced within two. | |
| You will be married within a year. | |
| You will not be elected to public office this year. | |
| Failed Attempts To Break Records In September 1978 Mr. Terry Gripton, of Stafford, failed to break the world shouting record by two and a half decibels. "I am not surprised he failed," his wife said afterwards. "He's really a very quiet man and doesn't even shout at me." In August of the same year Mr. Paul Anthony failed to break the record for continuous organ playing by 387 hours. His attempt at the Golden Fish Fry Restaurant in Manchester ended after 36 hours 10 minutes, when he was accused of disturbing the peace. "People complained I was too noisy," he said. In January 1976 Mr. Barry McQueen failed to walk backwards across the Menai Bridge playing the bagpipes. "It was raining heavily and my drone got waterlogged," he said. A TV cameraman thwarted Mr. Bob Specas' attempt to topple 100,000 dominoes at the Manhattan Center, New York on 9 June 1978. 97,500 dominoes had been set up when he dropped his press badge and set them off. -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures" | |
| Harry is heavily into camping, and every year in the late fall, he makes us all go to Assateague, which is an island on the Atlantic Ocean famous for its wild horses. I realize that the concept of wild horses probably stirs romantic notions in many of you, but this is because you have never met any wild horses in person. In person, they are like enormous hooved rats. They amble up to your camp site, and their attitude is: "We're wild horses. We're going to eat your food, knock down your tent and poop on your shoes. We're protected by federal law, just like Richard Nixon." -- Dave Barry, "Tenting Grandpa Bob" | |
| Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds; to seek out new life and new civilizations; to boldly go where no man has gone before. -- Captain James T. Kirk | |
| "`The first ten million years were the worst,' said Marvin, `and the second ten million, they were the worst too. The third ten million I didn't enjoy at all. After that I went into a bit of a decline.'" - Marvin reflecting back on his 576,000,003,579 year career as Milliways' car park attendent. | |
| I'm going to give my psychoanalyst one more year, then I'm going to Lourdes. -- Woody Allen | |
| If you throw a New Year's Party, the worst thing that you can do would be to throw the kind of party where your guests wake up today, and call you to say they had a nice time. Now you'll be be expected to throw another party next year. What you should do is throw the kind of party where your guest wake up several days from now and call their lawyers to find out if they've been indicted for anything. You want your guests to be so anxious to avoid a recurrence of your party that they immediately start planning parties of their own, a year in advance, just to prevent you from having another one ... If your party is successful, the police will knock on your door, unless your party is very successful in which case they will lob tear gas through your living room window. As host, your job is to make sure that they don't arrest anybody. Or if they're dead set on arresting someone, your job is to make sure it isn't you ... -- Dave Barry | |
| Last year we drove across the country... We switched on the driving... every half mile. We had one cassette tape to listen to on the entire trip. I don't remember what it was. -- Steven Wright | |
| Like you, I am frequently haunted by profound questions related to man's place in the Scheme of Things. Here are just a few: Q -- Is there life after death? A -- Definitely. I speak from personal experience here. On New Year's Eve, 1970, I drank a full pitcher of a drink called "Black Russian", then crawled out on the lawn and died within a matter of minutes, which was fine with me because I had come to realize that if I had lived I would have spent the rest of my life in the grip of the most excruciatingly painful headache. Thanks to the miracle of modern orange juice, I was brought back to life several days later, but in the interim I was definitely dead. I guess my main impression of the afterlife is that it isn't so bad as long as you keep the television turned down and don't try to eat any solid foods. -- Dave Barry | |
| My friends, I am here to tell you of the wonderous continent known as Africa. Well we left New York drunk and early on the morning of February 31. We were 15 days on the water, and 3 on the boat when we finally arrived in Africa. Upon our arrival we immediately set up a rigorous schedule: Up at 6:00, breakfast, and back in bed by 7:00. Pretty soon we were back in bed by 6:30. Now Africa is full of big game. The first day I shot two bucks. That was the biggest game we had. Africa is primerally inhabited by Elks, Moose and Knights of Pithiests. The elks live up in the mountains and come down once a year for their annual conventions. And you should see them gathered around the water hole, which they leave immediately when they discover it's full of water. They weren't looking for a water hole. They were looking for an alck hole. One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas, how he got in my pajamas, I don't know. Then we tried to remove the tusks. That's a tough word to say, tusks. As I said we tried to remove the tusks, but they were imbedded so firmly we couldn't get them out. But in Alabama the Tuscaloosa, but that is totally irrelephant to what I was saying. We took some pictures of the native girls, but they weren't developed. So we're going back in a few years... -- Julius H. Marx [Groucho] | |
