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Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) by Linux fortune

Life is like arriving late for a movie, having to figure out what was
going on without bothering everybody with a lot of questions, and then
being unexpectedly called away before you find out how it ends.
My band career ended late in my senior year when John Cooper and I threw my
amplifier out the dormitory window.  We did not act in haste. First we
checked to make sure the amplifier would fit through the frame, using the
belt from my bathrobe to measure, then we picked up the amplifier and backed
up to my bedroom door.  Then we rushed forward, shouting "The WHO!  The
WHO!" and we launched my amplifier perfectly, as though we had been doing it
all our lives, clean through the window and down onto the sidewalk, where a
small but appreciative crowd had gathered.  I would like to be able to say
that this was a symbolic act, an effort on my part to break cleanly away
from one state in my life and move on to another, but the truth is, Cooper
and I really just wanted to find out what it would sound like.  It sounded
OK.
                -- Dave Barry, "The Snake"
Recently deceased blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan "comes to" after
his death.  He sees Jimi Hendrix sitting next to him, tuning his guitar.
"Holy cow," he thinks to himself, "this guy is my idol."  Over at the
microphone, about to sing, are Jim Morrison and Janis Joplin, and the
bassist is the late Barry Oakley of the Allman Brothers.  So Stevie
Ray's thinking, "Oh, wow!  I've died and gone to rock and roll heaven."
Just then, Karen Carpenter walks in, sits down at the drums, and says:
"'Close to You'.  Hit it, boys!"
                -- Told by Penn Jillette, of magic/comedy duo Penn and Teller
"Linux poses a real challenge for those with a taste for late-night
hacking (and/or conversations with God)."
(By Matt Welsh)
A Tale of Two Cities LITE(tm)
        -- by Charles Dickens

        A man in love with a girl who loves another man who looks just
        like him has his head chopped off in France because of a mean
        lady who knits.

Crime and Punishment LITE(tm)
        -- by Fyodor Dostoevski

        A man sends a nasty letter to a pawnbroker, but later
        feels guilty and apologizes.

The Odyssey LITE(tm)
        -- by Homer

        After working late, a valiant warrior gets lost on his way home.
My only love sprung from my only hate!
Too early seen unknown, and known too late!
                -- William Shakespeare, "Romeo and Juliet"
Repartee is something we think of twenty-four hours too late.
                -- Mark Twain
Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later.
                -- F. Brooks, "The Mythical Man-Month"

Whenever one person is found adequate to the discharge of a duty by
close application thereto, it is worse execute by two persons and
scarcely done at all if three or more are employed therein.
                -- George Washington, 1732-1799
It is a very humbling experience to make a multimillion-dollar mistake, but
it is also very memorable.  I vividly recall the night we decided how to
organize the actual writing of external specifications for OS/360.  The
manager of architecture, the manager of control program implementation, and
I were threshing out the plan, schedule, and division of responsibilities.
        The architecture manager had 10 good men.  He asserted that they
could write the specifications and do it right.  It would take ten months,
three more than the schedule allowed.
        The control program manager had 150 men.  He asserted that they
could prepare the specifications, with the architecture team coordinating;
it would be well-done and practical, and he could do it on schedule.
Furthermore, if the architecture team did it, his 150 men would sit twiddling
their thumbs for ten months.
        To this the architecture manager responded that if I gave the control
program team the responsibility, the result would not in fact be on time,
but would also be three months late, and of much lower quality.  I did, and
it was.  He was right on both counts.  Moreover, the lack of conceptual
integrity made the system far more costly to build and change, and I would
estimate that it added a year to debugging time.
                -- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
Nobody's gonna believe that computers are intelligent until they start
coming in late and lying about it.
Real software engineers work from 9 to 5, because that is the way the job is
described in the formal spec.  Working late would feel like using an
undocumented external procedure.
        THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #17: SARTRE

