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Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) by Linux fortune

FORTUNE DISCUSSES THE OBSCURE FILMS: #12

O.E.D.:                                David Lean, 1969, 3 hours 30 min.

        Lean's version of the Oxford Dictionary has been accused of
        shallowness in its treatment of a complete work.  Omar Sharif
        tends to overact as aardvark, but Alec Guiness is solid in
        the role of abbacy.  As usual, the photography is stunning.
        With Julie Christie.
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
The more data I punch in this card, the lighter it becomes, and the
lower the mailing cost.
                -- S. Kelly-Bootle, "The Devil's DP Dictionary"
Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum --
"I think that I think, therefore I think that I am."
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
interlard - vt., to intersperse; diversify
-- Webster's New World Dictionary Of The American Language
miracle:  an extremely outstanding or unusual event, thing, or accomplishment.
-- Webster's Dictionary
"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
In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last
resort of the scoundrel.  With all due respect to an enlightened but
inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
In our civilization, and under our republican form of government, intelligence
is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption from the cares of office.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
                -- S. Johnson, "The Life of Samuel Johnson" by J. Boswell

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

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

Public office is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
                -- Boies Penrose
Absentee, n.:
        A person with an income who has had the forethought to remove
        himself from the sphere of exaction.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Abstainer, n.:
        A weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a
        pleasure.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Absurdity, n.:
        A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Accident, n.:
        A condition in which presence of mind is good, but absence of
        body is better.
                -- Foolish Dictionary
Acquaintance, n:
        A person whom we know well enough to borrow from but not well
        enough to lend to.  A degree of friendship called slight when the
        object is poor or obscure, and intimate when he is rich or famous.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Admiration, n.:
        Our polite recognition of another's resemblance to ourselves.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Adore, v.:
        To venerate expectantly.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
air, n.:
        A nutritious substance supplied by a bountiful Providence for the
        fattening of the poor.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Alliance, n.:
        In international politics, the union of two thieves who have
        their hands so deeply inserted in each other's pocket that they cannot
        separately plunder a third.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Alone, adj.:
        In bad company.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Ambidextrous, adj.:
        Able to pick with equal skill a right-hand pocket or a left.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Anoint, v.:
        To grease a king or other great functionary already sufficiently
        slippery.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Barometer, n.:
        An ingenious instrument which indicates what kind of weather we
        are having.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
birth, n:
        The first and direst of all disasters.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Bore, n.:
        A person who talks when you wish him to listen.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
boss, n:
        According to the Oxford English Dictionary, in the Middle Ages the
        words "boss" and "botch" were largely synonymous, except that boss,
        in addition to meaning "a supervisor of workers" also meant "an
        ornamental stud."
brain, n:
        The apparatus with which we think that we think.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
brain, v: [as in "to brain"]
        To rebuke bluntly, but not pointedly; to dispel a source
        of error in an opponent.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Bride, n.:
        A woman with a fine prospect of happiness behind her.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Cabbage, n.:
        A familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as
        a man's head.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
clairvoyant, n.:
        A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that
        which is invisible to her patron -- namely, that he is a blockhead.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Confidant, confidante, n:
        One entrusted by A with the secrets of B, confided to himself by C.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Coronation, n.:
        The ceremony of investing a sovereign with the outward and visible
        signs of his divine right to be blown skyhigh with a dynamite bomb.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Coward, n.:
        One who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
critic, n.:
        A person who boasts himself hard to please because nobody tries
        to please him.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
cursor address, n:
        "Hello, cursor!"
                -- Stan Kelly-Bootle, "The Devil's DP Dictionary"
curtation, n.:
        The enforced compression of a string in the fixed-length field
environment.
        The problem of fitting extremely variable-length strings such as names,
addresses, and item descriptions into fixed-length records is no trivial
matter.  Neglect of the subtle art of curtation has probably alienated more
people than any other aspect of data processing.  You order Mozart's "Don
Giovanni" from your record club, and they invoice you $24.95 for MOZ DONG.
The witless mapping of the sublime onto the ridiculous!  Equally puzzling is
the curtation that produces the same eight characters, THE BEST, whether you
order "The Best of Wagner", "The Best of Schubert", or "The Best of the Turds".
Similarly, wine lovers buying from computerized wineries twirl their glasses,
check their delivery notes, and inform their friends, "A rather innocent,
possibly overtruncated CAB SAUV 69 TAL."  The squeezing of fruit into 10
columns has yielded such memorable obscenities as COX OR PIP.  The examples
cited are real, and the curtational methodology which produced them is still
with us.