| Some of you ... may have decided that, this year, you're going to celebrate it the old-fashioned way, with your family sitting around stringing cranberries and exchanging humble, handmade gifts, like on "The Waltons". Well, you can forget it. If everybody pulled that kind of subversive stunt, the economy would collapse overnight. The government would have to intervene: it would form a cabinet-level Department of Holiday Gift-Giving, which would spend billions and billions of tax dollars to buy Barbie dolls and electronic games, which it would drop on the populace from Air Force jets, killing and maiming thousands. So, for the good of the nation, you should go along with the Holiday Program. This means you should get a large sum of money and go to a mall. -- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide" | |
| Statements recently seen on Slashdot: "The Internet interprets advertising as damage and routes around it." "Accept risk. Accept responsibility. Put a lawyer out of business." "A beowulf cluster of Cisco routers? Isn't that the Internet?" "Geeks aren't interested in politics because government doesn't double its efficiency and speed once every 18 months." "Windows 98 hasn't crashed for me once in over a year, either. Oh, wait, I haven't booted it in over a year." "For more than 4 generations the IT Professionals were the guardians of quality and stability in software. Before the dark times. Before Microsoft..." "You can tell how desperate they are by counting the number of times they say 'innovate' in their press releases." | |
| Linux Rally Held in Pennsylvania HARRISBURG, PA -- Thousands of Linux advocates gathered at the Pennsylvania state capitol building earlier today. They were protesting the state's recent three year deal with Microsoft to install Windows NT on all state computer systems. "Whatever pointy haired boss made this deal ought to be shot on sight," one protestor exclaimed. "Windows NT is a piece of [expletive] compared to Linux. The taxpayers of Pennsylvania are going to be sorry three years from now when this 'deal' concludes. The state has sold its soul to Satan [Bill Gates]." Brief hostilities broke out when a group of police officers armed with riot gear descended on the protestors. After the police threatened to use tear gas, the protestors threw thousands of Linux CDs at them. Once the supply of CDs was depleted, the protest became peaceful again. "I saw several policemen pick up Linux CDs and put them in their pockets," one protestor noted. The protest broke up a few minutes later once it was realized that the state legislature wasn't in session. "We may have wasted our time today," one advocate said, "But we'll be back later." State and Microsoft officials were unavailable for comment at press time. How typical. | |
| Red Hat Unveils New Ad Campaign Linux distributor Red Hat has announced plans for a $650,000 ad campaign. The ads will appear on several major newspapers as well as on a few selected websites. "These ads will be targetted towards Windows users who are fed up but aren't aware of any OS alternatives," a Red Hat spokesman said. "We feel that there is a large audience for this." One of the ads will be a half page spread showing two computers side-by-side: a Wintel and a Linux box. The title asks "Is your operating system ready for the year 2000?" Both computers have a calendar/clock display showing. The Windows box shows "12:00:01AM -- January 1, 1900" while the Linux box shows "12:00:01AM -- January 1, 2000". The tagline at the bottom says "Linux -- a century ahead of the competition." | |
| ARE YOU ADDICTED TO SLASHDOT? Take this short test to find out if you are a Dothead. 1. Do you submit articles to Slashdot and then reload the main page every 3.2 seconds to see if your article has been published yet? 2. Have you made more than one "first comment!" post within the past week? 3. Have you ever participated in a Gnome vs. KDE or a Linux vs. FreeBSD flamewar on Slashdot? 4. Do you write jokes about Slashdot? 5. Do you wake up at night, go to the bathroom, and fire up your web browser to get your Slashdot fix on the way back? 6. Do you dump your date at the curb so you can hurry home to visit Slashdot? 7. Do you think of Slashdot when you order a taco at a restaurant? 8. Are you a charter member of the Rob Malda Fan Club? 9. Did you lease a T3 line so you could download Slashdot faster? 10. Is Slashdot your only brower's bookmark? 11. Do you get a buzz when your browser finally connects to Slashdot? 12. Do you panic when your browser says "Unable to connect to slashdot.org"? 13. Have you even made a New Year's Resolution to cut back on Slashdot access... only to visit it at 12:01? | |
