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Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) by Linux fortune

A true artist will let his wife starve, his children go barefoot, his mother
drudge for his living at seventy, sooner than work at anything but his art.
                -- Shaw
Did you know that the voice tapes easily identify the Russian pilot
that shot down the Korean jet?  At one point he definitely states:

        "Natasha!  First we shoot jet, then we go after moose and squirrel."

                -- ihuxw!tommyo
E.T. GO HOME!!!  (And take your Smurfs with you.)
G. B. Shaw to William Douglas Home: "Go on writing plays, my boy.  One
of these days a London producer will go into his office and say to his
secretary, `Is there a play from Shaw this morning?' and when she says
`No,' he will say, `Well, then we'll have to start on the rubbish.' And
that's your chance, my boy."
Go ahead... make my day.
                -- Dirty Harry
I never failed to convince an audience that the best thing they
could do was to go away.
I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize the
reader.  But if I find that I cannot terrify, I will try to horrify, and if
I find that I cannot horrify, I'll go for the gross-out.
                -- Stephen King
I think...  I think it's in my basement... Let me go upstairs and check.
                -- Escher
It just doesn't seem right to go over the river and through the woods
to Grandmother's condo.
It's all right letting yourself go as long as you can let yourself back.
                -- Mick Jagger
Just once I would like to persuade the audience not to wear any article of
blue denim.  If only they could see themselves in a pair of brown corduroys
like mine instead of this awful, boring blue denim.  I don't enjoy the sky
or sea as much as I used to because of this Levi character.  If Jesus Christ
came back today, He and I would get into our brown corduroys and go to the
nearest jean store and overturn the racks of blue denim.  Then we'd get
crucified in the morning.
                -- Ian Anderson, of Jethro Tull
        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
        "Oh sure, this costume may look silly, but it lets me get in and out
of dangerous situations -- I work for a federal task force doing a survey on
urban crime.  Look, here's my ID, and here's a number you can call, that will
put you through to our central base in Atlanta.  Go ahead, call -- they'll
confirm who I am.
        "Unless, of course, the Astro-Zombies have destroyed it."
                -- Captain Freedom
        The big problem with pornography is defining it.  You can't just
say it's pictures of people naked.  For example, you have these
primitive African tribes that exist by chasing the wildebeest on foot,
and they have to go around largely naked, because, as the old tribal
saying goes: "N'wam k'honi soit qui mali," which means, "If you think
you can catch a wildebeest in this climate and wear clothes at the same
time, then I have some beach front property in the desert region of
Northern Mali that you may be interested in."
        So it's not considered pornographic when National Geographic
publishes color photographs of these people hunting the wildebeest
naked, or pounding one rock onto another rock for some primitive reason
naked, or whatever.  But if National Geographic were to publish an
article entitled "The Girls of the California Junior College System
Hunt the Wildebeest Naked," some people would call it pornography.  But
others would not.  And still others, such as the Spectacularly Rev.
Jerry Falwell, would get upset about seeing the wildebeest naked.
                -- Dave Barry, "Pornography"
The faster we go, the rounder we get.
                -- The Grateful Dead
The Great Movie Posters:

*A Giggle Gurgling Gulp of Glee*
With Pretty Girls, Peppy Scenes, and Gorgeous Revues -- plus a good story.
                -- Tea with a Kick (1924)

Whoopie!  Let's go!... Hand-picked Beauties doing cute tricks!
GET IN THE KNOW FOR THE HEY-HEY WHOOPIE!
                -- The Wild Party (1929)

YOU HEAR HIM MAKE LOVE!
DIX -- the dashing soldier!
        DIX -- the bold adventurer!
                DIX -- the throbbing lover!
                -- The Wheel of Life (1929)

SEE CHARLES BUTTERWORTH DRIVE A STREETCAR AND SING LOVE
SONGS TO HIS MARE "MITZIE"!
                -- The Night is Young (1934)
The Great Movie Posters:

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

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

AN ASTRONAUT WENT UP-
A "GUESS WHAT" CAME DOWN!
        The picture that comes complete with a 10-foot tall monster to
give you the wim-wams!
                -- Monster a Go-Go (1965)
The Great Movie Posters:

SEE rebel guerrillas torn apart by trucks!
SEE corpses cut to pieces and fed to dogs and vultures!
SEE the monkey trained to perform nursing duties for her paralyzed owner!
                -- Sweet and Savage (1983)

What a Guy!  What a Gal!  What a Pair!
                -- Stroker Ace (1983)

It's always better when you come again!
                -- Porky's II: The Next Day (1983)

You Don't Have to Go to Texas for a Chainsaw Massacre!
                -- Pieces (1983)
There's a trick to the Graceful Exit.  It begins with the vision to
recognize when a job, a life stage, a relationship is over -- and to let
go.  It means leaving what's over without denying its validity or its
past importance in our lives.  It involves a sense of future, a belief
that every exit line is an entry, that we are moving on, rather than out.
The trick of retiring well may be the trick of living well.  It's hard to
recognize that life isn't a holding action, but a process.  It's hard to
learn that we don't leave the best parts of ourselves behind, back in the
dugout or the office. We own what we learned back there.  The experiences
and the growth are grafted onto our lives.  And when we exit, we can take
ourselves along -- quite gracefully.
                -- Ellen Goodman
Use an accordion.  Go to jail.
                -- KFOG, San Francisco
You're all clear now, kid.  Now blow this thing so we can all go home.
                -- Han Solo
Everyone *knows* cats are on a higher level of existence.  These silly humans
are just to big-headed to admit their inferiority.
        Just think what a nicer world this would be if it were controlled by
cats.
        You wouldn't see cats having waste disposal problems.
        They're neat.
        They don't have sexual hangups.  A cat gets horny, it does something
about it.
        They keep reasonable hours.  You *never* see a cat up before noon.
        They know how to relax.  Ever heard of a cat with an ulcer?  
        What are the chances of a cat starting a nuclear war?  Pretty neglible.
It's not that they can't, they just know that there are much better things to
do with ones time.  Like lie in the sun and sleep.  Or go exploring the world.
Sometimes when I get up in the morning, I feel very peculiar.  I feel
like I've just got to bite a cat!  I feel like if I don't bite a cat
before sundown, I'll go crazy!  But then I just take a deep breath and
forget about it.  That's what is known as real maturity.
                -- Snoopy
In most countries selling harmful things like drugs is punishable.
Then howcome people can sell Microsoft software and go unpunished?
(By hasku@rost.abo.fi, Hasse Skrifvars)
not enough memory, go get system upgrade
Sysadmin didn't hear pager go off due to loud music from bar-room speakers.
Don't go around saying the world owes you a living.  The world owes you
nothing.  It was here first.
                -- Mark Twain
Go not to the elves for counsel, for they will say both yes and no.
                -- J.R.R. Tolkien
The countdown had stalled at 'T' minus 69 seconds when Desiree, the first
female ape to go up in space, winked at me slyly and pouted her thick,
rubbery lips unmistakably -- the first of many such advances during what
would prove to be the longest, and most memorable, space voyage of my
career.
                -- Winning sentence, 1985 Bulwer-Lytton bad fiction contest.
        The Priest's grey nimbus in a niche where he dressed discreetly.
I will not sleep here tonight. Home also I cannot go.
        A voice, sweetened and sustained, called to him from the sea.
Turning the curve he waved his hand.  A sleek brown head, a seal's, far
out on the water, round.  Usurper.
                -- James Joyce, "Ulysses"
When I was younger, I could remember anything, whether it had happened
or not; but my faculties are decaying now and soon I shall be so I
cannot remember any but the things that never happened.  It is sad to
go to pieces like this but we all have to do it.
                -- Mark Twain
        A manager was about to be fired, but a programmer who worked for him
invented a new program that became popular and sold well.  As a result, the
manager retained his job.
        The manager tried to give the programmer a bonus, but the programmer
refused it, saying, "I wrote the program because I though it was an interesting
concept, and thus I expect no reward."
        The manager, upon hearing this, remarked, "This programmer, though he
holds a position of small esteem, understands well the proper duty of an
employee.  Lets promote him to the exalted position of management consultant!"
        But when told this, the programmer once more refused, saying, "I exist
so that I can program.  If I were promoted, I would do nothing but waste
everyone's time.  Can I go now?  I have a program that I'm working on."
                -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"
        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 programmer from a very large computer company went to a software
conference and then returned to report to his manager, saying: "What sort
of programmers work for other companies?  They behaved badly and were
unconcerned with appearances. Their hair was long and unkempt and their
clothes were wrinkled and old. They crashed out hospitality suites and they
made rude noises during my presentation."
        The manager said: "I should have never sent you to the conference.
Those programmers live beyond the physical world.  They consider life absurd,
an accidental coincidence.  They come and go without knowing limitations.
Without a care, they live only for their programs.  Why should they bother
with social conventions?"
        "They are alive within the Tao."
                -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"
All parts should go together without forcing.  You must remember that the parts
you are reassembling were disassembled by you.  Therefore, if you can't get
them together again, there must be a reason.  By all means, do not use a hammer.
                -- IBM maintenance manual, 1925
===  ALL USERS PLEASE NOTE  ========================

CAR and CDR now return extra values.

The function CAR now returns two values.  Since it has to go to the trouble
to figure out if the object is carcdr-able anyway, we figured you might as
well get both halves at once.  For example, the following code shows how to
destructure a cons (SOME-CONS) into its two slots (THE-CAR and THE-CDR):

        (MULTIPLE-VALUE-BIND (THE-CAR THE-CDR) (CAR SOME-CONS) ...)

For symmetry with CAR, CDR returns a second value which is the CAR of the
object.  In a related change, the functions MAKE-ARRAY and CONS have been
fixed so they don't allocate any storage except on the stack.  This should
hopefully help people who don't like using the garbage collector because
it cold boots the machine so often.
===  ALL USERS PLEASE NOTE  ========================

There has been some confusion concerning MAPCAR.
        (DEFUN MAPCAR (&FUNCTIONAL FCN &EVAL &REST LISTS)
                (PROG (V P LP)
                (SETQ P (LOCF V))
        L        (SETQ LP LISTS)
                (%START-FUNCTION-CALL FCN T (LENGTH LISTS) NIL)
        L1        (OR LP (GO L2))
                (AND (NULL (CAR LP)) (RETURN V))
                (%PUSH (CAAR LP))
                (RPLACA LP (CDAR LP))
                (SETQ LP (CDR LP))
                (GO L1)
        L2        (%FINISH-FUNCTION-CALL FCN T (LENGTH LISTS) NIL)
                (SETQ LP (%POP))
                (RPLACD P (SETQ P (NCONS LP)))
                (GO L)))
We hope this clears up the many questions we've had about it.
And it should be the law: If you use the word `paradigm' without knowing
what the dictionary says it means, you go to jail.  No exceptions.
                -- David Jones
But this has taken us far afield from interface, which is not a bad
place to be, since I particularly want to move ahead to the kludge.
Why do people have so much trouble understanding the kludge?  What
is a kludge, after all, but not enough K's, not enough ROM's, not
enough RAM's, poor quality interface and too few bytes to go around?
Have I explained yet about the bytes?
Dear Emily:
        How can I choose what groups to post in?
                -- Confused

Dear Confused:
        Pick as many as you can, so that you get the widest audience.  After
all, the net exists to give you an audience.  Ignore those who suggest you
should only use groups where you think the article is highly appropriate.
Pick all groups where anybody might even be slightly interested.
        Always make sure followups go to all the groups.  In the rare event
that you post a followup which contains something original, make sure you
expand the list of groups.  Never include a "Followup-to:" line in the
header, since some people might miss part of the valuable discussion in
the fringe groups.
                -- Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette
Dear Emily:
        I'm having a serious disagreement with somebody on the net. I
tried complaints to his sysadmin, organizing mail campaigns, called for
his removal from the net and phoning his employer to get him fired.
Everybody laughed at me.  What can I do?
                -- A Concerned Citizen

Dear Concerned:
        Go to the daily papers.  Most modern reporters are top-notch computer
experts who will understand the net, and your problems, perfectly.  They
will print careful, reasoned stories without any errors at all, and surely
represent the situation properly to the public.  The public will also all
act wisely, as they are also fully cognizant of the subtle nature of net
society.
        Papers never sensationalize or distort, so be sure to point out things
like racism and sexism wherever they might exist.  Be sure as well that they
understand that all things on the net, particularly insults, are meant
literally.  Link what transpires on the net to the causes of the Holocaust, if
possible.  If regular papers won't take the story, go to a tabloid paper --
they are always interested in good stories.
DOS Air:
All the passengers go out onto the runway, grab hold of the plane, push it
until it gets in the air, hop on, jump off when it hits the ground again.
Then they grab the plane again, push it back into the air, hop on, et
cetera.
Fortune suggests uses for YOUR favorite UNIX commands!

Try:
        [Where is Jimmy Hoffa?                        (C shell)
        ^How did the^sex change operation go?        (C shell)
        "How would you rate BSD vs. System V?
        %blow                                        (C shell)
        'thou shalt not mow thy grass at 8am'        (C shell)
        got a light?                                (C shell)
        !!:Say, what do you think of margarine?        (C shell)
        PATH=pretending! /usr/ucb/which sense        (Bourne shell)
        make love
        make "the perfect dry martini"
        man -kisses dog                                (anything up to 4.3BSD)
        i=Hoffa ; >$i; $i; rm $i; rm $i                (Bourne shell)
Go away! Stop bothering me with all your "compute this ... compute that"!
I'm taking a VAX-NAP.

logout
//GO.SYSIN DD *, DOODAH, DOODAH
I went to my first computer conference at the New York Hilton about 20
years ago.  When somebody there predicted the market for microprocessors
would eventually be in the millions, someone else said, "Where are they
all going to go? It's not like you need a computer in every doorknob!"

Years later, I went back to the same hotel.  I noticed the room keys had
been replaced by electronic cards you slide into slots in the doors.

There was a computer in every doorknob.
        -- Danny Hillis
        I'm sure that VMS is completely documented, I just haven't found the
right manual yet.  I've been working my way through the manuals in the document
library and I'm half way through the second cabinet, (3 shelves to go), so I
should find what I'm looking for by mid May.  I hope I can remember what it
was by the time I find it.
        I had this idea for a new horror film, "VMS Manuals from Hell" or maybe
"The Paper Chase : IBM vs. DEC".  It's based on Hitchcock's "The Birds", except
that it's centered around a programmer who is attacked by a swarm of binder
pages with an index number and the single line "This page intentionally left
blank."
                -- Alex Crain
If you ever want to have a lot of fun, I recommend that you go off and program
an imbedded system.  The salient characteristic of an imbedded system is that
it cannot be allowed to get into a state from which only direct intervention
will suffice to remove it.  An imbedded system can't permanently trust anything
it hears from the outside world.  It must sniff around, adapt, consider, sniff
around, and adapt again.  I'm not talking about ordinary modular programming
carefulness here.  No.  Programming an imbedded system calls for undiluted
raging maniacal paranoia.  For example, our ethernet front ends need to know
what network number they are on so that they can address and route PUPs
properly.  How do you find out what your network number is?  Easy, you ask a
gateway.  Gateways are required by definition to know their correct network
numbers.  Once you've got your network number, you start using it and before
you can blink you've got it wired into fifteen different sockets spread all
over creation.  Now what happens when the panic-stricken operator realizes he
was running the wrong version of the gateway which was giving out the wrong
network number?  Never supposed to happen.  Tough.  Supposing that your
software discovers that the gateway is now giving out a different network
number than before, what's it supposed to do about it?  This is not discussed
in the protocol document.  Never supposed to happen.  Tough.  I think you
get my drift.
Is your job running?  You'd better go catch it!
        It took 300 years to build and by the time it was 10% built,
everyone knew it would be a total disaster. But by then the investment
was so big they felt compelled to go on. Since its completion, it has
cost a fortune to maintain and is still in danger of collapsing.
        There are at present no plans to replace it, since it was never
really needed in the first place.
        I expect every installation has its own pet software which is
analogous to the above.
                -- K.E. Iverson, on the Leaning Tower of Pisa
Just go with the flow control, roll with the crunches, and, when you get
a prompt, type like hell.
        Long ago, in a finite state far away, there lived a JOVIAL
character named Jack.  Jack and his relations were poor.  Often their
hash table was bare.  One day Jack's parent said to him, "Our matrices
are sparse.  You must go to the market to exchange our RAM for some
BASICs."  She compiled a linked list of items to retrieve and passed it
to him.
        So Jack set out.  But as he was walking along a Hamilton path,
he met the traveling salesman.
        "Whither dost thy flow chart take thou?" prompted the salesman
in high-level language.
        "I'm going to the market to exchange this RAM for some chips
and Apples," commented Jack.
        "I have a much better algorithm.  You needn't join a queue
there; I will swap your RAM for these magic kernels now."
        Jack made the trade, then backtracked to his house.  But when
he told his busy-waiting parent of the deal, she became so angry she
started thrashing.
        "Don't you even have any artificial intelligence?  All these
kernels together hardly make up one byte," and she popped them out the
window...
                -- Mark Isaak, "Jack and the Beanstack"
Meantime, in the slums below Ronnie's Ranch, Cynthia feels as if some one
has made voodoo boxen of her and her favorite backplanes. On this fine
moonlit night, some horrible persona has been jabbing away at, dragging
magnets over, and surging these voodoo boxen.  Fortunately, they seem to
have gotten a bit bored and fallen asleep, for it looks like Cynthia may
get to go home.  However, she has made note to quickly put together a totem
of sweaty, sordid static straps, random bits of wire, flecks of once meaniful
oxide, bus grant cards, gummy worms, and some bits of old pdp backplane to
hang above the machine room.  This totem must be blessed by the old and wise
venerable god of unibus at once, before the idolatization of vme, q and pc
bus drive him to bitter revenge.  Alas, if this fails, and the voodoo boxen
aren't destroyed,  there may be more than worms in the apple. Next, the
arrival of voodoo optico transmitigational magneto killer paramecium, capable
of teleporting from cable to cable, screen to screen, ear to ear and hoof
to mouth...
        Now she speaks rapidly.  "Do you know *why* you want to program?"
        He shakes his head.  He hasn't the faintest idea.
        "For the sheer *joy* of programming!" she cries triumphantly.  
"The joy of the parent, the artist, the craftsman.  "You take a program,
born weak and impotent as a dimly-realized solution.  You nurture the
program and guide it down the right path, building, watching it grow ever
stronger.  Sometimes you paint with tiny strokes, a keystroke added here,
a keystroke changed there."  She sweeps her arm in a wide arc.  "And other
times you savage whole *blocks* of code, ripping out the program's very
*essence*, then beginning anew.  But always building, creating, filling the
program with your own personal stamp, your own quirks and nuances.  Watching
the program grow stronger, patching it when it crashes, until finally it can
stand alone -- proud, powerful, and perfect.  This is the programmer's finest
hour!"  Softly at first, then louder, he hears the strains of a Sousa march.
"This ... this is your canvas! your clay!  Go forth and create a masterwork!"
Please go away.
Scotty:        Captain, we din' can reference it!
Kirk:        Analysis, Mr. Spock?
Spock:        Captain, it doesn't appear in the symbol table.
Kirk:        Then it's of external origin?
Spock:        Affirmative.
Kirk:        Mr. Sulu, go to pass two.
Sulu:        Aye aye, sir, going to pass two.
        Several students were asked to prove that all odd integers are prime.
        The first student to try to do this was a math student.  "Hmmm...
Well, 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, and by induction, we have that all
the odd integers are prime."
        The second student to try was a man of physics who commented, "I'm not
sure of the validity of your proof, but I think I'll try to prove it by
experiment."  He continues, "Well, 1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is
prime, 9 is...  uh, 9 is... uh, 9 is an experimental error, 11 is prime, 13
is prime...  Well, it seems that you're right."
        The third student to try it was the engineering student, who responded,
"Well, to be honest, actually, I'm not sure of your answer either.  Let's
see...  1 is prime, 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is... uh, 9 is...
well, if you approximate, 9 is prime, 11 is prime, 13 is prime...  Well, it
does seem right."
        Not to be outdone, the computer science student comes along and says
"Well, you two sort've got the right idea, but you'll end up taking too long!
I've just whipped up a program to REALLY go and prove it."  He goes over to
his terminal and runs his program.  Reading the output on the screen he says,
"1 is prime, 1 is prime, 1 is prime, 1 is prime..."
So you see Antonio, why worry about one little core dump, eh?  In reality
all core dumps happen at the same instant, so the core dump you will have
tomorrow, why, it already happened.  You see, it's just a little universal
recursive joke which threads our lives through the infinite potential of
the instant.  So go to sleep, Antonio, your thread could break any moment
and cast you out of the safe security of the instant into the dark void of
eternity, the anti-time.  So go to sleep...
Speaking as someone who has delved into the intricacies of PL/I, I am sure
that only Real Men could have written such a machine-hogging, cycle-grabbing,
all-encompassing monster.  Allocate an array and free the middle third?
Sure!  Why not?  Multiply a character string times a bit string and assign the
result to a float decimal?  Go ahead!  Free a controlled variable procedure
parameter and reallocate it before passing it back?  Overlay three different
types of variable on the same memory location?  Anything you say!  Write a
recursive macro?  Well, no, but Real Men use rescan.  How could a language
so obviously designed and written by Real Men not be intended for Real Man use?
        The salesman and the system analyst took off to spend a weekend in the
forest, hunting bear.  They'd rented a cabin, and, when they got there, took
their backpacks off and put them inside.  At which point the salesman turned
to his friend, and said, "You unpack while I go and find us a bear."
        Puzzled, the analyst finished unpacking and then went and sat down
on the porch.  Soon he could hear rustling noises in the forest.  The noises
got nearer -- and louder -- and suddenly there was the salesman, running like
hell across the clearing toward the cabin, pursued by one of the largest and
most ferocious grizzly bears the analyst had ever seen.
        "Open the door!", screamed the salesman.
        The analyst whipped open the door, and the salesman ran to the door,
suddenly stopped, and stepped aside.  The bear, unable to stop, continued
through the door and into the cabin.  The salesman slammed the door closed
and grinned at his friend.  "Got him!", he exclaimed, "now, you skin this
one and I'll go rustle us up another!"
There are running jobs.  Why don't you go chase them?
There's got to be more to life than compile-and-go.
"This is lemma 1.1.  We start a new chapter so the numbers all go back to one."
                -- Prof. Seager, C&O 351
        This is where the bloodthirsty license agreement is supposed to go,
explaining that Interactive Easyflow is a copyrighted package licensed for
use by a single person, and sternly warning you not to pirate copies of it
and explaining, in detail, the gory consequences if you do.
        We know that you are an honest person, and are not going to go around
pirating copies of Interactive Easyflow; this is just as well with us since
we worked hard to perfect it and selling copies of it is our only method of
making anything out of all the hard work.
        If, on the other hand, you are one of those few people who do go
around pirating copies of software you probably aren't going to pay much
attention to a license agreement, bloodthirsty or not.  Just keep your doors
locked and look out for the HavenTree attack shark.
                -- License Agreement for Interactive Easyflow
"We invented a new protocol and called it Kermit, after Kermit the Frog,
star of "The Muppet Show." [3]