MOZ DONG n.
        Curtation of Don Giovanni by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Lorenzo da
Ponte, as performed by the computerized billing ensemble of the Internat'l
Preview Society, Great Neck (sic), N.Y.
                -- Stan Kelly-Bootle, "The Devil's DP Dictionary"
Cynic, n.:
        A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not
        as they ought to be.  Hence the custom among the Scythians of plucking
        out a cynic's eyes to improve his vision.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Dawn, n.:
        The time when men of reason go to bed.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
default, n.:
        [Possibly from Black English "De fault wid dis system is you,
        mon."] The vain attempt to avoid errors by inactivity.  "Nothing will
        come of nothing: speak again." -- King Lear.
                -- Stan Kelly-Bootle, "The Devil's DP Dictionary"
Deliberation, n.:
        The act of examining one's bread to determine which side it is
        buttered on.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Dentist, n.:
        A Prestidigitator who, putting metal in one's mouth, pulls
        coins out of one's pockets.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Distress, n.:
        A disease incurred by exposure to the prosperity of a friend.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Egotism, n:
        Doing the New York Times crossword puzzle with a pen.

Egotist, n:
        A person of low taste, more interested in himself than me.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Endless Loop, n.:
        see Loop, Endless.
Loop, Endless, n.:
        see Endless Loop.
                -- Random Shack Data Processing Dictionary
Engram, n.:
        1. The physical manifestation of human memory -- "the engram."
2. A particular memory in physical form.  [Usage note:  this term is no longer
in common use.  Prior to Wilson and Magruder's historic discovery, the nature
of the engram was a topic of intense speculation among neuroscientists,
psychologists, and even computer scientists.  In 1994 Professors M. R. Wilson
and W. V. Magruder, both of Mount St. Coax University in Palo Alto, proved
conclusively that the mammalian brain is hardwired to interpret a set of
thirty seven genetically transmitted cooperating TECO macros.  Human memory
was shown to reside in 1 million Q-registers as Huffman coded uppercase-only
ASCII strings.  Interest in the engram has declined substantially since that
time.]
                -- New Century Unabridged English Dictionary,
                   3rd edition, 2007 A.D.
Famous, adj.:
        Conspicuously miserable.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
flowchart, n. & v.:
        [From flow "to ripple down in rich profusion, as hair" + chart
"a cryptic hidden-treasure map designed to mislead the uninitiated."]
1. n. The solution, if any, to a class of Mascheroni construction
problems in which given algorithms require geometrical representation
using only the 35 basic ideograms of the ANSI template.  2. n. Neronic
doodling while the system burns.  3. n. A low-cost substitute for
wallpaper.  4. n.  The innumerate misleading the illiterate.  "A
thousand pictures is worth ten lines of code." -- The Programmer's
Little Red Vade Mecum, Mao Tse T'umps.  5. v.intrans. To produce
flowcharts with no particular object in mind.  6. v.trans. To obfuscate
(a problem) with esoteric cartoons.
                -- Stan Kelly-Bootle, "The Devil's DP Dictionary"
gyroscope, n.:
        A wheel or disk mounted to spin rapidly about an axis and also
        free to rotate about one or both of two axes perpindicular to
        each other and the axis of spin so that a rotation of one of the
        two mutually perpendicular axes results from application of
        torque to the other when the wheel is spinning and so that the
        entire apparatus offers considerable opposition depending on
        the angular momentum to any torque that would change the direction
        of the axis of spin.
                -- Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary
Hand, n.:
        A singular instrument worn at the end of a human arm and
        commonly thrust into somebody's pocket.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Happiness, n.:
        An agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Hatred, n.:
        A sentiment appropriate to the occasion of another's superiority.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Heaven, n.:
        A place where the wicked cease from troubling you with talk of
        their personal affairs, and the good listen with attention while you
        expound your own.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Hippogriff, n.:
        An animal (now extinct) which was half horse and half griffin.
        The griffin was itself a compound creature, half lion and half eagle.
        The hippogriff was actually, therefore, only one quarter eagle, which
        is two dollars and fifty cents in gold.  The study of zoology is full
        of surprises.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Honorable, adj.:
        Afflicted with an impediment in one's reach.  In legislative
        bodies, it is customary to mention all members as honorable; as,
        "the honorable gentleman is a scurvy cur."
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Idiot, n.:
        A member of a large and powerful tribe whose influence in human
        affairs has always been dominant and controlling.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Impartial, adj.:
        Unable to perceive any promise of personal advantage from
        espousing either side of a controversy or adopting either of two
        conflicting opinions.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Incumbent, n.:
        Person of liveliest interest to the outcumbents.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Interpreter, n.:
        One who enables two persons of different languages to
        understand each other by repeating to each what it would have been to
        the interpreter's advantage for the other to have said.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Labor, n.:
        One of the processes by which A acquires property for B.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Liar, n.:
        A lawyer with a roving commission.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Mad, adj.:
        Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence ...
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
MAFIA, n:
        [Acronym for Mechanized Applications in Forced Insurance
Accounting.] An extensive network with many on-line and offshore
subsystems running under OS, DOS, and IOS.  MAFIA documentation is
rather scanty, and the MAFIA sales office exhibits that testy
reluctance to bona fide inquiries which is the hallmark of so many DP
operations.  From the little that has seeped out, it would appear that
MAFIA operates under a non-standard protocol, OMERTA, a tight-lipped
variant of SNA, in which extended handshakes also perform complex
security functions.  The known timesharing aspects of MAFIA point to a
more than usually autocratic operating system.  Screen prompts carry an
imperative, nonrefusable weighting (most menus offer simple YES/YES
options, defaulting to YES) that precludes indifference or delay.
Uniquely, all editing under MAFIA is performed centrally, using a
powerful rubout feature capable of erasing files, filors, filees, and
entire nodal aggravations.
                -- Stan Kelly-Bootle, "The Devil's DP Dictionary"
Magnet, n.:
        Something acted upon by magnetism.