| Linux Drinking Game (Abridged) With a group of friends, take turns reading articles about Linux from popular media sources (Ziff-Davis AnchorDesk is recommended) or postings on Usenet (try alt.fan.bill-gates). If the author says one of the things below, take a drink. Continue until everyone involved is plastered. - Linux will never go mainstream - Any platform that can't run Microsoft Office [or some other Microsoft "solution"] sucks - Linux is hard to install - Linux tech support is lacking - No one ever got fired for choosing Microsoft - Any OS with a command line interface is primitive - Microsoft is an innovative company - Could you get fired for choosing Linux? - Linux was created by a bunch of snot-nosed 14 year old hackers with acne and no life - Security through obscurity is the way to go - Linus and Unix are 70s technology while NT is 90s technology - All Linux software must be released under the GPL - Linux is a great piece of shareware | |
| 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. | |
| Linux Dominates Academic Research A recent survey of colleges and high school reveals that Linux, Open Source Software, and Microsoft are favorite topics for research projects. Internet Censorship, a popular topic for the past two years, was supplanted by Biology of Penguins as another of this year's most popular subjects for research papers. "The Internet has changed all the rules," one college professor told Humorix. "Nobody wants to write papers about traditional topics like the death penalty, freedom of speech, abortion, juvenile crime, etc. Most of the research papers I've seen the past year have been computer related, and most of the reference material has come from the Net. This isn't necessarily good; there's a lot of crap on the Net. One student tried to use 'Bob's Totally Wicked Anti-Microsoft Homepage of Doom' and 'The Support Group for People Used by Microsoft' as primary sources of information for his paper about Microsoft." A high school English teacher added, "Plagarism is a problem with the Net. One of my students 'wrote' a brilliant piece about the free software revolution. Upon further inspection, however, almost everything was stolen from Eric S. Raymond's website. I asked the student, "What does noosphere mean?" He responded, 'New-what?' Needless to say, he failed the class." | |
| Humorix Holiday Gift Idea #1 Linux-of-the-Month Club Price: US$60 for a one year membership Producer: CheapNybbles; 1-800-LINUX-CD It's the gift that keeps on giving. Every month a CD-ROM with a different Linux distribution or BSD Unix flavor will be sent in the mail. This is the perfect gift for those that have been using Slackware since day one and haven't gotten around to trying another distribution. Or, for those friends or relatives that still cling to Windows, a Linux-of-the-Month club membership is the perfect way to say, "Your OS sucks". | |
| Humorix Holiday Gift Idea #3 iTux Penguin Computer Price: $999.95 for base model Producer: Orange Computer, Co.; 1-800-GET-ITUX Based on the Slashdot comments, response to the Apple iMac from the Linux community was lukewarm at best. Orange Computer, Co., has picked up where Apple left behind and produced the iTux computer specifically for Linux users who want to "Think a lot different". The self-contained iTux computer system is built in the shape of Tux the Penguin. Its 15 inch monitor (17 inch available next year) is located at Tux's large belly. The penguin's two feet make up the split ergonomic keyboard (without those annoying Windows keys, of course). A 36X CD-ROM drive fits into Tux's mouth. Tux's left eye is actually the reboot button (can be reconfigured for other purposes since it is rarely used) and his right eye is the power button. The iTux case opens up from the back, allowing easy access for screwdriver-wielding nerds into Tux's guts. The US$995.95 model contains an Alpha CPU and all the usual stuff found in a Linux-class machine. More expensive models, to be debuted next year, will feature dual or quad Alpha CPUs and a larger size. | |
| 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. | |
| Microsoft Open Source Solitaire REDMOND, WA -- In a first attempt at "embrace-and-extend" of open source software, Microsoft will release its popular Solitaire and FreeCell games as open source under the MILA (Microsoft Innovative License Agreement). According to a Microsoft press release, the Visual C++ source code for the two games will be available from the Microsoft website "in the first quarter" (no year was specified). Industry pundits hail the move as revolutionary. "Microsoft's release of its most popular Windows feature as open source software demonstrates just how innovative the company really is. The DoJ is clearly barking up the wrong tree," wrote one Ziff-Davis flunkie. One executive at a large company said, "Freely available source code is the best idea Microsoft has ever invented." One Linux developer told Humorix, "Let's just hope some fool doesn't try to port this thing to Linux. Imagine the havoc that could ensue if a bunch of core Linux contributors downloaded Solitaire and became addicted to it. It would be a disaster! Linux and open source development would grind to a halt while the hackers wasted their time playing Solitaire or FreeCell. 'Just one more game...' they would say." | |