[3]  Why?  Mostly because there was a Muppets calendar on the wall when we
were trying to think of a name, and Kermit is a pleasant, unassuming sort of
character.  But since we weren't sure whether it was OK to name our protocol
after this popular television and movie star, we pretended that KERMIT was an
acronym; unfortunately, we could never find a good set of words to go with the
letters, as readers of some of our early source code can attest.  Later, while
looking through a name book for his forthcoming baby, Bill Catchings noticed
that "Kermit" was a Celtic word for "free", which is what all Kermit programs
should be, and words to this effect replaced the strained acronyms in our
source code (Bill's baby turned out to be a girl, so he had to name her Becky
instead).  When BYTE Magazine was preparing our 1984 Kermit article for
publication, they suggested we contact Henson Associates Inc. for permission
to say that we did indeed name the protocol after Kermit the Frog.  Permission
was kindly granted, and now the real story can be told.  I resisted the
temptation, however, to call the present work "Kermit the Book."
                -- Frank da Cruz, "Kermit - A File Transfer Protocol"
Windows NT Beer: Comes in 32-oz. cans, but you can only buy it by the
truckload. This causes most people to have to go out and buy bigger
refrigerators. The can looks just like Windows 3.1 Beer's, but the
company promises to change the can to look just like Windows 95 Beer's --
after Windows 95 beer starts shipping. Touted as an "industrial strength"
beer, and suggested only for use in bars.
You can tell how far we have to go, when FORTRAN is the language of
supercomputers.
                -- Steven Feiner
You can't go home again, unless you set $HOME.
You know you've been sitting in front of your Lisp machine too long
when you go out to the junk food machine and start wondering how to
make it give you the CADR of Item H so you can get that yummie
chocolate cupcake that's stuck behind the disgusting vanilla one.
Absence makes the heart go wander.
After the game the king and the pawn go in the same box.
                -- Italian proverb
All I kin say is when you finds yo'self wanderin' in a peach orchard,
ya don't go lookin' for rutabagas.
                -- Kingfish
How you look depends on where you go.
If anything can go wrong, it will.
It's always darkest just before the lights go out.
                -- Alex Clark
Left to themselves, things tend to go from bad to worse.
Time goes, you say?
Ah no!
Time stays, *we* go.
                -- Austin Dobson
When nothing can possibly go wrong, it will.
When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping.
You can go anywhere you want if you look serious and carry a clipboard.
Wherever you go...There you are.
- Buckaroo Banzai
Do not allow this language (Ada) in its present state to be used in
applications where reliability is critical, i.e., nuclear power stations,
cruise missiles, early warning systems, anti-ballistic missle defense
systems.  The next rocket to go astray as a result of a programming language
error may not be an exploratory space rocket on a harmless trip to Venus:
It may be a nuclear warhead exploding over one of our cities.  An unreliable
programming language generating unreliable programs constitutes a far
greater risk to our environment and to our society than unsafe cars, toxic
pesticides, or accidents at nuclear power stations.
- C. A. R. Hoare
There you go man,
Keep as cool as you can.
It riles them to believe that you perceive the web they weave.
Keep on being free!
"No matter where you go, there you are..."
-- Buckaroo Banzai
"I go on working for the same reason a hen goes on laying eggs."
- H. L. Mencken
"Where shall I begin, please your Majesty?" he asked.  "Begin at the beginning,"
the King said, gravely, "and go on till you come to the end: then stop."
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
Obviously, a man's judgement cannot be better than the information on which he
has based it.  Give him the truth and he may still go wrong when he has
the chance to be right, but give him no news or present him only with distorted
and incomplete data, with ignorant, sloppy or biased reporting, with propaganda
and deliberate falsehoods, and you destroy his whole reasoning processes, and
make him something less than a man.
-- Arthur Hays Sulzberger
I would have promised those terrorists a trip to Disneyland if it would have
gotten the hostages released.  I thank God they were satisfied with the
missiles and we didn't have to go to that extreme.
- Oliver North
I put the shotgun in an Adidas bag and padded it out with four pairs of tennis
socks, not my style at all, but that was what I was aiming for:  If they think
you're crude, go technical; if they think you're technical, go crude.  I'm a
very technical boy.  So I decided to get as crude as possible.  These days,
though, you have to be pretty technical before you can even aspire to
crudeness.
- Johnny Mnemonic, by William Gibson
Already the spirit of our schooling is permeated with the feeling that
every subject, every topic, every fact, every professed truth must be
submitted to a certain publicity and impartiality.  All proffered
samples of learning must go to the same assay-room and be subjected to
common tests.  It is the essence of all dogmatic faiths to hold that
any such "show-down" is sacrilegious and perverse.  The characteristic
of religion, from their point of view, is that it is intellectually
secret, not public; peculiarly revealed, not generall known;
authoritatively declared, not communicated and tested in ordinary
ways...It is pertinent to point out that, as long as religion is
conceived as it is now by the great majority of professed religionists,
there is something self-contradictory in speaking of education in
religion in the same sense in which we speak of education in topics
where the method of free inquiry has made its way.  The "religious"
would be the last to be willing that either the history of the
content of religion should be taught in this spirit; while those
to whom the scientific standpoint is not merely a technical device,
but is the embodiment of the integrity of mind, must protest against
its being taught in any other spirit.
- John Dewey (1859-1953), American philosopher,
  from "Democracy in the Schools", 1908
...I would go so far as to suggest that, were it not for our ego and
concern to be different, the African apes would be included in our
family, the Hominidae.
- Richard Leakey
"And kids... learn something from Susie and Eddie.
If you think there's a maniacal psycho-geek in the
basement:
    1)        Don't give him a chance to hit you on the
        head with an axe!
    2)        Flee the premises... even if you're in your
        underwear.
    3)        Warn the neighbors and call the police.
But whatever else you do... DON'T GO DOWN IN THE DAMN BASEMENT!"
-- Saturday Night Live meets Friday the 13th
   "Daddy, Daddy, make
    Santa Claus go away!"
                       "I can't, son;
                        he's grown too
                        powerful."
                                     "HO HO HO!"
-- Duck's Breath Mystery Theatre
"Today's robots are very primitive, capable of understanding only a few
simple instructions such as 'go left', 'go right', and 'build car'."
--John Sladek
"If I do not return to the pulpit this weekend, millions of people will go
to hell."
-- Jimmy Swaggart, 5/20/88
"If that man in the PTL is such a healer, why can't he make his wife's
hairdo go down?"
-- Robin Williams
New York is a jungle, they tell you.  You could go further, and say that
New York is a jungle.  New York *is a jungle.*  Beneath the columns of
the old rain forest, made of melting macadam, the mean Limpopo of swamped
Ninth Avenue bears an angry argosy of crocs and dragons, tiger fish, noise
machines, sweating rainmakers.  On the corners stand witchdoctors and
headhunters, babbling voodoo-men -- the natives, the jungle-smart natives.
And at night, under the equatorial overgrowth and heat-holding cloud
cover, you hear the ragged parrot-hoot and monkeysqueak of the sirens,
and then fires flower to ward off monsters.  Careful: the streets are
sprung with pits and nets and traps.  Hire a guide.  Pack your snakebite
gook and your blowdart serum.  Take it seriously.  You have to get a
bit jungle-wise.
-- Martin Amis, _Money_
Now I was heading, in my hot cage, down towards meat-market country on the
tip of the West Village.  Here the redbrick warehouses double as carcass
galleries and rat hives, the Manhattan fauna seeking its necessary
level, living or dead.  Here too you find the heavy faggot hangouts,
The Spike, the Water Closet, the Mother Load.  Nobody knows what goes on
in these places.  Only the heavy faggots know.  Even Fielding seems somewhat
vague on the question.  You get zapped and flogged and dumped on -- by
almost anybody's standards, you have a really terrible time.  The average
patron arrives at the Spike in one taxi but needs to go back to his sock
in two.  And then the next night he shows up for more.  They shackle
themselves to racks, they bask in urinals.  Their folks have a lot of
explaining to do, if you want my opinion, particularly the mums.  Sorry
to single you ladies out like this but the story must start somewhere.  
A craving for hourly murder -- it can't be willed.  In the meantime,
Fielding tells me, Mother Nature looks on and taps her foot and clicks
her tongue.  Always a champion of monogamy, she is cooking up some fancy
new diseases.  She just isn't going to stand for it.
-- Martin Amis, _Money_
"Flight Reservation systems decide whether or not you exist. If your information
isn't in their database, then you simply don't get to go anywhere."
-- Arthur Miller
"Once they go up, who cares where they come down?  That's not my department."
-- Werner von Braun
Go ahead, capitalize the T on technology, deify it if it will make you feel
less responsible -- but it puts you in with the neutered, brother, in with
the eunuchs keeping the harem of our stolen Earth for the numb and joyless
hardons of human sultans, human elite with no right at all to be where they
are --"
-- Thomas Pynchon, _Gravity's Rainbow_
... The cable had passed us by; the dish was the only hope, and eventually
we were all forced to turn to it.  By the summer of '85, the valley had more
satellite dishes per capita than an Eskimo village on the north slope of
Alaska.

Mine was one of the last to go in.  I had been nervous from the start about
the hazards of too much input, which is a very real problem with these
things.  Watching TV becomes a full-time job when you can scan 200 channels
all day and all night and still have the option of punching Night Dreams
into the video machine, if the rest of the world seems dull.
-- Hunter Thompson, "Full-time scrambling", _Generation of Swine_
"You don't go out and kick a mad dog.  If you have a mad dog with rabies, you
take a gun and shoot him."
-- Pat Robertson, TV Evangelist, about Muammar Kadhafy
[Astrology is] 100 percent hokum, Ted.  As a matter of fact, the first edition
of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, written in 1771 -- 1771! -- said that this
belief system is a subject long ago ridiculed and reviled.  We're dealing with
beliefs that go back to the ancient Babylonians.  There's nothing there....
It sounds a lot like science, it sounds like astronomy.  It's got technical
terms.  It's got jargon.  It confuses the public....The astrologer is quite
glib, confuses the public, uses terms which come from science, come from
metaphysics, come from a host of fields, but they really mean nothing.  The
fact is that astrological beliefs go back at least 2,500 years.  Now that
should be a sufficiently long time for astrologers to prove their case.  They
have not proved their case....It's just simply gibberish.  The fact is, there's
no theory for it, there are no observational data for it.  It's been tested
and tested over the centuries.  Nobody's ever found any validity to it at
all.  It is not even close to a science.  A science has to be repeatable, it
has to have a logical foundation, and it has to be potentially vulnerable --
you test it.  And in that astrology is reqlly quite something else.
-- Astronomer Richard Berendzen, President, American University, on ABC
    News "Nightline," May 3, 1988
"If you want to know what happens to you when you die, go look at some dead
stuff."
-- Dave Enyeart
"After one week [visiting Austria] I couldn't wait to go back to the United
States.  Everything was much more pleasant in the United States, because of
the mentality of being open-minded, always positive.  Everything you want to
do in Europe is just, 'No way.  No one has ever done it.'  They haven't any
more the desire to go out to conquer and achieve -- I realized that I had much
more the American spirit."
-- Arnold Schwarzenegger
        [May one] doubt whether, in cheese and timber, worms are generated,
        or, if beetles and wasps, in cow-dung, or if butterflies, locusts,
        shellfish, snails, eels, and such life be procreated of putrefied
        matter, which is to receive the form of that creature to which it
        is by formative power disposed[?]  To question this is to question
        reason, sense, and experience.  If he doubts this, let him go to
        Egypt, and there he will find the fields swarming with mice begot
        of the mud of the Nylus, to the great calamity of the inhabitants.
                A seventeenth century opinion quoted by L. L. Woodruff,
                in *The Evolution of Earth and Man*, 1929
Q: Somebody just posted that Roman Polanski directed Star Wars.  What
should I do?

A: Post the correct answer at once!  We can't have people go on believing
that!  Very good of you to spot this.  You'll probably be the only one to
make the correction, so post as soon as you can.  No time to lose, so
certainly don't wait a day, or check to see if somebody else has made the
correction.

And it's not good enough to send the message by mail.  Since you're the
only one who really knows that it was Francis Coppola, you have to inform
the whole net right away!

-- Brad Templeton, _Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette_
"Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company."
-- Mark Twain
"I am convinced that the manufacturers of carpet odor removing powder have
included encapsulated time released cat urine in their products.  This
technology must be what prevented its distribution during my mom's reign.  My
carpet smells like piss, and I don't have a cat.  Better go by some more."
-- timw@zeb.USWest.COM, in alt.conspiracy
"But are you not," he said, "a more fiendish disputant than the Great Hyperlobic
Omni-Cognate Neutron Wrangler of Ciceronicus Twelve, the Magic and
Indefatigable?"

"The Great Hyperlobic Omni-Cognate Neutron Wrangler," said Deep Thought,
thoroughly rolling the r's, "could talk all four legs off an Arcturan
Mega-Donkey -- but only I could persuade it to go for a walk afterward."
-- Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
"And it should be the law: If you use the word `paradigm' without knowing what
the dictionary says it means, you go to jail. No exceptions."
-- David Jones @ Megatest Corporation
"If anything can go wrong, it will."
-- Edsel Murphy
A diplomat is a person who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you
actually look forward to the trip.
                -- Caskie Stinnett, "Out of the Red"
Freedom begins when you tell Mrs. Grundy to go fly a kite.
Give all orders verbally.  Never write anything down that might go into a
"Pearl Harbor File".
I used to be a rebel in my youth.

This cause... that cause... (chuckle) I backed 'em ALL!  But I learned.
Rebellion is simply a device used by the immature to hide from his own
problems.  So I lost interest in politics.  Now when I feel aroused by
a civil rights case or a passport hearing... I realize it's just a device.
I go to my analyst and we work it out.  You have no idea how much better
I feel these days.
                -- J. Feiffer
If everybody minded their own business, the world would go around a deal faster.
                -- The Duchess, "Through the Looking Glass"
If you go on with this nuclear arms race, all you are going to do is
make the rubble bounce.
                -- Winston Churchill
        Once there was a marine biologist who loved dolphins. He spent his
time trying to feed and protect his beloved creatures of the sea.  One day,
in a fit of inventive genius, he came up with a serum that would make
dolphins live forever!
        Of course he was ecstatic. But he soon realized that in order to mass
produce this serum he would need large amounts of a certain compound that was
only found in nature in the metabolism of a rare South American bird.  Carried
away by his love for dolphins, he resolved that he would go to the zoo and
steal one of these birds.
        Unbeknownst to him, as he was arriving at the zoo an elderly lion was
escaping from its cage.  The zookeepers were alarmed and immediately began
combing the zoo for the escaped animal, unaware that it had simply lain down
on the sidewalk and had gone to sleep.
        Meanwhile, the marine biologist arrived at the zoo and procured his
bird.  He was so excited by the prospect of helping his dolphins that he
stepped absentmindedly stepped over the sleeping lion on his way back to his
car.  Immediately, 1500 policemen converged on him and arrested him for
transporting a myna across a staid lion for immortal porpoises.
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 and the fate of mankind are formed by men without ideals and without
greatness.  Those who have greatness within them do not go in for politics.
                -- Albert Camus
        Strange memories on this nervous night in Las Vegas.  Five years later?
Six?  It seems like a lifetime, or at least a Main Era -- the kind of peak that
never comes again.  San Fransisco in the middle sixties was a very special time
and place to be a part of.  Maybe it meant something.  Maybe not, in the long
run...  There was madness in any direction, at any hour.  If not across the
Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda...  You could
strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we
were doing was right, that we were winning...
        And that, I think, was the handle -- that sense of inevitable victory
over the forces of Old and Evil.  Not in any mean or military sense; we didn't
need that. Our energy would simply prevail.  There was no point in fighting
-- on our side or theirs.  We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest
of a high and beautiful wave.  So now, less than five years later, you can go
up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes
you can almost ___see the high-water mark -- that place where the wave finally
broke and rolled back.
                -- Hunter S. Thompson
The Least Successful Police Dogs
        America has a very strong candidate in "La Dur", a fearsome looking
schnauzer hound, who was retired from the Orlando police force in Florida
in 1978.  He consistently refused to do anything which might ruffle or
offend the criminal classes.
        His handling officer, Rick Grim, had to admit: "He just won't go up
and bite them.  I got sick and tired of doing that dog's work for him."
        The British contenders in this category, however, took things a
stage further.  "Laddie" and "Boy" were trained as detector dogs for drug
raids.  Their employment was terminated following a raid in the Midlands in
1967.
        While the investigating officer questioned two suspects, they
patted and stroked the dogs who eventually fell asleep in front of the
fire.  When the officer moved to arrest the suspects, one dog growled at
him while the other leapt up and bit his thigh.
                -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures"
The poetry of heroism appeals irresitably to those who don't go to a war,
and even more so to those whom the war is making enormously wealthy."
                -- Celine
We'll try to cooperate fully with the IRS, because, as citizens, we feel
a strong patriotic duty not to go to jail.
                -- Dave Barry
What does it take for Americans to do great things; to go to the moon, to
win wars, to dig canals linking oceans, to build railroads across a continent?
In independent thought about this question, Neil Armstrong and I concluded
that it takes a coincidence of four conditions, or in Neil's view, the
simultaneous peaking of four of the many cycles of American life.  First, a
base of technology must exist from which to do the thing to be done.  Second,
a period of national uneasiness about America's place in the scheme of human
activities must exist.  Third, some catalytic event must occur that focuses
the national attention upon the direction to proceed.  Finally, an articulate
and wise leader must sense these first three conditions and put forth with
words and action the great thing to be accomplished.  The motivation of young
Americans to do what needs to be done flows from such a coincidence of
conditions. ...  The Thomas Jeffersons, The Teddy Roosevelts, The John
Kennedys appear.  We must begin to create the tools of leadership which they,
and their young frontiersmen, will require to lead us onward and upward.
                -- Dr. Harrison H. Schmidt
When a place gets crowded enough to require ID's, social collapse is not
far away.  It is time to go elsewhere.  The best thing about space travel
is that it made it possible to go elsewhere.
                -- R.A. Heinlein, "Time Enough For Love"
When you go into court you are putting your fate into the hands of twelve
people who weren't smart enough to get out of jury duty.
                -- Norm Crosby
You should never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for
freedom and liberty.
                -- Henrik Ibsen
3rd Law of Computing:
        Anything that can go wr
fortune: Segmentation violation -- Core dumped
Bombeck's Rule of Medicine:
        Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died.
Davis's Dictum:
        Problems that go away by themselves, come back by themselves.
Dawn, n.:
        The time when men of reason go to bed.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
FORTUNE EXPLAINS WHAT JOB REVIEW CATCH PHRASES MEAN:        #9
has management potential:
        Because of his intimate relationship with inanimate objects, the
        reviewee has been appointed to the critical position of department
        pencil monitor.