Magnetism, n.:
        Something acting upon a magnet.

The two definition immediately foregoing are condensed from the works of
one thousand eminent scientists, who have illuminated the subject with
a great white light, to the inexpressible advancement of human knowledge.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Magpie, n.:
        A bird whose theivish disposition suggested to someone that it
        might be taught to talk.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Major premise:
        Sixty men can do sixty times as much work as one man.
Minor premise:
        A man can dig a posthole in sixty seconds.
Conclusion:
        Sixty men can dig a posthole in one second.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"

Secondary Conclusion:
        Do you realize how many holes there would be if people
        would just take the time to take the dirt out of them?
Male, n.:
        A member of the unconsidered, or negligible sex.  The male of the
        human race is commonly known to the female as Mere Man.  The genus
        has two varieties:  good providers and bad providers.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
methionylglutaminylarginyltyrosylglutamylserylleucylphenylalanylalanylglutamin-
ylleucyllysylglutamylarginyllysylglutamylglycylalanylphenylalanylvalylprolyl-
phenylalanylvalylthreonylleucylglycylaspartylprolylglycylisoleucylglutamylglu-
taminylserylleucyllysylisoleucylaspartylthreonylleucylisoleucylglutamylalanyl-
glycylalanylaspartylalanylleucylglutamylleucylglycylisoleucylprolylphenylala-
nylserylaspartylprolylleucylalanylaspartylglycylprolylthreonylisoleucylgluta-
minylasparaginylalanylthreonylleucylarginylalanylphenylalanylalanylalanylgly-
cylvalylthreonylprolylalanylglutaminylcysteinylphenylalanylglutamylmethionyl-
leucylalanylleucylisoleucylarginylglutaminyllysylhistidylprolylthreonylisoleu-
cylprolylisoleucylglycylleucylleucylmethionyltyrosylalanylasparaginylleucylva-
lylphenylalanylasparaginyllysylglycylisoleucylaspartylglutamylphenylalanyltyro-
sylalanylglutaminylcysteinylglutamyllysylvalylglycylvalylaspartylserylvalylleu-
cylvalylalanylaspartylvalylprolylvalylglutaminylglutamylserylalanylprolylphe-
nylalanylarginylglutaminylalanylalanylleucylarginylhistidylasparaginylvalylala-
nylprolylisoleucylphenylalanylisoleucylcysteinylprolylprolylaspartylalanylas-
partylaspartylaspartylleucylleucylarginylglutaminylisoleucylalanylseryltyrosyl-
glycylarginylglycyltyrosylthreonyltyrosylleucylleucylserylarginylalanylglycyl-
valylthreonylglycylalanylglutamylasparaginylarginylalanylalanylleucylprolylleu-
cylasparaginylhistidylleucylvalylalanyllysylleucyllysylglutamyltyrosylasparagi-
nylalanylalanylprolylprolylleucylglutaminylglycylphenylalanylglycylisoleucylse-
rylalanylprolylaspartylglutaminylvalyllysylalanylalanylisoleucylaspartylalanyl-
glycylalanylalanylglycylalanylisoleucylserylglycylserylalanylisoleucylvalylly-
sylisoleucylisoleucylglutamylglutaminylhistidylasparaginylisoleucylglutamylpro-
lylglutamyllysylmethionylleucylalanylalanylleucyllysylvalylphenylalanylvalyl-
glutaminylprolylmethionyllysylalanylalanylthreonylarginylserine, n.:
        The chemical name for tryptophan synthetase A protein, a
        1,913-letter enzyme with 267 amino acids.
                -- Mrs. Byrne's Dictionary of Unusual, Obscure, and
                   Preposterous Words
Misfortune, n.:
        The kind of fortune that never misses.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Molecule, n.:
        The ultimate, indivisible unit of matter.  It is distinguished
        from the corpuscle, also the ultimate, indivisible unit of matter, by a
        closer resemblance to the atom, also the ultimate, indivisible unit of
        matter ... The ion differs from the molecule, the corpuscle and the
        atom in that it is an ion ...
        -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
November, n.:
        The eleventh twelfth of a weariness.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Once, adv.:
        Enough.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
optimist, n.:
        A proponent of the belief that black is white.