| Microsoft ActivePromo Campaign: "Windows Competitive Upgrade Offer" Microsoft's PR masterminds are planning a massive marketing campaign, code-named "ActivePromo 2000", to promote the upcoming release of Windows 2000 (scheduled for February 2001). This marketing campaign will include a "Windows Competitive Upgrade Offer" promotion. Users of non-Microsoft operating systems (Linux in particular) will be given the opportunity to trade-in their present OS for a free copy of Windows 98 (or NT 4.0) and Office 97. People (all three of them) who want to participate in this program will have to: 1. Mail their operating system's floppy disks or CD-ROMs to Microsoft 2. Agree to a two year contract with the Microsoft Network. 3. Agree (in writing) to the Competitive Upgrade License Agreement; one of the terms of which is that the user may not install, copy, or otherwise use a non-Microsoft OS for five years. | |
| The GPL Is Not Y2K-Compliant! BOSTON, MA -- Panic ensued earlier today at GNU Project Headquarters when it was discovered that the GNU General Public License is not ready for the year 2000. Thankfully, the panic quickly subsided when RMS posted an emergency diff file to Usenet that patches the GPL to eliminate the problem. The non-Y2K compliant material appears on lines 295 and 316 of version 2.0 of the GPL. Both lines contain the text, "Copyright (C) 19yy ", a classic example of unpreparedness for the year 2000. Microsoft was quick to respond to the news, saying in a rushed press release, "At least our license agreements don't contain any Y2K issues." The GNU Project immediately countered Microsoft's statement with a press release that said simply, "Whatever". | |
| Microsoft Mandatory Survey (#15) 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 15: In your opinion, what companies should Microsoft seek to acquire in the coming year? A. Disney. I'd like to see a cute animated movie starring Clippit the Office Assistant. B. CBS. I'd like to see a new line-up featuring must-watch shows like "Touched by a Microserf", "Redmond Hope", "Everybody Loves Bill", "The Late Show With Steve Ballmer", and "60 Minutes... of Microsoft Infomercials", C. Google. Microsoft could drastically improve the quality and performance of this search engine by migrating it from Linux to Windows NT servers. D. Lowes Hardware Stores. Every copy of Windows 2000 could come bundled with a coupon for a free kitchen sink or a free window! | |
| ERIC S. RAYMOND: I'd like to introduce Eric Jones, a disadvantaged member of the geek community who has been forced to live in a homeless shelter. Eric? Come on out here and tell us about yourself... JONES: Well, I'm a consultant for a Bay Area corporation. Due to the housing crisis, I've been forced to sleep in a shelter. ESR: How much do you make? JONES: Over $100,000 a year. ESR: Wow! And you still can't afford housing or rent? That sounds terrible... Hopefully with this telethon we'll be able to raise money to fund new shelters for disadvantaged geeks like Eric here. We also have plans for a Silicon Valley Terraforming Initiative in which several square miles of Pacific Ocean will be turned into usuable land for building housing and apartments for geeks... -- Excerpt from the Geek Grok '99 telethon | |
| OPPRESSED GEEK: Everybody keeps blaming me for the Y2K problem, the Melissa Virus, Windows crashes... you name it. When somebody finds out you're a bona fide geek, they start bugging you about computer problems. I frequently hear things like, "Why can't you geeks make Windows work right?", "What kind of idiot writes a program that can't handle the year 2000?", "Geeks are evil, all they do is write viruses", and "The Internet is the spawn of Satan". I'm afraid to admit I have extensive computing experience. When somebody asks what kind of job I have, I always lie. From my experience, admitting that you're a geek is an invitation to disaster. LARRY WALL: I know, I know. I sometimes say that I'm the founder of a pearl harvesting company instead of admitting that I'm the founder of the Perl programming language. ERIC S. RAYMOND: This is tragic. We can't live in a world like this. We need your donations to fight social oppression and ignorance against geekdom... -- Excerpt from the Geek Grok '99 telethon | |
| What Did Santa Claus Bring You In 1999? (#1) LINUS TORVALDS: Santa didn't bring me anything, but Tim O'Reilly just gave me a large sum of money to publish my new book, "Linus Torvalds' Official Guide To Receiving Fame, Fortune, and Hot Babes By Producing Your Own Unix-Like Operating System In Only 10 Years". ORDINARY LINUX HACKER: I kept hinting to my friends and family that I wanted to build my own Beowulf Cluster. My grandmother got mixed up and gave me a copy of "Beowulf's Chocolate Cluster Cookbook". I like chocolate, but I would've preferred silicon. LINUX LONGHAIR: My friends sent me a two-year subscription to several Ziff-Davis publications, much to my dislike. I don't want to read Jesse Berst's rants against Linux, or John Dvorak's spiels about how great Windows 2000 is. Still, I suppose this isn't so bad. Ziff-Davis glossy paper makes an excellent lining for fireplaces. | |