inspirational:
        A true inspiration to others.  ("There, but for the grace of God,
        go I.")

adapts to stress:
        Passes wind, water, or out depending upon the severity of the
        situation.

goal oriented:
        Continually sets low goals for himself, and usually fails
        to meet them.
Gomme's Laws:
        (1) A backscratcher will always find new itches.
        (2) Time accelerates.
        (3) The weather at home improves as soon as you go away.
Hempstone's Question:
        If you have to travel on the Titanic, why not go first class?
Immutability, Three Rules of:
        (1)  If a tarpaulin can flap, it will.
        (2)  If a small boy can get dirty, he will.
        (3)  If a teenager can go out, he will.
Jones' Motto:
        Friends come and go, but enemies accumulate.
Jones' Second Law:
        The man who smiles when things go wrong has thought of someone
        to blame it on.
Kennedy's Market Theorem:
        Given enough inside information and unlimited credit,
        you've got to go broke.
lawsuit, n.:
        A machine which you go into as a pig and come out as a sausage.
                -- Ambrose Bierce
Madison's Inquiry:
        If you have to travel on the Titanic, why not go first class?
Murphy's Laws:
        (1) If anything can go wrong, it will.
        (2) Nothing is as easy as it looks.
        (3) Everything takes longer than you think it will.
Ozman's Laws:
        (1)  If someone says he will do something "without fail," he won't.
        (2)  The more people talk on the phone, the less money they make.
        (3)  People who go to conferences are the ones who shouldn't.
        (4)  Pizza always burns the roof of your mouth.
QOTD:
        "Every morning I read the obituaries; if my name's not there,
        I go to work."
QOTD:
        "I used to go to UCLA, but then my Dad got a job."
QOTD:
        "I've always wanted to work in the Federal Mint.  And then go on
        strike.  To make less money."
QOTD:
        "I've got one last thing to say before I go; give me back
        all of my stuff."
QOTD:
        "Just how much can I get away with and still go to heaven?"
QOTD:
        How can I miss you if you won't go away?
Rudd's Discovery:
        You know that any senator or congressman could go home and make
        $300,000 to $400,000, but they don't.  Why?  Because they can
        stay in Washington and make it there.
Rule of Feline Frustration:
        When your cat has fallen asleep on your lap and looks utterly
        content and adorable, you will suddenly have to go to the
        bathroom.
Rules for driving in New York:
        (1) Anything done while honking your horn is legal.
        (2) You may park anywhere if you turn your four-way flashers on.
        (3) A red light means the next six cars may go through the
            intersection.
Silverman's Law:
        If Murphy's Law can go wrong, it will.
Some points to remember [about animals]:
        (1) Don't go to sleep under big animals, e.g., elephants, rhinoceri,
            hippopotamuses;
        (2) Don't put animals with sharp teeth or poisonous fangs down the
            front of your clothes;
        (3) Don't pat certain animals, e.g., crocodiles and scorpions or dogs
            you have just kicked.
                -- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac"
The distinction between Jewish and goyish can be quite subtle, as the
following quote from Lenny Bruce illustrates:

        "I'm Jewish.  Count Basie's Jewish.  Ray Charles is Jewish.
Eddie Cantor's goyish.  The B'nai Brith is goyish.  The Hadassah is
Jewish.  Marine Corps -- heavy goyish, dangerous.

        "Kool-Aid is goyish.  All Drake's Cakes are goyish.
Pumpernickel is Jewish and, as you know, white bread is very goyish.
Instant potatoes -- goyish.  Black cherry soda's very Jewish.
Macaroons are ____very Jewish.  Fruit salad is Jewish.  Lime Jell-O is
goyish.  Lime soda is ____very goyish.  Trailer parks are so goyish that
Jews won't go near them ..."
                -- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
Clique Maintenance:
        The need of one generation to see the generation following it
as deficient so as to bolster its own collective ego: "Kids today do
nothing.  They're so apathetic.  We used to go out and protest.  All
they do is shop and complain."
                -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated
                   Culture"
Recreational Slumming:
        The practice of participating in recreational activities
of a class one perceives as lower than one's own: "Karen!  Donald!
Let's go bowling tonight!  And don't worry about shoes ... apparently
you can rent them."
                -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated
                   Culture"
A pickup with three guys in it pulls into the lumber yard.  One of the men
gets out and goes into the office.
        "I need some four-by-two's," he says.
        "You must mean two-by-four's" replies the clerk.
        The man scratches his head.  "Wait a minute," he says, "I'll go
check."
        Back, after an animated conversation with the other occupants of the
truck, he reassures the clerk, that, yes, in fact, two-by-fours would be
acceptable.
        "OK," says the clerk, writing it down, "how long you want 'em?"
        The guy gets the blank look again.  "Uh... I guess I better go
check," he says.
        He goes back out to the truck, and there's another animated
conversation.  The guy comes back into the office.  "A long time," he says,
"we're building a house".
Blessed are they who Go Around in Circles, for they Shall be Known as Wheels.
Go 'way!  You're bothering me!
Go away, I'm all right.
                -- H.G. Wells' last words.
Go climb a gravity well!
Take what you can use and let the rest go by.
                -- Ken Kesey
The problem with any unwritten law is that you don't know where to go
to erase it.
                -- Glaser and Way
Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.
                -- Henry David Thoreau
Use a pun, go to jail.
When things go well, expect something to explode, erode, collapse or
just disappear.
Why not go out on a limb?  Isn't that where the fruit is?
[ ] Safeguard this message - it is an important historical document.
[ ] Delete after reading -- Subversive Literature.
[ ] Ignore and go back to what you were doing.
        Festivity Level 1: Your guests are chatting amiably with each
other, admiring your Christmas-tree ornaments, singing carols around
the upright piano, sipping at their drinks and nibbling hors d'oeuvres.

        Festivity Level 2: Your guests are talking loudly -- sometimes
to each other, and sometimes to nobody at all, rearranging your
Christmas-tree ornaments, singing "I Gotta Be Me" around the upright
piano, gulping their drinks and wolfing down hors d'oeuvres.

        Festivity Level 3: Your guests are arguing violently with
inanimate objects, singing "I can't get no satisfaction," gulping down
other peoples' drinks, wolfing down Christmas tree ornaments and
placing hors d'oeuvres in the upright piano to see what happens when
the little hammers strike.

        Festivity Level 4: Your guests, hors d'oeuvres smeared all over
their naked bodies are performing a ritual dance around the burning
Christmas tree.  The piano is missing.

        You want to keep your party somewhere around level 3, unless
you rent your home and own Firearms, in which case you can go to level
4.  The best way to get to level 3 is egg-nog.
HOGAN'S HEROES DRINKING GAME --
        Take a shot every time:

-- Sergeant Schultz says, "I knoooooowww nooooothing!"
-- General Burkhalter or Major Hochstetter intimidate/insult Colonel Klink.
-- Colonel Klink falls for Colonel Hogan's flattery.
-- One of the prisoners sneaks out of camp (one shot for each prisoner to go).
-- Colonel Klink snaps to attention after answering the phone (two shots
        if it's one of our heroes on the other end).
-- One of the Germans is threatened with being sent to the Russian front.
-- Corporal Newkirk calls up a German in his phoney German accent, and
        tricks him (two shots if it's Colonel Klink).
-- Hogan has a romantic interlude with a beautiful girl from the underground.
-- Colonel Klink relates how he's never had an escape from Stalag 13.
-- Sergeant Schultz gives up a secret (two shots if he's bribed with food).
-- The prisoners listen to the Germans' conversation by a hidden transmitter.
-- Sergeant Schultz "captures" one of the prisoners after an escape.
-- Lebeau pronounces "colonel" as "cuh-loh-`nell".
-- Carter builds some kind of device (two shots if it's not explosive).
-- Lebeau wears his apron.
-- Hogan says "We've got no choice" when someone claims that the plan is
        impossible.
-- The prisoners capture an important German, and sneak him out the tunnel.
In 1967, the Soviet Government minted a beautiful silver ruble with Lenin
in a very familiar pose -- arms raised above him, leading the country to
revolution.  But, it was clear to everybody, that if you looked at it from
behind, it was clear that Lenin was pointing to 11:00, when the Vodka
shops opened, and was actually saying, "Comrades, forward to the Vodka shops.

It became fashionable, when one wanted to have a drink, to take out the
ruble and say, "Oh my goodness, Comrades, Lenin tells me we should go.
Symptom:                Feet cold and wet, glass empty.
Fault:                        Glass being held at incorrect angle.
Action Required:        Turn glass other way up so that open end points
                        toward ceiling.

Symptom:                Feet warm and wet.
Fault:                        Improper bladder control.
Action Required:        Go stand next to nearest dog.  After a while complain
                        to the owner about its lack of house training and
                        demand a beer as compensation.
                -- Bar Troubleshooting
Too ripped.  Gotta go.
We don't smoke and we don't chew, and we don't go with girls that do.
                -- Walter Summers
When the going gets tough, the tough go grab a beer.
Woody:  What's the story, Mr. Peterson?
Norm:   The Bobbsey twins go to the brewery.
        Let's just cut to the happy ending.
                -- Cheers, Airport V

Woody:  Hey, Mr. Peterson, there's a cold one waiting for you.
Norm:   I know, and if she calls, I'm not here.
                -- Cheers, Bar Wars II: The Woodman Strikes Back

Sam:  Beer, Norm?
Norm: Have I gotten that predictable?  Good.
                -- Cheers, Don't Paint Your Chickens
You're not an alcoholic unless you go to the meetings.
FORTUNE PROVIDES QUESTIONS FOR THE GREAT ANSWERS: #4
A:        Go west, young man, go west!
Q:        What do wabbits do when they get tiwed of wunning awound?
Q:        What do monsters eat?
A:        Things.

Q:        What do monsters drink?
A:        Coke.  (Because Things go better with Coke.)
Q:        What does friendship among Soviet nationalities mean?
A:        It means that the Armenians take the Russians by the hand; the
        Russians take the Ukrainians by the hand; the Ukranians take
        the Uzbeks by the hand; and they all go and beat up the Jews.
Q:        Why don't lawyers go to the beach?
A:        The cats keep trying to bury them.
        A reader reports that when the patient died, the attending doctor
recorded the following on the patient's chart:  "Patient failed to fulfill
his wellness potential."
        Another doctor reports that in a recent issue of the *American Journal
of Family Practice* fleas were called "hematophagous arthropod vectors."
        A reader reports that the Army calls them "vertically deployed anti-
personnel devices."  You probably call them bombs.
        At McClellan Air Force base in Sacramento, California, civilian
mechanics were placed on "non-duty, non-pay status."  That is, they were fired.
        After taking the trip of a lifetime, our reader sent his twelve rolls
of film to Kodak for developing (or "processing," as Kodak likes to call it)
only to receive the following notice:  "We must report that during the handling
of your twelve 35mm Kodachrome slide orders, the films were involved in an
unusual laboratory experience."  The use of the passive is a particularly nice
touch, don't you think?  Nobody did anything to the films; they just had a bad
experience.  Of course our reader can always go back to Tibet and take his
pictures all over again, using the twelve replacement rolls Kodak so generously
sent him.
                -- Quarterly Review of Doublespeak (NCTE)
Everywhere I go I'm asked if I think the university stifles writers.  My
opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them.  There's many a bestseller
that could have been prevented by a good teacher.
                -- Flannery O'Connor
        In a forest a fox bumps into a little rabbit, and says, "Hi,
Junior, what are you up to?"
        "I'm writing a dissertation on how rabbits eat foxes," said the
rabbit.
        "Come now, friend rabbit, you know that's impossible!  No one
will publish such rubbish!"
        "Well, follow me and I'll show you."
        They both go into the rabbit's dwelling and after a while the
rabbit emerges with a satisfied expression on his face.  Comes along a
wolf.  "Hello, little buddy, what are we doing these days?"
        "I'm writing the 2'nd chapter of my thesis, on how rabbits devour
wolves."
        "Are you crazy?  Where's your academic honesty?"
        "Come with me and I'll show you."
        As before, the rabbit comes out with a satisfied look on his face
and a diploma in his paw.  Finally, the camera pans into the rabbit's cave
and, as everybody should have guessed by now, we see a mean-looking, huge
lion, sitting, picking his teeth and belching, next to some furry, bloody
remnants of the wolf and the fox.

        The moral: It's not the contents of your thesis that are
important -- it's your PhD advisor that really counts.
Walt:        Dad, what's gradual school?
Garp:        Gradual school?
Walt:        Yeah.  Mom says her work's more fun now that she's teaching
        gradual school.
Garp:        Oh.  Well, gradual school is someplace you go and gradually
        find out that you don't want to go to school anymore.
                -- The World According To Garp
A Mexican newspaper reports that bored Royal Air Force pilots stationed
on the Falkland Islands have devised what they consider a marvelous new
game.  Noting that the local penguins are fascinated by airplanes, the
pilots search out a beach where the birds are gathered and fly slowly
along it at the water's edge.  Perhaps ten thousand penguins turn their
heads in unison watching the planes go by, and when the pilots turn
around and fly back, the birds turn their heads in the opposite
direction, like spectators at a slow-motion tennis match.  Then, the
paper reports "The pilots fly out to sea and directly to the penguin
colony and overfly it.  Heads go up, up, up, and ten thousand penguins
fall over gently onto their backs.
                -- Audobon Society Magazine
A New Way of Taking Pills
        A physician one night in Wisconsin being disturbed by a burglar, and
having no ball or shot for his pistol, noiselessly loaded the weapon with
small, hard pills, and gave the intruder a "prescription" which he thinks
will go far towards curing the rascal of a very bad ailment.
                -- Nevada Morning Transcript, January 30, 1861
"... And remember: if you don't like the news, go out and make some of
your own."
                -- "Scoop" Nisker, KFOG radio reporter Preposterous Words
This life is a test.  It is only a test.  Had this been an actual life, you
would have received further instructions as to what to do and where to go.
        Carol's head ached as she trailed behind the unsmiling Calibrees
along the block of booths.  She chirruped at Kennicott, "Let's be wild!
Let's ride on the merry-go-round and grab a gold ring!"
        Kennicott considered it, and mumbled to Calibree, "Think you folks
would like to stop and try a ride on the merry-go-round?"
        Calibree considered it, and mumbled to his wife, "Think you'd like
to stop and try a ride on the merry-go-round?"
        Mrs. Calibree smiled in a washed-out manner, and sighed, "Oh no,
I don't believe I care to much, but you folks go ahead and try it."
        Calibree stated to Kennicott, "No, I don't believe we care to a
whole lot, but you folks go ahead and try it."
        Kennicott summarized the whole case against wildness: "Let's try
it some other time, Carrie."
        She gave it up.
                -- Sinclair Lewis, "Main Street"
Gay shlafen:  Yiddish for "go to sleep".

Now doesn't "gay shlafen" have a softer, more soothing sound than the
harsh, staccato "go to sleep"?  Listen to the difference:
        "Go to sleep, you little wretch!" ... "Gay shlafen, darling."
Obvious, isn't it?
        Clearly the best thing you can do for you children is to start
speaking Yiddish right now and never speak another word of English as
long as you live.  This will, of course, entail teaching Yiddish to all
your friends, business associates, the people at the supermarket, and
so on, but that's just the point.  It has to start with committed
individuals and then grow....
        Some minor adjustments will have to be made, of course: those
signs written in what look like Yiddish letters won't be funny when
everything is written in Yiddish.  And we'll have to start driving on
the left side of the road so we won't be reading the street signs
backwards.  But is that too high a price to pay for world peace?
I think not, my friend, I think not.
                -- Arthur Naiman, "Every Goy's Guide to Yiddish"
I'm going through my "I want to go back to New York" phase today.  Happens
every six months or so.  So, I thought, perhaps unwisely, that I'd share
it with you.  

> In New York in the winter it is million degrees below zero and
  the wind travels at a million miles an hour down 5th avenue.
> And in LA it's 72.

> In New York in the summer it is a million degrees and the humidity
  is a million percent.
> And in LA it's 72.

> In New York there are a million interesting people.  
> And in LA there are 72.
Inglish Spocken Hier: some mangled translations

        Various signs in Poland:

                Right turn toward immediate outside.

                Go soothingly in the snow, as there lurk the ski demons.

                Five o'clock tea at all hours.

        In a men's washroom in Sidney:

                Shake excess water from hands, push button to start,
                rub hands rapidly under air outlet and wipe hands
                on front of shirt.

                -- Colin Bowles, San Francisco Chronicle
        Some 1500 miles west of the Big Apple we find the Minneapple, a
haven of tranquility in troubled times.  It's a good town, a civilized town.
A town where they still know how to get your shirts back by Thursday.  Let
the Big Apple have the feats of "Broadway Joe" Namath.  We have known the
stolid but steady Killebrew.  Listening to Cole Porter over a dry martini
may well suit those unlucky enough never to have heard the Whoopee John Polka
Band and never to have shared a pitcher of 3.2 Grain Belt Beer.  The loss is
theirs.  And the Big Apple has yet to bake the bagel that can match peanut
butter on lefse.  Here is a town where the major urban problem is dutch elm
disease and the number one crime is overtime parking.  We boast more theater
per capita than the Big Apple.  We go to see, not to be seen.  We go even
when we must shovel ten inches of snow from the driveway to get there.  Indeed
the winters are fierce.  But then comes the marvel of the Minneapple summer.
People flock to the city's lakes to frolic and rejoice at the sight of so
much happy humanity free from the bonds of the traditional down-filled parka.
Here's to the Minneapple.  And to its people.  Our flair for style is balanced
by a healthy respect for wind chill factors.
        And we always, always eat our vegetables.
        This is the Minneapple.
To a Californian, all New Yorkers are cold; even in heat they rarely go
above fifty-eight degrees.  If you collapse on a street in New York, plan
to spend a few days there.
        -- From "East vs. West: The War Between the Coasts
To a New Yorker, the only California houses on the market for less than a
million dollars are those on fire.  These generally go for six hundred
thousand.
        -- From "East vs. West: The War Between the Coasts
Actually, the probability is 100% that the elevator will be going in the
right direction.  Proof by induction:

N=1.        Trivially true, since both you and the elevator only have one
        floor to go to.

Assume true for N, prove for N+1:
        If you are on any of the first N floors, then it is true by the
        induction hypothesis.  If you are on the N+1st floor, then both you
        and the elevator have only one choice, namely down.  Therefore,
        it is true for all N+1 floors.
QED.
FORTUNE'S GUIDE TO DEALING WITH REAL-LIFE SCIENCE FICTION: #6
What to do...
    if a starship, equipped with an FTL hyperdrive lands in your backyard?
        First of all, do not run after your camera.  You will not have any
        film, and, given the state of computer animation, noone will believe
        you anyway.  Be polite.  Remember, if they have an FTL hyperdrive,
        they can probably vaporize you, should they find you to be rude.
        Direct them to the White House lawn, which is where they probably
        wanted to land, anyway.  A good road map should help.

    if you wake up in the middle of the night, and discover that your
    closet contains an alternate dimension?
        Don't walk in.  You almost certainly will not be able to get back,
        and alternate dimensions are almost never any fun.  Remain calm
        and go back to bed.  Close the door first, so that the cat does not
        wander off.  Check your closet in the morning.  If it still contains
        an alternate dimension, nail it shut.
Hi! How are things going?
        (just fine, thank you...)
Great! Say, could I bother you for a question?
        (you just asked one...)
Well, how about one more?
        (one more than the first one?)
Yes.
        (you already asked that...)
[at this point, Alphonso gets smart...        ]
May I ask two questions, sir?
        (no.)
May I ask ONE then?
        (nope...)
Then may I ask, sir, how I may ask you a question?
        (yes, you may.)
Sir, how may I ask you a question?
        (you must ask for retroactive question asking privileges for
         the number of questions you have asked, then ask for that
         number plus two, one for the current question, and one for the
         next one)
Sir, may I ask nine questions?
        (go right ahead...)
I had a feeling once about mathematics -- that I saw it all.  Depth beyond
depth was revealed to me -- the Byss and the Abyss. I saw -- as one might
see the transit of Venus or even the Lord Mayor's Show -- a quantity passing
through infinity and changing its sign from plus to minus.  I saw exactly
why it happened and why tergiversation was inevitable -- but it was after
dinner and I let it go.
                -- Winston Churchill
"I think the sky is blue because it's a shift from black through purple
to blue, and it has to do with where the light is.  You know, the
farther we get into darkness, and there's a shifting of color of light
into the blueness, and I think as you go farther and farther away from
the reflected light we have from the sun or the light that's bouncing
off this earth, uh, the darker it gets ... I think if you look at the
color scale, you start at black, move it through purple, move it on
out, it's the shifting of color.  We mentioned before about the stars
singing, and that's one of the effects of the shifting of colors."
                -- Pat Robertson, The 700 Club
        If you rap your knuckles against a window jamb or door, if you
brush your leg against a bed or desk, if you catch your foot in a curled-
up corner of a rug, or strike a toe against a desk or chair, go back and
repeat the sequence.
        You will find yourself surprised how far off course you were to
hit that window jamb, that door, that chair.  Get back on course and do it
again.  How can you pilot a spacecraft if you can't find your way around
your own apartment?
                -- William S. Burroughs
Love makes the world go 'round, with a little help from intrinsic angular
momentum.
People who go to conferences are the ones who shouldn't.
So as your consumer electronics adviser, I am advising you to donate your
current VCR to a grate resident, who will laugh sardonically and hurl it
into a dumpster.  Then I want you to go out and purchase a vast array of
8-millimeter video equipment.