Named after the late existential philosopher, SARTRE is an extremely
unstructured language.  Statements in SARTRE have no purpose; they just are.
Thus SARTRE programs are left to define their own functions. SARTRE
programmers tend to be boring and depressed, and are no fun at parties.
        The wise programmer is told about the Tao and follows it.  The average
programmer is told about the Tao and searches for it.  The foolish programmer
is told about the Tao and laughs at it.  If it were not for laughter, there
would be no Tao.
        The highest sounds are the hardest to hear.  Going forward is a way to
retreat.  Greater talent shows itself late in life.  Even a perfect program
still has bugs.
                -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"
Thus spake the master programmer:
        "When a program is being tested, it is too late to make design changes."
                -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"
Better late than never.
                -- Titus Livius (Livy)
The early worm gets the late bird.
It is a very humbling experience to make a multimillion-dollar mistake, but it
is also very memorable.  I vividly recall the night we decided how to organize
the actual writing of external specifications for OS/360.  The manager of
architecture, the manager of control program implementation, and I were
threshing out the plan, schedule, and division of responsibilities.

The architecture manager had 10 good men.  He asserted that they could write
the specifications and do it right.  It would take ten months, three more
than the schedule allowed.

The control program manager had 150 men.  He asserted that they could prepare
the specifications, with the architecture team coordinating; it would be
well-done and practical, and he could do it on schedule.  Futhermore, if
the architecture team did it, his 150 men would sit twiddling their thumbs
for ten months.

To this the architecture manager responded that if I gave the control program
team the responsibility, the result would not in fact be on time, but would
also be three months late, and of much lower quality.  I did, and it was.  He
was right on both counts.  Moreover, the lack of conceptual integrity made
the system far more costly to build and change, and I would estimate that it
added a year to debugging time.
- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
There is, in fact, no reason to believe that any given natural phenomenon,
however marvelous it may seem today, will remain forever inexplicable.
Soon or late the laws governing the production of life itself will be
discovered in the laboratory, and man may set up business as a creator
on his own account.  The thing, indeed, is not only conceivable; it is
even highly probable.
- H. L. Mencken, 1930
A lot of the stuff I do is so minimal, and it's designed to be minimal.
The smallness of it is what's attractive.  It's weird, 'cause it's so
intellectually lame.  It's hard to see me doing that for the rest of
my life.  But at the same time, it's what I do best.
- Chris Elliot, writer and performer on "Late Night with David Letterman"
...Veloz is indistinguishable from hundreds of other electronics businesses
in the Valley, run by eager young engineers poring over memory dumps late
into the night.  The difference is that a bunch of self-confessed "car nuts"
are making money doing what they love: writing code and driving fast.
-- "Electronics puts its foot on the gas", IEEE Spectrum, May 88
In his book, Mr. DePree tells the story of how designer George Nelson urged
that the company also take on Charles Eames in the late 1940s.  Max's father,
J. DePree, co-founder of the company with herman Miller in 1923, asked Mr.
Nelson if he really wanted to share the limited opportunities of a then-small
company with another designer.  "George's response was something like this:
'Charles Eames is an unusual talent.  He is very different from me.  The
company needs us both.  I want very much to have Charles Eames share in
whatever potential there is.'"
-- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
   Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
The late rebellion in Massachusetts has given more alarm than I think it
should have done.  Calculate that one rebellion in 13 states in the course
of 11 years, is but one for each state in a century and a half.  No country
should be so long without one.
-- Thomas Jefferson in letter to James Madison, 20 December 1787
A billion seconds ago Harry Truman was president.
A billion minutes ago was just after the time of Christ.
A billion hours ago man had not yet walked on earth.
A billion dollars ago was late yesterday afternoon at the U.S. Treasury.
aphorism, n.:
        A concise, clever statement.
afterism, n.:
        A concise, clever statement you don't think of until too late.
                -- James Alexander Thom
Brook's Law:
        Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later.
QOTD:
        "Everything I am today I owe to people, whom it is now
        to late to punish."
Three o'clock in the afternoon is always just a little too late or a little
too early for anything you want to do.
                -- Jean-Paul Sartre
The father, passing through his son's college town late one evening on a
business trip, thought he would pay his boy a suprise visit.  Arriving at the
lad's fraternity house, dad rapped loudly on the door.  After several minutes
of knocking, a sleepy voice drifted down from a second-floor window,
        "Whaddaya want?"
        "Does Ramsey Duncan live here?" asked the father.
        "Yeah," replied the voice.  "Dump him on the front porch."
Periphrasis is the putting of things in a round-about way.  "The cost may be
upwards of a figure rather below 10m#." is a periphrasis for The cost may be
nearly 10m#.  "In Paris there reigns a complete absence of really reliable
news" is a periphrasis for There is no reliable news in Paris.  "Rarely does
the 'Little Summer' linger until November, but at times its stay has been
prolonged until quite late in the year's penultimate month" contains a
periphrasis for November, and another for lingers.  "The answer is in the
negative" is a periphrasis for No.  "Was made the recipient of" is a
periphrasis for Was presented with.  The periphrasis style is hardly possible
on any considerable scale without much use of abstract nouns such as "basis,
case, character, connexion, dearth, description, duration, framework, lack,
nature, reference, regard, respect".  The existence of abstract nouns is a
proof that abstract thought has occurred; abstract thought is a mark of
civilized man; and so it has come about that periphrasis and civilization are
by many held to be inseparable.  These good people feel that there is an almost
indecent nakedness, a reversion to barbarism, in saying No news is good news
instead of "The absence of intelligence is an indication of satisfactory
developments."
                -- Fowler's English Usage
Oxygen is a very toxic gas and an extreme fire hazard.  It is fatal in
concentrations of as little as 0.000001 p.p.m.  Humans exposed to the
oxygen concentrations die within a few minutes.  Symptoms resemble very
much those of cyanide poisoning (blue face, etc.).  In higher
concentrations, e.g. 20%, the toxic effect is somewhat delayed and it
takes about 2.5 billion inhalations before death takes place.  The reason
for the delay is the difference in the mechanism of the toxic effect of
oxygen in 20% concentration.  It apparently contributes to a complex
process called aging, of which very little is known, except that it is
always fatal.