| New Linux Companies Hope To Get Rich Quick (#3) In the "Cathedral and the Bazaar", ESR mentions that one motivation behind Open Source software is ego-gratification. That's where OpenEgo, Inc. comes in. For a fee, the hackers at OpenEgo will produce a piece of Open Source software and distribute it in your name, thus building up your reputation and ego. You can quickly become the envy of all your friends -- without lifting a finger. Want a higher-paying tech job? With OpenEgo's services, you'll look like an Open Source pro in no time, and have dozens of hot job offers from across the country. Says the OpenEgo sales literature, "Designing, implementing, maintaining, and promoting a successful Open Source project is a pain. However, at OpenEgo, we do all the work while you reap all the rewards..." A page on the OpenEgo site claims, "We produced a Linux kernel patch for one customer last year that was immediately accepted by Linus Torvalds... Within days the person gained employment at Transmeta and is now on the road to IPO riches..." Prices range from $1,000 for a small program to $5,000 for a kernel patch. | |
| Excerpts From The First Annual Nerd Bowl (#4) BRYANT DUMBELL: Welcome back. After Round 1, the Mad Hatters are ahead 15 to 12. Round 2, the Caffeine Craziness event, is now underway. JOHN SPLADDEN: This is my favorite part of the Nerdbowl. Each player tries to consume as many gallons of caffeinated beverages within one minute, and then points are awarded based on the redness of their eyes. DUMBELL: I like this event too... I must admit, it's much better than the "Crash It" event that was played in the Zeroth Annual Nerdbowl last year. Players were each seated in front of a PC running Windows 98... points were awarded based on how fast the player could cause a Blue Screen. SPLADDEN: Ah, yes, I remember that. Everybody complained that the event was too easy. "Where the hell is the challenge?" yelled Chris DiBona while doing a victory dance after the VA Linux Rich Penguins beat the SuSE Cats In The Hats last year 121-96. | |
| Brief History Of Linux (#20) Linux is born Linus' superhuman programming talent produced, within a year, a full operating system that rivaled Minix. The first official announcement on comp.os.minix came October 5th, in which Linus wrote these famous words: Do you pine for the nice days of minix-1.1, when men were men and wrote their own device drivers? Do you want to cut your teeth on an operating system that will achieve world domination within 15 years? Want to get rich quick by the end of the century by taking money from hordes of venture capitalists and clueless Wall Street suits? Need to get even with Bill Gates but don't know what to do except throw cream pies at him? Then this post might just be for you :-) Linux (which was known as "Lindows", "Freax", and "Billsux" for short periods in 1991) hit the bigtime on January 5, 1992 (exactly one year after Linus wasn't hit by a bus) when version 0.12 was released under the GNU GPL. Linus called his creation a "better Minix than Minix"; the famous Linus vs. Tanenbaum flamewar erupted soon thereafter on January 29th and injured several Usenet bystanders. | |
| Brief History Of Linux (#23) Linus Torvalds certainly wasn't the only person to create their own operating system from scratch. Other people working from their leaky basements did create their own systems and now they are sick that they didn't become an Alpha Geek like Torvalds or a Beta Geek like Alan Cox. Linus had one advantage not many else did: Internet access. The world was full of half-implemented-Unix-kernels at the time, but they were sitting isolated on some hacker's hard drive, destined to be destroyed by a hard drive crash. Thankfully that never happened to Linux, mostly because everyone with Net access could download a copy instead of paying shipping charges to receive the code on a huge stack of unreliable floppy disks. Indeed, buried deep within a landfill in Lansing, Michigan sits a stack of still-readable 5-1/4 floppies containing the only known copy of "Windows Killer", a fully functional Unix kernel so elegant, so efficient, so easy-to-use that Ken Thompson himself would be jealous of its design. Unfortunately the author's mother threw out the stack of floppies in a bout of spring cleaning. The 14 year old author's talents were lost forever as his parents sent him to Law School. | |