... OK!  Got everything?  Well, *too bad, sucker*, because while you were
gone the electronics industry came up with an even newer format that makes
your 8-millimeter VCR look as technologically advanced as toenail dirt.
This format is called "3.5 hectare" and it will not be made available until
it is outmoded, sometime early next week, by a format called "Elroy", so
*order yours now*.
                -- Dave Barry, "No Surrender in the Electronics Revolution"
The  White Rabbit put on his spectacles.
        "Where shall  I  begin, please your Majesty ?" he asked.
        "Begin at the beginning,", the King said, very gravely, "and go on
till you come to the end: then stop."
                -- Lewis Carroll
The ark lands after The Flood.  Noah lets all the animals out.  Says he, "Go
and multiply."  Several months pass.  Noah decides to check up on the animals.
All are doing fine except a pair of snakes.  "What's the problem?" says Noah.
"Cut down some trees and let us live there", say the snakes.  Noah follows
their advice.  Several more weeks pass.  Noah checks on the snakes again.
Lots of little snakes, everybody is happy.  Noah asks, "Want to tell me how
the trees helped?"  "Certainly", say the snakes. "We're adders, and we need
logs to multiply."
The bomb will never go off.  I speak as an expert in explosives.
                -- Admiral William Leahy, U.S. Atomic Bomb Project
The meek shall inherit the earth; the rest of us will go to the stars.
Today's scientific question is: What in the world is electricity?

And where does it go after it leaves the toaster?
                -- Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?"
What the deuce is it to me?  You say that we go around the sun.  If we went
around the moon it would not make a pennyworth of difference to me or my work.
                -- Sherlock Holmes, "A Study in Scarlet"
Where are the calculations that go with a calculated risk?
1925 With a drink so good, 'tis folly to be thirsty
1929 The high sign of refreshment
1929 The pause that refreshes
1930 It had to be good to get where it is
1932 The drink that makes a pause refreshing
1935 The pause that brings friends together
1937 STOP for a pause... GO refreshed
1938 The best friend thirst ever had
1939 Thirst stops here
1942 It's the real thing
1947 Have a Coke
1961 Zing! what a REFRESHING NEW FEELING
1963 Things go better with Coke
1969 Face Uncle Sam with a Coke in your hand
1979 Have a Coke and a smile
1982 Coke is it!
                -- Coca-Cola slogans
Consider the following axioms carefully:
        "Everything's better when it sits on a Ritz."
        and
        "Everything's better with Blue Bonnet on it."
What happens if one spreads Blue Bonnet margarine on a Ritz cracker?  The
thought is frightening.  Is this how God came into being?  Try not to
consider the fact that "Things go better with Coke".
Do you feel personally responsible for the world food shortage?
Every time you go to the beach, does the tide come in?
Have you ever eaten an entire moose?
Can you see your neck?
Do joggers take laps around you for exercise?
If so, welcome to National Fat Week.
This week we'll eat without guilt, and kick off our membership campaign,
        ...by force-feeding a box of cornstarch to a skinny person.
                -- Garfield
How many hors d'oeuvres you are allowed to take off a tray being carried by
a waiter at a nice party?
        Two, but there are ways around it, depending on the style of the hors
d'oeuvre.  If they're those little pastry things where you can't tell what's
inside, you take one, bite off about two-thirds of it, then say:  "This is
cheese!  I hate cheese!"  Then you put the rest of it back on the tray and
bite another one and go, "Darn it!  Another cheese!" and so on.
                -- Dave Barry, "The Stuff of Etiquette"
IT MAKES ME MAD when I go to all the trouble of having Marta cook up about
a hundred drumsticks, then the guy at Marineland says, "You can't throw
that chicken to the dolphins. They eat fish."

Sure they eat fish if that's all you give them!  Man, wise up.
                -- Jack Handley, The New Mexican, 1988.
Life is like an egg stain on your chin -- you can lick it, but it still
won't go away.
Where do you go to get anorexia?
                -- Shelley Winters
A pig is a jolly companion,
Boar, sow, barrow, or gilt --
A pig is a pal, who'll boost your morale,
Though mountains may topple and tilt.
When they've blackballed, bamboozled, and burned you,
When they've turned on you, Tory and Whig,
Though you may be thrown over by Tabby and Rover,
You'll never go wrong with a pig, a pig,
You'll never go wrong with a pig!
                -- Thomas Pynchon, "Gravity's Rainbow"
An Hacker there was, one of the finest sort
Who controlled the system; graphics was his sport.
A manly man, to be a wizard able;
Many a protected file he had sitting on his table.
His console, when he typed, a man might hear
Clicking and feeping wind as clear,
Aye, and as loud as does the machine room bell
Where my lord Hacker was Prior of the cell.
The Rule of good St Savage or St Doeppnor
As old and strict he tended to ignore;
He let go by the things of yesterday
And took the modern world's more spacious way.
He did not rate that text as a plucked hen
Which says that Hackers are not holy men.
And that a hacker underworked is a mere
Fish out of water, flapping on the pier.
That is to say, a hacker out of his cloister.
That was a text he held not worth an oyster.
And I agreed and said his views were sound;
Was he to study till his head wend round
Poring over books in the cloisters?  Must he toil
As Andy bade and till the very soil?
Was he to leave the world upon the shelf?
Let Andy have his labor to himself!
                -- Chaucer
                [well, almost.  Ed.]
And miles to go before I sleep.
                -- Robert Frost
Angels we have heard on High
Tell us to go out and Buy.
                -- Tom Lehrer
Blackout, heatwave, .44 caliber homicide,
The bums drop dead and the dogs go mad in packs on the West Side,
A young girl standing on a ledge, looks like another suicide,
She wants to hit those bricks,
        'cause the news at six got to stick to a deadline,
While the millionaires hide in Beekman place,
The bag ladies throw their bones in my face,
I get attacked by a kid with stereo sound,
I don't want to hear it but he won't turn it down...
                -- Billy Joel, "Glass Houses"
But soft you, the fair Ophelia:
Ope not thy ponderous and marble jaws,
But get thee to a nunnery -- go!
                -- Mark "The Bard" Twain
Buzz off, Banana Nose; Relieve mine eyes
Of hateful soreness, purge mine ears of corn;
Less dear than army ants in apple pies
Art thou, old prune-face, with thy chestnuts worn,
Dropt from thy peeling lips like lousy fruit;
Like honeybees upon the perfum'd rose
They suck, and like the double-breasted suit
Are out of date; therefore, Banana Nose,
Go fly a kite, thy welcome's overstayed;
And stem the produce of thy waspish wits:
Thy logick, like thy locks, is disarrayed;
Thy cheer, like thy complexion, is the pits.
Be off, I say; go bug somebody new,
Scram, beat it, get thee hence, and nuts to you.
Christmas time is here, by Golly;        Kill the turkeys, ducks and chickens;
Disapproval would be folly;                Mix the punch, drag out the Dickens;
Deck the halls with hunks of holly;        Even though the prospect sickens,
Fill the cup and don't say when...        Brother, here we go again.

On Christmas day, you can't get sore;        Relations sparing no expense'll,
Your fellow man you must adore;                Send some useless old utensil,
There's time to rob him all the more,        Or a matching pen and pencil,
The other three hundred and sixty-four!        Just the thing I need... how nice.

It doesn't matter how sincere                Hark The Herald-Tribune sings,
It is, nor how heartfelt the spirit;        Advertising wondrous things.
Sentiment will not endear it;                God Rest Ye Merry Merchants,
What's important is... the price.        May you make the Yuletide pay.
                                        Angels We Have Heard On High,
Let the raucous sleighbells jingle;        Tell us to go out and buy.
Hail our dear old friend, Kris Kringle,        Sooooo...
Driving his reindeer across the sky,
Don't stand underneath when they fly by!
                -- Tom Lehrer
Down to the Banana Republics,
Down to the tropical sun.
Go the expatriated Americans,
Hoping to find some fun.
Some of them go for the sailing,
Caught by the lure of the sea.
Trying to find what is ailing,
Living in the land of the free.
Some of them are running from lovers,
Leaving no forward address.
Some of them are running tons of ganja,
Some are running from the IRS.
Late at night you will find them,
In the cheap hotels and bars.
Hustling the senoritas,
While they dance beneath the stars.
                -- Jimmy Buffet, "Banana Republics"
Easy come and easy go,
        some call me easy money,
Sometimes life is full of laughs,
        and sometimes it ain't funny
You may think that I'm a fool
        and sometimes that is true,
But I'm goin' to heaven in a flash of fire,
        with or without you.
                -- Hoyt Axton
Everywhere you go you'll see them searching,
Everywhere you turn you'll feel the pain,
Everyone is looking for the answer,
Well look again.
                -- Moody Blues, "Lost in a Lost World"
"For a couple o' pins," says Troll, and grins,
"I'll eat thee too, and gnaw thy shins.
A bit o' fresh meat will go down sweet!
I'll try my teeth on thee now.
        Hee now!  See now!
I'm tired o' gnawing old bones and skins;
I've a mind to dine on thee now."

But just as he thought his dinner was caught,
He found his hands had hold of naught.
Before he could mind, Tom slipped behing
And gave him the boot to larn him.
        Warn him!  Darn him!
A bump o' the boot on the seat, Tom thoguht,
Would be the way to larn him.

But harder than stone is the flesh and bone
Of a troll that sits in the hills alone.
As well set your boot to the mountain's root,
For the seat of a troll don't feel it.
        Peel it!  Heal it!
Old Troll laughed, when he heard Tom groan,
And he knew his toes could feel it.

Tom's leg is game, since home he came,
And his bootless foot is lasting lame;
But Troll don't care, and he's still there
With the bone he boned from its owner.
        Doner!  Boner!
Troll's old seat is still the same,
And the bone he boned from its owner!
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
Friends, Romans, Hipsters,
Let me clue you in;
I come to put down Caesar, not to groove him.
The square kicks some cats are on stay with them;
The hip bits, like, go down under;
so let it lay with Caesar.  The cool Brutus
Gave you the message: Caesar had big eyes;
If that's the sound, someone's copping a plea,
And, like, old Caesar really set them straight.
Here, copacetic with Brutus and the studs, --
for Brutus is a real cool cat;
So are they all, all cool cats, --
Come I to make this gig at Caesar's laying down.
Get out, you old Wight!  Vanish in the sunlight!
Shrivel like the cold mist, like the winds go wailing,
Out into the barren lands far beyond the mountains!
Come never here again!  Leave your barrow empty!
Lost and forgotten be, darker than the darkness,
Where gates stand for ever shut, till the world is mended.
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
Go placidly amid the noise and waste,
And remember what comfort there may be in owning a piece thereof.
Avoid quiet and passive persons, unless you are in need of sleep.
Rotate your tires.
Speak glowingly of those greater than yourself,
And heed well their advice -- even though they be turkeys.
Know what to kiss -- and when.
Remember that two wrongs never make a right,
But that three do.
Wherever possible, put people on "HOLD".
Be comforted, that in the face of all aridity and disillusionment,
And despite the changing fortunes of time,
There is always a big future in computer maintenance.

        You are a fluke of the universe ...
        You have no right to be here.
        Whether you can hear it or not, the universe
        Is laughing behind your back.
                -- National Lampoon, "Deteriorata"
Go placidly amid the noise and waste, and remember what value there may
be in owning a piece thereof.
                -- National Lampoon, "Deteriorata"
God rest ye CS students now,                The bearings on the drum are gone,
Let nothing you dismay.                        The disk is wobbling, too.
The VAX is down and won't be up,        We've found a bug in Lisp, and Algol
Until the first of May.                        Can't tell false from true.
The program that was due this morn,        And now we find that we can't get
Won't be postponed, they say.                At Berkeley's 4.2.
(chorus)                                (chorus)

We've just received a call from DEC,        And now some cheery news for you,
They'll send without delay                The network's also dead,
A monitor called RSuX                        We'll have to print your files on
It takes nine hundred K.                The line printer instead.
The staff committed suicide,                The turnaround time's nineteen weeks.
We'll bury them today.                        And only cards are read.
(chorus)                                (chorus)

And now we'd like to say to you                CHORUS:        Oh, tidings of comfort and joy,
Before we go away,                                Comfort and joy,
We hope the news we've brought to you                Oh, tidings of comfort and joy.
Won't ruin your whole day.
You've got another program due, tomorrow, by the way.
(chorus)
                -- to God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
Graphics blind the eyes.
Audio files deafen the ear.
Mouse clicks numb the fingers.
Heuristics weaken the mind.
Options wither the heart.

The Guru observes the net
but trusts his inner vision.
He allows things to come and go.
His heart is as open as the ether.
Hark, the Herald Tribune sings,
Advertising wondrous things.

Angels we have heard on High
Tell us to go out and Buy.
                -- Tom Lehrer
Have you seen the well-to-do, up and down Park Avenue?
On that famous thoroughfare, with their noses in the air,
High hats and Arrow collars, white spats and lots of dollars,
Spending every dime, for a wonderful time...
If you're blue and you don't know where to go to,
Why don't you go where fashion sits,
...
Dressed up like a million dollar trooper,
Trying hard to look like Gary Cooper, (super dooper)
Come, let's mix where Rockefeller's walk with sticks,
Or umberellas, in their mitts,
Puttin' on the Ritz.
...
If you're blue and you don't know where to go to,
Why don't you go where fashion sits,
Puttin' on the Ritz.
Puttin' on the Ritz.
Puttin' on the Ritz.
Puttin' on the Ritz.
Ho! Ho! Ho! to the bottle I go
To heal my heart and drown my woe.
Rain may fall and wind may blow,
And many miles be still to go,
But under a tall tree I will lie,
And let the clouds go sailing by.
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
I get up each morning, gather my wits.
Pick up the paper, read the obits.
If I'm not there I know I'm not dead.
So I eat a good breakfast and go back to bed.

Oh, how do I know my youth is all spent?
My get-up-and-go has got-up-and-went.
But in spite of it all, I'm able to grin,
And think of the places my get-up has been.
                -- Pete Seeger
I had an errand there: gathering water-lilies,
green leaves and lilies white to please my pretty lady,
the last ere the year's end to keep them from the winter,
to flower by her pretty feet till the snows are melted.

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

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

And that proved well for you--for now I shall no longer
go down deep again along the forest-water,
no while the year is old.  Nor shall I be passing
Old Man Willow's house this side of spring-time,
not till the merry spring, when the River-daughter
dances down the withy-path to bathe in the water.
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
I owe, I owe,
It's off to work I go...
I see a bad moon rising.
I see trouble on the way.
I see earthquakes and lightnin'
I see bad times today.
Don't go 'round tonight,
It's bound to take your life.
There's a bad moon on the rise.
                -- J. C. Fogerty, "Bad Moon Rising"
I sent a letter to the fish,                I said it very loud and clear,
I told them, "This is what I wish."        I went and shouted in his ear.
The little fishes of the sea,                But he was very stiff and proud,
They sent an answer back to me.                He said "You needn't shout so loud."
The little fishes' answer was                And he was very proud and stiff,
"We cannot do it, sir, because..."        He said "I'll go and wake them if..."
I sent a letter back to say                I took a kettle from the shelf,
It would be better to obey.                I went to wake them up myself.
But someone came to me and said                But when I found the door was locked
"The little fishes are in bed."                I pulled and pushed and kicked and
                                                knocked,
I said to him, and I said it plain        And when I found the door was shut,
"Then you must wake them up again."        I tried to turn the handle, But...

        "Is that all?" asked Alice.
        "That is all." said Humpty Dumpty. "Goodbye."
I stood on the leading edge,
The eastern seaboard at my feet.
"Jump!" said Yoko Ono
I'm too scared and good-looking, I cried.
Go on and give it a try,
Why prolong the agony, all men must die.
                -- Roger Waters, "The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking"
I'm an artist.
But it's not what I really want to do.
What I really want to do is be a shoe salesman.
I know what you're going to say --
"Dreamer!  Get your head out of the clouds."
All right!  But it's what I want to do.
Instead I have to go on painting all day long.

The world should make a place for shoe salesmen.
                -- J. Feiffer
I'm So Miserable Without You It's Almost Like Having You Here
                -- Song title by Stephen Bishop.

She Got the Gold Mine, I Got the Shaft
                -- Song title by Jerry Reed.

When My Love Comes Back from the Ladies' Room Will I Be Too Old to Care?
                -- Song title by Lewis Grizzard.

I Don't Know Whether to Kill Myself or Go Bowling
                -- Unattributed song title.

Drop Kick Me, Jesus, Through the Goal Posts of Life
                -- Unattributed song title.
I/O, I/O,
It's off to disk I go,
A bit or byte to read or write,
I/O, I/O, I/O...
If an S and an I and an O and a U
With an X at the end spell Su;
And an E and a Y and an E spell I,
Pray what is a speller to do?
Then, if also an S and an I and a G
And an HED spell side,
There's nothing much left for a speller to do
But to go commit siouxeyesighed.
                -- Charles Follen Adams, "An Orthographic Lament"
If Dr. Seuss Were a Technical Writer.....

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

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

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

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

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

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

                -- DementDJ@ccip.perkin-elmer.com (DementDJ) [rec.humor.funny]
In Riemann, Hilbert or in Banach space
Let superscripts and subscripts go their ways.
Our asymptotes no longer out of phase,
We shall encounter, counting, face to face.
                -- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"
In the early morning queue,
With a listing in my hand.
With a worry in my heart,        There on terminal number 9,
Waitin' here in CERAS-land.        Pascal run all set to go.
I'm a long way from sleep,        But I'm waitin' in the queue,
How I miss a good meal so.        With this code that ever grows.
In the early mornin' queue,        Now the lobby chairs are soft,
With no place to go.                But that can't make the queue move fast.
                                Hey, there it goes my friend,
                                I've moved up one at last.
                -- Ernest Adams, "Early Morning Queue", to "Early
                   Morning Rain" by G. Lightfoot
Into love and out again,
        Thus I went and thus I go.
Spare your voice, and hold your pen:
        Well and bitterly I know
All the songs were ever sung,
        All the words were ever said;
Could it be, when I was young,
        Someone dropped me on my head?
                -- Dorothy Parker, "Theory"
It was one time too many
One word too few
It was all too much for me and you
There was one way to go
Nothing more we could do
One time too many
One word too few
                -- Meredith Tanner
Just a song before I go,                Going through security
To whom it may concern,                        I held her for so long.
Traveling twice the speed of sound        She finally looked at me in love,
It's easy to get burned.                And she was gone.
When the shows were over                Just a song before I go,
We had to get back home,                A lesson to be learned.
And when we opened up the door                Traveling twice the speed of sound
I had to be alone.                        It's easy to get burned.
She helped me with my suitcase,
She stands before my eyes,
Driving me to the airport
And to the friendly skies.
                -- Crosby, Stills, Nash, "Just a Song Before I Go"
Last night I met upon the stair
A little man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today.
Gee how I wish he'd go away!
Let us go then you and I
while the night is laid out against the sky
like a smear of mustard on an old pork pie.

"Nice poem Tom.  I have ideas for changes though, why not come over?"
        -- Ezra
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question...
Oh, do not ask, "What is it?"
                -- T.S. Eliot, "Love song of J. Alfred Prufrock"
Louie Louie, me gotta go
Louie Louie, me gotta go

Fine little girl she waits for me
Me catch the ship for cross the sea
Me sail the ship all alone                Three nights and days me sail the sea
Me never thinks me make it home                Me think of girl constantly
(chorus)                                On the ship I dream she there
                                        I smell the rose in her hair
Me see Jamaica moon above                (chorus, guitar solo)
It won't be long, me see my love
I take her in my arms and then
Me tell her I never leave again
                -- The real words to The Kingsmen's classic "Louie Louie"
No pig should go sky diving during monsoon
For this isn't really the norm.
But should a fat swine try to soar like a loon,
So what?  Any pork in a storm.