However, the main disadvantage of the 20% oxygen concentration is in the
fact it is habit forming.  The first inhalation (occurring at birth) is
sufficient to make oxygen addiction permanent.  After that, any
considerable decrease in the daily oxygen doses results in death with
symptoms resembling those of cyanide poisoning.

Oxygen is an extreme fire hazard.  All of the fires that were reported in
the continental U.S. for the period of the past 25 years were found to be
due to the presence of this gas in the atmosphere surrounding the buildings
in question.

Oxygen is especially dangerous because it is odorless, colorless and
tasteless, so that its presence can not be readily detected until it is
too late.
                -- Chemical & Engineering News February 6, 1956
There is, in fact, no reason to believe that any given natural phenomenon,
however marvelous it may seem today, will remain forever inexplicable.
Soon or late the laws governing the production of life itself will be
discovered in the laboratory, and man may set up business as a creator
on his own account.  The thing, indeed, is not only conceivable; it is
even highly probable.
                -- H.L. Mencken, 1930
Man who arrives at party two hours late will find he has been beaten
to the punch.
The most exquisite peak in culinary art is conquered when you do right by a
ham, for a ham, in the very nature of the process it has undergone since last
it walked on its own feet, combines in its flavor the tang of smoky autumnal
woods, the maternal softness of earthy fields delivered of their crop children,
the wineyness of a late sun, the intimate kiss of fertilizing rain, and the
bite of fire.  You must slice it thin, almost as thin as this page you hold
in your hands.  The making of a ham dinner, like the making of a gentleman,
starts a long, long time before the event.
                -- W.B. Courtney, "Reflections of Maryland Country Ham",
                   from "Congress Eate It Up"
Too Late
        A large number of turkies [sic] went to San Francisco yesterday by
the two o'clock boats.  If their object in going down was to participate in
the Thanksgiving festivities of that city, they would arrive "the day after
the affair," and of course be sadly disappointed thereby.
                -- Sacramento Daily Union, November 29, 1861
Come on, Virginia, don't make me wait!
Catholic girls start much too late,
Ah, but sooner or later, it comes down to fate,
I might as well be the one.
Well, they showed you a statue, told you to pray,
Built you a temple and locked you away,
Ah, but they never told you the price that you paid,
The things that you might have done.
So come on, Virginia, show me a sign,
Send up a signal, I'll throw you a line,
That stained glass curtain that you're hiding behind,
Never lets in the sun.
Darling, only the good die young!
                -- Billy Joel, "Only The Good Die Young"
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"
Here I am again right where I know I shouldn't be
I've been caught inside this trap too many times
I must've walked these steps and said these words a
        thousand times before
It seems like I know everybody's lines.
                -- David Bromberg, "How Late'll You Play 'Til?"
I knew Leo G. Carrol
Was over a barrel
When Tarantula took to the hills.        ["Lick it!"]
And I really got hot
When I saw Jeanette Scott
Fight a triffid that spits poison and kills.