        A pessimist asked God for relief.
        "Ah, you wish me to restore your hope and cheerfulness," said God.
        "No," replied the petitioner, "I wish you to create something that
would justify them."
        "The world is all created," said God, "but you have overlooked
something -- the mortality of the optimist."
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Peace, n.:
        In international affairs, a period of cheating between two
        periods of fighting.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Positive, adj.:
        Mistaken at the top of one's voice.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
QWERT (kwirt) n. [MW < OW qwertyuiop, a thirteenth]   1. a unit of weight
equal to 13 poiuyt  avoirdupois  (or 1.69 kiloliks), commonly used in
structural engineering  2. [Colloq.] one thirteenth the load that a fully
grown sligo can carry.  3. [Anat.] a painful  irritation  of  the dermis
in the region of the anus  4. [Slang] person who excites in others the
symptoms of a qwert.
                -- Webster's Middle World Dictionary, 4th ed.
Recursion n.:
        See Recursion.
                -- Random Shack Data Processing Dictionary
Reporter, n.:
        A writer who guesses his way to the truth and dispels it with a
        tempest of words.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Technicality, n.:
        In an English court a man named Home was tried for slander in having
        accused a neighbor of murder.  His exact words were: "Sir Thomas Holt
        hath taken a cleaver and stricken his cook upon the head, so that one
        side of his head fell on one shoulder and the other side upon the
        other shoulder."  The defendant was acquitted by instruction of the
        court, the learned judges holding that the words did not charge murder,
        for they did not affirm the death of the cook, that being only an
        inference.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Truthful, adj.:
        Dumb and illiterate.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Wit, n.:
        The salt with which the American Humorist spoils his cookery
        ... by leaving it out.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Year, n.:
        A period of three hundred and sixty-five disappointments.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
alta, v:        To change; make or become different; modify.
ansa, v:        A spoken or written reply, as to a question.
baa, n:                A place people meet to have a few drinks.
Baaston, n:        The capital of Massachusetts.
baaba, n:        One whose business is to cut or trim hair or beards.
beea, n:        An alcoholic beverage brewed from malt and hops, often
                        found in baas.
caaa, n:        An automobile.
centa, n:        A point around which something revolves; axis.  (Or
                        someone involved with the Knicks.)
chouda, n:        A thick seafood soup, often in a milk base.
dada, n:        Information, esp. information organized for analysis or
                        computation.
                -- Massachewsetts Unabridged Dictionary
Decemba, n:        The 12th month of the year.
erra, n:        A mistake.
faa, n:                To, from, or at considerable distance.
Linder, n:        A female name.
memba, n:        To recall to the mind; think of again.
New Hampsha, n:        A state in the northeast United States.
New Yaak, n:        Another state in the northeast United States.
Novemba, n:        The 11th month of the year.
Octoba, n:        The 10th month of the year.
ova, n:                Location above or across a specified position.  What the
                        season is when the Knicks quit playing.
                -- Massachewsetts Unabridged Dictionary
paak, n:        A stadium or inclosed playing field. To put or leave (a
                        a vehicle) for a time in a certain location.
patato, n:        The starchy, edible tuber of a widely cultivated plant.
Septemba, n:        The 9th month of the year.
shua, n:        Having no doubt; certain.
sista, n:        A female having the same mother and father as the speaker.
tamato, n:        A fleshy, smooth-skinned reddish fruit eaten in salads
                        or as a vegetable.
troopa, n:        A state policeman.
Wista, n:        A city in central Masschewsetts.
yaad, n:        A tract of ground adjacent to a building.
                -- Massachewsetts Unabridged Dictionary
Yawd [noun, Bostonese]:  the campus of Have Id.
                -- Webster's Unafraid Dictionary
Three great scientific theories of the structure of the universe are the
molecular, the corpuscular and the atomic.  A fourth affirms, with
Haeckel, the condensation or precipitation of matter from ether -- whose
existence is proved by the condensation or precipitation ... A fifth
theory is held by idiots, but it is doubtful if they know any more about
the matter than the others.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
As me an' me marrer was readin' a tyape,
The tyape gave a shriek mark an' tried tae escyape;
It skipped ower the gyate tae the end of the field,
An' jigged oot the room wi' a spool an' a reel!
Follow the leader, Johnny me laddie,
Follow it through, me canny lad O;
Follow the transport, Johnny me laddie,
Away, lad, lie away, canny lad O!
                -- S. Kelly-Bootle, "The Devil's DP Dictionary"
The Poet Whose Badness Saved His Life
        The most important poet in the seventeenth century was George
Wither.  Alexander Pope called him "wretched Wither" and Dryden said of his
verse that "if they rhymed and rattled all was well".
        In our own time, "The Dictionary of National Biography" notes that his
work "is mainly remarkable for its mass, fluidity and flatness.  It usually
lacks any genuine literary quality and often sinks into imbecile doggerel".
        High praise, indeed, and it may tempt you to savour a typically
rewarding stanza: It is taken from "I loved a lass" and is concerned with
the higher emotions.
                She would me "Honey" call,
                She'd -- O she'd kiss me too.
                But now alas!  She's left me
                Falero, lero, loo.
        Among other details of his mistress which he chose to immortalize
was her prudent choice of footwear.
                The fives did fit her shoe.
        In 1639 the great poet's life was endangered after his capture by
the Royalists during the English Civil War.  When Sir John Denham, the
Royalist poet, heard of Wither's imminent execution, he went to the King and
begged that his life be spared.  When asked his reason, Sir John replied,
"Because that so long as Wither lived, Denham would not be accounted the
worst poet in England."
                -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures"
A man with 3 wings and a dictionary is cousin to the turkey.
A total abstainer is one who abstains from everything but abstention,
and especially from inactivity in the affairs of others.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Did you know that clones never use mirrors?
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
It has been observed that one's nose is never so happy as when it is
thrust into the affairs of another, from which some physiologists have
drawn the inference that the nose is devoid of the sense of smell.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
While your friend holds you affectionately by both your hands you are
safe, for you can watch both of his.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Yes, we're all anti-american terrorists who plan to make the
US economy collapse by inventing lots of new words which will
have to be added to the dictionary, making the US economy
unable to support the ever-growing dictionaries and ensuring  
the Americans will be unable to (learn to) spell, leaving them
dead in the water if there's ever a linguistic war between
them and the UK.