No pig should go sky diving during monsoon,
It's risky enough when the weather is fine.
But to have a pig soar when the monsoon doth roar
Cast even more perils before swine.
Now I lay me down to study,
I pray the Lord I won't go nutty.
And if I fail to learn this junk,
I pray the Lord that I won't flunk.
But if I do, don't pity me at all,
Just lay my bones in the study hall.
Tell my teacher I've done my best,
Then pile my books upon my chest.
Now of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It leaves me only fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.
                -- A.E. Housman
O! Wanderers in the shadowed land
despair not!  For though dark they stand,
all woods there be must end at last,
and see the open sun go past:
the setting sun, the rising sun,
the day's end, or the day begun.
For east or west all woods must fail ...
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,
A medley of extemporanea;
And love is thing that can never go wrong;
And I am Marie of Roumania.
                -- Dorothy Parker, "Comment"
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"
On the good ship Enterprise
Every week there's a new surprise
Where the Romulans lurk
And the Klingons often go berserk.

Yes, the good ship Enterprise
There's excitement anywhere it flies
Where Tribbles play
And Nurse Chapel never gets her way.

        See Captain Kirk standing on the bridge,
        Mr. Spock is at his side.
        The weekly menace, ooh-ooh
        It gets fried, scattered far and wide.

It's the good ship Enterprise
Heading out where danger lies
And you live in dread
If you're wearing a shirt that's red.
        -- Doris Robin and Karen Trimble of The L.A. Filkharmonics,
           "The Good Ship Enterprise," to the tune of "The Good Ship Lollipop"
One bright Sunday morning, in the shadows of the steeple,
By the Relief Office, I seen my people;
As they stood there hungry, I stood there whistling,
This land was made for you and me.

Nobody living can ever stop me,
As I go walking that freedom highway;
Nobody living can ever make me turn back,
This land was made for you and me.

As I went walking, I saw a sign there,
And on the sign it said: "No Trespassing."
But on the other side, it didn't say nothing,
That side was made for you and me.
                -- Woody Guthrie, "This Land Is Your Land" (verses 4, 6, 7)
        [If you ever wondered why Arlo was so anti-establishment when his dad
         wrote such wonderful patriotic songs, the answer is that you haven't
         heard all of Woody's songs]
One pill makes you larger,                And if you go chasing rabbits
And one pill makes you small.                And you know you're going to fall.
And the ones that mother gives you,        Tell 'em a hookah smoking caterpillar
Don't do anything at all.                Has given you the call.
Go ask Alice                                Call Alice
When she's ten feet tall.                When she was just small.

When men on the chessboard                When logic and proportion
Get up and tell you where to go.        Have fallen sloppy dead,
And you've just had some kind of        And the White Knight is talking
        mushroom                                backwards
And your mind is moving low.                And the Red Queen's lost her head
Go ask Alice                                Remember what the dormouse said:
I think she'll know.                                Feed your head.
                                                Feed your head.
                                                Feed your head.
                -- Jefferson Airplane, "White Rabbit"
Payeen to a Twang
Derrida
Ore-Ida
potato.

If you dared,
I'd ask you
to go dig
up your ides under brown-
tubered skies.

where pitchforked
you will ask
Derrida?
        Proposed Country & Western Song Titles
I Can't Get Over You, So I Get Up and Go Around to the Other Side
If You Won't Leave Me Alone, I'll Find Someone Who Will
I Knew That You'd Committed a Sin When You Came Home Late With
        Your Socks Outside-in
I'm a Rabbit in the Headlights of Your Love
Don't Kick My Tires If You Ain't Gonna Take Me For a Ride
I Liked You Better Before I Knew You So Well
I Still Miss You, Baby, But My Aim's Gettin' Better
I've Got Red Eyes From Your White Lies and I'm Blue All the Time
                -- "Wordplay"
rain falls where clouds come
sun shines where clouds go
clouds just come and go
                -- Florian Gutzwiller
Science Fiction, Double Feature.
Frank has built and lost his creature.
Darkness has conquered Brad and Janet.
The servants gone to a distant planet.
Wo, oh, oh, oh.
At the late night, double feature, Picture show.
I want to go, oh, oh, oh.
To the late night, double feature, Picture show.
                -- Rocky Horror Picture Show
Scratch the disks, dump the core,        Shut it down, pull the plug
Roll the tapes across the floor,        Give the core an extra tug
And the system is going to crash.        And the system is going to crash.
Teletypes smashed to bits.                Mem'ry cards, one and all,
Give the scopes some nasty hits                Toss out halfway down the hall
And the system is going to crash.        And the system is going to crash.
And we've also found                        Just flip one switch
When you turn the power down,                And the lights will cease to twitch
You turn the disk readers into trash.        And the tape drives will crumble
                                                in a flash.
Oh, it's so much fun,                        When the CPU
Now the CPU won't run                        Can print nothing out but "foo,"
And the system is going to crash.        The system is going to crash.
                -- To the tune of "As the Caissons go Rolling Along"
Speaking of Godzilla and other things that convey horror:

With a purposeful grimace and a Mongo-like flair
He throws the spinning disk drives in the air!
And he picks up a Vax and he throws it back down
As he wades through the lab making terrible sounds!
Helpless users with projects due
Scream "My God!" as he stomps on the tape drives, too!

Oh, no!  He says Unix runs too slow!  Go, go, DECzilla!
Oh, yes!  He's gonna bring up VMS!  Go, go, DECzilla!"

* VMS is a trademark of Digital Equipment Corporation.
* DECzilla is a trademark of Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of Death, Inc.
                -- Curtis Jackson
Strange things are done to be number one
In selling the computer                        The Druids were entrepreneurs,
IBM has their strategem                        And they built a granite box
Which steadily grows acuter,                It tracked the moon, warned of monsoons,
And Honeywell competes like Hell,        And forecast the equinox
But the story's missing link                Their price was right, their future
Is the system old at Stonemenge sold                bright,
By the firm of Druids, Inc.                The prototype was sold;
                                        From Stonehenge site their bits and byte
                                        Would ship for Celtic gold.
The movers came to crate the frame;
It weighed a million ton!
The traffic folk thought it a joke        The man spoke true, and thus to you
(the wagon wheels just spun);                A warning from the ages;
"They'll nay sell that," the foreman        Your stock will slip if you can't ship
        spat,                                What's in your brochure's pages.
"Just leave the wild weeds grow;        See if it sells without the bells
"It's Druid-kind, over-designed,        And strings that ring and quiver;
"And belly up they'll go."                Druid repute went down the chute
                                        Because they couldn't deliver.
                -- Edward C. McManus, "The Computer at Stonehenge"
The boy stood on the burning deck,
Eating peanuts by the peck.
His father called him, but he could not go,
For he loved those peanuts so.
                The Worst Lines of Verse
For a start, we can rule out James Grainger's promising line:
        "Come, muse, let us sing of rats."
Grainger (1721-67) did not have the courage of his convictions and deleted
these words on discovering that his listeners dissolved into spontaneous
laughter the instant they were read out.
        No such reluctance afflicted Adam Lindsay Gordon (1833-70) who was
inspired by the subject of war.
        "Flash! flash! bang! bang! and we blazed away,
        And the grey roof reddened and rang;
        Flash! flash! and I felt his bullet flay
        The tip of my ear.  Flash! bang!"
By contrast, Cheshire cheese provoked John Armstrong (1709-79):
        "... that which Cestria sends, tenacious paste of solid milk..."
While John Bidlake was guided by a compassion for vegetables:
        "The sluggard carrot sleeps his day in bed,
        The crippled pea alone that cannot stand."
George Crabbe (1754-1832) wrote:
        "And I was ask'd and authorized to go
        To seek the firm of Clutterbuck and Co."
William Balmford explored the possibilities of religious verse:
        "So 'tis with Christians, Nature being weak
        While in this world, are liable to leak."
And William Wordsworth showed that he could do it if he really tried when
describing a pond:
        "I've measured it from side to side;
        Tis three feet long and two feet wide."
                -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures"
Time goes, you say?
Ah no!
Time stays, *we* go.
                -- Austin Dobson
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
Upon the hearth the fire is red,
Beneath the roof there is a bed;
But not yet weary are our feet,
Still round the corner we may meet
A sudden tree or standing stone
That none have seen but we alone.        Still round the corner there may wait
  Tree and flower and leaf and grass,        A new road or a secret gate,
  Let them pass!  Let them pass!        And though we pass them by today
  Hill and water under sky,                Tomorrow we may come this way
  Pass them by!  Pass them by!                And take the hidden paths that run
                                        Towards the Moon or to the Sun,
Home is behind, the world ahead,          Apple, thorn, and nut and sloe,
And there are many paths to tread          Let them go!  Let them go!
Through shadows to the edge of night,          Sand and stone and pool and dell,
Until the stars are all alight.                  Fare you well!  Fare you well!
Then world behind and home ahead,
We'll wander back to home and bed.
  Mist and twilight, cloud and shade,
  Away shall fade!  Away shall fade!
  Fire and lamp, and meat and bread,
  And then to bed!  And then to bed!
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien
Watching girls go passing by
It ain't the latest thing
I'm just standing in a doorway
I'm just trying to make some sense
Out of these girls passing by                A smile relieves the heart that grieves
The tales they tell of men                Remember what I said
I'm not waiting on a lady                I'm not waiting on a lady
I'm just waiting on a friend                I'm just waiting on a friend
...
Don't need a whore
Don't need no booze
Don't need a virgin priest                Ooh, making love and breaking hearts
But I need someone I can cry to                It is a game for youth
I need someone to protect                But I'm not waiting on a lady
                                        I'm just waiting on a friend
                                        I'm just waiting on a friend
                -- Rolling Stones, "Waiting on a Friend"
Well, my terminal's locked up, and I ain't got any Mail,
        And I can't recall the last time that my program didn't fail;
I've got stacks in my structs, I've got arrays in my queues,
        I've got the : Segmentation violation -- Core dumped blues.

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

On a PDP-11, life should be a breeze,
        But with VAXen in the house even magnetic tapes would freeze.
Now you might think that unlike VAXen I'd know who I abuse,
        I've got the : Segmentation violation -- Core dumped blues.
                -- Core Dumped Blues
Well, we're big rock singers, we've got golden fingers,
And we're loved everywhere we go.
We sing about beauty, and we sing about truth,
At ten thousand dollars a show.
We take all kind of pills to give us all kind of thrills,
But the thrill we've never known,
Is the thrill that'll get'cha, when you get your picture,
On the cover of the Rolling Stone.

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

We got a lot of little, teen-aged, blue-eyed groupies,
Who'll do anything we say.
We got a genuine Indian guru, that's teachin' us a better way.
We got all the friends that money can buy,
So we never have to be alone.
And we keep gettin' richer, but we can't get our picture,
On the cover of the Rolling Stone.
                -- Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show
                [As a note, they eventually DID make the cover of RS. Ed.]
When someone makes a move                We'll send them all we've got,
Of which we don't approve,                John Wayne and Randolph Scott,
Who is it that always intervenes?        Remember those exciting fighting scenes?
U.N. and O.A.S.,                        To the shores of Tripoli,
They have their place, I guess,                But not to Mississippoli,
But first, send the Marines!                What do we do?  We send the Marines!

For might makes right,                        Members of the corps
And till they've seen the light,        All hate the thought of war:
They've got to be protected,                They'd rather kill them off by
                                                peaceful means.
All their rights respected,                Stop calling it aggression--
Till somebody we like can be elected.        We hate that expression!
                                        We only want the world to know
                                        That we support the status quo;
                                        They love us everywhere we go,
                                        So when in doubt, send the Marines!
                -- Tom Lehrer, "Send The Marines"
When the leaders speak of peace
The common folk know
That war is coming
When the leaders curse war
The mobilization order is already written out.

Every day, to earn my daily bread
I go to the market where lies are bought
Hopefully
I take my place among the sellers.
                -- Bertolt Brecht, "Hollywood"
When users see one GUI as beautiful,
other user interfaces become ugly.
When users see some programs as winners,
other programs become lossage.

Pointers and NULLs reference each other.
High level and assembler depend on each other.
Double and float cast to each other.
High-endian and low-endian define each other.
While and until follow each other.

Therefore the Guru
programs without doing anything
and teaches without saying anything.
Warnings arise and he lets them come;
processes are swapped and he lets them go.
He has but doesn't possess,
acts but doesn't expect.
When his work is done, he deletes it.
That is why it lasts forever.
When you get what you want in your struggle for self
And the world makes you king for a day,
Just go to a mirror and look at yourself
And see what that man has to say.
        For it isn't your father or mother or wife
        Whose judgement upon you must pass;
        The fellow whose verdict counts most in your life
        Is the one staring back from the glass.
Some people may think you a straight-shootin' chum
And call you a wonderful guy,
But the man in the glass says you're only a bum
If you can't look him straight in the eye.
        He's the fellow to please, never mind all the rest,
        For he's with you clear up to the end,
        And you've passed your most dangerous, difficult test
        If the man in the glass is your friend.
You may fool the whole world down the pathway of life
And get pats on the back as you pass,
But your final reward will be heartaches and tears
If you've cheated the man in the glass.
Whether weary or unweary, O man, do not rest,
Do not cease your single-handed struggle.
Go on, do not rest.
                -- An old Gujarati hymn
You go down to the pickup station,
        craving warmth and beauty;
You settle for less than fascination --
        a few drinks later you're not so choosy.
And the closing lights strip off the shadows
        on this strange new flesh you've found --
Clutching the night to you like a fig leaf
        you hurry to the blackness
        and the blankets to lay down an impression
        and your loneliness.
                -- Joni Mitchell
Are you making all this up as you go along?
Don't go surfing in South Dakota for a while.
Go to a movie tonight.  Darkness becomes you.
Time to be aggressive.  Go after a tattooed Virgo.
You are a bundle of energy, always on the go.
You are so boring that when I see you my feet go to sleep.
You should go home.
You will be Told about it Tomorrow.  Go Home and Prepare Thyself.
Your business will go through a period of considerable expansion.
Don't let go of what you've got hold of, until you have hold of something else.
                -- First Rule of Wing Walking
Go directly to jail.  Do not pass Go, do not collect $200.
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"
I can't decide whether to commit suicide or go bowling.
                -- Florence Henderson
I realize that today you have a number of top female athletes such as
Martina Navratilova who can run like deer and bench-press Chevrolet
trucks.  But to be brutally frank, women as a group have a long way to
go before they reach the level of intensity and dedication to sports
that enables men to be such incredible jerks about it.
                -- Dave Barry, "Sports is a Drag"
        If you do your best the rest of the way, that takes care of
everything. When we get to October 2, we'll add up the wins, and then
we'll either all go into the playoffs, or we'll all go home and play golf.
        Both those things sound pretty good to me.
                -- Sparky Anderson
        Max told his friend that he'd just as soon not go hiking in the hills.
Said he, "I'm an anti-climb Max."
        [So is that punchline.]
My first baseman is George "Catfish" Metkovich from our 1952 Pittsburgh
Pirates team, which lost 112 games.  After a terrible series against the
New York Giants, in which our center fielder made three throwing errors
and let two balls get through his legs, manager Billy Meyer pleaded, "Can
somebody think of something to help us win a game?"
        "I'd like to make a suggestion," Metkovich said.  "On any ball hit
to center field, let's just let it roll to see if it might go foul."
                -- Joe Garagiola, "It's Anybody's Ball Game"
The duck hunter trained his retriever to walk on water.  Eager to show off
this amazing accomplishment, he asked a friend to go along on his next
hunting trip.  Saying nothing, he fired his first shot and, as the duck fell,
the dog walked on the surface of the water, retrieved the duck and returned
it to his master.
        "Notice anything?" the owner asked eagerly.
        "Yes," said his friend, "I see that fool dog of yours can't swim."
THE OLD POOL SHOOTER had won many a game in his life. But now it was time
to hang up the cue. When he did, all the other cues came crashing go the floor.

"Sorry," he said with a smile.
                -- Jack Handley, The New Mexican, 1988.
Hi there!  This is just a note from me, to you, to tell you, the person
reading this note, that I can't think up any more famous quotes, jokes,
nor bizarre stories, so you may as well go home.
THIS IS PLEDGE WEEK FOR THE FORTUNE PROGRAM

If you like the fortune program, why not support it now with your
contribution of a pithy fortunes, clean or obscene?  We cannot continue
without your support.  Less than 14% of all fortune users are contributors.
That means that 86% of you are getting a free ride.  We can't go on like
this much longer.  Federal cutbacks mean less money for fortunes, and unless
user contributions increase to make up the difference, the fortune program
will have to shut down between midnight and 8 a.m.  Don't let this happen.
Mail your fortunes right now to "fortune".  Just type in your favorite pithy
saying.  Do it now before you forget.  Our target is 300 new fortunes by the
end of the week. Don't miss out.  All fortunes will be acknowledged.  If you
contribute 30 fortunes or more, you will receive a free subscription to "The
Fortune Hunter", our monthly program guide.  If you contribute 50 or more,
you will receive a free "Fortune Hunter" coffee mug ....
She won' go Warp 7, Cap'n!  The batteries are dead!
Sometimes a feeling is all we humans have to go on.
                -- Kirk, "A Taste of Armageddon", stardate 3193.9
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
You go slow, be gentle.  It's no one-way street -- you know how you
feel and that's all.  It's how the girl feels too.  Don't press.  If
the girl feels anything for you at all, you'll know.
                -- Kirk, "Charlie X", stardate 1535.8
"`...You hadn't exactly gone out of your way to call
attention to them had you? I mean like actually telling
anyone or anything.'
`But the plans were on display...'
`On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to
find them.'
`That's the display department.'
`With a torch.'
`Ah, well the lights had probably gone.'
`So had the stairs.'
`But look you found the notice didn't you?'
`Yes,' said Arthur, `yes I did. It was on display in the
bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused
lavatory with a sign on the door saying "Beware of The
Leopard".'"

- Arthur singing the praises of the local council planning
department.
"`Right,' said Ford, `I'm going to have a look.'
He glanced round at the others.
`Is no one going to say, "No you can't possibly, let me go
instead"?'
They all shook their heads.
`Oh well.'"

- Ford attempting to be heroic whilst being seiged by
Shooty and Bangbang.
"`Maybe somebody here tipped off the Galactic Police,' said
Trillian. `Everybody saw you come in.'
`You mean they want to arrest me over the phone?' said
Zaphod, `Could be. I'm a pretty dangerous dude when I'm
cornered.'
`Yeah,' said a voice from under the table [Ford's now
completely rat- arsed at this point], `you go to pieces so
fast people get hit by the shrapnel.'"

- Zaphod getting paranoid over a phone call.
"He stood up straight and looked the world squarely in the
fields and hills. To add weight to his words he stuck the
rabbit bone in his hair. He spread his arms out wide. `I
will go mad!' he announced."

- Arthur discovering a way of coping with life on
Prehistoric Earth.
"Trillian did a little research in the ship's copy of
THHGTTG. It had some advice to offer on drunkenness.
`Go to it,' it said, `and good luck.'
It was cross-referenced to the entry concerning the size of
the Universe and ways of coping with that."

- One of the more preferable pieces of advice contained in
the Guide.
"`...we might as well start with where your hand is now.'
Arthur said, `So which way do I go?'
`Down,' said Fenchurch, `on this occaision.'
He moved his hand.
`Down,' she said, `is in fact the other way.'
`Oh yes.'"

- Arthur trying to discover which part of Fenchurch is
wrong.
"The major difference between a thing that might go wrong
and a thing that cannot possibly go wrong is that when a
thing that cannot possibly go wrong goes wrong it usually
turns out to be impossible to get at or repair."

- One of the laws of computers and programming revealed.
Arthur said, "So which way do I go? "
"Down, " said Fenchurch, "on this occasion. "
He moved his hand.
"Down, " she said, "is in fact the other way. "
"Oh yes. "
"Ford had his own code of ethics. It wasn't much of one,
but it was his and he stuck by it, more or less. One rule
he made was never to buy his own drinks. He wasn't sure if
that counted as an ethic, but you have to go with what
you've got. "
A friend of mine is into Voodoo Acupuncture.  You don't have to go.
You'll just be walking down the street and...  Ooohh, that's much better.
                -- Steven Wright
        "But I don't want to go on the cart..."
        "Oh, don't be such a baby!"
        "But I'm feeling much better..."
        "No you're not... in a moment you'll be stone dead!"
                -- Monty Python, "The Holy Grail"
I got my driver's license photo taken out of focus on purpose.  Now
when I get pulled over the cop looks at it (moving it nearer and
farther, trying to see it clearly)...  and says, "Here, you can go."
                -- Steven Wright
I have a dog; I named him Stay.  So when I'd go to call him, I'd say, "Here,
Stay, here..." but he got wise to that.  Now when I call him he ignores me
and just keeps on typing.
                -- Steven Wright
        "I said I hope it is a good party," said Galder, loudly.
        "AT THE MOMENT IT IS," said Death levelly.  "I THINK IT MIGHT GO
DOWNHILL VERY QUICKLY AT MIDNIGHT."
        "Why?"
        "THAT'S WHEN THEY THINK I'LL BE TAKING MY MASK OFF."
                -- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
I turned my air conditioner the other way around, and it got cold out.
The weatherman said "I don't understand it.  I was supposed to be 80
degrees today," and I said "Oops."