| The Linux House 1.01 Mr. Billy O'Nair knows how to build a house. The 24 year old retired dotcom billionaire has constructed the "Linux House 1.01", a bachelor pad built in the shape of Tux Penguin. This geek haven features a 256 foot long computer room, along with other smaller, lesser important rooms (kitchen, bedroom, bathroom, etc.). Explained O'Nair, "Why do architects waste a bunch of space on formal living rooms, family rooms, dining rooms, closets, foyers, and hallways that are rarely used? In my 'Linux House', the majority of square footage is devoted to the two rooms that I myself use the most: a computer room and a procrastination room." ...The Linux House features a LAN (Liquor Acquisition Network) that delivers alcohol or caffeinated beverages to any room in the house by way of pipes that run through the ceiling. 'PANIC' buttons scattered throughout the house activate the RAM System (Random Access Munchies), in which candy bars and other snacks are immediately delivered by FPM (Fast Pretzel Mode) and EDO (Extended Delicacy Output) pneumatic tubes. | |
| 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 healthy male adult bore consumes each year one and a half times his own weight in other people's patience. -- John Updike | |
| I cannot and will not cut my conscience to fit this year's fashions. -- Lillian Hellman | |
| When a man you like switches from what he said a year ago, or four years ago, he is a broad-minded man who has courage enough to change his mind with changing conditions. When a man you don't like does it, he is a liar who has broken his promises. -- Franklin Adams | |
| You know you're in trouble when... (1) Your only son tells you he wishes Anita Bryant would mind her own business. (2) You put your bra on backwards and it fits better. (3) You call Suicide Prevention and they put you on hold. (4) You see a `60 Minutes' news team waiting in your office. (5) Your birthday cake collapses from the weight of the candles. (6) Your 4-year old reveals that it's "almost impossible" to flush a grapefruit down the toilet. (7) You realize that you've memorized the back of the cereal box. | |
| Any father who thinks he's all important should remind himself that this country honors fathers only one day a year while pickles get a whole week. | |
| Why not have an old-fashioned Christmas for your family this year? Just picture the scene in your living room on Christmas morning as your children open their old-fashioned presents. Your 11-year-old son: "What the heck is this?" You: "A spinning top! You spin it around, and then eventually it falls down. What fun! Ha, ha!" Son: "Is this a joke? Jason Thompson's parents got him a computer with two disk drives and 128 kilobytes of random-access memory, and I get this cretin TOP?" Your 8-year-old daughter: "You think that's bad? Look at this." You: "It's figgy pudding! What a treat!" Daughter: "It looks like goat barf." -- Dave Barry, "Simple, Homespun Gifts" | |
| While the year 2000 (y2k) problem is not an issue for us, all Linux implementations will impacted by the year 2038 (y2.038k) issue. The Debian Project is committed to working with the industry on this issue and we will have our full plans and strategy posted by the first quarter of 2020. | |
| <JHM> Somehow I have more respect for 14 year old Debian developers than 14 year old Certified Microsoft Serfs. | |
| <Knghtbrd> If we're both right (I'm guessing we are) I'm Not Very Happy. * Minupla hands you the understatement of the year award. | |
| <_Anarchy_> acf: maybe April 1 next year slashdot needs to run "Rob Malda accepts new job as head of Debian project" 8) | |
| A grade school teacher was asking students what their parents did for a living. "Tim, you be first," she said. "What does your mother do all day?" Tim stood up and proudly said, "She's a doctor." "That's wonderful. How about you, Amie?" Amie shyly stood up, scuffed her feet and said, "My father is a mailman." "Thank you, Amie," said the teacher. "What about your father, Billy?" Billy proudly stood up and announced, "My daddy plays piano in a whorehouse." The teacher was aghast and promptly changed the subject to geography. Later that day she went to Billy's house and rang the bell. Billy's father answered the door. The teacher explained what his son had said and demanded an explanation. Billy's father replied, "Well, I'm really an attorney. But how do you explain a thing like that to a seven-year-old child?" | |
| According to Kentucky state law, every person must take a bath at least once a year. | |
| Pittsburgh driver's test (5) Your car's horn is a vital piece of safety equipment. How often should you test it? (a) once a year. (b) once a month. (c) once a day. (d) once an hour. The correct answer is (d). You should test your car's horn at least once every hour, and more often at night or in residential neighborhoods. | |
| There is no doubt that my lawyer is honest. For example, when he filed his income tax return last year, he declared half of his salary as 'unearned income.' -- Michael Lara | |
| +#if defined(__alpha__) && defined(CONFIG_PCI) + /* + * The meaning of life, the universe, and everything. Plus + * this makes the year come out right. + */ + year -= 42; +#endif -- From the patch for 1.3.2: (kernel/time.c), submitted by Marcus Meissner | |