Science fiction, double feature
Doctor X will build a creature.
See androids fighting Brad and Janet
Anne Francis stars in Forbidden Planet
Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh
At the late night, double feature, picture show.
                -- The Rocky Horror Picture Show
I'm just as sad as sad can be!
        I've missed your special date.
Please say that you're not mad at me
        My tax return is late.
                -- Modern Lines for Modern Greeting Cards
"No program is perfect,"
They said with a shrug.
"The customer's happy--
What's one little bug?"

But he was determined,                        Then change two, then three more,
The others went home.                        As year followed year.
He dug out the flow chart                And strangers would comment,
Deserted, alone.                        "Is that guy still here?"

Night passed into morning.                He died at the console
The room was cluttered                        Of hunger and thirst
With core dumps, source listings.        Next day he was buried
"I'm close," he muttered.                Face down, nine edge first.

Chain smoking, cold coffee,                And his wife through her tears
Logic, deduction.                        Accepted his fate.
"I've got it!" he cried,                Said "He's not really gone,
"Just change one instruction."                He's just working late."
                -- The Perfect Programmer
        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"
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
Stayed in bed all morning just to pass the time,
There's something wrong here, there can be no more denying,
One of us is changing, or maybe we just stopped trying,

And it's too late, baby, now, it's too late,
Though we really did try to make it,
Something inside has died and I can't hide and I just can't fake it...

It used to be so easy living here with you,
You were light and breezy and I knew just what to do
Now you look so unhappy and I feel like a fool.

There'll be good times again for me and you,
But we just can't stay together, don't you feel it too?
But I'm glad for what we had and that I once loved you...

But it's too late baby...
It's too late, now darling, it's too late...
                -- Carol King, "Tapestry"
"You are old," said the youth, "as I mentioned before,
        And make errors few people could bear;
You complain about everyone's English but yours --
        Do you really think this is quite fair?"

"I make lots of mistakes," Father William declared,
        "But my stature these days is so great
That no critic can hurt me -- I've got them all scared,
        And to stop me it's now far too late."
Future looks spotty.  You will spill soup in late evening.
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"
It gets late early out there.
                -- Yogi Berra
(aikamuotojen käyttö aikamatkustuksessa)
"You can arrive (mayan arivan on-when) for any sitting you
like without prior (late fore-when) reservation because you
can book retrospectively, as it were when you return to
your own time. (you can have on-book haventa forewhen
presooning returningwenta retrohome.) "
It is not too late to turn back from the GATES of hell.
Use Linux - the free 32 bit operating system.
Top Ten Changes If Linus Torvalds Achieves World Domination

10. That annoying Linus character from the Peanuts cartoons would be killed off
9. New fashion style: Scantily clad females, even in twenty below weather
8. Forget Disney World, say hello to Penguin World!
7. Late Show with Linus Torvalds
6. High schools offer classes on kernel hacking
5. Microsoft stock certificates traded as rare collectors' items, along with
    Confederate money and Roman coins
4. Beowolf Clusters for everyone!
3. Computers no longer come with reset buttons
2. United States of Linusia
1. Three words: Open Source Beer
Microsoft Mandatory Survey (#15)

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

Question 15: In your opinion, what companies should Microsoft seek to
             acquire in the coming year?