In my house on the ceilings I have paintings of the rooms above... so
I never have to go upstairs.

I just bought a microwave fireplace... You can spend an evening in
front of it in only eight minutes.
                -- Steven Wright
"I was drunk last night, crawled home across the lawn.  By accident I
put the car key in the door lock.  The house started up.  So I figured
what the hell, and drove it around the block a few times.  I thought I
should go park it in the middle of the freeway and yell at everyone to
get off my driveway."
                -- Steven Wright
I was in a bar and I walked up to a beautiful woman and said, "Do you live
around here often?"  She said, "You're wearing two different-color socks."
I said, "Yes, but to me they're the same because I go by thickness."
She said, "How do you feel?" And I said, "You know when you're sitting on a
chair and you lean back so you're just on two legs and you lean too far so
you almost fall over but at the last second you catch yourself?  I feel like
that all the time..."
                -- Steven Wright, "Gentlemen's Quarterly"
In America today ... we have Woody Allen, whose humor has become so
sophisticated that nobody gets it any more except Mia Farrow.  All those who
think Mia Farrow should go back to making movies where the devil gets her
pregnant and Woody Allen should go back to dressing up as a human sperm,
please raise your hands.  Thank you.
                -- Dave Barry, "Why Humor is Funny"
        "Many have seen Topaxci, God of the Red Mushroom, and they earn the
name of shaman," he said.  Some have seen Skelde, spirit of the smoke, and
they are called sorcerers.  A few have been privileged to see Umcherrel, the
soul of the forest, and they are known as spirit masters.  But none have
seen a box with hundreds of legs that looked at them without eyes, and they
are known as idio--"
        The interruption was caused by a sudden screaming noise and a flurry
of snow and sparks that blew the fire across the dark hut; there was a brief
blurred vision and then the opposite wall was blasted aside and the
apparition vanished.
        There was a long silence.  Then a slightly shorter silence.  Then
the old shaman said carefully, "You didn't just see two men go through
upside down on a broomstick, shouting and screaming at each other, did you?"
        The boy looked at him levelly.  "Certainly not," he said.
        The old man heaved a sigh of relief.  "Thank goodness for that," he
said.  "Neither did I."
                -- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
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"
FORTUNE'S RANDOM QUOTES FROM MATCH GAME 75, NO. 1:

Gene Rayburn: We'd like to close with a thought for the day, friends ---
               something ...

      Someone: (interrupting) Uh-oh

Gene Rayburn: ...pithy, full of wisdom --- and we call on the Poet
               Laureate, Lipsy Russell

Lipsy Russell: The young people are very different today, and there is
               one sure way to know: Kids to use to ask where they came
               from, now they'll tell you where you can go.

          All: (laughter)
BUFFERS=20 FILES=15 2nd down, 4th quarter, 5 yards to go!
Linux. Where do you want to go tomorrow?
Linux: Where Don't We Want To Go Today?
National Weather Service advice for those threatened by severe
thunderstorms: "Go inside a sturdy building and stay away from
WINDOWS!"

   -- Ben Bullock
Linux: Where do you want to GO... Oh, I'm already there!

   -- Ewout Stam
Windows: Where do you WANT to go TODAY? You WANT to, but you'll never
get there. And you can go to only ONE place per day.

   -- Ewout Stam
Where do you want Bill Gates to go today?

   -- From a Slashdot.org post
Hear me out. Linux is Microsoft's main competition right now. Because of
this we are forcing them to "innovate", something they would usually avoid.
Now if MS Bob has taught us anything, Microsoft is not a company that
should be innovating. When they do, they don't come up with things like
"better security" or "stability", they come back with "talking
paperclips", and "throw in every usless feature we can think of, memory
footprint be dammed".

Unfortunatly, they also come up with the bright idea of executing email.
Now MIME attachments aren't enough, they want you to be able to run/open
attachments right when you get them. This sounds like a good idea to
people who believe renaming directories to folders made computing possible
for the common man, but security wise it's like vigorously shaking a
package from the Unibomber.

So my friends, we are to blame. We pushed them into frantically trying to
invent "necessary" features to stay on top, and look where it got us. Many
of us are watching our beloved mail servers go down under the strain and
rebuilding our company's PC because of our pointless competition with MS.
I implore you to please drop Linux before Microsoft innovates again.

  -- From a Slashdot.org post in regards to the ILOVEYOU email virus
Windows: Where do you want to go today?

MacOS: Where do you want to be tomorrow?

Linux: Are you coming or what?

   -- Linux Journal
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
Humorix Holiday Gift Idea #4

Microsoft Destruction Kit
Price: US$29.95 (more with optional digital camera or shotgun)
Producer: The Fuzzier Image; 1-800-BILL-SUX

Mix an Internet Explorer CD-ROM, a rocket launcher, and a flamethrower. What
do you have?  A whole lot of fun!  The Microsoft Destruction Kit is the best
way to destroy those Microsoft CD-ROMs you no longer need now that you've
discovered Linux.  You can launch the CD (and registration forms, manuals,
retail boxes, license agreements, etc.) and pepper it with bullets, all while
capturing the event with a digital camera. Or, you can use the included
miniature flamethrower to burn the evil CD to a crisp.  The kit comes with a
set of IE 4.0 CDs to get you started.  Tell Microsoft "where *you* want
it to go today" in style with the Microsoft Destruction Kit.
Microsoft ActivePromo Campaign: "What Slogan Do You Want to See Tommorrow?"

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
"What Slogan Do You Want to See Tommorrow?" promotion.

Children under age 16 will have to opportunity to create their own Microsoft
slogan to replace the aging "Where Do You Want to Go Today?"(R) motto.
Microsoft will set up a special email alias where children can submit their
entries along with detailed personal and demographic information (for
verification purposes, of course).  A panel of Microsoft employees will
select a winning entry, which will become the official slogan.  The winner
and his/her family will receive an all-expense paid week-long vacation to
Redmond, WA ("The Vacation Capital of East Central Washington State"),
including a guided tour of the Microsoft campus and a personal ten minute
photo-opportunity with Chairman Bill.

We personally believe that "Don't Think About Going Anywhere Else Today"
would make a perfect Microsoft slogan.  "Crashes Are Normal" might also be a
good choice.
Microsoft Mandatory Survey (#5)

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 5: Where do you want to go today?(tm)

A. To Washington, D.C. to meet Janet Reno and cuss her out for persecuting
   Microsoft

B. To Redmond, WA to take a tour of the Microsoft campus

C. To the software store to purchase a new piece of Microsoft software

D. To my local school district to convince the administration to upgrade
   the Macintoshes in the computer labs to Wintel systems

E. I don't know about myself, but I'd like to see so-called "consumer
   advocates" like Ralph Nader go to Hell.
Evolution Of A Linux User: The 11 Stages Towards Getting A Life

0. Microserf - Your life revolves around Windows and you worship Bill
   Gates and his innovative company.
1. Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt... About Microsoft - You encounter a growing
   number of problems with Microsoft solutions, shaking your world-view
2. FUD... About Linux - After hearing about this new Linux thing, you
   take the plunge, but are unimpressed by the nerdware OS.
3. Born-Again Microserf - You rededicate your life to Microsoft worship
4. Disgruntled User - Microsoft software keeps screwing you over,
   and you're not going to take it anymore!
5. A Religious Experience - You successfully install Linux, and are
   left breathless at its elegance. No more Windows for you!
6. Linux Convert - You continue to fall in love with the new system
7. Linux Zealot - You dedicate your life to Linux World Domination...
   and it shows! You go beyond mere advocacy to sheer zealotry.
8. Back To Reality - Forces out of your control compel you to
   return to using Windows and Office
9. Enlightened Linux User - You become 100% Microsoft free after finding
   ways to overcome the need for Microsoft bloatware
10.Get A Life - You become a millionaire after your Linux portal is
   acquired; you move to a small tropical island and get a life
Excerpts From The First Annual Nerd Bowl (#2)
(held during Super Bowl Sunday 2000 at the Silicon Valley Transmeta Dome)

BRYANT DUMBELL: Look out! Here comes Linus Torvalds himself to deliver the
starting chug. The crowd is going wild... all 64 people in the stands are
on their feet! Here we go... Linus is lifting up the Ceremonial Beer
Can... he's flipping off the top...

JOHN SPLADDEN: You can feel the excitement in the air! Wow!

DUMBELL: ...And there he goes! Wow... he chugged that beer in only 1.4
seconds... Let's see Bill top that! What a remarkable display to kick off
this grandest of all nerd sporting events.

SPLADDEN: "Nerd sporting event"? Isn't that an oxymoron?

DUMBELL: Linus is now waving to the crowd... Oops!  He just belched.
I Want My Bugs!

An entymologist in Georgia is threatening to sue Microsoft over false
advertising in Windows 2000. "According to Microsoft, Win2K contains
63,000 bugs," he explained. "However, the shrink-wrapped box I purchased
at CompUSSR only had one cockroach along with some worthless papers and a
shiny drink coaster. I got ripped off."

The entymologist hoped that the 63,000 promised bugs would greatly add to
his insect collection. "I had my doubts that Microsoft could deliver
63,000 insects in one small box for only US$299," he said. "However, with
a company as innovative as Microsoft, the sky is the limit. Or at least
that's what I thought." He then asked angrily, "Where do I want to go
today? Back to the store for a refund!"
Anatomy Of A Ziff-Davis Pundit
Collected Jesse Berst ramblings from the past few years:

"I've always said Linux could be a serious challenger."

"Could you get fired for choosing Linux?"

"Linux won't beat Microsoft."

"But in some situations, Linux makes sense."

"Linux will never go mainstream."

"We've been writing about the alternative OS for a long time
now. Watching its slow, steady ascent."
Brief History Of Linux (#13)
Wanted: Eunuchs programmers

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

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

That didn't happen. Ritchie and Thompson were too talented to create a
crappy operating system; no matter how hard they tried the system was too
good. Their last ditch effort to sabotage the system by recoding it
obfuscated C was unsuccessful. Before long Unix spread outside of Bell
Labs and their conspiracy collapsed.
Brief History Of Linux (#27)

Microsoft's position as the 5,000 pound gorilla of the computer industry
didn't change during the 1990's. Indeed, this gorilla got even more
bloated with every passing Windows release. Bill Gates' business strategy
was simple:

1. Pre-announce vaporous product.
2. Hire monkeys (low-paid temps) to cruft something together in VB
3. It it compiles, ship it.
4. Launch marketing campaign for new product showcasing MS "innovation".
5. Repeat (GOTO 1).

With such a plan Microsoft couldn't fail. That is, unless some external
force popped up and ruined everything. Such as Linux and the Internet
perhaps. Both of these developments were well-known to Bill Gates in the
early and mid 1990's (a company as large as Microsoft can afford a decent
spy network, after all). He just considered both to be mere fads that
would go away when Microsoft announced some new innovation, like PDAs --
Personal Desktop Agents (i.e. Bob and Clippit).
Throwing Windows Out The Window

The Federal Bureau Of Missing Socks has banned the use of Microsoft Windows
and Office on all employee computers. But don't get too excited; they aren't
going to replace them with Linux. Instead, this government agency has decided
to go back to using abucusses, slide rules, and manual typewriters.

The banishment of Microsoft software stems from the agency's new policy
against computer games. MS Office, which contains several games in the form of
Easter Eggs, is now verboten on all agency computers. "Flight simulators,
pinball games, magic eight balls... they all violate our policy," said the
sub-adjunct administrator second-class. "So we can't use Office."

Windows is forbidden for the same reason. "We've had way too many
employees wasting time playing Solitaire," she said. "Unfortunately,
Solitaire is an integral part of Windows -- Microsoft executives said so
during the anti-trust trial. If Solitaire is removed, the operating system
won't function properly. Therefore, we have no choice but to banish all
Windows computers."

The Bureau's Assistant Technology Consultant, Mr. Reginald "Red" Taype,
asked,  "Have you ever seen an abucus crash? Have you ever seen anybody
have fun with a slide rule? Do adding machines contain undocumented easter
eggs? No! That's why we're ditching our PCs."
The Blue Screen Of Advocacy

The Federal Bureau of Investigation & Privacy Violations has issued a
national advisory warning computer stores to be on the lookout for the
"Bluescreen Bandits". These extreme Linux zealots go from store to store
and from computer to computer typing in "C:\CON\CON" and causing the demo
machines to crash and display the Blue Screen Of Death.

Efforts to apprehend the bandits have so far been unsuccessful. The
outlaws were caught on tape at a CompUSSR location in Southern California,
but in an ironic twist, the surveillance system bluescreened just before
the penguinistas came into clear view.

"We don't have many clues. It's not clear whether a small group is behind
the bluescreen vandalism, or whether hundreds or even thousands of geek
zealots are involved," said the manager of a Capacitor City store.

The manager has good reason to be upset. The bluescreen raid was the top
story in the local newspaper and quickly became a hot topic of discussion.
As a result, the local school board halted its controversial plans to
migrate their computers from Macs to PCs.
Microsoft Employees Go On Strike, Demand Reduced Salaries

REDMOND, WA -- Several hundred programmers walked off their jobs at
Microsoft Headquarters on Friday to protest their shoddy public image. "My
friends all think I'm a servant of Satan because I get my paycheck from
Microsoft," explained Microserf Eric Eshleman. "If I didn't make so much
money, I'd have more of a backbone to shout 'No!' when my supervisor
demands that I include some new virus-delivery feature in Outlook."

The striking programmers demand salary cuts, less benefits, and zero stock
options. Their labor union, the Brotherhood Of Programmers Sick Of Being
Called Evil, hopes to get some face time with Microsoft executives and
touch base on reaching a proactive agreement leveraging the latest
innovatives in PR to produce a synergistic worldwide buzzword-enhanced
advertising campaign that showcases Microsoft associates as enlightened
engineers instead of morally bankrupt bastards bent on world domination.

Earlier today, about 150 strikers formed a picket line near the front
entrance to Bill Gates' mansion. They carried signs saying "Hell no we're
not going to Hell", "I want to be able to sleep at night", "Why does the
public hate us so much?" and "I'm fed up with ethical dilemmas".
A man would still do something out of sheer perversity - he would create
destruction and chaos - just to gain his point... and if all this could in
turn be analyzed and prevented by predicting that it would occur, then man
would deliberately go mad to prove his point.
                -- Feodor Dostoevsky, "Notes From the Underground"
An excellence-oriented '80s male does not wear a regular watch.  He wears
a Rolex watch, because it weighs nearly six pounds and is advertised
only in excellence-oriented publications such as Fortune and Rich
Protestant Golfer Magazine.  The advertisements are written in
incomplete sentences, which is how advertising copywriters denote excellence:

"The Rolex Hyperion.  An elegant new standard in quality excellence and
discriminating handcraftsmanship.  For the individual who is truly able
to discriminate with regard to excellent quality standards of crafting
things by hand.  Fabricated of 100 percent 24-karat gold.  No watch parts
or anything.  Just a great big chunk on your wrist.  Truly a timeless
statement.  For the individual who is very secure.  Who doesn't need to
be reminded all the time that he is very successful. Much more successful
than the people who laughed at him in high school.  Because of his acne.
People who are probably nowhere near as successful as he is now.  Maybe
he'll go to his 20th reunion, and they'll see his Rolex Hyperion.
Hahahahahahahahaha."
                -- Dave Barry, "In Search of Excellence"
As many of you know, I am taking a class here at UNC on Personality.
One of the tests to determine personality in our book was so incredibly
useful and interesting, I just had to share it.

Answer each of the following items "true" or "false"

1. I salivate at the sight of mittens.
2. If I go into the street, I'm apt to be bitten by a horse.
3. Some people never look at me.
4. Spinach makes me feel alone.
5. My sex life is A-okay.
6. When I look down from a high spot, I want to spit.
7. I like to kill mosquitoes.
8. Cousins are not to be trusted.
9. It makes me embarrassed to fall down.
10. I get nauseous from too much roller skating.
11. I think most people would cry to gain a point.
12. I cannot read or write.
13. I am bored by thoughts of death.
14. I become homicidal when people try to reason with me.
15. I would enjoy the work of a chicken flicker.
16. I am never startled by a fish.
17. My mother's uncle was a good man.
18. I don't like it when somebody is rotten.
19. People who break the law are wise guys.
20. I have never gone to pieces over the weekend.
As many of you know, I am taking a class here at UNC on Personality.
One of the tests to determine personality in our book was so incredibly
useful and interesting, I just had to share it.

Answer each of the following items "true" or "false"

1. I think beavers work too hard.
2. I use shoe polish to excess.
3. God is love.
4. I like mannish children.
5. I have always been diturbed by the sight of Lincoln's ears.
6. I always let people get ahead of me at swimming pools.
7. Most of the time I go to sleep without saying goodbye.
8. I am not afraid of picking up door knobs.
9. I believe I smell as good as most people.
10. Frantic screams make me nervous.
11. It's hard for me to say the right thing when I find myself in a room
    full of mice.
12. I would never tell my nickname in a crisis.
13. A wide necktie is a sign of disease.
14. As a child I was deprived of licorice.
15. I would never shake hands with a gardener.
16. My eyes are always cold.
17. Cousins are not to be trusted.
18. When I look down from a high spot, I want to spit.
19. I am never startled by a fish.
20. I have never gone to pieces over the weekend.
But I find the old notions somehow appealing.  Not that I want to go back
to them -- it is outrageous to have some outer authority tell you what is
proper use and abuse of your own faculties, and it is ludicrous to hold
reason higher than body or feeling.  Still there is something true and
profoundly sane about the belief that acts like murder or theft or
assault violate the doer as well as the done to.  We might even, if we
thought this way, have less crime.  The popular view of crime, as far as
I can deduce it from the movies and television, is that it is a breaking
of a rule by someone who thinks they can get away with that; implicitly,
everyone would like to break the rule, but not everyone is arrogant
enough to imagine they can get away with it.  It therefore becomes very
important for the rule upholders to bring such arrogance down.
                -- Marilyn French, "The Woman's Room"
Don't ever slam a door; you might want to go back.
Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die.
        Excellence is THE trend of the '80s.  Walk into any shopping
mall bookstore, go to the rack where they keep the best-sellers such as
"Garfield Gets Spayed", and you'll see a half-dozen books telling you
how to be excellent: "In Search of Excellence", "Finding Excellence",
"Grasping Hold of Excellence", "Where to Hide Your Excellence at Night
So the Cleaning Personnel Don't Steal It", etc.
                -- Dave Barry, "In Search of Excellence"
Fortune finishes the great quotations, #6

        "But, soft!  What light through yonder window breaks?"
        It's nothing, honey.  Go back to sleep.
Friends may come and go, but enemies accumulate.
                -- Thomas Jones
Go out and tell a lie that will make the whole family proud of you.
                -- Cadmus, to Pentheus, in "The Bacchae" by Euripides
Go slowly to the entertainments of thy friends, but quickly to their
misfortunes.
                -- Chilo
Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.
                -- Robert Frost, "The Death of the Hired Man"
How many "coming men" has one known!  Where on earth do they all go to?
                -- Sir Arthur Wing Pinero
I don't know why we're here, I say we all go home and free associate.
I put the shotgun in an Adidas bag and padded it out with four pairs of
tennis socks, not my style at all, but that was what I was aiming for:  If
they think you're crude, go technical; if they think you're technical, go
crude.  I'm a very technical boy.  So I decided to get as crude as possible.
These days, though, you have to be pretty technical before you can even
aspire to crudeness.
                -- William Gibson, "Johnny Mnemonic"
If God had wanted you to go around nude, He would have given you bigger hands.
If you don't go to other men's funerals they won't go to yours.
                -- Clarence Day
If you go out of your mind, do it quietly, so as not to disturb those
around you.
It is all right to hold a conversation, but you should let go of it
now and then.
                -- Richard Armour
It is equally bad when one speeds on the guest unwilling to go, and when he
holds back one who is hastening.  Rather one should befriend the guest who
is there, but speed him when he wishes.
                -- Homer, "The Odyssey"

        [Quoted in "VMS Internals and Data Structures", V4.4, when
         referring to scheduling.]
Love your enemies: they'll go crazy trying to figure out what you're up to.
Man belongs wherever he wants to go.
                -- Wernher von Braun
"Oh, yes.  The important thing about having lots of things to  remember is
that you've got to go somewhere afterwards where you can remember them, you
see?  You've got to stop.  You haven't really been anywhere until you've got
back home.  I think that's what I mean."
                -- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
Some people cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go.
Tact in audacity is knowing how far you can go without going too far.
                -- Jean Cocteau
There is a certain frame of mind to which a cemetery is, if not an antidote,
at least an alleviation.  If you are in a fit of the blues, go nowhere else.
        --Robert Louis Stevenson: Immortelles
Virtue would go far if vanity did not keep it company.
                -- La Rochefoucauld
You know you're in trouble when...
(1)        You've been at work for an hour before you notice that your
                skirt is caught in your pantyhose.
                Especially if you're a man.
(2)        Your blind date turns out to be your ex-wife.
(3)        Your income tax check bounces.
(4)        You put both contact lenses in the same eye.
(5)        Your wife says, "Good morning, Bill" and your name is George.
(6)        You wake up to the soothing sound of flowing water... the day
                after you bought a waterbed.
(7)        You go on your honeymoon to a remote little hotel and the desk
                clerk, bell hop, and manager have a "Welcome Back" party
                for your spouse.
You know your apartment is small...
        when you can't know its position and velocity at the same time.
        you put your key in the lock and it breaks the window.
        you have to go outside to change your mind.
        you can vacuum the entire place using a single electrical outlet.
You never go anywhere without your soul.
"Go on, girl!  You'll never get a better chance to buy Jif at this
price.  *Carpe diem*, babe!"
                -- "The Naked Consumer", Erik Larson
"If we can't keep this sort of thing out of the kernel, we might as well
pack it up and go run Solaris."