| (It is an old Debian tradition to leave at least twice a year ...) -- Sven Rudolph | |
| A cow is a completely automated milk-manufacturing machine. It is encased in untanned leather and mounted on four vertical, movable supports, one at each corner. The front end of the machine, or input, contains the cutting and grinding mechanism, utilizing a unique feedback device. Here also are the headlights, air inlet and exhaust, a bumper and a foghorn. At the rear, the machine carries the milk-dispensing equipment as well as a built-in flyswatter and insect repeller. The central portion houses a hydro- chemical-conversion unit. Briefly, this consists of four fermentation and storage tanks connected in series by an intricate network of flexible plumbing. This assembly also contains the central heating plant complete with automatic temperature controls, pumping station and main ventilating system. The waste disposal apparatus is located to the rear of this central section. Cows are available fully-assembled in an assortment of sizes and colors. Production output ranges from 2 to 20 tons of milk per year. In brief, the main external visible features of the cow are: two lookers, two hookers, four stander-uppers, four hanger-downers, and a swishy-wishy. | |
| But the greatest Electrical Pioneer of them all was Thomas Edison, who was a brilliant inventor despite the fact that he had little formal education and lived in New Jersey. Edison's first major invention in 1877, was the phonograph, which could soon be found in thousands of American homes, where it basically sat until 1923, when the record was invented. But Edison's greatest achievement came in 1879, when he invented the electric company. Edison's design was a brilliant adaptation of the simple electrical circuit: the electric company sends electricity through a wire to a customer, then immediately gets the electricity back through another wire, then (this is the brilliant part) sends it right back to the customer again. This means that an electric company can sell a customer the same batch of electricity thousands of times a day and never get caught, since very few customers take the time to examine their electricity closely. In fact the last year any new electricity was generated in the United States was 1937; the electric companies have been merely re-selling it ever since, which is why they have so much free time to apply for rate increases. -- Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?" | |
| Dealing with the problem of pure staff accumulation, all our researches ... point to an average increase of 5.75% per year. -- C.N. Parkinson | |
| One of your most ancient writers, a historian named Herodotus, tells of a thief who was to be executed. As he was taken away he made a bargain with the king: in one year he would teach the king's favorite horse to sing hymns. The other prisoners watched the thief singing to the horse and laughed. "You will not succeed," they told him. "No one can." To which the thief replied, "I have a year, and who knows what might happen in that time. The king might die. The horse might die. I might die. And perhaps the horse will learn to sing. -- "The Mote in God's Eye", Niven and Pournelle | |
| Save a little money each month and at the end of the year you'll be surprised at how little you have. -- Ernest Haskins | |
| 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? | |
| The departing division general manager met a last time with his young successor and gave him three envelopes. "My predecessor did this for me, and I'll pass the tradition along to you," he said. "At the first sign of trouble, open the first envelope. Any further difficulties, open the second envelope. Then, if problems continue, open the third envelope. Good luck." The new manager returned to his office and tossed the envelopes into a drawer. Six months later, costs soared and earnings plummeted. Shaken, the young man opened the first envelope, which said, "Blame it all on me." The next day, he held a press conference and did just that. The crisis passed. Six months later, sales dropped precipitously. The beleagured manager opened the second envelope. It said, "Reorganize." He held another press conference, announcing that the division would be restructured. The crisis passed. A year later, everything went wrong at once and the manager was blamed for all of it. The harried executive closed his office door, sank into his chair, and opened the third envelope. "Prepare three envelopes..." it said. | |
| Waste not, get your budget cut next year. | |
| XI: If the Earth could be made to rotate twice as fast, managers would get twice as much done. If the Earth could be made to rotate twenty times as fast, everyone else would get twice as much done since all the managers would fly off. XII: It costs a lot to build bad products. XIII: There are many highly successful businesses in the United States. There are also many highly paid executives. The policy is not to intermingle the two. XIV: After the year 2015, there will be no airplane crashes. There will be no takeoffs either, because electronics will occupy 100 percent of every airplane's weight. XV: The last 10 percent of performance generates one-third of the cost and two-thirds of the problems. -- Norman Augustine | |