A. Disney. I'd like to see a cute animated movie starring Clippit the
   Office Assistant.

B. CBS. I'd like to see a new line-up featuring must-watch shows like
   "Touched by a Microserf", "Redmond Hope", "Everybody Loves Bill", "The
   Late Show With Steve Ballmer", and "60 Minutes... of Microsoft
   Infomercials",

C. Google. Microsoft could drastically improve the quality and performance
   of this search engine by migrating it from Linux to Windows NT
   servers.

D. Lowes Hardware Stores. Every copy of Windows 2000 could come bundled
   with a coupon for a free kitchen sink or a free window!
NOTICE

LinuxForecast.com has issued a Slashdot Effect Watch for your domain
effective for the next 48 hours. Forecast models indicate that Taco Boy is
planning on posting an article about your "Penguin Porn" site. The models
disagree on the timing or duration of the storm, although we can say that
a moderate risk of server crashes, excess bandwidth usage, and increased
website hosting bills are possible.

Please take appropriate action by mirroring your site. It might be too
late now, but you might also want to consider purchasing Denial Of Service
Insurance.
Brief History Of Linux (#7)
The Rise of Geeks

The late 19th Century saw the rise and fall of "geeks", wild carnival
performers who bit the heads off live chickens. This vocal minority,
outcast from mainstream society, clamored for respect, but failed. Their
de facto spokesman, Tom Splatz, tried to expose America to their plight in
his 312-page book, "Geeks".

In the book Splatz documented the life of two Idahoan geeks with no social
life as they made a meager living traveling the Pacific Northwest in
circuses. While Splatz's masterpiece was a commercial failure, the book
did set a world record for using the term "geek" a total of 6,143 times.
Brief History Of Linux (#25)

By the mid-1990's the Linux community was burgeoning as countless geeks
fled Redmond monopolistic oppression, Armonk cluelessness, and Cupertino
click-and-drool reality distortion fields. By late 1991 there was an
informal Linux User Group in Finland, although its primary focus was Linux
advocacy, not drinking beer and telling Microsoft jokes as most do today.

Kernel development continued at a steady clip, with more and more people
joining in and hoping that their patches would be accepted by the
Benevolent Dictator himself. To have a patch accepted by Linus was like
winning the Nobel Prize, but to face rejection was like being rejected
from Clown College. The reputation game certainly sparked some flame wars.

One of the most memorable crisis was over the behavior of the delete and
backspace keys. A certain faction of hackers wanted the Backspace key to
actually backspace and the Delete key to actually delete. Linus wasn't too
keen on the proposed changes; "It Works For Me(tm)" is all he said. Some
observers now think Linus was pulling rank to get back at the unknown
hacker who managed to slip a patch by him that replaced the "Kernel panic"
error with "Kernel panic: Linus probably fscked it all up again".
If you're going to do something tonight that you'll be sorry for tomorrow
morning, sleep late.
                -- Henny Youngman
Something better...

1 (obvious): Excuse me.  Is that your nose or did a bus park on your face?
2 (meteorological): Everybody take cover.  She's going to blow.
3 (fashionable): You know, you could de-emphasize your nose if you wore
        something larger.  Like ... Wyoming.
4 (personal): Well, here we are.  Just the three of us.
5 (punctual): Alright gentlemen.  Your nose was on time but you were fifteen
        minutes late.
6 (envious): Oooo, I wish I were you.  Gosh.  To be able to smell your
        own ear.
7 (naughty): Pardon me, Sir.  Some of the ladies have asked if you wouldn't
        mind putting that thing away.
8 (philosophical): You know.  It's not the size of a nose that's important.
        It's what's in it that matters.
9 (humorous): Laugh and the world laughs with you.  Sneeze and it's goodbye,
        Seattle.
10 (commercial): Hi, I'm Earl Schibe and I can paint that nose for $39.95.
11 (polite): Ah.  Would you mind not bobbing your head.  The orchestra keeps
        changing tempo.
12 (melodic): Everybody! "He's got the whole world in his nose."
                -- Steve Martin, "Roxanne"
Would a giant, profit-oriented cartel lie to you?
                -- Top Ten List, Late Night with David Letterman
ACPI - it's too late to improve it - it's the standard

        - Andrew Grover, ACPI maintainer on Linux-power.
The wise student hears of the Tao and practices it diligently.
The average student hears of the Tao and gives it thought now and again.
The foolish student hears of the Tao and laughs aloud.
If there were no laughter, the Tao would not be what it is.