        - Larry McVoy
This is probably the first and last time I will openly agree for someone
to tell me were to go, and do it ;-).

        - Andre Hedrick on linux-kernel
It has always been the policy that format conversions go in user space.
The kernel is an arbitrator of resources it is not a shit bucket for
solving other peoples incompetence.

        - Alan Cox on linux-kernel
From: Alan Cox <alan@lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk>
Subject: Re: Yet another design for /proc. Or actually /kernel.

> Here's my go at a new design for /proc. I designed it from a userland
> point of view and tried not to drown myself into details.

Did you have to change the subject line. It makes it harder to kill file
when people keep doing that
The highest good is like water.
Water give life to the ten thousand things and does not strive.
It flows in places men reject and so is like the Tao.
In dwelling, be close to the land.
In meditation, go deep in the heart.
In dealing with others, be gentle and kind.
In speech, be true.
In ruling, be just.
In daily life, be competent.
In action, be aware of the time and the season.
No fight:  No blame.
The five colors blind the eye.
The five tones deafen the ear.
The five flavors dull the taste.
Racing and hunting madden the mind.
Precious things lead one astray.
Therefore the sage is guided by what he feels and not by what he sees.
He lets go of that and chooses this.
Give up learning, and put an end to your troubles.

Is there a difference between yes and no?
Is there a difference between good and evil?
Must I fear what others fear?  What nonsense!
Other people are contented, enjoying the sacrificial feast of the ox.
In spring some go to the park, and climb the terrace,
But I alone am drifting, not knowing where I am.
Like a newborn babe before it learns to smile,
I am alone, without a place to go.
Others have more than they need, but I alone have nothing.
I am a fool.  Oh, yes!  I am confused.
Others are clear and bright,
But I alone am dim and weak.
Others are sharp and clever,
But I alone am dull and stupid.
Oh, I drift like the waves of the sea,
Without direction, like the restless wind.
Everyone else is busy,
But I alone am aimless and depressed.
I am different.
I am nourished by the great mother.
Without going outside, you may know the whole world.
Without looking through the window, you may see the ways of heaven.
The farther you go, the less you know.

Thus the sage knows without traveling;
He sees without looking;
He works without doing.
When men lack a sense of awe, there will be disaster.

Do not intrude in their homes.
Do not harass them at work.
If you do not interfere, they will not weary of you.

Therefore the sage knows himself but makes no show,
Has self-respect but is not arrogant.
He lets go of that and chooses this.
A baby is God's opinion that the world should go on.
                -- Carl Sandburg
Are you a parent?  Do you sometimes find yourself unsure as to what to
say in those awkward situations?  Worry no more...

        Do as I say, not as I do.
        Do me a favour and don't tell me about it.  I don't want to know.
        What did you do *this* time?
        If it didn't taste bad, it wouldn't be good for you.
        When I was your age...
        I won't love you if you keep doing that.
        Think of all the starving children in India.
        If there's one thing I hate, it's a liar.
        I'm going to kill you.
        Way to go, clumsy.
        If you don't like it, you can lump it.
Are you a parent?  Do you sometimes find yourself unsure as to what to
say in those awkward situations?  Worry no more...

        Go away.  You bother me.
        Why?   Because life is unfair.
        That's a nice drawing.  What is it?
        Children should be seen and not heard.
        You'll be the death of me.
        You'll understand when you're older.
        Because.
        Wipe that smile off your face.
        I don't believe you.
        How many times have I told you to be careful?
        Just because.
Are you a parent?  Do you sometimes find yourself unsure as to what to
say in those awkward situations?  Worry no more...

        You wouldn't understand.
        You ask too many questions.
        In order to be a man, you have to learn to follow orders.
        That's for me to know and you to find out.
        Don't let those bullies push you around.  Go in there and stick
                up for yourself.
        You're acting too big for your britches.
        Well, you broke it.  Now are you satisfied?
        Wait till your father gets home.
        Bored?  If you're bored, I've got some chores for you.
        Shape up or ship out.
MEMORIES OF MY FAMILY MEETINGS still are a source of strength to me.  I
remember we'd all get into the car -- I forget what kind it was -- and
drive and drive.

I'm not sure where we'd go, but I think there were some bees there. The
smell of something was strong in the air as we played whatever sport we
played.  I remember a bigger, older guy whom we called "Dad."  We'd eat
some stuff or not and then I think we went home.

I guess some things never leave you.
                -- Jack Handley, The New Mexican, 1988.
My mother wants grandchildren, so I said, "Mom, go for it!"
                -- Sue Murphy
        On this morning in August when I was 13, my mother sent us out pick
tomatoes.  Back in April I'd have killed for a fresh tomato, but in August
they are no more rare or wonderful than rocks.  So I picked up one and threw
it at a crab apple tree, where it made a good *splat*, and then threw a tomato
at my brother.  He whipped one back at me.  We ducked down by the vines,
heaving tomatoes at each other.  My sister, who was a good person, said,
"You're going to get it."  She bent over and kept on picking.
        What a target!  She was 17, a girl with big hips, and bending over,
she looked like the side of a barn.
        I picked up a tomato so big it sat on the ground.  It looked like it
had sat there a week.  The underside was brown, small white worms lived in it,
and it was very juicy.  I stood up and took aim, and went into the windup,
when my mother at the kitchen window called my name in a sharp voice.  I had
to decide quickly.  I decided.
        A rotten Big Boy hitting the target is a memorable sound, like a fat
man doing a belly-flop.  With a whoop and a yell the tomatoee came after
faster than I knew she could run, and grabbed my shirt and was about to brain
me when Mother called her name in a sharp voice.  And my sister, who was a
good person, obeyed and let go -- and burst into tears.  I guess she knew that
the pleasure of obedience is pretty thin compared with the pleasure of hearing
a rotten tomato hit someone in the rear end.
                -- Garrison Keillor, "Lake Wobegon Days"
A fellow bought a new car, a Nissan, and was quite happy with his purchase.
He was something of an animist, however, and felt that the car really ought
to have a name.  This presented a problem, as he was not sure if the name
should be masculine or feminine.
        After considerable thought, he settled on an naming the car either
Belchazar or Beaumadine, but remained in a quandry about the final choice.
        "Is a Nissan male or female?" he began asking his friends.  Most of
them looked at him pecularly, mumbled things about urgent appointments, and
went on their way rather quickly.
        He finally broached the question to a lady he knew who held a black
belt in judo.  She thought for a moment and answered "Feminine."
        The swiftness of her response puzzled him. "You're sure of that?" he
asked.
        "Certainly," she replied. "They wouldn't sell very well if they were
masculine."
        "Unhhh...  Well, why not?"
        "Because people want a car with a reputation for going when you want
it to.  And, if Nissan's are female, it's like they say...  `Each Nissan, she
go!'"

        [No, we WON'T explain it; go ask someone who practices an oriental
        martial art.  (Tai Chi Chuan probably doesn't count.)  Ed.]
"This is the element_data structure for elements whose *element_type =
FORM_TYPE_SELECT_ONE, FORM_TYPE_SELECT_MULT. */ /* * nesting deeper
and deeper, harder and harder, go, go, oh, OH, OHHHHH!! * Sorry, got
carried away there. */ struct lo_FormElementOptionData_struct."
        -- Mozilla source code
* Overfiend ponders doing an NMU of asclock, in which he simply changes
  the extended description to "If you bend over and put your head between
  your legs, you can read the time off your assclock."
<doogie> Overfiend: go to bed.
* Culus thinks we should go to trade shows and see how many people we
  can kill by throwing debian cds at them
<kira> is a surgical war where you go give the foreign troops nose jobs?
Perhaps Debian is concerned more about technical excellence rather than
ease of use by breaking software. In the former we may excel.  In the
latter we have to concede the field to Microsoft. Guess where I want to go
today?
        -- Manoj Srivastava
<Valkyrja> java, hon, sometimes I really want to smack you.
<Knghtbrd> Valkyrja - he'd enjoy it too much
<Reteo> Valkyrja: yah, go ahead and do it... beat java into cappuccino! :-)
<lilo> it's weird, when you go on a safari to Africa to catch a lion, you
       find it alive and it charges, and then you kill it
<lilo> when you go on a safari to South Bay to find a Palm Vx, you find
       it dead and take it home and it charges after it arrives :)
Guns don't kill people.  It's those damn bullets.  Guns just make them go
really really fast.
        -- Jake Johanson
<cas> well there ya go.  say something stupid in irc and have it
      immortalised forever in someone's .sig file
* gxam wonders if all these globals are really necessary
<Knghtbrd> most of them at the moment yes
<Knghtbrd> we REALLY need to clean them up at some point
<Knghtbrd> gxam: the globals will have to go away as we migrate towards
           modularity and madness (ie, libtool)
It's not usually cost effective time wise to go do it. But if something's
really pissing you off, you just go find the code and fix it and that's
really cool.
        -- John Carmack, on the advantages of open source
<Overfiend> Culus: wanna suspend me for it? :)
<Culus> Overfiend:  Go maliciously crack a few severs and we'll talk
<Overfiend> Culus: damn, it has to be malicious?
<Culus> Overfiend:  Sadly, yes
At some point, bits have to go into packets and routers need to make
decisions on them. Changes at that level is what I want to hear about, not
strategic company relationships.
        -- John Carmack
Isn't it embarrassing when you have to go to the drugstore for some
"special items", and when you're checking out, the cashier looks at you
like, "oh, I know what YOU'RE doing tonight..."

Yep, that cashier read all the signs... canned chicken soup, TheraFlu,
Halls, NyQuil, the bigass bottles of OJ and grapefruit juice... he knew
and I knew that I had a date with the teevee and a down comforter. Awww
yeah.
        -- Elizabeth Kirkindall
A certain old cat had made his home in the alley behind Gabe's bar for some
time, subsisting on scraps and occasional handouts from the bartender.  One
evening, emboldened by hunger, the feline attempted to follow Gabe through
the back door.  Regrettably, only the his body had made it through when
the door slammed shut, severing the cat's tail at its base.  This proved too
much for the old creature, who looked sadly at Gabe and expired on the spot.
        Gabe put the carcass back out in the alley and went back to business.
The mandatory closing time arrived and Gabe was in the process of locking up
after the last customers had gone.  Approaching the back door he was startled
to see an apparition of the old cat mournfully holding its severed tail out,
silently pleading for Gabe to put the tail back on its corpse so that it could
go on to the kitty afterworld complete.
        Gabe shook his head sadly and said to the ghost, "I can't.  You know
the law -- no retailing spirits after 2:00 AM."
A Dublin lawyer died in poverty and many barristers of the city subscribed to
a fund for his funeral.  The Lord Chief Justice of Orbury was asked to donate
a shilling.  "Only a shilling?" exclaimed the man. "Only a shilling to bury
an attorney?  Here's a guinea; go and bury twenty of them."
Being a miner, as soon as you're too old and tired and sick and stupid to
do your job properly, you have to go, where the very opposite applies with
the judges.
                -- Beyond the Fringe
[District Attorneys] learn in District Attorney School that there are
two sure-fire ways to get a lot of favorable publicity:

(1) Go down and raid all the lockers in the local high school and
    confiscate 53 marijuana cigarettes and put them in a pile and hold
    a press conference where you announce that they have a street value
    of $850 million.  These raids never fail, because ALL high schools,
    including brand-new, never-used ones, have at least 53 marijuana
    cigarettes in the lockers.  As far as anyone can tell, the locker
    factory puts them there.
(2) Raid an "adult book store" and hold a press conference where you
    announce you are charging the owner with 850 counts of being a
    piece of human sleaze.  This also never fails, because you always
    get a conviction.  A juror at a pornography trial is not about to
    state for the record that he finds nothing obscene about a movie
    where actors engage in sexual activities with live snakes and a
    fire extinguisher.  He is going to convict the bookstore owner, and
    vote for the death penalty just to make sure nobody gets the wrong
    impression.
                -- Dave Barry, "Pornography"
Doctors and lawyers must go to school for years and years, often with
little sleep and with great sacrifice to their first wives.
                -- Roy G. Blount, Jr.
Fortune's nomination for All-Time Champion and Protector of Youthful
Morals goes to Representative Clare E. Hoffman of Michigan.  During an
impassioned House debate over a proposed bill to "expand oyster and
clam research," a sharp-eared informant transcribed the following
exchange between our hero and Rep. John D. Dingell, also of Michigan.

DINGELL: There are places in the world at the present time where we are
         having to artificially propagate oysters and clams.
HOFFMAN: You mean the oysters I buy are not nature's oysters?
DINGELL: They may or may not be natural.  The simple fact of the matter
         is that female oysters through their living habits cast out
         large amounts of seed and the male oysters cast out large
         amounts of fertilization ...
HOFFMAN: Wait a minute!  I do not want to go into that.  There are many
         teenagers who read The Congressional Record.
Fortune's Real-Life Courtroom Quote #3:

Q:  When he went, had you gone and had she, if she wanted to and were
    able, for the time being excluding all the restraints on her not to
    go, gone also, would he have brought you, meaning you and she, with
    him to the station?
MR. BROOKS:  Objection.  That question should be taken out and shot.
Humor in the Court:
Q.  And lastly, Gary, all your responses must be oral.  O.K.? What school do
    you go to?
A.  Oral.
Q.  How old are you?
A.  Oral.
Humor in the Court:
Q.  Mrs. Jones, is your appearance this morning pursuant to a deposition
    notice which I sent to your attorney?
A.  No.  This is how I dress when I go to work.
I suppose some of the variation between Boston drivers and the rest of the
country is due to the progressive Massachusetts Driver Education Manual which
I happen to have in my top desk drawer.  Some of the Tips for Better Driving
are worth considering, to wit:

[110.13]:
       "When traveling on a one-way street, stay to the right, so as not
        to interfere with oncoming traffic."

[22.17b]:
       "Learning to change lanes takes time and patience.  The best
        recommendation that can be made is to go to a Celtics [basketball]
        game; study the fast break and then go out and practice it
        on the highway."

[41.16]:
       "Never bump a baby carriage out of a crosswalk unless the kid's really
        asking for it."
In West Union, Ohio, No married man can go flying without his spouse
along at any time, unless he has been married for more than 12 months.
Just remember: when you go to court, you are trusting your fate to
twelve people that weren't smart enough to get out of jury duty!
                        Pittsburgh driver's test

(4) Exhaust gas is

        (a) beneficial.
        (b) not harmful.
        (c) toxic.
        (d) a punk band.

The correct answer is (b). The meddling Washington eco-freak communist
bureaucrats who say otherwise are liars.  (Message to those who answered (d).
Go back to California where you came from.  Your kind are not welcome here.)
(1) Avoid fried meats which angry up the blood.
(2) If your stomach antagonizes you, pacify it with cool thoughts.
(3) Keep the juices flowing by jangling around gently as you move.
(4) Go very lightly on the vices, such as carrying on in society, as
        the social ramble ain't restful.
(5) Avoid running at all times.
(6) Don't look back, something might be gaining on you.
                -- S. Paige, c. 1951
A cloud does not know why it moves in just such a direction and at such
a speed, if feels an impulsion... this is the place to go now.  But the
sky knows the reasons and the patterns behind all clouds, and you will
know, too, when you lift yourself high enough to see beyond horizons.
                -- Messiah's Handbook : Reminders for the Advanced Soul
Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this
big field of rye and all.  Thousands of little kids, and nobody's around --
nobody big, I mean -- except me.  And I'm standing on the edge of some crazy
cliff.  What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go
over the cliff -- I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're
going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them.  That's all I'd do
all day.  I'd just be the catcher in the rye.  I know it;  I know it's crazy,
but that's the only thing I'd really like to be.  I know it's crazy.
                -- J.D. Salinger, "Catcher in the Rye"
As failures go, attempting to recall the past is like trying to grasp
the meaning of existence.  Both make one feel like a baby clutching at
a basketball: one's palms keep sliding off.
                -- Joseph Brodsky
        "Cheshire-Puss," she began, "would you tell me, please, which way I
ought to go from here?"
        "That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.
        "I don't care much where--" said Alice.
        "Then it doesn't matter which way you go," said the Cat.
Don't go to bed with no price on your head.
                -- Baretta
If I had my life to live over, I'd try to make more mistakes next time.  I
would relax, I would limber up, I would be sillier than I have been this
trip.  I know of very few things I would take seriously.  I would be crazier.
I would climb more mountains, swim more rivers and watch more sunsets.  I'd
travel and see.  I would have more actual troubles and fewer imaginary ones.
You see, I am one of those people who lives prophylactically and sensibly
and sanely, hour after hour, day after day.  Oh, I have had my moments and,
if I had it to do over again, I'd have more of them.  In fact, I'd try to
have nothing else.  Just moments, one after another, instead of living so many
years ahead each day.  I have been one of those people who never go anywhere
without a thermometer, a hotwater bottle, a gargle, a raincoat and a parachute.
If I had it to do over again, I would go places and do things and travel
lighter than I have.  If I had my life to live over, I would start bare-footed
earlier in the spring and stay that way later in the fall.  I would play hooky
more.  I probably wouldn't make such good grades, but I'd learn more.  I would
ride on more merry-go-rounds.  I'd pick more daisies.
If something has not yet gone wrong then it would ultimately have been
beneficial for it to go wrong.
If there is a possibility of several things going wrong,
the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong.