        - Rik van Riel explaining the real reason behind spelling
          mistakes in the linux kernel
## a_nick (nobody@c213-89-87-111.cm-upc.chello.se) has joined #python
<a_nick> how do i add a new key to a dictionary?
<a_nick> nm
<dash> heh :)
<dash> behold the problem-solving power of #python.
        After his Ignoble Disgrace, Satan was being expelled from
Heaven.  As he passed through the Gates, he paused a moment in thought,
and turned to God and said, "A new creature called Man, I hear, is soon
to be created."
        "This is true," He replied.
        "He will need laws," said the Demon slyly.
        "What!  You, his appointed Enemy for all Time!  You ask for the
right to make his laws?"
        "Oh, no!"  Satan replied, "I ask only that he be allowed to
make his own."
        It was so granted.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
... but as records of courts and justice are admissible, it can easily be
proved that powerful and malevolent magicians once existed and were a scourge
to mankind.  The evidence (including confession) upon which certain women
were convicted of witchcraft and executed was without a flaw; it is still
unimpeachable.  The judges' decisions based on it were sound in logic and
in law.  Nothing in any existing court was ever more thoroughly proved than
the charges of witchcraft and sorcery for which so many suffered death.  If
there were no witches, human testimony and human reason are alike destitute
of value.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Got a dictionary?  I want to know the meaning of life.
Certain old men prefer to rise at dawn, taking a cold bath and a long
walk with an empty stomach and otherwise mortifying the flesh.  They
then point with pride to these practices as the cause of their sturdy
health and ripe years; the truth being that they are hearty and old,
not because of their habits, but in spite of them.  The reason we find
only robust persons doing this thing is that it has killed all the
others who have tried it.
                -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
No guarantee of accuracy or completeness!
©TU Chemnitz, 2006-2024
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