| XVI: In the year 2054, the entire defense budget will purchase just one aircraft. This aircraft will have to be shared by the Air Force and Navy 3-1/2 days each per week except for leap year, when it will be made available to the Marines for the extra day. XVII: Software is like entropy. It is difficult to grasp, weighs nothing, and obeys the Second Law of Thermodynamics, i.e., it always increases. XVIII: It is very expensive to achieve high unreliability. It is not uncommon to increase the cost of an item by a factor of ten for each factor of ten degradation accomplished. XIX: Although most products will soon be too costly to purchase, there will be a thriving market in the sale of books on how to fix them. XX: In any given year, Congress will appropriate the amount of funding approved the prior year plus three-fourths of whatever change the administration requests -- minus 4-percent tax. -- Norman Augustine | |
| XXXVI: The thickness of the proposal required to win a multimillion dollar contract is about one millimeter per million dollars. If all the proposals conforming to this standard were piled on top of each other at the bottom of the Grand Canyon it would probably be a good idea. XXXVII: Ninety percent of the time things will turn out worse than you expect. The other 10 percent of the time you had no right to expect so much. XXXVIII: The early bird gets the worm. The early worm ... gets eaten. XXXIX: Never promise to complete any project within six months of the end of the year -- in either direction. XL: Most projects start out slowly -- and then sort of taper off. -- Norman Augustine | |
| Your csh still thinks true is false. Write to your vendor today and tell them that next year Configure ought to "rm /bin/csh" unless they fix their blasted shell. :-) -- Larry Wall in Configure from the perl distribution | |
| "I'll tell you what I know, then," he decided. "The pin I'm wearing means I'm a member of the IA. That's Inamorati Anonymous. An inamorato is somebody in love. That's the worst addiction of all." "Somebody is about to fall in love," Oedipa said, "you go sit with them, or something?" "Right. The whole idea is to get where you don't need it. I was lucky. I kicked it young. But there are sixty-year-old men, believe it or not, and women even older, who might wake up in the night screaming." "You hold meetings, then, like the AA?" "No, of course not. You get a phone number, an answering service you can call. Nobody knows anybody else's name; just the number in case it gets so bad you can't handle it alone. We're isolates, Arnold. Meetings would destroy the whole point of it." -- Thomas Pynchon, "The Crying of Lot 49" | |
| Speaking of love, one problem that recurs more and more frequently these days, in books and plays and movies, is the inability of people to communicate with the people they love; Husbands and wives who can't communicate, children who can't communicate with their parents, and so on. And the characters in these books and plays and so on (and in real life, I might add) spend hours bemoaning the fact that they can't communicate. I feel that if a person can't communicate, the very _____least he can do is to shut up! -- Tom Lehrer, "That Was the Year that Was" | |
| The seven year itch comes from fooling around during the fourth, fifth, and sixth years. | |
| If elected, Zippy pledges to each and every American a 55-year-old houseboy ... | |
| 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?" | |
| "Verily and forsooth," replied Goodgulf darkly. "In the past year strange and fearful wonders I have seen. Fields sown with barley reap crabgrass and fungus, and even small gardens reject their artichoke hearts. There has been a hot day in December and a blue moon. Calendars are made with a month of Sundays and a blue-ribbon Holstein bore alive two insurance salesmen. The earth splits and the entrails of a goat were found tied in square knots. The face of the sun blackens and the skies have rained down soggy potato chips." "But what do all these things mean?" gasped Frito. "Beats me," said Goodgulf with a shrug, "but I thought it made good copy." -- Harvard Lampoon, "Bored of the Rings" | |
| For my son, Robert, this is proving to be the high-point of his entire life to date. He has had his pajamas on for two, maybe three days now. He has the sense of joyful independence a 5-year-old child gets when he suddenly realizes that he could be operating an acetylene torch in the coat closet and neither parent [because of the flu] would have the strength to object. He has been foraging for his own food, which means his diet consists entirely of "food" substances which are advertised only on Saturday-morning cartoon shows; substances that are the color of jukebox lights and that, for legal reasons, have their names spelled wrong, as in New Creemy Chok-'n'-Cheez Lumps o' Froot ("part of this complete breakfast"). -- Dave Barry, "Molecular Homicide" | |