If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which a procedure
can go wrong, and circumvent these, then a fifth way will promptly develop.
If you put it off long enough, it might go away.
If you wait long enough, it will go away... after having done its damage.
If it was bad, it will be back.
Just remember, wherever you go, there you are.
                -- Buckaroo Bonzai
Life is knowing how far to go without crossing the line.
        Most of what I really need to know about how to live, and what to do,
and how to be, I learned in kindergarten.  Wisdom was not at the top of the
graduate school mountain but there in the sandbox at nursery school.
        These are the things I learned:  Share everything.  Play fair.  Don't
hit people.  Put things back where you found them.  Clean up your own mess.
Don't take things that aren't yours.   Say you're sorry when you hurt someone.
Wash your hands before you eat.  Flush.  Warm cookies and cold milk are good
for you.  Live a balanced life.  Learn some and think some and draw and paint
and sing and dance and play and work some every day.
        Take a nap every afternoon.  When you go out into the world, watch for
traffic, hold hands, and stick together.  Be aware of wonder.  Remember the
little seed in the plastic cup.   The roots go down and the plant goes up and
nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.  Goldfish and
hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the plastic cup -- they all
die.  So do we.
        And then remember the book about Dick and Jane and the first word you
learned, the biggest word of all: LOOK.  Everything you need to know is in
there somewhere.  The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation.  Ecology and
politics and sane living.
        Think of what a better world it would be if we all -- the whole world
-- had cookies and milk about 3 o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with
our blankets for a nap.  Or if we had a basic policy in our nation and other
nations to always put things back where we found them and cleaned up our own
messes.  And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out into
the world it is best to hold hands and stick together.
                -- Robert Fulghum, "All I ever really needed to know I learned
                   in kindergarten"
No matter where I go, the place is always called "here".
        Once there lived a village of creatures along the bottom of a great
crystal river.  Each creature in its own manner clung tightly to the twigs
and rocks of the river bottom, for clinging was their way of life, and
resisting the current what each had learned from birth.  But one creature
said at last, "I trust that the current knows where it is going.  I shall
let go, and let it take me where it will.  Clinging, I shall die of boredom."
        The other creatures laughed and said, "Fool!  Let go, and that current
you worship will throw you tumbled and smashed across the rocks, and you will
die quicker than boredom!"
        But the one heeded them not, and taking a breath did let go, and at
once was tumbled and smashed by the current across the rocks.  Yet, in time,
as the creature refused to cling again, the current lifted him free from the
bottom, and he was bruised and hurt no more.
        And the creatures downstream, to whom he was a stranger, cried, "See
a miracle!  A creature like ourselves, yet he flies!  See the Messiah, come
to save us all!"  And the one carried in the current said, "I am no more
Messiah than you.  The river delight to lift us free, if only we dare let go.
Our true work is this voyage, this adventure.
        But they cried the more, "Saviour!" all the while clinging to the
rocks, making legends of a Saviour.
                -- Richard Bach
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away".
                -- Philip K. Dick
Sometimes you get an almost irresistible urge to go on living.
The farther you go, the less you know.
                -- Lao Tsu, "Tao Te Ching"
We have nowhere else to go... this is all we have.
                -- Margaret Mead
        Well, he thought, since neither Aristotelian Logic nor the disciplines
of Science seemed to offer much hope, it's time to go beyond them...
        Drawing a few deep even breaths, he entered a mental state practiced
only by Masters of the Universal Way of Zen.  In it his mind floated freely,
able to rummage at will among the bits and pieces of data he had absorbed,
undistracted by any outside disturbances.  Logical structures no longer
inhibited him. Pre-conceptions, prejudices, ordinary human standards vanished.
All things, those previously trivial as well as those once thought important,
became absolutely equal by acquiring an absolute value, revealing relationships
not evident to ordinary vision.  Like beads strung on a string of their own
meaning, each thing pointed to its own common ground of existence, shared by
all.  Finally, each began to melt into each, staying itself while becoming
all others.  And Mind no longer contemplated Problem, but became Problem,
destroying Subject-Object by becoming them.
        Time passed, unheeded.
        Eventually, there was a tentative stirring, then a decisive one, and
Nakamura arose, a smile on his face and the light of laughter in his eyes.
                -- Wayfarer
Well, you know, no matter where you go, there you are.
                -- Buckaroo Banzai
In most countries selling harmful things like drugs is punishable.
Then howcome people can sell Microsoft software and go unpunished?
        -- Hasse Skrifvars, hasku@rost.abo.fi,
Oh, and this is another kernel in that great and venerable "BugFree(tm)"
series of kernels.  So be not afraid of bugs, but go out in the streets
and deliver this message of joy to the masses.
        -- Linus, in the announcement for 1.3.27
Eh, that's it, I guess.  No 300 million dollar unveiling event for this
kernel, I'm afraid, but you're still supposed to think of this as the
"happening of the century" (at least until the next kernel comes along).
Oh, and this is another kernel in that great and venerable "BugFree(tm)"
series of kernels. So be not afraid of bugs, but go out in the streets
and deliver this message of joy to the masses.
        -- Linus Torvalds, on releasing 1.3.27
Go not unto the Usenet for advice, for you will be told both yea and nay (and
quite a few things that just have nothing at all to do with the question).
        -- seen in a .sig somewhere
Linux: Where Don't We Want To Go Today?
        -- Submitted by Pancrazio De Mauro, paraphrasing some well-known sales talk
Sorry for mailing this article, I've obviously made a typo (168!=186)
that's the price for being up all night and doing some "quick"
checks before you go to bed ....
        -- Herbert Rosmanith <herp@wildsau.idv.uni-linz.ac.at>
Just to remind everyone.  Today, Sept 17, is Linux's 5th birthday.  So
happy birthday to all on the list.  Thanks go out to Linus and all the
other hard-working maintainers for 5 wonderful fast paced years!
        -- William E. Roadcap <roadcapw@cfw.com>
Does biff in bo work
coz it biffin doesn't beep
an if biff in bo is broke
then biff in bo I will delete

I've tried biff in bo with 'y'
I've tried biff in bo with '-y'
no biffin output does it show
so poor wee biff is gonna go.
        -- John Spence <jspence@lynx.net.au> on debian-user
#if _FP_W_TYPE_SIZE < 32
#error "Here's a nickel kid.  Go buy yourself a real computer."
#endif
        -- linux/arch/sparc64/double.h
Just go ahead and write your own multitasking multiuser os!
Worked for me all the times.
        -- Linus Torvalds
I've seen people with new children before, they go from ultra happy to
looking like something out of a zombie film in about a week.
        -- Alan Cox about Linus after his 2nd daughter
(6)        Men employees will be given time off each week for courting
        purposes, or two evenings a week if they go regularly to church.
(7)        After an employee has spent his thirteen hours of labor in the
        office, he should spend the remaining time reading the Bible
        and other good books.
(8)        Every employee should lay aside from each pay packet a goodly
        sum of his earnings for his benefit during his declining years,
        so that he will not become a burden on society or his betters.
(9)        Any employee who smokes Spanish cigars, uses alcoholic drink
        in any form, frequents pool tables and public halls, or gets
        shaved in a barber's shop, will give me good reason to suspect
        his worth, intentions, integrity and honesty.
(10)        The employee who has performed his labours faithfully and
        without a fault for five years, will be given an increase of
        five cents per day in his pay, providing profits from the
        business permit it.
                -- "Office Worker's Guide", New England Carriage Works, 1872
"Every morning, I get up and look through the 'Forbes' list of the
richest people in America.  If I'm not there, I go to work"
                -- Robert Orben
Good salesmen and good repairmen will never go hungry.
                -- R.E. Schenk
"I am convinced that the manufacturers of carpet odor removing powder
have included encapsulated time released cat urine in their products.
This technology must be what prevented its distribution during my mom's
reign.  My carpet smells like piss, and I don't have a cat.  Better go
buy some more."
                -- timw@zeb.USWest.COM
I am more bored than you could ever possibly be.  Go back to work.
I go on working for the same reason a hen goes on laying eggs.
                -- H.L. Mencken
If you would know the value of money, go try to borrow some.
                -- Ben Franklin
Nitwit ideas are for emergencies.  You use them when you've got nothing
else to try.  If they work, they go in the Book.  Otherwise you follow
the Book, which is largely a collection of nitwit ideas that worked.
                -- Larry Niven, "The Mote in God's Eye"
        Now, you might ask, "How do I get one of those complete home tool
sets for under $4?" An excellent question.
        Go to one of those really cheap discount stores where they sell
plastic furniture in colors visible from the planet Neptune and where they
have a food section specializing in cardboard cartons full of Raisinets and
malted milk balls manufactured during the Nixon administration.  In either
the hardware or housewares department, you'll find an item imported from an
obscure Oriental country and described as "Nine Tools in One", consisting of
a little handle with interchangeable ends representing inscrutable Oriental
notions of tools that Americans might use around the home.  Buy it.
        This is the kind of tool set professionals use.  Not only is it
inexpensive, but it also has a great safety feature not found in the
so-called quality tools sets: The handle will actually break right off if
you accidentally hit yourself or anything else, or expose it to direct
sunlight.
                -- Dave Barry, "The Taming of the Screw"
So... did you ever wonder, do garbagemen take showers before they go to work?
The best things in life go on sale sooner or later.
The faster I go, the behinder I get.
                -- Lewis Carroll
The idea there was that consumers would bring their broken electronic
devices, such as television sets and VCR's, to the destruction centers,
where trained personnel would whack them (the devices) with sledgehammers.
With their devices thus permanently destroyed, consumers would then be free
to go out and buy new devices, rather than have to fritter away years of
their lives trying to have the old ones repaired at so-called "factory
service centers," which in fact consist of two men named Lester poking at
the insides of broken electronic devices with cheap cigars and going,
"Lookit all them WIRES in there!"
                -- Dave Barry, "'Mister Mediocre' Restaurants"
Time to take stock.  Go home with some office supplies.
What they said:
        What they meant:

"I recommend this candidate with no qualifications whatsoever."
        (Yes, that about sums it up.)
"The amount of mathematics she knows will surprise you."
        (And I recommend not giving that school a dime...)
"I simply can't say enough good things about him."
        (What a screw-up.)
"I am pleased to say that this candidate is a former colleague of mine."
        (I can't tell you how happy I am that she left our firm.)
"When this person left our employ, we were quite hopeful he would go
a long way with his skills."
        (We hoped he'd go as far as possible.)
"You won't find many people like her."
        (In fact, most people can't stand being around her.)
"I cannot reccommend him too highly."
        (However, to the best of my knowledge, he has never committed a
         felony in my presence.)
What they said:
        What they meant:

"You will be fortunate if you can get him to work for you."
        (We certainly never succeeded.)
There is no other employee with whom I can adequately compare him.
        (Well, our rats aren't really employees...)
"Success will never spoil him."
        (Well, at least not MUCH more.)
"One usually comes away from him with a good feeling."
        (And such a sigh of relief.)
"His dissertation is the sort of work you don't expect to see these days;
in it he has definitely demonstrated his complete capabilities."
        (And his IQ, as well.)
"He should go far."
        (The farther the better.)
"He will take full advantage of his staff."
        (He even has one of them mowing his lawn after work.)
What they say:                        What they mean:

New                                Different colors from previous version.
All New                                Not compatible with previous version.
Exclusive                        Nobody else has documentation.
Unmatched                        Almost as good as the competition.
Design Simplicity                The company wouldn't give us any money.
Fool-proof Operation                All parameters are hard-coded.
Advanced Design                        Nobody really understands it.
Here At Last                        Didn't get it done on time.
Field Tested                        We don't have any simulators.
Years of Development                Finally got one to work.
Unprecedented Performance        Nothing ever ran this slow before.
Revolutionary                        Disk drives go 'round and 'round.
Futuristic                        Only runs on a next generation supercomputer.
No Maintenance                        Impossible to fix.
Performance Proven                Worked through Beta test.
Meets Tough Quality Standards        It compiles without errors.
Satisfaction Guaranteed                We'll send you another pack if it fails.
Stock Item                        We shipped it before and can do it again.
What we need in this country, instead of Daylight Savings Time, which nobody
really understands anyway, is a new concept called Weekday Morning Time,
whereby at 7 a.m. every weekday we go into a space-launch-style "hold" for
two to three hours, during which it just remains 7 a.m.  This way we could
all wake up via a civilized gradual process of stretching and belching and
scratching, and it would still be only 7 a.m. when we were ready to actually
emerge from bed.
                -- Dave Barry, "$#$%#^%!^%&@%@!"
When you go out to buy, don't show your silver.
It's getting harder and harder to think out loud.  One of these days
someone's gonna go off and kill Thomas a'Becket for me...
             -- Larry Wall in <199709242015.NAA10312@wall.org>
The way these things go, there are probably 6 or 8 kludgey ways to do
it, and a better way that involves rethinking something that hasn't
been rethunk yet.
             -- Larry Wall in <199710221859.LAA24889@wall.org>
"I'd love to go out with you, but I did my own thing and now I've got
to undo it."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I have to floss my cat."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I have to stay home and see if I snore."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I never go out on days that end in `Y.'"
"I'd love to go out with you, but I want to spend more time with my blender."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm attending the opening of my garage door."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm converting my calendar watch from
Julian to Gregorian."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm doing door-to-door collecting for static
cling."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm having all my plants neutered."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm staying home to work on my
cottage cheese sculpture."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I'm taking punk totem pole carving."
"I'd love to go out with you, but I've been scheduled for a karma transplant."
"I'd love to go out with you, but it's my parakeet's bowling night."
"I'd love to go out with you, but my favorite commercial is on TV."
"I'd love to go out with you, but the last time I went out, I never came back."
"I'd love to go out with you, but the man on television told me to stay tuned."
"I'd love to go out with you, but there are important world issues that
need worrying about."
        "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"
Love is always open arms.  With arms open you allow love to come and
go as it wills, freely, for it will do so anyway.  If you close your
arms about love you'll find you are left only holding yourself.
Love is like the measles; we all have to go through it.
                -- Jerome K. Jerome
"Maybe we should think of this as one perfect week... where we found each
other, and loved each other... and then let each other go before anyone
had to seek professional help."
The story of the butterfly:
        "I was in Bogota and waiting for a lady friend.  I was in love,
a long time ago.  I waited three days.  I was hungry but could not go
out for food, lest she come and I not be there to greet her.  Then, on
the third day, I heard a knock."
        "I hurried along the old passage and there, in the sunlight,
there was nothing."
        "Just," Vance Joy said, "a butterfly, flying away."
                -- Peter Carey, BLISS
There are some micro-organisms that exhibit characteristics of both plants
and animals.  When exposed to light they undergo photosynthesis; and when
the lights go out, they turn into animals.  But then again, don't we all?
Why I Can't Go Out With You:

I'd LOVE to, but ...
        -- I have to floss my cat.
        -- I've dedicated my life to linguini.
        -- I need to spend more time with my blender.
        -- it wouldn't be fair to the other Beautiful People.
        -- it's my night to pet the dog/ferret/goldfish.
        -- I'm going downtown to try on some gloves.
        -- I have to check the freshness dates on my dairy products.
        -- I'm going down to the bakery to watch the buns rise.
        -- I have an appointment with a cuticle specialist.
        -- I have some really hard words to look up.
        -- I've got a Friends of the Lowly Rutabaga meeting.
        -- I promised to help a friend fold road maps.
Why I Can't Go Out With You:

I'd LOVE to, but...
        -- I have to answer all of my "occupant" letters.
        -- None of my socks match.
        -- I'm having all my plants neutered.
        -- I changed the lock on my door and now I can't get out.
        -- My yucca plant is feeling yucky.
        -- I'm touring China with a wok band.
        -- My chocolate-appreciation class meets that night.
        -- I'm running off to Yugoslavia with a foreign-exchange student
                named Basil Metabolism.
        -- There are important world issues that need worrying about.
        -- I'm going to count the bristles in my toothbrush.
        -- I prefer to remain an enigma.
        -- I think you want the OTHER Peggy/Cathy/Mike/whomever.
        -- I feel a song coming on.
Why I Can't Go Out With You:

I'd LOVE to, but...
        -- I have to draw "Cubby" for an art scholarship.
        -- I have to sit up with a sick ant.
        -- I'm trying to be less popular.
        -- My bathroom tiles need grouting.
        -- I'm waiting to see if I'm already a winner.
        -- My subconscious says no.
        -- I just picked up a book called "Glue in Many Lands" and I
                can't seem to put it down.
        -- My favorite commercial is on TV.
        -- I have to study for my blood test.
        -- I've been traded to Cincinnati.
        -- I'm having my baby shoes bronzed.
        -- I have to go to court for kitty littering.
Why I Can't Go Out With You:

I'd LOVE to, but...
        -- I'm trying to see how long I can go without saying yes.
        -- I'm attending the opening of my garage door.
        -- The monsters haven't turned blue yet, and I have to eat more dots.
        -- I'm converting my calendar watch from Julian to Gregorian.
        -- I have to fulfill my potential.
        -- I don't want to leave my comfort zone.
        -- It's too close to the turn of the century.
        -- I have to bleach my hare.
        -- I'm worried about my vertical hold knob.
        -- I left my body in my other clothes.
Why I Can't Go Out With You:

I'd LOVE to, but...
        -- I've got a Friends of the Lowly Rutabaga meeting.
        -- I promised to help a friend fold road maps.
        -- I've been scheduled for a karma transplant.
        -- I'm staying home to work on my cottage cheese sculpture.
        -- It's my parakeet's bowling night.
        -- I'm building a plant from a kit.
        -- There's a disturbance in the Force.
        -- I'm doing door-to-door collecting for static cling.
        -- I'm teaching my ferret to yodel.
        -- My crayons all melted together.
Yeah, there are more important things in life than money, but they won't go
out with you if you don't have any.
As President I have to go vacuum my coin collection!
Barbie says, Take quaaludes in gin and go to a disco right away!
But Ken says, WOO-WOO!!  No credit at "Mr. Liquor"!!
DON'T go!!  I'm not HOWARD COSELL!!  I know POLISH JOKES ... WAIT!!
Don't go!!  I AM Howard Cosell! ... And I DON'T know Polish jokes!!
Either CONFESS now or we go to "PEOPLE'S COURT"!!
Go on, EMOTE!  I was RAISED on thought balloons!!
GOOD-NIGHT, everybody ... Now I have to go administer FIRST-AID to my
pet LEISURE SUIT!!
I can't think about that.  It doesn't go with HEDGES in the shape of
LITTLE LULU -- or ROBOTS making BRICKS ...
... I think I'd better go back to my DESK and toy with a few common
MISAPPREHENSIONS ...
I want a VEGETARIAN BURRITO to go ... with EXTRA MSG!!
If a person is FAMOUS in this country, they have to go on the ROAD for
MONTHS at a time and have their name misspelled on the SIDE of a
GREYHOUND SCENICRUISER!!
It's OBVIOUS ... The FURS never reached ISTANBUL ... You were an EXTRA
in the REMAKE of "TOPKAPI" ... Go home to your WIFE ... She's making
FRENCH TOAST!
Where do your SOCKS go when you lose them in th' WASHER?
Where does it go when you flush?
It is a well known fact that warriors and wizards do not get along, because
one side considers the other side to be a collection of bloodthirsty idiots
who can't walk and think at the same time, while the other side is naturally
suspicious of a body of men who mumble a lot and wear long dresses.  Oh, say
the wizards, if we're going to be like that, then, what about all those
studded collars and oiled muscles down at the Young Men's Pagan Association?
To which the heroes reply, that's a pretty good allegation from a bunch of
wimpsoes who won't go near a woman on account, can you believe it, of their
mystical power being sort of drained out.  Right, say the wizards, that just
about does it, you and your leather posing pouches.  Oh yeah, say the the
heroes, why don't you ...
                -- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
After his legs had been broken in an accident, Mr. Miller sued for damages,
claming that he was crippled and would have to spend the rest of his life
in a wheelchair.  Although the insurance-company doctor testified that his
bones had healed properly and that he was fully capable  of walking, the
judge decided for the plaintiff and awarded him $500,000.
        When he was wheeled into the insurance office to collect his check,
Miller was confronted by several executives.  "You're not getting away with
this, Miller," one said.  "We're going to watch you day and night.  If you
take a single step, you'll not only repay the damages but stand trial for
perjury.  Here's the money.  What do you intend to do with it?"
        "My wife and I are going to travel," Miller replied.  "We'll go to
Stockholm, Berlin, Rome, Athens and, finally, to a place called Lourdes --
where, gentlemen, you'll see yourselves one hell of a miracle."
At the hospital, a doctor is training an intern on how to announce bad news
to the patients.  The doctor tells the intern "This man in 305 is going to
die in six months.  Go in and tell him."  The intern boldly walks into the
room, over to the man's bedisde and tells him "Seems like you're gonna die!"
The man has a heart attack and is rushed into surgery on the spot.  The doctor
grabs the intern and screams at him, "What!?!? are you some kind of moron?
You've got to take it easy, work your way up to the subject.  Now this man in
213 has about a week to live.  Go in and tell him, but, gently, you hear me,
gently!"
        The intern goes softly into the room, humming to himself, cheerily
opens the drapes to let the sun in, walks over to the man's bedside, fluffs
his pillow and wishes him a "Good morning!"  "Wonderful day, no?  Say...
guess who's going to die soon!"
Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died.
                -- Erma Bombeck
Quit worrying about your health.  It'll go away.
                -- Robert Orben
        "Welcome back for you 13th consecutive week, Evelyn.  Evelyn, will
you go into the auto-suggestion booth and take your regular place on the
psycho-prompter couch?"
        "Thank you, Red."
        "Now, Evelyn, last week you went up to $40,000 by properly citing
your rivalry with your sibling as a compulsive sado-masochistic behavior
pattern which developed out of an early post-natal feeding problem."
        "Yes, Red."
        "But -- later, when asked about pre-adolescent oedipal phantasy
repressions, you rationalized twice and mental blocked three times.  Now,
at $300 per rationalization and $500 per mental block you lost $2,100 off
your $40,000 leaving you with a total of $37,900.  Now, any combination of
two more mental blocks and either one rationalization or three defensive
projections will put you out of the game.  Are you willing to go ahead?"
        "Yes, Red."
        "I might say here that all of Evelyn's questions and answers have
been checked for accuracy with her analyst.  Now, Evelyn, for $80,000
explain the failure of your three marriages."
        "Well, I--"
        "We'll get back to Evelyn in one minute.  First a word about our
product."
                -- Jules Feiffer
No guarantee of accuracy or completeness!
©TU Chemnitz, 2006-2024
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