Hence it is said:
The bright path seems dim;
Going forward seems like retreat;
The easy way seems hard;
The highest Virtue seems empty;
Great purity seems sullied;
A wealth of Virtue seems inadequate;
The strength of Virtue seems frail;
Real Virtue seems unreal;
The perfect square has no corners;
Great talents ripen late;
The highest notes are hard to hear;
The greatest form has no shape;
The Tao is hidden and without name.
The Tao alone nourishes and brings everything to fulfillment.
It's never too late to have a happy childhood.
The idea is to die young as late as possible.
                -- Ashley Montague
Mieux vaut tard que jamais!

[ Better late than never ]
* dark greets liw with a small yellow frog.
* liw kisses the frog and watches it transform to a beautiful nerd
  girl, takes her out to ice cream, and lives happily forever after
  with her
<dark> liw: Umm it's too late to have the frog back?
I'd been hearing all sorts of gloom and doom predictions for Y2K, so I
thought I'd heed some of the advice that the experts have been giving:
Fill up the car's gas tank, stock up on canned goods, fill up the bathtub
with water, and so on.

I guess I wasn't fully awake when I completed my preparations late last
night.  This morning I found the kitchen shelves soaked in gasoline, water
in the car's gas tank, and my bathtub filled with baked beans.
        -- Dan Pearl in a message to rec.humor.funny
Linux poses a real challenge for those with a taste for late-night
hacking (and/or conversations with God).
        -- Matt Welsh
<doogie> netgod:  8:42pm is not late.
<netgod> doogie: its 2:42am in Joeyland
        -- #Debian
        I for one cannot protest the recent M.T.A. fare hike and the
accompanying promises that this would in no way improve service.  For
the transit system, as it now operates, has hidden advantages that
can't be measured in monetary terms.
        Personally, I feel that it is well worth 75 cents or even $1 to
have that unimpeachable excuse whenever I am late to anything:  "I came
by subway."  Those four words have such magic in them that if Godot
should someday show up and mumble them, any audience would instantly
understand his long delay.
My idea of roughing it is when room service is late.
        "Seven years and six months!"  Humpty Dumpty repeated thoughtfully.
"An uncomfortable sort of age.  Now if you'd asked MY advice, I'd have
said 'Leave off at seven' -- but it's too late now."
        "I never ask advice about growing,"  Alice said indignantly.
        "Too proud?"  the other enquired.
        Alice felt even more indignant at this suggestion.  "I mean,"
she said, "that one can't help growing older."
        "ONE can't, perhaps," said Humpty Dumpty; "but TWO can.  With
proper assistance, you might have left off at seven."
                -- Lewis Carroll, "Through the Looking-Glass"
The early bird who catches the worm works for someone who comes in late
and owns the worm farm.
                -- Travis McGee
The Worst Car Hire Service
        When David Schwartz left university in 1972, he set up Rent-a-wreck
as a joke.  Being a natural prankster, he acquired a fleet of beat-up
shabby, wreckages waiting for the scrap heap in California.
        He put on a cap and looked forward to watching people's faces as he
conducted them round the choice of bumperless, dented junkmobiles.
        To his lasting surprise there was an insatiable demand for them and
he now has 26 thriving branches all over America.  "People like driving
round in the worst cars available," he said.  Of course they do.
        "If a driver damages the side of a car and is honest enough to
admit it, I tell him, `Forget it'.  If they bring a car back late we
overlook it.  If they've had a crash and it doesn't involve another vehicle
we might overlook that too."
        "Where's the ashtray?" asked on Los Angeles wife, as she settled
into the ripped interior.  "Honey," said her husband, "the whole car's the
ash tray."
                -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures"
I'm dressing up in an ill-fitting IVY-LEAGUE SUIT!!  Too late...
If you look like your driver's license photo -- see a doctor.
If you look like your passport photo -- it's too late for a doctor.
No guarantee of accuracy or completeness!
©TU Chemnitz, 2006-2024
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